Sisterland
By Curtis Sittenfeld
Adult New Fiction - Main Level - SITTENFELD

Identical twin sisters Violet and Daisy are psychic. They can sense things that are about to happen. This story is told from Daisy’s perspective, back and forth between their childhood and the present, when they are adults.

Vi has predicted a huge earth quake to take place where they live in St. Louis, Missouri. National television has picked up the story, making Vi somewhat of a celebrity. Daisy, who in adulthood goes by her middle name of Kate, turned off her “senses” after her daughter was born, so she does not know if Vi’s prediction is true – but she does trust her. Vi may be a bit of a loose cannon, wild and unpredictable, but Kate knows her.

This is a story of family loyalty and obligation.  I’ve loved all of Sittenfeld’s books (especially Prep – read that one first!), and this one is a winner too.

Cinnamon and Gunpowder

Cinnamon and Gunpowder by Eli Brown. Adult New Fiction – Upper Level – BROWN Owen Wedgewood was chef to the head of the Pendleton Company, which seems to be a fictional relative of the East India Shipping Company. When the famous pirate Hannah Mabbot arrives to kill Wedgewood’s employer, she pauses to eat some of the dinner he’d cooked and decides to take him with her. She offers the straight-laced Wedgewood a bargain: cook her a full dinner every Sunday and be spared. Initially horrified by her lawlessness and determined to try to escape, he gradually comes to appreciate Mabbot’s iron determination to bring down the opium trade, so ruinous for both addicts and for those forced to grow it. Wedgewood is a philosophical cook, waxing poetical about the powers of civilization and wheat to create bread and the meanings of different tastes. Brown seems to have a good background in old-fashioned cooking, as he describes Wedgewood’s efforts to create what he considers a modern, functional kitchen on board ship, including his difficulties with the stove, creating a yeast starter from scratch, using a cannonball as a rolling pin, his joy over making sauerkraut and his delightful first experiments with miso. There are several almost-right errors in the nautical terminology, perhaps because the story is narrated by Wedgewood, who is decidedly not a sailor. In between the fabulous meals, there are many piratical adventures, including attacks on prisons, sea chases, and fights in seedy port taverns. Even though Mabbott’s ideas are decidedly more modern than 18th century, Wedgewood’s struggles to reconcile his new world with his beliefs felt perfectly appropriate to his time. This is a delightful book that I am happy to recommend to all those enamored of both food and adventures at sea.

The Kill Room by Jeffery Deaver
 Main Level - New Fiction

This new mystery thriller by Deaver once again features the characters of forensics expert, Lincoln Ryme and his NYPD assistant, Amanda Sachs. The very current topic of assassinations of American citizens  sanctioned by the U.S. government is front and center, especially when they are carried out from a secret place right in the heart of New York City.  Deaver is a master of twists and turns in the plot, never letting the reader become complacent or guessing how the story will ultimately end.  There is just enough technical detail to keep readers of forensic mysteries engaged as the scene switches from the Caribbean back to New York.  

This is a great way to start a summer of reading fun and I highly recommend it to all fans of thrillers.  It would make a great movie! 

How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia 
by Mohsin Hamid
Adult Fiction HAMID

The narrator of this ersatz self-help book could be the love child of Jane Austen and Thomas Friedman. This memoir of one man's rise to riches is written in a breezy and accessible style. Like Jane Austen, the narrator is keenly aware of the layers of society and how far upward he can reasonably expect to rise. Our narrator falls in love early in his life with a woman on her own upward trajectory and their poignant romance is much more significant that the mere mechanics of making money.

"Rising Asia" or, in this case, Pakistan is a major character in this story.  The vibrant chaos of life in countries with emerging economies will be familiar to readers of Thomas Friedman's books and articles. Mr. Friedman gives readers a panoramic view of life in an emerging economy, where Mohsin Hamid's novel gives the reader a taste of what it is like to eat, sleep, and survive in all that vibrant chaos. How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia is gritty, sad, sweet, and memorable.

The Noticer by Andy Andrews

If you’re in the mood to read something that just plain makes you feel good, then The Noticer is the book for you. It’s part autobiography, part allegory, and all inspiring.

The Noticer is based on best-selling author Andy Andrews’ own story as a directionless, homeless teen living under a pier on the Alabama Gulf Coast. In the book, Andy is visited by Jones – no “Mr.” – a mysterious, wise, old drifter who seems somehow to know all about Andy’s life and problems. Jones has a gift – he notices things that other people miss. He gives Andy sage advice and begins leaving library books under the pier that help Andy gain perspective and turn his life around.

The story has Jones disappearing and then crossing paths with other townspeople who are experiencing their own moments of crisis, among them a couple on the verge of divorce, a businessman whose business is failing, and an elderly woman despairing that her life no longer has meaning.

The common theme amongst all these stories is finding hope in the face of adversity. The book teaches readers that “sometimes, all a person needs is a little perspective.”

Love Anthony

Love Anthony
by Lisa Genova
CD Shelves - Main Level - GENOVA

(Also available in print.)

I love everything that Lisa Genova writes.  She is a
Harvard-educated neuroscientist, and her novels all have neuroscience connections. Her first novel, Still Alice was about Alzheimers disease and her second novel, Left Neglected was about a neurological condition known as left neglect.

Love Anthony is about autism.  There are a few overlapping story lines, but the main characters are Olivia, who is the mother of a recently-deceased autistic boy named Anthony, Anthony himself, and Beth.  Beth is writing a novel about an autistic boy...named Anthony.  Beth does not know anything about the real Anthony, but the story she writes is uncanny.  The manuscript falls into Olivia's hands when Beth asks her to edit it.  (Olivia was a book editor in the past.)  Olivia swears it is her Anthony, telling his story through Beth.  Beth's own family consists of three healthy, beautiful daughters and a husband from whom she is separated.  Her life forms a side story that is very subtly tied to Olivia's.  Olivia is also separated from her husband.

Genova does a great job of describing autism.  No one can know exactly what it's like to be a person with autism, but the character of Anthony is very believable.  Genova describes what outsiders see when they look at him, but even more touchingly describes what Anthony thinks of the world around him and how he copes with its disorder and noise.

This is a great choice for book clubs.  It is also recommended as a read alike to authors like Jodi Picoult, Elin Hilderbrand, and Amy Hatvany.  Anyone with ties to autism, as well as anyone who wants to know more about autism, will find great satisfaction in this novel.

Sarah's Key

Sarah's Key 
By Tatiana De Rosnay
CD Book Shelves - Main Level - De Rosnay

What a touching story this is!  In 1942, Jewish families were rounded up in Paris and sent to Auschwitz.  This is the story of Sarah Starzynski, a ten year old girl who escaped alone from the Vel' d'Hiv' roundup.  She had locked her little brother in a cabinet at home as they were ushered out by the police to hide him, thinking they would be back in a few hours, not understanding what was happening. When she escaped, she tried to get back to Paris to let her brother out of the cabinet.  The reader knows what that little girl doesn't, and it is absolutely heartbreaking.

Sarah's story is uncovered by a journalist, Julia Jarmond, fifty years later in 2002.  Julia finds that her family has a connection to Sarah's.  Julia's own story is also told in alternating chapters.   Her marriage is rocky, and she has to decide between her unborn baby and her husband - also heartbreaking and dramatic!

The audio book is read by Polly Stone.  She does a good job of differentiating characters by different voices (from small children to senior adults), and delivers an authentic French accent. I was glad to hear this book rather than read it because I know that her pronunciations were much better than my own would have been.

Highly recommended in all formats!

The Runaway Princess

The Runaway Princess by Hester Browne
Adult Paperback New Book Shelves – Main Level - BROWNE

This is one of my top 3 "Beach Reads" of all time.  A glorious little vacation in paperback!

Follow Amy Waite through the streets of London where she meets and falls in love with her own real-life prince.  Of course the path to true love is fraught with trials and tribulations.  Can Amy measure up to the expectations of dating a prince?  Will skeletons be brought out of her family closet and into the national newspaper?  Will she know what to do with all of the forks at her place setting during palace dinners?

It's a quick, easy read.  A super fun visit to Europe and a glimpse into the exciting lives of fictional royalty. 

 

Matterhorn

By Karl Marlantes

Adult Fiction Shelves-Main Level – MARLANTES

Having never been in combat, nor even visited Vietnam as a tourist, it will always be trite to claim that I feel as though I understand what it was like to be in the jungles of South Vietnam with the men of Bravo Company and second lieutenant Mellas – but that is precisely how good Karl Marlantes’s novel, Matterhorn truly is.  The poignancy and gripping realism of Marlantes’s first novel is informed and enlightened by his background as a combat-decorated veteran of the Marine Corps (awarded the Navy Cross for his heroism in Vietnam) as well as a Rhodes Scholar and Yale graduate.  “Pager-turner” clichés are much too worn for a novel as well-executed and absorbing as Matterhorn.  Every Vietnam War archetype is present here without ever feeling tired or forced.  Politics, class, and race all play a vital role in the novel, just as they did during the war and still do to this day.  If you haven’t yet, please do yourself the favor of reading what has quickly become the novel of the Vietnam War.  It is enriching, engrossing, and utterly moving – you will be well-rewarded for your efforts here.



A Walk Across the Sun

A Walk aCross the Sun by Corban Addison
Adult New Book Display Main Level - ADDISON

What a great book! This one is highly recommended to adults and mature teens. It's not warm and fuzzy, but just as John Grisham said in his review across the top of the cover, it is beautiful in story and important in message.

It is about two teenage sisters in India whose family die in a tsunami, leaving them orphaned. The same day, they are kidnapped and sold into the Mumbai sex trade.  The sisters are ultimately separated, and the book tells their individual stories.

Then there is Thomas, a lawyer who leaves his high-profile corporate job to work for an NGO that tries to rescue girls from sexual slavery in India.  Thomas and his wife are separated, and she just happens to have returned to her family in India.  The two meet up and try to salvage their marriage.

I can't give away the whole story, but Thomas's story intertwines with that of the sisters'.  Will have be able to rescue them?  Will the sisters be reunited?

As disgusted as I was reading about human trafficking, I learned a lot from this story. I was moved by the plight of the sisters and the good intentions of the non-profits who work to help girls in their situation.  I was also horrified at the corruption in the Indian legal system and the issues of jurisdiction when the problem crosses borders.  Even those who want to help are hindered by legalities, loopholes, and international politics.

It's a reasonably-sized book at less than 400 pages, but its message is huge and worth hearing.  It's a riveting story, and although this is fiction, I'm afraid it is all too a reality in many young girls' lives.

The Shoemaker’s Wife

The Shoemaker’s Wife by Adriana Trigiani. Narrated by Annabella Sciorra and Adriana Trigiani.
CD Book Shelves – Main Level - TRIGIANI

I’ve enjoyed many Adriana Trigiani books in the past – Rococo is the only one I’ve reviewed here, but I’ve read 5 or 6 others that I can think of off the top of my head. Naturally, I went for this one, though I waited for the hold list here at the library calmed down a little.

This one is an epic based on the lives of her grandparents that Trigiani has been researching for 20 years. We meet Enza and Ciro as they are both teenagers in Alpine Italy. Enza is the responsible oldest daughter of a large brood; Ciro is the youngest of two, left with his brother at a convent after their father dies. It’s love at first sight when Enza and Ciro first meet as Ciro is digging Enza’s baby sister’s grave, but before they can meet again, Ciro is to emigrate to America. Enza and her father travel to America somewhat later, knowing nothing of Ciro’s fate. They are just hoping to earn enough money in the U.S. to build their family a house before returning home. In America, Ciro is apprenticed to a shoemaker in Little Italy, while Enza labors in a sweatshop in New Jersey, before finding a better job in the Metropolitan Opera’s costume shop, sewing for Caruso. After years of working, romances with other people, and Ciro fighting in World War I, they finally marry, but decide to stay in America rather than trying to return to Italy. As there are plenty of shoemakers in New York City, they move to the Iron Range in Minnesota, where Ciro and his fellow former apprentice become the only shoemakers to the miners.

Maybe if I’d remembered more of the reviews I read, I wouldn’t have been disappointed – but I was expecting Enza and Ciro to be married for most of a book titled “The Shoemaker’s Wife.” Instead, they got married about disc 9 of 12. Somehow, I was strongly reminded of L.M. Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables series, and wished that this, too, divided the independent life, the courting, starting married life and having children into separate books. While I enjoyed the earlier parts, I felt like the last part, the part that was what I was expecting the book to be about, was rushed through, with years skipped over without transition. There were a few instances – Ciro’s first romance, and every upholstered item being covered in chenille – where I wondered about the historical accuracy, though it’s obvious that a lot of research went into it. Trigiani writes here, too, with a more emotional style than in her other books. I’m sure it’s deliberate, but sometimes when I could hear the violins in the background, it was a bit much for me. Writing along the lines of “If only Enza had known that she would never see her mother again, she would have hugged her longer” as part of a whole paragraph along those lines. It was Trigiani’s decision also, apparently, to switch to narrating the book partway through. I understood this decision a little more when I listened to her talk about it in the interview at the end, but it was initially very jarring to hear the characters talking in completely different voices, with New York accents while being described in the text as having strong Italian accents. That being said, while I personally preferred Sciorra’s narration, Trigiani read more expressively than many authors I’ve heard.

Despite its flaws, I sincerely cared about Ciro and Enza and their friends. Along with the Trigiani elements that I’d expect – the Italian family in America, the food, and the transformational trip back to Italy – there’s a lot of Caruso love, and a strong feeling both for the hardships that drove Italians to immigrate and the experience they had when here. If you’re in the mood to curl up with a historical novel set mostly only a hundred years ago, this is a fine choice.

The Iron Wyrm Affair

The Iron Wyrm Affair. Bannon and Clare Book 1. by Lilith Saintcrow.
Adult New Books – Main Level – SCI FI SAINTCROW

The Iron Wyrm Affair drops us into the middle of a fight scene in a complex alternate-Victorian steampunk world. I think it was the complexity of this world that made the first couple of chapters feel slow to me, even though it started off with action and never slowed down. Emma Bannon is a top-level sorceress, a Prima, in service to Queen Victrix, current vessel of the ancient spirit Britannia. Emma is talented, beautiful, fashionable, and fiercely intelligent and has fought her way up from the gutter to be the only Prima among several male Primes. (Though she’s fashionable because she wants to be, her jewelry stores power for her and is always chosen carefully as an ensemble.) As our story begins, she’s searching for Archibald Clare, an unlicensed mentath. Here we must learn that a mentath is someone along the order of Sherlock Holmes, more intelligent than your standard-issue genius, who notices details without trying, processing them into patterns, and who will go crazy without enough information to process. Clare, having lost his license, is indeed on the verge of insanity, but Bannon is looking for him because he is the last mentath of any kind to be found in London, the rest having been recently murdered. Bannon’s out to protect Clare, but as long as he’s in her house, he might as well be useful – and all the murdered mentaths are the first pieces of a dark puzzle that leads to a threat against Queen Victrix herself. (Here I confess that I was did double takes the whole book, trying to keep straight that Bannon meant Emma and Clare, Archibald – I kept want Clare to be the woman. Oy.) Bannon is assisted by a single Shield, Mikal, a man with yellow eyes and a dark past, whom Bannon both can’t completely trust and can’t stop being attracted to (but not in a romance-novel, can’t focus on anything else kind of way, and we never see inside his head). As mentaths and sorcerers don’t really work well in close proximity, Bannon hires Ventinelli, an assassin whom Clare rightly immediately pegs as an aristocrat hiding as gutter scum, to act as Clare’s bodyguard. Bannon and Clare set off in opposite directions, she investigating the magical murder of another sorcerer as she was trying to interrogate him, and he to find out the reason there are suddenly no Prussian capacitors on the market, a line of investigation which leads to large clockwork war spiders. The combination of magic and Holmesian mystery is intriguing, the setting brought beautifully to life, the characters interesting. It’s not as funny as Gail Carriger’s Soulless, and deals much more with the dark and seamy side of politics, though with somewhat fewer serious underlying issues thanThe Iron Duke There are dragons and griffons here, rather than werewolves, vampires, or zombies. It still worked very well as a steampunk vision, and I’d look forward to reading more of Bannon and Clare’s adventures. It’s written for adults, and though the language is a little off-color, there’s nothing here in the way of sex or violence that action-loving teens would find exceptionable.

It Can't Happen Here

It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis
Adult Graphic Novels-Main Level GIA


The Great Depression was one of the defining events for the United States. In hindsight, it is easy for the current generation may just assume that our country was destined to pull through with our democratic system intact. But this was no guarantee. Powerful forces such as Father Coughlin, Huey Long, and the Business Plot against FDR were real, dangerous threats to American democracy. Authors such as Sinclair Lewis wrote works of fiction to criticize these authoritarian figures. Lewis’s 1935 novel It Can’t Happen Here is one of the many novels written last century that warns Americans about how fragile democracy can actually be. Many Americans have always assumed that a dictatorship is not possible in this country but Lewis details in chilling fashion how such a takeover could have happened at this vulnerable point in history.

Americans during this point of the Great Depression were weary and uncertain about the future. In the story, the charismatic Senator Buzz Windrip rises to power with his paramilitary group the Minute Men along with promises to restore American greatness. Windrip gains support by using xenophobia, prejudice, and even promises of paying Americans a cash sum after he is elected. These promises, along with the general discontent in the country, help him win the election of 1936. Windrip quickly consolidates power by curbing the authority of Congress, lets corporations extend their influence, and silences any dissent. While some characters can see the horrible direction these actions will lead the country, others dismiss these fears because they simply cannot believe a real dictatorship can happen in the country, hence the title of the book. The rest of the novel sees the main character Doremus Jessup enduring the tightening state control over his life while struggling to find a way to fight back.

Lewis’s novel may come from a different era but its lessons can apply to any generation. During any economic distress, citizens may turn to easy answers while people in power use the circumstances to justify their actions. This book will easily appeal to fans of the genres of dystopian fiction, political fiction, or alternate history.

Where'd You Go, Bernadette

Where’d You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple
Adult New Book Display – Main Level - SEMPLE

Simply put, I loved this book. I found myself laughing out loud while reading it and also being moved by the family relationships it explores. It is the story of a reclusive architect, Bernadette Fox, who lives in Seattle with her husband, Elgin, and 15 year old daughter, Bee. Bernadette is considered a genius in the architecture world, yet she hasn't designed anything in years. Instead, she spends her days getting into squabbles with other parents and neighbors and having a virtual assistant on the other side of the world take care of everything for her. She is also preparing for a family trip to Antarctica. However, right before the trip, Bernadette disappears. Bee tries to figure out what has happened to her mother and the novel is told through a series of emails, letters, notes, and other correspondence between characters, with commentary from Bee. Overall, Where'd You Go, Bernadette is an excellent and unique read.

Defending Jacob

Defending Jacob William Landay

Adult New Fiction Landay




Imagine your teenage son has just been accused of murder. You have a happy family, a powerful job as a District Attorney, and your family is beloved in the community. Now it’s all gone. That is what happens to Andy Barber when his 14 year old son, Jacob, is accused of murdering a classmate.

This novel reads like a cross between John Grisham and Jodi Picoult. The setting is primarily in the courtroom where Jacob is being tried but the now unemployed Andy is our narrator and his instincts to protect his family are central to the story. He refuses to believe that Jacob could do such a thing while his wife, Laurie, isn’t so sure. The evidence does seem compelling. And then there is the “murder gene.” Nope, I’m not going to tell you about that one. You’ll have to read the story to find out.

The book is as compelling a read as any I’ve experienced. And the ending! Well, when I finished the book, I uttered a single expletive and sat there feeling utterly spent. What a book.

Blue Asylum

Blue Asylum by Kate Hepinstall
Adult New Book Display-Main Level - HEPINSTALL

Iris Dunleavy was sent to Sanibel Asylum to be restored to a good wife. Her crime? She disagreed with her slave-holding husband and helped his slaves to escape. Even worse in his eyes, she escaped with them. At Sanibel, she meets Ambrose Weller, a confederate soldier. He suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder from the war, but the civil war-era doctor just considers him as crazy as the others. Iris and Ambrose fall in love, and conspire with the doctor's twelve-year-old son to get off the island. But where will they go? Who will take them in? Can Iris handle Ambrose's fits of rage and grief? This is a beautifully-written novel with layers of complexity.

At the Mountains of Madness

At the Mountains of Madness by H.P Lovecraft
Adult Science Fiction-LOVECRAFT

The horror/sci-fi genre has a number of pioneers when it comes to well-known authors. H.P Lovecraft may not be as famous as other authors from his era, but his ideas influenced a generation of fiction writers and he has a dedicated contemporary fan base. His book At the Mountains of Madness is one of his essential works and a part of his Cthulhu Mythos. Horror readers who are unaware of his writings and mythology have probably at least seen his ideas in other people’s work. Movies such as Hellboy and some novels from authors like Stephen King are admittedly done in the Lovecraftian style. The plot itself for At the Mountains of Madness is deceptively simple. A scientific expedition to Antarctica discovers a vast city and also uncovers evidence of an ancient civilization that once ruled over the planet before humans. As the scientists Danforth and Dyer piece together the history of these Old Ones, the two quickly realize that they are not alone and that something has awakened after eons of sleep.

The themes of the story are similar to previous Lovecraft works. Lovecraft’s horror comes not from the typical blood and guts common in horror works now, but from building a sense of dread and fear along with showing humanity’s basic cosmic insignificance when compared with the Old Ones. The story makes it clear that the former masters of the world would have little trouble retaking what was theirs if they reawaken. This central tenant of Lovecraft’s mythology, that mankind’s power and place on earth is nowhere near as secure as we seem to think, is a far more horrifying prospect than is typically seen in horror stories then and now.

The Beginner's Goodbye

The Beginner's Goodbye Anne Tyler

Adult New Fiction Tyler


When a tree falls on Aaron's house, killing his wife Dorothy, he feels
completely lost. Everyone in his neighborhood and at work wants to cook
for him or take him out, but all Aaron wants to do is be alone with his
grief. So he empties out casseroles, dumping them in the garbage and
sending thank yous. In his grieving, the one person he longs to speak with
is Dorothy. There's a beautiful quote to that effect, but I can't find it.



After staying in the hospital for days on end, he returns to his torn up
home until a rainstorm forces him to move in with his overbearing sister.
Dororthy starts to visit Aaron for brief moments as he recalls his
courtship and their 10 year marriage. Dorothy, or Dr. Rosales as she would
always correct everyone, was a plain, no frills woman. Aaron was crippled
as a boy on his right side. The two seemed to converse through silences
and it takes Dorothy's visits after her death to show Aaron how to say
goodbye and to realize the truth of his marriage, that it wasn't really a
happy one.



This is a brief book. Aaron is a publisher of a vanity press, inherited
from his father, not something he would have wanted to do after having
graduated from Stanford. His company publishes "beginners' guides to..."
and in this way this book is a guide for Aaron to say goodbye. As usual
Tyler sets this in Baltimore and she has a way of drawing upon the most
ordinary of characters and finding their humanity and quirkyness.

Away

Away Amy Bloom

Adult Fiction Bloom


Barbara Rosenblatt does an excellent job narrating the story of Lillian
Leyb who comes to America in 1924 after her family is killed in a Russian
pogrom. Here she manages to get a job as a seamstress in the Goldfadn
Yiddish Theater where she becomes the mistress of the leading actor and
his father. Her friend at the theater, Yaakov Shimmelman, gives her a
thesaurus and coaches her in English. When she learns that her daughter
Sophie did not die in the pogrom, he helps her procure cheap passage to
Seattle, her launching off point for a trip to Siberia to find Sophie.
There she falls in with a kind African-American prostitute who rescues her
after she is robbed.



Lillian's trip by foot across Alaska is amazing, helped along the way by
kind strangers. Lillian's voyage is filled with tragedy, humor and
compassion; she is not one to wallow in self-pity. Lillian is open to all
experiences and without umbrage. A wonderful read or listen.

Salvage the Bones

Salvage the Bones Jesmyn Ward

Adult Fiction Ward


This powerful book is set in the woods of Mississippi in the days leading
up to Hurricane Katrina. It's a gritty story about a family of 3 boys and
their father, told by the 14-year-old sister, Esch, who discovers she is
pregnant. She is a lover of mythology, especially the story of Medea and
Jason and her ideas of Medea and Jason surround her unrequited love for
Manny, her sun, who made her pregnant but rejected her. Esch's brother
Skeetah loves his pitbull, China, who has just given birth to puppies
which he hopes to sell to pay for the older brother's basketball camp.
There is the youngest, Junior, whose birth was their mother's death, and
who has been cared for by all of them. Their lives are filled with grief
from the death of their mother and their father's most important
possession seems to be photos of her. West's writing is earthy and filled
with metaphore as well as love and respect for this family living in
desperate poverty.