Be Frank With Me, by Julia Claiborne Johnson builds in intensity as the plot develops and the characters are slowly fleshed out. The reader is drawn in and after awhile is so involved in the lives of Frank, a young 10 year old child with a very old soul and Alice who comes to take of Frank so his mother, Mimi can finish her long awaited second novel.
Frank is a young boy with a very odd personality which is never really diagnosed with any definitive coding but you wonder about throughout the story. He dresses in costume outfits from old movies and old styles. He was born in the wrong era, when it comes to his clothes. He is a small genius, who can memorize and recite facts as if reading from an encyclopedia. But, when it comes to personal interaction and social cues he is oblivious. He is described as an "odd duck", nostalgic for a simpler time. Frank dressed for an outing, "...he'd refreshed himself with a pass through Wardrobe. Now he was wearing an outfit more suited to an afternoon's motoring; white gloves, white canvas duster over chinos and a white shirt, leather aviator's cap and goggles, a silk scarf and old-school binoculars around his neck."
Mimi is the illusive author who wrote the bestselling novel, Pitched at the age of 19, which still flies off the shelves but never published again. Now she has lost everything in a Madoff style ponzi scheme and her editor, Isaac Vargas, sends his girl Friday assistant, Alice to help make sure the novel will be written. Alice is the young, naive assistant who leaves New York, for Los Angeles thinking she will be typing the manuscript, but ends up taking care of Frank, while Mimi is locked away noisily typing behind closed doors.
Though there are some unrealistic events in the book like Xander, the handyman, family friend who keeps showing up and disappearing throughout the book. A number of accidents that do not seem plausible and the fact that even though the story takes place in 2009, Mimi is typing her book on a typewriter, not a computer and turns over the care of her son to Alice, even when he is having trouble in school.
What makes the book so wonderful to read is that Alice and Frank develop a beautiful relationship as the plot develops and both seem to grow up and have a chance to be very introspective. Though the story is presented in a light hearted manner, there are some heart warming moments and there are some sad moments throughout the novel.
Monday, March 28, 2016
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
A Guide for the Perplexed
When my children were born and as they were growing up I took pictures of every
event in their lives and recorded every milestone in a book so that nothing would be
lost to faulty memory. It has become a fascination with people in my baby boom generation to trace our roots. We are looking for the story of our family’s past, our connection to our history.
In Dara Horn’s new book, A Guide for the Perplexed she takes this concept of people recording every aspect of their lives and expands it. Her protagonist Josie Ashkenazi, a software prodigy, has invented an application that records everything everybody does in their day to day life. She calls the computer program, the Genizah. This includes not only the important events that we are afraid we will someday forget, but every mundane activity.
In one example in the book, she has recorded every activity she and her daughter do so that in the morning when her young daughter cannot find her shoes, they just need to play the recording and see where she left them the night before.
The book takes on three different journeys based on this obsession with preserving the past. First, we are introduced to her sister Judith, who works for Josie’s company. In a modern version of Jacob and Esau, the jealous sister arranges a trip for Josie to fly to Egypt and sell this computer program to the Alexandria Library. Josie is abducted and presumed dead by the family she left behind in America. Judith then steals her sister’s husband and daughter.
Layered over this story line we learn the story of Solomon Schechter, a Cambridge professor,
who goes to Palestine to retrieve medieval archive, the Genizah, hidden in a Cairo synagogue. He brings back bags of papers that have been thrown in an attic in the old synagogue for centuries. The best known genizah, a synagogue store room for documents that for religious reasons cannot be destroyed. He takes on two assistants and they read through the mundane history of congregants from a millennium ago. The marriage certificates, the divorce decrees, the letters of people long gone.
Among the papers Horn imagines the papers of Moses Maimonides, the 12th century Jewish philosopher and physician. His actual book, “the Guide for the Perplexed” explores the relationship between faith and reason. In the room, Horn creates the fiction that Schechter finds
the draft copies of this famous book and copies of letters he exchanged with his brother.
The three journeys are connected as Josie reads Maimonides’ “Guide to the Perplexed” in her prison cell and Schecter finds the manuscripts in Cairo. Josie wrestles with the value of memory and the possibility of not really being in control of life. Maimonides says, “We choose what is worthy of our memory. We should probably be grateful that we can’t remember everything as G-d does, because if we did, we would find it impossible to forgive anyone”. Schecter comes to similar conclusions as he realizes sometimes it is not it is not always best to remember every detail of the past. The Rambam struggled with the paradox of destiny versus freewill and in Dara Horn’s A Guide To The Perplexed all the characters are struggling to see if they are in control of their lives or if there is a higher power that has the final say.
Dara Horn has written three other novels, In The Image, and The World To Come and All Other Nights. She has won many awards including 2003 National Jewish Book Award, the 2002 Edward Lewis Wallant Award, and the 2003 Reform Judaism Fiction Prize. She has taught courses in Jewish literature and Israeli history at Harvard, Sarah Lawrence College, and City University of New York, and lectured across North America and Israel. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and four children.
event in their lives and recorded every milestone in a book so that nothing would be
lost to faulty memory. It has become a fascination with people in my baby boom generation to trace our roots. We are looking for the story of our family’s past, our connection to our history.
In Dara Horn’s new book, A Guide for the Perplexed she takes this concept of people recording every aspect of their lives and expands it. Her protagonist Josie Ashkenazi, a software prodigy, has invented an application that records everything everybody does in their day to day life. She calls the computer program, the Genizah. This includes not only the important events that we are afraid we will someday forget, but every mundane activity.
In one example in the book, she has recorded every activity she and her daughter do so that in the morning when her young daughter cannot find her shoes, they just need to play the recording and see where she left them the night before.
The book takes on three different journeys based on this obsession with preserving the past. First, we are introduced to her sister Judith, who works for Josie’s company. In a modern version of Jacob and Esau, the jealous sister arranges a trip for Josie to fly to Egypt and sell this computer program to the Alexandria Library. Josie is abducted and presumed dead by the family she left behind in America. Judith then steals her sister’s husband and daughter.
Layered over this story line we learn the story of Solomon Schechter, a Cambridge professor,
who goes to Palestine to retrieve medieval archive, the Genizah, hidden in a Cairo synagogue. He brings back bags of papers that have been thrown in an attic in the old synagogue for centuries. The best known genizah, a synagogue store room for documents that for religious reasons cannot be destroyed. He takes on two assistants and they read through the mundane history of congregants from a millennium ago. The marriage certificates, the divorce decrees, the letters of people long gone.
Among the papers Horn imagines the papers of Moses Maimonides, the 12th century Jewish philosopher and physician. His actual book, “the Guide for the Perplexed” explores the relationship between faith and reason. In the room, Horn creates the fiction that Schechter finds
the draft copies of this famous book and copies of letters he exchanged with his brother.
The three journeys are connected as Josie reads Maimonides’ “Guide to the Perplexed” in her prison cell and Schecter finds the manuscripts in Cairo. Josie wrestles with the value of memory and the possibility of not really being in control of life. Maimonides says, “We choose what is worthy of our memory. We should probably be grateful that we can’t remember everything as G-d does, because if we did, we would find it impossible to forgive anyone”. Schecter comes to similar conclusions as he realizes sometimes it is not it is not always best to remember every detail of the past. The Rambam struggled with the paradox of destiny versus freewill and in Dara Horn’s A Guide To The Perplexed all the characters are struggling to see if they are in control of their lives or if there is a higher power that has the final say.
Dara Horn has written three other novels, In The Image, and The World To Come and All Other Nights. She has won many awards including 2003 National Jewish Book Award, the 2002 Edward Lewis Wallant Award, and the 2003 Reform Judaism Fiction Prize. She has taught courses in Jewish literature and Israeli history at Harvard, Sarah Lawrence College, and City University of New York, and lectured across North America and Israel. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and four children.
Monday, March 21, 2016
Vintage
Vintage, written by David Baker, is a entertaining novel especially appealing to wine lovers and foodies. If you are a person of discerning taste, who eats for the pleasure of the textures and flavors of the food and not just for the nourishment to your body than this is your kind of novel. If you consider yourself a connoisseur of fine wine and do not drink whatever wine is the least expense to accompany your meal, than you are in for a treat.
Vintage uses the plot device of uncovering a mystery to hold together a story of the gastronomic adventures of the main character, Bruno Tannenbaum. Tannenbaum is a washed up, food journalist, wine connoisseur and bestselling author. His marriage is on the rocks and he is sleeping on his mother's couch. The only people who really still believe in him are his daughters, Carmen and Claire. When we meet Bruno he is drinking and eating his way through the last of his money as he slowly slides into a depression that will end his career. He is trying to write another bestseller but his love of drink is a stumbling block that leads to being fired by his newspaper and his agent.
One last chance to redeem himself, both to the public and his family, presents itself when he accidentally finds a cork from a wine bottle that comes from a "lost" wine vintage. This special wine was part of a collection that was stolen or smuggled out of France during World War II. Not only would the wine be worth a fortune but this would be the story Bruno has been looking for to write about and resurrect his career and regain respect.
Through the book, Vintage, we follow Bruno as he renews old acquaintances, making new friends and searching for clues to solve the mystery of the "lost" wine bottles. He drinks and eats his way through France, from the vineyards of Burgundy through Moldova all the way to a Russian prison.
The descriptions of the wines and the information about the process of making wine and growing the grapes is interesting. Mouthwatering are the descriptions of the meals Tannenbaum cooks as he tries to win the love of his estranged wife and his daughters, and when he desperately needs information to solve the mystery. Each chapter heading is about different types of food, wine or ways to win a lover through food and wine. Each chapter has a paragraph description that is a quote from Bruno Tannebaum's first and only successful book, Twenty Recipes for Love. Quoted are descriptions of esoteric ingredients or recipes that are fascinating to learn about. One chapter is titled, "Mamaliga, a Moldovan corn porridge that is boiled and served plain along side a traditional fresh curdled ewe cheese..." another, Lepeshka, a Russian bread from Uzbekistan, "round and indented in the center, sprinkled with sesame and butter crust, dense, chewy, passed around the table, torn off in chunks..." These paragraphs add a layer of delicious taste for the foodie reading this book.
Nothing could be more true than the paragraph at the beginning of chapter eight, words to live and cook by, "Don't allow anyone to tell you that you can't cook. I know, dear reader, that you may be intimidated. You might be afraid of failure. And fail you shall. Often. There are those who claim a superior palate. Maybe they've summered in Florence and own stainless-steel appliances. They have kitchen gardens and wine cellars, which are fine, though hardly required. All you truly need to learn to cook; a pan, a flame, good ingredients, an open heart, a dash of tenacity and a pinch of courage. The rest will take care of itself. " - Bruno Tannenbaum, from the forward to Twenty Recipes for Love
Vintage uses the plot device of uncovering a mystery to hold together a story of the gastronomic adventures of the main character, Bruno Tannenbaum. Tannenbaum is a washed up, food journalist, wine connoisseur and bestselling author. His marriage is on the rocks and he is sleeping on his mother's couch. The only people who really still believe in him are his daughters, Carmen and Claire. When we meet Bruno he is drinking and eating his way through the last of his money as he slowly slides into a depression that will end his career. He is trying to write another bestseller but his love of drink is a stumbling block that leads to being fired by his newspaper and his agent.
One last chance to redeem himself, both to the public and his family, presents itself when he accidentally finds a cork from a wine bottle that comes from a "lost" wine vintage. This special wine was part of a collection that was stolen or smuggled out of France during World War II. Not only would the wine be worth a fortune but this would be the story Bruno has been looking for to write about and resurrect his career and regain respect.
Through the book, Vintage, we follow Bruno as he renews old acquaintances, making new friends and searching for clues to solve the mystery of the "lost" wine bottles. He drinks and eats his way through France, from the vineyards of Burgundy through Moldova all the way to a Russian prison.
The descriptions of the wines and the information about the process of making wine and growing the grapes is interesting. Mouthwatering are the descriptions of the meals Tannenbaum cooks as he tries to win the love of his estranged wife and his daughters, and when he desperately needs information to solve the mystery. Each chapter heading is about different types of food, wine or ways to win a lover through food and wine. Each chapter has a paragraph description that is a quote from Bruno Tannebaum's first and only successful book, Twenty Recipes for Love. Quoted are descriptions of esoteric ingredients or recipes that are fascinating to learn about. One chapter is titled, "Mamaliga, a Moldovan corn porridge that is boiled and served plain along side a traditional fresh curdled ewe cheese..." another, Lepeshka, a Russian bread from Uzbekistan, "round and indented in the center, sprinkled with sesame and butter crust, dense, chewy, passed around the table, torn off in chunks..." These paragraphs add a layer of delicious taste for the foodie reading this book.
Nothing could be more true than the paragraph at the beginning of chapter eight, words to live and cook by, "Don't allow anyone to tell you that you can't cook. I know, dear reader, that you may be intimidated. You might be afraid of failure. And fail you shall. Often. There are those who claim a superior palate. Maybe they've summered in Florence and own stainless-steel appliances. They have kitchen gardens and wine cellars, which are fine, though hardly required. All you truly need to learn to cook; a pan, a flame, good ingredients, an open heart, a dash of tenacity and a pinch of courage. The rest will take care of itself. " - Bruno Tannenbaum, from the forward to Twenty Recipes for Love
Friday, March 18, 2016
A Bag of Marbles
The original story was written by Joseph Joffo and is a memoir that chronicles the journey Joseph and his brother took across France to continually escape capture by the Nazi army. Based on his real life story, this book shows how he and his brother travelled from Paris, in the occupied zone of France to the free zone, constantly on the move one step ahead of capture. This book describes another way a family could survive during the war. This memoir shows both the history of the time period and how a family could, though there were close calls, for example being questioned about their papers, live through the war in the free zone of France, even at one point attending school. After the war the brothers and their mother were able to return to Paris. Joffo's father died in a concentration camp.
Here cartoonist, Vincent Bailly takes the adaptation written by Kris of Joffo's original book and illustrates the story into a graphic novel. It is a holocaust story. There is disturbing content, of the atrocities that happened during the war. Bailly has drawn a well created and descriptive adaptation of the plot. The pictures are well drawn and color is well used to both represent the lighter and darker moods of the story. It is sometimes a bit hard to recognize the individual characters but for the most part the characters are well drawn and believable.
I have read reviews that target this book to young teens, but though it is a graphic novel, I think,
this is not really a novel for children. It is an enticing way to get older teens to read about the Holocaust.
Here cartoonist, Vincent Bailly takes the adaptation written by Kris of Joffo's original book and illustrates the story into a graphic novel. It is a holocaust story. There is disturbing content, of the atrocities that happened during the war. Bailly has drawn a well created and descriptive adaptation of the plot. The pictures are well drawn and color is well used to both represent the lighter and darker moods of the story. It is sometimes a bit hard to recognize the individual characters but for the most part the characters are well drawn and believable.
I have read reviews that target this book to young teens, but though it is a graphic novel, I think,
this is not really a novel for children. It is an enticing way to get older teens to read about the Holocaust.
Thursday, March 17, 2016
From Ashes into Light
What a wonderful title for the new book by Gudrun Mouw. Mouw, herself having grown up in East Prussia has written about the Holocaust and countered balanced that atrocity against the Native American struggle on the coast of California at the time of the Spanish conquest. Though the subject of the novel is interesting, the execution of the writing did not grab me and make me eager to read the novel.
This was a very abstruse novel. I found the plot incomprehensible to follow. It is not that the story line is complicated but it was not to my taste. The chapters alternate between the story of Ruth, who living as a young Jewish girl during the Holocaust, Friede who is of German decent living during the Holocaust and her father is a soldier who is sent away to a work camp. This is all set against a story of Saqapaya, a Native American from coastal California during the time of the Spanish conquest.
Each of the main characters are suffering through tragic turbulent times in history. Somehow there is a phoenix bird that flies through their stories tying them together. Then there is a light that shines through each situation as if the character is having an out of body experience, or finding truth.
When Friede is converting to Judaism she talks about a dream she had, "I had a dream last night. In the dream, there was a part where I saw nothing but light, and it was as if the light was chanting, ... (she chants) As I repeat these words I feel strong inside, light shines around the walls of the room, along the ceiling and along the shapes of the celebrants. I see myself standing inside the light."
Though a topic and time period I really enjoy reading about, this book was not a story I enjoyed. I was not eager to finish reading the book and I would not, I am sorry to say, recommend it to friends.
This was a very abstruse novel. I found the plot incomprehensible to follow. It is not that the story line is complicated but it was not to my taste. The chapters alternate between the story of Ruth, who living as a young Jewish girl during the Holocaust, Friede who is of German decent living during the Holocaust and her father is a soldier who is sent away to a work camp. This is all set against a story of Saqapaya, a Native American from coastal California during the time of the Spanish conquest.
Each of the main characters are suffering through tragic turbulent times in history. Somehow there is a phoenix bird that flies through their stories tying them together. Then there is a light that shines through each situation as if the character is having an out of body experience, or finding truth.
When Friede is converting to Judaism she talks about a dream she had, "I had a dream last night. In the dream, there was a part where I saw nothing but light, and it was as if the light was chanting, ... (she chants) As I repeat these words I feel strong inside, light shines around the walls of the room, along the ceiling and along the shapes of the celebrants. I see myself standing inside the light."
Though a topic and time period I really enjoy reading about, this book was not a story I enjoyed. I was not eager to finish reading the book and I would not, I am sorry to say, recommend it to friends.
Tuesday, March 15, 2016
Beekeeper's Apprentice
Laurie R. King writes the series about Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes. She writes at the beginning of the first book in the series, Beekeeper's Apprentice, that she was sent this manuscript in the mail and she is just putting out into the world a book written by someone else, that being Mary.
So far I have only read the this one book in the series, but I do look forward to reading more of the adventures between Mary and Holmes. This is a fun, well written story that seems like it could almost have been written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. King has really found the rythym and voice of the original Sherlock Holmes mysteries.
In the Beekeeper's Apprentice, we meet Mary Russell, a young girl who has recently become an orphan sent to live with an unpleasant aunt. Mary meets a man on the downs and realizes she has encountered Sherlock Holmes, now retired and living the life of a Beekeeper. She enjoys visiting his cottage and being his apprentice and also being well after by Mrs. Hudson. Slowly, because she has such a quick wit and remarkable mind she and Holmes develop an amazing working relationship and become partners. Holmes trusts Mary incredibly, even more than he did Dr. Watson.
But their relationship stays professional and Mary is quickly accepted by Watson and Holmes' brother, Mycroft. the story build first just as what seems like individual cases, almost presented as short stories, but int he end everything ties together as Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes get mixed up in a case inc which they are both being targeted. They could have both been killed, but their quick thinking and intuitive reasoning helps them live to solve more crimes another day.
I am looking forward to reading about them working together again.
So far I have only read the this one book in the series, but I do look forward to reading more of the adventures between Mary and Holmes. This is a fun, well written story that seems like it could almost have been written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. King has really found the rythym and voice of the original Sherlock Holmes mysteries.
In the Beekeeper's Apprentice, we meet Mary Russell, a young girl who has recently become an orphan sent to live with an unpleasant aunt. Mary meets a man on the downs and realizes she has encountered Sherlock Holmes, now retired and living the life of a Beekeeper. She enjoys visiting his cottage and being his apprentice and also being well after by Mrs. Hudson. Slowly, because she has such a quick wit and remarkable mind she and Holmes develop an amazing working relationship and become partners. Holmes trusts Mary incredibly, even more than he did Dr. Watson.
But their relationship stays professional and Mary is quickly accepted by Watson and Holmes' brother, Mycroft. the story build first just as what seems like individual cases, almost presented as short stories, but int he end everything ties together as Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes get mixed up in a case inc which they are both being targeted. They could have both been killed, but their quick thinking and intuitive reasoning helps them live to solve more crimes another day.
I am looking forward to reading about them working together again.
Remarkable Creatures
I have enjoyed so many of Tracy Chevalier's books, including her first wonderful and popular novel, The Girl With The Pearl Earring. This book, Remarkable Creatures, just reconfirms for me what a fabulous author she is. She has a talent for taking a historically little known person and bringing their story to life.
In the novel, Chevalier has taken the facts of Mary Anning's life and discoveries and brought them out of obscurity. This novel is both a delightful story of friendship, love and jealousy, and of history, biography and scientific discovery. Until now, Mary Anning' name would only be known in the scientific circles of dinosaur hunters. Also portrayed in the this novel is another real life character,
Elizabeth Philpot, who helped bring Mary the recognition she deserved. It is always even more fascinating to read a novel that teaches you something new.
In the 1800 in England, women did not have the same rights or privileges as men. Women were still thought of as property. Marriage was what a woman should aspire to and spinsters were shuttled off to live quietly in obscurity. Such is the fate of the three Philpot sisters. Margaret, Louise and Elizabeth are set up by their brother to live their life out in the seaside town of Lyme Regis. Elizabeth discovers there are many fossils of fish vertebrae and starts to collect them. Her sister Louise is happy gardening and Margaret is the family socialite. Though they are living in reduced means after leaving London, as three spinsters, they are happy in the seaside village.
Elizabeth becomes friends with a young girl who collects fossils curios to sell to tourists and collectors. When she starts to uncover unusual fossilized skeletons which attract attention from the scientific community, the friendship between Mary and Elizabeth becomes strained.
This is a story of how the two women find their way through the pressures of class distinction and social prejudice to find that friendship can withstand jealousy and anger. Mutual appreciation, shared passion and loyalty can overcome envy and jealousy. The strength of friendship during an era in history when women were not seen and definitely not heard. This is story that shows how when you let go of the feelings of conventionality, and caring what others will think you reach a feeling of freedom and empowerment that lets you experience amazing new situations and make incredible accomplishments.
New updated review: second read:
Written by Tracy Chevalier, Remarkable Creatures turned out to be an incredible book. I admit I started this book just because I was supposed to read it for a book discussion group. Not wanting to show up for another month not having read the book, I started in. At first I thought the book was boring. The premise was interesting but I did not see where it was going and it seemed dull. But as you realize that the story line is not the most important thing about this book, this plot line becomes more and more incredible.
Remarkable Creatures is a book about the relationship between Mary Anning, who along with her brother hunt along the cliffs on the south coast of England and find fossils and the remaining bones of animals that have been extinct for hundreds of years. They are uneducated and this being the 1800s are not even sure of what they are finding. They sell them as curios to tourists to keep themselves and their mother fed.
This is also the story of Elizabeth Philpot, a cranky, cantankerous, spinster who along with her sisters has moved to the Lyme Regis after the death of her parents. She and her sisters live together, traveling to London in the summer, so as not to be a burden on their married brother and his family. Elizabeth is interested in science and fossils and meets Mary out on the cliffs. They form a fast friendship despite a difference in age. They are more knowledgable about the fossils than most of the men who come to the area looking to purchase their fossils.
Most remarkable about this novel to me was how these women are collecting fossils and fragments of animals they have not even heard of. This is a time in history when we have not yet realized how the world was created. This a a very religious area, where the church and the theory of G-d creating the world with what is listed in the Bible and no other animals is the standard belief system. This is all happening before Charles Darwin brings out his ideas of evolution and origins of species. The information that Mary is discovering is controvercial at this time. How could there be an animal that is now extinct? Why would G-d create an animal only to let it die out? G-d did not make mistakes.
It is remarkable the fossils they collected. It is remarkable that especially Mary did not really get the credit she deserved . At age 12 she discovered the first complete specimen of an ichthyosaur, a marine reptile about 200 million years old. Without fancy tools, she was able to pull out these animals almost intact. She was able to clean them and put them together correctly.
In the end remarkably, Mary and Elizabeth, stay close through landslides, arguments and jealousy and help each other grow stronger and more educated about fossils and life.
In the novel, Chevalier has taken the facts of Mary Anning's life and discoveries and brought them out of obscurity. This novel is both a delightful story of friendship, love and jealousy, and of history, biography and scientific discovery. Until now, Mary Anning' name would only be known in the scientific circles of dinosaur hunters. Also portrayed in the this novel is another real life character,
Elizabeth Philpot, who helped bring Mary the recognition she deserved. It is always even more fascinating to read a novel that teaches you something new.
In the 1800 in England, women did not have the same rights or privileges as men. Women were still thought of as property. Marriage was what a woman should aspire to and spinsters were shuttled off to live quietly in obscurity. Such is the fate of the three Philpot sisters. Margaret, Louise and Elizabeth are set up by their brother to live their life out in the seaside town of Lyme Regis. Elizabeth discovers there are many fossils of fish vertebrae and starts to collect them. Her sister Louise is happy gardening and Margaret is the family socialite. Though they are living in reduced means after leaving London, as three spinsters, they are happy in the seaside village.
Elizabeth becomes friends with a young girl who collects fossils curios to sell to tourists and collectors. When she starts to uncover unusual fossilized skeletons which attract attention from the scientific community, the friendship between Mary and Elizabeth becomes strained.
This is a story of how the two women find their way through the pressures of class distinction and social prejudice to find that friendship can withstand jealousy and anger. Mutual appreciation, shared passion and loyalty can overcome envy and jealousy. The strength of friendship during an era in history when women were not seen and definitely not heard. This is story that shows how when you let go of the feelings of conventionality, and caring what others will think you reach a feeling of freedom and empowerment that lets you experience amazing new situations and make incredible accomplishments.
New updated review: second read:
Written by Tracy Chevalier, Remarkable Creatures turned out to be an incredible book. I admit I started this book just because I was supposed to read it for a book discussion group. Not wanting to show up for another month not having read the book, I started in. At first I thought the book was boring. The premise was interesting but I did not see where it was going and it seemed dull. But as you realize that the story line is not the most important thing about this book, this plot line becomes more and more incredible.
Remarkable Creatures is a book about the relationship between Mary Anning, who along with her brother hunt along the cliffs on the south coast of England and find fossils and the remaining bones of animals that have been extinct for hundreds of years. They are uneducated and this being the 1800s are not even sure of what they are finding. They sell them as curios to tourists to keep themselves and their mother fed.
This is also the story of Elizabeth Philpot, a cranky, cantankerous, spinster who along with her sisters has moved to the Lyme Regis after the death of her parents. She and her sisters live together, traveling to London in the summer, so as not to be a burden on their married brother and his family. Elizabeth is interested in science and fossils and meets Mary out on the cliffs. They form a fast friendship despite a difference in age. They are more knowledgable about the fossils than most of the men who come to the area looking to purchase their fossils.
Most remarkable about this novel to me was how these women are collecting fossils and fragments of animals they have not even heard of. This is a time in history when we have not yet realized how the world was created. This a a very religious area, where the church and the theory of G-d creating the world with what is listed in the Bible and no other animals is the standard belief system. This is all happening before Charles Darwin brings out his ideas of evolution and origins of species. The information that Mary is discovering is controvercial at this time. How could there be an animal that is now extinct? Why would G-d create an animal only to let it die out? G-d did not make mistakes.
It is remarkable the fossils they collected. It is remarkable that especially Mary did not really get the credit she deserved . At age 12 she discovered the first complete specimen of an ichthyosaur, a marine reptile about 200 million years old. Without fancy tools, she was able to pull out these animals almost intact. She was able to clean them and put them together correctly.
In the end remarkably, Mary and Elizabeth, stay close through landslides, arguments and jealousy and help each other grow stronger and more educated about fossils and life.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)