Hilary's Book Blog

• My Friends – Hisham Matar, 2024. Second Monday selection; quotes TBD.
• Comet in Moominland – Tove Jansson, 1946. Hurray, a children’s literature group has started as a splinter from Amherst Book Group! Quotes TBD.
• The Great Displacement: Climate Change and the Next American Migration – Jake Bittle, 2023. Nature/Enviro, quotes TBD.
• Green World: A Tragicomic Memoir of Love & Shakespeare – Michelle Ephraim, 2024. Massachusetts Center for the Book reading challenge prompt: “A book published by a Massachusetts press” (University of Massachusetts Press in this case). I wrote: “All the blurbs say it’s hysterically funny – it didn’t seem that way to me, but I very much enjoyed this memoir of Ephraim making her way in the academy and earning tenure through devotion to The Merchant of Venice.” She’s funnier on The Moth, though!
• In the Frame – Dick Francis, 1976. Re-read, mostly because of revisiting the George Stubbs and other horse paintings at the newly-reopened Yale Center for British Art.
• The Running Man – Stephen King, 1982. Same as Long Walk: there’s a new trailer. I haven’t seen the movie, but enjoyed the re-read and appreciated the prescience.
• Dracula – Bram Stoker, 1897. Great Books selection (re-read); quotes TBD.
• The Family Under the Bridge – Natalie Savage Carlson, 1958. I remember liking this as a kid primarily because of the Garth Williams illustratations, and because it was set in Paris. It doesn’t hold up very well.
• The Girl in a Swing – Richard Adams, 1980. I finally bought an epub version of this (I’ve owned it in paperback for decades) and discovered that it’s a different edition – I knew from Wikipedia that there had been a change but didn’t realize my paperback was the original version. But there must also have been US/UK differences. I’ve read the book so many times that they jumped out to me – maybe a post someday. I see the movie, which I’ve never watched, is on Tubi now. On the list! Although this book is unbelievable in a number of ways, I really love it and re-read every couple of years. I must have missed a few occasions because it’s not listed here after 2006.
• Finn Family Moomintroll – Tove Jansson, 1948. Quotes TBD.
• Watership Down – Richard Adams, 1972. I had to re-read this after Girl in a Swing – one of my all-time favorites that so holds up. I love the epigraphs more and more; one day I might research them all/write them up.

Stories

I suggested these for an Amherst College slow read retreat, which was delightful. We had great discussions about the first two; the Henry James only a few of us talked about, which was fun, but it pales in comparison.

• “How I Became a Vet” – Rivka Galchen, 2023 (this is amazing – I’ve read it four times now and it gets better every time)
• “The Life You Save May Be Your Own” – Flannery O’Connor, 1955
• “The Real Thing” – Henry James, 1892

• A Month in the Country – J. L. Carr, 1980. Second Monday selection; one attendee described it as “a perfect novel” and that’s’not far off. I marked only four quotes/”in this book I learned”s. I haven’t really had a cut-off between monthly lists and what rates an individual post, so maybe I’ll make it five!
  • rulley – Yorkshire term for a flat cart
  • estovers – allowance of wood to be taken from the commons
  • “‘This one either is excessively hot, on occasions, red-hot (in point of fact) or else just keeping itself and no-one else warm.’ And he gave it a resentful little kick. They glowered at one another like ancient enemies.”
  • “If I’d stayed there, would I always have been happy? No, I suppose not. People move away, grow older, die, and the bright belief that there will be another marvelous thing around each corner fades. It is now or never; we must snatch at happiness as it flies.”
• The Age of Deer: Trouble and Kinship with our Wild Neighbors – Erika Howsare, 2024. Nature and Environment selection; quotes TBD.
• Look Homeward, Angel – Thomas Wolfe, 1929. Great Books selection; quotes TBD (I read it as a teenager or young adult)
• Hugh Lofting’s Travels of Doctor Dolittle – Al Perkins, illustrated by Philip Wende, 1967. I embarked on a Dr Dolittle re-read a few months ago and remembered a picture book adaptation I’d had as a kid. It may have been prompted by seeing the movie. To my surprise this is quite rare, but I was able to get it through the Commonwealth library system. The text is enh (thank goodness I went on to read the Lofting books as a kid) but the illustrations are memorable – a bit ligne claire but with visible cross-hatching. I can’t find out much about Wende.
• Kindred – Octavia Butler, 1979. Mass Center for the Book suggestion for September, “A book told in non-chronological order.” I wrote: “Compelling and vivid – it’s been on my TBR list forever and I’m so glad I finally read this classic, but it’s harrowing.” The relationship between narrator Dana and her ancestor Rufus is complicated and fascinating. I might put this on the suggested list for Great Books – I’ll be thinking about this one for quite a while.
• Big Damn Hero (Firefly #1) – James Lovegrove, 2018. Not as good as the one I read last month, but I enjoyed it.

• Sandwich – Catherine Newman, 2024 – Second Monday selection, but I didn’t mark any quotes. I enjoyed it quite a bit but it’s not rib-sticking; cute, funny, slight.
• The Deluge – Stephen Markley, 2023. Nature & Environment selection. The opposite: very dark. Quotes TBD.
• The Outsiders – S. E. Hinton, 1967. Read for the Massachusetts Center for the Book August challenge: “A book with a protagonist who is a teenager or senior citizen.” I wrote “I’ve been meaning to read this classic for decades. Now that I’m 60 I’ve finally gotten around to it. Teenage me would have enjoyed it more, but the emotional drama and relatable characters were appealing.”
• So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed – Jon Ronson, 2015. Well-written, interesting.
• The Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1850. Great Books selection (re-read), quotes TBD.
• Spent: A Comic Novel – Alison Bechdel, 2025. I enjoyed this because the character explorations felt like a continuation of Dykes to Watch Out For, and the art is great (especially the goats!), but I liked The Secret to Superhuman Strength more. (Hey, that’s not in my Goodreads list! Thank goodness for the CWMars reading history. Oh OK, it’s in the August list – would have just been left out of the year in review…)
• Excellent Advice for Living: Wisdom I Wish I’d Known Earlier – Kevin Kelly, 2023. Loved it, will read again. On this go-round I just marked one quote that hit me: “What you do on your bad days matters more than what you do on your good days.” I have found that to be very true.
• Carnival (Firefly #6) – Una McCormack, 2021. Loved it! Firefly is one of my favorite TV shows ever and I so wish there were more episodes. This novel provided an equivalent way more successfully than I could have imagined – I’m very impressed. I will read the others in the series, and look for more McCormack.

Short stories

• “Young Goodman Brown,” Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1835. Read for Story Club, and it was a great companion piece to The Scarlet Letter. I’m sure I’d read it before, but not given it close attention; what a weird and unsettling piece. Having seen his diamond graffiti at The Old Manse, visited the House of the Seven Gables, and hiked Monument Mountain, I feel surrounded by Hawthorne traces!

A very busy month so not a lot of books!

• The Voyages of Dr Dolittle – Hugh Lofting, 1922. I only read this one a few times as a kid because I didn’t own it, but I remembered it as one of the best Dolittles. The great naturalist Long Arrow and the beetle with the message on its leg stuck with me, and I remembered the giant sea snail from the movie – which I may have seen when it came out, so might have been my gateway to the books. Beginning of a binge, but spaced out because I have so much else to read (Amherst Book Group is reading Ulysses!)
• A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man – James Joyce, 2015. Re-read – for the Amherst College Book Group as a prelude to Ulysses. Quotes TBD.
• We Loved It All – Lydia Millett, 2024. Nature and Enviro, quotes TBD.
• Tell Me How Long the Train’s Been Gone – James Baldwin, 1968 – Second Monday, quotes TBD.
• Here Comes the Fun: A Year of Making Merry – Ben Aitken, 2023. Read for the Massachusetts Center for the Book Reading Challenge – “A book you were drawn to by its cover.” Jonathan saw it on the dollar shelf at Broadside and thought of me, because I am a fun-lover, and the cover did I wrote “A light-hearted account of Aitken’s attempts at dozens of activities from cold water bathing to improv. Not as funny as he wants it to be, but enjoyable.” Two things-I-learned and three good quotes (not quite enough for a stand-alone post):
  • An Idiot Abroad
  • Coasteering – wow, sounds like my kind of fun except for the jumping
  • “We are the sum of what we pay attention to and what we paid attention to. The more we look, the more we see, the more we see again. It’s the again I like. It’s the chance recurrence. It’s things reapparing and their being richer for having a precedent.”
  • “[The butterfly’s] wings are transparent — as mesh. I can see the green of the leaf through them. The wings’ colour is the colour of what is beyond. The wings’ colour is the colour of what they encounter.”
  • “I love the aimless wandering. I love the clueless ambulation. I love losing myself amid the thick and limitless variety of life.”
• The Sea, the Sea – Iris Murdoch, 1978 – Re-read for Great Books. I marked quotes so it will be interesting to compare to my previous post, once I get there.

• Brooklyn – Colm Tóibín, 2009. Second Monday book selection. This is the fourth Tóibín I’ve read with this group, and the first I actually enjoyed. But I only pulled one quote: “They knew so much, each of them, … that they could do everything except say out loud what it was they were thinking.” I’ll try the movie at some point.
• Of Time and Turtles: Mending the World, Shell By Shattered Shell – Sy Montgomery, 2023. Nature Enviro selection, quotes TBD.
• The Wind in the Willows – Kenneth Grahame, 1908. Great Books selection (multiple re-read), quotes TBD.
• The Head of the House of Coombe (1922) and Robin (1922) – Frances Hodgson Burnett. I’ve read this two-part novel several times, and produced Robin for Project Gutenberg because it was missing. I found a bunch of typos in the first one, which led me to a brief adventure using Github repos to report PG errors, but that’s already rolled back, so I’ll submit the revised files – at least it got me to actually do it, thanks to Jonathan doing the research. I’ve always meant to figure out how to submit corrections, and now I’ll plan on making it a habit. It’s time-consuming but feels very worth it. I marked two things I looked up:
  • Liebig – beef extract
  • Scatterbrained nurse is absorbed in Lady Audley’s Secret. I read that a while back – don’t remember it but it was compelling!
• The House of the Seven Gables – Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1851. The Massachusetts Center for the Book challenge was “A book that spans multiple generations.” I couldn’t think of one that appealed (and my rule is I must not have read it before), so I turned to their suggestions. My writeup: “I’m so glad I finally read this – it’s charming and not as dark as other Hawthornes, although plenty spooky. Hepzibah, Phoebe, and little Ned Higgins, insatiable devourer of gingerbread, are particularly endearing.” I found a bunch of typos in the Gutenberg edition, but fewer than in the Burnett, so they are already fixed for posterity.
• Hereward the Wake: Last of the English – Charles Kingsley, 1866. I picked this up last month because the protagonist of T. Tembarom refers to it. Quotes marked, TBD.
• Talking Turkey – Hilary Caws-Elwitt, unpublished mss (2014). I guess I’ll re-read my own book (it’s middle grade animal fantasy) every few years to make sure I still like it… and I do. I might self-publish at some point, I suppose, not under the illusion that anyone else will read it. (If you want to check it out, let me know!)
• The Long Walk – Stephen King writing as Richard Bachman, 1978. I saw a trailer for the new movie and was prompted to pick this up again. It’s the most memorable of the Bachmans to me, and of course it led the way for the Hunger Games books and Squid Game show. Not great but readable.

• Vulcan’s Hammer – Philip K. Dick, 1960. I resisted re-reading Lucifer’s Hammer and picked this up instead! I read a lot of PKD in the ’90s; I don’t like his writing much but often find it compelling. This is very relevant to AI concerns today; not great but interesting.
• How Far the Light Reaches: A Life in Ten Sea Creatures – Sabrina Imbler, 2022. Nature & Environment selection; quotes pulled, TBD.
• Possession – A. S. Byatt, 1990. Second Monday selection; quotes pulled, TBD.
• Little Grey Rabbit’s Story Book – Alison Uttley, 1977. I adore the Sam Pig stories; these aren’t as good, alas. Delighted to find this analysis of why she’s been described as a horrible person, perhaps unfairly.
• The Adventure of the Strange Ruby – Enid Blyton, 1971. Most of the Blytons I read as a child were in French translations, but I think we had this Knight paperback in English. I remember the kids hiding out in the temple with lots of food and cozy rugs to sleep on. Not good, but comforting to re-read.
• How to Lose a Marathon : A Starter’s Guide to Finishing in 26.2 Chapters – Joel H. Cohen, 2017. I picked this up from the running section of the library and was really looking forward to it, because I love first person accounts of mediocre runners and especially details about the New York Marathon. Unfortunately the “humor” was like nails on a blackboard for me. I finished it and would have gotten quite a bit of good practical advice out of it, between the unfunny quips, if I were new to running.
• The Diary of a Bookseller – Shaun Bythell, 2017. April’s Massachusetts Center for the Book challenge: “A book about books, bookstores, or libraries.” I wrote “Enjoyable brief daily entries by an eccentric but realistic bloke who enjoys teasing customers and staff.” It was really interesting to see day over day how many online sales can’t be located, and how dependent they are on the (terrible) software platform. He introduces each month with a quote from Orwell’s “Bookshop Memories” – TBR!
• A Little Princess – Frances Hodgson Burnett, 1905. Comfort re-read.

Notable novellas and short stories

• “The Beast in the Jungle” – Henry James, 1903. Far Out Film watched The Beast (2023), which is loosely based on this, so I wanted to check it out. Very Jamesian – I’m not a fan – but the connection to the movie was interesting.
• “The Moron Factory” – George Sanders, 2024. I would have loved this even if I weren’t a Story Club member, but GS himself giving it to us makes it all the better. It’s not dissimilar from “Tenth of December,” and I could see a critic accusing it of sentimentality – but kindness and humanity are his stock-in-trade, and the emotion he evokes is both real and earned.

• Green Mansions – William Henry Hudson, 1904. I have seen so many references to this over my reading life (especially about “Rima the bird-girl”) that I’m not sure why I hadn’t read it before. It’s weird, not great but quite interesting (despite lots of racism).
• The End of Drum-Time – Hanna Pylvainen, 2023. Second Monday selection; quotes TBD.
• The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms That Sustain Life – Johan Eklöf (tr. Elizabeth DeNoma), 2020. Nature Environment selection; quotes TBD.
• Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood – Trevor Noah, 2016. Massachusetts Center for the Book, “A book about someone with a marginalized identity” (this was on their suggested list and I’d heard good things about it). I wrote: “A charming memoir, mixing the comic, tragic, and everyday aspects of growing up mixed under apartheid and its aftershocks.”
• A Wrinkle in Time – Madeleine L’Engle, 1962. Great Books selection (re-read); quotes TBD.
• The Hunger Games – Suzanne Collins, 2008. I read this when it came out, as well as the sequel (I don’t remember if I read the third in the series, and definitely did not read the fourth). The fifth, which just came out, is getting excellent reviews, and a book group friend talks about how good they are, so I figured I’d re-embark on the journey. Yeah, it’s not bad. My biggest issue is how the producers/camera operators etc. are invisible and morally neutral. Current reality TV (esp. listening to the On Fire podcast and reading the book Bachelor Nation) keeps their viewpoint in my mind.

Short stories

• “The Mysterious Stranger” (1916 version) and “The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg” (1899) by Mark Twain (both re-reads). “Mysterious Stranger” came up in a Far Out Film meeting. Now that I know about the alternate versions I’m interested to try them too; it’s super-weird and fascinating.
• “Flowering Judas” (1930) by Katherine Anne Porter, for Story Club. I read it twice, read George Saunders’ great analysis and most of the comments, but still don’t 100% get/appreciate it.

• Just Like You – Nick Hornby, 2020.
• Crossings: How Road Ecology Is Shaping the Future of Our Planet – Ben Goldfarb, 2023. Nature and Enviro selection, quotes TBD.
• Gifts (2004) and Voices (2006) – Ursula Le Guin, Annals of the Western Shore #1 and #2. I was recommending more recent Le Guin to my mother-in-law, raved about these, and went to pick them up again. I’m saving the third for when I have time to appreciate it. Le Guin at the absolute top of her form!
• The Transit of Venus – Shirley Hazzard, 1980. Great Books selection, quotes TBD.
• After London; or, Wild England – Robert Jeffries, 1885. Read for the Mass Center for the Book February challenge: “A novel with the name of a city in its title.” I wrote “Although there’s a bit of how the English countryside would change after some unspecified disaster that wiped out the population, it’s mostly the adventures of a young man in a society much like the Middle Ages. I’m glad I finally read it, but I found it somewhat disappointing.”

Novellas

• “The Man Who Would Be King,” Rudyard Kipling, 1888 – Read (if I’d read this before, I don’t remember it) because when we discussed Black Narcissus at a Far Out Film meeting, the movie was mentioned as a comparison. I love lots of Kipling, but I often find him confusing, and this was very elliptical. (I think my dad had mentioned this work because it references James Brooke, whom family lore identifies as an ancestor. None of my genealogical research finds a connection though.)
• “The Death of Ivan Ilyich,” Tolstoy, 1886. I read the Pevear/Volokonsky translation, and re-read the Garnett, to participate in the wonderful Story Club. I got so much more out of this classic with Saunders’ guidance.