Fields and Fence Lines (Part Two)

A month ago I posted a piece in which, using the metaphor of fields and fence lines, I compared my talent to a field or pasture, and its limits as my fence lines. Fence lines that I could look over to see what was likely beyond my talent, and fences that I could, perhaps, climb over, if I cared to.

I believe I concluded that some of those fence lines were a matter of personal taste, while others defined the natural limits of my personality and intelligence. Let's explore more of those fence lines.

This installment talks about one fence line, at least, that pretty much insures I'm never going to write a book that will become a classic.

Great books, classics that last the test of time, usually have certain characteristics. Not all have all these characteristics, but have most do. When I look around the pasture of my talent, I don't see many/any of those characteristics. They are not in my skill set. I have to look over the fences to find them. Still let's have a look over the fence to see what I lack in this regard.

One of the adjacent pastures that, I think, would need be enclosed in the fences of one's talent in order to write classic great stories is that of intellectualism. One needs to think in terms of, and have a passion, for "themes." 

When I hear people talking about the truly great books one of its characteristic is often that the book offers deep themes that make them think, and/or challenge the way they think. There are even readers who, finding a story itself unpleasant to read, persist in doing so because they feel it's good for them. It offers lessons to be learned. They hold their nose and swallow their medicine. And pleasant or unpleasant they remember those books because of the thought-provoking themes linger long after they finish reading them. Books, when they click with a reader for whatever reason, stick in their minds long after they are read.

Alas, this type of story is on the far side of the fence for me. I'm not a great and deep thinker. I'd like to think that's a choice, but I'm not the one to say so. I just know that I am quite content not to waste time and words pondering questions with no answers, though I know is amuses many people. I am quite content to take life as it appears. I'm not curious enough to want to peek behind the curtain. 

It is the same when it comes to social issues. I've come to understand that everything takes time, usually much more time than we'd like to think it should take. Change happens at its own pace. Still, when I look at the big picture, the history of mankind is going in the right direction (left) slowly, but surely, even if it moves with all the speed of a glacier. Knowing this, I don't get too deeply wrapped up in all the fleeting issues of the day. Headlines, if that, are enough. Oh, and I'm not a very detail orientated person.

This mild mannered indifference extends to the study of humanity itself. I have no interest in human phycology and so I have nothing useful to say about us. I am quite content to take us as we appear on the surface. Basically, people are strange, and having said that, I'm content to leave there. 

My explanation, or excuse, for being content with my limits, content to stay in my pasture on these issues is that I'm an old and simple philosophical Taoist. I'm a "The Way That is Spoken is not The Way," sort of person. Instead of living by words, I live largely intuitively. I am content to "know" what I know without the need to put that knowledge into words, into a set of "facts." As I said above, I'm content to live with mysteries. And I don't do details.

So, in summery, I have no interest in exploring Western Philosophies, no interest in exploring current world or social affairs, or human psychology, no interest in exploring humanity; all great themes explored by great literature.  Nor do I have any special knowledge or brilliant insights to offer readers; i.e. things people claim to find in great literature, as well as in any book that people remember after they close that book. 

Given my lack of knowledge and interest in these subjects, I don't think I could leap this fence, write a heavy book, even if I wanted to. Which I don't. As a result, you'll find none - or little - of those things in my books; by choice as well as lack of talent. So, "Deep and/or Universal Themes" is unchecked in the checklist of the type of stories I can write.

Stay tuned for more unchecked boxes. There are more. Many more.

The Saturday Morning Post (No. 117) SUNDAY EXTRA!

 

This EXTRA! installment, marks a return to the Regency Romances of Georgette Heyer. 

My reviewer criteria. I like light, entertaining novels. I like smaller scale stories rather than epics. I like character focused novels featuring pleasant characters, with a minimum number of unpleasant ones. I greatly value clever and witty writing. I like first person, or close third person narratives. I dislike a lot of "head jumping" between POVs and flashbacks. I want a story, not a puzzle. While I am not opposed to violence, I dislike gore for the sake of gore. I find long and elaborate fight, action, and battle sequences tedious. Plot holes and things that happen for the convenience of the author annoy me. And I fear I'm a born critic in that I don't mind pointing out what I don't like in a story. However, I lay no claim to be the final arbitrator of style and taste, you need to decide for yourself what you like or dislike in a book.

Your opinions are always welcome. Comment below

Faro's Daughter by Georgette Heyer  C+

Faro is a game of chance, and the orphaned daughter in this book title is the niece of a widow who has turned her London house into an unofficial, and illegal gambling house. This venture has not gone well, and the aunt is in great debt. However, a young lord has fallen in love with her niece, who is, of course, viewed as not the thing by society. His mother fears that the niece will marry her son for his money, and requests that this young lord's older cousin, a rich man about town, try to buy off this gambling house's girl. He does, offering her money to drop his cousin, an offer which she finds insulting, since she had no intention of marrying him in the first place. And in mutual anger, they both set out to better each other in a game of wits. The ultimate end is predictable.

Tropes are both good and bad, or so I've been led to understand. Many readers, at least of genre books, expect to find the customary tropes of their genre in their stories, since they often are the essence of the genre fiction. On the other hand, an over reliance of them, or the use of generic tropes, is a sign of a less accomplished author. These Heyer Regency Romances all have her trademark tropes, which include a single, handsome, cool, competent and rather domineering male, and an unmarried, level-headed, young woman who, at first, dislikes the domineering male, but eventually falls for his masterful charm, and he for her beauty and common sense. Heyer has used this scenario with various variations, in her romances to date, which, taken in small doses, can be very entertaining. But, after a half dozen or more of these stories over the last several months, I've had my fill of them for now. It will be some time before I return to Heyer's romances. Still, I am going to give her mystery stories a try, though I'd have to drive down to the library to do that, since there are no ebook versions available at my library. Such a pain...

Note: I have done so, and as this is posted, I have one of her mysteries in hand. Review in a few months...

The Saturday Morning Post (No. 116)

 

This week a double feature, a two novel series by one of my old standbys. Do they hold up to expectations?

My reviewer criteria. I like light, entertaining novels. I like smaller scale stories rather than epics. I like character focused novels featuring pleasant characters, with a minimum number of unpleasant ones. I greatly value clever and witty writing. I like first person, or close third person narratives. I dislike a lot of "head jumping" between POVs and flashbacks. I want a story, not a puzzle. While I am not opposed to violence, I dislike gore for the sake of gore. I find long and elaborate fight, action, and battle sequences tedious. Plot holes and things that happen for the convenience of the author annoy me. And I fear I'm a born critic in that I don't mind pointing out what I don't like in a story. However, I lay no claim to be the final arbitrator of style and taste, you need to decide for yourself what you like or dislike in a book.

Your opinions are always welcome. Comment below. 

Bel Lamington by D E Stevenson  C

This book relates the life of the title character during a six month period. Bel is a twenty-something (four?) year old woman. Her parents were killed in a car crash, so she was raised by an aunt in the country. When her aunt died, she inherited just enough money to learn how to be a secretary to make an independent living. For two years she has been working for an importer in London as a typist, and eventually as the personal secretary of one of the partners in the firm. Lonely in the city, she still yearns for the country, and, like the cover art shows, had made a rooftop garden out one of her windows. There she meets a painter, who found his way there because he likes to climb mountains, and when in cities, climbs buildings and roofs. He talks her into posing for a painting. She briefly falls in love with him... and from there, has a variety of other experiences and trials at work and in her life, of which I won't spoil. It is a nice snapshot of the life of a single woman in London in the late 1950's.

My problem with this book, and indeed with the writing of D E Stevenson in general, is that she "reports," rather than spins her stories. By this I mean that she writes her stories in a rather cold, clinical, and unemotional way. Oh, her characters have lots of emotions, but her stories are often related with as much heart as a newspaper news article. Or at least that how it seems to me. Sometimes this unemotional storytelling is more evident in some stories than in others. It was evident in this story.

I find that many of her characters are not particularly likable. In this case, Bel is a strange mix of competence, and overwhelming timidness, such that I found it hard to reconcile who and what she was. She strikes everyone as levelheaded, but then acts in ways that are not at all level headed. For example she panics at the prospect of staying at a country inn when her boyfriend's car breaks down, because she doesn't like the look of the owner. While all this is quite possible, people are strange, after all, I find it hard to get into the mind of such a character and makes sense of the character. Plus, given Stevenson's very remote way of telling her story, I found it hard to care for her. But that's just me. 

The happy ending came as no surprise. But at least there is one.

Bel goes on to be featured in another D E Stevenson novel, the book below.

Fletchers End D E Stevenson  C

This second of the Bel Lamington novels features her friend, pictured on the cover. Bel gets married in this novel, and they buy an old house in the country known as Fletchers End. Over the course of the novel, we get to know the history of the house and the people who lived there. The romance of her friend with a rather irresponsible navy lieutenant commander adds what drama there is in the story.

My same remarks about the coolness of D E Stevenson's treatment of her characters and story in general apply here. What might have been a cozy story, is lost in the fairly heartlessness of its telling. The truth is that after these two books, I don't think I'll be all that eager to read more Stevenson books any time soon.

The Strangest Thing...

 

I was scrolling through my YouTube feed when I came across the video on the center left of the screen shot above. It proved to be an "album" of piano pieces by a Japanese composer/pianist, Yuriko Nakamura. Some music on YouTube Music also appears on You Tube channels and vise vera, and this is an example of that; a song with just a static version of the cover. I clicked on the video and found this;

The only reason I believe it appeared on my feed, was that I had been listening to some eastern music during my morning writing session on YouTube music. Which just goes to show you how much "they"  know about you and what you're up to, at least on the web.

And from there I went to the home page of the musician, and found this;

So why the curiosity?

It was the fact that the cover art for this collection of piano pieces is one of my paintings. Indeed the two covers on the left of the home page above are both my paintings. One is Upland Road in Winter which you can find HERE. The second one, Woods Along the Harniss Road you can view HERE.

Let me tell you, it is very strange experience to find your work as an the cover art of a Japanese new age-ish musician while scrolling through videos on YouTube. And rather cool as well.

The paintings were likely found on and downloaded from my DeviantArt gallery. It's a place where a lot of people go looking for art they can use. I don't watermark my paintings, and have no problem with people downloading them for their own use and enjoyment.

While I release all my work under a Creative Commons License, that license does require that if used, I be credited as the artist, and that it should not be used for commercial purposes without my permission. And since I was neither credited, nor was my permission sought to use it, and these videos and songs are commercial ventures for the benefit of, I presume, Yuriko, the use of my art is clearly not in accordance to the CC license. Hmmm...

Looking into the matter further, it appears that the music, along with the cover art, was uploaded to YouTube by Distrokid, a company that operates something like D2D, in that musicians use it to upload their work to music apps like YouTube and Spotify, whose Yuriko Nakamura page on Spotify is below also has my artwork for those albums.

From what I could find on the Distrokid site, the person uploading the music would also need to provide the cover art just like self-publishing authors do. Now I don't know who uploaded this music, whether it was Yuriko herself, or someone else, but in any event, I doubt I would have any easy way to reach out to them and at least request credit as the artist.

I suppose there could be some remedy for this, I could file a complaint with YouTube or some such thing, but I have no interest in pursuing anything like that. Why bother? Its use costs me nothing, and displays my work. Besides, I'm rather flattered that someone would choose my art for their album cover. Though I don't know exactly why they chose those particular ones, since I didn't see any title the paintings would apply to.

Besides, I am perfectly aware, and have been from the very beginning, that if you convert your analog work to digital and upload it to the internet, you have conceded control of it. Its use is out of your control, and there is no point losing sleep over that fact. I suppose, if you are trying to make money from your work, you might be tempted to try to find and put out all the little fires of piracy sites, but it is largely a futile effort. You'd best just look on it as free advertising.

So there you go, an illustration of how connected we are. Weirdly connected.

Strangely enough, I just used the Harniss Road piece for a recent posting myself.

The Saturday Morning Post (no. 115) SUNDAY EXTRA!

 

In this week's Extra! edition we return to a series for which I've reviewed three books already for one last adventure, though it happens to be the second book in the series....

My reviewer criteria. I like light, entertaining novels. I like smaller scale stories rather than epics. I like character focused novels featuring pleasant characters, with a minimum number of unpleasant ones. I greatly value clever and witty writing. I like first person, or close third person narratives. I dislike a lot of "head jumping" between POVs and flashbacks. I want a story, not a puzzle. While I am not opposed to violence, I dislike gore for the sake of gore. I find long and elaborate fight, action, and battle sequences tedious. Plot holes and things that happen for the convenience of the author annoy me. And I fear I'm a born critic in that I don't mind pointing out what I don't like in a story. However, I lay no claim to be the final arbitrator of style and taste, you need to decide for yourself what you like or dislike in a book.

Your opinions are always welcome. Comment below. 

The Body at the Tower by Y S Lee  B

As I mentioned in the lede, this is the second book in The Agency series, AKA a Mary Quinn Mystery. I've read the other three already, and reviewed them here, with their grades, book 1.(B) Book 3,(C+) and Book 4 (C) I have been getting these books from the library, and this book had, for some reason, a much longer waiting list, so it only became available three months after the others, and I didn't care to wait for it, so I read ahead.

I describe the first book, and subsequent books as rather over the top penny dreadfuls, but with an authentic flavor, being written by a scholar of the Victorian Era. They are also marketed as YA books, with a young, 18 year old heroine. 

The premise of these books is that "The Agency" is a private detective agency being run by two women who also run a school for orphan girls, training them to make a living in the male dominated Victorian Era. The best and brightest are offered the chance to become detectives, on the theory that women in that era were more or less invisible, and could investigate things without attracting attention.

This installment is perhaps the most down to earth one of the series, though the crime Mary Quinn is asked to solve involves a dead worker, and possible embezzlement or theft of building supplies, involving the building of what we usually just call "Big Ben", the clock tower of the Parliament Building. To investigate the questions surrounding the death of the worker from a fall from the tower during the night, Mary dresses up like a young boy and is hired as a helper to the bricklayers, who are clearly up to no good. Her romantic lead from book one returns from India, ill from the effects of malaria, and is hired to inspect the working of the construction on the tower for the inquest. Together, in an uneasy alliance, they begin to solve the case, along with a somewhat shady journalist, who shows up in later books as well. 

The writing is fine, the highlight is a fairly well rendered Victorian London, and some thrills and chills, without being quite so over the top as in the other books of this series. Considered as YA books, they are probably a better read for that market than for me, who doesn't read YA, except by carelessness, as in this case. Still, I don't regret my time with them.

The Saturday Morning Post (No. 114)

 

A work of historical fiction this time around, one that comes highly recommended by a number of fantasy booktubers.

My reviewer criteria. I like light, entertaining novels. I like smaller scale stories rather than epics. I like character focused novels featuring pleasant characters, with a minimum number of unpleasant ones. I greatly value clever and witty writing. I like first person, or close third person narratives. I dislike a lot of "head jumping" between POVs and flashbacks. I want a story, not a puzzle. While I am not opposed to violence, I dislike gore for the sake of gore. I find long and elaborate fight, action, and battle sequences tedious. Plot holes and things that happen for the convenience of the author annoy me. And I fear I'm a born critic in that I don't mind pointing out what I don't like in a story. However, I lay no claim to be the final arbitrator of style and taste, you need to decide for yourself what you like or dislike in a book.

Your opinions are always welcome. Comment below.

The Last Kingdom by Bernard Cronwell   B-

The Last Kingdom is a story about the youth of Conan the Barbarian, that is to say, Uhtred, son of Uhtred. Rather than a sword and sorcery story, it is a historical novel set in 9th century England when England was being invaded, occupied, and partially subjugated by the Danes, often called the Vikings. That said, Uhtred and Conan seem to have very much in common as fictional characters.

The story is told by Uhtred, son of Uhtred from the vantage point of his old age. It begins when he is 10 years old, the second son of an English nobleman of the north of England. Three Danish ships are spotted and his father, Uhtred, sends his eldest son, Uhtred, son of Uhtred, to spy on them. This sone does something foolish, gets himself killed, so our narrator is given his dead elder brother's name, Uhtred, son of Uhtred, as was custom. His father is then called to raise a force to fight the invading Danes and he takes Uhtred et. al. along, though he's only a boy of 10. They lose that battle. His father is killed. However, Uhtred, seeing the Dane leader who brought his brother's head back to taunt the elder Uhtred,  attacks him with his little sword. This amuses the Dane, Ragnar, who then takes him prisoner and raises him much like a son.

Uhtred finds life as a Dane appealing. He wants to be a warrior, and warriors the Danes are. Over the course of the next six years, he becomes a Dane, and a third son to Ragnar, and serves the Danes in their wars against the English, though in his heart he still believes himself an Englishman. And, as the heir of of a noble, he hopes to regain his rightful place in England.

Telling the story from the view point of Uhtred in his old age, allows Cornwell to prove a historical perspective to the events and people the young Uhtred meets in the ten years this book covers, something he could not do if written from the young Uhtred's point of view. And it is very clear that he wants to write a history of these times and uses the eyes and memory of Uhtred to do so. Uhtred's story is a vehicle for telling the history of the time. He is given various adventures that serve to move him about the land so as to view the history and people Cordwell wishes to write about. As such, less attention is paid to him as a character, though Cornwell does try to give him some depth, such as his dual loyalties to this Danish foster-family and his claims to be an English noble, who's land had been usurped by his uncle. Still, his character comes across as somewhat shallow. He's merely a warrior very much in the mold of Conan; a simple barbarian who loves to fight, rape, and murder like the Danes he was raised by.

This is a finely written book that moves along at a nice pace, which earns it is B grade. It has a lot of history to tell of the period when Alfred the Great ruled southern England, and resisted the Danish invaders. Cornwell went on to write 12 more Uhtred novels in this series known variously as the Saxton Chronicles, the Warrior Chronicles, or The Last Kingdom, from the TV series that adopted 10 of the books. 

That said, I have no desire to read more of them. Perhaps, if I had seen the TV show, I might have a different opinion. Or not. As I have implied, Uhtred, as a character, is very much a clone of Conan the Barbarian; someone who loves battle and killing his enemies. Other than his love of battle, and scheming, there's not a lot to like about him, for my taste. 

There are a number of battle scenes in the book, which, as I have often mentioned, I just skip over, as I can't picture them - making them a waste of my time. Plus, I'm not a fan of old men telling stories of their youth, tossing in hints of what's to come. Which is to say, I'm not a fan of foreshadowing. These negative factors are which earns it its " - " grade. However, I recognize that all of these things I don't like, are things a lot of readers love, so if you are one of them, give this book a try, knowing that if you love it, you have a dozen other books to read with Uhtred. You won't have to leave the 9th century anytime soon.

Books I've Read So Far In 2025

With half of the year having slipped by, I thought I would talk a little bit - without too many spoilers for upcoming Saturday Morning Post reviews - about what I've read this year so far.

At the time of this posting, I started 40 books so far in 2025. I did not finish 8 of those, so I read 32 books as of now. Last year I read in total 48 books, so I'm reading at a slightly faster pace than last year. I am also ahead in the number of books I DNFed, since the total for all of 2024 was 5 and I'm already at 8 only half way into the year. There is a simple explanation for the jump in DNFs that I'll touch on in a minute.

First the books I read. Below is the list of the books I've reviewed to date The first number in the listing is the Saturday Morning Post number of the review. I still have 15 more Saturday Morning posts written for the rest of the books I've read, or attempted to read. Clearly, I'm going to have to start releasing "Extras!" posts again, since I'm now nearly four months behind my reading in posting my reviews. I like a backlog, but I don't need four months worth.

Below is a list of the books which I've read so far this year, and have posted reviews of. The most recent review is on the top. The number before the title is that Saturday Morning Post (Number)

Blog Post # Title -Author-grade

113 New York Minute Stephen Aryan C

112 An Infamous Army Georgette Heyer C

111 Convenient Marriage Georget Heyer DNF 31%

       Emma Jane Austen DNF 6%

110 Winter Journeys Audrey Driscoll B

109 What Comes of Attending Commoners Ball Elisabeth Aimee Brown DNF 55%

108 The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Vol 7 Beth Brower A

The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Vol Beth Brower A

107 The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Vol 5 Beth Brower A

The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Vol 6 Beth Brower A

106 The Old World, Book One, By the Hands of Men Roy M Griffis C

105 The Wizard’s Butler Nathan Lowell DNF 29%

104 The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Vol 3 Beth Brower A

The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Vol 4 Beth Brower A

103 The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Vol 1 Beth Brower A

The Unselected Journals of Emma M Lion Vol 2 Beth Brower A

102 John Nuclear at the Perihelion Palace Berthold Gambrel B

101 The Devil’s Cub Gerogette Heyer B

100 Brother Cadfael’s Penance B

99 Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen C+

98 The Reluctant Widow by Georgette Heyer B+

97 The Quiet Gentleman by Georgette Heyer B+

96 Friday’s Child by Georgette Heyer A

95 Mansfield Park by Jane Austen B-

94 These Old Shades by Georgette Heyer B+

93 Eye of the Needle by Ken Follett DNF (40%)

92 The Toll-Gate by Georgette Heyer B

91 Black Sheep by Georgette Heyer B+

90 The Dawning of Everything by David Graeber & David Wengrow DNF

Despite a DNF to start the year, as you can see, my reading year took off strong, even with the 4 books I DNF'ed. The list includes lots of "B"s, and then we get to those 8 Emma M Lion A books. with their "A" grades. And I enjoyed the first Georgette Heyer books as well. However, my most recent reads of her books have not fared as well going forward. 

However, like the Heyer books, all my reading has taken a turn for the mediocre. Going through the list of the upcoming reviews, I see that I have another 4 DNFs, to bring the yearly total to 8, with only 4 "B"s and no "A" books. The remaining books, 10 books in all, are "C"s of one sort or another with one movie review. In short, not a single book to write home about in the last couple of months. The saving grace of this period of book reading, was that I had gone back and reread the Emma M Lion series. Just as good, if not better, the second time around. No doubt it casts a long shadow.

Much of this downturn can be explained by the fact that I am exploring books that are out of my usual orbit of reading. This includes a number of classic authors and books, as well as some odd one-offs. For example, one book was suggested by neighbor, as well as several suggested by one or two of the booktubers I follow. And it also includes a first draft of a book by an author that I did not expect to like, but was curious anyway. There were also two books I reread that did not live up to my expectations. In short, my reading has been somewhat all over the bookish landscape, sampling this and that, mostly based on recommendations and a "What the heck" attitude. Prospecting is a risky venture. Sometime you discover gold, other times... "C"s and DNFs

I must confess I'm getting rather weary of "C" books, and fruitless quests to find new authors to read. I have a book on hold at the library from a new author recommended to me, but beyond that, I've grown rather leery of the recommendations I've been coming across on booktube. I think I'm in the mood to start pulling out some old favorites from my shelves. What's the point of having a library if not to keep the books you love, close at hand to reread again?

As a bonus feature, below is a map I came across of fictional London's St Crispian's as featured in The Uncollected Journals of Emma M Lion by Beth Brower.

Source: https://emma-m-lion.fandom.com/wiki/St._Crispian%27s