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what i'm reading wednesday 27/11/2024
Nov. 27th, 2024 11:16 amWhat I finished:
+ Eden Undone: A True Story of Sex, Murder, and Utopia at the Dawn of World War II. This is, as I mentioned, the second book I've read on this topic, and I didn't enjoy it as much as the other one, though the comparison may not be fair because a) it was several years ago so I may be misremembering and b) I didn't know what was going to happen next when I read that one, whereas I knew all the beats here before they happened. That said, there was some new information that wasn't in the other one so it wasn't a total waste of time.
Basically: several small groups of Europeans settle on an island in the Galapagos in the 1930s. There's the couple who are there for deep, existential reasons; the husband and wife and child who just want to farm and be left alone; and the baroness and her entourage who want to start a glamorous hotel. Needless to say, these people do not get along, and after months of clashing personalities, murder ensues.
This is just a very interesting story, which is probably why I read a second book about it. I like stories about disparate personalities forced to interact. Lots of these people are very awful and arrogant and frankly I wasn't rooting for any of them.
Especially interesting is the way in which the couple are like, "We are going to live entirely on our own!!! We need no support!!!" and then they make friends with all these rich people who are stopping by in their yachts and constantly ask the rich people for Stuff. That's another interesting thing--just how many rich people there were going on long yacht cruises and stopping by the Galapagos. A lot of them did a huge amount of damage to the local fauna by gathering "specimens" and hunting and stuff. A lot of it made me cringe.
Anyway, if you want to read an interesting story sufficiently told, I do think this book is worth reading. I wish I could remember the name of the other one I read on this topic because that one's worth reading too, though you should probably only pick one of them.
+ The Wood in Midwinter is...not actually a book. It's a very short short story that has been illustrated and made into a very handsome hardback. I am super picky about short stories, and this one seemed...fine? I like Clarke's turns of phrase and evocation of magic and winter. But this was not worth putting out as an entire book, imo, and if any other author had done it, it would have felt like a money-grab and I would have resented it. However, Clarke has given me so much joy through her other books, and I paid like $5 for my second-hand copy of Jonathan Strange, so I do not resent giving her more money. She's welcome to it. I just hope the next time we get a book from her, it's really a book.
+ Latter End, yet another Miss Silver mystery. This series is not quite a cozy mystery series because it realizes that death matters, actually, and that people have very dark sides. They're not warm and fuzzy. But they are formulaic enough that they remind me of a cozy series.
Almost every book is: there's a large or small country house owned by a member of an established family. This person is surrounded by various kinds of family and other hangers-on, forming a household. Into this little world comes murder or the threat of it followed by actual murder. Miss Silver (and the police) arrive to investigate. There's always a central couple, a young man and woman who have kind of the same dynamic every time. We get the exact same description of Miss Silver's appearance and her apartment, in a way that reminds me of the first chapter of a Babysitters Club novel where we find out what Claudia wore and get the same exact description of the members and of Claudia's room and the candy hidden in the book and whatever.
(This is not the case for the first book, which I did not really like.)
That said, I keep reading them because they're a good palate-cleanser in between more substantive books, Wentworth was a good writer, there are interesting WWII and post-WWII era domestic touches, and the mysteries tend to be appropriately interesting. There are better and worse novels within this same formula; this one was on the better but not best end of the spectrum. I'm sure I'll read the whole series at some point.
What I'm reading now: The Devil at His Elbow: Alex Murdaugh and the Fall of a Southern Dynasty, which I am sure I'll have lots to say about later.
+ Eden Undone: A True Story of Sex, Murder, and Utopia at the Dawn of World War II. This is, as I mentioned, the second book I've read on this topic, and I didn't enjoy it as much as the other one, though the comparison may not be fair because a) it was several years ago so I may be misremembering and b) I didn't know what was going to happen next when I read that one, whereas I knew all the beats here before they happened. That said, there was some new information that wasn't in the other one so it wasn't a total waste of time.
Basically: several small groups of Europeans settle on an island in the Galapagos in the 1930s. There's the couple who are there for deep, existential reasons; the husband and wife and child who just want to farm and be left alone; and the baroness and her entourage who want to start a glamorous hotel. Needless to say, these people do not get along, and after months of clashing personalities, murder ensues.
This is just a very interesting story, which is probably why I read a second book about it. I like stories about disparate personalities forced to interact. Lots of these people are very awful and arrogant and frankly I wasn't rooting for any of them.
Especially interesting is the way in which the couple are like, "We are going to live entirely on our own!!! We need no support!!!" and then they make friends with all these rich people who are stopping by in their yachts and constantly ask the rich people for Stuff. That's another interesting thing--just how many rich people there were going on long yacht cruises and stopping by the Galapagos. A lot of them did a huge amount of damage to the local fauna by gathering "specimens" and hunting and stuff. A lot of it made me cringe.
Anyway, if you want to read an interesting story sufficiently told, I do think this book is worth reading. I wish I could remember the name of the other one I read on this topic because that one's worth reading too, though you should probably only pick one of them.
+ The Wood in Midwinter is...not actually a book. It's a very short short story that has been illustrated and made into a very handsome hardback. I am super picky about short stories, and this one seemed...fine? I like Clarke's turns of phrase and evocation of magic and winter. But this was not worth putting out as an entire book, imo, and if any other author had done it, it would have felt like a money-grab and I would have resented it. However, Clarke has given me so much joy through her other books, and I paid like $5 for my second-hand copy of Jonathan Strange, so I do not resent giving her more money. She's welcome to it. I just hope the next time we get a book from her, it's really a book.
+ Latter End, yet another Miss Silver mystery. This series is not quite a cozy mystery series because it realizes that death matters, actually, and that people have very dark sides. They're not warm and fuzzy. But they are formulaic enough that they remind me of a cozy series.
Almost every book is: there's a large or small country house owned by a member of an established family. This person is surrounded by various kinds of family and other hangers-on, forming a household. Into this little world comes murder or the threat of it followed by actual murder. Miss Silver (and the police) arrive to investigate. There's always a central couple, a young man and woman who have kind of the same dynamic every time. We get the exact same description of Miss Silver's appearance and her apartment, in a way that reminds me of the first chapter of a Babysitters Club novel where we find out what Claudia wore and get the same exact description of the members and of Claudia's room and the candy hidden in the book and whatever.
(This is not the case for the first book, which I did not really like.)
That said, I keep reading them because they're a good palate-cleanser in between more substantive books, Wentworth was a good writer, there are interesting WWII and post-WWII era domestic touches, and the mysteries tend to be appropriately interesting. There are better and worse novels within this same formula; this one was on the better but not best end of the spectrum. I'm sure I'll read the whole series at some point.
What I'm reading now: The Devil at His Elbow: Alex Murdaugh and the Fall of a Southern Dynasty, which I am sure I'll have lots to say about later.
