Top of the Blocks...

At last!  Finally finished the 646 page epic 'Murder Most Royal' by Jean Plaidy!  OK, that makes it sound like a chore, but the only real chore was holding up long enough to read it and having to carry it round with me (see earlier post!).  Glad to say no further injuries have been incurred, but I'm being careful not to drop it on my foot or anything now that I've finished it.

'Murder Most Royal' by
Jean Plaidy  (Published by
Arrow Books, 2006)

As always, Plaidy created a great sense of time and place in this retelling of the story of Henry VIII's second and  fifth wives, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, cousins who were both sent to the block for infidelity, a treasonable offence in a queen.  The story also includes Jane Seymour (wife number three) and Anne of Cleves (wife number four), though they were hardly touched on.  This was very much Anne Boleyn's show and, even if Henry didn't love her as much as the book suggests, you get the feeling that Plaidy certainly did!  The majority of the book is focussed so much on Anne, it feels like Plaidy completely forgot about his other wives and suddenly realised she needed to talk about them too about two thirds of the way through.  By comparison, their stories feel incredibly rushed and I almost wished she'd written three books rather than one.  From what I understand from other books and documentaries, these wives were actually quite interesting in their own right and I almost feel sad that they've been overlooked once again in favour of the more glamorous queens.

The thing I normally like about Plaidy's books is that she often talks about the bigger picture, including politics and the stories of people I know less about.  A good example is hearing about Katherine of Aragon's family in 'Katherine the Virgin Widow' (great book).  Unfortunately, the focus on Anne Boleyn got in the way of this a bit here, so it didn't feel so much of a rounded picture of the time.

I know it's a real nit pick, but sometimes Plaidy's tendency to use old language winds me up a bit too.  It can feel like she's learnt something new and is determined to use it at every opportunity!  Yes, it's probably intended to add to the sense of time and place, but I don't want it to feel like I'm translating every time I read a piece of dialogue.  I had enough of that with the Yorkshire brogue used by Emily Bronte in 'Wuthering Heights'!

Anyway, on the whole I enjoyed this book, certainly enough to want to see it through to the end, even though I knew what happened.  Not one of Plaidy's best and certainly not the one I'd recommend people to start with, but she wrote so many books, it's hard to get too upset about one that's not quite as good as some of the others.  It's not like I'm going to send her to the Tower over it or anything!

Voices from Beyond the Grave...

It's not my fault.  Personally, I blame Daphne Du Maurier.  Although I can't, of course, because she died in 1989, so I guess it must be someone else's fault after all.  Anyway, the long and the short of it is that I've cracked and bought another book.  I've been trying to stick to a 'two-out-one-in' rule (because sometimes life's so miserable that some retail therapy is a vital necessity), but once I knew a new collection of Du Maurier short stories had been published, I couldn't really help myself.  It's amazing really that she's still managing to produce work even though she's been dead 22 years, but it just goes to show how darn talented she is!

Here Comes the Son...

I love a bit of Science Fiction.  It's brave, it's clever and it's often quite bonkers.  What's not to like?!

'Behold the Man' by Michael
Moorcock (published by
Gollancz, 1999)

Earlier this week, I finished reading the 124-page novella 'Behold the Man' by Michael Moorcock.  This is the story of Karl Glogauer, directionless, neurotic and and an unlikely stand in for Jesus Christ.  But, after a traumatic trip into the past, that's just what he ends up being.

On the face of it, I rather liked this story.  It's about myth and myth making, how the mundane can become the magical and, above all, how belief in something better or higher than ourselves could be something we need as human beings.  In particular, it examines the conflict between Atheism and the need to believe on a personal level.  These are issues which are as pertinent today as they were in the 1960s, perhaps more so as Atheism goes from strength to strength, apparently ignoring why people feel the need to believe in the first place.

The book did annoy me a bit though and not through any fault of the author.  The blurb on the back pretty much told you the whole plot, which was a shame because it may have been easier to relate to Karl as a character if we shared his journey with him.  It made me feel a bit like I was waiting for Karl to catch up with me rather than taking in the story properly, so I think I will be re-reading it just to make sure I've not missed anything.

That said, a word of warning - there's a lot of sex in this book considering its size!  It's a shortcut to tell you about Karl's moral framework and highlight how confused he is (we see him as obsessive teenager, feckless lover, wandering lothario and indifferent bisexual), but it's not everyone's cup of tea.  It was probably incredibly shocking when the book was first published in 1969, but times have changed and most of us can tell the difference between what's there to shock and what's there to make a point.

On the whole, 'Behold the Man' is an engaging curiosity which will probably remain a relevant read for a while to come.

Now, what next..!

The Man with No Shame...

I've been offline for about a week, so you should be getting two for the price of one today!

Last Sunday, Prince Charming and I finished a talking book version of 'How to Lose Friends and Alienate People' by Toby Young.  I've seen the movie (can't remember a thing about it) and heard the rumours (allegedly, Young was annoying people so much, he got banned from the film set), so I was a bit quick on the draw when I started the book and thought I already knew what I was getting.

'How to Lose Friends and
Alienate People' by Toby
Young  (Film tie in, published
by Abacus  2008)

For those of you unfamiliar with it, 'How to Lose Friends...' is the story of Toby Young's time working in New York in the 1990s and early 2000s.  It begins with an unrefusable offer from editor Graydon Carter giving Young a chance to work on Vanity Fair magazine.  It's basically downhill from there for Young due to a weird combination of culture clash and Young's inability (or refusal) to read situations well.

In the end, this book was a bit of a surprise.  After everything I'd heard, I'd expected the tale of an arrogant, low rent, gossip column hack marauding around New York like a bucking bronco, deliberately stepping on toes and upsetting egos to get a good story.  Although the results were sometimes the same, Mr Young came across as something very different, a flawed character who wants to do well, but somehow manages to mess it up.  It felt a bit like he'd gone into a Wild West saloon for a quiet drink and somehow ended up in a gunfight at high noon.

Although he comes across as undeniably arrogant, the character portrayed in the book is also hopelessly naive, desperate to be loved and respected and a hopeless romantic.  He's well educated and self-aware, but somehow this all deserts him the moment he's face-to-face with anyone famous.  As such, he almost seems to lurch from calamity to calamity until he is inevitably fired from Vanity Fair.

To find out whether the book ends with self-realisation and redemption, you'll have to read it yourself!  I would recommend it, though,  because it's a fascinating read, particularly if you're interested in journalism and the magazine publishing industry.  I'm certainly intending to read it properly at some point.  I really ought to get through some more of my other books first though!

Lovely Spam, Wonderful Spam!

'Delete This at Your Peril: 

The Bob Servant emails' 

by Neil Forsyth 

(2010/Berlinn Ltd)

Well, not really.  I hate spam.  Who doesn't?  Well, Bob Servant for one!  I've just finished reading Neil Forsyth's 'Delete this at your Peril: The Bob Servant Emails', a book of email dialogues between the very naughty boy Bob Servant and various would-be email scammers.  While most of us delete or report spam emails asking us to help out broke African princes or accept dodgy money laundering jobs, Bob replies, often pushing the conversation in the most surreal directions.  (Talking big cats anyone?)  Despite this, I was amazed to read how long Bob managed to keep the three ring circus going before the spammers finally gave up and realised they were not going to get what they wanted.  It was also fun to see the different directions he went in when he received the same emails from different people.  

On the whole, this was an amusing rather than hilarious book, although it did have its laugh-out-loud moments (I think the conclusion of ‘Bobby and Benjamin are New Friends’ was probably my favourite!).  It would make a great little gift for anyone with a twisted sense of humour who gets as irate as a dead parrot owner about unwanted emails.

First Impressions (or Pride and Prejudice)

Now, I like to believe that I'm not a typical girly girl, that I'm pretty level-headed and interested in most books regardless of whether they're aimed at men or women.  I'm happy reading the odd bit of chick lit or a blood thirsty adventure story and that is reflected in the 479.  I've been known to sneer at a anything that looks a bit soppy and have told myself that I'm reading historical fiction because it's a way of learning about the past.  Looking at my shelves though it's pretty clear that I've been both proud and prejudiced and am really just a sucker for big, fat historical romances with posh frocks on the cover.

'Murder Most Royal' by Jean Plaidy
Published by Arrow Books (an imprint of
Random House) in 2006.  RRP. £8.99

One such book is the gargantuan 'Murder Most Royal' by Jean Plaidy, one of the three books I'm currently reading.  It's so massive, I'm sure that I've strained my hand trying to hold it up.  I've been working my way through the book's 646 pages for a few weeks now and, like the other Plaidy novels I've read, it's completely absorbed me without my noticing.  I love it when you get so engulfed in a book that it takes you a few moments to realise where you are when you finally look up from it.  'Murder Most Royal' tells the story of Henry VIII's second and fifth wives, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, their rise and downfall.  I'll let you know if I manage to finish it without further personal injury!

Once Upon a Time...

...There was a princess with a problem.  She lived in a tiny flat in a provincial town with over 450 books.  Her Prince Charming was very kind and let her indulge her book buying habit, but after the shelves of two book cases snapped under the strain, it became clear that it would take more than a fairy godmother to sort this one out.  So now The Girl Who Loves Books (TGWLB) is on a quest.  She must work her way through 477 paperbacks, hardbacks and ebooks, surviving foreign lands and strange times, to bring the addiction under control and, hopefully, find her happy ever after...