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alisarae's Reviews (1.65k)
Wow this was so good. Intricately layered vignettes that criss-cross across the author's life as much as she criss-crosses the American West provide an intimate context to her life. Susan Devan Harness was adopted when she was 18-months old after being taken away from her negligent mother (and family, and life on the rez, and all that comes with that). She was adopted by a white couple, their only child. Both her birth family and her adoptive family were dysfunctional. She has faced a lifetime of never belonging--not within white society ("too dark"), and not within her Salish tribe ("too white") that she was able to gain access to after a heartbreaking search as an adult. She now advocates for open-ish adoptions--where children's parents may be replaced by adoptive parents, but their families (siblings, extended relatives) are not. This allows for the child to cultivate a sense of belonging and a better grounding for stability in their lives.
It is hard to express everything that is woven into this book: US Government treaties with Native Americans, child welfare policy, missing paperwork, photos, childhood memories, scenes from nature, mental health, mentally ill and aging parents, racism, relationships gone awry, etc etc. it is complex and not straightforward, but at no point did I get lost with too many details or lose track of where I was in Susan's life. It turns out that this book is part of a large series published by the University of Nebraska Press called American Indian Lives. I hope I will be able to read more from this series. I learned so many things I didn't know (I am ashamed I didn't know...) and besides being well written and interesting, this book is imbued with emotion.
It is hard to express everything that is woven into this book: US Government treaties with Native Americans, child welfare policy, missing paperwork, photos, childhood memories, scenes from nature, mental health, mentally ill and aging parents, racism, relationships gone awry, etc etc. it is complex and not straightforward, but at no point did I get lost with too many details or lose track of where I was in Susan's life. It turns out that this book is part of a large series published by the University of Nebraska Press called American Indian Lives. I hope I will be able to read more from this series. I learned so many things I didn't know (I am ashamed I didn't know...) and besides being well written and interesting, this book is imbued with emotion.
You know, some people are complaining, "MAKE ME LAUGH, DAVID! DANCE, DAVID!" about this book. But David Sedaris has never been 100% funny 100% of the time, and that is on purpose. We need sobering moments to feel the cathartic relief of laughing at something ridiculous.
So, there are some hard subjects: the closeness of death and suicide, regret, dealing with grief, middle age marital struggles, having an alcoholic mother... But without that cold shock of reality, "Hey, you're a person, too!" would be a one-sided coin.
So, there are some hard subjects: the closeness of death and suicide, regret, dealing with grief, middle age marital struggles, having an alcoholic mother... But without that cold shock of reality, "Hey, you're a person, too!" would be a one-sided coin.
Literary psychological thriller with a flawed but reliable narrator. I dislike unreliable narrators, but flawed ones are fine.
I also read Longbourn by the same author—historical fiction set in Regency England (think Jane Austen from the servants’ perspective). I will always applaud authors for branching out into dofferent genres. Regency England is Jo Baker’s area of scholarship and she really shines there. But this thriller is not half bad.
Plot threads include: consent, male entitlement, classroom dynamics in an MFA program, and political correctness.
I also read Longbourn by the same author—historical fiction set in Regency England (think Jane Austen from the servants’ perspective). I will always applaud authors for branching out into dofferent genres. Regency England is Jo Baker’s area of scholarship and she really shines there. But this thriller is not half bad.
Plot threads include: consent, male entitlement, classroom dynamics in an MFA program, and political correctness.
It was very nice to read this book and see Gandhi's life from his own eyes. I understand why people say he was an INTP--I can totally see it now.
As Gandhi wrote this book published serially for contemporaries of the time, he didn't bother to give an explanation what was going on in the larger political theatre, assuming his readers would already be aware of it. Since I didn't know anything about his life before reading this book, I felt a little lost and some events appeared to pop up out of nowhere. For example, when he returned to India from South Africa, he was quite famous but he doesn't really explain the magnitude of his fame or how and why he became famous. Other iconic events like the salt march and the partition of India happened after this book was written (1921), so are not mentioned. It would have been better to read an outsider's biography of his life before reading his autobiography, and I plan to do that next.
A good deal of the book is spent talking about his personal experiments in dietetics, fasting, and telling anecdotes of people trying to convince him to eat meat or drink milk. So if you aren't really interested in that, maybe don't listen to the audio so you can more easily skip over those parts.
Other things are interesting though, like how completely inadequate he felt as a young lawyer and appeared by all accounts to be a failure in that department when he started out. How hard it is to sustain energy and motivation for political movements, and to raise money that impassioned people promise and then forget about. He would often fast when other people did something that disappointed him, as a way to show that he expected them to do better and to rectify the situation. And he talks about his spiritual development and beliefs.
The most inspirational thing was his commitment to personal morality and honesty, even as a young lawyer when more senior partners encouraged him to avoid the truth. The world needs more leaders committed to the truth; indeed, he said that Truth is his god.
As Gandhi wrote this book published serially for contemporaries of the time, he didn't bother to give an explanation what was going on in the larger political theatre, assuming his readers would already be aware of it. Since I didn't know anything about his life before reading this book, I felt a little lost and some events appeared to pop up out of nowhere. For example, when he returned to India from South Africa, he was quite famous but he doesn't really explain the magnitude of his fame or how and why he became famous. Other iconic events like the salt march and the partition of India happened after this book was written (1921), so are not mentioned. It would have been better to read an outsider's biography of his life before reading his autobiography, and I plan to do that next.
A good deal of the book is spent talking about his personal experiments in dietetics, fasting, and telling anecdotes of people trying to convince him to eat meat or drink milk. So if you aren't really interested in that, maybe don't listen to the audio so you can more easily skip over those parts.
Other things are interesting though, like how completely inadequate he felt as a young lawyer and appeared by all accounts to be a failure in that department when he started out. How hard it is to sustain energy and motivation for political movements, and to raise money that impassioned people promise and then forget about. He would often fast when other people did something that disappointed him, as a way to show that he expected them to do better and to rectify the situation. And he talks about his spiritual development and beliefs.
The most inspirational thing was his commitment to personal morality and honesty, even as a young lawyer when more senior partners encouraged him to avoid the truth. The world needs more leaders committed to the truth; indeed, he said that Truth is his god.
Beautiful book with a ton of great recipes. If I were going to buy an Indian cookbook, I would buy this one. A few ingredients are hard to find though.
This cookbook is a great resource for making traditional Brazilian dishes. I might buy it in Portuguese just to have around the house (online recipes are super sketchy and best not to trust). When I have guests over, it might be good to serve food they are used to. I usually cook Mexican, Thai, or Indian food if it is just me and my husband eating... So we eat a lot of spices that most Brazilians really cannot tolerate. Not kidding when I say that my MIL complains about sweet paprika being "spicy." Brazilian food is incredibly bland as 90% of it is fried and flavored with just onion, garlic, tomato paste, and parsley.
Unfortunately, this book is very poorly translated and there are many things that will leave readers of the English version scratching their heads. A good translation would have converted all the measurements into standard English cookbook measurements (Brazilian measurements continue to mystify me--how much is a teacup? Your teacup or my teacup? Filled and leveled to the top? Is this teacup a translation of "copo americano"? We shall never know.), as well as doing the research necessary to convert cuts of beef from Brazilian/Portuguese cuts to approximate American/British ones. Besides this, there are frequent mistakes in the wording that makes it obvious that the translator is not a fluent English speaker: change vs exchange, "a history for the last 400 years old" etc. Spelling mistakes related to poor knowledge of English abound. It's frustrating to read and I kind of have secondhand embarrassment for the translator and publisher, but I cannot say I am surprised. As a professional teacher and translator myself, I encounter this sort of translation work done by quote/unquote professionals on a daily basis. It points to a much deeper problem in Brazil that has nothing to do with a cookbook review, so I will leave it at that for today.
Unfortunately, this book is very poorly translated and there are many things that will leave readers of the English version scratching their heads. A good translation would have converted all the measurements into standard English cookbook measurements (Brazilian measurements continue to mystify me--how much is a teacup? Your teacup or my teacup? Filled and leveled to the top? Is this teacup a translation of "copo americano"? We shall never know.), as well as doing the research necessary to convert cuts of beef from Brazilian/Portuguese cuts to approximate American/British ones. Besides this, there are frequent mistakes in the wording that makes it obvious that the translator is not a fluent English speaker: change vs exchange, "a history for the last 400 years old" etc. Spelling mistakes related to poor knowledge of English abound. It's frustrating to read and I kind of have secondhand embarrassment for the translator and publisher, but I cannot say I am surprised. As a professional teacher and translator myself, I encounter this sort of translation work done by quote/unquote professionals on a daily basis. It points to a much deeper problem in Brazil that has nothing to do with a cookbook review, so I will leave it at that for today.
