Amodini's Book Reviews

Book Reviews and Recommendations

Wordless Wednesdays #7

Written By: amodini - Apr• 18•12

Crown Fountain, Millennium Park, Chicago

Book Review : The House at Tyneford

Written By: amodini - Apr• 16•12

[amazon_link id=”0452297648″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]The House at Tyneford: A Novel[/amazon_link]Title : The House at Tyneford
Author : Natasha Solomon
Genre : Historical Romance
Publisher : Plume
Pages : 368
Rating : 2.5/5

“The House at Tyneford” is a historical novel, set amid the upheaval of the Second World War. Elise Landau is a Viennese Jewess living with her parents Anna and Julian, a renowned opera singer and author respectively, and sister Margot. Tremors of war, and the fear of Hitler’s Jew-hating army over-running Europe causes the family to scatter. Elise is sent to England to work as a parlor maid. Her sister Margot emigrates to America while her parents wait for their exit visa. Elise, having till now lived a comfortable and wealthy life, waited on by servants, finds herself a member of the serving class. She is also homesick and worried for her parents.

Elise’s work is hard, and she is admonished by the butler and the housekeeper to devote herself to her duties. Her employer Mr. Rivers is kind and treats Elise with extra gentility when he learns that Elise’s father is the author Julian Landau. Elise also meets Mr. Rivers son, Kit Rivers when he is home, and the two fall in love. However when war breaks out, Kit enlists, much to his father’s displeasure. Kit leaves and Elise now finds herself praying for his safe return as well as the safe passage of her parents to America.

This is quite an atmospheric novel. As the cover so beautifully illustrates, Tyneford is a scenic place, and Solomon describes it well. In her words, she manages to convey the emotion of its characters and the fear, love or longing they feel. The characters were interesting – Elise and her family are described well, although I found Kit etched out a tad superficially. While this is a decent read, I found it predictable – I could tell quite early on how this was going to end; Mr. Rivers (senior) was too kind and gentle for the story to tilt any other way. Thus I wasn’t really motivated to finish it, although finish it I did.

The other issue I had was the depiction of Elise’s character as the “cosseted” heroine, the poor little rich girl – she has to but appear for everything to fall into place. And yes, it doesn’t always happen that way – she has her own hardships to deal with – but that is the lingering impression I was left with. And it is always a bummer when the main protagonist of the novel appears to have fate on her side rather than gumption and spine.

The book’s cover hints at similarities with Downton Abbey (which I love) but I didn’t find this to be true. As I write this review “The House at Tyneford” is on NPR’s Paperback BestSeller List at #5. I wouldn’t rate it as highly; while the language is polished, the book didn’t work for me.

Wordless Wednesdays #6

Written By: amodini - Apr• 11•12

Seattle Needle

NetGalley Read-a-Thon

Written By: amodini - Apr• 03•12


(Image Courtesy : Red House Books)

Yes, a month-long Read-a-thon – exactly what I need to sign up for. This is hosted by Emily of Red House Books, and encourages you to :

From April 1, to April 30 I challenge you to read as many NetGalley books as you can.I also challenge you to do some NetGalley account maintenance – post your reviews, email publishers, request new books 🙂

I’m currently reading “The Book of Lost Fragrances” by M. J. Rose and on my immediate reading list are books which released in March :

  • Murder of the Bride by C. S Chalinor
  • Blue Monday by Nicci French
  • Exogene by T.C McCarthy

The Goal is to read and review at least these 4 books during April!

Wordless Wednesdays #5

Written By: amodini - Mar• 21•12
B1340

Sunday Salon : Reading Challenge Countdown

Written By: amodini - Mar• 18•12

Checking in this Sunday to keep an up-to-date count of all the books read for my Reading Challenges. I keep forgetting to link the reviews up at the host’s site, so I’ll catch them up here. So far I have read the following :

 

GoodReads Challenge

Goal : 20
Read : 10 (See badge on right to see books read)

ARC Challenge

Goal : 24
Read : 8

EBook Challenge

Goal : 10
Read : 5

  • Accidents of Providence (March)
  • Midnight in Austenland (March)
  • Last Chance Beauty Queen (Feb)
  • The Golden Scales (Jan)
  • Pure (Jan)

NetGalley Challenge

Goal : 11-20
Read : 5

  • Accidents of Providence (March)
  • Midnight in Austenland (March)
  • Last Chance Beauty Queen (Feb)
  • The Golden Scales (Jan)
  • Pure (Jan)

South-Asian Challenge

Goal : 2
Read : 0*

*I did read State of Wonder where the protagonist is half-Indian. The book focusses only partly on Marina’s Indian ties, so think this might be a bit of a stretch to include here.

Book Review : State of Wonder

Written By: amodini - Mar• 14•12

[amazon_link id=”0062049801″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]State of Wonder[/amazon_link]Title : State of Wonder
Author : Ann Patchett
Genre : Contemporary
Publisher : HarperCollins
Pages : 353
Rating : 4.5/5

Ann Patchett’s most recent novel has as it’s stoic heroine Marina Singh, an Indian-American woman. A doctor turned researcher Dr. Singh, the daughter of an American mother and an Indian father who returned home to India after getting his doctoral degree, works for pharmaceutical company Vogel. Vogel is sponsoring research in the Amazon for a miraculous drug which will allow women to remain fertile until late age. Dr. Annick Swenson, who is spear-heading that research is a recalcitrant, close-lipped woman, who does not give Vogel much information, except to tell it that she needs more time to develop the drug. In desperation, the CEO Mr. Fox sends Marina’s research partner Dr. Anders Eckman to the Amazon to locate Dr. Swenson and get her to hasten up the drug development process.

Dr. Eckman dies in the Amazon, and word comes back to Minnesota of his death, two weeks later, via a curtly-worded blue aerogramme. Marina is then persuaded to go to the Amazon ostensibly to retrieve Dr. Eckman’s body and belongings for his grieving widow and family. In Brazil, Marina languishes for a while in Manaus at the mercy of the Bovenders, a young couple Dr. Swenson has employed to fend off Vogel emissaries. When she does meet Dr. Swenson, the eminent researcher attempts to thwart Marina’s questions and encourages her to return home. But Marina is steadfast and accompanies Dr. Swenson to her research lab in the deep jungles of the Amazon where she is studying the women of the Lakashi tribe. The location is remote, and having lost her phone en-route, Marina is cut-off from her world and it’s familiar connections and unprepared for what she will find.

There are two main characters in this book – Marina and Dr. Swenson. Swenson is an enigmatical figure, cruel yet compassionate, firm  in her own interpretation of justice and morality. Marina, ostensibly the weaker of the two, has her own demons to deal with, since she has once known Dr. Swenson well, although Dr. Swenson may not remember her. Besides that very conflict-causing fact, we also know that Marina longs for her missing father, and is caught between her Indian and American identities:

Her skin was all cream and light in comparison to her father’s and very dark when she held her wrist against her mother’s. She had her father’s round, black eyes and heavy lashes, his black hair and angular frame. Seeing her father gave her the ability to see herself, the comfort of physical recognition after a life spent among her mother’s people, all those translucent cousins who looked at her like she was a llama who had wandered into their holiday dinner. The checkers in the grocery store, the children at school, the doctors and the bus drivers all asked her where she was from. There was no point in saying, Right here, Minneapolis, though it was in fact the case. Instead she told them India, and even that they didn’t always understand.

I will admit that Marina’s character is the reason I picked up this book, ahead of all those books which cram my to-be-read pile. It doesn’t hurt that this comes much recommended by friends. And truly, “State of Wonder” is a luminous novel, and it gets it’s beauty from the wonderful prose – I could quote from every page – and Ms. Patchett’s skilled telling of the slowly unfolding, but momentous drama. I could summarize this book in a few short sentences, but that does it little justice. To fully appreciate this novel, one must read along with every eventful turn, to learn about each character – their thoughts and their motivations and the little nuanced swishes that very few authors can capture in this degree of exquisite detail :

Dr. Swenson put her hands on her thighs and pushed up but she did not stand. She was thicker around the middle than she had been in Baltimore and the weight and the long time sitting seemed to keep her tied to her case of hash. Dr. Swenson, so far as Marina could calculate would be in the neighborhood of seventy. It was possible at this point that even Dr. Swenson  was tired. Marina stood up and extended her hand.

This is the rarest of the rare – a novel that I’m tempted to award a whole, perfect 5 star rating. The only reason I don’t do it is the slightly disappointing (and heart-breaking) ending. Regardless, this is a fabulous, fabulous book. If you read one book this year, let it be this one.

Book Review : Accidents of Providence

Written By: amodini - Mar• 09•12

[amazon_link id=”0547490801″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]Accidents of Providence[/amazon_link]Title : Accidents of Providence
Author : Stacia M. Brown
Genre : Historical
Publisher : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Source : NetGalley/Publisher ARC
Rating 3.5/5

“Accidents of Providence” is a work of fiction set in the Cromwellian era of 1649, with characters based on some historical figures. In it Ms. Brown tells the story of Rachel Lockyer, a young unmarried woman, a glove-maker’s assistant, who gets pregnant. When her child dies – it is unclear whether it is still-born or not, she is targeted by Cromwell’s strict laws for “lewd women”, particularly the “Act to Prevent the Destroying and Murdering of Bastard Children(1624)”. Rachel is arrested and Thomas Bartwain, the gouty, 61 year old criminal investigator for the state must decide upon her guilt before she can be sentenced.

As the trial progresses and Bartain struggles with the testimony of the witnesses, we, the readers, get a better picture of the train of events and the characters in it – Rachel herself, her Huguenot employer Marie du Gard who has brought Rachel’s dead child to notice, Rachel’s lover the Leveler William Walwyn – a much married man and father to 14 children, her good friend Elizabeth Lillburne who tries to keep Rachel from punishment.

Most of the book deals with the narration of the events – the before, the during and the after of the child-birth, until it comes to the expected conclusion. There is no mystery or head-turning surprises here, rather it is the depiction of Rachel’s life – lone and unwed and at the mercy of a vindictive, Puritan state. The book can be intense and heavy in parts, and has a lot of detail on people and events, which make it an excellent read.

Ms. Brown develops her characters well. There is a lot of history – Rachel, Walwyn, John Lilburne are Levelers, a political faction which wants to level the opportunities for everyone – they want equality. Thomas Bartwain the investigator wants to do his duty, but his conscience and his wife have helped raised niggling doubts about what the state is asking him to do. The author also does a good job of showing us the state of women in those times. Rachel says it well :

“For myself, I have had so many hands and fingers clawing ay me my whole life long, telling me this and that and all the other is my duty, telling me fifteen duties in a row and then reminding me nothing I do matters because God has already decided one way or another, that I can hardly see what I am obliged to do or not do in this life; I can hardly lay all my duties on the table!”

The law of the time apparently punished only the mother if an illegitimate died and it was upto the mother to prove her innocence – i.e.; that the child had been still-born. If the child survived, the court could order the father fined or flogged. Eerily the problems of an unwanted pregnancy of the mid 1600s, really a very, very long time ago, reminds me of the present day, and the current ongoing war to curb women’s rights to contraception:

Rachel remembered one account of a maid-servant who went to a midwife for a blood-letting and emerged with her feet bound in red rags but her regular cycle restored. Then there was the mother of eleven who had tied her undergarments devilishly tight and pressed and flattened her stomach with a rolling pin. The next day her monthlies returned, though for weeks afterward her limbs spasmed and stiffened at inopportune moments, like a prisoner stretched on an invisible rack. Rachel remembered asking if it was a sin, what these women had done. Her great-aunt had waved this question off, her wooden spoon in her hand. She said women had neither the time nor the luxury to quibble over what was and was not a sin.

This is a well-researched, nuanced story and an engrossing read. Recommended.

Wordless Wednesdays #4

Written By: amodini - Mar• 07•12

B1589

Book Review : Midnight in Austenland

Written By: amodini - Mar• 06•12

[amazon_link id=”1608196259″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]Midnight in Austenland: A Novel[/amazon_link]Title : Midnight in Austenland
Author : Shannon Hale
Genre : Romance/Mystery
Publisher : Bloomsbury
Source : NetGalley/Publisher ARC
Rating : 3/5

I decided to read this book, because my daughter has read a number of Hale’s YA books and recommended her, when I asked her about the author. Also this book has an Austen-ian story-line, and that’s always a plus! I expected a light-hearted mystery-romance, and that’s pretty much what I got.

American Charlotte Kinder, a single, professionally successful mom of two, has booked herself into Pembrook Park which is a vacation retreat offering an immersive Jane Austen experience. This means that Charlotte and her co-vacationers live at the stately manor and dress, talk and eat in the style of the era. Each guest of Pembrook Park is assigned a persona, and actors help guests fulfill their Austenian fantasies.

When Charlotte reaches her destination in England, she discovers that she is to “be” widowed Mrs. Charlotte Cordial during her vacation. Pembrook Park is run by Mrs. Wattlesbrook, aided by male actors who play the characters of Colonel Andrews, Mr. Mallery and Mr. Edmund Grey. Charlotte is to be Edmunds’s sister and discovers with time that Mr. Malley is her Designated Love Interest. All three men are very handsome, and Charlotte finds herself “awash in an ocean of attractiveness”.

Apparently Mrs. Wattlesbrook only hired eye candy. While the colonel had a roguish appeal, Edmund was handsome in a cheery way. His slightest smile produced Death Star-size dimples in both cheeks, and his blue eyes sparkled in the candlelight. Not just metaphorically. Truly sparkled.

The other two guests at Pembrook Park are Miss. Elizabeth Charming, and Miss Lydia Gardensdale. Everything is going fairly well until an unexpected and unpleasant guest arrives. Soon after Charlotte discovers a body, which goes missing leading everyone (including Charlotte herself) to believe that the body might have been a product of her fertile imagination. However when things take a turn for the unpleasant, she must gird her loins corset and let loose the investigator within . . .

This is a simple mystery with elements of romance. I liked Charlotte’s character – it was strong, and funny and brave. Hale makes Charlotte a heroine easy to sympathize with, interspersing her time at Pembrook Park with details on her earlier marriage and divorce, and brings through Charlotte’s feelings on the subject quite nicely. Hale’s writing is infused with humor, and Charlotte thinks some very laugh-out-loud thoughts. sometimes laugh-out-loud funny. Yes, Charlotte is quirky and flippant:

Charlotte had been to parties in some impressive mansions back home, but they were weak sauce compared with this big, old stone house.

The one problem I did have this book was that Charlotte’s character did seem a tad juvenile – curious and given to whimsy (and yes, amusing) but at times just not well-thought-out, something I was expecting from a successful business-woman. I might have enjoyed this book more had Charlotte’s character had more heft. Still, this was a quick and breezy read, and I would recommend this to people looking for a light-hearted romantic mystery.