feather_ghyll

The last of what I read in Belgium:

Rest and Be Thankful by Helen MacInnes ( Read more... )

The Life of Elves by Muriel Barbary (translated by Alison Anderson) ( Read more... )

Or books I wanted to mention, but didn't want to write a full review about.

( Rattle His Bones by Carola Dunn; The Changeling of Monte Lucio by Violet Needhams; and The Girls of Mackland Court by May Wynne. )

Fardingales: Elinor M. Brent-Dyer, Girls Gone By 2015
(originally published 1950)

As this book is associated with Chudleigh Hold (I understand some of the characters in it will cross paths with Chudleighs), I was looking out for similarities as I read. It features a family of young people, living in a large family house, the eponymous Fardingales, by the sea, which means picnics, caves and adventure. ( Read more... )

Deborah’s Secret Quest: Cecilia Falcon The Thames Publishing Co.

This is a reread – I was uncertain as to whether I already owned this book, but the copy before me was lovely and irresistible. I didn’t really remember the story, anyhow. It has a little of the feel of a serial story brought together within covers of its very own: occasionally chapters start with an unnecessary recap and it stretches a little beyond most book length school stories in terms of genre. ( Read more... )

I hope to write about a couple of books that I read over last weekend soonish, but for now, here’s a meme via slemslempike. Abridged – I skipped a lot of questions.

( Read more... )

This is the last of the reviews of books that I read over my Easter holidays:

The Secret of Magnolia Manor: Helen Wells Grosset & Dunlap 1949.

This is part of the Vicki Barr Flight Stewardess Series – one of those career girl mystery story series that the Cherry Ames books epitomise. Vicki is ‘just out’ of her teens, loves her job, but is very pretty and attractive, makes friends wherever she goes, including male ones who pay her compliments and provide transport or back up as she solves cases, but aren’t to be taken too seriously. Being a flight stewardess means that she travels a lot (as does her later and fabulously named British equivalent Shirley Flight).

In this story, Vicki’s given the route from New Orleans, via Merida, to Guatemala City. She’s thrilled to get a chance to visit ‘Crescent City’, and we get a colourful, travel-booky feel for it, with Vicki staying at a Creole pension (the secret of the title is linked to her ‘host’ family) and meeting barefooted Cajuns, eating square-shaped donuts and visiting the bayou. (The other end of her route doesn’t get a look in.)

Magnolia Mansion used to belong to the Breaux family, but was recently sold. News of the new owner’s planned alterations make Monsieur Paul Breaux, Vicki's host, act extremely strangely. Vicki was already dubious about him for treating his niece Marie as if they were living in the eighteenth century – she may be about to turn eighteen and get engaged (to practically the first man she’s met, but he’s a nice man) but she has to ask permission to do anything and is treated in a somewhat Cinderellaish fashion. Vicki eventually deduces why, but in the meantime, a man goes missing, everyone takes a while to figure that out (and nobody except Marie seems particularly worried, and her concerns are easily calmed) or to do anything about clues that are screaming for attention. There is a fancy dress party for Vicki to attend first of all, you see. Anyhow, she manages to get her act together before no more than a couple of concussions are doled out (none to her) and all is well. Vicki even gets to rejoin her family in corn field country for a break afterwards.

I generally like the detail about nursing in Helen Wells’ Cherry Ames book, although that is usually subsumed in the mystery. Vicki isn’t quite such a memorable character, feeling like more of a representative of ‘the modern girl’ than her own person (especially in this book where she's contrasted with Marie Breaux).

I'm not quite sure what to call the subgenre that Sally Baxter and her ilk belong to (grandmother: Cherry Ames), which is part career girl story, part mystery tale. They're nearly always published by World Distributors, so they have a similar 'look', especially if the dust jacket is intact. Other examples are Vicky Barr, Shirley Flight and Sara Gay. These series feature unmarried girls, but usually from traditional families, with jobs that take them all over the world (Cherry does almost every kind of nursing she can, Sally is a reporter, Vicky and Shirley flight attendants and Sara a model). They're part-time sleuths, as they come across mysteries wherever they go and because they feature in serial stories, they need to do well at their careers for a long time, even if their attention is sometimes divided.

The heroines of straight-up career girl stories, may feature a mystery subplot, but they are much more about depicting the demands of a job for their readers. 'Kate in Advertising' by Ann Barton, Joanna in Advertising by Stella Dawson, and Marjorie Riddell's 'A Model Beginning' and 'Press Story' are some examples from my bookshelves. Somewhat unrealistically, they usually end with the heroine getting engaged and the likely outcome is that she will give up her job for marriage and motherhood. So why do I call them career girl stories? Well, they still work as an intro to the career rather than being about the romance. And I may be over-generalising there. Not all end like that.

However, the serial stories subvert this, most interestingly in the Cherry Ames series, and they're somewhat anti-romantic. The heroines are shown as attractive and likeable, and with plenty of dates on call, but they never say yes to proposals. The audience for these stories is slightly older than 'A Crime for Caroline', obviously, although, again, who am I to talk, still reading them, many years after I came across my first Cherry Ames? And that doesn't even consider the influence of Nancy Drew, although sleuthing is her hobby-career (she doesn't need the money, but she does need the challenge). But in the days when the series started, why, going to college was what boys do! (It'll be interesting to see how the new movie handles this).

Sally Baxter, like Shirley and Sara (oh, they all start with S's) is a very English character. (As is nurse Jean, who has four books and two authors to tell her tale, but she isn't published by World distributors). The book which brought this on, Sally Baxter--Girl Reporter and the Holiday Family by Sylvia Edwards, starts off when Sally gets sent on a summer stunt to improve the circulation of her paper, the Evening Cry. The paper pays for a family already visiting a seaside resort (how very British) and voted for democratically to have their dream holiday. This upgraded holiday is then covered by Sally. Of course what she ends up reporting is a series of catastrophes for the first holiday family, who turn against her and go back home until she can uncover who is behind the ir misfortunes and why. (Let us just say that the story is really of its time and leave it there.)

ETA: Related links can be found here.