You also made me pick up Trade Wind…I’ve gotten about 2/3 of the way through it and am loving it. Is that what made you use “Ten leagues beyond the world’s end, methinks it is no journey” in the Pink Carnation, or did you read the whole poem elsewhere?
Hmm, I’m going to have to look at Trade Wind again. There was a summer in High School when and friend and I obsessively read all of MM Kaye’s historical and mystery novels. We read Trade Wind after Death in Kenya, so Rory’s “pragmatism” sort of came across as more of Kaye’s “look, all of those Africand/Indians/other brown people *need* civilized white people to govern and take care of them.”
I’m sort of hesitant to go there, because I’m not sure if I’d find Kaye’s books more or less annoying on the re-read.
ps: please promise you won’t make Jane fall in love with a slave trader, and use that to defend the slave trade.
Hi, Liz C! It’s so interesting what impact reading order has on one’s experience. I read M.M. Kaye’s historicals years before I read her mysteries. Reading her historicals first, one gets the impression in them that the Europeans involved are the blunderers, the ones who come across as smug, ignorant and less civilized. After that, her mysteries came as a bit of surprise to me since, as you pointed out, they tend to lean in the opposite direction.
In any event, I can safely say that there will be no slave traders in Jane’s future.
Magical contact lenses. Perfect. I would love those. What a great idea!
Oh, great Q&A, also made me pick up Trade Wind, I saw it at a used bookstore recently and was waffling, I had to go back and get it!
You also made me pick up Trade Wind…I’ve gotten about 2/3 of the way through it and am loving it. Is that what made you use “Ten leagues beyond the world’s end, methinks it is no journey” in the Pink Carnation, or did you read the whole poem elsewhere?
Hmm, I’m going to have to look at Trade Wind again. There was a summer in High School when and friend and I obsessively read all of MM Kaye’s historical and mystery novels. We read Trade Wind after Death in Kenya, so Rory’s “pragmatism” sort of came across as more of Kaye’s “look, all of those Africand/Indians/other brown people *need* civilized white people to govern and take care of them.”
I’m sort of hesitant to go there, because I’m not sure if I’d find Kaye’s books more or less annoying on the re-read.
ps: please promise you won’t make Jane fall in love with a slave trader, and use that to defend the slave trade.
Hi, Liz C! It’s so interesting what impact reading order has on one’s experience. I read M.M. Kaye’s historicals years before I read her mysteries. Reading her historicals first, one gets the impression in them that the Europeans involved are the blunderers, the ones who come across as smug, ignorant and less civilized. After that, her mysteries came as a bit of surprise to me since, as you pointed out, they tend to lean in the opposite direction.
In any event, I can safely say that there will be no slave traders in Jane’s future.