strange and random happenstance

Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson
Published by: Katherine Tegen Books
Publication Date: January 16th, 2018
Format: Kindle, 432 Pages
Rating: ★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Ellingham Academy is known to an elite few in academia for it's unique approach to learning while it is known to everyone who is a true crime aficionado for Truly Devious. Albert Ellingham was rich, eccentric, and a true original. So what do rich, eccentric men do? They carve out the side of a mountain in Vermont and open a school to encourage unique thinking and a love of the game with their home being the crown jewel of the campus that holds parties worthy of Jay Gatsby. But rich men have enemies and Ellingham Academy became the scene of one of the most notorious unsolved crimes of the twentieth century. On April 13th, 1936, Albert's wife Iris and daughter Alice went for a drive and never returned. There was a phone call, a ransom demand, it was paid, a young student, Dottie Epstein, went missing, another phone call, more ransom demanded, it was paid again, Dottie and Iris's bodies were found, a local man became the scapegoat for the murders but all believed he was innocent, Alice was never seen again. And then there was the letter signed "Truly, Devious." In 1938 Albert Ellingham died in a tragic boating accident with his confidant George Marsh. The Truly Devious case has never been solved. Surprisingly, in all the years since the tragedy, Ellingham Academy is still flourishing, not letting the past blight the present. They still look for the best and the brightest to offer a unique and tailored two year education. Stevie Bell is part of the incoming class. Who would have thought that Stevie, a 16-year-old from Pittsburgh raised by right wing conservatives who isn't the most stellar of students would be at Ellingham academy rubbing elbows and sharing digs with authors and internet famous actors and solving the Truly Devious case? Because that is why she is there, that is why she was accepted, she said she was going to solve Truly Devious. And Stevie must be doing something right because the more she investigates the more odd things happen, and soon tragedy will strike Ellingham Academy again. Can Stevie solve a cold case when a current case is threatening her safety and sanity? And will she ever see a moose?

Truly Devious has a split personality disorder. The historic crime is witty and literary and has allusions to Dorothy Parker and F. Scott Fitzgerald and the Lindbergh kidnapping, while the modern half is oozing YA angst the likes of which I haven't seen since I read the dreck that Cassandra Clare calls "writing." And OMG I just looked up Maureen Johnson and she wrote for The Bane Chronicles and Ghosts of the Shadow Market and Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy and is friends with Cassandra Clare! Life actually makes sense! I wasn't just losing my mind. Well, I'm probably still losing my mind but not in regards to this. The problem of this split in the narrative is that I wasn't yet invested in Stevie and her angst and her feelings for David and her panic disorder and instead was just waiting for the story to take me back to the thirties. I wanted to be in that glittering world. I wanted to immerse myself in the Truly Devious crime. I wanted to solve it along with Stevie, only I wanted to do it without really learning anything about her. Which isn't really fair to Stevie, but that's just how it is. But then again, Maureen Johnson doesn't really play fair either. The main complaint I've seen with regard to this book is that the mystery isn't solved. Not the historic or the present day crime are in any way concluded. We are just left with more questions than answers. Which, at the time, only slightly irked me. I had gotten the book from the library and as soon as I finished it I was able to buy the boxed set and was able to continue reading the trilogy so as to solve the crime. But when I told a friend of mine how much I loved the series, which he eventually agreed with, he pointed out the lack of resolution in the first book and how this just wasn't done. And the more I thought about it the more I agreed. I didn't expect the historical mystery to be resolved but the modern mystery needed to be at the very least. I was able to binge these books one right after the other, but imagine having to wait a year between each installment? That could lead to some very disgruntled readers. Thankfully as you read this review, know that you can, over the course of three books, learn whodunit.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Albert Ellingham, Cassandra Clare, Charles Lindbergh, Dorothy Parker, Ellingham Academy, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Maureen Johson, Stevie Bell, Summer School, True Crime, Truly Devious, Unsolved Mysteries, Vermont

The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West
Published by: EFE Books
Publication Date: 1939
Format: Kindle, 206 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Tod Hackett is looking for inspiration. He wants to do a great painting, it's what his Ivy League education demands, but moving west to Hollywood means his skills are only useful in scenic work on films. Not exactly work that has depth and meaning, which is what could be said for the town and it's denizens. The more people he meets the more he realizes that Hollywood is full of frauds and wannabes with eyes full of hatred. He wants to capture this in his great work, "The Burning of Los Angeles." He wants to watch the town burn and immortalize the conflagration. In his apartment complex there is the full array of the Hollywood unwashed, the failed dreamers, the bookmakers, the screenwriters, and the failed actresses. Faye Greener is a failed actress, though she'd never admit as much. She's just doing what she needs to to get by until her big break. Tod becomes obsessed with Faye. He wants Faye but she always keeps him at a distance which results in him fantasizing of taking her by force. It's Tod's obsession with Faye that keeps him constantly in her orbit. He is stuck in a twilight world of hangers-on. Faye plays her men off each other. She seems to get far more enjoyment from their anger than their attentions. There's Earle, an ersatz cowboy, Miguel, a fake Native American, and most importantly, Homer Simpson. Homer came west for his health, one of those who come to California to die, and has ended up supporting Faye. It's unclear what he gets from the relationship other than pain and heartbreak. All these people scrap and fight in Homer's house in the valley. There's brawls and violence and cockfights and pornography. This group of people is endemic of what is happening in Hollywood and one night it all boils over. Homer tries to leave, there's an incident with a precocious child actor who has been taunting him and Los Angeles burns. Just as Tod envisioned.

A book needs to have something going for it, a compelling plot, compelling characters, or a compelling message. If you have all these things, all the better, if you have none of them, you have The Day of the Locust. I know, you could argue with me that it does have several messages, the deevolution of man to animals instincts, that California is where the American Dream goes to die, that it was a clarion call to take heed of the rise of fascism, but guess what? I don't care. This isn't an introduction to literature class where we sit around and justify this book as a Classic with a capital "C." This is nothing more nor less than a study in entropy with such violence against women that it is triggering to read. Tod again and again has rape fantasies. He plainly states that "[n]othing less violent than rape would do" in his pursuit of Faye. That isn't love, that is violent obsession. And I'm sorry, but that doesn't make him a quicky character, that makes him a sexual predator. I can't get past this. Tod is the epitome of all the characters in this book, horrible people living lurid lives. These are not people I want to read about because these are not people I want to spend time with. Have you ever been at a party you didn't want to go to and you don't really know anyone at and then all of a sudden the atmosphere shifts and you realize not only do you really not want to be there but that it could be dangerous? Well that's The Day of the Locust. I mean, maybe if it was eloquently written there could have been some redeeming factor. I think you can gather already that there was not. Nathanael West can write descriptions but when it comes to action? Oh, the cockfight and the riot are such a mess that they literally did not make sense. There was one section of the book where Tod goes to a party and for a second I was confused, the writing was assured, the story made sense, and then I realized that it was completely lifted from The Great Gatsby, female tennis pro and all, but with a lurid pornography twist. In an interesting aside, West was good friends with F. Scott Fitzgerald, and the day after F. Scott died of a heart attack Nathanael West ran a stop sign that killed both him and his wife. A cruel person would say that perhaps West had no more reason to live because he had no more work to rip-off... But I'm not quite that cruel, unlike the other reviewers who said that The Day of the Locust was overly praised because of West's death before he was even forty. I will just say this book was not for me and no matter how people praise Miss Lonelyhearts there's not a chance in hell I'm ever reading it.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: American Dream, Classics, Entropy, F. Scott Fitzgerald, For the Love of Book Clubs, Hollywood, Homer Simpson, Miss Lonelyhearts, Nathanael West, Rape, The Day of the Locust, The Great Gatsby, Triggering

Z: The Beginning of Everything
Based on the book by Therese Anne Fowler
Starring: Christina Ricci, Maya Kazan, Sarah Schenkkan, Jamie Anne Allman, David Strathairn, Kristine Nielsen, Scott Rosenfeld, David Hoflin, Jim True-Frost, Talia Balsam, Matt Malloy, Holly Curran, Jordan Dean, Corey Cott, Andrew Call, Andrew Bridges, Joel Brady, AJ Cedeno, Christina Bennett Lind, Natalie Knepp, Lucy Walters, Bill Phillips, Tony Manna, Cameron Scoggins, Conor Donovan, Randy Kovitz, Sean Bell, Ian Jarvis, Jun Naito, and Gene Jones
Release Date: January 27th, 2017
Rating: ★★★★
To Watch

Zelda is a bit of a whirlwind to the belles of Montgomery, Alabama. She swims, in a nude colored bathing suit, she dances, ballet as well as the more risque numbers, she parties, she drinks, she smokes, she hangs outside the local whorehouse with her friends shaming the men going inside. She isn't like anything that is expected or acceptable, yet she is endearing, even to her exasperated family. She's the baby who is going to break all the rules and when F. Scott Fitzgerald enters her life, he's the biggest break their is. A Yankee who aspires to be a writer who will break her heart again and again, yet she cannot live without him, she cannot give him up. And she does try. But then his book is finally accepted for publication and Zelda finally accepts his marriage proposal and their whirlwind of a life begins. Arriving in New York City Zelda is overwhelmed by how vast and big their new life shall be. They get married and the nonstop party begins that very night in the honeymoon suite of their hotel. Zelda soon realizes that in order to fit in she's going to have to be even bolder and brassier and bare herself to be accepted as Scott's wife. So she transforms into a character straight out of one of Scott's stories. Short hair, sultry dresses, no more frills and furbelows for the wife of F. Scott! But also because she's his wife, no more freedom with her own artistic expression. Any dreams of taking her "it" girl status to the next level in Hollywood is stifled by Scott. She's there to come to his readings, to inspire him, to be on his arm as he parades his success in front of all those who thought he'd never make it. A success that needs a followup if they are to keep living the life they are. Because the bills keep piling up and Zelda keeps spending the money, being kept in the dark by Scott as to their finances. Therefore they must leave New York and they get a house in Westport. There all their troubles are amplified and things come to a head. But one thing is certain, no matter how bad they are for each other they cannot survive apart. 

Therese Anne Fowler's book on Zelda Fitzgerald is an interesting logistical puzzle when you get to adapting it. From the framing device to Zelda and Scott's power dynamic to the narrative style, everything had to be reconsidered within this new medium. First and foremost is switching from a first person narrative to a hybrid which fleshes out the characters as something other than just how Zelda sees them while maintaining her voice. In order to successfully do this I was intrigued that instead of having Zelda and Scott somewhat equals they softened Zelda and hardened Scott, leaning heavily into being "Team Zelda" as Fowler herself puts it. Instead of Zelda's work and influence on Scott as a kind of "collaboration under duress" Scott is all out stealing her words and making them his own. He comes across as a pilfering, hostile, unlikable drunk, who will hurt Zelda any way he can. Now the book didn't endear me to Scott, but this series, it made me really hate him. There wasn't really any grey areas to their relationship, it was much more black and white, and to me, maybe a bit more romantic because there is the victim and the victor, and Zelda is deified as the true genius. While this might feel less realistic, Zelda has spent years being the millstone around Scott's neck in biographies and movies, so perhaps it was time for a little justice. Perhaps it was time for Zelda to be the out and out heroine. It sure made for bingeable viewing! Each thirty minute slice of life flowed into the next until the abrupt ending, which was meant to bridge into a second season which was commissioned and then cancelled. I can see why, once their daughter Scottie enters the picture their life changes and the show wouldn't have had the roaring twenties ritziness that so exemplifies the first season. The look, the feel, the sets, the costumes, everything made this time period come alive, almost more than the book. Because if anything, the twenties is about appearances, and well, no matter how well written a book is, sometimes things have to be seen to be believed.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: 1920s, Christina Ricci, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Roaring Back to Reading, Roaring Twenties, Team Zelda, Therese Anne Fowler, Wife, Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald, Z: The Beginning of Everything, Zelda Fitzgerald

Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald by Therese Anne Fowler
Published by: St. Martin's Press
Publication Date: March 26th, 2013
Format: Hardcover, 375 Pages
Rating: ★★★
To Buy

On the eve of her husband's death Zelda looks back on their life and writes to him about their future, their next great act that she doesn't know will never come. She was the belle of the ball and he was the Yankee soldier with ambitions of being a writer who swept her off her feet despite a lack of prospects and a northern upbringing. But marrying an unpublished writer would be folly. Therefore Zelda broke Scott's heart in order to push him to finish rewriting his first novel. Eight days after This Side of Paradise was published they were married and their decadent life in New York City began. Their bank account would widely fluctuate from being able to afford the most luxurious raccoon coats to not being able to buy groceries. Not that Scott bothered to tell Zelda about their finances, when in need he'd sacrifice his talent and his time writing his next great novel to churning out a story for the magazines he vocally reviled. But New York would prove too costly and with a baby on the way they moved to Minnesota to be near Scott's family. There Zelda found a surprising opportunity besides being a new mother she started to write pieces for the magazines Scott disliked. But he didn't dislike the money or his wife getting credit, even if he often received partial or full credit on her work. Zelda did dislike that. But what was she to do as the wife of a famous author who was notorious for spending more than he could earn. This habit soon led them to a vagrant lifestyle in France where their money could stretch further. They surrounded themselves with artists and authors yet Zelda resented always being the wife. And then Hemingway came into their life. Driving even more of a wedge between the now acrimonious couple. But through the years to come, the ups and downs, the coast to coast relocations, the drinking, the hospitalizations, they always came back to each other, until they no longer could. Until that day in December when Scott left this world.

There's a fine line that is tread when writing a fictional book about a real person, you have to go more for the emotional connection while still keeping enough historical content to ground it in reality. I find this is even more so for wives of authors, and yes, this is a whole subset of historical fiction. Because so much is known about certain authors that their wives, even if they aren't as famous as Zelda, are part of the mystique of the author. Part of their legend. And a truly successful book about a "wife" is one in which she is able to break away from her husband's legacy and be seen for herself. The problem is with Scott and Zelda they are so intertwined that this book is more about their suffocating co-dependence and how that affected Zelda emotional, physically, and artistically. And to get this emotional connection Fowler has gone the logical root of being "Team Zelda" and demonizing Scott, to an extent. Because as she mentions at the end of the book, fans of the Fiztgeralds are all about taking sides. But just the basic facts of Scott viewing the life they lived together as fodder for HIS work ONLY should be enough to make you sympathize with Zelda. Her letters, her stories, her reviews, her diaries, her experiences, all of it, Scott laid claim to. She was his "wife" and nothing more. Fowler shows quite clearly and sympathetically that this is what destroyed them. They destroyed each other because Scott laying claim to Zelda's life forced her into a mental collapse resulting in him becoming her caretaker. So while I felt the narrative got to the heart of the issue I still felt that it could have been presented more eloquently. The beginning of the book is so beautifully written but as the story continues, as Zelda's life disintegrates, the quality trails off, the story becomes more elliptical and suffers. This book is a good start for those interested in Zelda and the Fiztgeralds, but as the author says herself; "Look closer and you'll see something extraordinary, mystifying, something real and true." Just don't look for it here.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Alcohol, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, France, Minnesota, New York, Roaring Back to Reading, Team Zelda, Therese Anne Fowler, This Side of Paradise, Wife, Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald, Zelda Fitzgerald

Zelda Fitzgerald is a tragic figure, and not just because she died sedated and locked in in a fire that broke out at the hospital she was living at in Asheville, North Carolina, claiming her life and the lives of eight other women when she was only forty-seven, but because she will forever be known, and to some vilified, as F. Scott Fitzgerald's wife. Born in Montgomery, Alabama, Zelda Sayre, was the pampered baby of her family. She was active and artistic from an early age, taking an interest in swimming and dance, and later an interest in drink and boys. She was as shocking as she could be given the society she was surrounded with and her strict father, the judge. But the war and the parties for the troops gave her greater leeway than a southern belle would normally have and right before her eighteenth birthday she met F. Scott and both their lives would be forever entwined and she would find notoriety as the "first American flapper."

After their marriage while she at first reveled in Scott's success, the fact that she was contributing to that success uncredited was a thorn in her side. He often took whole sections of her writing, especially from her journals, and used them for his work. When she'd write pieces of her own she would have to share writing credit just in order to get paid a fair price, or that's what Scott and his agent said. She was creatively stifled, not able to write or draw or do anything without Scott overriding her. Therefore she took solace in dance. Only she took her escape to the extreme, pushing herself too hard, making herself sick. When Scott finally told her to give up her dreams she broke down and was hospitalized. From the age of thirty onwards she would spend her life in and out of hospitals. Many people will insist that her illness and Scott's caregiving duties are what led him to never fulfill his early potential. But Scott put it best: “Perhaps 50 percent of our friends and relatives would tell you in all honest conviction that my drinking drove Zelda insane - the other half would assure you that her insanity drove me to drink.” They weren't good for each other and they self-destructed, but what a conflagration to behold.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: 1920s, Alabama, Alcohol, American, Asylum, Caregiving, Dance, Drinking, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Flapper, Hospitalization, North Carolina, Roaring Back to Reading, Southern Belle, Zelda, Zelda Fitzgerald, Zelda Sayre

The Great Gatsby
Based on the book by F. Scott Fitgerald
Starring: Tobey Maguire, Jack Thompson, Leonardo DiCaprio, Joel Edgerton, Carey Mulligan, Elizabeth Debicki, Jason Clarke, Isla Fisher, Adelaide Clemens, Kate Mulvany, Iota, Gus Murray, Max Cullen, Brendan Maclean, Richard Carter, Jake Ryan, Amitabh Bachchan, Kim Knuckey, David Furlong, Steve Bisley, Callan McAuliffe, and Tasman Palazzi
Release Date: May 1st, 2013
Rating: ★★★★
To Buy

After the events of the previous summer Nick Carraway is a disillusioned drunk who has had himself committed. Talking with Dr. Perkins he reveals that the only true thing he found through all he endured was Jay Gatsby. Dr. Perkins recommends that Nick, who has always had ambitions of being a writer, write about Gatsby. Write about his experiences with this man. The book doesn't need to be for anyone other than himself, but the doctor thinks it will help Nick recover. Over the course of the winter as it thaws and becomes spring Nick writes Gatsby's story, which begins with Nick going to see his old college classmate Tom Buchanan in East Egg, an athlete through and through who spends his copious leisure time playing polo or playing around with his mistress Myrtle. Myrtle is a bit of a surprise to Nick as he thought Tom happily married to Daisy, who happens to be Nick's cousin. But according to Myrtle's sister, neither Tom nor Myrtle love their respective spouses. This is the first real step down into the depravity that will take ahold of Nick. But for awhile he will stay afloat because of his neighbor in West Egg, Jay Gatsby. Gatsby throws the most lavish, most decadent, most extraordinary parties, and yet no one, other than Nick, has actually ever been invited. They just show up and the Bacchanalia begins. But who would throw a party and then not partake of the revels? That is the enigma of Gatsby. Soon though Nick will be privy to all because of his unique situation and relation to Daisy. Gatsby has a favor to ask, a simple favor, he wants Nick to invite Daisy to tea, and then he'll just stroll in and sweep Daisy off her feet. Because five long years ago they were in love. This was before the war, when Jay was a penniless nobody, and Daisy loved him but knew she must marry for money. Now Gatsby wants to erase the intervening five years. Make Daisy's love for Tom nonexistent, and their happiness guaranteed. But life can't be so easily rewritten. Time moves forward, tragedy strikes, and disillusionment settles in.       

An over-the-top, frenetic, hyperactive adaptation that is the unholy lovechild of Dick Tracy and Sin City. But The Great Gatsby lacks the production quality and artistry of those two films which actually broke new ground instead of mashing up a whole lot of old and trying to make it new again. The problem all resides with Baz Luhrmann, he wants this film to be Busby Berkley on acid but he just doesn't have the talent of even the lowliest Hollywood hack director from the golden age of cinema. His work is all surface and no substance, just movies with catchy playlists, which on paper would make Luhrmann the ideal director for The Great Gatsby, but the problem is this adaptation strives to be something more, something greater, and therefore Luhrmann should have backed the hell away and just messed about with more absurd themes for the MET Gala. How about vintage advertising with a smattering of Erté? Because he sure as hell loved those visuals in this film, which, while cool, would have made Fitzgerald roll over in his grave. As for the framing device that reeks of a hackneyed Citizen Kane wannabe, it seems more like some desperate need to make Nick's narration plausible to a modern audience instead of just accepting that sometimes stories have narrators. Yes, it was interesting having Nick locked up for being a dipsomaniac writing Gatsby's story as therapy, thus combining Zelda and Scott into a single creative force that birthed the novel, but it was unnecessary. So much of this film is unnecessary. The movie takes half of it's screen time trying to figure itself out, much like the actor's accents. Leo finally landed on Kennedy if you were wondering, as for some of the others it's anyone's guess. But the end result of all THIS is a film that somehow succeeds in spite of itself because of the casting. Leo brings a depth to Gatsby you never thought possible. You feel he is lonely and hopeful and lost. You actually feel for him. You can see why Nick believes in him. Leo is a Gatsby to believe in and his loss is our loss.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Adaptation, Asylum, Baz Luhrmann, Carey Mulligan, Citizen Kane, Dick Tracy, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gatsby, Hollywood, Leonardo DiCaprio, Nick Carraway, Roaring Back to Reading, Sin City, The Great Gatsby, Zelda

The Great Gatsby
Based on the book by F. Scott Fitgerald
Starring: Paul Rudd, Martin Donovan, Mira Sorvino, Francie Swift, Alex Bisping, Bill Camp, Heather Goldenhersh, Janine Theriault, Matt Malloy, Richard Jutras, Jerry Grayson, Megan Broadman, Paul Hopkins, and Burt Harris
Release Date: January 14th, 2001
Rating: ★★★★
To Buy

Twenty miles outside New York City there are two eggs. Nick Carraway has found himself in the less desirable West Egg as he works in bonds in the city. But he has acquaintances in East Egg and the convergence of East and West will be memorable. One night he takes himself over to West Egg to see an old classmate from Yale who just so happens to have married his cousin Daisy. The Buchanans live a charmed and luxurious life, never worrying about what happens in their wake, and a ghost from the past will soon change their lives forever. But first there's the dinner. Nick is the only other guest besides the golf pro and childhood friend of Daisy, Jordan Baker. When Tom Buchanan gets a call during the dinner hour and Daisy storms out after her husband Jordan fills Nick in on the gossip. Tom has a girl in the city and that's her on the phone. Nick's a little surprised that Tom has the brainpower to juggle two women, but Jordan's suspicions are soon confirmed when Tom forces Nick to join him on a trip into New York City where they pick up Myrtle Wilson on the way. Once they reach the city Nick tries to break away from the couple only to be dragged into a party at their love nest with Myrtle's sister. There Nick can barely stomach the lies about Daisy being a Catholic and the violence that Tom unleashes against Myrtle and therefore he drinks. Later, inebriated, he stumbles home where he finds a manservant asleep on his front step with an invitation from his neighbor, the infamous Jay Gatsby, to come to his next party. The night of the party Nick walks over to Gatsby's house that's lit up like the world's fair. Nick feels a little superior to all the party goers knowing that he was in fact invited by the host, unlike most who just pile into a car on a weekend and head out to West Egg. Nick meets his elusive host and is invited to lunch in the city where Gatsby tells him his story and how Nick can help him achieve the one goal he has been working towards. He wants to see Daisy. Jordan fills in the details for Nick about how Gatsby and Daisy where an item but he went off to war and she married Tom. But Gatsby has never forgotten her and wants Nick to invite Daisy over so that Gatsby can show her the man he has become in an effort to take her away from her life without him. There reconciliation is everything Gatsby could have hoped for. What happens next as a result is nothing but a tragedy.    

What I find odd is how little impact any adaptation of The Great Gatsby has ever had on me. With the 1974 version I know I watched it with my Mom because she wanted me to see it, and she liked heckling movies with Robert Redford, but the only scene in the whole film I remembered is Edward Herrmann playing the piano. Then there's this TV adaptation and I have nothing. Just a blank. Oddly I remember tons of press leading up to the broadcast. An article in People about Toby Stephens being Maggie Smith's son and the "next big thing" has stayed with me more than the adaptation. Now I adore Toby, but my adoration didn't happen for many, many years, in fact it wasn't until after watching this and even Cambridge Spies and Poirot and The Queen's Sister that he made a lasting impression with Jane Eyre, but rewatching it I think I can be exempted for my lapse in memory because he's SO Jay Gatsby that you don't think of him as an actor who exists outside this role. That smile which feels like a veneer to coverup the mobster underneath is perfection. Unlike with Redford's performance you actually believe all the rumors about this Gatsby. Also I don't think I've ever seen Toby Stephens smile this much, which in itself would throw off even his diehard fans. So yes, at the time, I will admit, I was in this mainly for Paul Rudd, and a little for Mira Sorvino, because I've always loved her. But I don't know how everything about it was so forgettable because it is actually a really strong adaptation. For the first half hour it feels a bit like a beat for beat remake of the 1974 version, but listen to the genius music from Carl Davis hinting as to where this adaptation is going to go, he brings this to a whole new level. It feels like a made for TV movie that would have been event viewing in 1986, "Sidney Sheldon presents The Great Gatsby!" In fact I bet despite being only seventeen in 1986 Paul Rudd would have looked exactly the same if this was made then! And as for Rudd's Nick Carraway, at first I found his narration a little too detached, but then I noticed the subtle wry humor, the smirks, the badly concealed laughter, and I came to love this snarky version of Nick. The only flaw in the whole adaptation is the added specificity of Gatsby's wealth being tied up in fake bonds, though my Dad would probably say it was Myrtle's overly graphic death. Yes, the bonds angle made a nice parallel to what Nick's work was, but I didn't like this invented specificity. Gatsby is and should remain a mystery. 

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Adaptation, Bonds, Cambridge Spies, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jane Eyre, Mira Sorvino, Paul Rudd, Poirot, Roaring Back to Reading, Robert Redford, Sidney Sheldon, The Great Gatsby, The Queen's Sister, Toby Stephens

The Great Gatsby
Based on the book by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Starring: Sam Waterston, Bruce Dern, Mia Farrow, Lois Chiles, Robert Redford, Scott Wilson, Karen Black, Kathryn Leigh Scott, Edward Herrmann, John Devlin, Howard Da Silva, Patsy Kensit, Marjorie Wildes, and Roberts Blossom
Release Date: March 29th, 1974
Rating: ★★
To Rent

Nick Carraway is sailing the choppy waters from West Egg to East Egg to visit an old classmate from Yale and his wife, who happens to be Nick's cousin. Tom and Daisy Buchanan have a luxurious life of ponies and idleness. In fact Daisy barely is able to work up anything other than a sweat in the hot summer air until her friend Jordan mentions Nick's neighbor, a certain Gatsby who is known for his parties. But Gatsby's name is soon forgotten as Tom's mistress calls the house just as they are about to sit down to their repast. Tom is wild about his mistress Myrtle, and soon Nick is headed into New York City to spend a day cavorting with Tom and Myrtle and their new puppy. Their relationship is painted as a tragic love story, both no longer love their spouses and want to be together, but rumor is that Daisy, being a Catholic, would never allow a divorce. They live in a world of rumor and supposition. No one knows what's true or what's fantasy. And no one is gossiped about more than Gatsby. Did he kill a man? Did he go to Oxford? Did his family die and leave him a fortune? Did he earn all the money for his mansion in only three years? Soon Nick will be closer to the truth than anyone else as Gatsby invites him into his house and into his confidence. Because Gatsby needs Nick. Nick will be his conduit to Daisy. Gatsby has loved Daisy since they first met though they haven't set eyes on each other in almost eight years. Nick can be the cover for their affair and from Nick's point of view, if Tom is free to be with Myrtle why can't Daisy be with Gatsby? Their affair takes them back to their youth as they waltz about his house, he in his uniform, her in her debutante dress, yet perfect happiness is hard to find in this world, which is messy and complicated. Perhaps it's a fool's errand to think you can recapture what is lost, and they are all perfect little fools. 

The 1974 adaptation of The Great Gatsby is a technicolor phantasmagoria that felt like it had more in common with Roald Dahl's adaptation of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory that debuted three years earlier than the original source material by F. Scott Fitzgerald. As we luxuriate over a veritable rainbow of shirts and more vintage copper jelly molds than I've ever seen I almost expected Mia Farrow to break into song using one of the many fish-shaped molds as her singing partner. Because this adaptation is all about how things look, the feel of old Hollywood, the pastel suits and shirts suitable for a revival of Easter Parade, forgetting that classic cinema actually crafted a narrative that didn't feel like one overly long photoshoot for Ralph Lauren, who actually provided Redford's costumes. That idea of the still image, the photograph, is brought home again and again with the images of Daisy plastered throughout Gatsby's private rooms. And if the visuals hadn't bombarded you enough with the director's vision the music will drive it further into your brainpan with the constant use of the song "What'll I Do." That earworm of "what'll I do with just a photograph of you" will get under your skin like an itch you cannot scratch while the actors play at being in a film while actually just sleepwalking through this piece trying to look pretty for the camera. Pretty pictures of what was and will always be a doomed romance with some heavy handed foreshadowing means the film has created it's own symbolism instead of actually bothering with any of the book's. In fact I feel sorry for Bruce Dern, while Redford and Farrow are off waltzing in prewar garb in some tragic glimpse of faded romance, he should be applauded for being memorable with what little he was given because the rest of this film could float away like one of those pink clouds Daisy wishes to put Gatsby in and no one would miss it when it's gone.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Adaptation, Bruce Dern, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Daisy Buchanan, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gatsby, Hollywood, Mia Farrow, Roald Dahl, Roaring Back to Reading, Robert Redford, The Great Gatsby, Tom Buchanan

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Published by: Penguin
Publication Date: 1925
Format: Hardcover, 198 Pages
Rating: ★★★
To Buy

Nick Carraway has moved east to sell bonds in New York City. Because that's what young men do to make money right? Move east and sell bonds. But living out on Long Island he has an advantage across the bay. His wealthy former classmate from Yale, Tom Buchanan, lives in a luxurious house with his wife Daisy, who just happens to be Nick's cousin. At Nick's first dinner at their home he meets Jordan Baker, a rather infamous golfer, and gets ringside seats to the drama of the Buchanan household. There's trouble in paradise as Tom's mistress has the gall to call during the dinner hour! Of course, being old classmates, Nick is drawn into Tom's extramarital activities, and it isn't long before Nick is partying in the couple's love nest in the city where Myrtle's sister is insisting to Nick that Tom and Myrtle are miserable in their marriages and if it wasn't for Daisy being a Catholic there'd be two divorces and one marriage faster than you can blink. Nick can't be sure of this assertion and soon his life is about to be complicated by even more intrigue. He's going to be brought into Jay Gatsby's orbit. Jay Gatsby is Nick's infamous neighbor. Infamous for his parties and his secretive past. Everyone comes to his parties and yet no one ever sees him. Nick is about to see a lot of him as he brings Nick into his world and into his greatest regret, losing Daisy, the love of his life. He asks Nick to be a go-between. Of course fearing rejection he uses his own go-between, Jordan Baker. The request is simple enough, can Nick invite Daisy to his humble abode, only to have Gatsby swing in and take them to his manse next door? Nick is glad to help, especially as it's Jordan asking, and soon, like Daisy, he is under Gatsby's spell. But as Gatsby and Daisy's courtship from before the war proves, love and wooing never go smooth. Soon Tom realizes what is happening and there is a great reckoning that not everyone survives. That is the price of wealth and woo.

The Great Gatsby is light on plot with little depth and an unreliable narrator and for those very reasons it has become a classic. Other than a distinct "Americanness" and much rumination on the American Dream, everything is open to interpretation. Can we believe a word Nick says? Probably not. Can we blame Gatsby for how he made his fortune in order to woo the woman he loves? Depends on how he really got his money... which the characters themselves like to discuss ad nauseam. Can the valley of ashes be real or is it just a metaphor? You can literally read anything you want into this book. I was strongly reminded in the laborious and best skipped introduction of certain friends of mine who can talk for hours on end about the color symbolism in 2001: A Space Odyssey. What red means in one shot, followed by the blue of another. If they had a desire to, which I'm sure they don't, they could go into the symbolism of color that larders the pages of this book. The green light at the end of Daisy's dock, the golden sheen coming off Gatsby, all of it can be taken as something or nothing. The green could be tied to Daisy and how her voice is full of money. The green could be her openness to Gatsby's return. His golden sheen could be an outward aura of his wealth or a reference to the golden calf from the Bible and all the symbolism that weights him down because of that. In fact, though I never took a high school class that actually read The Great Gatsby, I can see why it's a popular one to teach. There is so much that can be drawn out of this book literally anything any student says is a possible interpretation. There is no wrong answer where it comes to The Great Gatsby! In fact, here's my weird little interpretation. I think The Great Gatsby is the inspiration for the TV series Remington Steele. Now prove me wrong! You literally can't. Steele is a man of infinite style whose past is dubious and who embodies the American Dream. He may or may not have tragedy in his past and as for that past, it shifts and changes with each retelling. Who knows, he might also have medals for heroic service as well as the known warrants for his arrest. This is how much this one book has become a part of the American consciousness that a popular TV show from the 80s could draw meaning form it for a modern audience and make it continually relevant. The Great Gatsby is a book for the ages.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: 1920s, 2001, American Dream, Daisy Buchanan, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gatsby, High School, Nick Carraway, Remington Steele, Roaring Back to Reading, Symbolism, The Great Gatsby, Tom Buchanan, Unreliable Narrator

If you were only allowed to pick one writer who encapsulated the zeitgeist of the 1920s your answer would be F. Scott Fitzgerald. I mean he is credited with naming this era the Jazz Age, a moniker first used in his 1922 short story collection Tales of the Jazz Age. What's more is he embodied the hedonistic lifestyle of free flowing booze and partying that everyone associates with this decade. Most of his early life, growing up in Minnesota and New York State, disappears in the telling of his life as if he emerged fully formed as a not-quite-graduate of Princeton and a second lieutenant in the infantry stationed in Montgomery, Alabama, where he met Zelda. Their lives were so entwined that you can't tell the story of one without the other. Their pasts are almost irrelevant. Yet Scott wanted to be a writer more than he wanted anything else, even a degree from Princeton. But his hastily completed novel, The Romantic Egotist, was rejected by Scribners. With the war ended and the thought that he might forever lose Zelda if he couldn't support her he rewrote The Romantic Egotist and it was published by Scribners as This Side of Paradise on March 26th, 1920, and eight days later he married Zelda.

Always hard up for cash due to their dissolute lifestyle Scott was forever writing short stories which he hated while trying to write his next great novel. He failed in many artistic attempts, from theater to cinema, and eventually he, Zelda, and their daughter Scottie, ended up in Paris as part of the Lost Generation where a dollar could stretch farther. But Europe, and Scott's friendship with Hemingway, didn't help their marriage, and they slowly destroyed each other. Scott died in Hollywood at the age of 44 from a heart attack virtually forgotten. After his death his work was reevaluated due to a resurgence in popularity in World War II because The Great Gatsby was chosen to be a part of the Armed Services Editions. His work is also a staple of high schools and colleges across the country, guaranteeing he will never be forgotten, even if it's sometimes students bemoaning having to read his work. Well Scott would have probably bemoaned it himself, not read the book, and written his own.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: 1920s, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Hollywood, Jazz, Paris, Princeton, Roaring Back to Reading, Tales of the Jazz Age, The Great Gatsby, The Lost Generation, This Side of Paradise, WWII, Zelda Fitzgerald

So here we go! The blog is fully back. Or I'm hoping it is. We'll see won't we? I took a year off in an attempt to quell the chaos that my life had become. Well, I don't know how things are going for you but that didn't work out so well. I was so excited for the start of this decade, the twenties are back people! But I didn't want it to start with a pandemic like it did a hundred years ago. Just goes to show that everything has a price apparently. The pandemic had me thinking I'd scrap my return, just continue to hide out in my house grumbling about people not wearing masks or social distancing, but then I realized that now IS the time to come back. Everyone needs an escape right now and everyone needs a community to belong to, and books set in another time are a perfect panacea, and my friends, my online community, YOU are what is keeping me sane. So it's time to get Roaring Back to Reading! To delve into the decade of decadence. The Roaring Twenties, where authors became stars and were fodder for gossip columnists! I'll be talking about several celebrity authors, some, like Scott and Zelda, who embodied the zeitgeist far more than say Virginia Woolf or Agatha Christie, who were still very influential. I'll be looking at the books, the adaptations, the stories of their lives, and I hope you'll join me. What else do you have on the books?

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:01 AM 0 comments  

Labels: 1920s, Agatha Christie, Blog, Blogging, Community, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Online, Pandemic, Reading, Roaring Back to Reading, Roaring Twenties, Twenties, Virgina Woolf, Zeitgeist, Zelda Fitzgerald

Shades of Milk and Honey by Mary Robinette Kowal
Published by: Tor
Publication Date: July 26th, 2010
Format: Hardcover, 304 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy
Jane and Melody Ellsworth are as different as two sisters can be. Jane is starting to accept the inevitability of her spinsterhood. At 28, there is no hope of finding a husband, particularly when Mr. Dunkirk, the man who holds a special place in her heart, is also the object of Melody's affections. Jane knows her beauty is no match to Melody's. Even if Jane is adept in the magical arts and can make the most fabulous glamours and illusions, she herself knows that men prefer beauty over brains. But more importantly, she would never stand in the way of Melody's happiness. Soon the small group of friends in Dorchester receives a few additions to their ranks. Mr. Dunkirk's younger sister Beth arrives, but the withdrawn and sallow young girl with a mysterious past is nothing to what is happening at the Viscountess's. Not only is her favorite, and need it be said, dashing, nephew, Captain Livingston, is arriving after years away, but she has also hired the famous Glamourist Mr. Vincent to make a wooded wonderland of her dining hall.

Soon everyone is coming and going between the homes with dinners and strawberry picnics, and all manner of enjoyments. Jane starts to hope that perhaps her sisters affections for Mr. Dunkirk are waning, as Jane befriends his sister and starts to hope that he might indeed have feelings for her, not Melody. The course of love never runs smooth though, neither does felicity between sisters. Melody and Jane have a falling out because Melody is willing to do anything to ensnare her man, even fain injury. Can talent and brains when out over conniving beauty? Or will the answer to true happiness be something and someone different than Jane ever thought.

Shades of Milk and Honey is like the best possible Jane Austen mash-up, drawing threads from her entire oeuvre. It's like if Elinor and Marianne had a major falling out with secret engagements to multiple parties. Then on top of everything, throw in some magic! The book is very much a slow burn. For a long time you just enjoy the routine of the characters very much pulled from the pages of Austen. The domesticity of everyday life is here on the pages for us to fall into. But instead of just painting or working on embroidery, the characters are using magic to enhance the world around them. There are the dances, there are the grand diners, and there are the arguments over fabrics at the modiste. Yet under the guise of Jane Austen fanfiction, like the threads of ether invisible to the naked eye used in a glamour, Mary Robinette Kowal is not only building an ending that packs a punch with the sheer number of Austenian endings happening simultaneously, but a deeper story about art and passion and love.

The magical element has this book being categorized as in the vein of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. While I can see the connections, one couldn't with two books both set in Regency England and employing the use of magic, but I think they are truly very different. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell has a far more faerie aspect. But more then that, for all the comparisons to Austen, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell is a far more masculine book with female undercurrents. Whereas Shades of Milk and Honey is derived more directly from Austen and stays within the female sphere. In fact, I will assert that, despite being of the same subset genre of the other Regency Magic books out there, Shades of Milk and Honey is so uniquely its own that it sets itself apart by the cunning deviations of magical usage.

In all the books I've read over the past few months set during this time and dealing with magic, the magic itself has practical applications. The magic is used for defeating foes, vanquishing Napoleon, this is, after all, the prime time to vanquish him, and other active endeavors. Now I'm not saying that the magic system here won't try to embrace this down the road, I have after all read this series before, but in this first volume the magic doesn't have many practical uses, magic is just art. Magic, or, as I should say, glamour, is just another womanly art, to be lumped in with embroidery, painting, and playing the piano. In fact glamour can enhance these already existing arts with subtle touches. Glamour is a home art, and is a skill that is recommended for a good wife to have. A way to add those special touches that make a house a home. The fact that it is womanly, finally giving a legitimate reason for women to swoon, is also why Mr. Vincent's chosen profession as Glamourist causes consternation to his family.

But Mr. Vincent understands the heights to which glamour can reach, and it's Jane's embracing of this revolutionary knowledge, to her, that calls out to the artist in me. The truth is anyone, given time, can become proficient in art or music. They can be technically wonderful, but that is all there is. Every key may be hit, every brushstroke executed to perfection, and yet there is something missing. This is what Mr. Vincent sees in Jane's art. Her studying and her interest in dissecting Vincent's work has given her technical perfection. But without the passion, without the raw emotions channeled into the art, then it can never be moving, it can never take a good artist and make them great. That passion inside you is what makes you strive, makes you see something and be inspired. Makes you always trying, learning, doing. There's a reason the greatest artists are caricatured as being passionate and emotional people, because deep down, if you don't have this, you won't make it.

The love and passion of art that the character of Mr. Vincent embodies is what pulls you into the story. It's as if Darcy and Elizabeth where dueling artists where their passion was expounded upon more, a Regency Zelda and F. Scott if you will. Jane's development from a retiring spinster to passionate artist because of the revelations gleaned from Mr. Vincent's journal literally took my breath away with it's beauty, simplicity, and passion. The scene where Jane gives way to all those bottled up emotions and creates the grove of trees in her room, it brought tears to my eyes. Taking an art form that during this time period was just an accomplishment for a young lady to possess as she is made the prefect meek wife and channeling that into a way to express all those bottled up and repressed emotions makes passionate glamour perhaps the most magical discovery of all.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Art, Elizabeth Bennet, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Glamour, Glamoural, Jane Austen, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, Mary Robinette Kowal, Mr. Darcy, Mr. Vincent, Passion, Regency Magic, Shades of Milk and Honey, Zelda

Name: Tom Hiddleston

Dream Character Casting for the Lauren Willig Fantasy Movie Adaptation: Nicholas "Nick" Dorrington

First Impression: I don't really have a first impression of Tom. He was kind of in the background of so many things for so long and then wham, superstar, that I can't quite figure what left the first memory in my brain. Perhaps Return to Cranford, though I had seen him in many things prior to this.

Why they'd be the perfect actor for the Lauren Willig Dream Movie Adaptation: Because why not really? He's everywhere, so why can't he be here? Also he has the right sexiness to bookishness needed to pull of the role of Nick. Plus, he feels to me like he'd be a Dorrington descendant (aka, great whatever of these two, Henrietta and Miles). Can't you tell he'd love a ginger biscuit right about now?

Lasting Impression: Is there really anything else to choose from? If given a choice we would willingly surrender the world to Loki.

What else you've seen them in: Um... he's everywhere! He started in smaller British shows like Return to Cranford and an obligatory Dickens adaptation. Wallander though I think is what brought him into another tier of stardom. Working with Kenneth Branagh made him and introduced him to other big name directors like Woody Allen who perfectly cast him as F. Scott Fitzgerald in Midnight in Paris. Also, his ability to do Shakespeare, swoon worthy.

Can't believe it's them: I really can't believe that he was in Suburban Shootout, because I watched all that was available stateside and only vaguely remember him. Same but worse with Miss Austen Regrets and A Waste of Shame, no memory of him at all. At least I'll watch Miss Austen Regrets again, A Waste of Shame... I don't think you could pay me to watch that again...

Wish they hadn't: Quit Wallander! Seriously, bring him back. Damn you Branagh for making him a star and then having to eliminate him from your own series! On the other end of "wish they hadn't" is Return to Cranford. Oh how I hate this miniseries. It destroyed Cranford! All the characters went against type and they crammed in all these other short stories of Elizabeth Gaskell's to be filler, just, gaw. No.

Bio: Tall, handsome, went to Cambridge and got a double first in Classics, had his big break worldwide when he dyed his hair darker... seems to be really likable and tends to randomly sing and dance in interviews. Did a spot for Sesame Street about delayed gratification... mmm, just so many things right and wrong with that...

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 2 comments  

Labels: Elizabeth Gaskell, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henrietta Selwick, Kenneth Branagh, Lauren Willig, Loki, Midnight in Paris, Miles Dorrington, Return to Cranford, That Summer, That Summer Spotlight, Tom Hiddleston