You've Captured My Heart

You've Captured My Heart

Jan 19, 2013

I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith

Release Date: 1948
Pages: 343 pages
Source & Format: Bought; Paperback
Amazon | Goodreads

Summary (from Amazon)

I Capture the Castle tells the story of seventeen-year-old Cassandra and her family, who live in not-so-genteel poverty in a ramshackle old English castle. Here she strives, over six turbulent months, to hone her writing skills. She fills three notebooks with sharply funny yet poignant entries. Her journals candidly chronicle the great changes that take place within the castle's walls, and her own first descent into love. By the time she pens her final entry, she has "captured the castle"--and the heart of the reader--in one of literature's most enchanting entertainments.

Thoughts on I Capture the Castle

Let me start by saying that this is a book to be savored. And it's already on my list of favorite books I've ever read. Not favorite of 2012... FAVORITES EVER. I'll be re-reading this book for the rest of my life. You hear that? I'll be telling you about my love for it in no uncertain terms. Now let's begin.

Cassandra Mortmain lives with her father, stepmother, sister and brother in a rundown castle in the English castle. While a castle may sound romantic, the family's poverty certainly isn't. Mr. Mortmain was a famous author, but a series of events have left him temperamental and unable to write anything. Topaz, her stepmother, is a free spirit. Modeling for painters, she longs to be someone's muse. Rose, Cassandra's older sister, just wants to marry a rich man. As a beauty, it's likely she'll be able to accomplish her goal. The younger brother, Thomas, exists but doesn't often step into the spotlight.

The book is written as Cassandra's journal, chronicling her observations and thoughts on everything going on around her. As an aspiring writer, it's delightful to watch Cassandra mature as the book progresses. It's a coming-of-age story with a narrator who reminded me of Anne from Anne of Green Gables. And that's quite a compliment because I adore Anne.

Life is rather routine for the Mortmain family until two American brothers, Simon and Neil Cotton, arrive and throw everyone into a tizzy. I knew next to nothing about this story, and I think it's best experienced that way.

Let me just say, however, that I found this book to be enchanting. Cassandra's voice is winningly naive. She charms you and disarms you with her thoughtful (and often comical) reflections. I also have to love a girl who references Pride and Prejudice rather often.

I had heard of this book, but I'd never felt compelled to read it until I found it in a little bookstore in San Francisco. Determined to buy a book while I was visiting the city, I took this home with me. And I'm oh so glad I did! I was shocked by how quickly I fell in love with this witty and memorable book. This is the kind of story and narrator that creeps into your heart and just leaves you feeling warm and glowy inside.

I can't say enough about how much I loved the writing. I wanted to savor it, to roll each word around in my head and let the descriptions come alive off the page. But the story was good, too! I wanted to race ahead and find out what was going to happen next. In my opinion, that makes for the best kind of book.

There aren't enough words to tell you how much I loved this story, this family and this world. I don't know whether to be happy I finally discovered it or to be mad I didn't find it sooner! This book won't be right for everyone, but it was the perfect read for me. I honestly think you'll probably know if you'll enjoy this book just by reading the first page.

So Quotable

"When I read a book, I put in all the imagination I can, so that it is almost like writing the book as well as reading it - or rather, it is like living it. It makes reading so much more exciting, but I don't suppose many people try to do it."

“How I wish I lived in a Jane Austen novel!” 

“Noble deeds and hot baths are the best cures for depression.” 

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Survival of the Nerdiest

Survival of the Nerdiest

Jan 18, 2013

Judging a Book By Its Lover by Lauren Leto

Release Date: 269 pages
Publisher: HarperCollins | Harper Perennial 
Pages: October 2012
Source & Format: Library; Paperback
Amazon | Goodreads

Summary (from Goodreads)

Want to impress the hot stranger at the bar who asks for your take on "Infinite Jest"? Dying to shut up the blowhard in front of you who's pontificating on Cormac McCarthy's "recurring road narratives"? Having difficulty keeping Francine Prose and Annie Proulx straight?

For all those overwhelmed readers who need to get a firm grip on the relentless onslaught of must-read books to stay on top of the inevitable conversations that swirl around them, Lauren Leto's Judging A Book By Its Lover is manna from literary heaven! A hilarious send-up of - and inspired homage to - the passionate and peculiar world of book culture, this guide to literary debate leaves no reader or author unscathed, at once adoring and skewering everyone from Jonathan Franzen to Ayn Rand to Dostoyevsky and the people who read them.

Thoughts on Judging a Book By Its Lover

Lauren Leto has written a book for bookworms. What follows is a series of essays about book-related topics: rules for public reading, stereotyping people by their favorite author, how to fake almost any author, how to write like any author and how to pick someone up in a bookstore.

With wit and snark, Leto tackles many topics that will have bookaholics laughing out loud. I really loved certain chapters - talking about that certain bookstore smell and why "bookworm" really should be "bookcat." But other sections just had me skimming the pages. Some of the lists just drag on, and sometimes the writing comes across as pretentious and snobby. 

I'm going to be honest - I didn't understand every reference she makes and hadn't heard of every book mentioned. Because of that, I just skipped around a lot in this book. I smiled in some parts, but I didn't really laugh like I was expecting. The book relies on generalizations for the most part, so you kind of have to take everything with a grain of salt. 

I wish Leto had focused more on the memoir part of this book because I loved reading about her experiences as a reader. I also loved her essay sections that left me wanting to highlight large passages and just say, "YES. THIS." Honestly, it was really just the list chapters that I found lacking. If it had been longer, with fewer lists and more essays, I think I would have loved this book.

I liked it as a light read, but I'm glad I found it at the library. It read like a series of blog posts - and there just didn't seem to be enough substance to justify purchasing it. I did, however, really love a few passages that made me glad I'd spent some time with this book.

So Quotable

"Considering yourself a serious reader doesn't mean you can't read light books. Loving to read means you sometimes like to turn your head off. Reading is not about being able to recite passages of Camus from memory. Loving young adult novels well past adolescence isn't a sign of stunted maturity or intelligence. The most important thing about reading is not the level of sophistication of the books on your shelf. There is no prerequisite reading regimen for being a bookworm."

"That's the kind of connection we can form with a stranger - even without their knowing - just by seeing a particular book in their hands. Life happens alongside the act of reading - a story is forever mixed with where we were and what we were doing while we were reading that book. To see someone else reading that book is to know that you share a sort of intimate experience."

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An Austen Adventure

An Austen Adventure

Jan 17, 2013

All Roads Lead to Austen by Amy Elizabeth Smith

Release Date: June 2012
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Pages: 384 pages
Source & Format: Bought; Paperback
Amazon | Goodreads

Summary (from Amazon)

With a suitcase full of Jane Austen novels en español, Amy Elizabeth Smith set off on a yearlong Latin American adventure: a traveling book club with Jane. In six unique, unforgettable countries, she gathered book-loving new friends— taxi drivers and teachers, poets and politicians— to read Emma, Sense and Sensibility, and Pride and Prejudice.

Whether sharing rooster beer with Guatemalans, joining the crowd at a Mexican boxing match, feeding a horde of tame iguanas with Ecuadorean children, or tangling with argumentative booksellers in Argentina, Amy came to learn what Austen knew all along: that we're not always speaking the same language— even when we're speaking the same language.

But with true Austen instinct, she could recognize when, unexpectedly, she'd found her own Señor Darcy.

Thoughts on All Roads Lead to Austen

Travelogue + Memoir + Austen essay = All Roads Lead to Austen.

A literature professor, Amy Elizabeth Smith became intrigued by the idea of studying Austen in other cultures. She noted that her students reacted to Austen's works in a way that was completely unlike their experience with books by other authors. They'd speak of being an Emma, meeting a Darcy, knowing a Wickham... their reactions were personal. They'd analyze the Brontes, but they'd become invested in Austen.

Watching her students, she knew that she wanted to study how Austen would translate in Spanish-speaking countries. She then sets up reading groups with the locals in six Latin American countries, each with the purpose of discussing a selected Austen novel. She wants to know how these men and women will react to such a difference culture.

Smith spends time discussing what she does in each country, as well as how each reading group reacts to the work they've read. I found it interesting to see how they responded to Austen, and I honestly wish Smith had just focused on her reading groups. The Austen discussions was mostly very surface-level, and the dialogue seemed a bit juvenile. I think the fact that she wasn't really a Spanish-speaker likely hindered the discussions, as did the fact that a number of her reading group participants didn't completely read the book in question.

There was a lot of time spent talking about her own personal experiences, and those sections started to grate on my nerves. I think the challenge with writing a memoir is that it's really easy for the focus on yourself and your experiences to start to seem really self-centered. Unfortunately, this book kind of suffers from that. There's a bit of whining and self-centeredness that dragged the book down a bit. I didn't pick this up to read about her adventures - I chose it to read about how Latin American readers would react to Austen. And I really wanted more of that and less of her personal opinions, actions and relationships.

Also, don't read this book is you're not familiar with Austen but plan to read her work - this does spoil the endings. I'd assume that you can't really spoil books that are 200 years old, but you never know...

For literary commentary, look elsewhere. If you like travel memoirs and want some Austen thrown in, you'll probably enjoy this trip to the Latin America.

So Quotable

"Brontë World is to be viewed and enjoyed at a distance, but Austenland is a place where people feel inclined to get cozy with the locals..."

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You're No Emma Woodhouse

You're No Emma Woodhouse

Jan 16, 2013

The American Heiress by Daisy Goodwin

Release Date: June 2011
Publisher: Macmillan | St. Martin's
Pages: 468 pages
Source & Format: Gift; Hardcover
Amazon | Goodreads

Summary (from Amazon)

Be careful what you wish for. Traveling abroad with her mother at the turn of the twentieth century to seek a titled husband, beautiful, vivacious Cora Cash, whose family mansion in Newport dwarfs the Vanderbilts’, suddenly finds herself Duchess of Wareham, married to Ivo, the most eligible bachelor in England. Nothing is quite as it seems, however: Ivo is withdrawn and secretive, and the English social scene is full of traps and betrayals. Money, Cora soon learns, cannot buy everything, as she must decide what is truly worth the price in her life and her marriage. 

Thoughts on The American Heiress

Since you probably can't read it in this picture, the blurb on the cover says, "Anyone suffering from Downton Abbey withdrawal symptoms will find an instant tonic in Daisy Goodwin's deliciously evocative first novel." When I passed this book in Barnes & Noble, I was definitely suffering from Downton withdrawal and hoped this would do the trick. Sadly, I quickly learned that an imitation isn't always flattering. 

Cora Cash's family is rich, and she's beautiful. So what could she possible need? The thing money can't buy her - a title. So, she travels abroad with her mother in order to find an eligible bachelor. Her mother is controlling, and her father serves no purpose other than supplying them with money.

As soon as Cora arrives in London, she undergoes training with an American woman living abroad who makes a living teaching rich heiresses how to find themselves a man with a title. That section was kind of interesting, but everything just went downhill from there.

While out riding, Cora falls off her horse and is rescued by Ivo. He's a duke, and they end up getting married. There are a few interactions in between them meeting and marrying, but they weren't memorable in the least.

There's a lot of drama once they get married. It was mostly predictable, overdramatic or just stupid. Ivo is an ass for almost the entire book, and Cora herself is pretty unlikeable. 

Honestly, this was such a letdown. My biggest complaint with the book was that I felt like it was trying to be both a romance and historical fiction. I don't read romance novels, but I love historical fiction. Sadly, this wasn't good historical fiction. It was fluffy, predictable and it bothered me that it felt like there were these random racy moments that seemed to be added for no reason. For example, Cora is concerned that she won't know how to kiss. So, she kisses her mixed-race maid to practice. Ummmm.... what? I just seemed so strange and out-of-place. And that was just in the first twenty pages.

It's not a terrible book, but it's not one I would recommend. There are so many great examples of historical fiction out there, and this one just didn't cut it for me.

So Quotable

"Cora found most novels hard to sympathize with - all those plain governesses - but this one had much to recommend it. The heroine was 'handsome, clever, and rich', rather like Cora herself. Cora knew she was handsome - wasn't she always referred to in the papers as 'the divine Miss Cash'? She was clever - she could speak three languages and could handle calculus. And as to rich, well, she was undoubtedly that. Emma Woodhouse was not rich in the way that she, Cora Cash, was rich. [...] But Emma Woodhouse was motherless which meant, thought Cora, that she was handsome, clever, rich and free."

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Somewhere Pretty, Something Sweet

Somewhere Pretty, Something Sweet

Jan 15, 2013

I’ve had a love affair with bridges for a long time. Ever since the Anne of Green Gables movie set the standard for me, I’ve adored the romance of a beautiful bridge. In the movie, Gilbert tells Anne, “It’ll be three years before I finish medical school, and even then there won’t be any diamond sunbursts or marble halls. Anne replies, a woman in love, “I don’t want diamond sunbursts or marble halls. I just want you.” That moment sealed it for me – good things happen on bridges.

I’m not a girl who wants grand romantic gestures. I may like reading about them, but I don’t necessarily want them in real life. No rose petal trails or hot air balloons for me. I always joked with the handsome one about my obsession with bridges. And I’d tease: “Take me somewhere pretty, tell me something sweet, and I’ll be yours forever.”

So I was both surprised and smitten two years ago today when he took me to Tallulah Falls. I thought we were just going to spend the day outside. We’d just had several days of snowfall (basically unheard of in Georgia), so it was a winter wonderland walking through the woods. Then, on a bridge overlooking a waterfall, with the sun just beginning to melt the snow on the ground, he asked me to spend the rest of my life as his wife.

For the life of me, I can’t remember what he said. He does, however, like to joke about the fact that I looked at the ring and asked, “For me?” And when I realized it was the ring I’d been dreaming about for years, it made the moment all the sweeter. I should probably note that he wouldn’t actually let me take the ring out of the box while we were on a bridge. Thank goodness. My clumsy fingers didn’t need to be clutching a diamond while standing over a body of water!

We got married just six months later, and the last year and a half has been even better than I could have imagined. From buying a home to adopting a puppy (and one day having babies!), there is no one I’d rather go through life with than him.

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