North Carolina Books

Bergen's well researched and tightly written account of one German sect, the _The German Christians_ , offers a sobering account of the political consequences of a Christianity turned anti-doctrinal, anti-hierarchical, anti-Roman, people-centered, and focused on "feelings" rather than objective reality. This movement, self-designated as "The People's Church," celebrated its uniquely German form of Christianity in emotion-charged liturgies cleansed of traditional rituals and language. Stripped of long-established ritual, rules, tradition,theology, and foreign co-religionists, this wholly-German sect pressed its reconfigured notions of Christianity into the service of Nazism.

Trend spotters will note ominous parallels to developments in contemporary (increasingly horizontal forms of) American Christianity. Bergen offers evidence that tinkering with religious language, liturgy, rules and doctrine can have profound socio- political consequences.

Must read for all German history buffs as well as readers interested in Christian liturgy and theology. A complete copy of my review of _Twisted Cross_ appears in the September 1998 issue of Adoremus Bulletin.

Adherents of the German Christian movement of the 1930's and 1940's saw Nazism and Christianity as movements with shared values and a common agenda. They were given official support by the Nazi party for a time and the first and only Protestant Reich Bishop, Ludwig Mueller, was nominated from among their ranks. While traditional church historians have sought to minimize this movement as an aberration, Bergen provides evidence to support the thesis that it remained a popular mass movement throughout the years of Nazi rule. The evidence she presents further demonstrates that this Protestant sect blended together Nazi and Christian doctrine not out of expediency but out of faith. She analyzes the views not only of the leaders of the movement but also of its rank and file in order to capture a sense of their religious as well as psychological and political motivations. For most of the book, her focus is on understanding how the at once nationalist and anti-doctrinal theology of the church evolved under the pressures of the Nazi regime. In this regard, her account of their escalating struggle to purge Christianity of its Jewish roots is of particular interest. The last chapter, Postwar Echoes, gives and interesting account of the way in which German Christians tried to reconcile their old allegiances in the post war period and the way in which other Protestant sects used the high-visibility collaboration of the German Christians to avoid thorough de-Nazification at the end of the war. Hard to find documentary photographs showing the widespread blending of Christian and Nazi symbolism in church life enhance the overall value of the work.

The two previous reviews may be well-intended, but are not quite accurate from what I read in the book. The book is an excellent indictment of Christian anti-semitism fully realized on a national level, revealing the inherent hatred of Jews so easily supported by the Christian Bible. I highly recommend this book to every Christian as a tool for some soul-searching concerning the true nature of their faith.

The German Christians were not a sect. They were not a separate entity from Christian churches in Germany. It was a movement *within* typical German churches with large numbers of supporters and great influence on all Protestant Christians in Germany.

In Germany at the time, and "In July 1933 Protestant church elections across Germany filled a range of positions from parish representatives to senior consistory councillors. Representatives of the German Christian movement won two thirds of the votes cast. Hitler himself had urged election of German Christians, who, he claimed in a radio address, represented the "new" in the church. Affirmed by the biggest voter turnout ever in a Protestant church election and soon ensconced in the bishops' seats of all but three of Germany's Protestant regional churches, in 1933 the movement seemed unstoppable." (pg. 7)

Protestant refers to Lutheran, Reformed,and united churches in the category of Evangelical churches (not quite the same as used here in the US today).(pg. 5) SO the German Christians were not a relative few, a sect, a cult, or the "not true" Christians but instead a vast number of the Christian population---all devoted to the elimination of Jews from culture, from the nation, and physically from the land of the living. How proud their Aryan Jesus (descended from Viking tribes in Galilee!!!) must be of Christianity in Germany!

This book documents the driving Christian force in Christian churches of Nazi Germany, and exposes the complicity of Christianity in the Holocaust. The everyday Germans did not sanctimoniously sit in the pews unaware of what was going on in the streets, ghettoes and camps. Jew hatred was a national endeavor taught from the pulpits, the teacher's lectern, and recited by the children of that Christian nation. Christians made up the armies, execution squads, and camp staffs who murdered men, women, children, and infants for their Nazi Christ and fatherland.

This book also reveals some of the religio-social mechanics that allow such failures in humanity. It can happen here.

Jesus taught repentence. Admission of guilt precedes correction and rejection of sin and evil. Christian? Read this book and start the process.

Delightful! The correspondence of 19 years between White and Lawrence is insightful, informative and elegant! Their letterse (far more elegant than e-mail) give us glimpses into life in the 60's and 70's and beyond. This book, which is expertly edited by Emily Herring Wilson has inspired a perennial garden at our Wisconsin home and a renewed interest in the writings of E.B. White, not to mention the writings of Katharine White and Elizabeth Lawrence. These two career women and ladie were supportive and encouraging of one another for 19 years!

As the editor of TWO GARDENERS/KATHARINE S. WHITE AND ELIZABETH LAWRENCE, I welcome hearing from readers. I am now writing the biography of Elizabeth Lawrence and would benefit from hearing others' understanding of her, both in these letters and in her books. Emily Herring Wilson

The TWO GARDENERS in question are Katherine White of New Yorker fame and Elizabeth Lawrence who wrote a garden column for years for the Charlotte Observer in North Carolina. White's columns on gardening written for the New Yorker magazine were compiled by her husband E. B. White (CHARLOTTE'S WEB, STUART LITTLE) and published after her death in 1977 in the book entitled ONWARD AND UPWARD IN THE GARDEN. Lawrence wrote a number of books, including THROUGH THE GARDEN GATE and THE LITTLE BULBS. Her book THE MARKET BULLETINS was completed by the New Jersey gardener Alan Lacy. The market bulletins were wonderful publications farm women in the South used to communicate information about seeds, plants, animals, receipts (what they called recipes), and other items they for sale or being sought. Elizabeth shared a good deal of information about the market bulletins which were not published north of Virginia with Katherine whose one interests lay with garden catalogues when their friendship began.

Lawrence and White corresponded for several decades. The two women discussed their gardens, their columns, their books, and their lives. In the early part of their correspondence, they often wrote each other by return mail. Toward the end of Katherine's life, the letters were few and far between as illness began to affect her movement and ability to see. In spite of their suffering, they continued to observe the world around them and relay how things were going in the garden-the latest blooms, the ravenous mice, the unexpected cold snap, the new greenhouse. Their words remind me of the hope and comfort women have long experienced when a letter from a loved one arrives. As my 87-year old aunt with whom I still correspond says, it doesn't matter what you write, the smallest thing matters.

The editor of this collection of letters Emily Wilson, quotes a librarian who remarked after having read the letters Elizabeth and Katherine wrote to each other, "I got a feeling of moral interdependence on a creative level. Somehow I had viewed the creativity of successful people as a strong force that perhaps needed channeling but not encouragement. Now, on this new-to-me-plane, I see again that no man is an island."

I think this a great book to take on an airplane or when you just need to sit down and have a good laugh. It can relieve stress and really help you deal with your next best excuse!

Do you find yourself stammering and stuttering when faced with a conflict? Then hire yourself a speech therapist and a psychotherapist. But if you just find yourself in need of some light humor and a few dozen nickels too heavy, this is the book for you. From the ridiculous to the sublime, TUBOE:FESE(JAW) covers every possible area of excuse necessity. If you only buy one book this year, you should buy a bigger one, in case the leg on the kitchen table goes wobbly and you need something to prop it up. If you can possibly manage to buy more than one book, you're going to be hard-pressed to find a better one for this amazing low price, unless you're into those trashy Harlequin Romances.

(Look, what else can I say? It's a book of excuses. If you have an excuse not to buy it, you probably don't need it, right?)

Anyone in need of a zany and rollicking excuse need look no further than the frighteningly hilarious "The Ultimate Book of Excuses." I have a dozen copies on my shelf which I give as gifts after each birthday I forget: but not until I use one of its excuses like "I thought you were dead," or "I paid a clown with a hacking cough to knock on your door and sing 'Born Free' but he just screamed and jumped into a manhole."

Whatever the occasion, this book has the perfect excuse. If you don't own a copy, what's your excuse?

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I love descriptive way that Mrs. Hopkins writes. She has created characters that I can not only almost see, but care about. Pax especially is a character I would like to see more of in later books.

Having spent some time in the area where the book is set, it makes me want to do so again.

This book is wonderful. It is a true example of someone living there ideals instead of just preaching them. If you have ever wondered what unconditional love is then read this book. This book is very well written and is a great story for anyone to read. I would highly recommend it to anyone who loves a good story and appreciates the small things.

This book keeps you guessing just enough. The heroine, Freddie, returns to the Appalachian mountains to care for her grandmother who raised her. But Freddie's a mess after seeking her fortune in Phoenix, and Gram's an artistic weaver with a passle of eccentric friends and a mentor in a young gallery owner Pax, who was Freddie's first high school flame. Old hurts keep the two young folks apart as Gram tries to get them together. Then the newspaper reporter from the big city paper tries to make a name for herself by accusing Pax of exploiting the poor mountain artizans and there's a flood and . . . All this, and it's clean.

Peter Perret and Janet Fox have made a worthy contribution to education by telling a story of how music can affect children's ability to learn, to listen and to raise their overall performance in school. This book explores the way musicians teach and the way children and teachers learn from the activities described in the ground-braking Bolton Project in Winston Salem, NC.
The writing is engaging and humorous, but also serious and well researched. The book touches on different models of teacher-student relationship, creative approaches to learning, and the sense of vocation and commitment to continuous improvement. It focuses on the realities of the present moment and the sense of accomplishment that results when there is passion for excellence.
The book also touches on some important questions on whether music instruction affects our cognitive abilities, and gives the reader a good overview on the research that has been going on for the last fifteen years. It tantalizes the reader to know more about the subject and makes a good case for adopting new teaching models through music instruction in the early school years.
I highly recommend this book to teachers, parents and to anyone who is interested on new models for effective teaching.
Patricia A. Dixon
Lecturer in Music
Wake Forest University

A Well-Tempered Mind, Using Music to Help Children Listen and Learn by Peter Perret and Janet Fox with a foreword by Maya Angelou
March 2004, Dana Press

"That is what I think the woodwind quintet is doing. Our musicians are playing to a fundamental language of the brain. They are evoking a muse that already lives in every child's head."

Harvard's Project Zero was named that because of Howard Gardner's belief in 1967 that "nothing had been firmly established about the link between the arts and cognitive thinking." Thirty-seven years later, the North Carolina Bolton Project creates a new yet ancient paradigm: live music in classrooms of elementary and middle school students, particularly at-risk ones, causes a dramatic increase in students' standardized test scores, perhaps due to the neurological changes the music catalyzes. This book proves it. And, as the authors point out, the link between music and learning dates back to Plato. Current tests, such as the Audio-Visual Integration test (AVI), were used to substantiate the significant success of the Bolton Project. Since we know most "children who fail to master reading in the early grades rarely learn to read later in life", elementary and middle school educators can find a panacea in this book.

Students listening to live music such as a quintet raised their scores by almost 50%. The authors stress that the quintet wasn't there to teach music but to teach through music, the classroom teacher creating the lesson plan with the music coordinator. Frank Wood, Professor of Neurology at Wake Forest University, states it directly in his introduction: "The Bolton curriculum, I can now say from firsthand experience as a research colleague of Peter Perret and a mentor of Shirley Bowles, has proved effective for enhancing cognitive skills, including the skills that support learning to read." Although the book focuses on music, all performing arts have potential to increase learning.

Far from being a dry read like a textbook, the book tells a success story of a ten-year old project that should rivet educational reformers. The authors also reveal insights into cognitive neuroscience and the learning process. Actual dialog of students enhances the book's readability in addition to showing the spatial-temporal reasoning being developed in students. Humor abounds in the titles and heads of the book, such as allusions "Close Encounters of the Musical Kind" and "Raising Arizona". Even the title of the book connects with the essence of the project.

As a high school English teacher of at-risk students, I'm overwhelmed at the difference this kind of classroom would make. The first thing I teach in 9th grade English is how to think back and forth between specifics and generalizations. If my students had been introduced to this type of teaching in elementary school, their struggle to form abstract ideas from specifics would be far less. Part of my job is to raise the reading scores of students, so when I read the chapter "Is Music A Reading Teacher?" I recognized the incredible value of A Well-Tempered Mind in terms of helping students improve thinking, reading, and, of course, writing skills.

Maya Angelou best expresses my thinking after reading Perret and Fox's book: "I pray the gift of this book, along with the gift of music, will herald the return of art in the classroom. The children need that and so does our world."

This is an important book for everyone who has a stake in the education of young children, meaning everyone concerned with our country's future. The book demonstrates what happens when a woodwind quintet visits the classroom to play music and actively engages the children in discussions about the music. What happens is the children's brain development is enhanced, together with their ability to learn everything in the curriculum.

This book provides a guide for school administrators and parents to adopt the program in their schools. The program's results are eye-opening: the new listening skills that the program develops help children better anticipate, remember, compare, and imagine. As the musicians and children discuss quarter notes and half notes, the concept of fractions becomes real and tangible. When the children compose music, their self-confidence improves.

The book provides empirical evidence about these results. For those who want it, the evidence is correlated with cutting-edge brain research. To many people, the idea of music in the classroom means music appreciation or learning to play an instrument. This program, far more ambitious, does far more.

Crone's portrayal of the South in mid-twentieth century is an authentic, gripping view of dysfunction and perceived reality. Claire's understanding of her parents' world grows as she grows. The use of multiple narrators through time to tell the story draws the reader in, even though the individual stories can stand on their own, complete with power, narrative shape, and characters you care about. Like Larry Watson's view of Montana in his novels, Crone makes no real judgment, simply recites the events from vantage points that bring the reader to her own conclusions. Worth reading and re-reading.

These haunting short stories cover about 50 years in a North Carolina town...each story can stand on its own, but since many of the characters weave in and out of all of them, the book is really more like a novel (similar to Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio). The narrators include some of the main characters, so the style of each tale varies; moreover, the people aren't freaks, as many of Sherwood Anderson's characters are----so what happens over the years in this small town is moving and meaningful to the reader in the way that the best literature becomes part of our lives.

Fayton, N.C., is a small town in Moira Crone's imagination, but it will strike a truthful chord with anyone who has experienced small-town life, with all its claustrophobic joys and troubles. The South is familiar territory to this New Orleanian, who teaches at Louisiana State University. In "What Gets Into Us," a story collection that also works as a fragmented novel with varying points of view, Crone depicts the tangled lives of Southern families -- the secrets of the neighbor next door, the waves of change that came with the civil rights movement and feminism and greedy development. Springing out into the world or slouching homeward, Crone's characters are as real as real can be.

In "The Ice Garden," winner of the Faulkner/Wisdom Prize, Crone tells a story of Claire McKenzie, one of the most engaging characters in this collection. Daughter of a troubled mother and a father in denial, Claire has more than her share of difficulties to face, but she does, and head-on, as is often the way with Crone's female characters.

Crone knows the tangled ties of mothers and daughters: "After a while I had the thought that my mother was very brave, compared to other people," Claire says. "Because it was so hard for her to live, knowing all she knew, feeling all she felt, as disappointed as she was, as confused and jealous. My mother needed beauty to keep her going. There was just no other way for her. She could never get enough. I must be just like her, I thought, then I thought, no."

As with Ellen Gilchrist's beloved Traceleen, Crone's African-American domestic workers often provide the most telling perspectives. Sidney Byrd returns to town for her friend Pauline's funeral and has tea with a grown-up Lily Stark, whom Pauline once rescued from a terrible situation. "At the sight of her serving me, I think, well, the time has finally come when Lily and I can talk as if there had been one life in that town in those days, and not two, the one at the front door and the one at the back. But soon I learn."

Crone has a gift for the telling phrase that conjures a time, a shared perception. Remember those parties, 'the kind where there was a huge dance band, white tablecloths, rum and Coke, and dinner"? Or the days when "There were big state hospitals then, with nice grounds, which were peaceful, some of them -- people lived in such places for years, their whole adult lives. Families could take a person there and drop them off." Or consider this description of a desperate woman: "She is old now, but she can still throw herself at strangers." Or "Being a lady is all about ignoring things." Entire eras, types of people, states of mind are summoned in Crone's gorgeous, memorable sentences.

As time works on Fayton and exacts its inevitable toll on human life and spirit, Crone's families -- the Senders, the Starks, the McKenzies, the Cobbs -- experience loss and change, abuse and betrayal and sometimes redemption. The drug of place -- sometimes intoxicating, sometimes poisonous -- gets into the town's inhabitants with its changing architecture, its difficult, sometimes blinding, sometimes obscuring, light. Crone wholly imagines the lives of these people, who might be you or me, in the house next door in any Southern town, with all the lights on and everybody home, dark secrets in every corner.


. . . . . . .


Book editor Susan Larson can be reached at slarson@timespicayune.com or at (504) 826-3457.

If you haven't met Peaches Dann, an amateur detective with a memory problem, you are in for a real treat. I would, of course, suggest that you pick up the first books in this series as well. When an reclusive multi-millionaire dies and leaves his fortune to various members of the family to the tune of fifteen million each. Deaths begin to occur even though it seems each member of the family is satisfied with the portion received. A friend of Peaches asks for her help in uncovering the killer. The family must make a joint trip to England to satisfy the terms of the will. When Peaches' friend is almost killed, Peaches flies to England to come back with them on the ship. This is no "Love Boat" cruise. Attempted poisonings, near misses on pushing members of the party overboard and a most humiliating, but hilarious, attempt on Peaches' life add to the non-stop excitement and fun of "Where There's a Will." This is a must-read for all cozy fans.

Elizabeth Daniels Squire's new Peaches Dann mystery, Where There's a Will, has everything: the beauty and danger of a high mountain setting in western North Carolina; a hazardous trans-Atlantic voyage on the fictional British luxury liner, the Ocean Queen; and a motley cast of newly made multimillionaires, one of whom may be out to murder the others. To this mixture is added a baffling plot with more twists and turns than a DNA helix. The result is an exciting adventure in mystery reading, especially the climactic scene in which Peaches, at the risk of her own life, solves the murder of handsome, charming Wingate Scott. When you start reading Where There's a Will, be prepared to read it straight through to the end, because you won't be able to put it down.

Suffering from a terrible memory, Peaches Dan takes lessons to learn a few tricks that will help her survive in the everyday world. She writes a book, How To Survive Without A Memory, to help others with similar afflictions recall critical things. Surprisingly, Peaches also solves murder mysteries by using her tricks to help her recall the clues.

Marietta, a high school friend, asks Peaches to investigate the death of her brother Winston, who allegedly jumped off a cliff. Marietta insists her sibling would never venture near an overhang because he deeply feared heights. Money could be a motive as Winston and his relatives recently came into a $15 million inheritance each. On a trip to England, someone tries to kill Marietta, who immediately persuades Peaches to join her. On the luxurious return trip by sea, several other murder attempts occur, including one on the sleuth. Peaches knows she must identify the culprit rather quickly before someone else dies at the hands of the unknown assailant.

Elizabeth Daniels Squire has created a near perfect sleuth in Peaches. The middle aged person with a faulty memory refuses to allow her ailment to stop her activities. WHERE THERE'S A WILL is a who-done-it loaded with misdirection cleverly executed by the author. Anyone who reads this novel will search for the previous five books in this humorous series with a deep message.

Harriet Klausner

Everything arrived in perfect order

Elizabeth Fox-Genovese has produced a very scholarly and enlightening examination of women of the old South. In vivid detailed with painstaking research, she presents the daily lives of women, black and white, within the plantation household. Though written from an academic perspective, the author has succeeded in presenting her research in an entertaining and even captivating narrative style. For those looking for the behind the scenes lifestyle of unknown women of the South, this is the one book of choice.

Reviewer: Bob Kellemen, Ph.D., is the author of "Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care and Spiritual Direction." He has also authored "Soul Physicians," "Spiritual Friends," and the forthcoming "Sacred Friendships: Listening to the Voices of Women Soul Care-Givers and Spiritual Directors."

This is an impressive and large-scale achievement. I would have appreciated more acknowledgment of the role that white male eurocentric paradigms played (and continue to play) in the south and oppresion of Women of Color. Overall, a good starting place.

This play does exactly what Aristotle suggested a play such do, cause the reader or viewer to experience catharsis. It is so visceral and penetrating. I was enlightened, disturbed, and in awe of Ms. Orldandersmith's poetic genius. This play is simply amazing, because it offers truth in such a creative,compelling way. It will enter the canon of great American plays.

It's such a wonderful experience when you read a book, listen to a CD, view a film or attend a play, and you just know that you are privy to something that can, and usually will, change your life. "Yellowman" is a work on that level; a work of staggering truth and honesty.

Dael Orlandersmith-both as a writer and an actress-is among the best of her generation. This play was produced all too briefly at MTC in New York, but for those who didn't get to see it, please read the text. You will not be dissapointed.

This is probably the best play in the last 5 years.

I saw this play with Dael Orlandersmith and Howard Overshawn at The Wilma Theatre in Philadelphia in 2002; and nearly 2 years later I bought and read the play because I still think about it so often. Everything I might say about it is insufficient, if you are inclined and have the opportunity - read it, see it, you'll never forget the experience. "Yellowman" is just magnificent.

Written accounts of solitary wilderness living show up every once in a while, and seem to have become especially popular after the Baby Boomers "discovered" Thoreau in the 1960s. His words still inspire a few folks to chuck their lives of quiet desperation and head for the hills to get away from it all. Some are successful, some are not. Many stay there only a year or two before the most pressing need -- the financial one -- forces them to return to civilization.

That's not the case with Thomas Rain Crowe, who spent four years (1978-1982) living alone in a cabin in the Smoky Mountains of western North Carolina. Crowe went back to his home state after living in a variety of places, doing a variety of work, communing with a variety of people. When given the opportunity to be the cabin tenant, he made the most of it. He worked hard to be self-sufficient, growing his own food and tending to his home and his tools. Others might have been bored in such a setting, but not him. He was always busy: gardening, fishing, taking care of his beehives, making homebrew, digging his root cellar, taking notes on the experience. And he regained the use of one his most valuable resources, the Southern Mountain speech of his childhood. He was downright satisfied with the situation.

His mentors in this effort were several local men who offered advice from time to time: Zoro Guice appeared in Yoda-like fashion whenever Crowe needed to learn how to perform a certain task. Walt Johnson was the scamp of the neighborhood, but was also an accomplished dowser who could find water every time. From these and other natives Crowe learned how to live close to the land, to live in the time of the seasons. The reader senses that Crowe would be living there still, if civilization hadn't encroached upon the property and changed it forever. That's when he knew he had to leave.

Not just a doer, Crowe is also a viewer -- a writer, a poet, a spiritual man who feels a strong connection to the natural world. His poetry uses simple words and turns of phrase to evoke powerful images. On the other hand, his prose, the narrative of his story, is the work of a learned and literate man. Complex constructs entice the reader to keep on going, to chew on the concepts and experiences offered. It takes time to digest these lines, and it's time well spent. Having witnessed Thomas Rain Crowe read some of this book aloud in person, I have the benefit of having heard the hint of the Smokies in his voice, the love for the place evident in every well-spoken syllable. No matter; it comes through in the typewritten text as well.

So was Thomas Wolfe right or wrong? Can you or can't you go home again? The reader decides. In the meantime, "Zoro's Field" should be placed on a shelf with the works of the old and new naturalists (Thoreau, Burroughs, Leopold, Carson, Eiseley, Bass) to one side, and the "Foxfire" books to the other. A thought-provoking addition to the environmental canon.

The local legend and mountain sage of the Appalachians of western North Carolina Zoro Guice told the author, "If a man goes out in the woods and just sits down in one place for long enough, all of nature and everything he needs to know will eventually pass before him like a parade." And so Crowe--poet, publisher, and recording artist--took up residence in the Appalachians for four years, and writes about the "parade." As in Thoreau's "Walden," Crowe writes about how he subsisted in the wild and what he learned from this. But moving somewhat beyond "Walden" in content and form, Crowe writes more about what goes on beyond himself; and some passages are in the form of verse. Not so meticulous or contained as "Walden," "Zoro's Field" reflects on modernity's effects on the tie with nature, environmental concerns, and changes which have come to the area. Though different in ways from Thoreau's classic which it cannot help but be compared with, Crowe's work in this same genre holds its own as an engaging, thought-inducing memoir.

More than a modern Walden, this is a book about intentional living. Crowe returns to home land in the southern mountains of North Carolina after living in Europe and northern California. Guided by principles of the Beat poets and philosophers, he embraces the traditions of sustenance, growing his own food, tending bees (honey for trade), making wine and beer. From his cabin beside the Green River gorge, he explores both terrain and history in celebration of a way of life that has been largely lost. The book is elegant and poetic. Crowe writes with an easy style, but critical intellect.