From: djheydt@kithrup.com
In article <6b0dad4e-2640-4616-bbb1-91bdc1f1f2f7@googlegroups.com>,
William Vetter wrote:
>On Friday, August 1, 2014 4:58:33 PM UTC-4, Dorothy J Heydt wrote:
>> In article ,
>>
>> William Vetter wrote:
>>
>> >Because there isn't much activity here, except ugly activity, I'm gonna
>>
>> >post something that isn't so important....
>>
>> >
>>
>> >I finished reading this book. The plot structure was a buildup to a
>>
>> >revelation. There were two women, the title character, Virginia, and a
>>
>> >cousin of hers that she was close to as a child, and about 4 older women
>>
>> >who were their female relatives, 2 of which were elderly and confused.
>>
>> >This structure was very obscured by the whole thing being written in
>>
>> >stream of consciousness and shifting viewpoints between all of these
>>
>> >characters. Unfortunately, the author chose to name two secondary
>>
>> >characters that were involved in the 2 confused viewpoint characters Roy
>>
>> >and Ray, which made parts of the narrative awful to sort out.
>>
>> >
>>
>> >Virginia visits her home town while she's pregnant, develops toxemia,
>>
>> >and collapses in her second aunt's house, who is the mother of her
>>
>> >childhood friend. She is out of it, and is advised not to be moved
>>
>> >much, so all of the female characters come there to tend to her, and
>>
>> >eventually there is the revelation that one of the grandfathers,
>>
>> >Raymond, developed a mental illness during the last decade of his life.
>>
>> >
>>
>> >He was fascinated by King Tut and the Pyramids, and saw himself as a
>>
>> >Pharaoh, and had himself buried in a concrete vault with his television
>>
>> >and books about Egypt. When he was alone with the girls, he terrorized
>>
>> >them, told them he'd kill them unless they worshiped him. When his
>>
>> >burial arrangements were complete, he became abusive toward his wife,
>>
>> >who eventually killed him and made it look like a suicide. Each of
>>
>> >these women has kept their aspect of the situation secret from the world
>>
>> >and each other, and in the climactic scene, they tell one another their
>>
>> >individual experiences, and how Raymond screwed up their lives.
>>
>> >
>>
>> >So that was the plot.
>>
>>
>> Thank you for telling us about this. I, for one, would probably
>>
>> have rejected it based on the back cover blurb, but it's always
>>
>> good to have more (but not too much) information.
>>
>The single excerpt about yellow interested me in the book. I am glad
>that I read a book of this type. I do not heavily endorse it and
>recommend you all read it. It had some problems, which I mentioned or
>suggested above; the denouement was weak, all the women being instantly
>and completely healed by confessing to each other. On the plus side, it
>was a women's novel where the characters' secrets involved no sexual
>abuse, which startled me.
>
>I respect an author who tries something difficult and partially
>succeeds; maybe more than some name author who somewhat bores me with a
>uniform product. I don't mean that as career advise for anybody.
>>
>>
>> But your point, I think, is that it's lousy plotting.
>
>I don't have a position on the plot. One of you ladies asked me what
>kind of plot it had. It's not a complex plot, was what I meant to
>convey. As a raw plot diagram, it could have been a short fiction plot.
>Maybe a complex plot would have made the book unreadable, given the
>complexity of the style.
I see. So Patricia Wrede, if she were still posting on these
forums, might call it the work of a natural short story writer
trying to write a novel?
--
Dorothy J. Heydt
Vallejo, California
djheydt at gmail dot com
Should you wish to email me, you'd better use the gmail edress.
Kithrup's all spammy and hotmail's been hacked.
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
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