dchaikin part 1 - searching for magical fernseeds

Finally getting my thread posted. I woke up January 1 with trepidation and found a massacre in New Orleans, my favorite city, on all my phone news apps. What else will this year bring us? Reading can be an escape, and I cross over the year reading The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt, a so far fantastic thing poking into the dark corners of fairy tales, childhood and escape (and Fabians, anarchists, museums and seaside church's now miles from the shore). Fernseeds have a appeared a few times so far. They traditionally make you invisible, and perhaps that would be ideal way to begin 2025...as long as I can still read.

Welcome to my thread and plans. Expect Piers Plowman, William Faulker and Booker Award listed books (like The Children's Book) early on. My themes this year are Spenser, Faulkner, Wharton & and the Booker. I will be working towards Edmund Spenser (hence 14th-century Piers Plowman), reading the later Faulker novels, three remaining books by Edith Wharton and, come August, the full Booker longlist (I hope to take a shot at the International Booker longlist too).

Currently Reading


Currently Listening to

My themes through the years

2012 - old testament
2013 - old testament and Toni Morrison
2014 - old testament
2015 - old testament, Toni Morrison & Cormac McCarthy
2016 - Homer, Greek mythology, Greek drama, & Thomas Pynchon
2017 - Virgil, Ovid & Thomas Pynchon
2018 - Apocrypha, New Testament & Gabriel García Márquez
2019 - Rome to the Renaissance & James Baldwin & Willa Cather and Shakespeare
2020 – Dante, Nabokov, Willa Cather, Shakespeare
2021 - Petrarch, Nabokov, Willa Cather, Shakespeare, the Booker longlists - added Edith Wharton
2022 – Boccaccio, Robert Musil, Wharton, Shakespeare, Anniversaries, the Booker longlists
2023 – Chaucer, Richard Wright, Wharton, Booker longlists, Naturalisty
2024 – Chaucer and medieval stuff, Faulkner, Wharton, Booker longlists
2025 – Spenser, Faulkner, Wharton, Booker

links to all my old threads:

2009 Part 1, 2009 Part 2, 2010 Part 1, 2010 Part 2, 2011 Part 1, 2011 Part 2, 2012 Part 1, 2012 Part 2, 2013 Part 1, 2013 Part 2, 2013 Part 3, 2014 Part 1, 2014 Part 2, 2014 Part 3, 2015 Part 1, 2015 Part 2, 2015 Part 3, 2016 Part 1, 2016 Part 2, 2016 Part 3, 2017 Part 1, 2017 Part 2, 2018 part 1, 2018 part 2, 2019 part 1, 2019 part 2, 2019 part 3, 2020 part 1, 2020 part 2, 2020 part 3, 2021 part 1, 2021 part 2, 2021 part 3, 2022 part 1, 2022 part 2, 2022 part 3, 2022 part 4, 2023 part 1, 2023 part 2, 2023 part 3, 2023 part 4, 2024 part 1, 2024 part 2, 2024 part 3, 2024 part 4, 2024 part 5

My reading life goal is to enjoy what I read. That means finding the happy medium between what's too heavy or difficult, and what's too light or unrewarding. I don't read much genre fiction not because I judge it bad or lesser, but because I don't enjoy it. It goes to fast, isn't generally reflective enough for me. I want middle paced books - thoughtful and literary, with some literary games, and, ideally, inspiring. So, I'm reading less and less nonfiction these days. I don't read philosophy. I do read some poetry, however. And I like memoirs but always forget to add them in my plans. And I limit my new books. New books are too unpredictable, and often difficult for me to mentally come into tune with. My compromise is to read the Booker Award selection - not perfect, but I have better success/annoying-failure ratio that way. And it makes me read new books.

Reading is mental thing, and the balance is meaningful. So I want to read the new and old, and I want to enjoy what I read.

One thing I'm missing - a source for non-classic poetry books.

Here is my 2024 favorite - some old, some new, and some between.

TOP TEN OVERALL: well 13
1. The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
2. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
3. As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
4. Possession by A. S. Byatt
5. Selected Poems of Emily Dickinson by Emily Dickinson
6. Keats: A Brief Life in Nine Poems and One Epitaph by Lucasta Miller
7. Shakespeare: The Man Who Pays the Rent by Judi Dench & Brendan O'Hea
8. The Blue Flower by Penelope Fitzgerald
9. Innocence by Penelope Fitzgerald
10. Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein
11. Western Lane by Chetna Maroo
12. James by Percival Everett
13. White Teeth by Zadie Smith

Books read quilt


Audiobook quilt

Books read in 2025 - links go to the review post on this page.

1. ****½ A Month in the Country by J. L. Carr (read Jan 16-19)
2. ***** The Children's Book by A. S. Byatt (read Dec 24, 2024 – Jan 25, 2025)
3. ***½ Our Evenings by Alan Hollinghurst, read by Prasanna Puwanarajah (listened Dec 27, 2024 – Jan 29, 2025)
4. **** Things I Don't Want to Know: On Writing by Deborah Levy, read by Henrietta Meire (listened Jan 30 – Feb 6)
5. *** The Wild Palms {If I Forget Thee, Jerusalem} by William Faulkner (read Jan 29 – Feb 8)
6. ***** To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf (read Feb 1-13)
7. *** The Buccaneers by Edith Wharton (read Jan 25 – Feb 14)
8. ***** Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein (re-read Feb 17-23)
9. ***** The Beginning of Spring by Penelope Fitzgerald (read Feb 24 – Mar 4)
10. **** On the Calculation of Volume (Book I) by Solvej Balle (read Mar 1-7)

Books read, sorted by original publication date

1927 To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
1937 The Buccaneers by Edith Wharton
1939 The Wild Palms (If I Forget Thee, Jerusalem) by William Faulkner
1980 A Month in the Country by J. L. Carr
1988 The Beginning of Spring by Penelope Fitzgerald
2009 The Children's Book by A. S. Byatt
2013 Things I Don't Want to Know: On Writing by Deborah Levy
2020 On the Calculation of Volume (Book I) by Solvej Balle
2023 Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein
2024 Our Evenings by Alan Hollinghurst

Some stats:

2024
Books read: 10
Pages: 2395 ( 93 hrs )
Audio time: 19 hrs
Formats: paperback 5; audio 2; hardcover 2; ebook 1;
Subjects in brief: Novels 9; Booker Books 5; Classic 3; Non-Fiction 1; Memoir 1;
Nationalities: England 6; United States 2; Canada 1; Denmark 1;
Books in translation: 1
Genders, m/f: 3/7
Owner: books I own 8; free on audible 1; Library 1;
Re-reads: 1
Year Published: 2020’s 3; 2010s 1; 2000’s 1; 1980’s 2; 1930’s 2; 1920’s 1;
TBR numbers: +1 (acquired 8, read from tbr 7)

All stats - since I started keeping track in December of 1990
Books read: 1416
Formats: Paperback 715; Hardcover 301; Audio 232; ebooks 131; Lit magazines 38
Subjects in brief: Non-fiction 532; Novels 501; Biographies/Memoirs 237; Classics 232; History 201; Religion/Mythology/Philosophy 141; Booker Prize listed 137; Poetry 110; Journalism 100; Science 98; Ancient 76; On Literature and Books 76; Speculative Fiction 70; Nature 70; Essay Collections 58; Short Story Collections 51; Drama 48; Anthologies 48; Graphic 46; Juvenile/YA 35; Visual Arts 28; Mystery/Thriller 17; Interviews 16
Nationalities: US 776; Other English-language countries: 327; Other: 306
Books in translation: 245
Genders, m/f: 860/452
Owner: Books I owned 1031; Library books 300; Books I borrowed 74; Online 10;
Re-reads: 29
Year Published: 2020’s 105; 2010's 286; 2000's 296; 1990's 187; 1980's 129; 1970's 62; 1960's 56; 1950's 36; 1900-1949 106; 19th century 23; 16th-18th centuries 38; 13th-15th centuries 17; 0-1199 21; BCE 55
TBR: 656

Recent milestones: 500 novels, 300 hardcovers, 300 library books

My books read shelf from 2024 - all the paper books I read and own, a little more than half the books I actually read (or listened to). I'll take it down shortly to make room for 2025.

I use the Bookly app to track my reading time. It's my attempt to not think about numbers too much. My goal is to average 2 hours a day each month. I usually come short, but I did average almost 58 hours each month. So, close! Star ratings don't always match the later ratings I put in my reviews (which are pretty random, anyway). 🙂

open for business, all. cheers.

Congratulations on your super organised thread. Thank you for all the work you have done for this group.
I read The Children's Book 12 years ago and loved it.
Happy reading 2025 😃

Great stats, as ever, Dan! Hope you’re enjoying The children’s book. If you want more on the real Edith Nesbit, there’s a good bio by Julia Briggs, A woman of passion. And of course there’s lots of stuff on Wells and his inappropriate love-life to follow up if you go down that rabbit hole…

>12 thorold: is Olive Wellwood Nesbit? I haven't found a source to confirm that... ok I haven't really looked. But I've seen the idea tossed about.

>11 Ameise1: thank Barbara. The group largely runs itself. 🙂 TCB is fantastic so far.

>13 dchaikin: It’s fairly obvious from the context that she’s a fictional character loosely based on Nesbit. The not-quite-admitted ménage-à-trois is very close to the real setup. I think Byatt acknowledges that somewhere, too, maybe in an end-note or in one of her later essays (I did a complete Byatt read-through a few years ago, so of course I’ve entirely forgotten what I read where).

The Children's Book is a wonderful book in which to immerse yourself, and just plain escape. It still remains one of my favourites ten plus years later.

>8 dchaikin: Where will they go?

>9 dchaikin: I use the Bookly app to track my reading time. It's my attempt to not think about numbers too much. That's too funny:)

>12 thorold: It's only the first week of the year, and there's a book to look for.

Welcome aboard, Captain! I love your books read shelf, a nice feeling of accomplishment, I’m sure. I, on the other hand, am faced with three shelves of must-read-now’s. Way to put on the pressure, Lisa.

Happy New Year, Dan.
>3 dchaikin: You have three of my all-time favorites on your list: Possession, The Sounds and the Fury, and White Teeth.

I read the Dench memoir, which inspired me to read/reread the complete Shakespeare. I've read most of the plays at least once, except for the histories. I started with Henry IV, parts 1 and 2 and wow! I will continue until I am done.

Anyway, nice to see your thread, and I will be following along.

>15 thorold: ok, I see that now. I don't know anything about Nesbit. In Byatt's interviews she says Nesbit and her Fabians were an inspiration.

>16 SassyLassy: I'm really enjoying TCB, although I need to take breaks.
- once I take my books down, they scatter to places I put read books - some to the local used bookstore I dump all my books I want to get rid of. Forty-seven books will be tricky to reshelve.
- yes, different number, time over pages. 😊

>17 labfs39: thanks. I like that shelf. As for the must-read-nows...well, you can read them. Or avoid them. I've done both, myself.

>18 BLBera: That sounds wonderful. Enjoy Falstaff and those history plays. 2026 might be a revisit/complete Shakespeare year. I recently found a book of his long narrative poems. And, I want to re-read everything. If this year's plan works out, next year might be the year. I'm looking forward to it.

Good luck with this year's reading!

I couldn't really get into The Children's Book (just didn't care about any the characters, and couldn't muster up enough interest in them to maintain that sort of plot for me personally, though I did finish it), but your review of Possession last year ensured I'll at least read one more Byatt.

For non-classic poetry books I wonder if it is worth finding a publisher you like? When I read poetry it is often either Faber (eg Zaffar Kunial, Alice Oswald) or Bloodaxe (who do a lot of anthologies as well as single-poet works).

Happy reading year Dan! So many authors I still haven’t read, Chaucer, Faulkner, Byatt. The Children’s Book sounds very tempting.

*Dropping a star*
In >3 dchaikin: I want middle paced books - thoughtful and literary, with some literary games, and, ideally, inspiring spoke to me!

And thank you for all your hard work setting up the 2025 Club read forum!

>23 Dilara86: Funny, I was going to quite that same sentence - it spoke to me, too. I think, Dan, that all my recent musings on what I’m trying to do with my reading boil down to that.

>20 mabith: TCB is not the easiest read. No plot. Kind of intense on my reading brain. I need breaks. But it’s rich. I’m not sure where that will leave you with Possession, but they are totally different books. Totally different mindsets (although both are very intellectual, which I see is Byatt-y)

>21 wandering_star: Thanks for the poetry suggestion. I’m a little worried about doing that. I would rather get a sense of the individual publishers best stuff, if there is a best stuff in poetry

>22 FlorenceArt: who are the great medieval French writers - the Chaucer colleagues?

>23 Dilara86: >24 rachbxl: These are such lovely comments to see. I’m glad that line snuck in there. Easy to say, hard to, you know, fulfill.

Great to find your new thread. I hope you'll enjoy your reading themes.
I did not visit or comment much on your thread over the second half of last year, so I hope I'll be better this year.
And thanks for all the admin work you've already done and you're doing!

>26 raton-liseur: it’s hard to keep up. For what it’s worth, as the year goes on, i encourage you to skip freely. Forget any old stuff because I’ve probably forgotten it too. 🙂

>27 dchaikin: I know it's not true, you're a conscientious reader, and a conscientious reader-writting-about-his-reading.
(Not sure the wording is clear, but just to be clear, this is meant as a positive comment).

>25 dchaikin: I’m afraid I don’t know enough to answer that question. There’s certainly no name that jumps at me, except perhaps François Villon? But he was a poet, not a novelist.

Hi, Dan, as another ex-New Orleanian, it was a terrible start to the year.

Butting in on the French medieval question: if you loved Chaucer, you need to check out Rabelais.

>28 raton-liseur: i’m semi serious. It’s definitely ok to skip stuff here. I would rather someone comment on my newer posts than read my older reviews. I’m probably not alone in that.

>29 FlorenceArt: Villion could be fun

>30 LolaWalser: that’s the advice I needed! I just put four English translations from my library on hold. I’ll peak through and probably buy my favorite edition so i can through all that slowly. Thank you!

Speaking of medieval stuff... Did you get to Silence: A Thirteenth-Century French Romance last year, as I think you'd planned? It's definitely worth a read.

>19 dchaikin: Well if you read Shakespeare next year, you can join me. I expect I will still be reading him. I've been reading a couple of plays a month, and I think there will be months when I only do one.

>31 dchaikin:

You work fast... I hope you enjoy the Rabelais trip.

>32 Dilara86: i read Silence quietly over the summer. Yes, it’s charming in translation. Not at all feminist, which for some reason I expected.

>33 BLBera: noting Beth. Shakespeare is better with company!

>34 LolaWalser: i just, i sort of had it mind, sorta didn’t have it in mind for a while. Didn’t look up where is might fit. You answered at the right time - in the right context. I’ve wanted to read Rabelais. Now is definitely the right time.

>35 dchaikin:

I hope you're primed for medieval rudenessesses of all sorts! Chaucer may look like a blushing rose in comparison :)

Rabelais has a reputation. Chaucer was a joy, but significantly because of his language, and that can’t be replicated in translation. But also because of his atmosphere of the joy of (and tolerance for) the diversity of life. His bawdy humor was fun, but hardly enough to make anyone comfortable. I’m really looking forward to Rabelais now. I had forgotten him completely.

Love the bookshelfies, and your beautifully organised thread. Never heard of the Bookly app before, it sounds pretty neat. I'm looking forward to your thoughts on The Children's Book.

Thanks R. The Children’s Book is vast. Not sure i can capture it. 🙂

I absolutely loved The Children's Book - I hope you end up loving it too.

Also just about to start that Hollinghurst latest novel - we'll compare notes!

>40 AlisonY: both books have been wonderful so far. Although Hollinghurst crawls along at snails pace. But he does it so elegantly. The Children’s Book is magnificent.

Happy not-so-new-anymore year, Dan! And thanks for your work coordinating 2025 for us—I know that's a lot of invisible work.

I really like how you've defined your reading sweet spot, aware of your own tastes but in not too limiting or proscriptive a way. Hmm, maybe I should just bite the bullet and open up The Children's Book next. I've been feeling weirdly attracted to hefty books lately, not sure why, but this would be a good entry point. And it's not like I have to schlep it on the subway every day.

Hey Lisa. Always better here after you visit. No books coming for a while yet. January is mainly The Children’s Book. My only issue is i’m reader faster than i want to keep pace with my group. It’s a lovely hefty thing that wants your mind to wander.

>20 mabith: I agree, but perhaps for me afteer the glow from Possession it feel flat for me. but your review is making me reconsider. I also lovedThe Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye and totally disappointed but the movie based on the book.

>44 cindydavid4: TCB is really different from Possession. It feels so vast, and there are no gimmicks to drawn in the reader, just a laying out of time and 50 characters.

>36 LolaWalser: Two Rabelais translations came in, Cohen (no notes) and Seethe (?), a Penguin edition with wonderful notes and an interesting introduction. I’ve decided to read Orlando Furioso 1st, since it’s older. But I’m putting Rebelais in, and i’ll spend some time on translation options. Seems most translations emphasize clarity over literary energy. I’m a little worried because he seems to be one who draws out his humor, and he’s clearly making philosophical points.

Here’s the updated plan

Orlando Furioso by Ludovico Ariosto 1516
Rabelais 1484 - 1553
- 1532 Pentagruel
- 1535 Gargantua
- 1546 Third Book
- 1553 Fourth Book
- 1564 posthumous Fifth Book
Thomas Wyatt 1503-1542 - at least a biography. Not sure how much poetry i will pursue. I would like a selection, instead of a complete works
Gerusalemme liberata (Jerusalem Delivered) by Torquato Tasso 1581
Spenser
(Then back to Shakespeare)

I've got a raggedy copy of Rabelais taking up space on a shelf. it was an inherited book that I've never read. Took a peek inside it though. Looks kind of intimidating.

>46 Fourpawz2: they call come in brick sizes

Halfway through the month and I'm still catching up, I'm excited to find out what you think of The Children's Book, which still sticks in my mind despite my having read it back in 2010. I wonder if it's time for a reread.

>8 dchaikin: With our latest move (NJ→TX), we moved from a sprawling house where I actually had a room entirely purposed as a library, to a townhouse. In the doing so, I had to get rid of most of my books. I gave away/sold/recycled thousands, which made me very sad, keeping only about 500.

Now, shelves like yours are a no-go because we just don't have the room. I have one small bookcase where I can add books. So, mostly I use my library (something I hadn't done for decades) and Kindle. I much prefer physical books, but I have to admit that a Kindle is nice when you're traveling.

>45 dchaikin: Very excited to see you're going to tackle Ariosto and Rabelais! I hope you'll post about your progress.
By the way, when I read them (and granted, I was quite young at the time), I found that I got rapidly diminishing returns on the Third, Fourth and Fifth books. They are for completists, really...

>45 dchaikin:

Ambitious as ever! And as ever, I wish to join. But my energies have never been spread as thinly as now...

>50 Dilara86:

Fair note.

>48 RidgewayGirl: I’m loving The Children’s Book. It’s so… vast

>49 TadAD: downsizing challenges. The books! I hope the move has been good for you.

>50 Dilara86: I’m exited too. But bummed about Book III, which the Seethe introduction led me to believe might be the best.

>51 LolaWalser: it’s a slowly pursued ambition. 🙂 🦥

>45 dchaikin: Maybe something like Tottel's Miscellany: Songs and Sonnets of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, Sir Thomas Wyatt and Others - the first printed anthology of English poetry? Not that it is short but then you do not need to read it all and it is important for the development of poetry in the era...

>53 AnnieMod: you’re the first to tell me about it.

>54 dchaikin: Barry (baswood) did a very good review of it when he was crawling through the period (looking at the work page, it is right there) - it may give you a good idea of what the book is and is not. But if you are looking at the poetry of the era, it is a good starting point IMO :) And it is a lot more enjoyable than most other options...

>55 AnnieMod: so I probably read about it and forgot. Is this the book with all the secret submissions by noble women?

Hi Dan, I'm finally getting around to visiting and wishing you a great 2025.

>57 Jim53: a pleasure to see you here. 🙂

<52 I’m exited too. But bummed about Book III, which the Seethe introduction led me to believe might be the best.
Don't let me discourage you! I read it ages ago and I might not have been ready for it...

>59 Dilara86: i’m all determined, for the moment. No worries

Hey, Dan. Happy new(ish) thread. Yes, that news from New Orleans was a devastating heart-breaker. Happily for me, my FB feed almost immediately started blowing up with "Marked safe from" notices from all my old friends there.

I'm always in awe of your brave forays into the classics. Carry on!

>61 rocketjk: Hi Jerry, I meant to come back here and respond. Thanks for stopping by.

Another belated New Year wish, Dan. I’ve just enjoyed reading through your new thread, and think it’s wonderful—but not surprising—to see Chaucer and faulkner at the top of your 2024 list of favorites. And seeing that you list Possession next, I know I have to read that this year. I’m looking forward to your great reviews and the interesting conversation on your thread!

>63 dianelouise100: Possession ❤️ 2024 was just a wonderful reading year for me. Thanks for stopping by Diane.

1. A Month in the Country by J. L. Carr
OPD: 1980
format: 111-page paperback, 1984 edition
acquired: 2006 read: Jan 16-19 time reading: 4:35, 2.5 mpp
rating: 4½
genre/style: Novel theme: TBR & Booker backlist
locations: York
about the author: 1912-1994. English novelist, publisher, teacher and eccentric born in Carlton Miniott in the North Riding of Yorkshire.

This month has been dedicated to A. S. Byatt's The Children's Book, so I only picked this up when I was caught up and had time to read other things. What a lovely "filler" it was. Carr was a teacher and had success writing mostly later in life. He had two books shortlisted by the Booker Award, including this one in 1980. That's the reason I decided to finally read it. This is also a little bit of a cult classic.

It's just really charming. We're in 1920 when our narrator, a WWI veteran with a disturbing facial twitch due to PTSD, leaves London to stay in small town in York where he is hired to uncover a whitewashed medieval mural in a medieval church. Getting off the train in a crowded car, he tells us, "If this was a fair sample of northerners, then this was enemy country, so I wasn't too careful where I put my boots." He spends to book reluctantly interacting with the town characters, and another traveling workman, the gently outrageous Moon who paid to find a an ancient grave per a will, but since no one is watching, is looking for other things. Our narrator gets attached to people, uncovers what turns out to be a masterpiece, inch by inch, and gawks at what he reveals.

This is really a special book. Short and endearing and thoughtful, with sparkling touches within a low-key setting. The war experience hovers on small town warbles and variations on faith and a since muted local character. (Carr grew up in York and knew these characteristics.) Part of what made it special for me is what it all comes to, and the fact that the narrator is looking backwards from many years later. But I don't want to say more on that in a review. Definitely recommended.

side note:

I spent yesterday checking out various used bookstores in my area. I was hoping to find a hardcopy of To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf, which cost me $1 for an e-copy. My search was dispiriting. These local stores are awful. Their literature sections after afterthoughts. They're all about Romance, and suspense and young adult series and products. One had several five stars reviews on google, and was stocked full of books they must have bought in chunks from those library book sales or goodwill type places. Someone asked for Murakami, and the confused assistant helping him, looked on her phone search and said, "like maybe No Country for Old Men". I found one Woolf in all these stores - a local Half-Price bookstore with a tiny general fiction section had two copies of A Room of One's Own. Otherwise no Woolf anywhere.

I like the idea of used bookstores. But the quality control is so low, the junk overwhelming, the interesting books a handful. I felt very out of touch with the real world. (There is one magnificent used bookstore in the area - called Good Books in the Wood - but it's far away and I didn't go that way. That owner once told me he only buys stuff he wants and he is very selective. It shows.)

>66 dchaikin: It’s not just used book stores that are limited. Chains are the worst. I went to a Barnes and Noble once and asked if they had any Doris Lessing. The dude on the customer service desk looked her up and then said, “But she’s dead”.

>67 kjuliff: oh, that’s almost funny. Barnes & Noble can be deflating.

>66 dchaikin: In Seattle the two Half Price Books stores I frequented had a very good selection, and there was another wonderful store selling a mixture of new and used books that had an amazing selection (Third Place Books). When visiting my daughter in Houston I had the occasion to visit the Half Price Books there in Rice Village, and, at least as of a few years ago, it had a decent selection (maybe because it was near a university?). Anyway, I'm thinking that that particular Half Price Books is no longer there (not sure, but I don't remember seeing it when driving past). I, too, have been very dissatisfied with Barnes and Noble's selection for a very long time.

2. The Children's Book by A. S. Byatt
OPD: 2009
format: 883-page paperback
acquired: December 2024 read: Dec 24, 2024 – Jan 25, 2025 time reading: 36:25, 2.5 mpp
rating: 5
genre/style: Novel theme: Booker backlist
locations: mainly Kent and London 1880’s to 1920-ish
about the author: 1936 –2023: an English critic, novelist, poet and short story writer born in Sheffield. Her sisters are the novelist Margaret Drabble and the art historian Helen Langdon.

I read Byatt's Possession last year and fell in love. I think it's my favorite book I've read that was published in my own lifetime. I like it even more than Ferrante's Neapolitan Quartet, or Mantel's Wolf Hall. It just really captured me and had me thinking and longing to read and spend time with it and learn. So, I was ready to read more Byatt.

I read this with a group in the Booker Prize Book Club on Facebook. We had a whole group read planned, there should be a video call coming. And I found myself helping to organize it. My January book mindset has been planned around this massive book. It's giant, and it's slow, with references everywhere, including to 50 major characters. I had tried this on audio many months ago and quit the sample within a minute. As a reader of an 883-page book, I often found myself reading in ten pages stretches. Read, stop, exhausted. Pause. Not bad exhausted, but tired enough I needed a break. Because it's a book that should be read slowly and processed. It's practically designed for that.

This is a vast book with sweeping themes. It's nothing like Possession, and the only really distinctly similarity is the amount of research involved. Possession was maybe about unearthing the past. This is historical fiction, bringing the past to life. Fully, in all its convoluted color. The Children's Book is about children who grow up, but they must come from somewhere. So, we begin in the 1880's with young children and in the distance their parents. As the children enjoy being intelligent creative children, sometimes enjoy pagan rituals, the parents come more into focus. They are the founders of the Fabian Society, a socialist society still active in England. The book is centered somewhat the children of Olive Wellwood, a children's book author partially based on Edith Nesbit. Olive's fairy tale creations are things she shares with her children, each of whom has their own fantasy story. And all these fairy tales seem to be very dark, as fairy tales are. They dig into the dark places of the human psyche and of cultural norms.

As the book evolves, the world devolves. The four main sections are Beginnings, The Golden Age, The Silver Age and The Lead Age. Like the ancient legends, the world continually gets worse. Childhood is an Eden, but adulthood is exposure to something far different, an unpleasant world. These changes in the book are subtle, the moves from child to parent's sex lives, and deviant sex lives. Some adults are as dark as the darkest depths of these fairy tales. This book is full of hopes and life, but also of falls, and errors, dark knowledge, of crimes, and partial recoveries. It's a bittersweet novel that is very critical of what we have become now, today, even if it stops 100 years ago.

There is so much here that any single reader will find their own things to focus on and think about. Byatt creates rich thick worlds, and colors in with literary and artistic references. And technological references. One character works on the Victoria and Albert Museum, which gets moved to a new building, it's current one, during the book. And the artefacts, the way they are treated, the implications within them all interact with the other themes in the book.

In many ways this is a slow powerful work that accumulates themes, historical eras in detail, structures, complexities, and meanings. And also, characters and feelings. I haven't been this devastated by a book in a long time as I was in places here. And I haven't been so attached to a book. This was a wonderful place to spend a month of reading. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even if at times I felt I wanted I want to slow down.

I can't recommend this to everyone because it's the kind of book that takes a mindset, and, of course, a time. But for those looking to get lost and stay lost, this is a terrific option.

>69 arubabookwoman: there were once three more highly regarded Half-Prices. They may all be closed down. One was in Rice Village. Another was in Montrose. There was also one west of town on Westheimer and Dairy Ashford or Kirkwood - that one may still be open. The one that used to be close by me suddenly got much worse maybe ten years ago. It was like they stopped stocking it with books, and the literary sections got thinner and thinner. And other stuff took over that space. Eventually it closed.

>70 dchaikin: Great review of The Children's Book, Dan; I loved it as much as you did. I'll have to get to Possession in the not too distant future.

>67 kjuliff: i no longer go to put local B/N they no longer sell books, they sell toys and what books they do have are hard to find because the staff is clueless. so i totally understnd. I am fortunat to have an excellent indie store and used store. Try IndieBound.org they can help you find a used store, or help you shop for them online hope that helps

>70 dchaikin: ok, that does it.. I need to try reading this book again. great review

>73 cindydavid4: I don’t buy paper books anymore Cindy. My B&N story was from years ago. I can’t read print.

>75 kjuliff: my apologies I was trying to sent to >66 dchaikin: and missed the target by alot

>76 cindydavid4: Oh that’s OK. People are always putting their foot in it. Just today an old friend FaceTimed me from Australia. She was commenting on my knowledge of world news and said I must watch a lot of TV news. I explained (yet again) that I cant watch TV as I’m blind. She said, “Oh but why don’t you turn on closed captioning?”

OMG! seems like knowledge is an unknown thing nowadays so sorry

>78 cindydavid4: Don’t be sorry Cindy. Please. Try to se the funny side.

>77 kjuliff: that’s hysterical. I hope you gave your friend an appropriate hard time.

>80 dchaikin: I was dumb founded. I just stared at her. Speechless.

>72 kidzdoc: i hope Possession finds and possesses you in right way. Unfathomably, some terrific readers don’t take to it. 🙂

>73 cindydavid4: i agree about that store. And thanks.

>74 cindydavid4: let me know how it goes. Take is slow!

Am glad to hear The Children’s Book is not like Possession which I tried to read and quickly failed at - twice. So far. I had no trouble with The Virgin in the Garden and Still Life. I quite liked them which is why I bought The Children's Book - new, no less - back in 2012. (I hardly ever buy new unless I am confident I will make it to the end or, in the alternative, am drooling with anticipation at the prospect of getting the next in a loved series.) But Possession - oh, that puppy slapped me around and then laughed in my face. It's sitting somewhere in this very room right now - glowering and daring me to try again. I am kind of afraid to touch it.

I think I'll wait to make attempt number three until after The Children's Book...

>70 dchaikin: Such a wonderful book, and a great review. I read the book when it first came out, drawn in by the milieu and the gorgeous cover (different from yours), as well as having read other Byatt books. You make me think it may be time for a reread.

Interesting about Barnes and Nobles. One thing I read in an article about the company about a year ago is that the individual stores are no longer all the same. Relatively recently, they decided to reinvent themselves somewhat by giving much more power to each individual store manager in terms of what books to order and how to display them, based on who they think their local customers are and what they want. There used to be a mandated uniformity, which has been more or less eliminated, at least according to this article. The Barnes and Noble near me is pretty good, all things considered, but the customer base in NYC is large enough to support a fairly robust store. But that doesn't mean the the 20-somethings who work at the desk near the main entrance have ever heard of Doris Lessing, though. They probably haven't.

Used bookstores are, we should keep in mind, limited to a significant extent to the books that their customers bring in to them, or to what their buyers can find out in the wild. Too bad you guys never got to shop in my used bookstore! Those were the days.

>84 SassyLassy: i wish i had that not-a-dragon-fly cover. (It’s a two legged thing swallowing a woman, perhaps a fairy, with wings for arms)

>86 dchaikin: The cover of my book is nearly identical to that one, as it's the UK edition (Chatto & Windus).

>65 dchaikin: That is such a perfect small gem of a book. Not a word wasted and yet so much is going on under the surface.

>66 dchaikin: Yes, I know what you mean. A lot of used bookstores become junk repositories. I think that they appeal to people who like to hunt for buried treasure, but they are disappointing. The best ones now seem to be part of regular bookstores, and tightly curate what they will accept. Those are a lot of fun to browse, but definitely lean toward newer stuff. Since I'm in a small city, there's a Barnes & Noble and one new/used bookstore downtown which focuses on YA and horror and seems to be a small haven for teenagers and misfits, so I can't complain. There's a single wall of fiction, but it's well-curated, but also not large enough for me to go in with a specific book in mind.

>70 dchaikin: I'm glad you loved this book, but I'm not surprised that you did.

>85 rocketjk: I bet that your bookstore was the best, Jerry. I'm sorry to have never had the chance to browse the shelves.

Regarding B&N, they got rid of all their experienced booksellers in a sweep back in 2018 and are now relying on regular part-time minimum wage help. They had had a really good number of people who had decades of bookselling experience.

>88 RidgewayGirl: It was a wonderful bookstore, and I had the best assistant a business owner could want, the late and highly lamented Yossarian the Bookstore Dog:



For whatever it's worth, here's the article about B&N and their relatively new business model I read last year. They may just be putting a different spin on the same phenomenon you were speaking of, since the company did get a new CEO in 2018.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/16/business/barnes-and-noble-is-back-again/index.htm...

>89 rocketjk: My part-time job in high school and college was always in one chain bookstore or another (one carefully crafted to look like an independent, despite just being a secret Waldenbooks, lol) so I am very familiar with the chain bookstore cycle of bringing in a new CEO who has to make his mark until a new CEO comes in to fix that and make his own mark. Rinse, repeat. Still, the allowing of some independence is a good move. I wish the experienced staff were there to be part of the curation -- then the stores would really appeal. Since a B&N is the main game here, bookwise, I am very familiar with their fiction selection and there is more there by authors outside the anglosphere and they are carrying more smaller presses, although mostly nyrb books and publishers like that, and not, say, Two Dollar Radio or Tilted Axis.

>70 dchaikin: Great review, Dan. This was a 5 star read for me too. I just loved the research Byatt did - she got me excited about all sorts of things I never previously knew much about.

Very curious about the size of your US edition - my Brit version is 615 pages. I thought US paperbacks tend to be slightly larger than UK editions so would have expected the page count to be a bit shorter if anything. Must have very different font spacing.

>86 dchaikin: - I like the blue cover a lot more than the green - which is the one I have.

I've always wanted to win a fairly good-sized lottery - winnings-wise - so that I could then open a used book store and not ever have to worry about making a profit. There would be comfortable chairs, wooden floors, and a cat.

I don't hate the local B&N, but I hardly ever go there unless I've got a birthday or Christmas gift card that needs spending. Was last there in December and was lucky enough to actually come away with the book I was hoping to find.

>79 kjuliff: oh believe me I do; really

>70 dchaikin: Great review, Dan. Glad to read that you enjoyed this book. I loved it too.

>70 dchaikin: Great review of The Children's Book. Byatt is one of my favorite authors (would have placed her among my favorite living writers on the List's thread, had I answered the question, and had she not died in 2019). Whenever I read one of her books I find myself thinking, "Why aren't there more books like this?" Of course, I also probably miss quite a bit more than I get from reading her books. I'm constantly amazed by her intellect, and the parade of cultural, artistic, philosophical, historical, scientific, and on and on references embedded in her books. And, as you say, the plethora of characters to keep track of.

Toronto has a good used bookstore chain ( well three) that always has interesting books-BMV. I frequent the really big one on Bloor Street in Toronto's "Annex" area.

>96 torontoc: How did I miss BMV?! I usually wind up at She Said Boom (either one) or Balfour, plus a couple of smaller ones. Will have to look for this next time I'm in Toronto.
Do you know what film was being shot at BMV? The website says it was closed for a shoot in November for a few days.

>97 SassyLassy: I don't know what film was being shot at BMV- interesting!
Another book store that I used to check but haven't recently is "Sleuth of Baker Street"- I think that they have reduced store hours but do a lot of online work.

>96 torontoc: I remember going to a rare book store that was very good dont remember the name

So January, the extralong painful month this year. I had planned to focus almost entirely on The Children's Book by A. S. Byatt this month. The book is worth it, but I got ahead and wasn't sure what to read next. So I read A Month in the Country by J. L. Carr, and stumbled through much of The Wild Palms by William Faulkner. And Piers Plowman slowly plows along. Piers hasn't been doing much for me, but I'm getting close to finishing the text (not the book, which is a Norton edition, and 50 pct sources and commentary). Anyway, 54 hours of reading for the month, which is good, but less than I could have gotten in. Byatt was wonderful.

On audio, only 15 hours listening. That was enough to finish Our Evenings by Alan Hollinghurst (not reviewed yet). It was beautifully written, but slow and a lot for a not very rewarding story. Now I'm on Things I Don't Want to Know by Deborah Levy. It's only 3 hours, so I should be off to another audiobook soonish.

February is Edith Wharton's The Buccaneers, Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse (my first fiction by Woolf), and a planned re-read - Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein, which I adored last year, and found mysterious.

>100 dchaikin: An interesting January indeed!
I keep assuming I’ve read To the Lighthouse but I’m pretty sure I haven’t. I think it’s because I was so traumatized. By Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in the film, “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf” , which set of a ptsd of my parent’s dinner parties.

>100 dchaikin: Interesting that you are doing a reread of Study for Obedience. I read it last year too, and found it quite intense and unusual. I'll be curious as to whether your impressions change on a second reading.

>102 labfs39: Ditto. A Study for Obedience was a most memorable book for me. It was interesting that so many readers didn’t pick up on the allusions to the Holocaust, and didn’t tie the beginning and ending of the books together.

>101 kjuliff: those must have been quite the dinner parties. So far i’m not afraid!

>102 labfs39: >103 kjuliff: - three things happening here. 1st a book (Jewish gothic). Second, It’s a small buddyread on fb. And 3rd, it’s a planned reread. I’ve wanted to reread more. (More than almost never) So i’m trying to see what happens if i plan it. I might do this more in 2026.

I used to reread more than I do now and I have found it rewarding. I loved To the Lighthouse; Woolf is such a good writer. I will watch for your comments.

>70 dchaikin: Great review! I’m fascinated by The Children’s Book now, and I really wasn’t before - I’m one of those that didn’t “get” Possession (DNF) and I was ready to let A.S.Byatt pass me by after that.

ETA I love your comments on A Month in the Country as well - I feel like it’s one I would have got to sooner or later but now perhaps sooner.

Your enthusiasm for The Children's Book has finally got me to accept the 30-hour listening time on audio. That is about 3 weeks of available time for me now. However, I am acquiring a Kindle version which I probably need also and viewing time is more available to me.

Possession remains my most memorable read and your gold standard review of that book is the final clincher.

>105 BLBera: it’s hard to reread when there’s so much i haven’t read. I’m adjusting to Woolf. Very interior. Not clear to me what she’s doing. I’m learning, i hope.

>106 rachbxl: A Month in the Country is a rewarding weekend read. I hope you get there sooner. As for The Children’s Book, it’s a lot different than Possession. You might just love it.

>107 JoeB1934: I tried the Children’s book on audio. It’s hard to keep track and enjoy at the same time. Byatt is all over the place. But it reads nicely. Enjoy. Don’t expect Possession. I should warn you, it’s not really in your literary mystery category.

>65 dchaikin: This really does sound charming. Thanks for the review of a book I would never have otherwise come across.

>66 dchaikin: Sorry to hear about your unsucccessful bookstore jaunt. I think it really depends on who is managing them. There's one near my house run by an older couple, both of whom love to read. As a consequence, the store is well-organised and they can tell their Murakami from their McCarthy. But most others are like you described: thrillers, romance, self-help books.

>70 dchaikin: Great review! Happy reading for February.

>109 rasdhar: thanks for stopping by. You would enjoy A Month in the Country. I love the story of your local bookstore.

>108 dchaikin: I just watched Vanessa Redgrave in the film version of Mrs Dalloway. I’d forgotten how good the book was. I’ll have to read/reread To the Lighthouse .

3. Our Evenings by Alan Hollinghurst
reader: Prasanna Puwanarajah
OPD: 2024
format: 16:36 audible audiobook (500 pages in hardcover)
listened: Dec 27, 2024 – Jan 29, 2025
rating: 3½
genre/style: contemporary fiction theme: random audio
locations: England 1960’s to 2020
about the author: An English novelist, poet, short story writer and translator, born in Stroud, Gloucestershire (1954)

Hollinghurst is a gorgeous and elegant writer. Everything is paced, carefully worded, all characters have a presence. The feeling of time is always kept strikingly tangible. He doesn't rush. Patient and precise. I enjoyed this book for that.

However, not much happens really in the life of David Winn. He's interesting in all the ways he is an outsider. He looks like his unknown Burmese father. He's gay. He attends elite schools on scholarship, economically isolating him, with his single mother. He finds himself performing, constantly, and eventually becomes a professional actor, albeit one limited, in the 1970's and later, by his ethnic appearance.

But, beyond this setting, and beyond the many interesting characters he interacts with, is attracted to, and has affairs with, not that much happens. The downside of this fictional memoir is that this is slow, and drags along, without challenging the reader much. As much as I liked many aspects, I never found myself truly drawn-in, deeply wondering about the details he patiently goes on about. I do like fine prose, but he stretched that a bit for me.

The end, I should note, adds a moving weight and reconstructs the context of everything we just read. And, I should also note, I would be happy to try any of his other books.

>112 dchaikin: Interesting review Dan.

But, beyond this setting, and beyond the many interesting characters he interacts with, is attracted to, and has affairs with, not that much happens.

I was pleased to read this, as I gave up on the book as it felt like noting was happening. Which of course ok if a book says something to the reader. But it wasn’t saying anything to me.

The problems of scholarship boys to the English (and Australian) elite schools has been written about so often. Adding the Myanmar (Burma) racial identity to the character of David Win was just the icing on the cake.

Being a straight woman who has not experienced an English boy’s boarding school, I just could not identify with David Winn. I was not gaining any insights from the book. The constant references to homosexual longings were too specific to interest me. So put the book aside.

I have read another book by Hollinghurst which I enjoyed as he’s a wonderful writer, but this one didn’t do anything for me.

Your review helped me feel less alone, as I felt I was meant to like Our Evenings but just couldn’t.

>113 kjuliff: oh, Kate, you were never alone. I like hearing your honest opinions on books. But I'm glad you liked others by Hollinghurst, he is a wonderful writer. I'll have to try A Line of Beauty.

4. Things I Don't Want to Know: On Writing by Deborah Levy
reader: Henrietta Meire
OPD: 2013
format: 3:29 audible audiobook (108 pages in paperback)
acquired: free on audible listened: Jan 30 – Feb 6
rating: 4
genre/style: memoir theme: random audio
locations: South Africa in the 1960’s, and England in the 1970’s
about the author: British novelist born in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1959

I love Deborah Levy. She's always a little absurd and it's always entertaining. This is her first of several memoirs, covering mainly her time in South Africa while her father was imprisoned for about five years for speaking against Apartheid, and then some of her time in England, where the family fled, and where she adjusts and wants to be a writer, but seems to only be writing the word "England" on napkins at greasy spoons...since she can't find Parisian writing cafes.

The nature of the book gives us a childhood view of South Africa's issues, and a chance to highlight the really absurd stuff without judgement. She faces antisemitism from her Catholic teachers, and she hides her ability to read from them, acquiescing to lessons on the alphabet. But as much as her tone is playful, she seems careful not to take all this too far. Entertaining book without enough closure. I definitely want to read or listen to the next one.

---

Audio note: The audio reader didn't work for me. I found her overly loud and tonally exaggerated, and it really put me off. I'm a little forgiving because this was free on audible. But even though Levy's second memoir is also free on audible, it has the same reader. I'll pass on that option and get a print copy.

5. The Wild Palms (If I Forget Thee, Jerusalem) by William Faulkner
OPD: 1939
format: 290-page paperback
acquired: 2024 (from Faulkner House in New Orleans) read: Jan 29 – Feb 8 time reading: 11:11, 2.3 mpp
rating: 3
genre/style: classic novel theme: Faulkner
locations: Mississippi , New Orleans, Chicago, Wisconsin, and along the Mississippi River
about the author: 1897-1962. American Noble Laureate who was born in New Albany, MS, and lived most of his life in Oxford, MS.

Hmm. Does it work? This novel is actually two separate stories in each in a kind of distinct contrast. Chapters alternate. One is the story of an impoverished and aspiring, if unenthused, doctor, who abandons his internship to run off with a married woman. She leaves her children willingly, drawing him away. Her story is about attempting to escape societies expectations by trying to leave society altogether. At one point they spend several months in a seasonally abandoned Wisconsin summer cabin. He wavers between wanting to believe in her goals, and also attempt to make things work. The other story is that of a convict who gets lost during the 1927 Mississippi River flood. He ends up floating down the Mississippi Huck-like, but instead of Jim, he's with a pregnant women nearing labor. He has a sort of parallel experience in an isolated cabin, hunting alligators. The men in these stories each pursue their own logic, and with their own principles, and stick to them to their tragic ends.

There are interesting elements here, including a look at abortion when it was illegal. I got caught up in it in places, especially with the accidentally escaped convict. But I'm not sure this novel was really worked through all the way, and maybe it doesn't work. Reviews online indicate Faulkner wrote the extramarital story first, and felt it was lacking, so he added the escape convict's story to provide some balance and contrast. Weird, but it's not a quick and dirty add. The convict's story may even be the better one. Some reviews find plot connections between the two stories, but I'm not sure they have it right. The connection I found is thin.

One thing I liked about the stories is that they are more straightforward and accessible.

Anyway, a book for Faulkner completists only.

>114 dchaikin: The Line of Beauty was the one I enjoyed.

>112 dchaikin: Enjoyed your review, Dan. As you know I'm a fan of Hollinghurst, but I can't promise you that a huge amount more happens in his other novels. For me it is all about the prose with him - snapshots of a life rather than a strong plot pull.

I did enjoy this one, but having said that it would have felt extremely long in audio format. Maybe his writing is more suited to a physical read.

>115 dchaikin: I think this might be the Levy I picked up in a bookshop not that long ago. Delighted to hear it's worth a read.

>115 dchaikin: I liked your review. It makes me want to try that book.

>116 dchaikin: Thanks for the warning that this one is for Faulkner completists only. I'm having a hard enough time being a Faulkner beginningist.

>117 kjuliff: good to know!

>118 AlisonY: interesting suggestion about the audio. I’m pondering. The reader was absolutely perfect. But he does slow down the text to its natural speed and that can make things drag. I’ll have to read Line of Beauty, instead of listen.

>119 AlisonY: i suspect any Levy is worth a read. 🙂

>120 TadAD: oh, yay! Levy is terrific. Pick any book by her. (Ok, I’ve only read three)

>121 Fourpawz2: ha! Faulkner has special stuff. But not everything works for me.

>112 dchaikin: I’m sorry it didn’t quite work for you — I can imagine that it might drag a bit if none of the particular social references there resonate with you, but I didnt really feel the slowness as a problem at all, I was soaking up all that detailed background. But I have all sorts of cultural overlaps with Hollinghurst, of course.

I don’t know how relevant it is, but Hollinghurst did admit that he’s a very slow writer (he averages a book every seven years, although he did have some quite important day-jobs along the way). He doesn’t like writing drafts, he wants everything to be just right the first time round. I can imagine that that might militate against a plot that is event-driven.

>112 dchaikin: Not sure the lack of social references was at issue for me. But maybe. It's all new to me - the schools and the atmosphere, the vacation spots, his professional and personal experiences. I liked all that a lot. But...it does read like a book that was not rewritten. Beautiful prose, but unwieldly structure that arguably isn't well managed until the end. That is, he could have rethought the structure and maybe he did, or maybe chose not to because he was so attached to each moment. But that's silly conjecture. I shouldn't post it. :) But, I want to read more by him. I loved his prose and, you know, his linguistic caress of each moment.

>116 dchaikin: i realized i forgot to mention that in The Wild Palms Faulkner deals with abortion in the 1930’s, when it was illegal and there was no prospect of change. It’s one of interesting elements of the book. So i added a line to my review.

>115 dchaikin: Interesting review. I'm not hugely familiar with Deborah Levy but just a couple of days ago I was contemplating reading an essay collection I came across by her. Sounds like she's worth reading generally.

>118 AlisonY: Agreed on this. I've read a couple by Hollinghurst - 'nothing much happens' is about right, but he does have a nice touch for emotion.

>115 dchaikin: >116 dchaikin: enjoyed your Levy and Faulkner reviews.

>126 valkyrdeath: Deborah Levy is wonderful. I encourage you to try Hot Milk or The Man Who Saw Everything (which i had to listen to twice to “get”)

>127 rasdhar: thanks!

>128 dchaikin: Thanks, I'm making a note of those!

>116 dchaikin: I agree with your assessment here, and relying just on memory, I’m probably even more negative. The thought of rereading this one has never even crossed my mind…

>129 valkyrdeath: I hope you enjoy Levy's fiction
>130 dianelouise100: That's funny. I can certainly appreciate you take.

6. To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
OPD: 1927
format: ebook (a botched edition by Kalamos Literary Services. There were missing that lines that I had to find online. Obviously, I recommend avoiding this publisher)
acquired: January read: Feb 1-13 time reading: 10:19, 3.4 mpp (maybe)
rating: 5
genre/style: Classic novel theme: none
locations: Isle of Skye, Scotland
about the author: 1882-1941, An English writer born into an affluent household in South Kensington, London. She later lived famously in Bloomsbury in the West End of London. She is considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors, and a pioneer of stream of consciousness narrative.

Experimenting - my first attached review.

so, for now I write my review here. Paste it into the review section of the book. Then come back here, erase the review, and attach it. Hmm. Perhaps I can simplify this. But mentally that's how the Woolf review worked best.

7. The Buccaneers by Edith Wharton
OPD: 1937
other authors The novel was never finished. Maggie Wadey wrote the screenplay for a 1995 television series adaptation, completing the story. Angela Mackworth-Young adapted the screen play into a finished novel, making up the last 25% of this edition (but I found it unreadable and quit 8 pages in).
format: 432-page hardcover (pub 1995) – I read 324 pages
acquired: May read: Jan 25 – Feb 14 time reading: 10:56, 2.2 mpp
rating: 3
genre/style: Classic Novel theme: Wharton
locations: 1870’s New York and England, including London and Cornwall
about the author: 1862-1937. Born Edith Newbold Jones on West 23rd Street, New York City. Relocated permanently to France after 1911.

>133 dchaikin: Yes that’s what I did on my last few reviews. But I had to copy/paste the preview as touchstones don’t work. A pity, as if I reference another book in my review, the reader can’t click on it.

I just wrote my review right on the book page and then added an extra info I wanted for my thread before attaching the review.

>135 kjuliff: >136 japaul22: - one question - does it make them more readable, or less readable? Or is that aspect not influenced?

I’m not aesthetically sold. 🙂

>115 dchaikin: I’m a big fan of Deborah Levy’s fiction, having really enjoyed everything I’ve read (Hot Milk, Swimming Home, August Blue). I didn’t know about her autobiographical books though - thanks!

>132 dchaikin: Funnily enough, I was flicking through my copy of To the Lighthouse this morning, trying to decide if I’d already read it or not (looking for another “old book” now I’ve finished War and Peace ;-) ). Your review (very nice) convinces me that I haven’t read it AND makes me want to read it. (Pre-LT I used to note down everything I read in a little notebook but I can’t find it to check).

>137 dchaikin: I’m neutral on the readability. I really like the easier interface with the actual book page, though. I also like the cover and stars displayed without me having to import an image of the cover. I like that you can thumb a review. I like that if I edit my review on the book page it edits it in any thread I’ve posted in.
I think there are a lot of benefits to merging the talk and cataloging features of LT in a more intuitive way.

>137 dchaikin: I think the reviews using the new method are less readable and less functional. The lack of touchstones is annoying when another book or author is referred to in the review. The more button disrupts the flow and can also be missed , resulting in the whole review not being read in the Talk section.

Also there’s a bug. I reported it to the Bug Group and it’s being investigated. If you have a quote in italics spaning the more button, the text after the more button is not italicized as intended. See an example here.

But I’ll probably still use the new feature as I make many typos and now I don’t have to fix them in two places,

ETA I agree with you re aesthetics.

>132 dchaikin: Enjoyed your review and thoughts, Dan. I hated this book with a passion when I was set it as A Level text for English Literature at school, but when I returned to it a few years back I absolutely fell in love with it. It's interesting that Woolf never became a mother herself, as I felt she captured so well the thoughts that go through a mother's head.

It utterly captivated me. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

>133 dchaikin: For me, the plus is that I can give thumbs easily, a habit I fell out of because it was cumbersome to go to the work page, and sometimes scroll before finding the review.

>132 dchaikin: Great review. I am going to add this to my list of books with a tie to World War I.

>139 rachbxl: re Levy - I need to read August Blue and Swimming Home...and her other memoirs... On Woolf, I do hope you find your way To the Lighthouse. I would love your thoughts.

>140 japaul22: that's all good stuff. I'm glad you find the aesthetics neutral.

>141 kjuliff: not all good stuff! Interesting about the bug. And I'll have to put my touchstones in the post separately.

>142 AlisonY: That's all lovely to read. Yeah, To the Lighthouse would have been awful at school. I would have just been irritated. I'll have to go hunt your review.

>143 labfs39: I like this aspect. I think thumbs encourage us. So I like them.

>144 janoorani24: it's not a really a WWI book, but also it entirely is thematically, from an entirely different point of view. (So it Wharton's Age of Innocence, which never mentions the war. The only indirect reference is the title.) Have you read The Children's Book by AS Byatt? That works towards WWI.

now, how to handle re-reads...

A year ago I read this wonderfully mysterious Booker shortlists, and Giller Prize winning book Study for Obedience. I was confused and felt I missed a lot, and yet adored it. I re-read recently, focusing on trying to gain clarity. Which may not be the right way to approach the book. Anyway, I was just looking at my review from last year. I remember it being a wash. But actually I made a real effort to capture the feel of the book, and it comes across better than anything I could write right now. Weird. This time I found myself much more interested in trying to understand what she's doing. So I lost that other aspect of feel. Strange, no? And what a loss.

So I'm thinking about a new review. In the meantime, abusing the system, here is my 2024 review. Which will eventually appear on this page twice.

A touchstone: We Have Always Lived in the Castle

Hm, Kate's right that it's annoying that you can't use touchstones on the book page. I think I hadn't noticed or hadn't cared before.

>147 japaul22: I always have wondered by LT doesn't have touchstones in reviews.

I re-read Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein last month and added to info to my 2024 review. Clicking more in >146 dchaikin: with show that. However, it seems to make sense to me to leave the re-read review by itself, in a post. So I'm replicating that part here.



8. Study for Obedience by Sarah Bernstein
OPD: 2023
format: 189-page hardcover
acquired: December 2023 re-read: Feb 17-23 time reading: 4:46, 1.5 mpp
rating: 5
genre/style: contemporary fiction theme: none
locations: outside a small rural village in a contemporary unnamed northern country with a non-English language and mountains, possibly fictional.
about the author: A Canadian writer and scholar who teaches literature and creative writing in Scotland. She was born in Montreal, Quebec in 1987.

When I read this the first time a year ago, I was very confused. Our narrator is Jewish like me, and I found myself sympathetic to her cultural traumatic history. I was always on her side. I finished the book wanting to like her. But that feeling didn’t hold up upon reflection. I started to realize she was doing some really bad stuff here. And I just didn’t pick up on it. Her being bad in some way didn’t make sense to me while reading. She’s the victim. So, I overlooked the signs. But the signs started to feel pretty clear. She was the perpetrator in many ways.

This is a novel of ominous mystery. It has a darkness provided by the voice of an unreliable narrator, who obscures much of what she does tell us. The basics, as she tells them, are that she has come to some village in a foreign country to help her brother, a successful businessman, who lives alone, his wife having left him and taken the kids. She is Jewish and speaks English, whereas the most villagers don't speak English and speak an unnamed language. It's also a place with a very dark Jewish history. There are no Jews left, but there is a sense of communal guilt. Who she is, where she is, who these villagers are, is never clear.

Weird things start happening upon her arrival. Several cows go crazy, a pig smothers its piglets, this kind of stuff. Our narrator tells us about her brother and these villagers and her awkward attempts to gain their trust. She tells how her brother fits in well, but the villagers act around her like she is bad luck, or someone to fear, perhaps someone to avoid looking at. When she walks into a cafe, everyone seems to freeze nervously. She also hints at issues in her past, perhaps some serious and repeated childhood abuse, perhaps by this same brother. And she tells us she would respond by being smaller, more obedient, take responsibility, all to extreme, self-invalidating ways. She imagines herself almost invisible, a ghost without identity, someone "withdrawing into myself".

On her past she tells us things like, "But here I find myself wandering again, into the past, which after all is not an explanation for anything, the lines of flight being so various, the question of harm and its reproduction so unanswerable, the beginnings always beginning again." - So, what does this mean? What replicated harm? And what doesn't it explain?

All this makes her very hard to understand. It's difficult to know what's true, what's an innuendo, what she isn't telling us, or what she doesn't understand. So, we work through her words, puzzled. I read it again to try to untangle some of the puzzle.

On rereading, our narrator seemed to me to have a pure evil intent the whole way. She was doing stuff intentionally. And everything that was happening started to seem to fit within her plan. She was manipulating somehow. Struggling because she doesn’t understand people well. But she was always working towards some desired end. I saw a dark character through and through, but one who hid her darkness through outward submission. A manipulative obedience. Like an evil priest clothed in holy robes, her humbleness, meekness, obedience, devotion, was all for show, all to purpose.

Same book, one about a victim of abuse, the other about a sort of evil sorceress.

The book was on the 2024 Booker Award shortlist. And the Booker Award website provides some material on the author and the book, including some interviews. One question they asked her was right up along my thinking: “To what extent would you say that the narrator is innocent or culpable when it comes to interpreting the events in the book?” Sarah Bernstein answered: “I think that’s exactly the tension that she wrestles with…. The tension between innocence and culpability...”

That is, Bernstein intends our narrator to exist in both lights. She's dark, but she's suffering, and both aspects have both a lot of mystery around them, and a lot of real substance in her experiences and actions. Bernstein also says she doesn't want the reader to come away with answer, but with questions. (Our narrator, unreliable always, says this a little differently: "… reading is not the equivalent of an explanation and while the teller has much to answer for, it is not the meaning itself, no.")

I re-read with a group and several readers felt this book didn't fully work. I don't agree with that at all. I think it's brilliant open-ended prose, that works within itself to its own purposes, ones that aren't straightforward. Further, it does this with a wonderful sense of sound and voice and atmosphere. I think it's a special book. Many reviews say it's not for everyone. One very positive review notes, "It is wretched to be trapped in the head of a narrator who is relentlessly unreliable and very unlikeable". Recommended to anyone ok with that.

------

One more quote, because it's so relevant to everyone today

"Every single one of us on this ruined earth exhibited a perfect obedience to our local forces of gravity, daily, choosing the path of least resistance, which while entirely and understandably human was at the same time the most barbaric, the most abominable course of action."

>149 dchaikin: Excellent review, Dan. Not sure I’m o.k. with unreliable and unsympathetic narrators just now, but adding this to my list with note to reference your review. (Your ending quote is scary)

>149 dchaikin: Yes, great review. Thanks.

>149 dchaikin: I love both of you reviews although I didn’t see the Study of Obedience the same way. I didn’t see the “evil sorceress” side of the narrator.

I was surprised that many other reviewers did not see the narrator as Jewish. There were so many references to the Jewish experience in Europe and to Jewish religious rituals.

I note that you read the book’s hardcover version. I listened to the audio version read by the author. Perhaps it was her audio narration that lead me to see the unnamed woman differently. I saw the actions that you saw as evil as rebellion. As in - you want to see us this way, well take this.

Your final quote is doubly apt: In that it is relevant to us all, but also it is interesting in interpreting the book. It contains title: a word from the title: obedience.

If I take any single thing away from reading this book, though I take much more, is that Bernstein is saying: Look at what happens to the world when people go along with the herd at a local level. We must all blame ourselves for evil on Earth.

>132 dchaikin: Just discovered there was a group read on APS Together in 2023 of To the lighthouse. If you (or I) ever decide to do a reread, that might be a good source of commentary. Now if I could just find on for Mrs. Dalloway, as I never seem to get far in that one.

>146 dchaikin: Excellent review as always, and I do see how your thoughts around the book have crystallised as you revisit it. I enjoyed the quotes you included, especially the closing one about "a perfect obedience to our local forces of gravity".

>149 dchaikin: I loved this one, too, Dan. I could definitely see myself rereading it and getting something different out of it, like you did.

been a little news shocked, need to do some LT catch up. Apologies for these delayed responses. I've enjoyed all the comments.

>150 dianelouise100: understand. It's kind of a weird thing to read right now.

>151 rocketjk: Thanks!

>152 kjuliff: that's all very interesting. Especially the nature of the audio-voice, which I didn't listen to. I think that I didn't get it right. And i hope that came across in my review. I think she, the author, tried to avoid any snap description. It's playing at a mixture of emotions, responses, decisions and actions. And I agree with you, it's definitely looking at the herd mentality

>153 markon: Thanks! I've wanted to read through Woolf's works for a while, but have put Faulkner first, and had sort of planned to do Hemmingway next, then Woolf. This was a great book. My Woolf group might do Mrs. Dalloway next February

>154 rasdhar: thanks! That quote is just so striking

>155 labfs39: what was odd to me is that it's equally opaque on re-reading. You can pick up themes you're already looking for, but it's slightly impenetrable. You kind of need to roll with it, even on a reread.

>156 dchaikin: Yeah, I've found that the days I leave the news alone until the evening are fine, but when I take a look early in the day, I spend it mysteriously anxious.

>158 RidgewayGirl: I took a day off social media, and it helped me a little. But also I feel responsible to be connected to the news. Like the comic psycho-analysist says to their patient, no, you're not crazy or paranoid, your problem is that you're informed about what's going on.

Some book shopping today. I noticed, despite my 656 books on by TBR, my poetry collections are depleted. So today I pulled a list of authors from my current read, Horace, The Odes: New Translations by Contemporary Poets. All these authors were born 1920’s-1960’s, and comfortable translating from Latin, and so all have a Classicist bent. I found books from several authors at my gem used bookstore in the Woodlands, north of Houston. One was signed and $50. I didn't buy that one. But I bought these five by four authors: James Lasdun, Carolyn Kizer, Daryl Hine and Richard Wilbur.

>158 RidgewayGirl: >159 dchaikin: I have been trying to keep up with the news lately and not posting much. I have taken to reading those magazines and books that have an AI voice reading the articles so I can listen.

But although I feel a need and a responsibility to be informed I suffer from doing so. After a day’s reading articles and catching up, I feel sick in the stomach and call my friend M in Australia .

9pm here is mid afternoon there. We talk for hours on end, each swapping takes on political articles, sending links, agreeing with each other. And then, exhausted I sleep and dream - vivid outrage dreams about the Ukraine and tariffs and firings and things.

>161 kjuliff: it's exhausting, and all so unnecessary. A forced crisis.

I'm about to create a part 2 thread, to refresh things a bit, give club readers a guilt-free excuse not read my whole extended Study for Obedience review, if they haven't already. But feel free to chat on about these last few posts here. I enjoyed these imaginary fern seeds A. S. Byatt planted in my head in January. Of course, ferns don't have seeds, they have spores. Which is part of the point of the myths.

>160 dchaikin: This post ties together the topic of poetry and the Doors concept about books from the posts yesterday on my thread. It occurred to me that while I never search out poetry its presence has a strong impact on me.

Recently I discovered that one of my memorable books My Life as a Fake was reviewed by you some time ago. That book had a large impact on me, and I even re-read it a year ago. Imagine reading that book after a life-long absorption with mysteries.

Of course, poetry provides the backbone of the book. Not being a poetry reader, I was impressed by the poetry, which Peter Carey, wrote. As I read it, I didn't understand that it was all fiction.

It turns out that only 43 out of my 1950 book library has the tag of Poetry. They are all very important books for me and I label them as Four Door books.