Nerds Heart YA - Judging Applications Open

Just a quick fly in, fly out post to mention that applications are now being taken for Nerds Heart YA judges. Just follow the link, check out the criteria (nothing too strenuous) and fill in the form. We'd love to take all of you, but due to the bracket style of the contest we only have a limited number of spots open so if we get more judges than spots we'll be working out a fair way of picking people.

Please pass on the word about Nerds Heart YA to everyone you know who loves young adult fiction. We want plenty of people aware of the contest so we can have the biggest pool of book blogging talent ready to wave their recommendations in our faces when it comes time for longlist nominations (provisionally set for early March).

To the Lighthouse - Virginia Woolf

‘She had done the usual trick - - been nice. She would never know him. He would never know her. Human relations were all like that, she thought, and the worst (if it had not been for Mr Bankes) were between men and women. Inevitably these were extremely insincere she thought.’

Reading ‘To the Lighthouse’ is depressing and enlivening in equal measures. It is depressing to see someone express the futility found at the centre of certain types of human interactions. It’s also startling and wonderful to see someone talk so honestly about this shadow of insincerity, which can hang over a perfectly pleasant evening. How brave of Virginia Woolf to be so true.

Woolf keeps delving into the true nature of relationships through the novel, which follows the Ramsey family and the guests they’ve invited to the Isle of Skye for a holiday. In other hands so much harsh truth would be hard to take and might end in the reader jumping off a cliff, but Woolf manages to make her the human disconnection she uncovers palatable by refusing to assign blame, or allow any one character to appear as the superior party, who is endowed with a more intense sense of feeling than others:

‘Lily was listening; Mrs Ramsey was listening; they were all listening. But already bored, Lily felt that something was lacking. Pulling her shawl round her Mrs Ramsey felt that something was lacking. All of them bending themselves to listen thought, “Pray heaven that the inside of my mind may not be exposed,” for each thought, “The others are feeling this. They are outraged and indignant with the government about the fishermen. Whereas I feel nothing.” '

How generous of her to recognise that this kind of dissatisfaction affects everyone from the artist, to the intellectual, to the woman at the centre of the domestic sphere. By offering this depth of feeling to everyone (everyone within the privileged circle anyway, the maid crying in the attic is not given a voice to speak about these kind of issues) she makes what at first seem depressing condemnations of the way humans interact, into liberating revelations. These offer readers the chance to dispense with the carefully cultivated pretence of society and dig deeper in their relationships with others, knowing that the people they meet may also feel a lack of something and wish it wasn’t so.

Emily has already vigorously examined the theme of modern women, fighting against traditional society, in ‘To the Lighthouse’ in her introductory post for this section of ‘Woolf in Winter’. If you want a good close reading of the book from this angle get over there and enjoy, I agree with all that Emily’s said. Considering that this is said to be Woolf’s most autobiographical novel I also think it’s reasonable to see Lily’s thoughts, which shift between admiration for the domestically accomplished Mrs Ramsey and assertiveness against her influence, as Virginia Woolf’s confusion as she tried to find a position between the exclusivity of Mrs Ramsey’s domestic marriage and the artistic apartness of her guest, Lily. Woolf was happily married when ‘To the Lighthouse’ was published, but the book betrays an almost intense foreboding connected to marriage, even from the happily married Mrs Ramsey:

‘Was she wrong in this, she asked herself, reviewing her conduct for the past week or two, and wondering if she had indeed out any pressure on Minta, who was only twenty-four, to make up her mind. She was uneasy. Had she not laughed about it? Marriage needed – oh all sorts of qualities (the bill for the greenhouse would be fifty pounds); one – she need not name it – that was essential; the thing she had with her husband. Had they that?’

Lily, who is desperate to escape marriage is aligned with the artistic side of life. Is this an indication of Woolf’s own confusion about how marriage and art can coexist, or is it a more general comment on the conflict between traditional and modern views about how a woman’s life should progress?

Stylistically ‘To the Lighthouse’ is refreshing. So many of the devices Woolf uses, such as repetition and extended periods of stream of conscious, internal monologues, are commonplace in modern literature, but Woolf really shows how to achieve maximum effect with them. Take the bracketed section above for example, ‘(the bill for the greenhouse would be fifty pounds)’. At first it seems so simple and inconsequential, but by repeating the phrase occasionally, in during seemingly unrelated thoughts about marriage, or children growing up, Woolf fills it with all the everyday worry that Mrs Ramsey has to shoulder because her intellectual husband cannot be burdened and makes it a powerful indicator of the fears Mrs Ramsey has about encouraging others to marry, despite her own happiness. My favourite part of the book is the second section ‘Time Passes’, where the narrative departs from the character’s immediate thoughts and actions to go on a modern stylistic adventure, as a literal, descriptive interpretation of what happens when time passes is offered, inter cut with bits of direct action and thought from the cleaning lady, sent to sort out the Ramsey’s holiday home. The reality of time passing is slowed down and detailed in a way which no one could ever remember observing as time passed, almost like when you watch a stop motion nature program of plants growing, but this is spliced with a more realistic version of how people remember the time that has passed, in snippets with a concentration on the big events.

Thanks to the organisers of ‘Woolf in Winter’ for pushing me to return to Virginia Woolf’s books, something I never thought I’d do after ‘Orlando’. I’m ready for more now, which is wonderful, because there’s nothing worse than when you have to close the door on an author. There’s still time for you to join in, as ‘Orlando’ and ‘The Waves’ will be discussed by two of the other organisers in February.

Other Reviews

Medieval Bookworm
Birdbrained Book Blog

Virginia Woolf - When talking about books is not so pleasant

‘ “Vronsky,” said Mrs Ramsay; “Oh, ANNA KARENINA,” but that did not take them very far; books were not in their line. No, Charles Tansley would put them both right in a second about books, but it was all so mixed up with, Am I saying the right thing? Am I making a good impression? That, after all, one knew more about him than about Tolstoi, whereas what Paul said was about the thing, simply, not himself, nothing else.’

To the Lighthouse – Virginina Woolf.

Liar - Justine Larbalestier

Micah admits that she’s a compulsive liar, but that may be the only true statement comes out of her mouth during ‘Liar’.

There’s so much I want to talk about relating to this book’s plot and characters, as well as the many issues of gender, race and teenage life Justine Larbalestier has embedded into her story. Unfortunately I can’t because due to all the lies and ‘maybe not lies’ that Micah tells this is one twisty plot with revelations and red herrings every other page. I would hate to spoil it for you, and the author openly asks that reviewers try their hardest not to reveal anything, so I’m afraid that sentence above is all you’ll get about the book’s plot. I will say the plot is excellent and the ending left me (gah was going to indicate something about my feelings at the end of the book here and realised that could be a spoiler too) uncertain. In fact I felt exactly the same kind of uncertainty *very significant wink* that I felt after watching a particular episode of Buffy *gigantic, face contorting wink*. If you’ve read ‘Liar’ and watched way too much Buffy during your teens perhaps you would like to wink back significantly at me?

Talking in code is exhausting. Let’s try something a bit simpler, if you’ve read ‘Liar’ please answer the question I’m about to ask, because I am bursting to have even the barest exchange about the plot without spoiling anyone else’s reading experience. At the end of the book, did you believe Micah’s story?; simply answer yes, or no.

There are two areas I think I can talk about without revealing anything about the plot. Let me start with Larbalestier’s original twist on the unreliable narrator, a device that in the late 90s - early 00s was greatly overused. A trusting reader would be quite happily enjoying a book, when little things would stop fitting together, other characters would present alternative perspectives on events and before you knew it you’d be feeling quite foolish for having believed (yet again) that the narrator was a perfectly nice chap (because the unreliable narrators I remember do all seem to have been men). Of course, it was a device that threw up all sort of interesting ideas like the problems of a story told in a single narrative, and the delicate trust we all put in an author to present the truth, but in the immediate moment when the narrator’s lies are revealed it was hard not to feel just a little bit stupid for missing their deceit.

But what if the narrator’s untrustworthy nature were never a secret to be revealed? What if right away they admit they are a liar, but promise not to lie to the reader? What if they later offer up lies, alongside truth and more lies and some very ambiguous descriptions? What if they say they know their lies make you less likely to believe them? That’s the kind of company Larbalestier leaves her readers in and by the end it’s very hard to keep faith with any one interpretation of the story because all narrative trust is undermined, but also because all narrative trust is reinforced. It sounds manipulative to create a character who constantly guides your opinion of what is going on by preying on your trust and your sympathies and your prejudices and your guilt and it is, it has to be for the device to work, but that’s nothing new; untrustworthy narrators have been doing that since they were created, they just generally do it secretively only to have their lies exposed later. Larbalestier’s originality is in telling readers about Micah’s unreliability and still managing to make them dance as she wishes, thereby further exposing the reader’s complete reliance on the narrator when only one point of view is available.

There were points where I felt so manipulated by Micah l was angry, I’m not a fan of having my opinions so obviously shepherded by a character and their author, but the strange thing is that I never felt like I was being overly manipulated by the author, if that makes sense. Despite the book cleverly manipulating my thought patterns as it directed me to believe, or not believe in certain plot aspects, the writing was never emotionally manipulative. I was left free to think what I wanted about Micah’s character and decide whether I felt sorry for her, loved her (kinda strongly), or hated her, independent of the way the plot unfolded. At east I hope I was, I hope my feeling of freedom isn’t another clever, under the surface manipulation of the author’s (you will trust nothing after this book).

Now for the second thing I can talk about while avoiding spoilers, it’s the writing. I feel like I should say the writing will not be to everyone’s taste, but what kind of writing is universally everyone’s bag? I guess what I mean is that the writing style experiments with form, like line breaks and sentence length, using these elements to reflect Micah’s personality and tone. It’s about as close as I’ve seen young adult literature come to what I’d maybe call popular experimental adult fiction (not as experimental, or cultish as authors who write whole chapters with just one vowel, but more experimental than authors who write using the norms of prose writing). I really enjoyed that element of the book, because it really was an outstanding example of an author crafting a distinctive, fitting voice for her character. Despite all the history Micah gives the reader, all the physical and emotional details she provides, I feel strongly that if her voice had been written using a more typical style she wouldn’t have worked as a character. Matching Micah’s personality and feelings with a writing style that reflects them through its form adds layers of believability to her personality and feelings.

The style used reminded me of a young adult novel in verse, ‘Because I am Furniture’ by Thalia Chaltas. Although the characters in the two novels are entirely different there’s the same kind of anger expressed through the use of shorter, sharp lines and that stylistic device lends credibility to the feelings the reader is told about. It’s a nice combination of show and tell, that demonstrates the two don’t have to be exclusive, there are not just books that successfully show and books that successfully tell, some writers do both. If I’m being picky I’d say there is sometimes a bit too much telling in ‘Liar’ as Larbalestier tends to info dump about subjects she’s obviously passionate about.

It’s kind of impossible to enter into a discussion of ‘Liar’, as it’s currently presented, without discussing the cover controversy yet again. For anyone catching up this was Bloomsbury’s first racial cover ‘mistake’, where they put a white girl on the front of a book about a black girl. The picture above is the new USA cover which some feel is a huge step and other feel is a half measure, because it portrays a black girl who meets white beauty standards when Micah is a girl very far away from traditional white, or female beauty standards. I don’t think I’m significantly educated on this issue to offer an opinion, which is so complicated (love to hear what others have to say), but I will say that the girl on the front of the book is not even close to Micah when you compare her with the descriptions in the book. After reading the book I can finally legitimately shoot down Bloomsbury’s excuse for that white cover, by saying there’s absolutely no indication in the writing that Justine Larbalestier wrote this book intending to show that Micah might lie about her race, just as she lies about other things. It’s totally down to Justine’s passionate engagement with issues surrounding race and gender at her blog that I kept this book on my to be read list, nothing to do with Bloomsbury’s terrible excuse.

So how did I do? I hope I’ve managed to avoid spoilers, but still managed to encouraged some of you to think about reading ‘Liar’. I do have one teeny incident to reveal about the book though, there’s a part where someone British is talking about taboo words and claims British men would use a swear word, that is probably the worst one for Americans as a jocular daily greeting, as in ‘Hey you...’, but you wouldn’t use it when greeting women because with women its meaning is literal. Now I’ve racked by brains but I cannot think of an appropriate British swear word that also translates into American that fits. Can someone fill in the blank please, because it’s bugging me!

Other Reviews

Bookshelves of Doom
emilyreads
Necromancy Never Pays
The Zen Leaf
Renay
books i done read
Phoebe North

Leviathan, or the Whale - Philip Hoare

Throughout school and college the majority of my friends were female science students. I sat humming to myself through far too many long, dull conversations about chemistry and was never really good enough at the subject to consider reading about science for pleasure. A science book has never been my first choice of reading, but Sylvia from ‘Classical Bookworm’ decided to host this awesome biodiversity challenge that offered me the chance to finally cover over my science blind spot by reading about cute critters of every description. So I picked up the most popular and ‘experimental’ sounding science book of 2009 ‘Leviathan, or the Whale’ by Philip Hoare.

Philip Hoare is from Southampton, a city that was heavily involved in whaling, and was the actual departure point of the famous ‘Mayflower’ ship which took the Pilgrims to America, despite a monument in Plymouth insisting that it left from their quayside steps. That fact turns up in the first few pages, and it’s one of hundreds sprayed throughout the book. If you want historical, scientific, or current day facts and theories about whaling, ships and Moby Dick this book is for you. The really great thing is you may not even know you are quite so intensely in the market for whale related information when you begin the book, reading about whales may be a passing fancy of yours, as it was mine:

‘Since 1342, when the right was enshrined in the reign of Edward II, every whale, dolphin, porpoise and sturgeon found on English shores has become property of the monarch. What was once a royal prerogative is now a liability. In the twenty-first century the Receiver of Wreck is, in effect, whale undertaker to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.’

‘The mysticetes or moustached whale – of which there are fourteen species – filter their diet of plankton and smaller fish through their baleen.’

‘Other reasons put forward for mass strandings raise intriguing questions about the whale themselves… Some see a Malthusian instinct for the preservation of the greater species: mass strandings as a kind of population control at times when the whale numbers in a certain area have reached their sustainable limit.’

After slightly over 400 pages of this kind of information you may feel the urge to talk loudly about all the fascinating things people may not know about whales. It’s one of those subjects liable to turn you into a specialist bore, presented in a prose style that does justice to the fascination of the subject.

Hoare does not try to apply one form of writing to all the different kinds of information he has to present. The scientific information is written in the unvarnished style of popular science, with definitions for the more technical terms, while the sections that relate to his personal interactions with whales have a much more novelistic feel to them, containing descriptive passages and sometimes a deliberate rhythmic feeling emerges in these sections. He’s not afraid to intermingle these different styles within the sections. After a passage on science, or history readers may find the repeated, almost poetic refrain of ‘Ah the world, oh the whale.’. At the end of a biographical history of Herman Melville (one of my favourite parts of the book), Hoare provides an account of what may have happened between Nathaniel Hawthorne and Melville, when Melville handed him the finished copy of ‘Moby Dick.’ The account experiments with line length, imagery and description, resembling a piece of fiction, or creative writing more than a strict piece of historical text. This makes the writing constantly surprising, matching the continuous revelations provided by the facts on whales, a mammal little is known about.

The structure of the book provokes a similar effect. At first, it seems that there is no underlying structure to the way Hoare has chosen to present his information; it appears to be presented as the delightful jumble of an enthusiast who cannot wait to get the information out. However, as the book progresses it become apparent that there are several structuring devices running throughout the book that dip in and out as they are needed. Hoare has used a background skeleton structure of a linear historical whaling timeline, which is supplemented when needed by the device of following Hoare’s personal travels around the areas in America, England and the Azores. There’s also a separate historical scientific structure, which answers all those questions about whales that scientific newbies like me need to have answered. Finally a line of literary analysis is continually woven into the book as Hoare compares history and science to passages from ‘Moby Dick’. To keep that many lines of information going at the same time is a huge feat, especially when Hoare wants to divert into other subjects related to whales, like the sightings of sea monsters. I felt that this type of complex structuring sometimes took the writing slightly too far away from the original starting point of a chapter, the sea monsters digression being a case in point, which while interesting seemed to stretch overly long and keep me from the whales. Still, this type of structure is ultimately successful at entertaining, informing and moving the story of whales forward. I am very grateful for the comprehensive index provided at the back because there’s a mass of information contained in the book, but any reference to the index was due to my atrocious memory rather than confused writing.

Packed with information about whales and the intriguing social history that surrounds them, this is a thoughtful and personal (but not overly so) book. A good way to stretch my underworked non-fiction reading muscles. Hoare’s poignant chapter on Herman Melville’s life and his frustrated love for Hawthorne convinces me I want to read his earlier biographies of gay creative figures like Oscar Wilde, so I’m looking forward to more from this author.

Other Reviews

What am I Reading?

News Flash

A little news update:

Bloomsbury is going to change the US cover of ‘Magic Under Glass’ due to the pressure exerted by readers. Great to know protests make a difference!

However, as Zetta Elliott says it appears ‘brown skinned’ means something different to the author than it does to others. You can judge for yourself by reading the author’s response and then think about what the book trailer (which in my opinion clearly portrays a young black woman) means.

At ‘Bookshelves of Doom’, Leila is highlighting the racial difference between the illustrations and descriptions within ‘The Mysterious Benedict Society’ books and the cover art without.

This year I’m involved in helping get Renay’s Nerds Heart YA contest going, along with Michelle, Amy and Trish, while Renay applies herself to the classics in university. The official announcement’s been made by Michelle so I’m free to link you to the separate blog that’s been created to provide a central hub for all this year’s information. The Twitter account is once again live so that you can follow all developments that way if you prefer.

This year the tournament’s going to focus on finding books that haven’t received much blog love, were published in 2009 and that feature characters, or are written by authors, who fit with the five categories of diversity we’ve identified (see blog for all details). The contest is going to be even bigger than it was last year, as an extra sixteen brackets have been added to increase the amount of books that receive exposure. The call for nominations and judges for the brackets will go out later and I really hope anyone who reads YA will get involved in some way so we can make the longlist, the shortlist and the actual contest as competitive as possible. Renay’s way of getting visibility for YA that was languishing in the shadows, worked so well last year I really want this year’s contest to do her proud.

Sorry this took me so long to announce but Amanda has won my blogiversary draw. Your copy of Stardust is in my room waiting to go off to you, just email me your details (see my profile or sidebar for email address).

Finally, not news but I want to say sorry for having been such an infrequent blogger and commenter since Christmas. So much to catch up on and January is probably the busiest month for me personally and work wise this year. I think I have my balance back now though so you should see me dropping in on your interesting conversations with more regularity. I know you haven’t been without content to read, or commentators to talk to with me missing, but I hate when people drop by here and I haven’t had time to check my feed reader for their posts in weeks.

The Buccaneers - Edith Wharton

‘The Buccaneers’ was the last novel Wharton began before she died. The afterword explains that Wharton produced detailed outlines and notes, which allowed her biographer Marion Mainwaring to complete the novel, which was hailed as a posthumous masterpiece. Mainwaring tried to stay true to Wharton’s prose style only changing language where Wharton describes race in ways that modern readers might find offensive. It’s extremely easy to read, rather romantic but punctuated by cutting, yet small incidents that contradict the lightness of Wharton’s tone and characters.

Nan and her sister live in Saratoga with her mother, part of a hotel dwelling community of wealthy Americans, who are not quite wealthy enough to follow fashion and migrate to Newport, or the more fashionable destinations. As a consequence Nan and her friends are without eligible suitors, destined to dress up and dance for no one but themselves. Into their lives comes Laura Testvalley, a governess for Nan as she is not yet out in society. Laura is the catalyst for the girl’s trip to England where some of the American girls will cause an upset by marrying into aristocratic British families. Only too late does Laura realise that for Nan’s character may not be suited to the strict bindings of British propriety.

It’s rare to find a novel that cuts through all the cynicism and all the knowledge, that most people acquire over the years about class and gender relations. It’s my experience that after a certain point every new book about what women went through and the treatment of the poorer classes tends to get filtered through a protective barrier that has to be constructed to keep the fits of weeping, shouting and violence at bay. So while I intellectually understand how awful these things were, I no longer always fully emotionally connect with historical characters who suffer injustice – I just can’t. But in ‘The Buccaners’ Edith Wharton just takes a stone and chucks it through my barriers with passages like the one below, relating to her character Nan whose husband believes that now he has given her a sum of money, for an undisclosed reason, she has made a bargain that she will resume sleeping with him to try and produce an heir:

‘ “Well you see Annabel has been rather nervous and uncertain lately; I’ve had to be patient. But I thought – I thought that when she found she’d gained her point about the money…she…er…would wish to show her gratitude…”

“Naturally.”

“So, when the men left the smoking room last night, I went up to her room. It was particularly late, and she had not undressed. I went in, and she did thank me…well, very prettily…But when I…when I proposed to stay, she refused, refused absolutely…”

The Dowager’s lips twitched. “Refused? On what ground?”

“That she hadn’t understand that I’d been driving a bargain with her. The scene was extremely painful,” the Duke stammered.

“Yes; I understand.” The Dowager paused, and then added abruptly: “So she handed back the envelope -?”

Her son hung his head. “No; there was no question of that.”

“Ah –her pride didn’t prevent her accepting the bribe, though she refused to stick to the bargain?” '

I knew this kind of thing happened. I studied how marriage and the rape laws evolved throughout history, so I’m well acquainted with rape as a property crime, marriage actively used as a legal contract and rich wives who were expected to view sex as a financial transaction, where allowance equalled heir. It wasn’t a surprise to hear the Duke’s pragmatic opinion, but it shocked me to feel an emotional connection with this idea that had little to do with how much I liked Nan (although I did like her). The connection seemed to come straight from the way this exchange was written, simple, quick and with a minimum of any kind of author commentary.

Then towards the end, when everything seems fine and Nan, having found her perfect partner in Guy, is on her way to happiness, Wharton again proves devastating, as she shows just how culturally blind Nan’s higher class privilege makes her. Despite her friendship with her former governess Laura Testvalley, despite her chats with her husband’s servants, she still manages to miss how her happiness will damage Laura’s own chances. She misses it partly because of how concentrated she is on escaping her marriage to a new relationship, which means everything to Nan and partly because Laura’s happy ending revolves around her potential marriage to Guy’s father, a man in a much higher social position. Nan doesn’t notice the growing feeling between Laura and this man, because her position as the daughter of a moneyed family means she is conditioned not to countenance the possibility of such a relationship. Nan and her American friends initially disrupt British social ideas by marrying some of the highest ranking men (marrying an American woman, whose family money had been made in trade was not considered proper behaviour for the aristocracy of Britain) and Nan will later subvert social conventions in the pursuit of romance, yet for all this Nan still remains to an extent, adherent to the social mores of the past. And with one exchange:

‘ “There’s something else, Val, isn’t there? Have I another response – There’s something you’re not telling me!”
….
“Miss Testvalley, is there more we should know? – Some obligation? – Is there someone else who will suffer besides Ushant and” – he halted, but then went on firmly – “my father?”

Miss Testvalley looked into the friendly, worried eyes that were searching hers. Did he know, did he guess? She couldn’t tell. But if he did, what difference would it make?” '

Nan and Guy leave her friend to a never ending life of bringing up other people’s children, living in other people’s homes to support her relatives:

‘ She clenched her fists so tight that her nails cut into her palms. Where next? A textile magnate’s family in Yorkshire? A broker’s in Purley? Or New York again? Saratoga? With no respectable references…’

And with these few, harsh words it becomes clear that Nan, the heroine Wharton has encouraged her readers to champion, has revealed something that can’t help but taint their ideas about the happiness she may achieve with Guy after the book ends.

See the rest of the Edith Wharton 'Classics Circuit' tour list for opinions on more of Wharton's books.

Bloomsbury - Any chance you could get smarter?

When I first started my blog I never imagined I would spend so much time talking about the drama surrounding one of my favourite leisure activities. I knew I was a cultural context kind of reader, who saw relevance in the way that the different theories of literary criticism (gender criticism etc) were applied to the examination of literature, so I kind of expected to be interrogating what I read with those ideas in mind. However, what I didn’t expect to be doing was applying those types of interrogative ideas to the industry involved in publishing books. I guess I naively thought publishers had all our best interests at heart and even that their status as big multi-national corporations made them too accountable to society to try to pull any kind of crazy discriminatory tricks. Yes I bought into the benevolent image of book sellers as ‘the good guys’ because I suppose I confused the business with the product and placed my ideas about traditional bookselling and the liberal nature of many authors onto these big companies, that are really operating in the same way as many other big businesses I would never give the time of day. Has the past year ever been a steep learning curve for me, as I began to realise with the help of many other bloggers that publishers may in some cases actually be a hindrance to the development of the book industry and with their marketing strategies are constraining our society in the same awful way as television advertising.

Remember the Bloomsbury ‘Liar’ cover controversy, where the book featured a black female narrator, but Bloomsbury put a white girl on the cover? Then after mountains of outrage they followed up with the weak reply that ‘the main character lies and so our cover is clever because it suggests she lies about her skin colour too’ and then got right on changing the cover when that strategy didn’t work. Well yesterday I learned about another example of Bloomsbury’s confusion about the difference between black and white, or more specifically brown and white. Ari at ‘Reading in Color’ notes that ‘Magic Under Glass’ (which sounds like it has a very cool premise and I’ve wanted it since I saw the UK cover) has a brown skinned heroine, but the US cover features a white girl. Now this cover was finalised before the ‘Liar’ controversy sprung up and I get that Bloomsbury wasn’t going to go back and change all its covers where they’d done something similar if they thought they could get away with it, just like they were never going to apologise for their ‘mistake’ if they could conjure up a weak reason for their behaviour, but that doesn’t mean we all can’t get mad about them having tried to pass off this cover in the first place. Ari has links to posts featuring quotes from the book explaining just what the heroines skin colour is, character sketches from the author and a whole lot of angry book buyers who would quite happily spend more money on books than food.

One of the most interesting opinions I’ve heard so far has been voiced by Colleen at 'Chasing Ray' who says that the US cover isn’t even that great, or memorable. I agree, it’s a generic bodice ripper cover and pretty much fails to convey the real magical wonder of the premise. And I imagine that’s rather the point, disguised as a standard historical romance the publisher hopes to sell more of this book than if the cover gave visual clues to the whimsically different nature of the story. It also points to the fact that the people who designed this cover are perhaps not above using their cover to disguise what they think are the less saleable aspects of the book, so just keep that in mind if any ‘reasons’ for the racially whiting out of the main heroine. But if this is their strategy then why keep the title as ‘Magic Under Glass’, which clearly hints this may book may not be a Phillippa Gregory for teens type affair? It seems like a rather confused marketing strategy to me. The piece of writing I always think of when discussions about covers come up is this Snowbooks blog post because it explains how publishers select cover images, using visual clues about genre as part of their marketing strategy. Sadly in the hands of less experienced publishers visual clues become stereotypical assumptions.

It doesn’t surprise me to see yet another industry where marketing is not being properly applied and is based on horrendous assumptions, although it once again saddens me. Any woman who has seen the skin care adverts where beautiful naked women touching each other is supposed to sell body moisturiser to women will know what I mean about confusion. If you’ve watched a pink razor commercial that contrasts so depressingly with the male, technology centred razor commercials you’ll understand what I mean about marketers making assumptions that really should damage their businesses (not to get too personal here but me and many of my fellow women shave approximately one third of our bodies regularly, while men shave a much smaller area and we’re under much more social pressure to remove all hair so we really need superior technology, not pretty pink handles but marketing companies and product development divisions continue to miss these quite obvious points – so sometimes I buy mens razors beause womens razors suck and what the marketers tell me they offer doesn’t appeal to me). In publishing there’s the ‘books with people who are black (Asian, Hispanic, Native American etc also but for the purposes of this discussion I’m just going to focus on black people) on them do not sell well’ cover superstition – and until someone proves otherwise I’m going to continue to call it superstition because I can only imagine what kind of statistics gathered when and where publishers have to back up this claim, because unfortunately during the Liar discussion no one saw fit to enlighten the reading public by explaining what facts have led publishers to believe that this is true. If they had facts they’d put them out there, because financial justification would seem a way for them to combat the bad press and transfer the blame to customers, so my theory is they don’t have them – prove me wrong Bloomsbury.

Even if it is true that books with black characters on covers sell badly, there are so many other factors that could influence someone not picking up a book with a black character on the front it’s impossible to identify this as a common turn off trend because there are just too many other variables that affect buying decisions. Even if it could definitely be identified as a common turn off trend what societal factors make people less likely to pick up a book with a black character on the front need to be questioned – like maybe the fact that black characters on the front of a book often end up with the book being seen as gritty, or too troubling due to people’s pervading misconceptions about black writing, which are reinforced by publishers and the books that they choose to publish are often such an none diverse selection of black literature.

It all comes back to the vicious cycle surrounding diversity. People who don’t like ‘gritty’ books won’t start buying more books with black characters on the cover until they see a more diverse field of books being published with black characters on the cover. Even if they’re out there (and they are) the majority of people don’t believe there are light hearted books featuring black characters and that’s something the publishing industry has to take responsibility for, as they’ve reinforced the image of black writing as gritty, hard hitting and harrowing (not bad things to be called, but they’re now preventing a whole market of readers who like lighter books from buying anything even remotely related to race (see Susan’s post for a better idea of this kind of thing). Publishers won’t start publishing more of these kind of books with black characters on the cover until people start buying the current books with black characters on the front and until they see the money they’re not likely to take a risk because this is capitalism my friends with all its flaws and joys. No one is taking a risk until they see the cash.

So what can we do about this most recent episode of bad marketing and bad decision making and just badness? Well we can show them the cash, but honestly although I do feel this is the most effective method to bring about change in the world we live in, I feel really bad advising people to buy books in order to change the world when they already have less money because they’re bailing the world economy out in so many various small ways every day. I feel depressed that my message is basically ‘you have to pay out to shape the society you want’. It pains me that publishers have created the problem that is ‘forcing them’ (oh sorry maybe that was their pain I was feeling) to keep black characters off the front of books and now readers have to spend their cash to change their minds back. But boycotts suck, they hurt the wrong people and if a product doesn’t sell it is more likely to gets cut than to change. It takes more money to examine why a product is failing than to ditch a product (ie. the childrens literature department). And if you’re spending your money with a fab publisher who gets it then they’re worth supporting, so yes we should be spending our small piles of cash better (and I am absolutely guilty of not doing this, not working hard enough to make ethical spending decisions, which I must change).

I agree with everyone else that the most important thing is to keep shouting about it being wrong to put a white girl on the cover of a book with a heroine described as brown skinned in a way that Bloomsbury understands. E-mail these guys to explain to Bloomsbury how they could be making money if they only changed their ways and that bad press affects their sales. Surely, surely they will have to take these kind of cries into account when compiling their next lot of marketing data and realise that facts affect their profits more than superstitious, insulting assumptions ever could.

Glee - I'll stop believing if I want to

Here follows a brief diversion from bookish topics again to talk about some television that’s finally arrived on Britain’s shores. Yes 'Glee' is finally here, after what seems like a long, long wait. In bookish news I am learning so many interesting things about whales, Melville and the history of whaling from Philip Hoare though, run out and go get your own copy while I talk about teenage television if any of that is of interest to you because ‘Leviathan’ is outstanding (the chapter on Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne is worth the book in my opinion and there’s historical analysis of ‘Moby Dick’s text throughout). Now to 'Glee'.

Ah 'Glee' how you disappointed me in two hours short hours.

The bad:

Hurrah I thought, here is a show featuring a diverse teenage cast. Unfortunately the whole first two episodes are spent under utilizing the cast members that represent the show’s diversity. Honestly two hours and Mercedes, Tina, Kurt and Artie must have ten lines between them.

It’s made very clear in those first two hours that the romance between the white characters sits centre stage. It’s obviously important to set up the white, straight world and all that is in it, before fully introducing the worlds that the other members of the glee club operate in. I know, I know Rachel is the product of a bi racial gay relationship and a surrogacy, but that’s her parents. She is a white, straight girl of average weight and she takes the lead along with the rest of the white, straight characters. I say this as a white, straight, average sized girl myself and there is nothing wrong with these kind of characters being heroes and heroines, but 'Glee' obviously wants to make diversity a point of the show which means the writers really could have worked a lot harder to make sure that the members of the cast that represent this diversity are fully involved in the main plot lines and are fully developed characters. It’s too soon to tell yet, but I’m concerned that characters like Mercedes and Kurt are going to end up compartmentalised with special episodes dedicated to their issues, which are mostly resolved after an hour with a rather cheesy pep talk, rather than having their issues integrated into the whole series.

There are white teenagers singing choral versions of soul and rap, while the black female singer with the big voice is doing backing vocals. I was in choir briefly and I know you have to do lame things like over enunciated versions of rock songs, but please make the white rapping stop.

There is too much life affirming message in this comedy. It is too peppy, too sappy and there’s not enough satire to offset the sickliness yet. It made me laugh a bit, but there were places where I wanted to stick my hands over my ears and some parts were just cringe worthy.

The ‘hero’ I am bored of him. I know he is changing and becoming better than himself, still I am bored with him already.

But then, there were the pick me up points.

The good:

The portrayal of Rachel is complex. She’s a total bitch, a driven stage brat who wants centre stage, but she’s also taunted for her ambition and a social outcast. Plus she has some great things to say about the ineffectiveness of celibacy.

The female adults easily outclass Will (but then they have all the best lines despite his planting cannabis rouse). I mean Sue is Jane Lynch at her crazyily unaware best and Emma and Terri are perfect opposites, competing for a man who doesn’t have a clue what’s going on. 'Glee' is funny, it’s just that the funny is overwhelmed by the saccharine at the moment. If there was more of the biting wit it could be a classy comedy.

Kurt’s hard line Liza version of ‘Mr Cellophane’ with the fringe straightening was amazing. I liked quite a few of the musical numbers like Quinn’s ‘Say a Little Prayer’, but could easily have done without ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ which sinks to the level of 'High School Musical' and on a personal note I think that remix of the Ray Charles song should be stricken from the earth.

So sadly I am disappointed and reminded more of teen dramas like ‘Popular’ than the evil ironic satire it obviously wants to be. I'll give it to the end of the series, because first impressions can be deceptive, but right now 'Glee' is not as cheering as I had hoped.

Birthday Wishes

Wednesday was my birthday (wuhu 25 I did not like 24 at all, it felt unbalanced and wrong) and my birthday wish was for world peace, which makes me sound like a Miss World contestant but I figure it never hurts anyone to believe in the possibility of magic birthday candles.

Anyhoo making my wish got me thinking about all the great things I'd have done throughout the years if everybody really did get one very magical wish every year on their birthday, but then I got angry about various things in the world and the list rapidly deteriorated into what I would do if I was a magical dictator with no morals. Yes, it seems that if I had magical powers my first instinct would be to go evil in that unfortunate 'set out to make the world a better place, ended up depriving people of their free will' way so many comic book villians seem to stray into. So my planned post about birthday wishes did not turn up on my birthday, but after a little step back I think I've come up with a really nice list of things I might have done if I got one world changing wish each year...and then I've thrown some of the eviler, mind control for the sake of humanity items in at the end just for fun:

The nice list

Bring back the dodo - Yes I know that the dodo was really not so clever, or well equipped by nature, but as I understand it kakapo are not much better or brighter and sceintists are working hard to keep them alive. Also maybe the dodo and kakapo would be friends which would be almost unbearably cute. How much nicer would our world be if you could say dodo regularly? It is a very pleasing word.

Get myself a unicorn - I probably wouldn't do this before bringing about world peace...I don't know, I'd have been able to make my wishes come true when I was ten and my ten year old self was really into 'The Saddle Club', a series that could only have been better if the girls had found a unicorn with rainbow hair one day.

Create world peace - Sorry did you not get from my resolutions that I would be unbearably worthy this year? I would like world peace, guns are probably the worst surviving application of advanced technology I can think of.

Stop anyone having that dream where you miss public transportation ever again - Last night I dreamt I was in Africa and I missed a crucial train because I had to climb a concrete hill made slippery by sun tan lotion and at the bottom of the hill children were being eaten by crocodiles! I hate these dreams because it always seems like life or death hangs on you catching a very specific bus or train. If that were true we would all be in very great trouble in the UK.

Breeding books - In a library your favourite books would meet and make the most beautiful babies ever.

The evil list:

Make David Cameron disappear - I should probably explain myself, but ugh explaining about Cameron just drains me and makes me want to type all in capitals. Tax breaks for married couples only? Britain is broken? Poverty does not affect children's development (I know yes very simplistic summation that last one, but it really requires it's own post)?

Make everyone a fan of gay rights - I know brainwashing is low and awful, but this really just made me want to do it (PS If you want to sign the UK petition against people being killed because of who they love follow this link that Lee Wind provided for me).

Make people who argue loudly in public on their mobile phones lose their voices for a day - There was this girl and she shouted a lot at this bloke on her phone and then ten minutes later I saw her hanging out with said bloke quite happily. However I couldn't hear what they were saying because my ear drums had imploded!

Stop American comedy forcing it's life lesson message on me, especially when it's message is stupid - I'm not really sure how I planned to do this, but I assume there would be evil restraining magic involved. This one was prompted by watching the first two episodes of 'Glee' and I know I'll be returning to talk about it more at a later date.

Now for the penny = thoughts moment. What would you do if you got a real birthday wish this year? Would you use it for good, for satisfying results try evil?

Silver Phoenix - Cindy Pon

Can I just say how gutted I am that I did not love Cindy Pon’s Chinese inspired fantasy novel. It sounded amazing (teenage girl, rejected by the marriage market must quest to find her father, who she believes has been taken captive at the Emperor’s Palace) and had a cover that popped graphically. I was ready for some vaguely Allanna reminiscent adventuring antics in a well realised fantasy world and ‘Silver Phoenix’s protagonist Ai Ling, is a charming heroine who evolves from an obedient daughter, unsure of her own abilities to a young women who defeats monsters and saves the day countless times. However, I felt that other aspects of the book, such as Pon’s creation of the fantasy kingdom of Xian, the relationships between some of the characters and the repetitive, unpolished feel to the writing let Ai Ling down.

In the first few chapters Ai Ling and her family are introduced, Ai Ling’s betrothed rejects her, Ai Ling begins to suspect she can hear people’s thoughts, the reader learns that her father left the Emperor’s Palace in disgrace and her father is recalled to the Palace. Time passes quickly and Ai Ling is all of a sudden compelled to go questing to bring her father home, because an odious man is looking to take her as a wife in repayment for an debt he alleges her father owes. So much happens so fast that the deep relationship that supposedly exists between Ai Ling and her parents, which in part makes her feel she must bring her father back, is never fully developed. The beginning of the book feels rushed and while it’s easier for the reader to form an emotional connection to Ai Ling as her thoughts are exposed to them, it’s much harder to understand how the connection between her and her parents goes beyond everyday filial loyalty. This lack of understanding makes her rapid decision to go after her father alone seem rather surprising and abrupt.

It’s the same with Pon’s fantasy The Kingdom of Xian, which is essentially China. Readers are told that the book is set in Xian, but there is never any real distinction made between Xian and China to give Xian a distinct being. It’s hard to work out why Pon felt she needed to create a new world, rather than setting her book in ancient China and just having unexpected fantastical happenings occur there, since Xian is not significantly different from it. It’s obvious that Pon has the required creative powers to bring a fantasy world to life, as she demonstrates when describing the many different monsters Ai Ling battles and the fantasy lands she explores, but Xian is just typical historic scenery that is inserted so Ai Ling isn’t walking on thin air. The lack of detail about what makes Xian, Xian evokes a feeling of constriction, as if Pon has a word limit she can’t exceed and so must cut out much of the development of her world. This sense that her story does not have enough room to breathe within the confines of her book’s structure quickly becomes familiar, as the reader sees Ai Ling find out she has a magical power and adapt to using it with the minimum of effort, angst, or curiosity about this extraordinary new ability.

But this unbelievably swift acceptance of her strange power is really my only criticism of Pon’s heroine. Ai Ling is fearless, as she sneaks out of her house to begin a lonely journey to rescue her father, but as a young girl, from a scholarly family who has not been bought up to fight she’s realistically fearful of the first supernatural encounters she has. As she gains experience and learns to properly control her abilities and weapon, she becomes the heroine, sinking her dagger into monsters, or using her abilities to save her male companions. She leads Cheng Wong and Li Rong capably without it causing conflict because she is a woman, and she makes friends with Cheng Wong, who describes himself as traditional, even though her quest is about as untraditional as it can get for girls in Xian society. And she eats! She loves food, gobbles it up at every opportunity and never worries about how eating will make her appear unladylike, because if she’s going to be an effective warrior she needs fuel and because dumplings taste good. It is ridiculous that I was so cheered to see a female heroine who actually eats her fill and is even comfortable being teased about her appetite, but happy, hungry female characters are so rare that Ai Ling feels like a feminist literary victory. Cindy Pon’s implicit feminist message is really fortifying and while I felt that sometimes her characters explicit conversation about women in Xian society felt like set pieces, rather than natural dialogue, I don’t think you can fault an author for trying to show that girls are human and that girls can fight, physically to save people.

The relationship between the three travelling companions is a valuable antidote to the other half realised relationships throughout the book. Despite Pon’s tendency to describe Cheng Wong’s golden eyes at every opportunity (know that I really want to make a Cullen comparison here, but I don’t want to be accused of playing Twilight bingo) it’s easy to see that Ai Ling and Cheng Wong’s admiration for each other goes past lust and love at first sight. It’s built on a mutual admiration of the skills and personal attributes that allow them to repeatedly save each other, as well as an interest in what is important to the other. OK there’s a little bit of lust and love at first sight in there as well, but it’s all very sweet and sensible, without a whole lot of overwrought angst. Li Rong, who is part of Cheng Wong’s adopted family is a cute character who acts as a balance to his brother and Ai Ling’s seriousness, but at the same time he isn’t just a structuring tool, he has his own personality. There’s a scene where the brothers spar and I felt a real brotherly history between them, full of all the tensions and joys that a lifetime living together brings.

My favourite aspect of the book other than Ai Ling and her travelling companions are the monsters the author includes. I’ve seen a little chatter about how they’re based on Chinese mythology, rather than being her own made up creations, but being totally unfamiliar with the darker side of Chinese mythology they felt like fresh fiends to me. I was really impressed by the level of imaginative evil that Pon introduces into her book, from the demon made of corpses to the sorcerer who steals life forces to stay alive. I can see she’s a big fan of possession and shape shifting, which I think are two of the creepiest deceptions evil can practise, so I was receptive to her version of evil and found myself interested every time another monster showed up. Her imagination also extends to creating mystical alternate kingdoms and the world of the Immortals, where her descriptions of the different kinds of mystical trees caught my attention. Unfortunately it is these inventive sections that seemed to suffer from a severe case of repetitive adjectives. Nothing is royal blue, or sky blue, everything is cerulean and the same applies to red, as crimson seems to be the only shade of red in these kingdoms.

This doesn’t sound like much but throughout the book repetitive description continued to annoy me. People with black hair, almost certainly had ‘raven’ hair, as I said above Cheng Wong’s eyes are noted as being golden about twenty times and everyone’s clothes and hair are described as soon as they are introduced, which becomes an irritating formula the more people the travellers meet. It might not sound like much, but it grated on me and it did leave me feeling like this book hadn’t reached the polished stage of a final novel. I also think there might be a completely unnecessary sequel coming, which will bug me because a little bit of extra space could have allowed for a much richer story and resolutions to some unresolved plot parts.

By the end of her adventures Ai Ling is a remarkable heroine, stranded in book that just doesn’t quite live up to the potential of the individual elements within it. I do want to recommend that people read it, because of Ai Ling and her friends, but be aware you might hit the same rough spots I did. I think there’s a much better book in Cindy Pon and it is exciting to watch authors develop, so I’ll be keeping my eyes open.

Other Reviews

The YaYaYas
Presenting Lenore
Reading in Color
The Book Smugglers

Behold, Books. Again.

The first full week back at work seemed long. But there was one big thing that made it much better than the last full week of last year:

Yes that’s right my workplace, in the building of the saddest ever bookshelves, was suddenly filled with books. Someone bought in three full bin bags of used books that they were on their way to throwing away (as in putting in the bin!) and offered them round, giving me first pick. Don’t worry the 33 books no one took away were taken away by another colleague to a Sense charity shop – who throws away books? See my bounty below:

'His and Hers' - Mike Gayle: After I picked up 'My Legendary Girlfriend' the giver started trying to press all his Mike Gayle books on me, which were many, but I stuck with just taking this one from the pile as it's terrible to stock up on an author and find you don't like them, then feel doomed to read all their books.

'The Given Day' - Dennis Lehane: I really enjoyed 'Mystic River' and wanted to give this new historical a try, but who knew it was so big!

'Yes Man' - Danny Wallace: Danny Wallace is always guarenteed to make me laugh. This is the story of what happened when he decided to say yes to everything (uhhuh that terrible Jim Carey film is based on this book, bet you this is much better). Will it be funnier than when he and Dave Gorman set out to find people named Dave Gorman?

'Carter Beats the Devil' - Glen David Gold: Proper magicians do tricks- end of. Books about magicians who use 'I can really do anything I want to, fairy dust magic' will always be second rate compared with tales of sleight of hand mastery (unless they are comic fantasy, because ridiculous wizards beat capable wizards down to the ground) . Sign me up for all great books featuring proper magicians.

'Cath 22' - Joseph Heller: This is the one book apart from 'Sense and Sensibility' that I always feel bad about not having read. The lack of it makes me feel intellectually shallow, despite the fact that this is silly. This year I will read it.

'The Rotters Club' - Jonathan Coe; Everyone raves about this and it was free so I let greed get the better of me.

'Nocturnes' - John Connolly: I've wanted to read this for ages, but have mostly forgotten why. Looks spooky though.

'Last Tango in Aberystwyth' - Malcolm Pyrce: A satire on hardboiled crime fiction set in Wales. Hehe.

'My Legendary Girlfriend' - Mike Gayle: Man-lit can be quite funny sometimes and this sounds like a light hearted read.

'Perfume' - Patrick Suskind: Again everyone is enthusiastic about this one, so I thought it was a good bet.

'Don't Lets Go to the Dogs Tonight' - Alexandra Fuller: A biography of growing up in Africa which sounds both scary and oddly more innocent than growing up in Britain.

The Lehane was a Bookmooch find, but it arrived on the same glorious day so I decided to include it in the pile as well.

I promise to get back to proper book talk next week. I have been reading and thinking about things, but only list posts seem to ahve made it to the page. I finished the thriller I started over Christmas, 'Too Close to Home' which didn't impress me as much as Barclay's 'No Time for Goodbye', even though it had a much more sensible conclusion to the mystery. Today I finished Cindy Pon's 'Silver Phoenix' which was a bit of a mixed experience for me and I'm sad about that because I wanted it to be excellent, it had such potential. I also read 'Buccaneers' by Edith Wharton, fell in love with it and will post about it later this month for 'The Classics Circuit'. Right now I'm a couple of chapters into 'Leviathan' by Philip Hoare and I think my mind has finally reacclimatised to non-fiction reading as I've stopped being distracted by every little thing. So yes, posting will come on those next week.

Excuse the lack of links but I must dash into the shower and out to a pizza night with friends. It is quite possible that I will slide down my steep, snowy drive tonight as I don't think I can wear wellington boots to the restaurant. Have nice weekends everyone :)

2009 Stats and 2010 Goals

I started recording titles, authors and page counts in a journal in 2005, just to keep track and maybe identify any reading gaps. Here are the stats, plus a few extra indications of my reading trends in 2009:

71 books read

That’s about 20 books more than I usually read in a year, mostly due to not having to study anything this year and reading shorter, young adult books.

45 by female authors
26 by male authors

This is the first year I’ve ever read significantly more books by female authors than male which is, in my opinion, a good thing. Looking back over other years there have been times where the proportions have been switched and one year where I broke even, so it’s about time the women had their year.

7 by authors of a race other than mine

Hmm I thought I had read a few more of these, but turns out I read a few with black and asian characters, where the author was white. I’d like to seek out some significantly different perspectives on life next year, so I hope to increase this total.

70 fiction
1 non fiction

Shockingly bad, there is a whole chest full of popular non-fiction where books weep in the dark.

3 classics

I read some modern classics as well, but I decided to stick with standard classics for this count (what is a classic is such a nebulous area isn’t it?). Can you believe in 2005 I read 8 classics and only two were for university courses (‘Oliver Twist’, ugh worst part of Victorian history)? I’m going to aim to read at least 6 classics next year. I think the key might be not trying to take on the classics I think of as really hard first, puts me off.

24 young adult

I’ve really enjoyed this element of my year. I feel like a third of my reading is about the right proportion of young adult for me over a year. My TBR list and bookshelves are bulging with
young adult choices for next year.

Thanks to my ‘Year of Reader’s’ project by reading 71 books I raised £428 for ‘Room to Read’ with the help of my sponsors. The cheque will be written out tonight and I’ll be back with news of how much the project raised in total, later in the week.

I’m especially interested to know how everyone’s male, female divide fell this year, how did yours come out?

Goals

Lose half a stone in 6 months
Lose a stone by the end of the year
Leave old gym
Join a gym/exercise class and go at least once a week for three months
Ten minutes of home exercise a day for next three months
Apply for one new job a week until get new job
Go to bed by 10:30 Mon - Thursday
Place at least 2/3 of each pay cheque into savings account from February
Follow one fun craft tutorial each month
Work at Living your Five areas of life already identified
Donate £100 to range of charities each month

Those goals make me sound like I’m going to be a totally worthy square during the week don’t they? The thing is I really don’t need resolutions to do more fun things, I just do them if I want to. Next year I’m already signed up for a flight lesson with my mum, a trip to Cardiff with my dad and a couple of concerts, as well as a musical with friends and other things are bound to come up. I need resolutions to keep me in line, so sorry about the good girl factor of the above list.

All the weight related goals start the week after next when my birthday and the cake, pizza and booze that goes with that will have passed by. The gym membership thing starts next week, as I should be able to pop down and sign up while I’m on annual leave (Birthday at work? Does not happen!). The N J search has already begun and so far I’ve applied for two jobs in areas that sound like they offer the kind of new challenge I’m looking for. Opportunites do look scarce at the moment, but not hopeless now that I have a decent level of industry experience and a lower level professional qualification in marketing.

My reading goals are fuzzier, less quantifiable, which is bad in goal terms. I know I want to read more non-fiction and poetry, but I’m hesitant about setting any kind of ratio up because of the fail factor. I would like to do more about representing diversity here at the blog. My decision to make February steampunk month is partly about promoting a genre that many people don’t know exists and I’m thinking of maybe doing a month dedicated to reading books about women in sports at the end of summer. So I want to focus on big issues diversity like GLBT books and the kind of books that reflect the diversity of humanity in general (girls in sport, boys who dance, all books do not have to be love stories to be interesting etc). Finally I do want to decrease the amount of bad tv I watch and give some of that time over to books. I no longer regularly watch the three soaps I used to follow, but I want to cut out my habit of watching endless reruns. Apart from Big Bang Theory I’m trying to cut tv after 10 on weekdays and watch series repeated on 4od or Iplayer at the weekends instead.

Reading in Color and Holiday Swap

Lo and behold Monday meant returning to work after New Year. According to my friend (whose job sent her to LA two years in a row when we live in the cold UK by the way, but please don’t allow that to prejudice you against her views) felt that because I had to go in for two days over the Christmas holidays my return to work would be easier than hers, because she had been on holiday for a whole two weeks (which brings her total holiday to 35 days last year, but again don’t let that affect your judgement about whether her sense of reality is a teensy bit off when it comes to this issue). I had a rather different view.

But Monday wasn’t all cold offices and taking down Christmas decorations. It was a day of receiving, because lo (you just don’t get to use lo enough in general conversation) my last bookish holiday swap presents did arrive. For a moment I did fear that I’d ordered things from Amazon in my sleep, but no they were shiny and wonderful free things!

First my ‘Reading in Color’ gift giver sent me 'Liar’ by Justine Larbalestier. I’ve continued following Justine’s blog ever since the cover scandal surrounding this book because it’s probably the best author blog to go to when you’re looking for a mix of the readerly, writerly and personal. One of my things to do this year is to start reading the books of authors whose blogs I follow because I don’t really do that at the moment. So let me start by reading ‘Liar’. Thank you secret Melissa Walker.

Second my Holiday Swap giver, Mariel from 'where troubles melt like lemon drops’ wrapped things prettily, but I was impatient and at work so I ripped apart all the wrapping without taking a picture. Here is a fragment I saved to show you the poshness.

There was extra swag like a big Next candle. I love candles, Wax lyrical used to be a very common teenage haunt for me and friends before it closed. There’s a notebook and if you are obsessed with lists and collecting quotes, or poems like me, you know you can never have enough pretty notebooks.

There was also a novel. ‘Soul Eater’ is the third part of Michelle Paver’s Chronicle of Darkness trilogy. Remember me getting all excited about it really being as good as the hype suggested when I read the first part? I’ve been resisting the second part because it would be so easy to burn through the five short novels, but now that the third part is in my possession...

And if that wasn’t enough I also got a non-fiction book, ‘1599’ by Jame Shappirro, about William Shakespeare. That will fit in wonderfully with my resolution to read more non-fiction. Thanks so much Mariel :)

What a wonderful bunch my Secret Santas were this year and seeing all the posts gave me some ideas for some extra touches for next year.

Lullabies for Little Criminals - Heather O'Neill

I know everyone is getting their blogs goals etc out there right now, but I just want to finish up my 2009 reviews before looking to the New Year form this blog might take, so hang in there while I talk about 'Lullabies for Little Criminals' by Heather O'Neill.

Baby is twelve, lives with her heroine addicted dad and when she’s not at school she roams the streets with hookers and pimps.

That’s the set up for ‘Lullabies for Little Criminals’ and now I’m going to ask you to throw out all your perceptions of what a book about a twelve year old girl in this situation will be like. It’s not unremittingly bleak, it’s not a slow build to an uplifting feeling, and even though it’s clear from the extra author material at the back of the book, that certain characters are based on people from Heather O’Neill’s life, it’s nothing like a misery memoir disguised as fiction. Instead it’s an observational account of one way of living, narrated by a very self aware character who feels the intense energy of the good and the bad aspects of her life. Baby is one of the most authentic narrators I’ve followed this year. As a future version of her talks about her twelve year old life she holds no reaction back and in doing so confounds all the clichés and the baggage that goes into the reader’s imaginings about how a twelve year old who turn tricks must feel and think, which the reader comes to realise as they’re exposed to thought like ‘It was also the red light district and, to me the most beautiful section in town.’ And ‘I could tell the hat was secondhand because the care instructions had worn right off the inside tag. Jules had a gift for finding wonderful garbage at the thrift store.’.

Baby doesn’t conform to the idea of the naive child, tricked into getting involved in a life of prostitution and she doesn’t do it as a desperate last resort when in need of money. Heather O’Neill also makes it clear that Baby’s bad decisions aren’t the product of stupidity; Baby’s on the honour roll at one of her schools and she reads for pleasure. While it’s true that Baby doesn’t end up doing drugs or sleeping with guys because she is stupid, it’s also true that she doesn’t willingly give away her childhood. Although she’s impatient to grow up, as all children are, in some ways she clings to her youth when other children her age have outgrown things like dolls and collecting toy rocks. So any readers who would like to judge her as a whore (yes I know she’s twelve and the idea that someone might judge her when fully grown men sleep with her is insane, but there are some prominent wackos out there as that whole Polanski case shows), who gives herself away because of some inbuilt womanly promiscuity will also be confounded. O’Neill has removed all the barriers that readers may try to put between themselves and Baby, so that they have to view her as an equal and once that happens the reader can begin to appreciate the real reasons why Baby lives as she does, without judging her.

The truth is that prostitution and drugs are an inescapable part of Baby’s situation. When she says ‘I knew Alphonse was a pimp and sooner or later I was going to have to turn a trick’ it sounds as though she is weighed down by a world weary inertia and just slips into the habit of doing these things, because this is what people in her world do when they have no other plans, just as a middle class person might fall into a dreary office job. Drug culture has always been the background to Baby’s young life, but even though I’ve just described Baby as operating in a state of inertia because she feels her involvement in the shady side of the street world is inevitable, she’s not crushed by this knowledge. As strange as it may sound drugs are associated with some of her best memories of her father:

‘I always remembered how Jules loved me best when he was stoned. That was still my main idea about junk somehow. If there was an alphabet book for little street kids, on the page where it said H is for heroin, there would be a picture of Jules smiling.’

Her life has been full of friendly drug users. Some of the most fascinating people she knows are pimps, or hookers and although she’s aware these people aren’t normal, as well as perceiving that street life is not a glamorous life she remains fascinated by the life she sees around her. Even though Baby lives in a way no responsible parent would want their child to live she does live, rather than just existing, she remains lively, aware and capable of love. That’s why readers might feel sympathy for Baby when she’s upset, but they need not feel constantly sorry for her because of her rotten life, because she’s so interested in living and struggling to be herself.

Haether O’Neill compares her approach to writing the narrative voice of such a perceptive and unique young girl with a punk singer who bases his entire personality around a pair of leather boots he falls in love with, in the extra material at the back of the novel she says ‘Every detail in a novel should have that kind of transformative power’. She has built much of her novel from a varied collection of imagery and similes, which produce an effect rather like shifting through the most interesting and diverse junk drawer in the world. The majority of the images O’Neill provides enhance the reader’s fascination with Baby’s world and voice by genuinely reflecting part of her experience, but occasionally an image does not connect with what it is attempting to describe and conjures no real picture. Apart from the creation of such an imaginative range of imagery O’Neill’s greatest feat is to make it sound completely natural coming from the mouth of her narrator, but her word choice and the details she chooses to focus the reader’s attention fits with the idea that Baby is presenting the story of her childhood from an older perspective, but the reader is also very presently connected to the twelve year old Baby. In fact the feeling of inhabiting Baby’s head as all these things happen to her, rather than being told about them at a remove is so strong that when an occasional more philosophical comment is inserted to remind the reader of the older Baby it can feel jarring as if O’Neil has made her twelve year old speak words that are too old and knowing for her. Of course this is just O’Neil reminding the reader of the wisdom that surviving the street and growing up can bring and not a flaw in her writing.

Can you tell I’ve fallen in love with this book? It’s this soulful, frank addition to my favourite subgenre of adult fiction (hard to describe but it’s something like retrospective novels about young, contemporary women who go through odd, beautiful, disturbing, unavoidable young lives). As the back cover sound bites couldn’t offer any more inspired comparison narrator than Holden Caulfield ( I like Holden but he is a boy and there are some amazing comparable female characters out there) I’ll end by suggesting some of my favourite books from this subgenre, with writing as wonderful (if not always similar too) as Heather O’Neil’s:

‘Who Will Run the Frog Hospital’ – Lorrie Moore

‘The God of Animals’ – Aryn Kyle

'Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang’ – Joyce Carol Oates

‘Mancrazy’ – Joyce Carol Oates

‘The Bitch Posse’ – Martha O’Connor

Anyone want to encourage me to read more by recommending similar titles?