The Carl Brandon Society has new recs!

[rydra_wong]

For anyone into speculative fiction, Nisi Shawl has a new list from the Carl Brandon Society: nine great books by authors of African descent, each with a comment by the CBS member who nominated it:

nisi_la: CBS list of recommended reads

Their resources section has even more booklists, so check it out.

David Kuo, Tempting Faith

[sanguinity]

22. David Kuo, Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction.

Once upon a time, David Kuo was a Democrat; after all, the Democratic party seemed to best-serve his Christian ideals of "helping the poor, righting racial wrongs, and pursuing justice around the world." He even interned for Edward Kennedy, personally convinced that if anyone was practicing true Christian statesmanship, Kennedy was.

But then Kuo's girlfriend had an abortion (a joint decision, but one which haunted Kuo), the Supreme Court reaffirmed Roe v. Wade, and Kuo found that there was no space within the Democratic party for someone who opposed abortion rights. Kuo joined a Baptist church (whose congregation held it as self-evident that Christians should be Republicans), became a Republican himself, and continued to actively attempt to pursue his Christian obligations via politics, but now on the other side of the aisle. Eventually Kuo rose through Washington circles to become the number two person in Bush's Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, where he served for three years. Which is where Kuo discovered that even with Christians apparently winning the culture wars, even with an evangelical Christian as head of state and Republican control of Congress, Christians still weren't managing to use politics to serve Christian ideals. Instead, the machine of politics was using Christians. And worse, tempting them away from their spiritual ideals.

There's a lot that Kuo and I don't agree on. Kuo experienced the same visceral "can't everyone see he's evil?" recoil about Clinton that I experience about Bush; Kuo regards Bush with the same naked admiration that I feel for Obama. Kuo titles a chapter "The Last Acceptable Form of Bigotry" (referring to secularists opposing those who seek to wed Christianity and the state), which makes me laugh, and not in a good way.

...and yet I find myself nodding with wry recognition when he talks about how Christians are taken for granted by the Republican party, repeatedly bought off with a few meaningless symbols. I recognize that phenomenon well, albeit with respect to my experience as a lesbian in the Democratic party. Similarly, I recognize Kuo's frustration with how cheap and dirty your ideals become after putting them through the political machine (assuming you can get them through the machine at all), how small the victories are, and the nagging sense that what you finally ended up settling for is almost as much a betrayal as the original wrong you were fighting against.

It turns out Kuo and I agree on other things, too. Like, for instance, my confusion about whether the things that Christians seem to be fighting for in American politics have any relevance to the issues that Jesus seemed to think mattered -- it turns out Kuo is puzzled about that, too. And hey, he thinks political liberals do a decent job of actually showing up and doing the social work that needs doing! I think that, too! And irrespective of agreeing with Kuo or not, there's a bunch of stuff in this book that's just plain fun, like getting all the salacious gossip on what William Bennett and other prominent figures of the religious right were doing during the years that Kuo spent slipping sneaky evangelistic code-phrases into political speeches.

After three years with the Office for Faith-Based Initiatives, Kuo finally quit, taking time away from politics to ask himself what any of these petty political battles had to do with what he still understood to be core Christian concerns in the world, concerns such as helping the poor. Kuo is disturbed enough by the answers that he calls for Christians to take a two-year fast from politics, turning away from the temptations of power and re-devoting themselves to spiritual matters.

I'd definitely recommend this book to politically-active Christians (on either the political left or right), as well as to those who have found themselves politically opposed to the religious right and wish to better understand the reasonable center of that movement. And hey, also to anyone who takes a dirty thrill from insider gossip about Washington politics.

Running in the family - Michael Ondaatje

[annwfyn.livejournal.com]

This is an odd book - half memoir, half novel - and is sort of the story of Michael Ondaatje's family. I say 'sort of' because at times he quite clearly takes off from what he actually knows, or witnesses, or remembers. Sometimes he's recounting family tales, sometimes extrapolating. It is, however, really interesting and is a really different slant on Sri Lanka in the 1970s. In some ways it's also the story of the Burghers of Sri Lanka, but told through the story of one family, in a really warm and anecdotal style which makes you feel like you're being drawn into the family entirely.

Michael Ondaatje is better known as the writer of 'The English Patient', which I read and actually enjoyed less, although I think it's still worth a read. I think perhaps I was surprised because I found 'Running in the Family' so warm (if that makes sense) and 'The English Patient' is a much colder, almost dream like narrative.

I've not read anything else by Michael Ondaatje, though I really ought to, because the two books I've read of his have been wonderful.