March Roundup

I have been reading throughout the month but have obviously not been writing about what I've read. So here's a roundup all in one post.

140) One by One: A Memoir of Love and Loss in the Shadows of Opioid America by Nicholas Bush

141) The Huntress by Kate Quinn. At 531 pages this was a long read, but I read it in a day and a half. Kate Quinn wrote The Alice Network and the character Eve Gardiner makes a brief appearance in The Huntress. Quinn was inspired by lakes, water, and the water nymphs that inhabit them in writing the story of The Huntress. The Huntress takes readers from the shores of Selkie Lake in post-World War II Boston, to the icy edge of Russia and the shores of Lake Baikal, to Lake Rusalka in Poland, and the spa town of Altaussee in Germany during and after the War. As far as spirits, the Rusalka and her German counterpart the Lorelei in turn hunt and are hunted, haunt and are haunted by each other. Nina Markova grew up on the edge of Soviet Russia and became a pilot. Swept up in the war she joins the infamous Night Witches. Behind enemy lines crosses paths with a Nazi Murderess known as die Jagerin (The Huntress). British War Correspondent Ian Graham has witnessed the horrors of war as a journalist. When the war ends, he abandons journalism and becomes a Nazi hunter with the help of his Jewish-American partner Tony. Their primary target is The Huntress and they must rely on Nina's help to find her, the only one escape the Huntress' clutches alive. On the other side of the ocean,  17 year-old Jordan McBride dreams of becoming a photographer. Jordan's quiet life is thrown for a loop when her widowed father decides to marry a German widow. Her investigations into her stepmother's past threaten everything.

142) A Bite-Sized History of France: Gastronomic Tales of Revolution, War, and Enlightenment by Stephane Henaut and Jeni Mitchell. 

The authors trace the history of France and her iconic food and beverages in appetizing vignettes. But underneath this bite-sized history is a more serious study of France's foodways and the power therein.  "By examining 'foodways'--the political, economic, and social practices related to food in a particular region or era--we can learn much about who hold the most power in a society, what sorts of values they prioritize, and how they sustain their elevated position. We can also learn about the most deprived communities, the constrains and limitation they in simply trying to feed themselves and survive, and what this indicates about the broader society in which they live" (283). 

143) The Good, the Bad, and the Furry: Life with the World's Most Melancholy Cat by Tom Cox 

Tom's daily life managing or being managed by his cats Janet, The Bear, Shipley, Ralph, and Roscoe.

 I enjoyed this psychoanalysis of cats that he has encountered on his travels or just walking down the street. Although I don't psychoanalyze the cats I see outside, I love to pet them. Before adopting a cat together Tom and his girlfriend Gemma imagined what their new cat would be like, created a whole personality for their future cat and selected a name. My husband and I did this before adopting our cats. Like Tom and Gemma's new kitten, our cat did not quite live up to our imagined version. 

In the chapter entitled "Keeping our Cats out of the Bedroom: Instructions for Housesitters" Tom refers to his cats as follows: the old intellectual black one, the middle-aged mouthy black one, the narcisssitic tabby one  (who really likes to meow his name and the word "HELLO" at 3 a.m.), and the small black and white one who looks like a living cartoon". Tom accurately captures how much of our daily lives cats take up.