Critics are people, too

most people hate change
admit it or not they do
poor jk rowling

critics are people
they expect more harry's world
so pan the new book


I personally am enjoying the book, A Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling.  I've just begun, but it's drawing me in and I'm loathe to turn off the light, but Friday's a work day.  I'll review the book soon as I can. 

The Nine Inheritors

Clare Datnow’s novel, The Nine Inheritors, reads very much like a biography of ten generations as told by a keen-eyed on-the-scene observer. I enjoyed her omniscient point-of-view because I could journey with the characters as they each moved through their part of history.

Readers enter the story in 1790 Lithuania in the small village or shtetl of Valinsk. It is a place long-steeped in a caste system, where the clergy and the learned are considered superior to the tradespeople. Schmuel Rosen is a tradesman. For all his wealth, he is not high on the pecking order of the shtetl and it rankles, for he is a prideful, driven man.

Wanting desperately to rise above his station, Rosen arrives at the idea of commissioning a new Torah to loan, not give, the village synagogue or shul. For Rosen, the new Torah is not a pious act; it is a means of raising his station and that of his family. Datnow waxes very Michener-esque in her descriptions of all things Jewish, particularly the ritual involved in making a true Sefer Torah scroll—fascinating. In death, Rosen achieves his goal. He is buried in “the most prestigious part of the cemetery, on the higher ground of rabbis and scholars.” Thus begins the journey of the Rosen Torah as it passes from one generation to the next, surviving immigration across stormy seas, theft, fire, and more.

Datnow subtly but persistently uses questions in the telling of each generation’s story. The questions are asked and answered variously by each character as they inherit or come in contact with the Torah: If one does a good thing expecting personal gain, does this diminish the good thing, or is the good inherent in the good thing one did? What is the price of inheritance? When is inheritance a boon, when a burden? What is the value of holy writ in faith?

Here, the Rosen Torah is the good thing, that one holy of holies revered by the Jews and believed to be the original words spoken by God to Moses. Here we have ordinary people encountering the Torah. It is bartered, coveted, rejected, revered, and reviled as each person brings his or her own personal history to bear on the encounter.

The snake handler cannot read the Torah, but imagines it has magical powers. The KKK threatens its existence. One man’s interpretation of the Torah’s words causes him to disown his only son. The disowned son rejects any holy writ that causes his father to disown him.

Datnow asks questions to which there are no pat answers, as there are no pat answers in life. The readers may judge, or perhaps ask questions of their own. How could anyone do that? How could anyone think that? What place does faith have in life?

I enjoyed visiting the lives in The Nine Inheritors, while learning more than I ever knew about the evolution of Jewish life and thought.

 Previously published in the First Draft Magazine of Alabama Writers Forum

Blogging for Money

Blogs. Some people make money at them. The thing about my Blog is it is a briefer version of my hand-written journal. My rambles on the page are better not aired to the world at large. Not that even a minuscule number of the world has read my Blog, but one never knows. My full name is unique and ‘Googled’, it brings up pretty much everything I’ve ever written on or off the web and some I know I erased.

The thing about Blogs is they should have a focus, and mine, alas, does not. Except for those know me and stop by just because, my Blog is obscure to the population at large.

The thing is, I’m a “Jack (make that Jane) of all…”. My interests range from quantum physics, Wicca, self help and biographies people, places and things to various genre of fiction: Sci-Fi, Fantasy, Mystery, Literary. My bookshelf is quite a mix. I’ve read the Self Aware Universe, The Elegant Universe, Spontaneous Healing of Belief, The Secret, and The Chariots of the Gods. I’ve read Amsterdam, Chocolat, Mother of Pearl, Mists of Avalon, The Harry Potter, Lord of the Ring, and Foundation (Asimov) series and so much more. In May 2007, laid off from Saks, I read all 12 of Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum series and all 11 of Laurie King’s Mary Russell series before year’s end.

It is the same with music. This morning I have Habib Koite’s “Maya” coaxing my muse. Sunday, it was Pavarotti and Bocelli followed by Nina Simone. My CD shelf is a mixed as my bookshelf, but you get the picture. I am not just one thing, so I’ll probably never have one of those money-making Blogs. Those Blogs, near as I can figure, make money by teaching others how to make money Blogging by in turn teaching others how to make money Blogging and so on and so on. The ultimate pyramid, except your payment to your up-line is a one-time deal.

At least with SMC, Nutrilife, and Amway, there is something tangible, for all those who pay to learn the how-to of it, but never do get a round to it.

Now it's time to go work on the Novel.