Bookends, Book Reviews by JC

A spare biography. Shields treats Austen with respect and admiration, shows Austen’s growth as a novelist, and comments on the writing process and Jane’s societal context. A regret: distance between Carol and Jane. An irony: Shields noted Sandition “does not read like the work of a dying woman” when she, too, died of breast cancer in 2003.                        7.5/10

The final book in my Austen rereading odyssey, Emma, isn’t among my favourites. My main reason: I don’t really like Emma, herself. She is well drawn as a know-it-all-better-than–anyone else young woman, particularly in affairs of the heart. It is how her character develops and mellows in the last 1/3 of the novel as she comes to see her own blindness that redeems the story for me. Her father and the dread Elkins are exaggerated to the point of annoyance but serve their purpose in the context for Emma’s evolution. Mr. Knightly, her knight undeclared and then revealed, is credible as a family friend, but as her lover? It’s a bit creepy to me that so many years her senior he admits to loving her since she was thirteen. Still the romance and happy ending please. 6.7/10

A friend’s invitation to an all-Austen session at her book club proved irresistible. The challenge: to read/reread as many Austen novels beforehand. I love ‘rereading’  Austen, a global phenomenon as described in a recent Times Books article. I read Pride and Prejudice twice a year as an antidote to stress. Sense and Sensibility: once a year. Both checked off my list. I turned first to Persuasion, a fine exposition on (un)requited love; then to Mansfield Park. Fanny Price didn’t disappoint. Though hobbled by her situation in life and outwardly restrained to a fault, she rises to every occasion, plus shows herself to be a thoroughly ‘modern ‘woman with judgment who won’t settle for less than she knows she deserves. The language is delightful, the settings rendered skillfully. A wonderful place to escape for a reader in 2015.                        9/10

When Ms. Humphreys spoke recently about writing fiction vs. poetry, she claimed you can have a perfect poem but not a novel. She may be right about poetry and also about her new novel, The Evening Chorus. It is as distinguished by its originality and by its often beautiful and lyrical language as it is by its imperfections.  At its best: the novel’s premise and the setting (POW survives by studying redstarts) are captivating and memorable. The offset plot and ill-fated wartime and post-war romances of the characters in England can feel less satisfying and somewhat contrived, as does the neatness of the ending. Also, the free use of free indirect style approaches the ‘no-no’ of telling rather than showing at times.     7/10

Does this non-fiction account with names-changed-to-protect-the-innocent-and-expose-the-guilty merit its accolades? Yes and no. I’m relieved that Connelly’s Touch the Dragon won the GG’s literary award for non-fiction, rather than this personal, sometimes so intimate, account of her coming to maturity and to an acceptance of reality in the cities, refugee camps and small towns embroiled in the struggle for democracy in Burma( Myanmar) and along the Thai-Burma border. But there’s good writing here, at its best when capturing the individuals she meets and the places she visits. You see the journalist/novelist and the poet at work, sometimes at odds. And that tension is often delicious.  Only the love affair—central to the narrative—disappoints somewhat. Why? Because sex often trumps desire in the telling, and the inevitability of the relationship’s failure is obvious throughout. BOOKEND RATING: 7/10.