I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: GORDON LIGHTFOOT-The Complete Greatest Hits (2002).

In keeping with the Gordon theme of this post, I’m going to mention Gordon Lightfoot. He is an iconic Canadian folk singer that I was sure I must have heard in the past. He seemed to be mentioned a lot recently, so I decided to get a hits collection and see what’s up. I was somewhat surprised to see that I knew only one song by him (“The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald”) and one other one “For Lovin’ Me” because it was covered by Peter, Paul and Mary.

So, after a few listens, I find that Lightfoot’s melodies are really strong, and I found myself singing along to most of the catchy choruses. It’s interesting to see his career evolve over the years: from the 2 minute folkie to some longer, more complex songs, to the 70s AM radio songwriter, to the very unfortunate 80s period, and finally back to basics in the 90s.

I know I won’t need any other records by him, but he’s a great addition to my folk collection. This album seems to cover a track or two from most of his records (although he was quite prolific). I prefer the earliest, most spare folk tracks, especially the “Canadian Railroad Trilogy,” but some of his later songs, while more produced, are even catchier: “Summer Side of Life” “Sundown.” And, even though some of these later songs are a little cheesey (in a 70s AM radio way), they’re still pretty good: “Cotton Jenny” and “Daylight Katy.” But still, the highlight is “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” what a great great song. And what a great great mustache too!

[DIGRESSION]: There’s a song on Moxy Fruvous’ b record called “Gord’s Gold” which I never understood. It was only after investigating Gordon Lightfoot that i realized he has two greatest hits records called “Gord’s Gold.” The Moxy song must be some kind of light footed parody of Mr Gordon. Also, Barenaked Ladies’ first record is called Gordon, and in the back of the liner notes they list all kinds of famous people named Gordon.

We figure that Gordon must be the quintessential Canadian name. I was surprised to find out that Gordon Korman is from New York.

[READ: March 2008] Son of the Mob

This is the YA book that Sarah has talked to me about the most. When we were first dating she used this book in her booktalks to the local teens in school. A booktalk is a compelling introduction to a book, designed to whet your appetite for more. Her booktalk for this title stuck with me, even if I didn’t remember the whole thing. But I knew I’d be checking this one out.

Sarah has talked about posting her booktalks on her blog, and if she ever does, I’ll link to it because her booktalk is more compelling than my summary, but then I’m not trying to convince you to read it.

The story for this book is quite simple: Vince’s father is the head of Luca crime family. Vince wants nothing to do with The Life, and tries his best to extricate himself from his father’s shadow (and money, and possessions, and access to everything material). Vince is somewhat successful, in that he is able to buy his own car (a crappy Mazda Protege (hee, hee)) while everyone else in his family drives stolen Mercedes.

The hook for the story comes right in the beginning. While on a first date, Vince opens his trunk to find a (still living) body in it. How does a high school boy, on a first date, with a girl he really likes, deal with that? If you’re not intrigued by that set up then read on.

Vince eventually meets and starts dating another girl in his class grade, named Kendra. Kendra just happens to be the daughter of the FBI agent who is listening in on the Luca family. Vince realizes this after a few dates, although Kendra doesn’t realize the connection (she stays out of her dad’s business). How can he ever have a family dinner? Now, really if you aren’t intrigued by this set up , there’s no hope for you.

This was written after the Sopranos debuted, so there are some references to it in the book. And, to be honest, you can see that Korman must have been at least somewhat inspired by the premise of the show–showing the human side of a mob family. Not that there is any kind of “rip off” or anything of the show, just that you can see where the germ of the idea came from.

So, clearly the story revolves around how Vince and Kendra can possibly stay together. But there are some other really interesting aspects going on as well: how can a son love a father when he hates everything that the man stands for. And, how can a son who hates the repercussions of his father’s job sit by while innocent people may be getting hurt. And, how can a son stay innocent when even his allowance is gotten from dirty money.

There are some mob staples in the story (the rat, the “Uncles,” the cover, etc.) and a familiarity with the Sopranos helps in this regard. I personally don’t know a lot about the mob genre of storytelling, so I can’t say if this story reflects back on any other icons of the genre, but I did watch most of the Sopranos, so I can see the familiarities.

I thought the first two chapters were a bit clunky (something about the jumping into the middle of the story without getting the flow going, I’m guessing), but once I got a few chapters in, I was hooked. I really enjoyed the story, and was very satisfied by the twists, and the ending.

Two observations: Vince is in a high school class media class, where the assignment is to create a web page. All of the sections about his web page seem very funny to me because of the “golly gee” nature of how the internet works. I can’t decide if it rings false, or if the publication date means that the web was new enough to still be a source of wonderment for the teens.

Vince’s site gets an unreasonable amount of traffic right away. He is completely unaware of where the traffic is coming from. Now, I’m not going to give anything away but it seems so painfully obvious where the traffic is coming from (even though I didn’t figure out what the “codes” meant) that I have a hard time believing that anyone as savvy as Vince seems to be couldn’t figure that out.