Art of Fielding - by Chad Harbach

I first read an excerpt of this book in Sports Illustrated. Then, it showed up on Amazon's Top 100 of 2011 list. It's one of those books that has all kinds of people writing things like "Best First Novel Ever!" - or "A Terrific Start" - or "Couldn't put it down." All of those sorts of things always make me a little suspicious; if too many reviewers think the book was that good, I'm starting to wonder if it wasn't the publisher's marketing campaign that made it good, rather than the writing.

While I don't necessarily agree with all of the hyperbole that preceded my reading of the book, I will say it was a pretty good book. Knowing it was the author's first published novel probably adds to a little more to that assessment. Basically, the book talks about relationships (family, friends, lovers) and goals/dreams. There are 5 main characters - 2 that you meet right at the start of the book. The relationships and goals/dreams revolve around baseball (hence the title, and the excerpt in Sports Illustrated). The five main characters consist of Henry Skrimshander (shortstop) and Mike Schwartz (catcher); Owen Dunne (Henry's intellectual, gay roommate, also a player on the baseball team); Guert Affenlight (the University President) and Pella Affenlight (Guert's "prodigal" daughter; later girlfriend to Mike Schwartz).

There are plenty of baseball scenes for the sport nerd - plus plenty of reference to literature (Guert was an English professor before becoming the university President). There are some slow parts (about 2/3 of the way through), and the ending turns out to be better than you were anticipating (not that you were anticipating anything bad - just as events unfolded you started to wonder whether it'd be one of those ending-that-totally-sucked-for-the-characters-but-surprised-you-as-the-reader type books (like John Grisham's "The Chamber"!)). There are some scenes that may be offensive to some (Guert and Owen develop a relationship), but they're easily skippable. Overall, I found it an interesting book - recommended to anyone who knows at least a little bit about baseball (if you don't, you'll have to get used to the multitude of baseball - especially shortstop - references).

In the Garden of Beasts - by Erik Larson

Erik Larson is most famous for writing "non-fiction novels." What I mean by this is that he's writing non-fiction, the stories are true. But, the books read like novels. In each book, he takes a historical event, and tells the story of that event through the eyes, or story, of some of the specific players. This is the first book of his that I've read - it was recommended to me by a friend.

Here, Larson wanted to look at the Germany of the 1930's. In 1933, America sent a new ambassador to Germany, William Dodd, who took his family along (wife, and adult son and daughter, Martha). Largely through the eyes of Dodd and Martha, Larson tells the story of the years immediatly after Hitler was made Chancellor. His main point seems to be that while those foreigners (such as Dodd) who were inside Germany at the time of Hitler's rise recognized him (and the Nazi party) for who they were - the folks "back home" in America (and other countries) just refused to accept that things were as bad as Dodd's letters made it seem.

Some of the book (an overly large amount, probably) focuses on Martha's various "relationships" with the variety of single (and married) men she met while in Berlin. While Larson seems to focus a bit much on the various relationships, I think the point he's trying to make is that some of the Germans, and other diplomats there at the time, were normal folks - prone to the same habits, mannerisms, and relationships as anyone else.

Anyway - I've read a lot of history books, including many on the Holocaust and World War II. The perspective of this book was new - and it was easy to get through the entire book. Just seems like a little of the relationship parts could have been removed without impacting the overall quality of the book.

My Korean Deli - by Ben Ryder Howe

This is a memoir, of sorts. Ben Ryder Howe was an American WASP who grew up in New England. While in college, he met a Korean girl who ended up as a lawyer at a big New York law firm. Ben was working (essentially part time) as an editor at the Paris Review (a journal for and about writers). They were living in her parents basement (with a bunch of other Korean relatives). At some point during this process, they decided to purchase a New York City deli.

This book is the story of the process of purchasing the deli, running it for several years, and ultimately selling it (sorry if that just gave away the ending!). It's the story of the lessons the WASP learned about running a small deli in Brooklyn; being a small-business owner; juggling two "jobs"; family relationships; and change. It was interesting seeing the "inside-look" of dealing with suppliers, city regulators and deli employees.

The book was incredibly easy to read. As a New England-educated WASP, there are some points where the author gets philosophical - looking at the deeper meaning behind some of the deli choices. All in all, though, it was a pretty interesting read.

This Burns My Heart - by Samuel Park

This book is a Korean love story. That alone should tell you it was unusual for me to read this book. I don't normally read love stories - however, this one was on the Amazon 2011 list, so I tried it out. The book tells the story of a South Korean girl who gets married shortly after the Korean war. She wants to go to Seoul to attend diplomat school, but her parents want her to get married instead. So, she finds a boy who she believes she can manipulate into letting her attend diplomat school, and chooses to marry him. Just before her marriage, though, she meets and falls in love with someone else. However, she chooses to go through with her marriage, rather than marry the other guy.

The rest of the book tells the story of her life after marrying the original boy - who turns out to have tricked her into getting married. Several times later in life she runs across the second man she met. I won't say the book wasn't predictable - it ends the way you want it to end, with several twists and turns in between. However, what was fun/interesting was to get a glimpse into Korean culture, and the way that families are made and treated. This was a pretty easy read - got through it in a couple of days. If you like love stories - this is an easy one to follow.

The Great and Terrible - by Chris Stewart

Chris Stewart is a Mormon author, who's written a series of books known as "The Great and Terrible." There's six books in the series, which starts with this one, The Brothers. The Brothers is a prologue to the rest of the series, and takes place in heaven, before the main characters come to earth. In heaven, there are 3 brothers and a sister (Sam, Ammon, Luke and Elizabeth), who are preparing to come to Earth. At the same time, Lucifer/Satan is gaining more power over those still in heaven, preparing himself to come to earth to tempt others.

The remaining books in the series take place on Earth, after the 4 kids have been born, and are a "preview" of what the end of the world may be like, and how those kids were prepared and participated in the events. I'd read all books in the series before, and recently re-read all of them. (I just included the first book's picture above - didn't want to load all six.)

I like the series - there's plenty of political thriller in it to keep me involved. Lots of "international-ness" to it (especially involving the Middle East). Also, there's quite a few scenes where Satan's angels/followers are tempting those on Earth. It's interesting to think about the mechanics of how that would work - and what would work to tempt folks. Scary, even, how easy some of their work seems to be. It also makes you think about what the pre-mortal life was like, and how we made our choices there. You'll view your kids differently - how much they were prepared before this life to come down when they did, and face the issues they will face.

As I mentioned - I liked the series. They're not difficult to read - I think I got through all 6 books in less than 2 weeks.

Conspiracy of Fools by Kurt Eichenwald

I read a different book recently by this author, called The Informant. The Informant was made into a movie starring Matt Damon. I like that book well enough, that when I saw this one, it intrigued me. I've had a passing interest in the Enron disaster that happened back in the early 2000's. (One of the last books I finished, The Sellout, referenced the Enron disaster too.)

This authors M.O. is to conduct a bunch of interviews and review a bunch of documents, then attempt to reconstruct a story based on those interviews and documents. Both this one and the Informant were true stories of corporate wrong-doing. The Enron story focused on accounting "creativity", and how it led to the downfall of both Enron and Arthur Anderson (the accounting firm both advising and auditing Enron). Throughout this book, the author does a great job at trying to show who, exactly, within Enron was the culprit of the "irregularities" that led to the destruction of the company. (I put "creativity" and "irregularities" in quote for a reason - the author here tries to show that the accounting issues that Enron had were obviously wrong, and should've been obvious at many different points in the process.)

Overall, this was a great book. You come out of it cheering for some folks, and wondering how others were able to get away with what they did for so long. The author definitely paints the picture of who was most too blame, and who simply had their head in the sand. After getting about 2/3 of the way through, I Googled the main characters, to see what had ultimately happened to them after all this went down. It was interesting to see that the main instigator of the problems (at least, the one one portrayed in the book here) didn't appear to get too much punishment for what he'd done to the company (and collaterally - to Arthur Anderson).

Anyway, if you want a good summary of the Enron situation, and what caused it to collapse, this is a pretty good read!