Leung Resocka Resocka থেকে Perel'oty, Odessa Oblast, Ukraine
I'm a sucker for a good fractured fairy tale; I think it stems all the way back to when I was 6, and there wasn't a gifted & talented program at my school, so the administrators had me meet with the librarian (Miss Hathaway!) to read and discuss fairy tales that featured princesses. In Godmother, Lil is a former fairy who was kicked out for failing her mission to get Cinderella to her prince. Now, hundreds of years later, suffering as an elderly woman in a human body with wings that she must keep hidden, Lil has an opportunity to connect two more star-crossed lovers. Characters, from fairy sisters to Lil's bookish employer to a vivid customer are wonderfully drawn; Turgeon's descriptive style is akin to Francesca Lia Block, but a smidge less outrageous and lush. The New York setting is nearly a character in its' own right. Highly appealing for urban fantasy fans who prefer romance to epic battles.
One grows suspicious of his literariness when his opinions differ from those of the established literary community. While most will tell you that Gravity's Rainbow is Pynchon's finest work, I enjoyed M&D the most. The contemporary author shows that he's still got it, more than 20 years after winning the National Book Award with GV. The narrative is much more straightforward, though the language takes some getting used to (it becomes one of the book's strengths though, and I found myself mimicking it in less formal correspondence for years). In the 18th century, Northern European powers were hitting full stride in their quests to colonize the New World and Africa. Great Britain and France would align with various indigenous tribes in the Americas and battle for supremacy there, while the Dutch and English trading companies conquered and profited from their conquests of the East and West Indies. In this context, demarcations and astronomical observations appear to serve purposes other than knowledge. This is where we begin with our two heroes, commissioned to observe an astronomical event from the Dutch colonies in what is now South Africa. The melancholy Mason and the more jovial Dixon make for comic tension immediately as they survive a naval scuffle and the sexual advances of Dutch colonists' bored daughters. The narrative continues to follow the title's characters as they travel to the American colonies to demarcate the line which bears their name. Pynchon's use of imagined worlds, narrative interruptions, and strange characters serve him superbly in this large work. The oft-leveled criticism that he leaves the reader no chance to identify or even sympathize with his characters does not apply here. There are touching scenes when Mason imagines his late wife communicating with him, and when he remembers his sons who have stayed behind in England. The warmth that does eventually grow between he and Dixon will cause the reader to remember the friends he has and remember that he should call them instead of spending all his time reading 800 page books. This one's worth it, though.