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Mar. 23rd, 2011 11:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsI have been continuing my read of the Mrs. Pollifax books, which have in their turn been continuing to fill me with delight!
The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax is the one in which Mrs. Pollifax is sent to quietly deliver some passports to help revolutionaries escape from Bulgaria, sort of accidentally ends up rescuing a whole bunch of political prisoners from a HIGHLY GUARDED FACILITY instead, because that's what happens when you send Mrs. Pollifax into a situation and her superiors should know this by now!
Especially entertaining factors:
1. Mrs. Pollifax's extremely beleaguered tour guide, who is SO FRUSTRATED with this old lady who keeps tottering off into top secret areas for NO APPARENT REASON
2. The poor-little-rich-girl sidekick who saves the day with GYMNASTICS
3. A very quiet, understated doomed romance between Mrs. Pollifax and a mysterious Bulgarian revolutionary, in which they sort of confess that they sort of like each other and if they were both not, you know, spies in different countries they would probably have gotten married, and that would've been nice, but since it's not clearly possible they will nip the idea in the bud and just kind of think about each other fondly and wistfully every so often. It is all very sad and grown-up and adorable. Mrs. Pollifax! <3
A Palm for Mrs. Pollifax is the one in which Mrs. Pollifax goes to have a nice stay at a health resort and spa in Switzerland in order to locate STOLEN PLUTONIUM, and while she's there she meets a hyperactive child and also a jewel thief who is unrelated to the entire plutonium incident but gets cheerfully blackmailed by Mrs. Pollifax into staying and helping her out anyway, because Mrs. Pollifax never met a Cary Grant expy that she didn't like.
I am sort of torn on the actual plot for this one, because on the one hand it features your standard Fundamentalist Muslim Terrorist from Imaginary Arabic Country, but on the other hand it also features several intelligent, sympathetic and proactive characters from Imaginary Arabic Country who play just as much of a role in thwarting the evil plot as Mrs. Pollifax does, which is at least several steps improved from most plots involving the standard Fundamentalist Muslim Terrorist. Also: Team Mrs. Pollifax, Hyperactive Child, and Jewel Thief is really adorable.
And while I was reading Unlikely Ladies Fight Crime, I thought I might like to reread Lloyd Alexander's Vesper Holly books and picked up The Illyrian Adventure. I had forgotten how much - well, okay. For those who are unfamiliar with the Vesper Holly books, they are narrated by Brinnie, a nice middle-aged Dr. Watson-ish gentleman who has just become the guardian of an independently wealthy orphaned redheaded sixteen-year-old girl who speaks five languages, fires a pistol excellently, and gets into numerous Indiana Jones-ish adventures. They are everything that you would expect.
I can see why I loved Vesper Holly when I was ten! I think perhaps I am slightly too old for the sheer sugar-rush wish-fulfillment that is Vesper Holly now; I find myself identifying much more with Brinnie when he is like "Vesper NO let's please NOT break in to observe THE TOP-SECRET RITUAL, it is RUDE." So I do not think I will be rereading the whole series, and will instead move on to a reread of the Prydain Chronicles, which I have also been meaning to do. But if you do feel like reading some Indiana Jones adventures staring an infallible red-headed teenaged heroine - and sometimes we all get in those moods! - then these are the books for you.
The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax is the one in which Mrs. Pollifax is sent to quietly deliver some passports to help revolutionaries escape from Bulgaria, sort of accidentally ends up rescuing a whole bunch of political prisoners from a HIGHLY GUARDED FACILITY instead, because that's what happens when you send Mrs. Pollifax into a situation and her superiors should know this by now!
Especially entertaining factors:
1. Mrs. Pollifax's extremely beleaguered tour guide, who is SO FRUSTRATED with this old lady who keeps tottering off into top secret areas for NO APPARENT REASON
2. The poor-little-rich-girl sidekick who saves the day with GYMNASTICS
3. A very quiet, understated doomed romance between Mrs. Pollifax and a mysterious Bulgarian revolutionary, in which they sort of confess that they sort of like each other and if they were both not, you know, spies in different countries they would probably have gotten married, and that would've been nice, but since it's not clearly possible they will nip the idea in the bud and just kind of think about each other fondly and wistfully every so often. It is all very sad and grown-up and adorable. Mrs. Pollifax! <3
A Palm for Mrs. Pollifax is the one in which Mrs. Pollifax goes to have a nice stay at a health resort and spa in Switzerland in order to locate STOLEN PLUTONIUM, and while she's there she meets a hyperactive child and also a jewel thief who is unrelated to the entire plutonium incident but gets cheerfully blackmailed by Mrs. Pollifax into staying and helping her out anyway, because Mrs. Pollifax never met a Cary Grant expy that she didn't like.
I am sort of torn on the actual plot for this one, because on the one hand it features your standard Fundamentalist Muslim Terrorist from Imaginary Arabic Country, but on the other hand it also features several intelligent, sympathetic and proactive characters from Imaginary Arabic Country who play just as much of a role in thwarting the evil plot as Mrs. Pollifax does, which is at least several steps improved from most plots involving the standard Fundamentalist Muslim Terrorist. Also: Team Mrs. Pollifax, Hyperactive Child, and Jewel Thief is really adorable.
And while I was reading Unlikely Ladies Fight Crime, I thought I might like to reread Lloyd Alexander's Vesper Holly books and picked up The Illyrian Adventure. I had forgotten how much - well, okay. For those who are unfamiliar with the Vesper Holly books, they are narrated by Brinnie, a nice middle-aged Dr. Watson-ish gentleman who has just become the guardian of an independently wealthy orphaned redheaded sixteen-year-old girl who speaks five languages, fires a pistol excellently, and gets into numerous Indiana Jones-ish adventures. They are everything that you would expect.
I can see why I loved Vesper Holly when I was ten! I think perhaps I am slightly too old for the sheer sugar-rush wish-fulfillment that is Vesper Holly now; I find myself identifying much more with Brinnie when he is like "Vesper NO let's please NOT break in to observe THE TOP-SECRET RITUAL, it is RUDE." So I do not think I will be rereading the whole series, and will instead move on to a reread of the Prydain Chronicles, which I have also been meaning to do. But if you do feel like reading some Indiana Jones adventures staring an infallible red-headed teenaged heroine - and sometimes we all get in those moods! - then these are the books for you.
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Date: 2011-03-23 05:36 pm (UTC)They're rather odd and dated and have that odd sense of, little priest smarter than everyone and random horrible dated things and religion. They're clever stories but just odd and I'm in a random writing mood, sorry.
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Date: 2011-03-23 05:46 pm (UTC)Hm, interesting! I've read Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday, and found it rather fascinating, but nothing else by him.
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Date: 2011-03-23 05:50 pm (UTC)If you're looking for some mysteries that are quick reads, try one of the books of short stories. I think there are five, the book I found has all of them.
I don't think I ever read the Westmark books, but I read all of the Prydain books.
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Date: 2011-03-23 05:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 05:55 pm (UTC)Oh not long ago, I found a Lloyd Alexander that was fairly new called The Rope Dancer I think. It was good but strange.
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Date: 2011-03-23 06:06 pm (UTC)I've seen that one around but not read it - a lot of the one-offs I haven't read, which is something I should also remedy one of these days.
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Date: 2011-03-23 06:08 pm (UTC)Its a good read, a little strange though, but the heroine is a wonderful character. I found it really cheap at a bookstore near my parents for about two or three books.
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Date: 2011-03-23 07:01 pm (UTC)Also, the name Vesper has been irrevocably ruined for me since a Swedish detective film featured an officer called Vesper Jonsson, whom my father quickly renamed Completorium Andersson.
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Date: 2011-03-23 07:14 pm (UTC)For me, on the other hand, the name 'Vesper' always just makes me think of Princess Vespa.