Where Julian Fights for Alice

Peveril of the Peak by Walter Scott
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I loved it. Easy 5 stars. This is one of my favorite Scott novels, so it is strange to see that the most common score from other readers was a 3. Huh. But that's alright.

[Summary--skip ahead without worry:]

Julian Peveril, the heir of a minor title and his father's diminishing wealth, is in love with Alice Bridgenorth, a beautiful and kind young woman from a family his hasty father cannot approve. She is from a rich Puritan family, folk who just lost the upper hand when Cromwell's reign was ended; he is from a proper Protestant family that has ties to old Catholics. They were born as neighbors, and for awhile they were friendly. Bridgenorth saved the old Peveril during the time of the Puritans, and later, when politics changed and when Bridgenorth's wife and other children died, the Peverils returned the kindness by raising the baby Alice in their household. But the families were separated by events. Over on the Isle of Man, when the Puritans were cast down, Alice's uncle was killed by Julian's relative, Lady Derby, and when Bridgenorth tried to bring that woman to justice for the killing, the Peverils interfered. They were enemies from that point on. Bridgenorth took his child back and disappeared.

Fate is tricky, and those children became acquainted anyway. And then, through the course of a pretty long novel, they fight to either get their parents' permission to marry or (last resort) honor their parents' wishes by forever parting. Most of the middle concerns the so-called Popish Plot (a real event of history, though the plot itself, at the time, probably was invented just to harm certain people). This brought many very cool characters together, all with intrigues and plots, getting Julian and his family thrown in prison, exposing Alice to men who would use her beauty to their advantage with Lord Buckingham or the king himself.

Fenella, the deaf-mute servant of the Countess of Derby over on the Isle of Man, is probably the best character in the novel. Scott often creates amazing, brilliant, resourceful female characters, giving them so many memorable scenes, and this young woman numbers among the greatest of his creations. Her participation in intrigues, and her manipulation of events, all while being sympathetic and likable, even lovable, makes her one of my all-time favorite characters. Her co-conspirator, Christian, who goes by several names in the novel, is also very interesting, very compelling, though definitely not sympathetic. Well, maybe a little, at the end. But pretty evil. Lord Buckingham is rather in the same vein. Also, Julian is a good MC--an honorable young man, deeply in love, and though he is more naive at times than his opponents, raised on an island as he was, he is active and capable. He can't overcome everything thrown at him by his own power, but he keeps fighting through, gathering help where he can. I liked him.

Sir Walter Scott, as always, does a great job at differentiating his characters, giving them their own voice and their own motivations, and as a master of historical settings--especially this one, apparently, set during the Popish Plot--he creates a believable and highly affecting world for their actions.

It isn't for everyone, though. Most readers wouldn't even open this novel. I get that. And among that smallish number who did trouble themselves to read it, most of them liked it less than me. I'm surprised by that, but I might account for it a little. Obviously, it's an old novel, and his language is a bit difficult, even semi-archaic at times. At the best of times, it is quite ornate, written in a high style. That's cool, but not every modern reader will make a seamless entry into his prose. I know I didn't, originally. However, the more familiar I am with his style, the less impenetrable I find it, so I have no doubt I enjoyed this more for having read other novels by him previously. And his pacing may not be to everyone's taste. This is a pretty long book, with lots of intrigues, and though that leads to some exciting action, most of them are planned and then aborted for various reasons. But I found it entertaining throughout. Plenty of fun. IMO, anyone who can read a Dickens novel (for example) with any pleasure at all will find this a fast-paced adventure that reads like an action movie.

You know, by comparison.

And I liked the ending. So--thumbs up.

Recommended for those who enjoy and have patience for older historical novels. This is one of my new favorites.

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Where the Kids Stumble on an Ancient Mystery

Over Sea, Under Stone by Susan Cooper
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I think this book is quite good, well written and entertaining, so I give it 4 out of 5. But that's an old man judging a MG (YA?) book. I can't say for sure, but I think a young me would have given this a 5, and I'm sorry I didn't get to read it way back when.

I found The Dark is Rising, the second book--the only book, as far as I knew, at the time--when I was in 7th or 8th grade. It's kind of a Christmas book, and I read it around that time of year, and it really struck a chord. I loved it. It felt deeply significant and mysterious, becoming a type I tried to find over and over again. (The closest I ever found was another fun book, The Weirdstone of Brisangamen.) When I learned there were other books in the series, I really wanted to get my hands on them, but our library only had the one book. I never got back to the series until recently, wanting to satisfy a curiosity from 45+ years ago.

Too bad I didn't find this back then. It's a well written, exciting story in the same vein as the sequel, and from an analytic perspective is probably a better novel. Unlike the second book (which, again, I really liked) the children in this book are active from the start, taking things into their hands, facing and evading dangers, solving mysteries. In the second book, exciting things happen around the main character, but he is responsible for little of it. The children having greater agency, taking an active role in the outcome, is, IMO, preferable.

The kids are staying with their parents in a cool old house near the coast in Cornwall. They find a document leading to something; their unconventional Great Uncle Merry seems tapped into secrets he's not explaining, though he's a good guy; certain people in the neighborhood act friendly but seem scary and creepy; and there's an ancient mystery they're starting to unravel, which the bad guys want to beat them to. It's a good story.

It's not flawless. It's a bit long; the children sometimes do silly things, like keep important details secret from the others, that create conflicts unnecessarily; and the bad guys vary from threatening to feckless. But the biggest problem in the novel, I think, is how Merriman does his Dumbledore impression, letting little kids face great dangers without explaining things very well or strategizing with them how to accomplish their goals. The author did it, I believe, to achieve a certain feeling. For kids, it's a great fantasy, having an adventure like this, doing things on their own in the face of great risk (like drowning). But for adults, it looks a lot like irresponsible behavior that is definitely child endangerment. Bit of a plot hole.

Despite that, it's a lot of fun, and probably very appropriate, 60 years after it was published, for YA readers or MG readers, especially those who enjoy books nearing 300 pages. (It would be nothing for those young readers who plow through LOTR or the Harry Potter series, obviously.) And it's still pretty good for old dudes who missed it the first time around.

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Where Manohar Searches for Madhumalati

Madhumalati: An Indian Sufi Romance by Mir Sayyid Manjhan Shattari Rajgiri
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Okay, so what happened was I was looking for historical romances from other countries--not Italy or France or England, I mean--and eventually found a little information online about this epic poem. Otherwise, I'd never heard of it. It was kinda chance, but kinda on purpose, and I'm glad it turned out to be very cool.

Based on questions like "Is it fun to read?" and "Is it a lot of work?" and "Do you learn much reading this?" I'd score this a 4/5, almost a 5/5. I absolutely can't speak to its value or even how "good" it is; maybe then it's a 5. I dunno. But for me, it was quite entertaining and instructive. The front matter really didn't help me enjoy it, and unless you're studying this, or studying Sufi thought in general, I'd just skip it all. Maybe come back to it after reading to see if it speaks to you, but plowing through the long introduction before reading the actual poem almost made me drop the book.

I'm glad I didn't. As a story, sort of a fantasy, it's very cool. Prince Manohar is young and full of virtue, and he's so handsome that a group of nymphs watching him sleep wonder if there is any young woman as beautiful as him. They settle on a likely name, the eponymous princess Madhumalati, but to be sure they decide to compare them. Magically, they transport him, still asleep in his bed, to the princess's bedroom. This sets off the action of the whole story, because they wake up, freak out, fall in love, mess around a little (not too much), and then fall asleep. Then the nymphs separate them again, and they both are despondent when they wake up.

The rest of the story is about them trying to get back together, and it includes a sea voyage and angry demon and other dangers, including Madhumalati being turned into a bird. Both the young lovers get help along the way and eventually find their way back to each other. All of this is filled with (to a western reader like me) exotic settings, fantastic celebrations, unexpected customs, strange supernatural creatures, and a very different worldview, and that's the instructive part of the work. After a while, you understand that, yes, of course he waited outside the city while someone went ahead to notify the king that he has arrived, and of course the people lined the streets, and obviously every caste is considered and made part of the wedding celebration...

Stuff like that. The culture of a time and place unknown to me is revealed a little bit by such literature, and I find that very interesting, well worth my energy to try to understand it. Not that I get it all--I surely don't. I don't think that's necessary unless you want to dig deep. There's a great deal of Sufi symbolism intentionally embedded in all this, and the reader is free to investigate it in the introduction and end notes, but I don't think it's necessary for enjoying the story.

As far as the translation: I like the way it's done, keeping the basic format of ten short lines and two longer ones, written in clear, non-rhyming English with a hint rhythm but nothing forced. (Or so it seemed to me.) There was nothing jarring in the language to remind me it's a translation, so I think it's pretty good.

This might not be of interest to most readers, but I'm sure there are more who would find something to enjoy here. I think the historical romance and sort-of fantasy elements get it close to a fit for me, and the curiosity I have about the literature of distant lands and times does the rest, so maybe readers with some of those characteristics should take a look.

I hope you do. And shoot me recommendations of your own.

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Where Jane Sees What the Rest Don't

Jane and the Stillroom Maid by Stephanie Barron
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is my second read of this book, and I keep finding (as I progress back through the series) that I like them even more the second time.

And I liked them a lot the first time.

The whole series, this book included, make good use of Jane Austen's biographical details, fitting stories into times and places where she actually traveled, using real people (often) who lived there and impacted history, along with other period-appropriate details, such as the various stillroom recipes that preface each chapter. As always, this is a mystery, following the normal mystery conventions, but it's also written like a novel of manners, or is at least adjacent to that, and I enjoy how deftly that is done. No; I enjoy the story, and I admire how deftly it is done.

Jane herself is a marvel. She is bright and witty, but she's also kind and caring. She can push back against foolishness or enforce her boundaries with a bit of sting, but she holds no grudges, and can be patient with the most annoying people. I kinda love one scene when she and her sister are discussing the details of the young woman's death, and their clergyman cousin keeps trying to get them to stop, but they just keep talking without saying anything to him. They just disregard him as if he wasn't even speaking, and it was the best way to handle it.

The main reason I love these so much and happily give them a 5/5 is that Jane is an awesome character and the author lets her BE awesome. She's not floundering, being goofy, making lots of mistakes. She's confident, useful, and insightful, and in most ways she is the best person in every setting and scene. She's not superhuman, but she's very cool, and watching be amazing is what makes this fun. Watching other characters be impressed with her coolness, her brilliance, just adds to the fun.

Highly recommended for mystery fans and Austen fans.

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Where We Hear Temple Bells on the Mountain

Crossing the Yellow River : Three Hundred Poems from the Chinese by Sam Hamill
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

A very nice collection in very readable translation.

The subtitle for this book is "Three Hundred Poems from the Chinese," and it's mostly a survey of poetry from earliest examples (first century BC, or thereabouts) to nearly modern, as late as the 15th or 16th century, and includes dozens of poets. Nevertheless, about half the book is devoted to just three Tang era poets: Li Po, Wang Wei, and Tu Fu. But they dominate the history of Chinese poetry, so it's warranted.

Many of these poems are available in other collections made by other translators, and though I probably favor other versions of some of these, I enjoyed the translation overall. The meaning is as clear as can be while still looking and sounding like poetry. Though I've lately come around on poetry books with notes (Red Pine does a really nice job of this) I like the way that these poems are presented without intrusions. Perhaps we give up a little comprehension, like when I'm asking myself if the oriole here is just a bird or if the poet is making some comment on ministers of state--and there's something like that in almost every poem, with cranes and geese and the river of stars and towers overlooking rivers and other recurring images--but you can let other collections do the full explication of symbols and really dig in to the allusions. This one's just for the reader and the text, and there's a clean simplicity to that which I enjoy.

In any case, Chinese poetry usually does such a nice job with imagery, readers can enjoy the language without troubling themselves over every layer of meaning. Here's a poem by Yen Shu simply titled "Song":

An old song with new words,
a cup of clear wine--

last year's weather haunts
old towers and pavilions.

The sun sinks below the world.
Will it ever return again?

Nothing can be done
to delay the flowers' falling.

When the swallows come
like old friends returning,

I pace this fragrant
narrow garden path alone.

I don't know how many layers are actually in that poem, but even a mediocre reader can work through a couple of them, and they're wonderful.

A very nice job overall. I recommend the reader not skip the translator's excellent introduction, either. It's not just useful but interesting on its own and well worth the few minutes spent reading it.

I expect I'll come back to this book in the future, dig a bit deeper. Maybe look into more books translated by the same translator.

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Where Samson Does One Last Trick

Samson Agonistes by John Milton
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I rather enjoy Milton, and Samson Agonistes is another work of his that I find interesting and engaging to read just for no reason at all. I am largely a genre fiction reader--fantasy, SF, mystery, pulp--and I'm not terribly patient with dry old poetry, but Milton, for some reason, is a pretty good fit. I'm trying to figure out why.

It's not like he's totally straightforward in his writing. There are so many obscure references and allusions that most of us could get pretty lost. But perhaps I'm fortunate in that I have enough of them in common with him (churchy childhood and all) that I get a lot of it, and the stuff I miss doesn't matter too much in terms of comprehension. Or enjoyment.

But these aren't stories that are hard to follow. IMO, the biggest hindrance to enjoyment of older literature is usually comprehension, and these are, of course, retellings of famous stories; that familiarity is a huge aid to comprehension. Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained are largely fictionalized, with a lot of added material, but the main contours of the story in Genesis are largely intact. This story, basically the last day in the life of Samson, the strongman from the Bible, hews a little closer to the original story, being much shorter, with fewer additional scenes or characters. And I think it works.

If you recall, Samson was an Israelite hero, defeating the Philistines in battle with his great strength. That was a gift from god, and it depended on him never cutting his hair. Delilah, his Philistine wife, eventually coaxed the secret out of him. She cut his hair, taking his strength away, and he was captured and blinded and made a slave. This poem (a Greek-style tragic play, actually) tells about his last day, when his father came to try to ransom him (invented detail), but he got dragged to the temple to perform feats of strength, which had largely returned to him. Then, when he gets the chance, he pushes the pillars down in the temple, burying huge numbers of Philistines and dying in the process.

Now, Milton likes to control women waaaay too much for me, spending a lot of time blaming them (and the men who don't control them) for being kicked out of Eden and for Samson being captured. But allowing for his Puritan attitudes a little bit, the story is generally entertaining and thought-provoking. This poem is just under 1800 lines, making it a little long for a single sitting, probably, but not too long to read in bits over several days. It's not meant to be performed like a regular play, but I like imagining how it could be realized as an animation or radio drama or some other thing...

Anyway, yeah, I liked it. Recommended for people who sometimes read epic poetry or adjacent literature.

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Where Fox and Willa Cross Italy

The Last True Templar by Boyd Morrison
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This second book in the series, another collaboration between brother and sister Boyd and Beth Morrison, is a lot of fun and a solid historical mystery/adventure. Four stars. Maybe 4.5.

It's another take on the lost and hidden Templar treasure, but it feels fresh just the same. The characters are likable (which I care about, yes) and the conflict is something that feels like it matters, making me eager to see Willa and Gerard reach the place and do the thing. Their happiness and the happiness of people around them is important enough to care about and root for.

Beth Morrison is an actual historian, which makes the details of the times not just accurate but compelling, helping sell the world-building to immerse the reader. And Boyd Morrison is an amazing story-teller, one who knows how to keep on-the-edge-of-your-seat tension going throughout the novel. There is no letup, no relaxing. They are metaphorically chased up the tree and attacked with rocks until the last page of the story.

In fact, that's my only criticism of anything beyond quibbles. Keeping the pressure on the MC's, making it so they are never, for one moment, able to take a free breath makes you keep reading. Ya gotta know if they get through it. But it also stresses me out. I need a breather here and there.

That's just me. It's not an actual flaw in the book, at least not how most people see it.

Anyway, I get a breather at the end of the novel, and it's a satisfying end, leaving me eager for the third book.

Recommended.

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