The Chaperone - Laura Moriarty

Checking on Goodreads I see that this quite a popular novel at the moment, but that it's also attracted some criticism. It also got a mention on Book Riot's list of the best 21st century novels written by women. I gave it three stars out of ten, and although it was a decent enough novel, I have to say it wouldn't really get on to my list of top novels. It's not exactly chick-lit or a romantic novel, I suppose you could characterise it as being historical fiction. 

I generally liked it, but I felt like it took a bit of time to get going and I was more gripped in the middle than at the beginning. Cora was a likeable main character who had quite an interesting journey and I was interested in the Louise Brooks parts, but having read some quite evocative novels from the period (I highly recommend Rules of Civility for both the atmosphere and the heroine), I felt like this missed out on capturing something about New York. Maybe about Louise too. I didn't find her to be a character you could really care about, she came across as being an annoying brat, even after Cora finds out about her history. Perhaps this was deliberate though. 

Love how sexy, dangerous and cross she looks in some images (link)

 It was interesting to find out what happened to both Cora and Louise afterwards, but I agree that the last part of the novel swept over great swathes of history ending up in a litany of who died when; that was not exactly the greatest part of the novel. Perhaps it would have worked better if the last we saw of Louise and Cora was the letter that Cora received from NYC.

Anyway, it is an okay library read, but I'm glad I didn't buy it. I will be attempting other books from the list in future though.

Another Book Bucket List...

Women writers and their works from the 21st Century from Book Riot. 

I am ashamed to say I haven't read that many of these, only the ones crossed out. I think some of them may need to go on the bucket list two. I know I'm short on 21st century books in the first list, so this has inevitably lead to a surfeit of dead white males. This list does have some of my favourite books and authors though, I love Jennifer Egan and Sarah Walters. I have also read other books by some of the authors, and even own the ones in bold, so I will have to put these books on the next list! I would've thought A.L. Kennedy would've made it on there, or Hilary Mantel, but they couldn't include everyone. I will have to start reading The Chaperone as I have it from the library at the moment.

Megan Abbott – The End of Everything (2011)

Diana Abu-Jaber – Crescent (2003), Origin (2007)

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie – Purple Hibiscus (2003), Half a Yellow Sun (2006)

Isabel Allende – Portrait in Sepia (2000), Ines of My Soul (2006)

Julia Alvarez – Before We Were Free (2002), Saving the World (2006)

Margaret Atwood – The Blind Assassin (2000), Oryx and Crake (2003), The Year of the Flood (2009)

Anita Rau Badami – Can You Hear the Nightbird Call? (2006)

Aimee Bender – An Invisible Sign of My Own (2000), The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake (2010)

Jane Borodale – The Book of Fires (2010)

A.S. Byatt – The Children’s Book (2009)

Susanna Clarke – Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (2004)

Edwidge Danticat – The Dew Breaker (2004)

Lauren B. Davis – The Radiant City (2005), Our Daily Bread (2011)

Lydia Davis – The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis (Short Fiction – 2009)

Kiran Desai – The Inheritance of Loss (2006)

Anita Diamant – Good Harbor (2001), The Last Days of Dogtown (2005)

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni – The Palace of Illusions (2008)

Emma Donoghue – Life Mask (2004), Room (2010)

Jennifer Egan – A Visit from the Goon Squad (2012)

Louise Erdrich – The Plague of Doves (2008)

Lyndsay Faye – The Gods of Gotham (2012)

Gillian Flynn – Gone Girl (2012)

Kay Gibbons – The Life All Around Me (2005)

Xiaolu Guo – Village of Stone (2003), A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary For Lovers (2007)

Lauren Groff – Arcadia (2012)

Carol Guess – Gaslight (2001)

Jennifer Haigh – Mrs. Kimble (2003), Baker Towers (2005), Faith (2011)

Melinda Haynes – Willem’s Field (2004)

Alice Hoffman – The Dovekeepers (2011)

Helen Humphreys – Wild Dogs (2004)

Siri Hustvedt – The Summer Without Men (2011)

Joshilyn Jackson – Between, Georgia (2007), A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty (2012)

Sue Monk Kidd – The Secret Life of Bees (2003), The Mermaid Chair (2005)

Haven Kimmel – The Solace of Leaving Early (2002)

Barbara Kingsolver – Prodigal Summer (2000), The Lacuna (2009)

Elizabeth Kostova – The Historian (2005)

Nicole Krauss – The History of Love (2005), Great House (2010)

Aryn Kyle – The God of Animals (2007)

Jhumpa Lahiri – The Namesake (2003), Unaccustomed Earth (Short Fiction – 2008)

Ursula K. Leguin – Lavinia (2008)

Anne-Marie MacDonald – The Way the Crow Flies (2003)

Claire Messud – The Emperor’s Children (2006)

Lydia Millet – My Happy Life (2002), Oh Pure and Radiant Heart (2005)

Lorrie Moore – A Gate at the Stairs (2009)

Laura Moriarty – The Chaperone* (2012)

Toni Morrison – Love (2003), A Mercy (2008), Home (2012)

Kate Morton – The House of Riverton (2006)**

Alice Munro – Runaway (2004), The View from Castle Rock (Short Fiction – 2006)

Eileen Myles – Inferno: A Poet’s Novel  (2010)

Sena Jeter Naslund – Four Spirits (2004), Ahab’s Wife (2005)

Audrey Niffenegger – The Time Traveler’s Wife (2003), Her Fearful Symmetry (2009)

Joyce Carol Oates – I’ll Take You There (2002), The Falls (2004), A Fair Maiden (2010)

Heather O’Neill – Lullabies for Little Criminals (2006)

Julie Otsuka – When The Emperor was Divine (2002), The Buddha in the Attic (2011)

Helen Oyeyemi – The Icarus Girl (2005), Mr. Fox (2011)

Ann Pancake – Strange As This Weather Has Been (2007)

Ann Patchett – Bel Canto (2001), State of Wonder (2011)

Marge Piercy – Colours Passing Through Us (Poetry – 2003)

Francine Prose – Blue Angel (2000)

Nina Revoyr – Wingshooters (2011)

Marilynne Robinson – Gilead (2004), Home (2008)

Mary Doria Russell –  A Thread of Grace (2005), Dreamers of the Day (2008)

Diane Setterfield – The Thirteenth Tale (2006)

Elissa Schappell – Blueprints for Building Better Girls (Short Fiction – 2011)

Sarah Schulman – The Child (2007), The Mere Future (2009)

Mary Ann Shaffer – The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (2008)

Lionel Shriver – We Need to Talk About Kevin (2003)

Marisa Silver – The God of War (2008)

Jane Smiley – Private Life (2010)

Ali Smith -  Hotel World (2001), The Accidental (2005), There But For The (2011)

Zadie Smith – White Teeth (2000), On Beauty (2005), NW (2012)

Kathryn Stockett – The Help (2006)

Elizabeth Strout – Olive Kitteridge (2008)

Donna Tartt – The Little Friend (2002)

Jannette Walls – The Glass Castle (Non-Fiction 2005)

Karen Thompson Walker – The Age of Miracles (2012)

Sarah Waters – Fingersmith (2002)

Kathleen Winter – Annabel (2010)

Alissa York – Effigy (2007)

*Have from the library at the moment

**Not a fan

Update: Have just finished this book, about to post review.

The Beautiful and Damned

Took me about a month to read. A difficult book both to read and to rate, I ended up giving it three (out of five), but if I could've given it another half I would've. It seems to be a book that divides opinion. 

On the one hand you have Fitzgerald's gorgeously poetic lyrical language, the book is stuffed to the brim with easily quotable memorable passages:

There was nothing, it seemed, that grew stale so soon as pleasure

I was intrigued by the parts that were written in dialogue, particularly the 'beauty' part.
 
Yet at the same time there are off-putting aspects. I know that we are not supposed to like Anthony and Gloria that much, but sometimes it can be quite hard to feel any sort of sympathy for two such unlikable characters to the extent that you stop caring about what happens to them. The plot meanders around their financial situation and the state of their marriage so much that it skips the parts where something actually happens (although I think again this may be a stylistic decision to fully convey the horror of meaningless lives, it nevertheless makes it quite difficult to read). 

I was surprised  by the ending. At first it's easy to assume that Anthony is about to be hauled off to the police station to be charged for the murder of Dot after lamping her with an oak chair, however, it is not certain that Dot has even entered the apartment, all we know is that there is a strong smell of cheap perfume and Anthony is surrounded by disarray, having apparently lost his mind. Then they abruptly inherit the money and the next we see is Anthony in a wheelchair on a ship.  

There is no real reaction from either character to the news that they have the money at last, and it invokes an odd confusion in the reader - because they are continually shown in such an unflattering, undeserving light there is definitely a sense that you don't want them to inherit the money, yet at the same time I think that this is the only way that Fitzgerald could end the novel; yes they have the undeserved reward, but it is clear that having learnt nothing from the experience of poverty and having ruined their lives to such an extent that they have lost everything aside from the money, there will be no happy ending for them. They are still and always will be damned. Anthony evidently doesn't realise this, and he is shown in the finally sentences of the chapter feeling exultant that he has come through what he looks on as a trial that he has faced completely alone:

Only a few months before people had been urging him to give in, to submit to mediocrity, to go to work. But he had known that he was justified in his way of life - and he had stuck it out stanchly [sic].

The only other way I could think of ending it would be Gloria leaving Anthony, but that would perhaps lead to some kind of redemption for her which would move away from the theme of the novel. No, instead they are able to carry on making each other as unhappy as possible, locked in perpetual money-spending misery.
 
Anyway, I'm glad to have read it and thought that it's a book with continued relevance, although I can't see it being a book that I would go back to. However, I would like to re-read The Great Gatsby and Tender is the Night is one of the books on the bucket list two.


 

Update on Infinite Jest

I certainly haven't been writing about it to the extent I wrote about Ulysses as I haven't really felt the need for a chapter-by-chapter analysis on the blog, especially as there are many more chapters. So, before I get too ahead of myself, I thought I'd update. At the moment, I am about 30% of the way through the book, I'm not sure, but I believe I've gone past the part I got to the last time I read. This time I am making copious notes about the different characters, which has helped a great deal. I can't always remember in what context each character has popped up before, so it makes sense to check on it. 

Wallace's plotting is intricate in the extreme; I can't think of another book I've read that works in the same way with each character fitting together. Its like a big puzzle giving out clues all the time. In some ways, I wish I'd left 'subsidzed time' as a mystery until it was reveled, but never mind, the rest of the book has been a spoiler-free zone so far. 

Even though it's difficult at times, it's an enjoyable book to read, particularly the incidences of black humour and absurdity. I particularly enjoyed the story of Poor Tony stealing the woman's heart, somehow you don't know whether to laugh or not. 

Difficult parts include a bit too much tennis and AA meetings, Clenette's narration and the history of Quebecois separatism, which is no walk in the park. 

Themes so far include appearences and the eternal struggle between freedom and responsibility. This final theme is revealed through the Ennet House Drug and Alcohol Recovery House [sic] parts, which is in turn mirrored by the drug taking that takes place in the Enfield Tennis Academy. It seems no-one can escape the consequences of absolving responsibility, and the Separatist Operatives have an interesting discussion about having enough responsibility to be able to be free. Even though there are serious points to be made, I haven't found the book to be that 'preachy' about it. 

The trouble with a book like this is that sometimes, it spoils you for other books. I want to carry on reading something that I can feel is doing something good. I want to find out what happens, but at the same time I don't really want it to end. 

Just a brief word about reading the e-book version. So far, I've found it okay. Using the footnotes in the book is good, but I've used a physical notebook and a pencil to make notes. I haven't really got to grips with bookmarks on the Kindle as yet, so I've had to scan around to find James's filmography and probably will when Separatism becomes vital to the plot. I think the main benefit to reading on Kindle is not ending up with a wrecked copy from too much bookmarking, note-taking and flipping back through different sections!

 

Bret and his big mouth

Bret has been spouting off about Matt Bomer being in 50 Shades of Grey and about "crap" sitcoms. Predictably, most of the comments were from people calling him homophobic, but I could see where he was coming from, although he didn't put it in a way that endeared himself to people! Not that that is Bret's bag anyway. 

In the first article, Bret was pointing out that he didn't think that a gay actor is suitable for the part of Christian Grey. Which is fair enough when you think about it. As a woman who has discussed who should play Christian with friends, I know that we are very opinionated about who should play him, because the point of the book is for us to identify with Ana. This is a man who is supposed to make us go weak at the knees; someone who manages to evade Ana's best instincts to avoid him at all costs. 

Brett says no thanks (image). Matt does look a bit gay in some of his pics.

It says something about a director's attitude to women that he is choosing to pick someone straight over someone who is gay, because I'm sure that if Bret was casting the same film but with Alan instead of Ana, he would go looking for the hottest gay actor he could find. Bret pays us a compliment by looking for an actor who is "genuinely into women", as well as applauding our open-mindedness. But dammit, I think he's right. No offense meant to Matt or anyone who wanted him for the part, but we are supposed to be fancying straight guys here. I haven't seen White Collar but if what Bret says is right, Matt came across as "totally gay" and in some of the pics I've seen he doesn't look perfectly straight. Don't know about you, but I'd rather my supposed 'dream hunk' was totally straight thanks.  And this is not about having anything against gay actors. Bret doesn't have a problem with gay actors playing straight roles, just not as 'dream hunks' who are supposed to be every woman's dream.

I think this is part of the point that Bret is making. It would be fantastic if instead of getting gay actors to play straight roles, TV writers would just write more gay roles and get gay actors to play them. I can understand why Bret feels uncomfortable about Neil Patrick-Harris, because in a way, it's as if we are supposed to be laughing about the fact that he's gay but playing an womaniser. Perhaps this does a disservice to both him and us.Why not write him as gay? Because it would be too shocking to have a promiscuous gay character in a fluffy US sitcom. They would probably have to ramp up the camp, or settle him down with a nice camp boyfriend/life partner. 

I get similarly annoyed with the portrayal of disabled characters, who seem to be nearly always played by actors without disabilities (apparently called 'cripface'). I suppose I can see why the producers do it that way, but it is still a great shame. Glee is a big offender. Good for having a disabled character in Artie, but I notice that he never gets the girl. Coincidence?

Very nice, but should not be playing a blind man (image)

 I had a look at a Wiki list of gay characters in TV shows, particularly looking at shows that are on currently in the UK and who made them. There are a few sitcoms like Glee and Modern Family, some dramas like The Borgias, Smash, True Blood and Game of Thrones. Out of these we have the inevitable musicals and straight men playing gay roles. One production company came up a couple of times, HBO's dramas.

In the second article, Bret hates CBS sitcoms and call The Big Bang Theory 'gay'. I happen to like the show (and Modern Family), but again, I can see what he's saying here. Raj and Howard continually skirt around their big 'bromance' and the big joke on Raj is that he likes things that the other men consider 'womanly' like manicures. But then the whole show is centered around stereotypes: dumb blond, socially inept scientist, Jewish mama's boy. He's right about Modern Family too, in my opinion. It may be a bit more progressive than other sitcoms (in that it has openly gay characters), but you've still got a straight man running around playing a big ol' camp stereotype. Is that the only thing we can handle?! 

I'm not saying the UK is any better at this either. Other than in soaps and the occasional drama like Downton Abbey, we're pretty short on the gay and disabled characters too. We are not challenging stereotypes, and I think that is why Bret hates the way that homosexuality is presented. It's lazy and predictable, or hiding behind multiple layers of coyness to avoid offending anyone.  

Great quote from an article in the Guardian:

"Good depictions of disability involve characters who happen to be disabled, rather than characters who are consumed and defined by their disabilities alone."

Same for goes for homosexuality.  

Capital (John Lanchester)

John Lanchester shows poor old Sebastian how to write a decent ensemble novel. I really liked this book. It was well written without being too high-brow and pretentious, it had a plot that moved things along nicely (the sinister postcards and blog). It was funny at times without being heavy handed and deliberate, touching without being too cloyingly sentimental, informative without being 'preachy'. The focus of Pepys Street gave a nice sense of London without it being too sprawling and widespread. I liked the cast of characters very much and I felt that I got a real sense of who they were, I thought Lanchester made you care about them and I wanted to know what would happen to Roger especially.

One thing that confused me though, the blub at the back had something about what life would be like in 2021, which wasn't really reflected in the book (thankfully, I find some of those future prediction things quite embarrassing). Having gone onto the website advertised on the back, I'm guessing the whole future thing was a marketing ploy. I've signed up to it out of curiosity, it's apparently going to tell me what my life's going to be like in the next ten years.

A Week in December (Sebastian Faulks)

Okay, so it was clever. Quite readable (though I could definitely put it down frequently). But at the same time somehow quite annoying. It's like Ben Elton without the jokes, and with an extra helping of smug on the top. I got bored of the rants about modern life - how people are disconnected from real life, how the education system is failing and the endless stuff about hedge funds and banking. Also, I couldn't find it in myself to like or care about the characters, I felt like they were more generalisations than anything. Perhaps this is what Faulks wanted, yet another comment on how self-centered and stereotypical we've all become. Add the re-occurring 'mysterious' bicyclist (a bit of an obvious technique if ever I saw one) and it adds up to quite a disappointing book. I found myself willing the fundamentalist on if only for something to happen. Two stars out of five, I didn't completely hate it. I'll give Sebastian another chance someday (probably), but I won't go searching for him.