Moon Over Eden
Oct. 11th, 2012 04:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
todayiamadaisyHere is a thing I would not want to see walking towards me in a forest. Or anywhere, really.
In early September I read The Complete Polysyllabic Spree, which is a collection of magazine columns that Nick Hornby wrote about the books he read each month. Well, I thought, I can do that too, even it might be for just one month. It would be nice to demonstrate to myself that I read more than ridiculous old novels.
September books read
* The Complete Polysyllabic Spree - Nick Hornby (2006)
* A Girl of the Limberlost - Gene Stratton Porter (1909)
* You are Awful (But I Like You) - Tim Moore (2011)
* The Tiny Wife - Andrew Kaufman (2011)
* The Little Grey Men - BB (1942)
* Mrs Harris Goes to Paris - Paul Gallico (1958)
* Mrs Harris Goes to New York - Paul Gallico (1960)
* [Title Withheld] - Barbara Cartland (1978)
So having decided not to read any more ridiculous old novels, I promptly went and read... a ridiculous old novel. Well, no, that's unfair. A Girl of the Limberlost is very much of its time, and I've read much sillier things. It had a very strange way of introducing some characters, in that it didn't introduce them at all. It just mentioned them in conversation, as if the reader already knew them. This was particularly noticeable towards the end when the Girl left the Limberlost and there was this big mystery about where she would go to stay. The book makes a big fuss about the reveal: she's with Freckles and the Swamp Angel! It clearly wanted me to think, oh, yay, Freckles and the Swamp Angel, but what I was really thinking was, who? It was only after I finished it that I realised it was a sequel to a book called Freckles, which presumably details how he came to marry someone called the Swamp Angel. Anyway, AGotL taught me that if you are good and kind and sweet, everyone will just love you, and also that you can pay your way through university by selling endangered species to foreign collectors. I had two favourite characters: the first was the Girl's mother, who spent the first half of the book as a MADWOMAN and the second half in recovery (she was better when she was MAD), and the second was the Girl's fiancé's ex-fiancée, a horribly spoilt brat who is sort of redeemed with a delightful cameo in the very last chapter of the book. My least favourite character, by some distance, was an orphan called Billy, who is adopted by the Girl's neighbours. There is a fine line between adorably mischievous and budding psychopath, and Billy crosses it quite early when he ties two kittens together by the tails and suspends them over the clothesline. Little beast. No wonder his father took to drink and died.
In retrospect, there was a theme to my reading in September: books that remind me of other books. A Girl of the Limberlost is Anne of Green Gables in Indiana, and the next book I read, You are Awful (But I Like You) by Tim Moore, is a British version of Red Lobster, White Trash and the Blue Lagoon by Joe Queenan, in which the author travels around experiencing the worst of his country. Only the Queenan book is hilarious (it's worth it for his thoughts on Flowers in the Attic and Love Story alone), while the Moore book is grim. He concentrates on visiting industrial cities with high unemployment, which isn't nearly so funny. When I finished it, I re-read a couple of chapters of his Do Not Pass Go, detailing his travels around the streets of the (London) Monopoly board, which cheered me up no end.
The Tiny Wife is Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Believe in the power of your dreams, f-list. And don't bother reading this book.
The Little Grey Men wants to be Wind in the Willows. It's the story of the last three gnomes in Britain who leave their home and travel along the river to find their missing brother. Dearie me, it was twee. Twee right up until a gamekeeper shoots their friend, Otter, and in revenge, the gnomes pray to Pan, who tells them how to make the gamekeeper's gun backfire. So it went: twee, twee, twee, dead otter, murder, twee, twee, twee. There's a sequel, apparently, but I'm not up for it.
A few years ago, I found a book called Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day in the library, and loved it. LOVED IT. Mrs Harris Goes to Paris wants to be Miss Pettigrew, but it's just a wisp of tulle and I didn't really like it at all. Mrs Harris is a London char lady who decides she wants to own a Dior dress. So she scrimps and saves and eventually has enough cash to get to Paris and buy a dress, only to realise that one doesn't just stroll into Dior and buy couture off the rack. So she has to stay in Paris, where, through her humble practicality and common sense, she changes the fortunes of everyone she meets. Huzzah. Then she takes the dress home, lends it to someone, and it's destroyed. The end.
There are apparently three sequels to Mrs Harris' trip to Paris, and I wouldn't have bothered with any of them, but the version I had was an omnibus with one of the sequels in it. In Mrs Harris Goes to New York, Mrs Harris goes to, er, New York, committing crimes of kidnapping, people smuggling and being an interfering old busybody along the way. I didn't enjoy it at all. Judging by the the titles of other two sequels, Mrs Harris goes to Moscow and becomes an MP. Good for her.
The last thing I read was the Barbara Cartland book that I will summarise when I get to the relevant title. It's really not worth discussing twice. :-)
This week's random word:
23. Joy
Our forebears were so keen on the word 'joy' that it replaced three Middle English words: wunne, hight and rot, all of which meant the same thing. They must have been a happy lot back then to need all those words for joy.
Also: it's my mum's middle name. So there you go.
Next week: lunch
In early September I read The Complete Polysyllabic Spree, which is a collection of magazine columns that Nick Hornby wrote about the books he read each month. Well, I thought, I can do that too, even it might be for just one month. It would be nice to demonstrate to myself that I read more than ridiculous old novels.
September books read
* The Complete Polysyllabic Spree - Nick Hornby (2006)
* A Girl of the Limberlost - Gene Stratton Porter (1909)
* You are Awful (But I Like You) - Tim Moore (2011)
* The Tiny Wife - Andrew Kaufman (2011)
* The Little Grey Men - BB (1942)
* Mrs Harris Goes to Paris - Paul Gallico (1958)
* Mrs Harris Goes to New York - Paul Gallico (1960)
* [Title Withheld] - Barbara Cartland (1978)
So having decided not to read any more ridiculous old novels, I promptly went and read... a ridiculous old novel. Well, no, that's unfair. A Girl of the Limberlost is very much of its time, and I've read much sillier things. It had a very strange way of introducing some characters, in that it didn't introduce them at all. It just mentioned them in conversation, as if the reader already knew them. This was particularly noticeable towards the end when the Girl left the Limberlost and there was this big mystery about where she would go to stay. The book makes a big fuss about the reveal: she's with Freckles and the Swamp Angel! It clearly wanted me to think, oh, yay, Freckles and the Swamp Angel, but what I was really thinking was, who? It was only after I finished it that I realised it was a sequel to a book called Freckles, which presumably details how he came to marry someone called the Swamp Angel. Anyway, AGotL taught me that if you are good and kind and sweet, everyone will just love you, and also that you can pay your way through university by selling endangered species to foreign collectors. I had two favourite characters: the first was the Girl's mother, who spent the first half of the book as a MADWOMAN and the second half in recovery (she was better when she was MAD), and the second was the Girl's fiancé's ex-fiancée, a horribly spoilt brat who is sort of redeemed with a delightful cameo in the very last chapter of the book. My least favourite character, by some distance, was an orphan called Billy, who is adopted by the Girl's neighbours. There is a fine line between adorably mischievous and budding psychopath, and Billy crosses it quite early when he ties two kittens together by the tails and suspends them over the clothesline. Little beast. No wonder his father took to drink and died.
In retrospect, there was a theme to my reading in September: books that remind me of other books. A Girl of the Limberlost is Anne of Green Gables in Indiana, and the next book I read, You are Awful (But I Like You) by Tim Moore, is a British version of Red Lobster, White Trash and the Blue Lagoon by Joe Queenan, in which the author travels around experiencing the worst of his country. Only the Queenan book is hilarious (it's worth it for his thoughts on Flowers in the Attic and Love Story alone), while the Moore book is grim. He concentrates on visiting industrial cities with high unemployment, which isn't nearly so funny. When I finished it, I re-read a couple of chapters of his Do Not Pass Go, detailing his travels around the streets of the (London) Monopoly board, which cheered me up no end.
The Tiny Wife is Jonathan Livingston Seagull. Believe in the power of your dreams, f-list. And don't bother reading this book.
The Little Grey Men wants to be Wind in the Willows. It's the story of the last three gnomes in Britain who leave their home and travel along the river to find their missing brother. Dearie me, it was twee. Twee right up until a gamekeeper shoots their friend, Otter, and in revenge, the gnomes pray to Pan, who tells them how to make the gamekeeper's gun backfire. So it went: twee, twee, twee, dead otter, murder, twee, twee, twee. There's a sequel, apparently, but I'm not up for it.
A few years ago, I found a book called Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day in the library, and loved it. LOVED IT. Mrs Harris Goes to Paris wants to be Miss Pettigrew, but it's just a wisp of tulle and I didn't really like it at all. Mrs Harris is a London char lady who decides she wants to own a Dior dress. So she scrimps and saves and eventually has enough cash to get to Paris and buy a dress, only to realise that one doesn't just stroll into Dior and buy couture off the rack. So she has to stay in Paris, where, through her humble practicality and common sense, she changes the fortunes of everyone she meets. Huzzah. Then she takes the dress home, lends it to someone, and it's destroyed. The end.
There are apparently three sequels to Mrs Harris' trip to Paris, and I wouldn't have bothered with any of them, but the version I had was an omnibus with one of the sequels in it. In Mrs Harris Goes to New York, Mrs Harris goes to, er, New York, committing crimes of kidnapping, people smuggling and being an interfering old busybody along the way. I didn't enjoy it at all. Judging by the the titles of other two sequels, Mrs Harris goes to Moscow and becomes an MP. Good for her.
The last thing I read was the Barbara Cartland book that I will summarise when I get to the relevant title. It's really not worth discussing twice. :-)
This week's random word:
23. Joy
Our forebears were so keen on the word 'joy' that it replaced three Middle English words: wunne, hight and rot, all of which meant the same thing. They must have been a happy lot back then to need all those words for joy.
Also: it's my mum's middle name. So there you go.
Next week: lunch