All Is Not Forgotten

All Is Not Forgotten
By Wendy Walker
2016
St. Martin's Press
ISBN:  978-1250097910

Digital Galley from NetGalley.com
Release Date: July 12, 2016

I got the review copy of this book after reading an excerpt in BuzzBooks. The brief except had intrigued me in part because of the premise (a young rape victim treated with a medication that erases her memory) and partly because of the voice of the narrator, unnamed in the excerpt.

So first, as a future psychiatrist, I feel the need to point out that the option to give someone a medication and prevent consolidation of their memory of a traumatic event doesn't exist. That part is science fiction. However, it is science fiction of the plausible near future variety, and there are medications available now that might reduce the risk of PTSD when administered shortly after a trauma. Other than the medication, the rest of the writing in this book about how memories form and can be manipulated is relatively scientifically sound, which is, frankly, part of what makes the whole thing frightening.  Some of the stuff about psychopaths and personality disorders I personally don't agree with, but it's mostly within the realm of things that reasonable people in the field might believe.

There's not too much that can be said about the plot of this one without giving away spoilers, and I don't want to do that. This book was not, however, what I expected it to be. It is more psychological thriller with a number of morally complicated situations than mystery. The questions that drive the narrative forward are far more complex, and frankly, more interesting, than the identity of the rapist.

Overall, I found this to be an interesting and innovative thriller, if an occasionally uncomfortable read. The narrator, a psychiatrist who is treating more of the characters than would likely be recommended by professional boundries, is a distinctive and complex voice, and a particular strength. I will definitely be recommending this one once it hits shelves this summer. I would be a great beach read.

And if you read it, let me know, because I would love to talk about it with someone who doesn't need me to avoid the spoilers.

Smarter Faster Better

Smarter Faster Better
The Secrets of Being Productive in Live and Business
By Charles Duhigg
2016
Random House
ISBN:978-0812993394

Digital Galley from NetGalley.com
Release Date: March 8, 2016

I really enjoyed Duhigg's earlier book, The Power of Habit, which was well-researched, accessible, and entertaining. So when I saw this one come up as an available option on NetGalley, requesting a copy was a bit of a no-brainer. I was actually pretty excited when I got approved, since I figured it would be a pretty popular choice.

In Smarter Faster Better Duhigg turns his attention to the science of productivity, and tips for thinking processes and ideas that can take your work to the next level. He cites Atul Gwande in the Introduction as a model for prolific producitivity, and with that had me sucked in from the beginning.

This is a very readable book, and very clearly intended for a general audience. Even when Duhigg is talking about the science that backs up his assertions, he does so without feeling the need to go into too much detail about methods, so if you're seeking that level of detail, look elsewhere. That being said, I found this an enjoyable, quick read, and felt that it brought home some ideas in ways that were accessible.

One of the most powerful ideas for me was introduced in the last chapter. Interestingly, Duhigg uses as an example the impressive turn-around of South Avondale Elementary School, which is less than 2 miles away from where I sit as I write this, and is the school that a child living in my house would attend. The core idea is one similar to something that I have been advocating with my tutoring students for a number of years: information is only internalized if one manipulates and uses it right away. Duhigg calls this process, that of taking information and forcing effort-full engagement, "disfluency." And points out that sometimes it requires the counterintuitive step of taking information from the representation that is most comfortable and clear, and translating it into another form. Interestingly enough, reading this chapter helped me see how the tactic that I use often (and I think well) when studying myself, and in helping other students study and designing board-prep plans, could be applied more broadly to other areas of my thinking, especially in terms of manipulating information as I read. (Of course, this very activity, the act of sitting down and writing deliberately about a book is a form of disfluency, forcing me to think more deeply about what I have just read than I might have otherwise. It is a form of disfluency that I know is effective, since I certainly remember the books that I write about better than those that I don't, and I am better able to talk about books that I have read lately if I am blogging regularly.)

In the spirit of disflunecy: Here's a summary of the core ideas in the other chapters.
1.Motivation - Marines are badass. Creating a sense of control will both help you to maintain motivation and help to create a "bias towards action" (which is a phrase I have personally been repeating in my mind when I've been tempted to procrastinate over the last few days.) It helps to have big picture reasons for the things that you are doing, and the reflect on those when things are challenging.
2. Teams - Google is cool. The most important characteristics of teams are culture-based, and a sense of ownership and a feeling of openness to risk and flexibility, which come together in something called "psychological safety" is essential.
3. Focus - Airplanes are scary. Focus is good, creating stories that you tell yourself about what you expect can help you anticipate situations and identify problems more readily, too much focus or getting trapped in a single cognitive structure can be (very) dangerous.
4. Goal Setting - Israel should have seen the Yom Kippur War coming. SMART goals are good, but can keep you trapped in small picture ideas, the best structure combines SMART goals with large ambitious ones that force transformative thinking.
5. Managing Others - There used to be a very uncomforting amount of debauchery going on in auto plants. Somewhat similar to teams, give people flexibility and autonomy, recognize that each person is an expert in their own area is essential.
6. Decision Making - Annie Duke is good at poker. Probability is hard to understand, but not so hard that you can't help your brain get good at it, and probably worth it, but even if you do that, your accuracy will depend on your base assumptions.
7. Innovation - Frozen almost sucked. Claiming things and making them personal is important. The highest impact creativity most often comes from novel combinations and pulling together ideas from different fields. Some stress is necessary.
8. Absorbing data - See above. There are good stories coming out of the Cincinnati Public School System, so my taxes aren't entirely wasted, even though they gave me a parking ticket today.

Overall, I enjoyed the book a lot, and I think that some of the ideas, if I can make them cognitive habits, will be a help. It's a quick and simple read, so you can probably get as much benefit as you are going to from an audiobook or a quick tour of a library copy, but if you're glad that you bought The Power of Habit (I gave my copy away) then by all means, buy this too.

The Upside of Stress

The Upside of Stress
By Kelly McGonigal
2015
Avery
ISBN: 978-1-58333-561-1

ARC from LibraryThing.com
Sent to my mother for now, but likely keeping in the long run

The LibraryThing Early Reviewers program sent me a copy of The Upside of Stress many months ago. I actually picked up the book last week for two main reasons. (1) I am trying to get through all the books that I ever said I was going to review, both because I hate the feeling of having things like that hanging over my head and because I want to be in good shape with the fine people at LibraryThing so that next time they have something I really want I am more likely to get it. (2) SO MUCH STRESS.

I just came back to Cinci for my last 3 months of medical school, during which I will also (finally!) defend my dissertation. In June I will officially be a "double doctor" and done with school FOREVER. The moving back to Cincinnati was stressful (also the leaving of husband and kitties in Boston). When I picked up this book I was still waiting for board scores (released today, all happiness!). I am 43 days, 16 hours, and 57 minutes from finding out where I will spend the next stage of my training, and if I will get to spend 4-6 months of next year in pediatrics (joy!) or if I will have to do adult medicine (something other than joy!). There's a lot going on right now.

This book was just right for me right now. I will admit, it was occasionally repetitive, over-simplistic, and perhaps occasionally a little to "upsidey" for me, but overall it was a very helpful check in. I recommend it to anyone that's feeling overwhelmed.

McGonigal's central thesis is that stress is not inherently bad, and that what matters more than the amount of stress in your life is your attitude towards the things that you find stressful. She points out (compellingly) that stress is actually the result of having meaning in your life, and that focusing on that meaning, having a growth mindset, and aligning your thoughts about the stresses in your life with your values and your sense of general humanity can turn "stress" from a pro-inflammatory health disaster into a positive force for your health.

There was not terribly much in here that someone in psychology will not be at least peripherally aware of, but McGonigal's clear writing, examples, and short simple exercises are a powerful synthesis of the information into a "mindset intervention" that likely all of us could benefit from. This is a quick read, and one I think is well worth the time.

Buzz Books Spring/Summer 2016 - Adult Fiction

Buzz Books 2016
Spring/Summer Edition
E-book free from NetGalley.com

So, in addition to the quick browse of the YA version of Buzz Books for the first half of this year, I gave a more in depth read to the adult side of things. Specifically, this post is going to deal with the fiction excerpts provided (I'll get to the smaller number of non-fiction excerpts later). I read all but one of them, and the one that I passed over was only because it was a sequel to a book that I plan to read but have no read yet, and I didn't want to set myself up for spoilers.

There are some things here that I am SUPER excited about, some that I am curious about, and some that are probably just not for me. I'll comment in progressively less detail about the titles that fall into those categories.

Category One: YES, please.
Everyone Brave is Forgiven – World War II London, a privileged young woman flees boarding school the day the war is declared to volunteer for the war effort, and finds herself assigned as a school teacher. I liked her, almost instantly. I found her optimism and energy delightful, and based on her voice alone I requested the whole book. I've already been given a free copy from NetGalley, so you can expect to read more about this pretty soon.

LaRose – I loved Eldrich’s The Round House, so I started this excerpt dealing with relationships in the face of morally complicated situations full of hope. I was engrossed in only the first few pages, and was sad to see the little sample that I’ve been given come to an end. I will be reading this book as soon as its released, unless I can get my hands on a copy sooner.

Jane Steele – Jane Eyre is one of the only assigned books in high school that I read cover to cover with pleasure (and at the expense of my “more important” math and science homework.) In this retelling, Jane is apparently a serial killer, and possibly from what this excerpt suggests, a psychopath. I am intrigued.

The Fireman – I love Joe Hill. I’ve read all his books and very much enjoyed them. He’s on my list of authors that I go to the bookstore on the day the new book comes out. So this would have to be truly bad for me not to want to get the whole thing. But it’s not bad. It's very good. I am so curious. Can’t wait.

All Is Not Forgotten – Psychological thriller / mystery in which a young girl who was the victim of a brutal rape is treated with a medication that leaves her with no narrative memory of the event. The premise is interesting enough, and the narrator, whose identity is not at all clear in the excerpt, is a clear enough voice that I will definitely be reading this one at some point.

The Nest - I've been hearing about this book on all of the "Things to look forward to in 2016" lists. From what I had read about it before this, I was on the fence, but the excerpt is pretty great, and now I really want to read it.

Last Call At The Nightshade Lounge - I really liked the voice of the narrator, and I am very curious about where it is going, so they got me.

Category Two: Hummmm, maybe.

The Summer Guest – A novel told in a combination of excerpts from a diary from the late 19^th century, and the modern lives of the publisher and translator that are about to bring it to publication. It appears that the titular “summer guest” will be Anton Chekhov. Interesting because I like Chekhov, but do not know much about his life, and the story seems to be inspired by true events. I was not overly charmed by the excerpt, but it was promising, and I might give the whole thing a go later in the year.

All Things Cease to Appear – A mystery in the vein of Gone Girl, which as we saw just last week can be either amazing or just junk food. The husband who is the focus of the first couple chapters is unlikable, and up to something, but probably not the actual killer. The three year old daughter, absolutely home, but only possibly a witness, adds an interesting twist. I’m curious after reading the bit of this that they gave me, but not enough to make this a super high priority.

Where I Lost Her – I’m not sure about this one. The summary suggests that it’s going to be a suspense/thriller in the vein of Jennifer McMahon, who I generally enjoy. The excerpt doesn’t really get into anything like the meat of the story though and didn’t have the same atmospheric feel, so it didn’t really pull me in. I’ll probably give it a chance, but I am not going to bend over backwards to seek it out.

Brighton – Interesting. Set in Boston, there’s clearly something very bad about to happen, but we don’t actually get to see it in the excerpt. Still, to manage to create an atmosphere of foreboding in such a short space, and one which contains a youth baseball game, is something, and I think that I would like to read the whole thing. High on the maybe list.

Maestra – Art dealer in a not great job, wants more. Not completely sure where this is going, I’ll wait for the buzz to see if I want to get sucked in.

Don’t You Cry – Roommate disappears. Again, what we’ve got isn’t enough to make me decide to read the whole thing, so I’ll let other people go first.

Christadora – Interesting premise, taking the spot in a neighborhood and using it as the basis for a long story talking about the modern history and near future of New York. I can see it being interesting, but I am not sure that I got there in this short introduction, on the fence.

Modern Lovers – Adults with children becoming adults and the challenges of that identity. Felt a little meh. Will maybe take it on if the buzz is good, but I don’t think that I need to preread.

Invincible Summer - The blurb makes it sound like a co-ed version of A Little Life (which was 2015's best book), but the excerpt was only OK, so we'll see when the release date gets closer.

The Versions of Us - A bunch of slight variations on the same story, interwoven in a kind of "what if things had gone only a very little bit differently?" sort of way. I can see it being very good, I can also see it being not good at all, so I will let other people take it on and let me know.

Under the Harrow - Thriller by debut author. Maybe great, maybe just meh. Will wait for others to tell me which.

The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper - Elderly man finds his deceased wife's charm bracelet and learns about the life that she had before he met her. Just maybe.

The Decent Proposal - Pair of strangers offered half a million dollars to sit and talk for two hours a week. Who knows why? Could be great, but there wasn't enough to convince me.

Magruder’s Curiosity Cabinet - Young girl who is apparently going to be saved by the interesting people of a side show type museum. I think that I would have put this on the read right away if I hadn't just been relatively unimpressed by The Book of Speculation. Instead it goes on the top of the maybes.

Category Three: Probably not.

The Choices We Make – Very clearly “women’s fiction.” I say this not to put that whole genre down for literary merit (just in case Jennifer Weiner ever reads this blog), but it is not always my cup of tea. The story of a woman who agrees to be a surrogate for a friend, and then suffers a severe medical complication at the very edge of viability. I didn’t find the writing enough to pull me in to a tag that I wasn’t all that engaged with initially.

At The Edge of The Orchard – A family of settlers ripe with conflict regarding the management of their apple orchard in northwestern Ohio. I didn’t find the teaser summary interesting, and wasn’t impressed with either of the narrators in the sample. Skipping.

There Will Be Stars – I get the impression from the blurb and the general feel that this is going to be something like Groundhog’s Day, without the comedy, and with a more religious redemption, which just doesn’t appeal to me.

If I Forget You – Not much from either the concept (old lovers reunited following a chance encounter), or the excerpt to really pull me in. The main female character’s daughter is away at Miss Porter’s, which is amusing, but not a reason to read the whole book. I’ll probably skip it unless the buzz pulls me in more than this little bit did.

My Best Friend’s Exorcism – Four teen girls, one gets lost alone in the woods overnight and comes back not quite herself. Felt very YA, don’t think that I need to read the whole thing.

Before the Fall – My read on the premise is that most of the characters are about to die in a crash, and that the book is going to bounce between the story of the aftermath and the backstory of how they all came to be on the plane and a possible sinister reason for the crash. Reasonable in theory, but the excerpt didn’t pull me in, so probably not unless the buzz when it comes out wins me over.

The Sport of Kings – A little dense, and maybe just not for me.  

Girls on Fire – The author has published mostly YA before, and this felt very YA to me, so maybe later if what I hear from other people is great, but I am unlikely to seek this one out.

Daredevils - Girl converted to Fundamentalism Mormonism, married off against her will. Just didn't feel all that interesting.

The Last Road Home - Meh. I didn't get any feel that there was something here to really love.

Jazz Moon - I found the characters annoying even on the first couple of pages, so no thanks

And the One I Skipped:

Glory Over Everything – A sequel to The Kitchen House, a book that I haven’t read yet, but plan to. I figure reading the first couple chapters of a sequel is inevitably going to give me spoilers for a book that I have been told I will enjoy very much, so why ruin it?

No One Knows

No One Knows
By J.T. Ellison
2016
Simon & Schuster
ISBN: 978-1-5011-1847-0

Ebook Galley from NetGalley.com
Release Date: March 22, 2016

I like a good thriller. For example, I really love Gillian Flynn. I was totally engrossed in all three of her novels, reading each in as close to a single sitting as possible. To me, a good suspense novel is like literature candy, you don't want it to be all you eat, that would make you feel sick, but when you have a craving, having some can feel so good.

So when I got the email from NetGalley that said that I could have this book, which was billed as a "masterful thrilled for fans of Gillian Flynn," I figured I'd take the free book plunge.

This is a fast-paced and entertaining novel, one that I read in two days. The plot pulled me in and I honestly did want to know what happened to the characters. So, you know, as candy goes, it was fine.

But really just fine. To extend this metaphor to the breaking point, Gillian Flynn is really. good. candy. Gourmet chocolates, or those really high quality fruit slice things that I love, hand pulled saltwater taffy. This book is more like skittles. Sweet, tasty, fun, but also generic and unremarkable.

Couple basic problems, which given that this is a thriller and I am very anti-spoiler, are impossible to explain in detail: (1) the connection between two of the characters was completely implausible. Like, breaking the story because WHY implausible. (2) The ending was annoying, its supposed to be a twist, but it's too much. (3) The epilogue pissed me off.

Most of all, I think that this book just really really wants to be Gone Girl. The parallels are had to ignore: story narrated by the spouse of a missing person who is being accused of murder with no body. Relationship that gradually becomes more complicated as the story progresses. Challenging family interactions. I would have trouble believing that Gone Girl had not been in the forefront of the author's mind when this plot was designed.

But Gone Girl it is not, because Gone Girl is gourmet chocolates.

There is a time and a place for Skittles. As Skittles go, this fits the bill, entertaining, engrossing, easy reading for the beach or study breaks, but it won't stick with you afterwards.

Disclaimer: I received this book for free from the publisher via NetGalley.com, which requests an honest review in return for the books that it sends you. The freeness did not influence the content of this review in any way other than ensuring that I wrote it (because review percentage matters).

Buzz Books YA Spring Summer 2016

Buzz Books 2016
Young Adult Spring/Summer Edition
E-book free from NetGalley.com

I've written before about the Buzz Books, a marketing collection of excerpts of upcoming books. (You can get it for free from NetGalley.com if you so desire.)

Buzz Books as an idea is fun because it gives me as a reader information that lets me identify books that I am excited about before they come out, including some that I might not have noticed without the excerpt provided. There's two volumes, the adult version, which includes both fiction and non-fiction, and the fiction-only YA version. I'm still working my way through the adult version, which has some real gems in it.

Buzz Books YA is particularly useful for me because, frankly, I find the tremendous majority of YA to be not worth my time. However, I can't just dismiss the genre as a whole, because the good ones are so good, and can be easy to miss because the bad ones (or at least vapid) ones are so prevalent.

So my approach to the YA Buzz Books is to try to find these gems, and thankfully there are some that I am interested in excerpted here. Here's the three that I will be trying to get the full galleys for:

Girl in the Blue Coat - A story of a young girl in WWII Nazi-occupied Amsterdam who works as a "finder" of black market items, and who apparently ends up searching for a missing Jewish girl who was hiding in the home of one of her clients. The promise of the complexity of the story it clear from the first few pages, and I want to read more.

Every Exquisite Thing - Written by the author of The Silver Linings Playbook (which is a very beautiful story about very broken people). This one is about a young person and reading and "the very formidable power of story." These are things that I like, and so I am going to read it.

Highly Illogical Behavior - A story of a young boy with agoraphobia and a young, super ambitious girl who has decided to save him. I found myself relating to the super-ambitious young woman who is interested in psychiatry (I wonder why), and I think that the possibility of reading something written from the perspective of a person with agoraphobia interesting, since I think that this a disorder which is relatively neglected in the realm of psychiatric illness narratives.

There are a couple of others on the list with vague potential, but those three are the only ones that actively made me want to seek them out. So that's what I'll do. Here's hoping that you'll be seeing reviews of these three sometime around the time they are released right here on this blog.

Note: As stated in the beginning of this post, I got Buzz Books YA for free from NetGalley.com. That did not influence the content of this post at all, although it did make the existence of this review more likely, since review rate matters for getting future books.

Did You Ever Have a Family

Did You Ever Have A Family
By Bill Clegg
2015
Scout Press
ISBN: 978-1-4767-9817-2
Hardcover
Purchased that Joseph Beth on my Man-Booker Kick
Stamped and Keeping

So here's an embarrassing thing about me as a reader. I read all the time, but sometimes, I have trouble holding what I have read recently in my head. Often, if you ask me what I've read lately that's good, I will have a hard time coming up with something, not because I haven't read anything lately, or because none of it is good, but because I just don't remember. I do much better when I have visual reminders (I will never have trouble recommending something in a bookstore or standing before the bookshelves in my living room) but I can't always pull something out of my head to a general question about reading.

This fall, that was potentially a problem, because I listed reading as one of my hobbies on my residency application, which I knew would lead to people asking me about what I was reading or had read lately. The combination of my baseline interview nervousness and the fact that I sometimes draw a blank in response to that question even in the most casual of circumstances led me to decide that I needed a strategy.

The strategy I choose was the Man Booker Longlist which had just come out around the time that I started thinking in earnest about my impending residency application process. I figured this was a good strategy for two main reasons. (1) It gave me structure, such that when asked what I was reading lately, I could say something like, "Oh well, I've been reading books from the Man Booker Longlist." This would both give me a second and remind me what connected what I had been reading lately so that I would actually be able to come up with the titles. (2) The novels that make the longlist are generally pretty good books.

So I read A Little Life (breathtaking, gorgeous, the best book of 2015, and what I actually ended up talking about on most of my interviews when asked if I had read anything good lately), Satin Island (different, very interesting), The Illuminations (lovely, atmospheric), and A Brief History of Seven Killings (which I just didn't like. I know, I know, it won the whole shebang. I can see that it is an accomplishment, virtuosity and all that. I personally didn't enjoy reading it, and frankly, I read fiction for pleasure.)

So that is how I came to have Did You Ever Have A Family in the "To Read" pile. I suspended hardcover buying limitations, and grabbed up a number of the other books on the list as well (eventually, I hope to get through them all).

Did You Ever Have A Family is one of those books that it is difficult to say, clearly, what it is about. The event that the story centers around is a home gas explosion which leaves June, a former galley employee, the only survivor, killing her boyfriend, ex-husband, daughter and daughter's fiancee, on the morning of what was to be her daughters wedding day. We hear from multiple narrators, most prominently June herself, and Lydia, who is June's boyfriend's mother and June's good friend.

The theme running though the whole thing is loss, but loss seems such a little word for the enormity of what is presented here. The title is apt, because really, what I came away from this was with a sense of the beauty and pain of the emotional ties that make us families, both by blood and by choice. The book is filled with all kinds of families, and wrapped in each are love and anger, hope and loss, guilt and pride, blame and joy. It is to Clegg's credit that he can so finely craft some of these voices that only a single chapter can both push the story forward and show us, "yes, I did have a family, and it caused me both joy and sorrow."

So overall, this is beautiful. It's a small book, a relatively quick read, and well worth the effort. I'm keeping it forever, so if you want to borrow it, come visit.

The Book of Speculation

The Book of Speculation
By Erika Swyler
2015
St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 978-1-250-05480-7
Hardcover
(Not Sure where I bought it)
Plan to swap away/sell

So The Book of Speculation had some bookstore and book blog buzz when it came out, and it has a lovely cover design. (Upon reflection, I am sure that the cover was designed in part to attract exactly the sort of reader that I am, someone who loves a good book about old books.) I'm not sure when I picked it up, but it looked like something that I would find entertaining.

And I did find it entertaining, but in a way that was disappointing. I was expecting something magical and complex (Think: The Historian or The Shadow of the Wind) and instead found something predictable and merely diverting. It was a fun way to spend a couple weekend days, but I saw the end coming from a million miles away, which is not something you want in a book that's supposed to be something of a mystery. Overall, just OK. I might have enjoyed it more had I been expecting less. I think there's much better work out there in the same general class, and despite the lovely cover art, I'll be letting this one go.

Gretel and the Dark

Gretel in the Dark
By Eliza Granville
2014
Riverhead Books
ISBN: 978-1-59463-255-6
Hardcover
Impulse buy at Joseph Beth, Date unrecorded
Stamped and keeping forever

I love fairy tales. I love them more as an adult when I am free to know that the original fairy tale stories are far darker and more gruesome than those that I was familiar with as a child. I love the casual magic. I love how adaptations and retellings of fairy tales help us to see the universality of human stories.

Gretel in the Dark is a beautiful example of an adaptation of fairy tales to a human story that is hard to talk about. In it, we alternate between the story of Lillie, a mystery woman who claims to be a machine on a mission to kill a monster in late 19th century Vienna, and Krysta, a young girl who ends up in the Ravensbruck concentration camp. It is unclear at the beginning how these two stories are connected, but both are compelling.

I found the beginning of the book a little difficult to get though, at first I wasn't sure where either of the stories were going, and I found Krysta to be a singularly unappealing narrator in the first couple of chapters in her voice. However, it was worth the work to get into it, because once I got involved in the story I was completely consumed. I couldn't put it down.

The beauty of this book is in what is not said. Once you get over the fact that Krysta is initially an unlikable child, the fact that the horrors of the concentration camp are represented only though her incompletely comprehending eyes make them all the more visceral and disturbing. The sense of magic, covert and just beneath the surface, leaves you wondering if you are just seeing this story with the innocence of a child, or if you are in a parallel universe where the rules are just slightly different. As the parallels between the two tales emerge, you wonder who has cast the spell that makes them both possible.

And in the end, you are left a deep sense of storytelling as a driver of humanity. As a way of understanding both the horrors and triumphs of our complicated lives. As a uniquely human magic with a real and significant power.

2016 is a young year, but I have a sense that this one is going to stick with me. I wouldn't be surprised if it's on my best reads of the year list come December.

The Smartest Kids In The World

The Smartest Kids in the World

By Amanda Ripley

Along with the rest of America, I have been thinking this weekend about things that I am thankful for. My education is one of the things that came most prominently to mind. There are a couple of reasons for that: (1) I had a fabulous Thanksgiving dinner with fellow medical students hosted by two professors and (2) one of my former professors, who was a gifted and kind teacher, passed away this past week. These two events made me think about how much the tendrils of my education have reached into all areas of my life, shaping my attitudes and my worldview, introducing me to wonderful people that I truly love, and allowing me to find work that is challenging, rewarding, and exciting. It's hard for me to imagine who I might be without the influence of the people and places that have educated me through all these years, and this weekend, I felt very grateful for their time and teaching.

Although, being honest, I spend a lot of time thinking about education in general, and my education specifically. Perhaps this is a side effect of being in the 23rd grade. Perhaps it's the residuals of that summer I spent in Teach For America training. Either way, education is a topic that I've been interested in for a long time. I've had my eye on this book for quite a while, so when it turned up on a bargain table and I had a gift card, I picked it up.

The Smartest Kids in the World takes the conversation about education away from local politics (that so often dominate the conversation in America) to look at differences from an international perspective. Ripley follows three American exchange students: one each in Finland, South Korea, and Poland. Through the experiences of these students, Ripley talks about the differences in educational systems around the world, and the corresponding differences in international test scores. She focuses primarily on the PISA, an international test that requires critical thinking as opposed to wrote memorization.

The author is a journalist, and the book feels more like an (extremely) long form article than anything else. It skims the surface of these issues rather than going into great depth. There is not much here that even a peripheral watcher of education like myself hasn't thought about before. She doesn't tell nearly enough of the stories of her representative students to make them feel like real fleshed out characters, squandering an opportunity that could have allowed her to say something new about these issues.

So, read this book if the following ideas sound new or interesting: Teachers in Finland are more rigorously screened and trained than those in most other nations, and their work in the classroom reflects this intellectual strength. The extreme high pressure end-of-high-school exam in South Korea is associated with a lucrative test prep industry, stressed and sleep-deprived students, and parents who think of themselves as "educational coaches." Expectations and peer attitudes influence school performance, and tracking students early leads to poor outcomes for the lowest track. Grit, hard work, and a willingness to stick with it when things get hard are all as important as pure brains. Most other nations in the world do not have nearly the focus on athletics that Americans do, and in many nations, there is no such thing as a "school team." Rigor and high expectations lead to better student performance around the US and around the world, regardless of socioeconomic factors. (Shout out to TFA! I recognized that one.)

Overall, The Smartest Kids in the World is an acceptable general interest read. But for me, the most enlightening thing in the book was Ripley's repeated observation that no nation is satisfied with what they've got. (Apparently one of the things that you hear traveling the world talking about education is people from all around the world complaining about their local educational system). If you've thought about this a lot, this volume is too slim to offer anything new. However, if you haven't thought about education much before, this is an accessible introduction that gets to some serious issues not always mentioned in discussions focused on the American system alone.

And yes, it left me feeling extremely grateful for a number of things: parents who read to me as a child and encouraged my love of books and words and science from the first, what little bit of grit I've got, and Miss Porter's - a place where I was truly challenged in ways that made me a better thinker. I am extremely grateful for all 23 grades of my education so far, and for the long weekend off that allowed me to read something about education in between all the education I'm still getting in pediatrics and neuroscience. Appreciation for the process is sometimes the best motivator... so back to work I go.

Missing Microbes

Missing Microbes
By Martin J. Blaser
2014
Henry Holt and Co.
288 pages
ISBN: 9780805098105
LibraryThing Early Reviewers Program

I am a neuroscientist, but I've found myself thinking a lot about microbiome science (traditionally the realm of immunologists and microbiologists) lately. There are a couple of reasons for this. (1) It's one of the areas that has gotten a lot of coverage in the media lately. The communication of scientific results in the popular media is one of my areas of interest,  soI have read a few primary papers in the past couple of months to compare the actual results to the stories in the popular news media. (2) Dr. Jeff Gordon (the microbiologist, not the NASCAR driver) gave a (fantastic!) talk at the annual MSTP retreat that left me with a bunch of questions to do follow up reading on. (3) I have been thinking a lot about non-invasive interventions that influence emotional regulatory brain systems, and it turns out that there is some evidence that probiotics may fall into that category (Curious? Read the abstract here.) Anyway, I was very excited to get a free review copy of this book from the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program.

Dr. Martin Blaser is one of the leaders in the field of microbiome research, and this book serves as an excellent introduction to the biology of the human microbiome, and how and modern medical practices are changing human-bacterial interactions. As a physician-scientist and someone who has done some in depth reading in the field, I found the first few chapters overly simplistic, but I suspect that they are at the right level for the general science reader. (General science readers, please tell me if this impression is correct.) Overall, I think that Blaser's summary of the ongoing research in this field is well-written and clear.

Dr. Blaser's basic thesis is that many modern ailments, including obesity, asthma and allergies, and inflammatory bowel disease, may be related to the alterations in the human microbiome, and that these alterations have been brought on by such practices as overuse of antibiotics and the increased frequency of Cesarean section births. Microbiome studies is a developing and active field of research, with new findings being published practically every day. Blaser's review is fairly comprehensive, and he does a good job describing the methods and findings of specific studies to allow the readers not only to hear the conclusions, but see how those conclusions were reached.

However, I do think that Dr. Blaser is sometimes a little overzealous in his presentation of potential human clinical applications of preclinical (animal) research findings, sometimes taking things one or two steps further than the data specifically supports. My work in science communication has led me to be very wary of stating the potential future implications of work without carefully emphasizing the potential aspect, and Blaser sometimes falls on the wrong side of that divide. To me this is doubly unfortunate because he also misses the chance to describe the future research needed to translate the basic science findings into actual human heath applications. In this time of limited science funding, this is a missed to present the process of translational science to the general public in what I suspect will be a widely read book. A better explanation could have gone far to garner support for research funding, especially in this increasingly "hot" topic in human health.

Overall, this is a very strong book. Perhaps most importantly, it presents one of the more well-articulated and accessible arguments for limiting antibiotic use that I have ever encountered. As a health professional, I can only hope that many of my patients will read it and come to the office ready to engage in an informed discussion of the risks and benefits of choosing antibiotic treatment.

Note: I received a free review copy of this book through the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program. The opinions expressed here are my own, and were not influenced by the publisher aside from the fact that I read this book sooner than I might have otherwise because I wanted to write a timely review.

Buzz Books 2014: Young Adult

So I recently joined a site called NetGalley.com, which gives free digital galleys of soon-to-be-released books to "professional readers," including bloggers and people that write reviews for websites. My chance of getting free books increases if my blog is more active (and if I get more people to actually read this). Getting free books that I want to read before they even come out is extra motivation to write more, which is something that I wanted to do anyway. I'm hoping that checking in here will help me keep in touch with my reading life as I dive into the third year of medical school. Think of this post as the first in a revitalization of this blog. I am committing to posting at least once a week going forward. Right. 

Anyway, one of the first things I downloaded is a thing called Buzz Books 2014: Young Adult. This is a book that has previews of around 20 forthcoming young adult books. For each one I got 10 pages or so, mostly from the very beginning of the book. I think this is particularly cool because while I often enjoy YA, I also find that it's the highest risk of the genres that I read. I love some books that are called YA, but others are too childish, poorly written, or just not great. Digging through an increasingly crowded field to find The Book Thief can be hit or miss. Plus, I don't have sources of reviews and recommendations that I trust the way I do for "adult" novels. However, these short previews are enough to help me decide what I want to take the time to read, and what I can skip. I've put the books into four main categories (1) Want to read, (2) Not for me, but good enough that I can see imagine suggesting to the right audience (3) Intriguing, but not for right now (4) Probably just skippable.

Now, obviously these books aren't out yet as I write this, and these are impressions based on only about 2 chapters of each. You should take everything I say here with a grain of salt. Really, I'm mostly doing this as an exercise for the compulsive book-finisher. (I can count on my fingers the books that I have actually given up on, but the books I SHOULD have given up on is a much longer list.)

The preview format actually forces a decision-point; I read a little bit and then decide if what I have read so far makes it worth making extra effort to read more. There's no inertial force to keep reading because the whole book is already in my hands. We'll see how it pans out between this and the other Buzz Books edition of adult reads that I also downloaded. So far, I think that I find it liberating. It's also an exercise in reading eBooks, not my favorite thing, but something it might be useful to accept in some situations.

So with that, my impressions of the books in Buzz Books 2014: YA

Want to read

Zac and Mia By A.J. Betts
This one is about kids in a cancer ward (perhaps a relation of The Fault in Our Stars, but I haven't gotten to that one yet.) Separated by a hospital room wall we have a long term ward resident in isolation as he recovers from a bone marrow transplant (Zac), and a new arrival who plays Lady Gaga loudly and on repeat (I assume Mia, although that wasn't revealed in the excerpt.) The writing is good, the characters, not just Zac, but also his mother and one of the nurses on the floor, have the feel of real people in only a few short pages. I can't completely explain why I want in on this one, but it got me.

Vivian Apple at the End of the World By Katie Coyle
A young girl living in the world where a predicted rapture has gained cultural power far greater than Harold Camping ever warranted. Even Vivian's parents have become "believers," and she herself is clearly conflicted. The strength of this is good world building even in the first few pages, especially with the quotes from magazines that present a religion that appears an interesting mix of conservative social rules and consumerism. I want to know what happens after just one chapter, so I'll take the time to find out.

Lies We Tell Ourselves By Robin Talley
This one is the story of one of the first black students to integrate a high school in Virginia (and supposedly also one of her white classmates, although that character doesn't obviously appear in the excerpt.) The writing is powerful and emotionally charged, and frankly, with all the coverage of the 60th anniversary of Brown vs. Board of Education in the last couple of weeks, I find myself curious about integration. This book seems like a cool jumping off point to explore.

The Accidental Highwayman By Ben Tripp
This one, supposedly based on a collection of documents pulled out of an old trunk, has a feel like The Gates By John Connelly, which I truly love. From the excerpt, it seems that a somewhat hapless 16-year-old-servant is about to be sucked into a series of misadventures due to the secret second life of his master. Dryly funny, and I think worth reading.

Afterworlds By Scott Westerfeld
A book that switches back and forth between the life of an 18-year-old author, who defers college for a life in New York City, and the novel that made that choice possible. I am more intrigued by the story within the story so far, (I found the sections of the author signing her contracts and bickering with her sister a little bland). However, the beginning of that story was quite gripping, and I want to read the whole thing, so I am willing to take this one on and hope that the other component picks up quickly.

Not for me, but good enough that I can imagine suggesting to the right audience

Press Play  By Eric Devine
Here we have an overweight teen boy who finds himself in possession of evidence that the lacrosse team that torments him is conducting brutal hazing rituals with the consent of the principal (who has contributed to his position as an outcast.) The first couple chapters seemed to me vaguely reminiscent of The Chocolate War, a book similarly about school politics, the fraught interactions between high school students and faculty, and the power of gang rule in schools. I loved The Chocolate War and found it powerful as a young adult, but haven't read in probably 20 years. I expect from the quality of the writing and the characterization in the first pages of this one that this might represent a timely update, although "the bad guys" might be a little too explicitly bad for there to be much nuance. Either way, I can see how this book would appeal to middle and high school students, but I think that I am past the time when I personally would enjoy a trip back into the sordid politics of high school.

The Zoo At The End of The World By Eric Kahn Gale
This book is about a kid that stutters but can talk to animals. To me this one felt a little more upper middle grade than YA, but the writing was good for that demographic. Overall, the idea is cool, the central character is appealing, and I can see it being a good fit for my younger cousins that fall into that in-between demographic. I imagine that what is clearly going to be a banner cast of animal characters will only make this more appealing for the upper middle graders. I might be buying copies of this one as Christmas gifts.

Bombay Blues By Tanuja Desai Hidler
This is the sequel to a book I haven't read, so it loses something but is not really at fault. I do want to say that it is great to see a well-developed young woman of color as a central character in a mainstream YA book, especially one that seems to deal explicitly with issues of cultural conflicts. Still, I doubt this one is worth reading if I haven't read Born Confused, and I am not sure that I am interested enough to go back.  We'll see, maybe some other time. Either way, for fans of Born Confused this starts strong.

Talon By Julie Kagawa
This is the first in a series about dragons who can take human form and are living among us, hiding from soldiers of the Order of St. George out to hunt them to extinction. The concept is cool, but the execution in the first chapters felt a little juvenile. I'd be willing to bet this one will hit with kids, (again, some of the cousins come to mind) but I doubt it will translate to adults as well as The Hunger Games or Divergent did. I certainly didn't love it enough to commit to a series.

Clariel By Garth Nix
This is a prequel to a completed trilogy. The writing is good enough that I'm sure readers of the other books will like it, but I am not one of them, and don't plan to become one.

King Dork Approximately By Frank Portman
Another second in series which seems good enough that I'd bet those that liked the first one will enjoy it, but not good enough to make me want to read the first one. 

Falling Into Place  By Amy Zhang
This is a book about the events leading up to the suicide (attempt?) of a popular high school student. The writing was just 100%, completely, all out teen angst. I'm sure that middle and high school girls all over the  country will love it, but I have (thankfully) aged out of that demographic, so I'll pass. 

Intriguing, but not for right now

Endgame  By James Frey and Nils Johnson-Shelton
The concept here is interesting. Basically, this is a book that is going to have an interactive real world component that extends outside the book, with some sort of video game build by the google people and puzzles for readers to solve. However, the writing felt choppy. That might just be an artifact of switching between two radically different character's perspectives in a short excerpt without the flow that might be achieved by returning to either. Basically, I can see this one going either way: it might be a seriously awesome idea that changes what teens expect from books, and it might totally flop. Clearly the publisher is putting a ton of resources behind it to push it into the former category. However, it seems to me that the experience will depend on the social component of how other readers are interacting with the book and the game as a whole. So I'll make my choice closer to the October release date when I have a better sense of how that is going to play out. This might be cool enough to get me to voluntarily engage with a series before all the volumes come out. We'll see.

Skink No Surrender By Carl Hiaasen
The beginning of this one mostly just made me curious about the back story on Skink, who is clearly a character of monumental proportions. Apparently he also appears in some of Hiaasen's adult novels, so I think that I will attempt those first. I can see myself coming back to this one, because I suspect that Skink is exactly the kind of character that I am going to fall in love with.  
I'll Give You The Sun By Jandy Nelson
This is a story about twins, that supposedly has a before-and-after format with some life-altering event in the middle. The beginning was good, but for some reason, it didn't completely grab me. I'll wait for reviews on this one, and see if it pops once it's out rather than leading the charge.

The Scavengers By Michael Perry
Another dystopian teen novel. The first couple chapters were OK, and I am moderately intrigued, but the dystopian fiction genre is so very overcrowded and full of duds, that it would take an extremely power opening to get me on board. This was just fine, so I'll wait and see if someone else tells me that I have to read it.

Belzhar By Med Wolitzer
This one is about a young girl sent to a boarding school for emotionally challenged teens after losing her boyfriend. It really could go either way. We all know that I love a good boarding school book, but I'm not sure how much I can take of the life-ending trauma of losing a boyfriend at 15. There just wasn't enough in the excerpt to decide if the good things are going to outweigh the bad, so I'll wait to hear more from readers that I trust.

Probably Just Skippable

Ghost House By Alexandra Adornetto
This one starts with a teen girl wandering in the woods, and coming across a devastatingly handsome fellow who is dressed inappropriately for the times, and who creeps her out a little bit. We're led to believe by the end of the preview that this gentleman might have supernatural origins. The characterization is fine, not obviously bad writing, but I am not sure that the world needs more paranormal teen romances, and I am sure that I do not. I suppose, if you are a lover of paranormal romance, this might be worth looking into, as the writing was fine. However, I don't know anyone that falls both into that category whom I might buy books for or actively recommend books to, so I doubt that I'll ever interact with this one again.

Black Ice By Becca Fitzpatrick
A teen girl going on a camping trip with best friend and ex-boyfriend in the middle of nowhere. This started with the main character running into the ex in a convenience store. She's trying to convince him that she's moved on, so she tells him that the handsome, older stranger pumping gas is her boyfriend. Much to her surprise, the stranger plays along when he comes into the store, but seems to know (or guess) creepily much about her. I can see where this one is going, and I don't really want to go there.

Rumble By Ellen Hopkins
A novel in poems is a very interesting concept, and some of the little plays on language in this excerpt show the potential of the format. Still, this just didn't do enough with it to be worth my time. The poems weren't anything special, and while the line structure changes often, there weren't enough differences between them in meter or language or voice to make them feel like separate pieces of writing. Overall, this seemed like a traditional prose novel with random bold titles and line breaks. I suppose that I might have been really into it if it came out during my bad-poetry-writing-phase in 8th and 9th grade. I suppose also that there is a whole new generation of bad-poetry-writing 14- and 15-year-olds, although I don't know what do they do without livejournal and bolt.com. They might make it a hit, but it's not worth my time or the time of other adults. 

Five Kingdoms: Rogue Night By Brandon Mull
Like Bombay Blues this is the second in a series, and I didn't read the first one. Here though, much more was lost for not having read the first book, and I was largely confused. I suppose there might have been a lot of beautiful world building in the first book, but what they gave me of this felt thin and disjointed. There was nothing compelling enough to make me even consider wanting to go find the first book. Overall, choppy and young, and more upper middle grade than YA. I won't be coming back to it.

Note: I think that it's obvious, but I received a copy of this book free from NetGalley.com. Aside from the freeness, I received no compensation for writing this review.