The Land of Nowhere

La Comtesse de Rudolstadt, George Sand. After about 1600 pages (on my tablet, but they are similar in size to book pages), I have finished the story of Consuelo, and what can I say but, that was a trip! I'm not sure that I would recommend it to people who aren't in the habit of reading lengthy novels in French for fun, but I was entertained the whole way through.

(I don't know how the translations are -- there are multiple from the 19th century, and a recent translation of La Comtesse de Rudolstadt, which can be read on its own, though I'd mainly recommend that if you want to start with the Frederick the Great fanfic and don't mind that the story leaves his court 1/3 of the way through and never come back).

Last post I was worried the story wouldn't wrap itself up in a satisfactory way, but it actually did a pretty good job -- the story proper ends with Consuelo's initiation into the secret society and wedding, which is celebrated with the Best Party Ever. All the Cool Guys are there! -- or at least all the cool guys who have been initiated into the secret society, sorry Joseph Haydn -- like the Chevalier d'Eon, who it turns out had befriended Consuelo back in Berlin, George Sand had just forgotten to mention it earlier! Despite my previous reaction "run! it's a creepy cult!", the Secret Society of the Invisibles grew on my somewhat, due to their having a good recruiting pitch and also to one of the members turning out to be Consuelo's supposedly dead mother-in-law (being buried alive runs in the family), who is badass and who also gives Consuelo some useful relationship advice -- which Consuelo ignores, but it's OK as her love triangle isn't actually a triangle after all.

Anyway, after that ending with a very strong "one brief shining moment" vibe, there is a lengthy epilogue, in which the narrator explains that the historical record on Consuelo becomes much more patchy after this point. This allows the epilogue to wrap up the various loose plot threads fairly expeditiously, and give a couple of peeks into Consuelo's later life.

(There is way more I could say about this book, but I'll leave it here.)

King Lear -- we finished the read-aloud, the second half is more exciting than the first, the language is beautiful, but didn't leave that much of a mark. I suspect it's more compelling when done visually on stage.

Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, Brandon Sanderson. Going from a 19th century bestselling author to a 21st century bestselling author here. So far this is entertaining fantasy about two 19-year-olds from different planets in the same solar system who have got some sort of a body-swap/travel to each others' worlds thing going on. I think this one is doing something interesting with the worldbuilding but I'm not sure where it's getting to yet.

Consuelo, George Sand. I finished this! The ending didn't resolve the protagonist's character arc but also it comes with an author's note saying "If you've had enough of Consuelo's adventures, you can stop here. The small minority that want to know more should read the sequel." So I will be reading the sequel! But not right away.

Consuelo got to spend some time performing in the Vienna Opera before leaving -- there's a really evocative depiction of the backstage, along with various melodramatic plot happenings. Sadly we have to leave Teenage Joseph Haydn behind in Vienna -- but on Consuelo's travels she encounters both what can best be described as the 18th century version of a theme park and an incognito Frederick the Great before the book's denouement, which did not go quite as I expected but makes a lot of sense as it did. I'm really not sure what to expect in the sequel, other than more music. Maybe I'll write a more coherent and possibly spoilery review later.

Translation State, Ann Leckie. Yay it's another book in the Imperial Radch universe with more Presger Translators! ursula's review is an excellent description of what this is. I got to the bit with monodromy and was like "yay monodromy!" Despite being set on the edges of various major political conflicts, the stakes of this book are mainly cozy and personal. I hope we get more in this universe!

Small Admissions, Amy Poeppel. I think this was an Ask A Manager recommendation. Our nerdy protagonist, whose plans for grad school were derailed by a bad breakup, tries to put her life back together by taking a job as a private middle school admissions officer. Some charming/amusing social commentary here. The family situation reminds me a bit of the play Proof: the protagonist is the kid of academics, and in her parents' absence her more worldly older sister tries to fix her problems.

The Front Page by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur. Readaloud. 1928 play about the newspaper business. Uses a bunch of slurs that have not aged well (though which characters do and don't use that sort of language in their dialogue serves the characterization), and, well, the reporteras are mostly kind of assholes, but apart from that it's an exciting ride! I was cast as the two most neurotic characters in the play, who get no sympathy from the play (Bensinger has a point about sanitation, and Mrs. Grant may be an embarrassing mother-in-law stereotype but deserves better than to be gaslit when she points out the truth).

Consuelo, by George Sand. This continues to be extremely entertaining -- as of last week I'd left off in the Gothic Castle in Bohemia, and the narrator had noted that if she were Ann Radcliffe there would be tons of secret passages and trap doors and all that, but she has to stick to verisimilitude. Not long after this we get a sequence where Consuelo has to venture through an underground aqueduct system to rescue Albert, the heir to the castle who has been missing for days. After which she succumbs to a fever, and Albert has to do some heroic doctoring under pressure to save her (which would be horrifying if we didn't know that Consuelo has Plot Armor).

After that we get what feels like an early version of the YA Love Triangle Trope (where does that trope originate from anyway?) where Consuelo tries to sort out her feelings for Albert (who as I've said is awesome, but also kind of terrifying) and for her ex-fiance Anzoleto (who is bad news for all sorts of reasons, but who she hasn't gotten over). This escalates when Anzoleto shows up claiming to be Consuelo's brother, and Consuelo, on the one hand not wanting Anzoleto to take advantage but on the other fearing that Albert will kill Anzoleto in a fit of jealousy, runs away in the middle of the night with the plan of walking to Vienna (where she was going to meet up with her mentor Porpora anyway).

On her first day on the road she encounters a teenaged Joseph Haydn -- if I had realized that Porpora was an Actual Historical Composer I might have seen this coming, but as it was I found it a hilarious suprise. They immediately become fast friends -- indeed, Haydn has a huge crush on Consuelo, who doesn't notice this as she sees Haydn as just a kid. (You might say "Mary Sue much"? but at this point Consuelo's Mary Sue credentials have been so solidly established I'd be surprised if Haydn didn't gave a crush on Consuelo.) And so they go off across Central Europe together, with Consuelo dressed as a boy in Haydn's spare change of clothes, singing and making music and having all sorts of adventures while trying not to be kidnapped for nefarious purposes or to let on that Consuelo is a girl.

This is all absolutely delightful, and I'll be sad to give it up when we finally make it to Vienna and the next stage of the story, but I also want to know what's happening next!