Quick Takes

Just popping in here with some quick thoughts about a few of the books I've read recently. First up is Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler. Part of Hogarth's Shakespeare series, which commissions current authors to reinterpret some of Shakespeare's classic plays, this novel offers a modern version of The Taming of the Shrew. This was my first time reading anything by Anne Tyler, who is one of those quietly but widely renowned authors, and I was really impressed with her writing. Her style, at least in this book, manages to convey a compelling drama while still being rooted in the ordinary little facets of everyday life. I also appreciated the direction went she with the story. A modern reinterpretation of The Taming of the Shrew could easily go a very cliche route--I'm imagining something in which Kate is portrayed as some kind of driven "career woman" who needs to be softened. Instead, Tyler takes a more subtle, unexpected route, casting her Kate as the 30 year old daughter of an eccentric scientist whose blunt personality starts to veer toward bitterness as she feels increasingly trapped by her life circumstances. The romantic lead she clashes with is her father's research assistant, an Eastern European immigrant whose visa is about to expire. It's the type of pairing you don't read about every day, and it plays out in a very satisfy way.

Next is a Persephone book, Few Eggs and No Oranges, the wartime diary of Vere Hodgson that spans the years 1940-1945. You might say that this falls at the more utilitarian end of the diary spectrum. It's not a memoir in which Hodgson has wrapped up her experiences in a neat and tidy package, nor is it secret diary in which she's revealed her innermost thoughts and feelings. Instead, this is a diary that she wrote and circulated among relatives living abroad as a way of updating them on her life in London during the war. She chronicles each day in a brisk way, succinctly recording the work she does, the increasingly skimpy food rations that she eats, and the endless air raids she experiences. There is very little plot beyond this sometimes repetitive chronicling, yet it is compelling in its own way. It gave me a new and deeper understanding of World War II from simply absorbing the daily grind of it through Hodgson's eyes. In a similar way, I also grew to love Hodgson as her wonderful, resilient character was revealed from witnessing several years' worth of her daily activities. At around 600 pages, I'll admit this may not be a book for everyone, but it's a real treasure for anyone who's interested in WWII and the female writers of the period.

Finally, a book that didn't quite his the mark for me: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie. I was excited to read this mystery after seeing it highly praised on a few of my favorite blogs in recent months. It's widely thought of as one of Christie's best, with a completely unexpected ending that was apparently very innovative for its time. Unfortunately, I think the vague allusions I had read about this amazing ending were exactly what spoiled the novel for me. From page one I found the characters to be a little dull and the plot a little hard to get into, but I kept reading on high alert, looking at the book from every angle to try to guess the ending. I did eventually hit on it, which made the end of the novel feel like more of a big letdown than a big reveal.

What are you reading these days?

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The Shuttle

I just finished reading The Shuttle by Frances Hodgson Burnett and I have to say, it might be my favorite Persephone book yet. I know for a fact that I have said this before about other books, but I may really mean it this time. It combines elements that are reminiscent of Ann Radcliffe, Jane Austen, and Edith Wharton, features a heroine that is equal to any of their classic characters, and just may be the latest addition to my list of favorite books of all time.



The Shuttle takes place in the early 20th century, when American heiresses were just beginning to marry into the British aristocracy. The shuttle of the title refers to the steamer ships that crossed the Atlantic, ferrying prospective brides and bridegrooms back and forth across the pond. The novel opens during the first wave of this phenomenon. The wealthy Vanderpoel family (fictional counterpart to the Vanderbilts) marries their eldest daughter Rosalie to Lord Nigel Anstruthers, an evil philanderer hiding behind the mask of a respectable title. As soon as the sweet, simple Rosy reaches England, she's easily overpowered by her husband, cut off from her family and money, and forced to live a reclusive life in Nigel's dilapidated manor house, Stornham Court. This section of the novel is pure Gothic fare.

Cut to twelve years later when younger sister Bettina Vanderpoel enters the scene as both the heroine of the novel and the hero of the day. Unlike Rosy, Betty is clever, composed, and courageous. She is close with her millionaire father and has inherited his practical business acumen along with his money. She brings both with her to find and rescue Rosy. She sweeps into the Gothic decay of Stornham and immediately begins to rehabilitate both the house and her sister. Gothic elements reappear as Nigel tries to plot and scheme against Betty, but they are always counterbalanced by her modern outlook, one that comes from a world where there's law and order and where people cannot be held captive against their will. This push and pull between the Gothic and the modern reflects the similar dynamic that occurs as American and English cultures mingle throughout the novel. Of course, there is a climatic scene in which Betty nearly does fall prey to Gothic horror at Nigel's hands--I won't reveal any spoilers, though. This is a true page-turner that's satisfying on many levels. (Did I mention that there is a romantic male lead who is at least as dreamy as Mr. Darcy? And characters with wonderfully ridiculous names like Ughtread and Mount Dunstan?) I can't recommend  this book highly enough!

Do you have a "favorite" Persephone book? Or at least a current favorite that has yet to be dethroned?

WWI in Books

Last October, I wrote about how everything I was reading and watching seemed to align around World War II. Now I've jumped back by a few decades to focus on World War I, with two of the best books that I've read recently both set during that time period.


(Vera Britain, image via here)

First, I finally got around to reading the memoir Testament of Youth by Vera Brittain. Published in the 1930's, it looks back on Vera's life when she leaves her place at Oxford to serve as a nurse during the war. Brittain writes about her experiences at the various hospitals she's posted at, both in England and abroad, about the deaths of her fiance and her brother, and finally about her subsequent return to Oxford to complete her studies after the war. It's easy to see why Testament of Youth has been considered one of the definitive literary accounts of WWI. Although Brittain brings 15 years' worth of perspective to her narration , she extensively uses excerpts from the actual diaries she kept during the war. The effect of that combination makes for one of the most compelling and moving books I've read in any genre.



After reading A Testament of Youth, I can see how it probably serves as source material for more recent works set during that time period, from the early seasons of Downton Abbey to Wake, the 2014 novel by Anna Hope. As the book's description points out, the word wake has several meanings: to emerge from sleep; a ritual for the dead; and a consequent or aftermath. Set just after the war, Wake illustrates these different meanings by using three different story lines in which three women interact WWI veterans in different ways. Their stories end up being intertwined, and are also woven into a narrative that follows the journey of the body of an unknown soldier as it is removed from its resting place in a French field and makes it way to London for a ceremonial burial. This was a beautifully written novel with smart plotting and character development. I can give it the highest compliment I can think of lately, which is that I can easily imagine this being a novel written by a beloved but forgotten mid-century writer only to be reissued by Persephone Books. Happily, it was written by a modern author, a fact that leaves me eager to read what Anna Hope writes next.

The Home Front

Recently my reading and my TV watching have aligned around the subject of the home front during World War II. 

First, I've spent the past few Sunday nights watching the miniseries Home Fires on PBS. It centers around the a Women's Institute in a rural village at the start of WWII. The WI's membership comprises a wide cross section of women--old and young, upper and lower class, housewives, shopkeepers, and farmers--and shows the impact the outbreak of war has on their lives. While it's interesting to see such a range of characters portrayed, my favorite thing about the show is its setting. From the neighborly sense of everyone knowing everyone's business in the village to shots of cozy British interiors, I can easily imagine the world of Home Fires being populated by a cast of Barbara Pym characters a few years down the road.

With all of this on my mind, when it came time to start a new book, I naturally gravitated toward On the Side of the Angels by Betty Miller, a Virago Classic that I had picked up at a used book sale. Also located in a rural village, the novel centers around two sisters: Honor, a mother of two whose husband is a physician in the local army hospital, and Claudia, a schoolteacher whose lawyer fiance has recently been invalided out of the service after developing a heart condition. Honor tends to be meek and prone to daydreams. Her world centers around her husband and she resents the pull that the commanding officer in his unit seems to have over his actions. Claudia is intellectual and feisty. She has very clear ideas of how she should act and how her life should be. She comes to question these ideas for herself when a British Commando comes to the village. His aggressive demeanor and his reputation for heroic deeds behind enemy lines cause all of the characters, both male and female, to reevaluate their impressions of the home front.

One key difference between Home Fires and this book is that while many of the characters in the former are left on their own when their husbands head to the front, in the latter both Honor and Claudia have their husband and fiance present with them. This highlights the different ways that the male and female characters deal with life on the home front. One theme that surfaces in the novel is the suggestion that the characters are actually glad for the war because of the opportunity it offers them to step out of their everyday civilian lives and adopt more exciting roles for themselves. While I felt that this argument could only hold up among people like Miller's characters, whose upper class professions enable them to serve on the home front and who are not separated from their loved ones, I nonetheless found it to be an interesting take that I had not considered before. While it doesn't evoke the kind of cozy atmosphere that Home Fires does, On the Side of the Angels is well worth reading for the new perspectives it offers on this time period and location.

Touch Not the Cat

And now for a complete change of pace from Flannery O'Conner:  Touch Not the Cat, Mary Stewart's awkwardly named novel that I enjoyed probably a bit more than I should have! Stewart is one of those mid-century British writers whose work I've discovered through blogging. I've read several of her novels over the past few years and have found them to be generally pleasant reads filled with cozy English settings, gentle characters, and hints of magical happenings here and there. In this book, though, Stewart seems to pull out all the stops. The story is crammed with every type of silly supernatural element you can imagine: a suspicious death, a crumbling estate, illegitimate family connections, a maze, a love story involving a telepathic connection with a mystery man, a pair of evil twins that have their own telepathic connection...all as depicted very literally on the 70's-era cover of my used copy.

I would be the first to admit that all of these elements seem way too over the top to come across as anything other than really cheesy, but somehow Stewart manages to make it all really fun. I was more than happy to just suspend my disbelief and just enjoy the pot as it unfolded. I think this might actually be my favorite Mary Stewart novel to date! 

Are there any novels that you've enjoyed even though they might sound silly on paper? 

Revisiting The Woman in White

It's been quiet around these parts lately not because I haven't been reading, but because I've been reading too much. Or, more accurately, I should say that I've been reading too many things at once. I had three books in progress over the past few weeks, which didn't leave a lot to blog about. One of these books was The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins, which I was rereading. This time around, some of the tensions in the plot and conflicts between characters left me feeling so stressed out that I had to lay the book aside for a while. It would be very hard to argue that Collins isn't a master of suspense. That said, The Woman in White is not without its flaws--a fact that became apparent as I revisited it this time around.

The Woman in White begins on a dark night when artist Walter Hartright encounters--of course--a mysterious young woman in white. They meet on the deserted road and Walter escorts her for a small leg of her journey into London. Shortly after they part, he overhears a passing conversation that leads him to deduce that the woman had escaped from an asylum. In the following days, Walter takes a position as a drawing instructor to half-sisters Laura Fairlie and Marion Halcombe and is unsettled to learn that their family may have a connection to the mysterious woman. Walter's narrative during this opening section is one of the strongest parts of the novel, setting a moody and atmospheric tone for what's to come. Because it's so good, it feels a bit disappointing when the novel switches narrators. We see much of the plot unfold through a series of devices like Marion's journal entries, letters from peripheral characters, and recorded testimonies from household servants. Aside from Marion, most of the characters who take a turn narrating are long-winded and irritating at best, completely unlikeable at worst, which can make some of their sections feel a bit tedious. It makes for a novel that you want to race through, both so that you can find out what happens next and so that you can move on to a different narrator.

The character of Laura Fairlie was another element that was slightly irritating upon this second reading. She's portrayed as kind, innocent, and delicate--traits that are all pretty typical for heroines of that time period, but that tended to grate after 600 pages worth of Walter and Marion tiptoeing around her fragile constitution. Although Laura is cast as the romantic heroine and the center of the novel's mystery, it's the active and competent Marion who is the stronger female protagonist (though Collins doesn't let her get away without having a few moments of simpering herself).

Although this rereading brought out some of these flaws for me, it didn't change my overall favorable opinion of the novel. The issues that stood out might even be attributed to the fact that it was first published as a magazine serial--making its overall success as a self-contained novel a testament to just how good of a mystery writer Collins was.

What do you think of The Woman in White? Or is there any other book that you enjoy in spite of its flaws?

Persephone Under the Tree

I always feel like a bit of a braggart when I do a post that recaps books I got for Christmas. Then, of course, I stop and realize that the majority of people probably wouldn’t consider a book to be a gift worth bragging about. Hopefully that’s not the case for anyone reading this blog, who may be more likely to share in my excitement over the collection of Persephone books that I received this year.

First there's The Home-Maker by Dorothy Canfield-Fisher, one of the more buzzed-about Persephones in recent months. It tells the story of a stay-at-home father in the 1920's, when that was anything but common. Perhaps even more than the intriguing premise and good buzz, it was the cover illustration of the Persephone Classics Edition that drew me to this book. It features a Norman Rockwell painting called Crackers in Bed that is so warm and cozy looking that it practically makes the book jump off the shelf, begging to be read during these dreary winter months. I'll definitely be tacking this one very soon.

The Village by Marghanita Laski and High Wages by Dorothy Whipple were both titles that I added to my wish list after browsing through the most recent Persephone Biannual. While the latter is still waiting on my shelf, I read The Village over the holiday break. It’s the story of a romance between an upper class girl and a working class boy, told through the eyes of the small British village they live in during the inter-War years. Laski introduces us to a huge group of characters and she skillfully makes each one multi-dimensional. The result is that you spend time liking and disliking aspects of nearly every character in turn. The love story feels almost secondary to this realistic character study. I wasn’t thrilled with the way the ending was wrapped up, which might keep this one from being one of my top Persephone recommendations, but it was still a very engaging novel.

The Persephone Book of Short Stories is a book that I've been wanting to get my hands on for quite a while. The writers represented in the collection include Dorothy Whipple, Dorothy Parker, Edith Wharton, Helen Hull, Susan Glaspell, among many others, which pretty much makes it a no-brainer.

And last, but not least, is The Country Life Cookery Book by Ambrose Heath. Traditionally I’ve steered away from Persophone’s nonfiction books on cooking or homekeeping, but this one spoke to me because of the way it features recipes broken down according to season, very much on-trend even though it was written in the 30's, back when eating that way was the norm and not a trend. Yes, it’s a very different kind of cookbook than the modern-day ones that clutter my kitchen, and yes, there are recipes for some dishes that I would never dream of preparing today, but there are also a fair amount that I can actually see myself trying. And as a bonus, each chapter is illustrated with drawings by Eric Ravilious, an artist whose work I’m always interested in seeing.

That was my holiday haul. Did you get any books for Christmas, Persephone or otherwise?

Reading Lately

I've been on a hot reading streak for the past few months, finding book after book that I've loved. Here's an overview of some of my favorites, starting with some current fiction.

I’m nearly halfway through The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt and so far it’s living up to its hype as a completely engrossing, modern-Dickensian coming of age saga. I’m amazed at how such a minutely detailed world—both in terms of exterior setting and the interior world of main character Theo—can spring from the mind of one author. Another book that inspired the same amazement was The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell. Although the last two chapters of the novel pale in comparison to the whole, and I didn't find the novel as a whole to be as successfully conceived as Cloud Atlas, I still found it to be a very worthy read.

A novel garnering much praise lately is Ali Smith’s How to Be Both. The novel is divided into two halves, one which follows George, a modern-day teenage girl who has recently lost her mother and one that follows the rise of Francesco del Cossa, a fifteenth-century Italian painter who isn’t exactly as he seems. Though the two halves of the story are linked by the painter and his frescoes, they are not fully dependent upon one another. In fact, half of the books printed start with George's half of the story while the other half start with Francesco's, emphasizing the point that they work together no matter which order they're read in. Despite all of the attention that the post-modern (or maybe post-post-modern? I feel like I should go back to college to debate this) structure is getting, the individual stories are very readable and beautifully written, particularly in the sections that explore memories. How to Be Both is probably the most interesting novel I’ve read in a while. It would be a perfect book club book, especially if the members were divided into two groups that read the stories in different orders, then compared their impressions.

Last but not least, I also caught myself up on one of the more buzzed about books from a year or two ago, George Saunders's Tenth of December. I've wanted to read this ever since it came out, but only just got around to it. I was very impressed by how his stories were simultaneously quirky and moving. I really enjoyed the majority of this collection and plan to seek out more of Saunders's work in the future.

Of course, my literary diet isn’t complete without copius helpings of 20^th century British female writers and two of my favorites of late are Margaret Kennedy and Angela Thirkell. I discovered the former a few months back when I read The Ladies of Lyndon a few months back during Margaret Kennedy Reading week. That single novel was good enough to elevate Kennedy to favorite author status. I’m looking forward to reading Together and Apart next. And then there’s Angela Thirkell’s Barsetshire series, which I’ve been reading as a sort of palate cleanser in between denser books. Most recently I finished Pomfret Towers, which may be my favorite of hers so far. In it, Thirkell hits on the perfect combination of witty writing, a glamorous setting, romantic entanglements with happy endings, and a collection of characters who are imperfect and irritating at times, but who manage to highlight some very relatable human emotions.

The Levant Trilogy

I'm back with two summer reading suggestions in anticipation of the upcoming holiday weekend. The first is an epic novel by Olivia Manning--in my opinion, one of the most under read mid-century female writers. To quote from a blurb I saw that perfectly describes it:

“How many Americans who have read Barbara Pym, Beryl Bainbridge, or Iris Murdoch have ever heard of Olivia Manning? Yet she is one of the most gifted English writers of her generation.... Nobody has written better about World War II—the feel of fighting it and its dislocating effects on ordinary, undistinguished lives.” —Eve Auchincloss, The New York Times

Although she doesn't seem to have experienced the resurgence in popularity that some of her contemporaries have in recent years, her books have found a place among my favorites, as evidenced by my gushing over The Balkan Trilogy. Ever since reading that, I've been on the hunt for a copy of its hard-to-find follow-up, The Levant Trilogy. As thrilled as I was when I finally tracked down a copy at a used book sale, I was equally happy to see that it was re-released by NYRB earlier this month, making it easier to access this wonderful book.

As is probably obvious, The Levant Trilogy does indeed pick up where The Balkan Trilogy left off. After evacuating from the Balkan peninsula when it falls to German forces, Guy and Harriet Pringle find themselves in Egypt. Adjusting to a new climate and new customs, they find themselves facing an even greater sense of waiting. Guy throws himself into any work that he can find, or that he can create for himself. After a short period working for the American embassy in Cairo, Harriet struggles to find ways to occupy her time. New characters enter their orbit, new relationships form among characters who evacuated from the Balkans with them, and Manning once again paints a portrait of the Pringles marriage, this time almost exclusively from Harriet's point of view. For my money it's the more compelling one, and Harriet evolves as a character in a way that surpasses her portrayal in the first three installments of the saga.

That isn't the only way in which The Levant Trilogy surpasses The Balkan Trilogy. Manning seems more sure-footed in a number of respects: the plot lines surrounding her supporting characters are more interesting and tightly drawn; she strikes a more perfect juxtaposition between the action on the front lines and the stagnant atmosphere among the diplomats who are playing out their lives just behind them; and she seems to have perfected a technique of referring back to things from past volumes within the trilogy so that it feels less like summary and more like memory. All in all, I'd say that The Levant Trilogy stands perfectly fine on its own and can be read independently from The Balkan Trilogy. Of course, I'd highly recommend them both, but if you're feeling curious about Manning's work, this might be the more intriguing one to jump into.

Still not convinced? I'll be back later this week with a current book for anyone who's looking for lighter, more modern beach read.

The Provincial Lady

E.M. Delafield's "Provincial Lady" novels have long been on my radar time thanks to seeing them praised by various book bloggers. I found a copy of the second in the series at a used book sale last year, but had it to put it on hold until I could get my hands on the first in the series. I finally did that last month when Persephone had a special preview sale of their new edition of The Diary of a Provincial Lady.  I didn't intend to read both books back to back, but a few days after finishing the first I found myself missing the narrator's witty take on life so much that I just couldn't help myself from reading it sequel, The Provincial Lady in London. Both are utterly charming books.

Both novels take the form of continuous diary entries of the unnamed narrator who writes about her life between the Wars. Her self-deprecating, shorthand style might be said to be a forerunner of Helen Fielding's work. Unlike Bridget Jones's diary, however, the Provincial Lady's diary feels more true to life as it focuses on the minor absurdities found in everyday events. The novels aren't structured around one overarching plot arc. Instead, they ebb and flow with the tedious and the exciting sides of the narrator's life, all presented through the lens of her keen eye. We see her deal with disgruntled servants, mischievous children, an aloof husband, and tedious neighbors. While her life has that cozy English feel that I enjoy so much in books, it's not too cozy. The Provincial Lady is actually quite modern. She's a feminist and a writer with an active social life. She travels abroad on her own and, eventually, publishes a novel and rents a pied a terre in London. The point of view and sense of humor that the Provincial Lady brings to both her family life and her individual intellectual pursuits feels refreshingly relevant, even today.

E.M. Delafield wrote several other installments of the Provincial Lady--she apparently goes to America, visits Russia, and survives wartime. After reading these two, I'm now eager to see how she handles all of those adventures.

Characters on Film

There's been a distinct cinematic connection to much of my reading over the past few weeks. What's more is that the films in question have actually enhanced the reading experience for me, breaking with the notion that the book is always superior to the movie.

First, I finally got around to watching last year's film adaptation of Julia Strachey's Cheerful Weather for the Wedding. After watching the beautifully shot film, I immediately picked up the novella to reread the story of moody young bride Dolly as she prepares for her wedding day by brooding upstairs over a hidden bottle of rum while her wedding guests gather downstairs. On its own, the book is amusing but somewhat difficult to wholeheartedly like since none of its characters are particularly likable. The movie tries to elicit more sympathy for Dolly through flashbacks to an earlier romance. I felt neutral about these not entirely necessary additional scenes, but what I really loved was the way the movie brought to life the cast of minor characters that make up Dolly's eccentric family and friends. With a newly vivid picture of them in my mind, it was these characters who stood out for me during my second reading of Strachey's book.

Another novel that was enhanced by a film counterpart was Helen Fielding's latest installment in the Bridget Jones saga, Mad About the Boy. I could actually be a bit harsher here and say that the memory of the earlier films was the only thing that saved the current book. There were spoilers all over the internet when Mad About the Boy was first released, so I won't repeat them here other than to say that the book picks up with Bridget as a fifty-year-old mother of two. In the first Bridget Jones novel, her diary cheekily tracked her smoking and dieting habits, among other things. This time around, two of its major focuses are Bridget's Twitter followers and texting habits. What might have been a cute joke if left at one or two mentions is tediously drawn out through the entire book. When she's not texting or tweeting, Bridget's up to some of her same old antics, only they don't translate as well as they used to. For much of this book, I could only find Bridget's character remotely appealing if I pictured Renee Zellweger's charming portrayal. On the whole, I think I'd say that the Bridget Jones films have definitely eclipsed the books.

And finally, proving that good things come to those who leave half-written blog posts sitting in the draft folder for a week, on Sunday night I stumbled onto The Making of a Lady on PBS, the film version of Frances Hodgson Burnett's The Making of a Marchioness. The novel was the very first Persephone classic that I read and while I enjoyed it, it was subsequently eclipsed in my mind by other Persephone novels. Seeing the movie version reminded me of how much I enjoyed the story. It was a perfect blend of the romance and the creepiness that make up the two halves of Burnett's work. I know what I'll be picking up to reread next.

Do you have any favorite film adaptations that you think are as good as, or even better than, the books they're based on?

A Glass of Blessings

A Glass of Blessings marks yet another Barbara Pym novel that I completely loved, which will come as no surprise to anyone who's been following along as I've gradually been reading all of her works over the past year.

This time our heroine is Wilmet Forsyth, who is something of a departure from the "excellent women" that Pym often writes about. While those characters are typically middle-aged spinsters, sometimes a bit dowdy in appearance, often overlooked or taken for granted by their circle of friends,Wilmet is a married, well-off woman in her early-thirties who is always stylishly dressed and sure to be included in any local social event. Married to a civil servant who doesn't want her to work, Wilmet fills up her days by allowing herself to be carried along on a wave of neighborhood gossip, afternoon teas, and church activities, although she's half-hearted about these things. Even while she holds herself apart as an observer, offering herself a silent wry commentary about what everyone else is doing, she seems to wish she was able to dive into the center of it all. She soon finds a pleasant distraction, though, when she begins to suspect that she has more than one male admirer on her hands.

I found Wilmet to be such a likable heroine. She's self-centered in a way that's relatable, not selfish, and by the end of the novel she comes to realize that many of the motives she ascribed to her friends and neighbors were actually projections of her own feelings. Yet in her true fashion, Pym ends Wilmet's story by showing that even these kinds of imagined projections can have meaningful real-life ramifications. With its chic, intelligent protagonist and its interesting, diverse cast of supporting characters, A Glass of Blessings brings a slightly more modern feel to the timeless themes that Pym typically covers...and, of course, gets a high recommendation from me.

Season's Readings

Well hello again, and happy holidays....to any readers who may still be out there, that is! I have to admit  that over the past several months I've been guilty of two of my biggest blogging pet peeves: 1) repeated apologies and excuses during slow periods of blogging; and 2) a long, unexplained stretch of radio silence (in my case it was mostly due to a lack of blogging inspiration). I'm feeling ready to start posting more regularly around here, though, Maybe that will happen in the new year, maybe earlier. I don't want to commit to anything definite, but I did want to briefly pop in with a recommendation for a perfect seasonal read: Christmas Pudding and Pigeon Pie by Nancy Mitford.

Coupled together in a recently reissued volume, these are two of Mitford's earliest novels. Like her more famous works, these are frothy and witty reads. With influences from Mitford's own life, they simultaneously offer a glimpse into and poke fun at the British aristocracy of a certain time period. Unlike her later novels, though, these two have more hi-jinx going on in their plots, with mistaken identities and characters who are not what they seem. In Christmas Pudding, a writer poses as a tutor to gain access to a country house and the biographical papers of its family. In Pigeon Pie, the outbreak of World War II sees a flighty heiress get drawn into a German spy plot that's unfolding right under her nose. Both are thoroughly enjoyable reads, particularly for anyone who's already a Mitford fan. And although only one of the two stories unfolds during the holiday season, either one would be a great read for this time of year--perfect light reading for when you're curled up on the coach with Christmas music playing in the background.

Have you read any Christmas themed books lately? Or are there any non-holiday books you're planning to read this season? I know that I'm looking forward to diving into at least a few more during my upcoming holiday break.

Reading Anita Brookner

Anita Brookner is the latest in the string of authors I've read as a direct result of encountering them through other bloggers. Brookner doesn't seem to be quite as widely or loudly praised as, say, Barbara Pym or Muriel Spark, but over the years I've noticed at least a few quiet but ardent admirers of her work, of which there is an impressive amount to choose from. Although her most famous novel is Hotel du Lac, which won the Booker Prize, Brookner has been prolific from the 1980s to the present. The first novel of hers that I picked up was A Friend From England, purely by chance of coming across a copy at a used book sale.

A Friend From England is told from the perspective of Rachel Kennedy, a Londoner in her early-thirties who is part owner of a bookshop. She befriends her accountant, Oscar, who had known Rachel's father, and is soon drawn into his family's circle. With no living relatives of her own, Rachel prides herself on being independent and progressive, yet she finds herself drawn to the conventional family dynamic that Oscar and his wife provide over the course of regular weekly visits. She's happy to be drawn into their world, yet finds herself at odds with Oscar's twenty-something daughter, whose perspective of marriage and family seems to be drastically different from Rachel's own.

A Friend from England is the kind of book that gradually engrosses the reader. Its action is subtle, with much of it occurring within Rachel's mind, but the character portraits are so richly drawn that I was completely captivated by the end of the book. Upon finishing I immediately wanted to read more of Bookner's work, so I headed to the library where I found Falling Slowly, in which we meet Beatrice and Miriam Sharpe, two middle aged sisters who have both faced disappointments in their lives. While Beatrice deals with hers by withdrawing from life and becoming more solitary, Miriam begins to act in uncharacteristic ways. Their relationship and their individual lives come to a turning point when Beatrice faces a health issue. Falling Slowly is another novel that builds up gradually. It gets off to an even slower start than A Friend From England does, and it stagnates in that slow pace for a longer time. I had to push myself to keep reading for much of it, but I did eventually hit a certain point where the development of the characters hit its full stride and made me eager to read on. 

After reading two of Brookner's novels practically back to back, I'm left feeling intrigued by her work, but in need of a change of pace from it in the immediate future. I like the way she dissects the unexpected inner lives of her characters. In some ways, they are very similar to the types of people Pym writes about, although her overall effect is much less cozy and more psychologically probing, as if she set out to give the Henry James treatment to some of Pym's "excellent women". Her sentences are certainly dense and long enough to rival those of James. Overall, I think her novels are best for when you're in the mood to get lost in rich language and characterization, but they can easily prove frustrating when you're in more of a mood to quickly move from one book to the next.

Have you read any of Anita Brookner's work? Do you have any recommendations for a novel of hers I should try the next time I'm in the mood for a slower-paced read?

Mary Stewart Reading Week

I'm so glad that Anbolyn spearheaded Mary Stewart Reading Week this week because it prompted me to read The Moonspinners, which in turn finally allowed me to fully appreciate the appeal of Stewart's writing. I've read two other novels by Stewart and thought they were okay, but wasn't enamored with them. I kept getting hung up on some dialogue that sounded a bit dated and on extensive descriptions of landscapes, which aren't my cup of tea. (Although the latter is 100% my problem, and not Stewart's. If you are into reading descriptions of landscapes, she writes lovely ones.) Something clicked with The Moonspinners, though, and I found myself quickly engrossed and fully entertained by it.

The heroine of The Moonspinners is Nicola Ferris. In what seems to be true Stewart fashion, she's a plucky, parent-less girl in her early twenties who doesn't hesitate to get caught up in danger. Nicola is also very independent with a worldly, urbane streak, which keeps all of that pluck from becoming twee. She and her older cousin, Frances, go on holiday in a rural, sleepy Greek seaside town. While exploring the surrounding mountains, Nicola stumbles upon Mark and Lambis, a young English tourist and his Greek guide, who are holed up in an abandoned shepherd's hut while Mark recovers from a gunshot wound he received after accidentally stumbling upon a murder in progress. Nicola is quickly swept up into the mystery and a series of adventures ensues, with many twists and turns that I won't spoil by trying to describe.

With its exotic Greek setting and its mid-century time period, I could easily imagine The Moonspinners as a classic film, with Nicola played by Audrey Hepburn in a Roman Holiday-esque dress. The novel's face paced action seems like exactly the stuff of movies. There are a lot of "only in fiction" elements to it, not least of which is the amount of adventure and trouble that the characters are able to squeeze into just two days' time! But that just added to the charm of it for me and made for a truly fun reading experience.

Noblesse Oblige

Noblesse Oblige is an unusual little book that I picked up at a used bookstore on Cape Cod. Edited by Nancy Mitford, it's a slim volume that proclaims itself to be "an enquiry into the identifiable characteristics of the English Aristocracy". It makes this enquiry though a series of essays by Mitford, Evelyn Waugh, and others that dissect the distinctions, primarily related to language and speech, between the British upper class and everyone else.

The collection opens with an essay about sociological linguistics by Alan S.C. Ross in which he outlines some of the differences between upper class (U) and non- upper class (non-U) usage. This covers everything from how to refer to places ("I'm going to Downton" would be U while "I'm going to Downton Abbey" would be very non-U) to specific word choices (radio and wealthy are both non-U words, while wireless and rich are U). This is followed by Mitford's own essay, in which she offers her response to what Ross says, which is in turn followed by an open letter in which Evelyn Waugh responds to what Mitford says, and so on and so forth. It all has the potential to be very dry, but Mitford and Waugh (as well as some of the less famous essayists) bring just enough of their characteristic wit and irony to their contributions to make the subject bearable.

Based on some of the online reviews I've read, it seems that public opinion is a bit divided about Noblesse Oblige. Should its arguments be taken seriously or is it meant to be read as satire? I think the answer lies in the middle. It's essays provide genuine, albeit lighthearted, commentary about a minor social debate that arose at the time of its publication. It's by no means a must-read, even for Mitford fans, but it does have enough to interest and amuse to warrant a quick skim if a copy should happen to cross your path.

Incidentally, I can't help but wonder what George Bryant of Bogota, whose path my copy crossed back in 1964, thought about the book:

Sweet Tooth

Reading Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan was a little bit like reading The Marriage Plot, if that novel had been written by John LeCarre instead of Jeffrey Eugenides--and that's not at all a bad thing! It's set in a world of Cold War-era spies, but features the unlikely heroine of Serena Frome, a young woman with voracious reading habits and indiscriminate literary taste. A childhood aptitude for numbers lands her a spot as a mediocre math student at Cambridge. While there, an affair with an older professor lands her a low-level job in British intelligence. She's eventually called upon to put her bookworm tendencies to use by befriending aspiring author Tom Haley, with the goal of subtly influencing his writing so that he'll produce works with an anti-Communist bent. During the course of her mission she develops a relationship with Tom that eventually leads to a betrayal, a blown cover, and a twist at the end of the novel that I'm still not sure how I feel about.

True to McEwan's typical form, Sweet Tooth creates a compelling, atmospheric world around a cast of characters of a certain class who are--to my mind, at least--quintessentially British. His standard quality of writing is made even more enjoyable by both the espionage intrigue of the plot and the literary references that are peppered throughout Serena's narrative. She talks about reading anything and everything from trashy Jacqueline Susan novels to Persephone favorites like Monica Dickens. Living up to the term "literary fiction", Sweet Tooth is an entertaining read that's likely to score some brownie points with bibliophiles.

Howard's End

Although it's a bit after the fact, I'm finally getting around to writing about the book I read for the last Classics Club Spin-- Howard's End. This was a re-read for me, and it surprised me in two respects. First, in a flare up of reading amnesia, I confused the plot of Forster's novel with Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro. Although the two authors aren't exactly that easy to confuse, both books do involve fancy English houses. All I know is that I opened Howard's End expecting to encounter a butler and maid (who would remind me an awful lot of Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson), and instead found myself facing the Schlegel sisters. Incidentally, Margaret and Helen Schlegel were the cause of the the second surprise of the book--the fact that I didn't like it very much at all! I found the Schlegels to be so annoying and hard to sympathize with that they negatively colored my reading experience this time around.

Margaret and Helen Schlegel are two sisters of German-English descent. They're a Bohemiam, liberal-minded, independently wealthy pair living on their own with their younger brother Tibby. At first glance, they would seen to be the polar opposites of the Wilcoxes, a rich, conservative, upper class family that owns a country house called Howard's End. The Schelgels first meet the Wilcoxes when they are traveling abroad. Once back in England, their lives interest at three pivotal points. First, Helen spends a matter of hours engaged to youngest son Paul Wilcox. Later, Margaret develops a friendship with Ruth Wilcox, the family's matriarch who harbors a sentimental, artistic streak. And finally, after Ruth's death, Margaret falls into an unlikely courtship with widower Henry Wilcox, whom she eventually marries. Margaret is aware that her personality is vastly different from Henry's, but she believes that she can get through to him and turn him into a more compassionate, open person. Some of her main efforts to bring Henry around involve a series of misguided attempts to help Leonard Bast, a poor young man who is repeated thrown into the path of the Schlegels. Not only does Leonard ultimately fall victim to Margaret's meddling, but he also pulls Helen into his tragic downfall.

One of the most famous lines from Howard's End is "only connect". It's a mantra that comes up repeatedly in the novel and describes the intention behind Margaret's desire to find a way to connect with Henry, and to teach him how to connect with others, especially with the lower class of people that Leonard represents. The way she goes about trying to make this happen comes across as extremely self-centered and self-righteous. She's obsessed with getting others to "connect" on her terms and fails to realize that there might be other perspectives outside of her own. The irony of Margaret's attitude may be intended to play into the themes Forster is exploring in the novel, but I found it so off-putting that I have to rank Margaret Schelgel among my least favorite literary characters. I know that many people love Howard's End and will likely disagree with me on this, so I want to make it clear that I'm by no means anti-Forster. I liked A Passage to India and loved A Room with a View, but just couldn't get past my personal distaste of this particular novel. But even though I didn't like it, I still have respect for it as a piece of literature. So much respect, in fact, that I refrained from going with my first choice for the title of this post: "Howard's End...Couldn't Come Soon Enough"!

The Warden

The Warden marks my first foray into the extensive body of work of Anthony Trollope. I'll admit that I chose this one to start with because it's the first installment of his Chronicles of Barsetshire series, rather than because it's plot sounded particularly compelling. In a nutshell (and a somewhat fuzzy nutshell at that, since I'm suffering from a summer cold at the moment!), it's a story about the ethical debate that erupts over the local monetary dealings of the Church of England. The specific controversy surrounds a hospital that serves as an almshouse for twelve elderly and destitute townsmen. It was originally endowed with money from a local clergyman's will, which stipulated a few pence per year be paid to each of hospital's twelve residents. In the ensuing years, however, the hospital's investments have grown substantially, bringing in hundreds of pounds per year as the salary the hospital's Warden, while its residents continue to receive their tiny stipend. This injustice is brought to light by a local young doctor (who also happens to be in love with the Warden's daughter, to further complicate matters) and a battle erupts between the church and the local townspeople, with Septimus Harding, the elderly, peace-loving Warden, caught in the middle.

I can't say that I loved this book, but I was pleasantly surprised by how engaging it was, especially in certain scenes in which two opposing characters were arguing about the issue at hand. There were a few passages in which I actually felt like I was on the edge of my seat as I raced through dialogue. I had to stop and remind myself that--wait a minute--these characters are actually discussing pretty dry points of church fiscal policy. Trollope's ability to pull off this story seems to boil down to his sense of satire, which he turns on each character equally. Things like the narrator's witty descriptive barbs and the names that he christens his characters with (Mr. Bold, Mr. Senitment), kept the book's theme from feeling too pedantic or preachy. 

Have you read any Trollope? Do you have any recommendations for his works outside of the Barchester series?

Revisiting Brideshead

After recently finishing Put Out More Flags, I decided it was the perfect time to go on a slight Evelyn Waugh kick and reread Brideshead Revisited. The two books showcase vastly different sides of Waugh's style. The former satirizes a group of upper class Brits who will seemingly go to any length to hold onto their comfortable lifestyles in the face of the changes of war. Brideshead also looks at a way of life whose disappearance was accelerated by the war, but it does so in a much more nostalgic, bittersweet way. It was apparently written very quickly during a period in which Waugh himself was abroad during World War II and pining for the England home that he used to know. I've read that in his later years, Waugh would cringe and dismiss the work as overly sentimental. His self-criticisms weren't widely shared, though, and Brideshead remains his most famous work.

Brideshead Revisited  is divided into three distinct sections. Sandwiching the main action of the story, the novel begins and ends with protagonist Charles Ryder, a middle-aged officer in the British army, arriving at a lavish country estate that has been requisitioned for his unit. The estate happens to be Brideshead, a house that he was intimately familiar with in his youth. The memories that the house evokes for Charles first take us back to his university days, when he first developed a friendship with Sebastian Flyte, the flamboyant and eccentric youngest son of the aristocratic owners of Brideshead. Each subsequent year of their friendship sees Sebastian take his heavy drinking habit to increasingly destructive levels, until ultimately he goes abroad and falls out of Charles's life. The novel then jumps to a time about a decade after that, when a chance encounter on a cruise ship leads to an ill-fated relationship between Charles and Sebastian's sister, Julia.

To say that Waugh was Britain's version of F. Scott Fitzgerald would be a largely inaccurate analogy. I will draw one comparison between them, though, which is to say that both wrote imperfect novels that manage to perfectly capture feelings of nostalgia for very specific times and places that are drifting away from their characters, even while they are in the midst of living in them. In my mind, some of the most glaring imperfections of Brideshead are that the novel feels imbalanced, with the first half outshining the second, and that Waugh often tries to juggle too many elements, which results in somewhat awkward resolutions for certain themes and characters he introduces into the novel. I'd be forced to elaborate on these complaints if I had to dissect Waugh's writing from a critical point of view. Luckily, I don't have to, and I can continue to enjoying his work for the same reasons that I enjoy Fitzgerald's- for the broad ideas of nostalgia and memory that their novels evoke.