Julia Spencer-Fleming

How I loved reading In the Bleak Midwinter by Julia Spencer-Fleming! So well done. I know I read it in 2011, but was it during the winter season? I can't recall. But it's a mystery that must be read IF you want a male and a female protagonist with fully developed, inspiring characters. It's also a book for people who like a mystery to have a genuine SETTING with ATMOSPHERE.


So now, perhaps more than a year later, I'm reading the second novel in the series featuring Clare, the Episcopal minister and former US Army helicopter pilot, and Russ, the caring, sensitive Chief of Police. This one, like In the Bleak Midwinter, is super-cheap on the Nook or Kindle. It's entitled A Fountain Filled with Blood. I'm just getting started with it.

I ordered two works of German literature in translation today. I'm looking forward to writing about them. One of them, by Julia Franck, has one title in Germany, another in the UK, and another in the US. Really! I object to publishers messing around with the titles of books in translation, especially when the titles go so far afield from the original.

German Writer Peter Härtling

Yes, Härtling in a moment, but I want to say I finished The Flight of Gemma Hardy, I felt satisfied, I'm glad I read it, I liked it, and I won't soon forget it. I found myself excusing two deus ex machina scenes, saying to myself, "Oh, well, I don't mind, I like you, Book, even with your flaws.

And, did you know, Margot Livesey, who has lived in Boston for decades, was born in Scotland? I should have read the Acknowledgments first. That's what happens with an e-book. You can't leaf through a book to see all these treats, though they are listed in the Table of Contents. It doesn't help that I usually don't bother with the TOC.

Oh!! Crutches by Peter Härtling. What a wonderful book, a deeply fulfilling human story of a boy and a crippled soldier who helped each other survive the ugly aftermath of war. I was so profoundly moved by this little novel. Yes, I cried and cried at the end. Not because of anything tragic, but because of the pathos of the entire tale. It's true, all relationships come to an end sometime, and sometimes that is very sad. I must purchase a copy. Yes, it's out of print, but perhaps I can dig up a copy somewhere. I would like to read it again, and again.

Härtling was born in Chemnitz in 1933. He's a well-known poet, prose writer, and children's book author. His father died in a Russian POW camp in 1945. His family fled from the Red Army in the early spring of 1945 and landed in Austria, just as Tom does in Crutches. Hartling has written several autobiographal books about this time as well, though they haven't been translated into English. Darn! Wikipedia has an entry about Hartling, but it's difficult to come up with additional information that's in English. There's plenty in German, however.

Reading Spree!

In the past two weeks, I have managed to clock in many hours of reading. What a relief it has been--dog curled up in a ball at my feet, tea at my elbow, gas fire pouring out heat, and book(s) in hand.

I have less than 80 pages to go in the nearly 400-page The Flight of Gemma Hardy. It has strayed deliciously from Jane Eyre. Mr. Sinclair, the Rochester character, is marvelously flawed! I love that twist.

I've found the novel to be a page-turner, but it must be said that I delight in orphan tales. UK readers' eyes will pop out when they stumble across what a novelist-friend of mine used to call "eye bumps." I think Livesy tried to write dialogue being mindful of British diction, but...she fails at times. She also can be a little careless with historical phrasing. This book takes place from 1958-1967, and she has some cliches and phrases that belong to the 1990s at the earliest. Still, I must say, they do not happen frequently, and I'm able to stay rooted in time and place. And I've thoroughly enjoyed it! That fact is uppermost!

Andrew Hudgins' poetry has figured prominently this week. I own Hudgins' The Neverending but have borrowed The Lost War Narrative. I'm not a poetry afficiando, but I enjoy reading poems from time to time, for the ideas, the emotions, the imagery, and to share with my students.

Jane Eyre and The Flight of Gemma Hardy

After groaning over P.D. James writing a novel post-Pride and Prejudice, I find myself falling prey to Margot Livesey's reworking of Jane Eyre in The Flight of Gemma Hardy.

How did this happen? I realize now that I had high expectations of P.D. James. I still haven't recovered from her decision to put her mystery novels to rest. I can understand her retiring from writing books at age 90 plus, but to go off on a Jane Austen bender was too much for me to handle with composure.

It seems that because I have no expectations about Margot Livesey, other than the fact that she is a respected novelist, I've been willing to be led down the Jane Eyre garden path. Yes, I'm enjoying The Flight of Gemma Hardy, but I must warn you, I'm a third of the way through and so far, Livesey doesn't stray far from Bronte's novel, other than to update the storyline to 1958. But I LIKE it! Perhaps it's important to admit that Jane Eyre is my favorite English novel.

But in Gemma Hardy's case, I can't imagine why she didn't run away from Mrs. Bryant's school and head for London or another major city to see if she could survive in the streets or the countryside. Maybe I'm too much the independent/explorer type, but I'd much prefer robbing from a farm or two or doing odd jobs in a city, always hiding myself, to enduring the horrors at the school. I can see why Jane Eyre didn't run away, but the twentieth century presents an entirely different environment.

Re-Envisioning the Blog & New Reads

I've been moved, at long last, to do some urgently needed updates to this blog.

I finished An Available Man by Hilma Wolitzer this morning, and the novel persisted in being a relaxing, though mildly provocative read. It's such a relief to read a novel geared specifically toward people in their fifties and early sixties. I heartily recommend it! Please see my earlier posts for more details.

I am now reading a YA novel by a German writer, Peter Hartling, which is set in Austria in 1945-1946. It's entitled Crutches and is about an orphaned German boy and a crippled German soldier strugging for survival in Vienna. The twelve-year-old boy, separated from his mother during a stampede at a German train station at war's end, arrives in Vienna, hoping to be reunited with his aunt. His aunt's house and all the apartments on the street have been reduced to rubble and she is nowhere to be found.

I've also started a new adult novel published in January 2012, The Flight of Gemma Hardy by Margot Livesy. Once again, I'm reading it on the Nook, which is such a help to my eyes! The brightly lit screen helps immensely, no matter what kind of day I'm having with my vision, and I'm able to read much more rapidly than I'm able to read a standard hardcover or paperback book.

An Available Man

I'm halfway through An Available Man by Hilma Wolitzer and am thoroughly enjoying it. I've grown fond of Edward, the bereaved spouse of his departed, beloved Bee. If you've never read Wolitzer, she deals with dreadfully serious subjects with a light touch. At times I've found her tone to be a little too breezy, but when it comes to grieving spouses in their fifties, a light tone is very welcome.

Wolitzer doesn't let us wallow in Edward's grief. The reader senses it but looks hopefully on all of Edward's attempts to stay connected to the world. He is a science teacher, and an endearing one, ensconced in an Upper West Side (NYC) private school.

His dating forays have begun, and they're humorous. I find I feel enormous empathy for Edward, with no sturm und drang attached. I feel comforted when I read about Edward's trials and adventures. I think everyone in their fifties has contemplated what it would be like to continue on after the death of his or her spouse or partner. This book allows one to think about it without an anvil above the head. I like that!!

What a winter we've had! Very, very little snow, but an overload of icy roads and trails. We've had some cold but never for long. The temps keep warming up to the 40s after a string of frigid days. No, I don't like it. This is not an Adirondack winter. But I've tried to make do.

Books, Books, Books!

I so want to write an entry this evening, but I arrived home SO LATE after work because of a long physical therapy session.

I will give you a tease. I'm loving An Available Man by Hilma Wolitzer. I have so much to say about why this is a superb, fun, worthwhile title for people over fifty. I will save that for tomorrow. I'm so glad I'm reading it and that I found out about this new book. (Published in January, I believe.)

More tomorrow! It's on my GOALS list.

Blogger Screws Up!

Just wrote an entire entry. Published it. And it disappeared in Google's attempt to explain in greater detail its privacy policy. Well, thanks a lot for messing up my entry, Google. You're tops.

January 2012 Reading Table

It's impossible to know how to "pick up" the blog after such an embarrassing hiatus.

Better not to go into the mournful details, but:

I enjoyed reading The Obamas by Jodi Kantor (2012) and The Rose Garden by Susanna Kearsley (inexpensive on the Nook) while continuing to make progress with Travels in Siberia by Ian Frazier.

The Rose Garden has been so much fun because it's set in Cornwall, one of my beloved foreign places. I've visited twice, but never long enough to come close to satisfying my appetite. A couple of days once, a few days twice just didn't do it! I long to walk the coastal route. I also want to hop over to one or two of the Channel Islands.

I think I should just do it--in late May to early June--just take a "card" and run it up. Problem is, I have other places in Europe I'm DYING to visit. Prague is at the top of my cities list.

Problem is, I keep wanting to return to England, so beautiful a land! I've loved every bit of it I've visited: Yorkshire, Northumberland, London, Kent, Devon, Pembrokeshire, Cotswolds, on and on, and yes, I love London, too, though primarily for the theatre first and the museums second.