Y'All Drive Me Crazy With Your Adult Over-Caution

Island of the Aunts by Eva Ibbotson

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I see a lot of objections in the reviews of this book to the "kidnapping" device of the story.  Adults are having a big problem with the concept of kidnapping - but not the fantasy.  I think we often stint on giving credit to children's intelligence.  You only have to look at the cover of this book (with the giant eye of the Kraken and the mermaid) to see this is a book of fantasy.  The first sentence tells you what you already know, that kidnapping children is not a good idea.  Nor, I might add, is luring them away. 
The author has to find a way to get three children from their mundane or painful lives to another place.  One of them has to be a mistake.  No sane child who is old enough to read this would make the assumption that being kidnapped is a fun thing to have happen.  The children in the book know what kidnapping is really about - it's about being tied up and awful things happening.  They have been taught properly.  But this is a book of fantasy where things don't happen as expected in real life. 
I think we need to let go of our adult sensibilities (we read murder mysteries, don't we, and we don't complain about people getting killed or tortured in them for our pleasure or it leading to readers who will go out and murder in real life) and enter this fantasy world that Ibbotson creates where there are nice people and not-nice people who do wicked things for what they think are good reasons and have silly opinions on "aristos" or men or whatever. 
Ibbotson's work is great fun to read.  There's lots of imagination and gentle humor and they are slightly sillier than, say, Diana Wynne Jones's books. Another fantasy writer who would appall adults and raise the hairs on the necks of kids is John Bellairs. 



View all my reviews

It's Just a Diamond

The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


It's hard to believe that all of the mystery conventions in this book we might consider to be trite were innovations at that time.  It's also amazing that Collins was (apparently) dealing with an opium addiction while writing this.  [Well, that's what Wikipedia said Monday.  It may have changed since.]
I had read this before, many years ago, after reading The Woman In White which itself was in response to a book I read in the 1970s about how real life experiences informed the fiction of several mystery writers.  TWIW was terrific in the beginning, but my recollection was that I thought it went out of control toward the end and I lost interest in it.  This book was not like that.  I kept surging forward, although I had a memory in the back of my mind what the solution was.  I just had to see how we got there. 
What fun characters!  And in their own words.  There are many narrators, each giving their peculiar spin on events.  How can you not love that dear Miss Clack and her well-meaning but "sadly" unwelcome proselytizing!  And it's so much more fun to hear it from her side. 
The re-reading of this book was a result of having read of the influence of the Kent murder on it (the nightdress! the nightdress! the failed detective! the failed detective coming out of retirement!) in Kate Summerscale's book, The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher. 
A book of its time (which is a coded way of expressing the possible political incorrectness), there is a lot of silly business about the superstitions of the "Hindoo" and yet there are characters that tread a bit far the other way to ennoble the Indians.  The most satisfying way in which Collins tips his hand in how he feels about them is by allowing them to rescue their Moon God's stolen diamond ... after 300 years of failing at it. 
Collins also shows his sympathies to the serving class by giving us well-rounded characterizations there ... yet making the steward/butler a figure of fun with his obsession with Robinson Crusoe and his way of soothing the distaff branch of the below stairs bunch by setting them in his lap.  Oh dear. 
As I said, great characters, interesting POVs, a jolly good mystery, and a trailblazer in the genre!



View all my reviews

Molehills Out of Mountains

Earth: An Intimate History by Richard Fortey

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


As much as I enjoyed his book on Trilobites and as interested as I am in geology, this meaty book was almost too much to handle (and I read John McPhee's Annals of the Former World. and ate it up - but, of course, that got a Pulitzer).  The literary quotations included, whilst showcasing Fortey's well-rounded education, were merely annoying and the one by D. H. Lawrence about a tortoise seemed pointless.  It took me months to read this because I had to mull over the material bit by bit to make sure I understood.  [Also, by the end I was hearing in my head Pwof. Bwyan M. Fagan weading it.] I was also disappointed in the bit about glass being a solid and yet a very, very slow-moving liquid, which I believe has been debunked - but what do I know?  [I only have a BA in Spanish. Carrumba.]
However, Fortey gives us just a taste of orogeny around the world and the make-up of the earth and only makes you want to go see it for yourself.  Of course, he also handily describes parts we will never see because they are too deep and, necessarily, hot.  I know from McPhee that there are scientists who do not subscribe to the tectonics gavotte of the plates, but none of that was brought up here.  Fortey does not eliminate controversy from the narrative.  I suspect that his trilobite hunting all over the world and other travels just made him more secure in that particular theory. 




View all my reviews

Keine Zahnfee?

Throw Your Tooth on the Roof: Tooth Traditions from Around the World by Selby B. Beeler

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A charming book of disgusting milk tooth traditions from around the world.  Reminds me of Pratchett's book Hogfather in that many of these teeth are being taken away or protected.  There must be some powerful universal hoodoo associated with this. 

Mice seem to be in charge of collection in many places, which makes sense as they are rodents and have the continuously growing teeth.  I'm not sure what throwing the tooth on the roof represents, but it seems to be popular.  And, I don't know Danish, but I suspect that the tooth fairy "named Tand Feen" is actually named "Tooth Fairy." [Just checked that with Google Translate and I'm right.]  Germany needs to get on the stick.  Apparently, they don't do anything special with baby teeth which just seals their fate for me as the Most Boring People in the World.  [Before anyone complains, I should point out that both sides of my family are German and no noticeable personality developed until they emigrated.]  If anyone knows of any interesting tooth traditions from Germany, please let me know.


For additional reading, I suggest I lost my tooth in Africa by Penda Diakité which is a really cute story with great illustrations.



View all my reviews