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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Mordor: twinned with Slough
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
Burnett's adult work is even more dodgy. If you read THE MAKING OF A MARCHIONESS it is frightening, how often the author has to assure us that the heroine is intelligent. (She acts like a moron.) The characters within the book praise the heroine as 'healthy,' which I gather to mean 'fertile'.
And if you ever get to THE SHUTTLE, her fantasy (it is no other) about trans-Atlantic marriages, it has the character with the most repellent given name EVER. A poor little boy is dubbed Ughtred; I can only hope it is a traditional name.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jack the Lass:
[QUOTE]Originally posted by JoannaP:
[qb] Having been unable to resist 40 stories by Frances Hodgson Burnett for 37p, I am now reading The Secret Garden, I think for the first time. There was also a lot of classist stereotyping which I found quite hard work.
I first read it as an adult. What bothered me most was that Dickon's mother, who did not have enough money to give her children all the food they wanted, bought a skipping-rope for Mary. She could have talked to the housekeeper about the fact that Mary needed something to play with.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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Tina
Shipmate
# 63
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Huia:
quote:
Originally posted by Tina:
Count me as another one who's reading through all manner of old stuff on an e-reader via Project Gutenberg. Did a chronological re-read of Jane Austen's work, now reading Trollope's Palliser novels, along with various eighteenth-century novels series!
How are you enjoying the Palliser novels? I'm now up to The Prime Minister and am really enjoying them. Some years ago (OMG - maybe 25 or 30) they were adapted for TV with Susan Hampshire (I think) playing Lady Glencora.
Huia
Yeah, I'm enjoying them a lot - I'm also up to The Prime Minister now. I think part of the appeal for me is they're very mixed characters and you often aren't sure how their lives will pan out and whether the good or bad will win out - for example I started the PM thinking Ferdinand Lopez was a confident, decent bloke being discriminated against for his parentage; but now he seems to be a bit of a git ![[Paranoid]](graemlins/paranoid.gif) And Lady Eustace is sooo bad but fun to read about!
Posts: 503 | From: South London | Registered: May 2001
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
I loved A Piece of Justice by Jill Paton Walsh and was disappointed by the Lord Peter Wimsey books in comparison.
I've just acquired my daughter's cast off Kindle (she's bought a i-Pad) and am reading the stuff on it I want to read before I deregister her and register it to me and start putting my own choices on. I'm looking forward to Project Gutenberg and the other out of copyright books.
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
I assume you mean the unsuccessful, IMO, Wimsey stories penned by JPW?
After all, Jill Paton Walsh was only 5 years old when the last Wimsey story by Dorothy Sayers was published.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
Yes, sorry, thought that was implicit. I find the Dorothy L Sayers books fascinating, with all their dated prejudices and mores, and found someone pastiching them not so great.
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
So did I. But I do urge you to skip over to the second-to-the-newest one, THE ATTENBURY EMERALDS, and read it. Actually, just read the latter third. Suddenly plot and character line up and sing together in harmony. It's amazing.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492
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Posted
I like listening to the Lord Peter mysteries on Radio 4, but have never actually read them. I think I saw a teleplay several years ago.
I just finished the June selection for Ship's book club and really enjoyed it!
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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.
Posts: 30517 | From: White Hart Lane | Registered: Oct 2002
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
If you were going to begin, I suggest THE NINE TAILORS, Sayers' best Lord Peter novel. A few of them really do have to be read in order, but this one is a delightful outlier. And if you don't like it then you don't have to get tangled up in the others.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Huia
Shipmate
# 3473
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Posted
I wish Jill Paton-Walsh would stop writing faux Lord Peter books and go back to her own writing, which I enjoyed.
I honestly can't think of novels written as sequels by an author other than the original, that I have enjoyed I thought Pemberley was dire, despite enjoying that author's other books.
There was one short story written as a sequel to Jane Eyre that I rather enjoyed. I can't remember who wrote it but it became obvious to Jane that Bertha Mason had actually been driven mad by Rochester who was trying to do the same to her.
Huia
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Charity gives food from the table, Justice gives a place at the table.
Posts: 10382 | From: Te Wai Pounamu | Registered: Oct 2002
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Oh, I'm glad I'm not the only one who dislikes Jill Paton Walsh's pastiches of Dorothy Sayers! They just don't work for me. Marrying Bunter off to a freelance photographer and giving him a cosy little mews flat so he can carry on being Wimsey's 'man' is Simply Wrong; modern ideas of how servants should be treated retrofitted onto an earlier society. It's nearly as bad as the later Pern books (I'm thinking of 'Masterharper' in particular here).
[ 06. June 2014, 08:52: Message edited by: Jane R ]
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif) I never got beyond the first paragraph...
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Sipech
Shipmate
# 16870
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Posted
Haven't tried Moby Dick yet. In terms of the epics, I have a copy of War & Peace at home, but I want to warm up to it with Crime & Punishment and The Brothers Karamazov first.
Have just finished volume 2 of The Forsyte Saga.
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I try to be self-deprecating; I'm just not very good at it.
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TheAlethiophile
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
Agree about the direness of Bunter in the mews. And oh lord, the latter Pern novels are to be strictly avoided.
I did read MOBY-DICK. Once was enough. I also read WAR & PEACE, and was annoyed. If the entire thing is going to revolve around the battle of Borodino, darn it I want a battle! I do not want to trail around on the verges of the conflict.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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JoannaP
Shipmate
# 4493
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jack the Lass:
quote:
Originally posted by JoannaP:
Having been unable to resist 40 stories by Frances Hodgson Burnett for 37p, I am now reading The Secret Garden, I think for the first time. I'm guessing that, if I had read it as a child, I would not have been so appalled at the way Mary is treated by the adults in her life. Having read a defintion of emotional abuse a couple of days ago dos not help.
Yes - I read that recently and felt exactly the same (and wait till you come across Colin later in the book!). There was also a lot of classist stereotyping which I found quite hard work. I hadn't read it as a child, and had to try and remember how much 'of its time' it was. I did read (and reread, several times) "A Little Princess" as a child, and would like to reread it as an adult, but I'm worried that reading it with 21st century adult eyes will spoil the childhood memory of a magical story.
Oh God, I see what you mean about Colin. Ten years old and he has never spoken to another boy ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
By way of contrast, I have just finished Kate Atkinson's Case Histories and will definitely look for the next one in the library. I am not entirely sure about the "literary detective novel" sub-genre but Kate Atkinson does it better than Susan Hill.
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"Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow." R. H. Tawney (quoted by Isaiah Berlin)
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
Posts: 1877 | From: England | Registered: May 2003
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jedijudy
Organist of the Jedi Temple
# 333
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Posted
Moby Dick has been on one of my library shelves for over twenty years. Some day, some year, I shall drag it down (again) and read it.
La vie en rouge, did you read it in French or English? If French, you have my humble admiration!
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Jasmine, little cat with a big heart.
Posts: 18017 | From: 'Twixt the 'Glades and the Gulf | Registered: Aug 2001
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
In defense of Burnett, it is only fair to say that Victorian and Edwardian medical practices would curl your hair. For instance after childbirth new mothers were to be kept in a dark room for six weeks. They had to nurse the newborn, of course, but they were fed on a diet of toast and water. Even the recipe fort his convection is depressing -- toast the bread and then boil it in water until it's a jelly. Strain off all the solids and feed the fluid to the patient.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
. It's nearly as bad as the later Pern books (I'm thinking of 'Masterharper' in particular here).
Oh that was dreadful. Emotional torture porn. Just. Why.?
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Welease Woderwick
Sister Incubus Nightmare
# 10424
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Posted
Although I have a copy on my shelves I have never managed Moby Dick, I just can't get into it at all - and I have tried, honest.
I am currently wallowing in a bit of Delderfield [again] - the Swann trilogy this time - and am on the second volume. An under-rated writer who seems quite out of fashion these days. I really can't get on with his book Diana - something else I have tried several times but ultimately been so bored I have chucked it back on the shelf for another day - that will probably never arrive.
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I give thanks for unknown blessings already on their way.
Fancy a break in South India?
Accessible Homestay Guesthouse in Central Kerala, contact me for details
What part of Matt. 7:1 don't you understand?
Posts: 48139 | From: 1st on the right, straight on 'til morning | Registered: Sep 2005
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Welease Woderwick:
Although I have a copy on my shelves I have never managed Moby Dick, I just can't get into it at all - and I have tried, honest.
I've never managed Moby Dick either. I had to read Billy Budd for a college course, and I disliked it intensely.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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QLib
Bad Example
# 43
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Posted
Moby Dick is worth the effort IMHO. I was a great fan of Melville's cold bedroom thesis for a long time (that a warm bedroom is one of the great discomforts of 'civilisation'). However, I will admit that I can't actually summon the stamina to re-read it at the moment.
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Tradition is the handing down of the flame, not the worship of the ashes Gustav Mahler.
Posts: 8913 | From: Page 28 | Registered: May 2001
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jane R:
I never got beyond the first paragraph...
I see I'm not the only one. IMO, life is too short to waste it reading stuff you don't enjoy, when it's your own spare time and it's supposed to be for pleasure.
I've been rediscovering some childhood favourites, and musing on the difference the lack of technology makes to a story. Hard to imagine a modern-day version of the Narnia Chronicles:
"Where's Edmund?" said Lucy. Everybody looked around the Beavers' comfortable little home, and Mrs Beaver hurried to turn the television off, but there was no sign of him. Susan sighed, and reached for her mobile phone. Somewhere far away in the snowy landscape, Edmund's pocket started to vibrate. He muttered a rude word and deleted Susan's text message. He glanced around, checked Google Maps Narnia for the White Witch's Castle, keyed in her postcode, and then hesitantly, rang the number she'd given him to let her know he was on his way...
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
That's interesting, I rewrote the first chapter of the very same story, as if it happened in modern times. Perhaps we should form a publishing team, Ariel?!
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
Posts: 34626 | From: Cream Tealand | Registered: Jun 2001
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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
...I had to read Billy Budd for a college course, and I disliked it intensely.
Moo
It's better as an opera than as a book! I saw it in Santa Fe a few years ago.
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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.
Posts: 30517 | From: White Hart Lane | Registered: Oct 2002
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JoannaP
Shipmate
# 4493
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
In defense of Burnett, it is only fair to say that Victorian and Edwardian medical practices would curl your hair. For instance after childbirth new mothers were to be kept in a dark room for six weeks. They had to nurse the newborn, of course, but they were fed on a diet of toast and water. Even the recipe fort his convection is depressing -- toast the bread and then boil it in water until it's a jelly. Strain off all the solids and feed the fluid to the patient.
I didn't know about the toast thing but I do find the social history and insights into attitudes one picks up from reading older fiction fascinating. It is true of more recent fiction as well; some of the casual anti-Semitism spouted by characters in whodunits written in the 30s is shocking.
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"Freedom for the pike is death for the minnow." R. H. Tawney (quoted by Isaiah Berlin)
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
Posts: 1877 | From: England | Registered: May 2003
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
Oh, very good, Narnia with cell phones (although, where are the towers for connectivity?). I believe that modern pupils, reading ROMEO & JULIET in high school, wonder why Juliet didn't just send her boyfriend a text: "faking death, ttyl"
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492
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Posted
Ha!
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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.
Posts: 30517 | From: White Hart Lane | Registered: Oct 2002
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
...whereas back when I was at school you had to fall back on pointing out how unromantic their relationship would have been if they had survived to set up house in Padua (or similar) and live on into their dotage. I remember writing an essay on that very subject...
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Eigon
Shipmate
# 4917
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Posted
I'm going for a bit more comfort reading - this time it's Madeleine l'Engle's Two-Part Invention, about her marriage, and being in theatre in the 1940s. She seemed to spend a lot of time fending off the unwanted advances of various men, despite not being seen as conventionally attractive.
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Laugh hard. Run fast. Be kind.
Posts: 3710 | From: Hay-on-Wye, town of books | Registered: Aug 2003
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jedijudy
Organist of the Jedi Temple
# 333
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Posted
Daughter-Unit, knowing her mother well, gifted me with "William Shakespeare's Star Wars, Verily a New Hope" for Mother's Day.
It was very enjoyable, and several place had me laughing out loud! There is quite a bit of "Henry V" misquoted, as well as a bit of Star Trek.
It's a nice, light read, and even though some of us know the story, there are enough asides to put a little extra flavor in the retelling.
Fun for people like me. You know who you are.
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Jasmine, little cat with a big heart.
Posts: 18017 | From: 'Twixt the 'Glades and the Gulf | Registered: Aug 2001
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The Rogue
Shipmate
# 2275
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Posted
Having watched the BBC series recently I am now reading the Three Musketeers and enjoying it. I am quite surprised at how much of it is in the programme. I have all the books but will probably look at something else before carrying on with them.
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If everyone starts thinking outside the box does outside the box come back inside?
Posts: 2507 | From: Toton | Registered: Feb 2002
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
They are just starting the BBC series here. I may have to look at it, if it is actually within shouting distance of the novel. (The best film version was the one starring Michael York!)
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
Just finished reading A Natural History of Dragons and Tropic of Serpents by Marie Brennan.
Brilliant books. Simply brilliant. No doubt a lot of people will compare them with the Temeraire books (American woman, writing about dragons) but the style is completely different. Alternative universe very well-imagined; author obviously knows her history and has had experience of field trips in difficult circumstances. The protagonist is a woman born into a society reminiscent of mid-Victorian Britain who wants to be a naturalist and study dragons. The first book is all about how she achieves her ambition; the second is about her next expedition and what happens after the 'Happy(ish) Ending' of the first. Can't wait for the third (hoping very much that there will be more in the series, of the same high quality).
I just checked Amazon and discovered she's written another series about fairies... off to investigate that. I really like this author's style.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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QLib
Bad Example
# 43
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
They are just starting the BBC series here. I may have to look at it, if it is actually within shouting distance of the novel. (The best film version was the one starring Michael York!)
It isn't. Not even if you had a megaphone. Actually, not even if you had a mobile phone.
Quite good fun, though: I like the King best. I mean Capaldi acts his socks off as Richelieu, but it's a bit like finding caviar in an iced bun.
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Tradition is the handing down of the flame, not the worship of the ashes Gustav Mahler.
Posts: 8913 | From: Page 28 | Registered: May 2001
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Huia
Shipmate
# 3473
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by QLib:
but it's a bit like finding caviar in an iced bun.
Thanks for that image. I want to wash my mouth out.
Today I finished The Duke's Children which is the last of the Palliser novels. I liked the series better that the Barset novels as I find the characters more interesting.
I've now started The Odd Women by George Gissing, though I may splice in some contemporary light reading.
Does anyone else find themselves using old fashioned language in their everyday speech after immersing themselves in Victorian or Regency novels? ![[Hot and Hormonal]](icon_redface.gif)
Huia
[ 09. June 2014, 09:01: Message edited by: Huia ]
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Charity gives food from the table, Justice gives a place at the table.
Posts: 10382 | From: Te Wai Pounamu | Registered: Oct 2002
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Huia:
Today I finished The Duke's Children which is the last of the Palliser novels. I liked the series better that the Barset novels as I find the characters more interesting.
I like them better also, although I confess I tend to skip the political stuff.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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Sipech
Shipmate
# 16870
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Posted
Am finally coming towards the end of Paul and the Faithfulness of God. Just 150 pages to go, but am over the "hump" of the central theology which is really rather dense.
Am also just a few pages from the end of my latest "coffee table" book, Julian Baggini's The Pig That Wants To Be Eaten. For what it is, it's pretty good, though as one might expect Baggini's take on religion is an exercise in getting the wrong end of some sticks and in other cases just getting the wrong sticks.
In the mean time, am pressing on with Friedrich Engels' The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844. Though as it is a volume also containing (and headed as) The Communist Manifesto, it prompts some interesting looks from my fellow commuters.
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I try to be self-deprecating; I'm just not very good at it.
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TheAlethiophile
Posts: 3791 | From: On the corporate ladder | Registered: Jan 2012
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Piglet
Islander
# 11803
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Posted
I'm still in the fifteenth century: I found an Anne Easter Smith book that I'd forgotten I had called Queen by Right which tells the story of Cecily, Duchess of York (mother of Edward IV and Richard III).
Like the Philippa Gregory book, quite unputdownable, but unlike PG she tells it in the past, and as a narrative rather than as though the author were one of the characters.
I still don't understand why Hilary Mantel gets all the history-as-fiction plaudits - give me either of these ladies any day!
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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music
Posts: 20272 | From: Fredericton, NB, on a rather larger piece of rock | Registered: Sep 2006
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
I am just about to start one of the Oscar Wilde mystery novels by Gyles Brandreth. They are a fast read and appear to be accurate in their historical detail, always an irresistible trait.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Ariel
Shipmate
# 58
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by piglet:
I'm still in the fifteenth century: I found an Anne Easter Smith book that I'd forgotten I had called Queen by Right which tells the story of Cecily, Duchess of York (mother of Edward IV and Richard III).
Like the Philippa Gregory book, quite unputdownable, but unlike PG she tells it in the past, and as a narrative rather than as though the author were one of the characters.
I still don't understand why Hilary Mantel gets all the history-as-fiction plaudits - give me either of these ladies any day!
Thank you for this recommendation. I love good historical fiction (esp when written in the past tense) and will look out for this.
I'm not a fan of Hilary Mantel either. I read one of her books and didn't like it much, a feeling that was clinched by listening to her on the radio when she was discussing her latest novel, which all sounded a bit pretentious to me.
Posts: 25445 | Registered: May 2001
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moron
Shipmate
# 206
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Posted
Sorry if I've overlooked comparable recommendations but this post is an alternative to starting another thread so sue me.
Anything by Mary Doria Russell is nearly beyond my ability to put down; typically fatigue is the culprit.
From The Sparrow to Children Of God to Doc to A Thread Of Grace to whatever is next in no particular order have been a very enjoyable time investment. She makes implausible plot twists well erm you know because of the believability of the complex characters she creates.
Very good stuff.
Posts: 4236 | From: Bentonville | Registered: May 2001
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
piglet: quote:
I still don't understand why Hilary Mantel gets all the history-as-fiction plaudits ...
Better PR? Also, she writes in a consciously literary style - which is what turned me off her, btw - it seemed like she was constantly shrieking 'Look how clever I am!' Really great authors don't need to do that, but it does get the attention of the Booker panel.
I got halfway through 'Wolf Hall' and found myself yawning over it - well, I did know how it ended, having studied sixteenth-century history to A-level.
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Huia
Shipmate
# 3473
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by Huia:
Today I finished The Duke's Children which is the last of the Palliser novels. I liked the series better that the Barset novels as I find the characters more interesting.
I like them better also, although I confess I tend to skip the political stuff.
Moo
I skipped the stuff about the Duke's decimal currency, he was a bit tedious about the detail. On the other hand I did read up on the Married Women's Property Act and about an estranged husband having the right to force his wife back to live with him (Robert Kennedy and Lady Laura). I wondered whether Trollope was punishing both Lady Laura and Mabel Grex for steppping out of their roles by not giving them happy endings. I thought Silverbridge was an insufferable snob, but then he had been brought up knowing he would become the Duke of Omnium right from when he was a child.
I think Phineas Finn is still my favourite character.
Huia
[ 10. June 2014, 08:42: Message edited by: Huia ]
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Charity gives food from the table, Justice gives a place at the table.
Posts: 10382 | From: Te Wai Pounamu | Registered: Oct 2002
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Huia
I wondered whether Trollope was punishing both Lady Laura and Mabel Grex for steppping out of their roles by not giving them happy endings.
I don't think so. I think that he was more concerned with his craft than with dispensing happy or unhappy endings according to the merits of the character.
One of my favorite characters to read about is Lizzie Eustace, although I would have hated to know her in real life. One minor character I like is the factor of the Scottish estate.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
He might not have been consciously thinking "ooh, pushy dame, must remember to smack her down before the last page." But there is a consistent tendency over the entire literature of the period to be sure that overly powerful women (especially sexual ones) had to Pay A Price in some way. It was a cultural expectation.
The big complaint about PRIDE AND PREJUDICE was the heroine's intelligence and outspoken quality. Austen heard and obeyed, and wrote MANSFIELD PARK.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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Eigon
Shipmate
# 4917
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Posted
I've just finished Two-Part Invention, by Madeleine l'Engle, and it turned out not to be comfort reading after all - but it is a very good book, being a moving account, towards the end of her husband's last illness and death.
Maybe I'll go for Diane Duane's A Wizard of Mars next. I've read the rest of the Young Wizard series and enjoyed them, and being Young Adult it can't be too harrowing, surely!
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Laugh hard. Run fast. Be kind.
Posts: 3710 | From: Hay-on-Wye, town of books | Registered: Aug 2003
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Jane R
Shipmate
# 331
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Posted
You could be safe with Diane Duane (it's been a while since I read anything of hers, but I don't remember her being particularly harrowing). But Young Adult fiction in general... perhaps not. They quite often have depressing themes. Or at least that's how it seems to me.
OTOH Diana Wynne Jones is usually classed as young adult, and she's not depressing at all...
Posts: 3958 | From: Jorvik | Registered: May 2001
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
A Wizard of Mars isn't harrowing--well, except to its characters. Just bring a bag of tomatoes, hey?
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Brenda Clough
Shipmate
# 18061
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Posted
Diana wynn Jones is a marvelous writer. One of the ones who should have lived forever.
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Science fiction and fantasy writer with a Patreon page
Posts: 6378 | From: Washington DC | Registered: Mar 2014
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