Tag: women

Sexual Politics

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Millett, Kate. Sexual Politics: a Surprising Examination of Society’s Most Arbitrary Folly. Doubleday, 1970.

Reason read: Millett was born in the month of September. Read in her honor.

Millett has a lot to say about male dominance and the history of sexuality. Her book, Sexual Politics, has been called sensational and groundbreaking. Critics gush that she was original in her thought. Sexual Politics has been reviewed as well researched and historically significant. Traditional gender roles persist despite changes in sexual behavior and norms. Sexual identities and behaviors are shaped and controlled by society’s influences. Millett opens Sexual Politics by breaking down works by authors like Henry Miller, Normal Mailer, and D.H. Lawrence. Line by line she interprets intimate scenes to demonstrate a man’s power over women. Erotic moments are no longer playful or sensual. In turn they become acts of dominance, humiliation, and abuse. Women are described as gullible, manipulated, possessed, and compliant. Men are arrogant, controlling, and often times they demonstrate contempt for the women with whom they share intimacy. In the second half of Sexual Politics, Millett goes on to describe the Victorian age when it was common law that a woman ceased to be her own person once she entered marriage. Her wages, possessions, and even children became property of the man of the house. His wife assumed serf status. Millett explores the norms of patriarchy – violence is a “right” of the dominant male. Whole societies (tribal Africa and elsewhere) subscribe to the hierarchy. Women are sometimes idolized or patronized but always exploited. Male dominance has been a universal standard for centuries. Just look at Freud’s clinical work. He was the king of the penis envy theory and had the idea that women were just castrated males (“…maternal desires rest upon the last vestige of penile aspiration” p 185). Women cannot advance knowledge because of their lack of a penis – you cannot put out a fire without “equipment.”
Remember the attitudes towards women in Nazi Germany during World War II…
All in all, Sexual Politics was depressing to read. Consider this: if you are a woman and you work in an occupation that serves others (teacher, nurse, governess), you are a servant or slave. If you are a live-in caretaker you are no better than a prisoner, kept under surveillance. Millet has this way of taking ordinary situations and turning them on their heads.

Confessional: I have never heard of the slang word “gash” for female anatomy.
As an aside, after reading Sexual Politics I started to think about lyrics that illustrate these points (Josh Ritter’s “Eve ate the apple because the apple was sweet” and Natalie Merchant’s “Adam cracked his rib and he let us go”).
As an aside, it is interesting to be reading a memoir written by a modern day call girl along side the work of a sculptor from the 1970s.

Odd quote, “Before the reader is shunted through the relatively unchartered, often even hypothetical territory which lies before him” (emphasis is mine). Why him?
Best quote about functionalism, “When it filters down to practical applications in schools, industry, and popular media, it may simply become a form of cultural policing” (p 221).

Author fact: Millett was an artist.

Book trivia: be prepared for graphic sex scenes from the usual suspects.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar” (p 120).

Note to Self

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Nova, EV and Freya Sharp. Note to Self. Harbor Lane Books, 2025.

Reason read: as a member of the Early Review Program I get to read interesting books from LibraryThing. This is one such book.

Think of Note to Self as a collection of tiny pep talks geared mostly towards women. Yes, you can read the entire book in one sitting, if you want. There are only fifty affirmations. I would caution against inhaling the whole book at once because every chapter becomes more repetitive as time goes on. The five clearest messages are 1) you are not alone, 2) every ending is a new beginning, 3) you are capable, worthy, and loveable, 4) it is okay to say no, especially if saying yes means sacrificing selfcare, and 5) breaking down only means building up or said another way, every ending is a new beginning. E.V. Nova and Freya Sharp take turns doling out the sage advice.
In short, this is a cool little book to pick up anytime you need a little pick me up. Tell your friends!
Author fact: Freya Sharp’s bio is a must read!

S

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Drakulic, Slavenka. S: a Novel About the Balkans. Penguin, 1999.

Reason read: the war in Bosnia started in the month of April.

To set the stage: in 1992 the Bosnian War was raging. S. was only twenty-nine years old. She was a home-room teacher proud of her profession. Single and young, she had her whole life ahead of her. Early one morning, and without warning, she was bundled off to a warehouse by a boyish soldier toting guns and more than plenty of ammunition. Naively, even though he did not say much, she thought she was going away for a short time. Wanting to be prepared for anything, she packed a small backpack with a red dress and her very best fancy shoes made for dancing.
You cannot help but notice any character or location of importance is anonymized with a single letter. S., G., F., and the baby are all nameless. Where they are going is an unnamed town. Despite being nameless the characters are full of personality. E. is a nurse. Z. is E.’s daughter. D. is the cook. You get the picture. This unwillingness to give characters and places formal names gives the story anonymity and, by default, more authenticity. These things further removes S. from the realm of pure fiction. When we first meet S. it is after her detainment and she has given birth to a child. Her character broke my heart. Her newborn baby boy is a product of rape and therefor despised. She sees the child as a disease, a cancer, a parasite, or, at the very least, a burden she is unwilling to carry much less look upon. Who can blame her? Her survival after four months of unthinkable torture is nothing short of heroic.
The soldier’s abuse was hard to read: forcing a woman to drink his urine, putting his cigarettes out on her naked body, striking her about the face until she passes out from pain. Rape seemed like the most benign atrocity. Murder seemed the most merciful. Drakulic takes pity on us: S is only 200 pages long.

Profound words, “…the survival instinct is the highest law of existence” (p 55).

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Balkan Specters” (p 31).

Hatwearer’s Lesson

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Joe, Yolanda. The Hatwearer’s Lesson. Plume, 2004.

Reason read: Yolanda Joe was born in March. Read in her honor.

When Grandmother Ollie speaks, her granddaughter, Terri, best sit up straight and listen with both ears wide open. Ms. Ollie knows a thing or two about life, love, and loss. When she couldn’t write Terri’s fiancé’s name (Derek) in her Bible she knew trouble was brewing. Terri might be a successful Chicago lawyer and one half of a gorgeous power couple soon to be married, but what is she to do when Grandmother says there is bad luck coming? Derek is wealthy, sexy, and smart. Terri, only thinking about image, cannot afford to lose Derek so she does what any practical woman would do. She ignores the mystical warnings. Terri thinks she has it all with her career and Derek, but her luck goes from bad to worse when first, she discovers her hunk of a boyfriend has been stepping out on her with a rival. Then her grandmother suffers a fall that lands Ollie in the hospital and in need of an operation. This health scare couldn’t come at a better time. Going back home to Alabama to care for Ollie gives Terri the much needed time away to clear her head. Except. What about her professional legal career? Will her absence jeopardize her place in the firm? She does have rivals sniffing around her clients. And what about her heart? Will she ever be able to trust Derek again? She has rivals sniffing around her man, too. Life becomes even more confusing when she meets an Alabama country boy who wears his heart on his sleeve and trustworthy honesty on his tongue.

Head scratcher: correct me if I am wrong, but I do not think you need to block your number when calling from a cell phone. No one will know if you are standing in your own bathroom or at the North Pole when you make a call from a cell.

Author fact: I am reading four Joe books for the Challenge. I finished Bebe’s By Golly Wow. Still to go are He Say, She Say and This Just In.

Book trivia: According to Joe, hat wearer is one word: hatwearer. My spell checker hates me right now.

Playlist: Gladys Knight, James Brown, Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Stevie Wonder, Sammy Davis Jr., Lena Horne, and Luther Vandross.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “African American Fiction: She Say” (p 12).

August

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Rossner, Judith. August. Houghton Mifflin Company, 1983.

Reason read: February is Psychology month. Maybe that is because so many people want to know what happened to their commitment to new year resolutions?

Two women: Dawn Henley is a patient with obsessive tendencies, latching onto daddy types as lovers. Her mother committed suicide when Dawn was only six months old. Her father drowned soon thereafter. She was raised by Vera and Tony, a lesbian couple. Do any of these early tragedies have anything to do with her current neurotic behavior of dependency? Like any person raised without really knowing their birth parents, Dawn is on a journey to find herself. Her identity is tied to people she doesn’t remember.
Lulu is Dawn’s therapist. The telling of her side of the story mostly happens in August, when she is on vacation and away from being a therapist. While on holiday, she can be a mother to two young sons and try to rebuild a relationship with her estranged adult daughter, who resurfaces after seven years. Lulu is also trying to justify a romantic relationship with a married man. She knows it isn’t right, but she can’t help herself. Lulu’s character reminded me of Brenda Leigh Johnson, the main character on the television show, The Closer. Brenda’s professional life hid a very chaotic personal life. Both women are great at their jobs, but behind the scenes, they were a mess.

As an aside, I tried really hard to not think Don Henley when reading about Dawn.

Author fact: I think I remember seeing Looking for Mr. Goodbar on my parent’s bookshelf when I was a kid. I am only reading Nine Months in the Life of an Old Maid for the Challenge (after August, of course).

Book trivia: August details the plot of an actual movie called “Seconds.” I put it on the list because I think it sounds interesting. Will I actually watch it? Who knows.

Music: Gershwin, and “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Shrinks and Shrinkees” (p 221).

Caspian Rain

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Nahai, Gina B. Caspian Rain. McAdams, 2007.

Reason read: the Iran hostage crisis ended on January 20th, 1981. Caspian Rain takes place in Iran. Read to celebrate a moment in history.

Twelve year old Yaas tells the sad tale of her mother Bahar’s marriage to her father, Omid. Bahar had come from a poor family full of shame. Her mother was a seamstress who cannot sew and her father was a cantor who could not carry a tune. Why Omid would want to marry beneath him is anyone’s guess. Baha left school to get married during her eleventh grade year and not even a year into her marriage she was desperate to return to school. Iranian custom did not allow her to continue her education as a married woman. Like a child who keeps running away from home, Bahar kept trying to stretch her independence, only to be dragged back to the life of a housewife. One has to feel sorry for Bahar. The old adage is true: you do not know what you do not know. Bahar was so poor she didn’t recognize a poor gift as a snub or insult. Iranian culture states that a divorced woman is a shame upon the family. She who separates from her husband has no rights, no family, no home, no money; nothing to call her own. So when Omid starts a public affair with another woman, Bahar can do nothing but suffer the disgrace in silence. Nahai gracefully details the gender and religious expectations of life in Iran.
I think Americans have a difficult time with the characters of Caspian Rain because of the cultural divide. We cannot relate to a woman who suffers so much abuse. I know I had a difficult time with the sister who was repeatedly beaten and locked in a shed with pigeons. To escape cruelty she made the only logical decision available to her.

The best line in the whole book, “For every sin, a virtue; every cruelty, a measure of mercy” (p 229). So beautiful.

Author fact: Nahai also wrote Moonlight on the Avenue of Faith. I will be reading it in the month of June a few years from now.

Playlist: Nahai rarely mentions specific songs in Caspian Rain although there is plenty of opportunity. There is a character called the Opera Singer who tries to sing. There is a Tango Dancer who never names the songs she dances to by name. Of the music Nahai does mention: “On This Moonlit Evening”, Ringo Starr, and Doris Day.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the obvious chapter called “Iran” (p 109).

Final Appeal

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Scottoline, Lisa. Final Appeal. Harper Collins, 2004.

Reason read: Scottoline was born in the month of July and since I have been reading her other mysteries lately, I thought I would throw this one on the pile. Read in honor of Scottoline’s birth month.

Grace Rossi is a law clerk, assigned to a death penalty case and in way over her head. Even though she isn’t one hundred percent qualified, Judge Armen Gregorian believes in her and wants her to work with him on a high-profile death penalty appeal case…until the judge winds up dead. Grace must act like a cop, sniffing out the truth because the little clues are not adding up to a supposed suicide. Plus, there is her truth to face. It must be said that she was in love with the deceased and she had sex with him the night before he died. He said he loved her. She is convinced he was murdered.
Final Appeal has all the hallmarks of a thriller: Grace Rossi’s case is controversial and full of racial tension, sexual rejection, silencing the witness, and clandestine love affairs. Truth be told, I thought the death penalty case would have more to do with the mystery of the judge’s death until Scottoline throws in the possibility the judge was crooked.
I could have done without the subplot of of Grace’s memory of child abuse. I disliked that she was quick to accuse each of her parents. she even went so far as to question her child about inappropriate touching. It was completely unnecessary and didn’t add anything to the overall storyline.
My only complaint is that Scottoline has a writing tic that becomes more and more noticeable with every chapter. She uses the simile “like a…fill-in-the-blank” technique a lot. Examples: like a bouquet, like a skinny…, like a black-eyed Susan, like a thirsty…, like a traffic…You get the point. I could go on and on. There were so many similes I lost count.

Natalie Merchant connection: you know that if there is the slightest connection to Miss Merchant, I am going to make it. In the penultimate line of the 10,000 Maniacs song, Natalie sings “Who will read my final right and hear my last appeal?”

Book trivia: Final Appeal won an Edgar Award.

Playlist: C+C Music Factory’s “Everybody Dance Now”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Big Ten Country: the Literary Midwest – Pennsylvania” (p 31).

Big Dig

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Barnes, Linda. Big Dig. St. Martin’s Press, 2002.

Reason read: to finish the series started in October in honor of autumn in beautiful New England.

Carlotta Carlyle is back. This time she has an assignment to go undercover to monitor rumors of theft on a construction site in the heart of Boston. Only this isn’t your ordinary dig site. This is Boston’s famous Big Dig. Massachusetts residents will remember that tolls paid along the turnpike were supposed to fund this ginormous project to reroute traffic around one of the oldest cities in the nation. Only, the action isn’t hot and heavy enough for Carlotta. She seems to be monitoring the theft of…dirt. She decides to moonlight, taking on a missing persons case. Working two separate jobs seems like a win-win for Carlotta until she gets fired from the Big Dig assignment. Isn’t it ironic that Carlotta discovers that her undercover assignment is directly tied to her on-the-side case, the disappearance of a dog groomer/waitress? Now Carlotta must find a way back onto the Dig assignment to connect the cases and solve them both.
Big Dig is full of twists and turns. Both the events of Waco, Texas and Oklahoma City play a part in the action. Carlotta finds herself back in the presence of an old flame and finds time to fan a new fire.
Confessional: Big Dig is not entirely believable (big shocker). When Carlotta finds a guy hog tied and suffering from a pretty nasty head wound, she is not alarmed. Instead, she takes him home to have sex.

Author fact: Every time I went to look up information about Linda Barnes I kept running into the character from Criminal Minds…

Book trivia: as with all Carlotta Carlyle mysteries, Barnes includes a plethora of real landmarks of Boston in Big Dig.

Playlist: Chris Smither, Frank Sinatra, Robert Johnson, Bonnie Raitt, Joni Mitchell, the Temptations, Marvin Gaye, Bessie Smith, and Wagner.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter “New England Novels” (p 177).

Flashpoint

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Barnes, Linda. Flashpoint. Hyperion, 2001.

Reason read: to continue the series started in October for leaf peeping time.

Flashpoint opens with cop-turned-private-investigator Carlotta Carlyle finding a man in her tub. It’s a kitschy beginning meant to throw the reader off from the true mystery. You think the man in the tub is going to be the problem to solve, but the real case doesn’t reveal itself right away. Here is how it all starts: Carlotta owns a Victorian outside the city of Boston. Oddly enough, this Victorian doesn’t have more than two full bathrooms. Carlotta’s roommate and PI assistant, Roz, has been painting with a man who passes out in Carlotta’s bathtub. Instead of asking Roz to clean up her gentleman friend in her own bathroom, Carlotta goes to the Y to shower. She has a regular game of volleyball with a team. There, she is approached by a volleyball teammate to help an elderly woman with locks on her apartment door. Carlotta knows nothing about teammate Gwen or why she is asking Carlotta help old lady Valentine Phipps with her locks. As a private investigator, I expected Carlotta to be a little more curious or cautious because Ms. Phipps ends up dead a short time later. Here is the real mystery. Did the elderly woman die of a heart attack or was she murdered? All evidence points towards murder since real estate developers are eyeing her apartment building for demolition…if only the old woman would leave.

As an aside, it is nice to have more of an explanation for Carlotta’s relationship with Paolina.

As an aside, Carlotta asks about where to buy black sheets. Times have certainly changed, girlfriend. You now can buy black anything from Amazon. Carlotta made a comment about New England being chilly in October. Newsflash! You can now wear shorts in November.

Author fact: Barnes has written at least eight Carlotta Carlyle mysteries. I am only reading three. This is my penultimate CC mystery.

Playlist: Ray Charles, Chuck Berry’s “Maybelline”, Wilson Pickett, Paul Rishell, Little Anne Raines, Mick Jagger, Bob Dylan, “Atchison, Topeka, and the Santa Fe”, and Chris Smither.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “New England Novels” (p 177).

Cold Case

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Barnes, Linda. Cold Case. Delacorte Press, 1997.

Reason read: Cold Case takes place in Boston. Massachusetts is beautiful this time of year. Read in honor of the leaves turning.

Carlotta Carlyle is a private detective and part time cab driver. A case comes to her that is as confusing as an overgrown corn maze. Thea Janis disappeared twenty-four years ago when she was only fifteen years old. After much digging Carlotta discovered Thea was a precocious and promiscuous teenager who published a book of poetry to wild success when she was fourteen. In the span of two weeks of working on the case, Carlotta uncovers a tangle of family secrets. Thea’s name was actually Dorothy Cameron, a gardener from the Cameron family employee also went missing at the same time as Thea, Thea’s sister is a schizophrenic, Thea’s brother is a politician running for office while his marriage falls apart, and more than one murder has taken place.
Maybe this is a premise I have seen too many times, but the wealth of the Cameron family bored me. Rich woman with an icy demeanor and impeccably dress code has a stranglehold on her adult son, who does nothing but disappoint her. Her beloved daughter went missing twenty-four years ago and has been presumed dead ever since a serial killer confessed to her murder. Her second daughter is in a mental facility battling with schizophrenia. What secrets are hidden beneath the cover of wealth?
On top of all this is a subplot involving Carlotta’s little sister and the mafia. Because Cold Case is the seventh Carlotta Carlyle mystery but my first, maybe I’ve missed some key details outlined in an earlier mystery.

As an aside, throughout the entire book I found myself asking does Carlotta ever drive a cab in Cold Case? Answer is yes, but not for hire.
As another aside, Liberty Café was a real place. Too bad it closed. I’m sure fans of Linda Barnes and Carlotta Carlyle would continue to see it out.
Third aside, and I would need an expert to weigh in on this but, when you open a casket after twenty four years, would the smell of death still be so strong that you would need a rag soaked in turpentine to mask the stench? Just curious.

Quotes to quote: there were a few really thought-provoking lines I would love to share, but due to the copyright language, I cannot. Too bad because they were really good.

Author fact: Linda Barnes, not to be confused with the character on Criminal Minds, has written other mysteries series.

Book trivia: as I mentioned before, Cold Case is actually the seventh book in the series. I am reading seven, eight, and nine for the Challenge.

Playlist: “Aint No More Cane on the Brazos”, Beatles, Blind Blake, Black Velvet Band, Chris Smither’s “Up on the Lowdown”, “Hard Times Blues”, Mississippi John hurt, Mozart, Muddy Waters, Robert Johnson, and Rory Block’s “Terraplane Blues”.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “I Love a Mystery” (p 117). Also from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Boston: Beans, Bird, and the Red Sox” (p 40).

Perfect Daughter

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Linscott, Gillian. The Perfect Daughter. Macmillan, 2001.

Reason read: Linscott celebrates her birthday in the month of September. Read in her honor.

It is difficult to be the prim and proper daughter of a military father and a snobbish mother in 1914 England. [It’s probably difficult to be a child of such parents in any given era.] Giving in to the pressure of perpetual perfection, did Verona finally commit suicide? Or was something more sinister at play? Found with a clever noose around her neck, it looks like the former. When details are revealed, readers must consider the era. Left-wing politics are raging, women are fighting for the vote, and Verona went from being a well-mannered daughter to a runaway, albeit talented, artist living in squalor with a group of Bohemian anarchists. Her life while she lived and breathed was fraught with contradictions, but it is her death which confounds us more. Her autopsy reveals she had been pregnant and had a great deal of morphine in her system. Her friends and family report her behavior was so strange they hardly knew her anymore. Maybe she led a promiscuous life. Maybe she was an addict. Was Verona’s cousin to blame? Suffragette and political agitator, Nell Bray had little contact with Verona; she barely knew the girl, and yet she finds herself trying to solve the mystery. Curious by nature, Nell wonders how a young girl from a well-to-do family could end up deceased on her parents’ property. Is her strange death a message to her society-slaved parents? Or was someone else to blame for her demise?

Author fact: Linscott worked for the BBC before she became a novelist.

Book trivia: This could be a movie.

Setlist: Chaliapin, “O Dem Golden Slippers”, and Schubert.

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Ms. Mystery” (p 169).

Pride

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Cary, Lorene. Pride: a Novel. Nan A. Talese Publisher, 1998.

Reason read: Pride is what some would call “chick lit” which I also call “beach reads” and since August is the last good month to visit the shore…

The friendship of four women. Each one of them has issues, both public and private. Roz (Rozzie) is the wife of a successful politician who has now set his sights on a higher office. At the same time as battling cancer, Roz is trying to be a mother to a difficult teenager and supportive of her husband’s ambitions. What she can’t get behind is the fact he has been having an affair with one of her best friends. Arneatha is an Episcopal priest locked in grief after losing her husband. She struggles to find herself in a world without him. Tam is the equivalent of Steve Martin’s wild and crazy guy. She does not take her sex life or career seriously. Audrey is a recovering alcoholic is struggles everyday with lure of addiction. And speaking of Audrey, Lorene Cary painted a fuller picture of Audrey with more colorful detail than any of the other women. It was if Cary knew Audrey best.
Pride is a testament to friendship. Like a pride of African lions, the women of Cary’s novel need to stick together in order to survive.

Quote to quote, “And the drums kept pounding like I love them” (p 318). Amen.

Author fact: Cary also wrote The Price of a Child which is on my Challenge list.

Book trivia: this should be a movie.

Playlist: “You Are So Beautiful to Me”, “My Funny Valentine”, “America the Beautiful”, “Maple Leaf Rag”, Otis Redding, Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra, Boyz II Men, James Brown, LL Cool J, “Zip-A-Dee Doo Dah”, Piaf, Mahalia Jackson, Lena Horne, Michael Jackson, “Four O Clock Blues”, James Brown, Bong Crosby, “Only the Lonely”, Duke Ellington, “His Eye is on the Sparrow”, Peggy Lee’s “Is That All That There Is?”, Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song”, “Getting to Know You”, Rachmaninoff, the theme from Family Matters, the theme from Magic Flute, and “Claire de Lune”.

Nancy said: Pearl includes Pride in a list of books to consider.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “African American Fiction: She Say” (p 13).

Fruit of the Lemon

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Levy, Andrea. Fruit of the Lemon. Picador Press, 1999.

Reason: Jamaica won its independence in August. This year it was celebrated on August 6th. Read to celebrate the history.

Faith Jackson is a Londoner just trying to make her way. She has a decent job, an apartment full of roommates, and a loving family living close by. Born to Jamaican parents, Faith does not look like a pale-skinned Englishwoman, but this has never been a problem until Faith wants to improve her life. At the corners of this seemingly content life, she starts to notice subtle roadblocks; a prejudice towards her gender and skin color. Why does she have to jump through hoops to get the job for which she is perfect?
Fruit of the Lemon will make you think about unconscious bias. There is a scene when Faith’s nationality is assumed. Even though she was born and raised in England, when people saw her dark skin, they immediately assumed she was from “away.” When she answered she was from London everyone wanted a different answer. In the end a trip to Jamaica made her realize she was more than her skin color. She was a great-granddaughter, a granddaughter, a daughter, a cousin, a niece, and an aunt.

Author fact: Levy passed away on Valentine’s Day in 2019 after a long battle with cancer.

Book trivia: Fruit of the Lemon is Levy’s third book. I am also reading Small Island and Long Song for the Challenge.

Setlist: “Lemon Tree” (as an aside, the Merrymen do a great version of “Lemon Tree”), “Danny Boy”, Louis Armstrong, Nat King Cole, “Hey Mister Tallyman”, The Sound of Music, Oliver, Shostakovich, Cilla Black, “Abide with Me”, “Away in a Manger”, Miles Davis, “Ave Maria”, “Jingle Bells”, and “God Save the Queen”.

Nancy said: Pearl said not to forget Andrea Levy.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Cavorting Through the Caribbean: Jamaica” (p 56).

Carnival

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Mackenzie, Compton. Carnival. D. Apple & Company, 1921.

Reason read: the Culzean Summer Fair happens in July in Scotland. A good portion of Carnival takes place in Glasgow.

The life of Jenny is a complex story with themes of identity, love, and sacrifice. Her journey is a verbose exploration of the human experience, filled with unexpected twists and turns. Throughout the narrative, Jenny’s internal struggles and external choices paint a vivid picture of a woman who is unafraid to defy societal norms and follow her heart, despite the challenges she faces. The exploration of her gender identity, her romantic entanglements, and her passion for ballet all contribute to a rich and multi-layered portrayal of her character. For lack of a true plot in Carnival Jenny navigates the tumultuous seas of love and self-discovery. Her interactions with the men in her life, Maurice, Fez and Zack, reveal the complexity of her emotions and the depths of her desires. Her willingness to make bold decisions, such as sacrificing her career and friendships for a life in the country, highlights the fierce and unyielding nature of her convictions. Jenny’s story is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and the complexities of the heart. It does not come without a warning.

Lines I liked, “There is nothing to counterbalance the terrors of childhood in Hagworth Street” (p 30) and “It was glorious to think of someone who could make the worst headache insignificant and turn the most unsatisfactory morning to a perfect afternoon” (p 196).

Author fact: Compton Mackenzie’s full name was Sir Edward Montague Compton Mackenzie.

Book trivia: Carnival was interpreted on the big screen three different times. Of course I have not seen any version.

Music: “March of the Priests”, “Athalie”, Wagner, Brahms, Verdi, “Tannhauser”, “Lucky Lindy”, Chopin, Victoria Monks, “The Eton Boating Song”

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Tickle Your Funny Bone” (p 217). But, here is the thing. Carnival is only listed because it is one of the first ten books reprinted by Penguin. None of those ten books were necessarily known for their humor. Mackenzie, however, did write some funny stuff.

Charms for the Easy Life

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Gibbons, Kaye. Charms for the Easy Life. G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1993.

Reason read: Mary Lee Settle celebrates a birthday in the month of July. Nancy Pearl suggested Charms for the Easy Life be read with Settle’s memoir, Addie.

Three generations of southern women. The relationships between mother (Charlie Kate), daughter (Sophia), and granddaughter (Margaret) are tangled and complicated. Like all relationships, they are rich in drama, tough-love, grace, and unspoken courage. Complicated by pride and fierce independence. Only these are no ordinary women. Granddaughter Margaret is no exception. She assists her grandmother with unconventional medical practices on military patients and encourages her mother’s second-time-around love life. The three generations can read the same book and discuss and argue like best friends and yet, they can also carry dark secrets strategically kept from one another, hold on to old grudges like a mean snapping turtle, and parse out the silent treatment to one another like professionals. Strong without menfolk to provide for them, the Birch women support each other through everything. This is an age when grandmothers could orchestrate the love lives of their granddaughters. Wise beyond her years, Margaret listens to her grandmother’s advice. As an aside, my favorite was when Charlie Kate gave Margaret her easy-life charm, telling Margaret that it worked…depending on the definition of easy.
Confessional: I couldn’t help but be reminded of Yellow Raft in Blue Water by Michael Dorris.

As an aside, the method of quilling a pregnancy was a new one for me.

Favorite line, “She had said all that she needed to say, and so there were no secret longings, no secret wishes and desires that had never been spoken” (p 254).

Author fact: Gibbons wrote her first novel when she was in her twenties.

Book trivia: Charms for the Easy Life is Kaye Gibbons’ fourth book and other editions include “Christina’s World”, a painting by Andrew Wyeth, as the cover art.

Playlist: Benny Good man, Nelson Eddy’s “Sweet Mystery of Life”, Johnny Mercer’s “Deep in the Heart of Texas”, Hazel Scott’s “Minute Waltz”, Frank Sinatra, “White Christmas”, “I’ll Be Seeing You”, “You Made Me Love You”, Britten’s “A Ceremony of Carols”, Chopin’s Revolutionary Etude, Grieg’s E Minor Piano Sonata, Bach’s Minuet in G, Ravel’s Le Tom beau de Couperin, and Sarah Bernhardt.

Nancy said: Pearl was generously vague when describing why Charms for the Easy Life was paired with Addie. The multitude of complimentary themes was a joy to discover on my own.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Companion Reads” (p 62) and again in the chapter called “Mothers and Daughters” (p 159), and a third time in the chapter called “Southern Fiction” (p 222).