This time around I actually managed to finish the main selection for this month. Perhaps the subtle pressure of being the May chairman had something to do with it!?
Flave
I selected The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie because it had gotten a lot of attention within the mystery reading community when the book came out in 2009 and it was on my “to be read stack”. Many authors have benefited from such attention and their series were off and running. Apparently Bradley has agreed to 3 or maybe it is 5 more books to complete the arc of this story.
Not really sure why by the end I was indifferent. Perhaps because it didn’t really matter that Flave was 11-years old. Had I gotten tired of her riding her bike around the countryside. Had I gotten tired of passages like the following:
I hated Mrs. Mullet’s seed biscuits the way Saint Paul hated sin. Perhaps even more so, I wanted to clamber up onto the table, and with a sausage on the end of a fork as my scepter, shout in my best Laurence Olivier voice, “will no one rid us of this turbulent pastry cook?” (p. 49)
The villagers still held novenas to pray she wouldn’t come out of retirement. (p. 62)
Seconds later the two of us were doubled over, hands covering our mouths, hopping about the room, snorting in unison like a pair of trained seals. (p. 90)
Years of practice-come hell or high water-have given her the left hand of a Joe Louis and the right hand of a Beau Brummell (or so Daffy says). (p. 104)
“What’s up, Dogger?” I asked lightly, trying to make it sound a little bit – but not too much – like Bugs Bunny. (p. 110)
One moment his cheeks were puffed out like the face of the winds that blow across medieval maps, and the next they were as hollow as a horse trader’s. (p. 176)
Charles Darwin had once pointed out that the fiercest competition for survival came from one’s own tribe, and as the fifth of six children – and with three older sisters – he was obviously in a position to know what he was talking about. (p. 224)
While clever, funny and creating a tone, could an 11-year really be in possession of such information. Okay it is fiction, maybe it does not matter. Just let it go and enjoy the affect. But then my practical side surfaces and I think, okay how can this knowledge be explained: she listened to the radio, Flave has been reading since she came out of the womb, they have a subscription to every newspaper printed in Britain, there is one or maybe many amazing libraries in this house, etc. Hmmmmmm?!
And now for something completely different. If you were wondering about that composition of Peitro Domenico Paradisi “Toccata” that Flave waxes on about on page 105 “the greatest musical accomplishment in the entire history of the world…” Click on this link http://www.ilike.com/artist/Pietro+Domenico+Paradisi/track/Toccata+in+La .
I was pleased to know that all my movie going and TV watching has not been in vain. I got the reference on p. 283. “Too late! Too late! The maiden cried. Curfew shall not ring tonight!” Remember that scene in Desk Set when the computer, EMMARAC, is printing out all the stanza’s of the narrative poem “Curfew must not ring tonight” and Catherine Hepburn’s character, Bunny Watson, is quoting from memory? See all experiences will eventually be useful and dare I say “connected”.
So did I like anything? Yes I like the embryo relationship presented between Flave and Dogger, which I assume will continue in all the books. Dogger appears to be the only one who is really looking out for people in the house. Which reminds me, what was that long chapter with the Father unburdening himself, in the prison cell? Doesn’t he spend the rest of the book behaving like a hermit, a recluse, a non-parental unit? Also I was completely charmed by the nicknames of the other two sisters: Feely for Ophelia and Daffy for Daphne.
My Vote: BORROW IT!
Paloma
Much less to say about The Elegance of the Hedgehog because I have not finished reading this book. And now I have to admit to skipping or at best scanning the “philosophy” chapters. What can I say? I am a gal who is all about the characters in the story!!!
My Vote: BORROW IT!
