After spending most of October reading Booker Prize nominated novels I reverted through much of this month into my mystery comfort reads. I did however read one more Booker shortlisted novel that I very much enjoyed as well a non-fiction book that from a novelist I love that was unexpectedly delightful. I also read one classic novel that I also (unexpectedly) loved.
The books I finished in November are:
The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller
Another of the Booker shortlisted novels. I did enjoy this one very much (although not more than the Kiran Desai novel). The story takes place in the winter, at the turn of 1962/63, and involves two families in a small English town who live next door to each other. One is a farm family (although the husband comes from money), the other is the local doctor (who comes from a middle class background). The two wives are both pregnant and get to know each other. I think Miller evokes the time period very well (although it really makes me feel old that "historical" novels now take place during my lifetime). I was looking forward to reading this novel because I remember liking another of his novels - Now We Shall be Entirely Free. I didn't like this one quite as much but mainly because it was set in a time period I have little interest in (because I lived through it). As an aside I really want follow ups to these novels set in the 60's that show how many people die of lung cancer from all the cigarette smoke.
Aunt Dimity's Death by Nancy Atherton
This is the first novel in a long running series. I guess you would call this a cozy mystery although there is a (totally unnecessary in my opinion) supernatural element too. I'm not a huge cozy mystery fan because I often find that they rely too much on coincidence and unrealistic plot points. This one was too cozy for me. It was written in 1992 and I realized how much life has changed since then, which was somewhat interesting.
The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
This is the story of Newland Archer, an upper class young man in old New York, who is engaged to a lovely woman named May but becomes enamored with May's cousin Ellen. Will he or won't he? This was a Bluesky Bookclub readalong and I am so glad I joined this one. I had never read any Edith Wharton and I expected her writing to be stuffy and perhaps difficult (maybe I was thinking of Henry James). Instead she was witty and delightful. I loved the picture she painted of old New York. The narrator's voice was humorous but never got in the way of me hearing the characters even with the point of view being only that of Newland Archer. Archer was annoying, looking at him from my modern viewpoint, but I didn't hate him. I suspected that his wife, May, had more to her than he assumed and it turns out she did. I really liked Ellen even though it was hard to understand her since Archer didn't really seem to understand her. On the whole, a great read.
Parallel Lives: A Love Story from a Lost Continent by Iain Pears.
Iain Pears is an art historian and an author. Most people know him from his huge novel An Instance of the Fingerpost but he has written other novels and even a series of mystery stories set in Italy about art thefts. His novel The Dream of Scipio is one of my favorite novels. This, however, is not a work of fiction. This is the story of Larissa Salmina, a Russian art curator at The Hermitage, and Francis Haskell, a British Art historian, who, against all odds, fall in love in the 1960's during the Cold War and marry. It is drawn from interviews Pears did with Larissa when she was almost ninety and from the journals that Francis (who was dead by this time) kept as a young man. It is not a complete biography of either since it ends (spoiler alert) with them happily living together, married, in Britain. Pears was a former student of Francis and as an adult lived near them. When Francis died in 2000 Pears would stop in to check on Larissa, who he knew less well. That's when he discovered how fascinating she was and what an interesting history she had in the Soviet Union. This isn't a long book but I found it quite enjoyable. I like the idea of an author "saving" the memory of two relatively unknown people who lived interesting lives.
All Mortal Flesh by Julia Spencer-Fleming
I Shall Note Want by Julia Spencer-Fleming
One Was a Soldier by Julia Spencer-Fleming
Through the Evil Days by Julia Spencer-Fleming
Hid From Our Eyes by Julia Spencer-Fleming
This was the month I tried to finish the Julia Spencer-Fleming series that features as its detectives a chief of police and a (woman) Episcopal priest. I like the contrast between them but at times this series almost jumps the shark with its melodrama. So it's hard to recommend it. One of my pet peeves in mystery series is when the author ALWAYS puts the lead character or their friends or family in mortal danger. It just isn't realistic. I was glad in the last book that she backed off and had a basic mystery to solve. There is one more book to read and I'm on the wait list for it.
