book-related

[kindkit]

I am, of course, sad about Terry Pratchett's death, but it sounds to me as though despite his Alzheimer's he remained pretty much himself to the end and died as peacefully as anyone could hope for. I'm glad that he was spared the hellish months or years of speechless bewilderment, fear, and impotent anger suffered by so many people with dementia, including my own mother.

I was going to write more, but I don't think I can.



*deep breath*

Okay, less gloomily, I wanted to mention a couple of books I've enjoyed recently.

Station Eleven, by Emily St. John Mandel, begins with the onstage death by heart attack of a famous actor during a performance of King Lear in Toronto, and traces out the impact of his life and death. Oh, and the night he dies is also the night a soon-to-be global pandemic arrives in Toronto. Within weeks, over 99% of the human species has been wiped out. The story moves between the pre-apocalypse and post-apocalypse eras; I found the latter more interesting and wished there had been more of it, and also that the plot was less reliant on coincidence. But overall I found the book engaging and interesting, and I liked that it avoided the usual "the world is completely brutal and hopeless all the time" clichés of the genre.

The Little Stranger, by Sarah Waters, is set just after the Second World War and revolves around a landowning family struggling to survive in a changed economic and social world, and the doctor who befriends them. Strange and increasingly disturbing things start happening in the big house: trickery, neurosis, or ghosts? This is a really well-written book that's made me want to read more Sarah Waters. Though I do now also quite want to read the AU of this one in which Dr. Faraday falls in love with Roderick Ayres (which at one stage I honestly believed was going to happen--I think a case could be made that it almost did happen) and the bad things that happen in the book . . . don't happen, somehow. I feel guilty for wanting this because it requires making Faraday a different kind of person, which I am in principle against, and yet I would read that AU in a heartbeat.



I'll have to see if I can get Waters' Night Watch from the library.

Comments

[lilacsigil]

I'm sorry about your mother and all the others who suffered or are suffering from Alzheimers.

The Little Stranger was a really interesting read for me, and the looming introduction of the NHS scaring the doctors was fascinating! I also thought Dr Faraday was going to fall in love with Roderick, and honestly it wouldn't have to be much of an AU - I can just as easily see him falling for either sibling. But I would also hope that somehow that relationship led them away from the house and the bad things in question and I really don't think it actually would.

[kindkit]

I can just as easily see him falling for either sibling

I'm not 100% convinced he ever fell for Caroline, as opposed to desiring the house through her; his attraction to Roderick felt more genuine to me (the first thing he notices about Roderick is how good-looking he is, whereas he usually thinks of Caroline as plain), but of course as you said it still doesn't outweigh his real heart's desire. My sense is that his choosing Caroline rather than Roderick has to do with convention (since Faraday is hugely invested in being accepted) and perhaps also with the fact that being with Roderick wouldn't give him direct power over the house, whereas if Roderick is out of the way and Faraday is Caroline's husband, he can see himself as "master of the house."

It would take a lot to pry Faraday away from the house once he's got his foot in the door. I'd like to think that if Roderick had more or less immediately said, "Let's elope!" it might have worked, but even that's an emotional stretch, not to mention all the practical considerations.

[lilacsigil]

Or Faraday's conventionality could be the key! If Roderick somehow got it together long enough to sell the house (maybe through having a clearer head after spending time out of the house with a secret rendezvous at Faraday's place) he could say, "Let's elope!" Faraday wouldn't be able to say yes, but also wouldn't want to say no. Then Roderick could buy out Faraday's share in the medical practice, put his mother and Caroline in a nice modern house in town where they don't have to spend all their time trying to shore up the old house while it kills them, and Roderick and Faraday could head off somewhere where no-one knew them, freeing them both from their oppressive history.

[mab_browne]

I think anyone who has experience of dementia feels a certain relief that Pterry left us apparently before the worst of the Alzheimer ravages took effect. It gives me very mixed feelings about his death.

[toujours_nigel]

I remember being very flabbergasted when Faraday/Caroline happened (and also rather betrayed, because Sarah Waters doing het is bizarre). The Faraday/Roderick AU where nothing awful happens would be brilliant.