Salvation City

Well, I just finished Salvation City by Sigrid Nunez, who was a writing professor of mine at Barnard and continues to be a mentor of sorts. I spent my senior year in her class, and immediately felt both intimidated and embraced by her. Most creative writing professors, in my experience, tend toward the all-inclusive, "everyone has something important to say" teaching style. There's nothing inherently wrong with this, and I'm certainly not advocating professors tearing down students' stories and styles, most of which are exceedingly personal and intrinsically connected to our ever-fragile egos. However, one of the things I automatically appreciated about Sigrid and her class was her no-nonsense approach. Her criticism was constructive, helpful, never excessive, and her praise was reserved for that which truly deserved it. I feel so lucky not just to have been taught by her then, but the fact that we're still in touch and she's still giving me encouragement and advice.
Also, as I've just experienced, she's written an incredible book. Salvation City has affected me in a way that I haven't felt in a while. Though the themes it deals with are big ones, and it's poignant enough to make you stop and think about the world, it's subtle and compulsively readable (thank you, job in Publishing. I now read so many book reviews I'm starting to write like one). In all seriousness, I admire so much about the book from a technical standpoint, but it's easy to love it purely for the story and memorable characters - which is why you read novels in the first place. To not get into too many details, the book is set in the not so distant future after a great pandemic, much like the Flu of 1918, which has left the world reeling. The narrator is Cole, a 14 year old boy who has lost both his parents and come to live with a couple in the fundamentalist Christian community of Salvation City. What I admire most is the way Cole narrates the story, skipping through time before and after the Flu but never leaving the reader feeling jarred or left behind. It's less than 300 pages, but it's the kind of book that was truly satisfying and taught me a lot. I actually laid there hugging it for a moment after I turned the last page.
I'm currently listening to a stereotypical (for me) "Writing Mix." Lots of Billie Holiday, the Beatles, and Annie Lennox, but "(You Make Me Feel) Like A Natural Woman", sung by Aretha Franklin of course, just brought me way back to memories of driving to school in the morning, probably more than 10 years ago. Aretha was a big hit on the morning drives, as was Van Morrison. I guess this bears mentioning because, at this point, my two brothers would be strapped into seats in the back, swinging their legs to the music. Now, they're both taller than me and turning 16 this weekend. Pretty amazing. I'm trying not to focus on the fact that this means I'm getting older, too.
It's cold and rainy here now, but that's not the only reason I'm running around closing all the windows in the apartment. Last night, I slept with my window open. This wouldn't normally be anything noteworthy, except for the fact that my window shares an air shaft with the identical building next door. In my half-sleep, the conversation two floors down and one building away sounded so clear as to be coming from the living room. As I was mostly sleeping and not in my right mind, I automatically realized that my apartment had surely been broken into, and the culprits were calmly discussing their breaking and entering on the couch. After mustering up enough courage to go investigate and discover that there was, of course, no one there, it still took two hours before I had calmed down enough to go to sleep, only half sure I wouldn't wake up to find all my earthly possessions carried away by some nonexistent burglars.