This is not a review of a film version of the Jack London classic.  I reviewed an audio version of that book a while back.  This latest Call of the Wild is a 2007 independent documentary about ill-fated American wanderer Christopher McCandless made by Ron Lamothe of Terra Incognita films (http://terraincognitafilms.com).  I first heard about it from a link on the Wikipedia entry for Christopher McCandless and later read good reviews of it on the forum about him (www.christophermccandless.info/forum).  Some people had seen it on Showtime or on their local PBS station.  I enjoyed the film Into the Wild that came out in 2007 and I listened to an audio version of the book by Jon Krakauer one year later (see earlier review).  Though I don’t feel I can completely relate to McCandless, I do find his story compelling.  The Call of the Wild seemed like it had a different take on the story, perhaps a more personal and honest account than the Hollywood movie.

We don’t have Showtime and they weren’t showing The Call of the Wild on PBS that I knew of so the only way I could see the film was to order the DVD from the Terra Incognita website.  I did so and it came in the mail a few weeks later.  I figured I would just save it until I had to call in sick from work.  With something fun to do on a sick day, I’d probably never call in sick, and so far I hadn’t.  My wife and I decided to watch it on April 2, 2010 that was our 5-year anniversary but also a Good Friday so it didn’t feel right to do anything overly extravagant.  One of our cheap date ideas is to stay in for the evening and watch a DVD and we had a DVD readily available.

We made some Act III microwave popcorn and popped in the DVD.  Right away we noticed that it had no special features, only the choice between watching the film and selecting chapters.  We chose the former.  Each chapter begins with white text on a black background.  I noticed that the chapter names, at least some of them such as the earlier “The Law of Club and Fang” and the later “The Sounding of the Call” are also the names of chapters in Jack London’s The Call of the Wild.  The film is 108 minutes long and has some soundtrack of mostly rock songs such as Supertramp’s “Dreamer,” interestingly enough.  It consists of Ron Lamothe following in the footsteps of McCandless, visiting the places where he went, talking to some of the people who knew him, and giving his own thoughts.  He skips around a bit as he goes through the events of McCandless’ life, but I had no trouble following.

Lamothe’s film is different from Into the Wild even though it was made at the same time and Lamothe often ran into Sean Penn and the Hollywood filmmakers.  It seeks to tell the true story, visit the actual locations, even travel by hitchhiking just like McCandless did.  Lamothe goes to the actual homes where McCandless spent his early childhood in El Segundo, CA and most of his childhood and youth in Annandale, Virginia.  The film includes many actual photographs of McCandless and chooses to go to actual over picturesque locations.  Lamothe doesn’t get to interview any of the major figures of McCandless’ life such as his family because they’re working with Sean Penn.  He still talks to several different people who knew McCandless casually at different points in his life.

This account is very personal.  Lamothe was born in the same year as McCandless and had his own adventure in Africa after he finished college.  He also has an indirect connection to McCandless.  Lamothe’s film explores larger themes such as Generation X, the need for adventure, and to test oneself.  He gives his own speculation about why McCandless took his journey but also lets the people he interviews give their opinions.  Some are sympathetic, others, such as the Alaskans he talks to, are critical.  One interviewee is actually indifferent.  Lamothe doesn’t go into his own theories as much as Krakauer does in his book.  The film doesn’t get into the dysfunctional family situations.  Unlike the book and Hollywood film it has these montages illustrating the themes such as one of Alaska that includes a shot of Rob Morrow from Northern Exposure.  The film also gives more complete backgrounds of some of the places such as Oh My God Hot Springs and the “Magic Bus.”

One problem I had with the film was a problem with the DVD.  Many times it would just stop and freeze.  Speeding ahead caused it to go ahead a chapter.  The only way to deal with it was to roll it back a bit.  The freeze points seemed to get more frequent towards the end.  We were able to catch the entire film but all the active intervention with the DVD made for a less relaxing movie watching experience.

I feel that The Call of the Wild tells a more accurate story of McCandless than Sean Penn’s Into the Wild.  It provides some good background information and some interesting personal viewpoints.  Still, I prefer the Hollywood movie Into the Wild as a more enjoyable film to watch and not just because the DVD played more smoothly.  But The Call of the Wild still made a decent cheap date for our anniversary.

A few months after we watched the DVD, Ron Lamothe emailed me (and others) asking how I found out about the film.  I wrote him back and also mentioned the difficulties I had with the DVD.  He offered to send a replacement copy.  I accepted and received the DVD a few weeks later.  It took me awhile to get around to watching it, but when I did it worked much better.  Thanks, Ron.

On Saturday, November 20, 2010, my younger brother visited me and we saw the film Unstoppable at the Edwards theaters on Lake Ave. in West Covina.  It had been raining hard earlier that day and we didn’t feel like driving out somewhere too far.  I had seen previews for Unstoppable and started to read a synopsis online.  But I stopped almost immediately because it seemed like something I would want to see.  I did read that it got good reviews.  What caught my interest was that it was about trains in which I have an interest because I commuted by train for several years.

My brother and I caught the 2 pm showing at the Edwards cinema located towards the end of Lake Avenue and east of the Westfield West Covina.  The Best Buy used to be located off Lake Avenue but has since moved to the Westfield.  Parking for the Edwards is further down on Lake in a structure and it was free.  We then had to cross a small street into a plaza with several chain eateries.  Unstoppable had been out for one week by then and the big movie out during the weekend of November 20 was Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1.  There weren’t very many kids or adults at the theaters when we went, though, and no queue at the ticket window.  Our tickets to Unstoppable cost $9 each, a bit expensive for Edwards but then the theater was very nice with colorful red carpeted floors and lights.  One theater had a large neon sign above it that said Chinese and another had the name Egyptian, both named after famous old theaters in Hollywood.

We passed one theater near which someone was dressed as the character Megamind from the movie of the same name.  He posed for photos with some kids and even waved at us.  The halls to get to theater 11 got rather cavernous and we eventually found it right at 2 pm.  There weren’t very many people there and, surprisingly, there were several children.  I thought the film was rated PG-13 so I think it was OK that they were there.  I guess I thought they would be seeing Megamind or the Harry Potter film.  We found some seats towards the middle back.  Also surprisingly, they weren’t showing any motion ads before the film.  Perhaps we missed them.  Soon after we arrived the screen went through this virtual coaster ride through the theater intro: get popcorn and snacks, don’t talk, turn off cell phones, etc.

There were at least five previews, mostly for films coming out next year and none of them seemed particularly interesting to me.  The first was “The Next 3 Days” where Russell Crowe’s character tries to break his wife, played by Elizabeth Banks, out of prison.  Then there were Sactum, a 3D film produced by James Cameron about some spelunkers or cavers who are trying to escape a flooding cave.  Next was Suckerpunch that I didn’t even understand.  Some young blond woman gets thrown in a mental health facility and plans an escape that turns into a video game fantasy?  There was a preview for Battle L.A. that I heard was similar to a film just released called Skyline.  The last trailer was the only one that wasn’t for an action film.  “Love and Other Drugs” looked like a romantic comedy set around the release of the drug Viagra and starred Jake Gyllenhall and Anne Hathaway.  The previews finished at 2:20 pm and it was finally time for the feature presentation.

The feature began like an ordinary day for railroad workers in Pennsylvania.  Captions mentioned the names of the rail yards and towns and I’m now sure if they were real or made-up.  Things quickly go from ordinary to out of control though that’s still almost predictable.  We wouldn’t have a movie if it was just an ordinary day.  I found all the references to trains and railroad terminology very interesting.  They used terms such as “main”, “siding”, “rip track”, and “switches”.  They’re fairly understandable but still interesting.  I learned that a conductor for a freight train differs from one for a commuter train.  On a freight train the conductor attaches the freight cars and directs the engineer where to go.  I also enjoyed watching the train dispatchers at work getting trains out of the way of the runaway train and using a big electronic board to track the locations of every train.  I wondered if they use something similar at Metrolink.

The actors do well despite slightly cookie-cutter roles.  Denzel Washington plays the long-time railroad engineer and Chris Pine plays the upstart conductor.  I think he’s best known for playing Captain James Kirk in the 2009 film Star Trek.  Rosario Dawson plays the chief dispatcher with a moral conscious.  There are many supporting characters such as the incompetent engineer played by Ethan Suplee, the railroad upper management, and a welder with a mustache, pony tail, and cowboy boots.  I like that some of these characters, especially the latter, were still portrayed as more than they appeared on the surface.  And then there were the trains that were like characters themselves.  The runaway train seemed especially anthropomorphic like the villain of the film.  It was train number 777 that I guess was a reference to the incident that inspired the film.  In the early 2000’s there was a runaway train in Ohio that I think had 888 or 8888 in its name.  The film also makes distinctions between the trains by making train 777 have a red engine and all the other trains have blue engines.

The setting is also featured very prominently in the film.  Rural Pennsylvania is cloudy and green with industrial-looking towns.  It’s very different from a sunny L.A. setting and so much more authentic to the story.  I have some coworkers who work from home in rural Pennsylvania and I wonder if it looks the same as in the film.  Maybe I’ll ask them sometime.  The names of the towns seemed legit but they could also have been fictional: Brewster, Arklow, and Stanton.

The best parts of the film were the action and suspense.  I kind of knew how things would end but had no idea how they would get there.  The characters tried many different things to stop the train and in the process I learned more about railroad operations such as how every train car has its own brakes.  A few things may have seemed a little unbelievable, but for the most part it was regular employees responding to an extraordinary situation.  It wasn’t about highly skilled secret agents, superheroes, crime fighters or mercenaries.  There really wasn’t any malicious violence though the runaway train could seem very vicious.  The action literally had us holding our breaths and kept our full attention.  It couldn’t have been much more gripping.

I mentioned to one of my coworkers in Pennsylvania that I had seen the film Unstoppable that was set there.  She hadn’t seen it.  I later read that the film was based on a real even that took place in Ohio in 2001.  The movie was filmed in both Ohio and Pennsylvania.  They had a train actually derail unplanned that delayed filming for one day.  Because of all the work and despite the challenges, the actors and filmmakers put together an excellent movie.

We saw Tears for Fears live at the Wiltern on Sunday, March 21, 2010.  I had known of them for at least 25 years since they released the popular songs “Everybody Wants To Rule the World,” “Shout,” and “Head Over Heels.”  They had an earlier minor hit with the song “Mad World” that was later made popular by the film Donnie Darko, though that may have been a cover version.  Later in the ‘80s, Tears for Fears had another hit song with “Sowing the Seeds of Love.”  They consist of primarily Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal and have been touring and releasing material off and on for the last 30 years or so.  Curt Smith has his primary residence in the Los Angeles area and I’ve heard of him performing solo at local venues.  Tears for Fears last released an album of original material, Everybody Loves a Happy Ending in 2004.  I believe they also performed at the Inland Invasion concert festival at Hyundai Pavilion that year.

My wife bought the tickets in advance from the Blockbuster in Glendora.  I believe she first tried to get them at the Blockbuster in West Covina where we had gotten the tickets for Wolfmother the year before but wasn’t able to.  This wouldn’t be the only aspect of the Wolfmother concert that wouldn’t work out this time around.  Tears for Fears would be the third concert we attended at the Wiltern in 25 months.  The first of these was seeing Mika there in February 2008 and the second was Wolfmother in November 2009 (see earlier reviews).  We liked the Wiltern as a venue since we could still see the stage fairly well from the upper mezzanine section, it had assigned seats for us to sit down in, and they usually allowed the audience to send text messages to the ad screen before the acts took the stage.  Our new cell phones had QWERTY keyboards so we were ready to post our own text messages.

The Tears for Fears came at the end of a 10-day stretch that included a birthday/graduation/expecting announcement party, a 4-day business trip to Linthicum, Maryland, and a friend’s wedding at Lake Arrowhead Resort.  So it was a busy time, our own “March Madness” to go along with the NCAA basketball tournament and the “March Cougar Madness” contest on the Jack FM radio station.  Luckily I had Friday, March 19 off as a travel day and would take a vacation day on Monday, March 22.  We didn’t realize until a few hours before we left that the doors opened fairly early, at 6:30 p.m.  We left home at 5 p.m.  Our sister and brother-in-law graciously allowed us the park in one of their spots near Staples Center.  From there we walked north on Hope Street.  While driving to downtown and walking towards Hope Street we saw a few people in Clippers jerseys and many people in Lakers jerseys walking around.  I hadn’t heard that there was a Lakers/Clippers game that evening.  Parked along 11th Street we saw a car in the Clippers colors of red, white, and blue and with the Clippers logo.

As we reached the corner of Hope and 9th I heard the sound of a violin playing.  Across the street on the SE corner of Hope and 9th an African-American man was playing a violin.  He looked like Nathaniel Anthony Ayers, the subject of the book and film The Soloist.  I’ve seen photos and video of him on the L.A. Times website.  He looked younger than I thought I remember how he looked in the photos, though.  I was too shy to go over and talk to him.  We were on our way to Pastagina where we had enjoyed a good dinner before attending the Wolfmother concert.  But after we passed the Ralphs Fresh Fare and walked along the eastern side of the Market Lofts/Ralphs building we found that Pastagina was closed.  This was the second thing that worked out for the Wolfmother outing but not for the Tears for Fears outing.

We went to Ralphs Fresh Fare where my wife had some creamy chicken and wild rice soup and vitamin water.  I had chicken fajitas from the deli/salad section.  They were pretty good but not enough food so I supplemented them with some sea salt and vinegar kettle chips.

We left Ralphs, walked north to the entrance to the subway station and caught the 7:02 Purple Line subway to the Wilshire/Western station.  It came on time and arrived at Wilshire/Western at 7:12 p.m.  We exited that subway station, crossed Wilshire Blvd. and entered the Wiltern at 7:16 p.m.  There was no queue because the doors had already opened.  I believe security just consisted of emptying pockets and opening bags and purses.  No wands or pat-downs.  We found our seats in row 15, numbers 201 and 202 in the mezzanine level.  They were located in the middle section along the right aisle.  There were many people already seated consisting of mostly Caucasians with a few Asians, both men and women in about equal numbers with many couples.  Some men and women came in groups.  There were also some young children with one or both of their parents.

The screen above the stage showed ads for future concerts at the Wiltern.  This time they didn’t have text messages scrolling across the screen.  I guess they figured the older crowd wouldn’t be as tech-savvy or maybe they were just trying to save money.  This was the oldest crowd I had seen for a concert at the Wiltern.  So the texting was the third thing that worked out for Wolfmother but not for Tears for Fears, and just in time for our new QWERTY keyboards, too.  On the stage fluorescent lights shone on a set of keyboards and a drum kit, both covered.

At 7:31 p.m. the opening act, Michael Wainwright, came on stage.  He was bald and wore a brown plaid shirt.  He looked to be around our age or possibly younger.  He played an acoustic guitar and sang mellow songs.  For the third song a woman in a blue dress joined him on stage and sang vocals with him.  He said that she sang with him on his record.  There were some pieces of paper on stage, possibly setlists.  Wainwright described how the last time he played in L.A. was in the Standard Hotel.  He said the next song was a new one.  It was a slow, ambling, lighthearted number about having $1 or a woman in my pocket or something strange like that.  They whistled a bit at the end though Wainwright said, “I’m a bad whistler.”  After the song Wainwright acknowledged that we were there to see Tears for Fears.  He mentioned that the next song was also new and that he wrote it with “Mr. Orzabal via internet.”  It was called “Divers” and was mellow like the others.  It included the lyric, “Divers always have to rise for air.”

The woman left and Wainwright described how he has been a fan of Tears for Fears since he was a kid.  He then said that he wrote the next song in “my sleep.”  He sang the song in a high voice that included the lyrics “Dream a dream for you.”  A man joined him on stage playing one of those portable keyboards with a tube and mouthpiece.  It was another ambling song.  He said he wrote the next song about a girl he saw at Starbucks talking on her cellphone.  It was a bit more soulful than ambling.  At one point he shouted, “It passed you by.”  After finishing that song Wainwright said, “Thank you very much” and that the next song was called “The Last Goodbye.”  It was a sad song that he sang very soulfully in a high voice, at one point singing a long, high note.  It turned out to be the last song.  He left the stage at 7:57 p.m. and house lights came back on.

We took some photos with our cellphones and the guy behind us took our photo.  On stage the crew uncovered the drums and keyboards and set up some microphones.  The venue looked like it had sold out.  We couldn’t see an empty seat in the mezzanine section.  They played classic rock for canned music such as “Boys of Summer” by Don Henley.  At 8:28 p.m. the screen retracted and the lights dimmed.  The stage was dark but we could hear the song “Mad World” playing.  It sounded like a choir singing it and a symphony playing.  The spotlight then shone on Curt Smith singing the song.  I think some of the music and choir voices were pre-recorded but Curt Smith was really singing.  He had very short light-colored hair.  All the stage lights came on for the next song and we could see the other main member of Tears for Fears, Roland Orzabal in the front part of the stage to the right of Curt Smith playing a large red electrical guitar.  His hair looked the same as it did 25 years ago, dark and slightly long.  There was also a keyboard player at the large keyboard set-up, a drummer playing the elevated drum kit and another guitar player or possibly a bass player.

Their second song sounded very familiar because it was their big 1985 hit “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” with Curt Smith singing lead and Orzabal on backing vocals for the chorus and guitar.  The crowd was on its feet.  They sat down for the next song that was more recent and less well known.  It was “Secret World” from their 2004 album Everybody Loves a Happy Ending.  Curt Smith picked up a guitar and Roland Orzabal sang lead.  It was a rockin’ song with the lyrics “cradle to the grave.”  During this song and the others different colored lights shone on the stage background sometimes purple, green, orange, red, and white.  Their next song was also from their latest album.  It was “Closest Thing to Heaven” another loud song but with a slower beat than the previous one.  Roland Orzabal again sang lead with Curt Smith joining in with a high voice during the choruses.  The lyrics mention “apple pie” at one point.  It was either during this song or the next one that Michael Wainwright joined the band on stage and sang backgrounds.

The next song was more familiar to everyone.  It was their late ‘80s hit “Sowing the Seeds of Love.”  Purple light flooded the stage and they got us to clap along with the rhythm.  The spinning light patterns of green snowflakes shone on the stage floor as they band played.  They looked like flowers.  After finishing that Roland Orzabal said, “Good evening and thank you.”  He then said jokingly (I think) that he “was exhausted from the L.A. Marathon” that had actually taken place that day.  He asked whether anyone had run it and I think a few people in attendance raised their hands.  Orzabal told them something like, “If you fall asleep during the concert, it’s OK.”  He said something about them having a new band member and that they last time they played in L.A. “was in 2004 at Universal Amphitheatre.”  Since then they’ve played concerts in “Orange County, Orange County, and…Orange County.”

Orzabal said the next song was from the best album they ever made together.  It was about a middle-aged man who falls in love with a girl who’s half his age.  But his testosterone level isn’t what it used to be so he has to “take a small blue pill.”  Orzabal said the song has some of the “best lyrics Curt ever wrote.”  It was the fast and rockin’ but still lighthearted sounding “Call Me Mellow” that contains the lyrics “to unify my universe.”  After the song Wainwright left the stage and Curt Smith said, “Thank you and good evening” and that it was “Nice to play in our hometown.”  He mentioned that “everyone (in the band) owns a house in the L.A. area.  He said there were so many versions of “Mad World” and they were trying to work out which one to do.  Someone shouted, “Original!”  and Curt Smith asked, “Do you want to hear the original?”  Loud cheers followed.  Curt Smith sang lead and this version had a loud percussive beat. 

The next song began with Roland Orzabal singing and organ accompaniment.  It song got more rockin’ as the rest of the badn joined them.  We’re not sure of the song’s name but the lyrics “Memories fade but the scar still lingers” were featured prominently.  For the next song he played his guitar very quickly and sang.  It was a loud fast song called “Raul and the Kings of Spain.”  Wainwright returned to help sing the next song, “The Quiet Ones” another loud, rockin’ song.  Roland Orzabal sang the verses and everyone joined in for the choruses.  During the song’s bridge everyone sang in high voices.  After the song Orzabal mentioned (jokingly, I think) how he was so dehydrated from the marathon.  He said that it was now time for the “fun part of the evening.”  Not that the evening hadn’t been fun but it was now time for the “funner part.”  He said he had just taken half a little pill and that he was staying in suite 47 of the Beverly Hills Hotel under the pseudonym “Jay Leno.”  He mentioned that the next song could only be found on their Gold Album, a compilation.  It was “Floating Down the River” a fast song with loud guitar.  It sounded fun and silly with a do-do-do rhythm and Roland Orzabal would jump up and down as each chorus started.

The next song started loud and slow.  It had just Roland Orzabal and Wainwright singing the verses with bass accompaniment.  Everyone joined in for the choruses.  It was “Everybody Loves a Happy Ending” with them shouting “Wake up” for each verse.  After the song Curt Smith told someone in the audience, “I’m in love with you, too.”  Then he said something like “Here we got peeps, teeps, kooks, and my family.”  He said he was going to sing to his children during this relaxing moment and that he was “getting verklempt.  Talk amongst yourselves.”  Turquoise and green light shined on the stage background and Curt Smith sang a slow relaxing song with lyrics such as “It’s all right…gotta tell myself it’s all right.”  Wainwright sang background vocals.  For the next song, Curt Smith picked up a guitar and sang lead.  The rest of the band joined in for this louder, more rockin’ song, “Pale Shelter.”

Roland Orzabal sang lead on the next song, “Break It Down Again” that also had a loud beat.  He and Curt Smith would salute during the short keyboard solos.  The audience clapped along.  The next song was one of their most popular.  Orzabal sang lead for the soulful, keyboard-heavy “Head Over Heels.”  The audience all stood up and sang along.  Towards the end the audience alone sang the part “Time flies.”  When they finished Orzabal said “Thank you very much” and the band left the stage.  It was 9:48 p.m.  The stage lights went dark and the houselights came on but the audience kept cheering loudly.  The band returned very soon by 9:50 p.m.  Orzabal said, “Thank you all for coming.”  He introduced the new drummer, the guitarist, keyboardist, and said they were fortunate to have Michael Wainwright sing with them.  I can’t remember if he mentioned Curt Smith but he did say, “Yes, I am Roland.”

Before the next song, Roland Orzabal explained that it was originally a duet with Oleta Adams.  He said that if someone suggested singing this song with a man many years ago, he would have slapped them, though very gently.  But now they were going to try it.  The song was the soulful “Woman in Chains.”  Orzabal sang the man’s part as he does on the original and Michael Wainwright sang the woman’s part in his high voice.  The song had a mellow guitar but a loud drum beat.  The first few percussive (or keyboard?) bars left no doubt what was the next song.  As they began playing it the audience stood up, clapped, and sang along.  Two young girls stood near Wainwright who lowered his microphone so they could sing along.  The song was “Shout” possibly their biggest hit and from all the way back in 1985.  Orzabal sang lead and towards the end Curt Smith talked over to talk to the young girls.  They finished to loud applause and cheering, bowed and left the stage.  It was 10:10 p.m.  The canned music came back on indicating that there would be no more encores.  We left right after they finished, hoping to beat the crowd to the Metro.  We used a side exit that opened onto Western Avenue, walked to the Wilshire/Western Metro Purple Line station, bought a one-way ticket for my wife (I could still use my Metrolink pass) and made it to the platform by 10:15 p.m.  There were other concertgoers on the platform along with some Metro security personnel.  The screen said the next subway train would leave at 10:22 p.m.  The train arrived at 10:20 p.m., the personnel did a security sweep and it left on time.  Initially we sat behind some drunk concertgoers who seemed to be complaining about the concert.  We moved to sit behind some Spanish speakers.  The subway arrived back at the 7th and Metro station at 10:30. We walked back to our sister and brother-in-law’s loft parking at around 10:40-10:45 p.m., drove home on the I-10 and got back before 12 a.m. the next day.  “Everybody Loves a Happy Ending.”

We had dinner at Taco Taco on Sunday, March 6, 2010.  My wife had a restaurant.com gift certificate for $10 off a $25 order and we needed to plug a hole in our meal schedule so we wouldn’t have to shop for food on a rainy day.  We looked at the menu on restaurant.com that had many interesting things listed.  There were separate sections for breakfast, burritos, specialties, plates, tacos, juices, tortas, sandwiches, etc.  The sandwich section only seemed to list American foods but the rest of the menu included many different kinds of Mexican foods including pechuga in the plates section.  The listed prices were fairly low and it took some work to get the total bill to over $25.  To do so we planned an order of four entrees: one for each of us on Saturday for dinner and for Sunday lunch.  But that still didn’t total $25.  We had to add two drink orders and four orders of papitas at 99 cents each.  We figured we could adjust our order if the prices were actually higher than those given online.

We left home soon after 6 pm, drove north on Citrus Ave. and turned left on Foothill Blvd.  After passing the former drive-in movie theater that’s now an APU parking lot, the Azusa Civic Center, and St. Frances of Rome Church, we crossed Pasadena Avenue.  Just passed a Seven Eleven on the northwest corner was a small parking lot to our right with a sign for Taco Taco.  The stripmall-like building consisted of two businesses: a juice bar on the left and Taco Taco on the right.  Later we would find that they were connected.  It had rained off and on all day and happened to be just barely sprinkling when we arrived at the parking lot.  The restaurant itself is more of an eatery where customers order at the counter from a large menu high on the back wall.  They only had one plastic hand menu.  We noticed that the prices were $1-$2 higher than the ones on the restaurant.com menu.

The restaurant itself is medium-sized with many two-person tables.  I seem to remember the wall colors of white and light green.  There were prints or possibly paintings of harvest food on the walls and a TV mounted in one corner that was turned off at the time.  All the tables were empty but we saw some customers show up to get take-out orders made in advance.  With the revised higher prices we recalculated our order and found that we didn’t need to order the papitas so we never found out what they were.  I thought I needed to order another bottle of Sidral Mundet to get the order to just over $25.  But when they calculated my tab it came out to $32 ($22 with the restaurant.com coupon).  I must have miscalculated somewhere.  Right before I sat down the cashier/server gave me my two bottles of Sidral Mundet, one opened and one sealed.  They had many different kinds of Jarritos soda in glass bottles.

We sat down and the first thing they brought was a small basket of chips.  The server said we could get salsa at the salsa bar and that the light green salsa was the spiciest.  I got some of the regular green salsa and the red salsa.  The chips seemed like regular store-bought chips and not made in-house.  The server then brought my wife’s drink order: an extra-large naranja-zanahoria (orange-carrot) juice and it was very large, looking like over a liter of juice.  I’m guessing it was made in the adjoining juice bar section of the building.  Before it was brought over we could hear what sounded like a blender running.  We shared the juice and it was good, very refreshing.  They then brought the entrees that I said we would eat in the restaurant: my wife’s pambazo and my Pollo con Mole burrito.  Both looked impressive but my burrito had little white flecks sprinkled in the mole sauce that smelled like cheese.  Now I had asked what was in the burrito and the cashier said, “chicken, mole sauce, rice, and beans.”  I told her to hold the beans and I then asked if the burrito came with cheese or sour cream.  She said, “no”.  I had to send the burrito back.

My wife enjoyed her pambazo.  It was a sandwich of flatbread filled with melted cheese, chorizo, and potato.  They soon brought a new burrito without the white flecks.  It was very good with lots of spicy brown mole sauce that had a slight chocolate taste.  The flour tortilla casing of the burrito had just enough integrity and give.  Inside the chicken was fully cooked but still juicy and delicious especially when dipped in the ample excess mole sauce.  The burrito also contained Mexican rice with traces of tomato.  Both our orders were a lot of food.  As we ate, it started raining hard outside.

They were nice enough to make our to-go orders later so that they would be ready and packed by the time we finished dinner.  We picked them up and made our way home in the rain.  The next day, Sunday, March 7, 2010, we had our to-go orders for lunch.  My wife heated her order up in the microwave and I put mine in the oven for a few minutes.  I didn’t want to heat it up too much since it was made with lettuce.  My wife’s Torta Ahogada looked very impressive:  long as a submarine sandwich, full of carnitas, and drowned (i.e. ahogada) in a spice brown sauce (though not mole).  It had some raw onions on the side that cooked slightly in the microwave.  She enjoyed it down to the last bite.  I also enjoyed my Pierna Torta that was shorter and stouter than the Ahogada.  The bread was slightly flat and had just enough integrity to keep it together.  Within it were lettuce, tomato, avocado, and smoky pork meat that was fully cooked with some juicy and some crunchy, all very good.

Taco Taco was another successful hometown restaurant find.  We’ve now tried at least five good eateries in Azusa including Tulipano, El Gallo Pinto, Jake’s Hot Dogs and Sausage (since closed unfortunately), Dino’s Chicken and Burgers, and Country BBQ Chicken and Ribs.  And these don’t include the surrounding areas.  Taco Taco’s large menu gives us many reasons to return.  Maybe we could try their pechuga or their namesake tacos.  We also still don’t know what papitas are.

Les Miserables continued with volume III: Marius.  This volume introduces a new character, Marius Pontmercy, whose father made a cameo appearance in the book “Waterloo” of volume II: Cosette.  Volume III is a little over 200 pages long and split into eight books, the usual number.  This volume includes page 611, the halfway point of the book.  It doesn’t contain as many digressions as volume II, but can still get slow and long winded such as when describing the gamins or young street urchins of Paris including the introduced character Gavroche, Marius’ grandfather, each of the “Friends of the ABC”, Marius’ father’s life, and the changing views of Marius from being a Royalist like his grandfather to believing in the empire like his father to beginning to believe people should be free.  There’s much setting up the background.  But once it’s set up the story gets more interesting and riveting in the last 75 pages of the volume.

From reading his namesake volume, I got to know Marius Pontmercy.  He lives most of his childhood and youth with his maternal grandfather, a Royalist, and has no contact with his Bonaparte-supporting father due to the different political opinion from his grandfather.  But after his father’s death, Marius grows to accept, learn of, and eventually idolize his father and reject his grandfather’s Royalist views.  Marius inherits a baron title from his father and receives a message to do service for an innkeeper, Thenardier, who saved his father’s life.  Marius seeks out Thenardier but finds his inn closed and his family moved away.  Ultimately rejected by his grandfather, he falls in with a group of young men, the Friends of the ABC.  Pronounced in French, ABC sounds like ah-bay-say that also sounds like the French word abaisse that translates to abased.  The friends include Enjolras, their leader; Combeferre; Jean Prouvaire; Feuilly, Coufeyrac who is similar in personality to Felix Tholomyes, Cosette’s father; Bachorel, Lesgle or Laigle or Bossuet; Joly; and Grantaire.  Marius wears black in mourning for his father and is poor because he refuses help from his great aunt who lives with his grandfather.  When all Marius can afford is a green coat, he only goes out after dark so that the coat appears black.

Most of the main characters from the previous volumes make appearances but often under different names.  On his daily walks, Marius sees an old man with white hair with his young daughter in a black dress.  Without meeting them, Coufeyrac nicknames them Monsieur LeBlanc (white) and Mademoiselle LaNoire.  Marius eventually falls in love with her.  Finding a handkerchief left by them with the initials U.F. he guesses her name is Ursula and so refers to her though he never meets her in the volume.  He later hears the old man give his name as “Urbain Fabre” though this is likely a pseudonym.  Marius’ neighbors are a man and wife with two daughters who seem very familiar.  The man writes letters under different names requesting financial support.  He uses alias Fabantou and Jondrette among others.  All these assumed identities along with Marius’ new admiration and conflicting loyalties set the stages for some riveting scenes.
 
Along with the main characters’ aliases, the book mentions names familiar to me in other contexts.  The royalist salon in which Marius’ grandfather participates includes the Bishop of Mirepoix.  Isn’t Mirepoix also a food term meaning celery, onion and carrot all chopped up and ready to use?  There are more references to “the Sword of Marengo” (p. 527) and “Marengo” is given as one of the “mighty words which blaze forever.” (p. 568)  Well, it does blaze a lot in this book.  I eventually researched this name of a street in Pasadena.  According to the ever-reliable Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Marengo (retrieved 3/2/2010)): “The Battle of Marengo was fought on 14 June 1800 between French forces under Napoleon Bonaparte and Austrian forces near the city of Alessandria, in Piedmont, Italy.  The French defeated Austrian General Michael von Mela’s surprise attack, driving the Austrians out of Italy, and enhancing Napoleon’s political position in Paris.”  The Wikipedia article later mentions Chicken Marengo, a famous dish of braised chicken with onions and mushrooms in a wine and tomato sauce.  It sounds delicious.  The article goes on to say “Local lore says it was cooked up on the battlefield by Napoleon’s personal chef using all the ingredients he could find in those adventurous circumstances.”

This volume mentions names significant to itself.  One of Jondrette’s letters asking for financial support is addressed to “Monsieur Pabourgeot, elector, wholesale merchant, milliner, Rue Saint Denis . . .” (p. 618)  The fourth and next volume is called “St. Denis.”  Are they related?  When describing the exploits of Marius’ father, Colonel Pontmercy, the author mentions how the colonel fought at the same place as his uncle, Louis Hugo.  Another reference is more significant.  After a visit from their elder daughter, Marius starts to notice his neighbors and realizes they are even worse off than he is.  “Undoubtedly they seem very depraved, very corrupt, very vile, very hateful even, but those are rare who fall without being degraded; there is a point, moreover, at which the unfortunate and the infamous are associated and confounded in a single word, a fatal word, Les Miserables;” (p. 627)

I learned some new words used in this volume that I had to look up in my Random House dictionary.  The Friends of the ABC have conventicles or secret meetings at the Café Musain.  One of the ABC, Joly, thinks himself a valetudinarian or an invalid who is excessively concerned about his poor health.  Marius passes the bar exam but continues to work for a book binder and doesn’t pettifog.  The dictionary describes a pettifogger as “a petty, shifty, and often dishonest lawyer.”  So they had just as much respect for lawyers in the 19th century.  Complaining of some radical students planning a protest, Marius’ grandfather exclaims, “Virtue of my quean.”  I’m not sure what that expression means.  A quean is “a shrew or a hussy.”

Like the last volume, Hugo includes some humor in his writing.  In the early chapters he describes how the gamin points to a house and says that a cure lives there.  A cure is a minor clergy but the Papal Nuncio actually lives in the house.  The new landlady at Gorbeau House is another old woman prompting Hugo’s line, “I do not remember what philosopher it was who said ‘there is never any lack of old women.’” (p. 504)  While the Friends of the ABC are having another conventicle at the Café Musain, at another table an old man of thirty advises a young man of eighteen.  Later Coufeyrac and Bossuet (A.K.A. Laigle) see Marius following Jondrette.  Laigle proposes following Marius but Coufeyrac scolds him, “Bossuet . . . you are a prodigious fool (to) follow a man who is following a man.” (p. 654)

Along with the humor Hugo’s writing includes some interesting points that edify.  In the section on Gamin, Gavroche is described as “one of those children . . . who have fathers and mothers, and yet are orphans.” (p. 504)  Marius’ friend’s servant reads her books out loud because “to read out loud is to assure yourself of what you are reading.” (p. 583)  Much of the exciting action in the volume takes place on February 2 that is “Candlemas Day” in 19th century France “whose treacherous sun, the precursor of six weeks of cold, inspired Matthew Laensberg with those two lines . . . Qu’il luise ou qu’il luiserne/ L’ours rentre en sa caverne (Let it gleam or let it glimmer/ The bear returns to his cave.)” (p. 615)  That sounds like a version of Groundhog Day.  There is the contrast between evil in the city and the forest: “ . . . in the cities, what hides thus is ferocious, unclean, and petty, that is to say, ugly; in forests, what hides is ferocious, savage, and grand, that is to say, beautiful.” (p. 628)  Finally there’s Thernardier’s speech about the rich and charitable who “think themselves above us, and come to humiliate us, and to bring us cloths! As they call them! Rags which are not worth four sous, and bread!  That is not what I want of the rabble!  I want money!” (p. 635)

I used tape flags to mark 26 places in volume III: Marius, possibly a record for a book of any length, and this was just one volume of a book.  This volume doesn’t have as much equivalent in the musical that doesn’t give much information about Marius’ life story.  Marius seems to be the least miserable of the Miserables, if he can even be categorized as such.  But that doesn’t make him any less a complex and interesting character.  The 26 tape flags can attest to that.

To celebrate Valentine’s Day on Saturday, February 14, 2010, we had dinner at Fonda Don Chon in Covina.  Sometime in 2009, my wife got a bunch of coupons from restaurant.com.  Fonda Don Chon looked like a good local restaurant to try.  For $3 she bought a coupon for $25 off a total bill of $35.   We didn’t use it for a while.  I also noticed there were small coupons in our church’s bulletin for the brunch buffet at Fonda Don Chon.  A while before we went there we did do recon to determine the exact location of the restaurant.  It’s on Shoppers Lane, a small street that turns perpendicular.  It is connected to Citrus Avenue from the east and Rowland Street from the south.  There are some shops, restaurants, and a nightclub along the street.  Fonda Don Chon is along the east side of the part where Shoppers Lane runs north-south.  The lane has angle parking all along the right side and a small parking lot on the left side.

On Sunday, February 14, we went to the 5:30 church service.  We learned that it was also was World Marriage Day, though I think that’s always around Valentine’s Day.  After the service ended at around 6:35 we slowly exited the parking lot, turned right onto Workman Avenue, and left on Citrus Ave.  I got Shoppers Late mixed up with a commercial driveway but we soon found it on the right and turned right.  We parked at an angled spot just past Fonda Don Chon and arrived there at 6:50 pm.  It looks a bit like a Mexican adobe on the outside.  It has several tables for sitting outside and there were people sitting at them this evening.  It had been warm for February that day, in the 70’s, though by 6:50 it was dark outside and quite cool.  We entered the arched doorway and queued up at the desk just to our left.  Earlier that day I had called the restaurant to try to make a reservation.  But they said they didn’t take reservations and seated on a first-come first-serve basis.  We hoped it wouldn’t be too crowded because of Valentine’s Day.

The restaurant wasn’t too crowded, just a little over half full.  There was one party ahead of us in the queue at the desk.  They were seated and then we were seated at 6:55 pm.  They put us at a table close to that party.  The inside consisted of one large room with many tables, some round and some smaller and rectangular.  They put us at one of the latter.  The chairs were large, sturdy, and made of dark wood like the tables.  It was a bit of work getting around between the tables and chairs.  The room had yellow-orange walls and lots of Mexican décor including sombreros and dolls of flamenco dancers on the back counter.  Painted on the walls were paintings that looked like little alcoves with shelves or windows, arched like those in a traditional Mexican Adobe, an example of trompe l’oeil style.  In the back hall there were more wall paintings of outdoor scenes that covered and nearly hid the doors to the restrooms.  Traditional Mexican music played over the speakers.

The servers handed us menus that were large and had lots of colorful photos.  There were sections for breakfast, appetizers, antojitos, combinations, carnes, chicken, tacos, salads, “From the Grill”, entrees, seafood, and more.  In addition to many regular Mexican dishes they had some unique ones such as Sopitos Estilo Tonaya, Supreme Molcajete, and Schwartzeneggar Taco. (Unrelated news flash (2/15/10, 6 pm): as first I wrote this, a woman sitting near me on the train said that she was friends with the aunt of a member of the 80’s music group Expose.)  Under beverages they had Jarritos soda.  In addition to the menu, on our table was a flyer listing specials including a pork loin dish and “Taco Bomba”.  Most choices were fairly inexpensive with many under $10.  We had to get our total tab to $35 and that took some work.  We ordered our beverages: hot chocolate for my wife and a tamarind Jarritos for me.  Unfortunate they were out of both so my wife got an apple juice and I got a lime Jarritos.  Later I got an orange Jarritos to further bring up the tab.

They brought us a large basket of chips and a bowl of salsa that were good together.  As we waited for our food I noticed there was a flatscreen TV mounted on the ceiling in the back right corner.  It was showing the halftime show of the NBA All-Star game with Alicia Keys performing.  We had hoped the see Shakira’s performance but I guess we missed it.  They showed a clip of it where she was wearing this “Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome” outfit.  We notice that the young Clipper Eric Gordon had made the All-Star team and we also saw a Sprite commercial featuring the rapper Drake.  After a wait of 10-15 minutes they started serving our food first bringing my wife’s antojito, the Tostadas de Tinga.  The two tostadas were stacked several inches high with all the toppings: shredded chicken marinated in tomato and chipotle salsa, pico de gallo salsa, lettuce, cotija cheese, and sour cream.  My wife enjoyed them but they were a lot of food for an antojito.

Very soon after bringing my wife’s antojito they brought her entre: Filete a la Plancha.  But she only had room for a bit of the large white fish filet.  She took the avocado garnish and mixed it with her excess lettuce from the tostada to make a salad.  Like all our dishes the fish had little Mexican flags planted in it.  They then brought the accompaniments to my order: Mexican rice, guacamole (with a Mexican flag in it) and pico de gallo.  They had sprinked a little cheese on them so I didn’t eat much of them.  But then they brought my main entrée: beef fajitas that were still sizzling on a hot black iron platter.  The tasted great with much of the beef blackened but not chewy at all.  The beef was mixed with slices of grilled red and yellow onion and red and green pepper.  The server also brought out a round plastic container of hot tortillas: two corn and two flour.  The corn tortillas were thick but not too chewy.  They held their integrity well when made into tacos.  They were a bit like the ones at Babita.  Everything was good and so much food.

After we had our fill, we doggy-bagged the Filete de Plancha.  Our server said we were still $2 short of $35.  They had only charged $4.99 for the Tostadas de Tinga rather than the $6.99 given on the menu.  We brought another Jarritos (sealed this time) to bring our total up to $35 and with the discount we only paid around $21 including tax and tip.  The server passed out red roses to all the female customers including my wife.  We put it in an empty Jarritos bottle at home.  The next day I was off work for President’s Day so I made fish tacos with the leftover tortillas and the Filete de Plancha.  The fish was very good, flaking easily even after I heated it up in the microwave.  It’s great we have so many good Latin restaurants in our neighborhood.  However, they don’t sell the $25 of $35 coupon on restaurant.com anymore.  They now sell a $25 of $40 coupon.  That would require getting a whole lot of food from Fonda Don Chon.

(Spoilers)

My reading of Les Miserables continued with Volume II: Cosette.  This volume comprises 232 pages, eight books and spans a time period of less than one year of the main story.  While Volume I: Fantine has its title character descend into misery, Volume II’s title character, who was born in misery, slowly starts to emerge out of it.  Volume II also has some long digressions, moreso than Volume I.  Much of it is Hugo talking to the reader.

The volume begins with a 47-page digression about the Battle of Waterloo.  It gives long descriptions of the battlefield and how the armies are arranged including how the field resembles a letter “A” and most of the fighting takes place in the top triangle of the A.  All the description of the setting is rather tedious, though Hugo does reassure the reader that “one of the scenes that gave rise to the drama which we are describing hangs upon that battle.” (p. 265)  The prose gets a bit more readable once the battle is underway, though it can get a bit hard to follow with all the action.  Hugo doesn’t always say to which side he’s referring.  I have to go by whether the names of the commanders sound French, English, or German.  I’m not sure who is being referred to as “the man of Marengo was wiping out Agincourt.” (p. 277)  I just know that around the time I read this we had driving north on Marengo Avenue in Pasadena.

Hugo often waxes philosophically as he describes Waterloo just as he does at many other points in the book.  He believes that by the time of Waterloo it was time for Napoleon to fall because “the excessive weight (as in power) of this man in human destiny disturbed the equilibrium.” (p. 280)  This description reminded me of the character in Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series known as the Mule.  He could control entire worlds with his mind and his emergence in power was not predicted by the Foundation psychohistorians.  Back to Waterloo, it isn’t until the end of the book about it that the reader learns how it applies to the main story.  After the battle, a prowler searches the bodies for valuables.  He takes a ring from a presumed dead French officer.  But the officer is not dead and the prowler carries him to safety.  The officer asks the prowler his name and the prowler answers, “Thenardier.”  The officer then gives his name, “Pontmercy.”

The volume contains another digression about Paris in the 1820’s and 1830’s.  Hugo describes how when we live a place we feel indifferent towards most of the streets, windows, roof, and doors that we see every day.  “But in aftertimes, when we are there no longer, we find that those streets are very dear, that we miss those roofs, those windows, and those doors.” (p. 378)  Two later books in Volume II, VI. Petit Picpus and VII. A Parenthesis, are about nuns and religious orders (VI) and Hugo’s opinion that religious orders are obsolete (VII).  I mostly just had to dig my way out of these books.  There were only a few interesting bits such as one nun “known in the convent only by the horrible noise she made in blowing her nose.  The pupils called her Racketini.” (p. 421)

The digressions can be long and tedious to read through especially that book VI: A Parenthesis that’s a digression of a digression.  But between these sections the story itself is compelling and exciting.  I learned details such as how Jean Valjean escapes after being captured and sentenced to life in prison.  While on work detail on the ship Orion that’s dock in Toulon, he dives into the sea and is presumed drowned.  I got a clear picture of Cosette’s miserable life with the Thenadiers.  She doesn’t fantasize about a “Castle on a Cloud” as in the musical but the book does refer to Thenardier as “Master of the House” (p. 322)  Thenardier also has a monologue that mentions “to sell to the first comer …”, “… empty small purses and honestly lighten large ones …”, “… to charge for the open window, the closed window, the chimney corner …”, “… to make the traveler pay for everything even to the flies his dog eat!” (p. 323)  I found compelling Jean Valjean’s attempts to evade Javert through the dark streets of Paris.  At one point Hugo writes, “If Jean Valjean had a kingdom, he would have given it for a rope” (p. 387-388) alluding to Shakespeare’s play “Richard III”.  In this volume, Jean Valjean acquires another alias (in addition to Monsieur Madeleine from volume I), Ultimus Fauchelevent.

Within the story Hugo cannot help but include bits of commentary on the class struggle, on how the rich live in a different world from the poor.  When the ship Orion approached the port of Toulon, her pennant “entitled her to a regular salute of 11 guns which she returned shot for shot: in all twenty two.”  Hugo goes on to describe how for all similar salutes the civilized world fires off “daily 150,000 useless cannon shots.  At 6 francs per shot, that would amount to 900,000 francs per day or 300 million per year, blown off in smoke.  This is only an item.  Meanwhile, the poor are dying of hunger.” (p. 310)  I’m not sure where he got the 150,000 figure.  That seems like a lot for the salutes in one day.  When describing how Thenardier’s daughters, Eponine and Azelma, treat Cosette like she’s below them, Hugo interjects, “These three girls could not count twenty-four years among them all, and they already represented all human society; on one side envy, on the other, disdain.” (p. 341)  In a digressive unrelated note, Eponine and Azelma are described as “regnant” a word I hadn’t known before that means “reigning in one’s own right and not as a consort” according to my Random House dictionary.

Not all the commentary is serious.  Hugo includes a few humorous anecdotes.  When Jean Valjean and Cosette first move to Paris, they rent lodging at Gorbeau House, and naturally, Hugo gives the entire history of the place.  He tells a story of two attorneys named Corbeau and Renard who worked at the same law office.  Their names translated to “crow” and “fox” respectively and the law clerks always made up silly songs about them and laughed.  The attorneys petitioned the king to change their names.  Corbeau became Gorbeau that has no meaning and Renard became Prenard that means “a grasping fellow” and the law clerks continued to laugh at him.  Hugo adds a bit of morbid humor later in the volume.  He writes, “It is, however, true; gravediggers themselves die.  By dint of digging graves for others they open their own.”  (p. 466)

Coincidentally, as I was first writing the preceding paragraph while riding the Metrolink train to work (at around 6:20 am on February 9, 2010), I noticed part of the name tag of the guy sitting next to me.  On the top part was written what looked like “Los Angeles” in a logo.  Below that was his first name in big bold type and below that in smaller type was the word (or name?) “Javert”.  Speaking of coincidences, while I was reading the long digression about Waterloo in mid-January that name came up in some other contexts.  We used MapQuest to get driving directions to Club Spaceland in Silverlake and one route has us taking a bunch of little side streets, one of them called “Waterloo”.  One of the opening bands at Spaceland, either Rabbit or Arms Control, sang the song “Waterloo Sunset” that’s originally by the Kinks.  Around that time there was a contestant on Jeopardy! who was a graduate of the University of Waterloo in Ontario.

Wow, I didn’t think this review would go this long.  Compared to the first volume not as much happened in the second and, of course, there were all the digressions.  Some do relate to the story and help explain some things such as the non in perpetual adoration in the chapel.  But much of it is tedious.  Still, the gripping story is worth it.

Towards the end of 2009 I started reading the classic novel Les Miserables by Victor Hugo.  I got the unabridged version of 1,222 pages translated into English by Charles E. Wilbour.  The edition I got from the Cal State L.A. Library was published by Modern Library, New York and does not have a publication date.  It also doesn’t have illustrations such as the famous one of Cosette that was used as the poster for the musical (more on this later).  There is one illustration just inside the cover page of a man standing knee-deep in water stooping over with a lantern and a walking stick.  The book is separated into five volumes: Fantine, Cosette, Marius, St. Denis, and Jean Valjean each between 120-300 pages long.  Each volume is separated into 8-15 books that are between 10-70 pages and each of these books is further separated into chapters of 2-10 pages.  All these segments allow the reader to feel like they are making incremental progress.

I first heard of the musical Les Miserables in the late 80’s or early 90’s when my dad bought the soundtrack on cassette.  The songs are very emotional and passionate.  When I was a freshman in college I saw a professional production of Les Mis in Portland, Oregon.  They used a revolving stage and there were more scenes than those featured on the soundtrack.  In late 2009 I decided to try reading the book.  The Cal State L.A. Library let me check out books for an entire quarter and renew them for two more quarters as long as no one else put them on hold.  My wife had read the unabridged version on Les Mis many years ago and enjoyed it.  She doesn’t read books very often, instead preferring to read magazine articles and web articles.  I thought the book might flesh out the story and explain some things not completely explained in the musical such as Jean Valjean’s past.  Within its great length, the book does this and much more.

The first volume, Fantine, is 253 pages long and separated into 8 books.  The reader learns almost immediately that Hugo likes to digress.  The first 50 pages (ie. the rule of 50) don’t mention any of the main characters.  Rather, they’re all about the Bishop of D_____ who plays a small but very important role in the main story.  I learned all about his background, religious life, and how good a man he was.  Hugo blanks out a few names of towns such as D_____ and M_____ Sur M_______ where Fantine comes from and where Monsieur Madeleine builds his factory.  Other town names are given such as Arras where the trial takes place and Montfermeil where the Thenardiers live in their inn.

The narrator (Hugo?) sounds as if he’s telling someone a story and sometimes refers to himself in the first person saying things like “I forget the place.”  Many digressions discuss the political and economic situation in France and Europe in the early 19th century.  After going through Jean Valjean’s past life and what led him to prison in the first place, Hugo writes, “English statistics show that in London starvation is the immediate cause of four thefts out of five.” (Hugo, p. 74)  Hugo uses some words that had different meaning back in 1862 when the book was published.  Diligences were horse-drawn coaches that brought people from one town to another.  People didn’t have cars to get around.  So far I found only 1-2 typos, pretty good for a book of this length printed before modern word processors.  On page 197 Monsieur Madeleine “rsumed (his) monotonous dismal walk.”

Despite the writing style and digressing, the book does a good job of fleshing out the story that the musical only highlighted.  In fact, Hugo is very thorough.  Not only did I learn that “Valjean” is possibly a contraction of “Voila Jean” and changed from Vlajean to Valjean but that his mother’s maiden name is Mathieu.  Speaking of names, Cosette’s real name was actually Euphrasie, but her mother, Fantine, made Cosette out of it as mothers tend to “change Josepha into Pepita and Francoise into Siltette.”  (Hugo p. 127)  I also learned why Jean Valjean faces life imprisonment after being released from prison.  Not long after, he inadvertently robs a young boy from Savoy, Petit Gervais.  At that time in France, those convicted of a second offence were sentenced to hard labor for life.  Two strikes and you’re out, I guess.

After Fantine is dismissed from the factory she not only sells her hair (golden blond in the book) but also her two front teeth for two Napoleans or forty francs.  Earlier Fantine is described as having gold on her head (her hair) and pearls in her mouth (her teeth).  Before she becomes a “Lovely Lady” (or a “woman of the town” as Hugo writes), she tries to make a living sewing coarse shirts for soldiers of the garrison for twelve sous per day.  This helps her get by until “a prison contractor, who was working prisoners at a loss, suddenly cut down the price, and this reduced the day’s wages of free labors to nine sous.” (Hugo, p. 157)

One aspect of the story that’s very fleshed out is Cosette’s full parentage.  Her father is Felix Tholomyes, a rich young idler of 30 and a student possibly equivalent to the privileged “career students” of currents.  He dates Fantine and three of his friends date three of Fantine’s friends.  The men dress extravagantly and smile with “effeminate foppery.”  The eight of them walk the public gardens of Paris, go to fancy restaurants, and eat apple puffs.  Tholomyes is very witty, stating that there is good sense and art even in apple puffs.  At one point he sings a Spanish love song in the gallega dialect.  At another he describes how the ladies eat too much sugar and sugar is desiccating like salt causing diabetes (p. 116).  Fantine and Felix are together for two years and not for just “a summer” as described in the song “I Dreamed a Dream”.

There is much consistency between the musical and the novel and some differences.  I believe the poster for the musical came from an illustration that’s not in this edition of the passage that reads, “It was a harrowing sight to see in winter time the poor child, not yet six years old, shivering under the tatters of what was once a calico dress, sweeping the street before daylight with an enormous broom in her brittle red hands and tears in her large eyes.” (p. 132)  Just as he sings in the song “Confrontation” in the musical, Javert was born in a prison. (p. 143)  Also just as Jean Valjean sings in that song, he asks Javert to “Give me three days” to retrieve Cosette and return her to Fantine.  Valjean does agonize over whether to reveal his identity in the chapter called “A Tempest in the Brain” (p. 184-199) of book VI (called “Javert) but he never explicitly asks himself “Who am I?”  At the trial he does declare “I am Jean Valjean” but does not say “2-4-6-0-1”.

Another difference is Fantine’s dismissal from the factory.  Her coworkers do spread incorrect and malicious gossip about her that gets her dismissed.  What happened was “the overseer of the workshop handed her, on behalf of the mayor (and factory owner Monsieur Madeleine), fifty francs, saying that she was no longer wanted in the shop, and enjoining her, on behalf of the mayor, to leave the city.” (p. 150)  I guess this isn’t really better than what happens in the musical.  Also unlike the musical, the overseer is not a man but an “old spinster.”  The directive actually came from her and not from the mayor.

The long digressions can make reading Les Miserables go very slowly and tedious but when Hugo gets to the main story, the reading becomes riveting and the book is hard to put down.  Just getting to the trial is a struggle for Monsieur Madeleine as he faces one obstacle after another.  I began to wonder if he would even make it on time and he’s not even sure he wants to go.  Then there’s the altercation between Fantine and the idle gentleman who throws snow at her back.  This leads to her arrest, her meeting Monsieur Madeleine in person, but also to her final downfall.  She doesn’t survive the volume that bears her name.  Though she didn’t start out as one, she is arguable the most miserable of the Miserables.