strange and random happenstance

The Daughters of Temperance Hobbs by Katherine Howe
Published by: Henry Holt and Co.
Publication Date: June 25th, 2019
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Connie is back in the same room at Harvard she took her oral doctoral examination in. Only this time she's on the other side of the table, asking the questions. Her protege Zazi will pass, despite Connie worrying that her study of syncretic religion, such as Voodoo and Hoodoo, is a little too niche. Afterwards there are drinks at Abner's and she comes home to Sam a little drunker and a lot later than she promised. It's been nine years since the summer of weirdness. Since she saved Sam's life using Deliverance Dane's physick book. Nothing much has changed in almost a decade. She is still in academia, now a professor up for tenure at Northeastern. Her world has changed very little despite the revelations of 1991. But then again, so much happened that summer it's almost easier to forget. She has far more pressing concerns. Her book based on her dissertation is overdue. She is swamped with grading and mentoring Zazi. And networking, talking to old colleagues like Thomas, seem to take up as much time as actually teaching. But her life is about to drastically change. Connie and her mother Grace have grown a little closer since Grace moved back to her childhood home in Marblehead. At the start of February Connie goes to see Grace and is given a gift and an ultimatum. Her mother attaches a bracelet to Connie's wrist that contains an eaglestone and tells Connie that she must leave Sam. Now. Connie is baffled. She thought Grace loved Sam like a son and to tell Connie to kick him to the curb makes no sense. Until her best friend Liz puts the pieces together. Connie is pregnant. During the summer of weirdness when Connie saved Sam from the machinations of her mentor Chilton Manning she assumed she'd broken the family curse that all women lose their partners. But as Grace informs Connie, their power comes from pain, both physical and emotional. That's why their men die. To fuel their powers. But not until the line is secure. Connie's pregnancy is what has put Sam at risk. A pregnancy she can't even tell him about. He'll want to get married. He's already proposed once. She did not take it well. Marriage, children, all of it have to wait for after tenure. Then, her place secured, she can concentrate on other aspects of her life. The aspects that aren't academic. The fact that she's pregnant has derailed all this. So she bottles it up. She was able to deny the witchier aspects of herself for almost a decade, what's waiting a few weeks or months to even admit she's pregnant? She'll figure out a solution to saving Sam and then she'll tell him everything. She just needs to go into serious research mode. For that she enlists Zazi. What they find might change everything Connie's known about her family. Because it appears that Temperance Hobbs's husband was an exception to the rule. He was saved in 1816 with dire consequences to the world. But Sam is Connie's entire world. She will find a way to save him. The world be damned.

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane was by no means perfect, but by some alchemical admixture it became perfect. Its sequel, The Daughters of Temperance Hobbs, is also by no means perfect, but there is no alchemy or even one redeeming feature in this book. It's predictable, preposterous, riddled with errors, repetitive, and just stupid. Thomas as the villain can be seen a mile off. The less said about Zazi the better because a new character should be fully rounded not intrusive and smacking of tokenism and have you referring to them as a DEI hire in the Republican sense. We're honestly supposed to believe that Sam doesn't notice that Connie is five months pregnant!?! What's more, seeing as she had twins, at four months she would have looked full term, so, this is complete bullshit. But then again, she doesn't even track her period which, as a woman, makes absolutely no sense. Established facts from the first volume are thrown out the window. The stone that Sam showed Connie in Marblehead no longer has a word on it but a drawing. An event that specifically took place on the Autumnal Equinox now happens sometime "over the summer." Connie spends the first half of the this book referring to her ancestral line as the "Goodwin" line only to have her change and call it the "Dane" line for no reason at the halfway mark. We're told that they didn't know volcanoes caused the Year Without a Summer in 2000!?! Just because that's what Connie says that doesn't make it so. For a book rooted in history this is an unacceptable error. Did this book even have an editor? There is just so much repetition of the same "facts" and turns of phrase that it became beyond annoying. This reaches it's zenith when Connie performs the weather work. We read Connie perform the entire spell and save Sam. Then we have to repeat this entire chapter but 184 years earlier when Temperance saved her husband with the same spell. It's beat for beat the same thing. Why!?! I won't even get into the fact that I don't understand why they're saving their significant others because there is no believable connection between them. I do not feel the love that is willing to risk the world. And Temperance risked so much. As for the stupidity? That is all Connie. She has regressed and is now the full embodiment of the too dumb to live trope. And keep in mind, this isn't including the aforementioned hiding of her pregnancy. Nine years have passed since the first book and the "summer of weirdness." In that time instead of delving further into her ancestry she has been in denial. She isn't a witch. She just writes about historical women viewed as witches. While knowing full well real witches exist. What!?! Talk about a conflict. She's even writing a book using Deliverance's book of shadows as a primary source but hasn't looked at the microfilm of that book in nine years. Wasn't she worried they might deaccession it? She seems to have spent almost a decade of her life in limbo, assuming that she saved Sam from the family curse and that she can deny her heritage by diving headfirst into academia. I'm sorry, but your past will always catch up to you. Not that a cardboard cutout character like Connie could ever understand that. She understands nothing.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: 1816, Academia, Connie Goodwin, Harvard, Katherine Howe, Pregnancy, Season of the Witch, The Daughters of Temperance Hobbs, The Physick Book of Deliverance Dance, The Year Without a Summer, Too Dumb to Live, Trope

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe
Published by: voice
Publication Date: May 22nd, 2009
Format: Hardcover, 371 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Connie is exultant, and a little drunk. But she did it. And her body is being bombarded by relief and fatigue in equal measures after a night at Abner's to celebrate passing the ordeal of her oral doctoral examination. Hours spent answering questions and the final one, from her advisor Manning Chilton, was a gift; "please provide the committee with a succinct and considered history of witchcraft in North America." And now she has moved from apprentice to colleague. Since she first entered the PhD program at Harvard she finally feels secure and validated. Of course moments later Manning Chilton brings her down to Earth by asking her if she's chosen a dissertation topic for her doctorate yet stressing the importance of newly uncovered primary sources. She's spent a year preparing for her qualifying exam, she needs at least one night off, and that night off is spent at Abner's. Stumbling home she thinks how nothing can taint this moment of triumph, so when she sees that her roommate Liz has left a not saying that Connie's mother Grace has called Connie feels how right things are with the world. Even her mother remembered the importance of today. After a lifetime of experience with Grace Connie should have known better. Because Grace had no idea why today was important and instead was calling Connie for a favor. Grace's childhood home in Marblehead needs to be cleared out and sold due to a change in the law. Grace hasn't paid the property taxes since Connie's Granna died twenty years earlier and the house has just been sitting there. Connie doesn't know why but she agrees to take on the task. She should be spending the summer working on her dissertation and instead is stuck at number three Milk Street. A house so enshrouded in vines that at first she didn't even see it. What's more, there's no telephone or electricity. Thankfully there's running water, but that's just by sheer luck. On her first night there Connie finds a key in an old family bible with the name Deliverance Dane written on a scrap of paper inside it. There's something that draws her into this mystery and soon she realizes she's not just dealing with a forgotten victim of the Salem witch trials, but a forgotten victim that might have left behind a recipe book. Could this be her new primary source? A recipe book, an almanac, a physick book, a book of shadows, whatever you call it, this would be the only one of it's kind ever discovered on American soil. And with a connection to Salem! Soon she has a sexy steeplejack named Sam helping her and her advisor breathing down her neck. But the one person who she should be heeding is her mother. She knows more than she's letting on.

This is by no means a perfect book. Connie Goodwin is at time completely infuriating and feckless. She verges on the too dumb to live trope. I mean, I figured out the whole witches are real, she is descended from Deliverance Dane, and her family is cursed in love in about five minutes. But seeing as I'm reading a book and not living the experience I guess she could be forgiven for not believing in witches. After all her advisor asks her point blank if those accused in Salem could have been actually practicing witchcraft and she comes right out and says witches don't exist. So, she really doesn't believe in witches, and to be fair, this is set before The Craft, Charmed, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer and their witchy ways became ingrained in popular culture. So I'm giving her a pass in that regard. What I'm not giving her a pass on is her lackadaisical clearing of her Granna's house. Yes, there's some sort of magic that makes time drift away while within the house at number three Milk Street, but she has a job to do. The least she could do is look closer at the books and start the research for her dissertation, but instead she's all, I cleaned three jars four days ago, I'm tired. As someone who has done far more than her fair share of clearing out offices, homes, and apartments, her lack of work ethic just grated on me. Again, magical atmosphere, whatever, don't be proud you washed a few plates and instead of boxing them for sale or storage you put them back on the shelf! This is a tiny little house in Marblehead, Massachusetts, and she has over three months. I've done a farm house that my family lived in for generations in under a month. I've done an office filled to the brim with tat in only three days. I admit it was three days of no sleep and using all my downtime to watch the first season of Riverdale, you know, back when it was good, but I did the impossible in three days. Connie wouldn't have even done three jars in that amount of time. Also, can we talk about the fact that she ends up dating a steeplejack that specializes in restoration and she doesn't have him look at the house and do an estimate on what it would take to fix it up. In particular the board in the hall that is literally growing mushrooms! She's supposed to be getting this house ready for sale! Or, in my more generous moments, I think maybe it was actually purposefully organized by her mother as a trap for her to learn the truth and the property taxes were just a convenient ruse. And yet this book sunk in it's claws and wouldn't let go of me. What fascinated me here, and what will always fascinate me, is language. The way it changes, how certain words mean certain things at certain times. How your world view changes the meaning. How maybe, from the point of view of a certain group of people at a certain time magic was possible. I couldn't help thinking about how Philippa Gregory said when she was writing The White Queen she wrote that magic was real because to the people it was. So no matter the flaws of Connie, the concept, the history, and the cunning women made me love this book.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Book of Shadows, Cleaning, Connie Goodwin, Harvard, Inheritance, Katherine Howe, Language, Philippa Gregory, Riverdale, Salem, Season of the Witch, Steeplejack, The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane, The White Queen, Time, Witches

Stiff by Mary Roach
Published by: W. W. Norton Company
Publication Date: April 17th, 2003
Format: Paperback, 303 Pages
Rating: ★★
To Buy

What happens to us when we die? That is what Mary Roach is interested in. And not the big philosophical questions, those are reserved for her second book, Spook. Here she delves into the meat of the question. What happens to our bodies when we die? And she means bodies. When we are no more than a corpse. The thing is, corpses are a very valuable tool. There are things that can't be learned about the human body while we're alive and therefore bodies are quite prized. Research and experimentation are key to knowing how to help us live and live longer and live better and live safer. But due to cultural beliefs experimentation on human remains has been a taboo for a long time and in some cases still is. This led to a lucrative rise of body snatchers. Bodies were in demand and medical students needed access to bodies, therefore these rather odious resurrection men were in high demand. Thankfully over time people have realized the importance of leaving their bodies to science. And Mary Roach was touched by the respect the students at the University of California, San Francisco, had in their gross anatomy lab towards their assigned cadavers. In fact much of Mary Roach's investigations revolved around institutes for research and therefore she spent a lot of time at universities. At Wayne State University they use bodies to test crash impact. Many view this as beyond what is acceptable to do to a corpse. But how are we to survive crashes unless we have some way of knowing how they affect the human body? These bodies and the scientists behind the studies should be commended for their work. And how about the research of human decay? This is invaluable to the study of forensics and in catching killers. The University of Tennessee does field research on just this subject. And by field, it's literally a field with corpses in different states of decay in different situations. It's like Disneyland for people who love CSI. And then there's the Harvard Brain Bank, where they study neurological diseases. This kind of research will be necessary to the understanding of Parkinson's. The human body can tell us so much, the question is, can you help in that study? Because people handle grief in their own ways and at the end of the day it's what those you leave behind need as well as your own wishes.

There was a time when I thought I would totally be a pathologist. It was medicine but without having to deal with the living and instead dealing with the mysteries of the dead. This career path was spurred on by watching way too much CSI and reading Michael Crichton's early works. So, given this possible career path I thought I would love this book. I didn't. And I didn't like Mary Roach's Spook which I had previously read and should have loved. I mean, come on, it's all about the supernatural and faking ecoplasm and giving birth to rabbits. I'm pretty sure that book talked about the rabbit lady. I double checked and yes, Mary Toft is mentioned in Spook if you need to learn about this famous hoax which I believe is even mentioned on an episode of What We Do in the Shadows. I can't confirm that right at this moment but I'm willing to go rewatch that entire show if you really need to know. Leaving the rabbits alone, what all this has done is it has led me to the conclusion that Mary Roach is not for me. I just don't like her writing style. It's inconsistent section to section, making it feel more like a short story collection by various authors, which as you should know by now, I'm not a fan of. The corpse research station was interesting. As was the Harvard Brain Bank. Which I really was interested in given that my mother had Parkinson's and that perhaps her suffering could help find better methods of care because if not just for me this needs to be assiduously studied for future generations. But then that Harvard morgue scandal broke, but the AI overlords are telling me that the brain bank isn't associated with the morgue... But that doesn't mean I trust them. But I wouldn't really trust any university with my money let alone my brain because stewardship is out the window at the moment and it's all about appropriating funds for pet projects and their own glory. And again I have become sidetracked. Yet that is fitting for this book, it's a common theme disjointedly told. Also is this really supposed to be humorous? I mean really!?! And to say the book is both "lively and fresh" ugh no. At least this is one author I can write off. She's just not for me.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Body, Body Snatcher, Cadaver, Corpse, CSI, For the Love of Book Clubs, Harvard, Mary Roach, Mary Toft, Michael Crichton, Parkinson's, Research, Resurrection Man, Spook, Stiff, Universities, What We Do in the Shadows

Born to Be Posthumous by Mark Dery
Published by: Little, Brown and Company
Publication Date: November 6th, 2018
Format: Hardcover, 512 Pages
Rating: ★★
To Buy

In 1980 the world became aware of Edward Gorey. His unique style of pen and ink drawing with only a splash of read suited Masterpiece Theatre's spinoff, Mystery!, to a tee and everyone was watching. The opening credits animated by Derek Lamb are iconic. What's more the sets the various hosts used were designed by Gorey, much like his Broadway production of Dracula three years earlier for which he won a Tony. He became known as the king of the macabre. Without him there would be no Tim Burton, no Neil Gaiman, no Lemony Snicket, though perhaps we could have done without Lemony Snicket. His cultural impact has not waned since his death in 2000. Thanks to the Edward Gorey Charitable Trust and Pomegranate Communications his name and his work are constantly available. But while he really came to the forefront thanks to PBS he had been making a name for himself in New York since the fifties. The young Gorey was a prodigy, growing up throughout the Chicago area. His scholarships to various Ivy League schools had to be deferred due to the war and he served at the Dugway Proving Ground in Utah. In 1946 he finally entered Harvard majoring in French Literature, because if you're going to read the great and melodramatic French novels you have to read them in French. In an interesting twist of fate he would room with Frank O'Hara who would also go on to be a darling of the literary world. But it wasn't just books that interested Gorey, it was all art, theatre, ballet, poetry, prose. His academic career was rocky, it all depended on if he was interested at the time in what he was doing. When he was he'd be on the Dean's List, when he wasn't, he was threatened with expulsion. His actual training in art was negligible. But that is what he'd go on to be known for, not writing some obscure commentary on French Literature. After college he got a job illustrating book covers for the Art Department of Doubleday Anchor. Covers that are iconic to this day. Especially his vibrant cover for The War of the Worlds. At the end of his tenure there he started to publish little books indepently. Some under his own name, some under cunning psdeynoms and anagrams. Through the Gotham Book Mart he became a bit of a celebrity to those in the know. He was also a man about town, always seen at the New York City Ballet where Balanchine was king. Eventually he settled on Cape Cod where this now internationally famous artist spent time with his cats and making stuffed figures to sell at the local theatre. But no one can say he didn't leave his mark. If only sartorially.

If you want to read about Edward Gorey, this book isn't for you. Literally pick up any book by Edward Gorey and you will get more concrete information and entertainment out of it than this volume. But if you want to read about an author projecting his suppoistions, speculations, and downright crazy conspiracy theories on their subject, then this book is for you. Because Mark Dery has written a book his subject would hate. He has taken a complex and fascinating intellectual and decided to focus on Edward Gorey's sexuality. Hundreds of pages questioning if Gorey was or wasn't gay. It's like Mark Dery needed to make Gorey gay. But more than that, he didn't just want Gorey to be gay, he wanted him to be the victim of sexual assault by the clergy as a child. At least he admits it's pure speculation but he claims that the ominous nature of the clergy in Gorey's stories coupled with the abuses of the Catholic Church in Chicago when Gorey was growing up point to his insights as being accurate. What the fuck? It's one thing to postulate on sexuality, it's another to just wholey fabricate something in a biography without any kind of proof. And I will point out that in Gorey's work, everyone, not just the clergy, are menacing. It's kind of Gorey's M.O. But more to the point is that in a book that is 415 pages long minus the acknowledgements, references, and endnotes, it took Dery until page 410 to include a quote from an interview Gorey did in 1980 with Boston Magazine wherein he said "Well, I'm neither one thing nor the other particularly... I suppose I'm gay. But I don't really identify with it much." HE SAID HE WAS GAY! AND YOU, MARK DERY, KNEW IT! For 99% of this "biography" you made me listen to your speculations when you knew. YOU KNEW! You wrote about something that wasn't even a something. Gorey is an icon, and yes, him being a gay icon is important, but just use HIS WORDS not your fabricated suppositions. But then again, by the end of this book I didn't trust the author at all. He refers to Gorey's work as etchings, which they are not. He should show us the pictures instead of badly describing them but we only get twenty-six badly reproduced pieces completely out of context. And I'm sorry, but I too watched that Dick Cavett interview, and he wasn't fawning over Gorey and his work, he had no freaking idea who Gorey was and Gorey knew it. The only positive to reading this book is it enraged me so much I went back and read all the Amphilgorys and fell in love with Gorey and his work all over again.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Balanchine, Ballet, Book Covers, Born to Be Posthumous, Chicago, Edward Gorey, For the Love of Book Clubs, French Literature, Gay, Harvard, Mark Dery, Masterpiece Theatre, Mystery, Neil Gaiman, New York, Tim Burton

The Handmaid's Tale
Based on the book by Margaret Atwood
Starring: Elisabeth Moss, O-T Fagbenle, Jordana Blake, Samira Wiley, Yvonne Strahovski, Joseph Fiennes, Amanda Brugel, Max Minghella, Ann Dowd, Madeline Brewer, Alexis Bledel, Tattiawna Jones, Nina Kiri, Jenessa Grant, Bahia Watson, Ever Carradine, Stephen Kunken, Zabryna Guevara, and Christian Barillas
Release Date: April 26th, 2017 - June 14th, 2017
Rating: ★
To Watch

Offred was once called June. She was married to Luke. They had a daughter called Hannah. When the Sons of Jacob felled the US government and established Gilead June and her family attempted to escape. She and Hannah were caught and she believes Luke was killed. Hannah is the proof that she is fertile in these times of sterility and therefore she was trained to become a handmaid. She was sent to a Commander's house, assumed his name, and once a month "participates" in the ceremony that will hopefully bring forth a child to his family. The ceremony is nothing more than sanctioned systematic rape. Yet Commander Waterford wants Offred to be happy, as does his wife Serena Joy. They think that this is not just an acceptable life but a good life for Offred. Yet Offred doesn't understand the game Commander Waterford is playing, and it is literally a game. He calls her into his study when his wife isn't around to play Scrabble. Such luxury to play with lettered tiles, to form words, to read when women are no longer allowed to. Yet who knows what Serena Joy would do if this aberrant behavior in her husband were discovered. The two of them literally helped write the rules of Gilead, yet Serena herself is willing to bend them a little if she could get a child, having Offred couple with her husband's driver, Nick. Yet she would never violate them outright no matter how stifled she feels now that she's nothing more than a Commander's wife dressed in blue. But if anyone is stifled, if anyone should be revolting, it's Offred. She makes contact through a fellow handmaid with the Mayday resistence group, but then her contact Ofglen is gone one day. But through her new daring Offred learns that Luke is alive, as is her best friend Moira. She now has even more reasons to fight. She is June and they will not destroy her.

I genuinely went into watching The Handmaid's Tale with high expectations. I mean it won ALL the Emmys so it had to be good right? Wrong! I think voting for The Handmaid's Tale was like a protest vote, it says the right things but in truth Westworld should have won. But I would have also taken The Crown or Strangers Things as acceptable substitutes. And the thing is, I'm not sure if I'm alone or not in this dislike. The people I know who liked the miniseries haven't read the book and those whose opinion I trust haven't watched it because they in turn trust my opinion. On paper the show sounds great, even if you're not a fan of Elizabeth Moss like I am. But the execution was just self-indulgent television that felt like it was done by a student filmmaker. While I can understand certain changes, moving all the big events that are excruciatingly paced throughout hundreds of pages of reminiscences into the first episode makes sense. You HAVE to hook the viewers right away. There can't be an entire episode with Offred deliberating about telling the Marthas about the arrival of oranges in the shops because no one would watch that and yet it's over fifty pages in the book. So I'm being generous here, I get these changes, even if it means you've wasted almost all the good plot points in the first episode, it was necessary. But there's the fact that with all the directors there is no fixed style. It's so varying that there is one episode that literally spends the entire hour with only Offred's eye in focus. What student level BS is this? But what I won't ever forgive is the annoyingly repetitious sound design. Low, ominous noises drawn out for what felt like eons. Or a musical cord or strident sound played over and over for entire blocks of the show. If this show wanted to go for sound design over music look to how David Lynch did the revival of Twin Peaks, that is masterful, this is shit. And yet the sound design is NOTHING compared to the music choices. Each episode had some classic used inappropriately or mashed up in some horrific way, WTF was that "Heart of Glass" remix? At the start of every episode I kept wondering, which classic song is going to be ruined in this hour? The answer is whatever song they used.    

Yet the use of the songs from "Don't You (Forget About Me)" to "You Don't Own Me" underscore a larger problem in the series. The book has a timelessness to it, and the soundtrack, no matter how "appropriate" the title or the lyrics date the show. In making this show NOW they made everything too definite. Yes, whatever time you make a series in dates it to an extent, but just because our political climate is so similar at the moment doesn't mean the series should be set in the moment. It might give it immediacy, but will it give it longevity? I don't think so. By giving such specifics, even down to making sure we know all the characters real names, there's a universality that has been taken away. Though oddly there is one thing that is less emphasized amongst all this specificity that further strips any meaning out of the narrative. This story is set in Cambridge and Boston. It's very clear in the book but it's not very clear in the show because they didn't film it on location, instead they took the benefits that Atwood's country gives in tax breaks and damn the consequences the show was filmed in Canada. The problem is NO town can be a substitute for the Boston area. It has a very specific look and use of red bricks that when gone, well, you notice it. What's more is that by having the story set in and around Harvard, there's symbolism attached to having the bodies of the traitors hung on the University's wall that can never have the same impact by just having some bodies on a wall next to a river. This is a MAJOR statement about how the current regime views education and betrayal and here it's just gone, entirely lost. What's more, Boston is the cradle of America! This is where the revolution started! This is where Paul Revere made his midnight ride! To have that which created us under the yoke of an evil regime? That is a statement that can only be said by seeing Boston on the screen! 

Going back to the specificity that this adaptation has embraced when it's convenient to them Offred herself is just too specific, she's too defined. Yes, Atwood's book gives us a lot of information about Offred's previous life, but at the same time she is generic enough, she can be the everywoman she's supposed to be. You can scarily see yourself in her shoes because she could be you! She's a passive vehicle for the atrocities of Gilead to flow through. Here with Elisabeth Moss's portrayal of Offred we see a woman who is not going to just lay back and take things, she's going to stand up and fight. She's going to hold onto her name, she's going to hold onto her memories, she's going to hold onto hope. She is going to be the rallying point for the rebellion. Offred here is not so much just one of the handmaids, she is front and center, punching and kicking during the punishment, helping in the birth, she's June goddammit and she's going to talk other handmaid's off the ledge and be a force for change. And THAT is a big change from the book. There suicide was an option because hope had run out, here hope never runs out. There is a far more optimistic bent here because Offred is willing to show when she's pissed off or sullen or sulky, she's not the blank vessel for her Commander. She doesn't always follow the rules, and while perhaps we can root her on, I don't think we can relate as much. I totally think there's a time when hope does run out, but for some reason this show was unwilling to embrace this fact. Yes, I know that all this makes sense when switching from one medium to another, but I think more than that this was done in an effort make this more than just an adaptation of the book and more an expansion of the story. This is just the beginning of the series, one that will be full of rebellion, whereas Offred's story in the book is just the beginning of the horrors of Gilead, her rebellion in that context would have meant nothing, would have had no impact, she was just the voice of the oppressed with no actual impact expect for historians.   

Yet as much as I don't like the changes to Offred I have to say they occasionally got it so right that I was, for the moment, happy. In fact I will begrudgingly admit that Elisabeth Moss is the perfect actress for this version of Offred, which is understandable given how much creative control she had in this instance. Therefore I have partially forgiven her for all the times I've hated her in the past, burn in hell Peggy Olson! OK, back to The Handmaid's Tale, in episode two "Birth Day" the handmaids attend the labor of Janine, Ofwarren. Offred goes downstairs to inform the wives of the commanders how things are progressing and one of them asks if she'd like a cookie. Of course this decision is in the hands of her mistress, Serena Joy. Serena asks Offred if she would like a cookie, in the way you'd ask a very small child. There's this big beautiful tower of macaroons and the range of emotions on Elisabeth Moss's face is exquisite. You can see how much she does want that cookie but simultaneously how much it pains her not only to have to ask but to ask it of these women. What's more, she's not even given a choice about asking, because once the suggestion is out there she must do as they say. All this is embodied in this one simple scene, and for once I thought, maybe they get it, maybe they get what Margaret Atwood's story was all about, but then Offred goes to the bathroom and I can see they didn't. Because what happens in the bathroom is that Offred spits out the cookie, but in the biggest act of rebellion she just leave it there, so that those women will know what she's done. Therefore I guess you could say this one scene embodied both what the book was about and likewise the rebellious nature this adaptation is going to take. Yet I have to say it, that at this point it's not the adaptation that is drawing me in no matter the level of acting, it's the expansion. I want to see where this goes. Offred so far has been too omnipresent, she needs to step back out of our faces and let the other characters have the spotlight for once.

Speaking of some other non-Offred characters, let's talk about Commander Fred Waterford and his wife, Serena Joy. In the book the Commander is a bit of a silver fox and Serena a washed up televangelist. In other words, 70s to 80s age range given the timeline. Here we have Joseph Fiennes and Yvonne Strahovski, 47 and 35 respectively. In fact Elisabeth Moss is the same age as Yvonne Strahovski. Now there are two ways to take this change, one is good, one is bad. Let's start with the bad. The bad is that this is Hollywood and they couldn't have an unattractive elderly man raping Elisabeth Moss, so instead we have the beautiful though perfectly brooding Joseph Fiennes who is only a mere 12 years older than her. In an aside, am I the only one who wonders if the Fiennes brothers used to spend their time trying to see who could be more menacing? So vanity wins even in the darkest of stories in this interpretation. Perhaps Elisabeth Moss even insisted on a pretty face to act to? This is Hollywood, weird things are the norm. The unlikely "dark" yet infinitely better interpretation is that by making Offred's oppressors young and beautiful we can see the true horror of what they are doing. Because somehow it would be more understandable if the Commander and his wife had no way of having kids because of their age and an old guy barely getting it up isn't as much of a threat? Also here the crisis of infertility is also brought home by this beautiful couple. This really pushes the message on the inability to procreate which kind of gets lost in the horror of oppression and rape. But going beyond this, going back to the whole infertility crisis, one thing that I just don't get is this need of all the women to have children. I understand the biological imperative what with the fact that the world could end without procreation, I just don't understand this sickening need to have a baby. Is it because it's all that the men have left them? But that's something that needs to be thought on more... biological clocks and imperatives and parental desires can not be covered in a paragraph or two, you need a book, like The Handmaid's Tale, not just some series you can stream and be done with in a few hours.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: David Lynch, Dystopian, Dystopian Drama, Elisabeth Moss, Gilead, Harvard, Hulu, Joseph Fiennes, Margaret Atwood, Offred, Rape, Stranger Things, The Crown, The Handmaid's Tale, Twin Peaks, Westworld, Yvonne Strahovski

Aunt Dimity and the Summer King by Nancy Atherton
Published by: Viking
Publication Date: April 14th, 2015
Format: Hardcover, 240 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Cozy mystery lovers’ favorite paranormal sleuth is back with her twentieth otherworldly adventure.

There’s trouble in Finch. Four recently sold cottages are standing empty, and the locals fear that a developer plans to turn their cozy village into an enclave of overpriced weekend homes. But for once Lori Shepherd can’t help.

Her infant daughter, her father-inlaw’s upcoming wedding, and the crushing prospect of her fortieth birthday have left her feeling inadequate and overwhelmed. Until, that is, she has a chance encounter with an eccentric inventor named Arthur Hargreaves. Dubbed the Summer King by his equally eccentric family, Arthur is as warmhearted as the summer sun. In his presence, Lori forgets her troubles—and Finch’s.

But Lori snaps out of her happy trance when she discovers detailed maps of Finch in the Summer King’s library. Next, a real estate agent comes knocking. Is Arthur secretly plotting Finch’s demise?

With Aunt Dimity’s otherworldly help—and her new daughter in her arms—Lori mounts a crusade to save her beloved village from the Summer King’s scorching greed."

I really need to get back into this series. I love the title and cover art, let's hope the story stacks up.

Very Good Lives by J.K. Rowling
Published by: Little, Brown and Company
Publication Date: April 14th, 2015
Format: Hardcover, 80 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"J.K. Rowling, one of the world's most inspiring writers, shares her wisdom and advice.

In 2008, J.K. Rowling delivered a deeply affecting commencement speech at Harvard University. Now published for the first time in book form, VERY GOOD LIVES presents J.K. Rowling's words of wisdom for anyone at a turning point in life. How can we embrace failure? And how can we use our imagination to better both ourselves and others?

Drawing from stories of her own post-graduate years, the world famous author addresses some of life's most important questions with acuity and emotional force.

Sales of VERY GOOD LIVES will benefit both Lumos, a charity organization founded by J.K. Rowling, which works to transform the lives of disadvantaged children, and university-wide financial aid at Harvard University."

Is printing famous author's commencement speeches a thing now? It seems to be a thing.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Aunt Dimity, Aunt Dimity and the Summer King, Harvard, J.K. Rowling, Lumos, Nancy Atherton, Tuesday Tomorrow, Very Good Lives