Review: Here on Earth by Alice Hoffman

"Maybe she'll regret coming back, but right now there is nowhere on earth that could feel more familiar." In this modern re-imagining of Emily Brönte's classic Wuthering Heights, the Cathy character, March, returns home years after marrying the right man, having his child, and resisting the temptation to return to her first love, Hollis, once. Can she resist it again?
Though based off of Brönte's novel, it diverges nicely, and becomes its own story, a story of the destructive quality love has and how much choice we have in the direction our lives take. Written with immediacy, Hoffman doesn't limit herself to the characters and events of the original novel, she introduces her readers to a town full of distinctive and realistic characters. Her landscape is incredibly detailed and stories about all these characters are woven through making the audience feel like they grew up in this town, they are up on all the gossip. She also plays with setting, she uses the marshes and back woods of the town as characters themselves, much the way Brönte painted her scene with the wild moors of England. The mystical qualities of the original have also been incorporated without being copied. Small town superstition comes together with the style known as magical realism (seen in works by Gabriel García Márquez, Laura Esquivel, etc.) where things happen that aren't possible, but yet feel possible. Hoffman often plays on the sense of scent; characters are able to smell feelings like rage and desire.
Hoffman also plays with language. Certain descriptions deteriorate throughout the book, she allows vulgarity and profane colloquialism to invade situations, but that only reinforces the actions of the characters. Also, by putting the story in a modern setting I think it personalizes the main characters. Sometimes when reading a text written in an era that was over long before you were born I think people have a tendency to romanticize the characters and situations. One of my pet peeves about film adaptations of Wuthering Heights is that Cathy and Heathcliff come across as too nice. Too loving and cruelly trapped by fate that is out their hands, too justified in the way they treat people. Putting it in a context that is closer to modern readers, I think, assists in creating a more even-handed view of the characters. Some might argue that they aren't the same characters from the original novel, and that's true, but this adaptation did give me a new perspective on Cathy and Heathcliff.
Even if you weren't a fan of Wuthering Heights or have never read it, you will be able to enjoy this as an independent story that is well told. If you are a fan of the original, you'll enjoy seeing the way the characters are adapted to a modern setting, but appreciate that it doesn't chain itself to Brönte's text.

This book is book #2 for my All About the Bröntes Challenge
This is "Book with a place in the title" (Earth) for What's in a Name? Challenge

Another Jane Austen Spin-Off (Sort of)

Jane Bites Back, a new novel featuring Jane Austen as its protagonist is released December 29th. No, this is not a meditation on the possible secret love story of Austen's life or a speculation into what the letters Cassandra burned might have contained. In this story Jane is the owner of a book shop in present day Upstate New York. How is this possible? She is a vampire. Oh, yes, Jane Austen as a vampire. (Catherine Morland would have squealed with delight.) Reviews have been positive if the ones referenced on Jane Austen Today's are any indication. The premise of Jane having to endure all the ridiculous paraliterature she's inspired is rather amusing. I'm sure her "bite list" would include some very particular authors and film makers... read an excerpt at Austenprose. (Yes link button is working again.)
Also a belated reminder that the sublime Cranford started its encore on PBS this past Sunday. If you missed it visit PBS's Masterpiece site to watch the program online. January 10th sees the sequel Return to Cranford at 9 pm again starring Dame Judi Dench. My friend Eloise and I are having a viewing party to celebrate. Yes, we believe watching Masterpiece Classic constitutes a party, thank you.

Just a Rumor (Thank Goodness)

According to an article on tvsquad.com there were rumors of a mini series based off Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith's Pride and Prejudice and Zombies , but they are untrue. Everyone with me now: Collective Sigh of Relief.
However, the "living author" has said there is interest in creating a theatrical film based off the piece. The writer of the article seems dissapointed at the lack of mini series and says "I've just started reading it, Jane Austen was never this funny." Well maybe her humor is more subtle than say... Shaun of the Dead, but plenty of people would disagree with you there sir. JASNA for example?
Picture and Quotation courtesy of www.tvsquad.com.
Oh and in case you thought Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters was going to be the end of this, you were wrong. (Why oh why couldn't you have been right??) Coming December 8th: Emma and the Werewolves.
However, on the bright (?) side, Jane Austen is not the only author being ravaged by monster mash ups. Apparently there is also:
The Undead World of Oz by L. Frank Baum and Ryan C. Thomas
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Zombie Jim by Mark Twain and W. Bill Czolgosz
The War of the Worlds Plus Blood, Guts and Zombies by H.G. Wells and Eric S. Brown
Forthcoming:
Alice in Zombieland by Lewis Carroll and Nickolas Cook
Dracula vs. Zombulaby Bram Stoker and A.P. Fuchs
Persuasion ... in Space! by Jane Austen and W. Bill Czolgosz
(Information courtesy of www.dreadcentral.com)
I'm sorry, there are no words... none that can be said in polite company, anyway.
I can't feel my toes.

Review: Wiloughby's Return by Jane Odiwe

Sequels, prequels, paraliterature; we see it everywhere, especially in regard to Austen. I am often skeptical, but when I saw Jane Odiwe (author of Lydia Bennet's Story) had a new sequel to Sense and Sensibility I thought I'd give it a read. I'm glad I did.
Unlike most sequels that endow Austen's characters with alarming amounts of sex and violence, Odiwe keeps in the spirit of Austen's style. She resurrects her most charming rogue with success. At the end of S&S the secondary heroine, Marianne Dashwood, marries the much older Colonel Brandon and the dashing Wiloughby disappears with his wife, married only for the money. Many fans have often asserted that Wiloughby's not a bad guy, that they almost wish in spite of everything that he and Marianne end up together.
This novel begins three years after the close of Austen's novel. It brings up very real concerns in Marianne's marriage to the Colonel. Does he only love her because she reminds him of his long dead first love? Does he spend too much time with his ward? At the same time, Odiwe also shows how much their relationship has grown from the timid affection and gratitude Marianne originally had toward the Colonel. It has a believable conflict for Marianne to face as her husband is constantly absent and her first love waltzes back into her life.
Though the title character, Wiloughby has comparably few scenes in the book, his prescence hangs over the story, even in the subplot surrounding Margaret, Marianne's younger sister, who is falling in love for the first time herself. It was refreshing to see her character grow, she is barely a shadow in the original novel. Perhaps 'subplot' is too subdued a term for her role in this book, she dominates the story at many moments, her struggles recieving almost equal time to Marianne's.
I would have liked to see more of Elinor and how her life with the trying Ferrars clan is at this point. Her major role in this story is to present an image of an ideal marriage match for Margaret. There are some spectacular cameos by Mrs. Jennings, Lucy and Robert Ferrars, and other amusing characters from S&S.
Overall, it was a tasteful, well constructed story that paid homage to Austen's style and characters. Jane would approve.

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters; and Withdrawal

I just saw a television commercial for Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. It was a shortened version of the book trailer I saw on Austenblog a while back. For some reason every time I think about these Austen/Monster Mash-ups I can't banish the image of the creative(?) team behind this franchise with their feet up on the board room table crushing beer cans against their heads and laughing. Probably unfounded, but I can see the conversation going something like this:
1- Dude, let's do something really funny, like a parody.
2- Of what?
1- Ooh, something really boring and old that no one, like, actually reads.
2- What about that movie with Keira Knightly? Pride and Prejudice, I heard it's also a book.
Again probably unfounded, but I chuckled inside at the image. I'm sure the people behind this are very deft bussiness men, they are certainly making a lot of money, but for their Sea Monster scenerio may I suggest that Persuasion is more nautically oriented, though not as popular so I suppose it would fall down in the money part of the scheme.
Also chalk this up to the possiblity that I may actually be suffering from NaNoWriMo withdrawal of all things. I don't have any novel to come home to at night, and I finished the novel I was reading this afternoon, so I don't have that to come home to either. I'm waiting to start reading Middlemarch because two of my friends want to get in on that too, we might start our own book club blog so we can all discuss it together, I'll link it to this site. Feel free to join us if you want to climb that mountain over the winter holidays as well, or if you already have.
It's not even December yet, I have got to pull myself together, but I have always hated that feeling when I'm between books. I need a life- though this weekend I spent an evening playing Rock Band with some friends. I suck at guitar; the strumming and button pressing at the same time really gets me. I used to play a bit of piano which involved both hands, but the strumming was ridiculously hard for me to accomplish simultaniously.

30,051

Okay, didn't make 35,000 but still. Whoa. Even some of the stuff I just wrote thinking, "Whatever comes to mind, I'll put down," turns out to have significance. Some character revelations have come out of that spew. Thank you subconscious.
More great Threads from the NaNoWriMo's site:
Please injure my MC
Calling All Drunk Dialers
Morgue Visiting Hours
REALISTIC Superpowers… yeah, I know.
Forks? Weapons of Death?
Prison, hard time, all that.
I chased my character through Wal-Mart today…
Be SAD Dammit!!!!

It is quite an interesting sub-culture actually, the NaNo people. There's a whole vernacular I'm gradually learning. In one week it will be December and it will be over much to the relief of friends and family who are tired of hearing me say, "I can't, I'm writing a novel!" or, "Stop interrupting my noveling!"
I can't wait until the script challenge in April, I have so many ideas! However a lot of things are going by the wayside: laundry, dishes, academic research, my hair.
All for my art I guess.
Planning on at least a two hour marathon tomorrow.
Also, first week of December I will be reviewing Wiloughby's Return by Jane Odiwe, a new sequel to Sense and Sensibility and "A Tale of Almost Irresistable Temptation" according to the subtitle.