December Reading Wrap-Up: The Second Half

 That's it--another month and year done and dusted. It was quite a year, but as always, I was happy to have books with me along the way. Below you'll find thoughts on the books I read in the second half of December. The books I read in the first half of the month can be found here and here. 

Can You Forgive Her? by Anthony Trollope (personal copy)

This is the first novel in Trollope's Palliser series. A few of the characters appeared briefly in the Barsetshire Chronicles, which was centered around the role of the church and church politics in English life. This series revolves around governmental politics. I first read the series 45 years ago--I remember going to the library every week and choosing the next couple of books in the 6-book series. I do not really remember any of the storylines, except vaguely, so with this book at least, it was almost like reading it for the first time. The book has two main threads which intersect. Following one, we see Alice Vavasor, who lives with her father, her mother having died some years before, and who is engaged to John Grey. She was previously engaged to her cousin George Vavasor, who is a jerk, but who is the brother of a cousin Alice is very close to and who really wants Alice to marry her brother. Alice does things out of a sense of duty to the extent that she gets herself tangled up in knots. Another, more distant cousin is Lady Glencora Palliser, who is connected on her mother's side of the family. She is married to Plantagenet Palliser, a man who is ambitious and working towards becoming Chancellor of the Exchequer. She didn't want to marry him and doesn't care one iota about government and politics. She's very young and still carrying a torch for the rather dissolute guy she was tempted to run away with before her family stopped her. As we follow these two women as they muddle through their young lives, we also earn about parliamentary politics and the culture of the time and place. I quite liked the book--it was a fun read. I've got the whole series so can pick up the next book soon.

High Rising by Angela Thirkell (borrowed from the library)

I'd read about Angela Thirkell somewhere and kept her in the back of my mind. I was reminded of her when I was watching a booktube video and someone got this book in their book advent. I requested it from the library and it came pretty quickly. This is part of Thirkell's Barsetshire series of novels--I don't think any of the characters were lifted from Trollope, but 'Barsetshire' was. From what I read, she was pretty easygoing about taking things from classic authors, but I didn't see anything explicit in this book. Author Laura Morland and her son, the train-obsessed Tony, leave London and go to High Rising, where they spend Christmas in their country cottage. Her agent comes to visit, her secretary comes in and out, and the locals are frequently there. There is some intrigue in the village because of a newcomer, Una, who is secretary to Laura's friend, George. It seems pretty clear that Una has some designs on George, but being an outsider she's looked on with suspicion anyway. There are the usual interpersonal issues you find in village novels (and villages), which is what drives the book. It's a fluffy book in some ways, but funny too. I did find Tony to be irritating. I think he was realistically drawn--there are children (and adults) like that--obsessed with one thing and that's all they talk about. So I don't think she exaggerated there, it's just that I don't enjoy being around children anyway, whether in books or in real life, and a child like this would be especially annoying--as this one was, even on the page. There are many more books in this series available online and I will read more in future. They're just right for certain reading moods.

The Hours Before Dawn by Celia Fremlin (read on the BorrowBox app)

Earlier in the month, I read Uncle Paul by Fremlin and loved it. I went looking in BorrowBox to see if they had any books by her and this was the one they had so I borrowed it. It was another winner. It's quite different to Uncle Paul, but just as good. In this one, Louise is a stay-at-home mother with two school-age kids and a newborn that will not stop crying. Money is tight. All Louise wants to do is sleep, but she has a cranky, clueless husband and money is tight so they advertise for a lodger. They get one, but is she too good to be true? It's pretty clear that something is off, but is it something sinister or is it Louise's sleep-deprived paranoia? This was a page-turner. I'll be seeking out more books by this author. I'm glad that her work is being republished.

An English Murder by Cyril Hare (my e-book)

I read about this book just over a week ago and when I saw that it was a classic Christmas mystery, I went looking and found it online, so I downloaded it. I'm a huge fan of classic British mysteries, but hadn't read any Hare. I will be reading more. This was a good read. It's the classic set-up--big house, rich old guy at the end of his life, a holiday gathering of people who aren't that keen on being with one another, and at least someone hoping for an inheritance of money, title, and property. In this one there's an interesting twist because the son is the leader of a neo-fascist organization, one of the guests is a foreign scholar who is there to do work in the family archives, and who has been in a concentration camp, and the somewhat distant relation is the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Oh yeah--one of the other guests is married to a guy who has designs on that office himself. So it's not a festive house party, but it gets even less festive when the patriarch dies. Fortunately, the Chancellor has a police bodyguard with him, so someone is on site to begin the investigation in spit of the blizzard that has cut them off from the outside world. 

Deerbrook by Harriet Martineau (personal copy)

I've wanted to read this book for a long time and I decided that this holiday season it was going to be a treat to myself to start it. I've had it for months, but then other books with more of a time limit (NetGalley and library books) were always there to read first and this one sat around. I'm glad I got to it because it was a really enjoyable read. In this book, Hester and Margaret Ibbotson arrive at the home of a distant relation in the village of Deerbrook after their father dies. They soon become part of village life, including the feud between the business partners' wives/neighbors. Their cousin, Mr. Grey, is in business with his neighbor, Mr. Rowland. Mrs. Rowland is a horrible gossip--mean and nasty and not above spreading malicious rumors and lies about people. This has tragic consequences for many people. There are the usual romances that you'd expect to find in such a novel, but they're not the usual kind of thing. Martineau is better known as a sociologist (this was her only novel) so the village itself is a character in this 1839 novel. In the course of the novel, the culture is well illustrated--religion, politics, class issues, gender issues, and more are all there. It's definitely my kind of book. I'm quite interested in reading more classics and modern classics by women, especially those that are less well known, so I'm thrilled to have this book. It's available on Project Gutenberg, but my copy was published by Virago and contains a great biographical and analytical essay.

Greenbanks by Dorothy Whipple (borrowed from library)

As I mentioned above, I'm quite interested to read more classics and modern classics by women authors. earlier in the year, I discovered one of Whipple's books in the e-audiobook section of the library website and listened to it (They Were Sisters). It was excellent. I went searching at the main library website and decided to request this one. When I got the book and saw this on the inside flap, I laughed. My expectations for the book were high at that point.

The book did not disappoint. From my limited experience, it appears that Dorothy Whipple is an author who is fast becoming a favorite. I am thrilled that there are many more books of hers for me to discover. This book tells the story of the Ashton family, primarily through the relationship between Louisa and her granddaughter Rachel, but also branching out to include other members of the family to varying degrees. In the scene above, the author is describing the relationship between Rachel's parents. Louisa lives in a big house with a philandering husband who isn't seen much and then dies in an accident. No one seems terribly broken up by his loss. When the book opens on Christmas Day, Rachel is a small child. By the time the book ends, she is an adult. She grows up in a home that is stifling and tense because of her pompous, ego-driven, self-inflated father, so she prefers to spend as much time as possible in her grandmother's home, which is nearby. Rachel is a curious person and extremely smart, which isn't valued by her father. Her grandmother loves her and provides stability and encouragement while also navigating various family crises involving her children. I loved this book. I sat down and read it in a day--I just didn't want to stop. I had to check to see when it was published (1932) because I was not expecting the overt, strong feminist vibe, which only made the book that much better. Can't wait to read more of Whipple's work.

Melmoth the Wanderer by Charles Maturin (personal copy)

This was my last book of the year. I'd started it back in October because of the Gothic vibe, but it proved to be too heavy and cumbersome to hold up with one hand while I had a dog on my lap, so I set it aside. I wanted to get back to it and finish it by the end of the year, so I'm glad I did.

I don't know what to say or think about this book, other than it's weird. It's quite a structure, which is sometimes tricky to follow. The book starts with a younger nephew going to see the elder uncle at Christmastime, I think. It's clear younger Melmoth will inherit when elder Melmoth dies. The house is not being kept in good shape and something is terrifying elder Melmoth. When he dies, the younger Melmoth makes some disturbing discoveries. Documents and paintings are destroyed. Eventually, a Spanish ship is shipwrecked near the house. Younger Melmoth goes to help and saves one sailor who is brought back to the house to recover. When the sailor finds out where he is, he is terrified, but is finally convinced to tell his story. Within this story, there are other people telling other stories which sometimes include still other people and other stories. It's stories all the way down. Then the stories end and readers are brought back to the present day and a rather abrupt ending. Maybe the author had no idea how to disentangle himself from all those story threads. My edition contains an excellent essay at the back which explains Maturin's life and the story of the book. This was fascinating. According to the essayist, he considered making this a book of short stories. This makes sense and it would have been a better book had he done so. Some of the reviewers of the day (1820) were angry about the way Satan's guy was portrayed, but he did have some reasonable things to say about society and the church of the time. Maturin himself was an Irish cleric, who always felt like he didn't get the respect he desrved. The back cover and the essay both mention the violence and it is a violent book, but since a large chunk of it takes place during the Inquisition in Spain, this is not surprising and the violence isn't gratuitous in any way. I wanted to read this book because a few years ago I read Melmoth by Sarah Perry and loved it. In an author's note, she explained how this book inspired hers. Now that I've read this one, I think I might grab the audiobook of hers and listen to it as a re-read. I'm glad I read it, because it seems like I'll continue to think about the book, but it was strange.

Finally, I read one book that will be published in February

Emily Dickinson: 100 Poems on Life and Love (to be published on February 17, 2026 by Gemini Book Group)

This is Book 2 in the publisher's Women in Poetry series. I read the first book earlier in the month. This book is a lovely introduction to the life and work of Emily Dickinson. The book begins with a short biographical essay before presenting a selection of Dickinson's poems, separated by theme and including helpful and interesting critiques of some. The themes of the poems presented here are: love, death and spirituality, identity and creativity, and nature. The selection of poems is excellent, the biographical introduction and poem critiques are very informative, and the book as a whole is a delight to read. I highly recommend it. I thank NetGalley and the publisher for a digital review copy.

And that wraps up December and the year. Another bookish year begins. I'll be starting with the last (for now) book on my NetGalley shelf and then, who knows. I have so many excellent books to choose from! Hope your reading year starts off with a 5-star read and goes on from there!

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