"There is a Parochialism to Some Kinds of Misery - a Geographical Remoteness Like the Life Led by a Grade-Crossing Tender - a Point Where Life is Lived or Endured at the Minimum of Energy or Perception and Where Most of the World Appears to Pass Swiftly By Like Passengers on the Gorgeous Trains of the Santa Fe."

The Wapshot Chronicle is on one of my lists (Modern Library) and I chose to read it now to fulfill the PopSugar Reading Challenge prompt of "Book About a Family." And it actually ended up being a pretty damn appropriate choice to fit that category.

Because that's exactly what the book is - a chronicle of the Wapshot Family, a long-standing fixture of the town of St. Botolphs, a fishing village outside of Boston (apparently it was based on Quincy, Massachusetts and was loosely based on John Cheever's life). We get the full family tree breakdown of several generations and then land on the most recent descendants - parents Leander and Sarah, sons Coverly and Moses, and cousin Honora. While exact dates are not necessarily given in the book, given some context clues, it's fair to assume that it takes place in roughly the 1920s to 194os. Leander wants to instill in his sons the honors of tradition and to love and celebrate their roots, not just of their family but of St Botolphs. But he also wants them to go out and make something of themselves in the world, find wives, and have children. Honora is the one who controls the finances of the Wapshots and makes it knows that she will only provide for Moses and Coverly if they get married and have sons. 

What seemed to be the biggest theme of this book to me was the contrast between the old ways and the new. Not just in the characters perceptions (in particular Leander - there are portions of the book where Leander is writing his memoir in a very choppy, matter-of-fact way), but in how things are described. In particular, the family home is dated. And the home that Moses is living in after he marries the ward of one of his distant cousins, Clear Haven, is a once-opulent American castle that is crumbling, with descriptions of dust, broken tiles, plaster ceilings falling apart in certain rooms, etc. It was a nice contrast to show how prominent the family had been through their fortunes, but how even time will degrade them in stature and prominence. This was most literally demonstrated when Clear Haven burns to the ground. Or when Leander's beloved ferry boat, the Topaze, is wrecked on the shore and his wife turns his lifeblood into a gift shop. 

Overall, I enjoyed the book. I don't know if I was necessarily wowed by it. It's exactly as advertised - a chronicle. So nothing too remarkable happens, there isn't a significant plotline. Just the retelling of the lives of a family. And there's nothin' wrong with that. 

Next up, I'm taking a short break from the lists to hit up Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. I've heard so many great things about this book, I'm really looking forward to it. I've got a couple of doozies coming up from the book lists as far as length goes (David Copperfield and War and Peace), so I'll probably be mixing in some more non-list books than I normally would just so I don't go absolutely batty trying to slog through them. But more on that on another day. 

Oh, I also realized that in my master list of books remaining, I had one listed that I had already read (Tess of the d'Ubervilles). So I in fact have 175 to go.  

"I Thought, Though Everybody Hated and Despised Each Other, They Could Not Avoid Loving Me - And They Have All Turned to Enemies in a Few Hours."

Confession: I didn't know what Wuthering Heights was about before I started reading it. And I mistakenly lumped it in with Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice. I assumed it was likely a love story, with characters that were complicated and a love you may not always have rooted for but you came around to in the end. Friends to lovers trope, perhaps. Spoiler alert: Wuthering Heights is not that book. 

It's been a long time since I came close to DNF-ing a book that I started. One that I despised so much that I just didn't care how it turned out. But that's where I was with about 100 pages left of this book. 

I very strongly disliked this book. And I genuinely don't understand how people can say they love it or that it's their favorite. This is not a love story. There is no love in there anywhere. There is selfishness and narcissism, toxicity and vengeance. Sure, someone might say that Heathcliff and Catherine had a complicated love and their choices are what drove the tragedy of the rest of the story. But they are both awful people and I couldn't give two squats if they were together or not. Because they were petty and petulant and snobbish and vindictive. So it's hard to get on board with the main "love story" of this book when you despise everything about the main characters. 

There are no redeeming characters in this (except maybe Nelly Dean, the narrator. Or Lockwood, the temporary tenant who Nelly narrates the story to). You don't root for anyone. They're all just wretched, miserable, and awful people. Heathcliff is truly one of the most villainous characters I've ever seen in print. Shit, I'd take undead, definition-of-evil Dracula over this turd. And passing their misery on to their children in such horrible manipulative ways, and the children all succumbing and becoming wretched awful people themselves (although, in fairness, they didn't know any other way than to follow the examples of the horrible people around them and they literally had no way of extracting themselves from their circumstances). 

I do give Emily Bronte a lot of credit. The story itself was masterfully crafted and felt like a Shakespearian tragedy - you could see what was coming but the inertia of the outcome was inevitable. And she managed to evoke very strong feelings in me about these characters and this book. But just not feelings that make me like the book. So bravo to her for that. 

I'm glad this is over with. I'll not revisit. And I'll have bad things to say if anyone ever asks me about this book. 

Thanks for coming to my salty, bitter TedTalk on the craptastic-ness of Wuthering Heights. 

I'm using this book for the PopSugar Reading Challenge prompt of "A book with a love triangle." Although if I could put the word "love" in quotation marks I would. 

Next up is The Wapshot Chronicle by John Cheever. Wish me luck. 

177 books to go.