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YTSL's latest post in her Webs of Significance blog is about favourite crime fiction writers.
Like her, my first brush with mystery writing was through Enid Blyton's kiddie detectives, Famous Five et al.
Unlike YTSL, I still read these books. Five Go on a Hike Together and The River of Adventure (Philip, Dinah, Jack, Luch ann and Kiki the parrot) are favourite re-reads.
My five favourite crime fiction writers, since you ask (???), are, in no particular order:
1. Josephine Tey: Inspector Alan Grant appears in a number of her novels. My favourites which feature him are The Daughter of Time and The Franchise Affair (although he isn't the "star" here).
2. Dorothy L. Sayers: Lord Peter Wimsey ... I'm not sure what to make of him, but I adore Harriet Vane, the woman he saves from the gallows and marries, much to the horror of his sister-in-law the Duchess of Denver. Wimsey has a rockin full name though: Peter Death Bredon! Death? Death!!!
3. Agatha Christie ... but only her Poirots. I detest Miss Marple.
4. Elizabeth George. Or at least, most of her Inspector Lynley series. I don't like the last two books: With No One As Witness and What Came Before He Shot Her. I hope she writes at least one more book and gives Barbara Havers a happy ending. She deserves it!
5. G. K. Chesterton for his Father Brown books.
Someone once told me that, when writing a book review, if I didn't have anything nice to say, not to say anything at all. She was, in particular, referring to reviews of books by local writers.
I have always had problems with the belief that reviewers should "go easy" on local writers. Writing a bad review, offering criticism, even of the constructive variety, is not supposed to be supportive.
I disagree. On the contrary, offering constructive criticism seems to me like a way of showing whole-hearted support.
If a reviewer writes, "I hated this book, just because ... well, I don't know. It's just terrible, just godawful, but I can't really say why", that would be unfair and uncalled for.
On the other hand, I don't see anything wrong with a reviewer offering an opinion like ... "The author has created some very interesting characters, but I wish he had spent more time developing them and less time describing the colour of the sky. His descriptive passages take up a large chunk of the book and can be distracting, as they are so long-winded they sometimes cause the reader lose the point or even the plot. It is a joy, however, to read the more action-oriented scenes. Here, the author really shines. He also writes engaging and believable dialogue."
Reviewers (and everyone, really) are entitled opinions and if they are balanced, which the above example is, I think they are entirely valid in a review.
A local writer recently got his knickers in a twist when a reviewer commented on spelling and grammatical errors in his book. Such mistakes are more a reflection of poor editing than bad writing so authors should not take it personally when they are pointed out. Just remember to get a more thorough editor next time.
Local writers should welcome constructive criticism with open arms. Local publishers don't offer much advice: The editors seldom comment on style or ask for rewrites. They are so overworked that correcting grammar and spelling is often as much as they can manage.
And for writers who self-publish, their work often goes straight from the word-processor to the printers.
Therefore, in Malaysia, reviewers may be doing the sort of things editors or even literary agents do elsewhere. These people tell the author if their book works, what's good about it and what could be improved on. Ideally, this would happen
before the book is printed, published and arranged on the bookshelves. But, really, it's not a bad thing to have happen to one's books, at any point.
It was this
post by
Roger Sutton that made me write mine. I especially like his conclusion ...
The author-reviewer relationship is unavoidably adversarial: one is judging the other. To have it otherwise means we should just all go work in publicity.
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"You bewitch me body and soul," says Mr Darcy, chest heaving.
That was the final straw.
No, I did not like the 2005 film adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, starring Keira Knightley.
The Bennetts were portrayed as a working class family. In fact, they were landed gentry, "poor" only in relation to the Bingleys and the Darcys. Mrs Bennett's anxiety over her daughter's future is to do with the fact that their father's property must be inherited by a male relative. It's a common problem of the time. Othewise, the family lives comfortably and hold a respected position in society.
Elizabeth Bennett would never traipse around her father's estate barefoot! Or kis Mr Darcy's hand, no matter how much she's bewitched his body!
People of the time were strictly bound by rules of propriety. A respectable man would never have entered a respectable woman's bed chamber. And so, Charles Bingley would never have enter Jane's bedroom, as he does when she is ill at Netherfield.
I dread to think how Hollywood will portray Austen herself. Anne Hathaway plays the author in Becoming Jane (out in August)
Over in the UK, ITV will screen new adaptations of Persuasion, Mansfield Park (starring Billie Piper!) and Northanger Abbey. The station will also be re-running their 1996 production of Emma, starring Kate Beckinsale, who, in my opinion, is much more believable than Gwyneth Paltrow was in this role. (Samantha Morton is also a better Harriett than Toni Collett. Harriet is supposed to be beeeutifool, for crying out loud! But I guess Paltrow''s contract stated that she could be the only cute one in the film.)
British television has, so far, done a tolerable job of adapting Austen novels, although, in the 1983 miniseries of Mansfield Park, Sylvestra Le Touzel played Fanny Price like she had learning difficulties.
My favourite adaptation of Pride and Prejudice is the 1980 BBC miniseries, starring Elizabeth Garvie as Lizzie and David Rintoul as Darcy.
I daresay Joe Wright's Pride and Prejudice will not be the last adaptation. I'm also pretty sure that it won't be the worst.
At very least, the fact that Austen's novels continue to be turned into movies (good and bad) means that she continues to be loved and read. Germaine Greer's article in the Guardian Unlimited talks about the secret to the novelist's staying power.
I should have curled up with Persuasion rather than sit through Knightley's performance as Lizzie. In Mr Hurst's words, it was a "damed silly way to spend an evening".
PS Apparently, Pride and Prejudice (the movie) ends differently for American audiences. In their version Mr Darcy kisses Lizzie repeatedly while murmuring "Mrs Darcy, Mrs Darcy, Mrs Darcy." I'm so glad my DVD does not end with this scene!
I spent a pleasant morning at Kinokuniya Bookstore. Well, it's always a good place to be, as any book-lover living in the Klang Valley will agree.
Drooled over several books and thought about buying them, but ended up with just one: Behind the Attic Wall (Avon Camelot Books, 315 pages) by Sylvia Cassedy. The cover is really shockingly unattractive, don't you think? Kino's children's and YA books buyer, Kit said to me: "American books have the ugliest covers."
Here's she is, in rock star/reclusive movie star mode: "Don't take my picture. I vant to be alone!"
I was at Kino to meet Sophia Ahmad, a journalist from the Bernama News
Agency. Amir and I were supposed to be interviewed about our picture
books. Our appointment was for 11, but Sophia didn't turn up til after
one: a last minute assignment sent her to Shah Alam and she couldn't
reach me on my mobile. No matter: more time to browse.
While waiting for Sophia, I had a scone and a cafe au lait. Any excuse!
Eric Forbes (our editor at MPH Publishing) was mooching about and joined us for a chat (unfortunately, I was too busy stuffing my face with the scone to snap his pic).
Eric was on his way to an appointment with one of his writers and stopped at Kino to buy Tan Tuan Eng's The Gift of Rain (Myrmidon Books, 448 pages). I don't particularly want to read a book set during the Japanese occupation, but I will read this one because I have heard many good things about Tan's writing. I am, however, looking forward to the first Malaysian novel about modern-day Malaysia and Malaysians.
Anyway, Sophia eventually turned up and we had a nice chat about children's books. She has a three-year-old girl so Amir and I suggested she get her our books: Hey, it's for a good cause!
I'm on leave for one week, starting today, and I hope to get a lot of writing done (reviews, projects, email, blog). I also hope to watch at least one DVD a night. Tonight's film will be Pride and Prejudice ... the version starring Keira Knightley. I admit that I'm watching it just so I can bitch about it later. But who knows ....
Matthew Macfadyen as Mr Darcy and Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Bennett in Joe Wright's film adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. (Austen must have cut this scene from her final draft!)
Now these are what I call classy covers: Faber and Faber's editions of Banana Yoshimoto novels.
Maybe I'm being shallow, but are the new Penguin Popular Classics covers the ugliest in the known universe or what?
To me they look like they are missing something. All that green space in the middle ... it's like the graphics went astray as the covers were going to print and so it was decided to leave them out.
I'm getting the Penguin Red Classics edition Austens for my birthday because the covers are lovely and I want to retire the Austens I have now (the muddy brown Popular Penguin Classics editions). Here is the Penguin Red Classics cover for Persuasion (my favourite Austen).
The boxset is going for just under RM90, which is pretty good for six books! The ugly new Penguins cost RM8.90 each, which is very cheap. However, I wouldn't pay RM2 for one.
The original Penguin covers are supposed to be the inspiration for the ugly new PPCs but look ...
Here's a green one ... now that's classic!
I interviewed Tunku Halim (left) on Friday and felt like a worm when he said that hardly anyone had reviewed his Children's History of Malaya.
(I interviewed him when that book was first published.)
I squeaked: "I mentioned you in my column."
OK, so it was a very, very brief mention ....
No excuses, so let's just look forward to his new book, 44 Cemetery Road, a compilation of his supernatural shorts.
For what it's worth, I still read CHM to my kids and have recommended it to a couple of home-schooling centres (where it is now used). The book makes history interesting for children. History is, of course, interesting anyway, but most textbooks have an uncanny knack of turning bloody battles, scandals and betrayals, turbulent lives, cruel dictators and courageous people into chunks of boring, lifeless facts. Quite a gift, that!
To get your kids interested in Malayan history, get them CHM.
And check out Tunku Halim's blog Write Lah! Writing for Malaysians.
44 Cemetery Road is due out in April.
In her introduction to The Little Bookroom (a collection of her own favourite short stories), Eleanor Farjeon talks about her book-filled childhood home:
"Our nurseries upstairs were full of book. Downstairs my father's study was full of them. They lined the dining room walls, and overflowed into my mother's sitting-room, and up into the bedrooms. It would have been more natural to live without clothes than without books. As unnatural not to read as not to eat."
She goes on to describe the room called the Little Bookroom: "There was no selection of order here. In dining-room, study and nursery there was choice and arrangement; but the Little Bookroom gathered itself a motley crew of strays and vagabonds, outcasts from the ordered shelves below, the overflow of parcels bought wholesale by my father in the sales-rooms. Much trash, and more treasure. Riff-raff and gentlefolk and noblemen. A lottery, a lucky dip for a child who had never been forbidden to handle anything between covers."
Farjeon was a lucky child whose parents did not restrict her reading. I too was as lucky and I believe that being given free-reign in my choice of reading material helped turn me into a voracious reader and develop my own taste in books.
And not only was I allowed to read whatever I liked (or rather, never questioned about what I was reading), I had choice and the freedom to read whenever I liked.
Not many children are as fortunate. Often they are allowed to read only parent-approved books and then only at prescribed times. Story books (or anything read purely for pleasure) also tend to take a backseat to school text books.
I daresay my parents were even more enlightened than I am now. They never practised censorship and I, sad to say, have done so (but in the past, when I was a new mother). It's something I make a conscious effort to avoid these days, but I do know how easy it is to panic and start restricting and dictating our children's reading, just because we think we know better ...
Tots to Teens, Star Mag
4th March 2007
Fed up with Grown-up Hang-ups
THE mother of a 13-year-old whom I tutor got a little upset when she discovered her daughter reading Lust, one of the books in Robin Wasserman’s Seven Deadly Sins
(Young Adult) series. I hastened to assure her that the book doesn’t
quite deliver what the cover picture or back cover blurb suggests.
Parents should realise that covers and blurbs are meant to “sell” books
and might not accurately reflect their contents. The only way to know
what a book is like is to read it. You may find that it’s not as
“shocking” as you believed. You may even find you like it.
But what if you don’t, and what if you think the
book is really as provocative/ controversial/ sexy/ violent as you
suspected all along?
Well, in my opinion, you should let your child read it anyway. You have
to because you know that if you say “no” she will want to even more and
she will find some way of reading it without you finding out.
If it makes you feel any better, you might negotiate some time to
discuss the story/language/issues after your child has finished reading
the book. Or you might like to express why you don’t approve of the
book and then ask her why she likes it.
It’s important that you don’t shoot down any of her opinions. She’s
entitled to them and if you acknowledge that, she’s more likely to
share them with you next time round.
Last week, I came across this comment from Roger Sutton, editor-in-chief of The Horn Book Magazine:
“Just because parents have the legal right to control their children’s
reading does not mean that we should encourage them to do so.”
Sutton was talking, in a blog post, about the uproar caused by Susan Patron’s Newberry Medal winner The Power of Lucky, all because the word “scrotum” appears in it!
I agree with Sutton, but, as a parent, I realise that it’s often hard
to control the urge to “protect” our children from everything. So, we
all practise censorship, whether or not we want to admit it.
When my eldest was a toddler, someone gave him a set of Peter and Jane
books and I’m ashamed to say that, in an effort to avoid exposing him
to sexual stereotypes, I stapled some of the books’ pages together.
However, I later removed the staples, deciding that exposure to and
frank discussion of the issue was better than total avoidance.
Speaking of censorship, it seems that Maurice Sendak’s In the Night Kitchen
is often “banned” by libraries in the United States. This is primarily
because Mickey, the main character in this picture book, appears
without his clothes on! I hasten to add that Mickey is a child.
I don’t know why anyone would think that a naked image of a child would
offend other children (who the book was written for), but then parents,
myself included, do tend to impose their own values onto children. (I
make a conscious effort not to, but frequently slip up.)
Well-meaning, older relatives are always crying “Shame on you!” on seeing my children running around topless.
And when Elesh was four, the little girls in his ballet class were told
that the reason he was getting dressed in full view of everyone, while
they had to do it behind a curtain was, “He’s a boy and you’re a girl
... girls must hide their bodies!” (I’m happy to say that my
little girl loves running around without a stitch on, all the while
patting her tummy lovingly and chanting, “Cantik, cantik, cantik.”)
Irked by the controversy surrounding Patron’s award-winning novel
(several libraries in the United States have pledged to ban it), Sendak
told Sutton, “This is such a putdown to those of us who spend our lives
creating art for children. It’s acutely embarrassing to adults, and
shows a complete lack of respect for children and their books,
especially when you know children’s fascination with and candour about
the body.”
Personally, I think adults are often just protecting themselves. They
want to avoid explaining what “scrotum” means. They want to avoid
having to dissuade little Ming or Musa that, unlike Mickey, they can
not take a milk bath or prance around naked. For children, it’s all
just about exploring fascinating new worlds and new words ... and being
comfortable in their own skin.
Tots to Teens, Star Mag
18th Feb 2007
I HAD the thrill, last Saturday, of attending the launch of my picture books. Now, before I go on, let me just say that I’ve been ribbed endlessly by friends and family about my “shameless self-promotion”. What can I say? Who else is going to blow my trumpet, right?
Anyway, back to the launch. It was fun. It was also nerve wrecking. I imagined no one turning up: How embarrassing! And then I imagined throngs of people: How even more embarrassing!
About 10 people showed in the end. Most of them were friends and family, and there was a girl who said she read this column, and a little boy who just smiled and took lots and lots of pictures….
esAnyway, thanks to my publisher, distributor and the bookstore for organising the launch. It’s cool to see more events being organised by MPH Bookstores. Today I went for the “press tour” of the latest store at Bangsar Village II in Kuala Lumpur.
Two interesting groups are being launched at this store this month. One is the Breakfast Club for Litbloggers, where bloggers who write about books can network; and Kidz Read! a reading group for children.
The Breakfast Club will meet on the first Saturday of every month from 11am to 1pm. Author Ooi Yang-May (The Flame Tree, Mindgame) will attend the first session on Feb 24.
Kidz Read! will be held on the last Sunday of each month. Each meeting will focus on two to four books, linked in some way, for example by theme, author or subject.
The books that will discussed at the first meeting on Feb 25 are Kate DiCamillo’s The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane; The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams; The Mouse and His Child by Russell Hoban; and Frances Hodgson-Burnett’s The Racketty-Packetty House.
At each session, children will explore themes and discuss questions and issues raised in the featured books. They will also be encouraged to talk about how they feel about the books, why they like or dislike them; and to even recommend similar books to each other.
By the way, I’m the facilitator for this group and I decided that there should be more than one book for each session so that children at different reading levels can join the discussion.
So, you don’t have to read every single book on the list ... unless you want to, of course! If there’s a book you (or your child) would like discussed at Kidz Read! do write and tell me about it.
I’d also love to hear from readers about books that they love. A couple of weeks ago I received an e-mail, from 17-year-old Justine Lee, raving about Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson. Justine says it’s “a beautiful story ... in a depressing kinda way ... full of wit and sarcasm”.
“I think this book will appeal to a lot of people, especially young adults,” she says. “I hope you can highlight the book in your column.”
Done!
Happy reading and Happy Chinese New Year!
I just got myself some new books with my office annual book allowance.
I would like to start reading them all at once because they look so very delicious (flipping through the pages I read snippets that make my mouth water) and I am greedy.
I got:
The Book That Changed My Life: Interviews with National Book Award Winners and Finalists
Edited by Diana Osen
Publisher: Modern Library Paperbacks
Sixpence House: Lost in a Town of Books
By Paul Collins
Publisher: Bloomsbury
The Child That Books Built
By Francis Sufford
Publisher: Picador
The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop
By Lewis Buzbee
Publisher: Graywolf Press
The Art of Eating
By M.F.K Fisher (My friend at the bookstore said: "Her initials are rather rude, don't you think?" I never noticed before, but yes, they are, rather!)
Publisher: Wiley
Check out the covers here.
