shkarlson

The Excessively Complex, too, particularly if you wish to solve mysteries.  First read The Sherlock Holmes Handbook: The Methods and Mysteries of the World's Greatest Detective.  It's Book Review N^o. 14.  The contents will be left to the reader as an exercise.  I did like one of the Holmes quotes from the end of the work.  From "The Adventure of the Copper Beeches" comes a theme for a model railroad display now a-building.  "The lowest and vilest alleys in London do not present a more dreadful record of sin than does the smiling and beautiful countryside."  Why else would Holmes and Watson be coming and going from Paddington Station or Victoria Station.

(Cross-posted to Cold Spring Shops.)

heaven_ali

It is not often that I leap to my computer to pre-order a new release in hardback. However I was so excited at the prospect of reading the next instalment of Hilary Mantel’s trilogy I just had to. It arrived last Monday – and I started it Tuesday night.  I wished I hadn’t had to go to work this week – and I was out after work on both Wednesday and Thursday, so it is testament to the enormous readability of this novel that I have finished it today.

In Wolf Hall – Mantel’s marvellous Booker winning first instalment – we see the raise of Thomas Cromwell. A blacksmith’s son, who having escaped his humble beginnings, serves time abroad learning his craft until eventually he arrives back in London and goes to work for the great Cardinal Wolsey. Wolsey is doomed however and it is Cromwell who ends up with the ear of king. The story in Wolf Hall takes place over a number of years and concerns mainly the divorce of Henry VIII from Katherine of Aragon, and the fall of Thomas More. The time period of Bring up the Bodies – is much shorter – the story opens in September 1535 - when the cracks in Henry’s marriage to Anne Boleyn are beginning to show - and takes us up to the summer of 1536. The autumn of 1535 there are crops failing all over England due to incessant rain, for which some blame Anne Boleyn. Katherine of Aragon is ill – dying and separated from her daughter Mary.

For any fan of Tudor set novels like myself – the story of the fall of Anne Boleyn is one we never tire of – though we know it ever so well. When it comes to stories about Henry VIII and those surrounding him, I feel like a child hearing a loved bedtime story – crying out “again, again” We know what happens to Anne, we know who whispers what to whom, and how it ends, but none of that ever stops it being utterly enthralling. When they finally come for Anne – her uncle among them – and take her away to the tower – how can we not be thrilled at the horror of a queen taken away in shame? She must have known what her fate could be even then, although she is often - as here - portrayed as believing that Henry would intervene for her eventually.

It is however Hilary Mantel’s marvellous writing that separates this from all the rest. From the strange and beguiling opening sentences:

“His children are falling from the sky. He watches from horseback, acres of England stretching behind him; they drop, gilt-winged, each with a blood-filled gaze.” - Cromwell has named his hawks after his dead daughters –  from here on in, I was hooked.

Mantel’s depiction of the times is brilliant, the sights and sounds of Tudor England subtly and beautifully woven into an extraordinary tale. The politics and conniving machinations that surround Anne are brilliant reproduced. Cromwell has a ready supply of gossip mongers and court informers that conspire to bring Anne down. Lady Rochford (one of my favourite Tudor characters) is marvellously sinister. Thomas Cromwell’s household in comparison to that of Henry’s court is a happy, settled and genial place. Despite the tragedies of his wife and daughter’s deaths that we witnessed in Wolf Hall – Cromwell retains a good family life – with his son, nephew and Rafe his clerk, who was brought up by Cromwell, as well as various well treated, good humoured and trusted servants.

Bring up the Bodies – is at least a couple of hundred pages shorter than the epic Wolf Hall – but it is utterly compelling and beautifully written, and I enjoyed it enormously. Already I am looking forward to the next instalment.

neversremedy

13. A Clash of Kings by George R. R. Martin [fantasy]
14. A Storm of Swords by George R. R. Martin [fantasy]
15. A Feast for Crows by George R. R. Martin [fantasy]
16. Principia Discordia by Malaclypse the Younger [religious parody, humor]
17. The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly [young adult fiction]
18. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins [sci-f, dystopia]
19. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins [sci-f, dystopia]

blondein2ways

It's also a love story, of sorts, the narrative of Gatsby's quixotic passion for Daisy Buchanan. The pair meet five years before the novel begins, when Daisy is a legendary young Louisville beauty and Gatsby an impoverished officer. They fall in love, but while Gatsby serves overseas, Daisy marries the brutal, bullying, but extremely rich Tom Buchanan. After the war, Gatsby devotes himself blindly to the pursuit of wealth by whatever means--and to the pursuit of Daisy, which amounts to the same thing. "Her voice is full of money," Gatsby says admiringly, in one of the novel's more famous descriptions. His millions made, Gatsby buys a mansion across Long Island Sound from Daisy's patrician East Egg address, throws lavish parties, and waits for her to appear. When she does, events unfold with all the tragic inevitability of a Greek drama, with detached, cynical neighbor Nick Carraway acting as chorus throughout. Spare, elegantly plotted, and written in crystalline prose, The Great Gatsby is as perfectly satisfying as the best kind of poem.
.....
I didn't like Daisy, I thought she was very flighty. And Gatsby was just a sad, desperate man.
I feel like I have to say this is good because it's great American literature..blahblahblah...

ereini0n

First, a little story - by the books I recently read, it may be obvious that I'm all over medieval England and War of the Roses especially. Funnily enough, I was hardly aware of the subject until March the 3rd, 2012, when I've read a childhood favorite "The Black Arrow" by R.L.Stevenson. It takes place during the war and mentions the completely awesome, if a bit of a prick, Duke of Gloucester and the House of York. Obviously, I wanted to know more and this place was very helpful and everywhere I looked on the net, I came across one book:

I looked for it in bookstores and they had none. In fact, they didn't have a single Penman between them. After being robbed blind by some hackers I've forsworn Internet shopping and knowing no one who didn't, I've quite dispaired. Until one day I remembered a conversation I overheard in a Steimazky book store years ago, about the possibility of ordering a book from overseas through the store itself and so I did. It took over a month for the book to arrive and when it did, I've began reading the very same day.

It says on the cover that it is the story of Richard III but it is so much more than that. The cast is enormous and not one of them is a support character - each has a story of their own, each has a voice, a past, friends and rivals. I was surprised that even the little people, like Rob Apsall and Ankarette Twynyho, who would have been but a footnote in any other novel, hardly even given a name, have an environment around them, their own little worlds.
The events span years and have ups and downs (and since it's war with two side to it, what is up for Yorks is down for Lancasters and vice versa) and though Richard, especially in the later years, is usually present, it's not all about him. Another one who is constantly present, if only in spirit as being dead for some years, is Edmund, the second York brother, ignobly murdered while being a prisoner of war.
I liked Richard, not only by virtue of being the main character, but because of him being a real person, with loves and hates, never perfect, always trying to do his best. His relationship with his wife Anne I've found to be lovely, like a real normal couple, though with far to many problems and responsibilities for someone so young. Anne herself is a great character, a true woman who knows her duty. Though being sceptical at first, I really liked "The Adventures of Two Noblwomen in the Slums" episode.
Another couple I like, separately and together, are Edward and Elizabeth. Edward is awesome. One can feel his radiance and energy through the page and he says the funniest things sometimes. Elizabeth is not some low-born wannabe slutty witch (though those are convenient insults to use against her) but a grown woman, of less-than-noble birth (on one side at least), with, yes, a large family, people she wants to take care of, now that she's reached prominence.
I've read the first 700 pages in a few days and the last 200 in over a week, such is the burden of forward knowledge. I did not, emphatically, want to get to the end. In fact, I wanted to do this:

But I soldiered on, and though the final battle broke my heart a bit, it was, at the same time, the awesomest thing ever.

The book is over 900 page long and every one of them is well used. The best thing is we meet those people as children and get to know them growing up and when they do something in later life, we don't ask "eh? what'd he do that for?", we know, because we know them.

Two things, two tiny little things, in 944 pages, bothered me - if it is acknowledged that this is Richard III, the painting of the portrait episode was unfortunately lacking. As well, Humphrey of Gloucester is presented as the son of Thomas of Woodstock, while being the son of Henry IV, which is such a weird mistake to make.

To conclude, I love this book immensely and look forward to reading it again in the coming years.