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Re: What Have You Read Lately? (2024 Edition)

Started by apl68, January 03, 2024, 06:35:02 AM

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apl68

They Were Counted, by Miklos Banffy.  This is the first volume of Banffy's "Transylvania Trilogy."  It has nothing to do with vampires and werewolves.  It's set in early 20th-century Transylvania, when it was still dominated by a Hungarian minority ruling it as part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.  Banffy gives a vivid portrayal of a lost world of aristocratic privilege that somehow lasted into the age of railroads and electric lighting.  It is sometimes funny and often melodramatic, but not nostalgic.  Banffy portrays his Hungarian elites as thoroughly morally, ethically, and politically corrupt.

The titles of the trilogy's volumes--They Were Counted, They Were Weighed, and They Were Found Wanting are an allusion to the famous "Feast of Belshazzar" in the Old Testament book of Daniel, where supernatural handwriting on the wall announced the doom of the Babylonian king and his court.  Banffy was a would-be Hungarian reformer whose efforts both before and after World War I met with little success.  He turned to writing to say what he thought of the careless aristos whom he held responsible.  They got their "handwriting on the wall" warning in time to do something about it, but ignored it instead.  For any attentive observers in today's U.S.--or anywhere today, really--this has an uncomfortably familiar ring to it....

I first learned of Banffy and his work at Neglected Books https://neglectedbooks.com/ He's one of several interesting authors I've discovered there.  Not sure yet whether I'll track down the other two volumes.  Banffy was out of print for some years before being rediscovered a couple of decades ago.  His Transylvania Trilogy isn't too hard to find.
See, your King is coming to you, just and bringing salvation, gentle and lowly, and riding upon a donkey.

hmaria1609

Starting from the library: The Rose of Versailles by Riyoko Ikeda, English translation by Mari Morimoto and Jocelyn Allen
Best selling Japanese manga series about a young woman raised as a son joins the French Royal Guard at the beginning of the reign of Louis XVI.  There was an animated series in the late 1970s in Japan and later syndicated internationally.

Larimar

I've been continuing my Agatha Christie kick. I finished Death on the Nile, then went on to Murder on the Orient Express and Sleeping Murder. I had a break between the latter two to investigate the Jane Austen mysteries recommended earlier (thanks for that!), and got my hands on the first two in the series. I liked them, but in the second one Jane was supposed to be falling for the guy she suspected was a notorious smuggler, but I didn't find that aspect convincing. I still have one more Agatha Christie on my to-be-read pile, The Body in the Library. Maybe the public library will have more of the Jane Austen ones.

Langue_doc

Quote from: Larimar on March 24, 2024, 12:14:54 PMI've been continuing my Agatha Christie kick. I finished Death on the Nile, then went on to Murder on the Orient Express and Sleeping Murder. I had a break between the latter two to investigate the Jane Austen mysteries recommended earlier (thanks for that!), and got my hands on the first two in the series. I liked them, but in the second one Jane was supposed to be falling for the guy she suspected was a notorious smuggler, but I didn't find that aspect convincing. I still have one more Agatha Christie on my to-be-read pile, The Body in the Library. Maybe the public library will have more of the Jane Austen ones.

Have you read Towards Zero? The Murder of Roger Ackroyd? A Murder is Announced? Three very different themes, other than the common one of whodunit. I liked the second two on your list above, but not so much the first one. I think I couldn't relate to any of the characters.

RatGuy

I'm reading The Tiger and the Cage by Emma Bolden. It's a memoir about a woman's struggle with endometriosis specifically and the problematic state of women's health care generally. It's tragic, but the author has also made it tragically humorous as well. I'm surprised at how often I find myself laughing out loud at some of her comments.

Larimar

Quote from: Langue_doc on March 24, 2024, 12:58:35 PM
Quote from: Larimar on March 24, 2024, 12:14:54 PMI've been continuing my Agatha Christie kick. I finished Death on the Nile, then went on to Murder on the Orient Express and Sleeping Murder. I had a break between the latter two to investigate the Jane Austen mysteries recommended earlier (thanks for that!), and got my hands on the first two in the series. I liked them, but in the second one Jane was supposed to be falling for the guy she suspected was a notorious smuggler, but I didn't find that aspect convincing. I still have one more Agatha Christie on my to-be-read pile, The Body in the Library. Maybe the public library will have more of the Jane Austen ones.

Have you read Towards Zero? The Murder of Roger Ackroyd? A Murder is Announced? Three very different themes, other than the common one of whodunit. I liked the second two on your list above, but not so much the first one. I think I couldn't relate to any of the characters.

Nope, the ones I listed are the only ones I've read. Thanks for the recommendations. She wrote so many that I have no idea which ones are the best. Glad to be pointed in a particular direction.


Larimar