Books Read in 2004

1/3/04 TRUE NOTEBOOKS by MARK SALZMAN - Salzman reluctantly agrees to teach a creative writing class at Central Juvenile Hall, a lockup for Los Angeles’s most violent teenage offenders. He is soon surprised to discover the high caliber of writing that the students are able to produce. Although the teens showed imagination and compassion in their writing, I could not get past the fact that most if not all of them were violent gang members who were accused of murder. During the course of the book, several of the boys had their trials, and were convicted of first-degree murder and given very long prison terms. I enjoyed reading about the writing habits of Salzman, who was writing Lying Awake at the time. In fact one reason that he decided to teach the class was because Lying Awake had a gang member character that he was having trouble with, and he thought he could get inspiration from members of the class. I almost walled this book but kept reading, and rated it 3 stars out of 5.

1/7/04 THE PIANO TUNER - DANIEL MASON - A beautifully written book about a middle-aged piano tuner who is commissioned by the British War Office to travel to the remote jungles of Burma to repair a rare piano belonging to an eccentric army surgeon. For the geography lesson alone, I rate it four stars.

1/11/04 The Lady and the Unicorn - TRACY CHEVALIER
An absorbing, creative book that tells the fictional account of how The Lady and the Unicorn tapestries were created. Not as good in my opinion as The Girl With the Pearl Earring by the same author, but still deserves four stars.