Read Along Check-In #1: Clarissa, or, the History of a Young Woman by Samuel Richardson

When JoAnn at Lakeside Musing and Terri at Tip of the Iceberg announced their idea for a year-long read along of Samuel Richardson’s epic Clarissa, I realized I had my chance to approach a book I knew I should read, but never had made time to read. Just looking at the book might intimidate the most voracious reader: I wouldn’t want to drop it on my toe, for fear it would break it. But somehow it seemed more likely that I’d actually finish it if I was reading it with a group, so I jumped in!

Obviously, I’ve have had a terrible blogging month for a number of reasons – but it hasn’t actually been a bad reading month. So tonight I’m sharing my thoughts on the January readings for Clarissa.

To begin, I am amazed at how “modern” the book is. Clarissa Harlowe is not, as I had feared, some Victorian milquetoast heroine. She is a young woman with a mind of her own, politic enough to realize that the unusual bequest her grandfather has left her puts her in a precarious position vis-à-vis her jealous siblings.

Lovelace is an ambiguous love interest thus far. Clarissa is not impressed by him at the beginning of the book. But there is something extremely appealing about him, especially in his distaste for Clarissa’s vile brother James. It was frightening to consider how much power a male child had over a female child within a family, even though he had no real accomplishments of his own.

I am not sure I trust Miss Howe at this point. She seems to be a very close friend of Clarissa’s, but her flowery and supercilious writing leaves me wondering about her sincerity. However I am absolutely unsure as to whether or not that is a function of the time and place that the book was written – so I’m reserving judgment for the moment. We’ll see if she is truly friend to Clarissa in the end, or if she is harboring some ulterior motives.

I am so glad that I signed on to participate in the read along, and if you haven’t yet, feel free to join us – there’s a whole year of fun to come, and you can easily catch up! It’s early in the read, but I am already enjoying this more than I expected, so I am eager to see that February’s letters bring to our heroine. The links to the January Clarissa links are at Tip of the Iceberg.

Book Review and Simul-blog: James Hamilton-Paterson's Cooking with Fernet Branca

Take a snarky British gourmand; mix with a bohemian composer of Eastern European extraction; add a self-important British pop star and an aging Italian movie director, each with delusions of grandeur; ply with a seemingly unending supply of an obscure liqueur; place on the top of an Italian mountain and watch what happens next! This recipe for disaster is the essence of James Hamilton-Paterson’s Cooking with Fernet Branca.

Cooking with Fernet Branca is the funniest thing I have read in a long time. So funny that I wound up with tears running down my face. So funny I gasped while trying to read passages aloud to explain said tears. Not to be maudlin or anything, but ever since Douglas Adams left this world far too young, I have honestly believed no novel could ever make me laugh that hard again. It was a delight to find out how very wrong I was.

Of course, the problem with humor is that it is so darn personal – why did Gerald Samper and his former-soviet nemesis Marta crack me up so? In my case, it all comes down to a subtle, sarcastic and deadpan writing style that only a few writers can deliver on. And almost all of them are British. At one point, Marta describes the take over of her home (and her neighbor’s yard) by an Italian film crew:

And all the time there came suggestive sounds from outside and glimpses through the window of poor Gerry’s fence being forcefully dealt with. There were some loud splintering noises which did not at all imply intactness. There were also some blasphemies new to me – the men were all-too-clearly native Tuscans – the gist being that the Madonna was unpopular for having yielded her virginity to a series of farmyard animals and the absent Gerry for having used a nail gun instead of an ordinary hammer. p. 182

James Hamilton-Paterson wrote Cooking with Fernet Branca with alternating narration between “Gerry” and Marta. Amazingly, both “voices” are hilarious, barreling along the path to what they believe can only be glory, Marta through her dissonant musicality and Gerald through his bizarre gustatory endeavors.

Hamilton-Paterson is obviously a great observer of contemporary culture, and he skewers a number of trends in this book – particularly fusion cooking. What else to make of recipes like Garlic and Fernet Branca Ice Cream, Mussels in Chocolate and Otter with Lobster Sauce? But it’s Gerald Samper’s self-seriousness that takes it from ludicrous to comic genius. And that’s what makes James Hamilton-Paterson such a fabulous writer.

This was my first book for the Europa Challenge, but it is already making me rethink my list. I don’t know if I can wait to read Hamilton-Paterson’s follow-up titles, Amazing Disgrace and Rancid Pansies. This book is absolutely recommended for lovers of British humor – if The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is your idea of a great time, read this book!

I am simul-blogging today! Both Jess at Desperado Penguin and Colleen at Books in the City read this book with me, as part of the Europa Challenge. I can’t wait to see their take on Gerald and Marta.

Oops! Forgot to put this book into one sentence: Bitter liquor makes strange bedfellows.




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