a novel experience

One Day, David Nicholls (Hodder)

This review is twofold.

First, the story itself. "The international bestseller" One Day by David Nicholls. I did not care for this novel. But I read it through to its end and below there will be spoilers.

Second, I read this book as a Flipback. Tiny book and an amusing, novel experience...an amusing novel experience? Oh for the love of a comma!


Now for the second, first. Printed on 'bible paper' it's pretty much necessary to employ the lick-your-thumb-to-turn-page method and, until your eyes adjust, sometimes being able to see the print on the other side so clearly is distracting.


Flipbacks are so delightfully tiny they fit in most small bags and are perfect for the tram. I think the idea is to just use one hand to hold the book, like an e-reader, but I persisted mostly with the two-handed approach.


Somehow I felt betrayed by this book. I feel like it was marketed as literary fiction, though to be honest and fair I don't believe it was. Somehow I had that perception though. Then all the "celebrities" were reading it in my trashy magazines. I thought - wonderful! Literary fiction to the masses! Then they made a film and I thought I had better read it before seeing the movie. It's definitely well written*, engaging and a good novel. I just think that if it'd had Maeve Binchy's name on the cover I might have gone into it with the appropriate expectations.**

Emma Morley and Dexter Mayhew (get used to hearing their full names, Nicholls refers to them thus all the time) meet at college. She's young and idealistic, he's charismatic and arrogantly entitled. They've just graduated from Edinburgh university and drunkenly hook up one night, though they don't sleep together, and eventually decide to be best mates. The book then checks in with each of them on the same date each year, spanning the next twenty years. It's a great concept.

Emma is smart and enigmatic, but she sneers at Dexter's wish to travel the world and then she's relegated to failing regional theatre and a dead end job in a shitty London Mexican restaurant.*** Meanwhile Dexter travels, is charming, and then gets work in television. This apparently entitles him to be condescending to Emma whenever they meet because Emma is a dowdy, writing girl who "wonders why sex, even when so enjoyable, leaves her so ill-tempered."**** The reader's sympathy is nearly always with Dexter as he struggles with the rise of fame, the loss of fame, relationships, family and aging.

The characters are self-centred and on the clichéd (ok, ok "everyman") side. Their problems are annoying. Is this kind of novel designed to make me get myself out of a rut? Am I supposed to identify with the characters and their haplessness? Maybe this is why I enjoy young adult literature so much. Even when the characters wallow it isn't the same; there's the future to look forward to - there tends to be some kind of hope.

And what about the ending of One Day, I hear you ask. SPOILERS: So Dexter the cad finally gets the girl (fortunately Emma has become less dowdy in the intervening years) and, because of Emma's love and all, he gets back on track: becomes a better boyfriend, a better son, a better father, a better human being. So, her job done, David Nicholls kills the girl.



I know.



Let's not talk about it anymore.




At least I could imagine this as I read:

Go and watch him sing I've Just Seen A Face.

*Though, occasionally boring. On page 343 "Emma felt the hot tears of humiliation prick her eyes".
**This is not mean to sound disparaging. Yes, I am a MB fan. You knew that already.
***Don't get me started. This didn't make sense!
****Seriously, I don't want get started. Emma was "so very British" while Dexter was allowed to enjoy love and sex and it made me SO MAD.

reader, i can't say i liked it...

blurb: Forced to drop out of an esteemed East Coast college after the sudden death of her parents, Jane Moore takes a nanny job at Thornfield Park, the estate of Nico Rathburn, a world-famous rock star on the brink of a huge comeback. Practical and independent, Jane reluctantly becomes entranced by her magnetic and brooding employer and finds herself in the midst of a forbidden romance.

But there’s a mystery at Thornfield, and Jane’s much-envied relationship with Nico is soon tested by an agonizing secret from his past. Torn between her feelings for Nico and his fateful secret, Jane must decide: Does being true to herself mean giving up on true love?

An irresistible romance interwoven with a darkly engrossing mystery, this contemporary retelling of the beloved classic Jane Eyre promises to enchant a new generation of readers.

reasons why jane eyre cannot be rewritten with a modern twist:

1. it's creepy when a 19-year-old nanny goes around falling in love with her 30-something employer
(with subclause 1.1 being that its particularly creepy when she insists on calling him "mr" and not his name)

2. when a grown man locks his schizophrenic wife in the attic, with only an alcoholic nurse to look after her, it's not pathetically, romantically tragic - it's effing criminal.

jane is a beautifully presented book: gorgeous, whimsical, mysterious cover and lovely rough-edged paper. but on the inside it's a horse of a completely different colour.

that colour is twilight.

i know that jane eyre is not everyone's cup of tea, but it's one of my favourite books for its simple but lyrical writing and for jane - the reserved, but strong-willed, independent woman. plus, it's rawther romantic.

april lindner's jane is an intensely boring character - an affront to feminism. in trying to portray jane as staid and introverted, the author has made her bland. her falling in love is unbelievable, her calling him mr rathburn the whole time is unrealistic and creepy, and she was forever going for a lie down on her bed to listen to his music, which she had never been interested in before, but wow! listen to those lyrics! that voice! swoon! i think i'm in loooove! jane in this incarnation is ... bella.

even bloody wikipedia gets it: [jane eyre] is a novel often considered ahead of its time due to its portrayal of the development of a thinking and passionate young woman who is both individualistic, desiring for a full life, while also highly moral. Jane evolves from her beginnings as a poor and plain woman without captivating charm to her mature stage as a compassionate and confident whole woman. As she matures, she comments much on the complexities of the human condition. Jane also has a deeply pious personal trust in God, but is also highly self-reliant. Although Jane suffers much, she is never portrayed as a damsel in distress who needs rescuing. For this reason, it is sometimes regarded as an important early feminist (or proto-feminist) novel.[1]

there is no such jane to be found within these pages.*

five-year-old maddie (whom jane is supposed to be nannying) is used merely as a prop, brought out when jane needs to speak to/be in the presence of mr rathburn. (and also, i don't know many five year olds who have a nap every day). nico rathburn is basically edward cullen but cooler (can i help picturing him as rufus humphrey? no i can not). any spark or attempt at love twixt the two characters falls flat. the dialogue is clunky and at times it feels like the characters are just play acting, trying to give the impression of being like jane and mr rochester.

i was intensely disappointed by this one.** it hurt my heart.

*i know there will be some who don't see jane eyre this way.
**and i couldn't help thinking: so much work goes in to producing a single book and in this case - why? what did someone see in this book? where did they envisage it going? who are its readers?

our australian girl

in honour of international women's day today:

our australian girl is a new series (published by penguin books) about four girls from different points in australian history. each story is accompanied by little illustrations by lucia masciullo.

meet grace (written by sofie laguna) takes place in 1808 and like many children in crowded and poor london, grace is a mudlarker - she spends her days searching for things to sell in the foetid water and mud of the thames. until one day she steals some apples to feed a horse she loves and finds herself thrown into old bailey - destined for hanging or transportation to sydney cove. grace is a lovely character, sweet and caring, and i await her sea voyage (for this, spoiler alert, is what happens) eagerly in the next three books to follow.

alison lloyd's meet letty tells the tale of a young girl who accidentally accompanies her sister's trunk onto a ship bound for the colonies, her sister travelling there as a free settler. i was a bit frustrated with letty not recognising who she could trust on the ship, but she was so willing to help people that i couldn't not like her.

meet poppy (by gabrielle wang) is the story of a chinese-aboriginal girl who runs away from her mission school, disguised as a boy, to meet up with her brother on the gold fields. i think this one was my favourite of the three so far - poppy is such a great character and she gets to eat dinner with a bushranger, for crying out loud!

the last girl in the series, meet rose (sherryl clark), is set just before federation and as women are campaigning for the vote. (a topic close to my heart) rose's mother wants her to be a proper young lady, but rose has other ideas...and a very modern henrietta dugdale-esque aunty ready and willing to indulge them! i believe that the australian women actually called themselves suffragists, though, to distinguish themselves from the british suffragettes. but that's ok.

remembering henrietta dugdale

with the election looming and a somewhat sombre and yet anxious feeling mumbling and grumbling around me everywhere i go, it makes me frightened and sad just how many youths i know who are so apathetic and generally unwilling to put effort in to care at all. but on the other hand there are many who are so passionate and i feel so sorry they can't vote - when they know more than me and are actually out there working for their cause already. i can only imagine the frustration.

but it's made me muse about all those people who have fought for my right to vote and how we must not take it for granted.

i was involved in a project at uni in 2007 where we were to write essays on an aspect, or a figure, of the fight for female suffrage in victoria (which was achieved in 1908) and we published our essays in a rather neat book entitled they are but women: the road to female suffrage in victoria and it was launched by former vic premier joan kirner.

i wrote about this fantastically eccentric woman named henrietta dugdale, who lived from 1826-1918 and campaigned vocally for the cause. she was saucy and clever. she wore trousers that she fashioned herself, was skilled in carpentry and grew her own food. journalists and critics called her unwomanly and a he-woman - the former in an entertaining article in the punch magazine in 1884. she spoke out about women's rights in legislation and was the president of the victorian women's suffrage society.

henrietta also wrote a novel, which you can read at the state library of victoria, called a few hours in a far-off age (it was published in 1883). the novel is narrated by a woman who has time travelled from the (1883) present day to a year far in the future. the woman, whom one would assume was based on henrietta herself, spends a number of hours observing a family examine a museum exhibit specialising in the nineteenth century ‘christian era’, which is otherwise known in the future as ‘the age of blood and malevolence.’ the mother, an extremely wise and self-possessed woman, encourages her teenage son and daughter to question and understand this horrific era in human development but to remember not to judge their ancestors by the standards of modern life. they look at the clothing (so restrictive!) their politics and even their inferior intelligence. i'd really recommend anyone to go and read it.

the other essays in the book cover other quirky female figures such as brettena smythe, who championed birth control and was also part of the suffrage society, bessie harrison lee, who was the more conservative (but no less passionate) leader of the temperance society, a wonderful piece about the everyday women of davis street who signed the 'monster' petition for women's suffrage of 1891. there are essays on the commemorative fountains you see around melbourne and even one on the maligned sir thomas bent, premier of victoria and who reluctantly, but finally, had the women's suffrage bill passed into law in 1908.