2024, a wrap-up

Aptly, the last book I finished in 2024 – on the evening of December 31st – was Jane and the Final Mystery by Stephanie Barron, a satisfying though bittersweet conclusion to the series…

As a way to bring this Year of Reading Women to a close, I thought I'd take a retrospective look at the books I most enjoyed reading over the course of 2024 (in no particular order):

- The Voyage Home / Pat Barker
- The Once and Future Witches / Alix E. Harrow
- After Atlas / Emma Newman
- A Good Girl's Guide to Murder / Holly Jackson
- A Grave Robbery / Deanna Raybourn
- Normal Women: None Hundred Years of Making History / Philippa Gregory
- The Possession of Barbe Hallay: Diabolical Arts and Daily Life in Early Canada / Mairi Cowan
- Jane Austen at Home / Lucy Worsley
- Jane and the Year Without a Summer / Stephanie Barron
- Jane and the Final Mystery / Stephanie Barron
- Dictionnaire critique du sexisme linguistique / coll.
- L'Euguélionne / Louky Bersianik
- L'Ennemie / Irène Némirovsky
- Découvrir la mémoire des femmes : une historienne face à l'histoire des femmes / Micheline Dumont

Overall, this was an excellent reading year, especially when it comes to historical mysteries (my preferred genre, as I've mentioned multiple times before). I "discovered" new authors who now count among my favourites, finally delved into classics I'd somehow neglected, and gained knowledge that might have otherwise have passed me by. 2024 also rekindled my love for and interest in Jane Austen thanks to Lucy Worsley, Stephanie Barron and "The Thing About Austen" podcast. Did I miss not being able to pick up works by male authors for an entire year? (Well, there was one exception: Homer's Iliad, in its translation by Emily Wilson. I'd had it on hold for many months, and the hold finally came in; these are good enough reasons for me to read it at that time.) Not really – the only books written by men that I was truly tempted by were Richard Osman's latest, We Solve Murders; The Witch by Ronald Hutton; and Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin series. 

What are my reading plans for 2025? I'd love to further explore the works of Irène Némirovsky, Annie Ernaux, T. Kingfisher, Alix E. Harrow, Pat Barker, Stephanie Barron and Emma Newman (who has a new release, The Vengeance, coming soon!). And for one of my writing projects, I'll be revisiting books that had an impact on my childhood, including Treasure Island, Sherlock Holmes and Agatha Christie.

So that's it. It's over. Thank you and goodbye.

Or should I say…

Excelsior!

fifty-second week

Although there are a few more days left to the year, this will be my last reading summary. Next Monday, if I have time, I might write a little overview of the entire year.

I wanted to read Death Comes to the Village as much because I'd previously liked Catherine Lloyd's Miss Morton series as for its plot. A rector's daughter and a wounded soldier joining forces to investigate crimes in a small village in Regency England? Sounds just my cup of tea! But, oh dear, was I disappointed… How could this anachronism-riddled, sketchy mess possibly be from the same author? Then I noticed that it was first published in 2013, nine years before Miss Morton and the English House Party Murder. It appears that Ms. Lloyd has put the intervening time to good use.

Then things got worse, since I read A Lesson in Vengeance by Victoria Lee. OH MY GOD the pretentiousness of this novel! It starts with the names of the boarding school (Dalloway) and its houses (Godwin, Wharton, Eliot, Boleyn, Atwood… There's a very obvious theme developing – you do see it, right? It's clever, right? Right?) and it just careens off from there. If I were to summarize this book, I'd say that it's a battle of warped minds between two disturbed girls, or that it shows what happens when a highly unstable girl is allowed to return to the scene of a traumatic event without direct supervision or regular monitoring from a therapist. Had I known in advance that it was inspired by The Secret History (which I loathe and DNFed at 50%), I never would have submitted myself to this pile of rubbish. I've seen it described as "sapphic dark academia;" well, it's neither dark (just bleak and squalid) nor academia (none of the texts mentioned are remotely obscure or particularly scholarly – many number among my favourites, and my reading tastes are not at all unconventional, as evidenced by this blog), and the sapphic elements feel pasted on and thoroughly unconvincing. The entire novel consists of a jumble of half-baked good ideas, with multiple plotlines that peter out before they go anywhere. Everything is superficial, except my boredom – that was very, very deep.

Fortunately, I received the very best literary Christmas present: my library finally acquired The Voyage Home by Pat Barker! I'd been anticipating reading this novel ALL YEAR, so it was with more than slight trepidation that I tapped "play"… I was convinced that I'd miss Briseis – and to be honest I did a little at first – but Ritsa captured my heart just as much as did her "almost daughter." I don't think I can adequately put into words my feelings about this series. From the very start, thanks to the emotional and psychological complexity Pat Barker imparts to her female characters, and no doubt amplified because I listened to the audio versions, narrated by the immensely talented Kristen Atherton, and therefore spent hours hearing these women's stories being told to me directly, I've felt intimately close to them, deeply invested in their lives. (I'd love to be more eloquent about all of this, but I'm writing while suffering from a terrible migraine and it feels as though someone's stuck an icepick in my ear, so this will have to suffice...) I'll be revisiting this novel, even if it means watching my step as I climb down the palace stairs.

fifty-first week

One of the non-fiction books I most looked forward to reading was my early Christmas present to myself, Terms & Conditions: Life in Girls' Boarding Schools 1939-1979 by Ysenda Maxtone Graham, based on interviews the author (herself a former boarder) conducted with "Old Girls" – hence the period she chose to cover. I was therefore disappointed by, among other things, the rather crass tone she used in discussing certain topics, the entirely irrelevant facts and anecdotes with which she peppered her account, and her glorification of traumatic experiences (she is definitely a proponent of "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger").

Even a few pages into Of Manners and Murder by Anastasia Hastings (one of Connie Laux's many aliases), I could feel my heart sink… When a historical novel is set in 1885 England, it ought to reflect the customs, the class distinctions, the social mores, the manners, and indeed the language, of the Victorian age in order to establish any kind of credibility with the reader. This was a dismal failure; I can't tell what era the author imagined as she wrote, yet it certainly was not the Victorian one. Additional minus points for using the word "chockablock" not once, but three times in this thankfully short book.

In Jane and the Year Without a Summer, Stephanie Barron (a pseudonym of Francine Mathews) shows how it's done! This is the 14th in a series of historical crime novels starring none other than Miss Austen as an amateur sleuth, and it's excellent. It takes place in Cheltenham, where Jane has gone with her sister Cassandra in the hope that her health will improve, and since it's set in 1816, the mood is doubly bleak. Firstly, as the book's title indicates, the weather is severely impacted by the eruption of Mount Tambora the previous year, resulting in what was called a "volcanic winter." And secondly, Jane's illness cannot be cured, and we know she will die in July of the following year. Despite the heavy atmosphere that pervades this narrative, I enjoyed the plot very much. The author used the social prejudices against women, especially ageing spinsters and unwell women, to brilliant effect here. I admit to finding the manner in which the murders were carried out not entirely plausible, but overall, this was a most satisfying read.

fiftieth week

I'm still feeling exhausted, but something very thrilling has happened: I've started a creative writing project! Over the past few years, I came with a variety of little scenarios to help myself fall asleep, occasionally noting them down on scraps of paper or on my phone. I recently devoted some time to gathering all of these random pieces of stories into a single master list, then chose one to work on and see what I can make of it. Since it's a historical crime/mystery narrative (my favourite genre!), this is what I'll probably be reading until the end of the year and for the foreseeable future.

One of the people who have inspired me to finally begin writing is the amazing Dr. Carson Brakke a.k.a. GlutenbergBible (her YouTube, Instagram and Tiktok accounts are great sources of erudition and entertainment).

She mentioned several times A Mouzell for Melastomus by Rachel Speght, a short text printed in 1617, and the first of three women-penned replies to Joseph Swetnam's anonymously published pamphlet The Arraignment of Lewd, Idle, Froward, and Unconstant Women. Rachel Speght was very young but manifestly already possessed a redoubtably sharp wit when she composed this glorious response to a misogynist's pathetic attempt at proving just how horrid women are. I giggled to myself as I read her point-by-point rebuttal of Swetnam's supposedly biblically based arguments. I've saved it to my Pocket account so I can revisit it next time I need cheering up.

I've always been under the impression that the Agatha Christie estate was extremely selective regarding the management of the rights to the Queen of Crime's works. I therefore picked up Marple, a collection of short stories by female authors featuring the incisive elderly lady sleuth, with utter confidence as to its quality – and was promptly disabused. With the exception of two or three, these pieces read like terrible fan fiction. Well, no, that's unfair: writers of fan fiction would at least have familiarized themselves with the original material, which some of these authors don't seem to have bothered to do. Of far better entertainment value is the "About the Authors" section, an arena where the contributors compete over the number of languages into which their works have been translated.

Given my interest in "school stories," I've heard a great deal about the Chalet School series by Elinor Brent-Dyer, most recently in an episode of the "Shedunnit" podcast devoted to health and illness. I was able to find the first volume, The School at the Châlet [sic]… and truly hated it. (That errant accent in the title should have warned me off…) The premise of this book – a young woman without qualification, experience or concrete plan opens an educational institution in a foreign country because she's poor – is so absurd, most of the pupils so indistinguishable, the punishments for minor pranks so disproportionate, the main incident so predictable, and the train accident inserted in the last few pages so random that I spent much of the time I wasted on this disaster shaking my head in disbelief that it was ever published. And that it was popular! And that there were 57 more!

This day, December 19, 2024, marks the 249th anniversary of Jane Austen's birth, which provides me with the perfect opportunity to mention my new favourite podcast: "The Thing About Austen." It offers a scholarly and loving but irreverent approach to Jane Austen's material world (episode 7 on the topic of spinsters is brilliant!), and is a must-listen for all Janeites.

forty-ninth week

I'm not doing the best health-wise at the moment – generally feeling run down and too exhausted to think for long periods –, so reading and writing will be kept to a minimum for the next few weeks. I must admit that I'm also getting rather impatient to be done with this year-long project that I've imposed on myself. I saw it as a challenge, and it certainly has been that! I'm looking forward to having more time and energy to spend on creative writing.

It took me forever to finish The Luckiest Girl in the School by Angela Brazil because I simply could not figure out the point of this novel. A reader of school stories can usually guess, in a general manner, where the author is going, but this narrative was entirely devoid of direction. In fact, I stopped taking notes after the main character, a terminally bland girl, is made Games Captain of her school, and all I can remember about later events in the book is that she learns to drive. One star.

When a woman vanishes and no trace or sign of her can be found for many years, odds are that she is no longer alive. But what happens if she turns up out of the blue one day, just as a documentary on her disappearance is being filmed? How do her own and her family's behaviours differ from what they and the rest of society thought or expected or imagined? This is the premise that Holly Jackson toys with in The Reappearance of Rachel Price, and given that I've become a devoted listener of a couple of podcasts focusing on the cases of missing women (as stated before), this is precisely why I wanted to see what treatment she would give this sensitive topic. The tension in the Price household between the newly re-emerged Rachel, her husband and Bel, the teenaged daughter who was a baby when her mother disappeared, was fantastically maintained throughout the book. I could have done without the constant mentions of the knot in Bel's gut twisting and tightening, though… The plot itself certainly involved a sufficient number of twists of its own. Although this had the potential to be a brilliant, thrilling novel, it featured enough unconvincing elements to break the spell for me, not least the baffling use of kleptomania to demonstrate how a character deals with trauma.

Many fans of English history and/or literature probably know Lucy Worsley. I've long enjoyed her work in both documentary and podcast form (her "Lady Killers" podcast series is highly recommended), but until now had never read any of her books, which include biographies of Agatha Christie and Queen Victoria. I listened to Jane Austen at Home and had a fantastic time; what an interesting way to approach such a variety of facets of "home" in Georgian society through Jane Austen's life and novels! This book was particularly eye-opening regarding the almost entire dependence of many women on the goodwill or even the simple considerateness – yes, it's a word – of men… The author also makes a point of reminding us of Cassandra's capital role in her sister's life as well as in preserving much of her memory for future generations (rather than focus solely on the papers she destroyed). A must, not just for confirmed or prospective Janeites.

J'adore Rebecca et La maison sur le rivage (The House on the Strand), les seuls de ses romans que j'ai lus jusqu'à présent, mais ma curiosité pour Daphne du Maurier a été récemment piquée par l'épisode que la série «Britain's Novel Landscapes» (présentée par Mariella Frostrup) lui a consacré. Voilà pourquoi j'ai emprunté – et dévoré en quatre jours – Manderley for ever, sa biographie par Tatiana de Rosnay. Il m'a fallu un moment pour m'habituer au traitement romancé donné au récit. J'y ai appris, outre de nombreux détails fascinants, que DDM s'était inventé un alter ego masculin et que Menabilly, la demeure qu'elle a longtemps louée, a exercé sur elle un véritable ensorcellement (ce qui explique sans doute comment elle arrive à rendre avec tant de subtilité l'emprise qu'un lieu peut avoir sur une personne). En tant que traductrice qui ne se refuse pas une bonne dose de schadenfreude à l'occasion, j'ai pris un malin plaisir à lire les passages où l'on souligne l'attitude inacceptable adoptée et la qualité douteuse du travail accompli par la collègue qui a traduit la plupart des œuvres de DDM en français… Tiens, parlant de qualité, je m'avoue à la fois surprise et déçue qu'une erreur majeure ait échappé aux relectures du manuscrit, c'est-à-dire l'attribution des Hauts de Hurlevent à la mauvaise sœur Brontë – une faute de débutant∙e!

Despite still being poorly, the lovely Emma Newman, about whom I've already written here and here  and here and here and here, is once again doing an Advent calendar on her "Tea and Sanctuary" podcast this year! Huzzah! Listen for a microdose of gentleness in this horrible, horrible world.

forty-eighth week

Je suis absolument épuisée en ce moment, possiblement à cause du changement de température, alors j'écrirai bien peu cette semaine.

Dans le cadre de mes «lectures obligatoires», j'ai terminé un volume très long, mais passionnant, La pensée féministe au Québec : anthologie (1900-1985), compilé par Micheline Dumont et Louise Toupin. Il s'agit uniquement de textes rédigés par des militantes et non par des journalistes, des universitaires ou des politiciennes. Parmi les sujets abordés que j'ai considérés les plus intéressants se trouvent les arguments déployés en appui à la contraception (j'ai photocopié ces pages pour mes dossiers, étant donné les rumeurs qui courent) et la remise en question du système hétérosexuel par les féministes radicales.

Parmi mes notes de lecture, deux citations de Marie Gérin-Lajoie datant de 1922, mais toujours d'actualité :

Développez votre esprit d'observation et pensez avec droiture et indépendance.

[…] il faut rester fidèles à vos convictions, même quand les vérités que vous soutenez sont défigurées par d'odieuses railleries.

After hearing Maureen Johnson (author of the excellent Truly Devious series) enthusiastically mention The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin on an episode of the "All About Agatha" podcast, I borrowed the ebook, since it sounded like a fantastic puzzle-based mystery novel. Our main protagonist is a bright, resourceful girl named Turtle. The narrative revolves around a wealthy industrialist who is found dead — freshly murdered — 13 years after going missing. In his will, he challenges 16 beneficiaries to discover the culprit. And then bombs start exploding. Although the story was well written, with great pacing and twists and turns that genuinely kept me guessing until the rather unsatisfactory conclusion, and while I loved that a disabled character held crucial clues, the fact that he's practically "cured" of his disability at the end of the book left a bad taste in my mouth…

forty-seventh week

Comme «lecture obligatoire» la semaine dernière, j'ai choisi Découvrir la mémoire des femmes : Une historienne face à l’histoire des femmes de Micheline Dumont. Étant donné la réélection de vous-savez-qui et la montée du «masculinisme» dans mon pays, il me semble pertinent d’étudier l’histoire des femmes, en particulièrement sur le territoire où j'habite. Dans ce volume, l'auteure — historienne renommée et respectée dont je découvre ici le travail — reprend huit de ses textes (publiés à l'origine entre 1973 et 2000) qui démontrent son parcours intellectuel ainsi que l'évolution de son regard sur les femmes et leur histoire, en faisant précéder chacun d'une brève mise en contexte quant à sa rédaction et sa publication initiale. On aurait tort en croyant que les efforts d'historiennes pour rappeler la place occupée de tout temps par les femmes dans l'histoire représentent une préoccupation récente. En effet, les ouvrages et documentaires destinés au grand public par les Britanniques Suzannah Lipscomb et Janina Ramirez (dont j'admire par ailleurs le travail) ont beau remporter un succès indéniable, les théories qui les sous-tendent datent d'une bonne cinquantaine d'années. Que l'histoire des femmes semble encore un concept novateur de nos jours s'avère fort révélateur quant à la vision étriquée et conservatrice (oserai-je dire momifiée?) de ce qui constitue l'histoire. J'ai fort apprécié que l'auteure remette si volontiers sa position en question sans tenter de justifier ses arguments ou ses opinions. Elle m'a amenée à considérer d'un œil plus critique ce qu'on nomme communément «histoire» ainsi que la façon dont on doit s'y prendre pour y montrer l'apport des femmes. Je crois que les passages suivants gagneraient à circuler parmi les personnes intéressées à étudier les femmes dans un contexte historique :

La vraie histoire, au fond, n'existe pas. Il n'existe que le pouvoir de déclarer ce qui est vrai et important parmi les milliers d'événements qui se produisent à chaque seconde depuis des milliers d'années.

***

Un préjugé tenace s'obstine […] à faire débuter l'Histoire avec la civilisation, avec le patriarcat, avec l'écriture qui impose sa force discursive. Un autre préjugé tout aussi tenace a longtemps laissé croire que ce qui était écrit était vrai.

***

Une rupture significative peut être faite quand on accepte que les femmes soient sujets de l'histoire et que l'évolution de l'humanité, vue du point de vue des femmes, soit envisagée autrement. On n'ajoute pas l'idée que la terre est ronde à l'idée que la terre est plate. Cette découverte exige que l'on retourne en arrière et qu'on repense tout différemment. L'histoire traditionnelle a été un des instruments majeurs qui ont contribué à implanter la subordination des femmes, à assurer leur invisibilité historique. Par conséquent, tout ce que nous savons sur l'histoire doit être déconstruit.

I happened upon The Manor School by L.T. Meade while searching for novels set in a girls' boarding school written by neither Enid Blyton nor Angela Brazil. Despite a frustratingly slow start and a highly preachy ending, it proved a very interesting psychological narrative that follows an imaginative 13-year-old girl who runs away with a younger friend rather than be sent to a very strict institution, encountering a variety of perilous situations and ill-intentioned individuals in circumstances far more credible and complex than The New Girl at St Chad’s by Angela Brazil. And the mind games between students were fascinating! L.T. Meade wrote quite a few other books that are available on the Project Gutenberg website, and I look forward to reading more of her work in the future.

forty-sixth week

Comme «lecture obligatoire», j’ai terminé deux livres la semaine dernière. Tout d’abord, un peu en rapport avec mon autre intérêt actuel, c.-à-d. les livres qui se déroulent dans un internat, j’ai choisi Entre femmes et jeunes filles : Le roman pour adolescentes en France et au Québec de Daniela Di Cecco. Bien que cet ouvrage analyse une période plus tardive (1985-1999) que celle qui tend à attirer mon attention, il offre un bref historique qui aide à situer le genre dans le contexte social et que j’ai trouvé fascinant. Il m’a entre autres donné envie de relire Colette! Françoise Sagan mérite bien entendu une mention, mais plutôt que de me plonger dans ses œuvres de fiction, j’ai pour le moment préféré explorer son recueil d’essais intitulé Avec mon meilleur souvenir, où elle entrecoupe les récits de ses rencontres avec des gens célèbres — Billie Holiday, Tennessee Williams, Orson Welles, Rudolf Noureev — par de courts textes sur son engouement pour le jeu, son amour de la vitesse, ses expériences de dramaturge… Elle parle d’elle-même en employant un mélange d’arrogance et d’authenticité absolument irrésistible, et peu importe le sujet dont elle traite, elle manie les mots avec une aisance magistrale. Je conclurai avec un exemple de son écriture si évocatrice et vivante; voici comment elle décrit son accident :

Et ce ne fut la faute de personne si j’allai alors faire quelques gambades dans un champ avec ma voiture décapotable, si l’on m’accorda illico l’extrême-onction et si je me retrouvai durant six mois habillée à la scène comme à la ville en toute exclusivité par les bandes Velpeau.

I’m now done with Enid Blyton’s school stories! I read all three novels in the Naughtiest Girl series (The Naughtiest Girl in the School, The Naughtiest Girl Again and The Naughtiest Girl is a Monitor), which chronicles how spoilt brat Elizabeth Allen grows in maturity while attending a small mixed boarding school. While I did enjoy the drama of the weekly meetings at which the students deal with any matters that have arisen over the past week through a form of self-government, I found the oh-so-sensible judges and jury rather unrealistic. And Elizabeth’s countless swings from badly behaved to angelic, often within a couple of paragraphs, nearly gave me whiplash!

About a year ago, I listened to Miss Morton and the English House Party Murder by Catherine Lloyd, narrated by Lucy Rayner, and was highly entertained by this story of a young aristocratic woman who, bright, resourceful, but destitute, becomes a lady's companion only to unexpectedly stumble into a murder mystery. The second instalment in this series, Miss Morton and the Spirits of the Underworld, thrilled me even more. Caroline Morton’s employer, the generous yet shrewd Mrs. Frogerton, is simply delightful! I admit to being partial to spiritualism as a trope in historical fiction (Linda Stratmann’s Mina Scarletti novels and The Dark Between by Sonia Gensler are among my favourites), so a plot in which a fake French medium asks our heroine to find her killer from beyond the grave was guaranteed to get my attention. Highly satisfying.

forty-fifth week

J’ai poursuivi ma lecture de la série commencée la semaine passée : Le Malicieux journal des sœurs Mouche au collège de Castelroc de Nathalie Somers. La deuxième moitié de cette tétralogie qui se déroule sur toute une année scolaire se compose des titres Tout Schuss! et L’incendie. Entre classe de neige et préparation du spectacle de fin d’année, l’auteure fait traverser à ses jeunes personnages des expériences difficiles qui les amèneront à grandir et renforcera les liens qui les unissent. J’ai apprécié l’intégration dans le récit de situations réalistes, mais sans clichés menant à l’apprentissage de leçons individuelles, et j’ai bien aimé l'évolution de mon personnage préféré, Yasmina, la timide passionnée d’animaux. Recommandé!

Partie sur cette lancée, j’ai entamé une autre série, L'Internat de l'île aux Cigales de Julie Bonnie, en lisant le premier volume éponyme. L’auteure est musicienne et son écriture s’inspire clairement de sa propre expérience pour décrire comment cinq élèves de 6e d’un collège particulier se lient d’amitié et forment un groupe musical. Bien que ce ne soit pas son premier livre, il souffre regrettablement du «syndrome du premier roman», qui incite une écrivaine à bourrer un récit du plus grand nombre de bonnes idées possible. L’histoire comporte de béants trous de logique et saute constamment d’un point à l’autre; les choses arrivent sans raison et sont racontées sans développement ni approfondissement. Cette superficialité nuit à un roman qui avait pourtant le potentiel d’être très touchant. Dommage.

Dans le cadre de mon nouveau programme de «lecture obligatoire», principalement constitué de biographies et d’essais, je me suis attaquée à une grosse brique, Carson McCullers : Un cœur de jeune fille de Josyane Savigneau. J’avoue que je ne connaissais jusqu’alors que le nom de cette auteure américaine et que je n’ai jamais lu quoi que ce soit d’elle — et que ce livre ne m’a pas du tout donné envie de modifier cet état de choses! Il s’agit en réalité d’un ouvrage mi-biographie, mi-critique d’une précédente biographie du même sujet écrite par Virginia Spencer Carr, qu’elle mentionne à tout moment. De plus, sans ses incessantes références aux habitudes éthyliques de Carson et de son mari, Reeves, Savigneau aurait sans doute pu réduire de moitié le volume de son manuscrit, puisqu’elle y raconte bien peu d’autre à part les souffrances physiques de l’auteure… Je suggérerais de changer le sous-titre pour Portrait d’une épave ou Histoire d’un naufrage annoncé. (Soi dit en passant, je trouve surprenant que dans cet ouvrage publié en 1995, elle désigne McCullers comme «un écrivain» alors qu’elle n’ignore manifestement pas la féminisation des titres, ainsi que le prouve son emploi du mot «enquêtrice».) Bref, je me suis ennuyée ferme.

As was the case recently with Enid Blyton’s Malory Towers, I’d read the first three volumes of St Clare’s and decided it was time to finish the series. To be perfectly honest, Second Form at St Clare’s, Claudine at St Clare’s and Fifth Formers at St Clare’s only served to deepen my perplexity… With settings, characters and situations bearing such a close resemblance, what was the point of writing two supposedly distinct series? I know, this isn’t an original thought, and there’s much debate as to which is better. My emphatic preference goes to Malory Towers, probably in large part because I read it before St Clare’s...

forty-fourth week

Par curiosité, j’ai recherché dans le catalogue de ma bibliothèque locale l’équivalent français des «school stories» que j’ai envie de lire ces jours-ci. Je n’y ai pas trouvé grand-chose… Ce genre de fiction ne semble pas occuper dans la culture littéraire francophone la même importance qu’elle ne le fait dans le monde anglophone. C’est un phénomène très intéressant! Je suis tout de même parvenue à dénicher deux séries, et j’ai lu les deux premiers volumes de l’une d’entre elles.

Le Malicieux journal des sœurs Mouche au collège de Castelroc de Nathalie Somers relate les aventures de Nina et de Lucille (les sœurs du titre) et de leur frère Clément — des triplés — dans leur nouvel internat. Perte de confiance, antipathie, jalousie, découragement, apprivoisement de tempéraments difficiles, on y retrouve toutes les expériences du début de l’adolescence racontées avec beaucoup d’humour. Bien que physiquement indifférenciables, les filles possèdent des personnalités bien définies et des façons distinctes de s’exprimer (on peut facilement identifier chaque narratrice même sans lire l’en-tête du chapitre); l’auteure fait un travail formidable en ce sens. En dépit des trous de logique, qui atteignent dans certains cas des dimensions considérables, mais dont je ne me formalise pas trop puisque j'ai depuis fort longtemps dépassé l'âge du public ciblé, j’ai passé un bon moment avec L’Arrivée et Tous pour Mouche!

Less enjoyable was my experience with the last novel in Holly Jackson’s A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder series. Not long ago I raved of my love for these books… but As Good as Dead broke my heart. I don’t understand, and I don’t want to talk about it. DNF.