Rebecca

This book, arguably the most famous novel by Daphne du Maurier, was another that I've been reading on my family holiday in Cornwall - where it is set, appropriately enough. In fact I acquired my copy of the book from Jamaica Inn when we were here last year - and as a tourist destination I would recommend this museum as a spotlight into 19th-century trade and culture. But enough said about that, onto the novel.*

   Narrated by an unnamed young woman, we are introduced to the high-society world of late-19th-century tourism. The narrator is working as a professional companion to a terrible lady on holiday in Monte Carlo, but her life is turned upside-down when she strikes up a relationship with Maxim, a handsomely wealthy man. She becomes his wife, quits her job, and travels with Maxim back to Manderley - his Cornish mansion/estate. However once there she soon finds herself becoming increasingly isolated in the bigness of the house and the rich shallowness of the life; and these factors are compounded by, in the flesh the creepy housekeeper Mrs Danvers, and in spirit by the memory of Maxim's first wife - Rebecca - who has been dead for several years. So follows a romantic mystery that I will not spoil here.

   I enjoyed this novel a lot more than I thought I would - historical romances not really being my favourite genre - and found myself shocked in many places at Maxim's cold treatment of his new bride, Mrs Danvers's scheming, and the unfolding of the plot. The characters (and alongside the main four I've already mentioned there are a wealth of side-characters) are extremely well-drawn and breathe vivacity and believability into the story, which is powerful in itself, and extremely skilfully told: du Maurier is a writer of immense subtlety and potency, and everything in this novel from the descriptions of Manderley's grounds to the narrator's inner turmoil are laid out in exquisite prose. I think leaving the narrator unnamed was a stroke of genius, as it really pulls you into her struggles in an empathic way.

   So, on reflection, I would highly recommend this book to anyone who likes period-piece drama/romance, with the caveat that what the story turns into is far more drama than romance - aside from, of course, Maxim's continuing obsession with the late eponymous Rebecca - and less strongly but still positively would recommend this if you just like a good novel. It's beautifully written, psychologically realistic, and narratively compelling; it will make you both envy and pity those who lived the kinds of lifestyles in the kinds of houses that these characters do.

* If you're into film versions, there are several - I've watched the classic old black-and-white version as well as the Netflix adaptation, and in all honesty enjoyed the latter more, but you do you.

Jurassic Park

This book is probably Michael Crichton's best-known novel. I am a big fan of the films* as most 90's kids typically are (who doesn't love dinosaurs?) and had read the book before - though way back when I was an easily-scared thirteen-year-old who wasn't thoughtful enough to get the most out of the story and its themes, so a reread was well overdue: as such I've been powering through it on holiday in Cornwall with my family.

   If you live under a rock and need a brief (spoiler free I promise) overview of what the book is about, here goes. An uber-rich science funder called Hammond has figured out a way of cloning dinosaurs by extracting their DNA from blood in mosquitoes fossilized in amber. His plan is to open a theme park where visitors can come a observe these ancient creatures doing what they do; but to settle various legal and ethical issues his project is (arguably unsurprisingly) suffering, he brings in a small team of experts to audit the park. Included among these are palaeontologist Alan Grant, palaeobotanist Ellie Sattler, and chaos theoretician Ian Malcolm. Everyone is blown away by the successes of the cloned dinosaurs - but the experts have their fair share of hesitations, which become more and more salient as the park starts to break down and the dinosaurs start causing violent havoc.

   On the surface this is already a great novel - an exciting, original premise; believable and well-sketched characters; deftly economic prose; pitch-perfect pacing. But it's the themes I really want to talk about. A good science fiction novel should force us to question not merely the ramifications within the story of what new scientific possibilities exist - it should prompt us to think about how those ramifications have implications for the conduct of science and culture in our actual reality. And this novel does that incredibly potently. Hammond's primary motives are profit and reputation; the problems and dangers with cloning creatures that have been extinct for 65million years or more barely occur to him. Hence the audit (during which, it is worth noting, the only "expert" who doesn't have strong reservations about the park is the lawyer who is on Hammond's payroll). The subtext prevalent throughout (often bubbling up via dialogue into the actual text also) provokes a great deal of thought about the ethical limits of science, what it means to "play God", surety and predictability, the natures of nature itself and the human relationship to it, and such.** However that is not to say at all that Crichton's novel is a mere think-piece - it is a powerful, compelling story in its own right, and helped change the game of what contemporary science-fiction could aspire to do. Plus the velociraptors are cool as heck.

   So - yes, I would immensely recommend this to anyone looking for a good read, even if you're not that big into conventional sci-fi as this (despite the dinosaurs, who in fairness are portrayed pretty much in just animalistic terms) stands up alongside more realistic novels on its own terms. Even if it weren't for the phenomenally successful film franchise it has spawned this will go on to become a modern classic.

* The original trilogy, that is (especially the first one, which is by far supreme). Jurassic World can do one; I haven't even bothered watching its sequels.

** A quick note on the "realisticness" of the science elements: Crichton has clearly done some not-inconsiderable legwork in his research into genetics, palaeontology, chaos theory, computer science and probably a couple of other fields I'm forgetting - and while it still requires some suspension of disbelief at least the characters in the narrative know what they're talking about. So even though one of the fundamental scientific premises of the novel has been debunked, if you're not too much of a nit-picker it still holds up as an internally-coherent and logically-satisfying fictionalization of science.