Last weeks reading was "meh" up until Friday and then I had a ravenous readingfest. Sunday I had finished The Post-Office Girl and on Monday morning I eagerly began A.S. Byatt's Angels and Insects. Angels and Insects had been on my TBR pile for about five years; I attempted a read several years ago and decided that it was the wrong time -- frankly, the book bored me. So I unearthed the novella pairing and was set to plunge myself in the dark secrecy of Victorian England. Right up my alley? Afterall, this year I've devoured Bleak House, am mesmerized by the Masterpiece Classics' Little Dorrit series, and have had books such as The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher, Drood, and The Mystery of Edwin Drood on docket.
50 pages in... hints of incest, secrecy, lies, opulence, violence, science....
and boredom.
Byatt tries to invoke the duality of Victorian life (closeted sexuality and overt morality) by droning on in speech after speech. Scientific speeches about butterflies (laden with meaning), meanderings on religion, allegorical tales.... (yawn). In fact, I finished the first novella and dreaded working my way through the second.
So I had a bookbortion. Seriously, I've tried the book twice and it isn't stickin'; certainly time to move onwards.
Friday was the beginning of a rather bookish weekend. Hope, Erin, and I ventured to Borders and I used a 20% coupon to purchase The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher: A Shocking Murder and the Undoing of a Great Victorian Detective; I began reading that evening and was completely absorbed. I finished the book today after non-stop reading all weekend. Mystery, murder, madness, and references to Dickens and Collins. Bleak House was all up in that book!
Saturday, I went out with some friends to shop for crafty items at Hobby Lobby and books at Barnes and Noble. I had a gift card for B&N burning a hole in my pocket. While I was there I picked up the first Dark Tower book for Sam and Little House on the Prairie for Hope. For myself I bought The Poe Shadow by Matthew Pearl, Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles: A Novel by Margaret George, and Jane Boleyn: The True Story of the Infamous Lady Rochford by Julia Fox.
Needless to say I have gobs of reading for this week. My goal for this week is ambitious -- 3 books: The Fifth Child by Doris Lessing, The Collected Children's Stories by Sylvia Plath, and The Mystery of Edwin Drood by Charles Dickens.
1 comment:
I have never been able to get into Byatt's books. I "read" Possession a few years ago (more like quick skim) and was so bored. The books have such great premises though. It's so sad!
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