Skip to main content

Sunday Salon


It's Sunday again! As usual, I've done a lot of reading this week. I finally finished Devil's Brood, and really loved it! After finishing such a weighty book, I decided to go for something light, so I picked up The King and Mrs. Simpson, which only took me an afternoon to finish. I was expecting it to be a completely different book, so I was a little disappointed.

Right now I'm reading two books (watch me multitask). It's Nine Coaches Waiting, by Mary Stewart. The book was originally published in 1958, and it's a classic of romance suspense, derived straight from Jane Eyre and Rebecca. In it, a young woman named Linda Martin goes to be the governess of the young Cout of Valmy, Phillippe. Attempted murder, romance, and suspense are all part of the receipe of this sort-of-trashy novel. I still have about fifty pages left to read, so I'll post a review when I'm done.

The other book I'm reading is an ARC of Those Who Dream By Day, by Linda Cargill. It's suspenseful historical fiction set around the sinking of the Lusitania in 1915, and the Arab Revolt thereafter. I'm not very far in, but I'm not enamored so far. Some of the prose is cringe-worthy.
I've also been following the Read-a-Thon; my Google Reader has positively exploded over the past day! I didn't participate, because endurance reading isn't something I'm very good at, but I was reading other people as they progressed through the challenge. Congratulations to everyone who made it!

Comments

Shoshana said…
I just started on Sunday Salon. It's fun. I hope you can visit me.

My Sunday Salon
Sandra said…
I've just started at Sunday Salon and I'm enjoying reading the entries. Interesting books, all those you mentioned are new to me.
Anonymous said…
Is that the Mary Stewart who write the series of books about Merlin? If so, I must look it out. She was a good writer.
Anonymous said…
I stayed home all day burying my nose in the Guernsey Society book.

Jane Eyre is one of the books that have gathered dust. I'll get to that soon I hope.
Anna Claire said…
I'd love to know how you liked Nine Coaches Waiting. I got about 20 pages in and was bored. Then received some interesting ARCs and returned it to the library to be read another time. If you say it's good, I'll give it another shot!

Popular posts from this blog

Another giveaway

This time, the publicist at WW Norton sent me two copies of The Glass of Time , by Michael Cox--so I'm giving away the second copy. Cox is the author of The Meaning of Night, and this book is the follow-up to that. Leave a comment here to enter to win it! The deadline is next Sunday, 10/5/08.

A giveaway winner, and another giveaway

The winner of the Girl in a Blue Dress contest is... Anna, of Diary of An Eccentric ! My new contest is for a copy of The Shape of Mercy , by Susan Meissner. According to Publisher's Weekly : Meissner's newest novel is potentially life-changing, the kind of inspirational fiction that prompts readers to call up old friends, lost loves or fallen-away family members to tell them that all is forgiven and that life is too short for holding grudges. Achingly romantic, the novel features the legacy of Mercy Hayworth—a young woman convicted during the Salem witch trials—whose words reach out from the past to forever transform the lives of two present-day women. These book lovers—Abigail Boyles, elderly, bitter and frail, and Lauren Lars Durough, wealthy, earnest and young—become unlikely friends, drawn together over the untimely death of Mercy, whose precious diary is all that remains of her too short life. And what a diary! Mercy's words not only beguile but help Abigail and Lars

Six Degrees of Barbara Pym's Novels

This year seems to be The Year of Barbara Pym; I know some of you out there are involved in some kind of a readalong in honor of the 100th year of her birth. I’ve read most of her canon, with only The Sweet Dove Died, Civil to Strangers, An Academic Question, and Crampton Hodnet left to go (sadly). Barbara Pym’s novels feature very similar casts of characters: spinsters, clergymen, retirees, clerks, and anthropologists, with which she had direct experience. So it stands to reason that there would be overlaps in characters between the novels. You can trace that though the publication history of her books and therefore see how Pym onionizes her stories and characters. She adds layers onto layers, adding more details as her books progress. Some Tame Gazelle (1950): Archdeacon Hoccleve makes his first appearance. Excellent Women (1952): Archdeacon Hoccleve gives a sermon that is almost incomprehensible to Mildred Lathbury; Everard Bone understands it, however, and laughs