LETTER OF MARQUE: ARTICLE THE THIRTIETH

Seduced | Pamela Britton

Today I finished reading Seduced by Pamela Britton. It's a historical romance, yes, I know, but it's enjoyable enough. It gets tedious with the he-said/she-said, I-love-you/I-hate-you, he-loves-me/he-loves-me-not back and forth stuff, but all in all, it's witty enough to hold one's attention. I think most people like the romance build-up at the beginning the best, but personally for me, I like the second half that becomes more of a non-romantic, life-and-death story. Once we get to that point, we stop getting the fluff and start getting the friction. I even teared up somewhat when the romance started getting genuine and necessary for survival. Never fully hits the mark, though, which is disappointing.  

That is partly due to the fact that it seems the author tried a mite too hard to get some vulgar wit points — points that ended up pointing to more vulgarity than wit, resulting in dropped charm from an otherwise merely cute book. Case in point: Lucien St. Aubyn reads far too witty to resort to the word “penis,” so when he said it, the page quaked with character inconsistency and shock-value treatment that I think stooped too low for any conquering. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind the word penis. It just shouldn't have come from Lord Lucien St. Aubyn, the infamous Duke of Death, the far-too-witty-to-resort-to-such-lowborn-commoner-tongue Rake of Ravenwood. Just tried too hard and missed the mark. But it certainly wasn't terrible. You'll get some good chuckles out of it.

•I purchased this at a yard sale. I do not know the publisher or author.•
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LETTER OF MARQUE: ARTICLE THE TWENTY-NINTH

North and South | Elizabeth Gaskell

Today I finished reading North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell, a novel written in 1855, and set in the middle of the nineteenth century in industrial-era Northern England. It was: loaded with morality, extremely verbose, and stoic in its representation of its people, although I do dearly love the hard man of Mr. Thornton, until his strength gets reduced to the rubble of a blathering idiot in an effort to show he has the softer side of a human being. Blah! Human beings are boring, and blathering is often poorly executed, as becomes the case here.  

I enjoyed enough the banter and the attempt at tackling a huge topic of morality, affliction of conscientious thought, the differences of North and South England at the time, class struggles, religious struggles, prejudices, the roles of women in an increasingly-liberated society, and the acceptance of those opposite you; but the largest downfall was the book's rushed and unsatisfying ending. There is a build-up of a romance that runs as a thread throughout the entire book, but it is met with constant opposition, whereas neither party can find the way, time, acceptance of differences, or social ability to reveal true emotions. Finally, at the very end, there is a chance! Oh, our first chance to see an acknowledgment of mutual feeling! And it's burned out in a few rushed paragraphs spanning no more than a page or two that reduce our hard man to a lovelorn blubbering fool and give us no clearly-stated sign of release or relief from either party. Our only relief, I guess, is in knowing that it apparently turns out okay for them, although our unsatisfied hearts are broken for them that they never get to experience the pure joy of an embrace, a kiss, an exchanged smile, giddy laughter ... anything.  

Long story short: read through the entire book until you get near the end, and then simply watch the last ten minutes of the ending of the BBC drama mini-series adaptation instead, for it is a far superior and satisfying ending.

•I read this for free on my Kindle. I do not know the publisher or the author, obviously.•
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LETTER OF MARQUE: ARTICLE THE TWENTY-SIXTH

The Scarlet Letter | Nathaniel Hawthorne

I know, I know, but somehow I managed to escape it in high school. My life was blissful until recently when I decided I needed to endure the classics in order to consider myself well-rounded. I really wanted to read The House of the Seven Gables, but knowing Letter came first and that Gables was Hawthorne's response to the public's outcry at his dismal, if blasphemous, take on the morbid East Coast, I figured I should read them in order. But hey, I've lived there. I've seen Salem. And I'll say that, although it takes me fewer words, Hawthorne has it just about right in Letter.

I knew this was not going to be a pleasant read, as obviously everyone knows by now the general story behind this bleak cover. What they might not know, however, is that there is nothing like Nathaniel Hawthorne to make you hate language and that this guy goes on and on and on for two chapters to describe one wall. Everyone is whiny, the man she loves is a weird wuss, the man who's supposed to be seeking revenge is cryptic and complicated to the point that you miss the point, and everything is obsessively descriptive with very little interaction. The few moments of saving grace come just after the middle of the book when we finally get some dialogue going between the characters. 

My big suggestion to you, if you must read this, is just sit down and get through it as quickly as possible, as it flows slightly better without breaks. You don't need to read “The Custom House" portion at the beginning unless you hate your life; all it tells you is that Hawthorne, while working in the Custom House, came upon the actual fabric of the scarlet letter (although not really ... I know, right!?) in an abandoned room upstairs. Yup, forty pages just for that. The first half took me months to read because I kept picking it up, putting it down, picking it up, getting frustrated, forgetting what had already happened, losing track of which man was which and who was whom and what was what, then putting it down, not wanting to pick it back up. I got more enjoyment out of the second half after reading it on an airplane with no escape but the drooling, oversized man next to me. So I was pinned, and that actually helped me get into it a little bit. But no tears, no remorse for Hester's stupid life or anyone's pointless death. The whole thing is just brutal, in story and in language.

I now have no desire to read The House of the Seven Gables.  Maybe during my next menstrual cycle when I hate myself.

•I picked this up at a yard sale. I do not know the publisher or the author, obviously.•
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