Thursday, October 4, 2007
Once Upon a Quinceanera (Book #98)
Once Upon a Quinceanera (Julia Alvarez, 2007) isn't exactly an anthropological analysis of the quinceanera tradition (and I'd love to read such a book), but it's an intriguing meditation on what it means to come of age as a young woman, especially a Latina woman, in the United States today and in the author's 1960's youth. It made me think about what I hope for my own daughter in 10 or 12 years and the kind of values I want to be passing down to her. Alvarez often repeated a quote from Plato--paraphrased, "Education means teaching our children to desire the right things." I want my daughter to desire knowledge, justice, integrity, and courage--but also joy, laughter, and a good story.
Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon (Book #97)
One of the hardest parts about exploring a new and relatively obscure topic as an adult is figuring out where to start. (Relatively obscure=any subject you can't take a class on at community college or find a basic For Dummies or similar introduction.) It's not always easy to find the bridges that take you from basic, wikipedia-article knowledge to the kind of expertise you need if you're going to write about a topic yourself. I've frequently requested books from interlibrary loan or shelled out my hard-earned money only to find they're barely more informative than a wikipedia article or else are way over my head.
Way back in 2003 or so when I was first developing the plot for The Sergeant's Lady, I realized I needed to know a lot more about all aspects of Napoleonic-era army life. One of the first books I tried was Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon (Rory Muir, 1998). And at the time, it was way over my head. I remember being baffled by the terminology, as if each paragraph was a thicket of thorns I was trying to push through.
Four years later and many research hours later, I tried it again...and found it easy reading. Informative, but easy. So I guess I've been learning something after all. That's encouraging, really--that my mind still has at least some of its collegiate flexibility despite being so busy and out of practice academically.
Way back in 2003 or so when I was first developing the plot for The Sergeant's Lady, I realized I needed to know a lot more about all aspects of Napoleonic-era army life. One of the first books I tried was Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon (Rory Muir, 1998). And at the time, it was way over my head. I remember being baffled by the terminology, as if each paragraph was a thicket of thorns I was trying to push through.
Four years later and many research hours later, I tried it again...and found it easy reading. Informative, but easy. So I guess I've been learning something after all. That's encouraging, really--that my mind still has at least some of its collegiate flexibility despite being so busy and out of practice academically.
Friday, September 28, 2007
Empire of Ivory (Book #96)
Empire of Ivory (Naomi Novik, 2007) is the fourth book in Novik's series about an alternate world in which the combatants in the Napoleonic Wars have air forces of dragons and their aviators as well as armies and navies. While I don't think it's quite as brilliant as the first book, His Majesty's Dragon, IMHO it's stronger than books #2 and #3, with a tighter plot arc and a strong hook at the end to make the wait till 2008 for the next volume seem endless.
I promised friends who haven't read it yet that I wouldn't spoil it, so there's not a whole lot more I can say, except that I like how Novik is expanding her world and focusing more on the differences dragons make in the intercontinental balance of power in the 19th century. Which sounds dry as dust, but this is a page-turner. I started it at 7:00 last night, pausing only to play with my daughter and watch The Office, finally going to bed at 12:45 a.m. with ~30 pages to go, which I finished on the bus this morning.
I promised friends who haven't read it yet that I wouldn't spoil it, so there's not a whole lot more I can say, except that I like how Novik is expanding her world and focusing more on the differences dragons make in the intercontinental balance of power in the 19th century. Which sounds dry as dust, but this is a page-turner. I started it at 7:00 last night, pausing only to play with my daughter and watch The Office, finally going to bed at 12:45 a.m. with ~30 pages to go, which I finished on the bus this morning.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Phrases you just can't use anymore...
So I'm working away on my manuscript. A colonel is flattering his commanding officer a bit, talking about the utter success of their most recent action.
He called it "a glorious battle."
In my mind's eye, my characters instantly morphed from humans in the elegant officers' uniforms of 200 years ago, developing ridged foreheads and growing long, long hair. Their discreet glasses of claret disappeared, replaced with great goblets of blood wine. My colonel's concern that the general would give him a stern tongue-lashing upon learning he allowed an important enemy leader to slip through his fingers became shame and terror that his fearsome commander would declare him without honor and kill him where he stood.
So. Humans cannot fight glorious battles. The very phrase transforms them into Klingons.
He called it "a glorious battle."
In my mind's eye, my characters instantly morphed from humans in the elegant officers' uniforms of 200 years ago, developing ridged foreheads and growing long, long hair. Their discreet glasses of claret disappeared, replaced with great goblets of blood wine. My colonel's concern that the general would give him a stern tongue-lashing upon learning he allowed an important enemy leader to slip through his fingers became shame and terror that his fearsome commander would declare him without honor and kill him where he stood.
So. Humans cannot fight glorious battles. The very phrase transforms them into Klingons.
Rites of Peace (Book #95)
As I suspect is true of most English speakers who develop an interest in the Napoleonic Wars, the parts I know most about are the ones England was involved in. Trafalgar? Check. Peninsular Campaign? Check, in great detail. Waterloo? I've read all about it. Anything east of France is a bit fuzzier. OK, a lot fuzzier. I know the names Austerlitz and Borodino and so on, but I don't know a lot about the players involved, the stakes, how it ties to what went before in the 18th century and what came after in the 19th and 20th.
I'm trying to remedy that defect, so I read Rites of Peace: The Fall of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna (Adam Zamoyski, 2007) to bone up on the political personalities and interests of Russia, Prussia, Austria, and the like. It was a bit of a slog at first, and for someone who was reading it to learn about not-England places, I was pathetically grateful for such blessedly familiar names as Castlereagh and Wellington! At least I knew who somebody was as I battled to keep the Austrians, Prussians, and German principalities and duchies straight.
The Congress and the settlements that followed it weren't the European powers' finest hour. It's as if they were trying to put the genie of self-determination back in the bottle by creating an inflexible principle of "legitimacy" that left armed revolt as almost the only option for anyone who wanted a change. And if you want, you can trace the consequences of the choices they made all the way down to the wars of the 20th century. (Though the author points out, and I agree, that it's pointless to blame Metternich, Tsar Alexander, Castlereagh, et al. for unforeseeable consequences a century and more after their time, and it's not as if we can KNOW things would've been better if they hadn't been so reactionary.) A good book, if a trifle depressing in spots.
I'm trying to remedy that defect, so I read Rites of Peace: The Fall of Napoleon and the Congress of Vienna (Adam Zamoyski, 2007) to bone up on the political personalities and interests of Russia, Prussia, Austria, and the like. It was a bit of a slog at first, and for someone who was reading it to learn about not-England places, I was pathetically grateful for such blessedly familiar names as Castlereagh and Wellington! At least I knew who somebody was as I battled to keep the Austrians, Prussians, and German principalities and duchies straight.
The Congress and the settlements that followed it weren't the European powers' finest hour. It's as if they were trying to put the genie of self-determination back in the bottle by creating an inflexible principle of "legitimacy" that left armed revolt as almost the only option for anyone who wanted a change. And if you want, you can trace the consequences of the choices they made all the way down to the wars of the 20th century. (Though the author points out, and I agree, that it's pointless to blame Metternich, Tsar Alexander, Castlereagh, et al. for unforeseeable consequences a century and more after their time, and it's not as if we can KNOW things would've been better if they hadn't been so reactionary.) A good book, if a trifle depressing in spots.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Sharpe's Siege (Book #94)
It's always a challenge thinking what to say in these little reviews when I'm deep into a long-running series. Of course I couldn't put down Sharpe's Siege (Bernard Cornwell, 1987). It's not like I'd go 17 books into a series and then decide the 18th one isn't worth bothering with. So I'll just make three comments:
1. This is one of the most tightly plotted entries in the series, IMHO. I enjoyed mentally laying out the puzzle pieces and putting it together.
2. I wish the American captain hadn't been named Killick, because to me Killick=the comic relief character in the Aubrey/Maturin series. So I kept having to readjust my mental picture.
3. In general Cornwell writes women better than most male authors. Even when I don't like them, their actions and motivation make sense to me--they're people, not fantasies. So WTF was up with that French farmgirl? Seriously. WTF?
1. This is one of the most tightly plotted entries in the series, IMHO. I enjoyed mentally laying out the puzzle pieces and putting it together.
2. I wish the American captain hadn't been named Killick, because to me Killick=the comic relief character in the Aubrey/Maturin series. So I kept having to readjust my mental picture.
3. In general Cornwell writes women better than most male authors. Even when I don't like them, their actions and motivation make sense to me--they're people, not fantasies. So WTF was up with that French farmgirl? Seriously. WTF?
Monday, September 17, 2007
Four Queens (Book #93)
Four Queens: The Provencal Sisters Who Ruled Europe (Nancy Goldstone, 2007) isn't the most intriguing book I've ever read. (I seem to be missing the "fascination with all things royal" gene.) And yet it filled in some blanks in my historical knowledge, since I don't know much about 13th century Europe. The focus is on France and England, the kingdoms the two eldest sisters married into, and it's kind of interesting to see the embryonic national characteristics of two countries I know so well in their later incarnations.
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