100. The Prince - Niccolo Machiavelli

100!! I did it!!

What a fascinating book! Published in 1532, this political treatise is basically Machiavelli's master plan for seizing and holding power. Apparently, Machiavelli sent it to Lorenzo de Medici, a member of the Florentine family that basically ruled the center of the Renaissance. In it, Machiavelli discusses the qualities of principalities (basically, what a prince has control over) and the reasons for their successes and failures. He also shows how many men try to acquire and keep these principalities, and discusses means of attack and defense that can be applied to defend them.

Some of Machiavelli's assertions are, in my opinion, quite true and realistic ... while others are quite disturbing. While I was reading this book, I found myself taking so many notes: this will definitely be a book that I buy and will have to re-read. I'll share some parts that stood out to me.

Cruelty can be called well used (if it is even permitted to use the word "well" in connection with evil) if it is executed at a single stroke out of the necessity to secure one's power, and then is not continued but converted into the greatest possible benefit for one's subjects. Badly used cruelty is cruelty that, even if initially limited, increases with time rather than subsiding.

Also, from the chapter entitled "Of The Different Types of Armies, and of Mercenaries":

The prince must therefore never shift his attention from the exercise of war, even in times of peace, and he must do this both in action and in mind. As for action, he must not only keep his troops well trained and organized, but must also himself continuously go out hunting, keeping his body accustomed to hardship, while learning the lay of the land ... He must do this with the greatest application[.]

In other words: be prepared, and know your enemies! This is a great quote that every president should read:

The choice of advisers is very important for a prince: Advisers are able or not, depending on the prince's wisdom. One can assess a prince's intelligence by looking at men with whom he surrounds himself. If they are capable and loyal, one can consider the prince prudent, because he was able to discern their ability and managed to keep them loyal. But when these men are lacking in quality, one can consider the prince as deficient because it is in choosing his advisers that he can make his first mistake.

I also loved the chapter on whether it is better to be feared or loved. I would absolutely love to read what other writers have said about it: it's only four pages, but it is so deep! Someone should write a book applying that idea to the concept of how we view God. God is supposed to be the the Creator, the All-Merciful, the All-Loving ... but it's considered a positive attribute to be "God-fearing." Is it better that we love God - or fear God?

I'm glad I ended on such a great piece of work. Thank you SO much to all who have been following my blog and for your thoughtful and insightful comments. I'll be taking a break from reading for a few days ... but don't worry, I'll be back! :)

99. What Is This Thing Called I? - Allen C. Carter

In this book, clinical psychologist Allen Carter explains how our minds often function by obeying "commandments" dictated by false gods that he calls "the creator god," "the we-god," and the "i-god." He explains how we can overcome being victims of these commandments by identifying who we truly are, through what Carter calls "the ten acceptances and their gifts."

In the chapter about one of the "i-god" commandments about how we often believe that we are unworthy and guilty with shameful pasts, Carter explains how forgiveness can often free us from these feelings of guilt.

True forgiveness recognizes that there is no guilt and never was! People just do what they do. Behavior is neutral. It is our judgment that makes the behavior right or wrong ... Yet, what about those others who hurt us, who did not love us, who used us, or abused us? What about them? The answer, dear reader, is "Forgive them for they know not what they do," or more accurately, they do not know who they are. They do not know that they are loved unconditionally. If they did, they would not hurt us, abuse us, or leave us.

I wasn't a fan of the first part of this book: it's supposed to the dialog in a class that he taught at Morehouse College, though the "dialog" seemed a bit phony and forced. But the next four parts were written better. The book fits pretty squarely into the lump category of self-help books by Deepak Chopra, Wayne Dyer, and others. The only difference is that it was by a black author and he often talks about the black experience while exploring these subjects. Overall: a decent book.

98. Memories of My Melancholy Whores - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The first line of this book shows how absolutely bizarre it is:

The year I turned ninety, I wanted to give myself the gift of a night of wild love with an adolescent virgin.

Wow. The unnamed protagonist has never been married or been in love, and has had a relatively sad, lonely, and unexciting life in Colombia. In fact, when he was twenty, he started keeping a record listing the name, age, place, and "a brief notation of the circumstances and style of lovemaking": by the time he was fifty, there were 514 women with whom he had been at least once. (I was amazed at how similar this was to what Florentino Ariza did in Love in the Time of Cholera by the same author). He approaches Rosa Cabarcas, the "madame" at the city's best brothel, to help him with his wish. He meets a fourteen year old girl with whom he becomes infatuated, and ultimately makes arrangements with Rosa to continue seeing her outside of the brothel.

As frightening and pedophile-ish as this all sounds, the old man really ends up seeming more like a tender voyeur than a sex-starved nonagenarian. He meets with the girl ... and watches her sleep. He says:

This was something new for me. I was ignorant of the arts of seduction and had always chosen my brides for a night at random, more for their price than their charms, and we had made love without love, half-dressed most of the time and
always in the dark, so we could imagine ourselves as better than we were ... That night I discovered the improbably pleasure of contemplating the body of a sleeping woman without the urgencies of desire or the obstacles of modesty.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez is such an amazing writer. I loved this part:

I confronted my inner self for the first time as my ninetieth year went by. I discovered that my obsession for having each thing in the right place, each subject at the right time, each word in the right style, was not the well-deserved reward of an ordered mind but just the opposite: a complete system of pretense invented by me to hide the disorder of my nature. I discovered that I am not disciplined out of virtue but as a reaction to my negligence, that I appear generous in order to conceal my meanness, that I pass myself off as prudent because I am evil-minded, that I am conciliatory in order not to succumb to my repressed rage, that I am punctual only to hide how little I care about people's time. I learned, in short, that love is not a condition of the spirit but a sign of the zodiac.

Ultimately, this seems to be a twisted story of love - and also of the old man finally finding himself at ninety years of age.

[whew. two more books to go! ...]

97. The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream - Barack Obama

For some reason, I thought that this book would be a "part 2" to Dreams from My Father, but it was definitely much different: less biographical, a lot more about "the issues." In this book, Obama writes in depth about his personal views on faith and values, repairing the broken political process, and issues like education, renewable energy, and the partisan divide.

I appreciated the way that Obama did not hide from the fact that he is a Democrat - but he was not as incendiary as Sarah Palin. From one part:

... Conservatives, for instance, tend to bristle when it comes to government interference in the marketplace or their right to bear arms. Yet many of these same conservatives show little to no concern when it comes to government wiretapping without a warrant or government attempts to control people's sexual practices. Conversely, it's easy to get most liberals riled up about government encroachments on freedom of the press or a woman's reproductive freedoms. But if you have a conversation with these same liberals about the potential costs of regulation to a small-business owner, you will often draw a blank stare.

I really admire and respect his more balanced approach - especially because he still stands his ground on what he believes.

I also really liked reading about an insider's perspective of Washington. The stories that he told about his interactions with Senator Byrd and President Bush were great! This part was also revealing:

If you ask my eight-year-old what I do for a living, she might say I make laws. And yet one of the surprising things about Washington is the amount of time spent arguing not about what the law should be, but rather what the law is. The simplest statute - a requirement, say, that companies provide bathroom breaks for their hourly workers - can become the subject of wildly different interpretations, depending on whom you are talking to: the congressman who sponsored the provision, the staffer who delivered it, the department head whose job it is to enforce it, the lawyer whose client finds it inconvenient, or the judge who may be called upon to apply it.

My favorite chapter was actually the last one, entitled "Family." Likely because I want to be Michelle Obama when I grow up ... I loved reading what he had to say about their marriage and their children. I laughed out loud when I read this story:

...I called Michelle from my D.C. office and started explaining the significance of the bill – how shoulder-to-air missiles could threaten commercial air travel if they fell into the wrong hands, how small-arms stockpiles left over from the Cold War continued to feed conflict across the globe. Michelle cut me off.
“We have ants.”
“Huh?”
“I found ants in the kitchen. And in the bathroom upstairs.”
“Okay…”
“I need you to buy some ant traps on your way home tomorrow. I’d get them myself, but I’ve got to take the girls to their doctor’s appointment after school. Can you do that for me?”
“Right. Ant traps.”
“Ant traps. Don’t forget, okay honey? And buy more than one. Listen, I need to go to a meeting. Love you.”
I hung up the receiver, wondering if Ted Kennedy or John McCain bought ant traps on the way home from work.

Perfection! Obama is a ridiculously amazing writer - and he makes even some of the drier topics sound quite interesting. I'll probably re-read this book some time in the near future.

96. Shades of Freedom: Racial Politics and Presumptions of the American Legal Process Race and the American Legal Process - A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr.

I was incredibly impressed by this well-researched and well-documented book by Higginbotham, a former Third Circuit judge. He gives a very thorough analysis of the "interaction between the law and racial oppression in America" (from the back of the book - but said so well). The first part of the book explains how perceptions of black inferiority developed, and how they came to influence our society so much. He also discusses the U.S. Constitution's references to slavery; the Supreme Court's sanction of racism in decisions like Plessy v. Ferguson and Dred Scott v. Sanford; and the unequal criminal justice system.
One passage that jumped out to me was from a part in which Higginbotham was discussing Harriet Beecher Stowe's book, Uncle Tom's Cabin:

Those who are oppressed may have the capacity to be brave and noble like everyone else, but the oppression itself is probably not what makes them brave and noble. Those who are oppressed may be in possession of certain absolute and simple truths beyond the knowledge of others, but chief among those truths is that freedom is preferable to oppression. Yet those who insist on seeing beauty in oppression often do so to assuage their guilt for contributing to that oppression. That is why the temptation to find beauty and nobility in suffering and oppression has a long and distinguished history.

Also, from the Dred Scott decision: did you know that Chief Justice Taney made twenty-one references to African Americans as inferior and to whites as dominant or superior? (i.e. African Americans being an "inferior class of beings"; an "unfortunate race"; and "unfit to associate with the white race"). And of course we all know that blacks were unable to serve as witnesses or jurors in court. This especially posed problems where a white man was sued by a black man, or was prosecuted for a crime against a black man, because the black man could not testify; nor could black witnesses. Clearly, this often led to a miscarriage of justice. To imagine a time where such things overtly pervaded our legal system.

And from President Abraham Lincoln:

I am not, nor have I ever been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races .... and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of superior and inferior, I am as much as any other man in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.

I think a lot of people forget how pervasive these beliefs were, and how they really influenced not only behavior but legislation and jurisprudence!

How humbling to have finished reading this book the same day that I was sworn in as a lawyer.

95. What Your Doctor Doesn't Know about Nutritional Medicine May Be Killing You - Ray D. Strand

In this book, Dr. Strand puts forth his arguments in favor of "nutritional medicine" - vitamins, minerals, and other supplements - and how these are essential to combating a lot of diseases. He defines "nutritional medicine" as a way to supplement pharmaceuticals (if needed) - to be distinguished from "alternative medicine," which is an alternative to pharmaceuticals. According to Strand:

Scientific research has established beyond a shadow of a reasonable doubt that oxidative stress, or cell damage caused by free radicals, is the root cause of more than seventy chronic degenerative diseases.

He devotes a good amount of time to explaining diseases such as fibromyalgia, lung disease, and diabetes. In the chapter about diabetes, he explains how Americans tend to eat way too many high-glycemic foods like white bread, white flour, pasta, and rice (meaning they cause blood sugars to rise very rapidly and stimulate the release of insulin). When our blood sugar drops, we feel hungry - so we eat again sooner. After a while, the release of insulin becomes overstimulated so often that our bodies become less sensitive to it.

It was interesting for me to have read Fast Food Nation recently, because Strand talks about a lot of the same things that Schlosser did. He explains that the RDAs (recommended daily allowances) set forth by the FDA are not very useful. Also: 17% of the American population does not eat any vegetables; and if we exclude French fries and baked potatoes - more than half of the population is not eating any vegetables!

Strand definitely made it clearer to me what these "free radicals" are that I keep hearing about; as well as what anti-oxidants are and why they're so important.

94. The Selfish Gene - Richard Dawkins

In this book, Richard Dawkins argues for the "gene-centered" view of evolution: in other words, that natural selection operates at the level of the gene rather than the organism, and that organisms are responsible for transmitting genes across generations.
Dawkins explains that even though we are born "selfish," we can overcome this selfishness by developing and improving ourselves as human beings through altruism and education. In one chapter that I enjoyed, he explains that "nice people finish first" - i.e. they're more likely to survive and prosper. He also argues against the premise that evolutionary theory somehow inspires selfish, aggressive, and competitive behavior.
I also enjoyed the chapter on "memes" - units of cultural transmission - as important contributors to human evolution (i.e. songs, rituals, religions, prejudices, etc.).
I have to admit that a lot of what Dawkins was talking about was over my head. I understood most of it - but I wasn't always sure how it all fit in with his overall premise. I also didn't find some of the material that interesting just because I don't consider myself to be so wrapped up in the whole debate about evolution as a lot of people are!

93. Gideon's Trumpet - Anthony Lewis

I was supposed to read this book the summer before I started law school (but never did). Now that I've finally read it three years later, I can definitely understand why it was assigned! This book tells the story behind Gideon v. Wainwright, the 1963 U.S. Supreme Court decision which held that states are required under the Sixth Amendment (of course, as incorporated through the Fourteenth) to provide counsel for criminal defendants who are unable to afford their own attorneys. I say that I now understand why it was assigned because Lewis does a fantastic job of explaining how a case gets all the way up to the Supreme Court; the procedure behind four justices deciding whether to grant a writ of certiorari; the role of the law clerks; etc. What I particularly enjoyed about this book was how Lewis gave so much context and background of the case itself, such as including letters that the defendant (Gideon) wrote to his lawyers.
For example, when Gideon learned that attorney Abe Fortas, had been appointed to represent him for his appeal to the Supreme Court, he wrote to Fortas asking him if there was any information he could provide that would help with the case. Fortas replied and told Gideon that "a little background" would help ... Gideon replied with a twenty-two page letter about his entire life that concluded as follows:

I have no illusions about law and courts or the people who are involved in them. I have read the complete history of law ever since the Romans first started writing them down and before of the laws of religions. I believe that each new era finds an improvement in law each year brings something new for the benefit of mankind. Maybe this will be one of those small steps forward, in the past thirty-five years I have seen great advancement in Courts in penal servitude. Thank you for reading all of this. Please try to believe that all I want now from life is the chance for the love of my children the only real love I have ever had.

Doesn't that put such a human face on such a landmark decision?! In the decision itself, the Court overruled Betts v. Brady and held that the right to the assistance of counsel was a fundamental right, essential for a fair trial, and emphasized the procedural safeguards needed for due process of law.

The amount of detail might make this book more likeable by lawyers and/or people who are interested in the law. Although some of the case law discussed is a bit outdated (this book was published in 1964), it's a great read.

92. Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance - Barack Obama

Dreams from My Father is the autobiography of President Obama, published in 1995 after he was elected to be the first black president of the Harvard Law Review, but before the start of his political career. In addition to telling the story of his life, Obama talks a lot about his personal experiences with race and discovering his identity.

Most of us know the basics of Obama's life: he was born in Hawaii to a father from Kenya and a mother from Kansas, and his parents separated when he was just two years old. Obama's image of his absent father was created by stories told by his mother and her parents; he didn't get to spend time with his father until he was ten years old when his father came to Hawaii for a month-long visit. His father died in a drunk driving car accident in 1982.

Obama moved with his mother to Indonesia when she married Lolo Soetoro, but returned to Hawaii to live with his grandparents when he was ten years old for better educational opportunities. He stayed there until the end of high school, after which he moved to LA where he attended Occidental College. In discussing his freshman year, Obama says:

... [O]ur worries seemed indistinguishable from those of the white kids around us. Surviving classes. Finding a well-paying gig after graduation. Trying to get laid. I had stumbled upon one of the well-kept secrets about black people: that most of us weren’t interested in revolt; that most of us were tired of thinking about race all the time; that if we preferred to keep to ourselves it was mainly because that was the easiest way to stop thinking about it, easier than spending all your time mad or trying to guess whatever it was that white folks were thinking about you.

Even though this next passage is a bit long, it has so much depth:

That was the problem with people like Joyce. They talked about the richness of their multicultural heritage and it sounded real good, until you noticed that they avoided black people. It wasn’t a matter of conscious choice, necessarily, just a matter of gravitational pull, the way integration always worked, a one-way street. The minority assimilated into the dominant culture, not the other way around. Only white culture could be neutral and objective. Only white culture could be nonracial, willing to adopt the occasional exotic into its ranks. Only white culture had individuals. And we, the half-breeds and the college-degreed, take a survey of the situation and think to ourselves, Why should we get lumped in with the losers if we don’t have to? We become only so grateful to lose ourselves in the crowd, America’s happy, faceless marketplace; and we’re never so outraged as when a cabbie drives past us or the woman in the elevator clutches her purse, not so much because we’re bothered by the fact that such indignities are what less fortunate coloreds have to put up with every single day of their lives--although that's what we tell ourselves--but because we're wearing a Brooks Brothers suit and speak impeccable English and yet have somehow been mistaken for an ordinary nigger.

Obama finished up his last two years of college at Columbia University and then moved to Chicago where he worked for a non-profit organization doing community organizing for the Altgeld Gardens housing project on the South Side. It was during this time that he decided to visit Kenya for the first time. On his way there, the flight attendant looks at Obama and asks him if he is related to Dr. Obama (i.e. Obama Sr.). It turns out their families were close.

I found myself trying to prolong the conversation, encouraged less by Miss Omoro’s beauty – she had mentioned a fiance’ – than by the fact that she’d recognized my name. That had never happened before, I realized; not in Hawaii, not in Indonesia, not in L.A. or New York or Chicago. For the first time in my life, I felt the comfort, the firmness of identity that a name might provide, how it could carry an entire history in other people’s memories, so that they might nod and say knowingly, “Oh, you are so and so’s son.” No one here in Kenya would ask how to spell my name, or mangle it with an unfamiliar tongue.

Something that came to mind after having read this book and Sarah Palin's book was Palin's comment during the 2008 campaign about how she loved to visit the "pro-America" parts of the country - implicitly implying that there were some parts of the country that she believed to not be "pro-America." Even though she later apologized for that comment, her book, in my opinion, maintained that same tone: the people who are "patriotic" and "so American" are the people who are most similar to her America. This memoir by Obama was very revealing and deep (and nonpartisan) and told so much about his life and lives of the poor black people in Chicago's projects. I hope Sarah Palin some day realizes that those people are just as "American" as the white farmers in rural America and "Joe the plumber."

Definitely a wonderful book, and I look forward to reading The Audacity of Hope.

91. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal - Eric Schlosser

Eric Schlosser does an amazing, in-depth survey of almost anything you can think of that has to do with fast food: he shares history of the most of the core fast food restaurants, e.g. McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King, and Carl's Jr.; he interviews the teenagers and immigrants who work at these restaurants; he uncovers secrets of the contemporary meatpacking industry; and he discusses marketing and globalization as it relates to fast food. He even explains how franchising fast food restaurants works: apparently the primary business of McDonald's isn't really fast food, it's real estate! The McDonald's Corporation owns the real estate of all of the 15,000 McDonald's restaurants in this country and it leases out the property to its franchisees. (Also, according to Schlosser, Subway is one of the worst companies of which you could become a franchisee.)

To understand just how much fast food has taken over our society:

[I]n 2000, [Americans] spent more than $110 billion [on fast food]. Americans now spend more money on fast food than on higher education, personal computers, computer software, or new cars. They spend more on fast food than on movies, books, magazines, newspapers, videos, and recorded music - combined.

The marketing strategies used by fast food establishments are amazing. The bulk of their advertising is directed toward children, since children are "surrogate salesmen" - they have the ability to persuade others, usually their parents, to buy what they want. Soft drink marketers try to get their products into elementary schools because children establish their tastes and habits early - and soda has the highest profit margins out of any product at fast food restaurants.
The part of the book that was the most disturbing was the part about the slaughterhouses and the meatpacking industry. It was basically a modern day version of The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. Did you know that American beef can't even be exported to most countries in Europe, because American cows are fed things that Europe has banned? They are given bovine growth hormone (banned in Europe) - and they're also fed ground up cows and poultry. Yes - cows, which are really supposed to be grain- or grass- fed, are now omnivorous. Oh - and if you are a vegetarian, you might want to reconsider eating McDonald's fries - part of what gives them their unique taste is that they're cooked in oil with beef tallow and beef extract.

This was a great book - I decided to read this book after it was quoted several times in The Hungry Gene. Schlosser really revealed a lot about the fast food industry ... probably a lot more than I ever wanted to know! Even though it won't prevent me from eating fast food, I appreciate having a better understanding of what McDonald's (et al.) is doing to lure me to eat its food and I appreciate knowing what exactly I might be putting in my mouth.

90. The Bluest Eye - Toni Morrison

[90 down - 10 to go!!!]
Told from the point of view of Claudia MacTeer, an African American girl growing up in Ohio in the 1930's, this story is mostly about a girl that Claudia's parents take into their home named Pecola Breedlove. Pecola is eleven years old and has a hard life: her parents, Paulina and Cholly, are always fighting, and Cholly is often drunk. Pecola's brother, Sammy, often runs away to get away from the family; Pecola, on the other hand, prays for blue eyes. She believes that if she had blue eyes, her life would be much better and people would stop telling her that she is so ugly.

It had occurred to Pecola some time ago that if her eyes, those eyes that held the pictures, and knew the sights - if those eyes of hers were
different, that is to say, beautiful, she herself would be different .... If she looked different, beautiful, maybe Cholly would be different, and Mrs. Breedlove, too. Maybe they'd say, "Why, look at pretty-eyed Pecola. We mustn't do bad things in front of those pretty eyes" .... Each night, without fail, she prayed for blue eyes. Fervently, for a year, she prayed. Although somewhat discouraged, she was not without hope. To have something as wonderful as that happen would take a long, long time.

Pauline treats the daughter of the wealthy white family (the Fosters) that she works for better than she treats Pecola, her own daughter. The Fosters' daughter has blond curls and blue eyes, and their lifestyle is the closest that Pauline will ever get to having it herself.
Eventually, Pecola goes to live with the MacTeers because Cholly burns down her family's home. Claudia MacTeer and her sister Frieda become friends with Pecola and go through a lot of typical pre-adolescent experiences together (e.g. being fascinated when Pecola is the first to start "ministrating").

It becomes apparent that Cholly, Pecola's father, has a thing for little girls. One day, while Pecola is doing dishes, he rapes her. Morrison's writing is exquisite - and the story is really heart-wrenching.

Following the disintegration - the falling away - of sexual desire, he was conscious of her wet, soapy hands on his wrists, the fingers clenching, but whether her grup was from a hopeless but stubborn struggle to be free, or from some other emotion, he could not tell. Removing himself from her was so painful to him he cut it short and snatched his genitals out of the dry harbor of her vagina. She appeared to have fainted. Cholly stood up and could only see her grayish panties, so sad and limp around her ankles. Again the hatred mixed with tenderness. The hatred would not let him pick her up, the tenderness forced him to cover her. So when the child regained consciousness, she was lying on the kitchen floor under a heavy quilt, trying to connect the pain between her legs with the face of her mother looming over her.

Claudia and Frieda hear that Pecola is pregnant by her father and feel sorry for her. They decide not to sell the marigold seeds they were planning on selling: they plant them and determine that if they bloom, then that would mean that everything would be fine. The seeds do not bloom. The story concludes (from Clauda's point of view):

I talk about how I did not plant the seeds too deeply, how it was the fault of the earth, the land, of our town. I even think now that the land of the entire country was hostile to marigolds that year. This soil is bad for certain kinds of flowers. Certain seeds it will not nurture, certain fruit it will not bear, and when the land kills of its own volition, we acquiesce and say the victim had no right to live.

I'm surprised that two common themes in several well-known works of African American literature I've read recently are child molestation and incest (this, The Color Purple, and Push). Though very sad, this was a great book.

89. Song of Solomon - Toni Morrison

This is a beautifully written story about four generations of the Dead family, centered around the main character Macon "Milkman" Dead III. Milkman got his unfortunate nickname because he was breastfed for too long and was, in essence, a "mama's boy." His mother, Ruth Foster Dead, is the daughter of the town's only black doctor. She completely idolizes her father and often makes her husband feel inadequate. (side note - this seems to be a common theme several books I've read recently, including The Color Purple and A Raisin in the Sun. Interesting).

Milkman has a sister, Pilate, who does not have a navel (not sure of the significance of that). Pilate has a daughter, Reba, and Reba has a daughter, Hagar - and Hagar is obsessed with Milkman and tries to kill him several times. Milkman's best friend, Guitar, also tries to kill Milkman when he suspects that Milkman has cheated him out of some gold that Guitar is trying to steal to help fund a group of which he is part. The group is called "Seven Days," and their goal is to commit revenge killings against white people in response to the killings of black people. For example, after the four little girls were killed in the church bombing, they go kill four little white girls to "even out" the killings.

There are a lot of complicated characters and themes in this book, so a brief overview really doesn't do the book justice. But I'll share some of my favorite quotes anyway! Here's one from Guitar, from a conversation he has with Milkman:

And black women, they want your whole self. Love, they call it, and understanding. "Why don’t you understand me?" What they mean is, Don’t love anything on earth except me. They say, "Be responsible," but what they mean is, Don’t go anywhere where I ain’t. You try to climb Mount Everest, they’ll tie up your ropes. Tell them you want to go to the bottom of the sea—just for a look—they’ll hide your oxygen tank .... You blow your lungs out on the horn and they want what breath you got left to hear about how you love them. They want your full attention.

This description of Hagar made me smile (and think it's sad that men really talk like this):

She was the third beer. Not the first one, which the throat receives with almost tearful gratitude; nor the second, that confirms and extends the pleasure of the first. But the third, the one you drink because it's there, because it can't hurt, and because what difference does it make?

(Isn't that passage, crass as it is, so incredibly poetic?!) Ultimately, Milkman ends up in Virginia searching for the gold, and meets a woman who tells him about his family history. There, he learns about his great grandfather Solomon who was said to have escaped slavery by "flying back to Africa."

I won't spoil the ending for those who haven't read it. I think what makes this book so good (and part of the reason why Toni Morrison won a Nobel Prize for Literature!) is how it's not just well-written - it's almost poetic in some parts. She really draws you into the story. The characters are also complex and certainly grow throughout the book. Definitely a good read - thanks to Jessica for the recommendation, Chris for lending it to me, and of course my mom for introducing me to Toni Morrison's books when I was just four years old :)

88. Life of Pi - Yann Martel

This is a very unique story about a 16 year old boy named Piscine ("Pi") Patel who comes from a family of zookeepers. He loves learning about different religions and practices Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity - all at the same time! When Pi's father decides to pack up the family and their business (the zoo) and move to Canada, they board a huge Japanese cargo ship ... with many of their animals. But after the ship sinks, Pi finds himself in a lifeboat with a hyena, an orangutan, a zebra, and a 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.
The majority of the story is about the relationship between Pi and Richard Parker, who end up being the last two to survive. They drift through the Pacific Ocean for almost a year, and Pi has to use his faith and training as a zookeeper to fight sharks, hunger, and the elements while keeping himself and Richard Parker alive.

I loved this passage from the beginning of the book when clergy of all the religions that Pi is practicing find out that he is indeed practicing all three religions:

“Piscine, can this be true?” asked the imam earnestly. “Hindus and Christians are idolaters. They have many gods.”
“And Muslims have many wives,” responded the pandit.
The priest looked askance at both of them. “Piscine,” he nearly whispered, “there is salvation only in Jesus.”
“Balderdash! Christians know nothing about religion,” said the pandit.
“They strayed long ago from God’s path,” said the imam.
“Where’s God in your religion?” snapped the priest. “You don’t have a single miracle to show for it. What kind of religion is that, without miracles?”
“It isn’t a circus with dead people jumping out of tombs all the time, that’s what! We Muslims stick to the essential miracle of existence. Birds flying, rain falling, crops growing—these are miracles enough for us.”
“Feathers and rain are all very nice, but we like to know that God is truly with us.”

I also liked this part, after Pi has started fishing (keeping in mind that before being stranded on the lifeboat, he had always been a vegetarian):

You may be astonished that in such a short period of time I could go from weeping over the muffled killing of a flying fish to gleefully bludgeoning to death a dorado. I could explain it by arguing that profiting from a pitiful flying fish’s navigational mistake made me shy and sorrowful, while the excitement of actively capturing a great dorado made me sanguinary and self-assured. But in point of fact the explanation lies else where. It is simple and brutal: a person can get used to anything, even to killing.

It took me around fifty pages or so to get into this book - but once I did, I couldn't put it down. I was so into it, I even forgot how completely implausible the whole story was! ... until the ending, when things sort of came together (I won't spoil it for those who haven't read it).
One thing I don't understand, however, is how the first part of the book about Pi's love for learning about different religions ties in with the second part of the book where he is stranded on the life boat with Richard Parker. Is it just the idea of faith - i.e. what gets him through the ordeal?
This was a fabulous book - thanks to Jade for the recommendation :)

87. How to Be Invisible: A Step-By-Step Guide To Protecting Your Assets, Your Identity, And Your Life - J.J. Luna

With frightening real-life stories, Luna makes his case for why personal privacy has basically disappeared in the age of technology; and how you can get yours back (and why you want to!). For example, what if someone with the same name as you is committing criminal activity, and you start being investigated? Do you really want government agents listening to all of your phone calls? And of course there are always (unfortunately) weird stalkers, so single women especially should not have their home address readily available in the public domain.
Some of the information was definitely helpful - i.e. how you can construct an alternative mail drop and ghost address, how to keep your real domicile unknown (a rule that he emphasized throughout the book: NEVER couple your name with your real home address), and how to avoid using your social security number and birth date for identification purposes.
But while a lot of his suggestions really seem like they are useful for undercover cops and women with stalkers (and criminals), I think they're a bit over the top for anyone else. For example, Luna explains how to set up limited liability companies and says that you should have your car, home, etc. titled in the LLC instead of in your own name; he also says that in lieu of giving a utility or phone company your social security number to run a credit check when you first sign up for service, you should give them a $1,000 deposit and ask that it be returned to you if/when you've made all of your payments on time after a year. I can understand the rationale behind those suggestions - you never known when a private investigator might be after you, or when the phone company's records would be hacked and someone gets a hold of your SSN - but what about those of us who are not yet at the point in life where we can just drop $1,000 deposits?
Still, just knowing how easily a criminal/stalker can get a hold of and exploit your personal information will make you want to use at least some of the suggestions in this book and protect yourself more.

86. The Hungry Gene: The Science of Fat and The Future of Thin - Ellen Ruppell Shell

This book, written by science journalist Ellen Ruppell Shell, is about why Americans are so fat, including the roles of genetics, drug companies, the food industry, and social class; and what crazy things we do to try to lose weight. $33 billion - yes, billion - a year are spent on weight loss products! - and bariatric surgeries like gastric bypass are becoming more common.

I found the first and last thirds (or so) of the book were the most interesting. The middle section on isolating leptin, the gene that helps to regulate energy intake and energy expenditure, including appetite and metabolism, got a bit dry. The first third talked a lot about the types of surgeries that people are going through to lose weight. Did you know that some doctors used to actually use a "slice and dice" approach - they'd actually cut you open and cut out layers of fat from your stomach!

The last third was definitely where I couldn't put the book down. One particularly interesting section explained how children of parents of ethnicities who tend to be smaller-framed (i.e. a lot of Hispanics and Asians) are especially prone to being obese when they start eating more Westernized diets (i.e. McDonald's, Coca-Cola, etc.). People in the Philippines have started drinking more Coke per capita than any other country - and their obesity rate has shot up dramatically in the past decade.

Shell also does a great job of uncovering the food industry. This part is so true:

Convenience is more than a buzzword in the food industry; it's a matter of life or death. Millions of advertising dollars are spent reminding us that we do not have the time or patience to shop for, cook, or thoroughly consume our meals. And we are convinced. In the 1960s homemakers spent about two and a half hours making dinner each night. In 1996, the latest year for which figures are available, dinner preparation had shrunk to fifteen minutes.

Another interesting thing to think about: why don't nice restaurants ever supersize, for example, your lobster tail? It's only the cheap places, like fast food restaurants, that do things like that. Well ...

"You're getting extra French fries, more soft drink, cheap stuff that is essentially filler ... You think you're getting a deal here, but you're really not.' Salads are rarely part of these "value meals" and for good reason - fresh vegetables are pricey to buy, prepare, and store. (Salads also take longer to eat, anathema to the fast food world.) Servers are trained to remind customers of the "good deal" they'll get by super-sizing their meal for the very sound reason that super-sizing is not a good deal ...

... because it only costs fast food places three more cents to add some more fries ... but just think of how many more calories that is for us!!

I'm definitely a fan of Shell's journalistic writing style - although to be completely honest, the chapters that talk about isolating leptin got a bit dry. I don't think it was her fault - she did the best job she could - it was just the material. Anyway, both books I've read by her have been great (this one and Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture), and I definitely recommend both of them.

85. Going Rogue: An American Life - Sarah Palin

In this 400+ page biography/memoir that really should have been no more than 250 pages, Sarah Palin paints a portrait of her life growing up in Alaska; meeting and falling in love with Todd Palin; raising their five children; and of course, rehashing the 2008 election and the plethora of issues surrounding it. For example, she discusses how she read the Wall Street Journal, Investor's Business Daily, Forbes, etc. ... and then says,

Perhaps that's why I was so shocked during the VP campaign when Katie Couric wondered which papers and magazines I read. Maybe I should have asked her what she reads. She didn't sound very informed on our energy issues.

I feel like Palin makes a lot of cheap shots and distorts some serious issues. For example, at one point she's talking about how her son Track, at age 17, was injured while playing hockey:

Apologetically, the nurse explained that they couldn't even let him walk down the hall to the drinking fountain because if he needed surgery his stomach should be empty, and they couldn't treat him without me. Of course I understood, but I still fumed inside. I even wondered out loud about why this big, strapping, nearly grown man who was overcome with pain couldn't even get a drink of water without parental consent, yet a thirteen-year-old girl could undergo a painful, invasive, and scary abortion and no parent even had to be notified.

Ummm ... it'd be helpful to note that only six states in the country don't require parental notification: in the majority of states, notification of at least one parent is required. What she said was technically accurate in the small world of Alaska - but just a little misleading for most people who'd be reading this book.

I do have to give it to her for a few good points, like this one ...

Everything in government attracts an obligatory acronym it seems ... Political terms are meant to paint a picture. For example, liberals prefer the term "social justice" over "welfare" and why conservatives prefer "marriage protection amendment" over "gay marriage ban."

... (weird phrasing of that last sentence in original).

Overall, I definitely do not think that this is a well-written book. She jumps around all over the place: at one point, she's talking about her five kids; then goes on to talk about the birth of Trig, her fifth child. She also makes a lot of cheap shots at the Obamas - and not only with regard to policy. She came down on Michelle Obama for saying that for the first time in her adult life, she was proud of her country ... honestly, if she understood the reality of being black in America, maybe she'd be a bit more sensitive to that. As Tim Wise said in his book - Sarah Palin is a proud defender of the Second Amendment when she's shown on the cover of Newsweek with a rifle ... but what would America have said if Michelle Obama were on the cover of a magazine with a gun?! Angry, scary black woman. I don't think Palin is great at understanding people outside of her America.
Anyway ... don't waste your time reading this book (not that my lowly review will matter: it's already sold more than one million copies). If you want to read a well-written right-wing book, check out Common Sense by Glenn Beck - the writing is much better and it cuts to the chase about the issues without the cheap, personal shots and drama.

84. Between Barack and a Hard Place: Racism and White Denial in the Age of Obama - Tim Wise

In this book, Tim Wise does a great job of analyzing racism and race relations post-Obama's victory as the first black president. He argues that "Racism 1.0," or typical, overt bigotry, has morphed into "Racism 2.0" - the idea that Obama has "transcended race" and that he is "different from regular black people." Wise argues that

White folks may "need" black folks to be Obama-like in style, affect, erudition, and educational background in order to be considered competent or trustworthy ...

... and that ultimately, this hurts African Americans. I was very impressed by Wise's analysis - as a white American, he really seemed to have done his research and to understand a lot of nuances of the issues he discusses. I was nodding emphatically while reading the book when Wise was explaining how Obama is "the Cliff Huxtable of politics" and that he is "attaining the lofty pinnacle of 'Huxtability.'"

Another quote I really like (that's actually from Michael Eric Dyson):

In a sense, if one conceives of racism as a cell phone, then active malice is the ring tone on its highest volume, while passive indifference is the ring tone on vibrate. In either case, whether loudly or silently, the consequence is the same: a call is transmitted, a racial message is communicated.

Wise also argues that many white Americans do not realize how they continue to benefit from a system of "entrenched privileges." While a lot of what he said was not new, I really liked how Wise was able to make his arguments in the context of "post-Obama America." And what a catchy title!

83. Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential - Joel Osteen

In this self-improvement book (ahem, or book on CD ...), televangelist Joel Osteen, a.k.a. the "smiling pastor" shares seven principles that he used to help him get to where he is in life. The crux of Osteen's message is that you can achieve a successul and prosperous life if you stop blaming yourself for the past and if you make the most of the present by using you God-given talents and strengths.
The seven principles (steps) are: (1) Enlarge Your Vision; (2) Develop a Healthy Self-Image; (3) Discover the Power of Your Thoughts and Words; (4) Let go of the Past; (5) Find Strength Through Adversity; (6) Live to Give; and (7) Choose to Be Happy.
I love Joel Osteen because he uses Christian teachings to share very universal messages; he also weaves in anecdotes from his own life and experiences told to him by his parishioners. One part that I definitely plan on keeping at the forefront of my mind:

... you must rid yourself of that small-minded thinking and start expecting God's blessing, start anticipating promotion and supernatural increase. You must conceive it in your heart and mind before you can receive it. In other words, you must make room for increase in your own thinking, then God will bring those things to pass. Until you learn how to enlarge your vision, seeing the future through your eyes of faith, your own wrong thinking will prevent good things from happening in your life. God will not pour fresh, creative ideas and blessings into old attitudes.

I definitely recommend this book to anyone who wants some practical steps on how to better themselves, regardless of their religion.

82. The Greatest Salesman in the World - Og Mandino

This short book, in the form of a parable, was packed with powerful principles behind salesmanship though the principles are definitely universal. The story is about a man named Hafid in pre-Christianity Jerusalem who learns from a wealthy and successful trader. When the trader was a young man, he was given ten scrolls by a man with instructions to guard them with his life but to pass them on before he died. So the trader decides to share the lessons on the scrolls with Hafid. The first lesson is entitled "Today I begin a new life" and has instructions for forming the habit that will lead to the successful adoption of the principles contained in the following scrolls. The other scrolls contain lessons like, "I will greet this day with love in my heart"; "I will persist until I succeed"; "I am nature's greatest miracle and I am a unique creature of nature"; and "I will live this day as if it is my last."

One of my favorite lessons is from scroll II:

Henceforth will I look on all things with love and I will be born again. I will love the sun for it warms my bones; yet I will love the rain for it cleanses my spirit. I will love the light for it shows me the way; yet I will love the darkness for it shows me the stars. I will welcome happiness for it enlarges my heart; yet I will endure sadness for it opens my soul. I will acknowledge rewards for they are my due; yet I will welcome obstacles for they are my challenge.

I also loved this passage, from scroll VII:

For all worldly things shall indeed pass. When I am heavy will heartache I shall console myself that this too shall pass; when I am puffed with success I shall warn myself that this too shall pass. When I am strangled in poverty I shall tell my self that this too will pass: when I am burdened with wealth I shall tell myself that this too shall pass. Yea, verily, where is he who built the pyramid, one day, not also be buried under sand? If all things shall pass why should I be concerned for today?

This is a more unique variety of self-improvement book that I would definitely recommend reading. Thank you to Justin for lending it to me!

81. Tuesdays with Morrie - Mitch Albom

I have been reading some books by some fabulous authors recently! This is the third book by Mitch Albom that I've read (others: For One More Day and The Five People You Meet in Heaven, pre-blog), and I've been super-impressed by all of them.
Anyway, this is a non-fiction book about Morrie Schwartz, a sociology professor at Brandeis University, who is dying from Lou Gehrig's disease. The author, Mitch Albom, had taken Morrie's classes back in college and was actually very close to him - but he had not corresponded with Morrie for several years (although he had promised to). After Albom sees a story about Morrie on Nightline, he tracks Morrie down and begins to visit him regularly. Morrie is at peace with the idea that he is going to die very soon - he has even come to peace with the fact that someone has to "wipe his ass" since he is no longer able to do it himself.

I was astonished by his complete lack of self-pity. Morrie, who could
no longer dance, swim, bathe, or walk; Morrie, who could no longer answer his own door, dry himself after a shower, or even roll over in bed. How could
he be so accepting? I watched him struggle with his fork, picking at a
piece of tomato, missing it the first two times - a pathetic scene, and yet I
could not deny that sitting in his presence was almost magically serene, the
same calm breeze that soothed me back in college.

During their visits, Morrie imparts a lot of life lessons to Albom. I especially liked the lessons in the chapter entitled "We Talk about Marriage":

"Well, I feel sorry for your generation," Morrie said. "In this culture, it's so important to find a loving relationship with someone because so much of the culture does not give you that. But the poor kids today, either they're too selfish to take part in a real loving relationship, or they rush into marriage and then six months later, they get divorced. They don't know what they want in a partner. They don't know who they are themselves - so how can they know who they're marrying? ...

There are a few rules I know to be true about love and marriage: If you don't respect the other person, you're gonna have a lot of trouble. If you don't know how to compromise, you're gonna have a lot of trouble. If you can't talk openly about what goes on between you, you're gonna have a lot of trouble. And if you don't have a common set of values in life, you're gonna have a lot of trouble. Your values must be alike.

And the biggest one of those values, Mitch? ... Your belief in the importance of your marriage."

Woven in with these lessons are hints at what is going on in Albom's life (he seems to care a lot more about work than his family) and in larger society (the O.J. Simpson trial) ... events which are in stark contrast to what Morrie is trying to teach.

What I like the most about Albom is that all of the books I've read by him are of the self-help/self-improvement variety - but they're all so different. I feel like books by other self-help authors like Wayne Dyer and Deepak Chopra are all the same after a while. Instead of just telling you a worthwhile life lesson, Albom weaves lessons into beautifully written stories, and it's more up to you to pull from them what you need to. I think For One More Day is still my favorite Albom book, but I most definitely recommend this one, too.

80. Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture - Ellen Ruppel Shell

In this very thoroughly researched book, Shell argues that there are a lot of hidden costs that we pay in our obsession with low-cost goods. In addition, she argues that even though the prices of many consumer goods have gone down in the past few decades, the overall cost of living has gone up in other ways. For example:

"Compared with the early 1970's, in 2007 we spent 32 percent less on clothes, 18 percent less on food, 52 less on appliances, and 24 percent less on owning and maintaining a car ..."

"...any savings from low-priced consumer goods was more than wiped out by the rising costs of nondurable goods and services: a 76 percent increase in mortgage payments; a 74 percent increase in health insurance costs; a 25 percent increase in tax costs; and, because it barely existed in 1971, a monumental increase in child care costs."

This is in part why so many working class folks are overweight: it's hard to afford the cost of health insurance, but it's a lot easier to pay $3 for a basket of cholesterol-laden shrimp from Church's!

Shell really hits a wide range of issues in addressing our consumer culture. For example, the psychology of shopping and how retailers manipulate us is quite interesting: the MSRP or suggested retail price is not only arbitrary, but it's really set to convince us to buy a product because it's a "good deal" when it's 30% off. Some of this information is pretty basic, but Shell does a great job with setting forth specifics and anecdotes to prove her point. Also, retailers make a killing off of those rebates ... what percentage of people do you think actually send away for the rebate you get from buying a cell phone or other electronic? 5-10%!! That's why retailers are starting to use rebates more - because they know that people won't send away for them. In fact, if more than 30% of people send away for them, they figure that the process is way too easy and try to figure out ways to make it more complicated.

Shell also talks about down-side of globalization, like buying farm-raised shrimp from Thailand that have likely been treated with antibiotics and tended to by maltreated workers; or buying toys made in China that, as we all know now, were sprayed with lead paint. "... increasing the wages of, for example, apparel workers in Mexico by 25 or even 30 percent would raise the price of a shirt in the United States by 1.2 percent. That is, a 30 percent increase in wages for the workers results in a leap in price of a $20 shirt to $20.24. Surveys indicate that most American consumers are willing to accept this additional cost without fuss, especially if they understand the reasons for it. So far, several small producers have taken up the challenge, but few multinationals have been willing to put it to the test."

Lastly, check out this brilliant writing:

"Cheap fuel, cheap loans, cheap consumer goods do not pave the road to salvation. On the contrary, our Faustian pact with bargains contributed to the worst recession of two generations. The economics of Cheap cramps innovation, contributes to the decline of once flourishing industries, and threatens our proud heritage of craftsmanship. The ennoblement of Cheap marks a radical departure in American culture and a titanic shift in our national priorities."

This was a fascinating book - the style reminded me a bit of Malcolm Gladwell's (journalistic style of writing; basic premises, but great research to back them up). I plan to check out one of Shell's other books, The Hungry Gene: The Inside Story of the Obesity Industry, next week.

79. Sweet Summer: Growing up with and without My Dad - Bebe Moore Campbell

What a wonderfully written book ... then again, what can I expect from a soror?! :)
This is a beautiful story about Bebe Moore Campbell's life growing up with her divorced parents: her mom who lived in Philly, and her dad (a paraplegic) who lived in North Carolina. As a young girl, Bebe completely idolizes her father even though she's not with him for at least nine months out of the year ... but as she grows up, she comes to see his many flaws. Nonetheless, she still maintains a relationship with him. "My father took care of me. Our separation didn't stunt me or condemn me to a lesser humanity. His absence never made me a fatherless child. I'm not fatherless now."
Even though this book didn't change my perspective on life - which is what would have earned it a spot in my "best non-fiction books" list - it is possibly one of the best-written books I've read, right up there with Malcolm Gladwell's works. Campbell does an exquisite job of capturing the essence of a child's thoughts and expresses them in an adult way, if that makes any sense. Check out this passage:

"I turned around and took a quick look at the front door. Coast was clear. I stuck my wet thumb back in my mouth and covered it with my other hand, just in case Nana or Mommy came outside. My mother was paying me ten cents a day not to suck my thumb and I'd already collected my dime. The rhythmic sucking flooded my body with tranquility for a minute until the urge for even greater pleasure made me bold and I took away my "cover" hand, reached up and started pulling my ear with it. Ahhhh. I hadn't been sucking and pulling for a good ten seconds when a green Buick slowed down as it approached my house. I jerked my hands away from my face, wiped my dripping thumb on the inside of my shorts and stood up, craning my neck to see if the person driving the car was my daddy ..."

How great is that passage?! Definitely a beautiful story about father-daughter relationships, and families in general ... highly recommended.

78. A Raisin in the Sun - Lorraine Hansberry

This is a play written by Lorraine Hansberry in the 1950's. It's about a poor black family living in Chicago - Walter and Ruth, their son Travis, and Walter's mom and sister (Beneatha). Walter is barely making ends meet as a limo driver - so when his mom gets an insurance check in the amount of $10,000, he pressures her into giving him a good chunk of it for him to invest. She puts some down on a new house (in an all-white neighborhood), and gives Walter the rest - making him promise that he save some for his sister's education. Walker ends up making some poor decisions with the money and loses it. The family does get to keep the home, however; and they turn down a neighbor's offer to buy it from them to alleviate some of the racial tension that he believes their move will cause.

George, Beneatha's Nigerian boyfriend, is an interesting character: he seems to think he's a lot better than Walter, especially because he is in medical school, and starts influencing Beneatha in many ways. For example, he tells her that she is assimilating herself into white ways by "mutilating" (straightening) her hair; so she starts wearing traditional African clothing and ends up moving to Nigeria with George.

Like the last book I read, this play has a great but complicated plot that I won't bother fully explaining ... but one of the themes does seem to be about relationships. I love this part:

Ruth: Honey, you never say nothing new. I listen to you every day, every night and every morning, and you never say nothing new. (Shrugging). . So you would rather be Mr. Arnold than be his chauffeur. So -- I would rather be living in Buckingham Palace.

Walter: That is just what is wrong with the colored women in this world... Don't understand nothing about building their men up and and making 'em feel like they somebody. Like they can do something.


Ruth: (Drily, but to hurt): There are colored men who do things.

Walter: No thanks to the colored woman.

Ruth: Well, being a colored woman, I guess I can't help myself none.

I also like this part, when Beneatha lets her hair go natural:

George: Oh, don't be so proud of yourself, Bennie - just because you look eccentric.

Beneatha: How can something that's natural be eccentric?

George: That's what being eccentric means - being natural. Get dressed.

Lastly, a tidbit of info: the name of the play comes from the poem "Harlem," a.k.a. "A Dream Deferred," by Langston Hughes ...

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore-- And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?

Or crust and sugar over-- like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

77. The Color Purple - Alice Walker

I'm embarrassed that I'm just now reading this ... this is such a fabulous novel!

This classic by Alice Walker is told mostly from the point of view of a girl named Celie in the form of diary entries. Celie is raped and impregnated twice by a man she calls Pa (after reading this and Push, I need to find some cheerier fiction!). The children are taken from her, and she ends up marrying a man referred to in the book as "Mr. ____." Mr. ___ has a mistress who goes by Shug Avery, who comes to live with Mr. ___ and Celie. It seems at first that Shug demeans Celie, like Mr. ____ does; but later, Shug and Celie become intimate and Shug helps Celie to discovery her sexuality.

Celie also has a sister, Nettie, who Celie's husband tries to seduce. When he couldn't, he forces Nettie to leave. Celie doesn't hear from Nettie for years, and so she assumes that Nettie is dead; but eventually it comes out through Shug that Mr. ____ was hiding letters from Nettie in a trunk. Nettie had been traveling in Africa with a missionary couple, Sam and Corrine, and their adopted children ... who turn out to be Celie's long-lost children.

The plot is complicated, so I won't go any further into it, but it is such a beautiful story. Maybe it's just my selection of books, but I haven't read much about homosexual relationships in African American literature - so I was surprised at Shug and Celie's relationship. It seems Shug had shallow relationships and Celie had physically and emotionally abusive relationships - so their relationship with each other was really the first time that they both seemed to experience love.

One of my favorite quotes comes from when Nettie is explaining how Corrine has started to think that the adopted children are really Nettie's children, because they look like Nettie - which would mean that Sam had cheated on Corinne with Nettie. In reality, the children look like Nettie because she is their aunt - but of course they don't know that at that point. But Nettie says, "She gets weaker and weaker, and unless she can believe us and start to feel something for her children, I fear we will lose her. Oh, Celie, unbelief is a terrible thing. And so is the hurt we cause others unknowingly."

I also love the part where Celie has left her husband and gone to Memphis with Shug: she has started her own business and is doing really well for herself, and starts off her letter to Nettie with: "Dear Nettie, I am so happy. I got love, I got work, I got money, friends and time!" It's just so powerful in the context of the story because things have finally started looking up for Celie!

Definitely a beautiful classic piece of literature that I would recommend reading! Now I'll definitely have to see the play ...