Ransom Riggs "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children"

Ransom Riggs Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (2011)Are you tired of vampires and werewolves?
Do you also love the “odd little book”?
If you love Lemony Snickett or John Connolly or Adam Gopnick (teen fiction series) this is book is definitely for you. It is quirky fantasy/adventure story combined with unique photography, which made the book utterly fascinating, charming and intriguing, especially for a debut novel. The complex/detailed vintage photographs added an unusual level of immersion with the story, with the reader visualising what Jacob is experiencing. The descriptive writing is so evocative that the unusual photographs interspersed numerously throughout the text, while not crucial to the story, certainly provide an additional element of realism (and surrealism!). Especially knowing that they are actual photos. Wouldn’t you love to make up your own story with these? (NB However, they are difficult to read/view on the Kindle.) The detailed prose creates a rich and magical otherworld of peculiar children and monsters that precariously co-exists with our human world which is all too realistically at war.

In the novel, Jacob Portman is an average, seemingly normal teenager, wanting an adventurous life, as described by his colourful, larger than life grandfather throughout his childhood. Jacob is not popular or overly smart and has one best (and only) friend. But with his grandfather death and the horrific monster that plagues his nightmares, Jacob’s world crashes around him. Then on his 16th birthday a book from his grandfather sets him on a voyage of discovery to an orphanage on a small isolated island in Wales. Once there, Jacob understands more than he ever could have believed about his grandfather and himself. His world is now separated into “Before and After”. He stumbles into time loops and uncovers his peculiar talent that transforms his previous reality. Jacob's dark adventure turns from creepy to scary, then to a poignant coming of age. It also foreshadows a sequel!


“My grandfather was the only member of his family to escape Poland before the Second World War broke out. He was twelve years old when his parents sent him into the arms of strangers, putting their youngest son on a train to Britain with nothing more than a suitcase and the clothes on his back. It was a one-way ticket. He never saw his mother or father again, or his older brothers, his cousins, his aunts and uncles. Each one would be dead before his sixteenth birthday, killed by the monsters he had so narrowly escaped. But these weren’t the kind of monsters that had tentacles and rotting skin, the kind a seven year old might be able to wrap his mind around – they were monsters with human faces, in crisp uniforms, marching in lockstep, so banal you don’t recognize them for what they are until it’s too late.”

"The trees parted like a curtain and suddenly there it was, cloaked in fog, looming atop a weed-choked hill. The house. I understood at once why the boys had refused to come.
"My grandfather had described it a hundred times, but in his stories, the house was always a bright, happy place---big and rambling, yes but full of light and laughter. What stood before me now was no refuge from monsters, but a monster itself, staring down from its perch with vacant hunger. Trees burst forth from broken windows and skins of scabrous vine gnawed at the walls like antibodies attacking a virus--as if nature itself had waged war against it---but the house seemed unkillable, resolutely upright despite the wrongness of its angles and the jagged teeth of sky visible through sections of collapsed roof.

‘I gathered up what scrawny courage I had and waded through waist-high weeds to the porch, all broken tile and rotting wood, to peek through a cracked window. All I could make out through the smeared glass were the outlines of furniture, so I knocked on the door and stood back to wait in eerie silence, tracing the shape of Miss Peregrine's letter in my pocket. I'd taken it along in case I needed to prove who I was, but as a minute ticked by, then two, it seemed less and less likely that I would need it."

“…stars, too, were time travelers. How many of those ancient points of light were the last echoes of suns now dead? How many had been born but their light not yet come this far? If all the suns but ours collapsed tonight, how many lifetimes would it take us to realize that we were alone? I had always known the sky was full of mysteries – but not until now had I realized how full of them the earth was. I came to a place where the path emerged from the woods. In one direction lay home and everything I knew, unmysterious and ordinary and safe. Except it wasn’t. Not really, Not any more. “

Dorothy L Sayers

Tomorrow, June 13th, is the birth date of one of the greatest mystery writers of all time: Dorothy L Sayers, best known perhaps for her Lord Peter Wimsey series. I will never forget reading the first novel of hers and rapidly read my way through all of them. Periodically I reread them, especially after publication of some recent biographical materials. Gaudy Night remains my favourite, although you must read them in order. Lately, Jill Paton Walsh has delightfully continued the series. (After the drought, it was fantastic to be transported back in time and place).

On the centenary of her birth in 1993, a celebration of her work was published as a collection of essays by various esteemed authors, edited by Alzina Stone Dale. I recently discovered this well hidden in the stacks of our library and highly recommend your perusal. I loved three of the essays by Amanda Cross (Carolyn G Heilbrun), Anne Perry and Sharyn McCrumb. Each brought an interesting perspective and fascinating tidbits about Sayers works, her life and her legacy in a short compact form. Most of the essayists have strong connections to DLS. I always glean something new - CK Chesterton's whimsical The Man who was Thursday was a favourite book of hers (as well as Anne Perry). I need to find the Wimsey Papers as well, to make sure I have read those!

Mysteries - Nicola Upson

Nicola Upson, An Expert Witness and Angel with Two Faces (2008, 2009).

I just discovered this series, in our Library collection. I cannot wait for the August 9th third book (Two For Sorrow - reserve your copy now, behind me! I requested purchase.) And while you are waiting, catch up on the Josephine Tey novels/mysteries so you have some great background reading. She had three pen names (she was Scottish), there are a host of interesting websites and there are a few interesting biographies as well. Did Catherine Aird's write a biography?

Upson's very credible mystery series features Josephine Tey, as an author writing her first and second novels (so far) with unfortunate murders complicating her life. The historical detail is accurate, and feels very familiar (particularly after reading the Maisie Dobbs series, although this latter is set slightly earlier). The second novel is set in Cornwall (after the debut novel in the theatre world of London). The descriptions made me feel right at home with my childhood memories. Ms Tey is developing a relationship with Scotland Yard Detective Inspector Archie Penrose, a Cornishman, whom she has known for over 20 years. Their lives have held much tragedy and they are attempting a fresh start to their friendship. Both of these are fairly typical English mysteries, well written and well paced. The polished surface of polite society has a great deal lurking beneath, especially when dealing with mystical Cornish people. Indeed, this is not for the faint of heart. But I found the stories immensely satisfactory and a good read. I hope you will also enjoy them.

Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson 1850-1894
The best loved literary figure of his time as much for his personality as for his authorship of Treasure Island, Kidnapped and Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Stevenson was born today in Edinburgh on 13 November 1850. He described his childhood in detail in his autobiographical essays and vividly recalled its emotions and pleasures in A Child's Garden of Verses (1885). Kidnapped was chosen by the Edinburgh City of Literature as their first "One City, One Book" title.

He wanted to become a writer at an early age; he compromised to study Law (instead of engineering at University of Edinburgh, as his family had been involved in building lighthouses for years). He was admitted Advocate in 1875 but never practiced. During these years he rebelled against the conventions of respectable Edinburgh society and there were bitter quarrels with his father (a devout Presbyterian) about religion.

In 1873 he met the critic Prof. Sidney Colvin who became his lifelong friend and literary mentor. With Colvin's help he began to achieve a reputation with his essays and short stories (collected in Virginibus Puerisque, (1881) and New Arabian Nights, 1882). Another close friendship was formed with poet and critic WE Henley, writing 4 unsuccessful plays (including Deacon Brodie, 1880).

The closest friend of his youth was his painter cousin RAM (Bob) Stevenson, and he spent much time with him in France. His early travels were undertaken so that he could write books about them. A Wand Voyage (1878) described a canoe journey, Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes (1879), Edinburgh: Picturesque Notes (1878; a classic account of the city whose climate he hated but which always haunted his imagination).

In the art colony of Grez (1876) he fell in love with Fanny Vandegrift Osboume, an American 10 years older than himself who was estranged from her husband. She returned to California in 1878 for divorce. In 1879 Stevenson followed, travelling cheaply by immigrant ship, then by train across America, recording his experiences in Amateur Emigrant (1895) and Across the Plans (1892). The hardships of the journey and the poverty wrecked his health and he suffered the first of the haemorrhages which plagued the rest of his life.

Stevenson and Fanny were married in May 1880, following a telegram from his father assuring them of financial support. They returned to Edinburgh. Stevenson's illness, diagnosed as tuberculosis, meant that he spent much time in bed, his life undoubtedly prolonged by Fanny's nursing. The next 7 years were spent in the vain search for health: two summer in Scotland, 2 winters in Davos, Switzerland, 18 months in the South of France, then Bournemouth for 3 years One rainy summer afternoon, Stevenson painted a map of an imaginary island to entertain his new stepson, and in a single month, he wrote his first great novel, Treasure Island(1883). He wrote it in Braemar (1882), one of the best children's stories. It's been in print for over 125 years.

He's also the author of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1885), about a scientist who invents a chemical that changes his personality from a mild-mannered gentleman to a savage criminal. Wider recognition came with this allegorical thriller on the dual nature of man, and then Kidnapped (1886) a skilful evocation of 18th century Scotland. He then produced The Black Arrow (1888), an historical potboiler for children. Stevenson made no claim to be a major poet, but Underwoods (1897) showed him to be graceful and original in both English and Scots. He developed a warm and lasting friendship with Henry James.

At the death of his father, the family traveled to America, spending the winter 1887/8 at Saranac Lake, Adirondacks. He wrote a series of essays and began his tragic novel The Master of Ballantrae (1889) set in 18P century Scotland and America. In June 1888 they chartered a yacht and sailed from San Francisco to the South Seas, describing the journeys in South Seas (1896), and The Wrecker (1892). The climate suited, he regained some health for outdoor activity so they settled in Samoa in 1890. However, Fanny had mental health issues and he overworked himself to earn money needed to maintain the estate.

Catriona (1894), the sequel to Kidnapped, was followed by work on the unfinished St Ives (1897) both set largely in Edinburgh during the Napoleonic wars. He was working at the height of his mature powers on his unfinished masterpiece Weir of Hermiston (1896), set in early 19th century Edinburgh and the Lammermuirs, its main character based on Robert MacQueen, Lord Braxfield, when he died suddenly and unexpectedly of cerebral haemorrhage on 3 December 1894.

The romantic legend created by sentimental admirers has helped obscure the recognition of Stevenson as a serious writer, and academic critics have largely ignored or patronized him. Those readers exploring beyond the popular works that made him famous will find a wealth of 'good things'.

The Works: Tusitala Edition, 3 5 vols. 1923 –4; Collected Poems, ed JA Smith, 1971.
Life. G Balfour, 1901; Voyage to Windward JC Furnas, 1952; RLS A Life Study, J. Calder, 1980.
Check out BooksfromScotland.com for additional information and titles.

Guy Fawkes

Guy Fawkes
Guy Fawkes (13 April 1570 – 31 January 1606), belonged to a group of Roman Catholic restorationists from England who planned the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. Their aim was to displace Protestant rule by blowing up the Houses of Parliament while King James VI and I and the entire Protestant court, and even most of the Catholic aristocracy and nobility were inside. The conspirators saw this as a necessary reaction to the systematic discrimination against English Catholics.
The Gunpowder Plot was led by Robert Catesby, but Fawkes was put in charge of its execution. He was arrested a few hours before the planned explosion, during a search of the cellars underneath Parliament in the early hours of 5 November prompted by the receipt of an anonymous warning letter. This search is still performed over 400 years later before the opening Parliament. The conspirators were executed.

Guy Fawkes Night (or "bonfire night"), held on 5 November in the United Kingdom and some parts of the Commonwealth, is a commemoration of the plot, during which an effigy of Fawkes is burned, often accompanied by a fireworks display. The word "guy", meaning "man" or "person", is derived from his name.

In 18th-century England, it became a tradition for children to display a grotesque effigy of Fawkes, termed a "guy", as part of the Bonfire Night celebration. As part of the tradition, they would often stand on streetcorners begging for "a penny for the guy". The "guy" would be burned on a bonfire at the end of the evening. As a consequence, "guy" came to mean a man of odd appearance. Subsequently, in American English, "guy" lost any pejorative connotation, becoming a simple reference for any man.
Antonia Fraser's 1996 book The Gunpowder Plot is excellent!
There is also some fun/excellent poetry concerning this event, a tradition that continues to today.

Ode
B McIver (2004, in progress)

Remember, remember
The 5th of November,
For Gunpowder, Treason and Plot......
Guy Fawkes, the offender,
Tried on evidence slender,
Was sent to the dungeon to rot.

His aim? To be sender
Of the message: "Surrender!
"King James and his troops will be shot!
"That Protestent bender
"Is doubtful of Gender,
"And the True King cannot be a Scot!"

But the erstwhile offender
To jailors was rendered,
And here are the orders they got:
"His body dismember
Then throw on the embers
Of a fire stoked up, burning hot."

So this 5th of November,
While in joy you remember,
By burning the effigy's bot;
The price you may render
To be "freedom's defender",
Is to burn in Hell if you're caught!

All Hallows Mas, All Hallows Eve (Hallowe'en)

Today is All Saints Day, the morning after the night before!
Halloween is one of the oldest CELTIC holidays (the festival of Samhain, original spelling Samuin, meaning end of the summer or light) in the Western European tradition. It is sometimes regarded as the "Celtic New Year". The ancient Celts believed that the border between life and death became thin on Samhain, allowing spirits, ghosts, faeries, and goblins (both good and bad) to pass through. The family's ancestors were honoured and invited home (with food and wine at the doorstep) while harmful spirits were warded off by the wearing of costumes and masks. Their purpose was to disguise oneself as a harmful spirit and thus avoid harm. In Scotland the spirits were impersonated by young men dressed in white with masked, veiled or blackened faces. Halloween is not celebrated in all countries and regions of the world.

Samhain was also a time to take stock of food supplies and slaughter livestock for winter stores. Bonfires played a large part in the festivities. Black and orange are the traditional Halloween colors and represent the darkness of night and the color of bonfires, autumn leaves, and jack-o'-lanterns. In traditional Celtic Halloween festivals, large turnips or rutabagas were hollowed out, carved with faces, and placed in windows to ward off evil spirits. In North America pumpkins are carved being available and much larger, easier to carve.

The name 'Halloween' and many of its present-day traditions have been expanded on from the British traditions with contemporary North American (USA and Canada) ingenuity. The word Halloween is first attested in the 16th century and represents a Scottish variant of the fuller All-Hallows-Even ("evening"), that is, the night before All_Saints/All Hallows Day (November 1st). Up through the early 20th century, the spelling "Hallowe'en" was frequently used, eliding the "v" and shortening the word.

American historian Ruth Edna Kelley wrote the first history in the US; The Book of Hallowe'en (1919), and references souling in the chapter Hallowe'en in America; "The taste in Hallowe'en festivities now is to study old traditions, and hold a Scotch party, using Robert Burns poem Hallowe'en as a guide; or to go a-souling as the English used."

Imagery of Halloween is derived from many sources, including national customs, works of Gothic and horror literature (such as Frankenstein or Dracula), and classic horror films (such as Frankenstein (1931 film) and The Mummy (1932 film), and local harvests (corn husks, pumpkins, scarecrows, straw, etc.)

Trick-or-treating is part of the celebration for children. Children go in costume from house to house, asking for treats (mostly candy but sometimes money, often for UNICEF, with the question, "Trick or treat?" The word "trick" refers to a (generally idle) "threat" to create mischief on the homeowners if no treat is given. The child performs some sort of trick, i.e. sings a song or tells a ghost story, to earn their treats. In some parts of Scotland children still go guising (this is normally on Guy Fawkes Night, 5 November.

Halloween costumes are traditionally modeled after monsters such as ghosts, skeletons, witches, and devils. Over time, the costume selection included popular characters from fiction, celebrities, presidents, athletes, and archetypes such as ninjas and princesses. Costuming became popular for US Halloween parties in the early 20th century, as often for adults as for children. The first mass-produced Halloween costumes appeared in stores in the 1930s. Ghost stories and horror films are common fixtures at Halloween parties. Halloween-themed television series and specials are commonly aired at the end of October; new horror films are often released theatrically to take advantage of the Halloween atmosphere.

Some games traditionally played at Halloween include divination. A traditional Scottish form of divining one's future spouse is to carve an apple in one long strip, then toss the peel over one's shoulder. The peel will land in the shape of the first letter of the future spouse's name (I always wondered if it was first or last name). You would also twist the core of an apple a, b c, d, e, f, etc, revealing the letter of the future spouse's name. Unmarried women sat in a darkened room, gazed into a mirror on Halloween night, hoping to see the face of their future husband. Viewing was not without risk; if they were destined to die before marriage, a skull would appear.

Halloween also coincides with the apple harvest. At one time, candy or caramel apples were commonly given to children, but the practice rapidly waned in the 1970s. One custom that persists in modern-day Ireland is the baking (or more often nowadays, the purchase) of barmbrack, a light fruitcake, into which a plain ring, a coin and other charms are placed before baking. The person who receives the ring will find their true love in the ensuing year, similar to the traditional king cake at the festival of Epiphany.

Deanna Raybourn

There is a Silent Series (on the Moor, in the Sanctuary, etc) that I have found charming. Another stand alone book was an easy summer read. I adored the bookstore sign that said "vampire free zone", and am mostly avoiding those tales. THIS last book though was delightful - historical mystery from Edinburgh to Transylvania, an unexpected romance with period descriptions. Will have to comment more! Devoured it in 2 hours.