Welcome to Litsy!

Always happy to find a green Virago at a book sale !

Lots of people found this funny. The have someone impersonate your grandson was. But on the whole I just found it horribly depressing. 😒

I nearly gave up on this in the first few pages because of the wildly descriptive beginning. Then I read this was adapted from a play by Keane, so I was able to see that as the stage directions for Act 1, Scene 1. And then the action started. The love triangle was not for me, but I very much liked Aunt Anna Rose.

I forgot to include this book read last August 2024: 3.8/4⭐️

First time published in 1921 and it describes so well the psychology abuse in a domestic relationship. The story is based on how this dysfunctional relationship is building up without alternatives to resolve or manage the situation. The reading can be hard and frustrating but we know the dynamics in this type of relationships are just like that or worst.

A tradition that I started in covid times is to spend the afternoon of my birthday visiting Brooklyn bookstores and buying a book or two at each. This year was a little different - I only visited three stores, but still managed to buy almost too many to carry!

Catch up review from mid year 5/5

I‘m reviewing these 2 together because they are 2 parts of a whole. The tagged book follows the early career of a young man from a small town who achieves literary success but struggles in society. In the sequel (tagged in comments) he struggles to replicate that success while travelling through Europe with his mistress. In both books he is oblivious to making a lot of people unhappy.

Read for #WhartonBuddyRead

Thank you, @TheKidUpstairs for my delightful #jolabokaflod swap. To be honest, I opened it on Monday because I am currently sitting in a hotel room before the kids and I fly to Florida tomorrow. I took the pic then so I could share tonight!
Thanks, @MaleficentBookDragon for another great swap.

Widowed Kate has married the younger, much less well off & apparently alcoholic Dermot, to general disapproval. Her young adult son is more interested in seducing girls than doing his job in his grandfather‘s business, her teenage daughter is infatuated with the local curate who is flirting with Rome, & live-in Aunt Ethel reports her slightly salacious interpretations of events in letters to a friend. A juicy slice middle class life in the 1960s.

Always in print since 1930, this novel details a year in the life of a lady who lunches and is now and then amongst ladies who lunch better. It's different than the usual English novel about class because it's set in the English countryside rather than London, and in a upper class house instead of a manor. It's a glimpse into the past about tea things but also the calm with which parents intentionally drown kittens while the kids are away.

Not sure exactly what Wharton was doing here as her artist wanders through all sorts of writing and social circumstances, and his one time muse, now lover, gets neglected, left behind, forgotten. I waited for her seek independence, but Wharton wasn‘t writing for me. I merely got a wink. Still, it‘s pleasant reading. #whartonbuddyread @Lcsmcat