#Epistolary Novels

[booksinpiles]

Dedicated to @charlesemersonwinchesteriii

[cupofteajones]

Stuart Turton Talk Now Online

Stuart Turton Talk Now Online

Didn’t manage to make the Janice Hallett author talk I conducted ? Don’t worry! The full discussion is now online. It was so wonderful to talk to Janie about her bestselling book The Appeal. I hope you enjoy the conversation as I much as I did and it makes you go out to pick up The Appeal and her latest, The Twyford Code! Watch Below! (more…)

[thatscarletflycatcher]

Thinking again about the darknesses that lurk underneath the surface of Sense and Sensibility (I have talked before about how Edward despite being the eldest is subjected to what we can argue is emotional and financial abuse by his family for years, and how the Dashwood women are disinherited on a whim of their great uncle), and this time specifically about the Brandons.

We get so little about them, and what we do get about them is all bad:

This lady was one of my nearest relations, an orphan from her infancy, and under the guardianship of my father... At seventeen she was lost to me for ever. She was married—married against her inclination to my brother. Her fortune was large, and our family estate much encumbered. And this, I fear, is all that can be said for the conduct of one, who was at once her uncle and guardian. My brother did not deserve her; he did not even love her... I have never told you how this was brought on. We were within a few hours of eloping together for Scotland. The treachery, or the folly, of my cousin’s maid betrayed us. I was banished to the house of a relation far distant, and she was allowed no liberty, no society, no amusement, till my father’s point was gained... My brother had no regard for her; his pleasures were not what they ought to have been, and from the first he treated her unkindly.

Mr Brandon Sr is shown to us as being a greedy man, a bad administrator of his estate, and a cruel father. His first son seems cut of the same cloth, and his pleasures were not what they ought to have been is one of the most, if not the most sinister line between all the Austen novels. But there's more about him!:

Her legal allowance was not adequate to her fortune, nor sufficient for her comfortable maintenance, and I learnt from my brother that the power of receiving it had been made over some months before to another person. He imagined, and calmly could he imagine it, that her extravagance, and consequent distress, had obliged her to dispose of it for some immediate relief.

The Brandons were married for two years; the colonel returns to England and starts looking for her 3 years later. Young Eliza was then a 3 year old toddler. We are obliquely told that Brandon cut all ties with his brother:

It was a valued, a precious trust to me; and gladly would I have discharged it in the strictest sense, by watching over her education myself, had the nature of our situations allowed it; but I had no family, no home; and my little Eliza was therefore placed at school. I saw her there whenever I could, and after the death of my brother, (which happened about five years ago, and which left to me the possession of the family property,) she visited me at Delaford.

Eliza is now 17, so the eldest brother died when she was 14, which is 16 years after his marriage with the older Eliza. In that period of time, he managed to squander the whole of her fortune, and put the estate in debt again, as we are told earlier on by Mrs Jennings:

Poor man! I am afraid his circumstances may be bad. The estate at Delaford was never reckoned more than two thousand a year, and his brother left everything sadly involved. I do think he must have been sent for about money matters, for what else can it be? I wonder whether it is so. I would give anything to know the truth of it. Perhaps it is about Miss Williams and, by the bye, I dare say it is, because he looked so conscious when I mentioned her. May be she is ill in town; nothing in the world more likely, for I have a notion she is always rather sickly. I would lay any wager it is about Miss Williams. It is not so very likely he should be distressed in his circumstances now, for he is a very prudent man, and to be sure must have cleared the estate by this time. I wonder what it can be! May be his sister is worse at Avignon, and has sent for him over. His setting off in such a hurry seems very like it. Well, I wish him out of all his trouble with all my heart, and a good wife into the bargain.”

We know the Bennets, with five daughters, and without a saving mindset, still manage to live very comfortably with 2000 a year, and if they had had any mind to save money, they could have provided all five of them with decent dowries/money enough to keep them out of poverty when their father died if they were single. It is clearly not that the money isn't enough, or that Delaford is an unproductive estate; in fact, it is described to us as almost paradisiac:

Delaford is a nice place, I can tell you; exactly what I call a nice old fashioned place, full of comforts and conveniences; quite shut in with great garden walls that are covered with the best fruit-trees in the country; and such a mulberry tree in one corner! Lord! how Charlotte and I did stuff the only time we were there! Then, there is a dove-cote, some delightful stew-ponds, and a very pretty canal; and every thing, in short, that one could wish for; and, moreover, it is close to the church, and only a quarter of a mile from the turnpike-road, so ’tis never dull, for if you only go and sit up in an old yew arbour behind the house, you may see all the carriages that pass along. Oh! ’tis a nice place! A butcher hard by in the village, and the parsonage-house within a stone’s throw. To my fancy, a thousand times prettier than Barton Park, where they are forced to send three miles for their meat, and have not a neighbour nearer than your mother.

One interesting character, though forgotten because only mentioned in passing, is the Brandon sister. On one of the quotes above we get that she's in Avignon for her health, and we know her husband is wealthy (and probably abroad with her) because it is his estate that the planned picnic is for:

A party was formed this evening for going on the following day to see a very fine place about twelve miles from Barton, belonging to a brother-in-law of Colonel Brandon, without whose interest it could not be seen, as the proprietor, who was then abroad, had left strict orders on that head. The grounds were declared to be highly beautiful, and Sir John, who was particularly warm in their praise, might be allowed to be a tolerable judge, for he had formed parties to visit them, at least, twice every summer for the last ten years. They contained a noble piece of water; a sail on which was to form a great part of the morning’s amusement; cold provisions were to be taken, open carriages only to be employed, and every thing conducted in the usual style of a complete party of pleasure.

It is implied that Brandon and his BIL are in very good terms (and we know he's not afraid of cutting ties with bad relatives), and one can safely guess that at the very least he cares enough about his wife as to have her travel for her health. Another guess can be made about her getting married about 10 years before the events of the book. Whether she lived at home before that, or was at school or somewhere else, it isn't said.

But this way you can feel there's a parallel in a way, between the Brandons and the Tilneys: a greedy, cruel father, a son that follows on his steps, and a younger brother and sister managing the toxicity as best they can. Talking about this with @bad-at-names-and-faces, she brought up the idea that in that scheme, Cathy would be Eliza (if it wasn't her not being an orphan, or a rich heiress, and how that connects with Austen's line about Cathy not being born to be a heroine at the beginning of Northanger Abbey). Certainly part of it is the romantic gothicness of the Brandon backstory, united with NA's commentary on Gothic tropes, but to me it drove home with even greater force how such a situation would break a man; losing Cathy that way would have definitely broken Tilney, and if we had met him 14 years down the line, would he have appeared to the unacquainted much different than Brandon appeared to the Dashwood sisters?

[aethersea]

HEY I LOVE THE SCHEHEREZADE PARALLEL ACTUALLY?? trapped with a capricious tyrant who must be entertained through the night, and you don’t know how long you yet have to live but all you can do is keep trying to be pleasant, to be interesting, to talk yourself hoarse if that’s what it takes and pray that it’ll be enough

[haveyoureadthishorrorbookpoll]

Have you read...

note: If you did not finish but feel you read enough to form an opinion, you may choose a ‘Yes’ option instead of 'Partly' (e.g., Yes, I didn’t like it). Similarly, if you’ve never heard of a book until now but formed an opinion from this post, you may wish to select a “no” option e.g., “No, but I want to.”

(...) [A] work of epistolary fiction and metafiction focusing on a fictional documentary film titled the Navidson Record, presented as a story within a story discussed in a handwritten monograph recovered by the primary narrator, Johnny Truant. The narrative makes heavy use of multiperspectivity as Truant's footnotes chronicle his efforts to transcribe the manuscript, which itself reveals the Navidson Record's supposed narrative through transcriptions and analysis depicting a story of a family who discovers a larger-on-the-inside labyrinth in their house.

submit a horror book!

[amplexadversary]

Right. This has been a vampire thing since *Dracula* Dracula. For some reason that's so easy to forget.

[thecandlewasters]

[forthegothicheroine]

We’ve talked about Muppet Dracula with Gonzo as Van Helsing, and while that’s still a good idea, we are overlooking another obvious option.

“My name is Bram Stoker!”

“And my name is Rizzo the Rat!”

[outstanding-quotes]

To be misunderstood is the fate of our kind.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther

[just-late-roman-republic-things]

Book review: Augustus, a novel by John Williams.

This is not a history book. This is a story about small and ordinary people living through extraordinary times. It's a story about destiny, betrayal, love and grief; about how the same person can do both wonderful and horrible things. It is a book that raises questions - how far should you go in pursuit of what is right? What price are you willing to pay? How do you choose between your loved ones and your country? And it doesn't grant you a comfortable answer.

It's written in epistolary format: a collection of fictional letters, memoirs, meeting notes and public announcements from Augustus' contemporaries. The biggest voice in the novel is Julia, Augustus' daughter, whose journal is incredibly touching. Another standout narrator is Marcus Agrippa, who's a perfectly nice guy but intensely biased toward Augustus, and who will lie so smoothly to defend him you won't even notice it. Mark Antony shines in all his appearances, too.

Honestly, all of the narrators are either good or great. Williams' prose is exquisite and evocative. We don't hear from Augustus himself until the very end, a narrative choice that forces us to consider the feelings of the people around him, and how his actions (both great and horrible) affected them. We see those narrators fade out one by one, as Augustus outlives almost everyone, and the second half of the book is very melancholy as a result. By the time we see Augustus' own words, he's an old man questioning whether he made the right choices, whether it was all worth it in the end. His self-doubt mirrors the conflicted feelings and judgment you will probably be feeling as a reader by then.

I wouldn't call it a sad ending; there are sparks of hope and joy, and the world keeps moving, in some ways better than before. It's bittersweet. It humanizes a man who would be the "evil overlord" in many other stories - in fact, I think it humanizes everyone, including the antagonists, and that's part of what makes it so moving.

This is not a book for people who want clear good guys and bad guys, or a happy ever after. It's also not completely historically accurate: Williams took a few liberties for the sake of wrapping up character arcs, and he glosses over the proscriptions and the immense damage Augustus did to Roman democracy. The author emphasizes at the beginning that this is fiction, and the narrators are clearly not supposed to be objective, so I can forgive that. Just don't use this book as a reference for judging the real people.

Even so, if you want something poignant, thought-provoking, and heartfelt, this book is an excellent choice. It has my favorite portrayals of Julia, Maecenas, Salvidienus, and a lot of other historical figures from this era. Highly recommended.

[jenni3penny]

FEBRUARY 2024: READING LIST

Lavender House, Lev AC Rosen: 4.50/5.0 Fiction & LGBTQIA+, 274pgs

Did You Hear What Eddie Gein Done, 3.75/5.0, Schechter & Powell: Graphic Novel & Biographical, 224pgs

Heartstopper: Vol. 2, Alice Oseman: 3.50/5.0, Graphic Novel & LGBTQIA+, 320pgs 

Moloka'i, Alan Brennert: 3.75/5.0, Fiction & Historical, 416pgs

Vanessa and Her Sister, Priya Parmar: 4.50/5.0, Fiction & Biographical, 384pgs

Wit, Margaret Edson: 3.75/5.0, Play & Literary, 85pgs

Selected Letters of Vanessa Bell, Bell & Marler: 4.25/5.0, Autobiographical & Literary, 593pgs

Nettle & Bone, T. Kingfisher: 4.0/5.0, Fiction & Fantasy, 243pgs

The Sisters’ Arts, Diane Filby Gillespie: 4.0/5.0, Biographical & Literary, 376pgs

Snapshots of Bloomsbury, Maggie Humm: 4.25/5.0, Biographical & Literary, 240pgs 

There Is Always Universe, Tiffany Aurora: 3.0/5.0, Poetry & Literary, 102pgs

Blue Horses, Mary Oliver: 3.50/5.0, Poetry & Literary, 96pgs

The Cassandra, Sharma Shields: 3.75/5.0, Fiction & Historical, 304pgs

Ghost Wall, Sarah Moss: 3.50/5.0, Fiction & Historical, 152pgs

Canto for a Gypsy, Martin Cruz Smith: 3.25/5.0, Fiction & Thriller, 176pgs

***

MOST ENTERTAINING: Vanessa and Her Sister & Lavender House

LEAST ENTERTAINING: Canto for a Gypsy & There Is Always Universe 

PAGES PER FEBRUARY: 3,985 (+94)

PAGES YTD: 7,876

[cupofteajones]

Best Books of 2022...So Far: Fiction & Mysteries

Best Books of 2022…So Far: Fiction & Mysteries

Welcome to another round of the Best Books of the Year so Far, where halfway through the year, I name the titles I read that I feel are the best of 2022. Just like last year, I will be listing the books by different genre and format. So stay tuned every Thursday throughout the rest of this month, catch my favorite reads of 2022 that you want to keep your eye on! (more…)

[purplebass]

2023 books ~ daddy long legs by jean webster

"I'm going to enjoy every second, and I'm going to know I'm enjoying it while I'm enjoying it. Most people don't live; they just race. They are trying to reach some goal far away on the horizon, and in the heat of the going they get so breathless and panting that they lose sight of the beautiful, tranquil country they are passing through; and then the first thing they know, they are old and worn out, and it doesn't make any difference whether they've reached the goal or not."

[desdasiwrites]

– Heather Fawcett, Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries

[suguruslut]

Watched Frankenstein (1931) and the first thing I see is "based on the novel by Mrs. Percey Shelley."

THE DISRESPECT 😤😤 I was fuming for half the movie lol

[fideidefenswhore]

i feel like they basically tried to transpose the storyline/dynamic btwn coa and mary boleyn from tobg in tsp (with coa and bessie blount) and realllly overdid what was already well-done and entertaining.