Weight of a Woman by Judith Jackson-Pomeroy; Substantial Characters Counter Light Development

 

Weight of a Woman by Judith Jackson-Pomeroy; Substantial Characters Counter Heavy Length 

By Julie Sara Porter 

Bookworm Reviews 

Spoilers: There is an old trick or piece of advice with storytelling. It’s “Tell people what you are going to tell them. Tell them. Then tell them what you already told them.” It works well when you are writing short works like a review, a political column, even a short story or a novella. It doesn’t work so well when you are trying to write a longer work like a novel. That’s the biggest problem with Judith Jackson-Pomeroy’s novel Weight of a Woman, a romance with fascinating leads but not enough to do that changes them.

Sara Wolfe is a Women’s Studies college professor and outspoken Feminist. She is a popular teacher and bonds with her students. She is in a long term but open relationship with Tom, another professor and has close friends in Jane, director of the Women’s Resource Center and Marco, an award winning poet. Even though she is well respected at this university, she has her sights set on a Wellesley fellowship. However, her seemingly perfect life hides some disturbing secrets. While attending a concert with her friends, Sara becomes enamored with Seth, a rock singer who is also one of her students. As if a romance with a student wasn’t controversial enough, Seth also has secrets of his own that could jeopardize his career and his relationship with Sara. 

The sad part is Weight of a Woman is actually very good, particularly in terms of characterization. The core romance is between two people who are seriously damaged and are in desperate need of psychiatric care. The type of romance that could strengthen or tear them apart and this book suggests that this s in danger of doing both. 

Sara projects an image of great confidence, wisdom, and integrity who courageously shares her convictions and stands by them. But that image disguises the troubled broken soul underneath. Her relationship with Tom is very toxic and emotionally abusive as Tom condescends her with his misogynistic and homophobic views and chips away at her Feminist views as a means of control. 

She is riddled with insecurities and anxiety that manifests itself as severe Anorexia. She starves herself and degrades her own appearance. In social situations, where she has to be seen eating, she chews her food, but doesn’t swallow. Instead, she empties it out into a napkin.

Sara is also a sexual assault survivor which has given her massive PTSD and trust issues. She can’t trust the men that she’s involved with and often has a hard time trusting herself. She stands as a paragon of Feminist values because they represent the type of woman that she wants to be, not the woman that she actually is.

 Even though Seth expresses his views through his songs and is just as committed to his beliefs as Sara is to hers, he has problems of his own. His music career is at a crossroads and he is torn between staying true to his artistic integrity and signing with a major label to get more money and exposure but selling out. 

Similar to Sara, Seth also has self-destructive tendencies. He has a history of cutting and is addicted to various drugs. Like Sara, he also projects an air of charisma and creative defiance, but his addictions reveal his vulnerabilities. He can't hide the needle marks on his arms or scars on his body just like Sara can't hide her dangerously thin weight.

Sara and Seth are memorable characters, either alone or together. This book is a brilliant character study of this pair.The conflicts are interesting because they expose their frailties and leave them at their most naked, honest, and defenseless. Unfortunately, Sara and Seth are hampered by constant repetition and little changes in their development. 

There are only so many times where we can hear the characters argue about the same things over and over. Marco and Jane arrange various interventions for Sara so often that they are practically scheduled. Sara and Seth confront one another about their addictions but these confrontations appear to have little bearing since they still fall into them. Yes, that happens often in real life where people often don't seek help or have the same issues and this book brilliantly explores that. But at the same time, it also stands as a red flag for why Sara and Seth might not be good for each other. 

Their disagreements about the trajectory towards Seth’s recording career, particularly his selling out, are almost hypocritical on Sara’s part since she too desires to ascend to a higher position with more money. Also they are divided by different views on sexuality which is a huge wedge between them that becomes more prominent the more they argue about it.

The book could benefit from a tighter narrative structure with more character self reflection and evolution. While individually, Seth and Sara are intriguing and could be a compatible happy couple, they could just as easily break up. They already have plenty of emotional baggage and different views on how they see their future. Because of having the same arguments and discussions, they can’t seem to reconcile them. A late complication suggests happiness, but it could just as easily lead to more strife and trouble. 

Because of the little change in character, Pomeroy does them a huge disservice. She gives plenty of good reasons why they need to work on themselves and get some serious psychiatric and emotional help separated or at least as friends. But she doesn’t give us enough good reasons why we should be rooting for them to stay together. 

New Book Alert: The Cabin Sessions by Isobel Blackthorn; Limited Setting and Ominous Sense of Dread Highlight This Session

 

New Book Alert: The Cabin Sessions by Isobel Blackthorn; Limited Setting and Ominous Sense of Dread Highlight This Session

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: The strongest adjective that I can use to describe Isobel Blackthorn's The Cabin Sessions is "ominous." On the surface not much happens until the very end but the entire book fills the Reader with such dread and anticipation that they know something bad is going to happen long before it does.

The Cabin Sessions is different from Blackthorn's previous works, Prison in the Sun and The Ghost of Villa Winter. Both of those books were mysteries involving murder, hate crimes, and sexual assault set against the backdrop of the beautiful Canary Islands. In those works, the exterior setting was just as important as the plot and character's actions. The beautiful island is a contrast to the darkness that the characters suffer. 

The Cabin Sessions does something similar but with a different type of setting. Instead of opening up, the action is contained and limited. The setting of the book is mostly on Christmas Eve inside a bar/nightclub/local hangout in small town Burton called The Cabin. At The Cabin, musicians and other entertainers of dubious talent entertain the locals one night a week. Most of the locals attend the sessions to drink, listen to or mock the music, and try their best to ignore their troubles. 

It doesn't help the creepy atmosphere that The Cabin Sessions is full of miserable characters with enough emotional baggage to fill an entire airport terminal. The character's interior lives add to the overall dread as they are filled with secret sins, obsessions, and relationships ready to come out.

The cast includes: 

Adam- A guitarist and newcomer to Burton. He just ended an unhealthy relationship with the abusive rocker, Juan. He is dealing with the death of Benny, his close friend and mentor and Juan's jealousy over Adam's friendship with other men. He also is terrified  when he sees a sinister unknown man outside the Cabin that may have done something illegal. When Juan barges in to fill in for the recently deceased Benny, Adam is filled with revulsion and longing for his ex.

Philip and Eva- They are a brother and sister who live next to Adam and across the bridge from The Cabin. Philip is a plumber and handy person who has his way with many of the women (and some of the men) of Burton. He has a salacious history and is one third of a love triangle that is in the process of ending badly.

Eva is usually in her own little world doing peculiar things like collecting stamps from her job at the post office, holding her breath under water for a record time, and talking to "mermaids" that only she can see. However, her chapters reveals forbidden longings and desires that she is unable to reveal. 

Rebekah and David- The proprietors of The Cabin and organizers of the Sessions. They are an ultra religious couple that try to keep a firm hold over their daughter, Hannah as she serves food and buses tables. Unfortunately, Hannah rebels against their watchful gaze by sneaking around with men. She ends up in a very precarious situation.

Cynthia- Dulcimer player, local eccentric, and some believe witch. She is in mourning for her sister, Joy, who most believe disappeared but she is convinced that she died. Cynthia also has a prophetic gift in which she displays that one of the gang is going to die before the night is through.

Delilah- She is the closest thing that Burton has to a diva. She is often the center of attention and acts as a confidante to many of the other characters. Also her father was the pastor at Burton but was defrocked after a sex scandal. She may have some buried rage against those who made it happen.

There are also a few other characters like Nathan (terrible songwriter, Hannah's boyfriend, and is also close to Eva), Alf (blues guitarist with a questionable musical history that he often embellishes), and Joshua and Ed (a duo who are often together, the former has a criminal history and the latter a bad tempered wife). 

With the small cast and limited setting, The Cabin Sessions would make a good stage play or short film. (Eva's chapters in particular would make effective monologues of a woman who may be in the process of losing her sanity and could be a very unreliable narrator.)

Most of the conflicts are implied and revealed through conversations and inner thoughts which often contradict each other. Everyone is hiding something and no one is revealing anything until they are forced to.

Most of the troubles are hinted at and it's partly because of the setting being largely in the Cabin. Despite some dramatic confrontations and dreadful situations throughout the night (like a rancid smell, Cynthia's predictions, and the strange man outside) no one makes an effort to leave the Cabin. It almost invites the possibility that they can't or won't leave. Perhaps The Cabin serves as a sort of Purgatory or holding pattern, even an askew and imperfect sanctuary, which tries to keep the bad things away. 

Unfortunately, The Cabin Sessions shows that troubles don't end at the front door of The Cabin. Sometimes they bang the door down and shake the Cabin's walls to create a giant explosion making what was once hidden and ominous become upfront and terrifying.

New Book Alert: Rhapsody by Mitchell James Kaplan; Lilting Jazzy Historical Fiction About Kay Swift, Brilliant Musician, Composer, and George Gershwin's Mistress

 New Book Alert: Rhapsody by Mitchell James Kaplan; Lilting Jazzy Historical Fiction About Kay Swift, Brilliant Musician, Composer, and George Gershwin's Mistress

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

Spoilers: The cliche "Behind every great man is a great woman" is outdated and demeaning especially when said woman is in the same field as the man. How many know that Zelda Sayres Fitzgerald wrote a novel called Save Me The Waltz and was a Surrealist artist? While many might know that Anne Morrow Lindbergh wrote Gift From The Sea, a spiritual and meditative series of essays that are considered a precursor to the environmental movement, few know that she was also an accomplished aviator and was the first woman in the United States to receive a glider pilot's license. 

Now also take the example of Katherine Faulkner "Kay" Swift (1897-1994).  She was a performer and composer of popular and classical music and was the first woman to score a hit musical completely. In fact, that musical, Fine and Dandy has produced several jazz standards including "Can't We Be Friends?" that are still performed to this day. Oh yes and her lover was also a noted composer of popular songs. You might have heard of him, George Gershwin.

Mitchell James Kaplan's historical novel, Rhapsody, brings Swift out from being an afterthought or a footnote in Gershwin's history and allows her to claim her own history. It is a beautiful lilting novel that is like a good jazz tune: independent, smooth, and unforgettable.

Swift was born to a family that included her music critic father, Samuel Shippen Swift who died when she was young. She was trained as a classical musician and composer at the Institute of Musical Art (now the Juilliard School.) She played with the Edith Rubel Trio, a classical trio. During a performance she met her future husband James Paul "Jimmy" Warburg, a banker and poet. The two married and had three children before Swift met Gershwin in 1925.

The two engaged in a long term affair. 

Swift was a musical advisor during his many productions and it was during their romance that Fine and Dandy was produced. Warburg also benefited artistically from Swift's interest in popular music by becoming Fine and Dandy's lyricist, under his pseudonym, Paul James. Swift and Warburg divorced in 1934 and Swift and Gershwin continued their relationship (though never married) and remained together until Gershwin's death in 1937.

Swift continued to work after the death of her lover. She and Warburg contributed songs to the musicals, The First Little Show and The Garrick Gaieties while they were still married. In 1934, Swift composed Alma Mater, a ballet for choreographer George Balanchine which was Balanchine's first original work with an American setting.

After Gershwin's death, Swift and his brother, Ira collaborated to complete and arrange his unfinished works such as Sleepless Night. 

Swift was also staff composer for Radio City Music Hall, wrote music for the Rockettes, provided the score for Cornelia Otis Skinner's one woman show, Paris '90', and wrote the book, Who Could Ask For Anything More? based on her second marriage to rancher, Faye Hubbard. (Who Could Ask For Anything More? was made into the movie, Never A Dull Moment starring Fred McMurray and Irene Dunne). 

Swift continued to transcribe, annotate, arrange, and perform Gershwin's music until her diagnosis of Alzheimer's in 1991 and death in 1993.

Kaplan's perception of Kay Swift is of a woman in love not just with Gershwin but with music. In fact, her romance with Gershwin is seen as more than a dalliance to satisfy carnal pleasures. It's a more emotional bond shared by two people who love music.

Swift's first encounter with Gershwin expresses that love beautifully. She hears him perform his piece, Rhapsody in Blue. She recognizes the sadness, exhilaration, and emotion expressed in the composition. Swift sees in Gershwin a soul mate and one with whom she can share a mutual language of music. 

Most of the book shows Swift at the forefront of Gershwin's most famous works. She and Warburg attend a performance of Lady Be Good (which coincidentally also features in another book that I am reviewing, Lady Be Good: The Life and Times of Dorothy Hale by Pamela Hamilton). He experiments with works like the American ballet, An American in Paris. 

Swift is supportive as Gershwin travels on his own to South Carolina, a trip that proves fruitful when he becomes fascinated with the novel, Porgy and the Gullah dialect of the African-American South Carolina community. The results are his magnum opus, Porgy and Bess which flopped in his lifetime but became a posthumous success and is still performed regularly on stage. (Constantly aware of the immense talent of African-American performers and concerned that any subsequent producers would try to recreate Porgy and Bess in blackface, Gershwin's will insisted that any performance of his musical featured only black performers. While Porgy bears some controversy because of Gershwin's authorship, it has also received praise for his understanding and support of the African-American community.) 

Swift also is on hand as he creates music for lighter musical comedies like Girl Crazy and Shall We Dance and that he harbors no distinction between his serious highbrow works and his lighthearted affairs. He quotes his friends Louis Armstrong and F. Scott Fitzgerald, "Why only fluffy entertainment or high art? Can't a great chef grill a burger once in a while?"

Gershwin's music and attention also propel Swift into a richer, more creative professional life. Before she met Gershwin, she was strictly interested in playing classical music, considering popular music predictable and trite. After she meets Gershwin, Swift sees popular music through different eyes and appreciates the emotion and work that composers and lyricists put into these memorable tunes.

When she plays Gershwin's music, Swift puts her own touches and improvisations making them her own. She also begins playing her own musical pieces that come into her head. Fine and Dandy ends up being an excellent lighthearted musical and is praised for its jazzy songs. Her composition, Alma Mater, combines inspiration from Ravel and Stravinsky to make her own work.

It's clear that Swift has an immense talent but not much opportunity to pursue it. Gershwin ends up being a catalyst for Swift to pursue her talents to independence and success.

Besides Gershwin, Swift meets many other people whose creative pursuits inspire her to put herself forward. People like Alexander Wollcott, Duke Ellington, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Josephine Baker, Nadia Boulanger, Arthur "Harpo" Marx, Maurice Ravel, Fats Waller, Louis Armstrong, Dorothy Parker, Fred and Adele Astaire, Eddie Cantor, and George Balanchine. (Oddly enough even though they traveled in similar circles, Rhapsody does not mention Dorothy Hale nor does the book, Lady Be Good mention Swift.) It's not just Gershwin that influences her, it's also these other people who inspire Swift to express herself freely through her music. 

This love is not shared with Warburg. Kaplan's writing doesn't turn Warburg into a bastard or irredeemable. He is more nuanced than that. He is a commendable lyricist and doesn't mind "sharing" his wife, having affairs of his own as well. Warburg is also seen as a victim of antisemitism being derided by Henry Ford as a "Jewish banker" and can see Hitler's tyranny even before it officially begins.

Warburg just operates on a different level from Swift and this creates a distance between them that continues to grow. He doesn't share her love of music or performing. Gershwin however shares that love of music, making him her soul mate. Gershwin and Swift share the same passion for music and bring out that passion in each other.

People reading Rhapsody will know about George Gershwin going in but once the book is closed they will come to understand Kay Swift. This is the perfect book to make Swift move to center stage.

Weekly Reader: Song for a Lost Kingdom Book 1 by Steve Moretti; A Beautiful Fantasy About Time Travel, Scottish History, and Music

Weekly Reader Song For A Lost Kingdom Book 1 by Steve Moretti; A Beautiful Fantasy About Time Travel, Scottish History, and The Power of Music

By Julie Sara Porter

Bookworm Reviews

PopSugar Reading Challenge: A book that you were interested in because the title grabbed your attention

Spoilers: Music can do powerful things, including transporting you back to a memory by recalling other moments, earlier times, and fill your imagination with nostalgia, all figuratively of course. But what if music had the power to transport you to another time, literally?

That is the situation faced by Adeena Stuart, the protagonist of A Song for a Lost Kingdom, a beautiful fantasy about time travel and the power of music.

Adeena is an amateur cellist who longs to play for a major orchestra.  In the meantime, she works at the museum managed by her best friend, Tara. The latest museum exhibit features the Duncan Cello, a cello created in the 18th century by a former student of Antonio Stradivarius. Adeena has been rejected by the conductor and plans to reaudition and "borrow" the famous cello. 

While auditioning something strange happens. Adeena finds herself in 18th century Scotland in period costume, playing in front of an audience dressed in Highland garb and calling her "Lady Katherine." She is transported back in time into the body of Lady Katherine Carnegie, a noblewoman, musician, and female composer caught up in the Jacobite rebellion. She becomes involved in political intrigue and romance in the past while returning to a failed romantic relationship and potential legal troubles involving ownership of the cello and a plagiarizing conductor. Meanwhile, Adeena's parents travel to Scotland to visit her dying grandmother and learn that the Stuarts'  connections to the Duncan Cello and Lady Katherine are much closer than they previously thought.

It's easy to compare Song for a Lost Kingdom to Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series in that both involve time travel and romance between a modern woman and an 18th Century Scotsman. However, there are a few key moments that differ between them. One of the biggest is that Adeena goes back and forth in time between historical Scotland and modern Canada. This situation leads to some humorous moments when Adeena changes things in the past just by her mere presence. During one passage, Adeena's parents, William and Jackie, read the diary of Katherine's tyrannical brother, James. They read bemused as James wrote that during an argument, Adeena-in-Katherine referred to him as "King Konge, a line of royalty (he) is unaware of but is believed to be an insult to (his) person."

 The constant time hopping takes a tremendous toll on Adeena both physically and emotionally. Her returns often bring about fainting spells that require hospitalization. An X-ray reveals potential long term medical complications should Adeena continue to travel back and forth.

She also is confused by her double life, particularly when she develops feelings for John, a nobleman with ties to the Scottish rebels. This forbidden romance puts Adeena or rather Adeena-in-Katherine at odds with Katherine's stern brother who will do anything to stifle rebellion even if it means attacking his own family. This romance also complicates Adeena's modern relationship with Philippe with whom she already is uncertain about her feelings. 

Perhaps Adeena's off kilter emotions during her time travel could be a factor in some of her decisions. However, there are other factors that make her decisions unwise at best and reckless and dangerous at worst. She steals the Duncan Cello and recruits a friend to make a dummy copy for the Exhibit, jeopardizing Tara's career. She is blackmailed by Friedrich Lang, a conductor who is not only aware that she has the Cello but shamefully steals an unpublished composition written by Katherine. Adeena is naturally angered by Lang's blatant blackmail and plagiarism, but fails to account for the fact that she brought it on by performing with the Cello, practically boasting about it in front of Lang.

Sometimes, Adeena's actions make her incredibly irritating, but she also has a lot of spunk. She stands up for herself in front of James and others and is able to call Lang out on his deceit. She isn't always likeable, but she learns and is able to use that recklessness to defend herself and those around her.

The historical setting is well-written. People who are fascinated by Scottish history will delight in the cameos by such notable figures as Bonnie Prince Charlie. Thanks to Adeena-in-Katherine, we also get a birds-eye-view of the status of women in such a society. It's disheartening to read about a woman of such musical talent like Katherine go unnoticed for centuries until a modern woman like Adeena brings her to life.

There is a strong connection to music as the book features characters whose lives revolve around music. Music has the power to do many things: incite revolution, cause people to fall in love, and in this world causes people to travel in time.

Song For A Lost Kingdom is a strong fantasy with a real sense of time and place. It plays all the right notes and composes a beautiful symphony.