Brian E’s Comments (group member since Jul 25, 2017)

Brian E’s comments from the Reading the Chunksters group.

This had some lengthy chapters but I enjoyed Vanstone's backstory and all the storylines in this section so they didn't feel overly long..

I did appreciate Norah's reaction to her status as I couldn't have taken much more of her continuing to be a pill all the time. However, her attempt to dispose of the theater agent's card without Magdalen's permission does show that she will still be a pill - just a part-time one now. I still enjoy Magdalen's dynamic personality significantly more - it's the key to the dynamics in this story.

Early on, it was commented that Miss Garth favored Magdalen and, in this section, she apologizes to Norah for this as she feels more aware of Norah's value now. However, I thought Garth's actions in the previous sections always showed a preference for Norah despite the narration's claim of her preference for Magdalen.

I've been waiting for the reason for the girls to have No Name but was quite surprised when it was revealed. After deciding to read this a few years ago I stayed away from plot overviews and did not recall whether this No Name factor would involve one or both sisters.
My most prominent guess was that Magdalen would turn out to be neither a blood child nor legally adopted one and the explanation would involve Mrs. Vanstone's past and her blackmailer. While I expect the blackmailer to become involved in the story sometime in the remaining 600+ pages, I was way off in my guess. I can't believe I never considered the simpler and cleaner explanation that the girls were illegitimate. Collins' characterizations duped me into never being able to consider that the Vanstones woukd be "living in sin." Score one for Collins.
I look forward to learning about Mr. Vanstone's checkered past and the rest of the backstory. The Magdalen/Frank dynamic reminds me of some of Trollope's relationships where the woman is stronger, more dynamic and more interesting while the male is pleasant and attractive, but weak and meek. Frank is an especially weak and meek example.
I also look forward to seeing how Norah reacts to her change in status. Hopefully she will stop being such a pill.

Great opening of the story. Unlike his epistolary novels, the third person narrator gives Collins a chance to reveal his precise detailed descriptive skills. I prefer this style for Collins.
I loved the long luxurious set up for the characters, especially as it is not what I anticipated from the plot description and also because it sets up the characters and their setting for the upcoming plot.
This is a 700+ page novel so I expect luxurious pacing - so far Collins is filling the space quite well.

As I nominated this book I both want to and am morally committed to particiate. I had planned to start by now but I have been delayed by health concerns and actually did not read at all for 2 weeks. Before this I can't think of a day I missed reading at least one chapter of a book over the past several years. It is almost an obsession for me to do some fiction reading a day. But the types of books I enjoy reading cannot be read and enjoyed when the brain cells aren't all triggering corrrectly.

I will start in a few days and plan to catch up, though it looks like I haven't missed any discussion yet. Guess I'll have to say something stupid to encourage responses - that is a skill within my wheelhouse.

Nidhi wrote: "I started The Woman in White two times but, it’s big and I usually can’t read big books on my own."

You are not alone Nidhi. This will be my 4th Wilkie Collins novel and ALL have been read as part of a Group read. While I wanted to read No Name, I wanted to read it in a group setting, especially one with weekly threads. If it had lost the poll, I would have held out a few more years and hoped that some group would have it as a Group read.

Perfect Schedule! I thought this read might spill too far into January and I wanted to finish reading this in 2022 to include its 800+ pages in this years page count in My Year in Review. With this schedule, I can finish it on New Year's Eve and still be able to remember what I read when I post of New Years Day.

I nominated this and it will be my 4th Collins. I like how he writes, more clearly and more interestingly than Dickens, but I haven't given his other three above 3 stars. I liked The Moonstone and it was a 4 star novel until I ran into the resolution which, while likely quite plausible to Victorian readers, I found laughable and it lowered my rating. The Woman in White was good and 4 star worthy most of the book but toward the end it started going on too long past the point where I thought it should end, so that reduced it to 3 stars. Basil just was overly dramatic even for a sensation novel, but it was an early effort while Collins was still honing his craft. In my review, I called it "a very readable 2-star novel though."
But some respected GR friends really like this one and I thought the plot sounded good and there shouldn't be any silly resolution or over-prolonging of the dramatic events to interfere with Collins writing. As I said in my Basil review: "Collins is a good storyteller, and his writing is page-turningly smooth."

Nidhi wrote: "I second Villette, it is a wonderful book and it inspired me to read Bronte sisters’ biography by Gaskell."

I think Paula changed her nomination from Villette to the Tenant of Wildfell Hall, going from Team Charlotte to Team Anne. If it isn't nominated and chosen here, you can still catch it as the GR group Catching up on Classics will be reading Villette in September 2022, as a Revisit the Shelf Classic.

I will second Of Human Bondage because it's a great 5-star book, one of my top 20 all time favorite novels. But I've read it this century so prefer to read my nominated choice, No Name. However, OHB is deserving of a second.

I nominate No Name by Wilkie Collins (1862) 748 Pages

I too noticed that Lizzie's brother Charlie was left out of the resolutions. As I was already complaining about there being too many characters, I didn't want to also complain that one was left out at the end, even though that is a different type of complaint.

The Riderhead drowning was definitely satisfying, especially with his superstition, but the double-drowning still was another unrealistic event among other unrealistic ending events.

As to the entire book, I found it overall a disappointment for the following reasons: (this will go in my review)
1. The story seemed poorly organized. There were too many story threads and one read many chapters without getting back to a certain storyline. It was hard to tell what threads were important or not and many of the storylines seemed extraneous;
2. There were too many characters, the mast majority being underdeveloped. Three sets of villains are too many. As for the heroic characters, I never felt I got to know them well, including Harmon, Eugene, Bella or Lizzie. None are as nearly as memorable as the ones from Great Expectations or David Copperfield. The best characters in this book were the offbeat quirky ones like Riah, Venus and Jenny Wren that Dickens populates his books with. However, these are unrealistic characters that are just added spice to a story and my fondness for them is insufficient to change my view of the the meat of the novel;
3. Dickens descriptions of scenes in this novel seemed more cryptic than usual, resulting in my often not properly visualizing the story events. While that is more due to my own lack of reading ability, I don’t remember having such a similar problem with the 5 previous Dickens I have read;
4. I was placated while reading this novel by the expectation that the story threads were to be woven together in a highly satisfactory ending, Instead, I found most of the ending events to be unrealistic and unsatisfying;
5. I was expecting to read a high-level Dickens ranking with Bleak House yet enjoyed this less than the other Dickens I have read. Again, this disappointment is likely a result of my lack of skill at reading and understanding Dickens. From what I have read, my reaction is more similar to the reactions of the general reading public of the time while true latter-day Dickens aficionados appreciate this book and rate it highly.

I have 6 GR friends who have read and rated this book. They are all skilled and knowledgeable readers whose opinions I respect. Every one of them has rated this book as a 5-star read. Moderator Hugh rates this as 4-stars. Our Mutual Friend has the highest GR rating of all of Dickens’s novels with a 4.08-star average.
Thus, I can only view the finish to my relationship with this book as definitely a “It’s me – not you” situation. I waver between rating this as 3-stars or 2-stars based on my own disappointing reading experience.

I found the book’s ending to be disappointing because many of the events just did not ring true to me.
1. The Estate – The Harmon estate only goes to Harmon due to the benevolence of the Boffins? Besides assuming there is no gift tax, this ending relies upon the total good will and obsequious attitude of the Boffins. Why wouldn’t the Boffins keep the whole and just give some of it to Harmon? Also, under present day standards, this resolution is not really the just outcome it is portrayed as. Harmon did nothing to earn the estate except being born while the Boffins were loyal workers for the estate owner. Views of the fairness of the ending may differ between 19th century and 21st century readers.
2. Boffins’ Acting Job – That Mr. B only play acted at being miserly and Mrs. B play acted as the caring worry-wort is hard to accept. They are so basic and genuine that they could never pull off such a long-term and extensive acting job. The goal of testing Bella seems too small a goal for such an extensive subterfuge. It’s also a goal that is insulting to our heroine.
3. Mutual Drowning – Headstone and Riderhood drown each other? Really?

Normally. the chapters in each discussion section have gone from one scene to another scene with completely different characters. This section is the first time that the 4 chapters flowed together so well. Lightwood even appears in each chapter, serving somwhat as a connection.
I didn't think the inevitable Rokesmith/Handford/Harmon reveal would be done so cryptically rather than with some grand scene. Much has occurred offstage at this time and with secondary characters. I should have realized how Dickens would present it, though, as Dickens seems to describe many situations more cryptically in this book than in his others I've read.
(As I've noted before, my failure to always properly decipher Dickens wording has sometimes caused my failure to visualize what has actually happened until either Hugh's summary or a fellow reader's commentary reveals it.)

Yes, the pace has picked up and stories are being resolved. Although we learned of the Lammle's leaving for mainland Europe in the last section, which I thought ended their story, Chapter 8's peek at what they accomplished prior to leaving for the European mainland should bring closure to their side story. This is good as the attention should be on the major plot issues.
The main issue is who will end up with the estate between Harmon, The Boffins, The Wegg Group or the public. Also, this story has been considered by some sources as a tale with 2 heroes, the primary one in Harmon and the secondary one in Wrayburn.
Yet, I find myself being most concerned with the fate of the two heroines, Bella and Lizzie. The estate story is of great concern since it will settle how Bella will live while Wrayburn's fate is important as it affects the status of Lizzie. This concern is due to Victorian women's inability to control their lives. Harmon can make a living without an estate, as will Wrayburn with his law practice. As common in Victorian era stories, the future of the women, Bella and Lizzie, rest on their abilities to make a good marriage.

Linda, we know old Mr. Harmon made his fortune collecting garbage and waste and I presume the mounds contain what today would be in a landfill, with the addition of more cinders and 'dust.' My understanding is that, at the time, money could be made both collecting the waste, as Harmon did, and then selling the waste to people such as brickmakers who convert it to useful products. So the mounds do contain some financial sources and are also consistent with what seems like a recycling or rebirth theme here. They may have some other symbolic value that I won't try to solve until I finish and read more on it.
Instead I'll focus on seeing how the various plots resolve themselves as we are now on the last fifth of the book. I too am not sure about Boffin and Venus's actions with Weggs - but that uncertainty is a good thing as there is obviously more to tell on that story and I don't mind a bit of suspense.

Jess wrote: "I've realised that the Veneerings are being used as a framing device at the start and end of each part to show how the other characters are gossiped about. Their chapters are easier to read now that I'm not trying to work out how they fit into the story. "
I too spent time wondering how the Veneerings might fit in and, as your explanation makes sense, it relieves some needless use of brain cells - a good thing as the intricacies of the various plots in this novel does require much brain cell usage.
While I liked that Bella chose to go with Rokesmith, I don't think I had an accurate read on her attitude toward him. I thought her stated annoyance with him seemed to grow into 'love' without much transition. Yet since I thought she would choose him by the end of the book, I may have just missed some of her previous expressions of a positive attitude toward Rokesmith, especially if they were subtle or understated.

Linda wrote: "I'm going to nominate two books and see if there is any interest in either. One is a recent publication, the other is older and many people may have already read it but I still have yet to do so. I already have copies of each book just waiting to be read.
1. Crossroads by Jonathan Franzen
2. The Secret History by Donna Tartt."

I'll second both of these. I just bought a copy of Crossroads (580 pages) and am curious enough about The Secret History to give it a try.

While some wish they would all leave Lizzie alone, if she does love Wrayburn, then I hope he continues his stalking her and makes an 'honest woman' out of her. Actually, its Lizzie who could make something more out of him.
(On another note, when I see the name Eugene Wrayburn I'm reminded of the American TV game show host Gene Rayburn - someone Brits would not know).

I like it when villains pair off. This book has so many characters that we get 2 such pairings as Headstone/Riderhood joins the Wegg/Venus duo from the last segment. Double the pleasure, double the fun.
Then there's also the Lammle pair and/or Fledgely/Lammle - a plethora of villains here.

This section's focus on the Wegg/Venus scheme meant no advance in the romantic plots. Maybe in the next section There is such an abundance of characters and side plots in this book-even Betty gets a chapter, though her demise also serves to allow Lizzie to reappear.
I had almost commented earlier that I wished Mr. Venus would reappear and take a larger role, Now that he has, I should be careful about what I want. He does add an extra element to Wegg's villainy, though, and I do find their relationship to be an interesting one.

Thanks, Hugh, I was waiting to start this section until you posted the thread so I can get back to reading it. The story was just beginning to make more sense when I last read it on January 31st. I look forward to the comments.