Celebrate Dickens at the Deptford Lounge

Saturday 28 April
11.30am-12.30pm

Sandra Agard celebrates Dickens

Storyteller Sandra Agard invites families to come and discover the lives of Victorian children and families in the novels of Charles Dickens.

Through readings and role play, it will be fun for all the family best suited to accompanied children aged 5-7 but children aged 8-11 are also welcome.

Saturday 28 April
2.15-3.15pm

Sandra Agard looks at the motivation behind many of Dickens’ storylines and assesses the impact of his written works upon social reform. This event concludes our local CityRead programme and is suitable for readers aged 14 and over.

New Cross-Wavelengths Reading Group News

The New Cross Reading Group has now relocated to Wavelengths Library. The July meeting looked at Kate Summerscale’s novel The Suspicions of Mr Whicher.

Those who attended the meeting were intrigued by this incredibly detailed consideration of the investigation, made during the 1860s into the murder of a small child which seemed to scandalize the local community where it occurred (a large country house located in a Wiltshire village) and mystify and enthrall the rest of the nation.

Much of the appeal of this work is found in the way it reveals the social hierarchy and moral values of the time, when the new breed of watchful and sharp witted detectives were regarded by many as impostors indelicately intruding into the personal lives of their betters.

Using newspaper articles, letters, police paperwork and reports of speeches made in Parliament, Kate Summerscale reconstructs the response of a society shocked by an inexplicable crime, where a helpless infant could be snatched away from what would be regarded as a secure environment. Many theories concerning the murder were put forward by a fascinated public, even Dickens decided on a motive and culprits. Summerscale recreates some of the interest of the time by carefully considering all conceivable explanations .

Apart from the murder itself it is fascinating to gain a vivid impression of how people lived in mid nineteenth century England, for instance we find that  Jonathan Whicher’s formative years were spent in Camberwell, then a village south of London, where his father made a living as a market gardener. Summerscale also succeeds in showing how far reaching are the consequences of this crime when Mr Whicher is forced into an obscure retirement having at first failed to prove the guilt of his main suspect,  while Alexander Kent, father of the victim, is unable to continue working as a factory inspector due to the hostility of society at large.

Next month’s group will look at The Help by Kathryn Stockett.
Tuesday 2 August 2011, 6.30-7.30pm
Wavelengths Library

Have you read this book? Let us know your thoughts.

Forest Hill Reading Group News

This month we read The Warden by Anthony Trollope.

The tranquil atmosphere of the cathedral town of Barchester is shattered when a scandal breaks concerning the financial affairs of a Church-run almshouse for elderly men. In the ensuing furore, Septimus Harding, the almshouse’s well-meaning warden, finds himself pitted against his daughter’s suitor Dr. John Bold, a zealous local reformer. Matters are not improved when Harding’s abrasive son-in law, Archdeacon Grantly, leaps into the fray to defend him against a campaign Bold begins in the national press.

Untypically short, yet three years in the making, The Warden has a simple structure that Trollope utilized again and again. Take a moral dilemma of some sort, one that provides endless pros and cons to be argued, one that possibly takes many hundreds of pages to resolve, explore its social, political and financial implications, and show how it touches the lives of characters not too unlike ourselves.

The dilemma here concerns the income of Septimus Harding, the Warden of Barchester. Under the terms of a will, dated 1434, twelve superannuated wool carders were to be accommodated in an almshouse, receiving one shilling and fourpence per day. A residence was to be provided for a warden who was to receive the income from the remainder of the testator’s property. Now, more than 400 years later, there seems to be an imbalance in these depositions. The almshouse inmates continue to receive only one shilling and fourpence, while the warden, living on the proceeds of some valuable properties, receives eight hundred pounds annually and the use of the warden’s house.

Comments from reading group members include:

“It had a charm I didn’t see to begin with.”

“The themes are topical in terms of the press, the media and government – you could substitute the banks for the church as the major power.”

Another member made reference to the cynical tone heard throughout the book and also commented on the fact that the warden tends to use different language with the individual characters, usually defined by their social status; he uses simplistic language with the lower classes and convoluted language with characters like the archbishop.

Overall, the group enjoyed the book and found the themes interesting to discuss.  

Read the Manor House Library Saturday Reading Group’s review of The Warden.

July’s chosen novel is The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga
Tuesday 12^th June 2011, 6.30-7.30pm
Forest Hill Library

Have you read this book? Let us know your thoughts.

Burning Bright

What they say about it:

Burning Bright follows the Kellaway family as they leave behind tragedy in rural Dorset and come to late 18th-century London. As they move in next door to the radical painter/poet William Blake, and take up work for a near-by circus impresario, the youngest family member gets to know a girl his age. Embodying opposite characteristics – Maggie Butterfield is a dark-haired, streetwise extrovert, Jem Kellaway a quiet blond introvert – the children form a strong bond while getting to know their unusual neighbor and his wife.

Set against the backdrop of a city nervous of the revolution gone sour across the Channel in France, Burning Bright explores the states of innocence and experience just as Blake takes on similar themes in his best-known poems, Songs of Innocence and of Experience.

What I thought:

I enjoyed this book but I am not sure if I would have enjoyed it so much if it wasn’t for the addition of William Blake. It elevated it from merely ordinary to something quite special.

I warmed to the main two characters Jem and Maggie and wanted to punch several of the others at times – Charlie and the Astley’s to be precise. All in all it was an enjoyable read and I’m a sucker for a happy ending.

Tracy Chevalier website

Helen Hilton

Available at Lewisham Library

Manor House Reading Group News

January’s MHRG looked at Stone’s Fall by Iain Pears.

What they say about it

“An indefatigably clever storyteller…witty, laconic dialogue; a galloping pace;…the concluding passages…detonate a series of surprises.” TLS 

“The novel is above all a romp, albeit an exceptionally intelligent and entertaining one.” Sunday Telegraph

What the group said about it

One member “read every word” and “thoroughly enjoyed it” finding it to have been an “absorbing and intelligent read”.  Most of the group found the book worthwhile on the whole enjoying the writer’s style and descriptions of events in 19th and early 20th century London, Paris and Vienna.

Most found it too long, however, some found it as much as 200 pages too long! Someone said the editor had fallen asleep on the job.

Criticisms were made of what some thought to be an over elaboration of what was essentially a simple plot, but for others the plot was well constructed and a matter of great intrigue.

The discussion was followed by the annual Manor House Library Quiz Competition based on the twelve books we read last year. This was won by Sue Byford (a worthy winner, even if, as acknowledged by herself she glanced once or twice at other peoples’ answers!).

The group’s nomination for best book read in 2010 was White Tiger by Aravind Adiga.

February’s chosen book is The Help by Kathryn Stockett.
Thursday 24 February 2011, 2-3pm
http://www.lewisham.gov.uk/LeisureAndCulture/Libraries/OurServices/WhoWeAre/ManorHouseLibrary.htm”>Manor House library

Have you read any of these books? Let us know your thoughts.

The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters

What they say about it:

Gordon Dahlquist’s debut novel is a big, juicy, epic that will appeal to Diana Gabaldon fans and lovers of literary fantasy, like Keith Donohue’s The Stolen Child. The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters begins with a “Dear Jane” letter in which Celeste Temple learns of the end of her engagement. Curiosity leads her to follow her fiancé to London where she uncovers a secret.

She sets off to do a bit of espionage to find out why he suddenly changed his mind (crucial information he neglected to include in his note), which lands her in a whole heap of trouble. She quickly discovers that her mild-mannered (but ambitious) Roger has become mixed up with a sinister group that has invented a technique for mind-control.

The villains, collectively known as the Cabal, are onto the fact that she has discovered their plot, and are out to kill her. Two others have also unwittingly become enemies of the Cabal, namely the half-blind assassin known as Cardinal Chang, and the German doctor Abelard Svenson. It’s up to this unlikely trio to stop the Cabal’s evil plans for world domination.

What I thought about it:

A usually voracious reader, I haven’t posted in some time because I was wading through this book. On paper it had everything I want in a book, a bit of sy-fy, a bit of victoriana, murder and intrigue. It started off well but I soon got completely bogged down and confused. By page 700 I no longer cared and was skim reading. I also have the sequel and I don’t know if I dare read it! And there is a rumoured movie scheduled for 2013.

I loved the central characters and felt that they had great potential. Basically, if they had cut half the pages it would have been a lot better. I still feel like I have no idea why they were bothered about blue glass, and why you would write a book on the subject. Has anyone else read it? Is it just me?

Helen Hilton

Available in Lewisham Libraries.