Besides checking out books from the library, Buckwalter and I have also found a welcome respite from network TV by checking out several DVDs. Having a Halloween birthday has created in me an interest in the macabre, the otherworldly, and the paranormal. So we recently checked out a show from the SciFi channel called Ghosthunters. The basic premise involves two plumbers who, because of their personal experiences, spend all their free time looking for evidence of the paranormal with a group they created called The Atlantic Paranormal Society (TAPS). These two links don't do the show, or the gentlemen, any credit -- the show is frantically interesting and the two main men -- Jason and Grant -- are adamant in their search for substantial evidence. They look for every possible explanation before they make any conclusions on their multimedia.This show, like any spooky show, created in me a sense of unease, based off of the evidence they found. The pictures and videos are just interesting...but the EVPs are eerie and make my heart beat a little faster.
Which brings me to Wickett's Remedy...from the author of Bee Season, a book that I owned for 5 years before reading. The story is about a young woman in Boston during the 1918 influenza epidemic. The story is sweet, charming, and lovable -- but it was the haunting margins that made an impact with me. As I sat down to read the book after just viewing an episode of Ghosthunters, the quips in the margin of the book became more and more clear. The margins in Wickett's Remedy are the voices of the dead, correcting the memories of the living, expounding on their tellings, and adding their own two cents. I had a vision of the characters in Our Town, all properly seated on their tombstones discussing the weather. The margin speak is not creepy -- the realization of what you are reading is startling -- but the dead only wish to make sure the story is told accurately and by all speakers available.
Despite the sweet love story, the tender family moments, and Lydia's own growing confidence, the book resonates with an uplifting grieving song. For anyone who has lost a close friend or family member, it is a book that will restore a little of the confidence you lose when they are gone. For anyone who, during the constant chatter of the human mind, is unsettled by questions of life after death, the book will add some bravado to your spirit. For anyone who wonders whether those who are gone can still love and wish for you, it will not let you down.
I loved it. Nothing more can sum it up.
Now I have to face head on the perils of reading binges...the lukewarm novel.
I have known the name Mata Hari and had vague ideas about her life since middle school. In middle school, I was entranced with Rocky and Bullwinkle, and acquired, through thoughtful presents, videotapes of old episodes. Fractured Fairy Tales, Ask Mr. Know-It-All, Dudley Do-Right, and all the best of cartoon sketch comedy. One of these fabulous treats had a semi-educational, googly-eyed look at history: Peabody's History.
There was a particular episode of Peabody's History (pictured above, Mr. Peabody on the left for those among the uninitiated) which featured a cockamamie history of Mata Hari, in which she gave secret plans to the German army. Eventually, though, her careful plotting against the bumbling British was waylaid by Mr. Peabody and Sherman, who stopped the German army by skewering a hot dog on the end of each soldier's bayonet... causing the foolish followers of the Kaiser to believe they were at a wienie roast.
Ever since soaking in this phantasmical feature, I've been curious about Mata Hari. It's a name that you hear, synonymous with femme fatale, but I have never actually known anything about her. The only other information I had on the infamous spy was a pot-crazed write-in of the character in a David Niven/Woody Allen/Peter Sellers movie called Casino Royale. It's the strangest of all the sixties pop-adelic movies that I've seen, but, with music by Burt Bacharach, is one of the best soundtracks for homework. More of my calculus problems were solved with the serenade of a flugelhorn than by any other tunes.
All rambling aside, these were the only views I had of Mata Hari -- hardly historical, and barely breathing on the truth. So when I saw this spine stretching out towards me at the library, my brain tingled with anticipation. Finally! I would know the actual history of this character! At last my chance had come!
But this novel turned out to be only slightly more informative than Rocky and Bullwinkle. It begins with her deliberate marriage into the Belgian Army, followed by family tragedy that ends in divorce. Then we see her become the dancer that she's known as, and follow her through those upcomings. At this point, I was hoping to know more about how she became a spy and what exactly she did for the Germans. The set up of the novel prohibited this knowledge from creeping off the page and into my head. Every chapter is told by a new person who knew Mata Hari at that point in her life. This makes the actual plot line of the novel drift and ebb with no consideration for presenting the facts clearly. I learned a few interesting things, not the least of which was Mata Hari's skiing accident. She was stranded in the mountains with her ski instructor overnight, and had to construct a hole in the snow so they could keep warm, and was actually saved by a man who used dowsing rods. But while reading this novel, I spent most of my energy just trying to understand how this new person connected to Mata Hari, and comprehend their importance in her life.
Of course, the main facts were presented, and I did learn a little more through them. But I disapproved of the constantly varying first-person narrative. It veiled the pressing information just like one of Mata Hari's scarves. It's nice to know another reader felt similarily, but I still feel that this book just needed some constructive criticism pre-publishing.
There was one cozy delightful moment of a love story between Mata Hari's maid and gardener. It was so sighingly sweet that I can't help but reproduce it for you here.
He said he had another surprise for me. He took my hand and led me upstairs. In my room, he tied several pieces of blue ribbon to the window catch and opened the window. They fluttered in the breeze. He said we had to wait until just before daylight faded. We lay on my bed together and he kissed my neck. He whispered flatteries in my ear and said, "Sex without love can be an empty experience, but love without sex is a waste of time." He loved talking in riddles. Just then, I noticed a butterfly by my window. Its wings were the palest blue and had black edges. Soon, there were six or seven butterflies, all flapping around the ribbons. He smiled and said the ribbons attracted the butterflies to mate. That night Hippolyte stayed with me. It was the sweetest night of my life.
Judging from this lovingly, sparse romance, Mr. Skinner might actually have a prolific career lined up with these publishers. Just like Ms. Hari, let's hope he leaves the espionage to other authors and seeks a better mate for his strengths in romance.
I'll clue you in on my prospective idea here:
Since the library has recently been reborn for me, I've been inspired to look back to my more literary days with more intelligent, controlled posting. It has seemed like the majority of my posts over the last year since our move here have focused completely on what was happening in my day...admittedly, nothing really worth posting about, since I never want to put TOO much information about my profession on the internet, lest some little child put two and two together. This would be quite the feat, since I subbed in a math classroom recently, and...well, we'll just leave it at that. I love to tear through books, especially after spending my day reviewing the parts of speech with my little freaky darlings. So it's big kids literary time here...time to review the thoughts of the day through the books of the hour.
Everything You Know...as I read this book (see summary here), I felt the masculine attributes in myself being drawn towards the sparse prose, dully vivid descriptions, and minimized realizations. One of my favorite small moments was a momentary brain jolt from the main character, Willy, as he watches the woman next to him sleep: "I watched a tiny tear of sweat making slow progress down the side of Karen's neck. Slightly creepy, that--the way the body keeps on doing its work while you rest: rumbling and oozing, the city that never sleeps. It would be more satisfactory if it shut down when your mind did." Moments like this in a book are bandaging to a bad day...that feeling of "oh, someone else too?" I have the nasty habit of waking myself up from naps because of the wetness of drool on my cheek. Give me a little credit here -- I am not a complete sleeping slob. This is only when I have fallen asleep on the carpet or on the small couch because my eyes can't stay open past 4:45.
Of course, there are more intimate realizations at work in the book: "We are taught very early, and most of us spend our lives believing, that there is a sliding scale of duplicity in life...well, the truth is, duplicity doesn't lend itself to any such neat system of evaluation." Insightful.
All in all, a good read -- the author bandies between letters from a dead daughter and the thoughts of the live father. The epistelary book is an artform that is resurging in effort, but not in completion. Most of the books I've read have some air of Frankenstein, Dracula, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde to them, but don't go whole hog. They have a strong narrative built around the newspaper articles, diary entries, and letters. Somehow it's just not the same as, "To Ms. Saville, England: August 5th, 17--. So strange an accident has happened to us that I cannot forbear recording it, although it is very probable that you will see me before these papers can come into your possession."
I am completely on an Atwood binge right now. Well, actually, I was for the last month, and plan to binge again in the upcoming month. Atwood binge and purge, we'll call it.
This book was fantastic. Just like The Blind Assassin, I was intrigued by a slight change in tone and the movement of words about 2/3rds through the book. Quite suddenly, you realize that something's different than you've expected, and has been all along. The surprises that she holds till right after you sense them are not that surprising. It's no Conan-Doyle impossibility -- the reader can see what the other characters are seeing, and is able to move along with them in logic and sensibilities. I just love an author who gives you credit for being intelligent and gives you the tools to move to her sways.
Check out the summary here, if interested.
Some folks are hesitant to step into an Atwood book because she has been labeled "a feminist writer." This is such a meaningless label that I wouldn't pay any attention to some such press. The word "feminism" is so bastardized and split open in current society that God only knows what someone means when they say that. For my part, I wouldn't hamper her down with any label of that sort. Don't be fooled by some of the topics this book tackles...she certainly has substantial remorse for the character of Mary and her predicament (see the excerpt), but she has just as much remorse for the slighted character of the Doctor, involved in an affair that he would like to end. If you think of feminism as a "girl power," women are better than men term, then you will agree with me that this point is hardly on her agenda. She positions characters in such a manner that every gender, age, and class is given the chance to seem human, and only human. Mistakes are made, all of them believable, and on all sides of societal issues.
That's the beauty of her work. Especially Alias Grace, because you feel such compassion and disgust for a character all at the same time. Also, this book hits heavily on the mental institutions of the 1800's -- not a good time to be locked up. Of course, the book is dealing with actual history, since Grace Marks was a real person, actually accused and convicted for the murders of her employer and his lover. Whenever you have a book that deals with real history, somehow it's more compelling. But just like studying history, you can feel something inside yourself break when the inevitable happens and the characters...excuse me, REAL people you are cheering for are brought down by a simple course of events. It all seems so reasonable at the time...watching these events unfold always worries me...what simple, reasonable decisions am I making that might bring the whole happy dream crashing down?
