Post number five is for James Thurber's The Wonderful O, which, when I first saw it in the library at school, I thought was some sort of Oz book. Oops!
Anyway, I needed a book to help pass the time today (lots of downtime for some reason; I thought for sure we'd be flooded with kids wanting/needing to check out new books since we had two days off from school due to snow), so picked this up. I finished it in about an hour, and although I don't have much to say, what I do have to say will contain spoilers, so please avoid if you feel it necessary.
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This story is kind of nonsensical, I think. It starts off with two pirates - Black and Littlejack - who set out for an island where they'll supposedly find lots of treasure in the form of gemstones. Black has an aversion to the letter "O" due to the fact that "his mother got stuck in a porthole and, as she couldn't be pulled back in, had to be pushed out."
When they land on the island they tell the people living there that they're searching for gems. The people of the island try to explain that they don't have any gemstones except for moonstones and opals and other regular stones. The pirates soon demolish everything in sight - they drain the water, they tear up the ground - but still can't find what they're looking for. So Black decides to take away the letter "O" from the island's vocabulary. House becomes huse, it becomes impossible to say "hello", hero becomes her, etc. (My favorite bit was how Otto Ott, when asked his name, could only stutter. :D) Also made illegal are games like tic-tac-toe and croquet, and instruments like pianos and violins, oboes and cellos.
The people are obviously outraged by this (or should I say utraged?) and start having secret meetings in the forest to try to figure out what to do. Andrea, a girl from the village, stumbles upon a book (or bk) that tells a story about an enchanted castle that appears every 100 years. This castle holds the map to the treasure that Black and Littlejack are searching for. It's said, however, that only evil men can enter the castle. The villagers all continue to use "o" in private, but are forbidden from speaking it in public. Exchanges like this make the book fun to read, and pretty funny:
"It's schl," his son replied.
"Never hiss at me," his father cried. "When I want aloes, I don't want ales, I hate such names. And cameos are cameos, not cames. Yesterday I met a man who wanted four canoes--"
"Fur canes," his son put in.
"Silence!" his father shouted. "What did you learn today in school?"
"That mist is always mist, but what is mist isn't always mist," his son recited.
At this his father rose up like a storm, put on his hat and cat, and stalked to where the door had been, and reached for where the knob once was.
"Where are yu ging?" whispered his anxious wife.
"Ut!" the boatwright cried, and ut he went.
:))
Anyway, the villagers (led by Andrea and Andreus) decide that there are four words with o's that can't be lost: hope, love, valor, and one that they can't remember. The castle appears like Andrea said and Black, Littlejack and their sailors go inside and literally tear it apart. Black finally notices the map on the wall, so they set out into the forest in search of the treasure. The forest, however, is magical, and in it appears all sorts of things with o's in their name that Black had outlawed - things like mosquitoes and Spanish moss, hornets and dragonflies. The forest also separates them all from each other, subjecting them to these terrors on their own. They finally find the tree they were looking for and manage to gather together in front of it.
Black gives the order to dig, and just as they're about to start, all these characters from books of the past show up - Lancelot and Romeo, Athos and Porthos, Robin Hood and Sherlock Holmes. It delays their digging until the clock - which is actually the clock "of their conscience", as all other clocks had been destroyed by Black due to their containing an "o" - strikes noon, at which point the ground hardens so much that they're unable to dig. Just then a whole bunch of containers (one of the words that was spared, due to the fact that it was collective noun) appear, so Black and co. start searching through them (it's worth noting that all of the containers are all o-less ones: a sack, a bucket, a basket, an urn, and even a casket). What they find is a single piece of paper in each with a single word on it: Freedom, which happens to be the fourth word that the villagers couldn't remember.
In the end, the pirates are chased away back to their ship, which appears to shipwreck due to the o-containing storms that crop up: hurricanes named Connie and Dorothy, typhoons and monsoons, etc. The only member of the pirate crew who is spared is Littlejack's parrot, who ends up living with Andrea and Andreus, who were married shortly after they set their village back to rights. They also erect a monument to "O", and the story ends with children asking an old man about the reason for the monument:
The old man shook his head and sighed. "I'm not as young as I used to be, and the years gone by are a mystery, but 'twas a famous victory."
So all in all, a cute book, and a nice way to spend my downtime. :)
Post number four for 2009 is for Bram Stoker's Dracula. I originally started this book in 2005 while I was working cashwrap at Barnes & Noble, and also only picked it up because it was the only thing that looked remotely interesting AND was close to where I needed to stand. I stopped reading it after a couple of days, then decided last year that I should try to read it again, so checked it out from the local library. That attempt didn't go so well either, so I finally just bought the book and have since been picking at it for about six months or so. Possibly longer.
And now I've finally finished it. What follows will contain spoilers, so please avoid if you're so inclined.
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Much like when I read Frankenstein, my feelings about this book are mixed. I enjoyed some parts more than others - in particular, the beginning and the end were, imo, better than the rest - and some parts were just downright difficult for me to get through. I had a difficult time with Van Helsing's speech, and the book in general reminded me of Tolkien's writing, in that, for one reason or another, I had a hard time reading it and staying involved in the story.
That being said, I enjoyed Jonathan's journey into Romania and all the things that happened to him at the Count's castle. It did a really nice job of setting up the story and introducing the different elements. The middle seemed to drag; I enjoyed Mina's telling of her time spent with Lucy, but at the same time it didn't engage me like the beginning had. There were a lot of new characters introduced - Dr. Seward, Quincey Morris, Lord Godalmning - and it seemed too big of a coincidence that they'd all be right there when needed, especially Morris who, if I was understanding correctly, actually lived in the U.S. Also terribly coincidental (and slightly eyeroll inducing) was the fact that all these men were iinterested in Lucy. It seemed a bit much.
One thing that irritated me was that the men didn't figure out what was happening to Mina until it was nearly too late. I mean, they'd all been there for Lucy's demise - shouldn't they have realized much more quickly what was going on? How many times do they need to see someone completely colorless and lethargic before they realize that Dracula just might be about? Also, Renfield's reason for being in the asylum was rather gross, and I could have done without quite so much detail. :-P
I enjoyed the end because of the whole "adventure" feeling I got from it. They were all working together to find Dracula and dispose of him, and I liked the various accounts of what each party had to go through. Although, that being said, these characters sure had exquisite memories! They were able to tell us exactly what every character ever said, even when the conversations went on for a long time. I get that we needed to suspend our disbelief, but I almost think it would have just been better to write this book like most other author's do and forgo the journal entry format. (Although, that being said, Frankenstein was built around journal entries, too. Must have been the literay method of the time, perhaps.)
I was glad that this edition of the book included footnotes to tell me what the heck they were talking about as far as geographical features and the different ways of speaking by the characters (the Czarina Catherine's captain's speech in particular was difficult to understand even *with* the footnotes), because I would have been quite lost without them. I'm glad we don't talk like that any longer. It may have been melodic, but MAN did they take a roundabout way of saying what they meant to say. :))
While I did enjoy the book and am glad I read it, I don't think I'll be rereading any time soon. Maybe it was the fact that it took me so long to get through it the first time that makes me feel this way, but I kind of feel that this book may be one of those that's just better off being read the one time. Time will tell, I suppose. I may find that I want to revisit it again after all. And I don't mean to sound like I didn't like it. I just ... didn't like it as much as others I've read.
One final thing. The back of the book declares, "The quintessential tale of suspense and horror, presenting one of the most terrifying characters ever born in literature: Count Dracula of Transylvania." My only thought on that is that I disagree. I have read several other books that do the suspense/horror thing much better. Maybe it's because I knew that in the end Dracula would be killed, but I wasn't terribly surprised by anything that happened in this book. Oh, well. Now I know. :-P
Post number three for the year is Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. The version of this story that I own at home actually has both this story and its sequel in one. However, I started reading this book at work, and therefore haven't yet read the sequel - will need to dig up my own copy of the book in order to accomplish that.
I don't have a lot to say, but here's the usual spoiler space just in case.
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As someone who only knows this story through the film versions, I was surprised at how many liberties many of these movies take. Some of the things that happen to Alice in Wonderland weren't in the film, and some things were brought in from the sequel, namely Tweedledee and Tweedledum and the flowers who mistake Alice for a flower. I always love the Chesire Cat and the madness of the croquet game (I laughed at the comment that Alice's biggest problem with the crochet game was managing her flamingo, hee) but the weird side story with the Duchess and the pepper and the weird pig-baby was ... well, odd. I suppose it's silly to ask what the point of it was as the whole story is pretty nonsensical, but that chapter in particular seemed stranger than all the others.
The king must certainly be a patient sort if he can handle living with the Queen whose only joy seems to be sending people to be beheaded (I laughed again at the whole argument about how they could go about beheading the Chesire Cat when the only part of him they could see *was* his head). The Mad Hatter and March Hare were as ridiculous as ever, and the poor White Rabbit really needs to find a new job that won't cause him as much stress. :-P
I'm looking forward to the sequel, as I'd like to see how many of the characters return, and also am looking forward to seeing those elements that have been taken from the sequel that I'm so familiar with.
Post number two for this year is the seven books that make up C.S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia. I originally started my reread of this series last year in preparation for the movie release of Prince Caspian, and as such only three of the books actually belong on my list of books read for this year. The previous four were on last year's list.
I think this is one of those series that pretty much everyone has read, but just in case, here's the usual spoiler space.
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I really enjoy this series, overall. There are definitely books I like more than others - Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Magician's Nephew being my personal favorites - but the series as a whole is definitely one I'd recommend.
It's pretty obvious what C.S. Lewis was doing with the Narnia books, but I tend to think of them as non-religiously as possible. I think they're a great fantasy series (although I don't, as a general rule, much care for The Last Battle) with fabulous characters: the Pevensies remain my favorite fictional family of all time, I think. For the most part, the books I enjoy in this series are filled with adventure - Voyage is all about Caspian and crew's adventure to the unknown lands east of Narnia, Silver Chair is about Jill and Eustace's adventures while trying to find Prince Rilian, Magician's Nephew is about Digory and Polly's first journey into unknown worlds, etc. I also enjoy The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, but that's more because it's an introduction to the Pevensies, and I really like them, even Edmund, who's a total beast throughout most of that book.
My biggest issue with The Last Battle is an issue I've seen several people have, and that's the issue of Susan. It is my hope that the death of her entire family (and how *completely* unfair is that?) made Susan admit that Narnia did exist, and I hope that, at her death, she's able to join the others in the ultimate Narnia. I thought that they did a good job of trying to explain Susan's character in the Prince Caspian film, where she tells Lucy that she's happy to be in Narnia for as long as their visit lasts. I personally think that it was a huge adjustment for Susan to go from being a beautiful, sought-after queen to being ordinary Susan Pevensie. She's quite older than Lucy, so would have experienced more in terms of her Narnian adult life, and to have to return to being a teenager would have been difficult at best. For Aslan (or anyone) to think that she wouldn't struggle with this was simply being unrealistic. I don't think she was being mean when she denounced Narnia to her siblings (and one might wonder if she truly didn't believe any longer, or if it was just too painful for her to continually talk about); she was simply trying to make due with the life she was forced to live in. One that definitely did not include Narnia. And that's quite enough about that, especially since I feel like I'm not being terribly clear in what I'm trying to say. :-P
When I first read the Narnia books I read them in their numbered order. This time I read them in their published order. I personally don't really have a preference, but I do think the story flowed along better when I read the books in their original publishing order. So, when I reread them in the future, that's probably the order I'll read them in again.
My final thought is that I really hope Walden finds someone to finance Voyage, because it's my favorite of the books and I really would like to see more Narnia on the big screen, especially with the cast they've assembled for it. <3
My first book of 2009 is J.K. Rowling's The Tales of Beedle the Bard, which I received for Christmas.
I honestly don't have much to say about it, but because what I DO have to say is spoilery, here is my obligatory spoiler space. If you haven't read the book yet and don't want to be spoiled, don't read any further in this post!
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I think my favorite story of the bunch was "The Fountain of Fair Fortune", because it seemed to have the happiest ending, and I am nothing if not a total girl. "The Warlock's Hairy Heart" was downright creepy (I could not even imagine telling my child this story!), while "Babbitty Rabbitty and Her Cackling Stump" was pretty funny and just goes to show what total misconceptions the Muggles in JKR's world had about their Wizarding brethren.
One thing that annoyed me was that JKR continued her anti-Slytherin campaign in this book by bringing up Draco Malfoy's ancestors (and father) and their anti-Muggle viewpoints. Dumbledore's commentary was occasionally funny and witty (like the character himself) but I really found the comments about Draco's father to be rather ridiculous at this point, especially the line about how Dumbledore set out to end Lucius' reign as "Lord Voldemort's Favorite Death Eater". Whatever.
I did find it interesting that Dumbledore's commentary lends one to believe that Dumbledore didn't believe that the "Tale of the Three Brothers" was factual, when, if you read Deathly Hallows, you know that it was. This was obviously prior to Dumbledore's encounter with the Resurrection Stone, but it also means that he wasn't aware - or didn't believe - that he was the current master of the Elder Wand. Makes you realize just how fallible Dumbledore was, I suppose, even though he had several occasions where he noted how clever he was.
All in all this was a nice edition to the HP world, although I, personally, would not have told a few of these stories to my impressionable young children until they were much older. :-P
2008 was a pretty pathetic reading year for me, but I intend for 2009 to be quite different. So here's the preliminary list of things to read in 2009.
This list is not a complete copy of those things I posted last year and didn't read, as I made several changes. But it's pretty close. Books with an asterisk are those that were on my list for the first time last year. Those books that have been on my list the past two and three years are indicated with a (2) and (3) respectively. And the sad thing is, it's basically the entire list.
Books to Read in 2009:
1) Niffenegger, Audrey – The Time Traveler's Wife (3) (currently reading)
2) Stoker, Bram – Dracula (3) (currently reading)
3) Benderson, Bruce – The Romanian: Story of an Obsession* (currently reading)
4) Lengyel, Olga - Five Chimneys (currently reading)
5) Lagnado, Lucette Matalon and Sheila Cohn Dekel - Children of the Flames: Dr. Josef Mengele and the Untold Story of the Twins of Auschwitz (currently reading)
6) Riordan, Rick - The Demigod Files (due out in February)
7) Clare, Cassandra – The Mortal Instruments, Book Three: City of Glass (due out in March)
8) Riordan, Rick – Percy Jackson & the Olympians, Book Five: The Last Olympian (due out in May)
9) DuPrau, Jeanne - The People of Sparks
10) Slash (with Anthony Bozza) - Slash
11) Scott, Michael - The Magician: The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel
12) Keneally, Thomas - Schindler's List
13) Segal, Lore - Other People's Houses
14) Riordan, Rick - The 39 Clues: The Maze of Bones
15) Stroud, Jonathan – The Bartimaeus Trilogy, Book Three: Ptolemy's Gate*
16) Black, Holly - Ironside*
17) Barry, Dave and Ridley Pearson – Peter and the Secret of Rundoon*
18) Rowling, J.K. - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows* (reread)
19) McEwan, Ian - Atonement*
20) Lewis, C.S. – The Chronicles of Narnia: The Horse and His Boy, The Magician's Nephew and The Last Battle* (rereads)
21) Blake, James – Breaking Back*
22) Barrie, J.M. – Peter Pan*
23) Haggard, H. Rider – King Solomon's Mines*
24) Clarke, Susanna - Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (2)
25) Larsen, Eric - Devil in the White City (2)
26) Willig, Lauren - The Secret History of the Pink Carnation (2)
27) Sparks, Nicholas - The Notebook (2)
28) Berendt, John - Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil (2)
29) Austen, Jane - Sense and Sensibility (3)
30) Gaiman, Neil - American Gods (3)
31) Goldman, William - The Princess Bride (3)
32) Pierce, Tamora - Trickster's Queen (3)
33) Rice, Anne - Interview with the Vampire (3)
34) Golden, Arthur - Memoirs of a Geisha (3)
35) Stevenson, Robert Louis - Treasure Island (3)
36) Maguire, Gregory - Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister (3)
37) Virgil - The Aeneid (3)
38) Dumas, Alexandre - The Count of Monte Cristo (3)
39) Japrisot, Sebastien - A Very Long Engagement (3)
40) Carroll, Lewis - Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass (3)
41) Homer - The Iliad (3)
42) Homer - The Odyssey (3)
43) Chaucer, Geoffrey - The Canterbury Tales (3)
44) O'Neill, Jamie - At Swim Two Boys (3)
45) Bray, Libba - A Great and Terrible Beauty (3)
46) Burnett, Frances Hodgson - The Secret Garden (3)
47) Gaiman, Neil – Neverwhere (3)
48) Wilde, Oscar - The Picture of Dorian Gray (3)
49) Tolkien, J.R.R. - The Hobbit (3)
50) Alcott, Louisa May - Little Women (3)
I foresee the same issues with this list as previous ones, which is that there is a lot of so-called "classic" literature on it. However, I have been making some headway on some of the classics the past few years (currently working on 'Dracula', actually), and am thinking that if I mix them up with the easier-to-read titles that I should be okay. I am going to try really REALLY hard to get those books with a (3) by them off the list this year. Consider it my secret ultimate goal, or something. :-P
My total number of books read this year was really rather pathetic. But since I want to keep track of everything I've read, I'm going to go ahead and post it. One of my New Year's Resolutions is to get as close to 50 books read in 2009 as possible, which works out to roughly one a week. Not sure if it's actually manageable, but we'll see!
Books I Managed to Read in 2008
1) Pullman, Phillip - His Dark Materials, Book Two: The Subtle Knife* (finished 01/05/08, 288 pages)
2) Pullman, Phillip - His Dark Materials, Book Three: The Amber Spyglass* (finished 01/10/08, 518 pages)
3) Clare, Cassandra - The Mortal Instruments, Book Two: City of Ashes* (finished 04/20/08, 453 pages)
4) Lewis, C.S. - The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe* (reread) (finished 05/16/08, 189 pages)
5) Lewis, C.S. - The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian* (reread) (finished 05/17/08, 238 pages)
6) Riordan, Rick - Percy Jackson & the Olympians, Book Four: The Battle of the Labyrinth* (finished 07/24/08, 361 pages)
7) Gregory, Philippa - The Other Boleyn Girl* (finished 08/30/08, 661 pages)
8) DuPrau, Jeanne - The City of Ember (finished 09/07/08, 270 pages)
9) Lewis, C.S. - The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader* (reread) (finished 10/06/08, 248 pages)
10) Yolen, Jane - The Devil's Arithmetic (finished 10/12/08, 170 pages)
11) Lewis, C.S. - The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair* (reread) (finished 10/13/08, 257 pages)
12) Ross, Stewart - The Star Houses: A Story from the Holocaust (finished 10/19/08, 83 pages)
13) Harris, Mark Jonathan and Deborah Oppenheimer - Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport (finished 11/03/08, 289 pages)
14) Sender, Ruth Minsky - The Cage (finished 11/24/08, 245 pages)
15) Roy, Jennifer - Yellow Star (finished 12/11/08, 227 pages)
16) Sixx, Nikki - The Heroin Diaries: A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rock Star (finished 12/21/08, 413 pages)
* - denotes a book on my To-Read List
Favorite books were probably the His Dark Materials books, although Nikki Sixx's autobiography was definitely eye-opening!
