First – I stole a poster:

More Novellas – November 3, 2023

Here’s another novella read late Nov 2:

Chronicle of a Death Foretold: A Novel
By Gabriel García Márquez

Post 1 – the opener with -7 Novellas, read the last week in October and posted 11/1/2023

I just caught wind of this a week or so ago, let it settle for a few days and then started in because Halloween and Novellas go together – imo.  I’ll keep it going through November and then see what comes up.  I really enjoy a good novella – it’s like they’re condensed so they’re more potent – like condensed milk- the water is evaporated out and it’s sweetened a tad – a little goes a long way – it’s comprised.

First, I needed a definition and according to Wikipedia “The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association defines a novella’s word count to be between 17,500 and 40,000 words; at 250 words per page, this equates to 70 to 160 pages.”  
https://iapwe.org/word-count-separates-short-stories-from-novelettes-and-novellas/

Also – they allow for a 20% leeway.)  I can live with that but a couple of mine may be over the line one way or the other.   

Okay … so … 

I read the first 5 on my list this past month: 

Bartleby the Scrivener 
by Herman Melville 
1853 (40 pages)
Read by Stefan Rudniki  
1h 48m
Rating 10 / classic lit
(Read and listened)

Bartleby is creepy (good Halloween stuff)- and I’m not sure about the Nameless Lawyer, either. I’m okay with Melville, though.  
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The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde 
by Robert Lewis Stevenson 
1886  / (141 pages – 1st edition) 
Read by Paapa Essiedu
Rating: 10/ classic gothic horror (novella) 

Embarrassed to type this, but I’d never read it nor watched any movies of it.  I kinda sorta knew what happened but that’s not the whole story – good for Halloween. Stevenson is okay – 
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Foster 
by Claire Keegan
2023 / (62 pages) 
read by Adolfe McMahon 2h 9m
Rating 10 / literary novella (Ireland)

Published this year! Last year a novella by Keegan made the 2022 Booker Prize list. I read it and was wow’ed. In this one a 6-year old girl is taken to a neighbor farm to stay while her mother has another baby.  

*******

Western Lane 
By Chetna Naroo 
2023 /149 pp 
Read by Maya Soroya 4h 21m
Rating: 8 / novella 21st century lit

Another Novella on the Booker Prize Short List which I read anyway –  (see why I did this?)  The mother of an immigrant  family in London dies and it affects an 11-year old girl and her father very badly. They get very involved in the sport of squash. 

*******

We Have Always Lived in the Castle 
By Shirley Jackson 
1963  (146 pp)
Read by Bernadette Duane 5h 32m
Rating: 10 / classic horror novella 

I read this every couple years because it’s so perfect.

*****
Actually I often have The Turn of the Screw (Henry James, 1898) in here, too but I can’t do all of them every year.
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And these I read earlier this year: July 2023: 

Crime 101: a Novella 
by Don Winslow
2022 /
Read by Ray Porter. 2h 5m
Rating A / novella
*(crime stories get ratings of A-F)

Highway robbery, jewel heists, on Route 101, the California coast.

 

And January 2023: 

The War of the Poor
by Eric Vuillard 
2021 / 75 pages (!) 
Kindle version 
Rating: 9.25 / historical fiction
Mark Polizzotti (Translator)

Brilliant historical fiction concerning the life of Thomas Müntzer, a German theologian opposed to the Church as well as to Martin Luther. He got the peasants to protest and the princes rose up against them. Hundreds died and the Wars of Reformation began. (I really should read this again.)

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And that’s it for the 2023 –  7 Novellas – I think I have some in my pile for November proper – or maybe it’s December.