This is an utterly delightly social study on umbrellas — what they have meant throughout history, how we use them today, and what they signify in literature.
ARMCHAIR BEA 16: Beyond the books and the blog
Beyond the traditional form of the novel, what are your favorite alternative forms (graphic novels, audiobooks, webcomics, etc.)? Do you have any favorite works within these alternate forms? How do you think the changing format affects the reading experience? How do you engage in talking about books outside of your blog? was lucky enough…
REVIEW: JANE STEELE by Lyndsay Faye
In this highly imaginative adventure, the heroine is no meek governess left to wander the moors. Though she shares some unfortunate circumstances with Jane Eyre — ones she freely acknowledges to the reader — Jane Steele is a fierce, violent and stubborn. And she is a murderer. One assumes had she met a crazed, homicidal…
REVIEW: THIS HOUSE IS HAUNTED by John Boyne
When Eliza Caine and her father brave the dreadful London weather to listen to the prolific Mr. Dickens read his new story, they could hardly have imagined the consequences. Eliza’s beloved father catches a chill and within hours he is dead. Eliza, alone in the world, and no way to pay the rent of her…
REVIEW: ELIJAH’S MERMAID by Essie Fox
In Fox’s follow-up to The Somnambulist, she eschews the sprawling country estate for the dank warren of the Limehouse district. Found floating in the river, like a Victorian Moses, baby Pearl is plucked from the Thames. But she enjoys no pharoah’s life. She is raised by the mysterious but efficient Mrs. Hibbert. The woman of the House…