Elegance by Kathleen Tessaro

 

So, my only excuse is that the last three months have literally whizzed by. I realised only last week that yesterday was Father's Day, and I thought, 'ahh the perfect opportunity to finish Elegance and post my review - this way I could still dedicate the post to a parents day' (it would've still been dedicated to my mum)... So I apologise Ma, here's your post.

I usually tell you when/where/why I brought the book I'm writing about - in all honestly I cannot remember at what point in my life I came to have this book in my possession - so instead I'll tell you about what the book has sparked in me in this particular point in time. I've been reflecting on my writing in relation to my Ma... I started writing creatively when I was 16 with the hope that one day I'd be a published writer with the book I had started to write (I won't give the title away) - Ma wrote in my birthday card for my 17th birthday that she couldn't wait for it to be published and (I quote) 'to get a move on with writing it' - 5 years later, I'm yet to finish it. After a lapse in all creative writing, I started write again last year, and felt that I was a completely different person to my 16year old self and to continue writing 'that story' didn't feel right, I had a 'Dear Me' moment (see below).  Too much has happened in the past five years for me not to be a different writer, with different motives, intentions, beliefs and experiences I want to share. So Ma, one day I will have a published novel - that is still absolutely one of my goals in life.

As well as this post having significance to the person I wanted to dedicate it to, it's quite significant to the book itself and the main character - Louise Canova.

Louise is a native American, living in London, who we see grow and develop (as we do with all well written characters) - we see a number of life changes and painful decisions that she makes. Her goals and motives for doing things changed. She re-evaluates her life and she gets on with it. Her aid throughout the novel, is a book called Elegance by Madame Genevieve Antoine Dariaux which she found lying around in a dusty bookshop. This book is effectively a self help guide (or at least that's how Louise treats it) and an A to Z as to what constitutes as being elegant in both appearances and in life.

From the extracts Tessaro uses from Dariaux's Elegance she's cleverly woven Louise's life around them, created some real laugh out loud moments as well as some absolute tear jerking moments. Does this constitute as an intertextual text? I'm not sure. It is really unique in this relatively tired genre (it was published in 2004, Dariaux's book was published in 1964- its stood the test of time in the 21st Century context), so I really love that aspect of it. Similarly to the way Tessaro uses the extracts in the book and the way Louise uses the book, I dipped in and out of reading this text because it allowed me too. Just like an old friend you may not have spoken to in ages, if the chemistry and foundations are there - whenever you meet up for a chat it should feel seamless. That exactly how I felt with this book, I was able to pick up exactly where I left off 'seamlessly'.

Louise crafts a new identity, which I and I'm sure Madame Dariaux, believe for any healthy person, is a perpetual part of life. You shouldn't live an unhappy life and if you've the power to change it and be brave enough to change it then by all means you should. Louise proves this, Madam Dariaux proves this and so does my Ma.
I really recommend it as a reserved pick me up, it's effortless throughout, I love both Tessaro's and Madame Dariaux's style of writing - Elegance book with a lot of beauty and style (just like the lady on the cover). The quote at the top is the first thing you read when you open the book, it set the tone perfectly - and I completely agree with it. xxx


Tessaro.K, 'Elegance' (2004) HarperCollins; London
Galliano, J., (2009) 'Dear Me, A Letter To My Sixteen-Year-Old self'. Simon & Schuster: London



Elegance - Happy Mother's Day

The next novel I will write on is Elegance by Kathleen Tessaro. I’ve chosen this as a dedication for Mothers day...  My mother absolutely epitomizes elegance, so let’s hope it’s a good read... xx

Very Valentine by Adriana Trigiani



Yep, I ate all of those chocolate hearts after taking this pic :)

 So three weeks after Valentine’s day here’s my valentine-y post... it’s actually quite appropriate that I didn’t post the ‘Very Valentine’ post on (or around) valentine’s day because the novel wasn’t about Valentine’s day at all, instead it was about our heroine, a woman called Valentine. This teaches me to not judge a book by its cover as it can lead to pre-judgements about what to expect from the novel....

We follow the story of Valentine, a woman from a large Italian family who has to find her way through the trials of life - Romance, independence, fighting for her job and home and dealing with the many dramas of her huge family. Very Valentine was full of laughs and there was plenty to take away and think about.

Valentine and her Grandmother, Teodora, run the Angelini Shoe Company Greenwich Village. It comes to light fairly early on in the novel that the company which has been around since 1903 is on the verge of financial collapse. It’s up to Valentine and her grandmother to think of new innovative ways to bring the company back into the 21^st Century and save it from ruin and the claws of Valentine’s banker brother.

I really felt that in terms of what happening in our economic world this story-line was very fitting and I felt the struggle Valentine and her grandmother faced. There were so many dilemmas surrounding pride, integrity, the will to keep fighting for what you believe in and what’s true to your heart Let’s just say when the right opportunities presented themselves to these girls, boy did the seize them! (I’m not going to say how they manage to save themselves but let’s just say the Angelini shoe company wasn’t such a small player in the world of competing with the creations from the likes of Chanel and Dior ;) …)

I have to admit, there were several times where I did struggle to relate to Valentine as a character. I think in terms of personality and the ways she went about certain things are most certainly not the way I would never go about things – for example kissing men in Italy while you have quite a lovely man waiting for you back in New York City..? She was a good girl at heart and I loved her relationship with her grandmother. They were perfectly written - very human! Valentine’s mom, was a character that I think I would like to know in real life – she oozed the (cheap) glamour that we all try and stay away from (I hope), she was loveable and these three characters were the anchors of the novel.

As much as the story was about Valentine, her love dilemmas, her work, and living, and family situations, the character that stole my heart was Valentine’s grandma – Teodora. An Eighty year old woman, still working and just managing to keep her company and jetting off to Italy once a year to get the finest Italian materials for the shoes she makes and also to meet the second love of her life – Dominic Vechiarelli (wasn’t expecting that twist). Teodora kept her love a secret from everyone for ten years as she didn’t want them to feel hurt that she had found someone who made her happy after the death of the grandfather of the family (which is understandable). She was completely adorable and the most loving and empathetic of all the characters – so when she has a surprise proposal at the end of the novel, it’s just the icing on the cake!!

At the end of the novel we have a real heart warming scene as Teodora, Valentine and Valentine’s mom are looking on at the shop window, seeing the work they have been a part of their entire adult lives and feeling a sense of pride and accomplishment that can only come from something you’ve practically dedicated your life to. Yes - that’s how the novel ends, a cliff-hanger..? I think so...

p.s ...By the way who am I kidding? I’ll always be the one judging a book by its cover...

xxx

Very Valentine

 

So the next post is dedicated to Valentines day.. I know the last post was for Welsh Valentine's day, but what can I say there are plenty of days to spread and share the love. So I brought 'Very Valentine' back in February 2009. This was at a time where I was coming to the final slog just before the final final slog of my A-levels. To get to Sixth Form I used to have to walk across an asda car park to cut through on to the main road of my Sixth Form (glamorous, I know). So anyway I decided to take a detour and went into the supermarket for a bit of retail therapy (this story is just oozing glamour) and the place was heaving with endless valentines displays, hearts and a massive haze of red hit me...as did the beautiful lady and the beautiful dress and the beautiful shoes on the cover of 'Very Valentine'... I picked it up and four years later I'm taking it off the bookshelf and I'm finally reading it! I have to say I also brought 'The Holiday' on this crazy shopping expedition and that has become one of my absolute favourite films, not only because I love Jack Black and Cameron Diaz, but the writer Nancy Meyers just epitomises what I love about this type of fiction/cinematic text - it doesn't matter how trivial people think it is, it resonates on some level - if a text is doing that, it's doing something right... Anyway I hope to have finished the novel by the weekend, it's pretty hilarious and the plot has got me hooked - I think I'm on to a winner xx

The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford

I first heard about TPoL when watching the ‘Romance’ episode ‘The Delicious Miss Dahl’, Sophie Dahl’s cookery programme back in 2010 – She read an extract from the book *(see below) and I knew I had to get my hand on a copy of the book and let’s just say I ended up buying all five of the re-published Mitford books (the power of persuasion of a cookery show on the desire for literary purchases..?)...

So the novel is narrated by a woman called Fanny, cousin of the Radlett family; the novel is essentially about Linda Radlett and the highs and lows of her (love) life.  We follow the girls from their younger years all the way to adulthood; we see marriages, births, deaths, lots of laughs, cries and lessons in life. On reflection I would call this novel a coming of age narrative, as we follow all of the characters on their journies through life.

I was rooting for Linda throughout the whole novel, the girl who had all the dreams and plans of how her life was going to pan out, but as she got older and made various decisions, she had to deal with her life choices, and the consequences – including motherhood which she struggled with terribly. Linda is an old romantic, she’s in love with the idea of love and her life pretty much revolves around her want for love in her life.  Funnily enough, Linda reminds me of Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany’s, this whole ‘mission’ of finding the things in life which please oneself and that carefree attitude is what they both have in common... There are traces of Scarlett O’Hara present too, she too was a hopeless romantic... I have to say I really do admire the three women mentioned above and Linda’s younger sister Jassy because they really do follow through with what drives them in life (including travelling to America to marry an actor), going across the world find love may seem trivial and also maybe a privilege of the middles classes but all in all the bravery and the fearlessness shown are wonderful attributes to have in any character.

A female in the 1930’s and 1940’s was all about being ‘the angel in the house’, not to disgrace and to stick to the rules of the society you came from.  Linda, as well as the other Radletts (except Louisa – who did everything the ‘right way’), are all radical and creative with their lives in their own ways. 

So, Linda very willingly marries Tony (a Tory...urgh) against her parent’s wishes because she is so passionate about following her heart (and not so much her head). To show for this marriage, she has a little girl (who she abandons because she feels no connection) and the marriage ends in divorce.  A little while later she falls in love again, this time with Christian. He is completely selfish, but I think that is what the attraction is. He was so engrossed in his views on life and his writing and took every day at a time; he's the kind of distraction one wants from the reality of life. This is a short lived love and Linda soon realises she's made a mistake with Christian.  The man she realises she loves and who reciprocates her love and passion for love and life is Fabrice. She meets him in France and is torn from him on several occasions because of WW2. They end up having a child together, but Linda dies in childbirth and Fabrice doesn’t die too long after in the War... With each love she thought he was, what we would call, ‘the one’...

Mitford has created a gem here, beautifully written and she strikes so many chords – you can’t help but want Linda to triumph in love and when she finally does, it’s the end of the road for her. Fanny’s mother, who similarly to Linda wasn’t a great parent (she was only concerned with her own happiness prevailing in her life), makes a visit at the end of the novel and she sums up Linda’s (love) life perfectly...

‘But I think she would have been happy with Fabrice’, I said. ‘He was the great love of her life, you know.’

‘Oh dulling,’ said my mother, sadly. ‘One always thinks that. Every, every time.’

...Perfect...

* Sophie Dahl bringing Ms Mitford into my life -

‘She was filled with a strange, wild, unfamiliar happiness and knew that this was love. Twice in her life she had mistaken something else for it; it was like seeing somebody in the street you think is a friend, you whistle and wave and run after him, and it is not only not the friend, but not even very like him. A few minutes later the real friend appears in view, and then you can’t imagine how you ever mistook that other person for him.’ 

This quote speaks such a truth that can’t be worded any better in my opinion...

 

p.s Happy St Dwynwen's day for last Friday :)

Mitford.N ‘The Pursuit of Love’ (2010) [1945]. Penguin: London

 

A belated Happy New Year!!

Hello everyone...

So its been a while since I last posted anything - the life of a working and commuting lady has taken over (yes, I got a job - I'm working in publishing and loving it!)... although I never thought being a student was quite as relaxing until I started working, which clearly tells you what kind of a student I was!  So, due to my complete lack of stamina with life and old age creeping up on me - it saddens me to say I have neglected 'BookCoverBeauty'.. One of my New Years resolutions is to do more blogging and to dedicate each post (if I can) to someone or something in my life whom I am very glad to have met or experienced for whatever reason. 

Over New Year I went to Paris and fell in love with a bookshop called 'Shakespeare and Company', as much as I would have liked to have spent lots of money and time in Chanel and Dior and Jean-Paul Gaultier and the list goes on... I'm glad I spent my time in 'Shakespeare and Company'... this little visit reignited my verve for literature and being surrounded by new and old (slighly battered looking) books, and to get back on with blogging and getting myself lost in literature... Here's a little fact about Shakespeare and Company, they were responsible for publishing Joyces' 'Ulysses' when no-one else would take it on, knowing this I knew this was going to be the highlight of Paris for me..

 

Little old me getting stuck into books...(quite literally)

This quote is on one of the walls in the shop... it's perfect.

 

Back to BCB, the first six chapters of 'The Pursuit of Love' have been read and I will be posting my review this week.  To be more specific, the post will dedicated to Friday 25th January - Welsh Valentines day...St Dwynwen's Day...and a certain Ms Poole, a young woman from Wales who is just brilliant! (you can follw her at http://bookandbiscuit.com).

xxx

The Pursuit of Love

Sneaky look at 'The Pursuit of Love' and you guessed it - I love her!... (the hat, hair, gloves, the expression on her face)