Best Laid Plans

"I watch her go, envying the certainty of her youthful confidence - the confidence of thinking that everything will go according to ones plans." Truth.

4.14 Arcadia falls

When I got back into reading, and began blogging, I never thought that I would lose my footing again. And then last year I lost all my footholds at once and I was shocked to see the salvation I had found in reading fade into the either of daily drudge. It also didn't help that my son stopped napping.

I made lists, I made stacks. I read the old blog posts to remind me how much the reading had helped me normalize the last time my life felt listless. I finally stormed through a book and thought I was cured only to languish again. In 2011, I read 67 books; in 2012, 23. My brain has felt the effects, and so has my soul.

As the 2014 started, I saw tweets about Goodreads already scolding participants of their reading challenge that they were behind. I'm not great at accepting scoldings but I thought joining the group might give me the right kind of push. I set my goal at 25 books, not lofty I know but I'm still feeling a bit fragile. And so far I am on track having just finished my fourth book - on track but certainly not burning up the highway - but what I love is that I am picking books based on the challenge instead of what I see going on in the reading world. Fact is, some books can be read in two days and not need to be anguished over and analyzed to death. So if I start falling behind it's time to pick something quick. Arcadia Falls fits that bill perfectly.

I read a lot of Carol Goodman when I was teaching high school. Mainly because a good escape was needed but also because the older girls liked to read them as well and I never recommended or lent out anything without reading it myself first. The blueprint here is the same as her others: Eastern boarding school, new teacher, some sort of literary mystery leads to a modern murder, final twist that I see coming a mile away. And a book read for my challenge in three days while feeling the awesome sensation of looking forward to finishing it.

Great literature it may not be, but turns out Goodreads doesn't judge.

Old School

This post disappeared but it was for Nancy Drew's The Bungalow Mystery.  This is what I said on Goodreads.

I picked this up at the library because it said it was the original story printed in 1930. I’m sure I read the 1957 reprinting.

The first page is basically a disclaimer from the publisher saying that readers may be “extremely uncomfortable” with the stereotypes and racial language used. I didn’t see any racial language in this particular story and while I was always impressed by Nancy when I read the books as a child, I had to laugh at the fact that she didn’t do any sleuthing to solve this particular crime. She instead overheard the bad guy, who conveniently spoke out loud to himself and detailed all of his plans. I know these are for younger readers – but come on!

3.14 The Bungalow Mystery

Good Golly Day

“To love anything once extremely well made you vulnerable to another loving attack.”  Truth.  But not so much here.

2.14 Flowers in The Attic

I saw a lot of people rereading this book in preparation for a new movie adaptation coming out on the Lifetime channel.  The movie promised to “go there” and so I saw a lot of readers my age going back to read something we had read as teens to see exactly where they were going to go.  I remembered reading this book and the rest in the series, but I mostly remember liking the Heaven series more.  So I decided to dive in and see how the book compared to the very vague memories – Just an FYI; making the movie for Lifetime should have been all I really needed to know.  Turns out I do remember some parts of the book vividly, mostly the talk of living so lavishly; and the romantic parts I remember turn out to be from the original film adaptation and not the actual book.  But what I really didn’t remember, but very much assumed, was how bad it all was.

The writing is plain bad.  Who says, “Good-golly day”? And quite frankly the dirty parts kind of run the gambit, all the couplings are questionable, not just he obvious, and the fact that the grandmother is set up as the villain is kind of ridiculous in light of the mother’s behavior.  Honestly, the whole thing is totally bizarre and I can’t believe it goes on for three more books.  I can’t even really imagine what I liked about it as a teenager, other than the fact that everyone was reading it.  But now I certainly know why my mother evoked the one piece of literature for every three pieces of trash policy in regards to my book buying.

Historical FanFiction

“It made him vividly aware that nothing was for ever; that pain had its tides, its pauses.” Truth.

1.14 Longbourn

I loved this book.  Reading it with my mom really helped me to get through and stick with it. making it the quickest I have finished anything in months.  And maybe that’s why I loved it so much – I really needed to read again. 

It is a retelling of Pride and Prejudice through the eyes of the downstairs help – basically a fancy fanfiction that falls into all the rage of the recent Downton fad.

I admit that the first third of the book felt like a pretty simple retelling:  We have a maid who likes two men, one who would be the “Wickham” and one who would be the “Darcy”, and so she must make the choice to stay in service or follow her dreams to travel and live unencumbered.  But then the story shifted away from all my assumptions and became a wonderfully heartfelt story about sacrifice and true family.  The additional details to the Pride and Prejudice characters were seamless and the two very different worlds of characters all living in Longbourn seemed perfectly placed and interestingly juxtaposed.  For all the pomp and circumstance of P & P you never really slow down to think of how all those balls and dinners are put together and it was nice to see that being slogged down by all those details didn’t make the characters doing them any less interesting, in many cases they were the better by far. 

If anything, this story was a bit harsh on our dear Bennets, but isn’t that the way life works?  No one really sees anything the same way.  Hence, fanfiction.  And boy oh boy, is the publishing world taking notice.

What It Is Versus What It Appears To Be

“We’re all just in the muck trying to believe we’re capable of greatness, but closer to breaking than we want to admit.” Truth

“The story you walk in to, he has learned, is always more complex than it first appears.” Truth

23.14 S

I loved this book:

This is a book lover’s dream – an old library book whose author is being researched by two students who write all of their notes in the margins as they go.  I have always dreamed of finding a mystery in a book, keeping notes.  It is an amazing piece of work, and quite honestly baffling to think of the process it took to put it all together. I truly loved every page.

I didn’t like the story:

Maybe I read it wrong.  Maybe I should have read the original “book” and then gone back to the marginalia.  Maybe the other way around.  But I know for sure that I generally read as a way to escape the feeling that everything I am doing in life is wrong, so to read a book and feel that way was just no fun. I truly hated very page.

So, what to say?  It’s beautiful, and adventurous, and tedious and frustrating.  In the end it will sit on my shelf to be looked at and never read again.  I will tell friends I loved it but not to read it.  So what’s the point? Not real sure myself.  But it kind of sums up 2013 for me – some huge changes for me and mine coupled with a very strong feeling of what the hell am I doing.  Things looking good on the outside but kind of all over the place on the inside.  So, how about in 2014 we just keep it simple and get back to basics.  I think I’ll start with Longbourne, because if the Bennets can’t get me back on track no one can.

Too Much Cuckoo

“When you are young, and beautiful, you can be very cruel.” Truth.

23.13 The Cuckoo’s Calling

This book took me far too long to get through. I picked it up thinking a well-written mystery would pull me in immediately, and once it was the hottest headline that JK Rowling was the actual author behind the story I jumped on it.  And then I floundered.  Seriously floundered.

It took me weeks to read, and I found myself trying to avoid it.  There was something about the whole thing that was very sad.  Of course, a murder mystery isn’t the most cherry of subject but that wasn’t all.  Everyone here was sad.  Lying about who they were or what they wanted.  Refusing to ask help from the ones they should trust most.  There was just something about it that made me feel even more shut in and lonely – and that was the last thing I needed when I picked it up.

Is it well written? Absolutely. Rowling can paint a character with words better than anyone else.  I guess I just needed her to paint someone a bit more happy to be living the life they were.

Rough

“‘Boss,’ he says. ‘I need to do something.’

‘So go on then,’ she says. ‘What?’

‘I can’t tell you.’”   

Luther’s Truth.  And once you know him, you know he means it.

22.13 Luther: The Calling

Luther is a BBC show that I totally stumbled on, and I was completely mesmerized.  Idris Elba IS Luther. He embraces the character in a way I have never seen before.  I stood up clapping and crying when he won the Golden Globe.  And yet, Luther is awful.  In the way Tony Soprano is awful.  In an I-totally-want-that-guy-on-my-side way.  In an I-feel-like-I-should-be-embarrassed-to-admit-my-adoration kind of way.  In fact, I don’t recommend this show to many friends because while I love it so much I also think it is probably a bit too real and too rough to be admired by too many.

Luther’s life is a mess.  His marriage, his career, his mind… All of it is falling apart and yet he manages to get the bad guy – generally with the help of some other rather shady guys – because he believes in justice.  Every single episode of the show is emblazoned on my brain in a way I can’t explain, partially because they are plain and simple rough to watch.  All of it is really violent, really realistic, and really rough. It reminds us how there is a bad side to everyone and maybe the ones who hide it more are really the worse ones in the end. Again, it is really rough and so is this book.

I am not sure you should read it if you haven’t seen the show, it is written by the creator of the show so it evokes the characters flawlessly, but if you didn’t already know them I am not sure it would work.  I am not going to talk about the plot but I will say any fan of the show needs to read this because it is a case you want to know more about.  Apparently there will be more books, and they take place before the events in the show, which is an interesting choice especially because he chose to write about immediately before those events.  I twas expecting to see a Luther pre-breakdown, but no – he is still a mess, and while that is completely compelling I was hoping to get a bit more insight into why he is the way he is.  Although, maybe it is better not to know, maybe I have no idea what rough really is.