Books!

[ailbhe]

I read "Mr Darcy's Daughters" which was written in 2003 and is a sort of sequel to "Pride and Prejudice" in the manner of "Scarlett" being the sequel to "Gone With The Wind" - and true to that manner it wasn't true to the characters, the environment, the writing style, or the amount of sex in the book. Though Mr Darcy's daughters are, happily, exactly the same as Mr Bennett's daughters, even down to Lizzy/Camilla being the second-eldest and there being two insanely flirtatious daft ones.

Then I started to read Naomi Wolf's "The Beauty Myth" but the second chapter is about work and the devaluing of work done by women and my blood started to boil, so I stopped. I will read it on holiday where my blood can boil in comfort.

I am also taking three Jasper Ffordes, as instructed by my Assistant Librarian (I always listen to her, she's great), and probably "What Mothers Do" and "How to suppress women's writing", as I want to reread them before I send them back to their rightful owner.

All the Christmas presents are now wrapped and ready to be posted. Rob will probably post them tomorrow while I wait in for someone to collect two computer monitors. He's also going to Kinko's to print off our e-tickets for the holiday.

We spontaneously invited friends around to dinner last night because as the three of us were coming home from town, Linnea decided we were to go and visit "Nickynickyis", so she and I went and rang the bell. There was no answer, so she knocked. There was no answer, so she made me ring the bell again. There was no answer, so I said "We'll go home," and she cried. She sat down. She knocked on the door again. It was hilarious and heartbreaking at the same time. So we invited Nickynickyis to dinner, along with Luke, when they eventually did come home.

New words are still rolling in very fast. The biggest thing now is that F is reliably pronounceable - she can now actually say "fish" just about every time she tries.

And waking at seven and napping in the afternoon and going to bed at a reasonable time seems to be working. Now it's just my personal insomnia that needs to be sorted out. I see the doctor tomorrow at lunchtime.

Comments

[jenett]

I think you'll like the Ffordes. They strike me as your style of humor (or at least, one compatible wtih yours.)

[kcobweb.livejournal.com]

I've never yet found an Austen sequel I could stomach. I recently read Fitzwilliam Darcy: Gentleman, which was recommended to me with high praise.... and I couldn't even finish the thing. Blech. :)

[mrs-warwick.livejournal.com]

Rhiannon hasn't got 'f' or 's'. Both are pronounced with a 'd'. We are unsure how to encourage her to say it properly (which she can if she wants to) without giving her a complex about it.

I tried a Jasper Fforde after seeing a recommendation on LJ, but I gave up after a couple of chapters, I just couldn't get into it.

[k425.livejournal.com]

The best way to encourage her is just to repeat the word pronounced correctly. At this age, pronunciation is a mixed bag - they get a sound, they perfect it, they regress while they're working on a different sound, one sound comes back perfectly, another one regresses... It's not a problem at this age. Also, it may well be that the pronunciation is affected by other sounds in the same word - I've noticed that whatever consonant is second or final colours how YoungBloke pronounces the first consonant, regardless of whether he can pronounce that consonant correctly in a different linguistic context.

[richtermom.livejournal.com]

Oh, and with Squeaky if a word has more than two syllables she's liable to just put in a dldld or blblbl noise to fill in the middle. Bandldla was banana for a while.

As for the insomnia, good luck. I had it before the kid, and I frequently have it again now -- usually after I finally put the girl back in her crib after her middle-of-the-night nursing session. Then I'm up a couple hours, and I fall asleep just in time for the alarm.

Austen Sequels

[(Anonymous)]

I read An Unequal Marriage and Pemberley, which were written I *think* by Emma Tennant who is the author of a book I liked.

They were... mixed. It was well done and I liked the development, but I couldn't cope with the basic premise which was that basically they hadn't sorted out their marriage at all.

I also read (backwards, istr) bits of "Emma in Love", also by I think Emma Tennant, and didn't like that one at all. Quite apart from the basic premise that she hadn't *really* been in love with Mr Knightley at the end of Emma [though she was by the end of this one, and called him George, which was the best bit about it] it involved a fundamental error, that of the Aunt being still alive.

I *do* like Joan Aiken's Austen books. She wrote "Jane Fairfax" which is Emma from Jane's point of view. Also "Emma Watson" which is the completion of Austen's unfinished The Watsons.... and several others too which I don't remember now. Her other stuff is good too.

LBs

Julie

(have a lovely holiday)