Category: Reading

Posts in which we talk about reading habits and preferences

To Kill A TBR Book

Updated on February 21, 2013 by megan

Last week, I attended the New England Chapter of the Romance Writers of America Conference.

But this post is not about what I learned about craft, Regency undergarments, writing sex scenes, themes and images, and what it sounds like when a room full of women hears there’s chocolate about to be served.

This is about not reading. During one of the workshops, the presenter mentioned Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird and said everyone should have read it, and if you hadn’t, shame on you.

I’ve never read it. How could this have happened? I’m totally embarrassed. I don’t know exactly how I missed it; I was an English major in college, before that took a lot of high school English classes, both my parents were avid readers. And somehow, I missed it.

It’s not like I haven’t read a lot of classics; besides the ubiquitous Jane, I’ve read all of Dickens, Fitzgerald, Wharton, and various books by Nabokov, Faulkner, Steinbeck, Woolf and Hammett (for fun, check out the top 100 list, but don’t get in a tizz about the inclusions and ommissions; it’s not worth it). I’ve read indiscrimately, but have never opened Ms. Lee’s classic, and only, work.

So–have you read TKAM? Do you agree it is a classic? What classics have you missed out on? Do you plan to read them in the future? What makes a classic, anyway? And do you think I should feel as ashamed as I do?

Thanks–

Megan
www.meganframpton.com

Posted in Reading | Tagged classic novels, classics | 18 Replies

Great beginnings

Updated on February 21, 2013 by Janet Mullany

What are your favorite opening lines? What makes the opening sentence of a book compel you to read on, and do you think those all-important first words should shout or whisper? Here are some of mine:

David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anyone else, these pages must show. To begin my life with the beginning of my life, I record that I was born (as I have been informed and believe), on a Friday at twelve o’clock at night. It was remarked that the clock began to strike, and I began to cry, simultaneously.

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte (and I’ve raved before on this very blog about the wonderful stark simplicity of this sentence, but I have to throw it in again. Truly, less is more!)
There was no possibility of taking a walk that day.

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier (look! She’s writing in iambic pentameters!)
Last night I dreamed I went to Manderley again.

Fast Women by Jennifer Crusie
The man behind the cluttered desk looked like the devil, and Nell Dysart considered that was par for her course since she’d been going to hell for a year and a half anyway.

Emma by Jane Austen–a masterly portrait of a heroine cruising for a bruising, but I can’t figure out how or why!
Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.

Finally, to clear the literary palate, the opening line of Paul Clifford by Edward George Bulwer-Lytton (an example of more being less):
It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents–except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.

(and a reminder, by the way that the official deadline for the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest is April 15, only two days away!)

You are hereby invited to share your favorites!

Posted in Reading, Writing | Tagged beginnings, first lines | 5 Replies

Another Important Survey

Updated on February 21, 2013 by Cara King

Look at them up there, glaring! The Miss Bingleys definitely want to duke it out. They’re both fierce and cruel. They’ve both been educated by the best instructors. Who do YOU think would win in a fight? Would one win at boxing, and the other at wrestling, or would one wipe the floor with the other in any form of combat?

Or how about the Lady Catherines??? Which one of these would beat the other at mudwrestling? At boxing? At sumo wrestling?

Would they pull hair and bite??? Would they gouge each others’ eyes out?

Who would you wager your hard-earned money on?

Inquiring minds want to know!

Cara
Cara King, www.caraking.com
MY LADY GAMESTER — Holt Medallion Finalist!

Posted in Frivolity, Jane Austen, Reading, TV and Film | Tagged Pride and Prejudice | 13 Replies

Pride Interrupted

Updated on February 21, 2013 by megan

Last week, my father (who also doubles as my Regency research partner) was in Brooklyn for a visit. Friday night, he poked around my DVD collection and found the BBC version of Pride & Prejudice; he had just visited my aunt, his sister, and seen the 2005 version, and wanted to compare with the one he’d heard was truer to the text (my dad wrote a paper on Emma in college, so he’s up on Austen).
It was 8:30 by the time we sat down to watch, and I warned him this version was at least five hours long, and I knew neither of us would be up that late. We stopped watching at the end of the first DVD (of the two-disc set), right when Elizabeth refuses Darcy’s first offer of marriage.
Whew. It was really, really hard to stop watching right there, right at the emotional black moment of the film. But how perfect its placement was–right as you’re realizing Darcy has feelings for Elizabeth (courtesy of Colin Firth’s guardedly melting glances), and Elizabeth is piqued by Darcy, although not yet willing to admit it, even to herself, he proposes in his characteristic blunt Darcy way.
The scene closes with her telling him that he would be the last man on earth she would ever contemplate marrying, and he tells her he understands perfectly, and will never bother her again. They separate, leaving behind our palpitating hearts.
Austen’s build-up to that moment is magnificent, as is her gradual threading together of our hero and heroine’s lives. It’s hard to believe, only one DVD disc later, that Elizabeth and Darcy will ever get to a place where they can be together.

Pride & Prejudice is one of the best examples of the Big Misunderstanding ever–yes, Elizabeth could have asked Darcy about Wickham, but there are ever so many reasons why she would not; and he could have discerned her embarrassment about her family, and possibly discussed it with her without blurting it out so baldly, but there are ever so many reasons why he would not.

Do you agree with my analysis of P&P as having a Big Misunderstanding?
What examples of a GOOD use of a Big Misunderstanding can you think of? Do you mind them in your novels? Can you envision any situation with a Big Mis that would make as much sense as the ones in P&P? And don’t you feel sorry for my dad, who had to return to Cape Cod without seeing the second half?

Megan
www.meganframpton.com

Posted in Jane Austen, Reading, TV and Film | Tagged misunderstandings, Pride and Prejudice | 13 Replies

Faking it

Updated on February 21, 2013 by Janet Mullany

The boddynge flourettes bloshes atte the lyghte;
The mees be sprenged wyth the yellowe hue;
Ynn daiseyd mantels ys the mountayne dyghte;
The nesh yonge coweslepe bendethe wyth the dewe;
The trees enlefed, yntoe Heavenne straughte,
Whenn gentle wyndes doe blowe to whestlyng dynne ys broughte.

Thomas Chatterton, the anguished teenage poet, was one of the great fakers of the Romantic period–his short-lived and unsuccessful career, which started with him faking medieval poetry, ended with his suicide in an attic at the tender age of eighteen.

And plagiarization is something fiction writers are too often accused of…after all, all regencies are about fresh-faced ingenues and rakes, right?…aren’t they? Even though academic story analyses have proposed that all story-telling is derivative, and derive from a handful of basic plots, it’s something we are accused of far too often.

As a living example of how different writers can take a simple plot premise and work it into something different, visit Diana Peterfreund’s Great Blog Voice Experiment. Diana invited twelve writers for their contribution, and each is different and interesting. Why? It’s a question of individual imagination and individual voice–whatever voice is. It’s one of those difficult-to-define elements that distinguishes a writer’s work, and I hold the theory that the stronger the voice, the more extreme the reader’s reaction.

Can you define voice? Which writers have a strong voice, and what do you like/dislike about their work?

Janet

Posted in Reading, Writing | Tagged author voice | 5 Replies