Category: Book Reviews

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The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas

Avery TemplatesIn current parlance this novel could be called a bromance adventure story. It is also historical fiction. In researching the movies I came across 2 terse summaries of the story. Appended to the 1973 movie was:

“A young swordsman comes to Paris and faces villains, romance, adventure and intrigue with three Musketeer friends.”

The summary attached to the 2011 movie goes a little deeper:

“The hot-headed young D’Artagnan along with three former legendary but now down on their luck Musketeers must unite and defeat a beautiful double agent and her villainous employer from seizing the French throne and engulfing Europe in war.”

A little more comprehensive plot summary would be along these lines. A young man from Gascon, D’Artagnan, goes to Paris to seek his fame and fortune. Continue reading “The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas”

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The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux

Phantom_of_the_Opera_1009I reread this novel recently after having seen the play. Part of my interest in seeing the play was to see how they adapted the novel to the stage. The relationship between Christine Daaé and the Phantom is portrayed in the popular perception as a beauty and the beast romance. My reading of the novel did not leave me with that feeling.

The plot is this. The two current managers of the Paris Opera House are tired of being blackmailed by the Opera Ghost aka the Phantom of the Opera aka Eric. They pass the reins onto two new managers, Armand Moncharmin and Firmin Richard. The Opera Ghost continues his blackmailing ways, but the two new managers initially think it is a practical joke either on the part of the exiting managers or their other co-manager. There are a series of incidences and disasters that change their minds.

There is the Opera Ghost who is obsessed with Christine. He becomes her musical tutor in a cryptic manner, but Christine thinks he is the Angel of Music sent from heaven Continue reading “The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux”

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Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

Miserables_Vol1_1201As good as the play is it is but a hearty soup when compared to the book. Of course, at 1100 pages, some folks may consider the book a gluttonous meal. For this reader, in those 1100 pages, I found very few times that the book dragged.

The book is many things besides the story of Jean Valjean and company. At its heart it is a religious work. At the beginning of the 7th book of volume II, Hugo pens:

“This book is a drama, whose leading personage is the Infinite. Man is the second.”

With the story as the driver, Hugo interweaves history, philosophy, sociology, politics, religion and accounts of contemporary social norms and practices. Ultimately, it is a book about morality and self-sacrifice.

This is a story we all know well from the play and from the movies.

Jean Valjean is sentenced to the galleys, Continue reading “Les Misérables by Victor Hugo”

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I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

cage bird“The fact that the adult American Negro female emerges a formidable character is often met with amazement, distaste and even belligerence. It is seldom accepted as an inevitable outcome of the struggle won by survivors and deserves respect if not enthusiastic acceptance.”

This book is about several things. It is the autobiography of Maya Angelou’s first 16 years of life. It is also the story of strong black women as evidenced by the quote above which is towards the end of the book. It is about the black experience growing up in a racially divided world. It is about folks making it the best they can under those conditions. And under all this is the story of surviving sexual abuse.

The first strong woman we encounter is Momma, her father’s mother who lives in Stamps, Arkansas. Stamps is in the southwest corner of Arkansas, a poor region in one of the poorest states in the Union. Momma ran “the only Negro general merchandise store since the turn of the century” in that part of Arkansas. And Momma did reasonable well for herself.   She is in a financial position where she has white renters, and at times loaned money to white people. She is also old school religious. After her son and Maya’s mother split the blanket, Maya and her brother are unceremoniously placed with their grandmother. Continue reading “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou”

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Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

around_the_world_vers3This book was published in 1872. Transpacific and transatlantic steamships had come into to being, but many still used paddle wheels and supplemented steam power with wind power. The Transcontinental Railroad, a 6 year project, had just been completed in the United States in 1869. What had been a many months journey from coast to coast of the United States had been transformed into a journey of a week. The concept of being able to go around the world quickly was just being realized. Verne took this new excitement and created the novel we know as Around the World in 80 Days.

Like many of Verne’s novels the bench of characters is not deep. Nor is there a great deal of character development. They remain throughout the book relatively unchanged.

The protagonist, if you will, of this book is Phileas Fogg, a wealthy man whose wealth was acquired by means unknown. To call this man regular of habit and punctual is to call the sky blue. Continue reading “Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne”

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20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne

20000_Leagues_Under_Seas_1110This book was not quite what I expected. What little I knew about this story was from seeing bits and pieces of the various movies based on this book. The movies emphasize the adventure aspect of book. Perhaps the best way to describe the book would a travelogue for 20,000 leagues most of which was under the sea.

Towards the end of the book Professor Aronnax is reviewing his time aboard the Nautilus. He does so in a short paragraph:

“My nerves were somewhat calmer, but in my excited brain I saw over again all my existence on board the Nautilus; every incident, either happy or unfortunate, which had happened since my disappearance from the Abraham Lincoln—the submarine hunt, the Torres Straits, the savages of Papua, the running ashore, the coral cemetery, the passage of Suez, the Island of Santorin, the Cretan diver, Vigo Bay, Atlantis, the iceberg, the South Pole, the imprisonment in the ice, the fight among the poulps, the storm in the Gulf Stream, the Avenger, and the horrible scene of the vessel sunk with all her crew. All these events passed before my eyes like scenes in a drama.

It is these events that Hollywood has sucked out of the book to make movies. Continue reading “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne”

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An Antarctic Mystery, or The Sphinx of the Ice Fields by Jules Verne

an_antarctic_mystery_coverI supposed there are a few ways to look at this novel. Perhaps Jules Verne was riffing on Edgar Allan Poe. Perhaps, given Poe’s sense of the macabre, Verne was collaborating with a departed Poe. Or perhaps, like me, Verne found the ending of Poe’s book was less than satisfying, and he decided to do something about it. The book I am referring to is Edgar Allan Poe’s The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket

In Poe’s book, after a series of adventures two of the main characters are adrift in the Antarctic Ocean in a small boat. Poe envisioned an Antarctic that was warmer than the reality we know to be true. This Antarctic may have been heated by thermal action. The novel ends with the two of them in a mist or fog when suddenly a huge human like figure appears as the boat rushes towards some rapids. The explanation given by the author Continue reading “An Antarctic Mystery, or The Sphinx of the Ice Fields by Jules Verne”

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The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Hunchback_of_Notre_Dame_1004This is a book that I believe most folks are aware of and probably have some inkling of the story. I would also hazard a guess it is a book that most folks have not read and the story is not really what they think.

I was interested in movies that may have been made based on The Hunchback of Notre Dame. There are several. The list is not complete.

  1. From 1923 starring Lon Chaney, Patsy Ruth Miller, Norman Kerry, Nigel de Brulier, Brandon Hurst and others
  2. From 1939 starring Charles Laughton, Maureen O’Hara, Cedric Hardwicke, Thomas Mitchell, Edmond O’Brien and others
  3. From 1956 starring Gina Lollobrigida, Anthony Quinn, Jean Danet, Alain Cuny, Robert Hirsch and others
  4. From 1976 made for TV movie starring Kenneth Haigh, Michelle Newell, Warren Clarke and others
  5. An animated Walt Disney version from 1996
  6. From 1997 made for TV version that can be found on YouTube starring Mandy Patinkin, Richard Harris, Salma Hayek and others

The one that surprises me the most is the Disney film. I have not seen it, but I cannot imagine Continue reading “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”

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The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe

Narrative_Arthur_Gordon_Pym_1108Edgar Allan Poe is best known for his short stories and poetry, particularly the poem The Raven. In researching Poe I discovered that he is known as the founder of the detective fiction genre and credited with reinventing science fiction. During his lifetime he was best known as a literary critic. In reading the Wikipedia article I had another myth burst. I was always under the impression that Poe was a drug addict and died from such a life style. Poe had his issues, alcoholism may have been one of them, but many of the negative qualities associated with Poe are the result of a smear campaign by an enemy of his, Rufus Wilmot Griswold and a public all too willing to be titillated. However, Poe did die in mysterious circumstances and his death has been attributed to a cornucopia of etiologies.

The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket is Poe’s only novel, although not a long one. It is a book in 3 distinct parts.

The first part is the classic sea adventure story. A young man is desirous of going to sea for the adventures he believes he will encounter. His parents and grandfather are adamantly opposed to his plan. Continue reading “The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Edgar Allan Poe”

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The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy

death_ivanilyitch_1104I cannot quite identify what draws me to Russian literature of the late 1800s, but it speaks to me. I’ve read many of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s books and several Leo Tolstoy’s.   I came across this little gem while perusing a list recommended literature.

It is in many ways a classic Russian work. Our protagonist is a judge who worked his way up by first going to the provinces and by a bit of luck too. He is a talented judge and unusual for these type of tales, an honest judge. He married as it seemed the thing to do, and that it was expected of people in his profession and social situation.   His marriage is not a happy one, but does produce several children. As in many Russian novels, there are money difficulties. It does not seem to matter what he makes, the family’s wants expand to the income and a little more. As his marriage deteriorates and other difficulties crowd in, he buries himself in his work. All of this is not an uncommon tale.

What I admire about Tolstoy is his ability to zero on the absurdities of human life. Continue reading “The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy”