Dancing on Broken Glass

What a delightful evening we had with Ka Hancock, the author of Dancing on Broken Glass, thanks to Juicy, whose walking buddy is Ka's childhood friend. Ka was warm and vivacious and shared her journey to publication with us.

I loved the story behind her dedication to her high school sweetheart husband. It says: "For Mark, who kindled a fire in me with his 1-in-64,000 odds. I love you madly!" I've read a lot of dedications and acknowledgements and listened to a lot of authors speak about the unflagging support they received from their spouses, but this story was different. Mark didn't want to read anything Ka wrote. I understand this. How do you respond when you don't like what your loved one has written? One time when Ka was talking to Mark about publishing this novel he said something like, "You know the odds of getting published are 1 in 64,000." And what impressed me so much about Ka is that it didn't discourage her, it made her more determined. The book has been very successful and has been published in multiple countries. Ka is hard at work on her second novel. Oh, and by the way, Mark loved the book when he finally read it.

What a privilege it was to have her visit our book group. She even put a picture of us on her website.

Ka used her experience as a psychiatric nurse to write this poignant love story of a couple facing the almost insurmountable challenges of mental illness and cancer. Because of my own experiences dealing with loved ones with mental illness and cancer it hit me very deeply. I read it on an airplane and when the sobs hit I was very glad about two things. One, I wasn't sitting by strangers. And two, I was wearing a scarf which did a nice of job of mopping up my wet cheeks.



The support of other women is a powerful thing and our book group has been a safe place for many years. Ka has had long-standing support from her writing group, all published authors, and they rent a house in Oregon twice a year for a writing retreat, which she was missing to come speak to us. :-)

Ka is on the front row in stripes with her childhood friend by her side.

We ended the evening with Juicy's truly luscious dessert:

Pumpkin Cheesecake with Pecan-Gingersnap Crust

Crust:
1 3/4 C gingersnap crumbs (about 30 small cookies)
6 T real butter, melted
3 T brown sugar
3/4 C ground pecans

Filling:
3 8 oz blocks cream cheese
3/4 C canned pumpkin puree
6 oz melted white chocolate (that’s about 1 C white chocolate chips)
1 C sugar
3 eggs
2 t vanilla
1/4 t nutmeg
1 1/2 t cinnamon
1/8 t cloves

Topping:
1 C whipping cream, beat with 1/2 tsp vanilla and 4 Tbs powdered sugar until medium peaks form.
1/3 C roughly chopped pecans, either toasted or caramelized
2 Tablespoons jarred caramel sauce

Preheat oven to 350. Using 2 large pieces of heavy duty foil, securely wrap the bottom and outside of your cheesecake pan. This will prevent leaks when using the water bath.

For Crust:
Use a food processor to crush gingersnaps. Then do pecans. Combine gingersnaps, pecans, brown sugar, and butter and stir well to combine. Press into a 9″ spring form pan. Evenly spread across the bottom of pan and up the sides about 1 inch.

To melt chocolate, place in a microwave-safe bowl and microwave on 30 second intervals, stirring in between, until smooth. Set aside.

With an electric mixer beat cream cheese and sugar until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time. Add pumpkin, vanilla, nutmeg, cinnamon, and cloves.

With the mixer running, slowly add in white chocolate in a steady stream (or steady blobs).

Pour mixture on top of the crust.

For water bath:
Place cheesecake pan inside of a larger pan. I use a roasting pan. The larger pan should be at least 2-3 inches in depth. Place in pre-heated oven. With a kettle or pitcher filled with hot water, pour water into the larger pan about halfway up, or approximately 1 1/2 to 2 inches.

Bake for 60-75 minutes or until set. The center should be just a tad bit jiggly still. It will finish cooking while cooling.

When it’s done, remove from oven and place on a rack until completely cool. Place in the fridge for at least 12 hours. This is a very soft cheesecake so sufficient chilling is a must!

When ready to serve spread sweetened whipped cream on top, drizzle caramel sauce over it, and sprinkle with pecans.

Old-Fashioned Apple Cake

Girl Wonder hosted our discussion of Kathleen Grissom's historical fiction best seller, The Kitchen House, and she made her recipe for Old-Fashioned Apple Cake.

"This delicious, moist cake recipe, one I believe Belle would have made, was given to me by Ann Anderson, a dear friend."

Old-Fashioned Apple Cake
Ingredients
3 cups flour
2 cups sugar
1 cup oil
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. vanilla
3 eggs
3 cups grated apples
1 cup chopped walnuts

Directions
1. Butter or grease a 9 x 12 inch pan.
2. Blend all ingredients in the order listed, blending well as you go.
3. Pour into pan.
4. Bake at 325 degrees for 50-60 minutes.
5.Serve with a sprinkle of powdered sugar or a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

The Kitchen House

Watch this two-minute video to learn the inspiration behind The Kitchen House and what the author, Kathleen Grissom, hopes the reader takes from the book:



Read a great bio of the author (in her own words).

There is a great reader's guide on the author's website with questions, a delightful interview and a recipe for molasses cake.

Don't miss it!

This Author's Note is well worth the read:

A few years ago, my husband and I restored an old plantation tavern in Virginia. While researching its past, I found an old map on which, near our home, was a notation: Negro Hill. Unable to determine the story of its origin, local historians suggested that it most likely suggested a tragedy. For months it played on my mind. Each morning I walked across our land to go down to the stream where I would meditate. On my return trip, I faced the direction of Negro Hill and, to myself, wondered aloud what had happened there.

Finally, one morning when I returned from that walk, I sat down to do my daily journaling. What happened next left me baffled. In my mind’s eye, I saw a scene play out as clear as a movie.

I began to write, and the words flew onto the paper. I followed in the footsteps of a terrified little white girl, running up the hill behind her frantic mother. When they reached the top, through their eyes, I saw a black woman hanging from the limb of a large oak tree. I set my pencil down, appalled at the story line. I had written the prologue to The Kitchen House. Although fascinated by antebellum history, I abhorred the thought of slavery and had always shied away from the subject. Quickly, I slipped the writing in my desk drawer, determined to forget about it.

Some weeks later, during a conversation with my father, I learned that an acquaintance of his had traced his ancestry back to Ireland. Around the turn of the nineteenth century, this man’s Irish ancestors had come over on a ship, and on that journey, both of the parents had died. Two brothers had survived, along with their little sister. The family was able to track what had happened to the boys but couldn’t find any trace of the little girl. As my father related the story, a deep chill ran through me. In my deepest core, I knew immediately what had happened to her. She had been brought home to the captain’s plantation as an indentured servant in Virginia, and put to work in the kitchen house with the kitchen slaves. She awaited me in my desk drawer.

I began to do the research. I visited the many plantations in this area, particularly Prestwould. I studied slave narratives from the time period and interviewed African-American people whose ancestors had been slaves. I spent hours in local libraries, the Black History Museum, the Virginia Historical Society, and Poplar Forest. I visited Colonial Williamsburg many times over. Finally, I began to write. Each day more of the story unfolded, and when I finished, often emotionally spent, I was left to wonder what the following day would bring. The only time the work came to a standstill was when the characters took me to an event or to a place where I had not yet done my research.I tried on a number of occasions to change some of the events (those that I found profoundly disturbing), but the story would stop when I  did that, so I forged ahead to write what was revealed.

I am forever grateful to the souls who gifted me with their sharing. I can only hope I have served them well.

Nurtureshock

We learn how to parent from our own parents, and many of us have had that uncomfortable aha moment when we realize that we are turning into them.

Not that we can't make conscious choices to parent differently. Reading the research on parenting in NurtureShock provides a great opportunity to re-examine our parenting methods. For instance, does praise hurt or help a child? Is our strategy to promote truthfulness encouraging our child to become a better liar?

The research is thought-provoking.

Po Bronson began his career in finance, but abandoned that to become a novelist. His first book, Bombardiers, became a bestseller. He switched to non-fiction and wrote another bestseller, What Should I Do With My Life? (I enjoyed reading it when it came out in 2002.)

Ashley Merryman is a lawyer who served in the Clinton administration as a speechwriter and worked as a researcher for Al Gore. She runs a church-based tutoring program for inner-city children.

There are some interesting videos and articles on their website, here.

This is a terrific video that Jeeves suggested we watch:

Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman's new book was published last month and it sounds intriguing. Read an interview about the book here.

What are the differences between a winning and losing performance? Why are we able to rise to the challenge one day, but wilt from it the next? Can we in fact become better competitors? In TOP DOG, Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman use cutting edge science to tease out the hidden factors at the core of every great triumph - and every tragic failure. By enabling you to identify your own competitive style, TOP DOG will help you tip the odds of success in your favor. Integrating wisdom from politics, finance, genetics, neuroscience, psychology, military training, sports, economics, education and more, TOP DOG offers counterintuitive, game-changing insights into the nature of competition, such as:

• Why the home field advantage in sports is just as relevant in diplomacy and deal-making
• That women are better at judging risk, while men are better at ignoring it - and how this plays out on K Street and Wall Street
• Why younger siblings are more competitive than first-borns, and how early-childhood influences shape competitive styles forever
• That the shape of entrepreneurs' hands can be just as revealing as their business plans
• How a single biochemical can predict a winner before an event has even begun
• Why discord can be better than harmony, and why stars on a team do deserve special treatment.

As President Dwight Eisenhower said, "What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight-it's the size of the fight in the dog." In TOP DOG, Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman reveal the size of the fight in all of us.

Uprising

Just over a hundred years ago, on March 25, 1911, 146 workers were tragically killed in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire. It was the deadliest industrial accident in New York City's history.

I am a Margaret Peterson Haddix fan, mostly for her science fiction and fantasy books, and I am so glad that her editor suggested she write a book about the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire. At the time, there weren't any books for young readers written on that tragedy, even though many important laws were passed because of it.

Here is the review I wrote on Goodreads when I read it in 2009:

"In the early 1900s the factories in New York City were booming and immigrants from all over the world were streaming in. Yetta is a Jewish girl from Russia who is passionate about fighting for better working conditions at the shirtwaist factory, Bella has immigrated from Italy and is working to send money home to her starving family, and Jane leaves her wealthy family to find her own way. These girls came alive, as did their stories, and I cared deeply about them. Though this story doesn't have a 'happily ever after"' ending, it left an indelible mark on me."

Here are some photos from that time:

An Italian woman is taking home a bundle of cloth for her family to sew:

Inside the factory:

Some of the women who lobbied for changes:

The firemen weren't able to effectively fight the fire:

The factory in ruins:

The often unrecognizable remains of the women who perished:

In April of 1911, the citizens of New York City joined together to mourn:

American Experience has a great 50-minute video that you can watch [here].

Jeeves heard Gay Ducey tell the story of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire at the Orem Library three years ago and felt that it was well worth your time.

I thought it was very good, as well.

If you want to learn more, Cornell University has a website dedicated to remembering the fire and its victims. You can find it [here].

This new picture book will be available on January 22, 2013.

When Clara Lemlich arrived in America, she couldn't speak English. She didn't know that young women had to go to work, that they traded an education for long hours of labor, that she was expected to grow up fast. But that did not stop Clara. She went to night school, spent hours studying English, and helped support her family by sewing in a factory. Clara never quit. And she never accepted that girls should be treated poorly and paid little. So Clara fought back. Fed up with the mistreatment of her fellow laborers, Clara led the largest walkout of women workers in the country's history. Clara had learned a lot from her short time in America. She learned that everyone deserved a fair chance. That you had to stand together and fight for what you wanted. And, most importantly, that you could do anything you put your mind to.

Unfortunately, industrial fires did not end with the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. In November 2012, there was a factory fire in Bangladesh that killed at least 112 people.

 ABC News Report about the Bangladesh fire  is available [here]

It's scary how little is learned from the past.

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother

The complete subtitle of Amy Chua's 2011 memoir is:

“This is a story about a mother, two daughters, and two dogs. This was supposed to be a story of how Chinese parents are better at raising kids than Western ones. But instead, it's about a bitter clash of cultures, a fleeting taste of glory, and how I was humbled by a thirteen-year-old.”

When Amy Chua wrote Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother she had no idea that it would trigger a fire storm of controversy. It obviously struck a nerve with western and eastern parents alike, for very different reasons.

Here she is with her lovely violin and piano-playing daughters . . .

and the rest of the family.

It's interesting to see the family dynamics in this short video:

Another short video clip with daughter, Sophia, speaking out:

Sophia Chua-Rubenfeld also spoke out by writing an article for the New York Post titled, "Why I Love My Strict Chinese Mom." Read it [here].

If you have time, this almost six minute video is very interesting:

There is an interesting interview with Amy Chua on NPR [here].

And another interview with Penguin [here].

Discussion Questions from LitLovers:

1. What is your overall reaction to Battle Hymn of the Mother Tiger? Are you appalled or impressed, in agreement, disagreement...or something else?

2. What kind of mother is Amy Chua? Do you wish you'd had a mother like Chua? Or that you were a mother like Chua?

3. Is this a parenting manual? Are Western parents too soft on, or too permissive toward, their children? Does Amy Chua offer an alternative parenting model?

4. What is the most extreme example of Amy Chua's mothering? Which incidents stuck with you more than others—the piano practice threats? The birthday card rejection?

5. Success for Chua is important: how does she define success...and how do you define it? How important is success to you?

6. Consider whether Chua's children are such extraordinarily high achievers (musically and academically) because of their strict upbringing...or because of their innate abilities, i.e., genetics? (See her father's background in the Author Bio above.)

7. According to Chua, her parenting method is typical of Chinese families. Is their method—with its strict demands for high achievement—superior to that of Western parents? How would you describe the differences between parenting in the two cultures?

8. Chua wishes to reverse what she sees as "a remarkably common pattern" of decline in the Chinese immigrant family. According to Chua, first generation immigrants exercise strict discipline. Their children, the second generation, will "typically be high-achieving" but less strict with their children. And the third generation, "will feel that they have individual rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution"—an attitude that ultimately leads to to disobedience and generational decline. Is the decline Chua describes real? Have other immigrant populations experienced the same pattern?

9. Do you agree or disagree with Chua's criticisms of various aspects of Western culture—Facebook and junk food being two examples?

10. What does Chua think of the Western emphasis on self-esteem? Do you agree...or disagree with her assessment?

11. Chua dismisses the happy endings of Disney family movies by saying that that's "just Disney's way of appealing to all the people who never win prizes." What do you think—are the movies' soft-focus on parenting values pandering to low-achievers, to those who will never rise above average?

12. Part of Chua's rationale is that she understands what all Chinese parents understand: "that nothing is fun until you're good at it." Do you agree? Is playing the piano well as an adult, for instance, worth those toothmarks bitten into the piano as a child?

13. Chua says of herself, "the truth is I'm good at enjoying life." What do you make of her admission? Has she risked teaching her daughters the same attitude toward life?

14. What role does Chua's husband, Jed, play in all this? What should his role have been? What do you make of the fact that Chua is not unlike his own mother?

15. How did her sister's illness change Chua's views on life?

16. When Lulu had her outburst in Russia, did you root for her, or shrink back in horror?

17. How, eventually, is Chua "humbled" by her daughters—in what way do they prove wiser than their mother? Is, in fact, Chua truly humbled by Lulu? Does she have a genuine awakening?

18. What area some of the books humorous moments. Many reviewers talked about laughing out loud. What sections do you find especially funny, even hilarious?
19. Is success worth the time and effort it takes to maintain oversight and discipline...and, most especiallly, is it worth a child's unhappiness? Is that unhappiness only momentary in the larger scheme of life? In the end, is the payoff—a lifetime of accomplishment—worth the cost?

20. What do you predict for Chua's daughters? Do you think they will raise their children with the same strict standards their mother applied to them?

Book to Film Adaptations

It's always fun to see how books we have read are conceptualized by filmmakers.

Sometimes I am disappointed,

sometimes I am baffled,

(The inexplicable change in the ending of My Sister's Keeper, for example.)

 and sometimes I am impressed by the filmmaker's brilliance and imagination.

The Lord of the Rings trilogy was beyond anything I could have imagined.

The first of three movies depicting The Hobbit will be released on December 14, 2012.

See the trailer [here].

(In case you are interested, Richard Armitage, the British actor who played John Thornton in North and South and Guy of Gisborne in Robin Hood will be playing Thorin Oakenshield!)

Unlike my daughter who is angry about every single change in the Harry Potter movies, I don't need the filmmakers to stay true to the book in every particular. I understand that the medium is different and that some characters will be deleted, some will be combined, some of the subplots will be eliminated, etc. There is no way to include the richness of detail that was included in the book. I just want the movie to stay true to the book at its heart, which I think many of us thought The Help adaptation accomplished.

But how are they going to pull off Life of Pi with the weather, water and wild animals? And how will they deal with the ambiguity and symbolism?

Life of Pi is in 3D and will be released on November 21, 2012.

After watching this trailer I am definitely intrigued.

The author, Yann Martel, weighs in on the movie [here].

This short video features the author and the director, Ang Lee.

It's definitely worth watching.

 

The movie I am most excited to watch is Les Miserables, which will be released on Christmas Day 2012. 

I have seen several of the other film adaptations and have been sorely disappointed in each one of them, including the 1998 movie starring Liam Neeson, which many others enjoyed.

Since Les Miserables has had such a profound influence on my life, the movie version has a lot to live up to for me.

But after watching this video I

cannot

wait!!!

Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand

Laura Hillenbrand wrote Louis Zamperini's amazing and inspiring story in her best-selling book, Unbroken: a World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. Her first book, Seabiscuit, was also a best-seller and was made into an award-winning movie, starring Tobey Maguire and Jeff Bridges. Both stories were about overcoming incredible odds, which Hillenbrand is very familiar with in her own life.

Hillenbrand wrote Unbroken  from her Washington, D.C. home, where she is mostly home bound because of a debilitating case of chronic fatigue syndrome. She has suffered from this illness for twenty five years, dealing with severe vertigo and the accompanying nausea, weakness, and debilitating fatigue. She is a true survivor in her own right.

She wrote poignantly about her experience with her illness in an article for the New Yorker.

During the seven years it took Hillenbrand to write the book, she and Zamperini never saw each other face-to-face, but communicated over the phone. It was Zamperini's great desire to meet Hillenbrand--his hero--and her health improved enough at one point for that to be possible.

Zamperini, Hillenbrand, and John Nabor, a former Olympian and friend of Zamperini

In 2008, Hillenbrand married her long-time boyfriend and college sweetheart, Borden Flanagan, who is a professor of government at American University. She talks about how he saved her life in her New Yorker article and their love story is chronicled in Bethesda Magazine.

Perhaps it took someone like Hillenbrand, whose steely persistence is required daily, to do justice to Zamperini's story.

Immortality of Henrietta Lacks

I know you are all busy, but it would be great if you looked at some of the great extras online. Rebecca Skloot has a terrific website, with lots of interesting goodies: extra photos, videos, audio, and much, much more. I don't know if I've ever seen so many extra resources on an author's website. There's even a Jeopardy game! When you click here, you can find pictures that weren't published in the book, the original BBC documentary referenced in the book, and video from the 1950's of HeLa cells growing in the lab.

Watch a video of the author discussing the structure of the book [here].

There's  a nine-minute video with the author, Rebecca Skloot and some of the Lacks family.
(CBS Sunday Morning)

Don't have that much time? Here's a shorter video from ABC News.

Or watch a 2 1/2 minute book trailer:

COMING SOON

• Oprah Winfrey has purchased the movie rights for the book. Alan Ball (True Blood) has been hired to produce it and a screenwriter is working on the script.

• Rebecca Skloot's new book will focus on the human-animal bond and explore some of the biggest, and as yet unanswered, questions at the heart of animals’ roles in our lives. She worked for more than a decade in veterinary medicine, first as a nurse for animals in general practices and emergency rooms, and later as a technician in veterinary morgues and neurology labs. In writing her book, she will weave personal stories — her own and others’ — with science, medicine, ethics, and history.

Celebrating Women's Voices

I didn't know when I met Karen thirty one years ago that she would become one of the most influential people of my life. We met when I was a young, starry-eyed college student, newly engaged to her brother, and she was a stay-at-home mom expecting her fourth child. She and her husband had hit a financial rough patch and she was living with her parents while her husband was trying to start a business in Texas. It was a trying time for her and she thought it was important to enlighten me on the difficulties of marriage, which I was not open to hearing at the time.

Fast forward a few years: I was now a young mom of two boys living in Colorado and Karen was teaching classes at a local college in Texas. Ever the seeker of wisdom, Karen would challenge my thinking as we visited late into the night on her stopovers to visit her parents in Wyoming.

There are so many things I could say about Karen. Her accomplishments, talents and interests are quite extensive, but I will let you read about some of those on her website.

What I want you to know about Karen is this: She is a rare soul. She has an insatiable desire to learn, to seek for truth and wisdom and to lovingly share that with others.  I would not be who I am without her love and friendship throughout the years.

Visit her beautiful website [here].

Connect on facebook [here].

See her bookshelf on goodreads [here].

Karen has helped hundreds of women access their own inner wisdom. She formed women's writing groups across the country where these women shared their "their deepest thoughts, feelings, musings, and lessons they’ve learned."

"The women who wrote with me found voices hungering for a deeper form of expression. Their joys and frustrations; complaints; and humorous and wise insights mirror the experiences of many. This book of shared thought invites you to listen to your own heart voice."