Thus Was Adonis Murdered by Sarah Caudwell -- BOOK BEGINNINGS

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS

Thus Was Adonis Murdered by Sarah Caudwell

Thank you for joining me for Book Beginnings on Fridays. Please share the opening sentence (or so) of the book you are reading this week. You can also share from a book that caught your fancy, even if you are not reading it right now.

I got back from my vacation yesterday but I still pre-scheduled this post because I knew I would be jet lagged and have 1,000 to do after leaving my husband home without me for three weeks. So, again, my apologies if something goes wrong. 

MY BOOK BEGINNING

Scholarship asks, thank God, no recompense but Truth.

-- from Thus Was Adonis Murdered by Sarah Caudwell. This is the first of four legal mysteries featuring a pipe-smoking Oxford professor named Hilary Tamar. I wanted to read this one because it takes place in Venice and I read it when we were there last week. I also love mysteries with lawyers and campus novels, so this one ticked all my boxes. 

 

YOUR BOOK BEGINNINGS

Please add the link to your Book Beginnings post in the box below. If you share on social media, please use the #bookbeginnings hashtag.

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THE FRIDAY 56

The Friday 56 is a natural tie-in with Book Beginnings. The idea is to share a two-sentence teaser from page 56 of your featured book. If you are reading an ebook or audiobook, find your teaser from the 56% mark.

Freda at Freda's Voice started and hosted The Friday 56 for a long, long time. She is taking a break and Anne at My Head is Full of Books has taken on hosting duties in her absence. Please visit Anne's blog and link to your Friday 56 post.

MY FRIDAY 56

-- from Thus Was Adonis Murdered:

The Venetians, it seems, adopted St Mark as their patron saint in the ninth century, at which time the mortal remains of the Evangelist were reposing in Alexandria. To demonstrate their piety, the Venetians set out a body-snatching expedition, which abstracted the sacred corpse from its resting-place and brought it back through Customs between two sides of pork, so discouraging investigation by the fastidious Muslims.

FROM THE PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION

Set to have a vacation away from her home life and the tax man, young barrister Julia Larwood takes a trip to Italy with her art-loving boyfriend. But when her personal copy of the current Finance Act is found a few meters away from a dead body, Julia finds herself caught up in a complex fight against the Inland Revenue.

Fortunately, she’s able to call on her fellow colleagues who enlist the help of their friend Oxford professor Hilary Tamar. However, all is not what it seems. Could Julia’s boyfriend in fact be an employee of the establishment she has been trying to escape from? And how did her romantic luxurious holiday end in murder?

2020 CHALLENGE: My Wrap-Up Post for the 2020 European Reading Challenge

 

WRAP-UP: COMPLETED

This is my wrap-up post for the 2020 European Reading Challenge. To link your wrap-up post, please go to THIS PAGE and add your link. 

To sign up for the 2021 European Reading Challenge, and I hope you do, please go to the main challenge page HERE. 

Unlike most reading challenges, the European Reading Challenge ends on January 31 of the following year. I just think there's so much going on at the end of the year with holidays and many people busy with work that it's nice to have the extra time to finish. You do not have to take the extra time. Personally, I finish reading all the books I'm going to read for the challenge by December and usually give myself January to do my wrap-up post and any reviews I still have to write (if I write them).

But I have the luxury of a few days off this year for the first time in forever so I'm doing my wrap-up post now. 

BOOKS I READ/COUNTRIES VISITED

I visited 10 countries for the 2020 European Reading challenge, which is pretty good, since I signed up for the 5-Star, Deluxe Entourage level to read five books. I don't get to compete for the Jet Setter prize because it's my challenge, but even if I did I wouldn't qualify because I didn't review any of the books! I read a lot in 2020, but I couldn't concentrate enough to review anything. 

I'm listing the countries in the order I visited them. Only one book from each country counts for the challenge, but I'm listing all the books from each country just because. It makes it easier to track from year to year, especially to see if I'm making progress on reading more books in translation.

Of course, most of the books are still from the UK. That always happens. 

GREECE: Circe by Madeline Miller. Ok, it was ancient Greece, but it counts. 

Prospero's Cell: A Guide To The Landscape And Manners of The Island Of Corfu by Lawrence Durrell

UK: Culture Counts: Faith and Feeling in a World Besieged by Roger Scruton

Home Fires by Kamila Shamsie

The Egyptologists by Kingsley Amis and Robert Conquest

Party Going by Henry Green

The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

The Five Red Herrings by Dorothy L. Sayers

Warlight by Michaele Ondaatje

Have His Carcase by Dorothy L. Sayers

Murder Must Advertise by Dorothy L. Sayers

Lost for Words by Edward St. Aubyn

Never Mind: Book One of the Patrick Melrose Novels by Edward St. Aubyn

Bad News: Book Two of the Patrick Melrose Novels by Edward St. Aubyn

Some Hope: Book Three of the Patrick Melrose Novels by Edward St. Aubyn

Mother's Milk: Book Four of the Patrick Melrose Novels by Edward St. Aubyn

At Last: The Final Patrick Melrose Novel by Edward St. Aubyn

Death in Holy Orders by P. D. James

The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley

A Severed Head by Iris Murdoch

House of Trelawney by Hannah Rothschild

Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe

Quartet in Autumn by Barbara Pym

The Adventures of Sally by P. G. Wodehouse

The Old Curiosity Shop by Charles Dickens

Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell

The Murder Room by P. D. James

English House Style from the Archives of Country Life by John Goodall

Something to Answer For by P. H. Newby

For the Sake of Elena by Elizabeth George

Room at the Top by John Braine

Just Like You by Nick Hornby

They Came to Baghdad by Agatha Christie

The Hanging in the Hotel by Simon Brett

Bridget Jones's Baby: The Diaries by Helen Fielding

The Innocence of Father Brown by G. K. Chesterton

The Stars Look Down by A. J. Cronin

NORWAY: The Devil's Star by Jo Nesbo

The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware

IRELAND: Days Without End by Barry Sebastian

The Likeness by Tana French

The Guest List by Lucy Foley

Country Girl: A Memoir by Edna O'Brien

FRANCE: Cheri by Colette

The Last of Cheri by Colette

Gigi by Colette

The Vagabond by Colette

The Shackle by Colette

France is a Feast: The Photographic Journey of Paul and Julia Child by Alex Prud'homme

Paris to the Past: Traveling through French History by Train by Ina Caro

The Stranger by Albert Camus 

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair by Joel Dicker

GERMANY: Less by Andrew Sean Greer

PORTUGAL: Night Boat to Tangier by Kevin Barry

SWEDEN: Britt-Marie Was Here by Fredrik Backman

RUSSIA: Make Russia Great Again by Christopher Buckley, a very 2020 choice

Letters to Yesenin by Jim Harrison

Bend Sinister by Vladimir Nabokov 

ITALY: The Invitation by Lucy Foley

A Thousand Days in Venice by Marlena de Blasi

The Lying Life of Adults by Elena Ferrante

A Venetian Reckoning (aka Death and Judgment) by Donna Leon

All in all, I read 62 books in European countries or by European authors. I made some progress in venturing outside the UK, but still spent most of that time in France, Italy, and Ireland. 10 of the books were translated to English and the Nabokov book almost counts since Russian was his first language and Bend Sinister was only his second book written in English. 

My goal for 2021 will be to spend more time in Scandinavia and venture further into Eastern Europe. I hope to visit some countries I haven't been to before on the European Reading Challenge and read more books in translation. 

A Thousand Days in Venice by Marlena de Blasi -- BOOK BEGINNINGS

 

I forgot to post last night because my sister got a new puppy and I was distracted by the cute pictures. She's a little scrappy thing -- the puppy, not my sister. But when her fur grows back and she gets some meat on her bones, she'll be adorable! She was rescued off the mean streets of LA and sent up here to a no kill shelter in Portland where Sis got her. 

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS

Time to share the first sentence or so from the books we are reading this week! Please share your link below. If you post on social media, please use the #bookbeginnings hashtag. 

YOUR BOOK BEGINNING

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MY BOOK BEGINNING

A Thousand Days in Venice: An Unexpected Romance is Marlena de Blasi's memoir about moving to Venice to marry a man she barely knew. She met him when she was in Venice with friends. A few weeks later, he came to see her in St. Louis and proposed. 

The small room is filled with German tourists, a few English, and a table or two of locals.

The book has been on my TBR shelf for years. I picked it in January as one of the books for my "TBR 20 in 20" personal reading challenge and the Mt. TBR Challenge. But apparently I never got around to doing a blog post on those. How 2020 is that?

THE FRIDAY 56

THE FRIDAY 56

Freda at Freda's Voice hosts another teaser event on Fridays. Participants share a two-sentence teaser from page 56 of the book they are reading -- or from 56% of the way through the audiobook or ebook. Please visit Freda's Voice for details and to leave a link to your post.

MY FRIDAY 56

I think most of us have it, this potentially destructive habit mental record-keeping that builds, distorts, then breaks up and spreads into even the farthest flung territories of reason and consciousness. What we do is accumulate the pain, collect  it like cranberry glass. 

Sadly, I think there is something to what she says. Recognizing this habit is one thing. What to do about it is another. 

Five Faves: Venice Books

FIVE FAVE VENICE BOOKS

It is Carnival in Venice this week, so here is a short list of my favorite Venice books:

• The World of Venice by Jan Morris (the history and vibe of Venice -- my all time favorite)
• Death in Venice by Thomas Mann (a classic of Venice-induced lust)
• Serenissima by Erica Jong (before there was Sex and the City, there was Erica Jong; reviewed here)
• Alibi by Joseph Kanon (post-WWII Venice spy stuff) 
• About Face by Donna Leon (or any of her Commissario Guido Brunetti mysteries) 

I keep a list of books set in or about Venice. Any suggestions? What are your favorites?

FIVE FAVES

There are times when a full-sized book list is just too much; when the Top 100, a Big Read, or all the Prize winners seem like too daunting an effort. That's when a short little list of books grouped by theme may be just the ticket.

Inspired by Nancy Pearl's "Companion Reads" chapter in Book Lust – themed clusters of books on subjects as diverse as Bigfoot and Vietnam – I decided to start occasionally posting lists of five books grouped by topic or theme. I call these posts my Five Faves.

Feel free to grab the button and play along.  Use today's theme or come up with your own.  If you post about it, please link back to here and leave the link to your post in a comment.  If you want to participate but don't have a blog or don't feel like posting, please share your list in a comment.

Teaser Tuesday: About Face

Brunetti and Cataldo, as often happened in the city, had never been introduced to one another, although Brunetti knew the general outline of his history. The family had come from Friuli, Brunetti thought, some time early in the last century, had prospered during the Fascist era, and had become even richer during the great boom of the sixties.

-- About Face by Donna Leon. Published in 2010, this is the 18th mystery in Leon's Commissario Guido Brunetti series, set in Venice. I was reading them in order, but they really didn't seem to need to go in order, so I skipped ahead when I found this audio version at my library. 

Teaser Tuesdays is hosted by Should Be Reading, where you can find the official rules for this weekly event. 

What Are They Reading? Dressed for Death

Authors tend to be readers, so it is natural for them to create characters who like to read.  It is always interesting to me to read what books the characters are reading in the books I read. Even if I can't say that ten times fast.

Usually, the characters' choice of books reflects the author's tastes or, I sometimes think, what the author was reading at the time.  But sometimes the character's reading material is a clue to the character's personality, or is even a part of the story. 

This is an occasional blog event. If anyone wants to join in, feel free to leave a comment with a link to your related post. And feel free to use the button.  If this catches on, I can pick a day and make it a weekly event.

Dressed for Death by Donna Leon



In this third installment in Leon's Venice-based series featuring Commissario Guido Brunetti, both Guido and his wife Paola are reading some pretty heavy tomes.

Paola is on vacation with the kids in the mountains, escaping the August heat of Venice.  Apparently she is a big Henry James fan and is reading his novel, The Sacred Fount.  Paola and I are going to have to agree to disagree about James.  He will never be one of my favorites, as I discussed here and here.

Stuck in the city to solve a mystery, Guido draws inspiration from Tacitus, reading the classic author's History of Rome.

Whew!  Maybe Paola and Guido need to take a break and read a good mystery!

Review: Serenissima

The Republic of Venice existed from the late 7th century until 1797 and was formally known as the Most Serene Republic of Venice, or La Serenissima for short. Erica Jong's 1987 novel Serenissima is set in contemporary Venice, but much of the story goes back in time to Venice in the late 1500s, at the peak of the Republic's glory.

Jessica Pruitt is a 43-year old actress in Venice to judge an international film festival and begin filming her next movie, a reinterpretation of Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice in which she will star as her namesake, Shylock's daughter Jessica.

Like the dreamy, foggy glide of gondolas downs Venice's romantic canals, the story drifts from the glittering present to Jessica's historic adventure. After an encounter with an aging ex-patriot – who may also be a witch – Jessica finds herself in the lavish Jewish ghetto of 16th Century Venice, in love with a visiting English poet named Will, and racing to save a newborn Christian baby by finding it a safe Jewish home.

The story definitely depends on the reader's willing suspension of disbelief. The time-travel doesn't try to make sense and the ending explains nothing. And there is a sex scene involving Shakespeare, a Venetian whore, and the Earl of Southampton that I would like to erase from my reading psyche.

But Jong is a terrific writer who blends sumptuous language with a knack for good storytelling. Fans of Jong may prefer her purely contemporary novels like Fear of Flying and its sequels. On the other hand, Serenissima would make a good introduction to Jong for fans of fantasy and historic romance.

OTHER REVIEWS

Fear of Flying, reviewed here
How to Save Your Own Life, reviewed here

If you would like your review of this or any other Erica Jong book listed here, please leave a comment with a link and I will add it. 

NOTES

Serenissima was also published as Shylock's Daughter.

This counted as my Italy book for the European Reading Challenge, my book for the Venice in February Challenge., and one of my books for the I Love Italy Challenge.

Opening Sentence: Serenissima

The way we live now, jetting from palmy LaLa Land to gray and frenzied New York City, to azure Venice, the Serenissima of all Serenisseme -- we might as well be time traveling. 

-- Serenissima by Erica Jong.

Today is my birthday, so I am playing hooky from work and having fun all day. One thing I am doing is indulging in Erica Jong's novel about Venice.  This one is pure fun.

It also is my book for the Venice in February Challenge.

2012 Challenge: Venice in February

February 1 to February 28, 2012

Venice in February Reading Challenge

FINISHED

Snow Feathers and Dolce Bellezza, are hosting a short, simple, and marvelous reading challenge: read one, two or how many books you would like and have the time for, that are related to and/or based in Venice.

They chose Venice "because it's a unique city, with a dreamlike atmosphere and yet, with secrets to discover. Whoever visited Venice once still wishes to go back and this challenge may be the next best thing."

Like so many people, I love Venice.  And since it doesn't look like I'll be going back any time soon, I am always in the mood to read books about La Serenissima.

Ideas

I made this list of Venice books a while back.  There is also a list on the Venice in February site.  And there is a much lengthier list of Venice books on a great website called Fictional Cities.

BOOK POSSIBILITIES AND REVIEWS

I ended up reading two books for this challenge, but I only reviewed one of them:

• Serenissima by Erica Jong (novel), reviewed here

• Dressed for Death by Donna Leon (third in her Commissario Guido Brunetti series)

One will also count as my Italy book for the European Reading Challenge.

Mailbox Monday

Thanks for joining me for Mailbox Monday! MM was created by Marcia at A girl and her books (fka The Printed Page), who graciously hosted it for a long, long time, before turning it into a touring meme (details here).

Serena at Savvy Verse & Wit is hosting in October.  Please go by and visit her wonderful blog.

Because the Friends of the Multnomah County Library had their big fall sale this past weekend, a huge stack of books came into my house.

Not counting the eight Jack Reacher books that Hubby got (he's only just now discovered Lee Child, although I've been raving for years), the stack includes:

Parnassus on Wheels and The Haunted Bookshop by Christopher Morley



Getting to Know the General: The Story of an Involvement by Graham Greene

The Complete Claudine: Claudine at School, Claudine in Paris, Claudine Married, Claudine and Annie by Colette (one of several omnibus editions I picked up; I read a lot of Colette when I was in college, but don't remember any of it; on my French Connections list)

The Complete Essays and Other Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson (a great Modern Library edition with dust jacket)



The Diary of Anais Nin, Vol. 1: 1931-1934 and The Diary of Anais Nin, Vol. 3: 1939-1944 (I am in a Paris book reading mood, so got these to add to my French Connections list; too bad I couldn't find Vol. 2)

The Vicar of Wakefield and Other Writings by Oliver Goldsmith (another cool Modern Library edition with dust jacket)



Between the Acts by Virginia Woolf (her last novel; I have an aspiration to read more Woolf)



Cities of the Interior by Anais Nin (in for a penny . . . )



Maurice: A Novel by E. M. Forster

The Beet Queen and Love Medicine by Louis Erdrich (Love Medicine won the National Book Critics Circle award)



The Raj Quartet by Paul Scott (in a nifty boxed set of paperbacks)



Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith (I've seen this around a lot -- it looks very good and I want to read it right away)



The Secret Hangman by Peter Lovesey (I've now gathered three of his books but haven't read any of them yet -- must start)



The Complete Father Brown by G. K. Chesterton (I've been meaning to get to these; here they are in an omnibus edition)



The Gun Seller by Hugh Laurie (I took a flyer on this one)



Toward the End of Time by John Updike (I'm an Updike completist)



Absolute Truths by Susan Howatch (the sixth and last book in her series about the Church of England; I want to read the series and still need the first two)



Brief Lives by Anita Brookner (I was inspired by International Anita Brookner Day)



House Made of Dawn by Scott N. Momaday (this won the Pulitzer Prize in 1969)



Small World by David Lodge (the sequel to Changing Places, which I loved)



The Woman Who Walked into Doors by Roddy Doyle



The Avignon Quintet by Lawrence Durrell (a doorstop of an omnibus edition; Monsieur: Or, The Prince of Darkness, the first book of The Avignon Quintet, won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize))



Venice: Lion City: The Religion of Empire by Gary Wills (looks great and is going on my Venice List)



The Lion by Nelson DeMille (because I am so loving Cathedral that I am stocking up on his others)

Review of the Day: Locations

I do not much like the songs of Edith Piaf, the boulevards of Baron Haussman, the furniture of Louis XIV, the sound of Gertrude Stein, the vainglory of Napoleon or the conceit of Charles de Gaulle. I distrust, at one level, people who turn ideas into movements; at another, ideas themselves too pressingly articulated.

So begins Jan Morris's explanation of the "insular prejudices" that limit her visits to Paris. It is an example of what makes her travel writing so very, very good -- an extraordinary gift of analysis and observation and a willingness to express blunt opinions.

Locations is a collection of previously published magazine pieces Morris wrote mostly in the 1980s. They are profiles of cities or other areas that highlight the character of the place as experienced by Morris. They are not travel guides, but ruminations on what makes the place itself, which is why they are entertaining and worthwhile even a few decades after they were written.

Morris is best known for her encyclopedic history, The World of Venice. Her clear eye and deft wit let her put a finger on exactly what makes a place tick. She does love a list, which can start to seem a little lazy and irritatingly rhythmic, but so often one of her lists can make a reader laugh with delight for bringing together all the incongruous parts that illuminate the whole. Take, for instance, her observations of life in a Texas border town along the Rio Grande:

The very presence of that southern bank, looking so often enough so much the same as the northern one, seems to speak of looser morals, freer ways, more bribable officials, less dependable mail deliveries, dirtier streets, better food, hotter sex, more desperate poverty, more horrible prisons, and an altogether better chance of adventure.

It is writing like this that inspires travel, which is why Morris's essays will never go out of date.

OTHER REVIEWS

If you would like your review of this or any other Jan Morris book listed her, please leave a comment with a link and I will add it.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Meet me in Venice

Ana Yuan, a plain young woman in a summery blue dress and sandals, never felt even a hint of danger when she boarded the double-decker train from Shanghai to Suzhou on the borders of the Tailhu Lake.

-- Meet Me in Venice by Elizabeth Adler.

I recently read Alder's Invitation to Provence and enjoyed it for the pure entertainment of it. This one caught my eye because I had just put together my list of Venice books.

It is light and fluffy, but that is just what I need right now.

A Venice Book List: Bella Città; Bellissimi Libri

Venice is at the top of my armchair travel destinations. It is such a magical city. I love to be there. I love to think about it. And I love to read about it.

This is a list of books about Venice, including fiction, non-fiction, and cookbooks. It is not a comprehensive list. These are the books about Venice that are on my TBR shelf now (in blue), on my wish list, or that I have already read (in red).

There is a much lengthier list of Venice books on a great website called Fictional Cities, along with lists of books about Florence and London. 

Any suggestions? Please leave comments.

The general list is in alphabetical order, by title. Following that is a list of mysteries by Donna Leon featuring Commissario Guido Brunetti, all set in Venice. The lengthy series is listed in publication order, starting with the first book in the series.

GENERAL LIST

Alibi by Joseph Kanon (novel)

The Aspern Papers and Other Stories by Henry James (short stories)

The City of Falling Angels by John Berendt (non-fiction)

The Comfort of Strangers by Ian McEwan (novel)

Death in Venice by Thomas Mann (novel)

Don't Look Now by Daphne du Maurier (short stories)

A History of Venice by John Julius Norwich (non-fiction)

The Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain (non-fiction) (reviewed here);

In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust (novel)

Locations by Jan Morris (non-fiction) (reviewed here)

The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare (play)

Nocturnes by Kazuo Ishiguro (short stories)

Serenissima by Erica Jong (novel) (reviewed here)

The Stones of Venice by John Ruskin (non-fiction; abridged)

Stone's Fall by Iain Pears (novel)

Stone Virgin by Barry Unsworth (novel)

Temporary Kings by Anthony Powell (novel)

Territorial Rights by Muriel Spark (novel)

A Thousand Days in Venice by Marlena de Blasi (non-fiction)

A Traveller's Companion to Venice, edited by John Julius Norwich (non-fiction)

Venetian Affair by Helen MacInnes (novel)

Venetian Holiday by David Campbell (novel)

Veneto: Authentic Recipes from Venice and the Italian Northeast by Julia della Croce (cookbook)

Venice Observed by Mary McCarthy (non-fiction)

The Wings of the Dove by Henry James (novel)

The World of Venice: Revised Edition by Jan Morris (non-fiction)

DONNA LEON'S

COMMISSARIO GUIDO BRUNETTI MYSTERIES

Death at La Fenice

Death in a Strange Country

Dressed for Death

Death and Judgment

Acqua Alta

Quietly in Their Sleep

A Noble Radiance

Fatal Remedies

Friends in High Places

A Sea of Troubles

Willful Behavior

Uniform Justice

Doctored Evidence

Blood from a Stone

Through a Glass, Darkly

Suffer the Little Children

The Girl of His Dreams

About Face

A Question of Belief

Drawing Conclusions

NOTE: Last updated December 28, 2012.

Opening Sentence of the Day: Death in a Strange Country

"The body floated face down in the murky water of the canal."

-- Death in a Strange Country (1993) by Donna Leon.

This is the second in Leon's Commissario Guido Brunetti mystery series set in Venice.  I read the first, Death at La Fenice (1992), several years ago, but the series has only recently caught my attention again.

Venice is such a magical city.  I go through periods of enthrallment with Venice, which don't necessarily correspond to actual visits and usually only lead to extensive periods of armchair travel. 

I think I will make a list of Venice books. At the top will go The World of Venice by Jan Morris, still my favorite "travel" book ever, more of a biography of a city.

Any other suggestions?