Friday 5ive- March 19, 2021

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly blog post featuring five things that caught my attention this week. This week was always a big celebration week back in my Catholic School days- we had St. Patrick's Day on March 17th (there was a large Irish population in my city and our principal was Sister Walter Anne O'Malley) and St. Joseph's Day is celebrated on March 19th. (The nuns at our school were Sisters of St. Joseph).

1) I made a new recipe from the New York Times this week- Skillet Hot Honey Chicken with Hardy Greens. It was so easy and quick to make, and since we don't like hot, I used a very mild pepper. You can use whatever pepper you like. We like bone-in thighs, and the crispy skin with the honey/apple cider vinegar sauce on the greens (we used romaine lettuce) was delicious. We paired it with salt potatoes. It's a great weeknight quick dinner and the recipe is here.

2) We made a trip to Wine Geeks in Armonk on Saturday. It's housed in a converted gas station, and the interior keeps that look with stacked metal shelving for the wine. I really liked the unique look of the shop, and we had a nice chat with the knowledgeable and friendly store owners Derek and Carol Todd. They had a well curated selection of wine and spirits, and if you ever find yourself in Westchester County, stop by.

3)  I did three book Zooms this week. On Adriana Trigiani's Tuesday edition of AdrianaInk's Facebook Live this week, she hosted two funny ladies -Laraine Newman from the original Saturday Night Live cast, (talking about her Audible.com original book, May You Live In Interesting Times about New York City in the 1970s and her time at SNL) and Susie Essman, (who plays the foul-mouthed and most popular character Susie Greene on Larry David's Curb Your Enthusiasm). All three of these ladies are so interesting, the conversation could have gone on all night.

On Wednesday, I listened to Pamela Klinger-Horn interview Lauren Willig (Band of Sisters), Kate Quinn (The Rose Code) and Elizabeth Wetmore (Valentine) about their historical fiction books. All three women's books deal with women working together to deal with difficult situations- Band of Sisters is about Smith College alumni helping French villagers in WWI, The Rose Code shares the story of three women working at Bletchley Park in London during WWII attempting to decode German war communications, and Valentine deals with the aftermath of a vicious attack on a young Mexican teenager and the effect that had on her and other women in Odessa, Texas in the 1970s. I loved all three books, and the discussion was enlightening.

Thursday's Zoom was a discussion with Michael J. Fox talking about his memoir (that deals with living  with Parkinson's Disease) No Time Like The Future with his friend mystery writer Harlan Coben, talking about his book Win (a book that will surely keep you up at night to finish). The men have been friends for years, so the conversation was easy and both men's books would make good gifts. Maybe they will write a book together about golf someday. (My husband would like that.)

4) We finally got around to watching the comedy Ted Lasso on AppleTV+. This is the show we all need during the pandemic! Ted Lasso (played by Jason Sudeikis, who is winning all the awards for his fabulous perfomance) is a small college American football coach who is hired to coach a Premier soccer team in England, even though he knows NOTHING about soccer. The female owner of the team, brilliantly played by Hannah Waddingham, wants to decimate her ex-husband's team that she won in her divorce. It is such a happy show that will put a smile on your face, filled with hilarious laughs and Ted Lasso is a guileless, sweet character. The writing is pitch-perfect and the acting by all is wonderful. If you don't have AppleTV+, you can get a free 7 day trial- you can watch all 10 half-hour episodes in seven days then cancel. Trust me, after all the serial killer documentaries you have been watching, you need this.

5) I read two books this week. The first is Silence Is A Sense by Layla AlAmmar, about a 24 year-old Syrian refugee in Great Britain. She spends her days looking into the windows of her neighbors in her apartament complex. The trauma she suffered during her escape from Syria and her journey across Europe have caused her to not speak, which most people take to mean that she is deaf. It's a stunning book, and I've never read a book that put me more into the head of a character as this one. My full review is here.

You always know what you're getting in a RaeAnne Thayne book, and her new novel gives us characters to root for in a beautiful setting, and a situation some can relate to in The Path to Sunshine Cove.  Jess travels the country helping people downsize and organize their home and when she ends up in her sister Rachel's town, they have a chance to repair their broken relationship. Rachel's Instagram life is not as beautiful as it seems though, as she deals with her young son's diagnosis on the spectrum, two young daughters, and a husband busy building his career as a construction company owner. The sisters have yet to deal with the tragedy that took their parents years ago, will they let that tear them further apart or bring them together? My full review publishes Tuesday. 

Stay safe and socially distant, wear a mask, wash your hands and get the vaccine when it's your turn. We are getting so close to getting back to good times, can you feel it?

This post was shared with The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader's Weekend Cooking posts.

Silence Is A Sense by Layla AlAmmar

Silence Is A Sense by Layla AlAmmar

Published by Algonquin Books ISBN 9781643750262

Hardcover, $25.95, 304 pages

I've never read a book that does a better job of putting the reader inside the mind of the narrator than Layla AlAmmar's novel Silence Is A Sense. 

The unnamed narrator is a 24 year-old Syrian refugee who has resettled in Great Britain. The novel opens with her narrating the sights she sees looking from her apartment into the windows of other tenants in the complex. 

There is Juice Man, a very fit man who has a stringent exercise program and entertains several women and a few men in his apartment. There is an elderly man who also lives alone, a family where the father beats the mother, while their teenage daughter sits in her room with headphones on and their teenage son has anger issues, and Tom and his wife Ruth, who keeps tabs on activities in the complex. We see them so clearly through her eyes.

Our narrator doesn't speak, leaving her neighbors to believe her deaf. She doesn't disabuse them of this notion, it makes it easier to avoid any type of relationship with them. She is too fragile.

We learn that she fled the violence and bombings in Syria, losing contact with her family in the process.

She made her way through Europe, through horrific conditions in refugee settlements, and a young woman on her own in this situation suffers physical, sexual and emotional violence that causes unbearable trauma.

The narrator gives us glimpses of her previous life- her parents and siblings, life at university protesting the brutal Syrian regime of Al-Assad, the daily barrage of bombings that killed so many thousands of innocent people. 

She writes essays under the name The Voiceless, and her editor pressures her to reveal more of her life fleeing Syria, something she is unable to do as she is "cornered by memories, caged in by recollections". Her pieces become more controversial as she is critical of the people who are marching with their posters, willing to speak up but not actually do anything to help the humans fleeing their homeland.

A violent attack on a Muslim forces the people in the neighborhood to face up to the racism and religious intolerance amongst them. The Imam of the mosque said of it:

"No god you believe in will be okay with this. You must do unto others as you want them to do to you. That is it. That is all of it. There is nothing else which matters. That is what all the great religions of the world tell us."

That resonated so much with me. 

I can tell how much I get from a book by how many highlights I make. Silence Is A Sense is covered with highlights, with insights into the plight of refugees, how memories can be deceiving, how dangerous it is for us to blame "the other" because we don't want to face up to our fears that the world is changing, and how "we all want the same things- freedom, happiness, safety". 

The writing is deeply affecting, and looking at the world through our narrator's eyes is enlightening. I will be thinking about her and Silence Is A Sense for a long time to come. I give it my highest recommendation.

Thanks to Algonquin Books for putting me on Layla AlAmmar's book tour.