I Remember Nothing: And Other Reflections
Nora Ephron, 2010
Random House
160 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780307742803
Summary
Nora Ephron returns with her first book since the astounding success of I Feel Bad About My Neck, taking a hilarious look at the past, the present, and the future, bemoaning the vicissitudes of modern life, and recalling with her signature clarity and wisdom everything she hasn’t (yet) forgotten.
Filled with insights and observations that instantly ring true—and could have come only from Nora Ephron—I Remember Nothing is pure joy. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—May 19, 1941
• Where—New York City, New York, USA
• Raised—Beverly Hills, California
• Death—June 26, 2012
• Where—New York City
• Education—Wellesley College
Nora Ephron was an American film director, producer, screenwriter, novelist, journalist, author, and blogger.
She was best known for her romantic comedies and is a triple nominee for the Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay—for Silkwood...When Harry Met Sally...and Sleepless in Seattle. Her film Julie & Julia came out in 2010. She sometimes wrote with her sister Delia Ephron.
Personal life
Ephron was born in New York City, eldest of four daughters in a Jewish family, and grew up in Beverly Hills; her parents, Henry and Phoebe Ephron, were both East Coast-born and raised screenwriters. Her sisters Delia and Amy are also screenwriters. Her sister Hallie Ephron is a journalist, book reviewer, and novelist who writes crime fiction.
Ephron's parents based Sandra Dee's character in the play and 1963 film Take Her, She's Mine (with Jimmy Stewart) on their 22-year-old daughter Nora and her letters to them from college. Both became alcoholics during their declining years. Ephron graduated from Beverly Hills High School in Beverly Hills, California, in 1958, and from Wellesley College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, in 1962.
She was married three times. Her first marriage, to writer Dan Greenburg, ended in divorce after nine years. Her second was to journalist Carl Bernstein of Watergate fame in 1976. Ephron had an infant son, Jacob, and was pregnant with her second son, Max, in 1979 when she found out the news of Bernstein's affair with their mutual friend, married British politician Margaret Jay.
Ephron was inspired by the events to write the 1983 novel Heartburn, which was made into a 1986 film starring Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep. In the book, Ephron wrote of a husband named Mark, who was “capable of having sex with a Venetian blind.” She also said that the character Thelma (based on Margaret Jay) looked like a giraffe with "big feet." Bernstein threatened to sue over the book and film, but he never did.
Ephron's third marriage was to screenwriter Nicholas Pileggi.
Although Jewish by birth, Ephron was not religious. "Because you can never have too much butter — that is my belief. If I have a religion, that's it," she told NPR in an interview about her 2009 movie, Julie & Julia.
Career
Ephron graduated from Wellesley College in 1962 and worked briefly as an intern in the White House of President John F. Kennedy.
After a satire she wrote lampooning the New Post caught the editor's eye, Ephron landed a job at the Post, where she stayed as a reporter for five years. In 1966, she broke the news in the Post that Bob Dylan had married Sara Lownds in a private ceremony three and a half months before.
Upon becoming a successful writer, she wrote a column on women's issues for Esquire. In this position, Ephron made a name for herself by taking on subjects as wide-ranging as Dorothy Schiff, her former boss and owner of the Post; Betty Friedan, whom she chastised for pursuing a feud with Gloria Steinem; and her alma mater Wellesley, which she said had turned out a generation of "docile" women." A 1968 send-up of Women's Wear Daily in Cosmopolitan resulted in threats of a lawsuit from WWD.
While married to Bernstein in the mid-1970s, at her husband and Bob Woodward's request, she helped Bernstein re-write William Goldman's script for All the President's Men, because the two journalists were not happy with it. The Ephron-Bernstein script was not used in the end, but was seen by someone who offered Ephron her first screenwriting job, for a television movie.
Ephron's 2002 play Imaginary Friends explores the rivalry between writers Lillian Hellman and Mary McCarthy.
Ephron and Deep Throat
For many years, Ephron was among only a handful of people in the world claiming to know the identity of Deep Throat, the source for news articles written by her husband Carl Bernstein during the Watergate scandal. Ephron claims to have guessed the identity of Deep Throat through clues left by Bernstein. Among them was the fact that Bernstein referred to the source as "My Friend", the same initials as "Mark Felt," whom some suspected to be Bernstein's source.
Ephron's marriage with Bernstein ended acrimoniously, and Ephron was loose-lipped about the identity of Deep Throat. She told her son Jacob and has said that she told anyone who asked...
I would give speeches to 500 people and someone would say, "Do you know who Deep Throat is?" And I would say, "It’s Mark Felt."
Classmates of Jacob Bernstein at the Dalton School and Vassar College recall Jacob revealing to numerous people that Felt was Deep Throat. Curiously, the claims did not garner attention from the media during the many years that the identity of Deep Throat was a mystery. Ephron was invited by Arianna Huffington to write about the experience in the Huffington Post and now regularly blogs for the site.
Death
On June 26, 2012, Ephron died from pneumonia, a complication resulting from acute myeloid leukemia, a condition with which she was diagnosed in 2006. In her final book, I Remember Nothing (2010), Ephron left clues that something was wrong with her or that she was ill, particularly in a list at the end of the book citing "things I won't miss/things I'll miss."
There was widespread and somewhat shocked reaction to her death (as she had kept her illness secret from most people), with celebrities such as Meryl Streep, Matthew Broderick, Billy Crystal, Meg Ryan, Nicole Kidman, Tom Hanks, Albert Brooks, and Ron Howard commenting on her brilliance, warmth, generosity, and wit.
At the Karlovy Vary Film Festival of that year, actresses Helen Mirren and Susan Sarandon, who were honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award, paid tribute to her during their speeches.
Nora Ephron Prize
The Nora Ephron Prize is a $25,000 award by the Tribeca film festival for a female writer or filmmaker "with a distinctive voice." The first Nora Ephron Prize was awarded in 2013 to Meera Menon for her film Farah Goes Bang. (From Wikipedia. Retrieved 5/1/2014.)
Listen to a terrific audio tribute to Ephron by bloggers Hollister & O'Toole.
Book Reviews
Nora Ephron's new book of essays is titled I Remember Nothing, but that's a sop. She remembers everything, and while some of the material in this book is tantalizingly fresh and forthright, some of it we've seen before. Which doesn't mean it's not just as entertaining the second or even third time around, offered in each new iteration with a few more spicy details…[Ephron]'s familiar but funny, boldly outspoken yet simultaneously reassuring.
Alex Kuczynski - New York Times Book Review
What you can finally say about Ephron is that she's a tremendously talented woman from a significant American period. Yes, she has some trouble making up her mind. She'll come horrifyingly close to self-denigration (in the divorce essay, for example), but then, just in case you might go along with that gag, she'll dazzle you in the next pages with strings of perfect prose. Luck, hard work, privilege, yes, yes, yes. But tremendous talent is her forte, her strong suit, her fiendish trump card.
Carolyn See - Washington Post
Vivid.... [An] entertaining collection of stories about her life so far. . . . She remains the neighbor we all wish we had. Someone to share a cup of coffee with. Or better yet, a glass of wine. Maybe two.
USA Today
Classic Ephron: gloriously opinionated—and on target.... Ephron sure does know how to tell a story and entertain.
Heller McAlpin - NPR
When you start to read her work, you can’t stop. You don’t want to stop. Her writer’s voice is remarkably engaging and fresh.
Buffalo News
Breathlessly funny.... Chatty, witty, self-effacing and candid.
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Breezily funny prose.... As candid and hilarious as before.
Kansas City Star
Nora Ephron is, in essence, one of the original bloggers—and if everyone could write like her, what a lovely place the Internet would be.... If this is Nora Ephron’s last word, it’s a stylish one—but here’s hoping she’s got a few more up her cashmere sleeve
Seattle Times
She’s never been more real than in this collection—a full pleasure to read.
New York Journal of Books
The power of these essays often comes from a voice clearly looking back at a riveting life with a clear-eyed wisdom and, at times, twinges of regret.
Salon
A slim, candid, and always witty package of Ephron’s insights, written and bound before they slip her mind forever.
Elle
(Audio version.) Ephron's voice has a nice grain to it, but where it should skip and flow to mimic the conversational patter of her prose, it stumbles and drags.... Stripped of the author's light touch and self-deprecation, the jokes fall flat, and [some of] Ephron's quips on...are likely to elicits more cringes than chuckles.
Publishers Weekly
[F]unny, relatable, and sometimes touching stories. The chapters on email and journalism are particularly amusing, while the accounts of Ephron's divorce and her mother's alcoholism show a different side to the author/director best known for her comedy.... One doesn't have to be on the other side of 50 to appreciate her wit. —Theresa Horn, St. Joseph Cty. P.L., South Bend, IN
Library Journal
Candid, self-deprecating, laser-smart, and hilarious.... A master of the jujitsu essay, Ephron leaves us breathless with rueful laughter.
Booklist
Bland, often rambling anecdotes from the acclaimed director and screenwriter. Ephron returns to the literary scene with a collection of essays that thematically hover around the issue of aging.... Only occasionally reaches emotional depth—seems like a tardy attempt to capitalize on the success of I Feel Bad About My Neck.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. In the title essay, Ephron writes," ... I have been forgetting things for years, but now I forget in a new way” [p.5]. How do the examples she uses capture the difference between her past and present ways of forgetting?
2. Does Ephron’s list of the symptoms of old age mirror your own experiences or things you have observed in older friends or relatives [p.6]? What other common signs of aging can you think of? How much of what we remember—or forget—is shaped by its relevance to our personal lives and history? What does Ephron’s inability to identify the celebrities in People magazine, for example, reflect about the different interests that naturally develop as we get older? How does this relate to Ephron’s list of what she “refuses to know anything about” [p. 10]?
3. Ephron writes about the start of her career as a writer in “Journalism: A Love Story.” Does the essay explain the rather unusual subtitle she has chosen? What does the atmosphere she encountered at Newsweek show about the times? How does Ephron respond to the limitations automatically imposed on her and the “institutionalism of sexism . . . at Newsweek” [p. 23]? To what extent do lucky breaks and useful connections play a role in the careers of most young people, including Ephron herself? How significant is her background—and her mother’s example—to Ephron’s confidence and drive?
4. “The Legend” offers a colorful portrait of Ephron’s childhood surrounded by Hollywood and literary celebrities, including her mother, a highly successful screenwriter, and the noted New Yorker writer, Lillian Ross. Discuss the various implications of the title. What does the anecdote at the heart of the essay, as well as the vignette about her graduation, convey about Ephron’s feelings for her mother? How does she capture the ambivalence experienced by a child of an alcoholic?
5. “My Life as an Heiress” provides more glimpses into the dynamics of Ephron’s family. How does she use humor and exaggeration to explore the relationships among her siblings—and the unexpected and less-than-admirable qualities triggered by the anticipation of an unexpected financial boon?
6. What does “Twenty-five Things People Have a Shocking Capacity to Be Surprised by Over and Over Again” reveal about human nature and our tendency to accept conventional beliefs despite lots of evidence to the contrary? What particular needs, emotions, or prejudices perpetuate our “capacity to be surprised”? Which entries resonated with you? What would you add to her list?
7. “Pentimento” chronicles the rise and fall of Ephron’s relationship with the controversial playwright Lillian Hellman. What qualities, personal and professional, initially make Hellman attractive to Ephron? What does Ephron’s description of their relationship— “‘Friends’ is probably not the right word—I became one of the young people in her life” [p.85]—convey about the way Hellman perceived herself and her importance in the literary community? Why does Ephron search for reasons to explain her ultimate rejection of Hellman [p. 89]? What do Ephron’s regrets show about how the passage of time alters our views of the infatuations and disappointments, as well as the missed opportunities, of the past?
8. “The Six Stages of E-Mail” is a very funny chronicle of Ephron’s evolving reactions to e-mail. Do you share her mixed feelings about e-mail and more recent (and, perhaps, more intrusive) technological advances like Facebook and other social networks? Have these new forms of communication made life easier or more complicated? To what extent have they become a less-than-satisfactory substitute for old-fashioned phone calls and face-to-face conversations?
9. In one of the most moving pieces in the collection, Ephron describes the traditional Christmas dinners she shared with friends for twenty-two years and the changes that occur when Ruthie, one of the participants, dies. How does the grief the others feel manifest itself? Discuss the repercussions of their attempts to move beyond (or compensate for) her absence, including its affect on the tone of their conversations as they plan the meal; Ephron’s resentment of losing her usual role of providing desserts; the group’s impatience and annoyance with the couple invited as replacements for Ruthie and her husband; and even the inclusion of Ruthie’s recipe for bread and butter pudding. What does “Christmas Dinner” reveal about the particular pain of losing friends as you get older?
10. Ephron turned her 1980s divorce from Carl Bernstein into the hilarious bestseller Heartburn. In “The D Word” she revisits that break-up and also recounts her divorce from her first husband in the 1970s. What do her accounts of each divorce illustrate about the issues she—and other women of her generation—faced? What light does she shed on the difficult challenges parents face when contemplating divorce [p. 120]? Which of her points do you find the most and the least convincing? She describes her second divorce as “the worse kind of divorce” [p. 123]. How do the details she offers provide a sense of the emotional toll of her husband’s deceptions and her reactions to them?
11. Ephron writes, “The realization that I may only have a few good years remaining has hit me with a real force...” [p. 129]. How do her memories of her younger years inform her feelings of loss and how do they shape her approach to the years to come?
12. Several essays are entitled “I Just Want to Say” and go on to explore a specific topic. What do these pieces have in common? What do they and her short, funny, and to-the-point personal revelations like “My Aruba,” “Going to the Movies,” “Addicted to L-U-V,” and “My Life as a Meatloaf” contribute to the shape and impact of the collection?
13. Reread the lists (“What I Won’t Miss” and “What I Will Miss”) at the end of I Remember Nothing and create your own versions highlighting what you cherish—as well as you’d gladly give up.
14. If you have read I Feel Bad about My Neck, what changes do you see in Ephron’s outlook and perceptions over the course of time between the two books?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
The Death of Caesar: The Story of History's Most Famous Assassination
Barry Strauss, 2015
Simon & Schuster
352 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781451668797
Summary
The exciting, dramatic story of one of history’s most famous events—the death of Julius Caesar—now placed in full context of Rome’s civil wars by eminent historian Barry Strauss.
Thanks to William Shakespeare, the death of Julius Caesar is the most famous assassination in history. But what actually happened on March 15, 44 BC is even more gripping than Shakespeare’s play.
In this thrilling new book, Barry Strauss tells the real story.
Shakespeare shows Caesar’s assassination to be an amateur and idealistic affair. The real killing, however, was a carefully planned paramilitary operation, a generals’ plot, put together by Caesar’s disaffected officers and designed with precision. There were even gladiators on hand to protect the assassins from vengeance by Caesar’s friends.
Brutus and Cassius were indeed key players, as Shakespeare has it, but they had the help of a third man—Decimus. He was the mole in Caesar’s entourage, one of Caesar’s leading generals, and a lifelong friend. It was he, not Brutus, who truly betrayed Caesar.
Caesar’s assassins saw him as a military dictator who wanted to be king. He threatened a permanent change in the Roman way of life and in the power of senators. The assassins rallied support among the common people, but they underestimated Caesar’s soldiers, who flooded Rome. The assassins were vanquished; their beloved Republic became the Roman Empire.
An original, fresh perspective on an event that seems well known, Barry Strauss’s book sheds new light on this fascinating, pivotal moment in world history (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1952-53 (?)
• Where—near New York City, New York, USA
• Education—B.A., Cornell University; M.A., Ph.D. Yale University
• Currently—lives in Ithaca, New York
Barry S. Strauss is a Professor of History and Classics at Cornell University and chair of its history department. He is an expert on ancient military history and has written or edited numerous books, including The Battle of Salamis (2004), The Trojan War (2006), The Spartacus War (2009), and The Death of Caesar (2015). His books have been translated into six languages.
Strauss holds a B.A. from Cornell and a Ph.D. from Yale and has been awarded fellowships by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, the MacDowell Colony for the Arts, the Korea Foundation, and the Killam Foundation of Canada. He is Director of Cornell's Program on Freedom and Free Societies and past Director of its Peace Studies Program.
He lives in Ithaca, New York, with his wife Marcia; the couple has two grown children. His hobbies are rowing, cycling and hiking. He love jazz and opera and watch too much television. (From Wikipedia and the author's website. Retrieved 4/20/2015.)
Book Reviews
[A] page-turner.... Detail after detail clothes the familiar facts of Caesar’s seemingly inevitable murder with fresh images.... The last bloody day of the Republic has never been painted so brilliantly.
Greg Woolf - Wall Street Journal
This history of Caesar by the American academic Barry Strauss is a romp, yes, but a glorious one, through the final months of Rome’s most famous ruler.... One of the most riveting hour-by-hour accounts of Caesar’s final day I have read.... An absolutely marvelous read.
Catherine Nixey - Times (UK)
A classics thriller.... The Death of Caesar teases apart this paramilitary operation of 60 or more conspirators and, in reporting the facts, revokes much of Shakespeare’s poetic license in Julius Caesar.
Katharine Whittemore - Boston Globe
The superb storytelling of Barry Strauss shows that the details of history's most famous assassination are just as fascinating as why it happened.... The Death of Caesar provides a fresh look at a well-trodden event, with storytelling sure to inspire awe.
Scott Manning - Philadelphia Inquirer
A fresh, accessible account of the archetypal assassination.... Strauss underscores [the conspirators'] dilemma with an urgency that makes each page crackle with suspense.... The Death of Caesar serves us both as an entertaining, vital act of preservation for those details and figures glossed over by other historians and as a reminder of a plot so daring it would be unthinkable today.
Nick Ochwar - Los Angeles Review of Books
[A] compelling, clarifying account of one of history's most dramatic assassinations.... [Strauss] conveys the complexity of late republican Roman politics while keeping up a lively pace.
Lev Grossman -Time
With a keen focus on the conspiracy itself, Strauss examines Caesar's rise to power while looking closely at his colleagues.... Strauss's writing is stilted and the material may be most accessible to those with some knowledge of ancient Rome, but most readers will find this an informative and dramatic tale.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) [A] riveting portrayal of Caesar's assassination on the Ides of March, 44 BCE. The author explains successfully very complicated political situations in laymen's terms, propelling the reader through Caesar's dramatic rise to his shocking murder.... [E]nriching and exciting .—Jeffrey Meyer, Mt. Pleasant P.L., IA
Library Journal
(Starred review.) wMaster historian Strauss zeroes in on the few years surrounding Julius Caesar's assassination and delves into the strengths of the characters involved.... Once again, Strauss takes us deep into the psyche of ancient history in an exciting, twisted tale that is sure to please.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher.)
American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History
Chris Kyle, Scott McEwan, 2015
HarperCollins
4416 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062376336
Summary
A celebration of the remarkable life and legacy of fallen American hero Chris Kyle.
This commemorative memorial edition of Kyle's bestselling memoir features the full text of American Sniper, plus more than eighty pages of remembrances by those whose lives he touched personally—including his wife, Taya; his parents, brother, and children; Marcus Luttrell and other fellow Navy SEALs; veterans and wounded warriors; lifelong friends; and many others.
He was the top American sniper of all time, called "the legend" by his navy seal brothers, and a hero by those he served with on the home front.
From 1999 to 2009, Chris Kyle recorded the most career sniper kills in United States military history. Gripping and unforgettable, Kyle's account of his extraordinary battlefield experiences ranks as one of the greatest war memoirs of all time.
American Sniper also honors Kyle's fellow warriors, who raised hell on and off the battlefield. And in moving first-person accounts throughout, Kyle's wife, Taya, speaks openly about the strains of war on their marriage and children. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—April 8, 1974
• Where—Odessa, Texas, USA
• Death—February 2, 2013
• Where—Erath County, Texas
• Education—High School, Midlothian, Texas
Christopher Scott Kyle was a United States Navy SEAL and the most lethal sniper in U.S. military history with 160 confirmed kills. Kyle served four tours in the Iraq War and was awarded several commendations for acts of heroism and meritorious service in combat.
Medals
He received two Silver Star Medals, five Bronze Star Medals, one Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal, two Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medals and numerous other unit and personal awards.
Kyle was honorably discharged from the U.S. Navy in 2009 and wrote a bestselling autobiography, American Sniper, which was published in January 2012. A film adaptation of Kyle's autobiography, directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Bradley Cooper, was released in December 2014. It won six Academy Award nominations and won for Best Sound Editing.
On February 2, 2013, Kyle was shot and killed at a shooting range near Chalk Mountain, Texas, with his friend, Chad Littlefield. The man accused of killing them, Eddie Ray Routh, was found guilty of both murders and later sentenced to life in prison without parole.
Early life
Kyle was born in Odessa, Texas, the first of two boys born to Deby Lynn (nee Mercer) and Wayne Kenneth Kyle, a Sunday school teacher and a deacon. Kyle's father bought his son his first rifle at eight years old, a bolt-action .30-06 Springfield rifle, and later a shotgun, with which they hunted pheasant, quail, and deer.
Kyle attended high school in Midlothian, Texas. After school, Kyle became a professional bronco rodeo rider and worked on a ranch, but his professional rodeo career ended abruptly when he severely injured his arm.
Military career
After his arm healed, Kyle went to a military recruiting office, interested in joining the U.S. Marine Corps with a special interest in special operations. A U.S. Navy recruiter convinced him to try for the SEALS. Initially, Kyle was rejected because of the pins in his arm, but he eventually received an invitation to the 24-week Basic Underwater Demolition SEAL school (BUDS), which he joined in 1999.
Assigned to SEAL Team 3, sniper element, platoon "Charlie" (later "Cadillac"), within the Naval Special Warfare Command, and with four tours of duty, Kyle served in many major battles of the Iraq War. His first long-range kill shot was taken during the initial invasion when he shot a woman approaching a group of Marines while carrying a hand grenade.
An article by CNN reported that the woman was cradling a toddler in her other hand. As ordered, he opened fire, killing the woman before she could attack. He later stated,
The woman was already dead. I was just making sure she didn't take any Marines with her. It was clear that not only did she want to kill them, but she didn’t care about anybody else nearby who would have been blown up by the grenade or killed in the firefight. Children on the street, people in the houses, maybe her child.
Because of his track record as a marksman during his deployment to Ramadi, the insurgents named him Shaitan Ar-Ramadi (The Devil of Ramadi), and put a $21,000 bounty on his head that was later increased to $80,000. They posted signs highlighting the cross on his arm as a means of identifying him.
In his book, American Sniper, Kyle describes his longest successful shot ever: in 2008, outside Sadr City, he killed an insurgent about to fire a rocket propelled grenade (RPG) at a U.S. Army convoy with "a straight-up luck shot" from his McMillan Tac-338 sniper rifle from about 2,100 yards (1.2 miles) away.
Kyle became known by the moniker "Legend" among the general infantry and Marines whom he was tasked to protect. This title initially originated in jest among fellow SEALs following his taking of a sabbatical to train other snipers in Fallujah. During four tours of duty in the Iraq War, Kyle was shot twice and survived six separate IED explosions.
Career as record setting sniper
To be counted as a "confirmed kill" the shot and the target must be witnessed to confirm the person was a combatant and was gravely wounded. Kyle's shooter’s statements, filled out by every sniper after a mission, were reported to higher command who kept them in case a shooting was contested as outside the Rules of Engagement.
The military has officially confirmed more than 150 of Kyles kills. Kyle never stated a specific number. In his biography, he wrote,
The Navy credits me with more kills as a sniper than any other American service member, past or present. I guess that’s true. They go back and forth on what the number is. One week, it’s 160 (the “official” number as of this writing, for what that’s worth), then it’s way higher, then it’s somewhere in between. If you want a number, ask the Navy—you may even get the truth if you catch them on the right day.
Kyle left the U.S. Navy in 2009 and moved to Midlothian, Texas, with his wife, Taya, and two children. He was president of Craft International, a tactical training company for the U.S. military and law enforcement communities.
In 2012, HarperCollins released Kyle's autobiographical book American Sniper. Kyle had initially hesitated to write the book but was persuaded to move forward because other books about SEALs were underway. In his book, Kyle wrote bluntly of his experiences. Of the battle for control of Ramadi he says "Force moved that battle. We killed the bad guys and brought the leaders to the peace table. That is how the world works."
In the book and in interviews following, Kyle stated he had no regrets about his work as a sharpshooter, saying, "I had to do it to protect the Marines." American Sniper has had a months-long run on the New York Times bestseller list and brought Kyle national attention. Following its release, media articles challenged some of Kyle's anecdotes, but the core of his narrative was widely accepted. "Tales of his heroism on the battlefield were already lore in every branch of the armed forces," writes Michael J. Mooney, author of a biography of Kyle.
Charity work
Kyle paired with FITCO Cares Foundation, a nonprofit organization which created the Heroes Project to provide free in-home fitness equipment, individualized programs, personal training, and life-coaching to in-need veterans with disabilities, Gold Star families, or those suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder.
Death
On February 2, 2013, Kyle and a companion, Chad Littlefield, were shot and killed at the Rough Creek Ranch-Lodge-Resort shooting range in Erath County, Texas. Both men were armed with .45-caliber 1911-style pistols when they were killed, but neither gun had been unholstered or fired. The safety catches were still on. Kyle was killed with a .45-caliber pistol, while Littlefield was shot with a 9mm SIG Sauer handgun. Both guns belonged to Kyle.
The shooter was Eddie Ray Routh, a 25-year-old U.S. Marine Corps veteran from Lancaster, Texas. Kyle and Littlefield had reportedly taken Routh to the gun range in an effort to help him with his post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Routh had been in and out of mental hospitals for at least two years and had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. His family also said he suffered from PTSD from his time in the military.
After the killings, Routh went to his sister's house in Midlothian and told her what he had done. His sister, Laura Blevins, called 911 and told the emergency operator: "They went out to a shooting range... Like, he's all crazy. He's fucking psychotic." Local police captured Routh after a short freeway chase, which ended when Routh, who fled the scene in Kyle's Ford F-350 truck, crashed into a police cruiser in Lancaster.
A memorial service was held for Kyle at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, Texas, on February 11, 2013. Kyle was buried on February 12, 2013, at the Texas State Cemetery in Austin, after a funeral procession from Midlothian to Austin, stretching more than 200 miles (320 km). Hundreds of people lined Interstate 35 to view the procession and pay their final respects to Kyle.
On February 24, 2015, Routh was found guilty of the deaths of Kyle and Littlefield with the jury returning the verdict in under three hours of deliberations. He was sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole. (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 4/15/2015.)
Book Reviews
[My] favorite book of the year. Chris Kyle’s American Sniper: It’s an amazingly detailed account of fighting in Iraq a humanizing, brave story that’s extremely readable. It will give you a much stronger appreciation of our troops, more awe for Navy SEALs and also insight into how wars are really fought today.
Patricia Cornwell - New York Times Book Review
(Refers to audio version.) One of the most feared soldiers to ever set foot on the battleground that was and still is Iraq, Kyle recounts his bloody tales of war with deadly accuracy. Skillfully narrated by John Pruden, these fascinating war stories offer insight into the perils of modern combat.... Kyle’s story is gripping.
Publishers Weekly
Reads like a first-person thriller narrated by a sniper. The bare-bones facts are stunning. .... A first-rate military memoir
Booklist
[T]his memoir...takes a more unassuming and approachable tone in narrating his improbable journey from a modest Texas childhood to becoming a sniper with SEAL Team 3 and serving four deployments in IraqEloquent ... An aggressively written account of frontline combat, with plenty of action.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
Also, consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion underway for American Sniper:
1. Some readers felt Chris Kyle used overly broad strokes to depict his time as a sniper; they wanted more detail in terms of the shot set-ups and engagement. Do you agree? Or does Kyle give an adequate description for you?
2. Is Chris a hero? If so what makes him one—is it his skill, bravery, self-sacrifice? He himself claimed that the real heroes are those in engaged in actual fighting, many of whom lost their vision, limbs, and in many cases their lives. What do you think?
3. Did you appreciate the sections written by Kyle's wife Taya? What perspective, in any, does she bring to Kyle's account, especially her discussion of the strains his service placed on the family?
4. Kyle writes honestly about the pain and suffering of war, especially the loss of two of his closest teammates. Did reading his account make you think about the costs of war and what it means for both soldiers and their families?
5. What wisdom is there to be gained by reading American Sniper? Did you come away with a different perspective of war? Did the book underscore your beliefs about our engagement in the Middle East...or did it challenge your beliefs?
The Folded Clock: A Diary
Heidi Julavits, 2015
Knopf Doubleday
304 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780385538985
Summary
A raucous, stunningly candid, deliriously smart diary of two years in the life of the incomparable Heidi Julavits
Like many young people, Heidi Julavits kept a diary. Decades later she found her old diaries in a storage bin, and hoped to discover the early evidence of the person (and writer) she’d since become. Instead, "The actual diaries revealed me to possess the mind of a paranoid tax auditor."
The entries are daily chronicles of anxieties about grades, looks, boys, and popularity. After reading the confessions of her past self, writes Julavits, "I want to good-naturedly laugh at this person. I want to but I can't. What she wanted then is scarcely different from what I want today."
Thus was born a desire to try again, to chronicle her daily life as a forty-something woman, wife, mother, and writer. The dazzling result is The Folded Clock, in which the diary form becomes a meditation on time and self, youth and aging, betrayal and loyalty, friendship and romance, faith and fate, marriage and family, desire and death, gossip and secrets, art and ambition.
Concealed beneath the minute obsession with "dailiness" are sharply observed moments of cultural criticism and emotionally driven philosophical queries. In keeping with the spirit of a diary, the tone is confessional, sometimes shockingly so, as the focus shifts from the woman she wants to be to the woman she may have become.
Julavits's spirited sense of humor about her foibles and misadventures, combined with her ceaseless intelligence and curiosity, explode the typically confessional diary form. The Folded Clock is as playful as it is brilliant, a tour de force by one of the most gifted prose stylists in American letters. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1968
• Where—Portland, Maine, USA
• Education—B.A., Dartmouth College; M.F.A., Columbia University
• Currently—lives in New York City and Camden, Maine
Heidi Suzanne Julavits is an American author and co-editor of The Believer magazine. She has been published in The Best Creative Nonfiction Vol. 2, Esquire, Story, Zoetrope All-Story, and McSweeney’s Quarterly. Her novels include The Mineral Palace (2000), The Effect of Living Backwards (2003), The Uses of Enchantment (2006), and The Vanishers (2012).
Background and education
Julavits was born and grew up in Portland, Maine, before attending Dartmouth College. She later went on to earn an MFA from Columbia University.
The Believer
For the debut issue of The Believer, she wrote one of the lead articles, titling it "Rejoice! Believe! Be Strong and Read Hard!: A Call For A New Era of Experimentation and a Book Culture That Will Support It." The Believer, is a literary magazine founded by Dave Eggers in 2003 and publised nine times a year from San Franciso. It urges its readers and writers to "reach beyond their usual notions of what is accessible or possible."
New York Times cultural critic A.O. Scott described the magazine as part of "a generational struggle against laziness and cynicism, to raise once again the banners of creative enthusiasm and intellectual engagement." It has a "cosmopolitan frame of reference and an eclectic internationalism," mixing pop genres with literary theory.
In 2005, Julavits told Scott how she decided on The Believer's tone:
I really saw 'the end of the book' as originating in the way books are talked about now in our culture and especially in the most esteemed venues for book criticism. It seemed as though their irrelevance was a foregone conclusion, and we were just practicing this quaint exercise of pretending something mattered when of course everyone knew it didn't.
She added that her own aim as book critic would be "to endow something with importance, by treating it as an emotional experience."
Personal
Julavits currently lives in Maine and Manhattan with her husband, the writer Ben Marcus, and their children. (Adapted from Wikipedia articles. Retrieved 10/12/2014.)
Book Reviews
[Julavits] tells of returning to her childhood diaries…looking for evidence of the writer she would become. "The actual diaries, however, fail to corroborate the myth I'd concocted for myself," she admits…With The Folded Clock, she corrects the record. Keeping a diary may not have made her a writer, but becoming a writer has made it possible for her to produce, now, an exquisite diary…[Julavits's] prose…is especially liquid, and her sentences are unimpeachable…The opportunity to inhabit another self, to experience another consciousness, is perhaps the most profound trespass a work of literature can allow. The Folded Clock offers all the thrill of that trespass, in a work so artful that it appears to be without artifice. This diary is a record of the interior weather of an adept thinker. In it, the mundane is rendered extraordinary through the alchemy of effortless prose. It is a work in which a self is both lost and found, but above all made.
Eula Bliss - New York Times Book Review
[A] well-written, sometimes entertaining, occasionally irritating portrait of an intelligent and accomplished woman struggling with identity and aging.... Each day describes an event...which over time reveal Julavits’s life: childhood in Maine, desperate to escape; infatuation with the lives of wealthy college peers; entering the New York literary scene; an erroneous first and successful second marriage; and professional success, which leaves her raggedly busy, missing her children, and yearning for her summers back in Maine.... [H]er search for identity, fear of time passing, and sense of her own aging can be poignant.
Rebecca Steinitz - Boston Globe
The Folded Clock replaces slavish chronological record-keeping with a playfulness that allows Julavits to thumb her nose at time. For starters, she scrambles the sequence of dates...with no identifying years attached. The lovely title...suggests a Dali-esque image of hours and days folding in on themselves to disappear altogether.... Julavits, as we know from her inventive novels...is a pro at spinning stories.... The Folded Clock is an engaging portrait of a woman's sense of identity, which continually shape-shifts with time. In her mid-40s, Julavits says she is "looking for the next age I will be."
Heller McAlpin - Los Angeles Times
[A] cleverly crafted, thoughtfully entertaining series of meditations on personhood and culture.... complex and captivating.... [Julavits] raises the questions, How do we curate our own lives when everything about them may wind up in print? Can we ever expect naked truth from a diary, or do we invariably receive a sanitized version? Maybe, Julavits's work suggests, the best we can hope for is a deeply mediated honesty—for words are always equal parts mask and revelation
Lydia Millet, O Magazine
[B]lur[s] the lines between contemplation and revelation, fact and fiction.... Julavits takes the novel approach of reinventing the form of the diary.... Julavits reveals a whole lot, in often-flawless prose, about motherhood, time, petty jealousies, grand debates, and the irresistible attractions of The Bachelorette (“8 Books You Need to Read This April”).
New York Magazine
Display[s] both charm and stark honesty... The diary angle makes for a clever hook, but masks what this really is—a compelling collection of intimate, untitled personal essays that reveal one woman's ever-evolving soul
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) [A] seamless narrative describing [Julavits's] life as a woman, wife, mother, and writer. Lyrically written, each entry is a brief but boundless meditation on time, identity, and constructions of selfhood. Julavits is a natural and gifted essayist. —Meagan Lacy, Guttman Community Coll., CUNY
Library Journal
(Starred review.) Reflections on being and becoming… Some entries are slyly funny, gossipy and irreverent; others, quietly intimate… An inventive, beautifully crafted memoir, wise and insightful.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher.)
Missoula: Rape and the Justice System In a College Town
Jon Krakauer, 2015
Knopf Doubleday
384 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780385538732
Summary
A stark, powerful, meticulously reported narrative about a series of sexual assaults at the University of Montana—stories that illuminate the human drama behind the national plague of campus rape.
Missoula, Montana, is a typical college town, with a highly regarded state university, bucolic surroundings, a lively social scene, and an excellent football team—the Grizzlies—with a rabid fan base.
The Department of Justice investigated 350 sexual assaults reported to the Missoula police between January 2008 and May 2012. Few of these assaults were properly handled by either the university or local authorities. In this, Missoula is also typical.
A DOJ report released in December of 2014 estimates 110,000 women between the ages of eighteen and twenty-four are raped each year. Krakauer’s devastating narrative of what happened in Missoula makes clear why rape is so prevalent on American campuses, and why rape victims are so reluctant to report assault.
Acquaintance rape is a crime like no other. Unlike burglary or embezzlement or any other felony, the victim often comes under more suspicion than the alleged perpetrator. This is especially true if the victim is sexually active; if she had been drinking prior to the assault—and if the man she accuses plays on a popular sports team. The vanishingly small but highly publicized incidents of false accusations are often used to dismiss her claims in the press. If the case goes to trial, the woman’s entire personal life becomes fair game for defense attorneys.
This brutal reality goes a long way towards explaining why acquaintance rape is the most underreported crime in America. In addition to physical trauma, its victims often suffer devastating psychological damage that leads to feelings of shame, emotional paralysis and stigmatization. PTSD rates for rape victims are estimated to be 50%, higher than soldiers returning from war.
In Missoula, Krakauer chronicles the searing experiences of several women in Missoula—the nights when they were raped; their fear and self-doubt in the aftermath; the way they were treated by the police, prosecutors, defense attorneys; the public vilification and private anguish; their bravery in pushing forward and what it cost them.
Some of them went to the police. Some declined to go to the police, or to press charges, but sought redress from the university, which has its own, non-criminal judicial process when a student is accused of rape. In two cases the police agreed to press charges and the district attorney agreed to prosecute. One case led to a conviction; one to an acquittal. Those women courageous enough to press charges or to speak publicly about their experiences were attacked in the media, on Grizzly football fan sites, and/or to their faces.
The university expelled three of the accused rapists, but one was reinstated by state officials in a secret proceeding. One district attorney testified for an alleged rapist at his university hearing. She later left the prosecutor’s office and successfully defended the Grizzlies’ star quarterback in his rape trial. The horror of being raped, in each woman’s case, was magnified by the mechanics of the justice system and the reaction of the community.
Krakauer’s dispassionate, carefully documented account of what these women endured cuts through the abstract ideological debate about campus rape. College-age women are not raped because they are promiscuous, or drunk, or send mixed signals, or feel guilty about casual sex, or seek attention. They are the victims of a terrible crime and deserving of compassion from society and fairness from a justice system that is clearly broken. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—April 2, 1954
• Where—Brookline, Massachusetts, USA
• Reared—Corvalis, Oregon
• Education—B.S., Hampshire College (Massachusetts)
• Awards—American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1999
• Currently—lives in Seattle, Washington
Krakauer was born as the third of five children. He competed in tennis at Corvallis High School and graduated in 1972. He went on to study at Hampshire College in Massachusetts, where in 1976 he received his degree in Environmental Studies. In 1977, he met former climber Linda Mariam Moore; they married in 1980 and now live in Seattle, Washington.
More
In 1974, Krakauer was part of a group of seven friends pioneering the Arrigetch Peaks of the Brooks Range in Alaska and was invited by American Alpine Journal to write about those experiences. Though he neither expected nor received a fee, he was excited when the Journal published his article. A year later, he and two others made the second ascent of The Moose's Tooth, a highly technical peak in the Alaska Range.
One year after graduating from college (1977), he spent three weeks by himself in the wilderness of the Stikine Icecap region of Alaska and climbed a new route on the Devils Thumb, an experience he described in Eiger Dreams and in Into the Wild.
Much of Krakauer's early popularity as a writer came from being a journalist for Outside magazine. In 1983, he was able to abandon part-time work as a fisherman and a carpenter to become a full-time writer. His freelance writing appeared in Smithsonian, National Geographic Magazine, Rolling Stone, Playboy, and Architectural Digest.
Into the Wild was published in 1996 and secured Krakauer's reputation as an outstanding adventure writer, spending more than two years on the New York Times bestseller list, which was adapted for film (director Sean Penn) and released in 2007.
In 2003, Under the Banner of Heaven became Krakauer's third non-fiction bestseller. The book examines extremes of religious belief, particularly fundamentalist offshoots of Mormonism. The book inspired the documentary, Damned to Heaven.
2010 saw the publication of Where Men Win Glory, about former NFL football player Pat Tillman, who became a US Army Ranger after 9/11. Tillman was eventually killed in action under suspicious circumstances in Afghanistan. (Adapated from Wikipedia.)
Book Reviews
As of yet, there are no reviews of this book. Due to the subject material and expected controversy, no advance copies were released to reviewers. We'll add reviews when they become available.
Discussion Questions
1. What insights does Missoula offer into campus culture that can lead to or enable acquaintance rape? Do the attitudes and atmosphere at the University of Montana resemble schools with which you are familiar? Is this culture unique to campus life or does it reflect American culture more generally?
2. For many students (and their parents), college campuses promise a sense of security—a feeling that people watch out for one another. In what ways is this assumption belied by the situations discussed in Missoula? Consider both the circumstances of the sexual assaults and the reactions of other students who learned about the allegations.
3. The descriptions of the assaults feature graphic, harrowing details. Is this essential to our understanding of the victims’ experiences?
4. Almost all the cases Krakauer discusses involve drinking. Does this color your notions of responsibility and blame? Does it influence your feelings about the victims? The perpetrators?
5. “Not unlike many other rape victims, [Keely] Williams reacted by wondering if she was somehow to blame” (p. 23). What does this imply about our understanding of rape? How does it relate to Allison Huguet’s reluctance to ruin her attacker’s life (p. 28), Kelsey Belnap’s to “get anyone in trouble” (p. 42), and Cecilia Washburn’s own testimony at trial (p. 273–74)?
6. Allison Huguet’s mother “reminded Donaldson that he had betrayed [Allison’s] trust” (p. 26). Does the personal betrayal inherent in acquaintance rape make it more traumatic than a rape committed by a stranger?
7. One of the most unsettling aspects of the book is Krakauer's exploration of how student athletes at the University of Montana are insulated from repercussions when they commit crimes. Do you think that a willingness to excuse the bad behavior of athletes is widespread? In general, are young men still allowed greater latitude than young women in issues of sexual activity?
8. “Most women are all too familiar with men . . . whose sense of prerogative renders them deaf when women say, ‘No thanks,’ ‘Not interested,’ or even ‘Fuck off, creep’” (p. 104). What does the portrait of serial rapists (pp. 132–137) convey about how a “sense of prerogative” can escalate into continued offenses? Do you agree with David Lisak that “predators like Frank get away with it over and over . . . because most of us are in denial” (p. 135)?
9. Kraukauer recounts the emotional difficulties the women he interviewed faced in the aftermath of their assaults (pp. 68, 173, 186–87) and cites several experts on post-traumatic symptoms that emerge both immediately after an incident and in the months and perhaps years to come (pp. 69, 106, 155). How are victims affected by the legal outcomes of their cases—that is, whether their attackers are brought to justice? Are the constitutional rights guaranteed to the accused unfair to victims of crime (p. 247)?
10. What do the meetings the Huguets have with prosecutors Shaun Donovan (pp. 178–185) and Suzy Boylan (p. 188–89) demonstrate about the difficulties of pursuing rape cases, even when the accused has confessed? What legal obligations do prosecutors have to victims?
11. Krakauer writes, “Seemingly by design, the American legal system encourages defense counsel to be as mendacious as possible” (p. 266). Do the defense attorneys in the Johnson trial go beyond their professional responsibility to create doubts about Cecilia Washburn and present a sympathetic portrait of Johnson? Do the proceedings reveal a fundamental flaw in the adversarial nature of our justice system?
12. Krakauer casts a harsh light on Kirsten Pabst, who as Missoula County prosecutor often refused to file charges in rape cases and later left her position to join Jordan Johnson’s defense team (pp. 97–98, 107, 259). Does her behavior—and her manner at the Jordan trial (pp. 282–288)—strike you as unethical, or can her choices be justified? What motives—both professional and personal—might explain her actions?
13. Throughout the book, people—including the police, defense attorneys, prosecutors, and friends of the victim and the accused—offer reasons why a woman might lie about being raped (pp. 23, 45, 60, 66,105, 116). What beliefs about girls and women in today’s society underlie these theories?
14. Why are allegations of rape often doubted or dismissed by authorities? Do you think reports of acquaintance rape should be subject to more scrutiny than rape by a stranger? Discuss how misconceptions about rape (pp. 278–81) affect police investigations, court proceedings, and ultimately a jury’s decision (p. 334).
15. Is the fear of false rape accusations valid? What are the short- and long-term consequences of the publicity surrounding the cases at Duke University, Polytechnic High School (pp.119–20), and the notorious article in Rolling Stone about the alleged gang rape at the University of Virginia?
16. Should schools play a disciplinary role in sexual assaults that occur on campus? Based on the cases Kraukauer recounts, what can school administrators accomplish that the police and court system cannot? How well do the protocols at the University of Montana and other universities (p. 198) balance the need to avoid punishing the innocent and protect the college community from harm? Do schools have an ethical obligation to inform local authorities about a campus sexual assault?
17. After the U.S. Department of Justice released a damning report on the Missoula County Attorney’s office, an agreement was reached to change the way rapes were investigated (pp. 357–59). Is the intervention of the federal government necessary to institute reforms in local judicial systems?
18. What are the strengths and weaknesses of Krakauer’s case-study approach to campus rape—his focus on a single city? How do the specifics of Missoula help us begin to deal with a national crisis?
19. Krakauer also chose to report from the perspective of the victims (p. xiv). Does this influence your reaction to the book? What, if any, information or points of view would you have liked to have learned more about?
20. What effect might the experiences recounted in Missoula have on a woman who is wondering whether to report a rape?
(Questions issued by the publisher... And thank you, Anne R.)