San Jose Mercury News, USA
Chris Watson, Bookbriefs
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Article Launched: 10/05/2008 01:36:33 AM PDT
In 1868, John Muir took his first trip across California, from Oakland
to Yosemite via the Santa Clara Valley, Pacheco Pass and the San
Joaquin Valley to Snelling and Coulterville.
In 2006, Peter and Donna Thomas, Santa Cruz book artists, followed in
Muir’s footsteps, recording their impressions along the way.
Because everything is grist for the artistic spirit, Peter then
decided to create, in secret, a record of the trip for his wife’s 51st
birthday.
Using Donna’s drawings and adding original lines from Muir about what
he saw so long ago, Peter made, on home-made rag paper, a 12-page
accordion book.
Luckily, he made 51 copies of the book and book collectors may
purchase one by visiting
Saroyan honored in his centenary
William Saroyan isn’t an author that all readers — even native
Californian readers — are familiar with.
The big, blustery Armenian-American may have lived up and down the
state over his lifetime and may have written scads of short stories, a
couple of novels and even won a Pulitzer for his play, "The Time of
Your Life", but his legacy has been, in large part, neglected.
On the centenary of Saroyan’s birth, Heyday Books of Berkeley has
published a volume
it hopes will revivify the author’s importance to California letters.
"He Flies Through the Air With the Greatest of Ease: A William Saroyan
Reader," edited by William E. Justice $35 cloth; $24.95 paper, is a
whopping 600-page volume that samples widely from Saroyan’s published
work: selected short stories from four anthologies; two novels; his
prize-winning play; plus, selected autobiographical writings that
illustrate why the man wrote the way he did "" big, with bravado and
joy and a visceral need to get it all down on paper.
Included is a foreword by his friend and fellow author Herbert Gold
and eight pages of family photos.
Lehane movesto a bigger stage
If you’re in the vicinity of Corte Madera on Monday or San Francisco
on Tuesday, you might want to stop by in that order Book Passage or
Books, Inc. at 7 p.m. to hear author Dennis Lehane read from his new
novel, "The Given Day."
Although Lehane has already earned himself a reputation for dark,
daring novels "" e.g., "Mystic River," "Shutter Island," "Gone, Baby,
Gone" "" his new effort ups the ante considerably.
A bruiser of a novel at over 700 pages, "The Given Day" profiles a
period in American life "" the end of World War I "" when social,
political and economic forces collided with considerable force.
Boston’s Irish populations still figure, but anarchists and
city-dwelling blacks have big roles too, as does Babe Ruth.
If you think today’s world is complicated, read this book and be of
good cheer.
Reading beyond 1984
George Orwell wrote a lot more than just "Animal Farm" and "Nineteen
Eighty-Four."
If he’d been alive today, it’s likely that the prolific Orwell would
have been a blogger. In consideration of that fact, a professor at the
University of Westminster in London is publishing Orwell’s diary
entries daily 70 years to the day after they were written.
Check it out at orwelldiaries.wordpress.com
Coming this week
¢ Wendy Chapkis and Richard Webb, "Dying to Get High: Marijuana as
Medicine," with special guests Valerie and Michael Corral, 7:30
p.m. today, Bookshop Santa Cruz, 1520 Pacific Ave., Santa Cruz.
¢ Robert Martensen, "A Life Worth Living: A Doctor’s Reflections on
Illness in a High-Tech Era," 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Bookshop Santa Cruz.
¢ Wendy Chapkis, "Dying to Get High," 12:30-2 p.m. Room 301,
College 8, UC Santa Cruz.
¢ The Rev. John Dear, SJ, "A Persistent Peace: One Man’s Struggle
for a Nonviolent World," 7:30 p.m. Friday, Capitola Book Cafe, 1475
41st Ave., Capitola.
Contact Chris Watson at [email protected].