How I missed out on reading Lessons in Chemistryby Bonnie Garmus in the several years since its publication is a classic lesson in the old adage, Don’t judge a book by its cover, and also, a lesson in personal flexibility—that being that there are no doubt a plethora of other excellent books out there that I would love if I had bothered to read them, and sometimes that deprives me of valuable experiences. I heard Lessons in Chemistry was very good, but, eh . . . I thought. Not for me. I’m not into chemistry. The 1950s and early 60s don’t interest me as much as earlier times. It looks somehow . . . I don’t know . . . frivolous?
HardcoverEdition
I’m happy to report that I was wrong on all counts. Well, maybe not the I’m not into chemistry part, but as it turns out, that doesn’t matter. I didn’t need to be into chemistry to appreciate chemist Elizabeth Zott’s deep love of it. I just needed to appreciate Elizabeth Zott, the wonderful protagonist of this deeply funny, tragic, and ultimately affirming story. And that was easy. As for my not being interested in the 1950s-60s, I think I took that period for granted because I am a product of it. I have few memories of my earliest childhood, and of those, most are sad. Those years have not been a time I willingly wish to revisit. It appears I prefer visiting earlier and more dramatic times—times that occurred before I was able to suffer through them in person.
As for the idea that the book was probably frivolous, I definitely derived that from the cover. And I wasn’t the only one. Three years ago, a reader named Lisa Wright posted a question on Goodreads, “Am I the only one who was furious about the pink chick-lit, rom-com cover on this book? It belittles the book in exactly the same way Elizabeth Zott is belittled!”
Bonnie Garmus, the author, answered: “I have to agree–and I’m the author! All I can say is, the publisher did let me have input and I told them I thought it looked like chick-lit (nothing against chick-lit but this book isn’t that). Still, publishers have a lot of experience knowing what an audience will respond to and they thought this was the best way. They’ve been great to work with; we just didn’t see eye-to-eye on this. You can google other covers from the other nations and see you if you think anyone else got a little closer–I think Germany and the UK both did a nice job. I have hopes that this cover will change for the paperback.”
Paperback Cover
The way I fell into reading this book
I went on a trip and forgot to bring my library book. The airport gift shop’s book selection was pretty slim. I didn’t see anything from my TBR list. The cover on the paperback version was slightly less frivolous in my very unscientific opinion than the hardcover I had entered in our public library collection. At least it featured something that looked like the periodic table in the background. I picked it up, sighed, and purchased it.
The book delighted me from the first page. When I read these lines: “Fuel for learning, Elizabeth Zott wrote on a small slip of paper before tucking it into her daughter’s lunch box. Then she paused, her pencil in midair, as if reconsidering. Play sports at recess but donot automatically let the boys win, she wrote on another slip. Then she paused again, tapping her pencil against the table. It is not your imagination, she wrote on a third. Most people are awful. She placed the last two on top.”
Bonnie Garmus had my attention on page one, and she had me laughing and crying and feeling every range of emotion throughout the delicious ride through the air from Reno, Nevada to Minneapolis, Minnesota and back again. I loved this book! Highly recommended.
Have you had this experience? Purposely avoiding something, whether a book or a movie or a sport or an activity, that you later found to be good or valuable? I’m sure I’ve done it a lot!
Luckily for me, this time I was given the gift of proving myself wrong.
Lauren Scott, King Copper: Our Dog’s Life in Poetry
Lauren Scott’s love of her family’s beautiful chocolate lab, Copper, shines in this sweet little volume of photographs and poems that follow their lives together from adoption day on. In her words, King Copper is “a poetic account of the joy that arises when a lovable chocolate lab walks into your life and changes it forever. And the eventual heartache you feel when he crosses over the rainbow bridge thirteen years later and still too soon.”
What a touching account, and what a testament to the glorious impact our beloved pets have on our lives. If only all dogs—all pets—were as well loved and appreciated as the delightful lab Lauren writes so poetically about, the world would truly be a better place. Brava to Lauren for giving her beloved Copper a tribute worthy of his beauty and goodness! Did it make me cry a bit? Absolutely. But tears shed over the loss of a dear dog are never wrong. There is nothing purer than a dog’s affection and devotion. Copper wasn’t my dog, but I, too, have loved wonderful dogs. Like Lauren and her family, I know our animal companions deserve our deepest affection in return for the many gifts they give us. Part of the price for that gift is the same as it is for anything we open up our hearts to fully—the possibility, even the probability that one day there will be pain and loss.
But as Lauren so aptly says, “We celebrate his life- those soul-searching eyes that connected to us- we were links in a golden chain and now one link is missing, our golden boy- each day tears follow like a shadow- the shadow he was, but smiles gently find their place because he is in our hearts, because joy needs room to simmer.”
You can visit Lauren’s blog at baydreamerwrites.com.
Jess Walter’s latest novel tells the story of Rhys Kinnick, a sad-hearted journalist who punches his son-in-law in the face at Thanksgiving, throws his cell phone out his car window, drops out of society, and goes off to live in the forest. The experience of reading So Far Gone reminded me of the not dissimilar experience of watching a Coen brothers movie such as The Big Lebowski or Fargo—odd ball characters, extreme situations, violence, and humor—often jumbled up together in the same scenes—in an overall story that somehow also manages to convey intelligence and love.
Walters is a master at building complicated characters in vivid, precise strokes. The characters in So Far Gone range from the struggling grandfather protagonist, to his charming grandchildren, his confused daughter, a group of religious zealot gun-toting conspiracy theorists, a bipolar retired cop, an old girlfriend with major attitude, his loyal friends Joanie and Brian, and other colorful characters Rhys meets along the way.
It’s a story about a crumbling America, about people lost and found, a world under siege, and ultimately about small miracles of healing magic fashioned by family and friendship. I found it refreshing, and touching, funny, sometimes outrageous, disturbing . . . and also an interesting look at the way some of us old dreamers and staunch believers in the ideals of fairness, justice, and a better future for all are feeling about and reacting to the twisted reality we now see laid out before us. So Far Gone is the perfect title for a book that describes us, now, today.
Two consecutive snowstorms, and the sun sparks diamonds on the snow-hushed surfaces here in Austin and in the Reese River Valley just below us, giving us time to read, to wander, to cook, and to write.
Walking after a snowstorm is one of my favorite activities, along with walking in a warm rain, or on a starry night, or along a tree-lined lane at the height of autumn. It’s like walking inside a dream, a vision, a movie . . . all of it a magical changing work of art. This has been that kind of a weekend. An appreciated and needed balm for the eyes, ears, heart, mind and soul.
Our footprints going down our driveway last winter after a similar storm in Austin, NV. My photo.
After today’s walk, I finished reading Dr. Vicki Atkinson’s memoir, Surviving Sue: An Inspirational Survivor’s Story About a Daughter and her Life with a Mother Who was Riddled with Alcoholism, Alzheimer’s, Anxiety, Depression, and Munchausen’s. Vicki is a fellow blogger, one I follow and read with pleasure, always knowing I will find something positive, real, and insightful in her posts. Vicki is generous with her readers, sharing of herself, her humor, her highs and lows with an empathic interest in our perspectives.
This is Vicki’s voice, and it shines on the pages of her book. She is a profoundly kind-spirited woman who grew up learning how to turn the injury and injustice of her mother’s mental illness into something bigger than her own pain. With keen intelligence, her father’s and sister’s love, and later through her own family and probably also due to her dedication to her studies, Vicki survives and thrives, and she does it without ever compromising her own values.
Vicki’s Wonderful Memoir
Vicki’s compassion for her mother is more than challenged over the years, but somehow, she stays the course of doing what she believes is best for everyone concerned. For those who don’t know Vicki or haven’t read Surviving Sue, I’d like to stop here to encourage you to read it for yourself. This story is worth your time. It may even affect the ways you view some of your own experiences, past or present. It may soften your heart. It’s a beautiful book, and an engaging read.
I write this on January 9, 2025, the day of President Jimmy Carter’s funeral. Jimmy Carter died on December 29th, 2024. He was 100 years old, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, a dedicated man who worked alongside his wife in public service and advocacy for human rights and humanitarian causes throughout his life (Habitat for Humanity being only one of them).
He graduated from the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland in 1946 with the distinction of being in the top ten percent of his class. His service in the US Navy included being selected to join the nuclear submarine program, where he and 23 other sailors opted to expose themselves to radiation to rectify a partial meltdown of an experimental nuclear reactor at Chalk River Labs in Ottaway, Ontario, Canada. As a result, the core of the reactor was successfully removed. Source: (https://www.warhistoryonliune.com/featured/jimmy-carter-us-navy.html).
Jimmy Carter was a humble man of faith who continued to teach Sunday school during his presidency. These are just a few examples of his character and place in our country.
This post is both meant as a tribute to President Carter and as a question for my community. You see, Mr. P. and I just returned from a tour of our town and were not able to spot a single American flag flying at half-staff. We were not out on a mission to check on flags. It is our usual practice to get out and about on our days off together, and today I was not working at the library because it was closed in remembrance of President Carter.
We were out in the cold bright light of a January day to take in the beauty of our town and the mountain trails and to get a little exercise.
Driving through the park at the top end of town I remarked, “Look. Someone forgot to place the flag at half-mast.” It didn’t strike me as that odd, just an oversight perhaps. Afterall, county workers had the day off, perhaps they had forgotten.
But after our walk we were intrigued enough to actually look for American flags being flown at half-mast. We did not find a single one anywhere in our town. There were a few empty flag poles. All the rest of the American flags were flying high.
I am deeply hurt. Why is not one American in this town following protocol?
“An easy way to remember when to fly the United States flag at half-staff is to consider when the whole nation is in mourning. These periods of mourning are proclaimed either by the president of the United States, for national remembrance, or the governor of a state or territory, for local remembrance, in the event of a death of a member or former member of the federal, state or territorial government or judiciary. The heads of departments and agencies of the federal government may also order that the flag be flown at half-staff on buildings, grounds and naval vessels under their jurisdiction. On Memorial Day the flag should be flown at half-staff from sunrise until noon only, then raised briskly to the top of the staff until sunset, in honor of the nation’s battle heroes. In the early days of our country, no regulations existed for flying the flag at half-staff and, as a result, there were many conflicting policies. But on March 1, 1954, President Dwight Eisenhower issued a proclamation on the proper times. The flag should fly at half-staff for 30 days at all federal buildings, grounds, and naval vessels throughout the United States and its territories and possessions after the death of the president or a former president. It is to fly 10 days at half-staff after the death of the vice president, the chief justice or a retired chief justice of the United States Supreme Court, or the speaker of the House of Representatives. For an associate justice of the Supreme Court, a member of the Cabinet, a former vice president, the president pro tempore of the Senate, the majority leader of the Senate, the minority leader of the Senate, the majority leader of the House of Representatives, or the minority leader of the House of Representatives the flag is to be displayed at half-staff from the day of death until interment. The flag is to be flown at half-staff at all federal buildings, grounds and naval vessels in the Washington, D.C., area on the day and day after the death of a United States senator, representative, territorial delegate, or the resident commissioner from the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. It should also be flown at half-staff on all federal facilities in the state, congressional district, territory, or commonwealth of these officials. Upon the death of the governor of a state, territory or possession, the flag should be flown at half-staff on all federal facilities in that governor’s state, territory or possession from the day of death until interment.The president may order the flag to be flown at half-staff to mark the death of other officials, former officials, or foreign dignitaries. In addition to these occasions, the president may order half-staff display of the flag after other tragic events. The flag should be briskly run up to the top of the staff before being lowered slowly to the half-staff position.”
So, I’m disappointed enough to ask . . .
Why is there not one American flag flying at half-mast in Austin today?
Hello, Readers! I just finished The Midnight Library and wanted to linger over it a while longer. One way to preserve and examine a recent experience is to write about it. Another way would be to get together with my friends at the Austin Ladies Book Club, but it’s been a busy summer and we are on hiatus. Here then, is my short take on Matt Haig’s “whimsical” novel (as The Washington Post aptly calls it).
It’s an intriguing little book, chockful of tiny little chapters, each one the piece of a puzzle containing alternate lives for our damaged, yet clever and likable heroine, Nora Seed. It’s midnight, and as Nora’s consciousness flickers between life and death, a wise and kind librarian directs Nora to endless books of possibilities—the myriad different paths her choices may have led her, and may lead her still.
This is a puzzle many of us have played in our minds, and often, as in The Midnight Library, we move these pieces around in the wee hours of the night.
Imagine if I had… What if I hadn’t… If only I could go back and change…
Regrets. Lost opportunities.
Shame.
Like Nora Seed, I’ve had plenty of these, and being the imperfect human I am, I continue to accrue new ones regularly. It can be a heavy load. The nights can be very dark.
Sometimes, a book can help. Some night soon when I drift off to sleep, perhaps I will find myself in a magic library like Nora’s. After all, I often have vivid dreams where things I experience in my waking hours revisit me in interesting and revealing ways (sometimes horrifying ways, too, but this isn’t that kind of book, thank goodness). So it could happen. Maybe tonight.
The Midnight Library is an obvious win-win for me, the lady lucky enough to run the local library and the lady who finds reading and writing endlessly captivating. It is wonderful for all the right reasons. Fun, and funny, too. Sweet, sad, insightful, and smart—it’s a little volume that may just lighten your heart.
Tatiana De Rosnay’s Historical Fiction Novel, Sarah’s Key, A Review
Sarah’s Key tells the intertwined stories of two fictional inhabitants of Paris; Sarah, a ten-year-old girl caught in the terror of Nazi-occupied France, an innocent Jewish child desperate to protect her little brother, and Julia, the journalist destined to discover Sarah’s story sixty years later. Though Sarah and Julia are fictional characters, the situations of the story are sadly all too real.
Before reading Sarah’s Key, I hadn’t known of the Velodrome d’Hiver roundup, which was ordered by Nazis, and carried out by French police officers, but as with all events relating to this terrible time of human history, the story is by equal measure unimaginably catastrophic and yet characteristically illustrative of the horrors of the systematic application of the NAZI party’s stated objective to eradicate Jews in what they termed “A Final Solution to the Jewish Question” at the Wannsee Conference on January 20, 1942.
The Velodrome d’Hiver roundup in Paris, France is one example of the implementation of that horrific policy.
Here is a brief summary of the real events:
“Beginning in the early hours of July 16 [1942], French police rounded up thousands of men, women, and children throughout Paris. By the end of the day, the police had taken 2,573 men, 5,165 women, and 3,625 children from their homes. The roundup continued the following day, but with a much smaller number of arrests.
Approximately 6,000 of those rounded up were immediately transported to Drancy, in the northern suburbs of Paris. Drancy was at that point a transit camp for Jews being deported from France. The rest of the arrestees were detained at the Vélodrome d’Hiver (Winter Cycling Track), an indoor sporting arena in Paris’s fifteenth arrondissement.
After five days, Jews incarcerated at the Vél d’Hiv were transferred to other transit camps outside Paris. At Drancy, Pithiviers, and Beaune-la-Rolande, French police guarded these men, women, and children until transport to concentration camps and killing centers in the east. At the end of July, the remaining adults were separated from their children and deported to Auschwitz.
Over 3,000 children remained interned without their parents until they were deported, among adult strangers, to Auschwitz as well.
German authorities continued the deportations of Jews from French soil until August 1944.
In all, some 77,000 Jews living on French territory perished in concentration camps and killing centers—the overwhelming majority of them at Auschwitz.”
De Rosnay’s novel expertly weaves the stories of her two heroines, as one suffers through the event and the other learns of it in a surprisingly intimate way many years later. This book reminds me of the importance of historical scholarship—true scholarship that doesn’t shy away from the painful realities of the past—and of the absolute necessity of bearing witness to the suffering of the innocent—as a way to honor them, of course, and also as a way to teach each new generation the lessons that seem so easy to forget, so fragile, and always under attack. We need to hear the stories. We cannot be allowed to forget.
Sarah’s Key is one of those books that takes us on an unforgettable journey, touches our hearts and souls, and joins us to the hearts and souls of others who were forced from this world before their natural times, and in terrible ways. It is both deeply dark and sweetly hopeful. A strange truth about literature, and part of its magic, is that you can enjoy it even while it is hurting you. Sarah’s Key is worth it.
Like Jenny, I love used books, books that have a history of relationship with other readers that I can see and hold in my hands. The cover doesn’t need to be in great shape. There should be a name written in long hand somewhere within the first pages. Notes written in the margins. Words, phrases, paragraphs underlined. Exclamation marks, hearts, question marks in the margins. Old shopping lists stuck between the pages. Dedications to lovers, children, grandchildren, friends on the title page. This book reminds me of how very much I love being your mom.
Despite my librarian grandmother, my own library training and teacher training, and my years working in libraries and public schools, I’ve always been much more of a book sharer than a book protector. This doesn’t mean I condone random doodling, especially not of the tasteless variety, or nasty vulgarisms of any sort in any book (and I’ve seen plenty of those, believe me). And I am not advocating writing in any book that you do not own—please, respect all library books, and school texts! But I do appreciate a pithy comment that pertains to the content. I love knowing that I am sharing the experience of reading a particular piece with someone who found something striking enough to comment on right then and there, in the moment.
Jenny Lawson says, “…reading those found books is like reading with ghosts, ones who eagerly point out their favorite passages or share their thoughts or questions in the margins.”
Books that I can remember writing in that are sitting around my house right now include:
Jane Eyre, A Prayer for Owen Meany, The Catcher in the Rye (probably my first!), The Diary of Anne Frank, Man’s Search for Meaning, Teacher Man, Rebecca, Atonement, Prodigal Summer, The Glass Castle, Learning to Walk in the Dark, and lots of poems—“The Raven” comes to mind along with some of Shakespeare’s sonnets. And memorably, the teacher edition of a literature anthology I used in my classroom for many years (not sure if this qualifies as defacing a public school text, but it did raise a few eyebrows during department meetings).
Funny story there. I was told, “That’s not your book! You can’t write in that!” back in 1998 by a wonderful teacher I respected and admired. Even so, I continued to write in the book. I planned on outlasting the book adoption cycle, and I wanted to remember what worked, what went flat, what insights, funny or touching, or what “light bulb” moments were expressed by my kids. When I retired in 2014 a young English teacher retrieved the same teacher anthology from the school library that I had written notes in for years. There hadn’t been a new book adoption in all of those years because the budget was just too tight for the district to purchase a new anthology. This new teacher wrote me a letter. “What a treasure!” she said. “Thank you for writing all of that down.”
A reader after my own heart. A teacher after my own heart. I hope she never forgets to write in the margins.
Being vegetarian and eating greens and salads out is always a risk, it s hard to be 100% sure all you eat is absolutely safe, so take it twice a year to guarantee your body is free from unwanted organism
The goal of this blog is to create a long list of facts that are important, not trivia, and that are known to be true yet are either disputed by large segments of the public or highly surprising or misunderstood by many.
This blog feature amusing and heartwarming stories about our late Leonberger dog Bronco, as well as other Leonbergers. It also has a lot of information about the Leonberger breed, the history, care, training, Leonberger organizations, etc. I also wrote a Leonberger book, which I am featuring in the sidebar.
LakeArrowheadLadyWriter 
Lessons in Chemistry / Lessons in Flexibility
How I missed out on reading Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus in the several years since its publication is a classic lesson in the old adage, Don’t judge a book by its cover, and also, a lesson in personal flexibility—that being that there are no doubt a plethora of other excellent books out there that I would love if I had bothered to read them, and sometimes that deprives me of valuable experiences. I heard Lessons in Chemistry was very good, but, eh . . . I thought. Not for me. I’m not into chemistry. The 1950s and early 60s don’t interest me as much as earlier times. It looks somehow . . . I don’t know . . . frivolous?
I’m happy to report that I was wrong on all counts. Well, maybe not the I’m not into chemistry part, but as it turns out, that doesn’t matter. I didn’t need to be into chemistry to appreciate chemist Elizabeth Zott’s deep love of it. I just needed to appreciate Elizabeth Zott, the wonderful protagonist of this deeply funny, tragic, and ultimately affirming story. And that was easy. As for my not being interested in the 1950s-60s, I think I took that period for granted because I am a product of it. I have few memories of my earliest childhood, and of those, most are sad. Those years have not been a time I willingly wish to revisit. It appears I prefer visiting earlier and more dramatic times—times that occurred before I was able to suffer through them in person.
As for the idea that the book was probably frivolous, I definitely derived that from the cover. And I wasn’t the only one. Three years ago, a reader named Lisa Wright posted a question on Goodreads, “Am I the only one who was furious about the pink chick-lit, rom-com cover on this book? It belittles the book in exactly the same way Elizabeth Zott is belittled!”
Bonnie Garmus, the author, answered: “I have to agree–and I’m the author! All I can say is, the publisher did let me have input and I told them I thought it looked like chick-lit (nothing against chick-lit but this book isn’t that). Still, publishers have a lot of experience knowing what an audience will respond to and they thought this was the best way. They’ve been great to work with; we just didn’t see eye-to-eye on this. You can google other covers from the other nations and see you if you think anyone else got a little closer–I think Germany and the UK both did a nice job. I have hopes that this cover will change for the paperback.”
The way I fell into reading this book
I went on a trip and forgot to bring my library book. The airport gift shop’s book selection was pretty slim. I didn’t see anything from my TBR list. The cover on the paperback version was slightly less frivolous in my very unscientific opinion than the hardcover I had entered in our public library collection. At least it featured something that looked like the periodic table in the background. I picked it up, sighed, and purchased it.
Bonnie Garmus had my attention on page one, and she had me laughing and crying and feeling every range of emotion throughout the delicious ride through the air from Reno, Nevada to Minneapolis, Minnesota and back again. I loved this book! Highly recommended.
Have you had this experience? Purposely avoiding something, whether a book or a movie or a sport or an activity, that you later found to be good or valuable? I’m sure I’ve done it a lot!
Luckily for me, this time I was given the gift of proving myself wrong.
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Tagged as 1950s-1960s, Book Review, Feminism, Fiction, Reading Advice