Braiding Sweetgrass

By Robin Wall Kimmerer

Milkweed Press     2013

384 pages     Essays

Robin Wall Kimmerer is a PhD botanist, a professor, and a member of the Potawatomi Nation. She is the author of two books. Braiding Sweetgrass has become a word-of-mouth sensation. My church spiritual growth book group read it over the course of two months and two meetings. We were completely enthralled and had vibrant discussions both months. I cannot tell you how much this book has meant to me.

Kimmerer “eloquently and beautifully uses the indigenous cultures’ sacred plant, sweetgrass, as a poetic metaphor to explain the origin of plant, animal, and human life on Mother Earth, their intertwined respectful and reciprocal relationships with each other, the loss of this reciprocity, and the hope of ecological restoration to return the gifts of Mother Earth and the balance that once was.”

The book is divided into several parts: planting sweetgrass, tending sweetgrass, picking sweetgrass, braiding sweetgrass, and burning sweetgrass. In each of these sections, Kimmerer poetically relates her experiences with her family, her students, and her heritage—all intended to show our relationship to the world around us. In one poignant section, she tells about teaching a botany class at an small Christian university. Instead of teaching botany as science, she attempted to teach the students the relationship between them and botany—the total interrelationship. They camp for a week; in the beginning the students are resistant to this interrelationship, but by the end of the camp session, they have become new beings. In another chapter, she and her children attempt to save salamanders as they cross the road to breed. The most poignant chapter for me concerned the lake by her house that had become filled with algae because of runoff from factories. In all of the chapters, the science of nature, botany, and ecology becomes personal stories and fill the reader with the same wonder with which Kimmerer faces the world.

This is how I read the book. I read a chapter a day and tried to find ways to relate the chapter to the world around me and what I was seeing and living. One day while reading the book, my grandchildren and I went for a walk. They found hundreds of milkweed pods. They decided that if they took some of those pods to my woods, they might be able to make milkweed grow in our woods. Not sure that it will in that environment, but the children were indeed trying to establish a reciprocal relationship with the plant and nature.

 Today, on our vacation in Orange Beach, AL, we walked in an area that had been greatly impacted by last fall’s hurricane. On that walk, I found several places where plants and trees were trying to rejuvenate themselves. It was quite inspiring. I am sure that I would never have noticed that reciprocity if I had not read Braiding Sweetgrass.

Albert Einstein is quoted as saying, “Look deep into nature and then you will understand everything better.” Truly, reading Kimmerer’s book has helped me look deeper into nature than I have ever looked. I will never be the same.

When Stars Are Scattered

 By Victoria Jamieson and Omar Mohamed

Dial     2020

258 pages     Graphic Novel

When Stars Are Scattered is classified as a children/YA book. I was absolutely captivated by it as was my 9-year-old granddaughter, Adela, who gave it to me to read so we could have a book club discussion. More importantly, the book was a finalist for the National Book Awards in 2020 and is the novelized memoir of the childhood of Omar Mohamed, the author. Victoria Jamieson is an award-winning writer of graphic novels who met Omar and together they told his story in graphic form.

The story itself is riveting. Omar and his disabled brother Hassan had to flee their home in Somalia when their father was killed during an uprising. Omar was 4 and his brother was younger. They ran with others from their village, but along the way they got separated from their mother. They lived for 14 years in the Dadaab Refugee Camp in Kenya in the care of an older woman and the community. This graphic novel is based on their experiences while at the camp, until Omar graduates high school and came to live in the United States. Omar graduated from the University of Arizona, but now lives in Pennsylvania with his wife and young children. He is a social worker at a refugee agency. His brother lives with them, and helps with the family.

Omar was writing a memoir about his experience when he met Victoria Jamieson, the Newbery Honor author of Roller Girl. She had come to volunteer at the refugee agency because she thought she wanted her next book to be about refugees. They joined forces—her illustration skills and his story—to create this compelling novelization about survival and resilience.

I have not had much experience with graphic novels because I read so many books on my Kindle. However, as I read the book, I realized the power that the graphics hold and the way in which difficult topics can be handled through illustration. Jamieson credits the colorist Iman Geddy for the drama produced through the color.

When Stars Are Scattered is much more than a children’s book. The storytelling is perfectly matched with the illustrations, and life in the refugee camp is starkly defined. Hunger is constant, but neighbors help neighbors with finding food and with child care. Everyone is constantly thinking about getting to the United States or Canada, so it is extremely important to learn English and do well in school. Most girls do not get the opportunity to go to school, but two girls are at the top of the class as is Omar. One of the girls is named Maryam, which is the Arabic version of my name, Miriam, and Adela’s middle name, Adela Miriam. Adela loved that one of the characters shared her name. Maryam wrote the poem that ends the book.

Those who are lost

Look to the stars to lead them home.

The flag of Somalia, our home,

Has one star, one background.

But we are not one star.

We are millions

Not one background, but millions.

To the untrained eye, the night sky

Is a scattering of stars,

A chaos of light

And dark across the universe

And yet, the stars are not lost.

They form patterns,

Constellations,

If you know how to look.

There are stories woven into the very essence of stars.

Be like a star.

Shine your light.

Shine your story.

For stories will lead us home.

 

Omar Mohamed has a welfare agency that empowers students living in refugee camps. It is called Refugee Strong. Here is the website.

 

Victoria Jamieson’s website. 

Fatal Intent

 By Tammy Euliano

Oceanview     2021

311 pages     Thriller

I named “thriller” as the genre of Fatal Intent, but a good bit of the book is a medical procedural book and also an exploration of moral intent.  Here is Goodread’s summary.

“Elderly patients are dying at home days after minor surgery. Natural causes? Malpractice? Or a serial killer? And why doesn’t anyone care? Anesthesiologist Dr. Kate Downey wants to know why, but her unorthodox investigation threatens her job, her family, and her very life. The stakes escalate to the breaking point when Kate, under violent duress, is forced to choose which of her loved ones to save—and which must be sacrificed. “

Perhaps the best thing about Fatal Intent is the protagonist. Dr. Kate Downey is an anesthesiologist at a Florida hospital. She has had a really rough life; most recently her husband has been on life support for nearly a year, and she has also had a late-term miscarriage that she continues to grieve over. When two of her patients die mysteriously, she has to discover the truth while also defending her role as the presiding anesthetist in order to save her career. (Of course, her last name is a bit of a connection to my family. Love to see my name in print!)

The first third of the book was clunky with lots of characters being introduced and quite a bit of confusion over what was going on. We do have to remember that Euliano is a practicing physician and a first time author. I would hope that as her skill develops, her introductory passages would improve as well.

As the plot took off, things sorted themselves out, and I continued to read, although I do have to say that I never quite bought into the plot line and the overall theme of the book. And there were a lot of dead people! One thing that made me uncomfortable was instead of emphasizing humanitarian choices regarding the right to die and assisted death, Euliano seemed to be suggesting that sometimes family members get tired of caring for their dying relative and seek to speed up the process. That most likely was not the author’s goal, but with some of the deaths, that certainly is what seemed to be happening.

After saying that, however, the last third of the book moved very quickly and the ending, although violent, is complete. Dr. Downey’s journey leads to much more grief and many more questions about end-of-life care. The author suggests in her epilogue that she wants to encourage discussion on ways to answer this question: “When is life no longer worth living and who should decide?” Did she succeed? I’m not sure, and readers will have to decide for themselves.

 Fatal Intent will be published on March 2. Here is Tammy Euliano’s website.

The Splendid and the Vile

 By Erik Larson

Crown     2020

585 pages      Narrative Non Fiction

The NPR review of The Splendid and the Vile begins “There are countless books about World War II, but there’s only one Erik Larson.” I feel the same way. His writing is amazing; history comes alive in his books. This is the third Erik Larson book that I have read, and it is as transfixing as all the others.

It is not very often that you can say about a history book, “It was utterly riveting.” But that is the case with The Splendid and the Vile. This is the story of Winston Churchill’s first year in office as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. In addition to Churchill’s diaries, speeches, and minutes, we are invited to read the diary entries of his daughter Mary Churchill, and those of several of Churchill’s advisors. Through those additional eyes, we capture a deeper look at this legendary world leader and that monumental year in history.

We gain deep insight into Churchill’s character, beginning with the important speech where he tells the British people at the start of the Battle of Britain,  "We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." Amusingly, Larson writes, Churchill then turned to a colleague and said, under his breath, "And ... we will fight them with the butt end of broken bottles, because that's bloody well all we've got." From Churchill working from his bed all morning to entertaining guests until late at night, the intimate life at 10 Downing Street comes alive—as well as the Churchill’s weekend home and the places where they waited out the blitz. I kept thinking that as interesting as the Churchill entourage was, I would have longed for a little peace and quiet. But there was no peace for Clementine Churchill and the rest of the family.

We learn that Churchill kept trying to get Roosevelt to engage in the war, but the United States was reluctant to enter.  Roosevelt sent Averill Harriman to London to assess the situation. Harriman ingratiated himself so thoroughly with the Churchills that he ended up having an affair with Churchill’s daughter-in-law Pamela. Ultimately, the US Congress passed the Lend-Lease Act which greatly aided the British in their fight against Germany. The United States ultimately entered the war at the end of 1941—and at the end of the book.

Alternating chapters gives the reader a view of some of the things happening in Hitler’s Germany during the same time frame. There are not as many details because the major part of the narrative concerns Churchill. One of the more interesting vignettes concerns Rudolf Hess, who took a plane from the German fleet, flew across the English Channel to Scotland in an attempt to work out a peace deal with England without the knowledge of the Third Reich. Of course he was captured and spent the rest of his life in prison.

My husband and I read The Splendid and the Vile aloud to each other a chapter at a time. We found it a totally engrossing read. We had read Devil in the White City and In the Garden of Beasts the same way and loved both of them as well. Erik Larson relates history like it were story. He is the best.

An enlightening article about Erik Larson and his writing in the New York Times. Well worth the read.