A Round of Applause for David Tennant

First off: this post has nothing to do with books (although I will mention a library later, see above). I'm bending the rules a bit for the sheer pleasure of writing about something I really enjoy: Doctor Who.

A little background, since I'm well aware that Doctor Who appears to be just about the geekiest thing out there, being not just a sci-fi show, but a cult sci-fi show. The Doctor is a Time Lord, who travels through time and space with a companion, has lots of adventures, and battles loads of dread beasties. He is also able to regenerate when he is dying, which is a convenient way to let a series of actors play the role. Doctor Who has been on since the 1960s, but the modern era began in 2005, when Christopher Eccleston took on the role of The Doctor*. Eccleston played The Doctor for one year, then David Tennant took over.

Tennant, who plays the 10th incarnation of the Doctor, is ending his run on Saturday. Doctor Who can be an uneven show, I'll admit**, but Tennant has been pretty uniformly brilliant, and I'm going to miss his Doctor terribly. So, as a bit of a salute to him, I'm going to do a spoiler-free rundown of my top five favorite episodes, in chronological order. So, without further ado:

The Christmas Invasion (Season 2): Tennant's first episode proper, and he spends almost the entire time in his jammies while London is under attack.

Why? In this episode, The Doctor is figuring out what sort of man (well, Time Lord, I suppose) he is. It turns out he's brave, righteously angry, manic, funny, and, to a point, merciful. In short, he's (to borrow Eccleston's favorite word) fantastic.

Human Nature/Family of Blood (Season 3): The Doctor and Martha are at an English boys' school in 1913 in this two-parter which slowly unfolds into one of the show's most heartbreaking stories.

Why? I just rewatched these two episodes (yes, I'm cheating a bit) last night, and they're every bit as great as I remembered. It also reminded me that you really want to know as little as possible about these episodes before watching. So why are they great? The end. And Baines's fairly terrifying scarecrow demonstration. Oblique enough?

Blink (Season 3): Resourceful Sally Sparrow (Carey Mulligan) must solve the mystery of her friend's disappearance by piecing together clues The Doctor has left for her.

Why? Definitely one of the scariest episodes - you'll never look at statues the same way. Plus, Carey Mulligan is the Next Big Thing, and you can say you knew her when.

Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead (Season 4): The Doctor and Donna (my favorite of the companions!) stumble upon a mysteriously deserted library, and discover the secret that lies in the shadows.

Why? "Hey...who turned out the lights?" is about the scariest thing I've ever heard. Also, I love the relationship between The Doctor and River Song (played by Alex Kingston, pictured above).

Midnight (Season 4): The Doctor hops on a bus tour that quickly takes an alarming turn.

Why? [Edited months later because I just rewatched this episode and I'm able to offer some more specific thoughts.] Knock knock. This one is so simple in its essentials that it could be an episode of The Twilight Zone. The monster is very effective - chilling, really - and Tennant gives a very vulnerable performance.

Honorable Mentions: The Girl in the Fireplace (Season 2), Army of Ghosts/Doomsday (Season 2), The Runaway Bride (Season 3), Utopia/The Sound of Drums/Last of the Time Lords (Season 3), and pretty much all of Season 4 (minus The Doctor's Daughter, which I didn't care for) and the subsequent specials.

All that writing, and I didn't even tell you how every season finale is somehow devastating, or how John Simm rocks my socks off as The Master (that platinum dye job!). Anyway, next season Matt Smith will take over the role of The Doctor (though odds are he will actually show up in Saturday night's finale, The End of Time: Part Two). Fingers crossed that he's as good as his predecessor, who is going to be a tough act to follow. Tennant is filming an American pilot, Rex is Not Your Lawyer, and I'm optimistic that it makes it to air (though I wish he could use his natural Scottish accent, as I assume he will not).

Links for your enjoyment:

Alan Sepinwall on Doctor Wh0: Alan Sepinwall is one of the finest tv columnists out there, and it is always worthwhile to get his take.

Television Without Pity Doctor Who Recaps: Jacob's recaps are long and philosophical and frequently over my head, but really, really good.


*I'll fully admit I know next to nothing about any pre-Eccleston stories.
**Though when it's good, boy, is it good; when it's bad, it's campy - which can be fun, too.

Flannery by Brad Gooch

The first official gathering of the entering freshman class, in September 1942, was a formal tea at the Old Executive Mansion, the residence of President Wells. Once home to Confederate Governor Joseph E. Brown, as well as to General Sherman during his March to the Sea, the Palladian high Greek Revival governor's mansion, with its soaring fifty-foot rotunda and gilded dome, was located on the same block as the Cline Mansion. Mary Flannery could spy its massive rose-colored masonry walls from her bedroom window, just beyond the backyard where, according to Betty Boyd Love, she still "kept ducks." Yet her family had to force her to walk around the block to the social event. "Flannery did not want to go but was pressured into it," remembers their classmate Harriet Thorp Hendricks. "She donned the required long dress - but wore her tennis shoes." When asked why she was sitting alone in a corner, she replied, "Well, I'm anti-social."

-Flannery: A Life of Flannery O'Connor

His black hat sat on his head with a careful, placed expression and his face had a fragile look as if it might have been broken and stuck together again, or like a gun no one knows is loaded.

-Wise Blood

What can I say about Flannery O'Connor? She's one of my very favorite authors, to start. Her dark, surprisingly funny stories won my heart in college. (The line I quoted above from Wise Blood, which has stuck in my head for years, would have been enough to do the trick.) I love the Southern Gothic atmosphere, the religious fervor, the misfits. All the same, a few pages into this biography by Brad Gooch, I was unsure as to whether or not I would continue. I'm at home right now, surrounded by a bevy of unread books, and as much as I like O'Connor's stories, I wasn't sure if her life had been interesting enough to support a biography.* I decided to push through for a chapter or so, and I'm glad I did.

Going into this book, I didn't know much about the particulars of O'Connor's life. I knew she'd lived at least part of her life in Savannah (somewhere I have a photo of myself outside of her home there) and that she died young from a degenerative illness. Other than that, the picture was pretty blank.

Although her life was not packed with drama, O'Connor herself was enough of a character to keep the reader absorbed. She grew up living a charmed life in Savannah, marred only when her father was diagnosed with lupus, the same disease that would later kill both him and his daughter. Her early work was considered weird but promising, and she managed to parlay her college writing and cartooning into a place at graduate school at the University of Iowa. From there, she worked patiently and persistently, spending six years developing Wise Blood, her first novel. It was not a huge success, and critical reception was mixed. She kept going.

Even when lupus began to ravage her health, she kept going, her barbed wit always intact. I felt like Gooch rendered this all quite vividly. My picture of O'Connor is certainly much clearer than it was before I read the book. In addition, Gooch does a nice job of showing where incidents from her life were worked into her stories - I reread "Revelation" last night and enjoyed recognizing the influences that Gooch had pointed out. Plus "Revelation" is just flat-out great.

If, by chance, you haven't read any O'Connor: Wise Blood is as good a place to start as any. She didn't write that much, so you're on pretty solid footing no matter what you choose. Also she had the best titles ever, no? (Wise Blood, The Violent Bear It Away, A Good Man is Hard to Find, Everything that Rises Must Converge). Incidentally, at least two of those titles have religious origins - I was aware of the amount of religion in O'Connor's works but never, oddly enough, realized how religious she actually was (Answer: plenty religious). Gooch treats O'Connor's religious and social views pretty evenhandedly, though I think these aspects of her character are what could make her, as a person, less relatable to a modern reader. (Otherwise, I could see myself hanging out on the front porch with her, eating vanilla wafers and watching her peacocks.)

Up next: I haven't picked up anything yet, but I'm thinking American Gods by Neil Gaiman. That may change, though. Choices - exciting!

*Compare, example, with those recent biographies of John Cheever and Patricia Highsmith, both of which I want to read.

One Step Behind by Henning Mankell

Wallander stopped in his tracks on the narrow footpath. In his mind he went back to the moment when he had stood in the doorway of the living room and first witnessed the devastation. Martinsson had been right behind him. He had seen a dead man and a shotgun. But almost at once he was struck by the feeling that something wasn't quite right. Could he make out what it was? He tried again without success.

Patience, he thought. I'm tired. It's been a long night and it's not over yet.

He started walking again, wondering when he would have time to sleep and think about his diet. Then he stopped again. A question suddenly came to him.

What if I die as suddenly as Svedberg? Who will miss me? What will people say? That I was a good policeman? But who will miss me as a person? Ann-Britt? Maybe even Martinsson?

A pigeon flew by close to his head. We don't know anything about each other, he thought. What did I really think of Svedberg? Do I actually miss him? Can you miss a person you didn't know?

-One Step Behind

Poor Wallander. At the start of One Step Behind, he's battling constant fatigue; he goes to the doctor only to be diagnosed as diabetic. He's ashamed by this diagnosis, disgusted by his own bad habits. He vows to make a change, only to have his plans for healthy living derailed by his discovery of a colleague's murder. Suddenly he's heading up the investigation, fantasizing about those little clumps of sugar floating in his blood and struggling to keep moving forward despite his ever-deteriorating health and subsequent gloominess. Of course, this is Wallander - gloominess seems to suit him.

Wallander realizes that his colleague's murder is tied to the disappearance of three young people, and from there things get complex. Mankell invents quite the intricate tale of murder and mayhem, and I enjoyed seeing Wallander having to suss the tiniest of details as he doggedly pursues answers in a case that presents question upon question. I think this story worked even better as a book rather than in televised form, and not only for the usual reason that the book presents a more detailed story. The plot of One Step Behind hinges on an important photograph, and I think things are much more mysterious if one can't actually see this photograph - otherwise it's much easier to solve the mystery, which in turn makes Wallander & co. look a bit thick.

Although One Step Behind was less ambitious in scope than the globe-spanning adventures of The White Lioness, I enjoyed it just as much. I am quite looking forward to reading more Wallander mysteries - not too much more to say as I hesitate to spoil any more of a mystery's plot than I have to. Also, I'm on my second day of winter break and I feel a bit too scattered to write up anything properly. Apologies for the brief and less-than-elegant post.

Up next: Flannery, by Brad Gooch, a biography of one of my hands-down favorite writers, Flannery O'Connor.

When Will There Be Good News?

Louise was an urbanite, she preferred the gut-thrilling sound of an emergency siren slicing through the night to the noise of country birds at dawn. Pub brawls, rackety roadworks, mugged tourists, the badlands on a Saturday night - they all made sense, they were all part of the huge, dirty, torn social fabric. There was a war raging out there in the city and she was part of the fight, but the countryside unsettled her because she didn't know who the enemy was. She had always preferred North and South to Wuthering Heights. All that demented running around the moors, identifying yourself with the scenery, not a good role model for a woman.

-When Will There Be Good News?

When was the last time you read the word "rackety," excepting the paragraph above? I'm not sure if I ever have. Such a delicious word, too - one of the many, many things on the long, long list of things I love about Kate Atkinson's writing. (The praise of North and South at the expense of Wuthering Heights also makes the list, naturally.)

When Will There Be Good News? picks up some time after the events of Atkinson's previous novel, One Good Turn, and also features former private detective Jackson Brodie and Detective Chief Inspector Louise Monroe. Like Atkinson's two prior mysteries (Case Histories was the first in which Jackson figured), When Will There Be Good News? is set in Edinburgh and told through the use of intertwining narratives: in this case, those of Jackson and Louise, as well as that of newcomer Reggie Chase. Reggie is a 16-year-old girl who could have easily slipped through the cracks. Instead, she's found work as a "mother's help" for a high-powered doctor and looks upon the doctor and her baby as a surrogate family. Perhaps that's why Reggie can't rest when the doctor vanishes and no one, not even the doctor's husband, seems to be worried. Of course, Reggie doesn't know that the doctor survived a brutal childhood tragedy that shattered her family, and that the man responsible has just been released from prison...

Reggie's hunt for the missing (...or is she?) doctor leads her to Louise, who's preoccupied with a domestic violence case as well as her misgivings about her own marriage; Reggie finds Jackson after a horrific train crash*. Atkinson manages to weave all of the stories together quite expertly. It's just a brilliantly constructed book, and I'm awed by the way Atkinson created three characters so well realized and orchestrated their interactions so beautifully. Jackson, Louise, and Reggie are all extremely tough - they'd have to be, to deal with the events of this book as well as to survive what we know of their lives before this point. They also seem so vulnerable, though, because Atkinson allows us to know them so intimately. It's very impressive. I basically want to be her when I grow up.

Also, I just love love love Reggie Chase, in case that wasn't clear. She's a wonderful heroine, scrappy and tenacious, and I was in her corner from the get-go. That reminds me: I need to see an adaptation of this on PBS's Mystery!, like, yesterday. They can start with Case Histories, but I think this is actually my favorite of the series so far - that's pretty exciting, when you think about it.

Up next: One Step Behind by Henning Mankell. It's part of the Wallander series, which I do not seem to be reading in any particular order (this book is set several years after the last one I read, but there were several in between). I actually did see an adaptation of this on Mystery!, but I seem to have done a good enough job of forgetting the particulars so as to be quite puzzled by the case - which is good, I guess, for entertainment purposes, though it doesn't speak too well of my memory.

*I find it strange how patterns can crop up in books one reads. For example, this is the second book I've read recently to deal with the aftermath of a train crash (Drood also had one). When I read American Wife and Admission back to back, I noticed that both mentioned the Princeton P-rade, something I had been entirely ignorant of before. Funny.

Dead to the World by Charlaine Harris

The vampires have a public face and a public explanation for their condition - they claim an allergy to sunlight and garlic causes severe metabolic changes - but I've seen the other side of the vampire world. My eyes now see a lot of things most human beings don't ever see. Ask me if this knowledge has made me happy.

No.

-Dead to the World

So feels Sookie Stackhouse, our heroine and telepathic waitress extraordinaire. At the beginning of Dead to the World, Sookie is on the outs with former boyfriend Vampire Bill (again), thanks to his behavior in the previous book. Coming home from work late one night, she is astonished to see a nude man running along the side of the road. She is even more astonished to discover that it's Eric, the vampire sheriff (!) of her part of Louisiana. She quickly ascertains that Eric has lost his memory, rendering the vampire best known for his power almost helpless. What sort of mischief is afoot? Why, it's the work of witches, of course! Sookie takes Eric in, and then must help the vampires and werewolves who have banded together in an attempt to fight off the evil, power-hungry coven. All this, and Sookie's roguish brother Jason has gone missing....

The addition of witchcraft to the mix once again widens the universe of Sookie Stackhouse. It's not quite as fun as the werewolf storyline from Club Dead, but there is certainly potential. Just to clarify, by the way, not all of the witches involved in the goings on of Dead to the World are evil. Only the V-addicted, were-vampires. Naturally.

I actually don't have a ton to say, I'm realizing. This book is very much in line with the previous books I've read in the Sookie Stackhouse series, and it hits all of the points that have made the previous books entertaining: Sookie's spunk, supernatural hijinks (as well as some mayhem), Southern Gothic atmosphere, and sexy vampires. I mean, it's a pretty good combination. It was rather contrived to have an amnesiac Eric shacking up with Sookie, of course, but it doesn't mean the results weren't enjoyable.

Up next: When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson - I've been waiting for this one for awhile, so I'm quite ready to start reading (After Glee, of course. Or perhaps during the commercial breaks.)

Drood by Dan Simmons

In this manuscript (which, I have explained - for legal reasons as well as for reasons of honour - I intend to seal away from all eyes after his death and my own), I shall answer the question which perhaps no one else alive in our time knew to ask - "Did the famous and loveable and honourable Charles Dickens plot to murder an innocent person and dissolve away his flesh in a pit of caustic lime and secretly inter what was left of him, mere bones and skull, in the crypt of an ancient cathedral that was an important part of Dickens's own childhood? And did Dickens then scheme to scatter the poor victim's spectacles, rings, stickpins, shirt studs, and pocket watch in the River Thames? And if so, or even if Dickens only dreamed he did these things, what part did a very real phantom named Drood have in the onset of such madness?"

-Drood

When I read the excerpt above, which is in the first few pages of Drood, I was left gaping - then smiling. A novel in which Charles Dickens is a potential murderer? Certainly a promising premise for a Dickens fan such as myself. The manuscript that is mentioned, which forms the substance of the novel Drood, is framed as the work of real-life author Wilkie Collins, a contemporary of Dickens. In his day, magazines containing serialized versions of Collins's books, such as The Moonstone*, actually outsold issues that featured Dickens, although it is my impression that Dickens was both more critically acclaimed and more popularly beloved. Collins, though, could tell a ripping good tale.

In Drood, Collins is not doing so well. In terms of his stories, yes, he's on the top of his game. But he's consuming more and more laudanum to deal with bouts of rheumatic gout, and his domestic situation is growing ever more fraught with tension. Plus, there's the pesky side-effect of all that laudanum: paranoid delusions (or are they?), such as his doppelgänger (whom he calls the Other Wilkie), which make him a decidedly unreliable narrator.

Collins is also increasingly unhappy with his relationship with the man who is publicly considered to be his mentor, Dickens. I'm surprised that I was almost all the way through the novel before I thought to compare their relationship to that of Salieri and Mozart in Amadeus, a film I love. Like Mozart, Dickens basks in praise while his fellow artist (Salieri/Collins) stews, becoming increasingly agitated by his perceived lack of respect. It does make me a bit uncomfortable to see a real person portrayed in this way - in Amadeus, Salieri is painted as a would-be murderer, which is unsubstantiated by history; similarly, Collins...well, I won't give that away, but needless to say, if this is how Wilkie Collins ends up being remembered, it's far from flattering (to put it mildly). All the same, I was actually quite sympathetic to Collins, despite some of his more egregious behavior (and it is pretty egregious) and his attacks on Bleak House (the nerve!).

One probably could have written a novel about Collins and Dickens that didn't involve the supernatural, but Dan Simmons invented the monster called Drood. I hesitate to say too much about the devilish Drood, because a novel of suspense is naturally weakened by an early revelation of too many details. I will say that Drood involves mesmerism, a creepy section of London known as Undertown, an enormous detective named Hibbert Hatchery**, and scarab beetles. My God, the scarab beetles. There was a certain point when I realized that my internal monologue while reading some scenes was along the lines of Ohmygodohmygodohmygod. One of the opening scenes in particular, which describes the aftermath of a train disaster Dickens survived at Staplehurst, is incredibly vivid and intense. Simmons certainly does know how to ratchet up the tension - if I hadn't been simultaneously working on NaNoWriMo, I certainly would have been flipping Drood's pages far more quickly.

There is the matter of length, by the way: Drood is nearly 800 pages long. I must say, I can't imagine keeping a novel of such length and complexity together, not to mention actually pulling off a satisfactory ending, as I think Simmons did. I also admire the way that things were resolved with sufficient ambiguity, which leaves one with a fair amount to mull over after finishing the story (although there's at least one bit I wish were a little tidier). There was a certain point, though, about 200 pages from the end of the book, when I rather wished I was done with it. Not that I wanted to put it down, just that I would have been satisfied had the novel reached a conclusion by that point. That having been said, this feeling may have been influenced by the dream team of books that I have acquired recently***, which are just calling out to be read.

Speaking of...Up next: It was difficult to decide, but I went with the 4th Sookie Stackhouse, which has quite the juicy premise - Eric has amnesia! You've gotta love it - or, actually, I suppose you don't have to, but I for one appreciate a good amnesiac vampire yarn.

*Unlike many people, I suspect, I actually have read The Moonstone. Sadly, I really don't remember any of it. (Sorry, Wilkie!)

**One does imagine that Dickens would be proud of that one - it actually is a spin on his own Dick Datchery from The Mystery of Edwin Drood.

***The 4th Sookie Stackhouse, a Wallander mystery, and the latest Jackson Brodie novel from Kate Atkinson. Terrifically exciting lineup for me.

From NPR: Neil Gaiman Asks: Heard Any Good Books Lately?

First off: I wrote 50,000 words in 30 days. How 'bout them apples?

Due to this semi-crazed November pastime and Thanksgiving, however, I've been pretty remiss about posting. I am about midway through Drood, which I adore, and presumably will be reading faster with my new-found spare time.

I didn't want to wait any longer to post, though, so luckily my mom came through with this link:

Neil Gaiman Asks: Heard Any Good Books Lately? (from NPR)

It's a story by Gaiman about audiobooks, including an interview audiobook reader extraordinaire David Sedaris. Speaking as an owner of the David Sedaris audio box set, I say: nifty. Also, just for the record, Gaiman wrote one of my absolute favorite books of last year, The Graveyard Book. I'm not sure if I've mentioned it before, but it's brilliant. When it was awarded the Newbery Medal, I was all kinds of psyched.

So, there you go. Now back to Drood!