The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

I was given this book for my birthday by my fabulous sisters.  When I first read the back of the book, I thought the topic was very interesting, and I would definetly like to read an article about it.  At the same time, I kind of worried that an entire book might be a little too much.  BUT, I was pleasantly surprised.  I would have read this all in one sitting if I lived that sort of life!  I did read it as much as I could during the day, and way later into the night than I should have.  The book focuses more on the human story of HeLa, than the scientific importance.  The science is definitely there, but it is explained in a way everyone can understand and relate too.  I think maybe because I can relate to Rebecca Skloot (really just being the same age and race) more than the Lack family, I enjoyed that her efforts to get the information and write the book were also included in the story.  (I read a couple reviews that did not appreciate this aspect.)

Henrietta was a poor black woman who grew up working on a tobacco farm with her extended family.  Shortly after the birth of her fifth child, she found out she had cervical cancer.  This was in 1951, she was treated, but the cancer spread and she died.  Samples of both her healthy cells and cancer cells were taken by scientists at John Hopkins when she was treated, and the cancer cells were the first human cells to survive and keep reproducing outside the body.  This was revolutionary, and the cell line called HeLa changed the world in many different ways.  Everytime Rebecca Skloot lists off scientific advances that have used HeLa, it is impressive. 

 Even though they were responsible for taking the cells without asking or informing Henrietta and her family, I really enjoyed reading about George Gey and his wife Margaret.  I liked that Gey built his labs out of scrap metal and  invented amazing things for scientific research without patenting them.  He sent the HeLa cells to anyone who was using them for scientific research.  I feel like his motives were good, he wasn't looking for fame, he was just a really smart guy that was obsessed with science.  I enjoyed the simplified explanations of how cells were used, and how specifically HeLa's cells allowed scientists to study so many different things. 

Henrietta's family really suffered after she died.  Her children were mistreated and abused by the cousin who came into take care of them.  I actually skipped a couple of pages that went into detail about this.  Three of her kids were still really young when she died, and an other one had been institutionalized for epilepsy and other illnesses.  Luckily, the oldest brother married a woman, Bobette, that figured out what was going on and rescued the kids.  Sadly, the damage had already been done.  Add to that poverty, un-diagnosed hearing problems and struggles with the law, and her children had really hard lives.  When they were asked for blood samples years later, bits and pieces of the history of their mother's cells were explained to them.  But not explained well.  They each struggled with it in different ways.  I think their reactions are well-justified, and as they slowly confide in the author and explain their experiences, you can really understand why they each reacted they way they did.  Some of the descendants wanted financial retribution, which is also understandable since they are all struggling with different illnesses, and many don't have health insurance.  Ultimately, they just want people to know who their mother was, and better understand themselves.

Much of the story comes from Deborah, who was only 2 or 3 when her mom died.  She has a lot of spunk, and definetly grows on you as she searches for information about her mom.  I think the biggest tragedy in the book is not that the cells were taken, but that those 5 kids lost their mom when they were so young.  I'm sure they would have still had struggles, but if they had had Henrietta to love them and teach them, I think things would have worked out better.

Rebecca Skloot explains different advances in patient privacy and disclosure.  She outlines different agencies' attempts to prevent what happened to the Lacks family from happening again.  But doctors can still store and use your cells without you knowing.  As I read the different issues and concerns, I wondered how I would feel if I found out 20 years later that my cells had been used.  Honestly, if anyone asked me, I would happily donate blood or tissues for scientific research.  I know when different kids of mine were born, we were asked to participate in different studies.  I find that kind of stuff fascinating.  One of them is in a data base for hearing loss, when my last baby was born we were finally able to donate cord blood.  I'm sure if it isn't used for a transfusion, they'll use it for research, and I'm really OK with all that.  One study even says that my appendix that was removed a while back could still be around in a lab somewhere.  But I'm OK with that.

I recommend this book.  It will be different than anything else you've read.  It is very interesting, educational and thought-provoking.  It seems to be very popular, so I'd love to hear what you thought of it.

Wish You Well by David Baldacci

I really liked this novel and recommend it.  I realized about 30 pages in that I had read this book before.  I went a little crazy trying to remember when, and who had recommended it to me.  I still haven't figured it out.  I enjoyed reading it again, and found I already had all the imagery of the setting in my head.

Lou is 12 and her brother is 7 when they are in a tragic car crash that leaves their mom in a catatonic state, and they move to live with their Great-grandma high in the mountains of Virginia.  Of course Lou is spunky, smart and endearing.  You love her from the start, faults and all.  Oz is a sweet little boy who teaches Lou through his limitless faith and ability to love.

The story is predictable (even if you haven't read it before), but it's still nice.  The main characters learn what you hope they will learn, and their relationships grow as they have to rely on each other.  Life is hard, there's a very real "enemy," and the poor kids have to deal with loss after loss.  BUT overall you leave with a good feeling.  It reminds me most of To Kill a Mockingbird.  And it has a nice storybook ending.

In his Author's Note, David Baldacci says: "Once we reach adulthood, most of us assume we know all there is to know about our parents and other family members.  However, if you take the time to ask questions and actually listen to the answers, you may find there is still much to learn about people so close to you."  I had this type of experience right before my dad died.  My sisters were filling out a little Grandpa book, and I learned some great stories about my dad's life as a child that somehow I hadn't ever heard before.  So I agree with his sentiment.

Here's a quote from one of the new friends they make on the mountain: "See, that why I ain't go to church.  Figger I got me a church wherever I be.  Want'a talk to God, well I say, 'Howdy-howdy, God,' and we jaw fer a bit."

Another one I liked:  "________ had had no material possessions to his name and yet had been the happiest creature Lou had ever met.  He and God would no doubt get along famously."

My favorite, that choked me up a bit:

"One day you're gonna get bigger than me, then I'm going to be running to you when I get scared."

"How do you know that?"

"Because that's the deal God makes between big sisters and their little brothers."

There's an afterward titled, Today, which kind of felt like those updates on the characters that sometimes roll at the end of movies.  It seemed a little unnecessary to me.  I did really like the Letter from the Author, which followed it, that included old photographs of his ancestors that lived in the mountains.

Have any of you read it?  Did you recommend it to me years ago?  Like 6 or 7?  I hate when I can't remember stuff!

When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead

I saw this book on my cousin Betsy's blog, then a few places after that, but I was way down the list on the library hold request.  Luckily, on Saturday I saw a copy in the teen section of the library!  Yay!  It is a Newberry winner, and the back says it is for 8-12 year old readers.  Because of that, you can read it quick.  Probably one sitting.  I liked it very much. 

I was a little put off in the beginning with all the references to the past, or future, or whatever.  But after getting over that, there wasn't anything else I didn't like in the book. 

Miranda is the main character.  She is 12, and lives with her mom in an apartment in New York.  She learns a lot about friendship and being nice through the course of the book.  She is smart, relatable and likable.  I liked Rebecca Stead's easy writing style.

Miranda's favorite book is A Wrinkle in Time, and hopefully you've read it because she does reference it a lot.  If you love A Wrinkle in Time, there's even more of a chance that you will really like this book. She has a bit of an mystery to solve herself after notes that seem to predict the future start appearing.  She feels nervous about them.  In fact, she is scared about a few things, and I like that.  I feel like she seems very normal, and even though she has a good life, nothing is too perfect.  She starts the story talking about how her best (only) friend had decided to take a break from her.  Because of that, she starts making new friends.  I thought that those relationships were portrayed really well.  I also liked the clever backdrop of helping her mom prepare to go on The $20,000 pyramid.

Here are a few quotes I really liked.

"It's all still there, like a movie I can watch when I want to.  Which is never."

"Sometimes you never feel meaner than the moment you stop being mean. It's like how turning on a light makes you realize how dark the room had gotten.  And the way you usually act, the things you would have normally done, are like these ghosts that everyone can see but pretends not to."

"They were circling each other and laughing and racing around and I wanted to be part of it so much that my heart almost broke watching."

The Blue Castle by L.M.Montgomery

I really liked this book!  Having re-read Anne of Green Gables recently, I was excited to read something else by L.M.  While the story is different, it leaves you with a similiar happy feeling.

Valancy is 29, in the 1920's in Canada.  She is part of a stuffy, snobby and controlling family.  She lives in an ugly room, does the same boring things each day and takes the brunt of rude behavior from her mother and extended family. "As far as she could look back, life was drab and colourless, with not one single crimson or purple spot anywhere.  As far as she could look forward it seemed certain to be just the same...."  The beginning felt kind of slow to me.  I didn't really want to try to keep all the relatives straight.  I did think it was funny when Valancy plays out in her head what each relative would say and do because her life and the people in it are so predictable.

Then, bom-bom-bom, she gets some news after a sneaky visit to a doctor, and Valancy decides to start living her life for herself.  She will say and do only what she wants.  Then her life really begins. 

And as in any good fairy-tale, there is a sweet romance.  (Although I don't love how it gets started.)   I love this description, "When he said good evening you felt that it was a good evening and that it was partly his doing that it was.  Also, you felt that some of the credit was yours." 

The Blue Castle is the imaginary home that Valancy used to escape to as a refuge from her boring, controlled life.  Her fantasies about it remind me of Anne.  But I also loved how when her life improves, she refers to her new home as The Blue Castle.  Not because it was what she had imagined, but because it made her dreams come true.  As she is reflecting on her happiness, she thinks, "It was amazing to be able to sit up half the night and look at the moon if you wanted to...Dawdle over meals as long as you wanted to....Sit on a sun-warm rock and paddle your bare feet in the hot sand if you wanted to.  Just sit and do nothing in the beautiful silence if you wanted to."  Sounds good to me.

I found this a charming little book.  I would recommend it for a quick fun read.  I think Disney could make it into a cute cartoon princess movie.  It's that kind of book.

Swimming by Nicola Keegan

I picked this up from the "Best Bets" shelf at my library.  I chose it based on the cover (see image right), and this description on the back, "Keegan's energy jumps off the page....Swimming is a wonderful coming-of-age story, a richly detailed account of a young woman channeling her rage, grief and insecurity into a passion to win.  The voice Keegan has invented for Pip is sarcastic, thoughtful, elegant, irreverent."  Plus, Judy Blume said, "I loved Swimming.  It's the most original novel I've read all year.  I can't get Pip's voice out of my mind.  Give yourself a treat this summer--read this book."  Seems like a book that I would like, right?  And while I didn't hate it, I wouldn't really recommend it.  There are so many better books.

I haven't ever read a book written in exactly this style.  It's first person, kind of stream of consciousness and all in Philomena's head.  The dialogue is only differentiated with italics, and chronology, ages, even settings, are often vague.  Sometimes she is telling you an old memory and then switches to what's happening now without any transition.  I thought it was interesting, and for me it worked sometimes, but other times it didn't.

Philomena is an interesting character.  You like her, then she and her friends are so mean and vulgar that you don't, then you feel bad for her and her falling apart family, then you feel proud, then annoyed.  I'm just not sure if over all I like her.  And even though you are in her head the whole time, it still feels detached. 

The story is really sad.  Her sister dies of cancer, a little later her dad dies in a plane crash, her mom stops leaving the house, her dog dies, and another sister ODs.  It has some good moments (like 11 Olympic gold medals!!) and some family reconciliations.  I enjoyed all the swimming stuff and also some insights the characters make.  I also liked how she uses "nervous breakdown" instead of "anxiety attack"  because, that's what they were called in the 80's.

Here are some quotes I thought were worth sharing:

"I feel the immense power of the dead, as if someone's flipped a switch and now I can see what's been making the shadows."


"If you move an atom, somewhere else an atom stops and starts twisting in the opposite direction.  Something like that has happened; things are exactly the same but twisting.  This is the opposite of joy."


"I only appreciate drama when it happens to fake people.  Roxanne doesn't like drama unless she's creating it.  Dot accepts drama as the weight she has to carry as naturally as her bones, but drama open a third eye in my mother, who now sees the drama in all things."


"So I opt for an English major with a French option.  English is better than perfect.  I sit around listening to real people talk about fake ones."


"There are two sea turtles swimming in front of her, an old one and a new one, with green froggy faces, two marble eyes, a round snout.  I feel my heart flood with love.  I am at one with everything as my breath bubbles out my tube into the hot dry air."


"Babies are...I've never thought...I stop mid sentence, filled with a dose of terror so intense my palms start to weep...What if you forget about it for a second and it rummages around in its bed until it buries itself in a blanket?  What if you leave it on the bed and it rolls on to a knife?"

So, I enjoyed parts of this book.  I'm interested to see what Nicola Keegan will do next.  I think she's a pretty good writer.  But I think there are enough other, better books for you to read.

The Weed that Strings the Hangman's Bag By Alan Bradley

Griff brought this purple beauty home from the library.  It's the next Flavia de Luce Mystery, and it didn't disappoint me.  If you liked The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, I think you'll like this.  She's still 10 going on 11, her family is the same and she solves another murder.  I thought it was another fun read, but the crime is a bit more tragic this time around.  Also, one of the things I liked about the first book was discovering Flavia's spunk and charm, but this time I already knew and loved her so that spark wasn't there. Even so, I loved reading her next adventure and I'm looking forward to A Red Herring Without Mustard.

Here are some quotes to further devote you to Flavia:

"Very well, then, I thought.  Actually, I thought more than that, but since I'm trying to be a better person..."

"You are unreliable, Flavia." he said. "Utterly unreliable."
Of course I was!  It was one of the things I loved most about myself!"

"At this, a great laugh went up from the children in the audience, and I have to admit I chuckled a little myself.  I'm at that age where I watch such things with two minds, one that cackles at these capers and another that never gets much beyond a rather jaded and self-conscious smile, like the Mona Lisa."

"All was in readiness.  The house lights had already been lowered to a level of delicious expectation.  Incidental music floated from backstage, and from time to time, the red velvet curtains on the puppet stage gave an enticing twitch."  I think this shows the perfect amount of description and adjectives.

If you were worried that the next book wouldn't be as good as first, you might be right.  But it's not far behind.  I recommend picking it up.

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

It's been a couple weeks and a fabulous vacation since I finished this book, so I've kind of struggled to focus my thoughts into a review. 

I liked Cutting for Stone, I got into the characters and their lives, and couldn't put it down.  But it is long, it is sad and it includes a lot of details that can be hard to read.  The book centers around doctors working in a charity hospital in Ethiopia.  There are a lot of surgical procedures, medical conditions and social interactions described in great detail.  To me it didn't seem too graphic, it seemed more National Geographic, but I didn't take the time to really visualize the gory details.  If you are looking to commit to a good, long story, I think you should try this book.

Now that I've got my warnings out of the way, it's important to say that the real story is more about family, loyalty and decisions the characters make.  Marion and Shiva are twins whose mother dies during their birth.  They are then raised by another man and woman at the hospital.  This all unfolds so sweetly, that I hate too summarize to much.  I really like the way Verghese writes and introduces his characters.  He also has a cool way of dropping hints, not quite foreshadowing, that I loved.

"But now, when her newborns, her Shiva and Marion, cried, it was like no other earthly sound.  It summoned her from sleep's catacombs and brought shushing noises to her throat as she rushed to the incubator.  It was a personal call--her babies wanted her! 
She remembered a phenomenon she'd experienced for years when she was about to fall asleep: a sense that someone was calling her name.  Now she told herself it had been her unborn twins telling her they were coming."

Isn't that pretty?  I think maybe Verghese could be edited down a bit.  But I feel that way about a lot of LONG novels.  He gives a lot of background to each of his characters, and some people might find it tedious. 

There's a part where Ghosh is teaching Marion about what to listen for when checking a patient's pulse.  As Marion begins to understand he reflects, "How exciting to be able to touch a human being with one's fingertips and know all these things about them.  I said as much to Ghosh, and from his expression you would think I'd said something profound."  The philosophies that each of the doctors adopt and explain through out the book are fascinating to me.

I really liked Marion, he chose to be a moral person when he was young.  Then there were moments when others assume he has done something his brother did, and he doesn't set them straight.  I wanted to scream at him to clear his name and explain what was really going on.  But of course he doesn't.  That drove me crazy, but also drove the plot for good and bad.  I felt like the main characters were really noble, and I thought about them when I wasn't reading.

In the prologue, it says "Life, too, is like that.  You live it forward, but understand it backward."  I liked thinking about that too.

Here's another part I liked, "When Ghosh emerged from the house, running as fast as he could, and when he grabbed me, fear and concern in his eyes, the last of my illusions vanished.  The adults weren't in charge."  I can remember that feeling when you are young and you realize that your parents can't control everything.

On a lighter note, he describes his parents bridge nights.  "A burst of conversation like a collective sigh signaled the end of a round. I loved to observe them play."   I remember hearing the exact same thing during my parents' Nertz parties!

And I LOVED this,  "I spent as much time as I could with Ghosh.  I wanted every bit of wisdom he could import to me.  All sons should write down every word of what their fathers have to say to them.  I tried.  Why did it take an illness for me to recognized the value of time with him?  It seems we humans never learn.  And so we relearn the lessons every generation and then want to write epistles."

And this, "He sat self-consciously on the edge of the bed.  He touched my hand.  His lips parted.
'Wait,' I said.  'Don't say anything yet.'  I looked out of the window at the clouds, at distant smokestacks.  The world was intact now, but I knew once he spoke it wouldn't be so.'"  This reminds me of a quote from Spanglish.  Something like, "can you repeat that because I couldn't hear anything after the crack in the planet."  Both referring to horrible life-changing moments when you know having heard something, nothing will ever be the same.  But I think it's beautifully written here.

I liked Verghese's writing style.  I can't read book after book that is this detailed and involved, but every now and then I like a really meaty novel.  I thought there were some really good character traits illustrated, and I loved the way that the doctors at the hospital functioned as a family.  Even when the events were heartbreaking, I loved reading how they handled them.  I also felt there were really profound statements thought and spoken through the characters. 

This is definitely a thought-provoking discussion-worthy book.  Tell me what you thought about it!

New Title List

For awhile I've been trying to figure out how to use the "search this blog" feature at the top of my page.  It only seems to bring up results for the past few months, instead of my whole blog.  Super annoying.  So, while in DC, Colby gave me an idea of how to make EVERY book I've reviewed easily available from my front page.

Now I have an "All the Books I've Reviewed" list on my sidebar.

I hope it's helpful.  Sorry I left the "The"s in the titles.  I might change that.

I've been on vacation, but I promise to get a new review up next week!

Happy reading!

Kammy

Charms for the Easy Life by Kaye Gibbons

Thank you Tara for the great recommendation! I liked this book and I think it's one I can univerally recommend.  It is a testament to women and reading.  The characters are great and the story is original.  It was a nice change of pace from other books I've read this year.

The story is told through Margaret's eyes as a teenager living in the South during World War II.  Her grandmother is known all around for being a midwife and healer.  Both Margaret and her mom Sophia go along with Charlie Kate on house calls and help take care of the sick.  I loved the relationship between these three smart, strong women.  They stick together, they watch out for each other, and they take care of everyone.  This book has some really sad moments, but overall you feel good reading it.

Here are some quotes (mostly wisdom from the grandmother) that I really liked.

“What is most fascinating with regard to her dentistry is that she would put women patients under, but work on the men as is.  She believed that although women, as a rule, could stand more pain and take more punishment than men, they should not have to and would not ever suffer under her care….The degree to which a woman looked tired in the face dictated the amount of chloroform she received, and sometimes when my grandmother recognized that a woman was too taxed by her life, she did her the favor of knocking her out to the point that she couldn’t neither lift her head nor say her name the rest of the day.  She said, 'Some of these women, if they didn’t have me work on their mouths, they’d never have gotten off their feet.'"

“She told me once, with great assurance, ‘I have read two books a week for thirty years. I am satisfied that I know everything.'”

“My grief had been plain and unpoetic, and the hole in my heart would’ve grown wide enough and deep enough to consume me had my mother and grandmother not kept me with them, and still.”


“In our house, the point of reading and learning was neither to impress outsiders nor to get a job or a husband, nothing like that. It had nothing to do with anybody but the three of us. When a good book was in the house, the place fairly vibrated. We trained ourselves to be exceptionally fast readers so a book could be traded around before the nagging and tugging became intolerable……We shared a curiosity about the world that couldn’t be satisfied in any other way.”


“My grandmother said, “When a marriage goes sour, two things start to happen. You can’t look at the other person chew and so you stare at your plate all through dinner, and you can’t sleep at night for harboring thoughts of how the one laying beside you spoiled something you wanted. Things go downhill fast when you can’t eat and sleep together, which are what married people are supposed to enjoy doing the most.”

Don't you love those?  I really loved these three women, and I think you'll like this book!

I Was Told There'd Be Cake by Sloane Crosley

I've been thinking about writing about this book for a couple days.  I contemplated not reviewing it, since I hate to have two negative-ish reviews in a row.  Last week I found this book review blog that only does positive reviews.  Which I guess I kind of understand, but I like to be warned about books and read a different opinions.  When I remember to, I like to look over Goodreads and decide if I want to read a book based on which of my friends like it and which don't.  SO I am going to tell you why I didn't like this book.  And I feel like I can be kind of mean because if you publish a book, you are asking people to judge you.  I say so at least.

I believe these essays are supposed to be funny.  Little slice of life, sort of self-deprecating, observations and experiences that she has chosen to re-tell for our entertainment.  I think Sloane Crosley has some good topics and stories to tell, but when she does, they just don't work for me.  They aren't funny.  Several of them felt like a whole different observation was tacked on in the last paragraph.  Others just didn't seem interesting enough.  Like maybe she needed to embellish what actually happened a bit more.  Some seemed to not explain enough, and others seemed to explain too many irrelevant things.

I remember trying to write this type of thing in college and I was terrible at it.  Really.  I didn't know how to not tell it exactly how it was, and I didn't know what was universal or actually appealing for others to read.  I'm mentioning that to show that I know how NOT to write these kinds of things.  Also, I read a lot more funny and interesting essays on blogs. And I have funny friends.  All of whom are way funnier than Sloane Crosley.

There's also this shock factor she seems to throw at you sometimes.  Like choosing to use the F-word when it isn't even funny, and seems forced and out of place.  Are you just trying to show us you are edgy? Dumb.
Some of her essays seemed like something I would like to read in a magazine, and might even take a mental note of her name to look up sometime.  When I was reading I kept thinking that maybe the next essay would make me laugh and I would join her fan club.  But it didn't happen.  I guess it wasn't so awful that I stopped reading, but I wouldn't recommend it.  Not at all.

I'd like to throw Sloane Crosley a bone, and admit that there were a couple essays that were OK.  They are the ones I wouldn't mind reading in the doctor's office waiting room.  There's an essay, The Height of Luxury,  about going through her mom's jewelry the night before her 16th birthday, and finding out her mom had been married before.  It was OK.  There's another about her stint as a volunteer at a butterfly exhibit. Sign Language for Infidels. The thing is that it seemed like there were all these funny things about it, but when I read it, it was not funny. I probably enjoyed Lay Like Broccoli the best, where she goes into her vegetarianism/vegan/sushi decision making.  The very last one, Fever Faker, is about when she finds out she might have a disease.  I really almost thought it was going to be funny.

I'm sad this book wasn't funny.  I think that the title is awesome.  I think the idea of it was great.  But it kind of reminded me of watching Saturday Night Live sometimes.  You know how that is, funny people, funny idea, dumb skit?