Once Upon a Timepiece by Starr Wood

I have a weakness for timepieces - I treasure the two gold pocket watches that belonged to my grandfather and a smaller gold watch that belonged to my grandmother. My mother must have had ten or more wristwatches in her jewelry box when she died and I still have them although I don't think any of them still tick. I have a clock in every room of my house. When I visit a historic home I am always on the lookout for an antique mantel clock or grandfather's clock to admire.

So the debut collection of twelve short stories by Starr Wood, Once Upon a Timepiece, intrigued me. Each story finds the timepiece - "a 1946 Breitling Chronomat made from rose-colored gold" - in the possession of someone new. The reader is carried along as each month the watch passes from wrist to drawer and from pocket to pawnshop over the span of a year. The telling of how that person - each a stranger to the others - came to have the timepiece is what makes this book such fun to read.

"Well, I didn't see that coming!" is what I found myself thinking often in the reading of these stories. Each one has a twist at the end and it was amusing to see how Mr. Wood gets his main character - the timepiece - into the life of someone new.

Mr. Wood is a journalist and his prose is crisp and uncluttered. His characters are drawn with just enough telling details - the woman with the gorgeous red hair, the obsessively tidy accountant, the self-righteous newspaper editor - as to make them quite distinguishable from each other. 

I am glad I was able to devote some 'time' in my reading schedule to these tales. There really is a 1946 Breitling Chronomat, a watch designed during World War II for aviators. Perhaps Mr. Wood's traveling timepiece looked something like the one below. If so, I would be happy to add it to my collection, but I certainly wouldn't like to let it go!

In Which Belle Celebrates Candlelight

I have been re-watching Cranford, that delightful series based on the novels by Mrs. Elizbeth Gaskell. It portrays life in a small village in England in the mid-1800s. The sight of all the ladies enjoying tea and scurrying about their business makes me want to don a lace cap and do my reading and writing by candlelight. 

This would be the day to do it as it is Candlemas, the midpoint between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. It is a festival of light and although I long ago gave away all my wax candles, I do have a fireplace and a couple of faux candles powered by battery.

Those will just have to do.

It is a day of new beginnings - in some traditions it is considered the beginning of spring and is a day when grain-based foods - pancakes and crepes - are to be enjoyed. I am sure that brownies and scones count as well.

It is cloudy and rainy here today and I plan on sitting in front of the fire, doing some reading, and reflecting on the coming year. I will sip my afternoon tea from a fine china cup and use a lace handkerchief in honor of the Ladies of Cranford.

Delighting in J.B. Priestley

I came across this title in my morning reading and was reminded that long ago I tried to find this little book but to no avail. The book in question is Delight by J.B. Priestley. It was published originally in 1949 and contains 114 short essays in praise of simple pleasures. Things were pretty dismal in England at the time; its people were still suffering from the effects of the war and these thoughts offered a bit of cheer.

I am a sucker for this type of book! A 60th anniversary edition was published five years ago which may have been when I searched for it before.

Now I am on a quest once again. I have submitted an inter-library loan request and have contacted Powell's Books concerning a copy it has listed as available (I want to make sure it is not a former library book).

I await a response. 

Here is a bit of the review of Delight written by Lisa O'Kelly for The Observer in 2009:

There is much here to raise a smile, not least Priestley's wonderfully lucid prose, which is a delight in itself. The little things in which he takes pleasure are varied and often hugely affecting: dancing; fountains; a walk in a pine wood; a new box of matches; the sound of a football or an orchestra tuning up; long trousers; playing a cracking game of tennis; smoking in a hot bath; being silly with children; waking to the smell of bacon and coffee; getting a great idea.

Mr. Priestly was a novelist and playwright. In the 1940s, he wrote the play An Inspector Calls which was performed by a touring company here sometime in the 1990s. The company put a call out for some local folks to be a part of a crowd scene. I auditioned but apparently didn't have the look they wanted. Oh, well. My one chance at Broadway.

My failed theater career aside, after a gloomy and dreary January, this book sounds to be the perfect pick-me-up. 

One Across, Two Down by Ruth Rendell

The best thing about Ruth Rendell's 1971 suspense novel One Across, Two Down are the crossword puzzle clues. The characters, the more-often-than-not unemployed Stanley, his overworked wife Vera, and Vera's mum Maud, are all quite unattractive. I wouldn't invite any of them for tea.

Stanley loves his crossword puzzles and even though he is a failure at everything else he tries to do, his grasp of the workings of the clues and answers is quite phenomenal. He attacks the daily puzzle in the paper and has volumes of completed puzzle books that he keeps in the bedroom. He even takes to making up some of his own.

The only thing he wants more than a new puzzle to work in the Daily Telegraph is the money he thinks his wife will inherit when Mother Maud dies...which she does but not in a good way and Stanley's descent into despair and insanity are not pretty to watch.

I am glad it was a short book - fewer than 200 pages.

It has been a while since I read anything by Ms. Rendell. I used to be quite a fan but eventually her books got too disturbing. I only stuck with this one because of the puzzle clues scattered throughout.

Here are a few:

Root cause of biting wit? - Wisdom tooth  

Underwear for barristers?  - Briefs 

Frank takes a well-known stage part?  - Candida 

Not one of my favorites? - This book

Fait Accompli - The Sketchbook Project

While ailing, between naps and bemoaning the fate of my laptop, I did manage to work on my sketchbook for the Sketchbook Project that I signed up to participate in last July (when the weather was warmer). You can read about my visit to the touring library here.

I was inspired by the recent weekend art workshop I attended. I pulled out some of the small watercolors and sketches I had created over the past few years and did a fine job of cutting and pasting a few of them into about half of the Sketchbook's 32 pages. Since I was adding paper to the book I figured it would make it less bulky if I only used the right-hand pages. 

I created a few new pieces as well. I dug out a calligraphy set that had been languishing in a drawer for years, did some practicing, and was able to add some lettering to the sketchbook.

It was a pleasant endeavor and a nice way not to have to think too much.

Of course, for my sketchbook to be included in the traveling library's tour this coming summer, I had to have it postmarked by January 15. I missed the deadline, but the book will be housed in the Brooklyn Art Library along with 30,000 others who have participated. 

If you think you might want to sign up for a book - it won't be due until January 15, 2015 so you will have plenty of time to complete it - here is the link: The Sketchbook Project. Some of the sketchbooks are digitized on the website if you need some inspiration.

And, if you should ever get to Brooklyn, be sure to visit my book!

A Dance to the Music of Time

The twelve novels that make up A Dance to the Music of Time

by Anthony Powell

Yesterday's presentation at the Monday Afternoon Club was another one involving a book, or I should say books. The topic for the January and February papers is "Great Journeys of the Past". This week's presenter chose to look at the fictional journey through life of Nicholas Jenkins, the narrator of twelve novels known collectively as A Dance to the Music of Time. 

Written by Anthony Powell (who was Welsh so his name is pronounced POHL), the novels were published between 1951 and 1975 and depict life between World War I and just after World War II. 

I would have liked to have heard a bit more about Mr. Powell (1905-2000), but the presenter quoted a lot from the books which I found to be tedious. Not the author's words, just the being read to...

Anyway, as luck would have it, after the meeting (which is held in the community room of a branch library) I was browsing through the branch's DVD collection and, lo and behold, there were the first three recordings of the 1997 television series based on the books and produced by Britain's Channel Four.

Well, I can tell you I snapped up all three of them up and am ready to settle in for a couple of nights and 'watch' the novels. I have the fourth and final DVD on request and it should be available by time I get to that point in the series. It will be fun to watch the characters flit around from upper class party to picnic in their tuxedos!

I know this is sort of cheating, but so be it. The idea of 3000 pages for the twelve novels seems a bit daunting! For now, I think I will simply watch the DVDs and read a biography of Mr. Powell. I see that he also published his memoirs and journals.

Has anyone read the entire A Dance to the Music of Time or even one or two of the volumes? 

On Weather and Being Under the Weather

Le frégate
Henri Matisse

Oh, my. My computer and I were both blindsided by viruses at the same time. While my laptop languished for a week at the techie hospital, I languished on the chaise lounge. 

The Polar Ice Caps that seem to be hovering over the region and the blowing snow didn't help my frame of mind. I did manage to push though and fulfill a couple of commitments but keeping up an entry a day on 'Belle, Book, and Candle' fell by the wayside.

I wish I could report that I read many books this past week, but sadly that has not been the case. I did finish Once Upon a Timepiece by Starr Wood which I really enjoyed and will write about another time.

I managed to read a chapter or two in The Bully Pulpit about Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft. Said chapters are quite long and so filled with information that after finishing one I feel as if I have read a book.

There were a couple of free mysteries on my Kindle which once begun were quickly abandoned as they didn't hold my interest. So, I returned to the tried and true detective adventures of Peter Diamond in Upon a Dark Night. Author Peter Lovesey never fails to sweep me away with his tales of Bath, England and the criminal goings-on there.

My laptop is back where it belongs...on my lap. I am slowly coming back to life myself and hope to get in the swing of things shortly. If you, dear reader, have left me a comment I plan on catching up with you over this weekend.