dappled shade

Book Review: Fingersmith

About halfway through Fingersmith, I thought, "Oh no, not another plot twist".

The huge number of plot twists (along with the red herrings the author throws out along the way) is the most notable feature of this book. They're all neatly tied up at the end, though, with no reaching by the author, Sarah Waters, to have it make sense. This is almost unique among books which change direction as much as Fingersmith does.

Fingersmith is a melodrama set in Victorian England. An elopement, thieves, lunatic asylums, pornographers and tyrannical relatives all make an appearance, along with sighing and blushing heroines (though as far as I can recall, no one faints which seems a lost opportunity for a novel set in the 1800s).

One of the curious aspects is that all of the characters, viewed dispassionately, are fairly awful. In pursuit of their own interests they will trample anyone who gets in their way. The two heroines take turns playing victim and villain, though it's not clear until the end which role they're playing when.

Despite the selfishness, the author uses the love affair that develops between the two heroines to make them sympathetic to the reader. Their sincere attachment to each other helped to keep me engaged in the story and to care what happened to them. The two women's lack of control over the conditions of their lives (one because of poverty and the other because of a social system that disadvantages even rich women) helped mitigate some of the cruelty they displayed toward others. It didn't excuse it, but it at least made it comprehensible.

Fingersmith is a melodrama and a thriller with two women at the heart of it. While I don't know I'll ever re-read it, it was entertaining and certainly very clever.

Hiking in the Rainy Season

Over the holidays I bought myself a new pair of boots. Unfortunately, after wearing them around the house for awhile, I decided they weren't going to work. So I took them back to REI, and made the mistake of wearing a skirt.

I have terrible feet to fit and it's important that boots fit well, so buying boots is often a long, involved process which I avoid whenever possible. The people at REI were actually very nice, but they clearly chalked me up as a woman with a New Year's Resolution to start hiking (which the skirt only reinforced). There was a certain amount of hand patting and "You don't really need boots which are that heavy duty." Eventually, I managed to walk out of there with a really solid pair of boots which will last me at least until next year.

I went for a hike in them a little over a week ago at Pacifica. The trail we took crosses back and forth through a Eucalyptus grove, and ends up with a view over Pacifica and the ocean. From there, we could either keep climbing over what becomes a fairly rough trail but ends at the top of the mountain or turn left and loop back. We decided to loop back and stopped at a bench for lunch on the way down which has a view of a waterfall (at least during the rainy season — the rest of the year, it's just a scrubby hillside).

We didn't linger because it was cold. At the bottom, I took some photographs, a couple of which I've added to this post.

I have spent most of my life in California and, when I was about 12, I was given a math problem in which I had to divide up the year and calculate how much rainfall there was each season. I had only the vaguest idea when the four seasons were supposed to be. I remember that the teacher, who wasn't from California, wasn't remotely sympathetic. The source of my confusion, though, is that in California there are really only two seasons — the time when it rains and the time when it doesn't.

The Bay Area is undoubtedly at its best this time of year, during the rainy season. It's cold and sometimes wet, but it's also clear, crisp and the hills are green.