March, Stephen. Strangers in the Land of Egypt. Sag Harbor, NY: The Permament Press, 2009. Available May, 2009.

There’s much to like in Stephen March’s Strangers in the Land of Egypt. The protagonist is that likable high-schooler who somehow is much more self-aware and wise than his peers but who still has lots to learn. The crises in the story don’t stretch our credulity. And the epiphanies in the end are profound, but they don’t promise to solve everything in a neat little package.

What keeps me from loving this book is that it doesn’t seem to know who its audience is, whether it’s aiming for a traditional Young Adult crowd or a literary adult audience. It’s the difference between Cecil Castellucci’s Beige or Sara Zarr’s Story of a Girl and Robert Clark’s Love Among the Ruins, between a coming of age story in which the narrator is developing along with story and one in which an adult narrator—with adult understanding—looks back on youth. Where this comes out most strongly to me is in the exposition. After passages of deep understanding probing the emotions and psyche of our main character, we’ll get expositions of the basics of Judaism or the Holocaust that might be fitting in an After School Special. Castellucci’s Katy learns things she doesn’t know in natural interactions with her environment; Jesse listens to the kind of lectures I’d like to give the teens in my life but know they’ll never hear.

Blurbs pasted on the back of my reviewer’s copy praising March’s previous work claim that “March has successfully captured the feel of Southern angst as only…Faulkner or Flannery O’Connor can.” I generally ignore blurbs, and its probably unfair to compare anyone living to the crown royalty of Southern fiction. I can certainly see how an overzealous blurber could make the connection. Does Strangers feature an agnostic protagonist being confronted with a moment of supernatural grace? Yes. Does the story take place in a small town where everyone knows everyone, and everyone has a colorful backstory? Yes. But for my money, this town could have been placed in any of a number of struggling Northern towns. Maybe the hegemony of consumerism has erased some of the unique qualities that made the South of Faulkner and O’Connor distinct from the Hawthorne’s New England or Sandberg’s Chicago.

I began this review saying there’s much to like in Strangers in the Land of Egypt. What made me keep turning the pages was the developing relationship between a self-aware, clueless boy and an odd Jewish Holocaust survivor. That Jesse (as in “the tree of”) is redeemed by the ministrations of a man named Ebban, the helpful stone carved with holy text, perhaps puts too fine a point on the transformation of the teen, but it is perhaps the only heavy-handed aspect to a subtle conversion in which we don’t see a fully renewed soul but rather a man set on the path of grace.

Was wandering about the kitchen today wondering what to do with a cucumber when I was reminded of that staple of Victorian English novels: the cucumber sandwhich. However, I’m a barbaric Midwestern American living in a place that considers pepper an exotic spice. So, here’s what I assembled:

Toast:
2 slices wheat bread

On one side spread
Cream cheese
On the other slice spread
Butter/margarine

Layer on one slice
6-8 slices of cucumber (1/8-1/4 inch thick)

Sprinkle with
Pinch of dill
1-2 grinds of fresh black pepper

Place the other slice of toast on top of the cucumber-laden slice.

Cut in half, and enjoy.

Sherry and I love poking fun at sports commentators who say silly things. Granted, we ourselves would probably say some dumb things if we were miked for three hours and sitting at a sporting event. However, sometimes folks say things that really are just plain, well, wrong.

At the end of today’s Maryland/California NCAA basketball game, the announcer was trying to be nice as the camera focused in on a California player burying his head in a towel as the game ended. “He’s just a freshman. He’s got plenty of more chances.”

Well, no. He doesn’t. He’s got three more chances. That’s it. No more. And possibly less if the guy is good enough for the NBA to come calling.

Now, I’ve got an open field that I’m going to look great in.

Just got back from midnight showing of The Watchmen. First thoughts:
Warning: possible spoilers

• It didn’t suck.
• Even in the graphic novel a certain distracting piece of anatomy was implied but not shown. They really should have gone with that approach.
• Lesson: Even the smartest people in the world need to read their Shelley.
• There were maybe 10 women in the mostly full theater. Not surprising really.
• Out of the entire theater, I end up sitting next to the one guy who doesn’t know what the film was about….And who seems to want to talk to me about it.
• Hollywood really needs to figure out how to end movies. This one had about three. Could be more, but I stopped counting.
• The soundtrack rocks.
• I found it interesting how they didn’t show anything about the Comedian that wasn’t shown in the graphic novel, but I despised him more in the film.
• Matt Frewer/Max Headroom is still fun.
• Seemed like many of the leads were channelling other actors: Billy Crudup is Toby Macguire, Malin Akerman is Drew Barrymore, Patrcik Wilson is Judge Reinhold, Jeffrey Dean Morgan is Raul Julia.
• There actually were no car chases.
• There were explosions.
• I thought the filmmakers did a fairly good job of hewing close to the original material. I say this as a person who just read the GN for the first time about a week ago.

Ok it’s 3:30am. That’s all the processing I do right now.

Oh, and Ken may be right about this film.

Last night we held the 6th (or 5th) Irregular Annual Monty Python party. The first party was held in 1995 at the Fry house. Since then we have had parties at the Toccoa house, the Chicago apartment, and the Tiffin house. All parties include coconuts, House Rules, costumes, and assorted hilarities. This year marked our third Spam sculpting event although there were no prizes this year due to the economic downturn and harried schedules. We crammed about 25 folk into the house, and a great time was had.

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