Susan Hated Literature

As you can see I’ve changed the header because the 2007 RWC kicks off today. I’ve also finally gotten around to adding a link to The Fear of God that’ll stay over there on the right for the duration of the competition.

I was talking to one of the students about Ireland’s chances, and over the course of our conversation we got on to the subject of Croke Park and the IRFU and FAI using the GAA ground. And do you know what he said? That he would never go near Croke Park, that the GAA “shower” would never get any money off him, weren’t they all bigots. That he had no time at all for the GAA. Can you tell where he was from?

But of course, a southside Dubliner^[1]

What an attitude to have. Of course his may be slightly mitigated in that he is a “mature” student and so can remember the days when GAA players weren’t allowed to play other sports. But that is in the past, and holding a grudge against the past is merely what the GAA were doing in the first place. After all it was set up, not primarily as a sporting organisation, but as a cultural one. To restore Irish culture through sport, and other activities. That is why you couldn’t play “foreign games”, because the foreigners had stopped the playing of Irish games.

So, the GAA has gotten rid of its outdated idiot rules lets hold it against them. Can you say “whataboutery”.

Tags: 2007RWC, bigots, Croke Park, FAI, Fear of God, GAA, IRFU, rugby, southside Dubliner, stereotypes

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The Journals of May Dodd
Author: Jim Fergus
ISBN: 0312199430
DDC: 813.54
See also: Library Thing ; HistoricalFavorites ; Jim Fergus.com

23 March 1875
Today is my birthday, and I have received the greatest gift of all - freedom! I make these first poor scribblings aboard the westbound Union Pacific train with departed Union Station Chicago at 6.35 a.m. this morning, bound for Nebraska Territory.

In 1854 a Cheyenne chief asked the United States government for one thousand white brides to marry into the people. Cheyenne society was a matrilineal society the resulting children, to their minds, would belong to white society. Yet they would also have an understanding of Cheyenne ways, and so it seemed a good way of joining white man’s society. Of course this didn’t go down to well in the white man’s world, and the offer was refused.

In this novel Fergus imagines what would have happened had the US govt decided to go along with this Cheyenne idea. In secret, of course.

The main protagonist in the novel is May Dodd, it is her journal that we are reading. And the letters she wrote to her family members back east, knowing she would never post them, and so using them more as a method of venting her frustrations and feelings at life in general. Before she agreed to join the Brides programme May was locked away in a mental asylum. The reason, she tells us, is that she committed the crime of falling in love. Falling in love and having two out of wedlock children with a man far beneath her in class and standing. Her family were not impressed and so arranged to have her placed out of sight, and out of mind. And, in order to escape the asylum she agrees to travel west and marry a strange savage Indian.

The whole book is told through Dodd’s eyes, she introduces us to the other women who have likewise agreed. The criminal, the insane, the poor and the adventurous. But there aren’t a thousand, she and her companions are the first train to leave the east. And as gold is discovered in Indian territory, they will be the last.

I quite enjoyed this book. It tells a good story and moves at a fairly decent pace. The writing style is very readable and it is all entertaining.

But May and her companions don’t really seem all that well-drawn as characters. Part of that I suppose is because it is May who is describing the other women, and indeed the Cheyennes she meets. And she describes them in cliches and stereotypes. We have the southern plantation lady with a drawl, a poodle, and a reluctance to marry any dahmn niggah, there are the Irish red headed twins with their thieving and oirish accents. The silent and noble Cheyenne chief, the dirty no-good half-breed.

And because of that I was never really all that gripped by this read. And it also made me wonder of some of the events that happened, or character traits, were there simply to move the plot along. Merely a device to get X here and Y there. Still, it was entertaining, and raised some interesting points. But at the end of the day it wasn’t a great read.

Tags: 1854, 6 Stars, 813.54, alternate history, Cheyenne, clichéd, diary, first person narrator, group read, Historical Favorites, historical fiction, Indians, Jim Fergus, native Americans, One Thousand White Women, stereotypes, USA - western

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ISBN: 1841492531
DDC: 823.92
The First Parrish Plessis Book
Author: Marriane De Pierres

First line:
If Jamon Mondo touched me one more time I’d kill him.

I almost wish I hadn’t finish this book. I was on the verge of tossing it around two thirds in, but figured I’d read this far might as well see how it ends. But the final third is actually quite good. Not sure if it is enough to make up for the first part, But now I am a little curious about the next books in the series.

When we first meet Parrish she is low on the pecking order, a bodyguard-come-unwilling companion to a local gang leader. And in this is a dystopian Australia of the future if you go against the gang leaders without backup you end up dead. And most likely after a spell of torture.

So when Parrish runs into Dark and Sto she thinks that maybe by using them she can get in with the Cabal, and maybe get away from Jamon. But things are not what they seem, and Parrish soon finds herself in deeper than she could ever have believed.

The basic story itself is vaguely interesting. But the writing isn’t. First person narration often results in supporting characters lacking depth and, well character, but in this book Parrish herself isn’t all that interesting or believable. A fairly typical wise-cracking, but scared underneath it all heroine. There is also a fair amount of future slang that seems clunky and forced.

But, over halfway through and the book seems to shift a gear. Almost as though everything in this book is simply setting the scene. Letting the reader get to know the Tert and Viva. Letting us see how things worked, and then suddenly introducing another plot element that really doesn’t seem to fit with everything that has gone before.

From then on it is readable, and even enjoyable. The question is, is this what the other books or like? Or will they return to the dull story-telling-by-numbers of the previous chapters.

Tags: 3 Stars, 823.92, aff, Australia, clunky, doesn't quite work, dystopian future, first person narrator, forced, future, Marriane De Pierres, Nylon Angel, Parrish Plessis, series, stereotypes

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