Book Review: Pride And Prejudice by Jane Austen

Women, in Austen's world, are restricted beings, and a large measure of the conflict in the plot comes from the inability of Elizabeth and Jane, at times, to act on their own behalf, rather than through the intermediary of their mother or some man. But the aesthetic power of this is heavily offset by the other consequence of Austen's world: Elizabeth's inability to act makes her a sympathetic figure, true, but it also means that her actions must be--by virtue of her world's logic--largely inconsequential to the plot. It's difficult not to see Darcy as the superior partner in what is ostensibly a relationship between equals: Darcy acts on Elizabeth's behalf, true, in resolving some of the most serious subplots and complications, but what does Elizabeth do for herself? Why, she decides that Darcy isn't so bad after all, and she consents to marry him.

In order to resolve the plot, she decides to consent. Is this the kind of strong action we expect from a character who is virtually our narrator, whose viewpoint we come closest to sharing? There's something unsatisfying about Elizabeth's ultimately limited range of actions, and there's thus something that jars us with the benevolent, "all's-well-that-ends-well" tone of the conclusion. There's something unsatisfying at the very heart of Pride and Prejudice, a necessary irresolution to its central conflict.

And yet this irresolution raises deeper questions: should the failure of Elizabeth's final actions to satisfy really be laid at the feet of Elizabeth, or at her world? Yes, it would be nice to see Elizabeth rise up, take matters into her own hands, and prove her equality with Darcy via direct intervention in Darcy's masculine sphere. But, given the restriction of female influence that has driven most of the plot to this point, could we really believe in such a resolution?

Austen's primary virtue is her precision. Could we really ask her to be so imprecise in her ultimately grim portrayal of the world faced by eighteenth-century women? Is it really proper to offset the dark streak that runs through the conclusion of Pride and Prejudice--the incomplete satisfaction of our hopes, our expectations--with a happy ending that satisfies us on a plot level, but that ultimately obscures a darkness, a dissatisfaction present in Austen's reality itself?

This, beyond the simple charm of the prose, is perhaps the greatest proof the status of Pride and Prejudice as a classic. It can't be reduced to the charge of "romance novel," which has occasionally been levied against it. Austen's sense of truth feels obliged--or Austen's patriarchal world feels obliged--to shoot an happy ending quite subtly in the foot. Pride and Prejudice, in the imperfection of its conclusion, rises from the mechanics of a pleasant plot to the level of great art.

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Review: Inside the Whale by Jennie Rooney

A broadly comedic novel featuring two characters separated by fate (in this case the second world war), with a plethora of attendant eccentricities, quickly turns into a deeply affecting story of thwarted circumstances and belated wisdom. It is the summer of 1939. Stevie and Michael are lovers until Michael joins the Royal Signals, disappears to Africa and doesn't return. Fast forward half a century, and Stevie cannot mourn the recent death of her husband or reveal a lifetime's secret to her daughter and granddaughter. Meanwhile, Michael lies in a south London hospital. Unable to speak, he writes down his story for a sympathetic nursing assistant. Rooney confidently moves between two narrators and shifting times, vividly recreating Blitz-torn London and the Africa of the same period. This book is seriously GREAT!!!

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Review: When God was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman

Review:    
Why do good things happen to bad people? For some of us, this is one of life’s big questions, bigger perhaps than those all-stars: What makes Iago evil? How can a country justify firing both missiles and schoolteachers? The undeserved job promotion, the bequest without cause, the random assigning of accolades or attention: when unmerited rewards are doled out to others, some of us are capable of descending into decades of moping.

 

More reviews from the Book Review's Summer Reading special issue. Thus it’s refreshing to read a book that causes us to ask that question’s obverse — the more traditional, Why do bad things happen to good people? Such a book is Sarah Winman’s wonderful, darkly comic first novel, “When God Was a Rabbit.” Starting in England during the 1960s and ’70s, then moving on to New York before and after 9/11, the book is primarily the story of its English narrator and heroine, Elly, and in particular her intense and loving relationships with her brother, Joe, and her very strange best friend, Jenny Penny. The misfortunes heaped on all three are outsize and seemingly never-ending. Job, in comparison, may have gotten off easy. 

The troubles begin when Elly’s grandparents die in a bus crash, sending her mother into a long and deep depression. Then Elly learns that she was the result of an unplanned pregnancy and starts to ask a lot of questions about her creator. 

“If this God couldn’t love me,” she resolves, “then it was clear I’d need to find another one that could.” This new divine entity is encountered some time later, after she tells her brother that she’s been sexually abused by their neighbor, Mr. Golan. “I’ll get you a proper friend,” her brother declares, as he holds her “in the darkness, as defiant as granite.” The new friend Joe finds for his sister turns out to be a Belgian hare, a pet she names “God,” who sometimes talks to her. Although Joe swears never to reveal Elly’s dark secret about their neighbor, it turns out to be mere prelude to total eclipse: the mentally disturbed Mr. Golan (who has lied about being a Holocaust survivor) commits suicide. And we’re only up to Page 27, kids!
Remarkably, “When God Was a Rabbit” never feels melodramatic or unkind to its characters. Much of this has to do with Winman’s mastery of tone: the narration is dry-eyed but glinting. Of Jenny Penny and her vagabond mother’s home, Winman writes, “They lived in a temporary world . . . that could be broken up and reassembled as easily and as quickly as Lego. Fabric hung from most walls in staggered strips, and around the door frame was a pattern of flowered handprints in pinks and reds that in the dingy light looked like the bloodied hands of a crime scene searching for an exit.” 

Winman simultaneously captures the occasionally overwrought self-consciousness of childhood and gently satirizes it. Young Elly quotes Nietzsche at the family dinner table and auditions for the school Nativity play with a monologue about needing money for an abortion and gin. The proceedings are also leavened by the fact that the supporting characters fare much better than the children. Elly’s parents win a lot of money in the football pools, allowing the family to relocate to a huge house in Cornwall. Elly’s lesbian aunt, Nancy, meets with much approbation, both as a film actress and as the family’s unofficial guardian angel.
Though “When God Was a Rabbit” is studded with era-specific references like the Tet Offensive and the shooting of John Lennon, Winman is, with the exception of a 9/11 plotline late in the book, ultimately less interested in historical resonance than in developing complicated relationships between believable characters. This is the kind of book in which a husband, on learning that his sister has consummated a longtime crush on his wife by kissing her, responds: “At last! At least we’ve got that out of the way.” Such moments give the book the feel of real life, which may cause the reader to be caught unawares, as I was, by its heart-rending conclusion. 

Winman has an authorial tendency to pick at life’s proverbial scabs. But while her plot traffics heavily in grim incident, she maintains a winning proportion of whimsy throughout. At the very least, she’s created the most amusing and emotionally satisfying work of rabbit deism to come down the pike in a long time. I give it five carrots.

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Review: The Help

 Synopsis:

Three ordinary women are about to take one extraordinary step.

Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.

Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her seventeenth white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.

Minny, Aibileen's best friend, is short, fat, and perhaps the sassiest woman in Mississippi. She can cook like nobody's business, but she can't mind her tongue, so she's lost yet another job. Minny finally finds a position working for someone too new to town to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own.

Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.

In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women--mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends--view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't.

Review:

A new classic has been born. Kathryn Sockett's "The Help" will live in hearts and minds, be taught in schools, be cherished by readers. The three women who form its core, idealistic Skeeter, loving Aibileen, and sarcastic, sassy Minny, narrate their chapters each in a voice that is distinctive as Minny's caramel cake no one else in Jackson, Mississippi, can duplicate.

These stories of the black maids working for white women in the state of Mississippi of the 60s have an insiders' view of child-rearing, Junior League benefits, town gossip, and race relations.

Hilly is the town's white Queen Bee with an antebellum attitude towards race. She hopes to lead her minions into the latter part of the century with the "enlightened" view of making sure every home in Jackson, Mississippi, has a separate toilet for the help. Her crusade is, she says, based on clear hygienic criteria, which will save both blacks and whites from heinous diseases.

Despite the fact that the maids prepare the food, care for the children, and clean every part of every home, privy to every secret, many of the white women look at their black maids as an alien race. There are more enlightened views, especially those of Skeeter, a white, single woman with a college degree, who aspires to more than earning her MRS. Skeeter begins collecting the maids' stories. And the maids themselves find the issue of race humiliating, infuriating, life-controlling. Race sows bitter seeds in the dignity of women who feel they have no choices except to follow their mamas into the white women's kitchens and laundries. Aibilene says, "I just want things to be better for the kids." Their hopes lie in education and improvement, change someday for their children.

There is real danger for the maids sharing their stories as well as danger for Skeeter herself. The death of Medgar Evers touches the women deeply, making them question their work and a decision to forge ahead, hoping their book can be published anonymously and yet not recognized by the very white women they know to the last deviled egg and crack in a dining room table.

The relationships between the maids and the white children, the maids and some kind employers, including "white trash" Cecilia Foot, illuminate the strange history of the South. The love Aibileen shows for Mae Mobley matches the love Skeeter felt as a white child from her maid-nanny Constantine. 

This is the best book I have read in years. But I would have liked to have seen characters that were a bit more multi-dimensional. The maids depicted here were for the most part without failing, their white female employers almost universally despicable. As a male reader, I couldn't help but notice that the few men depicted were pretty miserable people, from the stereotypical wife-beating husband of Minny to the mostly one-dimensional husbands. The one standout was the senator, who was an entertaining character that leapt off the pages and added some variety.

Then again it is compulsively readable while teaching strong truths about the way the United States evolved from a shameful undercurrent of persistent racism to the hopes and dreams of Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks. Ultimately, will the next generations children learn (and be taught) that skin color is nothing more than a wrapping for the person who lives within? 

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Review: The Sky Is Everywhere

"One boy helps her remember . The other lets her forget."

Summary -

Seventeen-year-old Lennie Walker, bookworm and band geek, plays second clarinet and spends her time tucked safely and happily in the shadow of her fiery older sister, Bailey.

But when Bailey dies abruptly, Lennie is catapulted to center stage of her own life—and, despite her nonexistent history with boys, suddenly finds herself struggling to balance two. Toby was Bailey’s boyfriend; his grief mirrors Lennie’s own. Joe is the new boy in town, a transplant from Paris whose nearly magical grin is matched only by his musical talent. For Lennie, they’re the sun and the moon; one boy takes her out of her sorrow, the other comforts her in it. But just like their celestial counterparts, they can’t collide without the whole wide world exploding.

Review - Nelson's debut novel is a largely introspective exploration of grief and how that affects your choices, actions and those around you. In the aftermath of her sister's death, Lennie starts living a different life - one without Bailey, one without colour and purpose. Lennie's existing rather than living letting her friends fall away, her music and even her relationship with her grandmother.

Death, grief, secrets and guilt are all strong themes throughout this novel which makes it an emotional read. That being said, the numbness that cloaks Lennie seems to permeate onto the reader at times. Nelson beautifully shows the movement of Lennie's feelings, memories and loss within poems that periodically appear but some are more effective than others.

The edge of the book comes in the relationship that forms between Lennie and Bailey's boyfriend, Toby. This pairing might come from left field for some readers as they had previously had very little relationship to speak of. In their united grief they find a connection, one that shows itself in an overtly physical way. Loss manifests itself in many ways and both characters have chosen to punish themselves while touching on the person they miss most. It's a complex idea, one strongly rooted in their ability to voice their emotions instead choosing to expend them physically. It's dark and hot and tinged with much sadness.

The light and shade of grief and all the emotions that colour it were truthfully conveyed throughout. The addition of Joe and his preoccupation with Lennie and their attraction for one another contrasts well with the primal connection she shares with Toby. The author has presented an emotional tug of war that Lennie can't voice or even choose, it just is. The boys are both layered and interesting without being "bad". They are distinct from one another and each offer her something different, immediate solace or the promise of forever. Both are flawed in that their previous relationships have strongly impacted their dealings with Lennie. It's an interesting conundrum - I do wish there had been further exploration of Toby's dilemma as it is by far the most complex of the three. There is no bad person in this triangle, only strong emotions, grief and compulsion.

Lennie is serious, contemplative and very aware of the beauty that exists around her in sight and sound. She is wallowing her grief and in some respects its the romantic in her that permits hers the missteps that she makes. She makes mistakes, she allows herself to make choices that would not have occurred before her sister's death. She's not a dynamic character but she possesses a soulfulness that you don't often read.

Nelson's language and depiction of grief is beautiful, thoughtful and at times complex. Lennie is a nuanced character who subtly and quietly navigated her loss. The language was slightly problematic at times as it felt forced when the majority of the wording was so effortless. Some of the transitions between Lennie's feelings, particularly the strength of her attraction versus that of her love could also have been smoother. Nelson's attempted something complex and subtle and she's largely been successful.

The Sky is Everywhere is an all encompassing study of grief, the strength of a sisterly bond, the power of attraction and love and ultimately the importance of being true to one's self. Jandy Nelson has debuted onto the YA stage with a sensitivity and sensuousness that conveys a multitude of feelings from grief to desire to love. An absorbing read.

I never liked any YA novel, but this was an exception. It's a must read for all.

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REVIEW: Sacred Hearts by Sarah Dunant

REVIEW

Sacred Hearts, author Sarah Dunant's latest, is an engrossing, fascinating story about cloistered nuns set in 16th century Italy in the fictional convent of Santa Caterina. Inside the walls of this world apart, a community of women works, prays and lives out its life. While many women heard the call of God and followed, many were placed without their consent, by families unable or unwilling to pay a marriage dowry in a time and place where women had no options apart from marriage.

As the novel opens, a young woman named Serafina has just arrived; gifted with a rare singing talent, and one of those confined against her will, she rails against what she believes to be imprisonment and pines for her lover, a music teacher. Serafina is ministered to by Suora Zuana, the convent's de facto doctor and a middle aged woman cloistered since the death of her father years ago. Zuana is charged with helping the young novice to adjust by Madonna Chiara, the powerful and skilled abbess, who has her own hands full with the political and religious turbulence of the counter-Reformation and a rival within the convent, her second-in-command Suora Umiliana.

What follows is an immensely satisfying novel, full of rich characters, suspense, intrigues and twists and turns. Dunant drew me in from page one and held my attention throughout; her style is nimble and graceful- readable and intelligent without being too dense or heavy. She paints a picture of a largely contented community of women, full of people who may not have chosen the veil but who have found a way to make a life within its limitations. Chiara is as skilled and wily as any politician and Dunant shows a place where the women are encouraged to use their natural gifts for the betterment of all, whether they be gifted singers, artists or diplomats. There is also mystery and mysticism, and somewhere, real faith on display as well. It's a book about religion- and about a particularly oppressive form of religion- that manages to critique it quietly, with respect for those who embrace it. Sacred Hearts is a beautifully written novel that captures what we fear- and was fascinates us- about a life we will never know, and a world that no longer exists.

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REVIEW: Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, by Winifred Watson

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Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, by Winifred Watson. Originally published 1938. This edition 2008 by Persephone Books.


I picked up Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day after seeing the movie of the same name. The movie was delightful- sunshine on the screen. The book is sunshine on the page.

Miss Pettigrew is the story of a poor single woman, Guenivere Pettigrew, in 1930s England who is having trouble finding work. She ends up, quite by accident, in the employ of one DelysiaLaFosse, a gorgeous, bubbly young actress who needs someone to keep her head on straight and her boyfriends at bay. As we watch her bumble her way through a thicket of romantic entanglements, we wonder, which man will Delysia end up with? Will Miss Pettigrew be cast out on to the streets? What will become of either woman?

First of all, if you've seen the movie and you want to read the book, be aware that there are some differences between the two. The filmmakers took license to create dramatic situations in the movie that don't exist in the book, and certain characters that barely merit a mention in the book are major players in the movie. The book also has some drug references absent from the film. But you'll recognize it nonetheless- the premise is the same, and Miss Pettigrew and Delysia, Delysia's dilemma, and the romantic entanglements, and the story's slapstick humor and pacing, remain the same.

The story is told hour by hour from Miss Pettigrew's point of view, and recited in a delicious, delightful period voice that captures the heady chaos of Delysia's and Miss Pettigrew's life. As the hours tick by, we see Miss Pettigrew change from a shy mouse who feels like an impostor and believes herself unworthy of love, to a more confident woman who just might be ready to change her life. Delysia learns that she deserves more too, and these transformations- and the sweet friendship between the two women- are what makes this Cinderella story so wonderful. Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day is a delight from start to finish. As I came to the end I actually teared up a little at Miss Pettigrew's happy ending. You will, too!

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REVIEW: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, 

by Sherman Alexie. Published 2007 

by Little, Brown and Company. 

 

Alexie's book is the story of a young boy known as Junior who's growing up on the Spokane Indian reservation. He's got some medical problems and he gets bullied a lot; his parents are unhappy; his older sister runs away. But he's got some things going for him, too- he's determined to get a good education and manages to get himself transferred to an all-white school off the reservation, where he excels at basketball and learns to believe in himself.

I loved this book. I loved it. I laughed and cried with his struggles, his victories and his defeats. Junior'sAlexie tackles some tough issues- racism, poverty, addiction, discouragement and the deep pessimism that comes when you feel like the whole world is against you. Things don't always go well for Junior and he doesn't always win but he does his best and he does well.

The Absolutely True Diary is a book I wish I could give to every kid I know and everyone who ever was a kid. It's brilliant and beautiful and wonderful. I loved Alexie's writing, which, although clearly enough for a teen audience, doesn't condescend or talk down and shows craft and skill enough for any adult to appreciate. Ellen Forney's comic-like illustrations, which pepper the story, are cute and sweet and darkly funny. I burned through it in about three days over the summer when I was home sick and can't think of a better way to spend time than reading this lovely gem of a book. dysfunctional family is every dysfunctional family, and his problems are the problems of every kid who ever felt like he didn't fit in or that nobody understood him (or her). He pushes his way through the pain of racism, defeatism and adolescence with a tenacity that was so affecting for being so real.

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Review: Stephen King's On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

The Bottom Line

Stephen King's On Writing provides insight into how a writer is formed and how one persists over time. King's ideas on craft and technique are astute and down-to-earth.

  

Pros

• Stephen King's approach to writing is down-to-earth and often funny.
• Highly readable with much useful advice on writing.
• King is passionate both about writing and about conveying what he has learned about it.

Cons

• There are better-written books on writing, but his insights are always worth reading.

Description

• One of the best, and most well-known, books on writing in recent years.
• Insightful and down-to-earth.
• Worthwhile for both beginning and professional writers.

Guide Review - Stephen King's On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

Though Stephen King may not be the all-time best writer out there, he is certainly one of the most prolific, and for that alone, this book warrants attention. The first section of the book is exactly what the subtitle leads one to expect: a memoir of one writer's life, from childhood experiences that shaped him as a writer to the experiences that hindered him in adulthood, in particular King's struggle with alcoholism.


Though King credits his prolificness to good health and a stable relationship, I imagine that his down-to-earth approach to writing also helps. This healthy attitude toward craft comes through in the second section of the book, which includes advice on everything from grammar to choosing an agent. My favorite bit of advice, and somewhat surprising considering his prodigious output, was,  

"Put your desk in the corner, and every time you sit down to write, remind yourself why it isn't in the middle of the room. Life isn't a support system for art. It's the other way around."

The toolbox metaphor that pervades this section further speaks to his humble approach to his calling.


It's obvious from reading On Writing that King loves to write and feels lucky to have done it for a living all of these years. This joyful approach to writing, and his real insights into craft more than make up for a sometimes-clunky writing style.


 You will find an even better review here by Mameve Medwed.

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Review of Oxford American Writer's Theasaurus

The Oxford American Writer's Thesaurus, billed as "the first thesaurus for writers, by writers," attempts to adapt and augment the standard dictionary-style thesaurus to better serve writers. Additions include excerpts from Garner's Modern American Usage, an overview of basic grammar, and lists of words, in spectrums and toolkits, to help you choose the best one.

Essays from Contemporary Writers

The biggest difference between the Writer's Thesaurus and others are the mini-essays on selected words written by eleven contributing authors, including David Foster Wallace, songwriter/musician Stephin Merritt, Francine Prose, and Zadie Smith. Whether or not these essays add value to the standard reference book will depend on the reader. Fans of the writers will be curious to read their take on certain words. Teachers and librarians, trying to persuade students to use books rather than the Internet, will recognize the value of having famous — even celebrity — writers on board. How better to seduce young people into using a reference book than by including indie musicians and trendy novelists?

Older versus Younger Thesaurus Users

However, for older writers, these essays will be interesting, but gratuitous. Most people only buy one thesaurus in their lifetimes; over the long run, pieces like these only take up valuable pages. While the Writer's Thesaurus has the same number of synonyms as the gold standard Roget's International, the entries are shorter and the price higher. (The Writer’s Thesaurus only comes in hardcover.) As for the usage notes, experienced writers will probably have picked up a usage book in the course of their educations. Young writers, on the other hand, might appreciate having everything between two covers. Given the current pressures on the book industry, these features are smart for marketing; whether or not they’re as valuable for the consumer is another matter.

Conclusion

If you don't own either a thesaurus or a usage book, or if you're a fan of one or more of the contributing authors, then the Writer's Thesaurus is a worthwhile investment. The entries for synonyms are as good as most thesauri, and you'll enjoy having everything in one place. For writers who seek the best thesaurus, don’t need a usage guide, and don’t mind veering from the standard dictionary format, the classic Roget's International will be more satisfying in the long run.

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Review of The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron

 When I picked up The Artist’s Way a year ago, I very much resembled the skeptics Julia Cameron describes in her opening chapter. And like them, I found that despite my cynicism, her technique worked, helping me unpack the life experiences that led to that particular moment of writer’s block and build new habits to overcome it. 

A recovering alcoholic, Cameron provides a 12-step program to help readers through a process of “creative recovery.” Readers study one chapter a week and then respond to questions such as “Time Travel: List three old enemies of your creative self-worth. . . . Your historic monsters are the building blocks of your core negative beliefs.” In addition, the 12-week course supplies readers with daily and weekly assignments — morning pages, artist dates, and exercises — that help them to develop creative habits.

 

This book is an absolute must for beginners.

(You can find the book  here)

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