Since I've been reading Michelle Moran's Nefertiti, I thought I would look and see what other books I might own about this period that could be used as supplemental reading (or browsing). I thought I might create a Thursday Thirteen.  Only I couldn't find enough books on my shelves to make a list!  I knew this was a period I hadn't read much about, but apparently I've also not bought many books about it either.  There is more information on Nefertiti found on Michelle's blog, which will be useful as I finish reading the book.  I especially like seeing what the characters (like the narrator of the story, Nefertiti's sister, Mutnodjmet) looked like.  It's always nice having some sort of visual in mind as I read.

As for the few books I do have: Daughters of Isis: Women of Ancient Egypt by Joyce Tyldesley -- I bought this ages and ages ago and must have started reading it at some point as I discovered a bookmark in it about a 100 pages in.  It's a survey of what a typical and perhaps not so typical Egyptian woman's life was like in ancient times.  Women's Work: The First 20,000 Years by Elizabeth Wayland Barber -- This is definitely on my list to read this year.  I'm especially interested in this book on textiles and women's roles in the manufacturing (perhaps not the best word to use when textiles were woven solely by hand) of them.  Uppity Women of Ancient Times by Vicki Leon -- There's a whole series of these books and granted they are on the irreverent side, but they do give just a tiny peek at a variety of women you may or may not have heard of.  What Life Was Like on the Banks of the Nile (Egypt 3050-30BC) -- This is one of those glossy, illustrated Time-Life books, and they're sort of hokey sometimes, but there are lots of nice pictures, like what a pair of sandals looked like or an ancient cosmetic case!

Michelle Moran also suggested Joyce Tyldesley's biography Nefertiti: Unlocking the Mystery Surrounding Egypt's Most Famous and Beautiful Queen as a good resource to learn more about her.  The famous bust of Nefertiti is found in the Alte Museum in Berlin.  Click here to see more representations of Nefertiti and Akhenaton. 

Since I couldn't come up with a list of books about Ancient Egypt (or the ancient world in general), any good reading suggestions?  Fiction or nonfiction.  Now that I've gotten a little taste, I'd like to read more.   

Although I like to have some sort of reading plan, I quickly get off track as one book  always leads to another.  I've started reading a very unusual novel.  I had heard about it before, but I was recently reminded that I wanted to find a copy.  Since there is no way I am going to pay upwards of $50-60 for a used copy of Rachel Ferguson's The Brontes Went to Woolworths, I resorted to my oft-used and very reliable ILL department to find a copy I can at least read, if not own.  I'll still be watching for a copy (and if anyone happens upon any less expensive copies anywhere, I'd be appreciative to be pointed in the right direction).  No doubt I'll happen upon a copy when I'm not looking for one.

I've only read the first few chapters, but it is incredibly eccentric and highly imaginative.  I may have to reread it in order to sort out what's real and what's fantasy. 

"The Carne girls--Diedre, Katrine, and Sheil--live with their mother and Sheil's governess.  Dierdre is a journalist.  She once declined a proposal of marriage, being in love with Sherlock Holmes at the time.  Katrine is at dramatic school, elocuting Shakespearian indecencies. They live like other middle-class London families in the 1920s, except that mealtimes are attended by a cloud of witnesses.  There's Ironface the doll who converses in French; the pierrot Dion Saffyn; Pipson, a music-hall comic, and a ballet troupe, 'The Kensington Palace Girls'.  And Judge Toddington, with his jam-tart yawn and small pomposities, is quite the most delectable thing.  Then one day Diedre goes to a charity bazaar, to be opened by none other than Lady Mildred, Toddy's real-life wife..."

A little strange, eh?  I'm saving the introduction by A.S. Byatt for later, but I did have to take a little peek at what she wrote about it.  She said she read it "when I was far too young--or just the right age", which I got a kick out of.  She calls it whimsical and fey, "but that doesn't seem to matter too badly".   I'll let you know how it turns out.  And don't you love the cover?

So, when I said one book leads to another...when I read about the Ferguson book, another tempting title was mentioned that I was lucky enough to find on the shelves at work.  The Feminine Middlebrow Novel, 1920s to 1950s: Class, Domesticity, and Bohemianism by Nicola Humble looks chalk full of interesting information, much along the lines of Nicola Beauman's A Very Great Profession: The Woman's Novel, 1914-39.  Rachel Ferguson is mentioned in both books.  I've started on the introduction and it makes for fascinating reading.  I even relish reading the footnotes, if that tells you anything, and I need to keep pen and paper handy for more reading ideas (while reading both books!).

I also spotted on the shelf a two-volume set edited by Harold Bloom, British Women Fiction Writers: 1900-1960.  This may or may not prove to be useful.  He covers only a handful of authors.  Each section starts with a short biography, and includes a bibliography.  The main purpose of the book is to give excerpts of literary criticism on each author's work.  It might serve as a nice jumping off place if I find something especially informative.  I can always go and look for the original source of criticism.  I'm particularly interested in the sections on Daphne du Maurier and Elizabeth Taylor, though all the authors sound interesting.  Can I mention one more resource I recently discovered?  (Yes, I've been busy...just how many books can I read at once...?).  Elaine Showalter's A Literature of Their Own: British Women Novelists from Bronte to Lessing.  Apparently the founders of Virago Press were guided by this hugely influential text.  Not a single one of these books are mine, but I want to own them all, of course.  There is all sorts of books on this period of women's writing in terms of British authors, but I wonder what their American counterparts were up to?  I'm a bit one-sided in my reading, but there doesn't seem to be the same sort of effort made over here when it comes to women authors from that period.  Or am I just not looking in the right places.  Perhaps that will be my next big project. 

I've finished reading my first mystery by Ngaio Marsh, called A Man Lay Dead.  Ngaio Marsh, along with Agatha Christie, Margery Allingham and Dorothy L. Sayers constituted the "Queens of Crime".  They wrote mysteries during the 1920s and 30s, which is considered the Golden Age of Detective Fiction.  I love mysteries, and why I've not read more (or in a couple of cases anything at all) by these authors is beyond me.  I've been in the mood lately for a really traditional type of murder mystery and this fit the bill perfectly.  Marsh wrote 32 mystery novels, and this is the first introducing Inspector Roderick Alleyn.

A Man Lay Dead is a classic murder mystery.  Five guests have been invited to the country house of Sir Hubert Handesley, where they are going to take part in a parlor game called "Murder".  Nearly all are of the British upper crust and wealthy, and maybe a few have one or two secrets they'd prefer to keep under wraps.  What begins as an entertaining weekend filled with a bit of (pretend) murder and mayhem ends quickly in the death of Handesley's good friend, Charles Rankin.  Although Rankin was nearing middle age, he was still quite handsome, rather wealthy and a bit of a womanizer, burning the candle at both ends even at this weekend party.  And he made the mistake of bringing with him an unusual Russian dagger that the murderer will use to dispatch him.  Conveniently (well not for him anyway) more than one house guest has something to gain by his death. 

Of course Scotland Yard is called in and we are introduced to Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn.  I always like to get a good handle on my sleuths.  Marsh was very careful not to reveal too much, too soon, and I still don't feel like I really know him.  Handesley's niece, Angela, remarks:

"Alleyn did not resemble a plain-clothes policeman she felt sure, nor was he in the romantic manner--white-faced and gimlet-eyed.  He looked like one of her uncle Hubert's friends, the sort that they knew would 'do' for house-parties.  He was very tall, and lean, his hair was dark, and his eyes grey with corners that turned down. They looked as if they would smile easily but his mouth didn't."

He seems to have a very dry sense of humor and has this self-deprecating manner.  You feel from his words that maybe he's not entirely in control, but his actions put that idea to rest.  Quite often in mystery novels the detective is an everyday sort of guy, but you get the feeling that Alleyn is equally as distinguished as the guests at Handesley's house party with his 'cultured voice', and he's most certainly a bright fellow and well-educated.  He's a gentleman detective, but he most certainly doesn't play up any of these facts.

I've never been very good at figuring out who the culprit is, and this story was no exception.  Marsh gave me every chance, leaving clues to follow or maybe to trip me up.  On a couple of occasions when a detail was revealed I know I mentally uttered an "oh, so that's what happened, why didn't I figure it out".  She did have a couple of twists that took the story onto an entirely different track, throwing in a little international intrigue along with simple run of the mill murder.  All in all this was a very satisfying read.  I've already ordered or am mooching the next couple of Inspector Alleyn mysteries, Enter a Murderer and The Nursing Home Murder, but it appears that some of her books have gone out of print.  I guess I'll be looking be keeping an eye out for them used.  I'd also like to read more Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers, and I've yet to even try Margery Allingham.

In the meantime, however, I have Elizabeth George's new mystery Careless in Red.  It's been at least three years since the last Inspector Lynley mystery, and I'm curious to see where she takes the story after killing off one of the main characters last time around!  Lynley is another posh detective, titled and all, and I am completely addicted to the series.  It's one of the few that I've read each and every installment since the very beginning.  Some of the last few have been a bit uneven, but I still can't help myself and will read them irregardless.  I'm disappointed that the BBC canceled the TV series, but at least I still have the books!         

I'm feeling just the tiniest bit bogged down at the moment with Victor Hugo's Les Misérables.  I'm slowly nearing the end of the second section, but he does tend to go off on these tangents.  Now I like details, and I love losing myself in the story, and no doubt this is all going to be tied together at some point, but really, do I need to know so much about French convents?  Things were moving along quickly, Jean Valjean made a narrow escape with little Cosette, as Javert was hot on their trail.  He scaled a wall, managing to bring Cosette with him and he landed in the garden of a convent.  And what happens?  Things come to an abrupt standstill as he spends the next 40 or so pages talking about the convent.  It makes me a little leery when I read:

"Since we are engaged in giving details as to what the convent of the Petit-Picpus was in former times, and since we have ventured to open a window on that discreet retreat, the reader will permit us one other little digression, utterly foreign to this book, but characteristic and useful, since it shows that the cloister even has its original figures."

Okay, I will indeed permit you these little digressions, but please can I find out what happens to Cosette soon? 

I decided to start with Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility for my 1% Challenge.  I know for many Austen fans this is not their favorite book of hers, but so far I am enjoying it.  Certainly that sparkling Austen wit is present.  No doubt you already know the story of Mrs. Dashwood and her three daughters who lose their home when Mr. Dashwood dies leaving nearly everything to John Dashwood, their half-brother.  John's wife is that certain Austen type--greedy and unfriendly behind that genteel facade.  She manages to talk her husband down from giving the Dashwood girls three thousand pounds to just the china, and then nothing at all.  The whole scene is just wonderful, but here's the tail end.

"That is a material consideration undoubtedly.  A valuable legacy indeed! And yet some of the plate would have been a very pleasant addition to our own stock here."

"Yes; and the set of breakfast china is twice as handsome as what belongs to this house.  A great deal too handsome, in my opinion, for any place THEY can ever afford to live in.  But, however, so it is.  Your father thought only of THEM.  And I must say this: that you owe no particular gratitude to him, nor attention to his wishes; for we very well know that if he could, he would have left almost everything in the world to THEM."

This argument was irresistible.  It gave to his intentions whatever of decision was wanting before; and he finally resolved, that it would be absolutely unnecessary, if not highly indecorous, to do more for the widow and children of his father, than such kind of neighbourly acts as his own wife pointed out.

She's quite the dissembler!  I don't think anyone does a scene like this better than Jane Austen!

And for something completely different I've been reading Michelle Moran's Nefertiti.  It is coming out in paperback later this month, and she has a new book, The Heretic Queen, coming out in the Fall.  Although I love historical fiction, I don't read many books set so far back in history.  The only book I can think of is Anita Diamont's biblically set The Red Tent, which I was very hesitant to read (it was for a book club), but surprised myself by enjoying much more than I expected.  I guess this period is outside my comfort zone, since I know so little about the time.  I've been enjoying the book, however.  I love the the descriptions--like how they used gold dust to powder over their bodies.  Or the beaded wigs that the women wore.  It's so hard to imagine the people and how they lived or what they thought and dreamed.  Perhaps I need to find some other book about Nefertiti to get more of a mental imange.  Of course this tast of another culture is why I love historical fiction so much!

Once again I chose this week's short story from American Short Story Masterpieces, edited by Raymond Carver and Tom Jenks.  Many of the authors included in this anthology are completely new to me, so I've been flipping through the volume and choosing the stories at random.  Although I've only read a couple I think it is proving to be an excellent selection of stories and 'masterpieces' is probably not an exaggeration.

I've never read any of Mark Helprin's work, but I was drawn to his story, "Letters from the Samantha", because it is told in the format of letters from the ship's captain.  A story told via letters and taking place on a ship, this should be a nice adventure, I thought.  Perfect Sunday reading.  I suppose it could be read as just an tale of adventure, but there was most definitely more to it.  Stories like this scream to be read in a group and discussed, but it'll give me something to think about over the course of the week.

The story consists of six letters written by Samson Low between August 20, 1909 and September 3, 1909.  The reader is told:

"These letters were recovered in good condition from the vault of the sunken Samantha, an iron-hulled sailing ship of one thousand tons, built in Scotland in 1879 and wrecked during the First World War in the Persian Gulf off Basra." 

Samson Low details his experiences, which began off the coast of Madagascar, and the decisions he makes after surviving a monsoon intact, decisions which he will come to regret.  The crew sighted a tornado on land, which quickly veered off to sea.  It was exciting for the crew to be so close to such a fierce spectacle of nature.  Even Low himself said, "I confess that I have wished to be completely taken up by such a thing, to be lifted into the clouds, arms and legs pinned in the stream".  It is feared that the ship will indeed be picked up by the wind, but in the end it will change directions, missing them.  When the storm was over, and they were piloting themselves through the mess, they spot a clump of vegetation and "floating upon it was a large monkey, bolt upright and dignified".  Impulsively Low offers the end of a boat hook and brings the animal on board.  Although he instantly regrets his action, "this creature we have today removed from the sea is like a man".

Spoiler alert from here on out, in case you've not read this yet.   

The monkey climbs up to the top of the rigging and stays there.  The captain considers throwing him overboard, but he won't come down, as the ship sails farther and farther away from its island.  Eventually a raft is designed, and the crew splits into two--one group wanting to send him off in the raft when they get close enough to land, and the rest wishing to shoot him down from the rigging, as the screeching noises the animal makes unnerves the men and terrifies them.  Low sides with the group who wishes to cast him afloat, knowing he would have to be the one to shoot the animal and has no desire to do so.  Eventually hunger will tempt the animal down, somehow he's much less fearsome, hunched down, walking nearly on all four limbs, half the men's heights and "no more frightening than a hound".  He becomes almost docile and a bit of a plaything to the crew who all stroll about with him on deck.  As the days pass the novelty of having such an animal in close quarters wears off, as the men are returning home.  Two of the crew will remove the manacles from the animal and dump the raft overboard, not wanting to set the ape adrift to what appears to be an inhospitable land.  The captain is angered and decides at some point he can just throw the ape overboard.  The men's attitudes quickly change.  They forget about the ape, who sits listlessly in the heat and "looks like an old man, neutral to the world".  The captain thinks only of keeping the crew under control.  In the end he strangles the animal and pitches him over the side, "where he quickly sank".    

I tried to look for some literary criticism about this story, but I didn't really come up with much online.  One reviewer compared Helprin's story to the work of Melville and Conrad, two authors I've not read since high school (and then only shorter works).  This makes me think the story must be full of symbolism or perhaps the author is trying to make a point about Empire/colonialism, or at the very least man's guilt and his inhumanity towards others (and I hesitate to just limit it to animals, since over and over the ape is compared to a man).  It's rather telling that the story ends thus: