Not your typical detective - Celine

Celine - art journal page

For the second time this summer, I found myself reading a story that involved a teenaged girl from a wealthy American family who finds herself pregnant during the years following World War II. Unlike Charlie St. Claire in Kate Quinn's The Alice Network (see my post) who is 19 and decides to keep her baby, Celine Watkins, of Peter Heller's novel Celine, is only 15 and her baby is given up for adoption. Both young women had difficult decisions to make regarding their pregnancy. Celine's decision would help to determine the course of the rest of her life.

After delivering her baby Celine returned to her private boarding school to complete her studies, went off to college, married and had a son. She was the unconventional member of her family by becoming a private detective and not your typical one at that. Celine only takes cases involving missing family members; often clients are looking for birth parents or children. On her travels, Celine continues to search the faces of women who would be the right age to be the daughter that she gave up all those years ago. As the novel unfolds, we learn about who Celine is and her family history. She is now in her sixties, remarried to Pete, suffering from emphysema, artist, master of acting, and a crack shot. We meet her adult son, Hank, who has learned his mother's secret from his dying aunt. Unknown to Celine, Hank in his early twenties went looking for his missing sister, and he might just have found her.

Celine's current case is  brought to her by Gabriella who is searching for her father a famous photographer who was presumed dead, eaten by a grizzly bear in Yellowstone National Park. But there are way to many loose threads to the case when Celine picks up the trail. Celine and Pete have arrived in Jackson Hole to begin their hunt for Gabriella's father and she comments about this town as being only in existence as a location for fun which is very tiring, "Pursuing fun is exhausting. Having fun is just fun. Much more relaxing just to do your work, don't you think? I mean if you enjoy it. (p.138)" What a statement about the American way of life - we work really hard in order to have the time to chase our happiness. In fact Pete responds to her with this, "It's why I always felt coming back to the States after traveling was a bit stressful. I mean our job as citizens, apparently, is the pursuit of happiness. Something I always have to gird myself for. I'd much rather just be happy, or not. (p. 139)"

Being happy has been a topic of mine in earlier posts (Hector and the Search for Happiness, The Happiness Project, and Happiness on the Mind), and I think Pete's quote above hits the nail on the head - happiness is a decision to be or not to be. We can't find happiness by pursuing it (see how i became stupid) rather it is something that comes from within. I believe that we can pursue fun, excitement gained by doing activities,  spending time with other people, or engaging in hobbies. But too many of us work very hard to get those things we think will bring us happiness - a thinner body, a bigger bank account, a house in a better neighborhood, the promotion at work, a new spouse, and the list goes on. What we lose is the precious time to just be. I attended the funeral of a wonderful woman this week, and I know that when she came to her last moments it wasn't her bank account she was thinking about, but the precious time that she had spent being herself for that was her greatest accomplishment and didn't everyone at her funeral say so. This woman was authentic, she used her big booming voice and she wasn't afraid to tell you just how it was. That's the lesson for all of us to take away - to be happy, to be ourselves, to go out there and do life. Thanks Patricia B. for the lesson.

Little Free Libraries - There's a Cozy Mystery for That

Little Free Library - mixed media
acrylic, magazine scraps, ink stamps, pen

Several years ago now, over dinner my son explained something new he had learned at school (yes sometimes children do have an answer to the "What did you do at school today?" question) something called the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon. What is that you might ask? Well, the phrase originally came from a West German militant group that formed in the 1970s that included two members with the names Baader and Meinhof, but in the 1990s was used to describe that thing that happens to us when we see or hear something and then it continues to crop up. True to form, shortly after my son explained Baader-Meinhof to me I read it in a book and then encountered it somewhere else. Too strange.

How does this relate to today's post you might ask, well remember about two or three posts back I mentioned my librarian friend's Little Free Library that she has in her yard? I had taken a book (how i became stupid) which I read and reviewed here. Meanwhile, I needed a new audiobook title to listen to and searched on new additions (see post on The Murder at the House of Rooster Happiness) and found A Most Curious Murder by Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli. This cozy mystery opens with the destruction of a Little Library built by the narrator's deceased father, and maintained by her mother. In a Michigan town with no library of its own, this Little Library served the community and its loss is seen as an outrage. Soon after, the man suspected of committing the vandalism is found murdered. Obviously, there is more to the story of just a vandal at work.

In the course of my reading life I have come across many a cozy mystery story. If you have an interest or a passion for something there is a cozy mystery out there for you. Do you like cooking or baking? There is Diane Mott Davidson's catering series or Joanna Fluke's bakery series. Need something to drink with those yummy treats? Try a tea shop mystery by Laura Childs or a coffee house mystery by Cleo Coyle. Do you knit, quilt, do needlepoint? There's Maggie Sefton, Earlene Fowler, and Monica Ferris.  Maybe you're into gardening, or vintage cookware, antiques, fixer-uppers, Bed and Breakfasts, libraries, I could go on all day, but the point is there is a cozy mystery out there to match any and all of your interests. Just think about it for a while and our old friend Baader-Meinhof will make sure you come across just what you need.

The Butterfly Effect - How It All Began

ButterflyTangle - art journal piece:
acrylic, zentangle, fabric and vintage book scraps

Penelope Lively opens her novel How It All Began with a quote from James Gleick regarding the Butterfly Effect, how the flapping of a butterfly's wings in one place can impact the weather somewhere half way around the world. It was Edward Lorenz of MIT, who in 1961, while trying to come up with a way to model weather patterns using computers, discovered that it would be almost impossible to generate longterm forecasts because we are unable to measure precisely enough the factors that we input into the model.

But how does weather modeling come into Lively's story? It doesn't. What does is the opening event - the mugging of an elderly woman named Charlotte. That event creates a cascade through the small group of Lively's characters who don't even know that they are connected to one another. You know it's like meeting someone who it turns out knows so-and-so and before you know it they are your neighbor's third cousin twice removed.

Charlotte is a former Literature teacher and in retirement a literacy volunteer. The mugging has resulted not only in the loss of her purse, but an injury: a broken hip. While convalescing, she finds it hard to focus on the one thing that has always sustained her - reading. "Forever, reading has been central, the necessary fix, the support system. Her life has been informed by reading. She has read not just for distraction, sustenance, to pass the time, but she has read in a state of primal innocence, reading for enlightenment, for instruction, even (p. 34)." How frustrating it must have been to her during this time not to have the solace that comes from reading. When my father was in the hospital and we were waiting a diagnosis, I knew that he was truly ill because after a lifetime of watching him reading, he didn't. He wasn't tempted by the daily paper, magazines or a book. When the diagnosis did come, Stage IV lung cancer, it was a swift five weeks to his passing.  I would not see him read again.

Like Charlotte, I read to learn about other cultures, what it is like to be a different age, have more or less money, how to overcome a broken heart, to be a brilliant scientist, an intrepid explorer, and the list goes on and on. "She is as much a product of what she has read as of the way in which she has lived; she is like millions of others built by books, for whom books are an essential foodstuff, who could starve without (p. 35)." How beautifully put, of course I am who I am because of what I've experienced but also what I have read. The thoughts of others, whether I've encountered them in person or through a book, and like the beating of a butterfly's wings, have had some effect on me. In return we may never know how our lives and words may effect someone else somewhere half way around the world from us.

Picking a book because of its cover

Artist Paintbox
from a visit to an open studio

There's a reason for cover art and that's to entice us to pick the book up and give it a closer look. How did they do it in the old days when all the books were bound in leather with gold tooling on the spine one looking pretty much like every other one? I imagine the quintessential Englishmen's library as featured in movies and design magazines.  I love strolling among the shelves looking for something that peaks my interest.

There are other methods to searching cover art for inspiration like flipping through BookPage: America's Book Review so thoughtfully left in the teacher's workspace by our wonderful school librarian. Her ploy is to get teachers to help with providing suggestions for the school catalogue, but I use it for my personal reading gain. There it was on the page, a cover featuring an open watercolor palette and brush, Julia Glass's A House Among the Trees.

Mort Lear, famous illustrator and children's book author, has foolishly, especially at his advancing age, climbed up onto the roof to clean away some debris left by a storm, only to fall to his death. His long time, live-in personal assistant Tomasina (Tommy) Daulair has inherited the house along with the responsibility of managing his literary/artistic estate. Enter a small cast of characters whose lives have been touch some way or another by Mort and his artwork. There is Meredith a museum curator to whom Mort as promised to donate a large portion of his work upon his death; Franklin his lawyer; Nick the actor who is to play Mort in a biopic movie; and Dani, Tommy's younger brother, who unwittingly served as the model for Mort's breakout work. It is through these people that we learn about Mort's character and his past. He presented a different face to each of them as he worked hard to hide his real self.

Mort, like many, suffered a trauma in his childhood which he never spoke about and kept hidden. The keeping of secrets leads one to develop mechanisms to protect the self, and prevent the rest of the world from knowing the truth. We are afraid that the world will not understand. They will judge us harshly regardless of the fact that we are a victim and not the perpetrator. As a result we become stunted. It is only by Mort's death and the coming together of this small group of characters that we can come to know the real Mort, and the truth is the real Mort lost out on a lot of life by holding onto his secrets. Finding the courage to voice our secrets allows us to be freed of them thereby giving us the opportunity to use all the energy that was dissipated in keeping those secrets and channel it into living more fully.

LFL Find - how i became stupid

Be Yourself - collage of magazine
and decorative paper scraps

As promised from my earlier post regarding Little Free Libraries,  here is a quick review of the book I chose - Martin Page's how i became stupid.

Twenty-five year old Antoine thinks to much. He goes through life examining each choice he makes. In fact he couldn't decide what to study in college so he has an eclectic assortment of skills by which he ekes out a meager living. Luckily, he has a posse of equally unique friends, all trying to make their way through life living in Paris.

Problem is Antoine thinks he's pretty unhappy with the way his life is going so he writes a manifesto regarding his issue - "The process of thought is not a natural one, it hurts; it's as if I were uncovering pieces of broken glass and lengths of barbed wire in the air. I can't seem to stop my brain or to slow it down.... Everything I see, feel, and hear throws itself into the furnace of my mind, fires it up and makes it charge on full steam ahead" (p. 56).  Over-thinker that he is he sets out to become more happy and his first attempt is to become an alcoholic. Never in my life, or that of the drunk in the bar that Antoine encounters, have I read of someone who diligently studies up on the subject before setting out to become an alcoholic. Turns out even with all his researching, that Antoine is super sensitive to alcohol and a mere half a glass of beer puts him into a coma.

Antoine, if anything, is persistent in trying to become happy. He finally resorts to prescription antidepressants and ringing up an old classmate who has become a wildly successful stockbroker. Like everything else Antoine throws himself into learning about the buying and selling of shares and with the help of decaffeinated coffee (I'll let you read to find out how this was done) becomes a millionaire. Of course now Antoine must pursue the life of a millionaire, and like many a millionaire he is doomed to lose it all.

At twice Antoine's age I have to laugh at his antics. Antoine thinks he's unhappy because he isn't like everyone else - he's unique. What he doesn't realize at the beginning of the book is that being unique may be hard in our world, but it makes us truly happy people. For most people they strive all their lives to be like everyone else. No where is it more apparent than in the halls of the high school I teach in. Girls who all have the same color hair (whether it is natural or not) cut in the same style, wearing the same black yoga pants and Ugg boots. Or boys with their basketball shorts and neon colored sneakers. It's the kids on the fringe who don't fit in you sometimes worry about, but they may actually have achieved what the others have not - self awareness. They already may know that following the pack is not going to make them happy. For other people it takes years, or they may never discover, that trying to keep up with the Joneses will never make them happy.

A trip to the far East - Murder at the House of Rooster Happiness

Gardening Happiness - art journal page
acrylic and magazine scraps 

Once again, a shout out to my public library for the many wonderful services they provide. This time it's the downloadable audiobooks, which I can access through the Overdrive App. Looking through the new additions list, filtered for mysteries, I discovered David Casarett's Murder at the House of Rooster Happiness set in Thailand. At the center of this story is Ladarat Patalang, a nurse who has traveled to the US to study at the University of Chicago in order to serve back in her native country as a nurse ethicist for the Sriphat Hospital. It is because of her training that a police detective comes to her with an issue regarding a man who had been brought to the hospital's ER by his wife - the man was dead, but an observant police officer on duty at the hospital recognized the wife except he recalled seeing her in another hospital with a dead husband in tow. Ladarat will be torn between her new found interest in being a detective on the trail of this woman, and her duties to the hospital which includes dealing with the family of an injured American man.

Casarett has peppered the book with loads of Thai language (little did I know how many different smiles we humans have), delicious sounding foods, description of the countryside, Eastern philosophy, and view points on ethics. As I listened I was reminded of another female character who became a detective - Precious Ramotswe of Alexander McCall Smith's No. 1 Ladies Detective series, set in the African nation of Botswana. Like Precious who refers to her detective's bible, The Principles of Private Detection by Clovis Andersen, Ladarat has her textbook by Professor Dalrymple, of Yale University who has written The Fundamentals of Ethics. Ladarat often refers to the wise words of Professor Dalrymple as she makes her way through the quagmire of actions, emotions and beliefs held by people in order to make ethical decisions to solve the problems set before her.

The story does present us with a medical ethical question regarding a gravely injured man who appears to be brain dead. What should the family and medical staff do to care for this man? The issue is exacerbated by the fact that this man is American and the Thais are well aware of how the family may perceive the medical care that can be received in a country not as developed as the US. As the reader, it was refreshing to see that issue handled and how another culture perceives us Americans. Once again we are reminded that we don't all see the world through the same lens.

The other major issue centers around prostitution. The sex trade is big business in Thailand as it is here in the U.S. Casarett presents two very different brothel owners and how they handle their business and treat their employees. We are challenged to see that in a culture different than ours that sending a daughter to work in the sex trade can be a way to support a family living in poverty. Does it make it right? As with many ethical questions there may be no right answer, but we must struggle to find the best answer for ourselves in a given situation.

Other's opinions about why reading is so good for you!

Art Journal - collage with buttons

My dear librarian friend is always looking for ways to get people reading; she has installed a Little Free Library (LFL) in her front yard. I stopped by this morning for my first visit. If you are not familiar with this idea, it is an opportunity for people to create a free book exchange program - take one, leave one - so I grabbed a title and will bring one the next time I drive by. What a wonderful way to discover a new author - Martin Page and his first novel how i became stupid. I will report back to you about this work after I've had a chance to read it, but be honest how could I resist such a title?

The other goodie in the LFL, was a url to a thoughtful TedTalk video by Lisa Bu, "How books can open your mind." I particularly liked her thoughts on how books can be a "magic portal" to connect us with people, the past, the present, and the future. They are also conduits for helping us to discover our passions. She presents the concept of comparative reading and several ways in which to choose companion pieces to do so. Lisa challenge accepted.

A word about today's art journal piece. When I was a kid I had a lovely yellow bike with a wire basket on the front, which I would ride to the library when the weather was good. It was a wonderful freedom and empowering to be able to head off and supply myself with reading material whenever I wanted. I didn't have to wait for an adult to take me to the library. How awesome was that. I hope you too have wonderful memories of childhood reading adventures, which live on into your present life.