A Work in Progress

Favorite authors, at a moment's notice...

I've been tagged by Tara and Angela for an author meme.  Now of course these answers could change on any given day, and I don't think I will be able to limit my answers to just one, so here goes...

Who’s your all-time favorite author, and why?  In thinking of authors whose work I've read lots of and whose work I could read over and over again I think I have to say Jane Austen and Margaret Atwood (sorry, Tara, I'm going to copy you).  However I am going to add in Wilkie Collins, as I love every new (to me that is) book I read by him and I know I could happily pick up one of the books I've already read and read it again!  I highly recommend him if you like an excellent story that's well plotted and filled with memorable characters!

Who was your first favorite author, and why? Do you still consider him or her among your favorites?  I had lots of favorites as a child/young adult.  Judy Blume was my absolute favorite, hands down.  Boy did she understand my every hope and fear!  I also loved Constance C. Greene, Patricia Coombs (I still wish I could find used copies of her books, but they are so expensive), Nancy Drew, and Laura Ingalls Wilder.  I've pretty much moved on from these authors, but I still have very fond feelings for all of them. 

Who’s the most recent addition to your list of favorite authors, and why?  Well, if I can only pick one I guess it would be Elizabeth Taylor.  I only came across her work in the last couple of years, and though I've only read a few of her books I know I want to read more.  Her prose is so subtle and clear and her characters so well drawn.  Her books are on the quiet and contemplative side.   

If someone asked you who your favorite authors were right now, which authors would first pop out of your mouth? Are there any you’d add on a moment of further reflection?  Joanne Harris, Wilkie Collins, Kazuo Ishiguro, Elizabeth Taylor, Daphne du Maurier, Deanna Raybourn, Jacqueline Winspear, Barbara Vine.

On further reflection, however, I've discovered a multitude of new authors in the last few years (in part through blogging): Sarah Waters, Richmal Crompton (am reading my first Crompton novel and really love it), Georgette Heyer, Elizabeth von Arnim, Barbara Pym, Margaret Laurence, Clare Chambers, P.D. James, Peter Ho Davies, Henry James (what little I've read, I've loved), Sarah Bower, Angela Young and Linda Gillard (three authors I'm not sure I would have come across had it not been for blogging), Catherine Delors and Michelle Moran (whose books I loved and have had the added bonus of being able to chat with them!).  I could keep going, but I better stop here...

I'm supposed to tag five people, but as I'm lazy today, if you've not yet done this meme and you feeling like answering the questions, feel free to grab it and play along!

Miscellanea

Grrr...has it already been nearly three weeks?  Three weeks is just not a long enough check out time for library books.  I'm afraid I've got to return The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher by Kate Summerscale with only the introduction read (and it looked so nice sitting on my nightstand).  I really do want to read it, but as I am so slow reading NF it's not a good idea to borrow NF books from the library (particularly when they can't be renewed).  I may have to dig out my remaining B&N gift card and just buy it. 

In the meantime...now for something completely different.  I've received a review copy of Jane Fletcher Geniesse's American Priestess: The Extraordinary Story of Anna Spafford and the American Colony in Jerusalem that I've decided to read next.  When I was first offered it I thought no, this doesn't really sound like me.  It seems to be a combination history (America and Palestine in the 1880s), religion (a Protestant sect called The saints), maybe a bit of women's studies (Anna Spafford) thrown in as well.  When I read the description more closely it sounded intriguing, and now that I've started it I'm sort of hooked.  I'll let you know how it turns out.

A fellow international book blogger has started posting a series of "Read and Tell" interviews.  She kindly asked me to take part.  You can read my answers here.  I'm looking forward to hearing other reader's perspectives as well.

I'm starting to learn how to catalog books at my work.  Actually what I am doing is known as copy cataloging (working with an already existing record and cleaning it up before it is exported into my library's online catalog).  I always thought I was a very detail-oriented person, but I have to say this is one of the most nit-picky things I've ever learned how to do.  There is a rule for EveryThing! I have no idea how I am going to remember it all (I'm going to start dreaming of call numbers and subfields and authority records).  I sometimes think surely there isn't enough room in my brain for yet another password or tiny bit of information.  I keep squeezing it in, and I wonder what is falling out the other side!

Earlier this month I mentioned that I lucked out and won a Penguin.  I never did get it in the mail.  I wonder if in the end US readers aren't included?  Alas, M. Simenon, no fear.  I will read you yet!

I sometimes wonder if I bore people to absolute tears with my chatter (are you even still with me or have you abandoned reading this post already?).  Is the minutiae of my reading life of any interest to anyone?  (Sorry, latest bout of self-doubt appears to be creeping in).  It's been very quiet around here, and I find myself wondering if I am on the wrong track.  What the right track is, I'm not entirely sure, but other bloggers seem to lead infinitely more exciting lives than I do--traveling, exciting hobbies, living in beautiful and picturesque cities--and if they don't have more exciting lives they write about mundane subjects in such a witty way that I'm engrossed from first word to last. 

I think I need a vacation.

Yet More Virago Goodness

Or badness, as the case may be.  But they're all used, and therefore reasonably inexpensive, so I don't actually feel too guilty.  And they're even all in pretty good condition, so I am pleased with my latest round of Viragos.

Our Spoons Came from Woolworths, Barbara Comyns - "Sophia is 21 years old, carries a newt - Great Warty - around in her pocket and marries - in haste - a young artist called Charles. Swept into the bohemian London of the 30s, she is ill-equipped to cope. She takes up with an aging art critic and learns to repent - at leisure." I've heard some interesting things about this author and want to see for myself what she's like.  I'm also wondering what it is with Woolworths?  (There used to be Woolworths in Omaha, but they are long gone now).  I'm reading The Brontes Went to Woolworths by Rachel Ferguson right now, and that is a curious story indeed!

Birds Fall Down, Rebecca West - "Through a vivid canvas layered with intrigue, conspiracy and murder, Rebecca West has created a story that is at once a family saga, a political thriller, a philosophical drama and a historical novel."  I want to read this for my 1% Well Read Challenge.  I had a library copy but thought it would be better to own it as I'm not sure when I'll get to it.

I've decided to buy (and read of course) all of Elizabeth Taylor's novels.  I think I am only missing a couple now.  Unfortunately Virago doesn't publish all her work, and I have this fear of not finding her books (or if I do they'll be exorbitantly priced like the Ferguson book), if I wait until later.

The Soul of Kindness, Elizabeth Taylor - "The soul of kindness was what Flora believed herself to be, and made almost everyone else believe.  Tall, blonde, and as beautiful as a Botticelli girl, she appeared to have everything under control--her household, her baby, her husband Richard; her all-too-loyal friend Meg; Meg's brother Kit, who has always adored Flora; and Patrick, the novelist and domestic pet.  Only the painter, Liz, refuses to become a worshipper at the shrine."

Wreath of Roses, Elizabeth Taylor - "Staying with two friends, the pattern of many years, Camilla finds their private absorptions--Liz with her baby, Frances with her painting--somehow exclude her from the gossipy intimacies of previous summers.  Poised on the brink of prim middle age, fearing that adventure and love will be denied her, Camilla begins an unlikely liaison with Richard Elton; handsome, assured and a compulsive liar with more than a bogus wartime record to hide.  In her desire for escape she inadvertently discovers evil..."  (Is it just me or does this one not sound like Taylor's other work?).  This is actually not a Virago, just a plain old Penguin, but I'm happy to have it anyway!

The Wedding Group, Elizabeth Taylor - "First published in 1968, this quietly ironic exploration of the ways in which the parental mould is not easily broken, is one of Elizabeth Taylor's most ambitious novels."

Blaming, Elizabeth Taylor - "While on holiday in Istanbul, tragedy strikes, and suddenly the comfortably middle-aged, middle-class Amy is left stranded and a widow. Martha, a young American novelist, kindly helps her, but upon their return to England, Amy is ungratefully reluctant to maintain their friendship—on home soil she realizes that in normal circumstances, Martha isn't the sort of person she would be friends with. But guilt is a hard taskmaster, and Martha has a way of getting under one's skin."

The Devastating Boys, Elizabeth Taylor - This is a collection of eleven short stories.  "We meet women, children and men, often ostensibly ordinary, who follow their paths of ruthlessness and ambition, each in pursuit of happiness, love, or power--each a classic creation."  By the way I love the cover of this book.  Isn't it sweet--a happy cata all curled up on a cushy armchair!

I also want to read all of Rosamund Lehmann's work.  She doesn't have quite as large an oeuvre as Taylor.  I'm starting from scratch with Lehmann.  I'm going to begin at the beginning and work my way through her books as she wrote and published them.  I've already got Dusty Answer on my night table.

The Weather in the Streets, Rosamund Lehmann - "Taking up where Invitation to the Waltz left off, The Weather in the Streets shows us Olivia Curtis ten years older, a failed marriage behind her, thinner, sadder, and apparently not much wiser. A chance encounter on a train with a man who enchanted her as a teenager leads to a forbidden love affair and a new world of secret meetings, brief phone calls, and snatched liaisons in anonymous hotel rooms. Years ahead of its time when first published, this subtle and powerful novel shocked even the most stalwart Lehmann fans with its searing honesty and passionate portrayal of clandestine love."

The Ballad and the Source, Rosamund Lehmann - "Ten-year-old Rebecca is living in the country with her family when Sibyl Jardine, an enigmatic and powerful old woman, returns to her property in the neighborhood. The two families, once linked in the past, meet again, with the result that Rebecca becomes drawn into the strange complications of the old lady's life—with her husband, her errant daughter, and her grandchildren. Through the spellbound eyes of the young Rebecca we enter into an intricate and scandalous family history and slowly the story of the passionate, stormy life of Mrs. Jardine unfolds."

All I can say is, yum.  I so love Virago Press books.  Now I want to start reading something by Elizabeth Taylor. 

Bound, by Sally Gunning

It's probably not very obvious by the books I've been reading of late, but I've had a long interest in Colonial America.  Several years ago I bought Sally Gunning's The Widow's War, which I'm sorry to say remains unread on my bookshelf.  I'll be remedying that very soon, however, after reading Gunning's latest novel, Bound, in practically one large gulp over the long weekend.  Not too far into the book I discovered I couldn't, didn't want to put it down!  Although I don't believe Bound is a sequel, several characters from The Widow's War feature in her newer novel as well.

Bound chronicles Alice Cole's rather harrowing journey from London with her family at the tender age of seven to the New World.  Not only does her mother become ill and die, but her brothers succumb to the same fate as well.  Alice's father is left with only his young daughter and medical expenses (such as they were on board a ship in 1756) he cannot pay.  He's left with no other option than to sell his daughter into servitude for a period of eleven years.  I tried to imagine my niece in Alice's position, (who is a couple of years older) having to leave her only relative and travel to an unknown destination in a foreign world, with a man who will put her to work as a servant in his house, but I simply can't do it.  Imagine a small child who dreamed of living with her family in a big, new house in this new world, only to have hear dreams pulled out from under her.  Would she even understand it?  It's pure luck that Mr. Morton is an honest man.  Alice becomes the companion of his daughter, Nabby, who's only a few years older than she and is treated as one of the family. 

Alice's luck runs out, however, when Nabby marries Emery Verley.  The few remaining years of Alice's indenture are given to Nabby and Verley as a wedding gift.  Verley is not an honest man, and Alice is used and abused by him, even with the knowledge of Nabby.  Feeling completely alone and with no knowledge of where her father may be after so many years, she runs away from the farm after being battered not only by Verley but by her former friend Nabby as well.  She returns to Mr. Morton, once so much like family, but he turns her away.  In the end she stows away on a ship and ends up in Satucket, Cape Cod.  Here Alice's path crosses that of the widow Lyddie Berry (whose story is told in The Widows War), and she finds a refuge with the widow and a man called Eben Freeman who is a boarder in her home.

I'll let you imagine the state she must have been in, and the consequences of Verley's abuse.  Although the story becomes quite heartwrenching, it's hard to turn away.  I had to find out what happened to Alice.  At times, I will admit, I was frustrated by her.  She had a total lack of trust in the widow and Mr Freeman, but under the circumstances it would be hard to imagine her otherwise.  This all created a certain urgency to Alice's story.  She was developed very well and had a depth to her.  She wasn't always easy to fix in my mind, but by the end of the story she had certainly grown and changed.  I do feel like there is some aspect of the widow's and Eben's characters/relationship that I'm missing.  I suspect things will be fleshed out more when I read Gunning's previous novel.

The story is all played out against pre-Revolutionary Boston and Satucket.  While Alice is dealing with her own inner turmoils, the colonists are dealing with ever increasing taxations (and without any Parliamentary representation).  Mr. Freeman must spend time in Boston due to his work, and each time he returns the men of the town gather round to hear the latest news.  All along the seaboard there is talk of non-importation of tea and coffee as well as cottons, wools and linens.  Eventually the women will drag out their spinning wheels and turn to homespun as the fabric of choice, and there will less China tea and more herbal tea (and not the nice sort of tea we know today).  I especially loved the descriptions of how Colonial textiles were made.  Alice helps the widow in the manufacture of homespun to try and pay back some of her kindnesses.

Although this was at times a sad tale, it was ultimately a satisfying story.  I'm quite curious now to hear about the widow Berry's history, so will hopefully be reading The Widow's War soon and am wondering what Gunning will come up next to write about.  Hopefully she'll continue on with more Colonial American tales.  I think I also need to dig out my books by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich (a noted historian on the period), especially Age of Homespun: Objects and Stories in the Creation of an American Myth, in which she discusses a variety of artifacts from the period and their makers and uses.  It sounds fascinating (as do her other books).   

I also want to mention the author's historical note at the end of the novel where she discusses indentured servants in America.  Maybe I already knew this (somewhere in the back of my mind), but it's still a hard concept to grasp, but indentured servitude still occurs today.  "...According to John Berger," Gunning writes, "CEO of The Emancipation Network, an organization whose mission is to end human trafficking by promoting economic self-sufficiency for survivors and at-risk groups, there are more people living today in indentured servitude, or debt bondage, than in any time in history, it being one of the most common forms of slavery worldwide, including in the United States.  Currently, there are an estimated twenty-seven million people living in slavery."  It's frightening to think that indentured servitude didn't die out at the end of the 18th century. 

Summer Reading?

Technically I've already got my summer reading planned out (well, sort of anyway), but I'm always open to distractions.  I don't seem to have many sources (paper sources that is) these days to find forthcoming, soon-to-be-published books, but I did come across a magazine at work from one of our vendors that has given an early Summer preview.  I found a few titles that I'll be keeping an eye out for.

When You are Engulfed in Flames, David Sedaris - I've never read anything by Sedaris, but I've heard he's very funny.  I could use some humor in my life.  This is a new collection of NF stories.  Isn't the title great?

Stealing Athena, Karen Essex - "The Elgin Marbles have been displayed in the British Museum for nearly two hundred years, and for just as long they have been the center of a raging controversy. In Stealing Athena, Karen Essex chronicles the Marbles’ amazing journey through the dynamic narratives of Mary Nisbet, wife of the Earl of Elgin, the British ambassador to Constantinople, and Aspasia, the mistress of Perikles, the most powerful man in Athens during that city’s Golden Age."

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows - I first read about this book here, and was pleased to see it's being published in the US as well!  Why does the title make me think of Southern (US) literature?  It's actually set in 1946 Britain.

My Sister, My Love: The Intimate Story of Skyler Rampike, Joyce Carol Oates - Since reading one of her short stories not too long ago, I've been wanting to read some of Oates's fiction.  This novel is based on the true story of an unsolved murder.

The Sand Castle, Rita Mae Brown - "Feisty Southern sisters Juts and Wheezy, of bestselling author Brown's Six of One trilogy, are back and as irascible as ever. The story unfolds in a single summer day in 1952, when the two make a day-trip to the beach accompanied by Jut's seven-year-old daughter, Nickel, and Wheezie's grandson, eight-year-old Leroy, whose mother has recently died".

The Creator's Map, Emilio Calderon - "Unable to set aside painful memories of the Spanish Civil War when they learn of the murder of an old acquaintance, Jose Maria and his wife, Montse, remember the early days of their romance during their incarceration at the Spanish Academy in Rome and their unwitting involvement in an underground Nazi effort to acquire a mystical artifact for the Fuhrer."  This is translated from Spanish.

Settlement, Christophe Hein - "Provincial Guldenberg is still reeling from World War II when a flood of German refugees arrives from the east, Bernhard Haber’s family among them. Life is hard enough—Bernhard’s father has lost an arm and his carpenter’s income. But added to this injury comes an accumulation of insults, as the upright town turns hostile toward the newcomers. After a string of mysterious losses—from the killing of the boy’s dog to the unexplained death of his father—Bernhard is set on extracting revenge.  Rich with psychological insight, Christoph Hein’s acclaimed novel tells Bernhard’s story across nearly fifty years, chronicling his remarkable rise from victimized outsider to Guldenberg’s most prominent burgher."  And this is translated from German.

Losing Ground, Catherine Aird - This is a detective series that is new to me, but the premise of the mystery caught my eye--two detectives are called in to investigate the theft of a valuable painting from an old manor house just before the estate goes up in flames.  During their search for the thief they discover a "grisly pile of bones".  Nothing like a grisly pile of bones to capture a reader's interest, eh?!

A Royal Pain, Rhys Bowen - I've not yet read her first mystery Her Royal Spyness (I'm waiting for the paperback, which is out in July), but I've noted her next in the series.  They look like fluffy fun.

What am I missing?  It seems like with Summer not too far off that there should be loads of new books being published.  There always seems to be one or two 'big' books that are much talked about, but I've yet to hear about what it is this year.  Of course just reading blogs tends to keep my wishlist nice and long these days.

The Beautiful One Has Come

I love historical fiction, but the farther back in history I go, the more elusive it all seems.  What was Egypt, ca. 1351 BC, like?  In my mind I can picture pyramids and deserts, but what about the people and how they lived?  This is not a time or place about which I usually read, and know even less about it historically.  Michelle Moran, however, brought this very exotic Egypt vividly to life for me in her novel Nefertiti.  Of course I've seen images of the famous bust that is now on display in Berlin, which has achieved a certain cult status.  Queen of Egypt, Nefertiti wanted to be remembered throughout eternity, and I guess she's managed it pretty well so far.  Over three thousand years later and we still know her name and face. 

Although Nefertiti is the star of the novel, we see her through the eye's of her younger, half-sister Mutnodjmet.  She's beautiful (her name actually translates as "the beautiful one has come") and charismatic.  Nefertiti is chosen to marry Amunhotep, and it's hoped she will be able to reign in the unstable young King who rules Lower Egypt after the questionable death of his older brother.  Royal courts seem to be rife with intrigues.  Incessant gossip, back-stabbing courtiers and even the threat of being poisoned fills Amunhotep and Nefertiti's court as well. 

Mutnodjmet would prefer to tend her garden of plants and herbs than be involved in the ruling of Egypt, but she's expected to stay with Nefertiti, the King's Chief Wife.  Nefertiti is a self-absorbed young woman in need of constant placating and reassurance.  Although she's the Chief Wife, Amunhotep has already married Kiya, and has a son and heir by her.  As the daughter of a royal family, Mutnodjmet is at the beck and call of Nefertiti and her parents.  Her life is not her own.      

When Amunhotep's father dies, also under questionable circumstances, he wastes no time bringing about the changes he's dreamed of.  He rules over all of Egypt now.  No longer will Egyptians pray to the ancient gods, they will now worship only Aten, the sun god.  Amunhotep becomes Akhenaten and forges the new city of Amarna in his name.  Imagine ruling a country when you are merely 17 or 15, about the ages of Akhenaten and Nefertiti when they first married.  Akhenaten didn't just to want to rule for the benefit of his people.  His actions verged on megalomania.  He felt he was Aten's voice.  He wanted his people to love him and only him, and he had a distinct hatred for the army.  He spends his time designing the city  of Amarna, creating temples and palaces and statues in his and Nefertiti's likenesses.  The city is a symbol of Pharaoh's greatness.  Nefertiti, rather than reigning him in only fueled his desire for power and glory.  She was just as conniving and ambitious, in end perhaps even more so.

While Akhenaten concerns himself with Aten and his beautiful desert city, trying to make his people love him (are throwing gold coins out to them enough?), and Nefertiti becomes increasingly jealous of Kiya, bearing daughter after daughter in hopes of having a son to pass the crown to, the Hittites are at Egypt's doors.  Akhenaten and Nefertiti seem only to see their own insular world and fail to see the priests plotting against them.

Nefertiti was a surprisingly fast paced and entertaining read.  Moran breathed life into a period of history that I had thought long, long ago had settled into dust.  I thought it was quite effective that the story was not told by Nefertiti herself, but by her sister.  Mutnodjmet was privy to Nefertiti's secrets, but had her own story to tell as well.  It gave a nice balance to the story.  I especially enjoyed the smaller details of daily life, which is what draws me so much towards historical fiction.  I could hear Mutnodjmet's sandals slapping against the palace's hallways, and imagine Nefertiti's body servant lining her eyes with Kohl and helping her to select a beaded wig to wear.  Nefertiti would have used a birthing chair when her daughters arrived in the world.  And I was intrigued with the idea that when a man and woman crossed the threshold of an empty house together they were married.   

Now that I've had a taste of such an exotic culture, not surprisingly I'll be looking for more books about this period.  I received some excellent book suggestions, which can be found in the comments area here.  Michelle Moran's new novel, The Heretic Queen is due out in September, which I'm already looking forward to.  Check out Michelle's website here, where you can read more about Nefertiti's life and times.

Wave Me Goodbye

I've discovered an excellent collection of short stories hiding on my bookshelves.  Heaven knows when I bought this, and I forgot I even had it, but it fits in perfectly with the sorts of books I've been reading lately. Wave Me Goodbye: Stories of the Second World War edited by Anne Boston has a very Persephone Books look about it (am thinking of their new Persephone Classics).  It is chock full of stories by excellent women authors: Beryl Bainbridge, Elizabeth Bowen, Rosamund Lehmann, Doris Lessing, Rose Macaulay, Olivia Manning, Dorothy Parker, Babara Pym, Jean Rhys, Stevie Smith, Elizabeth Taylor, and Sylvia Townsend Warner to name just some of them.  I've already decided I'm going to read the entire collection.

The stories are arranged chronologically (between 1939-1949) according to the events they describe and to a lesser extent the year they were written.  The collection was first published by Virago roughly fifty years after the war was declared (I have a 1989 US Penguin edition).  The anthology is meant to look at short stories written by women  "when war was a way of life; for among the literature of guns and tanks and battle stratagems, their voices are too easily forgotten or ignored."

Happily for me this collection has an excellent introduction as well as biographies of the authors at the back of the book detailing (when possible) what the author's "wartime circumstances" were.  It's made up mostly of British authors as well as a few Americans, though nothing by authors from Australia or New Zealand, though apparently the editor did try and track some down, but to no avail. I thought it was interesting to see how she went about choosing the stories.

"The best short-story writing, of course, is much more than the proverbial 'slice of life'; what turns it into art is the imaginative tension between surface, exterior events and the silent reality beneath; the dramatic insight implicit in the descriptive truth."

However, to balance things out she also chose authenticity over polished prose as "everyday human experience in wartime could be so extraordinary that it hardly needed to be embellished in fiction."  Each story needed to have a vivid glimpse of these years during the war--not only the outward circumstances but also how people felt and thought during this period. 

I read the first two very short stories that open this collection, but can I just quote one more passage from the introduction which I found so interesting, before mentioning the individual stories.  In researching for this collection the editor describes this experience:

"I turned eagerly to Horizon, the leading wartime literary journal as the first source for this anthology, only to be rebuffed by its editor Cyril Connelly's celebrated denunciation of experiences connected with the Blitz, the shopping queues, the home front, deserted wives, deceived husbands, broken homes, dull jobs, bad schools, group squabbles...' as too close to ordinary life to be worth recording.  Apart from revealing Connelly's disenchantment with his own civilian circumstances, his statement shows how easily it was (and is) to dismiss at a stroke virtually every aspect of women's lives as subjects worth writing about, especially the domestic and personal areas where women writers tend to excel."

I expect these stories to concern themselves particularly with that domestic sphere.  In Rosamund Lehmann's story, "When the Waters Came", war is only in the background.  It's given a cursory mention at the beginning of the story, but it still looms over the events Lehmann goes on to describe.  The young men enduring the desperate conditions of war verged on the unreal, "as objects of pity frequently remain."  The cold, the awful plumbing were the things that were foremost on most people's minds.  When a freak snowstorm hits a small village it delights and discommodes everyone including a mother and her two young children.

""The children ran in with handfuls of things from the garden.  Every natural object had become a toy: twigs, stones, blades of grass cased in tubes of ice.  They broke up the moulds, and inside were the smooth grooved prints of stems and leaves: a miracle."

When the thaw comes however, torrents of brown snow-water violently pour down the hills into the valley.  When one of the children is nearly swept away and drowned, a mother must contend with a near-disaster of her own.

Jan Strutter's "Gas Masks" is a very short story that describes one family's trip to the Town Hall to get fitted for gas masks.  I believe this story was taken from her book of sketches, Mrs Miniver.  As it is a change from routine the family looks on it with a small sense of excitement.  Mrs Miniver recalls being a very young woman in the First World War and having been shut out of any knowledge of the War except the lunacy of the boycotting (down to the tiny puppies of a Dachshund).

"But this time those lunacies--or rather, the outlook which bred them--must not be allowed to come into being.  To guard against that was the most important of all the forms of war work which she and other women would have to do: there are no tangible gas masks to defend us in wartime against its slow, yellow, drifting corruption of mind."

An interesting and patriotic story that gives the reader a sense of the stiff upper lip of the matron of this family.

I wish all short story anthologies were put together as nicely as this one is.  It should be a pleasure to work my way through it!

A Fatal Waltz Winners

Many thanks to everyone who left a comment in order to win a copy of A Fatal Waltz by Tasha Alexander!  As there were a total of 35 names to drop in the hat, I decided to do the drawing 'vritually' with the Random Integer Generator via Random.org.  I made a list of entrants and assigned everyone a number from 1-35 and then let the numbers be chosen completely randomly.  And the winners are:

Random Integer Generator

Here are your random numbers:

20	28	30	25	9

Timestamp: 2008-05-24 14:39:13 UTC

1. Elizabeth M
2. Heather
3. Pam
4. Petunia
5. Melissa Aho

If you could please email me your mailing addresses, I can have the books mailed off to you this coming week.  Thanks again everyone!

It's the Small Things

It sometimes (well, quite often actually) feels like not much attention is paid to people who prefer to walk rather than drive.  At least not where I live.  There are places in this city where I can't even go, as the bus routes don't extend that far.  There are neighborhoods as well as business districts that don't even have sidewalks.  At times it's extremely exasperating.  This city has been designed for drivers only I often feel.  So when something nice happens, I have to make note of it.  Okay, I realize this photo is not really very awe-inspiring.  Yes, it's only a bus shelter.  Many of the bus shelters have been vandalized to the point that the city has just taken them away altogether (annoying on particularly wet or cold days).  However, this shelter on my university campus has been maintained quite nicely.  What I want to point out, however, is the fresh new sidewalk that you see (perhaps it's hard to tell which is new--the pavement was wet this morning--the sidewalk to the right of the shelter).  I've worked at the university for ten years, and that shelter has always stood on a slab of concrete in the middle of this grassy area (between sidewalk and street).  Now that's just fine, but when it's wet, or worse, when there's lots of snow, it's not so fun to trudge through to get to the bus stop.  Someone very kindly finally thought of us pedestrians/bus riders and extended the main sidewalk to reach not only the shelter but in front of it as well.  Now if it is shoveled this winter, I will be one very happy person indeed!

A reminder that anyone interested in winning a copy of Tasha Alexander's A Fatal Waltz please leave your name in the comment area here by the end of the evening.  I'll drawn five names tomorrow morning.  I'm afraid this is only open to US and Canadian residents this time around. 

Many thanks for the input on which book to choose next.  I'm keeping the stack next to the bed, since I want to read them all now!  I've decided to choose Agnes Desarthe's Chez Moi to begin with.  I thought I should pick another book in translation (the main reason, though of course the story sounds good) and then it happens to be fairly short, which is sometimes a good thing (since I seem to be reading at a snail's pace).  I like the idea of a novel set in a restaurant.  I've not gotten very far yet, but Myriam, the narrator, seems sort of prickly.  It'll be interesting to see how the story develops! 

Something contemporary, please

I'm feeling in a bit of a reading rut.  Can you feel in a rut when you're enjoying the books you're reading?  The thing is I have this inkling to read something more contemporary, and every book but one (I've got Elizabeth George's Careless in Red ready to go, though not yet started) is either a historical novel or a 19th century classic or a book written between the two World Wars.  I'm in the mood for something more current.  I'm very predictable in my reading and every so often I get this urge to add something different for variety.  I grabbed a few promising looking books from my shelves, but I'm still not being terribly adventurous.  All the titles except one are by British or American authors.  I tried to choose post-WWII books, though post-1970s would be even better.  Of course as I was choosing the books and reading the blurbs I would think, yes, this is the one.  Then pick another and think, no, this is the one.  Now I have a stack of books that all sound good and I can't decide.  Perhaps the first line test? 

He, She and It, Marge Piercy - "Josh, Shira's ex-husband, sat immediately in front of her in the Hall of Domestic Justice as they faced the view screen, awaiting the verdict on the custody of Ari, their son."  This is actually a sci-fi title.  I like Piercy's work but haven't ready anything for ages. 

Chez Moi, Agnes Desarthe - "Am I a liar?"  This is a recent purchase by a French author.  It would be nice to read something set in Paris.

Brick Lane, Monica Ali - "An hour and forty-five minutes before Nazneen's life began--began as it would proceed for quite some time, that is to say uncertainly--her mother, Rupban, felt an iron fist squeeze her belly."  I know this was made into a movie, though not sure if it's been released.  It was shortlisted for the Booker.

The Bookshop, Penelope Fitzgerald - "In 1959 Florence Green occasionally passed a night when she was absolutely sure whether she had slept or not."  Not that it matters, but this is a slim little novel that I could read quickly (now there's a novel idea--reading something quickly).

The Best of Everything, Rona Jaffe - "You see them every morning at a quarter to nine, rushing  out of the maw of the subway tunnel, filing out of Grand Central Station, crossing Lexington Park and Madison and Fifth avenues, the hundreds of girls."  This was originally written in 1958 and looks like a nice, long drama that I could lose myself in. 

The Lost Art of Keeping Secrets, Eva Rice - "I met Charlotte in London one afternoon waiting for a bus."  I've heard raves about this one.  Another book about the 50s, this one set in Britain, though.

Pomegranate Soup, Marsha Mehran - "Dawn rose over Clew Bay and the small Irish village of Ballinacroagh."  This is actually a contemporary novel about an Iranian family living in a small Irish village.  And a sequel was just published.

Crow Lake, Mary Lawson - "My great-grandmother Morrison fixed a book rest to her spinning wheel so that she could read while she was spinning, or so the story goes."  Another book I've heard lots of good things about.  It's set in contemporary (at least I think so) Canada, though the subject matter sounds a little heavier than my other choices.

I'm leaning towards the Piercy, or maybe the Ali, or maybe the Desarthe.  Maybe I'll have to flip a coin.