richardderus's 2010 threads, #4

Halfway to April, I need a fourth thread. It's been a good year!

I'm in the Books Off the Shelf group, too, so I will review 25 books that've sat on my shelves since who-whipped-the-cat and also 75 new books...published no earlier than 2008...this year.

Reviews 1,2,3: first thread
Reviews 4-7: second thread
Reviews 8-12: : third thread

I now have a Homeless Reviews thread in Club Read 2010. I've set a completely arbitrary goal of 50 books to review that I don't own, and were published before 2008, so they don't fit anywhere else.

FOR THOSE JUST TUNING IN: I don't know the readers of my reviews personally, for the most part, so I don't have any way to gauge whether you'll agree or disagree with me. It's always perfectly fine with me either way, and I invite comments from all.










Books are reviewed in post number:

20. Leviathan... #249

19. Heat Wave... #238

18. A Touch of Dead... #226

17. Mania... #208

16. Through the Cracks... #200

15. The Long Song... #178

14. 1759: The Year Britain Became Master of the World... #81

13. Oh. My. Gods.... #77

Woo Hoo! I'm first. Hope you feel much better REALLY soon, Richard.

Maybe the germs will forget to transfer threads so you can lose them!

Woo Hoo! I'm in the Top 3 (that counts, right?)!

Feel better, Richard. :)

And here you are .... hello there.....

love the gif, Stasia

#5: Thanks, Caroline.

Just stopping by to say I hope you feel better soon. (I'm amazed that you found the energy to start a new thread!)

Good review of Let the Great World Spin, Richard. Not my normal comfort zone for the content but you've made it sound so intriguing. Tell you what: you do the gritty hard-life street stuff and I'll do the Jane Austen gardening stuff and we'll admire each other's reading from a distance.

How's the cold?

Just stopping lurking long enough to say feel better soon! There are far too many bugs flying around at the moment - totally sucks.

Cold is *drumroll* Mostly Gone!!

Say Hallelujah

I'm so pleased! I can breathe, I'm not coughing too much, NO fever. Yippee!

Tui...okay. Seems like a fair division of labor to me.

Thanks all for coming to visit. First review by tomorrow noonish, probably not tonight.

Richard I am glad you are feeling better!

Oh Richard, My Friend

I have suffered Sinus Hell for the pasteth few days..no sneezums...much headache....my Sympathies.. I wish i could sneeze!!

"Life" is hell.....but LT is an antidote (?)

J

>11 FAMeulstee: Thanks Anita, and glad you're coming to the new party!

>12 jdthloue: *sending powerful sneeze-whammy to Jude*

There, there, pat, pat

Thank you so much..."Sweetness"

..and I am trying to make "sensible"...regarding The Cathars....fiction/non...i have read...but, the brain is non-functioinal now....be patient

;-}

Richard, your review of Stephen O'Shea's book about the Cathars was good. I've owned that book for a few years now and was glad to see it featured in the Hot Reviews forum. Weren't the Cathars fascinating? I would love to explore that area of France, just because.

RD, Just read your review of the Cathars book, which I enjoyed. One thing I remember learning when I was traveling around that part of France was that the local duke or earl or whatever he was did not care one fig about the Cathar "heretics" and was happy to let them be as long as they paid their taxes, which evidently they did. Unfortunately, he was coerced into taking military action against them. A "Crusade," I believe they ended up calling it. Essentially, it was "You make war on them or we'll make war on you and take your land and your title." That's how I remember it, at any rate.

I loved Stephen O'Shea's book! His other two, Back to the Front and the one about the Mediterranean, are equally good -- just to give them a shout out! I've been down to the area few times, mostly around Toulouse and Carcassone rather than Beziers or some of the (now ruined) Cathar fortresses. It's fascinating to walk around Carcassonne at night (when all the tourist shops are closed).

Jerry, yes, that's a big part of the story -- called it the Albigensian 'crusade" after the town of Albi. It's where St. Dominic became a force in the Catholic church, and got the de Montforts going (Simon later played a pivotal role in the battle for an early version of democracy in England) and the 'crusade' consolidated the dominance of the northern French over Languedoc, Provence, etc.

I need to finish and post some reviews! Y'all stop waving interesting conversations around under my nose!!!!

Imagine...Gwillelm the Duke of Aquitaine converts to Catharism. Brings with him the County of Champagne, in the Kinglet of Francette (as it was then)'s gift. Daughter Alienor, Cathar, becomes Queen of France (politically inevitable). Louis, pious monkling Kinglet of Francette, does what? Does Alienor wait for sexy Henry the Angevin to sweep her off her feet, or does she set up shop as an independent Cathar state-ruler in opposition to her odious, drippy non-husband instead? After all, women held lots of power in the Cathar world-view.

This is the early germ of novel XI on my list of projects. Barely past note-taking stage, still in "devour all printed sources not in Rare Book Rooms" germination.

Great story, but you do realize there are a bunch of Eleanor novels out there now and three more due out this year? Not to pour could water... Or is this alternative history -- which could be rather fun, given what did happen. Imagine, no King John!

Oh heavens, Suzanne, straight (ahem) historicals would never interest me...have to be an alternative history. Plus, as you rightly point out, ain't like the lady got no play. That's another reason why it's eleventh on the list.

No Richard Coueur de Lion, no King John. No Hundred Years' War. No Kingdom of France as our maps knew it. Burgundy quite probably remains a world power...do the Low Countries provide a comfy home for the spread of Catharism? Does Roussillon unite with Catalonia, or do both fall under independent Aquitainian rule in the 13th century? What happens in a world containing a dominant dualistic religion during the 14th century's horrifying plague? (Side issue...what if Catharism had either survived or had recrudesced as a spiritual force opposing the Catholic Church in our own history?)

One day, that germ will announce its story. Perhaps the story of the last Catholic Pope, circa 1350, as he's on the run from slavering hordes of plague survivors, led by a fallen-away member of the Perfect.

Very interesting hypotheticals, indeed! re the Low Countries, my suspicion is that without the political oppression (which is what fueled the rather rabid Protestantism later on), I'm not sure there would have been the motivation to seize on new religious dogmas. Different environment/context. And had Burgundy remained dominant... The plague issue is VERY intriguing, given what people did, in fact, get up to. Heavens, you could have some Montsegur survivors using the plague to try and re-launch Catharism -- right there, that's a good plot!

Do you think Catharism could have survived in a post-Renaissance world, however? In its way, it has much more in common with Islam (religion as a way of life, not simply as world view and religious faith) than with the Catholic Church.

Richard...
Your thread always generates such interesting conversations!

Germ-free now myself and so I feel it safe to visit your house. Stay well and happy theorizing.

>21 Chatterbox: Do you think Catharism could have survived in a post-Renaissance world, however? In its way, it has much more in common with Islam (religion as a way of life, not simply as world view and religious faith) than with the Catholic Church.

There are no accidents...think about the geographic extent of the Cathar heresy. Areas that, from ~715CE bordered the Islamic states of Al Andalus. The Catholic monarchies of Navarre, Aragon, Castile were rumps until ~950-1000CE, and the world's richest state was Aquitaine (esp the County of Champagne) from ~900-1204-ish (death of Alienor).

The inhabitants were, by the standards of Christendom then prevailing, were rich, free (nobles seriously disorganized, fairly feisty, and completely uninterested in much beyond taxes/duties from their peeps), and possessed of time to think about stuff without much interference. There was quite significant trade across the Pyrenees and with trade comes ideas (and diseases, but let's not dwell on that). I suspect, though without any evidence to support the theory, that had Catharism managed a conversion very, very high up the food chain, survived, and prospered, that the Most Catholic Monarchies would've been menaced on two fronts, and the wealthier, more open Islamic societies and the posited Cathar state might've made some kind of common cause. And that, quite possibly, might've kick-started an early enough Renaissance to have had legs! (Much like the *actual* one that was juuust getting going at that time, cut short by plague.)

And, to chuck another change into the time stream, what of St. Francis of Assisi? He of the poverty/chastity wheeze that's proven so popular (go know!)? Perchance an evangelizing Perfect catches him ~1205 when he starts a-hearin' them voices and snares him...a two-front war for the Catholic Church as charismatic, convincing and apparently quite studly Frankie-boy goes around doin' his conversion thing.

This, clearly, could not be tolerated. Hijinks would of necessity ensue.

The plague issue is VERY intriguing, given what people did, in fact, get up to. Heavens, you could have some Montsegur survivors using the plague to try and re-launch Catharism -- right there, that's a good plot! Oh--really? I think, oh I don't know, seems sort of drab and expected. Forget that one. *races off to wiki idea for future theft use* No, no, no legs on that horse. Too bad.

re the Low Countries, my suspicion is that without the political oppression (which is what fueled the rather rabid Protestantism later on), I'm not sure there would have been the motivation to seize on new religious dogmas I was thinking of Catharism as the Reformation, and occuring all during the 12th century, but I wonder if the Low Countries at the time would've hated Catholicism for itself. From what I know of the Dutch character, and based on the Flemings I've known over the years, it seems like they'd like the simultaneous lack of expensive, useless hierarchy and promise of spiritual renewal. After all, these are the people whose national typeface is Helvetica....

Fun discussion, thanks. Clearly there is a pea under this mattress.

Hi. Don't know whether you have discussed this and I just missed it, but a few years back I read a really interesting book about the Cathars - Montaillou, by Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie. Montaillou was one of the last villages to hold out when the Cathars had pretty much been destroyed, and the book is about how they lived, their ways of preserving their religion in secret and their relations with their Catholic neighbors. It incorporates actual testimony from various anti-Cathar trials and confessions. It's not a novel, and the people in it are all real, but it reads like a story. I went to Montaillou, now just nothing really, and sat on the hillside there in total peace and quiet, imagining what it might have been like. Really powerful. Thought you might like to know, if you didn't already.

Well I picked up The Perfect Heresy from the library today. It's next up on the non-fiction To Read list.

I also got Dream Angus - so a lot of Richard influenced reading to come;-)

I wishlisted The Perfect Heresy, Richard. But I just have to say that although the discussions here are muy interesting they make my head explode and pacing myself has become an ultimate necessity.

Richard -- the Christian version of the Sunni/Shiite schism could have been Cathar/Catholic instead of Lutheranism/Calvinism vs Catholicism? or in addition to? Wow, holy wars, Batman!

Re Low Countries, mayyybe. Growing up in Bruxelles, learned a lot about the post-Charles the Bold era, and the feeling that the region began a de facto colony of the Holy Roman Empire, right around the time that Luther was madly hammering things on church doors. Regardless of national character, the ground was fertile. (Not that Burgundy had ever been terribly stable...)

Exploding brains is fun...!

>25 JanetinLondon: Hello Janet, no--hadn't discussed that one, though I''m familiar with the village of Montaillou. I'll see if my liberry has or can get it. Thanks for the pointer!

I went to Montaillou, now just nothing really, and sat on the hillside there in total peace and quiet, imagining what it might have been like. Really powerful. It's always a surprise to me when I encounter a place where major events have occurred. My reaction can be, "Yeah, okay, moving on now" or it can be to sit down and cry from the impact it has on me. I wonder what it is that makes a powerful experience like you describe. Some places seem to have a resonance of what happened there? Something one read made the past come alive when the scene was viewed? Just don't know....

>26 calm: Oh, calm, I expect you'll be glad to be influenced by me on those two. Good stuff.

>27 Carmenere: Hi Lynda! Cranial integrity is vital for reading, so pace yourself carefully.

>28 Chatterbox: the Christian version of the Sunni/Shiite schism could have been Cathar/Catholic instead of Lutheranism/Calvinism vs Catholicism? or in addition to? I would suspect, Suzanne, that the first schism would have hardened the Catholic Church to the point where Luther wouldn't have been needed. He quite probably would've been a Cathar.

(Not that Burgundy had ever been terribly stable...) Hmmm. Pretty successful at making money, and its rulers were successful at marrying into the Big Time Families. Stable? Well, what proto-state was all that stable in that era? Burgundy disappears from any further mentions in history as all but a geographic expression ~1450. It's never discussed that I know of, the place just *piff* vanishes and suddenly France is a lot richer.

the region began a de facto colony of the Holy Roman Empire, right around the time that Luther was madly hammering things on church doors Their subsumation into the HRE is another, "oh and then this place? They belong to the Big Boys Next Door now" event. Wonder why.

Picking nits, but -- Burgundy from 1450 until about 1480 was still independent and very powerful -- it was the makeweight in the political and military alliances of that time, involving Louis XI and Edward IV. The problem, alas, was that Charles the Bold had no male heir, and it ended up annexed to the HRE. Had Charles been a tad less bold or had a son to succeed him, Burgundy may well have remained what the Netherlands became in the 17th century, I suspect.

I do love the idea of Luther as a member of the 'perfecti', however! (He wasn't crazy about celibacy, however :-) )

*breezing through to say hi*

back on trak here, I hope.

Richard, you should definitely track down a copy of Montaillou - it's absolutely fascinating, and reads just like you're peeking in people's windows and seeing everything they get up to.

I read a stack of books on the Cathars years back and found it fascinating, but I seem to have forgotten most of it now. While I'm finding this conversation very interesting I've discovered I'm completely incapable of adding anything sensible to it. :( Must dig out some of the old books at some point and refresh my memory. If I studied it 12 years ago, all that information must still be in my brain somewhere, surely?

Stopping by to wave and smile hello and all that jazz. Not quite keeping up with the discussion because my brain is currently a bit mushy (what a nice image) but hey, you're starred and that's what matters!

I first heard about Cathars in the 80ies when reading The Holy Blood and The Holy Grail. My FIL had this book because my husbands family supposedly originated in France near the Cathar places. I also read Montaillou at that time, but I do not remember as much about that book (time to read again?).
In 2005 we were in Carcasonne and learned some more about the Cathars, facinating believe they had! I might get back to them and read some more.

LOL I think I was in Carcasonne in 2005... oh wait, maybe it was 04. How cool was that? Okay it was crowded, blighted by the town below, super commmercialized, but still I thought it was pretty darn cool.

My wife and I were in Carcassonne around 2006 or 2007! My wife still uses a cool carry-bag she bought in one of the shops. Carcassonne is fun, but it's luster diminishes somewhat when you learn that it was entirely restored in the 1800s, in an effort led by architect Eugene Viollet-le-Duc. Wikipedia says this:

"The restoration was strongly criticized during Viollet-le-Duc's lifetime. Fresh from work in the north of France, he made the error of using slates and restoring the roofs as pointed cones, where local practice was traditionally of tile roofing and low slopes, in a snow-free environment. Yet, overall, Viollet-le-Duc's achievement at Carcassonne is agreed to be a work of genius, though not of strictest authenticity."

The guidebook we were using during our visit, however, had much harsher words for the authenticity (or lack thereof) of the restoration. "Work of genius" was not in that description, to put it mildly. So I believe there is some serious disagreement on that score.

At any rate, we had fun while we were there.

I haven't had much time for LT lately--must be that I'm sleeping too much.....
http://www.librarything.com/topic/85711#1868705

#39 One can neither sleep nor read "too much".

Hello Richard...
Are you out there?

Tired...much sturm und drang...family members from Ghana, one kid on her way to Guatemala to be a diplomat, Gale Force Girl in a helpful mode so more work got done than I would ever even have attempted, The Divine Miss being herself; it all ended last night and I am whupped. Plus two doctors tomorrow for Auntie, a new fight with the village over street lighting and crime, interrelationship thereof, the property tax people to file a complaint with (annual ritual), and since the hordes are gone, grocery shopping to do.

And another weekend approacheth....

Whew! No wonder you dropped out of sight for a few days! But we missed you.

Richard

Sounds like you had quite a full plate! I hope you get some rest.

Me too!

Sounds like another episode of FAMILY CIRCUS (in a manner of speaking)! Glad you survived!

;-}

Bon courage et bon weekend !

I put my trotter down, saying no visitors this weekend, so what does auntie do? Invites a friend of hers for Sunday. Fortunately, he usually doesn't show when invited. But still...it's the irritating principle of the thing.

I finished Ysabel, my first Guy Gavriel Kay novel, and was delighted by it. I thought it was a blast to read! His prose is very supple. Review soon, though I want to review Barbara Fister's new novel first...a Chicagoland-set thriller, tightly plotted, very exciting, all kinds of fun to read.

*sigh* Much to accomplish yet today. Off to continue it.

#48: I look forward to your thoughts on Ysabel. I have not read that one yet by Kay.

His prose is very supple

Oooo, like kid leather gloves, like melting chocolate, as in lead for solder? You've got me on the edge of my seat waiting for your review of this, unknown to me, author.

>48 richardderus:: Ysabel is a sequel, Richard. Assuming you want to read all of Kay's stuff, you may want to let lots of time elapse before trying the three books of The Fionavar Trilogy if you want things to cloud in your memory a bit...or move quickly, should you enjoy the opposite.

I am so relieved. One down, one to go.

Richard, if you liked Ysabel then you definitely should read Kay's Tigana. I love, love, love, love that book.

I really must find a copy of Ysabel (library hasn't got it!) - I love Kay's work. He's also got a new book coming out at the end of April - Under Heaven.

I've read Dream Angus - nice recommendation, Richard.

NOOOOO

Not a series! No! I reject this knowledge! I refuse this temptation!! NO. Simply NO.

Tigana seems to be a consensus fave of Dr. Kay's ouevre so it I will procure, one day soon.

Off to answer the door...Turkish Delight bringeth our dinner.

Denying reality doesn't make it any less so! :-D

Actually, I enjoyed that first trilogy (really one story spread over 3 books like LotR was) a lot, though it's different from Ysabel, so...

Tigana and Last Light of the Sun are probably my top of his stories, though there are really no bad ones in the bunch.

ETA: In case you get hooked on him as I am...the only other sequence you have to worry about is Lord of Emperors is a sequel to Sailing to Sarantium. As far as I can recollect, everything else is stand-alone.

Btw, I jsut went over and read Amazon's blurb on Under Heaven—inspired by Tang dynasty China. That should be interesting.

I really enjoy how most of his books...actually all but The Fionavar Tapestry and Ysabel...are "re-settings" (I'm not sure of the word I want there) of history.

Under Heaven Kay is a tempting next target, Tad. I love Chinese history and lately am running across TV shows on National Geographic that bring new and interesting archaeology to my attention. It whets the appetite.

I think "re-setting" is a good way to say "re-imagining and re-telling" in shorthand, though it seems to me there should be a one-word way to do it even more explicitly. I can't come up with one, though.

Tigana is calling out to you Richard ..... come to me .... come to me ...... you know you want to......give in .....

>59 cameling: Oh heavy sigh...you are a vile influence upon me, madam...I have Tiganaed. My only source of satisfaction is that I ordered it used. Technically, I have not yet broken my resolve to buy no new books, since The Divine Miss's purchases for me don't come from the same budget.

I shoulda been a Jesuit...or a government bureaucrat....

> 60
No Richard, no Jesuit... that would be too much asked from you LOL!

>61 FAMeulstee: Oh good, Anita, I'm glad it seems that way to you, instead of agreeing with me that my ability to justify expensive purchases for "unnecessary" items is a good indicator of my career prospects.

> 62
A career as a Jesuit sounds as impossible for you as any career would be for me ;-)
But I DO admire your way with words!

>63 FAMeulstee: *blush* Awww

Maybe you should be in purchasing for the Pentagon?

Simply stopping by to say hi from Beavercreek Ohio where I'm having a lovely time with three grandchildren.

I hope you get some rest this weekend and the company stays at bay.

I agree with Anita, banish the thought of Jesuithood..

Heck, guys, I'd HAVE to be better than the people they have in the Catholic Church now...the pedophiles, that is...even when *I* was underage, I never had sex with anyone underage. Too ookie.

Although Suse has an interesting point there...maybe I could go into procurement! For the gummint, I mean, not the fleshly kind.

Musta hit the "submit" button twice.

67, even when *I* was underage, I never had sex with anyone underage.

So what are you saying Richard, that you seduced adults as a minor? That's still kind of pedophilia you know. ;P

>69 Ape: Mmm, good point...though being over the age of consent and under the age of legal majority leads one to wonder, just how young is too young? Certainly the adults in question had no problem with the informed consent part, since it was my idea.

YES! My duty is done .... Richard has Tiganaed ... I can go to sleep now. :-)

#71: Good for you, Caroline!

About the only argument in favor of the Jesuits is that they are the only religious order to believe in books. At least, those books that agreed with them...

Some very deep discussion going on here... Can't cope with it on a saturday....
had to pop in and check our what shenanigans were afoot...

70: I don't think it's a specific age, but rather a question of maturity. You could make the argument that there are plenty of 15 year olds who are more mature than most adults. And just as many 30 year olds who really, really shouldn't be having sex.

>74 mckait: Deep? Us? Here? Huh...never thought about it that way.

>75 Ape: There are plenty of people of every age who shouldn't be given the power of life and death over so much as a houseplant. Still and all, until we have the Brave New World, I suppose we just have to put up with it. (I think I was the only one who read that book in my school years who though, "Yeah, that makes sense...".)

Review: 13 of seventy-five

Title: OH. MY. GODS.

Author: TERA LYNN CHILDS

Rating: *** of 5

This YA novel of losing one's identity, being forced to adapt to a highly charged new emotional environment, and redefining what love and friendship mean to you is a cute, nicely thought out romp.

Greek gods, we all know, are myths. Right? Well, not so much in Childs's book. She's updated the whole "gods are real" trope that's so popular in romantic fiction these days to include teens. I think the intended audience will lap this up, since it plays into adolescent exceptionalism (the illusion that we are special and unique among our fellow creatures, but unrecognized).

This is Childs's first novel, and it has some first-novel-y clanks (eg, the mother and stepfather are simply not developed at all, and they're frankly badly drawn; the better solution would have been to have them not appear at all except in the main character's reports of their doings). But the main character, Phoebe, and her antagonists are all given snappy dialogue and put in situations much like the ones I remember being in during my adolescence back in the dark ages. The additional level of effort required of the author to incorporate the idea of the reality of the Greek pantheon pays off in humorous possibilities for supernatural pranking. That was fun.

I think Childs will be a fun writer to watch over the next few years, as she seems to be getting good editorial advice and help. I hope she'll keep taking it and getting even better than she is now. Recommended to anyone who needs to take a vacation from serious stuff. Do not read if whimsy-challenged, or of a dour temperament.

Thumbs up on the review, Richard. Thanks.

Another one for the wishlist - thanks Richard!

Thumbs up from me as well

Review: 14 of seventy-five

Title: 1759: The Year Britain Became Master of the World

Author: Frank McLynn

Rating: ***1/2 of 5

History books are notably hard to write for an inattentive, probably ill-educated mass audience. Books written by historians for historians are hard to sell, because they're usually inelegantly written. Okay, they're usually BORING to the point of suicide.

This is a popular history written like a standard work of today's non-fiction, with real attention to the narrative drive of the story and also a fine hand at illuminating the character of the dramatis personae. McLynn's book is very involving, and it's a rarity in that the subject matter, the role of the events of a single year in the subsequent development of the world, is handled un-portentously.

The urge to shout and wave one's arms about when presenting historical facts that one knows will be important later must be nigh on irresistible. McLynn resists. He lets the story develop at the same pace as the year itself did, though inevitably the events move out of strict time sequence because the narrative is driven by the locations as much as by the time. I was impressed by the analysis in the book, the support for his contention that, had 1759 turned out differently at any point, then so would our present world. It's very hard to make that weave into a book about the past without coming across as a cranky, tendentious old fuffertut. McLynn manages to do it, so KUDOS!

Why, then, only 3-1/2 stars? Because I don't think McLynn accomplished his stated aim of making a watertight case for 1759 being the final turning-point of the British march to world domination. I'm certainly not an historian, but there are some unsupported assertions in the book that could simply represent holes in my education and be facts that are Received Wisdom. But there are enough of them that I wasn't all the way convinced by the text.

Recommended? Oh yes, please go get one and read it of you're an Anglophile, a Francophobe, or an aficionado of the 18th century's fascinating history. It will repay you...especially the last chapter, on the naval Battle of Quiberon Bay. Exciting stuff!

Great review, Richard! You've piqued my interest, so this goes onto my wish list.

Hmmm, I may need to read this. I'm assuming that the analysis is based almost entirely on the events of the 7 Years' War? I can't think of anything else that would indicate Britain was becoming a world power that are specific to that year.

I saw an exhibit about London in 1753 at the British Museum several years ago that was fascinating. Rather than use the year as an absolute, the curators decided on it because it was the first year that Britain brought its calendar in line with that of the rest of Europe. It was also part of a several decades-long transformation from being a divided nation to a country able to focus outward on the world in a systematic way. Plus, it was the London of Johnson, Garrick, Hogarth, etc. etc. If anyone is really interested in this period, the exhibit's catalog has a great essay by Roy Porter (author of The Enlightenment.)

Looks like some good reading time for you rd..

*smooches rd on the top of his head...and leaves*

Both of your last two look good, Richard! They are both going into the Wishlist!

>82 kidzdoc: I think you'll enjoy it, Darryl, for its concision and its thoroughly readable tone. It's perfect for non-specialists to feel like they've been fully briefed!

>83 Chatterbox: Suzanne, the Seven Years' War is often called the first world war. It's really true. The events in India alone qualify it as a World War, since the French and the Brits were fighting the Mughals too. The French and Indian War, as it's called in American history, ended on the Plains of Abraham, and that battle's outcome was by no means assured. Had it turned out differently (read: Had Louis XV been a good general, instead of a dithering, score-keeping small-town mayor, at heart), the USA quite probably never comes into existence.

>84 mckait: Hello ma petite banane! Have not been to the PO yet, am heading that way tomorrow by hook or by crook. I have been horribly lax about sending out packages. I owe three people books! I would so suck at BookMooch.

>85 ronincats: Roni...I think you'll enjoy both of these books, so I feel no guilt whatever in tempting you to read them. None. Zip.

76: Sadly, I haven't actually read Brave New World yet. Man, I'm really behind on my classics...

>87 Ape: ...??...

...!!...

Go hence and procure, and so to read, Brave New World lo and verily this very week or risk the Wrath of God. Your mental furniture, whether it comes from Ethan Allen or Sotheby's Estate Auctions, **must** include this book. I mean, one can't have Ashley Furniture or *shudder* Rent-A-Center...well, what does one call that stuff?...in the drawing room!

88: Yea, I'm pretty much reading a Rent-A-Center couch right now. Brave New World is definitely on my "Read in the near future" list. :)

#81: That one is already in the BlackHole. I just need to find a copy. Another nice review as always, RD.

back from my trip to Dayton, Ohio area and checking in on the threads to see many interesting posts here...(as usual.) And, I see that you have two hot reviews on the home page this evening.

I'm adding your two recent reads to the pile.

No worries re: PO.

I went thinking I had my card with me, and did not.. so had to pay with car change.. lol. Your book and Judes are lollygagging around in media mail.

Brave New World.. read and relished a few times...

Somehow lost track of your thread Richard, but finding the Cathar conversation fascinating. I'm not much good at reading non-fiction, but think I'm going to have to root out some of that stuff. I love that part of France (insert *fond memories of travels in the Pyrénées and the Langedoc and even, just before university, some time in a tiny town called Pouzolles, near Béziers for the vendange* here...). Hmmm, you're making my feet itchy again...

1759: The Year Britain Became Master of the World - Sounds interesting. Not sure if it would be for me though if there are many unsupported assertions - this is something that really winds me up.

#83 Chatterbox, that sounds like a fascinating exhibition - wish I had known about it at the time!

...Oh yes, everyone should read Brave New World. Richard, have you read Brave New World Revisited? The essays are a mixed bunch and there's a lot to disagree with, but interesting, nonetheless...

Brave New World was back in High School....haven't read it since, because Real Life trumped all the stuff therein...and my cat threw up on my copy a year ago and I had to trash it (the book not the cat).....a replacement? someday.

Anywho...just stopped by to say Hey!

;-}

(Kath: MEDIA MAIL is fine. I send most of my books that way...)

>89 Ape: STEPHEN! Brave New World is the finest exploration of the psychology of totalitarian control ever written. It's worthy of being the very next thing on your list. Really, truly, honest white man, the writing is fabOO and the thinking is genius and the printing and binding are gorgeous and God in Her Heaven will stop hurling thunderbolts at you if you read it now.

>90 alcottacre: Hi Stasia! Thanks...I liked that book, so would encourage you to push 'er up a weentsy.

>91 Whisper1: LINDA! Welcome home. I hope Ohio held joys unequaled. What'd ya read?

>92 mckait: Heya Kath. Soon come.

>93 flissp: Fliss dearest, I'd encourage you to read 1759 because it's got more going for it than against it. Worth your time, promise.

>94 jdthloue: Jude, you can't kid me...your high school literature courses were taught by Aristophanes and you studied The Epic of Gilgamesh in the original Babylonian.

95: Yea yea yea, add my name to the list of members whose reading lists you have devilishly manipulated. :) You're just lucky I decided to read more classics recently after reading Farhenheit 451!

But first, I have an ER book to read.

>96 richardderus: Damn Richard...my secret is out. I really am Older than Dirt (don't let Stasia tell you otherwise)...but those Cave Paintings sure were purty! And i do want to read that latest(?) translation of Gilgamesh by Stephen Mitchell

later, toots
J

#98: Why would I lie about your age, Jude? lol

#99 That wasn't what I meant..just that one time you posted (somewhere) that YOU are Older than Dirt...I'm just challenging that assumption....given that, in Real Life, I am Older.......

seriously LOL!
;-}

#100: OK, you can be Older than Dirt. I will be Older then the Hills. ;)

Okay, Stasia..I'll give you the Hills!
;-)

#102: TY!

I'm older than the dirt and the hills and I'm happy to be walking around Gods good earth.

Richard- I don't know how I lost your thread but I did! Well, I'm here now and I liked the review of the McCann book, sounds like another winner!

#94 THE CAT THREW UP ON MY COPY OF THE BOOK!!! Sounds like a better excuse than "The dog ate my homework". I was really thinking of posting "The cat had the right idea"---I remember HATING Brave New World in high school (also 1984). Now, I'm thinking the unthinkable---that perhaps I should think of giving it another go. Anybody want to talk me out of that? (Not here---Richard will ban us--bop on over to my thread.)

But Mitchell's Gilgamesh is really wonderful. Read that.

>106 laytonwoman3rd: Linda3rd, please give Brave New World another go as an adult. It's got a lot to offer the grown-up sensibility. It's also faaar more thought-provoking to someone who has seen several genocides (Rwanda, Bosnia, Darfur) as an adult than it ever would to a youth.

As an aside, The Divine Miss (a Henry James scholar) **hated** The Spoils of Poynton when she read it as a 25-year-old. I love it. I read some bits to her (eg, the description of Owen Gereth as "pointlessly active and pleasantly dull") and she admitted that this sounded like something she'd enjoy now, in the fullness of her seventh decade. Sometimes reading a book before (or after, like You Can't Go Home Again, which should not even be SOLD to those over 22) its moment in your life is a sure way to miss out on a true joy.

Also posting to your thread, in case you're too chicken to come back here and face the music.

>106 laytonwoman3rd:....i never try to talk anyone out of reading a book unless it truly tickled my Gag Reflex...Brave New World was something I read very long ago..and never chose to re-read...1984..the same. but methinks it's time to replace those chestnuts.....for "old times' sake" if nothing else.

>107 richardderus:...I, for one, love the work of Henry james...Portrait of a Lady, The Golden Bowl, The Turn of the Screw, and even the dreaded Princess Casamassima which most folks I know find to be unreadable...have been favorites of mine for years..But then, I never "studied" JAMES. maybe that's the reason...

;-}

edited for bad spelling

HA! Who you callin' chicken?

Love your "birds"! They are beauties for sure...and Gilgamesh (translated by Stephen Mitchell) has been on THE LIST for a long time now...

;-}

>108 jdthloue: The Divine Miss liked The Princess Casamassima too...I wanted to choke myself while slitting my wrists to make sure I died while reading it. Not quite as painful as Sons and Lovers, which sent me to the hospital for fear that I'd had a stroke and would be ever after unable to read, speak, or move of my own volition.

>109 laytonwoman3rd: LOL I've never enjoyed being given the bird so much!

>110 jdthloue: Gilgamesh will not disappoint. Hasten to the local bookstore, they're bound to have a *stack* of them out where you live, right? heeheehee

I ODed on Lawrence in high school and have literally been unable to read him ever since. James, after reading The American for my 1010 challenge, I am cautiously willing to try once more. Until now I've had a perfect record: every classic Henry James work I started reading, I was unable to finish. A James phobia?

I also just re-read Huxley for my 1010 challenge and, oddly, found Brave New World less enticing than I had recalled. Not sure why that was. I'll be re-reading 1984 as well, which I first read in (natch) 1984.

106: It's definitely worth giving those old high-school-required books a 2nd try in adulthood. I also hated most of the books forced upon me at that age, ut now when I read things that were high school requirements I find I really enjoy them. I don't think I was old enough to appreciate them from a literary standpoint. Also, at that age the stories didn't capture my attention. I think some of those books just don't click when you're so young.

I'd say give a couple short ones a try and see if you like them now as an adult.

>112 Chatterbox: Don't try to break the Lawrence block, Suzanne, it will lead to nothing good. And as for finding favorites from the past less favorite as an adult...I am always saddened when that happens to me, too. I tend to re-read VERY cautiously. I re-read The Catcher in the Rye in my mid-30s and was ecstatically pleased that I'd loved it even more than the teens reading; then, emboldened, Look Homeward, Angel hit the nightstand and the skids at the same time. The man of the hour at that time was a bartender, so I'd read a lot staying up to feed and chat when he finally got home. He walked in one night, saw that I was reading the Wolfe, and asked me what I thought...I mimed unswallowing...he took it away from me, three-quarters read, and hurled it into the incinerator. I was shocked, it being a book after all, but then he made it all right because he said, "I see you seldom enough, don't want you in a bad mood or I don't get good dinner and good lovin'. Out!"

>113 Ape: When's the last time you read To Kill A Mockingbird?

Ape, it's not that I hated them; indeed, I loved Camus and Koestler, for instance. And even ones that didn't click, I still read. But I ended up parsing every. single. word. And in Lawrence's case, I read every single novel and most of his short stories. For instance with Hemingway, we only read The Sun Also Rises and The Old Man and the Sea, as well as some short stories, so I can quite safely venture elsewhere in Hemingwayland. I think the only author I didn't appreciate then was Marquez. And come to think of it, I do want to re-read Koestler's Darkness at Noon now that I know much more than I did even then (when I was an avid reader of history) about the era, simply because so much more is public.

#113 Oh, I wasn't one of those "I hate required reading" people in high school. My English teachers loved me---I was their fall-back when they couldn't get anyone else to contribute to classroom discussion. I can still see Mrs. C's face as she scanned the room, poked at her perfect coiffure and settled her gaze on me. "Well, Linda. Why don't you tell us what the landscape around Kumalo's home represents?" I loved Cry, the Beloved Country at 15, and re-read it last year; it made me cry all over again. Steinbeck became a favorite author one long summer when I picked one of his short novels off the suggested reading list and couldn't stop until I'd read the entire collection. He still works for me. I just happened to dislike futuristic/dystopian literature. I still do. Add to the list of books I hated: Lord of the Flies, Animal Farm and The Old Man and the Sea. I've tried re-reading two of those in recent years, and my opinion hasn't changed. They are not for me, although my reasons may be different now.

Hemingway *blech* and The Old Fart in High C most of all..."oh fish, mighty fish" shuddup Ernie you're embarrassing us all.

Hey, Richard, you're insulting my eighth cousin there.

Yeah, well, have a blood transfusion, maybe it'll dilute the taint.

LOL

Can't say there is one required reading I ever liked -- wait. There was ONE, 1, uno, in my SF lit class in HS that was okay. But I can't really think of one other required reading book that wasn't altogether depressing (Shakespeare excepted).

Happily I loved to read, even if I hated lit class ;->

Richard, the mere mention of To Kill a Mockingbird makes me smile thinking of how much I love this book. It is my #1 favorite of all time. IMHO there will never be another book like this one!

>120 suslyn: I know, Suse, there's something about "class" reading that's just...off-putting...for those of us with independent streaks.

>121 Whisper1: Hi Linda! Harper Lee sure knew when to quit. She'd never've matched that debut. Wise of her not to try, I think. How are you?

#122> I believe, according to her biography, that Harper Lee did try to write another novel, but never succeeded in finishing it. At least that was her story. If I'm remembering right, she told people about her manuscript but nobody ever actually saw it. I bought the recent biography of her as a gift for my wife, who had just reread Mockingbird, and she relayed some of the more interesting aspects of the bio to me. So I haven't read it myself and my memory of what I didn't actually read may be faulty.

Richard.

So very true about Harper Lee. Her one hit wonder was an incredible accomplishment. It is interesting to have a discussion about this topic because when I drove to work this morning I thought about the fact that I usually exhaust an authors works if I read one that I like. Yet, I do believe that Harper could not have topped her masterpiece. Anything afterward would be disappointing.

While Truman Capote wrote additional books, In Cold Blood was the best and brightest.

I'm currently reading The Moonflower Vine and, like Harper Lee, Jetta Carleton only wrote one book.

I'm sure Whisper and I have entered Mockingbird territory before. It's my all-time favorite (most days) as well. And I just read it about a year ago. For the umpteenth time. HOWEVER, it was never required reading when I was in school. And I wish they'd give over forcing kids to read it now. It makes them hate it. Which brings us right back where we started, I think.

114: I read To Kill a Mockingbird in 10th grade and remember thinking it was ok. The fact that I didn't despise being forced to read it is promising. It's definitely one I need to read again sometime.

The only required books I remember reading and truly enjoying in high school were The Old Man and the Sea and Animal Farm.

I'll be curious to see how much specific, required reading my children have (one is a freshman, the second approaching high school, the third a long ways away).

Even the freshman seems to be getting assignments of the form, "Read one of these books," rather than, "Read this book." Of course, that is likely to change once the classes become more focused but, maybe not.

I had an abbreviated high school and was rather math/science focused at the time, so a lot of stuff that "everyone has read"...I haven't. So, I'm making a conscious effort to read the things I missed periodically just to become culturally conversant. ;-D

127, TadAD, Even the freshman seems to be getting assignments of the form, "Read one of these books," rather than, "Read this book."

That would have been nice!

I hesitate to admit that I have not yet readTo Kill a Mockingbird. I do have a copy now, and I want to read it........and will....

I don't think I ever objected to being told what to read. There were definitely books I enjoyed more than others, and a handful I didn't like, but I didn't dig in my heels. I know some of my parents' friends were shocked when they saw me digging into Sons and Lovers on my summer vacation in 1978. I read Hawthorne and Thoreau, although my teacher never gave us the Transcendentalist context, which would have been fascinating. Marquez, Chinua Achebe, Lawrence. Shakespeare & Marlowe. Hemingway. Solzhenitsyn, Koestler & Camus. What strikes me now is what we didn't read: no Eliot, no Dickens, no Flaubert, no Hardy. Nothing classically Russian (Tolstoy, etc.) No Wharton, no Woolf, no Forster, no Joseph Conrad. No Henry James, no Roth, no Thomas Wolfe. I had already started reading independently by then, however, so that helped. I was reading Hardy, Chekhov and Stendhal in my senior year on my own, I recall.

Tad, I always had assigned reading, certainly from grade 9 onwards. My sophomore year was Great Expectations for instance -- it wasn't pick one of these books, of which that was my choice. I do like the idea of being able to pick, or leaving it to the student. Certainly, the IB program is designed to be flexible (so much lit in translation, so much poetry, so much drama, here, teacher, you pick within these categories) but I would have loved some flexibility. But then, they were teaching us to pass a mega external exam at the end of two years, and I can see that would have been nearly impossible with more flexibility.

Richard, you are forgiven for not liking Tolkien for your take on Hemingway. The Old Fart in High C, indeed. *cackledy cackle*

Interestingly, To Kill A Mockingbird was required reading in an English class. The teacher was incredible and I admired him. He brought life to the book and I've loved it ever since.

Oh dear...this statement usually clears the room...here goes:

I didn't much like To Kill A Mockingbird.

I hasten to add that I didn't HATE it like I do Dickens, Hemingway, DH Lawrence, Bohjalian, still less abominate and revile it the way I do Tolkien, but I read it and thought, "...and...?" That was three years ago. It's a very good book! It's beautiful in many of its passages and it's unquestionably worthy of admiration! I just...don't much care if I ever read it again.

*sigh* It was nice knowing y'all. I won't hold your running away against you, but please try to be civil when we meet.

Interesting company for Bohjalian... lol

I think you have a reasonable point.. maybe I will never read it :)

>134 mckait: Oh no no no, dearest, I think you'd LOVE it! I think its narratrix, Scout, will make your mom centers light up bright enough to land a fighter on a carrier at midnight. It's a classic for a reason. Don't dismiss it because I'm a curmudgeonly old cuss.

Dear curmudgeonly old cuss...I love you anyway...

Now then, do you have a favorite book, ie one that if you could only have one this would be it?

#129: I haven't read To Kill a Mockingbird either, Kath. Please let me know when you do read it, as I might want to read it alongside you.

#133: GASP! What didn't you like about it?

Darryl, I would be extremely surprised if you did not like To Kill a Mockingbird...

>136 Whisper1: Well, Linda, I really don't know. I guess if I was forced to choose, I'd select The Family Mark Twain because it's fourteen pounds of reading delight. Several complete novels and selections from his other works. Just about perfect for that desert island, except I'd ACTUALLY like a fully loaded Kindle and a generator and a fridge and a crate of Veuve Cliquot and about 6,000 pounds of Brie and pate de foie gras and water crackers and some wonderful Magno soap from Spain and a few dancing boys to spread the sunscreen on me.

>137 kidzdoc: Nothing! I just...well, I was all set up for this this *perfect* experience and it was...it was really, really, really good, but I didn't get all the way there. I liked it! I did, I promise, but...just not that way.

*frustrated sigh*

#129, 137:I also have To Kill a Mockingbird sitting on the shelf, unread.

Sounds like a new group read in the making, maybe?

We had to read Dickens too, Great Expectations amd A Tale of Two Cities, Fahrenheit 451 (sf class :), Romeo and Juliet, Othello, etc. (Shakespeare class). Animal Farm and 1984 were required reading when I was 11 & 12 -- certainly was not age-appropriate for me at that time. That was Then, This is Now was another dismal requirement. I know we read Walden, Twain, Whitman and Jonathan Edwards -- must have been an American Lit class. That one wasn't so bad. :)

ET fix touchstones -- and it got worse, not better! oh well.

I have never been successful at a group read.. lol

How about the last week of May? but I cannot promise much..
I tried one with richardear but just fell away. He had fun though with his other friends so I didn't lose any sleep over it. Don't hate me if I am bad at the group read thing. Character flaw, for sure.

I do want to read it. I am finished with work the third week of may for 4 weeks.
( I know, lucky me :) and maybe that will help me focus?

Kath, I could read To Kill a Mockingbird in late May. If it isn't too long I could read it over the last weekend (May 29-30); otherwise I'll read it over the four day break I have the previous week (May 20-23). Please remind me when you start to read it.

Let's try to remember.....

133: Oh dear...this statement usually clears the room...here goes:

I didn't much like To Kill A Mockingbird.

Don't worry! I get the same reaction whenever I tell someone I didn't like Huckleberry Finn...

#96 OK, I shall take your word for it and put it, tentatively, on the wishlist...

I'm with laytonwoman3rd & Chatterbox - most of the time, I loved the books foisted upon us at school. Having said that, I did science A-Levels, so no English beyond 16. Up to that point, aside from a few set exam tests, like Tad's kids, we used to be given a fairly lengthy list of books to pick from, so there was quite a lot of room for taste - I usually worked my way through most of the list (although somehow only just got round to To Kill a Mockingbird last year - wish it had been sooner now)...

The author I really did not get on with was D. H. Lawrence - I could, on occasion, see that he was talented and certainly why someone like my Granny thinks he was so wonderful (bloody-mindedness has a fairly healthy streak in our family - the fact that his work was shocking at the time instantly gave it plus points for her...), but not for me. We used to have competitions to see how many "-pressed" adjectives we could fit into our essays (oppressed, repressed, suppressed, depressed...). Oneday I'll try him again. Maybe. Glad to see I have company anyway...

#145: I do not like Huckleberry Finn either, Stephen, so you are not alone.

#133 I was pretty indifferent to Mockingbird. I had to read it as a set text for English lit, so maybe that's why. Thought it was okay, didn't hate it ... have absolutely no desire to read it again.

I'm not much on Huck either, so I'm in. It's not horrible, but I like Innocents Abroad so much more. And I'm doing Life on the Mississippi for my RL book circle and LOVING it.

>146 flissp: Fliss, we're from the same family! My mother's most salient characteristic was her "oh yeah?" 'tude. Likewise her own mother, and from what I gather, her mother's mother too. My sisters got less of it than I did.

>143 kidzdoc: Darryl, who'll be leading this read? I momnimate Kath! Any seconds?

>142 mckait: You possess many character flaws, dearest, but that's not one. It's just a genetic defect. See conversation above & at 146. And I *have* no other friends. You're the only one who likes me. *sniff*

#145 Nope, nope, nope....Huckleberry Finn is seriously flawed. So I give a free pass to anyone who doesn't like it, for that very reason. It is also one of the grandest books in American literature, flaws notwithstanding.

#149: I *have* no other friends. You're the only one who likes me.

Shows how I rate!

Hey Richard...
I'm seconding Stasia's comment...

head down..sulking!

>150 laytonwoman3rd: Oh, I agree, Linda3rd, it's one of the greats of our national literature, but it's no damn fun to read. I thought The Scarlet Letter was imperfect, too, but I still think a well-furnished mind should contain Hester Prynne.

>151 alcottacre: You know full well you're just doing missionary work hanging around with me, being nice to the outcast to walk the talk of loving thy neighbor. *I* am not fooled, you run off to your own thread and make merciless fun of me!

Hmmm...I seem to have one too many antipsychotics in my pill bottle...perhaps I should take one....

#149 Life on The Mississippi was a wonderful book and I'm glad you're enjoying it, Richard! I especially liked the discussions about the river itself - how the sandbars and banks change and how it must be respected.

>152 Whisper1: Hi Linda! I just took my Haldol!! I'm feeling juuust fiiine now! How's Will? Had any more Chiaroscuro Events? Lehigh still standing? Did I mention that The Circus in Winter was absconded with by The Divine Miss, a circus freak from way back, and she's liking it a lot? She even promised to bring it back from NYC when she comes after Easter!

>154 karenmarie: Karen, I am enthralled by the river. Owen Wister, The Virginian's author and a friend of Twain's, wrote an essay for my Twain birth-centenary edition of the book. Bill McKibben wrote an essay for The Divine Miss's copy of the book. In the intervening 70 years, so much has changed! Wister looks back on his personal friendship with Twain, and his nostalgia for "the Lincoln Generation" of people they belonged to; McKibben reflects sadly that the Mississippi has no centrality in the nation's consciousness any longer, a thing that Wister never even conceives of!

Books are completely invaluable. Will future generations of kids pick up Papaw's Kindle and discover a long-outdated edition of Anonymous Rex to compare with their own annotated version with introductory essay by Dakota Fanning explaining how the idea of dinosaurs in the modern world enabled her to face her inner demons or some-such? I doubt it.

Well, if I can't be your friend, I refuse to share any of my dancing boys with you. Nyah.

#157: You tell him, Terri!

>157 tloeffler: Ol buddy ol' pal ol' bosom (ew) companion Terri! Where you been hidin' your lovely self, not to mention the dancing boys?

*smiles craftily at narrowly averted dancing-boy bogarting by Terri*

Wheww! Where to jump in?? I read To Kill a Mockingbird in high school and loved it and then I was lucky enough to read it again with my daughter when she was in high school and it meant even more to me; but I think it's just like any other book, some people will like it and some won't.

Bojhalian reached his peak in his first book Midwives, IMO.

I remember reading the "American classic" Huckleberry Finn in high school and struggling to get through it but I think it's included because the powers that be have determined that it should be because of its classic status. Left to their druthers, students would never choose any of the books that are required reading that high schools dish out. The feeling is that students would never read these books otherwise which is exactly the point. And I see it. but considering the sorry state of affairs re:number of adults who actually consider reading "a" book, it seems to me that we should be exposing students to books that excite them and might turn on the switch to produce life-long readers.

Richard

great term---"Circus Freak."

Happy, happy spring to you!

>160 brenzi: But Bonnie, "The Classics" are classic for a reason. Shouldn't we expose kids to them *because* they're classics, and let the kids decide for themselves if they *like* them or not? I read the justifiably famous, game-changing book The Fellowship of the Ring and ABHORRED it...thought it was hideously overwrought and unendurably precious...but I still need to have it in my mental curio cabinet, if I'm going to be a functioning member of literate American society. Likewise Huck Finn and A Farewell to Arms and The Great Gatsby and all of Upton Sinclair...enjoyed them not at all, well Gatsby was okay, but I *need* to know about them firsthand. Not to mention that they've helped me become a confident judge of my own taste, while becoming able to distinguish between "I Like It" and "This Is Well-Made".

Such is my thinking, anyway. YMMV, of course.

>161 Whisper1: Linda, if you only knew how many times I've been to Baraboo, Wisconsin, and seen the Circus Museum...*shiver*

brenzi, you have a good point, but I would say there's a middle ground. Some of the books that junior high and high school students are made to read (or at least were when I was that age) should not be shoved down kids' throats. They can be used to teach certain "life lessons," etc., but they cannot be used to get kids excited about reading. And most of those life lessons can also be found in more contemporary and/or adolescent-friendly novels. But some of the books we're discussing have completely to do with the way they're taught. Huck Finn I would put in this category. To Kill a Mockingbird, too. Also MacBeth, by the way. I was lucky enough to have a great teacher who really brought Huck Finn alive for us in all sorts of ways and made us see how contemporary the story was. In the same class we read The Sun Also Rises, Catcher in the Rye, Mockingbird and MacBeth. Rather than showing us that all the "classics" were boring, this teacher showed us why they were considered classic, how alive these works were. (In fact, it wasn't until I got to grad school and ran smack into Henry James like a drunk walking into a lightpole that I found another boring classic.)

The class I'm recalling was 11th grade; in 10th grade I'd had a boring teacher who made A Tale of Two Cities and Julius Ceaser boring. Junior high I remember mostly as a Willa Cather festival. More than a little dreary (I would probably like those books now!), but with the occasional Treasure Island thrown in just to keep the boys from jumping out the window.

>163 rocketjk: But Jerry, A Tale of Two Cities is *Dickens* and Julius Caesar is a *play* and both those conditions of being are universally accepted as prima facie evidence of death-causing boredom. It really wasn't the teacher's fault at all.

>162 richardderus: Well they've been exposed for a zillion years now and we have an adult population composed of very few book readers. I'm just saying that we need to do something different if we want to change the outcome. I see high schools making some interesting changes to their reading lists and I hope that at some point that makes a difference.

I'm not saying that the classics are not worth bothering with but perhaps getting kids excited about reading first would then result in their trying some of the more challenging books that are out there, including the classics..

I am one of those... after highschool I thought I would never read a "classic" again. They were forced upon me, and I don't do well when forced ;-)
So for years I only read YA and an occasional Harlequin romance. Then there were some dark years I could not read at all.
But the phoenix did rise from the ashes. I read The name of the rose in 2008, Don Quixote last year and Moby Dick this year. Still the most of my readings are YA, but slowly I do read some books that are a bit harder to digest, but very tasty!

#165 Bonnie, I agree with you..and #163 Jerry, I agree with you, too. (In fact, you've probably read one of my rants on the subject of how Faulkner is taught, elsewhere on this site.) By the time a kid gets to junior high school, if he or she doesn't already know about reading for pleasure, the classics are going to be a mighty hard sell, and the last clear chance to change that kid into a reader is probably slipping away fast.

And I was wondering when someone was going to mention the dreaded whale!

I'm definitely one of those people who would rather encourage young people to read whatever they want, so that they become life-long readers, and then introduce them to classics once they become enthusiastic readers. I know far too many adults who don't like to read simply because the only thing they've ever read is intricately complex classic literature that they didn't grasp at that age. They read these classics that, yes, are very important, but they usually don't interest young people and usually they won't read another book in their lifetime after graduating.

So, do you educate them on classic literature in school and let them go on to become dull, non-reading morons as adults. Or do you let them read Harry Potter and Twilight in high school, get them hooked on books, and let them go on to become well-learned book readers as adults? I prefer the latter.

Ahhh...now I have it...I don't for one single instant think that schools can create passionate readers. That's done at home. I think the many who come to reading later in life would never have been available to books in school, peer pressure being what it is.

My idea isn't that we're creating more readers, just better informed kids. I think a person who comes from a house without books is most likely to create a house without books, and I don't see a lot of help for that in school. But school should cram some essential literary information into even the most recalcitrant kid.

Then again, I'm a cynical pessimist when it comes to human nature, to which I apply the Homeric phrase "red in tooth and claw."

169 Ahhh...now I have it...I don't for one single instant think that schools can create passionate readers

Acchh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Then I have wasted the last 40 years of my life. Schools do (at least the ones I've been associated with) promote excitement and passion for and love of reading every day. It's what we do! It's the most important thing we do!

>169 richardderus:: My idea isn't that we're creating more readers, just better informed kids.

I'm afraid the cynical side of me finds this wildly optimistic. Five years or a decade out of school, I suspect that kids who didn't like the book they were reading will be hard-pressed to remember the plot, let alone anything beyond that. And, since I don't think it's a reasonable goal to create well-informed children who are poorly-informed adults, you want them to engage with that early reading enough that they do enjoy it (or, at least, find value in it) and take something reasonably permanent from it.

...Even if that "something" is merely an openness to trying another book, and then another, and another.

...And even if that "openness" doesn't occur until after high school peer pressure diminishes.

Life is long for most and there is time for books. If you don't read The Catcher in the Rye in high school, you can read it as an adult. Not everyone needs to have read every classic to participate in a world of books. I don't mean to cause offense...really, I don't!...but I completely reject your statements in #162 that one must read Upton Sinclair, or A Farewell to Arms, or any specific work to "be a functioning member of literate American society."

I'm afraid I'm with brenzi on this one. If engagement is the sine qua non of taking anything lasting out of a book or (heaven forbid!) wanting to go on and try something else in a similar vein, let the kids have enough choice to try books that appeal to them. There is always time to go back and read Insert Classic Here but, if you burn them out before hand, there will never be the inclination. Perhaps creating passionate readers is rarer than we'd like in schools, but creating willing readers isn't. I watched younger siblings go from non-readers to readers (one passionate, the other not so much) simply because they were introduced to stories that resonated with them—something that hadn't happened with the particular books earlier teachers, or my mother, or I foisted upon them up until that point.

No one's saying, "let them read trash." However, I don't see what's wrong with telling a young girl who is unimpressed with the thought of a book about boys (The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn) that there is this other great story with a female protagonist (My Antonia). And, yes, that's a real-world example from my siblings many, many years ago.

Edit: typos

Good observations, Tad. And I believe that nobody needs to read Upton Sinclair...seriously, now. But I would submit that if you don't read The Catcher in the Rye in high school, you can cross it off your list, because some books have to be read at a certain time in your life to "work" (and I'm paraphrasing Richard here, from a related conversation that took place elsewhere - on my thread, maybe.)

>172 laytonwoman3rd:: Perhaps you're right.

I didn't read The Catcher in the Rye in high school because I missed my Junior year when everyone read it. I fully plan to read it at some point but I've always had this fear that I'll finish it and say, "So, what...exactly...is all the fuss about?"

Sounds like that fear may come true.

Of course, letting students choose their own books assumes they have an idea of what books they want to read. We also need to teach books that are good teaching tools in addition to being good books. By that I mean books through which a teacher can introduce students to themes of conflict, character, point of view, plot, etc. My high school teacher, for example, used Catcher in the Rye in part as a tool to teach the class about the concept of the "unreliable narrator". In retrospect, I would guess that he chose The Sun Also Rises and several of the Nick Adams story to teach, not because Hemingway is so wonderful but because he's an author with such obvious stylistic and thematic reference points. The teacher could therefore effectively show us how such factors can often be found throughout a particular writer's works. Huck Finn was an example of how a writer could use both drama and humor to skewer racism and hypocracy, while creating an interesting protagonist and exploring the friction between self-interest and loyalty.

So you have to find books that tell an interesting story and that also are good teaching tools. And you have to, by the way, have time to create good lesson plans. If you come into class on Sept 5 and ask for suggestions for what book to read first, even assuming you can get any sort of even moderate agreement, then, if you're the teacher, you have to run home, read the book overnight, find out how (or whether) you can use the book as a teaching tool, and set up a plan for doing so. And you have three or four different classes, so you're doing that three or four different times. Lots of luck.

I agree that more care needs to be taken in reading selections for our school kids, and that a cross section of eras, with an emphasis perhaps on more modern works, would be extremely helpful (although I haven't seen a junior high/high school literature syllabus for a long time, so maybe this has already happened).

>174 rocketjk:: If you go back to the beginning of this discussion, the option was not that the kids picked a book at random and informed the teacher of their choice. It was that the teacher provided a selection of books, saying "Read one of these," rather than "Read this one."

Mmm...interesting debate. I go away for a few hours to make a rhubarb cake, have dinner, and watch "Adam's Rib" on TV and just look at what happens!

Bonnie, I had no intention of insulting your career. I apologize for that.

As to letting kids decide what to read from a pre-selected list...it's asking a bit much of a teacher to supervise that kind of chaos, I would think, given the emphasis on standardized testing that classroom teachers are subjected to. But since I disagree with that emphasis, well, not much I can contribute to the discussion beyond "Don't keep doing what you're doing and expecting good results in the face of the generation-plus of bad ones we've seen."

I can see both sides of the debate. I have one child who is not by nature a reader and one child who is. For Beth, giving her a list of books to choose from and letting her make the selection of the one she would enjoy most or setting up a criteria that she had to meet in a book and allowing her to make a selection, worked. For Catey, who is like me and would read cereal boxes if hard-pressed, I could just say, read such-and-such book and she would tackle it.

One of the main benefits of homeschooling: you know your students extremely well.

Review: 15 of seventy-five

Title: THE LONG SONG

Author: ANDREA LEVY

Rating: *** of 5

What am I missing here? This is a perfectly good novel, and the character of Miss July is well-drawn, the story of Jamaica is interesting, but...great? How? Where?

It's all rather one-note cuteness from my POV. The narrative drive is that these are the memories of Miss July. So that takes any suspense out of the book. I know she's alive to tell the tale, so who cares who else dies?

I wonder if I should read Small Island now. I would hate to take another tepid bath in the Jamaican waters. I don't recommend this one with any vigor. Sure, if you can get it free, don't hesitate to accept it and read it. BUY it?! Oh hell no. Too many exciting books out there. I didn't connect with it, and I've read it twice now, so I think it's fair to say I've given the book a chance to make its mark on me.

It failed to do so.

#178: I have not read Small Island yet, so I cannot comment on whether you should read it or not, Richard. Perhaps Darryl might help you out? I believe he has read both The Long Song and Small Island.

>179 alcottacre: Someone would have to do one helluva sales job to make me want to read that now. I'm lukewarm and that's worse, IMO, than mad as hell.

Uh oh. Richard has his stinger out! Everybody duck.

>181 alcottacre: To the contrary, Stasia. I have often read books that have been Rave Fests here on LT....and ended up asking myself WHERE'S THE GOLD IN THIS LUMP OF COAL?. I don't usually say anything, though.... The Long Song is a case in point...except that i don't really want to read it...but someone is sending me a copy of Small Island..a freebie I just might read.

Good review, Richard..I'm glad I avoided the SIRENS BUZZ and stayed mine own course..

;-}

#182: I was not quibbling with Richard's review, Jude, only his comment that he was mad. I have also found books that others rave about on LT that I just go 'I do not get it.'

#183......and I wasn't pointing a finger at you, in any way Stasia...uh, I was trying to get my point across and was heavy-handed, is all..and Richard said he was "lukewarm about reading Small Island..which IMO (too) is worse than being angry....Apathy is so Sucky, in my case...because I tend to be pretty opinionated...When i have No Opinion..that's when it's time to Move On...

sorry if i ruffled yer feathers
J

#184: Nope, no ruffled feathers here, I just thought you thought I was knocking Richard's review and I wanted to clarify.

#185 Alrighty..I guess that's taken care of.....over & out
;-)

okay stasia.. here's my duck



I feel the same about some books just not reaching the wow factor for me.. that was one..

but then, The Hummingbird's Daughter was a wowza! for me, and yet certain others began to hate me for suggesting they read it. Most of them got over it..
one person is still on the fence...

#187: I am not one of the people who hates you for suggesting The Hummingbird's Daughter, since I loved it.

*relief* Glad to hear it :) the sequel is finished and in the hands of the publisher, I believe..

I have to ask him about the movie...

#189: I have no desire to watch a movie of THD - I am not much of a movie fan these days and that book was so good, I am afraid Hollywood will do nothing but mess it up!

I am not a movie fan either, and typically do not want to see movies of my favorite books in particular... and you are right about how the story is ruined. Case in point Mists of Avalon. This time, I am curious though, and will likely watch it.. not in a theater, goddess help me, but at home.

I will wait to see if it passes the 'Kath' test before I watch it!

:)

I liked The Long Song a bit more than you did, but it was nowhere near as good as Small Island, IMO. The realization that the narrator and Miss July were the same person didn't spoil the novel for me. In retrospect, I remember very little about the novel now, probably because the characters were not well developed, other than July.

Hmm...I see that I rated it 4 stars. That's too high; I'll bump it down to 3-1/2 stars.

Kathleen! I do *not* hate you for recommending that drivelous bird thing! I hate you for...well, another venue is perhaps more appropriate for that. The International Court of Justice shall be in touch with you, Madam.

Jude, I'm all ears for your reaction to Small Island. The Long Song was probably the biggest disappointment since the drivelous bird thing. At least this book was pleasant to read.

Darryl, I find that, since I don't acknowledge the books I read that either get Pearl Ruled or simply don't rate a review, I look like I give easy A's to the writers. I'm against writing nasty reviews on the whole, though I certainly have done so, so I don't really know how to handle this. I think it's a cheat to *rate* a book and not review it...*why* was that a 2-star read?!?...but I might be forced into it so I won't fall into the Pit of Rave Reviewers and be happy-perky-upbeaten.

Richard, maybe you should think 'constructive' instead of 'nasty' ... just a thought :)

LOL
luv ya!

ETA (oh, but he does scathing so well!)

>196 suslyn: Susan! I take back every nice thing I've ever said about you! "Scathing" indeed, how unfair, I am the *soul* of fair-and-balanced opinion-sharing!

LOL Yes, er..., indeed. You are always balanced in your scathing deliveries

And, from my thread, in case you've sworn it off:

No Richard, my summary is at the end of my first thread: http://www.librarything.com/topic/80701#1887213

And, yes, you do scathing rather well... and I'd guess you might even enjoy it :)

That does nothing to diminish my enjoyment of your person ... I can do 'scathing' rather well myself but try not to let loose as it was directed at people rather than their work, like a book... not good!

You do manage to do sathing very well darling, and it was not you that I was thinking of actually.. it was someone nearer by.. She said that if the plane window would have opened she would have tossed it into the Atlantic. She did finish it however, and ended up loving it.

I do believe that there were some dregs of hostility left for a while....

Review: 16 of seventy-five

Title: THROUGH THE CRACKS

Author: BARBARA FISTER

Rating: **** of 5

This ARC came to me courtesy of the author.

I like mysteries and I am especially partial to the cozier ones. This is about the farthest thing from cozy that I can imagine, with its cast of damaged, frightened people hunkered down against the seemigly endless emotional and legal storms that batter them.

And I loved it. It's very satisfying to read "outside the box" when there's a reward like this at the end. Anni Koskinen is about the last person on earth I'd expect to enjoy spending time with, and yet I do. She's a tough woman, but she's not tough in the faux-male swaggering way that's so irksome in PI fiction by other woman authors. She's tough in a genuine way, meaning her strength is what makes her tough, her decisions about her life as a result of the events in it make her tough, and her complete inability to imagine giving up before the Universe is compelled, by sheer force of her will, to deliver justice makes her tough.

In the course of solvng a decades-old rape, Anni fights through some of her personal demons and makes her peace with some terribly painful memories. She's involved up to the hilt in righting a series of very unpleasant wrongs. She's even, for the first time in a long time, daring to think about her own happiness. It's compelling reading.

Fister's Chicagoland is not a place I want to live, but I'll visit once in a way through Anni Koskinen's eyes. Recommended to those who enjoy fast-paced puzzlers, those who have a stronger-than-ordinary drive to see the evildoers in life punished appropriately, and the noir community at large. *NOT* for the tender of sensibility or those unable to endure violence.

#200: I will give that one a try. Thanks for the recommendation, Richard.

It comes out in May, Stasia, so be prepared to be patient. Or bug Mark for the ARC, since I've sent it to him and I think he'll be game to pass it on.

I checked this out..at your earlier mention...Good Review, Sweetie..and thanks for the differentiation vis-a-vis Tough Women..it's on THE LIST(the book)...but you are on my List forever

*she grins & winks and exits stage LEFT*

;-}

Sounds like I need to keep an eye peeled for that one.

#202: OK, thanks for letting me know the publication date. I will look for it then.

faux-male swaggering hate that too!

Great review, sir! It's always nice when an uncharacteristic read really clicks.

I'd add it to my watch list, but my desk-side shelf is about to snap, so i think I should focus on reading before picking up anything else. That is, if the grading ever stops...

Review: 17 of seventy-five

Title: MANIA

Author: CRAIG LARSEN

Rating: *** of 5

I don't think thrillers are all created equal. I think this book is a thriller because there isn't a sales category called "Noir" although, given the rate at which this kind of novel is being published, there soon will be.

I wasn't thrilled by the gory, bloody, lovingly depicted death and torture in the book. I wasn't thrilled by the editor's decision to leave a dizzying number of time-shifts in place. I wasn't thrilled by the sheer vileness of so many of the characters.

I was thrilled by the author's evident craftsmanship with words. I was thrilled by the plot's pacing, despite the time shifting...it all *worked* for the story being told. I was thrilled by the absence of a Hollywood ending.

And in spite of all the "ew" moments, I was thrilled by the relentless rightness of the story...that sense I get, in some books, that the story was authentically engaging and exciting to the author himself. It's intangible, it's unprovable, but it's also unmistakeable and unfakeable.

Recommended for the "noir" crowd, the puzzle people, and the gore ghouls. NOT for general consumption.

Your review makes me wish it was my kind of book :)

Three days -- and 78 posts??? Ye gods.

Weighing back in on the classics-in-schools debate, I'd argue for some kind of prescribed reading, simply because I think what DOES make someone a literate member of society is the ability to be able to look at a book and understand how or why someone might consider it a classic, even if it's not one that you would put on your own shelf of classics. Call it the ability to discriminate. For instance, both Julius Caesar and Mamma Mia are plays. But no one could argue seriously that they are of similar literary merit. James Patterson's YA novels and Catcher in the Rye probably have similar target readership, and yet there is a vast gap between them in the caliber of the writing and the fact that Salinger is actually exploring ideas. The ability to think about what makes something a "good book" is something that many people will acquire primarily in school, at some stage -- once they are out in the world, a lot of people who aren't avid readers as most of us here are, will read only rarely for pleasure, and won't think much about what they read. The probability that a 30-year-old will suddenly discover the joys of literature vs just reading a Danielle Steel or Harry Potter novel is MUCH lower than that a 15-year-old who is introduced to something classic will do the same -- especially since the latter's main job at that age is to acquire an education and is being actively asked to think about these things. There are few outside factors driving a 30-year-old office assistant to go off and think deeply about Dickens vs Eliot, for instance, if he or she hasn't already acquired that habit of thought. I'm not saying it can't happen, but the probability is low.

There is also the fact that we learn more easily when we are younger -- it's no coincidence that the people who speak multiple languages fluently and without accents tend to have learned them as children. (I just had afternoon coffee with a friend who grew up in Japan and attended French school there; her Japanese, French and English are all equally fluent.)

Ok, tirade over. I'm just about to give Dickens another try, with Bleak House. I read the first chapter in Barnes & Noble and found it remarkably vivid.

Save me a (heterosexual) dancing boy, pls, Richard...

Richard- You have such a dazzling thread going here! Interesting discussions and your usual "spot-on" reviews. THROUGH THE CRACKS sounds terrific! Sorry to hear you didn't care for Long Song but please don't let it influence your decision on reading Small Island. It's a fantastic read, my book of the year so far!

*has spots in front of my eyes from catching up on the 149 posts since my last visit to Richard's thread a few days ago!*

....weakly collapsing on couch to recover strength ......

Three days -- and 78 posts??? Ye gods.

Yup, busy thread! Lots of good stuff to comment upon . . . but too far behind for me to be timely.

#200 Through the Cracks sounds interesting.

#143 By late May, I'll may be un-buried enough from my current pile of half-read books and reading commitments to think about reading To Kill a A Mockingbird.

Re: classics / school reading lists: I advocate anything that will get kids reading stuff that will excite them, not bore them to tears. Some teachers can make the classics come alive to teens, but they are rare indeed. I simply didn't appreciate most of the classics until I was an adult. (Exception -- the Bronte sisters, but I discovered them through non-school sources.) But thank heavens, I had teachers who just got me excited about READING, and I eventually started to move beyond my original comfort zone in literature.

>209 suslyn: That was a lovely thing to say, Suse, but trust me...avoid this one, you'd LOATHE it.

>210 Chatterbox: Suzanne my dear, innocent silly, there *are* no heterosexual dancing boys. Metrosexual is about as close as you'll get, and frankly why would any woman want a man who's as likely to raid her lotions-and-products shelf as her fridge?

>211 msf59: Mark, you'll judge for yourself whether it's a good'un when you get it. Should be Tuesday or Wednesday.

>212 cameling: You'll be needing that strength, dear Caro, when I begin the reviling-and-berating campaign against you for causing Tigana, all 15068736pp of it in a TENTH-ANNIVERSARY EDITION (!), to land atop my TBR Tower, causing it to topple onto the dog and requiring the combined efforts of myself and Gale Force Girl (here for Easter) to unbury and resuscitate the aforementioned pet.

>213 tymfos: Hi Terri!

awww.....poor Ms Stella ....... i hope she isn't too traumatized from the tower falling on her because her silly owner didn't think to put the book somewhere else instead of at the tippy top of a teetering TBR Tower. Really, she should just cast you disdainful looks for the rest of the afternoon while you grovel for forgiveness.

>215 richardderus: wanna trade? Mine's grungy and well-used :)

>214 richardderus:, Hugh Jackman is heterosexual and he has been known to sing and dance? Perhaps he's a dancing man... Well, I'd settle for a Hugh Jackman clone. :-)

#215: I hope poor Stella is recuperated, Richard!

>214 richardderus:, 218 Oh, yeah--I must take you to task for that one, too, Richard. Hugh Jackman, Richard Gere, Michael Flatley...

I've added Through the Cracks. Sounds like something I'd enjoy.

Michael Flatley? Hmmm...he gestalted differently to me.

#173 I'm afraid that may be true Tad (unless you have particularly vivid memories of being a teenager) - I've very seldom come across an adult who's just read Catcher in the Rye for the first time who could understand what all the fuss was about... You never know though...

Fascinating discussions re school literature. Not sure where I'd weigh in on the arguments - maybe somewhere in between - surely it's possible to pick one or two modern classics that have something to draw in reluctant readers?

I think, perhaps, that a large part of how we accept the classics when we're younger is how they're taught in the first place - a truly enthusiastic teacher can make anything interesting, but even without that, if a book is introduced specifically as "a classic" and "something you should read", it's going to sound a lot less appealing than as something exciting that is still relevant today, or that influenced many people.

Of course, having parents or friends who are avid readers is also a huge advantage - I regularly read far more classics as a child than I read these days (shame on me) - and the vast majority of those I picked off my parents shelves for myself. Still do. I very rarely come away from their place without at least one book.

#214 "there *are* no heterosexual dancing boys - Adam Cooper?

#218 Hugh Jackman DANCING?!?!

Note to self, really must give Mark Twain a shot one of these days...

I have Barbara Fister's first crime novel which I acquired years ago, and wish I could get the others here. I'm glad to know you were impressed by it. She's part of an email discussion group I'm on and she's someone I always look out for what she has to say on her reading. She's also here on LT.

#223 RE: Hugh Jackman dancing, Big Time

#222 Flatley keeps marrying women and having children. I know that's not conclusive, but...

Review: 18 of seventy-five

Title: A TOUCH OF DEAD

Author: CHARLAINE HARRIS

Rating: ***1/2 of 5

April TIOLI read for short-stories challenge.

How fun. Sookie Stackhouse in short tales that are placed within the Sookieverse in gaps between the books. I think Harris has a superb grasp of what her readers expect and so has made her fortune with this clever, amusing set of tales. She delivers consistent and coherent world-building entries into the developing canon of stories. She makes certain her books have all the elements that have caused these otherwise slight stories to rocket to the top of the heap: Sex, spooks, sex, a likeable heroine, sex, and romantic entanglements. And sex.

I will never offer these books as evidence of the cultural superiority of the Western world, but I also won't keep 'em behind the other books on the bookshelf, embarrassed to have anyone see that I read Charlaine Harris. I think her writing is perfectly adequate, but not much more than that; her imagination is the thing that makes her books worth reading. She's created an internally consistent and very plausibly presented alternate world, and in a lot of ways a world that I'd prefer to live in, if I could find a way there.

The stories are fun by themselves; but my favorite one is the obligatory Christmas tale in which Sookie's newly discovered great-grandfather Niall the faerie king gives her the single most wonderful, thoughtful, and unusual gift I've ever heard or thought of. I won't give it away, but...like, wow.

Recommended for fans of the series. Not a place to start.

What a lovely review. Makes me want to run out and buy Harris -- and I don't even enjoy short stories, although ones set in to go with a series I love have occassionally been enjoyable.

I love Sookie Stackhouse, Richard! Thanks for the review. I'm not usually a fan of short stories, but I just may break down and buy this book. You've now got me curious about what the gift could be.

The True Blood TV series, though, absolutely sucks pond water. Major drek. I bought the first season, optimist that I am, but couldn't even get through the second episode.

Have you read any of Harris' Harper Connelly series? There are 4 of them and they're pretty good too. Very different from Sookie, although Harper's quirky and lovable like Sookie and has a unique "gift".

#226: Somehow I have missed buying that one. I will have to see if I can locate a copy. Thanks for the recommendation, Richard.

**YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE**

A "dancing boy" is **NOT** a person with a Y chromosome who moves more or less aesthetically appealingly to the beat of music. A dancing boy is a male, usually young, whose career path includes moving seductively that which a beneficent nature has endowed him with (aka, shakin' his moneymaker) before a crowd of lasciviously titillated persons possessed of the money to procure some further contact with his person. Analogue to "go-go girl" or "pole dancer." I seriously doubt, given that definition, that Mr. Jackman or Mr. Flatley (Lord Flatley?) would appreciate being drawn into this discussion.

Flatley is about as gay as John Wayne.

Jackman, who played uberqueer Peter Allen on Broadway, is not gay either. He is, however, completely fearless as an actor.

That is all. Return to normal activities.

Thanks for the explanation Richard Dear.
But in my mind it COULD be a dancing, male human too.
So I did not mind the link to Hugh Jackman, but I personally like older, grumpy curmudgeons ;-)

Richard

You might want to check the kitchen thread where I've posted a link to bookcloseouts.com. They are having a huge sale of fiction books for only $1.99 each!

>231 FAMeulstee: And the older-curmudgeon community lives in gratitude that this is so, Anita!

>232 Whisper1: What? WHAT?!? *taptap* This thing must be broken, I can't understand you, Linda!

>233 richardderus: Hahaha you really make me laugh Richard. Linda thinks she's doing a public service by telling us about the book sale when, in reality, we close our eyes and put our fingers in our ears trying to get away before we succumb and sneak over there to see what's up. Ahh isn't LT grand ;-)

*sigh* Just give up, Richard .... you will succumb like the rest of us .... you will be compelled to head over to take a quick peek at the sale .... books for $1.99 !! how could you not?

She should make commission off everything people from LT buy...she's great advertising.

Flately...hmmm...well, I'll be darned
Absolutely loved Peter Allen (RIP Peter) - saw him live and whatta show! Hugh Jackman doing Peter Allen...now I'd pay good money to see that.

Just did a little BookDepository fly by, so ixnay on the ooksbaycloseoutsbay.

Review: 19 of seventy-five

Title: HEAT WAVE

Author: RICHARD CASTLE

Rating: *** of 5

As a rule, I watch very little TV that isn't about science, on PBS, or revoltingly prurient. Outside of that, why bother? So the other year, there came on this little show called "Castle" that had a promising premise: Bestselling author strongarms NYC mayor into giving him access to a working homicide team to research a character for some novels. (Yeah, right.) Sorta like being an embedded journalist in Afghanistan.

I heard about it, I watched a few, I liked it fine. I forgot all about it after a few episodes, which is pretty much Standard Operating Procedure for me, unless the show is revoltingly prurient in which case its entire schedule is permanently etched in my brain (need to know when another episode of "Spartacus: Blood and Sand" is coming on? Me or the website, either one can tell you).

Then this slender volume assaults my eyes in the Buns and Nubile I patronize in Carle Place. I mean, what? A book by a fictional author in a real bookstore? And it's not soap opera related?! (Charm! Kendall Hart go look it up, and yes I watch "All My Children" I already said I like revoltingly prurient TV so leave it.) So I got...oh the shame...curious. I couldn't bring myself to plunk down twenty United States dollars for the little marvy, but the liberry saved me.

Sort of saved me, anyway. I read the book, a competently written tale of love gone bad, greed, revenge, and a dash of silly sex tossed (!) in for good measure. I wouldn't recommend it on its literary merits.

But I was struck by something interesting...the TV network that runs the show is owned by the same corporation that owns the publishing house, and that corporation owns several companies whose products figure into the story. The story itself isn't the usual "this is a script we couldn't find a way to budget so now it's a hit-series-companion-volume" type of thing...this is the book the fictional author in the series is said to be researching and writing, featuring the thinly disguised fictionalization of the sexy homicide detective he's following around. So for fans of the show, there are in-jokes and throwaways that add a level of insiderness to the read.

And it makes me feel a little queasy, frankly. It's all so...arch, manipulative, packaged that it just comes across as...cynical. It reeks of editorial committee meetings wherein the Corporate Parent's Wishes are acceded to. Possibly even applauded. Whatever, it just isn't natcherl, like a blue rose isn't. Recommended? Oh...on balance, not; if you're interested in plumbing the depths of commercialization, this is a good case study, though.

#238: Not at all interested in that one, so I will give it a pass. Nice review though, Richard.

#238. Thanks, Richard nice review, but I don't think that I could be bothered with the book, but then there are a lot of things that I can't be bothered with, so please don't be insulted.

comment = EEK!
apply where appropriate.

:)

Next gen product placement has arrived, in a bookstore near you...

The more I think about it, Suzanne, the more I wonder if I'm not overreacting to this book. After all, Slime-on and Shyster have been doing this very thing with their various Star Trek series of sharecroppin' books, haven't they? How many squillions of those have passed me by without so much as a wince from me, no discomfort at the royalty-less-ness of the authors. I think that's because they were writing under their own names, and Terri What's-it who wrote this book wrote as a fictional character.

But this is different from the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew how? The internal product placements? Given the brand-name-droppin' shopping fiction and chick lit titles, I can't really see why I feel a line has been crossed.

Yet I do.

No, I agree with you. The Star Trek novels were clearly tied to the films/TV series, in the same way that the action figures were. In this case, it's a tie-in posing as a 'real' book. It bugs me. I think one reason is that most tie-ins are part of a big phenom, like Star Trek. Castle, as you note, is/was a relatively minor show (not like Law & Order in terms of visibility.)

I'll contrast this, for instance, to tie-ins for a BBC series I love called Spooks there, and MI-5 here. There are two books published that tie-in to the story, one a fictional diary. But it's clearly fictional, and it's labeled as such -- part of the series. The Castle "novel" is a very clever idea indeed, but IMO a step too far.

ETA: Would someone in a store who spots this be immediately aware of its status as a tie-in? And could it be read with full enjoyment as a novel in its own right, exclusive of its nudge-nudge, wink-wink references to the show? If the answer to either is "no", then it crosses the line.

Oh, I like the tie-ins for Torchwood, too! I guess the tie-in-ness makes it all, oh I don't know, above-board somehow.

Actually, as an adult, I see the value in the Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew model of different writers/one name model, but it still makes me uncomfortable. (As a kid, it was completely transparent to me, of course.) Once upon a time, when I was a literary agent, I got a submission for a book called "The Rooster Crowed At Midnight." It purported to be the actual book that the characters of "M*A*S*H" couldn't put down and kept stealing from each other as they went about the course of one episode of the show.

Quite a quandary...no one can copyright a title, so we were free to use it; but the rights to market it as a tie-in of sorts to "M*A*S*H" would have been murky, and liable to be expensive. Plus there was the whole "it ended in the 80s" issue, though frankly I didn't see that as a problem until the money angle started bothering me.

So was that idea different from this one, in any material way? I begin to think not. And I thought then, and think now, that "The Rooster Crowed at Midnight" would've been a blast to publish and read.

*peeks over her desk*
I like Castle.
*Hides*

Hi Jenn! I like "Castle" just fine. I can't keep up with it, since I can't seem to remember when it's on until after it's over. I'll Hulu the whole series one long, rainy day.

Again, I come back to the 'will customers know' issue, or would they care if they didn't. Had your book been published in the 80s, I think most people would have made the M*A*S*H connection, or it could have been talked up in the PR. But also, presumably, it would have been a book in its own right -- a stand-alone book.

If the Castle book isn't good enough to stand alone, if it relies on its ties to the show and those ties aren't disclosed, I think it's problematic, although not on legal grounds. I worry less about the authors -- they should do their due diligence before signing a contract -- than I do about customers.

Review: 20 of seventy-five

Title: LEVIATHAN

Author: SCOTT WESTERFELD

Rating: **** of 5

This book was a lovely surprise giftie from A Certain Saintly LTer. *mmmwaaah*

Wow. Really, just...wow. I love alternate histories, and I dote on steampunk, and I am learning just how fertile the YA vineyards are in both these realms. This book is a wonderful tale of an alternate WWI, fought between the Darwinist powers and the Clankers. That is, those whose fighting technology is genetically manipulated animal based, and those whose fighting technology is...well, technology.

Darwin's theories of evolution became available to manipulate and modify animals at a much earlier stage of reality than our own, and of course the first thing that was created was fighting machines. Well, duh, we're talking about humans here, and what do we love better as a species than killing each other? The author, whose prejudices are clearly against the killing of others, never preaches, though his subtext is pretty overt to adult readers.

The story's focus is on a teenaged Hapsburg prince, the son of Franz Ferdinand (the archduke, not the Scottish dance band), whose factuality I have no idea about...though it wouldn't surprise me if there was a large dollop of truth in it...as he attempts to survive the loss of his parents, the bewildering early days of the war, and the inevitable confrontation of his prejudices with the realities of the Great Evil Other Side, the Darwinists. It's a very good piece of storytelling, no doubt about it; it's also a subtle and undidactic meditation on the sense of self as it's constructed during our adolescence, with all the pressures and trials magnified by both war and the identity that the young hero didn't choose.

His opposite number, a Darwinist airshipman, is secretly a girl, and this fact would just get her bounced out of service...whereas the prince's withheld identity, though known to midshipman Dylan/Deryn Sharp, would get him imprisoned and used as a pawn in international politicking. Both identities are kept secret, thank goodness, or there wouldn't be a sequel.

Which had darn straight better be forthcoming soon! I liked this book, and I recommend it to all lovers of identity fiction, steampunk aficionadoes, and the odd curious tourist into this twisty piece of literary territory. It's a great first steampunk book. Enjoy!

#249: Nice review, Richard. I am going to give it the old thumbs up now!

>248 Chatterbox: Point well taken, Suzanne...the book could easily stand on its own as a publishable mystery, if a bit formulaic. Its execution is in no way extraordinary, but it's far far far from the worst I've read!

I still wonder where this will all lead. But by the reasonable-reader standard you propose, this book isn't a fraud or a rip-off. A random reader who'd never seen "Castle" would get something out of the book.

>250 alcottacre: Thank you, o Certain Saintly LTer. It's a really beautiful looking book, too, with that exotic and complex jacket, the maps on the endsheets, and the illustrations throughout. An altogether impressive package.

Since it's over 250, my strongly preferred post-count cutoff, I've started a fifth thread for y'all's comfort and convenience.

#252: You are not to divulge my secret.

#225 Oh my. ;o)

"It's all so...arch, manipulative, packaged that it just comes across as...cynical. It reeks of editorial committee meetings wherein the Corporate Parent's Wishes are acceded to. Possibly even applauded. Whatever, it just isn't natcherl, like a blue rose isn't. Recommended? Oh...on balance, not; if you're interested in plumbing the depths of commercialization, this is a good case study, though."

Hmmmm . . . . sounds like a great idea for a book, though! A novel fictionalizing the creation of this devilish, conglomerate manipulation. Then the movie version, in which the lead character is seen reading the book version, making the movie a vehicle for the product placement of itself in book form.

You make Leviathan look very interesting. Maybe one of these days . . .

Seems like Stephen King tried the same sort of thing a few years ago with "The diary of Ellen Rimbauer," a fake-diary tie-in to his "Rose Red" television mini-series. It later turned out that the book wasn't by King after all, and library patrons were incensed.

I think something like that was done for Twin Peaks too.

But I think if there is ever a booby prize for cynical corporate assault on all media it ought to be named for the Garth Brooks character Chris Gaines. Fortunately or otherwise, that whole plot imploded before we were treated to the movie and fake biography -- but not before the CD, mockumentary and "greatest hits" songbook.

RICHARD!! I came back from my local library today and somewhere lost in the giant pile of books I checked out is Brave New World. However, out of retaliation I'm going to read it second. I'm reading another books first! Bwahahaha! ...

Stephen...on your head be it, then, when you come to read it and start getting dizzy with the sheer majesty of it and then begin to berate yourself for not reading it sooner...just remember to say to yourself, "Richard told me so...."

And see post #253? It has a link to my new thread!