Jul 20, 2007
I don’t think anyone could say the review’s content ruined the book for them. If the New York Times obtained a copy of the book, how can you blame them for writing about it? Wouldn’t keeping quite to please a private company be bad journalism?
- I’ll be attending a local release party tonight
While I don’t know all the details, it looks as though it’s going to be pretty big. Check back early tomorrow for pictures, and I’ll post a review as soon as possible.
Jul 17, 2007
So, I was reading the social news site Digg a minute ago. And Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is on the internet now.
Many of the sites where it was posted quickly removed it, but since hundreds of people already have it, I think there are bound to be copies floating around over the next three days.
Not to mention spoilers.
Jul 14, 2007
ISBN: 978-0743298025 | Words: 129,509
Author: Diane Setterfield
I avoided this book for the longest time, despite being rather attracted to the cover, because the title and jacket text both led me to believe it was a collection of short stories wrapped in a narrative of some sort.
The Thirteenth Tale does contain stories, but they’re more like windows into the past (of the fictional world, I mean) and very much a part of everything else that’s going on. Not at all what I’d led myself to believe.
The main character, Margaret, is asked to compile the biography of famed author Vida Winter (who, going from the book’s descriptions, is a sort of J.K. Rowling of adult literature, only more so). Margaret considers denying the request, but at length agrees to hear Vida’s story and is captivated by it.
The plot is good - I wished they wouldn’t have hidden quite so much from the reader, but it’s still well-crafted. The settings of old Gothic-like houses, windswept moors and a second-hand London bookshop are, of course, very appealing to me.
All the Gothic-like houses and windswept moors in the world can’t redeem a book if I don’t like its writing; fortunately, The Thirteenth Tale is one of a very few modern books that sound near-perfect to my ear.[1]
Everything considered, I’d enjoyed this a lot and I’d enthusiastically recommend it if the premise interests you.
See also:
Footnotes:
- Some others: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, The Society of S, The Little Friend… Farewell Summer… and, uh, I bet I could come up with a whole lot more if I was fully awake right now. ↩
Jul 10, 2007
I’m writing.
In fact, I’ve probably done more on my novel so far this month than in all of June, and it’s nice to see it start to come together. I’ve even been doing three or four handwritten pages in my journal every day - producing horrid crap that will never again be read is fun.
I’m just not doing it on Novelish. I suppose it’s the writing for an audience thing that’s stopping me. It’s been difficult for me to declare something “good enough to post,” especially on those days when, for whatever reason, the words don’t come out easily. But I think, and hope, I’m over it by now - mostly - so you may be seeing more of me, if all goes well.
Besides that (and a minor Read in 2007 page update), there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot happening this past week, either in the world of books or with me. A couple of reviews are very slowly being worked on. It’s enormously hot here.
Jul 2, 2007
After Donna Tartt’s The Secret History, which I’ve read twice already and very likely will again, it’s hard to open her second novel without having expectations or making comparisons. (The average rating of this book on Amazon is down to 2.5, I think, for that reason.)
To get those out of the way, then: the wonderful first-person narrative of The Secret History is absent, as is the whole atmosphere of the university setting. The beautiful descriptions I remembered are nowhere to be found.
Even so, I did like it. Judging The Little Friend on its own, which is probably how it should be judged, I liked it even more.
Donna Tartt is great at slipping acute observations on everyday details in, and for me, that alone made it a fun read. It’s obvious she gives a lot of thought to each word. She says as much in an interview on Identity Theory:
It is just pebble by pebble by pebble by pebble. I write one sentence until I am happy with it until I go on to the next one and write that one until I am happy with it. And I look at my paragraph and if I am not happy with that I’ll write the paragraph until I’m happy with it and then I go on this way.
The plot’s simple enough: twelve-year-old Harriet sets out to find her brother’s murderer and extract her revenge, aided by her devoted friend Hely. Harriet is a wonderfully developed character who I found myself liking despite any personality flaws. And though the events are all rather unlikely, they are, somehow, completely believable.
If The Little Friend sounds interesting and you’d like a more thorough review, Salon.com’s is very well done.
See also:
