Brain on Fire by Susannah Cahalan

Brain on Fire  is the true story of a young woman who had it all together and inexplicably begins to lose it. She begins to have odd physical problems, paranoia, and other various irrational behaviors. Her family and friends are shocked and don't know what to do. Fortunately, they manage to get her the help she needs.

What makes this book so special? Well, the author and subject is an amazingly gifted writer. She's also a reporter and a thorough researcher. She did a great job of going back to the times that she couldn't remember and getting information to fill in the blanks of what happened. She admits she is biased, as we all are when telling our own stories. But Susannah (I feel like I got to know her so well by reading this book that we are on a first name basis) tries hard to be fair to everyone involved in her trip through madness. Another thing that makes it an enjoyable read is her recovery, and the bittersweetness of the researching/telling her story (i.e., writing the book) which is integral to her getting her life back and moving on to keep living. I found her inspiring. 

Definitely recommend this one, and hope she will continue to write books ... I would read pretty much anything she writes. 

Reviewer:  Lorien Goodale

Guitar Zero by Gary Marcus

As a new student of the bass guitar (and in my forties) I was intrigued by the author's personal story. After trying unsuccessfully to play musical instruments in the past, he took up the guitar in his late thirties. He wondered how disadvantaged he would be by his age, lack of experience, and apparent lack of rhythm. The book is the result of research into his questions. Is there a gene for musical talent? Does one's age at beginning to learn about music really matter, and how much? What are the advantages of pursuing music - even if you could never be a professional? 

There is a lot about how the brain works. Honestly, it is not the kind of book I usually read, and I went into it thinking I could skim the research/scientific parts if it got too painful. I was surprised and relieved to find that this aspect wasn't bad. Most of it was interesting. I loved reading about the author's experiences learning the guitar, and his interviews with gifted musicians. It was great to hear all these different perspectives on playing stringed instruments and the music world. And the actual text of the book is about 200 pages, which is not really that long. 

I recommend this book to people who are considering taking up musical training at any age, or their parents, and to anyone who is interested in how musicians are made and think.  

Reviewer:  Lorien Goodale

The Ice Balloon: S. A. Andree and the Heroic Age of Artic Exploration. Alec Wilkinson, Knopf Publishing Group, 2012

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Until I saw the review of this book in the New York Times Book Review, I had no idea anyone had tried to find the North Pole by balloon.  In addition to telling the story of Andree, the book also tells the story of Adolphus Greely (1881-1884) and Fridtjof Nanen’s Fram expedition of 1893-1896. 

It seems naïve that Andree thought he could fly a balloon to the North Pole and return in a few weeks, but that is exactly what he proposed to do in 1897.  After spending several years planning and constructing his balloon, he and two other companions set off from the northmost point of Sweden, never to be seen alive again.  Pigeons sent back by Andree gave misleading information and all efforts to find Andree and his men were unsucessful.  According to Andree’s jounal, found with his remains in 1930, the balloon had crashed after three days because the fabric was unable to hold sufficient hydrogen to keep it aloft.  Along with the journal, photographs tell the story of the three’s efforts to make it south.  At first successful in keeping warm and fed by  hunting bears and seals, the men eventually sucummed to the harsh conditions and died. 

The North Pole has since been conguored by airplane, skis, sleds, and motor car, but it was not until 2010 that French explorer Jean-Louis Etienne completed the first solo balloon trip across the North Pole.

This fast paced book is very much worth reading, if not for the history of the polar exploits, but for the effect that these explorations had on the participants, the family, and the nations.

Reviewer: Dorothy Pittman

Into the Silence: the Great war, Mallory, and the Conquest of Everest, Wade Davis, Knopft Publishing Group. 2011.

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One can almost smell the hubris and testerone when reading this book about the men who tried to conquor Everest in the 1920s.  Davis goes into great detail about the World War I experiences of the various members of the Everest explorations in the 1920s.  Included in the narrative is a short history of Britain’s influence in the political affairs of the Tibet, China, and the other countries sitting atop the Himalayas. 

Davis details how each of the three explorations were planned and executed.  The underlying reason seems to be that because Britain had not bee successful in the search for either of the Poles and no one had been lost in an effort to ascent to the top of the highest mountain, then it was up to Britain to conguor it.  Because of that, anyone who was not a true “Brit” was excluded from the first expedition even if the individual had experience in high altitude climbing.

Anyone who has read Into Thin Air  and books on Everest and Mallory will enjoy reading this extensively reseasrch book.

Reviewer: Dorothy Pittman

Barnaby Grimes

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The creators of the Edge Chronicles, author Paul Stewart and illustrator Chris Riddell, have created a new series featuring Barnaby Grimes, a tick-tock lad, who “highstacks” across the tall buildings of Dickensian London to deliver messages, documents, and other items as contracted to do for its businessmen and residents.

In the first of the series, Curse of the Night Wolf, Barnaby is attached by an enormous dog and soon finds himself in the world of a very unusual doctor who dispenses a special cordial to the poor and unknown, and a lady seamstress who creates fashions with the much-desired “Wesphalian Trim.”

After delivery a strange parcel to a boy’s school headmaster, Barnaby becomes concerned when he finds that the students have imprisoned the master and are dressed in feathers and war paint. In the Return of the Emerald Skull, he must solve the puzzle of the school before it is too late for the headmaster.

Barnaby does not believe his eyes when he see the decaying body of the leader of the gangs in London rises up from his own grave.  Faced with a Legion of the Dead, Barnaby must find a way to defeat them before they take over the city.

There is a Phantom in Blood Alley that can disappear into then air. After an experiment with photographic chemical goes disastrously wrong, it is up to Barnaby to find the mad chemist before an innocent person is tried for murder.

Reviewer: Dorothy Pittman

The Death of Arthur: Thomas Malory’s “Le Morte d’Arthur.” Retold by Peter Ackroyd. Viking, 2012.

Now I know why I never read Malory’s  Le Morte d’Arthur  until now.  These tales, beautifully retold by Peter Ackroyd, have knights fighting for the honor of a chaste woman while bedding down any other women they can find.  Arthur is a boorish king who has no compunction in having his Queen Guinevere to be burned for infidelity while he has managed to bed down his half sister and sire Sir Mordred.  And then there is Sir Lancelot, who marries a fair maid, but will not bed her because of his love for Guinevere.  As for Sir Galahad,  son of Sir Lancelot, his search for the Holy Grail is just a round of fight after fight until the Grail disappears.  Knights number in the thousands in a country that probably had only a few hundred inhabitants and kings and knights can travel hundreds of miles in a couple of days in a country where there are no real roads.  I know it is oral tradition and fantasy, but at least make it believable.

Reviewer:  Dorothy Pittman

The Tigress of Forli: Renaissance Italy’s Most Courageous and Notorious Countess, Caterina Riario Sforza de ‘Medici. Elizabeth Levi. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012.

Not until the end of the 19^th and early 20^th century were women considered anything other than property to bought and sold.  So it was that Caterina, the illegitimate child of Galeazzo Maria Sforza, was sold at age ten to her first husband, a debauched 30-year-old nephew of the Pope, who demanded consummation of the marriage immediately before he left for Rome, leaving this bride still in the care of her father.

At age 13, Caterina travelled to Rome to live with her husband in the Papal Palace.  She soon realized that there was no substance to her husband although he managed to get her pregnant five times in nine years.

After the assassination of her husband, Caterina began to goven her husban’s lands in Forili and keeping would be kidnappers at bay.  It was at this time that she fell in love with Giacomo Feo, a glorified stable boy whom she knighted and married.  When he was murdered, Caterina “went ballistic” killing at least thirty-eight people and torturing, exiling, or imprisoning many others.  Soon afterwards, she married for the third time a Medici, Giovanni di Pierfrancesco.  After his death, her fortress was attached by Venice.  As she had been trained to fight as a young girl, it was not an unusual thing to see her in armor welding a sword against her foes.  Defeated by Cesare Borgia, she was imprisoned until she won her freedom.  She died soon afterwards at the age of forty-six.

As a student of powerful women in history, Caterina shines among those who was true to herself, even though she lost all of her power and possessions. 

Reviewer: Dorothy Pittman

London Under: The Secret History Beneath the Streets. Peter Ackroyd. Doubleday, 2012.

Anyone who has visited London has, at one time or another, ridden on the Underground. With its iconic map and stations, it is just an integral part of London as is Big Ben and the Tower Bridge.  But there is more beneath the streets of London than just the Underground.  Peter Ackroyd, author of London: The Biography and Thames: The Biography, has now gone below ground to discover the many wonders found there.

As London grew along the clay and gravel that comprised the banks of the Thames, the other smaller rivers, i.e. e. the Fleet, flowing to it carried all the filth and detritus from its inhabitants. London stank until city engineer, Joseph Bazalgette, designed and built in 1858 the first real sewers, some of which are still in use.  Later Charles Pearson developed the plan for the underground system that is it at the heart of the story.

Of particular interest was the use of the Underground as air-raid shelters during World War II.  Initially discouraged by the government, the citizens of London took over the Underground stations, developing a complex city with its own newspaper.

London Under is a wonderful tour of the city below with its tubes, rivers, sewers, and human remains.  The next time I ride on the Tube, it will be with a new attitude and respect for the ground under and above us.

Reviewer:  Dorothy Pittman