What Are We Reading? 18 January 2021

[Lljones]

Max (Outrage) wrote: "@Lljones (31)
Funny you should mention Joni. I haven't really listened to her for a couple of years and this afternoon I've been playing and obsessing over 'Marcie'. Such a lovely, clever song."

Right after I put up that post, Joni showed up in a NYT crossword I was doing. Yes, 'Marcie'. Love it.

I wonder how she's doing these days. Hasn't been much news of her lately, after the stroke she suffered a few years ago.

[Hushpuppy]

Lljones wrote (#51): "I wonder how she [Joni Mitchell]'s doing these days. Hasn't been much news of her lately, after the stroke she suffered a few years ago."

There was recently a nice interview of her in The G (happily, no sign of morgellons anymore): https://www.theguardian.com/music/202...

[scarletnoir]

giveusaclue wrote: Look for these - I am sure you will enjoy them:

Thanks for the suggestions - the authors are on my 'possibles' list, but I'm less certain than you are that they'd be my cup of tea.

I very much enjoyed the Cadfael TV series, in no small degree thanks to Derek Jacobi's superb performance in the title role. The setting - on the Welsh border - added interest for me; however, I never read any of the books - I'm more inclined to crime novels of the 20th C. onwards. That's not to say that I won't give them a try, but they aren't what are called 'bankers' in my book!

[Bill]

Justine wrote: "AB76 (44) wrote: "Its impressive the USA had two Quaker presidents.."

Herbert Hoover and Richard Nixon ... hm ... not the most inspiring examples ..."

The Penn Quakers always struck me as an odd name for the U of P football team as well ... Usually team mascots are more, um, sanguinary.

[scarletnoir]

Lljones wrote: "AB76 wrote: "Unless I'm wrong and its indoors anyway?
..."

Not yet, Biden continues to say no, but that could still change. Today the FBI is 'vetting' 25,000 National Guard troops, worried about insider attacks..."

I'm not surprised - the National Guard must have (more than?) its fair share of right wing extremists, and as we know from Indira Gandhi's assassination, it only takes one or two men with guns and a grudge...

[Blue]

I hope I will be forgiven for replying to some posts from last week here

Cabbie- Vanity Fair
I agree with your sentiments on Amelia and Becky. I also had to admire Becky's nerves of steel. She never seemed to get stressed.

CCCubbon- Vanity Fair
I don't know whether to be impressed or appalled that your teacher was reading Vanity Fair to you when you were 10. Did you ever read it again?

Emigration
The discussions on emigrants views on their homeland brought me back to a short story I read in a compilation of South African short stories. The story was called "Seed in a New Earth" by Karel Schoeman. The story is very short, sad and beautiful. It is about his grandmother who emigrated to Bloemfontein in 1905 from the Netherlands. She never accepted her new home which she lived in for over fifty years, the rest of her life.

" Her love she never gave, from the line where she hung her washing, from the kitchen door where she paused with a dishcloth in her hand, she could see the veld stretching beyond the last bluegum trees with the clear horizon etched against the sky. She heard the birds calling in the distance and the wind that stirred the leaves; she saw the clouds gather sparkling white in the sky, and she turned her back on them to go inside. The land remained alien to her, and the people with their flat intonations and long silences were not her people".

The saddest part of the story was that the city his grandmother longed for all her life, Rotterdam, was destroyed in World War 2 before her death.

"The dust has not retained the track of the foot; the glass has slipped, fallen and lies shattered on the ground. The pressed flower has not kept its sweetness, and old paper has become yellow and fragile. She is dead and the silence has finally enfolded her".

Magic Realism
I have to agree that heading would put me off reading the book but I loved Gabriel Garcia Marquez's " Love in the Time of Cholera". Maybe I am a hopeless romantic. In anticipation of another lockdown and book shops and libraries closing I bought " Midnight's Children" by Salman Rushdie. I have just started and am really enjoying it.

reen- A View of the Harbour
Thank you for your wonderful review. You brought me back to such a beautiful book. All life captured in the unassuming quiet stillness of a small harbour village.

[CCCubbon]

Blue
Yes I read it again many years later. Looking back it was such an odd choice and I doubt that any of us understood, maybe simply liked being read to. Miss Bloomer, elderly lady, rather dumpy, short, white hair, good teacher mainly, large class In deprived area, but have always remembered the title if not much of the book then.

[scarletnoir]

CCCubbon wrote: - it’s easier to go along with others if they are persuasive, if those close think in a certain way;

I think this is the key point in the creation of 'cults' (religious, political, whatever)... very many people - no matter how well educated - have a wish to fit in. They don't like feeling 'on the outside' - ostracism is a very powerful tool in preventing adherents from leaving cults, once they have been sucked in. Unfortunately, this understandable human characteristic is all too common... I always liked Nietzsche's aphorism if you want to multiply yourself, get zeros behind you meaning (I think) that if you want followers, you should choose those of weaker will than yourself.

Intelligence and education don't come into it.

I am updating this post with a quote found this morning (in relation to Brexit, as it happens):

Reasoning will never make a Man correct an ill Opinion, which by Reasoning he never acquired. Jonathan Swift

It seems that many versions of this sensible point have been published subsequently, as discussed here:

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/07....

(Sorry about that - I don't know how to embed links with a simple 'here'!)

[CCCubbon]

YesScarlet It’s not easy, is it, one may get carried along with the crowd.
Way back in the fifties there was an American singer called Johnny Ray , an early pop idol who used to cry on stage. Remembergoing to see him at London Palladium and screaming along with all the other teenage girls, not because I liked him but because that’s what everyone else was doing. Oh dear.

[scarletnoir]

Now for a book review (yes, indeed!)

Trouble Is What I Do by Walter Mosley is the sixth in his Leonid McGill series. McGill works as an investigator, and is based in New York; he has a criminal past, but now manages (just about) to stay on the right side of the law - for the most part. There is a back story involving his wife (who has a tendency to fall for other men) and his children (only one 'from his loins', as I think it's put at one point). Apart from one son, they don't feature much in this short-ish book, though.

An elderly black man comes to McGill, to task him with passing a message to a young girl brought up as white - her father is the son of this 'customer', but the mother was from a wealthy family and by chance their child was born with pale skin. It's a story, not a meditation or a tract - so it has its unlikely elements; it touches indirectly on self-denial (and, probably, self-hatred) in 'mixed' children brought up to consider black skin as being inferior. In truth, there isn't a great deal of introspection here - it's not that sort of book. It's more of a thriller with moral implications, and - for once - remarkably little blood-letting during the narrative. (Most of that sort of action occurs in back-stories when secondary characters are introduced.)

Mosley writes well, and as always I enjoyed this - though I do prefer the Easy Rawlins series. McGill seems, always, to need a lot of help from others to get his cases done.

[SydneyH]

Manhattan Transfer, a slightly longer than short novel, is veined with passages of dazzling writing, perhaps especially in the prose poems at the beginning of each chapter. The Joyce influence is apparent in the distinctive conjoined words, though Dos Passos is perhaps more self-consciously lyrical. For example, from the chapter Revolving Doors:
“Glowworm trains shuttle in the gloaming through the foggy looms of spiderweb bridges, elevators soar and drop in their shafts, harbor lights wink … Drooling light the ferries chew tracks across the lacquered harbor … they settle grunting into the back seats of limousines, and are whisked uptown into the Forties, clinking streets of ginwhite whiskey-yellow ciderfizzling lights” (276)
Unfortunately, if there is a narrative in this work at all, it isn’t a very interesting one. I struggle to define what Manhattan Transfer is ‘about’, except that the setting is New York City, on the verge of becoming the world’s second metropolis. I was aware of John Dos Passos previously, because his USA Trilogy is often mentioned in relation to American Modernism, but this book was quite a surprise. I will definitely be reading 42nd Parallel some time in future.
I’ve now started Paul Beatty’s The Sellout, having enjoyed Tuff so much last year.

[scarletnoir]

SydneyH wrote: "Manhattan Transfer, a slightly longer than short novel, is veined with passages of dazzling writing, perhaps especially in the prose poems at the beginning of each chapter. The Joyce influence is a..."

Thanks for the excerpt - my eyes glazed over after a few words, and my brain switched off.

The stye is definitely not for me, and it's useful and time-saving to know that Dos Passos can safely be put on the DNR (do not read!) pile.

[giveusaclue]

scarletnoir wrote: "AB76wrote:..."then i read and disliked Goldwaters book "the conscience of a conservative"

I thought the whole point of being a Conservative was not to have a conscience? To stand up for a continua..."

A sweeping generalisation perhaps?

[giveusaclue]

scarletnoir wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: Thanks for the suggestions - the authors are on my 'possibles' list, but I'm less certain than you are that they'd be my cup of t..."

Haha, not surprised, I meant the recommendations for MK!

I tend to go for modern crime novels or medieval/Tudor ones.

[scarletnoir]

giveusaclue wrote: A sweeping generalisation perhaps?

Not as far as the current generation of conservative leaders are concerned. You only have to read about the extremes of cronyism which affect their distribution of contracts following the COVID crisis. The virus has been a disaster for most people - but a real money-spinner for top Tories!
https://www.bma.org.uk/news-and-opini...

I suppose your 'average' Tory voter may argue that they don't know all this - but is ignorance an excuse?

Anyway - I suspect we'd better avoid local politics in this forum. Sorry.

[AB76]

scarletnoir wrote: "SydneyH wrote: "Manhattan Transfer, a slightly longer than short novel, is veined with passages of dazzling writing, perhaps especially in the prose poems at the beginning of each chapter. The Joyc..."

about 18 years ago i dumped "Manhattan Transfer", hated it, massive dissapointment. i had just read one of Sartre's triology based around ww2 that was supposed to be influenced by it and wow, Dos Passos was bilge

[AB76]

Justine wrote: "AB76 (44) wrote: "Its impressive the USA had two Quaker presidents.."

Herbert Hoover and Richard Nixon ... hm ... not the most inspiring examples ..."

lol....very true.....impressive that two members of a religious minority got so far i meant

[AB76]

Hushpuppy wrote: "AB76 wrote (#44): "worked as a sailing instructor in my late teens"

I think I've missed this if you've said it before! On what kind of boat?"

gosh, i cant remember the exact name of the boat, was a kind of similar to a Wayfarer, adapted for safer instruction. my memory is getting bad at 44!!!

[Pete]

It has been a bit of a struggle this week to stick with anything. I've picked up, and discarded several books, some I'll return to, some I won't.

Purchased cheaply, ages ago, I had a long overdue look at The Worst of Friends: The Betrayal of Joe Mercer, by Colin Shindler. For those who don't know, Mercer was manager of Manchester City in the 1960's and early seventies, famously partnered with the tabloid friendly Malcolm Allison.

I had assumed it was some sort of memoir by the author, but it turns out to be a fictional (but no doubt meticulously researched) account of the partnership. Not my cup of tea, discarded.

Over the days though, I'd pick it up again, read a page or two while waiting for the kettle to boil, or the bath to run and inexplicably found myself hooked, although there is a way to go yet.

It reads like a less brainy David Peace...where Peace is all motorick rhythm, repetition and pulsing energy, this is more...Mud.

The author is an avowed Manchester City nut and knows his history. I have no idea how true any of the detail of the relationship is, but based on what we know from their media appearances he has the two characters spot on.

The book is very funny, and it is fascinating on the machinations and attitudes of football managers, crowds and directors of the time. There is some lively gossip about some of the well known players of the day, which may or may not be true, but is hugely entertaining. I find myself googling players and events constantly.

You don't have to be a Manchester City fan to enjoy it, I cant stand 'em, but you'd probably need a love of football.

[giveusaclue]

scarletnoir wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: A sweeping generalisation perhaps?

Not as far as the current generation of conservative leaders are concerned. You only have to read about the extremes of cronyism which affect ..."

No problem

[Justine]

Good news today: my local bookshop has finally got hold of This Side of Brightness I'm halfway through Ivy Compton-Burnett's Pastors and Masters (which grows curiouser and curiouser), and am partway into War in Val d'Orcia: An Italian War Diary, 1943-1944 which I'm finding okay but unlikely to become a favourite. Coming up soon: Absolute Beginners by Colin MacInnes. My book group chose it because he was the son of Angela Thirkell, whose High Rising we read last month, with Greenery Street by her brother Denis Mackail after that. Also planning to squeeze in one or two other things recommended here.

[Bill]

That's one of a collection of geographically-titled multivolume works sitting around unread on my shelves. An attempt at the full list:

London Trilogy (City of Spades,Absolute Beginners,Mr Love and Justice)
The Williamsburg Trilogy
A Glasgow Trilogy
A Scots Quair
The Alexandria Quartet
The Bayou Trilogy: Under the Bright Lights, Muscle for the Wing, and The Ones You Do

[Bill]

Just saw this on Twitter, but haven't watched it yet: a 1978 interview with Patricia Highsmith. Today marks the author's centennial.

[MK]

Bill wrote: "
That's one of a collection of geographically-titled multivolume works sitting around unread on my shelves. An attempt at the full list:

London Trilogy ([boo..."

Your post arrived at a propitious moment as I have just finished my ration of Brother Cadfael (#16) for the month and was trying to decide - what's next?

I'm going to restart North Soho 999: A True Story of Gangs and Gun-Crime in 1940s London (Paul Willetts) in hopes that it will work this time. (All mystery, noir, etc. is read under the covers - mostly). Non-fiction (usually history) is sitting up reading.

[AB76]

Justine wrote: "Good news today: my local bookshop has finally got hold of This Side of Brightness I'm halfway through Ivy Compton-Burnett's Pastors and Masters (which grows curiouser a..."

Aha...Absolute Beginners, the book i was reading when i joined tGuardian TLS in summer 2018, hence my user name!. i have the last of Macinnes london triology "Mr Love and Justice" penned in for the autumn. "City of Spades" the first of the triology is my favourite Macinnes i have read so far

in a Ryde secondhand bookshop packed with books, i found a very slim 30 page essay by Macinnes, entitled "No Novel Reader", was a chance find

[AB76]

Bill wrote: "
That's one of a collection of geographically-titled multivolume works sitting around unread on my shelves. An attempt at the full list:

London Trilogy ([boo..."

try City of Spades(London Triology) or Justine (Alexandria Quartet), the first in each series....well worth it. I read Justine last year and it inevitably led me into researching census data of Alexandria and old maps(i love old data)

[Georg]

Justine wrote: "Good news today: my local bookshop has finally got hold of This Side of Brightness I'm halfway through Ivy Compton-Burnett's Pastors and Masters (which grows curiouser a..."

Justine, I do not know why you chose the Origo diary, so my recommendation might tickle your interest or not:

"Naples '44" by Norman Lewis

I thought it was excellent. One of the best books I read last year.

[AB76]

De Gaulle, 1942

BAM.....the allies are now invading north africa, de gaulle miffed that Roosevelt kept the invasion plans from him and predicts the Germans will now move into southern france (un-occupied zone) and send more troops to Africa

KAPOW......De Gaulle is quite a complex figure, endless brooding, outbursts of foul temper and sulking, while the great mind produces ideas and plans, concepts of what France COULD be. his spirits sink on any return to England, a country he doesnt love, while the British remain still focused, quietly, on some other possible figurehead arriving on their shores

SPLASH.....Admiral Darlan is a shady figure, Roosevelt brings him over to the Allies after the Admiral spent 18 months as a Vichy loyalist. In an angry exchange with De Gaulle, who opposed the idea, Roosevelt replied

"today Darlan gave me Algiers and i cry Vive Darlan...if Quisling gives me Oslo...i will cry Vive Quisling! Let Laval give me Paris tommorow and i will cry Vive Laval!"

Realpolitik at work...

The shady Admiral was assassinated within the year.....(Jackson loves his Gaullist admirals, the veteran Admiral Muselier "looked like a pirate", the "dashing ex-monk" Admiral D'Argenlieu...)

[scarletnoir]

AB76 wrote:about 18 years ago i dumped "Manhattan Transfer", hated it, massive disappointment. i had just read one of Sartre's trilogy based around ww2 that was supposed to be influenced by it and wow, Dos Passos was bilge.

Odd - in that the 'Roads to Freedom' bore no stylistic resemblance to the Dos Passos excerpt, as far as I can see. I read the trilogy twice (I think) a long time ago, and enjoyed the first 2 1/2 books.... the final section of Iron in the Soul seemed less impressive... I know that Sartre had planned a tetralogy - maybe he, himself, felt that he had failed with the final section of that book (?)

[FranHunny]

Amelia wrote: "I've started and abandoned about 8 different books in the last few weeks (none of them bad, I just haven't had the motivation to read them), so I'm glad I finally finished [book:Detransition, Baby|..."
8? Beginner. All in all I must have about 20 or so started books lying around.
But 8 in a row? Respect! That is something not even I accomplish.

I just counted - and can name/describe 20, I have abandoned. But that's over several years.

[FranHunny]

Still reading Bryson, The Body - have just reached the part of the fifth chapter (about the skull) where he discussed tears (in the middle of the description of the eyes).
18 % through. But it is the 19th and I want to finish it by the end of the month, or in the first half of February, to be able to read one or two slimmer books in February (still aiming for two books a month).

Do I like Bryson? Yes. Do I like this book? Yes, but like any non-fiction book of complex content I have to take it in small portions.

Wish me luck that I finish it before February. Still two weekends to go! But I push a lot of things to the weekends - with the results that I do not know where to begin and then do nothing.

[AB76]

scarletnoir wrote: "AB76 wrote:about 18 years ago i dumped "Manhattan Transfer", hated it, massive disappointment. i had just read one of Sartre's trilogy based around ww2 that was supposed to be influenced by it and ..."

the streams of consciousness and the filmic style of "The reprieve" had appareently being influenced by the cacaophony of voices and perspectives in Manhattan Transfer, or thats what the articles i was reading in 2002 said

Oddly i still havent read the first in the triology and i agree that "Iron In the Soul" lacked the brilliance of "The Reprieve"

[AB76]

FranHunny wrote: "Amelia wrote: "I've started and abandoned about 8 different books in the last few weeks (none of them bad, I just haven't had the motivation to read them), so I'm glad I finally finished [book:Detr..."

8 in a row must be soul destroying but with a reason can be explained, i think if you are in good spirits and 8 novels are dumped, then you should worry

as i said before i think 2 dumped in a row is as far as i ever got

[Justine]

AB76 (79) wrote: "De Gaulle, 1942

BAM.....the allies are now invading north africa, de gaulle miffed that Roosevelt kept the invasion plans from him and predicts the Germans will now move into southern france (un-o..."

The complex - and tense - relationships among the Big Four allies - Churchill, Roosevelt, De Gaulle, Stalin - are fascinating, From 1943 onwards they were, in various forms and combinations, planning the end of the war, which was influenced by their individual personalities, politics and paranoias Have you read Serhii Plokhy's book Yalta: The Price of Peace? No De Gaulle, of course, but plenty about the other three.

[Justine]

Georg (78) wrote: : "Norman Lewis "Naples '44"..."

I just looked this up, and it sounds far more interesting than the Origo. I've put it down for my next order from the library. Thanks!

[AB76]

Justine wrote: "AB76 (79) wrote: "De Gaulle, 1942

BAM.....the allies are now invading north africa, de gaulle miffed that Roosevelt kept the invasion plans from him and predicts the Germans will now move into sou..."

i love Plokhys books....must look that one up, thanks

[AB76]

Georg wrote: "Justine wrote: "Good news today: my local bookshop has finally got hold of This Side of Brightness I'm halfway through Ivy Compton-Burnett's Pastors and Masters (which g..."

Curzio Malaparte wrote "The Skin" a novel about his experiences in Naples in 1944. He had been a fascist at one point, wrote the brilliant but grotesque "Kaputt" about the eastern front and then switcheed over to the Allies when they invaded his homeland. he had a difficult relationship with Il Duce aka Mussolini

[scarletnoir]

AB76 wrote:"The streams of consciousness and the filmic style of "The reprieve" had appareently being influenced by the cacaophony of voices and perspectives in Manhattan Transfer, or thats what the articles i was reading in 2002 said

Oddly i still havent read the first in the triology and i agree that "Iron In the Soul" lacked the brilliance of "The Reprieve"

The Dos Passos excerpt simply looked like an early word salad to me - made up words, not much meaning. A sort of pointless prose poem. (If anyone wants to read poetic prose that has meaning, may I suggest Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupery.)

As for Sartre - no made-up words there, complete clarity of meaning - but the one trick he did use - and the first time I saw it done - was to pass the baton of narrative from one character to another in passages where the exact moment of transition remained obscure. Very clever, I thought at the time - and assumed Sartre had invented the idea... but now I think, probably someone else got there first...
Just to prove that you don't have to be a profound thinker to use the style, top class straightforward storyteller Len Deighton repeated the trick in Only When I Larf some 20 years later.

It was one of the reasons why I felt The Reprieve was the best volume of the trilogy, though The Age of Reason was very good as well.

[Max (Outrage)]

@Georg (46)
...why is there no public discussion about ethics?

Too many people think ethics is a county in the South East.

[Max (Outrage)]

@Hushpuppy (52)
There was recently a nice interview ..."

Thanks for that. She seems fine. (Of course, you never really know :-)).
The Early Years. Must get.

[Max (Outrage)]

@AB76 (79)
...the veteran Admiral Muselier "looked like a pirate".

I was impressed by that. It's how a French Admiral should look in my opinion so I googled him out of curiosity and was disappointed to discover that he actually looked far more like a bank manager.

[AB76]

Max (Outrage) wrote: "@AB76 (79)
...the veteran Admiral Muselier "looked like a pirate".

I was impressed by that. It's how a French Admiral should look in my opinion so I googled him out of curiosity and was disappoint..."

haha, thats brilliant, i thought he looked piratical in a few pics i saw but not quite as fearsome as i expected.

he looks a bit sinister here:

https://ww2db.com/person_bio.php?pers...

[FrustratedArtist]

I haven't been active on the TLS threads for a couple of years , and only just learned about the move today when browsing the book pages. So greetings from chilly Moscow, deep in snow and minus 15. I am currently deep in Regency England- half way through Charles Palliser's huge and ridiculously complex The Quincunx. Very satisfying, but I am still collecting my thoughts about it. Has anyone here read this brick-like tome?

[Justine]

AB76 (87)bwrote: "Justine wrote: "AB76 (79) wrote: "De Gaulle, 1942

BAM.....the allies are now invading north africa, de gaulle miffed that Roosevelt kept the invasion plans from him and predicts the Germans will n..."

I strongly recommend Plokhy's Yalta. I've even bern tempted t write |(for my own amusement) a radio docudrama based on it.

[Justine]

AB76 (88) wrote: "Curzio Malaparte."

The Skin is already on my list|!

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Hello everyone, I am delighted by the quiz in the other thread and, as ever, recommendations here. Thank you so much for keeping this up, inter and LLJones. I know I am repeating myself here, but I feel it's worth saying every time.

@ Bill & Scarletnoir (?): Thanks for the views on The Pickwick Papers at the start of this year. That was helpful; must say I am not keen on a reread either... Great Expectations, after gladarvor's impassioned review some months ago, or - new to me - Our Mutual Friend would interest me more. I would also like to reread Bleak House at some stage. That's such a great book.

I am sorry I am not posting here very often during these last months. Still cutback effects, still too much work. Apart from other things.
Regarding other things: I just saw this cartoon on politics and it made me chuckle: https://i.etsystatic.com/13980117/r/i...
Very much how I feel just now. It also seems apposite for discussions here in recent weeks, doen't it?

My reread of Michel Faber's The Crimson Petal and the White does not disappoint. Down, dirty and upwardly mobile (in some cases) in the mid-Victorian period, as well as excellent prose: Still love it. I have taken a break from it, though, because I want to delay reading the end for a bit (anyone else going in for these weird behaviours?).

I have also been reading lots of poetry, because this helps my attention span after too many online conversations (hello, reen: hope you are not still suffering from the same phenomenon, but I think you might... at least we have less team meetings and I have lots more conversations which are are related to what I am supposed to be doing in the first place).
So one pleasant christmas present was another poetry volume by Elke Erb, Das ist hier der Fall (German-language).

@ Bill: I did read A Scots Quair a long time ago and have it still, but I read a lot of Scottish literature at the time and now many of these works seem to have converged to a single, big multi-strand narrrative.... Arrgh. I can't recall much detail, but it is a good reminder that I might at least look into this novel once more. I have also got Scotland's Books: The Penguin History of Scottish Literature, which I might consult. It's one of the books I like reading in the bath on occasion (always worried there might be clumsiness and I might regret it). Laurence Sterne might know better than I do how this association comes about, though! Though I did love to immerse myself in Scoottish literature and culture when I lived there.

Stay well, everyone.

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

FrustratedArtist wrote: "I am currently deep in Regency England- half way through Charles Palliser's huge and ridiculously complex The Quincunx. Very satisfying, but I am still collecting my thoughts about it. Has anyone here read this brick-like tome?

That's wonderful, Frustrated Artist! I have read this book (I am very interested in Neo-Victorian fiction) and was eyeing a reread after having finished The Crimson Petal and the White. I think it is worth a reread, just for the foreshadowings which might be hidden on a first read. Would love to read more of your views on the book!
I thought it an excellent feat as regards style, as well.

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Just found a brief mention of The Quincunx in the old TL&S:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/boo...

Would have to modify my view on pastiche, though: The Crimson Petal and the White is less pastich-y (? ouch) than The Quincunx.

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Machenbach wrote: "All the talk this week of conspiracy theory tallies nicely with my most recent read – Charles Portis’s Masters of Atlantis – a gloriously deadpan comedy about a ridiculous cult..."

Great review (another one). You know, I would most probably never have come across this one otherwise. And now I am considering getting hold of it at once! It might be better just to go to bed. I will review your review tomorrow. But I think I am sold. Thanks.

[Justine]

FrustratedArtist(96)n wrote: "I haven't been active on the TLS threads for a couple of years , and only just learned about the move today when browsing the book pages. So greetings from chilly Moscow, deep in snow and minus 15...."

Hello, and welcome to TLS-in-exile! I read The Quincunx years ago, and enjoyed the atmosphere but remember little of the plot. I hope you'll write a review of some kind here when you finish.