Tag: England

2013 Challenges, Books

Book 202: Dancing with Mr. Darcy – Sarah Waters (ed.)

Geoff W

This book, a collection of short stories, disappointed me. There were definitely a few gems, but overall it left me uninspired and left wanting. Part of this disappointment stems from my the often tenuous connection to Austen in many of the stories. I mean one story’s inspiration came from the horseshoe door hinge at Chawton house, which yes connects to Austen but in such a minuscule way I could even figure out the connection until I read the ‘authors inspiration’ blurb.

The other part of the disappointment is pretty obvious and I discuss in further depth below. And as an aside, I’m not sure if it’s the generation of writers who are writing Austen ‘fan-fiction’ as I call it, but there are quite a few of them which throw in a Star Wars reference at some point, including one of the short stories in this collection. (This is seriously merging two of my favorite things in the world and it still stands that if anyone can find a single guy who likes Austen and Star Wars I want them to either marry me or be my best friend depending on their interests…)

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2013 Challenges, Books

Book 200: The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas – Gertrude Stein

Geoff W

The writing in this book is quite possibly the most beautiful writing I’ve ever read. The premise of the book, however, is incredibly convoluted. Regardless, I am glad I read the book because it counts for multiple challenges this year (Back to the Classics Reading Challenge and Mount TBR Reading Challenge).

When I first thought about reading this novel, I knew it wasn’t an autobiography, but I wasn’t quite sure where this fit into the myriad genres available. Ultimately, this book falls into some gray area between biography and autobiography. This felt like Gertrude Stein’s biography told through Alice B. Toklas but written by Gertrude Stein. And what I found out while reading this was that Paris was an incredibly small place and everyone knew everyone. It was incredibly strange how everyone was connected, but at the same time it was awesome the people who stumbled in and out of the novel including numerous painters and authors.

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2013 Challenges, Books

Book 195: Loot: The Battle over the Stolen Treasures of the Ancient World – Sharon Waxma

Geoff W

Sorry for the long post in advance, it’s been a long time since I’ve read a book about museums and antiquities and I forgot how much I love them and how much they make me think!

This book has been on my to-be-read shelf since July of 2011 and I can’t believe I waited this long to read it! I will never forget my first Anthropology class in undergrad and the professor going off on a tangent about the looting of the museums after the fall of Saddam Hussein. It pretty much guaranteed I would be an Anthropology major. (I later switched to cultural anthropology and focused on gender in the media, but still the people were awesome!) The intrigue, the drama, the affairs and the crimes, it could be a spy novel if it were fiction and not fact! This book will count as a bonus book for my 2013 Mount TBR Reading Challenge.

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2013 Challenges, Books, The Classics Club

Book 194: Down and Out in Paris and London – George Orwell

Geoff W

I chose this novel because it has an awesome name. I had a vague idea of what the book was about, but didn’t have any particular views going into the book and didn’t realize it was nonfiction (or mostly so apparently) until after I finished reading and verified it because I wasn’t quite sure. I knew it was an ‘adventure’ of sorts and thus I stuck it into my Back to the Classics challenge as a Classic Adventure and it conveniently qualifies also for my Mount TBR and my longer term The Classics Club Challenge.

It only took about two days to read the book and what I primarily noticed was that people are really interested in Orwell. I had multiple people ask me what I was reading on the T. I assume this is because Orwell’s name is in pretty large letters across the cover and that portion stuck out of my back pocket. It was a bit strange, but it was nice to talk to strangers. I feel like most people have only read Animal Farm or 1984 like me, but those who have read most (or all) of Orwell say that this one is his best work and it’s interesting as it’s his first ‘full length’ work.

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2013 Challenges, Books, The Classics Club

Book 192: Middlemarch – George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans)

Geoff W

So I finally finished it. It took almost an entire month, but I did it. It actually wasn’t a bad read, but it was such a long read that it was painful at times. Thankfully it counts for my 2013 Tea and Books and Mount TBR Challenges and for The Classics Club.

Looking back, I’ve realized that this novel is sort of like a proto-‘Love Actually’ – in that it is a network of love stories with interconnecting people who are only revealed slowly throughout the book. I felt the author did a great job at this even if it did cause me no end of frustration for the first couple hundred pages. I kept asking myself where this book was going and why the sisters from the beginning of the novel just disappeared, but they eventually reappeared and tied the story together.

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