The Write Adventure

NaNoWriMo's a coming, and I feel like a Really Bad Writer because I've no intention of participating. I mean, c'mon. I'm the sort of writer who never know where s/he is going, what the characters are going to do next, or even if any of the cast is going to be alive at the end of it. Sometimes this writer wonders if she's  going to be alive at the end of it. But... I actually enjoy it!

Why?

Because not knowing where my story is going to take off next is exciting. Throat-twistingly scary, but enormously fun. It's like bungee-jumping into an everlasting valley without knowing if you're all buckled up. Actually, it's like bungee jumping with nothing but your clothes on your body. Sometimes I wish that I'd everything all planned out nicely and neatly arranged, colour-coded and carefully alphabetized, but that would be oh so very boring.

Instead, this style of writing lets me rely on God more. I ask God to help me out when characters have sent me to Coventry, when my plots scream insanity, and when the dialogues are more stilted than Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy at the beginning of P & P.

God is the Great Artist and Master Storyteller- who better to turn to? ;)

If you're a writer and you are reading this post, I'm interested in what your writing style is . Unbelievably unpredictable? Happy-go-lucky? Precisely penned? Beautifully measured?

In the end... let's not forget that all creativity comes from God. When I delight in my stories, in my characters, I am delighting in the marvelous adventure that is God's brilliance.

Whatever you do, do it for the Lord!

Downton Abbey Episode 1 : Recap and Review

I'm addicted. Within twenty minutes I was reeled in so fast that my life flashed before my eyes, and my hands are still shaking. Downton Abbey. It's beautiful, it's period drama gold, and I'm already squealing so hard internally that I feel I'm going to bust my intestines.

So I decided to do a recap of Episode 1 just for fun. And because I'm addicted. :)

The venerable Julian Fellowes has done it again; Downton Abbey promises to be a richly textured, multi-faceted story, not only with the deliciously alternate yet complementary views of life up and below stairs, but a depiction of English society at a time when modernity was charging in with electricity and trains and suffragettes.

Robert, Earl of Grantham ( AARGGH- It's Hugh Bonneville!!!!!!). Must pause while wiping tears of joy away from face. What's wrong with me? Oh all right, I am partial to Hugh Bonneville. WHY hasn't he been knighted yet???

Anyway, back to Robert, Earl of Grantham. Robert seems to be a gentle, deeply sympathetic man, quite removed from the dark, lordly types ( I'm looking at you, earls of Georgette Heyer novels), and he is married to the beautiful and elegant Cora, an American heiress whose money went to the then impoverished estate. Cora didn't mind this stipulation by Robert's father at the time because when she'd married, she thought she'd bear Robert a male heir to carry on the line. Too bad she had three girls. And now her millions are not going to be going to her blood children.

When Robert takes up his morning newspaper ( freshly ironed by Thomas the head footman so that the ink won't stain his lordly fingers), he is shocked and saddened by the news of the Titanic's sinking. He is even more shocked and saddened when a telegram ( the dreaded telegram!) is handed to him, and he learns that his cousin and heir John, and John's son Patrick perished in that fateful voyage. His beautiful eldest daughter Mary was engaged to Patrick, and she is none too happy that her chance at keeping the family money in the family has disappeared into the watery grave. Oh, well. At least she doesn't have to wear mourning. Her sister Edith is furious at her lack of feeling, having harboured secret passions for the luckless Patrick herself. Meanwhile Sybil, the sister I find the most interesting at the moment, has very little to say. She is genuinely not interested. So what if she and her sisters don't get their full inheritance?

So what?! Say what?! Violet, Robert's mother and Dowager Countess of Grantham is at once furious and conniving. She didn't mind the grand estate and title going to Patrick, as her granddaughter Mary was set to marry him. She pays a visited to her barely tolerated American daughter-in-law, and the two decide to unite as "allies", because allies, according to Violet, are more useful than friends. Their aim? Get Cora's money back and smash that entail!

Now for life below stairs. We have Carson, the rightly prim and proper butler, Mrs. Hughes, the efficient dragon of a housekeeper ( echoes of Helen Mirren's housekeeper character in Gosford Park?), and Mrs. Patmore the head cook. Then comes sympathetic head housemaid Anna, bumbling second footman William, and a rather pathetic kitchen maid called Daisy. Last and certainly least is O'Brien, Cora's personal maid, and the sneering Thomas, first footman. You will see why I abhor these two in a minute. The servants are in their usual state of hustle and bustle as the dreadful news of the deaths descends upon the house. While Robert and his family react to it in a variety of different ways, the servants are too busy to reflect on it much except at dinner. No histrionics downstairs all right. But the pax romana is upset at the appearance of his lordship's new valet, John Bates. AIIEEEE! John Bates is played by Brendan Coyle! I heart Brendan Coyle! He's such a fantastic actor; another who should be knighted alongside Hugh Bonneville. Expect your hearts to be twisted folks. Brendan's at the helm.
The servants are dismayed that Bates is a cripple (
yeah, my heart twisted already), and O'Brien and Thomas are coldly furious. The reason for their fury is that Thomas was a sort of interim valet for Lord Grantham, and had been hoping to take the job on as a full-time position. They are outrightly cruel to Bates, the other servants are hopelessly sympathetic, and only Anna treats him with the respect he deserves.
At the servants' dinner table however, sharp footsteps are heard, and the door bursts open to reveal Lord Grantham. Starting out of their seats in amazement, the servants watch as Lord Grantham grasps Bates by the hand and welcomes him far too warmly for a mere stranger. Turns out, though, that Bates isn't a mere stranger. He was Robert's batman during the Boer war, and fought alongside Robert. Now that he's unemployed, Robert invited him to be his valet.
Everyone except for Anna is embarrassed, while O'Brien and Thomas decide to rethink their strategies. O' Brien murmurs in Cora's ear about Bates' inefficacy as a valet, what with his infirmity and all, while Thomas does all he can to make Bates feel like dirt. And Thomas complains to Carson, who is also harbouring doubts as to Bates' talent for valeting. Meanwhile spite is being shelled out upstairs as well: Edith throws barbs at Mary for not weeping over Patrick. Sybil tells Mary she knows more than she lets on, but Mary informs her that she's not feeling sad because of Patrick; she feels sad that she can't feel sad. Wow, lady. Go and buy a heart from somewhere.
But a great excitement appears in the form of the Duke of Crowborough, who's invited himself to stay at Downton for a few days. This is Mary's chance! If she can snag a rich duke, her future will be made! She pretties herself up for the duke, who is, shall we say, a young man and rather strange? When the servants line up to greet the duke, O'Brien kicks Bates ( gasp), and he falls, sprawling in front of the aristocrats. Red-faced, he is helped up by Anna, but now everyone assumes he fell because of his infirmity. Way to go O'Brien. I despise you so much now.


The duke barely looks at the servants, but he pauses in front of Thomas, claiming he remembers him from a previous stay. Thomas' face looks rather green, and O'Brien throws him a suspicious look.

Mary tries to engage the duke's interest, but it doesn't work, and when he and Robert have a tete-a-tete after dinner, the duke informs him that he cannot marry Mary. Robert is rightly furious: the duke had given every indication that he came to declare himself to Mary. However the duke counters that he had merely come to sympathise with the family over their bereavement. It's a lame excuse and they both know it.

A hopeful Mary is lurking outside the room, but when the duke comes out, he tells Mary shortly that he will be leaving on the morrow. Then he asks her to send Thomas up to his room. Crushed, Mary sinks back, practically into Edith's spiteful smile.

And I skipped the next scene.  Why? Because the duke is gay, and interested in Thomas. Thankfully my friend warned me of the scene, so I was ready to hit the fast forward button.
Anyway, Robert, under pressure from Cora and Carson, tells Bates finally that it isn't working out. Bates is devasted, and tries to beg Robert to reconsider, but Robert isn't used to reconsidering with servants, and tells him no. The disappointment on Bates' face, coupled with his desire not to cry, makes my hand clutch my heart in sympathy.  I sincerely dislike you Robert.
Anna is the only servant who feels Bates' pain, and at dinner she volunteers to take his meal up to him, as he hasn't shown up at the table. As she comes up, she hears the sounds of sniffing, and peeking in at the door, sees tears rolling down Bates' eyes. Who will employ him? It is 1912, and crippled ex-soldiers don't exactly have people flooding them with job offers. Seriously, where is Robert's heart? Surely he has one?

Anna's own face crumples, but she musters her courage and calls out in a falsely cheerful voice that she has his supper. Bates quickly wipes his tears away and she stammers that she's brought up his dinner. He thanks her for her kindness and she blurts out that she's ever so sorry he's going. " I'll be all right then," he says quietly. " Yes, of course you will," she agrees hastily. " There's always a place for a man like you."
" Ah yes," he says with forced hopefulness. " Something will turn up." He's bluffing, and they both know it. Shaking inwardly with sympathy, Anna asks him to write to them ( i.e. her) and tell them/her when he gets a new job.
Morning dawns too soon for Bates. He surveys the grand pillars of Downtown Abbey, a majestic, merciless mansion, a place in which he can never be at home. He's to ride in the Duke's car, as Robert says the duke can lump it. Haha.
And Bates takes off. Noooooo! Don't let such a great actor slip your fingers Julian Fellowes! What kind of a writer are you? I want Bates back or I refuse to watch anymore! I-
" Wait!"
Huh? What the-

" Wait!" Robert runs after the conveniently slow-moving car. No Mercs in those days? The car stops, while Carson takes a few surprised steps forward.
" Get out Bates," Robert says, taking out Bates' luggage ( oh my!), " We'll say no more of this."
Thank you Lord! And Robert, I like you again.
Meanwhile at some ( as yet) unspecified part of England, a pleasant-looking young man ( Matthew Crawley) and his mother ( Mrs. Isobel Crawley) are having breakfast. The post comes, and Matthew slits open his letter. " It's from Lord Grantham," he tells his mother. Mrs. Crawley inquires as to what he wants. Matthew lifts his eyes from the letter, stunned.

" He wants to change our lives."

Comments

I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed a good, long-running period drama series. Now I barely have to watch period dramas, and have a backlog of films/ series I have yet to watch. Oh, would that I had more time! But I want to stick with Downton Abbey. Not that I have much choice ( addicts rarely do ;), but because I know I'm in for a deeply thoughtful, ironic, provocative and emotional story, with each character's long-concealed thoughts and feelings being revealed with each passing episode, and with machinations and intrigues galore. Coincidentally, I'd watched Gosford Park the week before, and while I am not a fan of the numerous racy scenes, I enjoyed the upstairs/downstairs scheme very much, and enjoyed the characters who were played with as much truth and feeling as one would imagine.
Anyway, I'm saving the rest of my comments for later. This has been a really long post, and hopefully the other recaps won't be as long, since the first episode was actually the longest in the series. I can't wait to watch the rest and find out what the characters get up to!

For more information on Downton Abbey, including character and plot summaries, please visit Enchanted Serenity of Period Films.

If you have any questions concerning the series, please email me at maeriwrite@yahoo.com.

I'm looking forward to recapping more of the episodes!

God: My Everything

God in my living
There in my breathing

God in my waking
God in my sleeping
God in my resting
There in my working
God in my thinking
God in my speaking

Be my everything
Be my everything
Be my everything
Be my everything

God in my hoping
There in my dreaming
God in my watching
God in my waiting
God in my laughing
There in my weeping
God in my hurting
God in my healing

Christ in me
Christ in me
Christ in me the hope of glory
You are everything

Christ in me
Christ in me
Christ in me the hope of glory
Be my everything





I love this song because it conveys exactly what I want for my life in a far more eloquent and understandable format than I could ever try. I'm starting to realise ( I know I'm slow) that as Christians, our relationship with God is the most important thing. First we must be "rightly related to God," as Oswald Chambers says, then other things like serving and witnessing should come after. In fact, serving and witnessing will be natural results of our walk with God. You cannot have a deeply fulfilling relationship with God and not do these things.

It is when you have a relationship with God that people start to sit up and take notice. Going to church, volunteering in the inner city, all these things might not necessarily attract much attention. Perhaps people will call you "good,", but they will only be attracted to the hand of God they sense working in your life. I attend a state university, and many of my classmates, if not most, are atheistic. This is especially true in the English department, and last semester I had a professor who would declare, " There is no God." This was a class on Communism btw.

You can bleed trying to be good, but if your efforts are done without the hand and help of God, then they are done in vain. Now I've stopped trying to witness to my friends and classmates. Before you gasp in shock, let me proceed quickly. I am concentrating instead on my walk with God. And I've realised that the more time I spend with God, the more I want to talk about Him, the more I see the world through His eyes. Now it's not about the effort so much as something that's becoming natural to me. When he was on earth, Jesus always spent as much time as he could with His father. And therefore it was entirely natural for him to talk of his Father. The joy and peace that is found in the time spent at the Father's feet is unbelievable, beautiful, and impossible to achieve elsewhere. It is this joy and peace that will flow out of you, compelling you to love and witness and serve.

I still have a lot to learn of course, but I've decided to put my relationship with God First and Foremost in my life. And I'm expecting a lot of adventures on the way!

Back into the Blogosphere

I am Back. And it has been a month and four days since I last posted on here. Bad girl. Very bad girl. WHERE has my discipline gone? Not that I was a terribly rabid poster anyway, but if one has a blog, one has to maintain the said blog. Cardinal rule of blogging. A rule I obviously broke. But what can I say? Life and school intruded. And, according to my brother's engineering magazine, too much time on the Internet can really have an effect on your reading habits and the way you process information. Horrified by such news, I am now trying earnestly to cut back on my Internet time.

But I still intend to post on this blog. And the posts are probably going to be as erratic and miscellaneous as they already were. I want to glorify God through this blog, and document my growing relationship with Him. He is my everything.

Anyway, considering that The Vogage of the Dawn Treader is almost upon us (yippeee!), I'm thinking of doing a lot of Narnia-skewed posts before the premiere. Oh who am I kidding, even if I had no excuse I would probably choke this bitsy blog with Narnia-related things anyway.

So, without further adieu...

Keep shining for Jesus!

Artist: Ron DiCianni

Tess of the D'urbervilles 2008 Episode 1 Recap: Review and Professional Rants

I just watched Episodes 1 and 2 of the 2008 version of Tess of the D'urbervilles and have taken it upon myself to write a recap. Why have I chosen to do such a foolish thing? Because, mes amies, I need space to vent and spew out my spiraling emotions. And as seeing psychiatrist would send my bank account into a fit of apoplexy ( not to mention the poor psychiatrist), I decided to do a little DIY therapy: writing style.

First of all I would hereby like to state that contrary to my usual habits, I watched the series before reading the book. And now that that confessional is done, let's turn back to business.

The titular heroine Tess Durbeyfield ( an enchantingly lovely Gemma Aterton) is embarrassed by her father Mr. Durbeyfield, who is elated to discover that he is the descendant of a very old and illustrious family that went by the posh name of "D'uberville. I must say I really feel for Tess here. She can't help loving her father and sinking even further into embarrassment under the weight of that love. Her mother ( played to perfection by Ruth Jones) is an opportunist of the highest level, even more thrilled than her husband at this piece of news, and presenting a spoon with the family crest on it as evidence.

That spoon looks more like a ladle to me. But anyways...

Hmm, must check my own family spoons. Nah, on second thoughts, I remember they were bought at some nondescript supermarket twenty years ago.

Moving on... one night Tess gets into an accident as she is carting the family's beehives to the market. Unfortunately her family's horse is fatally injured, and is shot to put it out of its misery. Poor White Beauty. The loss of the animal deals a blow to a family that is already financially constrained, and Tess's mother persuades Tess to trot off to the D'urberville chateau to beg ask for employment. Unfortunately the first person Tess comes across is the smarmy Alec D'urberville who has "shifty" written all over him. Unfortunately Tess is only seventeen and very unworldly, and while she is uncomfortable with Alec's barely-disguised leers, she remains civil towards him. Alec, meanwhile, who is clearly bored and aching for something dubious to do, is taken with Tess. Not only is she jaw-droppingly beautiful, but there is an odd grace about her that belies her origins, and in spite of her natural deference to him, she shows him that she possesses spirit and a mind of her own.

Alec tries to seduce Tess with strawberries... FAIL

Alec proposes hiring Tess as the new poultry manager as their last girl disappeared mysteriously, and he has no problem persuading his old, invalid mother, Mrs. D'urberville to do so. Mrs. D'urberville is blind and has a love for birds that is tantamount to obsession. Having no love left over for her son ( rightly, I say) she likes to push his buttons by reminding him that he really isn't a D'urberville and that his father, whow as called Stoke, took on the D'urberville name because he thought it would raise him in polite society. Shocker! So Alec isn't a D'urberville after all??

Her expression is priceless... priceless!

A library?? Drool alert! Drool alert!

Alec attempts to seduce Tess, first with strawberries (unsuccessful), then with books (almost successful). Tess secretly desires to be a schoolteacher, and looks upon education very seriously. She is better-educated than her parents, but not as well as a fine young lady would be. This throws her into an interesting position whereby she's obviously more qualified and more literate than those of her class, but doesn't possess the education of those above her. Such a position, made confusing by education, reminds me of Pamela in Samuel Richardson's eponymous novel. Like Tess, Pamela was a servant preyed upon by her master, and like Tess she'd had some education, as her former mistress had taught her to read and write.

Tess might be innocent, but she's not stupid. Alec's attempts merely increase her distrust of him, and unable to secure her willing consent to be seduced, he rapes her.

ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH

I hate this man so much for destroying Tess, that I can't think straight. Must go dunk my head in a bucket of ice-water.

Tess leaves and Alec has the nerve to run after her and ask her to be his mistress. WHAT is wrong with you?? You've destroyed her life and now you want to make it worse? Creep. Tess informs him that she can never love him. She doesn't even hate him for what he's done to her. He's nothing but dust and ashes to her now. You tell 'im sista!

Alec's too lazy to push her further ( I think he's done quite enough of that already), and a broken-hearted Tess returns home. She tries to keep a brave face towards her siblings, but breaks down and confesses the truth to her parents. She asks her mother why she never warned her against such things. Yeah, Mrs. Durbeyfield. You were so greedy for money you destroyed your daughter's life. When Mrs. D tries to blame Tess, Tess rises up and cries out that she never read all the novels that explained such behaviour, that she was only seventeen, an innocent child. It's achingly sad to hear Tess herself acknowledging that her innocence has been destroyed. As the weeks go by, Tess retreats more and more into the shadows of her dingy house, unable to sit for more than two minutes without crying, the freedom and sweet naivete that came with her innocence forever destroyed.

Comments


I'd mentioned before that Tess of the D'urbervilles reminded me strongly of Samuel Richardson's novel Pamela. Written in the eighteenth century, Pamela chronicles the story of a beautiful servant girl harassed by her master. When seduction fails to affect Pamela's virtuous heart, her master tries to rape her and eventually kidnaps her in order to keep her under his power. Like Tess, Pamela is somewhat educated, and the fact that seems not to belong to any particular stratum of society is a theme echoed by Tess. These girls are not merely servants, but characters, with thoughts, feelings and aspirations. Pamela fears for her virtue, Tess does not, but loses something even more precious: her innocence.

Tess's innocence must not be confused with empty-headed naivete. She might not have been fully awakened to Alec's nefarious plans, but the fact that she distrusts him is evident even to him. Alec's callous disregard for everything except his carnal appetite ends up ruining the life of a girl whose life will obviously never be the same again. Had Tess been a Viscount's daughter, things might have turned out differently for her, but her birth condemns her to the fringes of society where no one will even think of advocating for her.And why should anyone advocate for her? Has what Alec has done a terrible crime?

Uh, YES. Not only is rape a terrible and disgusting act, but in Tess, it destroys her sweet innocence, robbing her of something she can never get back. Not only does this loss permanently alter her character, but it also thrusts her into a realisation of a dangerous, unforgiving world. Perhaps she should have had this realisation a long time ago, for with it she would have never allowed herself to fall into Alec's clutches. But such speculation is nothing finer than a waste of time, and I will close this recap with a reminder of that verse in the Bible which tells us to be "as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves." I used to think that that was an odd oxymoron, but after Tess, I can see how this advice is useful.

Performances
Gemma Arterton- I loved her portrayal of Tess. It hit all the right notes without making me feel the tiniest bit of annoyance towards her. I remember reading Pamela, and wanting to throw a shoe at the heroine for being so idiotic and simpering. I like Tess's spunkiness and intelligence. Hooray for intelligent heroines!

Hans Matheson- His Alec D'urberville is so convincing, I have to keep reminding myself that he is an actor and is only playing a role . He is at once infuriating, hateful, mocking and pitiable. For all he's done, I cannot bring myself to hate him. Like Tess I can only scorn and pity him.

Ruth Jones- Her Mrs. D'urberville is an interesting character, for she will literally sell her own daughter in order to keep the family's heads afloat. Her barely-concealed obsession with financial security and her pathetic pride in the D'urberville name bar her from ever being a good mother to Tess. I largely blame Mrs. D'urbeville for what happened to Tess. A good mother would have been very concerned over where her daughter was going off to work, especially if she was alone and defenseless. Was Mrs. D'urberville a bad mother, or was she a good one twisted by her circumstances?

That's it for my first recap! I'm looking to finish recapping all four episodes. It's going to be uphill work, especially with a somber drama like Tess, but I'm hoping there'll be little moments of levity to lighten the burden.

I know I haven't been around much, but I'm not too worried about that because there are about a hundred and thirty-four other blogs better looking and better written than mine, and I'm sure my dear followers and readers are happily occupied reading those. But my dad told me about the 10 aid workers recently killed in Afghanistan, and I felt I had to share the information. And my thoughts on it. Of course.

As I was reading about the ten aid workers and their commitment to a tough, financially unrewarding, dangerous job in order to help those in need, I was deeply moved. These people practised what Jesus preached. Their love and service to the Afghan people is a shining testament and example to me. I hope that God will use me, weak and fallible as I am, to show His love and to demonstrate His power and majesty in the same manner one day. I also pray that He prepares me for such a task, and that He will equip me daily to be ready fpr the trials and hardships that will come my way.

I'm glad that all over the world there are Christians demonstrating Christ's perfect, blessed, amazing love in a thousand different ways. It inspires me to keep on even when there are days when I fail, days when I need to bring myself to my knees to ask God for forgiveness for my wilful stubborness. I hope this this will inspire you too.

Here's the link with additional information: http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/08/09/afghanistan.victims.list/index.html?iref=allsearch


For my next post, I'm working on a recap of the period drama series I'm currently watching. Stay tuned for some not-so-insightful musings! ;)

Yours, in Christ's love,

Marie

The Historian: A book about... vampires??

Titles are odd things. When my colleague told me about a book called " The Historian", I (unsurprisingly) assumed it was about a historian. You know, old man with snow-white beard, piercing dark eyes and a stylised vocabulary. So when my colleague proceeded to crush these assumptions with the information that the book was about Dracula, I was slightly intrigued. A week later, she dumped the near 600 page tome onto my desk and I proceeded to sink my teeth into it. HAHA, lame joke right there. Oh yez, I couldn't resist. Sorry.

So I'm living in Canada right now and I understand that there's this craze about vampires. Personally speaking, I was never that much into vampires anyway. In the countries that I grew up, there were a myriad of other superstitions and ghostly creatures, and while I knew what vampires were, I was never fascinated by them. Maybe it's because I lump all blood suckers together, and after being covered with mosquito bites in every imaginable place, and after witnessing leeches do their thing, I couldn't bring myself to find any appeal in the idea of a blood-sucking human (?) being.

With the advent of Twilight however, I am forced to gnash my own teeth at the thought that I am confronted by vampires in every bookshop I go. Yes, I've read Twilight. Okay, okay, so I read one chapter. A little bemused by the fuss, I thought I'd give Twilight a try, reasoning that if so many people liked it, it had to be good, right? Riiiiiiight.

I mean, there are other things to write about in the world you know. I've pretty much stopped going into bookshops nowadays. Everything is so generic and vampire-based, and I can't wait until this madness is over and people get hooked onto nut-cracking newts or whatever other spine-chilling mythical creature there is out there in this crazy world.

Anyway. Where was I? Ah, The Historian.

The book is structured in such a way that there are actually two ( or at times, three) stories occurring with each alternating chapter. The narrator is a young girl whose name we are never told ( like the Girl in Daphne Du Maurier's Rebecca), a lonely, inquisitive little thing, who when exploring her absent father's library chances upon a strange old book with nothing on its pages except an eerie woodcut of a dragon and the word " Drakulya."
Little Miss then proceeds to read a couple of letters which are mysteriously addressed to " my dear and unfortunate successor."
Most intrigued, she confronts her father with her finding, and instead of getting angry as most normal parents would upon hearing that their perspicacious offspring have been reading their private correspondence, he instead begins to tell her a story. It all started when he was a university student doing research in the library ( the library again!). Suddenly he found the book with the dragon woodcut at his elbow. Thinking someone had left it behind, he returned it to the librarian. The very next day, the book  is back at his customary cubicle. Intrigued, he shows the book to his advisor, Professor Bartolomeo Rossi, who tells him that years ago, he received the exact book... and he suspects it all ties in to Dracula.

Who is Dracula? In The Historian, the premise is that the vampire Dracula is an actual being, based on the 15th century prince of Wallachia, Vlad Tepes. Such a personage did exist, and I love how Kostova takes this fact and works it in with with whole vampire myth. The girl's father, Paul, then begins telling his story, and the story of her mother. I know this sounds terribly simple, but it's not; half the story is narrated by Paul, some of it is narrated by Paul through letter format, some is narrated by Rossi through letters to Paul (!), and there is even some narration by the girl's mother.

While this is no blood 'n' guts horror novel (thank God for that), I did come perilously close to screaming a couple of times because it gets rather creepy, especially if you are reading at night. I was smart and did the bulk of it during the sunny daytime ;)

This is what I'd dub an " intellectual" novel, and apparently Kostova herself was going for a serious, almost Victorian tone. As a lover of history, I enjoyed the mysteries and clues revealed in maps and old books and parchments galore. I also enjoyed Kostova's marvelous descriptions of exotic countries like Romania, Turkey and Bulgaria. It's obvious that she's been to those places before, but each of her words felt like the artful strokes of a brush on a beautiful painting. I felt like getting out a map and planning out a trip to Eastern Europe ASAP.

The only downside was that I didn't bond with any of the characters at all. I felt that they were all rather far away from me ( with the slight exception of Paul) and some of the girl's reactions seemed a little too cool and distant considering the tense situations she was in. Another irritant is that the book is so long, the end feels rather rushed, as if Kostova had only just woken up to the fact that she needed to write " The End" somewhere. A rushed ending is definitely not a satisfactory ending folks.

However, I really enjoyed this book. While my heart might not have been too caught up in it; my brain was certainly engaged, and for this I thank Kostova for realizing that there are readers who do want to exercise their brains. And apart from one ambiguous scene which I'm still puzzling over, and people sometimes taking the Lord's name  ( grr) in tense situations, this was a pretty good ride. Which is nice for me. I have made a vow not to read books with sex scenes or negative messages, and that's pretty much shut the door on modern fiction for me. So it's nice to have books like these where I can read without getting too disgusted.

So that's it for this review! What should I read next?