I’m grateful for unexpectedly finding a book, for holding it in your hand, full of possibility, for locating a work with beautiful prose that leaves you in tears by the end.
On Wednesday last week I was in Sam’s in Amarillo, having just taken my parents out to the Civic Center to get their COVID vaccines (I’m grateful that I got mine as well). While my mom searched the frozen foods and Dad had his hearing aid batteries replaced, I wandered the book aisle with Toby, picking up a cookbook and Obama’s memoir, considering my options. There on a shelf I saw something with Tom Hanks in a grizzled beard on the cover.
Paulette Jiles’ News of the World was the book. It looked like a quick read and when I saw the author described on the back cover as a poet, memoirist, etc., I decided it was worth a shot. I dream of being a poet and I suppose I qualify these days as a memoirist, having written my own memoir that will soon be available on Amazon. “Qualify” is a loose term – I wrote a story about myself and paid a launch team to help me get it published. Does that make me a memoirist? Are my words anywhere near as eloquent as Ms. Jiles, who writes like a force of nature?
No. Thank goodness we have writers like her in our midst.
For the past few days I have been half in the real world of pandemics and D.C. violence and half in the world of Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd and ten year-old Johanna Leonberger, a Kiowa captive that Kidd is returning to her aunt and uncle near San Antonio. The Captain’s world is one of intelligence and lurking violence, of Texas in 1870 in the throes of Reconstruction, of little Johanna chafing against white society. The Captain reads from international newspapers to crowds in small Texas towns, charging a dime a head for his tales of faraway places; Johanna learns to take baths and eat with utensils and trust the Captain, longing for a return to the Kiowa family that is the only one she knows. They are in gunfights together, they watch for both Indian raiding and unsavory Texans, they travel the Hill Country in silence, awaiting ambush.
It is a both a poetic and harsh novel, based on a history that was equally harsh. Every paragraph is written in a way that stirs my heart. As I read, I think of people I want to loan it to, friends who would get it. This is a book Toby will love, given his passion for that slice of time in American history.
Tom Hanks is on the cover because it is now a movie, so I suspect many of my friends will see News of the World on the screen rather than reading it. I hope you’ll be persuaded to pick up the book and celebrate Ms. Jiles’ words. She is the type of writer I can only dream of being, her prose spare but stirring.
I’ll leave you with this advice: Buy the book, whatever book that might be.
When you’re in a place where you didn’t expect to find a book you might love, buy the book.
A couple of years ago I was standing in line at Hobby Lobby and saw Becoming Mrs. Lewis by Patti Callahan, a book about how Joy Davidson became the wife of C.S. Lewis. It was discounted to $5 and I threw it in my basket because really, doesn’t every $5 book deserve a home. Like News of the World, it was a surprise and a joy. It became one of my favorite books. It is an amazing love story of great minds and philosophies coming together. I still recommended it to friends and family.
Words are important. In this week of ugliness in our land, a good book feels like it could save your life, or at least your sanity.
Today I’m grateful for good books, stunningly good books that help us make sense of the rest of our world.
I’d love to hear about the good books you’ve been fortunate to find. Sharing beauty is a good way to heal our world. Let’s do it together.
By the way, I just read that the movie version of News of the World was filmed in and around Santa Fe and will be available for streaming on January 15 on several channels, including Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, Fandango Now, Google Play, Vudu and Xfinity. Because Hanks was one of the producers, I’m sure it will be as beautiful as the book.
Bunny Terry is a native New Mexican who grew up on a farm in northeastern New Mexico. Her first writing job was typing stories on index cards on her family’s Underwood, stories that were uncannily like the ones she read over and over in O Ye’ Jigs and Julips, her favorite childhood book. No one thought to save those index cards for posterity, although there is the theory sarcastically circulated by her siblings that they will certainly be worth millions someday. 