Best Biographies and Memoirs of 2011: Eleven Lists

Another year and another list of best books. In fact, many lists of best books, for many book reviews, online bookstores, and book blogs seem to issue them at this time of year. I've gotten into the act, too. I have gone through some of the major lists and identified the biographies and memoirs therein. The result is my fourth annual best biographies and memoirs master list.

I have been pretty liberal with my definition of biography. You might say I chose anything biographical. Some readers might quibble that a few are really histories with biographical elements. It seems to me that a book that has a person's name in the title is biographical enough for the list and certain to interest a biography reader.

As always, the lists agree and disagree. Every list has titles that all the other lists have overlooked or excluded. The biography Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable is included in eight of the eleven lists. Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie is in seven lists, and In the Garden of the Beast: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson appears in six lists. The most recognized memoirs are Blue Nights by Joan Didion and Townie: A Memoir by Andre Dubus III, both making six lists.

Some review sources thought there were many notable biographies and only a few worthy memoirs, while some others were more taken with the year's memoirs. The result is there should be something here for everyone.

Compiling this master list has become a little more difficult as some of the review sources have generated their lists in pieces. If you see a mistake, please let me know and I will correct the master list.

As always, I hope this help you in your book selecting this winter. Enjoy. Happy New Year.


Amazon Best Books of 2011

Biography

(I did not stick to Amazon's categorizations. Some of these titles were in its history list instead of the biography list.)

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard

In the Garden of the Beast: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson


Memoirs

Bossypants by Tina Fey

Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef by Gabrielle Hamilton

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

Jacqueline Kennedy: Historic Conversations on Life with John F. Kennedy by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer

My Korean Deli: Risking It All for a Convenience Store by Ben Ryder Howe

Then Again by Diane Keaton

Townie: A Memoir by Andre Dubus III




Audiofile's Best Audiobooks of 2011

Biography

Cleopatra by Stacy Schiff

In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson

Malcolm X by Manning Marable

Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand


Memoirs

Chapters from My Autobiography by Mark Twain

Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela

No Biking in the House without a Helmet by Melissa Fay Greene




Barnes & Noble Best Books 2011

Biography

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard

Hedy's Folly: The Life and Breakthrough Inventions of Hedy Lamarr, the Most Beautiful Woman in the World by Richard Rhodes

In the Garden of the Beast: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson

Machiavelli: A Biography by Miles J. Unger

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

Man in the Rockefeller Suit: The Astonishing Rise and Spectacular Fall of a Serial Imposter by Mark Seal

Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War by Tony Horwitz

Wendy and the Lost Boys: The Uncommon Life of Wendy Wasserstein by Julie Salamon


Memoirs

Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef by Gabrielle Hamilton

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

Reading My Father: A Memoir by Alexandra Styrom

Townie: A Memoir by Andre Dubus III

What It Is Like to Go to War by Karl Marlantes

Wilder Life : My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie



Booklist Editors' Choices 2011 

(Some titles were in categories other than biography)

Biography 

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie

The Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine, and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard

Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock by David Margolick

Huston: Courage and Art by Jeffrey Meyers

The Mirage Man: Bruce Ivins, the Anthrax Attacks, and America's Rush to War by David Willman

Obama on the Couch: Inside the Mind of the President by Justin A. Frank

The Paper Garden: An Artist (Begins Her Life's Work) at 72 by Molly Peacock

Pauline Kael: A Life in the Dark by Brian Kellow

Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend by Susan Orlean

Verdi's Shakespeare: Men of the Theater by Garry Wills


Memoirs

Becoming Dr. Q: My Journey from Migrant Farm Worker to Brain Surgeon by Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa and Mim Eichler Rivas.

The Map of My Dead Pilots: The Dangerous Game of Flying in Alaska by Colleen Mondor



Goodreads Choice Awards

Biography

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard

Dressmaker of Khair Khana : Five Sisters, One Remarkable Family, and the Woman Who Risked Everything to Keep Them Safe by Gayle Tzemach Lemmon

Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall - From America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness by Frank Brady

In the Garden of the Beast: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson

Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination That Changed America Forever by Bill O'Reilly

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

Man in the Rockefeller Suit: The Astonishing Rise and Spectacular Fall of a Serial Imposter by Mark Seal

A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mother by Janny Scott

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson



Memoirs

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua

The Chronology of Water by Lidia Yunavitch

The End of Boys by Peter Brown Hoffmeister

Girls Like Us: Fighting for a World Where Girls Are Not for Sale, an Activist Finds Her Calling and Heals Herself by Rachel Lloyd

Here Comes Trouble: Stories from My Life by Michael Moore

Life Itself by Roger Ebert

The Memory Palace by Mira Bartok

My Lucky Life in and out of Show Business by Dick Van Dyke

The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels - A Love Story by Ree Drummond

The Reading Promise: My Father and the Books We Shared by Alice Ozma

Seal Team Six: Memoirs of an Elite Navy Seal Sniper by Howard E. Wasdin and Stephen Templin

A Stolen Life: A Memoir by Jaycee Dugard

Stories I Only Tell My Friends by Rob Lowe

Then They Came for Me : A Family's Story of Love, Captivity, and Survival by Maziar Bahari

This Is Gonna Hurt : Music, Photography, and Life Through the Distorted Lens of Nikki Sixx by Nikki Sixx

Tiger, Tiger by Margaux Fragoso

Tolstoy and the Purple Chair: My Year of Magical Reading by Nina Sankovitch

Townie: A Memoir by Andre Dubus III

Two Kisses for Maddy: A Memoir of Love and Loss by Matthew Logelin

Wilder Life : My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie



Kirkus Book Reviews Best Nonfiction of 2011

Biography

Charles Dickens: A Life by Claire Tomalin

Courage Beyond the Game: The Freddie Steinmark Story by Jim Dent

Howard Cosell: The Man, the Myth, and the Transformation of American Sports by Mark Ribowsky

Jane Fonda: The Private Life of a Public Woman by Patricia Bosworth

Lennon: The Man, the Myth, the Music - the Definitive Life by Tim Riley

Love and Capital: Karl and Jenny Marx and the Birth of a Revolution by Mary Gabriel

Mightier Than the Sword: Uncle Tom's Cabin and the Battle for America by David S. Reynolds

Tolstoy: A Russian Life by Rosamund Bartlett

Wendy and the Lost Boys: The Uncommon Life of Wendy Wasserstein by Julie Salamon


Memoirs

Bento's Sketchbook by John Berger

Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef by Gabrielle Hamilton

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

The Memory Palace by Mira Bartok

Tiger, Tiger by Margaux Fragoso

Townie: A Memoir by Andre Dubus III

An Unquenchable Thirst: Following Mother Teresa in Search of Love, Service, and an Authentic Life by Mary Johnson

Witness to an Extreme Century: A Memoir by Robert Jay Lifton

Your Voice in My Head: A Memoir by Emma Forrest



Library Journal Best Books 2011 Top-Ten

Biography

Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War by Tony Horwitz



Library Journal Best Books 2011 More of the Best

Biography

Becoming Dickens: The Invention of a Novelist by Douglas Fairhurst

Everything Is an Afterthought: The Life and Writings of Paul Nelson by Kevin Avery

Nica’s Dream: The Life and Legend of the Jazz Baroness by David Kastin


Memoirs

Bossypants by Tina Fey



Library Journal Best Books 2011 Memoirs

Cabin: Two Brothers, a Dream, and Five Acres in Maine by Lou Ureneck

Fiction Ruined My Family by Jeanne Darst

The Girl's Guide to Homelessness by Brianna Karp

I Wore the Ocean in the Shape of a Girl: A Memoir by Kelle Groom

Love at First Bark: How Saving a Dog Can Sometimes Help You Save Yourself by Julie Klam

The Memory Palace by Mira Bartok

My Russian Grandmother and Her American Vacuum Cleaner: A Family Memoir by Meir Shalev

Tiger, Tiger by Margaux Fragoso

Townie: A Memoir by Andre Dubus III



Library Journal Librarians’ Best Books of 2011

Memoirs

The Long Goodbye by Meghan O'Rourke

The Orchard: A Memoir by Theresa Weir



New Yorker's Reviewers' Favorites of 2011

Biography

The Fear: Robert Mugabe and the Martyrdom of Zimbabwe by Peter Godwin

George F. Kennan: An American Life by John Lewis Gaddis

Great Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle with India by Joseph Lelyveld

The Inner Life of Empires: An Eighteenth-Century History by Emma Rothschild (about the Johnston family)

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

Mightier Than the Sword: Uncle Tom's Cabin and the Battle for America by David S. Reynolds

Modigliani: A Life by Meryle Secrest

Molotov's Magic Lantern: Travels in Russian History by Rachel Polonsky

Pauline Kael: A Life in the Dark by Brian Kellow


Memoirs

What It Is Like to Go to War by Karl Marlantes



New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2011

Biography

And So It Goes: Kurt Vonnegut: A Life by Charles J. Shields

Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane by Andrew Graham-Dixon

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie

Clarence Darrow: Attorney for the Damned by John A. Farrell

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard

George F. Kennan: An American Life by John Lewis Gaddis

Great Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle with India by Joseph Lelyveld

In the Garden of the Beast: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson

The Keats Brothers: The Life of John and George by Denise Gigante

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

Pauline Kael: A Life in the Dark by Brian Kellow

Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend by Susan Orleans

Van Gogh: The Life by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith



Memoirs

Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef by Gabrielle Hamilton

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

The Boy in the Moon: A Father's Journey to Understand His Extraordinary Son by Ian Brown

The Memory Chalet by Tony Judt

My Song: A Memoir by Harry Belafonmte

One Day I Will Write About This Place: A Memoir by Binyavanga Wainaina

[sic]: A Memoir by Joshua Cody

To a Mountain in Tibet by Colin Thubron



Publishers Weekly Best Books 2011

Biography

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie

Charles Dickens: A Life by Claire Tomalin

Hemingway’s Boat: Everything He Loved in Life, and Lost, 1934-1961 by Paul Hendrickson

In the Garden of the Beast: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson

Love and Capital: Karl and Jenny Marx and the Birth of a Revolution by Mary Gabriel

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend by Susan Orleans



Memoirs

Blood, Bones, and Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef by Gabrielle Hamilton

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

Bossypants by Tina Fey

Life Itself by Roger Ebert

The Long Goodbye: A Memoir by Meghan O’Rourke

One Day I Will Write About This Place: A Memoir by Binyavanga Wainaina

Tiger, Tiger by Margaux Fragoso

Townie: A Memoir by Andre Dubus III




Washington Post Best Books of 2011

Biography

And So It Goes: Kurt Vonnegut: A Life by Charles J. Shields

Branch Rickey by Jimmy Breslin

Caravaggio by Andrew Graham-Dixon

Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by Robert K. Massie

Charles Dickens: A Life by Claire Tomalin

Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China by Ezra F. Vogel

Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard

Endgame: Bobby Fischer's Remarkable Rise and Fall - From America's Brightest Prodigy to the Edge of Madness by Frank Brady

Hemingway’s Boat: Everything He Loved in Life, and Lost, 1934-1961 by Paul Hendrickson

The Hemlock Cup: Socrates, Athens, and the Search for the Good Life by Bettany Hugh

In the Garden of the Beast: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson

Love and Capital: Karl and Jenny Marx and the Birth of a Revolution by Mary Gabriel

Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable

Nothing Daunted: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West by Dorothy Wickenden

A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mother by Janny Scott

Sleeping with the Enemy: Coco Chanel's Secret War by Hal Vaughan

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

The Story of Charlotte's Web: E.B. White's Eccentric Life in Nature and the Birth of an American Classic by Michael Sims

The Triple Agent: The al-Qaeda Mole Who Infiltrated the CIA by Joby Warrick

Van Gogh: The Life by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith

Wild Bill Donovan: The Spymaster Who Created the OSS and Modern American Espionage



Memoirs

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

The Foremost Good Fortune: A Memoir by Susan Conley

The Last Resort: Taking the Mississippi Cure by Norma Watkins

Life Itself: A Memoir by Roger Ebert

The Memory Palace by Mira Bartok

Small Memories: A Memoir by Jose Saramago

Tiger, Tiger by Margaux Fragoso

ricklibrarian's Books That Matter 2011 and Year in Review

Each year I pick which books and movies I liked best. Because I mostly read nonfiction and hardly any fiction, there is little in the fiction category this year. Toward the end of the year most of my favorite books were written for children.

I did not attend any conference in 2011, so I have no reports to offer. I did reflect on what I now do as a reference librarian in a series of posts in March. We had some great concerts and author presentations at the library, of which I report.

I look forward to more reading, viewing, and listening in 2012. The stack of books and CDs on my desk is already getting tall.

Recent Nonfiction 

The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Tova Bailey

Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick

Here on Earth: A Natural History of the Planet by Tim Flannery

Atlantic by Simon Winchester

Horoscopes for the Dead: Poems by Billy Collins

The President is a Sick Man by Matthew Algeo

The Photographer: Into War-Torn Afghanistan With Doctors Without Borders by Emmanuel Guibert

Blue Nights by Joan Didion


Recent Fiction 

The Ginseng Hunter by Jeff Talarigo


Great Old Books 

Courtship: Valentine's Day: 1918: Three Plays from the Orphans' Home Cycle by Horton Foote

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

Children's Books 

Sugar Changed the World: A Story of Magic, Spice, Slavery, Freedom, and Science by Marc Aronson and Marina Budhos

Heart and Soul: The Story of America and African Americans by Kadir Nelson

Drawing from Memory by Allen Say

Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin


Audiobooks 

The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron by Howard Brandt

Selected Shorts: Even More Laughs

Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand


Author Events 

An Evening at the Library with Michael Perry


Films and Television 

Double Indemnity

Shaun the Sheep:Season One

Micmacs, a Film by Jean-Pierre Jeunet

The Visitor, written and directed by Tom McCarthy

Autism: The Musical


 Music 

Tom Kastle at Friday at the Ford

An Evening at the Opera

Are Compact Discs Disappearing? What Do I Do?

Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado in Iowa

Jason Deroche at Friday at the Ford


Readers' Advisory 

Life Stories: A Guide to Reading Interests in Memoirs, Autobiographies, and Diaries by Maureen O'Connor


Library Issues and Services 

Miss Dorothy and Her Bookmobile and Reference Is Dead

What Do Reference Librarians Do? Reference, Of Course!

What Do Reference Librarians Do? Select Library Materials

Weeding Biographies and Memoirs from the Library to a Tune from the Mikado

ZooBorns Cats! The Newest, Cutest Kittens and Cubs from the World's Zoos by Andrew Bleiman and Chris Eastland

ZooBorns Cats! The Newest, Cutest Kittens and Cubs from the World's Zoos looks so slight. I was not expecting anything more than a pleasant collection of cute baby animal pictures, but authors Andrew Bleiman and Chris Eastland use the photos (from many zoo photographers) to instruct readers on the state of the world's wild cats. The words "endangered," "vulnerable," and "threatened" appear repeatedly in their brief descriptions, which note than many of the world's wild cats suffer from habitat loss, poaching, and competition from feral animals. Some may disappear from the wild soon because their plight has only recently discovered. These secretive, often nocturnal cats are so poorly understood that conservationists are uncertain what efforts will be effective in saving them.

ZooBorns Cats! may also be one of the most extensive publicly available lists of wild cat species. I had never heard of several of these cats, including the rusty-spotted cat from India and Sri Lanka, the Iriomote cat from Japan, and Guina from the Andes Mountains of Chile and Argentina. The authors claim to have some of the only pictures ever published of some of these little-known cats. In presenting the photos as they do, with some zoo spaces, equipment, and personnel evident, the authors introduce the idea that zoos have species survival plans that involve selected breeding and protection of habitats. 

Despite the serious underlying message, you may still look through ZooBorns Cats! for pleasure. My favorite cats are the little snow leopards, sand cats, and Canada lynx. What are yours? You may see more zoo babies at Bleiman and Eastland's website ZooBorns.com.

Bleiman, Andrew and Chris Eastland. ZooBorns Cats! The Newest, Cutest Kittens and Cubs from the World's Zoos. Simon & Schuster, 2011. 149p. ISBN 9781451651904.

The Father Christmas Letters by J.R.R. Tolkien

Did you know that Father Christmas can fill about a thousand stockings per minute? He is fast, but he still needs all the time zones to get gifts to children round the world. He has to plan ahead. He is helped by the elves, of course, but his primary assistant is North Polar Bear. Sometimes, North Polar Bear suffers untimely accidents, adding much drama to the annual toy distribution, but he is a loveable old bear who fixes the sleigh and cares for the reindeer. I know all of this from reading The Father Christmas Letters by J.R.R. Tolkien.

Tolkien began writing annual letters that his children would find on Christmas morning in 1920 when his son was only three. For the next twenty years, they read Father Christmas's stories which were often accompanied by colorful illustrations in envelops with unique North Pole postal stamps. One year the price of postage was two kisses. I can imagine the excitement of finding these letters each year. They must have been read and reread and discussed by John, Michael, Christopher, and Priscilla Tolkien.

When you read them (as you must), notice that the North Pole is a little like Middle Earth. There are Goblins, Elves, and Men (Snowmen and Snowboys). It is also like 1920s England, where Father Christmas, North Polas Bear, and the bear cousin celebrate St. Stephen's Day and Boxing Day. In 1931, the world at large is acknowledged, as Father Christmas explains that he sent fewer toys as he spent much of his time helping poor and starving people.

I wish I had thought to follow Tolkien's example when Laura was little. I hope there are still storytelling parents and grandparents to take up the task. I'm sure there are children who might enjoy charming Christmas stories. Read The Father Christmas Letters for inspiration.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Father Christmas Letters. Houghton Mifflin, 1976. ISBN 0395249813.

Dying to Meet You by Kate Klise

I've always enjoyed a good ghost story, especially one on the humorous side. Dying to Meet You written by Kate Klise and illustrated by her sister M. Sarah Klise certainly fits the bill. It is set in a rundown Victorian mansion in Ghastly, Illinois. The address is 43 Old Cemetery Road. Ignatius B. Grumply moves there to find the quiet he requires to overcome twenty years of writer's block and pen the 13th volume in his Ghost Tamer series. To his surprise, an eleven year boy, his cat, and a ghost also live in the house. As the Rolling Stones would say to Ignatius (or Iggy), "You can't always get what you want, but you get what you need."

What is particularly fun about Dying to Meet You is that it is cleverly told through notes, letters, legal documents, and newspaper articles instead of traditional prose. In the process, readers are introduced to a number of secondary characters, such as E. Gadd and Frank N. Beans. It is as much fun for adult readers as kids.

Dying to Meet You is the first in the 43 Old Cemetery Road series. In the second book Over My Dead Body, Dick Tater tries to remove the boy Seymour Hope from the mansion to send him to an orphanage. It sounds promising.

Thanks to Dana who reviewed Dying to Meet You on Thommy Ford Kids.

Klise, Kate. Dying to Meet You. Harcourt, 2009. ISBN 9780152057275.

Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin

I have not seen a more beautiful book all year. The dust jacket of Where the Mountain Meets the Moon by Grace Lin shows a Chinese peasant girl riding on a deep red dragon through a deep dark blue lake. Above and below are intricate borders filed with magical creatures and letters. Single color sketches start each chapter, and for key scenes, there are beautiful framed full color sketches. Before I read a word I was charmed.

I'd like to read Where the Mountain Meets the Moon to a child sometime, for it would be ideal for nap or bedtime. With its stories inside the story there are many natural places to stop and promise more later. The story of Minli is so captivating, however, that the reader and the listener are not going to want to stop. I imagine we might read the book a second or third time. It's so good. I'd also like further stories, particularly about the twins A-Fu and Da-Fu. In the meantime, I will have to check out some of Grace Lin's other books.

Thanks to Uma who reviewed Where the Mountain Meets the Moon at Thommy Ford Kids.

Lin, Grace. Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. Little Brown and Company, 2009. 278p. ISBN 9780316114271.

Illumination in the Flatwoods: A Season with the Wild Turkey by Joe Hutto

In November, Bonnie and I watched a marvelous episode of PBS Nature called My Life as a Turkey. It was not specifically intended to be a Thanksgiving Day program, but the timing may have been good anyway. It recounted a year that artist/naturalist Joe Hutto hatched and raised a clutch of wild turkeys at Wren Nest, his North Florida plantation turned nature preserve. In the program, Hutto showed how wild turkeys are quick and inquisitive, perfectly suited for life in the wild, far different from fat, immobile domestic birds raised for holiday dinners. As you might guess from the title, it was personal and somewhat humorous, though it had tragic moments.

Wanting to know more, I borrowed Hutto's book about his wild turkey project, Illumination in the Flatwoods: A Season with the Wild Turkey. In 1991, he imprinted two clutches of wild turkey poults on himself and then acted as parental bird until the turkeys were ready to live on their own. It is a great story full of drama, humor, and fascinating observations about nature. It also is a touching memoir about the attachments that naturalists can form with their animal friends. The Nature episode captured the tone of the book well until near the end. I think the book is ultimately more heart wrenching.

While the episode has the advantages of film, the book is filled with Hutto's attractive drawings of the turkeys and all the creatures that they encounter, including insects, deer, rodents, and snakes - lots of snakes. The book explains in more details the science behind his project while also being more philosophical. I am glad to have both viewed the film and read the book.

Hutto, Joe. Illumination in the Flatwoods: A Season with the Wild Turkey. Lyons Press, 1995. 240p. ISBN 1558216944.

PBS Nature. My Life as a Turkey. You may watch the episode.

A More Perfect Heaven: How Copernicus Revolutionized the Cosmos by Dava Sobel

Copernicus was a man with a serious problem. He knew from his observations and mathematical calculations that his church's teachings on the nature of the universe were wrong. The earth was not a stationary center around which all heavenly bodies rotated. To speak out, however, would invite charges of heresy for which he could be ostracized, imprisoned, or even executed. It is no wonder he hesitated for decades to let anyone other than his closest friends know what he had discovered. The friends, however, did not keep secrets well. The drama that ensued is the subject of Dava Sobel's latest science history A More Perfect Heaven: How Copernicus Revolutionized the Cosmos.

High drama is exactly how Sobel see the story. She has written a short play about Copernicus and the risks that he choose to take when young Georg Joachim Rheticus from Wittenberg arrived at his doorstep in Varmia in 1539. This play is the core of her book, around which she recounts the history of planetary astronomy. The central event is the publishing of On the Revolutions of the Heaven Spheres, a book which the Roman Catholic Church embraced for its calendar math and scorned for its unbiblical view of the solar system. The rising of the Protestant Reformation adds extra layers of tension to the story. Ironically, Martin Luther agreed with a series of popes in insisting that the earth was the body around which all others passed.

Readers looking for historical insight into current debates in which politics complicates scientific debate need look no further.

Sobel, Dava. A More Perfect Heaven: How Copernicus Revolutionized the Cosmos. Walker & Company, 2011. 273p. ISBN 9780802717931.

The Soloist: A Lost Dream, an Unlikely Friendship, and the Redemptive Power of Music by Steve Lopez

A couple of years ago I tried to watch The Soloist, a movie about a Los Angeles Times columnist befriending a homeless musician on L.A.'s Skid Row. I was in a jumbo jet somewhere over the Pacific Ocean, and the pervasive engine noise made understanding the dialogue difficult, so I gave up. The beauty of the soundtrack and the images of the character played by Jamie Foxx playing a cello stuck with me. Wanting to get back to the story, I recently downloaded the audiobook The Soloist: A Lost Dream, an Unlikely Friendship, and the Redemptive Power of Music by Steve Lopez to my iPod.

I regret that the audiobook does not also have a soundtrack, for down-on-his-luck ex-Julliard student's Nathanial Ayers's beautiful words about Beethoven and Brahms seem to call for a little music to bridge chapters. If I'd have been smart, I would have kept a pad nearby to note the pieces that I wanted to hear. I have no regrets, however, about listening to the fascinating story mixing elements of investigative biography with an examination of mental health care methods. By writing about Ayers in his newspaper, Lopez becomes closely involved in the schizophrenic's daily life. Feeling that he must not simply exploit Ayers for a story, Lopez strives to hasten his new friend's rehabilitation, but he learns that his offers of shelter, counseling, and medications only cause the mentally ill man to suspect he will somehow be trapped in an institution. Ayers explodes in angry profanity as often as he praises the classical music masters.

What keeps Lopez on Ayers's better side is his ability to get donated instruments and sheet music for the talented man. The reporter also arranges visit to Walt Disney Concert Hall, surprising close to Skid Row, and reintroduce Ayers to his former Julliard classmate Yo-Yo Ma. Patience and persistence win the day but do not really supply a happy ending. The quality of Ayers's days varies greatly from day to day. The story does not really even end. A sequel is conceivable. In the meantime, The Soloist is a fine book for a reader who enjoys complex characters.

Lopez, Steve. The Soloist: A Lost Dream, an Unlikely Friendship, and the Redemptive Power of Music. G. P. Putnam, 2008. 273p. ISBN 9780399155062.

Blue Nights by Joan Didion

Joan Didion has survived two great losses. Survived may not be the right word, for it suggests either luck or inner strength. Didion would probably not claim either and prefer to turn back the clock. She would like to have her husband and daughter back. She would like not to be the one turning old and calling a taxi to take her to hospital in the middle of the night. She tells about her second loss in her new book Blue Nights.

In The Year of Magical Thinking, Didion told about the sudden loss of and grieving for her husband author John Gregory Dunne. Part of that story was the life-threatening illness of their daughter Quintana Roo. Blue Nights continues that subplot, recounting Didion's life from Quintana's death in 2004 to a day in 2009 when Didion contemplated her daughter's wedding anniversary. As in The Year of Magical Thinking, she goes around and around her topics, repeating key phrases, several of which were her daughter's words. The effect is mesmerizing.

Didion skillfully uses details, describing the light of the night, their many houses, and the inevitable hospitals. I was struck by her describing dresses that she wore in the 1960s which are still in her closet, for I have a family that keeps old clothes. Didion write for many of us. Many parents will identify with her desire and inability to truly protect her child. Many too will consider whether they would prefer to be the one to die or the one to be left behind. Ultimately, Blue Nights is a painful book that takes a little courage to start but demands reading.

Didion, Joan. Blue Nights. Knopf, 2011. 188p. ISBN 9780307267672.

Never the Hope Itself: Love and Ghosts in Latin America and Haiti by Gerry Hadden

Be sure to read the comments, too.

I propose that we recognize National Public Radio reporter memoirs as a sub-genre. Getting a frontline position with NPR seems to set up correspondents and anchors alike with eventual book deals. I challenge you to name a longtime NPR reporter who has not written a book about her or his efforts to gather the news. For years, I have enjoyed remembering past events and reading about the lives of reporters, such as Scott Simon, Tom Gjelten, Bob Edwards, and Michele Norris. I feel that I get to know both the world and the trusted voice better.

I do not remember Gerry Hadden, author of Never the Hope Itself: Love and Ghosts in Latin America and Haiti, but he was an NPR reporter covering Latin America from 2000 to 2004. While much of his time was spent in Mexico, he flew at a moments notice to Colombia, Guatemala, El Salvador, Panama, and especially Haiti. He interviewed many government officials, rebels, entrepreneurs, peasants, priests, and foreign aid workers about the events that were making headlines: natural disasters, contested elections, corruption, drug cartels, and illegal aliens. When he started in 2000, much official American attention was directed at the problems of Latin America, but that changed on September 11, 2001. During his later years on the Americas beat, he filed storied stories that were often overshadowed by headlines from Afghanistan and Iraq.

Reporters in turmoil-torn countries always seem to take risks and find themselves in dangerous situations. Hadden seemed to be particularly prone to getting himself positioned in the street between riot police and protesters. He also seemed inclined to follow migrant workers into the jungle were gangs waited to beat and rob them. Several times criminals were so surprised to find him stumbling into a trap for others that they just shook their heads and let him go. He must have had a guardian angel.

Mixed in with the news stories are accounts of Hadden's personal life, which some readers may doubt. Did he really see ghosts in the old house that he rented? Did he really not see the drug problems his own staff had when he was reporting on the ills of the region? Did he not consider where his love life was headed? In writing Never the Hope Itself, Hadden seems to have left nothing self-mortifying out. Readers who enjoy very confessional memoirs will be enthralled.

Hadden, Gerry. Never the Hope Itself: Love and Ghosts in Latin America and Haiti. Harper Perennial, 2011. 343p. ISBN 978062020079.

Letters of a Woman Homesteader by Elinore Pruitt Stewart

Before email took over long distance communications, I used to write and receive handwritten letters. While some were written on stationery, others were simply on lined notebook paper. A few were in greeting cards. Those from overseas often came on blue lightweight airmail paper stamped "par avion." I enjoyed finding any of these letters from friends or family in our mailbox. Now I often forget to look in the mailbox. There is rarely anything other than bills and solicitations from charities. The era of the letter to read and reread is gone, but there is a way to go back - reading collections of letters from your library.

It does not matter that letters in collections were not written to me - I enjoy them as if they were. I can easily slip into the role of friend and lose myself in a world of the writer. It is even better when the letters are read aloud by a professional reader. I say this as I am currently enjoying Letters of a Woman Homesteader by Elinore Pruitt Stewart, read by Kate Fleming. I am sure Fleming is channeling the spirit of Elinore, who would have been a good friend to have.

In 1909, widow Elinore Pruitt left Denver with her two year old daughter to take a job as a housekeeper on a ranch near Burnt Folk, Wyoming, near the border with Utah. She planned to earn enough money to make her own land claim and escape the drudgery of doing laundry in a city. She succeeded beyond her dreams. She also found beautiful country full of deserts, forests, and mountains, which she described to her friend Mrs. Coney in Denver, who seems to have kept all of the letters. Of course, life on the frontier was not easy, but Elinore met many people who worked with her to make a good life. In her cheerful letters, she tells many stories about the cattlemen, shepherds, farmers, and other frontier folk.

Letters of a Woman Homesteader make wonderful reading and would serve as a great introduction to the world of letters.

Stewart, Elinore Pruitt. Letters of a Woman Homesteader. University of Nebraska Press, 1989. 281p. ISBN 0803251939.

In Audio, 2003. 4 compact discs. ISBN 1584724722.

Before the Frost by Henning Mankell

Like father, like daughter. At least, it is that way in the world of Kurt Wallander. In Before the Frost by Henning Mankell, Wallander's daughter Linda has just finish police school and is about to join the Ystad Police. Like her father, Linda can not keep from breaking the rules. In fact, she starts breaking them before she actually joins the force. Like her father, she is drawn into dangerous situations without adequate preparation.

As in many of his other Wallander books, Mankell describes the Swedish village of Ystad as a place that is provincial with petty problems, but it is also a magnet for international troubles. He begins the book in 1978 with a story about an unnamed man escaping the mass suicide at the People's Temple, Jim Jones colony's in Guyana and finding his way to Cleveland, Ohio. The setting then shifts to fall 2001 and a small flat where Linda is staying with her father until she begins to earn a salary. Wallander is an unpredictable and hot tempered housemate, who at least does know how to apologize after each outburst. Linda hangs out with friends to kill time until one of them disappears. She then begins to discover some very odd people in strange places, and readers eventually begin to see the significance of the initial story.

Wallander mysteries are not by any means cozy, and Before the Frost describes some very grisly crimes. Fans enjoy them for their intricate puzzles and their intensity. Reading them in order is ideal but not absolutely necessary. Try any one that you find on the library shelf.

Mankell, Henning. Before the Frost. New Press, 2005. 383p. ISBN 1565848357.

My Russian Grandmother and Her American Vacuum Cleaner: A Family Memoir by Meir Shalev

When I was a boy, my paternal grandmother did not use the vacuum cleaner. Instead, my grandfather did the vacuuming. Meir Shalev's maternal grandmother in the Israeli village of Nahalal did not use a vacuum either. She got on her knees daily (or assigned the task to a daughter or grandchild) and scrubbed the tile floor until the water mopped up clear. She did this despite owning a vacuum. In fact, she had a top of the line GE canister vacuum, but it sat locked in an unused bathroom. Shalev tells the reconstructed story in his entertaining book My Russian Grandmother and Her American Vacuum Cleaner: A Family Memoir.

Other than not using the vacuum, Grandma Tonia was not much like my grandmother. Shalev's grandmother was obsessed with the cleanliness of her house to the point that she hardly let anyone in. Most cooking and eating were kept on the back porch. Small cloths were kept on doorknobs so there would be no dirty fingerprints. The nice furniture was stored in rooms that she kept locked. The modern bathroom was also kept locked, and family and visitors were directed to the shed out back. The bathroom served as a storeroom for nice things, and the vacuum that was sent by the uncle who abandoned socialism to become an American capitalist sat there wrapped to stay free of dust. The family, of course, longed to get into these rooms.

As you might guess, Grandma Tonia was a fierce woman of strong and often uncommon opinions who ruled the family. Shalev contends that she was the originator of the phrase "You talkin' to me?" Other familiar words included "Want me to take a chunk out of you?" and "She is no longer, and it was a terrible death." My grandmother never said anything like this.

I imagine My Russian Grandmother and Her American Vacuum Cleaner could be turned into a movie set against the early decades of Israeli independence with the nation building struggles in the backing up the domestic comedy. Until such a film is made, enjoy the book.

Shalev, Meir. My Russian Grandmother and Her American Vacuum Cleaner: A Family Memoir. Schocken Books, 2011. 212p. ISBN 9780805242874.

Instant City by Steve Inskeep

What do I know about Pakistan? It separated from India when the subcontinent gained independence from the British Empire in 1947. It has fought with India over border issues since then and lost its eastern section when Bangladesh broke away in 1971. It is a Muslim country that has a mountainous border with Afghanistan over which the Taliban often travels. The Pakistani army has dissolved the elected government several times. A former prime minister was executed, and his daughter was assassinated when she ran for the top office a third time. Pakistan has been an unsteady American ally. Osama Bin Laden hid there for many years.

What did I know about Karachi before I read Instant City: Life and Death in Karachi by NPR reporter Steve Inskeep? Not much. I knew the name, but I could not place it on an unlabeled map. I did not know that it had been the country's capital before Islamabad was built. Seeing the burning buses on the cover of the book I guessed that it was a dangerous place.

How did the former British colonial port become a battleground? Despite the reassurances from founding statesman Muhammad Ali Jinnah that Pakistan would be a secular society with opportunity for all, the Hindi majority fled Karachi and was replaced by various Muslims groups from India and rural Pakistan. City planning and services could never keep up with the flow of refugees, mostly illiterate rural people with no modern labor skills. Most public lands intended for parks and development were overrun with illegal encampments. Ethnic groups formed parties to press their own needs; they often resorted to violence to get their way. Wave after wave of people settled in Karachi. According to Inskeep, Karachi mushroomed from about 400,000 people at the time of independence in 1947 to over 13 million by 2010.

Inskeep lets us know all of this in his accounts of the events of 2009 and 2010, when a series of bombings rocked the city. I appreciate how he links incidents and histories to landmarks and neighborhood of the city, making the story immediate and understandable. Instant City makes the news from Pakistan a bit clearer. It joins a growing collection of great books from NPR staff that may be found in many public libraries.

Inskeep, Steve. Instant City: Life and Death in Karachi. Penguin Press, 2011. 284p. ISBN 9781594203152.

Black Friday at ricklibrarian: Real Lives Revealed Deal

I am not sure if this really is related to Black Friday but I noticed that my book Real Lives Revealed is now on sale for half the list price at ABC-Clio/Libraries Unlimited. Here is the link to see that what was $65 is now $32.50. I can only speculate as to the meaning of this for future sales. Whatever, if you were wanting a copy but were unhappy with the price, you can now get it at a better price.

I see that ABC-Clio's move has not affected Amazon or Barnes and Noble, which still want full price. They had offered discounts when the book was new. Used book sellers want as much as $92 for it.

The reason that I had looked my book up is that I had noticed some new Libraries Unlimited titles being offered as ebooks. I was hoping that my book would now be an ebook as well, but it has not happened.

Enjoy Black Friday in the manner of your own choosing!

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

I have been following Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson on Facebook for the past year. Using some of the same sets and locations, he is currently filming The Hobbit in New Zealand and occasionally posts photos and videos showing how the project is progressing. The videos are particularly fun as Jackson is witty and charming as a guide to cinematic Middle Earth. I also like being introduced to the actors and seeing how the makeup and costumes are created. I don't think it will lessen the magic of the film to have seen these little documentaries. I have already read the book several times.

A couple of weeks ago, I actually ran out of library books, so I decided it was time to revisit The Hobbit, which we have on a prominent shelf in the living room. The story held few surprises, of course, for I knew it too well, but I did notice some things about the writing. The first is that it really is much easier to read than the Lord of the Rings books. There is much less description and fewer references to the history of Middle Earth. Second, some of the scenes that I remembered as long were not. After finding the ring in the caves under the Misty Mountains, Bilbo gets away from Gollum in only a few pages. The hike along the elf trail through Mirkwood may be unending for the dwarves and Bilbo, but the reader is led through pretty quickly. Even Smaug's attack on the lake town of Esgaroth and battle of the five armies are briefly told - especially when compared to similar events in the trilogy.

I also noticed how Tolkien introduced a very modern ethical dilemma after Smaug was slain by Bard. What would have been a fair distribution of the treasure that had long been kept in the Lonely Mountain by the dragon? The dwarves could claim the mountain but the dragon had stolen from many, including people and elves. Could previous owners of the pieces have been identified? Could the losses of the victimized be tabulated? It seems that only Bilbo and Bard could clearly see that there was plenty of gold for everyone. What really mattered more was the repairing of buildings and gathering of food before winter. But sharing seemed so difficult to do when everyone wanted their part. Only the rise of the common enemy from the North brought the disputing sides together. This sounds a lot like contemporary problems.

Aimed at younger reader, The Hobbit is truly a great book for any age. I enjoyed my return to Middle Earth immensely and now await the late 2012 release of The Hobbit, Part One. I know it will be spectacular.

Tolkien, J.R.R. The Hobbit. George Allen & Unwin, Ltd., 1937.

So Big by Edna Ferber

One of the advantages of belonging to a book group is being introduced to books that you would not otherwise consider reading. So Big by Edna Ferber was off my radar. I once spent a couple of years trying to read selections from great American authors, but Ferber had not made my list. If I had to choose a Ferber title, I might have instead taken Giant, which is set in West Texas where I grew up. But Ferber's 1924 novel So Big was the democratically chosen title for our November discussion, and read it I did.

I quickly found I had a geographic interest in So Big, which I knewwas set in Chicago but did not know it would also include chapters set in High Prairie, Illinois. High Prairie is fictional Dutch immigrant farming community based on South Holland, a suburb south of Chicago. When I came to the Chicago area, I worked and lived near South Holland, a well-tended village with many Dutch Reformed Churches. It was interesting to read about its farming days when the community supplied the Chicago market with vegetables, especially cabbages and onions. One of the protagonists of So Big makes her mark by growing asparagus and raising pigs.

I say one protagonist because the first two thirds of the book focus on Selina Peake who when orphaned at eighteen takes a teaching position in High Prairie. She only teaches one year before marrying a handsome but poor farmer. While working hard along his side, she discovers he is unwilling to take risks that might improve the farm and their finances. Trying to get him to drain the marshy fields, she shows him government farming pamphlets, but he will not change. His death gives her the responsibility and opportunity to do better. And she does. Readers come to admire her for her studious perseverance and the maturing of her regard for the community that had once made fun of her. Her story is the best part of the book.

The final third is about her son Dirke, who had been called So Big as a toddler. His mother's success allows him to go to college to become architect, a profession for which he really has no talent or commitment. He instead in given a position in banking which he rides to wealth. His life, however, proves shallow. Ferber does not predict the 1929 crash of the economy, but the reader can fit her story into history quite well.

Being easy to read and feeling very authentic, So Big is a good choice for a book club that will read classics.

Ferber, Edna. So Big. Grosset & Dunlap, 1924.

Google Ngram Viewer

I have been playing with the Google Ngram Viewer, which measures the use of words and phrases in books through time. It is a byproduct of the Google Digitization Project. It is easy to use and free to anyone.

Question One: What is the most written about sport in America?

I entered baseball, football, basketball, and hockey into the search box and chose American English. I wanted to eliminate publications from the British Commonwealth where football is the game Americans call soccer. My assumption was that I would see baseball overtaken by football in the 1960s. What I found is here: The Results.

It is not what I thought at all. Football was the more popular topic through most of the 20th Century. Baseball passed it in the late 1980s but football caught back up.

Question Two: Who's more written about between the Beatles and the Rolling Stones? How far behind would the Beach Boys be?

I suspected the Beatles would win. I was not sure how the writing would vary over time. I searched between 1960 and 2008 (last year for which Google has searchable content). Here is the result: Click Here

It appears that the fame of the two British bands peaked around 2002 or 2003 when the Beatles were five times more written about the Rolling Stones and ten times more than the Beach Boys.

Question Three: Which Beatle has gotten the most attention in books?

Here is the result: Beatle Measure

George Harrison gets an early lead, which probably means there was another person with the name. This shows a shortcoming of the Ngram idea. Still, I was surprised how much more attention John Lennon has gotten.

You can do this, too. To learn how Ngram can be used for real research watch this TED lecture.

Jason Deroche at Friday at the Ford

We don't have to look far and wide to find talented performers for our Friday at the Ford concert series. For our latest concert we welcomed Jason Deroche, a classical guitarist from La Grange who not only enjoys playing standard guitar pieces but also likes to tackle works not intended for six strings. For example, he started his performance with selections from Vivaldi's L'estro Armonico, which were originally written for violins and cello. Jason took transcriptions of these written for keyboards by J. S. Bach and rendered them beautifully on guitar. Next, he played his own versions of a couple of Johannes Brahms's Intermezzos usually performed on piano. I had already been quite impressed when he then revealed his lively guitar covers of Wedding Day at Troldhaugen and March of the Trolls by Edvard Grieg.

For the second half of his concert, Jason turned from Europe to South America, highlighting the works of Agustin Barrios, each evoking a new mood. I especially like Muzurka Passionata. Showing that he also enjoys popular music, he closed with his take of the Beatles In My Life. For an encore, he played a familiar Spanish guitar classic Leyenda by Isaac Albeniz, which everyone in the audience seemed to recognize.

54 people attended the concert, and Jason sold all of the copies of a CD that he recorded with the harpist Mark Brewer called Bach to Brazil. I got the last one and have been listening as I commute. He hopes to record another CD featuring his growing collection of transcriptions for guitar. I want one when he does.

You can learn more about Jason, his music, his teaching, and his projects at his website.