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Ask the Author: Ben Fountain Will Take Your Questions Now

Ben Fountain

Ben Fountain said if D Reading Roomers (doesn’t work, does it) Roomettes? whatever, you all, have any questions, he will answer them. Best question wins a lunch at Stephen Pyles with Editor Laura Kostelny!

Ch. 2: Ben Fountain’s Idealist Heroes

In “Reve Haitien,” Mason appears to be another of Ben Fountain’s innocent Americans–naive about what constitutes a life of purpose and value, and especially what constitutes heroism, or whether it is even possible in the contemporary world. He has a glimmering—a nascent vision of a “purpose-driven life” (to appropriate Rick Warren’s phrase)—as his “O.A.S. Observer” status denotes, but the distance between observer and participant is huge. I myself am an even more distant observer; that’s what the Red Cross is for, right? But what if you go so far as to put yourself in the possible path of a strange mulatto who shows up at your chessboard one afternoon? If the milieu of “Near-Extinct Birds” depicts a very fallen world in which supposedly idealist revolutionaries make deals with professedly materialist businessmen, in “Reve Haitien” the hero seems at first glance even more quixotic, the dream even more fragile and far-off.

D Reading Room Has The Cure For (Late) Sunday Night

Sunday night. And no “Mad Men” to divert us. Just some kind of … football game. The next thing we know, the alarm will go off, and it will be…. well, you know. Hey, no big deal, because at the end of this lovely weekend, we get to read the second short story of Ben Fountain’s Brief Encounters with Che Guevara. It takes place in Port-au-Prince. Happy reading all.

Decoding Larry Allums’s Happy Ending Post

For those of us who were in a coma during the Seinfeld years, this.

Ch. 1: Ben Fountain’s Happy Ending, Take 2

I now reveal my kinship with Billy Mumphrey and all other cock-eyed optimists. Beyond the political and historical issues that provide the scaffolding for “Near-Extinct Birds,” I keep coming back to John Blair the protagonist. From a literary angle (rather than political or historical), the story is about him, more specifically what he discovers and comes to understand. Okay, there’s no “happy” ending, but I do think there’s something like an “updraught” to the action as it progresses. There will always be wars and rumors of wars, the Albertos and the Spassos, but the core movement seems to be Blair’s true education (following the one that cost him a lot of money), as when he listens to Hernan’s horror stories and enters them in his notebook alongside the parrot notes “because it all seemed bound together in some screamingly obvious way that he couldn’t quite get.” With Hernan as a strange and unlikely mentor, Blair begins for the first time to connect the ideal and the real: “Sickness, he wrote in the margin of his notes, there’s a sickness in the world, along with parrots the most intelligent and beautiful of birds, also the most threatened—a clue to the nature of things (?)” Such knowledge, which will mature with time, won’t save the parrots, but that doesn’t seem finally to be the point. Along with the film that Hernan slips into his pocket, his insights equip him to produce work that will outlast revolutions and lumber deals. How’s that for unbridled enthusiasm?

Brief Encounters Ch. 1: Who Stars In The Movie?

So Ben Fountain tosses up Jerry Garcia as an Alberto look-alike. What say you?  And while we are on it, how about casting Joan Blair. Spasso? Hernan?

UPDATE: Kevin plays JoanBlair?

Chapter 1: Ben Fountain’s Happy Ending

Is there a happy ending to “Near-Extinct Birds”? It appears not. Could there be? Not unless it were written as a different story, one in which, say, the birds were saved or Alberto became repentant or something like that. But the political milieu of Fountain’s world, which is infernal, doesn’t allow such options. And Joan Blair himself in the helicopter at the end thinks in response to Spasso’s ignorant question—“How does it feel to be free?”—that it feels “like death, and how grieved and utterly lost you’d feel as everything precious faded out.” However, we haven’t noted the little event hidden in the chaos of Blair’s release: Hernan’s slipping the 35 mm film cartridge into Blair’s hand. What’s on the film? What will Blair discover when he gets home and over his grief? There’s a future here, beyond the bounds of the story, that may signal a comic possibility—in the sense of an upward movement, to match the helicopter’s. Hernan is the closest thing we see to a Joan Blair convert. I’m wondering what he’s done behind the scenes.

Chapter 1: Ben Fountain’s Alberto

I am dying to discuss Joan Blair (I laugh every time) but I want to talk about Jerry Garcia Alberto for a while. Our commenter self-described as The Official Fitness Guru of Dallas! posited that Alberto knew that Blair’s bird research might endanger the Spasso deal, inferring that Blair’s capture was a brilliant defensive chess move. Intriguing notion, but I ain’t so sure. I  think the only person with strategic sense was Spasso. Alberto — like so many revolutionaries — seems to be a fatalist, and I don’t think fatalists have the need to think a couple of chess moves ahead. (I apologize for this strained chess analogy, I don’t know where it came from.)

When Joan and Alberto are together, there seems  to be fondness in the air, a bit like a married couple where there is a power imbalance but no animosity. What if Spasso’s heliocopter never made it, and Joan remained stuck with Alberto. How might Alberto have proceeded. Would anything like the wondrous Bel Canto have developed? Or would Joan have been bait for a new initiate? What do you all think?

UPDATE: Commenter “Carlitos” makes a good case that the story should have no happy ending.

Chapter 1: Ben Fountain’s sense of irony

I admire Ben Fountain’s sense of irony. In this first story, I find subtle layers of it,  one dramatic irony on top of another, revealed to the eyes of John Blair, who strikes me as another in a long line of American innocents. Thomas Spasso’s presence toward the end is one revelation—that Blair’s release doesn’t figure into Spasso’s deal. When Blair finds that out, he’s angry, holding his consolation Power Bars and thinking that his situation results from “the casual cruelty of people who’d never missed a meal or had a gun stuck to their heads.” Fifteen months ago, presumably, Blair himself was capable of such cruelty, but now he has suffered into wisdom, so he thinks. But the next veil pulled back—the Weyerhauser deal behind the deal that he stumbles onto—is the one that seems to open his eyes completely and transforms (to use Sarah’s word from yesterday) everything for him. Now he insists on staying for the parrots, but more so for the principle of it all. My question is, when Blair says “I won’t stand for this. I don’t accept it. You people can’t do this,” is he at his most absurd or his most noble? My own opinion is that he’s both at the same time.

Near Extinct Birds and Absurd Humans

Did anyone have a Catch 22 moment when Alberto the comandante told John Blair he didn’t look like a spy? “However, if they wanted to send a spy they wouldn’t send somebody who looked like a spy. So the fact that you don’t look like a spy makes me think you’re a spy.” It seems like the same absurd logic that puts an individual in the military in the “double bind” or no win situation. It’s the same sort of Kafka-esque moment when the American contingent comes and have no authority or real interest in bringing home a kidnapped American. He did get some Power Bars, though. The most hilarious scene to me was the true story when the head of the NYSE pompously invites the drug trafficking war lords to be his personal guests at the Stock Exchange. Of course, the comandantes can’t even look at each other for fear of rolling on the floor with laughter like a bunch of 7th graders in church. And this guy Richard Grasso was for real. Not only did he do business with drug lords, he also was ousted from the NYSE for questionable bonuses, and sued by the state of New York.  And for a timely footnote that sounds like an absurdly fictional part of this story, the New York Supreme Court has now ruled that he was actually entitled to all that cash ( about $150 million, I think) and the state has no suit against him.  Truth is crazier than fiction

Near-Extinct Birds of the Central Cordillera

After a great time last Wednesday evening at Legacy Books, I’m ready to blog about Ben Fountain’s Brief Encounters with Che Guevara. There’s plenty to say, but I’ll jump in with this:

In the first story, “Near-Extinct Birds of the Central Cordillera,” Fountain starts with a historical note—a 1999 comment from NYSE Chairman Richard Grasso inviting the commander of FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) to “walk the floor of the exchange with me.” One commentator termed this episode “the ultimate new business cold call.” Grasso, who was forced out of the NYSE in 2003 for a compensation scandal, is of course the model for the character Thomas Spasso, and I wonder how Fountain wants this historical link, actually more of a current event, to set up our reading of his story.

Our First Selection: Brief Encounters With Che Guevara by Local Author Ben Fountain

Last night we had a splendid gathering of smart locals at Legacy Books. You know who you are. Dr. Larry Allums of the Dallas Institute of Culture and Humanities introduced our first selection for 2010: Brief Encounters with Che Guevara. Ben Fountain wrote the book. A former lawyer at Akin Gump, Fountain is a story himself, having decided a few years ago to leave the prestigious practice and pursue his vocation as a writer. But enough about this writer who is so much braver than us. Let’s read the first of his eight short stories now and talk amongst ourselves.  On Monday we’ll start the conversation right here.  If you would like an rss feed — go here: http://readingroom.dmagazine.com/feed/. Otherwise bookmark this page and let’s do this.

Guess the (Local) Author of the Next D Reading Room Selection and Win a Free Book

The D Reading Room local authors program is about to begin!  Larry Allums, director of The Dallas Institute, and I ran up to Legacy Books yesterday for the backstory on Sarah Palin’s visit  to create a schedule for 2010 and it is going to be an amazing year. First, thank you commenters for your suggestions. All have been duly noted and we are going to incorporate as many as we can. Second, we will unveil our first selection at our little gathering next Wednesday evening, January 27,  from 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm at Legacy Books. (NB: It took just 23 minutes from downtown to the elegant cafe at the bookstore — granted, no traffic). Be there. And if you are first to guess the author of the book we’ve selected, you’ll win a free copy of the book. Hint: Coins go into this.

D Reading Room: It’s All About Local

Reading Room friends: it’s time to dissect a new title and start commenting. So here’s the deal: For the rest of the year, we are going to feature local or regional authors only. We also going to have a local professor, Larry Allums, Director of The Dallas Institute of Culture and Humanities, lead the conversation. He is smart and charming and you will love him. Plus Legacy Books is going to give a $100 gift certificate to the best commenter. You must be local to win.

On January 27, we’ll meet for Happy Hour at Legacy Books. Mark your calendar. And if you have ideas for books (by local authors) that we should check out, let me know. More soon.

What I’m Reading Now: Lynn McBee

Lynn McBee, civic leader, volunteer

Books: Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri. It consists of eight beautifully written stories about two generations of Bengali immigrants to America, describing their  struggles to build normal, secure lives. The stories are poignant and unforgettable. Each one makes you eager to read the next.  Jhumpa Lahiri also wrote The Namesake which I loved even more! Wild Fire by Nelson De Mille: I am just starting this novel but love Nelson DeMille and have read many of his others including The Charm School, The Gold Coast, The General’s Daughter, Plum Island, Cathedral, and Night Fall.  Emily Austin of Texas 1795-1851 by Light Townsend Cummins: I received this book from my mother for Christmas and look forward to starting it soon.  Emily Austin is my Great, Great, Great, Great -Grandmother. I can’t wait to learn more about her and the very early days of Texas as one of the first families and also as the  sister of Stephen F. Austin, the father of Texas.

Websites: FrontBurner, D Magazine’s Sweet Charity, New England Biolabs (the company I consult for), Neiman Marcus, DMN’s Friday movie reviews, The Trinity Trust, Southern Accents.

Magazines, newspapers, journals: Dallas Morning News, Wall Street Journal, Town & Country, Park Cities People, Park Cities News, W, Departures, D Magazine, Veranda, New York Times Sunday Arts section, Dallas Business Journal, PaperCity

What I’m Reading Now: Jim Oberwetter

Jim Oberwetter, President of the Dallas Regional Chamber and former
U.S. Ambassador to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Books: I keep a number of books going at a time, some for business and some for fun. The Leader of the Future 2, Vision, Strategies and Practices for the New Era is a good compilation on leadership styles and techniques: Usman A. Ghani, a visiting professor at U.T. Dallas provides one of the solid chapters which make the book worthwhile. Pursuit of Honor by Vince Flynn:  another virtuoso performance by Mitch Rapp vigorously pursuing terrorists who allegedly happen to be violent Islamists, loose on the American homeland allegedly blowing things up.  It almost seems real!  One never has to worry about what side of the moral high ground Rapp comes down on.   Hmmm, our side or theirs?  Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell:  light shined on obvious but veiled phenomena with application across a broad spectrum of life, a minor example of which is why almost every professional hockey player around the world is born between January and June.   And, why such significant matters as genius can lead to a profound “incomplete” in life.  Staffing your business up for success?  Thinking about starting your brilliant child in school one year early?  You better read this first. A Caribbean adventure without leaving home and in less than a day start to finish:  Pirate Latitudes, posthumously by the missed Dr. Michael Crichton.  The mid 1660’s were so swashbucklingly exciting compared to this current day stuff off the Horn of Africa.  Thanks for leaving this real pirate’s tale behind in time for the Christmas holidays Doc.

Blogs: D Frontburner’s up to the minute info on happenings at the center of the universe.  Drudge: a conglomeration of all the political sights, sites and cites one would want to experience.

Magazine, Newspapers, Journals: Dallas Morning News, The Wall Street Journal (print versions). When time allows:  The Washington Post, The New York Times, the Saudi Gazette and Arab News (online).

Magazines

Only one, cover to cover, The Economist, for a great world view.

What I’m Reading Now: Gretchen Bataille

Gretchen M. Bataille, President, University of North Texas

When Christine asked me to contribute to the D Reading Room with a list of books I am reading, all I could think of was the large pile of books next to my bed, the shorter stack on the night table and the Kindle in the closet.  Where do I start?  I am always reading several books at a time and my reading is determined by my levels of energy (working my way through Tolstoy is demanding and requires me to be alert), laziness (a detective novel by Sue Grafton is great for nighttime reading) or “weight”—it’s easier to take a Kindle loaded with novels on a plane than several hardback books.  I just finished Louise Erdrich’s The Plague of Doves on my Kindle.  I knew I had adjusted to this new format when I tried “turning” the page instead of hitting the button to move ahead.  My Kindle also has Outliers:  The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell and two novels I want to re-read:  Jane Austen and Anna Karenina.

I am just about finished with The Big Rich by Bryan Burrough and I realize that anyone new to Texas should read this to understand the dynamics between oil and politics in the State.  I’m also reading Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson and Oliver Relin.  I’m hoping this personal account will help me to better understand the Taliban, the importance of education for girls in Pakistan, and one man’s promise to make a difference.  Saving Ben: A Father’s Story of Autism by Dan E. Burns was a Mayborn winner and published by the UNT Press, so it is quickly moving to the top of the pile.

Because I want to keep up with higher education, I’m perusing Peter G. Northouse’s new edition of Leadership:  Theory and Practice and also seriously considering the conclusions reached by William G. Bowen and his co-authors in Crossing the Finish Line:  Completing College at America’s Public Universities. With less than 60% of students who begin college actually graduating, all of us in higher education need to learn all we can about what will generate success for our students.

I get the Chronicle of Higher Education and Inside Higher Education every day online as well as New York Times updates and regularly read magazines related to education such as The Presidency published by ACE, University Business, and, of course, The North Texan.

To keep up with Texas news, I read Texas Monthly and D Magazine as well as the Dallas Morning News and the Denton Record Chronicle.  Our news bureau regularly sends clips of all the higher education news as well.  I have been reading Newsweek for years, but for me the jury is still out regarding the new format.

I realize that my mantra is “too many books, too little time”!  I wish I had the time to read through many stacks of books much more quickly than I manage to do now!

What I’m Reading Now: Michelle Nussbaumer

Michelle Nusbaumer, interior decorator

Books: More is More by Hutton Wilkinson. Hutton is a dear friend. His  book is full of great anecdotes and stories about Tony Duquette and his Hollywood cronies. (Hutton was Tony’s business partner for over 30 years.) It’s a wonderful tribute to Duquette, who is one of the all time legends in interior and scenic design. The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins. T.S. Elliot described this book as the first and greatest English detective novel. The book deals with the theft of a large and magnificent diamond stolen from an Indian shrine. Valide by Barbara Chase-Riboud is a novel of love and slavery set in the confines of the Sultan’s harem during the reign of Abdulhamid I in 18th c. Constantinople. The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam by Edward FitzGerald’s translation reissued on the 150th anniversary of its original publication. This book was written by the astronomer and poet, Omar Khayyam, born in the later half of the 11th c. It tells the story of love and surrender and is a great book full of wisdom and beauty. It is inspiring to me. The Knife Thrower’s Assistant: Memoirs of a Human Target by Ronnie Claire Edwards. Ronnie Claire tells this hilarious and vivid story of her true life adventures as an actual assistant. Claire was formerly an actress on the TV show, “The Waltons”. Her talent for telling tall-tales is reminiscent of Mark Twain. I can’t wait to finish it!

Websites: 1stdibs.com. This site features among many others, my showroom, Ceylon et Cie. Allthebestblog.com is hosted by Ronda Carmen. She is a Texas girl living in Scotland who is up on what’s happening. Madeline Weinrib.com. Great textiles and rugs. The Strand Bookstore in NY. Shipping to Texas saves the tax and covers more than shipping. I buy most of my books there.

Magazines, newspapers,books: Sunday New York Times, Elle Decor, Veranda, D Home, Papercity, Dallas Morning News, FD Lux, Newsweek,Vanity Fair. Sotheby’s and Christie’s Art and Antique catalogs. I also thumb through just about every shelter publication.

What I’m Reading Now: Carolyn Bess

Carolyn Bess, Director, Arts & Letters Live, Dallas Museum of Art

Books: I’m always juggling a number of books simultaneously. Right now I’m working my way through books by authors featured in Arts & Letters Live, the literary series I direct at the Dallas Museum of Art. (Tickets are on sale now for our 19th season, which launches on January 15 – check out the series brochure online at www.DallasMuseumofArt.org/all.) I just finished Thirst by the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mary Oliver (Arts & Letters Live on January 29). I enjoy reading poems just before bedtime – since they’re short, I have a sense of accomplishment before my head hits the pillow! Oliver’s poetry reminds me a bit of Thoreau in that she finds great awe and wonder in the natural world. I also enjoyed the spirituality found in Thirst – many of the poems read like little blessings. I’m knee-deep into Tracy Kidder’s newest nonfiction book, Strength in What Remains. (Arts & Letters Live on March 23). He’s been hailed as a writer “with an anthropologist’s eye and a novelist’s pen.” It’s an eye-opening account of Deo, an African medical student and refugee from the civil war and genocide in Burundi who made his way to New York City with only $200 in his pocket, no English skills, and no contacts. I also read it as an inspiring call to action because it touches on the people who helped Deo and the work he’s done to help his home country as a result.  Next up on the nightstand are galley copies of two novels to be released mid-January: Melanie Benjamin’s Alice I Have Been, a historical novel and reimagining of the life of Alice Pleasance Liddell Hargreaves, the muse for Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland (Dallas Museum of Art’s Late Night on March 19). Also, Elizabeth Kostova’s The Swan Thieves, a haunting novel of obsession, history’s losses, and the power of art to preserve human hope. It spans the late 19th century to the late 20th century and takes us from American cities to the coast of Normandy, which will make a nice companion to the Museum’s upcoming exhibition The Lens of Impressionism: Photography and Painting Along the Normandy Coast, 1850-1874.

For guilty pleasures, I enjoy reading cookbooks. My latest favorite is Rebecca Rather’s Pastry Queen Parties. If you haven’t been to her Rather Sweet bakery in Fredericksburg, I recommend it the next time you’re heading to the Hill Country. It’s divinely decadent!

Websites: Publishers Weekly (to find out the daily scoop on book releases), DMN Arts and Books blogs, Art & Seek, Frontburner, Styleswoon, Facebook, Anthropologie (much to my husband’s dismay)

Magazines, newspapers, and journals: I read the New York Times, The New Yorker, and The Dallas Morning News for news, arts, and books information, Real Simple and Cooking Light for everyday inspiration and recipes, Vogue and Lucky for fashion ideas.

What I’m Reading Now – Jan Showers

Jan Showers:  Jan Showers & Associates interior design company, Jan Showers Collection, author of “Glamorous Rooms.:

Books: Well, I love to read and always have lots of books with me and now my Kindle
which is great for travel…..here are a couple of my favorites from this
year:
“A Short History of Women” by Kate Walbert.  This book traces the lives of
many generations of women in one family from the late 19th c. to 2007.  It
is incredibly well written and demands your undivided attention.  Her
writing is flawless and has a message about women and their lives.

“Olive Kitteridge” by Elizabeth Strout.  I like this one because it is a
series of short stories with a character named Olive Kitteridge who is
involved directly or indirectly in most of them.  All of the stories take
place in a small town in Maine.  Olive is complex, cantankerous—at times
you may like her and others, somewhat disgusted with her.  It is a book
about the human condition in the present day.

Right now I am reading “The Believers” by Zoe Heller.  She writes greatdialogue and interesting stories.  Cannot give it a review yet as I just started it.  Also, on my Kindle is “Let the Great World Spin” by Colum Mccann…haven’t
started it yet.

Websites: The Daily Beast—Tina Brown’s very smart and sassy website with hard news
and not so hard….check out these sections….Art Beast, Book Beast, Hungry
Beast, What’s in the Fabloids, The Week in Red Carpet and so on.  Really fun
and a great way to get your news these days.  I’m never depressed after
reading it!
Rotten Tomatoes—love this one for movie reviews.
As for design blogs, they are all listed on my website janshowers.com.  I am
busy writing my blog so don’t have lots of time for looking at others

Magazines: I still love magazines and read almost any one I can get my hands on.  I
take all of the shelter magazines (that are still standing!) as well as lots
of other fashion and literary magazines.  Vanity Fair is a favorite for
sure!  I read the DMNews and The New York Times everyday.  I like The Wall Street
Journal as well, especially on Fridays when they review all of the new
movies, books and plays.

What I’m Reading Now: Eric Prokesh

Eric Prokesh – Eric Prokesh Designs

Books: Here is what I’m reading at the moment: The Sell-Out by Charles Gasparino.  The Forgotten Man,
Amity Shlaes thoughtful and fascinating history of the Great Depression. And Ludwig von Mies’  “The Theory of Money and Credit”. Mies was one of the stand outs of the “Austrian school” of economists and is enjoying a revival. His almost overly simple and lapidary writing makes great ideas easy for the reader to grasp. Happy Holidays!

What I’m Reading Now: David Sutherland

David Sutherland – Owner and CEO David Sutherland Showrooms and Sutherland Teak

Books: I just finished The Big Rich by Bryan Burrough about the Texas oil families, all of whom have been my clients over the last 30 years.  I feel a bit like a voyeur since I know so many of them but it reaffirms my entrepreneurial spirit.  You can’t be in the oil (or Design) business and not be an optimist. I also recently read a couple of books by William F. Buckley, God and Man at Yale which he wrote just after graduating from Yale and  Miles Gone By.  I have always admired his dry wit, his immense vocabulary, and his pointed rejoinders on the Firing Line and was fortunate to have had dinner with him once in Fort Worth in the 80’s.  He was a fascinating guy and probably the greatest “Rennaisance Man” I have ever met. I am certain all of his days had 27 hours or more. Another recommendation would be to read two books at the same time, which I did quite by accident….Ken Follett’s Pillars of the Earth and William Rutherford’s Sarum. Both are about generations of stone masons from the earliest times of that construction and they actually parallel each other with just enough difference in the knowledge of the period to make the two together much bigger than either alone in scope.  Really cool. A big read, but they almost finish each other’s sentences.

Magazines: The magazines are “D” of course, Vanity Fair, The
Economist, American Spectator, National Review and Architectural Digest.
Papers are Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal.

What I’m Reading Now: Doug Hawthorne

Doug Hawthorne, CEO Texas Health Resources

Books: I divide my reading into four categories. First Category: Comfort and Peace. Every day and every year my reading is the Bible. Second Category: Fun. Love reading cookbooks. Current one is TWO DUDES ONE PAN by Jon Shook and Vin Dotolo. Just fun foods and creative ideas My current novel is Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea by Gary Kinder. Easy reading and lots of adventure. Magazines are D Magazine and Texas Monthly. Third Category: Professional Development. Current book: The Innovator’s Prescription by Clayton Christensen. It is a disruptive solution for health care. Magazines are Health Leaders, Modern Healthcare, Harvard Business Review, Kiplingers Personal Finance, and Hospitals and Health Systems. Category Four: Children’s Books. With 5 granddaughters all at or under the age of two, I love to read them children stories. Current book: The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein.

What I’m Reading Now: Yvonne Crum

Yvonne Crum, civic volunteer, flight attendant

Books:  The Bolter by Frances Osborne. This a terrific book about Lady Edina Sackville, the author’s great grandmother.  Lady Sackville was a modern-day woman back in the 1940’s and 50’s, a descendant of one of England’s oldest families. And she was not in the least constrained by the conventions of her day. (The woman married and divorced five times and took more lovers than Elizabeth Taylor.  She would shave her head and  go barefoot just to shock — though I loved that through all of her exploits, she was always impeccably dressed.)  Lady Sackville died in 1955 of cancer. Though the author never met her, her research suggests that Sackville never really came to grips with the fact that she was abandoned by her father. Not surprisingly, Sackville perpetuated the cycle and abandoned her own two sons. Rather late she reconciled with them — just before they served and died in World War Two. Osborne titled the book “The Bolter” because Lady Sackville “bolted” from all relationships.

Going Rogue by Sarah Palin  - Loved it but just cannot believe everything that she wrote. My favorite part is when she refers to her critics from the McCain camp as accusing her of “being off-script” and going “rogue”.  She responds by saying “it’s pretty easy to issue candid, off-script messages when there is no script to begin with.” I feel sure that’s how it is most of the time in politics and as I have found in charity work.  Life imitating life. A good fast read with a lot of generalities on conservative ideas and fiscal restraint and a great need for a strong defense policy.  A fun part for me was “Sarah’s not retreating; she’s reloading!”

Websites: Fox News, all the D Blogs, Park Cities People blog, Facebook, Gilt Group , Newport-News (shopping at a discount) and The Observer.

Magazines:D Magazine, D Home, Modern Luxury Dallas,  Time, Newsweek, Vogue, W, Vanity Fair, Marie Claire, Harper’s Bazaar.. I am a fashion junkie but like the news magazines as well

Newspapers:  I have to read The Dallas Morning News with my coffee each day or I am very edgy.  Being of the Right Wing persuasion, I sometimes have a hard time with the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and occassionally will try The Washington Post. I love them all.. Gave up USA today awhile back.

As a civic volunteer and Flight Attendant I feel it’s very important to keep with what’s going on in the world. The written word is wonderful and thought provoking.

Random: Does anyone want to read Reinhold Niebuhr with me?

This has nothing to do with Dallas. Or our book club. But it’s my party. Reinhold Niebuhr’s influence on Barack Obama is well known, and was made even more plain in President Obama’s Nobel Prize acceptance speech. I read some Neibuhr in college  (Children of Light and the Children of Darkness) but would like to dig deeper. E-mail me at christinea@dmagazine.com if you want to read some Niebuhr together. I will try to find a professor to guide us.