238. The House on the Borderland

The House on the Borderland
William Hope Hodgson
1908
Around 150 pages

I had this one marked down for a Halloween read, but ended up reaching it earlier than I expected. An eerie read is not entirely out of place in June of 2020, so I don't feel too bad about it.

Two Irishmen stumble upon the ruins of a house while on a fishing trip and find a moldering old journal in the crumbling walls. The journal recounts the story of an old man who used to live in the house with his sister and dog. He started the diary in order to record all the strange things happening within the house.

So this is sort of a throwback to gothic novels (e.g. the frame story of finding an old manuscript that tells a chilling tale, the exploration of the uncanny, etc.). At the same time, Hodgson is adding his own science fiction twist, and it's clear that this had a huge influence on sci fi writers.

It was a little too trippy for my tastes, but it was an entertaining read that clearly resonated with many future authors.

RATING: ***--

Interesting Facts:

Terry Pratchett has said this novel was "the Big Bang in my private universe as a science fiction and fantasy reader and, later, writer."

Praised by H.P. Lovecraft.

UP NEXT: The Old Wives' Tale by Arnold Bennett. Sounds hot.

237. Mother

Mother
Maxim Gorky
1907
Around 500 pages

There have been quite a few social justice novels lately, I suppose those are the novels with the staying power. This one adds a fun twist, because it is a Russian novel, so there's a character named Vyesovshchikov and way too many Nickolays.

The Mother in the title refers to Pelageya Nilovna Vlasova, a world-weary Russian woman who is repeatedly "treated to cuts" by her husband (her words, obviously, not mine). After her husband dies unexpectedly, her son Pavel is the breadwinner and it appears he will be condemned to same miserable workman's life as his father's. Soon, however, he starts to read revolutionary materials and surround himself with a new type of a people, much to the dismay of Pela- his mother.

Weirdly enough, the story is not from the point of view of Pavel, who is arguably driving the story, but his mother. I suppose this is done because Gorky thought Russian readers would be less receptive to a story where Pavel is the protagonist, since he is educated and well-read. In every one of these socialism novels, there's always that one character that is just there to give rousing speeches to a crowd of admiring onlookers who feel the truth of the words all the way to their bones, and often times this character is not the protagonist. I guess this is to elevate those particular characters to "prophet" status, which requires putting some distance between them and the average Joe (or, in this case, Josephine) that picks up your novel. I still maintain that Germinal did this best (fight me).

So another important novel that is not very fun at all.

RATING: ***--

Interesting Facts:

Adapted in a 1932 play.

Gorky had a rivalry with Leo Tolstoy. Tolstoy was a jealous bee-otch.

Met Lenin, but Lenin didn't like any of his ideas and Gorky's relationship with the Soviet Union only grew worse over time.

UP NEXT: The House on the Borderland by William Hope Hodgson.

236. The Secret Agent

The Secret Agent
Joseph Conrad
1907
Around 250 pages

I am not a huge fan of Conrad, but the Book doesn't care, so here we are with our fourth Conrad novel, with one more to go. Unlike some of the other List authors I don't click with, Conrad doesn't actively repulse me, but I just never find his prose very interesting. Still, I would take him over Henry James any day.

Adolf Verloc is a secret agent living in London in 1886. He owns a shop that sells naughty things with his wife, and they live with her mother and brother. He is enlisted by an unnamed embassy to spy on a local anarchist group, and to instigate a bombing of the Greenwich Observatory. The embassy thinks this will lead the British government to crack down on socialists/anarchists.

The plot of this novel sounds interesting, but once again, I was disappointed. I liked that we were moving away from sea faring stories, but I still found the plot confusing and convoluted. I suppose espionage plots are always like that, but I found it hard to follow, especially at the beginning.

So another so-so novel, and hopefully the next one isn't as frightening as it sounds.

RATING: ***--

Interesting Facts:

One of three most cited works of literature in American media in the two weeks after 9/11.

Dedicated to H.G. Wells.

Stevie is based on French anarchist Martial Bourdin.

The Unabomber was a huge fan of this novel, and kept a copy by his bedside.

UP NEXT: Mother by Maxim Gorky. The title kind of freaks me out, in a Norman Bates way.

235. The Jungle

The Jungle
Upton Sinclair
1906
Around 400 pages

I don't think it was required that we read this is in my AP history class, but I did anyway, either in the pursuit of being extra, or because I was writing an essay. Either way, this was probably the first social justice novel I read, back before Emile Zola ruined me for other men.

Jurgis is a Lithuanian immigrant and thinks he can support his entire family by working at a Chicago slaughterhouse. He's wrong of course, and things get pretty gross.

So we all know exactly why this novel was written, and it's not to create a complex narrative with multidimensional characters. It's to expose the horrifying conditions that workers in Chicago endured and it does that very effectively. I don't find stories as enjoyable when I am being frog marched to a particular point, but this is undeniably a very important novel, and deserving of its place on the List.

An essential read, and another entry on the List that proves storytellers can save the planet.

RATING: ****-

Interesting Facts:

Sinclair said of the novel, "I aimed at the public's heart, and by accident, I hit it in the stomach."

Jack London called this "the Uncle Tom's Cabin of wage slavery."

Sinclair worked incognito in Chicago's meatpacking plants for seven weeks to gather information.

Teddy Roosevelt referred to Sinclair as a "crackpot."

UP NEXT: The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad. Ugh.

234. The Forsyte Saga

The Forsyte Saga
John Galsworthy
1906
Around 800 pages

I snatched this one off the shelf of a library, back in those happy times when we were allowed to go to libraries. I was attracted merely by the title (because I love multigenerational sagas), and didn't even realize it was a List book. I should have known the Powers That Be find these stories as irresistible as I do.

It's difficult to give a short plot summary about a series like this; The Saga consists of three novels. Instead, I'll just focus on the characters. Soames Forsyte is a jealous solicitor, married to the intensely unhappy Irene. Soames longs to possess Irene fully, and for Irene to give him an heir. Irene has her own ideas about what will make her happy, and it is the pursuit of this desired independence that drives most of the narrative.

Soames is a fascinating character, simultaneously vicious and pathetic. Irene was also an interesting character. I was almost frustrated by her, because she seemed so self-possessed in some instances and then naive during other crucial moments. None of these characters were one-note wonders, which made them very real, and very sympathetic.

Highly recommended, and a welcome entry after 233's debacle.

RATING: *****

Interesting Facts:

Galsworthy won the Nobel Prize of Literature in 1932.

Listed as #123 on BBC's Big Read poll of the UK's best loved novel.

UP NEXT: The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. Anybody else have to read this in school?