Books Read in March 2014
In March 2014 I flew home to Nova Scotia for a much needed break, leaving my late mother’s house in complete disarray.
I didn’t get very many books read this month, because I had three months of magazines waiting for me. I don’t know about you, but I read magazines like a book: from cover to cover. There were 23 of them: Chatelaine, Canadian Living, Style at Home, Real Simple, Martha Stewart Living, House Beautiful, Saltscapes, Rural Delivery . . . It took half the month.
I decided I subscribed to too many magazines and now get only Rural Delivery and Saltscapes, both Atlantic Canadian magazines.
1. PAINTED GIRLS by Cathy Marie Buchanan (Fiction, Historical) 
This is the story of sisters Antoinette and Marie van Goethem, who live with their widowed, absinthe addicted mother and younger sister, Charlotte, in Paris in 1878.
The only way out of their dire situation is if Marie makes it into the Paris Opera (her older sister Antoinette tried, but didn’t have the talent) as a ballet dancer. While at the dance school at the opera house, Marie comes to the attention of French Impressionist Edgar Degas. Subsequently, she serves as the model (clothed, and naked) for the artist’s famous statue, Little Dancer Aged Fourteen.
This was an eyeopener for me as I had always associated ballet school with the well-to-do. This was not so in nineteenth-century France. 4 stars
2. TEA BY THE NURSERY FIRE by Noel Streatfield (Non-fiction, Historical) 
Doesn’t that title evoke a cozy picture? Indeed, subtitled A Children’s Nanny at the Turn of the Century, this is a charming little book.
From Amazon: “Emily Huckwell spent almost her entire life working for one family. Born in a tiny Sussex village in the 1870s, she went into domestic service in the Burton household before she was twelve, earning £5 a year. She began as a nursery maid, progressing to under nurse and then head nanny, looking after two generations of children. One of the children in her care was the father of Noel Streatfeild, one of the best-loved children’s writers of the 20th century. Basing her story on fact and family legend, Noel Streatfeild here tells Emily’s story, and with her characteristic warmth and intimacy creates a fascinating portrait of Victorian and Edwardian life above and below stairs.” 3½ stars
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Since there’s a total of only five books this month, I’m including the mysteries in this post.
1. THE TALK SHOW MURDERS by Steve Allen (Fiction, Mystery)
I found this book in mother’s attic and decided to give it a go.
I remember seeing Steve Allen on game shows in the 1970 and liking him, even as a teenager. He seemed to be to be a ‘gentleman’ and he seemed madly in love with his wife Jayne Meadows.
Now I learn that he was a ‘renaissance man’ of sorts. He not only wrote a series of murder mysteries centred on television shows, but he was a composer (This Could Be the Start of Something Big and hundreds of others) and the first host of The Tonight Show, where (Wikipedia informs me) “he was instrumental in innovating the concept of the television talk show.” Who knew?
In the book, Toni Tenille is hosting the television talk show where a guest is murdered on national TV and no one knows who did it.
This book is clever and certainly kept me entertained while I was reading it. If I had more of the series, I’d read them. 3½ stars
2. CHARLES JESSOLD, CONSIDERED AS A MURDERER by Wesley Stace (Fiction, Mystery, Historical)
From Amazon: “On the eve of his revolutionary new opera’s premiere, Charles Jessold murders his wife and her lover, and then commits suicide in a scenario that strangely echoes the plot of his opera—which (gentleman critic Leslie) Shepherd has helped to write.
Shepherd first shares his police testimony, then recalls his relationship with Jessold in his role as critic, biographer, and friend. And with each retelling of the story, significant new details cast light on the identity of the real victim in Jessold’s tragedy.”
This was one of The Wall Street Journal’s best fiction books of 2011, but it didn’t blow me away. The ending is phenomenal but the rest of the books is slower than molasses in January (and for all you young, hip city-dwellers: that’s pretty darn slow).
3½ stars
3. COLD COMFORT by Charles Todd (Fiction, Mystery, Historical) 
An Inspector Ian Rutledge e-novella set in France in 1915. I suppose the Todds are thinking of mysteries for their character that are set during the war rather than after it, and the only way to write it is in flashbacks.
But my comments for myself when I was finished this were “What was the point of this?” Although I want very much to like the Ian Rutledge books, I was not impressed with this entry. 2 stars
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Of everything I read this month, I think I enjoyed my Saltscapes magazines the most. {sigh} Ever have reading months like that?
P.S. The links are affiliate links so I will receive a small percentage of any purchase you make after clicking through from this blog.
I always have a book or three going, so I’m never without a good month of reading. I read the magazines cover to cover, too, and there used to be a lot of them. Subscribing is a hard habit to break!
I usually have at least a physical book and an ebook going, and sometimes an audio. That whole time was odd though, Jane.
You’re right: subscribing is a hard habit to break. But seeing that three months’ worth stacked up snapped something in me. I think I’m glad it did 😉
Do you mean that you don’t usually include your mysteries in your monthly write-ups? They must add significantly to your counts though, no? (But I can see where the writeups are not only time-consuming, but difficult with mysteries in series when you are trying to avoid spoilers, as pretty much everything past the first volume could be a spoiler!) Mostly I read magazines that way as well, but I don’t remember to include them in my log. I should adopt your habit!
You’re right, Marcie, the mysteries do add significantly to my counts, and I often review them in a separate post; that is, I do two posts each month – one for mysteries and one for the other books.
I had never thought of the fact that reviewing subsequent entries in a series could provide spoilers! I must be very careful in future not to do that.!
I too have stopped taking magazines. I don’t know if it is a good thing but I only read on-line mags now.
Last night at my reading group we were choosing our next two books and Cathy Marie Buchanan’s The Day the Falls Stood Still was on the list. Have you read that one? I wanted to read it but it didn’t make the vote. Painted Girls sounds good also.
Yes, I have read The Day the Falls Stood Still, Judy – and I loved it.
You always share books I’ve never heard of – which is a good thing. Thank you! I’ve not read too much lately – still reeling from summer vacay and start of the school year. I’m almost done with The Storied Life of AJ Fikrey which a bit slow but a good literary fiction/ character novel if that’s what you like.
Sometimes I’m interested in reading about books I’ve never heard of and sometimes I don’t have the patience. I often wonder how my comments on sometimes obscure, sometimes dated, sometimes just Canadian, books are received. Thanks for your feedback, Julia!
I quite subscribing to magazines because I wasn’t getting them read.
Because I’m paying for them, I make myself read them, Kathy. Therefore, it was the time, rather than the money, that was the issue for me!
You put into words how I feel about both Charles Todd’s series. I just cannot get into them. I read such praise about them, but not for me, I guess. I love my magazines. I get one on my state, and another on my region. I get the New Yorker, and a kind of newsletter publication on old time mysteries, and another from the Friends of Gladys Taber. I gave up Martha’s mag but then subscribed again. And I’ve just re-subscribed to the Oldie. It’s expensive but hell, I am an oldie so why not?!! I mostly read them at the breakfast table, a little ritual I love.
Saltscapes covers the four Atlantic provinces, Nan, and is my favourite magazine and, it seems, the only one for which I have a current subscription.
Is it Old Time Detection from Arthur V. that you get? Me too! I just didn’t think to call it a magazine. There’s SOOOO much information in there.
Where to start! The end perhaps. Jessold may not have been great, but the cover is gorgeous. Some mysteries have the best covers (though some can be cliched too).
I have pretty much given up on magazines. They were taking me over, partly because like you I tended to read them from cover to cover. It was hard giving them up but once I did I felt both a mental and a physical load lifted! I now occasionally buy one-offs.
BTW I am in the car driving back to Sydney for the next stage of my aunt’s estate. Getting closer … But what an ordeal.
It’s amazing, Sue, the “load lift” you feel when you get rid of magazines subscriptions. I’m so glad these piled up; they opened my eyes!
I’ll be thinking of you going through your aunt’s personal possessions. It’s a strain not only physically but also emotionally – and every item you touch is a decision to be made. If it helps to know I understand . . .