by SB Sarah • Wednesday, December 31, 2008 at 01:15 AM
What a perfect way to end the year: DocTurtle finishes another review.
Part 5: Chapters 20 through 26
All things must come to an end, and so it is with Heyer’s tale of Waterloo. After several truly engaging chapters, we come down from the mountaintop and finish out with a series of chapters focusing on the battle itself. Eighty-eight straight pages of blow-by-blow on the battlefield! Ouch. I wouldn’t mind a few highlights, but I’ll be damned if Heyer doesn’t tell us of every last little manoeuvre either side makes. I’ll go light on the details below.
Ready?
Here we go…
Chapter 20. It’s just a flesh wound
The chapter begins at the Worths’. Charles has returned from the front lines in order to spew some expository dialogue and show off his first war wound, a small scratch on his upper arm. “Trying to rally those damned Dutch-Belgians!” he complains. Sheesh...if only every soldier were a British soldier, eh? After all, a British tar is a soaring soul, as free as a mountain bird! Etc., etc.
After updating his hosts on the martial goings-on, Charles leaves with half of the Worths’ larder. His parting words to his sister-in-law are meant to lead us astray: “Judith, if you should see Miss Devenish...I wish you will tell her that you have seen me tonight, and that all is well.” And then to Bab: “I believe you friend Lavisse to be unhurt. I should have told you before.”
As the Cockney coppers might say, “what’s all this, then?”
Then it’s Lucy’s turn to knock up the Worths. It would appear that she couldn’t give a fig for Charles and is more interested in…
...“ ‘George?’ gasped Judith, grasping a chairback for support...‘He is my husband!’ Lucy said… ‘Last year—in England!’ ”
Well I’ll be. You don’t say. Huh.
Chapter 21. Wherein DocTurtle begins skimming
Um. Yeah.
I think I actually made it to the middle of page 370 (14 pages into the chapter) before I lost it and wrote “Blah blah blah...” in the margin.
At the bottom of that page I’ve written “toledoth,” a Hebrew word meaning “generations”: there are points in the Torah where for verse after verse after verse there’s nothing more than so-and-so begetting so-and-so begetting so-and-so until there’s no telling who is whose fifth cousin three times removed on the mother’s side.
So it is with the paragraph that begins “On this plateau, drawn back en potence to guard the right flank of the line, was Lord Hill’s Second Army Corps” and ends “Colonel Mitchell’s which was formed on the West of the Nivelles road, covering the avenue which led to the great north gate of Hougoumont.”
And it goes on, for another 10 pages after that.
But we couldn’t leave the chapter without the froidest display of sang yet seen, as Charles’s friend Gordon replies to Colonel Audley’s query about the artillery fire: “What do you call this?” “Damned noisy!”
I say!
Chapter 22. More
All you need to know about this chapter is that (1) Belgians are really cowardly, (2) Scotsmen are really brave, and (3) lots and lots and lots of people die.
Chapter 23. Yet more
Twenty-four pages more, to be precise. Herein Charles receives his second wound en courant, a shrapnel blast to the thigh.
About the only other event of note as far as our principals is concerned is Harry Alastair’s death. Bab’s younger brother. Damned shame. He was a nice kid, if a bit cocky. “I shall see you later, I daresay,” are his last words to Charles. English to the end!
Chapter 24. Guess what? More!
Yup. If we didn’t already know that the Lowlanders are a covey of craven cow-eyed kids, we’d know it by this chapter’s close. The Dutch flee in terror while the Brits try to rally them. And so forth.
On page 343 Charles receives his coup de grâce as an artillery shell all but takes his arm off.
As he’s forcing himself to his feet once more his arch-rival Lavisse gallops up.
“Parbleu! it is you then?”
“Hallo, Lavisse! Get me a horse, there’s a good fellow!”
“A horse! You need a surgeon, my friend!”
After a quick tit-for-tat, Lavisse agrees to complete Charles’s last mission for him, and the erstwhile enemies bury the hatchet in the bloody soil south of Waterloo.
Wouldn’t life be more interesting if we each had our own personal arch-rival? I think so.
Exeunt.
Chapter 25. Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Hey, look! Interesting stuff is happening! One could lose an eye with all the loose ends flying around, but somehow they all end up tied together.
Most of Brussels has by now migrated to Antwerp, but the Worths remain.
Judith (known as “Miss Fickle” to her friends) has had a complete change of heart regarding Bab: “You are unjust, Worth! For my part, I am persuaded that she repents bitterly of all that has passed. Oh, if only Charles is spared, I shall be so glad to see him reunited to her!” (I know I haven’t commented on Ms. Heyer’s exclamation marks lately, but boy howdy!)
Meanwhile Lucy’s aunt and uncle show up and let the Worths know that Lucy’s come clean to them.
And Bab’s grandfolks, the Duke and Duchess of Avon, make a grand entrance and a grand scene. Since Lucy’s family’s had to, you know, actually work for their money, they’re not good enough for the Alastairs. Says g-pops to Bab, “what’s this damnable story I hear about that worthless brother of yours?”
The Duchess is a bit more forgiving, reminding her husband that “you made a shocking mésalliance yourself,” hinting at how he’d married beneath his social standing as well.
Meanwhile meanwhile, the royal pair congratulate Bab on extricating herself from Charles, but she’ll have none of it: “Your congratulations are out of place. I never did anything more damnable in my life.”
For the next several pages there’s much coming and going and hemming and hawing and oooo-arrring and harrumphing. At last Worth announces that he’s off to fetch Charles, who’s been very badly wounded.
As it happens, they’ve had to remove his arm (I promise to make no jokes about Bab’s disarming smile). Worth brings him back and they install him upstairs to convalesce.
Chapter 26. England expects, and so do we
Charles is laid up, slowly recovering. “It’s a lucky thing it was only my left,” quips Charles about his missing limb. “It has been a most unfortunate member. I was wounded in it once before.” Such sanguinity!
Several important people call on him while he lies at rest, including that demigod, the Duke of Wellington, himself. “Well! We have given the French a handsome dressing!”
Vinaigrette?
At any rate, two pages from our story’s end, Charles finally slips a ring on Bab’s quivering finger. Not one to let history be one-upped, Heyer makes our Happily Ever After fade into a scene of the Duke scribbling away, blowing the whistle on the brigades that deserted in the line of duty.
Overall?
Whew.
I’d give it high marks for exquisite language, lovely prose, and excellent imagery. Heyer writes magnificently well and shows superb mastery of her idiom. Her tone throughout is almost invariably delicate and genteel, yet she manages to bring forth appropriate brutishness where needed, as in some of the bloodier battle scenes. Her dialogue is sharp and witty, but for the most part believable.
I’d give it a mixed grade for characterization: at times Heyer was riding high (Chapter 15 was marvelous), her characters rich and deep; at other times it was as if she couldn’t be bothered, and her characters were little more than one-dimensional ciphers. I’m most disappointed in Lucy and George, whose personages were only scantily sketched throughout the novel.
I’d give it poor marks for pacing and plot: eighty-eight straight pages of gore and guts is a little much, and moreover it took well over a hundred pages before I really began to care about some of the characters.
All in all, maybe a low, inconstant B or B-minus. At its best (which didn’t last long enough) it was delightful and fun to read, and at its worst it was a tiresome slog. That said, if this is one of her worst books, I’d definitely be up for trying out one of her better ones. Of course, I’m sure you’d all rather I tackle something in a different genre for my next set of reviews, so my next Heyer will likely be read off-record.
by SB Sarah • Tuesday, December 30, 2008 at 01:36 PM
Author Leslie Kelly wrote me with a bummer of a story:
I just found out (too little too late!) that on Christmas night, Sirius XM radio had a 4 hour read-aloud of a Christmas story I did for eHarlequin last year! (This on top of finding out that the thing was offered as a free audio book from audible.com for the past month!)
Anyway, I had no idea, would have absolutely loved to listen, and was just wondering if anybody out there in romance land actually heard any of it. Is there any teeny-tiny way you could ask on SBTB?
I only found out because somebody wrote to tell me about the Audible offer, so I googled the story, and this popped up. Major bummer, I had about 20 members of my family here on Christmas night...what an absolute blast to turn on the radio and hear one of “Leslie’s little stories” being read out loud.
So - did anyone happen to tune in to their Sirius radio and hear her story? How was it? And DUDE how much of a bummer is that!
by SB Sarah • Tuesday, December 30, 2008 at 10:46 AM
Sarah’s too close to the phone, Jane is driving, and we’re recording our conversation. Want to listen in?
This is the feed to the podcast and you can click on this link to add it to iTunes. We can’t curse on the podcast due to iTunes content restrictions. (Dammit fuck).
Feel free to give us content suggestions, tips on how to do this whole thing better, or general wtf-ery comments. It’s all welcome because a) we are new to this and b) we don’t really know what we are doing so the wtf comments are probably all valid. The email address for the podcast is .
The challenge of time continuity is epic fun in the “What?” department. We reference Dahl’s book and the Save the Contemporary as “in progress” because this was recorded before we launched the contest - and we talk about layoffs “this week” when in fact publishing is closed for the holidays. Whee! Newbie errors, we has them!
As Jane says, we are the picture of amateurs. Come watch us grow! Or, listen, as the case may be.
We’re going to be making this a regular feature in 2009, so let us know what you think. This podcast is brought to you by the letters W, T, and F, and by Morgan from Miss Media Productions .
by SB Sarah • Tuesday, December 30, 2008 at 05:26 AM
I think the word “looms” is hilarious for some reason. Deadlines definitely loom over me. They’re creepy like someone standing way too much in my personal space. But enough about me and my personal space issues: Videomo Contest Entries are due 1 January by midnight EST.
If you’ve made a Videomo and it’s not among the ones listed on our YouTube channel please please please asap so I can make sure to catch it and add it to our lineup.
Remember - winner gets Teh Kindle and a heaping pile of the people’s ovation and fame forever. Good luck!
by SB Sarah • Tuesday, December 30, 2008 at 04:28 AM
Our Grade:
Title: Embracing the Moonlight
Author: Wayne Jordan
Publication Info: Kimani Press 2006, ISBN: 1583147810
Genre: Contemporary Romance
When I redid the re-captioning of Wayne Jordan’s book from the Uncyclopedia definition of romance, the book itself caught my eye. The synopsis sounded very interesting, so I ordered it.
Mason Sinclair is recovering from a terrible injury sustained in the line of duty when his mother tells him that the man the thought was his father was not, and that he has three brothers he never knew about. Lianne Thomas is undercover protecting a little boy and his mother. They’re both in Barbados. Could this potentially rock? It seemed to me that yes, oh yes, it could. Caribbean setting? Law enforcement protagonists? Multiple plots of family history, intrigue, suspense and pretending you are someone you’re not while discovering you’re someone else entirely?
Oh, yes yes yes.
Unfortunately the book itself didn’t live up to my expectations, and despite my attempts to keep reading, it never caught my attention. The clumsy development of characters, the klutzy plotting, and the narration undermined my anticipation of the plot itself to the point where I didn’t finish it.
The biggest problem with this book is way too much telling, heavy-handed, broad-sweeping telling, with so little showing, it’s a wonder the character doesn’t break the fourth wall and tell me directly: “I’m a sensitive man! But no one understands me! But I value my family! But I’m all alone!”
The book starts with Mason recuperating in the hospital bed by doing some serious navel gazing and dropping backstory in two ton segments into the reader’s lap:
Mason wished his father were still alive. It was moments like these when he wanted his father. Sure, he was forty years old, but his heart ached for the man who’d be there for him for as long as he could remember.
Whew! What’s that smell? Foreshadowing?
He had been unable to imagine life without the man who’d been there for him. The pain had lessened over the years, but memories of the times they’d spent together were still vivid.
Ok, got it. Father = important. Moving on.
At least there was something to look forward to today. His mother was coming. A visit from his mother had become one of the highlights of his life. She had been in England or Europe when he’d been shot. He hadn’t wanted to take her away from her latest young lover, and he knew there would be one. His mother was never without her latest boy toy.
Wha? Ok. Father = important. Mother = dilettante ho!
His mother had also been devastated by his father’s death. She had, however, chosen to bury her sorrow in working with her charity organization and roaming the planet. While Mason didn’t approve of his mother’s lifestyle, he reasoned that she did so only to ease the pain of losing his dad.
Mason was looking forward to the visit. He needed someone to talk to and, despite everything, he loved his mother.
She’d make everything all right.
Dude, you are 40 years old, your mother flits about Europe with boy toys working for “her charity organization” and while you don’t approve of her “lifestyle” you want her to make everything all right?
This is not a hero I want to read about, not at ALL. Anyone working through a horrible injury is entitled to navel gazing and maudlin self-pity, but COME ON NOW. Confusing infodumping descriptions does not a complex character make. At this point I’m tired of his whining and have no interest in the mother or whatever the “everything” is that despite it he still loves his mom.
After reading more than a few categories, I’m pretty accustomed to the degree of info dumping that setups up a plot within the category format. This went beyond mere infodumpery into backhoe-shovel sized wallops of confusing detail that made me like the narrator less and the additional characters not at all.
The heroine isn’t much to entice me either, despite the potential of a plot that could have been amazing.
Her partner, Brent, was due back tomorrow. Returning to work a day early had been a good idea. She wanted to be re-acclimatized before he returned. Leanne prided herself on always being prepare, and even though they had been partners for several years, she’d only allowed him in to a very small part of her life.
Anyone miss that? She’s annoying but more importantly Brent is NOT competition for Whine Mason and his Gazed Upon Navel.
At this point I stopped reading. I could barely take their own ruminations; I didn’t want to endure them potentially speaking to other people. I was more annoyed and frustrated than curious, and most of all disappointed that a plot setup that could have featured a strong, capable woman and a complex man faced with a family he never knew about was in practice compromised by awkward development and contradictory, confusing description. It’s a rare thing, but this is a DNF/F.
