Book Journal

Beautiful bodies – Laura Shaine Cunningham

painfully honest and reflexive. i don’t often read too many books that deal honestly with certain aspects of ‘female friendship’ – the group dynamics, peer pressure, the bully of the group that no-one actually likes but are too kind and diplomatic to do anything about. it reveals the frustration that results from having stressful friends ( who needs enemies when your friends stress you out eh?)

The author Laura has been kind enough to stop by this blog and leave a comment.

Green Tea and Other Tales by Joseph Sheridan LeFanu

Irish writer born in 1814 well known for his ghost stories and supernaturalist fiction. M.R. James was a great fan of his work. He published his vampire story Carmilla in 1872 – predating Bram Stoker’s Dracula – ( it is theorized that Stoker was possibly influenced by Carmilla).

the wikipedia article on him points out:

“His best-known works, still read today, are the macabre mystery novel Uncle Silas (1864), ‘The Rose and the Key‘ (1871), and the collection In a Glass Darkly (1872), which contains Carmilla as well as ‘Green Tea’ and ‘The Familiar’, two famous stories of enigmatic hauntings apparently provoked by obscure guilt ”

A lot of his work is available online – the Green Tea e-text is available here.

*****

The Unrest Cure and other Beastly Tales : Saki

Absolutely one of the best reads ever. The Unrest Cure is something that should be more well publicized.
‘Saki’ was born Hector Hugh Munro in what was then Burma and is now Myanmar, the son of Charles Augustus Munro, an inspector-general in the Burmese police. Munro’s mother, Mary Frances Mercer – died in 1872 and interestingly and rather revealingly, according to some Internet sources – she was “killed by a runaway cow in an English country lane.”

That may explain some of his stories. The pseudonym Saki is thought to be taken from the name of the Cupbearer in the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.

A couple of quotes from Saki to whet your appetite and entice your curiosity about this interesting and rather enigmatic character:

“Addresses are given to us to conceal our whereabouts”

“He is one of those people who would be enormously improved by death”

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The Complete Short Stories of W. Somerset Maugham (Vol. III)

Maugham was a witty fellow. This collection of short stories features the British agent Ashenden – who it is said inspired Ian Fleming’s Bond. { particularly in Ian Fleming’s accounts of James Bond’s dealings with M}

In any case, they revolve around the First World War – and are loosely based on the author’s experience of being an agent for the Intelligence Dept. during this time. As he puts it – ” The work of an agent in the Intelligence Department is on the whole monotonous. A lot of it is uncommonly useless. The material it offers for stories is scrappy and pointless, the author has himself to make it coherent, dramatic and probable’

Apparently some of his stories were juicier and closer to the truth but were axed by Winston Churchill because they violated the Official Secrets Act..

Very readable, witty, highly recommended.

Another work – Ashenden: Or the British Agent which Somerset Maugham published in 1928 and is a complete collection of all the Ashenden short stories.

***Read more on William Somerset Maugham here**

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The Holy Blood – Holy Grail – Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh and Henry Lincoln (1982)

Written as a follow up to a BBC documentary, this is the book where the authors presented an ‘audacious’ and groundbreaking hypothesis : theories which of course have achieved notoriety in the shape of Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code. It’s funny – on the back cover ( it did cause a fair amount of hoo-ha when it was released) Newsweek said ‘ A brilliant thriller in the making’ – and of course, as we know, some people came along and did just that. Definitely worth a read. Of course for all Templar and Grail enthusiasts but nowadays anyone who wanted to know about where some of the ideas presented in the fictional Da Vinci Code had their roots ( and enough information and bibliography is presented in the text for people to take their own research further and draw their own conclusions about the subject matter) Again – they make it clear that theirs is a startling hypothesis and a set of speculations about historical events.

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The Rule of Four – Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason

Great – I really enjoyed reading this – I admit i’m fascinated with ancient and mediaeval texts and a good mystery at the same time so this was right up my street. It’s focus is the mysterious, lengthy, erudite and anonymous Renaissance text – the Hypneromatochia Poliphili

“A mysterious coded manuscript, a violent Ivy League murder, and the secrets of a Renaissance prince collide in a labyrinth of betrayal, obsession, and genius..”