GOODNIGHT LADY

GOODNIGHT LADY – Martina Cole/Headline – 1994

I found this book in the 48-cent bin and wish I had sprung for the dollar aisle.  This tale of an Irish family’s solidarity in the East End of London is really a batch of treacle.

We encounter the protagonist, Briony Cavanagh, as a child living in squalor with a drunken father and passive mother.  After seeing her sister’s change in lifestyle as a result of being sold to a wealthy pedophile, she is jealous.  When her sister outgrows the needs of the predator, she is anxious to take the place of her now-troubled sister.  Briony is delighted by her new status as a well-fed, well-groomed girl and has no qualms that she is involved with Henry Dumas, a married man.  After all, she is being cared for in a private home of her own, with two servants to boot.  At the age of 13, her son has been delivered and Dumas’s childless wife insists on raising the child as her own.  Dumas develops an immediate hatred of the child and Briony, but allows her to continue living in the house with the servants.  During her pregnancy, she is befriended by Tommy, a budding hoodlum.  They develop a lifelong relationship as they build their prostitution empire.

Intertwined with this tall tale, we are brought into subplots involving Briony’s sisters, the most titillating of which involves her sister Kerry, a talented sister on her way to stardom.  Kerry falls for a black American musician and gets pregnant.  Briony uses her gangland friends to break the musician’s hands and convince him to head home.

I will not go int0 the other strands of this yarn for obvious reasons.

Starting with the preposterous title, GOODNIGHT LADY is pure pulp fiction and her strong female character is not at all likeable.  But what do I know?  The cover calls it a sensational bestseller!

ESSAY: BAH HUMBUG!

ESSAY:  BAH HUMBUG!

From this Jew looking for holiday spirit, I just don’t feel it this year.  First, there is my landsman, Joe Lieberman, bringing sleaze and dissention in what might have been meaningful reform to health care.  Apparently, he got his goodie bag from the Hartford insurance giants, probably containing lots of Channukah ’gelt’ to brighten his season.  This attention-seeking politician changes with the wind, holding America hostage as a sometimes Democrat, recently Independent and probably future Republican.  Despite his religious orthodoxy, he seems amoral and increasingly obnoxious.  He is an embarrassment to his fellow Jews, I think.

Then there’s Obama.  I had such high hopes for change, but realize he was ‘produced’ like any other celebrity.  He was a tabula rasa and we projected our own hopes and dreams onto the manufactured illusion.  When we needed a giant push for jobs, a la FDR, we got first a bank bailout, then a car bailout, then his REAL priority for himself, the guy who is pushing through health care ‘reform,’ totally compromised into uselessness for most of us.  Can someone answer this?  If every American is going to be legally responsible to carry health insurance, what happens to those in the middle class with pre-existing conditions who are obligated to carry this without limits on premiums?  Will they be forced by law to pay four times the going premiums?  Will they go to the government guidelines and find they are too financially viable for subsidies?  But Obama needs a ‘success’ for his legacy.  He will go down in history for passage of health care reform, albeit flawed beyond words. 

Then there’s Afghanistan.  MORE troops?  What insanity!  At least in the days of empire we would have gotten some resources and real estate.  If we could tap into the poppy crop, we’d have SOMETHING for our occupation.  Ditto Iraq, substituting oil for drugs.

Obama is a sellout, dedicated, like his predecessors, to corporate profits and war profiteering. 

So, despite our Democratic majorities in the House and Senate and the Presidency, this is as good as it is going to get.

The vast majority of the population is suffering mightily with job losses, home losses and scrounging around for food in this land of plenty.

The progressives are getting nowhere, being thwarted at every turn by the lobbyists who control our politicians.

We’ve been fed a steady diet of garbage and I’m so saddened as I realize there is no way out, despite our high hopes.  Is the notion of AMERICA just an illusion, after all?

THE DISAGREEMENT

HISTORICAL FICTION:  THE DISAGREEMENT/NICK TAYLOR/SIMON & SCHUSTER – 2008

Even people who are not Civil War buffs will find THE DISAGREEMENT quite interesting for its setting in Virginia and its protagonist, John Muro, introduced to us on his sixteenth birthday, which coincides with the date of his state’s secession from the Union.  Young Muro has dreams of going to Philadelphia to study medicine.  Despite his jubilation over the secession, his mood is diminished when he realizes that Philly is “Yankee” country and  off limits.  Since he is eligible for the draft, his father urges him to go to the University of Virginia to avoid combat.  He arrives on campus and finds that he has been paired with the son of a plantation owner, Braxton Baucom III.  B.B. is gregarious and generous and Muro finds that both his transportation possibilities and his wardrobe have expanded.  Muro meets an intelligent, playful young lady named Lorrie in the dining hall.  We learn that she is from Texas and the niece of John’s professor and mentor, Dr. Cabell.  Their relationship intensifies throughout Muro’s medical education.  Dr. Cabell soon assigns the student to a hospital in Charlottesville, where the war wounded are brought.  This trial by fire brings some maturity to the boy as he tries to make do with the supplies on hand, which are rapidly dwindling.  Although an avowed son of the Confederacy, he treats a Union soldier and discovers that the man is also a doctor.  They become friends and Muro is disappointed when he learns that his friend is no longer there due to a prisoner swap.  John gains a good deal of grim experience as the war progresses and the Union army advances.  It is soon evident that his side will lose.  There is much privation for the wealthy and the poor.  The young doctor has cut ties with his family and has little income.  Yet, since love conquers all, he marries the unpredictable Lorrie and regrets it almost instantly and plots his escape north.

I enjoyed reading about Virginia during the Civil War and the bird’s-eye view of a medic.  I was disappointed that although Muro could befriend a Yankee, he never questioned the slavery issue.  Perhaps this is typical of the time and place, but I expected more character growth.

This was a really good read, though, and I recommend it if you enjoy learning some history via fiction.

DERAILED

FICTION:  DERAILED – James Siegel/Warner Books – 2003

I have to say that DERAILED was worth the 48 cents I paid for it.  I got really sucked in by the easy-to-relate to tale of an advertising executive commuting on the Long Island Rail Road and hooking up with a beautiful woman, eventually winding up in bed in a cheap hotel.  As a New Yorker, I could relish the depiction of some local landmarks, making it even more believable (except for his identifying a street in Forest Hills, Queens, as Continental Boulevard when it’s actually Continental Avenue.  That’s a glaring error for Queens residents as this is not only a major thoroughfare but an express stop on the subway.  Well, Perhaps Mr. Siegel never got off the railroad between Merrick and Penn Station.)

Although I was actually kept awake one night, sorting out what was going on and succeeding early in my reading, I kept going to prove myself correct.

This “New York Times Bestseller” got really silly really fast.  I think of BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES and DERAILED comes off badly in comparison, with its same ordinary and adulterous man caught in crisis.

I think Siegel did his “what if…,” starting with the conclusion and weaving in plot details to get there.  He’s thrown in a daughter with Juvenile Diabetes to bring urgency and a sense of betrayal and danger throughout the book.

I don’t want to be a spoiler, but Siegel’s protagonist finds himself up against embezzlement, murderers and fantastical occurences that seem contrived to get Charles Schine where Siegel wants him to be at the conclusion of the novel. 

I was unaware of this book and the film version, but can see that it could translate well to film of the action/adventure type.

Once it stopped being believable for me and I kept reading anyway, I felt as duped as the main character.

TWISTED BRANCH

FICTION:  TWISTED BRANCH – Chris Blaine/Berkley/Penguin – 2005

Even though I usually stay away from the horror genre, I enjoyed this scary tale of a haunted inn in Cape May, New Jersey.  After almost completing the book I peeked online to learn something about the author.  I was chagrined to learn that Chris Blaine is a pseudonym for a trio of writers (male and female) who authored three books about the Abbadon Inn.  It was all the brainchild of someone from the publishing house named Ginjer Buchanan who threw out the horror series idea to several writers.

This particular novel takes place in 1978 and features Sam Ford, a black middle-school teacher who is fleeing his Virginia Home and winding up in Cape May with a dead car, a girlfriend and a reason he can’t apply as a teacher.  He must find some work and a place to live and walking around town he sees a huge Victorian inn being renovated.  He is not especially handy but he inquires anyway.  To his advantage (and later to his horror) the new owners, newly arrived from Connecticut, he is offered a job as a private teacher for their 13-year-old son, Carl.  The parents acknowledge that Carl has some adjustment difficulties and peculiarities, but they offer $500 a week, plus board.  The unemployed teacher accepts the offer, relying on an old friend as a reference.  He and his girlfriend, Dani, move in to a dilapidated part of the building and are quite uncomfortable.  Carl takes an immediate dislike to both Sam and Dani and he targets them, practicing his self-proclaimed magic skills to scare them away.  Within days, Dani is gone.  Surprisingly, she doesn’t reappear.  It is soon apparent that Carl’s parents are completely disinterested in their peculiar son and are glad that he is being taken care of for most of the day.  It is very rough sledding with Carl.  Although Sam can tell that he is intelligent, he is very resistant.  Sam breaks through somewhat but starts to experience strange happenings at the inn.  He attributes the them to Carl and is particularly disturbed that Carl has been snooping in his room.  Sam has secrets.

The teacher becomes fascinated by the history of the inn and discovers, to his surprise, that the Abbadon was a stop on the Underground Railroad and that its owner back in the day was considered an abolitionist.  Sam experiences some very weird phenomena at the Victorian hostelry:  putrid smells, freezing cold spots in heated rooms, and most disturbing, leg irons.

Ford’s dreams are the most interesting part of the book, giving insight into slavery and slave masters (one bearing his last name) and an antecedent of his also bearing the name of Sam Ford.

Teacher and student are experiencing the haunting.  Carl feels that it was his magic that is causing the problems and he blames himself, desperate to undo what he feels he has brought into his home.  When his mother is found dead in the bedroom, he is devastated.  Sam calms him down.  Together they explore the history of the town and Carl becomes quite interested in some of their lessons and projects.  Still, even though Sam has padlocked his room and his closet, the curious, spiteful boy finds a way in and discovers his secret.  He reveals it to his father and Sam is promptly fired.

But Sam knows that he is needed, that the house’s mysteries involve him by way of his family history.

Despite the horror aspects, this is a pretty good book and it held my attention and I was sorry it ended.

ELEGY

FILM:  Elegy – 2009

Adaptation from THE DYING ANIMAL/Philip Roth novella

The fabulous Ben Kingsley is stunning as an emotionally limited aging professor and sometimes theater critic in this riveting film.  He makes no bones about his long string of affairs and detachment from serious relationships and his own emotions.

Enter a beautiful student (Penelope Cruz) and he is thrown into turmoil.  He worships her beauty and can’t get enough of her.  She is sensitive and wants more from the relationship.  He cites their 30-year age difference as he becomes possessive.  He is the last to know that he has fallen in love with her.

There is an impressive performance here by Dennis Hopper, a colleague, as well as by Ms. Cruz.

There is a somber, aching quality to this film, leading to a believable conclusion.

Thumbs up to those who love character driven stories with raw emotional examination.

A SHADE OF DIFFERENCE

FICTION:  A Shade of Difference – Alan Drury/Avon – 1962

This political novel follows ADVISE AND CONSENT in Drury’s trilogy.  I just finished this 800+page saga in paperback and although it was quite absorbing, it was murder on the eyes.

It’s fascinating to read this over-forty-year-old book and compare it to contemporary political life and world problems.  Drury’s plot is quite interesting, involving the U.N., the U.S. administration, emerging African nations and our own racial strife in America.  Set in the height of Cold War tensions, we meet His Royal Highness Terence Wolowo Ajkaje, the M’Bulu of Mbeuele (Terrible Terry), who has come to power by suspicious circumstances.  He and the Panamanian Ambassador to the U.N., Felix Labaiya (driven by his own ambitions and hatred of the United States, conspire to propose a U.N. resolution granting immediate independence to Terry’s homeland, Gorotoland, in Africa.  This British colony has already been slated for self rule in another year.  The pair want to force the issue in the midst of the other emerging African nations.  There is a lot of support for this at the U.N., especially from the non-white countries.

The very colorful Terry arrives at the U.N. and makes quite a splash.  He has been schooled in England and at Harvard.  He is arrogant.  Once he hits the headlines, he is helped along by another political aspirant here and is scheduled to be honored in South Carolina.  He invites himself to the White House but learns that the president will be away.  He considers this a terrible affront and much is made of this in the press.

Enter Rep. Cullee Hamilton, a black man representing his California district.  He is part of the U.N. delegation and is recruited for damage control.  He is to accompany His Highness to South Carolina, a hotbed in the beginning of the civil rights era.  When a desegregation order is being carried out in South Carolina, Terrible Terry jumps in and walks a black girl into the school building.  He is pelted with rotten fruit and eggs and his traditional robes are ruined.  Cullee Hamilton, a man of reason, patience and abiding patriotism is mortified.  He is torn by impatient fellow Black people, his own wife included and by his moderate position in the unfolding civil rights saga.  The administration decides that Cullee should be in the forefront of what is becoming a worldwide scandal, accusing the United States of hypocrisy and centuries of racism.

The book goes on, including many colorful characters.

I found this work to be compelling and I learned a lot about both our Congress and the United Nations.

It is clear that Drury was a conservative and opted for moving carefully in race relations and matters played out on the world stage.  He did paint a wonderful portrait of the tug-of-war in the black community and the resistence to change in the country.  Looking back at the state of affairs in 1962, it is at least rewarding that we currently have a black president, although we’re still far apart on race relations. 

I think this book is worth reading.  You may be disappointed by its conclusion, depending on your political stance, but you won’t be sorry you read it.