Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua (2011)

Western parents try to respect their children's individuality, encouraging them to pursue their true passions, supporting their choices, and providing positive reinforcement and a nurturing environment.  By contrast, the Chinese believe that the best way to protect their children is by preparing them for the future, letting them see what they're capable of, and arming them with skills, work habits, and inner confidence that no one can ever take away.

   - Amy Chua

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother is a biographical book which will surely raise a lot of debates on child-rearing. Chua labels her parenting style as Chinese which means that: (1) schoolwork always comes first; (2) an A-minus is a bad grade; (3) your children must be 2 years ahead of their classmates in math; (4) you must never compliment your children in public; (5) if your child ever disagrees with a teacher or coach you must always take the side of the teacher or coach; (6) the only activities your children should be permitted to do are those in which they can eventually win a medal; and (7) that medal must be gold.

The book proposes a simple (but extremely difficult to implement) formula for raising successful children: Kids CAN NOT:
1. Attend a sleepover
2. Have a playdate
3. Be in a school play
4. Complain about not being in a school play
5. Watch TV or play computer games
6. Choose their own extracurricular activities
7. Get any grade less than A
8. Not be the #1 student in every subject except gym and drama
9. Play any instrument other than the piano or the violin
10. Not play the piano or the violin

Amy and Jed, her husband, are Yale law professors. Their daughters Sophia and Louisa are straight A students who were hailed as piano and violin prodigies (at least until Louisa changed courses, but that’s getting ahead of the story.). Amy is the daughter of Chinese migrants and Jed is Jewish.

The Rubenfeld family is run with the precision of a military camp. The home is devoted to principles of tough love, high discipline, concerted effort (even if Jed disagrees with Amy, they present a united front before the children), and an attitude of failure not being an option. This is a home where a spade is called a spade, where Amy has no qualms resorting to hysterics, verbal abuse, or even bribery to get the children to practice 5 hours a day, if need be. Weekends are not for lolling but for more studying and practice.

Amy’s child-rearing principles can be implemented by only one as highly disciplined and as self-motivated as Amy herself. It is no small feat to shuttle children form one class to another, be present in their lessons so she can later on supervise the extra work at home, and cajoling and yelling at them so they do what they must do. It will also take a strong heart not to give in when the kids crumble and the fat tears start to roll. If there’s one thing Amy does not believe in, it is that she is inflicting psychological damage on her children by driving them too hard. She thinks it is 10 hours facebook and junk food which cause psychological damage.

It is hard to argue with Amy’s formula when you see her bright-eyed children who love her despite what she makes them undergo. In this day and age when children can easily dial 911 for either real or perceived parental brutalities, we ask if these children are much better off now and more psychologically prepared as adults compared to their counterparts a generation ago.

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother is a book which dishes its philosophy straight out without making apologies. It manages to combine irony and humor in one blow. The book feels to end with the taunt: “This is how I brought up my succesful kids, so sue me.”

Rescue by Anita Shreve (2010)

I am what one might call a loyal writer follower. Once a writer hits me with his/her best shot, I feel compelled to backtrack and buy the writer’s earlier books and support his/her future works. This is why my shelves are littered with all these Paulo Coelhos, Richard Bachs, Mitch Alboms, Susan Vreelands, Tracy Chevaliers, Malcolm Gladwells, Philippa Gregorys, ad infinitum.

The good thing about following a writer is that one gets to see the evolution of his/her body of work. One sees how the writer is able to polish his/her craft from one book to another. The not-so-good thing with respect this habit is one also sees how a writer can fall into a pattern, relying on previous successes and unwilling to chart new paths. These writers soon tend to repeat themselves from one book to another until their readers give a sigh of bored exhaustion.

Anita Shreve is one of the writers, who I have followed through the years. Except for Sea Glass, I have all of her books:

A Change in Altitude (2009)
Testimony (2008)
Body Surfing (2007)
A Wedding in December (2005)
Light on Snow (2004)
All He Ever Wanted (2003)
The Last Time They Met (2001)
Fortune’s Rocks (1999)
The Pilot’s Wife (1998)
The Weight of Water (1997)
Resistance (1995)
Strange Fits of Passion (1991)
Eden Close (1989)

Shreve’s books shift from exceptionally good to acceptable.

Rescue is Anita Shreve’s latest work and as in her other books probes closely into the decisions people take in their relationships and how these decisions impact on the lives of the book’s characters.

Rescue tells the story of Peter Webster and Sheila Arsenault who met in their early twenties when Webster, an EMT, rescued Arsenault from a vehicular accident. The two embarked on a whirlwind romance and not long after, Arsenault found herself pregnant. Arsenault, however, had a closet-full of skeletons bursting at the seams. She was battered as a child, gotten herself involved with a married policeman, and was alcoholic. Despite the red flags, Webster decided to marry her.

A few years later, Arsenault figured in another accident while drunk driving. This time, Webster took a different course in rescuing the damsel in distress. He told her to leave Vermont promptly and leave their daughter behind who almost got killed in the accident (she was in the backseat). Arsenault did not have much choice as she would have faced jail time if she stayed in Vermont. She did not only hurt her own child but managed to injure the passenger of another vehicle during the collision.

Eighteen years later, Webster found himself looking for Arsenault. He was having problems dealing with Rowan, their daughter. Mother and daughter would reunite when Rowan had an accident which resulted in her falling into a four-day comma.

Rescue is not Shreve’s best work. It was not able to develop that spine-tingling suspense where the reader can almost hear a pin drop (The Pilot’s Wife). There was none of the history and vivid backdrop story-telling which has captivated me in the first place (Fortune’s Rocks). There is just the constant dreariness and tiredness  throughout and characters have given up and settled for much less far too early. Even how Shreve builds the climax is a cliché. (Rowan falling into a comma; Arsenault and her daughter captivated by each other at the hospital; Rowan making it in time for her graduation despite the few days she needed to recover, undergo therapy, and take her exams.)

Shreve is also repeating herself. When Webster says to Rowan, “That’s your given. You didn’t have a mother most of your life. That’s another given. You’ve been dealt that hand, and that’s what you play with. You can wish you had a different given but it won’t do you any good. People start feeling sorry for themselves, that’s pretty much the end of them.”, she has stuck to her theme in almost all of her books: “You’ve made a choice/This is what’s been handed to you. Bear your cross.”

It would be interesting to find out if Shreve can make out a character in her future books who as Dylan Thomas put it, would “rage, rage, against the dying of the light.” Shreve might also consider leaving the past buried in history. Sometimes, there really are no resolutions to a story. Characters will just need to come up with their own answers to long-standing questions. Or leave the questions unanswered and move on with life.

Fifty Shades Darker by E.L. James (2011)

When Time Magazine in its 30 April 2012 issue named E.L. (that’s Erika Leonard) James as one of the 100 most influential people in the world (erotica’s new heroine), of course I had to get a copy of her books.

Time’s commendation hinges on James’ trilogy – Fifty Shades of Grey, Fifty Shades Darker, Fifty Shades Freed. The first volume, Fifty Shades of Grey, was out of stock so I promptly picked up the second volume, Fifty Shades Darker. I figured that the plot should be easy enough to follow and there shouldn’t be any problem moving from Volume II to Volume I and then to Volume III. After going through Fifty Shades Darker, there’s definitely no Volume I much more Volume III for me.

Fifty Shades Darker starts on the third day after Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey broke up. Steele is a recent college graduate and Grey is some hotshot rich business magnate. Apparently, Steele found Grey too hot to handle and they parted ways.

Only to hook up again (did I say after 3 days?). Steele moves in with Grey. Steele gets to know Grey better. Steele is stalked by Grey’s exes. Steele is harassed by her new boss. Grey gets protective. Grey proposes to Steel. All through these, they have a lot of sex (for a book hyped on BDSM, this is actually a yawner), a lot of ridiculous email messages (how do these people manage to get work done at all?) and a battery of inane conversations (vocabulary here is sorely limited; can somebody give these guys a thesaurus?)

Sorry, just don’t find Fifty Shades sexy. It is flat, repetitive, unimaginative, and… well, grey.

The Templar Legacy by Steve Berry (2006)

Steve Berry’s Templar Legacy reprises the romantic notion that the Knights Templar, found in AD 1118, possesses knowledge that can shake the very foundations of Christendom and that the organization has survived to present date.

Berry pushes the envelope further. He posits in the book that when the Knights Templar’s head Jacques de Molay was burned at the stake in Paris in 1314, the secrets of the organization died with him.

The newly-elected master of the Knights Templar, Raymond De Roquefort, believes that he is very near to finding the Knights Templar’s lost knowledge and once he finds it, he would be able to restore the Order to its former glory.

De Roquefort, however, has failed to take into consideration that his immediate predecessor knew that De Roquefort would wrest the Knights Templar’s leadership from the seneschal and has placed into motion an elaborate plan as soon as De Roquefort took over the Order. De Roquefort also failed to contend that Stephanie Nelle, widow of Lars Nelle and head of the Magellan Billet of the Justice Department, would be as tough as nails. (Lars Nelle was believed to have solved the mystery of the missing knowledge of the Knights Templar.) Moreover, De Roquefort could not have foreseen that the book’s hero, Cotton Malone, a retired lawyer of the Justice Department, would step out of his hibernation and come to the assistance of Stephanie Nelle, whom he has worked under for several years.

The quest for the Knights Templar’s missing knowledge (and lost fabulous wealth!) brought the concerned parties zooming across Copenhagen and then to France.

The Templar Legacy follows Steve Berry’s formula that after much chasing and exchange of firepower, the good guys find what they’re looking for. What’s just deflating about this book is that Berry, after trying to build a crescendo, rapidly brings the book to a conclusion. The reader goes, “Whaaat? What was that all?” The clues are too obvious, the missing knowledge and treasure too easy to find, and the bad guys too brazen and stupid. One wonders why it took eight centuries to solve the puzzle.

I am definitely giving the points to Dan Brown for telling a better story about the Knights Templar in his “The Da Vinci Code.”

The Amber Room by Steve Berry (2003)

This is the third of Steve Berry’s book I’ve read this month and it’s easy to see the formula he follows:

1. The book starts with a historical background which provides the reason for all the chasing in the story.
2. The good guy is a lawyer whose job does not involve litigation in courts.
3. This good guy stumbles upon a problem/issue/cause which takes him to several countries to resolve the problem/solve the mystery/find a long-lost object or person.
4. He gets chased, shot at, and punched around a lot.
5. He finds other good guys to help him out.
6. There are no surprises. We know who the bad guys are and that they don’t have qualms eliminating people to achieve their ends.
7. The good guys win in the end.

The book opens with a scene from the Mauthausen Concentration Camp in Austria on 10 April 1945. One of the Russian prisoners there, Karol Borya, came upon information concerning the Amber Room. Borya was a member of Russia’s Extraordinary State Commission established in 1942 to resolve problems associated with the Nazi occupation.

The Amber Room, finished in 1770, consisted of 86 square meters of amber-finished walls “dotted with fanciful figurines, floral garlands, tulips, roses, seashells, monograms, and rocaille, all in glittering shades of brown, red, yellow, and orange. Each panel was framed in a cartouche of boiserie, Louis Quinze style, separating them vertically by pairs of narrow mirrored pilasters adorned with bronze candelabra, everything gilded to blend with the amber. The centers of the four panels were dotted with exquisite Florentine mosaics fashioned from polished jasper and agate and framed in gilded bronze. A ceiling mural was added, along with an intricate parquet floor of inlaid oak, maple, sandalwood, rosewood, walnut, and mahogany.” It was so magnificent that the Amber Room was said to be the 8th wonder of the world.

These panels were dismantled and shipped from Russia to Germany in 1941, Germany believing to be the rightful owners of the panels. The tides turned in 1944 and with the approaching Soviet Army, the Germans dismantled and placed the panels in crates. The amber panels were last seen on 6 April 1945 when trucks left Konigsberg.

Borya somehow managed to survive and he eventually moved to the US where he took up the name of Karl Bates. He had a daughter, Rachel, who became a judge at the Fulton County. Rachel was married to Paul Cutler, a probate attorney at Pridgen & Woodworth’s (same law firm where Miles Lord came from [The Romanov Prophecy] but there’s no mention of this in either book.)

The Cutlers would soon find out that Borya, who they thought died of natural causes, was murdered by one of the Acquisitors of a secret organization called the Retrievers of Lost Antiquities. The club was composed of nine men, all extremely wealthy, and vying against each other who could locate a piece of art faster. For two of the club’s members, Ernst Loring and Franz Fellner, the race was on for the Amber Room. Loring and Fellner had the best Acquisitors - Suzanne Danzer and Christian Knoll, both ambitious, ruthless, skilled, extremely intelligent, and highly educated.

The Cutlers, together with their newfound ally Herr McKoy, after being chased by Danzer and Knoll in the US and then Germany, would bravely confront Loring heads on.

At the end of the day, the Cutlers found the amber panels and were able to have these reinstated at the Catherine Palace. It was not too surprising either where they found the long-lost panels. And of course, the Cutlers lived happily ever after.

The joy in reading Steve Berry does not come from the eureka of solving a mystery but the thrill of the ride itself. The Amber Room is no exception.

The Romanov Prophecy by Steve Berry (2004)

 Russia’s Nicholas II, his wife Alexandra, and their five children were murdered in Yekaterinburg on 17 July 1918.  The remains of Nicholas II and his family were exhumed in July 1991.  Two of the bodies of the imperial children, however, were not found in the mass grave.

Berry’s the Romanov Prophecy sits on the premise that the Crown Prince Alexei and the Princess Anastasia may have somehow managed to escape.

Enter Miles Lord, a lawyer of Pridgen & Woodworth’s International Division, whose  assignment is to support the claim of Stefan Baklanov’s claim to the Russian throne.  Russia, tired of its political experiments, is now ready to give monarchy another chance.

Baklanov, a Romanov by birth, is the leading contender for selection by the Tsarist Commission.  Since Baklanov is heavily entrenched with Western businesses, many of which are Pridgen & Woodworth’s clients, the law firm sent Lord to make sure that there is nothing that could impugn Baklanov’s claim.

A series of attempts against Lord’s life, old documents, and Rasputin’s prophecy, however, has led Lord to believe that there is something that could severely threaten Baklanov’s chance at the Russian throne: two of the imperial children have survived and that their progeny are out there biding their time.

Romanov Prophecy is a fast-past paced, heart-pumping book hard to put down. Be ready to suspend disbelief that Russia wants to revert to monarchy and that Rasputin was anything but a charlatan. 

Romanov Prophecy is highly recommended reading for long layovers at airports.

POSTSCRIPT:  Caty Petersen, a Filipina, recently brought forth a claim that her grandmother was the Princess Anastasia.  According to Petersen, her grandmother arrived by boat in the Philippines and stayed for a time with an orphanage before marrying her grandfather. The problem with this claim is that a DNA testing in 2007 showed that the remains of two children found in a separate grave about 70 meters away from the mass grave of the Romanovs rendered irrefutable that these were the two children who for a long time were thought to have escaped.