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Reading Life: 12th April 2023

A photograph of Hever Castle's gardens

Allow me another of these in such a fairly short period of time. I’m deep into Voyager now, 300 or so pages in but it’s got to the good bit (where you know it will go if you’ve read the second book) and so I’m reading it in earnest. I’ve been watching season 2 of the show, and may well start watching season 3 within the next few days, just staying behind where I’m up to in the book. I’m still finding reading and then watching very satisfying and my high opinion of the show and the changes they’ve made continues to stay the same.

Book cover of Diana Gabaldon's Voyager, book three in the Outlander series

Spoilers incoming for Dragonfly In Amber: The one thing I’m really struggling with, on both sides as it happens now (which in many ways is another plus for the show because they are faithful to the book the majority of the time) is Roger and Brianna’s relationship. I’m thinking of writing a dedicated post on this but having spent time mulling it over I wonder if the reason has to do with the relationship being relatively mundane and ‘normal’ when compared to a heady and exciting time traveller romance where the focus on the handsome historical man is rather paramount. I wonder whether the fact that Roger and Brianna are present day (well, 1968 to be exact) is part of it, and I wonder whether their relationship is very bog standard and unexciting deliberately to either further highlight the romance between Claire and Jamie or as some sort of comment on the fact that Claire and Jamie’s is a once-in-a-blue-moon, literally fantastical relationship, whereas Roger and Brianna are realistic (well, beyond their capacity to time travel, as it appears they will be doing… and I’ve seen the screenshots of the show of them in historical dress). That latter thought, though, is, I realise, me applying literary thought to the book where it may not be warranted. I really hope the chemistry improves – for starters, I badly need to see more of them to start believing it, and this is where I think the show will do better than the books as the TV team were quicker to show a variety of viewpoints than Gabaldon is in her novels.

Book cover of Chloe Gong's These Violent Delights

Having finished Orlando Ortega-Medina’s The Fitful Sleep Of Immigrants – which I did very much enjoy – I started Chloe Gong’s These Violent Delights. It has started pretty strongly but a little confusing in terms of motives for the characters, who in this book are gang members – the story is based on Romeo And Juliet – and I’m hoping for a strong set of reasons to feel empathy for the characters beyond the fact of their relationship to Shakespeare. The commentary surrounding colonialism, various countries taking their slice of Shanghai, and China in general, has a lot of promise.

My next book was supposed to be Amanda Prowse’s All Good Things but I’ve had a time of it on the download attempts front and so am not sure if that will happen – Chloe Gong’s book is me moving on in my reading for now. One I have added and successfully downloaded however, is Phoebe McIntosh’s DominoesAndrew Blackman wrote a very positive review of Dominoes on his blog and so I went looking for a copy. I’m very excited to get started on it.

What are you looking forward to reading after your current book?

 
 

Helen

April 12, 2023, 11:51 am

I had similar feelings about Roger and Brianna when I first started reading the series. I found them quite boring to read about and I resented the amount of time spent on them when we could be spending it with Claire and Jamie instead. Gradually I started to warm to them and somewhere around the fifth or sixth book, Roger in particular ended up being one of my favourite characters, so hopefully you’ll have the same experience!

Charlie

April 12, 2023, 3:32 pm

Yes, that – I’m wanting more Claire and Jamie, though that is what Gabaldon offered from the start so it’s understandable. I’m glad to hear you warmed up to them, even if it took a few books, and hope that I will indeed have the same experience! I do think Roger has a lot of promise, particularly due to his narratives starting in Dragonfly In Amber, and it’s interesting reading your comment because I recently read some opinions of people (though they may have been based on the show) who didn’t like Roger at all due to how he becomes. Not something I have the knowledge to have an opinion on yet but all I’ve seen so far is that’s he’s good.

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