50 Books in a Year Book #2: Charlotte Temple

All the morality of Jane Austen without any of the fun, Fantine without all the wonderful singing. Vanity Fair lite...triple ugh. Dear Reader, I've decided I loathe being talked to directly by the narrator.

I'd like to write more, but you see, I'd start talking about this book out of context of its time period and I'd be bad-mouthing things about it that weren't really in its control...like the plot, the lack of character development and other things that make books worth reading. I'm glad it's the first successful American novel, blah, blah, blah. I'm not sorry that I read it, blah, blah, blah...I'd recommend it to no one. I mean unless your into seduction novels, full of crap whose sole purpose is to make girls afraid of their feelings, of living, of leaving their parents homes and going out on their own...

See, I've gotta stop.

50 Books in a Year Book #1: The Sun Also Rises

The first time I read this book I was a senior in high school. It didn't give me a lust for Spain, Paris or bullfights, but it did give me this itch to travel and explore the American Dream. This year I'm teaching this book in a separate unit with some Harlem Renaissance thrown in for good measure. I look forward to talking about it as a part of Modernist literature and as another aspect of the American Dream, our disillusionment, or the death of the dream as it were.

The second and third times I read it, I focused mostly on character development with emphasis on Lady Brett Ashley. I'm a sucker for guys like Jake Barnes (more about that later), truly he's the reason I love this novel, but he wouldn't be the totally flawed, screwed-up, believable man he is without Lady Brett Ashley.

You see, I think she's a pretty amazing look at the modern woman. I may not want to emulate her 100%, but there are aspects of her character that, like Wonder Woman and Laura Holt, are part of mine.

The traits I like are simple:

1] She does what she wants Drinking, yes please. Smoking, okie doke. A bullfighter, a count, Cohn, sign her up. During my first read I thought what my students always think about her (you know that she's a ho), but she really isn't. If she was a man doing what she's doing nobody would care. It would seem a lot of people can't get past this to realize that she is just coping with her unhappiness and it is just part of the drinking and the other stuff that they are all doing.

2] She is independent and what confines her is in her head. This is true of all women. Heck, this is true of all  people. In the 1920s I think this was just becoming the normal view of things.

3] She loves and wants to be loved Brett loves Jake. Jake loves her. Their lives are complicated. This is pretty real stuff.

4] She can run with the best of them She's pretty darned honest about who she is and what she does. Sometimes strangely so...she's not going to let anyone or anything get past her. Sure, she doesn't really have any dreams or goals, but none of them do really, and I'd pick her over Daisy Buchanan any day (honestly, can you read both novels without comparing the two).

This time around I read it as a person past her 20s enough that I can remember them fondly with only a tiny hint of nostalgia.

There's a review of the movie adaptation on IMDB, and while I don't recommend watching the movie if you love this book, it is only a shadow of the book, even if it does have some great name actors and in that respect reminds me of the movie for The Fountainhead, I do love this review for the following:

the 'Lost Generation' Hemingway wrote of were disillusioned young Americans, who, shattered by the horror and brutality of a meaningless 'Great War', lost their innocence, and became a 'live fast, die young' crowd of expatriates, settling in Paris. These were men and women in their twenties and thirties...

As a person now in my late thirties I understand the feelings of these characters, and while I've never been to war, I understand what it means to be lost...in some ways we are all at one time or another lost. In this novel we see Hemingway's understanding of that. We see, that although he must not have felt this hope himself, he wants us to see that we don't always live in this lost moment in our lives. He also wants us to see that this hedonistic time helps mold and shape us. It is one of the many pillars that hold up our foundation. Yes, foundation. I'd even go so far as to say that it's part of that stereotypical American journey.

I can't wait to read this book again.

The End of the Affair by Graham Greene

I absolutely love the writing of Graham Greene. I especially enjoy his Catholic novels. I was introduced to these deeply personal and rich novels in college when I had to read Brighton Rock for a lit class. I became obsessed with the idea of a novel getting away from you. The idea of Green trying to write a detective story that turned into a morality tale is an idea I still find fascinating. I read The Heart of the Matter and The End of the Affair on my own later that year and a few years later a friend let me borrow The Power and the Glory. Although these books are just too perfect, my favorite, by far, is The End of the Affair.

I have always been a sucker for a love story where one person in the relationship loves the other person so much that they can never be together; add to that mix some sort of love triangle in which there's an insipid husband or myopic lover and I am sold.

I think it is because of this book that I understand the fact that in order to truly hate someone or something you truly are feeling something (pain, anger et cetera) towards the very thing you are trying to forget, and, having feelings means there's still hope of reconcilation. Hate can turn into love just as easy as love can become hate. It's when there isn't any feeling at all that you've got to worry. The heart knows even when the mind doesn't really want to at all and when you read this novel you understand what happens between Sarah and Maurice way before Maurice does and you understand that Maurice's pain at never seeing Sarah again is because he loves her so much. You may not realize the fact that she loves him too until the very end, but you know that Maurice's is a mean, selfish man because he feels too much not because he feels nothing at all.

The End of the Affair not only has all of these traits, it also has a gorgeous movie (the version starring Ralph Fiennes and Julianne Moore). There is a scene, which starts on the couch and ends on some stairs, that is so sexy and romantic and tragic at the same time I hold my breath when I watch it. 

Watch the movie, read the book...learn a lesson or two about sacrifice and redemption, do it...do it...now.

Ethan Frome in the Honors Sophomore Classroom

[Isn't this just the most delicious cover ever!? Source]

Ethan Frome

I read Ethan Frome for the first time in college and immediately fell in love. This book is written unlike any of Wharton's other books, but still contains some of the same themes of isolation and redemption. We read it with Our Town. Over the years I've taken to called this unit the Small Town Unit, as we explore the plusses and minuses of small town life and the gloriousness of being alive through these two works. I've read that a lot of 9th graders read this book. While they can read it and probably get it on some level, I enjoy teaching it to my honors kids at the 10th grade level. I think you need to have at least dated or experienced a little heart break of some sort to truly get into this novel.

Classic American Novel
Ethan Frome

• Delicious love triangle
• Individual vs. Personal Happiness
• the color red

Projects used:
Sadly, I have no idea where I got any of these sources, if you know or if the core of one of them is yours tell me...I love to give credit for things I don't totally create from my head. I do know that I've used the study guide from Glencoe McGraw Hill.

Ethan Frome and Edith Wharton notes
FOILS in Ethan Frome
Understatement
Frame Story
Agatha Christie writing prompt
"Man of the Hour"

Why I love this book: 
When I first read this book a million years ago it was Winter, and I've got to tell you reading a book about a man trapped in a small New England town as stark as its name just made that winter day all the more wonderfully bleak. I love that every year I teach this book I really can't decide who's responsible for Ethan's downfall...naive and desperate Ethan, love-torn and forlorn Mattie or cold and pathetic Zeena. This book can and should be read in one sitting and after you read it I dare you not to be upset with all three characters and I dare you to not look at a winter day a little differently.

Sample calendar with poems and short stories I pair with it:

55 Books in a Year: Book #57 Antigone and #58 The Woman in Black

Two Classic Novels

I read both of the books below for school. We were doing a new unit using Antigone and Persepolis and I read The Woman in Black for to complete the projects for our second independent read.

A Classic Greek Play
Antigone

• First heroine in literature
• Classic display of hubris

Projects used:
Adapted from Novel Units: Antigone Teaching Guide
The Oedipus Story
Persepolis Movie Questions
Irony in Antigone
Foils in Antigone
Antigone Structure-Summary Diagram
Persepolis/Antigone Pardon Essay
Allusions in Antigone

Why I love this book: 
I've always enjoyed the many aspects of this play as they are the first time ever to be seen. I like that when I read it the first time I really thought that Antigone was a strong, proud woman who stood up for her beliefs. I liked that upon reading it again I recognized that both Antigone and Creon could have changed their fates by listening to one another and I realized that while I didn't want to be Ismene, Antigone really isn't someone to emulate. She just seems stubborn and bull-headed. I wasn't really impressed by Haemon either.

A Modern Classic in the Gothic Style
The Woman in Black

• Includes several popular Gothic elements
• Classic ghost story

Projects used:
One-Pager and Single Page book

Why I love this book:
I like that I didn't even know that this book was published in the 80s, until I began reading it. I thought it was just a Gothic novel that I didn't know about. The build up to the end of this book was pretty gosh darned awesome. I kept on wondering what was going to happen and well, the ending does not disappoint in the sheer creepiness department.

55 Books in a Year: Book #48 The Bloody Spur

"But when they should endure the bloody spur, 
They fall their crests, and, like deceitful jades, 
Sink in the trial. Comes his army on?"
~Julius Caesar Act IV; Scene 2

I love film noir and I love classic pulp fiction. There's just something about an underpaid under-appreciated guy looking for the truth, trench-coat flapping, cigarette burning. Cleaning my classroom this summer I found a bunch of old books and in that pile was this lovely book The Bloody Spur (1st edition, opposite of mint condition). I cataloged the book and looked to see if they had it on the Nook, as I knew I wanted to read it, but didn't want to hurt the spine or break the cover any more than it already was.

Just, so you know last month they began to offer this classic pulp novel as an ebook and it's only $.99. It's got a few typos, but still it's a fun read.

The story opens with the funeral of a prominent newspaper man. At the grave-site and across the way there's a procession for a murdered secretary, the second, they believe, in a row of ghastly murders committed by the same evil man.

And, like any good piece of pulp this book goes off on many devious and bawdy tangents. There are four men vying for the spot left vacant by the newsman's death. These men are sleeping with their secretaries, one hires his mistress to seduce and blackmail someone else, there's lying and thieving and conniving and in the middle of it all there's these grisly murders. Based on real life events:

In 1952, he wrote a successful book called the "Bloody Spur," which was based on the crimes of William Heirens, the "Lipstick Killer," who terrorized Chicago in the mid-1940s. Movie director Fritz Lang later made the book into a celebrated 1956 film noir called "While the City Sleeps," which was set in New York.

Now, I've got to just find that movie...although, I'm sure it's taken out all the juicy bits. 

55 Books in a Year: Book #47 The Amazing and Death-Defying Diary of Eugene Dingman

When it comes to coming of age novels I enjoy an good story about an angsty, awkward teenage boy. I especially enjoy this kind of book when our male protagonist narrates. It's no wonder why I am in deep love with the blonde, uncomfortable male lead in the novel The Amazing and Death-Defying Diary of Eugene Dingman by Paul Zindel. Eugene Dingman reminds me a lot of Holden Caulfield, both are angsty and self-absorb, but when I was younger I felt they hung the moon.

I didn't realize how much this book is a foundation of my being until I re-read it. My favorite quote and philosophy of living comes from this novel.

"It doesn't make any difference what you do in the bedroom as long as you don't do it in the street and frighten the horses." ~Mrs. Patrick Campbell

Although I thought it was my idea to read Madame Bovary, I think it started here with Eugene.

I also didn't realize how many references, pop and political, lit and theatrical, exist in this book and you can't tell me that the Kauffman's (think Friends') and the Palladino's (think The Gilmore Girls) weren't subtly influenced by this book and Zindel as well.

One can not argue that this novel is a classic, a classic YA novel that I just had to nominate for the classic YA read for the month of August, (Nobody's commented on my comments if you want to join, read and do so that would be awesome). It follows the basic classic literature tenets.

From About.com and a conversation had at YA Reads...
1] is an expression of life truth or beauty this is a coming of age novel that has a male protagonist that deals with many of the things (family relationships or lack thereof, thoughts of suicide, friendships, running away) that teens deal with, and we read about his life 1st hand in his journal...whether the authors know it or not, this book is a foundation for books such as The Perks of Being a Wall-flower, An Abundance of Katherines's and  Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, as they have conflicted male voices as protagonists.

2] stands the test of time it's on many booklist, especially when looking for classic male coming of age books...and, i found several reading list, here are three of note:

Paul Zindel's Classic Novels
Various school districts including this one
Reading Suggestions for Advanced Readers

 It's also 'an American Bookseller Pick of the Lists, New York Public Library Books for the Teen Age

3] has universal appeal Zindel's books are much like SE Hinton's books in the sense that they appeal to a certain kind of kid, usually reluctant reader types or fringe kids as his characters exhibit some of these traits...Eugene Dingman is no exception.

4] makes connections From the back: "On his fifteenth birthday, precocious Eugene Dingman begins the amazing and death-defying diary of his summer spent as a waiter at a ritzy Adirondack resort." Here's a review from 1988 that I think hits the nail on the head. Any person who has doubted, wonder, puzzled and struggled will find something to relate to in the character Eugene Dingman. I know I did! Hope this helps! :D

Seriously, go grab yourself that mix-tape I know you've been itching to play since you found your tape player, pop it in and read this lovely homage to the 80s, brilliant teenagers full of ennu and summertime. Afterwards you might want to watch Dirty Dancing or any movie involving John Cusack as a teenager. You've been warned.

55 Books in a Year: book #44 The Last Unicorn

My first memory of The Last Unicorn is from 1982. My grandfather had taken the three of us to watch the movie. I was 5 years old. I remember that he bought us popcorn and a soda and candy each, so we didn't have to share. I remember sitting on one side of him, my sister Marissa on the other, my sister Kim beside me. Eventually Kim moved into the seat with me (there are parts of that movie that really are scary to a 4 year old).

I was mesmerized by the unicorn "the color of snow falling on a moonlit night", I fell in the love the singing and I was enchanted by the story of a lone unicorn searching for her brothers and sisters. A unicorn who sacrificed herself to save those she didn't even know she loved.

I remember reading the book not long after and I realize, now that I've read it again, I didn't get a lot of it and the parts that I remember most vividly are the parts that are included in the movie; a movie I have seen at least 100 times. This book, like other fairy tales, is perfect in the sense that it has the fantastic story of a unicorn, a prince, a castle, the sea, adventure and love. As an adult I still had all of these themes floating around in my head and heart, but as an adult I could see all that the unicorn lost and I could see all that she gained. When I was a kid the story didn't seem so bittersweet. I just liked all the unicorns. I knew she couldn't be the last.

You can read the sequel...I guess one can call it a sequel here. It's even more bittersweet and, well, sad.

55 Books in a Year: Book #28 Albert Nobbs

I started reading Albert Nobbs when I stumbled upon it and recognized that it was cheap, short and a recent movie.

After reading the intro, a lovely one by Glenn Close (did you know she played Albert in NYC as one of her first characters ever?), I knew that I must read it.

Alfred is a girl who doesn't realize she has dreams. As head waiter at a prestigious restaurant she uses her secret identity as a man to grow a nice nest-egg for herself. She understands that it is this identity that enables her to live a decent life and she doesn't want to ruin it. That is until she is forced to bunk with a man named Hubert and a flea threatens to ruin her secret.

After Albert's encounter she begins to wish for a wife and home, children and freedom, all the things that Hubert told her that she could have. Without Hubert around to guide her, she begins a relationship with a flirty, money-grubbing maid. This relationship will be her downfall.

At first glance this story seems to be nothing more than a sorrowful tale of lost identity and of love; how sad it must be to recognize that you can have more in life, but not know how to get it.

But, it's so much more than that as it comments on...

Societies treatment of gender
Albert wouldn't even be considered for her job as a woman. As a woman she would have become a prostitute or worse to survive. Being a man during this time period forced Albert into her livelihood and into her falsehoods. It would seem that men, too, are limited by their gender roles and can only be in pursuit or alone. Albert learns that to get and keep a woman he must spend money and time...it seems that it does not require honesty and forth-rightness.

Androgyny
As a man, Albert wants a woman to complete her, but not in the sexual sense. Only a woman can help her raise a family and only a room can help her keep her house. In this respect she reminds me of the women in the novel The Fox. It isn't that she wants a relationship, it's that she can't see the way around getting what she wants without being in one. It is this thought that proves to be disastrous.

Love
In the end, Albert's false feelings ruins him. Having had no other friends, because he didn't allow himself out of fear, and having never been in a relationship, he cannot figure out how to make it work. Albert learns about the ideals of love from those that would rather use it has an ends to a means. He cannot have what Hubert has with Cathleen because he is searching in all the wrong places.

Male/Female relationships
Albert is used by society, by women, and by men. Her naive nature limits her experiences. In the end every relationship is crushed.

And, all I could think about while reading this book was this poem:


THE FLEA.
by John Donne

MARK but this flea, and mark in this,
How little that which thou deniest me is ;
It suck'd me first, and now sucks thee, 
And in this flea our two bloods mingled be.
Thou know'st that this cannot be said
A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead ;
    Yet this enjoys before it woo,
    And pamper'd swells with one blood made of two ;
    And this, alas ! is more than we would do.

O stay, three lives in one flea spare,
Where we almost, yea, more than married are.
This flea is you and I, and this
Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is.
Though parents grudge, and you, we're met,
And cloister'd in these living walls of jet.
    Though use make you apt to kill me,
    Let not to that self-murder added be,
    And sacrilege, three sins in killing three.

Cruel and sudden, hast thou since
Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?
Wherein could this flea guilty be,
Except in that drop which it suck'd from thee?
Yet thou triumph'st, and say'st that thou
Find'st not thyself nor me the weaker now.
'Tis true ; then learn how false fears be ;
Just so much honour, when thou yield'st to me,
Will waste, as this flea's death took life from thee.

---

Source:
Donne, John. Poems of John Donne. vol I.
E. K. Chambers, ed.
London: Lawrence & Bullen, 1896. 1-2.

---

55 Books in a Year: Book #23 Robinson Crusoe

So, it should be illegal to have illustrated classics...they are very misleading. From about the age of 10 until I started this book, I thought Robinson Crusoe was just about a guy who got stranded on an island, met a properly clothed native named Friday and got off the island a rich man.

And, I thought it would be a bit of an easy read.

11 pages and at least one 160 (approximately) word sentence in, I realized so many things about weren't exactly as they appeared.

Let me break it down

A guy who got stranded on an island
Yes, Crusoe gets stranded on an island. He gets stranded on an island for almost 29 years and about 3 years in he realizes that he can't get off the island alone. There's also about 100 pages of detail about how he goes against his father's wishes and goes out to sea, makes a fortune and loses it and makes a fortune again, becomes a slave, runs away, owns a plantation and plans the voyage that is to be his final one for a long time. He also goes on and on about praying and religion and how he does both well in times of stress. He builds a house. He talks about how money really is a waste. He details planting crops and taming a parrot and shooting cats. He watches cannibals eat people. It's not as exciting as it sounds.

Met a properly clothed native named Friday
Friday is about to be eaten by cannibals. He is, in fact, part of them. Crusoe teaches him to be a good Christian, this, of course, means that he can no longer eat people and he must wear clothes. Crusoe points out that Friday is a better Christian than he is because Friday is naive. I liked reading about Friday the most as I found Defoe's description of Crusoe's view of Friday quite progressive. Crusoe treats Friday as an equal and considers him a friend, although he is dark skinned.

Got off the island a rich man
I have no idea why I thought this book was more like Treasure Island or Swiss Family Robinson with island treasure hunts and jewels and such, but I did. I was amazed to find that Crusoe had made his money before he left and instead of spending more years wasting it by creating adventures and buying stuff, it accrues value and he, alone on the island, learns how to take pleasure in the simple. If only every man got to spend time away from society during his most wayward years.

To say I disliked this book would be a bit harsh. I am glad I read this adult version of this book. There are so many allusions I understand on a deeper level, especially all of those presented by Betteredge in The Moonstone. I don't really see myself going back to it as a reference and if I want a Crusoe fix, I think I'll stick to that mini-series starring Pierce Brosnan.

Dear Sarah Ockler

Dear Sarah Ockler,

About a week ago I read your treatise entitled I CliffsNoted My Way Through H.S. Lit & All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt.

I was disappointed.
I was appalled.
I wailed and gnashed my teeth.

Then I realized something. As an English Major who now teaches High School English, I was the anomaly, you were just being a normal teenager. Teenagers today are no different. I think they aren't as good at hiding it as you may have been, but they would prefer to do anything else besides read a book that doesn't interest them (ie. a book that they are being forced to read). As teachers get more and more frustrated, the kids pretend less and less. There are whole entire groups of people making money on this fact.

Still there is no answer.

Here's a list of books we read in my Sophomore English classes (those that are bold are taught in Honors only, the others are taught at all levels)

Of Mice and Men (moving to Seniors next year to be replaced with Antigone)
The Crucible
The Scarlet Letter
Ethan Frome
Our Town
The Sun Also Rises
The Great Gatsby
A Separate Peace
Julius Caesar

I think that most teens do not find these books interesting in any way. In most cases I feel this is the fault of the teacher who, for whatever reason, didn't attach the proper hangers for the students to grasp the book or gave too many hangers and the students became over-loaded with the work's meaning and didn't even see how good the book could have been. I know that I have been guilty of both. I know that I forget that I am an anomaly. You see I love to read and I will read anything, just look at my Goodreads list from last year to see I'm all over the map. I think there's something to be said for reading those classics of lit that may or may not be easy to read, but have in them themes and characters that are truly universal. It's important to read pieces of literature that have stood the test of time.

All of those books above have within them a hook (a character or plot point or theme) that really grabs the interest of a student. It's up to me to figure out what that is and to make it work. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not some sort of Book Whisperer who entrances her students to read and understand and love every book we read (I know several students who feel compelled to tell me that they didn't read a book all year like it's some sort of honor), but I do try to get them to do so.

Example One: There was a student I had who I knew wouldn't like or want to read The Crucible. I also knew that he had just gotten out of a relationship with a girl who definitely wanted him back. While we're reading the play aloud it was easy for me to assign him the character of John Proctor. He immediately identified with the character and in the end was really mad with the outcome. I had him hooked for the rest of the year.

Example Two: It's easy to get students interested in Julius Caesar, all you have to do is tell them the best part of the story...the fact that a man literally gets stabbed to death because of his best friend. "Et Tu Brute?" And, if that doesn't hook them, tell them that man's other best friend may or may not be the best guy in the world, and ask them to tell you why.

Example Three: Once students read Of Mice and Men, they get certain SNL parodies, certain Bugs Bunny cartoons and even an episode of "Friends". They get pretty excited about that. Then you can teach them all about allusions.

That being said, below you will find a list of books from your list that you MUST read.

The Scarlet Letter...if you are going to reference in your book, you really must read it and then watch "Easy A" and cry for joy about all the nuances you are now getting. There is this chapter where Dimmesdale and Hester meet again in the forest and it is so beautiful and romantic that I can't help but love it.

The Canterbury Tales...find a list that details each tale and read the bawdier ones first. Seriously, there's one where a guy with a hairy butt gets a hot poker in the bum, that's good stuff.

Shakespeare...the stereotypical high school ones are Romeo and Juliet, Julius Caesar, Macbeth and Hamlet. There's crazy teen romance, a mother that gets a little too close to her son and then yells at the Gods to rip out her womb, friendships that go a-rye, premarital sex, suicide (I mean a girl swallows hot coals, hot coals, I say! and another drowns herself in the reeds), sword fights and battles on the fields of war. Good stuff. Girl, get thee to Shakespeare I say!

The Great Gatsby...first Modern American novel. Ask yourself "What does it mean to be an American today?" This book will tell you. It also has a character (Daisy) that I love to hate. Gosh, she gets under my skin. Understand that you're seeing Gatsby through Nick's eyes and wonder if you have ever had a friend that was that good to you. Then, if you find that you like this book go ahead and read Ethan Frome, another book that has a character or three that I love to hate. Choose a side. Read it again. Choose another. It's so much fun!

Our Town...I flipping love this play. Read all about that here.

I can only hope that at some point in time my students also come to the realization that they would love to read the classics they skimmed over, and that they do so "all in the name of keeping an open mind, finding human connections, and cashing in on all of the wonderful lovey-dovey of books." I am afraid, however, that they will think the movie or SNL parody will suffice.

If you read the above and feel I haven't steered you too wrong, I've got a whole delicious list of about 100 books just waiting for you!

Sincerely,
Stephanie M. Hasty
Communication Arts Teacher

PS. I don't like To Kill A Mockingbird (but, I have read it all the way through so I can say that). I also don't like The Help...maybe one day I will be brave enough to talk to the blog-world in a serious tone about why...

55 Books in a Year: Book #14 The Moonstone

Writing about The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins without giving anything away is going to be hard, as there are so many red herrings that I want to talk about extensively, but doing so would give away the book.

I would like to warn people...if you read The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher and/or know anything about Wilkie Collins then ending could be given away. Might I suggest not researching this book, and might I also suggest not reading the Whicher book first as it talks about the Saville Kent murder (a case that mirrors so closely the story of The Moonstone that I had no trouble guessing most of the Collins book a section into the narrative). 

I want to look at this book stylistically, as a detective novel, and in comparison to the Kent murder.

Stylistically

The story of the theft of the Moonstone, a large yellow diamond stolen from the forehead a mystic Indian statue,  is told from the stories and notes gleaned from 11 different characters and I suppose if you didn't just allow yourself to go on the adventure this could be quite tedious. At the behest of Franklin Blake, each narrator has something to tell and each narrator in his or her own way sets out many red herrings as to who might have taken the diamond. The chief narrator is Betteredge a long-time servant of the Verinder family. Although he is the chief narrator he is the most unreliable of the lot and I spent most of the time he narrated digging through his interpretations to find the truth. Please know he doesn't lie, he just sees things differently. The most annoying narrator would be Mrs. Clack as she is blindly and hypocritically religious. All the narrators vary in character and tone (for this I give Collins much credit), my favorites are Franklin Blake, who I suppose is the hero of the tale, Mr. Bruff, the lawyer and Ezra Jennings as they tell the story in a straight forward manner. Once you get to the conclusion of a certain narrative I promise you that you'll want to read on to the end.

As A Detective Novel

This book is considered by many to be the epitome of the detective novel and I can totally see why, written many years before the first Sherlock Holmes, Sergeant Cuff is definitely the prototype for all detectives hence. Cuff enjoys growing and talking about roses, he is quick to offend as his gruff manner is offensive to some, and he knows the culprit years before the others. He is smug enough about it to write the name of the thief on a sheet of paper and seal it in an envelope for others to read after they figure it out. He deduces aloud, makes conclusions that others don't agree with, but in the end knows the truth better and more thoroughly than anyone. If Betteredge is good at throwing out red herrings, all the reader as to do to combat this is read what Cuff has to say. Just like most detective novels, this book at three major plot twist, the final one is the most impressive. We also learn that any character could be the culprit, and that things get bumbled by the local police.

In comparison to the Kent Murder

In 1860, three year old Saville Kent was taken out of his bed in the middle of the night and murdered. The only evidence was a smear of blood on a night gown and the fact that the timing indicated that it was committed by someone in the house. While the theft of a diamond in no way compares to the murder of a child these stories share many similarities, in both the biggest evidence was a smear on a night gown, both were committed by someone in the house, both were committed without an accomplice of sorts, both would have been solved earlier had the people in the house understood that it was an inside job. The final comparison is the most important, Detective Whicher is the model for Sergeant Kent and both had to wait years to be told they're assumptions were correct.

This book is loads of fun and I can't wait to read more by Collins.

5 Stars

If you can't tell I enjoyed this book immensely!

55 Books in a Year: Book #8 The Fox

The only DH Lawrence I ever read before tackling this book was "The Rocking-horse Winner", an odd little story about love that borders on the Oedipal and luck that borders on insanity. While I could write a paper about it, I'm still not sure I get it. When I tell people that they just say, "That's Lawrence for you."


When I started The Fox I had "The Rocking-horse Winner" in mind, however, I wasn't really ready for the whole story and these plot synopses gave no indication as to what I was getting into.


Here's the breakdown from Wikipedia:

The Fox is a novella by D. H. Lawrence published in 1923. Set in Berkshire, England during World War I, The Fox, like many of D. H. Lawrence’s other major works, treats the psychological relationships of three protagonists in a triangle of love and hatred. Without the help of any male laborers, Nellie March and Jill Banford struggle to maintain a marginal livelihood at the Bailey Farm. A fox has raged through the poultry, and although the women—particularly the more masculine Nellie—have tried to shoot the intruder, he seems always to elude traps or gunshot.

and Goodreads:

The Fox (1923) is a short novella by D.H. Lawrence that is set in the Berkshire district of England in 1918, just after the First World War. Two women, Branford and March, both in their thirties and unmarried, live together on an isolated farm. One day, like a fox, a man enters their farm and lives. Lawrence uses the fox as a symbol of masculinity and through it explores male sexuality.

The Fox is down right sexy. I hear from those of you that know Lawrence that in his misogyny he can be pretty sexual. I read about March and Banford and thought, "Well, are they? Aren't they? Will they?" I was drawn to March and her battle with the fox in the hen house. And, then I was drawn to the fox, in the form of Henry, in the hen house. Every description left him more attractive than the next. Every description of March, though his eyes, makes her more beautiful and, dare I say, more feminine. The more the narrator refers to her trousers and her eyes and her neck and her boots and her legs in a dress, the more Banford shrinks and became a tiny, shriveled screw. The more the reader sees March as sexy too. Even the barren farm with its chickens and lack of cow seems inviting and sensual.


And, the whole entire triangle is reminiscent of the triangle in Ethan Frome and I can't decide which character I feel more sympathy towards. Heck, I can't tell if the women are supposed to be lovers supplanted by the boy, I can't tell if things had ended differently if March would have felt differently, I can't tell if March loves the boy, I can't tell if the boy really loves March and while there isn't out and out sex, there's this neck kiss that left me a little breathless and there's this confrontation between Banford, March and Henry that was just one step shy of a full sex encounter, although no one took off their clothes and everyone was very angry. In the end I can't tell if Henry is still the fox or if March is still the strong one. I can't tell if this book is pro love, or anti-feminist.


But, hey, that's Lawrence for you.


4 Stars   

I was entranced by this book and the story and Lawrence's writing style, but when it ended and I caught my breath I felt a little let-down, I'm not really sure by what.


You can read the whole novella here.


Read the novella and feeling frustrated? Check out these lovely reviews.
The Reading Life
Tony Crisp

55 Books in a Year: Book #4 Around the World in 80 Days

It all started innocently enough...I was catching up on my Pierce Brosnan. How does one do that you ask? Watch all his Bond movies, think about watching Thornbirds (then realize that's Richard Chamberlain, not Pierce), move on to a season of "Remington Steele", then dig deep, finding old gems like "The Lawnmower Man" and watch the whole mini-series "Around the World in 80 Days". And, if you're like me, this will prompt you to read the book as you've never read the book before and you've put it down as part of your Classics Challenge and will feel compelled to start it immediately.

This book is a delightfully easy read written during one of Verne's and France's low-points, but accents, what I'm sure many believe, the highest point of the British Empire. I am positive that if you read this book and "Shooting an Elephant" by George Orwell (an essay about the shooting of an elephant in India, written about 60 years later) you will have a perfect picture of British Imperalism and a well rounded idea of the British Empire.  If Orwell's is the Modern, not so positive aspects than Verne's is the Victorian, idealized version. Phileas Fogg can do no wrong. He is punctual, precise and phelgmatic. He fires his valet for the tiniest of errors and can be counted on to do exactly what he as always done. When one of the members of his prestigious gentlemen's club says he can't possible make it around the world in 80 days, he calmly says he can and will. Betting £20,000 (half of his whole worth) he leaves that night with the French valet he has just hired. 


The best part of the book is reading Fogg's conversion from a stodgy and eccentric man to a man that has gained love and true friendship; even if he does keep all of his Britishness--not that this is in any way a bad thing.

Some things that are in the book that aren't in the movies and visa versa:

1. An extra girl (in the mini-series, at least) who never appears in the book.

2. I've always seen and thought of Passepartout of being the comic relief falling over himself and others and getting into trouble. In the book it seems like he helps Fogg as much as he hinders, and actually does a lot more good than I thought originally.

3. And, the biggest one...There isn't a hot air balloon in the book, don't get too excited about that. There are steam engines and boats and carriages, but no hot air balloons. Yeah, I was fooled by every...cover...I've...ever seen...ever.

Anyway, read the book and imagine Pierce Brosnan, you'll have a grand time.

4 Stars