#books

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in 1873.

Louisa May Alcott's family satire "Transcendental Wild Oats" is published in the newspaper The Independent.

The work was first published in a New York newspaper in 1873, and reprinted in 1874, 1876, and 1915 and after. Alcott's view of male arrogance and female exploitation in this piece is paralleled in her novel Work, published in the same year as Transcendental Wild Oats.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcendental_Wild_Oats

Transcendental Wild Oats at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/34920

Louisa May Alcott c. 1870, writer, abolitionist, and Civil War nurse. Warren's Portraits, 465 Washington St., Boston. Alcott’s face is captured in a three-quarter profile, looking slightly to her right, with a contemplative and composed expression. She is dressed in a formal Victorian-era dress, characterized by its high neckline adorned with a small, lace-trimmed collar. The bodice is decorated with ruching (gathered fabric) and a row of cloth-covered buttons, typical of 19th-century women’s fashion. Her hair is neatly styled, parted down the center and pulled back, revealing soft waves around the forehead, which was a practical and modest hairstyle of the time. Her face is serious and refined, with strong features, including high cheekbones and a straight nose, reflecting both her intellectual nature and determination.

18/12: What are your biggest turnoffs or turn-ons when reading?
I try not to turn off immediately I see second-person narrative, but it very rarely works for me. Tense-flipping for no reason is a big turnoff too. Also, dialogue without quotation marks. It’s not clever, it’s just very annoying.
It’s harder to pin down what turns me on, but I know it when I see it.. Good story, engaging characters, and lucid writing are the magic ingredients.

" I always have a quotation for everything - it saves original thinking."
Have His Carcase

English author, poet, and playwright Dorothy L. Sayers died in 1957. Sayers is most famous for her detective novels featuring Lord Peter Wimsey, an aristocratic amateur sleuth. She wrote several plays, including The Zeal of Thy House and The Man Born to Be King. Sayers also translated major works, notably Dante’s Divine Comedy.

Dorothy L. Sayers at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/45867

Dorothy L. Sayers – English crime writer, playwright, essayist and Christian writer (1893-1957) uncredited; published by Boni and Liveright in connexion with her 1925 release Whose Body - Publicity photo from her American publishers; copy at the National Portrait Gallery. The focus is on Sayers' upper torso and face, with a neutral or slightly blurred background that ensures the viewer’s attention is drawn entirely to her.

"It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good-humor."

Annotations: A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens

Scrooge became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world.

By: Liz Tracey

https://daily.jstor.org/annotations-a-christmas-carol-by-charles-dickens/

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/46

Scrooge Extinguishes the First of the Three Spirits. Title: A Christmas Carol in Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas Author: Charles Dickens Illustrator: John Leech https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/46

17/12: Which writing conventions do you ignore, if any?
I don’t know, because I’m ignoring them…
Seriously, I don’t ignore grammar, punctuation, and spelling; if I flout any of those rules it’s done deliberately.
But I do begin sentences with ‘but’. And with ‘and’. And sometimes have sentences without a verb. And I’ll boldly go with a split infinitive at the drop of a hat.

How far would you go to right a wrong? ‘The House With 46 Chimneys’ is a spooky adventure story for younger readers involving a two-century-old family mystery and the haunting of Dunmore Park, a ruined house in central Scotland.

This distant view of the ruins of Dunmore Park shows the sheer size of the house - and over half the remaining chimneys that give 'The House With 46 Chimneys' its title.

Find out more on my website:
http://www.kenlussey.com/h46c/index.html

The image shows a distant telephoto view of the ruins of Dunmore Park. They are partly obscured by trees, which are growing to the sides and on top of the ruined house. Large numbers of decorative chimneys and a few narrow turrets project from the upper part of the ruins. The front cover of ‘The House With 46 Chimneys’ is shown in the bottom right corner.