Books by the Beach Book Club – International Nonfiction: History, Memoir (Fiji)
Kava in the Blood by Peter Thomson
*NOTE: The author, Peter Thomson, is a fifth generation Fijian, born to British colonial administrator. He served in many different Fijian government positions (as did his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather). Thomson has distinguished experience in diplomatic services, including as Permanent Representative of Fiji to the United Nations and President of the seventy-first session of the United Nations General Assembly.
Kava in the Blood begins with the first of Fiji's coups, in May of 1987, and ends with the second, in September 1987. Between these two upheavals, Thomson acted as the permanent secretary to the governor general (later president), Ratu Sir Penaia Ganilau, who attempted to restore order to the fractured political system.
Position of Coup Supporters:
“Fijians should produce a new constitution for Fiji which would irrevocably entrench political power in the hands of indigenous Fijians.” Which includes “the primacy of indigenous rights over the democratic rights of non-indigenous citizens.”
NOTE: *Non-indigenous = not belonging to or descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a place.
The non-indigenous people in Fiji include: European settlers who began arriving in 1840 and descendants of Indian indentured servants brought to Fiji in 1879 to work in sugar cane fields.
Thomson grew up as a "kavalaini" or non-indigenous Fijian and, until the coups, had full citizenship rights.
👉“I felt a creeping sense of delusion at being part of a country which, because of my European forbears, was now pointing a finger at me and saying, ‘Vulagi’ the Fijian word for visitor, or in this sense, foreigner.”
After the second coup, he had to give up his Fijian citizenship and was exiled. (He was eventually able to return years later and regain his citizenship.)
Thomson spends much of the book justifying his actions, and those of Ratu Penaia, then giving an account of historical events which obviously is difficult to do in a personal memoir. He also alternates accounts of the political intricacies of the inter-coup period with memories from his idyllic Fijian childhood. It certainly sounds like a wonderful place to live – except for the coups.
Fiction: Science fiction, nuclear war
The Last Day: A Novel of the Day After Tomorrow by Helen McCloy/Clarkson
*NOTE: This book was published in 1959.
It was a lovely August day. Bill and Lois arrived at their summer cottage in Selsea, a small, island fishing village. With their teenage daughter in France, they were looking forward to a quiet, tranquil vacation. They were a little surprised that no one was on the beach, but they weren’t worried about it. Because they were on vacation, they had not turned on the radio or read a newspaper. In their cottage that evening they finally turned on the radio. There was a report of an international crisis, but they weren’t worried. Bill and Lois had heard these types of reports before.
The next morning, they decided to lounge in bed …
“It was then we saw it – far across the dunes, on the horizon – the vast, idiot glare, more blinding than the sun itself. The sand was dazzling white, then red as hellfire in that sudden, monstrous, man-made day that came without dawn and fled without dusk … but still there was no sound.”
Seconds later they heard the roar and felt the blast that destroyed their cottage. It was all over in a few moments. At first, Bill and Lois felt relieved. The worst had happened, and they were still alive.
The people in Selsea suddenly transformed from passive observers to actors in a critical drama. They held an extended town-meeting to plan for survival. After the meeting, the people of Selsea performed a series of actions to try to delay and perhaps conquer their radiation danger. But when those actions are finished and the characters are left to wait and see what they've achieved, The Last Day shifts to anti-nuclear discourse.
The Last Day focuses on Lois’ view of events as a mother and follows her thoughts. Of course, she wonders if someone will help her daughter in France as she helps with her neighbor’s child. Lois has the same view of war as many American mothers living during the Cold War era. Their view is critical, because in that era there was great fear of nuclear warfare. This then led to numerous anti-nuclear, anti-war protest groups including some specifically made up of women. These women were encouraged and supported by the nationally admired pediatrician and author Dr. Benjamin Spock. The Last Day is unusual for its sustained, determined pacifist view on war.
👉“They used three devices to emasculate democracy. First, they classified all pertinent information as military top secret. Second, they initiated a bi-partisan foreign policy so that presidential elections became personal popularity contests instead of opportunities to vote on the issue of life or death. Third, they intimidated pacifists by equating them with communists and traitors and so muzzled dissenting opinion.”
Fiction: Contemporary
The Last List of Mabel Beaumont by Laura Pearson
Well, this was a strange one! It starts out as a sweet story about an 86-year-old woman, Mabel, whose husband, Arthur, dies. Arthur was a list maker and Mabel finds a list he was making the day before he died which includes “Find D.” She decides that "Find D" means that she should find the best friend of her youth, Dot. However, Dot and Mabel have been estranged since Mabel’s marriage 62 years previously. Mabel then enlists the help of her newly acquired group of friends who have their own personal problems to solve.
The Last List is a well-written novel that I initially enjoyed but by the end I was totally irritated with it. Most of the book concerns recently widowed Mabel making new friends and then meddling in their lives - such as interfering in their marriages, estranged family relationships, and even making up untrue accusations to break up a relationship. Mabel even sneakily accesses her friends’ cell phones without their permission because she thinks she “needs to help.” After each interference the author decides to have all the circumstances magically correct themselves, as though Mabel was right all along to have meddled - WTH!!!!
Throughout all her shenanigans, Mabel reflects on her 62 years with Arthur, the poor man! We learn that Mabel married Arthur even though she didn’t love him and refused to have a family with him against his wishes. Arthur always put Mabel first regardless of her shutting him out, pushing him away from any intimacy, and effectively ruining his life in many ways.
Nonfiction: History, Biography, Presidents
Life After Power: Seven Presidents and Their Search for Purpose Beyond the White House by Jared Cohen
This excellent book is about history and LIFE! Each one of the seven presidents in this book demonstrate that America’s presidents can sometimes accomplish more in private life than when they were in the White House. They can teach us how we, too, can take on new identities and find new purposes in life.
Publisher’s Description: “Thomas Jefferson was the first former president to accomplish great things after the White House, shaping public debates and founding the University of Virginia, an accomplishment he included on his tombstone, unlike his presidency. John Quincy Adams served in Congress and became a leading abolitionist, passing the torch to Abraham Lincoln. Grover Cleveland was the only president in American history to serve a nonconsecutive term. William Howard Taft became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Herbert Hoover shaped the modern conservative movement, led relief efforts after World War II, reorganized the executive branch, and reconciled John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon. Jimmy Carter had the longest post-presidency in American history, advancing humanitarian causes, human rights, and peace. George W. Bush made a clean break from politics, bringing back George Washington’s precedent, and reminding the public that the institution of the presidency is bigger than any person.”
Life After Power tells the stories of what is possible in the “new chapters” of life. My favorite is John Quincy Adams (JQA). The son of founding father and mother, John and Abigail Adams, he was an ambassador, senator, secretary of state and then President of the United States. After JQA was defeated by Andrew Jackson for a second term, he took a “step down” and served nine terms as a congressman. In Congress, JQA supported citizens’ First Amendment petitions for the abolition of slavery. His steadfast belief in the constitutional right for citizens to petition the government resulted in the Gag Rule, which he fought. In 1839 he proposed a constitutional amendment that would ensure every child born in the United States would be free, regardless of race. He was an ardent proponent of the abolition of slavery. JQA defended the Amistad captives in front of the United States Supreme Court and won! Sadly, he had a stroke while serving in Congress and died in the Capitol on February 23, 1848. What an amazing man and a true public servant.
The post-presidency is a fact of American life. The seven presidents discussed in this book demonstrate how former presidents continued to serve the public good but in a different leadership and humanitarian roles even during the last chapters of their lives. Their lives inspire us to write our own purposeful last chapters.
“Would it promote the peace of the community or the stability of the government to have half a dozen men who had had credit enough to be raised to the seat of the supreme magistracy, wandering among the people like discontented ghost, and sighing for a place which they were destined never more to possess?” – Alexander Hamilton, Federalist 72
Mysteries
This month I decided to try three new-to-me mystery series.
1. Wycliffe Series by W. J. Burley
The Wycliffe series was written by author W.J. Burley and is comprised of a total of 22 books released between 1968 and 2000. Our library system only has three of them and I read: Wycliffe in Paul’s Court; Wycliffe and the Tangled Web; and Wycliffe and the Last Rites. I plan to look for more of Wycliffe at my favorite used bookstore.
I learned about this series from Amazon Prime Video. There are five seasons of Wycliffe available for viewing which are “based on the Wycliffe series characters.” Personally, only seasons one and two were close in quality to the books. Of course, in my opinion, books are always so much better than film adaptations!
Every book of this series features the lead detective Charles Wycliffe and two of his co-detectives – Kersey and Lane. They are primarily set in rural or small villages in Cornwall, England. The criminals depicted in the novels are not professionals, but common people driven by emotions of hatred, jealousy, or frustration.
I appreciated how Burley depicted the tensions arising within people living and working in small communities. I was totally immersed in each book I read, these are excellent, quick, and easy to read. Two thumbs up for Wycliffe!
2. Mobile Library Mystery Series by Ian Sansom
I read the first book of four in the series, The Case of the Missing Books. This is a “cozy” mystery.
Publisher’s Description: “Israel Armstrong is a passionate soul, lured to Ireland by the promise of an exciting new career. Alas, the job that awaits him is not quite what he has in mind. Still, Israel is not one to dwell on disappointment, as he prepares to drive a mobile library around a small, damp Irish town. After all, the scenery is lovely, the people are charming--but where are the books? The rolling library's 15,000 volumes have mysteriously gone missing, and it's up to Israel to discover who would steal them...and why. And perhaps, after that, he will tackle other bizarre and perplexing local mysteries--like, where does one go to find a proper cappuccino and a decent newspaper?”
I keep trying to “like” cozy mysteries. However, I won’t be reading any more books in this series. It was just too silly for my taste which probably is why many other readers like it!
3. Lake District Mysteries Series by Martin Edwards
There are eight books in this series. The series centers on Hannah Scarlett, Detective Chief Inspector in the Cumbria Constabulary who heads the Cold Case Review Team. Partnering with historian Daniel Kind, they work together to solve cold case mysteries. This series is set in the Lake District, a region in North-West England.
I read The Arsenic Labyrinth. Ten years after the disappearance of a local woman, Emma Bestwick, a stranger comes to the Lake District and offers up tantalizing clues that could lead to a solution to the mystery. Scarlett's cold case and Kind's historical research intersect, this time at the Arsenic Labyrinth, a group of mining tunnels that could hold the answer to Emma's disappearance.
I liked The Arsenic Labyrinth so I tried The Girl They All Forgot. This time Scarlett reopens the case of the unsolved disappearance of Ramona Smith. A local man, Gerry Lace, was accused of killing Ramona, but a body was never found, and, eventually, Lace was acquitted. The case makes headlines once again after Lace’s son, Darren, drowns himself. When Daniel’s life is threatened, Hannah knows she must act quickly to keep him safe while also using her detective skills to find out what really happened to Ramona.
Fiction: Historical (1918, Ireland)
The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue
The Pull of the Stars takes place during the 1918 Flu Pandemic, in Dublin, Ireland. Julia Power is almost thirty, single and living with her WWI veteran brother who cannot or will not speak. It takes place over only a few days and barely moves outside of the single hospital ward in which Nurse Julia cares for those who are pregnant and in quarantine.
👉“Here we are in the golden age of medicine— making such great strides against rabies, typhoid fever, diphtheria— and a common or garden influenza is beating us hollow.”
Even as people were killing each other on the battlefields of the First World War, an even more deadly killer was spreading from person to person. With the combination of religious aversion to contraception, the social pressure to churn out babies (upwards of ten was the norm), sexual abuses in religious institutions, a maternal mortality rate of 15%, and the 1918 flu, this was a terrible time and place to be a woman and pregnant.
We follow Nurse Julia through a few days’ work - seeing a mother trying and failing to give birth to her twelfth child because her body has had enough. She provides loving care for a young victim of sexual abuse terrified as she is forced to give birth to the baby of the male relative who raped her. Nurse Julia also cares for a "fallen woman" of the Magdalene laundries forced to give up her babies.
Assisting Nurse Julia is twenty-two-year-old Bridie Sweeney a volunteer from a workhouse. What Bridie lacks in skill is more than made up for by her willingness to work and learn. There is also Dr. Lynn, a woman who acknowledges Nurse Julia’s efforts and treats her as an equal even as she avoids arrest as a member of Sinn Féin. (*NOTE: Dr. Lyn’s character is based upon Dr. Kathleen Florence Lynn.) The Pull of the Stars includes the Easter Rising, Magdalene laundries, WWI, and the flu pandemic creating an accurate and realistic plot. I appreciated this uniquely Irish perspective to history.
Tandem Read: History, Presidents, Politics
NOTE: *I didn’t intentionally plan to read these two books at the same time - alternating listening to one on audio and reading the other in print -, but I’m glad I did!
1. Our Ancient Faith: Lincoln, Democracy, and the American Experiment by Allen C. Guelzo, a Princeton professor and widely recognized as a leading Lincoln scholar.
Guelzo uses his vast knowledge of Lincoln's speeches, state papers, and letters to more fully interpret Lincolnian democracy. He shares views that will probably resonate with many who follow current events and ponder the present state of our nation. Can Lincoln serve as a source of beneficial wisdom for us today?
Lincoln’s words and actions suggest several improvements on American democracy. We could:
- “recover consent,” by improving the political process (closed primary voting, gerrymandering, etc.) to avoid ballots “imposed by a self-designated oligarchy”
- “embrace an equality in which no privileged groups claim superior sanction for power.” by acknowledging and limiting the influence of PACs, lobbyists, religious organizations, etc.
- Economically, there could be “an American system that protects American industry and productivity, [and] empowers and organizes workers and small producers” From his earliest days in politics, Lincoln was always strongly in favor of economic self-determination, and leveraging the influence of the federal government to help provide people with what they needed to succeed.
If we are to learn anything from Lincoln, it’s that democracy is not self-sustaining. We must protect it, participate in it, and fight for it if necessary. We should not be lulled into complacency by suggesting that Lincoln saved democracy, so we don’t have to. That idea is just as dangerous to our democracy as any of the current threats we face.
Following Lincoln’s “ancient faith” we can recover true citizenship and have “a democracy which embodies Lincoln’s own virtues – resilience, humility, persistence, work and dignity.”
2. Surviving Autocracy by Masha Gessen
I selected this book not really knowing what it was about. I saw an interview with the author and this book was mentioned so I decided to read it. Surviving Autocracy explores and connects themes of democracy and autocracy. Two days after the 2016 election, Gessen published an essay in the New York Review of Books titled “Autocracy: Rules for Survival,” which drew on the author’s experience growing up in the Soviet Union, reporting on Vladimir Putin and observing the Trump campaign. The rules were memorable and to the point:
- Believe the autocrat.
- Do not be taken in by small signs of normality.
- Institutions will not save you.
- Be outraged.
- Don’t make compromises.
- Remember the future.
In case you forgot what Trump said or did during his term as President, this book is a comprehensive history of his words (direct quotations) and actions (with actual authoritative citations, not social media memes!). Rather than attempt to claim power through one dramatic act, Trump did so through a series of steps that he said were to “drain the swamp”, but the goal was to “change the nature of American government and politics.” Trump’s steps include:
- undermining any mechanisms of accountability;
- downgrading the daily political discourse with name calling and bullying;
- abusing his office for the enrichment of his family’s bank accounts;
- embracing xenophobia (extreme dislike of foreigners);
- and praising foreign dictators while picking fights with democratic allies.
This was the gradual erosion of democracy, not by a coup but by co-optation – taking possession of the office of the Presidency to use for his, not the citizens’, purposes.
After losing the popular vote (again) and the Electoral College in 2020, Trump tried to seize power by committing Electoral College fraud thus inciting the January 6, 2021 insurrection. Most recently, his campaign committee, including his daughter-in-law, took over the Republication National Committee.
👉“Trump’s incompetence is militant. It is not a factor that might mitigate the threat he poses: it is the threat itself.”
We are now post-Trump, so far. We can recommit to true citizenship that Lincoln espoused and to reinvention “of institutions, of what politics means to us, and of what it means to be a democracy, if that is indeed what we choose to be.” If this book offers no other imperative, it is to remember that the choice always remains – democracy or autocracy?
“This is the most miserable book-writing experience I have ever had in my life.” - Masha Gessen
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