Category: nature

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Reservoir Gods by Brian Knight @ Joe Bob Briggs

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Dworshak was a body of water created by the Clearwater River. The dammed river created this reservoir that powers the town of Orofino. This project flooded a previously abandoned town and there are tales of desecrated Indian burial grounds. Amidst this stew of history, legend, and hearsay, Brian Knight brings us a “Big Fish Tale.” Remember the one that got away? Reservoir Gods is one of those stories. The story centers around the lives of various individuals spending their time around Dworshak. There is Commissioner Grant Lang, who enjoys the outdoors, camping with his underlings, and the occasional fourteen-year-old girl. … Continue reading Reservoir Gods by Brian Knight @ Joe Bob Briggs

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The Evil Garden (1965) by Edward Gorey

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Victorian stock characters get attacked by carnivorous plants and animals. The drawings have a simplicity matched by the rhyming couplets that explain the terrors illustrated for our enjoyment. The poetry conjures up nursery rhymes and like nursery rhymes, they veil the fangs and claws of Nature. Gorey’s slim volume is reminscent of the playful chaos of “Alice in Wonderland” and has a curdled humor like Max Cannon’s “Red Meat.” Continue reading The Evil Garden (1965) by Edward Gorey

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The Dissemblers by Liza Campbell

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The Dissemblers is a story about creativity, betrayal, art, crime, and jealousy.  Ivy Wilkes has recently graduated from art school and has moved to New Mexico to work in the Georgie O’Keeffee Museum.  She works as a cashier, but hopes being close to where O’Keeffe created her work will inspire her to do the same.  Ivy lives below a couple of musicians, Jake and Maya.  When not playing with the orchestra, Jake works as a guard at the museum.  Ivy eventually becomes romantically involved with Omar, café owner and Jake’s brother. As an artist, Ivy is remarkably perceptive.  She narrates … Continue reading The Dissemblers by Liza Campbell

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Critical Appraisal: The Landscape of Hell

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The representation of Hell as a cartographic region has its origins in Dante’s Divine Comedy.  Dante adapted the imagery already present in medieval painting and sculpture to comment on his political situation and his own scientific and theological beliefs.  He populated it with real people, including political heroes and villains, good popes and bad popes, adulterous princesses, and monsters human and mythological.  On Dante’s spiritual journey, he traveled with the Roman poet Vergil down the various circles of Hell and then up Mount Purgatory.  Finally, led by his beloved Beatrice, he journeyed through the heavenly spheres until he was in … Continue reading Critical Appraisal: The Landscape of Hell

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The Road by Vasily Grossman

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Best known for his novel Life and Fate, Vasily Grossman also wrote short stories and worked as a war correspondent in the Second World War.  A Ukrainian Jew with parents who worked as urban professionals, Grossman did not represent the common stereotype of the Eastern European Jew living in a “Litvak shtetl.”  The Road, a collection of short stories, journalism, and letters published by New York Review Books, provides a useful jumping off point for anyone interested in the life and work of Vasily Grossman.  It includes his earliest stories and his last short story he wrote.  “The Hell of … Continue reading The Road by Vasily Grossman

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Dead Weight by John Francome @ Joe Bob Briggs

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Phil Nicholas is a National Hunt jockey psychologically shaken after a bad fall. The National Hunt is a popular series of races involving horses in steeplechase races. Phil’s horse didn’t make it over one of these barriers, making the fall particularly nasty. He has had symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and it is making him not race as well. Because of the fall, he seeks psychiatric help, but keeps it secret from his wife Julia, a horse trainer, and his fellow jockeys. Phil is afraid the therapy might make him appear weak. Keith works as a gamekeeper and has been … Continue reading Dead Weight by John Francome @ Joe Bob Briggs

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Fall Asleep Forgetting by Georgeann Packard

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The appreciation of a novel can occasionally come down to something as random as timing.  When one reads a book too early or too late, one can miss important elements within the story.  This reviewer read Lord of the Rings too late and found its cod-archaic prose akin to downing a sedative.  Similarly, when reading Paradise Lost in middle school, the only thing gained was “bragging rights” since the poetry remained impenetrable.  All this represents a roundabout preface for my appreciation of Georgeann Packard’s novel Fall Asleep Forgetting. In the months leading up to September 11, 2001, the inhabitants of … Continue reading Fall Asleep Forgetting by Georgeann Packard

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A Confession by Leo Tolstoy

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Near the end of his life, Count Leo Tolstoy wrote two lengthy essays on the topic of religion.  Hesperus Press includes these two essays, “A Confession” (1879 – 1882) and “What is Religion, and What Does its Essence Consist of?” (1902).  The edition includes a foreword by novelist and Orange Prize winner Helen Dunmore with an introduction by famed Tolstoy translator Tony Briggs. Tolstoy would revisit the religious theme in “Father Sergius” (written in 1890, published in 1898), an excruciatingly introspective tale of sensual temptation, religious duty, and personal mutilation.  With “A Confession” and “What is Religion?”, Tolstoy works within … Continue reading A Confession by Leo Tolstoy

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Liver: A Fictional Organ with a Surface Anatomy of Four Lobes by Will Self

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A Review with a Surface Anatomy of Four Lobes 1. A Culinary Introduction Liver: A Fictional Organ with a Surface Anatomy of Four Lobes by Will Self explores and revels in decay and degeneration, gushing with bile and blood.  The quartet of interconnected short stories focus on the liver, a bodily organ with interconnected lobes. The liver functions by processing toxins and connects to the gall bladder.  People also consume liver as a delicacy.  The dish “liver and onions” is a classic in American cuisine.  I have eaten deer liver with onions and I enjoy the taste.  Prior to preparing … Continue reading Liver: A Fictional Organ with a Surface Anatomy of Four Lobes by Will Self

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Where the Wild Things Were: Life, Death, and Ecological Wreckage in a Land of Vanishing Predators, by William Stolzenburg

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On the tip of Washington’s Olympic Peninsula, ecology professor Robert T. Paine threw starfish into the sea.  In Alaska, killer whales preyed on sea otters.  In the northern forests of Wisconsin, massive deer herds mowed down several species of wildflower.  What do these disparate actions have in common?  In Where the Wild Things Were: life, death, and ecological wreckage in a land of vanishing predators, author and nature columnist William Stolzenburg explores what happens when top-tier predators go extinct.  Discussing several case studies, ranging from the tiny starfish to the polar bear-eating killer whale, Stolzenburg shows the ecological devastation following … Continue reading Where the Wild Things Were: Life, Death, and Ecological Wreckage in a Land of Vanishing Predators, by William Stolzenburg

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