FIRE UP FOR OUR MAVII CHRISTMAS GET-AWAY

Let's use this blog to plan our trip!

The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson

Our MOD, Mavii Dawn, has spoken:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lrq8J-Kqcto&feature=relatedCreate

Enjoy!

Note: Next Bookclub meeting: 11/11/08 (Veterans Day)

Our Next Book????

Was the MOD at the last bookclub gathering? If so, what book are we reading next? Any progress made for our December meeting? (i.e. gathering at Chris' tremendous lakehouse?)

Miss you all!
Sister Lisa

The March by E. L. Doctorow

Book Reviews

Amazon.com
As the Civil War was moving toward its inevitable conclusion, General William Tecumseh Sherman marched 60,000 Union troops through Georgia and the Carolinas, leaving a 60-mile-wide trail of death, destruction, looting, thievery and chaos. In The March, E.L. Doctorow has put his unique stamp on these events by staying close to historical fact, naming real people and places and then imagining the rest, as he did in Ragtime.

Recently, the Civil War has been the subject of novels by Howard Bahr, Michael Shaara, Charles Frazier, and Robert Hicks, to name a few. Its perennial appeal is due not only to the fact that it was fought on our own soil, but also that it captures perfectly our long-time and ongoing ambivalence about race. Doctorow examines this question extensively, chronicling the dislocation of both southern whites and Negroes as Sherman burned and destroyed all that they had ever known. Sherman is a well-drawn character, pictured as a crazy tactical genius pitted against his West Point counterparts. Doctorow creates a context for the march: "The brutal romance of war was still possible in the taking of spoils. Each town the army overran was a prize... There was something undeniably classical about it, for how else did the armies of Greece and Rome supply themselves?"

The characters depicted on the march are those people high and low, white and black, whose lives are forever changed by war: Pearl, the newly free daughter of a white plantation owner and one of his slaves, Colonel Sartorius, a competent, remote, almost robotic surgeon; several officers, both Union and Confederate; two soldiers, Arly and Will, who provide comic relief in the manner of Shakespeare's fools until, suddenly, their roles are not funny anymore.

Doctorow has captured the madness of war in his description of the condition of a dispossessed Southern white woman: "What was clear at this moment was that Mattie Jameson's mental state befitted the situation in which she found herself. The world at war had risen to her affliction and made it indistinguishable." And later, " This was not war as adventure, nor war for a solemn cause, it was war at its purest, a mindless mass rage severed from any cause, ideal, or moral principle."

As we have come to expect, Doctorow puts the reader in the picture; never more so than in recalling "The March" and letting us see it as a cautionary tale for our times.

Publisher's Weekly
Starred Review. Sherman's march through Georgia and the Carolinas produced hundreds of thousands of deaths and untold collateral damage. In this powerful novel, Doctorow gets deep inside the pillage, cruelty and destruction—as well as the care and burgeoning love that sprung up in their wake. William Tecumseh Sherman ("Uncle Billy" to his troops) is depicted as a man of complex moods and varying abilities, whose need for glory sometimes obscures his military acumen. Most of the many characters are equally well-drawn and psychologically deep, but the two most engaging are Pearl, a plantation owner's despised daughter who is passing as a drummer boy, and Arly, a cocksure Reb soldier whose belief that God dictates the events in his life is combined with the cunning of a wily opportunist. Their lives provide irony, humor and strange coincidences. Though his lyrical prose sometimes shades into sentimentality when it strays from what people are feeling or saying, Doctorow's gift for getting into the heads of a remarkable variety of characters, famous or ordinary, make this a kind of grim Civil War Canterbury Tales. On reaching the novel's last pages, the reader feels wonder that this nation was ever able to heal after so brutal, and personal, a conflict.

I think I might be on the blog. Could it be this easy??

I just had to do it....

So sorry fellow mavii -- but I couldn't stand that template any longer. I just know where this is leading -- I am going to have to figure out a way to customize our site. I can't stand these templates. Call me crazy.....

How Do I Add to the Mavii Recommended Movies?

I cannot figure out where to click to "enter" my votes.  Shouldn't I be smart enough to figure this out? (I'm clearly NOT, but shouldn't I be?)

I am breaking my blog cherry. This is a test to see if this is as easy as Sister Kim professes it to be. Things around my house are oh so quiet. I think I am enjoying it. So, everyone, how did I do?

Much Ado About Nothing

I am trying to figure out how to start my own thread! Unfortunately, I have nothing to really add at this time. I am just experimenting with starting a thread...just in case I ever have something I want to ramble on about. (how about ending sentences with a preposition?)

Carry on Sisters! This really is just a test.

PS My vote for Bookbabe is Sue. She is a sneaky little devil! :)

Weather Related Honesty

New Template for Mavii Site

Do you like the new template? Do you miss the old one? What drove Sister Lisa to change the template? Is it what it seems, or can we do an analysis that will prove differently. Am I 'freaking' you out?

Incentives, Via the Day Care Pick-Up Experiment

This isn't a question as much as a comment.  Two things fastinated me with this experiment.

First, it's so interesting that late pick-ups increased with the institution of a $3 penalty, because parents replaced guilt feelings ("I'll feel terrible keeping the workers there if I'm late") with an economic choice ("I can be late; it'll only cost me $3").  How did the "I'll feel terrible" part completely disappear from the decision process?

Even more fascinating are the results from removing the fine, where the day care center experienced the same amount of  late pick-ups as when the fine was in place.  The authors allege that the parents viewed the late pick-ups as "meaningless" to the day care center, since the center would only charge a measly $3.  

I thought these results were a compelling comment on human nature, and wondered what the Sisters had to say about them.

Let the discussions begin!

Thought I would 'whet your appetite' and jumpstart our bookclub discussion of Freakonomics:

Could you resist the temptation of evil if you knew your acts could not be witnessed? Could others?

Can't wait for your thoughts...

Freakonomics!

Mavii Sisters,

Do you know the connection between Roe vs. Wade and crime statistics?

Do Real Estate agents have your best interest at heart? Is there a way to measure this?

Does the amount of money spent by political candidates matter to the outcome of the election?

Is there a way to measure if school teachers cheat on standardized testing?


These are issues that are discussed in the opening chapters of our book. Quite fascinating actually. I hope you find it a thought provoking read.

The following are pictures of the various covers for this book in different countries. I was intrigued by this. Maybe this appeals to the marketer in me. But thought it was interesting. (Can you guess the countries?)







Anyway, thought a Mavii blog might be a very easy way to communicate. We will be able to post comments, initiate discussions and even provide encouragement to each other when we have a particularly tough read -- and of course, this blogsite will be a good way to keep in touch. I am sure we can even post a Mavii calendar on this site. It is easy to upload photos and link to websites. Who knows, maybe we will decide to share our reading list and our analysis/approval ratings with other bookclubs!

Picture this ... instead of reading 6 or 7 emails each time we plan a gathering, this blog can be your 'one stop source of all things Mavii!'

This is simply a quick attempt at sending out a prototype. Want your feedback before investing any more time. (Total time invested thus far, maybe 30 minutes if you count bathroom break, phone call, and attending to dinner. My point, this is not time consuming. It should actually save us some time!)

Hope to read your replies soon!