It seems appropriate that my inaugural post for The Bookhive List is on Brideshead Revisited in the same week that I put together a 'Downton Abbey' inspired reading list. I was very tempted to put Brideshead on that list, but I decided to save it for The Bookhive List because in my life, it is canon.
A part of me hates to recommend it in January, because it is such a late summer book, so if you're feeling inclined put it on the very bottom of your TBR list and wait for August to come around before picking it up. It's a novel to be read while lying in a hammock with a glass of chilled white wine.
The name 'Brideshead' refers to a fictional English manor house, and as the novel begins, the house has been overtaken by the British Army in the midst of World War II. Charles Ryder, the narrator and Army Officer, is revisiting the house for the first time in many years and takes the reader through his tempestuous relationships with Julia and Sebastian Flyte, two siblings whose aristocratic family owned Brideshead. If you enjoy a good homoerotic romp through Oxford culture in the 1930s, then this is the book for you. If you enjoy long, drawn-out descriptions of really over-the-top food and beverages, then this is also the book for you. And if you prefer your hetero relationships to be shallow and affectionless, you have found your book. There's also some intense Catholic stuff in the vein of Graham Greene.
Finally, once you've savored this beautiful novel, set aside ten hours of your life to watch the BBC miniseries adaptation starring a very young Jeremy Irons. There is a more recent film version that is less good, but it does star Emma Thompson.
The Bookhive List is a weekly recommendation of my all-time favorite, must-read books.
