This book arrived this morning…
In the middle of all other sorts of books, so shall have all sorts of new comments in a flurry at some point. To link to yesterday, one is a re-read, one is a new read by an ‘old’ author, and one is a new read by a ‘new’ author! And, what is more, I’m enjoying the lot of ’em.
Getting late, so quick post today.
Something I forgot to add in my little meme about 2007’s reads – old and new authors. I mentioned that six of the books were re-reads, but haven’t brought up the issue of whether authors are first-time-reads or not.
So I had a look at last year. 53 of them were books by authors I hadn’t read before. Hmm. Quite a few of those were for review but, still, quite interesting. And does leave over 30 which were by familiar authors.
Both have advantages – a familiar author is a known entity. They can surprise, sure, but you more or less know what you’re getting. Perhaps they exceed expectation – like Vita Sackville-West’s All Passion Spent – or perhaps they disappoint a little – like Frank Baker’s Before I Go Hence. The fact remains that an expectation of some variety or other is there, and you can’t help comparing. On the other hand, a new author (new to you, that is) has untold possibility… or lack thereof.
A very short post today, I’m afraid, but something to get you thinking – which do you look forward to more? An author you know you’ll like, or a new author you might well love? Anticipation or safety??
I’m doing this week’s Booking Through Thursday rather late. Well, you could probably work that out from the day… Never mind, eh, let’s just pretend I spent the past few days pondering the question.
How did you come across your favorite author(s)? Recommended by a friend? Stumbled across at a bookstore? A book given to you as a gift?Was it love at first sight? Or did the love affair evolve over a long acquaintance?
Well, as Margaret points out, this question involves the very tricky decision as to favourite authors. Since I shan’t be compiling a proper list today, I’ll just mention the ones which are undoutedly favourites, and any others which come into my head.
-Miss Hargreaves by Frank Baker – this is the one I yammer on and on about! See the 50 Books… Well, this was loaned to me by my piano teacher, after a chance conversation.
-The Diary of a Provincial Lady by EM Delafield – Though this is quite well known in the world of middlebrow interwar fiction, and still in print, I came at it in rather a roundabout way. Bought 1940’s Modern Humour because it had a sketch by AA Milne in it – read the others, and read two by EM Delafield. Those exact two should be available through a link on the excellent EMD website www.starcourse.org/emd but that address isn’t currently working on my computer… Anyway, loved these sketches (actually from As Others Hear Us) and sought out other EMD things from our local library – step forward Provincial Lady.
-the non-Pooh works of AA Milne – saw a Winnie-the-Pooh cartoon early in 2001, and re-read the books. Then sought out Christopher Milne’s The Enchanted Places, then AA Milne’s Year In, Year Out, then his autobiog, then everything else…
–Persephone Books – found a Richmal Crompton novel in a local bookshop and, having loved William, thought I’d give it a go. Loved it, and read many. Later saw a newish looking copy of Family Roundabout at the library, which led me to Persephone…
-Sometimes I just pick up a book more or less at random, and love it. Examples include The L-Shaped Room by Lynne Reid Banks; The Love Child by Edith Oliver…
-Most books I read are through some sort of connection. A LOT are recommends from dovegreybooks Yahoo Group (responsible for my penury). Some are recommended by parents or friends – though I haven’t had a recommendation from Mum for a while. If you’re reading this, Our Vicar’s Wife, recommend me something!
And for 2) – yes, they were all favourites after the first read! I’m afraid I rarely re-read, and certainly not something I didn’t enjoy much the first time.
Before I go, Nancy asked about the film Amazing Grace – I’ll quote The Carbon Copy’s blog from March 07, when he saw it: “I went to see Amazing Grace last night, the new film based on the life of William Wilberforce (and there’s no real excuse if you don’t know who he is) and I was pretty impressed; not sure how close to the truth it was, but I enjoyed it – and was moved by it. Nice to see a strong(ish) Christian message coming through, and the idea that Wilberforce needed the love of a good woman before he could help abolish slavery is one that I like, even if it’s almost certainly untrue. A worthwhile film.”
You’ll be delighted to know that my failsafe computer tactic – ignore the problem and it will go away – has once more worked its magic. My ‘b’ key, though needing a tiny bit more persuasion than the others, is almost as good as new. All through the magic of ignoring the issue. Trust me, if restarting the computer doesn’t fix the issue, then try ignoring it. Like all other dangerous animals, it secretly craves attention, and will right itself if is starved of it.
So why is this particularly pertinent today? Well, I realised I hadn’t blogged properly about Shakespeare by Bill Bryson. That’s a lot of ‘b’s, especially when you remember that William is known fondly as Billybob by myself and others who took the Shakespeare paper alongside me in finals.
The Carbon Copy bought me Shakespeare for my birthday, along with the wonderful and moving film Amazing Grace and, possibly my favourite, a little picture of Eeyore receiving his birthday balloon. My previous experience with Bill Bryson is positive – loved Mother Tongue, which I read about five years ago. Fascinating stuff on the evolution of the English language, and incredibly readable.
‘Readable’ always sounds a bit like damning with faint praise – cereal packets deserve the same honour – but it really isn’t. Take it from one who had to read a lot of literary criticism, readability (is that a word?) is a must. Shakespeare follows suit – Bryson has obviously done a great deal of arduous and scholarly research, and the resulting book manages to be both deeply informative and incredibly amusing. Tricky combination.
So why do we need another book about Shakespeare? Bryson is honest enough to tell us how many thousands are on offer. Can’t remember the exact amount, but enough to make sure I could comfortably be reading a book about Shakespare every week for the rest of my life – not mentioning the rate at which they’re still being published. What sets this book apart is that Bryson’s character and authorship is expressed through style and wit, not groundless speculation or wide context. Shakespeare is only about 200 pages long, but it is an essential and reliable tome. Everything we know about Shakespeare is in here. A few theories and possibilities are mentioned, but they are shown to be just that, and not argued as certain. The funniest chapter is the final one, on Anti-Stratford theorists i.e. those who, for some reason or other, refuse to believe Billybob wrote his plays. Littered with such scathing lines as “an excellent theory, if it weren’t for the complete lack of evidence to support it,” and “X demonstrated amazing foresight in, seeing as he died before many of Shakespeare’s plays were written, secreting enough manuscripts that they could be gradually released, and correctly estimating the time period between his own and Shakespeare’s death”. I paraphrase, but you get the gist – very funny.
For the rest of the book – the first chapters sketch out Shakespeare’s life; where he was, different instances at which he is mention in some document or other. A nice touch is that Bryson often details the person who discovered a new fact about Billybob, often through laborious and painstaking reading of many manuscripts and documents. Credit where due, is Bryson’s motto. Subsequent chapters talk about the plays and the sonnets – not lit crit, but where they were performed or when they were first published. All very interesting, and if it sounds dry (and to me it doesn’t!) then Bryson’s wit and charm will fascinate you.
There have been thousands of books written about Billybob, and I daresay there will be thousands more, but for the facts in an engaging and funny way, this can’t be bettered.
Sorry, been feeling sleepy of late. Clearly the lengthy time-off I took has left me unprepared for the world of work – or, more specifically, the early wake-up time. I consider myself quite a morning person, but there are limits. Once I have a cup of tea inside me, though, I’m bright n’ breezy.
Thought I’d share a couple of things today, in lieu of anything particularly bookish to report (though am immersed in The Mitfords: Letters Between Six Sisters and may not emerge for some time)
1) Handed in my Masters Application for English Literature 1900-Present! Yes, back here I annouced my intentions (sounds like I’m an Austen hero requesting a lady’s hand in marriage) and, but a short 2.5 months later, I handed the forms in. Nine days before the deadline, mind, which in my book is organised. Should find out whether or not I’ve got a place in about two month’s time.
2) www.freerice.com
Not in the sense of freeing injustly imprisoned rice (though that is also a worthy cause) or even the United States Secretary of State. This website, which can speedily become addictive, combines both a love of language and charitable giving. It’s basically a game of synonyms – a word is given, you choose between four possible definitions/synonyms/vaguely-related-words-sometimes – every time you click, the companies which advertise on the site will give rice to United Nations World Food Programme. I don’t know the ins and outs of this organisation, but it certainly seems more + than – . And the worst that can happen is that I procrastinate for a few minutes.
Go try. The words get harder as you get more correct (and easier if you get them wrong) with a running ‘vocab level’. This goes up to 50, but I haven’t got higher than 45… very addictive game. But with the added bonus of absolutely no guilt.
I’ve booked some of these lessons:
What do you reckon it is? No, not golf.
Driving.
Ha ha ha. Ha. Ha…
(I warn you – my knowledge of golf begins and ends with that pun).
Watch out motorists and pedestrians of Britain, I am going to try to learn to drive. Eek. Quite, quite terrified, truth be told, and also rather poorer fiscally. I’m doing it a bit late (nice to know I can be old for certain things) mostly because I was too scared to try before, but I’ve realised that my dream of a rural idyll would be rather compromised by not being able to get to and from it. So, shall spend three weeks at a ‘simulation centre’, whatever that is (six hours in these three weeks, you understand, not the whole lot) and then hit the road… agh!
P.s. stories of how you and all around you nearly died whilst learning to drive not particularly welcome right now…
I read The Kite Runner for Book Group last week, and after a few people raved about it, I was expecting something brilliant. Well, I quite liked it – there we go, nothing if not effusive! The first 100 pages or so were great – a very vivid and complex portrait of an unequal fraternal relationship. Fascinating glimpse at issues of servitude, power, jealousy, love and a very believable pair of main characters. For those not in the know, Hassan is the son of Amir’s father’s Hazara servant – so the boys are the same age, and very close, but in very different circumstances. Perhaps their relationship is best shown in the sport which gives the novel its title – Amir flies his kite in an important local competition; Hassan is one of those who run after the cut-down kites, to keep as prizes. Hassan runs after them in order that he can give the kite to Amir – and his loyalty is such that he will endure much rather than relinquish the kite.
There is an event about 100 pages in which changes the lives of the central characters, the nature of the relationship, and the rest of the novel. To be fair to Khaled Hosseini (the author) the event doesn’t feel signposted in any way. I’m always annoyed by pages which scream “Look! Most Important Event Happening Here! Get Ready For Everything To Change!” But after it happens, the main force of the novel is lost. I waded through the remaining 200 or so pages with some interest, but The Kite Runner had rather, ahem, run out of steam.
And it got me thinking. Much of the reason I didn’t enjoy the second half of the book, aside from its having lost momentum, was the violence and gore it involved. Don’t get me wrong, this wasn’t a slasher-horror or anything, it was just rather too much for a reader with as squeamish an imagination as mine. I think that political situations are best told through character, rather than graphic description. It’s easy to write something fairly disgusting (it’s farcically easy to write something which will make m
e feel ill) but difficult to write in such a way as creates true empathy.
So what was my pondering – it was about novels being challenging. Challenging mindsets and emotions rather than using long words, of course. I’ve always just assumed that they should (sometimes) be challenging – and in some areas I still do. I love it when novels change the way I think, especially the way I think about people, but I will no longer feel guilty for squeamishness. I always thought the fault was with me, being put off by novels too ‘challenging’, whilst now I think they’re just difficult to read without feeling ill.
Hmm. I’m still not entirely sure, though.
It’s fair to say that I’m pretty excited.
If this were the only thing to come from my blog, then it would all be worth it. Not that blogging is a chore. But I can’t ask for much more than came through my letterbox – the paperback version of Angela Young’s wonderful Speaking of Love. It was one of my favourite reads of last year, and the original review can be found here. Do go and see what I thought.
Angela read my review and wrote about it on her blog, and obviously her publishers – the aptly named Beautiful Books – also got to hear about. Then a while later I got an email asking if I would mind them citing me on the back of the paperback – did I mind! You can guess that, not only did I not mind, but I was deliriously happy. This is still Angela’s wonderful, sensitive, emotive, beautiful book – but I like to think I share a tiny, tiny fraction of the cover, at least. Here I am:
So now you have two reasons to buy it. Not yet, though – wait until March. I’ll let you know when, of course.
And for those counting, this doesn’t contravene my self-imposed restriction on book buying during January, since this was a gift. Canny, no?
Andrew, Andrew, Andrew…
First of all, thank you to those who sent messages – I am healthy (just about; cold on its way) and my computer is more or less healthy; I have been back in Somerset for a few days and forgot to tell you – sorry. It was a brief visit, but another very nice one. Now I’m back in Oxford, but thanks to my enormous amount of leave taken at Christmas, shall not be back at work until Wednesday.
And now back to chastising Andrew Davies. I watched Sense and Sensibility last week, or whenever it was on, and was impressed. Great casting, good script. A few holes, but not everything can be Cranford, can it? And Davies had proved himself with the 1995 Pride and Prejudice. What happened? I have a theory that Andrew started reading the novel, got to the end of chapter three and, like so many high schoolers before him, thought watching the film would suffice for the rest. I mean, what happened? There was so much wrong with today’s episode, both in how it related to the novel, and in itself. Did Marianne passionately kiss Willoughby? No. Should any couple kiss in slow motion? No. Did Elinor hide in caves or wander along cliff tops? Probably not. Do we want suggestive scenes of waves crashing against shores? Er, no. Would Edward Ferrars pop out for a bit of log chopping in the middle of tea? Dare I say it, no. This scene, I understand, was supposed to be the Colin-Firth-in-lake equivalent, but to me just looked like a silly man getting soggy.
What did I like? The Misses Steele were good. The Palmers – for my money, the funniest couple in all of fiction – were shamefully underused. Mrs. Jennings continued to be funny; Margaret was quite sweet. But that’s not enough, Andrew – please give the novel a proper read before you adapt it, and don’t presume that you’re better at plotting than Jane is. Contrary to the opinion of marketing agents, Jane Austen is not “all about sex!!!” Yes, sexual attraction holds considerable sway, but she ain’t Barbara Cartland.
Disappointed, Andrew. Could Do Better.
Sorry for some technical difficulties yesterday – I’m going to blame my faulty internet connection. The USB Wireless thing was sticking out the back of the computer, when I accidentally smashed it against the window sill, and it came apart. Now works only sporadically. I went into Argos today but they didn’t have any in stock, so I shall have to be patient.
Anyway, as promised, here is my report back on three books published by Two Ravens Press. As always, the absence of ‘b’s is not intentional… I’ll write about these novels in the order that I read them – which also, coincidentally, happens to be the order I’d place them evaluatively.
First off, Parties by Tom Lappin.
It took me some time to notice the pun on ‘parties’, despite the fact that the cover, with its ballgown and political rosette, give the game away. Yes, this is about parties of both a social and a political nature, and specifically Beatrice, Grainne, Richard and Gordon. I’m going to be brutally honest – after the first chapter I had made up my mind. I wouldn’t mention it on my blog, because I don’t like being critical about new books, especially those published by small presses, but I did not get along with at all. It was only the fact that I’d been sent the novel that made me continue at all. Thank goodness I did.
I don’t know what it is, but the first few pages seem like another novel to the rest – or perhaps I just needed time to get into Lappin’s world and writing. Either way, I encourage potential readers to persevere – having read a couple of other reviews, I see I wasn’t the only person who almost gave up. Keep going.
Parties is structured so that each chunk of the novel has a one-word subtitle – Crisps, Coffee, Champagne, Beer etc. – and the following section is divided again into Beatrice, Grainne, Richard, Gordon. Not always that order. And what Lappin has done, one gradually realises, is write a magnificent bildungsroman – but in actual fact four of them in one. There are four protagonists, each so rounded and stunningly, painfully accurate and whole that it is difficult to believe they are not real.
Beatrice is a very beautiful part-Italian who bewitches men (mostly her tutors) but has a wry intelligence and discontent which the reader sympathises with, and allows her to be approachable as a character. Grainne is a little podgy and has manages to combine dreaming optimism with self-loathing and realism – she is paired with Gordon, a political climber who will exhaust everything and everyone to reach his pinnacle. Richard writes musical journalism and has listless relationships, while always admiring Beatrice.
It is hopeless to define these characters so briefly, since they are complete and can only truly be understood when the novel is read. I found Beatrice and Grainne the stand-outs of the four, but really all four are needed. Though their paths throughout the novel are dogged with disilluion and dissatisfaction, there remains an undeniable warmth and truth to the novel throughout. Quite unlike the sort of novel I usually read, but so utterly engaging that the characters remain in my head several months after I read Parties. Not for the faint-hearted, perhaps, but a striking work which I would foist on you – if you can get through the first pages. Oh, and I am the most apathetic person in the world when it comes to politics (which I’m sure would displease the author immensely) so if you have the slightest interest in that area, you’ll probably value Parties even more.
Next, Nightingale by Pet
er Dorward
I shan’t talk as much about the other two novels, as they didn’t affect me as much, but this is still an admirable book. Rosie is in Italy on the journalistic track of a 1980 bombing. She is also encountering her father, Don, for the first time in many years. And he was a witness at the bombing. Political thrillers, again, aren’t top of my list of favourite genres, but Dorward presents this one as a tale about relationships, trust, lies, self-exploration and the like. It is divided into three – the first section sees Rosie exploring and interviewing, and recognising her own inability to tackle all the issues head on. The second section flings us back to the time of the bombing, and the exploits of Don. Eventually we are back with Don and Rosie as the mysteries are settled.
I found the first and third sections the most satisfying – perhaps because it is easier to sympathise with Rosie’s position as investigative, confused, intelligent but naive. Don’s plight was rather more self-enduced, and tales of sex, drugs and longing, though not paramount, were less able to grip my attention.
Finally The Most Glorified Strip of Bunting by John McGill
A novel about the United States Polar expedition of 1871-73? This is what I meant about Two Ravens Press publishing
things you wouldn’t see elsewhere, and a topic I wouldn’t have dreamt of reading about unless it had been sent to me. This trip was doomed, as may or may not be common knowledge, and this novel has a predicated ending of deaths a-plenty. Throughout a fairly witty narrative, sections of a court case (or rather interviews in a criminal investigation) are interspersed, surrounding a potential poisoning. I think, given another time and place, I might have really liked McGill’s novel, but I just found it difficult to connect with the subject matter. Perhaps because it was close to Christmas and I fancied something cosy. Even having said that, I didn’t dislike the novel, and it was obviously well-researched, but with character always at the forefront, and never sacrificed to facts and figures.