ALMOST A FOREIGN COUNTRY

A collection of columns reflecting love, life and old age.

As a college professor and columnist, Wolf enjoys expounding on his ideas. It doesn’t really matter if those ideas are trite or if the stories that explore them are a tad mundane–the author believes he’s providing readers with valuable insight. He succeeds intermittently, but he always provokes some curiosity about how he developed his opinions. For instance, Wolf believes sexual indiscretion should be mandatory and that concealing faults in a relationship protects feelings from getting hurt. Although he briefly discusses a few of his relationships, his thesis stirs questions about those arrangements. The book is arranged in sections that also touch on sadness, perception, conversation and immigrant stories, among other topics. The author’s columns were regularly published in newspapers including the San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury and the Daily Californian, as well as Dutch and Finnish publications. All the columns are brief, ranging from two to three pages in length, and Wolf’s wizened, cynical voice is consistent throughout. The book’s title refers to the predicament that elders often discover as they age–that the world is the same yet changed, taking on the strangeness of a foreign country. It’s with his tales of foreign experiences and observances that Wolf shines. From discussing the quiet success of Muslim women in Western Europe, to the fact that drug dealers are allowed to deduct firearms and pit bulls as business expenses in the Netherlands, the author engages readers with interesting points. He also offers the interesting perspective of an immigrant who has absorbed a large part of American culture but questions the rest. As a whole, Wolf has supplied an uneven yet worthwhile read.

A meandering, thought-provoking series of essays that will appeal to memoir and social-history fans.