Year of the Monkey by Patti Smith

        This is the book that sent me on the trail of books I'm still following now. From this to The One Inside by Sam Shepard to Monsieur Pain by Bolaño and now 2666 by Bolaño as well. There's a common thread between these stories, they're all mysteries with no answers, and all quite surreal.
        It's hard to tell how much of Year of the Monkey is true and how much is fiction, as it drifts between reality and dream with little indication. I found it best to let myself be carried, and then the mystery became the focus. It's not a conventional mystery because there are no individuals involved. Instead, Smith is investigating a mystery of worldwide occurences, of climate disasters happening everywhere, to the election of Donald Trump, to the death of a friend and disablement of another, and a number of small bizarre moments in Smith's life. The culprit of these events is not even a human, as is revealed in the end, though she does give it a name.
        There's very little pressure with this book, it seems like it was written with ease, a stream of events, and is easy to read, too. There's no pressure to stay on top of it, no pressure to investigate the clues because Smith is the investigator and this book is just a series of findings. It feels like there is no more she can say beyond what she's said, but the mystery is still bigger than what is written. I think that may be the essence of any ambiguous or abstract art. A good artist isn't witholding. If we can't understand fully what they're saying, it's because it can't be clearly explained.

Monsieur Pain, Roberto Bolaño

        Monsieur Pain is a Parisian Mesmerist, paranoid loner, and a WWI veteran. This story is a mystery that opens and closes before we (or Monsieur Pain) are able to fully comprehend it, yet we are given an answer at the end. An answer that only raises more questions about the essence of the mystery that precedes it.
        Pain is riding downhill, often looking back at his youth. He's watching himself slide into poverty and not making any effort to stop. He's pulled into the mystery by a woman (whom he secretly loves) pleading that he try his occult healing practice on her old friend's husband, who lays in a pertpetual hiccup fit that threatens to kill him. I'll spare you the details from here, it's worth discovering as you go.

        The strongest element of this novella was not its overall mystery (which, as I said, is unending to this day), but its moment to moment occurences. Throughout most of the story, Pain is wandering the streets of Paris, following some whim or idea or nothing at all. He finds himself in strange places seemingly out of time, and Bolaño does an incredible job of handing you all the fear and paranoia straight from Pain's thoughts, including a couple of chilling moments that may be a thrill to read in a dark room. Descriptions of the darkened streets, the winding hospital corridors, twisted night clubs and junk warehouses pull you into his world.

        And through these strange places, Pain is haunted by images of his old life creeping in, like some unseen hand is trying to lure him, placing references to his old mentor and colleagues, alive and dead, whom he hasn't seen for many years.

        It's a short, strong story that may not work for you, but it's worth a try. It didn't leave me with much immediately, but the questions still occur to me, more and more as the months go by.

Howards End, by E.M. Forster

        Howards End has a beautiful and simple premise that spans the whole of first-world society, from the poorest to the richest, illustrating a wide variety of the sentiments that travel between these groups, the pity, ignorance, desire for culture, glorification, degradation, and everybody's own ideas of what is most important in life. This is a universal book, at least I felt it to be so, but the story is told within a microcosm of it all, in England during the turn of the century, and our main characters are the Schelgel sisters, Margaret, practical and lively, and Helen, youthful and dramatic, a pair safely nestled in the upper-middle class due to a sizable inheritance. They encounter the Wilcox family, the stone cold mastermind Henry, his wife the gentle old Ruth who lives small and feels her entire existence is encompassed within her old family home, Howards End. Lastly, there is Leonard Bast, a starving young man locked into poverty but looking to become cultured.Throughout the book, their lives become entwined and certain facets of these personalities come to the forefront. We see how each character admires one, despises another, all on the basis of their philosophies for what life is about. They discuss this all openly and plainly, especially between Margarget and Helen, who have extremely open conversations. Politics come up often, for example women's suffrage, a hot topic at the time, and social welfare. The story of the Schlegels and the Wilcoxes is a story of rocks smashing together in unexpected ways, and always creating sparks, bringing to mind conflicts we all have within ourselves. Arts and culture against practical living, the sanctity of property ownership, money vs. life and death, and of course it can't give us any answers but it makes clear there are some people who are at complete equilibrium with these things, and others who think they know what is best. All the while, there's some great drama (unexpected pregnancy, old love affairs revealed, and DEATH) and some good fun. Not a dull moment.

Hatchet, by Gary Paulsen

We listened to this on a road trip to LA a few weeks ago. 3 1/2 hours (which is short for an audiobook), gripping wilderness survival story. Like many books in this category it made me want to up my wilderness survival game, and keep matches and water purification tablets in my purse at all times. Read by Peter Coyote. Great for 9 year old boys and 50 year old women alike. Recommend!

The Rules Do Not Apply, by Ariel Levy

I read this review/profile of The Rules Do Not Apply in The New York Times and reserved it at the library right away. Memoirs are a guilty pleasure for me, and especially gossipy ones about someone my own age, living in places I've lived, struggling with problems I've struggled with myself. The self-focused preference most kids have for reading about kids their own age and gender has, I guess, never left me. So I read it, fast. I don't want to give away the details of the story but it was a juicy diary. But it felt somehow unfinished. Too much like reading someone's diary, not enough narrative motion, not enough about the characters, and maybe not enough gossip. I've loved other memoirs much more.

That said, I do love the cover and the Jennifer Reese signature pink & red color combo. And can we all agree that she looks quite a bit like Annie Parr from Roco Dance?

Mister Miracle, by Tom King

A great comic book miniseries about a lesser-known hero, Scott Free, AKA Mister Miracle, legendary escape artist. He was born son of the benevolent god Highfather on the planet New Genesis, but raised in the fiery slave pits of the planet Apokolips, ruled by the tyrant Darkseid. He comes from a group of characters called the New Gods. Knowing the mythology of these characters helps with the enjoyment of Mister Miracle, but the book works on many levels so it's not necessary. The best superhero stories use the otherworldly aspects of the characters, their powers and cosmic origins, in tandem with their very human vulnerabilities and problems. This book begins with Scott, now living on Earth, attempting suicide. He states it was an attempt to escape death, but we see that he's depressed and disassociated. He wasn't trying to escape death, he was trying to escape life. The art of the book is presented like an old television set, often being interrupted by static. The narration is that of an old mystery serial or golden age comic book. This all feels like a representation of Scott's disassociation with reality. Everything feels off, he keeps showing signs of some inexplicable unrest, not knowing what's wrong with his mind, something like what motivated his suicide. He says he can escape anything, as he proves in many cases, but he can't escape this disconnect. Until one day he realizes he can. And for reasons I can't spoil for you, he decides not to. Check it out.

The Ghosts of Belfast

I recently finished The Ghosts of Belfast, a first novel by Stuart Neville.  The story is set in Northern Ireland after the truce that brought relative peace following "the troubles."  The protagonist is Gerry Fegan, a former paramilitary hitman, recently released from 12 years in prison.  He is a broken man, a drunk who talks to himself and is generally considered to be insane.  In fact, he is tortured by guilt and is haunted by the ghosts of 12 of his victims who follow him, demanding that he atone by taking revenge on the men responsible for the orders that resulted in their deaths. And so he goes about more killing until the ghosts are finally satisfied.  The book is well written and gripping.  Bad as Fegan is, he emerges as a sympathetic figure here. The treatment of the ghosts is very effective:  they don't speak, but appeal to Fegan with gestures and expressions to identify the men they want killed. They have the moral force to make him act, and as each is avenged he drops out of the picture and no longer haunts Fegan.  This actually works, and it is very powerful.