Review of THE KASZUBY STORIES by Gail Olsheski

 3 Stars

This book, classified as a memoir and complete with family photos, consists of twelve stories about the life of the Kashubs around Barry’s Bay, Ontario, in the mid-twentieth century. The author, a descendant of the Kashubs who first arrived and settled the region in 1858, outlines some of the customs of the Kashub community which were part of her upbringing.

What is unusual about the book is that it’s published in two languages. The recto pages are in English whereas the verso pages are a translation into Kashubian by Stanley Frymark. (I met Mr. Frymark when my husband and I visited Poland in the spring of 2014; we even stayed at his B&B, Zamek Zaborski.) Though as a child I spoke Kashubian, I can’t read the language so my review is based only on the English.

I was interested in reading these stories because I too am a Kashub descendant who grew up in the Barry’s Bay area; in fact, I’m only four years younger than the author so my childhood memories are of the same time period about which she writes. Certainly some of which she describes resonated with me: jam-jams and twisters; day-long weddings; gun firings on New Year’s Eve; First Communion dresses and photos; picking blueberries; chokecherry jam; harvest meals; stone fences; Kaszuby roadside crosses; and being taught by nuns at St. Joseph’s school.

Some of the stories, however, had little Kashubian culture in them. The first one, for instance, entitled “Of Stories and Ecstasy,” focuses on Sister Therisita, a teacher at the elementary school, and the stories she told her students. It describes the daily life of the nuns and emphasizes how isolated Barry’s Bay was from the outside world seventy years ago. Likewise, the second story, “Dying in Snow,” could be set almost anywhere in Canada during the winter.

“The Berry Patch,” the third story, begins with the suggestion that Sister Therisita prayed for Jesus to manifest Himself while she prayed. How does the author know this was Sister’s “only yearning” and that she “never relinquished her dream”? Did the author use poetic license to embroider a story? I was left wondering if the other stories are factual or if they too were embellished. Did I read fiction or non-fiction or some amalgam?

Another element that bothered me is the deification of people. Grandpa Szczypior in “Table” is a godlike figure whose fields are called “his garden of Gethsemane” and whose voice in church gave “majesty to all their blessed events.” His beneficence to his neighbours and community is described as being boundless. In “Easter Finery,” it’s the author’s mother who is idolized in her service to her neighbours. And Bernadette in “The Berry Patch” is “absorbed in her thoughts about her holiness and how spotless she was. She had never even committed a venial sin, nothing had stained her soul”?

One of the best stories is “Lone Wolf” which very effectively touches on the loss of culture and traditions. Unfortunately, the author, as she does several times, feels the need to explain what the story already makes obvious: “The last time we visited StańcƗów we wanted to tell him that the land belonged to our lineage. . . . We wanted to remind StańcƗów that our species existed here because stark Martin had roamed all the way over to this treacherous new country and it was only by sheer fortitude that we survived the first century, so pride in that feat alone should keep us bound together in the very place for the next century. Somebody needed to explain to him that our story had been lived here too. Now was the time to realize the greatness of legacy.”

There are contradictions that irked. Having lived in the area described, I’m aware that the land granted to the Kashubs was “a land full of rocks” which “despite the efforts of three generations . . . could not be transformed into farmland.” But Grandpa Szczypior has “long fertile fields”? And a pet peeve is the repeated references to northern and northeastern Ontario. Having lived in both Barry’s Bay and in northeastern Ontario, I can vouch that they are not the same parts of the province!

The book could use some revision. Some ambiguity needs clarification. References are made to Siberia without explaining that this does not mean the region in Russia as people unfamiliar with Barry’s Bay might think. In one paragraph, a nun is praying in her room in the convent and in the next she is praying in a classroom? Who would be the middle daughter of eight daughters? Is the drunk man at the altar for Easter Mass the author’s father? After speculation about the many things for which the man seeks forgiveness, there’s the statement that “Momma would find forgiveness in her heart, she understood that men could be weak and not be able to resist the temptation of the bottle.” This is after her comparing her new coat to “the colour of the spilled wine from the bottles that fell out of our dad’s truck.” Yet later stories like “Pulp” show a different father. In “Road to Halfway,” the road is both “a solitary road” and the road along which houses were built on small concessions? And there’s a statement on p. 189 that I found disturbing: “The union of our father and mother [second cousins] was a co-mingling of the same clean blood and the eight of us kids in the fifth generation have always been proud that we descended from that single hereditary Kashubian gene”?!

Some editing is also in order. Comma splices abound. At times commas are omitted when needed, and at other times, they are used where unnecessary. A paragraph will sometimes switch from third person pronouns to second person pronouns for no reason. The author seems to love words and then uses them over and over; for instance, on p. 55, some form of patriarch or patriarchy is used five times. Atavistic is another word that is used repeatedly: “atavistic trait” and “atavistic memory” and “atavistic confidence.” At times language is flowery and ornate and at other times it is colloquial and ungrammatical: “Us children really loved sweets” and “us Kashubians settled in among the stumps” and “It was us kids who were in charge of the fire” and “Us Kashubs had never associated with anyone but our own” and “us kids bouncing on the back of the pickup truck were their century marker.”

Other than for Kashubians living in Poland and Kashubian descendants in the Barry’s Bay region, I’m not certain that this book will have much appeal. The intention, to describe the life of Canadian Kashubs in the mid-twentieth century, is laudable, but the execution is less so.

Review of ALL THE WAY GONE by Joanna Schaffhausen (New Release)

 4 Stars

This is the fourth book in the series featuring Annalisa Vega. I certainly enjoyed my latest visit with the intelligent and determined Annalisa.

Annalisa has left the Chicago Police Department and become a private investigator. For her first case, she is hired by Mara Delaney who is anxiously awaiting the publication of her book entitled The Good Sociopath focused on Dr. Craig Canning, a local neurosurgeon. The thesis of her book is that sociopaths can benefit society because they are useful in professions requiring emotional distance. A young woman plunges to her death in Canning’s apartment building, and Mara is worried that her poster-boy for desireable sociopathy may have been involved, thereby threatening the argument of her soon-to-be released book. Annalisa is hired to investigate and hopefully prove that Dr. Canning is indeed what Mara has portrayed him to be: cold-hearted but not homicidal or violent. Annalisa’s investigation convinces her that a clever murder has been committed but Canning insists on his innocence. Where lies the truth?

As in the other books, Annalisa also has some conflict in her personal life. Her remarriage to Nick has brought his teenaged daughter Cassidy into their lives. A typical teenager, Cassidy doesn’t always listen to advice and sets out to help a friend find her mother. This case becomes Annalisa’s second case, but Cassidy sets out to solve it on her own.

Tension builds gradually. Cassidy places herself in danger and Nick and Annalisa have to rush to rescue her. Annalisa, like her stepdaughter, also finds herself in tense encounters with Canning. He realizes why Annalisa is investigating him so a cat-and-mouse game ensues in which they both intrude on each other’s territory. More than once Annalisa faces him alone.

The author has a doctorate in psychology and her knowledge of the workings of the brain is at the forefront. She asks a number of questions: Can sociopaths be good people who make valuable contributions to society or are they “violent predators to be eliminated at all costs”? Can sociopaths be helped or are they “all the way gone”? The book also inspires the reader to consider whether it is justifiable to kill a murderous psychopath if that death actually helps save others?

The plot is complex with a lot of twists, especially at the end. Given the psychological makeup of the characters involved, this complexity seems appropriate. There is a clue about 45% through the book that steered me in the right direction, though I certainly didn’t guess the details.

Though this is the fourth book in the series, it can be read as a standalone because there is enough backstory provided to ensure the reader will not be lost. However, I advise readers to treat themselves and read the previous three books (Gone for Good, Long Gone, and Dead and Gone) first.

Note: I received an eARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

Review of THE SPOILED HEART by Sunjeev Sahota

3.5 Stars

Nayan Olak is running for election for the position of general secretary of the largest labour union in central England. Forty-two years of age, he began as a factory worker but has been involved in union advocacy for decades. For Nayan, the union has become the centre of his life after a tragedy two decades earlier. Now divorced and caring for his aging father who is suffering with dementia, he starts a relationship with Helen Fletcher who has returned to the neigbourhood with her son. Nayan’s opponent is Megha Sharma, younger and better educated but with less experience, though she is serving as the first head of diversity, equality and inclusion. She shares Nayan’s Indian ethnicity but comes from a wealthier class.

Clashing visions of the union’s future lead to a vicious and destructive campaign. Nayan believes in broad economic reforms to benefit working people while Megha focuses on specific initiatives to address injustices against oppressed groups. The campaign becomes a series of ad hominem attacks where Nayan is labelled a racist and misogynist and Megha, an out-of-touch and divisive elite.

The narrator is Sajjan, a former neighbour of Nayan. A novelist, he is fascinated with Nayan’s story and meets with him years after the events to get his version of what happened during the election and his relationship with Helen. He thinks that he may be able to retell Nayan’s story in a novel. Sajjan is not just a narrator; he acts as a detective gradually unravelling the truth of what happened to Nayan and others involved in his life.

This narrative choice means that the information Sajjan provides is second-hand and there are suggestions that Nayan’s version of events may not always be reliable. Sajjan suspects that Nayan is not always totally honest; at one point he refers to Nayan’s “doctored version.” The truthfulness of the story Sajjan tells is also compromised when it seems that his parents were involved in Nayan’s past.

There is considerable suspense. There’s the outcome of the election of course. But then there are suggestions that Helen may have played a greater role in Nayan’s past than he suspects. Though Helen is a home health care aide, why does she refuse to accept Nayan’s father as a client and avoid any contact with him? Though Nayan and Sajjan meet “several years” after the election year, at first Sajjan is given only “glimpses of a truth [Nayan] couldn’t yet bear to voice”; only at the end are dark secrets revealed.

The novel is like a tragedy telling the story of a man’s ruin, both personal and professional, and explores whether the downfall is self-inflicted or caused by societal issues. Nayan’s character is well-developed. He’s a good man who has suffered, but he is flawed and there is certainly a degree of hubris that contributes to his heart being spoiled.

The book also examines how a few words or a single careless action can have unintended and unimaginable consequences. The toxic effects of social media are also detailed.

Though the discussion of election issues is sometimes heavy-handed, I enjoyed the book - as I did Sahota’s earlier novel, China Room (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/2022/01/review-of-china-room-by-sunjeev-sahota.html).

Review of LAST NIGHT AT VILLA LUCIA by Simon McCleave (New Release)

2.5 Stars

Though Simon McCleave has written 30 novels, this is the first time I’ve read one. This is his first standalone, not one of his DI Ruth Hunter, DC Ruth Hunter Murder File, or Anglesey series. Unfortunately, I was not impressed.

After a divorce from her husband Nick, Cerys Williams now owns a Tuscan villa which she operates as a B&B with the help of Lucia and Lorenzo, a couple who live nearby. Cerys struggles with alcoholism though she tries to hide her drinking from her daughter Lowri who is staying with her for a while. Guests arrive from England: Harry and Zoe and their son Charlie. Harry, who is described by family members as “a selfish, self-absorbed, predatory bastard” and an “absent, hostile and selfish father,” antagonizes everyone so it’s not surprising that it is his body that is found floating in the pool. The rest of the book focuses on finding who killed Harry.

In many ways this is a locked room mystery, though there is an attempt to suggest someone from outside the villa could have killed Harry while trying to rob the villa. This explanation does not ring true. In fact, the entire police investigation is unrealistic. To eliminate suspects, the police take fingerprints and DNA from everyone at the villa but not from Lucia and Lorenzo who work there? Car keys are apparently stolen but there’s no reference to the car? When Charlie is questioned, his mother is allowed to sit in on one interview but not on a second one?

The author tries very obviously to make everyone a suspect. Multiple points of view (Cerys, Zoe, Lucia) are used to suggest motives for various characters. However, I found it so easy to predict the murderer, especially because of the flashbacks. The fact that there’s such reliance on coincidence to bring characters together affects the novel’s credibility.

Characters are not likeable so it’s difficult to care about them. So many feel they are not being treated fairly. Men in particular are portrayed negatively; both Nick and Harry are controlling and violent, and even Charlie and Lorenzo are described as capable of anger and violent explosions. The women are weak victims; both Cerys and Zoe had long-term relationships with abusive men and did virtually nothing to remove their children from dysfunctional households.

There are both needless repetitions and unanswered questions. Is it necessary to make reference to Lorenzo’s dubious past every time he’s mentioned? How many times must we be reminded that Harry smokes cigars? I understand why but there’s no need to be so obvious. The vehicle that Lucia and Lorenzo see watching their property – in the end we’re just supposed to dismiss it as irrelevant? There’s also the huge plot hole surrounding much of Nick’s behaviour.

This book wasn’t for me. The plotting in terms of red herrings and twists is just so obvious. I prefer mysteries with more nuance. (Potential readers should be aware that the book touches on several serious topics like alcoholism, sexual assault, and domestic abuse.)

Note: I received an eARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

Review of WHAT HAVE YOU DONE? by Shari Lapena (New Release)

3.5 Stars 

The last Shari Lapena novel I read was Everyone Here is Lying (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/2023/07/review-of-everyone-here-is-lying-by.html). What Have You Done? has many similarities with this previous offering.

The naked body of 17-year-old Diana Brewer is found in a farmer’s field. Very quickly, Fairhill, Vermont, where nothing ever happens, becomes a town full of suspects. Who killed the well-liked teenager? Was it Cameron Farrell, her controlling boyfriend? Was it Brad Turner, Diana’s track coach who has been accused of inappropriate behaviour towards female students? Was it Joe Prior, the creepy guy who harassed Diana at her job? But then it seems these three are not the only ones who have secrets and are not totally forthcoming during the investigation into Diana’s murder.

The novel has multiple perspectives. Among them are a number of people connected to Diana: her mother, her friends (Riley and Evan), her boyfriend, and her educators (principal, English teacher, track coach). Then there are others more tangentially connected: Mr. Turner’s fiancée and various parents. Diana also narrates brief sections in the first person. This narrative approach creates a long list of potential suspects as the reader becomes aware of people’s actions and motivations which cause them to lie. Unfortunately, the distinctiveness of one perspective makes it easy to identify the killer.

Diana’s return as a ghost to provide her point of view is, I think, unnecessary. She doesn’t remember who killed her, presumably having blocked it from her memory because of the trauma, so she has nothing to add that will provide clues to her murderer’s identity. Most of her comments are about the grieving of her mother and her friends. What she mentions the reader already knows from others, so this supernatural element seems purposeless.

Of course it is not just Diana’s life that is destroyed. As secrets are uncovered, it’s obvious that the lives of many are turned upside down and will never be the same. The fallout may include marriages and careers being damaged beyond repair. Parents question how well they know their children. And people become suspicious of others, even loved ones.

Diana makes a comment at one point: “How many ways, I think, can a girl be assaulted?” This statement summarizes the theme of violence against women that permeates the book. Diana is harmed by other people besides her killer. She and other girls are subjected to unwanted sexual attention and suffer at the hands of men wanting to control their lives. And those who should protect them are dismissive and negligent.

This is an enjoyable book, and its short chapters make it a quick and easy read as well. Though it is not exceptional, I would classify it as a decent thriller perfect for a summer read.

Note: I received an eARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

Review of THE AFRICAN SAMURAI by Craig Shreve

 3.5 Stars

This novel is set in the late sixteenth century in Japan and is the fictionalized story of the first foreign-born Samurai, a black man from Africa.

The plot follows the story of a young boy, eventually given the name of Yasuke, who is kidnapped by the Portuguese from an unspecified African tribe. He is taken to India where he is trained to be a slave-soldier but then later finds himself amongst the Jesuits where he comes to the attention of Alessandro Valignano who educates him. Eventually he becomes the bodyguard for Valignano, the highest-ranking Jesuit in Asia, until he gifts him to Oda Nobunaga, a Japanese feudal warlord, in exchange for permission to erect a church. Nobunaga comes to trust and respect Yasuke and eventually he gives him the title of samurai.

The novel is narrated in first-person by Yasuke, though he tells his story in a non-linear fashion. The story alternates between his experiences in Japan and flashbacks to his childhood in Africa, his time enslaved and forced to fight in India, and his years spent in Europe with the Jesuits.

This is not my usual genre so it’s probably not a book I would have chosen to read were it not the 2024 SD&G Reads choice. It is a male-dominated book with few women. Yasuke thinks often of his mother but she features only in the flashbacks. Tomiko, one of Nobunaga’s servants, appears a few times but she is certainly not a central character and seems to have been added as a token female. I would have liked to learn more about Nobunaga’s home life. A quick Wikipedia search reveals that he had a wife, numerous concubines, and several children.

I understand that the author’s purpose was to tell Yasuke’s story, but I felt I got little sense of his daily life outside of training and fighting. I also get the impression that the author didn’t want to deviate from or take too many liberties with the limited historical information available about the protagonist. There is a non-fiction book about Yasuke which the author mentions in his bibliography. Why write fiction if not to imagine and dramatize that which is missing in biographical information? I guess I was looking for a richer, more in-depth imagining of Yasuke’s life.

It’s my failing, but I have to admit having difficulty with the Japanese names like Toyotomi, Tokugawa, and Takeda as well as Akechi and Azuchi. There are overly long passages describing the hierarchy of Japanese nobles, political rivalries and machinations, and military strategy; these bored me and some of them proved to be unnecessary to an understanding of events.

The book is very much an exploration of enslavement. At the age of twelve, Yasuke loses his identity, family, and freedom. He has no free agency; decisions are made for him by others. His value is only in his service: “It was the lesson I had learned many times over . . . That no matter how many years I had served . . . no matter how faithfully and how well, and regardless of the good treatment and fine clothes and training and occasional freedoms, in the end I was still a thing to be traded. I was still property.”

Yasuke learns to survive. He learns that “Adapting to new circumstances meant releasing any attachments to the old” and “Making myself valuable was one element of my survival. The other was learning everything I could of my new environment.” He proves to be intelligent and diligent, always observant and alert to dangers. Given what he endures, it is impossible not to find him a sympathetic character. It is heartwarming to see him finally be given freedom and the home he has long sought, though he questions the price he has paid: “was it worth it? Taken from my village, forced into war, . . . were the horrors suffered along the way justified by the honor waiting at the end? I could not bring myself to say yes. Too many had died, some at my own hand. . . . All justified by my own survival. . . The price was too high. But the price had already been paid, regardless.”

There are a couple of passages that I really liked. One is Yasuke’s reflection that humans are the same regardless of where they live: “So many reminders of home, in this place so far away from what should have been my home. The traditions of painted faces and carved masks, and song and dance. The beliefs that we can be guided by the spirits of our ancestors. Even the legends, of holy mountains and gods that fought over the land. All these things made me wonder if maybe men everywhere were the same.”

I also liked Tomiko’s rebuttal to Yasuke’s comment that he finds Japanese culture strange: “’No . . . you are just seeing it with strange eyes.’” He reflects “I suddenly understood how the foreign slavers and priests could look at my people as savages, not understanding our ways, evaluating our customs and practices against their standards, their experience.”

What the book also emphasized for me is the evils brought by Christianization. Yasuke mentions to Nobunaga that “’Many of [the Jesuits] are harmless priests and true believers. But some of them are far from that. Some are soldiers, criminals, killers, who were offered a choice between execution and salvation. There are dangerous men amongst them.’” Valignano chastises a priest for not baptizing Yasuke, stating, “’Why do we send our missionaries out to the farthest reaches of the world if we don’t believe the people we find there to be God’s children?’” However, he has little respect for the culture and beliefs of others and will do whatever he thinks is necessary to build his churches. He treats Yasuke like property in the belief that “’How can something that is necessary be evil?’”

This is an interesting novel about a largely unknown historical figure, though I would have preferred a more detailed depiction of all aspects of a samurai’s life. Readers should be forewarned that there is a lot of graphic violence: men are brutally tortured and killed and several commit seppuku, ritual suicide.

Review of BECOMING MARLOW FIN by Ellen Won Steil (New Release)

 3.5 Stars

This book is a mystery, family drama, romance, and psychological thriller.

In 1995, a six-year-old Black girl is found abandoned in the woods and is adopted by the Baek family that finds her. Stella and Patrick bring her into their family which also includes their eight-year-old daughter Isla and Patrick’s Korean mother known by all as Moni. That abandoned girl, Marlow Fin, becomes a supermodel. In 2021, she grants a tell-all interview in which she discusses her life and her role in some tragic events within her family. The nature of these tragedies and a number of family secrets are slowly revealed.

The book has multiple points of view. Isla’s sections, narrated in first person, focus on the past: how life within the family changed with Marlow’s arrival. Marlow’s section, in the present, is in question-and-answer interview form. There are also some third-person chapters from the perspective of a young woman named Wren; she describes events in her life in the 1980s.

There is considerable suspense. It becomes clear that there is an undercurrent of anger and tension within the family. Stella is reticent to accept Marlow and the husband and wife argue regularly, though Moni tries to protect the girls from witnessing these angry exchanges. Then as the girls grow up, jealousy arises between them. Marlow’s beauty tends to upstage Isla, though Marlow seems envious of her sister. And there is definitely a dark side to Marlow: “She was beyond the realm of control.”

The only truly likeable main character is Moni who loves everyone in the family. She is kind and welcoming to everyone. When the girls become friends with Sawyer who moves in next door with his grandmother, Moni welcomes them into the neighbourhood and ends up feeding Sawyer almost daily. Other characters prove to have less than admirable qualities and all have secrets.

There is a vagueness about some events that is problematic. Exactly how certain events happened is never explained. The ending also does not answer all the reader’s questions. This nebulous quality affects the novel’s credibility. I want details so I can believe that what supposedly happened could realistically have occurred. The somewhat open-ended closing may bother some readers.

The plot is carefully constructed to maximize twists. There are layers of family secrets, some of which I guessed though others are worse than I expected. These revelations leave the reader to re-evaluate impressions of characters so a re-reading might be interesting.

This book is recommended to those who enjoy trying to find the truth amongst secrets, lies, and rumours.

Note: I received an eARC from the publisher via NetGalley.