The data mining operation just threw up a rock and my personal logarithm has gone awry. For some mysterious reason Amazon seems to think that I have an unfulfilled longing to read a book genre I had no idea existed - the Amish Romance. My "Recommended For You" list is now filled with cover images of women in bonnets gazing pensively at some well-muscled fellow wielding an axe or driving off in a buggy.
Perhaps the all-seeing, all knowing electrons noticed that I was one of the twelve people in the nation who have not downloaded 50 Shades of Grey and combined that with the fact that my electronic gadgetry is shockingly outdated, causing the descriptives “Luddite” and “prude” to be entered into my personal profile. What Luddite Prude wouldn’t welcome an Amish Romance? they must have asked themselves.
While I haven’t been tempted to download any of the suggested books, which sport titles like "Hannah's Hardship" and "Fannie's Folly", I admit to being curious about the genre. This is how I imagine an Amish Romance:
Sensing Jacob's piercing gaze on the uncovered nape of her neck, Gretchen stopped stirring the cauldron of bubbling apple butter and laid down her hand-carved spoon. She saw her knitting sitting on the finely crafted artisan electric fireplace surround her father was building and snatched up the almost completed scarf. After swaddling her throat, she turned to face the intruder in her simple yet functional kitchen.
"I didn't know you were here" said Jacob. His steely stare seemed to cut through the nubby, hand-spun yarn and she felt as though he was unwinding the muffler with his eyes. "I came to get some beeswax to cauterize my cut."
Only then did Gretchen realize that the front of Jacob's coarsely woven linen shirt had an alarming blood stain. "You must take that off and let me tend to your wound," she said, surprised by her own boldness. "And I have boiling apple butter right here. We don't have time for beeswax."
from No Time For Beeswax: Volume I in the Gretchen's Barn Trilogy
I am left to ponder whether niche marketing and data mining isn't going a bit too far.Do people who buy Kalamata olives also purchase Greek Orthodox Romances? Is purchase of both mittens and goat cheese enough to trigger a recommendation for
Heidi?
While the "Recommended For You" function may be experiencing the same failure as the aunt who has no idea of your real tastes when buying your Christmas gifts, I have found on the other hand that the "Customers Who Bought This Book Also Purchased These Books" function to be quite helpful; it has led me on some interesting one-click-leads-to-another chains of discovery where I have found lesser known authors who turned out to be great treasures.
Just as an example, let's take the case of those well-known moor dwellers Charlotte and Emily Bronte -
People Who Read Charlotte and Emily Bronte also buy, CLICK:
Younger sister Anne's Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Although both Charlotte and Emily both wrote enduring novels of Gothic literature involving mad women in attics, revenge and love beyond the grave, among other things, it was the overlooked sister Anne Bronte who wrote compellingly about the more realistic lives of women in her era who were suppressed by their positions or their marriages.
Agnes Grey had the unlucky lot to be governess in a succession of unlikable families with mostly dreadful children, one of whom was a young animal sadist. This goes against the convention of many Victorian novelists portraying children as mostly angelic innocents. Anne Bronte delved into a more naturalistic style of showing Anne's juvenile charges in varying degrees of corruption due to the neglect of moral stewardship on the part of the parents, who to all outside appearances are good, upstanding members of the British upper class.
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall takes an unflinching look at domestic abuse, alcoholism, drugs, and infidelity. Helen, the abused wife, takes a daring stand against custom and the law when she confronts her husband and asserts her right of self preservation to exist separately from him.
Another author who should be read by Bronte fans is, CLICK:
Elizabeth Gaskell also known as Mrs.Gaskell, a contemporary and personal friend of the Brontes who also authored a biography of Charlotte. She's fairly prolific and some of her books are much better than others, but you can't go wrong with Cranford, North and South, and Wives and Daughters all three of which were made into outstanding series by PBS and BBC.
So, what about you? Have you been the unfortunate recipient of a book gift or recommendation that was just screamingly wrong for you?
Books in My Life is a weekly diary published every Friday morning about books that have had a particular resonance in ones life for some personal reason. If you would like to write a diary in this series please contact Phoebe Loosinhouse by Kosmail to schedule a date