"let's sway / under the moonlight, this serious moonlight / and if you say run / i'll run with you"

[larryhammer]

Wednesday reading meme day yay.

Finished:

Miss Marjoribanks* by Margaret Oliphant, a Victorian triple-decker that I can only describe as "social manipulation competence porn." The titular character is very good at running her drawing-room-based world, and her town, through judicious indirection and calculated directness. Best character study of a domestic tyrant (narrator's term) I've read, and a delight through and through. Oliphant is not a Trollope** or even a Gaskell, but she wields her irony on point and was a popular writer for good reason, even if we have largely forgotten her.

The Towers of Sunset by L.E. Modesitt, dropping back to book two of the Recluse series. Meh. I don't think I've ever believed a matriarchy written by a male author. That this is an origin-story installment (another one) may also be a factor.

Fanfic from just-past Yuletide, to be reported on later.

In progress:

Back to Rondo Allegro by Sherwood Smith, to a little short of half-way.

Up next:

Sorcerer to the Crown by Zen Cho just arrived from the library, yays.


* Pronounced "Marchbanks."

** Which is just as well, as he'd've bungled this one, especially the election business in the last third.

---L.

Subject quote from "Let's Dance," David Bowie (RIP).

Comments

[stevendj.livejournal.com]

The Oliphant sounds like my cup of tea. Thanks for the rec.

[larryhammer]

It does indeed.

[puddleshark.livejournal.com]

Miss Marjoribanks sounds rather interesting... I think I may have to track down a copy. Thanks.

I've been battling reader's block; nothing appeals. But surely curiosity will force me to pick up and open a book by a new (to me) Victorian author.

[larryhammer]

That's often a good way to find entirely new authors, when nothing known appeals.

I believe there's been a couple recent reprints, including one by Penguin Classics. Or there's the Gutenberg version linked in the post.

---L.

[genarti]

I'm in the middle of reading Miss Marjoribanks and enjoying it enormously, but I'd been pronouncing her surname phonetically the whole time. So thank you for the footnoted tip!

[larryhammer]

I suspected this starting a little ways in, but the text itself confirms the pronunciation a couple chapters from the end.

---L.