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WT Sharpe 08-20-2017 12:30 AM

September 2017 Book Club Nominations
 
Help us select the book that the MobileRead Book Club will read for September, 2017.

The nominations will run through midnight EST August 26 or until 10 books have made the list. The poll will then be posted and will remain open for five days.

The book selection category for September is: The Classics.

For a book to be included in the poll it needs THREE NOMINATIONS (original nomination, a second and a third).

How Does This Work?
The Mobile Read Book Club (MRBC) is an informal club that requires nothing of you. Each month a book is selected by polling. On the last week of that month a discussion thread is started for the book. If you want to participate feel free. There is no need to "join" or sign up. All are welcome.

How Does a Book Get Selected?
Each book that is nominated will be listed in a poll at the end of the nomination period. The book that polls the most votes will be the official selection.

How Many Nominations Can I Make?
Each participant has 3 nominations. You can nominate a new book for consideration or nominate (second, third) one that has already been nominated by another person.

How Do I Nominate a Book?
Please just post a message with your nomination. If you are the FIRST to nominate a book, please try to provide an abstract to the book so others may consider their level of interest.

How Do I Know What Has Been Nominated?
Just follow the thread. This message will be updated with the status of the nominations as often as I can. If one is missed, please just post a message with a multi-quote of the 3 nominations and it will be added to the list ASAP.

When is the Poll?
The poll thread will open at the end of the nomination period, or once there have been 10 books with 3 nominations each. At that time a link to the initial poll thread will be posted here and this thread will be closed.

The floor is open to nominations. Please comment if you discover a nomination is not available as an ebook in your area.


Official choices with three nominations each:

(1) She by H. Rider Haggard
Goodreads | Amazon US / Barnes & Noble / Kobo US | Patricia Clark Memorial Library: ePub / Kindle
Print Length: 317 pages
Spoiler:
From Wikipedia:

She is the story of Cambridge professor Horace Holly and his ward Leo Vincey, and their journey to a lost kingdom in the African interior. The journey is triggered by a mysterious package left to Leo by his father, to be opened on his 25th birthday; the package contains an ancient shard of pottery and several documents, suggesting an ancient mystery about the Vincey family. Holly and Leo eventually arrive in eastern Africa where they encounter a primitive race of natives and a mysterious white queen, Ayesha, who reigns as the all-powerful "She" or "She-who-must-be-obeyed" and who has a mysterious connection to young Leo.

The story expresses numerous racial and evolutionary conceptions of the late Victorians, especially notions of degeneration and racial decline prominent during the fin de siècle. In the figure of She, the novel notably explored themes of female authority and feminine behaviour. It has received praise and criticism alike for its representation of womanhood.


(2) The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold
Goodreads | Overdrive
Print Length: 146 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:

This classic work of science fiction is widely considered to be the ultimate time-travel novel. When Daniel Eakins inherits a time machine, he soon realizes that he has enormous power to shape the course of history. He can foil terrorists, prevent assassinations, or just make some fast money at the racetrack. And if he doesn't like the results of the change, he can simply go back in time and talk himself out of making it! But Dan soon finds that there are limits to his powers and forces beyond his control.


(3) Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.
Goodreads | Patricia Clark Memorial Library: ePub / Kindle / Librivox
Print Length: 490 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:

Jane Eyre is a nineteenth century proto feminist novel by Charlotte Bronte. It is a radical story of Jane Eyre, an unwanted orphan girl who is sent to live in a charity school by her aunt. Here she overcomes oppression to emerge a mature woman and lead life on her own terms. As an independent woman, she goes to Thornfield Hall as a governess, where she falls in love with the owner. However, it is on her most important day in life that she must take a difficult decision, which would change her life forever and of people around her.


(4) Whose Body? (Lord Peter Wimsey Series Book 1) by Dorothy L. Sayers
Goodreads | Amazon US / Amazon UK / Audible US / Audible UK / Public Domain (Life+50 countries ONLY!)
Print Length: 208 pages
Spoiler:
From Amazon:

Wimseys mother, the Dowager Duchess of Denver, rings her son with news of such a quaint thing. She has heard through a friend that Mr. Thipps, a respectable Battersea architect, found a dead man in his bathwearing nothing but a gold pince-nez. Lord Wimsey makes his way straight over to Mr. Thipps, and a good look at the body raises a number of interesting questions. Why would such an apparently well groomed man have filthy black toenails, flea bites and the scent of carbolic soap lingering on his corpse? Then comes the disappearance of oil millionaire Sir Reuben Levy, last seen on the Battersea Park Road. With his beard shaved he would look very similar to the man found in the bath, but is Sir Levy really dead?

From FadedPage:

"Whose Body" is something of an apprentice work. Lord Peter is here more a bundle of characteristics than a character: a collector of rare books and incunabula, facile with quotations, fluent in French and probably in Latin, a skillful and sensitive pianist who never needs to practise, slightly built but possessed of "curious" strength and speed which he maintains without exercise. Over subsequent books, this caricature smooths and deepens into one of the most interesting and attractive detectives in fiction.
In spite of its awkwardness, Whose Body is worth reading. The plot is clever, the villain is believable and sadistic, and most of the supporting characters are a delight. Some of these characters are further developed in later novels: Bunter, Parker, the Dowager Duchess, Freddy Arbuthnot. Others fortunately are not. Sayers is much better with people she might recognise as "like us" then with people from other social groups.

From Goodreads:

The stark naked body was lying in the tub. Not unusual for a proper bath, but highly irregular for murder -- especially with a pair of gold pince-nez deliberately perched before the sightless eyes. What's more, the face appeared to have been shaved after death. The police assumed that the victim was a prominent financier, but Lord Peter Wimsey, who dabbled in mystery detection as a hobby, knew better. In this, his first murder case, Lord Peter untangles the ghastly mystery of the corpse in the bath.


(5) Crome Yellow by Aldous Huxley
Goodreads | Librivox / Manybooks
Print Length: 176 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:

Denis Stone, a naive young poet, is invited to stay at Crome, a country house renowned for its gatherings of 'bright young things'. His hosts, Henry Wimbush and his exotic wife Priscilla, are joined by a party of colourful guests whose intrigues and opinions ensure Denis's stay is a memorable one. First published in 1921, Crome Yellow was Aldous Huxley's much-acclaimed debut novel.

First published in 1921, Crome Yellow was Aldous Huxley's much-acclaimed debut novel. With the evident relish of the true satirist, he mocked the fads, foibles and spirit of his time with an unsurpassed wit and brilliance.


(6) A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes
Goodreads
Print Length: 298 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:

A High Wind in Jamaica is not so much a book as a curious object, like a piece of driftwood torqued into an alarming shape from years at sea. And like driftwood, it seems not to have been made, exactly, but simply to have come into being, so perfectly is its form married to its content. The five Bas-Thornton children must leave their parents in Jamaica after a terrible hurricane blows down their family home. Accompanied by their Creole friends, the Fernandez children, they board a ship that is almost immediately set upon by pirates. The children take to corsair life coolly and matter-of-factly; just as coolly do they commit horrible deeds, and have horrible deeds visited upon them. First published in 1929, A High Wind in Jamaica has been compared to Lord of the Flies in its unflinching portrayal of innocence corrupted, but Richard Hughes is the supreme ironist William Golding never was. He possesses the ability to be one moment thoroughly inside a character's head, and the next outside of it altogether, hilariously commenting.
Irony finds a happy home indeed in the book's mixture of the macabre and the adorable. The baby girl, Rachel, "could even sum up maternal feelings for a marline-spike, and would sit up aloft rocking it in her arms and crooning. The sailors avoided walking underneath: for such an infant, if dropped from a height, will find its way through the thickest skull (an accident which sometimes befalls unpopular captains)." In that "such an infant" lies a world of mordant wit. In fact, throughout, Hughes's wildly eccentric punctuation and startling syntax make just the right verbal vehicle for this dark-hearted pirate story for grownups.

Hughes enjoys some coy riffing on the child mind, as with this description of the way Emily handles an uncomfortable social situation: "Much the best way of escaping from an embarrassing rencontre, when to walk away would be an impossible strain on the nerves, is to retire in a series of somersaults. Emily immediately started turning head over heels up the deck." Even so, Hughes never sentimentalizes his subject: "Babies of course are not human--they are animals, and have a very ancient and ramified culture, as cats have, and fishes, and even snakes." Children, as a race, are given rough treatment: "their minds are not just more ignorant and stupider than ours, but differ in kind of thinking (are mad, in fact)." That madness is here isolated, prodded, and poked to chilling effect. But Hughes never loses sight of his ultimate objective: A High Wind in Jamaica is, above all, a cracking good yarn.

~ Claire Dederer


(7) The Toll-Gate by Georgette Heyer
Goodreads | / Amazon US / Audible US
Print Length: 321 pages
Spoiler:
From Amazon:

His exploits were legendary...

Captain John Staple, back from the battlefront, is already bored with his quiet civilian life in the country. When he stumbles upon a mystery involving a disappearing toll-gate keeper, nothing could keep the adventure-loving captain from investigating.

But winning her will be his greatest yet...

The plot thickens when John encounters the enigmatic Lady Nell Stornaway and soon learns that rescuing her from her unsavory relatives makes even the most ferocious cavalry charge look like a particularly tame hand of loo. Between hiding his true identity from Nell and the arrival in the neighborhood of some distinctly shady characters, Captain Staple finds himself embarked on the adventure-and romance-of a lifetime.

From Goodreads:

Captain John Staple's exploits in the Peninsula had earned him the sobriquet 'Crazy' Jack amongst his fellows in the Dragoon Guards. Now home from Waterloo, life in peacetime is rather dull for the boisterous, adventure-loving Captain. But when he finds himself lost and benighted at an unmanned toll-house in the Pennines, his soldiering days suddenly pale away besides an adventure - and romance - of a lifetime.

Yet again Georgette Heyer shows the qualities that made her one of the most successful and best-loved romantic novelists of her age, and why her popularity endures to this day.

WT Sharpe 08-20-2017 12:31 AM

Nominations ("*" indicates one vote):

*** The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold [JSWolf, WT Sharpe, BenG]
Goodreads | Overdrive
Print Length: 146 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:

This classic work of science fiction is widely considered to be the ultimate time-travel novel. When Daniel Eakins inherits a time machine, he soon realizes that he has enormous power to shape the course of history. He can foil terrorists, prevent assassinations, or just make some fast money at the racetrack. And if he doesn't like the results of the change, he can simply go back in time and talk himself out of making it! But Dan soon finds that there are limits to his powers and forces beyond his control.


*** Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. [WT Sharpe, John F, CRussel]
Goodreads | Patricia Clark Memorial Library: ePub / Kindle
Print Length: 490 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:

Jane Eyre is a nineteenth century proto feminist novel by Charlotte Bronte. It is a radical story of Jane Eyre, an unwanted orphan girl who is sent to live in a charity school by her aunt. Here she overcomes oppression to emerge a mature woman and lead life on her own terms. As an independent woman, she goes to Thornfield Hall as a governess, where she falls in love with the owner. However, it is on her most important day in life that she must take a difficult decision, which would change her life forever and of people around her.


*** She by H. Rider Haggard [GA Russell, bfisher, John F]
Goodreads | Amazon US / Barnes & Noble / Kobo US | Patricia Clark Memorial Library: ePub / Kindle
Print Length: 317 pages
Spoiler:
From Wikipedia:

She is the story of Cambridge professor Horace Holly and his ward Leo Vincey, and their journey to a lost kingdom in the African interior. The journey is triggered by a mysterious package left to Leo by his father, to be opened on his 25th birthday; the package contains an ancient shard of pottery and several documents, suggesting an ancient mystery about the Vincey family. Holly and Leo eventually arrive in eastern Africa where they encounter a primitive race of natives and a mysterious white queen, Ayesha, who reigns as the all-powerful "She" or "She-who-must-be-obeyed" and who has a mysterious connection to young Leo.

The story expresses numerous racial and evolutionary conceptions of the late Victorians, especially notions of degeneration and racial decline prominent during the fin de siècle. In the figure of She, the novel notably explored themes of female authority and feminine behaviour. It has received praise and criticism alike for its representation of womanhood.


*** A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes [BenG, bfisher, sun surfer]
Goodreads
Print Length: 298 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:

A High Wind in Jamaica is not so much a book as a curious object, like a piece of driftwood torqued into an alarming shape from years at sea. And like driftwood, it seems not to have been made, exactly, but simply to have come into being, so perfectly is its form married to its content. The five Bas-Thornton children must leave their parents in Jamaica after a terrible hurricane blows down their family home. Accompanied by their Creole friends, the Fernandez children, they board a ship that is almost immediately set upon by pirates. The children take to corsair life coolly and matter-of-factly; just as coolly do they commit horrible deeds, and have horrible deeds visited upon them. First published in 1929, A High Wind in Jamaica has been compared to Lord of the Flies in its unflinching portrayal of innocence corrupted, but Richard Hughes is the supreme ironist William Golding never was. He possesses the ability to be one moment thoroughly inside a character's head, and the next outside of it altogether, hilariously commenting.
Irony finds a happy home indeed in the book's mixture of the macabre and the adorable. The baby girl, Rachel, "could even sum up maternal feelings for a marline-spike, and would sit up aloft rocking it in her arms and crooning. The sailors avoided walking underneath: for such an infant, if dropped from a height, will find its way through the thickest skull (an accident which sometimes befalls unpopular captains)." In that "such an infant" lies a world of mordant wit. In fact, throughout, Hughes's wildly eccentric punctuation and startling syntax make just the right verbal vehicle for this dark-hearted pirate story for grownups.

Hughes enjoys some coy riffing on the child mind, as with this description of the way Emily handles an uncomfortable social situation: "Much the best way of escaping from an embarrassing rencontre, when to walk away would be an impossible strain on the nerves, is to retire in a series of somersaults. Emily immediately started turning head over heels up the deck." Even so, Hughes never sentimentalizes his subject: "Babies of course are not human--they are animals, and have a very ancient and ramified culture, as cats have, and fishes, and even snakes." Children, as a race, are given rough treatment: "their minds are not just more ignorant and stupider than ours, but differ in kind of thinking (are mad, in fact)." That madness is here isolated, prodded, and poked to chilling effect. But Hughes never loses sight of his ultimate objective: A High Wind in Jamaica is, above all, a cracking good yarn.

~ Claire Dederer


** Evelina by Frances Burney [issybird, sun surfer]
Goodreads | Girlebooks | Patricia Clark Memorial Library: Kindle
Print Length: 455 pages
Spoiler:
From Amazon:

Frances Burney's first and most enduringly popular novel is a vivid, satirical, and seductive account of the pleasures and dangers of fashionable life in late eighteenth-century London. As she describes her heroine's entry into society, womanhood and, inevitably, love, Burney exposes the vulnerability of female innocence in an image-conscious and often cruel world where social snobbery and sexual aggression are played out in the public arenas of pleasure-gardens, theatre visits, and balls. But Evelina's innocence also makes her a shrewd commentator on the excesses and absurdities of manners and social ambitions - as well as attracting the attention of the eminently eligible Lord Orville. Evelina, comic and shrewd, is at once a guide to fashionable London, a satirical attack on the new consumerism, an investigation of women's position in the late eighteenth century, and a love story.


*** Crome Yellow by Aldous Huxley [issybird, bfisher, BenG]
Goodreads | Librivox / Manybooks
Print Length: 176 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:

Denis Stone, a naive young poet, is invited to stay at Crome, a country house renowned for its gatherings of 'bright young things'. His hosts, Henry Wimbush and his exotic wife Priscilla, are joined by a party of colourful guests whose intrigues and opinions ensure Denis's stay is a memorable one. First published in 1921, Crome Yellow was Aldous Huxley's much-acclaimed debut novel. With the evident relish of the true satirist, he mocked the fads, foibles and spirit of his time with an unsurpassed wit and brilliance.


*** Whose Body? (Lord Peter Wimsey Series Book 1) by Dorothy L. Sayers [CRussel, JSWolf, Alohamora]
Goodreads | Amazon US / Amazon UK / Audible US / Audible UK / Public Domain (Life+50 countries ONLY!)
Print Length: 208 pages
Spoiler:
From Amazon:

Wimseys mother, the Dowager Duchess of Denver, rings her son with news of such a quaint thing. She has heard through a friend that Mr. Thipps, a respectable Battersea architect, found a dead man in his bathwearing nothing but a gold pince-nez. Lord Wimsey makes his way straight over to Mr. Thipps, and a good look at the body raises a number of interesting questions. Why would such an apparently well groomed man have filthy black toenails, flea bites and the scent of carbolic soap lingering on his corpse? Then comes the disappearance of oil millionaire Sir Reuben Levy, last seen on the Battersea Park Road. With his beard shaved he would look very similar to the man found in the bath, but is Sir Levy really dead?

From FadedPage:

"Whose Body" is something of an apprentice work. Lord Peter is here more a bundle of characteristics than a character: a collector of rare books and incunabula, facile with quotations, fluent in French and probably in Latin, a skillful and sensitive pianist who never needs to practise, slightly built but possessed of "curious" strength and speed which he maintains without exercise. Over subsequent books, this caricature smooths and deepens into one of the most interesting and attractive detectives in fiction.
In spite of its awkwardness, Whose Body is worth reading. The plot is clever, the villain is believable and sadistic, and most of the supporting characters are a delight. Some of these characters are further developed in later novels: Bunter, Parker, the Dowager Duchess, Freddy Arbuthnot. Others fortunately are not. Sayers is much better with people she might recognise as "like us" then with people from other social groups.

From Goodreads:

The stark naked body was lying in the tub. Not unusual for a proper bath, but highly irregular for murder -- especially with a pair of gold pince-nez deliberately perched before the sightless eyes. What's more, the face appeared to have been shaved after death. The police assumed that the victim was a prominent financier, but Lord Peter Wimsey, who dabbled in mystery detection as a hobby, knew better. In this, his first murder case, Lord Peter untangles the ghastly mystery of the corpse in the bath.


*** The Toll-Gate by Georgette Heyer [CRussel, sun surfer, Dazrin]
Goodreads | / Amazon US / Audible US
Print Length: 321 pages
Spoiler:
From Amazon:

His exploits were legendary...

Captain John Staple, back from the battlefront, is already bored with his quiet civilian life in the country. When he stumbles upon a mystery involving a disappearing toll-gate keeper, nothing could keep the adventure-loving captain from investigating.

But winning her will be his greatest yet...

The plot thickens when John encounters the enigmatic Lady Nell Stornaway and soon learns that rescuing her from her unsavory relatives makes even the most ferocious cavalry charge look like a particularly tame hand of loo. Between hiding his true identity from Nell and the arrival in the neighborhood of some distinctly shady characters, Captain Staple finds himself embarked on the adventure-and romance-of a lifetime.

From Goodreads:

Captain John Staple's exploits in the Peninsula had earned him the sobriquet 'Crazy' Jack amongst his fellows in the Dragoon Guards. Now home from Waterloo, life in peacetime is rather dull for the boisterous, adventure-loving Captain. But when he finds himself lost and benighted at an unmanned toll-house in the Pennines, his soldiering days suddenly pale away besides an adventure - and romance - of a lifetime.

Yet again Georgette Heyer shows the qualities that made her one of the most successful and best-loved romantic novelists of her age, and why her popularity endures to this day.


** The Taking of Pelham One Two Three by John Godey [JSWolf, GA Russell]
Goodreads | Overdrive
Print length: 326 pages
Spoiler:
From Goodreads:
THIS AFTERNOON IN NEW YORK CITY, AFTER A SUBWAY TRAIN LEFT THE PELHAM STATION AT 1:23 P.M., THE EVENTS OF THE DAY TOOK A TERRIFYING DETOUR… “You will all remain seated. Anyone who tries to get up, or even moves, will be shot. There will be no further warning. If you move you will be killed…” Four men, armed with submachine guns, have seized a New York City subway train, holding all seventeen passengers—and the entire city—hostage. The identities of the hijackers are unknown. Their demands seem impossible. Their threats are real. Their escape seems inconceivable.Only one thing is certain: they aren’t stopping for anything.

John F 08-20-2017 06:32 AM

A subtle, but significant change to the category? We went from "Classics" to "The Classics".

JSWolf 08-20-2017 06:53 AM

I'd like to nominate The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold.

Quote:

This classic work of science fiction is widely considered to be the ultimate time-travel novel. When Daniel Eakins inherits a time machine, he soon realizes that he has enormous power to shape the course of history. He can foil terrorists, prevent assassinations, or just make some fast money at the racetrack. And if he doesn't like the results of the change, he can simply go back in time and talk himself out of making it! But Dan soon finds that there are limits to his powers and forces beyond his control.
Overdrive: https://www.overdrive.com/media/5222...folded-himself

John F 08-20-2017 12:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf (Post 3570290)
I'd like to nominate The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold.



Overdrive: https://www.overdrive.com/media/5222...folded-himself

A little warning from someone posting in another thread:

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf (Post 3570308)
I just picked up The Man Who Folded Himself and has no chapters. The publisher created it as one long flow which on some Readers won't work as it's too big.


JSWolf 08-20-2017 12:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe (Post 3570224)
Australian
Angus Robertson
Booktopia
Borders
Dymocks
Fishpond
Google

Canada
Amazon. Make sure you are logged out. Then go to the Kindle Store. Search for a book. After the search results come up, in the upper right corner of the screen, change the country to Canada and search away.
Google
Sony eBookstore (Upper right corner switch to/from US/CA)

UK
BooksOnBoard (In the upper right corner is a way to switch to the UK store)
Amazon
Foyle's
Google
Penguin
Random House
Waterstones
WH Smith

This list is somewhat obsolete. You'll need to make sure each link actually works. Some do not. Also, Kobo needs to be added in to the list as it's the top book store in Canada and the second biggest in the US. Oh and the last thing, not all the shops listed sell eBooks.

WT Sharpe 08-21-2017 11:08 PM

The Man Who Folded Himself has a interesting premise, but only 146 pages. I wonder how much discussion it would generate?

WT Sharpe 08-21-2017 11:15 PM

I nominate Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. A powerful classic that I believe will engender much conversation.

WT Sharpe 08-21-2017 11:38 PM

And because I like time travel tales, second The Man Who Folded Himself.

GA Russell 08-21-2017 11:58 PM

I nominate She by H. Rider Haggard.

HarryT has contributed this to MR's Patricia Clark library.

ePub
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=54887

mobi
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=15034

Also...

Kindle - free
https://www.amazon.com/She-Henry-Rid...dp/B00846QWEU/

Nook - 99 cents
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/she...ard/1123661053

Kobo - 99 cents
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/she-58

bfisher 08-22-2017 02:00 AM

I'll second She.

John F 08-22-2017 06:20 AM

I'll second Jane Eyre.

I'll third She.

JSWolf 08-22-2017 07:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe (Post 3571129)
The Man Who Folded Himself has a interesting premise, but only 146 pages. I wonder how much discussion it would generate?

I would think a lot given that it's about time travel and paradoxes.

JSWolf 08-22-2017 07:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GA Russell (Post 3571144)
I nominate She by H. Rider Haggard.

HarryT has contributed this to MR's Patricia Clark library.

I read King Solomon's Mines and I really didn't like it. The racism was too much and it detracted from the story. We have enough racism going on in the world without agreeing to read it. No thanks.

BenG 08-22-2017 07:42 AM

I'll third The Man Who Folded Himself.

I also nominate A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes (1929).
Quote:

To say A High Wind in Jamaica is a novel about children who are abducted by pirates is to make it seem like a children's book. But that's completely wrong; its theme is actually how heartless children are.

The story begins almost whimsically in Jamaica, with five English children surviving a hurricane and are sent by their parents back to England. On the way their ship is set upon by pirates, and the children are accidentally transferred to the pirate vessel. Jonsen, the well-meaning pirate captain, doesn't know how to dispose of his new cargo, while the children adjust with surprising ease to their new life.

The swift, almost hallucinatory action of Hughes's novel, together with its provocative insight into the psychology of children, made it a best seller when it was first published in 1929 and has since established it as a classic of twentieth-century literature - an unequaled exploration of the nature, and limits, of innocence.
Goodreads

issybird 08-22-2017 07:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf (Post 3571259)
I read King Solomon's Mines and I really didn't like it. The racism was too much and it detracted from the story. We have enough racism going on in the world without agreeing to read it. No thanks.

I don't mind racism in the context of its times; I find it illuminating. However, even though I like period fiction, I'd rather not follow up one month of period fiction with another. And let's face it, She is a classic because it created a genre, not because it's a towering work of literature.

I read Jane Eyre to death when I was a girl, but I suppose it wouldn't kill me to read it again. :) That's not a third, though, at least not yet.

bfisher 08-22-2017 08:38 AM

I'll second A High Wind in Jamaica

JSWolf 08-22-2017 08:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by issybird (Post 3571280)
I don't mind racism in the context of its times; I find it illuminating. However, even though I like period fiction, I'd rather not follow up one month of period fiction with another. And let's face it, She is a classic because it created a genre, not because it's a towering work of literature.

I read Jane Eyre to death when I was a girl, but I suppose it wouldn't kill me to read it again. :) That's not a third, though, at least not yet.

But when the racism detracts from the story, then it's too much (IMHO).

As for Jane Eyre, it's not for me.

WT Sharpe 08-22-2017 11:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf (Post 3571295)
. . . As for Jane Eyre, it's not for me.

I recently read Jane Eyre for the first time as an audiobook and fell in love with it. I expected a Pride and Prejudice type Victorian romance, but the depth of the characters and the unexpected and bold twists and turns taken by the plot caught me completely off guard. Even if you don't vote for it, you do yourself a disservice not to read it as some point. It's rich, satisfying, and full-bodied entertainment.

issybird 08-22-2017 01:15 PM

I am very fond of nineteenth century novels in general and Victorian novels in particular, but I realize that many find them turgid and we've already got a stellar nomination from that genre. So I've decided to go back a century and ahead a century with two nominations.

The first is Evelina by Frances Burney, published in 1778, a precursor to Pride and Prejudice.. From Amazon:

Quote:

Frances Burney's first and most enduringly popular novel is a vivid, satirical, and seductive account of the pleasures and dangers of fashionable life in late eighteenth-century London. As she describes her heroine's entry into society, womanhood and, inevitably, love, Burney exposes the vulnerability of female innocence in an image-conscious and often cruel world where social snobbery and sexual aggression are played out in the public arenas of pleasure-gardens, theatre visits, and balls. But Evelina's innocence also makes her a shrewd commentator on the excesses and absurdities of manners and social ambitions - as well as attracting the attention of the eminently eligible Lord Orville. Evelina, comic and shrewd, is at once a guide to fashionable London, a satirical attack on the new consumerism, an investigation of women's position in the late eighteenth century, and a love story.
HarryT has uploaded a Kindle edition here at MR.

All formats are available at Girlebooks.

JSWolf 08-22-2017 01:27 PM

IMHO, given that we just read a period piece that wasn't all that good, I would like to stay away from period pieces. Two period pieces in a row is not doing the book club any favors. The problem (as I see it) is that some of the books we get nominated that are about a period or a place don't work. Lets take the last book and the book we had for mysteries that was about Africa and both failed big time. They weren't abount what they should have been about. There were very wishy washy.

So let's try to get a book that's about what it should be about and not say it's about XYZ and we get ABC instead.

issybird 08-22-2017 01:28 PM

Next is Crome Yellow by Aldous Huxley, published in 1921 and thus public domain in the US. From Goodreads:

Quote:

Denis Stone, a naive young poet, is invited to stay at Crome, a country house renowned for its gatherings of 'bright young things'. Crome's hosts, the world-weary Henry Wimbush and his exotic wife Priscilla are joined by a party of colourful guests whose intrigues and opinions ensure Denis's stay is a memorable one. <SNIP> First published in 1921, Crome Yellow was Aldous Huxley's much-acclaimed debut novel. With the evident relish of the true satirist, he mocked the fads, foibles and spirit of his time with an unsurpassed wit and brilliance.
All formats are available at Manybooks.net

Librivox

issybird 08-22-2017 01:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf (Post 3571384)
IMHO, given that we just read a period piece that wasn't all that good, I would like to stay away from period pieces. Two period pieces in a row is not doing the book club any favors.

There's a difference between period fiction (lighter and less literary) and period piece (anything old). Honestly, Jon, a classic is a book that has stood the test of time! There has to be an element of period about it.

And I found Mr. Moto delightful.

CRussel 08-22-2017 02:30 PM

OK, you want a classic? I'll give you a classic, and one that's a delightful read as well, with a superb audio version for those who prefer audio books. Dorothy L. Sayers very first Lord Peter Wimsey novel, Whose Body.
Quote:

Originally Posted by Amazon.com
Wimseys mother, the Dowager Duchess of Denver, rings her son with news of such a quaint thing. She has heard through a friend that Mr. Thipps, a respectable Battersea architect, found a dead man in his bathwearing nothing but a gold pince-nez. Lord Wimsey makes his way straight over to Mr. Thipps, and a good look at the body raises a number of interesting questions. Why would such an apparently well groomed man have filthy black toenails, flea bites and the scent of carbolic soap lingering on his corpse? Then comes the disappearance of oil millionaire Sir Reuben Levy, last seen on the Battersea Park Road. With his beard shaved he would look very similar to the man found in the bath, but is Sir Levy really dead?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Goodreads.com
The stark naked body was lying in the tub. Not unusual for a proper bath, but highly irregular for murder -- especially with a pair of gold pince-nez deliberately perched before the sightless eyes. What's more, the face appeared to have been shaved after death. The police assumed that the victim was a prominent financier, but Lord Peter Wimsey, who dabbled in mystery detection as a hobby, knew better. In this, his first murder case, Lord Peter untangles the ghastly mystery of the corpse in the bath.

Quote:

Originally Posted by FadedPage.com
"Whose Body" is something of an apprentice work. Lord Peter is here more a bundle of characteristics than a character: a collector of rare books and incunabula, facile with quotations, fluent in French and probably in Latin, a skillful and sensitive pianist who never needs to practise, slightly built but possessed of "curious" strength and speed which he maintains without exercise. Over subsequent books, this caricature smooths and deepens into one of the most interesting and attractive detectives in fiction.
In spite of its awkwardness, Whose Body is worth reading. The plot is clever, the villain is believable and sadistic, and most of the supporting characters are a delight. Some of these characters are further developed in later novels: Bunter, Parker, the Dowager Duchess, Freddy Arbuthnot. Others fortunately are not. Sayers is much better with people she might recognise as "like us" then with people from other social groups.

Amazon.com -- $0.99
Audible.com -- $7.99 (WhisperSync) or 1 credit (read by the Nadia May, aka Wanda McCaddon!)
Canadian Public Domain -- Life+50 countries ONLY, please.
AmazonUK -- £1.99
AudibleUK - WhisperSync -- £6.20
Goodreads

Really, any of Dorothy Sayers' Wimsey books would qualify as Classics, and all can be read standalone. But let's go with the very first, since I know Jon prefers we read in order. ;) (And yes, we did read a Sayers way back in 2009. Murder Must Advertise)

This book is short (170 pages), and inexpensive, so both of those boxes are ticked. Plus, it's a good read, and I'm way overdue to re-read it. The only disappointment is that this was never dramatized with Ian Carmichael as Lord Peter. But with the superb narration by Nadia May for the audio book, that's less of a consideration.

CRussel 08-22-2017 02:33 PM

I'll third Jane Eyre, since there's a Wanda McCaddon Audible version. And while I'm sure I must have read it in my youth, it's been at LEAST 50 years, so I suspect it will all be new. :)

CRussel 08-22-2017 02:50 PM

And, while I'm on a roll, here's another classic that should lighten our reading for the month, and is certainly a 'period piece'. I'll nominate Georgette Heyer's The Toll-Gate. This delightful romp is a classic Georgette Heyer novel, and one of my favourites.
Quote:

Originally Posted by Amazon.com
His exploits were legendary...

Captain John Staple, back from the battlefront, is already bored with his quiet civilian life in the country. When he stumbles upon a mystery involving a disappearing toll-gate keeper, nothing could keep the adventure-loving captain from investigating.

But winning her will be his greatest yet...

The plot thickens when John encounters the enigmatic Lady Nell Stornaway and soon learns that rescuing her from her unsavory relatives makes even the most ferocious cavalry charge look like a particularly tame hand of loo. Between hiding his true identity from Nell and the arrival in the neighborhood of some distinctly shady characters, Captain Staple finds himself embarked on the adventure-and romance-of a lifetime.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Goodreads.com
Captain John Staple's exploits in the Peninsula had earned him the sobriquet 'Crazy' Jack amongst his fellows in the Dragoon Guards. Now home from Waterloo, life in peacetime is rather dull for the boisterous, adventure-loving Captain. But when he finds himself lost and benighted at an unmanned toll-house in the Pennines, his soldiering days suddenly pale away besides an adventure - and romance - of a lifetime.

Yet again Georgette Heyer shows the qualities that made her one of the most successful and best-loved romantic novelists of her age, and why her popularity endures to this day.

AmazonUS -- $2.99
AudibleUS -- 1 Credit or $7.49 WhisperSync

Goodreads

Again, inexpensive, but a bit longer, 321 pages. Still, not too long to read in the time available, and it is a quick read. Truly, if you've never read a Georgette Heyer, you're missing some fun. They're witty, funny, and so delightful. (And, full disclosure -- I generally do NOT like "romances", but I love these books.)

issybird 08-22-2017 02:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CRussel (Post 3571408)
The only disappointment is that this was never dramatized with Ian Carmichael as Lord Peter.

I know the reason. The producers thought Whose Body? was too weak and decided to start with the second book, Clouds of Witness, instead. CoW is one of the better books in the canon, IMO, so I think it was a good decision. Why they did Five Red Herrings, the worst book of all, is beyond me.

I liked Edward Petherbridge, too, but I thought Harriet Walter as Harriet Vane was awful.

CRussel 08-22-2017 02:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by issybird (Post 3571416)
I know the reason. The producers thought Whose Body? was too weak and decided to start with the second book, Clouds of Witness, instead. CoW is one of the better books in the canon, IMO, so I think it was a good decision. Why they did Five Red Herrings, the worst book of all, is beyond me.

I liked Edward Petherbridge, too, but I thought Harriet Walter as Harriet Vane was awful.

I liked both Petherbridge and Carmichael, and if one were to suggest we read Clouds of Witness instead, I'd be fine with that. But even if it is a less stellar book in the series, it is the start, so has some virtue for that. But if you want to suggest CoW, instead, I'll pull my nomination and second CoW. :) But it's been too long since we read a Sayers!

issybird 08-22-2017 03:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CRussel (Post 3571417)
I liked both Petherbridge and Carmichael, and if one were to suggest we read Clouds of Witness instead, I'd be fine with that. But even if it is a less stellar book in the series, it is the start, so has some virtue for that. But if you want to suggest CoW, instead, I'll pull my nomination and second CoW. :) But it's been too long since we read a Sayers!

Oh, no, it makes no nevermind to me; I just thought I'd pop in with the reasoning. And we have to think of Jon.

More seriously, we've already had four mystery-ish titles this year and a fifth might send me screaming into the marsh (handily located behind my house). :) I just don't like mysteries that much anymore. :(

I'd like our classic to be a classic and not just a classic of its genre!

CRussel 08-22-2017 03:04 PM

If we want to switch to Clouds of Witness, I offer the following:
Quote:

Originally Posted by Goodreads.com
Rustic old Riddlesdale Lodge was a Wimsey family retreat filled with country pleasures and the thrill of the hunt -- until the game turned up human and quite dead. He lay among the chrysanthemums, wore slippers and a dinner jacket and was Lord Peter's brother-in-law-to-be. His accused murderer was Wimsey's own brother, and if murder set all in the family wasn't enough to boggle the unflappable Lord Wimsey, perhaps a few twists of fate would be -- a mysterious vanishing midnight letter from Egypt...a grieving fiancee with suitcase in hand...and a bullet destined for one very special Wimsey.

Quote:

Originally Posted by FadedPage.com
Dorothy Sayers' second Lord Peter Wimsey novel comes in on a more serious note. Wimsey, just returned from a long rest in Corsica, finds himself embroiled in a murder far closer to home. While staying at a hunting lodge with friends Peter's brother Gerald has gotten tangled up in a murder, and has become the chief suspect. To make matters more complicated, the victim is their sister Mary's ex-fiancée. Very recently ex, as a matter of fact. The murder was done shortly after Gerald has thrown him out of the house as a card cheat.
When an alibi is demanded, Gerald refuses to give one, and so is charged with the crime. As he is the Duke of Denver, Gerald's case will not be heard in court, but before the House of Lords. Lord Peter is confronted with a case in which the accused seems bound and determined to get himself hung. Gerald offers no help to his brother, the police, or even Impey Biggs, his barrister. Peter and his long time friend Inspector Parker, are left with only faint clues.

Canadian Public Domain -- Life+50 only, please
AudibleUS -- 1Credit, narrated by Ian Carmichael
AmazonUS
Amazon DVD -- $24.73, Prime

Pages: 185

CRussel 08-22-2017 03:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by issybird (Post 3571418)
Oh, no, it makes no nevermind to me; I just thought I'd pop in with the reasoning. And we have to think of Jon.

More seriously, we've already had four mystery-ish titles this year and a fifth might send me screaming into the marsh (handily located behind my house). :) I just don't like mysteries that much anymore. :(

I'd like our classic to be a classic and not just a classic of its genre!

Well, I can understand that, but I'd argue that Sayers has stood the test of time as a classic, not just a classic of its genre. And you know you'll happily listen to a Nadia May narration of just about anything. ;)

JSWolf 08-22-2017 04:17 PM

I'll second the first Lord Peter Wimsey book.

BenG 08-22-2017 04:27 PM

Are you sure you don't want to second the second?

JSWolf 08-22-2017 04:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BenG (Post 3571465)
Are you sure you don't want to second the second?

I'm sure of what I want.

bfisher 08-22-2017 08:18 PM

I second Crome Yellow

Alohamora 08-22-2017 11:20 PM

I'll third the first, or second the second Dorothy Sayers, whichever is on the table.

CRussel 08-23-2017 01:18 AM

The first is on the table, having been seconded already. The second is off the table, since I don't have another ticket to nominate with. ;)

So, thank you very much for putting Lord Peter's first case on the table for this month.

BenG 08-23-2017 11:26 AM

And I third Jane Eyre.

John F 08-23-2017 11:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CRussel (Post 3571410)
I'll third Jane Eyre, since there's a Wanda McCaddon Audible version. And while I'm sure I must have read it in my youth, it's been at LEAST 50 years, so I suspect it will all be new. :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by BenG (Post 3571771)
And I third Jane Eyre.

:chinscratch:

CRussel 08-23-2017 12:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by CRussel (Post 3571410)
I'll third Jane Eyre, since there's a Wanda McCaddon Audible version. And while I'm sure I must have read it in my youth, it's been at LEAST 50 years, so I suspect it will all be new. :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by BenG (Post 3571771)
And I third Jane Eyre.

Quote:

Originally Posted by John F (Post 3571782)
:chinscratch:

I suspect because he didn't see mine, and Tom seems a bit behind in updating the master list. I think he's been more than a bit buried by other things.


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