Tag: may

Imagine If…

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Vale, Lucien. Imagine If…Tupac Did Not Go To Vegas. Shattered Mythos Press, 2025.

Reason read: I am a member of the Early Review program for LibraryThing. I occasionally get to review interesting books and this was one of them.

The one thing to keep in mind when reading Lucien Vale’s Imagine If series is that it is pure fiction. You are imagining an alternate ending to a well-known story. Everyone knows Tupac was murdered in Las Vegas. Vale is simply flipping the script and imagining a scenario where Pac would decide against that fateful trip. Vale cleverly finds a real life story and imagines an alternate ending. I don’t really care if the events in New York City mirror fact or not. The whole idea is to ask what if? and to be entertained. The action of Imagine If is tightly wound and fast paced. It reads like a movie with exaggerated dialogue full of gangster lingo and drama. If entertainment was Vale’s goal, he succeeded.

Confessional: one of my favorite movies is Sliding Doors starring Gwyneth Paltrow. It is the story of Helen’s two very different lives: the life she would lead if she had caught the train going home and the alternate where she misses it.

Author fact: Lucien Vale has also written an “Imagine” book about Bruce Lee.

Book trivia: Imagine If… is a very short 77 pages long.

Murder in the Museum of Man

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Alcorn, Alfred. Murder in the Museum of Man. Zoland Books, 1997.

Reason read: May is a traditional graduation month for colleges and universities. Read in honor of commencements everywhere.

Wainscott University is your typical institutional of higher education full of snobbery intellectuals, grant-fueled competition, and academic politics. Add crime to the list when Dean Cranston Fessing goes missing. When it is revealed that Fessing was not only murdered but cannibalized, Museum of Man (MOM) secretary Norman de Rateur turns amateur detective to solve the crime. Then another dean is decapitated. Murder in the Museum of Man turns to mayhem. Through de Ratuer’s journal we follow the action.
Norman is an interesting character. He pines for an old girlfriend who wrote him a Dear John letter while he was serving in the military decades earlier. And speaking of the girl, I won’t give it away, but the ending was my favorite.
Confessional: why is it that I have a lukewarm dislike of academic satires? The names of characters are always ridiculous and the snarkiness is at a level I cannot enjoy. Ethnopaleosiphonapterology? The study of fossil fleas? Really? Chimpanzees making sexual advances towards humans and drinking their beer? Really?

Author fact: According to Google, Alfred Alcorn is former director of travel at Harvard University’s Museum of Natural History. 

Book trivia: Murder in the Museum of Man is part of a series. I am only reading the one.

Setlist: Dvorak Piano Quintet in A, Brahms, and Schubert’s Die Unterscheidung.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Academic Mysteries” (p 4).

I Lift, Therefore I Am

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Gezalyan, Manuel. I Lift, Therefore I Am. Identity Publications, 2025.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing I get to read interesting books.

Part journal, part self-help fitness manual, I Lift, therefore I Am is an attempt tp bring spiritual fitness to the masses. Encompassing philosophy, psychology, and expertise along with personal experiences, Gezalyan maps out all the reasons for exercising. It goes beyond looking good. Lifting weights does something for the mental side of taking care of oneself.
Something to take with a grain of salt (whatever that means), many trainers will tell you different things. In I Lift, Therefore I Am, Gezalyan wants you to be able to push past pain barriers. Meanwhile, my running coach dislikes the phrase “no pain, no gain.” He thinks that working until there is pain is stupid and irresponsible. Instead, he says “no pain…no pain.” Speaking of the subject of pain, I found it curious that Gezalyan mentions pain a few times in the acknowledgments. The love of his life kills his pain and his parents experienced pain.
Pros: Gezalyan has written a book for anyone. The tone of I Lift, Therefore I Am is conversational and casual. I liked that Gezalyan gives you permission to read his book any which way you want. You are not restricted to any particular order of information.
Challenge: It would have been beneficial to have the workbook built into the text rather than forcing one to wait for the supplemental (read separate) journal to be published later.
I would also caution people from taking advice from nearly half a century ago (Gezalyan has a thing for Arnold Schwarzenegger).

Confessional: Part of I Lift, therefore I Am focused on the physical appearance and it got me thinking. Let’s say I am 5’2″ and 250lbs. I may not look physically fit. I probably would be perceived as stereotypically fat. But. But! But, let’s just say I can bench press three times my weight and I run ultra marathons every six months. Am I still fat because I don’t look the part?

Author fact: Gezalyan calls himself unusual and I immediate thought “in the Cyndi Lauper kind of way?” Forgive me. I am a child of the 80s.

Book trivia: I Lift, therefore I Am is not intended to get you into fitness. — is merely seeking to change the perception of fitness.

Black as Hell, Strong as Death, and as Sweet as Love

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Unger, Steven. Black as Hell, Strong as Death, and as Sweet as Love: a Coffee Travel Book. Robert D. Reed Publishers, 2025.

Reason read: I am a member of the Early Review Program for LibraryThing and this is one of the coolest books I have had the pleasure of reviewing. I wish I knew someone who loved coffee enough to deserve this book as a gift.

First impression: for all that Unger promises in the introduction, the rest of the book seems way too brief. After all the introductions and foreword, it takes sixteen pages just to get to the first chapter and the entire book is only 166 pages long. Unger spent three years traveling specifically for this book; traveling to locations which traditionally (and obviously) have a strong relationship to coffee. He spent five years conducting additional research and probably drank countless cups of coffee in the process. Together, with the talented Ruth St. Steven as photographer, Unger has produced a stellar multi-genre (mostly travel and historical) book about one of the world’s most popular and symbolic drinks.
Beyond describing the best places to enjoy the brew, Unger outlines the correct customs for drinking coffee. The Arabic way is always with your right hand, for example. (As an aside, I am left handed like the author.) I appreciated his description of the way coffee is prepared in Ethiopia and the various ceremonies surrounding coffee. Unger also shared his opinion of where to get the best falafel in Paris, where to witness “relentless citrus-based combat” known as the Battle of the Oranges, how to swim with spinner dolphins, when to attend a voodoo festival in New Orleans, and how to hang out in the same places as Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. Unger delves into the importance of the traditional café as a place to socialize, argue, and create.
After finishing Black as Hell… readers might want to follow Unger on his coffee trail from Ethiopia to San Francisco, California (as a beer trail adjacent adventure?). Or. At the very least, make the recipes for dishes and drinks he generously supplies. All in all, Black as Hell… is one of the best books I’ve read all year.

Confessional: I was nervous about Unger’s web-related recommendations and contact information. I wondered if a year from now if the information would still be accurate. It was smart of him to say check the internet. I also appreciated the recommended reading if one wants to learn more. Hopefully, books will still be a thing in the future.
As you all know, I am not a fan of repeating information more than once. There is a little repetition to Black as Hell…: the roasting of green coffee beans with frankincense and served with sugared popcorn came up more than a couple of times.

Second confession: there was a time when I was addicted to a show called Castle. The description of adding spices to a brewing pot of coffee reminded me of a scene when Castle’s ex-wife prepared Castle’s coffee just the way he liked it, with a touch of nutmeg.

As an aside, I know someone who cannot stand even the smell of coffee. He will walk out of a room if someone has brewed a fresh pot or poured a cup of coffee. Interestingly enough, even though I have been drinking coffee since I was a teenager, my sister didn’t start enjoying the beverage until just a few years ago. It took her almost 50 years to try it… and like it.

As another aside: I know there is such a thing as a coffee snob. This person cannot stand coffee that is brewed at the wrong temperature, served out of the incorrect vessel, or brewed with stale beans…but is there such a thing as a coffee whore? Someone who will drink coffee reheated five times in a microwave? Someone who doesn’t mind Folgers from a can (especially if they have flavor crystals)? Someone who actually likes a cup of coffee gone cold?

Book trivia: there are a bunch of photographs included in Black as Hell… They are stunning.

Music: “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” by the Beatles, “Bohemian Rhapsody” by Queen. Jim Morrison, Lenny Kravitz, Gloria Estafan, “Hey there” by Rosemary Clooney, “O Sole Mio”, John Lennon,

Where There’s a Will

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Stout, Rex. Where There’s a Will. Bantam Books, 1940.

Reason read: to continue the series started in November.

Unlike Nero Wolfe’s other mysteries to solve which usually involve death, Where There’s a Will starts with a potentially phony last will and testament. The family of Noel Hawthorne have hired Nero Wolfe to contest Hawthorne’s final wishes as they seem absurd and out of character. Who gives his mistress his entire estate while leaving his sisters each a peach, a pear, and an apple? True to form, Nero interviews a large cast of characters and uncovers corruption, illicit affairs, and even a few murders. Of course, Wolfe solves the case. Interestingly enough, it all came down to a flower.
The Crime Line Nero Wolfe series always includes an introduction by another author. Where There’s a Will was introduced by none other that Dean Koontz, an accomplished mystery author in his own right. Written in 1992, Koontz is funny and, dare I say, charming? As an aside, I have to wonder what he would say about our current administrative situation (he mentions #47 in his introduction).
The other fact about the Crime Line series is it boasts that not one word has been omitted from the original text.
Insult that had me scratching my head: “Go chase a snail” (p 21). Is that a roundabout way of saying someone is slow?

As an aside, Fred Durkin is a man after my own heart. He puts vinegar on things. So do I.

Author fact: Stout briefly attended the University of Kansas.

Book trivia: at the end of Where There’s a Will there are two recipes from Stout’s private collection: basic omelet and scrambled eggs. I will definitely try the omelet because I like the technique described.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe: Too Good To Miss” (p 226).

Phoenix and the Carpet

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Nesbit, E. The Phoenix and the Carpet. Read by Anna Bentinick. Naxos Audio Books, 2005.

Reason read: May is Nesbit’s birth month. Read in her honor.

The Phoenix and the Carpet is the second book in the Psammead Trilogy. (Five Children and It and Story of the Amulet round out the series). The same five children as in the first book are back: Cyril (Squirrel), Anthea (Panther), Robert (Bobs), Jane (Pussy), and Lamb (Hilary). This time they discover an egg hidden in a carpet. It holds a beautiful talking phoenix. Like a genie from a bottle, once the phoenix is freed from the egg it explains that the carpet can grant three wishes a day. So the children’s adventures begin. The phoenix needs to often consult the Psammead to get the children out of various predicaments, but unlike Five Children and It, this time the Psammead is not the central character of the story.

Author fact: Edith Nesbit was a political activist in addition to being an author.

Book trivia: The Phoenix and the Carpet was first published in 1904. It became a British miniseries in 1997.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Fantasy for Young and Old” (p 83).

Winds of War

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Wouk, Herman. Winds of War. Simon & Schuster, 1974.

Reason read: Memorial Day is in May. Read to remember those no longer with us.
Confessional: I read most of this as an ebook. I made a lot of notes and highlighted many passages, but had to return it before I could transfer the information here.

The year is 1939 and Germany busily bullies the world into a clash that would later become the infamous World War II. The advances of Hitler into Poland and eventually England, France, and the Soviet Union indicate a man hellbent on world domination; all the while citing the “Jewish problem” as his justification and motivation. Wouk will take you on a panoramic journey through the intimate details of war. You will have a front row seat in the war room; be a voyeur in the bedroom; sit elbow to elbow in the libraries of world leaders as they speak in hushed tones about counterattacks. With a book this size (Winds of War is over one thousand pages long in paperback format), I wanted to make sure I kept track of all of the different characters. I wasn’t sure who was going to be worth remembering, real or imaginary. At the center is Berlin attaché Victor Henry (“Pug”), his glamorous but bored wife, Rhoda, and their three adult children. Winds of War begins when the parents are relocated with Germany on assignment. The three children, Byron, Warren, and Madeline are scattered across the globe. Pug desperately wants to captain a battleship but being relegated to serve as Naval attaché in Berlin has afforded him the opportunity to see the war fold out firsthand. As he gains the unusual trust of President Roosevelt he travels the world, gaining insight on future enemy tactics. Indeed, many real political powerhouses make an appearance in Winds of War.
A note about Winston Churchill: It is interesting to see how time blunts the sharp edges of an unfavorable reputation.
It is also interesting to see the varying opinions about the start of the war. Byron and his girl, Natalie, didn’t take it seriously until they were strafed in Poland and Natalie began to have troubles getting her Polish uncle out of Italy. Byron’s mother only had superficial societal concerns when Pug couldn’t accompany her to the opera. I mentioned she was the epitome of the bored housewife, didn’t I? She becomes even more cliché as the story progresses.
Separating fact from fiction: Did Hitler really have a remarkable smile?

Wouk certainly loved his women characters. As an aside, have you ever noticed that a woman’s breasts can be described with abandon (dressed or undressed), but barely (pun intended) anyone writes about the size of a man’s privates? Wouk is no different in the way he romanticizes the female body. Here are the breasts of Wouk: creamy breasts, pretty bosom, ample bosom,

Quotes to quote, “So they stood together, watching the Luftwaffe start its effort to bomb London to its knees. It was the seventh of September” (p 422).

Author fact: Wouk won a Pulitzer for The Caine Mutiny.

Book trivia: Winds of War has been made into a mini series starring Ali MacGraw and Robert Mitchum. Of course I haven’t seen it. Confessional: I confuse Ali MacGraw with Ali Sheedy.

Playlist: “The Star Spangled Banner”, Chopin, “Star Dust”, Liszt, “Deutschland Uber Alles”, “Three O’clock in the Morning”, “Horst Wessel Lied”, “Bell Bottom Trousers”, “She Wore a Yellow Ribbon”, “Auld Lang Syne”, “This Can’t Be Love”, Bach, Schubert, Beethoven, Mozart, “There Will Always Be an England”, and “Alexander’s Ragtime Band”.

Nancy said: Pearl called Winds of War good fiction.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “World War II Fiction” (p 252).

Giants in the Earth

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Rolvaag, O.E. Giants in the Earth: A Saga of the Prairie. Translated by Lincoln Colcord. Harper & Brothers, 1927.

Reason read: a celebration of spring and Minnesota became a state in May.

Volume One of Giants in the Earth was published in Norway in 1924. The second volume was published a year later. Vern Lewis Parrington (editor) wrote an introduction. Rolvaag wrote the foreword. Forty-six pages later we begin the story…Per Hansa is moving his family from Minnesota to the the Great Plains of the Dakota Territory in the hopes of putting down roots.
A lot of comments have been made about Beret and her mental illness. Her uncontrolled fear of the Midwest was justified. She was in a strange land without the comfort of true community. There was an underlying fear of Indians – fear and fascination in equal measure. I am reminded of the 10,000 Maniacs’ song, “Gold Rush Brides” written by Natalie Merchant. The lines, “The land was free and the prices was right”, and “Who were the homestead wives? Who were the gold rush brides? Does anybody know?…Accounts of madness, childbirth, loneliness, and grief” are particularly poignant. When Beret uncovers an evil secret wrongdoing her husband committed she starts to question their entire relationship. She fears that evil everywhere and her husband seems oblivious to her growing concerns. No one in the community notices her distress until it is beyond breaking. They even make fun of her nonsense. Were they distracted by opportunity? Were they preoccupied with adversities such as the strain of long, harsh winters and plagues of locusts in the summers? Did they want to slough off their old world identities identities in the new world by choosing new names? The question becomes how does one honor traditions of Norway while forging a new existence in America?

Quote to quote, “But it was easier to warm his body than thaw his soul” (p 277).

Author fact: Rolvaag was born in 1876 on the island of Donna almost in the Arctic Circle.

Book trivia: The title comes from a Bible quote.

Nancy said: Pearl said Giants of the Earth is one of the earliest sagas written about the immigrant experience (More Book Lust p 123).

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “The Immigrant Experience” (p 123).

The Odd Women

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Gissing, George. The Odd Women. Stein and Day, 1968.

Reason read: Read in honor of Mother’s Day.

Society is the name of the game in The Odd Women. Think Victorian and you have The Odd Women in a nutshell. It is all about the sociable attitude and the intelligent female society: women live in shame if they do not marry a man who has a sense of honor (and carries gloves and a walking stick). There is a subtle analysis of the institution of marriage.
As an aside, I found myself getting increasingly annoyed by Edmund Widdowson’s behavior when he would not allow Monica to see her friend Milly alone. By the time he consented to let her see her friend for just an hour I was seething. Edmund insists on them always being together and criticizes her friends. It reminded me of the classic behavior of an abuser: alienating one from their friends and family, always wanting to be together, the possessiveness that turns rageful (my word). Meanwhile, there is Everard Barfoot and Rhoda. Rhoda fears that marriage would interfere with the best parts of her life. All in all, I did not care for Gissing’s barely veiled attitudes towards women’s love of fashion and gossip.

Lines I liked, “If I could move your feelings, (p 29), and “Not a word reached her understanding” (p 30), and “I would go any distance to see you and speak with you for only a few minutes” (p 67). That last line, while incredibly romantic, is also very telling.

Author fact: George Gissing helped a prostitute while he held a teaching position. He was later fired for the act, but he married the lady of the night.

Book trivia: the introduction to The Odd Women was written by Frank Swinnerton.

Playlist: “The Blue Bells of Scotland” and Schubert.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Companion Reads” (p 62).

Odd Woman

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Godwin, Gail. The Odd Woman. Ballantine Books, 1974.

Reason read: I needed a book for the Portland Public Library Reading challenge in the category of a book that takes place in the Midwest. The Odd Woman opens in a midwestern town. This is also a companion read for another book I am reading in honor of Mother’s Day.

On the outside, Jane Clifford has everything going for her. She is a respected professor, teaching Women in Literature (the British section) at a Midwestern college, but secretly Jane is a neurotic mess. She lives vicariously through the beloved characters of literature; every character is either a friend or a mentor or a villain. She gets all of her advice from these imaginary people. Poor Jane doesn’t know how to relate to people in the real world, especially her own mother. The death of her stylish grandmother sends Jane down upsetting memory lanes especially when she returns to her childhood home for the funeral.
To make matters worse, Jane’s love life revolves around a married man who has no plans to leave his wife. Gabriel patronizes Jane by being controlling and condescending and like a good girl, she puts up with it. He gently admonishes and corrects and chides. Pay attention to the language Godwin uses about Gabriel and his hands. He is always “trapping” Jane’s hand in his own. He holds all the cards because he is the married one.
In the end I didn’t know whether to cheer on Jane or cry for her.

Quotes that had me thinking for days, “If Jane Austen were putting me in a novel, how would she define me?” (p 27), and “Jane, face it: we are all just basically neurotic creatures trying to get through our days and nights” (p 46).

Author fact: Gail Godwin reported for the Miami Herald.

Book trivia: The Odd Woman is a bit dated. Written when flying meant you could sit wherever you wanted and planes had magazine racks.

Playlist: Mozart, Al Martino’s “Here in My Heart”, Glenn Miller’s “Little Brown Jug”, The Ink Spots’ “If I Didn’t Care”, and Nat King Cole’s “Somewhere Along the Way”.

Nancy said: Not only did Pearl suggest reading The Odd Women and The Odd Woman together as “companion reads, Godwin practically insisted upon it as well, albeit in a much more subtle manner. I found it a disappointment to do so. In The Odd Woman Godwin revealed a spoiler in The Odd Women that I wasn’t prepared to absorb. I did not want to know Monica died.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Companion Reads” (p 62) because Jane in Odd Woman is using George Gissing’s Odd Women in her Women in Literature class. Also in the chapter called “Mothers and Daughters” (p 159).

Presenters Aren’t Robots

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Pettit, F. Annie. Presenter’s Aren’t Robots: a Practical Guide to Becoming a Fearless and Engaging Public Speaker. 2024.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review program for LibraryThing I get to read interesting books. This is one of them.

I struggle to call Presenters Aren’t Robots a full length book. There are only seventy-five pages of text. Chapter one doesn’t begin until page eleven, but that’s me reading it on my phone. Maybe the print version will be different.
Practical is the key word to Presenters Aren’t Robots. Most of the suggestions were intuitive. I learned a few things (it was cool to see AI art options mentioned) and relearned a few things (handouts are still a thing). Some information was micro-detailed (like explaining the colored buttons on a clicker for a presentation), while other information was vague (like no suggestions of software for presentations). I appreciated the speaker checklist the most. I am sure I will use it in the future. Aside from a few typos and font changes, I found Presenters Aren’t Robots to be a helpful and friendly book.

As an aside, why all the illustrations of robots if presenters aren’t robots? Are the robots the audience?

Author fact: Pettit mentors people in public speaking and she is a marketing research author.

Chef on Ice

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Kuhn, Sebastien J.M. Chef on Ice: Living and Working as a Chef in Antarctica.

Reason read: This is a LibraryThing Early Review win for the month of May.

Chef on Ice is sort of a misnomer. Kuhn does not just tell the story of cooking in Antarctica, he also describes starting up a pretzel business in the off months in Brisbane and Melbourne. He mentions other cooking gigs as well. A better title for the book would have been Adventure Chef: Daring to Cook Anywhere. Seriously. Sebastien sounds like one of those people who would be perfect for an assignment with CoolJobsdotcom. While not a professional writer, Kuhn writes with an abundance of emotion, briefly remembering the sights, sounds, experiences of his various cooking expeditions. He has fantastic subject matter but not the articulation to translate it to the written word. I would have liked more stories about the actual cooking – more about the meals served, sourcing the ingredients in such a remote area, food prep. That sort of thing.
Confessional: I had one head-scratching moment in terms of chronology. Admittedly, for most of the book I didn’t try to keep up, but when it came to Covid-19 Kuhn stated they endured a year and a half of lockdowns. Later he states he was back in business by November 2020. That would mean the Australian lockdown started September of 2018. I don’t know. Maybe I read that part wrong?
Most impressive moment: I was impressed with Sebastien’s level of respect when recounting the death of a crew member; never revealing the nature of the accident or the deceased’s identity. Other authors would sensationalize such a tragedy.

Confessional: I had to look up Kelly Slater and Zach Galifianakis.

Author fact: The entire time I was reading Chef on Ice I was wondering what kind of family Kuhn was leaving behind every time he ventured to Antarctica. He made mention of a mysterious partner and some dogs. It would have been better to leave them out of the story completely.

Book trivia: Chef on Ice includes a generous amount of color photographs. Some didn’t need an explanation, but some description would have been cool for others. It was hard to read on a phone. The formatting was strange. I could only read for less than thirty minutes at a time.

Playlist: none. There were plenty of opportunities for Kuhn to mention music but he never did. Blah.

On Being Different

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Miller, Merle. On Being Different. Random House, 1987.

Reason read: Merle Miller celebrated a birthday in May. Read in his honor.

The prejudice one has for homosexuals borders on insane, yet it exists. Why anyone would see a link between homosexuality and communism is beyond me. Same with thinking marriage could be a potential “cure” for homosexuality. These are the beliefs of the ignorant. It took Miller fifty years to come out of the closet. That is an unimaginable length of time to hide one’s true self yet it happens all the time. Miller’s essay “On Being Different” is a valiant attempt to respond to the ignorant and expose the human side of love. He discusses the prejudices and fears without flinching. There is grace threaded throughout his anger.

Book trivia: the foreword was written by Dan Savage. Afterword One was written by Merle Miller. Afterword Two was written by Charles Kaiser. Acknowledgments were written by Carol Hanley. On Being Different is only a twenty-one page essay, but with all these other additions and appendices A through C is becomes a much longer book.

Confessional: I, too, like Halloween for all of its mask wearing.

Playlist: Paul Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Peggy Lee’s “Love Story”, Liberace, Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus, and “We Shall Overcome”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Merle Miller: Too Good To Miss” (p 155).

Queen Victoria

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Strachey, Lytton. Queen Victoria. Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1921.

Reason read: Queen Victoria was born on May 24th, 1819. Read in her honor.

The biography of Queen Victoria opens with the unhappy life of Princess Charlotte who is in the care of her father. She is betrothed to a man of her father’s choosing but has fallen in love with a married man. O the scandal! As a result Charlotte is exiled to Windsor Park. When all the other suitors fall away due to her absence she ends up marrying Prince Leopold and having a baby girl. Thus begins Victoria’s royal lineage. Victoria became queen in 1837 at the age of eighteen. Much like any new political leader, there were high hopes for Queen Victoria’s honest and scrupulous rule: the abolishment of slavery, the elimination of crime, and the improvement of education. Funny how some things never change.
This was a time when impulsive marriages could be made void with the stroke of a pen and uncles could fancy their nieces for matrimony. All marriages were open political and economical strategies. Marriage could alter friendships between entire nations. With arranged marriages it is usually the bride who feels trapped. Not so with the wedding of Albert and Victoria. It is the groom who does not want to go through with it. Too bad Victoria ended up marrying someone who wasn’t all that popular. She had to deal with a “foreign” husband who could not be accepted by her ruling nation. After Albert’s death, widowed at forty-two years old, she tried to bolster Albert’s reputation posthumously. What she succeeds in accomplishing is a nation in love with her. She becomes one of the most adored royalty of all time.

As an aside, Queen Victoria’s reaction to her husband’s death reminded me of my mother in the years after my father’s passing. Victoria puts Albert on a pedestal and worships his memory with grandiose gestures. My mother did the same thing. Saint and savior, my father could do no wrong once he was gone. Here is an example of Victoria’s “loyalty” – “Within those precincts everything remained as it had been at the Prince’s death; but the mysterious preoccupation of Victoria had commanded that her husband’s clothing should be laid out afresh, each evening, upon the bed, and that, each evening, the water should be set ready in the basin, as if he were still alive, and this incredible rite was performed with scrupulous regularity for nearly forty years” (p 404). Interestingly enough, this tidbit of information does not have a source. It comes from “private information” whatever that means.

Quotes to quote, “Cold and formal in manner, collected in speech, careful in action, he soon dominated the wild, impetuous, generous creature by his side” (p 3) and “…the dragon of his dissatisfaction devoured with dark relish that ever-growing tribute of laborious days and nights; but it was hungry still” (p 285)..

Author fact: Strachey also wrote Eminent Victorians which is on my Challenge list. Strachey’s full name is Giles Lytton Strachey.

Book trivia: Queen Victoria is dedicated to Virginia Woolf and also includes some black and white portraits of Victoria. The first portrait of Victoria is when she was seventeen years old. The final portrait is of Victoria at seventy-eight. Confessional: unfamiliar with British fashion, I never knew what was on Victoria’s head. It blended in with her hair so well that I always thought she had a mohawk hairstyle.

Playlist: “God Save the Queen”, “Come Holy Ghost”, “Hallelujah Chorus”, Hayden, Mendelssohn, “Rock of Ages”, and the National Anthem.

Nancy said: Pearl said Strachey produced one of the better biographies of Queen Victoria.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Queen Victoria and Her Times” (p 191).

Brothers Karamazov

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Dostoevsky, Fyodor. The Brothers Karamazov. Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. Alfred A. Knopf, 1992.

Reason read: I no longer remember why this was chosen for May.

The question of nature versus nurture has always been a topic for debate. Who are we? Why are we here? Do we have a divine reason for being on this planet? In short, Dostoevsky is asking for the meaning of life. Sort of. This is the story of a patricide when any of Fyodor’s children could have been his killer because no one has a good relationship with him. Not to mention the competition between father and son over Agrafena (Grushenka). Here is a brief overview of The Brothers Karamazov:

  • Book One sets up the family dynamic
  • Book Two introduces the dispute over the family inheritance
  • Book Three is about the love triangle between Fyodor, Dmitri, and Grushenka
  • Book Four – you can skip. It’s a side story
  • Book Five is pros and contra, the Grand Inquisition & Jesus (reason and blind faith)
  • Book Six is about the Russian monk; the life and history of Elder Zosima, dying in his cell
  • Book Seven introduces Alyosha and the death and decay of Zosima
  • Book Eight illustrates Dmitri’s greed in order to run away with Grushenka
  • Book Nine is Fyodor’s murder (finally)
  • Book Ten is another side story
  • Book eleven is about Brother Ivan and his quest to find his father’s killer
  • Book Twelve is the trial of Dimitri

Author fact: Dostoevsky died shortly after finishing The Brothers Karamazov.

Book trivia: The Brothers Karamazov was originally published as a serial.

Nancy said: Pearl said “A good part of reading life can be spent most productively with the great (and well-known) Russian books…” (Book Lust p 210). She said more but you’ll just have to read it for yourself.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Russian Heavies” (p 210).