Embers - Sandor Marai

"I hate music." His voice rises, and for the first time this evening he speaks with a hoarse intensity. "I hate this incomprehensible, melodius, language which select people can understand and use to say unihibited, irregular things that are also problably indecent and immoral. Watch their faces and see how strangely they change when they're listening to music."

Embers is written by a Hungarian writer originally published in 1942. I agree with other critics who call the writing masterful. The book is full of passion and intrigue- all dispensed by the primary character while seated in a heated discussion with an old friend. Yes, it is somewhat reminscient of the movie "My dinner with Andre", but this book delves deeply into inner thoughts and feelings on love, betrayal, revenge, friendship, anger and much more.

The story and message are timeless in this great book. The author is intelligent and original. There are great lines through out the book, such as, "When he listened to music, he listened with his whole body, as longingly as a condemned man in his cell aches for the sound of distant feet perhaps bringing news of his release." Embers is the perfect title for this about about burning passions that consume humans.

Life Class - Pat Barker

...what people don't realize is that knowing that you're your own worst enemy doesn't automatically turn you into your own best friend. Insight. The psychologist Mother had insisted on sending him to, when he was fifteen, had gone on and on about insight. Rubbish. He had insight by the bucketful and it did him no good at all.

This is a well-crafted book covering the lives of several art students as World War I is breaking out. Like other books by Barker, the interplay of war on the lives of individuals is the focus. I liked the contrast of students in a school for the arts as the inhumanity of war moves into their insular world. Barker is an excellent writer and the winner of a Booker Award for a prior book. She is intelligent and creates interesting characters.

The time period in England, and later in Europe, is depicted in a realistic style. The writing is straight-forward whether describing art or war. The horrors of war and how it changes lives is both enlightening and disturbing. The book examines how humans react to war and what compels us to artistic expression.

Chavez Ravine, 1949 - Don Normark

To Vin Scully, KTTV and the Whole Dodger Organization:

I want to let you know at the start that I am a very big fan of the Dodgers and Vin Scully, but how dare any of you call Chavez Ravine a wasteland or a dump. Every time anyone talks about Chavez Ravine before the Dodgers came along they seem to forget that many families made their homes there! No one wants to acknowledge the fact that people lived there. Maybe it wasn't Beverly Hills, but it was home to a lot of people, my family included. Doesn't anyone want to acknowledge us because we are Mexicans? Or is it because we were told that our homes would be destroyed to make room for low rent housing?

...

Great photos of Chavez Ravine before the houses were bulldozed to create a baseball stadium for the LA Dodgers. The area was referred to in the book as a "poor man's paradise". The black and white photos were taken in 1949 and are largely portraits of the residents. They are reminscient of Dorothea Lange's depression era photos, although these residents are not impoverished, but living well on modest incomes. The people lived in time and place far removed from today. Normark has done a fantastic job of capturing the flavor of the community and the personalities of the residents.

The text is composed largely of interviews of former residents. Their stories are touching and help to the reader to imagine this former community close to downtown Los Angeles. The introduction describes the author's involvement with Chavez Ravine and its people. It also explains what happened through corrupt politics, including the McCarthy era anti-communism hatred, to destroy the beautiful neighborhoods. If you enjoy this book as much as I did, I highly recommend Ry Cooder's CD entitled Chavez Ravine.