Necessary Illusions

Thought Control in Democratic Societies, by Noam Chomsky.

Quickie Recap: This book probably defies quickie anything, but generally, it's the published version of several of his lectures, including 'Democracy and the Media' and 'Adjuncts of Government'.

Quickie Review: Going to the beach? Drawing yourself a bubble bath? Climbing under the duvet? Read something else. The best adjective I know of to describe this book is "dense" which is not to say it's bad. It has some really good ideas, but man, you have to be mentally prepared to plough through them. Basically, this book is about politicians maintaining a culture of confusion by using propaganda to distract us from what's really going on. Of course this smacks of the past 8 years of George W, but this book was prescient I guess, having been written in 1989. The edition that I read had the added bonus of being twice as long as the original, thanks to a series of appendices that address the criticism of the book's contents. If you think Chomsky is normally a little....scathing, well, you should see him with his hackles up!

Quickie Recommendation: Oooh, tough one. I can't really imagine gifting anyone with this book, which is usually what I go by. Sorry, Noam.

Crazy

A Father's Search Through America's Mental Health Madness, by Pete Earley.

Quickie Recap: When Earley's adult son suffers a breakdown and is arrested after a bizarre incident committed under the haze of mental illness, he is astounded by the inability of the health system or the justice system to deal with his son, let alone get him the help he needs.

Quickie Review: This book should serve as a wake-up call: something isn't working. Earley makes an excellent advocate. He goes looking for answers even when he can't get anyone to listen to his questions. He has the instincts of a journalist but in this work, he is tempered by having been touched personally by the subject. It makes him more sensitive, more probing, more concerned. It gives him fire.

Quickie Recommendation: It should be lighting fires in all of us.

Crossing California

by Adam Langer.

Quickie Recap: It's Chicago, 1979-1981. Some of the kids live on the right side of California Ave, some of them live on the wrong side of it. But they're all trying to get by, trying to navigate the world as it passes them by, trying to claim some piece of it for themselves.

Quickie Review: Adults, teenagers, and children all share narration responsibilities in this novel, which gives the story an interesting pace and an ever-changing perspective. It's the kind of book that, for the first half, makes you wish you could have been born in a different time and place, and for the second half pokes holes in the illusions created. So, it's not really re-hashing the glory days: it's about the election, the hostage crisis, the drug use, the sexuality. It keeps surprisingly well-focused, and is unrelenting in showing how useless and irrelevant authority (parents, school, government) had become and how a narcissistic generation was born.

Quickie Recommendation: Vigorous, acerbic, and good. But not wholesome.

A People's History of the United States

1492-Present, by Howard Zinn.

Quickie Recap: Does America really need an introduction?

Quickie Review: I was gutted by the first page, the first fucking page, when Christopher Columbus gets off his boat, is touched by the generosity of the "native" Americans and remarks what "fine servants" they would make..."With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want." What a sickeningly cynical way to give birth to a nation, and yet there it is, on the very first page....and it made me wonder what kind of people would go on to celebrate this man, even name a national holiday for him...but not to worry: there were still 700 pages to go.

Luc lent me this book, called it his bible. And I totally get how you might come to hold a belief system based on this book, because I felt stirred while reading it. I felt restless and touched and small. Zinn is critical of his government every step of the way, and by all accounts, there is much to be critical of. However, this is the people's history, and it is clear that Zinn feels that it's the people who have made his country a great one, in spite of its government, in spite of the oppressive class who relied on slavery to give birth to a nation and now relies on poverty to keep it going. People fought...and I can't help but feel complacent in comparison, and this has me a little worried for the future.

Quickie Recommendation: Arm yourself.

A Complicated Kindness

by Miriam Toews



Quickie Recap: A teenage girl named Nomi watches her family be pulled apart by the Mennonite community they live in and the choices they are forced to make between church and each other.



Quickie Review: I am painfully late reading this book, everyone and their pet rock already read it 3 years ago, so this review is just for me and I'm okay with that. I'm glad I didn't read this book before this because it heartens me to know that such things exist: that there are still beautiful words waiting on a shelf for me somewhere, if only I can discover them. This book does not fall short of brilliant. It aches with mundanity at times, pulses with a yearning that is surprisingly relatable to someone who did not grow up in a cult. Of course kindness is complicated. This book makes me really question whether anything has ever been simple.



Quickie Recommendation: Keep this one nearby, self, as you'll want to read it again.

No Way to Treat a First Lady

by Christopher Buckley.

Quickie Recap: When she wakes up in bed next to the body of her dead philandering husband, Beth isn't just under suspicious for murder, but for the high crime of assassination - because that's what they call it when your husband's the president. Not to worry though - America's most pompous and sensational trial lawyer just happens to be her ex-lover...you know, the one she dumped to marry the president. Yeah.

Quickie Review: Oh woe is me - can it already have been a year since I last read Buckley? I read this book in a span of 24 hours - in the bath, on the bus, at work, at the gym. I couldn't help myself! His books are like those little boxes of very expensive chocolates. You tell yourself you'll be good and just have one, maybe two. But they're so velvety on the tongue that before you know it you've gobbled them all up and all you've got left is a box full of empty wrappers. Okay, I took that metaphor too far. But Buckley is an insanely sharp writer and he reduces me to gushy fandom in the space of a paragraph.

Quickie Recommendation: Get into Buckley, he is soooo money!

Kane & Abel

by Jeffrey Archer.

Quickie Recap: In the early days of the 20th century, two babies are born, worlds and classes apart, but destined to play a part in each other's lives. Each man is fuelled by ambition, and by hatred for the other - and each will stop at nothing to see the other lose everything.

Quickie Review: More Romeo & Juliet than the biblical title implies, this story is nonetheless epic and engrossing. I surprised myself by developing a small addiction to these characters.

Quickie Recommendation: You'll basically know what's coming, but you still won't be able to wait for it to get there.