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Rest You Merry
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Dec 23: Rest You Merry (#1 Professor Peter Shandy) by Charlotte MacLeod (1978)
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Who is joining us on this read? I've just finished listening to the audio version and really enjoyed it.
The spoiler thread is linked below:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
It’s the next book but one on my list. I loved this series when it first came out and can’t wait to revisit it.
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This is an annual holiday reread for me, I appreciate the way the author shows the town/gown relationship, from my father-in-law’s time as an associate Dean at the small university I attended (and worked at briefly), it rings very true! As does the various personalities of faculty- as a student, they all seemed old, but work “behind the scenes”, and you realize it’s as rife with gossip, intrigue and conflict as any workplace! I loved this series when I first read it many years ago, and even though it seems more dated with each year that passes (lack of cell phones and other technology), the humor is still there for me!
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Sandy wrote: "This was a re-read but from eight years ago. Surprisingly I remembered the premise, the victim and the college setting, especially the president. Shandy is a pleasantly grumpy character though I ha..."Still waters…they thought he was just a nice, quiet old fashioned bachelor /soil scientist, then rumors start flying (Peter started it by being cheeky and saying he was with “Suzy” over the holidays, but he said it to the wrong gossipy character, and it spread like wildfire, as campus rumors do!), and now the bored housewives (very dated, I know), think he’s a secret wildman with a hidden love life!
Enjoying it so far. Love the two professors.
Neer wrote: "Enjoying it so far. Love the two professors."Yes, I always appreciated that Shandy saw beneath his friend’s gnome-like exterior to the smart, incisive mind and dry humor.
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Judy wrote: "I really enjoyed the descriptions of the horrendous illumination at the start and the way Peter is tempted into taking part with a vengeance - though I dread to think of his electricity bills, even..."Yup, even with the colorfully named “skunk works” providing power on campus!
I will be joining you, and I have an ebook from the library so I will be forced to finish it in 11 days before it disappears back into the library cloud (unlike library book-books which I will occasionally hold late to finish!). I haven't read this author before but understand she was Canadian-born (though became an American citizen later) so that's an extra incentive for me to try her out. First I have to finish our Lorac though!
I haven't decided - I read it four years ago. Not sure how fresh it is in my mind. So I may re-read or not.
I've started this and enjoying so far-yes I like the friendship between the two men, although the way they dance around discussing the murdered wife is a little odd, but perhaps not for two academics-while I hate to get all Psychological, the fact that Shandy counts everything and remembers the numbers does suggest some neurodivergence.
Also, what a lot of drinking is going on! Very 70's vibe.
Definitely a different world! The echoes of the sexual revolution too.
Starting this today, my first by this author!
Just finished this one. It was fun, but took me a while to get into it.
I've just finished too. I gave it four stars, because I did sort of enjoy it, but I had difficulties with the way the women in the community were presented - over sexed and generally unattractive busybodies. Except of course for the wonderful Helen ...Were there any female academics? I remember them as all being wives/secretaries, not lecturers.
As the second book is available on Kindle Unlimited, I'll give it a try, anyway.
There were two female academics introduced to Helen outside the cafeteria, Shirley Wrenne and Pam (?) something. Don’t remember there areas of study.Since the book was set in the 1970s, I think, I wasn’t surprised at the small number of female academics, especially at a small agricultural college.
"Ms. Waggoner, a thin, dark assistant in Animal Husbandry" (I dread to think what that involves ..."Ms. Wrenne, a long-faced blonde clad in a great deal of hand-weaving; she specialized in native crafts" - so basket making and bead-work.
I'm not sure if 'assistants' count as academics - the US system is different. They are not sympathetically portrayed in their brief appearance.
Rosina wrote: ""Ms. Waggoner, a thin, dark assistant in Animal Husbandry" (I dread to think what that involves ..."Ms. Wrenne, a long-faced blonde clad in a great deal of hand-weaving; she specialized in native..."
No, they’re not, are they? And animal husbandry is” concerned with animals that are raised for meat, fibre, milk, or other products. It includes day-to-day care, selective breeding, and the raising of livestock.”
I assumed “assistant” referred to assistant professor, as in not yet achieving tenure as a full professor
Definitely most of the women not portrayed in a positive way although I love the college president's wife Sieglinde.
It was definitely the case in the 1970s that there were few female full professors at American universities. It was very common to give emerging female scholars a low-paid assistant professor post for three yo seven years but then never grant them tenure. The numbers were a little better at women’s colleges but at a technical college like Balaclava there wouldn’t have been more than a handful.As for the whole oversexed faculty wife thing, I regarded it as a comic shtick rather than as something to be taken too literally. In comic writing it’s a common technique to intensify the humor of a joke by repeating it at every opportunity. It was the rumor about Shandy running off with someone named Susie that opened the floodgates—suddenly the wives were seeing him as a hot commodity. I thought it was an amusing reversal of the sexual harassment of women so prevalent in the era.
It might have meant 'assistant' as in 'person who mucks out the cow byre' or specialises in artificial insemination ... I assume that that's one of the skills taught at an Agricultural College.I am now interested to see if any of the reappear in the second book. If so, I'll update this!
Abigail wrote: "I thought it was an amusing reversal of the sexual harassment of women so prevalent in the era."I saw it as a justification for the sexual harassment of women - they're all gagging for it really! Particularly middle-aged/elderly women. I completely missed any 'humour' in the situation.
Rosina wrote: "I saw it as a justification for the sexual harassment of women - they're all gagging for it really! Particularly middle-aged/elderly women. I completely missed any 'humour' in the situation.."Yes I felt this way as well, and disliked the general mockery of older women, other than the sainted Helen.
Rosina wrote: "Abigail wrote: "I thought it was an amusing reversal of the sexual harassment of women so prevalent in the era."I saw it as a justification for the sexual harassment of women - they're all gaggin..."
Well, bear in mind that the author is female. It has been many years since I read the rest of her books but I recall them as having rational female heroines and menschy men, so I don’t think she’d intentionally write female characters as predatory sex fiends.
Abigail wrote: "It was definitely the case in the 1970s that there were few female full professors at American universities. It was very common to give emerging female scholars a low-paid assistant professor post ..."That’s how I’ve always taken it!
Abigail wrote: "It was definitely the case in the 1970s that there were few female full professors at American universities. It was very common to give emerging female scholars a low-paid assistant professor post ..."I went to a small "religious" affiliated college in the '70s and there were a number of female professors, now some may actually have only been assistant professors. But I knew one who was the head of her department - history with four other (asst) Profs in the department. And it was in the South.
On Christmas Day, a University scrooge finds a murdered librarian.
Each December, the faculty of Balaclava Agricultural College goes wild with Christmas lights. The entire campus glitters with holiday decorations, save for one dark spot: the home of professor Peter Shandy. But after years of resisting the Illumination festival, Shandy snaps, installing a million-watt display of flashing lights and blaring music perfectly calculated to drive his neighbors mad. The horticulturalist flees town, planning to spend Christmas on a tramp steamer, but soon feels guilty about his prank and returns home to find his Christmas lights extinguished, and a dead librarian in his living room.
Wishing to avoid a scandal, the school's head asks Shandy to investigate the matter quietly. After all, Christmas is big business, and the town needs the cash infusion provided by the Illumination. As Peter Shandy will soon find, though, there is a dark side to even the whitest of white Christmases.
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