Book Review: "Enigma Variations" by André Aciman

André Aciman's debut novel, Call Me by Your Name, utterly blew me away. I remember reading and re-reading paragraphs, mesmerized by his poetic language, and at times dissolving into tears from the emotional power of the story. While I could never seem to get into his second novel, and didn't know he wrote a third, when I stumbled on his latest novel, Enigma Variations, I thought I'd give his writing one more try.

This book is staggeringly beautiful. Powerfully emotional, haunting, frank in its sexuality and its romanticism, this is a book about love, infatuation, longing, and lust. It's a book which explores the divide between wanting the familiar and wanting what you do not (or in some cases, cannot) have, and makes you realize that the things you think you cannot live without lose their appeal as soon as you get them. I felt this book in my heart and in my head, and I don't think I'll be able to forget it anytime soon, nor do I want to. I don't doubt this will be among the best books I read this year.

"Perhaps in this, finally, lay the leanest proof of love: the hope, the belief, the conviction that she knew more about me than I did myself, that she, not I, held the key to everything I felt. I didn't need to know anything; she'd be the one to know."

Enigma Variations consists of five novellas, each focusing on a man named Paul at a different time in his life. In "First Love," 22-year-old Paul returns to the Italian island where his family spent summers in his early adolescence. He remembers in particular one summer, when he was 12, and he became obsessed with the village's cabinetmaker, a ruggedly handsome man who seemed to show an interest in Pauly (as he was called back then), and awakened desires in the boy he was never aware of before. When Paul returns to the island he finds while certain things are as he remembered them, certain things are as far from memory as possible, yet he realizes things about that summer that young Pauly would never have understood. And that was the first time he realized the loss we can suffer when we don't say the things we most want to.

In "Spring Fever," Paul is dating a woman, Maud, whom he believes is cheating on him. While he is slightly dismayed by this fact, at the same time he feels freed by it. At a dinner party with friends, where he meets Maud's suspected lover, he discovers that perhaps she isn't the only one with secrets, and he is more of an open book than he thinks. "Manfred" follows Paul as he becomes obsessed with a younger man who plays tennis at the same club he does, and Paul longs for Manfred to recognize him, to see him as a man and not just a person, to desire Paul with the same fervor Paul feels for him.

In "Star Love," Paul is reunited with a college girlfriend, Chloe, with whom he had a fitful yet intense relationship. They seem to meet up every four years in a similar setting, and yet each time they leave one another indelibly changed, yet immobilized from expressing their true feelings, even when both are with other people. And in "Abingdon Square," an older Paul meets a younger writer and starts to wonder if she is his last chance at true happiness, yet he is afraid of rejection and putting his feelings out there.

"When I'm with you, I feel I can take what others call my life and turn its face away from the wall. My entire life faces the wall except when I'm with you. I stare at my life and want to undo every mistake, every deceit, turn a new leaf, turn the table, turn the clock. I want to put a real face on my life, not the drab front I've been wearing since forever."

Aciman's storytelling draws you in, holds you by the heart, and envelops you in the story. I found these novellas so powerful, so beautifully written, and they provoked so many emotions in me. I found the way Aciman and the other characters treated Paul's bisexuality very interesting—in a less-talented author's hands this could have been fodder for melodrama. This is a book about love and the intensity of that love; it is not a book that truly cares about the sex of the people Paul loves.

This is probably not a book for everyone, but it is so bold and poetic, so emotionally rich and exquisite, if it sounds like it might appeal to you, pick it up. Perhaps you'll identify with some of Paul's emotions, or perhaps you'll just understand the enduring power of loving and being loved.

Movie Review: "Captain Fantastic"

At least some of you know that once the Golden Globe and SAG Award nominations are announced, we spend a lot of time at the movies, seeing all of the movies and performances nominated for the major awards, so we're reasonably prepared come Oscar nomination time. (Then, of course, comes the crush to see anything we haven't seen before the Oscars—we usually come really close, if not hit 100 percent.)

I'm actually grateful for this obsession, because sometimes the Golden Globes and SAGs nominate performances or movies that got very little, if any, time in theaters around here, so learning about them introduces me to some great films and performances I might not have otherwise seen. Captain Fantastic is definitely one of those.

Ben Cash (Viggo Mortensen) and his wife Leslie have raised their six children in a remote cabin in the mountains of Washington state, almost completely off the grid. They've educated their children in history, science, politics, culture, survivalism, even socialism. (A favorite holiday is Noam Chomsky Day.) These children know how to hunt, forage for, and grow their own food; they know how to rappel, climb rocks, defend themselves, and treat injuries; and they are stronger, faster, and more agile than most adults, let alone children their own age. Ben and Leslie have also taught their children to be critical thinkers, although they mostly believe the same things their parents (or more so, their father) do.

Over the last several years, Leslie has been suffering from mental illness, and is starting to tire of life off the grid. She wants her children to live more typical lives and interact with their peers. Yet this is a source of significant friction between her and Ben, and she has been hospitalized while he remains with the kids.

While some of the children are devoted to their father and the life they know, some are beginning to think like their mother. The oldest child, Bo (George MacKay), wants to go to college, and realizes that he has no understanding of how people interact in the "real world." When a tragedy forces Ben and the children back into society, their interactions with Ben's sister and her family, as well as Leslie's parents (Frank Langella and Ann Dowd), devout Christians who blame Ben for what has befallen their daughter, show just how wide the divide is between Ben's way of thinking and others', and it sets up a situation in which the children must choose what path they want to follow.

Mortensen is a tremendously versatile actor, equally comfortable in both fantastical and realistic roles. His performance is Captain Fantastic is both intense and sensitive—he's a man who so fully believes that the way he has raised his children is right, and can't believe anyone (including his children) would disagree with that, but he's absolutely horrified when he realizes that he may have done his children a disservice. He is proud of the ways his children excel over others, yet turns a blind eye to where they may be lacking. And he is a man devoted to his wife, but he cannot understand why she would suddenly change her mind about the life they have chosen for them and their children. (Oh, and he goes full Viggo again in this movie, if you know what I mean.)

The actors playing the children are all quite good, particularly MacKay and Nicholas Hamilton, who plays the son whose questions and wants start to cause cracks in the foundation Ben has built. Langella has a fairly one-dimensional role as the film's heavy, and Kathryn Hahn and Steve Zahn, playing Ben's sister and brother-in-law, don't have a lot to do other than be shocked at how outlandish Ben's behavior and obsession has become.

This is a sweet, predictable movie, but its quality is ratcheted up a few notches because of some of the performances, particularly Mortensen's. He has been nominated for Golden Globe and SAG Awards, and I hope to see his name among the Best Actor Oscar nominees later this month. It's definitely a movie worth seeing—it's thought-provoking, a little emotional, and quite enjoyable.

Movie Review: "Hidden Figures"

When I went to see Hidden Figures I joked on social media, "Let it be said I am seeing a movie about math." While obviously this movie is about so much more than that, it is truly fantastic to see a movie which focuses on the superior intellect of women, particularly minority women, at a time when contributions from both groups in "serious" fields was hardly valued.

As the space race between Russia and the U.S. heated up, with the Soviets in the lead, NASA was under significant pressure to put a man in space. In addition to the large number of mathematicians, engineers, and scientists they had on staff, NASA relied on "human computers," African-American female mathematicians who were used to perform calculations and analysis—but not be seen or heard unless spoken to. Informally supervised by Dorothy Vaughan (Octavia Spencer), these women were smarter and faster, but rarely even thought of beyond their abilities to get work done.

One of the smartest of these "computers" was Katherine Johnson (Taraji P. Henson). She is assigned to work with the men calculating how to get a man into space before the Russians did so, and she quickly proves her worth, despite the resentment and prejudices of those around her. But despite the fact that she is asked to calculate figures without access to classified information that would help, as well as the subpar treatment shown to all African-Americans at this time in history, Katherine quickly catches the eye of the NASA Director (Kevin Costner), who begins to rely on Katherine more and more, despite some things he just doesn't understand about her.

Meanwhile, Mary Jackson (Janelle Monáe), is encouraged to apply for one of the engineering positions that has opened up at NASA. She's perfectly qualified (perhaps more so than others), but in an effort to keep African-American women from advancement, the job requirements were changed to include coursework that is only available at segregated schools. She wants to challenge the system, but is discouraged by some (including her husband) from making too much of a fuss.

At the same time, Dorothy is becoming increasingly frustrated by NASA's refusal to formally give her the supervisor position (and pay) for which she has essentially been doing the work for some time, but she sees opportunity in another challenge: mastery of the new mainframe computer that NASA has brought in, which has the potential of replacing all of the "human computers."

As NASA begins preparing for John Glenn's launch into space, Katherine's work becomes ever more crucial, yet she is challenged by the obstacles that keep being put in her path. She wants to attend the meetings where the up-to-the minute data is discussed, and she wants to be viewed as an actual member of the team, not just the typist who is actually doing all of the work. Will her calculations prove correct, and will Glenn make it to space and back safely?

Hidden Figures succeeds on so many levels. It brings to the public eye the achievements of some truly unsung heroes whose work made a huge difference in our world, as schools don't teach about Katherine Johnson, Mary Jackson, and Dorothy Vaughan when they're talking about the space program, they talk about the astronauts. The film also conveys some strong messages, yet never seems heavy-handed. It also succeeds in creating tension even though you know most of what will happen, but you get so invested in the characters and the story you can't stop yourself from getting nervous.

This film may be a crowd-pleaser, but it's also a tremendously well-acted one. Henson plays a role very different to many of those she's played recently, and walks a line between the deference her character was supposed to show and her frustration that her intelligence wasn't valued the way it should. I really don't understand why she hasn't been more of a factor in the Oscar conversation, since she really has some great moments.

This is the second memorable performance that Monáe has turned in this year (after Moonlight), and this absolutely should land her among the nominees for Best Supporting Actress this year, as her Mary Jackson is fiery, funny, and unabashedly proud of her intellect. Her biggest competition is Spencer, who is always good, but I didn't think her performance rose to the level of Monáe's (mainly because her role wasn't as exciting). Where the Oscars are concerned, however, sometimes the familiar gets in over the more-deserving. (Ironically, when watching the previews before this movie started, Spencer is in five of the movies we saw previews for.)

I really enjoyed this movie, and absolutely expect it to get a Best Picture nomination in a few weeks. It's rare that a movie with female leads does as well at the box office—this weekend marked the film's second consecutive week at #1—and it's even rarer to see a film succeed which features women's intellectual prowess as such a significant factor. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come!

Book Review: "Our Short History" by Lauren Grodstein

If it has been said that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, well then, I'm (more than) a touch insane. Because I keep reading books that are tearjerkers despite the fact that television commercials make me tear up, and yet I'm surprised that these books leave me a sniffling mess nearly Every. Single. Time. And so it is with Lauren Grodstein's newest novel, Our Short History.

Karen Neulander has made a name for herself as one of New York's top political consultants. She's not afraid to leak things to the press about her clients' opponents, or do everything she needs to in order to help them gain advantage and, of course, votes. She's equally protective of her six-year-old son, Jake, whom she has raised alone since before he was born. When she found out she was pregnant, her boyfriend at the time told her he didn't want to have kids, so she left and never spoke to him again.

Now Karen is facing an even tougher opponent. Two years ago she was diagnosed with Stage IV ovarian cancer, and given approximately four years to live. While she has fought as hard as she could, with surgery and chemotherapy, she knows there will come a time that she won't be around any longer, no matter how much she hopes a miracle might come her way. But she has everything all planned out—when she feels that she's ready, she and Jake will move to Seattle to live with her younger sister Allie and her family, so Jake will be cared for when it's time.

While Jake understands—as much as a young child can—what is happening to his mother, he has one request: he wants her to get in touch with his father. After dragging her feet for a while in the hopes that he will forget what he asked, Karen relents. She's not too surprised to find out that Dave Kersey is still living in the same expensive condo in New Jersey. But she is thrown for a loop when he's excited to meet Jake.

Despite how happy Dave makes Jake (and vice-versa), Karen is adamant about allowing him to become too large a part of her son's life. She can't reconcile this man who is head over heels for his son when he didn't want her to have the baby in the first place, and as the two grow closer, she becomes frightened that Dave may try to take Jake away from her, or at the very least, upset the plans she has made for his future. And she can't seem to accept that perhaps what Jake needs most of all is his father, at a time when all she wants to do is cling as closely to her son as possible.

Our Short History is written as Karen's "memoir," ostensibly to be read by Jake when he is older. She provides glimpses of her childhood and her relationships with her own parents and grandparents, as well as her time with Dave, and what it has been like raising Jake. It also includes "advice" and her hopes for her son, so he knows how much she has always thought, and feels, about him.

Well, as you can imagine, this packs an emotional punch. But despite its ability to generate tears, this is a book about the fierceness of a mother's love, and the need to hold on to her son as tightly as she can for as long as she can, as if that can make up for the time she won't have with him. It's also a story about how we can be short-sighted and let our own hurts take precedence over doing what is right.

As I remember from her previous books, A Friend of the Family and The Explanation for Everything, Grodstein is a talented writer and knows how to tell a story. I thought this was a little predictable, and while I completely understood the emotions, fears, and anxieties Karen was experiencing given everything happening in her life, I found her to be a little more unlikable for a little longer than I expected.

This book definitely makes you count your blessings as well as wonder how you might act if faced with similar circumstances. It takes you on an emotional journey and gives you a touching picture of everything a mother would do for her child.

NetGalley and Algonquin Books provided me an advance copy of the book in exchange for an unbiased review. Thanks for making this available!

Book Review: "The Signal Flame" by Andrew Krivak

Well, looks like I've read my first truly great novel of 2017! It took two books last year, it's taken seven this year, but clearly it was worth the wait. Bleak yet hopeful, poignant, and powerful, The Signal Flame is beautifully written and draws you into its story fairly quickly.

In early 1972 in Northeastern Pennsylvania's Endless Mountains, Jozef Vinich, the patriarch of a small family, is laid to rest. The former owner of the town mill, Jozef was known not only for his rags-to-riches story, immigrating from the Austro-Hungarian part of Europe after World War I to make a life for himself, and eventually his family, but he is also known for his strong work ethic, as well as his sense of humor. He is mourned by many in the community, including his priest, who was also his best friend, but especially his daughter Hannah and his grandson Bo Konar, who bought the mill from Jozef a number of years ago.

Jozef, Hannah, and Bo all lived together, as the life of the Konar family wasn't quite a happy one. Hannah's husband, Bexhet (Becks), emigrated from Hungary to fight with the Americans during World War II, but deserted and spent time in prison. He never got over what he saw during the war, and when he returned home he was changed, until his sudden death in a hunting accident on the family land. Apart from one semester away for college, Bo has spent his lifetime working the mill, but his younger brother Sam was always the one who wanted something different, so he enlisted in the military, and on his second tour of duty in Vietnam, went missing.

As bleak as I've made the book sound, and there are moments of tragedy and moments of loss, this is equally a book about finding hope where you've believed there was none, of realizing that there is a time to let go of the grief and anger you feel, and of allowing yourself a chance at happiness. This is a book about family, about the legacies of land and emotion and anger that we bequeath to our children, and about the simple joys of nature, the smell of lumber, the sounds of wildlife.

In another author's hands this book could be maudlin, or the simplicity of its story could be boring. But in Andrew Krivak's hands, this book is almost poetic, in its use of language and its evocative imagery, in the characters he has created. Here's just one example of the beauty of his storytelling:

And when they were finished, they sat at the garden table in the twilight and watched the coals of the fire pulse red and an ashen silver without flame, sat like sated guests at their own feast, silent once again and not wondering what came next, for all that they had strived for in the course of the day lay in the past, and what anxiety each carried lay, at least for the moment, in the past as well.

This is a special book which I can't get out of my mind. I know that when I begin thinking of the best books I read in 2017, this will undoubtedly be one of them.

NetGalley and Scribner provided me an advance copy of the book in exchange for an unbiased review. Thanks for making this available!

Book Review: "Small Admissions" by Amy Poeppel

Sometimes after I've read a few fairly heavy or angsty books, I need to metaphorically cleanse my literary palate by reading something a little lighter. It doesn't necessarily have to be a humor book or utter fluff, but every now and then I like to seek out books that are lighter in tone, more straight-forward, something I can enjoy without having to tax my brain or my psyche too hard.

After the last few books I've read, I turned to Amy Poeppel's Small Admissions as my literary intermezzo of sorts. It was just what I was hoping for—an engaging story with characters I could root for (as well as some I could root against). It even made me laugh more than a few times, which was a pleasant surprise.

The daughter of two college professors, Kate Pearson has always been almost myopically focused on academics, much to the frustration of her friends and her older sister Angela. But when her post-graduate work in a prestigious anthropology program with a noted professor turns disastrous, she makes a characteristically un-Kate decision and plans to move to Paris with her trés handsome boyfriend Richard. Only she doesn't quite get out of the Paris airport, and then she's back in the U.S., nearly catatonic in her depression, never getting out of her pajamas, drinking far too much, and refusing to do anything to fix her situation.

After nearly a year of moping and mourning, Angela feels compelled to do something to save Kate from herself. Angela's chance meeting with the overworked director of admissions for a tony prep school in New York lands Kate an interview. And despite one of the most disastrous job interviews on record, where she dresses inappropriately and says even less appropriate things, Kate is shockingly hired as the assistant director of admissions for the famed Hudson Day School.

"...she didn't like children particularly. Didn't know any other than her niece, didn't want to. Didn't know anything about schools in New York City, either, obviously. Or schools anywhere. Or the admissions process. Or administrative anything. She would be expected to answer people's questions, and she wouldn't have the answers because—to get right down to it—she didn't know anything."

After her initial fear that her boss will discover he accidentally hired the wrong girl, or that she'll screw everything up, abates, Kate starts to settle into her job. Before long she's interviewing prospective students—smart, driven children programmed by their parents; clueless children wondering why they're even there other than because their parents are making them; and the rare child who actually deserves to go to Hudson. Kate is far from a traditional interviewer, and as crazy as her interviews with the kids are, some of the parents are even crazier! (While a subplot featuring two feuding parents seems tired, there's a terrifically funny payoff.)

Meanwhile, as Kate is getting fully immersed in the whole admissions process, Angela constantly worries that Kate will suddenly backslide and tries to take control of her life prematurely, and Kate's two best friends from college are dealing with their own secrets, while one of them, Chloe, tries to find Kate another boyfriend, mostly out of guilt, since Richard is her cousin. It's all fodder for more chaos than any one person can handle, but Kate surprises them all by taking it in stride. Mostly.

Was this book fairly predictable? Absolutely, but that didn't lessen its appeal for me. I would have enjoyed the book more without the tired (and annoying) subplot about Kate's jealous friend, because Kate and her work in admissions made for a pretty enjoyable book on its own. I worried the book would lose its way diving into her romantic life, but fortunately Poeppel didn't hamper the book with turning the plot into total chick-lit. I thought Poeppel has a great ear for dialogue and a knack for crazily outlandish conversations that you can absolutely see someone getting nervous and saying.

Small Admissions was fun, lighthearted, and it didn't take itself too seriously. It was exactly the type of book I was looking for, and if you want something to read that you'll enjoy without getting agitated or depressed, or having to really decipher the plot, definitely pick this up.

Book Review: "Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood" by Trevor Noah

I was really surprised when Trevor Noah was named Jon Stewart's successor on The Daily Show. I inherently knew that they wouldn't pick someone with a sense of humor and style identical to Stewart's, but I felt that Noah was so different that his selection meant the show would have a really different feel, which might not appeal to long-time fans of the show. But I always root for the underdog, so as he was getting savaged by critics and fans in his first few days on the job, I kept hoping he'd be able to tough it out and show the stuff—comedic and otherwise—of which he was made.

After reading Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood, I realize that I needn't have worried about Trevor Noah. For a child growing up in South Africa in the last days of, and the tumult following apartheid, he faced crises far greater than dissatisfied fans. And if he could be raised during such a crazily illogical time in a country where more violence, racism, and mistreatment went unreported than caught the media's eye, he'd have no problem skewering the insanity of our political system, especially leading into the election of 2016!!

"On February 20, 1984, my mother checked into Hillbrow Hospital for a scheduled C-section delivery. Estranged from her family, pregnant by a man she could not be seen with in public, she was alone. The doctors took her up to the delivery room, cut open her belly, and reached in and pulled out a half-white, half-black child who violated any number of laws, statutes, and regulations—I was born a crime."

Born to a black Xhosa mother and a white Swiss father, Noah literally spent his earliest days hiding indoors. His parents, who never married, couldn't be seen together, and because his mother looked so different than he did, she couldn't walk through the streets with him, because at any moment someone might accuse her of kidnapping another person's child. Yet while their lives dealt with crushing poverty, violence, and racism from all sides, his deeply religious mother never let anything bother her, or stop her from raising her son to know he was loved, and to know that he truly could accomplish anything he wanted, despite all of the obstacles in his way.

"She taught me to challenge authority and question the system. The only way it backfired on her was that I constantly challenged and questioned her."

Born a Crime provides a first-hand account of the last days of apartheid and its aftermath, and what it was like to grow up as a mixed-race child, where he wasn't white enough to be considered white, nor was he black enough to be considered black. While at times this had its advantages, for the most part, it left him on the outside looking in, having to handle everything on his own, fight his own battles, struggle to find people who genuinely liked him for who he was and not the novelty of his skin color, and rebel against a mother who only wanted him to behave.

If you go into this book expecting to laugh hysterically because of Noah's day job, think again. While the book does include some of the wry humor that has begun endearing him to fans, this is an emotional, brutal, and educational story of a life which flourished despite the odds stacked against it. This is a book about growing up in a culture of poverty and crime, and how easy it was to get caught up in that, especially when it was one of the only ways to make money and be able to feed, clothe, and enjoy yourself. It's also a book about fear, how it motivates you, how it paralyzes you, and how it threatens to take away the one thing you cherish more than any other.

More than anything, though, this is a book about the unwavering love of a mother for a child she chose to have. She knew it would be difficult raising her son in the age of apartheid, and in fact, she had no idea when he was born that it would end anytime soon. But Noah was a remarkable child, and while he exasperated, frightened, and upset his mother from time to time, she knew he would accomplish great things one day (as soon as he stopped putting cornrows in his hair and hanging out with those awful hoodlums he called friends).

I enjoyed this book and learned a lot about apartheid, which I really didn't know much about. Noah is a good writer, and delivered his narrative much as I've heard him deliver his lines on The Daily Show. This is a funny, thought-provoking, and emotional book, although I felt that some of his anecdotes went on a little too long, while others didn't go on long enough. I also would have liked to have learned how he went from his upbringing in South Africa to one day hosting an acclaimed television show—other than passing mentions of things he did, I have no idea how he made the leap.

I've heard some people say that the audio version of this book is brilliant because Noah reads it himself, but if you read the print/digital version, you can still hear his voice. Noah's story is a lesson of the inequities of the past, and a warning for what is still possible to happen again in our world. But this isn't heavy-handed; it's fun, insightful, and very compelling.