strange and random happenstance

Whispers Under Ground by Ben Aaronovitch
Published by: Gollancz
Publication Date: June 21st, 2012
Format: Paperback, 375 Pages
Rating: ★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

It's the week before Christmas and PC Peter Grant is working with the big boys, he's been assigned to the murder squad. It's almost a thrill to be working with other coppers again. Being assigned to the Folly means his coworkers are his boss and hopefully soon his old partner Lesley. But not today, today Christmas has come early. He was called in to the Baker Street Underground station to see if he could pick up anything uncanny about their newest corpse. The corpse though was surprisingly clean. No magic. The broken piece of pottery shard that ended the life of James Gallagher is anything but. And now Peter's looking into the murder of an American art student who just happens to be the son of a U.S. Senator. The victim, James Gallagher, was not untalented, he had an eye for street scenes and capturing life. It was almost old fashioned in it's precision. But his art had started to change of late, becoming darker. One of his teachers worried that he might be suicidal. Peter assures him that James Gallagher's death was indeed murder. At his studio Peter learns that his victim was interested in Ryan Carroll, an artist who road the Celtic Tiger all the way to the Tate Modern. Ryan Carroll's artwork, an assemblage of mannequins and found pieces, exude magic. Much like the murder weapon. And much like a bowl found at James Gallagher's apartment. Because magic is the reason that Peter was allowed on the murder squad it's his job to look into the pottery. For that he'll need the help of James Gallagher's roommate, Zach. Zach had obviously been living rough prior to moving in to "help" James discover the real London. Zach though is only passingly familiar with telling the truth. He is definitely more than he looks and when he discovers that Peter is in league with the Nightingale, he's almost more obstreperous. Which Peter doesn't have time for. He has an FBI agent breathing down his neck, an unexpected snowstorm, a trek through the sewers, and who knows what other hell before Christmas comes and all the while there's the looming threat of their "Little Crocodiles," black magicians illegally trained at Oxford that are trying to make his and Nightingale's life a living hell. Couldn't Zach give him the smallest of breaks? And not another broken bowl thank you very much.

What's interesting about the Rivers of London series is that Ben Aaronovitch has created a series with a strong connection to the arts. The first installment was about the world of the threatre, the second installment was about the world of music, in particular jazz, and this third installment brings us to the art world. Oh my, it's like this series was made with me and the various stages of my life in mind, from the piano lessons I started in first grade to the Bachelor's degrees I got in art and theatre as an undergraduate. But when you think about it while the arts are viewed as something rarefied, especially to those with pretensions who I was occasionally taught by, we all have a connection to them, be it a school play we were in, a song we've loved, or something we've drawn. Through our development from child to adult even if it's only tangentially, we've experienced the arts. So while some might think these themes lofty, I think of them as the basic human condition, these are what separate us from the animals, the ability to create and enjoy wonder. But going back to my time as an undergraduate, the student studios that Peter tours are priceless. I mean, it was so spot on I could barely contain my glee. The pretentious concept pieces to James's very traditional art, I've seen it all and Ben Aaronovitch brought it all back to me. Oh and I can't leave out Ryan Carroll, a man in it for the money, who views that his art should speak for itself. Do not get me started on people who think art should speak for itself. Nothing is beyond verbalization. Your "act of creation" or whatever you want your process to be about in the forming of clay or what have you should be able to speak for itself BUT you should be able to talk about the what and the whys of it. An artist who can not explain their art isn't a true artist, they are a poseur. Which is very interesting as to how the pottery angle works in. I don't know if other people experienced the mystique of pottery as I did. Two hippies ran my pottery classes and it was a weird clique. They "knew things others did not." Therefore to have this mystery of the pottery just made me nod my head sagely and go, "yes, pottery is the greatest mystery." And it's a mystery that Peter is able to solve to the delight of artists and urban explorers everywhere.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Art, Baker Street, Ben Aaronovitch, Christmas, Little Crocodiles, London Calling, London Underground, Murder Squad, Music, Nightingale, Peter Grant, Pottery, Theatre, Urban Explorers, Whispers Under Ground

The Marvels by Brian Selznick
Published by: Scholastic Press
Publication Date: September 15th, 2015
Format: Hardcover, 640 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

In 1766 there were many hurricanes. Billy Marvel and his beloved dog are the sole survivors of the sinking of the Kraken which was hit by this force of nature. Billy even lost his beloved brother Marcus in the wreck. When Billy gets to London he is drawn to the construction site of the Royal Theatre and is mesmerized by the painting of the ceiling. There he is recognized as the sole survivor of the wreck, as his picture is on the cover of every newspaper, and he enthralls the crew with his tales of the hurricane and of his brother Marcus. The painter hired to do the ceiling is so moved by the tale he paints Marcus as an angel looking down over the audience. This serendipitous meeting is the beginning of the Marvel theatre dynasty. Billy works as a stagehand and set designer, and soon he has a son, and then there is a marriage. Down the generations until their dynasty ends in 1900. In 1990 Joseph Jervis has run away from school. His parents are abroad so he decides that he will go to his uncle's house in London. He has only the faintest notion of where Albert Nightingale lives, but cold and ill he arrives on his uncle's doorstep thinking that he might just have seen a horse and carriage. Inside the house is even odder. It feels trapped not just in another time, but at a specific time. A dinner is on the table, but a dinner that was interrupted. A napkin lays askew, and it must always lay askew. Albert reluctantly lets his nephew stay in the dream world he has created in this house in Spitalfields. But Joseph must behave. But Joseph is a curious child and from artifacts around the house he starts to learn about the Marvel theatre dynasty. The more he learns, the more he hopes that he is related to them. Yet what he knows of his own family's history doesn't add up with the Marvels. So in this house of make-believe Joseph must distinguish fact from fiction and then decide which is the better way to live?

It's hard to pick a favorite Brian Selznick book in that he is the master of his niche of storytelling. His style of art combined with his prose never fails to entertain, inspire, and uplift. Here though he's tweaked his winning style by having almost four hundred uninterrupted pages of illustration followed by two hundred pages of prose with a coda, another fifty pages of illustration. There was just something about this twist that made me fall even deeper into it than I did with The Invention of Hugo Cabret or Wonderstruck. The Marvels might just be my favorite Brian Selznick book yet! The four hundred pages of illustrations sped by as I was swept away by the history of the Marvel theatre dynasty. By the time you hit the prose section you're so invested in the story that I don't get those who felt the shift in style and tone betrayed them and made them dismiss the book out of hand. Thankfully I believe these to be a minority, because the twist to the story, the way art mimics reality and the artifice of theatre just made me love this book even more. In fact I was sorely compelled to re-read the first four hundred pages a second time after finishing the prose so I could come to terms with the awe I felt with how everything tied together so perfectly. But I was so overcome with tears streaming down my face that actually trying to read or look at a book would have been impossible due to the deluge of tears. What makes this book even more special I feel is that it's loosely based on a real location and person, Dennis Severs' House. One of my friends went to this museum that Dennis Severs created, a place where you can journey back in time with his staged "still-life drama." This is immersive history in the extreme. Oh how I want to go there. But reading this book is literally the next best thing and “you either see it, or you don’t.”

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Billy Marvel, Brian Selznick, Dennis Severs, Dennis Severs' House, History, Hurricane, Illustration, Immersive, LGBTQ, Museum, Pride, Shipwreck, The Invention of Hugo Cabret, The Marvels, Theatre, Wonderstruck

When I was in grade school and high school Les Misérables was everywhere. In grade school the t-shirt for the musical was a badge of honor that your parents had taken you to a big city to see the show. In other words, that you had money. Just like winter coats with ski lift tags. In high school it was the cool music and theatre kids who wore them as a coat of arms. I, being the misanthrope that I have always been, took it as a mark of how cool I was that I had never seen the musical and had no desire to. Cats ALL THE WAY! I continue to revel in the fact that I have never seen Les Misérables and have no plans to ever see it. I know some of you are shocked and even some of you who I consider my close friends are planning on disavowing me, but you're not going to guilt me into seeing it. EVER! Therefore hearing that Masterpiece was doing a no singing, no dancing adaptation of Victor Hugo's novel made me very happy. I could finally see an adaptation without hearing "One Day More!" Even better, Andrew Davies was adapting it. I know a lot of you have issues with him, to that I say you're hypocrites. Davies can have a moistened Colin Firth but any other sex is off bounds? How do you think say the Bennet's had children in the first place!?! Sigh. Some people would rather live in cloud cuckoo land than the real world I guess and "modern" adaptations have, for the most part, succeeded by grounding them in reality. I also liked Davies attitude going in that he was going to adapt the book to show the lesser known storylines, the plot points that weren't worthy of the musical. Plus casting Dominic West as Jean Valjean and David Oyelowo as Javert was genius. I will watch anything with Dominic West, I ever finished out the shit show that was The Affair because he was in it and am really looking forward to the new adaptation of The Pursuit of Love. As for Les Misérables itself... it showed a very bleak and at times incomprehensible world. There is a lot of death and so much of it is unnecessary... but then, that's life. None of us get out of it alive. Though most of us don't just randomly die in a garden with no ovious cause of death. Could we get a crossover with Masterpiece Mystery and bring in Poirot? 

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Andrew Davies, Cats, Colin Firth, Dominic West, Fifty Years a Masterpiece, Les Misérables, Masterpiece No Longer Theatre, Masterpiece Theatre, Musical, Poirot, The Pursuit of Love, Theatre, Victor Hugo

The Marvels by Brian Selznick
Published by: Scholastic Press
Publication Date: September 15th, 2015
Format: Hardcover, 640 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

In 1766 there were many hurricanes. Billy Marvel and his beloved dog are the sole survivors of the sinking of the Kraken which was hit by this force of nature. Billy even lost his beloved brother Marcus in the wreck. When Billy gets to London he is drawn to the construction site of the Royal Theatre and is mesmerized by the painting of the ceiling. There he is recognized as the sole survivor of the wreck, as his picture is on the cover of every newspaper, and he enthralls the crew with his tales of the hurricane and of his brother Marcus. The painter hired to do the ceiling is so moved by the tale he paints Marcus as an angel looking down over the audience. This serendipitous meeting is the beginning of the Marvel theatre dynasty. Billy works as a stagehand and set designer, and soon he has a son, and then there is a marriage. Down the generations until their dynasty ends in 1900. In 1990 Joseph Jervis has run away from school. His parents are abroad so he decides that he will go to his uncle's house in London. He has only the faintest notion of where Albert Nightingale lives, but cold and ill he arrives on his uncle's doorstep thinking that he might just have seen a horse and carriage. Inside the house is even odder. It feels trapped not just in another time, but at a specific time. A dinner is on the table, but a dinner that was interrupted. A napkin lays askew, and it must always lay askew. Albert reluctantly lets his nephew stay in the dream world he has created in this house in Spitalfields. But Joseph must behave. But Joseph is a curious child and from artifacts around the house he starts to learn about the Marvel theatre dynasty. The more he learns, the more he hopes that he is related to them. Yet what he knows of his own family's history doesn't add up with the Marvels. So in this house of make believe, Joseph must distinguish fact from fiction and then decide what is the better way to live?

It's hard to pick a favorite Brian Selznick book in that he is the master of his niche of storytelling. His style of art combined with his prose never fails to entertain, inspire, and uplift. Here though he's tweaked his winning style by having almost four hundred uninterrupted pages of illustration followed by two hundred pages of prose with a coda, another fifty pages of illustration. There was just something about this twist that made me fall even deeper into it than I did with The Invention of Hugo Cabret or Wonderstruck. The Marvels might just be my favorite Brian Selznick book yet! The four hundred pages of illustrations sped by as I was swept away by the history of the Marvel theatre dynasty. By the time you hit the prose section you're so invested in the story that I don't get those who felt the shift in style and tone betrayed them and made them dismiss the book out of hand. Thankfully I believe these to be a minority, because the twist to the story, the way art mimics reality and the artifice of theatre just made me love this book even more. In fact I was sorely compelled to re-read the first four hundred pages a second time after finishing the prose so I could come to terms with the awe I felt with how everything tied together so perfectly. But I was so overcome with tears streaming down my face that actually trying to read or look at a book would have been impossible due to the deluge of tears. What makes this book even more special I feel is that it's loosely based on a real location and person, Dennis Severs' House. One of my friends went to this museum that Dennis Severs created, a place where you can journey back in time with his staged "still-life drama." This is immersive history in the extreme. Oh how I want to go there. But reading this book is literally the next best thing and “you either see it, or you don’t.”

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Billy Marvel, Brian Selznick, Dennis Severs, Dennis Severs' House, History, Hurricane, Illustration, Immersive, LGBTQ, Museum, Shipwreck, The Invention of Hugo Cabret, The Marvels, Theatre, Wonderstruck

The House on Durrow Street (Mrs. Quent Book 2) by Galen Beckett
Published by: Spectra
Publication Date: September 28th, 2010
Format: Hardcover, 704 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy
 
Ivy has more than she could ever have wished for. When she went to Heathcrest Hall she had hoped to earn enough money to open up the family house on Durrow Street and remove her sisters from odious familial obligations. Now returned to Invarel she has opened up her old home, with her husband and former employer Mr. Quent by her side. The house undoubtedly belonged to a magician, but to Ivy and her sisters it is home despite all it's oddities. The ever watching eyes carved out of wood, which tend to be unnerving to the workers refurbishing the house, are there to protect Ivy's family, constantly observing their well-being and safety. But what else might they be protecting? Ivy's father was a great magician and the house definitely has its secrets. Soon a door is discovered bricked up behind a wall, and awhile later it's mate on the other side of the room is stumbled upon. Doors of great craftsmanship and beauty that no one would rightly cover, unless they needed protecting. Items in the house are also behaving curiously. The clock on the mantel is more accurate than the most up-to-date almanac and there's a journal of her father's that Ivy discovers is slowly revealing it's entries in a haphazard manner. If Ivy knows her father, all this is to lead her on her path to becoming the heroine and savior of Altania her father believes her to be.

But distractions are in Ivy's way, in the form of societal obligations. Mr. Quent is always busy. Before, when they lived in the country, he was away from home all the time, but now that he's in Invarel he's just as occupied, rising in the ranks of society. While Ivy's sisters are excited about the prospects of their higher stations, Ivy has hundreds of concerns, from bringing her sisters out into society, to new friendships with the likes of the great Lady Crayford. With unrest in town can she trust these new acquaintances? Because a dear old friend, Dashton Rafferdy, is at the heart of the unrest. Rafferdy has taken his father's seat in the Hall of Magnates. Being so politically placed is making a man of this rake. The king is ill, he is in fact dying, and factions are forming within the Citadel. There are two waring parties of magicians, and Rafferdy is on the wrong side, not aligning himself with Lord Valhain, the king's black dog who has the terrifying Lady Shayde as his personal weapon. With the lack of rebellions and risings associated with the "rightful king" Huntley Morden these other magicians are determined to keep the rebellion fomenting by publicly turning against magic itself. Because magicians will be blamed for terrorist acts. Even illusionists are threatened. Yet could all this be tied to the threat Ivy and Rafferdy faced before? Could all this be in aid of the Ashen? And will they attempt an even greater rising, this time at the Evengrove? But most worrying of all, what happens when the red planet Cerephus gets even closer?

It is a rare occurrence for an author to create a group of characters and make you love each and every one of them. It's even rarer for this to happen in a love triangle. I quite literally can not think of one where all three of the characters held equal space in my heart. And if you say you actually like George Wickham I will smack you right now! He was so up to something from his first appearance in Pride and Prejudice. There is always a weak link. One character that just isn't up to snuff and therefore you're secretly rooting for them to fail. Since the first page of The Magicians and Mrs. Quent I was shipping Ivy and Rafferdy. By the very title of the first book you know that Ivy isn't going to end up with him. She's going to end up with the, at that point unknown, Mr. Quent. So going further into the narrative Mr. Quent already had a black mark against him. I didn't know him but I knew he was going to cause trouble. And then he arrives and is stalwart and upstanding and just an all around good guy. Yes, I still wanted Ivy to be with Rafferdy, but I couldn't fault her marrying Mr. Quent, he is so wonderful in his own way. Galen Beckett has created his own little Catch-22. He has made such wonderful characters that I am conflicted as to who would bring them greater happiness. I keep thinking, it HAS to be Rafferdy because he helped Ivy defeat The Vigilant Order of the Silver Eye and she makes him a better man! But then she completes Mr. Quent who was so wounded by the death of his first wife all those years ago. Seriously, if this was a pick your own adventure book I would be screwed.

Of course there is always an exception to every rule. It's like it's own rule am I right? So when I say "I love every character" what I mean is "I love every character except..." And I'm not talking about the characters that you are meant to hate, because you eventually come to love hating them. I'm talking about the characters you just don't like. In this case it's Eldyn. You're probably saying, who's Eldyn right about now. In my review of the first book I mentioned him in passing as Rafferdy's best friend. In this review I've glossed over him almost entirely with lumping him in as one of the illusionists, which he is. Yet he is one of the three principal characters in this series and a third of the narrative belongs to him. So perhaps I should explain why I've omitted him. In The Magicians and Mrs. Quent he has a rather boring storyline about his sister and some rebels. These sections were excruciating. If I had to read about him at least Rafferdy could be present right? The fact that he didn't die in the first book was a major source of contention with me. I should have given more credit to Galen. Because in The House on Durrow Street if there's one surprise it's the redemption of the character of Eldyn Garritt. I know. I'm as surprised as you that my opinion could be changed so drastically.

With books this big it's hard to cover everything that happens in one review. I could write several reviews of The House on Durrow Street and never repeat myself and still have things to talk about. But this redemption of Eldyn is, I think, the most interesting. Yes, his learning to become an illusionist and eventually a performer at The Theatre of the Moon is fascinating, as is his paramour Dercy, but what's more surprising is that Eldyn's story is the driving force of this book. The simple line of "even illusionists are threatened" from above encapsulates more than you can imagine. Because what lies underneath is a dark mystery that keeps you turning the pages waiting to find out the truth. Because illusionists are turning up dead. Of course only fellow illusionists could make this connection. Eldyn, in trying to support that rebel loving sister of his is straddling the world of the church, where he works as a clerk, and the world of illusion, where he is learning his art. The church has strong opinions on illusionists, all of them bad. But it's only through being a part of both of these worlds that Eldyn is able to see the greater picture, to uncover the conspiracy of the church using magic to exert control. They are harming and harnessing magic to their own purposes. Purposes that are almost too dark to discuss. But when you see the full extent of the conspiracy in it's reveal you will be astounded and hopefully agree with me that you were seriously doing a disservice to Mr. Garritt.

With Mr. Garritt being revealed as an illusionist the three branches of magic are represented in our three protagonists, Mrs. Quent, the witch, Rafferdy, the magician, and Eldyn, the illusionist. What's interesting about Galen's worldbuilding is that he doesn't just go into the customs and mores of society, he goes far into outer space and alien forces, and closer to home with genetics. Because witch, magician, and illusionist are all born this way. Which given that illusionists are homosexual I think it's nice to have someone pointing out even in a fantasy world that they are born that way. It's genetics people not something that is in need of deprogramming. Witches are born to witches, in fact it is very rare for a witch to have a male child, but if she does that child is an illusionist. Magicians just descend down the male line of the seven great houses with some having the power and some not. Hence the Hall of Magnates is literally littered with real and wannabe magicians. What comes about in The House on Durrow Street is a distinct segregation of the types of magic and fear-mongering. The magicians in power in the Hall of Magnates use their influence to make war on magic, particularly the "natural" magics of witches and illusionists, though if push comes to shove they will totally use those "natural" powers for their own gain. Likewise they instill fear in the populace to hate all magic, hiding their own. Because of all the branches of magic, magicians are the most easily corrupted by the power they need in order to work their magics.

Going back to outer space I have one question lingering at the back of my mind, and that is, is this world of Altania perhaps our future? Go with me on this, it's kind of a reverse Star Wars with our future looking like our past, but it's possible. The days and nights are of varying duration and the planets are all akimbo, but perhaps over time that could happen. Ivy talks of a time when days and nights were fixed. Here in our world after the winter equinox we gain a few minutes of sun every day until the summer equinox where we lose a few minutes of sun every day, unless you live at the equator and then it's twelve hours of light and twelve hours of dark everyday, year round. But this is to do with the moon and the tides and the planets. Now imagine something happening to knock them off course, or even just as time passes and the planets paths start to degrade, might Ivy's world come to be? Could night and day no longer be dependable? Could Earth's rotation be random? I wonder how this plays into crops and trees and even grass. And here again is why I love this book, it makes me think, it makes me imagine. I wonder about things and question things that I just accepted. Yes, there are stories I've read about night falling, forever, but never have I read a story where it's handled so deftly and also so woven into the society and their customs. I seriously just need more of this world, more of this story. I literally never want it to end. Ever.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Galen Beckett, Genetics, Illusionist, Love Triangle, Magic, Pride and Prejudice, Regency Magic, Star Wars, Ten Years, The House on Durrow Street, The Magicians and Mrs. Quent, Theatre, Witches, Worldbuilding

The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell
Published by: Penguin Books
Publication Date: March 6th, 2018
Format: Paperback, 404 Pages
Rating: ★★★
To Buy

Elsie is being exiled to her husband's decrepit country estate, The Bridge. She feels like they are burying her along with her husband. A pregnant mermaid drowning in black crepe. That is all she is now, the vessel for her dead husband's heir. Her marriage to Rupert Bainbridge was meant to raise her above her station. No more work at the match factory where she and her brother Jolyon slaved away until Rupert bailed them out of a tight spot. Now she'd have an idyllic life of luxury where she would walk through the streets of Fayford giving her beneficence to her new tenants. Instead on arrival she is greeted by her husband's corpse laid out in the great hall, a paltry indoor staff of three she can't bear facing, and the new knowledge that the villagers view the house as cursed and won't even deign to work there let alone accept anything from her. In fact the only person who has come to view her husband's body is the local preacher, Mr. Underwood. So here Elsie will waste away with only Rupert's cousin Sarah for companionship and the occasional visit from Mr. Underwood. But then there are the noises in the night. A hissing sound the cook writes off as the cat, or perhaps a nasty nest of squirrels. Only when Elise finally enters the locked room from whence the sounds came she finds no squirrels.

There are two eyes looking at her. She thinks it's a painting but it's "as if someone had cut the figure out of a painting and mounted it on a plank of wood." Elsie is intrigued by the figure that oddly looks like her, whereas Sarah is taken by the two slim volumes next to the figure, the diary of her ancestor, Anne Bainbridge, who was the doyenne of The Bridge when King Charles I and his wife visited in 1635. As uncanny happenings increase after the finding of the figure, with rooms changing and shifting, figures multiplying and poses changing and eyes following the two volume diary of Anne Bainbridge might hold the answers. Because it was in 1635 that The Bridge got it's nasty reputation of losing it's heirs, leading it to be left abandoned for years and years on end. Elsie laments that her life is starting to read like a bad penny dreadful. Only is this really happening? Perhaps the answers that Sarah finds about Anne and her husband Josiah, and their daughter Hetta, their miracle child who unnerves the servants and is otherworldly, and the Bainbridge Diamonds, will stop whatever is currently happening at The Bridge. Because it was Anne who brought these "silent companions" into the house. A trompe l'oeil treat bought in Torbury St. Jude that was just the thing to please his majesty. Or perhaps Elise is mad. Left silent in a sanatorium after her experiences at The Bridge.

I have a friend Matt. We've often joked that we should do a podcast because we literally do not agree on anything. Any book I love he hates and vice versa. Therefore it came as a shock to both of us to discover we agreed completely on The Silent Companions. I don't know what stars aligned or what parallel universe we entered, but we came to a consensus; we both thought it should have been more. The silent companions themselves were lacking. I think this has a lot to do with whomever wrote the cover blurb. Shame on you! When Elise opens "a locked door, beyond which is a painted wooden figure - a silent companion - that bears a striking resemblance to Elsie herself" I know every single person reading that thinks wooden weeping angels. There is not a single person who thought that the silent companions were basically set flats. I'm sorry, but set flats aren't scary. No matter how much they "change" or "multiple," cut-outs dragging their wooden selves across now deeply grooved floors doesn't inspire any kind of chills going up and down my spine. In fact I found them bordering on laughable. I don't know if this is because I am inured to cut-outs due to the popularity of having a cut-out of an actor from your favorite TV just chilling about your house or because I worked in theater... but the fact of the matter is, I was underwhelmed. By it all. I was sold by the blurb and the reality came nowhere near that frisson of fear I had the first time I read the synopsis.

Reading this book around the same time I was watching the new Netflix adaptation of The Haunting of Hill House I realized there was one area in which this book succeeds which I think is vital to the success of any true book purporting to be Gothic, and that is Laura Purcell nailed the sense of place. She nailed The Bridge and because of that there is a lot that can be forgiven plot wise. In fact, as I discussed this book with my fellow book club members I posited that I think I could actually draw the blueprints for this house. If there's one thing that I hate it is when I read a book and I can't get a good sense of the surroundings. I need to ground the characters in their setting. This book took it to a new level. Not only did I have the sense of the house, the house became a central character to the book, which I think was necessary for the narrative. That is why I compare it to The Haunting of Hill House. While the buildings have supernatural elements and events, you can still know where everything is and therefore when it changes, even subtly, you know something "other" is going on. Thinking on this further, and tying it into the set-piece like nature of the companions themselves, I wonder if there's a theatrical aspect that this book is embracing. Everything laid out just so so when it goes off the rails, you know where you were supposed to be but aren't any longer.

Enough about what I liked, an aspect of the book that really annoyed me was that Laura Purcell has an elliptical storytelling style. She drops potential plot points and red herrings all along the path and maybe one or two are actually resolved. I know there are people who say, but that makes the book more realistic, not having everything tied up in a neat little bow. To them I say, that's why I read books! Because unlike in real life everything can have a resolution and you won't be grumbling about what exactly happened in the heroine's past. Because really, there is a lot of heavy-handed doom and gloom about what went on in Elsie's life prior to her marriage. Abuse allegations about her parents, the struggling match factory, and her relationship with her brother... and yet not a single one of these is dealt with. We don't even really get any sense as to why Rupert married her. And I think the event that then catalyzes the entire narrative of the story should at least be discussed don't you? What annoyed me most though is that the book drops hint after hint that Elsie's much younger brother, Jolyon Livingstone, was perhaps her son. It would explain the strain in her relationship with her parents, whether Jolyon was the product of incest, again strongly hinted at that would be firmly rooted in the Gothic, or whether they were just forced to raise their grandson as their son, it would explain a lot. But nope. Nothing whatsoever is elucidated and for a minute I thought the book could be completely written off.

But Laura Purcell finally delivered! It's amazing how the final few pages of a book can retroactively fix many of the issues you previously had. And yes, I'm looking at you The Circle. Sure, there are all these threads left dangling, but the most important, the crucial thread was picked up and given a tug. I was wonderfully surprised that one of the many plot points Laura Purcell set up actually paid off with a little twist at the end. And no, I am not going to spoil it for you because you'd be able to pick up the one important thread at the beginning and not follow all the ones that are cut short. Yet I will say that what I liked most about this twist was that it took several of the unnatural occurrences at The Bridge and put it on one character's shoulders. Everything weird and uncanny tied back to one character. What's more, this had the added benefit of tying the two timelines together. Often in books with two timelines so far apart, two hundred years here, authors tend to have the past inform the present but not really carry anything over of importance from the past. Here that's different, and I think that is what raised this book up to being a satisfying read while also firmly classifying it as Gothic. So while this might not have been everything I wanted it to be, it surprised me in the end because the author broke her pre-established patterns and gave us one satisfying answer.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Elliptical, Going Gothic, Gothic, Incest, Laura Purcell, Netflix, Sense of Place, The Circle, The Haunting of Hill House, The Silent Companions, The Weeping Angels, Theatre, Victorian

The Painted Queen by Elizabeth Peters and Joan Hess
Published by: William Morrow
Publication Date: July 25th, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 352 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Egypt, 1912—Amelia Peabody and her dashing archeologist husband, Radcliffe Emerson, are once again in danger as they search for a priceless, stolen bust of legendary Queen Nefertiti and Amelia finds herself the target of assassins in this long-awaited, eagerly anticipated final installment of Elizabeth Peters’ bestselling, beloved mystery series.

Arriving in Cairo for another thrilling excavation season, Amelia is relaxing in a well-earned bubble bath in her elegant hotel suite in Cairo, when a man with knife protruding from his back staggers into the bath chamber and utters a single word—"Murder"—before collapsing on the tiled floor, dead. Among the few possessions he carried was a sheet of paper with Amelia’s name and room number, and a curious piece of pasteboard the size of a calling card bearing one word: "Judas." Most peculiarly, the stranger was wearing a gold-rimmed monocle in his left eye.

It quickly becomes apparent that someone saved Amelia from a would-be assassin—someone who is keeping a careful eye on the intrepid Englishwoman. Discovering a terse note clearly meant for Emerson—Where were you?"—pushed under their door, there can be only one answer: the brilliant master of disguise, Sethos.

But neither assassins nor the Genius of Crime will deter Amelia as she and Emerson head to the excavation site at Amarna, where they will witness the discovery of one of the most precious Egyptian artifacts: the iconic Nefertiti bust. In 1345 B.C. the sculptor Thutmose crafted the piece in tribute to the great beauty of this queen who was also the chief consort of Pharaoh Akhenaten and stepmother to King Tutankhamun.

For Amelia, this excavation season will prove to be unforgettable. Throughout her journey, a parade of men in monocles will die under suspicious circumstances, fascinating new relics will be unearthed, a diabolical mystery will be solved, and a brilliant criminal will offer his final challenge . . . and perhaps be unmasked at last."

I thought we had seen the last of Amelia Peabody, how happy am I to be wrong! Plus Joan Hess is doing an event just a block from my house, oh, I can't wait to go!

Strange Practice by Vivian Shaw
Published by: Orbit
Publication Date: July 25th, 2017
Format: Paperback, 400 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Meet Greta Helsing, doctor to the undead.

Dr. Greta Helsing has inherited the family's highly specialized, and highly peculiar, medical practice. She treats the undead for a host of ills - vocal strain in banshees, arthritis in barrow-wights, and entropy in mummies.

It's a quiet, supernatural-adjacent life, until a sect of murderous monks emerges, killing human and undead Londoners alike. As terror takes hold of the city, Greta must use her unusual skills to stop the cult if she hopes to save her practice, and her life."

This sounds like a really interesting take on the Dracula mythology!

Vanguard by Ann Aguirre
Published by: Feiwel and Friends
Publication Date: July 25th, 2017
Format: Hardcover, 368 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The companion fourth book in the New York Times―bestselling Razorland YA series sees beloved characters reunited and features an unexpected new romance."

Could you give us less details?

The Punch Escrow by Tal M. Klein
Published by: Geek and Sundry
Publication Date: July 25th, 2017
Format: Paperback, 300 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"It's the year 2147. Advancements in nanotechnology have enabled us to control aging. We’ve genetically engineered mosquitoes to feast on carbon fumes instead of blood, ending air pollution. And teleportation has become the ideal mode of transportation, offered exclusively by International Transport―the world’s most powerful corporation, in a world controlled by corporations.

Joel Byram spends his days training artificial-intelligence engines to act more human and trying to salvage his deteriorating marriage. He’s pretty much an everyday twenty-second century guy with everyday problems―until he’s accidentally duplicated while teleporting.

Now Joel must outsmart the shadowy organization that controls teleportation, outrun the religious sect out to destroy it, and find a way to get back to the woman he loves in a world that now has two of him."

I really had hope in loving Ready Player One and I so didn't... so I now have faith in this book instead.

The Backstagers by James Tynion IV and Rian Sygh
Published by: BOOM! Box
Publication Date: July 25th, 2017
Format: Paperback, 112 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"All the world's a stage . . . but what happens behind the curtain is pure magic—literally!

When Jory transfers to an all-boys private high school, he’s taken in by the only ones who don’t treat him like a new kid, the lowly stage crew known as the Backstagers. Not only does he gain great, lifetime friends, Jory is also introduced to an entire magical world that lives beyond the curtain. With the unpredictable twists and turns of the underground world, the Backstagers venture into the unknown, determined to put together the best play their high school has ever seen."

My old theater loving self just has to say YAS! 

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Amelia Peabody, Ann Aguirre, Dr. Greta Helsing, Dracula, Elizabeth Peters, Joan Hess, Ready Player One, Strange Practice, The Backstagers, The Painted Queen, The Punch Escrow, Theatre, Vanguard, Vivian Shaw

The House on Durrow Street (Mrs. Quent Book 2) by Galen Beckett
Published by: Spectra
Publication Date: September 28th, 2010
Format: Hardcover, 704 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy
 
Ivy has more than she could ever have wished for. When she went to Heathcrest Hall she had hoped to earn enough money to open up the family house on Durrow Street and remove her sisters from odious familial obligations. Now returned to Invarel she has opened up her old home, with her husband and former employer Mr. Quent by her side. The house undoubtedly belonged to a magician, but to Ivy and her sisters it is home despite all it's oddities. The ever watching eyes carved out of wood, which tend to be unnerving to the workers refurbishing the house, are there to protect Ivy's family, constantly observing their well-being and safety. But what else might they be protecting? Ivy's father was a great magician and the house definitely has its secrets. Soon a door is discovered bricked up behind a wall, and awhile later it's mate on the other side of the room is stumbled upon. Doors of great craftsmanship and beauty that no one would rightly cover, unless they needed protecting. Items in the house are also behaving curiously. The clock on the mantel is more accurate than the most up-to-date almanac and there's a journal of her father's that Ivy discovers is slowly revealing it's entries in a haphazard manner. If Ivy knows her father, all this is to lead her on her path to becoming the heroine and savior of Altania her father believes her to be.

But distractions are in Ivy's way, in the form of societal obligations. Mr. Quent is always busy. Before he was away from home all the time, but now that he's in Invarel he's just as occupied, rising in the ranks of society. While Ivy's sisters are excited about the prospects of their higher stations, Ivy has hundreds of concerns, from bringing her sisters out into society, to new friendships with the likes of the great Lady Crayford. With unrest in town can she trust these new acquaintances? Because a dear old friend, Dashton Rafferdy, is at the heart of the unrest. Rafferdy has taken his father's seat in the Hall of Magnates. Being so politically placed is making a man of this rake. The king is ill, he is in fact dying, and factions are forming within the Citadel. There are two waring parties of magicians, and Rafferdy is on the wrong side, not aligning himself with Lord Valhain, the king's black dog who has the terrifying Lady Shayde as his personal weapon. With the lack of rebellions and risings associated with the "rightful king" Huntley Morden these other magicians are determined to keep the rebellion fomenting by publicly turning against magic itself. Because magicians will be blamed for terrorist acts. Even illusionists are threatened. Yet could all this be tied to the threat Ivy and Rafferdy faced before? Could all this be in aid of the Ashen? And will they attempt an even greater rising, this time at the Evengrove? But most worrying of all, what happens when the red planet Cerephus gets even closer?

It is a rare occurrence for an author to create a group of characters and make you love each and every one of them. It's even rarer for this to happen in a love triangle. I quite literally can not think of one where all three of the characters held equal space in my heart. And if you say you actually like George Wickham I will smack you right now! He was so up to something from his first appearance in Pride and Prejudice. There is always a weak link. One character that just isn't up to snuff and therefore you're secretly rooting for them to fail. Since the first page of The Magicians and Mrs. Quent I was shipping Ivy and Rafferdy. By the very title of the first book you know that Ivy isn't going to end up with him. She's going to end up with the, at that point unknown, Mr. Quent. So going further into the narrative Mr. Quent already had a black mark against him. I didn't know him but I knew he was going to cause trouble. And then he arrives and is stalwart and upstanding and just an all around good guy. Yes, I still wanted Ivy to be with Rafferdy, but I couldn't fault her marrying Mr. Quent, he is so wonderful in his own way. Galen Beckett has created his own little Catch-22. He has made such wonderful characters that I am conflicted as to who would bring them greater happiness. I keep thinking, it HAS to be Rafferdy because he helped Ivy defeat The Vigilant Order of the Silver Eye and she makes him a better man! But then she completes Mr. Quent who was so wounded by the death of his first wife all those years ago. Seriously, if this was a pick your own adventure book I would be screwed.

Of course there is always an exception to every rule. It's like it's own rule am I right? So when I say "I love every character" what I mean is "I love every character except..." And I'm not talking about the characters that you are meant to hate, because you eventually come to love hating them. I'm talking about the characters you just don't like. In this case it's Eldyn. You're probably saying, who's Eldyn right about now. In my review of the first book I mentioned him in passing as Rafferdy's best friend. In this review I've glossed over him almost entirely with lumping him in as one of the illusionists, which he is. Yet he is one of the three principal characters in this series and a third of the narrative belongs to him. So perhaps I should explain why I've omitted him. In The Magicians and Mrs. Quent he has a rather boring storyline about his sister and some rebels. These sections were excruciating. If I had to read about him at least Rafferdy could be present right? The fact that he didn't die in the first book was a major source of contention with me. I should have given more credit to Galen. Because in The House on Durrow Street if there's one surprise it's the redemption of the character of Eldyn Garritt. I know. I'm as surprised as you that my opinion could be changed so drastically.

With books this big it's hard to cover everything that happens in one review. I could write several reviews of The House on Durrow Street and never repeat myself and still have things to talk about. But this redemption of Eldyn is, I think, the most interesting. Yes, his learning to become an illusionist and eventually a performer at The Theatre of the Moon is fascinating, as is his paramour Dercy, but what's more surprising is that Eldyn's story is the driving force of this book. The simple line of "even illusionists are threatened" from above encapsulates more than you can imagine. Because what lies underneath is a dark mystery that keeps you turning the pages waiting to find out the truth. Because illusionists are turning up dead. Of course only fellow illusionists could make this connection. Eldyn, in trying to support that rebel loving sister of his is straddling the world of the church, where he works as a clerk, and the world of illusion, where he is learning his art. The church has strong opinions on illusionists, all of them bad. But it's only through being a part of both of these worlds that Eldyn is able to see the greater picture, to uncover the conspiracy of the church using magic to exert control. They are harming and harnessing magic to their own purposes. Purposes that are almost too dark to discuss. But when you see the full extent of the conspiracy in it's reveal you will be astounded and hopefully agree with me that you were seriously doing a disservice to Mr. Garritt.

With Mr. Garritt being revealed as an illusionist the three branches of magic are represented in our three protagonists, Mrs. Quent, the witch, Rafferdy, the magician, and Eldyn, the illusionist. What's interesting about Galen's worldbuilding is that he doesn't just go into the customs and mores of society, he goes far into outer space and alien forces, and closer to home with genetics. Because witch, magician, and illusionist are all born this way. Which given that illusionists are homosexual I think it's nice to have someone pointing out even in a fantasy world that they are born that way. It's genetics people not something that is in need of deprogramming. Witches are born to witches, in fact it is very rare for a witch to have a male child, but if she does that child is an illusionist. Magicians just descend down the male line of the seven great houses with some having the power and some not. Hence the Hall of Magnates is literally littered with real and wannabe magicians. What comes about in The House on Durrow Street is a distinct segregation of the types of magic and fear-mongering. The magicians in power in the Hall of Magnates use their influence to make war on magic, particularly the "natural" magics of witches and illusionists, though if push comes to shove they will totally use those "natural" powers for their own gain. Likewise they instill fear in the populace to hate all magic, hiding their own. Because of all the branches of magic, magicians are the most easily corrupted by the power they need in order to work their magics.

Going back to outer space I have one question lingering at the back of my mind, and that is, is this world of Altania perhaps our future? Go with me on this, it's kind of a reverse Star Wars with our future looking like our past, but it's possible. The days and nights are of varying duration and the planets are all akimbo, but perhaps over time that could happen. Ivy talks of a time when days and nights were fixed. Here in our world after the winter equinox we gain a few minutes of sun every day until the summer equinox where we lose a few minutes of sun every day, unless you live at the equator and then it's twelve hours of light and twelve hours of dark everyday, year round. But this is to do with the moon and the tides and the planets. Now imagine something happening to knock them off course, or even just as time passes and the planets paths start to degrade, might Ivy's world come to be? Could night and day no longer be dependable? Could Earth's rotation be random? I wonder how this plays into crops and trees and even grass. And here again is why I love this book, it makes me think, it makes me imagine. I wonder about things and question things that I thought of as just accepted. Yes, there are stories I've read about night falling, forever, but never have I read a story where it's handled so deftly and also so woven into the society and their customs. I seriously just need more of this world, more of this story. I literally never want it to end. Ever.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Galen Beckett, Genetics, Illusionist, Love Triangle, Magic, Pride and Prejudice, Regency Magic, Star Wars, The House on Durrow Street, The Magicians and Mrs. Quent, Theatre, Witches, Worldbuilding

The House on Durrow Street (Mrs. Quent Book 2) by Galen Beckett
Published by: Spectra
Publication Date: September 28th, 2010
Format: Hardcover, 704 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

Ivy has more than she could ever have wished for. When she went to Heathcrest Hall she had hoped to earn enough money to open up the family house on Durrow Street and remove her sisters from odious familial obligations. Now returned to Invarel she has opened up her old home, with her husband and former employer Mr. Quent by her side. The house undoubtedly belonged to a magician, but to Ivy and her sisters it is home despite all it's oddities. The ever watching eyes carved out of wood, which tend to be unnerving to the workers refurbishing the house, are there to protect Ivy's family, constantly observing their well-being and safety. But what else might they be protecting? Ivy's father was a great magician and the house definitely has its secrets. Soon a door is discovered bricked up behind a wall, and awhile later it's mate on the other side of the room is stumbled upon. Doors of great craftsmanship and beauty that no one would rightly cover, unless they needed protecting. Items in the house are also behaving curiously. The clock on the mantel is more accurate than the most up-to-date almanac and there's a journal of her father's that Ivy discovers is slowly revealing it's entries in a haphazard manner. If Ivy knows her father, all this is to lead her on her path to becoming the heroine and savior of Altania her father believes her to be.

But distractions are in Ivy's way, in the form of societal obligations. Mr. Quent is always busy. Before he was away from home all the time, but now that he's in Invarel he's just as occupied, rising in the ranks of society. While Ivy's sisters are excited about the prospects of their higher stations, Ivy has hundreds of concerns, from bringing her sisters out into society, to new friendships with the likes of the great Lady Crayford. With unrest in town can she trust these new acquaintances? Because a dear old friend, Dashton Rafferdy, is at the heart of the unrest. Rafferdy has taken his father's seat in the Hall of Magnates. Being so politically placed is making a man of this rake. The king is ill, he is in fact dying, and factions are forming within the Citadel. There are two waring parties of magicians, and Rafferdy is on the wrong side, not aligning himself with Lord Valhain, the king's black dog who has the terrifying Lady Shayde as his personal weapon. With the lack of rebellions and risings associated with the "rightful king" Huntley Morden these other magicians are determined to keep the rebellion fomenting by publicly turning against magic itself. Because magicians will be blamed for terrorist acts. Even illusionists are threatened. Yet could all this be tied to the threat Ivy and Rafferdy faced before? Could all this be in aid of the Ashen? And will they attempt an even greater rising, this time at the Evengrove? But most worrying of all, what happens when the red planet Cerephus gets even closer?

It is a rare occurrence for an author to create a group of characters and make you love each and every one of them. It's even rarer for this to happen in a love triangle. I quite literally can not think of one where all three of the characters held equal space in my heart. And if you say you actually like George Wickham I will smack you right now! He was so up to something from his first appearance in Pride and Prejudice. There is always a weak link. One character that just isn't up to snuff and therefore you're secretly rooting for them to fail. Since the first page of The Magicians and Mrs. Quent I was shipping Ivy and Rafferdy. By the very title of the first book you know that Ivy isn't going to end up with him. She's going to end up with the, at that point unknown, Mr. Quent. So going further into the narrative Mr. Quent already had a black mark against him. I didn't know him but I knew he was going to cause trouble. And then he arrives and is stalwart and upstanding and just an all around good guy. Yes, I still wanted Ivy to be with Rafferdy, but I couldn't fault her marrying Mr. Quent, he is so wonderful in his own way. Galen Beckett has created his own little Catch-22. He has made such wonderful characters that I am conflicted as to who would bring them greater happiness. I keep thinking, it HAS to be Rafferdy because he helped Ivy defeat The Vigilant Order of the Silver Eye and she makes him a better man! But then she completes Mr. Quent who was so wounded by the death of his first wife all those years ago. Seriously, if this was a pick your own adventure book I would be screwed.

Of course there is always an exception to every rule. It's like it's own rule am I right? So when I say "I love every character" what I mean is "I love every character except..." And I'm not talking about the characters that you are meant to hate, because you eventually come to love hating them. I'm talking about the characters you just don't like. In this case it's Eldyn. You're probably saying, who's Eldyn right about now. In my review of the first book I mentioned him in passing as Rafferdy's best friend. In this review I've glossed over him almost entirely with lumping him in as one of the illusionists, which he is. Yet he is one of the three principal characters in this series and a third of the narrative belongs to him. So perhaps I should explain why I've omitted him. In The Magicians and Mrs. Quent he has a rather boring storyline about his sister and some rebels. These sections were excruciating. If I had to read about him at least Rafferdy could be present right? The fact that he didn't die in the first book was a major source of contention with me. I should have given more credit to Galen. Because in The House on Durrow Street if there's one surprise it's the redemption of the character of Eldyn Garritt. I know. I'm as surprised as you that my opinion could be changed so drastically.

With books this big it's hard to cover everything that happens in one review. I could write several reviews of The House on Durrow Street and never repeat myself and still have things to talk about. But this redemption of Eldyn is, I think, the most interesting. Yes, his learning to become an illusionist and eventually a performer at The Theatre of the Moon is fascinating, as is his paramour Dercy, but what's more surprising is that Eldyn's story is the driving force of this book. The simple line of "even illusionists are threatened" from above encapsulates more than you can imagine. Because what lies underneath is a dark mystery that keeps you turning the pages waiting to find out the truth. Because illusionists are turning up dead. Of course only fellow illusionists could make this connection. Eldyn, in trying to support that rebel loving sister of his is straddling the world of the church, where he works as a clerk, and the world of illusion, where he is learning his art. The church has strong opinions on illusionists, all of them bad. But it's only through being a part of both of these worlds that Eldyn is able to see the greater picture, to uncover the conspiracy of the church using magic to exert control. They are harming and harnessing magic to their own purposes. Purposes that are almost too dark to discuss. But when you see the full extent of the conspiracy in it's reveal you will be astounded and hopefully agree with me that you were seriously doing a disservice to Mr. Garritt. 

With Mr. Garritt being revealed as an illusionist the three branches of magic are represented in our three protagonists, Mrs. Quent, the witch, Rafferdy, the magician, and Eldyn, the illusionist. What's interesting about Galen's worldbuilding is that he doesn't just go into the customs and mores of society, he goes far into outer space and alien forces, and closer to home with genetics. Because witch, magician, and illusionist are all born this way. Which given that illusionists are homosexual I think it's nice to have someone pointing out even in a fantasy world that they are born that way. It's genetics people not something that is in need of deprogramming. Witches are born to witches, in fact it is very rare for a witch to have a male child, but if she does that child is an illusionist. Magicians just descend down the male line of the seven great houses with some having the power and some not. Hence the Hall of Magnates is literally littered with real and wannabe magicians. What comes about in The House on Durrow Street is a distinct segregation of the types of magic and fear-mongering. The magicians in power in the Hall of Magnates use their influence to make war on magic, particularly the "natural" magics of witches and illusionists, though if push comes to shove they will totally use those "natural" powers for their own gain. Likewise they instill fear in the populace to hate all magic, hiding their own. Because of all the branches of magic, magicians are the most easily corrupted by the power they need in order to work their magics.

Going back to outer space I have one question lingering at the back of my mind, and that is, is this world of Altania perhaps our future? Go with me on this, it's kind of a reverse Star Wars with our future looking like our past, but it's possible. The days and nights are of varying duration and the planets are all akimbo, but perhaps over time that could happen. Ivy talks of a time when days and nights were fixed. Here in our world after the winter equinox we gain a few minutes of sun every day until the summer equinox where we lose a few minutes of sun every day, unless you live at the equator and then it's twelve hours of light and twelve hours of dark everyday, year round. But this is to do with the moon and the tides and the planets. Now imagine something happening to knock them off course, or even just as time passes and the planets paths start to degrade, might Ivy's world come to be? Could night and day no longer be dependable? Could Earth's rotation be random? I wonder how this plays into crops and trees and even grass. And here again is why I love this book, it makes me think, it makes me imagine. I wonder about things and question things that I thought of as just accepted. Yes, there are stories I've read about night falling, forever, but never have I read a story where it's handled so deftly and also so woven into the society and their customs. I seriously just need more of this world, more of this story. I literally never want it to end. Ever.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Galen Beckett, Genetics, Illusionist, Love Triangle, Magic, Pride and Prejudice, Regency Magic, Star Wars, The House on Durrow Street, The Magicians and Mrs. Quent, Theatre, Witches, Worldbuilding

The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde
Published by: The Franklin Library
Publication Date: 1891
Format: Hardcover, 243 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

The painter Basil Hallward has found his muse in Dorian Gray. Just having the dazzling and innocent youth in his life has made his work reach heights he never thought it would. Basil longs to keep Dorian his secret but his dear friend Lord Harry Wotton is so enthralled by the portrait that Basil is painting of Dorian that he demands to meet the youth whose likeness is sure to be the best painting of Basil's career. But the meeting of Harry and Dorian changes everything. Harry fills the empty vessel of Dorian's mind with vanity for his own beauty and that naivete that Basil so adores quickly starts to slip away from Dorian. Upon gazing at the finished portrait Dorian makes a heartfelt plea that he might remain forever youthful and pure in his looks while his likeness ages and withers before his eyes. Little does Dorian know that sometimes wishes come true. After an ill fated love affair Dorian realizes that sometimes the unexplainable happens and soon he's on the path of vice and immorality while his portraiture suffers, all guided by the steady hand of Harry.

The late nineties was the perfect time to develop an Oscar Wilde obsession. Almost a hundred years after his death the cinema was filled with marvelous new adaptations of his most celebrated plays as well as a biopic starring that celebrity I am most likely to kidnap to read all my books to me, Stephen Fry. Even that one movie I saw more then any movie ever in theaters, Velvet Goldmine, had a little Wilde in it. Birthdays and holidays I was gifted new Wilde books, from The Importance of Being a Wit: The Insults of Oscar Wilde to the Wilde: Screenplay. I even had a postcard from my friend Paul promoting Wilde with Stephen Fry in his dapper photoshop pink suit that I remember holding pride of place on the mirror in my bedroom for many years. In fact, I'm pretty sure given the impetus I could dig it out again. I waited for each adaptation with baited breath and saw them all on opening weekend, even if I had to see Wilde at our rather run down art house cinema where half your attention was on the screen and the other half on the ceiling hoping it wouldn't collapse. Wilde and his wit became a way of life for me. 

When I ended up becoming a theater major through the back door by way of classes cross-listed with my art major I felt like I was becoming more in tune with Wilde's world. I studied the history of the theater and read my fair share of plays from the Greeks right up to Wilde himself. In the fall of 2001 I was taking a class that was meant to expand our critical writing skills of plays, both productions and text being analyzed. I was frustrated with this class in that I had spent my life honing these skills and to be given simple exercises that I could have done in freshman year of high school, well, my mind tended to wander. What my mind wandered to was the one thing I was looking forward to in this class, and that was my semester long project on a play of my choice. It almost goes without mentioning that I chose The Importance of Being Earnest. I dove into the research material and lived there while blocking out the boring class. I learned the finer details of Bunburying and the great value of not misplacing your handbag.

While researching my paper I read a selection of Wilde's non-fiction essays and quickly came to the conclusion that he needed to remain a playwright. Reading his only book, The Picture of Dorian Gray, has not changed my opinion on this, in fact it has reinforced it. Plays and prose are such vastly different creatures. The way Wilde writes, every single sentence or line of dialogue is quotable. This works better in a play, because the way the actors bring the words to life and bounce them off each other the rapid fire wit entrances you. In a book it tends to get bogged down and lost. The back and forth of unassigned dialogue makes you confused and makes it loose it's punch. So many of the lines from The Picture of Dorian Grey are classics of Wilde's wit, but read in context they just loose something ineffable.

The best way I've thought of describing this ineffable issue, which, given it's ineffable is near impossible, is to compare Wilde to Nancy Mitford. Nancy Mitford wrote all her books so that each and every line amused her. Some were inside jokes, others mere wordplay, but each book was crafted to the nth degree sentence by sentence. Now Nancy wrote eight fiction books in her lifetime, only half of those are worth reading. Because of the way Nancy wrote the success of her brand of humor was hit or miss, either wonderful or awful. Given Wilde crafted his sole book in a near identical way he had about a fifty-fifty chance of success, and he did not succeed. Nancy had more time to get it right, and I must say it's a pity that Wilde didn't have that luxury, dying at the age of 46. As a reader I am not someone to necessarily be amused by an author who is amused by their own wit. I don't want to be highlighting every line as a favorite quote. You need the book to ebb and flow with valleys and peaks. Even if I take away the fact that Wilde wants us to stay at the top of this mountain range, when he does deign to descend, he gives us weird ramblings about gems and tapestries that would try the patience of any reader.

I am not the only one to have issues with this book. The Victorian society into which Wilde debuted his novel was scandalized by the hedonism and homosexuality of the book. This is another instance where I agree with someone having a problem with the book, but not for the same reasons. Wilde's themes and how he is laying them bare is what intrigued me while scandalizing those prudish Victorians. The way he wrote it is where my annoyance lay. Yet it wasn't my only issue. The self-impressed characters, especially Lord Harry, are people I would have to murder if I spent more then five minutes with them. Also, while the book's themes were worthy, the way they were handled was not with a deft hand. The hedonism was in some regards too obvious and in others too opaque, giving us a muddled view as to how evil Dorian has really become. If you're going to really show how a man's soul has been corrupted, I don't think you can go by halves here. Wilde's already scandalized the public, why not go all out?

The chilling fact that this all stems from Dorian wanting to remain the societal ideal of beauty is the most intriguing aspect of this book, but again it is badly handled. NO ONE EVER COMMENTS ON DORIAN NOT AGING! I just don't get this. By the end of the book he's what, thirty-eight and looking twenty-one? Someone would say something, wouldn't they? Or were Victorians really that missish to think it rude to ask? So while I applaud Wilde for handling a topic that is still relevant to today's society, IE, worshipping at the Temple of Youth where appearance is everything, he could have done a better job. But seeing as Wilde himself was felled by a twenty one year old, well... getting it wrong in literature is not nearly as bad as getting it wrong in your life.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Classics of Horror and Suspense, Nancy Mitford, Oscar Wilde, Playwright, Stephen Fry, The Importance of Being Earnest, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Theatre, Velvet Goldmine, Victorian, Wilde

Requiem for a Mezzo (Daisy Dalrymple Book 3) by Carola Dunn
Published by: Kensington Books
Publication Date: 1996
Format: Paperback, 249 Pages
Rating: ★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Daisy Dalrymple has some interesting neighbors in her little bohemian community of artists and writers, like Daisy herself. Out back her roommate has set up a photography studio, while right next door is the famous opera singer Bettina Westlea, who lives with her spinster sister and her older vocal coach of a husband who has students coming and going all the time. While fixing a cake for her roommate's birthday she runs out of flour and rushes next door to ask Bettina's sweet sister Muriel for the loan of some. Daisy walks right into a house full of divas, with Bettina practicing for her big performance that coming weekend of Verdi's Requiem at Albert Hall, while her husband coaches Miss Olivia Blaise, the talented singer who was up for the part Bettina snagged, and then in walks their conductor, Mr. Eric Cochran. To get Daisy off the front line, Muriel plies her with tickets to the performance, as well as the flour she so desperately needed.

Daisy knows exactly who she wants to take to the concert. Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher. Sure she tends to nose in on his cases... but it gives her a chance to see him. This would be a first outing for them without murder and mayhem, until Bettina drops dead on stage right after the interval. Alec takes charge of the scene but he knows, no matter how hard he tries, that Daisy will worm her way into his case and take someone under her protective wing. The suspect list is very fixed, but they are all of an artistic temperament and therefore have drama and secrets born in their very bones. From Bettina's cuckolded husband, Roger Abernathy, to conductor Eric Cochran and Olivia Blaise, the object of his affection, to Bettina's sister and her secret love interest, the Russian Jew, Yakov Levich, too the other soloists, the Spanish soprano Consuela de la Costa, the Welsh tenor Gilbert Gower, and the hostile bass, Dimitri Marchenko... to various spouses... well, Alec will have his job cut out for him untangling this mess. Luckily for him Daisy is there to help him, even if he doesn't see it as such.

While I really enjoyed the first two mysteries in Carola Dunn's Daisy Dalrymple series, they were very much more in the traditional vein of Golden Age "Manor House" Mysteries. Daisy arrives at a grand estate and murder ensues and Alec is called in. While this is all well and good and enjoyable, for the purpose of a series, setting each book up like this, well, the plot would get old fast. That's why I love how Carola has stepped it up a notch with Requiem for a Mezzo. In the previous two volumes we had heard how Daisy had bucked the conventions of her "honourable" and gone working girl, but it's one thing to hear about it as just a part of her character's background, it's another thing to get to be a part of that life as we see her typing away on her behemoth typewriter on the gorgeous Georgian writing table from her ancestral home in the heart of Chelsea while her roommate is out back in the mews cum photography studio taking portraits of the neighbors Opera students. You get a firmer grip on who Daisy is. In the manor houses we saw who she was, the honourable that can blend into any social setting, but here, here is the life she has chosen for herself. The beans and toast meals, the struggling to get by. The life that she has made for herself makes it far more likely that her and Alec are compatible. Which for me is a strong yeah.

What takes the cake, sponge of course, is the artistic temperaments and the petty jealousies, secret affairs, grudges, and just plain hatred that live within the world of Opera. For many years I worked in theatre, even on a few Operas, backstage of course, doing the painting and the props. I had minimal interaction with the actors on the whole, but I did have many classes with them, and while there were dramas backstage with the crew, it was really the dramas and intrigues of the actors that trickled down to us that we fed off of. Who was seeing who, which of the men was a real whore, who was the biggest diva, which actors weren't talking to each other, sadly never a murder in the lot, but one can see how that could easily happen. They are high strung and I wouldn't say they are all promiscuous, but within a fixed community, you will get some bed jumping, as Gilbert Gower shows with his predilection to international beauties. So, what struck me is that Carola was just spot on with showing the inter dynamics of her cast of characters. I lived in that world and she took me right back there.

While I was reading this book, one thing struck me, and that's this. Requiem for a Mezzo NEEDS to be made into a British TV Movie. It can even be a one off instead of a series, because seriously, I have the dream cast in mind. Firstly, Gilbert Gower, the Welsh playboy... who has the voice and the talent and the raw sex appeal and is Welsh? Tom Jones! Tom Jones as Gilbert Gower, and really, my job here is done. But, I will take the time to round out the cast. While she can't sing, that I know of, I think Consuela de la Costa needs to be played by Sofia Vergara. She has the diva attitude and the sex appeal, plus her and Tom Jones, I KNOW you want to see that. Now for the starring role as our murder victim... Katerine Jenkins. Such an amazing and gorgeous voice, and a real opera singer to boot. I think it would be totally spiffing to have her play against her sweet demeanour by being a bitchy diva. As for Daisy and Alec, I've always pictured Alec as Dominic West... I don't know why, but I always have. Perhaps he just lends himself to being a cop, or he has those expressive eyebrows of Alec's, or is just wonderful in period pieces, but anyway, he would be perfect. And then, after recently watching The Hour, I think we need Romola Garai to be Daisy. First, she has the chemistry with West, second, she has the dirty honey blond hair that would look so cute in the bob Daisy gets, as well as being an amazing actress. So I want and need this to happen, so minions or whomever at the BBC reads this, get this going, ok?

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Albert Hall, Carola Dunn, Daisy Dalrymple, Detective Alec Fletcher, Dominic West, Golden Age of Detection, Katherine Jenkins, Opera, Requiem for a Mezzo, Romola Garai, Sofia Vergara, The Hour, Theatre, Tom Jones

Ok, so finally you're getting this post on time, and not a few weeks late. All Sartorial Sundays are up-to-date, if you feel like reading the older posts. So, I have never really done tea dyeing. I mean, I helped my mother do some "ageing" on cotton batting years and years ago, but never on clothing. I knew that there was many ways I could mess this up, but luckily bleach could always restore my cheap skirt back to it's original downy whiteness, and I could start all over... sigh, like I'd want to do that right? The first thing I did was research! I had read Gail Carriger's blog on tea dyeing, so I had that as a starting off point. I then starting trolling the interwebs, and found this really helpful blog with all the does and don'ts nicely broken down, including reminders not to burn yourself, so yeah, I knew this was the blog for me, because obviously, if I wasn't warned, I would burn myself. Therefore, if you want the more detailed step by step, head on over to Lotus Out Loud for the full details, otherwise, you'll get just a vague step by step here, but with PICTURES!

Here is the skirt, originally and holey.

So, what I first did actually was to see if my skirt, while wet, would fit in the pot I had (yeah it did) and then I left it to soak in the bathroom sink. Look at my olde tyme sink, you can either burn or freeze your hand, no nice lukewarm water for you! Also, wet fabric takes dye better, which I remember from my days in the theatre (say it fake posh please). I had to help bulk die fabric, which had the coolness of being in a giant vat, so I felt like a witch!

Here is me waiting for my pot to slowly boil... yeah, 16 cups of water takes some time. Time I should have spent cleaning that other burner, but, whatever, I'm really lazy at heart, though you wouldn't know it.

So here are all my calculations. I gauged the skirt at about three yards of fabric, but water for four yards covered the skirt better, so that would mean... 32 tea bags! Oh my! Luckily I had this new box of 50 tea bags, black tea as recommended, and what was nice about this brand is that they don't have a string or a tag, so just throw them in the pot! Although, as some have said (Gail), what a waste of all that tea... but it actually has a longer life as part of a skirt, because usually tea just passes right through you (oh, don't look at me like that, you know it's true).

So the brave little bags did jump to steep in the giant pot of boiling water. Side note, my whole house now smells of strong bergamot tea. I think it's kind of nice, I mean, I don't like my tea strong, but the smell is nice. Other members of the household have been more vocal, I think brunt fruit loops and piss have been mentioned more than once this day...

So, as recommended, I didn't try to squeeze the bags by hand, but used a slotted spoon and a wooden spoon in tandem, and it worked quite well. Though my slotted spoon now has a brown tinge... hopefully it will all come out in the dishwasher...

So, I wrung out the skirt and shook it out, so as to get an even color, and into the vat it went! I steeped the tea a long time (about twelve minutes) because I wanted a darker color, so I was also planning on keeping the skirt in there for awhile. Perhaps if I do it again I will leave a lid on the pot so that the vocal member of my house will shut his yap. I left it in for about 90 minutes.

After pouring out the tea you can see that it's not quite as dark as you think it is, but I was forewarned, so I knew it would be lighter.

A close-up of the fabric post rinse pre-wash, because I am going to use the cold water washing machine method and maybe a few minutes in the dryer as well to be safe.

Here it is all washed and dried! It has a wonderful peachy tone that I just adore. Also, whew, it looks good with the top and my over skirt! The skirt has amazing uniformity of color, so I must have done something right! Only near the waistband is there a little splotchiness, but it's under the over skirt, and even if it was, character right? The skirt is now definitely darked than the shirt. Now that they dying is done, time to get me some yarn on!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 6 comments  

Labels: Gail Carriger, Lotus Out Loud, Sartorial Sundays, Skirt, Tea, Tea Dying, Theatre, Yarn

It Ends with Revelations by Dodie Smith
Published by: Little Brown and Company
Publication Date: 1967
Format: Hardcover, 280 Pages
Rating: ★★★
Out of Print

Jill wanders the streets of a town she once knew in desperate times. How things have changed knowing that she could now have anything in any shop window along the high street. Of course, she doesn't want or need for anything since she married the distinguished actor Miles Quentin. Miles is in town to reopen the theatre by testing out a new play that has been adapted from television before moving to the West End. Jill's life is no longer the chaotic life of a stage manager. Now she's there for Miles. She keeps him on schedule, writes his correspondences, buys little presents for the cast, she is wife and personal assistant in one. While out on errands for Miles she wanders into a shop she remembers frequenting in her past. She wants to buy a box of chocolates for the young lad in the play, Cyril. He's never acted on stage and her and Miles want to give him all the encouragement they can. This day proves to be a fateful day. She runs into Geoffrey Thornton, a member for Parliament whom she met once at a function. They get to talking and she learns that his two daughters, Robin and Kit are huge fans of Miles'. They agree to arrange a meeting. Miles, as well as Jill, are charmed by the girls and soon when Miles is busy with the play, she spends all her free time with the girls.

Provincial runs are short though, and after the week the play packs up for London, as do the Thorntons. They all agree to meet often once back in the city, where Jill and Miles are met by their horribly austere and modern new apartment which they loath. It does not look like the play is going to have as receptive an audience in London and the bets are on that it won't last above three weeks. Miles starts to desperately engage Jill into thinking about what they want to do after the play folds. Perhaps an autumn in the country, some time abroad, a new home. Because while she can't place her finger on when or how, things have changed between her and Miles. It all comes out one day when Thornton takes her to see a possible house for Miles' "autumn in the country." Jill is married to Miles because of convenience. Miles is gay. The girls have long suspected this to be the case and have been encouraging their father with the "Thornton Take-Over Scheme" wherein Jill will be there new mother, seeing as their first nymphomaniac, dipsomaniac mother wasn't the best. Things are made all the more easier by the fact that Jill fell in love with Georffrey at first sight, as he did with her. But Jill will not leave Miles after all he has done for her. She is caught between a rock and a hard place and then, just when the pressure couldn't be any worse a scandal is set in motion.

After my second and most recent foray into Dodie Smith's back catalog thanks to my library, I was hesitant to continue. The Girl from the Candle-lit Bath being perhaps one of the worst books I've read in awhile. I am very glad to whomever put this book on hold at the library so that I had to read it right away, because one can't just return a book to the library unread, it goes against Blue Stocking code! I found the characters sweet and endearing. It Ends with Revelations gave me hope that perhaps I read Smith's worst work and now all I had was wonderful books to look forward to, all piled on my desk! The thing that struck me as groundbreaking about this work is the open discussion of homosexuality. Dodie Smith, spending many years in the theatre industry, obviously didn't have the prejudices of many others in society and therefore homosexuality is represented as it is, just the way people are. Robin and Kit are amazingly refreshing in their attitudes. They where raised by tolerate loving people, their grandmother being a friend of Oscar Wilde. To think this book was written in 1967! Many people don't have this openness of mind to this day. There where times when sometimes the slang to refer to homosexuals was a bit dated, so it seems a little derogatory. But keep in mind that while sometimes the words are a product of their times, the feelings behind them are amazingly progressive.

When one thinks that this book came out the year the sexual offences act finally decriminalised homosexuality in England, you realize how amazingly progressive it is. Jill being Miles' beard, which, lets face it, still happens a lot in Hollywood, and the way the Thorntons open up there hearts and in return change everyones lives for the better makes this a very uplifting book. Of course Dodie tries to throw in a bit of a scandal at the end, which wasn't worthy of the characters or their relationships, but she's an author who dabbles in theatre, you have to forgive her need to sometimes throw in an obstacle or two. I'm also glad to see that according to Amazon, this book is going back into print early next year! A book this fun and progressive and modern should not be confined to dusty shelves where the librarian has to basically go into the catacombs to unearth it for a devoted reader like myself!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Beard, Dodie Smith, Homosexuality, I Capture the Castle, It Ends with Revelations, The Girl from the Candle-Lit Bath, Theatre