Jane and the Stillroom Maid by Stephanie Barron

Although I love the entire Austen Mysteries series so far, some of the individual books can drag. Barron's version of Austen is always a great, funny, observant, courageous detective, so she and her supporting cast and all of the historical details that Barron includes are enough to keep me interested. But some of the books have had stretches in which I was eager to get back to the investigation. Stillroom Maid doesn't have that problem and so it's one of my favorites. 

The plot really moves. When the body of the eponymous woman is found among the hills of Northern England, Austen's investigation into her death basically takes place over a weekend and she's active the whole time. The story also keeps interesting by switching between three great settings: the craggy wilderness, a quaint village full of suspects, and an elaborate estate with a lavish mansion of even more potential killers. My mind's eye was quite happy.

And then there's the fact that the maid herself was possibly a witch. Just my cup of tea.

Love & Friendship (2016)

I watched Love & Friendship when it was first released just because I love Kate Beckinsale and I love Jane Austen movies. I hadn't yet read Lady Susan, the unpublished novel it's based on, so my first opinion was that Love & Friendship was a minor entry in the Austen movie collection. I thought it was funny and charming, but not on the same level as my go-to Austen films: Ang Lee's Sense and Sensibility, the 1995 Pride and Prejudice mini-series, and the Emma with Gwyneth Paltrow (Autumn de Wilde's version didn't exist yet, but it's very much one of my favorites today).

I liked Love & Friendship even more after reading Lady Susan. Since the novella tells the story through letters between the various characters - and pulls a lot of the humor from the differences between those letters - the film has to be funny in a different way. And impressively: it is.

I ding it a little for robbing Lady Susan of some comeuppance that she has coming to her. In the book, she settles for marrying herself to a rich idiot whom she'd planned on attaching to her daughter. It's clearly a Plan B or C outcome for her. But the film makes it seem like she's getting exactly what she wants. And as much as I enjoy her scheming, I want to see her thwarted more than she is.

Lady Susan and The Watsons by Jane Austen

During the first few books in Stephanie Barron's Jane Austen mystery series, Austen is thinking about and working on a couple of stories that were never published. Lady Susan is a completed novella that she just never submitted for publication, but she never even finished writing The Watsons. 

There's some debate about why she abandoned the latter book, but the theory I like best (and Barron seems to adopt it, too) is that after the death of Austen's father, she lost her passion for writing. She started The Watsons just before her father's death and continuing it would likely have been a rough reminder of that time.

She would eventually get that passion back, but there's a chunk of time in which she's not writing (though the mysteries keep coming in the world of Barron's series). When Austen eventually did write again, it was to work on a new novel that became Sense and Sensibility.

In the timeline of Barron's series, Austen's father died shortly after the events of Jane and the Wandering Eye. In Genius of the Place, she's still feeling the loss. So it seemed appropriate to me to read Lady Susan and what exists of The Watsons after Genius of the Place and before continuing with Barron's stories. (Collections also include her unfinished Sanditon, but that's the book she was working on when she died, so it'll be a while before I get to that one.)

Lady Susan is delightful. It's the story of a scheming widow who's not quite done getting everything she can from her deceased husband's wealthy family. It's told in a series of letters between the various characters, which is an approach that doesn't always keep me engaged when some writers use it. But I enjoyed it very much as a change from Austen's usual style and she brings a lot of humor out of it as she shows the characters' wildly different points of view alongside each other. 

It was adapted as a movie called Love & Friendship in 2016, starring Kate Beckinsale as the crafty Lady Susan, so I'll talk about that next post.

The Watsons had a lot of promise and it's too bad Austen never went back to it. What we have needs polishing and doesn't compare well with her finished works, but the dramatic seeds are all strong. It's the story of a young woman named Emma who's trying to reintegrate with her family after spending significant time away from them. (When Barron has Austen thinking about Emma in the early mystery books, I mistakenly assumed that she was working on the novel Emma featuring the character Emma Woodhouse, but the Emma in The Watsons is entirely different.) 

All we really have of the story is the introductions of Emma and her family and some potential romantic interests. Austen's niece took a shot at finishing it in 1850 and other writers have given it their own spins through the years, but so little of Austen's own work on it exists - and we know so little about her plans for the story - that I'm not interested in seeing other writers build their own things out what's essentially nothing more than a story prompt by Austen.

Jane and the Genius of the Place by Stephanie Barron

The "genius" in the title has a fun, unexpected meaning in that it's a landscaping term. In this one, Jane is staying with her wealthy brother and his family at their country estate. Landscaping and architecture come up a lot. One of my favorite things about this series is that I learn a lot about the details of life in early Nineteenth Century England, but all while trying to figure out a murder mystery.

In this case, the victim is an infamous woman who may be a spy for Napoleon. Everyone suspects so, but was she killed to keep her from learning something or to prevent her from telling something that she already knew? And if she wasn't a spy, what then?

There's an important clue in the early chapters that's pretty obvious, but Jane and her fellow investigators (her brother is also the area magistrate) missed. That's annoying, but Genius of the Place is otherwise a great, twisty mystery is a picturesque setting. 

And outside of that one clue, Barron's Jane Austen is as observant, insightful, and witty as I want her to be. Her adventures in this series are historical fact as far as I'm concerned.

Jane and the Wandering Eye by Stephanie Barron

This was a fun book to revisit after finally getting to see Bath myself a few years ago. 

It's not my favorite in the series, mostly I think because of the Will They Won't They between Jane and a character named Lord Harold Trowbridge. Barron is great at bringing Austen's historical family and acquaintances to life, but Trowbridge is rare for the series in that he's a recurring character created entirely by Barron herself. And he's great.

He was introduced in the first Austen mystery as a potential suspect in the murder, a gentleman rogue who both infuriates and intrigues Austen. At least at first. When all is revealed, she's more intrigued than infuriated.

He mostly sits out the second book, but makes a full, welcome return in this one. We know enough about him now that we also know he's going to be an ally in Austen's investigation, but Barron reintroduces tension by showing that Austen and Trowbridge are clearly attracted to each other. Sadly, they come from very different social stations and Trowbridge's work keeps him moving around, so there are Obstacles. 

It's a fun, compelling relationship, but in the Will They Won't They of it all, history has clearly revealed that They Won't. What keeps me interested is the question of Why Not. Barron is too good a writer not to have thought this through, so I trust that she has a plan for the couple. And I'm along for the ride of learning what that plan is.

Not that Wandering Eye gives any clues about that, which is what affects my enjoyment of the story some. It's only Trowbridge's second appearance, so the goal of the book (as far their relationship is concerned) is to push them back together and make us dig them as a potential couple. Which it does. I'm just impatient for more.

As for the mystery itself, it's good, but the backdrop of Bath's theatre community can't compare with the ghosts and pirates of the first two novels.

Jane and the Man of the Cloth by Stephanie Barron

Jane Austen's second mystery has her vacationing with her family in the seaside village of Lyme. The town is famous for its harbor wall called the Cobb, which Austen included in her novel Persuasion (though it will be a long time before this fictional version of Austen writes that book). The Cobb is also an important feature in The Man of the Cloth since that's where the first dead body is found. Austen of course takes an interest in the murder (for good reasons that I won't spoil here) and begins to look into it.

I like the setting of the previous mystery a little more with its old manor house, but Lyme is quaint and located near dramatic cliffs, so I enjoy spending time there too. The mystery is good with lots of characters to explore and unravel and I love the element of a mysterious red-cloaked girl wandering the sea cliffs with a lantern.

Jane and the Unpleasantness at Scargrave Manor by Stephanie Barron

I've re-read this several times, but recently did it again in order to catch up to the rest of the series (which I'll also jot some notes about here in yet another attempt to figure out what to do with this blog).

I love the series. I've always known who Jane Austen was and what she wrote, but it was Stephanie Barron (a pen-name for Francine Mathews) who introduced me to Austen as a human being who happened to also write several classic novels. Her Austen is observant, smart, and funny. The mysteries tend to be spooky, but even when they aren't, they're compelling. Barron includes great details to bring the historical period to life and has created a fantastic cast of supporting characters (some based on real people, but not all) who follow Jane from book to book. 

This one picks up right after Jane has rejected a marriage proposal. It would have been a good match for practical purposes, but she didn't love him. Her decision created some drama in the family and community, so in this novel she escapes to stay with a recently married friend and her husband. And when the husband dies under suspicious circumstances and people start looking side-eyed at Jane's friend, Jane takes it on herself to find out what really happened. 

And there may be a family ghost involved.

The story tends to drag a little for me in the middle these days, but I think that's because I'm so familiar with it that I'm eager to get to the final revelations at the end. It certainly didn't feel slow the first time I read it.

Thinking About God

Evan Hanson and I have talked for a couple of years about producing a feature on After Lunch where we talk about the intersection of religion, philosophy, and art. The word "art" might give the wrong impression. Mostly we're thinking about movies and TV shows that spark ideas in us about religion and philosophy. 

We're very serious about doing it, but if you listen to After Lunch, you know that Evan's wife is ill and has been for a while. So Evan's time for podcasting is limited and it's impossible to predict when we'll get around to adding this series to the show.

When we first started talking about it, Evan came up with a list of topics that we could discuss. So while I try to do something with this blog, I think it might be good for me to take a stab at writing about each of these topics a little. Not instead of producing the episodes or in any way competing with that project, but just as a form of note-taking for myself. When we do get around to the series, I may use some of this or I may find that I've completely changed my mind. And it will certainly be true that conversations with Evan will challenge how I think about these topics. He's done at least as much thinking about religion as I have and endlessly more study of the world's philosophers. 

His idea for the first episode is a natural place to begin: Introductions. It'll just be a chance for us to talk about our backgrounds with religion, spirituality, and philosophy and why we're both interested in discussing those things with each other on a podcast. Evan has questions about how religion, spirituality, and philosophy are alike and how they're different. And what our relationships are to religious and philosophical texts: how we read and apply them.

I've only done basic high school study of philosophy, though I'm very interested in big ideas and excited to hear Evan explain them so that we can talk them over. I've spent a lot more time on religion and spirituality - my whole life really - and it's going to be a challenge not to ramble about my background. I'll try to be concise.

I was raised by Christian parents and have always believed in that view of God. I have doubts that I'll talk about in future posts and eventually on the podcast, but I cannot shake off the belief that someone created all of this. I don't believe this is opposed to Science. I'm sure this will get fleshed out later too, but I believe that Faith and Science are answering two different questions and that we come closest to the truth when we use them together. 

I passed the point where walking away from my belief in the Christian view of God is even a possibility. There's no part of me that wants to, however many questions I have about him. But that's mostly because I've spent my life asking those questions and receiving good answers. As it turned out, my biggest questions weren't about the believability of God, but about specific ideas about him that I heard as a kid. When I kept an open mind about the theology and allowed my vision of God to change and grow, I found that I was always led to a view of him that made sense. 

I got my Bachelors degree in Theology with the intent of going full time into ministry, but one of the benefits of that education was that I learned I didn't want to become a professional minister. I don't regret a dollar or minute that I spent though. I learned new ways of thinking about God and Scripture that I've used the rest of my life and have shared with other people. 

This is getting long, so I'll save for another post the questions about how religion, spirituality, and philosophy are alike to me and how I think they're different. And what my current relationship is to the Bible, the religious text I'm most familiar with, and how I read and apply it.

Christmas 2024

We had a relaxing, comfortable Christmas again this year. With David grown and it just being the three of us in the house, that's the vibe we go for lately. 

Last year, Diane let me know that real Christmas trees are hard on her allergies, so I bought her an artificial tree as her big Christmas gift. David and I put it up this year and loved how easy it was to assemble. No trying to make it stand up straight and tying it to a wall to keep it from falling over. No futilely trying to keep it watered to prevent it from drying out too quickly. And it already has lights on it right out of the box. 

We've lost the romance of going to our favorite tree farm and cutting down our own, but I did still bring in real greenery for the holiday. We always get a real wreath for the front door, so this year at the nursery I also picked up some garland: white pine like our Christmas trees used to be. I hung it on the railings going up to our front porch and also the railing on the inside stairs. It wasn't as full and lush as I imagined, but it's pretty in a humble sort of way. Bob Cratchit would like it.

For the last several years, I have a tradition of starting the same book every December. It's called Christmas: A Treasury of Verse and Prose, a collection of art and writing curated by Sheila Pickles. The writing is a mix of letters, essays, and story excerpts that Pickles describes as helping her keep Christmas in context. It has the same effect on me. It's so easy to let the holiday get out of control and these paintings and writings (mostly from the 19th Century) either describe very simple, but joyful holidays or communicate thoughts about Christmas that ground me in its meaning about Christ, but also family and friends.

We always get together with my side of the family a few times during the season. I help my Mom make one of my favorite holiday treats, a fruit-filled pastry that I and some other out-of-town family and friends can't celebrate without. We make them, I take some home, and she ships the rest around the country.

Then there's our annual trip to the very small town of Kellogg, Minnesota where we have lunch at the same diner every year before going to Lark Toys, a magical independent toy store that has individual rooms for various kinds of toys, but also books and games. There's a huge collection of vintage toys to look at. There's also a soda counter/grill, a fudge shop, a candy store, and an indoor carousel with beautiful, hand-carved wooden animals to ride. 

Rather than buy individual gifts for family members, my folks treat us to some kind of Christmas outing every year: a play or a concert or something like that. This year we watched the Minnesota Orchestra perform a tribute to John Denver, my Mom's favorite musician and someone the whole family has a lot of fondness and nostalgia for. The concert featured Christmas songs, but also all the signature stuff like "Country Roads" and "Rocky Mountain High" and "Calypso," a personal favorite of mine. Accompanying the orchestra were members of John Denver's old band, but also archival recordings of him singing. As someone who grew up on this music, it was incredibly moving for me.

Finally, my brother and his wife traditionally host Christmas Eve dinner, though this year their schedule prevented it being on Christmas Eve. That worked well for Diane, David, and I though. 

For most of our married life, Christmas Eve has been a time to get together with Diane's side of the family. There was a traditional meal and lots of caroling accompanied by Diane's mom on the piano. After Diane's folks died, we continued the tradition at her brother's place (without the piano accompaniment), but he and her other siblings have gradually moved to other towns and cities, so now it's a chaotically fun Zoom call. 

Typically, we'd have to leave my brother's place after dinner to get home in time to call Diane's family. And then the last couple of years, we've adopted the Icelandic tradition of Jólabókaflóðið. We buy each other a selection of books to be opened on Christmas Eve, then we spend the night reading. It's a wonderful, relaxed, low-stress way to finish an evening directly following two different family gatherings. But this year, with my side's family meal moved to a different night, there wasn't the usual rushing around before book time.

Christmas Day was also very relaxed. We slept in and opened gifts around 10:00. Then we didn't have anything else scheduled until dinner time, so we leisurely cleaned up and spent the rest of the day reading and/or napping. My big gift for the year was an iPad. I resisted it for years, because I didn't think I needed it, but my little Kindle wasn't cutting it for reading digital comics, so I finally asked Santa for a larger screen and spent the afternoon catching up with Wonder Woman.

My sister and her family came over for an informal Christmas dinner (our oven broke a couple of days ago, but Santa brought us an air fryer that saved the meal). Then we relaxed some more until about 10:00 pm when Diane went to bed and David and I went to a late show of Robert Eggers' Nosferatu. 

Greatness Will Not Make Me Happy

I'm reading Sense and Sensibility and was struck by this exchange between Elinor and Edward. She speaks first. Not accusatorily; just matter-of-factly.

"You have no ambition, I well know. Your wishes are all moderate." 

"As moderate as those of the rest of the world, I believe. I wish as well as every body else to be perfectly happy; but like every body else it must be in my own way. Greatness will not make me so."

Edward gets it.

The Express Purpose of Interfering

I just finished reading The Peril at End House, a Hercule Poirot mystery by Agatha Christie. It's very very good, but I was especially struck by a bit of theology that Poirot brings up.

There's a minor spoiler in this, so if the book is on your reading list and you want to remain totally surprised, you'll want to skip this whole thing.

Some set up: Poirot and his buddy Hastings suspect that someone is trying to murder a young woman named Nick. It's an unusual case, because they're trying to prevent a murder instead of solve one. That's one of the things I love about the book. 

But here's the spoiler: Nick's cousin Maggie is dressed similarly to Nick at one point and is killed instead. Shortly after, Poirot and Hastings talk about what happened. Hastings is narrating and begins:

"It's really amazing the way Nick has escaped. It seems almost incredible." 

And suddenly I remembered the tone in Frederica’s voice as she had said: "Nick bears a charmed life." 

I shivered a little. 

"Yes," said Poirot, thoughtfully. "And I can take no credit to myself. Which is humiliating."

"Providence," I murmured. 

"Ah, mon ami, I would not put on the shoulders of the good God the burden of men’s wrongdoing. You say that in your Sunday morning voice of thankfulness — without reflecting that what you are really saying is that le bon Dieu has killed Miss Maggie Buckley." 

"Really, Poirot!" 

"Really, my friend! But I will not sit back and say 'le bon Dieu has arranged everything, I will not interfere.' Because I am convinced that le bon Dieu created Hercule Poirot for the express purpose of interfering."

It's a profound, important idea that Poirot expresses. Hastings offers a quick, simple platitude about the Providence of God being responsible for saving Nick, but he hasn't thought through the implications. Hastings is never the deepest thinker, but someone a little more thoughtful would realize what Poirot points out: that God can't just get credit for saving Nick. If Hastings is right, then God must also taking the blame for murdering Maggie.

Poirot goes even deeper though and dismisses the idea that God had a direct hand in the affair at all. In Poirot's view, God has placed his people on the Earth to act on God's behalf. We don't get to sit back and wait for God to fix the world. We have to understand that it's our job to fix it as God's agents. That the way he fixes it is through us. 

It's a terrifying responsibility that more of God's people need to take seriously, but I think Poirot is absolutely right.