American Doll and Toy Museum: On Souvenirs

American Doll and Toy Museum: On Souvenirs: I'm writing in praise of all kinds of souvenirs in this post, all kinds.  Not just dolls, but spoons, thimbles, snapshots, pennants, pat...

What makes a book a success?

Briefly, in fiction, poetry, drama, for a book to be a success the reader has to care about the characters.  Some beautifully written books leave us cold because we don't like or care about the people in them.  I've read, and enjoyed, badly written books, some romances, some sci fi, some mystery, because I cared about the character, even if they were two dimensionally drawn and shallow.  Something made me care.



I like reading when I was young, Jackie and Joan Collins books; I didn't think they were going into the literary canon, but there characters in them I worried over.  Same with Judith Krantz.   Barbara Pym has made a career of birthing memorable characters, and Jane Eyre, Ann Karenina, and Jo March have transcended the pages of their own novel homes.  So has Nora from A Dolls House, so have any number of Shakespeare heroes and heroines.  Comic heroes do the same to us, hence passionate discussions over who is better, Superman or Batman.  Ahab, Ishmael, Lord Jim, Billly Budd, Tess, we lvoe and care for them. Even our animal protagonists get to us, Bambi, Dumbo, Beautiful Joe, Black Beauty, Lassie, Stellaluna, on and on.



Plots are nice, nonfiction passions make those books go round, but in the world of fiction, we have to care, and the character needn't be the most moral, law abiding  creature in the book. Like the real people in our lives, fictional folk have to spark an emotion; we don't care how they've been created via pen and paper, but we care about them and what happens to them. That is what drives the story.

On Loss

" I remembered that after my father died I would wake up in the morning and I would not remember for a minute that we had lost him, and then when I did, it was not so much amguian that I felt as a simple child's desire to be back in the time before he died."

Anne Rivers Siddons, The House Next Door

The House Next Door

Review of The House Next Door by Anne Rivers Siddons

There is an old Greek saying that if you don’t praise your own house, it will fall on you.  Indeed, good old Elphaba could tell us a lot about houses that fall and kill one’s siblings.  There are books about them, too, those nasty, vicious, sort of haunted houses, but the ghosts and malicious presence are the house itself.  Rose Red, Amityville Horror, The Haunting of Hill House, and so many more nasty abodes seem to have their own brand of deadly in hospitality.

Siddons has written a masterful suspense about a malicious house and its grounds worthy of real estate like The Castle of Otranto.  This brilliant, modern house, and its lush grounds and rhododendrons, prove deadly to all its owners.  Spoiler alert; the architect does not leave unscathed.  Also, if you like pets and animals, maybe you want not to read this book.

The praise heaped on the house next door soon turns into a curse.  Strange maladies, violence, and personal tragedies creep up on you.  The prologue skillfully foreshadows  events to come.

Colquitt and Walter Kennedy are the couple who witness and define the neighborhood, full of old money, but not ostentatious.   Their names conjure Camelot, which we all know wasn’t. Comfortable, New Englandy, a classier version of Peyton Place.  A talented architect creates a gorgeous modern house in  neighborhood of classic traditional homes.  Each part of the book introduces a new family that meets with all kinds of catastrophes once they move into their dream home. An interesting aside is the name “Colquitt” which is an old Anglo Saxon name meaning “from the coal pits.”

Be careful what y wish for; you might get it.  This house is pure, shining, daytime evil, where no one is safe.

"And So this is Christmas . . "

Every year the holidays seem to come and go much more quickly.  They are as ephemeral as the snowflakes that often accompany them, often dissolving on glass even as they accumulate on dead grass and concrete.

Tonight I went to a brief, but wonderful, Christmas concert of classic carols and music, sung in harmony by amateur musicians with professional heart.

With each note, I heard the ghosts of everyone I've loved, those same phantoms of Christmas past blinking in the lights of the Christmas tree.

For the first time this season in all of the frantic behavior, it felt like Christmas. Our holiday is low key this year, wrapped more in memory than giftwrap.  How I miss my mother and dad, my grandparents, uncles, good friends now long gone.

As I age, I measure my life in Christmases past, and wonder now many will be in my future.  Memories of the smoked chicken and pheasants we used to have are almost better than whatever it is we have for dinner this year.  At least we aren't coming off of or planning funerals. 

What memories do you cherish of The Holidays?  I remember and treasure the memory of nearly every gift I've ever received, and I've treasured the giver more.  I treasure memories of handmade Christmas gifts and cards, of cooking my mother's recipes one after the other to try to resurrect her.

To those who lament the alleged commercialism and  excess of Christmas, I say Christmas is more than that, those aspects have been lamented since at least the 6th century.  Christmas is good will, and good feelings, it is fellowship, and music, and spirituality.  There is nothing like it, and no one like Santa and its key players, including the Holy Family and the three wise men.

Angels we have indeed heard on high, and sometimes, we even listen to them.

God bless us, everyone!

Dr. E's Doll Museum Blog: Creature from the Black Lagoon

Dr. E's Doll Museum Blog: Creature from the Black Lagoon: Does anyone remember his name in The Munsters?  He was Uncle Something.  Watched the whole film tonight with Julie Adams, who recently passe...

American Doll and Toy Museum: Honoring Vets and Dolls!

American Doll and Toy Museum: Honoring Vets and Dolls!: Travel Celebrate Vets Love our Dolls Harriet Brinker’s   Dolls Etc. brings us   VETS and DOLLS Together! Two terrific prog...