Monday, May 30, 2005

Book Review--First, Do No Harm, by Larry Karp

This is a murder mystery that begins with a computer programmer, Martin, telling his father that he's been accepted into medical school. Most parents would be thrilled with this news, but Martin's dad, an eccentric painter, is horrified (even though Martin doesn't expect him to pay for it).

Martin cannot understand his father's reaction, until his father, Leo, tells him a story about his own father, Dr. Samuel Firestone, a legendary doctor in their small town. Leo spent the summer of 1943 working as his father's extern and received quite an education. Most of the book is spent delineating this summer. As it turns out, Leo's father, though an amazing doctor in many ways, is participating in all kinds of illegal activities--baby brokering, illegal abortions, black-market pharmaceuticals, and supplying heroin to an addict. On one case, Dr. Firestone determines the cause of death to be a heart attack. Leo does some reading on his own and decides the symptoms don't fit, and believes that his father is covering up a murder. He and his sort-of girlfriend, Harmony, both aged 16, begin investigating on their own and of course get in way over their heads.

Upon hearing the story, Martin follows the loose threads 60 years later and learns the truth that his father had been unable to uncover at the time. And in both hearing the story and following up on it, he learns about his father's own dark secrets, and the real reason he didn't want Martin to go into medicine.

What was most interesting to me about this book was the interplay of 1940s medical practices and the politics and social issues of the times. Leo tended to see things in very black-and-white terms, not surprising considering that he was only 16. His father's illegal activities were of course very upsetting to him. His father saw his activities as benefitting the greater good. He was helping out mothers who had few options available to them. Certainly he was very progressive for his time. He obtained medicines that were only supposed to go to soldiers, because he felt that his patients were just as deserving. I'm less clear on how he justified supplying heroin to an addict, however.

Anyway, this book should appeal to both mystery-lovers and those interested in social and historical issues.

Sunday, May 29, 2005

Random Thought #4: I Hate to Clean

I hate to clean. I could be wrong, but I hate it with a vengence that I think may be unparalleled. It isn't that I enjoy living like a slob, so I do feel compelled to clean at least every once in awhile. But the problem with cleaning is that you're never really done. I will think that everything is looking really nice, and then I will notice that the top of the microwave is all dusty. Well, I won't feel like the place is really clean when the top of the microwave looks like crap, so I have to dust that. And then I notice that the computer screen is a little dusty, and that the crumbs around the toaster seem to have multiplied even though I just cleaned that area. It's never good enough.

Somehow I manage to stop myself before I go too crazy and decide to just move.

A friend of mine says that she just acknowledges that the dust won. I think it's good advice.

Cat hair is the worst. If I don't cover up my desk chair with a towel, within five minutes it will be completely covered in cat hair, because the cats love to lie down on it. The only good news is that when I sit in it in its cat-hair-covered state, I do not become covered in cat hair, because it still sticks to the chair.

Yes, I even have books about cleaning! Once one of my cats had a UTI and peed on my rather expensive bed, and I tried every cleaning trick known to humanity, enzyme products, using a black light to see if the stain still showed up (which means the cats can still smell it), club soda, borax, baking soda, you name it. Finally it seemed to be clean, and I flipped it over and put a bowl of food on the bed. This is kind of a neat trick. Cats don't like to pee where they eat, so putting a bowl of food somewhere helps them remember that that place is not a bathroom.

I seem to have gotten away from my original premise of reviewing mostly fiction books. Apparently I have been thinking more random thoughts than reading in the past few days, but I will do another fiction book review soon.

Anyway, these books have some really good cleaning suggestions, and helped me weather my cat's health problems.

How the Queen Cleans Everything: Handy Advice for a Clean House, Cleaner Laundry, and a Year of Timely Tips, by Linda Cobb (New York: Atria Books, 2002). Extremely thorough. This is a compendium of three of Cobb's bestselling books. In the introduction, the author says although she loves talking about housework, she hates doing it. I find this extremely hard to believe. The level of detail in this book suggests a degree of obsession with cleaning that I find highly disturbing. But, I challenge anyone to have a cleaning question that this book does not cover, so it's really useful.

Haley's Cleaning Hints, by Graham and Rosemary Haley (New York: New American Library, 2000). This book also has many useful hints. The focus is on saving money by using common household items (i.e., baking soda, ammonia, even toothpaste) instead of buying a lot of expensive cleaning products.

Friday, May 27, 2005

Random Thought #3: OCD

I can remember the title, artist, and year the song came out for hundreds of 80s songs. I can remember things my professors said in class 15 years ago. I can remember the test scores of kids I've tested at work within a few points for months or years afterward.

I just can't remember if I turned off the curling iron, or if I locked the door on the way out. Even if I've just checked. Even if I've stared at the curling iron in its unplugged state and the electrical outlet with nothing plugged into it for a good minute or so, trying to burn the image into my brain. It's like my brain has turned to Teflon, and the information just won't stick.

I don't have full-fledged Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, or OCD. I did when I was little. Now I just seem to have vestiges of it that compel me to check and recheck things at times. It's maddening. When I was five, I didn't check and recheck things; then I was into compulsive handwashing. My parents did all the right things; they consulted with a pediatrician and took me to a child psychologist, and never made me feel bad about it or anything. It was hard for me not to feel like a freak, though, at least sometimes. Certainly no one else did anything so strange. Of course, that was in 1975, and awareness has increased a lot since then, not to mention the availability of effective drugs. Now it seems like a lot of people have it. Well, okay, that was probably always true; it's just that no one talked about it before the late 80s or early 90s or so. I don't have any statistics right in front of me, but it sure seems like many people I know have it or seem to have some symptoms of it.

Anyway, I'm not sure there's a particular point to this post except that I felt like talking about it. Here are a couple of good books about it:

(1) Brain Lock: Free Yourself from Obsessive-Compulsive Behavior. A Four-Step Self-Treatment Method to Change Your Brain Chemistry, by Jeffrey M. Scwartz, M.D. with Beverly Beyette, (1996). Written by a doctor who specializes in treating OCD, this book details a self-treatment program for people with OCD based on cognitive-behavioral therapy; it can used with or without the aid of a professional therapist. I found it quite interesting and helpful.

(2) The Boy Who Couldn't Stop Washing, by Judith L. Rapoport, MD (1989). This is an older book, so it doesn't have doesn't have updated information on medication, but it has case studies as told by OCD sufferers and the doctor's perspective. It's really interesting and helpful in gaining a greater understanding of the disease. The publication of this book and the media attention it generated really helped OCD and its sufferers come "out of the closet."

Thursday, May 26, 2005

Random Thought #2: More (Humane) Uses for Cats

People who own cats have to talk about them. It's just how it is. It's not that people don't talk about their dogs, or birds, or goldfish, but cat owners seem to have a particular compulsion to talk about their cats.

Since I don't want to be the cat owner to break tradition, I have come up with a list of (humane) uses for cats.

(1) Foot warmer--this is the most obvious one. My cat Carmela is the best foot warmer. Moonie sometimes likes to sleep on the pillow and wrap herself around my head.

(2) Massage therapist--my cats like to walk on my back on occasion. This is very tension-reducing.

(3) Protector--this one is not so obvious with cats, but I believe it can be true. Once I was really sick, so sick that I thought I was going to die. I ended up having to go to the hospital and get rehydrated. But while I was lying there in bed, trying not to die, Moonie literally would not leave my side. Usually she is pretty skittish and will jump off the bed whenever I move, but this time she refused to budge. I suppose there's a chance I could be anthropomorphizing here, but she seemed to feel like she needed to be there for me.

(4) Comic relief--once, after shopping, I left a big shopping bag with handles on it on the living room floor, thinking it would make a dandy kitty fort. Indeed, Carmela enjoyed playing with it, until she got herself into a slight fix. I heard her rattling around out in the living room, and then she walked into the bedroom, wearing the bag. (Note to self: next time cut the handles off the shopping bag before letting the cats play with it). Of course, she wiggled like crazy when I attempted to free her.

Now, if only I could get them to do these things on demand.

Another fun cat book:

What Cats Teach Us: Life's Lessons Learned from our Feline Friends, by Glenn Dromgoole (Minocqua, WI: Willow Creek Press, 2000). This is another novelty-type book. I am a sucker for cute cat pictures, of which this book has a lot. The pictures illustrate brief sentiments about getting along with others, self-esteem, etc.

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

Book Review--The Pact, by Jodi Picoult

Another amazing book. Two families live next door to each other. Their children grow up together. Chris and Emily are inseparable best friends when they are little, and then start dating when they get older. Both sets of parents are thrilled, and everything seems perfect, until the parents get a midnight call from the hospital. Emily has been shot and killed, supposedly as part of a suicide pact between the two of them. But Chris is still alive, and the police think there was no pact. The real story, it turns out, is pretty complicated.

This story, as with My Sister's Keeper, alternates between different points of view and different points in time, but it flows together beautifully. It includes Emily's point of view at different ages and right before she dies. The romance between her and Chris seems to be perfect for everyone--Chris, both sets of parents--but her. To her it was sort of like dating her brother. But she loves Chris too much to be able to tell him that. Not only that, but her parents and Chris' have every expectation that they will get married someday, and she feels heavy pressure from that.

Both sets of parents realize how little they knew about their kids, and their friendship cracks and breaks as they take sides. Chris's parents believe he would never do anything to hurt Emily. Emily's parents only know that he is alive, Emily is dead, and Chris was with her when she died.

This is another extremely thought-provoking book, as well as a tearjerker.

Monday, May 23, 2005

Random Thought #1: Cats are Great De-Stressors

Once I was lying in bed feeling completely stressed out. My whole body was tense, and I simply could not relax. My cat Carmela jumped up on the bed, purring up a storm, and cuddled against me. I don't think I have ever heard her purr so loudly before. Anyway, one cannot stay tense and stressed out when their cat cuddles against them, especially when you add the rhythm and sound of the purring. It's just not possible. How did she know I was stressed out?

Cats really do sense how their human is feeling, though, as many people know. My other cat, Moonie (I am the proud mother of two cats), sometimes strokes my face with her paws when I am feeling stressed out, thankfully with her claws retracted, or that wouldn't be very pleasant.

I guess everything I've read about cats (or other pets) being good for mental health is true.

There are lots of great cat books out there; here I will just mention a few of my favorites:

Diary of a Cat: True Confessions and Lifelong Observations of a Well-Adjusted Housecat, by Leigh W. Rutledge (New York: Galahad Books, 1995). This is a "diary" from the point of view of a cat, as one can probably guess from the title. It is great fun. If you've ever wondered what a cat might be thinking about his owner, the neighbors, furballs, holidays, new cats in the house, etc., you will love this book.

The Cats' House, by Bob Walker and Frances Mooney (Kansas City: Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2001). This is a mini-novelty-type book. This couple turned their entire house into a haven for cats. They have elevated walkways so the cats can walk overhead, scratching posts that reach the ceiling that the cats can climb up, "mouseholes" in the wall so that the cats can pass from room to room without leaving the elevated walkway, not to mention an eclectic ensemble of bright colors. I can't do anything like this because I rent, but I would love to do some of these things for my cats someday.

The Everything Cat Book, by Steve Duno (Holbrook, MA: Adams Media Corporation, 1997). This book contains a wealth of information about cats, including cat psychology, how to choose a cat and take care of it, problem behavior, first aid, emergency care, common illnesses, and breeding and showing your cat. This last part doesn't interest me much, as my cats are both fixed and "mutts." One I rescued from a shelter; the other was given to me by a friend. But anytime one of my cats has a symptom I'm not sure about, I look it up in this book. It also lists plants that are poisonous to cats, and even gives suggestions for good names for cats. The appendix lists some cats associations and organizations.

Sunday, May 22, 2005

Book Review--My Sister's Keeper, by Jodi Picoult

I have just recently discovered Jodi Picoult, and I just love her books. My Sister's Keeper came out in paperback in February. I bawled most of the way through it; if you don't like tearjerkers, you might want to avoid this one. It's about a girl, Anna, who as conceived as a bone marrow match for her older sister, Kate, who has an aggressive form of leukemia. The book begins when Anna is 13 and after undergoing countless surgeries on her sister's behalf, she hires a lawyer because she doesn't want to give Kate one of her kidneys. With Kate's kind of leukemia, the body just gets worn out from fighting it, and in her case, her kidneys were giving out. The book alternates between various points of view--Anna's, her lawyer's, her mother's, her father's, her brother's, and Anna's guardian ad litem (appointed by the court to be Anna's advocate). The parts told from Anna's mother's point of view also go back in time, to when Kate was first diagnosed and various points in her childhood. This sounds like the book would be hard to follow, but it actually flows really well.

I didn't come away from reading the book with a clearer sense of right and wrong concerning the issues--"designer babies," stem cell research, etc. If anything, the book illustrates just how complicated the issues are. I didn't really blame the parents for doing anything they could to save their daughter. How could they not? But, they had a little girl who knew perfectly well that she was conceived to save Kate's life, and who seemed to have little sense of her own self worth apart from Kate. Indeed, Kate's horrific illness takes up so much of the family's energy that it often seemed to leave room for little else; the girls' older brother also feels neglected, as well as guilty, for not being able to save Kate's life himself (since he wasn't a match). At times, when others were talking about her, I didn't like the mother, but the sections from her point of view and her despair each time Kate relapsed absolutely broke my heart.

This was an amazing book, with an engaging storyline and three-dimensional, sympathetic characters. It was so fascinating to see how these complex social issues might actually play out in a family.

Introduction

Hi! Since this is the first post on my new blog, I thought I would start with a brief introduction. I love to read, mostly fiction, and I do a lot of reading in my spare time (what little there is of it :-). I would like to be able to discuss the books I read with someone, and I don't always have that. I want to read what I want to read, and not whatever a book group selects. Anyway, I will write book reviews on books I've enjoyed, and hopefully readers will comment. I will also at times just discuss random thoughts that I have (hence the "Random Thoughts" part of the blog title) that hopefully will be interesting to others.