Community Organizing: Books for Troubled Times, Part 3

A particularly difficult day in difficult times. Here are some of the books people have recommended for action or comfort (or both!) during this inauguration day and a few previous resistance days.

from Lori Tharps:
Same Family, Different Colors: Confronting Colorism in America’s Diverse Families by Lori Tharps
"Explains so much about race and color in these troubled times."
The Hug Machine by Scott Campbell
"Will make you feel good."

from Gail Mershon:
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
"Restores my faith in the goodness of people."

from Jes:
Recipes for Disaster: An Anarchist Cookbook by CrimethInc
"Direct action for everyone."
Alice's Restaurant Cookbook by Alice May Brock
"Cooking with friends makes everything better."

from a customer:
Dylan Thomas: Collected Poems by Dylan Thomas
"They just kind of cheer me up about life."

from staffer Jennifer Sheffield:
Women in Science: 50 Fearless Pioneers Who Changed the World by Rachel Ignotofsky
"It's important right now to know of so many women standing strong in their chosen occupations and to recognize the importance of science in our lives."

from Claudia Ginanni:
The Tea House Fire by Ellis Avery
"This wonderful novel asks important questions about the human cost of art."

from Anne Rubenstein:
Beyond a Boundary by C.L.R. James
"The relationship between the sport of cricket and anti-colonialism in the British Caribbean, beautifully written. How everyday life can get us out of this mess."

from staffer Mariga Temple-West:
The Lord of the Rings trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien
"Evil is spreading over the land, but goodness and hope triumph!"

Community Organizing: Books for Troubled Times, Part 2

More book recommendations from our community. Over the three instances of On Fridays, We Fight Back!, people have been finding space, guidance, and company for the various actions we've taken -- calling representatives and other government officials, writing to electors, sending comfort to survivors of violence. Please come join us, Fridays between 2pm and 6pm!

from Lucas Jaeger:
Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo
"It's a captivating tale that will keep you entranced for days."

from a customer:
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
"A nested series of six stories that will linger with you for years. I've never stopped thinking about it."

from Anndee Hochman:
Angels in America by Tony Kushner
"The Reagan years were no picnic either; Angels in America captures that time with ferocity and hope."

from staffer Mariga Temple-West:
A is for Atom: A Midcentury Alphabet by Greg Paprocki
"Humorous alphabet book with marvelous 'mid-century' illustrations, and so wonderfully inclusive!"

from a customer:
Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
"Great book for young people."

from Hillary Kruger:
Delicious by Ruth Reichl
"A great escape into the world of food!"

from Paul Fitzpatrick:
Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
"Frankl's philosophy is a survivalist philosophy. Despite staring into the face of evil itself, Frankl reminds us of the importance of meaning and maintaining our own personal freedom."

from Robert Bingham:
The Man Who Quit Money by Mark Sundeen
"'Money is a communal delusion.' (Comment I just overheard that is very relevant.)"

Community Organizing: Books for Troubled Times

There was great turnout for our first Friday phone banking action today! Lots of people showed up (not all at the same time), made calls, cheered each other on, and helped each other through logistical phone difficulties. We argued against Steve Bannon, we argued against hateful rhetoric, we named our identities. In a lot of cases, we reached real people who said that indeed they have been receiving lots and lots of calls...

I asked those who came whether they'd like to recommend a book, and here is what they came up with, from inspiring to intense to comforting:

from Anndee Hochman:
19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East by Naomi Shihab Nye
"Nye, a Palestinian-American poet, speaks with clarity, curiosity & humanity. 'How Long Peace Takes' is essential reading!"

from Stacia:
The Last of the Just by André Schwarz-Bart
"Epic novel of the history of persecution of Jews, by a French author"

from Nora:
Phoebe and Her Unicorn by Dana Simpson
"Hilarious, great storyline"

from Karen Bruhin:
Liber Null by Peter J. Carroll
"Perfect introduction to chaos magic"

from Blair Thornburgh:
The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis
"It will make you laugh out loud and also weep -- in a very short span of pages."

from Agatha Andrews:
Soul of a Citizen: Living With Conviction in a Cynical Time by Paul Rogat Loeb
"This is a beautiful book about how to move from inaction to action as a citizen. Beautifully written, gentle, and inspiring!"

from Rahul Mehta:
Diving Makes the Water Deep by Zach Savich
"A beautiful, wise, brave book about how to live fiercely and fully -- and with radical hope -- during difficult times."

from Robert Bingham:
Start where You are: A Guide to Compassionate Living by Pema Chödrön
"This book is a gift that keeps giving. I have returned to it again and again during difficult times."

from a 12-year-old visitor:
Hamilton by Ron Chernow
"A look at the founding of the U.S. government and what it was like back then (before Trump was president 😞 )."

from Sonia Rosen:
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
"Reading both of these together is really useful. Together they do a good job tracking the relationship the Black community has with the criminal justice system and political institutions, and putting forth a vision for Black liberation."

from Ryan Lovett:
A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra
"Historical fiction about Chechnya -- familiarize yourselves with the history of our coming Russian overlords."

from Mel:
Some Girls Bite by Chloe Neill
"Little bit Harry Potter set in vampire world. Female hero and just a good series."

from Genie Ravital:
Quantam Night by Robert Sawyer

from Sarah Napolitan:
Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino
"A whimsical journey through the universe, clever, personified, and distracting."

Come next week for another round of calls: same time (or maybe an hour off...check back), same place!

Last Book I Loved: My Brother Martin by Christine King Farris

With four children and a business to keep up with, the kind of books that I find time for these days is pretty much limited to bedtime stories. The last book my five-year-old son discovered (and timely at that) on his book shelf was My Brother Martin: A Sister Remembers Growing Up with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by Christine King Farris.

This book gives a glimpse into the childhood of Martin Luther King Jr., through intimate stories shared by his older sister, and heartwarming illustrations by Chris Seontpiet. I love how the stories and illustrations weave together a memoir filled with tenderness and compassion, and yet evoke a sense of vibrancy, purpose, and character.

This book offers a very gentle and thought provoking way to introduce the struggles of the civil rights era to children, and the progress that our country has made due to the sacrifices of people like Dr. Martin Luther King. When we finished reading the book, my son said, "I want to be like Martin.", which can only make a mama feel good.

-Dana Scherer

--Dana Scherer keeps herself enchanted with little ones, both as a mama and a local children's photographer. She lives in Germantown and is a proud parent of two students at Wissahickon Charter School. You can find more on her photography and family adventures at Bamboo Photography.

Last Book I Loved: Gumbo Tales by Sara Raohen

I bought Sara Raohen's Gumbo Tales at the airport on the day I was leaving New Orleans and, as I read, I wished that I had picked it up the day I arrived. Raohen is a master at bringing the eclectic tastes of New Orleans cuisine alive on the page and conveys the city's pride and heritage to the reader. I read this book hungrily on the flight back to Philadelphia and upon landing, immediately sought out local restaurants that may just deliver Roahen's described oyster po-boys, okra gumbo, and olive-salad muffalettas. Whether or not they will be accurate to Roahen's experience I'll never know until I go back to New Orleans (which I will) to sample from the restaurants she highlights.

My favorite part of the whole book is her explanation of why Monday's meal, in the whole of New Orleans, is red beans and rice. Roahen writes, "If there was a first pot of red beans in New Orleans, documentation of it has not been found. Everyone here knows, though, that whether truth or myth, red beans and rice became a Monday staple for two reasons: it made good use of the ham bone from Sunday dinner, and cooks could stir the low-maintenance dish infrequently while tending to housework back when Monday was laundry day and people still set their washtubs over charcoal furnaces in the backyard." To know that, even today, Monday's meal is red beans and rice where the washing machine and dryer will dutifully do New Orleans laundry any day of the week is so comforting to me, someone who likes to know what's coming up next. And the fact that the whole city participates shows the tight-knit community that is New Orleans.

I fell in love with New Orleans while I was there and Roahen's Gumbo Tales made me love it even more. If you want to get a little taste for this wonderful city, please read this book.

-Lucia Gunzel

--Lucia Gunzel is the author/publisher of the children's book, Cranky Pants.

Last Book I Loved: Most Good, Least Harm by Zoe Weil

Between the snowstorm, holidays, and my glorious new Kindle, I've had plenty of time to read this winter. And I am so glad I was able to read Most Good, Least Harm: A Simple Principle for a Better World and Meaningful Life by Zoe Weil right before the new year.

Most Good, Least Harm book delves into some of the issues covered in my own book. Weil gets to the core of conquering eco-anxiety and environmental guilt, using information and consumer power to improve and enrich your life. The book is truly inspiring and the perfect thing to read entering the new year.

-Paige Wolf

--Paige Wolf is a publicist, author, and green living expert who uses her media savvy and personal moxie to promote manageable eco-chic living. After working as a journalist, publicist, and communications manager, Paige founded Paige Wolf Media & Public Relations in 2002.

Last Book I Loved: Room by Emma Donoghue

I am jumping on the bandwagon and singing the praises of Room by Emma Donoghue. The storyline itself sounds like something from a Lifetime Movie Of The Week, but what sets it apart and makes it unique is the author's choice to tell the story through the five-year-old boy's point of view. The reader sees things through his eyes and knows what's happening (like the tension between characters or the shrillness of what's not being said) but the boy is completely clueless. There's a naivety to the voice that makes many scenes quite disturbing. Had Donoghue told the same story from the mother's point of view, the book wouldn't have been nearly as effective.

-Robert Swartwood

--Robert Swartwood is the editor of Hint Fiction: An Anthology of Stories in 25 Words or Fewer. Visit him online at www.robertswartwood.com.

Last Book I Loved: Road to Tater Hill by Edith Hemingway

Granted, I've got a thing about mountains. Or maybe more than "a thing": At one point I quit my job and joined AmeriCorps in far-western Maryland to try to figure out why so many of my favorite books take place in the mountains. So I knew when I picked up Road to Tater Hill, by Edith Hemingway, that it would quickly become "the most recent book I loved." The author uses her keen eye and ear for detail to give us Annie, a 10-year-old in 1963 whose infant sister has just died. Annie befriends a mysterious woman who lives near the spot where Annie returns to grieve, and together Annie and the woman forge a new path onward.

Readers of all ages who have experienced loss--and what reader has not experienced loss?--will draw strength from Hemingway's sharp observations and message of unexpected renewal. And readers without a particular fondness for mountains don't need to worry. Though the characters are thoroughly rooted in their mountain community, the powerful story and hopeful message will resonate strongly on the subway, on the beach, and anywhere else books are enjoyed.

-Pamela Ehrenberg

***

--Pamela Ehrenberg is the author of two novels for young readers: Ethan, Suspended (2007) is set in Washington, DC, but Tillmon County Fire (2009) is set in the mountains.

What's Mt. Airy reading?

A selection of books that our community was reading last year:

"I'm reading For Decades I was Silent: A Holocaust Survivor's Journey Back to Faith by Rabbi Baruch G. Goldstein. It's an amazing firsthand story about how a young man survived 2 1/2 years in Auschwitz, including the final Death Marches to lose his faith in the D.P. camps and eventually regain it and become a Rabbi and teacher. It's beautifully written and overwhelmingly positive and loving in outlook."
-Tamar Magdovitz


"I have just begun to read the biography of John Nash, the mathematician and Nobel Laureate featured in the movie A Beautiful Mind. I'm not far along in the book but several things predict it as a fascinating read. The author, journalist Sylvia Nasar, takes the time to describe a vivid picture of Nash's personality. She shares her interest but especially her compassion for her subject."
-Charissa


"I'm re-reading Love by Toni Morrison."
-Aisha


"To Love What Is: A Marriage Transformed by Alix Kates Shulman (author of Memoires of an Ex-Prom Queen) -- Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 2008. In this memoir, Shulman writes about her experience of being in love with and married to Scott, both before and after a very tragic accident that led to his mental deterioration. It has touching details about how love and commitment extend into a very different and often difficult phase in her life. Shulman describes how she makes it her mission to optimize her husband's chances of a recovery at the expense of her own sense of self. She then describes the shift that takes place inside of her when, after over a year of 24/7 care, she realizes her husband has sustained permanent damage that has rendered him completely dependent on her. She concludes with a very touching chapter entitled "Amor Fati" -- how one learns to not just accept, but love one's fate. Great book!"
-Esther Wyss-Flamm


"Pity the Nation by Robert Fisk."
–Kayla Ankeny


"Right now I am reading The Driver's Seat by Muriel Spark. It's a short book and a quick read- but I can't seem to get through it. It is supposed to be a suspenseful thriller and is described as a book 'to make the flesh creep' but I am nearly through the thing and it has not crept for me yet. I'll keep you posted."
-Jen Bendik


"I'm reading Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg. It's a great book on getting in touch with your authentic voice and on writing down the juicy details. She also is a practicing Buddhist and encourages readers to concentrate and be fully in the moment.."
-Susan


"I am currently reading Annie Proulx's early book, Accordion Crimes. She is one of my favorite writers. Her amazing ability to describe the intricacies of the activities and emotions (loneliness, sacrifice and passion) of everyday lives of average Americans, while tracking the impact of a particular culture's impact on this country's evolution is profoundly moving."
-Susan Arthur Whitson



"I'm reading Steve Lopez' The Soloist. The book explores the effects of the intersection of race, class, and giftedness through the life of a black male classical music prodigy who ends up being homeless on the streets of Los Angeles. In the telling of Nathaniel Anthony Ayers' story, I appreciated Lopez' introspection about his role (as friend, advocate, columnist) in the "big picture.""
–Jennifer Beaumont



"Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert Ed by Margaret Cohen; a norton critical edition second edition, 2005: A middle class, French, 19th century lady trapped by birth in an undistinguised life. Style! Besides the translation of the text, there are letters by Flaubert about the writing enterprise - 5 pages a week. . .a transcription of his trial, commentary by several critics including Baudelaire and Henry James, and a Flaubert Chronology."
-Barbara Torode

Last Book I Loved: American Gods by Neil Gaiman

I don’t normally enjoy science fiction or fantasy, but I had heard so many good things about the author Neil Gaiman and had recently seen the movie Coraline, based on his children’s book of the same name. Immediately, American Gods hooked me with an interesting protagonist, Shadow, that makes you want to keep reading to learn more about him.

The question that runs through the story is part theology, part mystery and altogether thought-provoking; if gods are kept alive by their believers, what happens to them when people stop believing? Or what happens when people start worshipping money, television and technology instead?

American Gods is well-written, provocative and just plain fun.
-Christine Knapp

Christine Knapp is the director of outreach for Citizens of Pennsylvania's Future (PennFuture).

Community Book Review: Smashed

Smashed by Koren Zailckas

This is a heartbreaking memoir. It is a short book written by a young author of 24 years who is coming out of binge drinking since she was 14. Her political views and factual nuggets are scattered throughout this scary and honest portrayal of underage drinking to an excess which is hard to imagine. It's scary to think of it happening with my own daughter so close to the collegiate experience, and already familiar with the allure of it all. I highly recommend this book to all parents and anyone who loves memoirs or drinking!

Reviewed by Gail Kotel
(founder of Therapeutic Pilates
in the Blue House)

Last Book I Loved: The Four Spirits by Sena Jeter Naslund

The last book I loved was called The Four Spirits by Sena Jeter Naslund. It took place in Birmingham, Alabama during the civil rights movement and has fictional as well as historical characters. I loved how wrapped up you got in the fictional characters while they interacted with the historical ones and history itself. I also loved the ending which was hopeful and scary/uncertain, which really described the time. It was difficult and pulse racing at times but very beautiful.
-Gail Kotel

Gail Kotel is the proprietor of Therapeutic Pilates in Mt. Airy, a holistic physical therapy and pilates practice where she uses the Pilates method for strengthening and alignment. She is also a fine artist. Be sure to check out her March exhibit at MilkBoy in Ardmore and her exhibit at Cambell's in Chestnut Hill in April.

Last Book I Loved: Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell

Here's a new series on Big Blue Marble Bookstore's Blog. Last Book I Loved will profile books that community and neighborhood teachers, neighbors, artists, writers, and all kinds of other folks read recently and loved. Our first profile is by the talented Claire McConnell... and please be sure to check out her creative speech workshops (including the one starting on February 19th!)

The last book I loved was Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell, published in 1960. Karana's tribe leaves her Pacific Island home and she must survive there alone. She learns how to build a house, how to make weapons to fight off the wild dogs, how to catch an octopus, and makes a number of surprising friends in lieu of human companionship. Like the Little House books, it's for children and it's about 'roughing it', the basic skills for living on the earth. You really learn to love the island, all the textures and colors and worlds within it, even while pining for human contact along with Karana. I would recommend this book to children around age 9 and to grown ups too!

Claire McConnell is writing an island novel. She is an assistant pre-school teacher at the Waldorf School of Philadelphia (across the street from the Trolley Car Diner). She also teaches Creative Speech-- the arts of storytelling, poetry reciting, and acting based on the work of Rudolf Steiner-- and will teach an intro workshop on February 19th at the Philadelphia Dance Theater, 10am to 3pm (More info at Creative Speech Philadelphia.)

Community Book Review: The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How The War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals

The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How The War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals by Jane Mayer

This book presents a heartbreaking parade, not just of horrifically abused detainees but earnest do-gooding government employees who actually believe in American ideals. The horror film atmosphere is most obvious in the scripted "takedowns" in which teams come in the night, but in the "don't go near the old farmhouse!" shock when some would-be public servant says "we don't torture! not this executive!" only to be proven desperately, tragically wrong. At the center of this horror is not even Cheney, who at least holds a constitutional office, but Cheney's "Cheney", his lawyer David Addington. Addington is a towering, raging bully, claiming the "president has already decided this!" as his cackling refrain. This book by New Yorker reporter Mayer definitely supports the "Bush as tool" theory, as the supposed wielder of all this executive power is portrayed as a disengaged cipher with a five minute attention span.
Meanwhile, Cheney and his own evil genius dream up a nightmare of a policy for the world's most powerful country, a country that apparently wrote the Geneva Conventions and is the custodian of their physical hard copy, appropriately located in the marginalized State Dept. The accounts of torture trying to extract confessions of things that don't exist (most damningly a Iraq-9/11 connection) brings the reports of Iranian interrogations unpleasantly to mind. There are good guys here(even John Ashcroft!), but they end up disillusioned and out of work. The book is particularly disheartening to read as Obama escalates Afghanistan and keeps plenty of those executive powers just in case. But it's nice to know that someone believed in US ideals, even if us cynical lefties don't.

Reviewed by Jesse Bacon

Community Book Review: The Hemingses of Monticello

The Hemingses of Monticello by Annette Gordon-Reed

Thomas Jefferson: impregantor of his enslaved half sister-in-law and clingy extrovert. That is the portrayal that Annette Gordon-Reed concocts from the documentary material and the perspectives of the enslaved people in his life. The scanty lack of the former in the voice of the latter forces her into impressive acts of empathy and many such constructions as "He would have.." "She would not have..." But the work definitely earns its Pulitzer by doing so with such skill and illuminating a subject we kind of dimly know about but are missing a lot of important details. Chiefly the fact that this affair(?) between societal unequals lasted for decades, and followed the death of Martha Jefferson, Sally Hemings' half-sister.

Gordon-Reed manages to avoid either canonizing Hemings and her famiy or robbing them of all agency, leaving us to ponder the fact that her brother James committed suicide soon after freedom, or that either James or Sally could have had their freedom decades earlier during their brief time in Paris (Paris courts never refused a freedom suit.) Gordon-Reed does not argue in either of these or any other cases that this shows the beneficence of slavery or Jefferson, but she doesn't reduce her subjects to diversity month cutouts either. She points out other cases such as an enslaved woman who gets her white lover to buy her and live with her openly, and as a free woman. She makes the amazing observation that Jefferson would have had far less wealth if his father and law had to leave property to his enslaved sons, instead of just his white daughter. Similarly, Jefferson's daughters benefited materially from Jefferson taking Hemings as a "substitute for a wife" instead of marrying a woman who could have made any legal claim on him.

The best defense of Gordon-Reed's method, and the most lasting wisdom comes in her saying that the truth can be known by how it illuminates while lies are bound to obscure. This would seem to have application long beyond turn of the 19th century Virginia.

Reviewed by Jesse Bacon

Community Book Review: Chronic City

Chronic City Love Letter

Jonathan Lethem's Chronic City woke me up in the middle of the night, right out of a dead sleep. I realized something about the stranded-in-orbit astronaut, about the environmental sculptor, about the ghostwriter, about Malcolm Gladwell's quality-of-life police, about the acupuncturist, about the war-free edition of the New York Times. (Who would choose the other edition?) I lay there in the dark, as paranoid/inspired as Perkus Tooth, the ex-broadsider around whom the story revolves.

And now I am in love with Chronic City. (It almost spells synchronicity!) It's the kind of love where I cannot stop mentioning it even/especially to people who haven't read it. It's the kind of love that shifts your perceptions forever. Try reading this book and then driving into New York City past Liberty Park; it's like liberating a collective repressed memory, a catharsis, an admission.

It's fitting to be in love with Chronic City, because it is a love letter to writing and the beautiful/terrible role that writers play in the necessary lies and half-truths that keep any culture, but especially this one, intact.

-Reviewed by Jane Cassady

Jane Cassady is the booking maven for the Philadelphia Poetry Slam. She has appeared in The November 3rd Club, The Comstock Review, Valley of the Contemporary Poets, and others. She works at Emlen Elementary Afterschool Program in Northwest Philadelphia, spending lots of time with craft supplies and optimistic little faces.

Community Book Review: The Wasted Vigil

The Wasted Vigil By Nadeem Aslam.

For folks whom Kite Runner was not depressing or complex or poetic enough.

Wasted Vigil literally nails its symbolism to the ceiling in the form of a library. The books were put there by a woman driven mad by years of Afghan wars, but the method is crudely effective, the Taliban don't notice them. Other metaphors are similarly fraught, the house also features paintings devoted to the 6 senses covered over by mud, a giant Buddha's head that weeps tears, and a collection of inhabitants who range from Afghanistans' would-be occupiers (British, Russian, American) to its current inhabitants, themselves an Al-Qaeda former Bagram detainee and a female schoolteacher.
All of this weight threatens to overwhelm the storyline which is basically flashbacks, hanging out, and gathering menace.

The poetic language, historic sweep, and admirable dialectic of blame (between colonizers and colonized) more or less sustain things, and we enjoy our time spent with these shattered people. My only complaint is the women are either dead, disappeared, or going back to Russia which serves to make them a moew little two dimensional then the agonizing, suffering, and also dying men.


Reviewed by Jesse Bacon