22. Your House Will Pay, Steph Cha
At the heart of this novel is a real life incident. In 1991, two weeks after the footage came to light of Rodney King being beaten by LAPD officers, a 15-year-old African-American girl named Latasha Harlins went into an LA convenience store owned by a Korean family. Soon Ja Du, the female owner who was on the till at the time, accused Latasha of shoplifting, there was a violent confrontation, then as Harlins turned to leave the shop, Du shot her in the back of the head, killing her instantly. In her subsequent trial, Du was convicted of voluntary manslaughter but did not go to jail, being sentenced instead to community service. This incident, according to the Wikipedia entry about Latasha, "exacerbated the existing tensions between African-American residents and Asian-American merchants in South-central Los Angeles. Those tensions were later interpreted by some members of the public and activists as being one of the catalysts for the 1992 Los Angeles riots. The Los Angeles mayor's office estimated that 65 percent of all businesses vandalized during the riots were Korean-owned".
Cha fictionalises this (giving the characters different names and fictional families, though keeping the essential facts of what happened pretty much the same) and picks up in present day LA, where tensions are running high after the shooting by police of an unarmed young black boy. Two families, one African-American, one Korean, have to face up to the long and difficult aftermath of what happened to them in 1991 - what they did, how their communities reacted and what it means for where they are now. An evocative account dealing with some essential and complex issues - recommended.
23. Stuffocation: Living More with Less, James Wallman
Mixed reaction on this one - good but could have been so much more. Wallman starts by pointing out, Kondo-style, that we have too much stuff in our lives, and that much of our stuff makes us feel bad, not good. He looks at a variety of reasons as to why this might have happened. But then just as you think he's going to urge you to get the bin bags out and embrace minimalism, he switches direction. Stuff, he says, is good. Stuff brings us comfort, fun, safety. The problem isn't stuff, per se, but that we are measuring our happiness through stuff rather than through experiences, which are actually what make us happy.
This is essentially good advice, IMHO, and some of the case studies are interesting, and the final section with tools that you can use to think about your own life was actually really thought-provoking ("it is better to be anywhere on a ladder that you want to climb than at the top of a ladder you don't" - I liked that). However, the book is really limited in its scope. He talks almost entirely about rich, western case studies, ignoring the vast majority of people who have just enough or not enough. The rise of the super-wealthy in China gets a short and rather patronising chapter, otherwise anywhere outside Europe or the US seems to be just there as a potential destination for cheesy, rich-person gap year travel. He notes early on that women are much more stressed out by having too much stuff, then ignores issues of gender (I would really have liked to hear more about whether these issues affect men and women differently, whether they accumulate stuff in different ways, whether the move to experiences is equally liberating). And the chapters about experiences are just so corny - surely if you are turning away from stuff towards experiences, there's just as much happiness to be had walking along a river with your child, or singing in a choir, or whatever it is that floats your boat, as there is visiting Tahiti, or giving away your collection of artworks to friends so you can ride a bus around South America, or going to a bizarre high-end "experience" curated by Louis Vuitton ( "To my right was a floor-length blood-red, gold-braided velvet curtain. In one recess, on the far side of the room, a small painted man was doing a slow-motion ballet dance...." ).
I googled James Wallman, and didn't find out a huge amount about his background but it appears that he has lived in France, Greece and Palo Alto and is "an author, futurist, journalist, activist and keynote speaker". There was some really good, interesting and well-explained stuff in this book but it strikes me that he's spent so long with people who have more money than sense that he's forgotten how normal people live - including all those many normal people who have too much stuff and could use his advice.
24. Between the Stops: The View of My Life from the Top of the Number 12 Bus, Sandi Toksvig
Sandi catches a bus near her home in SE London up to the West End, and as she describes her journey, she rambles through stories of her own life, of the local area and its history, and of the people she meets while riding the bus. Her own life has certainly been interesting and varied - as the daughter of Denmark's most famous broadcaster, she was in the room at Mission Control in Houston watching the moon landings - and amongst the showbiz anecdotes she shares affecting stories of heartbreak, misogyny and homophobia. The local history was interesting to me as I know this area well and am very fond of it, but for the more general reader it's more of a jumping off point either for amusing stories in QI fashion (quirky history, accessible science) or for Sandi's observations about British society. She's very generous and kind company but rather steely, and with a complete lack of tolerance for unfairness or prejudice. I'd say the book is much the same - fluffy and unthreatening at first sight, but don't be deceived.