Dearly Devoted Dexter by Jeff Lindsey

It's that moon again, slung so fat and low in the tropical night,

calling across a curdled sky and into the quivering ears of that dear old voice in the shadows, the Dark Passenger, nestled snug in the backseat of the Dodge K-car of Dexter's hypothetical soul.

Opening to chapter one of Dearly Devoted Dexter by Jeff Lindsay

There are three ways a literary series can go.  Each successive book can offer essentially more of the same.  What the reader enjoyed in one book is repeated in the next, with just enough variation to keep it all entertaining.  This worked for Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, for P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves and Wooster and for Sue Grafton's Kinsey Milhone.  What keeps bringing the audience back for more is not so much the "crime" but the "detective."  We enjoy seeing just how Holmes will solve the case or how Jeeves will make sure Bertie's latest caper works out.  The details of the problem itself are of secondary interest.

The second way for a series to go is to up the ante somehow, to make each successive plot top the ones that proceeded it.  A mystery/crime series begins with a simple crime of passion.  The next book involves a serial murder.  Then a child rapist, a mother who kills her own children, incestuous Nazis, ad infinitem.  Eventually, credulity can't help but become strained.  

The third way, character development, does not warrant consideration.  Do we really want to know about Sherlock Holmes's childhood trauma or what Jeeves's love life was like?  One is unlikely to find coffee stains on these pages in a used book store because they have been skipped by readers anxious to get on with the story.

(Spoiler Alert)

Dearly Devoted Dexter, the second book in the Dexter series,  takes route two with a few brief detours down route three.  Dexter's back story is part of what made the first novel so interesting.  How a serial killer came to kill only other serial killers is an interesting plot line.  But it is at heart, ridiculous.  Looking at this question too closely can't help but reveal just how unlikely it is.  It's dangerous ground for an author to tread and risks revealing the series concept as essentially flimsy. 

The second problem comes from upping the ante.  The first novel featured a gruesome killer, so the second must feature a worse one.  Dearly Devoted Dexter's killer leads the author into territory that is more ridiculous than believable.  This killer tortures his victims by slowing amputating them until they are nothing but living torsos.  It's horrible, certainly worse than what the killer in the previous novel did, but it's also a bit silly.  Think about it.  Late in the book, one victim, a detective, gets away after losing an arm and a leg.  When he insists on continuing to be a part of the investigation the book becomes laughable.  I've just lost an arm and a leg but I'm not going to stop working on this case.  It's only a flesh wound. 

I purchased Dearly Devoted Dexter to occupy the five hours it takes to ride the train from New Haven to Washington, D.C.  In that sense the book succeeds.  The pages kept turning as America passed by and I finished the book shortly before I arrived.  I enjoyed it enough for it to serve it's purpose well.   But murder by piecemeal amputation?  Come on.  Really?

Flush: A Biography by Virginia Woolf

But she was woman; he was dog.  Mrs. Browning went on reading.  Then she looked at Flush again.  But he did not look at her.  An extraordinary change had come over him.  "Flush!" she cried.  But he was silent.  He had been alive; he was now dead.  That was all.  The drawing-room table, strangely enough, stood perfectly still.

Ending to Flush: A Biography by Virginia Woolf

This is the first time I've ever started a review with the closing lines of the book.  Before accuse me of 'spoiling' hear me out.  If you are a reader of dog stories, then you know that all dog stories are sad stories because they all have the same ending.  The protagonist always outlives the dog.  Many people refuse to read dog stories for this very reason.

But note the complete lack of sentimentality in Ms. Woolf's ending, "He had been alive; he was now dead.  That was all."  No one could ever accuse Virginia Woolf of sentimentality.  In its way, Flush is a dog story for people who hate dog stories. 

Flush entered Elizabeth Barret's life several years before she met Robert Browning.  At the time she was an invalid and would remain bedridden for several years.  Flush immediately bonded with her, sleeping on the rug at her feet throughout the day, though Ms. Woolf would have us believe he longed to roam the countryside.  Fortunately for Flush he would survive multiple dog-nappings, a common crime in Victorian London, to spend several years in the Italian countryside after Elizabeth Barrett met and married Robert Browning.  It's difficult to imagine a spaniel that wouldn't thrive in the Italian countryside, but Flush did pay a price for his freedom.  Upon his return to England he was so infested with flees that he had to be shaved, losing his thick golden coat forever.

Add Virginia Woolf's prose style to this dog story and you end up with a strange little book.  Virginia Woolf said that she found Flush mentioned in several of Ms. Barrett-Browning's letters as well as in a poem she wrote about him.  Ms. Woolf became fascinated with the dog and decided to take a break from her more serious work to write a biography of him.  She was close friends with Lynton Stratchy and may have been working in response to his successful book of short biographies Eminent Victorians.    If you need a break from more serious stuff, like Ms. Woolf did after finishing The Waves, Flush: A Biography may be the book for you.  Think of it as an aperitif to savor in the glow a a fine meal. 

Since I began with the ending, I'll finish with the beginning:

It is universally admitted that the family from which the subject of this memoir claims descent is one of the greatest in antiquity.

Opening to Flush: A Biography by Virginia Woolf

Full Disclosure: I've no idea where I found the picture of Elizabeth Barrett-Browning.  Sorry.

TSS: Read These Blogs

I can't think of anything I want to write about this morning.  So, I'm going to point out two very good Sunday Salon posts instead.

Nymeth has a thoughful and thoght-provoking piece about several bookish peeves here.

Teresa has a good commentary on the Franzen/Picoult literary quarrel here.

Congratulations to everyone who made the BBAW Awards short lists.  Ready When You Are, C.B. didn't make it this year.  I feel a little like Jodi Picoult.  Just a little.  If I had her readership, I would feel more like her. 

Meantime, C.J. and I are off to Santa Rosa to look at several open houses.  I'll be back tomorrow with a review of  Virginia Woolf's Flush: A Biography. 


Full Disclosure:  I found the picture of Santa Rosa at City Data.

Friday Picture Reading: Picasso

Girl Reading by Pablo Picasso. Available at Allposters.com

Middleworld Book One: The Jaguar Stones by J & P Voelkel

Lord 6-Dog was awakened by the sound of his own screaming.

Opening to The Jaguar Stones by J and P Voelkel

The Jaguar Stones might be just the book you're looking for.  If you are, or happen to know someone in middle school who is not all that crazy about reading. 

The Jaguar Stones is a quick paced, entertaining adventure featuring a boy/girl team of wisecracking heroes.   The main character heads to Central America to find his missing archaeologist parents.  Once there he meets Lola, a local girl who knows more than she'll reveal to this outsider until she is sure she can trust him.  The two are soon involved in a series of adventures and death defying escapes that will keep most readers turning the pages in search of what will happen next. 

And there are pictures.  Lots of them. Because The Jaguar Stones is set in Mayan Central America, both modern day and historical Mayan culture play heavily into the adventure.  The pictures go a long way towards helping the reading visualize and understand the setting and the culture of the Maya.  They are also a lot of fun.  More books should be illustrated if you ask me.

Unfortunately, The Jaguar Stones goes on a bit too long for my taste and becomes one thing after another by the end.  Adventure stories walk a careful line as they build towards their climax.  All of them, from A Wrinkle in Time to The Call of the Wild, present a series of events most of which could stand alone as a short story.  What is an adventure novel if not a series of threats overcome by the heroes.  Think of any Indiana Jones movie.  Knowing when to say when is key.  The Jaguar Stones needed to say when sooner.  But I am not a reluctant reader nor am I a middle schooler.  It's probable that the target audience will reach the end wanting more.  Fortunately for them, for their parents and teachers, too, more editions of the Middleworld series are coming soon.

Let's hope they have pictures, too.

Full Disclosure: I received an Advanced Review Copy of The Jaguar Stones from the publisher.

Penny Monypenny by Mary and Jane Findlater

"James," said Sandy Monypenny. 

Opening to Penny Monypenny by Mary and Jane Findlater.

I am the Findlater sisters last best reader. 

Mary and Jane Findlater wrote seperately and together during the early part of the 20th century.  While they made a living at it, their novels have never been household words.  They occupy a middle ground between domestic drama and high art and would have long passed into obscurity if  their novel Crossriggs, about the struggle of two unmarried sisters, hadn't had the good fortune to get the attention of a handful of feminist critics.  Crossriggs has found its way into many a graduate thesis; it filled one chapter of my own.

The rest of their work is much harder to come by.  Fortunately for me, I did find a decaying copy of Penny Monypenny at Yale while studying Chaucer there this summer. 

I once had a professor who argued that Wuthering Heights is about the transfer of property from the landed aristocracy to a usurper from outside society.  Heathcliff does end up with both Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange in the end.  It's possible to read much of Victorian fiction this way; it's certainly possible to read Penny Monypenny as a novel about the transfer of property.  Even the heroine's name speaks of money. 

 

Penny lives with her widowed mother, her cousin Lorin and her two bachelor uncles James and Sandy in the family mansion.  Because the uncles are getting on in years they have become concerned with ensuring the family estate be handed down to someone who bears the Monypenny name.  Lorin, the nearest male heir, does not.  He is also a dissapated wastrel, someone completely inappropriate in the eyes of  Uncle James and Uncle Sandy.  If only Penny could marry without changing her name. Penny and Lorin are in love, much to the horror of her family who find Lorin unsuitable for various reasons, one of which is that he is Penny's first cousin. 

Penny Monypenny is not a ground breaking novel; it does not contain the more subversive material to be found in Crossriggs.  There is never any real doubt, not for a modern reader anyway, that Lorin will leave the scene one way or another so that Penny can find a suitable match and inherit the Monypenny estate.  Penny Monypenny is exactly the sort of novel Oscar Wilde's Miss Prism would love--the good will end happily; the bad unhappily and all is right with the world.  At least all is right with the novel. 

The resulting book is more diverting than entertaining, the sort of book that can fill an otherwise empy afternoon or two.  I'm glad I found a copy and got a chance to read it, but I doubt anyone will ever devote a chapter of their thesis to Penny Monypenny. 

 

Full Disclosure:  The photographs of Mary and Jane Findlater were found at Findlater.org.

Virginia Wolf Speaks about Words

From a BBC recording.  This one is a little long, but I think it's worth listening to through to the end.

"The meaning that makes us catch the train, the meaning that passes the examination."

TSS: School Starts Tomorrow!

School starts tomorrow.  Most schools in America have already started, but I remember a time when school didn't start until after Labor Day.  Ahh, the golden early days of the Clinton administration....

I'm ready for the kids, but I'm just not feeling the excitement this year.  It's the start of my 20th year as a teacher.  It's become old-hat.  I'm trying to decide which literature series I'll be using with my 6th grade class. I am  leaning towards the Junior Great Books series instead of the official text which I won't name here.  I'm one of the few public school teachers left who get to make that decision because I teach gifted and talented students who all walk in the door with high enough test scores to escape the drive to teach to the test.  Instead, I can pick a text based on how good the stories are. 

So, in the spirit of selecting good stories, I thought I'd ask everyone what I should read next.  I picked severn from the very large stack of books from my summer in Yale:
Brick Lane by Monica Ali.  An eighteen year old girl leaves her home in Bangladesh for an arranged marriage to an older man in London's East End.

Cheri and The Last of Cheri by Colette.  A beautiful young man with an empty soul and the much older woman who pampers him.

Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane.  I bought this one for the airplane and the Read the Book, See the Movie Challenge, but didn't get around to actually reading it.

Memoirs of a Midget by Walter de la Mare.  A pretty young woman isolated from society due to her diminutive size is forced to make her own way in the world after her father's death.

Raven Stole the Moon by Garth Stein.  An Advanced Review Copy that I really must read soon by the author of The Art of Racing in the Rain.

The Informers by Juan Gabriel Vasquez.  A young author's book is panned by his own father.  He continues his research to discover secrets dating back to the streets of 1940's Bogota.

Dog Day by Alicia Gimenez-Bartlett.  Set in Barcelona, two detectives investigate a murder involving big money dog-smuggling.

So, can you recommend any of these? 

Survey Results - GlowDay.com


Meantime, I'm off to my book club.  We're discussing Let the Great World Spin.  All I can say is they better like it. I've a suspicion it may end up my favorite read from 2010.  I'm certain it will be on the top ten list come December.




Full Disclosure:  I found the photo at top on Under a Blue Moon.

Dakota's Favorites: Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

I have almost no memory of this book.  Rereading the glowing review I gave felt like reading something written by a stranger.  I don't  remember any of it.  But, now that I've re-read my review, I want to re-read Kafka on the Shore.  I certainly sounds like a book I would enjoy.

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami is a twin narrative of isolation and connection. While on a class trip to the mountains during the second world war, Nakata and his classmates fall into an inexplicable coma-like sleep. Their frantic teacher goes for help and returns to find that all of the students but Nakata have woken up. Weeks go by before Nakata wakes, but when he does he has no memory of what happened before his sleep, he no longer has the ability to read and write, he has lost most of his intelligence and is unable to continue his schooling.


Sixty years pass, and we find Nakata living on a government pension and handouts from his family. He has no friends and very little human contact in his life, but he is able to talk to cats. This ability makes it possible for him to create a small business as a finder of lost cats. While looking for Goma, a neighbor's cat, he discovers a nefarious plot to steal the souls of cats and put them into a kind of flute. The man behind this plot, Johnny Walker, is a nationally famous artist and the father of Kafka, a fifteen year old boy who believes he is cursed, like Oedipus, to kill his father and sleep with his mother. Kafka runs away, drawn mysteriously to the island of Shikoku where he finds shelter in a private library.

Nakata fills in for Kafka and kills the artist once he discovers the extent of his crimes against the neighborhood cats. He then flees the city, drawn also to Shikoku and the private library, unaware that the library is just beneath the mountainside where decades earlier he fell into the mysterious coma.

This must sound like a very strange story and it is, but it is also very touching. The main characters do meet other people with whom they form connections. Everyone in the book is a lost soul, looking for something to fill an emptiness inside them. For a time they find each other, not all of them together though. I was surprised that the story's events continually kept everyone from meeting up in the library, which seemed like the logical end. I expected Nakata and Kafka to meet, but they did not. Still, the ending did not disappoint. I will not spoil it any further here except to say that I found the last 100 pages very difficult to put down and the ultimate finish unexpectedly touching.

Strange things happen in a Murakami novel (a boy falls into a coma, a man talks to cats, Colonel Sanders makes an appearance, doors to alternate worlds open) but within this magical/fantasy structure Murakmai gets at the heart of what it means to live in the modern urban world. He understands how so much of our world can make so little sense, how alienating that experience can be, how the randomness of events can lead to an unexpected sense of order, of destiny and what it is like to be compelled by fate towards actions we often cannot explain.

If I sound like I am gushing, I am. I am also giving Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami five out of five stars. It's a book that leaves the reader thinking about it long after the last page.

BTT: The 55

This week from Booking Through Thursday-- a meme:

1. Favorite childhood book?



Harriet the Spy.  She made me want to be both a spy and an author.


2. What are you reading right now?


Asleep in the Sun by Adolfo Bioy Casares

3. What books do you have on request at the library?


None



4. Bad book habit?


Using them as coasters.  I know.

 5. What do you currently have checked out at the library?


Peyton Place.

 6. Do you have an e-reader?


No



7. Do you prefer to read one book at a time, or several at once?


Sometimes one at at time; sometimes five at once.


8. Have your reading habits changed since starting a blog?


Yes.  I read much more than I did before and I tend to pick shorter books, which I know I shouldn't do.



9. Least favorite book you read this year (so far?)


Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress.  But it's been a very good reading year so far.

10. Favorite book you’ve read this year?


Let the Great World Spin



11. How often do you read out of your comfort zone?


Not that often, I guess.
12. What is your reading comfort zone?


I think I have have fairly wide comfort zone.  I'm up for just about anything.  But I never read books about right wing politics.  Articles and blogs, yes, but never an entire book.  Though I did skim Sarah Palin's book, mainly just to satisfy a morbid curiosity.


13. Can you read on the bus?


Yes.

14. Favorite place to read?


Someplace a bit noisy, like a cafe or a train. 


15. What is your policy on book lending?


Borrow anything you like, as long as it's not an antique.  If I'm not reading it right now, there's no reason to keep it on my shelf.  Return it whenever you're done with it.  Next week, next year, next lifetime.  My TBR stack is so big, I'll never get through it all.


16. Do you ever dog-ear books?

Yes.  I love dogs.


17. Do you ever write in the margins of your books?


Not often.  I don't really have any reason to.  You can't swap a book you've written in, so I avoid it as much as possible.




18. Not even with text books?


I do write in textbooks.  Isn't that one word?

19. What is your favorite language to read in?


I can only read in English.


20. What makes you love a book?


Something about it hooks me, grabs me somehow.  This could be any number of things.  I like finding something I didn't expect to find or something I never found before. 


21. What will inspire you to recommend a book?


See number 20 above. I only recommend specific people books if I know their reading habits.  I hate it when I recommend a book only to find out later that it wasn't liked.


22. Favorite genre?


I don't like to limit myself to a genre.  I probably read more Young Adult titles than any other.  I also read a lot of mystery/thrillers.  But I like to think that you never know what you'll find here.


23. Genre you rarely read (but wish you did?)


Fantasy adventure.  They always look like so much fun from the covers, but they always end up several hundred pages longer than they need to be.


24. Favorite biography?


Becoming Judy Chicago.


25. Have you ever read a self-help book?


Yes.  I read many "how-to" books on book binding, photography and book arts.  These are a kind of self-help book.


26. Favorite cookbook?


Cuisine Economique by Jacques Pepin.  The best cookbook there is.


27. Most inspirational book you’ve read this year (fiction or non-fiction)?

Oddly, it was Flush by Virginia Woolf.



28. Favorite reading snack?


A vodka martini.  I know.

29. Name a case in which hype ruined your reading experience.


I don't think this has ever happened.  Books succeed or fail on their own merits.  I don't blame the hype.  There have been books I've avoided altogether because they were so over hyped.  The Kite Runner comes to mind.  Not gonna read it. 


30. How often do you agree with critics about a book?


Maybe because I pay attention to who is reviewing a book I end up agreeing with them fairly often.  The people I usually disagree with are members of the Mann-Booker jury.  Where do they find those people.  Child 44?  Really? Child 44?  Was the airport they flew out of so small that it had no other thrillers on the shelf?



31. How do you feel about giving bad/negative reviews?


I hate it.  I don't mind if I'm giving a bad review to a book that's made lots of money for its author, see Child 44 above, or if the author is long dead, but I hate writing bad reviews the rest of the time.

32. If you could read in a foreign language, which language would you chose?


French.  Because then I could go into the bookstores in Paris's Latin Quarter and do more than admire the covers.


33. Most intimidating book you’ve ever read?


Geoffrey Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in the original Middle English.


34. Most intimidating book you’re too nervous to begin?


There aren't any I'm "too nervous" to begin.  But there are some long ones out there that I'm shy about picking up.


35. Favorite Poet?


I recently discovered Aurthur Rimbaud.

36. How many books do you usually have checked out of the library at any given time?


Between zero and 12.  Typically three to five.


37. How often have you returned book to the library unread?


Probably a third of the books I check out end up being returned unread or unfinished.  I tend to check out lots of books on a whim and then have second thoughts about them once I get them all home.  The are free, after all.  (Well, not counting the tax dollars I pay to support the library.)  They same ratio is generally true for the books I buy, which is why my TBR stack is so high.


38. Favorite fictional character?


Francis Micawber from David Copperfield.  In short, I'd follow him anywhere.


39. Favorite fictional villain?


I liked The Pardoner from Canterbury Tales.  He's a nasty piece of work, but he sure is an interesting character.


40. Books I’m most likely to bring on vacation?


Hard-boiled detective novels.  I like to wander the mean streets while I relax on vacation.


41. The longest I’ve gone without reading.


Maybe a day at most.


42. Name a book that you could/would not finish.


The Savage Detectives.  I was just under 100 pages from the end when I decided I had had enough and that I didn't care how it all turned out. 



43. What distracts you easily when you’re reading?

Dinner.


44. Favorite film adaptation of a novel?


The television version of Brideshead Revisited. The one from the 1980's.  Carrie is also very good.



45. Most disappointing film adaptation?


Nightfall, based on the wonderful short story by Isaac Asimov.  Halfway through I turned to my friend as said, "I'm going to get a soda from the lobby.  Would you like me to bring you a magazine?"



46. The most money I’ve ever spent in the bookstore at one time?


Under 100 dollars.  Probably over 50, though.

47. How often do you skim a book before reading it?


Never. 


48. What would cause you to stop reading a book half-way through?


If the plot takes an unbelievable turn, or things start to happen that I just can't believe.  There have been times when it's been so bad that I've thrown the book across the room.


49. Do you like to keep your books organized?


Are we allowed to organize them?  I have a TBR shelf, a to be traded shelf, and a to be kept shelf.  There's not much in the way of organization other than that.


50. Do you prefer to keep books or give them away once you’ve read them?


I only keep books if they contain something I might use again or if I think there's a chance I might want to read them again.  I have a few small collections of antique books but most of these have pictures or illustrations that make them worth keeping.


51. Are there any books you’ve been avoiding?

I refuse to read James Joyce and I refuse to read Marcel Proust.  I will not read them on a train, I will not read them in the rain.  I will not read them in the house. I will not read them with a mouse.


52. Name a book that made you angry.


Most books by Virginia Woolf make me angry.  How she can spend so many pages going on and on about the most mundane things is beyond me.  And then she goes and has the nerve to be such a brilliant writer.  I can open any of her books to any random sentence and be 100% certain that it will be a brilliant sentence and that I'll want to throw the book across the room if I continue reading for three more pages.


53. A book you didn’t expect to like but did?


Flush by Virginia Woolf. See above.


54. A book that you expected to like but didn’t?


The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt.  I loved Possession and was looking forward to The Children's Book because so many people had said it was as good or better than Possession.  I read several hundred pages and honestly didn't care if any of the characters lived or died.  So I gave up. 


55. Favorite guilt-free, pleasure reading?

All of my reading is guilt-free now.  Except, maybe Sarah Palin's book.  It was from the library, so at least is was "free."  See #37 above.

The Exception by Christian Jungersen

Don't they ever think about anything except killing each other?" Roberto asks.

Opening to The Exception by Christian Jungersen, translated from the Danish by Anna Paterson.

A terrorist kidnapping in Kenya, a series of email death threats in Copenhagen, The Exception grabs the readers attention from the start.  We're immediately focused on the suspense--familiar territory for readers of thrillers.  But then Mr. Jungersen does something completely unexpected.  Once he's got our attention, he lets it go.  The story moves from international thriller to inter-office politics.  From the political to the very personal.  The threatening emails appear to be harmless.  The police can't do anything about them.  Told to go on about their regular lives, the three women who got the emails are left to figure out who sent them on their own.  True, they could be from a terrorist, or they could be from the only woman in their office who didn't get one. This is how The Exception begins to work its way under the reader's skin like no other thriller I've ever read.

The narrative shifts perspective among its four main characters, all women who work for the Danish Center for Information on Genocide, (DCIG).  Their work brings them in close contact with very unsavory people, like Mirko Zigic, a Serbian torturer and war criminal whom they suspect may be behind the threatening emails.  Zigic, the subject of a lengthy profile in the DCIG's monthly publication, may be out for revenge.  Or it could be that Anne-Lise, the newly hired librarian, has come un-hinged.  She was the only one not to get a threatening email, she tends to keep to herself and is suspected of having a drinking problem. 

But when the narrative shifts to Anne-lise's point of view and moves back in time to provide her side of the story so far, the reader is led to believe that she is the innocent victim of the other three women who have joined together to bully her for reasons she does not understand.  It's this shifting of perspective, from one woman to anther as well as backwards in time, that continually undermines the reader's expectations.  As soon as we're convinced we know what is going on, perspective changes, we get details we didn't have before and what looked like oranges begins to resemble apples. 

Mr. Jungersen keeps The Exception from falling into an account of petty office squabbling by presenting the results of the women's research into the character of the men who commit genocidal acts.  The DCIG is devoted to preventing genocide by discovering how people can bring themselves to commit genocidal acts.  The papers printed in The Exception deal with psychological and historical studies into human behavior.  Just how did regular soldiers in the German army come to commit mass murder for the Nazi's?  What were the effects of random assignment of power positions on those who participated in prisoner/guard experiments at Stanford University?  While some of these articles cover areas many readers are familiar with, others deal with more current research, and all of them make for fascinating reading.  Understanding why people behave the way they do adds to the novel's tension and makes the reader suspect the actions of the four women.  It also forces  readers to take an uncomfortable look at their own past.  Have we ever participated in unjustifiable inter-office bullying to insure our own position or to protect ourselves from becoming the one who is bullied or the one mostly likely to be let go when the office downsizes?

The rest of the tension comes from the lingering possibility that the Serbian war criminal Mirko Zigic is really after the three women responsible for the article about him.  Small but significant things happen throughout the novel.  It could be that Anne-lise is responsible for them, but it's also possible that Zigic is the guilty party.  It's even possible that one of the other three women has become unhinged and begun striking out against the others. 

I've been indulging in the current wave of Scandinavian mystery/thrillers.  While I do think The Exception could have been trimmed by about 50 pages or so, and I have a few small problems with parts of the ending, I suspect it will end up on my list of favorite reads of 2010.  It's a thoughtful, suspenseful book that this reader thought about a long time after the story ended.

The Mystery of the Black Tower by John Palmer

During the reign of the illustrious Edward of Windsor, the scourge of Gallia, and whose warlike arm plucked from her pallid sons fresh leaves of laurel, which he entwined in England's diadem; a peasant, named Christopher, resided in a beautiful valley in Northumberland, from which the golden rays of Phoebus were excluded by the impervious branches of a hanging wood, that environed it, and cast a delightful shade upon the plain beneath.

Opening sentence, yes sentence, to The Mystery of the Black Tower by John Palmer.  (This is the longest opening sentence ever to appear on this blog.)

The Mystery of the Black Tower by John Palmer was first published through subscription in 1796.  The Gothic Classics edition published in 2005 by Valancourt Books features a complete list of all the original subscribers--an unusual legacy to leave posterity.  In the early days of the novel, before anyone was quite sure what a novel was, publishing by subscription was common place.  An author with a work to publish sold copies in advance, usually to friends, family and acquaintances.  Once enough subscribers could be found, the book could be printed.  If the publicity that followed was good enough, another edition would follow. 

18th century Gothic novels are of interest to me because they represent one of the possible paths the novel could have taken.  Had Fanny Burney and Jane Austen not come along, dark stories with mysterious towers and elements of the supernatural might have become the 19th century novel, instead of stories about young women searching for proper husbands.  Gothic novels didn't vanish, of course.  Elements of them can be found in many 19th and 20th century novels, and they are all the rage today.  Any novelist who has ever imprisoned a heroine in a tower owes a small debt to John Palmer.  He was the first.  (The Mystery of the Black Tower precedes even Grimm's Fairy Tales which came out in 1812.)

But, in the end one must ask if the modern reader has anything to gain from reading The Mystery of the Black Tower other than satisfying the idle curiosity sparked by finding an unusual title in the Yale library stacks one rainy afternoon.  To answer this question read the passage from the book below.

     "Indeed! Is it even so?" exclaimed Edmund, irritated at her indifference; "I know full well for whom I am thus scorned; the beggar Leonard has your heart: I , however, have your person; let then your love-sick swain tune his discordant pipe amidst surrounding branches, or beside some flowing rill; I will feast myself on more substantial joys.  You are in my grasp, remember, nor all the earthly, all the heavenly powers, shall tear you from me."
     "Can you think so meanly of me," she cried, "as to suppose your threats can terrify me into what my heart abhors? My innocence, like the solid rock that braves the billows, is proof against your menaces and arts, and alike despises your frothy eloquence and malice."
   With fury in his looks, Fitzallon now darted from the room, and left the afflicted Emma to her sorrows.


John Palmer will never find a formal place in the English Cannon.  Not with writing like this.  And I don't think many modern readers will be able to make it very far with prose like "I will feast myself on more substantial joys."  As Abraham Lincoln once said, "It's the sort of thing that appeals to people who like that sort of thing." 

That may be the best way to end this review of  John Palmer's The Mystery of the Black Tower.

Read the Book, See The Movie Challenge: Entries for August and September

I am late getting a Read The Book, See The Movie linky up for August/September.  Here is already halfway through August.  If you are playing along with the Read the Book, See the Movie Challenge and have a book/movie review to list please do so in a comment below.  Please include a link to your review so we can all find it. 

I've had trouble with Mr. Linky again, so I'm going to ask everyone to leave their links in the comments. I'll come back and make a link list at the bottom of this post periodically. 

There will be ten prizes this time around.  And, yes, you may win more than one prize if you enter multiple times. 

If you're not already playing along and would like to join the Read the Book, See the Movie Challenge you can sign-up here.  It's not too late. 

Entries for August/September:
    You're the first!

Sunday Salon: Some Catching Up

Yesterday, C.J. and I went out to Pt. Reyes Station to pick up some of my artwork.  I show my work at a gallery there called Sometimes Books.  Along the way we stopped at The Cheese Factory and had a very California lunch by the pond.  Some cheese and crackers, a few olives, a bottle of Gloria Ferrar champagne.  A celebration of our second legal wedding anniversary which was last Tuesday.  We took both dogs along for the ride as well. 

It has taken me a few days to feel fully back at home.  There was a moment, Friday morning as I was sitting at a stop light on the way in to school.   I looked up, over the neighborhood roofs, and saw the hills behind them, green and gold, dusty California trees and brown summer grass.  Home.

I can't say that there has been much reading this week.  I'm almost finished with The Exception, by Christian Jungersen which I picked up in New York during my trip back east.  It's the strangest thriller/mystery I've ever read.  I've no idea how I'm going to write a review of it, but review it I will. 

I feel that I've neglected my Read the Book, See the Movie challenge this summer.  Below you'll find a little video of Dakota selecting a prize winner for May/June/July.  I'm giving away one copy of Roger Ebert's
book Your Movie Sucks.  You can still join the challenge, of course.  Go here to join in the fun.  I'm going to give 10 August/September reviews a prize to help make up for my past neglect. 

Dakota will be attempting her new trick in the video, so please watch even if you're not entered in the challenge.  It's a very cut trick C.J. taught her while I was away at Yale.  For the record, C.J. has asked that there not be anymore seven week trips away on my own. 

I've agreed.  It was a long time away from home.



I really need a new camera. 

The winner of Mister Pip is lgh164.  Mrs. B. won Your Movie Sucks.  I'll try to get an email off to you both later today.  To join the Read the Book, See the Movie Challenge go here.

Full Disclosure: The picture of the pond at The Cheese Factory along with several others can be found here.

Friday Picture Reading: The Cat's Meow.

Photo found on Yangabang.

Yale Update #9: Home Again

I arrived home last night to find two very happy dogs and one happy husband who has grown a beard.  I think I like it.  Not sure yet.

I also found five large envelopes full of the books I mailed home media mail.  This morning I decided to make a "Not Library Loot" video of them.  Stick around to the end for a little giveaway. 




I hope you'll excuse the poor video quality this time around.  I'm a bit jet-lagged. 

If you'd like a copy of Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones, please say so in  a comment below.  Dakota and I will pick a winner for this week's Sunday Salon.  I'm going to try to get her to do her new trick for the camera, too.  C.J. taught her to shake while I was away.  It's very cute.

Books on Film: Octavia Butler

If you've never read Octavia Butler, read Kindred. It's marvelous.

Sunday Salon: Still on the Road

I typing to you today from inside Jacob's Coffee House at 8th and D St.s in Washington, D.C.   It's just the sort of coffee house I miss.  Quick service, good food, reasonable prices, tables and comfy chairs, interesting local crowd, shelves of free books is you need one.  And free Wi-fi.

I travelled to D.C. by train on Thursday which took four and a half hours but was pleasant enough.  I got to D.C. so late I decided to take a cab to my sister-in-laws place just six blocks away. D.C. is not exactly laid out in a friendly way, and I didn't want to get lost at 11:30 at night.  The cab stand line took 30 minutes. 

By daylight the Capitol Hill neighborhood is quite nice.  Lots of older, charming row houses.  Wondering around the Eastern Market area I found this little park with  bird houses hanging in the trees.  You have to be on foot, and maybe be a little lost to find places like this.  Just the sort of tourism I enjoy. 

I had an entertaining tour of the Folger Shakespeare Library that included several behind the scenes stops.  Bought a curriculum unit on A Midsummer Night's Dream to use with my 7th graders.  Shakespeare Set Free comes very highly recommended by several Yale classmates.  Then it was off to the National Portrait Gallery which has new digs since I was last there.  It's wonderful.  It has much more than portraits now.  It's not very crowded once you get off of the first floor.  They have two very large, very good Edward Hoppers on display.  I've been jonesing for Edward Hopper lately because the dorm I stayed in at Yale had several Hopper posters in the common rooms.

Two museums a day is my self-imposed limit while I'm here in D.C.  I want to take it easy for a few days.  I'm heading off to either the Dupont Circle neighborhood to see Renoir's  Boating Party at the Phillips or to Georgetown to find the stairs from The Exorcist.  I can't decide which; I may flip a coin when I get to the Metro station.

As far as reading goes, I've moved on to trash.  Finished Darkly Dreaming Dexter on the train down here, tried to get into The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and couldn't get past page 26. (I may try again when I get home.)  I have a few other books in my suitcase, but then, I may pass by a bookstore later today......



Full Disclosure: I found the picture of Edward Hopper's Cape Cod Morning here.

Dakota's Favorites: Zeroville by Steve Erickson

Sometimes the right novel comes along at the right time.  This was the case with Zeroville by Steve Erickson.  I read this one simply because the title started with 'Z' which I needed for the A-Z Reading Challenge.  I liked it so much that I decided to try more books by Steve Erickson.  The other one I found, I did not enjoy, but I can recommend Zeroville.

Zeroville by Steve Erickson is a cult novel. You can tell it's a cult novel because it's full of very hip cultural references and it's hero is a disaffected wanderer with tendencies towards violence. I like cult novels and I liked Zeroville.


Vikar Jerome, the novels hero, sort of strays into Hollywood without much of a past and without much of a plan for the future. What he does have is a head full of cinematic knowledge; so much so that it is actually visable. He has a tattoo of Montgomery Clift and Elizabeth Taylor in a scene from A Place in the Sun on the side of his head. Vikar reminded me very much of Hazel Motes from Wise Blood, probably because I just read it, and of Ignatius J. Riley from A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole. I think if you crossed the two of them and threw the product into The Day of the Locust you'd be pretty close to understanding Zeroville.

I fear that, so far, this probably sounds like I didn't like the book, but I'm just not sure quite what to make of it yet. One of the characters talks about seeing a movie six times and saying "God, I hate this movie," every time, then seeing it a seventh time and saying "God, I love this movie." I think that may be a common experience with readers of Zeroville.

After Vikar wanders into Hollywood, he sort of wanders into a series of jobs in the movies culminating with a chance to direct his own film. Along the way he meets various people and befriends them through no real effort on his own part. All he really wants to do is watch movies, and watch movies he does. Erickson spends a lot of time summarizing the movies Vikar sees; sometimes he names them and sometimes we have to guess what the movie is. He does the same things with the people Vikar meets, naming a few celebrities and letting us figure out who the rest of them are. Far from becoming annoying, this is actually fun. In fact, I plan to thumb through the book and add most Vikar's movie lists to my Netflix queue.

Throughout the novel Vikar is haunted by a recurring dream and by the idea that all movies contain a secret movie that wants to be released. How readers react to the way this idea plays out will probaby determine whether or not they end up liking the book enough to seek out Mr. Erickson's other work. I'm not really sure what I think of it, but I'll be thinking about it for a while; I'll also be looking into other books by Steve Erickson.

I'm giving Zeroville by Steve Erickson five out of five stars.

Yale Update #8: Leaving New Haven

After class today I'll be heading for the train station.  I'm off to Washington, D.C. for a visit before returning home to California.  I'd thought I'd finish this account of my summer of Chaucer at Yale by  indulging in a couple of lists.  I love lists.

 What I won't miss about Yale/New Haven:

1. Construction noise.  Construcion on the neighboring new dorms has gone all night long more than one.
2. The powerplant.  If you've ever lived next to one, you know.
3. Slightly pickled lettuce on burritos.  What the heck is that about anyway?  It's just so past wrong.  If wrong were Mars, pickled lettuce on burritos would be Neptune. 
4. Rude service.  There is plenty of good service in New Haven, too, but the service I've had at the post office, Starbucks and Walgreens has been shockingly and consistantly bad.   The worst I have ever experienced.  Other places have been bad in a more pedestrian way.  Some have been very good. 
5. Living in a town that has no supermarket.  How is that even legal in America?
6. All the smoking.  You all in the North East sure do smoke a lot.
7. The feeling that everything in New Haven costs 22% more than it should.
8. The humidity.  I'm from California. 

What I will miss about Yale/New Haven:

1. Having three decent bookstores in walking distance whenever the mood for browsing strikes.
2. The scones at Blue State Coffee.  No one on the west coast makes decent scones. They should give it up and go with muffins.  (Except one of the members of my book club.) 
3. The bagels at Bruegger's.  Again, no one on the west coast makes decent bagels.  I'm talking to you, Noah!
4. Trivia Tuesdays at Anna Liffey's and/or The Black Bear.  The Black Bear has five dollar pitchers.  Guess which place is our favorite.
5. Grinders.  Between the New England grinders and New York deli's the North East is a sandwich heaven. 
6. Ice cream at Ashley's, voted the best in Connecticut.  
7. Day trips into New York City and the New England countryside.
8. The stacks at the Sterling Memorial Library.
9. Birch Beer.
10. Finding humorous stonework on the buildings at Yale
11. Learning just how wrong I was about a particular Canterbury Tale once our Yale professor begins class.
12. Wednesday night movies and pizza.
13. The chance to see a good Van Gogh at the Yale University Art Gallery whenever I feel like it.
14. The camraderie and friendship of my classmates.
15.  The chance to talk about classic books with a bunch of people who have read them all. 

What I'm most looking forward to when I get back home to California:

1. Seeing CJ.
2. Petting the dogs.
3. A decent burrito.
4. Driving.
5. Papusas.
6. Sleeping in my own bed.
7. Vegetables fresh from the garden.
8. Reading some  of the many books I bought while here.

I should have an update from Washington on Sunday.  This trip has taken me away from home for  two months.  That's the longest I've ever been away from home, and I can honestly say I don't want to do it again.  From now on, four weeks tops.  I miss my house and all those who live in it.

Full Disclosure:  The pictures today are all windows in the classroom below ours at Yale.  They are by Tiffany.

Prop. 8 Ruled Unconstitutional

:-)








Complete text of the judges ruling can be found here.

Who Was That Man? A Present for Mr. Oscar Wilde by Neil Bartlett

I wrote this book in London in 1985 and 1986, and I suppose that's what it's about.  I wanted to write a book about what it feels like, because I think that's what people always want to know, really, what does it feel like...

Opening to Who Was the Man? A Present for Mr. Oscar Wilde by Neil Bartlett

There is a notion that gay people came about as a result of Oscar Wilde's trials.  Before Oscar Wilde there were men who slept with other men, but that there was no gay identity, nothing a modern person would recognize as a gay. According to this notion, we are all the children of Oscar Wilde, both gay and straight.  Even straight people didn't exist as we know them today without gay people to stand in opposition to.

But for Oscar Wilde to exist as a gay man, there had to be a space for this to happen, a gay world of some sort.  He had to come from somewhere.  What was gay London like before Oscar Wilde went on trial?  What kind of world did he live in?  What sort of world proceeded him?  These are the questions Neil Bartlett attempts to answer in his book Who Was That Man? A Present for Mr. Oscar Wilde.

These are difficult questions to answer.  Oscar Wilde referred to homosexuality as "the love that dare not speak its name" for a reason.  Prior to his trials there were very few public figures willing to identify as homosexual.  Finding direct evidence of their lives proves almost impossible.  So Mr. Bartlett must learn to read between the lines as he combs through old newspaper clippings, arrest records, and published books to ferret out evidence of a gay demimonde in pre-Oscar Wilde London. 

This evidence takes a scrapbook form.  Mr. Bartlett reprints many clippings allowing his reader to piece together the gay subculture of 19th century London as he does.  Gay men of my generation and before may  remember what it was like to read about police raids of known cruising areas or scenes in a book that appeared to be about something more than the teacher was describing.  Why did Gene spend so much time watching Finny do sit-ups in A Separate Peace?  Why was Sal Mineo following James Dean around all the time in A Rebel Without a Cause?  While there was a prurient thrill on one level,  on another there was a growing awareness that there were other people out there like us if only we cold find them.  It's this feeling that Mr. Bartlett tries to explain in Who Was That Man?

The results are mixed.  Mr. Bartlett does assemble enough evidence to draw a sketch of gay life before Oscar Wilde, but not one that completely satisfies this reader.  It's difficult to see how he could.  The evidence that exists, at least in the British Library where Mr. Bartlett did his reading, is the kind that gives only hints.  Arrests were made following a police raid.  Mr. So-and-so died after sharing the last few years of his life with his long time friend.  Who Was That Man?  is a collection of hints and clues.   Is there enough evidence to make a conclusion?  Each reader must decide.

Full Disclosure: I found the picture of Oscar Wilde and Alfred Douglass on Wikipedia.org

Viva Argentina! Viva!

Yesterday, in Argentina....



Tomorrow.....

"The Scarlet Plague" by Jack London

The way led along upon what had once been the embankment of a railroad. 

Opening to "The Scarlet Plague" by Jack London

Not many people would think of Jack London as an early pioneer of Science Fiction.  He's much better known for his adventure novels, The Call of the Wild, and White Fang, among many others.   But along with the adventure stories, Jack London was a fierce social critic and a sometimes author of science fiction, well before the genre was firmly established.

"The Scarlet Plague" can be found in The Science Fiction Stories of Jack London which is on the shelves at Yale University where I came across it last week.   The story is set about 200 years in Jack London's future, about 80 years in ours.  The main character is Granser, an old man nearing the end of his life who feels he must teach his grandsons the history of their world so they will remember how it  came to an end and what it was like before the Scarlet Plague struck.  Like most children, the grandsons are concerned only with their own immediate lives and have no interest in history.

A curious part of the story's charm is that the past Granser describes is just a few years into our own future--the Scarlet Plague strikes in 2013.  The story  is both  dystopian and  post-apocalyptic so the future Mr. London envisioned was not  altogether bright.  Daily life remained much like it was during Mr. London's own time, but the country was taken over by a conglomerate of super-rich oligarchs.  The Scarlet Plague killed off all but a  handful of people who banded together in groups and lived the primitive lives of their ancestors-- plot  that has become standard in science fiction.  See Earth Abides.

"The Scarlet Plague" is a good story though it may not hold much of interest to those not interested in Jack London or the development of science fiction as a genre.  I did enjoy the fact that it is set in the San Francisco Bay Area.  I was pleased to read that Santa Rosa, where C.J. and I hope to move next spring, fares better than most places.  We'll have a couple of years to prepare for the plague's arrival after we've moved and a fairly good chance at survival.

TSS: The Pilgrims Close in on Canterbury - Yale Update #7

The following entry was written earlier this week on the night before our class discussed "The Monk's Tale" and "The Nun's Priest's Tale." 

I admit I had to read "The Nun's Priest's Tale" three times but I think I finally got the point of Chanticleer.  It's pretty clever, too. 

It's very important when reading The Canterbury Tales to consider their order.  They comment on each other, parody each other, take pot-shots at each other throughout.  This is how our Yale professor has built his case that they are a finished work. 

So Chanticleer.....

The story of Chanticleer is proceeded by "The Monk's Tale."  This is one of the dullest tales in the collection, possibly one of the dullest tales in English.  It consists of a series of short portraits of kings  and other people who rose to great heights only to be struck down beginning with Lucifer, followed by Adam and proceeding through history on and on until the Monk is finally interrupted by the Knight:

"Hoo," quod the Knyght, "good sire, namoore of this!
That ye han seyd is right ynough, ywis"

The Host hands the story-telling off to the Nun's Priest who tells the story of Chanticleer, a grand rooster who rules the barnyard of a very poor widow.  Chanticleer dreams that he will be killed by a fox.  His wife mocks him for his fear.  He argues his case, citing several people in history who have dreamed their own doom only to have it come true.  Then he forgets about the dream. 

One day a fox appears.  He tries to lure Chanticleer into his reach by praising his wonderful voice and asking him to sing.  When Chanticleer stretches out his neck to crow, the fox grabs him and runs off into the woods.  Once they are in the woods, Chanticleer tells the fox if I were you I'd yell at those chasing you to let them know they are wasting their time since you've made it into the forest.  There is no way they can catch you. The fox decides to do just that and sets Chanticleer down which makes it possible for him to escape.  The moral of the story, keep you mouth shut when you should.

I think the Nun's Priest is mocking the Monk.  His hero is a barnyard fowl, but he's linked to the Monk through the series of stories he tells to illustrate his point that dreams come true.  The last story Chanticleer tells, of King Cresus, completes the story the Monk was telling when the Knight interrupted him.  No one pays any attention to Chanticleer's stories just as no one was paying any attention to the Monk.  Chanticleer is in love with the sound of his own voice just as the Monk was.  The moral stated in the Nun's Priest's  epilogue appears to be a direct comment on the Monk:

...God yeve hym meschaunce
That is so undiscreet of governaunce
Than jangleth whan he sholde holde his pees.

The Monk's tale is all about how misfortune came to the powerful, but the Nun's Priest message is that misfortune comes from talking when one should be quiet.  There's even a line in the General Prologue's description of the Monk that links him to Chanticleer:

He haf nat of that text a pulled hen

The line refers to what the Monk thinks of books that say those in monasteries should refrain from hunting, which the Monk loves.  One might think that the Nun's Priest would have no way of knowing this line is in the General Prologue, but he interrupts his own tale to complain that he cannot write as well as Chaucer does, so we know he's read at least some Chaucer.  (How fun is that.  Turns out The Canterbury Tales uses lots of post modern techniques.  It's a bit like reading a Paul Auster novel at times.)

We'll see if I'm right about this tomorrow.  Scroll down to find out.


Partially right.  Chanticleer is a dig at the Monk, there's much evidence to support this.  However, my two major pieces of evidence do not really work.  The tale of Cresus is the last one the Monk tells in our edition, but this turns out to be scribal.  In its original form, "The Monk's Tale" was probably written one example per page for 17 pages.  These were not bound to make it easier to copy just the ones a particular patron wanted whenever a copy of the book was ordered.  Our Yale professor thinks the story of Ugolino should come last, not the story of Cresus.  So much for my big insight.  I asked about the chicken reference in the General Prologue and suggested that the Nun's Priest may have known it since he has read Chaucer.  Our Yale professor was amused by this, but he thinks it's kind of a stretch.  Those may have been his exact words.  (He may be right, but my interpretation is more fun.) We didn't get to talk about "The Nun's Priest's Tale" much, since our Yale professor had a lot to say about "The Monk's Tale."  There may be some hope for me yet come Monday's class.

We only have two class sessions left and six tales to get through. I'm not sure we're going to make it.  There may be a bonus class on Wednesday.


Full Disclosure:  The rooster picture above comes from Dave Cory's blog.  The picture of the Monk is from the Ellsmere Manuscript.  The selections from The Canterbury Tales quoted above translate as follows:

"Whoa!" said the Knight, "Good sire, no more of this!
What you have said is right enough, indeed.

God give him misfortune
That is so incapable of self-control
That he chatters when he should hold his peace.

(He) gave not a plucked chicken for that text