In which I read fiction

Let the Right One In: A Novel

John Ajvide Lindqvist

I came to read Let The Right One In
at the recommendation of a friend whose opinion I hold in high regard. 
I am going to admit right here that in high school the two of us read
vampire books.  Then we quit reading vampire books around the same
time for about the same reasons.  But that is perhaps another post. 

Let The Right One In is set in the Stockholm suburbs in 1981. I
kept thinking, "This seems anachronistic," and then immediately
thereafter thinking, "Oh, yeah.  It's 1981!"  Every time they talked
about the new Kiss album, or described the apartments.   I finally got
temporally oriented, but I never got a real sense of Sweden.  I'm
comparing this to the sense of Iceland that I got very strongly from
Last Rituals, which actually suffered from a flatter plot.  Maybe the point is that Sweden is does not leave an impression on you.  The characters, however, were more textural and detailed.

Anyway… it's the coming of age story of a likable-enough adolescent
boy-doofus complete with bullies and elaborate revenge fantasies. There
is a manhunt for a mysterious serial killer, a smattering of dead-end kids, and a
cadre of hapless neighborhood alcoholics.  It sounds like the feel good
hit of the season, doesn't it?  But for once the vampire
isn't some sensitive guy with dreamy eyes!  In all, John Ajvide Lindqvist
does a good job of maintaining my interest for the long haul and I was
rewarded with, if not a twist, then a flourish at the end.

So, it wasn't the greatest piece of literature in the world, but it was
meaty, creepy, supernatural mystery, and– best of all– it was
different.

So now let's all listen to Morrissey.

Let the Right One Slip In

Morrissey

From the discard bin: Black Music

Billy Frickin' Preston

Black Music , Gavin Petrie Editor and Designer (New York: Hamlyn, 1974) came out of the discard bin last week.  Confident from my new-found ventriloquism skills and cheered on by Paul's suggestion that I make this a feature I went looking for more trashed treasures.  And how could I NOT grab a
book with Billy Preston on the front?  Sorry I forgot to scan the front before I released it back into the wild, but I did get the awesome one to the right.

Tighten Up

Archie Bell & The Drells

In a world of top 5 lists it is
refreshing that Gavin Petrie comes up with his top 21 black artists of
the day (1974).  As I flipped through the pages, most of the artists
made sense. There were a few– three to be exact– that I had to read
up on. Can you guess which three?

Here's the list:

1. James Brown
2. Ray Charles
3. Staple Singers
4. O'Jays
5. 3 Degrees
6. Chi Lites
7. Thom
   Bell
8. Bill Withers
9. Pointer Sisters
10. Barry White
11. Maytals
12. John Holt
13. Isley Brothers
14. Harold Melvin
15. Smokey Robinson
16. Stylistics
    

    O'Jays in hoodies
17. War
18. Al Green
19. Bobby Bland
20. Dandy Livingstone
21. Billy Preston

Living A Little, Laughing A Little

The Spinners

Here are the ones I had to look up:
 7, 12, and 20.

I'm Stone in Love With you

Stylistics

And here's what I learned.

Didn't I (Blow Your Mind This Time)

The Delfonics

I'm a little ashamed that I did not recognize Thom Bell's name.  He was a producer and arranger of the Philadelpia Soul Sound. He worked on countless Philly soul hits (with The Delfonics, The Stylistics, and The Spinners ) and wrote a few songs you'll recognize:  "I'm Stone in Love With You," "La La Means I Love You," "Living a Little, Laughing a Little,"
"Rubber Band Man," and so on.  Parenthetically, I did not realize that
there is a direct connection between the sound of Philadelphia and
strings and horns of smooth jazz.  I really need to read that book House on Fire and catch up on my Gamble/Huff/Philly knowledge. Yeah, Archie Bell says that they're from Houston but the song was produced and recorded in Philadelphia. Like that's not confusing enough.

Glamor-Shot Barry White

The Tide Is High

The Paragons

John Holt is "The Barry White of reggae," according to Petrie at least.  (And we ALL know how cool Barry White is.  He has all the smoothest pix in Black Music.)  Early in Holt's career he worked with The Paragons. I've got "The Tide is High" from 1967 and a couple of later things.

Dandy Livingstone came to England from Kingston, Jamaica in 1959. He had hits with  "Reggae in Your Jeggae," "I'm Your Puppet," and "Rudy A Message To You."
I am excitedly on the lookout for two of his songs: "Move Your Mule"
(1968, Down Town) and "Donkey Returns" (1968, Trojan, as Dandy & Brother Dan All Stars).  Dandy appears to be my kind of guy!

Smokin' Barry White

Well, that's what we scrounged out of the discard bin this week.  Black
Music by Gavin Petrie.  It was a pretty dull and flimsy book on what
should be a pretty juicy bit of music history.  But as usual, I learned
something.  Books don't have to be good to teach you something.  Go
figure.

Isley Bros in all their sartorial splendor

Patti Smith Land 250 (with Donkey Wednesday goodness)

Patti Smith, Land 250

Patti Smith

Land 250 is published by the Fondation Cartier Pour L'Art Contemporain
in Paris to accompany a big exhibit earlier this year.  It's a nice
hefty volume with a sturdy, grippy cover and medium weight paper.  So,
yes, it does feel good to hold. Between my public school French and Ms.
Smith's crazy handwriting I managed to turn it into a learning
experience.

But
the photographs… the PHOTOGRAPHS are the thing.  They are two hundred
fifty delicate black and white ones created with Polaroids by Patti
Smith.  She started out with a Land 100 in the 70s but later got a Land
250, of which there is a photo in the book. She went back to shooting
Polaroid after the death of her husband Fred Sonic Smith.

Leonardo

In
her introduction she writes that, "The experience of taking Polaroids
connects me with the moment.  They are souvenirs of a joyful solitude."

Carte _de_visite

I felt it.  Time doesn't exist in these pictures. Fred waves back as he pauses before a door. 

Fred

Bye, Fred.

Most of these images come from Paris, where used to live in 1969.  French culture was always an influence in Patti: Rimbaud, Genet, Artaud and Baudelaire.  Brancussi,  Houdin, and Maupassant. Man Ray.  Man Ray.

Pitted Mirror

In 69 Patti was sitting on the curb in Montparnasse writing in her notebook about Picasso.  She looked and saw a plaque.  The photograph is of a studio where Picasso worked.

Pitted Mirror

There are the obligatory Robert Mapplethorpe photos: his hands and the tambourine he made for her, seen of the front of "Twelve." 
I understand that Patti and he had a bizarre chemistry.  He just gives me the
willies.  It's not his work.  I'm good with that.  But the guy starved
a monkey to death in his apartment.

Monkeys

Several are shot in Montparnasse cemetery where one is surrounded by poets, philospher, writers, and artists.   They're all dead.  But they're all there.

There
is one photo of Susan Sontag's grave on the morning after her funeral. 
Patti went back to the graveside to take photos because Annie was too
stricken to return.  She said the flowers looked fresh.

Chevre Mere

Lamb of God

There's nothing stiller than a tombstone, but Jackson Pollock's monolith is still– palpably, creepily still.

Her son, Jackson, has a tattoo of his father on his shoulder. 

Biblioteque

For
animal lovers I have included a passage and a photograph about a goat
she encountered on a beach in Senegal.  The donkey, of asse, is from
Namibia.  That's for me.  So is the monkey painting.

You'll
recognize that painting of Leonardo's of those guys at that table.

But
I bet that you didn't know that Virginia Woolf watched her mother die
in a mirror, because she couldn't bear to watch her straight-on.  That
pitted mirror is in there.

The Lenny Kaye portrait gave me a lump in my throat.  It wasn't anything special, just a guy in a chair.  But it is so warm.  And strangely spiritual.

In conclusion:  You should go to your library (type in your zipcode & Worldcat finds it) or independent bookstore and pick up a copy of Land 250.  Literally pick it up.  Remember, I said it feels good.  I also recommend the slide show at Lens Culture.  They also have text from the book.  It is a nice site.

 

april is the cruelest month etc. what remains?
brian jones bones, jim morrisons friend jimi hendrix
bandana. sweatband angel…

from Patti's poem "picasso laughing"

Asse, Namibia

From the discard bin

Cover

There is a class of
books that are discarded from any library collection.  We call them
weeds, or discards, and they are the result of surveying the collection
for out-of-date, out-of-favor, extraneous, or physically repellent
items.  Before you get all indignant, be advised that without the
important deaccessioning of some materials there would be no room for
new materials.  Furthermore, the practice pre-dated me by decades (at
least) so don't get militant on me. 

A lot of libraries use these culled items for their annual used book sale.  So you, the customer, benefit.

Our library system is
awash in donated books to resell and something like a coffee-stained
copy of a Danielle Steel book is beneath our customers' standards.  So
our weeds go into big welded-wire bins which we, humble library gnomes,
are allowed to pilfer.

I sort
through them for old books in patterned buckram bindings and celebrity
cookbooks.  I don't actually climb into the bins, but I have been known
to hang over the side in an unladylike manner.  Sometimes I find a
happy surprise, like an out-of-print title I've been coveting.  So what
if it has an ugly cover or writing in the margins?

Senor_wincas

This is how I came to possess a dog-eared copy of Ventriloquism Made Easy: How to Talk to Your Hand Without Looking Stupid! by Paul Stadelman and Bruce Fife

In case you've been
pondering whether you should quit your day job and start a career as an
entertainer, here are some professional development tips from a…
professional.

Mmmm

p. 6
Ventriloquism is enjoyable not only because it can be used for creating comedy but because it is mysterious.

p. 7
Ventriloquism
can be used not only to bring traditional ventriloquial figures and
puppets to life, but also unconventional objects such as paper bags,
gloves, even socks.

p. 18
For a novel twist, instead of using a lifeless figure that you make
look alive, use a living figure and make him look like a dummy.

Hi_baby

p. 21
Why should magicians and clowns have all the fun?  Ventriloquists can join in the excitement of balloon sculpturing and make talking balloon animals.

p. 25
I also recommend that, if possible, you take your book and your partner
into a private room for your practice session.  You will learn faster
if no one sees you in the progressive stage.  You are not yet ready to
perform.

Mirror

p. 30
The simplest method for handling labials is to simply dodge them.

p. 36
The first hint it to put emphasis on the words without labials.  For
example, in the sentence "I can play the guitar," if you emphazise
"guitar," slight variations in the word "play" ("tlay") will not be
noticed.

Singing

p. 39
To help you build an interesting character, you should give your puppet
preferences on subjects such as music, clothes, sports, friends, and
food.

p. 43
But don't make the mistake of jiggling the head continuously; it's distracting and will make your audiences nervous.

Balloon-animal

p 59
If you are interested in selling yourself as an expert ventriloquist,
the ability to smoke, drink, and eat while the figure is talking will
add to your reputation.

p. 62
You can use ready-made dialogues, but writing your own material is best.

p. 63
Joke #3
Farm Boy:  My pop can't decide whether to get a new cow or a new tractor for his farm.
City Boy: He's certainly look silly riding around on a cow.
Farm Boy: Yeah, but he'd look a lot sillier milking a tractor!

Let_me_out

p. 67
Just reading about ventriloquism won't make you a ventriloquist.

p. 84
Paul: You're at the foot of your class.  Why don't you try to get to the head of the class?
Windy:  Why?  They teach the same things at both ends.
P:  Your teacher said you spelled needle N-E-I-D-L-E.
W: That's right.
P:  That's wrong.  There is no "I" in needle.
W:  Then how you going to thread it?

p. 91
You: Old MacDonald, it isn't me… I wasn't going to mention it, but you smell like a barnyard.
Old MacDonald: I just came from feeding the pigs.
Y: How long have you been raising pigs?
O: Forty-eight years/
Y:  Seems like they'd be grown by now.
O: I said I'll tell the jokes, sonny!
Y: Do you have any other animals?
O: Yeah, I got a flock of cows.
Y: Not flock, herd.
O: Heard what?
Y: Herd of cows.
O: Well sure I've heard of cows… I said I had a whole flock of them!

p. 95
You:  How does an alligator get here from Florida?  Did you swim?
Gator: (Sarcastically) Did you swim? … No. I flew.
Y:  Come on. Alligators can't fly.
G:  Tell American Airlines that.
Y: You came on a plane?
G:  No.  I came IN a plane. They thought I was a suitcase.

Eye-contact

(This book is a candidate for deaccessioning because it has been superceded by a 2nd edition, NOT because it is lame.)

*Not to worry, classic works of fiction will never be completely deaccessioned.  It doesn't matter how many years Martin Chuzzlewit sits there without checking out, we will keep at least one copy because of it's noble provenance.

What’s in a name?

Bertha Venation: And Hundreds of Other Funny Names of Real People

Larry Ashmead

Laughs.  Lots and lots of laughs.

Names selected for their awesomeness from Bertha Venation by Larry Ashmead:

• 
  Vaseline Glass
• 
  Jermajesty Jackson (Jermain Jackson's son)
• 
  Shanda Lear (William Lear, Jr.'s daughter)
• 
  Johan Riley Fyodor Tiawo Samuel (Seal's and Heidi Klum's son)
• 
  Shreiking-Loud-Train-Whistle
• 
  Dooly Ponder
• 
  Bopeep Seahorse
• 
  Formica Dinette
• 
  Placenta Louise
• 
  Quentin Cumber (Q. Cumber)
• 
  Peter Enis (P. Enis)
• 
  Rita Book
• 
  Randy Hamburger
• 
  Kodiac Yazzie
• 
  Baskerville Holmes
• 
  Van Lingle Mungo
• 
  DeMarcus Faggins
• 
  Fonda Dicks
• 
  Sally Forth
• 
  Septimus Lurch
• 
  Nira Hardon Long

From the department of strange marriages:

"A literary agent, Janis Donnaud, had childhood friends named Barbara
Fatt and Bill Heavy.  They got married.  Odd names before the union,
odder after, and odder still when they had twin boys, Lemon Jello and
Orange Jello."

"Author Andrew Solomon's father went to law school with Mel Hiney, who
married a Smith classmate of her mother's called Barbara Fatt, and
became Barbara Fatt Hiney."

"His college classmate has a high school teacher with the first name of
Vermester, who marries Mr. Bester and became Vermester Bester."

'"Llonald King sent me this note: 'Joseph Cotten's son married (against
his family's wished) the girl next door.  Her name was Velvet Satin,
Satin being a name the father of the family , who was an immigrant from
eastern Europe, had adopted and made legal.  Thus the young woman's
name became Velvet Satin Cotten.'"

Place names that make me giggle (all in Great Britain):

• 
  Gropecunt Lane, London (renamed Grape Street)
• 
  Merkins Venue
• 
  Hole of Horcum
• 
  Upper Dicker
• 
  Nether Wallop
• 
  Mudchute
• 
  Crotch Cresent
• 
  Titty Ho
• 
  The Furry

I read books

I've been a little busy IRL and
not very reflective or articulate of late.  As I read my
neighborhood posts I feel bad about myself.  What a lump I am.  At the very least I can attempt to write
about the books I've been reading.  I can't promise that it will be
informative or entertaining but here we go.

The Monster of Florence

Douglas Preston

The Monster of Florence by Douglas Preston with Mario Spezi

I
am a sucker for a good true crime book.  I prefer them to be thoroughly
researched, I like the elements to be clearly laid out, and– most of
all– I like a good fluid narrative style. Having said that, I have
read, and enjoyed, some real drek also.

The Monster of Florence case spans
three decades, during which a number of couples where slain as they
made out in their autos in the Tuscan countryside.  Besides the murders
I am pretty fascinated with the prevalence of parking for Italian
youths and the slightly weirder tradition of pervy old guys creeping
around to watch and photograph them doing so.  The Monster case has had
plenty of suspects, numerous arrests, and lurid conspiracy theories. 
And all of this has been the subject of jurisdictional and investigative conflicts between the carabinieri and the polizia.

I've
long wanted somebody to write about the Monster of Florence killings in
English.  When I heard that Douglas Preston (of Preston and Child) was
doing just that I was both pleased that a novelist was writing it and
apprehensive that a novelist was writing it.  So I waited.  And
waited.  And waited some more.  It turns out that Preston and his
co-author Mario Spezi (who had been reporting on the case since the
80s) got too closely involved in the the investigation and the politics
surrounding it.  The two were accused of hampering the investigation
and suspected of planting evidence.

The
book is structured in three parts.  The first and longest part is about
the series of murders and Mario Spezi's investigation of them.  The
second part introduces Douglas Preston into post-monster Tuscany where
he befriends Spezi.  And the final bit is about the prosecution's
pursuit of Spezi and Preston for involvement in conspiracy and cover-up
of the crimes. 

Having read and watched a documentary on the writers'
ordeals, I anticipated getting bored and bailing after the first
section.  I surprised myself when I had finished the whole thing. 

Also, from the facts of the case as they are presented in MoF, I agree with the authors' conclusion on the true identity of the Monster.

Here is the link to a good article in The Atlantic that you might want to read if you are not up for the whole book.

Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World

Vicki Myron

Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World by Vicki Myron

OK. 
Here's the story:  1. Tabby kitten found in the book drop of a small
Iowa town's library book-drop on the "coldest morning of the year."  2.
Librarian keeps cat.  3.  People love having a cat in the library
except for the ones who don't think a cat should be in the library. 
4.  Cat gets comfortable and nobody dies of allergies.  5.  Cat is a
picky eater.  6.  Cat becomes celebrity locally, then nationally, and
finally world-wide.  7. Cat gets old and you can guess the rest.  

This
book is generally a little dewy-eyed for my taste.  It's a great
heart-warming story– totally worthy of a lengthy article but not quite
enough to sustain a whole book.  I fought the urge to skim but finally
I gave in.  Life is too short to dwell on every nuance of of a
small-town cat's life. 

My other complaint is that Dewey confirms the image of "librarian" as "lonely middle-aged white lady who loves cats."

Dewey Readmore Books website.

Stay tuned in coming days as I arduously grind out a few more reviews.  Maybe they'll even get better.

Weekend Book Roundup

I am a couple of weeks behind on my weekend book roundup, so this will be a chunky one.

First up, Will Eisner. Here are three of his graphic novels based on his old neighborhood, Dropsie Avenue in the Bronx.  Contract With God and Other Tenement Stories (1978) is widely accepted as the first "graphic novel."  Contract, along with Life on Dropsie Avenue and Life Force
all releate stories from Eisner's days growing up in the Bronx.  Over
time the area changes from rural to suburban to urban then transmutes through
the influx of various groups of people: WASPs, Irish, Jews, Italians,
African-Americans, Puerto Ricans, hippies and so on. I have Fagin the Jew and Will Eisner's New York: Life In The Big City on my list to read next.

Next up are a few books (graphic novels) by Marjane Satrapi. 
Satrapi grew up in Tehran during the Iran-Iraq war and then went to
Vienna for school and to escape the conditions in Iran under the
Ayatollah Khomeini's regime.  Persepolis and Persepolis 2 tell her story during these years.  Embroideries is about the lives of women in Iranian culture and it draws on the uncomfortable justaposition of sewing and sex.  Chicken With Plums
is the tale of the last days of  Marjane's uncle Nasser Ali Khan who,
in 1958, out of despair decided to lay down and die.  If you are interested in her,
there is great interview with her over @ bookslut.

The Cheese Monkeys: A Novel in Two Semesters

Chip Kidd

Then there was The Cheese Monkeys, a novel by Chip Kidd.  Kidd is widely known as they guy who changed the way people make book jackets.  In the spirit of "write what you know" Cheese Monkeys
is set in a 1958 university (Penn State) art department graphic design class.  It is
a period piece, a coming of age story, and a design manifesto.  The
cover of CMs is truly worthy of
Kidd (cover design by TK).  The cover seen here is a concealed by a slipcover that had to be
slid on by hand and the copyright information is printed across the
endpapers.  Kidd's publisher, Scribner, was choking on these special
features UNTIL Kidd renegotiated his royalty.  Wow.  A guy who would
reduce his cut to assure that the packaging is just so. 

True Stories of Law & Order: The Real Crimes Behind the Best Episodes of the Hit TV Show

Kevin Dwyer

In an interview I read Kidd comments that he watches lots of Law & Order.  He suggests that the show should be renamed "How to Construct a Plot."  Which reminds me that I never wrote up True Stories of Law & Order.  I was familiar with most of the stories in the book:  murdering transvestite millionaire Robert Durst, the repressed memory case of George Franklin,  and Norman Mailer's protege, Jack Abbott. 
But I have one particular favorite.  Every time I hear this story it is
so bizarre that it's like hearing it all over again:  two lawyers in
San Francisco who were keeping a Presa Canario for an Aryan Nation dude in prison when the dog attacked and killed their neighbor (Diane Whipple). 

Fast Forward 1: Future Fiction from the Cutting Edge

Last for now, Fast Forward I,
a sci-fi anthology edited by Lou Anders.  There are a couple of Robyn
Hitchcock poems, which is sad because they don't hold a candle to his
short stories.  For me the highlights were Paul Di Filippo's
"Wikiworld" and Ken MacLeod's "Jesus Christ Reanimator."  The rest was
the regular sci-fi short story fare.

OK.  That covers it for now.  Except for the Sush book!  But I'm reading another sushi book and a book on the future of food, so I'll save those for one roundup.

Ye Olde Timey Booke Review: Platero and I

Platero y yo / Platero and I

Juan Ramon Jimenez

Spanish poet Juan Ramon Jimenez wrote Platero y yo (Platero and
I) in 1914.  Each chapter in this short novel reads like a poem. 

Jimenez
lived between 1881 and 1958.  He studied law and painting but
ultimately pursued writing.  As you read his words you will notice his
artists attention to color, light, and texture.  He's been called a
Platonist and an Impressionist.
 
           

(Some cool photos of Moguer)    

In 1900 the young Jimenez's father died and the up-and-coming poet sank
into a deep depression.  He returned to Moguer and eventually ended up
in a san in France.  But he continued to write, went back to Moguer
(1905-11), then to Madrid where he met Zanobia (1912), whom he then
followed to New York (1916).   Then a bunch of other stuff happened.

In 1956, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature.  He died two years later.

Platero views the valley

Platero's Sweetheart

The
version I read is translated in 1957 by Eloise Roach and illustrated by
Jo Alys Downs, both nice ladies from Austin.  I have no gripes with the
translation, but I am conflicted about Ms. Downs' illustrations.  They
are simple compositions that capture the quiet, contemplative tone of
the prose, but they are rendered in a grey somewhere between pencil and
silverpoint.  (I had to tweak the contrast in these scans to get them
to even reproduce.)  The overall effect for me is that of something
fading, so I'll give Downs the benefit of the doubt:  she wanted them
to look transitory like the memories and impressions Jimenez shares with us.

Years
ago when I initially read this, I thought it was a horriffic story
about a sad man whose only friend was his donkey.  I did not
remember/understand that he was a poet and he was waxing Romantic.   I
thought he was just a crazy guy with a donkey in a horribly poor and
cruel land full of freakish people and sick animals.  I remember a lot
of dead or miserable animals, and there are some in there– but they
are  just one part of Jimenez's point of  view of life in Andalusia. Some of it is quite heartbreaking, but it all makes sense in the larger context.

Platero reading

A partial list of things discussed in Platero and I:

• A mother dog, a mangy dog, a white horse, a runaway bull, an old
  donkey, an evil donkey, a sweetheart donkey, a canary, a parrot, sparrows,
  and geese
• A cemetery, a castle, a bull ring, a fountain, a pool, a well, a locked gate, a windmill, and a cistern
• 3 blind women, a crazy man, the village idiot, a consumptive girl, a shepherd, various children, Gypsies, and Romanies
• Pine trees, vinyards, flowers, butterflies, and trees
• A pomegranate, figs, grapes, bread, wine, and pine nuts
• One cockfight and a few religious processions

Below, I have excerpted a few of my favorite chapters here.  I hope you enjoy them:

XXXVII
The Cart

In
the big creek, which the rain has swelled as far as the vinyard, we
found an old cart stuck in the mud, lost to view under its load of
grass and oranges.  A ragged, dirty little girl was weping over one
wheel, trying to help the donkey, who was, alas, smaller and frailer
than Platero.  And the little donkey was spending himself against the
wind, trying vainly at the sobbing of the child to pull the cart out of
the mire.  His efforts were futile, like the efforts of brave children,
like the breath of those tired summer breezes which fall fainting among
the flowers.

I patted Platero, and as well as I could I hitched
him to the cart in front of the wretched little donkey.  I encouraged
him then with an affectionate command, and Platero, at one tug, pulled
cart and beast out of the mud and up the bank. 

How the little
girl smiled!  It was as if the evening sun, setting among the
yellow-crystal rain clouds, had kindled a dawn of joy behind her dirty
tears.

With tearful gladness she offered me two choice oranges,
perfect, heavy, round.  I took them gratefully, and I gave one to the
weak little donkey, to comfort him; the other to Platero, as a golden
reward.

Platero Hug

XLIII
Friendship

We understand each other.  I let him go at his fancy, and he always takes me where I want to go.

Platero
knows that on reaching the Corona pine I like to get close to its trunk
and touch it, and look up at the sky through its enormous,
light-filtered top; he knows that the narrow path that leads between
the grassplots to the Old Fountain delights me; that it is high
festival for me to watch the river from the pine hill, which, like a
sorceress brings classic scenes before me.  If I go to sleep, unafraid,
on his back, my awakening always finds me at one of these friendly
spots.

I treat Platero as if he were a child,  If the road is
rough or a little too hard for him, I get down to make it easier for
him.  I kiss him.  I tease him mercilessly.  He knows that I love him
and bears me no grudge.  He is so like me, so different from the rest,
that I have come to believe that he dreams my own dreams.

Platero
has given himself to me like a passionate adolescent.  He protests at
nothing,  I know that I am his happiness.  He even avoids donkeys and
men…

LXXXVIII
October Afternoon

Vacation days
are over, and with the first yellow leaves the children have returned
to school.  Solitude.  The heart of the house, also, with the fallen
leaves, seems empty.  Distant cries and faraway laughter are heard only
in fancy.

Evening falls apace, slowly, on the flowering
rosebushes.  The sunset glow reddens the last late roses, and the
garden, lifting its flame of fragrance to the flame of the dying sun,
smells of burnt roses.  Silence.

Platero, wearily restless as I,
does not know what to do.  Hesitantly he comes toward me, considers,
wonders, and at last, confidently stepping sturdily and cleanly on the
brick floor, he comes with me into the house…

CXXXVII
Cardboard Platero

Platero, a year ago when there appeared in the world a part of this
book that I wrote in memory of you, a friend of yours and mine made me a
gift of this toy Platero.  Do you see it from where you are?  Look: he
is half-gray and half-white; his mouth is black and red; his eyes are
enormously big and enormously black; he carries little clay saddlebags
with six flowerpots filled with silk-paper flowers, pink and white and
yellow; he can move his head, and he walks on a blue-painted board that
has four crude wheels.

Remembering you, Platero, I have become attached to this little toy
donkey.  Everyone who enters my study says to him, smiling, "Platero." 
If anyone does not know about you and asks me what he is, I say "It is
Platero."  And so well has the name accustomed me to feeling that now
I myself, even when alone, think he is you, and I caress him with my
eyes.

You?  How inconstant is the memory of the human heart.  This toy
Platero seems to me today more Platero than you yourself, Platero.

Platero's wreath

The Thirteenth Tale

The Thirteenth Tale: A Novel

Diane Setterfield

Here's a book that I didn't want to like (because it seemed a formulaic gothic tale) but I thoroughly enjoyed.  The contemporary component of Thirteenth Tale concerns a reclusive author  on her deathbed who recruits a bookish but troubled heroine to write her biography.  

The retelling of the author's life constitutes a story (or stories) within a story.  And here is where Setterfield turns up the gothic.  The author's story runs through the whole list of gothic elements:  the ancestral manor, sprawling gardens, twins, inherited insanity, suspicions of incest, a ghost, quirky domestics, and an idealistic governess.  At one point a baby even shows up on a doorstep.  It would seem farcical if the prose was less fluid.  Setterfield coaxes you along with parallel narratives.

Just as TT is shaping for a perfectly predictable ending, Setterfield throws us a couple of curves.  Nothing too drastic, but still a bit of a surprise.   Ultimately, Thirteenth Tale is a "recommend."