Christmas BOOKings now being taken

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It’s the 25th, and you know what that means – only two months until Christmas. Yep, usually I’m there with the Grumpy Old Men and complaining that Christmas comes earlier every year, with tinsel going up as soon as the Easter eggs have been melted down for fondue. But I’ll make an exception for books, as it’s not their fault that marketing has to happen in October. Today I’m going to chat about two different Christmas books – very different, actually, but both worth mentioning.
This week, like a couple of other bloggers, I was sent Lynn Brittney’s Christine Kringle, described as a book for children of all ages. All the Gift Bringers from around the world are meeting for the annual Yule Conference, which debates such issues as whether Gift Days should be internationally universalised, or whether women can be become the hereditary Gift Bringer if a Yule family have no male offspring. This is especially important to Christine, daughter of Kriss Kringle, as she has no brothers and wishes to inherit her Yule duty. In the midst of this, the council of Plinkbury, a town in Worcestershire (hurray!) decide to ban Christmas. Off flies Christine and her Japanese and English friends to get Christmas reinstated… An enjoyable book, though not my usual fare, and was delighted to see Worcestershire get in print, as it was my homeland for thirteen years. Can’t work out if Plinkbury is based on a genuine town, though… there certainly isn’t one of that name. Unsurprising, really.
When I started the book, I was a little dubious at all the national stereotypes. You know – Italians in the Mafia; British sullen; Japanese polite and industrious; Americans saving the day. But Brittney melds these characters into a fun plot which keeps you turning the pages. I do have quibbles with the polemics Christine delivers – as a Christian, I didn’t like to see the Christ part of CHRISTmas swept under the carpet so much, quite openly, and I’m too British not to blush at some of the bits about loving ourselves and finding a hero inside every one of us and so forth. But if you’re feeling Christmassy and uncynical, give this one a go.

The second Christmas book I wanted to mention is Jostein Gaarder’s The Christmas Mystery, initially published in 1992. The book is divided into 24, being the first twenty-four days of Decemver – like a big advent calendar, in fact. The central character, a little boy called Joachim, is given a mysterious old advent calendar – each day opened provides a slip of paper and a picture. Through the story on the bits of paper, we follow Elisabet as she wends her way through the shepherds and wisemen as they journey towards Christ’s Nativity – and Joachim’s family try to connect it to the Elisabet who disappeared at Christmas 1948. This is a beautiful book, with mystery and atmosphere and the magic of Christmas without making the festival commercial or saccharine. I read it last year, a chapter a day through advent, and would definitely recommend reading it that way.

Oh, and don’t forget you still have a chance to get Miss Hargreaves!

Fancy a Book-Swap?

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All sorts of experimentation today… I do apologise if it doesn’t work.

Fancy a Book-Swap?

I was wandering into Arcadia, one of my favourite shops in Oxford and one which is mentioned here, and bought a little Penguin paperback, with anticipation of its being sought after with my readers on this blog. And, if you’d like it, leave a comment – or email simondavidthomas@yahoo.co.uk – and I’ll make a little draw. To make it fun and reciprocal, all I ask is a paperback-swap i.e. send me anything at all that you think I might want to read, even if it only cost 5p! How’s that for a deal?

But what is the book I’m offering, you ask? Well… it’s probably got more mention than any other on Stuck-in-a-Book, and is one of my very favourite novels. The video will give the rest away. It took me an age to get it to work, and then I forgot that videos will show you a shot from the middle as their default screen, which rather removed the mystery. But humour me, and play it anyway. I’ve put a gap in the blog to extend the surprise… If the video fails, then your answer can also be found here.

Tempted?! Remember, just comment or email, then the winner can have a paperback exchange with me.

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Old Penguin/New Penguin

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Today I’m going to chat about the New Penguins. Or do I mean Old Penguins? Or Penguins experiencing a second childhood? Before you think I’ve gone all David Attenborough (does that mean anything Across the Pond?) I am talking about the world of publishing. I’m probably not very uptotheminute, but I haven’t seen much discussion about the OldNew Penguins across the blogosphere, and thought I’d contribute my tuppenyworth.

For years – ever since I first found an old orange-striped Penguin paperback – I’ve maligned Penguin’s decision to ditch these covers. Yes, they’re Penguin Classics covers are often beautiful and well chosen, and I daresay some of their other choices aren’t aesthetically unpleasing, but there is no book jacket so distinctive and iconic as the old Penguin stripes. Moan on, I did, and moan. And, I can only imagine as a direct result of my solitary moaning, Penguin celebrated their birthday by reissuing several recent books in these old covers. Be still, my palpitating heart! Well, not completely still. That would be rather a fatal error.

So I did what any self-respecting bookaholic did, and scurried along to all good bookshops (or at least one of ’em) and beheld a table full of these beauties. Light Blue for big idea; Green for mystery; Orange for fantastic fiction; Pink for distant lands; Dark Blue for real lives; Purple for viewpoints. And in a buy-one-get-one-half-price offer.

My first choice was quite easy. I’ve been wanting a copy of Claire Tomalin’s Jane Austen : A Life ever since I borrowed Our Vicar’s Wife’s copy a few years back – and to have a nice purple Penguin copy… But I was determined to get a truly iconic orange Penguin, in which guise so many of my favourite novels have appeared. Hmm… (quick perusal of stall)… well… no, not really… and I don’t want that. Haven’t heard of that, doesn’t look very good… Saw that for 10p the other day…

I came away from the orange Penguins entirely empty-handed. Fantastic Fiction? For each title I either had it, didn’t want it, or could get it (in a different cover) for next to nothing in a charity shop. Hmph. So I bought The House at Riverton instead. Great idea, Penguin, but a little more thought in the fiction department, perhaps.

50 Books…

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15. Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead – Barbara Comyns

The early stream of books to include in my 50 Books You Must Read But May Not Have Heard About has slowed to a gradual flow, and that was sort of deliberate. I suppose I didn’t want to overwhelm people. This site mentions a lot of books – as you might expect on a literary blog – and also suggest a great deal as being worth reading. I suppose I want to say “Even if you ignore everything else I mention, pay attention to this list.” Of course, you’re perfectly welcome to ignore the list too, but I’d like you to pay special attention to them if you so wish(!) They’re all there for a reason – because they’re touching or hilarious or brilliantly written or just very indicative of my taste, and I know that you’re unlikely to hear about them unless I mention them.

So, after that little preamble, step forward no. 15 on the list – Barbara Comyns’ Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead. Those of you who are more knowledgeable than I will have spotted that the title is from The Fire of Drift-Wood by Longfellow.

We spake of many a vanished scene,
Of what we once had thought and said,
Of what had been, and might have been,
And who was changed, and who was dead;

The only other Comyns I’ve read was Our Spoons Came From Woolworths, so she certainly has a way with titles. I bought Who Was Changed… a few years ago, partly because I’d quite enjoyed Our Spoons Came From Woolworths, partly because the mix of a Virago paperback and an interesting cover piqued my interest. Had I turned to the first sentence, I daresay I’d have read the novel much sooner: ‘The ducks swan through the drawing-room windows.’ How can you not want to read on?

The novel opens with a flood, and things get stranger and stranger. If I were to choose one word to describe this novel it would be “surreal” – but surreal in a very grounded manner. Exactly like the cover illustration, actually; part of ‘Christ Preaching at Cookham Regatta: Dinner on the Hotel Lawn’ by Stanley Spencer. Throughout the events (which I don’t want to spoil for you) Comyns weaves a very real, earthy, witty portrait of a village – especially the Willoweed family. A cantankerous old lady who won’t step on land she doesn’t own, Grandmother Willoweed, rules over her docile son, Ebin, and his young children Emma, Hattie and Dennis. Grandmother W is a truly brilliant creation – without the slightest feeling for anybody around her, she is still amusing rather than demonic. For some reason this novel was banned in Ireland upon publication in 1954 – perhaps for the occasional unblenching descriptions, but these are easily skipped if you, like me, can be a bit squeamish.

Though quite a slim novel – my copy is 146 pages of large type – Comyns writes a book which lingers in the mind, one that is vivid and funny and absurd and a must read for anyone interested in off-the-wall literature with human nature at its heart.

And it’s cheap on Amazon.co.uk…

(please do go and read a rather better review on John Self’s Asylum blog here.)

E-Friends?

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I have a (free) account with StatCounter.com, and they tell me interesting things like the countries in which I’m being read; the keyword searches which lead to SiaB; the length of time people spend here before getting bored and going away (a startling number stay for ‘0 seconds’). The other day I noticed a lot had come from normblog… curious, thought I, and pootled off there to find out whys and wherefores.

Well, thank you Elaine! The lovely lady of Random Jottings has entered the blogging hall of fame, in the form of a normblog profile. Have a look at it here. There are all sorts of questions about blogging, reading, politics, personality and so forth – bits and pieces which you might pick up from her blog, but which are usually in the background. Anyhow, in the course of this interview Elaine mentioned my blog as one of her favourites, hence what we in the business call increased traffic. Shucks, and thanks!

And this got me thinking… Before my blogging days, as you probably know by now, I was (indeed, still am) a member of a Yahoo group dovegreybooks@yahoogroups.co.uk – it began as a group devoted to those nice grey books I talk about quite a lot, but chatter is often about a whole range of books, which we call ‘doveish’ for want of a better word. There are only three of us from the day I joined (January 2004) but many past and present are very dear… whats?

That’s the point of today’s post. What are these people? Well, they’re friends of course. I’d count many of you as that, too, of course. Most of you know more about me than colleagues I see everyday, and we certainly have more in common than many people I socialise with – the main reason I blog and am in the Yahoo group is because I love ‘meeting’ other people who love books like I do. But – or is just me? – do you ever feel embarrassed talking about FRIENDS when you’ve never met them? The whole thing can sound like people who hold online conventions about cartoon characters, or participate in online dating. Nothing wrong with those things, I daresay, but they’re not what we’re doing right here. Plus, let’s face it, for the most part those things are a little geekier than we’re willing to admit to. So… what do I say? At the moment I tend to say “e-friend” in an ironic, very postmodern sort of way. There just isn’t the right language yet, or the right social knowledge of this sort of very real friendship.

Language aside, my question for you today is – which e-friend (for want of a better word) have you known the longest? How did you e-meet, and have you met in the Real World? What was it like?


My longest e-friends are mostly in the blogosphere now – Elaine at Random Jottings, Lisa at BlueStalking, and Lynne at Dovegreyreader. The other dovegreybooks Yahoo group member whom I’ve know since January 2004 is Lyn, who introduced me to it, and thus to a whole different life of reading, and this blog. Ruth, at Crafty People, joined around the same time, I think. I haven’t met any of these people, but have met Karen at Cornflower, and Barbara and Jane from dovegreybooks. The former event was lovely, though I’d only been blogging for a fortnight or so, and had only just ‘met’ Karen online. The latter – met both of them at a book event, by design – was really, really nice. I thought it might be a bit awkward, but we had good fun and, though brief, it was a delight to put a face to a typeface. I don’t seek out these meetings, but am not adverse to them if they occur – and think it would be great fun if they happen by coincidence. Doesn’t blogging open up a lot of possibilities?!

p.s. for those who read this yesterday – Blogger is now letting me put up sketches again!

Bokking Thorugh Thrusday

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Boking Thrugh Thurssday thsi weke iz abowt speling orr grammer erorrs.

“You may or may not have seen my post at Punctuality Rules Tuesday, about a book I recently bought that had the actual TITLE misspelled on the spine of the book. A glaring typographical error that really (really!) should have been caught. So, using that as a springboard, today’s question: What’s the worst typographical error you’ve ever found in (or on) a book?”

Beeing inn an libary, i seee alot off thiss, thogh its allmost allways acidental. Misslabelling teh syde off volyumes, taht sortov fing. Cant thinc off eny blatent erors inn tituls oar eeven conntents off buks themselfs… all so ca’nt kepe tihs upp four mutch longerer, sew shal tern teh qestion ovver two ewe…?!

Not Quite The Booker

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Wouldn’t you just know it? I start to dabble in the twenty-first century, and the book I read doesn’t even win the Booker. That’s gratitude for you. Hmph. Well, can’t see myself bothering with Anne Enright’s The Gathering, even with the accolades of the Booker panel, but I have now read one of the shortlist at least. My library-trainee-chum Lucy, a McEwan aficiando to the death, leant me her copy of On Chesil Beach to see if Ian could redeem himself in my eyes. For the record, my previous experience with Mr. McE goes something like this: Atonement – great, especially the beginning; Enduring Love – amazing opening chapter, kinda tailed off after that; Saturday – umm, what happened Ian? So I’m pleased to say that, while On Chesil Beach isn’t particularly like any of the others there, it met with approval from Stuck-in-a-Book and McEwan is back in my good books. There’s almost a pun there.

Have now returned Lucy’s book, so shall type my thoughts as best I can without it. I’m sure you all know the premise by now – virginal newly-weds Edward and Florence experience an awkward honeymoon, and McEwan uses this tiny canvas to present their lives and the lives of a generation. Two such fully-formed characters he’s not written since Briony in Atonement – no cliches (imagine the accent, if you will) or easy portrayals, these are real people experiencing real situations. The only issue I take is that Florence seems like a real person from about 1910, not 1962… feels a bit like McEwan flipped through his Decades of the Twentieth-Century Book and picked the first one which wouldn’t have them encumbered by a World War. Still, that’s a minor quibble, and we’ll let it pass.

McEwan (controversially) called On Chesil Beach a ‘novelette’. Controversial because this more or less disqualified him from the Booker shortlist, but somehow they managed to sweep that under the carpet. Whether or not it was wise to label the book thus, I think I agree with the term – if McEwan had only included the honeymoon scenes, then this would be a (long) short story. Since he intersperses these sections with substantial chunks of background, it’s more than that, but it still doesn’t quite feel like a novel. Usually huge amounts of back story irritate me, and here they weren’t always welcome, but generally they are woven in in such a way as give characters deeper dimensions affectively. I certainly didn’t want more – the characters’ backgrounds offer the central story, almost a vignette, poignancy and integrity, but any attempts to make this a thousand page tome would have lost all the spark and depth.

I shan’t spoil the ending – except to say that it is the opposite of Atonement in terms of effect. Much of Atonement examines the consequences of a single action; On Chesil Beach examines the single action and allows the reader to extrapolate the consequences.

Six(th) Sentences

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Mel, whose little biography dominated yesterday, also brough another website to my attention recently – Six Sentences. Can’t decide whether or not it’s intended to be a pun on sixth sense – if not, then it should be.

Quite a simple idea – what can you say in six sentences? If the short story is too long for you, then this is the website to which to head. Obviously a single sentence could be infinitely long (discuss) but the contributors take it sensibly, and use a small canvas to make a big impact. Some famous people have made their efforts known – Sting, Stephen King, Tom Cruise (think some of these are just six sentences stolen from other places, come to think of it…) and Mel George, of course. Haven’t written anything myself yet, though I probably will when I’ve had time to ponder on’t – but a fascinating little domain of miniature thoughts, experimenting successfully. Worth checking out in an idle moment – got to be better than day-dreaming, anyway.

And, like that website, today’s entry is short. Because my camera is charging, and so I can’t do any of the posts I’ve been thinking about. Will just share an amusing incident from the library today – fresh from tipping a trolley of books over myself yesterday (both librarian and books are in a stable condition) today an oldish man told me cheerfully that “40 years ago what I was doing would be vandalism”. Um, ok, except what I was doing was dealing with his enquiry and typing on a computer… left me with a bit of confusion, but all adds to the rich tapestry of life.

Cinderella DOES go to the ball?!

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I’ve always assumed there are some books which one knows psychically.

Well, obviously that’s nonsense, but there are all sorts of books which I don’t remember having explained to me, but which I knew about, down to most of the plot twists. I’m not just talking boy-gets-girl, I’m talking Jane-Eyre-Madwoman-in-Attic. It would never have occurred to me to put a *SPOILER* warning in front of that, as I might if I were revealing climactic moments of more obscure literature. Sorry if I’ve spoilt the novel for you… I rather assume that most of my readership know about old Bertha, even if they haven’t waded through Gilbert & Gubar. I didn’t read Jane Eyre until I was 17 or thereabouts – but I knew the whole plot without, as far as I’m aware, having heard or seen any adaptations. So it was fun, but it wasn’t surprising.

Writing yesterday about the Queen’s (fictitious) introduction to literature made me think about my friend Mel. She is a very, very dear friend, and hopefully won’t mind me writing about her (!) Though a bright lass, she’s not as book-obsessed as I am, and some of the classics are still unread for her. That makes it sound like I’ve read the lot, which is incredibly far from being the case, but Mel still had The Big Three to read. The Big Three are not books I consider to be the best in the world, nor to have a huge amount in common, it’s just I’ve never met anyone who liked one of them without loving the others too. What are they, you ask? Jane Eyre, Rebecca and I Capture the Castle. She’s now done all three, and loved them – but the reason I write about it is because she didn’t know what would happen next! I had great fun hearing updates on Jane Eyre, with surmises and surprises along the way – what would be in the attic? A deformed son? And they were getting married but half the book seemed to be left – what could go wrong?? What a treat it must be to have a completely fresh introduction to such a classic.

So, any books you’ve done this with? Shocked to learn that Elizabeth gets over her prejudice? Astounded that Scrooge turned out not too bad? The nearest I’ve got is with Rebecca – I knew most of the plot beforehand, but not one important twist. My biggest gasp-out-loud moment came in To The Lighthouse, but I think a fair percentage of you may not have read TTL yet. YET, I say…

Oh, and as an aside – do you, or anyone you know, break my Big Three declaration?!

Common/Uncommon

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Had a lovely time at home, soaking in the countryside, and am now back in my usual blogging spot of Oxford – specifically the desk of the back bedroom in Regent Street. While down in Somerset (or Zumm as I affectionately label it) I was able to offer my lovely Aunt Jacq. a cup of tea, for she also lives in Zumm, and she reciprocated with much more exciting gifts…

No, not my birthday of anything – she just saw them and thought of me. It pays to make your opinions known, doesn’t it?! Well, you all know I love Virginia Woolf – and I’d ummmed and ahhhed over the Alan Bennett for a while, glad the choice was made for me.

Haven’t used the mug yet, but a car journey too and from Bristol to see The Carbon Copy (the whole Clan together for a few hours at least!) allowed me to read The Uncommon Reader, and greatly did I enjoy it. Haven’t read any Alan B before, though did see The History Boys film, and have vague recollections of Talking Heads being on in the car in my younger days. It was great fun – I’m sure everyone knows the plot by now. The Queen bumps into the local library van, and, out of politeness, borrows an Ivy Compton-Burnett. Love her or loathe her (ICB, that is), you have to acknowledge she’s not a great one with which to start the long path of literacy:

‘She’s not a popular author, ma’am’.

‘Why, I wonder? I made her a dame’.
Mr Hutchings refrained from saying that this wasn’t necessarily the road to the public’s heart.

As she pursues more and more books, with the help of kitchen boy Norman who becomes her constant aide, her royal duties start to suffer… This book, as well as being witty and just the right combination of absurd and plausible, also offers some genuine insights into the realm of reading, without being too truism-y. ‘I think of literature,’ she wrote, ‘as a vast country to the far borders of which I am journeying but cannot possibly reach’. Ever felt like that?!!

And just a final word about the sketch. Not a great one today, I’m afraid, so if you need a clue just think ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’.