Speak

Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson

From her first moment at Merryweather High, Melinda Sordino knows she's an outcast. She busted an end-of-summer party by calling the cops - a major infraction in high school society - so her old friends won't talk to her, and people she doesn't know glare at her. She retreats into her head, where the lies and hypocrises of high school stand in stark relief to her own silence, making her all the more mute. But it's not so comfortable in her head, either - there's something banging around in there that she doesn't want to think about. Try as she might to avoid it, it won't go away, until there is a painful confrontation. Once that happens, she can't be silent - she must speak the truth.

This book has been on my periphery for awhile, but it was still surprising to me that it has a tenth anniversary edition already - ten years ago this should have been exactly the kind of book I was reading. Maybe if I had, it would have had a bigger impact on me, like The Luckiest Girl in the World, which is all kinds of melodramatic and over the top but remains one of my favorite "serious topic" books. Reading Speak for the first time as an adult, long since gotten over any high school scars, there is less of an emotional impact, less forgiveness for mood over technique. In less obtuse terms, I just didn't buy into the plot. Back in the day, that wouldn't have been a problem - books that I connected with as a teen were put into continuous rotation regardless of minor flaws. But reading it for the first time, it niggles at me, and distracts from my enjoyment of it. And there is a lot to be enjoyed from Speak; it is a good book, an excellent book for young teens especially. Speak is about Melinda, and from a character development standpoint, it's an amazing piece of work. I truly believed in (almost) all the characters, as they were written very realistically, and the internal viewpoint style of the book lends itself well to a thoughtful look at Melinda's feelings and struggles. Having a less than perfect memory of my own high school years, I can't argue with the author's depiction here - although from my own perspective, few have managed puberty with the grace and goodwill that I demonstrated time and again in the face of everlasting ridiculousness on the part of other people.

While I am willing to believe in the character and life of Melinda, I am not willing to suspend all my disbelief (and a little bit of disappointment) in the plot she must navigate. It doesn't take a detective to read between the lines of the front cover flap, but in case you are easily startled the rest of this review involves a major ***SPOILER***SPOILER***SPOILER*** (although to be fair, it's only a spoiler if you've been under a rock since your early letter-learning days). The book begins at the beginning of school, maybe a few weeks after Melinda called the cops on a teenage party where she was raped, pissing off all her friends, and this is where my imagination begins to stretch. Since the book never covers this time period, we are left wondering why not a single one of her friends asked her why she called. I find it hard to believe that not one of her friends from who knows how long didn't stick by her, at least until Melinda had the opportunity to drive them away as she does someone else later in the book. It made me question just how valuable these friends are in the first place, if they can't forgive one summer faux pas against the years they knew Melinda. And yes, Anderson does try to make even older readers understand the depths of betrayal of the cop-calling (one student's sibling lost their job, or some such thing) but I think the more natural reaction isn't the flat-out hate that Melinda has to deal with, but more of an insidious lack of trust. I feel like the reactions of the other kids are so overblown that it becomes cartoonish, while a more realistic rendering would have been more powerful - trying to fight outright hate is (true story) easier than fighting smoke, the frustration of trying to prove the negative, that you aren't untrustworthy. The matter of Melinda's age also bugged me - it's such a small detail, but she's a full year younger than she should be as a freshman, which made her younger at the time of the rape, and the moment of reveal is done such that I feel like it's just to manipulate the reader, trying to add shock value, a look-how-awful-because-so-young! moment. The mere fact of the rape is appalling by itself, and even though I am sure Anderson didn't intend the age thing to come off the way it did, well, it did to me.

And while we're on the subject of unnecessary overexaggeration, I would like to get the matter of the rapist off my chest. WHY IS HE PURE EVIL? I mean, yes, of course, he is terrible, because anyone who does that to a girl is terrible, but why is he so dumb as to attempt to do it again after she accuses him and her friends don't even believe her? It is nice to prove Melinda's strength and healing after the course of the book, but how insane was that whole scene? To be fair, I was on the edge of my seat biting my nails just as much as the next person, but even while I was terrified for Melinda, I was thinking, "Oh, come on." Part of the reason for the book's endurance is the realistic treatment of teenagers and rape, and all of a sudden there is a too-perfect opportunity for Melinda to change her future the way she can't change her past, and I just don't buy it. I can't help picturing people who have their own struggles to conquer, reading this book and finding hope, but then being like, "Well, since I didn't get cornered by my rapist again and fight him and win and everyone believes me this time, it's not a good ending." Not only are there other ways to prove your strength besides ass-kicking your former rapist, those are much more common. I guess, in the long run, I would have preferred a book that took the hard way out, the way without a tidy bow, the way that has to accept that even without the opportunity to expose your rapist for the scum he is and prove your own strength and non-victimness, you can live without fear or shame.

So give this to every young girl you know, but give it to them before they grow up and become too cynical to read this books for all of its gifts, and none of its flaws. In short, mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys.

The Turn of the Screw

The Turn of the Screw, by Henry James

The story starts with friends sharing ghost stories 'round the fire on Christmas Eve. One of the guests tells about a governess at a country house plagued by supernatural visitors. Only the young governess can see the ghosts; only she suspects that the previous governess and her lover are controlling the two orphaned children for some evil purpose. The household staff don't know what she's talking about, the children are evasive when questioned, and the master of the house is absent. Why does the young girl claim not to see a perfectly visible woman standing on the far side of the lake? Are the children being deceptive, or is the governess being paranoid?

I hated this book. Novella, story, whatever. I am relying on my (not always reliable) memory because if I never read another word of Turn of the Screw, it will be too soon. I have to work hard just to erase the memory that I do have of this book. It was, in a word, agony to get through. I cannot say this enough: I hated this book. Hate, hated, will hate. The story is not simple: a tale within a tale. The book, like Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew, begins with a group of people telling stories, in this case, ghost stories. Like Shakespeare, once we are thrust into the main meat of the book, we never return to the original storyteller and listeners. Had I been at that gathering, I would have a few choice words for the storyteller, not least of which would be a scathing indictment of the company they keep and their opinion in the "scariness" of their chosen tale.

The main character (I dare not call her "heroine") is the governess, sent to watch over two young children in the countryside, whose uncle and guardian can't muster up the energy to care for them himself, or to actually find a responsible caretaker for them. Instead, he settles on our erstwhile narrator, who begins as she means to go on: maudlinly, irrationally, and with the certainty granted to both lunatics and self-declared martyrs. All of which she is. A worse governess I cannot imagine. Were it only the governess whose character I despised, I might think that Henry James is actually a genius, able to write good stories without the benefit of the reader liking the main character. Not so. I hate the governess, the children, the housekeeper, the ghosts, the uncle, everyone. I hate the drary monotony of the story, and the absurdity of the plot and actions. It's like the stupid plotline, where the only way to get to the climax is to have every person behave as though they had a head injury, or a script. There is no reason (or at least we're privy to none) as to why anyone would act the ways they do. The sheer irresponsibilty of the governess begs the question of why she wasn't locked up after these events. The mere knowledge that this person was able to obtain work, and work as a governess after this strained and broke the limits of my patience and imagination. The whole situation was so crazy that I didn't even care whether or not the ghosts existed - the mere continuance of the governess in her role, and the fact that no one removed her to a padded call was such an annoyance that the whole ridiculous demonic children side story was only insult added to injury. The governess, upon deciding that the children are under the influence of their former servants, alternates between coddling them and shrieking at them like a priest in the grips of an exorcism. Then (and I don't care if this is a spoiler) she kills one of them. Or at least, that is what I like to imagine, since that would atone in some small part for my having read all the way through to the end.

I repeat: how, how, could she have gotten another job as governess after this? Who would have hired her?! It boggles the mind. The one bright spot is that at least my copy has this awesome 70s cover on it, which, while still producing feelings of appalled fascination, also provides unintentional hilarity to lighten the mood.

The Season

The Season, by Sarah MacLean

Seventeen year old Lady Alexandra is strong-willed and sharp-tongued -- in a house full of older brothers and their friends, she had to learn to hold her own. Not the best makings for an aristocratic lady in Regency London. Yet her mother still dreams of marrying Alex off to someone safe, respectable, and wealthy. But between ball gown fittings, dances, and dinner parties, Alex, along with her two best friends, Ella and Vivi, manages to get herself into what may be her biggest scrape yet.

When the Earl of Blackmoor is mysteriously killed, Alex decides to help his son, the brooding and devilishly handsome Gavin, uncover the truth. But will Alex's heart be stolen in the process? In an adventure brimming with espionage, murder, and other clandestine affairs, who could possibly have time to worry about finding a husband? Romance abounds as this year's season begins!

This is a relatively harmless little book. It's told from the point of view of one who is poised on the cusp (at the start of the book) of entering society. There were, of course, anachronisms in the book, it's hard to find a regency novel without them, these days. It's a delicate balance between admirable heroine and realism of the times. Certainly I doubt that any young lady went about "breaking into" houses, or even expressed half of the sentiments that Alex does, without much disapprobation. The trend of giving heroines nicknames which are boys names has always irritated me, as well. To me it seems to say, "she's feminine, because look, she's got a girl's name, but girls aren't as cool as boys, so we'll pretend that she's one of the guys with her nickname." I have the feeling this is a long suppressed feeling, which has only now had the opportunity to air itself. Perhaps if the plot or characters better satisfied me, I wouldn't take so much offense at the matter of her nickname.

The plot, such as it is (and my general malcontent may be attributed to a possible desire for a mystery/romance rather than a romance/mystery, as was the case) is not ill-done, giving us suspects who are so obviously guilty they have to be guilty, as well as those so obviously guilty, they must be working on the side of good. One of my peeves was that Alex was never really wrong in any of her assumptions, and didn't cause more confusion and misdirection than she solved, as I would generally expect of a seventeen year old girl in regency England. Not that I assume that all seventeen year old girls are stupid - although given my own behavior at seventeen that opinion wouldn't be baseless - but her circumstances don't inspire confidence that she will have magically attained clarity of insight into murder.

Well, it certainly doesn't sound as if I liked the book at all - and that's only partially true. It wasn't offensive to me, as some books have been. I wouldn't mind re-reading it, but only for those sweet sections which describe first, true love (and in these types of societies, the only one you get). The author seems to be setting the three girls (more on that later) up for a series of books, and I will probably read the others in the series as well, but I would wait to check them out first before purchasing, next time. The three girl friends are one of the most refreshing parts of the book. Too often the heroine is cut off from good, female friendship and advice, and the friends in this book more than adequately perform their duties in that regard. They are close without being confining, supportive without being foils. They are neither perfect nor merely a backdrop for Alex's own exploits. I wouldn't mind reading ten books with faults worse than this one, as long as they contained good friendships. So, could be better, could be worse, good if you're in the mood for a short, sweet chaste romance, with some adventure and balls thrown in.

And I mean "balls" in the "gala" sense, not the "frank 'n' beans" sense. Get your minds out of the gutter.

A Garden in the Rain

A Garden in the Rain, by Lynn Kurland

After her fiance, Bentley Douglas Taylor III, dumps her, then fires her, Madelyn Phillips attempts to salvage what she can from the wreckage of her life by going ahead with her planned trip to Scotland sans Bentley, only to find him twit waiting for her there in a misbegotten attempt to convince her to return to him. While trying to ditch Bentley, Madelyn bumps into Patrick MacLeod, the lethally handsome Scotsman who earlier almost ran her off the road. At that moment, Madelyn intuitively realizes that Patrick is her one true love, but she hesitates to communicate this inexplicable idea to him since she's puzzled by it herself. Even if Madelyn reawakens a long dormant sense of desire in him, Patrick knows telling her the truth about who he really is will destroy any chance of a relationship.

I suppose I should begin by saying that I was not best pleased by this book. I had high expectations, admittedly, since the description was so promising ("Ditched by her fiance!" "Taking her honeymoon trip alone!" "Love at first sight, but retaining at least a minimal sense of rationality!") but it began to fizzle about as soon as Madelyn's ex-fiance stepped onto the scene. His presence in the book is almost a mystery - he is so buffoonish, so cartoonishly old-fashioned evil, that while his presence serves to vex our heroine, her sufferance of him vexes me. True, she doesn't like him, doesn't like to be around him, but her acceptance that he is merely a jerk, and not, say, completely out of his mind insane, is bewildering. And he is insane. His reasons for sticking to her like a burr are so mwa-ha-ha-ha batshit crazy that he clearly wandered out of some gothic romance for impressionable young girls of the 1800s, and has but poor luck in making sufficiently convoluted and apalling schemes which fit the twenty-first century. Nowadays we are all about internet scams and drive-bys, young man.



While Bentley should have been living in the 1800s, Patrick MacLeod, hero of the piece, supposedly was. "Was" being the operative word. Like any good transplant from 1795, Patrick practices swordfighting and mooning about over old battlefields in his spare time. One of the best sequences in the book happens as Patrick and Madelyn first get a good look at each other over Culloden - each is struck by a nameless feeling, natch, and Madelyn, overcome, shouts over to him that they're soulmates. This intentional bit of levity was unfortunately, suceeded by a very dull and lengthy middle section - all about their various encounters, and their various encounters with Bentley (I will be fair - this is where we were introduced to Bentley's magnificently thought-out plot, which mocks, deservedly, any reasonable person for reading so far), wherein Patrick buys her lots of clothes and a new violin, she wonders, does he or doesn't he?, he mourns, I can't!, but then they can, but then they can't, secrets, love, angst, etc., etc., until finally, finally, Madelyn falls into one of those mysterious spots that were so oddly marked for her on a map of the forest. And thus begins our descent into hell.


This whole half of the book was like, whoa. Madelyn (and I hope this won't spoil it too much for you) gets peed on. Peed on. Repeatedly, over a course of about four weeks. Four weeks! As you can tell, I am still overcome by the memory. Four weeks! In a little bitty cage, learning gaelic from a conveniently placed piper. Meanwhile, our erstwhile hero gets to dress up with a sword and beat the shit out of everyone he meets (I exaggerate). There is, apparently, no humilation our dear author will not subject Madelyn too, which just makes me contrarily, no doubt, hate Madelyn all the more. This woman is so beaten down by recent events, that even were I to accept the ridiculous premise, the fact that she has no money, no clothes, no apartment, no passport, nothing of her own, literally, that she is completely dependent (as Blanche Dubois would say) on the kindness of others, would make me cry foul at her romance with Patrick. It doesn't feel like love so much as dependency, and a dependency which is prevented at every turn from becoming anything resembling independency. Madelyn may be the most resiliant person in the world, who has the will and ability to overcome all kinds of obstacles. But we're never given a chance to find out. Her every rescue, from perils both Bentley and otherwise, is performed by Patrick, which makes for a fairly one-sided match. That, I suppose, is my biggest problem with the book. The whole thing left a bad taste in my mouth, and if in the future I feel the need for a time-traveling romance I shall fall back on Outlander, whose heroine has both common sense and a sense of humor.


NB: As a special bonus, I leave you with these words, which the title frequently and amusingly brought to mind:

Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don't think that I can take it
Cause it took so long to make it
And I'll never have that recipe again!
Oh no!