Martin Clunes Islands of America DVD

Reviewed by Jeanne

I enjoy a number of British TV series including Doc Martin, about an irascible physician with an aversion to blood and a dreadful bedside manner. (And yes, the library owns the series on DVD!) I was intrigued to see that the actor who plays the titular doctor has done some travelogues so I put in a request for “Martin Clunes:  Islands of America.”  

There are four episodes in the series, starting with Hawaii’s islands and then moving on to Alaska, just to get in the extremes.  Clunes is an exuberant guide, determined to enjoy himself if at all possible.  He gets a bit more than he bargained for in Hawaii, as Kilauea was still erupting about that time. He also visits the islands off the coast of Washington state, California, New Jersey and the island of Puerto Rico, among others.

I confess I skipped ahead and started with the episode where he meets some Gullah people who live on the lowlands and islands of Georgia and South Carolina. Then it’s on to North Carolina to Roanoke Island and the long-running outdoor drama about the Lost Colony.  He talks with cast members and gives the audience some background about the mystery (the primary audience is British, after all).  Next he and the crew go to Virginia and to the annual pony swim at Chincoteague.  It’s obvious Clunes is a real animal lover, especially of horses.  His excitement and enthusiasm is palpable.

I had thought I might just watch the one episode, do a quick review, and call it quits.  But Clunes was having such a good time I ended up watching all four.  Other stops include the island of Manhattan where Clunes goes up in the Empire State Building despite his fear of heights.  I could identify.  But he gamely made his way around, white-knuckling the guard rail and trying to be pleased that he was outside in an area not usually open to tourists. He was perhaps most excited on a visit to Avery Island, Louisiana where the McIllhenny family has made their world famous tabasco sauce for over five generations.  Clunes is a fan of the sauce, and he was interested in every aspect of the production.

In short, I was happily entertained and even learned a few things.  One is not to taste the tabasco mash, but another is to look for other travelogues with Martin Clunes.

The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah

Reviewed by Kristin

You can make one mistake in Alaska, but the second one will kill you.

That’s the advice the Allbright family receives from locals when they move to an Alaskan homestead on the Kenai Peninsula in 1974.  Thirteen-year-old Leni is hoping for a fresh start, and she is no stranger to fresh starts.  Leni’s father Ernt is a Vietnam veteran, one of the “lucky” ones who returned home after years of being held in a POW camp.  Now his temper is quick and violent, but Leni and her mother Cora hold onto hope that Ernt might one day find his way back to being the husband and father he was before the war.  Another job, another town, just another chance is all he needs.  Or so Leni and Cora think.

While the Allbright family is almost laughably unprepared for an Alaskan winter, their new neighbors pitch in to help them stock up over the few warm months of summer.  Neighbor Large Marge explains the community’s way of trading goods and services.  Leni and her parents quickly find out how much of a lifestyle change they have chosen, but they grow stronger and more wilderness-savvy as the weeks of sunlight pass.

As the wintry darkness falls, the world becomes smaller for Leni and her family.  What seemed like a new beginning becomes only a new setting for Ernt’s nightmares, anger, and obsessions.

I had never read anything by Kristin Hannah before The Great Alone.  The harsh Alaska landscape was an appealing setting, so I jumped right into this new release.  Quickly I began to care about Leni as she deals with the complicated love within her family.  Even Ernt with his volatile emotions simmering just under the surface, draws some kind of sympathy because his wartime experiences changed him.  Cora’s relationship with Ernt is intense, full of love and caring as well as jealousy and violence.  Leni loves both her parents, but desperately wants to protect her mother from harm.

This saga stretched out so long with so many dramatic moments that I really wondered what other twists and turns could happen.  At some points, I thought the situation could not possibly be resolved without someone dying.  This isn’t much of a spoiler, but people do die before the end of the book.  The question is:  will it be a death of someone by the hands of someone they love, a matter of self-defense, or simply the tragedy of making a mistake in the Alaskan wilderness?

Less Than a Treason by Dana Stabenow

Reviewed by Kristin

Dana Stabenow left her readers on edge four years ago with a cliffhanger at the end of the last Kate Shugak book, Bad Blood.    This was no small, inconsequential cliff either—we were left wondering if Kate herself was alive or dead, not to mention Mutt, her beloved dog/wolf hybrid.  Spoiler alert:  If you haven’t figured it out from the fact that there is another book in the series—Kate survives.  Mutt, well, you’ll just have to read and find out.

Although severely injured, Kate left the hospital against medical advice and has holed up in a box canyon on a nearly vertical 160 acre Alaskan homestead, tearing down Old Sam’s decrepit cabin and building another with her bare hands.  When a group of orienteers (hikers using maps and compasses to navigate from place to place) travels straight through her metaphorical back yard, Kate is disturbed, even more so when one of the group tumbles back to her cabin after tripping over some human bones.

A Native Aleut and private investigator, Kate is used to her independence.  Although romantically involved with state trooper Jim Chopin, after her injury Kate felt the need to lick her wounds in peace.  After a significant inheritance from his father, Jim has resigned his law enforcement position.  Used to flying all over the area in which the roads are impassable more often than not, Jim starts airplane shopping like most of us might shop for a car.  When Kate and Jim finally do reunite, sparks fly.

Even though I have never been to Alaska, the characters here ring true to me.  Kate can be dark and brooding with her mysterious scars, but is well respected within the Native community.  Her grandmother was highly regarded, and the other Aunties do their best to keep Kate close.  The “Park rats,” other Natives who live on private property within the national park, have strengths and foibles like any other group of neighbors who must depend on one another.  Jim may be the handsome stranger, but he has been taken into the group because of his affiliation with Kate.  Even Mutt has been an outstanding character throughout the series with her faithfulness amidst her wildness.

Stabenow makes a tiny jab at United States politics without actually naming the 2016 presidential election; Kate goes to vote after bemoaning the horrible choices of candidates, including some detailed descriptions of the candidates’ characters.  She also throws in a little pop-culture as Kate realizes that a certain person reminds her of a character from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  These connections with the “real world” don’t detract from the fictional landscape within Alaska’s Quilak mountains, but just provided (to me, at least) a couple of chuckles.

Althought it was worth the wait, I certainly hope that Stabenow will publish another Kate Shugak mystery before another four years have passed.

Nevermore: Laura Ingalls, Little Failure, Pilgrim's Wilderness, and in Praise of the Gift Shop

Summary by Kristin

Nevermore started on the prairie, that is, with Laura Ingalls Wilder Country by William Anderson.  This slim book contains photographs of the modern day landscape in all of the places where the Ingalls family lived.  Interspersed are the well-known drawings by Garth Williams that were included in many editions of the books after 1953.  Family photographs are included as well.  Our readers enjoyed this look behind the scenes of the Ingalls family historical fiction book series.

Next was Little Failure: A Memoir by Gary Shteyngart.  The author is a 1979 immigrant from Russia with a comic literary style.  Much is made of his relationship with his Jewish family, as well as his interactions with his American classmates.  Since the family didn’t have a television, the author was more interested in talking about Anton Chekov than the latest shows.  Known as a serious novelist, Shteyngart lets his humor shine through as he describes the challenges of adapting to a new culture.

Another reader wanted to praise the library gift shop, where many different types of books are available.  She recently purchased and read a 1934 biography of Elizabeth I.  Her praise of the book included:  “It was like reading Game of Thrones.  It was like reading Shakespeare without footnotes.”  She also commented that with the low prices, she is likely to purchase books and re-donate them when she is done, further benefitting the library.

A couple of readers read and discussed Pilgrim’s Wilderness: A True Story of Faith and Madness on the Alaska Frontier by Tom Kizzia.  Written by a journalist, this book chronicles the settlement of Robert Hale (aka Papa Pilgrim, Pilgrim Bob, Firefly, Preacher Bob, and more) and his family on a miner’s claim in Alaskan Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve.  With fifteen children, the family soon became known as a musicians dedicated to an old-fashioned Christian lifestyle.  However, behind the façade, “Papa Pilgrim” was a brutal disciplinarian who abused his family and fought against the federal government