Finished: The Yearling (Rawlings). Loved this Pulitzer Prize winning book! Of course, it's pretty much a given that when a book is named after an animal, that animal will probably not be alive by the end of the book. :-( That's how it was with The Yearling, but oh my, the story that led up to it was told so well! It was fascinating to read the story of young Jody Baxter who was growing up right here off the St. John's River in central Florida, near where I live. Rawlings' descriptions of the vegetation, trees, swamps, animals...were all so real. In what I assume to be the late 1800's, Jody Baxter is growing up on a patch of scrubby farmland with his mother and father, Ora and Penny (an old nickname of his father's). He's a 12 year old only child, and he's very close to his father. He learns all the ways of making a living in the wild, hunting, farming, tracking, etc. His father is truly an upstanding person of high moral character and only hunts those things necessary for the family to eat, and doesn't hunt for sport. He tries to hunt only male deer and not females so he won't leave any young ones motherless. Jody, loves his strict mother, and his more forgiving father, who knows what it's like to be a twelve year old boy with wanderlust for the land. Jody also longs for a pet of his own, and one day when his father is bit by a rattlesnake, his dream comes true in a roundabout way. His father immediately shoots a doe and cuts out her liver, then cuts his own arm, and uses the deer liver to suck out as much poison as he can! Sadly, the doe had just given birth and a baby fawn is laying near. Jody's main concern is to get his father back to the farm and get a doctor there. Luckily, Penny survives, but he's down and out for quite awhile. One of the rough-and-tumble neighbors, Buck Forrester, comes to the farm for over a week and does all the manual labor that Penny usually does. Meanwhile, Jody remembers the fawn and goes back to find it in the forest. Of course, the fawn, named Flag by Jody's best friend, Fodder-wing Forrester, becomes Jody's constant, inseparable companion. He is even allowed in the house, much to his mother's dismay, and sleeps with Jody in his room. The story moves on with all the ups and downs of the two families trying to make their living off the land. There's the tracking, and finally the killing, of the mean old bear, Slewfoot, who has killed the Baxter and Forrester livestock for years. There's the hunting of the wolves, who also come to attack the animals. There's the surviving of what seems to me was probably a hurricane, which devastates the surroundings, ruins the crops, and kills all kinds of wild animals. And, there's the sad death of Fodder-wing. Fodder-wing had been born a bit deformed, and took ill in his youth, and died. Both families were, of course, shaken. Then, just as I think I'm going to get through the whole story with Flag still alive and kicking, the reality sets in. Nearly a year has passed since Jody rescued Flag, and Flag adores Jody, and vice versa. However, Flag is now a yearling and likes to run off into the woods for a bit, always coming home. He's too big to stay in the house now, because when he does, he gets into everything, knocking precious food all about, etc. After Jody and Penny spend long, grueling hours planting the peas and corn, when the first little heads of the corn plants start to pop up, one night, Flag gets into the corn field and eats most of the corn!! Ma is beside herself and wants to get rid of the fawn then and there. Penny instructs Jody to work day and night to build a fence around the corn field as high as he can reach. Unfortunately, Penny has just pulled what appears to be a hernia, and has taken to bed. Jody replants all the corn by himself and gets to work on the fence...but it is of no use. Flag jumps the fence and once again destroys a large portion of the corn. Jody is devastated when his father tells him that he'll have to kill Flag. He would never be able to run him off, because Flag knows where "home" is. They can't tie Flag up at night, because he struggles so much that he starts to hurt himself. And, mostly, they can't afford to lose their livelihood and the food for their bellies because of the deer. Jody is heartbroken and can't bring himself to obey his father. As Flag once again gets into the garden, Jody's mother comes out the door with a gun and shoots the yearling. She's not a good shot, though, and only wounds him. In such a sad scene, Penny tells Jody that he simply must be a man and go put Flag out of his misery. Jody does as he's told, his last look into Flag's eyes being one of trust, yet confusion. :-( After killing Flag, Jody attempts to run away and is gone for several days, where he ends up nearly starving to death. After at first hating his parents, and especially his father, who he feels like betrayed him, he comes to see what going hungry would be like and he resignedly heads for home. His mother has gone to trade some chickens for more corn seed with the Forresters, but his father is there and so happy to see him. He thought for sure something had happened to him. He tells Jody that he's no longer a yearling himself, but a man, and Jody hugs and forgives his father. It's such a sad, sad tale. I do love Penny Baxter though. Throughout the whole book he says and does such wise things, and diffuses many hot situations. I think I'll put a few of my favorite quotes below.

Here's one from Penny: "Ain't it a treat, to have a woman [who] reads your mind and then agrees with it."

Love that! :-)

Another from Grandma Hutto, a neighbor and friend: "A woman has got to love a bad man once or twice in her life, to be thankful for a good one."

And, again from Grandma Hutto when her son Oliver is home from his seafaring life after many months, but is off visiting friends instead of at home: "I miss Oliver worse," she said, "when he's here, and away from me, than when he's at sea."

I kind of know that feeling she's talking about! When one of my kids was home from college, I wanted to be with them as much time as possible while they were home. :-)

Anyway, there were alot more, but those are the ones I wrote down. Loved the book!

Finished: A Daughter of Eve (de Balzac) Another good de Balzac story! This is yet another book from his La Comedie Humaine opus that has the character Eugene de Rastignac in it...though his role is very minor. Eugene is becoming less of a likable character as he gets more and more embroiled in high society, politics, etc. However, I will still probably read at least one more de Balzac story that centers more on de Rastignac. In A Daughter of Eve, though, the story starts off with naive, young upper-society sisters, Marie Angelique and Marie Eugenie who are raised by a strict, pious mother. At 18 and 20, the sisters marry the first respectable men to ask for their hands in marriage to escape their stifling upbringing. Marie Angelique, known as just Marie, marries a good man in high society, Felix de Vandenesse. Marie Eugenie, known as Eugenie, marries a scheming, harsher man, banker Ferdinand du Tillet. Though the sisters are as close as sisters can be, the two husbands, now inlaws, are competitors in society and on the opposite side of the "political issues". After a few years, both of the sisters have children, and both are miserable for different reasons. Eugenie is constantly monitored and bullied by her husband, yet for outward appearances, she's got all the riches she could ask for, to keep her in the manner that du Tillet would expect his wife to be kept. Marie, on the other hand, is married to a kind, understanding, yet somewhat boring young man. De Vandenesse has taken his young wife under his wing and continued her education, brought her out into society, and surrounded her with everything she could want. The problem is...he's too nice and predictable....Marie needs a challenge! Into her life comes the artist/journalist/"bad boy", Nathan Raoul. Though Nathan has had a long-term love affair with a beautiful local actress, Florine, he falls hard for Marie de Vandenesse, and she for him. Marie and Nathan never physically consummate their affair, but they meet quite often for about a year and declare their feelings for each other. Meanwhile, all the upper-crust men like du Tillet, de Rastignac and the Baron Nucingen, conspire to make Nathan fail at the new newspaper he has started up in hopes of making a success and being offered a position in the local parliament. Du Tillet himself wants that position, and the men all pretend to be supporters and friends of Nathan's, lending him money...all the while planning to call in the notes right when they're due and force Nathan into debtor's prison before he can make a success of things. When Nathan's 40,000 pound note comes due and payment is demanded, Nathan realizes he will go to prison, so he attempts suicide. Marie finds him in time and saves his life, and then proceeds to try and borrow the money from whoever she can to keep Nathan from prison. She goes to her beloved sister, and together they come up with a plan to get the money, but the plan would end up eventually compromising both of them. Eugenie begins to worry that her sister is headed for a huge mistake and actually goes and confides in Marie's husband....honestly, one of the most understanding men I've encountered in a novel. He ends up letting Marie know that he knows all about her affair, and he doesn't blame her for feeling like she fell in love with the artist, scoundrel, Nathan. He feels like she was seduced by the excitement of it all, and realizes he had not provided her with enough interest right in their own backyard. Rather than chastise her and throw her out, he understands her and forgives her. He tells her they must get back the letters she has written to Nathan so that nothing can get out and ruin her reputation. He concocts a scheme at a masquerade ball to let the actress Florine know that Nathan had been two-timing her with Marie, and Florine hands over all the letters. Marie now sees the duplicitous behavior of Nathan, since she had no idea that he had another lover. Poor Nathan, though, had really fallen in love with Marie and would have dumped Florine in a heartbeat, but it was all too little too late. Nathan spends the next few years in the poverty known to many artists back in France of those days, and still on the arm of Florine. Marie's husband whisks her off to Italy, etc., and they have a grand adventure, rekindling their marriage which is now stronger for all the missteps. And, Eugenie actually finally stands up to her bullying husband and says she will do as she pleases, which actually pleases her husband more than he'd like to admit. In all, I was happy with the ending of this story and hope that Marie and her husband stay happily ever after married. :-) Nathan Raoul appears in something like 19 of the books in La Comedie Humaine, so he must bounce back and have his ups and downs, lol.

Finished: And The Mountains Echoed (Hosseini) Book Club Book #2. A good, solid book by the author of The Kiterunner, a book on my favorites list. This one jumped around a little bit too much between characters, never really leaving me feeling complete about any one character's journey or story. The opening chapter really sucked me in as the poor Afghan villager, Saboor, tells his children, Abdullah and Pari the story of a monster, the div, who comes to the village each year to take one child away. The villagers must obey his decision or he will kill an entire family. Of course, the choice about which child to give up is at the center of the story, and a few years after the father of the child gives him up, the father goes in search of the div to kill him. No one has ever tried this before. The div says, before you kill me, let me show you something.....and the div shows him a virtual paradise amidst the heat and draught ravaged villages. All the children he has ever taken are running happily around in a green, paradise with plenty of water and being schooled and taught all kinds of manners, etc. So, in comes the key question of the novel. Should the father leave his son there where he is clearly better off physically or take him back to the village where he could die of poverty, starvation and/or cold, but be with his loving family. The father leaves his son there. So, as Saboor takes his children on their own journey into Kabul, we see how very close 10 year old Abdullah and 3 year old Pari are. We also soon see that Saboor is taking Pari to Kabul to be adopted by his brother-in-law's wealthy employers who cannot have biological children of their own. Abdullah is devastated, and Pari too young to remember. She's swept up in the whirlwind of the nice "lady" who takes care of her and grows up forgetting her village family. Abdullah is tormented the rest of his life, even after he moves to America and has a wife and daughter, also named Pari, of his own. Not until Abdullah is very old and clearly suffering from Alzheimer's or dementia does his sister discover that she was adopted and has a beloved brother. By the time Pari and Abdullah finally meet, Abdullah remembers nothing of his sister...so sad. However, his daughter, Pari, and his sister, Pari, have finally met and will live happily as family. So, in between all that, the book focuses on several other pairings of people and their ethical trials and tribulations. But, as quickly as someone is introduced, they are left at the end of their story...right when I wanted to know more. For instance, I would have loved to read more about how the injured girl, Roshi, was helped by the outgoing, but egotistical, Temur, after his seemingly well-intentioned cousin, Idris, dropped the ball on getting her help. Anyway, it was still a well written book that once again opened my eyes to the bigger world around me. I'm glad I read it. :-)

Finished: Inferno (Brown) Another page-turning Dan Brown book, and this one set mostly in Florence, my favorite city in Italy! :-) Of course, Brown's Inferno is all about a bunch of clues that a madman uses from Dante's Inferno, so that was kind of fun to read as well. And, again, Robert Langdon, the perpetual hero of the Dan Brown novels, is the hero of the book, helping the World Health Organization track down what they presume to be a world population-crushing virus before it is released on the innocent public. This time, Robert is helped and hindered by the mysterious, child-prodigy turned complicated grown doctor, Sienna Brooks. At times she appeared to be on Langdon's side, and at times a foe, but in the end, she did the right thing. I really liked her character and hope she'll turn up in another Robert Langdon adventure! So, though they don't manage to save the day in the end, the virus isn't really a killing virus, like they thought, but a virus to render 1/3 of the world's population infertile, thus slowing down the eventual demise of civilization due to overpopulation. It was an interesting read! My favorite parts, though, were all the descriptions that I could see so easily in my mind's eye of the different sites in Florence! :-)

Finished: The Golden Bowl (James). Ugh, that was a very difficult read! Henry James is just so darn wordy! A book that was almost 800 pages should really have been about 200 pages for all the plot it had. I have read that in his later years Henry James wrote much more vaguely and intricately and round-aboutly and over-metaphorically, and I think I just witnessed that. I really enjoyed two of his books, The Portrait of a Lady and Washington Square...but one of his other books, The Wings of the Dove, was so atrociously ambiguous that I read only the first 20 or so pages and then returned it to the book store...the only book I have given up on in this entire reading endeavor of mine. So, anyway, I went into The Golden Bowl wondering which of the two types of writing I would get...and it was the latter. However, I stuck this one out because I was intrigued by the story. It's the story of American millionaire art dealer, Adam Verver, and his beloved daughter, Maggie, who marries an Italian penniless prince, Amerigo. Maggie falls head over heals in love with the prince, but we know right off the bat that the prince is marrying Maggie for her money, though he treats both Maggie and her father with the utmost respect and consideration. Until, that is, the former love of his life, and coincidentally Maggie's dear childhood friend, Charlotte, comes to London for their wedding. Here we find out that Amerigo and Charlotte still love each other. They couldn't marry when they were in love before because both were very poor, and how could they then have existed in life without having to :::gasp::: work for a living? Maggie and the prince go off for a year or so on their whirlwind wedding trip, and we join them two years later where already their baby son, Principino (that's all he's ever called) has joined the family. Maggie's father falls in love with his grandson and Maggie soon begins to feel that her father also needs a companion, so she convinces him to marry Charlotte! Of course, this throws Amerigo and Charlotte back into each other's orbits, so an affair ensues. When Maggie finally gets wind of the affair, she acts with grace and lets her husband know that she knows without letting her father know. By the end of the book, Maggie has convinced her father to move to America with Charlotte, where her father and Charlotte will basically start over, which will also allow the prince and Maggie to start all over again as well. Not hard doings for Amerigo or Charlotte, since they both somewhat loved their spouses and really loved the money that came with them, apparently more than they really loved each other.Throughout the book it is always clear that Maggie and her father adore each other, and would do anything for each other, including making sacrifices to keep the other from being hurt. It's just too bad that it was so hard to figure all this out most of the time due to the bizarre, rambling writing! I've only got one more James book on my list to read, and then I think I'm over and out with Henry James. :-)

Finished: A Separate Peace (Knowles) Sigh, what a good book, and what a great character Phineas, aka Finny, is! This is definitely one of those books I've had to ponder a bit all day after finishing it this morning. It is just so heart-tugging in many aspects. I'm not sure I'll ever understand WHY Gene purposely rocked the branch so Phineas would fall, but then I'm not a sixteen year old, competitive, enlistment-anticipating, male jumble of emotions. Set in a boy's college prep school, A Separate Peace is beautifully written, bringing quite vivid pictures to the school, the boys, and the unsure time in America during World War II. I loved the relationship between best friends, Gene and Finny, and I could follow Gene's logic when he figured out that Finny might be encouraging him to skip classes, etc., so that he'd not do so well in classes, so as not to be better than Finny. However, then it was so clear how that wasn't the case when Gene suggested it to Phineas and his honest, vibrant nature rang through and he couldn't believe Gene would think something like that. Phineas was so naturally good at sports and at people. He could talk his way into and out of anything, and all the other boys and faculty adored him. Gene found himself jealous of those abilities, even though Gene was the far superior academic student. When Gene and Phineas created their secret society where every member had to jump from a huge tree into the river every night that they met, I had the foreboding feeling of trouble to come. When Finny convinced Gene to go up with him and do a double jump, after convincing Gene to leave his studying for the night, I never dreamed that Gene would be so mad inside that he'd deliberately make Finny fall. :-( I literally read that passage four times to see if Gene really did it on purpose! Finny's leg is shattered and he can never play sports again. The guilt eats Gene up alive to where he finally confesses to Phineas that he jiggled the branch on purpose, but Phineas doesn't want to hear it...or admit it...or know it, because that would mean his best friend wasn't to him what he thought he was, and more importantly, what he still needed him to be. When another student finally forces Phineas to face the truth, he leaves the room in a whirl of emotions and accidentally falls down the marble stairs, rebreaking his leg. He doesn't want to see Gene, but when Gene sneaks in to see him, Finny finally gets Gene to admit that he didn't shake the tree branch out of maliciousness...it was just a momentary anger that made him do it, right?...that he still loved his best friend. Gene agreed wholeheartedly, since it was true, and Finny and Gene were at once all right with each other again. Then, tragically, Finny dies in the surgery to reset his broken leg, and Gene is sucker-punch, heartbroken. It's so very sad. :-( I want to say that maybe all of Gene's complicated feelings about Phineas die with him, but that's not the case since the book opens fifteen years later and Gene is still revisiting the old sites (tree and stairs) that caused him so much pain and loss in his youth. And, what can I say about the character of Phineas? I loved him, and his honesty, and his gumption, and his zest for life, and his ability to forgive, and his mischievousness, and for his unique view on life. I would love to have made Phineas room mates with Quentin Compton from The Sound and the Fury and perhaps some of Finny's joy for life would have rubbed off on Quentin, keeping him from taking his own life at college. Now, how do I go about adjusting my Top 100 Books list to include Rebecca and now A Separate Peace??

Finished: Rebecca (Du Maurier) Such a good book, and hard to put down! "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again." A book I've had on my "to read" list since I started this project, and now I wish there was more to read. The story is about the young, naive woman who is training to be a companion to a rich dowager when she meets the wealthy, older, Maxim de Winter in Monte Carlo. After a whirlwind courtship, she marries Maxim and he takes her back to live at his estate, Manderley. Mrs. de Winter, as she is heretofore known, is very unsure of herself and just knows that the staff will not like her.....because....less than a year earlier, the first Mrs. de Winter, the beautiful, confident, beloved Rebecca, had drowned in a boating accident on the estate. The new Mrs. de Winter feels like she pales in comparison in every way. What she doesn't realize is that her refreshing, non-spoiled, non-socialite ways are exactly what had drawn Maxim to her. Mrs. de Winter isn't very formidable against the evil housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers, though. Mrs. Danvers detests the new mistress of the house because Mrs. Danvers adored Rebecca, who she had been a servant to since Rebecca was a girl. Mrs. de Winter's self-esteem and confidence in her abilities plummet when everyone in the household, and even her husband's sister, Bea, and his best friend, Frank Crawley, compare her to the dead Rebecca. It never occurs to her that maybe they are comparing her and finding her MORE worthy for Maxim than Rebecca was. Maxim doesn't help matters by being a little standoffish now that he's back home. He leaves his new bride to her own devices far too much, and this leaves her imagination, which is incredibly vivid, the room it needs to imagine all sorts of things, including the fact that her husband must certainly still be in love with his first wife. Finally, at the urging of some family friends, Maxim agrees to give a huge costume ball like he and Rebecca did in the good old days. He decides the ball will be in honor of his new bride and he will introduce her to everyone. Rebecca decides she will surprise Maxim with her costume and be more grown-up looking for once...but what to wear? Mrs. Danvers, in an unusual display of almost kindness, suggests that Mrs. de Winters go dressed as one of the many de Winter ancestors whose portraits are hanging in the halls. She even goes so far as to suggest the beautiful relative in the flowing white dress and mass of curly hair. Rebecca decides to do just that, and still tells no one. Of course, alarm bells are going off for me as the reader. I just know that Mrs. Danvers has set her up to fall miserably. And, I'm right. Before all the multitudes of guests arrive, but after Maxim, Bea, her husband, Frank Crawley, and all the staff are gathered at the foot of the staircase waiting for her, Mrs. de Winters descends the stairs in her white gown. Maxim, and everyone else, turns white as a sheet. Maxim yells at her, asks what in the world she thinks she's doing, and forces her to go upstairs and change. The poor new wife has no idea what she's done, but Bea comes up to explain that the white flowing dress and wig are the exact same outfit that Rebecca had worn to her last ball at Manderley before she died. omg, so Mrs. Danvers really pulled an evil one! Mrs. de Winters is mortified and distraught because she thinks Maxim thinks she did it on purpose. Honestly, he is rather a jerk about it....not speaking to her the rest of the night at the entire ball, after she comes down in a different frock. The next morning, Mrs. de Winter assumes that her three month marriage is over and that she has failed. She confronts Mrs. Danvers who goes off on an eerie tirade about Rebecca. Mrs. Danvers is so manipulative that she almost convinces Mrs. de Winter that she should jump from the window since there is no way Maxim will ever love her the way he loved Rebecca. As Mrs. de Winter stands near the window, three town-wide alarms sound which indicate that a ship has run aground in the harbor at Manderley. Mrs. de Winter snaps out of her near trance and runs downstairs in time to hear Maxim shouting to the servants to open their doors, fix lots of food, and prepare to help anyone who is brought in from the ship. After a trying day, both Mrs. de Winter (it really drives me crazy that we never know her first name) and Maxim, are given the shock of their lives when the harbor master comes to tell them that while the divers were inspecting the grounded ship, they actually came across Rebecca's capsized boat on the floor of the harbor.....and what's more...there's a body in the cabin. Two months after the accident, a body had washed ashore and Maxim had identified it as Rebecca's, so whose could this new body be? After the harbor master leaves, Maxim breaks down to his bride. He tells her that he's made a mess of things, and been so distant, that she surely probably doesn't love him anymore. Mrs. de Winter cries out and embraces him and tells him, on the contrary, she's so thrilled to hear he really does love her because she was convinced that he was still in love with his first wife. Maxim scoffs at that idea and tells her that his marriage to Rebecca was a sham that they never even consummated. He married her because she promised to make Manderley a grand place for everyone to gather at. They pretended to have the perfect marriage, and everyone fell in love with Rebecca. In reality, she was selfish, willful, spiteful and had numerous affairs! As her affairs grew more brazen, Maxim confronted her about not keeping up her end of the bargain by painting the picture of a happy marriage. He followed her down to the little boathouse she had turned into a love nest...taking a gun with him in case he had to confront one of her lovers. She was alone, and she laughed in his face asking him what he could do about it? No one would ever believe they weren't happily married if he tried to divorce her. And what's more....if she ever had a child by one of her lovers, Maxim would have to recognize the child as his own and make the child his heir to inherit Manderley and everything else. In a fury, Maxim shot Rebecca, put her body in her boat, took it out to the harbor and sank the boat. The next day, everyone just assumes that the headstrong Rebecca had gone out in bad weather and been unfortunately drowned. Maxim insists to Mrs. de Winter that she's now the only other person who knows the truth. They both panic, though, at what will happen when the authorities realize that the body on the boat is Rebecca, and not the body identified months before. At the inquest, everyone believes Maxim when he says he must have been distraught and identified the body thinking it was Rebecca's, but clearly he was mistaken. He's about to get off when the boat builder testifies and insists that there is no way the boat would have sunk on it's own, so he had inspected the boat that morning and found man-made holes and other signs of foul tampering. Still, the jury comes back with the verdict that Rebecca must have committed suicide. Maxim and his wife again breath easy. However, soon the slovenly cousin of Rebecca's, Jack Favell, who was also her lover, comes to Manderley to try and bribe Maxim! He has a note written to him by Rebecca the very day of her death saying she needed him to meet her at the cabin as soon as possible. She had something very important to tell him. Maxim does not give into Jack's blackmailing attempt to be kept in a fine way with a yearly salary from Manderley for the rest of his life. Instead, Maxim calls his bluff and calls the county magistrate to come directly there and hear Jack's story. Jack is such a bully, that the magistrate doesn't for one minute believe him, but the note does nag at him. The magistrate decides to trace Rebecca's entire last day through her booking calendar. They all see that she had an appointment with a Dr. Baker that very afternoon which she marked off as completed. Maxim and Mrs. de Winter instantly look at each other and feel like they are doomed.....perhaps Rebecca really was pregnant and this is what she was going to tell Jack. In that case, she wouldn't have killed herself. Jack has now convinced himself and the evil, glaring Mrs. Danvers that Maxim, in fact, killed Rebecca. However, the magistrate won't believe him. To solve the last piece of the puzzle, they all agree to go to London and see Dr. Baker the next day and see why Rebecca was seeing him. Maxim and his bride spend their last evening together before who knows what lies ahead of them. The next day, as they all wait for Dr. Baker to thumb through his file, Jack is feeling confident, and Maxim and Mrs. de Winter very nervous. Finally, Dr. Baker says, ahhhh yes. Poor Mrs. de Winter, the first. She came to me with pains and xrays showed she was inoperably, terminally ill and wouldn't live but a few months more. Needless to say, the entire room is shocked. I think even the magistrate had started to wonder if there was some truth to Jack's accusations. As they all separate to head back their own ways, instead of taking the magistrate's advice that Maxim take his new wife and go on a holiday, Maxim has a foreboding feeling and decides he needs to drive through the night back to Manderley. As they approach Manderley in the middle of the night, Mrs. de Winter can't understand why it looks like the sun is rising at 3 in the morning. Maxim just says, "that's Manderley", and we are at the end of the book! I suppose that Mrs. Danvers, and/or Jack burned Manderley to the ground! Anyway....such an abrupt ending. I wanted a little more closure, but oh what a good book. :-)

Other than that infamous opening line, and the description of Manderley that follows it, here's another snippet of the writing that I liked. It is the narrator, Mrs. de Winter, looking back and talking about first love:

I am glad it cannot happen twice, the fever of first love. For it is a fever, and a burden, too, whatever the poets may say. They are not brave, the days when we are twenty-one. They are full of little cowardices, little fears without foundation, and one is so easily bruised, so swiftly wounded, one falls to the first barbed word. Today, wrapped in the complacent armour of approaching middle age, the infinitesimal pricks of day by day brush one but lightly and are soon forgotten, but then--how a careless word would linger, becoming a fiery stigma, and how a look, a glance over a shoulder, branded themselves as things eternal. 

Love that, and her way with words. :-)

Finished: Shiver (Stiefvater) I got this book for my 14 year old niece and decided I better read it first before giving it to her for Christmas. I wasn't sure what the content might be. Actually, not a bad little book. A little girl, Grace, is attacked by wolves when she's 11. She is saved by the yellow-eyed alpha wolf, Sam. She spends six years hanging out in her remote Minnesota backyard making eye contact with "her wolf". Unbeknownst to her, Sam turns human during the warm summer months. Sam worships Grace from afar, both as a wolf and a boy. When Grace is 17 and Sam 18, he finally lets her pet him as a wolf, and she buries her face in his fur. She feels extremely close to him. Then one day, the bad boy of the town, Jack, is killed by wolves. The town goes crazy and goes on a wolf shooting hunt. Grace freaks out knowing that "her wolf" might be killed. When she arrives home, she finds a naked, human teenage boy on her back deck, wounded in the neck. (Somehow the adrenalin that surged through his body when he was shot turned him human...hmmmm.) She knows immediately it's her wolf, turned into a human. She rushes him to the hospital where he survives and heals abnormally fast...in hours. He explains to her who he is, but she already knows. He tells her that he was bitten by wolves as a young child, and began turning into a wolf during the cold months. He explains that when he saved her when she was bitten, he kept waiting for her to turn into a wolf like he did, but she never did. She said she always felt close to the wolves after that. She also tells him how a couple of weeks after she was attacked by wolves, her dad accidentally left her sleeping in the car when she was sick one day and she barely survived the soaring temperatures. (dun...dun...dunnnnnn. I'm sure this will be the key to turning Sam human permanently, but the kids don't realize it yet.) Anyway, as predicted the human Sam and Grace become inseparable and fall in love. Sam longs to never turn into a wolf again, but he feels like the next time her turns he may never turn human again. Other characters come into play, like Jack's sister, Isabel, Sam's wolf-mentor and protector, Beck, and Grace's best friends, Olivia and Rachel. Jack's mean-girl sister, Isabel, is just as interested in finding a "cure" to the wolfness as Sam and Grace are. The kids finally figure out that surviving a raging fever, i.e., heating from the inside out may be the key. Jack and Isabel's mother works at a clinic where, conveniently, an outbreak of meningitis has occurred. Isabel manages to get her hands on some tainted meningitis blood to give to Jack, Sam, and Olivia, who has also now been bitten. Jack is injected, but before they can inject Sam, the cold night gets to him and he turns into a wolf. Grace manages to evoke some memories in him that turn him human for just a few minutes, and they inject him right before he turns back into a wolf again. Olivia gets cold feet and tells Grace she'd rather take her chances as a wolf for one season and then readdress the possible cure in the warm spring. And, it's a good thing she does....because Jack dies from his meningitis. (No great loss, because he was an abusive jerk.) Grace spends the next couple of weeks certain that Sam died from the injection because she hasn't seen him with the other wolves. At the very end of the story, as she goes out to her backyard in the snow, a shadow and footprints appear, and low and behold, it's the very human Sam...in the snow...not affected by the cold, and no longer a wolf. The End. I know this book is the first one of a trilogy, so I'm sure their story, and Isabel's, Olivia's, Beck's, etc. continues. I'm not sure I'm interested enough to read the next two books though. Now....to figure out whether or not it's an appropriate book for my niece. :-)

Finished: Henry the Sixth, Part III (Shakespeare) I seem to be making my way through the Shakespeare histories backwards at this point. :-) "Tell me if you love Warwick more than me? If it be so, then both depart to him; I rather wish you foes than hollow friends." Well, ain't that the truth in current times as well as back in the day. Edward says this in questioning two of his loyal followers when he realizes that Warwick has betrayed him and gone over to fight on King Henry's side. Of course, Warwick only went over to King Henry's side because he felt horrendously betrayed and embarrassed by Edward when Edward married Elizabeth Woodville without his knowledge AND while Warwick was on an ambassador's trip to the King of France to unite their countries by arranging a marriage between Edward and the sister of the King of France. When notice came during this meeting, which had been approved of by Edward, then Warwick became furious and changed his allegiance. So, this was yet another book of many battles and trading allegiances. First, Edward's father, Richard and his brother, Edmund, were slain in the battle to usurp King Henry from his throne. Then, Edward and his brothers, Richard and George (of Clarence) prevailed and defeated Henry, exiling him to Scotland and placing the crown on Edward's head. Then, Edward ups and marries Elizabeth, which really ticks both of his brothers off as well, since he seems to start favoring her brothers and other family members. Then, Warwick wages war on Edward, with the help of Henry's wife, Margaret, AND with the help of Edward's brother, George, who has defected to his side. This temporarily restores Henry to the crown, until brother Richard and some loyal men free Edward from his guard and restore him yet again back to the crown. In that ensuing battle, Warwick is finally killed because at the last minute, George decides that he can't go against his brother, so he helps Edward defeat Warwick. Young Edward, the son and heir of Henry and Margaret is also killed in that battle, so the wind rather goes out of Margaret's sails at that time. And then, Richard rushes off to finally kill the usurped Henry, instead of just imprisoning him. Then, at the end, Elizabeth presents King Edward with a son and heir, and Edward seems to think they'll all live happily ever after in a peaceful kingdom. The plotting Richard, though, is already showing signs of having other ideas...which we soon find out about in the book I finished before this...Richard the Third. In all, another great Shakespeare reading! I'm not sure if I'll go further back in history right now, but I will eventually. I left off coming the other way in history with the honorable Harry Hotspur, one of my favorite Shakespeare characters, being killed in his uprising against Henry IV, so I've got some middle ground to cover. :-)

Finished: Richard III (Shakespeare) Another great one by Shakespeare! O momentary grace of mortal men, which we more hunt for than the grace of God! Love that line from the character Hastings as he is about to be put to death by the evil King Richard. I really enjoyed this entire story because my hubby and I have recently been watching a different viewpoint story of the famous War of the Roses (Lancaster versus York) by watching The White Queen on television. In The White Queen, Richard is more of a pretty boy, sniveling younger brother to King Edward who never really seems as if he cares to have any power at all until he starts listening to the treacherous women around him, in particular, his wife Anne Neville. In Shakespeare's version, Richard is born disfigured, and remains ugly inside and out his entire life. He craves power and will do anything to be king from quite an early age...including killing anyone who stands in his way in line to the thrown, i.e., his own brother, George of Clarence, and his nephews, the sons of his recently deceased brother, King Edward. When King Edward dies, he leaves his brother Richard as their "protector" until his oldest son, also Edward, who is only about 12, can take over the throne. In Shakespeare's story, Richard mercilessly orders the deaths of both of his young nephews, after killing his brother George. In The White Queen, it is never clear exactly WHO orders the deaths of the boys, but it is implied to be either Anne Neville or Margaret Beaufort. Richard is specifically NOT implicated in the killing of the boys. So, what is the actual truth? In actuality, no one knows what became of the "princes in the tower". Richard did have them locked in the Tower of London after having King Edward's children by Elizabeth Woodville declared illegitimate. He then had himself crowned king. However, there came a day when no one ever saw the boys again and the mystery remains. Was Richard really so ruthless from an early age? I'm not sure that is clear either. It is very clear, however, that Richard was not a good king and was soundly defeated in battle by Margaret Beaufort's son Henry Tudor, a Lancastrian...who would go on to become King Henry VII. And, King Henry VII also ended up marrying Elizabeth, the daughter of Elizabeth Woodville and the deceased King Edward, to finally unite their families and do away with the War of the Roses once and for all. Anyway, as far as Shakespeare's version, as usual for me, no one compares to his turn of the word. :-) I liked this passage where Queen Elizabeth comes out to tell everyone that King Edward has died:

To make an act of tragic violence:
Edward, my lord, thy son, our king, is dead!
Why grow the branches when the root is gone?
Why wither not the leaves that want their sap?
If you will live, lament: if die, be brief,
That our swift-winged souls may catch the king's;
Or, like obedient subjects, follow him
To his new kingdom of ne'er-changing night.

I love that! And, there are, as usual, some famous quotes to be had from Richard III. One I had never known the context of until I just read it last night:

King Richard: A horse! a horse! my kingdom for a horse!

Basically, Richard had been fighting the battle against Henry atop his horse, but once his horse is slain, he is forced to fight on foot, with no opportunity to retreat. Being forced to fight man to man, he is killed in battle. In the midst of the fighting, he yells the above now famous line. In every day language, I think the quote symbolizes a person needing something they usually take for granted, and being willing to give up anything for it.

And, of course, the famous opening lines spoken by Richard when he is still Duke of Gloucester and his brother, King Edward, is still alive. In history, they have been successful in overthrowing the Lancastrian King Henry VI, and King Edward has grown more apt to indulge in wine, women, and food than in going out and doing more battle. Richard's true character and intent comes out in this soliloquy as he shows how he is envious of his brother's power, looks and abilities with women, compared to his deformed figure. He declares himself a villain and in the same breath plots the murder of his brother, George of Clarence:

Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of York;
And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;
Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings;
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visag'd war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front;
And now, --- instead of mounting barbed steeds, 
to fright the souls of fearful adversaries,---
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
but I, that am not shap'd for sportive tricks,
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;
I, that am rudely stamp'd, and want love's majesty
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature, 
Deform'd, unfinish'd, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me, as I halt by them;
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace, 
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to see my shadow in the sun
And descant on mine own deformity:
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain,
And hate the idle pleasures of these days,
Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous,
by drunken prophecies, libels, and dreams,
To set my brother Clarence and the king
In deadly hate the one against the other:
And if King Edward be as true and just
As I am subtle, false, and treacherous,
This day should Clarence closely be mew'd up,
About a prophecy, which says that G
Of Edward's heirs the murtherer shall be.
Dive, thoughts, down to my soul: here Clarence comes. 

I could go on and on, but I'll stop there. I'm anxious to go now and read King Henry VI Part III. This one deals with the actual defeat of Henry VI by the Yorks and Edward becoming king and meeting and marrying Elizabeth Woodville. :-)