Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions

After I took the required Algebra, Geometry and Trigonometry in high school, I was done with math. I wasn't good at it, it wasn't a "fun challenge" and it made me anxious and miserable. I knew practical applications of math, like how to calculate 25% off while shopping, and even how to calculate a nifty 18% tip. I knew how to count change back using the fewest coins possible and I could balance my checkbook. But in the IB program everyone had to test in some math...realizing that some of us were more artistically based, a class called Math Studies was created just for us. Have you ever had to compose a term paper for a math class? I did. I wrote mine on the geometry of sailing. Annie wrote hers on the geometry of billiards (keep in mind that diagrams added to the total number of pages submitted-- another practical math application!). I can't remember what Caron wrote hers on....Caron? By the time I got to college I did have to take Calculus. My mom signed me up for an intro class at Butler County Community College the summer before Sophomore year, figuring that a failing grade in a community college would be serve as a prep for my BU class, and hopefully allow that I get a C+ there. My mom is very smart.
Fast forward ten years. Mihee rightfully encourages teens, especially girls, into math and science careers. She mentors and leads a fulfilling life in the lab (with excursions to bars, parties, and book club). When it's Mihee's turn to pick a book for book club, we all groan and know that she is earnest in her obscure pick, which this month was Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott. Despite Mihee assuring me that it was a "romance" I wasn't fooled for long. THIS IS A BOOK ABOUT MATH! There is even a quote on the back from Mathematics Teacher. It was only 83 pages, so I read it. A square in flatland is introduced by a sphere to the novely of spaceland. But more than onerous math, this book contained the 3 things I most despise in this world: sexism, racism and religious proselytizing and persecution. Because I respect Mihee and because she tries to educate, I will give this book 2 netflix stars. Also because it was only 83 pages. That's it.

Lulu in Marrakech

If you could travel to exotic locales and live a life of percieved ennui, maybe just volunteering for some local projects, would you? Would you forfeit your identity, even from your family? Would you risk your life and be prepared to go to jail in a foreign country? Lulu Sawyer does all this, in Diane Johnson's book, Lulu in Marrakech.

We don't know a lot about how and why Lulu became involved in the CIA, but as a young agent without a family, she is able to deftly move place to place without prompting suspicion. Lulu isn't a robot; like many 30 year old, liberal educated women, she questions the role of women in world society, specifically focussing on her new post in Morocco. She yearns to marry Ian, the man whom she ostensibly travels to Marrakech to be with, although he could in fact be part of a larger plot which Lulu is supposed to keep tabs on.

Ms. Johnson expands her themes of Americans abroad much as she did in Le Divorce. Lulu and a fellow guest and expat, Posy, try to navigate as women in a Muslim (albeit liberal) society and are confronted with other European women who have conflicting views about the roles of Muslim women-- some believe they deserve to learn to read, while others think, "what's the point?".

Lulu's covert task comes to a head by the end of the book, but along the way she has to decide where her allegiances lie; are the friends she's made really friends? What personal risks, if any, will she take to maintain those friendships?

Ms. Johnson, through our heroine Lulu, is able to address non-PC topics and sterotypes and ultimately, those become the main themes of the book-- not Lulu's mission.

I loved this book. I loved that it was current and provacative, yet at times also really funny. I give this 5/5 netflix stars.