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The story of this book revolves around the trials and tribulations involved in becoming an uber-deb. An uber-deb, as everyone knows, is a very respectable position. When one is an uber-deb, one commands great respect. Bat/Bab is a siamese twin who wants more than anything to be an uber-deb, but his/her disability prohibits this honor from being bestowed. This story is the chronicle of his/her rise from lowly sub-deb to grand uber-deb.
When I read this book for the first time, I found myself weeping hysterically as Bat/Bab was mercilessly ridiculed and insulted. The cruelity of the uber-debs reflects our own trying times of moral decline. When Bat/Bab finally overcame his/her disability, i wept again, but this time it was tears of joy. This novel gives siamese twins, such as myself, hope for a future. After all, it's not every book you find that tells our particular tale. In short, I loved this book and would recommend it to anyone in search of a tear jerking novel about the human condition and man's inhumanity to man.
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An amazing mystery writer whose work has long been overlooked!
This collection of books rectifies this omission. Mary Roberts Rinehart has been called the American Agatha Cristie -- and it is really true. Her novels have that well-mannered atmosphere of an Agath Cristie story combined with novel plot twists.
However, what gives Rinehart an edge is the true feeling you have for her characters- they are so life-like and well drawn that they seem fresh and contemporary even if the story settings are from the 1920's.
I highly recommend all of the novels in The Essential Rinehart collection. There are often two and sometimes three novels all published in one book- a good value and an interesting selection since each book has a shared theme with the others.
The Case of Jenny Brice is atmospherically set during a flood in a boardinghouse of a poor Pittsburgh neighborhood. From the very beginning, Rinehart develops a real sense of place. Unlike too many amateur detectives in novels, this heroine has a believable reason for being involved in the case. Again, seen as a product of 1912, Miss Pittman is an especially extraordinary woman, but even without that in mind, she is a convincing character. The Case of Jenny Bright has been referred to as not one of Rinehart's most outstanding mysteries, but in light of the stiff competition from her other novels, that is not really a criticism.
Compared with many of today's better mysteries, The Case of Jenny Bright holds its own. It is not just a curiosity because of its age; it is a fascinating mystery in its own right.
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But this 1934 title is a break-out novel, a dark and amazingly believable depiction of a woman from a loveless upper class home, and the choices that take her life to the precipice. Elinor's husband, Lloyd, has his own psychological damage, drawn by the author with superb insight. The interplay between the couple, as they each try to do the right thing, hampered by their demons, is the stuff great suspense is made of. Elinor's tragic infatuation with another man keeps the tension high. Once her husband dies in a hunting accident -- or was it? -- the tension keeps up as she tries to forge a life with the other man, blind at first to his flaws, and, later, as realization grows and she realizes that she's trapped. The amazing thing about this novel is the way Rinehart can make the reader understand Elinor's feelings, as a function both of her self-loathing, and of the morals of the era -- even though today most of us would just dump the jerk! But is she truly guilty of his murder?
Rinehart keeps you turning the pages, in a novel worthy of discussion groups about The Modern Crime Novel!
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