Honor

Thirty Umrigar is the author of Honor, a story about a journalist. Smita travels the world as a journalist. Her apartment is is New York. Smita was born in India but moved to the United States with her brother and her parents. When she was young and living in India, her family was targeted because of their Muslim faith. For that reason  she never wanted to cover stories in India. When her friend, a fellow journalist named Shannon calls her and asks for her help, she does go to India. Smita thought her friend wanted her physical help because of an injury. When she arrived she learned Shannon wanted her professional help in covering a story. Reluctantly Smita agrees to cover the story. The story involves a trial. Meena, a Hindu, is suing her brothers for killing her husband and nearly killing her as well. As Smita covers the story she processes her own story. I thought this was a great story about faith, discrimination, and how honor can mean one thing to one person and a completely different thing to another person.

  

Golden Eagle Puts On A Show

 Today was a very pleasant day at Hawk Ridge. The air was warm, the sky was sunny, and the winds were only 5 mph. We had visitors from Canada, California, Massachusetts, Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa and New York. We all got a really good view of a low flying golden eagle today. Although the bird banders and counters will continue to work through the month of November, tomorrow is the last day that the store is open and the naturalists are working.

All He Ever Wanted

 Years ago I enjoyed The Pilot's Wife by Anita Shreve. This time I read All He Ever Wanted by the same author. In this novel Nicholas Van Tassel is a professor at a small college in New Hampshire. While dining at a hotel one evening, the hotel kitchen catches fire. The dining room diners dash outside into the cold winter night. Nicholas catches sight of a young woman. Nicholas is telling this story as an 64 year old man on a train ride to his sister's funeral. The woman he sees that night eventually becomes his wife, Etna, as well as the mother of his two children. Reading Nicholas' words we learn that he is a pompous, arrogant, stuffy, controlling jerk of a man who got all he ever wanted but couldn't hold onto it because of his personality. The story was well told. There are reasons Nicholas is alone on that train ride. He deserves to be alone on that train ride.

Historical Miniatures

August Strinberg is a Swedish author writer, playwright and painter. He wrote Historical Miniatures and it was published in 2006. The novel has chapters for various characters in history. All the characters were men and they included Plato, Socrates, King Herod, Julius Caesar, and King Henry VIII. The author wrote conversations into the chapters as well as arguments and celebrations. Some of the scenes were funny. Although I read the entire book I can't say I know more about historical figures than I did before I read it.

The Undertaker's Assistant

 The Undertaker's Assistant is a historical fiction novel by Amanda Skenandore. She wrote a story about Effie Jones. Effie was a slave in Louisiana. At age 7 she escaped her captors and made her way to a Union Army camp. A doctor in the camp took her in thinking she was a boy. Wanting to please this doctor, she learned all she could about anatomy. After the war he returned to his home in Indiana. Effie came to live with him and his wife. His occupation in Indiana was undertaker so Effie learned that trade as well. When she turned 18 she left Indiana and returned to Louisiana. She got a job as an undertaker's assistant. Her skill at embalming were helpful. The man she worked for was an alcoholic and he was not managing very well. She cleaned his shop, straightened up his accounts, and with her help his business began to thrive. He stopped drinking as much too. Effie wanted to find someone who knew her when she was young. The story is about how Effie faces loss and heartbreak but eventually finds her place in life. I thought the story was well written and definitely worth my time.

A Simple Favor

 Darcey Bell wrote the novel A Simple Favor. In this story a widowed mother of a five year old, Stephanie, meets the married working mom of her five year old's best friend, Emily. Stephanie is a mommy blogger. Emily commutes two hours to work in the high end fashion field in Manhattan. Their boys are friends and like to play together and have sleep overs at both houses. One day Emily asks Stephanie to pick up her son after school saying she would come and pick him up by 9 p.m. She is asking for a simple favor. Nothing about these two women is simple. The story is narrated by Emily, Stephanie, and Sean who is married to Emily. All the  narrators are unreliable but Emily is the worst. Emily lies so much she doesn't even know what the truth is anymore.  I liked the two boys but I did not like any of the narrators. I guess unreliable narrators are a trick to use when writing mystery stories but I just found these characters to be repugnant. I thought the plot was convoluted too. This wasn't my favorite book to read.

Planting Pines

Today my master naturalist chapter had a meeting at the Boulder Lake Environmental Learning Center which is north of Duluth. As I drove up there the tamarack trees were dressed in the golden fall splendor. Today was an Indian summer day with a high of 71.

After the meeting we did a service project at the Boulder Lake Bear Paw campground. Specifically we worked at the Superior campsite.

A disease called Spruce tip rot had killed a wide swath of spruce at this campsite making it look less than superior.

Those white patches are where we stapled paper to the top of the red and white pines so the deer wouldn't eat the terminal end of the tree. I planted probably 30 trees myself. We had a dozen people so we maybe planted 300 trees in short time. It would be fun to camp here because it's free camping and you could canoe or kayak  right up to your campsite.