Writer Ralph Ellison, Monstrous?

I learned a couple of startling things about the African-American author Ralph Ellison (1913-1994) in a "By the Book" Q & A interview in the New York Times Book Review (July 25, 2021).

The interviewee, Eddie S. Glaude Jr., a professor at Princeton and the author of Begin Again: James Baldwin's America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own (Crown, 2020), had this to say about Ellison: "I loved Ralph Ellison....But after reading Arnold Rampersad's biography of Ellison, I despised the man. The way he treated his mother, his betrayal of [writer] Albert Murray--monstrous."

I own two review copies of Ralph Ellison: A Biography by Arnold Rampersad (Knopf, 2007). I never got around to reading the book. After seeing that quote from Glaude, I intend to start reading it soon.

Terror In The Sky

The best book trailer that I've seen is the one for Falling (Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster), a thriller by T.J. Newman. It's like watching a mini movie.

I first saw it at a Target store in Harlem on their giant screen near the electronics department. I bought the book the same day I saw the trailer. The trailer didn't influence me because I was planning to buy the book anyway.

I knew I wanted to read it when I read an article about the author, a former flight attendant, and her "what if" scenario on Los Angeles magazine's website. "What would a pilot do," asked the article, "if someone took his family hostage and demanded he crash the plane to save them?"

I wanted to find out and so far (at this writing, I am 85 pages from the end), the book is a real roller coaster ride, or maybe I should say, a turbulent ride, living up to the media hype.

I want to finish it before the movie version comes out which will probably be a year or a year and a half from now. It will be interesting to see how close the movie follows the book.

I read the brief review of Falling in the New York Times Book Review (July 18, 2021) in which the reviewer points to the book's "over-the-topness." But that's why people read thrillers in the first place. These books keep the reader on the edge of their seat, biting their fingernails as a result of their "over-the-topness." The movie will probably be more so.

One thing is for sure, Falling is not a book you'd want to read while flying; it's too scary.

Karmic Justice

The June 11, 2021 issue of The Week magazine published this item: "Good week for: karma, after a boatful of Memorial Day revelers on Washington state's Moses Lake shouted slurs and gave the finger to another boat that was flying Gay Pride flags. Minutes later, the harassers' boat exploded, and they swam to the other boat to be rescued while shouting 'Help us!'"

This item would make an excellent basis for a short story or film short.

A Novel About The Internment Of Japanese-Canadians During WWII

I knew about the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. What I didn't know was that the same thing occurred in Canada. While skimming through the Canadian Oxford Dictionary, I came across the name Joy Nozomi Kogawa, a Japanese-Canadian poet and novelist, born in 1935, who wrote a novel called Obasan, published in 1981.

Wikipedia describes Obasan as a book that "chronicles Canada's internment and persecution of its citizens of Japanese descent during the Second World War" and is told "from the perspective of a young child." Obasan, continues the Wikipedia article, "is often required reading for university English courses on Canadian Literature."

I plan to put Obasan on my Must-Read list.