Review: Summer Half, by Angela Thirkell

 

Summer Half, by Angela Thirkell (1937; this edition 2014 by Virago Modern Classics)

Colin Keith is training to be a barrister but decides to try his hand at teaching in this entry into Angela Thirkell's Barsetshire series. He feels badly about being financially dependent on his father and takes a job as a schoolmaster to experience independence. The opening chapter, when Colin tries to tell his family about his decision, and they one by one ignore him in favor of their own self-absorbed interests, is everything I love about Angela Thirkell's writing. All of her wit and subtlety are on display here and in the rest of this delightful light read.

Colin is surrounded his sisters- tomboy Lydia and sweet Kate- his parents and his friends Phillip, Noel and Everard. Noel has been corresponding with Kate; Phillip, Colin's fellow teacher, is engaged to the beautiful idiot Rose, daughter of the head of their school. And then there's Everard, another teacher, who is crushing hard on Kate but convinced that she's all but engaged to Noel, who, as it turns out, is not the marrying kind. (Barsetshire fans will also note the presence of Tony Morland, met previously in The Demon in House, no longer the Dennis the Menace of the English countryside but now a student at the school where the men teach.) 

This was so much fun to read. Everything turns out the way it should; everyone ends up where they are supposed to be and with the people they should be with. Thirkell gives us just the right smidge of suspense and dramatic irony to keep us reading but the endings are never really in doubt. Her lovely luminous writing and subtle insights make it all come to life so very enjoyably.

I wait too long in between these books. This was a fine entry in the series.

I did not receive this book for review.

French Movie Mercredi: Bluebeard (2009)

 

 

Catherine Breillat's 2009 film Barbe Bleue is definitely one for the grownups.

She tells the story of the Charles Perrault's Bluebeard through the eyes of two pairs of sisters, Marie-Anne and Catherine, and Marie-Catherine and Anne. 

The first pair are little girls and Catherine, the young girl, tells the story to her older sister Marie-Anne, who is terrified by it. Marie-Catherine and Anne are the girls in the story; they hear about Lord Barbe Bleue through local gossip and are appalled that someone rumored to have killed his wives has escaped justice. The girls return home from school to find out their father has died and the family has become impoverished, so one of them has to get married and the younger girl, Marie-Catherine, is selected to become Barbe-Bleue's bride.

The movie felt moody and felt slow-moving to me, very suspenseful as we await the fate of the young Marie-Catherine. She plays her role in the fairy tale to a point and then Breillat reminds us that even the young and innocent have agency and the power to change how their stories end.  Marie-Catherine is played by actress Lola Créton with a combination of wide-eyed wonder and steely resolve; this is a young lady who knows what she wants.

I do like Breillat's movies for the willfulness of her heroines and the way she portrays her women and girls as taking charge of their lives and their sexuality. She has a reputation for being "edgy" which I think has to do with the frank way she depicts womens' sexuality and women trying to control their own desires rather than being controlled by those of others. Definitely not a "Sunday morning movie" but worth your time for sure.

It's Monday! What Am I Reading?

I've got three excellent books going right now.

Still working my way through Robert K. Massie's wonderful Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman. What a book! I'm just loving it. It's written in these morselly little chapters and I just savor two or three every day.

I'm also reading Shirley Hazzard's The Transit of Venus, another "depressed people having affairs" mid century novel set in England about two Australian sisters, Grace and Caroline, and their lives and loves. It was originally published in 1980 but reads like something much older, and I am here for it. The writing is so delicate and nuanced and the relationships are beautifully drawn. It got a write up in the Times not too long ago and has a wonderful introduction by Fates and Furies and Matrix author Lauren Groff.

Finally I'm reading Dineh, by Ida Maze, the current selection of the Yiddish Book Center's book club. It's a coming of age novel set in Belarus in the late 19th century. 

What are you reading?

Sunday Salon - Hugh Jackman is America's Sweetheart

This week was back-to-work-after-vacation, which is always exhausting. There was a lot of catch-up but not as much as I expected. Everything was under control as of EOD on Wednesday- not bad!

Last night marked our triumphant return to Broadway; we saw our first show since the shutdown in March 2020. Right at the end of February we saw an adaptation of Medea starring Bobby Canavale and Rose Byrne. And yesterday we saw The Music Man starring Hugh Jackman and Sutton Foster!

I'm a huge Jackman fan and I have to tell you, back in my background days I was lucky enough to be on set with Jackman twice for the movie Bad Education. Bad Education was a movie about a corrupt school administrator who stole millions from a Long Island school system, and one day on set Jackman brought dozens of local lottery tickets he'd bought (because the lottery goes to fund public schools) and passed them out on set to the crew. Adorable! And for what it's worth you can see a scowling Marie in the courtroom scene towards the end of the movie. (I adore Jackman and it killed me to make mean faces at him!)

And there is a whole story about the series of delays in seeing Music Man; it was supposed to be my birthday show in February 2021 but then our tickets were pushed back to September, then again to May; then we were going to take a trip in May and rescheduled our tickets to June. Then the trip was cancelled, but Jackman got Covid and our tickets were pushed back again to July. So we finally got to see it last night and it was definitely worth the wait. He was amazing- the whole cast was. What a night!

Today I'm recovering from being out late with some bagels and coffee courtesy of my husband, who made them in our new air fryer. They are delicious! I'm pretty sure this is the recipe he used.

As far as what's up for today, we're going to hit Barnes and Noble for some funsies and relax the rest of the time. I'm doing some volunteer transcription for a local museum and I have a language book I need to look at for an upcoming class, so that should be fun, along with piano practice and other things.

Paris in July- My French Book Reviews

 

I'm kind of late to the party for the Paris in July French book party going on in the blogosphere but here is a list of some of my favorite books I've reviewed that were originally written in French.

The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery, the book that put Europa Editions on the map.

Climates, by André Maurois, a great beach read of a romance novel, originally published in the 1920s.

Another frothy romance, Enough About Love, by Hervé le Tellier.

Fatale, by Jean-Patrick Manchette, a gritty, violent noir.

On Leave, by Daniel Anselme, a moving book about soldiers in the Algerian War.

The Truth About Marie, by Jean-Philippe Toussaint, about the end of a love affair.

The Last Brother, by Natacha Appanah, about World War 2 Mauritius- a gem.

The German Mujahid, by Boualem Sansal, an emotionally challenging novel about the legacy of the Holocaust for one German-Algerian family.

Of course these are just a few of my reviews of books in translation from the French. Hopefully you will find something to enjoy!

Friday Finds

 

Here's a bunch on new books I either picked up on vacation or ordered in the past couple of weeks.

Piano Roles, by James Parakilas, is a history of the piano. I got it at Bryn Mawr Bookstore in Cambridge, Mass., in my old neighborhood of Huron Village.

The Hundred Waters, by Lauren Acampora, is a galley I received in the mail from Grove Press.

Atomic Anna, by Rachel Barenbaum, and The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem, by Sarit Yishai-Levi, were both recommended by a friend who reviews for the Association of Jewish Libraries. I got Atomic Anna from Porter Square Books in Cambridge, where I used to work.

The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem is also a Netflix series starring Dreamy Michael Aloni of Shtisel fame, so there's that. My friend said read the book first. Beauty Queen came from Bookshop.org.

The Ingenue by Rachel Kapelke-Dale is a galley coming from St. Martin's Press later this year. It has to do with love, sex and piano. Fun!

What is Written on the Tongue, by Anne Lazurko, is an intriguing-sounding WW2 book I bought from Bookshop.org.

Musicophilia, by Oliver Sacks, is about music and the brain. It came from Bookshop.org.

Review: The Good Soldier, by Ford Madox Ford

Have you seen the meme about how childrens' books are all about unicorns and rainbows, and adult books are all about depressed people having affairs? Well, buckle up, because this may be the most depressed book about the most depressed people having the most depressed affairs ever in the history of depressed people having affairs.

That said, it's kind of wonderful- beautiful and sad and stupid and tragic and full of dumb people making dumb choices.

Originally published in 1915, it tells the story of two couples, the Dowells and Ashburnhams, as told by Ned Dowell, one of two survivors of what he calls "the saddest story I have ever heard."  The two affluent Anglo-Irish-American couples meet every year in at a resort in Germany and it quickly becomes clear that things are not all on the up-and-up. Edward Ashburnham is a serial adulterer; Florence Dowell has a past she would rather her husband not know about, and Florence's husband Ned and Edward's wife Leonora seem to just exist as cover for theirs spouses' various issues. 

Edward and Florence have a passionate affair but that's not even the one at the true center of this domestic maelstrom, something we learn about much later in the narrative than you might think, given the outsize role that relationship plays. 

What I loved about this book is the beautiful, careful writing, the slow unrolling of the mess of these peoples' lives and the complete lack of resolution. By modern standards these peoples' lives are ridiculous but if you can put that aside and just kind of wade in and let yourself get immersed it's worth it. I think the pointlessness is also the point. This is not going to be a book for everyone; stay away if you need likeable characters or a satisfying resolution. But if you can lose yourself in the story of a life you'll be grateful you're not living, it can be a satisfying read.

I did not receive this book for review.

This is the Saddest Story

I finished a re-read of Ford Madox Ford's classic The Good Soldier last week. I'll have a review-ish-type post on it later this week but I wanted to share a photo of a lengthy quote I liked.
 

New Treasure for My Booker Prize Collection

 

On my cruise vacation a couple of weeks ago I visited Commonwealth Books, a used and rare bookstore in downtown Boston. When I lived in Boston I was a regular here, and bought a lot of things like Angela Thirkell books and harder-to-find used fiction. It's a fun labryrinthy bookstore; they don't have an inventory system and good luck finding something specific, but you will find things you didn't know you needed for sure.

I was checking out their modern firsts shelf and came across a US first edition of Salman Rushdie's Booker Prize winner Midnight's Children in good condition (and pre-Booker state) for a low low price under $100. 

Normally I would not bother with a US first when there is an earlier British or other first edition (and with Booker winners before 2016 the first edition was rarely American) but true firsts of Midnight's Children go for $1,000 and up so that was never going to happen.

It may not be the true first but priced to sell as it was, it's the only first I'm ever going to have of this particular book so I'm pretty excited!

Sunday Salon- Summer Cruise to Maine and Halifax

My husband and I are just back from our first cruise, aboard the Queen Mary 2, flagship of the Cunard line of ships. Technically, as people love to say, the QM2 is not a cruise ship but an ocean liner since she was built for Transatlantic crossings. We did not do a crossing; we went up to Halifax, Maine and Boston. It was wonderful! 

First shore day was in Bar Harbor, Maine, where we took a walking tour and learned some about its history. Next shore day was Boston, where we spent the Fourth of July. We listened to a reading of the Declaration of Independence and hit two of our favorite bookstores, Commonwealth Books and Trident Bookstore & Cafe. Then we watched the fireworks from the top deck of the ship. So fun! Our final shore day, a washout, was spent in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where my grandfather is from.

On our "sea days" we spent a lot of time in the onboard library. On Deck 8, tucked in a corner, alongside a small bookshop is an oasis of literature and serenity.

It's apparently one of the largest libraries at sea, with 8,000 or so volumes and lots of space to relax. The collection consists of books in English, French and German and possibly other languages, with current fiction and nonfiction, a selection of Everyman's Library classics and even a shelf devoted to P.G. Wodehouse. The library was one of the selling points for me, for sure.

Here is my baby Yoda, Eugenie, relaxing in one of the library's many comfortable, ocean-facing chairs. I spent a lot of time reading and relaxing in this beautiful, welcoming space. The bookshop is small and consists mostly of souvenir books, nautical books, light fiction and "dad books." I did not find anything there for me.

I think working in this library would be a dream!

Sunday Salon- Taking the Week Off, Playing Piano

Well I feel like I'm off to a pretty strong start when it comes to relaunching my blog and my social media presence as a book person. I'm posting regularly here, got a new Insta up and going (@bostonbibliophile2) and reading blogs now and then. So that said I'll see you next week. Lol.

This has been a quiet week; just a little book mail, nothing big going on. Work is work, and I'm progressing on my piano lessons, working my way through the next few measures of "One Summer's Day."

For those of you who play piano, what books do you recommend for learning? I have a mess of things on the floor near my instrument but I'd love to hear your thoughts. (I have all of the Alfred's books you're supposed to have. My first teacher loved Alfred's but subsequent teachers have placed less emphasis on it. My current teacher had me work on the Duets book, which I loved doing, but we've moved off of that too.)

I'm pretty sure I'm DNF'ing the Jonah Rosenfeld collection. It is Such. A. Downer. I really can't take it anymore. I'm still counting it as a read book because I got more than halfway through it. And that was endurance test enough.

So onto better things, starting with Zac Bissonnette's A Killing in Costumes, a lightish mystery. Wish me luck!