'Daphne' by Justine Picardie

Summary: It is 1957. The author Daphne du Maurier, beautiful, famous, despairing as her marriage falls apart, finds herself haunted by Rebecca, the character in her most famous novel, written 20 years earlier. Seeking distraction, she begins to research a biography of Branwell Bronte.

MY THOUGHTS:

This well-researched novel was loads of fun to read. It is not a fictionalized biography of Daphne du Maurier's whole life, but focuses on a specific block of time, beginning when she is already fifty years old. And only one third of the novel is told from Daphne's own point of view. The other two thirds deal with two other characters, which I found a most creative way of tackling it. 

First thread begins in 1957 and focuses on Daphne herself. The popular novelist receives a whopping blow when her husband of almost 25 years, Lt. General Sir Frederick Browning, is admitted to hospital for mental breakdown treatment and she also discovers he's been having an affair. Devastated Daphne takes refuge from emotional pain in her current writing project, a biography of Branwell Bronte. She decides this red-haired wastrel may well be her lifeline. Daphne extends feelers by writing to a stranger, J. Alexander Symington requesting any help he may give her. She has heard he is a librarian, archivist and keen Bronte scholar.

The second thread covers Alex Symington's perspective. Although he'd initially love to snub Daphne, (for if anyone was to write a book on Branwell Bronte it should be himself, not a romantic lady novelist who knew nothing of scholarly research), he is impressed by her fame and reputation. 

However, Symington hides a dark secret. He was dismissed by his former employers for thievery. His sticky fingers purloined several valuable documents, including irreplaceable Bronte original writings. Symington naturally hedges around this disgrace in his correspondence with Daphne, hoping that she'll never twig. He's a sad and seedy little man creeping amongst his stacks of hoarded papers, also trying to dodge the demands of his exasperated wife.  

The third thread jumps forward to modern times. A shy young woman plans to write a proposal for her PhD thesis on the Brontes' imaginary worlds, yet she's keen to incorporate Daphne du Maurier and whatever she can discover about her correspondence with Alex Symington.

This girl never divulges her name, at least not until the very end. She is married to Paul, a smug and breezy English lecturer who is twice her age. The specter of Paul's perfect first wife, Rachel, hangs over their home. (Does this begin to sound familiar?) However, unlike the infamous Rebecca, Paul's ex-wife is still alive. She is a gorgeous and celebrated poet, darling of the literary world. 

Nothing the insecure young heroine may do in the academic world will ever hold a candle to anything Rachel produces. What's more, the girl admits to herself that she was initially swept away by Paul's sex appeal because he reminded her of Heathcliff, Rochester, and Maxim de Winter all rolled into one. But it is becoming clear that they might have been too hasty to tie the knot. Paul was on the rebound and she was intent on building herself a life that might live up to her beloved Bronte and du Maurier novels. 

This novel reminds me of all the academic snobbery and pomposity I encountered in the English department as a youngster during my undergraduate degree. Paul is not at all happy for his wife to include Daphne du Maurier in her planned dissertation, for he considers her far too minor a figure in twentieth century literature to bother with. In his eyes, Daphne was merely popular, but undistinguished. 'Irrelevant to the proper study of English literature!' Oho! 'Although Paul turns out to have a more personal reason for his antipathy to Du Maurier's body of work, many of his faculty buddies agree with him. 

In actual fact, Du Maurier's whole extended family were quite illustrious. I'm now intrigued to find out more about her five cousins, the Llewelyn Davies boys, who were adopted by James Matthew Barrie and became his role models for Peter Pan and the Lost Boys. 

At the heart of the story, however, is the long distance friendship based on deception. I grabbed my copy of The Infernal World, and sure enough, there was Daphne's dedication to Symington, written while she still had no idea he was a crook.

'To J. Alex Symington, compiler and editor of The Shakespeare Head Bronte, whose life-long interest in Patrick Branwell Bronte stimulated my own, and encouraged me to undertake the present study.' 

Perhaps the scandal which is exposed in this book explains why Alex Symington has no Wiki Page devoted to him, although a couple of articles about his dodgy shenanigans popped up. Yet after all his subterfuge, poor old Symington couldn't take a single one of those documents with him, could he?

This is a wonderful homage to celebrated British writers with more interesting tidbits of info packed into it than I can even cover in this review. A real springboard for further reading. According to this book, Daphne du Maurier has a personal diary locked away in a bank vault, with strict instructions not to be opened and released until 50 years after her death. Well, that sad event occurred in 1989, so by 2039, there will be another fascinating release for du Maurier fans to look out for.   

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Check out my review of Daphne's impressive achievement, The Infernal World of Branwell Bronte.  

'The Kind Ghosts' by Linda Newbery

Summary: It is the summer of 1917 and still neither side seems close to victory. Jack and Alice Smallwood, already disillusioned by the harsh realities of three years of war, have each lost someone dear. But the war grinds on, to Jack, in the mud of Flanders, and to Alice, at a base hospital in France, it seems that it must go on forever. And after the armistice, the joy and relief at returning to home life are soon cut short by unexpected and dramatic complications.

Warning: This review contains spoilers from its prequel, Some Other War. Proceed with caution.  

 MY THOUGHTS:

I consider myself lucky with book sightings. I plucked this paperback off the freebie trolley at a secondhand bookshop. It was clearly a vintage read with a catchy title. At first I thought it might have a supernatural theme, then discovered it is the second in a duology about the First World War. Fortunately its prequel is available on Internet Archive, so I raced through that (Some Other War) to get to this one. 

We are back with Jack and Alice, the Smallwood twins, whose lives were abruptly shattered in 1914. Part One picks up where Some Other War leaves off, in the chaos of combat. This time, each twin narrowly avoids death. Jack gets gassed in the trenches and Alice's Base Hospital is bombed by German planes. 

Although many characters cross these pages, the seven main characters are essentially the same as the first book. Jack and Alice, Philip, Edward, Lorna, Harriet, and Stephen. The two dead guys deserve to be still included, for the influence they continue to wield. 

Part Two deals with the twins trying to put together the pieces of their lives after Armistice Day. Jack deals with survivor's guilt, PTSD, and recurring nightmares. Then his wife, Harriet, delivers him a whopping emotional blow. 

Alice's continued grief over the loss of her beloved Edward leaves her wondering whether she remains in love with an idealized, embellished version of her fiancė rather than the real one. Edward's sister, Lorna, suggests this might hold some truth. Then the last person Alice would ever have expected romantic overtures from suddenly declares his love for her. 

I appreciate how Jack and Alice always have each other's backs whenever necessary. She changes her plans to stay near him when he's in hospital, and in turn, she's the first person he thinks to confide his heartbreaking domestic news to. Their relationship is bedrock. It's almost enough to make me wish I'd had a twin brother. 

Every character lives and breathes, including the infamous Harriet. I'm sure we've all come across girls like her in real life. They are shallow and restless, acting on sudden whims, and never thinking beyond their own concerns. Yet the Harriets of the world tend to fall on their feet and live reasonably easy lives, because they never lapse into moments of self-reflection. Therefore, they completely avoid self-reproach or remorse. 'Shame' is a word that never crosses their minds. Some archetypal characters similar to Harriet from the classics include Lydia Bennet and Rosamond Vincy. 

It turns out Harriet made a calculating, cold-blooded move in the first book. Yet from her own own point of view, this heartless character simply performed an action that needed to be done for her own protection. The person who put her in the position to deem it necessary is equally culpable (and he shall remain nameless). 

The twins' faith in the supernatural takes a sound battering, and understandably so. Alice admits to herself that she's merely going through the motions of singing and praying in church. Yet is their faith in providential machinations really dented beyond repair? On the very last page, Jack considers that the benevolent ghosts of Edward and Stephen may be working behind the scenes to find him and Alice each perfect soul mates. At last, the significance of the book's title is revealed. 

If I had any criticisms, Newbery spends a lot of time having Jack and Alice interacting with lovers who are completely wrong for them. Scenes spent with their perfect soul mates are far sparser in comparison, and I would have lapped up more of these.  

Yet The Kind Ghosts leaves me still thinking about the characters long after I finished, which is the litmus test of a great novel. With Jack and Alice in particular, Newbery has us share so many intimate moments in their skin, even when they're alone. Hence, I can't help loving these two in a really empathetic way. And since the unfolding horror of war elicits these reactions, it reinforces what I've long known, that a well-written story is the best way to bring history to life. 

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A Winter Update

I sometimes pause my book chat and reviews for mid-year updates. Ideally I add these at the end of June, but this one has been deferred until August, largely because I've been busy on the homeward stretch of the writing project I describe further down. But here are the most salient things that have happened. 

The Change of Life

I've had a health issue which began early last December. It was all perimenopause related. It turns out I've most likely had adenomyosis for several years without knowing it, or even that there was such a condition. It is a sort of cousin of endometriosis, which I've heard of far more frequently. At this stage of my life though, I became an unwitting science experiment. The question I never sought the answer to was, 'What happens when the influence of progesterone is suddenly removed from an organ that is honeycombed with adenomyosis?' Even though I never asked, I found out the answer resembles something like a school experiment when a Mentos-style sweet is dropped into a bottle of coke.  

If this seems irrelevant to a book blog (my daughter would surely say it is, and I never even mentioned a word to my sons), I've come to decide that matters of this nature are kept too hushed up in general. If ladies' menstrual cycles weren't such a private and taboo topic, I might've discovered my adenomyosis even sooner.

 I'm better now. I have two sources of synthetic progesterone working for me in the lead-up to true menopause, a local IUD plus daily doses of oral progesterone. Sometimes modern pharmaceuticals are lifestyle, sanity-saving gifts, although at one stage of my life I would never have imagined myself saying so. Sometimes things that need simple tweaks can cause chaos. 

The Writing Project

I've been writing plenty of fanfiction over the past two years. My longest and most popular are Louisa May Alcott inspired stories following the lives of several characters from Little Men and Jo's Boys. Perhaps my most ambitious project was Emil's shipwreck story. But the one I've just finished focuses on Jack Ford and Ned Barker, the pair of boys who Jo Bhaer sadly deemed her 'two failures.' Even when an author writes off her own characters, we readers needn't write them off too. 

I came up with some excellent plot-threads and backstories for Jack and Ned. For the last eight months, I've uploaded one chapter per week. It was great fun. Yet it sometimes seemed like a crazy project to start, because Little Women fans rarely seem to make it to Little Men and Jo's Boys these days, and for those who do, there is certainly no existing fandom for these two boys. Who would possibly read it? Yet the views have been steadily rising. 

My pseudonym for these stories is Ada Sage. Ada was the name of my paternal grandmother, and Sage speaks for itself. Taken both together, it rhymes with her maiden name, which was Ada Gage. And I find 'Ada Sage' rolls off the tongue. 

The work is time-consuming, fairly challenging to get right, a huge stretch of the imagination, and great fun! 

If you'd be interested to read these novels free at Archive of Our Own here is the link to my Ada Sage writing. However, several people I know in person would prefer to have hard copies, and I aim to provide that, because I would love them too. But I don't know if will happen in the near future. 

Now what do you think of this? An uncomplimentary reviewer on Goodreads of a fantasy-adventure trilogy I wrote several years ago said, 'It feels as if Louisa May Alcott tried to write Narnia.' I burst out laughing when I read that, for this person could have no way of knowing I am now actually writing Louisa May Alcott inspired fanfiction.  

Mid-Year Aims and Goals

Rummaging through my stash of secondhand books yet to be read, I see I have a pile of Anne Tyler novels and another stack by Daphne du Maurier. Perhaps I'll get a move-on with all of those, since they are already at hand. I would also love to finish reading all the Aussie/Kiwi novels by Ruth Park. So there's a fair stash of 20th century quality literature right there, American, British, and Australasian.

Overall

Despite its bothersome start, 2026 has been a pretty good year. In past decades, trying to stand out, make a name for myself, sell my books, and prove my worth has driven me nuts in many ways, and when results I strived for weren't forthcoming, I'd slump and feel responsible. 

But right now, I'm enjoying being an anonymous worshiper among a sea of faces at different city churches, and an anonymous writer on an enormous platform along with a teeming number of others. It feels restful to think that I am doing each of these things purely for their own sake.     

 

'The Sittaford Mystery' by Agatha Christie

Time for another Agatha Christie from the stash I inherited from my mother's place. 

MY THOUGHTS:  

The time period is the late 1920s. This winter mystery takes place in the deep snow of rural Dartmoor. Six people are holding a mock sėance around a small table. The hostesses are Mrs Willett and her daughter, Violet, who are currently renting the bleak and cold Sittaford House, although nobody knows what appeal it could possibly hold for them. Their guests comprise of four gentlemen. 

There is Major John Burnaby, a hardy ex-soldier; Mr Ronnie Garfield, a young man who loves an easy life; Mr Rycroft, a wizened old chap who enjoys bird watching; and Mr Duke, a quiet, big, unassuming guy. 

A sudden alarming message is revealed. 'Trevelyan dead - Murder.' That puts an instant dampener on the gathering. It seems like such a random, tasteless joke. Although he claims not to believe in supernatural tomfoolery, Major Burnaby insists on tramping the six snowy miles to check on his old chum who lives in the nearby village of Exhampton. But Captain Joseph Trevelyan lies face down with a lethal fracture to the back of his skull. The estimated time of the crime coincides with their sėance. 

It is undeniably creepy. Unless the message truly was spirit generated, who around the table could have possessed such chilling knowledge and revealed it in such a cruel way?

Captain Trevelyan's nephew, James Pearson, is arrested on circumstantial evidence. The unlucky young man happened to be on the spot with the perfect motive, a desperate need for money which the terms of the the captain's will might nicely supply. But James' charismatic fiance, Emily Trefusis, insists that the police have the wrong man. 'Jim is a frightful idiot but he doesn't murder people!' 

While Inspector Narracott conducts the formal investigation, Emily enlists the help of an admiring young journalist named Charles Enderby to assist her in her unofficial, emotion-driven quest to clear her lover's name.  

Since Captain Trevelyan had a handful of hard-up relatives apart from young Jim to sift through, there are the usual Agatha Christie red herrings and secondary threads, including a thoroughly sleazy author named Martin Dering, and a link to Australia. I always enjoy it when Dame Agatha incorporates my country, although we do not call, 'Cooee,' to each other! This isn't the first time she's added that stereotypical detail.

In this novel, Ronnie Garfield has this to say about a certain other character. 'Fellows that go off to the Colonies are usually bad hats. Their relations don't like them and push them out there for some reason.' Since this was published in 1931, his attitude surprised me. I would have thought it late in the day for that particular prejudice by then, but apparently it wasn't. 

Some ingenious sleuthing reveals the identity of the murderer, along with revelations of why others are acting strangely for perfectly unrelated reasons. For me, this is up among her more enjoyable titles. 

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Check out my entire Agatha Christie page.