Werner’s Comments (group member since Jan 26, 2009)

Werner’s comments from the Litwit Lounge group.

Earlier this week, the mail brought me two books I'd ordered online, both of them chosen to allow me to complete series I've started: The Complete Morgaine by C.J. Cherryh, and The Doxies Penalty by Madeleine E. Robins. (Until the latter book was published last fall, I'd believed that I'd already read the final book of that series, so this gives me one more to look forward to!

The Matchmaker by Thornton Wilder is the first of four plays, originally read as required reading in my high school American Literature class, which I'm rereading. This one is best known for providing the basis for the subsequent wildly popular Broadway musical Hello Dolly; but it's well worth reading or viewing on its own account. My four-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

The next one of the four plays that I'm currently rereading is The Caine Mutiny Court Martial (1954) by Herman Wouk. Set during World War II, it's a dramatic adaptation of his Pulitzer Prize-winning 1952 novel The Caine Mutiny (which I've never read, although I read a Wikipedia plot summary of it just now). For the play, Wouk (who himself served in the Navy in WWII, so he was writing about a milieu he knew) concentrated just on the court-martial after the mutiny.

I'm hoping to finish reading it this week, and to post my review this weekend, Reggia!

Well, I made even less progress with The Chemist than with The Tokaido Road before setting it aside; but in this case, I've only returned it to my to-read shelf. Through interlibrary loan, I'd gotten a collection of four plays I read in high school, intending to review them retrospectively. But I quickly concluded that I'm going to need to reread them first; and since I wasn't very far into the Meyer book, I decided to set it aside and do those reads first, rather than checking out the collection again. I'll try to work The Chemist in some other time.

The first play up of the four is The Matchmaker by Thornton Wilder (d. 1975). Written in 1954 and first produced in 1955, this was a revision of an unsuccessful Wilder play from 1938, The Merchant of Yonkers. In its rewritten incarnation, it enjoyed a long Broadway run, and was later re-adapted (apparently with Wilder's consent) as the iconic Broadway musical Hello Dolly.

Contemporary American Drama (1964) is a collection of four plays from the 1950s and 60s, which was required reading in my high school American Literature class. I plan to do separate reviews for each of the plays (after I've reread them); this review (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... ) just deals with the special features of this collection itself.

By request, I'm passing on this information (which was shared in another group). GR has a couple of glitches that have been going on for the past two weeks. Many people are not getting notifications when someone leaves them a comment directly to their profile pages. Also, you are now not necessarily getting group emails from your group Moderators when they are sent out. For some people, these may appear days later or not at all. There is no official estimate on when any of this will be corrected.

Having bailed on The Tokaido Road after close to 100 pages (I wrote a short note explaining why, here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... ), I've now started on another thick book, and one that's been sitting in my TBR piles for quite a while: The Chemist by Stephenie Meyer. It's in a different genre than other works I've read by Meyer; but she's an author who's never disappointed me!

The link to my original review of Carmilla by J. Sheridan Le Fanu hasn't changed; but since I've completely re-written it following a second read (after a 20-year gap), this time as a common read in another group, I thought it might be appropriate to re-share it here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . (Though it's linked to the Wildside Press printing, that's not the one I read, so I can't comment on any special features that it might have.)

I've finally started my long-postponed read of The Tokaido Road: A Novel of Feudal Japan by Lucia St. Clair Robson. She's a new-to-me author; but she was actually recommended to me by a then library colleague back in the 90s. (You can tell that I usually can't get around to following up on recommendations very quickly!) This read should count towards a couple of challenges I take part in.

I'd previously read and liked a couple of novels by C.J. Cherryh; but although it opens a four-book series, when I started reading her "swords-and-planets" tale Gate of Ivrel, I intended to read it as a stand-alone. (At the time, I was more interested in --and still want to eventually read-- her Russian Stories trilogy.) But I'm now resolved to read the whole series! My five-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Although I'm starting slightly late, I've just joined in a common read (in another group) of the 1872 vampire novella Carmilla by Victorian master of supernatural fiction J. Sheridan Le Fanu. This is a reread for me, and I rarely reread books I've already reviewed here; but it's pretty short, and in this case I want to see if I missed or misinterpreted an aspect of the tale that I wasn't really aware of on the first read.

bodkin --[in this context] "A dagger."

"...the boy twisted in his grip and gave forth a stream of curses, and the girl with a shriek rushed at him and clawed at his hand upon the boy --a bodkin in her hand."

--from Gate of Ivrel by C.J. Cherryh

Here's the link to my four-star review of Golden Age Detective Stories, edited by Otto Penzler: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... . All 14 of the stories here were published in America (though a few of the writers were British immigrants) between 1925-1953, and mostly reflect the cerebral British style of that day, although a few are in the rougher style birthed in the pulps on this side of the pond.

I'd say that it's fair to count East of Eden, Vickie!

Because I wanted a short read that I could finish before starting a common read in another group, I've started reading Gate of Ivrel by C.J. Cherryh. I read and liked a couple of her other SF novels back in the early 90s; and this one has been on my radar since early in this century, when I read about it in the 3rd edition of Anatomy of Wonder: A Critical Guide to Science Fiction. (It will also count towards an annual challenge in another group.)

Thanks, Reggia! (I'll agree with John, though, that Dorian and Sir Henry are about as unlikable as it's possible for characters to be!)

Reggia wrote: " The Picture of Dorian Gray is another one on my list, the title keeps coming up and I mistakenly bought a second copy (both used so cheap). Anyway, I keep hearing conflicting things ..."

I gave it five stars. For whatever it's worth, my review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Most serious readers in the English language have the basic idea of what the short novel Animal Farm (1946) by George Orwell is about, even if they've never read it
--and I highly recommend it, as a worthwhile read for everyone! My retrospective four-star review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .

Reggia wrote: "Still haven't found my current reads from 5 months ago, however, I did discover Vanity Fair in another book box. Excited to start reading it... just wish I had someone to discuss it with."

We'll be interested in your review when you finish it, Reggia! Maybe some of us can discuss it with you then. I've read it twice (in different editions), and gave it four stars.