Seedfolks by Paul Fleischman

I came across this book one day while shopping for books for a young person in which I hoped to inspire an interest in reading. I did not pick this book for her because I did not think that she would be interested in gardens or gardening but I made a note of it for myself. It is a very slim volume and on the cover are the faces of residents of a Cleveland neighborhood. Seedfolks tells the story of a vacant and abandoned lot in this city. It is filled with trash, neglected, and has become a haven for crime. The residents are not proud of it, some do not even take notice, others are overwhelmed by the stench and still others are overwhelmed with anger that people outside of the neighborhood use it as a dumping ground. It starts with a young Vietnamese girl who plants 6 beans in an attempt to honor her father who was a farmer. She digs with a spoon through hard ground, nestles in her lima beans, and waters them. It is April.

Like the variety of produce and flowers planted the gardeners are themselves varied, young children, an older woman who has watched the lot from her window since the early 1900s and recent arrivals to Cleveland. Some know how to care for a garden and others do not. Each chapter is told from the point of view of different gardeners and passerby. They each have their own reasons for stopping to work in the garden-good things are contagious. Each is inspired by others and it started with the first seed planted. We are with the gardeners through the first year. Through the garden a sense of community that never existed before is built. “You drop bread on the ground and birds come out of nowhere. Same with that garden. People just appeared, people you didn’t know were there.” Walls come down and people begin to notice each other, they begin to notice themselves and their surroundings and misconceptions are dissolved.

Now that I’ve read Seedfolks, I think it would be a perfect selection for my reluctant reader. It is light but carries a wonderful message about the strength of community, about trying things that you never thought possible.

Wendell: There’s plenty about my life I can’t change. Can’t bring the dead back to life on this earth. Can’t make the world loving and kind. Can’t change myself into a millionaire. But a patch of ground in a trashy lot-I can change that. Can change it big.

Nora: Gardening boring? Never! It has suspense, tragedy, startling developments-a soap opera growing out of the grown. I’d forgotten that tremolo of expectation produced by a tiny forest of sprouts.

The Book of Night Women by Marlon James

This is a book I picked up earlier this year and kept putting it off. It first attracted my attention because it has the same painting on the cover as another book I have, Heaven of Drums. The painting is entitled Portrait of a Negress (1799-1800) by Marie-Guillemine Benoist. I often wonder about the lady in this portrait-who was she, what was her life like, why was she painted. I tried to find some information about the portrait and according to Wikepedia the portrait was completed a few years after slavery was abolished.

The Book of Night Women chronicles the story of a young girl named Lilith who is born into slavery on a sugar cane plantation in Jamaica. The story is told in her voice and in the voice of an unknown narrator who is reveled at the end. In 1785 she is orphaned at birth, a “baby wash in crimson and squealing like it just depart heaven to come to hell…” Lilith is instantly feared because her green eyes are a spectacle against her black skin. These green eyes and their implications of rape, violence, and enduring will create the backdrop for Lilith’s life at the Montpelier Estate.

We watch as Lilith passes from childhood into adolescence. She becomes aware of beauty, status, boundaries. Lilith speaks up, is sometimes cocky and others begin to say that she is spirited and believe that she is powerful though they can’t quite figure out what powers she harbors. Because of the potential seen in Lilith she is invited to meet with a group of women who are planning a revolt across estates. These are the night women, one of which has Lilith’s green eyes-the same green eyes of the overseer. They have been planing for years and see Lilith as a way to finally launch themselves into freedom similar to a successful revolt years earlier. Lilith, however, is struggling to make sense of her own feelings both good and bad, her identity, and her position on the estate. She struggles with wanting to do well at her work so that she can advance to better positions, she struggles with desires to attract the master’s attention, with dreams of being loved, and generally with pushing the ideas of the place of a young black woman on a slave plantation. Lilith who was once a girl is growing up and is not sure that compromising security is worth an attempt at the freedom the night women speak of.

The Book of Night Women is graphic and the language explicit, but the language and images are not so bothersome to me. I appreciate stories about slavery that are intense, where you can smell the sweat, fear is electric, and the resilience and resolve are tough as nails. It is a stark departure from many history books. It is a history that is not often told but that all should know.

Every negro walk in a circle. Take that and make of it what you will. But sometime the circle not be the negro’s but the white man own, and white man circle full of hill and valley and things they say that mean something else. Black man wake up to find circle make for him, beginning with the shackle that lock round him neck. White man circle come by him own choosing. Plenty have choice to walk straight and away, yet plenty come back to where them start. Others never leave. And if you the negro get take up in the white man life, you travel that circle too.

Teaser Tuesdays

The teaser this week is from a collection of short stories. Each story is told from the point of view of a child. They are amazing stories of resilience and hope in the face of devastating circumstances.

As we filled the space at the top of the walls, the room became darker and darker because he wouldn’t even open a window. I could only see his profile. Down where I stood, since we didn’t move anything out of the room, it wasn’t only dark but crowded. It was afternoon outside but night in our home.
Fattening for Gabon From Say You’re One Of Them by Uwem Akpan

Chicken With Plums by Marjane Satrapi

Alright, this is the last graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi that I have. I read Persepolis and immediately took the others out from the library. Chicken with Plums recounts the story of Nasser Ali Khan who is apparently a wonderful tar player. A tar is a string instrument that somewhat resembles a guitar. We never get to hear/see him play the tar, however, because when the story opens his beloved tar has been broken and he is searching for a replacement. The instruments that he auditions do not seem to speak to him as his old instrument did. He becomes depressed and decides that he wants to die. Taken to his bed the graphic novel replays his last week of life. His family attempts to persuade him otherwise but he is determined. While he waits for death to take him, he remembers moments from his childhood, a lost love and his subsequent marriage to his wife, his time as a pupil of the tar, and other moments both bitter and sweet. There is even a visit by Death who has a sense of humor.

Holiday Cheer

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

My Persephone Secret Santa and Virago Secret Santa gifts are making the journey to their giftees. I’ve taken Saplings, The Ante-Room, and Say You’re one of Them with me while I’m away for the holidays.

Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton

Ethan Frome is a poor man working an unrelenting farm. He feels trapped in a loveless marriage to Zeena who is constantly ill and in an ill mood. After a death in the family, Zeena’s cousin Mattie moves in. To Ethan she is like a breath of fresh air and brings with her happiness that he has not known for some time.

Wharton provides wonderfully descriptive scenes of the snowy, unrelenting country side and the New England farm in which Ethan lives. I could feel the cold air and snow brush past me in this tragic, almost excruciating love story-it is haunting. The setting complements the atmosphere in Ethan’s home and the coldness of his relationship with his wife. I didn’t know what to expect in this interplay between these three. The plot is tightly woven and no word is wasted. The looks and exchanges between Mattie and Ethan are intense, like the fire that they sit near at night, exactly opposite of the situation between he and his wife.

What I found most interesting about Ethan’s story is that he struggles with society’s perceptions of his marriage with his wife. Keeping up social appearances becomes more important than his happiness and governs his actions to the point of destruction. I read a lot of books by and about women, and I usually find that women are placed in this position, or are at least depicted in this way. It shows that men are just as susceptible to social conventions.

Earlier this month I read Roman Fever, a short story written by Edith Wharton that appeared in the the Persephone Biannually. I have some other Ethan Wharton books on the shelf that I’m looking forward to reading.

Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return by Marjane Satrapi

Last week I read Persepolis and enjoyed it so i immediately read Persepolis 2. In this book, Satrapi continues the story of her life where her first story left off. She is a young lady and too escape the war has left her home in Iran at the request of her parents to study in Austria. Her roommate and fellow classmates are quite different from what she is used to. There are some bumps in the road as she tries to belong and as she is gripped by the alienation of adolescence. She is growing up and she eventually finds herself moving again and eventually returning home. She views her time abroad as a failure.

For a child who grew up during wartime, Satrapi’s eyes are dramatically opened during her independence. There are drugs, relationships, new ideals to ponder, and coming to terms with a changing body and a new identity. After returning to Iran, she realizes that her old friends are strangers, and that both she and her country has changed. She has to work hard to pull herself into a new place and start a new chapter in her life-as a woman. She attends university to study art and in true Satrapi fashion challenges the notions held by the women and men there.

Satrapi discusses the search for self and identity, the importance of education and family, and the roles of women as dictated by religion, by society and by the women themselves. She shows that throughout ups and downs family will always provide support and home is a great place for rest and reflection. That you can always start over. I enjoyed the sequel a bit more than the first. I was touched by the experiences that Satrapi had.

Persepolis and Persepolis 2 together make up my first non-fiction work for the Women Unbound Challenge.

An underwater garden

For a while I’ve wanted to try my hand at a planted aquarium. I’ve seen photos of lush underwater landscapes that support an entire ecosystem of fish and about two months ago I set out to set up my very first planted tank. I think some folks call this aquascaping and since it’s plants in a type of container, I think I’ll keep up with my progress here. I waited before I posted just in case I was a failure and all the plants died off, but they are still going strong, and I have fish and shrimp (…and snails).

I’ll start with the set up. I have a 20 gallon tank with a basic filtration system, heater, and lights. I added a substrate specifically for planting-a mix of fine and larger gravel and some RO water about 3 inches from the bottom. This allowed me to landscape. Into the tank went a couple pieces of driftwood (already soaked and ready to go) and a variety of plants. Fill her up with more RO water and turn on the filter and stare eagerly through the glass. Not too bad.

Maintenance hasn’t been too bad…similar to the containers on the balcony. Trim and remove dead leaves as needed. I have 4 cardinal tetras and 2 zebra danios, ghost shrimp, and some snails that hitched a ride in on something. I’ll have to keep an eye on them since they eat plants, so far they seem to be eating only the dead stuff.

The bulbs I planted a month ago are sprouting-a water lily and an aponogeton are coming up.

Song of the Trees by Mildred D. Taylor

This is my first Mildred Taylor. You may be familiar with her Newbery Medal-winning book Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry. The Song of the Trees is based on a true story told in Taylor’s family. The story takes place in rural Mississippi during the Depression. Cassie Logan’s father is away working to provide for his family. She lives with her mother, grandmother, and her brothers. Outside her window the forest serves as her playground, a place for discovery, and refuge. The trees sing and whistle for Cassie but one day while out with her brothers she notices that the trees are silent. Her brothers are aware of no such thing.

Mr. Anderson has come to buy the trees from Cassie’s family so that they can be cut down for lumber. The family could use the money but Cassie is greatly opposed and Big Ma has not yet made her decision. This is not enough to stop Mr. Anderson who begins to cut trees. Cassie must wait to see if patience and goodwill will save her beloved forest.

Jerry Pinkney’s illustrations are excellent. He also illustrated the edition of The Tales of Uncles Remus that I read earlier this year.

The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me by Roald Dahl

It’s no secret that I loved Roald Dahl as a kid. His books for children are witty and entertaining.

So I read The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me for nostalgia’s sake. It is the story of a little boy named Billy who walks past an abandoned building wishing that it would be re-opened as a candy store. When he returns the next day he is met with an unlikely trio of singing and rhyming window washers: the giraffe is the ladder, the pelican holds the wash water, and the monkey washes the windows. The window washers immediately invite Billy to join the crew but before they can begin to solicit clients an invitation arrives from The Duke of Hampshire, “the richest man in England” to clean over 600 windows. So they get to work.