Book Rec of the Day 12/15-12/18/2008

BIOGRAPHY

Not since I. F. Stone’s The Origin has there been a study of the great evolutionist Charles Darwin so readable, so colorful, and so revealing. Focusing on the period just after Darwin’s work aboard the Beagle, and shedding light on his work habits, personal life, and development as a thinker in an extremely lively scientific era, Quammen is more than up to the task of bringing both the man and his ideas to life. A sparkling read.

THE RELUCTANT MR. DARWIN: AN INTIMATE PORTRAIT OF CHARLES DARWIN AND THE MAKING OF HIS THEORY OF EVOLUTION, by David Quammen (W. W. Norton, 2006)

IT’S A MYSTERY

Carola Dunn’s 1920s-period Daisy Dalrymple series is smart, stylish, and fun, and this one has a holiday theme. Daisy, her Scotland Yard husband, Alec, and her aristocratic mother are invited by Lord Westmoor to his stately mansion for Christmas. Dunn whips up a great British read, “replete with well-drawn characters, snappy dialogue, and interesting plot twists” (Booklist) and a setting just made for a mystery: a Cornish estate with ghosts, secret passageways, past secrets, and hidden treasure.

MISTLETOE AND MURDER: A DAISY DALRYMPLE MYSTERY, by Carola Dunn (St. Martin’s Minotaur, 2002)

GREAT THOUGHTS

The German philosopher Karl Jasper called the period between 900 BCE and 200 BCE the “Axial Age,” the time when the foundations of the world’s great religions were established. Armstrong’s book is an insightful narrative of this era, when Confucius, Siddhartha, Elijah, and Socrates lived, questioned, and taught and when the idea of compassion became a central and essential concept in the world’s religions. A deeply fascinating read.

THE GREAT TRANSFORMATION: THE BEGINNING OF OUR RELIGIOUS TRADITIONS, by Karen Armstrong (Knopf, 2006)

GROWING UP

Blackden is the tiny Scottish highlands hometown of Patrick Hunter, our chatty, ingratiating 18-year-old narrator. Stuck with his grandparents while his mother goes to visit his sister at college, Patrick is desperate to get away somewhere beyond Blackden, turned off by his beer-swilling, foul-mouthed cronies and somewhat impatient with his grandfather’s war stories. But you can’t help feeling Patrick is a winner; his sweetness and openness to the magic and possibilities that always hover just outside his reach make him a character you root for from beginning to end.

BLACKDEN, by Duncan McClean (W. W. Norton, 2000)