what I’ve been reading lately:
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The Letter, the Witch, and the Ring by John BellairsPuffin Books, 2004 (originally The Dial Press, 1976)
This is the third of the Lewis Barnavelt mysteries, after The House with a Clock in Its Walls and The Figure in the Shadows, though the star of this one is really Lewis’s friend Rose Rita Pottinger. It’s summertime and Lewis is off to boy scout camp, and Rose Rita wishes she could go along
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The Figure in the Shadows by John BellairsPuffin Books, 1993 (originally The Dial Press, 1975)
I seem to be on a kids’ books kick at the moment, or maybe just a John Bellairs kick. This book is the sequel to The House with a Clock in Its Walls (though sadly, it’s not illustrated by Edward Gorey like the first one was) and introduces us to Lewis Barnavelt’s friend, Rose Rita
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The House with a Clock in Its Walls by John BellairsPuffin Books, 1993 (originally The Dial Press, 1973)
I’m sure I read this book as a kid and liked it, though by the time I picked it up as an adult I had forgotten just about everything about it, including the fact that it was illustrated by Edward Gorey. I’m glad I re-read it, because it’s really satisfying, right from the start. I
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Montmorency and the Assassins by Eleanor UpdaleScholastic, 2007 (originally 2005)
I found this book on the sidewalk and picked it up without having heard of this author or the series (this book is the third of four, but it works as a stand-alone story as well). It seemed promising—London! Italy! Intrigue! 1898!—but as I started reading, I was a little grumpy. The story opens with
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Finishing The Fugitive, and taking a break from Proust
I just finished The Fugitive, and it was good, and I am glad to be done with it. The “Sojourn in Venice” section was of course really pleasing, water and light and history and beauty and art, a brief boring digression on politics/diplomacy aside. There’s a surprise telegram (with an added twist) that makes our
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More in The Fugitive: “Mademoiselle de Forcheville”
The “Mademoiselle de Forcheville” section of The Fugitive starts out funny, which is refreshing: our narrator’s doing his usual thing of walking around looking at girls, he sees a group of three and tries to follow them but fails when they get in a carriage. But then, joy of joys, he sees them leaving his
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The first part of The Fugitive
With Albertine gone, our narrator immediately starts thinking of how to get her back: in contrast to the inaction of The Captive it feels like he’s suddenly all action, though really he’s still all talk: he decides he’ll marry her, but writes telling her how good it is that they’ve parted; he sends Saint-Loup to
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Finishing The Captive, moving on to The Fugitive
The rest of The Captive has been pleasing (though slow) reading. I last posted a quote from page 160-something; between there and the end there is: Albertine’s trip to the theatre cut short by the narrator’s jealousy, an afternoon carriage ride, Albertine’s visit to the Verdurins forestalled by the narrator’s jealousy, the narrator’s own visit
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The Captive: the “litanies of small trades”
Despite my initial ambivalence toward The Captive—picking it up then putting it down, picking it up and reading but feeling like it was going to be a tedious and claustrophobia-inducing recitation of jealousies— I’m now really enjoying it, and have been since around page 100. Part of this might have just been me getting back