Big Magic

Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of Eat Pray Love, is like a pep rally in book form. Her words inspire me to just keep writing every day now that I’m retired and there’s a bit more space in my head for creativity.

Even when it feels like every word I write is drivel, the process of getting it out is worthwhile for my mental health. And as Gilbert suggests. “It is fun!” For me, it’s also good practice playing with words and experimenting with my voice.

Interestingly, I read the book in tandem on my kindle and a paperback copy I bought for cheap on Amazon. I like having a hard copy that I can mark up and refer back to on my “empty brain” days, which oddly enough have been few and far between since I stopped teaching.

I love that Gilbert cautions against the perfectionism trap. It’s good advice for the over-zealous editor in me. She also suggests, “Just keep busy,” when inspiration evades us. I’m a huge believer that movement stimulates creative ideas.

Gilbert’s humor infuses Big Magic, and her metaphors for the creative process really resonate with me. In a chapter titled, “Have an Affair,” she compares writing to a brief clandestine meet-up that is sometimes all sneaky lovers can make happen. “Stop treating your creativity like it’s a tired, old, unhappy marriage (a grind, a drag) and start regarding it with the fresh eyes of a passionate lover,” she writes. “Even if you have only fifteen minutes a day in a stairwell alone with your creativity, take it.”

Moloka’i

Moloka’i by Alan Brennert is a well-researched historical fiction novel covering the time period that Hawaii became a state through World War II. It focuses on the establishment of a leper colony on the island of Moloka’i. 

Leprosy and the treatment of the disease in the past is a fascinating but gruesome topic. This book also explores the Hawaiian/Japanese connection and the horrifying internment of Japanese Americans after the war. 

This book was recommended by Te Fitz in Mexico. I was able to get it for free through Kindle Unlimited before I canceled the subscription that came with the new device my kids got me for my retirement!

The Covenant of Water

My performance with The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese should win me an award for “the longest time taken to read an interesting and compelling book”! Along with Cutting for Stone, his previous bestseller, this author was recommended to me by my physical therapist friend Sue. 

Fun fact: Sue actually found, not just a type-o, but a factual error, in this book, and contacted the author online about it! It had something to do with specific names of bones in the leg. Nerds of a feather ;)

Anyway, whenever I read long books like this one and especially when it takes me f o r e v e r to read them, my inner editor always emerges. I’m probably being too judgmental because this book is beloved, but for me the transitions between people and time periods felt awkward.

I loved that I learned a bit about India—its history and British colonization. I also loved being immersed in the feelings and perspectives of the iconic main characters, especially Big Ammachi. Finally, I loved dragging this book with me through the last months of my teaching career. It was like a warm embrace returning each night to this story after my grueling days at work. 

This is how long it took me to finish this epic novel. In the end, I just bought a digital copy so I could finish reading it in peace without CLAMS harassing me.

 

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

 

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid entertained me. There’s something about her writing style that I love AND hate. It’s easy, like comfort food. It has a certain appeal but isn’t nourishing. I liked this story  more than Malibu Rising, but I’m not inclined to indulge another selection from this author’s buffet again.

Little Monsters/Wild Game

Adrienne Brodeur is an author with a connection to Cape Cod. I started reading her memoir, Wild Game, which oddly enough documents her unorthodox relationship with her mother, while I was waiting for her novel Little Monsters to become available. I like her writing style which is unrestrained and descriptive but not overblown. 

Finally Little Monsters arrived on my kindle, and I took it to jury duty in December. (That’s a story for another day! Warning: it involves a transvestite lawyer, drunk driving, and an overcrowded, pre-holiday courthouse.) 

Fast forward to Saturday of the glorious MLK long weekend when I returned to Little Monsters. I finished reading about the hellishly dysfunctional Gardner family on a day that began with a blustery thunderstorm and then morphed into a balmy, windswept, blue-sky day.

Now I can get back to Wild Game: My Mother, Her Secret, and Me and reawaken some “mama trauma” of my own.

What makes this book so disturbing is that it recounts a true story. The people are real, and their actions are appalling. Here is the author's mother’s obituary from the Cape Cod Times.

I’m glad I read both books. I liked the memoir better than the novel, and the references to Cape Cod were an added bonus.