Friday Inspiration

This week I discovered a blog I instantly fell in love with. It is called Brain Pickings and I highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in mental processes, finding inspiration and just being reminded of how much we love what we do.

This week I also spent an insane amount of hours reading and writing for my dissertation. Yesterday I was in front of the computer for 8 hours only stopping to have lunch and drink some tea. So, despite how much I love reading and writing these days are a little bit hard but not too much I still love doing research and writing and yesterday I even managed to do some creative writing which I haven’t done in a good while.

I saw the following picture in a post called The Pace of Productivity and How to Master Your Creative Routine and thought it would be a great idea to share it with you on Friday since we are all tired, sleep-deprived and leisure-deprived.

Source: Brain Pickings

Also from that post, I loved this quote by writer Isabel Allende reminding us that sometimes – and never overdoing it – we need to force ourselves to do something. In my case, writing or doing research, even when we don’t feel like it. The reasoning is simple: if we don’t force ourselves then it’s not a job, it’s a hobby.

The notion that I do my work here, now, like this, even when I do not feel like it, and especially when I do not feel like it, is very important. Because lots and lots of people are creative when they feel like it, but you are only going to become a professional if you do it when you don’t feel like it. And that emotional waiver is why this is your work and not your hobby.

Happy weekend, everyone!

Exclusive Interview: Ann Weisgarber

I met Ann Weisgarber some nine months ago when I requested Sophie from Mantle an ARC of her latest novel, The Promise. After that, we started talking on Twitter and she even let me interview her. Now that I’ve already reviewed The Personal History of Rachel DuPree - her debut novel – I had some questions to ask and she kindly accepted to our second interview.

One of the things you must know about our friendship is that I always feel I can ask her any question and she’ll answer it. Regarding this interview, I was particularly nervous about the first one, but Ann as lovely as usual, provided me with a great answer.

So, here it is. Ann Weisgarber’s exclusive interview for Books and Reviews on her debut novel The Personal History of Rachel DuPree. Thanks for letting me interview you, Ann. It’s always a pleasure!

Q&A FOR BOOKS AND REVIEWS

The Personal History of Rachel DuPree – Ann Weisgarber

Elena, before we begin with the questions, I’d like to thank you for your support of my books.  It’s a pleasure to work with you, and I’m delighted to be a part of your blog.    

Were you ever worried about giving voice to an African-American woman being yourself white?

 I did think about this and was concerned that this was not my story to tell.  There were times when I lost my nerve and nearly stopped writing.  But I’d think about the inspiration: the photograph of an unnamed woman sitting alone in front of her sod dugout. “You think it was easy to homestead?”  I’d imagined her saying. “If I could do that, surely you can do your part.”  Spurred on by her courage to stake a claim in the West, I’d return to the manuscript and push on, just as she must have done countless times.

Since publication, African-American readers have told me stories about their ancestors who were part of the Oklahoma Land Rush, or who mined for gold in California, or who ranched in Montana.  Many have thanked me for remembering people who have often been overlooked in history books.  It’s been a humbling experience, and I owe a debt of gratitude to the woman in the photograph who would not allow me to give up.

The novel reminded me a lot of Willa Cather’s works.  Did you have them in mind while writing?

 I did.  I reread My Antonia and O Pioneers! while writing Rachel DuPree to get a sense of the times, to understand the landscape, and to learn how the characters perceived the world.  I also reread Laura Ingell Wilders’ Little House series and was struck by the many desperate situations the family faced.  I also gained a new awareness of the father’s restless spirit.  In the early books, he’d announce that it was time to move and within a few days, the family picked up and went farther west.  The mother, with young children, was expected to somehow cope.

 The works that most influenced Rachel DuPree, though, were Oscar Micheaux’s The Conquest, Era Bell Thompson’s American Daughter, and Luther Standing Bear’s My People the Sioux.   Micheaux and Bell Thompson were African Americans who moved to the Dakotas during the early 1900’s.  Standing Bear was a member of the Sioux tribe who lived during a time of upheaval for his people and was sent to a boarding school in Pennsylvania. Their voices provided the perspectives that I needed for Rachel DuPree.

It is very ironic that Rachel’s husband is fighting against racism yet he always discriminates against Indians.  How did you come to articulate that double morality?

Rachel’s husband’s discrimination against Native Americans comes to a surprise for many readers.  This was painful to write but I felt compelled to make the characters fit with the prevailing mindset of the times and with the historical evidence I’d discovered. Well before Rachel and Isaac arrived in the Badlands, Native Americans had been negatively portrayed by newspaper reporters.  By the time the novel opens, the federal government had already moved Native Americans to reservations, taken the children from their homes and sent them to boarding schools, and outlawed many of their religious practices.  Few Americans questioned this, including most African Americans who had their own civil rights struggles.

 To heighten the tension, Isaac, Rachel’s husband, had been an army man trained to see Native Americans as the enemy.  On a personal level, Isaac didn’t think about what had been taken from them during the past 150 years, but only what had recently been given to them.  At the same time, Native Americans had suffered mightily at the hands of the United States army and drew little distinction between black and white soldiers. They saw only the uniform.

 The stereotypes were too engrained and the wounds too deep for either Isaac or for Mrs. Fills the Pipe, a Native American character, to forget and forgive.  However, the novel hints that a softening will begin with the next generation.

Would you like to explore other issues and times of female African-American history in the South?

 It might seem odd, but I don’t think in terms of wanting to explore specific themes and then building a novel around them.  Instead, I’m first inspired by a particular landscape and then by the people who once lived there.  With Rachel DuPree, I was on vacation in the Badlands when I stumbled across the photo of the woman.  The Promise, my second novel, was the result of an interview I’d conducted in Galveston.  The spark for my current project hit me while I was hiking high above the Fremont River in Capitol Reef National Park, Utah.  Once I have the landscape fixed in my mind, the main themes seem to evolve.

To answer your question, any character and all issues are possibilities for future projects. I know it sounds like a cliché, but for me, it’s a matter of being in the right landscape at the right time.

Top Ten Favorite Book Covers Of Books I’ve Read

Another Tuesday, another Top Ten Tuesday by The Broke and the Bookish!

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created here at The Broke and the Bookish. This feature was created because we are particularly fond of lists here at The Broke and the Bookish. We’d love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists!

We are told to never judge a book by its cover, but sometimes it’s impossible. There are incredibly beautiful and artistic designs out there. These are the 10 I love the most from least to more favourite. Can you guess which is my number 1?

10. Unwanted by Kristina Ohlsson

The Personal History of Rachel DuPree

The Personal History of Rachel DuPree by Ann Weisgarber was originally published in 2009 when it was also shortlisted for the Orange Award for New Writers. I first knew of Ann Weisgarber due to the publication of her latest novel The Promise – first review ever published here! - and since then we have remained in touch. When The Promise came out last March, I wanted to review her other novel and was kindly sent a paperback edition by Sophie from Mantle.

From Goodreads:

When Rachel, hired help in a Chicago boardinghouse, falls in love with Isaac, the boardinghouse owner’s son, he makes her a bargain: he’ll marry her, but only if she gives up her 160 acres from the Homestead Act so he can double his share. She agrees, and together they stake their claim in the forebodingly beautiful South Dakota Badlands.

Fourteen years later, in the summer of 1917, the cattle are bellowing with thirst. It hasn’t rained in months, and supplies have dwindled. Pregnant, and struggling to feed her family, Rachel is isolated by more than just geography. She is determined to give her surviving children the life they deserve, but she knows that her husband, a fiercely proud former Buffalo Soldier, will never leave his ranch: black families are rare in the West, and land means a measure of equality with the white man. Somehow Rachel must find the strength to do what is right-for herself, and for her children.

Reminiscent of The Color Purple as well as the frontier novels of Laura Ingalls Wilder and Willa Cather, The Personal History of Rachel DuPree opens a window on the little-known history of African-American homesteaders and gives voice to an extraordinary heroine who embodies the spirit that built America.

One of the things I pay attention when reading reviews is whether the blogger refers to the time it took them to read the book. I think there are books that capture your attention and don’t let you go. This is one of them: it only took me 5 days to read it despite the tough story it tells. You want to know about Rachel – her past, present and future – while at the same time you struggle with the story. The Badlands in South Dakota are as dry and arid as you can think. There are moments when you fear sand is actually falling out from the book and you feel your mouth going dry.

Regarding the historical period, I had never heard of African-American settlers and their stories in the frontier. But neither did Ann before a trip to the Badlands. There, she saw a picture that inspired her to write this moving debut novel. Somehow, for most readers the frontier stories are exemplified by Willa Cather and her novels such as O Pioneers! Weisgarber’s story has very much in common with Cather in that they both create strong, female main characters. They have families but they find themselves alone and fighting a place that seems keen on expelling them. They also struggle with fellow settlers and their perception of women: Alexandra from O Pioneers! becomes a powerful landowner after a lot of years fighting against what they believe she should be which is basically a wife and a mother. Rachel DuPree is a wife and a mother but she is also a landowner and never lets the Badlands defeat her desire for a better life.

Another key theme is racial segregation. In Chicago, Rachel’s parents in law were relevant among the African-American community, but her husband has the need to prove himself equal to white landowners. He is usually reminding Rachel of the need to acquire more land to become a powerful man and how people are not used to to seeing a black man owning so much. Rachel’s response throughout the novel questions how far would her husband go to fight racial stereotypes and how it would all affect their family. I think this was the most interesting theme in the whole novel: Rachel not only is African-American, but she’s also a woman who makes her doubly subjected in an era when women were not allowed to vote and her ancestors – still alive like her grandmother – were born slaves.

One of the suggested questions for book clubs is whether The Personal History of Rachel DuPree is a feminist novel or not. I think the fact Ann is giving voice to an African-American woman in the frontier already makes it a feminist novel. As I said before, the idea of black settles had never crossed my mind and they are definitely not properly inscribed in history books. But Rachel is also a strong woman and more importantly, she allows herself to change. The Rachel you encounter in Chicago has nothing to do with the one that desperately prays for some rain at the beginning of the novel. The Badlands made her a resolute, powerful woman but also more humble, sensible and sensitive.

I would recommend The Personal History of Rachel DuPree to everyone who is interested in frontier stories, but especially to those who have already read Cather’s novels. Weisgarber novel provides a very different yet very similar point of view. Despite the ethnic difference, Alexandra and Rachel are both women, they are both human beings who struggle against one of the most difficult situations in American history. But beware! The story is a hard one and it may be useful to keep a box of paper tissues near you while reading!

Two Books I Give Up On

I’m not one for giving up on books. For many reasons, but mainly, a book is someone else’s project. Someone had an idea and worked hard on it: wrote it, got an agent, got a publisher, finally got it published. And then the book finds its way to you as a reader. But these two, I just couldn’t bear to turn another page. A little voice inside me cried every time I sat to read them telling me there is a pile of books with which I’d rather spend my time with:

1. The Pleasures of Men by Kate Williams.

Everything in this book made it sound like a perfect read: Victorian London, murders, a female main character and behind the story, a well-known, respected and young British historian. But it was too dark, too twisted and don’t get me wrong, I’m all for dark and twisted but I feel they need to make sense, fit into the story and have a motive. Not that I could find any of that in this book. I was really sorry to feel this way since I myself requested it.

2.There Once Lived a Girl Who Seduced Her Sister’s Husband, and He Hanged Himself: Love Stories by Lyudmila Petrushevskaya

I didn’t request this one, the publisher did, and I thought it would be a great idea to read something not-so typically romantic this Valentine’s Day. Well, it’s May and I had only read half of it and didn’t intend on keep on reading. Of course, I see they are supposed to be ironic love stories, but I just couldn’t see it. The women in them were constantly abused, subjected and suffered because of their children: either because they chose to sacrifice themselves or because they follow society’s rules. Not my cup of tea at all.

Behind The Scenes At The Museum

Behind The Scenes At The Museum is Kate Atkinson’s first novel – originally published in 1995 – and winner the 1995 Whitbread Book of the Year. The following is a SPOILER FREE review. Enjoy!

From Book Depository:

Ruby Lennox was conceived grudgingly by Bunty and born while her father, George, was in the Dog and Hare in Doncaster telling a woman in an emerald dress and a D-cup that he wasn’t married. Bunty had never wanted to marry George, but here she was, stuck in a flat above the pet shop in an ancient street beneath York Minster, with sensible and sardonic Patricia aged five, greedy cross-patch Gillian who refused to be ignored, and Ruby…Ruby tells the story of The Family, from the day at the end of the nineteenth century when a travelling French photographer catches frail beautiful Alice and her children, like flowers in amber, to the startling, witty, and memorable events of Ruby’s own life.

First of all, no site offers an attractive description of the book. I was very reluctant to read it at first because somehow it did not fit the image of Kate Atkinson as a writer that I had in mind. Shame on me for doubting the always-masterful Atkinson! Behind The Scenes At The Museum is a really good book, a great one, and probably even better than any other of her novels except for the recent Life After Life. Actually, the themes in this book -and the complex family relations, draw a family tree when you read them both !-  hint at the seed that will later on produce Life After Life. There are moments when you can feel Ursula’s ghost wandering around, waiting for her time to arrive and become a main character herself. But Behind The Scenes At The Museum belongs to Ruby:

“I am a jewel. I am a drop of blood. I am Ruby Lennox!”

The story begins on Ruby’s conception which is a quite unusual way to start a novel, and might I add quite a polemic one in a time when abortion and conception are widely discussed. I was not at ease with the idea, but since I was between the safe boundaries of fiction I told myself to simply enjoy the story. Ruby’s story seems typical of anyone born in a middle-class family in the 1950′s in England, but as the plot progresses we find not everything is what it seems. Ruby is totally aware of what is going on around her even though she is a baby. In fact, her character shifts easily from being an omniscient narrator to a what she really is: a child. It is this contrast what makes the novel so special and innovative, and also what keeps you engaged. With such duality she explores her parents’ marriage and her relationship with her two older sisters: Patricia and Gillian. I said the novel belongs to Ruby because it truly does, but it explores the life of the women from whom she comes: her mother, her grandmother and her great-grandmother. Some would say they are different stories, but the fact they are a family and the plot only focuses on the women in that family is extremely relevant. This creates a familiar identity that influences our personal history, that is, one is partly what it is thanks to their ancestors. As a consequence, it is not strange to find uncanny resemblances between the four generation of women despite the relevant economic, social and cultural changes that separated them.

Because of its focus on women – late 19th century and 20th century herstory - the book covers a wide range of themes extremely important in women’s history and sadly, still fought for nowadays. The supposed need to marry, the impossibility of getting contraceptives, gender roles and The Angel in the House, violence, personal frustration, lack of opportunities in the outer world (college, jobs), the constant and prevalent fight between science and humanities and above all, what being a woman meant, not for oneself, but for the others and mainly, what it meant for men.

After such a description, what more can I say? I loved the book yet I found it extremely sad that some issues dealt with are still present in my life. This is poignant, moving book. It’ll move you from tears to laughter in a single chapter. It will make you love and hate the very same character in the same sentence. But, if you are a woman this book will resonate with you and the stories you probably heard from your mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. Sadly, some of it could also resonate with your own life now in 2013, but this is why books like Behind The Scenes At The Museum are so important and so wonderful. They remind us of our past and also of our present, but they also remind us of our future and how we are building it every day and need to so in a conscious and constructive way. If possible, always a feminist way.

Some quotes I knew you would love:

“The past is what you take with you.”

“But I know nothing; my future is a wide-open vista, leading to an unknown country – The Rest Of My Life.”

“In the end, it is my belief, words are the only things that can construct a world that makes sense.”

Top Ten Topics That Instantly Make Me Pick Up A Book

Another Tuesday, another Top Ten Tuesday by The Broke and the Bookish!

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created here at The Broke and the Bookish. This feature was created because we are particularly fond of lists here at The Broke and the Bookish. We’d love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists!

Today’s list will be pretty obvious to those who know me.

1. Kay Scarpetta. - Have I mentioned I’ve fallen in love with her? She’s smart, she is a doctor, she solves crimes, she has a gun, she is always busy and tired and overworked. I can relate to some of the latter!

2. Serial Killers.-  The likes of Zodiac (2007) and most of the bad guys in the Scarpetta series are like this. Their cases are usually full of psychological analysis and lots of tension.

3. Dark main characters.- Crime fiction has evolved enough so as to leave room for dark, twisted main characters with whom we end up sympathising wich obviously calls for some introspection.

4. Anything by Kate Atkinson.- I think I’m on the verge of becoming obsessed  with her works. Not that I find anything wrong with that though.

5. Complex, undervalued female characters.- It could be historical as in Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace where the main character is a Canadian supposed killer (You should read this book if you haven’t yet) or fictional as if someone revisited the American Colonial era from a female point of view.

6. Women’s history in the USA.- I’ve long wanted to read a bunch of non-fictional works where the role of women in American history is explored. I started and loved The Plantation Mistress although I didn’t have time to finish it.

7. Philosophical and psychological issues.- I really loved my philosophy lessons in high school and as a consequence I tend to fit in as much philosophy as I can in between my fiction readings. My latest discovery is The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

8. Nordic crime fiction.- It’s been quite popular since Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo became a global success. Ever since, our bookshops have been flooded with Nordic crime fiction, some of it pretty good!

9. 19th century novels by women.- I’m thinking of Wüthering Heights, Cranford, Jane Eyre, Mansfield Park etc. Can you believe I still haven’t read Middlemarch?

10. Any combination of the above!