"Vaclav and Lena" Book Review

First published March 29, 2012 http://www.hercircleezine.com/2012/03/29/vaclav-lena-by-haley-tanner/

VACLAV AND LENA by Haley Tanner (Dial Press, 2012) tells the story of two immigrants who meet as children. Vaclav wants nothing more than to be a magician and to have his childhood friend, Lena, as his assistant. Lena comes from a troubled home and must face obstacles from the nature of which Vaclav’s mother protects him. Early in the book, we, the readers, are also not privy to the circumstances of Lena’s life or those that led to the point at which she is wrenched from Vaclav’s life. We learn that Rasia, Vaclav’s mother, is somehow responsible and involved with Lena’s departure and do not learn the stories behind each character until much later in the tale. Like the magician’s hat that seems infinitely full of tied multi-colored scarves, we marvel when, at long last, all the scraps are removed and yet still a rabbit is drawn from the hat.

In Haley Tanner’s book, we find strong female characters, including a few surprises. Vaclav’s mother, Rasia, is at first almost a caricature of the stereotypical immigrant mother. Even when we’re allowed into her thoughts early in the book, her worries are formulaic. She wants to be more like American mothers, and yet is simultaneously disdainful of the children raised by American mothers. We see her care for her son, like any mother, but also withhold information in a way that seems cruel at first. Later, when more of Rasia’s heart and mind are revealed, we find a complex woman who grapples with her immigrant status, her lost hopes and with being a mother who wants to ensure opportunity for her son also while not forcing him to live her unrealized dreams. I have to admit that by the end of the story, Rasia was my favorite character.

Emily, who adopts Lena when she is taken from her aunt’s home, is another woman of great strength. As a single mother, she takes on the challenge of raising a girl with a troubled past and with language barriers that inhibit her opportunities and ability to assimilate. Emily steadfastly stands by Lena, helps her work toward acquiring language and shows her the rewards of success as the result of hard work. She provides a loving home and unwavering support. She gives Lena a place and space wherein she can work through her frustrations and grow into herself.

Another character, who is not revealed to be strong until much later in the story, is Lena’s aunt, Ekaterina. At first, Ekaterina is referred to as “the Aunt.” We rarely see her name. She is depicted as responsible entirely for Lena’s suffering. In Ekaterina, we find a perfect example of someone we cannot understand until we become aware of her circumstances. It’s that proverbial “until you’ve walked a mile in her shoes” kind of situation. We find Ekaterina a monster, and then we see that there is much more to the situation. After the story ends, we must consider Ekaterina a little longer before we pass judgment, and we might come to see her actions as exhibiting strength more like the main character in the THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO than a typical female hero.

VACLAV AND LENA is a great new edition to novels that depict strong women and female characters. Tanner demonstrates the great variety of ways in which women can be strong, as well. She also does not provide a pat description, but asks us to actually question how we define strength and what constitutes this attribute.

"The Best American Science and Nature Writing - 2011" Book Review and Reflection

First published March 22, 2012 http://www.hercircleezine.com/2012/03/22/the-best-science-and-nature-writing-2011/

EDITOR: MARY ROACH

THE BEST AMERICAN SCIENCE AND NATURE WRITING 2011, edited by Mary Roach (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011), contains five articles by women science journalists. These represent one fifth of the authors in this particular edition of the series. The articles cover topics ranging from a historical consideration of chemistry and governmental policy, to the environment and energy, to land use, to the intersection of science and religion and, finally, our changing oceans.


Deborah Blum is the author of THE CHEMIST’S WAR, which was originally published in SLATE magazine. The article addresses the government sanctioned poisoning of industrial alcohol during the prohibition era. When the eighteenth amendment passed, congress passed laws to make sure that alcohol needed for industrial purposes could not be repurposed for whiskey and other spirits via the addition of chemicals that sickened and killed many people before the end of prohibition. Blum learned of this practice while researching her book THE POISONER’S HANDBOOK: MURDER AND THE BIRTH OF FORENSIC MEDICINE IN JAZZ AGE NEW YORK (Penguin, 2010).


SPECTRAL LIGHT by Amy Irvine was originally published in ORION magazine. Irvine’s article shares the story of the author’s family’s experience with a bear in their frontier home. She considers the traditional hunter’s perspective and values as well as those of contemporary environmentalists in an attempt to appreciate both viewpoints simultaneously. Ultimately, Spectral Light examines issues around land use. Irvine explores this topic further in her book, TRESPASS: LIVING AT THE EDGE OF THE PROMISED LAND(North Point Press, 2008).

PHOTO CREDIT: HTTP://OPENCAGE.INFO/PICS.E/LARGE_4976.ASP

Originally published in ECOTONE, Jill Sisson Quinncontributes SIGN HERE IF YOU EXIST. Quinn uses the life cycle of the ichneumon wasp to come to terms with the divide between science and religion. She struggles not with belief in a deity, but rather our human desire to somehow outlast or survive death. This article is unique in how it traverses between biological and philosophical discussion. Online reviewers of this series cite SIGN HERE IF YOU EXIST as a favorite in the text.


Fracking is the drilling of natural gas from shale.Sandra Steingraber, originally writing for ORION, is the author of THE WHOLE FRACKING ENCHILADA. The author explains fracking to readers, and discusses the environmental impact of this process. Admittedly, I do not know a lot about fracking, other than hearing news stories or headlines. However, the implications of this article beg me to research the topic further and to get active talking with representatives who control industrial ability to perform this procedure to access otherwise trapped natural gas deposits.

PHOTO: JAMES WILLIAMS

Abigail Tucker is the author of THE NEW KING OF THE SEA from SMITHSONIAN. Tucker writes about jellyfish blooms and examines research about these organisms. Scientists realize that proliferation of particular species can be cyclical in nature. However, it seems that the present increase in blooms may be related to human influence in the oceans. Tucker provides information not only on the phenomena of jellyfish, but also the different types and describes how these organisms thrive in environments that can kill other ocean creatures.


While analyzing the 2011 BEST AMERICAN SCIENCE AND NATURE WRITING series for inContext, I examined the contributor’s notes section of the book. I wondered how each author presented him or her self, and read these entries with interest. Some of the female authors did not include personal information, such as listing family or pets in addition to their place of residence and writing, research, publishing or academic credits, and many of the male authors included this information. That said, of the five articles contributed by female authors, two write about family and from a personal or memoirist viewpoint. Two of the twenty male-authored contributions specifically mention and include family as major elements of the articles. (Links to author’s websites are included where available to promote and encourage reading of women science writers.)

"Wild Swans" Book Review

First published March 15, 2012 at http://www.hercircleezine.com/2012/03/15/wild-swans-by-jung-chang/

WILD SWANS: THREE DAUGHTERS OF CHINA (Anchor, 1991) is an epic true tale of three generations of Chinese women. The book takes the reader from a China ruled by warlords, through the Maoist regime and, to the early 1980s. We glimpse at the strength three generations of women exhibited in spite of foot-binding, arranged marriages, and the hardships brought about by Maoist rule and the cultural revolution. Jung Chang, the author, tells her grandmother’s story, her mother’s story and then her own.

At the start of the book, a biography of Chang’s grandmother and mother, we learn of a China before communism. The metaphorical curtain is pulled aside and we discover what life was really like for women who were concubines of powerful warlords. We see the maltreatment brought on by jealousy of wives of powerful officials, as well. Yu-fang, Chang’s grandmother, escapes her fate as a concubine by running away from the General’s home with her infant daughter in tow. Because the General was on his deathbed, and he freed her, his surviving spouse could not compel Yu-fang to return. Yu-fang eventually remarries. She suffers life-long from the foot-binding she endured as a child.

The next part of the saga is about Jung Chang’s mother, Bao Qin/De-hong, who became active in the Communist Party and supported Mao’s Red Army. De-hong wanted a new world in which to live, one where prosperity would be shared, and in which women would not be bound, either physically in the form of their feet or through being kept as concubines or acquired through arranged marriages. Her own parents sought to arrange a marriage for her, to a man in a powerful position in the old government. De-hong could not imagine such a life, and fought with her parents to refuse the arrangement. She fell in love with Wang Yu/Shou-yu, a fellow comrade. This marriage, while one of love, met with turmoil and suffering since De-hong’s potential pairing with a member of the old government is revealed, and the Communist Party separates her from her husband and daughter for some time.

We learn of Chang’s personal struggles and hear her story in the last section of the book. We see her suffer in her childhood when she is separated from her grandmother, who is looked down upon for keeping up the “old ways” of class privilege. We see as she suffers separation from her mother, and bear witness as her father is ostracized for upholding what he believes are the true principles of communist philosophy, despite the Maoist government’s denial of problems such as mass starvation.

In WILD SWANS, we glimpse a very personal account and personal history of a significant historical period, in a place we rarely gain such intimate access. Some of what Chang writes has that quality we describe as “stranger than fiction,” referring to circumstances in a true tale that are beyond our capacity to imagine other than as fabricated. The cruelty meted out upon the people of China throughout history is illuminated in a personal narrative. As I’ve written in other inContext articles, story provides a personal context so that we may know what we would otherwise be able to cast aside as “other.” WILD SWANS helps us learn about a culture and history of incredible importance. The story is also far from over, as we read about citizens still persecuted by the Chinese government.

When I saw a theatrical performance of WILD SWANS at the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts, what struck me even more forcefully than reading the book was the strength of the women in the story. Chang’s grandmother, Yu-fang, defied her family, her late husband, tradition and culture to save her daughter. De-hong, too, exhibited incredible tenacity in the face of continued adversity in her life. All of the women in this familial line endured as much if not more than the men, and yet did not have their spirits broken, even as the men in their lives demonstrated the extent of their emotional and mental suffering. Chang left her family and country to live abroad in freedom. While in theory we are familiar with and support those who seek political asylum or become refugees to escape drastic and deplorable conditions, we never really know the extent or story of the people behind the news stories. Chang helps us understand the personal aspects of such bold moves on behalf of individuals so that we come to appreciate the extent of dislocation one might feel if faced with such a choice. In telling this tale, both De-hong and Jung Chang exhibit yet greater strength as women and global citizens.

"Denial: A Memoir of Terror" - Book Review and Reflection

First published March 1, 2012 http://www.hercircleezine.com/2012/03/01/denial-a-memoir-of-terror-by-jessica-stern/

Even after reading DENIAL: A MEMOIR OF TERROR by Jessica Stern (HarperCollins, 2010), my initial reaction upon hearing about a sexual assault that occurred at three-thirty in the morning was to ask, “What was she doing walking the streets alone at three o’clock in the morning?” Of course, I believe that the streets should be safe at any time of the day, and the fact that it was in the middle of the night has nothing to do, really, with what happened. If the street was clear and the same vehicle was there, and the same woman was walking at three in the afternoon, the result may have been the same. The point is that we cannot help ourselves but to place part of the blame on the victim.

Jessica Stern writes about the rape she and her sister endured during their early teens. She wants to understand, from her own and others’ experiences of trauma, what it is about trauma that makes society unable to bear victims. Stern herself, when interviewing a victim of clergy abuse, somehow wants to believe her interviewee had some flaw that made him not fight back, not report the abuse, even through three different changes in priests in his parish!

“Denial helps the bystander. We don’t want to know…would rather not know about terror or be confronted with evil” and, Stern claims this is true “about personal assaults and more private crimes, the crimes that occur inside families” (p 144). The author examines her own thoughts about victims, and admits that she has “embarrassingly cruel thoughts that are not politically correct. One feels sorry for victims, but one also feels lucky not to be one—even a bit superior, a not entirely unpleasant feeling. Victims are weak. They must be. Why else would they be victimized? Especially rape victims. Morally and physically weak. And then there is the comforting thought that victims lie. If the victim is exaggerating or has made his story up out of whole cloth, I don’t have to confront my own unattractive desire to punish him” (p 191).

This stance about denial enthralled me. I thought about the suspected abuse of my daughter that we needed to investigate when she was five years old. Once we learned my daughter had not been abused, we were quick to close the door on the topic. No more discussion was needed, right? The fact that she endured extensive and potentially traumatizing interviews and an invasive physical exam was written-off entirely. None of that was part of the assault. Thus, when I was the one who actually asked the pertinent question in a non-leading way, and got a satisfying answer, I was relieved of worry, anxiety and angst. Since it was the son of a close neighbor who was the suspected perpetrator, all the ugliness of the entire thing could be forgotten. We could all move on.

The same was true for the attempted kidnapping I experienced as a young teen. Because I was not kidnapped, and had, actually, outwitted my potential rapist/murderer, I could rest on the laurels of my trickery. According to my parents, I should feel superior. Oh, and I should immediately leave the house and start walking the streets alone again to “get over” my fears. Stern believes her family history of trauma, dating back to her family’s experiences in Nazi Germany, made her father gloss over her rape. I wonder now whether this denial of experience and emotion around even things that did not get that far is just as dangerous.

DENIAL: A MEMOIR OF TERROR discusses more than just victimhood and victimization. Stern explores the incidence of her own and others’ PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder. She speaks directly to readers and lets us into the inner workings of her mind in an effort for us to confront our own humanness and the mess of juxtapositions that make up our minds and beliefs. Her examination of what makes a perpetrator, of rape or other violence, including terrorism, is an important contribution to our understanding so that we may seek to help those who (most often) were victims themselves before becoming the perpetrators we love to hate. She also humanizes victims, so that we can’t so easily write off the woman who walks alone back to her dorm in the dark.