It’s the first Saturday of the month which means it’s time for another Six Degrees of Separation, hosted by Kate of Books are my Favourite and Best. The idea is that Kate chooses a book to use as a starting point and then we have to link it to six other books of our choice to form a chain. A book doesn’t have to be connected to all of the others on the list – only to the one next to it in the chain.
This month we’re starting with Life of M by Rachel Cusk. I haven’t read this book, but here’s what it’s about:
M is a film star, and one of the most recognisable faces of our time.
With such fame, her life has the appearance of freedom: people are instantly obliging, spaces are altered to accommodate her, time can be rearranged. For her, it seems, the rules of reality have melted away.
Now M has agreed to let a stranger write her biography. Their project will sprawl and expand: to the olive groves and holiday beaches where M spends her days; across hotel rooms, bourgeois facades, film sets; through endless modern cities. It is hard not to feel ugly next to M, hard not to feel insignificant. But what truths – about the very experience of living – might this proximity allow the writer to briefly capture? And what in the end will M make of their work?
I struggled to find a clever first link to start this month’s chain, so I’ve gone with a very simple link to a book with a similar title: Yann Martel’s Booker Prize winner, Life of Pi (1), in which an Indian boy, Pi, finds himself stranded in a lifeboat in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with a hyena, a zebra, an orangutan – and a Bengal tiger called Richard Parker!
There’s also a tiger in Jamrach’s Menagerie by Carol Birch (2). Jaffy Brown comes face to face with it in the streets of London and the experience leads to him being offered a job with Mr Jamrach, a dealer in wild animals. For the next few years Jaffy works at Jamrach’s menagerie, helping to take care of the animals – until one day he gets the chance to go to sea in search of a ‘dragon’. I loved this entertaining historical adventure novel, my favourite of the three books I’ve read by Birch.
The Georgian Menagerie by Christopher Plumb (3) shares a word in the title and is an interesting non-fiction book about the history of exotic animals and birds in 18th century London. As you can imagine, it’s sad to read about the treatment some of these creatures received once they were removed from their natural habitats and exhibited to the public, but there are also lots of fascinating and amusing anecdotes.
There’s a sort of menagerie in Swamplandia! by Karen Russell (4), although it focuses on only one type of animal. This unusual novel follows the story of the Bigtree family who run an alligator-themed amusement park in the Everglades. I found this book a bit uneven, but loved the imaginative setting, complete with theme park attractions such as daily alligator wrestling shows, the Bigtree family museum and the Swamp Café!
I tried to think of an alligator link, but I could only come up with a crocodile one! Crocodile on the Sandbank by Elizabeth Peters (5) is the first in the Amelia Peabody mystery series, about a Victorian lady with a passion for archaeology. Like most of the books in the series, this one is set in Egypt. Unless I’ve forgotten, I don’t think there were any real crocodiles in the novel – the title comes from an ancient Egyptian poem.
There is an actual crocodile in one of the stories in the collection A Bad Business by Fyodor Dostoevsky (6). The story is appropriately titled The Crocodile and is about a Russian civil servant, Ivan Matveich, who is swallowed alive by a crocodile being exhibited in St Petersburg. It’s a fascinating and surprisingly funny story. There are five others included in the book, all in new translations by Nicolas Pasternak Slater and Maya Slater.
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And that’s my chain for October! The chain has an animal theme and the links have included: ‘Life of’ titles; tigers; the word Menagerie; animal parks; alligators and crocodiles.
In November, in recognition of Novellas in November, we’ll be starting with a novella that’s on our reading list.
Your first link is great!
I’m glad you like it!
I loved Jamrach’s Menagerie. Thanks for reminding me of it. A very inventive chain!
Thank you! Jamrach’s Menagerie was very entertaining – I’m glad you loved it as well.
Love an animal-themed set of links – very clever indeed!
Thanks! I don’t often manage to keep the same theme going through the whole chain.
Loved your chain Helen, especially the animal theme. Both menagerie books I’m certainly going to be looking up–the Dostoevsky story I enjoyed very much as I did the Amelia Peabody–they’re so entertaining!
I’ve read the first three Amelia Peabody books and enjoyed all of them – I really need to read the next one soon!
Another very clever chain. Thanks, Helen!
Thanks! I’m glad you like it.
I’ve never read the Amelia Peabody series although I have been told I would enjoy it. I will add to the TBR.
I haven’t actually read any of these but you have some very appealing covers!
I think you would enjoy the Amelia Peabody series. I’ve only read the first three books so far, but have the fourth on my TBR.
What a clever chain! From which I’ve – so far – only read Life of Pi. The carol Birch looks fun.
Thanks! I read the Carol Birch years ago but remember finding it very entertaining.
Very good first link! I don’t know these books, but it looks like an interesting chain.
Thank you! I enjoyed all of these books.
Very good work. Jamrach’s Menagerie sounds interesting.
Thanks. Jamrach’s Menagerie was fun!
Love the connections!
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Thanks!
Life of Pi was my first thought, but I couldn’t figure out how to move on from there — you did a great job with all the animals.
Yes, sometimes it can be difficult to think of the next link and it’s easier to go back and change to a different book instead.
Oh I have that little Pushkin Press edition of Dostoevsky’s stories too – glad to know it has some humorous ones in it!
I was surprised by how much fun some of the stories were! I hadn’t really been expecting that from Dostoevsky.
what great links, I would never have thought of an animal menagerie!
Thanks, Jane. I didn’t set out to make a whole chain of animals, but after the first three books I decided to just keep going!
Great links!
Fun that we both had Life of Pi!
I added your last book to my clasics TBR, thanks!
I love Elizabeth Peters, but somehow was a bit disappointed by this one, I need to try volume 2