Weekend Book Notes
I set a goal at the beginning of the year to read 70 books. Part of the 70 will come from what the writer Ann Patchett (who owns Parnassus Books in Nashville) calls “Shopping Your Closet”—a reference to all those books we buy and haven’t quite gotten around to reading. And there are some gems on my shelves—including, Viet Thanh Nguyen’s, Pulitzer Prize-winning The Sympathizer, which I bought when it came out in 2015, and must read before I watch the new HBO mini-series. (Which based on the trailer, looks darn good!)
I also read as “part of my job” as a writer—following that pearl of wisdom that says if you want to become a better writer—you need to become a voracious reader. And finally, I read a number of bestsellers in order to understand the publishing market—and by extension, where my novel might fit within it—which means I read many things that I wouldn’t necessarily gravitate to—and in some instances, don’t much like. But you won’t hear me talk about those here, as Wit & Wisdom endeavors to abide by the policy that if you can’t say anything nice……
Book Notes, are not reviews—more like musings. If you want reviews—I’ve included links to some here—and if you are looking for a great sampling of diverse reader opinions—go to Goodreads and see what others say. (If you need any reminders that taste is subjective, take a gander at the 5-star comments along with the 1-stars. Some of those 1-star reviews seem pointlessly scathing—at Wit & Wisdom, we don’t do scathing and cruel.)
Finally…I can’t read (or do) anything without thinking about how to score it to music, so I’ve included a link to the music (admittedly, an obvious choice) that played on mind-loop while reading David Grann’s, The Wager—which I’m covering in this first installment of Weekend Book Notes. (Grann’s Killers of the Flower Moon is a must.)
The Wager, David Grann
(Amazon: 4.5 stars; Goodreads: 4.2)
New York Times Book Review Jennifer Szalai
The National Book Review, Ann Fabian
Soundtrack: Ride of The Valkyries, Richard Wagner
How writers like Grann manage the monumental task of researching and writing as ambitious a book of non-fiction as The Wager is, absolutely confounds me—especially given the fact that he’s writing about something that took place nearly 300 years ago, when record keeping wasn’t the best. (When Grann’s deep into writing, I’d imagine his office—and maybe his entire house—has got to be wallpapered in sticky notes.)
Grann is truly a fact-based writer. (Well, of course he is. He’s writing non-fiction based on historical events.) But by that I mean that his works are anchored in comprehensive research and generously peppered with the related attributions, or as Ann Fabian says in the National Book Review above:
“He is a reporter with the patience of a detective and the persistence of a historian and a man with the stomach to spend months in the company of murderers, madmen and obsessives.”
The Wager is a sweeping naval yarn—a tale of anarchy and the worst of human behavior (cannibalism, murder) but at its heart, it is also a story of survival and resilience—physical (disease, scurvy, starvation) and mental (the strength of character that drives the will to survive.)
And how they survived through their years as castaways—eventually managing to sail to safety in cobbled together vessels that were the seafaring equivalent of hunkering down in your kids’ treehouse during a hurricane—is more than remarkable—it’s miraculous.
Grann does an excellent job of transporting you to place and time, and immersing you fully into the events in a way that helps you truly understand just how remarkable their survival was. But he also humanizes the tale by using the perspective of John Byron, a 16-year-old midshipman, and the grandfather of the poet, Lord Byron, (whose later account of the wreck inspired Patrick O’Brian’s novel, The Unknown Shore.) When everyone else’s behavior was teetering on the despicable, I needed a person to sympathize with—and the compassionate character of John Byron provided me that.
One of the most tragic things about the story was that among the few who survived was a free black sailor, John Duck, who when they seemingly made it safely to land, was then kidnapped and sold into slavery. (I still haven’t quite gotten over that.) But I think the tale of John Duck fits into the larger motif of colonialism in general—and what the War between Britain and Spain was truly about—enslaving native peoples and stealing their wealth.
Another heartbreaking fact that Grann dropped into my mental archives, was that when short of sailors (as they were at the time of the Wager’s sailing—during the British Empire’s war with imperial Spain—also known as the War of Jenkin’s Ear), armed gangs pressed people into service—sailors, vagrants, criminals, and children—some of whom were woefully young—reminding me once more that in my life, I have very little to complain about.
Another tidbit I added to my mental archives was the comprehensive description of WHY The Drake Passage is so dangerous. I knew it was, but not the science behind it. This excerpt is from page 62 of the hardcover version of the book:
“Far southern seas are the only waters that flow uninterrupted around the globe, they gather enormous power—with waves building over as much as thirteen thousand miles, accumulating strength as they roll through one ocean after another. When they arrive, at last, at Cape Horn, they are squeezed into a narrowing corridor between the southernmost American headlands and the northernmost part of the Antarctic Peninsula. This funnel, known as the Drake Passage, makes the torrent even more pulverizing.”
Bottom Line: Everyone I know who has read the book (although it just dawned on me—they’re all men) has absolutely loved the The Wager—often referring to it as “one of the best books they’ve ever read.”
I might not quite put it in that category—I actually liked Killers of the Flower Moon better—but that is not intended to minimize the feat that writing The Wager represents—which I thoroughly enjoyed and gobbled up in record time.
And having read it, I can’t help but wonder what brave director will undertake bringing it to the big screen?