Book Review: Akin

Akin, by Emma Donoghue

An old man, childless, set in his ways, and still mourning the loss of his wife to cancer, suddenly finds himself the guardian of an 11-year-old great-nephew he barely knew existed and had never met. 

Worse for Noah Selvaggio, he must take custody of the boy the same week he had planned a visit to his native France, for the Carnival in his hometown of Nice.

Days before he's set to fly from his home in New York, Noah gets a call from a social worker. Michael, his sister's only grandchild, needs an emergency parental figure, and Noah is his only living relative. The boy's father? A recent overdose fatality. His mother? Serving time in a prison upstate.

It's either Noah or a state home. Noah reluctantly agrees to take care of the child.

Thus begins Donoghue's latest novel, an exploration of family, heritage, and the responsibility one has -- or should feel -- for the actions of their ancestors.

You see, at the same time Noah is learning he will be taking Michael along on his trip, he discovers a small packet of cryptic photographs his mother took during World War II, when she stayed in France as he and his father shipped off to the United States for safety. Noah has no idea who the photos portray or why they were taken. Michael, snootily introducing Noah to Google images search, easily discovers the location of one picture. It's a hotel in Nice.

So off they go.

It's a tough relationship. Michael, at 11 years old, often finds his phone to be a better companion. He enjoys baiting Noah. Nor is Noah enamored with Michael, whom he sees as a whingy little brat. His immediate response to any request from Michael is to say no.

But still.

Noah is empathetic enough to know Michael's background and sympathize with his upbringing. He recognizes the child is poor and lonely, but he struggles to accommodate his wants and needs.

Still. 

For the most part, I liked their relationship. Noah wants to educate the child, and he takes every opportunity to explain history and science (sometimes in excruciating detail, but then, Noah is an old, retired chemistry professor). The boy generally is bored to tears, but sometimes responds to Noah's prodding and teaching.

So we see them slowly, reluctantly and uncertainly, grow closer and show concern for each other in fits and starts. Noah comes to enjoy Michael's wit, even if it is exasperatingly at his own expense. Michael tries to help Noah's search for meaning in his mother's photos, even as he struggles to maintain his own sense of self with his strange great-uncle.

Book Review: On the Come Up

On the Come Up, by Angie Thomas

This is not my world. It's Bri's world, and she's letting me visit. Bri is a champion tour guide. She tells me things. Things I didn't know. Things I need to know.

Things like how woefully ignorant I am about popular culture, particularly black popular culture. For instance, I had no idea black nerds existed, and that superheroes and comic books are a thing among young African-Americans. I also learned about daps, snapbacks, and timbs.

Look, I am an old white guy living in the suburbs, Bri, Angie Thomas's smart, hip, talented, and ambitious protagonist, is a 16-year-old black girl living in the ghetto with her mother and brother. Her father, a popular rapper, was killed in a drive-by shooting when she was a child.

Bri wants to emulate him, but she also wants to be her own person -- in many ways, that's a common enough struggle for any teen-ager. But Bri's life is more complicated.

For one thing, members of the gang who shot her father are contemptuous of and try to thwart any success she might achieve. Her mother, a recovering heroin addict, is trying to raise her two children and find a decent job. Her brother -- who returned home after college to help out the family but can only find a job making pizzas -- likes to analyze everyone with his degree in psychology. Her aunt, who is also her mentor,  is a drug dealer. Her paternal grandparents like to throw shade on her mother. Her best friends are growing up with their own crises.

And Bri finds out that people -- even perfect strangers -- judge her through lenses tinged with bias, pre-judgment, and outright bigotry. Her teachers condemn her as "aggressive" when she speaks her mind. White parents blame her rap lyrics for any violence that occurs. Even those with good intentions see her as a ghetto hoodrat, and want her to become one -- or at least play the role.

How she handles that is shown through Thomas' masterful story-telling and crisp, descriptive writing. Thomas knows her characters and their lives. She bring them into ours with dignity, compassion, and respect.

Book Review: The Immortalists

The Immortalists, by Chloe Benjamin

Great books tell a great story. This one tells four.

How would you live if you knew the day you would die? Would it affect your lifestyle or career choice? Would you be more brazen or more cautious? How would your relationships change?

These are some of the questions the children of Saul and Gertie Gold must grapple with after they visit a fortune teller, who gives them the specific date of their deaths. Chloe Benjamin tells us their stories.

And geez, most are well told. I will admit, the novel dragged a bit in the middle, but that part gave readers lots of information about the family dynamics.

Varya, the oldest; Daniel, the practical one; Karla, the dreamer; and Simon, the lover of life, are the children of Jewish immigrants, growing up on the Lower East Side during the 1960s. One day, they hear about and visit the woman on Hester Street, who is said to be able to give you the date of your death. The children, in varying degrees, want to know their futures.

The book then delves into their lives, their choices, and their destinies. It explores how they face, or don't face, the world, and how they draw away from, and occasionally return to, their family and its rituals.

Some of the stories are a bit predictable. And sometimes, an exposition fairy magically reappears at just the right literary time to fill in the details.

But the high points of the book, and their emotive telling, easily overshadow these trivial complaints.

Book Review: Last Night in Montreal

Last Night in Montreal, by Emily St. John Mandel

This is a sad book about a lost soul, and about people whose ability to cope consists of running away. 

Back when she was a child, Lilia Albert's father abducted her. Well, perhaps abduct is too strong a word. Actually, he showed up at her house in the middle of the night, she went with him willingly, and both disappeared.

They spent their days driving around the United States and Canada, briefly living in motels and campgrounds, before heading out again. They lived on the road, changing their names and identities, rarely staying anywhere for more than a few days at a time. Lilia's father taught her wile he cruised the backroads. Freedom, to both of them, meant driving away.

Why this happened is not yet explained.

Then we fast-forward to the present day, and Lilia is living the hipster life in Brooklyn with Eli, an academic who is losing his taste for academia. One day, Lilia tells Eli she is going to the grocery store. As is her wont, she never returns. Eli, after getting word she is in Montreal, goes after her.

Thus, the scene is set for back-and-forth flashbacks of Lilia on the road, Eli trying to find her, the emerging backstory of her disappearance and years growing up, and the arrival of a private investigator with a growing obsession about finding her. It's a daring way to write a novel, stopping one character's perspective to bring in a second, then a third, and a fourth. But soon, you see them coming together to form a cohesive, compelling narrative.

It's a thoughtful tale about lonely people who only think about leaving, driving off, or running away. It's what they do. It's what they must do. It's not a coincidence that the book references Icarus, who, when given wings to fly, responded by taking it too far -- both literally and figuratively. Icarus, of course, met his end of getting too close to the sun, and suffering the consequences.

Lilia, Eli, and other characters, all of whom have taken a good idea too far, also meet the various consequences of their actions.

Book Review: The Testaments

The Testaments, by Margaret Atwood

If you were riveted by The Handmaid's Tale, its sequel also will enthrall you.

I'm not sure I like the word sequel, which carries the inference of being somewhat lesser than the original. So consider this not a sequel, but a continuance of the first novel. Think of it as Part 2, the later years.

Because that's a better description of it.

I read The Handmaid's Tale back in the long, long ago, and saw the original movie. I have not watched the TV series for a number of reasons. But I remember the first book, which had a huge impact on me.

The Testaments provides a backstory as to how and why Gilead came into existence. It's setting is years into the Gilead regime, which solidified its control of the country once known as the United States. Opposition to the regime, both from Canada -- its neighbor to the north and the author of these novels -- and among the states that split off from the regime after various civil wars, has intensified.

This is today's story.

It is told in a multitude of voices, from a top aunt in the organization to members of the resistance, both inside and outside the country. Some of the voices are those of children, who only know Gilead after the revolution, as they are taught little about the previous life.

Those voices alternate in the book. Together, they tell a complete tale, but the individual accounts are compelling in their own right. What happens is you get into one person's story; the chapter ends, and you move into another's story. You immediately want to find out more about the story you were reading, but wind up so engrossed in the new one you get upset when that chapter ends, and a third story moves in, or a previous one returns.

So you find yourself staying up late into the evening to learn the next verse of each story, which together tell a complete tale.

Atwood is a wonderful story-teller and a top-notch writer. It's no wonder this book was short-listed for the Booker Prize. We'll know who wins the prize later this month.

My bet is on Atwood. Besides, anyone who quotes a William Blake poem is OK with me.