Moloka'i: Alan Brennert

You know how, when someone you respect proclaims the glory of a book, and you are compelled to immediately go out and find a copy? That's how I came across Moloka'i by Alan Brennert. It was my father who read the book after he received the recommendation from someone else...which seems to be the way with this author. I believe that word-of-mouth has garnered him a great amount of fame. His fourth publication, Moloka'i is about the fifth largest of the Hawaiian islands and the strange culture bred there in it's years as a leper colony.

Rachel is just seven years old when she is taken from her family because of wounds that aren't painful, and red splotches on her skin that won't heal. In the late 19th century, Hansen's Disease, or leprosy as it is more commonly known, was a death sentence. It was a misunderstood affliction that remained a mystery for nearly a hundred years; known as the flesh-eating disease, it condemned it's sufferers to physically painless disfigurement but endless emotional anguish. Spitfire Rachel is already more familiar with leprosy than she'd like, having already seen her uncle Pono shipped off the Moloka'i. When her turn comes, her sole comfort is knowing that uncle Pono will be waiting for her. What follows is an intimate exploration of what life on the island of Moloka'i was like during it's years as a leper colony. Rachel is housed  in the school for girls, and then in the home that her uncle shared with his leper wife. While traversing the bureaucratic wilds of a Hawaiian island that has been left to die in the Pacific Ocean, Rachel comes of age and learns a great deal about love and the many ways it appears.

I found myself addicted to this story. Why? Am I secretly fascinated by leprosy? Do I like a good cathartic read? Does the rocky butte known as Moloka'i appeal to me? Maybe all of the above. Here's what I know for sure. I like Rachel. I like her from the very beginning, when she is just a little kid, disobeying her mom, arguing with her siblings, and cherishing the dolls her dad brings back to her from overseas. Rachel is not a complex character--she is actually very simple. She is just a little girl who is ripped away from everything she knows at a young age, and is forced to find good in the new world she finds herself in, or die slowly, miserable with her lot in life. It's not as if she is living in the lush green jungle of Maui or the white sandy beaches of Oahu. Moloka'i was chosen as the leper colony because it was considered undesirable land. Very little could grow on the mountain of rock, and the ocean meets the sand in only a few stretches. I wanted to imagine that Rachel was aging in a beautiful paradise, but the reality is that she was watching her friends die as she aged and became more disfigured. And yet, this isn't a sad story. In fact, it's sort of uplifting! It sounds impossible, but it turns out that Rachel's life serves a purpose and she touches so very many lives. Her resolve never fizzles, as she wakes every day determined to live. Brennert's book is a fictionalized account based on true events that should make any sane person feel at least a little sad at the way so many people were treated. Instead, he has written a story that exposes only a few of the horrors suffered by the afflicted, and turned it into a relatable story of inspiration. I can't help but admire him!

Rating: $$$

The Help: Kathryn Stockett

I lost count of how many people recommended this book to me. It was a best-seller and every book blogger was reading it. I bought it, and then let it collect some dust on my bookshelf while I read some other things. I finally decided to pick up The Help and see what all the fuss was about. Now that I've finished reading, I can safely say that it was worth all the hype.

The Help is narrated by three women-- Skeeter, the liberal white woman who doesn't quite fit the conservative mold that her mother is pushing; Aibileen, the backbone of the black maid community who has raised more white children than black; and Minny, the sassy young maid who has had the most trouble with the privileged white ladies of Jackson, Mississippi. Each of the narrators takes their turn moving the story forward, from the beginning when we learn that Aibileen is a servant in the home of Miss Leefolt, through to the publication of Miss Skeeter's controversial book. The Help is the story of Skeeter's efforts to interview working black women to write a book about the servants who create the homes of her friends. She is inspired to write their stories because of her curiosity about the mysterious disappearance of her own maid, Constantine. With the assistance of Aibileen, Skeeter gathers the heartwarming--and sometimes heart-wrenching--stories of black servants in Jackson, Mississippi during the Civil Rights Movement. Through the narrations we learn about the women as individuals as well as the culture and society they live in.

To deduce this novel's characters to just three women is misleading. There are dozens of characters in this novel, each with his or her own personality, and a few fantastic one-liners. Each woman that Skeeter interviews is an important individual with an enlightening story to tell. Even the husbands of the affluent women that the maids serve, play an important role to illustrate the make up of the average home. The very servants who were considered less than human, were the people who kept the children dressed and fed, and the house running smoothly.

Writing this review was daunting because there is no easy way to describe it; The Help is harsh, emotional, uplifting, hopeful, frightening, sweet, and politically charged. It is a contemporary novel, but it's also a very important piece of historical fiction, well-suited to any American History classroom. There are things I could nitpick over, but it would be a disservice to this well-crafted debut from Kathryn Stockett.

Rating: $$$

Revolution: Jennifer Donnelly

Last year the book blog world was flooded with rave reviews about Jennifer Donnelly's historical fiction novel, Revolution. I was intrigued by this story about the French Revolution, but couldn't justify the hardcover price. Then the downtown Borders closed and offered me this beautiful hardcover at a 30% discount, much to my excitement. Now that I have read it I am so glad I didn't wait for it to come out in paperback.

Since witnessing her brother's death, Andi Alpers has lived in state of depression, lifted only by two things: music and her antidepressant medication. When her estranged father rolls into town, Andi's life is turned upside down. Her father has Andi's mother admitted to an asylum to help her get past her grief after losing her only son, and then he takes Andi to Paris with him on his next Genetics project. Angry, sullen Andi has no interest in anything except her music and doesn't want to be stuck in Paris with her father for two weeks. Her love of music quickly draws Andi to the discovery of a diary, written by Alexandrine Paradis during the French Revolution and stored in the secret compartment of an old guitar case. While writing her senior thesis on Amadé Malherbeau, Andi reads Alexandrine's diary and gets a very personal view of life during the Revolution. Alexandrine Paradis was hired by the Queen of France to entertain the Dauphin, Louis-Charles. Alex became deeply attached to the prince and found herself at the epicenter of the revolution that sees the royal family beheaded. Alex and Andi's stories are further entwined due the nature of the project that has brought Andi's father to France. A preserved human heart has been discovered and it is believed to be the heart of the Dauphin. Andi's father is in France to sample the heart and run genetic testing against hairs from Marie Antoinette which will prove if the heart shares the queen's DNA. Andi becomes emotionally invested in the results of the genetic testing because of what she reads in Alex's diary. In an interesting plot twist, Andi awakes in the year 1795 as Alex and not only witnesses life during the Revolution, but also meets Amadé Malherbeau.

I struggled a bit with the character of Andi. Being rather familiar with depressed and grieving teenage girls, I had a hard time believing all of her motivations. No matter how angry I may have been in my own teenage years, I would have looked upon a free trip to Paris with total and utter glee! Andi, on the other hand, doesn't want to go, and is eager to leave as soon as she arrives. However there are other aspects of her character that I really appreciate--namely her love of music and her survival skills. Donnelly has created a modern young woman who is intelligent and capable, if not altogether plausible. Conversely, the character of Alex is easily admired. She is a very real heroine; initially attracted to a job with the royals for the money and prestige, she finds herself truly caring about the Dauphin and his family.

Donnelly has obviously done a lot of research, sprinkling interesting facts throughout her novel that enrich her excellent storytelling. It seems as if every detail has been considered, which brings the scenery to life. The scenes in the Catacombs in 1795 made my stomach roll in disgust at the incredibly detailed descriptions of rotting corpses and the smells with which they filled the tunnels.  Donnelly's study of the French Revolution allows her to relate the story of how the people of  France threw off the Royal Robes in exchange for Emperor Bonaparte, but without sounding like a dry text book.

I have tremendous respect for Jennifer Donnelly. She has taken on the task of bringing history into context for today's modern young readers, and done it exquisitely. Revolution is filled with emotional layers of content that draw you in to both Andi and Alex's unforgettable stories.

Rating: $$$

Doomed Queen Anne: Carolyn Meyer

After reading Beware Princess Elizabeth and loving it, I went to my favorite used book store and bought two more books from The Young Royals series. Carolyn Meyer has written four novels in The Young Royals series, each about a different notorious woman in King Henry VIII's court. These are young adult novels, written as historical fiction. Each novel is narrated with the youthful tone of their title character. Blending historical accuracy with all of the emotional teen drama we expect from young adult fiction, Meyer has created a special voice in her writing that makes centuries-old royalty seem as accessible as the girl next door.

If King Henry VIII is the most memorable King in English history, certainly Anne Boleyn is the most memorable Queen. Her life story has been told and retold so many times that the truth seems unobtainable. The younger sister of one Henry's many mistresses, Anne Boleyn has long been accused and suspected of being motivated not by love, but by aspirations of royalty. Her rise to--and subsequent fall from--royalty was aided by family members with political agendas. There are some historians who question if Anne loved her king at all. Meyer writes about Anne with more honesty than you will see in the movies by illustrating her physical flaws and her emotional insecurity. In this novel Anne is not a confident, manipulative femme fatale, but a young woman with a girlish crush on her king. As she gets closer to Henry, she narrates her fear of his temper. Her frequent blushes and flusters give her a sense of propriety not often associated with Queen Anne.

Despite it not being a new story to me, I was riveted by this telling of Queen Anne. I love Carolyn Meyer's writing and how accessible she has made the Tudor history.

Rating: $$$

Alias Grace: Margaret Atwood

In 1843 Grace Marks was arrested along with James McDermott for the murders of Thomas Kinnear and his housemaid Nancy Montgomery. Grace and James were employed by Kinnear and were accused of first murdering the maidservant and quartering her, and then shooting and killing the master of the house. The supposed motive for the murders was lust and jealousy, as the testimonies put everyone in everyone else's bed. Grace was just sixteen years old.

It was, of course, a great scandal at the time. A young girl, so innocent in appearances and history, being taken into the folds of an evil plot. There were also rumors that the maidservant had been impregnated with Kinnear's child before her death. It was a headlining news story in Canada, America, and Britain. The trial for Thomas Kinnear's murder was held first, and as McDermott and Marks were both found guilty and sentenced to death, the trial of Nancy Montgomery's death was never held as it was considered redundant. It was only the outcry by a group called The Committee For The Commutation of Grace Marks that she was not hanged until dead. She was instead sentenced to life imprisonment, which was very fortunate, as she was in fact later commuted and pardoned after serving just twenty-nine years of her life sentence.

Atwood has taken all of the transcripts and news articles, the psychological reviews and personal interviews into consideration. She has remained as accurate as possible in her fictional retelling of the story of Grace Marks. The problem there is that the stories are all so conflicting. Grace Marks tried to maintain that she was unconscious during the murders and had no recollection whatsoever of the twenty-four or so hours during which McDermott committed his crimes, but one of her many confessions states that she was an unwilling participant in parts of the murders. And McDermott himself gave multiple confessions, including one version in which he was a mere pawn in Grace Marks' plot, in which she wooed him with sexual invitations to convince him to do her bidding. Really, it's all very thickly layered on. I don't know how a jury ever managed to convict considering the complete lack of consistency. It just goes to show, when at a loss to prove your innocence, confuse 'em with as many stories as possible!

In my (para)professional opinion, after having read this novel as well as some other sources of fact, I believe that Grace Marks may well have been schizophrenic. During the times when she was unconscious, her witnessed behavior was different, and quite coarse in comparison to her usual prudish nature. Some psychologists chalked this up to her amazing ability to appear insane in an effort to save her life. Others argued it was a case of possession in needs of exorcism. Regardless of what is believed, I think that it's obvious Grace Marks was not in her right mind during the murders.

A note on the writing...Atwood is rather well known for her work in poetry. As such, I would expect her fiction writing to be concise and well-written. I found Alias Grace to be verbose and almost painfully long. Granted, when writing about a piece of history, a certain amount of expository is to be expected. I felt that it was perhaps overdone in this novel. For one thing, so much is said rather than shown making the text slightly dry to read. On the other hand, all of the information was provided, and I felt that I was able to make a reasonable conclusion of my own based on evidence presented. So perhaps the expository was necessary. I will have to read more of Atwood's fiction to make a fair judgement of her writing style.

Ultimately, I slogged through this novel in the interest of finding out The Truth, whatever it may be, and I think I discovered it by the last page. It was a very tedious read, but not without reward. Grace was only forty-six when she was released from the penitentiary and I can't help but wonder...then what happened?