Hey, Austen Fans: I Read UDOLPHO so You Don’t Have To

[Oh my, look who’s posting for the first time in ages and ages! It me. That light at the end of the grad school tunnel finally approaches…]

It is a truth universally acknowledged that most Austen fans who read Northanger Abbey and find themselves wondering “What the heck is this Udolpho everyone keeps mentioning,” must subsequently find themselves running far from Anne Radcliffe’s The Mysteries of Udolpho as soon as they see it. Clocking in at 632 pages – and that’s with teeny tiny Penguin Classics type, mind you – Udolpho is a gothic monster most folks don’t mind skipping. Especially once they try to struggle through the first chapter or two. 

Well, reader, Northanger Abbey has always been my favorite Austen novel and I finally decided to brave the monster myself. And here’s the thing: it’s not bad. It’s not exactly what modern readers would consider good, either, since editors have a lot more control these days – but once it got going I felt sucked in to the trashy fun, same as Austen and her family did a few years after its release. The fun is just wrapped in a whole lot of Romanticism and tiresome moralizing and endless nature writing. 

Here are some thoughts in case you want to know the ways that Anne Radcliffe’s 1794 blockbuster influenced not only Jane Austen’s earliest (but last published) novel Northanger Abbey, but also Jane Austen’s writing style itself. 

But first! Here’s a brief-as-possible plot synopsis (just kidding, this book is LONG.)

Emily, a virtuous young maiden growing up in the French countryside under the tutelage of her equally virtuous and conveniently wealthy father, enjoys the sublimity of the surrounding nature A LOT. Then her als0-virtuous mother dies. To rally her father’s spirits, Emily takes him on a tour across rural France, and they marvel over the sublimity of nature A LOT. One night they meet a wanderer named Valancourt, to whom both Dad an Emily take an immediately liking because he is likewise pure and virtuous because “he has never seen Paris.” They all enjoy the sublimity of nature A LOT. When they shelter near a mysterious castle (or chateau? whatever), Dad acts super cagey about his relationship to the castle and a woman who lived there long ago, then he promptly succumbs to illness and dies. Emily returns home, now under guardianship of an Aunt she’s never met. 

Got all that? Good. 100 pages down. 

Turns out Emily’s aunt is an awful person. She dithers on whether or not Emily should encourage Valancourt’s affections, finally setting up an engagement when she learns he’s from a wealthy family, because of course he is. Emily and Valancourt are very much in love and thrilled to get married except OOPS, Awful Aunt finds Even More Awful Italian Guy named Montoni, who talks her into marrying him, and Montoni immediately calls off Emily’s upcoming wedding. Valancourt is PISSED, but what can he do? Montoni also decides to whisk his new wife and “niece” off to Italy with zero warning, which is not a sketchy thing to do at all. 

They get to Italy, where Emily appreciates the sublimity of nature A LOT. She is pursued by one Count Morano, whom she continually rebuffs, and Montoni forces her to marry the Count until OOPS he mysteriously whisks her and her aunt of to the remote castle property of Udolpho the night before the wedding. FINALLY WE GET TO THE GOTHIC GOOD STUFF. IT HAS TAKEN 216 PAGES OF MICROSCOPIC TYPEFACE TO GET HERE. 

Time for some good ole fashioned Gothic horror! And it’s great stuff, too. Remember that glorious passage in Northanger when Henry Tilney teases Catherine about all the Gothic tropes she can expect to find once they reach the Abbey? All of that’s lifted straight from the Udolpho plotline. Here we have secret staircases for devious deeds, unsavory and criminal characters led by Montoni, a housekeeper named Dorothy who makes cryptic remarks, a heroine isolated from the rest of the family in a remote part of the castle, moans and supposed ghosts, eerie music from nowhere, and of course, a forbidden portrait in a haunted chamber, covered by that infamous black veil! (Spoiler alert: like Catherine, we will forever be guessing what’s behind that stupid black veil because Radcliffe NEVER, in 600 pages, tells you precisely what it is, just that it’s so horrific that Emily faints whenever she thinks about it. Talk about a tease.) 

Montoni just wants his new wife’s money, and after she refuses to sign it over to him he deliberately neglects her until she dies. Then when Emily also refuses to sign the property she just inherited from her aunt over to Montoni, he essentially sets his band of outlaws upon her. At the last minute she’s rescued by ANOTHER handsome young man, who’s been in love with her for his whole life, but whom she’s never met, even though they were next door neighbors. Convenient, that.

Now all that’s left is for our Emily to reunite with Valancourt and live happily ever after, right? Wrong. Because we still have 200 FUCKING PAGES left, in which Ms. Radcliffe decides to introduce entirely new characters, including a young heroine named Blanche who is also virtuous and loves the sublimity of nature and why, oh WHY am I supposed to care about these people?! Anyway, they finally become connected to Emily’s story, and Emily finds out that Valancourt still loves her as much as ever, except unfortunately *GASP*  he learned how to gamble while she was in Italy, and now she needs 100 pages or so to decide whether or not her virtuous heart can forgive him for, I don’t know, acting like a 20-year-old boy visiting Paris for the first time.

BUT! Before she finally forgives him, she learns that she’s the illegitimate daughter of her father and a marchioness who lived in the very castle Dad was sketchy about 500 pages ago, and that said marchioness was murdered by a woman named Laurentini, whose creepy portrait hung in Udolpho covered by a black veil. Also Laurentini’s a nun now.  And she quickly dies after telling Emily all this. This lineage means Emily is ultimately related to the new characters we only got to meet 200 pages from the end, which, I mean, fine, whatever. And Emily FINALLY forgives Valancourt for having “seen Paris” and they finally get married and live happily ever after. The End. 

So…yeah. That’s The Mysteries of Udolpho in the smallest nutshell I could manage. Here’s why this novel matters to us Austen fans, beyond enhancing our enjoyment of Northanger Abbey: 

1. Sense of Humor

Even though Udolpho was published in 1794, 17 years before Jane Austen’s first book was published (although only six years before she wrote an early draft of Northanger), there is certainly kinship here. One can see, in Radcliffe’s writing, the seeds of Austen’s famously dry wit in skewering the self-satisfied upper classes, especially in passages featuring Madame Cheron (Emily’s aunt). Consider the moment where Udolpho’s narrative voice describes Madam Cheron as wearing

the blush of triumph, such as sometimes stains the countenance of a person, congratulating himself on the penetration which had taught him to suspect another, and who loses both pity for the supposed criminal, and indignation of his guilt, in the gratification of his own vanity. (p. 116)

Or this gem, after a gentleman mocks her: “Madame Cheron did not perceive the meaning of this too satirical sentence; and she, therefore, escaped the pain, which Emily felt on her account” (p. 122).

Or this delightfully Austenian moment: 

“I will not be interrupted,” said Madam Cheron, interrupting her niece, “I was going to say – I – I – I have forgot what I was going to say.” (p. 120)

Austen’s obnoxiously talkative female characters, like Miss Bates from Emma or Mrs. Jennings’ daughter Charlotte from Sense and Sensibility or even Mary from Persuasion, also share DNA with Radcliffe’s servant characters in Udolpho, especially with lady’s maid Annette.

In such similarities we see the precursor not only to Austen’s incomparable talent for snarky insults, but also – nearly lost in the midst of a lot of ridiculous Gothic storyline – of Austen’s focus on the close relationships between women behind closed doors. As in Austen’s writing, the relationships and friendships and rivalries between women are given the most detailed character work in Udolpho. Men, by and large, are either suspicious or outright dangerous – even Emily’s beloved father harbors a dangerous secret. 

2. Travel by Proxy

When Catherine, in Chapter 14 of Northanger Abbey, declares that the landscape outside Bath reminds her of “the south of France,” the moment is played mostly for laughs. When a bemused Henry Tilney realizes that Catherine has never actually been to France, but simply thinks of how Udolpho describes the French countryside, I believe we as readers are meant to feel bemused along with him. Here’s the thing, though: now that I’ve actually read Udolpho, I get what Catherine means. I’m not a terribly visual reader, unfortunately, but for those who are, I can see why this novel would be transporting. And I mean that literally – it took me many pages’ worth of frustration to catch on, but I finally realized that Radcliffe wrote The Mysteries of Udolpho to be half suspense novel, half travelogue. Emily’s journeys take her throughout the French countryside and the French Mediterranean coast, to Venice, and on to the wild mountains of Italy before returning her to her beloved French chateau, La Valle. I cannot emphasize enough how much Radcliffe describes each of these locations in excruciating detail – the sublimity of nature is subliming itself aaaall the fuck over this novel. This fact not only betrays Radcliffe’s Romantic sensibilities but also positions this novel as escapism of every kind for 1790’s readers. Beyond its sensationalist and propelling plot, Radcliffe’s writing allows readers to take a virtual vacation to France and Italy. For many women of this time period, a nice trip to the Continent was nearly impossible – and during the 1790s and early years of the 1800s, as the UK prepared itself for a supposed invasion by Napoleon, such travel was of course difficult and dangerous for basically everybody. For a girl of young Jane Austen’s social status, Udolpho was not only a gate to thrills and chills but also a gate to somewhere much more beautiful than the same sitting room at home in which one had to pass hours every day.

The travelogue trappings also gives Radcliffe permission to write her more salacious content, since said content supposedly occurred in a savage, medieval Europe, far way from “civilized” 18th-century England. As Henry Tilney says in his blithely imperialist chastisement of Catherine’s suspicious: 

“Dear Miss Morland, consider the dreadful nature of the suspicions that you have entertained. What have you been judging from? Remember that we are English, that we are Christians.” (p. 186, emphasis added.) 

Oof, British Imperialism.

The brilliance of Northanger Abbey, of course, is the way that Austen takes Radcliffe’s sensationalized European dangers and translates them for 1790s Bath. 

3. Menfolk

While I note the similarities above between Radcliffe’s female characters and those of Jane Austen, it’s important to note just how differently these two authors view their menfolk. Of course we must keep in mind that Radcliffe set out to write a Gothic horror story, so that might go a long way toward explaining why nearly every man in the book represents some degree of physical danger or threat. (Well, except maybe for Ludovico and poor, sweet, friend zoned Du Pont). Even the lover Valancourt, in his more passionate outbursts, carries an element of unpredictable threat in his desperation. Can you believe this guy? Here’s a taste, upon their enforced separation: 

“Emily!” said he, “this, this moment is the bitterest that is yet come to me. You do not – cannot love me – It would be impossible for you to reason thus cooly, thus deliberately, if you did. I, I am torn with anguish at the prospect of our separation, and of the evils that may await you in consequence of it; I would encounter any hazards to prevent it – to save you. No! Emily, no! – you cannot love me.” (p. 150)

Blergh. Aren’t we glad that “If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more,” was coming down the road in just a few more years? 

Not to mention that every man in this entire story seems to be physically incapable of hearing/respecting a woman saying “N0.” Which, of course, is an idea that Austen will thoroughly explore later, especially in Mansfield Park.

And then there’s the complex but unrepentantly evil stepfather Signor Montoni, responsible for so much of Emily’s suffering. When Catherine suspects General Tilney of murdering his wife, she’s naturally inspired by the merciless and secretive Montoni in Udolpho. Yet though her fanciful fears about General Tilney – and about the secret stairways, buried human skulls, and other horrors she hopes to find to prove his guilt – comically turn out to be the figments of an overactive imagination, Austen has not finished yet with the Montoni/Tilney comparison. 

The misogynistic Montoni’s motivations for his cruelty toward Emily, after all, revolve around his desire to enrich himself through her advantageous marriage; General Tilney forthrightly shares the same priorities. Montoni has a cruel temper; despite his over-the-top civilities to Catherine (at least while he thinks she’s rich), we can see that Tilney’s temper has traumatized all his children, Eleanor in particular. Ultimately, of course, Austen parallels the height of Montoni’s cruelty through a similar story beat in Northanger Abbey. When Emily refuses to sign her inheritance over to him, he calmly tells her that he will no longer give her any protection from the men in his house who, you know, have been making casual remarks about their intention to rape her. General Tilney doesn’t do something so exaggeratedly villainous (he is English, as Henry would remind us), but his greatest cruelty toward any character in the book must be turning an unaccompanied Catherine out of his house with zero notice, forbidding Eleanor to provide her with a servant to protect her on a long and multi-step journey home, and not even caring whether or not she has enough money to make said journey home at all.

This action of General Tilney’s is not only “uncivil,” but outright cruel and extremely dangerous. For a young woman in the late 1700’s England to travel over a hundred miles without a guide or protection posed an enormous risk from assault by unknown persons, especially strange men – Austen doesn’t belabor the point because that’s not her style, but anyone reading Northanger Abbey at the time would have equated General Tilney’s actions with the threat of sexual assault. In the end, then, Catherine is proven right. General Tilney really is Signor Montoni. Just not in any of the ways that she had enjoyed imagining. In her sendup of The Mysteries of Udolpho (and other popular gothic novels like it), Austen deliberately creates for us an 18th-century, British, respected-member-of-society Montoni. The dangers facing young women like Catherine and Isabella Thorpe might have their edges sanded off here, but Austen dials the comedy vibe down occasionally to remind us that those dangers, and the powerful men who control them, are no less serious or frightening. 

4. The Endless Moralizing

Gah, just so, so much moralizing about virtue and vice and propriety and mental fortitude and spiritual fortitude and whatnot. It helps one appreciate Austen’s own moralizing: those who complain that Sense and Sensibility is too blunt in its moralizing would find it subtle compared to Radcliffe.

So there you have it. Believe it or not, I have more thoughts, but I think I should stop before I write a blog post as long as The Mysteries of Udolpho. Now go forth, and watch the BBC movie version of Northanger Abbey if you haven’t already!

Have you read Udolpho yourself and compared it with Northanger Abbey? What are your thoughts?

Citations from Penguin Classics paperback of The Mysteries of Udolpho by Anne Radcliffe. 2001: Penguin, London.

Essay copyright Kristin Hall 2023.

Two Englands; or, Thoughts from a Yorkshire Moor Walk

Oh, hello. I promise that someday I’ll get back to writing book reviews again, but I just finished yet another Common Ground literary pilgrimage – this time IN PERSON IN ENGLAND LIKE WHOA – and I often tend to scribble stream-of-consciousness things I ultimately like in my journal during such pilgrimages. I put pen to paper one morning after a ten-mile hike the day before, wrote this, then cried for about an hour straight. So in the interest of pretending no time has passed at all and LiveJournal circa 2002 is the hot new thing, here’s a public glimpse of me processing some shit. You’re welcome, interwebs.

My mother had England in her bones and blood, as do I, but we often argued over which England to call the best England.

My mother’s England contained picture-perfect idylls, neatly partitioned by handcrafted stone walls. Thatched roofs, impossibly green grass, a scenic sheep placed every few yards, perhaps even lambs if you visited at the right time of year.

My England is wild and unkempt, free from livestock and their obnoxious early morning wakeup calls. Give me foxes and Heathcliffs, heather and the gusty coasts of Cornwall. My England screams romance.

My mother’s England loved the tranquility of the gentleman farmer. My England resists that tranquility with all its heart, yet can’t quite escape the picaresque completely.

My mother’s England was Sense and Sensibilty 1995. My England is Sense and Sensibilty 2008.

My mother could often be heard uttering her famous catchphrase when viewing a new landscape: “Not enough trees. I need trees.” Though secretly I share her preference for trees, I keep a special place in my heart for the unforgiving English expanses, born the first time Mary Lennox experienced the moors’ wuthering and I swore I could hear them, too, if I listened hard enough. A few years letter I would transform from Mary into Cathy Earnshaw, wild as my isolated home, laughing in the face of all who dared deny me and staying out with my soulmate after dark just to feel the icy wind on my face. I would silently urge Jane Eyre to do the same thing, and silently judge her when she did not.

My mother’s England was a private garden, meticulously tended before bursting into riotous color. My England is a garden locked away and hidden, guarded by a robin, overgrown yet filled with surprising life. A garden hushed and lush and entirely mine.

My mother’s England is a small village, cozy neighbors, a local butcher and chemist who remember your regular orders. And farm animals, so many farm animals! (I don’t care for farm animals. Smelly and noisy and far too much shit on your shoes.)

My England is a lonely manor rising up from the moors or, better yet, from cliffs by the dark and unforgiving sea. A long walk or horse ride to the nearest town, filled with plenty of stops to gaze moodily at the surroundings along one’s way.

BUT

not

entirely.

My England is also willow trees by the river. Ancient churches. The flash of a spaniel running through a field. The impossible green of a moss-covered tree when the sun pokes its head through the clouds.

And bluebells.

My England is bluebells. My mother’s England was bluebells. Always, bluebells.

Our Englands meet in a bluebell wood.

When I meet her again, someday, the sun will be shining. And it will be in England. The birds will be singing. And we will find ourselves surrounded by a carpet of bluebells.

And all shall be well.

This One Time, at Drama Camp: TWELFTH by Janet Key Review

“And yet, by the very fangs/ of malice I swear, I am not that I play.”

TWELFTH NIGHT, William Shakespeare, Act 1 Scene 5

I was all set to wholeheartedly adore this new mystery adventure starring a group of theatre kids, which cleverly uses clues based on TWELFTH NIGHT (my favorite Shakespeare comedy) and champions LGBTQ+ rights. And I did really, really, really like it. I’m not ultimately as rapturous as I hoped I’d be, but I still recommend it.

This is basically an LGBTQ+ version of Varian Johnson’s brilliant THE PARKER INHERITANCE: a group of middle schoolers in the present day work against the clock to find a hidden treasure. Which you know, if you’ve read that novel and read my opinion of it, could only be another argument in TWELFTH’s favor. But it also meant that this book had a high standard to meet.

THE STORY

Maren, a shy middle grader who has always lived in her talented, outgoing older sister’s shadow, can’t believe that her parents have dumped her off at the same theatre camp where her sister was a shining star for so many years. Theatre was her sister’s thing – until she became dangerously depressed and became the focal point of their family once again. Stung and resentful, Maren arrives at camp ready to grit her teeth through the summer; then she accidentally finds herself making friends with Theo, a nonbinary camper who endures bullying for using they/them pronouns. (Which, really? At a sleepover theatre camp in the year 2022? I’m dubious, but okay. The camp must be in Florida.) A teacher disappears, there’s rumors of the camp founder’s ghost appearing, and suddenly Maren keeps finding clues hidden for her – pieces of text from the summer production of Shakespeare’s TWELFTH NIGHT. Supposedly the clues may lead to a valuable diamond ring hidden somewhere on campus, the sale of which could save the struggling camp before the owners must sell out to a Walmart-like corporation. But Maren and her friends must juggle their responsibilities to the play with solving the puzzle first…because evil forces are hunting for the treasure, too.

[FROM HERE THERE BE VERY MILD SPOILERS.]

Got all that? Good. Because meanwhile in the novel, we also get the detailed backstory of the camp’s founder and namesake, Charlotte/Charlie Goodman, whom we learn was a victim of genderqueer oppression during the Golden Age of Hollywood. Charlie’s story is told in flashbacks intercut with scenes in the present. In the end, we discover that the clues and mystery puzzle are intricately linked with Charlie’s life.

THE BABBLE

Did that sound like a lot? It is. This novel juggles so much – mostly, but not one hundred percent, successfully. It’s a fun and frequently touching ride that only occasionally cracks under the strain of having to be a family drama AND an important piece of historical fiction AND, oh that’s right, a beat-the-clock puzzle mystery with an action climax. For a novel that champions celebrating one’s identity, it sometimes has trouble remembering or even knowing what its own identity is. But maybe that’s the point – this book is quirky and individual and isn’t one thing or another, but rather falls on a spectrum of middle grade genres. And I kinda love it for that.

Which parts of book worked the most for me? The family stuff. More and more books for young people have begun to tackle mental illness head-on, and TWELFTH does so in a way that I haven’t seen yet. I’ll be the first to admit I was extra invested because the novel explores depression through the lens of the theatre world, a world with which I’m familiar (and which is rarely explored in middle grade). But so many novels in which younger children watch their idealized older siblings fall into a depressive episode lean on a tragic accident to trigger it – coming home from war, losing a friend, a horrible breakup, etc. From Maren’s point of view, her bright and brilliant older sister simply left home to be a star in New York, then one day came back home crushed. She shut Maren out, and didn’t act like her sister anymore. Maren is still a child and can’t understand why. Watching Maren process the impact her sister’s mental health issues have had on her, and on her relationship with her sister and her parents, through her writing exercises throughout the book brought tears to my eyes more than once.

The characterizations and dynamics are vivid, the use of TWELFTH NIGHT lines is quite clever, the mystery resolution is fun…so why doesn’t this get a full 5 stars for me? Because TWELFTH falls into the trap that so many middle grade and YA novels seem to lately, trying to shove in one or two or five extra social issues – or, in this case, extra characters who relate to/spell out the central theme of LGBTQ+ oppression. I could have dealt with one fewer character reduced to a platform to drive home Key’s important message.

But once again I am reminded that I’m not the intended audience for this book (although I doubt middle grade readers will get as much squealy delight from the TWELFTH NIGHT clues). In theory, children ages 8-12 are the intended audience. I can’t speak to their experience, but I can imagine a scenario where a child that age who is just beginning to grapple with their own gender and sexual identity might find the range of possibilities explored here welcoming and inclusive and nurturing, rather than overstuffed and slightly unfocused.

Anyway, this wonderful new novel is fun and meaningful and well worth a read. And if nothing else, why should science and math whizzes have all the fun solving mysteries? We artsy types can have adventures, too!

RATING

**** OUT OF *****

RANDOM BABBLE

  • I’d say the beautiful, movingly rendering historical narrative sections edge this book toward the more mature end of middle grade, but as always that depends on the reader.
  • Did I mention the use of TWELFTH NIGHT is clever? Key’s selections made me think about certain lines in new ways – and not to be a snob but that is a difficult thing for me to achieve at this point with TWELFTH NIGHT.
  • I understand the desire to represent a wider swath of the LGBTQ+ spectrum, I really do, I just…I wish we could have focused on just Theo, and parallels between Charlie’s struggles for acceptance and Theo’s struggles in modern day. It would have been enough, I promise.
  • Those playwriting class sequences. Amazeballs.
  • Will this book inspire kids to be less terrified of Shakespeare? Please? I hope so!
  • Action theatre kids, to the rescue! I love it.

What CDs Can Tell Us About Books: A Case Study

Gather ‘round, all you children, and I shall tell you a tale about this fossil of media pictured below.

This artifact is a compact disc, also known as CD, a self-titled album by a forgotten early 00s band called Radford. Way back in ye olde days of the 90s and into the 00s, there used to be a brick-and-mortar store called Circuit City. (Gah, anyone else remember Circuit City?) Because it took approximately 10,000 hours for even a picture to load on a webpage in order to browse music – as we were hiking uphill in the snow both ways to school – we instead went to physical places that sold CDs, which would usually display a few kiosks with the newest album releases loaded up, and headphones allowing you to sample said albums to your heart’s content. The highlight of every month for me was a trip to Circuit City to don those headphones and discover random new bands. (Ah, those golden years before my anxiety disorder began to manifest as germophobia…)

In the year 2000, on one such trip, I discovered this self-titled album by a band named Radford and, in the way of young teens, promptly became somewhat obsessed with it. (Who can say why. It’s not a particularly great album. Though I do still think “Closer to Myself” and “Overflow” are solid Oasis/Fuel hybrid tunes.) Also in the way of young teens, I then lost the CD and moved on to obsessions with other bands. Two years later, in a used CD store (still a viable business option at that point), I found the exact CD you see in this photograph (that I just took and loaded here from my telephone through wireless internet and am now sharing with who knows how many of you, because THAT kind of witchery is possible now) and fondly remembered my love for the album. I rediscovered it for a little while.

To this day, I still haven’t managed to trash/give away a whole bunch of CDs that I never listen to anymore, due to nostalgia or laziness.

Flash cut to 2022. Music streaming and the internet have liberated both music makers and music listeners from the tyranny of gatekeeping record companies, album deals, etc. I find that, of all songs, Radford’s “Closer to Myself” is suddenly stuck in my head. (Hey, it was a refreshing change from “We Don’t Talk about Bruno.”) Filled with a rush of fondness for my youthful music tastes, I rush to Spotify to find the song. 

It’s not there. The album isn’t there. It isn’t on Apple Music, either. Or Amazon. Radford’s underwhelming second album is widely available, but for whatever reason — probably rights-related — songs from their debut are not. I go hunting, and far as I can determine, the only way to access these songs in our new online music landscape are to find user-made YouTube videos of the tracks. If I hadn’t failed to get around to ditching this 20-year-old piece of technology, I’d have to watch a stupid YouTube ad every time I wanted to hear one of these songs. It’s not a massive loss to the musical canon or anything, but still.

ALL THIS TO SAY. (Let’s bring this back to books like I promised, shall we?) Using digital copies of the work that you love is great. They are handy, and portable, and don’t take up space. But it helps to remember that they aren’t, strictly speaking, yours. The world of copyright and permissions, not to mention the world of entertainment corporate mergers, is a giant cesspool of fuckery, and while it feels as though the world’s entire listening and reading catalog is available to you online…some things do fall things through the cracks. So if you love something and think you might want to enjoy it or return to it decades down the road? Get yourself a physical copy. Because those who truly own it may not love it like you do, and you may not have access to it later. (Yes, I mean even from library.) 

Maggie Stiefvater Creates a Brave(ly) New World: BRAVELY Review

Why, hello there. It’s been a hot minute, hasn’t it? Been relying on Bookstagram as my venue of choice for the past few months, but a new Maggie Stiefvater ARC will always inspire an un-social media amount of words and thoughts and feelings so LET’S. GO.

I should start with the disclaimer that I’ve avoided all of the Disney Press and Disney-Hyperion remix books for middle grade and YA readers so far, which makes me rather a snob. Why mess with a good thing? Isn’t that a cynical cash grab? Just leave your movies alone, Disney. To be honest, if Bravely weren’t written by my beloved Maggie, master craftsperson that she is, I most likely wouldn’t have picked it up.

Holy shit, am I glad I did.

Is this a sequel to the first Pixar movie to feature female leads, taking place a few years after the events of Brave? Yes, in the sense that all of the characters and places have the same names and the movie’s events are alluded two once or twice. But this story about ancient Scottish mythological beings and the balance between ruin and creation and the nature of true personal change is 100% pure heroin Stiefvater. I am a diehard fan of The Raven Cycle, and revisiting the TRC world through The Dreamer Trilogy has been such a gift for the past few years, but watching Stiefvater sink her creative teeth into a completely new world and mythology is thrilling.

THE STORY

I want to keep this post more spoiler-free than usual, since I’m posting so far before publication (May 3, 2022). Which will be tricky, but here goes.

A few years after the events of Brave, all is well in the kingdom of DunBroch. Merida leads a cozy, if repetitive, life, and so does everyone else in her family. The king is still jolly, the queen is still proper, the triplets are still mischievous, Merida is still fiercely independent. But DunBroch has attracted the attention of outside forces: not only a warlord threatening the borders, but also the Callieach, the Scottish goddess of creation, and Feradach, the god of ruin and destruction. When Merida happens to catch Feradach about to begin his destructive work on DunBroch, she makes a bargain with the god and goddess: now she has one year to bring change to DunBroch and her family members and undo her home’s death sentence. Thus begins a series of journeys, quests, battles internal and external, and a deeper appreciation for the close association between destruction and growth.

THE BABBLE

A reader doesn’t need to have seen the film at all to enjoy this novel. Stiefvater takes this world and these characters and makes them her own, giving them her distinctive flavor of dialogue and wit. Is it nice to hold in your head the film’s stunning visuals of Merida’s wild red hair as she gallops on her horse through the Scottish countryside? (Still need to do that before I die, by the way.) Of course it’s nice. But Stiefvater proves more than up to the task of bringing the world to vivid life anew, and in some ways, I wish I’d been able to meet Merida for the first time through her eyes, rather than occasionally thinking of the cartoon character created mostly by men.

The triplets, in particular, are tweens/early teens now, and each gets his own personality and character arc. The world around DunBroch expands in a way that feels “historical-ish” but still holds an air of myth about it. Feradach and the Callieach will steal your heart.

My only slight stumble is the epilogue: I’ve read it two or three times now and…I’m still not entirely sure what it’s saying. I think it’s meant to give me hope about certain plot developments? But maybe not. Normally I would give a book ***1/2 stars for a quibble like that but, just like the Callieach, when I am partial to someone, I cheat.

RATING

****

RANDOM BABBLE

  • I love how Stiefvater sprinkles two or three occurrences of “change DunBroch’s fate” throughout the novel. Clever callback to the movie, and it reclaims the phrase, raising the stakes from a petulant teenager’s catchphrase to the quest to save an entire kingdom from a destructive god.
  • There’s a new character named Leezie and she’s great. Trust me on that.
  • The novel gives wonderful nuance to the concept of whether or not you can change another person (or manipulate them into situations where they might change themselves).
  • I’m fascinated to learn more about how this book came into being. It seems different than the other Disney titles – not part of the Twisted Tales series, for example. Did Disney approach Stiefvater based on her previous work and her unique background? Or did Stiefvater’s agent pitch Disney the story idea (I think Maggie said at one point that she’s been playing with some of these ideas for ages)? It doesn’t really matter, but it would explain why the book feels like it could easily have been a novel about a different fantasy royal family, that just happens to be about the family from Brave.

What’s your favorite Stiefvater read? Are you excited to dive into Bravely?

I’ll Never Let Go, Luck: LUCK OF THE TITANIC Review

Grad school semester finished and family emergency [mostly] addressed, I have time to write blog posts again!

And apologies for the terrible post title, but I just couldn’t help myself. Hopefully it conveys how much I really really really loved this new look at the Titanic voyage. It is in turns enlightening, hilarious, enraging, inspiring, heartbreaking, and hopeful. Stacey Lee has created a wonderful new heroine in Valora Luck and given us a brand new perspective on a story that most of us thought we didn’t need to hear told again.

I’m not a high school teacher, but if I were, I would try to find a way to work Luck of the Titanic into my curriculum somehow.

THE STORY

Valora and Jamie Luck are twins, children of a Chinese man and a British woman, who grew up holding poverty at bay with their parents. With both their parents dead now, the siblings are one another’s only family, but Valora hasn’t seen Jamie in years since he left London to find work elsewhere. Now she’s finally tracked him down: as part of a Chinese-British engine room team that’s supposed to be working the maiden voyage for the largest, most luxurious ocean liner in history. As it turns out, the wealthy woman that Val serves as a housemaid has also bought tickets for both herself and Val on that same ocean liner — and Val sees no reason why her mistress’ last-minute death should prevent her reunion with her brother. Instead, she sneaks on board and, once there, blusters her way into posing as her former employer. She must keep her face hidden, however, to evade the Chinese Exclusion Act, which will prevent any person of Chinese descent from entering the United States without special permission.

Val has a plan to get that permission: when they were children she and Jamie trained themselves to be incredible acrobatic street performers, hustling on London street corners to help their family eat. Val knows that a talent recruiter for Ringling Bros. Circus is on board, and she intends to convince him to hire both of them as legitimate American immigrants. Jamie, however, has found a new home with his engine room crew (the “Johnnies”), and doesn’t seem too keen on going to America to join the circus. Thus begins a story of push and pull, with Jamie regaining his hope and Val gradually joining his new family on the lower decks. All the while, Val must keep her secret identity from being discovered. And of course the Titanic and a certain iceberg have irreversible plans of their own.

Oh, right! The iceberg!

THE BABBLE

[From here there be spoilers. But not too many because I don’t want to spoil it for you.]

So let’s just get the most important question out of the way first: is this book an adaptation of the movie Titanic? No. And…also kinda yes? I haven’t had a chance to ask Stacey Lee (not yet, though we live in the same area so maybe I’ll get the chance one day) but I have to believe that some of the parallels between Val’s story and the movie plot are intentional. There are similarities in the first class/lower class deck contrasts, a main character getting imprisoned right when the ship starts going down, parts of the final sequence, the cruelty toward the lower class passengers, even hints of a cross-class romance…and so on. But the beauty of those parallels is the way that Lee either subverts the movie’s most famous moments or shines a new light on them through the lens of racial prejudice.

Look, I’m a child of the 90s, so that movie is branded into my psyche. I’ve always thought that one of the more haunting images in the film is the moment when the ship’s crew members, a dozen decks above, lock the doors to the flooding engine rooms and effectively sacrifice the lives of any workers still left in those engine rooms. That’s a haunting image, but Stacey Lee has written an entire novel about the people staffing those engine rooms. Their hopes, their fears, the racism they faced even among other workers in their same class and line of work. She does such a great job of establishing those characters that I actually forgot, for about two-thirds of the book, that OOPS none of the stuff the characters were working toward was ever going to happen because the boat still had to sink.

And the final boat sinking sequence is devastatingly described. Lee tells it in such brilliant detail, you’ll feel as though you’re right there with the characters. That’s all I’m going to say because spoilers.

To be honest, this lands just under 4 stars for me because of the final two pages, which drop some serious plot reveals for which I wanted a little more explanation. I 100% understand why Lee made that stylistic choice, and it’s effective, but still…I wanted the story behind a few of those outcomes.

Seriously though, who cares? This novel is wonderful and so unique. Go forth and read!

RATING

****

RANDOM BABBLE

  • I loved Val’s arc in this novel related to her parents, the way she slowly comes to grips with the fact that Jamie doesn’t share her affections or even her memories of her father.
  • I did some Googling and as far as I can tell, April Hart was not a real person. Which makes me so, so sad.
  • I was grateful that the quietly building romance between Val and Bo didn’t overwhelm the story at all.
  • Excuse me while I go read everything else Stacey Lee has ever written, including and especially The Downstairs Girl, which I already knew I should have read by now…

Racism History with Ghosts and Mystery: OPHIE’S GHOSTS is a Must-Read Spring Release

“It filled her with a sense of ease, and as they approached, she spun around, taking in the small part of Pittsburgh where it seemed that being a Negro was no more unusual than wearing a hat.”

Justina Ireland, OPHIE’S GHOSTS

[Note: this review covers an advance reader’s copy provided by HarperCollins.]

I’m always on the lookout for middle grade titles that discuss America’s racist history and/or present in ways that 1) don’t talk down to their audience and 2) won’t make readers feel like they’re in school. Ophie’s Ghosts, Justina Ireland’s middle grade debut that’s scheduled to come out in May, just joined The Parker Inheritance at the top of my recommendation list.

This book pulls no punches when it comes to the way black people were treated by white people – and sometimes by fellow black people – during the 1920s. But it wraps those punches in an intriguing mystery full of haunted houses, ghosts, and complicated characters. Basically: go order this one right now!

THE STORY

Twelve-year-old Ophelia has an unusual talent: she can see and interact with ghosts. She learns about this talent one night when it saves her and her mother from death at the hands of the Ku Klux Klan. Fleeing Georgia with no money and little hope, they find refuge crashing with relatives in the rapidly growing industrial city of Pittsburgh. Soon Ophie’s mother, desperate to move out of their relatives’ house, pulls Ophie out of school to begin working with her as full time house staff for the white and wealthy Caruthers family.

Unfortunately for Ophie, her job at the Caruthers mansion turns out to be waiting on the elderly, bed-ridden, and abominably racist Caruthers matron. Also unfortunately for Ophie, the mansion turns out to be haunted by its past — literally haunted, as in haunted by ghosts. The other black staff members are terrified of Mrs. Caruthers, and everyone keeps making hushed references to the woman who used to have Ophie’s position. When Ophie befriends a young female ghost in the attic who can’t remember how she died, it’s up to Ophie to uncover the truth.

THE BABBLE

I love that Justina Ireland establishes a whole set of rules and mythology for the afterlife, while never becoming so busy focusing on the ghost story that she allows us to forget both the casual and aggressive racism that Ophie and her mother face every day.

The mystery is a slow burn–one that younger children in the middle grade range might find a little too slow, honestly, but for more patient readers it’s worth the wait. I found myself constantly amazed by the number of dimensions of white supremacy and racism that this middle grade ghost story winds up addressing: not just overt “bad guy” stuff from the KKK members and Mrs. Caruthers, but also colorism, microaggressions, passing, segregation in the south versus the north, and so on. The sequence when Ophie attends the movies with Clara, and she finds herself gaping at an entire functioning mini-society filled with people who look just like her, was heartwarming and devastating at the same time.

That sequence soon also became incredibly creepy, as do most of the ghostly moments in this novel. The ghosts in this world are genuinely spooky.

One last observation: it might just be an accident of timing, but this is the second occasion in the past year when I’ve read an #ownvoices novel starring a BIPOC character, shortly after reading a novel with a similar theme/plot written by a white author. The first time this happened, I read Tracy Deonn’s Legendborn shortly after reading Leigh Bardugo’s Ninth House, both of which follow a female black student on scholarship to an elite college, where she joins an ancient secret society of wealthy students that abuse magic in order to reinforce their privilege. This time, I read Ophie’s Ghosts after reading Cat Winters’ The Steep and Thorny Way, a loose YA adaptation of Hamlet in which a black teenager – also named Ophelia, interestingly enough – tries to avoid the rise of the KKK in 1920s Oregon after seeing the ghost of her dead father. Both cases serve as excellent examples for why #ownvoices publishing is so important, because in both cases, the BIPOC authors brought different levels of nuance and different areas of focus to similar stories, themes, and explorations. I enjoyed both Ninth House and The Steep and Thorny Way, and I’m not ready to say that only members of marginalized populations should be “allowed” to tell stories about those populations (Winters in particular did a ton of research and involved sensitivity readers in her writing process). HOWEVER. These two recent cases perfectly illustrate why from now on, for every Ninth House that’s published, there’d better a Legendborn published (preferably two Legendborns). For every The Steep and Thorny Way, there needs to be an Ophie’s Ghosts. It’s up to publishers to make that happen, but it’s also up to us as readers — and, more importantly, as buyers — to hold publishers to the fire to make sure it happens.

Anyway, soapbox aside, Ophie’s Ghosts is fantastic. I hope teachers read it and incorporate it into their lesson plans – I think it’s a worthy successor to Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry. Ophie makes an engaging, opinionated, sympathetic heroine from the first page, and the characters around her are just as detailed. It’s a unique approach to this important and all-too-relevant subject, written in a modern style.

RATING

* * * *

RANDOM BABBLE

[From here there be mild spoilers. Ye have been warned.]

  • I know I said it above, but some of the ghost encounters are friggin’ creepy. Dining room lady? Creepy. That rose garden scene? SUPER creepy. Honestly, they might be a little scary for younger readers, but it will depend on the reader.
  • A testament to how well Ireland immediately establishes this world, and these characters, and the stakes that impact them: I had tears in my eyes by the end of the prologue.
  • The mystery about Clara is such a slow burn, yet I still didn’t see part of that final reveal coming. Props to Ireland for that.
  • Ophie’s dream to be back in school is gutting, and I appreciate that Ireland incorporates child labor into this story. A great way to discuss how school wasn’t mandatory for all children in the U.S. until 1930, and wasn’t strictly enforced for many years.
  • I thought Ireland did a skillful job of weaving the different ways that Ophie and her mother are processing, or failing to process, their grief about Ophie’s father throughout the story, without allowing that to overwhelm the story or their relationship.
  • Oh yeah, in case I haven’t made this abundantly clear elsewhere:

Someone Tell Me, When is it My Turn? THE OTHER BENNET SISTER Review

“In our house, no-one is obliged to sparkle. Which, I find, makes it far more likely that they might.”

Janice Hadlow, THE OTHER BENNET SISTER

Guess maybe I was right about that posting once or twice a month thing because OOF, grad school. Anyhoo…

I fell head over heels for this book, y’all. I really did. I’m a sucker for revisionist fiction, but I’ll admit I did come to this particular novel with some healthy skepticism – if you’re going to come for the well-known and well-beloved characters of Pride and Prejudice, you’d best not miss.

I enjoyed Longbourn a few years ago, but that book felt more like a Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead for Jane Austen fans: the novel’s plot happened tangentially to the main plot of P&P, only occasionally checking in on the famous story to give us the events we all know so well from the servants’ point of view. In The Other Bennet Sister, we’re seeing famous events through the viewpoint of a supporting character from the novel, poor middle child Mary. P&P traces the stories of Jane, Lydia and, of course, Lizzie. This book is Mary’s chance to shine.

THE STORY

I don’t want to spoil too much, so I won’t spend much time on plot summary, but I will mention that I was surprised by how little time The Other Bennet Sister spends on the familiar events of P&P. We open with glimpses of Mary’s childhood, her strained relationship with her appearance-obsessed mother, her increasing isolation from her other sisters, and her developing interest in philosophical study. We then experience the first third or so of the Pride and Prejudice plot through Mary’s yearning for acceptance and constant small humiliations (I will never watch any version of the excruciating scene in which she plays pianoforte and sings at the Netherfield ball the same way again). Shortly after Mr. Collins leaves town, having secured Charlotte Lucas as his wife, we finish retracing P&P and jump way ahead to after Lizzie and Jane have married and settled down with their respective partners.

That’s Part One. In Part Two, Mary has been left living alone with her parents (Kitty also married quickly once the family became rich again) and must figure out what her place will be within her family. With which relative will she settle? To whom will she be the least “burden”? The novel deals sensitively with the bleak realities facing unmarried women even in wealthy families, and deals particularly well with Mary’s sad awkwardness upon revisiting Longbourn, her childhood home, once the Collinses take residence there.

That visit back to Longbourn, and the threat of having to become a governess, inspires a trip to London and Mary’s slow blossoming into a more independent woman away from the stifling judgement of her family. Of course, she finds herself the attention of two suitors. Of course, she finds the happiness she deserves. But she also finds self-respect, which feels just as deserved if not more so.

THE BABBLE

First off, if you’re going to riff on Austen then you need to do justice to Austen’s writing style, and I feel that Hadlow excels here. Hadlow does not try to make a direct imitation, but the voice sounds similar enough that you feel as though you have slipped back into the familiar world of Longbourn, Netherfield, Pemberley, and beyond.

Secondly, I love this novel if for no other reason than it finally gives credence to those of us who have been screaming at Mrs. Bennet for years something along the lines of “WHY ARE YOU SHOVING LIZZIE AT MR. COLLINS WHEN THE ANSWER IS CLEARLY MARY, YOU RIDICULOUS WOMAN!” But it also gives credible motivation for Mrs. Bennet’s actions, so, many thanks to Hadlow for that nod without it feeling like simple fan service. In fact, Hadlow seems to be on a quest here to rebrand two of Austen’s two most-ridiculed characters from the novel, giving depth not only to Mary but to Mr. Collins as well. Mary’s visit back to Longbourn was ultimately one of my favorite sequences of the entire book, rich in meaning and character development, and not just because I’m fascinated by the idea of Longbourn ownership these days. One objection, though: I’ve always been a fan of Charlotte Lucas, and it feels as if Hadlow’s vision requires some reworking of Charlotte’s character in a way that isn’t entirely flattering. I love the idea of Charlotte seeing Mary early on as a kindred spirit and similar “at-risk” young woman, and taking her under wing with pragmatic advice. But later her pragmatism comes across as coldness, heartbreaking to both Mary and Mr. Collins, and also to me. Charlotte may not be romantic, but she’s also never struck me as blunt to the point of being cruel.

I do love that the Gardiners once again come to the rescue of a Bennet sister, and this time truly help her to blossom and grow into a woman. The Gardiners don’t just offer Mary a chance to escape her family, they offer her a chance to escape her old self. And the fact that Mary, not Lizzie, winds up taking that long-awaited trip to the Lake District with her Aunt and Uncle feels exactly right. She is finally learning to appreciate poetry, after all. Lizzie didn’t need the Lakes. Mary does.

Much as I enjoyed watching Mary come into her own once the Gardiners adopted her into their family unit, I found the London third of the book the least interesting, if I’m being honest. Perhaps because it felt like dropping back into romantic comedy conventions after a heartfelt exploration of 18th-century womanhood and marriage? Or perhaps because I could see where this part of the story was headed from a mile a way.

But who cares? I loved it all. I dub this new required reading for any diehard Austen fan. So go forth, and read!

RATING:

* * * 1/2

RANDOM BABBLE:

  • One ridiculed Austen character whom Hadlow doesn’t seem interested in revising: Lady Catherine de Bourgh. She’s as delightfully abominable as ever. Never change, Lady C.
  • Points for callbacks to Mr. Collins’ gardening.
  • Hill is still the best, forever and ever. What that woman has seen/put up with, I swear…
  • The parallels to P&P plot structure at the very end might have either annoyed me or charmed me. They charmed me, because they were just different enough to be callbacks rather than hitting me over the head. (So, like, clearly not written by J.J. Abrams. For example.)
  • Okay, one other quibble about Charlotte revisions then I’ll shut up about it: the book implies that Charlotte and Lizzie’s friendship never quite recovers from Charlotte’s announcement of her engagement to Mr. Collins. But wouldn’t that…significantly mess with the plot of P&P? Maybe I’m overthinking it.
  • I like the subtle work that Hadlow does on the relationship between Mary and Lizzie, and the ups and downs of sisterly affection.
  • I’m glad we got a brief glimpse of Spectacles Boy at the end. He was so nice! My heart broke for both of them at the beginning.

And for real, here’s how I want to see Charlotte and Lizzie forever:

A VOW SO BOLD AND DEADLY Review: Cursebreak and Heartbreak and a Smashing Finale

“Had I known you were my brother,” he says, his voice rough and trembling, “I would have forced you to leave on the very first day of her curse.”

I shake my head. “Had I known you were my brother, I would have stayed by your side just the same.”

Brigid Kemmerer, A VOW SO BOLD AND DEADLY

Is there any feeling so simultaneously filled with excitement and despair as beginning the final book in a series that you really love? Finally, you get to learn how the story ends! But that means the story is ending. After you finish, that’s it. No more new adventures with these characters. (At least in theory. In these days of blockbuster publishing, who knows.)

I love the Cursebreaker series. I flew through A Curse so Dark and Lonely in a single sitting. For a story whose basic bones have been told a gazillion times, I thought it was fresh and intricate and convincing and just fun. (Apparently YA Beauty and the Beast retellings are thing that I gravitate toward? Didn’t plan it that way, but what can you do.) I loved these characters and I wanted them to succeed. ALL of them. Which Kemmerer deliberately sets up as a problem.

The world of Emberfall and Syl Shallow is a world in which four potential rulers wish for peace, but the world itself might not be set up for peace. Kinda like our world. How can they navigate political rifts and potentially permanent rifts with one another? Can Kemmerer stick the landing after spending her entire second novel complicating the heroes from her first?

THE STORY SO FAR

[FROM HERE THERE BE SPOILERS FOR THE WHOLE SERIES. OBVIOUSLY.]

A Curse so Dark and Lonely sets out a particularly bleak Beauty and the Beast remix premise: the enchantress whom spoiled Prince Rhen refused was straight-up deranged and evil, and cursed him to become a deadly monster every few months that would wage terror upon his family and his people. In the interim months, or “season,” his one Royal guard left alive after the first few monster attacks will travel through a portal to a parallel realm to fetch a girl for the prince to woo. If the girl can fall in love with Rhen even after finding out that he’s the monster, then the curse is broken. If not, then monster Rhen probably kills some more people before the curse resets, at which point Rhen and his guard, Grey, return to exactly how they were at the beginning yet the dead remain dead (including Rhen’s entire family). For some reason, the magic portal opens into Washington, D.C. At the start of the novel, Grey accidentally brings back Harper, one of my favorite YA fantasy heroines in quite some time. Harper doesn’t take kindly to learning that she’s trapped in a fantasy kingdom called Emberfall, where the populace is struggling under threat of invasion from a neighboring kingdom called Syl Shallow. From here, it’s Beauty and the Beast, so you can guess how the story goes. But just take my word for it that it goes there very enjoyably, alternating POV between Harper and Rhen — except for a crucial final chapter from the POV of Grey.

A Heart so Fierce and Broken seems to spend most of its time undercutting Harper and Rhen, whom we grew to love in the first novel. We don’t get to spend much time with them, instead alternating POV between Grey and Lia Mara, elder daughter of the vicious queen of Syl Shallow. (While Lia Mara turns out to be an excellent heroine on her own and a worthwhile Harper stand-in, I found Grey a little wooden in this novel. He had more life in the first novel as a foil for Harper or Rhen. But perhaps that was the point–he’s still figuring out who he is away from them.) Turns out Grey is the real heir to the throne of Emberfall, the dead King’s first son with a different enchantress. That means Grey can also wield magic. Both of these facts combined absolutely terrify Rhen, who received the worst of the torture from the enchantress Lillith during Emberfall’s curse. Rhen’s PTSD inspires him to act violently toward his former guard and companion, and Grey becomes a fugitive and ally for Lia Mara, seeking asylum in Syl Shallow. Lia Mara, who wishes for her country to seek peace with Emberfall rather than invading, becomes queen of Syl Shallow by the novel’s end. In a final chapter from Rhen’s POV, we learn that Lillith survived Grey’s supposed death blow at the end of the first novel, and Rhen makes another deal with her: he will fight against Grey to keep his throne, if she will promise not to harm Harper.

THE STORY OF A VOW SO BOLD AND DEADLY

After two novels focusing on our two separate pairs of lovers, it’s time to mix them all together! Vow alternates between Team Emberfall and Team Syl Shallow, focusing on Harper and Rhen POV chapters for a little while before switching over to Grey and Lia Mara, and back again and back again. Neither kingdom is inclined to trust its current ruler: Lia Mara’s subjects don’t believe she’s bloodthirsty enough to rule effectively, and they fear Grey’s magic, while Rhen’s people protest that he isn’t the rightful heir. Moreover, while Grey and Lia Mara seem to have a functioning partnership, Harper’s partnership with Rhen is crumbling. She’s having trouble forgiving him for the way that he tortured Grey in the last novel, and he’s having trouble forgiving himself. Also, Lillith is back to emotionally, mentally, and physically abuse Rhen when no one’s watching. Harper and Rhen finally mend their relationship when Rhen confides in her about his new deal with Lillith, and Rhen agrees to seek peace. Only by then it’s too late: an enraged Lillith brutalizes Rhen and all in the castle, and Harper barely escapes with her life to Syl Shallow, where she begs for Grey’s help. Grey, Lia Mara, and their team do ultimately join in the fight to destroy Lillith…and because I don’t want to spoil everything for you, I’m not going to detail how, but let’s just say I cried. In the end, Rhen agrees to yield the throne to Grey and acts as his advisor.

THE BABBLE

Okie dokie. So. I love these characters, and with the exception of one quibble* (see below) I feel as though this final volume does right by them. Grey comes into his own not only as a leader but as a fleshed-out character in this book. I loved seeing the payoff of the hints that Kemmerer has laid for us all along that while we thought this was a fantasy-romance series about princes and plucky YA heroines–and it was that, sometimes–it was really a story about bromance through shared trauma, and how everyone processes trauma differently, and how blood family and found family can sometimes feel the same because they are literally the same. My gods, gentle reader, when I got to the end and Rhen was a monster again and Kemmerer gave us such a delicious twist on the now-tired Frozen trope and Grey went all “Come back to yourself, brother” I was SCREAMING and WEEPING…ahem. I loved that these two young men spend two whole novels claiming that they aren’t friends when they clearly are, and they clearly care for each other very much. Because of course they do. The glimpses Kemmerer gives us of what they suffered together are horrific. They are Samwise and Frodo and I love them.

In some ways, I found that connection a slight weakness as well as a strength, because so much of the characterization for both Rhen and Grey revolves around each character’s relation to the other. What does one think about the other at any given time, and vice versa? How is he reacting to the other’s actions? Harper and Lia Mara, by contrast, feel like much more fully-rounded characters on their own, Harper in particular. And that’s fine with me! If we’re talking about literature geared toward young people and we have to choose, then by all means, let’s please make sure the female characters are more developed than the male ones after many centuries of, you know, that not happening.

Here’s where we get to my small quibble, though: I thought the PTSD focus and narrative structure wound up being a little unfair to Rhen. I like Rhen and I think he’s the most intriguing character in the series. But after three books, I still feel like there’s a gaping hole where his PTSD experience should be. His trauma response becomes such a plot point in Book 2, when his fear of magic drives him to whip Grey nearly to death, and I think we are supposed to feel sympathetic toward Rhen while also feeling sympathetic toward Grey. But every character gets to talk and have opinions about Rhen’s trauma-inspired response to magic, it seems, except for Rhen himself. I get what the books are doing with structure — Kemmerer can’t suddenly shift into Rhen’s POV in book 2, because that book’s dedicated to Grey and Lia Mara — so I don’t have a good solution to this issue, but still. By the time we’re allowed back into Rhen’s head in book 3, he’s mostly back to worrying about holding his kingdom together, worrying about his relationship with Harper, or, near the novel’s climax, just completely and heartbreakingly broken. I felt like we missed an important step.

Like I said, it’s a quibble that doesn’t take away from my enthusiasm for the series as a whole. I can’t wait to sell this novel and this entire series. I loved it! Now come the days of the king. May they be blessed.

RATING

* * * 1/2

RANDOM BABBLE

  • Okay, I know this is supposed to be about Book 3, not Book 1, and I know there’s room for infinite fandoms in the YA fantasy world so no competition necessary, but having read and written about A Court of Thorns and Roses so recently I couldn’t stop comparing these two Beauty and the Beast adaptations and reflecting on how much better I like A Curse so Dark and Lonely. (And before you all come at me: YES I HAVE KEPT GOING IN THE MAAS SERIES, YES YOU WERE RIGHT IT DOES GET BETTER, YES I CALLED IT WHEN I SAID RHYSAND WAS THE OBVIOUS LOVE INTEREST SETUP, YES I AM ALSO EAGERLY AWAITING A COURT OF SLIVER FLAME.) I thought Kemmerer’s work was tighter, the curse itself made WAY more sense, Lillith’s motivations only sorta made sense and they STILL made more sense than Amarantha’s, and this take on the curse narrowed the focus to only two immediate characters (Rhen and Grey) for us to know and care about while upping the stakes to including an entire kingdom of innocent people. Also, the Beast can be useful! Genius.
  • Also, no beast sex. A plus.
  • But still…just as I was thinking maybe I could re-shelve these in my “younger YA” section, I get to Vow and…sexy times. Had to happen eventually. Preferred these to Maas scenes as well, but that’s just me. Though I couldn’t help it, y’all, I did gigglesnort when the consummation for the second teenage pair mirrored the first by also involving the girl murmuring the guy’s name twice.
  • Also about Curse: lots of places where Harper calls Rhen arrogant. I look forward to going back for many re-reads, but…his behavior never seemed all that arrogant to me? Are we to interpret that as Harper’s unwillingness to trust anyone? Did Kemmerer just throw that in there because it’s required terminology for a YA love interest? Or have my standards for arrogance just been skewed by other YA love interests who truly are insufferable twerps? (See: Cardan. Whom I adore.) Discuss.
  • Didn’t mention Jake or Noah above, but they are a delight. Jake giving Grey a hard time after he emerges from Lia Mara’s bedroom was the absolute best thing. I enjoy these books’ approach to representation: Harper has a disability that doesn’t define her, Jake and Noah are gay and it doesn’t define them. People are who they are.
  • I like the unresolved story with Nakiis, and the implication that the trauma Lillith inflicts can cross species.
  • Okay, one more quibble, this one’s tiny and it’s about Lillith: it would have been nice to get a teeeeny bit more explanation about why Lillith could be hurt sometimes, by some people and creatures, in some places, and why not in/by others. But hey, who am I kidding, I’m a Doctor Who fan. Wibbly wobbly timey wimey, I’ll just accept it and move on.

A New, Beautifully Understated Holiday Fable: A WILD WINTER SWAN

Why does the most obvious thing, the only thing that doesn’t need to be said, hurt so much when it is actually said out loud?

Gregory Maguire, A WILD WINTER SWAN

Hey look, a blog! What is this strange, magical contraption for writing one’s thoughts about books and other topics in long form?

Happy New Year, everyone. After taking a few months away from Bookshelves & Babble to juggle Mom’s passing with finishing up fall semester of grad school, I’m hoping to start writing book reviews here again instead of just lazily posting a few sentences over on Instagram. (Aiming for only once or twice month, though. Because, you know, grad school.)

Before we get too far away from Christmas/New Year’s Eve/Solstice/Winter holidays, I definitely want to share this book with y’all, because I haven’t talked to too many people who’ve read it yet and that’s a shame.

Look, Gregory Maguire has written approximately 5,000 books. Some of them get loosely adapted into juggernaut musicals. He’s got a thing going. You may have read all of them, you may have read none of them, you may have read one and then decided Gregory Maguire’s not your thing. Before picking up A Wild Winter Swan I’d read…two, I think? His novel Wicked completely captivated me the first time I read it, and I’ve read it more than once. I borrowed the first sequel from the library, and wasn’t as big a fan of that one. (How have I never even read Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister? I’m just now realizing that I haven’t.)

Okay, yes, this song is great. But other than that I kinda hate the way the musical waters down, and happy-ends, the novel.

But I kept walking by this new novel in the store and it kept calling to me. For one thing, the book itself is gorgeous – the under-jacket case illustrations by Scott McKowen are spectacular. I finally caved and bought it on a whim, and I’m glad I did.

THE STORY

Loosely inspired by one small detail in Hans Christian Anderson’s tale The Wild Swans — in Anderson’s tale, one of the brothers-turned-swans is never completely turned back into a human, and is left with one arm as a swan wing — A Wild Winter Swan takes place in mid-twentieth century New York City. Cleverly, and perhaps because The Wild Swans might not be as universally known as some other Anderson tales, Maguire has his heroine, Laura, tell the tale to the children she babysits in an early chapter. Not only does this trick familiarize the reader with the source material, but it also keeps the story in Laura’s mind as well, an important fact later on.

Laura has come to live with her Italian immigrant grandparents after a series of family tragedies (i.e., first her father’s and now her brother’s untimely deaths) has led to her mother’s mental breakdown. She lives on the top floor of their crumbling three-story townhome in New York City. (Ah, the 1960s, when such a thing was still possible to acquire!) Due to a mishap at her private school, where she’s never felt particularly at home anyway, Laura has been expelled. Her grandmother Nonna has told Laura that she will not be welcomed back to school, or any other school in NYC, and the only other option is a boarding school in Canada. Nonna and grandfather Nonno are struggling to save Nonno’s floundering business in order to pay for Laura’s tuition – and to do that, they’ll need to secure and investment from Nonna’s sister’s new boyfriend, the wealthy Corm Kennedy. The whole deal, because of course, hinges on an important dinner at their home on Christmas Eve, which Corm Kennedy will attend.

Unfortunately for Nonna and Nonno, around this time a nearly-mute teenage boy with a swan wing where one arm should be crash lands into Laura’s upper-story window. She manages to get a name out of him — Hans — and gradually realizes that he must be a character from her favorite Hans Christian Anderson story, impossible or no. He doesn’t become a friend, but he does become company, while also chastely helping her to discover the first stirrings of her own sexuality.

As she sets about trying to return him to his own family and keep him from ruining her grandparent’s important dinner, she becomes reluctant allies and then possible friends with Maxine, the girl whose broken nose got her expelled. But when Hans’ animal instincts destroy her family’s big night, she realizes the only option is to set him free as quickly as possible.

THE BABBLE

[FROM HERE THERE BE BIG SPOILERS. YE HAVE BEEN WARNED.]

Maguire’s tone throughout feels somewhat distant — almost chilly, you might say, appropriate for a winter tale — and I liked that. It echoed the feel of reading Hans Christian Anderson or another older folk tale. The narration stays close to Laura’s thoughts, though, and that’s an important detail. Toward the end of the novel, I think (and this is just me, you may have a completely different reading) that the reader is suddenly supposed to question Laura’s sanity.

How reliable is Laura as a protagonist? No one else has seen Hans, and the damage he’s created could easily have be created by Laura herself. We know that her mother suffers from mental illness. Has Laura had a similar outburst of illness triggered by the knowledge that she will soon have to leave for Canada? Are we in a warped, fairy-tale Fight Club situation here? Laura’s heartbreaking conversation with Nonno on Christmas Eve punches holes in the entire story we’ve read up to that point, despite the gorgeously written Central Park escape scene between Hans and Laura that follows. And I do mean gorgeous…though I admit to being a sucker for any scene involving the Bethesda Fountain.

And Hans. He’s a cipher. Some might have an issue with that, but I loved it. Maguire never lets you forget that Hans is as much a foreign creature(bird) as a human teenager. He rages against his confinement, against huger, against basically everything. (You know, like a teenager. And an animal.) Anyone who finds a swan a strange fit for such behavior has obviously never met a swan in real life. But Hans also quiets into moments of temporary peace with Laura. The scene where she sleeps curled beside him is moving — two lost teenagers, both refusing to completely trust the only people left who want to take care of them.

I also loved the way that the setting of 1960s New York allowed Maguire to examine the class system in the US. While I fully acknowledge that I’m far from an expert on this topic, I thought that the relationship between cook Mary Bernice and her employers subtly illustrated just how fluid the notion of “whiteness” has always been in America, and how much the goalpost has shifted in even in the past 60 to 70 years. We, as a society, tend to forget how fluid it really is. Reading a book in which Italian immigrants like Nonna and Nonno are taking accent-reduction classes in order to pass for “white,” so they can impress upper-class characters like Corm Kennedy, in contrast to Irish immigrant Mary Bernice, who seems more comfortable in her own skin, serves as an effective and crucial reminder about such things.

More holiday-themed novels for every reading age begin popping up on shelves around November and December every year, most of them involving elves or prepubescent Santa or magic trains or romcom characters. And that’s lovely. But if you’re one of the many, many people for whom the holidays aren’t all merry and bright, or if you’re just looking for a different sort of winter tale with a few Christmas trappings but zero Christmas cheese, I highly recommend this quick and unusual read.

RATING

* * * *

RANDOM BABBLE

  • In the dedications and the leading quotes, Maguire strongly suggests that Mary Poppins author P.L. Travers not only gave him the idea for this novel, but specifically tasked him to write it. If that’s true then I love it so much.
  • I love all of the imagery Maguire uses to reflect Laura’s imperfect attempts at independence: the baby owl from the novel who’s not quite ready to fly away, the homemade wing, restless pacing at the top floor of the house…it’s all the obvious images one would use, but it all smacks of failure to launch as well.
  • I also appreciated the slow burn of Laura’s frenemy relationship with Maxine. Maxine comes over to apologize, Laura doesn’t accept her apology – fine. She doesn’t have to accept it. Then Maxine wants to bond because she got something she wanted out of the accident, and maybe that allows Laura to accept the olive branch? By the end of the novel it’s still a little unclear how Laura feels about finally having a real friend, and that might be okay. Girl’s got some serious trauma.
  • Speaking of trauma. Loved how delicately the scene with her searching through her brother’s old clothes to find Hans something to wear was handled.
  • Okay, so. I’m not Italian American, so I’m not the best judge. But Maguire walks a fine line with Nonna and Nonno, and I think he succeeds? Their struggles with language are comedic at times, but I think they always remain 100% sympathetic. These poor grandparents are doing the best they can to raise a difficult teenager. They clearly love her. They have real concerns. To my eyes, at least, they never fell into lazy stereotype, but I’d love to hear from another reader in a better position to judge.