Review: Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption

Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption by Stephen King
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book has taken a surprisingly long time for me to get around to reading, given just how much I enjoy the movie Shawshank Redemption (one of my favourite movies!). But I kept forgetting about it until a student decided to read it for an independent novel project this year in one of my English classes. So, I thought it was a good opportunity to read it. Of course, some of what comes below will be informed my better understanding of the movie, but I'll try to give the book its due.

Fundamentally, the plot of the book is the same as the movie. Yes, the wardens are compressed into one. Yes, there are adjustments to the plot to intensify the 'Robin Hood' aspect of Andy Dufresne's financing efforts, but, fundamentally, the story remains the same. And that is the story, told by a fellow inmate, of Andy Dufresne, wrongly convicted of murdering his wife and her lover and imprisoned in Shawshank Prison for almost thirty years before his almost miraculous escape. It is a meditation of guilty/innocence, freedom and how to live with integrity in a moral cesspool. The centre of the book is always Andy, as told through his relationship with the narrator, Red.

This is really a lovely book. Don't get me wrong. It's brutal in parts, as one would expect of a prison book. The discussion of prison rapes and solitary confinement make that brutality very clear. But, ultimately, it is a book about hope, which is probably why I love it and the movie so much.

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Review: Are u ok?: A Guide to Caring for Your Mental Health

Are u ok?: A Guide to Caring for Your Mental Health by Kati Morton
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I picked this book up from my library app on a bit of whim. I'd seen Kati Morton's YouTube videoes a few times over the last couple of months and found her quite helpful, so thought I'd look this up. It took me only a couple of weeks to get it from the on holds, so I was able to get to it quite fast.

Morton's book is really an introduction to therapy and to psychology. Like her YouTube channel, Morton is really good at explaining the complexities of psychological treatments and approaches as well as illnesses in clear, easy to understand prose. Her style is easy to read and really quite compassionate. Her good sense comes through and she is full of recommendations of how to approach mental health issues. The book is intended for someone with limited experience with therapy, so I found that I knew a lot of what she was talking about, except, of course, the more nuts and bolts who does what kind of things (which really only applies directly to California). But I still found the book helpful.

If you're struggling and wondering about a book to de-mystify how to get help, this is a good book to start with. And, of course, Morton's YouTube channel.

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Review: Braided Learning: Illuminating Indigenous Presence through Art and Story

Braided Learning: Illuminating Indigenous Presence through Art and Story by Susan D. Dion
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book was loaned to me by a colleague as a kind of introduction to considering how to include indigenous voices into the high school classroom. It is an development of Dion's Braided Histories, which tells the stories of indigenous peoples in Canada. This book includes some of the stories, but also includes indigenous art pieces and a really useful consideration of how education fits into the efforts to bring out the indigenous voice in Canada.

I found the book really helpful in my efforts to improve my understanding of indigenous voices, so I would recommend it on that basis. Dion spends the time to explain the complexity of those voices, which is helpful for those of us who are on the outside. The fact is that, like most other communities, there is no uniform indigenous voice, so we have to ready to embrace that complexity. And Dion helps us on that journey.

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Review: Seasons of a Family's Life: Cultivating the Contemplative Spirit at Home

Seasons of a Family's Life: Cultivating the Contemplative Spirit at Home by Wendy M. Wright
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I really enjoyed this book. I found it, really, because I was re-reading Richard Rohlheiser's Domestic Monastery which references a talk by Wendy Wright. That mention intrigued me, so I hunted out her books and was able to find this is one of the theological libraries near me.

This book looks at family life from a contemplative angle which is both genuinely contemplative, but also pretty robust theologically- an unusual combination believe me. Many of the books on family spirituality I've run into tend to get into didactic mode, telling the reader how to do family (meaning, in the way the author does) and never really gives much flexibility to explore and to delight. Wright's book understands contemplation and understands what Christian contemplation is, and genuinely delights in it. It is firmly convinced that we discover the way to God in parenting, but that that path is as individual as the people who tred the path. And that is refreshing.

This is Wright's second book and I fully intend to hunt out her first one. This one spoke to me also because she was at a similar point in parent as I am when she wrote this. That is, she has two children in university and one in high school. I'm a little behind that, but not so far that I don't understand where she is. That helps, but, it isn't necessary because Wright reminisces about all the stages of her parenting life.

This is definitely worth reading- a lovely mix of personal memoir, robust theology and poetic, contemplative spirit.

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Review: Julia

Julia by Sandra Newman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a bit of a tag-along afterthought in my fall of dystopian literature. While I was finishing off 1984 with my class, I found out that a new novel came out that retold the 1984 story from Julia's point of view and that was simply too good to miss. Given how deeply male 1984 is as a novel and how two-dimensional Julia is in that book, seeing a retelling by a woman was just too interesting.

The result is an inspired re-reading of the story. I won't do any spoilers, but this novel goes beyond a simple re-telling. It is more complex and intriguing than that. Julia emerges as a real person, driven by circumstances and people which aren't even hinted at in the original 1984, but which oddly work in its context. And it is also, ultimately, much, much more hopeful.

Of course, the book has been controversial and, yes, the book also written with a distinctly feminist, left-learning slant with rather fluid sexual identities, shall we say? The Goodread reviews are mixed and mine is distinctly positive. My warning is, don't expect a scene by scene imitation of 1984, but take this as a creative re-telling. It doesn't slavishly follow the tone and details of 1984, nor does it replicate the almost oppressively male centered and honestly, casually misogynistic world of Orwell's original. It isn't a replacement, but a novel in its own right.

So, yes, read it! And, certainly, if you know 1984 well, compare and contrast the two. But judge it on its own merits, which, I think, are considerable.

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Review: Strangers to the City: Reflections on the Beliefs and Values of the Rule of St. Benedict 2013 edition (Voices from the Monastery) by Michael Casey (1-Aug-2013) Paperback

Strangers to the City: Reflections on the Beliefs and Values of the Rule of St. Benedict 2013 edition (Voices from the Monastery) by Michael Casey (1-Aug-2013) Paperback by Michael Casey
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is another of my Benedictine books which I've been reading the last few years. I took this one slow, reading a few paragraphs, stopping, reflecting, sometimes reading a bit more. Really the book rewards that kind of reading because it was clearly written out of lectio divina, which is a similar type of reading style.

The book itself is, of course, reflections on aspects of the Rule of St. Benedict, so the context is, of course, monastic. And, as I am not called to be monastic, but rather a husband and father, you'd think the connections would be difficult to apply to my life. And some are, to be sure. However, like many books on Benedictine values, so much of what this book talks about is common to all vowed lives- balancing stability, accountability and on going conversion to our own lives in the here and now. And Casey has a lot to offer in considering those common elements of the spiritual life.

For those who find a value in Benedictine values, this book is well worth reading. It is clear. It is thoughtful. And it inspires reflection on one's own life, whether one is a monk or not.

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Review: The Peaceable Classroom

The Peaceable Classroom by Mary Rose O'Reilley
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I've been meaning to get this book for a few years, but have found it quite difficult to find. And that is a pity in my view because this book deserves to be better known. In this book, Mary Rose O'Reilley uses a course on war poetry to reflect on the simple question, posed to her in the maelstrom of campus politics in the Vietnam War, "How do we teaching English without killing anyone?". That seems an odd question, but, at a time when flunking out of college lost one their deferment from the army, it was legitimate one.

The result is a rather meandering, but incredible insightful reflection on how does one run a peaceable classroom. That is, how does one encourage peace, while teaching English. I won't do a spoiler, of course, and, besides, O'Reilley is the last to think she has the answer for that question, since she is rather a 'live the question' kind of person. But this book raises important questions about how we teach students, how we run our classrooms and the complicated power dynamics in them and what kind of society do we want to see.

And, O'Reilley is funny. Well, okay, funny in a curmudgeonly way, which is an acquired taste, but with a genuine heart for her students and the world around her. I would read her on the subway going into work at my school and just laugh aloud at a passage.

But, as a caveat, keep in mind, the book is written twenty years ago and reflects experience from the late sixties and early seventies. Sometimes the language is jarring. It was a jarring then too, but more so now.

But, yes, if you're a teacher or a student or just interested in how to teach, definitely read this book!

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Review: It Can't Happen Here

It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I picked this book up, largely because I was teaching 1984 for the first time to high school students and so was on a dystopia kick. And this one interested me because it is quite an early political dystopia and because it has been touted as being eerily reflective of the political landscape today.

Written in 1935, amid the totalitarian revolutions in Europe which saw the rise of Fascism in Italy and Nazism in Germany as well as the continued threat of the Soviet Union, Sinclair Lewis takes us through how quickly a democracy could be overthrown amid the economic dislocation and political instabilities so endemic in the Great Depression. Starting with Roosevelt being displaced as Democratic candidate for second term by a populist rabble rouser with the preposterous name of Berzelius Windrip, Lewis charts the failure of the various fail-safes in American democracy which allows for the setting up of a fascist dictatorship. It follows the adventures of Doremus Jessup, a small time journalist as he navigates the crisis, eventually emerging as a resistance leader to the fascist government. It presents a frighteningly effective blueprint of what happens to people, families and communities in the midst of such a political takeover.

The premise of the book is really interesting and, of course, prescient for today's politics in the US. There are, of course, glaring flaws with this book. It is difficult to warmup to Jessup, who is difficult to take seriously as a hero because, frankly, while having good principles, is rather too comfortable in his life, until it is gradually taken away. He is tougher than one might expect at the beginning of the book, but, honestly, that is such a low bar that he rarely ascends past mildly perturbed. The writing also has a certain 1930s folksy journalist tone which really rings false almost a century later. And the plot really does limp along.

In addition, our knowledge of how the Fascist and Nazi story ended in real life also creates a certain amount of dissonance with this book. Lewis' understanding of both systems was good for his time and he was influenced by his journalist wife's work in this area, but knowing that these two systems also dragged much of the world into the spectacularly destructive Second World War changes modern perspectives about how to view those systems. Lewis is hardly pro-totalitarian, but one misses the horror that the Second World War instilled in much of the world .

Still, with those caveats, this book is still worth reading, partly for those interested in how the worked in the 1930s and for this book's genuine political savvy.

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Review: Strangers to the City: Reflections on the Beliefs and Values of the Rule of St. Benedict 2013 edition (Voices from the Monastery) by Michael Casey (1-Aug-2013) Paperback

Strangers to the City: Reflections on the Beliefs and Values of the Rule of St. Benedict 2013 edition (Voices from the Monastery) by Michael Casey (1-Aug-2013) Paperback by Michael Casey
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is another of my Benedictine books which I've been reading the last few years. I took this one slow, reading a few paragraphs, stopping, reflecting, sometimes reading a bit more. Really the book rewards that kind of reading because it was clearly written out of lectio divina, which is a similar type of reading style.

The book itself is, of course, reflections on aspects of the Rule of St. Benedict, so the context is, of course, monastic. And, as I am not called to be monastic, but rather a husband and father, you'd think the connections would be difficult to apply to my life. And some are, to be sure. However, like many books on Benedictine values, so much of what this book talks about is common to all vowed lives- balancing stability, accountability and on going conversion to our own lives in the here and now. And Casey has a lot to offer in considering those common elements of the spiritual life.

For those who find a value in Benedictine values, this book is well worth reading. It is clear. It is thoughtful. And it inspires reflection on one's own life, whether one is a monk or not.

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