North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell on DVD

I totally loved this BBC series back in 2004 when it was first aired on TV. I remember being entranced by it for lots of reasons right from the first episode. I love a good costume drama, good Sunday evening fare before work on the monday, and Mrs Gaskell has provided us with lots of excellent material which have successfully translated to TV. In the last few weeks I have watched and enjoyed it all again.

This 4 part drama was on some time before Cranford hit our screens, a love story between Margaret Hale, the daughter of a clergyman from the south of England and John Thornton, a mill owner from the northern town where Margaret moves to after her father gives up the cloth.

At first Margaret struggles to adapt to the dirty industrial town, finding it course and savage, and judges its inhabitants hastily, especially Mr Thornton whose rough justice at the mill offends her. When a strike is looming across the town, all of them are involved with many lessons heeded on all sides.

I found myself rooting for both of these characters who misunderstand each other greatly at first. This adaptation is filmed with beautiful shots and costumes. It was the scenes inside the cotton mill that stayed with me the most, and all of the parts are cast brilliantly. The two main characters, played by Daniela Denby-Ashe and Richard Armitage are compelling as are all the supporting characters played by Brendan Coyle (now in Downton Abbey), Sinead Cusack, Tim Pigott Smith and Pauline Quirke. After watching this series 8 years ago I went and bought the book and enjoyed the story all over again.

I have another reason to remember this series with such love...it was largely responsible for me researching my family tree. I was so entranced with the mill workers and industry in the series I had a voracious need to find out what my own ancestors did. No mill workers, but being from Liverpool there were lots of Dock workers, several generations of cork cutters, quite a few farmers who moved to the city in the early 19th century, a gun smith, some railway workers, merchant sailors and an Ostrich Feather Dyer. The more exotic jobs are fascinating, but it was the ordinary industrial workers that I related to most, especially as many of the buildings and landmarks can still be seen around Liverpool from way back, linking us to them. I have learnt such a lot, about the history and social history that my ancestors were involved with, and how I fit in with it all. On watching the series recently I could feel my need to take up my research again. I have continued my family tree since I originally saw this series back in 2004 with huge rewards.

This is a lovely story, emotionally involving and memorable. The music of the series also deserves a mention, adding a lot to the period and the feel of the drama. The novel and the TV series (now on DVD) are highly recommended, and the TV adaptation is particularly special to me.

You can read more about North and South on the BBC by using the link.

Ship Fever by Andrea Barrett

This book was one of my acquisitions from the book swap last year that I held in work. It is a collection of short stories that I thought, from the blurb on the back, were all different stories of people on a boat fleeing the potato famine in Ireland in the 1800's, but this only applied to the story of the title. The rest of the stories were on various subjects with science and scientific breakthrough's being the common thread.

The story of the title was the last one in the book, so you begin with the other very short stories first, some of which are only 10 pages long. Ship Fever itself is more substantial at 100 pages.

I read the first story and found it so dull I remember very little about it, other than it exploring 'the hybridization of the edible pea'. This phrase entertained me more than the actual story.

The second story was set in Uppsala in Sweden, a place I have actually visited, so it grabbed my attention initially, but this also faded and I could feel myself rushing the end to get it out of the way. At this point I considered giving up on the book entirely.

I then re read the blurb on the back, to try and reconnect with why I had picked it up in the first place, and most of the comments were about the title story, so I headed there instead and skipped the rest.

It starts with a letter written in 1847 from a Canadian in Ireland to his wife back home, about how dreadful the conditions are there during the famine. Her friend Lauchlin Grant reads her the letter. He is a doctor and has always loved her. Feeling inadequate against her husbands exploits, Lauchlin, in a fit of determined heroism, signs for a job at Grosse island, meeting the immigrants on the ships as they arrive from Ireland to administer necessary health measures before ushering the immigrants further upstream to Quebec and Montreal.

If only it was that simple. Lauchlin, and also us as readers, receive a severe wake up call, as the conditions on the ships and their wretched cargo of destitute people are described in horrific detail. The scale of misery goes beyond anyones imagination. It is in these descriptions that the text grabs hold of you and you are moved to plow onwards, to find out what the outcome is going to be for these characters. This story not only explores issues of survival, but also the value of family, and the problems faced by those who find themselves aliens in another country through no fault of their own.

This story saved the book for me and is evidently why it is the only story referred to in the blurb on the book. It is a highly moving account of a desperate episode in history and I cared for the people caught up in it. It almost seems as if the other stories in this book are from another writer. To me Ship Fever is the only story that I will remember from this book, and I am glad that I gave it a go. You can read an interview with Andrea Barrett about Ship Fever by clicking the link.

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

Having enjoyed 2 other Steinbeck novels I was pleased that this one was on the reading list for the course I am on in the new year, about how American history is depicted in its literature. I already had a lovely 2nd edition hardback from 1940, that a friend had given to me, so it was great to be able to pick up this American classic as my next read.

This famous depiction of the great Depression during the 1930's follows the Joad family, generations of which have worked the land near Oklahoma as tenant farmers, and who now find themselves (along with all of the other farmers from the neighbouring states) losing their home to corporate land owners, who turf them out with no work or home. Like everyone else for miles, they all head west on route 66 to California where more corporate companies have advertised work on the fruit and cotton farms. Sadly there are many many more workers than jobs, a deliberate calculation to keep wages down by the companies, so instead of a bountiful place where you can eat all the fruit you want and make a good living, there are shanty towns of desperate hungry people, oppressed and abused by the police, hated and mistrusted by the locals. There is little work and little hope.

We follow the Joad's, decent and hard working, from their farm, piling their resourses, leaving a life that had worked over generations, on their journey west, losing family members, making friends, surviving with others on the same journey. Their incredible migration fills the first half of the story. The second half is their attempts to do everything they can to find work and survive in California, through the dreadful Hoovervilles, the better government camps where a sense of civility returns, and being forced to leave to work on a peach plantation surrounded by strike pickets protesting about pay cuts, forcing them to live in near prison conditions. They finally settle picking cotton and living in a box car, but the family have fragmented, the work is drying up and their future is uncertain. The last chapters depict their desperate situation with maximum drama.

Steinbeck depicts his characters in such a way that you feel as if you know them, you care about them, spend time with them, understand them. I always feel as if Steinbeck loves his people and it makes you love them. This made this story really hard because you know that things will not go well for them and you worry. The family however seem to hold on to hope despite the worst conditions. Their dignity and resoursefulness is inspirational and heart warming. I rooted for all of them.

Steinbeck intersperses his chapters about the Joad's with short commentaries about the wider picture, some of which incited disgust and fury in me while reading them, while recognising the relevance of those affected by similar organisational giants and their railroad tactics today. I particularly found the chapters about the faceless tractors mowing down their land and houses very moving, and the one about the abundance of fruit while people starved, the rotting mountains of peaches, the vegetables tipped into the river causing people to literally fish for potatoes to feed themselves and their families. In fact I found the entire story very moving on lots of levels.

I loved Ma Joad, the character that is depicted the most, the matrarch who increasingly finds herself making the decisions for the family. I loved it when she stood up to the jobsworth shopkeeper telling him that when you are struggling, it is only other poor people who will help you out, others with nothing.

I really enjoyed this book because I connected wholly with the characters and worried for them all the way through. The disturbing last chapters and last scene in particular will stay with me. I am not sure I could emotionally survive the film version with Henry Fonda. This is not the most harrowing story I have read (that award goes to Germinal by Emile Zola), but it is certainly a very memorable roller coaster, and an important book that I highly recommend.

For a readers group guide to The Grapes of Wrath click the link.

A Mercy by Toni Morrison

Bought on a 3 for 2 deal at Waterstones, this novel saved me from my recent reading crisis. It is my third Toni Morrison, having previously read Song of Solomon and Beloved and enjoyed both. Its also quite short at 165 pages.

Set in the 1600's we are told an account of a plantation and of how some of the people who live there came to be there. Some of the chapters are 1st person, some are not.

Florens is taken there as payment for a debt at 8 years old, as a slave, leaving her mother to a harsher existence on another farm. The place is owned by Jacob, an ambitious but fair master, and his hardy wife Rebekka who has escaped a life of poverty in England. They have a Native American servant called Lina, who is protective and suspicious. There is also a young pregnant slave girl called Sorrow, wayward and quiet, she was rescued from a shipwreck.

Each of these people, including two male farm hands, have a chapter or two to tell pieces of a story that knits them all together. The different voices of the characters or the narrator keep the narrative fresh and interesting.

The writing is very typical of Morrison's style, non-linear, elusive and poetic, it often feels as if you may have missed something, as if it assumes a fore-knowledge of events while starting in the middle. You feel that the story is much bigger than what is actually written on the page. It is why Morrison is hailed as a truly great writer, but it is also why some find her novels difficult to connect with. Thankfully I am in the former category and gain a lot from her books. I found some of the passages beautiful and intriguing, and I really feel that Morrison loves the people that she writes about.

I think that a novel written in this style by a less accomplished writer could alienate and distance its readers, but this one, though not quite as moving as Beloved, still raised a lot of emotion in me, especially towards the end, when we hear Florens's mother speak. I also found it a little easier to read, maybe because of the short chapters.

Although the characters are not quite as quirky and memorable as the other books, I really enjoyed it and recommend it to Morrison fans, naturally, and anyone who likes their narrative to be less straight forward and 'spoon-fed'.

You can see Toni morrison discussing A Mercy here.

There is a reading group guide for A Mercy here.

The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett

This is a rollicking good story. Recommended by a work colleague, I bought this book from Waterstones earlier in the year, but because of its size, I have waited for a decent slot in my reading schedule to tackle it.

Set in the 1100's in England, the story tells of a whole group of people who come together over the building of a cathedral in the fictional town of Kingsbridge. The story is much more than an account of a building, which serves as a pivot for which their complex lives move around. Spanning over 50 years, it intertwines certain key events from history and includes a short episode in Spain and France.

We learn about each character in turn, before they converge at a later stage, starting with Tom Builder, the stone mason who dreams of building his own cathedral, and his family who are dependent on him. There is Philip, the ambitious but fair-minded Prior who wants a replacement church for his run down priory. We have Aliena, daughter of a deposed Earl, using her wits and canny intelligence to survive as a wool trader, a woman in a mans arena, until her brother can reclaim the family title. Then there is Jack, the smart and unconventional son of an outcast woman, and finally William, the slightly insane enemy, paranoiaic and cruel, with more than a little taste for sexual violence, who plots and plunders his way towards his plan to destroy the Kingsbridge cathedral. There are many other characters along the way.

This book is very easy to read, and there are adventures, twists and turns on every page, so that the 1076 pages turn without you noticing. There are huge sections of the book where I couldn't put it down and found myself reading until the early hours, wanting to know what was to happen next. I quickly became very attached to some of the characters (many of the ones listed above) and rooted for them against all the odds that were thrown at them. At times feeling like a cross between The Tales of Robin Hood and The A Team, this is very much a plot driven story about character, and the triumph of good over evil. The text has no ambiguity about it and very little poetry, but the intricacies of the lives of the characters and the plot made up for this.

There are some bloody scenes that naturally occur when writing about this time period, the book starts with a hanging, and there are battles, injuries, punishments and even a bear baiting at one point, but I did not feel it went too far. Just far enough to evoke the period, or to demand justice in the readers conscience when the baddies struck.

Some readers may find the ups and downs of the plot a little formulaic, good triumphing over evil, prayers answered, the baddies getting their comeuppance and love stories coming to fruition. We all know that life is not often like that, but sometimes it does you good to read such stories and restore a little faith. This book certainly does that and hope is an emotion that I felt often during its course. There are still lots of heart stopping moments too.

This is an exciting book to read, not for complexities of language, but for a story that never lets you go once you have opened the first pages. The building of relationships, friendships and industry towards a common goal, of people forging lives against the odds, was infectious. I really enjoyed it and I think it will appeal to many types of readers from lots of backgrounds, especially those who enjoy a good adventure told in a straight forward way.

Ken Follett has his own website where you can read more about how the book came about. It also includes a Pillars of the Earth reading guide.

The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry

I had seen this book reviewed around various blogs a few months ago so bought it on a 3 for 2 offer at Waterstones and took it away on holiday.

Set in Sligo in Ireland, an inmate at a Psychiatric Hospital, Roseanne McNulty, is nearly 100 years old and is their longest serving resident. Sectioned during the 1940s she has spent most of her life as a Psychiatric patient, but like many early inmates, the reasons for her admittance are vague and have little to do with any actual mental illnesses. Roseanne is writing her life story down and hiding it under the floorboards. She wants someone at some stage to know her story. At the same time Dr Grene is assessing all of his patients because the hospital is closing down. He becomes transfixed with finding out about Roseanne and also why she is there.

The chapters alternate between Roseannes accounts of her life, and Dr Grenes investigations. Sometimes these accounts clash as peoples memory and point of view provide different meanings to events. There are also some cover ups on documents so part of the intrigue is picking through these stories to find out what really happened.

The chapters dedicated to Roseanne are more lyrical, and also have a dream like quality that took a little longer to connect to. I do think that this illustrates an elderly lady who has been interred for most of her life successfully. I did like alternating between her and Dr Grene's voice, and I found both of them interesting.

Most of the other characters are explained through Roseanne's point of view, so we get a lot of information about her father, and a palpable feeling of dread surrounding the local priest. But there are others who remain 2 dimensional, her mother, her husband and his family, and even the young rebel she befriends and has more of an influence on her life than she realises. This didn't detract from the telling, but when I remember the story in my mind, these characters are faceless and I tried to examine whether this was deliberate and I think that maybe it is, to add distance to something that happened long ago.

I enjoyed the story and wanted to find out how all of the pieces fitted together. I cared about Roseanne and Dr Grene and found parts of it very moving and tremendously sad. There were a few teary eyed moments. I did guess part of the ending early on but there were some surprises where I had to put the book down I was so moved. Some readers have said they didn't like the ending but I found it tied everything together and was happy with it. I think my only reservation is that she didn't rebel more when certain restraints were inflicted upon her (I don't want to give anything away).

A lot of the books beauty lies in its descriptions, of people and of Sligo. Part of Roseannes fate is sealed by her beauty as a young woman, but her beauty comes as an old lady through her words and how she tells her story. This is a well told and highly moving story about a woman surviving and retelling her story during one of the many troubled parts of Irelands history and I recommend it with enthusiasm.

There is a reading guide to The Secret Scripture which you may find useful.

Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks

This book has been covered by a number of blogs and I liked the premise of the story so I took it away on holiday. Taking an actual event as its start point, the novel covers a year from spring 1666-7, when the Derbyshire village of Eyam took a brave and drastic measure to try and contain the plague when it hit their village, by imposing a quaranteen upon themselves.

Written in the first person, we follow Anna Frith, a shepherdess and house maid to the young Rector, Mr Mompellion and his wife Elinor. Anna is only young and already widowed with 2 children, and is blessed with a keen sense of survival and common sense. She recounts the year with all of its rural beauty, the folklore, her community,and she is a shrewd judge of character with more than a little kindness. The quaranteen, which was advocated by the Rector, throws them into a bizarre existence, where elaborate measures ensure food is brought in, but they have contact with no one from the outside for fear of infection. The village boundaries are set and their internment is kept.

While bodies drop in every household, yielding to the cruellest of diseases, the Rector, Anna and Elinor try to administer to the sick, while trying to keep order as villagers are consumed with grief and fear. It is not long before they start to turn upon each other as superstition and religious fervour gets a foothold in a frayed society. Desperate survival is sought, however unscrupulously, and many die along the way.

I liked Anna, even though she seemed like something of a wonder woman in parts. Quietly savvy, loving and sensible, she has the fortunate position of being a working girl who is also in with the privileged and educated, hearing their plans and being part of them, enabling us to see many sides of village life. I particularly enjoyed the accounts of herbal lore and rural living, the partnership between people and nature.

Many of the scenes have raw descriptions of death, either by disease, or by punishment. I didn't find these overwhelming, and anyone reading about the plague must expect this, but I didn't think it was gratuitous, however shocking. It pulls no punches.

The language includes some dialect and references to simple country living, which I found added to the beauty of the story, setting place and time. It also helps to place Anna's character within the story.

This is not just a story about death, but also survival, friendship, and sacrifice. It is also about love.

There was only really one part that I wasn't keen on and that was the ending, which didn't really fit with the rest of it. I felt as if I had wandered unguarded into another novel, and when I remember the book, I find I have brushed that part under the carpet, as if it doesn't belong. I know I am not the only one who feels this way.

Otherwise, I really enjoyed it, being part of Anna's world for a short time, and I missed it when I finished it, re-reading some passages again.

Geraldine Brooks has a website here, where you can read about her and her work.

There is also a Penguin Reading Guide which may be of interest to reading groups.