Book 12: Half-Truths and White Lies

Can we ever truly know who we are, and where we come from? Do any families tell the whole truth, or are we all kept in the dark for our own good? Andrea has grown up in a picture perfect life. The only child of devoted parents, she also shared her home with a grandmother whose words had a knack for coming true. Her happy world is shattered when her parents are killed in a car accident, and she is injured separately, ending up with a broken jaw. While recovering, her Uncle Pete (not an actual uncle, but her father’s best friend) gives her a photo album and tells her stories of her parents, how they met and how much they loved each other.

Once the official story has been told, we switch from Andrea’s point of view to her Uncle Pete’s, and then on to her aunt Faye, her mother’s sister. The story Andrea has been told is a lie, and Pete and Faye hold pieces to the puzzle, although they might not know it. Eventually Andrea starts to question what really happened between her parents and Pete, and learns things she could never have expected. Ultimately it’s a story of forgiveness, what you would give to make things right, and how far you would go to protect the ones you love, even at your own expense.

This is the first novel from Jane Davis, and it is a very good read, although it took me a while to get into it. Once I sat down properly with it I really enjoyed it. The pacing and reveals are excellent, never keeping too much back so that it’s frustrating, but also not feeling like it’s all being spelled out for us in a heavy-handed way. It also never seems too over the top considering the subject matter of illegitimate children and affairs. I liked the way it was separated into sections so we got each side of the story first hand, and you weren’t left wondering for too long just what had happened. I’m not sure I believe people would behave this way, but I did believe these people would behave this way, if that makes sense. The characters are expertly drawn and you really get to know them and their motivations. Definitely a nice one to sit down with on a crappy winter day and disappear into.

Got Any Chocolate?

And so Christmas is over once again. Won’t be long before it’s here again though. You might laugh but the years go quick. I have been in Yorkshire for most of it, loving being off work and mainly lolling about doing very little. Bliss. I got lots of nice things and ate far too much food, most of it chocolate based. I’d write a proper entry but really, who’s going to read it? This year:

• We have all lost our shit over the snow.
• We again pretended we wouldn’t go to my grandmother’s house on Christmas Eve, only to cave at the last minute, but we positively would NOT be opening presents. And yet we did.
• I have learned more about my grandfather’s bowel movements than I ever needed to. Must go bleach my brain.
• Mum gave up her tradition of running up and down the stairs and flushing toilets to wake us up. I guess that makes me officially old.
• I moaned about not getting any socks or smellies.
• I spent a ridiculous amount of time playing DS games, and I haven’t even started the new Zelda yet. There goes my reading target…
• On Boxing Day I watched too much TV, including The Proposal, The Other Boleyn Girl, and Inkheart.
• You can tell I was going stir crazy since I agreed to go shopping in the sales.
• I was disappointed by Doctor Who.
• I have felt cold, especially my poor feet, for most of it.
• Christmas telly was mostly crap. Who does the schedules and why did they show the third Pirates film before the second? Same with The Santa Clause sequels. (Although who knew there were three of those?)
• My Google Reader had hit 250 posts on my return. I admit to hitting ‘mark all as read’ a fair bit. Sorry.
• I have succeeded in getting through the festive season without having a cold. Woot! Dear universe, this is not an invitation to strike me down.

I have no plans for New Years Eve, but since I hate, loathe, detest!!! NYE I don’t really mind not doing anything. The weather is awful, it’s cold and wet, I do not wish to trek across the city in the dark to go to a party where I know no one and be jostled about and feel out of place until the clock strikes twelve and we all pretend to like each other and then trek back across London to go home. I’m such a bloody misery. Of course, I will go, if I get a nice invite, but snuggling up under a duvet and watching The Big Fat Quiz of the Year sounds like heaven to me…Oh, it appears that’s on New Year’s Day. Pfft. Schedulers.

Book 11: Sex and the City

Put together from Candace Bushnell’s columns, this is more a collection of stories than a novel. There’s no real thread running through the whole thing, other than obviously sex. Before reading I thought Bushnell was Carrie, that she’d written about her life sort of autobiographically but with a pseudonym. But it is written in the first person, and there is another character called Carrie (we’re not given much info on the actual narrator, other than she puts together groups of people to talk about their relationships and sex lives), who has a relationship with Mr Big, so I’m not sure how I’m supposed to take it really. Maybe she still is Carrie, maybe not.

Charlotte, Miranda and Samantha do appear, but as very different versions to the series, for the most part, and they’re not included much. There are also stories that appear in the series and other characters, but that’s where the similarity ends for me. It wasn’t all that interesting or entertaining. Since it didn’t have a main story arc there was nothing for me to keep coming back to. Carrie and Big appear a little more towards the end, but neither are particularly inspiring characters. Actually the whole thing is totally superficial. Everyone talks about looks, and money, and status. It’s no wonder they seemingly can’t find happiness in relationships, none of them have realistic expectations about anything. Possibly you could say the same about the women in the series, but at least that had some characters you could relate to, and humour. I think this takes itself way too seriously. Maybe it speaks more about the time and place it was written, but I’m kind of impressed/surprised someone read this and thought it would make a good series, and made it one. I wouldn’t have bothered.

Book 10: The Behaviour of Moths

This is a first novel from Poppy Adams, and begins with Ginny awaiting the arrival of her sister Vivi, who she has not seen for over forty years. Ginny lives a rundown mansion, an old family home desperately in need of repair. She does not go out, having her groceries delivered and fighting off the woman from social services. Ginny comes from a family of lepidopterists (people who study moths), and claims to be well known in those circles, having published great findings and research. Once Vivi arrives, we discover more about their childhoods, family, and their relationship with each other. The story roams around in time, flashing back to significant events — Vivi falling off a tower and being unable to have children; being expelled from school; their mother’s battle with alcoholism — but also focusing on the two as adults who don’t really know each other.

This wasn’t an enjoyable read for me. I didn’t want to pick it back up, it was quite a chore. And it’s not like it’s a particularly long book, or difficult. I just wasn’t that interested. I couldn’t really engage with any of the characters, possibly because I couldn’t know for sure if anything I was being told was true, and so how do you feel sympathy for someone who may be making everything up? And there was far too much information about moths for my liking. It seemed Ginny used them as an escape from the real world, when she didn’t want to deal with what was going on, so it was another way of keeping us in the dark. It was also very heavy handed. I wasn’t here for a lecture on moths, or a how-to on studying them. I admit to skipping big chunks of it, just to get back to the plot, such as it was.

Ginny is the textbook definition of an unreliable narrator. It’s implied from the beginning that she sees events in a very different way to everyone else, and so her version is not to be trusted. We can glean little bits of truth from conversations with others that she recounts, but over all we can never fully believe what we’re being told. This would be fine, and an interesting way of making us read between the lines, if it weren’t for the ending. We are told nothing. I’m not someone who always needs everything spelled out for me in books, sometimes the best stories are those with ambiguous endings, because it works for that particular tale. But it doesn’t work here. I don’t think you can imply throughout a novel that there are huge secrets within a family, and about a main character, that will change your entire view of the situation and then, well, not disclose those secrets. It’s frustrating as all hell. I don’t want to try and piece it together myself, as I am left to do. I want some sort of resolution. Otherwise it feels like I went through all that for nothing.

Book 9: The 19th Wife

Author David Ebershoff has put together one hell of an impressive book here. It’s a story of two parts, set in different times. The first is the story of Jordan, excommunicated from a secretive sect of Mormons known as the Firsts, he returns home six years later after his mother is imprisoned for murdering his father. The second focuses on Ann Eliza Young, the wife of Brigham Young, one time Prophet of the Mormon church, and her escape from the clutches of polygamy. Both women are wife number 19, and have had to face hardships because of their faith. Jordan initially believes his mother guilty, but soon comes to see things a different way, leading him to investigate what really happened and return to the town that kicked him out.

Ann Eliza tells of her parents and their conversion to Mormonism, and their love of and faith in Joseph Smith and his religion, how they feel it has saved them, and their ultimate undoing as a couple at his hands. Initially finding the idea of ‘Celestial Marriage’ abhorrent, Ann Eliza’s father comes to embrace it as his duty and way into the afterlife, first marrying the maid and then taking on three more wives in as many months, much to the devastation of his first wife. We’re also given the history of Mormonism as a growing faith, its persecution, its flight across the desert and eventual settlement in Salt Lake, and its achievements, but the main focus is polygamy and how it affects women, children, and indeed the men. It raises questions of faith and love, and whether if you believe one thing to be true within a religion, you must therefore accept all?

The two sections are woven together throughout, but remain separate until they come together in a fashion toward the end. Each tale is so riveting and so expertly told that I wasn’t sure which one I liked more. Every time one came to an end I was frustrated, desperate to find out what happened, but I was soon caught up again in the other. A lot of research went into this book, and it paid off. Ann Eliza is a historical figure, and she did indeed write a book about her experiences as Brigham Young’s wife (you can read it at Ebershoff’s website), but the tale recounted here is fictional. Much of it happened, but how it happened and her feelings about it are all from the author, but it reads very true. I was fascinated by this way of life, and by the origins of Mormonism, the beliefs and move towards polygamy, and the struggle many had with it before seeming to embrace it fully and without remorse. This was God’s will after all. Ann Eliza’s story contains much history, but it is richly told and never dry, her voice is authoritative but personable, and you do feel for her. I also liked the conflicting points of view given by her family members, and by Brigham Young at different times. There are also fun things like wikipedia entries and news items, all fictional, but adding to the style of the piece.

Jordan’s story is more of a whodunnit, as he pieces together his father’s final hours, and tries to prove that his mother is innocent. Making life more difficult is the fact that few feel able to talk to him, and the addition of a hanger on in the form of a young kid, excommunicated like himself. Within Jordan’s story there are excerpts from a master’s thesis about Ann Eliza Young, and letters, again from her relatives, fleshing out her tale. The different voices never clash, and I think Ebershoff does a great job adding personality to them all, without going over the top. I really enjoyed this book, and didn’t want to put it down. I liked the history and learning more about a way of life I hadn’t considered much before, but as well as that it’s just a big, good read, and I do so love those.

Ten Things You’d Hate About Me

A while ago Ashley at Writing to Reach You wrote a post about the things you’d hate about her. Since I’d already done a post about things you know about me I thought I might as well do this too. So, here are ten reasons you wouldn’t like me:

1. I am very picky when it comes to food. I wish I wasn’t. I wish I could eat anything in sight, but alas, it’s just not how it is. I basically live on the four Ps: pizza, potatoes, pasta, poultry. (OK there’s other stuff but I like how that fits.) My favourite dinners consist of mainly white food. That’s just how it worked out, I’m not prejudiced against green things, except that they mostly taste disgusting. I like to think I’m getting a bit better as I get older, but I do know what I like. More importantly, I know what I don’t like, and I think I’m old enough now to be able to say ‘I don’t like that’ and have you believe me. And shut up about it.

2. I don’t lie, but I do with hold information. Unless I am asked outright, I probably won’t tell you certain things. Part of it is just being a very private person, another part is fearing confrontation of any kind.

3. I am so not a morning person. If I can’t get up, have a cup of tea and my breakfast in peace, I will not be fun to be around. Don’t talk to me first thing. Don’t be in my space. Don’t get between me and the kettle.

4. I too am selfish with my time. I like to be alone. I often need to be alone. I’m so channeling Greta Garbo. But I do like my own company, I like to unwind away from other people. I like to shut out the world.

5. I can be very indecisive. I weigh up all the options and go back and forth about things. It drives me mad so god knows how annoying it is to others. In contrast though, once I have made a decision I will stick to it and make things happen no matter what.

6. I am extremely competitive. I like to win. It doesn’t matter if it’s an argument, a fun game of Trivial Pursuit with friends or a simple game of badminton in the back garden. I want to win, and not only that, I want you to lose. I want to kick your ass.

7. I will correct your spelling and grammar, even if you don’t want me to. And I will judge you for the way you write. I’m not talking about honest mistakes here, typos and the such. That happens to us all. It’s the people who I know can write properly but just can’t be bothered that bug me the most.

8. I don’t drink. Now, for me this is a total non-issue. If you want to drink, go right ahead. It’s nothing to do with me. Unless you’re acting like an ass or throwing up on my shoe. But for other people it seems to be a big deal. Why don’t I drink? What’s wrong with me? Am I religious? Am I just a stick-in-the-mud? Apparently not drinking makes you a complete bore in some circles. I guess if you’re in those circles, you really don’t want to be around me. But then, I probably don’t want to be around you either.

9. Following on from the ‘I hate confrontation’ thing: I’m passive aggressive. I won’t say to you straight out ‘Take the god damn recycling down, are you blind, can you not see it’s seeping down the stairs on its own?’, but I might put the recycling box outside your bedroom door so you trip over it, or stick a note on the loo roll holder saying the toilet roll fairy is on holiday. OK, I haven’t done those things, but I’ve thought about them. A lot.

10. I make references to films and get annoyed if you don’t get them. One of my favourites is ‘I’m sorry, I wasn’t listening’ from The Big Lebowski. That can get me in trouble. Saying ‘Get Babyface, get Babyface, wait a minute, what am I saying, I am Babyface’ more often gets me blank looks. I should just start saying them in my head.

And that, I am sure, is just the tip of the iceberg.

Book 8: The Lost Daughter

In 1977, sixteen year old orphan CeeCee Wilkes falls in love with older man Tim Gleason. He is educated, has money, and lavishes her with attention, something she has been sorely missing. As she gets to know him he confides in her about his sister Andie, currently on death row for murder. Tim tells CeeCee Andie killed her rapist and all appeals have failed. Tim persuades CeeCee to help him get his sister out of prison. Only one man can commute her sentence, Irving Russell. Tim’s plan is to kidnap Russell’s wife until he agrees to let her go. CeeCee agrees to watch the hostage while Tim negotiates with Russell.

Of course, things go wrong. Genevieve Russell is eight months pregnant and they are miles from anywhere. Genevieve dies and CeeCee flees with the baby, raising the girl as her own. We follow her flight and change of identity, and her relationship with her daughter. Almost thirty years later Genevieve’s remains are found and Tim is sentenced to death for her murder. Will CeeCee confess to her part in the crime and risk losing the life she has built, and most likely the love of her daughter? Can she really say nothing and let an innocent man die?

When I started reading this I thought it was going to be dreadful. They’ve tried really hard to make Diane Chamberlain the next Jodi Picoult. The jacket design screams Picoult, and quotes on the back name drop, just in case you’d missed it. I have issues with Jodi Picoult, which I may have mentioned before, mainly her terrible endings and obsession with putting in a twist, even if it makes no sense, but I think the comparison may be unfair. Sure, the writing initially didn’t seem that great, and it just seemed trite and overwrought, not true to life in any way, but it did get better. It was very difficult for me to believe that anyone would act the way CeeCee did, even if she was only sixteen, but once I’d got past the beginning and the crime that sets CeeCee on a certain path, I started to get into it a bit more. I enjoyed reading about her relationship with Cory, the baby she stole, and how her actions had an impact on her daughter. And I became absorbed in the tale, wondering what would happen. It’s very much a page-turner. I felt a lot of sympathy for CeeCee, after my initial reservations, and became invested in her life. I didn’t want her to lose everything she had worked for, and I especially didn’t want her to lose Cory. Cory as an adult is a little hard to take, but there’s a lot of love between them.

Unfortunately the ending was a little pat. Any tension that has built up just deflates as there’s a nice easy ending where no one really pays for anything or loses anything. I may have wanted a happy ending for CeeCee, but that doesn’t necessarily mean she deserved one, or at least not one quite as good as she got. She did wreck people’s lives after all. I don’t know, I think it could have been handled a bit better, but it’s very enjoyable for what it is.

R.I.P

I woke up this morning and just knew it was going to be a bad day. I think my first thought was ‘Fuck, it’s Monday’. I should have snoozed for another ten minutes. Instead I stumbled into the kitchen, grabbed my mug from the side…and dropped it. It hit the side of the sink and I stood for a minute thinking, ‘Nah, it’ll be fine’, but I knew, it was a goner. I slowly turned it and there it was, a big chunk missing and a crack down the side. Into the bin it went.

I am sad. It was the perfect size for tea. It’s my favourite. My mum bought it me years go and it has been with me through many moves and survived intact. I hate myself. I’m such a moron.

So goodbye lil Pooh mug, see ya old chum. You’ve been a good companion. Always there when I needed you, brightening my mornings, there before I went to sleep…

Here he is in better days, helping to showcase a crap little hat I had knitted.

I wonder if I can find one the same. Alas, I think it was from Woolworths.

Book 7: The Fabulous River Boat

Ugh…I think I am done with the Riverworld series. This one was so hard going. To recap, everyone who was ever born (other than those under five years old when they died) has been resurrected on the banks of a river on an alien world. They are young and strong and if they die here they are again brought back in a new body. Here we ditch Richard Burton and follow Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain) as he tries to build a riverboat to take him to the end of the river and confront whoever it is that is behind the resurrection and find out what they want.

Oh god, it’s boring. Most of the book is just about Sam’s attempt to build this damn boat, on a planet without much in the way of materials. The Mysterious Stranger kindly sends a meteor into Sam’s territory to give him some iron, but he still has to trade with other territories for minerals and extra wood. The leaders of those lands also want to get their hands on his boat, so he’s fighting them too and there are a fair few battles. And he’s made a dubious alliance with King John who will double cross him at every opportunity. He’s also got issues of the heart since he’s finally found his wife after being alive again for over twenty years, only to discover her loved up with Cyrano de Bergerac. If only this could have been used for some sort of comedic effect, it would have helped me finish the book a lot quicker.

And there are many more famous people who pop up. Bloody Hermann Goring is back, Odysseus (I am not making this up) turns up at one point for absolutely no reason that I can see other than Philip Jose Farmer wanted to rewrite the story of the Trojan War. There’s also a cameo from Mozart who is a little lost on this planet of no musical instruments. He doesn’t do anything either.

Then there’s Joe Miller, not famous but a Titanthrop, some sort of prehistoric giant man with a face like a monkey’s backside. He thpenth motht of the thtory talking like thith. It ith thomevhat annoying and unnecethary and I thtopped reading hith bith after a vhile.

It only gets marginally more readable toward the end when there’s a final battle for the riverboat, but the rest of it is just yawntastic. I also find it hard to believe that on a world of no resources or industry they can build a riverboat and guns and planes and a whole host of other things as easily as they do. ‘Oh we found this man who is an engineer from the year 1997, he’ll build it’. Yeah yeah. And women are once again completely sidelined, appearing only as love interests or rape victims, although one does manage to become a secretary. Whoop.

Nope, I can’t take any more. I shall read the plots of the rest of the books online, if anything, but I cannot be arsed to read the other books. Plus I’m totally sci-fi-ed out, and I have two more Philip K. Dick ones to pick up from the library. At least he was entertaining.

Walking in a Winter Horrorland

I am steadily sinking into a deep hatred of winter. It’s dark, cold and wet. My eczema has flared up, my scalp is dry and flaky meaning wearing anything black is a hazard, and I live in black for the most part. Christmas is fast approaching and I am in deep denial about it and have no idea what to get people. I need some Christmas cheer! Where’s an angel when you need them? Even that annoying one from It’s a Wonderful Life would do.

But there are some good things about the season, one of which is the Hyde Park Winter Wonderland, where they put up lots of stalls to sell you Christmas tat and rides that have tenuous connections to the festive season at best. Last year it was the Wild West ride which had been turned into a budget reindeer race by sticking headbands with antlers on the horses. This time there was a beer garden hall of mirrors ride, which had a (rather terrifying) animatronic man/woman holding its belly and laughing, moving back and forth. They had stuck a Father Christmas outfit on it and a beard which had slipped down its neck, but left the shoes and socks as they were. A little girl was crying her eyes out next to it.

This ‘Santa’ found life very amusing, but the laughter was extremely unsettling. You would not want this person crawling down your chimney at night and leaving you a surprise. Trust me.

And his/her feet. They really went all out with the costume.

Or there was the Christmas dinosaur, and the Christmas pirate ride (which didn’t tell you exactly what was in it, but a grown woman was weeping when she came out so god knows. We were tempted to go in, but for four quid each we passed). My fave though was the ghost train, which had two dead bodies hanging from gallows (not all that child friendly if you ask me), but they’d hung a little green bell from the gallows too. So that made it ok. And in theme.

I did very much enjoy wandering around in the rain, which wasn’t too awful, but I did wonder at the people ice skating and winced when they fell and created a tidal wave of water with their bodies. It looked miserable. But we walked around with our hoods up drinking soup and laughing our heads off at the rides while being smacked in the face with my umbrella. I gave up after a while. Later we went to see the ‘Palace of Grand Illusion’ (by day it’s the circus). Not especially grand I must say. There’s a reason the guy is in a tent in Hyde Park and not, say, Derren Brown. He had no charisma whatsoever. He did some good tricks (just where did that woman come from?!) but it was all so half-assed in the presentation it kinda ruined it. His lovely assistants were bordering on indecent with their asses on show.

Maybe I should go back when it’s not raining (is that likely to be sometime soon?) and see if I can recapture the Christmas spirit? Or at least have an amusing evening of sarcasm and mockery.