Substantial and fun titles fill a summer of lockdown and recovery

Like so many people at high risk (due to age and infirmities) because of the ongoing emergency, I am stuck at home. However, I had begun not just to get used to lockdown, but really to enjoy it. I was cooking like crazy, even making three different breads in one day, I adopted a kitten, and I was plowing through that to-be-read pile on my nightstand.

However, shoulder surgery has put a kink in my fun. I can’t cook, even with the help of a somewhat reluctant sous-chef (the roommate). I can’t exercise. It’s too hot to take a walk. All that’s left for me is reading. I am not crying.

Last week’s reads

When we used to go out into the world, we liked to visit the used book store, piling up ambitions to be fulfilled later. Sometimes titles get pushed to the bottom of the pile repeatedly for more intriguing finds. For me, one of those was “The Partly Cloudy Patriot,” a collection of essays by Sarah Vowell, an author, journalist, essayist, actress, and contributor to “This American Life.” I selected the book because I had heard a review of a more recent title, “The Wordy Shipmates” on NPR.

Vowell calls herself a history buff, and the essays in “Patriot” include topics such as presidential libraries, historical maps showing California as an island, a letter to her deceased congressman, and the founding of the Canadian Mounties. Although some of the essays are dated, bemoaning the election and inauguration of George W. Bush, (which seems quaint now) they are still entertaining.

Vowell addresses her topics with insight and humor. On a “pilgrimage to Gettysburg,” Vowell writes, “Fact is, I think about the Civil War all the time, every day. I can’t even use a cotton ball to remove my eye makeup without spacing out about slavery’s favorite cash crop” juxtaposed with Lincoln’s own words, that “it may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men’s faces.”

Vowell also argues that Tom Landry was her first entrée into existentialism because he introduced her to “dread: nagging, doubting, gnawing fear. And I’m not even referring to the ’79 Super Bowl.” Rather, she refers to her Tom Landry Christian comic book, which was meant to inspire with tales of redemption, but instead “clued me in to the horrors of the world.” I will definitely be reading more from Vowell.

For one of my book clubs I read “Where’d You Go, Bernadette” (2012) by Maria Semple. It is a great, fun summer read. Talented, troubled, and quirky Seattle housewife Bernadette goes missing from her own home as her husband tries to have her committed to a mental hospital. But Bernadette is merely a misunderstood misanthrope. Her daughter, Bee, sets out to find her, following her to the literal ends of the Earth, Antarctica.

2013 Alex Award recipient Semple is an alumnus of the writers’ rooms of “Mad About You,” “Arrested Development,” “Saturday Night Live,” and “Suddenly Susan,” among other television shows. And “Bernadette” is in the same vein: hilarious situations, unbelievable coincidences, characters that change in an instant, and a very happy ending. Not a substantial read, “Bernadette” was fun and worth the time I spent on it.

This week’s read

I am in the middle of “Deacon King Kong,” by author, journalist, and musician James McBride. I put the book down only to write this column.

I taught McBride’s first book, a memoir, “The Color of Water,” for many years to my Advanced Placement juniors. To a person, they loved it. “The Color of Water” was a best seller and is considered a masterpiece.

Using two narratives decades apart in chronology, McBride relates his life growing up with 11 siblings in New York City, and his mother’s life as a Polish-born Jew who grew up in Suffolk, Virginia. McBride’s lyrical style and the book’s masterful structure make it a tremendously touching and a rewarding read.

“Deacon King Kong,” set in 1969 in a Brooklyn housing project, is a novel that gives us earthy, gentle, hilarious characters such as Sportcoat, Hot Sausage, and the Elephant. The novel opens with 50ish handyman and hard-drinking Sportcoat walking out to the project plaza, shooting baseball-phenom-turned-drug dealer, Deems, in the ear, and then not remembering any of it.

Drug ring enforcer, Earl, is then out to punish Sportcoat, but repeatedly suffers the same fate as the would-be burglars in “Home Alone.” Who knew that slapstick comedy could work so well on the printed page?

Sportcoat’s main concern is locating the church Christmas fund that his wife oversaw before she died by walking into the harbor. Where did she hide it? Where did she keep the records? Side plots include love stories: married cop Potts falls for the preacher’s wife and Tomaso “the Elephant” Elefante becomes infatuated with an Irish girl. And there are other mysteries. I can’t wait to get back to this one.

What’s next

On my TBR list are “Mexican Gothic,” “The End of October,” and “A Covert Affair.” The first two I chose for my book clubs. I love a good gothic tale. My favorites are “Wuthering Heights” and “Frankenstein,” and “Mexican Gothic” is in that tradition.

“The End of October” is a weirdly prescient and disturbing novel about a devastating viral pandemic that begins in Asia. I know what you’re thinking and you’re right. I could just watch the news.

“Covert Affair” concerns one of my strange obsessions, Julia Child. It is an exhaustive account of the time that Julia and Paul Child spent in the OSS, the precursor to the CIA. I’ve read many articles that describe the Childs as spies, but they were not. Julia was a keeper of secrets. She kept and catalogued secrets that the spies discovered, and then doled out information to other spies as they needed. She called herself a glorified file clerk. Paul, the artist, created maps and graphs before the days of desktop publishing. He was also a very skilled photographer, so happily for us, he left a treasure trove of photos of their life across the globe.

As you can see, no matter how many hours I devote to reading, the pile on my nightstand does not get any smaller.