I can tell it’s not summer yet. The sky is still gray. The temperatures are still below sixty. And while Opening Day and the log boom ritual may be scheduled for this weekend, the quality literature arriving on the Front Table tells me that we still haven’t reached beach reading season. We’ve got one more month to enjoy thought provoking novels and informative non-fiction before the arrival of the sun distracts us and lures us to more frivolous pursuits.
Even the title of Thrity Umrigar’s latest novel, The Weight of Heaven, tells us this book fits the prevailing monthly theme. Frank and Ellie Benton are living a typical American family’s happy life until their seven-year-old son dies suddenly of meningitis. The weight of this loss is threatening to destroy their relationship until Frank decides to accept a job offer in a coastal town in India. Ellie adapts well to the new environment but Frank struggles with the difficulties of work in another culture, preferring the distraction of a growing friendship with the young son of the Benton’s cook and maid. Bombay-born Umrigar uses the colorful background of her native country to highlight the difficulties of the Benton’s loss but ultimately it’s the emotional baggage they brought with them to India that determines their fate. $25.99
Author and educator James Tooley was also in India when he made a discovery that changed his thinking and his career. In The Beautiful Tree: A Personal Journey into How the World’s Poorest People Are Educating Themselves, he describes how, while in India to assess state-run schools, he accidentally discovered that the poorer neighborhoods were full of small, ill-equipped private schools that were passionate about teaching. He then investigated similar schools in China and Africa, leading him to become an advocate for international assistance to this grass-roots movement. The later chapters of his book present his ideas for a system of vouchers and credits that would assist poor parents in their quest to educate their children. As Tooley argues his case he manages to keep the writing interesting with the moving stories of academic achievement against tremendous odds that he has personally witnessed. $19.95
Bulgarian-born author Iliya Troyanov also takes us to India in The Collector of Worlds: A Novel of Sir Francis Richard Burton. Burton’s fantastic 19th century career as a military man, linguist, author and explorer is the stuff of legends so it’s appropriate to have it presented in fictional form. The novel centers on three famous periods in Burton’s life: his military time in India, his adventure in Mecca disguised as an Indian doctor making the Hajj, and his exploration of African lakes with John Speke. Translated from the German, Troyanov’s award-winning novel is not straight forward bio-fiction. He uses multiple narrators and a non-linear style to tell parts of Burton’s story, leaving it to the reader to supply beginnings and endings. He does, on the other hand, create richly detailed images of Burton’s exotic travels and moving portraits of the people he encountered. This is fascinating historical fiction that is challenging literature, not light beach reading. $24.99
As long as we’re following explorers to faraway places, let’s join Tom Avery in To the End of the Earth. After finishing an expedition to the South Pole, young British adventurer Avery’s friends kept asking him, “What’s next?” He decided that his next logical trip (certainly not my definition of logic) would be to attempt to recreate Richard Perry’s amazing and controversial 37 day trek to the North Pole. Avery’s team used replica wooden sleds and dog teams to negotiate punishing ice fields, pressure ridges, streams of open water, and bitter temperatures. In the end they managed to better Peary’s time by four hours, proving that Peary’s record was at least possible. Avery mixes in tales from the history of polar exploration along with the page-turning details of his team’s trek so you can even learn something while you’re getting your virtual adventure travel fix. Alright, I admit, this one is pretty much a fun read despite the ice and near death experiences. $26.95
Rejoice, Anne Michaels fans. The author of Fugitive Pieces has finally written a second novel. The Winter Vault tells the story of yet another couple torn apart by loss, but Michaels’ luminous writing elevates it to a tale of heartbreaking poignancy. The novel begins in Egypt where Avery Escher is a Canadian engineer on the team attempting to rescue the monuments of Abu Simbel before the waters on the new Aswan Dam inundate the valley. His wife Jean, a botanist, becomes pregnant, only to deliver a stillborn girl, a loss the couple is unable to deal with. They try to move on with new loves and new careers but there are still ties that hold them together. Michaels is primarily a poet and her descriptions of the settings of Egypt and Canada and the elegant way she weaves the themes of drowning and displacement through the plot are what make this novel more than just a love story. $25.00
The Front Table book that comes closest to a light read this month still has some pretty serious themes. About Face is the eighteenth (!) installment of Donna Leon’s popular mystery series starring Commissario Guido Brunetti that began with 1992’s Death at La Fenice. This time around, the Venetian police detective is asked by a colleague in the Carabiniere to investigate a case of illegal garbage hauling. (In real life, Leon is concerned that problems with pollution are reaching critical levels all around Italy.) Brunetti also gets a request from his aristocratic father-in-law to look into the background of a potential business partner. Soon a mysterious beautiful woman, a dead body and evidence of the inevitable official corruption enter the picture and we are drawn into yet another thrilling Italian adventure. Leon gets consistent high marks from the critics for the quality of her plots and characters and this latest book is no exception. $24.00
Enjoy these last days of cool, cloudy weather!
Tags: about face, beautiful tree, books, collector of worlds, terrell, to the end of the earth, travel, weight of heaven, window vault
