Hello! My name is Nicole and this is my journey to read and discuss interesting, significant, and unusual books. I mostly read British classics (especially from 1700s-1800s), Japanese and Chinese classics. I'm also a big fan of anything written over 100 years ago and love a good long book. To spice things up you'll catch me reading fantasy, historical fiction, and doing other reading projects.
Nice stacks of books lying on the tops of your boxes of books. And then there was Drood. 😅 I'll believe you'll read that very soon! The only of these I've read are Nicholas Nickelby and A Room With a View, and those are both good fun. I'd like to finish the Gormenghast trilogy on audio by the end of the year. Otherwise, I'll try to prioritize the books on my shelves. 😂
Soo many good books. Always hard to choose. I know I'll sneak Drood in somewhere. How are you liking the Gormenghast series? I've had it on my TBR for ages and finally bought book 1 this summer.
@noteworthyfiction in your defense, all the books on your tbr look amazing, so it's near impossible to choose. Surprisingly, I'm loving the audio of Titus Groan! It isn't so much the story or characters, but it's just such an incredible world. The writing is such a work of art. The plot starts slow but really picks up halfway. I know I have to listen to whole trilogy.
Because of my eye surgery, December would be better for NICk. My surgery is in the middle of month. I will still be able to use one eye but it is harder to do. I originally wanted to do Dec./Jan. but I know there are other people. I just think of Dec. as dickensy.😊
Let's do December! I agree that December feels more Dickens like and November is looking busy anyway. Also, I think I need a break from chunky Dickens! Hope your surgery goes well!
Ages ago in High school (?). I haven't read it in a long time and definitely want to return to it. I recall it feeling like the longest short book. 😂 Hope you enjoy it.
Following themes similar to Drood I would definitely recommend Pale Blue Eye by Louis Bayard (Edgar Allen Poe) and The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl (Fireside Poets)
I've read Nicholas Nickleby at the beginning of last year. It was my second Dickens ever (my first one was The Pickwyck Papers) and didn't love it but I did like it a lot. A Room with a View is my favourite by Forster. I enjoyed Howards End but loved Room 😍
I have the feeling that is going to be true for me for a lot of Dickens "didn't love it but I like it a lot." I loved Howards and have hear equal love for A Room. Can't wait!!!
What books do I want to read before the end of the year? I forgot to list those...hummm...In December I was thinking of halting all my regular books and focusing only on books by or related in some way to J. R. R. Tolkien so am thinking of those (I actually purchased over 50 books and I've only read maybe about 10). In November I might just grab a book...lol. I'm so happy to see Drood on your list.
I've read a few of Forster's books and I think my favorite is A Passage to India, but they were all well written. I'm looking forward to your new bookshelves, I hope you do a nice long video on your library, I admit I'm a nosy old lady (love bookstores, libraries and what people are reading)...as usual your videos are informative and delightful. Happy reading.
I also have A Passage to India but am less excited about it. I read it in college and recall not really liking it. I am looking forward to rereading it to see if my thoughts have changed. There will definitely be a library tour. Most likely I'll also do some sort of video as I reshelve all my books (aka everybook I own). Should be fun! Thanks for all the kind words!
I love your commentary, so glad I stumbled upon your channel. I never heard of The Doll Maker, but I'm intrigued, so I'm going to add it to my To Read list.
Yay, A Room with a View! I'm excited to hear your thoughts on it. I'm in the middle of Howards End right now and I'm loving it too. I'm already eyeing up more Forster to add to my wishlist. 😅
@@noteworthyfiction Maybe he’s fallen out of fashion. There were a bunch of movie adaptations in the 80s and 90s, but not much lately. (Not that there are many left to adapt!)
I own Main Street but no plan to read it soon. I am working on Demon Copperhead right now. Huck Finn and James are on tap for November and December. Katie at Books and Things is hosting a Christmas version of her Dickens readalong where we will read five Christmas-themed short stories of his. I have some Christmastime contemporary novels I want to read in December; they’re just random titles I have picked up used over the year. Technically it’s still October so Victober is ongoing. However, I expected to stretch my Victorian reading over September, October, and into November back when I made my pile of possibilities. Things have not changed and, if anything, I’ve been reading them more slowly than anticipated. I still want to read a Sherlock Holmes, Dorian Gray, and War of the Worlds before I reshelve the Victorians.
What a treat to have 'A Room with a View' to read, I think you'll like it, everyone my age has seen the film, I once got a postcard from a friend stating she was 'Lost in Florence without my Baedeker' - 😄 Avoid the Andrew Davies TV adaptation though as he changed the ending! I can't tell you how angry that made me... especially as EM Forster wrote later about how he envisioned the characters lives would continue beyond the end of the book (which is in my copy's introduction) and the new ending was nothing like and so joyless!
I can't wait to read it. Thanks for the warning about the tv adaptation as based on the end of Howards End I get the sense that Forster's very intentional about his endings.
Decided after 20 years to re-read the LEFT BEHIND series by Jenkins and LaHaye. Its not great literature but can be a page turner. There are 16 books in the series including 3 prequels and I am in the middle of #7. I also have some Christmas themed books to get to as well.
oh boy! That's quite an ambitious end of year reading stack! I read the Left Behind (first two books?) when they first came out. I agree with your assessment. I never made it past book 2 (not a series girl even then), so good on you for hanging in for so long!
@@noteworthyfiction actually there are others in the series better than the first two...in terms of page turners. It's not my theology at all...I am Catholic. Doing a combination of reading and audiobook which does make it move faster!
@noteworthyfiction funny thing... you said "can you guess?" And an ad popped up just like on TV when they want you to keep tuned in to see the answer. 🤣🤣🤣
Also wanted to ask Did you read 4321 by Paul Auster ? I feel like I saw you with it? Did you like it??? I’m 280 pages into it and I’m waiting to see if it gets better??????
It was on my TBR back in spring (?). I picked it up to give it a try, read the first 10 pages, and put it back on the shelf. 😂 Let me know how you get on with it. I could definitely do a video on everything I DIDN'T read this year!
Good Morning Nicole. I guessed Drood 😉. If You don't get to The Dollmaker until Feb or later, I'm interested. Over the next 65 ish days, I have 21 NetGalley that I would truly like to finish. The Grasping Root #2 & Storm Wrack & Spindrift #3 by Margaret Pinard. The Last Ark #2 and The Curse of Cortez by Guy Morris. Finally, A Woman's Devotional I would like to finish.
I have read the woman in white, man and wife, Armadale, Jezebels daughter, dead secret, the law and the lady. Somehow the woman in white is not such a favourite with me, I think that me having seen the tv Series many years ago ruined the reading experience for me. So for now Armadale is my favourite and Man and wife is my second favourite. I am saving no name til later. Law and the lady is my least favourite so far. I am so glad you enjoyed the evil genius, I am putting it on my tbr.
I think the only book everyone agrees on is The Law and the Lady! That'll be the last one I read. Armadale is solid and a favorite of many. I'll be interested to see what you think of the Evil Genius.
Before I re-read Huck Finn, all I could remember from reading it as a child was that I liked Huck, I disliked Tom Sawyer, and Huck and Jim help each other run away and they're on a raft in the river, and I couldn't recall the ending at all. When I re-read it and got to the final part, I was wondering what the heck Everett could do to fix the ending. Because it's so horrible. Clearly I didn't remember it because even as a child I found it without value. 😆 It made me laugh when I realised that Everett must have found it unfixable as well, so he just took a sharp left and changed the ending all together.
I'm definitely going to have to check that out. I'm still, vainly, hoping to come across at least The Witches of Lancanshire. Someone did republish it at some point, but I've yet to come across it.
I know! They're really close. I was really tortured about everything after Armadale. That's the only one I can say for sure is correctly placed. I'm pretty sure if I did this again in 6mos it would be different.
I can understand that. There were parts I enjoyed, parts I didn't, and everything in between. I like it alot compared to some other books, but I just needed it to transition a bit better.
@@Galdra the villain is great! I really enjoyed it as well. In some ways I thought the book picked up when the perspectives changed, it was just not well done, but that's a super picky comment for sure!
@@noteworthyfiction There novels were serialised, and due to that the authors couldn't go back and change what was already out there. I think maybe the jump in narration, is due to the author not being happy with the story and therefore changing the narrative to save the story. Which it did.
Fun! Which Wilkie Collins books do you plan to read next, and how soon will we get a new ranking video? 😂 After reading a few of his duds last year (New Magdalen and The Haunted Hotel) I took a break, but after reading The Evil Genius I'm ready to read more and work my way to zero. I read WIW in 1997 and I'm long overdue for a reread.
That's around when I read WIW and I really enjoyed my reread of it. I'll probably read The Dead Secret next since that's the only other full length novel of his that I have.
Yes, stay with it. I started it and put it down then restated it this year. The second go around I think I used an audiobook at the start. And thank! I love that shirt too.
I have to read more Wilkie Collins. I've only read Antonina, which is his first novel. I enjoyed it. No Name just might have to be my next Wilkie Collins. I have to know what made you clutch your pearls😂😂.
I've only read 'The Woman in White' (had to study it), I really enjoyed it, I thought the principal villain was complex and I really like the heroine, she's got pluck. I intend to read more, I just haven't got to them yet!
I just finished The Moonstone last weekend and you said exactly what i said in my review "it started feeling too long". But i loved the different perspectives. After i finished i wanted to read all Wilkie but I'm going to read something else and throw in some short stories of his.
Sounds good. There's definitely a point in the book where I felt like he was stretching it out. It wasn't bad, it just seemed like he should have naturally wrapped it up sooner than he did. Still love the book.
I think that and Basil are the two you'd enjoy the most. Both feature really interesting characters and The Woman in White is the one with the best character development all around.
I definitely think it's one of his weaker starts. The exposition carries on a bit too long to no where. So, I'm never surprised that people put it down. The said Woman in White doesn't show up until quite a few chapters in and if that initial appearance isn't enough to grab you it'll be a few more chapters before you'll feel settled. We've been spoiled by modern books with short expositions!
I read Huckleberry Finn for the first time a few years ago. While I enjoyed some of the hijinks, I certainly struggled with the content and felt a lack of cohesion. I thought I saw where Twain was going, but that cameo you mentioned ruined any kind of “lesson” Huck might’ve been learning. I’ve been so interested in reading James and loved listening to your articulate comparison! James just got bumped up higher on my tbr!
I agree about the lack of cohesion. There were a couple points where it felt like it went of course, but I thought I saw it coming around and was hoping it was going to land well and then it just went completely off the rails and there was no coming back from that. James is soo much the better book.
Brilliant discussion, Nicole. James is the best novel I have read this year, maybe the best book I’ve read in the past several years. I completely agree with you that Everett does the narrative a great service by leaving Tom Sawyer out of his story. I have always felt that Twain’s narrative was weakened by allowing Tom Sawyer to control so much of the narrative later in the book. I also completely agree with you that Twain’s character Jim is a fairly flat character and, in fact, a caricature. I would add, though, that I believe that Jim is actually the hero of Twain’s novel, even if he is not a fully developed, three dimensional character. He does stand up to Huck when Huck plays pranks on Jim and treats him as less than the good and kind protector that he has been to Huck. And Jim also behaves in an incredibly noble way on Tom Sawyer’s behalf, when Tom clearly does not deserve the time of day from Jim. This is not to defend Twain’s book. I think Twain wrote the book he could write for the time in which he was living. It has many flaws and shortcomings, and Everett has most definitely improved upon Twain’s original conception. Everett himself has said he sees himself as being in dialogue with Twain who was “not ill-equipped but rather unequipped” to write the novel that he, Everett, has now written. Twain thought of Jim as heroic, but he also made him a docile, gullible fool. Everett gives James a powerful voice and a keen intellect and most importantly, a profound human dignity. I can’t think of a book that has moved me as deeply as JAMES has. I do think that Everett is going to win several major awards for this novel, as well he should. Thank you for this brilliant discussion of the two works, Nicole. ❤
Thanks, Pat! I agree that Huck left me with the feeling that Twain wrote what he could for the time, didn't handle the satire part well, and made a fatal mistake with Tom. It was an ambitious attempt that just falls flat in lots of awkward ways. I'm glad we now have James to tell the story and give us more to reflect upon. I too hope Everett wins numerous awards.
@@noteworthyfiction I agree with you completely. I never really thought of Huck Finn as a satire. That’s so interesting….It’s definitely a problematic book today. I forget the details now, but I think Twain wrote it over a long period of time, and there was even a gap, I think, of a few years where he didn’t work on it all. I feel like he kind of lost control of his own book when he came back to it. At any rate, JAMES is a magnificent book for our time, and it has also made me very interested in the many books that Everett wrote before this one. Again, thank you for this really thoughtful discussion of both books.
Great video! I agree that I could not find Twain’s satire. I thought there was something wrong with me, but when I read Swift I know it’s satire, and I get it. I think more depth and emotional investment is created in James over Huck Finn. For example, through depictions of slave treatment, and also the character development of James himself. However, I wish there was more variation in the education of the slaves. James is educated through his master’s library, but it’s unrealistic to assume everyone had the same opportunity, not to mention the motivation it takes to become so educated on one’s own. Overall, Everett has done a great service to Twain’s work in my opinion, and elevated a mediocre adventure to a 5 star experience.
Yes, yes, and yes. I think education and literacy as a goal was over emphasized in the book as being the only measure of intelligence, but I think it had a point and purpose. There should definitely be more books that explore that issue during this time period and others.
Hi Nicole, thank you so much for this video. I'm really excited to read James after all you've said about it. I kind of specialize in American Lit for my reading, so of course Huck Finn, being the canon fixture that it is, has a kind of special status for how I think about writing that came after. But I wanted to offer something I came across earlier this year. Mark Twain was aware of passing. It's the main plot device for The Tragedy of Puddn'head Wilson (1894). I don't know if that interests you at all. I understand that Percival Everett has studied Mark Twain really closely, and that plot element made me wonder if he was engaging or alluding to more of Twain's works than exclusively Huck Finn. Anyway, if you ever wanted to look at it I'd recommend reading some critics' introductions before the work itself, because like Huck Finn, Puddn'head can be a difficult read. Love your videos!
Oh wow! Good to know and thanks for sharing. With your knowledge I definitely think you'd get a lot more out of James (especially as it relates to Huck) than the average reader. I hope you enjoy it and I'd be really interesting to hear how, if it at all, it impacts your thinking about Huck Finn. Thanks for watching and leaving a comment!
I read Huckleberry Finn in grade school nearly 60 years ago. The only things I remembered through the years is he ran off and got to float a raft down the river. That's it, lol. Completely a kid's view -- and one reason I don't trust my memories or views about books I read long ago. I'm reading through an old family collection of Mark Twain books (from the 1910s) and will get to Huck Finn eventually -- and will certainly follow it up with James!
Very helpful insight. I decided not to spend time with Huck Finn again, so I remember hardly anything, and don't remember at all the ending. That being said, do you think the parentage that was revealed fit with the original story? Another Booktuber said she already got that feeling just from the original Huck Finn even before James.
I just read a summary of the ending online and yikes. That sounds terrible. I wonder if we skipped that in school, I don't remember it at all. It does give me more appreciation for what Everett did in James.
I definitely wondered about Huck's parentage, but on his mom's side not that dad's. I don't know that it "fits" the original story, but I think it's one of the things that Everett did that still works with the original story.
