In 2017, I just about scraped by with my goal of 52 books
read, although most of this was achieved in March and April when I was Artist
in Residence and was working intensively on research-based projects. I got three-quarters of the way into The Pickwick Papers so I hope to finish
that in 2018.
Moon Over Soho – Ben Aaronovitch
The second book in the generally entertaining series that started with Rives of London. It was a bit of a disappointment. The hero Peter Grant was too busy having sex
to be the charming, hilarious, sarcastic, individual character he was in the first
book. There wasn’t enough of
Nightingale, and I didn’t at all like the ending revelation regarding Lesley
(see Whispers Underground below). That said, the plot was for the most part
very intriguing and there were potent images and characters—Larry the Lark
being discovered in the basement was a memorable one. There were a few good laughs to be found here
and there . . . it was not a book that would be picked up without having read
the first one.
A Grim Almanac of Georgian London – Graham Jackson and Cate Ludlow
This was a fascinating book and written with humanity and humor, despite
the sometimes disgusting, sometimes saddening, sometimes maddening
material. The 18th century
was rife with infanticide, (fatal) domestic abuse, temper tantrums, cruelty and
starvation, not to mention its share of maniacs and sheer unfortunate
accidents. It was still, of course, the
era of public executions, grave-robbing, and rather barbaric punishment that
seldom fitted the crime (branding on the hand for manslaughter, death for
stealing handkerchiefs). Still, human
nature has remained virtually the same.
Gothic Tales – Elizabeth Gaskell
Many of these I quite enjoyed. “The
Nurse’s Tale” is probably the scariest ghost story, though there was definitely
a strong sense of the uncanny in “The Poor Clare.” I enjoyed how “Lois the Witch” filled in
between The Scarlet Letter and The Crucible. Gaskell’s female characters are much more
lifelike than their equivalents in Wilkie Collins. I was surprised that religious evangelization
played very little part; they seemed generally stories to entertain rather than
edify.
The Broke-Ass Bride’s Wedding Guide – Dana LaRue
Interesting and potentially useful.
A Monstrous Commotion: The Mysteries of Loch Ness – Gareth Williams
I have always wanted to believe in something living in Loch Ness—I am
interested in cryptids, after all.
However, having been presented with all the evidence in this
non-polemical book, I (painfully ) have to agree with Williams and disbelieve
that anything resembling the “Loch Ness monster” exists. Waves, optical illusions, families of otters,
and perhaps sturgeons are evidently the only things that can reliably said to
account for the sightings. Most damning
of all, Williams—a former believer and medical professional—argues that a newspaper
man concocted the whole thing in the early 1930s, based on a few sights of “something”
from St Columba on. That doesn’t wipe
away how enticing the plesiosaur idea was and is, nor the fact that Loch Ness
is still a very interesting place.
Dakota: A Spiritual Geography – Kathleen Norris
Although evidently dated now—the Internet has probably had a huge impact
on the residents of the Dakotas as much as it has had for other rural people;
and the author has since moved to Hawaii!—this was an important book to read
before integrating, however briefly, into South Dakotan society. I believe its observations about the
emptiness of the land, the pride and parochialism of the people, the tension of
extremes, and why some people really love to live there hold true to this
day.
Lakota Woman — Mary Crow Dog and Richard Erdoes
An engrossing book; hardly a piece of great literature but
important and revealing for its absolutely honest depiction of Native America
in the second half of the 20th century. In the second decade of the 21st
century, you could get that from Scalped
but back in 1991, Mary Crow Dog (also known as Mary Brave Bird, a Lakota Sioux)
was where you went for uncomfortable truths about female AIM activists being
raped, mutilated and murdered, about forced sterilization of Indian women, and
“we were happy because we didn’t know we were poor” childhoods on the Pine
Ridge and Rosebud Reservations. The narrative high point was during the AIM
siege, after which the narrative petered out slightly as the story became more
about her husband, peyote priest and medicine man Leonard Crow Dog. She wrote a second memoir of her older years
which would be interesting to read.
Tatanka-Iyotanka: A Biography of Sitting Bull— Michael Crummett
This was brief, readable, to the point, and often remarkable;
I found it fascinating that this man’s first name as a child was Slow as he was
slow and steady but eventually began counting coup and gaining widespread
recognition as a wise man.
Big Bat Pourier — Hila Gilbert
Like so many of the books I read in the Badlands, family
history and memoir tales don’t necessarily equal great literature. Yet they tend to tell a remarkable story, as
this one did, about the very interesting Baptiste Pourier, second generation
French-Canadian fur trader, trapper, “squaw man,” and denizen of the Badlands
area during the second half of the 19th century. This one was definitely a cut above the rest
for its plentiful and relevant photographs and genuinely interesting details
from grandchildren and contemporaries.
Reflections of the Badlands — Philip S. Hall
Although carefully edited this was not (and sometimes
confusing in its chronology), this was the go-to source for general history of
the Badlands, with a reasonably strong bibliography of primary sources to back
it up.
Legends of the Lakota — James LaPointe
A well-written, generous, imaginative, and sometimes quite
funny collection of tales in English translated from Lakota oral tradition; I
found it immensely rewarding.
Scotty Philip: The Man Who Saved the Buffalo — Wayne C. Lee
Similar to the previously-mentioned small-press family
histories, this book was no riveting gamechanger. Nevertheless, it was a solid study of a
fascinating man whose origins in rural Scotland seemed very far away indeed
from his eventual destiny as inheritor of Bat Pourier’s legacy in the Badlands
area: a freighter, gold-hunter, “squaw
man,” Army courier, and eventual cattle baron supreme (with the added twist
that his respect for the dwindling bison actually saved them from extinction).
Frontier Woman: The Life of a Woman Homesteader on the Dakota Frontier — Walker D. Wyman
This was a rather peculiar book, only in the sense that Grace
Fairchild’s personality was a hard nut to crack. It was her relationship with
her husband, “Shy” Shiloh, that seemed really difficult to fathom, as he seemed
a totally incompetent ne’er-do-well (and she admitted as much), and she had to
support the entire family in the unforgiving Dakota frontier. What homesteading experience had she
had? Mainly as a schoolteacher and from
her farm upbringing. Despite the
psychological questions which are never answered, it’s a book full of excellent
details about real homesteading life, filled with tragedies as well as Grace’s
general beating the odds.
Painting the Dakota: Seth Eastman at Fort Snelling — Marybeth Lorbiecki
The Eastman story has all the aspects of an opera: Seth Eastman, an ambitious West Point
graduate, brings his art skills to a backwoods trading post in Minnesota. He captures the Dakota Indians in beautifully
observed watercolors, takes an Indian wife, and has a child; yet, “in the
custom of the country,” he leaves the fort and his wife. When he returns some years later, an elevated
artist, he has a white wife and white children; who can tell what his first
Dakota wife thought of them.
Intriguingly, his descendent was Charles Eastman, an articulate doctor
proud of his Dakota heritage. This short
book was merely an introduction to all of this, heavy on the beautiful artwork,
but a compelling introduction nonetheless.
Women of the West — Cathy Luchetti and Carol Olwell
This lavishly illustrated book (including many archival photos
which had never been published before) took considerable effort to get through,
though its scope was admirable. The
editors’ introduction was superb, authoritative and also intriguing. The bulk of the book was diaries from women
pioneers of every possible stripe, which made a fascinating counterpoint to the
many homesteader accounts I’d been reading (mainly those women were from
similar socio-economic/cultural backgrounds), and to the exciting but slightly
more circumscribed accounts of Chris Enss.
They included Miriam Davis Colt who joined an ill-fated vegetarian
colony experiment in the 1840s; Mary Richardson who left Massachusetts for
Oregon in 1838; Pauline Lyons Williamson, an independent Black single mother
who moved to California in 1885; Priscilla Merriman Evans, a Welsh convert to
Mormonism who arrived in Zion in the 1850s; and the extraordinary Bethenia
Owens-Adair, surely one of the most bad-ass women to have ever lived.
Daughters of Dakota: Volume II Stories from the Attic —Sally Roesch Wagner, (ed.)
In its own way, this more modest tome was just as revelatory
as the bigger-budget Women of the West,
as it ferreted out astonishing stories of Dakota women of the late 19th
and early 20th centuries.
These included urban women of eastern Dakota (many of whom had very
complicated love lives) and ethnic minorities such as Norwegian immigrants in
Dueuel County and Italian immigrants in the Black Hills. Particularly affecting was the story of
Nellie Fulker whose isolation and depression stuck on her homestead threatened
to drive her insane, as recounted by one of her daughters. The Todds have the
most extraordinary story of all, as Scottish immigrants whose story rivals
Scotty Philip’s.
The South Dakota Road Guide to Haunted Locations — Chad Lewis & Terry Fisk
The quality of prose was about what you’d expect from
self-publishing with its fair share of typos, inaccuracies, repetition and
superficiality. Moreover, with no
bibliography, it’s difficult to believe the authors put in much historical
research. Nevertheless, two sections of
the book stand out: the well-researched
section on the Easton Castle (Aberdeen) and the investigation of Sica Hollow
(Lake City), which includes a lot of thoughtful information on
will’o’-the-wisps and their pseudo-scientific explanations.
Sea Dragons: Predators of the Prehistoric Oceans - Richard Ellis
This book was odd in that it seemed to be a literature review
from a non-scientist for laymen (as an illustrator of oceanic life, Ellis’
clear forte is in visually depicting ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, pliosaurs, and
mosasaurs). What I got from it was how many questions about these reptiles
remain unanswered, including whether plesiosaurs gave birth to live young or
returned to shore to lay eggs like turtles; what exactly the reptiles ate; and
other behavioral issues.
After the West Was Won: Homesteaders and Town Builders in Western South Dakota, 1900-1917 - Paula A. Nelson
This book was succinct and academic in tone, and while it
focused mainly on Kadoka, it was well-researched and perfectly justified in the
arguments it made. Namely, that newspaper
writers and editors had a dubious and powerful role in advertising western
South Dakota as “the last great frontier” and chastising disappointed settlers
as lazy when they dared to suggest that they had been ill-equipped (as much
mentally and emotionally as physically) to live in such an unforgiving land.
Homesteading in the South Dakota Badlands, 1912 - Ernest C. Bormann
Even though second-generation German immigrant Bormann only
spent about 18 months on his Badlands claim (south of Wall), it left a strong
impression on him, and he kept his land for nearly 40 years subsequently. He is a hilarious and entertaining raconteur,
self-effacing and with a good eye for comic detail. I very much enjoyed reading his account.
Bedside Book of Bad
Girls: Outlaw Women of the Midwest – Chris Enss
Enss is the doyenne of popular women’s history of the West,
and this short, enjoyable collection of biographies of a diverse range of “bad
girls” is a good example of her style.
Her research is sound and her writing well-paced.
Whispers Underground - Ben Aaronovitch
I’m
sorry to say book 3 in the series still has not lived up to the sheer virtuoso
skill and enjoyable quality of Rivers of
London. Although longer than both
previous books and with a premise that seems ripe for storytelling— the endless
urban legends of mole people who live in the London Underground tunnels—the
novel takes a long time to get started.
The presence of the FBI officer stretches credulity, and none of the
other new characters have the authenticity and flair of previous books. On the other hand, I have warmed to Lesley’s
new role, and there were some good set pieces.
Plus, it was set at an improbably snowy Christmas.
Interior, the Badland Town and Stories of Badland Homesteaders – Mary Solon Lewis
The organizational principles of this book left something to
be desired, but it was a trove of interesting information about the area
gathered from primary sources. Some of
the biographical sketches of early settlers compiled by Lewis herself were
definite highlights.
Banjo - Samantha Wynne-Rhydderch
Sometimes I do wish she’d write some notes as her work can be
very enigmatic. But overall she was on
form with some interesting poems from the POV of men on Antarctic expeditions.
Nothing Like Love – Jenny Joseph
I had never read any of her poems before, but some of her
controlled rhymes were really moving.
Angels of Music – Kim Newman
The Doctor Wore Petticoats: Women Physicians of the Old West - Chris Enss
Although full of interesting stories, I found this to be the
least well-written of Enss’ works that I’ve read, as if it were dashed off in a
hurry without proper proofreading.
Nevertheless, her bibliography always turns up helpful leads should one
wish to read further.
For the Love of Radio 4 – Caroline Hodgson
A rather dreadful book.
Anyone who has the nerve to say that Val Gielgud was an iconoclast
because he discovered Joe Orton is clearly no historian. To be fair, it did have some interesting
facts about Radio 4 that I might not have been able to find elsewhere.
Disturbance – Ivy Alvarez
This collection had a fabulous wheeze—voices reacting to the
senseless crime of a father killing his wife and son and then himself—though I
wasn’t 100% sure that every poem lived up to its potential.
Sweetly Sings Delaney: A Study of Sheelagh Delaney’s Work 1958-1968 – John Harding
I’ve had a very strange and meandering association with
Delaney over the years, from Country Life,
her very popular radio drama written toward the end of her life, to reading
about her influence in social histories of the 1950s and 1960s. This book was neither biography nor strictly
speaking a history and was rather poorly edited. However, it was very interesting and probably
overdue.
Making History – Brian Friel
A great example of how to write non-grandiose historical
drama, but no quite as mind-blowing as Translations.
Go Tell It on the Mountain – James Baldwin
Reading this somehow made me feel like I was in high school
again, perhaps because of superficial similarities with Song of Solomon. Despite being a little bit one-note (a classic
cathartic first novel, I suppose), it was well-written. I would definitely like to read more by Baldwin.
The Disappearance of Maria Glenn – Naomi Clifford
I very much enjoyed this.
Clifford was scrupulous in accurately relating a historical trial whose
enigma was actually much like Serial’s—instead
of who is lying, Jay or Adnan, we had to ask, who is lying, the Tucketts and
Maria or the Bowditches? Despite the
fact the case was very different than what I thought it would be, it was
nevertheless an excellent story and well-told.
A Skull in Connemara – Martin McDonagh
I enjoyed this morbidly humorous play (the humor is very much
that of The Cripple of Inishmaan
which I saw on stage several years ago).
The grave-digging scenes were sharp and unusual for a stage play—I still
felt none the wiser about the satirized community at the end, though.
Of Mutability – Jo Shapcott
This
collection was mostly about the author finding out something bad about her
health—her cells were erroneously subdividing so likely it was some kind of
cancer—but in the end the threat seems to have passed. There are some good poems.
British Museum - Daljit Nagra
This poetry is very literary in style, though, as the
publisher blurb says, Nagra is also a transparently political writer (it’s one
of the few poetry collections I’ve actually read the year it came out, making
everything even more topical).
The Hired Man - Aminatta Forma
I enjoyed elements of this book, but I still felt like
something was missing when I finished it.
It was told from the POV of a Croatian who has lived through the events
of the last 30 years, and much like McDonagh’s characters, is keeping uneasy
alliances with his fellow townsfolk after unspeakable crimes were done. I don’t know what the point of the English
family was—if they were a trigger for Duro to remember the horrors of the war
years, then I wish Forma had used another trigger as they were so aggravating
and thin on characterization. However, I
guess its value lies in covering similar territory to McDonagh, the extreme
instability of small, rural communities, hiding behind a façade of
normality.
The Glass Castle – Jeanette Walls
This was compulsive reading, at first suggesting quirky
reminisces of eccentric Americana, a bohemian upbringing from a nostalgic
period when— I suppose, according to most of its readers—life wasn’t so
needlessly PC. On the other hand, it
quickly becomes an indictment of irresponsible parenting brought to frightening
extremes. This is all depicted
(generally) without rancour, in bald language, but the inciting causes for such
selfish behavior are suggested to be alcoholism, sexual abuse, cowardice, and
poverty. Walls clearly loved both her
parents but had attained the distance to tell the story with some objectivity. So while I felt a little manipulated and a
little sordid, it must be said it was a great story, very well told.
The Dark Wind – Tony Hillerman
The poorest of the Hillermans I’ve read so far, through with
an impressive finale set piece and interesting meditations on Hopi/Navajo
antagonism. I didn’t feel the Jim Chee
depicted here was that Jim Chee-like (he started a fire, for heaven’s sake!)
though the ending would only have been believable coming from Chee.
Walking London’s Medical History – Nick Black
This was a really excellent book: detailed, well-organized,
conversational. Unfortunately, it had
nothing about the medical history of Southwark (why the heck not?!), which was
the reason I bought the book. Still,
you’d be hard-pressed to find a more beautifully-edited book.
Over Land, Over Sea – Poems for Those Seeking Refuge ed. Kathleen Bell, Emma Lee and Siobhan Logan
I found this collection to be mostly quite affecting, though
some poems were more adventurous, both content-wise and the verse form, than
others.
The Letter of Marque – Patrick O’Brian
[SPOILERS]
The year was
moving along, and while I had read a Patrick O’Brian novel last year, I hadn’t
had time to write a review (an indefensible tragedy). From what I remember, The Reverse of the Medal was well-written and paced but came with a
heart-breaking conclusion. Captain Jack
Aubrey had been (falsely) implicated in a stock exchange scam (through his
land-based ineptitude more than anything else, though also through the
machinations of the sinister Mr Wray, Stephen Maturin’s opponent in the
espionage cat-and-mouse. As a
consequence, Jack had been struck from the navy lists, meaning his career as a
naval man was gone, and he had been publicly pilloried (though public opinion
was on his side, so he was not harassed).
Stephen, through inheritance on his Catalan side, became a wealthy man,
to the extent that he bought Jack’s old ship, HMS Surprise.
Inheritance
is certainly a roundabout theme of The
Letter of Marque as well. The book
opens with the Surprise outfitted as
a private man-of-war, with Jack afforded a letter of marque—and due to
Stephen’s acumen, a letter from the Admiralty excusing Jack’s sailors from
impressment. It is evident of how much
the characters of O’Brian’s universe hold Jack in esteem, for sailors are
fighting to be part of the crew of the Surprise,
including naval sailors who were previously in Jack’s crew, and a new breed
of privateers, the professional seafarers and smugglers of Shelmerston. If you have gotten this far in the series,
you, too, have a high opinion of Jack, and just as Stephen’s frequently fraught
romantic situation pains you, Jack’s total unhappiness at the turn of events
hurts like a mother.
It
was a matter of great personal joy that Rev. Martin, originally from a previous
voyage, returned in The Letter of Marque,
to accompany his friend Stephen and the Surprise—and
to receive his due. The Surprise’s action is a daring and
successful one, which brings a great deal of prize money to Jack and his crew,
including the penurious and recently married Martin. For Jack, it’s helpful to his growing family,
but he would “give his right arm” to be back on the navy lists. The infrequent interludes at Ashgrove Cottage
are always amusing, as Jack’s children have picked up their vocabulary from
Killick and Bonden, who keep the house ship-shape (why didn’t more people hire
sailors as cleaners?), but I feel myself missing Sophie’s interactions in the
most recent books. When Sophie finds herself in Shelmerston, that
smugglers’ and whores’ haven, she rises to the occasion, her narrow upbringing
notwithstanding. Indeed, the whole town fascinated her.
The
next mission, to capture the Diane, is,
even with diagrams, beyond my understanding, but it’s a tense action that sees
Stephen take up a cutlass and pistols—apparently, among his many other talents,
he can fence—making his boarding action in Master
and Commander the movie seem less far-fetched. This is the most exciting fighting of an
otherwise rather placid book. In the
event, Jack is severely wounded by a pistol-ball to the sciatica, but due to
Stephen and Martin’s good care, he recovers—the hero of the hour. ‘Well,
I am ashamed to say he took a pistol-ball out of the small of my back. It must have been when I turned to hail for
my hands—thank God I did not. At the
time I thought it was one of those vile screws [horses] that were capering
about abaft the wheel.’
‘Oh sir,’ [said Babbington],
‘surely a horse would never have fired off a pistol?’
The
success of this mission brings Jack great acclaim but still does not restore
him to the navy lists. His father,
meanwhile, has contributed nothing positive to his life and has caused Jack a
great deal of difficulty—which is repaired in this book, when he up and
dies. This brings us on shore to Jack’s
childhood home in Woolhampton, a very interesting section of the book. Relations are awkward with Mrs Aubrey, Jack’s
stepmother, a former dairy maid whom everyone in the village, including Jack,
has slept with. Nevertheless, Jack is on
good terms with his young step-brother, who in turn worships him. At General Aubrey’s funeral is the almost
deus ex machina character of Mr Norton, Jack’s distant relation who gives him
an MP-ship in his county seat, propelling Jack back into respectability and the
navy lists. I say almost deus ex
machina, because Mr Norton is an interesting enough character that he doesn’t
feel as slight as a mere plot device.
After
this happy restoration, for the last sixth of the book, we have to resolve
Stephen’s story. Stephen’s adjustment
to newfound wealth is comical; from a pinch-penny slovenly background, he has
to reconcile himself to a few of life’s luxuries. Ironically, his largesse seems to have inspired him into an addiction to
laudanum—unlike Thomas De Quincey, he seems not to be able to admit even to
himself that he is an opium-eater. I
hope that in the next book he may come to terms with this, given the disastrous
effect it has on his Irish-speaking servant, the gentle giant Padeen, not to
mention Stephen’s own brush with near-death (more on that anon). Yet, this being O’Brian, I suspect Stephen’s
sense of denial will remain one of his few blind spots. Indeed, he admits as much regarding
Padeen—Stephen’s addiction fuelled Padeen’s which in turn literally caused
Stephen’s accident—a surprising lack of judgement from an incredibly lucid man
(though, like his blind spot regarding trusting Wray, it’s understandable but
disappointing). I fear Stephen may in
future risk his marriage over an incipient addiction to cocaine.
In
the excellent Treason’s Harbour, several
books back, Stephen had to appear to be dallying away from his new wife Diana,
and they have been separated ever since.
Armed with Diana’s blue diamond, her most prized possession which she
bartered believing Stephen’s life was in danger in The Surgeon’s Mate, he seeks her out in Sweden, where she has been
living as a kept woman with Jagiello, the delightful Lithuanian adventurer from
The Surgeon’s Mate. My heart sunk when I thought of Diana and
Jagiello together, simply because Diana belongs with Stephen (!), but Stephen
is buoyed by rumors that Diana is under Jagiello’s protection—no more. Indeed, when Stephen meets Diana, she says as
much. ‘Protection in the plain sense was what I wanted, not a bed-fellow. He did not believe it—indeed, even while he
was protesting all possible respect, brotherly sentiments and so on, he
smirked, as men will smirk, I am afraid.’
Along
with inheritance, the powerful symbol of the hot air balloon has been haunting
this novel and it’s finally in Sweden where this image takes flight. One of the few criticisms I can have of the
series is that we don’t get to spend nearly enough time with Sophie and Diana,
the two female characters of any consequence, and it’s not because O’Brian
can’t write convincing women—at least as far as Sophie goes. I’ve always been ambivalent about Diana;
sometimes her superficiality gets on my nerves.
But Stephen works out that her independence is more important than her
love of luxury. When Stephen returns the
diamond to her, I believe she understands how much he loves her, just as when
she gave it up to save his life, the readers understood that she loves him
(despite them being a star-crossed couple if there ever was one).
The
book, then, ends on a wildly uplifting note.
Before Diana learns the truth, that Stephen was never untrue to her, and
before he returns the diamond, he offers her companionship and financial
security as his wife. ‘I say this only because it means you could
have room for your Arabians—you could have half the Curragh of Kildare—you
could have a great stretch of English downland.’
‘Stephen, you know what I said
to Jagiello: I will not put myself in
any man’s power. But if ever I were to
live with a man as his wife, it would be with you: there is no one else at all.’ Stephen’s
intention, despite Diana’s rejection, is to go up in a hot air balloon with
her, but he unintentionally takes an almost fatal dose of laudanum, faints,
falls down a set of stairs, breaks a leg, stabs himself, and is wild and raving
for days (!). Diana nurses him back to
health (talk about hurt/comfort!) and decides to accompany him back to England
and stay with her cousin Sophie while Stephen voyages to South America
(!). ‘What
a sad mercenary creature I am—I find my heart is quite thumping with
happiness. I was quite pleased to have
my husband back, but to find him covered with gold from head to foot as well
fairly throws me into transports. How
vulgar.’ And thus we are left to
wait for the next book, with Mrs Maturin being conveyed to Dr Maturin’s cabin
aboard HMS Surprise. It’s unlikely this happiness will last,
but I thought the last sixth of the book was fantastic; well-worth the read.
The Witches – Peter Curtis
I was surprised how nail-biting and compelling I found this
novel, originally from 1960 and made into the Hammer Horror film (which I’ve
never seen). I really appreciated Miss
Mayfield as the heroine; much to everyone’s surprise, she had sussed the
problem in the village of Walwyck in East Anglia by about 40 pages in, yet the
book was about what she did with that knowledge. It was definitely scary. It was refreshing to
find a character like Miss Mayfield, and I feel like Norah Lofts (the real
identity of the author) was able to make a much more convincing job of rural
Satan-worship than any 1970s hysterical treatment (which were invariably written
by men).
Count Magnus and Other Ghost Stories – M.R. James
I
have to say, I wished I had read this collection first, as all the best stories
were here. I became more aware of James’
potential misogyny but also, conversely, of his sense of humor. I got to see a bit more range from James (not
just the prototypical, albeit disturbing, spook epitomized in the rather
disappointing “Oh, Whistle and I’ll Come to You, My Lad”).
Antique Dust – Robert Westall
Westall’s first adult ghost story collection, it includes such
gems as “The Devil and Clocky Watson,” “The Doll,” and the ones I’d previously
read, “The Last Day of Miss Dorinda Molyneaux,” and “The Woolworth Spectacles.”
Ghosts: A Haunted History – Lisa Morton
I picked this up because I enjoyed her (award-winning) history
of Halloween. While I learned quite a
lot from the section on Asian ghosts, much of this felt lightweight. It’s hovering between “popular” and “academic,”
and I would have liked a bit more academic.
Raising the Dead – Andy Dougan
I wasn’t sure about the level of historical accuracy of this
book at first, but I quickly grew to admire the level of detail characterizing
this precise and circumscribed book. It
tells the story of a single incident in Glasgow in 1816, the electrification of
the corpse of a hanged criminal, and how this event was linked both to Mary
Shelley’s Frankenstein and the whole
history of galvanism. As this was the
perfect reference for my novel, I eagerly picked it up, not expecting to find
it quite so readable nor so interesting.
Why Was the Partridge in the Pear Tree? The History of Christmas Carols – Rev. Mark Lawson-Jones
I was initially skeptical as I wasn’t sure what more I could
learn about the origins of familiar Christmas carols. However, I was wrong— this well-written and
interesting little book refined and expanded my existing knowledge,
particularly regarding the 17th and 18th centuries.
The Story of the Other Wise Man – Henry Van Dyke
This very short book is told in vignettes, which is rather
frustrating at times. Yet each vignette
is extremely well-written, and in such a story, it does feel like brevity
really helps its effectiveness.
Batgirl: Volume 1: Batgirl of Burnside—by Cameron Stewart and Brenden Fletcher—art by Babs Tarr (issues #35-40)
I kept forgetting this was written in 2014, as it seemed more
relevant than ever. I don’t know how
much I like the reinvention of Barbara Gordon as a slummin’ it college student
who is seduced by fame and surprisingly immature at times (and has apparently
recovered from being attacked by the Joker, negating all the previous storyline
of Oracle; heck, it’s the New 52, isn’t it?).
Whether I like her or not is a bit of a moot point, because the writing
here feels very fresh and real, at least as en pointe as Sherlock (and less annoying by far). Barbara is a computer genius (retaining that
much of Oracle, I suppose) working on her Masters thesis while spending way too
much time fighting crime and doing the things her peers do (going to
nightclubs, vegging out with coffee, not-quite-sleeping-around). She also seems to have a cousin named Dinah
(who I think is Black Canary?), and they fight frequently. The storylines are clever, and the art is
impressive. I feel the volume is highly
enriched by Babs Tarr having worked on it.
Is Barbara sustainable in this mode?
I don’t know, but it was fun while it lasted.
Fiction – 12/51
24%
Nonfiction – 29/51
57%
Poetry – 6/51
12%
Plays – 2/51
4%
Graphic Novels 1/51 2%
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