Very light reading indeed – Regency and meta romances

Sometimes, all you have the energy for is a good, light-hearted romance, preferably without those awkward "I'm serious, me" sections where the heroine Learns About Herself or has to get over some family drama of the decidedly-not-fun-kind. But where to find a romance that is not too embarrassing? I no longer automatically reach for the latest Sophie Kinsella, as she seems to be leaning a bit too much into lesson-learning nowadays. Emily Henry is a find, but she can hardly be expected to turn out more than one book per year. So what else does the genre have to offer?

After a newspaper article recommended Sophie Irwin's A Lady's Guide to Fortune-Hunting, I bought it but was unconvinced by the first couple of paragraphs. Luckily, I gave the novel another try this year, and found that it improved considerably after the first chapter or so. This is classic Regency romance fare: you may not be too surprised by how things turn out, but it's highly enjoyable all the same, and not too anachronistic-seeming. I've stumbled on some shockers in this genre, which were essentially just modern chick-lit in fancy dress, but this feels if not genuinely 19th-century, at least genuinely Georgette Heyerish. 

Also, it's uncommonly clean for a modern romance novel, which is a plus in my book. Honestly, there are only so many sex scenes using "of him" and "of her" phrases ("the scent of him", "the wondrous touch of her") and featuring supernaturally patient guys I can take. More power to Irwin for sparing us them. Her second book A Lady's Guide to Scandal is just as good, even a touch better when it comes to the plotting (at one time, I was genuinely unsure of where the story was going), but the obvious play for the Bridgerton audience bothered me a little.

Elsewhere, Emily Henry seems to have started a new trend: the meta romance. I hesitated before buying Katie Holt's Not in My Book as the plot seemed uncomfortably close to the one in Henry's Beach Read. But though it features a(n aspiring) romance writer and a broody love interest who's into literary fiction and who criticises her in creative writing classes, it's sufficiently its own thing not to feel like a rip-off. The heroine is cute, the hero bearable and "enemies to lovers" a very solid trope. 

I can't help it, I tend to enjoy romances about writing romances – and more often than not I prefer the book-related stuff to the romantic scenes, which was also the case here. Yes, there are sex scenes this time around, with the patient-guy factor very much in evidence, but I'll say this for Holt: when it comes to these scenes, she manages them better than Emily Henry, though Henry has the edge in other respects. Ideal for travelling.

The meta romance sub-genre has its pitfalls, though. Even though I had a good enough time with Cristina Wolf's How to Write a Rom-Com, I had expected more from the premise – jaded publishing assistant sent to a small town to gather ideas for a romance writer, though she really doesn't enjoy small-town romances – than I got. Pointing out that something is a trope doesn't make it less of  a trope in your own story if you don't put a different spin on it. Here, the heroine succumbs to the charms of the small town and the small-town hunk way too easily, plus there's a Liar Revealed story baked in, and that's not a favourite plot-line of mine. But hey, I read the novel. I'm by no means tired of meta romances yet. 

A double dose of cosy crime dramas

The expression "cosy crime" is an odd one. It has a negative, somewhat patronising tinge, and I think few crime writers would whole-heartedly admit to penning "cosies" (as they're called in the latest Carol Goodman – I don't know if it's an established term). People who enjoy cosy crime like myself, though, don't tend to be shy about it, and bookshops sometimes proudly label a whole section of their shelf space as "cosy crime", so their customers don't risk going home with something grim and gritty by mistake. I don't think TV execs mind the term "cosy crime" very much either.

One reason writers themselves are wary of the term is perhaps that it can be unwise to consciously pen a "cosy crime" story. If you sit down thinking: "Right. Let's make this really selling. Cups of tea, shrewd yet loveable senior citizens, fireplaces, cute pets, quirky neighbours, dead earls, here we gooo", chances are you'll end up with a story that is either too cloying or too ironic and underestimates its readership/audience. It's better to start with the mindset that you'd like to write the kind of crime story you yourself enjoy – and then, as often as not, it will turn out a comfortable read or watch. 

As for any moral reservations: it's true that crime is not cosy in real life. But nor is it entertaining in any other way. Criticism against "cosy crime" could be levelled against the whole genre of crime fiction, however glum and gory. We're probably ghouls to like it so much, but hey, no real person is harmed during reading or watching, and it keeps us away from the bear pits.

Circling back to the real subject of the post: I've recently watched not one but two British "cosy crime" dramas, which aired in the UK in the summer and have now found their way to Swedish television. I must admit it took me by surprise to find that they were as good as they were, because on paper they do seem a bit too textbook even for me.

What to say of this pitch? In Ludwig, David Mitchell, the comedian known for his "posh and repressed" persona, plays professional puzzlemaker John aka Ludwig. He's forced to impersonate his much more well-adjusted twin brother when the latter goes missing. The brother's a police detective, and John soon finds that his puzzle-solving flair is a help when cracking murder cases, though he's not great at social interaction.

I was suspicious of this setup as it smacked of "diagnosis crime", i.e. the kind of plot where the problem-solvers are better at their job because they have a touch of Aspergers, autism or OCD. It's a bit overdone. Besides, David Mitchell as nerdy and socially handicapped? Not exactly inventive.

Yet somehow it works. The crimes themselves are nice little puzzles, and the continuing mystery of James's disappearance is intriguing. But what really saves the show from being too run-of-the-mill is John's interaction with his brother's family: his sister-in-law, for whom he has always carried a torch, and his nephew, who isn't half as resentful about his uncle's prolonged stay as he could have been. Anna Maxwell Martin as James's wife, who ruthlessly pushes John out of his comfort zone yet is also very fond of him, is a standout. It's a pity Mitchell doesn't have more scope for his comic timing, though: mostly, he plays it straight.

Another obvious pitch would be Mark Gatiss as a closeted owner of a bookshop, who keeps his books in an eccentric order, enjoys tea and ginger biscuits and solves murders as a side-line in post-war Britain. And that's what we get in Bookish. Gatiss's character is even called Gabriel Book (which means his shop is called Book's, with an apostrophe). He has a harmonious lavender marriage with lovely Trottie, his best friend since childhood, and they own a dog named Dog. Bit too cosy, surely?

However, yet again, the obvious set-up works. The atmosphere is reminiscent of Foyle's War, and we get classic whodunnit plots in enjoyable settings, like a film shoot and a luxury hotel (the latter falling apart a bit). The problem-solving team is easy to root for: Polly Walker as Trottie is a delight, and I like ghoulish girl-next-door Nora and the easy-going Inspector Bliss. The Books' young protegé Jack is less interesting (he mostly walks around looking clueless), but I can take that. As for Gatiss, I admit I prefer his icy Mycroft in Sherlock, but he keeps Book (in some ways an eccentric-Brit cliché) from becoming grating with a touch of vulnerability.

It's heartening to see that even shows that look formulaic on the face of it can turn out to be treats if carried off with a bit of effort and some heart. A focus on core relationships is a good way to make a drama more compelling; it's not all about the problem-solving, even in a whodunnit. I'm looking forward to more Ludwig and Bookish – but no annoying communist housemaids next time, please.

The Diplomat season three is the best one yet – but I still don't know what kind of show it is

Just when I was convinced that The Diplomat was not trying to be the new West Wing, guess what kind of vibes the first episodes of season three gave off? Uh-huh, West Wing vibes, all the more obvious as Allison Janney's Grace Penn is now the President, and her husband is played by fellow ex-West Wing actor Bradley Whitford (boyish Josh's hair's now white – feel old yet?). The first major plot point is about who's going to be Penn's Vice President, and the whole "who sunk the ship?" plot of the first two seasons is shoved firmly in the background.

Soon, though, we're back from the US to the UK and from national to international intrigue. Which is something of a bummer. In spite of being an anglophile (or probably because of it), I prefer The Diplomat when it concerns itself with American rather than British politics. As long as we are on American soil, the show carries itself with more assurance. There may still be preposterous developments (they do not back-track from the revelation in season two, which is pretty hard to swallow), but you feel the home field advantage.

Thankfully, though, even when we're back in the UK, the repartee remains suitably snappy. The writing this season is far more consistently good than in the first two seasons, so even though I've had my misgivings I'm in for future seasons. It's time to give this show its own blogging tag.

But honestly, what is this shape-shifter of a show? Right now, I'd say it's leaning away from soapy thriller and more towards marital drama. It happens to also involve politics, as the central couple – Kate and Hal – are both ambitious politicians who, just to complicate matters, are entirely convinced by the other's statesmanlike qualities. They support each other, but also use each other, until this viewer at least has little clue about what's going on. But it's a pleasant kind of cluelessness.

The characters are sometimes as mysterious as the show's ambitions. I still don't know what Kate actually feels for her husband. In the first season, she was all for ditching him. Something shifted during season two, but then he had just been in a car bombing. This season, the relationship is incessantly on-off. Hal still loves his wife – I think – but he may love politics more, and there are signs that his patience with her private antics is wearing thin, as is her patience with his political schemes.

Fun as all this is to watch, characterisation is not the strong point of this series. It's carried by witty writing and good performances but, when it comes to most of its characters, you can state two opposite things about them, and either of them could be true. Grace Penn has the making of a great President. Grace Penn has the making of a dangerous President. Nicol Trowbridge is a fool. Or perhaps he is a crafty knave. Maybe he secretly loves Kate – or not-so-secretly hates Kate. Dennison is the voice of reason. Dennison is a stuffed shirt, ready to betray his boss at any time (the only thing that makes him credible as a Tory politician). Eidra is still in love with Stuart, or merely exasperated by Stuart... I could go on and on.

As long as we get plenty of one-liners and high-octane marital squabbling, though (and more Janney and Whitford, please!), I'm on board, and not only because Sewell remains impossibly handsome and charismatic as Hal. The next soapy thriller development seems to be just around the corner, but I'm ready to take it. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Who cares – it's watchable.

Miss Austen should be right up my alley, and yet...

Was autumn always this intense? I have trouble even making it to the gym a modest number of times a month, let alone finding the energy for blogging. But I guess I should be able to write about how there's no pleasing some people, in this case me.

A few weeks ago, I watched Miss Austen, a respectable period drama based on a novel by Gill Hornby. It's well-cast, well-acted, and has the admirable goal of defending Jane Austen's beloved sister Cassandra. She's not much liked by literary historians as she burned most of her sister's letters. However, this drama fights Cassandra's corner. An enduring love for Jane and an eagerness to follow her wishes are shown to be the reasons for the letter-burning, rather than an attempt to sanitise Austen's reputation. I think Austen would have warmly approved.

All the same, isn't it kinda boring?

That's certainly not the actors' fault. Both Keeley Hawes (always a safe bet) and Synnøve Karlsen put in engaging performances as the older and younger Cassandra; Patsy Ferran is a perfect Jane; and Jessica Hynes as my personal favourite, passive-aggressive sister-in-law Mary Austen, is a joy. We follow two timelines. The older Cassandra travels to the deathbed of the brother of the man she was supposed to marry, and takes an interest in his daughter Isabella. Isabella's deceased mother was a firm friend of Jane's, and Cassandra finds her sister's letters in an attempt to keep them from her sister-in-law's clutches. While she reads them, memories resurface. That's where the younger Cassandra and Jane – long-dead in the more recent timeline – come in.

The problem is, not much happens in either timeline. Either Hornby or the TV adapters have attempted to jolly things up a bit with a romance or two, but for once I could have done with less of this particular ingredient. Isabella's interest in the local doctor, who reciprocates her feelings but is too proud to ask again after having been shown the door once (by Isabella's dad), is a tepid affair. The young Cassandra meets an absurdly eligible admirer (wholly fictional, I suspect) while on a family holiday, but as we know that both she and Jane ended up single, it's just irritating to watch her push away her chance at love for no apparent reason. The plot drags quite a bit.

What should bring some zip into the proceedings is Jane's writing, but the flashbacks take place very early in her writing career, so there's not much discussion about her published novels. The exception is Persuasion, which the older Cassandra is reading to Isabella. I loved the flashback, taking place later than the other ones, where we see young(ish) Cassy reading the scene of Louisa's accident for the first time and exclaiming "you killed her!", much to Jane's amusement (Louisa lives). In the later timeline, Isabella is equally on the edge of her seat when the scene is read to her by Cassandra. 

This was great, and I could have done with more in the same vein. That Isabella's impertinent maid Dinah eavesdrops and gets ideas on how to bring her mistress and the doctor together was perhaps a melodramatic twist, but hey, I'm not complaining. We needed a reminder, at this point, as to why we should take any interest in these women at all.

The continuing problem with life and works dramas is that novelists' lives – even the most colourful ones – are rarely as interesting as their books. That doesn't mean they themselves were unhappy. The best thing about Miss Austen (besides Mary) is the sisterly bond between Jane and Cassandra, and I can well believe that they lived very contentedly, as long as they could be together. Whether their life really lends itself to the costume-drama treatment, however, is another matter.

Arguments for and against a Downton Abbey next-generation sequel

When Downton Abbey the series ended, I spent a post arguing for and against the idea of a Downton film (or movie). So it is only fitting that now the final Downton film has aired, I should do something similar, and look at why it could be a good idea – or not – to follow up with a new TV series, this time focusing on the next generation of Downton inhabitants and their friends and relations. Well, whether it is fitting or not, I'm going to do it, and that despite the fact that there is to my knowledge not a hint of a rumour that Fellowes or anyone else has any such project in mind.

For: I can't be the only one who's thought about it? The original Downton characters have made their farewell to the audience, in a very decided manner, in Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale. The trailer stated "It's time to say goodbye", almost as a plea to the fans: "Please, don't force Julian to write any more of these". Another movie would be such an obvious cash grab I don't think even we tolerant Downton fans would stand for it. Enough is enough.

But... what if we jumped forward in time, ten or fifteen years or so, and instead caught up with the Downton children as young adults? We have the bones of a new central cast of characters there: George, Sybil, Caroline, Marigold, Tom Branson's new kid (I forget the name)... These often invisible children haven't been given much personality of their own, so they'd be almost like new characters, but still tied to the "Downtonverse". The settings would still be the castle, the Dower House, the village etc., places we've grown to know and love.

I'm generally tired of World War Two dramas, but I dare say we can't miss out on the nervous tension surrounding the question: will George, the heir, make it back from the war alive? There's even room to explore a new version of the Obscure Heir plot which started off the original series. Some long-lost cousin could be revealed to be the heir should George die, and this time it might not be a good egg like Matthew but a very unsavoury character. Moreover, Downton Abbey surely lends itself to being a centre for evacuated children, or something else war-related, with juicy Foyle's War-esque plot lines as a result.

On the other hand, from the Thirties to the Forties isn't that much of a time jump, which could become a problem if you constantly have to check in on old characters and don't give the new ones the space they need. A bigger time jump to the Fifties could give Fellowes or other writers the opportunity to clear the field by stating that at least some of the old guard has passed away. And we could still have the vague threat of an unsuitable heir apparent after George (who, of course, makes it through the war). Here, the vibe would be more Agatha Christie (without the murders!) than Foyle's War.

One original character who would still be very much alive – and bickering, though with less vitriol than in their young days, with her sister – is Lady Mary who, as foreshadowed in the original series, will take the place of the Dowager Countess. Now that's a decent pitch for a period drama, surely? 

Against: The personality-less depiction of the Downton kids means that we aren't exactly on the edge of our seats waiting to see what happens to them. The biggest argument against a next-gen. sequel though, in my book, is the trickiness of the genre itself. One might think that a next generation sequel risks doing less damage to the original than a sequel taking place directly after another story ends. After all, we would mainly be following new characters and storylines. However, a sequel has to address what happens to the original characters, and as a next-gen. sequel takes place so much later than the original story, whatever is said about the original characters' lives is pretty much set in stone. There's no way of walking back from it later on.

To take an example in a completely different genre: recently, Netflix in Sweden finally aired the animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender, which I hadn't seen before but with which, apparently, a whole generation of Nickelodeon viewers have grown up. I surprised myself with how much I got into it and, after chomping through all three seasons pretty swiftly, couldn't wait to check out the next-generation-and-then-some sequel The Legend of Korra (bizarrely showing on another streaming service). 

New avatar, new characters taking centre stage, the original protagonists either aged purveyors of wisdom on the sidelines or dead: so far, so good. But when the middle-aged children of Aang, the now deceased titular character of the original series, get in a fight we're suddenly told that Aang favourised the son who'd inherited his air-bending gift over the others. This sounds very unlike the fun-loving, warm-hearted character we got to know in Avatar: The Last Airbender, and Aang never gets the chance to set the record straight or make it up with his kids. Because, by this time, he's already dead.

This detail didn't ruin The Legend of Korra for me, but it saddened me a bit, and the Star Wars sequels had similar problems with their original golden trio. Imagine how miffed we would be if we found out, twenty years on, that Molesley never hit the big time with his film scripts or Andy and Daisy ended up fighting every other day. Even if their life would then take a better turn, much time would have been wasted, and there would be no way the already past decades could improve. 

On the other hand, if nothing at all happens to the original Downton crew for twenty years, it gives the impression that they've been in a sort of stasis waiting for a new story to come along. This isn't very  satisfying either, narratively speaking.

At the end of the day, I'm still in favour of a next-generation Downton Abbey TV series. But I acknowledge that it would not be easy to get it right.                      

Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale is strictly for the fans (and that's OK)

It's been an intense week, and I was tempted to give blogging a miss. But I can't very well do that, as it's Downton time!

Yes, last weekend, I in company with two other avid Downton fans had the greatest time at the cinema watching Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale. We weren't alone, either: the cinema was more packed than I've seen it in a long while, and the audience was in a positive mood. The scene where Mrs Patmore declared to Daisy that she was "the daughter I never had" was especially popular, drawing an "aaah" from some audience members. There were snivels and giggles at appropriate moments. All in all, if you're a Downton enthusiast, it's very hard not to enjoy this last hurrah. If you're not, you'd most likely be bored to tears.

I had first planned to follow up on my predictions in my usual manner, but there is little point as absolutely none of them came true. Well, they addressed the Henry question, explaining his no-show with divorce rather than death, but that's about it. 

Mary's old beaux appearing? No such luck. Edith's Marigold secret playing a role? Nope – I'm not sure we even got to see Marigold. Peter Coyle making an appearance? Not even close (though that surely would have been better than the Molesley storyline we got). The Bateses' future? Not much drama there: they both decamped to the Dower House with Lord and Lady Grantham, but the thought that they could quit the servant life never even occurred to them. The butler question? Not a question, it seems: what with Andy staying on at Downton as butler and Daisy as cook, I'm wondering who's actually taking care of Mr Mason's farm. Thomas plotting? Chance would be a fine thing.

I don't think I've ever been as consistently wrong in my predictions before, but in my defence, it's not as if there was much going on instead of my suggested plot lines. The Grand Finale wasn't big on plot, and what little conflict there was had to come from external sources (a quite foxy American swindler, and the absent Henry who by this time counts as an external source). Instead, the film's aim was clearly to give the fans a last opportunity to hang out with (as Disney DVD sequel trailers used to put it) "all your favourite characters". 

This aim was fulfilled. We could leave Downton Abbey with the comfortable feeling that everything will be all right, and everyone gets on quite well really, even Mary and Edith. No need to think too hard about what the outbreak of World War Two (still years away at the end of the film) will mean for young George.

But is the film any good, I hear you wonder? Is it as good as the series? Is it the best of the films, or the worst? I did ponder these questions while watching it, but found them unexpectedly hard to answer. I think I have to say, The Grand Finale is not as good as the series, and probably sits in the middle script- and plot-wise when it comes to the films: better than the Upstairs, Downstairs rip-off that is the first movie but less snappy and pacy than the second. However, of all the proposed endings of Downton Abbey that we've been offered, this is by far the most satisfying, and that is quite a feat. For that reason, I suspect The Grand Finale will have a special place in fans' hearts for the years to come, and the question of how good it is as a film will be considered less important. Only, if you've never watched Downton, for pity's sake don't start with this.

Of course I'm thrilled for Thomas, even though he's so de-fanged at this point everyone seems to have forgotten he was once a villain. His end vignette, complete with the Hollywood sign in the background framing his still harmonious romance with the glamorous Guy Dexter, is all an often sorely tried Thomas apologist could wish for (though he had more chemistry with the nefarious Duke in the very first episode, but never mind). All's well that ends well for my Tommy, even if his entertainingly bitchy lines are a thing of the past.                     

On a roll with books, until...

Judging from my latest blog posts, one would have thought that I'd not done much reading lately. In fact, I was doing pretty well with my reading until not so long ago – I've just been too lazy to blog about it. I finally read books which I actually owned instead of just buying new ones, got in some ambitious reads and finished books I had previously discarded after only having read a few pages. For a while, I was feeling pretty smug, and then the inevitable happened: I got stuck.

The problem is not when you don't get any further with one book, but when they pile up. My first mistake was when I vaingloriously decided that it was finally time to read Sketches by Boz from cover to cover. It's the only major work by Dickens I've only read a fraction of, and that simply wouldn't do. Not for the first time, though, I soon came to a halt, and not by any means because the book is bad or un-Dickensian. There are a lot of humorous descriptions to make one chuckle. The problem is that because of the genre, the sketches are mostly just that: descriptions, with little dialogue or story. With Dickens, I want human drama, preferably with a lot of cutting lines by villains and suchlike. I can stand descriptive parts of his novels because they're so brilliantly written and often funny, but without a plot to hook me I find even the wittiest tableau of a London street hard going.

All right, then, so maybe I could postpone Sketches by Boz a bit longer and read it more piecemeal. But there were other substantial books I could try. I looked forward to Kept by D.J. Taylor, clearly as Neo-Victorian as they come. It was a bit hefty – which is only natural when you want to emulate the Victorian novel – so maybe not ideal to lug to work for my lunch break. My plan was this: at home, I would read Kept, and at work I would dip into The New Penguin Book of American Short Stories. Ambitious, yes, but I could take it: just look at how easily I got into Wuthering Heights a couple of months ago!

You can guess what happened next. I never knew Yanks could be such a downcast lot. Nothing wrong with the writing, it was just so depressing. After four short stories, I started on the Nathaniel Hawthorne one, stopped after about a page with a disgruntled "OK, so she's totally a witch" and set this volume aside as well.

As for Kept, it's annoyingly well-written, which means I have no excuse to give up on it until after a mandatory hundred pages. But the plot lines so far just don't interest me. The art of poaching wild birds' eggs? Some ghastly madwoman locked up somewhere? I need to persevere, but what did I find when I last tried? A lengthy description of a London street!

What conclusions can be drawn? Nothing most readers don't already know: that it's darned hard to find a reading strategy which allows you to virtuously work your way through the piles of books you've bought without getting stuck somewhere. When I was younger, I tried the tactic of alternating between Ambitious Book Projects and self-indulgence reads, but that put too much pressure on the latter and involved far too many ABPs for my liking. 

This time around, I went into a regular self-indulgence bonanza. I re-read the last three Thursday Next novels (I've had my doubts about some of Jasper Fforde's latest novels, but the Thursday Next ones really are brilliant); devoured, for the first time since childhood, an old Swedish translation of Betty Cavanna's A Touch of Magic, a delicious example of having your cake and eating it when it comes to historical fiction (you're invited to tut-tut over the frivolous Shippen girls while at the same time revelling in the drama of balls and suitors); and finally tucked into a Young Adult novel irresistibly called Do You Ship It? I wasn't sure at first, but yes, I did.

Will all this self-indulgence reading give me strength to start up with slightly heavier stuff again?  I've started on The Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden, but the jury's still out. Pros: if I know Arden, there will be folklore elements and possibly a villain in the works. Cons: death, disaster and World War One.