Saturday 1 December 2018

#6degrees December

#6degrees is a monthly meme hosted by Kate @Books Are My Favourite and Best.

Oftentimes I haven't read the starting book for this meme, but I can assure you that I only play the next 6 books with ones I have actually read. 
If I've read the book during this blogging life, then I include my review, otherwise, you just have to take my word for it!

This month the starting book is A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.
Are you game?

Old image alert - Kate @Books Are My Favourite & Best now hosts #6Degrees but this is a good refresh of the rules.

A Christmas Carol?
Where do we go after that?
Do we follow the seasonal story path or the famous author road?
Perhaps I could choose another story about redemption or kindness?
Too easy! I cry rashly!
Instead I will follow the ghost story element - straight into the arms of Audrey Niffenegger and Her Fearful Symmetry.

Now I could simply pick another book about twins as my next link.
Too easy! I cry rashly!
Did you know that the title of Her Fearful Symmetry was based on a poem by William Blake?
It is and I'm sure there are oodles of books out there based on or named after famous lines in poems, but the stand out based-on-poetry story for me is Steven Carroll's The Lost Life.

I adored everything about this story - the language, the love and the poem.
However the other two books in the proposed quartet haven't grabbed me quite as much.
I'm still hopeful for the fourth.

Which is a similar experience that I had with the Elena Ferrante tetralogy.
The first book was intriguing, but I struggled to finish the set.
My energy and care factor fizzled out.

Sadly I also failed to care about or connect to Lorena Hickok in Amy Bloom's White Houses (review to come shortly).
I wanted to, but I felt like I was kept at arms length the whole time.

My next leap combines several links from the books above.
The Monkey's Mask by Dorothy Porter includes a degree of poetry, LGBTQ and glorious language.
It also still haunts me to this day.

So my final link is to another book/author that also continues to haunt/obsess me years after reading her.
Angela Carter's The Bloody Chamber really got under my skin.
I dreamt about her stories and 'researched the shit out of' each and every one (thank you Matt Damon & The Martian).

Who would have though way back there at the beginning of this post, that A Christmas Carol would end with us being marooned on Mars with Matt Damon!
From ghosts to twins, poems to tetralogy's, lesbians to fairy tales, with a final nod to popular movie culture (& one of my most used in real life movie quotes), we have another exciting month of #6degrees.

Where did you end up this month?

6 comments:

  1. Very clever Brona ... I enjoyed this, particularly the link on lines of poetry. I still have to read Carroll. I feel very remiss about his gap.

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  2. The idea of being on Mars with Matt Damon and a copy of A Christmas Carol sounds like the perfect way to spend Christmas...

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  3. I have not read any of these. I ended up in Monte Cristo!. Here is my chain: https://wordsandpeace.com/2018/12/01/six-degrees-of-separation-christmas-in-monte-cristo/

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  4. I was tempted to read Elena Ferrante tetralogy but going off your experience I'm glad I didn't bother. I didn't care much for Her Fearful Symmetry but I enjoyed The Martian - the film that is, I haven't read the book. Not sure I'd want to be marooned on Mars though, even with Matt Damon!

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  5. Lovely chain this month Brona! (and we're in heated agreement on Ferrante although it hasn't stopped me taping the television series...).

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  6. I just visited Campobello Island last month, and it was really neat. They host a "Tea with Eleanor" program, though I wasn't there for that, so I've been curious about White Houses. Interesting chain!

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