Who the Hell is Pansy O'Hara?

"Who the Hell is Pansy O’Hara? The Fascinating Stories Behind 50 of the World’s Best-Loved Books" by Jenny Bond 

Reviewed by Gerti

This is a simple book that can be put down and picked up again easily, thanks to the clever design by Jenny Bond and Chris Sheedy. While I would have preferred the book arranged by author, rather than “best-loved book”, it is nice to have the 50 divisions so you can read your favorite authors first, for example, before venturing into those you know less about. Which is exactly what I did, reading about Jane Austen (in the chapter titled “Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen, 1813”) and Helen Fielding, first.

Unfortunately, I had just finished a large-scale biography on Austen, so I was pretty well versed in her life and times. Of course, that biography was much more in-depth and accurate than the blurb found in this book. However, that said, I did find that the other 49 chapters were interesting and did give me many facts about authors that I did not know, even though I had been an English major at college, and an English teacher at the college level.

Because of the way my mind works, I find certain things fascinating, like how many of the authors of “the world’s best-loved books” were Scottish, or how many had a variety of occupations before finally finding success in writing. I liked that the format went forward in time, starting with Austen in 1813, and ending with Dan Brown’s “The DaVinci Code” in 2003. I did NOT like that fiction and non-fiction were divided, because then the time clock reset itself, with Samuel Johnson’s “The English Dictionary” in 1755, and Stephen Hawkings “A Brief History of Time” in 1988. I understand why you’d start with fiction, since most readers are fans of that rather than non-fiction. But I have to say that I found the information on the history of encyclopedia’s every bit as engaging as that of any fictional work (and author). I also quibble with the inclusion of Truman Capote’s “In Cold Blood” into the non-fiction section, because I think that can be arguable (as it seems, can Alex Haley’s “Roots”), but people will argue about anything, especially what constitutes truth!

In the end, despite not liking the book when I started reading, I bought myself a copy so that I could mark up facts on each author that I didn’t know, and could also dog-ear the pages on books I hadn’t read yet. So is “Pansy O’Hara” perfect? No. Just like Margaret Mitchell changed the heroine’s name in her novel “Gone With the Wind”, the authors of this text could have made changes that enhanced my enjoyment of it. But did I learn something from it? Yes, I did. And as a reference book, however flawed, I’m sure I’ll refer to it for years to come.