Books, books, books...

[lareinenoire]

Just as a quick note to everyone -- there will be no spoilers on this journal. None at all. In fact, my book probably won't arrive until early next week since I ordered from Amazon.co.uk., so I'll almost certainly be avoiding the Internet until I've read it.

I did finish The Virgin in the Garden two days ago, and immediately launched into

Comments

[nineveh_uk]

I have repeatedly tried byatt's Frederica Potter books and failed. I think I hit the nadir in "Babel Tower" when I was reading a bit and thinkging "I'm sure [spoiler incident] is indeed a very frightening and visceral experience, and it would be nice if the narrative were able to convey this on any level but the purely intellectual". I'm afraid I can't stand Frederica, and I tend to read her as a sort of Mary-Sue of the child Byatt (possibly in adulthood rather than childhood) would have wished to be - brilliantly intelligent, enormously well-read (any real-life girl would have had to fail every other subject to get that much reading in, I think), her talents unrecognised by her peers yet nonetheless recognised by the adults who matter, throwing her into glorious starring roles etc. etc. and a big thing going on with Stephanie who isn't Margaret Drabble precisely, because she is older, but who I can't help seeing as a sort of revenge on Drabble. Which is a pity, because I do think that some of the descriptive writing is very good, and

[lareinenoire]

Byatt wrote a notorious anti-HP article, that alas drowned any interesting point she had to make in a near-trademark flow of appalling snobbery basted in ignorance. Oh dear, can you tell that I just don't like the woman and really ought to shut up.

I never actually read the article, but I did hear a lot about it and it made me rather sad since I generally like Byatt's writing. Although much of what bothers you about Frederica bothers me as well. She did seem terribly Sueish, in the sense that the narrative bent around her and things just didn't follow logical steps when they concerned her. I hadn't realised she'd written several Frederica-centric books...

[anonymous]

Hi, this is about your fanfiction story "Be All My Secrets Remembered", and I'm sorry to leave this random comment on your journal like this... However, I suspect that someone has attempted to claim that particular story for their own, over at harrypotterfanfiction.com: here. I may be wrong, but I just thought I'd alert you to it...

[lareinenoire]

Oh wow. Yes, that is my story and someone is definitely trying to claim it as their own. I'm now reporting it to the webmaster. Thanks so much for letting me know!

[quistis218]

Thackeray's book was good and everything, but his constant moralizing got on my nerves...
I like Becky though...so far (I'm about a third through it).