Good Books, Bright Side

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader - film commentary

2010-12-13T20:22:00.000-08:00

I don't think I've yet read The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis, but I have read the first page and just love the first line, something like: "There once was a boy named Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it." Hee! (Sorry for the possible paraphrase, but I don't feel like hacking through my cluttered shelves with machete-like abandon.)

I saw the movie, fairly unexpectedly, on its first day in theaters. After my jaw dropped at the price of the ticket, I decided I could still afford lunch and went for Chinese. I came back, put on those silly 3-D glasses - why, by the way, are NOT worth the extra 5 or so dollars for the ticket, but I had to get them anyway because the man behind the counter told me everything would be 'fuzzy' if I didn't (and, of course, ticket prices are not optional) - and watched and enjoyed the movie. My nose pinched, but no big deal. I would have much preferred for it to be a normal movie, and if they (hopefully) make another Narnia film, I'd like them to lay off the 3-D, for the sake of my wallet and aversion to this bit of superfluousness.

The film itself had lovely, lovely production qualities; lovely, lovely returning actors and actresses; and strong new characters.Judging from scuttlebutt on the web Will Poulter's Euctace Scrubb seems to be a favorite among those who have seen the film. He does go through his character's various changes effectively and convincingly. I enjoyed Caspian's (Ben Barnes) use of an English accent, I imagine the actor's own accent. If you remember, in the last film it was an imaginary, exotic accent. I think this worked better. I particularly liked
the Lucy storyline - she's concerned about her beauty, or she seems to think lack thereof. She does some fighting in this film, and seems to have grown so much since the first Narnia film. There's a lovely minor story arc with a very young girl who Lucy acts as a sort of caretaker to; this character helps bring about a nice denouement to the Lucy-and-her-looks storyline.

I was reading about Narnia on the internet and I've come to suspect that some theaters are showing Dawn Treader without the 3-D requirement. Probably, it's a good idea to check ahead of time. Perhaps, your nose need not be pinched, and your wallet, neither.

What you find when you're not looking...

2010-11-30T22:50:00.000-08:00

I'm reading Meghan McCain's Dirty, Sexy, Politics, where McCain writes about the three buses her father used on the "Straight Talk Express." Apparently, the first bus was gorgeous and that's where John and Cindy and the main players rode; the second was pretty good too for other staffers and journalists; the third was crappy (complete with smelly toilet) and reserved for low-level campaign blogger Meghan and staff and...journalists who were on the outs with the campaign. Interesting.

First of all, imagine riding in a toilet on wheels for a year and a half. Wouldn't you think some reporters might be tempted to make nice in their articles just to get an upgrade? Here's hoping ethics won out, though something makes me picture FOX "News" people riding happily on bus 1.

Secondly, I imagine Ana Marie Cox, a blogger and writer who talks about politics on Rachel Maddow's show on MSNBC - a stellar show, by the way - was stuck on bus 3: Meghan recalls waiting to get on a bus (remember, it's crappy) and turning to Cox to ask a question. Ergo, Cox's bus was the stinker, too. Isn't that logical reasoning? If you've heard Cox on Maddow, you won't find the scenario surprising; you might happily sense the refreshing breeze of journalistic ethics sweep over you. Hopefully, Cox felt it, too. A year and a half is just too long to hold your breath and listen to Republican politics all day, too.

But....here's the exciting part, and it has nothing at all to do with smelly transportation. Well, actually it kind of does, but it's DONKEY smell! That's kind of like horse smell, isn't it? Mmmm, so good! Anyway, in a Wonkette review of Meghan McCain's book (of all things), there's a link to this wonderful video. Prepare to feel good about book lovers!

Thirdly, and lastly, (and, again, why not estimate about 1 year ago)...

2010-11-27T15:26:00.000-08:00

Allie Finkle's Rules for Girls, Book One: Moving Day

My goodness, I gobbled up the first hundred pages or so of this book! Ah, the joys of juvenile literature. First, The Penderwicks, now Allie Finkle.

I won't compare the two beyond saying they're both fun. But whereas The Penderwicks is timeless and reminiscent of books past, Allie Finkle is - it seems to old fuddy-duddy me who was never totally plugged in, even as a child - hip. Just look at her on the cover. I'd have looked like a little yuppie next to her.

Not that the heroine of this series by Meg Cabot would have cared. The girl's got sense, after all; she keeps a notebook of rules to help her live life more smoothly and, while "Never eat anything red" doesn't seem too do-able or constructive, that particular rule and many others illustrate her personality. The attitude conveyed by the voice of Allie, who tells the story in first-person, and the rules she chooses to make - at once logical and humorous - paint a picture of a very charismatic nine year old.

Barbies and Bratz, trips to Dairy Queen - Cabot certainly hasn't forgotten what it's like to be a kid. I've got to think there are a lot of little girls wishing this author was an older sister or aunt. She's seems the kind to let you stay up past 11:00 and try on her make-up. That's much like the humorous Uncle Jay character in this novel; he plays a charming role toward the book's end and, indeed, throughout. It is his influence that sends Allie into "war" mode as her parents decide to move and she decides they shouldn't, in ever-so-gentle a way.

The writing in the book will allow even oldies like me to laugh out loud remembering childhood. Cabot's got it spot-on. Annoying best friends? Check. Games of pretend in castles made out of bushes and brick walls? Check. Little brothers who play astronaut using air vents between rooms? Check.

How Cabot remembers all these things I'll never really know. I've read that she uses old diaries from her childhood. Makes me wish I'd been more of a diarist in my youth. Ah well.

You know, I've so enjoyed reading these children's books I think I might just have to keep on reading. It's like drinking a little bit of the fountain of youth. I hear one of the next books in the Allie Finkle series is called Best Friends and Drama Queens. Now how can an old fuddy-duddy afford to miss that chance at re-living her younger days?

Next up (and from about 1 year ago)...

2010-11-27T15:24:00.000-08:00

On film adaptations of classic novels, Andrew Davies and the Davies' (nearly mathematical) 'formula'

Upon an urge to pop something in the DVD player, I watched snippets of the 1990's Davies' adaptation of Middlemarch last night. Who knew that simple act could jeopardize my enjoyment of future viewings of Davies' adaptations?

Every film seems to include some staple scenes. There are Celia and Dorothea in their pj's and bedroom discussing men and romance. There are Marianne and Elinor in their pj's and bedroom discussing men and romance. There are Isabella and Catherine in their pj's and bedroom discussing men and romance. There are Elizabeth and Jane in their pj's and bedroom discussing men and romance. And at least three out of the four pairings are brushing their hair at the same time. Well, isn't that what girls do?

Then there's the scene when the good-looking gentleman is transfixed by the young, unsuspecting heroine's singing voice. I'm thinking Rosamond and Dr. Lydgate, Col. Brandon and Marianne, Elizabeth and Darcy.

There's also the 'manliness' scene wherein Darcy emerges soaking wet from a lake, Edward chops wood in the rain and Col. Brandon plays with a falcon. Okay, the last one doesn't involve water but it counts. What is facing the elements compared to facing down a bird of prey?

So the next time I watch a Davies' adaptation, I'm making a checklist. Whether I want to or not, I have a feeling I'll be testing my theory.

First, though, let me ask, have you noticed any other components to the Davies' formula?

I'm digging up old favorite posts from my old blog. First up (and from, about 1 year ago)...

2010-11-27T14:37:00.000-08:00

This is Water by David Foster Wallace

Graduation season is approaching and I guess that's why there was a new little hardcover book on the shelf in the store one day recently. It's a commencement address by David Foster Wallace that can be read in one sitting and, interestingly, is presented by printing just one idea, often just a sentence, on each page.

This presentation is probably meant to make something that most people wouldn't want to read seem readable. Who can't read a line per page? It might also be that the editors saw that there were some big ideas in this small book. Page by page they can be more easily digested. In any case, it cost somewhere around 14 dollars. Hefty, it seemed to me. The cynic in me suspects that maybe more pages mean higher pricing and this was a factor in the presentation, as well. Who knows.

It's a gem, though. Called This is Water, it's billed on the back as thoughts on compassion. It is. But it's not touchy, feely compassion. Using, sparsely, phrases like 'no-shit' to speak to his college audience, Foster keeps it real. He links thinking with compassion and shows how these two are related - how using your brain intelligently can help you put yourself in others' shoes.

But putting it in that nutshell seems so, as Foster might say, "lame and banal." He wisely describes what he means instead of preaching ideas at the students. In a wonderful depiction of the boredom and frustration of everyday life that most college students have yet to experience at their age, he relates the hypothetical but oh-so-identifiable experience of being tired after a rotten day at work, hungry, and needing to go to the grocery store before you can go through the equally rotten experience of cooking for yourself and satisfying that hunger. However, Foster says, the line in the supermarket is long, the behemoth cars on the road are cutting you off and you're miserable because all you want is to go home and eat. For most people at this point, Foster says, it's all about themselves.

But wait, he writes,

"It's not impossible that some of these people in SUVs have been in horrible auto accidents in the past and now find driving so traumatic that their therapist has all but ordered them to get a large, heavy SUV so they can feel safe; or that the Hummer that just cut me off is maybe being driven by a father whose little child is hurt or sick in the seat next to him, and he's trying to rush to the hospital, and he's in a way bigger, more legitimate hurry than I am - it is actually I who am in his way." (Foster's italics.) This is Water, page 85

Whoa.

But reading it in context is even more impressive. So I recommend This is Water as an economy of words with an abundance of meaning. This is lean meat; no fat here. Everything is there for a reason. I suspect the 'no-shit' reference made the message more credible and palatable for young people to hear. Rather than being solely amusing or drily informative, the anecdotes at the beginning serve their dual purposes of drawing in the attention of the speech's audience/readers and illustrating a point.

Foster suffered from depression and committed suicide in 2008. Another writer who suffered depression, Tennessee Williams, once wrote in his play Summer and Smoke, "Life is such a mysteriously complex thing that no one should really presume to judge and condemn the behavior of anyone else." Sounds like Foster and Williams shared more than an illness; they seem to have had something similar to say.

And, perhaps, we all should listen.

Outlander, Diana Gabaldon

2010-10-16T17:33:00.000-07:00

There's a real 'wow' factor in reading Outlander by Diana Gabaldon. It was recommended to me three years ago and I never read it. Then, a few months ago, I felt like treating myself in the store - I think I had a coupon - so I indulged in a purchase of something different and new, Outlander. It's such a nice feeling to get something you're not sure of at a good price, experiencing adventurousness without a risk of buyer's regret. And, then, it turns out to be fun. I'm sure you know the feeling.

So, I let the book sit on a shelf for a couple of months. After I finished the Sookie Stackhouse marathon I recently undertook, I felt the fat, blue Outlander book calling me. I don't know why, and I had serious doubts about whether I'd would or wouldn't be able to finish a mammoth-sized book like it. The first few pages were pleasant, uneventful and encouraging. Yes, I realize that the adjective 'uneventful' does not seem to jibe with 'encouraging,' but it was, so there.

And, 'uneventful' seems to be, oddly, one of the things I liked a lot about some parts of this book. Make no mistake, there are tons of adventures and romance in its various incarnations (setting, love affairs, characters who will from now on inhabit fiction because they're so real and lovable in one way or another). There are hugely intriguing bits of history (though I don't know about the accuracy and am not terribly concerned about it as this is, after all, fiction) and really, really intriguing turns regarding characters and there's definitely that thing that makes a reader stop and stare somewhere away from the page imagining the 'what if's' that come to mind. In other words, there's a lot in it that illustrates why storytelling is so important to the human species.

But, I have to say that I enjoyed the pages describing main character Claire's forays into medicinal botany and the minutiae of daily living in the 18th century. It was cool to dip in and read a few pages about life in this fictitious world kind of like I was a voyeur who thought, 'Okay, now I'll look through the neighbors' window a little, entertain myself, check in, see what's going on.' Only, of course, reading a book isn't immoral or illegal, so the pleasure came without guilt. Sweet.

Tons of violence characterize the book. I got steamed and angst-ridden when Jamie, the hero, behaved in a very un-21st century manner toward his wife. Frustrating it was that he could be kind of right and his behavior kind of understandable whilst doing these horrible things. I vented on some online book forums. But, of course, the fact that I got so involved and was able to see different sides in something so abhorrent in anyone's eyes in the modern day was an argument itself that here was a book well-written with well-rounded real-person characters. They do seem like real people. I guess in approximately 850 pages you can dot that as a writer. Well, I mean skill is important, but the length allows a way to carve out characters that shorter stories won't allow. And, then, when you know you have a few more books of similar length to continue the story? You can slowly unfurl these characters' lives for the reader and expose them for scrutiny with almost (okay, I'm exaggerating) the pace and complexity of a real life.

I plunged right into the next in the Outlander series, Dragonfly in Amber, which I found presented unexpected news and events from the Outlander world, funny since I had read spoilers and thought I knew what was coming. So, now I can read on in the series and concurrently read spoilers on the web (though, admittedly, never with a great deal of care so as not to really endanger my reading of the books) and not (hopefully, but where the hope has a good track record) spoil the actual books before I've gotten to them. This is great since, as you know, reading series books years after they were begun runs the risk of learning outcomes you'd rather not yet know or else endeavoring to engage in unnatural levels of discipline and restraint (read: keeping away from the internet to research the author, books, reviews and community opinions on the series). It's hard enough to keep from eating that extra cookie in the evening; no one needs to limit his or her indulgence on a great, newly-found lit-feast. Don't you think?

Surprisingly, there are those who seem very much taken with (almost) anger for the series and its writer's decisions for this and that in the books. To each her own, I suppose. So far, though, I quite like them.

libraries are fundamental and, the library card as literary passport

2010-09-21T20:38:00.000-07:00

One of the best things about modern life is the circulating library. That we can go to a big building (or a small one) and take away loads of books (and CDs and DVDs and other stuff, too) for a few weeks without paying a cent (unless you count overdue and lost fines) is an amazing thing, and a great edifier for the soul and intellect of a society.

Think of it: If you don't have any money for recreation - and there's a lot of that going around these days when a movie costs more than an hour's minimum wage - you can still read books. If you don't have money for a paperback - again, an hour of minimum wage often doesn't cover a mass-market - there's always the library.

A library card is like a literary passport. It gets you - really your mind - into places it would otherwise have a very difficult time being allowed into. Borders and Barnes and Noble don't let hoards of students sit in their cafés monopolizing books (i.e. merchandise) and table space so thet can complete their twenty page research papers. Libraries do.

To be sure, I love owning books. But, come on, you can't have everything and, when it comes to books, should only HAVE TO HAVE very little, if anything. Who can live without a dictionary? Most people have one, probably. But even if you don't, every town or group of towns has reference materials. This is as it should be.

A library provides a way for a determined yet penniless person to learn about any topic he or she wants. It doesn't take the place of a school system, but it's a necessary supplement and often an educational lifeline. It is a fundamental component of intellectual life for a people who wish to be lifelong learners and informed voters. And it's fun.

I feel rich that I have the benefit of cards to four different library systems. And I'd venture to guess that it's historically and geographically exceptional experience to live in a time and place when libraries are considered a basic human right, or nearly so. Many of our ancestors would have felt like royalty if they could have stepped into a city library and stepped out with a three week reading supply that could outlast the pace of a book a day.

And it's an exquisite privilege to have a public library system that goes out-of-state to find patrons books that it lacks in its own collection. And don't forget all the internet resources. From my corner of the world, I have searched databases in Europe and all over the United States, which is a great research tool.

So I think it's disgusting that towns and cities feel they have to close libraries as a remedy for the bad fiscal health of their budgets. It's disgusting that, perhaps, they are correct. If the choice is an adequate police force or books, obviously bodily safety comes first. I just hope that everyone remembers that, ultimately, the safety and health of societies lie in education and access to information. We need our bodies so we can live and function; we need our minds to make living worthwhile.

Sookie - What I'd like to see...

2010-09-12T13:50:00.000-07:00

I'd like to see:

- Sookie hit Bill upside the head (figuratively speaking) about his secretiveness and his treatment of her. He needs to do more than beg her lamely to come back. Harris is doing a good job of making Bill into a lame heel. I want the moment to come when Sookie calls him such. And I want him to explain himelf. I mean, really, 130 years old and he tries to win her back with a hastily mentioned word at an elevator door while he's dating someone else? Didn't he learn anything over the past century and a third?

- more with Remy Savoy. He seems like a nice human sweetie who might make a good mate for Sookie if his character is developed.

- Sookie grow up and make better decisions. So oftne she worries when she need not and doesn't when she should.

- Sookie go through a needed soul-searching about her religion and the supes, especially since she's religious and the supes bring up a lot interesting questions.

- Jason and Sookie get even closer in a mature sibling relationship. He's getting so much better.

- Sookie be liberated in the seemingly hopeless world she's in.

- Some vampire (Eric?) start a vampiric revolution to regain free will in their crazy, strict power structure. Now that would make interesting conflict, something different... There could be a lot more books if that happened and the stories would be refreshingly different from what is currently seeming like a constant case of more of the same.

Top Sookie Moments

2010-09-12T13:35:00.000-07:00

I'm trying to think of what the top Sookie Stackhouse moments were since I have finished the 10 novels that have so far appeared.

Here are a few without book references as all the titles have run together for me:

1 - Cute little Hunter saying bye to Sookie telepathically after their first meeting.

2 - The joyful love of the 1000 year old vampire, Eric, bouncing Sookie up in the air as they waltz at the Rhodes ball.

3 - Similarly, the joyful way Sookie jumps into Erics arms at his request upon her seeing him at his house in the last book.

4 - Pam's peck on Sookie's cheek before the witch war.

5 - An exchange in an early book between Eric and Bill which involves a reference by the former to possessive pronouns. It just tickled me. Of course, it wasn't really a pronoun; it was an adjective, but the idea was great. (Perhaps, you have to be a bit of a grammar nut.) ; )

6 - I hated when Sookie finds out about Bill's motives in dating her, but since I had such a visceral reaction I am adding it here. It moved me.

7 - Eric whipping off his coat to reveal that ridiculous spandex outfit he wore to accompany Sookie on her fact-finding expedition to the creepy party in an early book.

8 - Any scene in which the enigmatic and maddeningly quiet Bill opens up, though for various reasons there are too few of them.

9 - Sookie's enjoyment of sunbathing... Particularly, the first time when her Gran is fussing with gardening or laundry or something in the yard and we first see Sookie in the lawnchair soaking in the relaxing moment, the sun and the music from her radio. It's a simple pleasure of her human existence that she gives up as her supernatural saga plays out. Sunbathing will never be the same again for her.

10 - Pam's humor and Harris's fleshing out of her personality. Does anyone else imagine her talking like Lilith Sternin-Crane in the old TV show Cheers?

11 - Jason's paternal concern for Alexie in the last book.

Ah, well....

2010-09-07T13:23:00.000-07:00

I finished Definitely Dead. You might see my posts below describing my initial infatuation with the Sookie series, based on the first book, and the subsequent rough patches I hit. It actually ended not bad. I told you I get grumpy...

Sookie burn-out - What a disappointment!

2010-09-06T16:03:00.000-07:00

Why does bad writing happen to good story ideas??? Oh, why?

I was enjoying the Sookie Stackhouse series. But now that I'm in the middle of book 6, Definitely Dead, I have to say this is showing how terrible it is when ideas that have potential are executed so badly. Quite disappointing.

I'll submit this: Charlaine Harris is a pretty good storyteller, but really a pretty bad writer. There are so many reasons to say this, and the very, very least of them are the striking misuse of vocabulary that one wouldn't expect from a purveyor of the language.

1 - The wonderful beginning of the series - ordinary woman in extraordinary circumstances - is destroyed as the series progresses. As an observer of this imaginary universe, it seems that there are virtually no humans left on the planet. No contrast whatsoever; it's all supes all the time and the depth that gives the reader some orientation in this universe is lost.

2 - Why all the boyfriends? Even in other series this is not normal. Man, it's like some kind of manic reaction or something. Can we please just stick to one or two guys and actually explore a relationship?

3 - This brings me to the bad writing. Harris does whatever she feels will make an exciting story, and if that means major inconsistencies - far more than other professional writers - and incongruous behavior by characters (Sookie is smart but does some massively and unbelievably stupid things), then so be it, I guess.

4 - This leads to there not being a backbone to the series. No general guiding direction. We, the readers, don't need to be aware of it - we shouldn't, actually - but we should feel it. It's like she's making it up as she goes along the way you make up a story at a campfire. The characters don't work. The story has no integrity.

5 - Harris can do what she wants with her books - they're hers, anyway - but she should take care of a good idea if she has one. She discards her good ideas the way other people waste food. A reader should be insulted by this. It is irresponsible for a writer to pluck an idea out of the world of storyline possibilities that exist in our collective imagination and to then treat it so badly. To top it off, on Harris's site, she gives a curt response to why she doesn't like fan fiction. But, my goodness, someone has to do it right.

6 - There are so many interesting and juicy ideas wrapped up in the characters and fantastical element in the books readers could chew on if Harris chose to explore them. But she doesn't. Perhaps she doesn't recognize the possibilities, or perhaps she does, but doesn't know how to realize it.

7 - Finally, the careless/non-existent proofreading by editors doesn't help. It's like no one cares about the product.

Opinions, anyone?

Who knew? Sookie Stackhouse books are (based on the first one) enjoyable.

2010-08-30T00:25:00.000-07:00

Mass market paperbacks that advertise vampires are generally not something I gravitate toward. Nothing against mass markets - I have come to have an affinity for them. It's the vampire thing. Boy, was I prejudiced against the Twilight series for the longest time. But then I pretty much loved the first three. (Haven't read the last yet.)

Then I picked up Insatiable in the store. And then I put it back down. But, eventually, that, too, got read. My comments about that book are here.

Now, for some reason, I thought I'd explore the Sookie Stackhouse books by Charlaine Harris. I don't know...maybe it was the whole True Blood tv show that so many people are abuzz about. I don't watch it, but it looks gory and and seems like it's hopped onboard the vampire-fad bandwagon, but for a more "sophisticated" audience (read: individuals who enjoy gratuitious sexuality and blood).

None of that is really a recommendation for the books. My expectations before I began were pretty much on the lower end of the spectrum, but I finished the first, Dead Until Dark, and actually enjoyed it. We'll see about the others.

Sookie, the telepathic southern waitress, is a likeable character. The point is made that she is "uneducated" but smart. If you have egalitarian tendencies, this will probably endear her and the book to you. I really liked it. Sookie is sweet and caring and funny.

Her love interest is a vampire with the unassuming name of Bill. Bill the vampire. That's right.

Anyway, Bill is an interesting character and pulling apart his ethics would be an intriguing exercise. He's not the squeaky clean - and very likeable, if possessive - Edward Cullen of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series. Bill you wonder about. That's not necessarily a bad thing.

There are elements to the first Sookie book that bear great (suspicious?) similarity to Twilight, which was actually published four years after Dead Until Dark. I wonder if Meyer read any Sookie books. Just curious, not casting aspersions.... What similarities? There's a furry rival for Sookie's love, for example. There's her innocence. There is Bill's old-fashioned, protective nature. There is also the fact he kind of glows or shines sometimes.

But, in many ways, the books are very different. Sexual content is completely on another level, for instance. The book is NOT for youngsters. There can't be an argument there. It's very explicit. And it's very violent, though mostly in references to crimes. But that's enough. Language is vulgar, though it arguably serves the characters at times. At other times, it doesn't and it's annoying. Sookie is different, too, than Twilight's heroine, Bella. She perhaps has a spunk in her southern manners that strengthens her; Bella seems fairly 'damsel in distress-y' in contrast. Bill, again, is not a white knight of a vampire.

I was annoyed at times by the writing. First of all, and this is kind of petty, it's two "pairs" of shoes, socks, jeans, etc; it's not two "pair" of shoes, socks, jeans, etc. That's just like nails on a chalkboard. EEEEEEEE! Then, again I'm picky here, I think I spotted the word 'simile' misused which for some reason irritated me. Another time some kind of editing or grammar error which I have now forgotten - so, you know, again picky - interrupted my reading for about 2 minutes.

But, these are not major impediments to the enjoyment of an entertaining yarn. Even the three or four times I was confused by writing (sentence/paragraph construction is what I remember) were not prohibitive to understanding the story, even if they were a bit frustrating.

So, all in all, not a bad read. And, tomorrow, I am attempting to find book two at a time when libraries seem out of them. That, perhaps, tells you something.

Dancing Poll

2010-08-27T17:11:00.000-07:00

Thought I'd try a new poll. See, it's over there -------------------------------------------->

I saw on the internet today that people are starting to gossip about who might be on the new season of Dancing With the Stars. But, strangely, no literary characters have been mentioned. They always seem to be overlooked. So I have some suggestions. Who would you cast?

Write in candidates are welcome in comments.

A hopefully entertaining instance of venting which should not be taken terribly seriously

2010-08-27T11:53:00.000-07:00

Ugh. I hate pretentious writing. I don't even like it when I do it. But, you know, I think in the process of blogging it's very easy to fall prey to pretentious 'too-cute-for-its-own-good' writing.

Being inclined to bookishness, I tend to read bookish blogs and, as you know, they are very popular. Who knew pre-cyberspace that there were so many readers around who not only wanted to read, they also wanted to pontificate, share opinions and joy? I'm all for the joy. And I'm for the opinion-sharing, too...though, as everyone knows from reading book reviews and talking with new acquaintances of different tastes at parties, opinion-sharing can be problematic. For example, never, never, never talk about politics with a person waiting for the bus. They'll say the darnedest things. (This is experience speaking and I was dumb to ever try. Although, I'll probably do it again, someday. But, humor mostly aside, it can kind of be like taking your life in your hands.)

But I'm digressing. That's politics, this is books. Let's get back to what I'm calling 'pretentious' writing - writing that's just too much. Often in life, I am kind of "too much." I'm not sure how to describe that concept but if you've watched every Designing Women episode ever made - great TV from when Hollywood hadn't sold out to mindless vulgarity and blood-soaked dramas and 'reality' TV moronathons - then you'll know something of what I'm trying to get at. Because in her own words, the bigger-than-life character Suzanne Sugarbaker, was a bit "too much." She was a Bob Mackie gown in a denim world.

A bit more elucidation on this concept of being too-much: How can I describe it? Here are some ways. Well, there's, of course, Suzanne. There are always the sitcom characters whose personalities were big, showy, entertaining if nothing else. Think of Blanche Devereaux (Golden Girls), Blair Warner (The Facts of Life), Norma Desmond-types without the pathos. There is a former Russian ice-dancing couple, Anjelika Krylova and Oleg Ovsyannikov, whose skating was thought to be too over the top, but whom I loved. There's any smart, compassionate person who thinks outside the box when appropriate and doesn't care if he is going against the tide but who, nonetheless, doesn't seek to bring attention to himself. But now I'm starting on a tangent again.

So there's the idea of being too much. But, I hear the one or two people reading thinking. Why are you complaining, Blogger-person who thinks of herself as a little bit too-much herself? I am complaining because I wanted to complain because I was just visiting a writer's blog which I had thankfully not visited for a very long time and boy was she just as irritating as ever.

Said writer (from here on I'll call her Thinks a Bit Too Much of Herself) is constantly posting pictures of herself which is an activity that (1) has nothing to do with writing and (2) smacks of stupidity and (3) makes the endeavor of her blog seem a teeny bit like a love letter to herself. Invariably the photos are accompanied by back-handedly self-deprecating comments. For example, a photo of a somber Thinks a Bit Too Much of Herself might be captioned with, 'Oh, dear, don't I look like a Weeping Willow in this pic?' knowing full well, one suspects, that a Weeping Willow is really a very beautiful tree and that likening herself to such is actually flattering herself by coyly hiding a clear compliment inside what is generally considered a sentence construction that expresses modesty and/or true humility. GRRRRRRRRRRRR....

But that's only a small bit of what's so irritating about her blog. The big thing is that she can't write. Or, perhaps more accurately, she writes the same thing over and over again. And over again. Same style all the time. Same cutesy-type phrases. Same thematic silliness: Hey, look, I remember the advent of the internet and I'm only 25; Hey, look I'm chronically forgetful of my keys. Aren't I special?; Hey, look, I feel that misspelled words and bad grammar are horrorific. Forget about the lack of lifeboats on this ship. I don't care if there are dangerously high winds and turbulent seas. The ship builder has inappropriately place a hyphen between the word 'life' and the word 'boat' in this empty space. Get some stencilling, stat!

Ah, youthful self-indulgent drama. I remember it well. Thank goodness we grow out of it.At least, I'm hoping to do so one day. So, I shouldn't be too seriously annoyed with Thinks a Bit Too Much of Herself. Pretty much everyone is childish in some way to some degree for life. A human lifespan is not enough time to grow up. Kindness toward each other's silliness is necessary. But I don't think a bit of venting over unnamed developing writers in literary neutral is ridiculously mean. Or maybe it is. I'll let other bloggers philosophize about that. They can refer to me as Talks a Bit Too Much.

Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

2010-08-13T00:08:00.000-07:00

I was finally tempted to pick up Eat Pray Love after seeing the Julia Roberts cover where she's licking gelato off a spoon with coy enjoyment. Roberts' beauty paired with old Roman buildings and Italian ice cream made it seem promising. Publishers know very well that we judge books by covers.

So now I'm reading it and I have to tell you I don't particularly like it. I'm somewhere around page 18 now, admittedly not far, but even up to this early stage I've come across so many of the trite writing cliches authors tend to love but at some point learn to control. Elizabeth Gilbert - it's weird to say this about a professional writer - uses them like they're original thoughts.

Take her talk to God on the bathroom floor, for example. Basically, she claims it's her first foray into prayer and she introduces herself by declaring her name and telling him that it's nice to meet him. As though this is something the reader might miss, she underscores it by telling us it was just like at a cocktail party. Then she apologizes for disturbing him.

Do people like this exist? This whole I-have-no-idea-how-to-communicate-with-a-being-whom-I'm-told-knows-everything-thing is hard for me to buy as a reader. At least it is the way she describes it. This is sitcom stuff that's been done forever.

There seem to be annoyances on every page and I wonder if I'll make it through this book.

There also seem to be a lot of people (Julie and Julia author Julie Powell, for instance) who seem to be writing about projects they have done and it's beginning to feel so contrived. Do these people actually do things and watch themselves do them for extended periods of time just so they can write about their experiences later as though said experiences happened in a normal organic way? Or do they know all along that they're going to write a book?

I don't know, but I kind of think the latter can be argued very persuasively by reading the intro to Eat, Pray, Love. Gilbert explains to us that she changes people's names in her book for their privacy. That's great and normal, but then she gives us this reason for the name-changing:

"This is out of respect for the fact that most people don't go on a spiritual pilgrimage in order to appear later as a character in a book. (Unless, of course, they are me.)"

So, I guess she admits a book was the plan to begin with. I'm being very cynical here. I mean, she's a writer. Of course, she's going to write about this big event in her life. But, people don't do these things "in order to appear later as a character in a book...Unless...they're me"? Probably just bad wording, but the cliched and cloying nature of the writing doesn't help inspire a belief in the authenticity of the back cover's claim that Gilbert's year-long journey was a way for her "to examine three different aspects of her nature." Unless, of course, the examination was meant to generate a book. Not exactly the way any of it's been marketed, I think.

Is it so naive to think people still have experiences in life and and only later decide to write about them? No. But these self-indulgent self-discovery and exploration themes that seem to have been popping up for years now are getting old and tired. In the same way that reality shows aren't really 'real,' these books seem to be too self-conscious for their own good.

Perhaps the movie will be better. I'm hoping the rest of the book will, too.

I won a contest.

2010-07-27T18:59:00.000-07:00

Notice the lackluster punctuation in this post's title. A period is a very understated full stop. There's none of the provocativeness of a question mark or the enthusiasm of an exclamation point. Forget about the coy suggestiveness of ellipsis marks....

As you probably have seen in the post below, I read and savored Meg Cabot's Insatiable. After having raved about it to those who have no choice other than to listen to me because they're stuck living with me and if they don't listen I will just follow them to the bathroom and yell my review at them through the door as they do inside that which can only be done in a bathroom (keep in mind many a shower has been taken under a tropical waterfall - at least on Gilligan's Island - so obviously I'm not talking about that), I perused the internet for mentions of the book. I did the "simple Google search" that unhelpful people are always telling us we can do to learn about things that they are too lazy or daft to tell us about, even though there is sometimes no substitute for picking a real person's brain. So, on this search I found a contest, entered and was later notified that I'd won a signed copy of Cabot's vampires-in-NYC-tale. I gleefully dashed off a thank you email and received Insatiable today via the US Postal Service. I love getting books in the mail.

So why the listless punctuation? My inner existentialist teenager (named Morticia) is screaming the answer: people are YUCKY. All right, that's my inner existentialist teenager, Morticia, self-censoring her language. Morticia may be into the whole well-the-world-is-hurtling-through-space-and-tomorrow-we-might-hit-an-asteroid-and-die-anyway-so-why-bother-thing that some teens go through, but she doesn't feel it's necessary to use bad words. So, 'yucky.' Use your imagination.

You know those days when work just GETS TO YOU and you wish you could dream up the next big useless money-making idea (like that blanket-cape thing people wear around the campfire on that TV commercial and everyone seems to adore although humans have been doing perfectly well for centuries by draping a proper blanket over their shoulders)? And then you go on errands and someone tries to fleece you and you quite rightly complain to a manager and now you're not fleeced but you invested time and energy in the endeavor when you were all the time wishing that you could be playing Hungry Hungry Hippos like when you were a kid? You know what I mean, right?

Of course you do. Because that is the human struggle: to toil in the workaday world while harboring fantasies of flipping game chips into multicolored plastic hippopotami's mouths and watching the money roll in from your blanket-coat business. Perhaps you'll say, 'Wait a minute. Isn't it nice to come home to a signed copy of a fabulous Meg Cabot book? Count your blessings.' Well, of course you're right. But sometimes yucky people just drain you of the energy needed for enjoyment of good stuff. But writing is a good catharsis, and I'm feeling a little bit better now. So you know about those yucky people?

Yuck them. I'm going to gaze lovingly at my new book.

'Insatiable' by Meg Cabot

2010-07-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

I heard about this one, probably on one of those mass emails the big bookstores send out. I had a coupon and thought this would be a fun splurge given the 40% discount. So when I went to the store (a big one with a grand opening coming soon), I headed to the adult fiction section with the help of a really nice bookseller. It's always pleasant to be in a new bookstore, even if it is one of those cookie-cutter chain stores that have eaten up the market and pushed out the indies. Let's face it, it's not the employees fault these stores seem so often to be soulless.

So, anyway I was a bit surprised 'Insatiable' was in the adult section, I guess since Cabot always seems to be known for kids books (though she writes for adults, too.) I opened her book, took a quick peek and decided I wasn't spending the money. Too bad, it had sounded good when I'd read about it online.

The next week I went back for something else. Once again, I had a coupon. Once again, I was compelled to look at 'Insatiable.' This time I bought it. And, after a quick (for me) read lasting a few days, I have to say I thought this book was delicious.

Okay, that's one of those cutesy words that seem pretentious and overwrought, but you know what? Sometimes it just works. I loved this book. It didn't seem like a Cabot to me. For a long time, this author had perplexed me. I was familiar with the Princess Diaries series and not overly impressed. I'd dipped in to other books of hers and they all sounded the same to me as far as tone was concerned. I like a writer who can slip into different voices the way character actors slip into different personalities for their roles. But then I read her first Allie Finkle book and I thought, yeah, kids will like this. She's good.

'Insatiable,' about a soap opera writer who hates the current vampire trend and is thrust into the world of real-life vamps, is over the top and full of references to pop-culture. (Did I see a stab at the banking industry or did I just imagine that?) It's funny. It's romantic. It takes place in NYC. It features a character who walks around Manhattan in a long leather trenchcoat armed with a sword out of a fairy tale and no one blinks an eyelid. Who doesn't love that?

Points of views are from different characters at different times, though it's always in third person. You'd think this would be jarring, but it's perfect. It's laugh-out-loud funny. And, Cabot's right when you go on her website and find the cautionary note that 'Insatiable' is meant for adult readers. It's a bit sexy, too. And swashbuckling.And it features great supporting characters (caricatures?).

As I was just into the beginning pages of the book - maybe in the 60s - I thought to myself, Why did I ever think I wouldn't like this book? And I was grateful that that momentary misjudgement didn't permanently keep me from this novel. That's how much I enjoyed it.

This seems to be a bit of a habit with me. I laughed and laughed about the 'Twillight' series until I actually read them. Hoovered them, really. I should really write about those, too and fix some bad karma.

So, I liked 'Insatiable.'

And it has a pretty cover. ; )

How I find books

2010-07-14T20:34:00.000-07:00

When I was a little girl in grade school, my class would take one class period a week to visit the school library, a sunny big, open beautiful room run by a nun who was lovely and taught reading and who always got my name wrong. It was a great place. After all, 'that which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet' so, really, I don't remember the name thing really bothering me a lot.

This lovely library was staffed by volunteers mothers who would check out books to us kids. We would file out of our homerooms, half of the class at a time, for half a class period. Then we'd peruse, we'd read, we'd mingle a bit and borrow a book. Instead of library cards, we had sheets of paper on which we wrote the name and authors of the books we read and then we'd give a rating: poor, fair, good, or excellent, if I am not mistaken.

I'd love to see one of these sheets again. Who would have thunk back then the value a grown-up me would see in these reading records.

I was so soft-hearted that I had a great aversion to the 'poor' rating. For me, 'fair' was as low as it went, unless, truly, it was a pathetic book and, really, nothing but 'poor' would do. In these cases, I was very proud of my integrity overcoming my wussiness.

I could truly be a ditzy kid. One day at the library, I was returning my reading material and I had forgotten to rate the book. The mother sitting at the library desk asked me, "And how did you find the book?" I was stunned that she would ask me a question with such an obvious answer. After all, we were in a library loaded with books. How could you miss them? I squinted my eyes. "I looked on the shelf and there it was," I replied. Keep in mind that I did not mean to be rude; this was pretty much said in complete innocence. That was the day I learned another meaning for the word 'find.' These things happen when you're a kid.

Cornelia and the Audacious Escapades of the Somerset Sisters by Leslie M.M. Blume

2009-06-13T20:06:00.000-07:00

Loved the title when I first saw it and the adorable French Bulldog on the cover. Was very curious to learn what a youthful Oxford and Cambridge-educated author had written.

I pretty much flew through this book. Cornelia is actually not a dog, contrary to what the cover of the hardback might make you think. But she is a winsome young character who lives in the sophisticated world of concert pianists in Manhattan, which is interesting enough. Leslie M.M. Blume, the author, adds something, though. And what she adds really makes the book....

Now, here is where I start to worry about the many articles, blogs, books, etc that I read. Somewhere sometime somebody in the very recent past compared some piece of literature (or some story or something else) to the magical residence of Sarah Crewe's next-door neighbor in A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett. (You see how hazy my memory is?) And I'm not sure if it was this book, Cornelia, that that person was comparing Princess to or not.

Regardless, let me appropriate the comparison and use it here. Basically, Cornelia finds a "world" next door to the swanky apartment she shares with her pianist mother. It's an even swankier, and considerably more exotic (there are palm trees growing out of the floor), apartment occupied by an elderly writer. The woman's tales and incredible apartment have a huge effect on Cornelia's life.

While it's not exactly a novel idea for a child character to undergo a metamorphosis after meeting a wise older person, Blume's tale joins in strong form the roster of these kinds of stories. The descriptions of the apartment are vivid. The old lady's stories are engaging. The characters and images are drawn such that many can be seen particularly well with the mind's eye.

If I, an adult, had this reaction to Cornelia, I can imagine that a child reading this book would be as absorbed in it as the title character is entranced by neighboring apartment with palm trees growing out of the floor.

Blogger is frustrating!

2009-06-13T19:08:00.000-07:00

Just a note to say that I try to maintain a sane amount of spacing between paragraphs, but Blogger is not cooperating. So I apologize for posts with miles of white space between graphs and, especially for those in which the graphs run on and on, one on the heels of another. Irritating....

Another old-fogey rant

2009-06-13T17:25:00.000-07:00

Remember the Katie John books? And The Phantom Palomino? What about Mystery Aboard the Ocean Princess? And By Secret Railway?

I can see you shaking your head. And I'm not surprised that you don't remember. These were great kids' books; as that animated tiger used to say (the one that used to advertise cereal at just about the time I read these books), "They're g-r-r-r-eat!!!"

These examples of kids' lit have gone the way of that marketing campaign: oblivion. Not to sound like some aged teeny-bopper who's become sour and resentful in later life but there are some perfectly good books that ought to be shared with our youngsters along with today's servings of literature. Dare I say, better books, in some cases?

These are lost books that no one except former child bookworms fondly recall. I was in the bookstore today and heard a disheartening exchange between a girl of about eleven or twelve and her father.

Girl: (Shows a book to her dad.)

Father: Hmmm. (In dismissive voice) "That looks like a book your mother would have read as a child."

Father and daughter thus place said book back on the shelf and continuing searching.

The books was a Bobbsey Twins mystery.

I should have had a lovely sitcom moment at the time and done something one of the many bold, mouthy characters of television would have done. I should have pivoted to face that man, cocked my head critically and said something sassy like, "Was that meant to actually be helpful or do you just work undercover for Cecily von Ziegesar?" I didn't.

I mean, what's he trying to do? He didn't look like someone who would, because he wanted desperately to be thought hip by his pre-teen daughter, diss retro kid lit. I think he was serious. But with what motive? Is he worried that his daughter will grow up thinking she has to be prim and proper and vacuum while wearing pearl necklaces while her husband is out earning money? I just don't think she's likely to become June Cleaver just 'cause she read an old book.

I found two books from the Katie John series at the store today. Unbelievable. They were in the bargain books section where I (and Pop and the little girl with good taste) were browsing. How the store's buyers found an unused edition of Depend on Katie John copyrighted in the 1970s, I don't know. It's presence in that store is not a ray of hope as much as a reminder that these retro kids books are dying, if not already dead.

And, really, it's no wonder. It's the way of the world, isn't it? Youth tends to inherit its spoils prematurely. What fifty-year old executive isn't looking behind his back to make sure Junior doesn't take his place? Is it really any different for things as likely to be dated as books?

Still, and you knew there had to be a 'still,' there are many children today who'd enjoy these older books. Maybe it would be for their old-fashioned qualities or their wholesomeness. Maybe it would be for today's kids, as it was for me, because of the charmingly outdated terminology used. (Remember when Nancy Drew used to "don frocks" instead of putting on dresses?)

Kids aren't, after all, frozen in their own time. They aren't focus groups. They're individuals. And today's old-fashioned adults were once yesterday's old-fashioned kids often mistaken by elders as only interested in the whatever fads were contemporary to that era. Not every one of today's kids wants to read the A-List books; some are quite yearning for the Green Gables series. Some prefer the romance of Jean and Johnnie to that of Twilight. And more might, but they're not being given the opportunity to discover it because publishing executives are ramming what they see as most profitable down the small throats of children.

Miss California isn't the only looker on the block

2009-05-13T16:41:00.000-07:00

Well, is it pageant season or what? I'm not sure there even is such a thing. Certainly pageants have been in the news with the big Miss CA controversy that never dies.

The allure of pageants died for me long ago. And this blog is about books, not looks. Still, I spied a picture of Charlotte Bronte today and thought to myself, What a looker! So, I thought I'd open the topic of literary lookers. Reader, I'm asking your opinion: Which writer was to-die-for great looking in addition to talented with pen or quill.

My nominations go to the aforementioned Charlotte Bronte and to a gentleman who's not my favorite author, but whom I always thought of as quite something in the beauty department: Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Who's caught your eye?

A happy find in the children's non-fiction section....

2009-05-11T16:05:00.000-07:00

Hot on the heels of reviewing Allie Finkle's Rules for Girls, Moving Day, I had to read a Meg Cabot bio. And, since the only biography that seems to have been written is, understandably, geared toward children, it was that one I borrowed from the library. It's part of a series called, Who Wrote That? and the book is written by Camille-Yvette Welsch, an English teacher from Penn State, according to the back cover.

It's not so simplified that an adult would find it frustrating, but it does do what children's biographies tend to do: make the subject into a paragon of, if not virtue, then role model-hood. But that's fine. Kids need role models and Cabot seems a fine one. The book is colorful, with many sidebars under the subtitle Did you know... and photos. This 136-page book is recent, with a copyright of 2008, so you don't feel like your reading one of those ancient dusty bios the neighborhood librarians just can seem to take off the shelves, or afford to replace.

There are many other authors bios in the series, like Judy Blume, Beverley Cleary, E.B. White, L.M. Montgomery, C.S. Lewis, Charles Dickens and the list goes on for about two and a half columns of bold-faced type. It seems a happy thing to have happened upon this series, a good resource in research for kids and adults alike.

Library book sale treasures and no buyer's remorse!

2009-05-09T19:24:00.000-07:00

The library book sale I went to today, in a neighboring town, was small with little selection, especially compared to the annual sale in my own town. But it was worth the lengthy and beautiful walk I had to make home. A lovely excursion on a Saturday morning: I knew I'd like poking around at old books, the older the better.

Well, there were precious few really old books. And I thought the library was overpricing its wares at $1 a paperback and $2 for a hardcover. It used to be that you could get a book for fifty cents and it felt like a steal (a great feeling) and you were more likely to load up on them. But, perhaps, I'm being a Scrooge. In any case, I purchased two books, one old, one ancient-looking. I was prepared to pay the $4 for the two of them, but right when I got to the counter, the gentleman who had been doing the transactions was relieved for a break by a woman. Lucky me. Because she felt the books I'd selected were so out of shape that she seems to have made an executive decision and let me have them for half off. Happy thing for me! I sometimes feel foolish after I buy used books, deciding I don't want them after all and giving them away. I hate that wasted money feeling.

I am quite sure, quite sure, that there is no monetary value to the books I purchased. Their value is entirely personal. One is is Louisa May Alcott from 1908 with some pretty frontispieces which I plan to make part of a LMA collection as Alcott things seem to turn up a lot of places; I already have two others.

Thrifty book buyer that I have become, I thought hard and relatively long about whether I wanted these two. I couldn't let the Alcott go; I anticipated relative disappointment then. But, I realized as I pretended to browse the other books on the tables while I deliberated, if I'd found that the other book had gone missing there would have been near-visceral disappointment. What is this mystery book?

I have to laugh and say it's really nothing special. IT terribly tattered, missing its back cover, looks like it fell in someone's bathtub a hundred years ago. It's like something pulled out of a traveler's trunk that's been rescued from a long-ago sunken sea-faring vehicle.

But that's why I love it. It's as old as it looks. The copyright is 1859 with no later years listed. The first page is blank save for the inscription its owner made, presumably many years ago. The book appears to have been a text entitled A Greek Reader by Anthon and Jacobs. Its owner was Chas. L. Babson who wrote his school name below his, East Corinth Academy. Below that a Latin inscription and its English translation - Labor Omnia Vincit - Labour (British spelling) Conquers All Things.

So, was he studious, this Charles L. Babson. Did he place the Latin quote in his Greek text to motivate himself? And where was East Corinth Academy? And could I find out anything more about him in the wired world of today?

In times like these, Google is a friend, indeed. So, I found out that East Corinth Academy was located in East Corinth, Maine. Also, a Chas. L. Babson (that same spelling) was a town selectman in Brooklin, Maine circa 1864. I fancy he was in high school when he used the book and five years later, finished with school, became an involved member of the community. Of course, this brings up more questions. Can I find out more about him? Did he harbor grand ambitions as a antebellum young man? Had he dreamed of having Lincoln's job before Lincoln himself had it?

The search will, when I'm bored and want to putter around the internet, continue. Would Chas. L. Babson ever have guessed that one hundred and fifty years after inscribing that book, his signature and text would be on display for anyone to see who happened upon a place called GBBS?

Artsy-craftsy idea for people with clothes they don't want and books they do in fifteen easy steps

2009-04-29T16:23:00.000-07:00

Step 1: Take inspiration from CS Lewis and decide to create magic wardrobe.

Step 2: Resolve to call your armoire a 'wardrobe.'

Step 2: Haul out the bell-bottoms, hot pants, pill-box hats, poodle skirts, Nehru jackets, tie-dye shirts, polyester pantsuits, coats bulging with shoulder pads, and other vintage items hanging in your armoire. Fish out that snood swimming at its bottom. Clear the whole place out and determine to wear bravely your old new-found period apparel in public or to give it away.

Step 3: Scour attic and basement and boxes beneath beds to find all your precious long-lost books.

Step 4: Spread said books out on the floor of the largest room in your house so it looks like you're re-tiling with a literary theme. Open windows and allow the poor books to breathe in the open air that wafts through. If it's winter, keep windows closed but at least let the Glade-scented inside air do its thing.

Step 5: While books are breathing, measure your wardrobe.

Step 6: Joyfully sashay to your local thrift store with the intention of making your wallet happy and the owners of the store, too, in this rotten economy. Buy stinky old bookcase.

Step 7: Rope a neighbor into hauling the bookcase home for you.

Step 8: Attack the bookcase with Clorox and sandpaper and staining supplies.

Step 9: Place your fabulous 'new' bookcase in your wardrobe.

Step 10: Load books onto the bookcase.

Step 11: See the happy books in their proper habitat.

Step 12: Close the wardrobe doors and decorate with pictures of Jane Austen, photos from various movie adaptations of novels, bookmarks, etc.

Step 13: Bask in that satisfied sense of having sheltered your babies from dust and mildew, provided a comfortable home for them with pretty aesthetics, and allowed new-found accessibility to loving readers.

Step 14: Visit occasionally and transport yourself to new worlds Lucy Pevensie-style via your new magic wardrobe.

Step 15: Buy more books!

Have you ever seen a character come to life?

2009-04-28T19:09:00.000-07:00

Remember my review of The Penderwicks? Well, if you do then you probably remember that one stand-out character was little Batty Penderwick, the youngest of the sisters, the one who constantly wore butterfly wings everywhere.

In a little bit of miscellany, I thought I'd mention that I saw Batty on the street the other day. I'm not sure if outside of Halloween and costume parties I've ever seen a little girl wearing butterfly wings, especially not on a street corner while obviously out on an afternoon walk. But there waiting for the walk signal was a tiny thing with her mother and she was wearing a pair of lavender butterfly wings! Maybe fairy wings, but still....

But I didn't even get a chance to read the book.

2009-04-25T19:06:00.000-07:00

A book caught my eye today. It was dense. I mean, it was really thick. It had a dark greyish cover, no jacket and a drawing embossed in gold coloring. The drawing, some sort of symbol, with foreign writing around it was ominous. I think I always knew whose book that was. It was J.R.R. Tolkien's work. Possibly, it was the whole Lord of the Rings series.

Don't be surprised that I'm not sure. Immediately - and I don't know why, especially as I'm far from a Tolkien expert - a thought hit me: This guy really lived. So, I put the book down. It seemed to have made its point, albeit probably not the one that's contained in the text within its covers.

Tolkien was a language-lover. It was either that or he put an awful lot of effort into something that he didn't feel a great affinity for. He was a professor, a linguist, a creator of languages, a creator of fictional worlds. That much I know. I also know that he was spiritual, a Catholic.

Now, I knew he was a writer. That he was a professor was never surprising. (I don't know if I ever knew about his piety until I was in a seminary bookshop one day and the clerk there, a young, earnest, be-spectacled seminarian, started to talk with me and leapt into a speech about Christianity in the Rings books.) But the language creation really impressed me. To make up a language seemed like such a cool thing. Language is usually organic. But here it is being made by a man, one person. That's one person soaking up the world around him, and feeding back to it his own modest contribution.

And that's the crux of this matter of living. Arguably, to live, you have to engage with the world around you. You have to take in what it offers and, in turn, give back something. I'd say creating a language fits this criteria for living. But Tolkien had more than that. His spirituality meant he believed there was more in life than the world around him. He had a cake and he ate it, too. That's life and then some. That's living.

That's sort of what I was thinking when I saw this book.

Poll results

2009-04-25T18:56:00.000-07:00

Poll results tell me readers would like more book reviews and literary ramblings. And, so, today I oblige with some of the latter; there's more of the former coming up shortly. And, of course, don't forget to check-out Book-ivorous for more book reviews, info and links. Finally, thanks for participating in the poll!

A quiz and a giveaway at Book-ivorous!

2009-04-25T09:16:00.000-07:00

Visit Book-ivorous for a quiz on the literary classic Pride and Prejudice and the chance to get entered into a drawing for a new book courtesy of Hachette Publishing!

Oh, to be young again!

2009-04-23T14:29:00.000-07:00

I've been feeding my inner child recently. Or, perhaps, I should say I've been submitting it to taste tests of different reading material geared toward little bookworms. I want to see what kind of fare is being offered to the younger age groups, but I want to do it without the pain of having to read books about vampires, or sulky, gorgeous teens whose weekly allowances exceed a year of minimum wages, or Harry Potter knock-offs.

So, having already read The Penderwicks by Jeanne Birdsall and given it a review here, I made my way to not one but two local libraries and raided the children's sections of books that I thought I might enjoy. Those are the ones I'm testing. Some test! you might say. True. But it is a test, I'd argue because our instincts can be wrong, and, indeed, I am trying a couple I have some questions about.

For instance, what's the big deal with Meg Cabot? Hats off, she's got a little dynasty going with her various series. But when I've started reading her books I've been left with...questions. For me, the books didn't have a magnetic quality that a book needs. And they're so modern. And I'm decidedly unmodern. Well, I'm using a computer now so perhaps that isn't quite true, but you get the picture. I'm still a Louisa May Alcott girl and kids these days don't seem so interested in poor Louisa.

So, I had a grand time marching into the children's room of the library yesterday (considerably warmer in atmosphere if not company - librarians can be cold, but more on that later) - and pulling Allie Finkel's Rules for Girls, Moving Day, off the shelf. I also took out The Penderwicks on Gardam Street and I await with delight the experience of reading these. Let's face it, there's just something about children's lit that grown-up lit doesn't match, some charm or something. I mean, just think of the wonderful drawings on the covers of kids' books. (Harry Potter comes in adult and children's editions and I'll take the colorful kids' editions any day; I don't care who sees me reading them on the bus!)

In addition to these two titles, I also pulled a few Magic Tree House books by Mary Pope Osborne. Just by chance, one of them happened to be the first in the series, Dinosaurs Before Dark. Finally, making its way into my to-be-read pile was Nicola and the Viscount, another creation from Meg Cabot and her endlessly-filled pot of ink.

I read Dinosaurs Before Dark last night and let me tell you, there's a reason kids love this series. I loved this book. It always seemed promising to me, the idea of a treehouse that transports kids to different times and places. But when I found out that treehouse was filled with books, well, that really got me excited. As you know, fellow reader, book-lovers love books about books. This particular one was a wonderful yarn a kid can read alone or listen to an adult read. And the adult won't get bored reading it. No wonder that kid at the library book sale kept asking me if I'd found any. Obviously, these books are good enough that the young man was willing to interrogate library patrons and hunt all over the sale to find one.

So, shortly I'll be off to read some more. I think it will be Allie Finkel. This looks like a promising series and, in the interest of being a good reading connoisseur and book blabbermouth, I figure I ought to know something about it. So, I'll let you know how it goes. Stay tuned.

This one fits right in - Review of The Penderwicks by Jeanne Birdsall

2009-04-21T16:39:00.000-07:00

It seems as though there have been very few books which fit the theme of this blog quite so well as does The Penderwicks, A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy by Jeanne Birdsall.

This delightful read had me from line 1. It's the type of children's book that I wish I saw more of these days, reminiscent of Louisa May Alcott, L.M. Montgomery, Maud Hart Lovelace, C.S. Lewis and so many others who were on the literary scene in those eras when childhood really seemed to be childlike. That is not at all to say it's out of touch. It's not to say it's childish. Far from it. This middle-grade novel presents the whimsy of a child's summer in a natural wonderland while deftly touching such subjects as death, memory, first love, sibling relationships. I enjoyed its retro-yet-timeless feel; it may have taken place a hundred years ago, so little does the garishness of twenty-first century life invade its bucolic magic.The eldest daughter in this story of four sisters actually writes letters to her friend while on vacation. Forget emails. But a computer is mentioned, and subtle details allow the reader's subconscious to know it's a contemporary story without overpowering the tale and robbing it of the kind of natural spell children's stories so often used to weave. You know, I'm talking back in the days before the A-list and Clique novels brought wetbars into kids' books. Wetbars or enchanting gardens? Which will I choose? If only all decisions in life were so easy.

The characters are believable down to the youngest, an adorably-drawn four year old who sticks to her dog and costume butterfly wings with an endearing stubborness that makes an older reader want to adopt her and a younger reader identify with her. The middle sisters are a scream. Young Jane, a budding writer, sometimes finds herself narrating her life in the third person and Skye, math whiz, has great one-liners. The eldest spends much of the book lovesick and is presented respectfully by Birdsall, who bestows the same respect on the entire cast of characters. Each is written with compassion.

I had to put the book down for a split second out of admiration when I read a passage describing the little Batty playing in a field with birds singing overhead and worms gliding through the earth below. There's an obvious love of nature present in the book, as well as a love of words. Birdsall possesses the happy ability to create place and character names which simultaneously charm and remain credible.

I have occasionally heard of children today who are described as "old-fashioned," the kind who read Anne of Green Gables or A Little Princess. If you're stumped for a new read for such a child, I suggest The Penderwicks. It deserves its place among these wonderful books.

Book-ivorous!

2009-04-20T20:40:00.000-07:00

I'm launching a new blog called Book-ivorous about - what else? - books. The new blog has a different format and will be more generalized, as well as have links to newsy tidbits on the web. I hope you're able to stop by and let me know how you like it. There are some posts up already....Enjoy!

Dream a little dream...

2009-04-18T20:26:00.000-07:00

Photo credit: nufkin at Flickr.com

What a dream this is, huh? Can the greenery be any greener? Imagine the air there! Take a big whiff and browse the bookstalls....

I found this lovely photo on flickr.com. Apparently, it's a castle in the background. Quite a little fairy-tale moment for the booklover, I'd say!

New poll!

2009-04-17T20:10:00.000-07:00

Just over to the left!

Dearest Diary... (Wherein the writer attempts Regency parlance worthy of Mr. Collins)

2009-04-11T17:59:00.000-07:00

It is with the greatest felicity that I take up my pen once again after a lengthy absence due to my being much occupied with matters of great import. Now, at last, I may fulfill the happy duty of reporting on D.A. Bonavia-Hunt's Pemberley Shades, the reading of which I have recently commenced, though not yet completed.

To sate my desire to write, I have made the decision to comment whilst I read this promising novel rather than wait for the end. Indeed, though I am just on page 24 and the story remains in expository stages, I find I have much to say.

That Elizabeth seems to me to have forgotten her modest origins - gentlemen's daughter, of course, but with a family of questionnable manners and situation - troubles me. The vicar of Pemberley has most sadly died and Mrs. Darcy, who has now a son of two years, wishes to be certain that the new vicar have no daughters of similar age; this would endanger the boy when he becomes a young man seeking a wife. Only a lady of appropriate standing will do for Richard. Thankfully, her husband, Fitzwilliam Darcy, overcame similar prejudices when choosing her as his beloved.

Mr. Darcy himself (or Fitz, as Elizabeth calls him) is his usual self, concerned with the welfare of his employees and their families. Happily, this has not changed, though it is apparent that Elizabeth has done nothing to educate Fitz on his great fortune of being - how shall I say it? - the big fish on the end of the food chain. No one is bound to ever displace a Darcy from his or her home, as is happening to the deceased vicar's daughters. The vicar gone, they must leave their childhood estate. This is a point on which my twenty-first century self feels powerful stirrings of late twentieth century feminism. Oh, to have means of one's own!

But the strength of the fidelity and partnership that the Darcys share is robustly gratifying. There is nothing on which they do not consult, a very advanced situation for their time, I think, and each appears to be defensive of the other in a manner most appealing.

I must take leave now. Until next time, when I will continue with my attempts at nineteenth century parlance...or give up and resume my modern persona, I am ever your steadfast literary servant, etc. etc.,

Jemima

Thanks to Danielle from Sourcebooks for the review copy of Pemberley Shades.

Happy Birthday Miep Gies!

2009-02-14T15:34:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow is Miep Gies's 100th birthday. Gies helped hide Anne Frank and the others in the Secret Annex during WWII and has, by the accounts I've read, always remained loyal and modest about it. I find her so courageous and principled, very admirable. And that this member of that circle of friends is still here today is wonderful and amazing. So here's a big shout out to Miep Gies:

Happy Birthday!!!

Check this out :-) And some advice...

2009-02-14T08:42:00.000-08:00

I hope you had a chance to read my Q&A with Lost for Words author, Lorelei Mathias. But I forgot to put something in and I'm a little ashamed of myself and - OUCH! (Note to the wise: If you forget to do something and, thus, the whole 'slapping yourself on the hand' thing comes to mind, DON'T actually do it! It hurts.)

So I'm popping in today and just wanted to let you know that Lorelei has a really fun site of her own where you can read about her books, her articles and play videos! Here's a link. Enjoy!

Charity Girl by Georgette Heyer - A review

2009-02-01T16:48:00.000-08:00

Alas, blood is not thicker than water, after all. At least this seems to be the case for Charity Steane, the unfortunate young woman whose father is dead and who has been thrust into the care of her mean relatives. Unable to bear her life with the Bugles, she runs away and is rescued en route to London by Viscount Desford who takes it upon himself to find a better life for Cherry, as she likes to be called.

Georgette Heyer's novel, the second that I've read, is light and frothy. At times it gets a bit longwinded but you can always count on a character to clarify a situation for you and that can be greatly appreciated, as anyone knows who reads books that simply don't make their plots clear. Now who's that? Why's he there, not in London? How'd she get out of that scrape? Characters explain themselves which can be either tedious or helpful, depending on the reader's temperament. Consequently, you could shave off a great deal of this novel and retain the whole plot and even most of the characterization (which, by the way, is done very well.)

There's no real way to emphasize how light this novel is; it's lighter than air or even helium. And it's without that shoe and shopping mania, that man-crazy female theme that so many of today's 'chick-lit' novels aspire to. Say you're drinking champagne. This is the bubble that tickles your nose. Non-alcoholic.

And the characters are loveable, particularly Cherry and Desford and, later, Hetta and Simon. Reading Georgette Heyer's work astutely, the reader realizes that it wouldn't be all fun and games living in Regency England, despite the frothiness of the tales. This becomes obvious when you consider lives from the minor characters' viewpoints, or at least when you consider how vulnerable they are to those on whom they rely. If it's Desford and Hetta being relied on, no problem. The major characters that populate this novel are loveable for a reason, not least of which is their decency.

So why is it that water is thicker than blood? I won't tell you. Why would I want to spoil it?

Thanks to Danielle at Sourcebooks for this complimentary review copy.

Yea! A Q&A! - Lorelei Mathias

2009-02-01T08:33:00.000-08:00

Lorelei Mathias is the author of two novels Step on It, Cupid and Lost for Words. After reading the lovely Lost for Words, a romantic tale of a slush pile reader, her literary discovery and her love-life, I emailed Ms. Mathias with a question and was very pleased to receive her thoughtful response. And I am so pleased now, as well, to present this Q&A, made possible through the magic of email (as were my previous Q&As). If you're looking for a frothy, romantic read for Valentine's Day, the kind that doesn't insult sensibilities or intelligence, Lost for Words may be for you. (Meanwhile, I'm going to look forward to Step on It, Cupid!) Thanks so much to Ms. Mathias for her thoughtful answers! Reader, enjoy!

GBBS: If you could, which literary fictional character would you date?

LM: Septimus Hodge in 'Arcadia' by Tom Stoppard. It's a play, but he's just the most dashing, intellectual hero of all in my opinion. He's classic Byronic hero in looks, and genius in mind. Oh and he's a great dancer too - he's got it all!

GBBS: What is the one book you'd take to a deserted island?

LM: War and Peace. It's so long, so I’d be getting the most out of my one and only book. And it's also one I've not yet got round to reading, but always wanted to!

GBBS: What's your preferred method of book-buying -- internet or old-fashioned bookstores?

LM: I'm a total luddite, so I'd say old-fashioned book stores all the way. There's so much more magic in browsing through old shelves and being surrounded by them than just staring at a screen! My favourite bookshop in the world is 'Shakespeare and Co' in Paris - it's wonderfully chaotic and romantic and dusty...

GBBS: Which writer is so great that it's hard to tear yourself away from his/her writing so you can get stuff done?

LM: Ian McEwan

GBBS: Lost for Words possesses a big sense of fun while declining to stoop to the questionable language and situations of so much chick-lit. Is this a reflection of your preferred brand of writing?

LM: I guess so - I don’t actually read that much chick-lit per se but I do know that the genre often gets slated for being trashy. I don’t know if I succeed in this but I do try to write books that are entertaining but also make you think – so it’s not just literary popcorn, but perhaps chick-lit with a brain… Even though all my books are romantic at heart, I also try and make them books about ideas too, and a bit more nourishing in some way (!). In both my novels there is usually an intellectual pursuit running along side the romantic strand. In Step on It, Cupid Amelie has an ad campaign to come up with, so it’s as much a journey of ideas as it is romantic. Similarly, in my latest, Lost for Words, Daisy is drowning in a slush-pile and is helping a struggling author get published. I’m told my readers enjoy learning about both these industries, (a number of fans have written to tell me they now want to work in advertising or publishing as a result, which is sweet!) So yeah, I like to hope that my readers get more than just escapist buzz from my books, and they’re not (entirely) brain dead when they turn the last page!

GBBS: Are you writing anything new? Any possible sneak-peaks, by chance?

LM: Yes, I've got two ideas on the go at the moment. One's a non-fiction piece but is on a backburner while I focus on the novel. The novel has a much more complex plot than my last two so it's taking a lot longer to do! It's all about a group of friends joined together by weirdly similar circumstances - in some ways it's also a modern spin on John Hughes' classic 80's movie The Breakfast Club. I can't say much more about it than that though for now!

Here she goes talking about movies again!

2009-01-26T10:38:00.000-08:00

Just saw Inkheart, based on the young adult novel by Cornelia Funke, and quite enjoyed it! I stopped reading the book when I was well into it because it was so dark, but it was obviously written by a booklover and that sort of persuaded me to like it anyway. The trailer looked good so I thought I'd give it a try.

I can't believe Cornelia Funke wrote the book with Brendan Fraser in mind and was then actually able to get him for the movie! It reminds me of Colin Firth and the Bridget Jones books and movies.

The movie is interesting because it obviously takes place today but one wonders why Folchart, Fraser's character, doesn't just place an ad on Craigslist or something for the book he's seeking. Of course, then we wouldn't get to see the beautiful Swiss village book market and so much would be taken away from the story. Adding to the story's odd placement in time and geography, is Helen Mirren's beautiful wardrobe which seems to come out of the 1930s. It's these different cues the audience gets from the film (when to place it? where to place it? why there? whey then?) that bring to it some of the ambiguity which makes it so storybookish.

Jim Broadbent is wonderfully bumbling as the writer. After seeing him play the professor in Narnia who could expect anything else? Dustfinger isn't anything like I imagined him which would have been a sort of a younger, shiftier Danny Devito. Instead, he's tall and blond, sensitive and conflicted. The young actress playing Meggie is engaging, one might even say captivating, and personifies well the question mark her wandering life seems to be.

A warning is due that this movie can be quite dark and is not for the very young. But what booklover could resist such a story?

A little recycling

2009-01-02T20:25:00.000-08:00

On my old blog, Bookspring, I used to post under a heading called Musings every once in a while. I've decided to bring one particular bit of Musings back as I've noticed that people are now talking about what I mentioned there three years ago. Laura Miller touches on childhood versus adulthood reading in her book, The Magician's Book and an article byMichelle Slatalla in The New York Times is entirely devoted to the issue. So, since it seems to be one of the literary topics of the day and since I seem to have been the one of the early birds on this band wagon, I'll re-post here my musings from October 4, 2005.

Musings

I wonder. Why is reading such a different experience as an adult than it is as a child? Children put their imaginations to use so skillfully when reading. As an adult, I'm not sure I have ever been so engrossed in a novel as I was when I was a child reading Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I'm quite sure I have never read a book in a single afternoon at the library as I did with one of Beverly Cleary's wonderful children's chapter books.

I still love to read, but it is a different experience. A book can interest me, even absorb me, but still not fully envelop me.

Recently, I had been longing to read a great book, the kind of book that makes you feel like you've been sucked into an alternate universe. So, of course, I was on the look-out for one. One day when I was downtown I managed to find a popular book on the shelf of the library. I began reading the book across the street on the terrace of a restaurant, shaded from the sun by a large umbrella over my table. The book, Girl With the Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier, is a story about a Dutch maid in the painter Vermeer's household during the 17th century. It was intriguing. Despite its stains and tattered condition it was good company. Whenever I left the book I found myself wanting to return to it. But it still wasn't the consuming experience of my childhood. That seems no longer possible.

And, yet, I wonder. Is it the same for all adults? If a person is never encouraged to read as a child, has he missed the only opportunity in life for such an experience? What is reading like for a person who only became a bookworm as an adult? I read raves about books on a literarature-related website I frequent and I wonder how those readers seem to still have the experiences that ended for me as youth did.

Maybe it's just the cynicism of adulthood, the lack of being able to suspend disbelief. Maybe it's chemical - perhaps there is a biological reason children get so absorbed in books and not adults. We live too much on the surface, as has been said. I don't know.

Reading continues to give me pleasure. It provides me with entertainment and information. I recommend it. But, still, I wonder.

The Magician's Book, A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia by Laura Miller - Comments and a Review

2008-12-27T19:14:00.000-08:00

The Magician's Book, A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia by Laura Miller is the author's reflections on and reminiscences about reading CS Lewis's Narnia books with a lot of history and literary criticism thrown in. A quote from Anne Lamott on the front inside flap praises the book and states "I couldn't put it down."

I had to put it down. But that was just for a while. I was glad when I picked it up again and continued to hear alternate views on the famous children's author. Many people are familiar with the kindly picture of CS Lewis as an Oxford don who would reply to the children who wrote fan letters to him about his Chronicles of Narnia. So often in life, where there's a good side seen by the world there is often a less appealing underside. At least, there are those who like to talk about an underside. And whether you feel their version of the story is accurate is up to you. Perhaps that's why so many biographies are subtitled 'a life.' It's person A's account of another's existence. Person B may write another very different account. Same subject, different lives - life A and life B.

I had heard about CS Lewis's life A: the curmudgeon who converted to Christianity, wrote apologetics for the faith, created a beloved series of kids' books, taught at Cambridge and Oxford and is criticized for his treatment of females in the Chronicles. I hadn't heard of CS Lewis the raunchy incredibly human (ie, flawed) man of life B. Sadomasochistic feelings?

But such a, once more, human depiction of Lewis I was not prepared for. Indeed, more human than one would want it to be. I put the book down; it was too much to absorb at once. Miller does an excellent job painting this layered and complex picture of a real person. This is not a fawning paean to the man, but Miller does give credit when she feels it's due. She goes into Lewis's childhood, a necessity to explain the adult he was, and indepth into the histories of his friend Tolkien and other readers of the Chronicles.

That's perhaps one of the most interesting things about this criticism/memoir/
biography. Hearing about Tiffany's and Pam's experiences as readers of the Chronicles, voices that may have been unheard on this subject if not for their inclusion in this book, is a great part of the pleasure of reading it. Then there are the readers who became famous authors in their own right, like Neil Gaiman, Susanna Clarke and Jonathan Franzen. These many personal accounts of how Lewis affected their young lives and had effects on their older lives are quite interesting.

Miller's own experiences make for an absorbing first few chapters. Then, for a Narnia lover, there's the shock of so much criticism of Lewis: he never matured (an assertion by others that Miller references rather than makes herself), he liked risque stories and jokes, he had sadomasochistic feeling (which he, Miller states, fought), he was snobby. And for each of these assertions Miller makes her case by providing ample background information and weaving it into a readable story with some clever and effective turns of phrase.

Lovers of Lewis will be miffed. Haters will be satisfied. General interest readers will be engaged save for a few dry spots which they may be inclined to gloss over, although information will be lost by doing such.

I am now looking forward to one day reading a literary response to this book. I have six pages of notes. Perhaps I'll write it.

Thanks to Hachette for this complementary review copy.

Hey, it's just a story!

2008-12-25T01:19:00.000-08:00

After a brief sabbatical during which I read Anelli's Harry, A History, I am back to reading Miller's The Magician's Book. How different they are! Anelli's book is a paean to all Potter things Rowling-approved. Miller's is genuine criticism in the personal and literary senses.

I keep finding things I want to write about as I read the book. So, on the heels of my humble self-correction below, I thought I'd go back to criticizing.

Consider this sentence from page 158 in the chapter entitled Blood Will Out.

"[The Narnia stories] take place in a dream world where talking beavers bake marmalade rolls despite having no surplus goods to trade for oranges and sugar, commodities that can only have been imported from a warmer land."

Miller then goes on to make several points about the illogical logistics of Lewis's "slapdash creation."

We are talking about children's fiction are we not, or did I miss something? Miller seems to be taking apart the world of Narnia - the fictional world of Narnia - the way a Trekkie dissects the United Federation of Planets. Only for a Star Trek fan that makes sense since it's meant to be thoughtfully considered, a safe way to comment on the real life we all live through the safety of fantasy. I doubt that when Lewis called his story a "supposal" of an alternate world he meant for readers to nit-pick about where ingredients for baked goods came from for Mrs Beaver. He was probably talking about more weighty, theological matters. If you're going to critique so far as the most minute aspects of daily fictional life for these characters, perhaps you've lost the Narnia forest for the talking trees.

Miller's readable prose does reveal some things about Lewis that, perhaps, we'd rather not know. Perhaps. So maybe I should be grateful for these silly asides which take the focus away from weightier issues like sado-masochism and prejudice. After all, it did give me material for another post. And the reference to marmalade rolls did provide delicious imagery. But, hey, this truly belongs under the 'it's just a story' heading.

Oops! A correction...

2008-12-25T00:25:00.000-08:00

Perhaps it's the congenial spirit of the season or perhaps it's months of linguistic study - probably it's just the desire to set a wrong to right - but I want to amend something I made quite a snobby little point of last year when I reviewed a book called Me and Mr Darcy by Alexandra Potter.

How can Potter write Me and Mr Darcy, I asked? Not only is there vulgarity contained within this novel, the author has the grammar wrong! My, what a snotty-nosed little critic I was!

Well...my mistake!

After all, why not Me and Mr Darcy? Do you see a verb there? I don't see a verb there. For all I knew or know this phrase has been picked out of a sentence in which it functions as an object, like, That nervy blogger is writing about me and Mr Darcy, again - a sentence in which 'me and Mr Darcy' is the object of the preposition 'about.'

Oh, Ms Smith - fourth grade English teacher - I should have known better! Did you not teach me grammar if not modesty and sense? With hubris I entered adulthood and stayed there for quite a while culminating in a moment of public criticism in which I implied that this author, poor Ms Potter, doesn't have a proper hold on sentence construction! Like it even matters!

Obviously, if the narrator of the book were saying 'Me and Mr Potter got a thrashing from that blogger again,' then the grammar must be amended by changing the objective 'me' to the nominative 'I.' (And maybe you would want to transpose the two subjects for the sake of politeness.) But who cares?

First, this is the stuff children's grammar lessons are made of. Why pick into such a trivial thing when commenting on a novel, especially when point number two is coming right up. That is, why criticize a paperback with the charge of rudeness when all you have is a noun phrase floating around on its cover? Grammarians of the world, you're obviously not reading my blog if you let that go.

So, I hope I've shown proper contrition for my presumptuous assertion of last year.

One last thing: I may have given off the itsy-bitsy teeny-tiny little suggestion that the book's not very fun. - Oops. - It was actually quite entertaining if a bit bawdy.

To add to my Goodreads bookshelf or not - That is the question or, I didn't read the whole book. My bad.

2008-12-22T23:05:00.000-08:00

I had big expectations for Harry, A History, The True Story of a Boy Wizard, His Fans, and Life Inside the Harry Potter Phenomenon by Melissa Anelli. But I 'read' only half of it and skimmed the rest. Now I'm left with a dilemma: Do I add it to my Goodreads bookshelf or not?

While I've only read two of the Harry Potters, I have always been intrigued by the Potter phenomenon. I follow the magazine articles. I watch the news segments on television. I was there at midnight for the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows release. I respect the love readers have for the series even if I don't quite fully understand the fanaticism which at times can seem a bit odd. But let me not sell myself short; I like odd. I prefer to think I am a little odd.

So when I say that the Potter phenomenon intrigues me I do not mean the way a med student specializing in psychiatry is 'intrigued' by his first patient. No, Potterology is fun. But I have found the actual Potter books too dark which helps to explain why I haven't read them all. Imagine a baseball fan who likes all the accoutrements of the game - hotdogs in the stands, the hats, three-quarter length sleeve shirts with a big number on the back, the crack of the bat, the sports column - but for some reason can't make it through an actual game. That's me. At least that's me in reference to Harry Potter. (And baseball, too.)

It's perhaps because of this that I pooped out when reading Anelli's book; it was too detailed for me and better suited to die-hard fans. I had hoped for more of a balance between Anelli's life and Potter stuff, that the book would be about where the two converge. So it was this in-depth reportage, or the knowledge that I had many, many books on my to-be-read-list, or the fact that it was about 2 o'clock in the morning and I still had half the book to go that made me zip throught the last chapters. I also skipped the chapter entitled Rocking at Hogwarts - not literary enough. I'm tough to please.

Technically, I haven't read the entire book. I think it's wise to skip now what I might find very engaging after having read the Potter series. But I feel so familiar with this book that my urge to share my opinion MUST be satisfied. Furthermore, I want to place it on my Goodreads list. I wanna! I wanna! I wanna! I wanna! So I guess I will.

Before I head there to do that, though, here's a few thoughts. I read a comment online that went something like this: 'At least now I know I'm not the only nerd out there!' But it sounded so mean.

I'll acknowledge, the fervor and ardour with which Anelli and her Potter-mates treat the series seems, um, unusual. But Anelli makes a good point on page 209. She states of the fans, her friends, that,

"All of us led other lives...with families who didn't understand how we could love anything as much as we loved Harry Potter, who even, at times, made fun of us...but then would spend six hours shouting themselves hoarse at a football match, and five after that shouting themselves hoarse at each other as they discussed the same game."

It's true, isn't it? People can recite the score of the '56 World Series of baseball and who ran how many home runs in the same game. Culturally, this is okay. But somehow fervent discussion of Harry Potter makes you a nerd. Painting your face the colors of your football team is okay. But dressing like Hermione isn't.

Anelli's account of her own passion for Potter, the detail with which she relates the purchase of the fifth book in the series, the way she felt with the book in her hands, her dedication to the Potter website she devotes so much time to all seem to be unusual things to 'fess up to if, for instance, she were trying out for most popular girl in homeroom. But it's refreshing and lovely to hear someone speak so freely about their love for a 'nerdy' subject; quite obviously, it comes from the heart. Brave. Or naive. Perhaps Anelli has no idea how she might sound to some. It's wonderful to hear someone reveal in such an unabashed way parts of her personality that others would hide, that people who never grow past their high school snobbery wouldn't understand.

Here is the power of much of the book, the confessional, honest tone it has. More personal moments and fewer dry facts may have kept me reading. (But, then again, so may have more familiarity with the series on my part.)

I wonder as I wander or, I'm pensive as I peruse

2008-12-21T17:58:00.000-08:00

The Magician's Book, A Skeptic's Adventures in Narnia by Laura Miller is a weighty piece of literary criticism, not in the sense of being so scholarly that a casual reader wouldn't want to approach it, but rather because it calls into question a figure from children's literature who is very dear to many. This is, of course, the author of the Narnia books, C.S. Lewis.

To a lot of people, Lewis seems to be a curmudgeonly figure from history, a kindly and nearly lifelong bachelor who wrote stories for children and responded when his young fans penned letters to him, a man who literally wrote the book on Christianity (or at least a really famous one) with his Mere Christianity, a sort of meditation on and explanation of his faith.

Certainly, this image is preferable to the flawed individual who emerges from the pages of the first half of The Magician's Book. There's nothing new in being imperfect. Most of us know we all belong to that club. But a benign and almost purified light is so often thrown on Lewis. The tales of Narnia are moving and lovable and crystallize so much of what we imagine Lewis to have been; it is, therefore, difficult to stomach an ambivalent take on the spinner of these tales.

As a lover of Narnia I think I am not alone in wishing that Miller's book could be a happier criticism of the series. Not being a Lewis scholar I am not qualified to say which view of Clive Staples is the more accurate one. I can only express the heaviness that is causing me to put aside this book for a time while I recoup my fortitude for the rest of it. A fun romp through a reader's imagination would have been more fun.

But it wouldn't necessarily have been more thought-provoking. So I must acknowledge that the issues brought up thus far in my reading of this book (like prejudice, misogyny, crafting a story that spreads religious doctrine) are important to discuss. And they are discussed well; that is, they are thoughtfully represented, appear professionally researched and spiced up with references to works of literature and talks with readers and writers. In addition, the author delivers what she promises in the subtitle; she tells us of her relationship with the Narnia books - her Narnia adventures - as she gives us a memoir of this significant portion of her reading life. Readers like to read about readers, so this is most welcome.

The title of Miller's book does identify her as a skeptic, so it should come as little surprise to anyone that there is criticism here. And this, I have found in scanning reviews from other sites and blogs, has prompted bloggers to caution Narnia lovers that they may not want to read The Magician's Book lest it affect their own further experiences of the Chronicles.

How can anyone dare to say that any particular book is one not to be read or, conversely, must be read? We can just guide a little, give some suggestions. And keep in mind any suggestions I give are based on my thoughts at the midpoint of Miller's book. So let me tell you this way, if I were talking about pastry I'd say don't expect meringue; realize that it's more like fruit cake. Be prepared to eat, taste and digest. And then do it again.

And when I do it again, I'll be back with my final thoughts on The Magician's Book.

Thanks to Hachette for this complimentary review copy.

A couple of unimportant thoughts have occurred to me...

2008-12-20T20:12:00.000-08:00

and I've decided I'd share them.

On movies...

All right. After reading a post on one of the sites I regularly peruse, I discovered that the 1970s version of Little Women I usually snobbily eschew was actually an entire mini-series. It starred Meredith Baxter (of Bridget Loves Bernie) , Susan Dey (of the Partridge Family) , Eve Plumb (of The Brady Bunch) and William Shatner (of Star Trek), as well as others. Now, when I had first heard that there had been an adaptation with Baxter and Dey I wasn't impressed. As much I had enjoyed The Partridge Family, there was something unexciting about seeing Laurie portraying characters that had such an essence of their own. It's like I thought that somehow these actresses would carry their sitcom roles into Little Women with them and drown the nineteenth century New England characters in 1970s schmaltz.

But here's the thing: It had occurred to me years and years ago that Little Women should be made into a mini-series. Since I'm partial to British productions I thought, the uniquely American nature of Little Women notwithstanding, that they would ideally be the ones to film it. They do it so well and well is how I wanted to see it done.

I'd love to see a new production of Little Women, despite the fact that I have liked all the previous ones I've seen. But as I doubt that any producers are reading my blog and thinking, This Jemima person really wants a new film so, gee whiz, let's go out and make a movie!, I'm thinking I'll have to settle for the new-to-me 70s version. And you know what? I watched a couple of clips online and it looks good! I'm even getting enthusiastic about the era of the production. It will be fun to see these actors in these roles, like seeing good friends in their old home movies, except the production values look quite nice in this production. And, really, schmaltz or not, those 70s shows were good.

Further on movies...

Just in case any producers are out there reading my blog, I'd like to pitch a film idea. Starving writer with baby in tow writes novel amidst the clattering cafe's of Edinburgh, nervily sends her manuscript in to fledlging publisher, and a literary star is born.

No, of course I didn't just make that up. That's the J.K. Rowling story. But reading a new book called Harry, A History, The True Story of a Boy Wizard, His Fans, And Life Inside the Harry Potter Phenomenon by Melissa Anelli, the account of the birth of the Harry books seemed new to me and I thought, What a great story! This is going to be filmed someday when we're all old! So, golly gee, I wanted everyone to know: I THOUGHT OF IT, FIRST! And to the Harry Potter people, two things: (1) You're welcome, and (2) Remember, it's J-E-M-I-M-A at GBBS. (I'm available for screenwriting, as well.)

Comments on The Reluctant Widow by Georgette Heyer

2008-12-16T18:38:00.000-08:00

I closed this book with a sigh. It was a heartily sighed sigh. It was a swoony sigh. Well, I had just finished a Georgette Heyer novel, so I suppose it was the appropriate sigh.

This is not a book you tell an Oxford don you're reading. It's not one they'd understand. You wouldn't tell your intellectually snobby friends either. They'd tease you.

But do not make the mistake of thinking this is a badly written book. No, no, dear reader; this is a picture painted with skill and clarity. I recognize these characters. Some might say they're recycled from other works of fiction on screen or even the page. They might be right. They probably are. But it's not easy to reconstruct in print a celluloid character. And even if other writers' pens have created such personalities, the subsequent author can't just say, "You know, this character is a fop. Think Stephen Fry as Oscar Wilde." The author has to apply the dyed oils to the canvas with dexterity. And Heyer does this well. Take the character Nicky, an endearing upper-crust university student more interested in fun than scholarship. He's a cousin, of sorts, to the title character and, here, gives her a compliment.

"By Jove, Cousin Elinor, if that gown is not the most bang-up thing I ever saw! You look all the crack!"

Now, c'mon. Don't you know just by this utterance what sort of character, or caricature, we're dealing with? Yeah, it's over the top. And I certainly don't know if anyone ever spoke like that, but it does paint that picture, does it not?

The Reluctant Widow is a Regency mystery with a touch of romance about a woman who becomes entangled with a likeable upperclass family when she gets into the wrong carriage at the inn where her stage-coach has dropped her off. Thus begins a story of humor and intrigue and some ineptitude (Nicky has a big role.)

The book, written in the 1940s, may or may not be accurate when it comes to language, but the author does seem to know a couple of things about the Regency period, dropping phrases like phaeton and nuncheon, and sometimes using the singular form of the verb 'do' in constructions where today we would use 'does.'

There are copious descriptions of meals and one does not mind spending a day with the personages populating the book. They are ensconced in the cozy estate of Highnoons and seem to enjoy each other's company. I did want, however, more chemistry between the two who are meant for each other, and some romance sooner, too. That, in my opinion was desperately wanting.

Why then did I sigh so swooningly at its conclusion? Well, because that's when Heyer unveiled the real romantic parts. Don't get excited; it's just a proposal. But it's lovely. I would have liked more adventure, too, than the brief bit we get, similarly, toward the end of the book. (The widow can drive a phaeton like Danica Patrick drives a race car.) And I have some scruples about the ethics of the main characters after the resolution of the mystery but, remember, they're likeable.

It's not surprising that Heyer has a reputation of being a bodice-ripping writer. The heroine's "bosom" had already "swelled" twice by page 75. But this was to show her indignation and nothing else. An odd way to express it, but whatever. If you like this brand of word play, you might well, indeed, enjoy The Reluctant Widow.

You just might find it's a bang-up thing.

Thanks to Sourcebooks for this complementary review copy.

Just a bit off-topic (but just a bit)

2008-12-15T05:10:00.000-08:00

Last weekend, I watched the supposedly last in a series of adventure movies starring Noah Wylie, Bob Newhart (yes, Bob Newhart in an adventure series) and Jane Curtin. Called The Librarian: The Curse of the Judas Chalice, it intrigued me because of (you guessed it!) the librarian angle. That and adventure are not often paired. Now, I had heard of the first movie when it began, missed it and had forgotten about it. I had no idea that there was now a series, though I fairly bounced with enthusiasm when I found out it was still around.

Well, I'm smitten. Not so very smitten that I don't see flaws, but bitten and smitten by the idea of a librarian with the derring-do of Flynn (Wylie's character) who is a bit nerdy but awfully capable of holding his own quite impressively in brain work and physical encounters. What an idea! And to think it saw the light of day as a television film. I can't imagine that is this day and age of gritty gore, where writers seem to sit around tables in passionate discussion about how they can bring disturbing images into their programs, that such a film could be a feature (i.e. cinema) film. That it was produced on TV, the haven of grit and gore, is unbelievable. As far as cinema is concerned, it doesn't seem to have the modern-day uber-adult quality required for that venue.

So it seems a bit anachronistic in that sense. But it was made. And, it was made three times at that. Somewhere out there someone seems to need some old-fashioned action-adventure-mystery. I can't vouch for the first two films as the Judas Chalice is all I've seen. But this third installment, despite its flaws - some might quibble with the revival of Cold War overtones (after all, why isn't it the Americans who seek the chalice's strength and rejuvenatory qualities?) - it seems so innocent.

Though there's blood and darkness, it's relatively sanitized and it's all done in such a fantastical context - truly it's a fantasy - that it does not have the same effect a crime drama has. It's the kind of film that used to be made and taken semi-seriously, enough that people were willing to suspend their disbelief for a while for the fun of the ride; nowadays, we're just too sophisticated, aren't we? We laugh at such childish things. We've internalized coolness so much, made it such a mainstay of our personalities that we don't even realize it. We don't see when it's rearing its ugly head and preventing us from betraying our other more realistic qualities. Isn't genuineness so much nicer?

Now, the Judas Chalice, at least, was a bit intense for younger viewers, a bit too scary and a bit too sexy at one point. It could use some tweaking to get its target demographic decided. But I like the mixture of the childlike and the grown-up, so I wouldn't want it to be made too slickly and strictly just for one personality type.

And, in smaller ways, making this movie charming was the retro clothing, Wylie's sense of humor, the thoughtful ending, the direction of Jonathan Frakes and simply just the aforementioned concept of a swashbuckling librarian. It's so seldom that a successful Hollywood star makes a throwback of a film like this that kudos go out to Wylie, though I have no idea if making a throwback was, indeed, his intention.

So, there it is, off topic a bit but still within the realm of bookishness. Now why hasn't a series of paperback adventures begun?

Rambling post

2008-12-12T18:47:00.000-08:00

Here begins the ramble:

I'm reading and reading and reading. And yet, there's so much more to read! Sort of a luxurious problem to have, really. I'm not complaining, just trying to muster up the speedy reading of my youthful days from so many, many years ago. I could wax poetic about the slowing-down that my brain has done in its adulthood, but I'm not in the mood to rhapsodize about minutia, oddly enough.

I just sort of felt like chatting about some of the books I've got going now. I'm feeling pretty solid now, like one of those tennis players steadily winning game after game within a set and pumping fist victoriously in air rallying herself onwards. I mean I just finished The Journal of Helene Berr and, before that, a foreign language book (yea!), and prior to that Giants by John Stauffer; so, I'm on a roll. Game won.

Right now, I'm reading My Lady of Cleves, A Novel of Henry VIII and Anne of Cleves by Margaret Campbell Barnes and my first ever Georgette Heyer, The Reluctant Widow! I shall soon have the latter finished and ready for comment. Shortly thereafter, My Lady, will be appearing on these "pages" with its own commentary. These two were review copies from Sourcebooks and things are looking pretty good for them. I'm very intrigued by developments in Widow, (is it a ghost story?), and am finding the account of Elinor's settling in to her new home quite pleasingly cozy.

So, what else is there? Dum-di-dum (taps fingers while thinking) - Oh yes! I haven't discussed my like/dislike relationship with used books yet. I tend to love to go into used book fairs, buy a bunch, and then end up giving them away since I love a clean, crisp book rather than dog-eared copies that who knows who has taken into the bathroom with them. Please understand, I think it's wonderful that people recycle their books and that out-of-print copies are available in used bookstores and through ABEbooks, etc. But I'm a bit squeamish and that squeamishness generally ends up getting the better of me. There are exceptions of course like the one dollar Gone With the Wind I got from the year it came out, though it's not worth anything. Believe me, I checked.

Despite, these ambivalent feelings I could not resist buying two used books for one dollar each the other night. One, called Lenten Lands, by Douglas Gresham, is about CS Lewis. The other, is Charles J. Shields Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee, which I've been wanting to read. My justification for these purchases was that if I were to take them out of the library I would probably end up owing a fine of more than the dollar I paid for each and, thus, good economics allowed me to freely buy them with good conscience. And, judging by my recent $7.50 library fines, I was right.

About those fines, I feel so ashamed. What a waste. There is, at least, one consolation. And that is that the fines go to that wonderful establishment so important to individuals and societies in so very many different ways, the public library. So, instead of being ashamed, maybe I can consider myself a noble patron of the arts because of my fines? Yeah, I'm going with that.

So, now I've extolled the virtues of the public library system, supported it financially, discussed literature and used an athletic metaphor. Job done tonight.

Here ends the ramble.

It depends!

2008-12-12T18:33:00.000-08:00

Thank you so much to all who participated in the latest poll! The unanimous verdict seems to be that music may, or may not, be an enjoyable part of bookstore visits. Everyone picked the 'It depends' choice. I find my readers are a most diplomatic group, indeed!

On translation of texts

2008-12-01T21:11:00.000-08:00

The translation of literary works is not an issue I've seen discussed too often in periodicals and sites about books. But reading The Journal of Helene Berr has made me think about it.

Do you translate the exact words that are on the page or do you translate the essence of what is being said? In other words, do you translate the letter of the language or the spirit of the language? Probably, you do both. If so, how do you strike the balance? I imagine you do it gingerly and with great sensitivity.

Translation does not get a lot of attention and translators don't get a lot of press, but when the last English version of War and Peace came out I think translators got a moment in the sun. I heard the translators interviewed on the radio (NPR, probably) and, if I remember correctly, they talked about that delicate process of conveying same nuances in the new language as exist in the original. Sounds like a job requiring a love of the intracies of language and the discussion of such.

I may not have thought too much about this whole issue of translation if I hadn't been struck particulary by one sentence in Helene Berr's book and generally by her impressive skill with language. On page 94 of the edition which was released in the United States this October, a sentence appears which if I am right may contain a misplaced modifier - the placement in a sentence of an adjective or other modifier which creates ambiguous meaning. This is the way the sentence reads in the translation:

"My sense is that the irrevocable is coming to pass; I don't know if I'll ever see any of the people who are leaving me again."

Here, my question is with the word 'again.' Does the sentence mean 'I don't know if I'll ever see any of the people again who are leaving me?' Or does it mean, 'I don't know if I'll ever see any of the people who are leaving me now as they have left me before?' No indications are given in the text to assume the second. The first is highly sensible and it is what I assume was meant. But it makes me ask, why would a skilled translator decide, in a sentence which expresses such a clear idea, to place a modifier in a spot which creates so obviously such ambiguity? My question is not a criticism of the translator, David Bellos, but a sincere example of curiosity. Was there something ambiguous in the original French that prompted this? And, if so, why was there no footnote to acknowledge this for the confused reader?

I think this question could prompt a lovely discussion on the translation of texts. If only one could find a translator with whom to discuss it!

New poll!

2008-12-01T20:57:00.001-08:00

I've added a new poll. And this one has to do with bookstore music. It was prompted by a discussion I found on another site's forum which I ran across and which suddenly brought to my attention that not everyone likes music in bookstores. I'd never thought about it. And then recently I heard a complaint in a bookstore, something about "rubbish" and "blaring." So, what side of this contentious issue do you fall on? Feel free to comment, too.

Where I discuss a unique verbal expressiveness (but use a lot of cliches to do it)

2008-12-01T19:16:00.000-08:00

I'm reading The Journal of Helene Berr which is, as its name indicates, the diary of a woman named Helene. She is a real person who lived and died and wrote during the second World War and I'm a little over a third of the way through this disturbing personal account of the Holocaust. Helene is very endearing to any lover of words and literature; her life centers around her university community and books, as well as music and, of course, the devastating events of the times in which she lives. It is a quick read, very conversational. Helene has an effective way with language; hard-to-express ideas are conveyed precisely and with deceptive ease. She hits the nail on the head but with a light touch. (I don't know how much of this is due to the fact that the journal has been translated from French - was the writing as expressive in the original? - but the translation factor will be discussed in another post.)

Those times at which we experience an ephemeral feeling or thought, the kind that dissolves in your mind the way a snowflake dissolves on your palm, it can be difficult to find words to express what we have just gone through. It may be harder, though less fanciful, than catching lightning in a bottle. But Helene seems to have the touch for it. I have found at least three instances of phrasing that have the power to make me put my book down, stare off, and think.

Consider these three.

On page 83, Helene talks about the odd way a person's perceptions change from night to day. After describing some of the horrible things that have occurred, Helene writes,

"It grabbed me in the dark, but it never comes to me during the day. In the daytime, life forms a crust on top of thought."

Just a lovely example of the kind of simplicity she employs to convey a complex thought. If it were me writing in my journal I might just say, 'You know how things seems different in the day than in the night? It's like that.' Helene writes abundantly better.

Then there's the example on pages 78-79 in which she describes truly fathoming her current circumstances and then, suddenly, losing the sensation. She writes of realizing what she already knew - that her father was imprisoned - upon reading his correspondence from the internment camp.

"But it hit me when I reread passages from his postcard...I realized how empty his new life was...Yet as I looked at the postcard I still could not grasp the reality....And now I've lost it again. No, I've got it now, suddenly in the dark: between the Papa of home and the one out there who wrote this postcard, a gap is yawning open."

She records her thinking process as it happens and does it in a way that makes you feel you're watching the thoughts in her mind.

Finally, that feeling that you have when things aren't going well and what was friendly and loved by you previously is friendly no longer, she describes in a passage on page 82 about her family's garden.

"...the rest of the garden lived its separate life, as it must do when we are not there. I can no longer manage to commune with it, to feel that it loves me and welcomes me. It has become almost indifferent."

So the garden is unfeeling or, rather, it has only apathy; it grows in bad times as well as good. But also it bears the personality which we imprint onto it, not necessarily one of its own; so what is a lovely and happy thing to us one day, is not lovely or happy the next and what enriches our lives at one moment does nothing for us the following moment.

It can be difficult to read such well-done writing as this. It's hard to get to the end of a book when you put it down every few pages and stop to wonder. But it's worth it in order to have ideas put into words that have always hovered in your thoughts but have not been given shape.

Good book, bright side? What are you talking about? Some thoughts...

2008-11-22T23:28:00.000-08:00

To resurrect once more the ideas on which this blog was founded, I'd like to open a discussion on the concept of life-affirming books which are thoughtfully and well written, which are entertaining but do not pander to baser senses, as so many popular novels tend to do. I do not mean to rubber stamp any book as a pure example of such by mentioning it in these pages. (And this blog has morphed into a general one about books, although most are relatively benign in the sense that they are not terribly vulgar or obscene.) But, hopefully, there is an element of worthiness in most of what is presented here.

To seek out books that espouse only worthwhile ideas and to write only about them leaves very little to write about, it seems, sadly. First of all there is the question, whose worthwhile ideas? The disposition of this blog is, generally, to define 'worthwhile' as absent of most vulgarity (although that is, today, a tall order) and exuding a leaning towards brighter standards, rather than darker inclinations, something with less lewdness and more style. But I'll pretty much write about anything that is not overtly offensive. To employ the movie ratings system, even an R-rated book can be included if it is thoughtfully and maturely written.

What prompted this post was a discussion on a couple of other sites about religious fiction. And, so this was born more as a lament to the fact that secular fiction seems so bent on swears and gratuitous displays of violence and sexuality; it does not generally point to any better alternatives, but glamorizes the aforementioned elements, instead. Fiction cannot be sanitized in the way a cloth is rid of grime through the use of chlorinated detergent; it cannot be all high roads and no low ones. It needs conflict. But it would be nice if more fiction reflected a feeling that the high road was the worthy one. A lot of fiction doesn't seem able to do that and, frankly, I'd welcome more proof that I'm wrong.

So the point of this yammering on is to clarify and expand this blog's philosophy and to ask, why can't fiction aspire to more?

Book lover solidarity

2008-11-16T17:20:00.000-08:00

I was in a bookstore recently and a kid was nagging her mother for a book. Well, it wasn't quite nagging so much as very interestedly and earnestly asking for the book.

"Mommy, look!"

Mother, who was an intense looking woman with an angular face and shredded nerves to match, wasn't that interested.

"Mommy, It's called The Magician's-"

"The Magician's what?" mother snapped.

"Nephew," the girl calmy responded.

"Mommy, this book is so-o-o good!"

"How do you know?" mother barked, adding at one point, "I'm trying to do something here."

The little girl, in a naive attempt to engage her mother's attention and enthusiasm which would tear at any book-lover's heart, started to read from the book.

Mother stops her. "Look, you just don't get it, do you!"

Later, I think I hear the little girl sniffing loudly.

Finally, I'm up at the counter. So's mother. Lo and behold, in their small pile of purchases is CS Lewis's The Magician's Nephew. Annoyed at the mother and wishing to vindicate the kid, I casually point at the book and remark, "That's a good one."

"Oh great!" was mother's reaction. I'm not sure if it was sincere or if she was wishing the buttinsky would shut up. But how many times as a child would it have been nice to have someone stick up for you? I like to think that kid was gratified. Book lover solidarity and all that. Of course she may just be an annoying brat who always hounds her bedraggled mom for new stuff.

In that case, oops.

Timely reading: Comments on Giants, the parallel lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, by John Stauffer

2008-11-16T14:23:00.000-08:00

How I came to read the book

I felt like a kid eating at the grown-up table; I probably wouldn't have gravitated to these choices of nourishment if I were sitting at the little table with spaghettios in front of me.

I had a list of books to choose from and none of them were instantly striking me. Still one did tempt my intellectual side (or what there is of it). Giants, the parallel lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln seemed interesting but scholarly. But did I dare take on the challenge of reviewing a scholarly book? Would it be the readable kind or the type that requires a magnifying glass, intellectual appetite of an academic with an 800 pound brain, and infinite patience?

It was too tempting, so I took a chance.

My little 3 pound brain needn't have worried. As soon as I received the 432 page work in the mail and gave it a pre-read cursory glance I was heartened. The warm egg nog colored pages were filled with print I could ably read and the writing style was conversational. Preliminary indicators were positive; this was promising.

The reading experience

In Giants, author John Stauffer draws upon similarities in the lives of the abolitionist former slave Federick Douglass and the Civil War-era president Abraham Lincoln to create a framework on which this dual biography can be written. The second paragraph of the preface lists some stunning comparisons between the two individuals' lives. Stauffer writes,

"They learned to read and re-make themselves from the same core set of books: the Bible; Shakespeare; Lord Byron; Robert Burns; Aesop's Fables; and The Columbian Orator, a popular anthology of speeches for boys. They avoided tobacco and alcohol at a time when people regularly chewed and drank on the job....And they were strapping men, at least a half foot taller on average than their peers, when physical prowess could determine success or failure, even life or death." (Giants, by John Stauffer, page xi)

Stauffer doesn't bring up these shared traits just to list coincidences. He continues within the book to describe how the physical power of these men did, indeed, help them attain power in the forms of intellect and social influence. And Stauffer describes the strength that an excellent skill at orating was at this time in history, as well as the severe disadvantage that was bad speech-making.

Readers are taken on a birth-to-death journey with both men, whose tales are interwoven throughout. And, boy, is it ever more complicated than we were taught in grammar school. Neither was a saint, neither was an innocent in romance, neither's view on abolition remained static through their lives. In Lincoln's case, he became more radical, seeming to grow more willing to stand for abolition as he neared the end of his life - probably no coincidence. As for Douglass, he lived a long life, became quite wealthy and more conservative in his activist views.

If Giants had been available to read one month ago (it's publication date was November 3 - election eve) and immediately read, it would have been a different reading experience. Back then, one month ago, the question was still being asked if an African-American could be elected president. In the course of one day, the nation passed a milestone that future historians will be writing about. So when on page 285 a scene is described of Frederick Douglass sitting in a room with a white man, a judge, while both awaited their respective meetings with President Lincoln, and the judge, "outraged at having to share the same space with a black man," snidely makes a comment by asking Douglass, "Are you the President?" readers post November 4 know something as fact: that today this question cannot be used in the same demeaning manner the judge meant back in 1863. It kind of makes you wish you could hoist that judge out of his nineteenth and into this twenty-first century.

Giants is an engaging read. It explains the drawn out and painstakingly slow pace of the abolition of slavery and the complex personalities behind the movement - some personalities wholeheartedly behind a fight for equality and some with provisos. It is amply supplemented with endnotes and footnotes, populated with interesting major and minor players, and contains nearly enough photographs to satisfy readers.

I'm glad I didn't choose the spaghettios.

Thanks to Hachette for this complementary review copy.

What are your favorite first lines?

2008-11-13T19:04:00.000-08:00

We all know memorable first lines from famous novels. There's, of course:

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." - Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

And there's also:

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...." - Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

Children's lit has its classic lines, too. Like:

"Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents," grumbled Jo, lying on the rug." - Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

But there are very many novels out there. And, while they do not provide modern-day writers with material to manipulate and, in some cases, abuse (I'm thinking, the kick-off to Austen's novel), they do have some pretty good openers. One that I like particularly comes from another kids' book, C.S. Lewis's The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. I chuckle whenever I read it and like to fancy that I'll one day have the opportunity to read it aloud at some storytime hour somewhere. It so would make a great spoken sentence. As a matter of fact the whole first paragraph is stellar and with it Lewis paints an enviable character sketch of a main character; you get the feeling you know who you're dealing with when you've read the first page.

"There once was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it."

I can just imagine that avuncular Lewis telling this story beginning to the neighborhood kids. And do you ever hear of anyone talking about it? At least the negative answer to that question means that the sentence has survived untainted by the overuse of writers looking for a cutesy, "clever" way to open their own stories. I might mention again poor Jane Austen's first line to end all first lines.

I suppose that my love of this line is unique and explains why no one has pinched it to use it in their own way. Lewis's line is unassuming, it doesn't try too hard. And perhaps it plays to a childlike sense of humor. But how many subtle lines can send a kid into hysterics? Granted I have yet to witness this but I haven't tested the theory yet. And if my inner gauge is correct I am sure that I would have been rolling on the floor as a kid and reading this line out to adults while waiting to see them collapse into fits of laughter. (I used to do this - read from my books, look up after I'd read the good part, and wonder why my family wasn't chortling heartily. But that's a story for another day.)

So this is my nomination for the best first lines list. It's not Austen or Dickens but just think what a great theater-trained actor could do with it, reading the first clause matter-of-factly, raising his head and stating slowly and viciously "and he almost deserved it," with eyes narrowing at the poetic justice implied.

Now, what's your nomination?

Instant shelving!

2008-11-11T21:10:00.000-08:00

It's really all about the small things in life, isn't it? A cup of coffee with just the right amount of sugar and cream, a child hysterically giggling, more book space? Sure, much of life is made of small stuff, at least that's what the Salada tea bag told me years ago, so I have been delighted recently by the addition of two small shelves , baby shelves if you will, to the big grown-up shelves which hold my books.

It's quite appropos really. I pulled out a bunch of old books that were packed away a while back and wanted somewhere to put them. Perhaps I'm a bit of an ageist when it comes to books; I didn't want my old books mixing with my new. So what to do? Enter refurbished book shelves - your big break has come at last.

I found stacked amid old shoes and sundry items a wooden wine rack which was just begging to be made into a bookshelf. I believe it actually belonged to someone close to me once but, baby, you are my bookshelf now! Hopefully, said person won't mind that I absconded with their holder of libations and took a saw to it in order to remove those pesky rungs that would have held the bottles in place. I washed off the sawdust and put on some lemon oil treatment (mmmm, lovely scent!) and now the former unhappy wine rack has the proud job of holding an old copy of Northanger Abbey and some Lord Peter Wimsey's.

Additionally, this is not nearly as exciting but worth mentioning, I found an old VHS cassette holder. VHS cassette holder? How passe'! So I gleefully ripped out the plastic innards of that thing and, lo and behold, a lovely bookshelf was longing to get out the whole time of its existence. Now, it can live happily.

So you see, now the old but loved books have old but upgraded digs. The old wine rack and VHS cassette holder have seen the light of day again, and have done it in style.

(You think maybe I'm a bit of a book nut?)

Is there such a thing as a free book?

2008-11-11T20:33:00.000-08:00

A lively debate was ignited at the Guardian site a few days ago by Edward Champion's article, There's no such thing as a free book, on the practice of publishers giving bloggers advanced reading copies of books that are soon to be published in exchange for a review on their blogs. This interested me as I had just recently received my first review copies from Hachette and Sourcebooks.

It was very exciting to open the front door and see that the postman had brought a lovely hardcover absolutely free to me for reading and reviewing and adding to my library. As it was followed up by a special delivery a few days later of two really stunning paperbacks I can say, as a booklover, it was a good week. But this article got me anxious. Would I feel pressure to write glowing reviews for all such books that I read?

There are lots of book blogs out there. If you're looking at mine right now, let me say (first, what good taste you have!) and, of course, how much I appreciate my readership. On my internet travels, I found a site called Becky's Book Reviews wherein the blogger makes no bones about the fact that while review copies are welcome, she will give an honest review so if you do not wish an honest review please do not send the book. Furthermore, she gets so many review copies she can't guarantee that she'll get around to all of them. Wise girl, Becky, I thought! I'd like to state that I have similar policies; I will endeavor to be as honest as possible with any review copy I have been sent. But I don't foresee a problem of becoming flooded with such books, so I should be able to give each some attention, true and honest attention.

Meanwhile, I am pleased so far to be enjoying my first review copy, the aforementioned hardcover, which is entitled Giants, the parallel lives of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln and is written by John Stauffer. There's a big whew! factor in reading this book since it's genuinely a good, entertaining comparison of the lives of these two famous men. I'll soon be posting a review. Stay tuned.

A Q&A with author of Someday My Prince Will Come: True Adventures of a Wannabe Princess, Jerramy Fine

2008-11-09T12:30:00.000-08:00

Jerramy Fine's whimsical walk on the regal side is described in her absorbing book, Someday My Prince Will Come: True Adventures of a Wannabe Princess. This memoir recounts Fine's quest to become a princess and her lifelong attachment to the English royal family as she grows up with Hippie parents in rural Colorado. Sound a little too fanciful to be true? I was a little cynical, if you remember from my review in April. But I am assured by the author that the story is absolutely the real thing and am very pleased to post here the second of GBBS's writer Q&A's. Many thank you's to Jerramy Fine for taking time out and answering a few questions which I hope have some whimsy of their own!

GBBS: If you could, which fictional literary character would you date?

JF: I know that I'd definitely (and stupidly) fall for Daniel Cleaver in Bridget Jones's Diary - I just know it. But if I could go back in time, I think the playfully witty aristocratic gentlemen (Algernon Moncrieff and Jack Worthing) in The Importance of Being Earnest would also make my heartflutter to end.

GBBS: What is the one book you'd take to a deserted island?

JF: It's toss up between The Dud Avocado by Elaine Dundee, The Alchemist by Paul Coelho, and Return to Love by Marianne Williamson.

GBBS: What's your preferred method of book-buying -- internet or old-fashioned bookstores?

JF: I like both. I prefer browsing in cozy, independent bookstores compared to getting lost in one of the huge, sprawling chains. But I also really like Amazon because it has such a sense of community. I love reading readers reviews and I always get drawn in by listmania. But Amazon can be dangerous because it makes buying books almost too easy - it's good thing they're so heavily discounted because I always end up buying more books than I possibly have to read.

GBBS: Which writer is so great that it's hard to tear yourself away from his/her writing so you can get stuff done?

JF: Phillipa Gregory

GBBS: If you weren't a writer, what would you be?

JF: A princess - obviously. Or first lady. :)

GBBS: Reading Someday My Prince Will Come was as addictive as eating potato chips. Are you working on anything new we can look forward to? Any little sneak-peaky tidbit you're able to share?

JF: I'm working on another novel set in London. I can't give away much more than that but stay tuned!

A Q&A with author of the Pink Carnation series, Lauren Willig

2008-11-04T06:43:00.000-08:00

Here is the very first of GBBS's Q&As with some very fun and talented writers! First up is Lauren Willig, the author of the Pink Carnation series. For much more on Lauren and her novels follow this link. And for a GBBS review of the first book, The Secret History of the Pink Carnation, click here. Many thanks to Lauren for responses that are super thoughtful and as entertaining to read as her books!

GBBS: What is the one book you'd take to a deserted island?

LW: The idea of only having one book… agh. I’m usually a five book a week girl. Fortunately, I am a re-reader and the book I’ve probably re-read most over the course of a lifetime would have to be Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind. Even after five different copies and roughly fifty readings, I still find something new every time I open those covers. Her eye for detail, her ear for dialogue, the subtleties of characterization, and the sheer appeal of Rhett Butler just can’t be matched.

GBBS: If you could, which fictional literary character would you date?

LW: It’s so hard to narrow it down! The heartthrob of my teen years was Ian Thornton from Judith McNaught’s Almost Heaven. By the time I got over him, there was Jamie from Outlander to be drooled over, Lovelace from Clarissa (I know he’s an evil rake, but, oh, the challenge!), Orlando Rock from Love: A User’s Guide, and, of course, those traditional swoon-worthy souls: Mr. Darcy, Mr. Rochester, and Rhett Butler.

If I had to choose now, I might go for Rory Frost, from M.M. Kaye’s Trade Wind. Rory is the classic black sheep hero, an unrepentant rogue running guns in mid-nineteenth century Zanzibar, always ready with a quick quip, cynical to the core—but with his own sense of honor. Think Errol Flynn crossed with Rhett Butler (which mixes genres a bit, but you get the idea).

GBBS: What's your preferred method of book-buying -- internet or old-fashioned bookstores?

LW: Bookstores are my mothership. Whenever I’m bored or cranky, nothing cheers me up like taking a long stroll through the new book tables. There’s something infinitely soothing about it. I’ve found some of my favorite books that way, just randomly roaming along with my head angled awkwardly sideways, never knowing quite what I might find. If I can’t find a particular book in the store (or three or four stores, since I’m lucky enough to live near a Borders, two Barnes & Noble, Bookberries, and Shakespeare & Co, all in a thirty block radius), then I do resort to ordering online. But nothing can possibly replace the sheer joy of being entirely surrounded by books. Books, books, books, and more books, all waiting to be read.

GBBS: Which writer is so great that it's hard to tear yourself away from his/her writing so you can get stuff done?

LW: Actually, there are a lot of those. (As you might have guessed, I’m very susceptible to distraction!). Even though they’re all very different, Susan Elizabeth Philips, Tracy Grant, Robin McKinley, and Georgette Heyer all have that effect on me. Once I start reading any of their books, I fall prey to Just One More Chapter syndrome and have to keep going until I’m done, even if it’s three in the morning and I know I’m going to be useless the next day because of it.

GBBS: Your books are so detailed (I'm thinking of Amy's sneaking around the passages of her brother's huge house in Paris), how are you able to imagine so much so vividly?

LW: Thank you!! Part of it comes from having spent most of my youth being steeped in other centuries. When I was little, one of my favorite treats was being taken to the period rooms at the Met. Other little kids might clamor to go to the park; I just wanted eighteenth century interiors. Family vacations generally involved roaming around old castles. And let’s not even discuss the sheer number of costume dramas I’ve watched over the years. I managed to put my college years to good use by taking classes on seventeenth and eighteenth century art and architecture (Amy’s brother’s house had its inception in a junior year art history class, for which I had to design a seventeenth century French house) as well as literature and history. By the time I sat down to write Pink Carnation, the vistas of the past were often more vivid to me than the workaday world around me; looking out my window in London, I could picture carriages rather than cars, street vendors hawking their wares, dandies tooling their phaetons to Hyde Park. The hard bit is dragging myself back to the present day.

GBBS: I suppose that, unfortunately, the Pink Carnation must end at some point. Do you have any ideas on the backburner for other series?

LW: So many ideas! I don’t want to jinx any of them by saying too much (I get superstitious about these things), but I’m a little obsessed with a pirate project I’m working on right now. I also have vague plans for an eighteenth century series, involving a husband and wife team immersed in international intrigue in the 1770s. Of course, nothing is set in stone—or paper—until I actually sit down to write it.

Juggling books when you don't know how to juggle

2008-10-31T19:43:00.000-07:00

I have so many books going in my life that it would be embarrassing to write about them all. But I'll write about the most recent. I seem to be doing a good job lately of starting books and then placing my bookmark in them long enough to permanently disturb the binding. The Rebecca Notebook by Daphne Du Maurier is currently experiencing that kind of spine damage from the 'men of Jane Austen' bookmark (the idea came from the PBS site) I personally made. Then I dove into Possession by AS Byatt for which the word 'brilliant' seems an appropriate adjective, if generally overused. I have finally gotten around to Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones, the Booker Prize winner of 2007, which is a quick read and charming and delightful so far. I began Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx but guess I wasn't in the mood for something so seriously serious so, though it's just a short story of fifty or so pages, it hasn't been finished yet. (Oh my, this is getting embarrassing.) Carson McCullers' Member of the Wedding is good, but not so cheery to say the least, so that's on the backburner right now. And, finally, I'm fortunate to have an advance reading copy of a novel coming out in February called Addition by Toni Jordan. It's always fun to get to read something early. Did I mention my re-read of Pride and Prejudice?

So I should have loads of commentary in the weeks to come. (One would hope I'd be finished in that time.) Meanwhile, I'll have to carve out a little time for figuring out why I'm such a freewheeling reader.

Small joys

2008-10-31T19:11:00.000-07:00

Recently one rainy afternoon I was able to walk into one of those cavernous warehouse stores where everything is at dramatically reduced prices and the smell is a bit musty.

It was wonderful.

Actually, not everybody finds it that way; I read a review (you can Google reviews on anything it seems) that stated pretty much the same description as the one above but which put in the caveat of its not being a place for "the faint-hearted." Perhaps. But I love it because it is quite the place for low-cost book lovers. Situated on several tables and shelves are books, the majority for anywhere from one dollar to four dollars. I found Katarina Witt's book for 99 cents which caused a little excitement even though I've dipped into Katarina Witt's book and I didn't care for it. There were hardcovers and paperbacks, obscure and popular. And there was not a bad children's section, which is heartening in tough economic times when one hopes that kids can still be furnished with needed imagination- and knowledge-boosting materials. My big purchase came in at just under two dollars. What did I get for less than the price of a Starbucks coffee? Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and a neat matching bookmark. Who needs Borders bargain section?

Lookie here!

2008-10-31T18:45:00.000-07:00

Here's a post in the Guardian's book blog about literary crushes. So similar to my literary lonelyhearts post earlier this month one wonders if the writer is a GBBS reader....Well, maybe not. But what fun it is to read the many responses. It seems people are wild for their protagonists. And there are some good ideas from the commenters. Lord Peter Wimsey? Good taste, Joana!

Am I missing something?

2008-10-16T11:34:00.000-07:00

I found this interesting tidbit in a small story about the high quality of libraries in Wyoming that ran in the September 13 issue of The Economist magazine. The article was entitled Why Cowboys Read.

"Libraries are especially thriving in the conservative rural heartlands. The average Wyoming resident checked out nine books in 2005-06, compared with an average of five in California and two in Washington, DC."

I was struck by the statistics given here. Is it just me or does the amount of books annually borrowed from libraries seem awfully small in each of the three geographical areas the article mentions? Two books on average in DC? Nine in Wyoming?

I always see the library bustling. Where are these library-goers reflected in these statistics? I suspect that they're hidden - the numbers would probably be zero if it was not for a small, dedicated group who all but raid their libraries and utilize them for all their taxes are worth. It's likely these few borrow so very many books that it makes it appear as though the hundreds of thousands of residents in these places each take out a few books a year. That's quite a feat for this bit of the population.

But what about the others? Do they read? Do they actually have the cash to buy every book they want to enjoy or need to consult? Please tell me they realize there's a life beyond Barnes and Noble. Where else than a library can a person get just about any book they're looking for - either on the spot or through interlibrary loan - in any language and have it handed to them free of charge, entrusted to their caretaking for a period of weeks? This is an experience that ranks up there with the shopping high or even day-tripping fun.

If others do not wish to avail themselves of the resource and pleasure that is the library, dear fellow booklovers, all I can say is, well...more for us.

Another site about upbeat books!

2008-10-13T16:39:00.000-07:00

Fun book seekers! I was trolling the web and found that GBBS is not the only site dedicated to uplifting reads. Positively Good Reads features a Chicago Sun-Times article by its creator addressing the way so many fine, truly literary works can induce a state of depression in their readers. It also lists many reading recommendations. Here's a place with oodles of reviews to mine and titles to discover or remark on, "Hey! I didn't know that one was upbeat!"

Sometimes it's just nice to read good writing that buoys you, isn't it?

Literary lonelyhearts club post (Well, not exactly...)

2008-10-08T18:56:00.000-07:00

I was perusing another lit site today and ran across a great question I decided to pose here. Anyone out there ever have a crush on a literary character?

I'll 'fess up. When I was little and read Little Women I had a crush on Laurie, as I'm sure many girls had had before me and have had since. What's funny to me is that I pictured him so differently from the description Jo provides in the book. "Curly black hair, brown skin, big black eyes, handsome nose, fine teeth, small hands and feet, taller than I am, very polite for a boy, and altogether jolly." Although I have no doubt my Laurie was polite (for a boy) and jolly, in my imagination he was a fair-skinned, auburn-haired, lanky young man. At least I had the height thing right. I'm not how sure my imagination strayed so far from the author's intention - Alcott gave such a detailed description! - but I quite liked my Laurie and he fit very well into his role in the book. Why didn't Jo want him to love her, I wondered? Silly girl! Prof Bhaer wasn't alluring to me at all.

Is there a literary love of your life? Or just a wee bit of a crush? Feel free to reveal which characters you fancy. (Don't be shy - I'm pretty sure none of them are blog readers.)

Emma, are you ready for your close-up?

2008-10-08T18:43:00.000-07:00

As you can see to the left the results are in and in the first poll inspiration, uplift and sensitive handling of themes seem to be key points looked for in good books. Emma Woodhouse was the favorite by far for cover girl in the second poll. Thank you to everyone who voted in the polls!

First Term at Malory Towers is dated but delightful

2008-10-06T18:21:00.000-07:00

Now, you see, this is what I wish kids were still reading. Good old fun stuff with no mention of wetbars anywhere to be seen. Kids just being kids, getting into mischief, making friends, unabashedly loving their schools, having fun. Apparently, at some point in history kids enjoyed this sort of thing.

Some kids, the kind who like old-fashioned stories, still will. There are plenty of old-style or at least very Englishy, terms here like 'jolly,' 'hark,' 'hols' for 'holidays, and 'dormie' for dormitory. Characters feel swells of love in their hearts for their boarding school, Malory Towers, and the author's not writing it out of sarcasm. No worrying about being nerdy (or dorky or whatever the kids call it these days). The book is as unashamed of its own feelings and statements as tiny children are. When was the last time you saw a child of three worry about being cool? You don't because they don't. And neither does this book.

This story of a girl's first term at a boarding school is not the tightest writing. It's just fun. No big storyline is really carried through the novel; it's just a string of engaging events linked by the theme of a student's first year. The point of view is sometimes from one character, sometimes from another in a way that is just simple rather than confusing. This is not great literature in the tradition of Pride and Prejudice but it's great anyway and is, in its own way, a classic.

Thoughts on reading Enid Blyton's First Term at Malory Towers

2008-10-06T16:23:00.000-07:00

I might have read Enid Blyton's Malory Towers series when I was a child. I might have thoroughly loved it and it might have led me to other Blyton books which would probably have led, as reading books does tend to do, to discovering other authors who, as it stands now, have gone unread.

I might have, but I didn't and I find it sad. This is not because I didn't read as a child, but because I can see both my reading life and the rest of life being made richer in the process. There's a world of authors out there for children but when you're nine years old you don't scour libraries worldwide to make sure you're not missing out on anybody's good books. So, this British writer, whom I know that the little Jemima would have adored, has only been discovered and enjoyed in later life, when things are much different for the reader.

Taking in a book, experiencing and processing it, is quite different from childhood to adulthood. I'm not quite as absorbed in boarding school tales today as I would have been as a ten year old. But, then? Boy, would I ever have been! Still, I'm able to appreciate (with a slightly saddened heart) what I would have loved at that age.

My reading life as a child seems to have run like a parallel universe to my actual life. It wasn't exactly me driving that yellow convertible in River Heights and solving mysteries with Bess and George, or me frustrated with my older sister Beezus and being babysat and fed graham crackers and apple juice with annoying Willa Jean. Nonetheless, Nancy Drew and Ramona Quimby hung around me, affected my views on the world, and helped inform my fantasy life. That was my reading life. But there was room for more. So, I know Enid Blyton's Darrell Rivers, student at the idyllic Malory Towers, would have had a place there, as well. When I find books like the Malory Towers series, then, I think to myself, there's my lost reading life. There are all the books that went unread and could have filled up a second childhood of sitting on the porch or the couch at the bay windows on a sunny afternoon with my small nose pointed toward the page.

Linguists talk about a critical age at which language must be learned by children or it will not be learned properly or at all. From my experience I'd dare to suggest that there's a critical age for experiencing the transporting nature of stories. If you don't take the trip that books offer at that moment in life, you've declined ever taking quite the same journey.

But, alas, that's over and what can be done, really? To find that there are so many good books in the world that no child could possibly ever read them all is an embarrassment of wealth. So I only scraped the surface of what was out there? So what? There's a reward in itself to being a grown-up who lingers on the thought of lost reading lives, understands what she did have and wonders about what she could have had.

Comments on Daniel Tammet's Born on a Blue Day, A Memoir

2008-10-02T12:10:00.000-07:00

Daniel Tammet's lovely book is called Born on a Blue Day, A Memoir. Tammet is an Englishman who was born with autism and synesthesia. It is a crisply written autobiographical work, a window into the brain of an individual with mental abilities that are unfathomable save for some bits of insight he provides. The descriptions of the workings of his mind are invaluable to those who do not have his conditions. One reads Born on a Blue Day and breathes a sigh of thankfulness that a member of a population which can have such a challenging time expressing itself is able to benefit the rest of the world with such an account. It is written in a clear and relatively understandable manner and, at times, the synesthesia can actually sound somewhat relatable, begging the reader to wonder if the claims that we are all to some degree synesthetic must not be true.

To get a taste right away for what synesthesia is Tammet entitled his book with a reference to his condition. He was born on a Wednesday which, to him, is a day that is the color blue. This type of association is what synesthesia is about; two unrelated things, a number and a color or a texture, perhaps, are connected. Some of the descriptions by Tammet are made up of wonderful images. He writes, for instance, that, "Thirty-seven is lumpy like porridge, while 89 reminds me of falling snow." Tammet describes his method of calculation which incorporates these synesthetic qualities. He supplements his explanations with drawn diagrams showing the calculative process. Chapters are headed not only by chapter titles, but also by sketches which I suspect are visual representations of the numbers. Such a nice touch to see what 3 looks like in Tammet's mind by glancing at the beginning of chapter three.

Particularly touching is his description of falling in love and, indeed, love is a theme that arises time and again in this book. It seems to be a theme in Tammet's life. This is capped off by Tammet's recitation of 1 Corinthians's famous lines of what love is and what love is not. The quote is a fitting end to a book which seems to have love as its refrain - the love of a son for his parents, parents for their son, sibling's for each other, friend for friend, man for man. It also underscores the irony of how the feelings of the autistic are so easily misunderstood by the rest of society.

For Regency ladies who want to be in the know...

2008-09-20T18:37:00.000-07:00

New poll!

After toying with my open office software and with Microsoft, too, I finally was able to make a mock magazine cover, only to find blogger didn't accept it. Thus, I had to search the internet for a way to convert to a jpeg image and, la, you see the product below. Note to all: I found this image of Lizzie Bennet on google images. No copyright infringement is intended.

Why did I even do this? Well, I thought it would be fun. Imagine a fashion and personality magazine dedicated to the women of Jane Austen's novels. Who should be the first cover girl? For the prototype I chose Lizzie. But who do you feel would best be featured in a Regency edition of Vanity Fair or Vogue? Who would you most like to have do a fashion shoot and interview?

Sort of an enjoyable 'what if' kind of question and, so, I pose it to you. For GBBS's second poll, I ask you to be the editor and decide....(The poll is at the sidebar.) Feel free to add comments here about your selection.

Can you keep a 'Secret'? A review of The Secret History of the Pink Carnation by Lauren Willig

2008-09-17T13:05:00.000-07:00

There is no character named Victoria in this novel.

Too bad.

If there was a character named Victoria here, I'd have the opportunity to make one of those "Vickie's Secrets" plays on the title. I don't know, maybe I could say, 'Victoria's secret is out and her favorite color really is pink.' Or, 'Vickie might peddle satin and lace at America's popular purveyor of tacky lingerie but her heart belongs to espionage.' Perhaps, 'Victoria, dear, some advice just in case a Pink Carnation movie is ever made: DO NOT do your own costuming!'

All this allusion to VS would not be completely out of left field, for Lauren Willig's The Secret History of the Pink Carnation has some, ahem, provocative moments. Beware, there are some such lingering scenes. So you're happily plowing through the novel and then - Whoa, baby!- there's a truly intimate interlude. A few times.

Parents, teachers, readers inclined to blush easily - just wanted to let you know.

With all that said allow me to continue about this contagiously entertaining novel. It begins all innocence and fun scene-setting in England and France, a sweet little tale apparently written on the side by a Harvard law student, very girlie. And it pretty much stays that way throughout the book save for those handful of pages previously discussed. There are few, if any, swears in this novel, or any other sort of verbal vulgarity. This is not a scary book - suspenseful at times, as befits a novel of espionage - but none of the grotesque elements so often found in pop culture today. And, now that I've mentioned the spy business, I should clarify that this is the cartoon version, not at all to be taken seriously, fun for it's ridiculousness. This playful novel could not, after all, be the book it is if it took itself seriously.

It is light on true espionage, heavy on romance, highly imaginative - how did Willig come up with such a detailed floor plan for Edouard's house? - and populated with characters which are familiar and original at the same time. Reading it you feel you've met them before, in a '40s film or somewhere, but haven't had the pleasure of their company for a few years as most writers seem to take a more prurient and/or darker slant with their stars and supporting players. It's refreshing.

Basically, the main character, Amy, decides in Regency England that she wants to join an espionage ring in France. In another plotline, we have Eloise, a modern-day scholar who is studying Amy's diaries which form the entree into Amy's world.

The writing is of the effervescent ginger ale variety in its sweetness and levity, risque sections notwithstanding. The book doesn't masquerade as more literary than it is, but it is intelligent fluff.

So, decide if you're more a G, PG or R rated reader, and proceed from there. If you read it, enjoy, if not, there's always many more books on the shelf.

Polling is fun!

2008-09-15T00:46:00.001-07:00

I've added a poll, so please feel free to share your opinion on what qualifies as a good book with a bright side. The poll closes at noon on September 22. So much more enjoyable than the general election! Don't you think so?

How the book joined her library....

2008-09-14T14:45:00.000-07:00

Jemmie, tired of classes and scholarly work, lingered at the bargain bin at the college B&N after standing in the book buy-back line for a solid hour and a half. After a few slow yawns she shook her head and determinedly set her jaw into a no-yawn position; but she simply found her nostrils expanding when her body experienced the next sleepy impulse and she was finally forced to admit that, yes, she needed rest.

Right, Jemmie, you need to lie down, be unconscious for about 8 hours, snore deeply and unabashedly til you sound like a foghorn in the night, and -

Then she spied it. She knew her reluctance to leaving the store without spending a bit of that textbook money on a nice novel or two existed for some reason. Could this book be as promising as it looks? The lady living on the cover of The Secret History of the Pink Carnation carried such a flower in her delicate alabaster hands and the folds of her equally pink gown cascaded over her slippered feet. The book was branded with a blushing wax seal. How perfect could a cover be? But could the words inside match the promise of the outside?

She'd seen the book before but assumed it was just more of the same silly chick-lit and bad writing she'd seen so much of before in stores. That money was really wriggling around in her wallet impatient to be spent. She was yearning for a bookish cash transaction - my money, your book then your money, my book - resulting in a purchase carried home in a nice green bag after a few witty words with the cashier about the state of popular literature these days.

Certainly, she'd earned it after all her hard work, hadn't she? Yes, the book would be hers...and,the novel lived happily ever after on Jemmie's shelves....

But did Jemmie live happily with that book or did she regret the indulgence of that buy? NO REGRETS! This bears repeating. The book purchase was not a bad idea.

So keen on her novel find was Jemmie that she consented to have her experience romanticized by her book-blogging alter ego, Jemima. But surely you're wondering now how a review would go. Jemima is going to transcribes Jemmie's feelings right here on GBBS.

Stay tuned.

How d'ya like them apples an' oranges?

2008-09-08T22:04:00.001-07:00

It seems some screenwriter has taken the lovely Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen and based a fantasy called Lost in Austen on it. Now, I'm straying a bit, just a bit, from the topic of books because Lost in Austen is a television program; but, with its literary roots it seems an appropriate tangent to explore.

After thinking so much about the unfortunate-but-oddly-fun-at-the-same-time Lost in Austen, I thought back on the book Austenland by Shannon Hale. They're really quite similar (a romance in a regency-esque environment) as so many JA knock-offs tend to be, but I recently blogged about its relatively good taste.This stands in such dire contradiction to some aspects of the new Lost in Austen that I selfishly thought I'd ask JA lovers and readers a question or two: How do you compare or contrast the arguably more innocent Austenland (which has had its own criticisms of being too tame) and the arguably racier Lost in Austen?

Granted, I realize this is an apples and oranges situation, with one being a television production and one a novel, but as they are both related works of writing I thought, why not?

Is Austenland too innocent to be believable? Is Lost in Austen a bit vulgar at times?

Letter to a young high school English student, letter to my former teacher

2008-09-07T13:42:00.000-07:00

To: Mrs C
CC: any high schooler who thinks assigned reading is loathsome

Jemima here. I have a confession. Remember the time sophomore year when you assigned The Scarlett Letter to us. I read the first chapter, ie pages 1 and 2, was stricken by the image of the rose but felt much like I would normally feel in high school - like I'd rather be watching Mystery on PBS. So I did.

And remember when you assigned Bernard Malamud's The Fixer? I read it in between points at a tennis match.

And remember when you assigned To Kill a Mockingbird? I read it! This is big because most of what you assigned went unread by this particular student. You see, for a lover of books - even then a lover - I went through stages, and this stage was the Black Hole, the Bermuda Triangle, the Star Trekkian force field stage which ate up any hope of literary growth. Ah, the books I could have read and enjoyed, the progress my brain's right hemisphere might have made, the influences I missed that could have molded me at that possibly critical period of writerly development - all gone.

It is with regret that I look back on the reading non-experiences of my high school English career. All right, I wrote that great short story. All right, I learned some valuable grammar. But the books! The discussions I might have taken part in! The quizzes I would have aced!

Yes. I have regrets.

Some of the works I missed out on in virtually whole or in part: Romeo and Juliet, Hard Times, Wuthering Heights

Granted, these are not exactly what I might now call 'Good Books with a Bright Side,' but they are classics and necessary to some degree in a healthy literary diet to produce a robust, well-balanced body of reading. A reader should probably know something about these books. To speak intelligently about them, reading helps.

So, dear high schoolers of today, there are good reasons you are being asked to read certain books. And you have an opportunity now to engage in vigorous debate and interesting discussion that we adults salivate over the thought of and which we form book groups to attain. This, during hectic lives when reading is a luxury. And you get to do it for your work! How many forty-year olds would love that? Many, I can assure you.

Now, if you're reading this blog, I might just be preaching to the choir, but at least I put my unfortunate reading past into words. Whew, what a load off!

Good reading,
Jemima

Fun with books! or, I hope I've progressed a bit since then....

2008-08-31T20:41:00.000-07:00

Rummaging through old things and hoping to find items such as a specific notebook from my past I, of course, found nothing I was looking for. But I did find these ancient book reports from about a decade into my life. I can certainly say that I hope I've improved as a synopsizer and reviewer of books.

One thing I love about the book reports I was made to do in grade school was the artistic element of drawing a cover related to the novel or biography or what-have-you involved. I wasn't a bad artist. But I was nothing compared to other students who sketched amazing sports drawings during math class and then got caught and advised by the teacher that they were very talented, indeed, but right now was the time for long division. I think I plateaued in my artistic ability as a child, so badly do I draw now. So it was pleasant for me to find these book reports which demanded I use my language arts skills as well as math (to ascertain how many pages needed to be read by the due date - there's that long division, again!) and, of course, required me to find the Picasso in myself.

It's so great the number of talents we students were asked to utilize at that age - so very different from the monotony of adulthood wherein accountants are always calculating, writers are writing, and just about everybody is in a state of cyclical action. Repetition rules grown-up life and makes me, at least, long for the variety of grammar school where at 8am you were a theologian, 9am a mathematician, 10am a geographer, 11am an athlete, 12 noon a social butterfly doing lunch and recess with your friends, 1pm a scientist, etc....

So, here I have found three book reports, evidence of fulfilling childhood schooldays - portrait of the blogger as a young reviewer. Was I any good? Well, I filled about three pages summarizing The Moonstone Castle Mystery by Carolyn Keene with information that seems to my grown-up ears to describe a pretty interesting story. Then comes my last sentence: "I wouldn't recommend this book because I thought it was very boring." Perhaps I needed a lesson in cohesion...and a little personality. But I seem to have simplicity down pat and not a smattering of that attitude that I so often find annoying in reviewers.

Here are the sparkling reviews according to Jemima, age 10:

Ramona the Pest "I liked all parts of this book."
by Beverly Cleary

Understood Betsy "I liked mostly every part of the book."
by Dorothy Canfield Fisher

The Moonstone Castle Mystery "I wouldn't recommend this book."
by Carolyn Keene

I was so obviously destined for The New Yorker.

Mourning the absence of a good pop-lit magazine

2008-08-30T15:13:00.000-07:00

Someone should start a glossy magazine about popular literature. There are heaps of blogs about books and, indeed, a few magazines; the independent booksellers' Book Page and the review magazine Bookmarks come to mind. But I'm looking for something along the lines of Conde Nast Traveller or Premiere for the book-minded, something that has lovely author-at-home-or-on-vacation photos and profiles; tiny, little front of the book snippets that tell us who and what is up-and-coming or which gadgets companies are trying to convince us we need; editorials on why all you really need is a good book, a quiet space and an attentive mind; reader's letters on everything bookish under the sun; man-on-the-street Q&A's on what's popular on the streets of, say, New York or Cleveland or Little Rock; celebrations of the classics. I'd like to hold in my hand a portable, visually attractive conversation starter or conduit for information-sharing with other booklovers. I don't want to have to be near a computer to point out bits of news. E-mailed links to articles in the Guardian or Times are great but you can only do that when you're separated from the person with whom you wish to converse about that particular topic. Then what are you supposed to do - survive on e-mail conversations or schedule a lunch date so you and your book-loving buddy can finally get together with a print-out of the article to refer to? Wouldn't it be more fun and much easier to grab a glossy and share?

Perhaps the really literary only want serious mags. But I can't imagine that no one would be interested in Haruki Murakami's favorite brand of running shoe or if Joanne Harris prefers Russell Stover or Godiva chocolates. Now, wouldn't that be fun?

France seems to have Lire magazine. The United Kingdom has Waterstone's Books Quarterly. Where's the US version? Once upon a time, not so long ago, there was Pages magazine but that seems to have gone defunct. Cannot a glossy pop-lit magazine grace the coffee tables of the United States?

I say yes.

Funding, anyone?

That bold face of the last two paragraphs that I wrote

2008-08-25T19:48:00.001-07:00

in the previous post was not meant to imitate hollering. Neither was it meant as an artistic statement. Unfortunately, though I'm picky about presentation, Blogger does not seem to be cooperating with me and refuses to undo the bold. Maybe if you squint it will look normal size. :)

Literary Pet Peeves

2008-08-25T18:21:00.001-07:00

Book critics with attitude.

You know the type....They're more interested in turning a phrase, ultimately overwrought and grating, than in helping to guide anyone in their book-buying efforts. 'LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT ME!' they seem to yell. Aren't I clever? As a matter of fact, I'm so clever that I'm going to rate this book a D- and show you how fancy I can write.' Do I sound like a writer scorned?

Actually, it's not all critics with attitude that bother me, just some. And, honestly, can't you say the same? It's like when you read a magazine profile of a celebrity and come away feeling that you know more about the psychology (and mental word count) of the journalist who wrote it than the famous person whose pics are splashed all over the pages.

Anyway, with all that said, I'd like also to say that some critics are quite good at what they do. My beef is with the few (but loud) who use their bully-pulpit to nauseate the rest of us readers.

So, please, if you're a book critic (competent or with attitude), keep reading. Let me show you how fancy I can write.

Self-infatuated writing by authors who've spent too much time inhaling dust in the farther reaches of the library instead of reading in the fresh air where they should.

I was once perusing a piece of literary criticism. I think the writer of that piece got a little carried away with himself. "In embryo," one phrase was just too cute. In embryo, you say? That's right.

Reader, I laughed at it.

Apparently, 'in sum' was too often used, 'in a nutshell' too casual, and 'in short' too mundane. So the writer either sat there scratching his head, tearing at his thoughts trying to find some unusual way to express himself or he spends far too much touchy, feely time with that inner child everyone talks about.

Perhaps we should send him some body-building magazines to toughen him up a bit....

Bloggers who can't resist the temptation to write fancy and read in dusty, remote library rooms.

What? You think I don't know I'm one of them? Take a look at my review of Alexandra Potter's Me and Mr Darcy from last year. Tragic. Did I jump over the edge of the QE2 with that one or what? I was kinda harsh. And way too cutesy.

Hopefully, other critics are kinder than I am.

I went crazy on the Good Reads site today writing some off-the-cuff reviews, so I thought I'd share...

2008-08-23T23:34:00.000-07:00

Sweet book! A woman with a small position at a publisher finds a mysterious love while wrestling with her feelings about her current beau. An example of fun chick-lit which isn't obnoxious with vulgar language and situations. It's frothy like a beach shore and effervescent like ginger ale.

Beware of spoiler in next review!
How could this book not be one easily found in a bookstore? You probably have to go on-line to find this one, but it's worth it if you love a great, absorbing read.
It's very romantic. Will the lovers find each other after so many years? Incredible near-misses and ultimate reunion. I wasn't sure I should buy the book, despite its bargain price, but I did and couldn't believe I got such a great find. Recommended highly for romantics and the kind of person who used to like listening to Believe It or Not.

Isn't it refreshing to find a book which does not glorify promiscuity, which actually advocates sweetness and love? There are other books,like On Chesil Beach, for instance, which contain sexual references and are, indeed, also worthy of praise for their thoughtfulness and writing. However, this is the only book I've read that eschews the modern seemingly requisite trashiness that's found so often in novels.

The writing here is a bit amateurish, but what do I care? It's a great idea for a story sweetly done.

I actually found some of the writing humorous where it wasn't meant to be. And it could use some pizazz in its structure and sentence construction. However, the concept is so great - an American goes to Oxford University, meets a new Inklings group, and falls in love - that the writing can be forgiven and a reader can be thankful the book somehow made it into print given today's stinky narrative/content standards.

26=infinity - explain THAT math majors!

2008-08-20T16:57:00.000-07:00

Twenty-six letters in the English alphabet and yet those relatively few symbols can express stories as complex as Middlemarch, Les Miserables, the Bible. Amazing to believe that each book is a combination of carefully placed spaces and members of the same pool of twenty-six letters. From that you get a window into the souls of characters and their authors. That's really quite powerful for these little drawings it takes less than a stroke of a pen to make. There are doodles that are more elaborate than the word 'die' and, yet, when we're reading Little Women and run across this word in reference to Beth, we are delivered a shock that causes that blood-pumping muscle in our chests to skip a beat.

I mean, a punch in the gut can make you lose your breath, so can a well-placed verb. Amazing.

When I'm in a bookstore and can't find something that really interests me, I just think to myself that somewhere here, hiding on a shelf is a collection of letters that one day I'll find fascinating. We just haven't met yet. And each of those books I see on the tables and stands are a different sequence of the same otherwise redundant twenty-six letters.

Which sequence will you choose next?

Q: How embarrassed am I? A: Not a whole lot.

2008-07-04T14:09:00.000-07:00

So, I've been corrected. Sort of.

Remember my earlier post about the Gossip Girls books and others like them? Well, I was browsing some used magazines for sale recently, ran across a March 10, 2008 issue of The New Yorker and found an article that just oozes praise for these novels, describing the books with compliments like "wickedly satirizing the young," "gleeful political incorrectness," and "the reader she seems to have firmly in mind as she writes is a literate, even literary, adult."

And that's all in the first paragraph.

I appear to have completely misread the intentions of the author, Cecily von Ziegesar. These, apparently, are works of social criticism and intelligence, "full of literary allusions."

Let me reiterate I haven't read a single Gossip Girls book. Previously, I tried to be interested in them, but found articles on quantitative studies of the effect of muzak on shoppers more palatable. Perhaps I'll be able to stomach the novels now that I know they're fonts of eruditeness.

I wonder if the readers of these works are taking away the message that Janet Malcolm, writer of the article, "Advanced Placement, The wicked joy of the 'Gossip Girls' novels," seems to find in them. Are they developing a taste for "Goethe and Tolstoy," or do they just enjoy the fact that the main character plans an, ahem, (can we say romantic, I mean really?), rendezvous at a swanky hotel with her boyfriend? I would have blushed and had the urge to go to confession if I had been reading that as a young'un. Did I tell you Malcolm refers to these books as "children's literature?"

To be fair, Malcolm states that "[von Ziegesar] is writing a transgressive fairy tale, not a worthy book for a school list." You've got that right, Janet.

Referring to the novels as that beloved brand of sweets made for children, she also says, "There are no Brussel sprouts hidden in her Rice Krispie marshmallow treats." Yet she claims that "[t]he books are full of literary allusions," as though that were some kind of medicine going down with the spoon full of sugar. Am I mistaken that this is a bit oxymoronic?

I've got nothing against fairy tales for children or adults, for that matter. What else is most of what we read at the beach or watch on television, if not fairy tales minus the mythological element? But I balk at the way this particular brand of fairy tale is manufactured. Fine the girls have endless credit card limits. Fine they can take rooms at the Plaza hotel when they feel miffed. Fine they have unconventional families. Who wouldn't love that? It's all fun. But, somehow, I just find that the black silk underwear, the nauseating amount of references to upscale clothiers, the swearing, the crassness seem to spoil that feel-good frothiness that fairy tales are supposed to deliver.

But that's just me. After all, I have been corrected.

A Note on C.S. Lewis

2008-06-29T13:53:00.000-07:00

I noticed that C.S. Lewis's essay, "A Note on Jane Austen," existed while enjoying some meanderings around different internet sites. Someone somewhere mentioned it at some point and I tried to find it in full on the www but failed. I did manage to scrounge it up at a university library in a volume called Selected Literary Essays by C.S. Lewis, edited by Walter Hooper and published in 1969 by Cambridge University Press. I thought I'd share the info here since no one really seems to talk about these two English writers together, despite their popularity in the early 21st century in print and, especially, in film.

The author of the really, really successful Narnia series of children's books Lewis was a great academic, too. His style of writing is peppered with classical allusions but is also very readable and enjoyable. He quotes other critics of Austen, uses French and Latin terms and phrases, and quotes the Austen novels themselves, of course.

He does not seem to be a fawning fan of Austen's. He calls Mansfield Park "in places the best, yet as a whole the least satisfactory, of Jane Austen's works;" he says that the character Fanny Price could have been handled better by Charlotte Bronte; he states (when defending Fanny) that "[he] is far from suggesting that Fanny is a successful heroine."

He does, however, seem to have an admiration of Austen. Lewis refers to her "commonsense" and "morality." He states that " 'Principles' ... are essential to Jane Austen's art." And he goes on to state that "If charity is the poetry of conduct and honour the rhetoric of conduct, Jane Austen's 'principles' might be described as the grammar of conduct. Now grammar is something that anyone can learn; it is also something that everyone must learn." To my own humble blogger's self this seems to me that Lewis is saying that if everyone must learn principles, then they're a good thing; and, if principles are essential to Austen's work, then her work is admirable.

At the essay's end, Lewis makes a statement about Austen and her work that, to me, seems quite appropos for the theme of this blog and, as such, I will quote it: "She has, or at least all her favourite characters have, a hearty relish for what would now be regarded as very modest pleasures. A ball, a dinner party, books, conversation, a drive to see a great house then miles away, a holiday as far as Derbyshire -- these with affection (that is essential) and good manners, are happiness."

So, I guess we're not the only ones who like the bright side.

What's your most prized book?

2008-06-12T20:58:00.000-07:00

When I was a kid I used to ask my family members the most irritating questions. The conversations would go something like this:

"Which name do you like better - Josephine or Stephanie?"

Sigh of an exasperated older person. "I don't know. They're both nice."

"No, c'mon. Which name?"

"I don't know."

"You've gotta choose."

"Look, I don't know they're both pretty. Which name do you like better?"

"I don't know," I'd shrug to their further annoyed sighs.

So, in keeping with tradition, I have decided to ask a question for which I don't have my own answer: Hey all, what's your most prized book?

Because I'm not such a selfish little inquisitor anymore I guess I'll break tradition and hasten a guess as to what's at the top of my list.

Of course, I must say first that I don't truly know. Nonetheless, here goes...

Anything signed by the author, like my copies of Lauren Willig's The Deception of the Emerald Ring and The Masque of the Black Tulip. Any of my lovely books from childhood. My old Gone With the Wind.

I look forward to hearing your picks!

Hopefully it will be a loved book anyway

2008-06-12T18:50:00.000-07:00

You've gotta feel for the kid. They say some things weren't meant to be...and, perhaps, some books just weren't meant to find the proper owner.

I was at a library book sale recently trolling for some unique find - something that I couldn't just walk into a Barnes and Noble and buy, one of those you-know-it-when-you-see-it-finds, probably some super old hardcover someone once bought for fifty cents back when the nickel had a buffalo on it and the Wheatpenny was being minted and circulated. I like those.

Of course, I wasn't the only one searching. There were many book hunters there all out to fill their brown bags at about a dollar a book. I felt a vicarious thrill when I overheard a woman purchasing $99 dollars worth of stuff. I already knew something was up when I walked in and saw the volunteer sales staff bustling around placing piles of books in boxes for her and asking if she'd be able to carry it all. She added one paperback to make an even hundred and pushed it all out on a two-wheeler.

There was one guy talking to himself and another talking to me trying to praise a book I knew I was unlikely to read. I politely listened and then, when he was gone, returned the book to its place.

And there were kids running all over the place. As I perused the Nancy Drews and other such classics, I heard a little voice behind me.

"Excuse me," it said. And then again, "Excuse me."

I turned to find one of the little ones behind me.

"Have you seen any Magic Tree House books?"

I responded that I hadn't, but would let him know if I did and continued my browsing.

Back to picking through piles of books I went, searching all the sections to see if any old stuff was hiding there. It doesn't matter much that they're torn and tattered and not worth anything; just knowing that they were in someone's shopping bag, or wrapped neatly with brown paper and string, in 1910 is enough to make it interesting to me.

So I was having a merry time trying to decide if I wanted to purchase this autobiography or that novel and I heard that voice again.

"Excuse me."

I looked over.

"Have you seen any Magic Tree House books yet?"

I repeated my intention of letting him know if I did see one and I moved on.

I clutched a 1945 Sinclair Lewis novel that was in pretty bad shape, described on the copyright page as "A Wartime Book" which was "made to comply with the Government's request to conserve essential materials." That's interesting, I thought, and possibly worth a dollar. So I moved around the room considering the purchase.

New people came and old ones left, including Magic Tree House kid. I was still there and had pretty much seen everything but, attracted to the place like a moth to a porch light, I lingered.

I took one last look at what I guess one might call the antiquarian (really cheap antiquarian) books, didn't see anything again, and decided I'd spent enough time there and should leave already. I decided to go with the Lewis and paid up.

But wait. What was that water-warped book with a unicorn sticker stuck to the solid purple cover? Not knowing why it intrigued me, I reached over and took a look.

But your kid has gone away, I yell at it. For there, disguised and looking like it had just been dragged out of one of the seven seas and air dried, was a Magic Tree House book.

Can booklovers and their paperbacks be star crossed?

Introducing Romy!

2008-06-05T15:34:00.000-07:00

Introducing the official Good Books, Bright Side kitty! How beautiful is she? She's a literate kitty, too. After poring over Of Mice and Men yesterday, she had a hankering for something lighter. Romy is the GBBS kitty, after all; while she appreciates a great literary work, she also loves to look on the bright side. So now she's having a hard time choosing between Beverly Cleary's The Mouse and the Motorcycle and Eve Titus's rodent sleuth The Basil of Baker Street. Then there's also Stuart Little by E.B. White. Too much good stuff to choose from!

Well, a love of words is bound to blossom when your kind have grown up in bookstores for ages and ages. And when you're named after the French word roman, or novel, you're practically destined for it.

Actually I, after surveying Romy's pleasure-reading picks, am inclined to read some of these myself. How very odd. Never was that interested when I was a wee one. But then I don't know which of her nine lives she's on; compared to her I may be a youngster, indeed!

And now for a change, something a little less tacky

2008-06-03T13:10:00.000-07:00

Harrumph! I'm a bit peeved.

Sometimes one reads something that gets a tad under the skin and requires a comment. Happy thing, then, to have a blog.

I was over at a couple of the websites that I peruse regularly and there are discussions going on about the book Austenland by Shannon Hale, which I read about a year ago. I was fortunate to have gotten an advanced reading copy which I enjoyed very much, but now it seems the paperback edition is out and I'm eyeing it for its cute cover design.

As you can tell, I liked a lot about this book. Not everything, mind you, but a lot. The plot concerns a woman, thirtyish, who has a Pride and Prejudice obsession she is trying to purge herself of. For some reason, she thinks flooding herself in the world of regency England will help in this endeavor. Tiny little problem with the plot there, IMO, but no matter. It allows for a fun story to ensue in which the protagonist, Jane, visits an all-Regency-all-the-time resort. And there is a disturbingly fuzzy line between reality and script throughout the book as the guests of the resort interact with the resort actors, who are always in Regency character and terrible flirts. This seems to be a requirement of their jobs, which raises a whole ethical issue. But this novel is a light-hearted piece of beach-reading fun and that ethical discussion is something I'll save for another time.

Now, why am I peeved? Well, there's been a bit of impassioned criticism by readers that's directed towards the way the main character has been written. They cry immaturity since she becomes attached to one of the resort's actors after several embraces which she takes to indicate a level of seriousness on his part. There's a refrain I hear echoing from the critics: a woman that old thinking that such behavior may actually mean a guy likes you! Horrors!

Apparently, the notion is a bit unbelievable to people. I'd like to submit that perhaps it's actually charming. I mean every corner we readers turn we're faced with uber-sophistication. How many references to high-end stores, margaritas, and one-night stands can a book hold without making a reader sick? There are few stories nowadays where this kind of thing isn't overdone and it has become a little nauseating. So, to see a story where the characters have a bit more taste, well that's just plain nice.

And, let's remember, this is a story about a place where Regency life is (sort of) recreated, a time when a kiss could be tantamount to a proposal of marriage. So it's not all too inappropriate for the heroine of an Austen take-off to model arguably similar attitudes as, say, an Elizabeth Bennet or a Catherine Morland.

Of course, this is a twenty-first century book, but why not have a touch of nineteenth century sense and sensibility thrown in? (Sorry, had to get that out of my system.)

Books about books

2008-05-29T11:15:00.000-07:00

I love to read books about writers or other 'book people' and the works they have produced over the years. It really doesn't matter if these book people lived long enough ago to already be considered a part of history or if they're contemporary, they're interesting to me. But most people don't write books about their experiences until they've done a good bit of living. Likewise, a great deal of contemporary authors are profiled in magazine and newspaper articles, rather than book-long biographies. Consequently, these memoirs and other works are instantly of the historical variety.

And, thus, it is not surprising that Bookends: Two Women, One Enduring Friendship by and about antiquarian book dealers Leona Rostenberg and Madeleine Stern, as well as Melanie Rehak's Girl Sleuth: Nancy Drew and the Women Who Created Her, are both imbued with the nostalgic atmosphere of bygone Americana. Bookends is a fast, easy read and tells the a story of two women each of whom loved books, achieved higher education degrees, and never wed in a time when for young females marriage was de rigeur and advanced schooling not so much, really. It is engrossing to read about their excursions to Schrafft's and Stern's Columbia University experiences in the New York of the early twentieth century. Rostenberg inherits a fairly centrally located imposing house in the city from which they base their book business, at least in the earlier years. So there's a lot of opportunity for one's mind to create a playground of old New York landmarks and of book-buying and -selling tales which, presumably, is the kind of thing the reader of such a book would enjoy.

Girl Sleuth by Rehak is even more absorbing a read, especially for a Nancy Drew alum like me. It had me hunting through boxes and boxes of childhood memories and digging out my old Nancy's. Girl Sleuth weaves the history of the day - which happens to be the late nineteenth century up to the present - into the machinations of the Stratemeyer Syndicate, responsible for the creation and production of the Nancy Drew mystery stories. Contrary to what one might think by reading the book's title, it was a man who conceived the idea for the Nancy Drew mysteries. But it was, indeed, one learns from Girl Sleuth, women who fleshed her character out and launched her to eventual superstardom. The books were ghost written with the use of outlines provided by the Syndicate - really, a sort of mass production assembly line kind of way to produce books. Surprising, then, that they held and continue to hold the allure of good stories for young girls.

That said, I'm wondering what today's Nancy Drew's are like since they seem to still be in production. I remember reading an article about them a few years back and it didn't sound all that promising, something like a teeny-bopper romance instead of an elegant mystery, but apparently Nancy's gone through some metamorphoses and, hopefully, they've got her back to form.

Recommendations, therefore, on Girl Sleuth and Bookends for those with a sense of wanderlust that can only be cured by a bit of time travel to bookish places of the past.

Addendum to 'The accessories of reading'

2008-05-28T10:27:00.000-07:00

Hello All,

In the interest of attribution, though I suspect this is unnecessary, I did want to make clear that my previous post included a play on the sweet song My Favorite Things by Rodgers and Hammerstein from the musical The Sound of Music. It was meant to be obvious but I have a nasty little worry that if I don't explicitly explain this I'll be getting something akin to a slap on the hand or worse. So I would like to acknowledge and thank the owners of the rights to this song, just in case it is not considered to be sufficiently in the public domain or covered by fair use for the kind of wordplay that I tried to have some fun with a few days ago.

Just a note that if I ever do quote or reference other materials in any of my posts, I do not mean to infringe on anyone's rights. No harm is intended.

After all, imitation is the highest form of flattery! ;)

Thanks!

The accessories of reading

2008-05-19T20:12:00.000-07:00

Bookmarks and bookends and personalized bookplates,
Big shelves and small shelves with doors made of glass plates,
An old, first edition to which the cover barely clings,
These are a few of my favorite things....

Okay, I guess the old, first edition is a bit of a stretch as I haven't got that kind of inventory in my personal library, but you get the picture. I like books and bookish things. What booklover doesn't love the accessories that go with the hobby? It's why bookstores nearly double as gift and stationery shops.

I especially like bookmarks. They're economical. They're sweet. They can convey a sage quotation or beautiful photograph. They're art. And they're easy to collect.

Happiness is an impulsive bookmark purchase!

A bookmark is a lovely pick-me-up when you're down, consolation buy when you can't afford that book you've been eyeing in the shop window, or just a little treat for no reason at all. And when you give a book as a gift, it is both utilitarian and decorative to add a bookmark as an adornment on the top of the wrapped gift - an inexpensive, multi-tasking item that buoys spirits as it marks your page.

I do love my bookmarks. So often they're doing their job hiding away mid-chapter never to see the light of day unless one of the books they've been paired with is getting some attention. And then they're just brushed off to the side, ever at the ready to resume their duties once I have need of them again. So I thought I'd take my shy little page markers out for a photo shoot and give them the attention they deserve. Get ready for your close-ups, you most favored literary accessories. Smile!

Literary looks-ism

2008-05-14T20:16:00.000-07:00

Readers can be a looks-ist group.

For example, 'Don't judge a book by its cover' is true, but how closely do we follow that old maxim? When it comes to cover art a lot of us act like a crow attracted to a shiny object. We flock to the glossy photos and drawings that ornament the fronts of our hardcovers and paperbacks and skip over duller covers.

A more apt example might be the pick-up scenario at a bar. You're sitting there on your swivel stool. On your left is a mass-market paperback, thick, with smudgy print and a cover that shows off its picture about as well as a passport photo shows off its owner's image. On your right is a trade paperback, the front cover as showy as an 8 1/2 x 11 glossy, strong paper and clear print, with a little special illustration accompanying the beginning of each chapter. And why not throw in a hardback on the next stool - although you find its great-looking form, stylish jacket and luxuriant pages too intimidating to approach.

So there you are sandwiched between these two candidates vying for attention. Trade paperback clearly comes from some wealthy corporate bookstore or posh independent bookshop. Poor little mass-market paperback obviously stepped off a supermarket check-out counter shelf. Whose do you approach? Quality over quantity? Or what if the books are the same title? The same content, but different packaging? Fearing you can only afford a beer when a gin-and-tonic might be more to trade's liking, do you apt to offer a Sam Adams to the mass-market and settle? Or do you scrape together your pennies and get a cocktail for the trade just to have a looker on your arm?

Like the speaker in Dorothy Parker's short story, I usually fall for the one on the right. But it's not fair...or economical. I once opted for the trade version of P.S. I Love You instead of its smaller counterpart because it came with a nifty Cecilia Ahern bookmark and a bigger picture of Gerard Butler on the cover. Looks-ist, I tell you.

But I do love my trade paperbacks, even more possibly than my hardcovers. The latter serve to remind me how much money I spent. The trades are, in this way, friendlier.

It's a shame, really, because a person could afford so many more books if she bought all mass-markets. But what's really a shame is how much you have to spend these days for a book, trade or otherwise.

At one time, if memory serves me, most books were the smaller size. How much more egalitarian that was! And since there was little to compare it to, who cared? But no, publishers had to introduce a new way to discriminate, this time involving inanimate objects.

I feel quite ashamed, really. I just bought a trade edition of DuMaurier's Rebecca, that I'd been eyeing. It finally was in the bargain section at about a third of the regular price. But I already had a copy, gotten as a teenager and now held on to for sentimental reasons. Isn't that good enough? Apparently not for me. Sorry Rebecca. Still, sentiment can sometimes trump looks, and you'll always have a place on my shelves.

Litter-ature, and a note about negativing...

2008-05-12T19:12:00.000-07:00

Sorry. By the end of this post I will have been guilty of negativing. I don't really mean to negative anything. But when speaking about certain aspects of literature these days, I find it difficult not to negative. Actually, they seem to deserve to be negatived.

Now then, I think I have sufficiently introduced into my vocabulary the verb negative, (presumably rhyming with derive or revive.) The verb negative, you ask? Yes, I timidly answer. But I confess that I, too, am not convinced it's a true verb. Having run across this odd usage of the word in some scholarly tome about English language negation, I've been peppering my informal conversations with it as a way of expressing 'to be negative about,' (as in, That's a perfectly good score for such a difficult final exam, so just don't NEGATIVE it!). And, since my discovery of this term dovetails with my plan to reflect on my rather dim impression of some of today's young adult literature, I thought I'd put it to written use.

I believe that will conclude my use of negative. Don't want to overdo it all at once...

Unfortunately, it does not conclude a bit of a rant on a sub-category of books which I think would warrant much more use of the term.

A disclaimer: I haven't read these novels. I'll admit it. But I've tried. As a matter of fact, I have two of them, both library books, sitting on my desk waiting to be read, but I doubt I'll be able to do much more than just skim them. The A-List by Zoey Dean and Don't You Forget About Me by Cecily von Ziegesar are each one of a series called the A-List books and the Gossip Girls books, respectively. But I lump them together, books of this ilk. To me they're just those awful-looking books that we adults are feeding kids, the mental equivalent of serving junk food for dinner.

Why awful? Aren't I being terribly unfair? Well, I have tried to read them, as I said. So, I'm not totally their stranger. And I've read about them, for what that's worth. Check out this article by Naomi Wolf from the March 12, 2006 edition of The New York Times entitled, Young Adult Fiction: Wild Things.

While covering mature themes, these books do not seem to aim to educate. They seem, to a self-confessed non-reader, to glamourize the inane and the mean. At least, this is what I've gleaned from surveying their covers, captions and content. The titles are catchy, I'll grant you, but what do they mean to impart to the people of that impressionable age for which they're written? Nothing, I imagine, but a sense of fascination that will persuade these kids to plunk down their money in exchange for insipidity like All I Want is Everything, Nothing Can Keep Us Together, Dial L for Loser, Best Friends for Never. The cover art is often photos of glaring, sullen teenage girls glossed up and looking disdainful of whomever dared to pick up the book.

It's not hard to find fodder for criticism. Even if the inanity only goes as far as a few twists on popular sayings, why give that particular age group more superficiality to absorb? And why try to make it attractive? Who does it help? I assume it helps the publishers and authors, but does it do anything for the kids reading the books? This is a far cry from the the young adult reads of yesteryear. Wet bars? Martini's? In a kids' book?

But I guess it's par for the course in today's world. Still, does the book industry really need to be aiding and abetting in the dumbing down and spicing up of the upcoming generation's entertainment? And, if there are saving graces buried somewhere in these books, why must they have titles that reflect and promise to deliver such negativity?

So, now I don't know. Should I actually go ahead and try, again, to read one of these books? There are only so many hours in a day and there are so many actually good books I wonder if the investment of time is worth it. Unless I find a redeeming quality there, somewhere.

Maybe, I'm just negativing.

Touched by an e-mail writing author...

2008-05-06T18:10:00.000-07:00

There are papers tucked into copies of some of the books in my library. They're folded business-letter style and sit on my shelves waiting to be taken out, dusted off and unfolded carefully one day when they are brittle and yellowed. They're just copies of emails. In this computer age there's really no reason a computer print-out of an email should be handled so gingerly. Somewhere in cyberspace, I'm told, the message will always be hovering. So if I lose one, who cares?

I guess it's just a mark of a book-lover to fancy that a folded sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 that slips out of a novel five years from now is more romantic, will bring back more memories, than will logging on to a Mac or accessing data stored on a CD. So when I write to an author, this is what I do. And I think it makes my shelves more interesting, adds another story for them to tell beyond the dramas and comedies that already occupy spaces there.

It's a relatively new activity for me, this writing to authors. So far everyone I have written to has responded, and nicely, too. In one case I read Melanie Jeschke's Inklings and, knowing some places and people were based on the real thing, thought that I may have met someone whose fictional counterpart dwells in the pages of that book. I got a couple of really lovely emails from Ms Jeschke while we tried to sort out if my own inkling was right. In another case, I found what I thought to be an allusion to one character's future in the ending of Lorelei Mathias's Lost for Words, emailed, and was let in on the fact that it was actually the writer's joke about the book business. Another time, I happened upon Megan Crane's English as a Second Language in the store (a signed copy!) and enjoyed it. So I told her!

I think that these writers are not yet such big names that they can afford the time to email back to a reader. Not that I begrudge them a healthy readership, but I think it's rather nice that there are writers who are being read but are not so phenomenonally successful that they become unapproachable due to time, work, ego, or whatever. (And, as for being successful, I think just getting something good written and published and enjoyed by a few people who can then discuss it is being successful.)

I've got itchy fingers. I'd like to write to someone else. I'd better get reading....

This is not an example of one....

2008-05-04T22:49:00.000-07:00

Some writers are blessed with an ability to produce thought-provoking or unusual titles for their works, not the formulaic kind that just consist of the main character's name or maybe a noun and adjective. Perhaps it's their editors writing them, but somebody has a talent for it.

Every once in a while I'll run across an impressive title and store it somewhere in my memory where it settles in a corner and gathers dust until something jogs the gray matter and the title resurfaces.

There have been so many over time and I haven't kept track of them so I am QUITE irritated because I know there are more and I'd like to remember them. What a fun thing that would be for bibliophile list-maker to be able to do! But the thing is I can only recall one of them and it's a great one, but I know there are more and perhaps one day they'll come to mind but where's that mental list when I need it? Well, you see the frustration, don't you?

So, here's a list of titles because they deserve a mention somewhere of how great they are and because it's always nice to re-read great writing, or even to re-read that lure, that tease, that encapsulation of an idea that takes 70,000 words to fully articulate, the title.

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers (the best title on this list by far)

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
(so expressive)

Anne's House of Dreams by Lucy Maud Montgomery
(ethereal)

Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe by Fanny Flagg (a noun phrase anda prepositional phrase!)

Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri (Yeah, it's just an adj and a noun, but what a combo!)

How Elizabeth Barrett Browning Saved My Life by Mameve Medwed (intriguing)

Tolstoy Lied, A Love Story by Rachel Kadish
(a short complete sentence that makes the reader wonder,"Lied about what?")

I am America (And So Can You!) by Stephen Colbert (have no idea what it means, but love the enthusiastically bad grammar)

Love's Labour's Lost by William Shakespeare (a play this time - gorgeous use of alliteration, though again, what does it mean?)

As you can see, it's not an exhaustive list and maybe more reflective of guilt and misery than this blog's name indicates. Still,not a bad list since the books and play on it make me want to know more (especially since I haven't read them all yet!)

Anyone have a favorite title of their own?

Trees or books? What's a lover of words and paper to do?

2008-05-01T18:52:00.000-07:00

My former English professor called it one of life's great pleasures: reading outdoors.

How ironic then that that master work of nature, the tree, so loved by so many as cool company on a hot summer day of reading in the park, is threatened by the same people's love of books. You go out, maybe it's spring, everything is blooming and blossoming, maybe it's rained and the darkened barks and newborn leaves are smelling fruity in the breeze. You sit on a bench and pull out a dog-eared copy of your favorite annual re-read and breathe a sigh of regret that what you hold in your hands was once a fruit-smelling, life-giving tower of nature just like the ones around you. But worse is when you buy a new glossy copy of some recent release or old classic and know that you just contributed to the demise of a tree.

Sounds like dog-eared copies may be the way to go, as this article in the The Guardian seems to point out, at least if you want to read with the clear conscience that seems requisite for outdoor reading enjoyment.

Looks like book-swapping is big nowadays and may be a good way to help the cause of tree survival, but check out the reaction of the author mentioned in this piece. It's a legitimate issue - authors should get paid. But I balk at the comparison to the file-sharing woes of the music industry. One might want to ask her, ever heard of libraries, sister? They circulate books. And what about friends who share books? Should they be stopped? The book swap sites talked about in this article are like the "take a book, leave a book" program also mentioned, just on a large scale. Does their size render them somehow wrong?

I love a new book as much as anyone, but there's merit in this book swapping idea. Were I only so loyal to nature that I did more of it, but occasional used book-buying of hard to find titles is about as close to it as I get. Kudos to those who book swap. Love those books, love those trees!

One woman's quest to meet her love - Is it a touching story or just a bit touched?

2008-04-27T16:12:00.000-07:00

If you've read 'Someday My Prince Will Come, True Adventures of a Wannabe Princess'by Miss Jerramy Fine, you know what I'm referring to. This little book is a confection like cotton candy. It's yummy, pretty to look at, as girly as the color pink, and so light and ethereal that once you've consumed it, you question its ever having really been there...except that you now have a stomachache. Well, not a bad, bad stomachache, just a little gnawing at your gut making you wonder, Could this be true?

Fine tells her tale of growing up on the American side of the Atlantic knowing full well that her fate was on British shores and his name was Peter Phillips, the Queen's grandson. She finally escapes from her rural upbringing in 1980s Colorado by hippies who never let the age of aquarius end and gets herself into hundreds of thousands of dollars of debts financing her honors degree at the London School of Economics, and just perhaps, her partying. Because the good times really do roll in this author-described true story, but they aren't the most interesting part of 'Someday.'

That anyone would believe from the age of six to adulthood that they were destined for a particular well-known, royal man and would fixate on him, making their lives and life decisions mold to the plan of getting him seems, to me at least, a little, oh, unusual. But Fine says it's true and whether it is or isn't doesn't really matter. It's a good story all the same. That she told people of her plan along the way to meeting him is even more unbelievable. Wouldn't most people have suggested therapy? Wasn't she afraid she'd get kicked out of England?

I discovered this book around Valentine's Day, shelled out the $25 to get it and don't really regret it. It's expensive cotton candy, but I'm quite fond of cotton candy. A word of advice, though: you may want to mooch off your friend the public library's bag of candy before you buy it. Taste test. But I found it yummy. Quite yummy.

Edith Wharton facing foreclosure?

2008-04-26T19:51:00.000-07:00

Looks like the economy has gotten so bad it's starting to reach back in time and to foreclose on history and culture. The Mount is the name of Edith Wharton's gorgeous and historic house in western Massachusetts. Like so many others today its caretakers are facing foreclosure and then that's the end of strolls through those fantastic gardens and the rooms this particular author (House of Mirth, The Buccaneers, The Age of Innocence) called home. To get an idea of what lit lovers are potentially losing, check out the last couple of paragraphs of this Boston.com article from February 27, 2008.
To get more info on how you can help visit The Mount's website here. A total of $3 million is needed apparently by May 31st.