The Best of 2018

As 2018 gives way to 2019, it's time to take stock of the books that will stay with me into the new year. My resolution a year ago was to read more broadly, of ideas, of cultures, of places, and this I managed to do. From the Palestinian diaspora to America's opioid epidemic, my reading delved into subject matter I previously knew little of. I'll keep the same resolution for 2019.

More than previous years, my reading was also shaped by the contours of life. I read more than one work on neuroscience, and, not unrelated, an equal number on the impacts of the foods we eat on the workings of that most mysterious organ. Tony Danza's I'd Like to Apologize to Every Teacher I Ever Had, his memoir about teaching for a year at an inner city school, resonated with me in light of our decision to send our son to an urban school, rather than our suburban home district - and the ways in which my eyes, too, have been opened by the circumstances such schools face.

Out of the 70ish books I read this year, here are the ones I loved best:
 
Over the years, some of my favorite memoirs have been those of Edmund Love, the Gilbreths, and James Herriot (all of whom lived lives so rich they cannot be contained in a single volume). Mary MacLeod's Call the Nurse and Nurse, Come You Here! are works of this same, fine tradition. Each is steeped in the time and, especially, the place (the Shetland Islands) where MacLeod lived; these are easily the most delightful memoirs I read this year.

 As regards general non-fiction, three books stand out to me:  
Chesapeake Requiem: A Year with the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island;
The Lost City of the Monkey God;
Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates   

Chesapeake Requiem remains the most important, thought-provoking work I have read this year. Earl Swift so captures the culture, contradictions, and history of a people and a place, and in doing so brings to the fore all of the issues dividing this country so deeply today.

In a similar way, Lost City of the Monkey God poses crucial questions about the ownership of culture and history, what we know versus what we think we know, and also the limits of science, knowledge, and medicine in the face of the vast and the unknowable.

As for Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates, it's easily the most important volume on history I've read since Hero, another work that so eloquently lays out how the world's problems are not new and are perhaps more intractable that any currently-powerful individual (whenever "current" may be) would like to believe. This, too, is a story of cultural clash and the limits to reconciling cultures across such a vast schism.

For the first time, the fiction I read surpassed the non-fiction, and the year was rich was soaring, multi-generational works whose characters, plots, and prose captivated me. These five books rose to the top:

Pachinko;
What We Were Promised;
Tai-Pan; 
A Gentleman in Moscow;
Last Bus to Wisdom

The first three are set in Asia, though at varying times and in varying places, from early twentieth century Korea and Japan (Pachinko) to modern-day Shanghai (What We Were Promised), to the founding of Hong Kong (Tai-Pan); given my affinity for both history and Asia, it's not surprising they rose to the top, although plenty of Asian-centered books did not. What sets these apart is the stories they tell, the characters the authors bring to life, and the language that evokes time and place: from beginning to end, these works feel authentic.

A Gentleman in Moscow is more subtle, occurring entirely within the confines of a single hotel across the birth, rise, and decline of the Soviet Union. Through it all, Count Alexander Ilyich Rostov, Recipient of the Order of Saint Andrew, member of the Jockey Club retains his loyalty to the Russia or yore.

Of all the fiction I read, though, it is Last Bus to Wisdom that left the most lasting impression on me, whose characters reached through the pages, whose words I could hear and faces I could see. I am with Donal and Herman the German yet as they ride that last bus.

The Best of 2017

Looking over my reading for the past year, I am struck by how much of what I've read is utterly forgettable. Even books that, by title, I recognize as having liked are now, months later, reduced to a hazy memory.

There are, of course, exceptions. Shogun is far and way the best book I read this year - and as I said when I reviewed it initially, possibly ever. The details of James Clavell's masterpiece, the central part of which is the Anjin-san's adaption to and ascent within sixteenth century samurai culture, are still fresh.

Two other works of fiction also number among the best books I've read this year: A Man Called Ove and The Housekeeper and the Professor. A Man Called Ove made me laugh out loud more times than I can count, and reminded me of Owen Meany in all the best ways. The Housekeeper and the Professor is a totally different animal, and so very Japanese (yes, I acknowledge possible bias), but the contours of the sweet story of an amnesiac professor and the housekeeper who befriends him are still fresh.

As always, I read a great deal of non-fiction and here I had a harder time separating the very best from the merely very good. In the end, The Mushroom Hunters, Hidden Figures, and The Radium Girls take the prize. I loved the latter two for shedding light on historical episodes that were previously only shadows in my mind - and for acknowledging the contributions of the women who were central to the events. And Mushroom Hunters...well, who knew that one of my favorite foods could have such a complex and colorful supply chain?

I also want to acknowledge the excellent biographies and memoirs I discovered this year. Chicken Every Sunday, which warms my soul to remember, and The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind are memoirs of the first order. They could not be more different - the former offers nostalgic reminisces on life in small town America in the early twentieth century, and specifically of the author's childhood growing up in the boarding house her parents ran, while the latter is the hard scrabble story of survival amidst the famines and deprivation of modern-day, rural Malawi. Both, however, are simply wonderful. I would be remiss not to include Eve of a Hundred Midnights among my "best of" picks, as well. Written in the style of a non-fiction novel, Eve is essentially a biography of Melville Jacoby and, more to the point, the story of his flight across Asia and the South Pacific when the Philippines fell.

Lastly, I have to award and honorable mention to Celia Garth, if for no other reason that her pluck and spirit made her my favorite character that I encountered this year.

 And so, while much of what I read may have been (and may continue to be) rather forgettable, so much isn't, and that what keeps me turning the pages. Here's to another year of reading - may your New Year also include many happy hours of reading pleasure.

The Best of 2016

In past years, I've carefully charted out a formula that neatly determined how many books had the "right" to be considered the best. Last year, I carefully categorized books and presented the best by topic. I don't, frankly, have time for such shenanigans this year. What follows, instead, is a list of those books I would highly advise any avid reader to add to their list for the coming year.

Non-Fiction:

The Last Resort: A Memoir of Mishchief and Mayhem on a Family Farm in Africa
Black market currency dealers? Check. Backpacker lodge turned local hotspot for pimps, prostitutes, illegal diamond dealers, and government ministers? Check. Pot, power cuts, and police run amok? Check, check, check. Only in Zimbabwe.

Midnight in Broad Daylight: A Japanese American Family Caught Between Two Worlds
Or, perhaps better subtitled: what happens when half of a family is "interred" in America and the other half is conscripted to fight for the Japanese while living in Hiroshima. This is a fascinating, chilling, haunting read that will get you thinking about everything from loyalty and resiliency to how life is so seldom black-and-white, right-and-wrong. And certainly about the human lives impacted by government decree, and about how capricious it all is.

The Rescue Artist: A True Story of Art, Thieves, and the Hunt for a Missing Masterpiece
Of all the careers I never knew existed, art detective may top the list. Who knew? In any case, Charley Hill rescues art. He is Scotland Yard's art recovery man, and this is the man, and more to the point, the profession, that Edward Dolnick brings to life in Rescue Artist.

Fiction:

Gutenberg's Apprentice
Peter Schoeffer a scribe-on-the-make, recalled from Paris by his foster father in order to become part of a harebrained new scheme to print books. Schoeffer is to be nothing less than Johann Gutenberg's apprentice and the rest, as they say, is history. Reading the author's note and discovering how much of the book was true was the icing on the cake for me. Schoeffer and company not only really existed, but based on historical records, existed largely as author Alix Christie portrayed them. For a connoisseur of excelling historical fiction, there are few happier conclusions than learning that it really happened the way the author said.

West of Sunset
Zelda and Scott. What couple better embodies the Roaring Twenties? West of Sunset is set well beyond the roar, though, deep into the years of madness and drink. No longer golden children, Zelda is locked away in an Asheville asylum and Scott is desperate often destitute, torn between the past and the present, obsessed with his failures, and resolving to be better. Stewart O'Nan's Scott feels absolutely authentic.

Lucky Us
Amy Bloom has created an entire cast of memorable characters, each with their own personalities, quirks, and, perhaps most importantly, flaws. And she has done this using some of the most beautiful prose I have read in a long time. Most notably, Lucky Us contains two of the best quotes I encountered all year: "The wicked people of the world are not supposed to be calm and composed." Another character explains her aversion to religion concisely with this beauty: "she absolutely did not believe that a white man was going to come back from his own lynching to help out Clara Williams or take her hand or be her friend."

The Summer Before the War 
England, 1913. The inhabitants of quaint, little Rye feel the drumbeat of war and are prepared to do their part, and out do their neighbors, to defend their King and country. Helen Simonson tackles more heavy topics in a single book than many authors span in several: war crimes, racial discrimination, homosexuality (remember, this is 1913), unwed motherhood (I repeat, it's 1913), loyalty, patriotism, and women's rights come to mind in a hurry. Yet she does it deftly, softly, almost, so that this book is not a dark and gloomy slog, but a quiet day's journey into the English countryside.

The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend
This is a book about books. It is a book for and about people who prefer the company of books to that of other humans. Anyone who has ever loved reading so much that they've turned down an invitation or marinated in the stew of so-many-books, so-little-time will be able to relate to the protagonists, Sara and Amy.

Happy New Year and, as always, Happy Reading!

Over the Top

Arthur Guy Empey was an American who traveled to England and enlisted with the British armed services well before the United States joined World War I in 1917. Over the Top is Empey's memoir of his time "somewhere in France," but written as it was in 1917, it is also a manual of sorts for prospective U.S. soldiers and their families.

I discovered that this book existed in reading The Last of the Doughboys earlier this year. Richard Rubin excerpted from it liberally and I wanted to read it in full. Thanks to the Internet Archives, I was able to do so, and on my Nook, and entirely for free.

In a conversational and self-deprecating style, Empey tells the reader all that he experienced. (They style, I should add is highly reminiscent of Edmund Love, for whom I've previously stated by admiration. I have no doubt this is one of the reasons I liked this book so much. But I digress.)

Empey captures the language and atmosphere in the trenches beautifully, and he recalls his exploits with a heavy dose of humor, noting for example, that upon uncovering a decomposing corpse, one of the men fainted. I was that one, Empey writes in the next sentence. The humor carries into the last section of the book, "Tommies Dictionary of the Trenches." For example, Supper: Tommy's fourth meal, generally eaten just before "lights out." It is composed of the remains of the day's rations. There are a lot of Tommies who never eat supper. There is a a reason.

I think part of what I appreciated so much about Over the Top is that it is written in the midst of World War I. Empey hasn't had time to reflect, either on the causes of the war, or on the ways it will change him. It is written in the moment, when all Tommy wants to do is survive - and maybe have a little fun along the way.

Five stars.

The Best of 2014

In 2014, I cracked the cover of 66 books, making it to the last page of all but five. Using the same 15% rule that I've used in the past (2013, 2012, and 2011),  I should select the 9.9 best books. What follows is the best of my 2014 reading list - 5 fiction and 5 non-fiction - with two honorable mentions tacked on. Happy reading!

Revolutionary Medicine: The Founding Fathers and Mothers in Sickness and in Health
(reviewed January 20, 2014)
Jeanne E. Abrams reveals the extent to which elite, early Americans (George and Martha Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson, for example) were marked at every stage of life by death and disease. There is not one who hasn't lost a child or spouse to what we look upon today as a highly treatable disease. The denizens of Washington, DC, are laid low by malaria with alarming regularity in Washington's time; today, such a diagnosis in the city would be regarded as singularly peculiar - and alarming. Revolutionary Medicine also serves as portrait of how medicine has changed. In the time of days of the Founding Fathers, an educated person knew as much of medicine as, perhaps, their physician - who may or may not have ever studied medicine...

Twenties Girl
(reviewed January 24, 2014)
Sophie Kinsella has created a lighthearted masterpiece here. Lara Lington's life is a wreck, and that's before her great aunt Sadie begins haunting her, harassing her about finding a missing necklace, without which she cannot go to her eternal rest. Did I mention that Lara never met Aunt Sadie while the woman lived? Or that Sadie is also determined that, in addition to finding the necklace, Lara will also learn the Charleston? Twenties Girl is completely and utterly over-the-top. It is ridiculous in the best sense of the word and it is hilarious pretty much from start to finish.

A Walk in the Woods
(reviewed April 17, 2014)
Bill Bryson wins the prize for best travel writing in 2014. Bryson, you see, has decided to hike the Appalachian Trail. Rather than hike alone, he has persuaded an old high school buddy to hike with him. Never mind that they've not seen each other for some 15 or 20 years. No, it's until the buddy, Stephen, shows up on the eve of the hike seriously overweight and badly out of shape that Bryson begins to doubt his plan. What ensues is general hilarity. From nutty fellow hikers to those who pick up hitchhikers to innkeepers and cab drivers, Bryson brings color - and humor - to each day's long, hard slog.

Cutting for Stone
(reviewed June 15, 2014)
Abraham Verghese made me cry. Not little sniffles, either. He is by far the only author about whom I can say that this year. (In fact, no book has come close to imparting the emotional trauma of Cutting for Stone since Leila Meacham's Roses, which I read in 2010.) This is an epic, sweeping novel that travels from early-twentieth century India to mid-century Ethiopia and onward to twenty-first century America. It is the story of Marion and Shiva Praise Stone, but more than that it is a story of man's unparalleled ability to make terrible, terrible decisions, most often when blinded by love. The prose is lovely and wisdom - "We come unbidden into this life, and if we are lucky we find a purpose beyond starvation, misery, and early death which, lest we forget, is the common lot." - is more than page deep.

Elizabeth is Missing
(reviewed July 16, 2014)
Emma Healey's Elizabeth is Missing is not only well-written and well-constructed (often a challenge for books with parallel narratives), but it is also a stunning, poignant look at aging and dementia. Maud's friend, Elizabeth, is missing. Or maybe not: Maud can't really remember. But as she tries to make sense of Elizabeth's disappearance, memories flood back of another disappearance, this of her older sister Sukey who simply vanished in 1946. The reader can feel the losses and confusion mount around Maud and her daughter Helen, whom Maud is often unable to recognize. Healey creates a genuine portrait of a woman falling away from the world, which is terrifying in its realness.

The Ice Cream Queen of Orchard Street
(reviewed August 26, 2014)
Susan Jane Gilman's novel begins when five-year-old Malka Treynovsky arrives in New York in 1913. Three months later she's crippled in an accident and abandoned. Taken in by an Italian family, Malka becomes Lillian, and ultimately marries the handsome but illiterate Albert Dunkle, with whom she builds an empire of ice cream shops starting with a single truck. Soon, Lillian is the head of an ice cream empire and a celebrity in her own right, which is wonderful for her right up until it isn't: when she finds herself on trial for both tax evasion and assault. In the midst of this double ordeal, Lillian has decided to share her ordeal with us, darlings, and her voice is what makes Ice Cream Queen the masterpiece that it is.

The Great Match Race: When North Met South in America's First Sports Spectacle
(reviewed October 17, 2014) 
John Eisenberg has taken a single event - and a horse race, at that - that happened nearly 200 years ago and imbues it with a level of suspense and outsize importance such that the reader feels the outcome truly matters. In 1823, a southern horse and a northern horse squared off in the first mass sporting event in American history. That summer, the race to be the fastest horse was merely a stand-in in the decades-long superiority contest between North and South that would culminate in the Civil War four decades later.

The Long Way Home: An American Journey from Ellis Island to the Great War
(reviewed November 5, 2014)
David Laskin has painstakingly reconstructed the histories of a dozen young, fresh immigrants to the United States, all of whom - by choice or by chance - return to the "Old Country" as soldiers in their adopted country's army to face the horrors of World War I. In Europe, some men barely see war, while others become heroes. As with the Doughboys write large, most of Laskin's subjects make it home after the Armistice, but some do not. As much about the immigrant experience as the soldier's, The Long Way Home is illuminating on both fronts.

Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris 1932
(reviewed November 29, 2014)
Francine Prose has crafted the most amazingly constructed novel I have ever read. At its heart, this is the biography of Lou Villars, a cross-dressing, javelin-thrower-turned-race-car-driver, Hitler revering, collaboratrice extraordinaire. What makes Lovers so remarkable is that Prose has written, essentially, the biography of a woman who never existed (Lou Villars) written by an author who never existed, the chapters of which are interspersed with chapters from the memoir of a heroine of the Resistance, the unpublished diary of another Resistance hero, famous works of an American writer and Hemingway contemporary, and letters to his parents penned by a Hungarian photographer. There are also chapters devoted to the memories of the owner of the Chameleon Club. And none of these people ever existed: this is not historical fiction based on actual people; it is fiction transported to another time. This book is a fabulous, dizzying ride at the end of which the reader can't help but wish to have been there, Paris's lover, if only for a moment.

A Girl Named Zippy: Growing Up Small in Mooreland, Indiana
(reviewed December 24, 2014) 
Haven Kimmel's memoir is written in a lighthearted and self-deprecating tone, and the many quirky characters of Mooreland, Indiana, (population: 300) come to life in the pages of Zippy. Unlike many other memoirs, this is a small story of a small life, but there is a touching sweetness to it, and a humor to which anyone familiar with small, Midwestern towns can connect. Fittingly, Growing Up Small is a small book, and a quick and happy read.

HONORABLE MENTIONS:

Villa Triste
(reviewed July 23, 2014)
Lucretia Grindle has actually written two books here, one historical fiction and one modern-day mystery, and woven them together rather ingeniously. Caterina Cammaccio is a nurse by day and a reluctant partisan (or Italian resistance fighter) by night in wartime Florence, which is simultaneously occupied by Nazis and overrun with fascists. Flashing to the present day, Giovanni Trantemento, an elderly and decorated former partisan, has been brutally murdered in his own home. As Florence's top cop, it's up to Alessandro Palliotti to solve the crime, but when another former partisan is similarly murdered elsewhere in Italy, it's clear to him that Trantemento's murder wasn't a mere crime of opportunity. I won't spoil the mystery - or how they connect - but I will say that Grindle has pulled off both parts of her novel beautifully, while creating an array of remarkable characters.

The Moor's Account
(reviewed December 27, 2014) 
Laila Lalami's novel is grounded in actual events: In 1527 the Pánfilo de Narváez expedition set off for the New World only to be beset by every trouble that could plague a sixteenth centruy explorer. Narváez, in fact, was carried out to sea on a raft and never seen or heard of again. Four men (of the six hundred or so who set off for the new world) did survive: Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, Alonso del Castillo Maldonado, Andrés Dorantes de Carranza, and his Moroccan slave, Estebanico. Cabeza de Vaca returned to Spain achieved great fame with his account of their journey. The Moor's Account is Lalami's telling of this same story, but from the perspective of Estebanico. It is a beautifully written and captivating tale.

Books That Matter (to me)

A friend recently posted the 10 most influential books that she's read and it got me thinking. Normally, of course, I post about books I've just read, but most of the books I've read in my life were all long before I began blogging about my reading. So, I thought I'd take a few minutes on a cold and snowy evening to think about those books that made the greatest impression on me and, in all probability, made me the avid, voracious reader I am today. So, in no particular order:

The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
This is the first book that I remember reading over and over and over again (sorry, Mom, Go, Dog, Go doesn't count in this tally). I was fully transported to the world Burnett created and can still imagine the high-walled garden that captivated little Mary so.

Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery
The books following the life and times of Anne - and then of her growing family - was likely the first series that I read. Embarrassing confession here, but I still remember crying when I finished Rilla of Ingleside, so sad was I to have concluded my adventures with Anne. 

Number the Stars by Lois Lowry
I went through a phase where I would only read Newbery Medal winners and this was one. This is a children's book in a way that the previous two books on this list are not, though the topic is far from breezy: ten-year-olds Annemarie Johansen and Ellen Rosen are about to be parted as Ellen's family seeks to escape Copenhagen - and the Gestapo - at the height of World War II. This is the book that first opened my eyes to World War II. Also as a result of reading it, I spent decades nursing a desire to visit Copenhagen and especially Tivoli Gardens.

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
We read this book in high school; as best I recall, it is the first non-fiction "novel" that I ever read and instilled in me an immense liking for that genre. You likely already know, but the subject is the Clutter family murders in rural Kansas, circa 1959.

Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
I love this book. Some 400,000 words, written longhand, by a woman who had never written anything before...and then tried to have the manuscript returned to her from the publisher because she feared it was not good enough. From a purely author/writing-focused standpoint, Peggy Mitchell is my hero.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
My high school English teacher recommended the story of Francie Nolan to me and I fell in love with it the way I had with Secret Garden before it: Francie's immigrant world in Williamsburg at the turn of the last century captivated me entirely. That Francie ends by enrolling at the University of Michigan was the icing on the cake.

To Kill a Mockingbird  by Harper Lee
I'm sure it's cliche to include Harper Lee's classic on my list, but this was another school read that helped me love reading and made me think, for a fleeting moment, that I'd like to be an English teacher one day. I'll keep my current job, but am still thankful to the teacher who assigned it.

Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition by Daniel Okrent
I did very little "fun" reading while I was working on my PhD. Last Call was one of the first books I picked up purely for enjoyment once my time was my own again. Okrent confirmed for me how fantastic truly well-researched, well-written non-fiction could be (see In Cold Blood above for my first suspicions!). The book also made long-ago events highly personal: a Prohibition-era drugstore in Chicago (Markins) that may or may not have been a hotbed for bootlegged liquor was most definitely owned and operated by my husband's great-great-uncle. His grandmother confirmed the store was his; she could not believe her dear uncle Harry had ever been a bootlegger. The truth, I imagine, has ultimately been lost to history.

Song of the Dodo: Island Biogeography in an Age of Extinction by David Quammen
Faithful readers of this blog will know that I want to be David Quammen when I grow up (or in my next life - I'd settle for reincarnation). Song of the Dodo is the first Quammen book I ever read; in fact, it's the first scienc-y book I ever read and for that reason it makes my list. Prior to this book, I would have dismissed anything with a subtitle including the word "biogeography" as far too dense (read: dull) for my taste. Nothing could have been farther from the truth.

Agatha Christie
I've included this one last of all because it's (obviously) not a book, but an author. My French penpal first told me about Agatha Christie when I was in seventh grade and I spent the better part of the subsequent years reading everything the great dame wrote. I never would have delved into mysteries if it hadn't been for Tifenn, but by doing so, I believe I broadened my palate and also found a go-to author for quick, light reads, particularly on cold, snowy weekends.

The Best of 2013

As best I can figure, I read 64 books this year, all but a couple of them cover-to-cover. Using the same 15% rule that I used in 2012 and 2011, I should select the 9.6 best books - so the following, in the order I initially read them, are my top 10 reads from 2013. I should note that a few themes jump out as me as I look over my list: disease (typhoid, tuberculosis, yellow fever, and zoonotic) and war (the Civil War, the Lincoln County War, World War I, World War II ) chief among them. So perhaps next year I ought to strive for a more cheerful selection. In any event, happy reading!

Good Book
(reviewed January 4, 2013)
David Plotz's hilarious take on the Old Testament. There is also an element of the serious, as well, when Plotz summarizes Judges 11:  Do you not hold what Chemosh your God gives you to possess? So we will hold on to everything that the Lord our God has given us to possess." As Plotz concludes, "And there, my friends, you have practically the entire history of Israel, of the Middle East, and of planet Earth, in two short sentences."

The Guns of August
(reviewed January 10, 2013)
 Barbara Tuchman's tome on the opening days of World War I is mesmerizing, masterful, and mighty depressing. The crux of the book is the many failures - diplomatic and military - that ultimately led to four years of unrelenting bloodshed across Europe, and eventually the world. I have read more World War I books than I can remember and only The Beauty and the Sorrow comes close to matching The Guns of August.

After Appomattox: How the South Won the War
(reviewed February 7, 2013)
Stetson Kennedy believes you should reconsider what you probably think that you know about the end of the American Civil War: North wins, South loses, and the rest is just details. Andrew Johnson, in one of his finer moments (of which there were to be enough for Congress to impeach him), sent a messenger south to inform the generals stationed there that the president was "for a white man's government, and in favor of free white citizens controlling the country" (p. 45). Using a decade of such incidents as his foundation, Kennedy builds and supports the argument that the end result was as though Grant had surrendered to Lee at Appomattox and not the other way around.

The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal, 1870-1914
(reviewed February 19, 2013)
David McCullough has clearly done an almost-unfathomable amount of research - on the Suez Canal, the history of Panama, early engineering and railroading technologies and techniques and American imperialism (add Panama to the list of places Teddy Roosevelt took by storm), to name a few of the areas he visits in great, but highly readable detail. Path is 600 pages of everything you ever wanted to know about the Panama Canal and many things you never knew you wanted to know.

A Man in Uniform
(reviewed March 10, 2013)
Kate Taylor's little mystery centered around the Dreyfus Affair was one of the first, and best, fiction books I read this year. The idea is a mysterious woman comes to a relatively small-time lawyer whose family has extensive military connections, pleads that Dreyfus is innocent and charges him with not only gaining an appeal for Dreyfus, but with finding the real spy. It has the makings of a great mystery wrapped in the packaging of 20th century Paris.

Turn Right at Machu Picchu: Rediscovering the Lost City One Step at a Time
(reviewed July 21, 2013)
Mark Adams visits Machu Picchu the way the Incas did. On foot. No facilities. Serious off-the-beaten path adventuring. And then he weaves his own adventure together with that of the "discovery" of Machu Picchu by Hiram Bingham III and with the colonization of Peru by the Spanish some 500 years ago. Taken together, this could be a circuitous, hard-to-follow read, but it's remarkably well done, humorous, insightful, and informative. All told, Turn Right at Machu Picchu is some of the best travel writing I've ever read.

The House at Tyneford
(reviewed July 30, 2013)
Natasha Solomons probably could not have created a more tragedy-laced, heartstrings-tugging, tear-inducing story if she had tried to. "Please treat the church and houses with care; we have given up our homes where many of us have lived for generations to help win the war to keep men free. We shall return one day and thank you for treating the village kindly." - notice pinned to the door of Tyneford Church by departing villagers. In her author's note, Solomons informs the reader that Tyneford is based on Tyneham, which was requisitioned by the British army in 1943 and to which not a single resident was ever allowed to return.

Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic
(reviewed August 24, 2013)
David Quammen is my favorite author. In Spillover, Quammen has set out to understand the origins of any number of diseases that transfer from animals to people. He provides a detailed examination of some of the better known ones - such as AIDS, ebola, and yellow fever - as well as ones I certainly had never heard of: Nipah, Hendra, and Marburg virus to name a few. In the process, Quammen criss-crosses the planet, from Bangladesh and the Congo to Washington, DC, and the Outback, speaking with molecular biologists, immunologists, epidemiologists and the like, rendering their science-speak into understandable, and highly readable, prose. I've said it before and I'll say it again: this is who I want to be when I grow up.

Somerset
(reviewed September 17, 2013)

Leila Meacham's prequel to Roses was probably my favorite fiction read this year. Somerset is the meandering story of the generations of Warwicks, Tolivers, and DuMonts, who form the backbone of both books, as they make their way from the antebellum south to the untamed lands of Texas. The star of the story is Jessica Wyndham, a girl-woman of, some might say, misplaced passions who is at the heart of all that follows. This is storytelling as it was meant to be, it turns gently unfolding and  soaring and always difficult to put down.

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman
(reviewed November 17, 2013)
Robert K. Massie has created a meticulously researched and engagingly written portrait of Russia's last female ruler. Of all the biographies I read this year - Lady Almina, Countess of Carnarvon; Hetty Green; and Gertrude Bell to name a few - that of Catherine the Great was certainly the most complete, most thorough, and largely because of the subject, the most interesting. After all, the reign of Catherine the Great was notable for its length as well as all she accomplished - partition of Poland and victories in the Crimean, for example. Not bad for someone who entered the world as a minor German princess, may or may not have murdered her husband, and had, ahem, no legitimate claim to the Russian throne.

The Best of 2012

By my count, I read 60 books cover-to-cover in 2012, started but couldn't manage to finish four others, and began reading one book (The Guns of August), which I anticipate finishing in early 2013. In keeping with the same formula from 2011, I've chosen to highlight the top 15% of what I've read this year. I've also included three "honorable mentions" that are nearly as deserving. My best of list, like my reading list, is dominated by non-fiction, but I have included two fiction titles that stood out from the crowd.

Appearing in the order in which I read them originally, the best of my 2012 reading list follows:

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine, and the Murder of a President
(reviewed February 9, 2012)
I knew virtually nothing about James A. Garfield before I read this book, but came away with a deep admiration for him, as well as deepened cynicism about the current state of politics in this country.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
(reviewed March 13, 2012)
A lovely and fun historical fiction read set in the immediate aftermath of World War II in the Channel Islands. Yes, I hope to visit them someday.

Flyboys
(reviewed April 29, 2012)
James Bradley is the only author to appear twice on my list this year; clearly he has the touch. I had no way of knowing when I read this book last April that it would tell the story of Japanese-American relations up to and during World War II so perfectly that I would feel compelled to actually assign and teach the book to my Japanese culture class this coming spring.
 

The Food of a Younger Land
(reviewed May 10, 2012)
It is neigh on impossible for me to imagine an American in which ravioli is an ethnic specialty, eaten only in the homes of bonafide Italians. This book transports the reader to that place and enables one to see what we have gained in the past 80 years - and what we have lost.

The Worst Hard Time
(reviewed July 6, 2012)
Timothy Egan takes an unflinching look at the Dust Bowl and the series of calamities faced by those at its geographic center,as well as the government's role in creating the conditions that led to a decade of impossible-to-imagine drought and disaster. It seems justified to believe the end is coming when it rains mud from the sky.

An African in Greenland
(reviewed August 25, 2012)
From the lush, snake infested coast of West Africa to the snow- and ice-covered villages of Greenland, Tete-Michel Kpomassie's journey is as improbable as it is fascinating. Part memoir, part travelogue, and entirely anthropological, this book was engrossing from beginning to end. And of course now I want to visit the Arctic.


The Imperial Cruise: A Secret History of Empire and War
(reviewed October 3, 2012)
Such a secret history, in fact, that it's seldom (if ever?) taught in school. James Bradley's account of the imperialistic policies of the first Roosevelt administration is as eye-opening as it is damning and proves, rather conclusively, that the more things change, the more they stay the same. From trumped up charges to garner support for the Spanish-American War (when Roosevelt was Assistant Secretary of the Navy and an aggressive war hawk) to waterboarding in the Philippines, the book covers some of the darker episodes in American history.

Suite Française
(reviewed October 8, 2012)
Written with a poignant urgency that vibrates through the pages, Suite Française is a book about war when the days are early and the outcome is uncertain. How long would this war go on? Sadly, Irène Némirovsky would never find out; she died at Auschwitz in 1942.

April, 1865: The Month That Saved America
(reviewed November 18, 2012)
When I finished this book, I thought, "My God, but that I should be able to write so masterfully myself." More than the story of a single month, it is the story of the choices that defined that month, as well as those that came before it and those that came after it - essentially, a synopsis of the American Civil War and a biography of all the major actors in it.

Honorable Mentions:

Devil in the White City
(reviewed January 13, 2012)
Erik Larson seems to have an especial genius for finding and depicting evil in this world (and in this book, at the Chicago World Fair). I look forward to reading whatever he writes next. 

The Beauty and the Sorrow
(reviewed March 14, 2012)
Calling all Downton Abbey fans. The war as even Julian Fellowes would not dare to present it: raw, wrenching, and completely uncut. Clearly far more sorrow than beauty in this book, but a rich and fantastic read.

America, 1908
(reviewed March 15, 2012)
Evidently March was a very good month for reading. In any case: perhaps I am a bit biased because my own great-grandfather entered the world in early February of 1909, but I found it fascinating to see how this country was a century ago. I was especially enthralled by the New York to Paris automobile race...across thousands of miles of virtually non-existent roads.

The Best of 2011

The following 8 books constitute my “best of” for 2011. I've read 54 books this year and chose 8 "best," that is, the top 15%. I won’t write more here about those I’ve written about previously, but for those I have not commented on, I’ve added a paragraph or two about the book and why I liked it so much. 

1.   In the Garden of Beasts
   (I reviewed this book on November 17.)
2. Hero: The Life and Legend of Lawrence of Arabia
   I became interested in Lawrence of Arabia after reading a bit about him in the sixth book on this list, The Great Silence… This biography, which is a veritable tome, is not only an excellently researched and written look at the life (and legend) of T.E. Lawrence, but does a phenomenal job of outlining the conflicting loyalties in the greater Middle East and, in the process, provides the reader with an in-depth tutorial on why peace in the Middle East has been so elusive. Michael Korda does a commendable job with the World War I history, in particular, from the military history and shifting alliances, to the lasting impact of both the guerilla warfare Lawrence practiced to the Treaty of Versailles, which left him bitter, on the Middle East. We are still reaping what others sowed nearly 100 years ago. 
3. Operation Mincement
   (I reviewed this book on December 9.)
4. Doc
   (I reviewed this book on December 2.)
5. The Paris Wife
   Hadley Richardson, Ernest Hemingway’s first wife, was The Paris Wife, with whom he lived in Jazz Age Paris, while establishing himself as one of the pre-eminent writers of the 20^th century. Paula McLain draws the reader into the heart of a city still grappling with the privations of war, and into the circle of expat writers and artists seeking to make it their own.  Likewise, Ernest and Hadley’s travels to an as-yet-undeveloped Riviera, the battlefields of Italy, and bullfights of Spain are eloquently rendered so that it is hard to believe this is work of historical fiction, and not non-fiction. The ending for Ernest and Hadley is not happy (remember, she was his first wife – it follows and that there were others), but her personal ending is much happier than his. (An interesting aside: their baby makes an appearance in The Irregulars, going on a bender upon learning, falsely, that his father was killed in a World War II car accident. Like father, like son.)
6. The Great Silence: Britain from the Shadow of the First World War to the Dawn of the Jazz Age
   I read this book in January, and it directly shaped much of my reading list for the first half of the year, from piquing my curiosity about Lawrence of Arabia to introducing me to Eric Horne, Butler, whose memoirs were reprinted this past April after being out-of-print for decades, to my desire to read other related books by Juliet Nicolson. In many ways, it is a singularly depressing book: Britain has been decimated by World War I, the populace is weary, and tremendous hardship abounds. While Nicolson certainly captures the deprivation and desperation, she also captures the hopefulness that begins to emerge as the War Years give way to the Jazz Age.
7. Last Call: Rise and Fall of Prohibition in America
   Daniel Okrent’s work on Prohibition is colorful, entertaining, and informative. He sets the stage with a history of drinking in American (in early America, “Americans drank from the crack of dawn to the crack of dawn”, page 8) and carefully examines the causes as well as the effects of the 18^th amendment. On a personal note, my husband and I were bemused to read a reference to a Chicago drugstore owned by grandmother’s uncle (p. 196). I contacted Mr. Okrent, who was kind enough to share with me his original source for the anecdote; the documents  confirmed Uncle Harry was the owner (and possibly a small-scale bootlegger, in the same fashion as many Prohibition-era druggists).
   
   
8. Rich Boy
   Rich Boy is the only fiction that made my Best of 2011 list, in part because my reading list was dominated this year by non-fiction. Sharon Pomerantz’s work embodies the best of good fiction writing: an interesting story, carefully built page-by-page; rich – if not entirely sympathetic – characters (no pun intended); and a sense of time and place.