A lesson for kids from a Chico writer

First introduced in "Crowlyle Finds His Caw," a tale about the importance of honesty, Crowlyle the crow is back with a bouncy story that shows the power of volunteering. "Crowlyle's Plan To Save the Zoo" ($12.95 in paperback from North State Children's Books) by Vic Sbarbaro and Marcia Pezzella is graced with delightful full-page, full-color illustrations by Ashe Lewis. The book is available locally at the Chico State University Associated Students Bookstore and Lyon Books in Chico.

Sbarbaro is a Certified Health Education Specialist who teaches at both Chico State University and Butte College. According to an author's note, he also "specializes in ... multicultural education issues, emergency care and aquatic safety." Pezzella, his sister, "was born and raised in Weed," had careers in the entertainment field and special education for disabled children, and now in retirement helps her husband in the restaurant business.

Lewis is "majoring in Communication Design and Applied Computer Graphics" at the university, where she was lead illustrator for the Orion. Her whimsical art invites the reader into Crowlyle's world, which is always on the move. Eli Elephant "walks the ropes," Tia tiger approaches the ring of fire, Hop Hippo belts out a tune, as all the animals put on a talent show to raise funds for the beleaguered local zoo. "When you do a good deed / Surely you can earn respect / Helping those in need / For a worthy zoo project."

Everyone will have to hurry. No time for Crowlyle to sleep in. "The children are full of sorrow / And are feeling very blue / The zoo will close tomorrow / They don't know what to do."

Crowlyle "has a plan / The idea is so cool / His friends take a stand / Then go to the school." He enlists volunteers to set up a "veggie shack" to raise funds, and his animal friends strut their stuff.

Together the animals save the day. "Crowlyle thanked everyone / With pride in his heart / Be very proud for what is done / Since you all did your part." The lesson for readers? "Take some time from your day / Giving thanks for all you do / Watch animals as they play / And support your public zoo."

Paradise author tells the adventures of a street mutt

At the age of 78, J.T. Brown of Paradise has become an author. She writes me that her story--suitable for middle grades and up--is based on real life experiences but told from a dog's perspective. "My desire," Brown says, is "that young and old will be made aware of the heartache when one is abandoned whether as a puppy or a child."

"Torno" ($15.99 in paperback from Xlibris; also available in Amazon Kindle e-book for $7.69 and Barnes and Noble Nook book format for $7.99; available from www.tornobyjtbrown.com) is short for "tornado," a fast little pooch but not the handsomest of canines.

"Could someone out there like me?" he wonders. "Lookin' at the other mutts, I saw they were pretty good lookin'. I looked down at my reflection in my water bowl and took inventory. My feet looked too big. My legs were long and skinny. My white hair was more scraggly than ever. I had a black spot on my tongue, plus one ear stood up and the other hung down. I couldn't see much of my tail, but there was no doubt it was funny lookin'. Who would want a mutt like me for their very own?"

Torno is impounded and on the verge of being put down. No one seems to want an ugly dog and he wonders about his life's purpose. He pours his heart out to his "superior being" and is convinced he is watched over, cared for.

Then Tom arrives and Torno has a new master. An airline pilot, Tom takes the dog home to his family, but Torno soon realizes all is not well. Tom's marriage is crumbling and the children face an uncertain future. Torno tries to bring happiness to the household--he has a great personality--but soon Tom's wife leaves and it feels like love has left, too.

Eventually Tom moves on with his life, and one day, returning from a trip, finds a new neighbor has moved in. Tom decides to introduce himself, and Torno tags along: "The door opened and a lady stood there beside the most beautiful German shepherd I'd ever seen.... I was in love."

The conclusion is poignant, mingling love and loss. So it is with life.

Robots behaving badly

Daniel H. Wilson has a Ph.D. in robotics from Carnegie Mellon University. He lives with his wife and daughter in Portland, but two or three weeks ago found himself near Colusa. He was, he writes me, "in an RV with eight guys on a bachelor party, on my way to a wedding in Calistoga. Incredibly beautiful place! I ended up getting on NPR Science Friday, and so a black towncar picked me up from a dusty RV park over in Meridian where we stopped for the night. Took me down to SF and then back up. Pretty hilarious."

He was receiving the VIP treatment because of his new, best-selling can't-put-down "Robopocalypse" ($25 in hardcover from Doubleday; $12.99 in Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook e-book). Word is that Steven Spielberg will direct the movie version.

In the future, humanoid robots are deployed as housekeepers and cars have smart chips in them so they can talk with other cars. People in offices depend on smart copy machines and kids play with smart dolls.

A researcher in northwest Washington pushes the limits of computer intelligence and succeeds a bit too much. His creation, "Archos," is quick to put things straight: "I am not your child," Archos tells the scientist. "I am your god." It's not long before Archos brings other robots under its sway and soon an apocalyptic conflict breaks out between humans and robots. It's intense and pretty gruesome.

The story of the war, and what happens afterward, is told in many voices, from Tokyo to Oklahoma, transcribed by a single soldier, Cormac "Bright Boy" Wallace, using documents preserved by a robot hidden in Alaska. Here are the stories of Mr. Takeo Nomura, a Japanese bachelor, assaulted by his robot companion; Paul Blanton, an American soldier fighting in Afghanistan; and groups of human survivors who will one day mount an attack on the Archos intelligence. The action seldom lets up, but this is not a simplistic humans-against-robots yarn.

Wilson raises the question whether the triumph of Archos would actually liberate the robots. Maybe not. But, then, what is true robot freedom? Perhaps the war against Archos is a war for a new kind of liberation.

Just to be on the safe side, I read the printed version of the book.

Local author on sustainable living with native plants

 

An author's note says that Alicia Funk, who lives "off the grid with her husband and three children," "first learned plant based medicine in 1990 from an indigenous grandmother in Ecuador's rainforest." With her co-author, landscape architect and Nevada City resident Karin Kaufman, Funk has crafted a full-color reference, "Living Wild: Gardening, Cooking and Healing With Native Plants of the Sierra Nevada" ($29.95 in paperback from Flicker Press).

A recent visitor to Lyon Books in Chico, where the volume is available locally, Funk facilitates "living wild" workshops. According to the authors, "our modern-day American diet relies upon a mere 30 or so plant species, while 200 years ago an indigenous Californian's diet would have included about a thousand. We have lost the Native Californians' valuable 'user's manual' that could guide us to the plants we would enjoy eating and help us to learn the best ways to prepare them."

The largest part of the book is a color compendium of native species for the garden, from the White Alder to the evergreen shrub Yerba Santa (which is deer resistant). Each listing points (as appropriate) to the Foods, Medicine, and Cultural and Functional Arts sections. For the Manzanita, one can fix Manzanita Blossom Jelly for breakfast. Manzanita has been used to treat Poison Oak; its wood has been fashioned into kitchen utensils.

The section on making medicines (including teas, herbal syrups, salves and poultices) notes that the process "is a fun, relaxing experience that provides a way to personally engage in health and wellness." The authors carefully note that the uses listed often come from Native lore and haven't been tested scientifically; and in many cases the preparations shouldn't be used by those who are pregnant. Yerba Santa tea is considered a decongestant by "by Miwok, Pomo and Yuki tribes and by doctors who listed it as an official remedy in the US. Pharmacopoeia in 1894." The Maidu "used the dried and powdered inner bark (of the White Alder) as an astringent to clean wounds."

There are some 70 recipes in the food section. Elderberry wine, anyone? Oak Nut Gingerbread? (Oak nut flour is gluten-free.) It's a way to "enjoy nutrient-rich, carbon-free food from the plants growing around our home. ... We allow the wild in."

New Mia King/Darien Gee novel has baked-in goodness

Independence Day celebrations evoke images of small-town America, so it's easy to imagine Avalon, a place that "isn’t more than what it seems to be—a small, simple river town in northern Illinois." In the midst of buzzing cell phones and economic downturns it is also a place of broken marriages and fractured relationships. And then one small act of kindness, its origin a mystery, turns the town upside down.

Best-selling author Mia King, writing under her real name, Darien Gee, weaves together the lives of several women in Avalon in "Friendship Bread: A Novel" ($25 in hardcover from Ballantine Books; $12.99 in Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook e-book format; and an audio book version narrated by Nancy Linari). Gee's husband, Darrin, has relatives in Chico. The couple lives on the Big Island of Hawaii with their three children.

It begins on Julia Evarts' front porch with a Ziploc bag full of starter for "Amish Friendship Bread," instructions, and a note that says: "I hope you enjoy it." But for Gracie, her five-year-old, Julia would have tossed the strange substance. Now she is prepping it for baking in ten days, thinking of her husband Mark's sweet tooth. But she is thinking, too, of Josh, their son, who died tragically at the age of ten in the care of her younger sister, Livvy. She doesn't talk to Livvy anymore, can't forgive her, or herself.

Hannah, a master cellist, has settled in Avalon with her husband, but the marriage is not going well. Madeline, an older woman, has opened a tea salon in Avalon, and when circumstances bring Julia and Hannah together, Madeline provides the emotional glue. All the time, loaves of Friendship Bread continue to multiply as new starters are passed from person to person.

The novel is about finding true freedom. As Julia realizes, "I want to be free. Only it wasn’t the freedom she had toyed with before, that singular independence that excluded Mark and Gracie. It was a freedom that included them. She wanted to be free to love them, to be with them."

Readers can download a free PDF booklet with more than 50 Amish friendship bread recipes from now until July 10, 2011. Visit www.friendshipbreadkitchen.com/pantry/chicoer. The password is er.

Two codgers on horseback from Paradise to Idaho's Snake River

Back in June 1990 Loyal McCammond and his friend Bert Lefevre told their wives they'd be making a 700-mile horseback ride from Paradise to Glenns Ferry (where Bert's brother-in-law lived) near the Snake River in Idaho. Loyal was 50-years-old, Bert 70, and the two set out with three mules and two horses and not many smarts.

When it was over, Bert wanted to write the story of the 27-day trek but passed away before the project could be completed. Loyal took up the task, recounting their misadventures in Bert's voice and in so doing introducing readers to a plain-spoken man with an eye for beauty, given to understatement and deadpan humor. Bert comes alive in "We Poked A Hole In The Wind: The Story of Two Old Codgers Fulfilling A Dream" ($10.95 in paperback from JADA Press) by Loyal McCammond.

McCammond, who now lives in Orland with his wife, will be signing copies of his work at Lyon Books in Chico this Wednesday, June 29 at 7:00 p.m.

The trekkers "crossed the Skyway at the Lovelock Inn," says Bert, "and, oh man how I wanted to stop for a beer. I've always been a very reliable beer drinker, and I sure wanted a beer mighty bad." But it was not to be. There were deserts to cross and parts of four states to traverse. So no beer--until they, uh, pulled into the Inskip Inn.

But now onward! Along the way the travelers meet a succession of nice folks, people who provide a place to crash, food for the animals and the adults, and a bit of trail guidance. Bert and Loyal don't hew to roadways if they can help it, and sometimes there's not much of a trail. Here and there they find lonely windmills still pumping fresh water, abandoned barns in which to take shelter, and even places that serve beer.

Preparing to cross into Nevada, they spend the night in an empty cabin. The next day, says Bert, "when we were about five miles out from Wemple's cabin, I made a terrible discovery. I had either lost my teeth or left them in the cabin."

Intrepid, Bert soldiers on, leaning forward, living the dream, poking a hole in the wind.

Local investment advisor teaches through humor

If you are responsible for handling someone else's money, you may be a fiduciary. Investment advisors are fiduciaries, but so are people managing the finances of an aging parent or acting as a trustee for a family trust. Fiduciaries are regulated by the Uniform Prudent Investor Act (UPIA), a code of conduct expressed in formal legal language.

That's where Guerdon Ely comes in. He's the author of "Uncertainty Is a Certainty: Fables for Fiduciaries" ($14.99 in paperback from Xulon Press). The Chico-based Certified Financial Planner (www.elyportfolios.com) presents the duties spelled out in UPIA using stories and analogies that anyone can understand.

His self-deprecating reminiscences are sometimes hilarious, but Ely has a serious purpose. Proper stewardship of another's money is not just about following a legal process; it's about developing honest character not tempted by Wall Street greed or swayed by "sucker bets."

Ely will be speaking at the Chico Branch of the Butte County Library on Wednesday, June 22 at 2:00 p.m. as part of a series entitled "Transforming Life After 50." He is scheduled to focus on global economics, the financial meltdown, and how individuals can respond. The two-hour presentation is free and open to the public.

It's vital for a fiduciary to determine the "time horizon" of investments; but the time horizon may well change with changing circumstances. Early in his marriage Ely was living from paycheck to paycheck. He told his wife: "'My most important short-term goal is this month's rent payment and my most important long-term goal is next month's.' ... Things were so tight that a big night out was splitting a turkey sandwich and a cup of soup at Denny's, and then going window-shopping at the grocery store." Later, Ely and his family were able to look a little farther ahead.

A fiduciary is judged not by portfolio performance but by whether he or she follows a process that rests on appropriate skill and good judgment. "Knowing isn't enough," Ely writes, "because we are hardwired to do dumb things when it comes to money. Therefore, as a fiduciary, you need the courage to do the right things and the discipline not to do the wrong things."

If this sounds like a philosophy of life, the reader has made a prudent observation.

Holocaust survivor Voyles offers remembrances of wartime in the Netherlands

The 1st Montessori School in Amsterdam opened its doors as a public institution on October 27, 1927. Almost 75 years later, a former student wondered how many of the children from the school had died in World War II. That sent one of the teachers, Ronald Sanders, on a quest. "When the war started," he writes, "about 20 percent of our students were Jewish. After the war, fewer than ten students came back to the 1st Montessori School; the Nazis had murdered more than 90 percent of the Jewish population of the Netherlands."

Hannie J. Ostendorf Voyles, longtime Butte College writing instructor now in active retirement, attended the school starting in 1939 with her sister Joosje. "Before that," she remembers, "we had been students at the 6th Montessori School with Anne Frank. Anne was older than I was; she was in the upper grades, but I remember seeing her at school and in the neighborhood."

Anne and her family went into hiding. "Before long, many students in our new school met a similar fate. Like Anne, they simply vanished. We were little children and could only watch as our friends were first deported to JEWS ONLY schools, and then were rounded up and carted off for extermination. From my own school, 173 students were murdered."

Some of the stories of those who survived, and those who didn't, are told in "Storming the Tulips" ($17.99 in paperback from Stonebrook Publishing), written and compiled by Ronald Sanders and translated and revised by Hannie Voyles.

Voyles will be speaking about the days of Nazi occupation at 7:00 p.m. this coming Wednesday, June 15, at Lyon Books in Chico.

The various accounts in the book are anchored by a love of 1st Montessori. Here are the stories of teachers who hid Jews; those in the Dutch Resistance who gave their lives; Jewish children who barely escaped the incinerators. In 1942, as "friends and neighbors were torn from their homes and sent off to the camps," the Pinkhofs, including three children who attended 1st Montessori, "committed suicide as a family." Another student, who stopped by on the way to school, discovered the bodies. That student was Hannie Voyles.

"The children have no monument," she writes. Now, they do.

Paleo for the family: A guide from a local mom (and Crossfit Trainer)

Sarah Fragoso is not only a trainer at Robb Wolf's NorCal Strength and Conditioning gym in Chico. She's an ardent exponent of what has come to be known as "the paleo solution" (the title of Wolf's recent best-seller). Fragoso says that "eating paleo is an easy concept: We should eat as our ancestors once did, we should eat based on how we are genetically wired to eat."

That means out with processed foods along with "dairy, legumes, any form of sugar, and grains!" Grains? Fragoso writes that they "are gut irritants, especially grains containing gluten such as wheat, barley, and rye. When our gut lining gets irritated, we are unable to properly digest our food." So bread is out. But it's okay to bring home the bacon since the right kind of fat is not bad. Fat is not what is making Americans overweight, it's the "non-fat, high-carb diet."

For those who want to try paleo at the family level, Fragoso has written an intensely practical guide. "Everyday Paleo: Embracing a Natural Diet & Lifestyle To Increase Your Family's Health, Fitness, and Longevity" ($29.95 in softcover from Victory Belt Publishing) tells what happened when she, her chiropractor husband, and three kids embraced the paleo idea. But that's just the beginning.

Fragoso will be signing copies of her book, and talking about the paleo lifestyle, at 7:00 p.m. this Wednesday, June 8 at Lyon Books in Chico.

The largest part of the book is a compendium of recipes (including shopping lists for trying "30 days of paleo") that will feed the entire family. Recipes (with full-color illustrations) include "perfect pork pot roast," "everyday meatloaf," and "Thai shrimp soup" (with more recipes available at http://everydaypaleo.com).

The last section introduces basic fitness showing the author's family in a series of full-color, step-by-step moves from "stroller sit-ups" to "partner push-ups." There's a chapter on fitness for kids and one on "advanced body weight and bar movements" (for those a little more advanced), as well as a series of beginning and intermediate workouts.

How about cheating on eating? Fragoso recommends a strict adherence to the paleo diet the first thirty days--no gluten--but she's a realist. Readers will respond to her verve--and honesty.

Local writer on the roots of her postpartum depression

"When my parents got divorced," writes Melissa White in a harrowing account of abuse and depression, "any semblance of a family fell apart." In her senior year of high school she lived with her dad, a prison guard who physically and emotionally abused her. She made plans to "run away" to her mom, who seemed to care little for her, ninety minutes away in Chico. But her father, whom she refers to as "the Monster," retaliated. It is a heartbreaking story.

Today White lives in Chester with her husband and two daughters. The birth of her first, Hailey, produced a depression in Melissa that wouldn't go away. In her late twenties she began counseling with Lisa Jellison, a Chico-based licensed clinical social worker. The results form the basis of White's first-person account, "It's Not The Baby Crying: A Woman's Struggle With Postpartum Depression" ($11.99 in paperback from Tate Publishing; $9.59 in Barnes & Noble Nook e-book format).

The author, who recently signed books at the Chico Barnes & Noble store, is a courageous chronicler. Violent thoughts would assail her, always about Hailey. "As I transfer dishes from the sink to the dishwasher, I find myself being extremely careful with the steak knives. As I gently place them into the silverware holder in the dishwasher, placing them pointy-end down, I catch myself in the following thought: The sharp end of the steak knife is plunging into my daughter's abdomen."

Melissa began to practice the "stop sign technique," saying no--out loud if need be--to those nightmarish thoughts. From moment to moment she was imagining all the terrible things that might happen to her daughter--and trying to protect her. But this was ultimately about her father and the "fear of my father walking through my front door and shooting us dead in my living room." It was "not a rational thought" yet Melissa succumbed to terrible fear.

Then, hope. "I learned that in order to recover, you must clean up all the broken pieces. If you leave the mess on the floor, you could walk through life continually stepping on those sharp shards of glass." Counseling saves her life; her faith sustains her.

And she must face the question: Can she forgive her father?

Anthropology educator and Ishi researcher to speak Wednesday

Did Bryan "Pancho" Beavers, born in 1901, hold the key to Ishi's heritage? Before Beavers died in 1971, a researcher recorded his stories of Konkow Maidu culture (Beavers's father was Scots-American and Maidu). According to educator Richard Burrill, who obtained the transcripts, Ishi was not only Yahi/Yana, but Maidu (as many Maidu believe). Beavers said "the Maidu here were always at war with them [the Yana]. They didn't like 'em. They wasn't exactly at war. ... But the Yana didn't have any friends anyplace."

Then, writes Burrill, "it is believed that in about 1830, the Yahi raiders kidnapped Beavers' great aunt from the fishing grounds downstream from Pulga on the Feather River. ... Upon coming of age, she was made the wife of one of the Yahi raiders named Yètati, a Northern Yana man. In about 1854, they produced a baby boy [who] remarkably survived the many massacres dealt the Yana. He became the man we have come to know as Ishi."

The fruits of Burrill's research are compellingly displayed in "Ishi's Untold Story In His First World: A Biography of the Last of His Band of Yahi Indians In North America" ($22.95 in paperback from The Anthro Company; www.ishifacts.com). The large volume contains a dozen maps and hundreds of historical photographs.

The author will talk about his research at 7:00 p.m. this Wednesday, May 25 at Lyon Books in Chico.

"In 1864," Burrill writes , "a general massacre reduced [Ishi's] entire tribe to no more than fifty souls. Compromised, and yet still proud, a small group of about twenty of Ishi's Yahi/Yana tribe retreated deeper into their remote hiding places along Antelope Creek, Mill Creek and Deer Creek. With few exceptions, the outside world was unaware of their existence. ... On August 28, 1911, Ishi was captured at the Charles Ward Slaughterhouse, forty miles south of the tribe's homeland. For observation, the Indian stranger was locked up in the Butte County Jail and placed in the solitary and padded cell for the insane."

The book reconstructs "the secretive years" before Ishi's capture, and details his cultural heritage as well as "his inner strength and ability to assimilate." He died of tuberculosis in 1916, "the passing of the last Stone Age Indian in North America."

Gifted San Francisco artist and writer to appear at Chico book signing

Paul Madonna's stunning pen-and-ink cityscapes appear in the comic section of the Sunday San Francisco Chronicle. His drawings contain short stories, snatches of conversations, philosophical observations, forming strange juxtapositions with his intricate architectural renderings.

The weekly strip is called "All Over Coffee" (I suspect the multiple meanings are not accidental), which gave the title to Madonna's first compilation. Now he's out with a new collection of panels, "Everything Is Its Own Reward" ($27.95 in hardcover from City Lights Books), and it's a mesmerizing journey, as the author puts it, "from an introduction, into autobiography and fiction, to a climax of creative questioning, then to resolution."

Madonna will be signing copies of his books Wednesday, May 18, at 7:00 p.m. at Lyon Books in Chico.

An Afterword provides context for each of the drawings and a rationale for Madonna's project. "What was it that was its own reward? Everything was, the more I thought about it. And that was the answer to life as much as it was to making art. Anything I did had to be for the sake of doing--from getting out of bed in the morning to pursuing my grandest aspirations."

One picture shows a little trailer against a large hill. The words in the upper left: "There is, for all of us, no matter what we've mastered, something incomprehensible." Madonna points out that the pictures are not meant to illustrate the words, or vice versa. There is something more subtle going on. Humans are never depicted. Yet they are there, on every page. You just have to read them into the houses, imagine the goings-on behind the walls.

There are hints of color in the sepia renderings. One shows a dizzying view of the blue sky looking up from several apartments. And the text: "The guys who sit on my stoop, doing deals out of bass-thumping cars, they don't care if I make something today, how I phrased these lines, or if this drawing turned out the way I wanted. Every doorway in every city, every cafe, church or town hall, every profession, passion or pursuit, is its own microcosm." And so it is with each page, a delight to the eye and provocation for the mind.

True tales of flight from a Chico pilot

Mike Paull's interest in flying was piqued in 1978 and he's never looked back. Though a dentist in San Carlos, California, he also managed to log "3500 hours of flying time" as a private pilot and flight instructor.

Who better to get into the hearts and minds of the pilots who frequented the little eatery near the San Carlos Airport? A dozen of their stories are brought to life in "Tales from the Sky Kitchen Cafe" ($14.95 in paperback from Skyhawk Publishing).

Paull, retired and living in Chico with his wife, Bev, will be talking about his work at Lyon Books in Chico, Wednesday, May 11, at 7:00 p.m.

Many of the stories are (need I say it about flying?) uplifting. Paull tells how two pilots, Jeanne and Fran, developed the "Fear of Flying Clinic." Then there's "Crazy Dave," a test pilot and racer. "Dave has competed in more races (216) than anyone in the history Reno Air Racing."

One of the Sky Kitchen denizens was a pilot named Herb. The conversation around the counter would frequently move to flying mistakes, and Herb would say that "there are old pilots and there are bold pilots, but there are no old bold pilots ... The difference between a big airplane and a little one, is that the little one will kill you just a little."

The emotional heart of the book, though, is the story of Phil and Hap. On March 10, 1945, "Phil's B29, Sentimental Journey, had just dropped the first bombs that would lead to the largest fire ever known to man. Over 100,000 people would burn to death in the next twenty-four hours. ... As his fellow B29 crews flew overhead just 5000 feet above him, an American B29 navigator huddled in his cell, terrified he would die that night in a Japanese prison camp. The navigator, Hap, survived that night, survived the war and fifty years later wandered into the Sky Kitchen for lunch. He sat at the center counter and coincidentally sat next to a guy named Phil, the Pathfinder of the March 10th raid over Tokyo."

The war left terrible scars, but both men would later return to Japan--a testimony to the courageous fellowship at the Sky Kitchen Cafe.

New book from award-winning Chico poet

Troy Jollimore teaches philosophy at Chico State University, and his philosophical sensibility informs his poetry as he explores the intersection of inner and outer experience. "Truth be told," the poet writes in "The Solipsist," "the whole place, / everything that the eye / can take in, to the sky / and beyond into space, // lives inside of your skull." But that "raises a question // that comes up again and again, / as to why / God would make ear and eye / to face outward, not in?"

The poem is included in a masterful collection, "At Lake Scugog" ($16.95 in paperback from Princeton University Press, $9.99 in Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook e-book). Jollimore won the National Book Critics Circle Award for his first collection, "Tom Thomson in Purgatory," and the new book, part of the Princeton Series of Contemporary Poets, includes fourteen poems that get inside the head of a mellower Tom Thomson.

The book's publication was celebrated last Thursday at the Blue Room Theatre with a literary event sponsored by Lyon Books in Chico.

In the title poem, "who I am / maintains an uneasy truce / with who I fear I am. ..." In "Meme, I, Self, and Eye: Fifteen Self-Portraits," the poet is "An inward facing projector / lighting a screen / that is its own audience."

But there is another out there, "On Location": "Even in the midst of silence the words of my language swarmed around me like flies. // Even in the midst of that swarm I could hear the director shouting Action! / Even in the midst of all that action I managed to take your hand. // Even in the midst of that swarm, that song, that silence, I found the resolve to kiss you. / Even in the midst of that kiss I knew you and I would end up on the cutting room floor."

Yet, in "To His Lover," "If you mistake me for / a solid and persisting thing, we both / will come to tears. Whereas, if you but grasp / the truth of what I am--then we'll still come / to tears; but there may first be time, before / this doom arrives, to get some kissing in."

Noted Bismarck biographer set for Chico book signing

Who is Otto von Bismarck? As Prussian Prime Minister in the last half of the nineteenth century, he unified Germany and established the German Empire. When he died, in 1898, his son Herbert wrote that "I have lost the ... most splendid and noblest spirit in the world." Others did not have such salutary thoughts. Bismarck was ruthless, devilish even, a man given to rage--and a political genius.

"The real Bismarck," writes Jonathan Steinberg in an extraordinary new biography, "was a complex character: a hypochondriac with the constitution of an ox, a brutal tyrant who could easily shed tears, a convert to an extreme form of evangelical Protestantism, who secularized schools and introduced civil divorce." Steinberg's stated aim is to understand Bismarck by listening to his friends and his enemies, and to what Bismarck, in voluminous writings, had to say about himself.

The result is "Bismarck: A Life" ($34.95 in hardcover from Oxford University Press; $9.99 in Amazon Kindle and $14.97 in Barnes & Noble Nook e-book formats). Henry Kissinger, writing for the New York Times Book Review, called it "the best study of its subject in the English language."

Steinberg, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Pennsylvania, is in Chico for a short stay and will be signing books and talking about Bismarck at the Chico Barnes and Noble Store this coming Saturday, April 30, from 3:00 - 5:00 p.m.

Steinberg's work is large, like Bismarck's personality, but accessible and compelling. His curiosity about this man drives him onward and the reader is swept into a Europe that became the "ready room" for two world wars.

Bismarck "held office for twenty-eight years and transformed his world more completely than anybody in Europe during the nineteenth century with the exception of Napoleon, who was an Emperor and a General. Bismarck did it while being neither the one nor the other. ... He ruled Germany by making himself indispensable to a decent, kindly old man, who happened to be a king. ... His rule depended absolutely on the bond between William I and his chief minister and on nothing else." ... "With perfect justice, in August 1866, he pounded his fist on his desk and cried, 'I have beaten them all! All!'"

Author Ron Sider to speak at Jesus Center dinner

As Christians look ahead to Easter, and the celebration of Jesus' resurrection, theologian Ron Sider asks some pointed questions: "What will Christians do in this time of swelling affluence and persistent poverty? Will we dare to remember that the God we worship tells us that 'whoever is kind to the poor lends to the LORD' (Prov. 19:17 NRSV)? Will Christians have the courage to seek justice for the poor, even if that means disapproval by affluent neighbors? Where will you and I stand?"

Sider is the author of "Rich Christians In An Age of Hunger: Moving From Affluence to Generosity" ($15.99 in paperback from Thomas Nelson Publishers; Amazon Kindle e-book $6.94; Barnes & Noble Nook e-book $9.99), now in its 5th edition (2005). First published in the late 1970s, the new edition notes that fewer in growing Asian economies are living in poverty. Still, worldwide, "more than a billion desperate neighbors live in wrenching poverty." Sider issues a clarion call for Christians to respond, not only in adopting a simpler lifestyle (and laughing at TV commercials) but in doing something that might change unjust social or political structures that prevent the poor from acquiring property.

Sider will speak at the annual Jesus Center benefit dinner on Friday, April 29, at Chico State University's BMU. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. Tickets (through April 15) are $35; a table for eight is $250. To purchase tickets, call (530) 345-2640 or visit www.jesuscenter.org.

Sider, founder of Evangelicals for Social Action, is Professor of Theology, Holistic Ministry and Public Policy at Palmer Seminary of Eastern University in Pennsylvania. His book is divided into four parts. The first looks at the economic realities of world poverty; the second presents "a Biblical perspective on the poor and possessions"; the third explores poverty's causes; the fourth offers practical advice (from implementing a "graduated tithe" and building Christian community to "correcting weaknesses in market economies" and "reducing unmanageable debt").

By turns controversial and convicting, Sider is optimistic about how God might work through his people today. "In obedience to our Lord, we could empower the poor through small loans, community development, and better societal systems. And in the process, we would learn again His paradoxical truth that true happiness flows from generosity."

West Sacramento poet's posthumous collection to be celebrated in Chico

Quinton Duval loved the Delta region. He and his wife Nancy made their home there until his untimely death at 61 a year ago. "In the breeze," the poet writes, "I sometimes smell the sea. . . . She lies / back--picnic basket, blanket under /cottonwood, a day when clouds slow / to see her shining there. Good Lord, / thank you for the chicken, the cold / wine, the river coming down from / its source. Thank you for lips, a tongue, / and some imagination. For finger- / tips and skin warmed by sunlight. / Thank you for the sea, for what the river / discovers at its end, what waits / for all of us to come calling." ("Oceanic")

Duval was a creative writing instructor at Solano Community College and founded chapbook publisher Red Wing Press. His friend, poet Gary Thompson (who taught writing at Chico State University), worked with Duval in the last days of his life to bring together "Like Hay: Last Poems" ($16 in paperback from Chico's Bear Star Press).

Thompson will be reading from Duval's poetry, and from his own new collection, "To the Archaeologist Who Finds Us," at a book release celebration at Lyon Books in Chico, Wednesday, April 13 at 7:00 p.m.

Duval's poems are clear-minded and poignant. "They smell like hay to me, / your last sweet words / blown across the fields / of the bedroom and out / the window to join the real breeze / moving the trees and changing / May light from green to gold." ("Like Hay") "I am sixty and changing too, / my dreams filled with sea- / water and flickering fires on some shore." ("Late Summer") "Some of us cry in joy, relief, / in the thin clear stream of music / the body gives willingly away / as it collapses, exhausted, into dust." ("Red Memory")

* * *

"The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind," William Kamkwamba, is scheduled to speak Thursday, April 14 at Laxson Auditorium as part of the "Book in Common" program (www.butte.edu/bic or www.csuchico.edu/bic). My review is available on this blog. Ticket prices range from $10 for students and children to $20 for premium; for details, go to chicoperformances.com.

George Keithley limns the night

Maybe because it's "the cruelest month," as T.S. Eliot would have it, April is National Poetry Month. In a time that mixes "memory and desire" we need the poet to call our attention afresh to the little corners of our lives. And so, just in time, we have "Night's Body" ($19 in paperback from WordTech Communications) by George Keithley.

He'll be reading his poems at Lyon Books in Chico on Tuesday, April 19 at 7:00 p.m.

The retired Chico State University professor illuminates the night we all must traverse. In five sections ("At Four in the Morning," "Winter Nocturnes," "Women at Night," "In the Night of Unknowing," and "Summer Night") Keithley awakens memory and desire in the context of shadows. The "Tree House," "A tree of stars / where our children stir and dream // they are flying from limb to limb / among the shining creatures taking shape / the moment the mind makes them out-- / The Hunter, two Bears, the Princess, the Swan, / dance on the dark floor of heaven. . . ."

But the heavenly visions are anchored to the earth. In "The Driver," "Before us Search and Rescue had planted flares. / Unsteady stars, they flamed up, hissed, flickered / over the slick creekside, revealing tape / that sealed the 'discovery site'--bold yellow / like the body bag laid out upon the bank. . . ."

And what will we do to the animals? "Who can inhabit the unholy sleep / of the soul once they wander / silently away? Who'll bark, howl, / bray, croak, whirr, whinny, all / together raise their joyful noise?" ("When They Leave" won the Pushcart prize.) The poet continues: "Droves of animals who mate and thrive / and swarm before our eyes only / to disappear when we dream / because they are too innocent / to survive."

"Winter Night": "Silence / thrives in the black night and we know / at the heart of this clarity / is sorrow." Then "The Dance": "Memory spares us nothing touched by love-- / You wept without a sound while my fingers brushed / your blouse--apple blossoms--then we walked down / among the last trees, their shifting shadows, / into the light to join the others."

Paradise author shares improbable life, from prison inmate to Cousteau diver

What better title? "Extreme: On Living in the Intensity of the Moment" ($18 in paperback from Drugs Bite, www.drugsbite.com) summarizes the mind-boggling downs and ups of Stephen Arrington's life. The Paradise resident tells a first-person story of becoming addicted to marijuana (and, later, harder drugs) as a bomb disposal frogman stationed in Hawaii in the late 1970s. He was busted and kicked out of the Navy. Today he's a drug educator.

The gripping narrative is a sad history of bad choices. Arrington's picture hits the front page of the Los Angeles Times on October 21, 1982 as one of the accused drivers in a cocaine-smuggling operation masterminded by auto magnate John Z. DeLorean. It meant prison for Arrington and there, he writes, he found the freedom from self-deception he could not otherwise escape.

The author is scheduled to be interviewed by Nancy Wiegman on Nancy's Bookshelf tomorrow morning at 10:00 a.m. on KCHO (Northstate Public Radio, 91.7 FM).

In prison he realizes that "all my choices were pre-determined by my quest for self-fulfillment on my terms. My relationship with God was also for my convenience." It's two in the morning. "There is no sudden decision, I just find myself climbing down from the bunk in my shorts and getting down on my knees on the cold concrete floor. The last thing I see before closing my eyes are the shadows of the jail bars silhouetted on the lower corner of the cell's wall. ... I am not sure that I am going to pray until it happens."

By 1985 he was out, landing a job teaching at the College of Oceaneering in Los Angeles. There he saves a student's life after a near-drowning. Receiving a Red Cross Certificate of Merit, "I look down at the signature upon it in wonder." It is personally signed by President Reagan. "I remember hearing President Reagan announcing his war on drugs while I was driving that drug-laden car in Florida."

Still thirsting for adventure, he's offered the job as Chief Diver for the Cousteau Society. In 1988, preparing for a filming expedition to Maui, he meets Cindy, she of the "playful hazel eyes," who lives in Paradise and who became his wife.

An improbable life indeed.

Writer Philip Yancey scheduled to speak in Chico Sunday morning

Though he bills himself as a journalist, Philip Yancey manages in his many books not only to ask searching questions about God but to put the church on notice that superficial answers will not do. Yancey is an editor-at-large for Christianity Today; his books include "What's So Amazing About Grace?"; "Disappointment With God: Three Questions No One Asks Aloud"; and "Where Is God When It Hurts?: A Comforting, Healing Guide For Coping With Hard Times."

His latest is a response to the "new skeptics" who question God's goodness and very existence. "What Good is God?: In Search of a Faith That Matters" ($23.99 in hardcover from FaithWords; $10.99 in Amazon Kindle or Barnes & Noble Nook e-book) puts it bluntly: "Often when people pose a question like 'What good is God?' they are asking why God doesn’t intervene more directly and with more force. Why did God let Hitler do so much damage, or Stalin and Mao? Why doesn’t God take a more active role in human history?"

Yancey is scheduled to speak at all three morning services this Sunday at Bidwell Presbyterian Church (located next to Chico State University). He'll give one message at 8:30 and 9:45 in the sanctuary, and a second at the El Rey Theater in downtown Chico at 11:11. The presentations are free and open to the public; best seating is at 8:30 or 11:11.

"What Good is God?" is arranged in ten parts, each recounting a trip in search of answers, each presenting a talk Yancey gave. "This book," he writes, "relates stories from places like China, where the church grows spectacularly despite an atheistic government; and the Middle East, where a once-thriving church in the heartland now barely hangs on; and South Africa, where a multicolored church picks through the pieces of its racist past. In the United States I have visited not only Virginia Tech and a convention of prostitutes, but also a group of alcoholics in Chicago and two enclaves in the Bible Belt South."

Yancey's book is not a logical defense of Christianity, but a picture of God at work in the trenches. The author is convinced that "for whatever reason, God chooses to make himself known primarily through ordinary people like us."

Mud-lover Dick Cory muddles through

Chicoan Dick Cory is a man of the sod. The theme runs from "Six Boys and a Bag of Dirt" (essays about growing up in small-town Nebraska) to his latest compilation, "Seeking Common Ground" (self-published paperback; write the author at ubangarang@yahoo.com to order). Cory writes that the title conveys "multiple meanings and connections to earth. My books promote the value of dirt. We all have a stake in protecting this common ground."

But, as the author makes clear, that doesn't mean everyone has to agree. "Seeking Common Ground" is dedicated to long-time writing teacher Hannie Voyles, whose poem, "Contradiction," celebrates the energy produced when "We meet and merge, / and counter and clash." In seventy-six chapters, Cory takes some decidedly strong views, from the importance of unions to his wish not to be cremated or buried but to be turned into soap slurry and purified at a water treatment plant. (Ever the punster, he calls this "a slurry with a fringe on top.")

Cory will be signing copies of his books this Saturday from 1:00 - 4:00 p.m. at Made in Chico, 127 W. Third Street.

The chapters include several short stories (a sexy murder mystery and a steamy gym workout among them) and ruminations on the importance of one's conversational community. For Cory, that means the R.O.D.E.O. club ("Retired Old Duffers Eating Out"). "Our former professions, political and religious views, and lifetime experiences cover the full spectrum. We agree and disagree with equal passion." Other essays opine about the demise of bumpers (replaced by plastic that breaks at a mere nudge) and the difference between care giving and "caretaking." Some of the reflections are somber, some more light hearted (Cory is a notorious prankster).

He claims to have been the first to use "reality check" back in 1976 or so. And "it may be dum (mud spelled backwards), but I love mud" (except for "mud slinging by rivals with muddled-minds" who "seek to muddy the waters of progress").

Cory's generation came after "the Greatest Generation" and "carries no moniker. . . . All of our experiences (including six-man football), work ethic and job stability are recorded in our brain. This legacy must be shared with our descendants if they are to profit from our successes and failures."

Under Lake Oroville, the town of Bidwell still beckons

For seven years Chuck Smay has been digging into the historical records of a small town that for a short time in the nineteenth century was the seat of government in Butte County. His work, some written in the first person, reads like a mystery story as he pieces together evidence from old deeds as to the businesses there and old maps as to the size of the place. General readers will enjoy the winsome narrative and armchair historians will appreciate the carefully chosen details.

"The Town of Bidwell at Bidwell's Bar: Boom and Bust, 1848 - 1860" ($25 in paperback from the Butte County Historical Society, buttehistory@sbcglobal.net) has a companion website,

http://sites.google.com/site/bidwellthetown. Copies of the book are available at the Society's Museum Store in Oroville (http://www.buttecountyhistoricalsociety.org/giftshop.html).

Smay provides first an overview of the town's history with a chapter devoted to its various names (Bidwell, Bidwell's Bar, Bidwell Bar). Next is the story (an adventure, really) of map reconstruction and then several chapters devoted to the post office, the town's newspaper, the National Hotel, and the bridge at Bidwell's Bar. There are also historical photographs and a wealth of appendices.

In 1854 the editor of the Butte Record in Bidwell "expressed his view of community values": "Dropping into one of the newly erected saloons in town the other evening, we were surprised and shocked to see the youth of Bidwell, gathered around several tables, and engaged in the nefarious business of gambling."

There's also the story of a political fight for the future of Bidwell. "Between 1853 and 1856 Bidwell was the center of county government." A fire gutted the town in 1854, but the residents rebuilt. "In 1854 talk started about the construction of a permanent bridge across the Feather River at Bidwell" and "the local newspaper championed the continued prosperity of the town and unlimited future growth."

But the town failed to reckon with nearby Ophir (Oroville) "which began flexing its political and economic muscle," causing "vicious editorial exchanges" between rival newspapers. Bidwell lost. "Its remaining glory was perpetuated by a bridge, tollhouse, orange tree and a small community of businesses that served the needs of the local residents who refused to leave the area." But now, in print, it lives again.

Chico couple's cross-country journey mixes social activism and vegetable oil

In July 2007 Chris Nelson and her spouse Michael Pike celebrated retirement from nursing careers by setting off on a nine-month journey. Their transportation of choice: "An '87 Ford F-250 four-wheel drive 3/4-ton pickup with a 8' cab-over camper," a "multi-fuel vehicle able to run on diesel fuel, bio-diesel, or straight vegetable oil." They called it the Veggie Voyager.

Nelson kept a blog along the way (http://veggievoyagers.blogspot.com) and now its content, including some stunning landscape photographs, has been published as "The Veggie Voyagers: An Eco-Friendly, Low Budget Loop Of North America's Wild Places Powered By Used Cooking Oil" ($26 in paperback from Are-We-There-Yet Press) by Chris Nelson with Michael Pike.

The couple will be sharing their "adventures in mobile homelessness" tonight at 7:00 p.m. at Lyon Books in Chico.

"This is a book about retiring on $40 a day," Nelson writes. "It's a book about loss of habitat and environmental threats. Most of all, it's a book about the beauty of the natural world." The couple sometimes bought vegetable oil from Costco, but often along the way obtained the used variety from fast-food chains. Any water had to be removed from the oil. The filtration process involved a modified juicer and a contraption that looked more like a still or meth lab. It took hours, and more than once local law enforcement asked them to move along.

Nelson and Pike (along with Sasha, the dog, who learned repeated lessons about porcupines) traversed some twenty states and three Canadian provinces. "I figured out we'd stayed 16 times at Walmarts and 67 days with friends, family or under the wing of New Orleans folks. We've stayed at gravel pits, casinos, . . . hot springs, dumps, roadside turnouts, BLM land, campgrounds and four motels."

During their trip they participated in a rally in New Orleans on behalf of public housing, made tense with abundant police presence. In Utah they visited the town of Monticello where the "uranium and vanadium processing plant" "had created a legacy of cancers." They walked among the Bristlecone Pines on the Eastern Sierra and took a "walking meditation. The trees had one voice. It was a low, slow, deep, muted sap hum."

And they showered every four days, needed or not.

Chico author's heartbreaking true story

In 1962, the Salvation Army's Booth Memorial Home in inner-city Oakland existed to "house, hide and feed" pregnant teens and unwed mothers. Fifteen-year-old Judi G. found herself there that summer. "I'm horrified my friends will find out where I am and why. Being in trouble doesn't mean the simple words, she's pregnant. It means I had sex, and that is the worst part of the truth, the dirty truth. I feel dirty; I am dirty."
Young Judi's thoughts are captured with poignant clarity by Chico author Judi Loren Grace. "The Third Floor" ($14.99 in paperback from Jetstream Publishing) is her own story, pieced together from letters she sent her lifelong friend, Joanie, that summer of '62. Written in the voice of her fifteen-year-old self, the story traces Judi's growing up years in Porterville and the aftermath of delivering a child. "I have a son. . . . I'm tired and happy and scared. I was in labor for sixty-five hours."
Lyon Books in Chico will hold a book signing and talk by the author on Monday, February 28 at 7:00 p.m.
The book reads like a novel, yet there are historical photographs throughout, an epilogue explaining what happened to those involved, and a selection of Judi's letters to Joanie ("For the past two nights about 12 girls have met in the parlor and we dance. I've learned to do the Continental walk, Texas Hop, Watusi and the Bristol Stomp" . . . "Don't get the idea that I'm having one big blast cause honey I'm not.").
Then there's the agonizing moment of giving up the child. "The new mother stands to get the baby. . . . I stand in the middle of our living room in full sight, kiss him on the top of his head, smell his scent, rub my cheek on his cheek as he sleeps, unaware he is changing mothers; then I look at his face for the last time."
But it isn't the last time. "Secret stuff has a way of oozing out," as therapist Silona Reyman says in the book's resource page. "Sometimes secrets explode. Secret keepers in the world of adoption play a dangerous and heartless game."
Co-owner, with daughter Dana, of Satori Color and Hair Design, Judi Loren Grace has penned a courageous narrative and reclaimed a life.

[Clarification: Author Silona Reyman has clarified that she is the writer of the quotes: “Secret stuff has a way of oozing out. Sometimes secrets explode. Secret keepers in the world of adoption play a dangerous and heartless game.” They are from her book, “Musings of a Ghost Mother.” The text of the original review has been updated.]

Creative writing for kids from a Chico State University grad

"Wool around with fords," writes Karen Benke, spooneristically. "Rake tisks!" Her new book does just that. It's called "Rip the Page: Adventures in Creative Writing" ($14.95 in paperback from Trumpeter, an imprint of Shambhala Publications). As the cover proclaims, "Rip" "includes word play, open-ended writing experiments, encouragement from writers and poets, and enough blank pages to let your words roam."

With a degree in creative writing from Chico State University and an M.A. in Writing from the University of San Francisco, Benke conducts workshops with California Poets in the Schools. Based in the Bay Area, she visited Lyon Books last year to help empower young writers. As she says in her introduction, "Let the tip of you pen scrawl, scribble, leap, doodle, and rip, rip, rip! That's what creative writers do when they aren't busy staring, day-dreaming, and eavesdropping."

Here are dozens and dozens of writing exercises brilliantly disguised as word games. There are word lists (such as sound words like "buuuuurrpp!" and "eeek!"); "try this" experiments (writing a poem about a real-life hero. Let's see: What rhymes with "Rodgers"?); "definition decoders" (connecting inner and outer worlds by describing "what color a star sounds like" or "what does a new idea feel like?"); "suddenly a story" (writing about something HUGE, like a disappointment, and writing about scars, inner and outer: "Tip the word S-C-A-R on its side and see what oozes out. Put your initials on it, date it, tape it above your desk. Look in the mirror and congratulate yourself. Smile at that brave warrior gazing back at you").

Scattered throughout are words from writers to young writers. There's "a note from" Lemony Snicket: "You must spend time eavesdropping on the world, writing down things you see and hear while no one is paying attention to you. This is best done with a notebook, and the first thing you should write down in your notebook is an excuse, so if you are ever caught eavesdropping you will have a good reason. . . ."

Betsy Franco likes "to act like a mad chemist and put things together that don't normally mix, such as math and poetry." ("puddles - rescued worms = cloudy mirrors")

My try: We oldsters support Aaron. Codgers for Rodgers!

An adventure in the Arctic from a Chico novelist

Phyl Manning spends her time in Chico and New Hampshire, but in her imagination she lives among the Inuit, specifically those in the high Arctic reaches, the Inupiat. Her new novel (a sequel to "Kiti On Ice") is "Arctic Circles" ($15.99 in paperback from Raven's Wing Books). In this story Kiti is now grandmother to fourteen-year-old Nik (pronounced "neek") and his older brother, Sitok. Artistic Nik is not much of a hunter, but a series of events forces him to confront some of the fiercest animals in the wilderness and brings him face-to-face with the "dog people."

The author will be signing copies of her books tonight at 7:00 p.m. at Lyon Books in Chico.

The "dog people" are the kalunait, those with "heavy eyebrows," Westerners from the south. An anthropologist, Clifford Belson, travels to Nik's village and brings his twelve-year-old daughter, Bonnie ("PAH-nee" to the villagers).

Because of her outfit Nik thinks she is another male, someone wanting to study the ways of the Inupiat, and together with Sitok the three share some breathless adventures. "Nik's hunting improved because he himself now had someone to teach. On rare days, Sitok took both of them out with him--for fish, for seal." And then comes the encounter with Nanuk, the great bear. Sitok nearly loses his life; Nik finds unexpected courage; Bonnie saves the sled-dog Nuko.

It is 1935. Far away to the south great nations are struggling with economic depression and rumors of Nazi aggression. "And 1935 will be the last generation for Arctic Inupiat to live within their five-thousand-year-old tradition, for civilized people and now whole governments to the south are encroaching, are determined to emend these primitive folk who have for so long lived in health and harmony with their land and with each other." Some Inupiat have journeyed south to villages so vast they actually have a name; among them is Nik's father.

But now Nik's parents have disappeared in a flood and he is determined to find them. Nik's growing maturity and resourcefulness form the centerpiece of the novel and make for a gripping tale suitable for young adults.

Never settled, Nik and his kin always prepare food caches for the next journey. "Inupiat travel--that's what they do."

Butte College philosophy instructor answers the big questions

Ric Machuga has distilled thirty years of teaching philosophy at Butte College into a new book with a rather playful title: "Life, the Universe and Everything" ($36 in paperback from Cascade Books). But the book is serious in intent, and not only does it take up the biggest questions of all (what is truth? are humans free? does God exist?) but proceeds to answer them. In a calm, humble, and convincing fashion Machuga shows the implications of some simple commonsense propositions ("plants and animals exist; square circles and other contradictions do not exist; and nothing comes from nothing") have enormous consequences.

These consequences are fleshed out in what the book's subtitle calls "An Aristotelian Philosophy for a Scientific Age." Though no physicist or biologist would follow Aristotle's ancient Greek science today, Aristotle nevertheless had some profound things to say about the scientific enterprise. He was a philosophical realist, meaning that he was convinced that plants and animals were really there, outside of our minds. Some philosophers today are not so sure, and that's the problem. It's hard to make sense of the world without a real world to make sense of.

As my colleague and friend points out, Aristotle's insights, enriched (and surpassed) by the Christian philosopher Thomas Aquinas in the middle ages, can help ordinary people in their daily quest for "the good life." The modern age, Machuga writes, has mistakenly focused on promoting "values" (which frequently clash). Aristotle and Aquinas emphasized the virtues, those habits of life that lead to genuine flourishing for all humans.

The question of God dominates the final chapters (all of which feature lucid summaries and extensive notes for those who want to dig deeper). "Philosophical realism," Machuga writes, "is inherently theistic." But if God exists, why is there evil? The author rejects the standard free will defense since it envisions humans as autonomous creatures, a contradiction. A better answer involves "the paradoxes of omnipotence" and evil as a privation (as strange as that may sound).

Want a book to chew on? Make it this one.

The author will discuss what it means to be human at the fourth Science and Religion Conference, "Neuroscience and the Human Soul," hosted by Bidwell Presbyterian Church, tomorrow and Saturday. Details at www.bidwellpres.org.

A life of John Bidwell for teens

Kudos to Nancy Leek for bringing Chico's founder to life. "John Bidwell: The Adventurous Life of a California Pioneer" ($20 in paperback from ANCHR) is aimed specifically at the young adult audience, but it also found your friendly columnist standing and cheering.

The book is available at Lyon Books in Chico, at Bidwell Mansion, Made in Chico, and Teachers Book Connection, or from ANCHR (The Association for Northern California Historical Research), www.csuchico.edu/anchr. You can also write the author at bidwellbook@gmail.com or visit her blog at nancyleek.wordpress.com.

Leek is children's librarian at the Orland Free Library and she and her husband Jim reside in Chico. Her words are beautifully crafted. She wears her research lightly and develops a strong narrative line with John, and later John and his wife Annie, at the center. Her choice quotations from Bidwell's journals and other writings reveal a man of his time but also a man who could little abide the harsh treatment of the native Mechoopda and the emigrant Chinese.

Replete with period photographs, the story opens with John, at seven, walking fourteen miles to see a new steamboat launched on Lake Erie. Throughout the rest of his life he pushed into new territories. Bidwell, writes Leek, "came to California in 1841, an event that he considered a 'mere accident.' . . . He never thought he would find himself taking apart a Russian fort or supervising Indians at a Spanish mission. He never expected to discover gold or bring a new state into the Union or rise to the rank of general."

Though too honest to be good at electioneering, in 1880 he and Annie were visited by President Rutherford B. Hayes and his wife. And "the Bidwells became great friends with John Muir. ... In 1877 Bidwell took Muir" and several scientists "on expeditions to explore Mt. Shasta and Mt. Lassen. Muir stayed with the Bidwells for two months" and "found it hard to leave his friends in Chico and their 'cool fruity home.'"

"John Bidwell not only saw history," Leek writes, "he lived it and created it. By the end of the century he could say, 'The history of California lies like a map before me. Somewhat confused it may be, but I have seen it all.'"

Local authors offer compassion for caregivers

William Martin is the founder of The Still Point Center for Zen Practice in Chico. His wife, Nancy, is its director. Together they have drawn on years of counseling to offer "The Caregiver's Tao Te Ching: Compassionate Caring For Your Loved Ones and Yourself" ($14 in paperback from New World Library). The Martins are scheduled to talk about their work tonight at 7:00 p.m. at Lyon Books in Chico.

The ancient "Tao Te Ching" of Lao Tzu reflects on the mysterious Tao in 81 short chapters. Its message, say the Martins, is deceptively simple: "You are, by nature, an expression of the Tao, and its wisdom and power are part of your true nature. Let go of the stories to the contrary and live in wonder and appreciation." The "stories" come from what the Martins call "the conditioned mind."

For caregivers, the conditioned mind is always asking "Am I doing this right?" It tends to tell and not listen; it tries to problem-solve rather than accept. By contrast, the Martins have adapted the chapters of Lao Tzu to present what they call the "Tao mind" in short poems and brief commentary. "If we believe in our conditioned mind," they write in Chapter 30, "there is never a time when we can stop doing. / There is always more to do. // If we trust our Tao mind, / times to stop and rest appear like rainbows, / surprising us in the cloudy sky. / Pay attention to these times."

The book eloquently encourages "compassion, simplicity, and patience," but the paradox of the Tao is that it is indifferent even to these labels. So the Martins have interpreted the Tao though Buddhist eyes.

The authors know first hand the challenges of care giving. "We may look ahead to some task we fear we won't be able to do. From a distance the task seems like a cliff edge. . . . As we keep going, we find that we reach that cliff without noticing. We are doing what naturally unfolds, and suddenly here is the task we had dreaded. Now that it is here, there is no question that we will be able to keep going. What appeared too difficult is now just what needs to be done."

Authors: "Pitchapalooza" is coming to Chico

Arielle Eckstut and David Henry Sterry know publishing from the inside out. Both are successful writers and "authorpreneurs." Together, the married couple has produced the most current and practical guidebook for aspiring authors I've ever seen. "The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published: How to Write It, Sell It, and Market It . . . Successfully!" ($15.95 in paperback from Workman Publishing) is full of real-world examples, including the success of local author Susan Wooldridge, whose "Poemcrazy" is now in its umpty-umpth printing.

After years of promoting their own books, the authors found themselves in demand as "book doctors" for others. True to their own advice, they have plunged into social media with a website (www.thebookdoctors.com) and more. Now they are bringing their well-received "Pitchapalooza" workshop to Chico.

This free event will be held at the 1078 Gallery, 820 Broadway, on Tuesday, January 18 at 7:00 p.m., and is sponsored by Chico's Lyon Books. According to publicity materials, local writers get sixty seconds to make their best pitch to a panel of experts, including the authors, who will provide feedback on the concept and its potential in the marketplace. The winner of the competition will receive an introduction to an agent.

"The Essential Guide" is divided into three sections. The first, "Setting Up Shop," deals with the new world of social networking as well as book proposals and finding representation (Eckstut is herself a longtime literary agent). "Taking Care of Business" takes on contracts, working with a publisher, and self-publishing. "Getting the Word Out" concerns the fine art of selling. Key to the guidance is the importance of research. New writers simply have to know the terrain out there--which books might be competitors?--if they are to increase their chances of a sale. In fact, the reader is halfway through the book before the authors say it's time to sit down and write.

Tips abound, like checking the acknowledgements page of similar books for possible contacts, but in the end a writer's passion must carry the day. Eckstut and Sterry have the passion, and wit. Get the book.

PROGRAM NOTE: Please join host Nancy Wiegman and me for a live edition of Nancy's Bookshelf tomorrow morning at 10:00 a.m. on KCHO (Northstate Public Radio, 91.7FM).

Booked for 2010

Three categories dominated the reviews this year. First, memoirs: "The Story of Another Child's Christmas in Wales" (Lynn Elliott); "I Grew Up In Latvia" (Zig Vidners); "Burning Bears Fall From the Sky" (Peter Edridge); "A Life To Remember" (Gregory Ghica); "From Harlem To Hollywood: My Life In Music" (Van Alexander with Stephen Fratallone); "Google Brain" (Gordon Greb); "Sometimes, Memories Are All We Have" (Shari Edwards).

Next, novels and short stories: "Crown of Dust" (Mary Volmer); "The Great Bay" (Dale Pendell); "Rubber Tuesday" (Phil Coppock and Mrs. Bower's 2008-2009 4th Grade Class); "Captured By Desire" ("Kira Morgan"); "Rose Cottage" (Olivia Claire High); "Voices of a City of Gold: Stories From Oroville, California" (Leslie Hale Roberts); "Murder at the Altar" (Terry Phillips); "Desiree" (Doug Keister); "Heart of a Pirate" (Pamela Johnson); "The Departure Lounge" (Paul Eggers); "The Last Baktun" (Lisa Westwood); "The World Is At Your Feet" (G. Donovan Oakes); "Gene Pool" (Steven Maass and Katherine Terstegen); "Submerged in Darkness" (Shannon A. Hiner).

Finally, the broad category of self-help: "The Pebble Path: Returning Home From a Forest of Shadows" (Jan Hasak); "The Couples Thrival Guide" (Shannon Sheridan); "To Believe Or Not To Believe: The Social and Neurological Consequences of Belief Systems" (Rahasya Poe); "Alligators in the Water Cooler" (Judith Munson); "The Tao of Forgiveness: The Healing Power of Forgiving Others and Yourself" (William Martin); "The Mindful Path Through Shyness: How Mindfulness and Compassion Can Help Free You From Social Anxiety, Fear and Avoidance" (Steven H. Flowers); "Deep Down Things" (Lin Jensen).

Add three volumes of poetry: "Where Once" (Sally Allen McNall); "Vortumna" (Sarkis Shmavonian); "Gorrill's Orchard" (Jeanne E. Clark).

Throw in some history: "Hops and Dreams: The Story of the Sierra Nevada Brewing Co." (Rob Burton); "Durham Locations, Landmarks, Lads and Ladies" (Adriana Farley); "The U.S. Navy's Coastal and Motor Minesweepers, 1941-1953" (David D. Bruhn); "Chico History Minutes" (Verda Mackay).

Politics: "House of Lords" (Charles W. Frank).

Guides: "Mount Shasta Guide to Fun" (Robin Kohn); "The Birds of Bidwell Park" (Roger Lederer); "Light Travel: Photography On the Go" (Tom Dempsey).

And season with kid stuff: "The Famous Nini: A Mostly True Story of How a Plain White Cat Became a Star" (Mary Nethery); "Math Wise!" (Jim Overholt and Laurie Kincheloe); "Crowlyle Finds His Caw" (Vic Sbarbaro); "Love and Logic Money-isms: Wise Words About Raising Money-Smart Kids" (Jim Fay and Kristan Leatherman).

That wraps up the year, except to remind do-it-yourself authors that Publishers Weekly is now featuring quarterly listings of self-published works. Submissions close January 31, 2011. Details: www.PublishersWeekly.com/diy

The day after Christmas

For those who embrace what the Christmas carols herald--the coming of God to earth in the form of a small child--the "good tidings of great joy" speak of a new kind of life here and now. Yet for Christians around the world how this life works itself out on the "day after Christmas," and all the days yet to come, is not easily answered. It is an "in-between" time when believers are not yet fully formed but are wooed by God's grace to conform more and more to the image of the God-Man.

This is the starting point of a provocative new book by N.T. (Tom) Wright, formerly Anglican Bishop of Durham (in the U.K.), now Research Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at St. Andrews University in Scotland. "After You Believe" ($24.99 in hardcover from HarperOne; $11.99 in Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook e-book formats) is subtitled "Why Christian Character Matters." It matters, Wright maintains, because it's true to the kind of life transformation set out by the New Testament.

"Character," he writes, "--the transforming, shaping, and marking of a life and its habits--will generate the sort of behavior that rules might have pointed toward but which a 'rule-keeping' mentality can never achieve. And it will produce the sort of life which will in fact be true to itself--though the 'self' to which it will at least be true is the redeemed self, the transformed self, not the merely 'discovered' self of popular thought."

Wright draws upon the ancient tradition of virtue to illuminate what he means by character. Virtue--excellence--comes through practice and enables the person to respond appropriately in a wide variety of situations.

But the Biblical idea of virtue, Wright says, is not about celebrating the individual. "Christian virtue isn't about you--your happiness, your fulfillment, your self-realization. It's about God and God's kingdom, and your discovery of a genuine human existence by the paradoxical route--the route God himself took in Jesus Christ!--of giving yourself away, of generous love which constantly refuses to take center stage."

Christians are to be a royal priesthood, clothed in "humility, charity, patience, and chastity." It is nothing less than the practice, through God's power, of becoming fully human.

Lynn Elliott remembers Welsh Christmases. . . .

Born and raised in Cardiff, Wales, Lynn Elliott, a professor of English and creative writing at Chico State University, shares family memories with groups around the country. He's now reworked his autobiographical tales into "The Story of Another Child's Christmas in Wales" ($10.95 in paperback from Memoir Books). Elliott is scheduled to be interviewed by Nancy Wiegman on Nancy's Bookshelf, Friday, Dec. 24, at 10:00 a.m. on KCHO (Northstate Public Radio, 91.7 FM).

Decorations have "all mystically appeared, overnight, in James Howells' department store, Queen Street, heralding the beginning of Christmas season in the sea-faring capital city of Wales, Cardiff. I am four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten and eleven years old, chocked full with accumulated memories of food, joy, song, and jolly, wind-swept shoppers."

Mostly Lynn is eleven, a celebratory mixture of naivete and sarcasm. Reading the book, listening to the tone, I thought of Jean Shepherd's voice-overs in the classic film A Christmas Story. Young Lynn is lurching toward adulthood.

"Last year," he says, "before the prospect of Lynn attaining manhood entered my parents' minds, I got a cowboy suit for Christmas. Dressed in my boots, spurs, leggings, chaps, shirt, gun belt, guns, waistcoat and one-gallon hat, I sidled out of the front door into Forrest Road, seeking a show-down with Billy-O the Kid, the bully who lived ten houses down from ours. Did Wyatt Earp ever fight in snow? No time to ponder the question, as an iceball--not even a snowball, but an iceball!--hammered into my ear and slid slowly, like a polar iceberg, down my once-warm neck. I reentered the sheriff's office, crying for my mother and vowing that next year I'd get a snow-scooping machine gun. . . . "

There are drunken carollers, oddball neighbors, Tiddles the cat exacting revenge on a certain boy's Meccano set tower, but everything moves toward Christmas Day night and the Elliott family gathering, the flowing elderberry wine and singing relatives, and Auntie Bess ("a diminutive woman with a voice like an air raid siren"), all tinged by quiet news that Grandma Elliott may be celebrating her last Christmas. And for grandma: Lynn's boisterous, be-wigged performance as Ethel Merman.

How can one be sad this night when "everything's coming up roses"?