Cycler - Lauren McLaughlin

Today’s post is about ‘Cycler’ by Lauren McLaughlin, a book with an fantastic premise. Jill is a pretty typical teenage girl, focused on getting a date for the prom and bantering with her friends Ramie and Daria. Except she’s not really as normal as she’d like everyone to think, because during the four days when she should be getting her period Jill transforms into a guy, Jack. Her mother keeps Jack in the house, hiding the truth by telling people her daughter needs regular blood transfusions. Her dad is absent from life, as he lives in the basement drifting through life and offering little support.

Usually I save the less structured bookish chat type posts for big books where they’re so excellent I just want to go off and splatter my excitement everywhere. I just have to share. This post is more of a Twilight style chat post, where a book has annoyed me so much I can’t see myself sticking with a proper structure for this post. And so to bullet points of the problems I had with this novel (almost definitely spoilers):

Sexism – Jack is a realistic teenage boy who uses words like ‘bitch’ and watches porn. I accept that real teenage boys use sexist language and objectify women, but I very much subscribe to Renay’s idea that it seems like any time authors want to create a realistic male voice, they head straight for sexist language, rejection of the female and objectification of women. These sexist voices tend to get praised highly as realistic teenage male voices. What she wants to know (and I do too after she pointed it out in her comments) is why this must ALWAYS be the default path for creating realistic, traditional male voices? Why don’t authors take another approach? Jack could talk about sports, or cars, or any number of traditionally male subjects. He could talk about sex, without making it all about the objectification of women. There are other avenues.

I can find reasonable textual explanations for Jack’s disregard for women. Women are keeping him virtually a prisoner with no life, so it makes sense that he would not be especially respectful about them. However, if I take that as the reasoning for his disrespectful attitude to women, why should I believe that the relationship he wants to establish with Ramie will be a healthy, happy partnership (I think that I am implicitly asked to believe this and to root for Jack by the text)? Clearly he has little respect for women for whatever reason so why should I root for him to get with Ramie, who is a kick-ass girl?

I’d also like to know why Jack emerges as a fully socialised male. He did not exist before Jill was old enough to menstruate and he has no independent memories of childhood, replying on Jill’s memories. He has limited contact with the outside world and no traditional male role model at home. This means that he wasn’t ‘taught’ his sexist behaviour. While Jill’s mum has filled her head with some pretty anti-feminist stuff, I don’t believe that her memories alone would be enough to create the sexist traits of Jack’s personality. Am I meant to believe that he sprang forth with these typical male views of women upon his first transformation? If so then that suggests that negative male behaviour is not socially created, but naturally inherent, which is certainly a point of view, but in my opinion is bull.

Stalking – ‘Cycler’ is another story where we’re asked to believe that stalker like behaviour is attractive. Jack escapes from the house to go and stare at Ramie through her window. He watches her sleeping without her knowledge and then initiates contact that lets her know he has been watching. Despite the creep factor Ramie is into this. She sets up a few precautions, like making sure her parents could hear her if she screamed, but pretty quickly she lets a mysterious stranger into her bedroom. Now, while I’d tell any of my female friends that this kind of scenario will end up with you strung up from the tree outside, I can also understand the romance of the situation (if you believe everything will turn out ok it could seem romantic). However I think we all know that just because the girl equates stalkerish behaviour with attractive behaviour, doesn’t make it so.

Homophobic language - Some nasty language about gay sex comes out of both Jack and Jill’s mouths. Jack’s comment on finding out that Jill’s potential prom date, Tommy Knutson, is gay is ‘So Mr.Dreamboat’s a bum bandit’ and he follows that up with ‘The thought of another dude touching my dirty bits makes me want to puke.’ Again it’s a realistic attitude for a teenage boy, but his comments appear without an alternative view to qualify them. The fact that Jack meets few people in the novel is a huge problem for the narrative, as nothing negative that Jack says can be directly opposed by any of the other characters since he doesn’t often speak to others. So his negative statements about women and gay people are just left there to stand, with no specific opposing viewpoint. Earlier in the novel Ramie steps up and knocks down the idea that being bisexual is bad, but she doesn’t ever say this to Jack because it just doesn’t come up when they’re together.

Jill’s views on homosexuality are more complicated. Her initial homophobic views appear when she finds out that Tommy is bisexual. Ramie’s there to shoot down those remarks and Jill gets over herself, because Tommy is hot and nice. However, during that whole getting over herself period she continues to assert that she feels sick thinking about Tommy with guys. She views the gay part of Tommy and his gay past almost as an enemy, saying ‘Whatever Tommy and his gay leg-touchers from his past have to throw at me, I can take it.’.

Now I think Lauren McLaughlin works really hard to show that Jill’s ideas evolve. She also makes sure there’s a qualifying viewpoint included about bisexuality in parts of the book, for example when Ramie and Jill fight against their friend Daria’s prejudices:

‘ “But Jill,” she says. “Aren’t you worried?”

“About what?”

Daria leans in close, “AIDS.”

“Daria!” Ramie reaches over to me to whack Daria on the shoulder. “Don’t be ignorant. Hey, Jill, has he actually had sex with a guy?”

“Not that it’s any of your business,” I say, “but no. He’s still a gay virgin.” I lower my voice to a whisper. “But not a straight one.”

“That is so gross,” Daria says.

Ramie shoots her a scowl. “No it isn’t. It’s deeply normal.”

....

Daria’s face scrunches up so much it looks like it hurts. “You still want to go to prom with him?”

“Of course,” I say. “He’s going to look so cute in a tux.”

However Jill’s comments about finding the thought of Tommy with boys sickening stuck in my mind, especially as they’re never addressed again. Jill describes her changing ideas about Tommy’s bisexuality, saying ‘The thing is, although I find the idea of him being into guys stomach-churningly mal l I don’t find him mal at all.’ but there’s no further examination of her idea that gay sex is sickening and no counter view is provided. That made me sad.

Sex with your friend’s male ego - What's really skeevy is the idea that Ramie sleeps with Jack, even though she suspects that Jack is Jill transformed. Now they’re characterised as two separate people, with two separate bodies, not as one transforming body that simultaneously hosts two minds and that’s what allows Ramie to separate Jill from Jack. Still if I was going to sleep with a guy who shares a transforming body with my best friend, I would ask her about it first. It feels weird, like Ramie takes the decision out of Jill’s hands. Also creepy because how does Ramie know that Jill isn’t in there somewhere watching it all happen? They haven’t discussed it at all and Ramie has no idea of how the specifics work. It didn’t seem like something a friend would do.

So yeah, there was quite a bit I did not like. However, to be fair there was quite a bit I did like:

‘Cycler’ is one of those fast paced books that you want to gobble up in one go, to see how everything turns out. I actually feel like this is more of an advantage for writers who write badly, than it is for writers like Lauren McLaughlin who writes well. If you write badly a fast pace keeps people from noticing, if you write well a super fast pace distracts from the writing you’ve worked so hard on. But whichever way you look at it, this book is addictive and despite my problems with it (almost because of them actually, I want to see if the sequel will make me feel better about the first book) I want the next one soon.

The teenage voices sound authentic, managing to be harsh, truthful and affectionate at the same time. The dialogue is smart and funny.

There are actual descriptions of sexual activity, although not of penetrative sex. I know this might not be to everybody’s taste, but personally I think the world could stand a lot more authentic sexual behaviour in young adult literature at the moment, as the implication of sex seems to be dominating the field right now. It’s all about balance. Also, the sexual scenes are hot!

The emotional power of this novel is strong. I could really feel how the characters felt, from their distress, to their love and that was wonderful. The scene where Jack feels he will never escape his room, really sent a jolt though me:

'Acceptance does not sand the edges off this brutal reality. Nor does it shrink the scope of its awfulness. If anything, it feeds it, enlarges it until it's so huge and terrifying I can't find room for it in my puny brain.

I drag myself back to bed and hide under the covers, the only place their cameras don't reach.

Sleep doesn't come.'

‘Cycler’ also made me think outside of my normal comfort zones. I had big problems with part of the novel for a while, as I was viewing it through my normal feminist critical filter. After a lot of hard thinking I realised I had to think about this story in a different way because feminist theory didn’t really apply here. I have to give credit to a book that stretches the way I think in new directions.

Ramie is my favourite character. Apart from the ‘I totally don’t get how this would creep my best friend out’ decision to have sex with Jack she is wonderful. She’s blunt, innovative, into experimental fashion, accepting and loyal. She is fun to be around!

Just behind her comes Tommy. I loved Tommy. Sigh:

‘ “I don’t see people as male or female. I just see people.”

I take a deep breath and try to understand this concept. “But –"

“But what?” he says. “Don’t you think this world has expended enough energy keeping men and women separate, trying to convince us we’re from Mars or Venus? For what? We’re from Earth.”

I stare dumbly.

“We’re just people,” he says. “Why does it have to matter so much?” '

If you’ve made it this far you’re a saint and I’d love to hear your own thoughts on the book.

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Becky's Book Reviews

Oh We've Been Walking Barefoot All Summer...

What have I been doing?

1.) On Friday I saw Ash who were awesome! We were totally motivated and stood all though the second support act, which meant we were one person away from the front, until maybe the last 20 minutes of a nice long Ash set (when moshers tried to squish us). Awesome, actually better than I was expecting and I was expecting good things. That makes 3 bands so far this year and I’ll be at Latitude and possibly Reading festival later in the year. Awesome!

2.) Watched ‘Date Night’, which made no sense and totally killed the momentum of what could have been a sweet exploration of marriage, but still managed to be hilarious. About ten minutes in I decided that Tina Fey and Steve Carrell would make a great real life couple in an alternate universe.

3.) Finished the weekend watching a repeat of the 2010 Leszno Grand Prix which was a cracker. Speedway season is back people and if you fancy seeing a new form of motorsport I bet you can find a track nearby.

3.) Bought the rest of the Orange shortlist. Now, it’s not as bad as it sounds. I bought ‘Black Water Rising’ and ‘The Woman on the Green Bicycle’, but left the other two alone (saving money = good). Then Friday, before I left for Ash, I got a phone call from my mum to say she was in Waterstones, Orange shortlist books were part of the 3 for 2 offer...so she got the two I was missing.

4.) Made a start on ‘ Black Water Rising’, the thriller on the Orange shortlist. It’s pretty good, if a little slow. I’m finding the exploration of racial politics, through references to the main character’s past, more interesting than the present day crimes. I’m sure it will all tie together at the end and the present day crimes will become political.

5.) Made a massive push in my Anna Karenina reading. I’m now about 20 pages from finishing the first part so I’ve met Anna and her brother, Anna has met Vronsky and Kitty’s world is getting rocked. More on that in a later post. You can read Danielle’s first post about the read-a-long too. I think she’s a bit surprised about how easy it is to read and so am I. Must remember that not all Russian writers are unbearably earnest like Pasternak.

How has life been with you?

Toads and Diamonds - Heather Tomlinson

Heather Tomlinson’s ‘Toads and Diamonds’ is a reimagining of Charles Perrault’s ‘The Fairies’. Tomlinson has kept the basic elements of the original tale, but has adjusted the content for a modern audience (meaning she has removed the sexism and made the women of the tale active heroines). She has also fleshed out the characters and changed the setting to produce a confident novel, inspired by a short piece of fiction.

Tana and Diribani are stepsisters who live with Tana’s mother. Their father, a renowned jewel trader, has recently died leaving the women unable to support themselves. The book opens with Diribani taking a trip to the well to bring back water. At the well she meets an old woman and offers her a drink, but when is an old woman in need of charity ever what they seem in a fairytale? The woman turns out to be the goddess Naghali and she rewards Diribani’s charity by making her speak jewels and flowers. When her sister Tana visits the well she meets a young, foreign woman who she speaks to frankly. Guess what, that woman is also the goddess Naghali in disguise and Tana is left speaking frogs and toads.

As this story is about girls blessed by a goddess the novel is primarily about faith and having a personal connection to religion. Faith isn’t often discussed in mainstream, young adult fiction and ‘Toads and Diamonds’ is especially different because it doesn’t concentrate on Christian faith. Instead it looks at faiths that resemble (but according to the author are not intended to represent) religions commonly found in India. Tana and Diribani worship the twelve, a group of gods and goddesses who each have specific functions. Their country has been conquered and the conquerors, who they call the white-coats because of their religious dress, worship only one god. Both groups view the opposing religion negatively.

Once her gift becomes public knowledge Diribani is taken to Fangandibad to live among white-coat royalty. Here she explores the differences between the two religions and gains a deeper understanding of their religion. Some of their beliefs are in direct opposition to the way she lives, for example the white-coats eat meat and kill in defence, while Diribani is a vegetarian who uses dance training to avoid attackers. Although she can’t accept everything the white-coats do, by living with them Diribani comes to appreciate the value their forms of worship hold. She also learns that she can find a connection with her gods in many ways:

‘She closed her eyes and sensed an invisible force flowing around her, as if the Believers’ prayers ran together in a river, and carried her heartfelt wishes for her family’s and the prince’s well-being along with the rest. The river didn’t judge her. She was present; her silent voice, to, would be heard.

Opening her eyes Diribani felt lighter, as if her water jar of worries had tipped over and spilled its contents into the current, where they had washed away. How odd, that she could almost feel Nahali-ji’s hand on her head in the middle of the white-coat’s prayer hall.’ .

I’m not sure the white-coat characters learn to accept her religion, but there are moments where they come to appreciate the skill and humanity of the people they rule. This is progress considering how negatively they view the native people, who they call ‘dirt-eaters at the beginning of the book.

While Diribani lives in a palace, Tana is ordered to live outside of her home town Guranth, by a well. As the girls try to work out why they’ve been blessed with their gifts they find themselves doubting, then reaffirming their faith. Tana especially struggles to find the usefulness of her gift. They put serious thought into how their gifts might benefit the world and why Naghali has touched their lives. They also reflect on the world they live in, then encounter examples of both the injustice and the beauty present in their society. Both girls try to reduce the suffering they encounter, with mixed results. It’s such a welcome change to see two young female characters that are passionate about thinking deeply and helping others. Even though both girls have love interests they continue to think independently and to concentrate on what is important to them. Take note other authors, girls can love and think at the same time – it’s part of that multi-tasking thing people are always banging on about.

Clearly all that waffling on about faith and good works was just to trick people into thinking I am a serious lady who is not obsessed with lurve stories. I mean the book is bright pink; surely it is all love and pretty flowers? Ok, so the important stuff - love. Tana is in love with Kalyan, a prosperous jewel merchant’s son and Diribani comes to love Prince Zahid, second in line to the throne. It’s easy to understand where Kalyan and Tana’s love comes from. She admires him for his compassion, he admires her for her capable nature and beauty, qualities they have both observed during their lifelong friendship.

Diribani and the prince’s love story seems to come from nowhere and they interact so little that it’s hard to understand why their feelings become so intense, so fast. Their relationship is very much the typical love at first sight fairytale romance, which probably shouldn’t be surprising since this book is a reimagining of a fairytale where the prince carts a girl off to marry him five minutes after meeting her. After a slightly steamy scene where he and Diribani practise trader talk (communication via hand pressure) their attraction seems obvious, but I’m still not sure I understand what specifically inspires their love. Not that there isn’t a lot to love about Diribani, but...and this will sound totally paranoid...I am suspicious of the prince. I kept expecting his love to be revealed as a charade to gain her jewels, but that didn’t happen. Still I can’t help speculating about how well things will go after they ride off into the sunset together.

The ending was another problematic area. Since this is such a contemplative little book I found the sudden action of the ending rather jarring. Twenty pages from the end something dramatic happens, out of nowhere and then everything is resolved, the end. Although the villain who instigates the drama appears at the beginning of the book he’s largely absent for the rest of the book. This means that there’s no foreshadowing of the event and it comes as a shock. The ending felt rushed to me, but maybe that’s just because I wasn’t quite ready to leave the girls world and resented being shunted out so abruptly.

On a side note I was actually a little surprised to read that the author did not intend the two religions shown to represent specific real life religions. The white coat’s seemed to clearly represented Muslims; the women wear veils, the ruling force are white coats as they were during the time of the Mughal Empire and the description of their prayer space sounds like a mosque:

‘Nissa grabbed Diribani’s hand and tugged her to the left, around a lacy stone screen. “The ladies side,” the maid whispered. “We leave our shoes here.”…

…just like their clothing, the white-coats’ prayer hall was deliberately plain…

Then as she looked around, Diribani noticed the details. Bands of intricate cream-on-white geometrical designs surrounded the doorways and high arched windows.’

It’s harder to decide on a real life equivalent for Tana’s religion, but she and her family sound like Hindus because of their belief in reincarnation and their commitment to non-violence. I’d be really interested to hear if other readers think the invented religions have single, real life counterparts or if they seem more like an amalgamation of all Indian religions.

‘Toads and Diamonds’ is the first book I’ve read for 'Once Upon a Time Challenge’ and it was a great way to start. If you’re looking to fill your fairytale quota for the challenge this new release could be a good choice.

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Reading in Color

Debut Book Battle

After a taste of it last year I just couldn’t resist the lure of judging power so I signed up to be part of the Debut Book Battle. This contest is Alyssa’s idea (of ‘The Shady Glade’) and it’s designed to bring some attention to authors who wrote their first young adult book last year.

The schedule goes like this:
Round 1 (Brackets 1-12): April 25th-May 8th
Round 2 (Brackets 13-18): May 9th-May 22nd
Round 3 (Brackets 19-21): May 23rd-June 5th
Round 4 (Brackets 22-23): June 6th-June 19th
Round 5 (Bracket 24): June 20th-July 3rd

And the books line up like this to start off.

I’m judging in ‘Round 2’ with ‘The Lost Entwife’ and we could end up with any combination of ‘8th Grade Superhero’ (I hear good things), ‘Because I am Furniture’ (I think you all know my rapturous feelings about that book), ‘Hex Hall’ (which I’ve never heard of) and ‘Agency – Spy in the House’ (a book I am majorly excited about).

Plus there is going to be a mystery revival! This means a book that gets eliminated can be brought back (somehow, not sure how that’s going to work yet).

Bored of looking at my words? Well then why not check out the official nominees trailer, which is full of beautiful, beautiful covers.

The Help - Kathryn Stockett

I’m so glad that Meghan and Claire encouraged me to read ‘The Help’. Without their comments, especially Claire’s, telling me I could read it before Orange short list day ‘The Help’ would still be sitting on the book heap (that’s what I’m calling the tower emerging from the plastic bag full of books I have NO ROOM for).

‘The Help’ uses alternating narratives to follow the lives of two black maids Minny and Abileen and one white wannabee writer, Eugenie ‘Skeeter’ Phelan. The three women live in Jackson, Mississippi, during the 1960s, a place that embraces segregation with a particular relish thanks to the town’s master puppeteer Hilly Hollonbrook. Skeeter and Hilly have been best friends since school, but when Skeeter returns home after four years at college she finds that her views don’t quite fit with those of her friend.

After Hilly bullies Abileen’s employer into building a separate toilet outside for her maid, because she believes black people carry diseases, Skeeter starts to really see the black maids who take care of the town’s households. Determined to write and spurred on by an editor at the New York Times, Skeeter comes up with the idea of interviewing the maids about their experiences working for the white women of Jackson. Needless to say this could get everyone in trouble.

‘The Help’ was a good book to read after ‘Wench’. It takes up the story of black civil rights almost a century after Lizzie and her friends sat in chains. Despite the different time period, location and status of black people, it uses loosely the same kind of writing style as ‘Wench’ to describe the state of relations between white and black people. The writing is relaxed and uses plain, every day language and lots of dialogue.

The casual, conversational tone is part of what makes the book such a quick read and so enjoyable. It’s just under 500 pages and I finished it in two days, when it’s unusual for me to finish more than a book a week. ‘The Help’ is also quite a funny book. It’s plot driven. It focuses on the domestic and the family. All of these aspects contribute to making it an easy book to read and mean I can class this as an enjoyable reading experience. But wait how do I square the idea of a novel about black people being treated unjustly with the idea of an enjoyable read? Now this is where I go on a bit of a literary wander, but please come along if you’d like.

All of the aspects I mentioned above are things I typically expect to find in books about slavery, or black civil rights in America. If you look at some of the most well known novels that mention race relations in the South, like ‘The Colour Purple’, ‘How to Kill a Mockingbird’ and ‘Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry’ and a couple of more recent novels such as ‘Flygirl’, ‘Wench’ and ‘The Help’ you’ll notice a similar feel to the writing and a similar focus. They’re not exactly quiet books, but the descriptions of setting, family life, or the use of conversational prose seem to soften the edges of their stories. Although terrible things happen in many of these books, somehow the writing style absorbs the horror, or the injustice and passes it on to the reader in a form they can easily accept.

I’m interested in the limitations and the possibilities of writing about injustice and tragedy in this way. I don’t have a lot of concrete ideas on what these might be, but I’m hoping you guys might do. Are you more likely to pick up books which talk about a particularly painful part of history if it moves it somehow softens the blow? Is this a reader thing rather than a writer thing, where a reader removed from the events may find them less painful than a reader who has a more personal connection with events?

Why does this style of writing seem to be such a prevalent trend in the novels that are published about race relations in America’s southern states (do you even agree with that)? Can you suggest books that take a different approach (right now all I can think of is ‘Beloved’)?

For people who actually talk about ‘The Help’ rather than wandering off to chat about other things try:

Reviews

Paperback Reader
BOOKLUST
Reading in Color
books i done read
Bookbath

Savage Lands - Clare Clark

There is something special about Clare Clark’s fiction; I am sure about that now, but how to describe what she does so well without getting into a debate about what makes ‘good’ historical fiction? Clark is writing dark, cruel fiction where she destroys her main characters whether they deserve it or not. She’s writing fiction without any real moral underpinning. She’s writing historical characters that present authentic historical attitudes and mostly avoids introducing modern views unless she can think of a plausible context for them. I have a feeling that lots of people are not going to like the approach she takes, because her novels 'The Great Stink’ and ‘Savage Lands’ are so different from the majority of historical fiction being published (although there are other authors working along similar lines).

I think her books are exciting, because in my opinion historical fiction has become too safe. Authors are adept at creating grim atmospheres, but there’s a sense of security underneath that assures you the characters you like will survive. So many characters have extremely progressive views, or are punished because their morals don’t match modern readers. Few authors really capture the fear and the prejudice that came with just being alive before the twentieth century. That doesn’t mean I don’t like to read much of the historical fiction that’s published, but it’s really become my safe genre. Of course, history has never been safe and I’d like a higher proportion of books in the genre to trouble my mind. So, yes, not saying normal, safe historical fiction isn’t good, but I’d like to see more from the dark side please.

Now, on to 'Savage Lands’ proper. It’s 1704; Elizabeth Savaret joins a group of French girls, who are sent overseas to become wives for the settlers of Mobile, Louisianna. The girls’ dream of love in an exotic location and only Elizabeth maintains a practical view of her situation. When they arrive in Mobile, they discover the New World is rather coarser than they were promised, but almost alone among the young women, Elizabeth finds love with her new husband Jeane-Claude Babelon.

Many bad things happen to Elizabeth and the girls she arrives with. Like I said Clark is brutal with her characters, especially her heroine Elizabeth. Strangely, the piling on of tragedy actually seems to be a strategy to help readers warm to rather unlikeable characters. At first, Elizabeth seems to have emerged in a typically sympathetic shape. She’s a rebellious, adventurous modern woman trapped in a historical woman’s body, who longs to escape her aunt’s claustrophobic dress shop and adores reading. However, soon she becomes a character who is hard for a modern reader to like, as she shows she disdains all other female company and becomes obsessed with her husband. When she comes out with the line ‘books were the solace of those who did not live’ she will put every modern reader’s back up. Then a succession of miscarriages begins and her husband turns out to be extremely flawed. Her tragedy allows readers to empathise with Elizabeth, despite the fact that her authentic historical behaviour may initially create a barrier between her and the reader. By the end of the book every reader will be straining for some good to come to Elizabeth.

Auguste Guichard is another character whose authenticity initially keeps the reader from warming to him. Auguste is a cabin boy who arrives in the New World around the same time as Elizabeth. He is left in an Indian village, ostensibly to strengthen relationships between the French and the Native Americans, but is really expected to spy on the tribe. At first Auguste is a spiky character, reluctant to join in with village life and disgusted by the ‘savage’ way of life. His views make him hard for a modern reader to like, but they make him an authentic character. Then his dog dies. As anyone who has read ‘The Great Stink’ will know, Clark can conjure a great deal of emotion through a simple friendship between man and dog, without being sentimental. After the dog dies it’s hard not to feel some connection with Auguste, who is all alone among unfamiliar people and feels the need to prove himself a man, even though he’s just a young boy.

As a modern author Clark was never going to escape the need for introducing what we think of as modern sensibilities into a book about French settlers and Native Americans. She may find a way to encourage readers to like her politically incorrect characters, but she also finds subtle, contextually appropriate ways to critique the colonialist attitudes expressed in the book. While Auguste begins by expressing disgust and hatred for the people he lives among, he is later the means for Clark to show that the colonists treatment of the native people is wrong. While Elizabeth’s relationship with the slave her husband brings home is complicated, by the end of the novel she feels tied to her by companionship and what they have shared:

‘Sometimes as she worked, Elisabeth heard the steady thump of Jeanne pounding corn, but when she looked up there was no one there. She looked at the covered mortar, the paddle propped idle against the wall, and she bent her head and counted the thumps of her own heart quiet in her chest. When evening came and the mosquitoes gathered in the darkening sky, the long shadows over the yard had the shape of her.’ .

Jeanne’s daughter Marguerite, also forms a special bond with Elizabeth and is one of several small characters who give the Native Americans a voice in this novel. Still, this is all done in an incredibly subtle way to avoid disturbing the historical authenticity of this book and sometimes it feels a little too subtle. Sometimes the Native Americans could have done with a much louder voice, while ‘Savage Lands’ is mostly about the colonist’s feelings.

When Auguste meets Jeane-Claude, he is brought back among French settlers, but can’t fit among them after his time with the Native Americans. He feels a connection to Elizabeth and her husband, but readers can never be sure if he feels romantic love for these two, or if shared experience and kindness makes their friendship feel so intense. These three people must work out how to live in the country they now call home, because there simply isn’t any other choice. They cling to each other, yet they repel each other and these essential relationships are what Clark uses to create her secrets and revelations style plot.

In ‘Savage Lands’, as in ‘The Great Stink’, plot is second to character study. Honestly, I wish Clark would just give up on incorporating mystery plots into her novels, because her plot action tends to be weak and can obscure her strong character development. The biggest problem with ‘Savage Lands’ follows the introduction of the seismic event that leads to secrets, lies and misunderstanding. After this point the book is permeated with a feeling of disconnection that almost breaks the link between reader and character. What is supposed to be a tight plot woven of details that are kept cleverly obscured from the reader, is actually a jumble of back tracked information that keeps readers from learning about the character’s current situation.

‘Savage Lands’ isn’t on the Orange prize shortlist, but it is good as is ‘The Great Stink’ (long listed in 2005). One more author to watch brought to you by the Orange list.

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Crystal Ball Time

Tomorrow the Orange prize shortlist will be announced. Eep! I thought I might have burned out on Orangey goodness by now, but nu uh, I’m still excited. I managed seven books from the long list and I only have one more long list nomination left in the house (‘Small Wars’). So I did’t reach ten, but it’s still a nice little total. I feel informed.

Shall we have some predictions (please bear in mind I’ve never won the Grand National, so predictions may not be my best mad skill):

Wolf Hall – Hilary Mantle
The Little Stranger – Sarah Waters
The Still Point – Amy Sackville
Savage Lands – Clare Clark
A Gate at the Stairs – Lorrie Moore

And then a random pick, ummm, I’ll go with ‘The Secret Son’ by Laila Lalami.

And now we wait...

Edit: Well the announcement is in and the results are surprising as they always are in a bookish contest. Looks like I'm going to have to start all over again if I want to be informed about the short list (oh no, more books to read whatever will I do?)

I can't say I'm surprised not to see 'Savage Lands' or 'The Little Stranger' on this list after Goodwin's comments that she feels the best literature needs both light and shade. Even though both books do have light and shade they sit closer to the shadows than the lamp.

I can tell you right now there's no way Lorrie Moore's book is going to beat 'Wolf Hall'. Good as it is it's not that good.

I've heard so many good things about 'The White Woman on the Green Bicycle' that I'm going to give it a go even though it doesn't sound like my thing. Every major newspaper is going to be clamouring to review Rosie Alison's book now if they haven't, as she's very much the unknown quantity (I bet at least half the reviews will start with the fact that her book hadn't received a single review in a major newspaper before her book was longlisted).

The only one I'm really not looking forward to reading is 'The Lacuna' and I might just give it a miss. I know lots of people are enjoying it, but something is putting me off picking it up. Can anyone make a case for it?

Earth Day Fest

Chris at book-a-rama is hosting Earth Day Fest until 22nd April, which gives me the perfect excuse to show you some pictures of my favourite growing things:

My trio of cacti, one of which is starting to flower.

A couple of my rhubarb seedlings. So far six are doing quite well and although I can only find room for one the rest have found good homes with friends and colleagues.

These are the flowerbeds by the bus station in the city I work. The bus station's being revamped, so it's boarded up and kind of ugly looking, but who cares when there's bed after bed of bright cheerful flowers nearby?

How do your flowers grow?

Wench - Dolen Perkins-Valdez

I’ve been meaning to write a review of ‘Wench’ by Dolen Perkins-Valdez for ages now, but just haven’t been able to get a grasp on it. It’s one of those books where even though the descriptive scene setting is good it’s not exactly what you go to the book for. It’s the dialogue and interactions between characters, the unique approach to a well worn subject of historical fiction and the plot that induce a greedy urge to gobble up the book. I think I probably read it too fast and that’s why I’ve struggled to review it.

‘Wench’ is a solid piece of historical, that follows four southern slaves: Lizzie, Sweet, Renee and Mawu, who are ‘mistresses’ to their southern slave masters. They are regularly taken to a hotel called Tawawa House, so that the masters can escape the censure of their wives. The hotel is situated in Ohio, in the North of America, where the early stages of abolition are underway. Free black servants work at the hotel, but the women from the south remain property of their masters. It’s an uneasy time and an exceptionally strange period in the history of slavery, which was one of those strange historical movements that relied entirely on a kind of worldwide make believe that what was happening made sense. As the black slaves observe the black servants moving freely it becomes more urgent to them to question the system they live under. Dolen Perkins-Valdez is adept at showing readers just how ridiculous the reality of slavery law was, as some black characters are free while others remain slaves in a free territory just because they are owned in the south.

The author is good at exposing parts of a life of slavery few other writers examine. She looks at the uncomfortable truth that despite their bad treatment some slaves, such as Lizzie, believed themselves in love with the masters who abused them. The psychology of slavery is really well examined from a variety of angles, until it’s possible to understand why Lizzie makes decisions that may seem illogical to modern readers. Lizzie’s master Drayle seeks to legitimise his abuse of slaves, by making Lizzie reflect love back at him, confirming to him that he is not doing anything wrong. She also examines the Quakers refusal to keep slaves, alongside their inability to accept that slaves often wanted to turn away from God.

The most complicated issue she brings up is the idea that to slaves children were a mixed blessing. The more children Lizzie has the harder it becomes for her to think about escaping, as the children tie her to Drayle’s plantation. She had to watch her children work as slaves and worries about them being forced out of the main house, to a harsh life working in the fields. When Lizzie brings on a miscarriage because she is considering escaping, her female Quaker supporter can’t summon any understanding for her situation. All she sees is children as God’s blessing, but she doesn’t understand that for Lizzie another child means a further unbreakable connection to Drayle. Lizzie’s decision causes conflict with Drayle’s wife, who envies Lizzie and her two children. Although she wants Lizzie’s connection with Drayle to be broken and has previously tried to sell her without him knowing, she still calls Lizzie wicked for having arranged to miscarry. Once again the story shows the illogical reasoning that slave owners used to justify their actions against slaves. When Lizzie is having Drayle’s children Fran sees her as a whore, but when Lizzie finds a way to stop having Drayle’s children Fran sees her as unnatural and evil. In Fran’s mind the relationship is never as much Drayle’s fault as it is Lizzie’s fault.

Ok I’m flagging now, even though there’s lots more to talk about and as I write I find I can remember what happens quite clearly. Never leave books several weeks before reviewing them, lesson learned. Anyway, if you like historical fiction that gets right under the skin of an age, written in a confident style ‘Wench’ would make a great addition to your shelves.

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The Big Readalong (or eeep a plan)

Oh Christ, am going to try to read Anna Karenina this year apparently. All due to Danielle’s plan.

Look how bloody big it is! Tiny writing too.

I am excited about this one, but in the same way that you’re excited about climbing a big hill until you get right to the base of it (did that last weekend actually). It’s all fine once you’re at the top I seem to remember and it will be nice to have other people climbing alongside me. We are leisurely taking our time with it, rather than proceeding on any sort of organised trek which means there will be time to stop and gather the Russian flowers along the way Plan to start soon as, but probably after finishing ‘Savage Lands’ and I’ll now be reading two books at once instead of my usual one.

Good luck fellow trekers.

A Gate at the Stairs - Lorrie Moore

Tassie wants a job to earn some extra money during college (that’s university to UK readers). She applies for childcare jobs knowing that she’s good with kids but with little real enthusiasm for this kind of job. Eventually she’s hired by Sarah and Edward Brink, who are planning to adopt a baby and becomes the nanny for Emma Mary, a mixed race two year old. Sarah owns a high end restaurant and is out most of the time and Edward is so uncommitted to his new baby it’s crazy. Tassie spends most of her time with the Brinks, as her roommate has moved in with a boyfriend and her parents live back on their strange, high end produce farm, but she visits home and talks about her roommate often.

Phew, glad that’s over. Does anyone else hate writing plot summaries when the novel’s contents are kind of abstract? It’s hard work. Lorrie Moore’s new novel ‘A Gate at the Stairs’ really has too much going on to be summarised, without missing out chunks of interestingness and I’m actually finding it hard to write about at all.

To me Lorrie Moore seems like an old school modernist. She’s obsessed with consciously using reoccurring symbolism (hurray) but the symbols are never explained by context during the novel, for example the central image of the title, the gate at the stairs, is used in a variety of ways. Even though it turns up several times throughout the novel it’s not a consistent running metaphor and could have many meanings. Some of those meaning are easy to guess, but some remain oblique. The same is true of other repeated symbols that Moore includes, like birds which range from flocks of dead songbirds to a bird costume Tassie wears on her dad’s farm. I love that Moore doesn’t simplify her novel’s intentions for readers. I love that she resists the urge to handhold and explain what everything means, so that her novel almost requires a second reading.

Sometimes the novel wanders off on a random track for no real plot reason (again hurray). There’s a short scene where Tassie goes to her boyfriend’s house and finds everything has gone, he will be leaving soon and people may come and say he was part of a terrorist cell. They have a final conversation where nothing makes sense, their responses to each other’s sentences don’t make up a conversation and it doesn’t really relate to anything else in the novel:

‘ “Why London?”
“The English are simultaneously critical and stiffly uncomplaining – a stage Americans bypassed altogether, having gone from a dullard’s stoicism to a neurotic’s whining in less than half a century.”
“That is such a bullshit answer.”
“I’m part of an Islamic charity for Afghan children. That is all. They think I’m part of a cell. I’m not. If anyone asks you, if they question you when I’m gone, please tell them I’m not.”
There was no room in this conversation for “What about us?” The conversational space had suddenly filled with other creatures. Perhaps we had reached that last stage of intimacy that destroys intimacy. '

Somehow this odd way of parting, where Tassie fails to ask him any sensible questions makes sense in the context of the increasingly nonsensical world Tassie finds herself in. Whenever she tries to have a conversation with other adults she finds herself unable to work out how they want her to respond. At first it seems as if this is Tassie’s lack of confidence showing itself, perhaps she imagines their odd reactions to what she says, but soon it’s clear that the adults she meets speak in nonsense phrases, without ever listening, or genuinely conversing:

‘ “There are Austrains saying that shimpanzees are people.”
“And don’t get me started with the primate research. There is such an eagerness to lump black people with apes. Beasts of any kind.”
“That’s done even to the Jews.”
“Well, Austrians…”
“What do you mean, ‘even’?”
“I mean nothing. I meant even chickens. I’ve heard the PETA people compare what goes on with chickens to what went on with the Jews.”
“Well, how else are you going to make them sit still in their nests and do your taxes if you don’t cut their legs off?”
“Your sense of humour is too dark.”
“Don’t say ‘dark’. It’s racist.” '

Sarah Brink hires her because she sees something real in Tassie, perhaps something she recognises from her younger self, but she quickly finds of the open, genuine way Tassie acts an inconvenience. She asks Tassie to visit the birth mother with her and Edward, but when Tassie accepts she quickly realises that was not the expected answer. In the supposed real world of mixed race adoption, business ownership and marriage everything seems fake. The only authentic people Tassie meets are her own age like her roommate Murphy, or other domestic workers like Noelle.

For all that I really liked ‘A Gate at the Stairs’ I don’t agree with the reviews I’ve seen that say Moore has cracked writing in novel length (or the ones that seems to think a lack of novels shows she is lacking as a writer). Some passages in the novel drag because the writing is not a tight as it could be. It could have been shorter without losing any of its significance and in some ways it might have been more vital if some of Tassie’s descriptive introspection had been removed. The writing really shines during the personal interactions between characters, or Tassie’s thoughts about people, but it feels like Moore is trying to go past detailed social observation to a way of explaining the world that uses sustained descriptive passages and less dialogue. This technique doesn’t always feel as incisive as the way she uses dialogue to skewer people’s behaviour. ‘A Gate at the Stairs’ wouldn’t necessarily work better as a novella, but a shorter novel might have been better.

I’d like to have the time to break Moore’s writing down, line by line and study how she writes and what she means, comparing major themes across her works. I don’t really have time for that in a first time reading, so I’m thinking of making the writings of Lorrie Moore a little personal project this year as I have her collected short stories and I could reread ‘Who Will Run the Frog Hospital’, as well as some criticism if I can find any that’s cheap. Meanwhile will ‘A Gate at the Stairs’ be on the Orange shortlist? I think it should be there, but my shortlist slots are filling up so fast and I’ve only read five books from the list. Maybe I’m not being critical enough, grrr must be tougher like the real judges.

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New Books - Part Three: Absolutely the last one

This is definitely the last book spending spree for a good long while (although I’m currently buying up books for the GuysLitWire teen book drop, which is sending books to two reservation schools). In fact I feel the need for a big clear out of my wardrobes and there are some books that can be passed on to charity as well.

You can see evidence of my recent Orange prize purchases in there:

‘Savage Lands’ – Clare Clark: I really enjoyed ‘The Great Stink’, but I wasn’t sure how interesting this sounded when I read the Orange summary. Reading the jacket flap, which speaks of love and betrayal, makes me want to read it now.

‘Small Wars’ – Sadie Jones: Ok I caved. I bought it in hardback because a prize list told me to. ‘The Outcast’ which had a soup like atmosphere of shame and anger, won the Orange debut prize last year. I’m hoping to see something different in her second novel, even though they have similar settings and I’ll be a little disappointed if it’s just the same kind of story built from related material.

‘The Help’ – Kathryn Stockett: ‘The Help’ is another unexpectedly thick book, so I don’t think I’ll finish it before the short list appears. I have been assured by many reviewers descriptions of the book that this will be much better than I’m expecting and is not limp, politically correct historical fiction.

Some of the books I pre-ordered have appeared:

‘A Wish After Midnight’ – Zetta Elliott: Zetta Elliott writes one of my favourite author blogs. I read a little excerpt from the sequel at her blog and the confident, developed writing style convinced me to pick up the first book. I think this would be great for the ‘Once Upon a Time’ challenge, because there is time travel.

‘Page from a Tennesse Journal’ – Francine Thomas Howard: I’m feeling the love for the Amazon Encore program. I’ve ordered three books from the publisher, who scoops up the best self published writers and gives them access to resources they’ve been missing. This is a historical novel about sharecropping (another blank area in my knowledge).

‘Toads and Diamonds’ – Heather Tomlinson : Based on an Indian myth about a girl who meets a goddess and starts dropping diamonds from her mouth when she speaks, when her sister meets the same goddess she starts producing toads. What an awesome idea! Thanks to Ari for alerting me to it. This also looks like a great choice for ‘Once Upon a Time’

‘The Windup Girl’ – Paolo Bacigalupi: Advertised as a steam punk novel (although the Smugglers don’t agree) but even if it’s not it sounds like some good sci-fi.

A couple of review copies sent to me for free. Yes, review copies, those are rare here (because the pressure scares me). It’s always nice to be contacted directly by an author and I’m discovering I am more likely to say ‘yes please’ to authors who type out the email themselves. I’ll be reviewing both of these books in May and I’d like to thank the authors for trusting me with their books : )

‘This One is Mine’ - Maria Semple : Two women living very different lives, two different attempts to change. I’m pretty sure this is on my massive TBR list somewhere, because it sounded familiar when I read the synopsis

‘The Devil’s Music’ – Jane Rusbridge: The author contacted me about my review of ‘The Still Point’. She’ll be teaching a creative writing workshop in the same place Amy Sackville will be working and she really liked the book as well. On such little threads are connections built and we decided there’s a decent chance I’ll like her book about a small family breaking down.

Some for online book discussions:

'Moo Pak' – Gabriel Josipovici: My first read for the year of reading along organised by the bloggers who created ‘Woolf in Winter’. I’m really annoyed that I managed to buy the Spanish version of ‘Santa Evita’ and will now probably miss out on that discussion, unless I can find it in a library.

‘Fledgling’ – Octavia Butler: I keep hearing this compared to ‘Beloved’ which is one of my favourite books. Vampires and slavery should make for an interesting change of pace over at the ‘Not the TV Book Group’.

And a couple of randoms:

‘Collected Stories’ – Lorrie Moore: Lots of Lorrie Moore. Lovely. Review of ‘A Gate at the Stairs’ coming soon.

‘Even the Dogs’ – Jon McGregor: John McGregor’s writing is too beautiful to resist and I love that this book uses a cloth cover, so different.

In the interests of money I must now desist and read what I own (having made sure I own everything I want to read right now...sort of).

Out of the Pocket - Bill Konigsberg

Bobby Framingham is a decent high school quarterback who likes nothing better than playing football with his buddies at Durango High, hanging out with his dad and spending time with his friend Carrie. Lately however life hasn’t been so sweet. Bobby is gay, in a world where there are no visible sporting role models for a gay quarterback. He’s almost ready to start coming out, but is concerned about how this might damage his chances of being recruited to a college team. There’s a lot of pressure on Bobby as he tries to get a football scholarship at a good college and help his team win the championship. Problems also arise away from the field as his dad’s doesn’t seem to care about Bobby anymore and Carrie is beginning to show that she’d like to be more than friends. Can Bobby come out and keep his life intact?

What I really like about ‘Out of the Pocket’ is that it’s a different kind of coming out story, one for a new generation of gay teenagers that's more concerned with the practical side of coming out than with a sense of societal created, personal shame at the thought of coming out. While Bobby’s clearly concerned with how coming out will affect his relationships and his chance of a professional sporting career, there’s never any hint that personal shame about being gay is what keeps him from coming out. He mentions being excited at the thought of dating a guy in the future and there’s a sense that his coming out is inevitable because it’s a part of himself he wants to freely explore, even if he’s not quite ready to come out now. The last coming out novel I read was ‘The God Box’, where Paul’s personal shame and fear, created by the society he lives in, was palpably painful. Bill Konigsberg’s idea that a realistic teenage character could be comfortable with the fact that they’re attracted to the same sex was a welcome new view on how gay teenagers may view themselves.

Konigsberg also makes a strong case that there are concrete obstacles that keep some teenagers in the closet, even in reasonably liberal areas like Bobby’s town where the school has an established gay straight alliance and many people clamour to support him once he’s outed. Although shame is often a factor, it’s not acceptable to continue to blame personal shame alone for keeping teenagers closeted and brushing off their concerns about being ashamed with an eye roll and ‘Oh don’t be silly, the world is much more equal now’. Bobby’s first encounter with the guidance counsellor, Dr Blassingame shows the limits of our understanding about just how diverse gay life is and the specific issues that affect different people:

‘ “Can you name a single gay male athlete?”
“The diver,” he said, searching for a name.
“Team sports,” I said. “It’s different when it’s a team sport.”
He gawked at me inquisitively.
“You can’t name one, I can’t name one,” I said patiently.
“But it never occurs to me to think of the sexual persuasion of an athlete. Why does it matter?”
“Well maybe it shouldn’t, but it does,” I said. “Otherwise wouldn’t there be some openly gay people?” '

That a gay person will encounter different problems if they play for a sports team is an especially good point, that’s reinforced throughout the book. Bobby’s job as a quarterback is what makes his particular situation so hard. As he is part of a sports team whose members are naturally physically close on the field, he faces a whole different kind of homophobic attitude based on very specific worries that are felt even by his friends like Austin, who wants to be cool when Bobby tells him. A debate occurs about whether other players will shower with Bobby ( Bill Konigsberg has a great article about why this shouldn’t be an issue)and homophobic concerns about him being sat behind the centre arise. Yes coming out is wonderful and we all like to think that by being a liberal, general society we remove all the problems of coming out for a young man like Bobby but in reality he and many other teenagers have a specific set of problems that continue to exist no matter how accepting those of us outside of their lives may be.

Of course that doesn’t mean the general public should stop being accepting, but we also need to accept that despite the support around them some teenagers feel unable to come out publically and we need to support them in this, rather than insist they must come out. Bobby struggles to make people understand that who he tells and when is his choice. He tells his oldest friend Austin who tells other teammates, one of those teammates tells his family and eventually Bobby is outed by a high school reporter, Finch, who later claims he ‘did what I did knowing it would be good for you.’ . Another great aspect of ‘Out of the Pocket’ is that while Bobby decides to own the announcement as his own and is eventually happy that people know, he avoids letting Finch get away with stealing his right to come out on his own terms. While Bobby is gracious about Finch’s involvement when he submits his own article, spouting the line others want to hear, he also works on expressing his story in his words and getting justice by exposing Finch. Maybe what Finch does leads to the openness Bobby always wanted, but no one has the right to take his story from him. It’s a small distinction that I’m glad Konigsberg took the time to make.

There’s a certain amount of sappiness in this novel, but for once I didn’t mind. I think there’s always a little bit of over done emotion in every sporting story as they’re tales of intense highs and lows, where everything rests on just one season. In general I thought the balance between strong emotion and over the top sporting metaphors for life was about right. There are powerful scenes between Bobby and his dad, as well as this amazing moment as Bobby let’s his emotions out on the beach:

‘My sinuses burned, and I felt the wetness in my eyes that had been so dry.
And the first tear fell.
My eyes flooded with them and I screamed as loud as I could scream.
I charged blindly into an oncoming wave, breaking it with my bare chest as best I could before it flung me back toward the shore, frigid salt water rolling over my head, mocking me.’ .

Then there are crescendo like explanations of what the tier formation symbolises, which are distracting and too much. Bobby’s article about being forced ‘outside of the pocket’ probably sits on the border for me. It squeezed my heart, but the style of using the pocket as a metaphor for coming out felt a little weak. Then again maybe that’s the way a seventeen year old jock would write, they make you write a lot of emotive campaign articles in school. It had a lot of heart, even if the writing wasn’t sophisticated.

Oh and how I did like the secondary characters and the world Bobby lives in. Konigsberg sets his story in a real life, diverse high school and many members of Bobby’s team are hispanic. The secondary characters are just fantastic even though they only get to appear in brief bursts: Bryan, Carrie, Coach, Rahim, Austin and Bobby’s dad are my favourites, as they all have their little interesting differences, like Bobby’s dad’s ageing catchers figure, or Rahim’s quiet belief in God. They’re like real people and their individuality separates ‘Out of the Pocket’ from books that treat their secondary characters as if they’re just there to enable plot points with the main protagonist. The laid back, supportive dynamic of the team, which is created as Konigsberg allows many of the team members to have a significant presence, is part of what makes the book so enjoyable. It’s easy to feel why the team plays so well together, but there’s also a tension underneath their unquestioning support for each other that comes from a combination of things like competitiveness and bravado. It’s a picture of male friendship that rings with authenticity.

I must admit that I find American football confusing, so I was at a bit of a disadvantage when I tried to imagine the big games Bobby is involved in. It’s odd , because I have no problem with other big American sports that we don’t get over here. I understand the basics of ice hockey, basketball and baseball, but for some reason I can’t crack American football and I can’t picture the plays at all. I’d guess it’s because I’ve seen a lot of terrible, yet uplifting sports films about baseball (‘A League of Their Own’) and ice hockey (‘Mighty Ducks’). I watched a lot of ‘Hang Time’ and ‘One Tree Hill’ when I was growing up. But the only visual representation of American football I can remember is ‘AirBud: kajillion’ or something, when the dog learns to play. I just don’t know what the sport looks like when it’s being played. Does anyone have any films they can recommend to help me picture it better?

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YA Fabulous

Teen Book Drop

Remember last year’s Book Fair for Boys, run by GuysLitWire? Well this year, as part of the Teen Book Drop that runs every year the teams at Guys and the readergrlz have set up something similar, but a little different. This year they’re hoping to supply books to two reservation schools in America, but they need our help. If you have a little bit of money left in your charity budget this month consider popping over to the main post, clicking through to a their Powell’s wish list and donating a book to either school.

Over at ChasingRay Coleen lets us in on some of the behind the scenes organisation that went into selecting the schools and setting up the lists. I hope she won’t mind me quoting just a little bit of her post, which really got to me:

‘Books are still gold. The emails I have received in the past week or so from Alchesay as the kids realized they could ask for books to come their way have been great. And with their internet hookup (more reliable than Ojo Encino) they are going to check their wish list everyday to see what is coming. They are so excited - both schools are so incredibly excited. Yes, the ipad and kindle and whatever else are all wonderful and good but these are kids who do not own a book.’

The lists are so well constructed, there’s a great mix of Native American fiction, non-fiction, creative books (books that teach kids how to draw and make zines), new short story collections and all other kinds of great young adult fiction. You can purchase used copies from the Powell’s wish list because the GuysLitWire team say their quality is fantastic, which means you can donate more books for your buck. And they ship straight to the organisation so there’s no need to spend tedious time at the post office. So check it out and see if you can help.

PS Good luck to everyone taking part in the 24 hour readathon this weekend. I’ll be away having a movie marathon with a friend, but I’ll be thinking of you all and your tired, but excited eyes : ) Hopefully some reviews will go up while before I leave away because I’ve actually finished quite a few books recently and maybe a tantalizing final stack of bought books.

Whoosh - There goes the Bank Holiday

Well here we are again on a Tuesday, about to begin a four day week. The little things I like the most about being off work were great. I could eat whatever I liked at lunch, proper meals that don’t have to be decided on in advance and if I want to walk upstairs for no reason, or go outside I could. Small things...There were also big wonderful things like a trip to Birmingham for tapas and shopping, finishing most of a book in one day, chips in Bridgenorth by their sad castle (our castle could beat up their castle any day) and getting ridiculously drunk. I have squeezed the Bank Holiday weekend until it had nothing left to give, now back to the working week.

I finished ‘The Little Stranger’ on Friday. Here are my final thoughts on the fourth book I’ve read from the 2010 Orange longlist:

In the comments on my last post softdrink asked if I felt that the house contributed to the creep factor of the novel, as lots of readers thought the house was malevolent. I didn’t get that feeling at all; Hundreds was not another Manderley for me. While in ‘Rebecca’ the descriptions of the grounds and rooms created much of the scary atmosphere of the novel, the great decaying house in ‘The Little Stranger’ feels passively abused, rather than an active, angry force. The novel was scary at times, for example the scene where the nursery door would not open was terrifying. Other moments, such as Caroline standing on the staircase, her face in the shadows, seemed foreboding , but the house felt like it was inhabited by malicious energies, rather than made of those energies.

I loved the ambiguity at the end of the novel. I know which way I choose to interpret the ending and what I think caused the Ayres family to collapse. Then sometimes I rethink things and it seems like my interpretation is totally wrong. My opinion of what was hurting the family changed throughout the novel as Sarah Waters clearly wanted it to. The crack in the window, after Dr Faraday throws the ring out the window, confirmed my ideas and made me retrace my steps to see if my theory fit with all the episodes in the novel, which it does because Waters has made sure that all the possible theories she gives to the reader have plausible textual evidence.

Waters sets up opposing arguments about what caused the destruction of the strictly structured upper class. Did the upper class destroy themselves because they were unable to adapt to the new order of the world, or were they brought done by the rise of the middle class? Water’s representation of the latter possibility seems rather violent, as if the middle class purposely set out to destroy the upper class, when they really just wanted equality. I’m middle class, with parents who worked to move classes so while I may not trust Dr Faraday, there’s no way I’m going to willingly agree that because I believe he brought down the Ayres and he is middle class, the whole middle class was gleefully cognisant about bringing down the upper class. Again Waters sets up possible ambiguity of interpretation. Is Faraday cognisant of what he’s doing to the Ayres family and deliberately lying to the reader, or as his narrative voice often suggests is he deceiving himself about his involvement in the whole affair?

The last scene where Faraday surveys the ruined Hundreds as if he is the owner, by using the key he should really have given back, makes me feel uneasy about the class politics Waters expresses in this book. That scene has a symbolic ring about it, which seems to suggest that Faraday stands for a whole class who have actively usurped a dying structure. However, this idea is never openly articulated by Faraday and while the way he describes his visits to the house sound proprietary, there’s no use of gleefully violent language, or any recognition that he has been deceptive. Rather his visits are endowed with a subtle violence and satisfaction, by the picture of a deceptive narrator that has been reinforced throughout the book. It is the reader who gives him this characterisation as a deceptive, violent personality based on the textual baggage they’ve accumulated throughout the book, not the text of the final pages. When viewed as a deliberately deceptive person Faraday and his last visits to the house feel strongly symbolic, making him seem less of an individual character who just happens to be middle class and more a representation of a whole, rather spiteful class. An alternate picture is easily constructed using other textual evidence, of Faraday as an innocent self-deceiver who can’t see the harm he is doing. Viewed in this way he still seems like a representation, instead of an individual character in the final moments of the book, but there is no malice behind his actions although readers can still assign blame to the ambitious middle class through him.

Of course this unsettling interpretation doesn’t apply if you decide that something other than Faraday’s troubled paranormal energy destroyed the Ayres. Even if you think Faraday is an unreliable narrator who really murdered one of the characters, he appears more as a character, than a representation of his class. Sarah Water’s depiction of class is something I’d like to investigate further by reading more of her novels.

I don’t think this will win the Orange prize. Although it’s well written and although it’s well plotted, this year’s field seems so strong I think the winning author may have to do something more overtly spectacular than just tell a good story in order to win. Sarah Waters has had a go at adding extra layers and something more subtle than a ghost story, or a mystery lies beneath the surface of her swift, natural prose, but I’m not sure she’s introduced enough new significance to an old tale. I predict a shortlist nomination, but no prize.

On a personal note massive points to Waters for setting this novel in the West Midlands. There’s not exactly a wealth of historical fiction set in any part of the area, so reading a novel set in Warwickshire, with a few references to Birmingham was nice.

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The Little Stranger - Bookish Chat

I’m sure I’m not the only person in England looking forward to the long Bank Holiday weekend. A couple of four day work weeks back to back are frankly a blessing right now. To all of you out there under immense work pressure it must sound like I’m being whiny about not having much to do at my job, but it is very depressing to have to scrounge up tasks to fill your day. To me it seems terribly wasteful for me to spend hours like that, even though I’m being paid. Money can’t buy your time back.

I’m going to try and forget I have to go back next Tuesday (this has suddenly become almost too easy to do, which means the end of weekend freedom comes as a massive shock) and put the whole four days away from work to the best use possible. Tomorrow it’s time for some shopping and lunch out, Saturday getting my hair the full treatment (dye, cut, style, head massage) and then out for some drinks, Sunday lots of time with BOOKS, 24 and Easter chocolate and Monday a drive out somewhere with my parents as long as the weather stays decent. I don’t expect to be on the computer much (except for time spent looking for a job) but before I take myself away from blogland I thought I’d tell you a little bit about how ‘The Little Stranger’ is going. I know lots of you read it when it got the Booker nomination, so I’m looking forward to a bit of comment chat. I’ll need something to read while waiting for my job applications to upload, won’t I?

Thoughts 350 pages in:

I don’t know if it’s because I’m British, but I love historical novels set in big country houses. All those secrets among the upper class and scandals in the servant quarters make for brilliant drama. I tend to like these kind of novels more when they’re set during the crumbling days of the golden age of the British class system (which if you weren’t part of the upper class must have seemed like a very long, dark age), so it was always quite likely that I’d enjoy ‘The Little Stranger’. I do like that most of the story takes place in the impressive, but decaying ‘Hundreds’, a grand home that is slowly falling into disrepair. The building reflects the disintegration of the traditional upper class way of life and forces its inhabitants to accept that they will have to find a new way of living. Cue lots of ‘Oh wasn’t it glorious in its day’ style reminiscing.

Although I really enjoyed the first 200 or so pages I did find myself wondering what the big deal was about Sarah Waters. She has written this lovely, easy to read first person narrative and her writing style is much more than competent, without being obviously literary, but the way everyone talks about her I was perhaps expecting a more blatant form of genius. Her writing style reminds me of lots of classic authors like E M Forster, Evelyn Waugh and Daphne Du Maurier whose fluid, but straightforward prose almost fool you into believing that they’re just telling a story about domestic life. Now this is great because I love this kind of author and their writing style, so I was happy to find a living author to match them in Sarah Waters. However these authors all conceal their deeper themes under light prose that encourages the reader to happily follow wherever it leads, but at first I couldn’t see Water’s deeper ideas. I mean I could see ideas about what the war has done to society, the shifting class system and the malevolence of ghosts, peeping through but I couldn’t see Water’s doing anything in particular with those ideas. I’m still not sure she does reveal anything new through her incorporation of those three themes, although she handles them as well as any of the other novelists I’ve mentioned above. Am I missing something, do you see more coming out of these ideas than I did?

Then during a scene where Dr Faraday and Caroline park up in his car I began to see an emerging theme of manipulation, enabled by deep power structures. Before I began reading I was told something about the doctor that made me very aware of how he was shaping the narrative. I’m still not sure if I would have preferred to read without knowing to watch him carefully, but knowing what I did meant that I’d already started picking up that all may not be quite as he describes it. I thought the car scene really crystallised his potential dishonesty. It also showed me that Waters is interested in the many forms manipulation takes and I began to realise that perhaps other characters in the book were not quite as uncomplicated as I’d been led to believe by the light tone of the writing. I’m in the process of re-evaluating my reactions to all the other characters and to the strange things that are happening in the house. For me this strand of examination is what makes ‘The Little Stranger’ a potential short list candidate, because it’s so subtle.

I feel like looking at ‘The Still Point’, ‘Wolf Hall’ and ‘The Little Stranger’ side by side is like seeing graduations in a spectrum of good writing. ‘The Still Point’ overtly plays around with language and structure, in places it openly glories in words. Its narrative voice is abstract as it doesn’t come from within a character in the book and that gives the book a kind of layer of artificiality, so you can never forget a story is being told. That’s not a criticism; it’s just the way omniscient narrator works. Sometimes I feel like there are too many first person narrators out there and first person narration is being taken as an easy option by authors who don’t really understand how difficult it is to create a convincing first person voice. Amy Sackville’s decision to remove herself from direct contact with the narrative is rather wonderful because it’s different.

‘Wolf Hall’ also enjoys playing with language, but in a more naturalistic way as the third person narrator never steps aside to overtly examine language. Perhaps it plays with traditional structure with a little more subtlety, or perhaps it’s just a little more conventional in the way it subverts that structure (because yes messing about with traditional linear narrative has now been going on for so long that it has conventions). There’s definitely a difference in the way they approach producing stories, which are essentially created using a similar forms of writing, even if I’m not completely sure what that difference is.

Then there’s ‘The Little Stranger’ which uses linear structure and doesn’t overtly examine language. Instead it’s told using lovely fluid prose which keeps from being simple, or extravagant. And here’s the thing all three novels are very good. So authors can play around with structure and language, while taking on big ideas, or they can use traditional forms of language and structure, while taking on big ideas and still produce comparably good books. Not a shocking idea to readers I know, but I just thought I’d bring it up.

Initially I thought I’d have no problem reading quite a few books nominated for the Orange prize before the shortlist appeared. I’d already read ‘Wolf Hall’, which was surely the biggest book on the list. ‘Wolf Hall’ might be the biggest one, but ‘The Little Stranger’ is not far behind. It’s 500 pages and even though I’ve devoted a lot of reading time to it this week and it’s so easy to read I’m still only 350 pages in, with 29 days until the shortlist is announced. I'm hoping to read six before then, but I wonder how many I’ll manage.

Have lovely weekends everyone and if you’re in Britain enjoy those extra days off if you’ve got them.