Books with SECRETS – an open-to-all game

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Let’s try and find as many book titles with the words “secret” or “secrets” or “secretive” (or closely related meanings) as our overcover brain power allows!

I will start with an old favourite of mine:
The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole, Aged 13 3/4 by Sue Townsend

[Lljones]

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

@ Lisa: Sounds good!

The secrets of the reverend Maister Alexis of Piemont: containing excellent remedies against diverse diseases, wounds, and other accidents, with the maner to make distillations, parfumes, confitures, dying, colours, fusions, and meltings...
(1595 edition)

You can look into the book via this website:
https://archive.org/details/secretsof...

On the genre of "books of secrets", see:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Books_o...

[Berkley]

The Secret Garden - Hodgson Burnett
The Secret Agent - Conrad

[Bill]

If subtitles count, I just finished one: Erotomaniac: The Secret Life Of Henry Spencer Ashbee.

@Shelflife_wasBooklooker, perhaps I am on an opposite tack from you: reading books that emphasize the "male gaze", as beside finishing this one, I just started Nana.

[Hushpuppy]

Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "Let’s try and find as many book titles with the words “secret” or “secrets” or “secretive” (or closely related meanings) as our overcover brain power allows!"

The Secret History


The Secret of the Unicorn

[Bill]

Bill wrote: "If subtitles count, I just finished one: Erotomaniac: The Secret Life Of Henry Spencer Ashbee."

I should note that the author, Ian Gibson, argues (for me, not convincingly) that his subject, Ashbee, was in truth the author of another book that fits this category, the anonymously written Brobdingnagian work of Victorian pornography, My Secret Life.

[Bill]

Two books about presidential assassinations:
The Judges of the Secret Court
A Cruel and Shocking Act: The Secret History of the Kennedy Assassination

[Bill]

Hushpuppy wrote: "The Secret of the Unicorn"

A very different book with a similar title: The Unicorn's Secret: Murder in the Age of Aquarius: A True Story

[scarletnoir]

- you need James Bond on a job like this!





plus, of course, for those of us who grew up reading Enid Blyton, the whole of the 'Secret Seven' series.
is the first - there seem to be 15 in the series with 'secret' in the title!

Sorry for lowering the tone, a bit.

[Gpfr]

Lady Audley's Secret by Mary Elizabeth Braddon

[Lljones]

The Secret of the Old Clock by Caroline Keane

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

This is great, thanks, public contributors! Quite the wide-ranging collection, across genres even, as I was hoping. Hope we will collect some more in due course.

The idea, in part, came about thanks to Tam posting about floods. I then remembered that I had seen, on rummaging for opening passages, a book by Kate Grenville, The Secret River, the title of which I connected in my mind with the Toni Morrison quote on water's memory I posted yesterday.

Bill & Mach: subtitles do count, I'd say! Bill, I know, via an anthology, a few parts of My Secret Life. Might write more about gazes at some point (have been eyeing, amongst other books, my A Mieke Bal Reader, but in any case I need some more thought on this). Zola is an author whose works I definitely want to acquaint myself with, at last (!), at some point.

scarlet, great "tone" there, very glad you brought in Bond & Blyton.

Mach, thanks to your Secrets of Happiness, I remembered that I was presented with The Ten Secrets of Abundant Happiness once. Found it on the shelf just now. The person who gave it to me told me it had changed their life, in a good way, so that's quite something (although it did not touch me so strongly when I read it).

Also remembered Tana French's The Secret Place, which I got hold of last year, but have not read yet.

Acually, mysteries fit the bill, too, as you can see in this quote from an etymological entry:

mystery (n.1)
early 14c., misterie, in a theological sense, "religious truth via divine revelation, hidden spiritual significance, mystical truth," from Anglo-French *misterie, Old French mistere "secret, mystery, hidden meaning" (Modern French mystère) and directly from Latin mysterium "secret rite, secret worship; a sacrament, a secret thing."

This is from Greek mystērion (usually in plural mysteria) "secret rite or doctrine (known and practiced by certain initiated persons only), consisting of purifications, sacrificial offerings, processions, songs, etc.,"

https://www.etymonline.com/word/mystery

I am intrigued, and, not only that: I have a strong impulse to order some of these books you mentioned NOW.
And look for the Procopius here on the shelves now, while hoping to find a few more titles, and,... oh dear, getting carried away (as far as that's possible with arms full of books).
Hope you may enjoy this, too!

[giveusaclue]

Hi there, don't usually look into this thread but spotted your name. Nice to see you dropping in again.

[scarletnoir]

giveusaclue wrote: "Hi there, don't usually look into this thread but spotted your name. Nice to see you dropping in again."

I second that - even though I didn't 'get on' with the only Conrad I tried to read!

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

LeatherCol wrote:

Conrad’s short story “The Secret Sharer”. One of the best stories about being gay I’ve ever read. Stunningly good.

Oh, excellent, thank you. I think I might go for this Penguin Classics edition: The Secret Sharer and Other Stories - the others look less attractive.

Can confirm that it is good to see you! Was thinking of you the other day, in connection with a Stefan Zweig novella recommended by Hushpuppy (who you may remember under a different monicker): https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

[Lljones]

LeatherCol wrote: "Cheers to you all..."

Cheers to you too, Leather! Hope you'll stop by more often.

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

LeatherCol wrote:

Those TLS discussions seem almost from another lifetime...as does Berlin (my profile photo here is in Berlin!).
And...your choice of edition for the Conrad seems excellent: if I understand your point about attractiveness correctly, I agree that it is a plus when the edition looks attractive. The cover of a book is, I think, hugely important.
Cheers to you all
Col

Hey Col,
yes, TL&S does seem almost from another lifetime.

The word “nostalgia” comes from two Greek roots: νόστος, nóstos (“return home”) and ἄλγος, álgos (“longing”). I would define it as a longing for a home that no longer exists or has never existed.

(Source: http://monumenttotransformation.org/a... - that's an article I found via Swelter, back on TL&S, too). Well, at least TL&S DID exist!

And Berlin is still there, I promise. I have been there a couple of times since we met last. They are doing a "Club Culture Reboot" - https://www.dw.com/en/berlin-takes-st...
(You might like the "Latex and Leather only!" quote.)

I agree on the cover and the difference it makes, in fact I haunted poor storm with enthusiastic replies on the subject soon after first posting in TL&S, but I also like it when a book is well-crafted in general and feels good to the touch.

I think I miffed glad and Mach recently, writing about what Mr. B calls "ugly English books" - I suppose I put my foot in it! When I was younger, I had to go for cheap editions, which indeed often look ugly now. Also the sunlight didn't/doesn't do them much good (I have lived in brightly-lit daylight rooms whenever I could). And then there's the ugly, ugly gold lettering you get with English-language books. and not only the trashy ones (Hilary Mantel comes to mind).

Ack, I suppose I have put my foot in it - again.

___________
Technicalities: You never see who has replied to you in these threads directly by a separate indicator, unless you enable "notify".
What works well for me is the button on the right-hand side titled "my group discussions", https://www.goodreads.com/topic?ref=n.... At least, this way you have a good overview over new posts. The general group page showing all threads is, er, clunky.

In any case: Cheers and hope to see you again.

Edit: Should probably say that I was not clubbing, myself, when I stayed in Berlin.

[Robert]

LeatherCol wrote: "Conrad’s short story “The Secret Sharer”. One of the best stories about being gay I’ve ever read. Stunningly good."

Have you read William Carlos Williams' "The Knife of the Times"?

[giveusaclue]

LeatherCol wrote: "giveusaclue wrote: "Hi there, don't usually look into this thread but spotted your name. Nice to see you dropping in again."

Hey, please see my reply to Shelflife below."
Seen, thanks

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Stefan Zweig, The Burning Secret

The Baron, bored on holiday, begins a flirtation with a beautiful woman via her twelve-year-old son. He befriends the child and charms him, all the while attempting to seduce the mother – but he cannot begin to imagine the effect he is having on the boy’s life…

https://pushkinpress.com/books/burnin...

[Greenfairy]

I haven't seen all the suggestions, so I'm sorry if I am repeating,
A childhood favourite, The secret Garden
and The Secret Life of Trees, Colin Tudge.

[CCCubbon]

Not a story but a two line poem by Robert Frost

The Secret Sits

We dance round in a ring and suppose,
But the Secret sits in the middle and knows.


It’s that wretched elephant in the room again!

Great to see you, Col. Hope all well.

[Greenfairy]

Sebastian Barry; The Secret Scripture

[Greenfairy]

LeatherCol wrote: "Shelflife_wasBooklooker wrote: "LeatherCol wrote: Conrad’s short story “The Secret Sharer”. One of the best stories about being gay I’ve ever read. Stunningly good. Oh, excellent, thank you. I thin..."

Cheers to you as well Col 😊

[Robert]

LeatherCol wrote: "Robert wrote: "LeatherCol wrote: "Conrad’s short story “The Secret Sharer”. One of the best stories about being gay I’ve ever read. Stunningly good."

Have you read William Carlos Williams' "The Kn..."

I'm a fan of Gothic writer Sheridan Le Fanu, and have enjoyed his supernatural tale "Carmilla." It's surprisingly frank about the sexuality of the Carmilla character, given the mid-Victorian time of writing.

[Robert]

I vaguely remember a kid's book called "The Secret World of Og," a mischievous underground adventure.

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

LeatherCol wrote: "Hey,
Thanks for the Svetlana Boym which I will read properly later.
Looks interesting.
And...thanks for the clubbing clip! I just hope “the most Berlin rejection” caused the poor, woefully underdressed, guy to question whether he might actually want to comply with the latex/leather dress code and then come out as a leatherman! I’m sure he’d have received an enthusiastic welcome! "

Ha, I can envisage the enthusiastic welcome!
Maybe he just needed that nudge regarding his self-recruitment to the scene. Who knows?

Glad you think the Svetlana Boym text of interest. I think her disctinction of restorative and reflective nostalgia a useful start for approaching the topic.

Which periods of nostalgia do you think might be shared in what might constitute queer memory?
Here in Germany, it's definitely Twenties and early Thirties Berlin, with many go-to places and a lively, if precarious scene. (And definitely not free of repression, it should be stressed.) This scene's destruction makes its remembrance even more poignant.

I seem to remember that, for obvious reasons, with Edmund White, as well as with other writers, it's the period before HIV hit so badly.
Then there is also an imagined queer past, with books like Tipping the Velvet.

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Machenbach wrote:

"I was, and remain, unmiffed."

Hey there. That's good to read.

I find these threads related to personal reading status really confusing. Often I'm unsure whether I have overlooked something or whether someone has overlooked something written by me... though I take it that the notifications work most of the time (I hope).

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Hey, thanks for your thoughts on this fascinating topic. It's important to me that queer people are seen as part of history and can remember and, if they like, commemorate the events and people important to them visibly (not in secret).

[Lass]

Fiction…the incomparable Alice Munro’s collection “ Open Secrets”

Non fiction…Sarah Helm’s “A Life in Secrets. The story of Vera Atkins and the Lost Agents of the S O E.”. The courage of these women was truly humbling.

[Lass]

Sorry, courage of, or courageous.

[Shelflife_wasBooklooker]

Good calls, Lass! I probably should get hold of that Munro collection, and Vera Atkins reads intriguing.

It is good to see your and earlier contributions. Have got a new one, too: In the book shop today, I saw The Secret by Rhoda Byrne - I would doubt it's everyone's cup of tea, though. (I was not tempted to buy it at all.)