Victorian Challenge: a conclusion

The Victorian Challenge has been graciously hosted by Alex on a dedicated blog here. Do take a look – there are some wonderful reviews of an inredible array of books.

I was thrilled as soon as I first saw the words “Victorian” and “Challenge” together, and decided to set about reading a few of the big Victorian novels that I hadn’t got around to.

In the end I settled for a walk in Hyde Park (4 books) rather than the tour of the British Museum (5 books) I had planned.

I loved the books I read and I’m happy that I took my time and enjoyed them rather than rushing to hit a target.

Here they are, linked to reviews:

Little Dorrit, by Charles Dickens

The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde

Miss Cayley’s Adventures, by Grant Allen

Cranford, by Elizabeth Gaskell

Miss Cayley’s Adventures by Grant Allen

Miss Cayley’s Adventures is definitely a Victorian novel. Like many works of the period it first appeared in serial form – part one was published in The Strand in March 1898.

But Lois Cayley is definitely not a typical Victorian heroine.

When her stepfather dies Miss Cayley finds herself alone in the world. The obvious thing to do would be to take her friends advice and find respectable employment as a teacher or in a hat-shop. Does she do that? No. Miss Cayley decides to step out into the world in search of adventure, grabbing whatever chances come her way.

The adventures come thick and fast, and the storytelling is quite wonderful.

Miss Cayley travels through Germany, Italy, Egypt and India. And in the course of her travels she becomes a lady’s maid, a bicycle saleswoman, a house-sitter, the proprietor of a secretarial agency and a journalist. She foils a robbery, wins a cycle race and rescues an injured mountaineer.

Yes, Miss Cayley is bright, articulate, athletic and extremely resourceful. She is also engaging from the first sentence and so very likeable.

Along the way Miss Cayley makes many friends, a few enemies and she meets her true love.

It is to save him from imprisonment for a crime that she finally return to London. Does Miss Cayley save the day? Is there a happy ending? Well what do you think?!

Miss Cayley’s Adventures provide wonderful entertainment from beginning to end!

Teaser Tuesdays / It’s Tuesday, where are you?

Just quote a couple of spoiler-free sentences the book you’re reading to tempt other readers.

Here is mine:-

“It must have been an astonishing imposition for the canal people when war brought them dainty young girls to help them mind their business, clean young creatures with voices so pitched as to be almost impossible to understand. It must have been amazing, more especially since the war changed their lives so little, for they read no newspapers, being unable to read, and, if they did possess a wireless, seldom listened to the news. “

Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by MizB

I am on the Grand Union Canal, at the Regent’s Canal docks. You see, I signed on with a scheme to employ women to work boats while the war is on.

It’s Tuesday, where are you? is hosted by raidergirl3.

This all comes courtesy of Maidens’ Trip by Emma Smith.

Recent Arrivals

I’m not usually well enough organised to write posts about additions to my bookshelves, but when I realised that my most recent purchases fitted a 3 by 3 formation I had to do it. It appealed to the logical side of my brain as well as the bookish side!

Back at the end of May the Book Depository ran a Family & Friends promotion offering a 10% discount on everything. I hadn’t bought any new books for ages and it seemed like a sign!

My first thought was “Persephone”, but I like to buy my books direct from Persephone so I get the bookmarks and to make sure I stay on the mailing list, and so I paused. And then another name came into my head – “Valancourt”.

Valanourt Books is an small press press and it publishes gorgeous new editions of rare books from the 18th and 19th centuries, many of which have been out of print for yours.

There are stacks of Valancout books on my wishlist, but this is the trio I went for:

Clermont by Maria Regina Roche

Clermont is the story of Madeline, a porcelain doll of a Gothic heroine, who lives in seclusion from society with her father, Clermont, whose past is shrouded in mystery. One stormy night, their solitude is interrupted by a benighted traveller, a Countess who turns out to be a friend from Clermont’s past. Madeline goes to live with the Countess to receive her education, but her new idyllic life soon turns into a shocking nightmare. Ruffians attack the gentle Countess, and Madeline is assaulted in a gloomy crypt. And to make matters worse, a sinister stranger appears, threatening to reveal the bloody truth of Clermont’s past unless Madeline marries him. Can she avoid the snares of her wily pursuers, solve the mystery of her father’s past, and win the love of her dear De Sevignie?

One of the “horrid” books mentioned in Northanger Abbey. I’m starting to work my way through them.

Diana Tempest by Mary Cholmondeley

When Mr. Tempest dies, the family fortune and estate pass to his son, John, whom everyone except John himself knows to be illegitimate. Colonel Tempest, his spendthrift son Archie, and his beautiful daughter Diana find themselves cut off, and Colonel Tempest is bitterly resentful. One night, in a drunken stupor, he agrees to a bet, by which he will pay £10,000 if he should ever succeed to the Tempest estate. By the time he realizes that the effect of this wager was to place a bounty on John’s head, it is too late — and attempts begin to be made on John’s life! Meanwhile, Diana, strong and independent, has declared that she will never marry . . . but as she becomes closer with her cousin, her sentiments start to waver. And when John learns of his own illegitimacy, what will happen to his burgeoning relationship with Diana and his claim to the Tempest fortune?

This one was particularly recommended to me – and the fact that Mary Cholmondeley was a Virago author would have ensured that I bought a copy sooner or later.

The Two Emilys by Sophia Lee

In The Two Emilys, masquerade, an earthquake, bigamy, insanity, blackmail, and duels serve the demonic Emily Fitzallen in her drive for revenge on her counterpart and the novel’s heroine. Emily Arden, and the man over whom they do battle, the Marquis of Lenox. Will the good Emily or the evil one prevail? Featuring a wild, improbable plot and action that ranges from Ireland and Scotland to Switzerland and Italy, The Two Emilys remains an unpredictable and thrilling Gothic tale.

I just couldn’t resist!

And then there’a a trio from charity shops:

A Woman of Independent Means by Elizabeth Forsythe Hailey

At the turn of the century, a time when women had few choices, Bess Steed Garner inherits a legacy – not only of wealth but of determination and desire, making her truly a woman of independent means. From the early 1900s through the 1960s, we accompany Bess as she endures life’s trials and triumphs with unfailing courage and indomitable spirit: the sacrifices love sometimes requires of the heart, the flaws and rewards of marriage, the often-tested bond between mother and child, and the will to defy a society that demands conformity. Told in letters we follow the remarkable life of Bess Steed Garner from her childhood in 1899 to her death in 1977.

This has been on my wishlist for ages and it isn’t rare but I held out for a Virago Modern Classics edition. One appeared on Saturday – and for a mere 50p. I love books of letters (fact or fiction) and this one looks wonderful.

Hellfire and Herring by Christopher Rush

‘The scent of God…the air was impregnated with him and his mint-sweet and moth-ball evangelists. Just as it was with herring, as you might expect in a fossilised fishing-village on Scotland’s repressed east coast where fishing was an act of faith and not yet a computer-science industry designed to suck the last drops of life out of the sea.’ A vivid and moving account of the author’s upbringing in the 1940s and 1950s in the little fishing village of St Monans. Rush returns decades later to rediscover his childhood, and offers a frank account of how it was for him. This evocation of a way of life now vanished demonstrates the power of the word to bring the past timelessly to life. Rush writes of family, village characters, church and school; of folklore and fishing, the eternal power of the sea and the cycles of the seasons. With a poet’s eye he navigates the worlds of the imagination and the unknown, the archetypal problems of fathers and sons and mother love, and the inescapability of childhood influences far on into adult life.

The little caught my eye first. Then I saw it was a seaside childhood memoir and so I took a closer look. The prose looked lovely, and so home it came.

The Athenian Murders by Jose Carlos Somoza

In Athens, a pupil of Plato’s Academy is found dead and his teacher suspects this was no accident. He asks Heracles, the “Decipherer of Enigmas”, to investigate the case and the murky cult that surrounds it. The second plot unfolds in parallel through the footnotes of the translator of the original Greek text and soon leads the reader to suspect the author of the tale has something to hide too. Plot within plot, meaning inside meaning, the story develops in a fascinating manner that will enchant both mystery fans and scholars as reality is shown to be somewhat untrustworthy.

Another long-serving book from my wishlist that finally appeared before me.

And finally, some Persephone Books. What could I do when an email containing details of a special offer for their 10th anniversary landed?

… Also, for this week only there is a special offer of three books for the price of two ie if you buy two books you may have a third free of charge …

I should have resisted – I have a number of unread Persephones on my bookshelves – but I didn’t, and now I have three more. All are dressed in beautiful dove grey covers, and so it is the prints used for the endpapers and bookmarks that you see below. Can fellow devotees identify the books without looking to the words below i wonder …

I definitely have three gems: -

Miss Buncle’s Book by D E Stevenson

The storyline of Miss Buncle’s Book (1934) is a simple one: Barbara Buncle, who is unmarried and perhaps in her late 30s, lives in a small village and writes a novel about it in order to try and supplement her meagre income. This is a light-hearted, easy read, one of those books like Mariana, Miss Pettigrew, The Making of a Marchioness and Greenery Street which can be recommended unreservedly to anyone looking for something undemanding, fun and absorbing that is also well-written and intelligent.

Minnie’s Room: The Peacetime Stories of Mollie Panter-Downes

This companion volume to Persephone Book No. 8, “Good Evening, Mrs Craven”, contains ten stories describing aspects of British life in the years after the war. “Minnie’s Room” itself is about a family who are unable to believe that their maid wants to leave them to live in a room of her own. An elderly couple emigrates because of ‘the dragon out to gobble their modest, honourable incomes.’ The sisters in “Beside the Still Waters” grumble because ‘Everything is so terribly difficult nowadays.’Mollie Panter – Downes, said the Spectator, ‘is discomfortingly good at anatomising the crudities and subtleties of snobbery – but she is never unkind.’

The Shuttle by Frances Hodgson-Burnett

Sir Nigel Anstruthers crosses the Atlantic to look for a rich wife and returns with the daughter of an American millionaire, Rosalie Vanderpoel. He turns out to be a bully, a miser and a philanderer and virtually imprisons his wife in the house. Only when Rosalie’s sister Bettina is grown up does it occur to her and her father that some sort of rescue expedition should take place. And the beautiful, kind and dynamic Bettina leaves for Europe to try and find out why Rosalie has, inexplicably, chosen to lose touch with her family. In the process she engages in a psychological war with Sir Nigel; meets and falls in love with another Englishman; and starts to use the Vanderpoel money to modernize ‘Stornham Court’.

Now all I have to do is catch up with my library books and my challenge books so I can start on these!

Litle Dorrit by Charles Dickens

For years I loved Dickens’ writing but I struggled to get through his books. Fortunately though, I have recently found a way to read that works for me. Short installments over a long period of time. Which makes sense when you remember that much of Dickens’ work was originally published in serial form.

And so I made a resolution – to read one of the big books every year. And this year’s big book is Little Dorrit.

At the heart of the book there is a simple story of two characters.

Amy Dorrit: The titular heroine. A young women, thinking the best of and doing her best for everyone, and resident with her father in the debtor’s prison where she was born.

Arthur Clennam: A middle-aged man recently returned from working aboroad in his family business: He sees signs that his family is responsible for the troubles of the Dorrits and determines to uncover the truth.

Their stories are woven into a much bigger framework. Indeed Dickens presents a panoramic portrait of Victorian London. And through a wide range of characters he explores many of the problems of Victorian society. His primary target is the debtors prison. And then there are bureaucratic government bodies, greedy landlords. powerful bankers….. Themes that still resonate today.

The characterisation is superb, the settings are wonderfully evoked and there was not one moment I considered putting the book down until I reached the end of its 1070 pages.

Little Dorrit is not without problems. The plot sometimes gets a little lost when Dickens is hitting his targets and a few of the sub-plots and characters are not as strong as the others – maybe even a little superfluous.

But when it works it is superb, packed with incident and provoking an incredible mix of emotions.

And certainly it is a book that I am glad I made the effort to read, and one that I know will stay with me.

The Solitude of Thomas Cave by Georgina Harding

I started reading The Solitude of Thomas Cave some weeks ago, but I put it down after just one chapter. Not because I didn’t like it – quite the opposite! I was so taken by the ideas, the prose, the images forming in my head, that I wanted to save the book for just the right day when I could get completely lost in it.

That day came a week ago and The Solitude of Thomas Cave has been echoing in my mind ever since.

The story begins in 1916, with a whaling ship sailing away south from the icy seas around Greenland. Winter is approaching, and yet a man has been left behind.

An argument among the crew provoked Thomas Cave into a bet with another crew member – that he could survive the winter alone in the Arctic. His fellow seafarers have little hope for his survival and try to dissuade him, but he is determined to remain behind. And so they leave him, with just basic shelter, food and supplies.

That was the opening chapter that captivated me.

The following chapters watch Thomas Cave, as he struggles to come to terms with not only the Arctic winter and with the pain and loss in his past that led him to the Arctic.

In the spring the Heartsease returns. What the crew find and what happens then it would be unfair to say. But what I can say is that the story remains intriguing right to the end.

The Solitude of Thomas Cave is a simple story quite beautifully told. Georgina Harding writes lovely prose – simple, but so evocative.

She paints wonderful pictures, and the chill and the isolation of Thomas Cave’s world are quite tangible.

And the story has so much to say. About man’s ability to survive, and indeed to do extraordinary things. And about his relationship with the world he lives in.

So this is a book with everything I look for – a captivating storyline, beautiful prose and thought-provoking ideas.

If only all books were like this!

Blackmoor by Edward Hogan

The story of the decline of a Derbyshire mining village? It didn’t sound like a book that I would necessarily pick up, but I read some very positive reports, and so when I saw a copy in the library I gave Blackmoor a chance. I am so glad that I did.

When the story opens Vincent Cartwright is an awkward teenager . He lives with his father, George, a man who is awkward in a way that only adults can be, in the Derbyshire village of Church Eaton.

But their roots aren’t there. Their roots are some miles away in Blackmoor, an abandoned mining village. But George won’t talk about Blackmoor and what happened there. How did Beth, George’s wife and Vincent’s mother, die? Why was the village abandoned?

Those questions are answered by storylines in two time-frames.

In the present Vincent, enouraged by his schoolfriend Leila, begins an investigation in the guise of a joint school prject about the deserted village.

And in the past Beth’s own story unravels. Beth was albino, her skin a ghostly white and her eyes plagued by tremors. She suffered from severe post-natal depression after Vincent’s birth. Her unusual appearance and her unconventional behaviour, led the villagers of Blackmoor to shun her.

When the village was affected by “firedamp” – explosive emissions of methane from abandoned pit shafts – the villagers blamed Beth.

Was she a witch? Did she curse the villagers who made her an outcast? Or was she an intelligent but troubled woman, unafraid to speak her mind?

What happens is inevitable and it is heart-breaking.

Blackmoor is an exceptional debut novel – and certainly a worthy winner of the Desmond Elliot Prize for new fiction.

Edward Hogan writes wonderful, evocative prose and his story never loses its grip.

His characters are diverse, complicated and eminently believable. Their interactions, and the communities that they form always ring true. As does the world where they live.

Blackmoor is not without its flaws, but they are few and it’s many strengths definitely carry the day.

It’s a remarkable debut, and I am intrigued to see what Edward Hogan may write next.

Spring Reading Thing – Now Summer is here

Summer is here and so spring and the Spring Reading Thing must be over.

The Spring Reading Thing was graciously hosted by Catrina at Callapidder Days.

Even as I made my list I knew I wouldn’t stick to it. I’m too easily distracted by library books and there’s nothing like feeling I should be reading a book to put me off. But I was interested to see how much I might read in a season and just how far off plan I would wander, so I carried on.

I read as many books as I thought I would, half from the list and half not. Here they are:

Here’s the list:

Childhood Books

It was on the list and I read it:

Anne of Green Gables by L M Montgomery (re-read)
The Dolls’ House by Rumer Godden (re-read)
Alice In Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (re-read)

It was on the list but it wasnt the right time so I didn’t read it:

Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (re-read)

Pretty much as planned, but it wasn’t the right moment for Little Women so I left it for another day. I think it may be a winter book…

Classics and Older Books

It was on the list and I read it:

Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell

I’m reading it, I just haven’t finished yet:

Miss Cayley’s Adventures by Grant Allen
Little Dorritt by Charles Dickens (nearly finished!)

It’s still on my reading list, I just haven’t got to it yet:

Emmeline by Charlotte Smith
Belinda by Rhoda Broughton

I love my classics, but I wanted to take my time with Mrs Gaskell and Mr Dickens and so I haven’t got to the others quite yet.

Crime and Mystery

It was on the list and I read it:

The Girl Who Played With Fire by Steig Larsson
The Preacher by Camilla Läckberg
Unseen by Mari Jungstedt
The Paris Enigma by Pablo de Santis

It was on the list but it wasnt the right time so I didn’t read it:

Full Dark House by Christopher Fowler
Beyond Suspicion by Tanguy Viel

No, it wasn’t on the list, but it called to me and I read it:

What to Do When Someone Dies by Nicci French
An Incomplete Revenge by Jacqueline Winspear
The Pyramid by Henning Mankell
The Reunion by Simone van der Vlugt

i was going to read less crime this year, but I keep finding books too good to miss …..

20th Century Fiction

It was on the list and I read it:

South Riding by Winifred Holtby
Every Eye by Isobel English
Pigeon Pie by Nancy Mitford
Invitation to the Waltz by Rosamond Lehmann

I’m reading it, I just haven’t finished yet:

Doves of Venus by Olivia Manning

It’s still on my reading list, I just haven’t got to it yet:

Nightingale Wood by Stella Gibbons
The Post-Office Girl by Stefan Zweig

No, it wasn’t on the list, but it called to me and I read it:

The Weather at Tregulla by Stella Gibbons

All great books, but I was distracted by so many great contemporary novels.

Recently Published Fiction

It was on the list and I read it:

The Fire Gospel by Michel Faber
True Murder by Yaba Badoe

It was on the list but it wasnt the right time so I didn’t read it:

American Wife by Curtis Sittenfield
The Maytrees by Annie Dillard
A Secret Alchemy by Emma Darwin

No, it wasn’t on the list, but it called to me and I read it:

The Herring Seller’s Apprentice by L C Tyler
The Spare Room by Helen Garner
UFO in her Eyes by Xialou Guo
Yellow by Janni Visman
An Equal Stillness by Francesca Kay
A Very Persistent Illusion by L C Tyler
Chez Moi by Agnes Desarthe
The Flying Troutmans by Miriam Toews
The Solitude of Thomas Cave by Georgina Harding
Blackmoor by Edward Hogan

A few of the books on my list didn’t grab me, but others that I couldn’t wait to read just kept popping up! I really should have left space for some of the books listed for Orange Prizes…

Non Fiction

It was on the list and I read it:

Henry: Virtuous Prince by David Starkey
The Good Women of China by Xinran
Without Knowing Mr Walkley by Edith Olivier

I’m reading it, I just haven’t finished yet:

A Swan in the Evening by Rosamond Lehmann

It’s still on my reading list, I just haven’t got to it yet:

Olivia Manning: A Life by June and Neville Baybrooke
Mrs Woolf and the Servants by Alison Light
The Secret life of Aphra Behn by Janet Todd
Madresfield by Jane Mulvagh

No, it wasn’t on the list, but it called to me and I read it:

A Boy at the Hogarth Press by Richard Kennedy

The books I didn’t get to look great, I’ve just been in fiction mode lately.

Miscellaneous

It was on the list and I read it:

Knights of Love by Jane Tozer
The Joy of Eating: The Virago Book of Food edited by Jill Foulston

It’s still on my reading list, I just haven’t got to it yet:

Words of Love by Pamela Norris
The Complete Romances of Crétien de Troyes

I just ran out of time!

Now I was going to do some numbers, but I hear a book calling to me so maybe I won’t!

Teaser Tuesdays / It’s Tuesday, where are you?

The year is 1731 and I am at home in Dublin. I am at my desk and I am writing a much-needed manual – Directions to Servants! I have been plagued by servants and this short volume shall be my revenge!

It’s Tuesday, where are you? is hosted by raidergirl3.

Just quote a couple of spoiler-free sentences the book you’re reading to tempt other readers.

Here is mine:-

Directions to the housekeeper

You must always have a favourite footman whom you can depend upon, and order him to be very watchful when the second course is taken off, that it be brought safely to your office, that you and the steward may have a titbit together.

Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by MizB

This all comes courtesy of Directions to Servants by Jonathan Swift.

Childhood Favourites Challenge – Completed (well, sort of…)

Lynda‘s challenge to reread the favourite books of your childhood was a wonderful idea and I have really enjoyed reading and writing about my five books:

• The Owl Service, by Alan Garner
• The Borrowers, by Mary Norton
• The Dolls’ House, by Rumer Godden
• Anne of Green Gables, by L M Montgomery
• Alice In Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll

I had planned to read little Women too, but I have picked it up a couple of times and it wasn’t speaking to me so I put it down. I have loved Little Women all my life and it’s too good a book to read at the wrong moment. I have no doubt though that I will read and love it all over again before too long. And i’m eyeing up a few more childhood favourites too …