Book Review Publication: The Last Mrs. Parrish

Happy November, everyone!

For the past month, I've been occupied with work and school, and just trying to juggle both simultaneously. Unfortunately, I am still semi-dealing with the "reading slumps," which is no bueno. But it is my senior year in college, and the pressure and stress of finishing up my studies while looking for a long-term job is stressful. It is hard trying to fit in recreational activities (like reading) into my already hectic schedule. Luckily, the New Year is approaching and I am already starting to jot down ideas as to what should be my New Year's Resolution, and it mainly concerns READING. Hopefully, I'll stick to my self-made promises for 2018!

Recently, I published a book review in The Sentinel, a local newspaper near my college town. It is a requirement for students in the Reviewing the Arts and Publications class to publish at least one review for their portfolio. Since I am taking that class for my minor, I decided to publish two reviews--a film review and a book review on the psychological thriller novel The Last Mrs. Parrish by Liv Constantine. I will not reiterate what I stated in my book review, but I will say that it is excellent! This is the debut novel of Liv Constantine, which is the pen name for sisters Valerie and Lynne Constantine. If you happened to like Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn, then you will definitely love The Last Mrs. Parrish.

To read my review in The Sentinel, click here.

Thank you for reading and for your support, everyone!

x, K

Book Review: Rebecca (3 Star Rating)

I have finally finished Rebecca, by Daphne Du Maurier. The story is told through a series of flashbacks—it is about a young and nameless heroine who marries a 46 year-old and recent widower, Maximillian de Winter (Maxim), while she stays and works in Monte Carlo as a “companion” for a gossip and vulgar American woman, Mrs. Van Hopper.

The setting takes place in Kerrith, England in the 1930s, in which Maxim owns the prominent and grand house called Manderley. As I mentioned before, it is narrated through a series of memories of the heroine’s past life—when she first met and married Maxim. At the beginning of the tale, the reader learns that the heroine and Maxim are living from hotel to hotel, not necessarily as poor vagrants, but nonetheless they are homeless. Even though the heroine’s stay at Manderley was brief, she continues to relive the fond memories of the beautiful house that was supposed to be her forever home. But a dark cloud of the past still hovers and lingers above their heads, as they try to move forward into a bright future and come to grips with reality.

“I wondered how many people there were in the world who suffered, and continued to suffer, because they could not break out from their own web of shyness and reserve, and in their blindness and folly built up a great distorted wall in front of them that hid the truth.” 

Within weeks or possibly days of knowing each other at Monte Carlo, Maxim asks the heroine for her hand in marriage, and the couple soon after wed and go on a nice honeymoon. When the newlyweds return and arrive at the majestic Manderley, the heroine is now confronted with a new life so dissimilar from her quiet and quaint life she led before. The heroine is shy, skinny, spineless, timid, and awkward—she soon realizes that she does not carry the same grace and a powerful attitude that a mistress should carry. Maxim on the other hand is the opposite—he is strong, moody, authoritative, and troubled. When he first met the heroine, readers learn that he lost his late wife, Rebecca, almost a year ago; she drowned while she was sailing in sea one night—or as it was led to seem that way.

As the couple adjust to each other and start their lives as a recent married couple, the heroine is not only finding her self as a misfit in this new life of wealth, but she is also dealing with the shadows of the late Rebecca. It appears that the presence of the first Mrs. de Winter, still remains in Manderley. Although dead, Rebecca is remembered as a young, beautiful, vibrant, talented, and impressionable lady who has charmed almost everyone she met; as everyone came to say, it was hard not to fall in love with Rebecca. The heroine worries that her husband is still in love with Rebecca, and she feels that she could never rise above the high reputation that Rebecca still carries, even well after her death. Then there’s the sinister Mrs. Danvers, who is the housekeeper at Manderley. Mrs. Danvers was strongly devoted to Rebecca, and continues to remain devoted to her even after her passing; she also despises the heroine for taking her “mistress’s place.” The housekeeper does her best to frighten as well as intimidate the heroine, thus making the heroine’s life at Manderley unbearable.

“I suppose sooner or later in the life of everyone comes a moment of trial. We all of us have our particular devil who rides us and torments us, and we must give battle in the end.” 

Like with all stories, a tragedy strikes and soon the heroine is now met with a past that she had no part in—the death of Rebecca. Rebecca’s boat is discovered, as well as a decaying body of the late Mrs. de Winter. Now questions arise as to how Rebecca really died, and the heroine’s life with Maxim is now being threatened with horrid secrets of Manderley’s past.

“We can never go back again, that much is certain. The past is still close to us. The things we have tried to forget and put behind us would stir again, and that sense of fear, of furtive unrest, struggling at length to blind unreasoning panic - now mercifully stilled, thank God - might in some manner unforeseen become a living companion as it had before.” 

Overall, I did enjoy reading this book. I saw the movie years before and it motivated to make me read this novel. It has been 78 years since the novel has been first published and continues to be in print; it was a bestselling novel until the mid-sixties. It is considered to be the author’s true masterpiece and her most prominent literary legacy of the 20th century, in which apparently continues to enthrall many today. Also, the story was inspired by events that took place in the author’s life. Du Maurier discovered letters that belonged to her husband’s first fiancée, Jan Ricardo; Ricardo threw herself under a bus and died years previously to Du Maurier’s marriage. When Du Maurier married her husband, she feared that he was still attracted to Ricardo, thus inspiring her to write a novel based on this suspicion of hers.

“The moment of crisis had come, and I must face it. My old fears, my diffidence, my shyness, my hopeless sense of inferiority, must be conquered now and thrust aside. If I failed now I should fail forever.” 

To move on, there were things that I did not like about this novel. Firstly, the narrator is a pathetic and a weak character, thus making it agonizing to even read at times. She’s docile, meek and allows her husband’s mood swings to affect her emotionally. The heroine never takes a stand to combat the ghosts of Manderley’s past, especially when it came to Rebecca. The story does give readers an overall context of the era and how people behaved back then, which I find to always be fascinating; I love to compare and contrast certain cultural mores back then to the present time. I thought that some of the characters were too posh, uppity, snobby, and judgmental—but it also allowed me feel sorry for the heroine and to also understand why she’s feeling out of place in this new world of hers. There were many instances where I was frustrated, angry, and so upset at the heroine—especially between certain situations with Mrs. Danvers. I really began wishing that I were the heroine in the story so I could slap Mrs. Danvers across the face—but then there would be no point in the story, so I just tolerated it for the most part.

Additionally, the author is unnecessarily descriptive and too wordy throughout the entirety of the story. Du Maurier adds in useless information, which could have been cut out and you still would not lost the tale's coninuity. It made reading the book long and at times boring. I feel that at many times, the narrator/author digressed and talked about things that were not relevant to certain situations or events that were taking place. Not only was I frustrated with some of the characters, but also I was also frustrated with how long it took for the climax to finally happen. It felt like eternity for the story to finally reach its peak.

I love the idea and premise of the story, but as I previously mentioned before—the characters and the certain parts in the story made it painful to finish at times. The story still remains to be a timeless classic, and I would certainly recommend it to anyone who does not mind getting mad while reading. Otherwise, it was a decent read altogether.

x, Kayla

Book Reviews: American Hippies, All Shook Up, Three Lives for Mississippi, & Patty's Got a Gun

As much as I should be studying for my finals right now (taking procrastination to a whole new level, as we speak), I decided to take the time to review some books that I had to read for two of my classes, which are U.S. Contemporary History and Modern Germany.

Usually, I would not think of making book reviews on assigned reading materials, but I have to admit—these history-related books were and are quite intriguing. Whenever I am “assigned” to read something that does not come out of my own freewill to do so, even if it is reading, I dread it—especially if there’s an assignment with it. Nobody wants to be forced to do something and then having to do extra work for it! Luckily, this was not the case for me this semester—I have been assigned to read some thought provoking, interesting, eye-opening books that definitely enriched my knowledge on certain events of the past. I would not say that each of the books I am reviewing are phenomenal - some were slow to read, but nonetheless they were decent reading material—good enough to at least write about. Although I had to write extensive analytical papers or really long book quizzes for some of these reads, I actually enjoyed reading them, and I hope that maybe I will spark an interest in you to read them as well.

Before I start, I am going to book review four books that I read for my U.S. Contemporary History class, and then I'll do a separate blog post/book review on my other class. Hope you enjoy my reviews!

American Hippies by W.J. Rorabaugh (✭✭✭✭)

This has been a really exciting read for me. Who doesn’t want to learn about the counterculture and hippie movements, psychedelic drugs, Acid Rock, sexual freedom, communes or cults, and more sex and drugs? This book encompasses the radical period of the 1960s and tells the story of the counterculture movement vividly; a historical analysis during a time when America embraced radical permissiveness. It made the hippie counterculture sound thrilling, scary, and to a good degree pointless and chaotic.

The author does an excellent job in explaining the historical context, or background, of the events and movements that led up to the creation of hippies. It also mentions prominent members of the Beatniks, in which provided a basis for hippie counterculture, like the famous Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsburg.  It also discusses Ken Kesey, as some of you may know—he wrote the book One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, and he was actually a big supporter of LSD. In fact, Kesey gave up his career as a writer to promote LSD. He believed that the purpose of LSD was to have fun and be free; the drug apparently allowed him to question cultural assumptions, therefore, he wanted to bring universal enlightenment to society and to have everyone experience it. This author, who turned into an LSD crazed hippie, started a nationwide tour called Merry Pranksters, in which was a celebratory approach with the goal of flooding the nation with LSD quickly and democratically—on a massive scale—in order to create a cultural revolution. This actually became a stepping-stone to the creation of Acid Rock. It also goes ahead and mentions the Woodstock Festival, which was 3 days of peace, love and music, and other imperative countercultural events that shook the entire nation.

I truly found this book to be very fascinating. People tend to think that the countercultural movement began in the 1970s, but it really began in the early or mid sixties when the Vietnam War first broke out. People, who were born in 1950s affluence culture, were dissatisfied with their life and felt that conformity was not the way to find their individualism. Even though some might not find reading anything history-related at all interesting as reading a fiction novel, I will say that this book is anything but boring. You will be getting a good dose of learning while you simultaneously enjoy reading about this crazy time in American history. Additionally, I think many will find a connection the hippie movement and the purpose of the counterculture, because we have all experienced what it is like to want to try something different and to break away from the things that people expect us to do; simply, it is about searching for an adventure of a lifetime and spontaneity.

All Shook Up, How Rock 'N' Roll Changed America by Glenn C. Altschuler (★★★★)

In Glenn C. Altschuler’s book, All Shook Up, How Rock ’N’ Roll Changed America, the author argued that rock and roll created conflict, at times making it worse and in other times lessening it. Altschuler focuses on the major conflicts that the music genre contributed to, such as race, sexuality, corruption of youth, pop culture, and American society. The book discusses how rock and roll started a firestorm of controversy, especially for race relations, generational values and pop culture. Most importantly, rock and roll’s societal conflicts turned into a positive cultural revolution in American society, because it united blacks and whites, it gave teens their own special identity, and it redefined a new culture.

It is interesting to read about how the emergence of this thunderous, rollicking and harmonic tune represented, to many Americans, rebellion, sex, drugs, and racial integration. Although the music back then bears no comparison to the music of today’s generation, I found it amusing to read about the worries and concerns that parents had about their children listening to this supposed “God-forsaken” music. Also, I find it amazing on how a piece of rock and roll altered America in unimaginable ways; who would ever think that a piece of music could lead to immense social changes.

Rock and roll had an everlasting effect on America while causing inconceivable problems and conflict that ended up setting forth change. The change that occurred influenced different parts of American life and culture, such as in race, generational values, and pop culture. Rock and roll made integration possible, allowed teens to find their voices through the music, and redefined a new culture that threatened pop culture. What rock and roll did was create a revolution in social trends that impacted lives and reshaped the American way of life.

If anyone is interested in learning about social changes in American society during the early 50’s to even late 60’s, this is definitely the right book! The author does a great job in engaging readers throughout the entirety of  his novel, and he does a great job in having the reader journey along through the cultural transformations that rock and roll contributed to, through his words.

Three Lives for Mississippi by William Bradford Huie (★★★★★)

The first chapter of Three Lives for Mississippi was heart stopping. So far, this has to be my favorite read out this entire book review post. It is a story about three Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) workers who were murdered during the Freedom Summer of 1964. For all of you who do not know about the Freedom Summer, CORE and Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), that were both civil rights organizations, created a movement aimed at garnering more African Americans to register to vote in the state of Mississippi. What resulted was the deaths of two Jewish men, Mickey Schwerner and Andy Goodman, and an African American, James Chaney.

As I mentioned, the first chapter was tough to get through. It does not dive straightaway into the main premise, but gives the reader an overall context of the African American struggles in the South. The first chapter was about a 34 year-old African American citizen, from Alabama, by the name of Edward Aaron. A lieutenant Klansmen, Bart Floyd, wanted to be promoted to captain, and in order to prove himself to his fellow Klansmen, he had to be willing to go to any extreme measure to get “blood from any black person.” Aaron was walking home one night, with a family friend, when he was attacked and castrated by Floyd. Aaron survived the attack, but it left a deep scar in his mind and forever changed his life.

The author, Huie, was a young journalist at the time of the murders. When the three men were reported missing, he was afraid of going down South to report on it, because he was afraid that it would lead to terrible consequences that could lead to potential violence for his part. Shamefully to say, at the time, Southerners approved of these types of murder or at least did not show any objection to it. Huie at first believed that “reason and restraint have no voice,” he felt it would be a useless cause to try to report on the disappearances since nobody down there cared. But somehow, he was convinced to go down there, because Huie was a person who understood both sides. He was inspired to report the case to explain civil rights workers to the white supremacists and white supremacists to the civil rights workers.

Throughout the book, you learn more about the victims, their beliefs, humanitarian efforts, and their struggle to bring racial justice in a world and era where equality was nonexistent. This is a fantastic book, a book that you won’t want to put down.

Patty's Got a Gun by William Graebner (★★★)

This is a story about the Patricia Hearst kidnapping. It is a bizarre tale of a nineteen-year-old newspaper heiress, who eventually turned into a fire-armed bank robber, that was abducted by a radical group of domestic terrorists that were known as the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA). In William Graebner’s Patty’s Got a Gun, the author analyzes a time when America was caught midway between permissive radicalism of the 1960s and the United States transition to conservatism of the 1980s. The events of and surrounding the kidnapping of Hearst, and her subsequent trial, can be seen as both the culmination of radicalism and shift to conservatism, because the trial confronted the issues of ideology and philosophy. At the time, two forces were at odds—it was between a culture of the victim versus the emerging culture of personal accountability. The events and actions of SLA and Patty Hearst represented many of the liberal principles of that time, while the trial represented the end of radicalism; cultural and social contexts influenced the verdict of the Patty Hearst trial. 

Patty Hearst symbolized a misguided sixties radical, that was in the mist of cultural and social chaos, involved in the fight for a revolutionary change, and in search an exciting adventure; she also was an example of the wide variety of cultural anxieties and critical perspectives. When the seventies emerged, many Americans were searching for a sense of normalcy; Hearst’s conviction showed a sign that a new political corner had turned and that homegrown terrorism would not be allowed. Hearst and the SLA began to be viewed as small fragments of the past and of an insignificant era of social and cultural disorder; it was the end of progressive enthusiasm that was popular in the 1960s. According to the author, Hearst was a “quintessential symbol of privilege and wealth,” and therefore Hearst presented herself, in American society, as a powerful figure of what had gone wrong in the nation at the time—which was the fact that radicalism ideologies did not bring change, but crime and chaos.

Today, Patty is living the life of a free person. If you want to know about interesting and also questionable, yet an impressionable case in American history, this book might be it. I didn’t give it a high rating, because the author makes the case hard to follow and understand. It was a complex time in American history—the counterculture was shifting to radicalism and violence, and once the seventies emerged, many people just wanted to have a sense of normalcy and control in society. It was scary, exciting, and confusing time period—this then began to pave the way to the Reagan Era, or the New Right, where law and order would be enforced and respected. In the end, you still wonder if she’s innocent, a victim of kidnapping, or a true criminal. But I’ll leave you up to decide!

x, Kayla 

Book Review: Bridget Jones Diary (4 Star Rating)

“When someone leaves you, apart from missing them, apart from the fact that the whole little world you've created together collapses, and that everything you see or do reminds you of them, the worst is the thought that they tried you out and, in the end, the whole sum of parts adds up to you got stamped REJECT by the one you love. How can you not be left with the personal confidence of a passed over British Rail sandwich?” 

The Bridget Jones Diary, by Helen Fielding, is a brilliant and funny novel. It is about a thirty-something and self-involved singleton, living in London, that documents every bits of her life in a twelve month span--including her tumultuous love life; each of the chapters represent the twelve months of the year. At the beginning of the book, it starts off with with Bridget devising her New Year's Resolution, which is to: lose weight, drink less, quit smoking, find a soulmate, advance in her career, and to not allow herself to date "emotionally unavailable men."

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that when one part of your life starts going okay, another falls spectacularly to pieces.”

This singleton deplores male "fucktwittage" while also in search of a steady and dependable boyfriend. She finds herself judged by the fact that she is thirty, not married with children, and is stuck in a dead-end job; Bridget is lost and in a sense, is a hopeless romantic--she's searching for love. She finds herself attached to an aloof fella, aka her boss named Daniel, who is a "sexy" and extremely charming character. But Daniel is the perfect example of male "fuckwittage;" he uses his sex appeal, charm, and looks to lure women for sex, while being emotionally detached, then after he has his fun--he abandons them. In my opinion, he is the definition of a sex-crazed jerk. Of course, Bridget is in total awe of Daniel--her lifelong crush; she pushes aside his evident imperfections and suppresses the inevitable. There's also smart, recently divorced, very rich, and perfect lawyer, Mr. Mark Darcy--the man that her parents tried fixing her up with. At first he came off a bit snobbish, but as the story unravels we see that Mr. Darcy is a caring and benevolent man.

“I will not fall for any of the following: alcoholics, workaholics, commitment phobics, people with girlfriends or wives, misogynists, megalomanics, chauvists, emotional fuckwits or freeloaders, perverts.” 

I shall not spoil the rest of this amusing novel; I really enjoyed reading this book by Fielding. It was first published nearly 20 years-ago and is practically based, with a touch of modernity, on the Jane Austin novel, Pride and Prejudice. There are times when this book really screams the 90's, but regardless of its time period, it still attains its sense of humor and relatable nature. This book basically centers on Bridget's journey to self-improvement. She becomes very concerned and obsessed with improving her physical looks, in order for her to look more attractive to potential male suitors; she counts every bit of calories she consumes on a daily basis, measures the circumference of her thighs, and weighs herself everyday. Meanwhile, as she is on this insane and obsessive journey for self-improvement, she also adopts a new style of self-improvement--inner-poise.

“I will not get upset over men, but instead be poised and cool ice-queen.” 

This book exposes Bridget's thoughts, feelings, desires, dreams, and wishes--from her point of view. There are times when I couldn't help laughing out loud, and also there were times that I found myself understanding the character on a deep and emotional level. I emphasized with her, understood her, and found myself remembering encountering the same situations that Bridget encountered herself--especially when it came to the feeling of helplessness, the whole low self-esteem issue, and having zero confidence. I resonated with Bridget and because of that, I grew to have a fond love and attachment to the character. Everything that happened to her, had at one point, happened in my own life once--well to a certain degree it did.

This is a book that I definitely recommend. It still resonates with mainstream culture and society, regardless of its time period, and it is hilarious! I really would love to see this book regain its popularity once more--it deserves more recognition in today's generation.

x, Kayla

P.S.
Fun Fact: The Bridget Jones Diary, originally started as a weekly newspaper column.