Picks to begin your literary year
By Susan Swagler
Too Much Happiness
(Knopf) By Alice Munro
Munro, who won the 2009 Man
Booker International Prize for her
body of work, has a new collection
of short stories. At age 78, Munro is
as sharply attuned to the human
psyche as ever. Each of these 10 stories
offers more plot and power
than most novels. Munro is known for her ability to beautifully and
tellingly examine the interior lives of women. This is especially evident
in the opening story, “Dimensions,”in which a hotel maid carries
a terrible secret; it’s far worse, even, than her poisonous, incapacitating
connection to her incarcerated, older husband. The title
piece, though, stays with you. “Too Much Happiness”is the story of
a real Russian mathematician and author named Sophia
Kovalevsky. Munro limited the story to the days before Sophia’s
death, with flashbacks to her earlier life. Readers encounter Sophia
traveling through 19th-century Europe while trying to figure out
her place in the world. (Female mathematicians were rare.) These
stories—all of them—are short fiction at its very finest.
Lucky Girl
(Algonquin) By Mei-Ling Hopgood
Mei-Ling is indeed one lucky girl. This memoir, a riveting,
page-turning book, contrasts her comfortable, American suburban
life with the one she might have had with her Chinese
birth family. Mei-Ling’s adoption
preceded the international adoption
agencies in place today. But
the slow, informal, disorganized
process landed her in a loving
home. She became a big sister,
went to college and studied journalism,
lucky to escape a life of
poverty in Taiwan. Then one day,
in The Year of the Ox, she writes,
her birth family made contact.
What followed was a physical and
emotional journey, filled with new
friendships and old secrets, which
Mei-Ling has translated into a
powerful personal story.
The Business Devotional: 365 Inspirational Thoughts on Management, Leadership & Motivation
(Sterling Publishing) By Lillian Hayes Martin
Local author Lillian Martin says she
read nearly 80 books while doing her
research for this motivating, highly readable collection of daily
devotionals. She says she also revived a family tradition of writing
inspirational quotes on a chalkboard. (Her mother did this when
she was growing up.) At the time of her research, Martin’s boys
were very young. The older of the two would look at the day’s
quote and usually say, “I don’t get it.” The younger one would say,
“I can’t read yet.” She tells this story laughing, and, indeed, her
sense of humor can be found throughout this book with its
words of wisdom that offer inspiration for career growth, leadership,
team-building, entrepreneurship and more. There’s day-today
advice and long-term guidance on workplace success here.
It’s packaged cleverly with motivational quotes from successful business leaders such as Oprah Winfrey, Bill Gates, Carly Fiorina, Peter Drucker and Warren Buffett. The overall message of making positive changes is especially helpful right now!
Settled in the Wild
(Algonquin) By Susan Shetterly
This is the first essay collection in 20 years from Shetterly, and it details what she learned in the decades since she and her husband and two young children moved into an unfinished cabin in Maine. Often beginning with such simple observations as how many various living things are in the dead tree in her own backyard, she shows how animals, plants and humans share the land in an ever-evolving community.
She writes about a catching a cricket with her young son, rehabilitating a fledgling raven, discovering escaped farm-raised salmon trying to live in natural waters and fruitlessly shielding her goldfish from a vigilant kingfisher. The prose here is poetic and inspiring enough to make readers really look at the world around them—and then perhaps lend a hand in protecting it.
