Beyond the Brush

This Blog Is Moving

2012-01-16T11:44:00.000-08:00

Hello all, I'm moving this book blog to a new location with a new name. If you like, please follow me over to: Stories Geek. I'm trying to separate my art stuff fully from this other blog and this was the best way to do it, plus it is fun to try out Wordpress. Also a brand new Twitter for the book blog which will only relate to books, movies, etc. and not at all to my art. I am still settling in on both, and will likely be a little confusing for me for a bit, particularly having two Twitter accounts, but I hope to get things running smoothly soon.

Slowly, I will be moving book blogs I follow to the new blog and same with the Twitter. Eventually, I will delete this blog altogether. If you are also one of my art blog followers, that will all remain the same. Just the book blog is changing. Thanks everyone!

Girl with the Dragon Tattoo...The Movie

2012-01-08T14:30:00.000-08:00

If you recall, I recently finished reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and less than a week later, we went to see the movie. Wow. It was pretty intense, which was really no surprise having read the book. However, to see it right before you like that, the graphic, violent scenes, it still takes your breath away.

I don't want to say too much, in case you don't want anything spoiled. But I'll just mention a couple things I really liked. I loved, loved the settings. I have a big weakness for Scandinavian things (think I mentioned that before) and I so enjoyed seeing the locations, the houses, the landscapes, etc. I could have used some more interior shots, though, because I like to see how people live. But, that's just me.

Rooney Mara, who played Lisbeth Salander, did an amazing job. She was all that I imagined the character to be.

All that hostility, it was so hard to believe this was the actress who played her:

Tattoos, piercings, that big black thing in her ear, the black, choppy hair and not to mention the whole Lisbeth attitude. There were several other great portrayals of the characters from the book, but she really took on Lisbeth for me. And those really bad, scary scenes she had to do...I am still nauseous thinking about them.

It was a long movie, despite having condensed some areas of the book. They did have a lot to cover I suppose, but after one of the crucial plots wrapped up and it felt like we had already been sitting there a long time I thought about how there was a whole other section they had to cover.

One more thing, I would have liked a little more of (though how this would have been possible without making the film even longer, I couldn't say) was more focus on the main character's (Mikael) near isolation on the island, which, in the book, was even more so with the freezing temperatures and all that snow. For me, that isolation and climate were a major part of the story, of Mikael's story. And while there were bits of that, I didn't get nearly enough of it to satisfy me.

I'll have to watch it again, there was so much to take in. Though I think I'll wait until I can watch it at home and skip over a couple of those violent scenes.

The Time Machine

2012-01-05T10:10:00.000-08:00

I am so pleased, I really enjoyed reading The Time Machine by H.G. Wells. First, I'm glad to have finally read it. I've enjoyed the movie version (the 1960 version, I've not seen the 2002 one) for years and have had the book sitting on my Kindle for well over a year. Perhaps if I had realized it is only about 100 pages long I might have read it sooner? It really is that short, I'm amazed Wells was able to pack so much into such a small book.

The Time Machine is the story of a man in Victorian England who builds a time machine, travels forward in time thousands and thousands of years to see what has become of the earth, what has become of humans. He expects we have evolved to some sort of perfection, but he finds instead humans have basically dumbed down and spend all their time playing around and basically doing nothing. His time machine goes missing, but initially he isn't terribly concerned as these humans seem so harmless. Then he finds there is another sort of human, one that has evolved quite differently. They live underground, can't stand the light, and apparently provide the other humans with their clothes and food, which explains why that first group of humans he encounters don't seem to have to work for anything. And, in trying to find his missing time machine, he finds out something rather unsettling about this underground species of human.

The 1960 movie mostly stays true to the book, but there were a few differences. (Here I might include a spoiler or two so be warned and will write as if you already know the story.) The Time Traveler's relationship with the future human Weena in the movie I felt was over-romantacized now having read the book. Those humans, the Eloi, are described as looking much different than humans are today. Smaller, delicate, Weena does not strike me as someone the Traveler would develop a romantic attraction for but instead just a strong affection. A parental sort of relationship. Also, the movie, I thought anyway, insinuated that the Traveler was going back to Weena and the Eloi at the end, but the book only suggests he is continuing to travel. Another difference was how the Morlocks (those underground humans) harvest, so to speak, the Eloi seemed to be much less calculated. In the movie, this great siren sounds and the Eloi go into a trance as they are led underground. The book has the Morlocks simply going out at night to try to collect Eloi. The movie gave it more of a nuclear attack sort of feel.

And speaking of nuclear attacks, or at least big bombs, I felt, and perhaps this was my own misunderstanding, that it was insinuated in the movie that the division of humans into Morlocks and Eloi was a result of wars. In the book, the division came about through class differences. Through one group serving another and that over time, the Morlocks degraded into this subspecies of ground dwellers serving the other subspecies who were originally the upper classes. The upper class, having all their needs met, simply stopped bothering to do anything and became naive and innocent (stupid) and spent all their time playing around and doing nothing. The Morlocks were also not bright, but perhaps Wells saw this as normal as being the poorer class they would have been uneducated anyway? Each subspecies (I hope I'm right in called them subspecies) had degraded to living off their instincts. Instead of advancing, they had regressed and didn't know to do otherwise. Wells of course wrote this book before both of the World Wars and the movie was filmed after. Class distinctions, while still present, were perhaps less so than in Wells time so the wars, not long after World War II, made more sense for movie-goers?

(End of spoilers) I guess I had a lot to write about this little book. Now I can check this one off my Science Fiction/Fantasy List. Next up: Farenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury.

The Stephen King Project

2012-01-05T09:00:00.000-08:00

While I'm trying to resist signing up for too many challenges this year, I just couldn't pass this one up. The Stephen King Project 2012 was a perfect match for my reading plans as I have 2 Stephen King books on my list for the year and am very tempted to add a third. But by at least reading one, I qualify for A King Novice so certainly I can do that and if I do bump it up to 3 books I would be at the level A Lil Bit of King. Here's a little bit about the challenge:

The Stephen King Project Overview

This will run from January through December 2012
Anyone can join. But you should have a blog OR an account with Goodreads, Shelfari, etc., so you can write your reviews and we can visit via the link at The Stephen King Project.
The Project will be hosted at The Stephen King Project review site. Participants should link their reviews to the Linky there.
Audiobooks count.
E-books count.

What Are the Commitment Levels?

A King Novice: 1 book
A Lil Bit of King: 3 books
A King to Balance It All: 6 books
A King Legend: 9 books
A King for All Seasons: 12+ books

What About the Movies?

Hell. YEAH. Same rules from the above apply, except...
You can mix and match but you should have more books than films in your end-of-year total tally.

More information about the challenge can be found here. And by the way...they even have prizes...

So what am I reading for this? So far I have:

Dark Tower I: The Gunslinger This book is also on my Science Fiction/Fantasy List so I'll be pleased to check one off. I tried reading it years ago and couldn't really get into it. I am very hopeful this time around will be different.

The Eyes of the Dragon I'm totally excited to read this one. It will actually be a re-read for me (and likely a re-re-re-read). I had this book years ago and adored it. I cannot remember anything about it now, which is perfect, and was totally inspired to try it again.

One of these two others I'm considering: The Stand and 11/22/63. Both tempt me so much, I might not be able to resist.

The Girl with the... You know the rest

2011-12-31T08:09:00.000-08:00

For Christmas I received the Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson from my husband and the decision was made that I had to very quickly read first book, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, so we could go see the movie next week. Done.

As I said, I received the trilogy so the cover I put above is not what my copy looks like. Let me first tell you about how beautifully published this set is. I was completely unprepared for it. Despite having put it on my own wish list, I had not really paid attention to what they would be like. Which is unusual for me, I usually pay great attention to such things.

Clothbound, hardcovers with embossed lettering and symbols. Very nice. The paper is good quality and the edges are deckled. I'll be very happy to have these sitting on my shelves for years.

Once I was into the first story, I found it very hard to put down. I did have that deadline to finish the book, but I doubt I would have had a problem finishing it so quickly anyway. It is a mystery, and I do like mysteries, and although at times more violent and graphic than I might like it doesn't dwell on those moments overly much. The main character, Mikael Blomkvist, is a likable character whose career has taken a beating. He is hired by a wealthy, elderly man to find out what happened to the old man's great niece when she disappeared 40 years earlier without a trace.

I liked the main characters, despite their oddities. I really enjoyed Lisbeth Salander, the heroine of our story, though an unlikely one. Tattoos, piercings, and more hang ups than I could count she is totally unlike any heroine I've ever read before. While she has no compunction about committing any number of crimes to suit her needs, she has an incredibly strong sense of what is wrong when she believes another has been harmed.

Now I'm really looking forward to seeing the movie, especially as it seems to have gotten favorable reviews. I don't care for seeing it so soon after reading the book (I like some time between, a chance to forget things) but that can't be helped. I can't wait to see the Swedish settings and I hope they don't disappoint. Someday, I hope to see the Swedish films on the trilogy too.

***

In other reading news, I had to set aside Game of Thrones to read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and therefore will not have it finished in time for The 2012 Science Fiction Experience starting tomorrow. I plan to read it here and there over the next couple of months, so I don't forget anything, and then pick it back up fully again in March. Tomorrow, I begin reading The Time Machine by H.G. Wells. I love the movie and have seen it many times (the 1960 version, I haven't seen the more recent one).

Reading Plans for 2012

2011-12-29T17:36:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in a previous post that I was thinking about doing a "12 for 2012" challenge. 12 of whatever I decide and here is what I came up with:

My "12 for 2012":

12 science fiction/fantasy books
12 new releases (released no earlier than October 1 2011, just to pick a random date)
12 books already on my shelves

There will be some crossover on these, giving me even more flexibility (for example, I have a few science fiction and fantasy books already on my shelves). I wanted to give myself the opportunity to not just work on my shelves, but to explore new work and, in doing so, support living authors hence the 12 new releases.

I hope to cross several books off my Science Fiction/Fantasy List, I hope to read at least one book by Jane Austen (as I'm reading or rereading her books in publishing chronological order), and I hope to read at least a few on my shelves, including several classics, that have been there a very long time. Also, I really would like to read this year something by Margaret Atwood and Catherynne M. Valente as well as a few others.

My hope is that I will read more than just this small number, but ahhh... the freedom, the lack of pressure. I like that feeling! I should have tried it last year. You can see some of the possible books I'll be reading for the "12" right here, though they might change if I feel like it.

A Very Short Post About My Experience of War and Peace

2011-12-27T19:17:00.000-08:00

For the year 2011, I joined up to read War and Peace, a chapter a day and I'm pleased to say I finished the book, after a big push, a couple of months ago. I waited to post about it, unsure how much to really write. But it must be done.

I won't say much, it is too long a book to sum up as I'm sure you know and I would really like to get this post done and move on. I truly enjoyed reading it and found it surprisingly easy to follow unlike the challenge I thought it would be. If you have thought about reading it but were unsure due to its immense size or reputation, it can be done.

After probably about the first 100 pages, I started to get used to the characters and settled in. I developed favorites, then changed my mind about them and developed new favorites. That happened at least a few times during the book as the characters evolved. The characters were my favorite part overall, seeing how they changed, for better or worse. Learning their good traits and bad. They felt real to me as if I was reading non-fiction and not just characters in a story.

I liked the war parts the least and honestly did not read them all that carefully after awhile. I did like reading about Russian society and Tolstoy (at great, great length) engulfed me in all the details of a Russian household or at least how the upper crust lived. I've had very little exposure to anything Russian and it was fascinating to learn more about the culture.

No spoilers here, but I was surprised by some of the ending (i.e. who married who) and found Tolstoy's epilogue, in which he updates us later in the characters' lives, to be incredibly over the top. It was more than 80 pages and frankly I got it. Got the point, was ready to be done. But in my frustration I thought why would the epilogue be short and to the point when the rest of the book was certainly not. It was all Tolstoy and he wrote beautifully so even though I had to push through to the end of those last 80 pages, it was worth it. Plus, what a feeling of satisfaction! I read War and Peace!

And yay, now I've finally posted about it. Phew!

Holiday Wishes

2011-12-23T09:13:00.000-08:00

Hope your holidays have been and will continue to be wonderful!

It has been a busy week, but I am progressing quickly through Game of Thrones. It took a little while to get into it simply because there are so many characters to follow. But once there, it is worth it. It is a fascinating story so far.

Have a great weekend!

Science Fiction is coming!

2011-12-21T19:16:00.000-08:00

The non-challenging, Science Fiction immersion is coming! I'm hoping to finish Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin by the end of this month (less than 600 pages to go, surely I can do that!...) so I can fully immerse myself in all things science fiction come January. I've signed up for two non-challenges with that in mind starting with The 2012 Science Fiction Experience (January and February) and The Vintage Science Fiction Month (January).

Here are my books and screen possibilities so far:

Books:

The Time Machine by H.G. Wells

Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

The Dispossessed by Ursula LeGuin

Graphic Novels:

Serenity: Those Left Behind

Serenity: Better Days

The Screen:

Star Trek (2009)

Logan's Run

Firefly (the series)

Doctor Who (as many as I can squeeze in)

I'm waiting to see if I will be adding any books to the list from Christmas and if not, I have a few others in mind I might add anyway.

My plan for 2012 in regards to challenges is to keep them simple. I'm not going to sign up for anything yearlong or heavy duty. I will probably do the three challenges over at Stainless Steel Droppings (Science Fiction Experience, Once Upon a Time, and R.I.P.) because they are too fun to miss but I expect that will be it. The only other thing tempting me was a challenge of sorts proposed on the podcast Books on the Nightstand (Have you heard of Books on the Nightstand? If not you should check it out. I really enjoy their weekly podcasts.) Michael Kindness talked about "12 in 2012" but leaving it open to interpretation. So for me that could mean 12 of a certain genre or country or anything really. So I'm giving that some thought. I'll let you know if I come up with something.

FYI, I changed up the format of my blog and apparently this particular theme, or whatever you call it, doesn't have a sidebar. I like the way it looks so for now I'm leaving it, but if you want to see what I'm currently reading ever, you can visit my About page and I'll put that sort of information there.

Kusamakura

2011-12-11T14:30:00.000-08:00

Kusamakura by Soseki Natsume

Beautiful, slow, lovely. I believe this was written as if it were a long haiku and it certainly felt that way (at least to an untrained in haiku reader) in that the scenes were unraveled slowly and full of carefully chosen details. It is the story of an artist who travels to a remote mountain town and his interactions with some of the inhabitants. Originally published in 1906, Natsume really gives you a feel for the time, the village, the hotel the artist stays in, and everywhere the artist visits. I enjoyed it very much, though I did read it very slowly for such a short book (around 176 pages). I do tend to like a bit more of a plot-driven story, but it was an interesting book.

The Exile

2011-11-07T18:27:00.000-08:00

The Exile by Diana Gabaldon
Graphic Novel

A fun, graphic novel written by Diana Gabaldon based on her Outlander series. I enjoyed it, having read all of her Outlander books, but I suspect it would be a challenge for someone who hadn't read at least that first Outlander as the story revolves around the beginning of that book. The artwork was beautiful and it was fun to see the characters as the author might have imagined them (I assume she gave her approval) even if they weren't exactly what I had imagined (especially being a graphic novel, let's just say some body parts were a bit more pronounced). There were some similarities in the male characters and that made it a bit confusing at times, who was who, but overall I liked it and would recommend it for Outlander fans.

Holiday Reads

2011-11-06T09:28:00.000-08:00

Awhile back I posted that I was going to start reading by the season. R.I.P. having just finished up and two months until the Sci Fi Experience over at Stainless Steel Droppings, I decided to call November and December my Holiday Reads time. Of course, this won't just be about reading but also movies and television shows.

My definition of what I'll be reading (or watching) during the Holiday Reads is incredibly loose. The idea is to read or watch things that I enjoy, aren't overly challenging, are warm and cozy, not scary (R.I.P. being done), and are perhaps a little exciting and entertaining. I will avoid, for the most part, science fiction because, as I said, that will be coming in January. And I hope to make a dent in my TBR pile and not buy any additional books for this (we'll see!).

So here is what I'll be reading (and technically, some are already done so posts to come):

The Exile by Diana Gabaldon (a graphic novel)
Kusamakura by Natsume Soseki
Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenger
Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
Game of Thrones: A Song of Ice and Fire: Book One by George R.R. Martin

Classic, Japanese classic, graphic novel, contemporary, and fantasy. I definitely picked a variety. I'm trying to get to Game of Thrones quickly because it is rather large though I hope it will be difficult to put down and I'll get through it quickly anyway.

As for movies, I hope to watch the following:

(we always watch these)
It's a Wonderful Life
White Christmas
Christmas Vacation
A Christmas Story
Love Actually

(Looking at that list I'm feeling like I need to add some titles to watch each year that do not revolve specifically around Christmas. Something to think about.)

I might watch one or all of the Little Women movies (1933, 1949, 1994) though as I hope to read the book again soon I might hold off (though I've seen them all before so that might not stop me). I just watched a documentary about Louisa May Alcott that has me even more interested in reading her work.

I hope to include some movies featuring:

William Powell (featured star on TCM for December yay!)
Bette Davis
John Wayne

I'm also hoping to watch some episodes of Northern Exposure. That seems like a good cold weather sort of show to revisit. I loved watching it when it was out and have been slowly collecting the series on DVD.

I think that is enough to keep me busy for the next couple of months. (Oh, and Doctor Who! I can't wait until the Sci Fi Experience for that as I would end up with easily a hundred episodes to watch on my DVR.)

R.I.P. VI Wrap Up

2011-11-01T09:52:00.000-07:00

It was another great season of R.I.P.! While I'm ready to move on to tamer reads and plan ahead for the Sci Fi Experience in January, I had a great two months of reading and watching the scary and suspicious.

Here's what I read:

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs
Storm Front by Jim Butcher
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier
I Am Legend by Richard Matheson
Silent in the Grave by Deanna Raybourn

and these short stories:

Don't Look Now by Daphne du Maurier
The Birds by Daphne du Maurier

And a few other short stories by Daphne du Maurier and Richard Matheson that I truly enjoyed but did not review here.

I also watched the following unsettling movies (some scarier than others):

The Innocents
The Others
Dead of Night
The Tingler

and I watched a particularly spooky episode of Doctor Who and a few episodes of Bedlam.

Did you participate in the R.I.P. experience and if so what was your favorite book/story/film/show? I will be already starting my list for next year, suggestions will be much appreciated.

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T08:06:00.000-07:00

Best wishes for Halloween!

In case you are wondering, the one on the left is my daughter's design (it is of her Grandmother, my daughter is 5) and the one on the right is of course a stormtrooper.

R.I.P. Movies

2011-10-30T21:29:00.000-07:00

I felt like combining the remaining R.I.P. (creepy) movies and shows I've watched into one post. So here are a few things I've been watching:

The Others

So glad I ended up buying this movie this year. I had seen it all the way through once before and then bits and pieces since. Sitting down to watch it all the way through a second time, I found so much in the film than the first and I'm assuming that was because I wasn't so freaked out this time around. I knew what was going on. Still, I did jump at one spot, so the creepy does linger on. Now that I own it, I plan to try watching this one every Halloween season. If you haven't seen it and like an interesting scare, you must watch it.

Dead of Night

I knew I was overdue for watching this movie, which has been waiting on my DVR for some time, because, 1. Robert Osborne introduced it and if you are a TCM watcher you know he's been on vacation for some time, and 2. Robert Osborne said it was a perfect movie for this Halloween. That would be last year's Halloween. Oops! Didn't realize it had been on the DVR for that long. Well, at least I finally watched it.

A man travels to join a group of others only to find out they are the people he has been having a recurring nightmare about. Then they all tell a story, ghost stories of sorts. Some scarier than others I thought. And did the man's nightmare end up coming true? You'll have to watch to find out... Not as outright scary as a movie like The Others but I agree with Robert, a good addition to the season.

The Tingler

Having a Halloween season without Vincent Price is like having Christmas without Santa Claus. Ok, maybe not quite that serious. But I had to get one Vincent Price in before the end of October. A doctor, Vincent Price, was researching what happened to the body when scared. His theory was that there was something, an organism of sorts, produced by the body that clung to the spine. That would be "the tingler". The only thing that stopped the tingler, which could kill you, was screaming. It seemed to paralyze it temporarily. So if you were unable to scream for some reason, the tingler would have nothing to stop it.

The Tingler was a new one for me and while the special affects, if you can even call them that, were perhaps laughable at times the best part, for me, watching this film was knowing what they did to theater audiences. At the theater, at least some of the larger ones, they placed buzzers under some seats and at certain strategic moments those buzzers would zap a few patrons. Presumably they would scream, as they were told to do to save themselves, which would then freak out other audience members and I'm assuming a little chaos would ensue. Can you imagine being one of the ones sitting on a buzzer? Even if you weren't too scared by the movie, it would have been startling to say the least.

Now onto TV shows:

Blink, Doctor Who

I have only very recently gotten into Doctor Who (and where has it been all my life now that I've found it!?!) and it is likely this one episode that began it all. At least I know it was one of the first I watched. I have to say of all the creepy movies and shows I've watched this season, this one freaked me out the most. Do you watch Doctor Who? Have you seen the Weeping Angels? I've seen them since in at least one other episode, but Blink was by far the scariest. These Weeping Angels appear to be statues, but then when you move or BLINK, they move. Toward you. Slowly. Over and over.

And they change positions as they go.

Don't look away. Don't blink. Or...

I admit I even got a little unnerved posting the photographs. The freakiest of the angels I think is actually that first one covering its eyes. I might have to find a replica of that one, bring it out with the Halloween decorations each year.

I won't ruin it for you by telling you what happens in the episode beyond that, but it is pretty spooky and I think a really well written/directed show. I also won't start gushing Doctor Who, which I'm now obsessively compulsively watching. I'll save that for another post.

The last spooky show I've been watching is Bedlam on BBC. Not totally sure what I think about this one yet. I like the idea of it, a group of friends living in a plush apartment set in a former mental asylum. And one of those friends sees ghosts but more specifically how they died (you can imagine in a former mental asylum there might be a ghost or two). It is a good set up, but I'm not sure how it is carried out totally works for me. For starters, it is a little too polished (like that every character looks perfect and beautiful, for one thing). The other is that the affects meant to scare are a little obvious and overplayed. I like spooky to be a little more subtle. Have you watched it? What do you think?

That is it, unless I get one more thing in before November 1st. I had hoped to catch up on The Walking Dead but alas, they are loading up in my DVR and the zombies will have to wait.

Silent in the Grave

2011-10-30T07:29:00.000-07:00

Silent in the Grave by Deanna Raybourn

It is all I can do to not immediately purchase the next book in this series (and oops, I just ordered it for my Kindle right after writing that. Well, I can always save it for later!). I picked this book off my TBR shelf because I was in the mood for a story that would really suck me in for an enjoyable ride and I could not have picked a better one. Still wanting to read something more for R.I.P. but needing a break from zombies and ghouls, I went for a mystery. And while this is on the lighter side of the R.I.P. spectrum, it was a mystery that kept me wondering until nearly the end.

A story, set in Victorian London, about a mysterious death. Strong and complicated characters, my favorite was Nicolas Brisbane who seems to be good but oh so strange and mysterious. The story revolves around Lady Jane Gray after the sudden death of her husband. A death that seems, given his family's history of early death, perfectly normal. But after a visit from a stranger (Nicolas Brisbane) she begins questioning how her husband died. Particular after finding some threatening letters amongst his affects. She asks Nicolas for his help, as he claims to be a sort of private detective, but she ends up entangling herself in the investigation despite his warnings to stay clear.

If you are in the mood for a cozy mystery, I'd recommend giving this a try.

I Am Legend

2011-10-25T19:15:00.000-07:00

I Am Legend by Richard Matheson

I recently finished reading I Am Legend for R.I.P. and I can't imagine many other story so perfect for R.I.P. than this one. Blood, gore, the undead, isolation, fear it is all there. Vampires are everywhere with one known exception, Robert Neville. We follow his isolated existence as he seals up his house daily to survive the vampire attacks at night. Every night they come. Every night he hears them calling him, starting with his neighbor who calls him by name. The women especially tempt them showing their bodies as a way to lure him out. It is a post-apocolyptic sort of tale in which a virulent virus turned the population into vampires, all except for Robert who seems to be immune.

The vampires are especially unnerving. While they are vampires (can only be out at night, crave blood, etc.) the ones Robert interacts with are very much like I'd imagine zombies. And the book apparently was a large influence on the zombie genre to follow. Unlike many other depictions of vampires as the suave seducer, Matheson's vampires are mostly pretty stupid. They wander around, looking for food, and act totally on instinct. Have you seen any recent zombie film or TV show? That is exactly how these vampires act. The only difference that I noticed was rather than just battering Robert's house, though they do that too, they try to tempt him out with their words or actions. Otherwise, zombies.

I was especially struck by Robert's isolation. If there are any other survivors out there, he doesn't know about them. Richard Matheson so perfectly illustrates the loneliness that Robert must feel and how he deals with the loneliness. He obsesses over the things he has control over and he drinks. No, he drinks a lot. Nothing really to stop him except perhaps if he gets too drunk and opens his front door one night. It isn't until he is consumed by his research of the vampire disease that the drinking decreases. His days are pretty routine spending them mostly getting provisions and, as I mentioned before, sealing up his house. And then there is killing vampires. He brings along his homemade stakes to kill off a few vampires whenever he is out.

SPOILER ALERT BEGINS (scroll down if you don't want spoilers)

During my reading, I thought very little of Robert killing the vampires. They are vampires, after all, and would kill him if they could. It wasn't until the very end, when I understood there were new vampires. Ones who were pretty close to still being human. Who, unlike those zombie-like creatures who hung out in front of his house all day, were still intelligent and thoughtful beings. They just happened to have had the same virus as those others.

Along comes Ruth who tricks Robert into believing she is also unaffected by the virus so she can gather information from him. After her cover is blown, she tells Robert he killed her husband. Her husband was, presumably, like her. Able to live somewhat normally with the vampire virus. And Robert killed him. Turns out, Robert killed a lot of them. He killed people, sick people, but people nonetheless. A new sort of people. Now, Robert is the monster. A killer. That took awhile for me to get, after I finished reading the story. The whole time I thought I was reading a story of a man when in fact it was the story of a killer. Yet, he thought he was protecting himself. The fine line, I think anyway, seems to be in how he goes about doing it. He doesn't just kill the vampires he comes across. He seeks them out. He finds them in their beds and kills them. I wonder if he didn't go a little crazy, after all that time living alone having lost his family to the virus.

SPOILER ALERT ENDS

A very well told story and as I said perfect for R.I.P. The book I purchased (same as the cover above) has other short stories by Matheson and I read a few of them. I'm going to save the rest for next year. They were equally interesting as I Am Legend but much shorter (I Am Legend was under 200 pages). If you haven't read this one before, I'd definitely recommend it for next year's R.I.P.!

My Cousin Rachel

2011-10-20T08:50:00.000-07:00

My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier

Once again, Daphne du Maurier swept me up into her world of mysterious death. Overall, it was simply a pleasant book taking me deeply into du Maurier's rural England. Atmospheric though not gothic, du Maurier again made the surroundings so real to me I could almost pull the scenes from my memories.

The cousin Rachel, while playing a pivotal role in the story, was not the main focus but instead we followed Phillip Ashley who was raised by his cousin Ambrose after losing his parents as a child. Phillip was to inherit a large estate from his cousin, an estate they both loved and cherished. I don't think I'm spoiling anything here, as your going to need to know how Rachel fits in, but before Ambrose dies in Italy (traveled there for his health) he marries a woman named (you guessed it) Rachel. Ambrose dies quite suddenly, unrelated to his known health problems, and it is thought he died of the same brain tumor sort of problem as his father. Having never changed his will to allow for his wife, Ambrose left nothing for Rachel.

Phillip has no good feelings for his new cousin Rachel and wants nothing to do with her until she shows up in England. Supposedly, she has traveled to bring him the news of his cousin's death and to bring along his belongings for Phillip. Initially, Phillip distrusts her to the point he suspects foul play in his cousins death, but the charm of Rachel soon bewitches him and falling under her spell (or perhaps it is just her good nature?) he does some things I thought questionable giving their short acquaintance.

Am I being too cryptic? I don't want to give too much away. I so enjoyed this book and plan to read more from du Maurier. While lacking the gothic thrills of Rebecca that might have fit in more with the R.I.P. season, the mystery of Rachel had its own eeriness. Not knowing what her true motives were really kept you guessing all the way through.

I will have to watch the classic film version of My Cousin Rachel someday as Rachel is played by Olivia de Havilland. A perfect fit, she almost exactly fits the image I had of Rachel.

The Picture of Dorian Gray

2011-10-13T09:20:00.000-07:00

Well I wish I could say I loved this book but frankly...

(there might be a few little spoilers here but no big ones)

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde is the story of a rich man with very little to do with his time other than obsess over himself. An artist friend paints the portrait of Dorian Gray and Dorian wishes that instead of him aging, his portrait would instead. His wish comes true (be careful what you wish for). But rather than just age, his portrait shows everything. Every wrong, every sin, really every evil thought perpetrated by Dorian shows up on the face of this portrait and over time it becomes hideous. Dorian hides it, ashamed and scared for anyone to see it but he is afraid to destroy it. And he resorts to the worst of evils to keep it secret and is then haunted by his sins.

I liked the idea of the book, that the picture would take on the worst of a person and what that would do to that person as they watched the image degrade, but that was about it. I couldn't bring myself to like any of the main characters except perhaps the artist who painted Dorian's portrait. But he played really such a small (though important) part, it wasn't enough. Dorian Gray, and his friend Lord Henry, live a lifestyle of decadence and laziness that I couldn't at all relate to, and was mostly annoyed by, the entire time I read the book.

I suspect it was my own dislike of the characters that colored my overall impression of the book and perhaps I did not judge it fairly. Not having a character I can relate to can definitely affect my overall impressions of a book (or movie). There was a lot good about the book, a lot that Wilde did well hence why his only published novel has lasted and carried so far with themes that still resonate today. (I adored his descriptions of the painting as it changed, as it grew more disgusting and deformed.) The fact that I didn't fall in love with the book as a whole is purely a personal thing.

As for a R.I.P. reading material, the man had a portrait of himself locked up in his house that aged and degraded, getting more and more hideous with every sin while the man remained unchanged. Can you imagine having a picture of you like that locked up in your attic?

Welcome dark and story weather!

2011-10-09T10:31:00.000-07:00

Subtitle: In which I blather on about my reading plans

We've been having rain and more rain these last few days. I'm rather enjoying it even though it means bad news for my tomatoes that only started to ripen a few weeks ago. The weather has certainly encouraged my R.I.P. reading as I've been breezing through the books and watching several movies and shows for the challenge. However, it hasn't apparently encouraged my post writing as I'm terribly behind. I hope to catch up on everything very soon and hopefully by saying so here that will force me to get it done.

I'm more in the mood for posting about my plans today, so that is what I'll do. I have recently noticed (and am surprised I didn't notice it sooner) that the seasons dictate my reading moods. Summer, for instance, I stagnated and I suspect now it was because I was not reading the book to suit my mood. As soon as fall crept up and R.I.P. was back, I was completely back on track and reading like crazy. If you participate in R.I.P., you might have noticed that Carl has a couple other reading "challenges" in addition to R.I.P. and they seem to be at the times of year he is inspired to read a particular type of book. He has the Sci Fi Experience in January and February and the Once Upon a Time challenge in mid to late spring. It was while reading about these challenges that I realized I too am interested in certain types of books at particular times of the year and actually he was about right on with the challenges for my tastes too (so I might have to participate in them, assuming he does them again). I suspect before I started blogging that I might have naturally read by the season, totally unaware of it, but when I started blogging and list making that I ignored these natural instincts and instead dictated to myself what I needed to read and when. I can be such a self-taskmaster when I want to be. Time to loosen up!

That was a lengthy way of saying I'm going to pick books to suit my mood for a given time of year. Obviously, spooky sort of books work for me right now. Next, I'm lining up books that are more suited for the holidays. These would be books that just make me happy or cozy or might really suck me into their story. The list I've picked so far is very broad and includes a graphic novel, a classic, a fantasy, a Japanese classic, and a very recent publication. I might change things, so I won't bother to list them all. Not just yet anyway. I won't start those until around the end of October.

Following that, science fiction for winter. Then, I'll squeeze a classic in before getting into fantasy, fairy tales, myths, and folk takes. And finally summer which I'm still figuring out, but I will not plan anything too heavy nor will I plan much of anything and just figure it out as I go. Perhaps that is best for summer?

Naturally, this led me to re-organize my books by season. There is always a good excuse to organize the TBR shelves. I even set up seperate wish lists on Amazon for books I don't yet own that fall into each of these categories in hopes that I'll be adding to the shelves or at least to the Kindle. Perhaps all this organizing has kept me away from writing posts... possibly...

I'm curious if you also have noticed seasonal changes with your books and if so what?

Storm Front Group Read, Part 3

2011-10-03T07:09:00.000-07:00

This is the final post for the group read of Storm Front by Jim Butcher. Thank you Carl for hosting, the group read was a great addition to my R.I.P. reading this year. And thank you to Carl and Jeff for coming up with the questions for the posts. Let's get to them,

Spoilers ahead!

1. Were you disappointed that we didn't get to see any more of Bianca and Harry together?

Definitely! Butcher must surely plan to bring the two together in future books. There is something left hanging after their volatile meeting. Something unresolved. I felt that way with a few other characters, that they were introduced to play such a small part in this book that surely he intended them for more in the series to come.

2. We finally get to see Harry go on the magical offensive in this section of the book. Any favorite moment?

I enjoyed the scene where he and Murphy were under attack from the giant scorpion and he had to really scrape and scramble to get them to safety. Particularly in the elevator where he finds he has almost nothing to work his magic with but manages to make the elevator shoot up to smash the beast and then protects them from the plummeting elevator with his bracelet creating the shield or bubble or whatever that thing was around them. Meanwhile, he is handcuffed to Murphy. I like how Butcher has to always throw in one more complication for Harry. It can't just be him saving Murphy from the giant scorpion, he has to do it with one hand. And all that with the storm approaching.

3. How did you feel about where Harry and Murphy's relationship was at when the book ended?

I thought it was funny. Clearly they seem to be on the mend or at least back to business as usual. I liked that he tried to patch things up with the flowers but that she chucked them right back at him. If I were her, after nearing dying from the scorpion sting, I might still be a little bitter too.

4. How did you feel about the wrap up after the climax, the brief mentions of various characters as part of various characters as part of Harry's closing narration?

It was alright but I thought it a little quick and would have enjoyed more details, particularly with Bob(!) and Murphy. A little more from her at the end would have been good. Other than still be upset with Harry, I didn't get a good sense of her experience of the whole thing. Whether or not she remembered any of it, I would have been interested to know more about her side of things.

5. Now that you've seen Harry in all three acts of a story arc, what are your thoughts about him as a character, particularly in light of this being a debut novel for the series?

I liked Harry all the way through the book. I thought him an interesting "hero" to follow. He's so human for a wizard. He doesn't fluff himself up or make himself out to be some amazing guy who does magic. He's just Harry who happens to be quite good at magic and not as good with other things in life. And he knows it, I like that. I think it all sets him up quite well for the series because he clearly has issues that can be explored with future books.

6. And finally, a two-parter: Discuss your overall experience with the book and/or the group read and will you be reading the next book in the series?

I had a great time with the group read. This was my first group read like this (in which I had to answer questions and do regular posts). It was a fun experience and one I hope to do again sometime. I like answering the questions because either they bring up something I hadn't thought much about and also because by the time I answered them I will have finished the reading days ago and had already started to forget things. It was a reminder of the parts of the story I liked.

I enjoyed the book, it was a fun, light read for R.I.P. I would be tempted to continue with the series at some point, particularly when I feel the need for a humorous book. Because it was quite funny at times. I think I would probably first check out Butcher's Codex Alera series as I was thinking about that even before this group read came along and now, having read and enjoyed Storm Front, I'm even more curious about it. Likely I will go to that before I come back to Harry Dresden but you never know.

Storm Front Group Read, Part 2

2011-09-26T09:12:00.000-07:00

After reading the second section for the group read of Storm Front by Jim Butcher, I found it very difficult to put the book down and wait to read the final section until this coming week. The action was moving, I wanted to know what was going to happen. But I knew it was best to wait as it is much harder to answer the following questions for the group read if I've skipped ahead.

Spoilers ahead, you are warned!

1. What are your thoughts on the pop culture references Butcher includes in his work, largely coming from Harry himself?

I have to admit, while I remember vaguely some moments of recognition, I didn't pay much attention to them. I suspect with all the fast moving scenes I kept ripping right through them.

2. As I finished part two of Storm Front I realized that each section of the book thus far feels like a distinct act in a three act story arc. How do you compare the events in this second section of the book with what happened in part one? Is there a mood or theme or such that you feel is embodied by part two of Harry's adventures?

The second section moved much faster than the first. The characters, for the most part, were set in the first section and it seemed like Butcher let the scenes unfold much more quickly in the second. As each problem was resolved, Harry seemed to move right into another one. Some other pending disaster. In the first section, he had some time to think things through, to prepare himself or at least try. In the second section, he barely has time to process was has happened before the next catastrophe. Makes me wonder what the rest will be like in terms of pacing. Fast as the second? Or even faster?

3. One of many things Jim Butcher demonstrates in Storm Front is a healthy sense of humor. Share with us your thoughts on one (or more) of the humorous moments in the story thus far.

I have to say that, despite the danger, the time he was having to battle that creature brought on with the storm cracked me up. It was thrilling to read, no question, but the fact that he ended up without any clothes on in front of Susan who he was to date with that evening and trying to battle this magical creation was quite funny. I like how Butcher peppers in these humbling (or humiliating?) moments for Harry. He suffers enough of them to certainly ever keep his ego in check.

4. Our hero Harry had disastrous interactions with the women in his life in section two of the book (Four by my count). For first time readers, were you surprised by any of these and what are your thoughts? For those who've read the books before, had you forgotten about any of these? If so, or even if not, share your thoughts on Harry's luck with women.

Or lack of? I'd say probably the latter. He just can't seem to catch a break. The scene I mentioned above in question 3 being one of my favorites so far. His interactions with Lt. Karrin Murphy are also quite comedic. They seem to be friends, on one level anyway, so in that sense he is doing pretty well. She seems to be quite sympathetic towards him. Then there is the next murder of another woman, Linda Randall, whom he was supposed to see the same evening she was killed. He just can't seem to catch a break.

5. A few other popular characters have been brought up in the first round of discussion about Storm Front. What books, films, tv shows, etc. does this story/these characters call to mind an why?

I just couldn't think of any that felt close enough, at least as far as Harry is concerned. He is so capable with some things and so unlucky with others, I just couldn't think of a good connection for him. Most "heroes" are written as being near flawless. Or they have one flaw that is constantly touched upon. But not Harry. His problems are right out there, tripping him up constantly while at the same time his mastery of magic gets him out of much worse situations.

6. For new readers, what is your overall assessment of the story thus far? For re-readers, what have you picked up on this time that you either forgot about or don't remember seeing from your first trip through the book?

This is a first read for me and I've enjoyed the book so far and am looking forward to finishing it, see where things end up. In the midst of some other, slower moving, books it has been fun to pick up something fast paced and relatively light and fun.

Storm Front Group Read, Part 1

2011-09-19T09:51:00.000-07:00

For the R.I.P. reading experience this year, I'm participating in the group read for Storm Front by Jim Butcher. Each of the participants, as able, will be doing three posts with questions to answer. This is my very first group read like this, so I'm excited to get started. This is the first of three posts as we work through the book.

My first impressions of this book are that it is a light and enjoyable (in a dark, twisted sort of way perfect for R.I.P.) following the main character, Harry Dresden, as he tries to solve a murder, a missing person, and save himself from a few complications. Harry is a wizard and advertises his business as such. He is a sort of private detective who works for individuals and sometimes for the local police.

The following will contain spoilers as this is a discussion of sorts with other people in the group read (or anyone who has read the book or if you haven't and don't mind the spoilers). I'm not even going to worry about giving things away so consider yourself warned...

Onto the questions:

What are your first impressions of our main character, Harry Dresden? I find Harry interesting. He at first seems anti-social, what with people not really being able to look him in the eye. It is almost as if he has given up on any sort of relationship, that it is unattainable for someone like him. But then at the prospect of a date, he has almost an high school boy's excitement. He tries to contain it, assuming that the date is an excuse for finding out information but clearly he is hoping it is more. Then there is his relationship with Lieutenant Karrin Murphy. It is a working relationship, but there is a connection there. I like that he has accepted his isolation but that some part of him seems to need more of connection to others.

In the first section of the book we are introduced to a large cast of characters. Some in support of our main character and others who are involved in the multiple investigations with agendas unknown to us. Are there any of these characters who stood out to you? I found the vampire Bianca fascinating. She fights to control her true self and Harry thinks she is embarrassed after she has, unsuccessfully, attacked him and shown her true face. I look forward to seeing more of her and how their relationship, if any, evolves.

I also really liked Harry's cat Mister. His history and presence in Harry's life add a comic element to the story and I can't help but wonder if this huge cat will play a larger part in the story other than just a pet companion.

Did you ever watch the Syfy channel's Dresden Files TV adaption? If so did if effect how you approached the novel? Were there positive and/or negative differences that stood out to you? I never saw nor even heard about the series and will be curious to hear others' responses to this question in the hopes someone has seen it.

Any thoughts on Jim Butcher's magic system, Harry's Watcher, and/or the White Council? I'm still trying to grasp all the elements we've learned of the magic in this book so far. While I initially thought the magic was a mild addition to Harry's practice turns out to be quite complex. I suspect that the magical world being introduced here is vast and that we have only touched the tip of it. We've been introduced to vampires, though unlike other vampires I've read before, faeries, spirits, and more. And then there is Harry creating magical potions in his sub-basement and his soulgazing when another meets his eyes for more than a few seconds. I feel like I'm only just starting to understand the complexity of the system Butcher is setting up.

Lastly, any guess on where Dresden's multiple plot threads will lead and/or any favorite scenes the first section of the book? I suspect that the missing person and the murder are somehow connected though how I could not say yet.

I think a favorite scene is of Harry working on a potion in his sub-basement with Bob. Bob alone cracks me up. A spirit name Bob who lives in a scull and has a vicarious interest in the more sordid details of human life, too funny. Another favorite scene was Harry with Bianca. While I knew Harry would have to come out of it alive, it was still very tense wondering how he would manage it. Bianca was quite terrifying. And then, with her need for blood still very present, he watches her feed off another. It was chilling.

The Birds, A Short Story

2011-09-17T13:29:00.000-07:00

I finished reading Daphne du Maurier's short story The Birds last weekend from a collection of her short stories. It was an enchanting little story, though definitely unnerving, about a sudden change in the environment: the birds start attacking people. I'm assuming you knew that much, even if, like me, you never saw Hitchcock's loosely adapted movie.

This is probably the only major Hitchcock movie I haven't seen all the way through. I've seen parts of the movie so the short story came as a surprise to me. It wasn't what I expected. In the introduction to this compilation of stories by du Maurier, it is noted that she did not care for this movie rendition in part because he filmed it in California. The short story takes place in England on a peninsula along the sea. This location was important to du Maurier and I can see why. It adds an atmospheric element to the story that I'm sorry to say I don't get from the parts I have seen of the movie. Nor did it have a blond stranger coming to town...

The story is told around a farm worker and his family. One night, the birds start tapping on his window. He, a war veteran, opens it only to be suddenly attacked by those birds. These strange attacks continue and increase, but not consistently. He notices a pattern that corresponds to the tide giving him time he can count on to barricade and protect his family. This really was a chilling story, du Maurier captures the terror of the family hearing the birds trying to get into their house. Tapping, scratching, pounding, even killing themselves to get in and attack the family. It seems to be widespread, they hear updates on the radio but even that has to be abandoned as the birds are attacking even there. My favorite part was how the man saw the seagulls at sea, in between attacks, hovering over the waves...waiting...waiting.... Terrifying.

The Innocents

2011-09-15T07:56:00.000-07:00

The Innocents, 1961

I finally watched a movie I've been wanting to see since reading Henry James' Turn of the Screw for last year's R.I.P. Back then it was a re-read for me and after getting to the end I remembered what drove me nuts the first time I read the story: it left me totally confused and needing answers. So I hoped, perhaps a film adaptation would flush something out for me? That something I perhaps missed would become clear?

I'm sorry to say I'm as confused as ever. However, I really enjoyed this film. If I remember the book well enough, I believe it stayed quite true to the story (perhaps that is why I still struggle with it?). And it was just the right amount of spooky and creepy with a little of what looks like insanity sprinkled in without being too over the top. It was quite late when I finished watching and it made me want to turn the lights on while walking across the house.

Without giving too much away, Deborah Kerr plays a young woman who becomes governess to two orphaned children in a huge manor house out in the country (in England). The uncle of the children who hires her wants nothing to do with their upbringing, other than providing financially for them, and asks her never to contact him for any reason. That she alone is responsible for them. One would hope he would hire someone with a lot of experience for such a responsibility, but that doesn't seem to be the case here as this is her first position. Really, we know very little about this woman's past which will only add to questions later (like how much if any of what happens is in her head). Shortly after her arrival, strange things begin to happen. She wants to understand what she is seeing and presses the housekeeper for answers. She sees strange things, things in windows, end of halls. And then the children, they seem to be hiding something. Or are they? Towards the end, you start to wonder if you too are starting to imagine things. The small cast was great. I thought Deborah Kerr played it beautifully. Her character was strong yet unnerved, sane or insane, it could have gone either way.

The filming was gorgeous, it was in black and white, and artistically shot. Moody and atmospheric, it put me right in the mood for The Others so I had to order a copy.

As for my questions regarding Henry James' Turn of the Screw, I might just have to live with the questions. Perhaps I'll grow to love that about the story.

Don't Look Now!

2011-09-09T17:40:00.000-07:00

Don't Look Now: Selected Stories by Daphne du Maurier

This book is a compilation of some of Daphne du Maurier's short stories and includes a few you might have heard of, like The Birds (though I understand Mr. Hitchcock took some liberties with that one). I plan to read about one story a week, spreading them over September and October for the R.I.P. VI experience. I've read one story so far and it was fun to read more du Maurier (so far I've only read Rebecca but I've just started My Cousin Rachel too so there is going to be a lot of du Maurier this R.I.P. for me).

(I actually have a different copy of this book than in the photo, but I liked this cover. If you click on the link above for the book you'll see the one I'm reading from.)

Story One: Don't Look Now

A couple travels to Italy after the death of their daughter. The mother is taking her death particularly hard, hence their traveling in an effort to get some normalcy back in their lives. They do have another child, but the connection between mother and son is apparently not quite as strong as it was between mother and daughter. I haven't seen the movie version of this story (Don't Look Now) but I do know that in the movie they show the daughter having drowned but in the book she died of meningitis. I guess drowning is more dramatic? Or perhaps there is a subtlety in the book I missed? Anyway, I haven't given anything away, this is all told at the beginning of the story.

While in Venice, the couple encounters a strange pair of elderly spinster sisters. The sisters are staring at the couple, making them wonder if they are planning some sort of theft. Then they find out one of the sisters is psychic and has seen their deceased daughter standing between them and laughing with them. This comforts the woman and she wants to spend more time with the sisters while the husband doubts and wants to avoid them. The sisters also claim that he is, unknowingly, psychic himself. He does not believe it but it is this psychic ability that causes him trouble throughout the rest of the story.

I love how du Maurier wove the scenic Venice into this story. The couple gets lost weaving through the confusing streets. I almost felt claustrophobic with the couple, it felt like the old buildings were closing in. I have been to Venice, I don't know if that heightened that experience for me or if it was just the writing.

So far so good! I'll be reading the next story I think tonight which is, as a matter of fact, The Birds.

R.I.P. Movie Alert!! I have found that TCM is playing The Innocents tomorrow (Saturday) night. This movie, which I have not seen yet, is based on Henry James' Turn of the Screw (which I read for last year's R.I.P. and have been wanting to see this movie ever since, particularly because it left me confused). Click here for schedule information (though make sure you note the time zone differences).

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

2011-09-07T07:37:00.000-07:00

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

I know that this book is on many to be read lists (as I keep seeing it mentioned over and over), particularly for R.I.P. VI. So I will keep this brief because if I were planning on reading this particular book, I wouldn't want to know too much. So here is a little quote from Amazon about the book:

As a kid, Jacob formed a special bond with his grandfather over his bizarre tales and photos of levitating girls and invisible boys. Now at 16, he is reeling from the old man's unexpected death. Then Jacob is given a mysterious letter that propels him on a journey to the remote Welsh island where his grandfather grew up.

There is more to that bit from Amazon but I thought it more than I wanted to give away here. You can go read the rest should you desire. Be sure to scroll down on the page to watch the video promotion. I found out about this book, and saw the video too, on Carl's blog Stainless Steel Droppings (the host of R.I.P.) and knew this book had to be one of my R.I.P. reads this year.

I will say that I thoroughly enjoyed it. The story was captivating and interesting and moved right along. It was difficult to put down and I spent several late and early hours devouring it. And devour it I did. I read it quickly, particularly as I do not have a lot of hours I can devote in my week to reading.

This was a fun read for R.I.P.. Fantastical, mysterious, and spooky. It was a good way to start the challenge. The good news is, there is going to be a sequel. Can't wait! By the way, I read this on my Kindle. I was a bit unsure about that reading format since there are quite a few vintage photographs used to illustrate the story. But it worked out just fine, I didn't mind it a bit.

And I'll leave it at that. Hope it wasn't too little...or too much...

Pride and Prejudice!

2011-09-04T10:16:00.000-07:00

Let's just get this out of the way, I ADORED Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Much, much more than I thought I would. I wasn't sure. I have seen all the major film and recent television versions of this book. I knew the story and I loved it. I admit I was afraid that the book would disappoint me. Not that I thought it would be just awful or anything. Just that it wouldn't catch and maintain my interest. That I would slowly trudge through it until I struggled to the end.

Nothing could have been further from what really happened.

About a third of the way through, despite enjoying it thus far, I hit a reading slump. It was across the board. The Hobbit sat waiting, War and Peace don't even look at me. And, if you recall, the large pile of books I had started? Ignored. Nothing to do with any book nor was there any reason except perhaps it was summer?

Then, the mood swung back. I finished The Hobbit in no time and then dedicated all my time (except a little to catching up on War and Peace) to Jane Austen. And she swept me away. Now I understand why this book is so cherished and constantly remade on the screen. It is with good reason.

Part of the fun for me in reading this book was seeing how it really was written. Of course movies will change things and I wondered what did Jane Austen actually write (no Mr. Darcy jumping in water fully clothed after a hard ride, for example). Why I feared being disappointed, I don't know. When is a book ever not better than the movie? A good movie, even a really good movie, based on a great book can only every be a wonderful complement to the original source. Really, it couldn't be any other way unless we are prepared to sit in a theater for hours on end while the film works through all the nuances of the book. And really, would I want to do that anyway? Films are an art in themselves (some films anyway...) and should be treated as a separate entity. While I might raise an eyebrow at this or that film rendition of a particular book, and their questionable interpretations of said book, the movie has to be effective on its own.

Let me just say here I do not intend to describe the whole story because I assume most people are familiar with it, whether from film or book, and if not then please go read it and enjoy your ignorance of all the details. I might include spoilers from here on out so be warned.

So jumping right into things, I have a whole new appreciation for Mr. Darcy. Before I thought him aloof and dismissive, I now know him to be uncomfortable and shy. Yes, he expects a certain decorum maintained at all times but that is not what holds him back at, for instance, the ball at Netherfield. He is simply uncomfortable. He lacks the conversational skills at which Elizabeth Bennett excels. She doesn't even consider shyness the reason for his lack of communication, assuming that anyone in his position should be at all times at ease in society. She decides that he is proud. Therefore making her, you guessed it, prejudiced against him. What is funny for me about that, despite the title, despite watching the films many times, I don't think that pride and prejudice thing really sunk in for me until reading the book. I knew what each referred to and yet while reading I actually had a lightbulb moment in which I thought, "AHA! So he is proud and she is prejudiced!" Then I realized, duh, I already knew that. But the book really allowed this to sink in I guess on a more personal level? That's the best I can describe it.

A little something that bothered me about Elizabeth Bennett was how she took credit for Mr. Darcy's social transformation. After his proposal and her rejection, she chastises him for his social aloofness and doesn't listen to his excuses about his inabilities in social situations. That wih his wealth and position he should have had ample opportunity to overcome such things as shyness. Later, upon seeing him at home with friends and family, she finds he has improved and gives herself credit for the transformation. A little proud, aren't we, Miss Bennett? Could it be that this shy man is simply in a comfortable situation, feels relaxed, and is able to be himself? The fact that every one she talks to who knows him intimately seems to think only the best of him should be a clue that in fact he was probably like this before her harsh words. The only change might be that he is allowing her into this world. Yes, he is trying to take what she said to heart but in these situations I think it more likely he is being himself. What did you think? Do you think he was just more comfortable or do you think it all the result of Elizabeth?

I loved the way Austen slowly changed Elizabeth's perception of Darcy. Little by little, she sees another side to him, finds she cares about him, and eventually... Well, you know. The book really flushed this out for me. And you know what? It was funny. Elizabeth thinks about when her feelings started to change for Darcy and jokes to herself it was after seeing his very large estate. I believe I laughed out loud not so much because it was humorous but because Jane Austen made a funny! And there were more too. You know she had to have fun writing about Mr. Collins. The jokes and the humor open me to a totally different Jane Austen than I remember in reading some of her other books. Now I'm excited to re-read Emma, Mansfield Park, and Northanger Abby before finally getting to my long coveted book, Persuasion (a first read and my favorite story of hers).

I've said a lot here and yet not very much. If you haven't read this, have hesitated for the same reasons as I did, please read it. You won't be disappointed. I think I'll have to watch the 1995 film version again soon. It has been awhile and I thought that one of the closest renditions to the book.

A few of the Mr. Darcy's:

Hard to pick a favorite amongst these. I thought each brought something to the role (unlike, I'm sorry to say, my feelings about all the Elizabeth's. Just a personal taste sort of thing.). Do you have a favorite film version or person portrayed from any?

And in case you remember from an earlier post that I hoped after reading this I would no longer stumble in typing the word "prejudice", it hasn't helped. I can blame my new computer and keyboard, but it wouldn't be honest I'm afraid.

R.I.P. VI

2011-08-30T22:31:00.000-07:00

R.I.P. VI reading challenge is back at Stainless Steel Droppings. I've been waiting for this one! In case you are unfamiliar with it, for two months the challenge focuses on books in the following genres: Mystery, Suspense, Thriller, Dark Fantasy, Gothic, Horror, and Supernatural. Some of my favorites. Here is a list of books I will be choosing from, though I'm not going to hesitate to add to it should something tempt me (one has already been added since I first drafted this post):

(* = definitely going to read for this R.I.P.)
1. Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs*
2. Storm Front by Jim Butcher (as part of a group read on Stainless Steel Droppings)*
3. My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier*
4. I Am Legend by Richard Matheson* (a top 100 Sci Fi/ Fantasy book)
5. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde*
6. Dracula by Bram Stoker
7. The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

Then I also plan to read from, and hopefully all, of:
Don't Look Now: Selected Stories of Daphne du Maurier*

I don't know how many I will end up reading and I'm trying really hard not to structure it at all except that I know the first book will be Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. I've heard a lot of good things about this one and am anxious to try it. I am going to try for Peril in the First which means reading at least 4 books, but will just see what happens. With Daphne du Maurier's short stories I will also be doing Short Story Peril. It looks like since I'm doing one of the group reads I will also do Peril of the Group Read (Storm Front by Jim Butcher). And finally, a few movies I might choose from for Peril on the Screen:

Dead of Night (1945)
Bell, Book and Candle (1958)
Shutter Island (2010)
The last three episodes of the television show The Walking Dead (2010), which we have yet to finish watching from last year.
And many more I hope!

These are all waiting on my DVR. Hoping to add to it as the season approaches.

Are you joining the challenge and if so what are you excited to read? I'd love to get some more ideas, not that I'll have time to read everything but there is always next year...

Getting back into science fiction and fantasy

2011-08-28T09:49:00.000-07:00

About a month ago I was suddenly overcome with a desire to read something either science fiction or fantasy and I realized just how long it had been since I had read something in either of these categories. This sort of book used to be a regular for me. Not sure why it has been so long, but there it is.

Not sure where to begin, I picked up The Hobbit but was uncertain what to do next. The field is vast and frankly there are a lot of books in these categories (as in all categories) that were not quite what I was looking for. But I was in luck. For over at NPR they were creating a list of the top 100 books in Sci Fi/Fantasy and I was again lucky that Carl at Stainless Steel Droppings was posting about it. This list was going to give me the perfect starting point, a list to work from and you by now must know how I do like lists.

The geek in me demanded that I not just copy and paste that list for future reference but instead create a whole Excel sheet with categories like author, title, dated published, genre (Sci Fi, fantasy, horror, etc.), date read, own, and any other media created from the book. It took awhile, time that I couldn't really justify, but I just couldn't help myself. Bummer part is the computer I created this on has died on me (just the screen, it is a laptop, so it should be salvageable) but for now I can't access it (hoping to remedy that with a new computer later today, yay!).

Here is the top 100 Science Fiction/Fantasy list (you can also find the list voters had to choose from here, a list I will visit after completing the top 100 I think, though that might be awhile as you'll see below). You'll notice that they decided to include series of books in this list, again see below for what that means if one wants to read everything on the top 100 list (the ones I've read are in bold though I suspect there are some I've forgotten):

1. The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy, by J.R.R. Tolkien
2. The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
3. Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card
4. The Dune Chronicles, by Frank Herbert
5. A Song Of Ice And Fire Series, by George R. R. Martin
6. 1984, by George Orwell
7. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury
8. The Foundation Trilogy, by Isaac Asimov
9. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
10. American Gods, by Neil Gaiman
11. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman
12. The Wheel Of Time Series, by Robert Jordan
13. Animal Farm, by George Orwell
14. Neuromancer, by William Gibson
15. Watchmen, by Alan Moore
16. I, Robot, by Isaac Asimov
17. Stranger In A Strange Land, by Robert Heinlein
18. The Kingkiller Chronicles, by Patrick Rothfuss
19. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
20. Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley
21. Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?, by Philip K. Dick
22. The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood
23. The Dark Tower Series, by Stephen King
24. 2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke
25. The Stand, by Stephen King
26. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson
27. The Martian Chronicles, by Ray Bradbury
28. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
29. The Sandman Series, by Neil Gaiman
30. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
31. Starship Troopers, by Robert Heinlein
32. Watership Down, by Richard Adams
33. Dragonflight, by Anne McCaffrey
34. The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, by Robert Heinlein
35. A Canticle For Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller
36. The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells
37. 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, by Jules Verne
38. Flowers For Algernon, by Daniel Keys
39. The War Of The Worlds, by H.G. Wells
40. The Chronicles Of Amber, by Roger Zelazny
41. The Belgariad, by David Eddings
42. The Mists Of Avalon, by Marion Zimmer Bradley
43. The Mistborn Series, by Brandon Sanderson
44. Ringworld, by Larry Niven
45. The Left Hand Of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin
46. The Silmarillion, by J.R.R. Tolkien
47. The Once And Future King, by T.H. White
48. Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman
49. Childhood's End, by Arthur C. Clarke
50. Contact, by Carl Sagan
51. The Hyperion Cantos, by Dan Simmons
52. Stardust, by Neil Gaiman
53. Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson
54. World War Z, by Max Brooks
55. The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle
56. The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman
57. Small Gods, by Terry Pratchett
58. The Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant, The Unbeliever, by Stephen R. Donaldson
59. The Vorkosigan Saga, by Lois McMaster Bujold
60. Going Postal, by Terry Pratchett
61. The Mote In God's Eye, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
62. The Sword Of Truth, by Terry Goodkind
63. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy
64. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
65. I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson
66. The Riftwar Saga, by Raymond E. Feist
67. The Shannara Trilogy, by Terry Brooks
68. The Conan The Barbarian Series, by R.E. Howard
69. The Farseer Trilogy, by Robin Hobb
70. The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
71. The Way Of Kings, by Brandon Sanderson
72. A Journey To The Center Of The Earth, by Jules Verne
73. The Legend Of Drizzt Series, by R.A. Salvatore
74. Old Man's War, by John Scalzi
75. The Diamond Age, by Neil Stephenson
76. Rendezvous With Rama, by Arthur C. Clarke
77. The Kushiel's Legacy Series, by Jacqueline Carey
78. The Dispossessed, by Ursula K. LeGuin
79. Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury
80. Wicked, by Gregory Maguire
81. The Malazan Book Of The Fallen Series, by Steven Erikson
82. The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde
83. The Culture Series, by Iain M. Banks
84. The Crystal Cave, by Mary Stewart
85. Anathem, by Neal Stephenson
86. The Codex Alera Series, by Jim Butcher
87. The Book Of The New Sun, by Gene Wolfe
88. The Thrawn Trilogy, by Timothy Zahn
89. The Outlander Series, by Diana Gabaldan
90. The Elric Saga, by Michael Moorcock
91. The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury
92. Sunshine, by Robin McKinley
93. A Fire Upon The Deep, by Vernor Vinge
94. The Caves Of Steel, by Isaac Asimov
95. The Mars Trilogy, by Kim Stanley Robinson
96. Lucifer's Hammer, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
97. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis
98. Perdido Street Station, by China Mieville
99. The Xanth Series, by Piers Anthony
100. The Space Trilogy, by C.S. Lewis

So what does the series mean if one wanted to read everything on the list? I had some difficulty in getting an exact number. Some of the series have series upon series which will take further research to determine exact numbers. But I can tell you it is close to around 400 books in all...a bit staggering. This includes a graphic novel series by Neil Gaiman (The Sandman, number 29 on the list) totaling 75. Needless to say, this will give me plenty of reading material for a very long time.

Despite all the lists, I have no goals or deadlines for reading any of this. This was just to give me something to pull from, some inspiration and ideas.

Bilbo, oh Bilbo

2011-08-26T10:00:00.000-07:00

Well, I've gone and fallen in love with the little hobbit. I got even more from this reading than the last (several years ago). Having since read the Lord of the Rings Trilogy (and have seen the movies) I have developed a huge amount of respect for this little guy. The first time I was introduced to this book was either in fifth or sixth grade. The teacher read it to the class and I'm sorry to say I wasn't very into it. I don't know if it was how it was read or perhaps I just wasn't ready for this sort of book (I was probably still heavily into Laura Ingalls Wilder at the time). Later, my husband bought this and the Lord of the Rings Trilogy and insisted I read them all which I did. This last reading, though, put it over the top and I had a much greater appreciation of the story Tolkien had to tell. And, by the way, The Hobbit is my favorite of his so far.

Bilbo Baggins is quite content living his hobbit life. Socializing, eating, smoking a pipe, eating, and just being a hobbit. Then along comes Gandalf, the wizard in case you don't know, and Bilbo unknowingly gets led (tricked) into an adventure with a group of dwarves to get back the lead dwarf Thorin Oakshield's family treasure from the dragon Smaug. They doubt Bilbo's abilities as the burglar (as Gandalf has proclaimed him) of the group and so does Bilbo. But there is a little bit in his family heritage, the Took family line, that keeps popping up in him making him not completely miserable and incompetent on the long and dangerous trek. And just when they need him most, Bilbo keeps surprising them all.

Despite its title, I don't think I really got before that this was Bilbo's story. I felt like it was a story of the whole group, Bilbo just a part of it. But this time I really focused Bilbo and I think I got so much more out of the story. Just like in Lord of the Rings, when we learn that one person can change the course of everything (in that case Frodo Baggins), in The Hobbit, Bilbo can make a huge difference despite all the odds. I like that.

In case I wasn't already excited for the movie, now I'm even more so. One of the few photos they have released from the upcoming film The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (the link will take you to a few more photos of other characters).

Photo from Entertainment Weekly.

Above Martin Freeman as Bilbo Baggins (and I think that is Richard Armitage behind him as Thorin Oakshield, plus a few more dwarves). This will be part one and I think won't be out until December 2012, ugh! Maybe I'm wrong. Part two will is showing release in 2013. It is going to be a long wait but on the plus side I will hopefully forget a few things of the story by then. I like to have read the book before seeing a movie, but not too close. I don't want to spend the whole time comparing plus it is nice to have a few surprises.

I'm back

2011-08-25T09:06:00.000-07:00

Slowly but surely, the desire to get things going here again is returning along with, coincidentally, my desire to trim down my reading list and focus on only 2-3 books at the most. I suspect there is a connection and it probably has to do with summer. There is definitely a reading mood with each season for me (for you as well?) and apparently my summer reading mood is sporadic and chaotic. I will have to remember this next summer and perhaps line up some light summer reading that might help me through. Now, I'm getting into the fall reading mood which means the mood is going to gothic/horror/mystery and am anxiously waiting for the R.I.P. reading challenge announcement (any day now I hope!) over at Stainless Steel Droppings.

Speaking of challenges, I'm letting them go. I mean those really big ones which spanned the whole year (with the exception of the War and Peace readalong, though I got a bit behind). I love the idea of those huge challenges but I think the fun for me is more in the planning and list making and less in the execution. So I'm going to (try) to stick to the shorter challenges (like R.I.P.) or readalongs for now.

But, as I mentioned before, this will not all be about books here. Still figuring it out, honestly, but I have something in mind for movies and other interests. Little by little, it will come together (until then I might leave up that "Under Construction" sign on my sidebar, I kind of like having that there for now.). What I'm really wanting to do is get a little camera that I can throw in my purse so I can include more photographs of day to day things. Not too much, just a little here and there. But that will have to wait because I'm having major computer problems. Like the screen won't come on (it is a laptop). I'm using what is essentially my daughter's computer right now until we can come up with a replacement or a solution, either of which will be expensive I'm sure. But eventually, a camera.

So thank you everyone for sticking around through my blogging break. Really wasn't that long, in the end, as I thought it might be. I'll be back soon to catch up on a few things (new book acquisitions, getting back into science fiction/fantasy, books I've read, movies, etc.).

A little break

2011-07-26T09:21:00.000-07:00

As you can tell, things have stagnated here and I can't seem to bring it back around just yet. I suspect come fall I will be itching to get back to work on this blog so I don't want to give it up. At least not yet. So why don't I just make this an official blog break? I'll be back, I'm pretty sure. I do have some ideas to work on here, just can't seem to get it done. I'll continue to update changes in my reading and other things so I won't be totally absent. Plus, I'll be keeping up on my blog reading.

I suspected this might be a good idea when I couldn't even get myself to write a post about seeing the last Harry Potter movie. A bittersweet moment, saying goodby to the last big HP event, you'd think I'd be able to pull something together and yet... No particular reason though I think summer and work are to blame. Totally preoccupied with my painting right now and then with summer comes tons of work outside. Think I just have tapped out.

Have a great rest of summer (or winter, depending) and I hope to be back soon.

Yielding to Temptations and the Pile of Books Currently Reading Grows

2011-07-09T11:00:00.000-07:00

At a time when I seem to be barely picking up a book, what with the weather demanding that I work outside in the garden and all, it seems pure lunacy to add yet another one to my nightstand. I can't help it though, I'm overly tempted to re-read something. I was recently inspired by another blog to pick this series back up again. Over at Stainless Steel Droppings. First, there was this marvelous challenge called Once Upon a Time. I resisted the temptation to join the challenge knowing full well I'm neglecting my other challenges right now. However, the desire to read something like a myth or a fairy tale became stronger and stronger as a result of reading about that challenge. Then came the posts discussing the movies of a particular series of books (I'm getting to those) and I transferred my desire to read a myth over to reading those particular myths (or fairy tales, or whatever you might call them).

What am I talking about? What series of books is this? J.R.R Tolkien's The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Starting with The Hobbit. Mainly because it starts the series but also because the movie will be coming out before I'm likely through with the whole series (especially at the speed I'm reading these days). That is the movie Part One. I'm pretty excited for The Hobbit movies. I really liked the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy but as I'm not a huge fan of watching wars and violence it was a lot for me to take in.

I read all of this series years ago after my husband gave me a box set as a gift. He felt it was important for me to read them, especially as I had a less than desirable introduction as a kid when a teacher decided to read The Hobbit to the class. A great idea and a good book for it, but for whatever reason it was lost on my 11 year old self. Now that I'm essentially reading it for the third time, I have to say I'm finally enjoying it properly. Perhaps this is a result of the Lord of the Rings movies? That I now have in my head what some of these "creatures" looked like? Or perhaps it comes from reading more classics and I'm approaching books differently all around. Not sure, but I like it.

So, another book added to the nightstand and I'm while I'm very tempted to just read The Hobbit at the moment and let the others wait, I'll try to give them all equal time whenever I have the time. Actually, I just bought another book of poetry and after it arrives, it will be another book I'm currently reading. That will make eight books. I'll try to keep it under a dozen, I swear.

A quick note about this blog, since I'm here. I'm working on developing some new ideas for what sort of things I'd like to post here. I think it will be more than just about books and the occasional movie and when I decided that was the direction to take, to hopefully get me out of my posting rut, I realized that was my original intent of this blog. Somehow I sidetracked into almost all about books. While I intend for books to remain strong, I hope to blog about other things too. Still figuring out just what that will be. When I have a better idea I will let you know, though I suspect it could be awhile before I have it all figured out. Stay tuned!

My reading week

2011-06-19T15:53:00.000-07:00

I am thoroughly enjoying Pride and Prejudice (and I hope by the time I'm done reading it I won't stumble over typing the word "pre J udice". I don't know why that is a tough one for me.). I'm not very far into it yet but it is just lovely to read and remarkably similar, so far, to the 1995 television series. Less so to the recent film version, but I expected much would have to be edited out to make that shorter version. I also have to say how much I'm enjoying reading this particular publication of the book too (I'm reading the Penguin clothbound edition). I'm a big sucker for a nicely published book. The cloth cover feels nice to hold, the pages are thick and the typeface (am I correct in calling it that?) is so easy to read. Though I've collected quite a few of these clothbounds, this is actually the first one I've read and I can't wait to read more of them!

I knew my "On my nightstand" stash of books (what I'm currently reading) would grow and it has. I've been recently re-inspired to get back into reading poetry and writing poetry. Several things came together to motivate me and now I want to learn everything about poetry. I always liked it but admittedly I knew nothing, really, about it. I knew some poets that I loved to read and that was about it. So I'm learning. The first sort of "how to" book is one I've actually owned for awhile but am only now really giving a try. It is by one of my all time favorite poets, Mary Oliver. Love, love, love her work so who better to learn more about poetry from? Starting with this book, A Poetry Handbook:

She also wrote Rules for the Dance which I'll likely read next (also already own). It is about metrical verse. Again, I know nothing about this. Then there are a few books by other authors about how to read/write poetry and I'm considering which to read next. I'm also listening to a CD of At Blackwater Pond which is Mary Oliver reading her own work. I always enjoy listening to the poet reading their own poems.

That is about it for my reading, still plugging away at all the books. Trying to read from each regularly. The biography on Virginia Woolf is hefty and a bit daunting but I found it difficult to put down the other day. As I'm waiting to read that before picking up one of her books, that should be motivation enough to finish it I think.

A Great Deliverance finished, a new Jane Austen to start

2011-06-10T10:32:00.000-07:00

I finished reading A Great Deliverance by Elizabeth George last night. Definitely this was a good choice for me, I needed a good, gripping tale to follow and, for me anyway, it is hard to beat a mystery. I picked this particular mystery in part because I enjoyed the Inspector Lynley series on PBS, based on the books, but also I think I might have read about the series of books on another blog. Unfortunately, that was a long time ago so I cannot remember which blog. I just know I bought the book, put it on my shelf, and there it sat waiting for the perfect time to pick it up. I bought it at Powell's Books, by the way, a great place to find used books and they ship them too. Just had to mention.

This was, I think, Elizabeth George's first published book and that makes it pretty impressive. She did a great job of character development particularly in the character of Sergeant Havers. Havers, let's just say, has some issues. And these issues have tended to come into her work making her an undesirable partner for a detective inspector. Sort of her last chance, she is paired with Inspector Lynley. He's the least likely sort of person one would predict would work well with Havers. They are like night and day to each other in terms of class, tastes, lifestyle, and more. But they surprise each other. It was interesting to go deeper into these characters in the book than is covered in the TV shows, as is with all books, and it gave me a lot more insight.

And although I had some suspicions as to some things that were revealed at the end, I still did not guess the identity of the killer. I'm glad because although part of me wants to figure it out, I know I'd be disappointed if I actually did.

I decided about halfway through A Great Deliverance it was time to pick up another Jane Austen next. I've mentioned before I'm reading them in chronological publishing order (or trying to anyway) so that means Pride and Prejudice is next. This is one of the last two remaining Jane Austen books I haven't read yet (the other is Persuasion) so I'm excited to get started. I have, naturally, seen about every movie or show about this particular book but I can't wait to get deeper into it. Plus, I get to read it in this beautiful, Penguin clothbound version:

A recent gift from my husband and daughter along with a couple other books:

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte (my clothbound collection is growing!) and:

The Monsters: Mary Shelley and the Curse of Frankenstein by Dorothy Hoobler. I picked out this one to read more about Mary Shelley before reading Frankenstein.

In other reading, I was recently swept up in War and Peace and ended up reading ahead because I just had to know how one of the romances would survive a scandal. Of course, Tolstoy left me hanging by getting back into the war so I'll just have to muddle through and wait to find out. I like reading both the war and the "peace" parts, I just would like to know what will happen. And might I say that came as a big surprise to me, not being able to set the book down. I've thoroughly enjoyed reading War and Peace, but reading a chapter or two at a time was about right for me. Until recently. I'm curious now to see if there will be more moments like that with this book. War and Peace, you surprise me!

I sidetracked from the other books I'm reading just a bit but am now getting back into reading from most every day. I like getting a little bit from each whenever I have the time.

On my nightstand

2011-05-31T18:49:00.000-07:00

I have finished reading A Village in a Valley by Beverley Nichols. Very nice, though not my favorite Nichols, and it had a bittersweet ending. Next came the struggle of what to read next and as I mentioned in my last post, I seem to be in an indecisive mood. So I gave up limiting myself to one (plus War and Peace) and I now have a stack of books in progress. Why not? I tried to pick different sorts of books to keep the confusion to a minimum resulting in 2 biographies, 2 fiction, and one history. Five books total and suspect another one might join the pile but I'll try to keep it from getting out of control.

So in addition to War and Peace, I am reading the following: A Great Deliverance by Elizabeth George, because I really enjoyed watching the Inspector Lynley series on PBS; Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee, a whopping big biography; The Unknown Matisse by Hilary Spurling which I actually started a long time ago but never finished; and finally The Bible: A Biography by Karen Armstrong which discusses the history of how the Bible (Torah, Old Testament, New Testament, etc.) developed from oral to written traditions. I found the book by Armstrong when temped to join a challenge, Once Upon a Time V, and was cruising for myth related stuff and found, by Armstrong, A Short History of Myth. I decided to not do the challenge (at least for now, there is still time...) but checked out her other books which looked really intriguing. I've always been interested in history, history of religion, archaeology, etc., so I couldn't resist getting one of her books to start. I do intend to come back to the Short History of Myth as growing up I loved reading the Greek and Roman myths and would like to rediscover my interest in them.

One last thing to share, I gave up the fight (in my head) and went to see Jane Eyre yesterday. What made up my mind to see it before reading the book again (this would be the third time reading it) was that it was playing at my favorite movie theater, Salem Cinema. They play great movies and serve really good popcorn (popped on site with real butter and cheese, if desired, so good I brought home the leftovers). The house was packed but everyone was so quiet yay! And the movie did not disappoint. I really enjoyed the Gothic elements, a few very spooky moments, and the setting was amazing. Much of the film seemed to be in semi-darkness which I thought worked very well for it. I only wish they had been able to make it a little longer to play up her time in school and then a little later on as well (I won't say when, in case you don't know the story already). There were a few other details I didn't care for much but overall it was a wonderful experience and really tapped into, I felt anyway, the mood of the book.

I'm still avoiding my computer a bit but am trying to get back in the habit here. Hope to be back soon.

Where did May go?

2011-05-25T10:55:00.000-07:00

I'm still here and yes I'm reading but I haven't been much in the mood for posting about it. I'm sure it will all come back around eventually. I haven't felt like being on the computer much in general. Maybe it is the time of year? In any event, it has happened many times before and I always get back in the mood for it eventually.

I've actually had a difficult time deciding what to read as well. Right now, I'm reading A Village in a Valley by Beverley Nichols. Have you read anything by Nichols? He writes about his gardens, homes, villages, cats, and the people in his life which he makes fictional but apparently some of those people were based on real ones. So closely that sometimes they recognized themselves. My favorites series of his, so far, and what I would recommend to anyone just starting out with him is the trilogy beginning with Merry Hall. I think those were written a little later than the series I'm reading now (which ends with A Village in a Valley) and he really seemed to hit his stride with them. That said, I've enjoyed all of the books of his I've read to date. Plus, they have lovely hardcover editions like the one on the left. So pretty and luxurious to read.

And I'm still reading War and Peace by Tolstoy. Several of the characters are now dear to me, and a few are definitely not, and although I do occasionally still have to look a character up (just the ones who make only occasional appearances) I have found the book to be not at all difficult to read. I was so intimidated by it initially, which is probably why I decided to read it in the end. I do like a challenge.

I'm torn what to read next. I've read a few samples on my Kindle, mostly biographies, but I think I need a book that will really captivate me. Can't decide what that would be. I have a lot of books to read right now, but am uncertain which one to go to, which one to commit. Must make a decision soon, I'll be done with Mr. Nichols in a day or two. Hopefully a really good story will get me going here again too.

Villette, Finished!

2011-04-28T18:46:00.000-07:00

After a long slump in reading, I finally finished reading Villette by Charlotte Bronte. Such a wonderful book, my incredible slowness to finish had nothing to do with the writing. The story and characters were so interesting. The main character, Lucy Snowe, is quite guarded with her feelings and her past and shares little about them with the reader. Even her love interests are challenging to decipher, never outright stated. Without giving too much away, I was stunned by the final love interest. Never saw that one coming. He seemed like the last person for our heroine to me, but I have to say after their romance began he seemed a much more likely candidate than her first. Even so, I'm still surprised how that came about. It is suspected that his character is based on Charlotte's real love interest when she worked in a French school and that helps me to understand a bit more that story development.

During the lengthy reading of this book, I decided that whenever possible I would now read more about the author prior to their books (not so much with modern authors, naturally). I understand many tragic events took place before the writing of Villette and I can certainly sense it in the tone. Lucy, in particular, felt to me very careful. Delicate almost. Not in a physical sort of way, but emotional I think? Is this careful crafting of character a result of Charlotte's recent losses? I am looking forward to reading more about the Bronte family and then re-reading Jane Eyre to see if I sense the difference between the earlier book (Jane Eyre) and the later Villette (though yes I'm aware it is a reworking of a novel written before Jane Eyre, The Professor). I hope to do that soon as I'm going to try to hold off seeing the new Jane Eyre movie until after I read it (which will be oh so challenging...!).

Moving Slowly

2011-04-06T19:58:00.000-07:00

I've been in a bit of a reading rut (which means a bit of a posting rut as well I'm afraid). I read a little but then put it down. I'm even behind on War and Peace. I'm hoping to get back into things soon but until I do it might be a little before my next post. I'm sure things will pick up, I think my work is distracting me a bit lately.

So today I thought I would share some recent book acquisitions. But these are a little different because I actually got them all from my Mom. She had two boxes full of books that belonged to my great Grandmother Grace, Grace's father, and I'm sure a few other family members. I got to go through the boxes and pick out some to keep before they make their way through the family (and should any of the family be reading this, believe me there are still plenty left to choose from).

The books all seem to be from around 1909ish to around the 1920's (roughly). There were some of Grace's school books as well. I picked mostly ones that I found a great inscription inside (either to or from Grace mostly) or an interesting cover. I won't list all the titles here but I did find one by P.G. Wodehouse, one Charles Dickens, and a couple by Jack London.

And a few inscriptions (hope you can see these):

My favorite part about this one and the next is the apparent need to inscribe them twice.

The next two are from what my Mom thought were her school books. A young signature:

And here she wrote her name while making a notation in the text:

That one might be hard to see, it is a little faded. Most of the books had someone's name in them, date, and sometimes an address as well. I especially loved seeing how much my family enjoyed reading. I'm sure these two boxes were only a small sampling of what was once an extensive library. I doubt I will actually read these copies, they seem too precious. But I do love having them!

I'm still here

2011-03-26T18:18:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the long delay in posts. I came down with the flu last week and it was a doozy. I was in bed for four days (something I haven't done since childhood I think) and really felt like I could have stayed there for an entire week. I'm still fighting off the last of a very bad cough.

Very unpleasant and I read very little. When I'm really sick all I can do is watch television. And it has to be light and entertaining at that. Something to distract me from my woes. So I made a large dent in my husband's Magnum PI collection while my computer and books sat idle.

Before all of this, I finally watched The Last Station. Have you seen it? I had meant to see it before but was especially interested since I started reading War and Peace (it is about Tolstoy you see). Great movie by the way. But the reason I bring it up is that it really cemented an idea I've been thinking about. With reading I mean. I want to read more about the authors before I read much, if any, of their books. Jillian left a comment before, in response to a post about Villette, "I find the story behind Villette so sad. (The loss of Charlotte's siblings, and her struggle for sanity.)" I was so sad to realize I had no idea what she was talking about. I had no clue what was going on in Charlotte's life when she was writing Villette. And I realized how much I wanted to know this. I will finish Villette as is (because I love it and can't stop now) but from now on I am going to first read about the author, whenever possible, before reading their work. I just think it will mean so much more to me to at least have an idea of them in my head. Most of the time anyway. Obviously when I read work by current authors this will not likely be possible.

So next up I will start reading my very large copy of Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee (because I really want to read A Room of One's Own by Woolf in May with the Year of Feminist Classics readalong). Then I plan to read a biography of Tolstoy. The movie brought up parts of his life I had no knowledge of at all, definitely need to learn more.

A Doll's House

2011-03-08T09:03:00.000-08:00

I finished reading A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen. It was a quick read, a short play. I haven't read a play in a long time and was wondering how I would like the format. I quickly settled into it, though, and actually it was remarkably easy especially thinking of some books where I often, during a dialogue, lose track of who is talking and have to work my way back. Also, I found that even without many details of the surroundings I had the scene in my mind without a lengthy description.

The main characters in the play were Nora Helmer, her husband Torvald, their friend Dr. Rank, Nora's friend Christine, and Nils Krogstad. I was completely annoyed at how Nora was treated by her husband, as if she were a young and naive child needing his supreme guidance. He teased, he chided. If I were reading this on my own and not part of A Year of Feminist Classics I'm sure I would have stopped. But I kept going because I thought there surely must be a reason this book was chosen for this series. Plus, I had read prior just enough about Henrik Ibsen to know he was writing a critique of society and that there was likely a purpose to him including this behavior.

Briefly, Nora tells her friend Christine about how she had previously borrowed money so that her family could travel to a better climate to save her ill husband. But as they did not have the funds, Nora decides in order to save her family she has to borrow. She takes a shady loan, pretends the money came from her dying father, and keeps it a secret while slowly paying it back. She is initially proud, telling her friend of her deception, but later the man she got the loan from approaches her (Krogstad). He is now supervised by her husband at work and is about to lose his job. He threatens to tell Torvald not only about the loan but about an error Nora made on it which could land her in jail unless she can secure his job for him.

(The following is not a complete spoiler, I tried to avoid that, but might allude enough to spoil just so you are warned.)

The ending completely caught me by surprise. I wasn't expecting it at all. Nora's decision, which I won't say here in case you haven't read it yet, I struggle to accept. While I understand the reason, I do feel as parent that one has certain responsibilities that cannot be neglected. But it is a story and I imagine Ibsen wanted a shock there at the end, a real shake up to Nora and Torvald's marriage. I read about the alternate ending that Ibsen had to write for a German audience and later regretted. I can see why. That different ending completely negated his original ending and, for the most part, put Nora right back where she started. Perhaps her change, then, would have still taken place but more gradually and should the play have been allowed to follow her for years we might have seen that change. Good for a novel, perhaps not so much for a play.

Mornings with Tolstoy

2011-03-03T08:46:00.000-08:00

I am reading War and Peace by Tolstoy as part of a year long readalong so that means I read a chapter a day. It is a lovely way to make my way through this book (so much so that I think I will do the same with Anna Karenina next year). Lately, I have been reading my daily chapter in the morning with my breakfast. I kind of like starting my day with a little Tolstoy and some tea.

My reading, otherwise, has been slow this week. I have found it difficult to find the time and I'm also finding Villette by Charlotte Bronte so lovely that I'm dragging it out. I do that sometimes. If I really enjoy a book I either rip through it to see how it ends or I read it so slowly it seemingly take forever to finish. I think I'll even have to squeeze in another book before finishing it as I have one for A Year of Feminist Classics to read this month: A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen.

I will make time for both today, even though my time is short what with finally going to see the latest Harry Potter installment...

Love these book covers (and the books!)

2011-02-25T11:06:00.000-08:00

I have started collecting these beautiful Penguin clothbound classics and now I can't seem to stop myself. So I have recently acquired three new ones. One of the books in the stack I already owned, but it looked so nice altogether I had to include it today.

They are:

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins (already owned this one)

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

The first one I will read, and very soon I hope, is The Picture of Dorian Gray. But Jane Eyre will be soon to follow as I understand there is going to be a new movie version?! I hadn't heard about it until just the last couple of days. Very curious to see how it fares. I have read it twice before but it has been awhile and I've been wanting to revisit it (also a good excuse for buying that beautiful edition, don't you think?).

Then there are two others I have ordered but are not yet released are Middlemarch by George Elliot and Dracula by Bram Stoker. Thought you might like to see:

You can see why I cannot help myself... Especially Dracula. I don't plan on getting every single edition they publish, just all the ones I can justify (even in some small way).

I finished The Savage Garden by Mark Mills. It was a good story (though I found myself missing the classics or "heavier" reading). But I did enjoy the Italian setting and garden that much of it was set in. It had some historical references as well as two old murder mysteries.

Now I am back to Villette by Charlotte Bronte. I set it aside for a bit as I felt I was reading it too quickly. Now I am back and loving it all over again, though taking care not to rush. Beautifully written, I adore the main character Lucy Snowe. She is a quiet heroine and I am hope she finds her way by the end. Villette, by the way, is the the town she is living in for a good part of the book. I had assumed it to be a character's name, but no.

And lastly, I have been busy crafting a new, much larger, book project to replace my old and now deleted one. It is large, though with no end date so no pressure. Just how large, I'm not sure yet. I will certainly share when it is ready.

A few random thoughts on War and Peace

2011-02-19T09:57:00.001-08:00

I am on page 228 of War and Peace and thought it about time to give my first impressions. Complex, winding, beautiful prose, I love reading the Russian scenes and grew a bit bored during the war bits (no surprise to me here). It has taken me a long time to only begin to learn about some of these characters. To form my favorites and villains. These impressions are still forming, the characters are still being flushed out. While some I thought I knew quickly, later they changed on me. Fascinating.

Tolstoy is slow and methodical, at least in this book (my first Tolstoy) and only seems to demand that I try to keep track of things. He doesn't leave me hanging, wondering what will happen next, but instead asks for my patience. That I hang in there and more will be revealed. That the war chapters will eventually lead to more Russian chapters. I know, I know. The war is a character in this book. It is, I think, the most flushed out character of them all so far. I exaggerate. It is only that I know that while I am back in Russia, at this moment in the book, I know there are more war chapters coming.

What keeps me going through my least favorite moments is the prose. It is so lovely. Let me give an example of one I marked in which Pierre finds himself falling for Helene even though he does not know how it came about (I don't think you need to know what is going on to appreciate this quote):

And here he is sitting next to her, a fiance; he hears, sees, feels her closeness, her breathing, her movements, her beauty. Now it suddenly seems to him that it is not she but he himself who is so extraordinarily beautiful, that that is why they are looking at him that way, and he, happy in the general astonishment, draws himself up, raises his head, and rejoices at his happiness.

Oh, Pierre. I think I'm starting to like him. I am also finding my first impressions of other characters were not always correct. That I only caught a bit of them on a particular day and perhaps their mood was not good. They are complex, each with good and bad points. Not a one dimensional character in the bunch. Many have surprised me later and I love that. Here's hoping the war grows on me much in the same way.

A sigh of relief

2011-02-15T08:24:00.000-08:00

After all the work, planning, and scheduling I decided to throw it all away and start again. I could have told you this was coming. I'm big on planning which means I like to re-plan quite a bit. What am I talking about? My Project 2011 list and reading schedule. Gone. Well, mostly.

As soon as I posted the reading schedule I began to regret it. Not that I minded sharing, that was fine. It was that it suddenly felt so restrictive. I made the schedule to help keep track of everything not so that I would feel pressured to keep to it. I knew the list was doomed, it was only a matter of time. Then I read that Jillian was getting rid of her reading schedule and that gave me my final inspiration to just go for it.

I also desire a broader project, one that wasn't time sensitive (2o11). I haven't figured out what that is yet, but I have moved my Project 2011 books over to a To Be Read page and have started adding other books to it as well. I decided I'm not going to add every single book that interests me (I have my Amazon wishlist for that) but I am putting every book there that I feel I should read, for whatever reason. I suspect it will become huge. And over time I might figure out what I want to do with it and how. Or not. I'm just relieved that the self-imposed pressure is gone.

I will be reading mostly the same books from my old project page as I am able and will be completing all the challenges, so none of that has really changed. I was worried about how this might all seem but when I thought about it, does anyone else really care how I go about all this other than me?

Enough about that. As I mentioned in my last post I finished reading A Month in the Country by J.L. Carr last week. Lovely little book about a man who, after serving in World War I, goes to a small village (in England) to restore a mural in a church covered by whitewash. He purposefully stretches out the time as long as he can, staying there much longer than he might have needed, I suspect suffering from PTSD. It was a quiet book and I enjoyed it very much.

I also watched a couple of movies. None from my Project (which I'll still be working on and just need to figure how I want to post them). The first was Easy A and I knew nothing about it going in, my husband picked it out. It was hilarious. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone easily offended but as I am not I really enjoyed it. In short, it is about a high school girl who tells a lie then lets the rumor build and get progressively worse until even she regrets it. One of my favorite parts are her parents, played by Stanley Tucci and Patricia Clarkson. Hilarious. They are very open minded, supportive, and frequently embarrass their daughter by their too candid discussions about themselves.

The other film I finally saw was Zombieland. It was entertaining, silly, and completely disgusting in parts though for anyone who has been watching the TV show The Walking Dead, it was pretty tame. I'm not a huge zombie fan, I prefer ghosts (particularly the subtle or imagined ones), but I'm pretty good for most horror related themes as long as the violence does not last the entire movie. I find those so exhausting. Do you have a favorite horror/suspense theme?

My reading week and a little before

2011-02-11T06:55:00.000-08:00

I titled this post "My reading week and a little before" as I have a little catch up to do and I'm going to make it brief, I think, so that I will get it done.

If you read my last post you will know that I have been overwhelmed by creating a post about Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell. So I'm just going to do it real quick (like pulling off a bandage) and be done with it. After all, I have already written at least a post or two about it so a couple of topics have been covered.

The difficulty is two things. One, loved it! And two, it is huge with many, many things I could talk about. But I'm going to stick with two things and perhaps that will be simpler.

One, loved the book and have a love/hate relationship with Scarlett. This is a good thing. I am a big fan of a good story and though I do like reading books having a strong character base and that is about it, but there is nothing like a good plot to hook me. And this had it in spades. Scarlett's character was fascinating. She really stirred it up for me, making me root for her sometimes and other times so mad I couldn't read about her for days. And Rhett too as I thought he was just as much to blame for their relationship struggles as she was. Talk about communication problems. The baggage those two carried, each from their unique struggles, it is a wonder they came together at all.

The second thing I wanted to note was my changed impressions of the civil war and its aftermath. I have never given much thought to it all beyond the basics and then occasionally finding out about my ancestors having fought in it. This book gave me an insight into the south that I hadn't had before: how it was from the southern point of view. Mitchell really covered that well, I thought, giving that side of things and the impact of it all. The part that particularly stuck with me was the aftermath. How the southerners were treated when it was over. And I couldn't help but think that had things been handled differently (a smoother transition, better support) then perhaps the next 80 years or so might have been better. That there would not have been so much turmoil and perhaps not even segregation? I don't know. How the winning side of war, any war, handles things is so crucial to the future of that area. I can think of a few more recent places that we have seen a direct link between what happened after a war and problems suffered later.

That is it for me now on GWTW but perhaps it will pop back up. I intend to watch the movie again sometime soon and am really looking forward to it now that I have read the book. I hope it will flush out the characters for me in the next viewing.

In other books, I finished reading The Subjection of Women by John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor Mill. Much easier text to read than A Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft (sorry Mary) and although there were parts I didn't agree with overall the arguments were well thought out, explored, and an enjoyable read. I was particularly interested in his comparisons to the freedom of women and the recently freed American slaves. Although I think the comparison questionable for many reasons, I thought in an interesting angle to illustrate his thinking that all people in society were still not essentially free.

I also finished reading A Month in the Country by JL Carr, but I'll talk about that in my next post as I feel I've said enough for now. Have a good weekend!

Some thoughts about this blog

2011-02-09T19:16:00.000-08:00

I have been giving some thought lately about how I want this blog. What do I want from it and how much time am I able to dedicate to my posts. I don't have a lot of time these days. I'm a stay-at-home mom of a four year old as well as a professional artist. It feels like every day is a race to the end (I'm sure you can relate). So in all parts of my life, I'm trying to balance things out and not just tread water like I so often feel.

Continuing this blog is important to me. I really enjoy being a part of the book blogging community. I like sharing ideas and discoveries about books and I very much enjoy reading other book blogs. I'm not really able to participate in a traditional book club and really I prefer having total control over what I am going to read so this format, so to speak, works very well for me. I also like having a journal of sorts to remember what I have read. I don't have the best memory so this helps and it also keeps me thinking about the books afterwords in an effort to write something about them. And having it be public keeps me accountable whereas I might slack off if I just kept a personal journal.

One problem I have had lately (or always) is writing a post about a book upon completion. The task seems daunting, particularly when it is a very large, complex book (Gone with the Wind, I'm looking at you). I feel the pressure of what to say, how much to say, and just how long is it going to take hanging over me.

I have seen those blogs where they suggest ways to get more followers and all sorts of other blog tips. To be honest, that doesn't interest me. Yes I would like to have people who are interested read my posts and comment when inspired, but I'm not looking to get hundreds of followers just for the sake of it. If I end up with that, great. But that is not my goal.

So with all this in mind I had an idea to try. And next week I might do something different, who knows. But for now my idea is this: I'm going to try to just do a weekly post (or more if I'm inspired) and rather than feeling like I need to dedicate an entire post to one book I'm just going to talk about where I'm at in my reading and any thoughts I have about it at the time. It really will be more a journal of my reading, or whatever else, rather than a "review" focused blog. It isn't like I'm reading new books for publishers. I'm mostly reading books that have been out for years or even decades.

I'm even thinking I will even re-write my first Welcome post to reflect this (and then perhaps I will have to update again later when I have a new idea). I think when starting a new blog you aren't totally sure where you will take it. Unless you have had a similar blog before, it is hard to know where the journey (and it does feel like a journey) will take you. I know I'm at a different place with not only the blog but also my reading than I was about six months ago.

That is where I'm at for now. A journal and hopefully a discussion with anyone wanting to leave a comment. I do enjoy the discussions!

A few things

2011-02-05T09:55:00.000-08:00

I have decided to add my Reading Schedule to my blog, it is now in the tool bar. I was hesitant before, unsure if I had any hope in keeping to it. January gave me courage, though, as I not only finished the books on time, I finished them early! Except War and Peace, which I read a chapter a day no matter what.

So there it is but I am not letting it make me feel like I have no flexibility. I can still move books around and if I do fall behind then oh well. I do not want to feel like I have to rush through any books, especially the ones I really like.

I had to redo my Books Read page because I accidentally deleted it. Argh! It should not be so easy to do that, thank you Blogger. Since I had to do it all over again, I decided to make it alphabetical this time which is something I think I will appreciate later. Now I live in fear of deleting it again someday, like when there are dozens and dozens of books on there...

On my Projects 2011 page, I added the Oscar best picture and best foreign film nominations. One of my goals for the year is to watch them all (unless one really doesn't interest me). I like the idea of watching movies nominated that I might not have wanted to see otherwise. Sometimes those movies surprise me. Just like books I might not have read on my own, they sometimes have an amazing affect. Introduce me to something new I find I am so excited to find out about.

I have already seen 3 of the 10 best picture nominees. Inception I saw before I started this blog. Then this week we watched Toy Story 3 (my four year old thought it good but too scary at times) and The Social Network . I won't be able to see them all before the Oscars but that isn't the point anyway. I am hoping to see The King's Speech sooner than later, it looks so good. I won't go into great length about the movies I see unless I am really excited about one (either like or dislike). These were all good, I'd recommend them.

I can't wait to share this with you. A friend who is an amazing artist and has this blog (check out her painting called "Nabokov's Dream", so wonderful!) found this web site which will tell you who you write like. And you can do it over and over again. I have using quotes from my blog and if I didn't like the author it said, I did it again. Mostly, it told me I write like...Margaret Mitchell! How cool is that?!? Also Jane Austen popped up a few times, sigh. Then there were some current writers whose work I probably will never read which made me feel like I should work harder on my writing. If you know what I mean. Try it! I know you'll have fun.

Washington Square

2011-02-02T22:48:00.000-08:00

Washington Square by Henry James is my favorites Henry James story to date. Of course, I've only read two so far but hands down more enjoyable and not nearly so confusing and frustrating as Turn of the Screw (see my post about that here). Technically, I've read all of the stories in this book but it was in high school and I honestly cannot remember any of them. I keep hoping a spark will ignite a memory but so far nothing.

I mentioned in a prior post that I realized Washington Square was a very familiar plot and as it turns out it is the story in the 1949 movie The Heiress. Really good movie, if you haven't seen it, with Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift. As soon as I realized the connection, I had de Havilland in my head the whole time which was funny because I also had this actress in mind while reading Gone with the Wind (was reading at the same time and a post will be coming up).

Briefly, the story is about a father and daughter and the daughter's love interest. The father thinks his daughter less than interesting and doubts the intentions of the man suddenly intent on marrying her as she is to inherit a substantial amount. She is also influenced by her aunt who lives with them. Her aunt is a romantic, of the strangest sense, and comes up with various schemes to bring the two young people together though her own motivations might have more to do with her than her niece. She seems to like all the intrigue.

Dr. Sloper, the father, does not think much of his daughter Catherine. He thinks her not bright and rather dull and for a time had hoped for much more from a child. Yet he did very little to encourage her to do much else so I found myself annoyed at him. He basically had a hands off to her raising including having his widowed sister move in and having her take over the education. A little questionable since he thinks very little of his sister's capabilities. Again, I don't know what he expected would come of this.

Still, his Catherine is devoted and kind, even if she is not intellectually stimulating, and she puts up with what is probably a very difficult parent with continued respect and obedience. Is it this devotion to him or his threatening to cut her off from his inheritance that drives a wedge into her romance? She would still receive a sizable amount from her deceased mother's estate so it isn't like she would have been poor. But the man she is to marry appears to her to be concerned about the divide between the father and daughter. Or he really wants both estates and is hoping the father will decide not to disinherit his daughter after all.

As I said, I really enjoyed the movie The Heiress, but reading Washington Square gave me much greater insight into each of these characters and their motivation (big surprise I know). It also lacked the dramatic Hollywood moments towards the end. Although they were not far off the mark, these moments in the book were much quieter and left open to interpretation. Questions remain, for me anyway, about the young man's real intentions. Probably he wanted more money, but still I wonder if he just didn't want to split up a family. He waited a very long time for the hope of marriage when he could have simply given up and found another rich heiress. He was supposed to be quite handsome and charming, surely he could have found someone else.

The father also struck me as rather vindictive. Despite his Catherine's split from her fiance, and literally decades passing, he still decides to leave her basically nothing because he fears she is waiting for him to die before she can marry the same man. And by golly, he has a point to make. Never mind that she has had no contact with him, not spoken of him, and has been devoted to her father all those years. She doesn't care. She never cared about the money.

It is interesting, the impressions the story leaves you with. A lot of gray areas, uncertain who was wrong or right. It is a sad story, really, in the end. But a good one, an interesting one.

Lady Susan

2011-01-29T08:36:00.000-08:00

I have finished three books in the last few days so you can anticipate several posts to come over the next few days. I think I'm saving Gone with the Wind for last as I'm still thinking it over and waiting for things to settle down a bit.

So starting with Lady Susan by Jane Austen. I am reading and re-reading all of Jane Austen's novels in order of publication. I read Sense and Sensibility (last summer, before this blog) before realizing there was actually an earlier book. So I backed up before moving on to Pride and Prejudice. The reason for reading the books in this order is I think it would be fun to read them in the order people back then would have read them. Thrilled to actually have a Jane Austen that I had not read or seen a film version of (I've seen or read them all), I jumped in.

Austen wrote Lady Susan as a series of letters either written by or to Lady Susan or about Lady Susan. And what a character, this Lady Susan. A widow, scandalized by rumor about one affair or another but particularly involving a married man, she takes refuge at her brother-in-law's despite a sketchy relationship with her sister-in-law, Catherine (Susan tried to prevent their marriage, they aren't the best of friends). Much to Catherine's dismay, Susan starts up a very close friendship with her brother Reginald. Letters fly between Catherine and her parents and from her parents back to Reginald who claims only to a friendship with Susan (though it is clear there is more there based on Susan's letters to a friend).

Susan also has a much neglected daughter, Frederica. Opressed and shy, her mother is determined to marry her for wealth but it seems Frederica is also interested in Reginald. Too bad for her, Susan already has his attentions despite his family's advice against her. She is apparently a notorious flirt. Scandal! Lady Susan certainly likes to play the field, whether the others are available or not, and has made quite a few enemies doing so. The husband of her close friend will not even see her if she comes to visit.

While this definitely felt like Jane Austen, it was a little more challenging to read due to the letters format. I had to make sure to stop and think who was writing and, because many times it was addressed to Mr. De Courcy or Mrs. Vernon, etc., it took awhile for me to remember who these people were. In their letters they primarily referred to people by their first name. And rarely were the letters very long so that I sometimes felt like I had to pause and recall quite frequently.

Still, if you like Austen you should read this book. Not my favorite Austen by any stretch, but I'm glad to have read it. Very much looking forward to this summer when I will read Pride and Prejudice. P&P and Persuasion are the two remaining Austen books I haven't read before and Persuasion is the one I am most looking forward to because I have absolutely loved the film versions. More than any of the others. Sadly, according to my schedule, I won't be reading it until sometime next year (it was the last to be published). Still, it will keep me moving along to get to that one.

I am so surprised that with all the remakes of Jane Austen's other books that Lady Susasn hasn't been touched yet. However, I saw on Wikipedia that it is being adapted. Very curious to see how that comes out. Hopefully we won't have to wait long.

I have recently found some contradictory information as to when Lady Susan was originally published. One source gives an earlier publication date and one much later. Oh well, I'm not trying to be perfect in this and really given when she wrote it I'm glad to have read it earlier than later despite its publication date. Still, if anyone knows for sure when it was published I'd be curious to know.

End of the month is looming

2011-01-20T09:21:00.000-08:00

This might be a short post, I hurt my right arm (who knows how) and although it is improved a bit today I don't want to aggravate it too much. I absolutely have to paint today so I must save it for that. However, I do tend to ramble at times so we'll see how short it really is.

I am now reading four books at once in hopes of keeping up with my reading schedule for January. This reading schedule is for 2011, to read all the books on my Project page. I haven't posted this reading schedule because I don't know if I can keep up with it or not. But I am hoping to for at least the first few months so I am cramming a bit at this point. Though since I am enjoying each of the books it is a pleasant cramming.

One of the four is War and Peace and I just have to read a chapter a day (not a book I will be finishing this month). No problem since each chapter is usually no more than 4 pages each. This is part of the year long readalong. I hope to do a post on my progress soon. You know what? War and Peace is rather a pleasant book to read. I feared it, I admit it, but once past the first few chapters it is quite entertaining and not at all difficult. The worst part is just keeping the characters straight and that does get easier as you go.

The next book is Gone with the Wind and I plan to finish it before the end of the month. I have been moving slowly through it. Three reasons for this: it is a wonderful book and I wanted it to last; I have had several other books to read at the same time; and lastly, sometimes Scarlett just makes me so mad I don't want to read about her for a couple of days. (Really there is a fourth reason, it is a long book! But I thought that part obvious.). All that said, I need to get it done so I am being diligent now.

I started reading Lady Susan by Jane Austen a few days ago. Interesting, though different. This is a short novel written as a succession of letters to and from various people, Lady Susan is sometimes the writer and sometimes the subject. I am reading two letters a day. Beautiful prose, confusing set up. I'll let you know how it goes.

And finally, I also started Washington Square by Henry James. I read this ages ago in high school and remember nothing but as I was going along it all seemed so familiar. And then I realized why. I recently saw a movie with this exact same set up. The Heiress with Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift. I looked it up and sure enough, the movie is based on this story. I wonder if when I saw the movie I thought the story slightly familiar... I don't think so, as I said it has been a long time since the last reading.

That's it. Reading some of everything every day and I will just get it done. By the way, the photo up top is of an amaryllis, a Christmas gift from my Mom.

A Vindication of the Rights of Woman

2011-01-17T10:05:00.000-08:00

Last weekend, I set aside Gone with the Wind and dedicated my reading time to finishing Vindication. And, with a sigh of relief, it is done. Now to briefly share my thoughts.

I am so glad to have read the biography of Mary Wollstonecraft prior to reading this book (and that I was able to share them here with other Vindication readers). Knowing a bit about Mary's character and her life shed some light on her discussions. If you recall from a previous post, I struggled a bit with her writing. I found it difficult to follow her train of thought as it tended to ramble around a bit and she frequently made references to people and their ideas that I simply no nothing about. Still, I was able to get the ideas, mostly, that she was putting forth (at least I think so) and I am glad to have read the entire book despite the struggle.

A few connections to the biography for me were: her thoughts about family, education, and her opinion of women. These I thought fascinating. Mary's upbringing I believe she felt was lacking as to parental affection and support and that is something she stresses importance of in her writing. Plus, I know she spent time as a governess for a wealthy family in Ireland. Here she observed the mother's affections for her dogs more than her children and the father's continual absence. These experiences certainly shaped her opinions about raising a family.

She had much to say about education and not just about women but men as well. She finds the whole system lacking. Mary herself did not go to school but was taught here and there by others as well as by herself. Her opinions of school are by keen observation of society, of the men who attended the schools, and her frequent low opinion of those men (as a result of their schooling and upbringing).

I thought her opinion of women the most fascinating. She did not have a lot good to say about them and although she lay the blame for their flightiness and fascination with dress on society, she does also seem to blame the women themselves. It is as if she thinks they should raise themselves up because, after all, she did. She doesn't say that, but it is definitely the impression I get. She spends so much time addressing the failings of women, it is a wonder many women wanted to read the material. I assume those who read it did not think of themselves as the women she is describing.

I can see why, after Mary's own life was revealed after her death, that so many people were put off by this document, though it is sad to me. That because she did not live up to her own words it should all be but thrown away. But for the most part it was. Yes, there was certainly room for something more here but it was a start. It would be awhile after her death before more movements for equal rights for women would start to move ahead. I wonder what might have come sooner had she lived longer and written again on the subject.

Considering the "N" word in Gone with the Wind

2011-01-12T19:29:00.000-08:00

What an amazing coincidence to be reading Gone with the Wind right now with all the hubbub over Huck Finn! I assume you have heard? About a publisher exchanging the "N" word for slave? And a few other things as well. Every article and mention I have seen about this topic have led my thoughts back to Gone with the Wind.

I am making slow progress with this book (mostly due to the other books I'm reading at the same time). It gives me time to think about the issues the book raises including the subject of this post. And I have thought about it a lot from about the first few pages of the book.

I have had a very hard time reading about the slave owners in Gone with the Wind (in other words, most of the main characters). And yet I am in love with the book, it is a wonderful story. Except... I am struggling to reconcile the two. Yes, this is how things were, more or less. And I can take some comfort in that Scarlett's family was mindful of their position and tried not to abuse it. But still, they were slave owners and only the civil war changed that. And then I find myself amused by Mammy with her own prejudices and calling others the "N" word because she believes them lower in their station than she. And then I shift uncomfortably.

And here is the kicker. My parents have for years worked on my family's genealogy and there were a few things I felt pretty certain of as a result. 1. I have no Native American in me (all Northern European for the most part it seems), and 2. I have no slave owners in the family. Or so I thought. You see, my family mostly lived in areas where there were no slaves so not to say they were all such wonderfully advanced people (thought I'd like to think) but just by default ended up that way. However, my Mom recently started to uncover a mystery. I won't go into the details but to sum up: many generations ago there were a husband and wife and then the wife claimed to be a widow. Only it looked suspicious, I can't remember why at the moment. Like perhaps she just wanted people to think he was dead when in fact they were...divorced. Shocking at the time (I think we're around the 1860's or so and if I recall, which I'm probably wrong, she claimed he died in the Civil War), it would have been much more acceptable to be a widow than a divorced woman I'm sure. Anyway, my Mom has found evidence that he did not die and possibly went on to remarry. And if this is in fact the same man, she has found his father. And now to get to the point of this long bit of personal history: the father of this possible ancestor owned slaves.

This little revelation, which might in fact turn out to be no relation to me in the end, was given to me last fall. Now this ancestor didn't own a large plantation or anything, and I think just a few slaves, but it stunned me then and still does now. It certainly gives me much to think about. Suddenly, I have a personal connection. Suddenly, all the slave references in Gone with the Wind are personal. And what was my possible ancestor like? Was he a kind slave owner? Or do I have some distant relatives out there descended from his misbehavior?

So this weighs on me, though perhaps it shouldn't until it is confirmed or denied that I'm related to this person. But I can't help it and I certainly can't not think about it while reading Gone with the Wind. Slaves and slave owners are all over this book. And that fact, whether I have a personal connection or not, weighs on me.

So getting back to the whole point of this rambling post, what would I think of an editor making changes to a book like Gone with the Wind? In my opinion, despite the frequent offenses, it would do an injustice to not only the book but also the time period. The bottom line is that people owned slaves, some were treated tolerably well and many weren't, and horrid names such as the "N" word were used. To remove them from a historical novel not only doesn't change the past, it puts rose-colored glasses on the reader. And in the case of Mark Twain, from all I have read, he intentionally used the word full knowing its meaning and the affect. I have to think Margaret Mitchell did too. How could a writer, writing about a particular time, not include such huge issues such as these?

And if such words and subjects can't be used in case they offend, whose stories do we tell? Because I'm sure most stories have something somewhere in them which will bother somebody. Where do we stop? I read somewhere about it being a slippery slope and I agree. Rather than removing the offender, discuss it. Discuss its meaning, implications and if the concern is that a reader is too young to understand those meanings than I think that either the reader is too young for the book altogether or perhaps the reader will learn about it in time.

I also take issue with changing someone's work. As an artist, it concerns me greatly that sometime in the future someone could come along and change something I created, even with good intentions. To me, these things are sacred. (Although completely different, it reminds me of all the fig leaves strategically applied over genitalia to countless paintings and sculptures during a time period when it was thought the naked body would offend. Should we put a fig leaf over the "N" word? It is still there, just waiting for that leaf to be removed...)

These are just some thoughts I've had and I'd be curious to know what you think about it all. Now I must go read a section of A Vindication of the Rights of Women and a chapter of War and Peace before it gets too late.

Gone with the Wind, and Vindication, and War and Peace: Oh My!

2011-01-08T19:19:00.001-08:00

I am feeling officially overwhelmed by all the books right now and not even sure what or which to blog about. It will settle down a bit, for awhile, after I finish reading A Vindication of the Rights of Women. Until I start reading the February selection for the Year of Feminist Classics anyway.

So here is a brief update because that is all I feel up to writing on anything at the moment. I am hoping to do a bit more in depth on Gone with the Wind in a few days as I have some more thoughts ruminating (about halfway through the book now). On to the other two.

War and Peace is going well. I am reading a chapter a day as part of this readalong and I am so pleased to say I have actually read a chapter a day so far. A little overwhelming in the first couple of chapters as there are so many characters being introduced and, as I knew going into it, Tolstoy likes to use variations of their names so even if I think I know the character I still have to check the list at the front of the book to be certain. By around chapter 4 or 5, though, I was starting to get interested in some of these characters and am now looking forward to reading it each day. I do think reading a chapter a day is a great way to go as it gives me time to slowly know the people and Tolstoy's writing. I don't feel I need to rush through each page but instead can enjoy the beautifully crafted sentences.

Of course, my growing love of War and Peace could be a result of my frustration in reading A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (something about thinking that at least War and Peace is more readable than this). Mary Wollstonecraft wrote this book in six weeks and from what I understand had always planned on re-visiting it at some point and I so wish she had. It is in dire need of at least a good editor. The first couple of sections left me scratching my head wondering if I had missed the point. Now, I don't consider myself terribly intellectual but I also do not think I am stupid. Let me give you an example:

"And, made by this amiable weakness entirely dependent, excepting what they gain by illicit sway, on man, not only for protection, but advice it is surprising that, neglecting the duties that reason alone points out, and shrinking from trials calculated to strengthen their minds, they only exert themselves to give their defects a graceful covering, which may serve to heighten their charms in the eye of the voluptuary, though, it sink them below the scale of moral excellence?"

End of sentence. And actually that one isn't so bad but happened to be on the page I am currently reading.

So I am struggling a bit and hope that I am "getting" her points. I am so glad I am reading this as part of a readalong because reading others' thoughts helps greatly. I hope to write some more soon about the issues Mary discusses and my feelings about them, assuming I can put it all together (and if I am silent you will know why). I think it is getting more clear and concise, relatively, as I go but I don't know if that is her writing or my getting used to it.

After reading her biography I feel compelled to continue on with her book despite my struggles. Especially knowing had she not died so young, she might have come back to write this again at a more advanced age and with greater wisdom (and hopefully an editor...just saying...). She was only about 33 years old when she wrote Vindication and it was before meeting the father of her first child and marrying the father of her second. And then she died only five years after writing Vindication. Nearly forty myself (eek!), I think back to my early thirties and am certain my views on issues have matured and I would think hers had as well.

A few things

2010-12-31T09:23:00.000-08:00

I don't really have a sum up of 2010 or goals for 2011 to share with you today. Since I've only had this blog since September, I did not feel up to doing a top ten, or the like, for 2010. So I'm just sharing some random things today.

Tomorrow is the big day for those of us participating in the year-long War and Peace Readalong over at A Room of One's Own. I'm pretty excited to start, feeling totally unprepared (will try to read more about the Napoleonic wars tonight!), and can't believe tomorrow is the start date.

It is also the beginning of A Year of Feminist Classics and although there are now two books for January for this event, I will stick with just reading A Vindication of the Rights of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft and will start that tomorrow as well.

I am also hoping in January to finish Gone with the Wind, read Lady Susan by Jane Austen, and Washington Square by Henry James. Fortunately those last two are quite short. Still, I feel like my plate is quite full and I really don't want to fall behind on my reading schedule as soon as January. I accept that I will likely not get through every book on my list for this year, but I am hoping to keep up for the first month or two.

One last thing. I mentioned ages ago I would share a painting (I paint in case you weren't aware) inspired after reading the short story "Mr. Jones" by Edith Wharton. The painting is finally dry and here it is:

This story was included in the book The Ghost Stories by Edith Wharton, which I very much recommend. This painting was only loosely inspired by the story which is about a woman inheriting a manor house and finding it inhabited by Mr. Jones, a servant from.... I won't give it away. This painting is a mixture of both the current owner and a prior mistress and the affect of Mr. Jones. I find it difficult to explain without giving too much away of the story.

I can't believe it is New Year's Eve, just a little over 7 hours left for 2010 for me. Happy New Year all! Now I better get to those books.

Reading update: Gone with the Wind

2010-12-29T19:30:00.000-08:00

I was so busy over the holiday (and especially before) that I did not have nearly enough time for reading (and it seems like I'm not alone from what I have seen on other blogs). But things are settling back down and I am really getting into Gone with the Wind now.

Initially, I really enjoyed it but was not sucked in and unable to put it down. But now I am just under 300 pages and cannot wait to see what happens next (technically I know, I just saw the movie for the first time but the book is a little different so there might still be a surprise).

I did not at first connect with Scarlett, finding her so shallow and dissimilar to myself. But either she grows on you or she is changing (or perhaps I am noticing I am more like her than I thought...) and I am more and more compassionate to her situation as I go. She desperately loves Ashley and nothing, not his marriage or her growing relationship with his wife, changes her mind about this. She desperately looks for clues, anything, to know he feels for her too. Its rather sad, I almost cried after a particular scene in which she declares her love for him despite the odds right before he goes back to the war. It really sheds light on what seems on the surface is just her selfish personality but really she cannot let go of her feelings for him. And he does not help the situation, whether by purpose, social considerations, or just plain weakness. Here is his reaction to her telling him of her love:

He bent suddenly to retrieve his hat and she had one glimpse of his face. It was the unhappiest face she was ever to see, a face from which all aloofness had fled. Written on it were his love for her and joy that she loved him, but battling them both were shame and despair.

'Good-by,' he said hoarsely.

Who knows what he is really feeling, how much of that assessment is Scarlett's own wishful thinking. But see what I mean about not doing much to discourage her? He could have said he doesn't love her and never will and instead he says good-by. Leaving her to pine after him some more. Perhaps he didn't want to hurt her, perhaps his intentions were good. Still, he leaves her more vulnerable than ever.

I love the character of Melanie, or "the other woman" in Scarlett's eyes. She is quiet and good and initially comes across as weak but we soon find out she can be stronger than even Scarlett. Rhett Butler stirred up some trouble, simply talking honestly about the war. The general reaction was to ostracize him from society. When told she could not accept Rhett Butler into her home Melanie refuses to do this, despite great risk to her social standing. She stands up for him when even Scarlett, who has been spending a good deal of time with him at this point, is unable to do so. Melanie does it quietly but firmly and I was so impressed with her for doing it.

It is funny, the two characters of Melanie and Scarlett. Surely these two very different women were written this way on purpose and especially considering their involvement with Ashley Wilkes? They balance each other so well. Strong when the other is weak, good when the other is bad (I should say Melanie is good when Scarlett is bad). And I am so curious about the character of Melanie. Is she really so enamored of Scarlett or does she sense the woman's feelings for her husband and keeps her close simply to keep an eye on her? Is she blind to it, simply naive, or is she completely aware of the situation? So wish I could get into her head to find out.

The only thing I'm not as excited about with this book is all the war talk. Though I thought last night how, when wishing I could skip ahead a bit past it, that I was thinking just like Scarlett. She was sick of the war and talking about it too. How funny. Being tired of war talk also concerns me a bit for my upcoming, year-long read of War and Peace. I'm guessing there is a lot about a war in there, wouldn't you think? I did read the introduction and am still pretty excited about the project so here's hoping I can handle all the battle details.

Such a lucky holiday

2010-12-26T08:56:00.000-08:00

I had a wonderful Christmas. Time with the families and spending the special day with our four year old who truly believes. Magical!

I received some wonderful gifts and I won't trouble you with every one of them, but I of course have to share the books. Naturally! So here they are:

Can you believe it? As I added to the stack over an over, I was stunned to receive so many wonderful books from my wish list. They are (from top to bottom):

Someone at a Distance by Dorothy Whipple
Don't Look Now by Daphne du Maurier (I'll have to save this for next fall, it is supposed to be spooky.)
Kusamakura by Natsume Soseki
Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee (The book is huge! I hadn't expected that. 761 pages.)
A Truth Universally Acknowledged edited by Susannah Carson (writers writing about Jane Austen)
The Summer Book by Tove Jannson
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
The Diary of Frida Kahlo
Creating Lifelike Figures in Polymer Clay by Katherine Dewey
Folklore and Symbolism of Flowers, Plants, and Trees by Ernst and Johanna Lehner

I also received the DVD set of the third season of Northern Exposure (love that show) and a set of Bette Davis movies (my favorite actress) to add to my collection. My daughter gave me a beautiful Madame Alexander doll which she picked out herself after much deliberation (so I was told). And I also received a fantastic Cuisinart electric tea kettle and am loving it (many cups of tea since yesterday, when not trying out the new Kahlua flavors of the season...).

I will leave it there. Thank you for indulging me in sharing my spoils. It was such a lovely time all around and I feel truly thankful for spending it with family and for their generosity.

2010-12-23T16:12:00.000-08:00

Happy Holidays!

The next couple of days will be busy but I might try to pop in with a post. If not, have a wonderful holiday! I'm cooking all day until dinner tomorrow and then hope to relax on Christmas and enjoy. And I hope to get in a little reading on Gone with the Wind as well as some more about Napoleon (in preparation for the War and Peace readalong).

Enjoy!

Guest Post on Silents and Talkies

2010-12-19T13:39:00.000-08:00

My internet has been down all day, such a drag. Thanks to my husband, I am back up and running. Really terrible that I am so dependent on this thing, but I just can't help it!

I have the great fortune to have a guest post on my favorite classic movie blog: Silents and Talkies. The topic? My favorite actor, William Powell. The host of the blog painted this amazing portrait of William Powell at the request of my husband for our 10th anniversary and I just love it. If you have a chance, please check out my post and while there take a look at her great blog and her wonderful art. She has some wonderful blogs and I am so glad we have "met" over the internet, she is so nice and talented too.

Falling in love with Gone with the Wind

2010-12-17T17:02:00.001-08:00

Several weeks ago I watched for the very first time Gone with the Wind. How I could have gone 39 years without seeing this movie is beyond me. It was absolutely wonderful!

So of course I would have to read this book. Of course I always assume the book will be better than the movie and so far (currently on page 82) this is holding true. Full of rich details, far more than they would have been able to include in an already full movie, it is revealing more to me about the characters than I had even hoped.

Thankfully, and possibly because I have only seen the movie once, I am not stuck with the movie versions of the characters in my mind while reading. Rhett Butler is not Clark Gable nor is Vivien Leigh Scarlet. But I am truly amazed how well they cast these roles in the movie. Take Clark Gable for example:

"When her eye caught his, he smiled, showing animal-white teeth below a close-clipped black mustache. He was dark of face, swarthy as a pirate, and his eyes were as bold and black as any pirate's appraising face and a cynical humor in his mouth as he smiled at her, and Scarlett caught her breath. She felt that she should be insulted by such a look and was annoyed with herself because she did not feel insulted."

When I read that I could totally see why Clark Gable was the man for this role. Can you think of another actor at the time who would have fit this description as fully? I have to say I am now more than ever wanting to see more Clark Gable movies. Sigh.

But I digress, I wanted this to be about the book and not my growing crush on Mr. Gable. I wanted to share with you how much I love the first 80 or so pages of this book and frankly cannot wait to read more. I am slowed down by holiday preparations or else I think I'd whip through this in under a week. As it is, I will probably be awhile at it. But then I am glad for that. Glad to go slow and savor the rich descriptions of these characters and their settings.

One other thing I'm relieved is not holding over from the movie: the music. I loved the music, don't get me wrong, but for awhile every time I looked at the book on my shelf I caught myself singing. You know the one, "Dah daaah dah dah, dah daaaah dah dah,...". I feared I would turn every page with that tune in my head. Luckily not. Perhaps it will only pop up in those key dramatic moments. I will let you know if it does.

War and Peace

2010-12-14T13:36:00.001-08:00

Despite having too many books to read already for next year, I just couldn't resist this readalong for War and Peace hosted by one of my favorite blogs, A Room of One's Own. And I did try. Actually, I first tried to figure out how I could do it but then rationality set in and I decided against it. Until today, I guess my lack of sleep last night removed the logical parts of my brain.

It is such a perfect readalong for this type of book. It goes for the entire year and the idea is to read one chapter a day. There are 365 chapters and each is around 5 pages or so. Surely I could squeeze that in, right? And I can't imagine a better motivation to read this whopper (the version I'll be reading is 1296 pages).

I did remove a few books from my list for next year to make room, but I know if I actually have time I will come back to them. Always time for those later, but only one time for this readalong.

I will have to do some Napoleonic research prior to the reading and I'm also thinking about some Tolstoy inspired reading or movies. Perhaps sticking with movies would be good, since I have enough reading to do... Any suggestions?

The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft

2010-12-13T09:21:00.000-08:00

I am feeling disappointed in my last post about Mary Wollstonecraft. Here I was at the precipice of the very reason I read this biography (what brought Mary to write A Vindication of the Rights of Woman) and all I could come up with was some vague summary of the events. Blah blah blah. Ugh.

Certainly one reason I was feeling a bit overwhelmed was by the huge amount of information there was and the uncertainty of how much to share here. I run into this problem every time I do a post. I try to keep my posts more about my own feelings and observations rather than retelling the story. In part because I hope you come to read about it here to have a brief summary but also because you are curious to my own observations. I hope anyway...

Mary lived in a rapidly changing world. Revolutions, new thought, radicals. And as much as I would have liked to have written a clear path for her to Vindication it was ridiculous of me to think I'd be able to summarize it here for you in a few short paragraphs. I know that. Yet I want to tell you more because it feels important to me. I feel this woman needs to be well represented. Still, can I sum up the French Revolution, the Religious Dissenters, the radical thinkers into a neat little blog post? Am I just trying to make my self feel better? Probably.

Now I will provide you with a bit of the story after she wrote Vindication so I can then explain the other reason I had some difficulty writing about her in my last post but first I must do this:

FIRST SPOILER ALERT

Many of you probably already know what happened to Mary or could very easily read about it on Wikipedia. I think somewhere in my memory I knew a few things but since I could not easily recollect them I decided to not look on her Wikipedia page, for example, and instead find out in the Tomalin biography. I did know she lived a short life, that much was already there. And I knew she was the mother of Mary Shelley. But how this all came about and what happened to her was a mystery. So I waited.

By the time Mary wrote A Vindication she had an affair of sorts with a friend of her publisher (Joseph Johnson) named Henry Fuseli. Fuseli was married and it seems unlikely that he and Mary ever consummated their affair. In Vindication she adopts the idea that "sexuality was wrong in itself, redeemed only by parenthood: and largely imposed on women by men." Not exactly the steaming portrayal of someone enjoying a sexual affair.

What happened next would be what caused her to be scorned, ridiculed, and forgotten after her death. She went to France, fell in love with a rather unsuitable man, and got pregnant by him. Her thinking seems to have changed in regards to women and sex. The man was Gilbert Imlay, an American living in France. They never got married although the birth documents for their daughter indicate that they did and Mary often referred to herself as Mary Imlay. Gilbert, for whatever reason, was not in this relationship for the long haul and what is worse, in my mind, is that he couldn't just tell Mary it was over. He sort of left, kind of put things off, didn't really say... So she spent a long time trying to get him back, frustrated, confused. She eventually tried to kill herself (oh, I should mention this was the second attempt she made to do this, the prior being I believe when she was in the "relationship" with Fuseli). She was unsuccessful and then realized she must live for her daughter. Good for her. I do wonder if Imlay had been more upfront with her if she had gone on and on as she did, basically pining for him. It was crazy, he was even living with another woman by that point. I mean come on, tell her its over instead of continually leading her to hope. He even sent her on a business errand for him to Scandinavia. After he knew it was over. Good night.

So Mary has a daughter, Fanny, and her relationship with Imlay is over. She eventually ends up marrying William Godwin. They have a rather tumultuous relationship. One wonders if it was a marriage of convenience or of love. Hard to say, especially now. We do know she was pregnant again (conceived before their marriage), so that was certainly an inspiration to get married. She perhaps did not want the ridicule of another illegitimate birth. There were jealousies, squabbles, but towards the end of her pregnancy they seem to have settled into their marriage.

Her last pregnancy and birth were quite easy, relatively, so she had no reason to think this one would be different. After birth, it is common for women to have a "lying in" for a month. After Fanny was born, Mary was up within a few days. She felt she was physically strong enough not to need a long lying in period. And she expected to be back up shortly after this next birth.

SECOND SPOILER ALERT

The labor was very long and after her baby, Mary, was born her placenta did not present itself (that seemed a pleasant way for me to put it). A doctor was called in to remove it, but this procedure at the time could be quite dangerous. He found the placenta was not whole and removed everything he could find. Likely he did not wash his un-gloved hand before doing this and introduced all sorts of unknown things into her body.

At first she seemed to do better and was improving. But then she had a violent shaking fit. And another. Septicemia the likely cause. Part of the placenta left behind, bacteria introduced by the doctor, who knows. And she died.

I read this part of the book before I write my previous post and I suspect this was the other reason I found that post difficult to write. Difficult for many reasons. The obvious reasons, that she died young and the mother of two very young girls. The potential of what she might have written later in her life gone. She had hoped to write a follow up to A Vindication, a more organized, thought out version since the first one was written so quickly (six weeks). That was never to be.

I also have difficulty reading about women dying in childbirth. Medicine has come such a long way and that so many died as a result of such stupid, little things like hygiene really upsets me. Now, Mary's death was probably a result of a bit of the placenta being left behind and they really would have had no way then of knowing that I know. Still, to think if she had given birth in our time this would have likely never happened. So sad.

I have always been sensitive to this issue (as I'm sure most people are) but in particular became even more so about five years ago. I had a difficult pregnancy and had I been in Mary's time I likely would have died or at least come very close to death. So while I think I would have been very sad to learn of how she died I think it hits even closer to home now. I also think about after her suicide attempt how she decided to live for her daughter. And now after the birth of her second daughter, she is gone.

So this was weighing on me when I wrote that last post. I thought about combining them into one but you can see how much I had to say about the end of Mary's life. It would have been too much and I wanted to separate the two.

After Mary's death, Godwin wrote a memoir about her and he did not leave out anything. He talked about her suicide attempts, her pregnancies, etc. What was probably his memorial to his deceased wife was received negatively by the public. It ended up reflecting negatively on her earlier work. How she lived her life in the end was not like what she had written about in Vindication. Or so the public believed anyway. So the general public turned on her.

The result was that any ground gained for the rights of women reverted back. And by women, no less. Various publications advocating that women should be subservient to men were issued. Only one person, a friend of Mary's, seems to have taken up Mary's ideas and published a writing to further them. And she in turn was ridiculed. It would be decades before the Women's Suffrage movement and even they downplayed any affect Mary's writings had on their movement due to negativity towards her through the years.

Things might have been different had she lived a longer life and written a new version of Vindication based on the knowledge of a more mature woman. Or perhaps she would have been around to witness the reversal of any ground gained by her original writing.

One last note about her daughters. Both were cared for by Godwin and eventually his second wife who brought along her own daughter. Relations were strained for Fanny later in her life within the Godwin household and she eventually commits suicide at the age of 22. There is a Wikipedia article that goes into far more detail about her and her death than in Tomalin's book and I will have to read some more about her and her half sister and step sister.

Mary's other daughter, Mary, I'm sure you are familiar with (eventually becomes Mary Shelley). She leads a fascinating life but I just wanted note something about her son, with Percy Bysshe Shelley, in how she decided to raise him. She opted to have him not raised in philosophical, radical thinking and wanted him to have a "normal" life. Considering her own life I thought that interesting. And from what Tomalin describes, he did lead a very normal life.

Well, I feel a bit better now after this post. And I will do more justice to Mary Wollstonecraft in January when I read and write about A Vindication of the Rights of Woman.

Until then I have started reading Gone with the Wind which I have to admit to feeling some irony in reading about Scarlet O'Hara right after Mary Wollstonecraft. Not sure why, just a feeling...

More on Mary Wollstonecraft

2010-12-12T10:43:00.000-08:00

Each time I start to write a post on this woman I find I can't stop talking. I try draft after draft and it is still just too much. Not that I don't like reading long posts myself but in case you want to read the book for yourself you are not going to want to read it all here.

So this is me trying to be concise. The book is The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft by Claire Tomalin and I'm reading this prior to reading Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Woman for A Year of Feminist Classics. You can read my first post on it here.

As I've said before, the reason I wanted to read this book was to have an idea of Mary the woman prior to reading her work. What led her to write one of the very first feminist documents long before feminism or the suffrage movement were active. I have now read through the section leading to her writing A Vindication and feel like I know a bit more though frankly there is so much to understand about the time in which she wrote it that I feel like my understanding is quite vague.

A Vindication was written during the French Revolution in response to subjects being raised in France regarding education for women, among other things. The community of Dissenters (English Dissenters) she lived in were following the revolution carefully, but not all were all that concerned with rights for women. In fact, Mary thought herself more of a philosopher than what we might consider an activist.

Her relationship with her publisher certainly was a big influence on this work. By this point, he was providing her with a place to live and a modest income, among other things. Joseph Johnson came to her aid when she had either no family or friends who would help her or who she wanted to ask. He rented her a house, she did some work for him in addition to her own writing, and he eventually encouraged her to write A Vindication when he sensed the time was ripe for such a work. (I recommend at least glancing at the Wikipedia page on him. Fascinating man. I hoped to write up something here but in an effort to get this finally done...)

Mary was without question a unique person. Another person in this time period, even within her radical thinking community, might still have not written this document. Mary is opinionated, those opinions are being nurtured by friends in her community, she is a writer, and she is supported strongly by her publisher.

So I think I've barely covered the reasons why A Vindication came to exist. Like so many other revolutionary ideas, it took just the right elements to come together and the right person to tell them.

I am not going to talk about the publication A Vindication of the Rights of Woman now though Tomalin does go into some discussion of it in the biography. Since I'll be reading that document soon I'll save it for later (though I admit I'm a bit apprehensive to discuss it after struggling to discuss its author in any cohesive manner).

I'm now well past this section of the book and am nearly done so I should be back soon to finish. I hope this wasn't too vague for you and at least gives you a hint of Mary's path to Vindication.

Gothic Reading Challenge

2010-12-08T13:12:00.000-08:00

As I have already too many books to read next year I am trying to pick any reading challenges I participate in carefully. In other words, I am trying to only join challenges in which I already have the books on my TBR list (unless I just can't resist, of course). I enjoy participating in challenges for several reasons. It is a good chance to interact with other book bloggers, I am often introduced to new books, and it inspires me to accomplish my own reading goals. I discovered the Gothic Reading Challenge today and lucky me, I have plenty of options for it already on my list. And it goes for a whole year giving me plenty of time to read them. Here is the challenge:

There is nothing better than a great Gothic read - crumbling old castles, mysterious legends, shadowy characters, supernatural beings and unexplainable events, make for some of the most haunting and captivating reading imaginable.

There are four levels of participation to choose from:

A Little Madness - Read just 1 novel with Gothic elements.

The Darkness Within - Read 5 novels with Gothic elements.

A Maniacal Frenzy - Read 10 novels with Gothic elements.

Mad, Bad, and Dangerous to Know - Read 20 novels with Gothic elements.

- Anyone can join and you don't need a blog to participate. Click on the Sign-up Page under the blog header to join. (Non-Bloggers: Sign up in the comments section of this post.) -

- Audio, Re-reads, eBooks, YA, Young Reader – basically, anything goes as long as it has element(s) of the Gothic. I'm not going to police you. If you think it is a Gothic read, that's enough for me. Crossovers from other reading challenges are fine as well. -

- List your books in advance on your blog, or choose your books as you go along.

I will participate at the level "The Darkness Within" (5 books) with the following:

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
The Italian by Ann Radcliffe

Six books in all and I will resist the temptation to add four more and bring myself up to the next level (A Maniacal Frenzy). Though I will be keeping an eye out for any other books I read in case they contain Gothic elements and am able to increase my count that way.

Mary Wollstonecraft

2010-12-04T19:16:00.000-08:00

I am almost halfway through The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft by Claire Tomalin and am really enjoying this biography. Tomalin has a way of giving you the facts in an interesting, page-turning sort of way. Late at night, when I think I will just read a few pages before going to sleep, I find myself sucked into the story much like I would a well written fiction novel.

My hope is to write a few posts about this book, we'll see how that goes. I started to write one before and I found that it became so long with my notes and observations and knowing I was, at that point, only about a third of the way through the book I got the feeling I might be sharing too much. Really, if you want to know more you should read the book, right? So I'll try to keep it a bit more concise. I'll try. I'm reading this book to learn more about Mary Wollstonecraft before reading the book she wrote The Vindication of the Rights of Woman for the upcoming Year of Feminists Classics.

I wanted to know more about her mainly because she was writing her book, Vindication, so incredibly early. Mary was born in 1759 (in an area now part of London). Her writing comes so early for any publication on anything even hinting about the rights of women that I wanted to know what made her come to writing it. What events in her life brought her to this at a time when women were rarely educated and even less authoring books about such things.

Claire Tomalin does not fail to illuminate what are likely the steps leading up to the writing of The Vindication. I am not quite there in this biography yet but the ground work is nearly laid. Wollstonecraft is a formidable woman. Even if she had never written a book, it is likely that her presence on earth would have been remembered for some time after her death. "For hereditary christening gifts, she had her paternal grandfather's willpower and ambition and her mother's Irish fluency of tongue."

She was the second child born and her mother's heart was already attached to the first born, a boy. Mary never thought she received the attention or affection she needed from either parent and did not form strong bonds in childhood with her other siblings. She was a bit of a loner and often preferred to be by herself. But when she formed a friendship, she treated it almost like a romantic relationship. It was all consuming and was disappointed if the recipient did not treat it the same way.

There does not seem to be much interest in the opposite sex at this point or at least nothing is brought up in seriousness. Mary is determined to make her own way and not depend on her family. She was excluded from her grandfather's will (unlike her older brother, Ned, who received a third of the estate) despite being the only other grandchild in that family at the time. "The overt preference given to Ned in terms of love and money stung her quite sharply as any of the injustices of her life."

There are many small things leading up to the whole, but I'll try not to dwell on each detail. A few events to note:

Mary moves out of her family home to work as a companion as she does not want to be dependent on anyone else. Her dream is to live with her closest friend, Fanny Blood, in a sort of self-sustaining utopia but funds are a problem as there are not many respectable jobs women can keep at that time.

She helps get her sister out of an unhappy marriage in which she believes her sister is being mistreated (though likely her sister was simply suffering from post-postpartum depression).

She and Fanny along with one or two sisters (depending when) move to a section of London where many Dissenters are living. Dissenters are an interesting bunch. Primarily, they are religious dissenters. But it seems to be a rather radical group looking for reform in many areas. Here she and her companions open a school. Teaching is one of the few professions acceptable for women.

Though Mary does not seem interested in their religious views, she is drawn to these outspoken people. It is here she finds her future publisher (I hope to talk more about him in a future post, really interesting man) and several influential people who no doubt accelerate her ideas of female independence.

It is interesting to see how she came to do what she did. What brought her there. I can imagine that to her own family, Mary could be a lot to deal with. She had certain ideas of how she wanted to live and if you didn't bend that way she wasn't interested in dealing with you. What really strikes me, though, is how protective she is of the women in her life. She stood between her sometimes drunk, violent father and her mother. She took her sister away from what she thought a possibly abusive marriage.

Mary comes across as self-serving and bossy at times, but how much of that is coming from the perception of the time that women should know their place? Even most women held that opinion. Even now a strong, forceful woman in her field is often perceived as a .... You know the expression I'm sure. Mary is strong, she is passionate, she is concerned about those who cannot help themselves. But she maintains a positivity about the world. "Mary wanted to believe that individual willpower and energy could better the state of the world, and that human nature was improving."

All that and I don't think we have gotten out of her early twenties yet. I hope you don't mind that I will have multiple posts on this book but posting as I go helps me to remember, to interpret, to gain a better understanding of this woman.

Maisie Dobbs

2010-12-01T19:35:00.000-08:00

Such a lovely little book! I just finished reading Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear and very much enjoyed it. At the beginning I thought the book would mostly be about the detective work of Maisie but then the author took us deep into Maisie's past. How she started out working as a servant in a wealthy household and eventually came to be sponsored in her studies by the mistress of the house. A lucky combination of timing and hard work, Maisie's life took a much different direction than it might have.

I loved reading about Maisie's educational experiences. Tutored by a friend of the family, he understands that this girl is capable of much more than basic learning. He is a master detective and also seems to be a philosopher (a bit of a renaissance man I think). She eventually wins entrance into college. But this is all taking place during World War I and Maisie ends up leaving to work as a nurse and eventually ends up in France. I know very little about nurses during any of the wars so I thought that fascinating. The nurses suffer great hardships and they are doing so, at least I think most of them if not all, as volunteers. Many of them wanted to be there as their brothers or boyfriends were fighting the war and they wanted to be a part of it. Maisie was not there for either reason. She was compelled to do what she could to help. To make a difference. A parallel to the woman (her former mistress) who gave her the education that Maisie so desperately wanted. She too had wanted to make a difference in the world.

I will definitely have to read more in the Maisie Dobbs series. A pretty quick comfort read sort of book. The writing is straightforward, to the point, and yet I feel like I have learned quite a bit of what it must have been like to have been in Maisie's shoes in England during that time period. Fascinating.

I've just started reading The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft by Claire Tomalin and am loving it. I'm actually finding it hard to put it down, which is unusual for me in non-fiction. I do like reading non-fiction, it is just unusual for me to find such a page turner. I can't wait to share my progress on that one! I will try to do that book in installments and share some of what I learn about this fascinating woman.

Some new (new to me) books

2010-11-29T13:23:00.001-08:00

Although I plan on reading mostly books I already have or books on my Kindle in 2011 (or books given for Christmas...), that still doesn't stop the urge to go to the bookstore. Especially when I have a credit or a coupon to use.

So here are the books I've purchased in the last couple of weeks:

The first two books, going from the bottom up, are The Cambridge Guide to Women's Writing in English edited by Lorna Sage and Images of Women in Literature by Mary Anne Ferguson (I have the second edition). I bought both of these at my local new/used book store and I'm glad I did because the Cambridge Guide is about triple what I paid for it new and my copy is in perfect condition. And the other book, Images of Women, I can't even find in my edition and the latest edition is quite expensive. Score! The Cambridge Guide reads like an encyclopedia, which will be handy. The Images of Women is full of short stories and poems. I've only just started reading the introduction so I'll share more about that one later.

The next book in the stack is The Glass-Blowers by Daphne du Maurier. The second du Maurier I've found at a local antique shop and each only cost me a dollar. It is a hardcover from 1963. I don't know much about it yet, but I seem to be collecting vintage du Maurier's so why not. Here's a photo of the cover:

So lovely. Then I purchased a copy of Gone with the Wind (think I mentioned this in a previous post). I suspected I would want to own a copy of this one and I found a beautiful 1964 hardcover:

And I've saved the best for last. Armed with my Black Friday weekend coupon for Borders for one book 50%, I braved going out last Saturday because really that is too good to pass up. Thankfully, it wasn't that busy. I had decided prior to going I would either buy the new translation of Madame Bovary or the Penguin Classic edition of The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins. The minute I had The Woman in White in my hands the decision was made.

And inside:

It even comes with its own bookmark. So gorgeous! And it feels lovely, that fabric cover. I'll definitely have to get another one of these printings. Maybe Wuthering Heights? Sigh.

Some decisions made, some challenges entered

2010-11-28T10:27:00.001-08:00

A couple of posts ago I mentioned I was trying to decide what to read next. So I am back to let you know what I decided, I'm sure everyone has been dying to know.

I am going to go ahead and join The Year of Feminist Classics and read the first five books (so far anyway). Here they are again:

January: A Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft
February: The Subjection of Women by John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor Mill
March: A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen
April: Herland by Charlotte Perkins
May: A Room of One's Own by Virginia Woolf

I am also going to read these related books:

The Life and Death of Mary Wollstonecraft by Clair Tomalin
The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf
Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee

I haven't read anything by Virginia Woolf before and have some preconceptions about her based on who knows what. I really want to learn more about her and read at least one of her fiction books so that I had some base before reading A Room of One's Own.

I also discovered on a couple of blogs I follow this new challenge: Victorian Literature Challenge.

Here's a little something about it:

Victorian Literature Challenge 2011

What you need to know:

This challenge will run from 01 Jan 2011 - 31 Dec 2011.
Participants can sign up at any time throughout the year.

Read your Victorian literature.
Queen Victoria reigned from 1837-1901. If your book wasn't published during those particular years, but is by an author considered 'Victorian' then go for it. We're here for reading, not historical facts! Also, this can include works by authors from other countries, so long as they are from this period.

Literature comes in many forms.
There are so many Victorian reads out there, including novels, short stories, and poetry. One poem doesn't count as a 'book': pick up an anthology instead!

Choose your books.
List your books before you begin, or pick up titles along the way. It's up to you! You can review them if you choose to, but it's not necessary. If you don't have a blog, that's fine! Link to a Facebook, or a page somewhere where you can list what you've been reading. If you can't link up, no problem - feel free to just comment and enjoy.

Spread the love.

Post the reading challenge on your blog - make your own post(s), or stick the button on the side of your page. The more the merrier, after all. Let's build a big community of Victorian literature lovers!

Choose from one of the four levels:

Sense and Sensibility: 1-4 books.
Great Expectations: 5-9 books.
Hard Times: 10-14 books.
Desperate Remedies: 15+ books.

Well, I already had 14 books on my TBR list for 2010 so I couldn't resist. I also decided to add one more book so I could bump up into the Desperate Remedies category because I was already so close. This is assuming I can get them all read of course. Here is my list:

Turn of the Screw and Other Short Fiction by Henry James
Lady Susan by Jane Austen
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte
Villette by Charlotte Bronte
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Gothic Tales by Elizabeth Gaskell
Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Somewhere in January I'm going to squeeze in Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell too because I'm dying to read that very soon. Feeling a little overwhelmed but in a good way.

The House at Riverton

2010-11-27T09:01:00.000-08:00

A few days ago I finished reading The House at Riverton by Kate Morton. The story of a servant named Grace as told by her many years later at the end of her life. Her life was intertwined with those she served and, as she finds out later, even closer than she could have imagined. The book hints at a sudden death at Riverton, the home she served in, from very early on in the book so that is not a mystery. How it comes to take place, though, is left to the very end of the book.

Grace is telling this story, leaving it recorded, for her grandson. Now that nearly all of the people in the story have died she must feel it is safe now for the truth to be known. She kept it hidden for decades, protecting the family and in particular the woman she served as lady's maid for several years. A close bond was felt between both the women. Only Grace was to later find out that bond was even closer than she realized. And she never told, until now. I won't spoil that here, though I had it figured out pretty early on in the book. I was glad that was not the basis for the book, or I'd have been disappointed to have learned the secret so early.

I've mentioned before I like stories that combine time periods. Whether through reminiscing or otherwise, I like moving between the two. I think it is the element of discovery. The possibility of finding out something many years later. This book was certainly full of time shifting as Grace would move from the daily events to remembering her past. I thought the way Kate Morton wove the story together fascinating. Rather than just start to finish of Grace looking back, we'd get a bit in one time and then go back to get the full story later. It was not confusing at all, either, as it could have been with all that back and forth.

This was the last book for me in the Chunkster Reading Challenge (sigh of relief to be done, though I do enjoy larger books). The books I read for this challenge were:

Possession by A.S. Byatt
Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
The House at Riverton by Kate Morton

The books had to be over 450 pages long and these were, for the most part, just barely over that but I was late coming into the challenge so I didn't want to be too ambitious.

Now I am reading a quick one, Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear. I'm about 20% through the book and started it about a day ago (reading on my Kindle, hence the percentage). Just the sort of read I needed after three Chunksters in a row.

Where I ramble on about what to read next

2010-11-22T08:38:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking about my reading list for 2011, trying to decide what I want to read first. To read second. You get the idea. I've tried to leave it open, so I can go by my mood. But I am a planner, so I can't help myself for at least the first few books.

I'm debating joining, at least for the first few books or so, this reading group: A Year of Feminist Classics. I discovered this wonderful group on Iris on Books blog, a favorite of mine.

The books I'm interested in reading are the first five, because they were written during my favorite book time periods (approximately 1800 to 1950ish). Here are the selections I'm interested in:

January: A Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollestonecraft
February: The Subjection of Women by John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor Mill
March: A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen
April: Herland by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
May: A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf

The only thing holding me back is: 1. I feel like my reading list is already quite full for next year, 2. I expect I'll find other books during the year that I really, really want to read, and 3. it is important to me that I finish the books already on my list (or at least try).

Nonetheless, I have wanted to read something by Mary Wollestonecraft (Mary Shelley's mother, in case you weren't aware) because she sounds like an amazing, complex woman way ahead of her time. And if I read that book I think I might as well read a few more with the group. That makes perfect sense, don't you think? And if I decided to read the book by Mary Wollestonecraft I'm very tempted to read The Life and Death of Mary Wollestonecraft by Claire Tomalin which I would probably start before the end of the year.

The other book that is at the top of my desired early reads is Gone with the Wind. I recently, finally, watched the movie (all the way through for the very first time) and was enchanted. I am very curious to read the book now, which I'm assuming will be better than the movie because isn't that normally the case? I even went to Book Bin yesterday, my local used book shop, and found a 1964 hardcover copy. I had a feeling this would be a book I'd want to keep, and therefore opted to not get it on my Kindle.

And then there are all the other books on my list. I'm looking forward to more Jane Austen, Elizabeth Gaskell, and (for some lighter reading) P.G. Wodehouse. Then there is To Kill a Mockingbird, which, believe it or not, I have never read nor seen the movie (I'll wait to watch that until I've read the book, unlike Gone with the Wind. I'll resist.). And now I'm distracting myself looking at all the possibilities. I think it will be a good year for reading.

Reunion in France

2010-11-19T13:41:00.000-08:00

I don't blog about every movie I watch. Instead, I wait until I'm inspired to share something about one. The movie has to stay with me, whether good or bad, otherwise I just don't feel inspired to write about it. I do have a few movies I will write about soon but am not quite ready for various reasons (like Serenity and several William Powell movies).

For now, though, I feel compelled to write about Reunion in France with Joan Crawford, Philip Dorn, and John Wayne. I hadn't planned on watching this movie but joined my husband on the couch after he had already started. I picked up a shawl I'm knitting (and trying to finish quickly, the cold weather is very inspiring to get that project done) and settled in. This was definitely a propaganda film, very pro-French and anti-Nazi. It was released in 1942, after the United States had joined the war. The story is of a wealthy Michele de la Becque (Crawford) returning to Paris to find the Nazi's have taken over her home, her money gone, and her fiance has become a Nazi conspirator. Michele suddenly becomes patriotic and rejects her fiance's assistance and him. Formerly quite rich, she now becomes an assistant in a designer's dress shop (where once she was a customer). Onto the scene comes John Wayne. They meet on the street, he grabs her and asks her to pretend to be his lover to fool the men following him. Turns out he is an American pilot stranded in Paris and needs a way out. Michele does all she can to help him escape, including turning to her ex-fiance.

This film did not receive the best reviews. In fact, Joan Crawford did not think much of it. I found this quote on Wikipedia: "Oh God. If there is an afterlife and I am to be punished for my sins, this is one of the pictures they'll make me see over and over again. John Wayne and I both went down for the count, not just because of a silly script but because we were so mismatched. Get John out of the saddle and you've got trouble." I also did not think much of the two of them together, but really it was not their love story but another that stays with you. I also thought more of the film overall than apparently the star did. Probably not a movie I would bother to watch again, but it was not bad overall.

I always like stories of strong women. Women who decide for themselves what is right and what is wrong. Joan Crawford's character stood up to Nazi's. The Nazi's in her own home, the Nazi's she finds herself at a dinner party with, the Nazi wife who demanded to buy a coat not for sale at the dress shop. It's not hard to imagine Joan Crawford standing up for herself, but to imagine a woman in Nazi-occupied France doing so I find inspiring.

As a side note, the Nazi wife insisting on buying the coat was played by Natalie Schafer who also played Mrs. Howell from Gilligan's Island, among other things. And I didn't realize it at the time, though I remember thinking this actress looked familiar, but Ava Gardner was also in the film (uncredited) as one of the other shop girls.

I won't give away the rest of the movie, but I thought it ended rather nicely. In the end, it is a romance story after all.

The Lacuna

2010-11-13T09:46:00.000-08:00

Lovely. Barbara Kingsolver has a wonderful style of writing. This was the first book I've read of hers and I do plan to read more. I have read that some think the book slow and I do agree but on the other hand I was glad because it gave me time to enjoy her writing.

I was introduced to this book during a recent Frida Kahlo craze which started with an innocent trip to the bookstore. I was browsing casually the art section when, for some reason, I was inspired to pull a small book about Frida Kahlo down from the shelf. I have had very little to do with Kahlo prior. I saw the movie, I imagine I must have studied some of her paintings in college (since I was an art major and all) but frankly I really did not know anything about her. Not really. I don't know why on that day her work spoke to me but it did and so I brought that little book home, read it, soon went back for another. And I was hooked. I couldn't get enough information about her. I ended up reading a really wonderful biography called Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera. I highly recommend it if you want to know about this fascinating artist.

So after this and a few more books my obsession was still raging and I found on Etsy a commemorative plate of one of Frida's paintings. I chatted with the seller, admitting my distraction with all things Frida, and she recommended The Lacuna to me. I bought it then, last summer, but did not get around to reading it until a few weeks ago.

On a side note, a very strange coincidence led me to be part of a group painting this exact image for the Mary Lou Zeek Gallery's Face the Public Show last month. I did suggest Frida Kahlo as the artist but the choosing of this same painting was fate. Twelve different artists did this rendering. Here's the final painting (and you can find out more about this event here):

Anyway, back to The Lacuna. The story is of a boy born to an American father and Mexican mother. It is told primarily through his own journals and letters compiled later, we are told, by a woman who eventually became his stenographer. A rather sketchy upbringing, he eventually goes to work for the artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo (finally the tie in, and for any of you who don't know, Diego and Frida were married). Frida steals the show every scene she is in, despite the interesting Harrison Shepherd, our hero of the story. Kingsolver, in my opinion based on all the biographies I read, portrayed Frida beautifully. I couldn't wait to read more of her in this story. She's such a real-life vibrant person, she was bound to captivate even in this fictitious story.

Working for the Rivera's led Harrison to work for Leon Trotsky. I knew very little about Trotsky and actually all I did know was a result of reading about Frida Kahlo. Working for Trotsky, or just being around him, was very dangerous due to the attempts on his life by Stalin. Harrison likely developed PTSD from his time with Trotsky. The symptoms are hinted at later in his diaries. We later follow him back to the United States only to arrive during the McCarthy era. Not long after he becomes a famous writer, Harrison finds himself under government suspicion due to his associations with suspected communists (Kahlo, Riera, and Trotsky). This poor guy, he just cannot seem to catch a break.

This book might not work for everyone, especially if you prefer a fast-paced plot. But if you enjoy a beautifully crafted story then you might give this a try. I also read this book as part of the Chunkster Reading Challenge.

In the midst of: The Lacuna

2010-11-08T10:04:00.000-08:00

I'm about in the middle of the book The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver and I wanted to share what I love about the book so far. This is not a plot-driven page turner sort of read, and because of this I am moving a bit slower through it. It is written primarily in a diary format with the occasional interruption by an "archivist" to clarify something about the journals. The diaries are kept by a young man who has spent part of his life in the US and part in Mexico. He has an American father, whom he barely knows, and a Mexican mother, whom he can barely relate to, he eventually comes to spend time working for the artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo and also Leon Trotsky. Throughout, he keeps journals. Mostly he is reporting on the events around him and very little personal information is divulged. He doesn't go on and on about his dreams or desires, these are only hinted at and I have found that fascinating to get those little tidbits and try to get a picture of our diarist.

As I'm obsessed with all things Frida Kahlo these days, I have particularly enjoyed her portrayal in this book. It's all fictional of course, but the author clearly researched these historic figures (or at least Frida Kahlo, she is the one I am most familiar with). Love these bits in the diary about her:

22 April
"Insolito!" she cried from her hospital bed. "Look at your poor Friducha, falling all to pieces and dying. Let me have that basket." She wore only half the usual pirate's chest of jewelry today, but her hair was pinned up the usual way. She must have nurses and stretcher-bearers at her command at the Hospital Ingles.

5 January 1936 After weeks lying in bed existing on air and pink bananas, the Queen has risen. She came down the stairs, ribboned and ruffled like a Oaxacan saint's day, to reclaim her rightful place in this house and terrorize the staff."

I'll stop, I'll leave it there for now so I have plenty to talk about when I finish the book.

Recent Loot

2010-11-05T13:24:00.001-07:00

I had to share some recent purchases, some books and a couple of other things too. I'll start with the other things. (You can click on any of the photos to see them larger).

Last Sunday I went to the antiques expo in Portland, Oregon and had a great, overwhelming time. It's always overwhelming, so many things to look at, so many people to not bump into, and I always leave feeling like I've missed seeing something.

This year I was quite restrained, too much so as I'm wishing I had purchased a portable writing desk that was suspected to be from the mid-1800's or so. But, I didn't and I'm out of luck. I did buy a couple of charming metal snowflake ornaments, here's a close up of one of them (the prettier one):

And also this very lovely print of two ladies:

Not sure how old it is. The back of the frame is covered by something that looks old, but it could be from the fifties or so. One of these days I might break into so I can see if there is more information hiding.

Onto the books. I did find one book at the antiques expo. Hungry Hill by Daphne du Maurier. A really lovely edition from 1944. Here's what I found out about the book on Amazon, "The fortunes and fates of five generations of an Anglo-Irish family are bound to their copper mine on Hungry Hill." Adding that to my vintage du Maurier collection.

Then I received a few books from Powell's as they had a weekend of free shipping for orders over $16. Usually you have to spend over $50 to get that so naturally I couldn't help myself. I bought the following (as seen above except for one which I forgot):

A Great Deliverance by Elizabeth George (the first of the Lynley mysteries)
Jamaica Inn by Daphne du Maurier
The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith (been hearing a lot about this lately)
101 Dalmations by Dodie Smith (reading this to my daughter, it was a childhood favorite)

The last book in the stack is Flaubert and Madame Bovary by Francis Steegmuller and this is the book that previously was owned by Anne Rice (find out how I got this in a previous post). So cool! Here's a photo of the front:

On the inside flap Anne Rice wrote her and her husband's name with an address in California (I thought it best not to share a photo of that in case it is still a current home of hers). I am sure she wrote it, though, because I compared the writing to her signature in another book I have. The "A's" are the same. Powell's Books did put a sticker on the book to prove it came from Rice's library:

She did write in the book though not until the section discussing Madame Bovary. Check it out:

and:

"Show to Stan". I just loved that bit. I can't wait to read Madame Bovary and then go through this book enjoying and enjoying Anne Rice's thoughts as I go. Powell's is still selling her books and I'm finding new ones on there frequently. You can find them here and be sure to check for more sections than are shown on this front page. That's it for now.

Possession

2010-11-03T19:21:00.000-07:00

I've been slow to post about this wonderful book I finished called Possession by A.S. Byatt as there is so much to say about it and yet I don't want to say too much. So I'll stop procrastinating and just get it done.

A wonderful book. The writing was thick, full of stories and poems, and had an interesting plot that kept you moving. The story is about two scholars who discover a romance between two Victorian poets. The scholars work in England at different schools and only meet after Roland finds a clue and is directed to Maud for assistance. Although they muddle through, each is coming into this working relationship with a lot of social baggage. Still, they are both sucked into the mystery of this yet unknown affair between Randolph Ash and Christabel LaMotte. Roland and Maud try to keep their research a secret, not wanting to share their findings with their peers until they have the full story. But this becomes a challenge as suspicions flare due to the continual absences for their research.

Byatt provides a huge amount of additional reading by providing poems, stories, letters, and journals written by LaMotte and Ash (both fictional). I admit I might not have studied deeply all of the poems (can't say Victorian-style poetry is one of my favorites so far) so I might have missed a clue or two. But adding all this additional writing into the story gave so much more depth to those characters than I might have felt otherwise had she simply mentioned them instead. It was through the writings of these poets, and a few people they knew, that we learn about Ash and Lamotte individually and together. I really enjoyed this, it made me feel like one of the researchers. Also, other than just a small bit towards the end to give the reader some closure, we don't learn anything that Roland and Maud do not find through their research.

Possession is a larger book and I read it for the Chunkster Reading Challenge, but I thought it was a fairly fast read all the same (especially if you didn't dwell too much on the poems...which are really lovely...just saying).

Next up, another big book for the same challenge: The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver. Already about a third through and it is fascinating. Part of the book takes place at the home of Frida Kahlo (of whom I am a huge fan) so I'm fascinated. But more about that one later.

The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton, Part 3

2010-10-30T08:59:00.000-07:00

A couple of days ago I finished reading all of the short stories in The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton. Just in time for Halloween and also the end of the Readers Imbibing Peril Challenge (or R.I.P. V). These short stories were a perfect addition to the book I read for the challenge, The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield. I read one short story every couple of days throughout the month, which I recommend as they really stay with you for awhile after reading them. You can read my earlier installments on the Edith Wharton ghost stories here: Part 1, Part 2.

On to the stories, the ninth story, "The Pomegranate Seed", centered around a new marriage and some traces of the old one. The story begins as Charlotte Ashby and her husband Kenneth recently returned from their honeymoon. Upon their return, the letters start coming.

"The letter was always the same - a square greyish envelope with 'Kenneth Ashby, Esquire,' written on it in bold but faint characters. From the first it had struck Charlotte as peculiar that anyone who wrote such a firm hand should trace the letters so lightly; the address was always written as though there were not enough ink in the pen, or the writer's wrist were too weak to bear upon it."

Every time Kenneth received one of these letters he became visibly upset. Charlotte maintains it is his reaction to the letters that concerns her the most and not that he is receiving letters from what she suspects is a woman. I did not completely accept that she was being honest about her feelings, if only because she is constantly repeating that it is her concern for him and nothing else. The story follows Charlotte along as she tries to find out more and even confronts him about the letters, all under the guise of her concern for him. It does not end well for any of them, at least where Edith Wharton leaves it, and, in hindsight, perhaps she should have just left him alone.

The tenth story, "The Looking Glass", was about a masseuse caring for a wealthy and vain woman. The wealthy woman, Mrs. Clingsland, had been a generous and kind client for Mrs. Atlee, the masseuse. Mrs. Atlee had gained much financially through their relationship.

Mrs. Clingsland was not aging well and tried many things to maintain her youthful appearance. She was visited by a medium and was getting correspondence from a suspicious man both of whom concerned Mrs. Atlee. Worried that her client would be taken advantage of, she decided to help her instead. Mrs. Atlee had been a bit of a medium, though she only had done it for awhile as she was concerned about her soul (apparently talking to the dead can be perilous for the soul). When she learned that Mrs. Clingsland was trying to reach a deceased lover, she offered to help. But it would not be as a medium, she was not getting messages from the deceased man. Instead she would come up with the messages herself. But she was concerned that since this deceased man was educated and in a different class than herself that Mrs. Clingsland would not be fooled. So, she enlisted the help of a dying man, an educated man, who she had been asked to visit by a friend. He was happy to help and the two created several messages to give to Mrs. Clingsland from her lover. It went well, but Mrs. Clingsland demanded more as proof that the messages were indeed coming from her beloved. So, Mrs. Atlee asked the dying man to write a letter and she left him for the night to do so. When she returned the next morning, she found he had died in the night. But there was the letter. She brought it to Mrs. Clingsland who found it completely convincing, as if her lover had written it himself. Did the deceased lover speak through the dying man?

The final story, titled "All Souls", was less a ghost story and more a mystery to me. The story is told through a cousin of the victim (I guess I can call her a victim) Sara Clayburn. The location is an old manor house that the widowed Sara lives in. Sara enjoys walking and one day comes across a woman headed toward her house who says she is going to visit "one of the girls". That is the end of their meeting and it is quickly forgotten as Sara slips and falls, hurting one of her legs in the process. She ends up in bed under doctor's orders not to move or she will have to wear a cast. After a night of very little sleep, likely from a fever, she wakes to find the house completely empty of servants. And, thanks to the snow storm, the electricity is not working. Despite the doctor's orders, she wanders the house hoping to solve the mystery though afraid she might find them all slaughtered and the killer waiting for her too. She finds nothing and goes back to her room and eventually must fall back asleep. When she is awake again, everything has returned to normal. The servants deny the event. It was as if she had dreamed the whole episode, but she doesn't believe that. She is convinced they were all in on it. Were they? Or was it simply the fever from the injury? The cousin narrator hints at the possibility of witchcraft or the supernatural, that the maid Agnes who cared for Sara might have been responsible for it all.

I loved these stories. Edith Wharton is a wonderful write/storyteller. Her writing is simple and elegant and the stories were so well crafted. Was I scared reading them? Only in two of the stories, my two favorite stories in fact. I have mentioned them already in a previous post. My first favorite is "Mr. Jones". I liked that one so much, I even found myself working on a painting about it (I'll share that here when I'm done). The other was "The Lady's Maid's Bell". Both of these were true ghost stories, or at least I think they were ("The Lady's Maid's Bell" is still a mystery to me). I also really liked "Kerfol" with its ghost dogs. I would definitely recommend reading these stories and I hope I've inspired you. So glad I did the posts about this in three parts, you can see how difficult it is to summarize these stories without going on and on about them. I kept editing to try to keep the posts small, but it is difficult to know what to remove as, though the stories are simple, they are really quite complex. Read them, consider each story carefully, and you'll see what I mean.

Happy Halloween!

A few things including upcoming reviews and Anne Rice excitement

2010-10-29T11:25:00.000-07:00

Thank you everyone who left suggestions on my classic reading project for 2011 post. I have already made a couple of changes to the list, which I suspected I might. Since my intention is to read books I think I will actually enjoy, I will definitely consider any suggestions for books to read or books I should perhaps avoid for awhile.

I have some fun news to share. I found out yesterday (thanks to my husband) that Powell's Books has acquired the library of Anne Rice (around 7000 books!) and is selling it online. You can buy one! Here is the link: http://www.powells.com/section/from-the-library-of-anne-rice/ I've read I think all of her books (that she wrote I mean, naturally) and even have a signed copy of one of the vampire books so I couldn't resist shopping for something. The prices are amazing, they are exactly what Powell's would sell anyone's used books for which I find astonishing. After all, they could probably make more off of them just knowing where they come from. The greatest part? Some of them are annotated and signed by Anne Rice. Not all, you have to check under Condition Notes which will say it is from her library but then will also say if she's written in them at all. So, naturally I bought something:

Flaubert and Madame Bovary by Francis Steegmuller. I plan on reading Madame Bovary next year so I thought this the perfect companion read and, might I add, it is annotated and signed by Anne Rice!! It is shipped and on its way, I'll share more about it when I receive it. They were also selling a copy she signed of Madame Bovary and I was very tempted to get that as well. However, it was not the newly translated edition and that really is the one I want to read so I resisted.

I just noticed that this book is a New York Review Books Classics so I might need to add it to my 2011 Classics list...

Keep checking back at that site (I know I will). They are still listing books. I see some new ones on there today that weren't there before. At least in the Literature section.

Moving on, I have two reviews to post soon. One I hope to have later today or tomorrow for the remaining Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton. Then, I also finished reading Possession by A.S. Byatt (loved it) and will get something up about that soon.

One last thing, I watched last night on OPB (our public broadcasting station) a British production called Crooked House. It has several stories woven around a spooky manor and I love how they all connected unexpectedly at the end. Some of it was in the present and some in the past (I think I've mentioned before I love books that do that too) and there were several moments where I was truly on the edge of my seat. Definitely recommend it. I plan to watch it again with my husband and hopefully pick up a few things I think I missed the first time. I know it is scheduled to show again here late Saturday night, I have no idea if they are playing it elsewhere but I would hope so.

The Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton, Part 2

2010-10-25T09:05:00.000-07:00

This is the second post on this wonderful compilation of stories of Edith Wharton in which I will talk about stories 5-8. To see the first installment, please see the first post here.

I have to say that reading a short story, particularly by Edith Wharton, and then sitting on it for a day or two before moving on to the next is really the best way to read them. Each of her stories wants to stay with you, wants you to examine it, wants you to make sure you got it (though you likely won't, at least in part). She seems to like to leave you in the lurch, at least with some of them. Nothing is fully explained, nothing is totally clear.

Story 5, "The Triumph of Night", was a slightly bizarre story about a gentleman traveling to his new job, getting waylaid at another home due to a storm, and then caught up in a drama he can only guess about. The "ghost" in this story is the evil side of the owner of this home as he tries to pull one over on his dying nephew. The narrator doesn't really understand what is taking place until it is too late.

In the next story, "Miss Mary Pask", I felt all twisted up in the reading. Our narrator visits a friend's sister in Brittany. The sister lives as a recluse and there is some concern about her. A tiresome journey, and some odd reactions by the locals to his destination, to get there, the narrator arrives after dark. The narrator is greeted by the sister who seems very odd and then the narrator remembers hearing, though he had temporarily forgotten, that she is...deceased. Rushing out despite the sister's pleas to stay, our narrator flees. However, that is not the weird part of the story but I can't tell you that without spoiling it so I'll leave it there.

I am quite convinced that the seventh story "Bewitched" is all about a cheating husband and his cover story after being discovered by his wife. No, dear wife, the woman you saw me with was my former love. Who is dead. I just can't seem to shake her ghost. Really. (not a quote, that's just me) Right. I'm sure it was the ghost of the dead girl and not her sister...or is the sister actually dead and that was his love? That's the thought that has stayed with me since the reading, the mystery Edith Wharton likes to leave you with.

The final story for today is I think my favorite so far (followed closely by the very first story, "The Lady's Maid's Bell") titled "Mr. Jones". Lady Jane Lynke has inherited from very distant relations an old manor house. No one has actually lived in the house for years except for a few servants keeping it up. Our heroine, a woman of financial means, moves into the house and embraces her ancestral home. The servants are the housekeeper, the housekeeper's niece, the gardener, and the butler Mr. Jones. Lady Jane does not see the butler, she is told he is elderly and sick and yet his presence is felt everywhere as he dictates how the servants are to handle the home. There are some mysteries. Lady Jane is told not to use one of the parlors due to a smokey chimney yet the housekeeper delays it getting repaired. Why? Also, a key is missing for a room which contains records of the family and the home. It turns up later after Lady Jane threatens to break down the door. By this point, she has spotted Mr. Jones but only briefly as he disappeared behind a curtain. She find the curtain hides nothing except a bricked up doorway which has been like that for decades. A strong female heroine, a spooky manor, mysterious characters, and, like all the stories in this book, it left you wondering.

I have three more stories to go and I will be back before Halloween for Part 3 of the Ghost Stories of Edith Wharton. I'll let you know then my favorites from the entire book, the ones I think you should read even if you don't read them all.