The Six Degrees of Separation meme is hosted by Kate at booksaremyfavoriteandbest. The idea behind the meme is to start with a book and use common points between two books to end up with links to six books, forming a chain. The common points may be obvious, like a word in the title or a shared theme, or more personal. Every month Kate provides the title of a book as the starting point.
The starting book this month is Curtis Sittenfeld's Romantic Comedy. I have not read that book or any of the books by that author, although I am curious about her writing.
For my first link, I will start with a romance novel ...
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier is a romance, but definitely not a comedy. I like romance in a book, but usually not if that is the only focus. This one is also a mystery and a classic.
I like it when a book features a romance but the romance is secondary to the main plot, as in...
The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman, the second book in the Thursday Murder Club series. In this book the mystery plot is primary but a secondary plot is DCI Chris Hudson's developing relationship with his PC's mother, Patrice.
Elizabeth, one of the four main characters in The Man Who Died Twice, was formerly an MI5 agent, and in this book she is helping her ex-husband Douglas, who is still working for MI5. This leads me to my next link, also featuring an MI5 agent...
The Last Defector by Tony Cape features Derek Smailes, an MI5 agent sent to London to work at the UN. The plan is for him to aid in a plot to convince a Soviet (also working at the UN) to defect and provide information on disarmament plans in Russia.
This leads to another book I read featuring a defector...
Catch a Falling Spy (apa Twinkle, Twinkle Little Spy) is one of seven novels featuring an unnamed British spy. The agent is tasked with evaluating a Russian defector, Professor Bekuv. This novel felt like a world tour. It starts out in the Algerian Sahara Desert and returns to that spot for the denouement. In between they visit the US, France, and Ireland.
My fifth link also features an unnamed spy, this time working for the CIA ...
The Mulberry Bush by Charles McCarry is about a man whose main focus is getting revenge for his father, a spy for the CIA whose career ended in disgrace. Now the son has succeeded in getting a job with the CIA and is bent on avenging the wrong that Headquarters did to his father. I am currently reading this book and have only about 100 pages left.
I did not realize how many books I have read that have revenge as the prime motivation.
The Beast Must Die by Nicholas Blake is a classic mystery novel, part of the Nigel Strangeways series. Nicholas Blake was the pseudonym use by Cecil Day-Lewis, who was an Anglo-Irish poet and the Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom from 1968 until his death in 1972. In this book, a father seeks revenge for the death of his son, who was killed in a hit-and-run accident. Nigel Strangeways does not show up until midway into the book.
My Six Degrees takes me from a romance set on a fictional late night comedy sketch show set in the US to a classic mystery novel set in Gloucestershire. Along the way I discussed several novels in the spy fiction genre.
If you are participating in the Six Degrees meme this month, where did your links take you? If not, have you read these books?
The next Six Degrees will be on September 2, 2023, and the starting book will be Wifedom by Anna Funder.
27 comments:
Curtis Sittenfeld is one of my favorite writers. I especially liked AN AMERICAN WIFE, which was a re-imagining of Laura Bush and PREP. She also did one on Hillary Clinton. I could not get into ROMANTIC COMEDY however.
Thanks, Patti, that is good to know. I will try either An American Wife, or Prep. Prep is the only one I have looked into at all, except for Romantic Comedy which did not appeal.
Nice shift into mysteries!
I like the primary vs secondary connections here. Well done!
I always struggle to make sense of Cecil Day Lewis, poet laureate, being the same person as Nicholas Blake, writer of crime novels. It's just weird. LOL!
This is a really clever chain, Tracy! From romance to romantic suspense to espionage to revenge - I think it's great. You picked some authors whose work I like, too (Osman, Blake, and of course Du Maurier). And you've reminded me that I'd like to read more of Blake's work.
Hi Tracy, a very good chain you have come up with and what's so fun about this challenge is we never know where we will end up. I'm thinking choosing 6 books where they each contain a word from the title of the last book might be interesting.
American Wife is amazing!
Excellent work--very unexpected chain
Thanks, Kate. Since I used to read almost exclusively mysteries, my earliest Six Degrees posts were very heavy on mysteries and I have tried to avoid that recently. But this one just went that way naturally and I did not even notice.
Thanks, Davida. It was fun to get back into Six Degrees again, and I enjoyed making the connections.
Cath, all I remember about that is that he wanted to increase his income. Like most mystery series, some of the books in the Nigel Strangeways series are very good and some are just so-so. And there are a good number I haven't read yet.
Margot, I also want to read more by Blake. I read a good number when I was much younger so have no records of those, but it never hurts to reread them.
Osman's next book will be out soon and it will be one I buy when it comes out, which is unusual for me.
Kathy, I do think I will try doing that approach (each book in the chain would contain a word from the title of the previous book) next time. Sometimes that leads to more variety in the chain.
Lisa, glad to hear that you also like American Wife. I enjoyed doing my chain, and I did like where it went. But I discovered that it is harder work than I remembered.
Rebecca is one of my favourites and I'm so glad to see it here. Like you I don't mind romance as a secondary thread in a book but not so much the main focus. Loved The Man Who Died Twice too!
Romance to revenge! The course of true love... 😉
Mallika, There are some romances I have read, such as the ones by Jane Austen and a few by Georgette Heyer. I don't even think of Rebecca as a romance, but of course it is. That and a lot of other things.
FictionFan, I really was amazed to find how many books I have read that are about revenges. That should not be a surprise since I read mystery novels primarily, but it was.
Amusing exercise...glad to read it! Some of these are new to me.
Great collection of titles, and what a journey from Curtis S on to spies!
I have read four of these books and enjoyed them all. I might try out the Len Deighton - I have read a lot of his, but this one has passed me by. I read a different book by Tony Capes, so this one might go on the list too....
Todd, it is fun to put these together but I honestly get more fun from reading the chains at other blogs. Lots of books and authors I haven't tried or even heard of.
Moira, I am sure your blog was the first place I saw a review of a book by Sittenfeld, and probably at that time I had not even heard of her. Still haven't read anything by her, but at least I am more open to that now.
I have more books by Deighton I want to try but really I want to go back and reread the Bernard Samson series. I would like to find the book that follows The Last Defector by Cape but I haven't found a copy at a reasonable price. Oh well, it isn't like I am running out of books.
I am now listening to Romantic Comedy on audio and enjoying it, although it has some crude elements.
Constance, it is good to hear that you are liking Romantic Comedy. I may try it some day, but it probably won't be the book I try first. Although you comment about crude elements has me curious.
I just finished and while I found it enjoyable, it was really just a romance wrapped up in a pretense of literary fiction. I like romance but if you were expecting something more complex or sophisticated, you would be disappointed.
Thanks for letting me know. I might enjoy it too, even if it is mainly a romance, but I would want to read other book or stories by her first before trying Romantic Comedy.
Post a Comment