The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde

When I was in my mid-teens, I discovered Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.  It quickly became a favorite book of mine, and one that I read every year or so in the spring time (it’s become part of my personal literary tradition).  So, while wandering through Chapters, my eye was immediately drawn to my latest read, The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde, and my curiosity was peaked.  I know the story of JE so well, that I’m always curious to see how others view it, and how they would use in for inspiration.

The Eyre Affair is set in 1980s England in a historical stream very different from the one we lived through; in Fforde’s world, the Crimean War is entering its 132 year, the state bureaucracy is built on almost 30 levels of Special Operative departments, werewolves and vampires wander amongst the people, time travel is de rigueur, and a whole host of other pieces of our known history have change (notably, those pieces related to Churchill, Wellington, the Nazis, etc).  The main character in The Eyre Affair is Thursday Next, a LiteraTech, that is a SpecOps-27, one of the bureaucratic cogs assigned to crimes against literature; fraud, forgeries, misrepresentations, etc.  When a copy of the original manuscript of Charles Dickens’ Martin Chuzzlewit goes missing, Next is called in to investigate.  What follows is an adventure in time and (literary) space as Next works to protect the beloved literary work Jane Eyre from a mad-man who is bent on reeking havoc for the sake of having some fun.

This book is so far from the average read (in many ways) that it is almost indescribable.  To start off with, Fforde has taken such a very non-flappable approach to rewriting our shared history that he has to be commended; I found it completely believable that dodo birds have become a popular personal pet, no matter what genetic splicing accident they were afflicted with.  Not only did Fforde mess with the readers’ accepted reality of history, he also bent our understanding of the physical world; an invisible car?  Sure.  Totally believable.  But what I appreciated the most was Fforde’s creation of a society that placed such a high premium on its literary tradition.  An entire government department (with regional offices!) dedicated to ensuring the consistency and veracity of literature?  I would happily live in a world where time vortexes can open up on a freeway if I could live in a culture that so treasured the written word so much.  This ability to capture the imagination of the reader is capped off with an unctuous writing style; almost like the whipped cream on a slice of pie, the foundations of the book are strong, but accented by the skills of the writer in forming beautiful turns-of-phrase and chains-of-thought.

While the plot and writing style are unique, where Fforde really hits his stride is in creating his characters.  Thursday Next is a no-nonsense operative with a whole host of skills at her disposal, and a whole host of baggage that comes with her everywhere which she can’t seem to shake.  Her nemesis, Acheron Hades, would be a lovable rogue, if he weren’t so bent on creating havoc and destruction for no purpose other than to live up to his name.  Next’s coworkers, family and friends all have their own personal backgrounds, history, and quirks that, while not fully explained, are presented so calmly and clearly, that you feel like you know their personal histories without actually having been given anything of the sort.  Most interestingly of all, however, is the way that Fforde makes literary characters come to life.  I won’t say more on that aspect of this book, but trust me – it’s amazingly, creatively, and uniquely done.

So, final verdict?  Oh my god, read this book.  This book was a real book-hangover read for me; I’m still trying to extract myself from the world that Fforde has created.  A large part of my wants to rush over to my local Chapters and pick up the rest of the books in the series, and that’s definitely something I’ll be doing this week.  And what higher recommendation can I give?  In a world where we’re all busy to the extreme (and have no ChronoGaurd to help us sort things out), I’m desperate to give away my time and money to spend more time in the world that Fforde has created.  I can’t say it enough: go out, and read this book!

Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier

About a year and a half ago, I took over a job from a young woman who was always portrayed to me as the cream of the crop – everything I did was compared to her and her abilities.  I’ve spent the last 18 months trying to live up to the expectations she set, and then trying to exceed them.  Finally, about a month ago, my Executive Director turned to me and said, “I think you did this better than she ever did.”  My heart almost stopped.  Finally!  So, maybe that’s why I related so much with my latest read, Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier.  So much so, that I think it’s fare to say that I have a new favorite book!  I wasn’t looking to add to my rotation of books to read every year of so, but I think I found one regardless.  Rebecca was a pleasant surprise in terms of writing style and plot.

A word on the plot: this book revolves around the de Winter family, specifically Maxim.  When we meet Maxim, he’s vacationing in Monte Carlo after loosing his wife (Rebecca) in a sailing accident.  While in Monte Carol, he meets a young woman who’s a paid companion to an older woman; they quickly fall in love, marry, and return to Maxim’s family estate of Manderley in England.  Maxim’s new wife, however, finds her fit at Manderley to be an awkward one – continually living up to the memory of Rebecca, all her natural insecurities and inabilities are magnified, and she feels like an unmitigated failure.  However, as she learns more about life at Manderley, it becomes clear that not all is as it seems….

So, that’s a little wishy-washy as far as a plot summary goes.  There are two reasons for that: 1 – I don’t like to ruin plots and the give-away is a great twist, and 2 – I can’t give you the name of the main character of this book (Maxim’s new young wife), because du Maurier never names her; it’s a brilliant piece of writing that she goes over 350 pages without giving her book’s narrator (because this is told in the first person) a name!  There’s a brief reference to it in the early chapters, but the only comment made is that it’s a unique name.  But that’s it.  Hats off to du Maurier for that slight of hand, because it doesn’t impact the flow of the book at all.

The more I think of this book, the more it comes as no surprise that I enjoyed it so much, as it parallels one of my all-time favorite books very closely – Jane Eyre.  Both are about young women who meet, love, and marry older men, then have to come into their own in order to fit in with their worlds.  I made the connection the first time by comparing Maxim and Rochester – on the surface, the comparison doesn’t stand, but the more you read, the more it does.  And, just like Jane Eyre, Rebecca is about a twisted love-triangle.  I found it wholly engaging. 

The love triangle at the heart of this book leads to a collection of wholly engaging characters.  Trying to figure out who is the ‘good guy’ and who is the ‘villain,’ I found myself rooting for some characters and disliking others, but in the end, coming to terms with all of them for who they were and what they did.  I think that’s the sign of a great book – when you have acceptance even for those characters whose actions hurt the ones you’re rooting for, it means you’ve been wholly engaged in the characters the author has created, and you’re enjoying your read thoroughly.  

In terms of writing style, at first I was a little turned off – there are long passages describing settings and plants, but I quickly realized that these passages were so well written that it was no burden to get through them.  In fact, it became a pleasure in and of themselves to have du Maurier describe her Manderley and surrounding areas in a such a compelling fashion.

So, final verdict?  Read this book.  It’s amazing.  I love it.  I read a borrowed copy, but the next time I’m at Chapters, I’ll be buying my own copy.  This one is going into rotation with Jane Eyre and Alice in Wonderland, no doubt.  

Oh, and one last word on why I think I love this book so much and can relate: the girl who I replaced at work?  No word of a lie, her name was Rebecca.

Wuthering Heights, by Emily Brontë

I have no patience for drama.  Anytime someone tries to bring it into my life, I shut down emotionally and then I shut that person out.  I think it’s a waste of time and energy.  Want to compare me to your ex-girlfriend?  Not on my watch.  Want to complain for the millionth time about your boss?  If you’re not going to do anything about it, then I don’t want to hear it.  Wish you could loose weight, but just can’t get there?  Put down the potato chip, then we’ll talk.  I think people who are happier with something to complain about are a waste of space and time in my life, and I’d rather they not be there.  So, what does all this have to do with my latest read?  Well, as it turns out, Wuthering Heights, by Emily Brontë, is nothing but useless drama.

A ‘quick’ re-cap of the plot: The Earnshaw family takes in a young orphan, Heathcliff, when the children, Hindley and Catherine, are in their early teens.  Hindley takes against Heathcliff in a big bad way, but Heathcliff and Catherine become inseparable.  When Mr. Earnshaw dies and Hindley inherits, his treatment of Heathcliff gets even worse.  By a twist of fate, Catherine meets the son of one of the neighboring manors, Linton, and being unable to do what her heart really wants which is to marry Heathcliff (because of his lower station), she marries Linton.  Heathcliff, heartbroken, disappears for a few years.  The night that he leaves, Catherine is so upset she develops a serious ‘fever’ that will forever impact her health.  When Heathcliff returns, the fight between himself and Linton so upsets Catherine that she has a relapse which eventually kills her.  During all this main drama, Heathcliff marries Linton’s younger sister, who leaves him, and later has his son, and Catherine has a daughter by Linton, only to die shortly after she’s born.  Heathcliff spends the rest of the book pining after Catherine, plotting to have his son marry Catherine’s daughter, to reduce the Earnshaw and Linton heirs to a lower station that he was originally in, and to destroying the happiness of everyone around him.  Ugh.  So much useless drama.

I have no patience for any of these characters.  Catherine is a spoiled brat who doesn’t really have a heart, and is literally feld by a long drawn out temper tantrum.  Heathcliff is just a monster.  Linton is a weak man who lets his heart take a beating and comes back for more time and again.  Catherine’s daughter is just like her mother, but worse because there’s a certain naïveté that makes you roll your eyes non-stop.  Heathcliff’s son is little more than a toddler in a young man’s body because he was so coddled by his mother.  The saving grace of all the characters is Ellen Dean, the long-time family servant, but even she’s got moments that make you wonder what the hell she’s thinking.

The worst part, to me, of the whole book, has to be Catherine’s cause of death.  The night Heathcliff leaves, she waits up for him all night, part of it outside (and in the rain).  The next morning, she’s developed a fever.  This is a completely reasonable expectation.  What’s not reasonable is the local doctor diagnosing her with a nervous condition as a result, which means she should not be upset by anything for fear of causing a relapse.  Then, when Heathcliff returns and a fight ensues between her and her husband, she locks herself in her room for three days without taking any food and very little water.  This causes a massive relapse of the nervous condition and when she recovers from this fever, she’s little more than a blithering idiot.  When she gets a visit from Heathcliff and they finally confess their love for each other, she goes almost catatonic, goes into premature labour, and dies later that night.  Why authors of the era thought that woman had such weak constitutions, I’ll never understand.  And Brontë, a woman herself, should have known better… But, Catherine is one of those women that we all know – she loves drama, seeks it out, and it eventually did her in.  As a reader, I fully feel she deserved the end she came too.

For all these complaints, Wuthering Heights isn’t a bad read.  The plot moves along at a good pace, and as much as they are unlikable, the characters are still quite engaging.  There’s only a little of the religious moralizing that makes some of the ‘classics’ impossible for me to get through.  I know, I just went on and on with complaints, and in the end I’m saying it’s not the worst book I’ve ever read.  But, for all the hassle around my problems with the characters, that I can still admit that it’s a good read shows how good the author was at her craft.

So, final verdict?  Read it if this is your type of book.  Wuthering Heights is closer in tone to Jane Eyre (which makes sense, as it was written by Brontë’s sister) than Pride and Prejudice, but what it lacks in light-heartedness, it makes up for in an engaging plot line.  However, don’t bother to read it if you not a patient person.  Getting through all of Catherine and Heathcliff’s crap, then their children’s crap, can be exhausting.  If you’re at all like me and hate drama, the fact that you can’t reach into the pages and smack a few characters upside the head to knock some sense into them might not make for an enjoyable read.  But, regardless of all that, Wuthering Heights is a major part of the western literary tradition and zeitgeist, and is worth a read.