A BEATRIX POTTER TREASURY by Beatrix Potter

PUBLISHER: Warne, 10/2007

GENRE: Children's Fiction/Fantasy
PURCHASE: link
MY GRADE: A

SYNOPSIS: Ten of Beatrix Potter's most popular tales are brought together in this beautiful jacketed hardcover treasury. The tales trace the life of Beatrix Potter from her first publication of The Tale of Peter Rabbit 1902 to her later tales set around her farm, Hill Top. A wonderful illustrated introduction provides background on Beatrix Potter and the people and places that inspired her writing.

MY THOUGHTS: This hardcover book includes ten of Beatrix's 24 stories. Printed on the book itself are the same images found on the dust jacket. The book is 10.25"x8 x.75". Here's the table of contents, back cover. The front and back of the inside is light blue with white outlines of various animals, which you can't see in the photo.

There's a 17-page biography of Beatrix at the very beginning that's filled with photos of her and some of her early drawings. There's information about the origins of each of these ten stories but at the beginning of each story is a similar telling of those facts.

Fourteen of her stories were made into nine short animated films and shown in the UK and US from 1992-1998. They've been put on DVD many times and some DVDs have all nine episodes.

The Tale of Peter Rabbit- Peter and his three sisters, Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cotton-tail live under the root of a fig tree with their mother. He eats vegetables from Mr. McGregor's garden and loses his jacket trying to escape. He gets sick from overeating so that's his punishment for stealing. 

According to information in this book, this story originated as an illustrated story in a letter Beatrix wrote to her ex-governess' son. She asked to borrow the letters so she could write the story. See the letter here and here.

The Tale of Benjamin Bunny- Benjamin and cousin Peter are out looking for Peter's coat and shoes, which are in Mr. McGregor's garden. They take some vegetables. The saw a female cat so they hid under a basket. The cat laid on the basket. Benjamin's father, old Mr. Benjamin Bunny, was out looking for his son. He was smoking a pipe and was carrying a switch. He jumped down on the cat, hit her and kicked her into the greenhouse and locked her in. He whipped Benjamin with the switch. 

I don't like the violence in this story but I like the illustrations very much. Benjamin's outfit, because of Mr. McGregor's hat, is my favorite of all the outfits from any of her stories.

This story was inspired by a rabbit Beatrix had years before who liked hot buttered toast and sweets.

The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies- Mr. McGregory found the Flopsy bunnies, the children of Peter's sister Flopsy and their cousin Benjamin, sleeping in his yard so he put them in a paper bag without waking them and sat the bag aside. Their parents couldn't find them and suspected they may be in the bag so they told Mrs. Tittlemouse about it. She nibbled a hole in the bottom corner of the bag so they could be rescued. They were pulled out and pinched! to wake them up. They filled the bag with rotting vegetables so fool Mr. McGregor. They watched him take the bag home and "throw" it down "in a way that would have been extremely painful" to the rabbits had they been in the bag. Mrs. Tittlemouse was rewarded with rabbit fur to make winter clothes with.

This story is set in the garden of Beatrix's uncle's house in Wales. 

The Tale of Mr. Tod- I didn't care for this story at all and it was her longest one. It was like two different stories thrown together with abducted bunnies to tie them together. Benjamin Bunny's father, "old" Mr. Benjamin Bunny, his name is changed in this story to old Mr. Bouncer. Tommy is a badger who's a nuisance who smells something awful. Mr. Tod, the fox, finds him sleeping in his bed so he plays a water prank on him then they get into a physical fight that ends up outside. Mr. Bouncer is in charge of watching the seven twin Flopsy rabbits but loses site of them. Flopsy smacks him for that. They figure out they've been stashed in Mr. Tod's oven by Tommy so when Tommy and Mr. Tod are outside fighting, Peter and Benjamin sneak in and take the bunnies home.

This story features real-life landscapes of villages in Near Sawrey.

The Story of a Fierce Bad Rabbit- This may be the shortest story of all of Beatrix's. A mean rabbit is picking on another one and gets what he had coming to him.

This was written for Beatrix's editor's daughter who wanted her to write about a bad rabbit.

The Tale of Tom Kitten- Tom has two sisters, Moppet and Mittens. His mother is Tabitha Twitchit. The three kittens get very dirty playing outside and Tom loses some buttons from his coat. Their mom finds them sitting on a wall outside and smacks them and takes them home. While they're out there before their mom shows up, Jemima Puddle-duck and her family show up.

Beatrix borrowed a real kitten for this story so she could use it for the drawings. 

The Tale of Jemima Puddle-duck- She encounters a sly fox while she's out searching for a nesting place. He offers her the use of his woodshed. He plans to eat her and her eggs but a collie dog named Kep and his canine friends rescue her. Now this is a story I like! I like the predator fox and what he's up to. This story sounds more like a Grimm's fairy tale. 

This was inspired by ducks Beatrix saw in Putney Park in London while she was there visiting a cousin. 

The Tale of Samuel Whiskers or the Roly-Poly Pudding- Tabitha Twitchit has her cousin and neighbor Ribby over. They can't find Tom and his sisters. The sisters are hiding from two rats who were stealing from the kitchen. Tom finds them in the attic and gets trussed up by them. They wrap him in dough to make a dumpling out of him but a dog named John shows up and rescues him. The two rats get away with stolen goods. Moppet and Mittens become professional rat catchers. 

Samuel was inspired by a real pet rat Beatrix had named Sammy. When she bought her farm, Top Hill, it was infested with rats and I guess Sammy was one of them.

The Pie and the Patty Pan- Ribby the cat from The Tale of Samuel Whiskers invites a female dog friend named Duchess over for tea. Duchess is worried that Ribby will serve her a mouse pie so she brings another pie over and sneaks it onto the second rack in her oven. The plan backfires. Kind of a strange tale because of how terrified she is at the thought of eating mouse pie.

The dog was inspired by two Pomeranians that belonged to the wife of a gardener Beatrix knew.

The Tale of Ginger and Pickles- Another strange story. Ginger is an orange cat and Pickles is a brown terrier dog. They run a shop called Ginger and Pickles but make no money because they allow everyone to put things on credit but the customers never pay their bills. So they close shop. That's it, folks.

The story is based on a real shop in Near Sawrey. 

Thanks to Jason for gifting this to me!

RESURRECTION ROW by Anne Perry

PUBLISHER: St. Martin's Press, 1981

GENRE: Historical Fiction/Mystery

SETTING: England, 1885/86

SERIES: Pitt #4

MY GRADE: B

SYNOPSIS: It is a most incredible sight: a corpse sitting at the reins of a hansom cab–and not just any corpse, but the body of a peer of the realm. To Inspector Thomas Pitt and his wife, Charlotte, this macabre apparition seems like sheer lunacy. Who would ever want to exhume a decently buried old chap like Lord Augustus Fitzroy-Hammond?

A doctor insists that Lord Augustus’s death was natural. But as far as the police are concerned, there’s certainly nothing natural about any of this gristly aftermath. Inspector Pitt is determined to unearth the truth–even if the digging puts his own life at perilous risk.

MY THOUGHTS: Very interesting synopsis and very macabre. Who wouldn't want to read this? I'm not satisfied with the ending or how abrupt it was, how it was solved in the last few pages. I had no clue as to who was behind any of the exhumed bodies so I give the author credit for not making it obvious, to me anyway. There were an awful lot of characters in such a short novel, over 19. I found Inspector Pitt to be somewhat dull, and his wife too. I really like aunt Vespasia's personality and she's my favorite character in the book. I was never bored with this book though I don't think it was well-written at all. The subject matter held my interest and made me want to keep reading.

I like how the cover of the edition I'm reviewing, Ballantine Books, 2009, uses a piece of art from 1896 called Naval and Military Club by Cecil Cutler. It definitely represents the scene in the book where the first dead body was found.

Thanks to Jason for giving this to me!

DOUBLE INDEMNITY by James M. Cain

PUBLISHER: Avon, 1943

GENRE: Contemporary Fiction/Thriller

SETTING: California, USA

MY GRADE: B

SYNOPSIS: Double Indemnity is the classic tale of an evil woman motivated by greed who corrupts a weak man motivated by lust. Walter Huff is an insurance investigator like any other until the day he meets the beautiful and dangerous Phyllis Nirdlinger and falls under her spell. Together they plot to kill her husband and split the insurance. It'll be the perfect murder... 

MY THOUGHTS: This was too condensed and too much was going on. I really disliked the stuff involving someone and multiple past murders. I felt it was overkill to the plot line. There was absolutely no character development. Worst of all, none between the two main characters which was very strange considering Walter's so in love with Phyllis but when did all that happen? Despite the negatives I still liked the plot and the ending.

The film versions are a bit different than the novella, especially the endings, which I didn't care for at all. I liked the male lead in the original 1944 film better than the one in the 1973 made for TV version but liked the actress in the TV version better than the one in the original.

Thanks to Jason for giving this to me!

MY LORD MONLEIGH by Jan Cox Speas

PUBLISHER: Bobbs-Merrill, 1956
RESSUED: Avon, 1978
GENRE: Historical Romance
SETTING: Scotland, 17th century
MY GRADE: C

SYNOPSIS: Scotland was a land divided. The rightful Simon Stuart had been driven into exile in France, his country ruled by the dour Presbyterians who had ridden into power on the coattails of Oliver Cromwell's rise to power in England. All who opposed them were rebels and outlaws, to be hunted down and branded as traitors. And the man with the highest price on his head was Monleigh.

Anne Lindsay met him first on the windswept moors, though when first she saw him she had no idea who he might be. She knew only that he was handsome and that he did something to her heart, that here was the one man who could bring warmth and happiness into a life seemingly forever chilled by the bleakness of her early childhood. . .

MY THOUGHTS: I was disappointed in this. I finally bought it for $13 after searching for several years then horded it for another 4.5 years before reading it. I can't understand why only one person on Goodreads has mentioned the rape. I know it happened but I was seriously doubting it until I got to a review that mentioned it. It was written in such a weird way that left me really confused. The story was too condensed and felt shorter than 297 pages. If I hadn't read on Word Wenches blog I'd not have known this took place in the 17th century. I had no sense of the timespan but someone said it was no more than a month. I don't know how old Simon is or anything about his background except what really happened to his wife. I only know he's got dark hair and gray eyes.

I like bad characters so I liked Margaret Clennon (and Walter) but I was also hoping something bad would happen to her as punishment for being a nasty person. I really like the dark and drab tone of the book and that Anne seems depressed. You don't get that much in historical romance so it was a nice change.

Rape scene is here. You can read the book for at Archive.org.

The 1978 Avon reissue, pictured on the right, has a beautiful cover. The pages are edged in red too.

STALKING JUSTICE: The Dramatic True Story of the Detective Who First Used DNA Testing To Catch a Serial Killer by Paul Mones

PUBLISHER: Pocket Books, 7/1995
GENRE: True Crime
SETTING: Virginia, USA, 1980s-90s
MY GRADE: B

SYNOPSIS: Paul Mones, author of the acclaimed When a Child Kills, presents the first in-depth account of the pursuit and capture of "The Southside Strangler," based on extensive interviews and a graphically detailed examination of the evidence. STALKING JUSTICE focuses on the heroic efforts of the lone investigator who, by using his gut instincts and twenty-first-century technology, ended the vicious rampage of an elusive killer.

Detective Joe Horgas suspected that Susan Tucker's murder was connected to a similar case nearly four years earlier-a murder to which another man had already confessed. Horgas's theories were dismissed by superiors and colleagues alike; undaunted, he developed his own leads, and ultimately targeted a suspect. But he had nothing except semen stains from the crime scene to tie his suspect to the murder-nothing but a genetic code that, once deciphered, would break open the case. In a historic breakthrough for the U.S. criminal justice, DNA testing would be used to catch a killer.

MY THOUGHTS: This was a decently written account of the crimes of the monster known as Timothy Wilson Spencer. More time was spent on the rape-murders than the rapes from 1983, if I'm remembering correctly. Thankfully not much time was spent on courtroom proceedings as that always bores me to tears. Lots of information on DNA was included, which was brand new at the time, having first been used a year before in England on the Colin Pitchfork case. That case was profiled on season 1 of Medical Detectives (Forensic Files.) Timothy has gone down in U.S. history as being the first person to have been convicted based on DNA evidence and he's the first person to have been executed based on a DNA conviction.

I wish the author had tried to interview Timothy. Now that I think about it that would have been as waste of time since he denies having any part of the crimes though he left his DNA (semen) all over crime scenes. I don't know why photos of the victims and Timothy weren't included. His family wasn't interviewed by the author either after the execution, which was 15 months before this book was published. I'd have loved to know their thoughts about all that went down. We weren't told of how law enforcement thought Timothy may have targeted his victims or if it was just random.

As for the killer himself, he was troubled from the start, at least from age 9 when he set something on fire at school. He seems to have just been a bad seed. There was no mention of him being abused as a child and I'm curious if he was maybe abused by someone as a child, before the fire incident at school, and his parents never knew about it.

I know of this case from the first season of Medical Detectives, which later became Forensic Files, "Season 1, episode 6, "Southside Strangler", from 1996. A British documentary called "Born To Kill?" profiled this case on an episode called "Timothy Spencer: The Southside Strangler" in 2014. This documentary is very good, better than Forensic Files in some ways.

THE WOMEN OF EDEN by Marilyn Harris

PUBLISHER: Putnam, 1980

GENRE: Historical Fiction
SETTING: England, 1870-71
MY GRADE: A++

SYNOPSIS: Sweeping from England's Devon coast to London, Cambridge, and finally America, this new volume in the Eden family saga is surely the best yet.

John Murrey Eden is the dominating force in the lives of the five Eden women. Lady Mary Eden, John's cousin, is the recipient of his greatest beneficence and the object of his deepest rage. Young and headstrong, Mary is stifled and eventually almost killed by John's zealous protection. When she falls in love with Burke Stanhope, a man John despises, battle lines are clearly drawn. Mary must decide if her love for Burke is stonger than her loyalty to the man who has single-handedly rescued her family from financial ruin.

Elizabeth Eden, the closest to a mother John has ever known and his staunchest supported, lives with Mary in her fashionable London home. As she watches John destroy the family she loves, even she is forced to choose a life independent of him.

Lady Lila Harrington Eden is John's charmingly free-spirited wife, whose suffering at John's behest is perhaps the most devastating of all.

Dowager Countess Harriet Eden, Mary's mother and John's aunt, lives in a self-inflicted world of darkness as penance for a sin so heinous that only she and John know of its nature.

And finally, Dhari, John's mistress, whose deep affection for John is replaced by an even stronger love for his solicitor, with catastrophic results.

 
From Mary's homosexual brother, who's lover dies unexpectedly, to the editor of the London Times, whose illustrious career is placed in jeopardy, John Murrey Eden makes his indelible mark on all the book's characters.

The Eden women's raging conflicts with John and their abiding love for one another provide the framework for this superbly written historical novel. As in This Other Eden, The Prince of Eden, and The Eden Passion, the reader is so caught up in the family's dramatic events that the book's ending comes all too soon.

The Women of Eden will certainly enrapture Marilyn Harris's wide audience and gain more and more devoted readers.

MY THOUGHTS: Excellent, excellent read. Many chef's kisses to you, Ms. Harris. There was never a dull moment in these 600 pages. I've had this gem in my possession for two months short of 13 years. This was deep, dark and disturbing. This takes place 9 years after the previous one, The Eden Passion, and spans one full year, May 1870-May 1871. John is said to be 37. The previous book takes place between May 2, 1851-May 3, 1861. John is 15 when it starts so he'd be 25 when it ends, making him thirty-four 9 years later when this book begins. The author has made him three years older for some reason. His blond hair is mostly gray now. He's one sick and deranged human being and I wouldn't want him any other way. I do think you should read the previous one before you read this so relationships will make sense.

John is nothing like he was in the previous book. He's a different character altogether. He seems to have lost his mind and has become a madman. He's out to make everyone miserable and truly succeeds. He's physically abusive towards women, Dhari, Elizabeth, Mary, and verbally abusive to all.

 

I think John's blonde wife Lila is just a few years younger than him. I got the impression she was in her early teens when John went off to war at age 17. In the previous book she had visions of all sorts and the townsfolk were scared of her but her visions were never mentioned in this book. They have a strange relationship. They only have sex when John wants another baby. She dreads it and has had many miscarriages. I assume the thought of pregnancy is why she dreads sex though it wasn't made clear. We don't really know anything of what she's like outside of the pregnancy stuff. She's basically in this story to suffer and suffer she does. They have two sons, Stephen, 4, Frederick, 2.

Dhari is John's Indian mistress who he brought home with him in the previous book. There's no interaction between her and Lila and I don't even know if Lila knows she's her husband's mistress. She did absolutely nothing for this story.

Aslam is Dhari's eighteen-year-old son who John thinks of as a son. He's kind of a bland character and I don't know why he's even in the story other than to be a cohort of John's. The only time we see him is when he's with John.

Richard, John's cousin and son of his aunt Harriet, is twenty-seven and I'm not sure if he's a student at Cambridge or what, but he lives there or near there. He's in a secret relationship with professor Bertie Nichols, who teaches there. John tries his best to ruin it, unbeknownst to Richard, since he can't stand someone being happy and hates "sodomites." It's very tragic and I didn't see what happened coming since it happened without warning. I wish it had been drawn out more and not so abrupt. 

Poor Mary, John's twenty-one-year-old cousin. She's blonde and blue-eyed. She's the daughter of Harriet, John's aunt, who was married to his uncle James Eden, and younger sister to Richard. John's overly protective of her and is out to sabotage her and orchestrates something horrific. He later ships her off to Miss Veal's School for Young Females where bad things happen to her. I think Mary's a bit disturbed herself anyway because she comes on to him and contemplates suicide in front of two others.

Burke Stanhope is Mary's love interest. He's American and almost 15 years older than her. They barely know each other and I wish they'd have known each other longer and had developed more of a relationship. His mother Caroline was another pointless character. She was clearly mentally ill before the awful deed that happened. There was already so much going on in this book that that incident wasn't needed.

Every few pages for the entirety of this book and the one that came before it (and probably the first two too) the author uses the word "commenced" and it's maddening!! She also refers to several characters by their full names most of the time and I don't understand why.

Harriet was in the previous two books. We see her again in this one, much to my surprise.

See my reviews for the first three in this series:

This Other Eden

The Prince of Eden
The Eden Passion

THE EDEN PASSION by Marilyn Harris

PUBLISHER: Putnam, 4/1979
GENRE: Historical Fiction
SETTING: England, India
SERIES: Eden, #3
MY GRADE: D

SYNOPSIS: John Murrey Eden came home to bury the man and legend of his father -- and to claim a castle ands destiny named Eden.

Standing amid the bea...more John Murrey Eden came home to bury the man and legend of his father -- and to claim a castle ands destiny named Eden.

Standing amid the beauty of all that would one day be his to rule, was the woman that should never have been his to love -- the Lady of Eden, the mistress of his father...

From their tragic, forbidden love, a woman fled into the tormented darkness of endless guilt, and a man wandered around the world searching for honor without sorrow, the future without the past, and love without end.

MY THOUGHTS: This is the third in a series of seven. I can't remember much about the two previous ones since I read them 13 years ago. It's taken me 13 years to want to read this one because the other two were awful. This one was a huge letdown. Took me exactly 2 weeks to get though it. The timespan is 10 years. The first 302 pages were very good and kept my attention. It went downhill quickly after that when John, who was 15 when this began, went off to fight in the Crimean war at age 17 then was in India for many years. That part of the book lasted 163 pages but it felt like 300. I couldn't have cared less about what was happening and there was just no point to it. Not one word of it was interesting. Then there was another 200 pages after that after John returned home to England, now age 25, and most of that was uninteresting.

Harriet is a main character and was in the previous book. I don't have this written in my notes but I think she was in her late 20's, the age 27 is coming to mind, in the previous book, so she would be 42-ish at the start of this. After a horrific revelation, she does something very disturbing to herself (page 193 of hardcover, chapter "Eden Castle, May 2, 1852) and banishes herself to her bedroom for years. That revelation lead to another horrific act. After her banishment, she's practically forgotten about until the last few pages. There's a scene on the very last page regarding her that almost made me cry. There's so much more that could have been done with her character that wasn't. 

James Eden is Harriet's abusive alcoholic husband, father of young Richard and Mary, and uncle to John, brother to his father, Edward. His character is short lived, unfortunately. 

There's a bad character in here that I really like, Morley Johnson. He's stealing from the Eden estate, whom he works for. There's also a violent scene in which he rapes and beats a women in the face. He too is forgotten about until the very end of the story. I like that he gets away with his bad deeds because he's got dirt on someone else. We find out what happens with him in the next in the series, The Women of Eden.

Lila Harrington was a teenager when she had a brief encounter with John and I mean a very short meeting with him outside one day before he went off to war. She writes to John while he's at war but I don't know why. She doesn't really know him and has only met him once and saw him one other time in the street, so why's she writing to him for years? And why does John get in touch with her when he returns and marry her? Bizarre to me. She's another character who was brought on then forgotten about until the end of the story. She's interesting because she has visions and some think she's a witch. What's the point of making a character that way if the author's not going to do anything with it other than simply tell us?

John leaves for war mostly, I think, to escape something bad that's revealed shortly before. He forgets about his young cousins and forgets Elizabeth, who was a friend of his father, she helped raise him and is the only mother figure in his life. I'm puzzled by why the author had him do that. Characters are brought on only to be put on the back burner until the end. If most of the war section had been cut out this would have been a pretty good book. 

See my reviews for the first four in the series:

This Other Eden

The Prince of Eden

The Eden Passion

The Women of Eden