November 2014 Books

Half in Love (surviving the legacy of suicide) by Linda Gray Sexton
Published: 2010
Rating: 4
Goodreads
Author web site

Another brutally honest memoir from the daughter of Pulitzer Prize winning poet Anne Sexton who died by suicide when Linda was 21 years old.

In her first memoir, Searching for Mercy Street: My Journey Back to my Mother, Anne Sexton (1994), Linda examines the complicated relationship with her brilliant but mentally unstable mother. I read and reviewed this in August - see post.

Years pass and Linda is now happily married with two boys. However the idyllic life ends as she spirals into deep depression/suicidal ideation resulting in three suicide attempts which tear her own family apart.

For someone who seeks to understand the suicidal mind, I found this memoir to be very helpful - similar to William Styron's Darkness Visible - see post on Josh's blog for thoughts on his book.

Takeaways:

• Her description of depression is harrowing: a hungry monster, strong, insatiable, looking to devour.
•  Love is not enough to prevent suicide - neither the love for others to stop oneself nor the love from others to prevent. 
• To cope with her intense internal pain, she became a cutter. She describes in excruciating detail her thoughts and feelings while cutting and why it worked.
• She exonerates her mother and herself by saying that the motivation for suicide was a way, albeit extreme and final, to end pain.
• She recognizes that to live with someone who struggles with depression and suicidal ideation is tough. Her own husband, father and sister could not cope with her. 

On a lighter note, she has written a third memoir called Besotted about living with Dalmations.

Skeletons at the Feast by Chris Bohjalian
Published: 2008
Rating: 4
Goodreads
Author web site

This historical WWII fiction is based on a diary of an East Prussian woman in which she chronicles her family's harrowing move west in 1945 - just ahead of the brutal Russian army.

Bohjalian gives a list of books that helped in his research - I've only read two and am interested in the others.

Non-fiction

• Armageddon by Max Hastings
• D-Day, June 6, 1944 by Stephen Ambrose (read)
• Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland by Jan T. Gross
• Hitler's Willing Executioners by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen
• On Hitler's Mountain: Overcoming the Legacy of A Nazi Childhood by Irmgard A Hunt
• What We Knew: Terror, Mass Murder, and Everyday Life in Nazi Germany by Eric A. Johnson and Karl-Heinz Reuband
• Sins of the Innocent: A Memoir by Mirelle Marokvia
• The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million by Daniel Mendelsohn
• German Boy: A Child in War by Wolfgang W. E. Samuel
• The Holocaust: Personal Accounts edited by David Scrase and Wolfgang Mieder
• All My Life by Gerda Weissmann Klein

Fiction

• Wartime Lies by Loise Begley
• Crabwalk by Gunter Grass
• Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky (read)

Euripides III:  Hecuba  translated by William Arrowsmith
Published: 425-424 B.C
Rating: 4
Goodreads

Tragedy upon tragedy and suffering upon suffering is this play's theme.

Queen Hecuba is wife of defeated King Priam of Troy. She has lost everything: her husband, her children, her city, her title and now lives as a Greek slave. As a mother, she has seen her son Paris, start the Trojan War by abducting Helen; her first born Hector, die at the hands of Achilles; her daughter Cassandra taken by Agamemnon and now faces the death of two other children.

I can relate to her willingness to die in place of her daughter, Polyxena:

Let me take her place upon the tomb;
kill me, be merciless to me, not her.

And when she sees the body of her son, Polydorus:

O Gods in heaven, let me die!

 What amazes me in reading the Greek tragedians are the timeless truths written centuries ago:

That man is happiest
who lives from day to day and asks no more,
garnering the simple goodness of  a life.

That no man on earth is truly free.
All are slaves of money or necessity,
Public opinion or fear of prosecution,
forces each one, against his conscience, to conform.

The Blessing: A Memoir by  Gregory Orr
Published: 2002
Rating: 4
Goodreads

I ordered this memoir after reading his Poetry as Survival and read it in two days.

He begins with a question that can only be asked years removed from the trauma: "Do I dare to say my brother's death was a blessing?"

I cannot imagine how hard it was for him to drudge up memories and feelings of the time leading up to the moment when he accidentally shot his brother.  While reading, all I could do was write OMG in the margins over and over. He was only twelve years old - just beginning adolescence. His dysfunctional family offered no solace or comfort. Then his mother died two years later. How could this kid survive? Through the power of poetry.

My memories of the horrible day when I found Josh are millisecond snapshots that sometimes pop up in my head. When certain images threaten to linger, I shut them down.

Next up - read his poetry.

Song of Myself in Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
Published 1855 (1st edition) and 1892 ("death-bed" edition)
Rating: 5
Goodreads

Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky
Published: 2004 (posthumously)
Rating: 4
Goodreads

I bought this book a while ago and decided to read after seeing it in Bohjalian's list of books that inspired his Skeletons at the Feast. 

The story of how this book was published reminds me of Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl. It is a miracle that both manuscripts survived WWII.

A French novelist from Jewish descent had a vision of writing an epic, five-part novel in the same vein as Tolstoy's War and Peace.  She began feverishly writing the first two parts while living in occupied France in 1941-1942, instinctively knowing that time was short.

She was arrested and deported in July 1942, leaving her husband and two young daughters. She died in Auschwitz the following month. Her husband was arrested a few months later and before leaving, entrusted their oldest daughter Denise, with Irene's unfinished manuscript. He also perished in Auschwitz.

Serendipitously the girls and manuscript survived but it wasn't until decades later that Denise finally decided to read what she thought was her mother's journal. As she read, Denise realized that her mother had written a powerful novel of life in occupied France.

She painstakingly deciphered her mother's teeny handwriting and took it to a publisher who recognized the historical significance of the novel. Published over sixty years after Irene's death, Suite Francaise became an instant bestseller.    

To learn more, read these articles from the NY Times and the Telegraph.

Americans In Paris: Life and Death Under Nazi Occupation by Charles Glass
Published: 2011
Rating: 4
Goodreads

All The Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
Published: 2014
Rating: 4
Goodreads

October 2014 Books

Edge of Eternity (Century Trilogy # 3) by Ken Follett
Published: 2014
Rating: 4
Author web site
Goodreads

Two years ago, I read the first two books in Follett's Century Trilogy (see post) which began a love for historical fiction and initiated a reading spree of World War II that continues to this day; also spawning interest in the subsequent Korean and Vietnam Wars.

I pre-ordered the book and began reading upon receipt.  Follett begins the narrative in 1961 and continues to follow the same families (American, British, German and Russian) introduced in the first two books.

In this lengthy book (1,098 pages), I was disappointed that the Korean War was completely skipped, but that is just par for the course - another example of how it is truly the "Forgotten War."  That said, Follett did not focus on the Vietnam War either, rather turning his attention to the Civil Rights movement in American and the Cold War with Russia, specifically the Cuban Missile Crisis.  Very gripping reading - I did not realize how close we were to a nuclear war which could've wiped us out.

The book ends with the events that led to the demise of communism in Eastern Europe, culminating in the dramatic fall of the Berlin Wall.

I found this particular quote of a semi-retired CIA officer as he watched the fall of the Berlin Wall on television - very telling of our foreign policy decisions:

Everything we did was completely ineffective. Despite all our efforts Vietnam, Cuba, and Nicaragua became Communist countries. Look at other places where we tried to prevent Communism: Iran, Guatemala, Chile, Cambodia, Laos….None of them does us much credit. And now Eastern Europe is abandoning Communism with no help from us.

To say the twentieth century was tumultuous is an understatement,  Follett has done a great job bringing it to life and making this reader, formally uninterested in history, a convert.

Poetry as Survival by Gregory Orr
Published: 2002
Rating: 5+
Goodreads

I loved it - evidenced by the numerous dog-eared pages and marks (underline, circles, exclamation marks, asterisks and comments) within the margins.

How he found poetry and what it has meant in his life reminds me of Anne Sexton - both say that poetry had literally saved them.

When he was twelve, Orr was responsible for a hunting accident that killed his younger brother. While his parents did not blame him, they were unable to talk about it due to their profound grief. He was left unconsolable.  Then two years later, his mother died after a common medical procedure. Trauma upon trauma inflicted on this young adolescent's soul.

Lucky for him, a high school English teacher exposed him to poetry and he has not looked back.

I wrote a poem one day, and it changed my life. I had a sudden sense that the language in poetry was "magical," unlike language in fiction: that it could create or transform reality rather than simply describe it. That first poem I wrote was a simple, escapist fantasy, but it liberated the enormous energy of my despair and oppression as nothing before had ever done. I felt simultaneously revealed to myself and freed of my self by the images and actions of the poem.

and

When someone, in the throes of a powerful and disturbing experience, turns instinctively to the writing or reading of a poem, it is because they sense the personal lyric can be a powerful aid in helping them survive and make sense of their experience.

Orr is a professor of English at the University of Virginia.  Reading this book gave me a sense of being in a seminar class on how poetry, specifically the personal lyric, has saved him.  It reads like a memoir, peppered with the poems and lines of poetry that he knows and loves. I have transposed these poems into my own personal poetry journal:

• Back by Jane Kenyon
• Hallowe'en by Lisa Spar
• Dulce et Decorum Est by Wilfred Owen
• It struck me - every Day and I felt a Funeral, in my Brain by Emily Dickinson

There is much more to say about this life changing (strong words but true!) book which I hope to do on Josh's blog.  

Would highly recommend!!!

Other books by Orr:

• The Blessing: A Memoir (2002)
• The Caged Owl: New and Selected Poems (2002)
• Concerning the Book That is the Body of the Beloved (2005)
• How Beautiful the Beloved (2009)
• River Inside the River: Poems (2013)

The Poet's Corner: The One-and-Only Poetry Book for the Whole Family compiled by John Lithgow

Published: 2007

Rating: 4

Goodrreads

This famous actor's love of poetry began at a young age - at the feet of his grandmother who could recite numerous poems from memory.

So this book is like a love offering - a poetry anthology of his all-time favorite poets who "lived on different continents, in different eras, their works are old and new, romantic and savage, comic and gloomy, orderly and chaotic, long and short."

Lithgow includes a short commentary on each of the fifty poets and what the chosen poem(s) means to him.  

He also includes quotes from the poets themselves - my favorites are below.

Almost anybody can learn to think or believe or know, but not a single human being can be taught to feel….the moment you feel, you're nobody-but-yourself. To be nobody-but-yourself - in a world that is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else - means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.    E.E. Cummings 

If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that it is poetry.  Emily Dickinson 

A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness.    Robert Frost 

Look, then, into thine heart, and write!        Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

To elevate the soul, poetry is necessary.      Edgar Allen Poe

Emily Dickinson is one poet whom I find both difficult to understand and amazing when I do.  I found and bought The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson edited by Thomas H. Johnson at my local library book sale a couple of years ago for the bargain price of $1.50. I have not delved into the book as yet but have rather run into Dickinson's poetry via other means - even finding an ambitious blogger who aims to read and write about all 1,789 poems. 

So when deciding which of the many poems in Lithgow's book I could transcribe here, how could I go wrong with Dickinson? 

There is no Frigate like a Book (#1263)

by Emily Dickinson

There is no Frigate like a Book

To take us Lands away

Nor any Coursers like a Page

Of prancing Poetry - 

This Traverse may the poorest take

Without oppress of Toll - 

How frugal is the Chariot

That bears the Human soul.

Audiobook: The Churchills: In Love and War by Mary S. Lovell
Published: 2011
Rating: 5
Goodreads

I borrowed this from the library - a fascinating, in-depth, frank and somewhat gossipy look at the extended family of one of the greatest statesman ever: Winston Spencer Churchill.

Lovell's premise is that family is very important to a person and so to gain better understanding of WSC, one must look at his family.  What kind of family was he born into? How did he interact with his parents, grandparents, friends, siblings, girlfriends, political allies and enemies, wife, children?

WSC was a product of his time and class: post-Victorian, British aristocracy.  He was the grandson of the 7th Duke of Marlborough and cousin to the 9th Duke of Marlborough. His mother was an American beauty, Jennie Jerome.  His cousin married an American heiress, Consuelo Vanderbilt whose first love was Winthrop Rutherford who eventually married Lucy Mercer, FDR's mistress.  Small world!

While primarily known as prime minister during the Second World War, I came to learn of his many other skills: novice pilot,  prolific writer, historian, painter, bricklayer, consummate politician and Nobel Prize winner (for Literature).  Also, I did not know he had served as prime minister twice.

Any subsequent reading of this man's life will be enriched by the insights gained from this well researched book.  

March and April 2014 Books

April 2014 will mark a significant milestone in my grief to reading journey.  I am just coming to realize this has been a spiritual journey all along. 

My Bookstore: Writers Celebrate Their Favorite Places to Browse, Read and Shop

Edited by Ronald Rice

Published: 2102

Rating: 4

Goodreads

I bought this book at my favorite bookstore, Northshire Bookstore in Manchester, VT and was not surprised to see it make the list.   Why do I love it so much?  I found my answer to be similar to the short essays in this quick and engaging read. 

When I walk into Northshire, it feels like a book lover has opened their home and invited you in to browse, read and talk books. Buying is secondary.  That said, I have never left empty handed or disappointed in a purchase.  Occupying a prominent and central location in town, it overlooks the other shops.  It has great space - lots of nooks and crannies with well-placed comfy chairs.The sad thing for me (but probably good for my bank account) is that I do not live in VT, just visit for vacations.  

Libraries, on the other hand, feel institutional with their rows of dewey decimal labeled bookcases and books.  Large stores like Barnes & Noble feel materialistic and capitalistic - all it wants to do is to make as much money as possible. 

The stated goal of one of the bookstores, The Talking Leaves in Buffalo, NY is the reason I read. 

They want to offer books that "open us up to new worlds, or illuminate more clearly our own; they stretch and deepen our vision and our comprehension of the universe and its creatures, cultures and ways." 

The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success by Deepak Chopra

Published: 1994

Rating: 4

Goodreads

My daughter downloaded the audio book for us to listen to while driving to NYC earlier this month.  Neither of us had read any of Chopra's books but felt we should in advance of meeting him, for Lauren had been invited to talk about her work as Executive Director for the Josh Anderson Foundation on his One World program. 

I've since bought and re-read this short thought-provoking book.  A synopsis of the seven laws reveals more a philosophy of life with practical ways to experience each law.  

1)  Law of Pure Potentiality - or said another way, how to access the soul.  Chopra advocates the practice of silence, meditation and communion with nature.

2)  Law of Giving - simple but easy to forget:  freely give and freely receive.

3)  Law of Karma or Cause and Effect - reminds me of this saying: "you reap what you sow".  Because every action has a consequence, we should be consciously aware of every choice before acting and every reaction to outside stimuli by tuning into the heart.  He says it will never lead us astray…our hearts know best.

4) Law of Least Effort - Nature is full of examples: "grass doesn't try to grow, it just grows.  Fish don't try to swim, they just swim.  Flowers don't try to bloom, they bloom.  Birds don't try to fly, they just fly."  Components are acceptance (accept this moment as it is now), responsibility (have a creative response to the moment as it is now) and defenselessness (refrain from holding onto my point of view, in other words, be open). 

5)  Law of Intention and Desire -  this reminds me of the verse in Matthew 7:7-8: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

6)  Law of Detachment - goes hand in hand with above.   This is for the controlling part of self.  One must give up attachment to outcomes by welcoming and trusting the uncertain journey.  "I will participate in everything with detached involvement."

7)  Law of "Dharma" or Purpose in Life - asks the following questions: "What is my unique talent?  How can I help?  How can I serve?"

Life After Death: The Burden of Proof by Deepak Chopra

Published: 2006

Rating: 4

Goodreads

A very thought-provoking book which will take time to absorb, ponder and process.   Understanding the soul and connecting with it has become a starting point for me. 

The following descriptions from the book feels true: 

"The soul is the most real aspect of the self and is:

• Constant

• Never loses sight of you

• Connected to every other soul

• Shares God's omniscience

• Untouched by change

• Lives beyond time and space

The soul is disguised when:

• You are too tired or stressed

• You are pulled outside yourself

• Your attention is dominated by externals

• You let others think for you

• You act out of compulsion

• You are influenced by fear and anxiety

• You struggle and suffer

The soul is revealed when:

• You feel centered

• Your mind is clear

• You have the sensation that time has stopped

• You suddenly feel free of boundaries

• You are keenly self-aware

• You sense the truth

• You feel supremely loved or absolutely safe"

I like this quote very much:

There is a still, small point that watches all, witnesses all.  Be with that stillness whenever you can.  Notice it instead of sliding past it…..Find the I am inside yourself, and it will expand to fill you.  When that happens, you are safe.  Your being will be the same as your soul.

On Life After Death by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
Published: 1991
Rating: 4
Goodreads

Kubler-Ross is best known for her seminal book, On Death and Dying, which I own but have yet to read.

Within these pages are 3 short essays taken from lectures Kubler-Ross gave in the late 70's - early 80's.  By this time, she had spent many years with terminally ill patients, many of them children.  She also studied hundreds of NDE (near death experience) cases and reports of her own out-of-body experience induced in a laboratory setting.

She emphatically states that death is not the end but rather a "transition to a higher state of consciousness where you continue to perceive, to understand, to laugh and to be able to grow."

We must, she argues, move from "an age of science and technology and materialism to a new age of genuine and authentic spirituality" which she defines as an "awareness that there is something far greater than we are, something that created this universe, created life, and that we are an authentic, important, significant part of it, and can contribute to its evolution."

She also advocates silence and meditation as a way to access the soul or "facet of divinity".

Learn to get in touch, in silence, within yourself.  Get in touch with your own inner self and learn not to be afraid.

On Grief and Grieving: Finding the Meaning of Grief Through the Five Stages of Loss by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross and David Kessler
Published: 2005
Rating: 4
Goodreads

Kubler-Ross spent her professional life as a psychiatrist studying death and dying not knowing that her own would be prolonged and painful - nine years of partial paralysis due to numerous strokes.  It was during this time that she co-wrote this and another: Life Lessons: Two Experts on Death and Dying Teach Us About the Mysteries of Life and Living with David Kessler.

Five years into my grief journey, I found this book helpful in validating my own experience.  I have spent much time in the first four stages of denial, anger, bargaining, depression and only just recently, acceptance.  It is a long, convoluted road with many ups and downs, ins and outs.

I would recommend to anyone who has suffered a devastating loss.

Audiobook: FDR By Jean Edward Smith
Published: 2007
Rating: 4
Goodreads

The public library system in Fairfax County, VA (where I live) has an impressive selection of audiobooks.   I had ordered this tome (636 pages with 153 pages of notes and 34 page bibliography) last summer from Amazon but had never started, so when I saw the audiobook in the winter, I checked it out.  Four renewals and as many months later, I finished listening and found every chapter interesting (albeit the one about the 3rd presidential campaign).

From my reading of WWII, I have come to believe that both Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Winston Spencer Churchill became President of the US and Prime Minister of England, to quote the Bible, "for such a time as this."

What would've happened if either man was not in power during World War II?   Would England have signed an appeasement agreement with Hitler and Fascist Germany?  Would the US have been able to successfully move from a post-depression economy to a country that became the "arsenal of democracy", supplying the Allied forces with men, war machinery and ammunition?  Then surfaced from this horrible war alongside Russia as a world superpower?

Born into wealth and a privileged life known only to a few select New York society families, FDR became the champion of the urban and rural common man.  Politics was a game of high stakes and no one played it any better than he.  He took care of his friends and remembered his enemies.  His buoyant, optimistic demeanor gave courage and strength during the dark days of the Depression and in the war that spanned the globe.  He forged a strong relationship with the media.  He educated the country on domestic and foreign policies in clear everyday language via his intimate fireside radio chats and so changed how the Office of the President communicated with his primary constituents, the average US citizen.

For the most part, he knew the right thing to say or do at exactly the right time.   The initial epigraph taken from Mario Cuomo's 1984 keynote address to Democratic National Convention says it all:

"He lifted himself from his wheelchair to lift this nation from its knees." 

Divergent by Veronica Roth
Published: 2011
Rating: 3.5
Goodreads
Author's blog

My niece, a middle schooler, told me about this YA (young adult) series when we were together over the Christmas break.  Then my daughter saw the movie and said I would like it but suggested that I read the book first.

This quick-reading novel set in dystopic Chicago, reminds me of the Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins.

Both authors feature a female protagonist; in Roth's world, she is Tris, aka Beatrice Prior.  There is a male love interest as well - Four, aka Tobias Eaton.

It is a coming of age story in a difficult time and covers the gamut of the human condition:  power, choice, cruelty, bravery, competition, love, jealousy, loyalty, hatred, sacrifice, manipulation, secrets, honor, trust etc.

I saw the movie this weekend and really liked it.  So am now reading Insurgent. 

Bridges to Heaven: True Stories of Loved Ones on the Other Side by Sue Frederick
Published: 2013
Rating: 4
Goodreads

A couple of weeks ago, I accompanied my daughter to a Yoga in Schools symposium at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in western Massachusetts.   Their store is stocked with all things yoga and my favorite section in any shop: books!

It was there that I found this book and on my return, read it in one day.  The author's own journey as an Intuitive Coach began in grief with the passing of her 34 year old husband from colon cancer and later, her best friend from childhood.   She devotes her book to them with these poignant words:  "To Paul and Crissie, whose early deaths brought me to my knees in despair - and then kept me there in awe."

I am not sure how I would've responded to this book in the early months or years following Josh's death.  My gut says "not too well" because of the sheer weight of negative emotions: grief, guilt, anger and remorse.  Those very feelings, says Frederick are hinderances to knowing our loved ones are still with us.

I plan to write more on Josh's blog.






 

December 2013 Books

D-Day June 6, 1944: The Climactic Battle of World War II by Stephen Ambrose
Published: 1994
Rating: 4
Goodreads

I bought this at the humongous Strand Book Store in New York City in June of this year.  It is a chronologically detailed account of D-Day: the Allied invasion of Hitler's Fortress Europe on June 6, 1944.

What I learned:

• Eisenhower's fateful decision to go ahead despite the horrible weather conditions.
• The paratrooper's missions behind enemy lines were critical.  Many were dropped miles from their intended areas.
• Role of mini-subs and minesweepers
• Engineers who blew up beachhead obstacles were no less courageous than infantry soldiers. 
• Unbelievably detailed planning - down to the minute.
• The training of troops for amphibious landing.
• The horrible seasickness onboard the landing crafts - the soldiers were eager to get off
• Carnage on Omaha Beach.
• Brave decisions/actions of junior officers and NCO's made the difference.  If they stopped, the invasion would have failed. 

Germans

• Almost all senior leaders like Rommel were away.
• Hitler was the only one who could release the Panzer tanks to the front and he was not awakened when the invasion began.
• Operation Double-Cross was wildly successful - the Germans were convinced the real invasion would occur at the heavily fortified Calais.
• Troops were very slow to react.  Many frontline soldiers were conscripted Russians and Poles, who surrendered easily.
• The Atlantic Wall was the main defense - once it was breached by the Allied forces, it was only a matter of time before Germany fell. 
• Hitler did not use his new V-1 bombs on the beaches, nor were the Allied ships attacked by U-boats.

Allied forces

• Control over air and sea was critical for success. 
• Came to France as liberators, fighting for freedom.
• Troops were made up of citizen soldiers who fought as courageously and grit as the professional German army. 

I recently watched and would highly recommend the Oscar winning 1962 movie about D-day called The Longest Day.   

Soldier From the War Returning: The Greatest Generation's Troubled Homecoming from World War II by Thomas Childers
Published: 2009
Rating: 4
Goodreads

As opposed to Tom Brokaw's rosy accounts of returning GI's in The Greatest Generation, Childer's excellent book paints a more realistic picture.

As the only son of a WWII veteran, Childer's knows firsthand of what he says in the introduction: "wars are not clean or neat, and neither is their aftermath."

After years of research, he traveled and spoke on this topic which elicited heartfelt responses and confessions, reinforcing Childer's belief that WWII had a far greater negative impact on the veterans and their families than history has led us to believe.  His aim was to tell a truer story - I believe he succeeded.

Sample stats:

• In 1947, unemployment of veterans was triple that of civilians.
• Post war housing was hard to find.  In early 1946, an estimated 1.5 million veterans were living  with family or friends.  
• Civilians grew weary of veteran's complaints and needs. 
• Divorce boon in the two years right after the war.  
• PTSD was not a recognized diagnosis at the time but veterans exhibited all the classic symptoms: depressions, recurring nightmares, survivor's guilt, unexplained rage, extreme anxiety.

The book underscores and emphasizes the high price of war.

There are times when war may be necessary.  With all its horrors and grotesque crimes, the Second World War is a case in point.  But if, as a last resort, we send soldier's into harm's way, we should be under no illusion about war's colossal human costs, remembering that even in the most brilliant triumphs there is heartbreak and that the suffering does not stop when the shooting does.   

One only has to read a few brutally honest memoirs of WWII veterans who fought in North Africa, Guadalcanal, Italy, Peleliu, France, or Iwo Jima to know the "Greatest Generation" could not come home unscathed.

My Son and the Afterlife: Conversations From the Other Side by Elisa Medhus, MD
Published: 2013
Rating: 4
Goodreads

I can't help feeling like I was led to this book - by Josh.

On December 18th,  I was at the Dulles airport with a few minutes to spare before my plane took off.  Although I had plenty of reading material, I stopped at a book kiosk and lo and behold, this book was on a shelf that I just happened to peruse.  After reading the back jacket, I not only got the book but read it within a couple of days.

Dr. Elisa Medhus never believed in life after death.  As an accomplished physician, she placed her faith in science.  All of that changed after her son Erik took his own life and then reached out from the other side. 

Intimate, heartbreaking, and illuminating, go on an incredible journey from grief and skepticism to healing and belief.  Based on Medhus' wildly popular blog, ChannelingErik, My Son and the Afterlife provides answers to the most universal questions of being human. 

At once tragic and uplifting, Erik speaks from the other side with candor, wisdom, and depth as he describes his own experiences and provides new answers about the nature of souls, death, and the afterlife - answers that have the potential to change our lives forever.

Erik died on October 6, 2009 - almost 7 months after Josh.  Have they met?  I wonder.  Soon after, she began communicating with him via mediums and started her blog.

The book is essentially a transcript of her questions and his answers (via medium).  It is information overload: strange, surreal, and difficult to process.   The following bullet points are what I wrote in my book journal:

• Afterlife is a reality
• Our two-dimensional (space and time) are a very small part of the overall reality
• Souls depart the physical body upon death but retain their essence, memories, everything that makes them unique.
• Souls want to remain connected to their loved ones on earth and are able to give signs, play pranks, show themselves and communicate
• Reincarnation exists
• Unconditional love for ourselves and others is the ultimate goal of being human
• This energy, life-force, soul, spirit exists in all living things: humans, plants, animals

Along with Dr. Eban Alexander's book, Proof of Heaven, there is much to ponder. 

October and November 2013 Books

Since Josh's death, I've felt no motivation to tackle much needed organization/clean-up of our home which included his room.  But last month, I wrote about emerging from a "grief cocoon" on Josh's blog and an unexpected result has been the energy to work on such projects.   But since there are only so many hours in a day and/or gas in the tank, only one book was read in October.   Hence this post will be a record of two months.

Code to Zero by Ken Follett
Published: 2000
Rating: 4
Goodreads

Very fast read; I finished in a  couple of days.  Signature Follett - pulls the reader in right from the start.   Just what I needed after several months of heavy reading of WWII and the tome, War and Peace.

This book is about the Cold War or more specifically, the space race between Russia and the US.  And spies.  I would recommend.

The Road from Coorain by Jill Ker Conway
Published: 1989
Rating: 4
Goodreads

The cover also says In the tradition of My Brilliant Career - a woman's exquisitely clear-sighted memoir of growing up in Australia.  

In my book journal, I added:

• with a crazy, over-bearing, manipulative, paranoid mother
• in the outback or bush
• in a male-dominated, colonial British culture where women get married and have babies
• where as a true intellectual, she felt out of place, shut down and totally inhibited
• where family cultures says "one does not cry" no matter who has died
• where she decides to go the Harvard/Radcliffe to pursue a graduate degree

Her description of the bush in the first few pages is so vivid.  One of my favorite sentences:

There is the ever-present round mount of prickly weed, which begins its life a strong acid-green with hints of yellow, and then is burnt by the sun or the frost to a pale whitish yellow.  As it ages, its root system weakens so that on windy days the wind will pick it out of the earth and roll it slowly and majestically about like whirling suns on a Van Gogh painting. 

Matterhorn: A Novel of the Vietnam War by Karl Marlantes
Published: 2006
Rating: 5
Goodreads

This book came highly recommended by my sister-in-law, a fellow bibliophile.  I got the audiobook from the library and was hooked!

Click here to listen to the author discussing his first book.  The debut novel is great on so many levels:

• In the head of many characters
• Description of the ugly military bureaucracy and ambition/greed which led to good Marine's deaths
• Fascination and quest for medals
• Racism in the military, not only white vs. black but sometimes, black vs. black
• Enlisted vs officers
• Junior officers vs "brass"
• Becoming a killing machine
• Bravo company as fodder
• Surviving in enemy jungle without food, water, supplies
• In the end, Marines really fight for one another

I've read quite a bit of the Marine's horrific experiences in WWII.  Vietnam was no different, except in a major way - these brave young men did not have the backing and support of the home front.  Tragedy heaped upon tragedy.  

Other book by Marlantes:

What It is Like to Go To War" - click here for Q&A with Marlantes.

The Twelve (The Passage # 2) by Justin Cronin
Published: 2012
Rating: 4
Goodreads

I spotted this book in the library while looking for an audiobook for the car.  I read the first book of the trilogy, The Passage and liked it.  The notes in my book diary, however, were not thorough enough to help me remember the main characters and plot outline - thank goodness for Wikipedia.

Cronin's dystopia world pulled me in from the start and did not let go - the plot builds suspense to where I had to find out what happened next even though I felt ambivalent to the main characters.

The story reminds me of Stephen King's The Stand, one of my all-time favorite books except that in his masterpiece, King focused on a few memorable characters (Stu Redmond, Larry Underwood, Randall Flagg, Mother Abigail, Fran Goldsmith, Nadine Cross).

So my new equations:

Fast and good read - suspenseful plot a must; characters can be secondary
Awesome book - suspenseful plot and interesting, round characters

Flyboys: A True Story of Courage by James Bradley
Published: 2003
Rating: 5
Goodreads

Absolutely horrifying account of 8 American airmen shot down and captured off the island of Chichi Jima, a critical Japanese radio base.  For 50 years, howe these men died was kept classified by the US Government.  With the exception of one mother who was still alive when the book was published, all the other parents died without knowing the truth, despite numerous attempts to find out……WOW.

Many, many OMG written in the margins of the book.

In order to fully understand the Japanese mindset and their subsequent treatment of the 8 flyboys, Bradley provides a concise but comprehensive backstory of Japanese history leading up to WWII.  What I learned:

• For almost 250 years (1614 - 1853), Japan was completely isolated.
• After seeing Western imperialism in Asia, (Dutch ruled Indonesia; French had Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia; the mighty British Empire governed Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaya, Burma and India), Japan began turning itself into a military nation.
• In 1862, Japan began its conquest but taking Chichi Jima from American businessmen who had settled this island as a critical coal stop for freighters from US to China.
• In 1894, Japan attacked China and emerged victorious.  
• in 1904, Japan started the Russo-Japanese War, resulting in a 1905 treaty mediated by Theodore Roosevelt, in which Japan received territory conceded by Russia and complete control over Korea.
• The US was far from innocent it her own quest for land against the Native Americans, Mexicans and Filipinos. 
• Japan continues its course as a military state, where Emperor Hirohito was god and service unto death for the Emperor was expected of every Japanese man, woman and child.  To surrender to the enemy was shameful and forbidden, hence the suicidal policy permeating Japanese military and utter contempt for surrendering Allied soldiers in WWII.   
• The training of soldiers was brutal and dehumanizing.  The rules of war did not apply. 
• In 1931, Japan invades and conquers Chinese Manchuria renaming it Manchukuo.  
• In 1937, Japan shows their brutal hand with the infamous Rape of Nanking.  Atrocities committed against 300,000 civilian Chinese reverberated throughout the world.
• Summer of 1941, the US and UK ended trade with Japan and cut off precious oil, without which Japan's military would be paralyzed. 
• Japan faced two options: concede to the West or strike boldly and gain enough territory to exact a treaty with the US. 
• December 6, 1941 - bombing at Pearl Harbor

Next book to read by Bradley:

• The Imperial Cause: A Secret History of Empire and War

True North: A Memoir by Jill Ker Conway
Published: 1994
Rating: 3
Goodreads

Picks up where The Road From Coorain leaves off:

• graduate work at Harvard/Radcliffe
• marries Harvard professor and moves with him back to his native country, Canada where she moves from Professor to Vice President of Internal Affairs at the University of Toronto
• becomes President of Smith College

Reading her memoir makes me appreciate how much women had to fight for equal rights and how far we have come however, my interest waned in the many pages describing the inner politics of university life.

The Marines of Autumn: A Novel of the Korean War by James Brady
Published: 2000
Rating: 5
Goodreads

Wow - I loved it.  Like Marlantes' Matterhorn, this is another superb example of how the use of fiction by an ex-Marine can place the reader in war.

Brady was a Marine officer in The Korean War, sandwiched between WWII and the Vietnam War and often called the "Forgotten War" - a sad fact for the brave 52,000+ Americans who fought and died in the three years of conflict from 1950 - 1953.

In this novel, Brady chose to write about a campaign that occurred a year before he arrived in Korea, when the Chinese entered the war on behalf of the retreating North Koreans and nearly destroyed MacArthur's army in the frigidly cold autumn of 1950.  The battleground was the Chosin Reservoir.

It is clear that my prior reading has built a pyramid of knowledge that enhances each subsequent book.   I understood the references to Marine's battles on small Pacific islands, their intense dislike and distrust of General MacArthur, of Marine commander Chesty Puller's reputation, and why the US could not allow Korea to fall to the communists.

What I learned in this book:

• General MacArthur - decent job getting Japan on her feet after WWII, caught sleeping when North Koreans invaded the South, brilliant move at Inchon, clueless about Chinese invasion, uncontrollable by Washington, thought he would be the next President. 
• MacArthur vs the Marine generals under him.
• Army vs Marines 
• Marine officers vs. senior non-commissioned officer (NCO) vs enlisted.
• Military hierarchy - if you wanted to move up in the ladder, you did not disagree.
• Poor decisions by commanders cost lives.
• Fighting in freezing cold - "God never meant honest soldiers to fight winter wars."
• Orderly retreat of army vs panic.
• How the Chinese could have destroyed MacArthur's army but did not, similar to Meade's chance to annihilate Lee's army at Gettysburg. 
• Criticalness of strategic airstrips and ports during war. 

Other books by Brady to read:

• The Coldest War: A Memoir of Korea (1990)
• Warning of War: A Novel of the North China Marines (2002)
• The Marine: A Novel of War from Guadalcanal to Korea (2003)
• The Scariest Place In the World: A Marine Returns to North Korea (2005)
• Why Marines Fight (2007)

September 2013 Books

This month, my reading of WWII has focused on individuals and their contribution to what will hopefully be known as the last World War.  In addition, I have given myself a huge pat on the back for finishing Tolstoy's epic War and Peace.

Double Cross: The True Story of the D-Day Spies by Ben Macintyre
Published: 2012
Rating: 4
Goodreads

My brother has a condo on Stratton Mountain, VT and whenever I visit, a trip to my favorite bookstore (Northshire) is an absolute must.  I am never disappointed.

Take this book, for example.  I've perused the WWII section of numerous bookstores and have never come across this gem.  But being prominently displayed at Northshire, it caught my attention.  I was hooked after the first couple of pages and finished it within a few days.  It reads like fiction, similar to Truman Capote's nonfiction fiction: In Cold Blood.  I would highly recommend.

In fact, two novelists who have written about WWII had this to say:

"How on earth, in 1944, did we dupe Berlin that we would attack the coast of France in completely the wrong place?  It was a deception that saved tens of thousands of Allied lives. In Double Cross, Ben Macintyre ingeniously explains exactly how it was done."    Frederick Forsyth

"Never before revealed facts about the workings of the Intelligence Service in the build-up to D-Day in the Second World War.  Ben Macintyre's remarkable book is a gripping revelation."  Jack Higgins

Two epigraphs:

Tangle within tangle, plot and counter-plot, ruse and treachery, cross and double-cross, true agent, false agent, double agent, gold and steel, the bomb, the dagger and the firing party, were interwoven in many a texture so intricate as to be incredible and yet true.
Winston Churchill 

The enemy must not know where I intend to give battle.  For if he does not know where I intend to give battle he must prepare in a great many places.  And when he prepares in a great many places, those I have to fight in any one place will be few.  And when he prepares everywhere he will be weak everywhere.
Sun Tzu

Other WWII espionage books by Macintyre:

• Agent Zigzag
• Operation Mincemeat

Audiobook - Hell in the Pacific: A Marine Rifleman's Journey from Guadalcanal to Peleliu by Jim McEnery with Bill Sloan
Published: 2012
Rating: 4
Goodreads

I found this audiobook at my local library and would highly recommend.

An honest, simply written memoir about an enlisted Marine's journey to hell and back.  Mac was in K/3/5 (K Company, 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division) and fought at Guadalcanal and Cape Gloucester (like Robert Leckie of Helmut for My Pillow) and at Peleliu, where he met E.B. Sledge, author of With the Old Breed.  

Published in 2012, this may be the last memoir published by a surviving WWII veteran - see video.   

What the young Marines endured in the Pacific campaign is beyond belief: horrible conditions, little food and water, malaria, jungle rot, constant fear, lack of sleep, seeing best friends die, close combat with K-bar (knife) and bayonets, knowing that you either "kill or be killed."  Mac eventually grew numb to the killing by considering it "his job".  It is what he had to do; it is what he was ordered to do.

His disdain for Army General, Douglas MacArthur or "Dougout Doug" (his infamous nickname after escaping to Australia), is palatable.  It is MacArthur that ordered the invasion of Peleliu, to cover his flank during the Allied invasion of the Philippines, resulting in thousands of Marine casualties.  In retrospect, the securing of the island was unnecessary.

Despite everything, it is clear that he is proud of being a Marine and especially proud of their stand on Guadalcanal, the first US offensive after Pearl Harbor, thereby being the first real test of green Marines.  The Japanese thought the "soft" Americans would turn and run.  Little did they know what courage, stamina, bravery and heroism lay in the soul of those extraordinary "greatest generation" citizen soldiers.

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
First Published: 1869
Oxford University Press/Translated by Louise and Aylmer Maude/Intro and notes by Henry Gifford
Rating: 5
Goodreads

Pending - to contemplate writing a blurb about this epic work is a bit overwhelming.  

Wings of Morning: The Story of the Last American Bomber Shot Down Over Germany in World War II by Thomas Childers
Published: 1996
Rating: 5
Goodreads

Childers is a history professor at the University of Pennsylvania and delivers one of my favorite audio courses produced by The Teaching Company: World War II: A Military and Social History.  

I LOVED this book and plan to read his other two WWII books: In the Shadows of War: An American Pilot's Odyssey Through Occupied France and the Camps of Nazi Germany (2003) and Soldier From the War Returning (2009)

Two epigraphs:

If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;
Even there shall thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me.
If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me, even the night shall be light about me.
Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee, but the night shineth as the day....
Psalm 139

And in the end, of course, a true war story is never about war.....
It's about love and memory. It's about sorrow
Tim O'Brien, The Things They Carried

The subject of this book, the bomber Black Cat and her crew, shot down days before the war's end is very personal to Childers as the radio operator was his uncle, Howard Goodner.

While going through his deceased grandmother's possessions, Childers discovered a pack of letters and photographs, postmarked 1943 - 1945.  One picture was of the Black Cat crew; 11 young men in the prime of life, dressed to fly, smiling in front of their plane.  It graces the book's cover (not sure why is does not show up here).   This discovery began a three year journey, taking the author to multiple states as well as a deserted English air base and small town's field in Germany.

The writing is immediate; the reader is right there, experiencing the long training of a bomber crew, the GI experience as part of the 8th Air Force stationed in England, flying the cumbersome Liberator B-24's, the milk runs, the harrowing runs, the frigid winter of 1944, the physical, emotional and mental challenge of flying bombing missions, the added pressure as the lead crew, the fateful last run and the author's quest to discover the truth.  Here are some of my favorite quotes:

About the never-ending British rain:

And, most mystifying and maddening of all, it came in the form so fine they could never feel anything as distinct as a drop, so invisible it failed to stir even the placid surface of a puddle, and yet after walking ten yards their faces, their jackets, their caps would be drenched as if they had somehow generated the moisture from some elusive internal source.

Preparing fore the Black Cat's first official run:

...the atmosphere was subdued, somber, as if each man in the crowded room had deserted the present and crawled into a small, secret space just behind his eyes.

 and

.....these final few minutes before takeoff crawled by, caught in the undertow of time.

 While on leave, walking alone in London, after being with his crew 24/7 for months:

It was a dreamy, luxuriant feeling, this fleeting sensation of solitude, of privacy, a sensation that belonged to another lifetime, like the simple, sensual steam of a shower.

Goodbye Darkness: A Memoir of the Pacific War by William Manchester
Published: 1979
Rating: 4
Goodreads

William Raymond Manchester is a renowned biographer, most known for American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur 1880-1964 and The Last Lion trilogy on Winston Churchill.

But as a young 23-year old Marine sergeant, he fought in one of the bloodiest engagements of the Pacific Theatre: Okinawa.

Three epigraphs:

Your old men shall dream dreams,
your young men shall see visions.
Joel 2:28 

War, which was cruel and glorious,
Has become cruel and sordid.
Winston Churchill 

But we....shall be remembered:
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother, be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition.
Henry V, Act IV, Scene iii

This is an interesting and intensely personal memoir.  In fact, it is a memoir of the quest to access the horrors of war which he had tried in vain to write about for years.  The memories were too deep for conscious recollection but manifested themselves in troubling dreams of a split persona - "the scrawny, Atabrine-yellow, cocky young Sergeant of Marines who had borne my name in 1945.  The other was the portly, balding, Brooks-Brothered man who bears it today."

The solution was self-evident - he would have to travel back to the Pacific.  So thirty-three years after the end of the war, Manchester embarks on an island-hopping journey to visit the sites of all the major engagements, beginning at Pearl Harbor to Corregidor, Guadalcanal, Tarawa, Saipan, Guam, Peleliu, Leyte, Manila, Iwo Jima and finally, Okinawa.  As a Marine, he served at two places: Guadalcanal (after the island was secured) and Okinawa.

So it is an unusual memoir with intermingled parts: 1) the sequential account of the war, 2) description of the impact three decades had on these "killing fields", 3) vivid accounts of Manchester's personal experience in Okinawa and 4) reconciliation of his split persona.

 To gain a better understanding of the somewhat complicated structure of this unique memoir, I will need to take pen to paper and write an outline and/or a chapter-by-chapter synopsis.

August 2013 Books

Audiobook: Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon's Journey into the Afterlife by Eben Alexander, MD.
Published: 2012
Rating: 4
Goodreads
Author web site
Eternea.org

Audiobooks are a favorite way to pass the time in the car, especially this personal and fascinating NDE (Near Death Experience) memoir, read by the author himself.

There were a number of poignant parts in the book made more so by the increased huskiness and emotion in Dr. Alexander's normally calm and matter-of-fact voice.

There is much to think and ponder about his post NDE convictions; I have ordered the book from Amazon and plan to journal through and possibly write more on Josh's blog.

Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain
Published: 2000
Rating: 3.5
Goodreads

After much reading about WWII, I needed something different and boy, this fit the bill.

My daughter had read this chef's no-holds-barred memoir of rising within the cutthroat and competitive restaurant industry so when I found it at a local library book sale, into my bag it went.
Good to know "insider" tips:

• Do not order seafood on Mondays - most likely 4-5 days old.
• Same reason to beware of seafood dishes on Sunday brunch menus.  Also best cooks and supervising chefs do not usually work Sunday brunch. 
• Never order mussels or anything with hollandaise sauce (i.e. eggs benedict).
• Ordering the most popular dishes will most likely ensure the freshest ingredients.
• Best nights to eat out: Tuesday and Thursday.
• Do not eat in restaurants with dirty bathrooms which are much easier to clean than kitchens (gross!). 

To be a chef is a calling.  It is a tough life - the hours, the pressure, the back-breaking work.  Hats off to those who choose it. 

Audiobook: Escape From Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West by Blaine Harden
Published: 2012
Rating: 5
Goodreads

Shin Dong-Hyuk was breed and born to be a slave inside Camp 14, a hell-hole work camp for political prisoners and their families deep in the heart of North Korea, a nation subject to tyranny that is hard to fathom by one who has only known democracy and freedom.

Brutally led and brainwashed by the Kim dynasty, first by "The Great Leader", Kim Il Sung, then for seventeen years by his son, Kim Jong Il and now by Kim Jong Eun, the youngest grandson of Kim Il Sung who is promoted by North Korean press as "another leader sent from heaven," the difference between communist North Korea and a democratic, capitalistic South Korea could not be more clear.

In 2008, I had an opportunity to travel to the land of my parents and visited the demilitarized zone between the two countries.  It was sobering to think about my father's family on the other side of the heavily armed border and wonder if they had the basics: food, adequate shelter and medicine.

Shin's miraculous escape from Camp 14, his trek through North Korea and China, his fortuitous meeting with a journalist who walked him safely into the South Korean embassy in China, and the difficult acclimation to South Korea and eventually the United States is a story that everyone should read.

I've learned that South Korea's apathy towards reunification with the North is because the populous is "more interested in preserving peace and protecting living standards" and are well aware of the economic burden of unification.  Some studies show this could cost "more than two trillion dollars over thirty years, raise taxes for six decades and require that ten percent of the South's gross domestic product be spent in the North."

This does not sit well with a society that has gone from a backward, third-world country to the 4th largest economy in Asia via it's focus on education, money and success.  Harden's depiction of a "success-obsessed, status-conscious, and education-crazed culture" is spot on; it permeated my upbringing in a Chicago suburb, over 6,500 miles away.

The staggering rise of South Korea is not without human cost as "South Koreans work more, sleep less, and kill themselves at a higher rate".  In fact, the suicide rate is over twice that of the United States (2008), and higher than Japan, a country renowned for it's suicidal culture.

During my visit to Seoul, the city pulses with the hard-driving, ambitious energy of its occupants.  It was overwhelming to me, even though I've lived in Boston, London and New York City; no wonder Shin and many other North Korean defectors have such a hard adjustment.

My dad says that if China stopped providing aid to North Korea, the country would fall.  He also says that in the past, when the North provoked the South via random attacks, the US encouraged the South not to retaliate.  But if the North did so now, the new female President, Park, Geun-Hye, would take a hard line stand. He says she is a new "Iron Lady" in the mold of Margaret Thatcher.

I know my father's family wishes for reunification in their lifetime - we shall see.

And If I Perish: Frontline U.S. Army Nurses in World War II by Evelyn Monahan and Rosemary Neidel-Greenlee
Published: 2003
Rating: 5
Goodreads

Excellent book on a group of fiercely committed and patriotic unsung heroes who risked their lives to save others.   Dedication in the front and epitaph says it all: "To all the women of the Greatest Generation" and from the Book of Esther 4:16, "I will go....and if I perish, I perish."

This book is the result of the two author's determination to bring to light previously unknown accounts of the nurses who served in WWII, often near the front line and in some cases, right in the line of fire, from the campaigns in North Africa, to Sicily, to Italy and then to Fortress Europe.   It is the same motivation which drove Elizabeth Norman to write of the previously untold accounts of US nurses held as Japanese POWs for over three years - another excellent book.

These women were gritty, courageous, hard-working and as tough as nails...they had to be to work the grueling hours demanded in hospitals set up near the front lines.  Their stories are truly inspiring and should be made into a movie.

Other books are on my wish list:

• All This Hell: U.S. Nurses Imprisoned by Japanese by Monahan and Greenlee
• Albanian Escape: The True Story of U.S. Army Nurses Behind Enemy Lines by Agnes Mangerich
• The Secret Rescue: An Untold Story of American Nurses and Medics Behind Nazi Lines by Cate Lineberry

Franklin and Winston: and Intimate Portrait of an Epic Friendship by Jon Meacham
Published: 2003
Rating: 5
Goodreads

I listened to the audiobook and after finishing, bought the book so I could re-read the inspiring speech excerpts of both-larger-than-life statesman but in particular, Winston Churchill.   He had a way with words.

The book is also peppered with snippets from their prolific correspondence via letters, telegrams, notes and memos from September, 1939 - April, 1945.  In that time, the two men spent 113 days together - solidifying their "epic" friendship that "rallied the forces of light when darkness fell."

Highly recommend.

Handling the Truth: On the Writing of Memoir by Beth Kephart
Published: 2013
Rating: 4
Goodreads

This is Kephart's 6th memoir and as a write and instructor of the genre, she imparts why she loves reading memoir, what she looks for, blurbs on her favorite memoirs and guidance on writing memoir.  Her passion radiates and is infectious.

Memoirs, journal writing and published journals have become an important genre for my own journal and blog writing.

Her views on memoir:

• Writers of literary memoir "ope themselves to self-discovery and in the process, make themselves vulnerable - not just to the world but to themselves."
• "Some of the best memoirs are....the contemplations of universal questions within a framed perspective."
• She argues that such literary memoirs are works of art.

What she looks for in memoirs:

• deliberation with structure
• ambition with language
• compassion in tone
• magnanimous reach
• a refusal to assume chronology alone teaches

Books to add to my wish list

• Road Song by Natalie Kusz
• Running In the Family by Michael Ondaatje
• Duke of Deception by Geoffrey Wolff
• Townie by Andre Dubus III
• Heaven's Coast by Mark Doty
• The Long Goodbye by Meghan O-Rourke
• The Tender Land by Kathleen Finneran
• Bereft: A Sister's Story by Kane Bernstein