Vacation Travel Reading: The East Coast

Well, I'm finally back to blogging after a summer off. It was unplanned, but it turned out that my kids were so busy this summer, I spent my time driving them around Los Angeles (even during "Carmageddon"!) instead of blogging.

My summer reading this summer has suffered from a general lack of time to laze at the beach or by the pool, but next week my family is taking it's first-ever cruise, and I'm loading up the suitcase with books! We are sailing out of Brooklyn, New York (who knew?) up to Halifax, Nova Scotia, and then down the east coast, stopping in St. John, Bar Harbor, Portland, Boston, and Newport before heading back to New York. When I travel, I like to immerse myself in the literature of the place, so I have found some New England literature to read while sailing down its coast.

On my very first visit to Maine, I'm planning to read Sarah Orne Jewett’s classic novel, The Country of the Pointed Firs, first published in 1896, for a look at what life in coastal Maine was like at the turn of the twentieth century. People praise Jewett as one of the great American writers that nobody reads any more, and I'm eager to take in her characters and the atmosphere of the rocky coast of Maine.

One of my favorite books in recent years, Olive Kitteridge, by Elizabeth Strout, is also set in Maine, but the Maine of the present, not the past. A set of interconnected stories that make up a novel, it's about ornery Maine woman Olive who looks back on her life and relationships in her small town, and it has an amazing sense of place.

There's so much good writing set in Boston that it's hard to choose one book. For non-fiction, I'd like to read David Hackett Fischer's book Paul Revere's Ride, which I've heard is an amazing piece of narrative history, and a compelling read.

I've also had a Boston novel, John P. Marquand's The Late George Apley, which won the author a Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1938, on my to-read list for a long time. It is supposed to be another hidden gem by an author who fell out of favor in the 1960s, which satirizes the life and manners of the "Boston Brahmins" in pre-World War II Beacon Hill.

But when we round Cape Cod, I'm going to get out my old copy of Henry David Thoreau's book Cape Cod, an account of his meditative, beach-combing walking trips to Cape Cod in the 1850s, told with his trademark reverence for nature. The Cape is a wondrous place, and Thoreau's travelogue is satisfying a mixture of its folklore and natural history.

Another of my favorite books of all time is set on Cape Cod, Annie Dillard's The Maytrees. It is the chronicle of the ups and downs of a marriage over many years, set in the parabolic dunes of the very tip of the Cape, at Provincetown. I read it while sitting on a Cape beach one summer, and was captivated by Dillard's lyrical language and quirky characters.

We won't be visiting Providence, Rhode Island, this year, but it's a great city, and I was intrigued when I heard that its former mayor wrote a book about his exploits there. Politics and Pasta: How I Prosecuted Mobsters, Rebuilt a Dying City, Dined with Sinatra, Spent Five Years in a Federally Funded Gated Community, and Lived to Tell the Tale is a memoir by former Providence mayor Vincent “Buddy’’ Cianci, and I hear it's as colorful and controversial as the man himself.

When we hit the mansions of Newport, Rhode Island, I plan to pick up Thornton Wilder’s fictionalized memoir, Theophilus North. It tells the tale of a young man who spends the summer of 1926 in Newport, teaching tennis to the rich, and getting caught up in their travails, narrated by the elderly North from a distance of 50 years.

I've heard good things about John Casey’s book Spartina, winner of the National Book Award in 1989. It's about Rhode Island fisherman and boat-builder Dick Pierce, his difficult family problems, and his life among the salt marshes and crab fishermen of South County, RI.

What vacation reading have you done this summer? Has any of it reflected the places you visited? What was your favorite summer read?

On Vacation

I'm off to Paris for my first real vacation in quite some time (not a trip to visit family or some other obligation). I'm planning to read as much as possible, probably in cafes, while enjoying wine or hot chocolate or macarons.

I'll be back in two weeks, unless I find some free internet access somewhere, in which case I will try to post some pictures!

Impromptu vacation

Hello again! Sorry for the unexplained absence. I kept meaning to get to the computer, but I just couldn't seem to. This is what I was doing over the last few weeks instead of blogging:


I took my unplanned blogging break because I planted a huge vegetable garden in my back yard, and then our family took an impromptu trip to Vancouver, where my husband sometimes has to work. He's been going there every once in a while for the last several years and I hadn't ever been, so we packed up the kids and had a wonderful week exploring the city.

And now there's just the craziness of three kids not in school. I feel like a chauffeur. I have yearly amnesia about just how difficult the "unstructured" time of summer is. It's harder to get the kids to their various fun things during the summer than it is to get them to and from school every day.

While in Vancouver, I managed to read Laurie Colwin's book of essays, Home Cooking: A Writer in the Kitchen. I love her fiction, and her food writing is just as good. Her voice is wonderfully confiding, and self-deprecating, and funny. Some of the recipes are dated (which doesn't actually take away from their charm) and some are timeless, but there are quite a few dog-eared pages where I marked recipes I'd like to try.

While I was away, Jose Saramago died, at age 87. I have only read his novel Blindness, but I really liked it (and wrote about it here). It was a singular reading experience. I will definitely read more of his work in the future. Here's an appreciation of Jose Saramago and his NY Times obituary.

Here's a picture of downtown Vancouver from our hotel room balcony, taken with my iPhone:
I had never been to Vancouver before, and I really, really liked it. Breathtakingly beautiful, clean, and lots of good food. I'll go back!

Where is everyone going this summer, and what are you taking to read?

Still on the jury...

I'm on a jury. The trial is supposed to last two weeks, but we hear it might go a day or two longer. Which means it will get dangerously close to Christmas.

We celebrate both Chanukah and Christmas in our family. At home, we've been lighting our candles nightly, and it is quite beautiful. Then next week we plan to head to my parents' house, a six-hour drive away, to enjoy their Christmas tree and lots of presents and food. I was hoping to drive north on the 22nd, but...I could still be in court. I'm thinking the judge won't like it if I skip town...

I've barely cracked a book during the trial, because I've had no time to do any of my part-time work, regular errands, Christmas shopping, or kid stuff during the day. Due to the trial, I'm missing one child's family history presentation at school, and another's teacher-appreciation party. My third is in the middle of finals week, so in honor of that, I thought I'd post a little list of vocabulary words for y'all to ponder.

My eighth-grader (13-year-old) read To Kill a Mockingbird this semester in his English class. This is the list of vocabulary words, mostly gleaned from that book, that he has to know the definition of for tomorrow's exam. I thought it was a pretty good list for a 13-year-old to know. You can quiz yourself on how many you know :)

morbid
prowess
expound
nebulous
rue
articulate
fractious
furtive
perpetrate
temerity
mitigate
indolent
affable
deplorable
solicitous
amenity
distraught
urbane
truculence
terse
righteous
reconcile
conjecture
patronize
lurid
dexterity
discourse
protract
restive
indiscriminate
countenance
cultivated
uncanny
duress
repose
inordinate
assuage
venerable
ingenuous
intricate
exuberant
vehement
disposition

Back home again

Settling back in after another weekend away. These are champagne problems, I know. My hubby and I had a wonderful weekend in San Francisco to celebrate our fifteenth wedding anniversary. Some foodie friends recommended more restaurants than we could have possibly visited, but we chose to dine at Quince and Delfina, both of which were wonderful.

We also took a long walk from the Marina to Fort Point, just under the Golden Gate Bridge. The photo at left is of the bridge from inside the fort. I didn't have my camera, just my phone, so this is the only picture really worth posting. The rest are fuzzy or lopsided or both.

The weather was gorgeous, and so was the city. And the kids had fun staying with my parents, so everyone was happy.

I'm still full from all of the eating.

I did a little reading, too. I downloaded a couple of the Fairacre series of books on my Kindle, which I started. I got through Miss Clare Remembers and Emily Davis (The Fairacre Series 4 & 8). The Fairacre series chronicles life in a rural English village from the late 1800s through the middle of the next century. Not a lot actually happens in most of the books, but they are full of atmosphere, and I'm enjoying them.

I also started The Middle Place, by Kelly Corrigan, which I'm reading for my book group. It's a memoir about her battle with cancer, and her father's battle with cancer at the same time. I'm enjoying Corrigan's voice, and somehow, despite the obviously difficult subject matter, it's not really a depressing book. It's not just about cancer; it's about being a daughter and a mother, and so far, I like it.

A Weekend in New York

I spent last weekend in New York, visiting a friend who recently moved there. It was freezing by Los Angeles standards, in the 40s and raining, but that didn't stop us from walking all over the West Village, Soho and Chelsea, exploring, shopping, and eating. It was a rare weekend away from the kids, in a city I love to visit.

I didn't have much time to read, except on the plane rides. But I did finish David Lebovitz's food memoir, The Sweet Life in Paris: Delicious Adventures in the World's Most Glorious - and Perplexing - City. I really enjoyed his conversational style, his funny anecdotes about living among Parisians, and especially his recipes. Lebovitz learned the pastry chef trade at Chez Panisse, and writes wonderful cookbooks and a blog that I love to check for recipes. I love how he writes about chocolate, because chocolate is something I can't live without.

So when my friend gave a dinner party for me in New York, I pulled out the book and made David Lebovitz's Mocha Creme Fraiche cake for dessert. It's a dense, chocolate-y, flourless wonder, and it was a big hit, and the recipe is definitely a keeper. I'll be pulling it out the next time I'm entertaining any chocolate lovers.

Now I'm back in good ol' 80-degree Los Angeles weather, kind of missing my New York gloves, boots, scarf and wool coat. Maybe I'll get to pull them out again when we all head up north to San Francisco next weekend...

More Vacation Reading

As a last hurrah before school started for two-thirds of my children, we went on a mini-vacation to a "glamping" spot just north of Santa Barbara. Glamping, in case you're not familiar with the term, is short for "glamorous camping", and you can find it at outdoor resorts equipped with well-appointed tents or small cabins, and in this case a store with a great wine selection.

I hiked, read, and ate too many s'mores. I also spotted a mountain lion! I was safely in my car at the time, as I saw it lope across the road ahead of me, and disappear into the chaparral. Beautiful but dangerous when hungry! The next morning on my hike, I saw mountain lion tracks, and took a picture with my phone's camera. Needless to say, I was happy I had a hiking partner and a big stick with me.

I only brought one book with me, Joanne Harris' Five Quarters of the Orange, which I really enjoyed. It's the only book of hers that I've ever read, but I also have a copy of Gentlemen and Players on my shelf, which I am more likely to pick up now. I loved the author's descriptions of food; of the production of food on her main character's small, French farm, and of the recipes for the dishes she serves in her little restaurant. Harris really transported me to the little town on the Loire, and back in time to WWII. I was also impressed with her vivid descriptions of a woman's suffering from migraines. I get them, too, and so, I learned, does Harris.

Vacation reading

My family and I just returned from a week's vacation at a guest ranch in Central California, where we had a lovely time. This ranch was all about horseback riding, which is not one of my hobbies or interests, but was really appealing to my kids. They also fished, kayaked, swam, and otherwise ran around in the great outdoors.

I, of course, read. I did have the good sense to read outdoors, but I did spend most of my free time reading. I finished The Story of a Marriage, by Andrew Sean Greer, which I enjoyed very much for the quality of the writing and the twists and turns of the story, as well as the descriptions of post-war San Francisco. I also finished The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, by Stieg Larsson, which I also enjoyed--essentially for the same reasons, but of course it was a very different kind of book. I am not usually into thrillers or mysteries, but this was atmospheric and smart, and a real page-turner.

I also started and finished Geraldine Brooks' People of the Book. It was one of my book group's picks for summer reading, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's the imagined history of a book, the Sarajevo Haggadah, a 14th century illuminated manuscript which actually exists, and has survived many attempts at its destruction. I loved Brooks' way of making history come alive with wonderful characters and vivid descriptions of historical events. I know a fair amount about Jewish history, but it was so interesting to have the history come alive with a good story--to have examples of, say, how it felt when the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492 by Isabella and Ferdinand, rather than to just know that dry fact.

If I can find my camera in all the unpacking chaos, I'll post some pictures of the vacation...

Beach reading

I'm back from a week on Cape Cod, where we get together with my husband's family every summer. We had gorgeous weather, and I had lots of time to read on the beach and at the pool, which was a little slice of heaven. However, there were pitfalls, too, including several plagues--lice and a vicious stomach virus. We managed to stay uninfected until the day we were leaving, when my littlest one came down with the stomach virus, and vomited cross-country on the plane ride. Sorry for the grisly details, but really, it was a trial for me. I don't like plane travel at the best of times, and this was a little slice of hell. However, we are home, and my small one has her appetite back--at last!

Before we left, I threw it out there that I was looking for light airplane reading, and the charming and ever-informative Litlove suggested I find something by Elinor Lippman or Barbara Trapido. I couldn't find anything by Barbara Trapido, but found a book by Elinor Lippman that fit the bill, a novel called Then She Found Me. Apparently it was made into a movie. It was a nice, light, engaging airplane read for the flight out--just right!

While on the Cape, my sister-in-law--who is always looking out for me in the reading department, bless her--brought me a book of linked short stories by Elizabeth Strout called Olive Kitteridge. I really liked this book. Not only was it set in a small town in New England--I always like to read about the places I'm visiting--it was also beautifully written, sad and sweet, and a wonderful study of human nature. I had read an earlier novel of hers, Amy and Isabelle, which I also liked. But to me, this was even better.

Then I got to something that had been languishing on my to-read pile, The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, by Maggie O'Farrell. It was a suspenseful read, and terribly sad, and set in Scotland, both in Edwardian times and in the present--I enjoyed the juxtaposition.

I also bought a couple of books while I was there, at the Brewster Book Store, an independent book shop that I've posted about before. I love to support the independents! I bought The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, by Mary Ann Schaffer and Annie Barrows, which I got through in one day. It was a lovely little book that I had heard about on the book blogs, and when I was at the cash register, the woman behind the counter said I would love it. She was right, it was charming and a page-turner.

I also bought The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street, by Helene Hanff, a sequel of sorts to her memoir, 84, Charing Cross Road. 84, Charing Cross Road is one of my all-time favorite books about books and reading, and it's something I find myself re-reading every once in awhile. It was satisfying to read about Hanff's journey to London after the publication of 84, Charing Cross Road, where she finally got to meet some of the people she had corresponded with for so long. But though it was entertaining and well worth reading, it wasn't quite as good as the first book.

And, on the recommendation of my sister-in-law, I bought Beginner's Greek: A Novel, by James Collins--another book to read on the plane. Of course, I didn't get any reading done on the plane on the way home, but I did manage to start the book at least, and I'm finding it to be warm and witty at the same time.

All in all, a great vacation for reading! (Mostly because my kids were totally engaged with their cousins and I barely saw them!) What have you read on vacation this year?

Vacation Reading

Here's a photo of the beach in Malibu, where we went to visit old friends of my husband's yesterday. If you click on the picture, and look closely, you can see one of my sons waving at me, and the other one ignoring me, while they boogie board.

I remember last summer a bunch of bloggers I know and love (really, kisses to all of you) blogged about the concept of "summer reading". I remember some of the bloggers were, shall we say, disdainful about the term "summer reading", as they didn't get why reading in the summer should be different than reading any other time.

I understand their argument, but as I've been nearing the start of my only actual summer trip, I've been thinking a lot about what books I want to bring, and I've realized that I do think differently about books to read on vacation, summer or otherwise.

First of all, I always have to think about something light yet immersive to read on the plane. I'm not the world's most comfortable flyer, so if I can concentrate on a book at all, it needs to be something that really grabs me. Sometimes that's a tall order. Then I need to make sure I have enough books to interest me for the week that I'll be gone, but I don't want to lug hardbacks, especially now that the airlines are making us pay for every bag.

I've pulled a few things from my tottering book pile for my trip to Cape Cod next week:

The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, by Maggie O'Farrell
The Photograph, by Penelope Lively
The Blue Flower, by Penelope Fitzgerald
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie
In a Sunburned Country, by Bill Bryson
Oleander, Jacaranda: A Childhood Perceived, by Penelope Lively
The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel, by (you guessed it) Amy Hempel

But clearly this is overkill, so I'm going to have to whittle down the pile so that it will fit into my luggage. So obviously I need your help.

Does anyone have any favorites here? Anything I have to take, or absolutely shouldn't, on this list? Or do you have another suggestion that I need to go out and buy immediately? (I have a couple of coupons, so I might actually do it!)

Let me know what you think!

Booking Through Thursday--Vacation Spots

Booking Through Thursday's question today:

Do you buy books while on vacation/holiday?

Do you have favorite bookstores that you only get to visit while away on a trip?

What/Where are they?

I'll buy books anywhere, so yes, I buy books while on vacation. Actually, I usually bring plenty of books with me for my vacation reading, but I find an excuse to buy new books while I'm away, anyway.

I actively seek out local bookstores when I'm on vacation--it's a wonderful way to soak up the local color. Also, I love to buy local books to help me learn about a new place.

We usually visit Cape Cod every year with my husband's family, and there's a lovely little bookstore right down the road from where we stay in Brewster. I blogged about it here.

And here's a picture:

Walden Pond

Nothing so fair, so pure, and at the same time so large, as a lake, perchance, lies on the surface of the earth. Sky water. It needs no fence. Nations come and go without defiling it. It is a mirror which no stone can crack, whose quicksilver will never wear off, whose gilding Nature continually repairs; no storms, no dust, can dim its surface ever fresh; -- a mirror in which all impurity presented to it sinks, swept and dusted by the sun's hazy brush -- this the light dust-cloth -- which retains no breath that is breathed on it, but sends its own to float as clouds high above its surface, and be reflected in its bosom still. -- Henry David Thoreau

This weekend was our last weekend of insane travel for awhile. We were in Boston for a long weekend, for a lovely family event. And though the schedule was grueling (up at 4:30 to make a 7am flight), the time we spent was memorable.

Monday, before catching a flight home, my sister-in-law took us to Walden Pond, near Concord, MA. The area is now a Massachusetts state park. We saw the replica of the tiny cabin Thoreau built and spent two year in, thinking and writing and living simply. We also walked along the shore of the pond to the original site where it stood. Next to the site, visitors have left rocks as a memorial, and now the pile of rocks is quite large.

It was a really beautiful and peaceful spot. I didn't bring my camera (and good thing, since we were drenched in a sudden spring downpour), but I found a few shots on the internet (the top one at Freefoto, by a photographer called Ian Britton). We only encountered a few people hiking around the pond on that cloudy day, but my sister-in-law says the beach gets crowded in the summer when people come to swim.

I'm glad people can enjoy the beauty of the spot, but it is funny to think of Thoreau's place of contemplation filled with summer picnickers and beachgoers!

I have never read Thoreau's work, but I have two of his books on my shelf: Walden, and Cape Cod. I hope to get to both soon!

Unaccustomed Earth, by Jhumpa Lahiri, and Yosemite pictures

I finished Jhumpa Lahiri's collection of stories Unaccustomed Earth while we vacationed in Yosemite. I really enjoyed it, as I enjoyed her earlier books. I remember reading a couple of these stories in the New Yorker a while back, so they weren't all new to me.

Lahiri's prose is plain but elegant, and I love her attention to detail. I also relate to her work for other reasons. Lahiri is a couple of years younger than I am, and she often describes Bengali children growing up in suburban America as immigrants or the children of immigrants. I didn't have that experience, but I did grow up in suburban America during the time period she often describes, the seventies and eighties, and I think her descriptions of feeling like an outsider in suburban America hold true for me and many, if not most, American teenagers. In one of the stories, a young girl receives a hand-me-down coat from the son of family friends, and she hates wearing it, because it is a boy's coat, and nothing like the puffy pink and purple coats her female classmates wear--but her immigrant parents don't understand her embarrassment and won't let her get rid of it. Ah, the indignities the young must bear! It's scenes like this one that Lahiri does so well.

This book also describes courtship and the early years of marriage, and describes the difficulties in parenting young children, which I can also relate to. I would be interested to hear if the book is as interesting to all the readers out there who are not in this stage of their lives, or who didn't grow up in suburban America.

Yosemite was beautiful. There's something about being in Yosemite that is calming and meditative. The photos don't capture the scale, or the majesty, of the place. But here are a few snaps anyway:
Yosemite Valley from the entrance at highway 41

Half Dome at dusk.

El Capitan from a distance.

A granite dome in the distance.

Upper and lower Yosemite Falls.

Local Bookstores Make Me Happy

My family vacations on Cape Cod every year, if we can make it, and every year I make at least one trip to the local bookstore in Brewster, which is walking distance from where we stay. It's called The Brewster Book Store, and it's wonderfully eclectic, as all good local bookstores are. They have a marvelous children's section, and a solid fiction area where I can always find something to add to my vacation reading list.

When I visited on this trip, I asked Val, who works at the store, what people were reading this summer. Val (and I remembered her from summers past, though I forgot to ask her how long she's been with the store) mentioned that people are reading A Thousand Splendid Suns in hardback, and Water for Elephants: A Novel in paperback. Local book groups were reading Nicole Krauss's The History of Love: A Novel and Irene Nemirovsky's Suite Française.

And people are reading books of local interest. Many have bought Annie Dillard's bestselling The Maytrees: A Novel, which is set in Provincetown on Cape Cod. I'm sure many a Cape Cod vacationer sat on the beach with this book this summer--I know I did. I enjoyed it very much, and will write about it soon.

Another book of local interest is the perennially popular The Outermost House: A Year of Life On The Great Beach of Cape Cod, by Henry Beston, a memoir of a year spent living in a house on the beach at Eastham, on the Atlantic coast of Cape Cod, in 1926. The book is praised as a classic of natural history, and Beston is compared to Thoreau, and even to Proust, in the reviews I read. This one will have to go on my list.

Val also mentioned The Widow's War: A Novel, by Sally Gunning, as another book of local interest. It is a work of historical fiction, the story of Lyddie Berry, a whaling widow who struggles to make a life for herself in 18th century Cape Cod, when widows had few rights. Reviewers liked it and gave it high marks for thorough research and a compelling central character. I bought a copy of this one, and will let you know how I like it.

Thanks Val and the rest of the folks at the Brewster Book Store, for making my vacation reading that much more transporting.

Back from vacation, but buried under piles of laundry...

We're back from our family vacation on Cape Cod, which was lovely. I managed to read The Maytrees: A Novel, by Annie Dillard, which is set mostly in Provincetown, and which I enjoyed very much. I also read a graphic novel that my sister-in-law is reading for her book club, Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic, by Alison Bechdel, which I also thoroughly enjoyed. More on these later. Here are a few photos from the trip...

The woods behind the place we stayed. Out here in Southern California, we don't get woods as dense as this...

The path to the beach, through the dunes.

Beach plums that grow in the dunes.

The beach where we stayed.



The general store in Brewster, MA, with penny candy and fudge. The sign in the window says, "Beach Books."

The beach near Wellfleet, on a windy day. The kids were supposed to take a surfing lesson, but it was cancelled because the waves were too big! (Surprising to those of us from California...)

The bay at Wellfleet, MA.

Wellfleet.

Me doing what I do best.