The Girl Who Drank the Moon

If you've been following me for any length of time, you know that I hate buying books and that fantasy is not a genre I typically enjoy. The thought of spending almost $10 to purchase a fantasy book to be read for Books & Beer Club was not something I was thrilled with doing. Sharon, if you are reading this, thank you so much for trusting me with your kindle to enable me to read this book! I appreciate it more than you know.

The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill is supposed to be a middle grade fantasy novel. It's the winner of the 2017 Newberry Medal. The Newberry Medal is a big deal. It's named for an 18th century British bookseller, John Newberry. In the present day, it's award annually by the American Library Association to the author of the greatest contribution to American literature for kids. Like I said, it's a really big deal. In my teaching days, I was totally on top of the Newberry Medal winners and Honors titles.  Imagine my delight when Books & Beer selected a) a kids' fantasy and b) a Newberry Medal winner and finally c) a book with mostly female characters.

I think that those three reasons made The Girl Who Drank the Moon a little bit more to my liking than The Name of the Wind which we read last March.

Luna is a girl born in the Protectorate who is raised by a witch, a swamp monster and a tiny little dragon. She is accidentally enmagicked. As a young girl, her magic endangers Luna and those who love her. The kindly witch locks Luna's magic inside of her... which can be done until she becomes a teenager.

To me, the book is about pre-conceived notions and assumptions and why they can be often be wrong. The people of the Protectorate think that the witch is evil. They sacrifice a baby each year to the witch, believing that will keep them safe from the witch's wrath. They also believe that the leaders of the Protectorate have their best interests at heart. The witch thinks that the parents of the Protectorate are neglectful. Why else would they abandon their babies?

In reading some reviews, I guess there is a political component to this book that I didn't really catch. I'm anxious to learn if others in the book club picked up on that.

What I loved about this book were the strong female characters. They aren't role models in any way, shape or form, but they demonstrate the strength of women and girls, something that in the past was lacking in lots of children's books. The Girl Who Drank the Moon is a coming of age story. Yet this feels like a story from long ago. The fantastical parts of the story are simply the way the story is told. And I was okay with that.

This isn't a story for all middle grade readers. I think that like me, some kids who aren't big fans of fantasy might be okay reading this book. It would make a great read aloud. Some of the story is a bit dark and some of the villains are really villainous. The dragon, Fyrian, is a completely lovable. He's a teeny tiny dragon who thinks he's exceptionally large. I found Xan, the witch, lovable as well. Who wouldn't want a grandmother like Xan?

Has it made me a convert to the fantasy genre? Okay, don't go crazy. But it also wasn't painful for me to read this book and I look forward to discussing it at Books & Beer Club on Wednesday.

I've also read that the story has been picked up to be made into an animated movie. I'd pay money to see this movie!

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis

I'd read this snippet from a New York Times reviewer:

“[A] compassionate, discerning sociological analysis…Combining thoughtful inquiry with firsthand experience, Mr. Vance has inadvertently provided a civilized reference guide for an uncivilized election, and he’s done so in a vocabulary intelligible to both Democrats and Republicans. Imagine that.” (Jennifer Senior, New York Times)

I think these couple of sentences from a review set my expectations of the debut memoir by 30-something J.D.Vance in a certain direction. Perhaps it set my expectations too lofty as they weren't met. I expected to understand a little bit more about the past election after reading this book. And I really don't.

On the one hand, I thought J.D. Vance's memories of growing up in Ohio/Kentucky Appalachia was pretty specific to his family. Yes, there were a lot of folks that had migrated from Kentucky to Ohio in hopes of a better life. But even in his telling, many of the experiences varied family to family. In that way, how was this about a culture in crisis? In order for that description to fit, the stories of most of the families had to be much more similar than they were.

Are the stories he selected reflective of the working white poor only? The working white poor in factory towns? Can society be categorized as simply as that?

On the other hand, I didn't think a lot of what he wrote about was general enough. I recall families with substance abuse problems in New Jersey. Aren't some of their problems similar to what J.D. personally experienced? Some of what he wrote about were class issues, some socio-economic, some strictly economic. Others were education issues. I don't think the issues can be attributed to a specific place in the country. I believe these issues are more widespread and general that the book would have us believe. Lots of people have lots of problems. And lots of people blame others for their problems. Plain and simple. I believe the purpose of Hillbilly Elegy was for J.D. Vance to figure out if the hillbillies he is familiar with were the cause of their own misfortune or was there something external behind it. He didn't solve that mystery for me.

I also have issue with the fact that while J.D.'s grandparents were anything close to being traditional, they were there for him in a way many young people aren't lucky enough to have. Although uneducated, they knew the importance of education. They went above and beyond to make up for the shortfalls of the parenting of J.D.'s mother by being good parental figures for J.D. He was incredibly lucky that he didn't end up in the foster care system. I've read enough books about how that works out. And rarely does it work out well.

J.D. had tough beginnings but he attended Ohio State thru the G.I. Bill and later went on to Yale Law School. He was able to make the move from the underprivileged to the privileged and I think he believes that gives him a window and the vocabulary to explain one group of people to another. On that level, I think the book fails. He's writing from the privileged side. He knows how his story ends. And he is able to articulate the path that made his success happen.

As a memoir, Hillbilly Elegy does a great job of telling the author's personal story. It's a story that will inspire many. That is the real strength of the book. We might have a better understanding of why his grandfather went from being a staunch Democrat to critical of the Democrats over such a short period of time. So much of what is written, though, is very specific in nature to this family.

I believe my book club selected this title not because members hoped to better understand the politics of the last election but rather to understand the part of the country where we now find ourselves living. Many of us lived suburban or urban lifestyles before moving to this rural area. Reading this book helped me understand why many of the kids here don't value the importance of high school because they don't see high school graduation as an aide in getting a decent job or as a  path to college. I definitely understand that better now. I understand a little bit more about grandparents raising grandchildren, something I only grasped somewhat before.

Right now, I'm not sure if I will be able to attend the meeting where Hillbilly Elegy will be discussed. I'm hoping to make it for at least part of the discussion.
 

Mixed review on 1929

I really didn't like 1929 by M.L. Gardner. I found it poorly written. Poor grammar, poor character development. Lots of anachronisms. Too much use of language that would not have been used in 1929. Difficulty following dialogue. I didn't understand the motivations of the bad guy. Some of the drama added to the novel made it too much of a soap opera, taking away from what should have been the main focus - the Great Depression. (I read that the crash of 2008 was what motivated M.L. Gardner to write this novel... which is also book #1 in a series.) I wonder who critiqued the novel before M.L. Gardner self-published. And I wonder if the remainder of the series is so poorly written.

However... my community book club selected this as a "different kind of book" for our March book club meeting. For that, I think it fits the bill perfectly. It was different from what we normally read. And while I didn't like the book, I think I'm going to really enjoy the conversation that comes as a result of the reading.

It is impossible not to ask the question "What would I have done?" while reading the book. That's true at the start of the book. And it's just as true at the end of the book. What would I have done? What would I have done if during the stock market crash of 1987... or 2008... or or or... I had lost everything? If I had been forced from my home? If I had to totally and completely recreate myself? I'm not talking about learning to live on less. I'm talking about a complete reversal to my change in circumstances. How would I have managed?

I know the world was a very different place in 1929 and I suppose I'm grateful for that. In the novel 1929, which follows the lives of three young couples and their family and friends after the big stock market crash in October of 1929, the wealthy young couples need to flee their homes literally overnight, knowing that "the bank" (or whoever) was coming in the following day to take everything they own. In the 2000's, that simply wouldn't happen. People can stop payment on their mortgages and it might be months before anyone comes chasing them down - literally - to leave their homes. So much would be different in this day and age.

I also gave considerable thought to how the Depression hit various parts of society in different ways and at different times. Growing up, I'd wonder about how many parents' lives were impacted by the Depression. I'd ask them about it, but having been born in 1927 and 1929, they were unable to tell me if their lives - or the lives of their parents and families had been changed dramatically by the stock market crash. What they were born into was their normal. From conversations I had with my mom, I know that she wondered as well. But she had a wonderfully middle class (or upper middle class) early life and she had no recollection of any of the "bad things" that one might read about the Depression impacting her family. In this novel, it was made clear that those who worked in the stock market and those heavily invested in the stock market came out the worst very quickly. And it took months for the hardships to really trickle down to those who were already living the hard knock life prior to the Crash. Slum lords prospered. Those who provided manual labor didn't seem to be hit as hard until scarcity of food became a problem.

I suppose there are very few, if any, people alive today who can give a firsthand recounting of what it was like to live through the Great Depression. No one who can say, "This is how it really was." I don't think M.L. Gardner did the best job at telling us what it was like back then, but her novel is a great starting off point for a discussion about it.

I plan to update this post after our book club discussion on March 14th.

(In case you're following me on Goodreads, you probably noticed that I finished Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance last weekend. You might have also noticed that I didn't give it a "star review." I also haven't posted anything about it here. I've sat down to start blogging several times, but I'm still thinking about that book and trying to decide how I really felt about it. That review should come shortly.)