WESTERN SKIES :: Darden Smith

With Western Skies, Austin-based singer-songwriter Darden Smith has created a multi-form artistic experience unlike anything I've seen/read/listened to before. Created as a love message to his home state, the idea emerged during several road trips across West Texas, as Smith took polaroid photos to memorialize his trips and composed lyrics behind the wheel. 

The results of those trips and Smith's creative pathways are a beautiful collectible book and a companion album. The book includes Smith's photographs, essays derived from notes scribbled in his notebook on the road, lyrics to the songs on the album, forward by the legendary Rodney Crowell, and a link to download a free copy of all the Western Skies songs.

I found the experience a fantastic way to discover Smith's music. Listening along as I read the lyrics and perused the photos perused was a fantastic way to immerse myself in as broad a way as possible into the mindset and emotions of Smith as they relate to the land he loves and traveled.

 

I highlighted numerous passages and lyrics that I both wanted to remember and thought would be apt to share within a review. Yet when it now comes time to do so, it feels as though sharing only a part of the whole without its related elements does a disservice to what Smith has done. I will say I've now discovered music I would not have without the words, a writer I would not have known or understood as well without his music. And while Smith initially felt old-school polaroid photos wouldn't do the landscape justice, their eerie, ghost-like quality lends a gorgeous ethereal quality that seems to fit just right with the other parts. A rare feat, Western Skies is a gift for the senses. 

PASSERSTHROUGH :: Peter Rock

Not since Iain Reed's I'm Thinking of Ending Things have I finished a book and thought "I have little to no clue what I just read, but I loved every damn minute." Peter Rock's Passersthrough is all kinds of crazypants, and I am far from understanding everything that happened, but in the words of Trip in Meatballs, "It just doesn't matter!"

The basics of what I DO know are this--Helen and her father Benjamin have been estranged for more than two decades, since something mysterious happened when she was eleven and they were camping together in Mt. Rainier National Park. Helen disappeared and wasn't found until a week later and 100 miles from their camp.

After her mother's death, Helen begins reaching out to Benjamin, although tentatively. She gives her father a machine that he can speak into (and vice versa) and his words will be transcribed and sent to her machine. Helen is not yet to the point where she trusts him enough to spend time him or speak directly about what happened. 

Through their communications, we learn snippets of what that camping trip involved, including a blue tarp and a lake they called Sad Clown Lake, a body of water filled with bones that never seems to be in the same place twice. They also had a notebook they left in their tent while they were out, leaving it for "passersthrough" to write in. 

As Helen and Benjamin talk remotely, Benjamin has a semi-catastrophic encounter with a woman and her dog in the market parking lot. Melissa helps Benjamin home and tends to him, but also reads some of the transcriptions on Benjamin's machine. As Melissa and her "brother," who are squatting in a "murder house," try to help Benjamin figure out what happened on that ill-fated camping trip, things start to get really cuckoo. 

To share more would be both too much information and me providing a perception that might not be anywhere near correct. Although the story seemed to remain outside my grasp, it was so beautifully written and intriguing that I didn't want to put it down for a minute. It's haunting, eerie, bizarre, lovely, and tragic. Rock is a beautiful writer (his heartbreaking My Abandonment was a gift of a novel and also made into a fantastic film, Leave No Trace) and even though much of Passersthrough escaped me, I enjoyed the hell out of it and will pick up Rock's next work without hesitation. 
 

THE OTHER DR. GILMER :: Benjamin Gilmer

Holy cats. Benjamin Gilmer may be a doctor, but he could have a second career as a thriller or true crime writer, because The Other Dr. Gilmer is a barnburner. A story that, almost too bizarre to be believed on multiple levels, held me rapt from cover to cover. 

It's best to go in knowing as little as possible, because some of the links and coincidences between the two Drs. Gilmer are best when they are come across in the book and smack the reader upside the head. But a "whet your whistle" synopsis goes something like this:

Dr. Benjamin Gilmer was something of a late bloomer, a medical resident who, unlike his twenty-something classmates, was 39, married with a mortgage, one child and another on the way. He had decided on family medicine as his path and found a calling towards a rural practice. He found that at a tiny six-room clinic in Fletcher, North Carolina. After a three-year hiatus, the clinic was being reopened and desperately needed help.

Dr. Benjamin Gilmer learned that his predecessor, Dr. Vince Gilmer, had quite a story. Gilmer the second opens the book with this passage, hooking me instantly:

On June 28, 2004, in rural Appalachia, a man with my name and my profession strangled his father in the passenger seat of his Toyota Tacoma.

The morning after killing his father, Gilmer the first showed up for work as usual and saw his patients like nothing had happened. 

Benjamin Gilmer was in a tough position, coming in after Vince Gilmer (no relation) and trying to win over the patients that, UNIVERSALLY, loved their prior doctor. An upstanding member of the community, beloved by his patients, a man who, according to all reports, went above and beyond to help people and couldn't even bear to kill the mice behind the clinic. No one ever had a glimmer of what was coming.

But how? And why? Feeling the need to answer those questions, Benjamin Gilmer started investigating. Little did he know that deep dive would require all of his (and others) medical acumen, a legal battle, and end in the most unimaginable way possible.

I can't recommend The Other Dr. Gilmer highly enough. On top of a top-notch true crime mystery unfolding before your eyes, the writing of Dr. Gilmer is fabulous, keeping the story moving at a wonderful pace while keeping the complex facts, medical issues and legal process easily comprehended. This is simply one of the most amazing stories I've ever read. 

EMOTIONAL INHERITANCE :: Galit Atlas, PhD

Every individual and family hold a history of trauma. Those who study the intergenerational transmission of familial trauma investigate how the trauma of those who came before us is passed down like a gene, an "emotional inheritance," leaving its mark on us and future generations. In Emotional Inheritance, Dr. Galit Atlas describes how different traumas are held within families and impact those who are not yet even born, even if those traumas are kept secret. Fascinating, mind-blowing, and difficult to think about. 

Dr. Atlas's belief is that silenced experiences belong to everyone in our family tree and impact our ability to live up to our full potential. "They effect our mental and physical health, create gaps between what we want for ourselves and what we are able to have, and haunt us like ghosts." 

The work is broken into three sections. The first relates to our grandparents and the trauma of past generations. The second involves our parents and how those secrets and traumas are carried on to our generation, and the final section is about you and me, ourselves and how we break the cycle. 

Dr. Atlas writes in a matter-of-fact way that is not dumbed down but quite understandable by a layperson. Some ideas are wilder than others, yet when walked through some of Dr. Atlas's examples, one is left without doubt. For example, evolutionary or epigenetic changes occur when a generation (or individual) is marked by trauma. Take, for instance, the Holocaust. Research has shown that the offspring of Holocaust survivors (similarly to enslaved people, war veterans, etc...) are more likely to present with PTSD following traumatic events.

Perhaps in a "survival of the fittest"/Darwinian way, the biological changes of such trauma might be seen to prepare the children of survivors for environments such as those experienced by their ancestors. However, they also often leave them vulnerable to carrying symptoms of trauma that they didn't experience firsthand. 

By weaving the stories of her patients' narratives in with her own personal stories, Dr. Atlas helps provide a way for us to recognize some of these issues or changes within ourselves. The key is to deal with the disconnect between ideas and feelings, thus knocking down the protective walls that keep us from feeling something devastating. Of course, the walls also keeps the trauma "isolated and unprocessed." An emotional Catch-22, for sure, but one that gives new meaning to the phrase "we are only as sick as our secrets." 

Emotional Inheritance is an utterly engrossing work that will have readers thinking about their own histories, family terminologies and stories, and the trauma that shapes so many of our relationships and paths in life.   

 

SUNDIAL :: Catriona Ward

Holy cats. If you've read Catriona Ward's prior novel, The Last House on Needless Street (which I HIGHLY recommend), you know not to believe a word she writes (in the best way ever). For me, this only amped the tension up to 11 in her latest, Sundial. Although I'm not generally one for genre labels, someone called this psychological horror and I can't really quibble with that. I took a dip into the "horror" genre a couple of years ago and promptly discovered Ward and Stephen Graham Jones, who are now two authors I trust implicitly to give me creeptastic entertainment. 

Rob and her husband Irving have two daughters, Callie and Annie. The issues with this foursome are evident right away. Irving is a serial cheater with anger issues, but he's not even the most troubling aspect--elder Callie is way too into dead things and Rob fears if she doesn't get her away from the family, Annie is going to end up as one of those dead things. Yet Irving has some level of control, forcing Rob to take drastic measures.

Rob absconds with Callie to Sundial, a supremely messed up property she inherited from her parents. Rob believes the only way to deal with the darkness in Callie is to divulge her own (and the property's) dark past, then make the hardest decision of her life.

The POV changes quite a bit throughout and the twists and arcs are many. Though they feel hard to grasp, it's mostly because Ward never lets the reader in on what is real or what any character's true motivation is. Some of the chapters are actual passages from author Rob's series books, which she writes with real names and then changes. They shed murky light on some of Rob's former trauma, yet nothing clear enough to make out.

Rob also revisits the past with Callie, and the prior goings on at Sundial were less than stellar. Fold in Callie's discussions with some kind of mysterious "friend." Is the friend real? Imaginary? Who is the monster? Why is Callie saving bones of the dead and where does she get them? What hold does Irving have over Rob?

Ward is a magical writer, because I was enrapt with what was going on even though I had no idea what was really going on. All you can hope to do is hold onto enough of the pieces to put together the puzzle with as few missing pieces as possible. It was a wild, magical ride that I continued to think about for days after finishing. I found this much more complex than Needless Street and I'm very happy I read that first. It gave me a little insight into Ward's style and thus I wasn't worried about not having a clue. I knew I just had to hold on and she would take me where she wanted me to go. I will gladly get on her E-ticket rides as long as she keeps opening the gates.
 

SOMEDAY THE PLAN OF A TOWN :: Todd Boss

Following the loss of a 20-year marriage and strained relationships with his children, poet Todd Boss sold all he owned and gave up his Minneapolis apartment ("only half-facetiously writing "Trump" on the "Reason for leaving" line of the Lease Cancellation form). In that grief-stricken state, he traveled the world for two years utilizing a series of thirty housesitting gigs. In each location, he wrote. This collection of poems is a result of that trip, reflecting Todd's emotional difficulties permeated with the essence of the different locations he visited. 

This fascinatingly unique premise, along with superb cover art (which I initially thought was shipping containers and which would have been no less attractive) were all I needed to dive into the collection. It began by sucking me in with Boss's notes on his approach to the book, which was an important foundation to understanding his views. 

I was also drawn in by his summary of the saga, as he was "alternately inhabiting thatched-roof farm-houses, hillside estates, urban apartments, and lush gardens in Berlin, Barcelona, Marrakesh, Singapore, Auckland. Housesitting gigs often came complete with pets or livestock for which I was responsible. I tended sheep from a stone cabin in the Pyrenees. I minded two sleepy cats in a Tuscan villa, a coop full of unruly chickens in London, and a playful puppy on the Gold Coast of Australia."

There were some incredibly lovely moments within the collection. I especially loved the titular piece, a lyrical run-on about finding your place in the world, a dream for everyone who just doesn't feel quite right where they lay their head:

Someday the Plan of a Town--right down to its sidetracks and back alleyways--will match--or so goes the dream--with some identical patch of neural network your rogue thoughts roam in--overlay it like those musculoskeletal transparencies with which anatomy textbooks come bound--and you'll be at home in its dogleg jointwork of cobbled kinks--and your body will resound at every fork, tuning-fork-like--and every road you ever rambled will be re-scrambled to appear to have brought you here, where you fit so perfectly... (Tarifa, Andalucia, Spain)

From my perspective, the most engaging pieces described the essence of Boss's particular surroundings, taking the reader along on some portion of his trek. From Workmen Discarding a Parquet Floor, Vienna:

It's a four-handed band performing the complete works of Beethoven using only wooden castanets in incomplete sets. What once a woman danced across. What once in a sash of sun the cat snoozed afternoons upon. Un-glued, un-patterned, going, gone.

And this, from Why Empty Barber Shops Draw Me, I Don't Know:

...we want to talk when we want to talk & we want sometimes instead to sit quietly while someone touches us all about the head with the edges of a scissoring scissor & the neat teeth of a comb. Small comfort, but lucky for us, the wealthy as well as the poor, that there are a few things left in this old world we still need other people for. (Baltimore, Maryland, USA)

There are also moments that are beautifully-worded knife cuts that reflect Boss's current state. From He Divides his Time Between:

I had a married life before, in a subdivision of peace and war. 

In equal thirds my loved ones ate my heart like a festival roast.

Now my father's son is a ghost, a wisp of smoke, a metaphor.

He divides his time between nothing and much and matters and anymore. (Greenville, South Carolina, USA)

Then there were the pieces that came from what felt like a very dark place. I won't say these works ruined the collection for me, but they somehow tinged those lyrics I enjoyed with their perceived venom. For example:

Fairer The claw marks in my neck long faded, the steam of hate evaporated, attempted identity theft subverted, assets, passwords, passport converted, accusations of assault reversed, two years' court fees reimbursed, restraining orders at last elapsed, libelous campaigns collapsed, attempts to turn my friendships rotten and threats of murder and vengeance forgotten, I'm finally ready--whatever comes next--to reengage the fairer sex.

And, in Men, Then, Maybe, as Boss wonders if he couldn't love or touch a man just as generously as he has women:

Men aren't faultless, oh, I know. Now and then a prick, okay, but let's just say the "fairer" blooms I've picked so far, though lovely, are no prick-less clutch. So, men, then. Maybe. Huh. The hot mechanics may yet be a mystery, but at least I know the parts already. (Auckland, New Zealand) 

This last bit, in a vacuum, I actually love. We can all be pricks, and why are love and touch any different depending on the "mechanics?" But when taken on the heels of the Fairer, it felt more vengeful, a little "fuck women"-ish. Which Boss may be entitled to, and the hurt and disappointment are bound to come out in the words of a poet. I'm not sure why these two hit me wrong. They don't strike me as much now as I reread them as they did initially. Perhaps because we know which woman they are directed at they feel viciously one-sided when we don't know the facts. 

Overall I enjoyed this collection, but mostly so when Boss fell into the first two categories. I love a good evisceration poem, poems of honest hurt and devastation. When they delve into real personal intimate lives, I'm more likely to feel the judgment than the camaraderie.

FUNNY FARM :: Laurie Zaleski

Who doesn't love a good animal rescue story. Of course, animal rescue stories come with their share of pain, anguish, and difficult times. I still had no idea the depths of storytelling I was in for when I cracked open Laurie Zaleski's Funny Farm: My Unexpected Life with 600 Rescue Animals. Zaleski didn't start the rescue, but continued it as a labor of love for her indomitable mother, Anne McNulty, who started it accidentally, borne out of kindness and necessity. Anne McNulty may be one of the greatest people I've ever read about and Zaleski did a brilliant job of painting a full-color portrait any mother would be proud of.

Zaleski was born into wealth. Before they were thirty, her parents had three homes with a housekeeper and nanny for the kids. Her father, however, was  domineering, controlling and violent. At twenty-six, Anne McNulty took her three children and ran for their lives. With no child support or alimony, the foursome ended up living in a run-down structure (I can't even call it a house) with no electricity or functioning bathroom. 

What Anne did to create even one loving, united, warm memory of that time is nothing short of amazing. She had multiple low-paying jobs, but her main position was cleaning cages for the local animal control (you see where this is going). Despite scraping the bottom of the barrel for their own existence, Anne McNulty couldn't say no to an animal in need. 

With plenty of them, the "Funny Farm" turned into a free-range free-for-all full of assorted rejects who lived together, often in the house and on the couch. Eventually, the farm opened to the public and donations helped the family and the continued growth of the rescue.

Zaleski, "a tomboy, an ass-kicker, Tarzan and Jane rolled up into one propulsive locomotive of a girl," turned into a force of nature just like her mother. She became a successful designer and founded her own graphic design company, Art-Z Graphics, of which she is also the President and CEO. Her life goal, however, was to fulfill a promise to her mother to buy a real farm where she could retire and rescue animals full-time. Of course, in McNulty fashion, that road wasn't smooth either.

Told in alternating chapters, Zaleski weaves the tale of her family's horrific (and beautiful) past into the present, where, in 2019, the Funny Farm's 600+ denizens welcomed over 100,000 visitors from all over the world. A story of hardscrabble existence, exhausting work, ongoing terror, and the power of family, love, and the healing nature of animals, Funny Farm is a triumph. It made me want to get on the next plane to the remote Jersey Pinelands and wish I could meet and hug Anne McNulty. Laurie Zaleski's writing is smart and engaging, informal and welcoming while flowing with ease. It uplifts and drops the bottom out, over and over, until you are both in love and can't take anymore. Highly recommended.