Reading Round-up

So what have I been reading whilst up to my eyes in work and rampaging 7 year old girls on their school holidays? First up is the delightful Nimrod's Shadow . Part of the Fiction Uncovered promotion, which is how I spotted it, it is a satifyingly enigmatic read. The time slip narrative moves between the Edwardian and present day and begins in realistic enough fashion before tumbling you into flights of melodramatic maddness. Chris Palling pulled off the trick of making the historical part seem solid and real and modern part ethreal and elusive. Taking the "now" and defamiliarising it to such an extent brings the Edwardian artist closer to us in a way now ammount of realistic historically accurate writing could have done on its own. The lovely story, delightful dog, and fantastic narrtive fireworks, all mean this has gone straight to my re-read pile.

Passion by Jude Morgan was even better than the wonderful The Taste of Sorrow. Like The Taste of Sorrow it is a multifaceated fictional treatment of intertwining literary lives, in this case Lady Caroline Lamb, Augusta Leigh, Mary Shelley and Fanny Brawne, the WAGS of the Romantics, so to speak. Like the Bronte inspired novel Morgan again amazes with his ability to keep so many complex characters both real and different. Caro Lamb is rendered Mad, Bad and Dangerous to know through a wonderful and increasingly rambling and self-deluded first person narrative. Fanny Brawne is as strong pert and 'minx' like as you could hope and her relationship with the doomed Keats is nonetheless tragic for knowing what will happen in the end. I willed Keats to live as I always do but as poor Fanny discovers will alone is never enough. Mary Shelley suffers long and hard and I got lots of enjoyment from disliking Shelley. Augusta Leigh, Byron's half sister and possible lover, was the one I knew least about, but she was perhaps my favourite by the end.

Despite the huge undertaking of creating realistic psychological portraits of four extremely different women Morgan further excels himself with strong supporting cast: the poets themselves are beautifully drawn, William Godwin is neatly knocked off his Radical pedestal, Annabella Milbanke is not so much a portrait as a chilling self-focused carving in marble. Most delightful of all are the childhoods of the four women, where the earlier Romantic poet showed the "Growth of a Poet's Mind" from his childhood environment in The Prelude, Morgan shows how the women of these later poets were equally formed by their early lives. Utterly enchanting from start to finish I have not the teeniest quibble with a single syllable of Passion.

The Hound of the Baskervilles by Conan Doyle was also one of my summer reads. Rather a murky misty atmosphere and hardly a beach book but apt for the damp and chilly place yorkshire has been over the last month. Spending time with Mr Holmes is always a pleasure despite the many and varied faults and I enjoyed this immensely. The dog, needless to say, is less engaging than little Nimrod above. I read it in Leopard's Collected Editions with an introduction and an afterword by John Fowles. I am not knocked-out by Fowles' fiction but his critiques here were spot on. Amazon's page say in the "Product Description" that the introduction is by Trevor McDonald. Ignore them they know nothing! 

Comments

[Kristen M.]

Good to see you back! And what great books. I still haven't read any Jude Morgan but it appears that I need to!

[GeraniumCat]

You always review such interesting books! Both Nimrod's Shadow and Passion sound really interesting - our library only has one book by Chris Paling, but I might give that a try on the offchance - only 90p after all to order it!

[GeraniumCat]

Ooh, they had Passion at the library (sounds good, doesn't it!) I shall see if they will get Nimrod's Shadow for me, I really like the sound of it.

[Juxtabook]

Thanks for finding me again you two after all this time with no blogging. I'm glad you found Passion in your library GeraniumCat (I don't mean that quite as it sounds!)

[Yvette]

THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES is one of my favorite re-reads. I love listening to it too. It's a fabulous audio book.

[sakura]

I've read Hound of the Baskervilles but haven't read the other two titles which look intriguing (although I've heard of them before). Nicely chilling summer reads, no?