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 SCPL Staff Picks...           

Sunday, November 1, 2009
Tale of Two Sisters

Title: Shanghai Girls
By: Lisa See

Sometimes I think I am the only person who didn't enjoy Lisa See's earlier novel Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. For this reason I was reluctant to try Shanghai Girls, but I found myself with a copy in my hands and decided to give it a chance. I'm glad I did! Approximately five pages in, I was immersed in the story and could barely come up for air. During the days when I wasn't able to read, I found myself daydreaming about sisters Pearl and May. The sisters lived with their well to do parents and worked as "beautiful girls" in 1930s Shanghai. They bought new dresses every week and had servants to cook and clean for them -- until their father admitted that he gambled away their money and was in debt. To pay off this debt, he promised his daughters as wives to two Chinese American men. Although Pearl and May try to escape their fate, the invasion of the Japanese turns their arranged marriage into an opportunity to flee China. Their voyage to California is horrific, and they find life in Los Angeles and "Haolaiwu" much different than they had hoped, but their perseverance and endurance of physical and mental agony is great. See has an amazing capability to transform what might be an ordinary scene into a delectable experience for the reader. This book leaves me with a new interest in the experiences of Chinese Americans during WWII and the Red Scare.

Tuesday, October 20, 2009
It's A Long Drive Down Interstate 5, or that's a lot of cotton!

Title: The King of California, J.G. Boswell and The Making of A Secret American Empire.
By: Mark Arax

This book dovetails perfectly if you happen to be reading John Steinbeck, or studying the photographs of Dorothea Lange. A biography which examines the life of a very powerful farmer (at one point owning over 200,000 acres of rich farmland) used to driving bargains across bar stools and shaking down his opponents in boardrooms. The book is written by two L. A. Times journalists who, after much convincing, are lucky to have their subject, Jim Boswell himself, drive them around in his old pickup truck and tell them his version of the story. Boswell’s company drained Tulare Lake, once the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi, (four times the size of Lake Tahoe). Finally it comes down to the value of water and to what extremes Jim Boswell and his business empire did to get that water. Boswell & Co. was one of the first companies to employ lasers to level fields so that water flowed evenly and efficiently. He hired the best and most creative scientists who perfected the soil and germination of cotton seed. Boswell & Co.'s special Pima cotton is considered the finest cotton grown anywhere in the world. Carefully intertwined throughout the book are the personal sacrifices and racial differences; stories of sharecroppers escaping to California; the strategy and consequence of importing laborers from Mexico in the 1930's. Did you know that it takes 257 gallons to make one cotton T-shirt? But at what cost to the environment? Includes maps and photo illustrations.

Saturday, October 10, 2009
Journeys of a Passionate Traveller

Title: A Year in the World
By: Frances Mayes

Mayes' most well-known work Under the Tuscan Sun and its offshoots never appealed to me so I was surprised and delighted when I discovered her more recent memoir, A Year in the World. In her day job Mayes was a writing instructor, and here she shows her craft in top form. The title is somewhat of a misnomer – her several journeys around Europe were actually conducted over a five-year period – but they are arranged in calendar order, beginning with a January visit to Andalucia and concluding at year-end with a trip to Mantova, Italy. Always she is looking around and wondering, 'How do place and character intertwine? What is home to those around me? Who are they in their homes, those mysterious others?' In this luminous, beautifully written work Mayes' observations get to the essence of place, whether listening to soul-filled fado in Portugal, wandering the souks of Fez, or finding the perfect restaurant outside Naples. For all armchair travelers and those who love beautifully crafted, evocative writing.

Sunday, October 4, 2009
Ever worked a weird low-level job?

Title: Nickel and Dimed, on (not) getting by in America.
By: Barbara Ehrenreich

Haven't we all worked at some kind of wretched job at some point in our lives? And thought to ourselves "I am so over-educated for this!" In this book, Ms. Ehrenreich conducts an experiment, using herself for the test subject: find work in meaningless jobs and write about the experience of being subservient to rules of management. Can she survive on a low minimum wage, plus find a place to live, plus enough to eat, plus clothes to wear? You are going to laugh out loud at how Ms. Ehrenreich joins a maid service, and has to strap a vacuum to her back while going through hallways, dusting wainscoting and wiping down counter tops with the same dirty cloth! I cried laughing when I read how she had to sort clothes at a famous department store on hangers and re-display the inventory in just the right spot, then see how the next day that display is in another area! She kind-of makes friends, or comrades, and their working class stories are real. The writer returns to her motel room at night to write about the indignity of the lower working class with deep insight. Perfectly appropriate right here, right now. Also available as an audio book.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009
From Frito Pie to Pho

Title: Take Big Bites: adventures around the world and across the table
By: Linda Ellerbee

Longtime reporter, producer, TV host, and author, Linda Ellerbee calls herself "a recovering journalist who's traveled and eaten her way around the planet and lived to tell some tales." In Take Big Bites she has written a witty, sassy book about food that's also a blend of autobiography, travelogue and self-help. In a warm and poignant style she draws the reader into her life and travels, as she weaves fascinating stories about places as varied as Vietnam, Bolivia, and the Appalachian Trail; and as she makes heartfelt observations about trying to age gracefully, her relationships with friends and family, and the motley strangers she has met worldwide. As an extra bonus for foodies, each chapter ends with a recipe or two (try the chocolate cake!).

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