That’s right, folks, we badgered Alice into hosting another readalong! And I confidently anticipate that we will badger her into more in 2016, but for now let’s focus on Matthew Gregory Lewis’s Gothic classic The Monk, because the Monkalong has officially begun!
The titular MONK (an official readalong style guide has not yet been released, but I have to assume that it will stipulate the word MONK must appear in all caps when referring to the eponymous one) is Ambrosio, a man of mysterious background and flawless morals who is basically the One Direction of eighteenth-century Madrid, except he uses riveting sermons instead of synthy pop songs to win the hearts of teen girls.
(Okay, this metaphor doesn’t fully work, because grown-ass nobleman are just as susceptible to Ambrosio, but let’s move past it. There’s a lot of ground to cover in these first two chapters.)
The first chapter deals with a newly converted Ambrosio fangirl, the lovely but dumb Antonia, whose mother — ugh, this is so long and stupid to explain. Short version, Antonia had a brother who her father’s rich relatives took away from her mother, and the mother later heard back from them that the brother had died while still in tothood.
Y’all, important question. THE MONK is obviously Antonia’s brother. Is the plot of this book going to be that he creeps on her? IS THIS AN INCEST BOOK?
Anyway, Antonia and her ugly old aunt Leonella meet two Italian nobleman, of whom one — Lorenzo — immediately falls in love with Antonia because of course he does, and the other — Christoval — is my favorite character in this readalong so far. I suspect he’s going to spend the bulk of this book being told “Not now, Christoval,” but I hope that at the end he wins everything. When someone tries to tell Not-Now Christoval (h/t) a secret, he says “I must beg leave to decline your confidence.”
Free advice: If you have any reason to believe that you are a character in a Gothic novel, it’s probably best to leave the room — or better yet, the country — as soon as you get a whiff of intrigue. Smart money says Lorenzo or Antonia or both are going to be dead by the end of this book, but I have a good feeling about Not-Now-Christoval’s survival chances.
In the second chapter, we get to spend time with THE MONK and his best monk friend, Rosario, who never shows his face and nobody finds this suspicious because Rosario brought a ton of money to the monkery when he took his vows. That — actually seems super plausible. I got really excited about Rosario when he first showed up, because the only thing he cares about (he says) is the affection of THE MONK, and I was really looking forward to making all the gay priest jokes throughout the rest of this readalong.
However, I was thwarted. Rosario turns out to be a lady named Matilda who’s passionately (but platonically) in love with THE MONK. When she tells THE MONK her secret, he insists that she leave the monkery, and she threatens to kill herself if Ambrosio doesn’t let her stay. Madam, you are now my least favorite character, probably forever, because manipulative suicide threats are the dickest of moves. THE MONK — also a strong contender for being The Worst — sees the boob she is threatening to stab a knife into and becomes inflamed with lust, because nothing is sexier than a woman on the brink of self-harm. He subsequently has several dreams about Matilda’s boob.
So much ridiculous bullshit ensues after this that I can’t even make myself describe it. Suffice it to say that the chapter ends with both Matilda and THE MONK feeling decidedly less platonic about each other than they have been claiming all along, and some stuff ensues. You know what I’m saying.
SO FAR I HATE EVERYONE IN THIS BOOK I AM SO GLAD WE ARE DOING MONKALONG. Swing by Alice’s place to see what everyone else thinks of The Monk so far. Will anyone love it? Probably not, y’all, cause this book is legitimately not that good.