The Forgotten Affairs of Youth - Alexander McCall Smith

This is the latest Isabel Dalhousie novel from one of the world's most prolific novelists. It's only a couple of weeks since I read the latest 44 Scotland Street novel (I know these are serialised in The Scotsman so it's been nearly a year in the writing) & there's a new Professor Von Iglefeld novel out soon, Unusual Uses for Olive Oil. My favourite series are the Edinburgh series. I love the atmosphere of Edinburgh in these books. Isabel Dalhousie is a wealthy woman, a philosopher, living in Edinburgh with her fiancé, Jamie & their young son, Charlie. Isabel is the owner & editor of a journal, the Review of Applied Ethics, & her life as a philosopher influences every area of her life. Isabel is always aware of her good fortune. Her inherited wealth makes her slightly uncomfortable & she is very sensitive to the feelings of others.

In this latest novel, Isabel seems to have stopped questioning her good fortune in relation to Jamie & is just enjoying being in love. Jamie is younger than Isabel & was once the boyfriend of her niece, Cat. Although Jamie & Cat had broken up by the time he fell in love with Isabel, Cat has always resented their relationship & it hasn't made their already spiky relationship any easier. The fact that Isabel goes down with mild food poisoning after eating mushrooms bought at Cat's deli doesn't help either - or the fact that Isabel can't bring herself to lie to the food inspector when asked where she bought the mushrooms.

Isabel often finds herself involved in the problems of friends & acquaintances. She's discreet & genuinely wants to help so she finds herself asked to investigate tricky problems. Jane Cooper is an Australian academic spending her sabbatical year in Edinburgh. She chose Edinburgh partly because she was born there & adopted as a baby. She's about to turn 40 & wants to find out about her parents. Jane knows that her mother, Clara Scott, was a student who died in an accident about eight years after Jane's birth, but she knows nothing about her father. Isabel agrees to help & starts making enquiries. Isabel soon discovers a possible candidate, Rory Cameron, who had been Clara's boyfriend at the time. When she visits him, she discovers a disappointed man whose life had been one missed opportunity after another. He is thrilled to learn that he has a daughter & Isabel arranges for Jane & Rory to meet. But, it's not as simple a story as Isabel first thought & when she begins to have doubts, she has to decide how much to tell Jane about what she discovers.

Along the way I always enjoy being part of Isabel's privileged, well-ordered life. Her housekeeper, Grace, is a touchy but warm-hearted woman who goes to spiritualist meetings. When one of the spirits recommends investing in West of Scotland Turbines, Isabel is intrigued enough to ask advice. What is she to think when she invests & the shares go up? Is Grace right to have such faith in mediums & their messages? Then, there's Isabel's ongoing tussle with Professor Lettuce over control of the Review. Isabel's coup in buying the journal is still resented by Lettuce who sends her a paper written by his nephew, Mark, & virtually dares her to reject it. When Isabel meets Mark to discuss the article, she learns a lot about Professor Lettuce - some of it surprising. The readers who commented on my post about the last Isabel novel, The Charming Quirks of Others, will be pleased to know that I looked for mentions of Charlie's Macpherson tartan rompers & couldn't find any. Of course, it could be that he's too old for rompers now that he's started playgroup, but the only reference to Macpherson tartan was the kilt Charlie wears on a very special occasion. I always look forward to a few hours spent in Isabel's company.

Sunday Poetry - Obsessions

I've chosen Robert Burns (picture from here) again today. Where would Scottish love poetry be without Burns? The young man in this poem seems quite languidly obsessed by his beloved, I imagine him sighing as he thinks about her & waits for her to notice his obsession.

O were I on Parnassus hill,
Or had o' Helicon my fill,
That I might catch poetic skill,
To sing how dear I love thee!
But Nith maun be my Muse's well,
My muse maun be thy bonie sel';
On Corsincon I'll glow'r and spell,
And write how dear I love thee!


Then come, sweet Muse, inspire my lay!
For a' the lee-lang simmer's day,
I couldna sing, I couldna say,
How much, how dear, I love thee.
I see thee dancing o'er the green-
Thy waist sae jimp, thy limbs sae clean
Thy tempting lips, thy rouguish een, -
By Heaven and earth I love thee!


By night, by day, a-field, at hame,
The tholughts o' thee my breast inflame;
And ay I muse and sing thy name,
I only live to love thee.
Tho' I were doom'd to wander on,
Beyond the sea, beyond the sun;
Till my last, weary sand was run, -
Till then - and then I love thee!

Jennie Gerhardt - Theodore Dreiser

Jennie Gerhardt is the daughter of poor German immigrants, living in Columbus, Ohio in the 1880s. She & her mother find work as cleaners at a big hotel in the city. Jennie catches the eye of Senator George Brander who takes an interest in her. Brander helps her family by employing Mrs Gerhardt to wash his laundry & giving the family other gifts. Brander is a lonely man, about to lose his seat in the Senate & he genuinely cares for Jennie & even plans to marry her – after she’s been suitably educated, of course. Mr Gerhardt is a sternly religious man who works hard for his family but doesn’t have much sympathy for his children. Mrs Gerhardt is a much more loving, sympathetic character & the close bond she shares with Jennie is one of the most important relationships in the book. When a neighbour tells Gerhardt about Brander’s visits to the house & that Jennie has been seen out driving with him, he is furious. He confronts Brander & forbids Jennie to see him. Soon after, Jennie’s brother, Bass, is arrested for stealing coal from the rail yards & when Jennie goes to Brander for help, he seduces her. He leaves next day for Washington, promising to return & marry Jennie but he dies of typhoid & Jennie discovers that she’s pregnant. Her father turns her out of the house but Bass & her mother contrive to look after her. When Gerhardt has to seek work in another town, Jennie goes home & her baby daughter, Vesta, is born there.

Jennie's family go through some hard times & she moves to Cleveland with Bass to look for work, leaving Vesta behind with her mother. Surprisingly, her father becomes besotted with his granddaughter, insisting on having her baptized & looking after her devotedly. Jennie begins working as a maid for a rich family & she is pursued by a friend of the family, Lester Kane. Lester is in his 30s, working in his father’s carriage making business but a little bored & at a loose end. He’s not interested in marrying any of the suitable young ladies of whom his family approve. Lester’s relationship with his brother, Robert, is also difficult. They have completely different temperaments & Robert’s ideas for running the business don’t always meet with Lester’s approval. Lester & Jennie are immediately attracted to each other & she eventually agrees to go to New York with him & become his mistress. Jennie tells her mother the truth but lets her father think she’s going to be married. She doesn’t tell Lester about Vesta & the longer she waits, the harder the confession becomes. Jennie finds it easier to convince herself that she can keep Vesta a secret & that her father doesn’t need to know about her unmarried state. She knows that she is not being honest but she’s frightened of the consequences. Both Lester & Jennie are indecisive & this drifting is one of the main problems in their relationship. Lester isn't just a rake, he loves Jennie but not enough to defy convention & marry her. He enjoys Jennie’s company & is proud to be seen with such a beautiful woman although he’s careful to keep Jennie in the background of society, setting her up in houses in different towns where he can visit her on business trips. He admires her virtues even while he takes advantage of her, & refuses to give her the status of his wife.

She’s a woman of a curious temperament. She possesses a world of feeling and emotion. She’s not educated in the sense in which we understand that word, but she has natural refinement and tact. She’s a good housekeeper. She’s an ideal mother. She’s the most affectionate creature under the sun. Her devotion to her mother and father was beyond words. ... She hasn’t any of the graces of the smart society woman. She isn’t quick at repartee. She can’t join in any rapid-fire conversation. She thinks rather slowly, I imagine. Some of her big thoughts never come to the surface at all, but you can feel that she is thinking and that she is feeling.

After her mother’s death, Jennie brings Vesta to live near her & when the child falls ill, Jennie is forced to tell Lester the truth. Surprisingly he accepts Vesta & the three of them live happily together for some time. Lester is careful to keep their relationship secret but rumours get about & when his family discover their relationship, they disapprove. His parents are especially upset & try to convince Lester to leave Jennie & marry someone “suitable”.  He refuses but feels increasingly uneasy about his inability to make a decision about his future. His father dies & the will virtually disinherits Lester unless he leaves Jennie or leaves him with enough to live on if he marries her. It's the difference between $10 000 a year & millions.

A lot of the story is about Lester's dilemma, he just doesn't have the moral courage to carry out the logical end of his actions. Jennie is a good woman & it's easy to see how she gets involved with Lester who loves her & looks after her family, even having Mr Gerhardt to live with them after the family breaks up after Mrs Gerhardt’s death. Jennie is portrayed as quite spiritual & morally pure. Everything she does is the result of love. She gets involved with Brander because he looks after her family. She falls in love with Lester but she knows that she has no other way to get out of poverty than to live with him so she allows her emotions to lead her into a relationship that her family morally disapproves of. Jennie loves Lester & can see his dilemma. She offers to leave him so that he can please his family but perversely he refuses to let her go. Lester just ties himself up in knots thinking about what he should do. The crisis comes after his father’s death when he is shut out of the family business & begins to speculate with his money. Then, he meets an old flame, now a wealthy widow, & still in love with him. The decision he makes will affect the rest of his life.

This is such a beautifully-written book. Dreiser doesn’t judge any of the characters. He allows us to understand Mr Gerhardt’s religious intolerance, Lester’s indecisiveness & all Jennie’s decisions as a part of the period in which they live. Jennie’s life is constrained by the fact that she was a poor woman in the 1880s & 1890s.Her poverty & lack of education meant that she had few choices. In Dreiser’s eyes she remains pure & good, even after she has been seduced by Brander & then Lester. Brander & Lester are also constrained by society’s expectations, they are not just moustache-twirling villains. Jennie Gerhardt is an involving story, I read most of it in a couple of days, I couldn’t put it down. I’m very glad that my 19th century book group chose to read it & I’d like to read more of Dreiser’s novels..

Untying the Knot - Linda Gillard

I understood Magnus. I loved him. But in the end, I just couldn't live with him. A familiar story, you might think, but some friends and family saw things differently. Wives are meant to stand by their man - Army wives particularly. And I didn't. I walked away. I walked away from a war hero.

It was a long, at times agonising walk. It wasn't as if I was walking into the arms of a new love. I couldn't even persuade my teenage daughter to come with me. I felt like the loneliest woman in the world. I think I was only able to do it because Magnus understood why I was going. That was possible the hardest part. The lack of recriminations.

But Magnus knew all about The Long Walk. And feeling like the loneliest man in the world.

What do you do when you love someone but can no longer live with them? That's the dilemma facing Fay McGillivray when she leaves her husband, Magnus. Magnus has been a career soldier, working in bomb disposal. His postings have been to Northern Ireland, the Falklands, the Gulf. Fay lived with the tension of being an Army wife for years, wondering if she'd ever see Magnus again every time he went back on duty. Then, the call came that Fay had always dreaded, Magnus had been badly injured in a bomb blast in Derry. And it wasn't just the physical scars, it was the mental torment that tore them apart. Magnus suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The flashbacks, the nightmares, the blank spots where he doesn't remember where he is or what he's done.

As part of Magnus's recovery, he decides to buy Tullibardine Tower, a rundown ruin of a medieval tower house, & restore it. (The picture, courtesy of Linda, is of Balvaird, to give you an idea of what Tully would have looked like). Hard physical work & solitude begin to heal Magnus but they drive Fay to the edge. Two years in a caravan on a windswept building site is more than Fay can stand. Their daughter Emily stays with her father & Fay begins a new life.

Fay starts again. She begins working seriously as a textile artist & finds some success. Her relationship with Emily suffers but she has a warm friendship with Magnus's mother, Jessie, a woman with secrets of her own. Her relationships with men are pretty disastrous because she compares them all to Magnus - & no one can compare. Magnus is still at Tully Tower, living with Nina, a young teacher who longs for a commitment from Magnus that he's not able to give. When Magnus turns up at an exhibition of Fay's work, she has to confront her feelings about him, their marriage & the reasons why she left.

Untying the Knot is a complex novel. Fay & Magnus are both damaged people. They suffer from guilt - Magnus because he's still alive & because of the way his illness has impacted on his family. Fay because she left. She was there to look after Magnus & she couldn't do it. She was so busy trying to be the buffer between Magnus & Emily, making Magnus feel secure & shield Emily from the worst of Magnus's symptoms. In the process, she lost herself. But Fay & Magnus both discover that the physical & emotional knots that tie them together will take a lot of breaking.

This is a romantic novel in the sense that Fay & Magnus have a great love for each other & the reader wishes that they could find a way to be together. Their love is encapsulated in a letter Magnus wrote to Fay to be delivered in the event of his death. He kept it with him always as a talisman but didn't have it with him on the day of the Derry explosion. He finally reads the letter to Fay in one of the most moving scenes of the novel & that's the point where I thought there was a chance that they would be alright. But there's more than romance in the book. It's harrowing to read the descriptions of Magnus's PTSD, the terror he suffers, the flashbacks. It's also very funny. Poor Nina & her gorgon mother, pushing Magnus into an engagement that ends almost before it's begun when the engagement party descends into violent farce & recriminations.

Linda has published Untying the Knot as an e-book for the Kindle. Her previous novel, House of Silence was published as an e-book in April & has been a great success, selling over 12 000 copies. Linda has written about her experience of e-publishing on this blog here & also on Dani's blog, A Work in Progress. Dani has also reviewed Linda's earlier books, Emotional Geology & Star Gazing which I've read & loved in my pre-blogging days. There are links to lots more reviews of Untying the Knot at Linda's excellent webiste here. You can buy Untying the Knot for the Kindle at Amazon UK or Amazon US.

The Girls in the Garden

It was a lovely early Spring weekend in Melbourne & one look at the garden told me that the time had come to sweep the drive & do a little weeding & cutting back. Lucky & Phoebe came out to help, supervise & explore.

Phoebe has almost stopped climbing inside the house now. She doesn't need to climb furniture & venetian blinds now she's discovered fences,

trees

and even taller trees.

She also enjoys stalking through the undergrowth,

& relaxing on the front steps.

Lucky, on the other hand, was content to follow me around, eating grass & enjoying the fresh air.

These photos pretty much sum up their very different personalities. Lucky is much quieter, happy to follow me around & sit on my lap when I settle down with a book & cup of tea. She's much less nervous than she was when she first arrived & she & Phoebe get on quite well, especially now that they have the garden to roam in & can get out of each other's way when necessary. Phoebe is a daredevil. She's already given me several (more) grey hairs. She fell from the roof of the back porch last week. Luckily she grabbed on to the handrail of the back stairs & I was able to rescue her. It's a long way to the ground. She's also disappeared over the back fence a couple of times & I've been nervous about where she was. But, she's always come home &, if she did get lost, she's tagged & microchipped so I just try not to worry too much. After all, they're out all day when I'm at work & I have no idea what they're getting up to.

It's lovely to sit on the couch in the evenings with Lucky on my lap & Phoebe asleep beside me, exhausted by another day of climbing & exploring. The cats, that is, not me. Librarians don't do much climbing or exploring.

Sunday Poetry - The Nature of Love

I haven't been able to find out very much at all about this week's poet, Alexander Scott. He lived near Edinburgh in the 16th century, there are about 35 poems attributed to him, including this one, A Rondel of Luve, & that's about it. I couldn't find a picture of him so I've chosen a painting by one of my favourite Scottish artists, Sir Henry Raeburn. The period is wrong but I like this portrait of Mr & Mrs Robert Campbell of Kailzie (from here). They look happy & contented as they walk through the grounds of their home. Although Scott is pretty gloomy on the prospects for happiness in love, I think the Campbells may have achieved his ideal - to lufe and be wyiss.

Lo! what it is to lufe,
Lerne ye, that list to prufe,
Be me, I say, that no wayis may
The grund of greif remufe,
Bot still decay, both nycht and day:
Lo! what it is to lufe.


Lufe is ane fervent fyre,
Kendillit without desyre:
Schort plesour, lang displesour;
Repentence is the hyre;
Ane pure tressour without mesour:
Lufe is ane fervent fyre.

To lufe and to be wyiss,
To rege with gud advyiss,
Now thus, now than, so gois the game,
Incertane is the dyiss:
Thair is no man, I say, that can
Both lufe and to be wyiss.


Flee alwayis frome the snair;
Lerne at me to be ware;
It is pane and dowbill trane
Of endless wo and cair;
For to refrane that denger plane,
Flee alwayis frome the snair.

Miss Buncle Married - D E Stevenson

At the end of Miss Buncle's Book, Barbara Buncle marries her publisher, Arthur Abbott, & starts a new life. Hopefully a less controversial life as Barbara's career as a writer has led to unintended complications & a midnight flit from her village home. Some months later, the Abbotts, although blissfully happy with married life, confess to each other that their busy social life of bridge evenings & drinks parties, bores them silly. Arthur suggests they move to the country & Barbara embarks on the exhausting task of house hunting. Arriving in the small town of Wandlebury to view the Archway House, Barbara is mistaken for another client, given some very expensive port to drink & virtually commanded to read a will with some very curious clauses. The will of Lady Chevis Cobbe, owner of Ganthorne Lodge, leaves everything to Jeronina Mary Cobbe, provided she is unmarried at the time of Lady Chevis Cobbe's death.  If she is married, Jeronina's brother, Archibald, will inherit. Once the mix-up is sorted out & Barbara's true identity is established, she views the Archway House, falls in love with it & sets about renovating & reviving the lovely but dilapidated old house.

Life in Wandlebury is just what Barbara has been looking for. She soon hears more about eccentric Lady Chevis Cobbe who won't even have a married servant in the house & is definitely unbalanced on the idea of marriage for any of her family. One of Arthur's old Army friends, Monkey Wrench, turns out to be the local GP. Artist James Marvell, his wispy model wife & their three tearaway children live next door. Barbara soon meets Jeronina Cobbe, known as Jerry, a practical young woman who makes ends meet at her rundown house by running a riding stable & school, while her selfish brother, Archie, skives off work & sits around waiting for the inheritance he thinks his rich aunt is going to leave him..

Arthur's nephew, Sam, who works in the publishing business, comes down for a visit & is immediately taken with Jerry. Unfortunately, she's heard that he's a nightclub-loving, irresponsible, burn the candle at both ends town lover, so she tries to ignore her growing interest in him. Jerry loves the country & could never be happy in town. Sam grows increasingly desperate trying to attract Jerry's attention. His efforts aren't helped by Barbara who knows the terms of Lady Chevis Cobbe's will & does everything she can to keep the potential lovers apart so that Jerry won't lose her inheritance.


Miss Buncle Married is a lovely, domestic book with lots of humour & acute observation. Barbara is an innocent whose best efforts often end in disaster. Hiding Sam's trousers so that he can't leave the house to visit Jerry has unintended consequences. A dinner party at the Marvells' begins awkwardly & doesn't really improve, even when Barbara goes off to inspect Mr Marvell's studio.

The Abbotts and the Marvells had not very much in common. Mrs Marvell never bothered to talk for talking's sake, and Barbara was an observer rather than a conversationalist. She liked to be with people who talked a lot, so that she could listen, or not, as she felt inclined. Mr Abbott knew nothing about Art. Mr Marvell knew nothing about Business. It was all rather difficult.

Marvell is fascinated by Barbara. Her total innocence & lack of guile entrance him. While they enjoy an intimate conversation about Art & Life in the studio, Arthur struggles to talk to Mrs Marvell, who is always exhausting by posing for her husband & lies languidly on the divan, not bothering to talk or try to entertain her guest. The Abbotts leave early when ping-pong is suggested as an after-dinner entertainment.

Barbara is suddenly inspired to start writing again. She shuts herself away writing a new novel called There's Many a Slip, basing her story, as before, on her new neighbours. Arthur loves the book & foresees even greater sales than the other books written by "John Smith". He especially enjoys the plotlines that he thinks Barbara has made up, like the woman who reads a will not meant for her eyes, but Barbara is horrified at the thought of publication. Her characters are only thinly veiled, after all, & she would hate to have to leave Wandlebury as she'd left Silverstream. The manuscript is locked away and, with the book out of her system, Barbara decides that John Smith has written his last word.

There's a third book about Barbara Buncle called The Two Mrs Abbotts. Set during WWII, it's another great read, about the Home Front & the stresses of making do with very little & worrying about loved ones fighting overseas. I listened to it on audio a year or so ago, not realising it was about Barbara Buncle until she turned up in an early chapter. It was good to read Miss Buncle Married to fill in some of the gaps in the character's lives. I enjoy D E Stevenson's books & she's having a little mini-revival at the moment with the Persephone editions of the Miss Buncle books, the recent Bloomsbury reprint of Mrs Tim of the Regiment & Greyladies publishing some previously unknown novels.