One Bear's Opinion -- Book Review

A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver by E.L. Konigsburg

My housemate signed up for a personal reading challenge with fifty-two categories, one for each week of the year.  The challenge was designed to expand reading tastes, and at least try authors, genres and books you might not have ever considered.  But my housemate altered the challenge to fit her reading, and is making it a bit harder for herself by using books she already owns.  It means there is potential for a bit of re-reading in completing the challenge, but I don't really object to that.

This book is for the category:  A book that came out the year you were born.  As my housemate is not really sure when books "came out," she decided to take the category to mean books with an original copyright date in the year she was born.  She checked out lists of books with an original copyright date in the year she was born and comparing those lists to books she owned, either as physical books or e-books, she found A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver.  I fully approved this choice.  E.L. Konigsburg is one of my favorite authors, and this book was actually my introduction to her work back when we first read it years ago.

E.L. Konigsburg's books are written for younger readers, I'd say her audience is between 9 and 13 years old, but like all of the best-written children's and young adult books, they appeal to adults as well.  This one is no different, in fact, I'd say this one is more enjoyed by adults than children, if only because the book is a bit better with even the general understanding of the history of the characters most adults have.  Additionally, the title might be a bit off-putting to children, who may be loath to bust out a dictionary (or even a dictionary application) to determine the meaning of the word miniver.  The book, however, rewards its readers, with not only a definition of miniver but a very good story of one of the very great characters in history -- Eleanor of Aquitaine.

It is a book of historical fiction, and other reviews I have read have commented on the less than perfect research on the subject -- a particular point of contention is a mention of Eleanor having potatoes, when historically potatoes were only in the New World at the time, they had not been introduced to wider Europe at the time.  But minor points aside, the book is a fun and interesting way to get readers involved in Eleanor's story and interested enough to search out other books on the subject.

A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver has an unusual take on Eleanor's story, by telling it as she is in Heaven awaiting her second husband's, Henry II of England, arrival from limbo.  The story is told in flashbacks from people influential Eleanor's world at the period being discussed.  It's not a unique structure, but it is a perfect way to tell Eleanor's story.  Eleanor of Aquitaine was an uncommon woman, at any time, but particularly for her time and as such, her story deserves an uncommon telling.

The book is not hard to read, though you may want to have a dictionary handy now and then.  The author's own illustrations are complementary to the tale, and make the book a bit more real to readers.  It's a fun read, even with the historical inaccuracies.  They are completely forgivable, after all, this is a work of historical fiction.  On the whole, I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and found it just as good as the first time we shared this book.

One Bear's Opinion:  Five cups of decadent spiced hot chocolate in the fanciest cups available

Happy Reading Everyone, 
Oliver

Another Bear's Opinion -- Book Review

A Cellarful of Noise by Brian Epstein
 
One of my housemates is just about the biggest Beatles fan you can imagine. He has almost every record any of them has made, and some of them several times over. He insists there are good reasons for the duplicates. My other housemate, although accepting of his enthusiasm, appears unconvinced.

Although a voracious Beatles record collector, my housemate does not have the same obsession with Beatles books. He said that you could probably build a house out of Beatles books without ever doubling up on one. So I was a little surprised that he bought this one as an e-book when he saw an email promotion for it.

His reason was that unlike so many Beatles books, this one was written by someone who was really there and it’s contemporary to the time rather than being built on decades of received wisdom. That makes it stand out from the rest.

This memoir of The Beatles’ manager was written in 1964 – a time when anyone would have said that The Beatles had peaked, little knowing they were still on the ascendancy. Brian Epstein writes in an entertaining, conversational manner, avoiding all trace of self-indulgence. Although the book is not merely about his association with The Beatles, he is enough of a professional to know that there’s really only one reason anybody would be interested in reading it. The book therefore opens with The Beatles’ triumphant first tour of the US, before a couple of short chapters on the author’s childhood and upbringing, but he quickly comes back to the topic he knows his audience is most interested in.

Epstein was probably the last honest man in the music business, if not the first. There is hardly a trace of cynicism and one comes away completely convinced that he only had any association with his clients because he completely believed in them as artistes. He also writes with wit and charm. If you told someone that certain passages were written by Stephen Fry, they would probably believe you.

Another bear’s opinion: Four scotch-and-cokes.
 
Sláinte,
Spencer

Another Bear's Opinion -- Book Review

The History of Rock and Roll in Ten Songs by Greil Marcus

It’s the kind of title that is bound to start arguments in pubs and social media, which is surely deliberate.

The objective is to pick ten songs that tell the history of rock & roll, and you’re probably already making your own list which may possible include That’s Alright Mama, Johnny B Goode, Good Vibrations, Strawberry Fields Forever, Stairway to Heaven, Rapper’s Delight, Stayin’ Alive, Anarchy in the UK, Smells Like Teen Spirit, or Common People but if so, just hold your horses.

This is intended as an alternative history of rock and roll in ten very unpredictable songs, some well-known, some completely obscure. It’s a more than worthy objective, but I’m not sure the author has completely pulled it off.

It’s not that he doesn’t know his subject deeply or chose inappropriate examples – in fact the choices are brilliant and his explanations incredibly detailed. It’s more that he seems to go off on wild tangents, spending several pages of several chapters describing particular movie scenes in intimate detail only for the purpose of essentially saying, ‘It’s a bit like that.’ In fact, it could almost have been The History of Rock ’n’ Roll in Ten Movies, which might be a good idea for a follow-up.

It’s this kind of padding out that suggests the premise was a bit too long for a major magazine article but not quite enough to fill 250 pages.

Having said that, the book is full of great quotes and even the most knowledgeable music fan will learn something from it. It’s worth it just for Guitar Drag, easily the most powerful chapter in the book. Despite the book being frustrating in parts, you will definitely come away with a new perspective.

Another bear’s opinion: Three pints of flat beer.
 
Sláinte,
Spencer

One Bear's Opinion -- Movie Review

Paddington (2014)

Today I went with my housemates, and my good friend Spencer, to see the new Paddington movie.

This is the first movie I've seen in the theaters in a while and the first I've seen since moving to Australia.  Assigned seating in a movie theater is a bit odd, but still not such a bad idea.  The last time I went to the movies, I shared some popcorn with my housemate, but this time, they were planning on going to dinner afterward and didn't want to spoil their appetites.  It was just as well for me.  Sometimes I find nibbles during movies distracting, and I did not want to be distracted during Paddington.

I was first introduced to Paddington through the shorts broadcast in between Sesame Street and Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood on PBS when I was much younger.  Then my housemate found a copy of Paddington at Work at the Symphony Book Fair and we read that.  We never had all the Paddington books, only the one, but I still feel I know Paddington pretty well -- if only because I am a bear.

I really didn't know what to expect from the movie.  I'm always a bit nervous about movie adaptations of books I know, but this one looked pretty good from the previews.  And even if it was horrible, I would have had a nice adventure.
 
It was not horrible.  It was a very good movie -- fun, entertaining and exciting, all the things you want from a movie.  I will say this, the movie is not the book I know, but that may be because it was based on stories from other Paddington books.  I found the characters of the Browns not to be perfectly in character with either the portrayals in the books or the tv shorts.  I did enjoy them nonetheless.  Paddington was perfectly portrayed, if not an exact adaptation from the books.  I'm not a big fan of Nicole Kidman, but she was well cast as the villain.

On the whole the movie was very enjoyable.  It was fun and funny.  There were a few scary parts, especially for bears.  But have no fear, by the end of the movie, all was well for the Browns and Paddington.

I had a wonderful time seeing this movie and highly recommend it to anyone, particularly for bears.

And if you do go see it, watch for the cameo appearance of Paddington Bear creator and author Michael Bond.

One Bear's Opinion:  Five Marmalade Sandwiches (and one to keep for emergencies)
 
Happy Viewing Everyone,
Oliver

One Bear's Opinion -- Perfect Days

Sometimes all you need is a couple of books and some friends to make the day perfectly complete.

Here's hoping everyone has such a great Friday,
Oliver (and friends)

One Bear's Opinion -- Book Review

Mr. Churchill's Secretary -- Susan Elia MacNeal

This is one of the books my housemate found on her book buying adventure when she was back in the land of cheap books.  I'm fairly sure she saw it on the shelf and decided to give it a try based on the title and the blurb.

I am very glad she did.  I have found some new friends.  The book was a fun read, and the descriptions of daily life in 1940 London were vivid enough to make it feel truly real.  Good books do that, they can draw you into not only the story, but the setting.  With a good book it is possible for me to get lost in the world of the story, so much so that sometimes I wonder why the people that populate my real life are not the characters when they are talking to me.  On more than one occasion while reading this book, I caught myself looking up from the book and wondering why my bedroom looked nothing like the bombed-out streets of London.

Mr. Churchill's Secretary is a good mystery, with some twists and turns.  I really can't say it kept me guessing to last page, but that is mainly because I dropped the book and upon retrieving it, accidentally saw one of the clues.  I spoiled the mystery for myself, but that did not make it any less enjoyable to read.  (I know many people, my housemate included, read the last pages of mysteries first.)

I know the book was historical fiction, and I understand that not everything described in the book is, or needs to be, historically accurate.  There are many thing in historical fiction I can overlook that because I know it is fiction, but there were a few things that rankled with me in this book.  Firstly, I really disliked the way the author tried to make the characters embrace anachronistic attitudes about alternative lifestyles.  I know alternative lifestyles have existed as long as people have, but the author's style of forcing acceptance and/or mainstream normalcy by emphasizing things that would have been hidden at the time was irritating.  I do not need a current social justice lecture in my leisure reading, especially when I thought I was reading a historical fiction mystery.  But I do need the characters to be products of their time.  I'm perfectly willing to suspend belief for the purposes of the story, but the story needs to make sense in its own parameters.  Forcing current ideals on otherwise time-appropriate characters makes those characters very hard to believe.  I think of the characters as friends, and I am still looking forward to other adventures with them, but the disconnect between their time and this was glaring and definitely made them feel as though they were merely tools, forced to do the author's bidding, not their independent characters of their own.

The other thing that really grated on my nerves was the author tried, and for the most part succeeded, to get snippets of all of Winston Churchill's famous speeches in the text of the book.  I know it was war-time and Churchill did many "rally the troops" speeches, but it was not necessary to quote all of them.  The point that the main character was a typist for the Mr. Churchill could have been just as easily made without her speaking along with the Prime Minister on the radio.

On the whole it was a good book, and I look forward to the others in the series.  Maggie, John, David, and Sarah have become friends and I am anxious to share their next adventures.

One Bear's Opinion:  Three Cups of Strong, Black British Tea, without sugar (there's a war on, you know)

Happy Reading Everyone, 
Oliver

One Bear's Opinion -- Book Review

The Assassination of the Archduke: Sarajevo 1914 and the Murder That Changed the World by Greg King and Sue Woolmans
 
This is a departure from my usual reading.  Usually I read fluffy mystery novels, best categorized as "Cozy Mysteries."  But this year marks the 100th anniversary of the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and, 6 weeks later, the start of World War I, so when my housemate found this book at the bookstore, we decided it was perfect timing to read it.  I'm sure that's why the bookstore had it displayed so prominently, but we were both planning to read a World War I history anyway.

In all honesty, I am not unfamiliar with the royals in the pre-World War I Empires.  I have read several historical biographies of Tsar Nicholas II, as well as biographies of Queen Victoria's daughters and granddaughters.  I was familiar with the major players.  But I had known of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie, only peripherally in those books.  I had never read anything specifically about him or the Austro-Hungarian Empire prior to the War.  Sure, I knew of the assassination from school textbooks and answering essay questions.  And when we were in college together, my housemate took a history class titled "Europe Since 1914" which the professor wanted to subtitle "From Sarajevo to Sarajevo."  (For reference, we were in college in the early- and mid-1990's, when Yugoslavia was self-destructing.)

But in all that time, and through all those histories, I had never really read anything specifically about Archduke Franz Ferdinand.  It was time to rectify that.  And this book was perfect for it.

I am picky about my historical biographies, in that I prefer to read ones I know are well-researched and based predominantly in verifiable fact.  Don't get me wrong, historical fiction has its place, but not in biographies.  I had read both Greg King's The Fate of the Romanovs and The Court of the Last Tsar:  Pomp, Power, and Pageantry in the Reign of Nicholas II previously, so I knew him to be a reputable biographer and one who researched his books well, so I was happy to begin the book.

It is nearly impossible for me to review this book without discussing the book, so I will have to mention some things that may be considered spoilers to people who have not read the book.  If you are concerned about spoilers, please do not read this review any further, but know that I can definitely recommend this book if you are interested in the subject.

First, the book is about Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Countess Sophie, more than about the assassination in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914.  Naturally the assassination is discussed, but the main focus of the book is the life of the Archduke, not so much his death, or a discussion of the after-effects of his murder.

Second, and this is important, because it is the crux of the author's theory of the assassination, the marriage of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and Countess Sophie was a morganatic one, meaning that the couple were of unequal social rank.  Archduke Franz Ferdinand was the heir presumptive to the throne of Austria-Hungary, and his wife Sophie was the daughter of a Bohemian aristocrat.  She was not royal, and as a result of an oath the Archduke took on June 28, 1901, should he ascend to the throne, his wife Sophie would not become Queen/Empress and his children were specifically excluded from inheriting either the throne or anything from the Hapsburg line.

The central theory of the book is that the morganatic marriage set the stage for the assassination.  Not that there was such public and popular dislike or disapproval of the marriage, but because Sophie was not and never would be a royal, she was not entitled to the same protection as the Archduke, even if traveling with him.  Emperor Franz Josef's Lord Chamberlain, Prince Montenuovo not only made sure that Sophie never forgot she was not a Hapsburg, he ensured and insisted on the different treatment whenever and wherever the Archduke and Countess appeared together.  While the authors acknowledge the role of Gavrilo Princip as assassin, there is definitely a theory that the enforced differential treatment, to the point of not allowing royal guards along the route because Sophie was in the car, and she was not entitled to such a guard, was a major factor in allowing the assassination to be successful.

It was a very interesting portrait of the couple, and the treatment of the Countess.  It was definitely a theory that is never presented in high school history classes.  And I certainly learned things reading the book.  In fact, I learned that Archduke Franz Ferdinand's sons were captured by the Nazi Regime after the Anschluss and sent to hard labor at Dachau Concentration Camp.  They were released only on intervention by members of other European Royal Families.  That was a completely unexpected repercussion of the assassination of their parents.

It was a heavy book, both in subject matter and actual weight of the book.  And reading it was sometimes slow going, not only because of the subject matter, but because I wrestled with the Austrian, Bohemian, Serbian, and Croatian names.  I liked that the authors kept the names as close to the actual names as possible, but I did struggle with them.  It is definitely worth reading if you are at all interested in the life of the Archduke.  There is really very little discussion of World War I.  My edition was subtitled Sarajevo 1914 and the Murder That Changed the World, but other editions have the much more accurate subtitle Sarajevo 1914 and the Romance That Changed the World.  Either way, the Archduke never realized what an impact his life and death would have.

One Bear's Opinion:  Five Cups of Viennese Coffee and a slice of sachertorte for after
 
Happy Reading Everyone,
Oliver