Review & Giveaway: The Once and Future Queen: Guinevere in Arthurian Legend by Nicole Evelina

The Once and Future Queen: Guinevere in Arthurian Legend
by Nicole Evelina
Release Date: November 21st 2017
2017 Lawson Gartner Publishing
Kindle Edition; 278 pages
ISBN: 978-0996763226
ASIN: B076B6TYJC
Genre: Non-fiction
Source: Review copy from author via HFVBT

4 / 5 Stars

Summary
Literature tells us painfully little about Guinevere, mostly focusing on her sin and betrayal of Arthur and Camelot. As a result, she is often seen as a one-dimensional character. But there is more to her story. By examining popular works of more than 20 authors over the last one thousand years, The Once and Future Queen shows how Guinevere reflects attitudes toward women during the time in which her story was written, changing to suit the expectations of her audience. Beginning in Celtic times and continuing through the present day, this book synthesizes academic criticism and popular opinion into a highly readable, approachable work that fills a gap in Arthurian material available to the general public.

My Thoughts
The Once and Future Queen is a great companion to Nicole Evelina's Daughter of Destiny and Camelot's Queen as she explores the legend of Guinevere from its earliest beginnings to current literature, and how the change in societies has had an impact on her story and on her personality. I am very familiar with the tale of Arthur and Guinevere and have found the various legends and stories to be quite interesting, so I was quite thrilled to read this author's thoughts on the various tales and how they might have developed over time.  

First of all, while this wasn't a real in-depth overview of Guinevere, in the sense of a deep scholarly study, I really enjoyed the lighter touch to her well-researched book as it was easy to read and to follow. I remember reading some more scholarly things about Camelot while taking some history courses and they were not easy to read nor follow, so I definitely appreciated the effort to keep it light but also be very informative.  I don't want to make light of the amount of research that would have gone into this book though, so when I say it's light, it just means that it was written in such a way as to make it easy to understand who the characters were that people Guinevere's world.  You don't have to have a huge background knowledge of Guinevere and her court in order to understand this book. There are no assumptions made that you have read material about Camelot before, so anyone could pick this up and enjoy the discussion about her.  

What I did find fascinating is the trends that took place over the centuries regarding Guinevere and her personality and how it is shaped by the societies in which each story was written.  I am not especially surprised by this, but to have it laid out in a format that discusses each story as they were written makes it easy to follow the historical routes and ideas that conceived each novel. Was Guinevere a saint, a sinner, a martyr, a queen, a feminist, a mother, a slut, or a simply a representation of what should have been like during each time period in which she was written.  Naturally, being born in the modern time period, I prefer her when she is strong and independent, but flawed through bad choices and pressures that were put upon her.  I know when I read Le Morte d'Arthur, I wasn't overly impressed with Guinevere (or Arthur either for that matter), so reading Sharan Newman's Guinevere series (Guinevere, The Chessboard Queen, and Guinevere Evermore) was very enlightening, with a much stronger queen that I liked, even if I had issues with the overall stories.

Verdict
The Once and Future Queen is an engrossing and detailed rendering of Guinevere through the ages, and is a welcome addition to the works about Guinevere.  As someone with a background in history, I definitely enjoyed the simplicity of what I read, but there is definitely a plethora of research notes that you could check out if you were interested in going deeper and into even more detail.  I definitely like the stories of today whereby Guinevere is from a Celtic descent with overtones towards pagan worship as opposed to Christian worship and the conflicts that must have ensued.  It's evident that every author wants to put their own on her life and I definitely appreciate that, but I really like the fact that her character has grown to be a more trusted and powerful one, almost a warrior queen.  The author makes Guinevere's evolution easy to understand and provides very detailed reasons for why these shifts occurred over the years.  I am glad to know that Mistress of Legend (the third book in the Guinevere's Tale) will be released this year as I highly recommend the other two books in the series, as well as this non-fiction book of Guinevere's development through the ages.  Anyone with an interest in Camelot should pick up this book.

Giveaway


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The Once and Future Queen

Review: The Selected Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder by William Anderson

The Selected Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder
by William Anderson (Editor)
Release Date: March 8th 2016
2016 Harper
Ebook ARC Edition; 395 Pages
ISBN: 978-0062419682
ASIN: B00ZP5WMTW
Genre: Nonfiction / Historical / Memoir
Source: Review copy from publisher

4 / 5 Stars

Summary
This is a fresh look at the adult life of the author in her own words. Gathered from museums and archives and personal collections, the letters span over sixty years of Wilder’s life, from 1894–1956 and shed new light on Wilder’s day-to-day life. Here we see her as a businesswoman and author—including her beloved Little House books, her legendary editor, Ursula Nordstrom, and her readers—as a wife, and as a friend. In her letters, Wilder shares her philosophies, political opinions, and reminiscences of life as a frontier child. Also included are letters to her daughter, writer Rose Wilder Lane, who filled a silent role as editor and collaborator while the famous Little House books were being written.

Wilder biographer William Anderson collected and researched references throughout these letters and the result is an invaluable historical collection, tracing Wilder’s life through the final days of covered wagon travel, her life as a farm woman, a country journalist, Depression-era author, and years of fame as the writer of the Little House books. This collection is a sequel to her beloved books, and a snapshot into twentieth-century living.

My Thoughts
The Selected Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder was an interesting and absorbing collection of her personal letters to fans, family, friends, colleagues, and so on.  I will admit to being fascinated by the details they gave us about her later life, and couldn't get enough information about family and friends mentioned from the Little House books.  Having grown up on these books, to the point where they were so dog-eared I had to buy another set for my own children, I have always been fascinated by Laura's life.  I even got a chance to visit some of Carrie's old haunts while visiting Keystone several years ago, and often regret not stopping in De Smet while driving through South Dakota to visit the Laura Ingalls Wilder Historic Homes Tour.  

What was nice about reading this collection was reconciling Laura as a child with Laura as a mother and author. You definitely got a much better understanding of the relationship between Laura and Rose as well as what Laura thought about a myriad of things, including simply the weather.  It was also nice, as an adult, to learn more about Laura's family and friends, and I definitely looked for those names I recognized from the novels, hoping for more information.  Unfortunately, as in a lot of families, including my own, so many things get thrown out over the years, including correspondence, and I am frankly amazed that so much was left from Laura's papers.  Although it was a shame that so much was destroyed, it is a reality; I didn't really take much interest in my own grandparents' letters and things although now I wish I had, especially as my grandmother tended to keep a lot of things.  In her letters, Laura seemed to live quite frugally and often commented on the materialism of young people, which I found quite interesting, and she found disturbing, often echoing the same thoughts going around today.

I thought Anderson did quite a good job putting together these letters and I imagine it wasn't very easy to do.  For the average person with little knowledge of Laura Ingalls, I don't think the collection will be very interesting, and some of the letters to fans were a bit repetitive, but to someone like me who adored the Little House books, I loved reading this collection.  It definitely gave you a new understanding of the adult Laura, some of her political and religious viewpoints, as well as what she thought of friends and neighbours. What I really liked was the writing process between Laura and Rose as she edited her books; I also liked learning about how the drawings were developed for the books as well, quite interesting. My only disappointment with the letters had to do with how little new information we learn about Almanzo, but it is possible many of those letters were lost over the years.  You do however, get a real appreciation for how attached she was to Manly and how much she adored him. 

Verdict
The Selected Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder gives us a more in-depth understanding to Laura as an adult through letters written by her own hand.  I liked how Anderson laid out the book and gave little snippets of information in order to help understand the letters.  For anyone with an interest in the adult life of Laura Ingalls, I highly recommend this book; she was just as charming as the little girl we grew up with in her famous books.

Review: It's Not About Perfect by Shannon Miller

It's Not About Perfect: Competing for my Country and Fighting for my Life
by Shannon Miller with Danny Peary
Release Date: April 21st 2015
2015 Thomas Dunne Books
Ebook Edition; 304 Pages
ISBN: 978-1250049865
ASIN: B00PF7826C
Genre: Non-Fiction / Biography
Source: Review copy from publisher

3.5 / 5 Stars

Summary
When she retired at age 19, Shannon Miller did so as one of the most recognizable gymnasts in the country. The winner of seven Olympic medals and the most decorated gymnast, male or female, in U.S. history, Shannon tells a story of surviving and thriving. A shy, rambunctious girl raised in Oklahoma, Shannon fell in love with gymnastics at a young age and fought her way to the top.

In 1992 she won five Olympic medals after breaking her elbow in a training accident just months prior to the Games. Then, in 1996, a doctor advised her to retire immediately or face dire consequences if she chose to compete on her injured wrist. Undeterred, Shannon endured the pain and led her team, the "Magnificent Seven," to the first Olympic team gold medal for the United States in gymnastics. She followed up as the first American to win gold on the balance beam.

Equally intense, heroic and gratifying is the story of her brutal but successful battle with ovarian cancer, a disease from which fewer than fifty percent survive. Relying on her faith and hard-learned perseverance, Shannon battled through surgery and major chemotherapy to emerge on the other side with a miracle baby girl.

My Thoughts
It's Not About Perfect was an interesting, behind-the-scenes look at what it was like to be an elite gymnast during the 1990s.  As a huge fan of gymnastics, having watched the "Magnificent Seven" win gold in Atlanta, and having followed Shannon's career, I was very curious about her life out of the limelight and what it took to get to the top.  There were always so many rumours circulating about her training schedule and the grueling training, especially after Barcelona, that I was curious as to what she had to say about the whole thing.  To be quite honest, I felt that she kind of glossed over a lot of the issues in gymnastics and didn't really discuss a lot of what was circulating in the media during those years, but it was still fun to read nonetheless.

Her training years were very intriguing to read about, but I can't imagine it was as easy as she made it sound.  I have a daughter who trains around twenty hours per week, and I know how difficult it is to keep up with homework, a social life (if it exists), family time, and personal time, so she made it sound way too easy.   And while it was fascinating to read about her training, and definitely motivational for my daughter, especially when she learned how long it took Shannon to learn some of her skills, I still felt like the real training, the difficulties, were kind of glossed over, and made to sound idealistic.  For gymnasts-in-training, Shannon made it sound like it was possible for anyone to do it and that is definitely not the case.  I do have to admire her tenacity and her fighting spirit however, as I remember the story about her elbow injury before the 1992 Olympics, and I have no idea how she made that comeback in time to make the Olympic team; an incredible dedication to her sport and I'm sure it was an intense training period as well.  Very admirable!! It would have been interesting to learn a bit more about her experiences with Steve though, and what it took to create such an athlete-coach relationship; there was some mention of how he helped her in competition and what they chose to do, which did baffle people at the time, and is more understandable now, but I wish more had been written about that relationship.

I understand about Shannon not wanting to reveal too much about her personal life, especially with regards to her first marriage, but so little was mentioned that readers would be confused about what happened and how everything fell apart.  I think it was an important learning curve for Shannon, and it's hard to understand how that is when there is no explanation for it.  And there are a couple of episodes like that in this novel when it comes to her personal relationships; everything is always rosy and happy and life is not typically like that, so it makes me a bit suspicious as to the truth.  Either Shannon has not personally delved into her own relationships and how they have shaped her life, or she's not spilling anything personal, which is fine.  My only thought to that though, is why write a biography then?  

Verdict
It's Not about Perfect came across as something that is more of an ideal version of her life whereas the truth lies much deeper than that. In other words, it came across as rosy and sunshiny, but also a bit fake, in my opinion.  While I understand that she went through some very difficult times, both as a gymnast and as a mother, cancer definitely beating everything else out, she always seemed to be so positive and everything in her life was positive, to the point where it seems unreal. I'm not knocking the positivity as I know how important that is when someone is going through chemotherapy (my dad having suffered through lung cancer), but I felt emotionally detached from her as she was sharing her experiences and I don't think I should have felt this way.  Definitely not the same experience I got when I read some of her blog posts, so I know the depth can be there.  Shannon has always been one of my favourite gymnasts, and I have followed her career for years, so I was a bit disappointed in this one as I felt I still haven't seen the real Shannon, more the one that is markerting herself, a company, and a brand.   For anyone who loves gymnastics though, you will definitely enjoy the descriptions of her training life and her competitive career as I certainly did.  It's nice to know that she enjoyed her big Olympic moment when she won beam in 1996 and can remember it with clarity.  I know I certainly remember that moment.
 

Review: Dancing Through It: My Journey in the Ballet by Jenifer Ringer

Dancing Through It: My Journey in the Ballet
by Jenifer Ringer
Release Date: February 24, 2015
2015 Penguin (reprint edition)
Ebook Edition; 288 Pages
ISBN: 978-0143127024
ASIN: B00DMCV2MS
Genre: Nonfiction /Autobiography
Source: Review copy from publisher

3 / 5 Stars

Summary
Raised in South Carolina, Ringer led a typical kid’s life until she sat in on a friend’s ballet class, an experience that would change her life forever. By the age of twelve she was enrolled at the elite Washington School of Ballet and soon moved to the School of American Ballet. At sixteen she was a professional dancer at the New York City Ballet in Manhattan, home of the legendary George Balanchine and Jerome Robbins.

Ringer takes us inside the dancer’s world, detailing a typical day, performance preparation, and the extraordinary pressures that these athletes face. Ringer shares exhilarating stories of starring in Balanchine productions, working with the famous Peter Martins, and of meeting her husband and falling in love at the New York City Ballet. Ringer also talks candidly of Alistair Macauley’s stinging critique of her weight in his 2010 New York Times review of The Nutcracker that ignited a public dialogue about ballet and weight. She unflinchingly describes her personal struggles with eating disorders and body image, and shares how her faith helped her to heal and triumph over these challenges.

My Thoughts
Dancing Through It: My Journey in the Ballet is one of those books over which I was quite excited when I first received it as I love the ballet and was somewhat familiar with Jenifer Ringer's battle with her weight.  However, I was a bit disappointed by a large portion of this book as I felt that the book jumped from topic to topic as though trying to avoid some disagreeable moments rather than getting to the heart of the ballet world and all of its real moments and the real relationships between Jenifer and the rest of the New York City Ballet members.  

One of the things over which I was surprised was the Christian side to this memoir.  Although I have nothing against faith and inspiration, I was a bit thrown off by the preachy nature of the tone the book took with regards to Christianity and faith, although I don't believe that's the intention in this book.  Jenifer obviously was inspired by her faith to become a healthier person and that is fantastic; it's just a bit frustrating for the reader to read through the moral tone that comes across in her book.  

I definitely enjoyed learning about Jenifer's earlier days and her meteoric rise through her ballet schools to eventually join NYC Ballet at the age of sixteen.  To be honest, she almost makes it seem too easy, as if anyone could do it, and I definitely doubt that is the case.  She becomes an apprentice at the age of sixteen, joins permanently with the company a short time later, becomes soloist, and after a year off due to weight issues, is welcomed back with almost seemingly open arms.  I honestly don't believe it was that easy.  And while Jenifer does mention some of the grueling schedules and some of the aches and pains, such as learning how to ice her feet at night, she rarely mentions injuries or other aches and pains and the toll this takes on her body.  Only in vague passing references do we learn about previous injuries that had sidelined her years ago although they weren't really mentioned in her book.  I wanted the grittier read to the world of ballet, to learn more about what it was like to be a ballet dancer day in and day out, and not the glossed over version of that world.  I do appreciate her honesty when it came to her struggles with her weight and it was fascinating to read about what happened after the critique came out.  I would have liked to have learned more about what the dancers thought about the issue as well, though, and she never really mentioned if anything changed with regards to weight issues at the company after that.  I also thought the commentary about falling onstage, forgetting one's choreography, daily preparations, and her openness about choreographers was quite fascinating and frankly, I wanted more!!

Verdict
Dancing Through It: My Journey in the Ballet definitely had some interesting moments and I was fascinated by the minute details of the ballet world.  I enjoyed reading about the day-to-day preparations and her rise to soloist at such a young age.  I also appreciated Jenifer's candor when it came to discussing her breakdown due to her problems with body image and eating disorders; as a mother of a competitive athlete, it certainly gives you a lot to think about.  It felt quite easy to relate to Jenifer and the stresses she had in her life; those of a young athlete, working professional, wife, and mother.  I wasn't crazy however, about the preachy tone in the novel as it felt somewhat forced and I thought the book finished a bit abruptly as well.  Overall, I think that anyone who likes ballet will probably enjoy this book.
 

Review: Luck or Something Like It by Kenny Rogers

Luck or Something Like It
by Kenny Rogers
Release Date: October 4th, 2012
2012 William Morrow
Hardcover Edition; 304 Pages
ISBN: 978-0-06-207181-1
ASIN: B004XVN7ZN
Genre: Non-fiction
Source: Review Copy from Publisher

3.5 Stars

Summary
For more than half a century, Kenny Rogers has been recording some of the most revered and beloved music in America and around the world. In that time, he has become a living legend by combining everything from R&B to country and gospel to folk in his unique voice to create a sound that's both wholly original and instantly recognizable.

Now, in his first-ever memoir, Kenny details his lifelong journey to becoming one of American music's elder statesmen—a rare talent who's created hit records for decades while staying true to his values as a performer and a person. Exploring the struggles of his long road, his story begins simply: growing up in Depression-era Texas, living in the projects, surviving in poverty, and listening to his mother, who always had just the right piece of wisdom.

Staring across the decades, Kenny writes a story seemingly straight from one of his songs. The end result is a rollicking ride through fifty years of music history, which offers a heartwarming testament to a time when country music wasn't just a brand but a way of life.
  
My Thoughts
I have been a long-time fan of Kenny Rogers and jumped on the chance to review this memoir when the opportunity presented itself.  With a mom as a country music fan, I can remember singing to his music as a young child and I was always fascinated by his songs and the stories they told.  I even found a collection of his songs on Youtube and treated myself to a trip down memory lane as I was reading his memoir.  Unfortunately, while I found his memoir to be interesting and quite enjoyed it, I was disappointed as I felt it only moderately scratched the surface of what I now perceive to be a quite fascinating and quite brilliant career.

There were some pretty fascinating moments in this memoir, such as his work with Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie on "We Are the World", his duets with Dottie West, his work with Dolly Parton, and his partnership with Lionel Richie, but I found the information to be superficial, something I could have found on Wikipedia if I had taken the time to hunt it down, and what I wanted was something a bit deeper, what it REALLY felt like to work with these legends of song.  Can you imagine that Kenny Rogers actually sat down several times with Elvis Presley and it was only casually mentioned in his memoirs?  And what was it REALLY like to work with all of these legends on "We Are the World"? To be fair, Mr. Rogers did mention quite clearly in the Author's Note that his friend Patsi Bale Cox, who was instrumental in getting this memoir off the ground, died of lung cancer in the middle of the project, which could be why it has that feeling of being rushed and incomplete.  

I also enjoyed learning about his family and those moments of his childhood that shaped his life.  As a memoir, I felt like a lot of information was kept hidden, probably due to protect the individuals involved, but it would have been nice to learn a bit more about his children and their childhoods as very little was revealed and I don't feel like I learned anything about them other than what would be gleaned off any internet site.  

I did enjoy learning about a lot of the charity works he has been involved in and a lot of the other interesting things that he has done with his life.  That was quite fascinating as I don't think I really knew about the tennis, the photography, and some of the other interests that drive Mr. Rogers in his more private life.  And I am absolutely amazed at the longevity of his career.  I know he is coming to my area in January for two shows, and both of these shows have been completely sold out now for months.  And this past summer, as we were doing a sing-a-long around the campfire, what songs came up that everyone knew and belted out at the top of their lungs?  You guessed it.  "The Gambler" and "Coward of the County".  And some of these folks, by the way, are die-hard 'rockers' who would never admit to being country fans.  And there they were belting out these tunes along with the rest of us.  

Verdict
Luck or Something Like It was an enjoyable look at the life and singing career of a very remarkable man.  While I found it to be somewhat superficial, he does open up about some things, such as the phone sex scandal, but remains very closed about other aspects of his life that probably would have been quite interesting.  I would thoroughly love to see a sequel, one that captures a bit more of Mr. Rogers himself, and delves a little deeper into his thoughts and perceptions about those around him and the legends he has had the privilege of working with.