Again, Truepenny asks for book recommendations

[truepenny]

A conversation on someone else's LJ reminded me of a long-standing curiosity. And now that, hey, I have people around who are extraordinarily well-read, I thought I'd pose the question.

Books about boarding schools that get it right.

There's a long post I made back in December about a number of reasons why Diana Wynne Jones's Witch Week is a better res (Latin for "thing"--I can't think of a word for what I want) than the Harry Potter books. One of those reasons is that Rowling's vision of what boarding school is like doesn't ring true, even to an American reader such as myself. But, when I grumble, Someone ought to write a book that does this properly, I can't put my money where my mouth is, because I don't actually know what I'm talking about. I can just tell a dreamy delusion when I see one. So I'm interested in finding books that achieve a more accurate representation.

Obviously, if the book is sf/f/h, that's a big bonus, but for the purposes of this book-quest, it's the boarding-school-ness I'm looking for. All suggestions welcome and appreciated!

Comments

[lcohen]

this isn't quite an accurate picture of a boarding school, but i wanted to stick a mention of it in here because i remember you making some reference to it and having just finished it, i was wondering your opinion of it: a college of magics by caroline stevermer.

my recollection is that your remark was something along the lines of this book improving with rereading? no? anyway, i wanted to request your thoughts and at least here the request fits in a little bit with the topic at hand.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Well, there is a teensy bit of a Malory Towers feel to the college itself (am blanking on the name and too lazy to walk across the room to check), crossed with Pamela Dean's Tam Lin. But that's very much in keeping with the tone of the book, and besides, I adore Jane.

My other remarks on A College of Magics are back here (http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?journal=truepenny&itemid=18944). (There may be other remarks other places, but I'm too lazy to go look for them.)

I think A College of Magics is an excellent book. The first time I read it, I was all cluttered up with genre expectations about how comedy of manners/romance type books ought to end, and that made me disgruntled. But the second time I read it--after I'd temporarily lost the book for five years--I remembered what was coming, and suddenly saw all the ways in which that ending was necessary and made sense and was actually extremely beautiful. It's a very HARD ending to what has been a largely light book, but it comes quite organically out of everything that has gone before.

Um, I can go on, probably for hours, but that's my basic what-do-you-think-of-ACoM response. If you want to lob another question at me, please do!

[lcohen]

thank you very much for the link!

i guess my thought is that the ending makes it a much better book although i in no way saw it coming. i definitely see what you mean about genre expectations but i was sort of irked with how perfect tyrian was up until that point. making it hard made it more thought-provoking.

i really liked the school (greenlaw) parts and yes, i adore jane, too. i thought that the weakest part of the book was menary and wonder if you had an opinion about her and how she is drawn? i sort of felt like there was no reason for her to be the way that she is except for plot needs and what? corruption by the rift? it took me a bit of time to warm to farris, too, but i eventually did.

SPOILERS FOR A COLLEGE OF MAGICS (in case anyone else gets this far)

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

Right. Menary. She and Faris's uncle Brinker are both rather Iago-like characters. I'm very fond, btw, of the way in which Brinker and Faris SIMPLY CANNOT STAND EACH OTHER. It's completely unmotivated, and in that respect actually perfectly credible.

My reading of Menary goes like this: she's hollow. There's nothing inside her and never has been. At most, there's a angry, selfish little girl who has all these adult tools at her disposal. She stands against Faris's awe-ful dutifulness, and I think we need Menary's willingness to destroy the fabric of reality to get what she wants in order to appreciate fully Faris's willingness to sacrifice everything in order to stop her. No, Menary has no psychologically credible motivation, but like I said, she's Iago. She doesn't NEED psychology.

But looking at what I've just written, I observe that my take on Menary depends on a particular and idiosyncratic approach to characterization and structure and therefore may not actually constitute a defense. Menary has never bothered me, either for the reasons you mention or for melymbrosia's reason here (http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?journal=melymbrosia&itemid=189118) (down in the comments), although I freely acknowledge that you both have good points. I guess for me, Menary is so obviously the Wicked Queen from fairytales that she just doesn't bother me. She SHOULD, since she doesn't fit in the comedy of manners the rest of the characters inhabit, but she just doesn't.

I have a weakness for unabashedly melodramatic vilainesses.

Re: SPOILERS FOR A COLLEGE OF MAGICS (in case anyone else gets this far)

[lcohen]

yes, i liked uncle brinker a lot too.

i think that there is some motivation for why faris doesn't like him--he apparently disregards her opinion on things, tries to paint her as hysterical and doesn't care about galvaston (did i get that right?) in the exact way that she feels that he should, although she has a revelation along those lines, too. why doesn't he like her? she's opinionated and not tactful about it--not deferential enough? it doesn't have the same "out of left field" feel to it.

i totally get what you are saying about melodramatic villainess but stevermer seems to have taken a lot more time to paint why other people are doing things than she took with menary. don't mistake me--she doesn't ruin the book or anything. probably she bumps against some expectation of mine that a rereading will bring forward, or something.