Feel free to share your general thoughts and opinions on the book - the plot, the characters, the style of writing, the setting, whatever strikes you. Also, you're invited to reference any scenes or passages you found memorable (for whatever reason).
If you'd prefer to answer questions rather than write freestyle, here are some:
1. Did you like the book? Why or why not?
2. Would you read it again or recommend it to a friend?
3. Who was your favorite character, and why?
4. Did it make you think? What about?
5. Did it make you happy or sad, afraid or hopeful...what did it make you feel, was there an overall impression when you finished it?
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10 comments:
I stink at reading with a deadline...I just can't seem to get into a book right now. I'm sorry.
1. Did you like the book? Why or why not?
Yes, I liked it. I liked the way different time periods and characters were woven together, and I liked the setting and voice of the book.
2. Would you read it again or recommend it to a friend?
Yes, I'd read it again and recommend it.
3. Who was your favorite character, and why?
Although I could relate to Helena in many ways, I found Diana to be my favorite character. One reason: She was a strong but flawed woman. She made some weak decisions because of her flaws, but in the end, her strength saved her and she found absolution.
4. Did it make you think? What about?
Yes, it made me think...about time and love and history and prejudice and politics and gender and marriage and motherhood and betrayal and forgiveness and truth. That's about it. :o) Oh! And it made me realize in a fuller sense that we never know people, not REALLY - we never know all their meaningful and colorful history, personality, and potential - unless we get beneath the surface and, letting go of our preconceptions and prejudices, really examine their life with open and honest (and hopefully, *kind*) eyes.
5. Did it make you happy or sad, afraid or hopeful...what did it make you feel, was there an overall impression when you finished it?
I was happy about the verdict and the conclusion to all the research in the present day to verify the verdict (trying not to give the plot away!!). I was sad for Helena - she didn't seem to grow much. She learned a lot ABOUT Diana, but I was hoping she'd also learn a lot FROM her. Overall impression: LIVE. From your heart. No matter the times, the culture, the pressures to conform, the snobbery or misguided expectations of those around you. Lesson learned: when you make decisions based on fear, life never turns out like you want it to...and might turn out very badly indeed (poor George). :o)
mjm: I stink at deadlines too. (Not a great trait for my line of work. ha!) No need to apologize. Read and comment when you can. You're always welcome round here!
Lisa Ensor: Where are your comments? I know you liked this book...spill!!! :o)
1. Did you like the book? Why or why not?
I agree with Rissalee that Death in the Garden was a nice change of genre. It was nice to escape and build suspense in the web of characters, their stories, and their whereabouts at Diana's birthday party. I felt as though I read this book like the game/movie "Clue." As Diana was doing her research, I felt as though I had to keep track of every little detail (and Ironside gives MANY details-- some significant and then others not at all-- which was exhausting!). I also like to make predictions as I read, so it was fun to see the culmination of the research and my own "verdict" being tried. Overall, I suspected at the "presence" in Helena's apartment was Robert's wife, Sara. However, I wish Ironside would have elaborated a bit on her schziophrenia or purpose for being there. I also suspected that George committed suicide simply because it was too obvious that he was killed with photographic chemicals. I really appreciated Ironside's use of the subtle clues that focused Helena's attention to the true storyline. After all of her tedious research, the answer was in Simon's nonchalant summary of Arkadi's novel (however, when it was first mentioned at the beginning of the book I wondered why Helena didn't jump on reading those earlier! I guess her character was not ready to infer the "borrowed" storyline).
2. Would you read it again or recommend it to a friend?
I probably wouldn't read it again simply because it is hard for me to re-read books when I already know the plot (or have seen the movie). It takes the fun, motivation, and suspense out of it. However, I would recommend it to others to read... but not as a "must!"
3. Who was your favorite character, and why?
I liked Edith Scrafton Gaetan the most because her character was very minor at the birthday party and yet played a major role at the end. It was also a surprise to find out that she married one of Diana's suspects so that added an interesting twist. I also think her retelling of her husband's connection to George was the biggest motive to the story.
4. Did it make you think? What about?
Yes. This book had me constantly evaluating conversations and details for clues. However, I liked the final analysis Helena gave once she reached her verdict: "The evidence had been quite other. Nothing new in terms of the occurrences of that weekend had appeared. The details that she learned from Diana's diaries and from the biased Buckherd had not been significantly altered by anything she had discovered subsequently. Only the pattern of relationships that meshed those events had come into focus, bound Diana into a context which made it harder, not easier, to judge whether or not she was guilty" (263). All the details she needed were right in front of her, but she did need background information to form the relationships and connections.
5. Did it make you happy or sad, afraid or hopeful...what did it make you feel, was there an overall impression when you finished it?
Overall, I was pleased with the verdict and I felt both myself as the reader and Helena had closure on what happened.
I felt sad for Helena who, as she discovered in her husband's intentionally "lost" letter: "It is impossible to forget that someone, your husband, has tried to kill you, by killing himself. Suicide is the ultimate revenge" (291). This letter could have saved her during the trial, however, he intended her to be found guilty. I am just glad that she died with some peace on the situation.
I agree with Rissalee that I hoped Helena would be changed. I didn't really like the subplot of Robert and I don't think it was fully developed enough to where it was an effective closing. Essentially I didn't have any sympathy for her, Sara, Robert, or the situation.
Overall, fun read! Thanks!
fthluvhope: Good thoughts!! Thanks for sharing them. I have a few questions/replies.
First, you lost me a couple of times - I'm wondering if you mixed the names up - Diana/Helena?? Ex: "As Diana was doing her research, I felt as though I had to keep track of every little detail..." And, "I felt sad for Helena who, as she discovered in her husband's intentionally "lost" letter..."
I really like your choice of favorite character and agree with your reasons for choosing her. I enjoyed all the various "retellings" of events from the different povs. I think that's what helped me realize further that we never really know someone until we see/live life from their perspective.
I liked the passage you quoted about suicide and revenge, and thought it particularly interesting that Sara would follow George's basic path of punishing Diana in order to punish Robert - had a symmetry to it.
Interesting to me that Diana didn't do more to exonerate herself way back when, or in the eyes of posterity. Did she do this because of her depth of character, to protect others? Or as a means of penance - to suffer for the choices she had made??
Rissalee: You are right! I was getting the names wrong... Even as I was typing them I remember I kept changing them. It's probably because HELENA was so into DIANA'S story that I only knew DIANA through HELENA-- hence, they are the same person in my mind! ;)
fthluvhope: They DO sound the same: Diana/Helena...lots of similarities between them. And I agree with you on reading it again - hard to, now that I know "who dunnit," but maybe I'd skim through the pages I've marked.
Other thoughts I had later...
I would like to share a long walk with Arkadi, talking things over.
I enjoyed that I was able to learn a BUNCH of new vocabulary words while reading this book. I typically circle the words I don't fully know while reading any book, and this book has more circles than most. I was also intrigued by the author - the fact that she was the wife of a British Ambassador and wrote under a pseudonym.
Strangely enough, I also greatly enjoyed the literal feel of this book - the version I bought was so pleasing to hold in my hands (weight, shape, size, papergrade, etc.)! Very unique.
I personally identified with Marta and Edith quite often, so I'm glad at least one of them turned out well in the end. Edith became a key figure in the story and ended up married to Gaetan. Good for her.
Speaking of Gaetan, I'm impressed at his keeping quiet and thoroughly disgusted at George's duplicity.
Here are some lines I loved:
Death is a huge cliff and when you are about to be thrown off it, like an Aztec sacrifice, other problems on the valley floor look very small, but once on the ground with the rest of the world they become again of dominating proportions. [P5]
She would have said of herself that she was someone entirely unmercenary. She was not interested in money, though she had found by experience that a lot of it was necessary to live and it was with living that she was really concerned. [P33]
This passage was lovely!
"You don't ride at all?"
"I prefer motors. What is the point of riding from A to B on horseback when you can do it quicker by car?"
"The train overtook the horse half a century ago but we still go on racing."
"A pointless exercise in my view."
"I think the thing was never for its utility; only for pleasure. And pleasure is never pointless, wouldn't you agree?" This was addressed to Edith, who had not been able to prevent herself from laughing at the mention of pleasure.
"You musn't," she said, "mention pleasure as a motive here. You are in England after all. We do things for duty and for respectability and because other people do them, not for pleasure."
"Do you never act for pleasure?"
"Of course. I am here for my pleasure. Yet in order to come I had to say that it was my duty to be present at my friend's birthday."
"Duty. The call of duty: that's what you say. Well, we all have our national hypocrisies; duty is simply the Anglo-Saxon version. Is it not?" [P36]
He had married Diana to use her beauty and talent to shore up the gaping fissures in his personality and found that they could not be so used. [P57]
It was the eve of her thirtieth birthday, which it now seemed she would spend here alone. Those zeros. Not at twenty perhaps, but at thirty it begins, the casting of accounts, the recalling of doors not opened and roads not taken. Only in noise and distraction, companionship and conversation becoming progressively more sentimental, could it be avoided. In the stillness and light of her own house nothing could prevent it. [P73]
"How one takes the old for granted and assumes that because their lives are uneventful now they were always so." [P 105]
In answer to Helena's question on page 231, "Did anyone keep a diary meaning no one else to read it?" YESYESYES!!! The graph that followed her question was lovely. It starts, "Thinking of her own life, she knew she could never write down the most important part if it." And ends with, "Nor could she confess even to herself what she felt and confront, by writing it down what she was doing."
"We change. We remain the same but we change. I am not the Edith Scrafton of those days. I look back and I see someone else, not myself, quite separate. A fool in many ways. I feel impatient with her folly, a lucky fool." [P227]
The female answer to a problem, eat it. [P266]
Rissalee: I agree about the new vocabulary! I don't usually circle unknown words (not because of my mad vocab skills, but just because it never was a habit for me... even though I try to teach my students to do it!), but I DID circle words in this book! So I'm glad I'm not the only one who enjoyed the new language... Words like: quotidian, insouciance, alighted, etc. Good stuff! :) And,
I agree AGAIN about the literal feel of the book. The size was very unique (which I must confess, made me first thing it wasn't a popular book because it must have been made in some second-hand publisher's shop. whoops!)But the fact that they addressed the esteem of holding a Felony & Mayhem "British" book did make me feel special! ;)
In regard to your quote references: Your last quoted line is CLASSIC! I must have missed that in my reading becasue I don't remember laughing out loud like I did just now. Also, at the very beginning of the book in Part I, pgs. 3-5 (where Diana writes in her diary and then we hear about her acquittal), I wrote underneath those first two pages: unreliable first-person narrator. So I find it fascinating that Helena had the same thought when she first read those lines in Diana's diary: that surely she was a liar.
In addition,I also liked the quote about writing for a reader. All good. I was also really fascinated by the realtionship with Arkadi and Pia at the beginning. I liked how Ironside use their different modes of observation to define their personalities: "Pia's acute and sensitive observation of the actual and her lack of interest in making any deduction from what she had seen; she was capable of putting two and two together" contrasts with "Arkadi, whose mind constantly made connections between the most distant and apparently unrelated facts and objects, found Pia's view profoundly strange... he could not really believe that this was the way she saw the world" (13). What insight into their characters, personalities, and marriage! No wonder Arkadi's book makes the connection for Helena because that his perspective and way of seeing things.
Great insights, thanks for sharing! :)
And now you know why I want to take a walk with Arkadi, to talk things over...
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