It's been a while since I last updated the blog, and I've now been working in London for almost two months. For the first six or seven weeks, I was living at my aunt and uncle's house on the border of Kent, which was about an hour's commute every day. I forgot how long it takes to get around London, considering that everything is pretty close together - just getting onto the platform of a station is extra time I always forget to take into consideration. So, while I was living with my relatives, I didn't have an awful lot of time or energy in the evenings (or mornings, when I worked late shifts) to do much; I was just working, eating a ready-meal, and crashing, before repeating the same thing the next day.
Yet, I've found that because I'm happier, I haven't needed as much down-time as I usually do, and have filled most of my days off with my cousins or making trips into or across the city to visit friends and relations. I've now moved closer to my bookshop, and most importantly, got my books out onto the shelves; enough to keep me in reading material for the next couple of months, but not quite enough to really feel at home yet, as most of my books are still at my parents'. Now I've got a bit more space of my own, I feel like I can take my life off pause.
I met up with Laura and Bex a couple of weeks ago, in Leicester Square - and for once we did not go book-shopping, but went to a neat little pizza place called Mod, where all pizzas are a set price and you can add as many or as few extra toppings as you like. And as far as I am concerned, the more toppings (and cheese) the better! Bex also brought her best friend Rachelle, and Rachelle's boyfriend, and I invited my sister along too, whose plans for the evening had not quite got around to being organised. It's lovely to be living closer to people, even though I'm in the opposite corner of the city to most people I know, and I do miss my Isle of Wight friends.
I'm not going to be able to spend Christmas with my family this year (perils of working in retail) but one of my best friends from university has invited me to spend a few days with her and her mother. It's a chance to make new Christmas traditions, or just have a really nice one-off holiday. Change is not necessarily a bad things as it means making a new set of good memories.
I worked an additional shift at Gollanczfest this last weekend, which was a great experience. The Sunday event was a masterclass in how to get published, with many prominent writers of science fiction, fantasy and horror, such as Joe Hill, Ben Aaronovitch, Alistair Reynolds and Joanne Harris, as well as some names I've since added onto my watch list, such as Ed McDonald, Elizabeth May and Catriona Ward. (Have any of you read their work?) It's a great opportunity to work on events like these, or even go as a member of the audience; the flagship store in Central London hosts so many book events and signings, although which ones I can attend depend upon which shifts I'm working in my store. I also ran into one of my university classmates who I hadn't seen since graduation nearly ten years ago, although we've kept in touch through Facebook.
As the final book, not only of the trilogy of trilogies featuring FitzChivalry Farseer, but also the related Liveship and Rain Wilds chronicles, a lot depends on Assassin's Fate. The story follows Fitz and his friend the Fool, as they embark on a long mission of rescue and revenge, to put an end to an evil regime, and be the Catalyst for an explosive change to the world. But it is a mission with only the faintest outline of a plan. How can they possibly succeed?
A huge amount of Assassin's Fate is spent on the move, whether on foot or by ship, and there's only so much brooding and plotting a reader can stand. Fitz spends much of the middle third of the book aboard the Liveship Paragon, which was first introduced in Ship of Destiny, and his role as narrator bears witness to the final story of the liveships and their crew: Althea and Brashen, Boy-O, Kennitson, and Amber. Amusingly - for reasons you'll understand if you've read the previous books - Fitz does not like Amber, and this gives an additional layer of tension to his already tumultuous relationship with the Fool. With this tying-up of multiple story threads, Hobb makes the dreaded endless travelling pass with some fascinating developments in the liveships' stories. A lot of questions you might not have realised you were asking from the very start are answered, but for me, this section of the book held more of an intellectual interest than an emotional investment. I didn't like the Liveship books as much as the Fitz ones, and skipped them on the reread, although this book and the preceding one made me want to go back and fill in the gaps.
After having only a few chapters in Fool's Quest, the secondary narrator, Bee, is back in full force for Assassin's Fate. This storyline is hard-going in places, as Bee travels as the prisoner of incredibly unpleasant villains. There have been horrific villains in the previous books, of course; Prince Regal in The Farseer Trilogy and the Pale Woman in Tawny Man, but never before have we had to spend so much time in the company of completely irredeemable villains (unless you count Kennit in the Liveship books.) Certainly seeing them in action, we can judge that they must be stopped and deserve everything Fitz has in store for them, but that doesn't take away my distaste for revenge narratives that soured Fool's Quest for me. The climactic bloodbath is inevitable.
Yet, if the trilogy's main quest didn't quite work for me, the ultimate conclusion was very satisfying, and true to Fitz's character, both with his strengths and his imperfections. Hobb does not let him off the hook. He has always been reckless, stubborn, and not a great father (although a loving one.) Fitz and the Fool's story ends as it has always been; fraught with folly, misunderstanding, miscommunication and frustration, but ultimately shaped by intense loyalty and love. The fate of the Assassin and Fool is a bittersweet one; messy, sad and painful, but beautiful nonetheless; a fitting finale to an excellent saga.
It's been a while since I've written a personal update post on the blog, but this week I've got some exciting news.
I'M MOVING TO LONDON!!!
It's been almost exactly a decade since I moved back to the Isle of Wight after university, and although it is a beautiful place to go to in the summer, it doesn't offer many career opportunities, and can be quite isolating when you have to travel for an hour, bus and ferry, before you can even catch the train anywhere (and let's not mention the cost of the ferries!) I planned to be back for maybe a year or two, but life had other ideas and somehow I found myself still here ten years later.
But that's all about to change. I've been offered a job at a branch of one of London's great bookshops, in a shopping centre in the East End. I start a week tomorrow, and the contract continues into the new year. Time will tell whether this will lead to a permanent position with the company, if I make a good enough impression; otherwise, it's a good name to have on my CV.
This week is going to be a busy one, as I sort out my room at my parents' house and decide what needs to come up with me in the short term and longer term. Initially, I will be staying with my aunt and uncle, but hope to be able to find a room or flat share before my birthday next month. I'm thrilled, but also can't quite believe it's true. It's taken months of job applications, and then this offer came out of the blue. I'm a little afraid that somehow it'll all fall through, and a little nervous about moving to a part of London I don't know. But now it's time to start a new chapter of my life. BRING IT ON!
Fool's Assassin was a leisurely, bittersweet and foreboding but mostly cosy exploration of Fitz's new home and life, up until the last few chapters, during which Robin Hobb struck with a two-pronged emotional attack. Fool's Quest picks up just where the previous book left off, at least from one of the plotlines. But it is a while before primary narrator Fitz is even aware of the events that have befallen the other narrator. The tension is high because of the reader's awareness of the anguish in store for Fitz. Hobb has never been kind to her characters; Fitz and the Fool have been through a ridiculous amount of suffering through the course of three trilogies, but now Fitz finds himself caught between the only two people who could come near to testing his loyalty to the other.
After nearly the entire length of a book waiting for Fitz and the Fool's reunion, Hobb reminds us of the old cliche, be careful what you wish for. For the Fool has changed. It is devastating to see this beloved character broken by his experiences in his years apart from Fitz. The Fool is alternately pitiful and aggravating, and trauma has emphasised his worst traits. He has always been stubborn, when it comes to his sense of his role in a higher purpose, but now, he comes across as hard-headed, manipulative, self-absorbed. It's forgivable, given his desperate circumstances, and a natural evolution of the character of the previous books, but still hard to read without wanting to shake some sense into him. And yet, through it all, Fitz and the Fool's relationship is what gives the book its heart. It's far from being the only important relationship; Robin Hobb's strength is that her characters have multi-faceted lives, and despite his quiet existence, Fitz has built up a lifetime's worth of close friends and family, all of whom come together to make him who he is. But there is no love like that between Fitz and the Fool, and Hobb gradually reveals just how powerful that love is.
Amid the frustration with certain characters, and the anxiety for those whose fates are unknown, there are a few moments of joy. Hobb finally presents Fitz with a moment of triumph that has been withheld from him since the beginning of his tale - just so he can be fall the furthest from his highest peak to his greatest despair. And when that happens, watch out world! FitzChivalry Farseer is on the loose, and he is furious!
Fitz has been many people over the course of the series: stable-boy, assassin in the shadows, royal page-boy, outcast, wolf's companion, soldier, husband. Respectability, however, has never come easily to him. He has always had a wild streak, and at this point in his life, when he is expected to be on his politest behaviour, his wildness breaks out like never before. And it is terrifying to behold.
Fool's Quest is relentless, the darkest book of the series so far. In a series starting with Assassin's Apprentice, you can expect dubious morality, grey areas, but really, assassinations were never the focus of any of the stories. And when they were, there was a strict code of professionalism (if that makes it any more palatable.) There was violence, there were battles, there was self-defence or defence of the realm or mercy-killings. But Fool's Quest is the start of a revenge narrative, and that doesn't sit well with me. From early on, Fitz was taught that his job was political, not personal, but now he's thrown all that to the winds. And worst of all, I can feel the narrative nudging me to cheer him on as he sets off on his murderous rampage, because they deserve it. It is an uneasy situation to find oneself in.Still, Hobb has taken us thus far, and I trust her storytelling enough to be sure that the final volume, Assassin's Fate, will be much more than an epic bloodbath. It'll be messy. It'll be morally complex. Fitz will make some terrible decisions. There will be dragons, and there will be tears.
Note: you really need to have read The Farseer and Tawny Man trilogies to get the full appreciation of this one.
Review contains minor spoilers for previous books.
Many years have passed since the events of the Tawny Man trilogy. FitzChivalry Farseer has left behind his former existence, and settled down to a happy family life in the country, living as Holder Tom Badgerlock of the Withywoods Estate. But Withywoods is not the sanctuary Fitz had come to believe. Strange and dangerous things are afoot in the world, even infiltrating Fitz's own home. So often, the trail seems to lead back to the Fool, who Fitz has not seen since they parted at the end of Fool's Fate, but whose absence is a constant weight on his mind. Why has the Fool kept his* distance for so long? And what can he want with Fitz now?
After the intrigue, action, might and magic of the previous books, Fool's Assassin has a much more domestic feel to it than Robin Hobb's readers may be used to. The plot is slow-burn, taking place over a decade or more, slowly building up a thorough picture of a quiet life in the country. Fitz still visits his friends and family at Buckkeep castle, but he is no longer a part of the political wrangling. His concerns are of his family and home; his ageing wife, his youngest child, the household staff and difficult guests. Most of the book is setting up events for the action to come: Hobb builds an entire new world for Fitz, with just enough hints from the outside world and his retrospective narration to fill the reader with terror for when everything comes crashing down. It's only a matter of time.
A new point-of-view character is introduced, who allows us to see the same story from different perspectives, and to show us Fitz as others see him. This was less jarring than I'd expected after six books with only one narrative voice; I wasn't instantly sold on the new character, as at first I found them a little too precocious to be true, but they soon won me over. I enjoyed the alternating chapters, and the new voice brought a freshness to the book while fitting in as though they had always been there. Despite lacking much action for the majority of the book, Fool's Assassin is every bit as engrossing as the previous titles, and has forced me to put the rest of my to-read pile on hold until I find a way to extricate myself from this series.
The book's title, Fool's Assassin, brings together the title patterns of the previous two series, and begs the question, why would the Fool require an assassin? It is so out of character for someone who despite all the chaos and devastation he's caused and endured, is at heart a gentle soul. And we don't even meet the Fool in person until about the last tenth of the book, although he has been at the heart of most of the disturbances that have come into Fitz's life. When he does show up, everything goes terribly, horribly wrong. The longed-for reunion is devastating; one reckless action has far-reaching consequences, and the volume closes on a cliffhanger that made me very grateful that I had waited until the whole trilogy had been published before losing myself in Hobb's world again.
* I use the male pronouns to describe the Fool here, as although the character's gender is ambiguous, he presents as male in the Fitz-narrated books.
It can be a risky thing to return to a book series you loved a decade ago. Time and distance can change your perspective; sometimes it can give you an added appreciation for things you didn't spot before, but also there is the danger of disappointment, disillusionment. I was a different person ten years ago, when I first discovered Robin Hobb's fantasy epic, beginning with Assassin's Apprentice. It was my "last summer" between finishing university and taking the first steps into the wider world. I found the Farseer Trilogy in the Kingston borough libraries, and was instantly captured by the narrator's voice. From the first page, I could envision the writer, a world-weary scribe in an untidy stone room, scratching his memoirs onto parchment by flickering torch- or lamplight. That summer, I was swept away into a land of political intrigue and half-comprehended magic in a diminished world whose glory days have faded into shadowy myth. And during the weeks while I was engrossed in Hobb's universe, I discovered that by coincidence, three of my friends were at a similar point in the series. We would meet up as an informal bookclub, with cheese and wine on the seafront, and exchange thoughts, theories and hints about what we had read and what was to come. I raced through those books that summer, not only the Farseer chronicles, but the Liveship Traders and Tawny Man set in the same universe. With the publication of a new trilogy, Fitz and the Fool, I returned to the Realm of the Elderlings to refresh my memory of the story so far. It's been a while since I was really into the sword-and-sorcery genre (Terry Pratchett excepted, if he counts) and now science fiction is more my cup of tea. But I was fond of Hobb's characters, and want to see how their tale concludes.
FitzChivalry Farseer is a royal embarrassment. The illegitimate only child of the heir to the Six Duchies throne, he spends his youth hidden and despised, working variously in the castle stables, as page to his father's widow, and learning the arts of the royal apprentice, the shadowy figure Chade. In his lowly position in the royal household, Fitz sees everything, and there is a lot to see, for it is a turbulent time for the Six Duchies. The country is under siege from outside forces, and threatened by treachery from within. The only hope seems to lie in a desperate quest to dangerous territories. But what has this to do with Fitz? And what is the meaning of the cryptic prophecies by the King's Fool?
Superficially, The Farseer Trilogy, and its sequels, is cut from the same cloth as many other fantasy novels, its setting resembling a medieval society, with kings and queens, tradesmen and peasants, with taverns aplenty. Fantastical elements are quite light on the ground. Magic, called "The Skill" is a trait that runs through the bloodline of the Farseers, the ruling family, but its rules and workings are mostly forgotten, passed on by word of mouth and preserved in scraps of scrolls buried deep in the archives. The Skill is a mixed blessing, powerful but addictive to its user and potentially deadly. There are also other, earthier magics, most notably "The Wit" - the ability to bond with an animal companion, a privilege granted to few and viewed with hostility. Fitz is gifted - or cursed - with both Wit and Skill.
The series is fairly slow-paced, taking time to introduce the reader to a rounded cast of characters: Burrich, the stablemaster tasked with Fitz's upbringing and training, Chade, the cantankerous, scarred spy and assassin. The aging King Shrewd, noble Prince Verity and cruel, foppish Prince Regal. Patience and Lacey, Molly Chandler, Nighteyes the wolf, and the Fool. Oh, the Fool! That character stole my heart from his very first appearance. The Fool is an enigma, a character of many contradictory identities, each of which are completely real. Frivolous and melancholic, gender-fluid, stoic and vulnerable, brave and so afraid, all these elements come together to create one of the most exasperating but beloved characters of fantasy fiction.Whenever the Fool arrives on the scene, Fitz must prepare for his life to be turned upside-down. Their relationship grows from youthful antagonism, to friendship, to a love story - whether you call it bromance or romance - that is the heart of the entire saga.
The Farseer Trilogy is followed chronologically by The Liveship Traders, but it takes place in another part of the world, with an entirely new cast - entirely new, but for one character whose familiar identity is revealed gradually. Although I enjoyed that trilogy well enough on my first reading, I decided to skip it on the rereads, as I didn't feel a strong connection to the characters, setting or plot. However, it does give extra background to the events of TheTawny Man, which pick up Fitz's story, fifteen years later. The Farseer Trilogy and Tawny Man series (and Liveships if you're reading them) are worth savouring and taking time over - and then, when things start to go wrong, you feel the full impact on the characters and the wider world. Robin Hobb makes you fall in love with the characters and then whack you in the emotions, because when things go wrong, putting them right comes at a great cost. Yet Hobb keeps the story from growing too bleak with a light touch of humour, characters who are good company, and a world woven of wonder. Happiness is hard-won, and tempered with sorrow and suffering, so when contentment comes, it is all the sweeter.
However, a new trilogy awaits, and even as I can't wait to reunite myself with Fitz and the Fool, I fear for what else Hobb has in store for them.
Complete saga. Titles in bold are the Fitz/Fool books, which I'm reading this time around.
I've been reluctant to admit it, but the last few years my
interest in Doctor Who has started to wane. I can trace the decline in fanaticism to the first mid-season
break in season six. The series had its most ambitious, complex
narrative arc to date, but splitting the season in half stalled the
momentum, and giving us just a few episodes at a time for two or
three years did not give me the chance to really become invested.
There came a change in companion, then in Doctor. I did not warm to
Clara at all; she was primarily a mystery to be solved, and her
characterisation followed the narrative's requirements instead of
shaping the plot.
I've rewatched the first five and a half seasons enough times that
it probably wouldn't be too hard to give you a rundown of the
episodes, but after that first mid-season cliffhanger, everything
starts to blur together in my memory, and only the odd episodes,
characters and ideas stand out: the War Doctor, Missy, the immortal
girl-woman Ashildir, and the chilling puzzle-box episode
"Heaven-Sent." There was
still some great material, but it just did not come together as it
might.
Season ten is a return to form. With a new companion comes a fresh
start, and Bill's first episode was the closest thing to an
introduction to the series since Matt Smith's first episode. The
danger with telling the story of a man who goes here and there
throughout all of space and time is that the narrative risks being
untethered. This year, the writers introduced a simple yet radical
new element into the mix: stability. The Doctor has a profession, a
purpose, for the first time since his brief stint living as John
Smith. Ostensibly, he works as a university professor, and this
shapes his relationship with his newest companion into that of
teacher and student. Bill Potts is a breath of fresh air into the
series: being the first openly gay companion (although there has been
some bisexual representation in Jack Harkness, River Song, and
probably Clara Oswald) means that there are none of the messy
romantic feelings that have crept across the edges of
Doctor-companion relations since the 1995 film. Bill catches the
Doctor's eye because of her curiosity. "Most people, when they
don't understand something, they frown," he tells her. "You
smile." That line gives us a better understanding of Bill than
the show gave us of Clara in three years. I loved Bill instantly; she
is bright, curious, good-humoured and big-hearted - and a big old
nerd. She brings her savviness of science fiction into the very
science-fictional world she inhabits, and she wants to know
everything. Who better to learn from than a tutor whose expertise
spans all of time and space?
But The Doctor's real reason for the change in lifestyle, the real
reason he has settled down to academic domesticity, is what's at the
heart of this series, for he has sworn an oath to guard a locked
vault for a thousand years. The Doctor goes on his adventures, as
ever, but always he comes back to guard the vault, assisted by his
assistant Nardole. A lesser series would have dragged out the mystery
of what, or who, is in the vault until the finale. The story would
stand or fall by the surprise factor - and if Doctor Who had
done that this year, it would have fallen, as the mystery was easily
deduced by the knowledge of which guest stars were returning.
Instead, it was a story all about the characters. I don't think it's
a great strength to say that it was a love story of sorts, a story of
hope, loyalty, and redemption.
It's a shame that Doctor
Who only returned to its former
glories in Peter Capaldi's - and head writer Stephen Moffat's - final
year with the series, but it's best to end the era on a high. The
reason Doctor Who has kept going all this time is because it is not
afraid of change; there is no more sure way of killing a TV show than
to keep trying to satisfy the audience's desire for more of the same.
Capaldi has one more episode, the Christmas special, and next year we
can expect another fresh start with Chris Chibnall in charge of the
writing and Jodie Whittaker playing the Doctor. I don't know much
about either of these names, but they have worked together on
Broadchurch, whose first and third series seem to have done very
well, and I'm excited to see what they can do given the keys to the
Tardis. There are limitless possibilities; my wish is for the
Thirteenth Doctor to travel with more than one companion, in a
practical outfit, with pockets aplenty!
Here I am, right on schedule to pronounce my judgement on the latest Anne of Green Gables adaptation, Netflix's Anne With An E. In the last two or three years I've been rather pleased by the abundance of different versions of Anne Shirley, what with last year's TV movie starring Ella Ballentine, and the two webseries, Green Gables Fables and Project Green Gables. But how does Anne With An E measure up to the rest?
The Ella Ballentine adaptation attempted to hint at a darker side to the familiar story, but it is a half-hearted effort, with little more than a few flashbacks to Anne's unhappy pre-Green-Gables life to add shadow. Ballentine is sweet and likeable, but her delivery of Anne's peculiar speeches feels calculated for effect; her "depths of despair" are melodramatic but quickly shrugged off. It sticks to the story, but on a surface level; it is the child's Anne. What makes Lucy Maud Montgomery's story stand out from her contemporaries like Pollyanna and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm is her deft weaving of light and shadow; the light touch of sorrow makes the joy all the more rewarding. And so, it is not necessarily a bad thing that Anne With An E does explore more darkness than we are used to, mostly in examining how a childhood of neglect, drudgery and loneliness would form a character like Anne, with a second level exploring the attitudes of cliquey, small-town people towards an unknown orphan. There is some room to readjust the balance between darkness and light in this story, but it is a delicate process, to be handled with care, if Anne is not to skew too far either way.
Anne With An E starts off with a superb pilot episode, sticking faithfully to the first fourteen chapters of the book, at least up to the last few minutes. Amy Beth McNulty is a wonderfully lovable and believable Anne - and unlike every other version where her plainness is in name only, her Anne is "terrible skinny and homely," all eyes and teeth and elbows. Her non-stop chatter is humorous and heartfelt, with an underlying desperation to please and to be loved. She is a more traumatised Anne than we've seen before, which does not take away from her endearing Anne qualities, but rather gives them more depth. Her imagination has helped her to survive.
There is a solid supporting cast, especially R.H. Thomson and Geraldine James as Matthew and
Marilla Cuthbert. Marilla in particular is a "Spock" sort of character: it requires great subtlety to correctly convey the amount of emotion that goes on behind the repressed, stern facade, and James plays the part admirably. However, as in several of the other adaptations, it really bothers me that Anne's initial stay at Green Gables is dependent on her good behaviour; it does not sit well with me that Marilla would hold the threat of banishment over Anne like a weapon. Diana is a sweet girl and a devoted friend, without being Anne's shadow, and the series gives a different perspective towards her and her family; there is a noticeable difference in class between the Barrys and the Cuthberts. We also get to see a bit more of Aunt Josephine, and I enjoyed seeing a new side to this cantankerous old lady with a heart of gold. Gilbert Blythe passed the test; the popular boy in class, who is used to getting the girls' attention, mischievous but with a goodness and maturity that hints at the man he will become. Not that there's any room for the lovey-dovey stuff so early in the story, although Anne already doth protest too much.
I am open to different interpretations of Anne; I welcome them. I return to the story again and again because I get something new out of it every time I read it or watch an adaptation; if it was the same experience every time, I don't think it would be alive the way that it is. So I am not going to declare the story "ruined forever!" because another person reads it differently. Some of the scenes shown in Anne With An E did not work for me, but they gave me something to think about. I did not like Anne's frank speculations with her classmates about her teacher's relationship with Prissy Andrews - it seemed more Mary Vance from Rainbow Valley, a character who I view as the antithesis of Anne. And yet there was an innocence even in her scandalous breaking of taboos that she's not even aware of, that makes the scene make sense from another angle. The same could not be said about her lying about skipping school, when the show earlier worked so hard to establish Anne's honesty.
The faithfulness towards book details and historical setting varied wildly. The team worked hard at ensuring the right sorts of potatoes were used, and that Anne's schoolbook was correct, for example, and then might utterly blow it with something utterly anachronistic; a line of dialogue, the use of pinky-fingers in Anne and Diana's oath of friendship, and a progressive mother's group being so progressive that they use the words "feminism" and "suffragette" about twenty years before their first recorded use (if Anne With An E is set in 1876 like the book; the last two adaptations were brought forward to the turn of the century.) And it felt all wrong to show characters such as Mrs Andrews and Mr and Mrs Barry - the Cuthberts' nearest neighbours! - introducing themselves for the first time, when the defining characteristic of the Avonlea setting is that it is a small rural community where everyone knows everything about everyone else's business!
The publicity for Anne With An E, back when it was just called Anne, made a big point about introducing new themes of feminism and being true to yourself - except they are themes that have been in the text all along. Lucy Maud Montgomery was a remarkable woman for her time, very unusual to have a university education and an independent career, and throughout the books Anne defies society expectations with a similar determination. The addition of the minister telling Anne that she needs to learn to be a good wife, or the boys shouting at the girls to get back in the kitchen, felt like a heavy-handed imposition on the storytelling.
After the first episode, the plot takes ever-increasing detours away from the source material. I'm the person who takes note of every digression of the 1985 Megan Follows miniseries/film from the book; it (the first story, anyway) is so faithful there is only minutiae to criticise. I'm less of a purist than I used to be; I went into Anne With An E allowing for a lot of wiggle-room in the treatment of the story. It is an episodic book, so new episodes can be slotted in alongside the familiar ones, giving Anne new adventures without derailing the entire story. I didn't sit there saying "NO, IT DIDN'T HAPPEN LIKE THAT!" but considered each alteration under the question "could it have happened like that?" Sometimes yes, the changes fitted, and other times they did not. Some plot elements, although they did vary from the book, could have been written in collaboration with L.M. Montgomery herself, albeit the older, sadder Maud who wrote Rilla of Ingleside and The Blythes Are Quotes, the Maud revealed in her diaries. Other aspects felt heavily influenced by the Brontes, Dickens and Hardy. The narrative wanders off the path, then comes back for such key moments as the cracked slate, the raspberry cordial and the puffed sleeve dress, usually framed in a new and more sombre context.
But with every step off the path, the plot gets further away from what is recognisably Anne, and I'm sorry to have to report that by the last episode, the series is well and truly lost in the Haunted Woods. Although I had a high tolerance for the series taking liberties with the plotline and the tone, I nearly switched off halfway through the final episode, watching one particular scene with absolute horror and fury. Unforgiveable is a strong word, and at the end of the day, even Anne of Green Gables is only a story, but one character's decision, and one newly-introduced plotline for a cliffhanger, felt like a violation of something precious. By the end, the dynamic of the story has changed, and I'm not sure how Anne With An E can find its way back to the sanctuary of Green Gables.
Beauty and the Beast has always had a special place in my heart, since I was a little girl. Maybe it's the recognition of a heroine just as much of a dreamer and a bookworm as myself, perhaps it's the songs, the snappy dialogue, the humour. I'm pretty sure a lot of it comes from memories of my younger sister singing the opening number "Belle" and about Gaston's worrying egg habits, with great energy and glee. Whatever the reasons, I love that film, and so when I found out there would be a live-action adaptation, my wariness of remakes instantly became a thing of the past.
I didn't quite count on just how much I was going to love the new film, though. I don't consider myself a particularly romantic person, especially when it comes to fairy tales and Disney Princesses. I knew I would enjoy the film - how could I not? I was not counting on how happy Beauty and the Beast would make me. Quite aside from the nostalgia factor came the joy of seeing a fresh take on an old favourite, adding new depth and colour to the familiar tale. I fear the new - and the old - Beauty and the Beast will become my latest obsession; I could quite happily move into the cinema for the next month or so, just to keep watching that movie.
1. It will come as no surprise to anyone that the bookish Belle was always my favourite Disney character. Emma Watson's portrayal plays up not only her academic intelligence, but also her practical, down-to-earth nature and her stubborn independence. She sounds like a believable person, not an actress or a fluttery princess. (although that might be bias on my part, having a similar accent.) I particularly appreciated her scenes with Gaston, when she turns down his advances with no excuses, no flattery, but a simple "no." Bravo, that girl!
2. Also, who knew Emma Watson could sing? And I don't just mean she has a pretty voice. She knows how to use it - and I think it's actually quite rare to hear such clean, clear diction, without a hint of warble or sliding from one note to another. (Actually, that goes for most of the performers, come to think of it.)
3. Many of the plot holes, continuity errors and flaws of logic that have puzzled me from the animated film are corrected in the update. Originally, we learn that the Prince was given until his twenty-first birthday to break the spell, but Lumiere sings "ten years we've been rusting..." - what kind of enchantress curses a bratty preteen like that? This time around, the time is kept vague. And then consider Belle's puzzling arrangement with the bookseller. How does he stay in business when the only reader in town treats his shop as a library? The new film sees Belle borrowing her books from the priest, Pere Robert, instead.
4. I'm aware this is maybe a controversial one - but I really appreciated LeFou's storyline. A lot of people were unhappy about the unfortunate implications of making the villain's buffoonish henchman Disney's first officially gay character, or felt that because he plays a pretty minor role it was a case of too little, too late, and fair enough. But I thought that after Belle and the the Beast, his was the most interesting subplot - yes, the slapstick sidekick gets a subplot of his own! LeFou is still a comic character - funnier, in fact, in his own right - but gets some wonderful character development in this version, as he gradually comes to realise the friend he adores is a dangerous man who will stop at nothing to get what he wants. LeFou's lines in "The Mob Song" gave me the shivers: "There's a beast running wild, there's no question/But I fear the wrong monster's released..."
5. The new film re-introduced some elements from the original fairy tale that were omitted from the animated tale, notably the rose that kicked off the whole plot. No, not the enchanted rose in the West Wing. The other rose. Also of note was the naming of Belle's village as Villeneuve - after Gabrielle Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, writer of the original "La Belle et la Bete."
6. I enjoyed the details that set Beauty and the Beast firmly in mid-eighteenth century France, complete with powdered wigs and make-up (even if the setting and dancing at the beginning made me think of nothing so much as the BBC's 2005 Casanova series.)
7. More was given over to the Beast's backstory; what made him the spoilt, selfish, loveless prince that he was, and why the household staff were punished (or, at least, felt as though they deserved to be punished) as well. He still doesn't get a name though.
8. There was an added element of poignancy for the enchanted servants, who stand to lose not only their chance of being human again if the Beast fails to break the spell, but also what little freedom they still retain, as they are becoming more and more like the objects whose forms they have taken.
9. Beauty and the Beast was always the most Musical with a capital M of all the Disney animations, with such glorious set pieces as "Be Our Guest" and ensemble numbers like "Belle," "Gaston" and "The Mob Song." Seeing the actors and sets brings home that this is more than just "the live-action version of a Disney film complete with songs. It is a musical - and there are a couple more epic ballads added to the film. I've been listening to the soundtrack on repeat since leaving the cinema yesterday.
10. Call me shallow, but I'm sure I'm not alone in finding the Prince Formerly Known As Beast a little disappointing once the spell is lifted and he is transformed. With Downton Abbey's Dan Stevens in the role, there is no such disappointment.
An anti-immigrant, fear-mongering demagogue runs for President of the United States
- and wins.It can't happen here. Right?
Written in the mid-1930s, Sinclair Lewis's It Can't Happen Here tells the fictional account of the rise of President Berzelius "Buzz" Windrip, an ignorant, small-town nobody who, by playing on the fears and insecurities of white working-class America and by dividing loyalties to his opposition, manages to worm his way into the White House. And once he's in, it is a matter of weeks before he reveals himself to be an apparently unstoppable dictator.
The land of the free becomes a state of terror. Within days, the President gives himself absolute power to enact whatever legislation he sees fit, no opposition allowed. He gives guns and a uniform to his most fervent supporters and sends them back to their communities as his defenders. The press is censored and any dissenters imprisoned under terrible conditions. It's written as a satire, and is clearly intended to be very shocking - and the violence of it is. (The rapid timescale - not so much. Not in 2017. Just look at how quick another president was to sign his Executive Orders in the week after his inauguration.)
Looking at the context of the time Lewis was writing, and once more you can draw parallels. Of course, this was written in response to Hitler's rise to power in Germany - and I'm quite sure that most ordinary Germans would have thought their country too civilised for anything like that to happen, just as much as Americans. In America, and around the world, this was the time of the Great Depression. It Can't Happen Here gives a little insight into why desperate people might consider democracy and freedom a fair exchange for a bit more money, better job security and a more comfortable lifestyle. More comfortable, that is, as long as you don't make a fuss.
All this is seen through the eyes of Doremus Jessup, an aging newspaper editor who lives in comfortable circumstances in the region formerly known as Vermont. He's a liberal-minded man, wary of Windrip from the start, and gradually is drawn into an underground resistance. But what is the best way to use his power in such circumstances? If he draws attention to himself, he'll be locked up or killed, and what use is that to anyone? But if he stays safe, he's just allowing the regime to be normalised. It's a fine line.
Lewis makes it quite clear that liberal complacency is just as much to blame as the ignorance and malice that actively brings a tyrant into power. By saying "Oh, it can't happen here," people don't bother doing anything to prevent it from happening. And by then, it's too late.
And so, It Can't Happen Here is as relevant a warning today as it was when it was written; we can already see some of our nations taking the steps towards towards a future like the one represented in the book. I'd say this is an extreme version, but it's that sort of complacency that enables such systems to take hold. It can't happen here? It's up to all of us to make sure it doesn't.
I'm not promising to do a monthly round-up every month, but as I've stopped keeping track of every single book I read, buy and borrow on the blog (because life is too short and who's going to scroll through that list except me?) and as I've actually had a really good bookish month after about three months of reading slump, I thought I'd give a quick summary of what fictional (and real) worlds I've been inhabiting lately.
So I left my job at the beginning of the month, which coincided with the re-readathon, two very excellent things to re-kindle my love of reading. Then on the 18th, was the second London Bookshop Crawl, which was a much bigger affair than last year's. Bex did a wonderful job of organising the day, and although it was a little crazy, it was a great time once more. It was good to catch up with Ellie W, Louise and Elena again, though they were in different groups; Laura was there with her tall boyfriend, and Hanna and Charlotte came down from Leeds (so I've now met all the members of our little circle.) I tried to be more restrained this year, but somehow, with loans, swaps and purchases, I still managed to bring ten books home at the end of the weekend.
I've been dabbling a bit in the Marvel comics universe, borrowing a selection from my sister's best friend: Civil War, Avengers Versus X-Men, and the very excellent 1602. I picked up the first issue of a new Avengers series, Occupy Avengers on the bookshop crawl, which followed on from some huge changes to the Marvel universe in Civil War 2, so of course I had to work backwards and borrow that one from the library to find out just what had been going on. It's all been happening in Marvel!
In February alone I read five 5-star books in quick succession (not that I usually remember to give star ratings, it's not that kind of blog.) 2 of which I have reviewed: the aforementioned 1602and The Book of Strange New Thingsby Michel Faber, Aliens, a non-fiction book edited by Jim Al-Khalili in which a load of very clever scientists hypothesise about whether there might be life on other planets, what it might be like, where it might live and if there are any circumstances under which we might discover each other. I've forgotten most of my GCSE chemistry and biology, but I half-understood most of it, and although, realistically, I'm quite sceptical about the existence of aliens (other than maybe bugs) it made a fascinating read (and very useful should I venture into writing hard science fiction.)
Then there was Terry Pratchett's The Last Hero, which I read as part of Bex's Discworldathon, one of only (I think) three Discworld books I'd never read before. I'd been putting it off for years, because I'm not a big fan of the wizards and Rincewind sub-series, and this one essentially follows after Interesting Times, the only book I've read by Pratchett that I actively disliked. So it was a pleasant surprise to enjoy it. It's a short novel with full-colour illustrations by Paul Kidby, and its story - an elderly band of barbarian heroes seeking revenge on the gods for allowing age, decay and death - had an added poignancy after Pratchett's own demise in 2015. Plus, there was the Discworld's own twist on space travel - rocket wizardry with dragons! - and of course Pratchett's inimitable wit and truth. I reached the end feeling quite bereft: only twice more will I read a Discworld book for the first time (though I am sure I will reread my favourites many, many times over, and I haven't touched his Long Earth series with Stephen Baxter.)
And I bought a comic anthology called Love is Love from Orbital, after not buying it on the Bookshop Crawl because I thought I'd find it elsewhere. It's a collaboration of short one- and two-page stories, poems and artwork written in honour of the victims of the Orlando massacre last year, and it was very powerful stuff. A very slim volume, but it took me a while to get through because each page was beautiful and devastating. I think it broke me a little bit.
I've just finished Juno Dawson's latest book for teenagers, Margot and Me, in which Fliss, a teenager from London moves to Wales to live with her stern grandmother Margot. Fliss finds Margot's diary from the Second World War, and comes to realise that her 15-year-old self in the 1990s, and 16-year-old Margot in the 1940s had a lot more in common than she initially realised. It's a powerful book, two stories in one, and in the 400 pages, Dawson deals with bullying, being a young carer, teen pregnancy, sexuality, romantic love and practical love, compassion, grief and loss. It could so easily be an "issues" book, but instead it is all about how messy life can be, with rounded and lovable characters, and an emotional heart. It is very different from her previous book, All of the Above, and yet Juno Dawson has a distinctive narrative style that stands out from similar books in the contemporary Young Adult scene.
All in all, I've had an outstanding reading month.What about you? Have you read any of these books? What did you think?
I'll confess it right away: most of my knowledge of the Marvel universe comes from the films, and general popular culture osmosis. I've been borrowing some of the comics recently, from the library and friends, but am well aware that I've barely scratched the surface. Even when I pick up a new series, there are so many other stories that have come before that point, and so many characters, that even though they work as stand-alones, and give the reader what information they need to know, I find myself working backwards to fill in the gaps of my knowledge.
1602 is a new story, a stand-alone graphic novel in eight issues. Set in England, at the end of Queen Elizabeth I's reign, it is peopled with some strangely familiar faces and names: the Queen's physician Doctor Stephen Strange, for example, and Sir Nicholas Fury, her head of intelligence, alongside his servant, a boy named Peter Parquagh. There are strange forces at work; storms and rumours of the end of days. Is it witchcraft? Could it be the work of Carlos Javier, master of a school for the sons of gentlemen, who are rumoured to be "witchbreed" with unnatural powers? Or does the source come from a young woman called Virginia Dare, returned from the colonies across the Atlantic with her quiet and huge "Indian" protector?
I wrote a post a year ago celebrating modern updates of classic stories, and the different ways to adapt the details in such a way as to emphasise the timelessness of the tale. In 1602, Gaiman does the same in reverse, cleverly using Elizabethan explanations and variations on the familiar characters and motifs. It was a lot of fun spotting the nods to the characters' more familiar incarnations, such as the teasing of Peter Parquagh's connection to spiders, and the blind and unmusical Irish minstrel Matthew Murdoch, with his song about "The Four from the (ship) Fantastick," the heroes of which become a part of the story itself; Carlos Javier, with his school for mutantur or "changing ones," including Scotius Somerisle and Master John Grey (whose true identity was never meant to be a secret.) Then, there is the Inquisitor, unnamed until late in the book, whose backstory is complex, conflicted and devastating. Other characters took their time for me to figure out their identity, whether through unfamiliarity or ignorance on my behalf, and the climactic revelation towards the end was so obvious retrospectively that I could have kicked myself. That twist was not, I feel, without its problems, and yet - as I so say time after time about Neil Gaiman's writing - it made so much sense on multiple levels, and left me gasping with the cleverness of it all.
1602 is a Marvel superhero tale, told as only Neil Gaiman would tell it; a glorious mixture of old and new. 20th century heroes and villains fit seamlessly alongside historical figures, obscure folklore and unsolved mysteries of the past. It is an extraordinary work of art that earns a high ranking in the canon of Marvel comics, and no doubt it will offer a deeper understanding on every reading.
Peter Leigh is a man with a mission - literally! For this mild-mannered Christian minister to be selected to cross the galaxy to preach to and live among an alien race, this is the opportunity of a lifetime. But Peter leaves behind his beloved wife, Beatrice, and while he's out living the dream, Bea is trapped in a nightmare. How can a marriage survive such a distance?
In a literary culture saturated with dystopian futures, Oasis is aptly named as a seeming Utopia. It takes Peter a while to adjust to its days that are three times as long as an earth day, the peculiar regularity of the rains, and the crops and creatures that grow on the planet. The people themselves are difficult for him to connect with, at first; the way they look is hard to picture, the way they speak impossible to translate onto the page, and some of their words and consonants are pictured in symbols the reader has no frame of reference for. I was reminded of last year's film Arrival, where the linguist has to try to communicate with an alien race without any way of translating their language.
But that doesn't really matter. The Oasans are reserved, but kind-hearted, open and eager to hear Peter's message, and the work he puts in to translating the Bible into language they can understand and words they can pronounce is truly a labour of love. They open their hearts and homes to Peter; building a church together and working at the harvest. Probably this is the easiest missionary work ever. It all seems too good to be true. For the pages and chapters where Peter is alone among the Oasans, there seemed to be no conflict at all. And as someone who has studied the craft of writing, this made me uneasy. You just can't have a story without conflict. When, and how, was it going to go wrong?
That question is answered when Peter gets back to the base and reads his messages from Bea. All is not well on Earth. Every message from home brings news of some great catastrophe, whether a natural disaster, economical collapse or political chaos. And it is this dissonance that is the emotional heart of the novel. Like Peter, at first, you can compartmentalise what is happening on Earth, and on Oasis. The events are shocking, but you only hear about them from Bea, and the story you see first-hand is Peter's. And then Peter goes back to the Oasans, and you can relax a while and just enjoy the headway he is making with getting to know these people. That's what feels real.
But you just can't put your spouse to one side like packing a toy away in a cupboard until the next time you want them. They have their own lives, and a relationship must become strained if both parties are living in different realities. Tensions grow between them, as back at home Bea is overwhelmed by personal tragedy, professional struggles, social unrest and religious doubt, all things that Peter can't be whole-heartedly part of. It is devastating to read their messages (conveyed by a primitive email system called The Shoot) as they try to reach out for each other. The Book of Strange New Things is powerful because of its authenticity. I don't know if Faber's writing was informed by any personal religious faith but Peter and Bea felt real, presented with compassion and with no impression of being seen from the outside. Both have overcome painful pasts to become a strong, supportive team at the heart of their community. Their love for each other quite literally spans the universe. And yet a love story does not end with the "happily ever after." The best relationships have their downs as well as their ups, and require a lot of work. Love is a choice, not just a feeling, and a choice that a couple has to make day after day after day. The Book of Strange New Things ends in one way just as you might hope, and yet there is a bittersweetness to the ending because it is not neat, it is not easy, and it is not over yet. But such is life. Faber has taken a gentle, quite simple tale and made of it an extraordinary examination of humanity, of what is worth living for, of faith, hope and love.
This week has been all about returning to books we've read before, whether it's the second time of reading, or the seventy-seventh. But is there a book from your past you'd like to read again, if only you could find a copy? Maybe it's out of print, or maybe it's half-forgotten but you can remember just enough details to make you want to return to that book if only you could identify it. Feel free to tell us what you can remember, and maybe your readers can help you track it down.
The first book was, I think, called Red, White and Blue, and I read it at the age of twelve or thirteen. It was narrated by a teenage boy called Gawain (his brother was Lance; his parents had a rather romantic streak, evidently) and the same story was told in three ways on three different coloured paper. White was a school project, red was his personal diary, and blue was his fantasy novel which drew heavily from his experiences. It charted his fraught relationship with his bullying older brother, coming to terms with his mother's new boyfriend - I seem to recall he was a writer named Richard Curtis, but surely not Four Weddings and a Funeral Richard Curtis. Even Goodreads isn't helping, as I guess it's a very common title.
I read the other book a couple of years later. Both came from the teenage section of the public library. Teen fiction wasn't such a huge market back in the early '00s, and the books were rather faded and dull-looking paperbacks for the most part, and padded out with books for younger readers, such as Karen McCombie's Ally's World and the Babysitters' Club. One book I checked out a few times was Annie on my Mind by Nancy Garden, the first book I read depicting a romance between two girls. I'd encountered a few gay side characters in fiction - usually a boy the female narrator had an unrequited crush on - but this was the first time they got to tell their own story. I don't suppose it would stand out now, when the YA market is so far ahead of mainstream adult fiction in LGBT* representation, but that faded green paperback was important when I was a teenager.
Friday stats:
Books read from today: Kindred by Octavia Butler
Pages read: 75
Total books finished: 3
What else have I been up to?: Went to Chocolate Island cafe in Godshill with a friend, lots of pottering about doing nothing.
Saturday stats:
Books read from today: Kindred by Octavia Butler
Pages read: 36
Total books finished: 3
Sunday stats:
Books read from today: Kindred by Octavia Butler, All of the Above by Juno Dawson
Pages read: 504
Total books finished: 5
What else have I been up to?: Designed and knitted a fair isle hat. Final rereadathon stats:
Books read this week: 5
Pages read: 1325
Average pages per day: 165.6
Best reading day: Sunday (12th)
Worst reading day: Saturday
Favourite reread: Kindred
I've accumulated several bookish-themed objects over the years (quite aside from the books themselves.) There are several Harry-Potter bits of merchandise, for a start, and last year I finally completed my Malory Towers series in the editions that I grew up with, a quest that started back in about 1994. But today I'd like to show off my Lord of the Rings Lego sets, because, let's face it, I never really grew up.
And of course I have my Anne of Green Gables collection. Up until last year I resisted calling it a collection. I had a very sensible three copies: the big two-in-one hardback with Anne of Avonlea that my parents bought me when I was eight, the 100th anniversary paperback to keep in my bag when out and about, and a second-hand Puffin classics edition for reading in the bath or other times when it might get a bit battered. But then I discovered the little hardback with gold edges and the original illustrations and it really, truly would fit into your pocket, and how could I resist that? Then, my sister ended up with a spare copy and brought it home for me, and when you've got five copies of the same book you might as well go all out and do it properly, right? Not the whole series, of course - that would just be silly. And then there's quite a few bits of stationery as well: Notebooks and journals, address book and pens, and even a colouring book. If it's Anne, it's mine.
Do you have any bookish collections? Maybe you've got one publisher whose books look so good on your shelves that you have to complete the set, or like me with Anne you have several editions of the same book. Or maybe it's bookish tote bags, mugs, or other merchandise. If so, do please show me or tell me about it, linking in the widget below.
Hi all. Hope you're enjoying becoming reacquainted with old books this week.
One quick notice before we begin: I'll be hosting a Twitter chat tonight at 8PM (using the hashtag #rereadathon) so we can get to know each other a bit better and chat about what we've been up to. Hope to see you all there.
Different Perspectives mini-challenge.
This mini-challenge is hosted by Gee, who writes:
Today I'd like you to reflect on different perspectives that a re-read has given you, for the better or the worse. Maybe you've re-read a book and found it wasn't quite as good as you've remembered. Maybe you've re-read a book and found it was actually much better than you first thought. Maybe you've picked up on little details you missed first time around. Good or bad, I want to hear about it.
When I was sixteen, I fell into the fantasy genre in a big way. It's easy to pinpoint how and when that happened, as the first of the Lord of the Rings films was released that winter. I couldn't wait another year to find out what happened next, so I picked up my dad's illustrated hardback and zipped through it in about a week flat. Then I set off to the library - not having very much money - to see what else I could find in the genre. And one thing I learned was that epic fantasy rarely came in stand-alone novels, and there were few series that the library had in their entirety. One of the shorter ones I managed to find was David Eddings' Elenuum trilogy. The first book had a gorgeous cover depicting a beautiful queen encased in diamond. The story followed her protector knight Sparhawk as he gathered together another band of knights to break the curse and restore her to life. So far, so fairy-tale. But I loved the cast of characters, I liked the affably "misguided" villain, the sadness that he and Sparhawk had once been friends. And it was partially responsible for me starting to write my own fantasy novel at the age of seventeen.
Years passed, books upon books were read, and an English Literature with Creative Writing degree was earned. A few years ago I picked up the first Elenium book again, and to my amazement and dismay, I really struggled to finish it, this magical fairy-tale that I reread several times in my teens! Whether it was because I'd studied how to write well, or because my tastes had moved away from high fantasy into other varieties, or because I'd just read so many better books since, I got bored. The dialogue sounded stilted, the prose simplistic, and even the characters felt one-dimensional. Plus, having since read Eddings' other series, The Belgariad, I recognised that he was an author with one story, one cast of characters, who would change the names, perspective and details, but use the same shape of the plot over and over. I never picked up the second and third books - although I can't bring myself to get rid of them. There are two other series of books I fell in love with sitting alongside them on my bookcase and I'm a little afraid to reread them now, in case the same happens with them.
However, not to end on a depressing note, the opposite happened to me with Neil Gaiman's American Gods. After Neverwhere, I didn't instantly "click" with the book generally held to be his masterpiece. I quite liked Shadow's tale, and I particularly liked the relatively quiet and normal part of the book set in the cosy town of Lakeside, but the story about the war between the gods, and all the little "coming to America" stories didn't grab me. There was too much going on, too many characters to care about all of them. But there was enough that held my interest to get me to reread the book a year or two later, and this time, being familiar with Shadow's story, I was able to pay more attention to the bits around the edges, pick up on details and nuances I'd missed the first time around. I've read it three or four times now, and every time I enjoy it more; I know where I'm going now, so I can focus more attention on enjoying the scenery.
Tuesday Stats:
Books read from today: Rainbow Valley
Pages read today: 158
Total books finished: 2
What else have I been up to?: Grocery shopping, chores
Wednesday Stats:
Books read from today: The Handmaid's Tale
Pages read today: 122
Total books finished: 2
What else have I been up to?: Made the most amazing chilli! (Tom Kerridge's recipe from The Dopamine Diet book)
I think we all have that one book. It's more than just something we read and loved, more even than an obsession. This particular book spoke to us personally, came to life within us and is something we've carried around with us ever since. Maybe we found ourselves represented within the pages for the first time, or the best time, and realised the power of an author to get inside our heads. Or perhaps we simply found it at just the right time and it helped us through a difficult time. This is the book that made us.
For today's mini-challenge, I'd like you to tell me what your "one book" is, and to create a visual representation of it. You can use a photograph, a collage, selfie, MS paint, doodles, stick figures or Lego bricks; be as arty or as plain, literal or abstract as you like. Then leave a link to your blog, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube or other post so I can come and see what you've done.
For me, (and I can see Bex smiling because she knows what I'm going to say) there can be only one choice. There have been a handful of books that have really changed my life, but the first one, the one that has been with me constantly throughout the last twentymumble years, is Lucy Maud Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables. I was bought the first two books in an omnibus edition when I was about eight years old, and its heroine, the fiery, imaginative and scatterbrained Anne Shirley was the first time I felt that a character was real and alive, a true "kindred spirit," and it really didn't matter that I was flesh and blood while she was ink and paper.
I'm cheating a bit with my picture, as it is a notebook that I covered a long time ago. (Though it's my challenge, I make the rules, and therefore I say it's not cheating. You can absolutely use something you made earlier.)
Monday Stats:
\Books read from: Rainbow Valley by L. M. Montgomery
Pages read: 67
Total books finished: 1
What else have I been up to: Dug an old writing project out of mothballs and pulled together all the false starts, notes and outlines into one place/
It's here! The Rereadathon is probably my favourite blogging event, and this year I've signed up to co-host the event with Bex and Gee. This week we've got a busy schedule of challenges and blogging prompts, and I'll be hosting a Twitter chat on Wednesday. You're welcome to take part in any, all or none of these; most importantly, it's about the reading. It's lovely to take some time out of your week to rediscover old favourite books and return to the story worlds that feel like a second home - or a holiday you loved once and have been long meaning to return to.
So, without any further ado, let's start with a mini-questionnaire from Bex!
1. Tell us a little about yourself.
I'm Katie, I live on the Isle of Wight and as well as being a voracious reader, I'm a massive sci-fi and fantasy geek in other genres. I've written a book for children and I'm just about ready for it to leave home and go out into the world. I enjoy crafts such as cross-stitching, knitting and crochet, love bright colours and have a very sweet tooth.
2. Have you participated in a re-readathon before? How often do you re-read books?
Yes, I've been doing this from the beginning, but this is my first time co-hosting anything. I re-read fairly regularly, but not as often as I would like due to my feelings of guilt about my ever-increasing to-read pile.
3. What is your current favourite book?
You'll hear all about my all-time favourite book tomorrow, but the best thing I've read in the last year is Becky Chambers' debut novel, The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet. Set in a far-distant future, where the human race has quite recently joined an interstellar alliance, it follows the lives of a spaceship crew, an engineering team commissioned with the job of building a hyperspace wormhole in uncharted territory. But it's not about the job so much as the journey; Chambers has created a wonderfully diverse universe, celebrating the unity of different types of people discovering the things they have in common. I loved spending time with her characters and exploring her world-building, and the optimistic view of the future.
4. What do you love most about re-reading? Or what makes you wish you re-read more?
I love the feeling of being reunited with a good friend, and of noticing new things that you might have missed before, picking up on nuances and concentrating on different elements of what you're reading, rather that racing ahead to find out what happens next.
5. What's on your TBR? What are you going to read first?
"Here's one I prepared earlier!" I've been adding books to my list over the last few months and came up with this lovely grey-and-orange pile.
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell. Apparently this book has shot to the top of the bestseller charts in the last week or two, for some reason... I studied this one for A-Level, and wrote an essay about how it seemed to predict the future. That was back in around 2003 - how much more relevant it'll seem fourteen years later, I am curious and a little fearful to discover.
Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb. Part of a series of trilogies; I read this one ten years ago, and it just so happened that three of my friends were reading it at the same time, so we had an informal series of book clubs involving wine and deep discussions - sometimes even about the book! Two of the friends have moved away now, one to Gloucestershire, the other to Canada, but the remaining two of us still have our very own mini book clubs from time to time, in memory of these days.
The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood. Another dystopia, another A-Level book, and another one that cries out to be read again in 2017.
Kindred by Octavia Butler. A time-travel story, but more historical than science fiction. We're used to white men travelling here, there and everywhere in fiction, where all they need to come to terms with is the right clothes and language. But for a black woman in Maryland, the past is a very dangerous place indeed. With her narrative, Butler joins the dots between past and present and reminds readers that it is not a straightforward thing to say "that was then, everything is different now." And again, sadly, I am reminded more than ever that the past does not stay safely locked away. I think this book, often harrowing and heart-breaking even the first time around, is going to be even more difficult to read today. But that's just what makes it so important!
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. This is just pure fun and escapism, a treasure-hunt story stuffed full of nerdy '80s references. Some I know, some I am less familiar with, but they are a geek's delight.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. I went into this novel the first time around knowing nothing about it, and I think that's the best way to read it; to gradually come to terms with what is going on in the seemingly idyllic English setting alongside the characters. It'll be interesting to read it with that extra knowledge a second time. There won't be the surprises, but I'll be curious to see what significant details I overlooked first time around.
All of the Above by Juno Dawson (published under the name James Dawson.) A book for young adults about a teenage girl trying to figure out her own identity while campaigning with her friends to save their favourite hangout spot.
The Earth Hums in B Flat by Mari Strachan. I really loved this book and read it two or three times a while back. A precocious young girl tries to investigate what has happened to a missing man from her Welsh village. I remember it being quite quirky, with a childlike innocence unwittingly revealing a darkness the narrator does not quite understand, but the reader does.
But the first book I read for the rereadathon was one I started a couple of days ago: Anne of Ingleside by Lucy Maud Montgomery. It's the sixth book in the Anne of Green Gables series, chronologically, though written last. It's been one of my least favourites on my last readthrough, only ahead of Anne of Windy Willows/Poplars, but I warmed to it more this time around. The focus is shared between Anne and her children, and we see a down-to-earth reality of the ups and downs of family life after the "happily ever after" of Anne of the Island and Anne's House of Dreams. I've also got the next book, Rainbow Valley lined up for this week, or next - I do not expect to finish ten books in eight days.
Sunday's Stats:
Books read from: Anne of Ingleside
Books completed: 1
Pages read: 164
On the menu: Pizza, cookies and ice cream, blackberry wine.
What else have I been up to?: Feeling bunged up with a cold, watching Labyrinth (again) with a friend and introducing her to Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell BBC series.
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