Post number twenty-two is for the first book in the new series, The 39 Clues, which is called The Maze of Bones and is written by Rick Riordan. The books in this series are actually written by all different people (or at least, the first four are - there are only three out at present with a fourth coming soon), but they include a card collecting game and the chance to win prizes up to $100,000 if you should solve the mystery.
I'm not going to be attempting that, but am interested in the books. Originally it was just because Rick Riordan was involved (and I'm a huge fan of his Percy Jackson series) but I've kind of fallen in love with the concept of the series, so am glad I have the second book handy.
Anyway, what follows is spoilery, so here's the usual spoiler space, although I'm not going to go into too many details, as I want to get back out into the living room to watch more of the NCAA basketball coverage. :-P
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Basically this story is about a huge family - the Cahills - who are descended from pretty much every famous person in history ever. Grace, the matron figure, has died, and instead of leaving her family inheritance money, she's giving them the chance to become the "most powerful Cahills ever" by giving them the first of 39 clues, which will supposedly lead the family to the source of the Cahill family power.
Dan and Amy, whose parents were killed in a fire of seemingly strange circumstances, decide to take up Grace's quest. They bring their au pair, Nellie, along with them, as this search will require traveling abroad, which you can't really do without an adult. The first clue has something to do with Benjamin Franklin, and takes them to Paris, where they have to outsmart their other family members while searching for the second clue (which they find, which will now take them to Vienna, Austria in book two). The other family members have decided that Dan and Amy are the ones to beat, as they were Grace's favorite grandchildren and everyone is convinced that they know more than the others. (They don't, but of course no one believes them when they say so.)
Anyway, this book was nice and suspenseful - I kept reading and reading, wanting to know what would happen and wanting to know if they'd find the clue, which they did, and how they'd deal with the other crazy family members also searching for the clue. So, all in all this was a fabulous start to the series, and I'm eager to see where it all leads and what the actual source of the Cahill's power is. I'm betting there will be lots of twists and turns, and danger (note: what's up with Mr. McIntyre? Is he good or bad? And what's up with the man in black?), and all-around excitement. To which I say this: Bring. It. On. :D
Post number twenty-one is for Olga Lengyel's Five Chimneys, which is a "woman survivor's true story of Auschwitz". The five chimneys in the title refer to the five chimneys of the crematories on the Birkenau campus, which is where Olga spent her entire time while imprisoned in the death camp.
Because this is basically a recount of history, I'm not going to use spoiler spaces. I'm also not going to get into specific details, because, obviously, her accounts of what took place in Auschwitz-Birkenau are gory and shocking. So instead I'm going to talk about Olga herself.
Olga was from a well-to-do family in Cluj, Romania, which was actually called Transylvania back in 1940. Her husband was a surgeon and she was his nurse. One day, her husband is summoned to the train station. Olga, not wanting him to travel alone, goes with him, bringing her sons and parents with them on the journey. They're loaded into the Nazi-typical cattle cars and shipped to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where her parents and children are immediately sent to the left, to the gas chambers. Olga and her husband are sent to the right, although they're separated, as men and woman prisoners were not housed together.
Her story continues telling the hardships she faced - the hunger, starvation, disease and dehumanization the Nazis subjected them to. Olga is finally sent to work in the "hospital", which is what saves her life. Her husband, she finds out, is also working in a hospital on the Auschwitz campus as a surgeon, and she even arranges to meet him once. This is the last time she'll see him, however, as he was sent out on a death march and, even though he'd been told not to stop for any reason, stooped down to help a fallen comrade. They are both shot to death by the S.S.
Olga is also taken on a death march in January of 1945, just days before the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau by the Soviet army. Her and two other ladies she worked with in the "hospital" manage to escape the march and hide in a barn. However, Olga is seen by a German soldier and forced to come with him as they make their escape out of Poland from the advancing Red Army. Olga again manages to escape, and hides herself in a huge house in an area that's in the process of being liberated. The Germans, for the most part, have left the town due to the artillary shells from the Russians. Olga is found by the house's owner, and is finally liberated by the Soviet army.
The book ends with her asking herself how she can still have faith in humanity, and whether or not people are innately good or bad. She ends by saying that those prisoners who'd refused to give up their human dignity even after all they faced in Auschwitz-Birkenau help her keep her faith. She says, "If, even in the jungle of Birkenau, all were not necessarily inhuman to their fellow men, then there is hope indeed. It is that hope which keeps me alive."
Post number twenty is for Bruce Benderson's The Romanian: Story Of An Obsession, which I'd found while perusing various searches at the bookstore while trying to pass the time standing at cashwrap. I've always been kind of infatuated with Romanian history - there's still a ton I'd like to know, and have yet to learn - so when this book showed up on the computer screen I ordered it into the store, and then purchased it after reading the first chapter or so. This is another of those books that I've been working on for multiple years, and I figured, now that I'd finished The Time Traveler's Wife, that I should probably finish up another of those in-progress books. Hence this one.
I'm not going to go into too much detail, really, but here's the usual spoiler space regardless.
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The story is about Bruce (the author of this book), who's working as a writer. He's taken an assignment to write an article about Romania for a magazine, and while on assignment in Bucharest, he meets Romulus, who is the Romanian mentioned in the title, and becomes Bruce's obsession.
Bruce finds himself falling for Romulus, who doesn't quantify himself as gay, but nonetheless has sex with Bruce quite a lot in the beginning. However, Romulus always has girls, too, and Bruce kind of ignores this, hoping it will go away. He's totally obsessed with Romulus; he can't handle being away from him for too long of a time, and finds himself inextricably drawn to Romania. He's also obsessed with the story of King Carol II, the last King of Romania, who was himself involved in an ill-fated love affair with a Jewish woman named Elena Lupescu. Bruce's story interweaves the history behind Carol and Lupescu's affair with his own story with Romulus, and he makes very eye-opening comparisions between the two. Also interlaced is a history of Romania itself, which I personally found fascinating because, here in America, Romania is definitely one of those forgotten countries that no one knows anything about.
Anyway, the obsession continues to drag on for eight months or so. Finally, however, Bruce's eyes are opened to what the heck he's doing and he realizes how destructive this whole affair has been. He's tens of thousand of dollars in debt (as he's been renting an apartment for him and Romulus in Bucharest as well as sending Romulus and his family money at various intervals) and he realizes that Romulus isn't in love with him as he'd imagined. A fight between the two of them turns ugly and Bruce finally realizes that he's got to give this whole thing up and go back home.
So he does. However, he and Romulus continue to see each other a couple of times a year and finally manage to have an actual friendship (with benefits, of course) and to this day - I'm assuming - this relationship continues. What I found most fascinating is how Bruce recounted his adventures with Romulus in a matter-of-fact tone of voice - this happened, here's what I felt, and here's what I learned. That, mixed with the historical stories, made this a really good book to read. It's definitely not going to be everyone's cup of tea, and is in fact quite dark and dangerous in places (Bruce is battling a codeine addiction, for one thing, so a bit of his monologue is tainted by the addiction), but I definitely enjoyed it. I especially like that there's a list of books in the back of various stories he'd read while writing this, a couple of which are about Carol and Lupescu that I definitely think I'll check out at some point.
Post number nineteen is for Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife, which I've been poking at for two years or so. I was first told to read this book by my friend, Jessica, so bought it from the bookstore when I was still working there (and getting that lovely 30% discount). However, I'd been told by several people that the ending was really sad, and, knowing that, I was kind of reluctant to read it, even though I'd also been told that the story was really good. When rumors started going 'round about the film being released, I decided I'd better hurry up and finish the book, so started reading it again last year. Then rumors started going around about the movie being delayed, so I stopped. :-P However, I finally managed to finish it today, thereby scratching yet another of those pesky (3) books off my To-Read List. Hurrah!
I'm not really going to get into too much of any spoilery content - just my general thoughts, really - but here's the spoiler space just in case.
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Okay, so everyone was right: This book was pretty damn heartbreaking. I don't think I went through so many kleenex since I finished reading The Amber Spyglass. I felt so badly for Clare - she'd dreamt her entire life of Henry, and their life together, only to have it cut short. And while she no doubt could feel the end drawing near, it still must have been totally shattering to her. I wonder if her father or brother ever tell her the truth about how Henry was killed.
It was interesting, because Henry comes across as a total prick in some places, but he loved Clare so entirely that it was really a redeeming factor for him. I'm glad that they had those completely joyful moments intermixed with the tradegy and sorrow, but it really felt unfair that the two of them had to live the lives they were given. At least with their daughter it seems there's a bit more research and support for the time-traveling gene - while Henry really seemed to hate the fact that he had to time travel, Alba seems to love it. Hopefully her future was better than her father's.
But my heart literally broke when Clare read the letter Henry had left for her, and how, even though he hadn't wanted her to, she seemed to live the rest of her life just to get to that point in time when she'd see Henry again. Those glimpses we got of Clare post-Henry were heartbreaking, too - she was so empty, and lost without him that you have to wonder what she thought of her life. (And the fact that she got to "see" Henry only briefly that day he'd traveled to Alba's field trip - see him but not touch him - GOD. I'm not sure I could have dealt with it, to be honest.)
So - all in all, it was a really well-written book. But the ending was so sad that I don't think I'll be picking it up again any time soon. And seeing this on the big screen (should it finally be released) may just reduce me to the kind of tears I was crying at the end of Return of the King. Woe. :(
EDIT: So I was thinking more about this story last night before I went to bed, and I couldn't help but think about how Clare must have felt each time Henry disappeared. Would he come back? When would he come back? Was he all right wherever he was? Was he hurt? Would he come back in one piece? And I can't help but think how worrying it must have been knowing that he lived "at least until he was 46". Because that's not such a long time, and with as gaunt and thin and old-looking as he was getting, you know Clare had to be thinking that the reason he only knew into his future until he was 46 was because something bad happened, and not because he found a way to stop time traveling. I just. Man. My heart is still breaking over their whole life. How much must she have loved him to live that life each day? And the way he loved her - so much that it totally transformed him - that's what everyone wants, but was it worthwhile, do you think? Was the time she got to spend with Henry worth everything? Especially since she lived the rest of her days counting them until she saw him again? I don't know. It's really too sad to think about, which of course is probably why I can't stop. God. This book really twists your heart, doesn't it?
Post number eighteen is for Mary Downing Hahn's Look For Me By Moonlight, a semi-spooky tale about the supernatural. I'd never even noticed this book on the school library's shelves until a girl returned it last Friday. The premise looked interesting, so I decided to give it a look-see, and found myself unable to put it down. As usual. :-P
What follows contains spoilers.
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Cynda is a sixteen-year-old girl who's been living with her mom and stepdad. Her parents are divorced (dad is remarried to a much younger woman, who he actually had an affair with while married to Cynda's mother - he was a professor and she - Susan - was his student); when her mother and stepdad decide to move to Italy, Cynda rebels, and her mother works it out so that she can go stay with her dad in a small coastal town in Maine instead.
Her dad and Susan own a bed-and-breakfast on the coast. They also have a five-year-old son, Todd, and are expecting another child. Nonetheless they try their best to welcome Cynda into their home and family.
Things aren't going so well - Todd is very demanding of everyone's attention and Cynda thinks he's spoiled. She's also concerned that her father ignores her (he's a writer) and that Susan takes advantage of her by making her do various chores/etc. Cynda then meets Will, the grandson of the inn's housekeeper, and develops a sort-of crush on him. She's also told that the inn is haunted by the ghost of a girl who died some sixty years ago, which helps add to her feelings of isolation. But then a mysterious stranger, Vincent, shows up, and things change.
Vincent tells them he's a writer (poetry) and that he's looking for a quiet place to work on his writing. In reality (as we find out later), he's a vampire, and he's looking for fresh blood, and he thinks Cynda will fit the bill perfectly. He seduces her by telling her exactly what she wants to hear and by providing her what she thinks is a sympathetic ear. When Cynda finally realizes what he is (after much drama and to-do), he makes her unable to tell anyone. He then turns his attention to Todd, who had hated Vincent from the start and tried repeatedly to get his parents to throw him out of the inn. By biting Todd he manages to make Todd ridiculously attached to him, thereby getting rid of the one person who could innately tell he was evil. Cynda also realizes after a trip to the local diner (and a chat with the overly-helpful waitress) and library that Vincent is actually responsible for several other deaths in the same area, and the girls who have died are all exactly like Cynda - lonesome, young, and gullible.
Cynda realizes she has to tell someone the truth or Vincent is going to kill her and Todd. She manages to tell Will (by biting him on the neck) but Vincent, who by this time has the entire family under his spell, twists the incident around, telling Susan and Cynda's father that he'd interrupted Will trying to rape Cynda, and that's why Cynda bit him. Cynda manages to get away the next day to Will's shed (he's an artist and uses the shed as his studio) with Todd, and they devise a plan to destroy Vincent.
However, Susan and Cynda's father end up calling the police on Will, after Vincent tells another story about Will supposedly abducting Cynda and Todd off the forest path. Nonetheless, Cynda manages to get Vincent into the shed and sets it on fire - the only way they can kill this particular vampire - while her and Todd escape through the trapdoor in the bottom that Will had left open for them. Will was supposed to lock the door of the shed from the outside, but as he was being detained by the police, this was impossible. Fearing that Vincent may have escaped, they're amazed to see that someone *did* padlock the door. Cynda realizes that it was Eleanor, the girl who'd died sixty years ago, whose ghost still haunted the inn. Vincent's death manages to release Eleanor's spirit, and the spirits of all the other girls he'd killed in his five hundred years of "life".
The book ends with Cynda telling Todd the story of "The Three Little Pigs" and Will showing up at the inn and snuggling close to Cynda on the couch as the story ends. Aww. <3
While I could tell what was going to happen from the beginning re: Vincent being a vampire, I still found myself unable to put the book down, as I wanted to see how everything was going to work out in the end. So, while not the best written book ever, it was still good, still suspenseful, and a good way to fill my lunchtime. :)
Post number seventeen is for Kate DiCamillo's The Tiger Rising, which I just finished reading today during my lunch break. It was another of those books that popped up on that "customers who bought x also bought" thing that Amazon so nicely provides, and, while quite short, was actually pretty good.
There are spoilers below, so be forewarned.
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This book is basically about two children, Rob and Sistine, who are both living in the same town in Florida for slightly different reasons. Rob lives with his father in a motel. His mother has recently died from cancer and they left Jacksonville in order to "get a new start". In reality, his father couldn't deal with the constant reminders of his wife, so he picked them up and moved them somewhere where his wife wasn't known. Sistine, on the other hand, is living with her mother after her mother discovered her father was having an affair with his secretary. Sistine is under the impression that her father will come get her and take her to live with him.
The book opens with Rob finding a caged tiger in the woods behind their motel. Rob is picked on mercilessly by the other kids at his school, namely because he doesn't fight back and because he has a rash on his legs. Sistine, who wears frilly dresses and shiny shoes, also gets picked on for being new, but she fights back, whereas Rob just ignores his taunters in the hope they'll leave him alone. Rob is informed by the principal that he's not going to be allowed to come to school for a while, as the other kids' parents are worried the rash on his legs is contagious (it's not). Rob is glad to hear this, as he hates school.
Sistine sits with Rob on the bus ride home, and they become sort-of friends. Sistine is full of anger at her parents, and takes that out on the other students. Rob, on the other hand, is full of grief over his mother's death. (Willie May, the lady who does the housekeeping at the motel, tells Rob that the reason he has the rash on his legs is that he's keeping his sadness down in his legs instead of letting it get to his heart.) Rob finds himself unable to keep his feelings deep inside (he says he keeps them in a tightly-closed suitcase) when Sistine is around, and ends up telling her about the tiger. Sistine wants to let the tiger go, but Rob loves him and doesn't want to lose him. They argue about it, and Rob ends up telling Sistine that her father isn't ever going to come get her, which Sistine doesn't like, and she takes off in anger. The two of them had told Willie May about the tiger as well, and Willie May tells Rob that Sistine doesn't mean what she says. Rob, however, can't stand for Sistine to be angry at him, so runs after her, telling her that he'll release the tiger (he's been given the keys to the cage by Beauchamp, the owner of the motel and the one who "owns" the tiger, who has enlisted Rob to feed the tiger for him). They do so, and the tiger runs free, only to be shot by Rob's father when it got near the motel (Willie May had told Rob's dad what was going on, because she knew that the kids would try to release it). The book ends with Rob yelling that he wished it had been his dad that had died instead of his mom, and urges his dad to say his mom's name (Caroline). The two end up in tears, while Sistine cries in Willie May's arms, thereby cleansing everyone of their sorrow. Rob feels like a weight has been lifted off him, and his dad tells Rob that he'll say Caroline's name for Rob, because he realizes Rob needs to hear it. Sistine, meanwhile, takes back her earlier words (that Rob was a "sissy" and she hates him) and tells him that he's her best friend, and that she knows her dad isn't ever coming to get her.
They bury the tiger in the woods, and afterward, Rob's dad takes Rob back to the motel room and makes him mac and cheese, just like normal, but in much better spirits.
This book was basically a look at what grief and sorrow can do to you when you refuse to let it out, or what anger can do when you let it control you. Seems like several of the kids at my school could take a page out of Sistine's book; we have WAY too much anger going around. :-P
Post number sixteen is for Rick Riordan's The Demigod Files, which is a book of three short stories and various character interviews pertaining to the Percy Jackson & the Olympians series, which is one of my favorite series of books ever. If you like Greek Mythology mixed with modern-day adventure, these books are for you. I highly recommend them. Percy is, quite simply, one of the best narrators I've ever read. :)
What follows contains spoilers, although they're kind of minor in the grand scheme of things, but avoid if you feel it necessary!
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There were three short stories in this book: Percy Jackson and the Stolen Chariot (which featured Percy, Clarisse, her two minor god brothers, Phobos and Deimos, and a chase to track down Ares' war chariot before sunset), Percy Jackson and the Bronze Dragon (which featured Percy, Beckendorf, Annabeth, Silena Beauregard, a giant ant hill and a bronze automatron dragon), and Percy Jackson and the Sword of Hades (which featured Percy, Thalia, Nico, a trip to the Underworld and a quest from Persephone). My favorite story (and one that I think is going to play a role in the fifth and final Percy Jackson book) was The Sword of Hades, simply because it was more adventurous AND featured Thalia, who I really miss since she became one of Artemis' hunters and wasn't in The Battle of the Labyrinth. There was also a very funny part in that story in which [SPOILER ALERT]Percy pulled Iapetus (a Titan Lord, who is Atlas' father) into the River Lethe and erased his memories, and when Iapetus asked who he was, Percy said he was "his friend Bob", which was pretty hysterical, seeing as moments before Iapetus was dead set on killing Percy quite throughly by running him through with his spear. Hee! (I also loved how Iapetus - now called "Bob" - simply healed Percy's shoulder wound with a touch, saying, "Owie".)[END SPOILERS]
As for the other stories, I enjoyed Beckendorf's crush on Silena and his finally getting up the courage to ask her to the summer fireworks (even though Percy remains throughly stupid as far as Annabeth is concerned) and Percy telling Clarisse that she was included in his circle of friends when he saw his worst fear (courtesy of Phobos, who is the minor god of fear, which is also where we get the word "phobia" from), because even though they don't get along (and she still wants to get back at him for covering her with toilet water in the first book before he realized that he could control water thanks to being Poseidon's son) they really couldn't have completed their quests without each other.
I also liked the brief glimpse from the final book, although I can't help but want to beat Percy senseless for still being completely blind to the fact that Annabeth has a crush on him, and there seems to be a building love triangle (which I really can't stand) between him, Rachel Dare and Annabeth, which I really could do without. But we'll see how it all comes together: hopefully the love triangle (if it truly does materialize) won't overshadow the other - more important - elements of the story, namely how they're going to defeat Kronos.
Basically, here are my thoughts on this book: If you're a fan of the Percy Jackson series, give it a read, because these short stories may play into the final book (especially, as I said above, the Sword of Hades). If you've not read any of the books - and I must ask, "What are you WAITING for?!" - then skip it, as it's not really a stand-alone in that you need to be familiar with the characters and storyline for these short stories to make sense. But I enjoyed the stories, and am now even more eagerly awaiting the final installment. :)
Post number fifteen is for Trenton Lee Stewart's sequel to The Mysterious Benedict Society (which I mentioned here), The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey. This book was just as hard to put down as the first one, and had all the same elements of the first one that I adored: well-written characters, fun mysteries and riddles, adventure, danger, and more.
What follows will contain spoilers, although I'll try not to mention TOO many things, as this series really is better when you don't know what's coming. That being said, if you're thinking about reading either of the books that are written thus far in the series, please don't read this post. You'll be sorry if you spoil yourself, trust me!
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The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey picks up about a year after the first book. The four friends - Reynie, Kate, Sticky and Constance - are about to reconvene in a get-together thanks to Mr. Benedict, and are very excited to see each other. Reynie and Sticky will meet Kate at her and Milligan's farm, and will then travel to Mr. Benedict's house, where they'll meet up with Constance, Mr. Benedict, Rhonda and Number Two.
However, they soon learn that things aren't going as planned. Mr. Benedict and Number Two have been captured by Mr. Curtain, and they have four days to give Mr. Curtain the information he wants or they'll be killed.
The kids decide that they need to take matters into their own hands, and thereby enter into the "Perilous Journey" mentioned in the title. Originally the kids were to travel with Rhonda and Milligan, and follow the clues laid out for them by Mr. Benedict (the surprise they were to have been told about once arriving at Mr. Benedict's house - Number Two and Mr. Benedict had laid out a scavenger hunt, if you will, that they were to follow). This journey takes them across the Atlantic to Portugal, then to Holland, then to a mysterious island in the North Sea. Luckily for the kids, Milligan finds them in Holland, and joins them for the journey to the island, where the danger spikes even higher.
I won't give anything else about the plot away, but we learn some new things in this book about Constance that continue to make her absolutely fascinating imo, and Reynie once again becomes one of my favorite narrators of all time. There's a new character introduced as well that I think is pretty hysterical (his name is Moocho Brazos and he used to be the circus strongman in the circus where Kate grew up), and there's more twists and turns than in the first book, too, just to keep you guessing right along with the kids in the story.
There's a third book coming out in November which I am highly anticipating. I can't wait to see what happens next!
Post number fourteen is actually for two books, The Castle in the Attic and The Battle for the Castle, both by Elizabeth Winthrop. They were both really fast reads and I enjoyed them equally, for the most part. They were a nice blend of magic, adventure and action, so if that's your thing, give them a look-see.
What follows contains spoilers, so please don't read any farther if you don't want to be spoiled.
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The Castle in the Attic starts with a boy, William, who lives with his parents and their housekeeper, Mrs. Phillips. Mrs. Phillips has decided to return to England to live with her brother. William doesn't want her to go, so starts to think up ways he can keep her with him. As a going away gift, Mrs. Phillips gives William a big, old castle that's been in her family for generations. He puts it in the attic, hence the title of the book. Along with the castle, William is given a Silver Knight. However, when he touches the Knight, he comes alive. His name is Sir Simon, and he was turned to lead by an evil wizard, Alastor, who has since taken over Simon's kingdom. Sir Simon wants to return to fight Alastor, but isn't sure how to do it, although he does have possession of one of Alastor's magic pendants, that shrinks living objects. William gets the brilliant idea that he'll shrink Mrs. Phillips, thereby finding a way to keep her forever. As she's heading to the bus stop, he shrinks her while her back is turned, and takes her back to the castle to keep Sir Simon company. Mrs. Phillips is understandably upset and disappointed in William, and refuses to talk to him. Sir Simon gives her the master bedroom in the castle (it's fully decked out with everything possible, except people) and tells William about the prophecy above the door, which states that a lady will start sewing (Mrs. Phillips), a Knight will ready for battle (Sir Simon) and a squire will cross the drawbridge. William realizes he's the squire, and also told that the only way Mrs. Phillips will talk to him is if he goes into the room himself. He realizes he has to shrink himself down to their size, so has Sir Simon use the pendant on him. Once in the castle, he takes a bit of time to train and reconcile with Mrs. Phillips, before he and Simon set off to do battle with Alastor, as the attic around the castle has disappeared and been replaced with a forest.
Sir Simon gets separated from William in the forest (it's been enchanted by Alastor) but William makes his way through and sets off for Alastor's castle. Along the way he meets a man who's been enchanted with constant hunger (Dick), whom he saves by climbing the apple tree Dick is under and retrieving the lone apple from its branches. He then arrives at the castle, where he has to do battle with the dragon guarding its gates. The dragon is actually Sir Simon's old nurse's cat, transformed, and when you look into it eyes you see horrors that make you want to look away. But as long as you don't, the dragon's fire won't hurt you. He manages to subdue the dragon and makes his way into the castle, where he meets Alastor and has to pretend to be his fool.
He also sees that Sir Simon has once again been turned to lead, as he'd made his way out of the forest and arrived at Alastor's castle ahead of William, who had wasted a lot of time in the tree for Dick. Meanwhile, Sir Simon's nurse, Calendar, tells William what he needs to do to defeat Alastor, and he manages to do it, and also set Sir Simon and all the others Alastor has turned to lead free by touching them. He returns to his own time and returns Mrs. Phillips to her regular size. She takes the pendant, and Alastor (who was transported by Calendar to William's time and has been turned to lead), and promises to drop them over the boat into the Atlantic as she crosses back to England.
The second book opens with William a couple years older (he's twelve). For his birthday, Mrs. Phillips sends him the pendant, which she decided not to toss into the ocean after all. (She did, however, toss Alastor into the water. :-P) William, who hasn't grown much and is still extremely short, decides to tell his best friend Jason about the castle and his adventure, and the two of them decide to use the pendant to go back into time to visit Sir Simon. However, all is not well in Simon's time, although Simon is trying his best to ignore the signs. Calendar has died, but before she went, she told them all of an evil vision she'd seen, which all of them - except for her granddaughter Gudrin and Sir Simon's fool, Deegan - dismissed as crazed ramblings. Sir Simon is leaving to attend a jousting tournament, but assures William that all is well.
However, all is not well, and a skeleton ship full of bones has come into the harbor (Sir Simon had already sent it back out to sea once, but it's now returned a second time). Gudrin decides that they need to burn the ship. They manage to get it ablaze, but realize that there were tons of rats on board the ship, all of which then swim for shore. They also realize that there's a giant rat leading them - Calendar's evil force - and that they need to tell someone. However, none of the adults believe them until an old fisherman shows up on a horse nearly dead, and they realize he and his horse have been bitten hundreds of times by the rats. Dick and Brian (the lead guard) decide they need to send the majority of the people away from the castle for their protection, and send Tolliver, Dick's son, out on William's bicycle to fetch Sir Simon and help. The remaining people - Dick, Brian, William, Jason and Gudrin - will lock themselves into the dungeon after locking the rats in the castle and stand siege until Sir Simon arrives. However, William and Jason realize that Deegan had stolen the magic pendant, so they're left - in their opinions - without weapons. All manages to go well, until the rats finally arrive. They manage to get the drawbridge up, locking the rats inside the castle grounds, but as they're running for the dungeons, Brian gets badly injured thanks to rat bites on his legs and stomach, and William has to rescue him, getting bitten by a rat on his ankle.
Gudrin manages to nurse them back to health, but they realize that the rats have started chewing on the dungeon door, and they're not sure they'll be safe for much longer. William realizes that the rats are afraid of the sunlight - especially the leader, who hides in the farthest, darkest corner possible until the sun goes away. They decide to make their escape at 6:15AM, which is when the line of sunlight is lighting up the passageway outside the dungeon door. When they do so, however, they realize that Jason's shield is catching the light and bouncing the beams into the rats. The rats become frenzied, and William finally realizes they need to destroy the leader with the sunlight, so uses the shield to refract the light onto the huge rat's body. The rat melts down and becomes a normal size, and the other rats, angry that it had taken them over and made them do as he wanted, turn on it and kill it. They then become normal rats again, so William and Brian lower the drawbridge so they can go back into the wild.
Sir Simon and his men arrive after all the danger has passed (of course :-P), and Deegan returns the magic pendant, and William and Jason return back to their castle, and back home.
These books were, in my opinion, mostly about not allowing other people's opinions of you to affect what you do in life. William was considered small and weak, because he was shorter than the other boys and was a gymnast. Jason, in the second book, has grown taller and stronger than him, and also manages to jump the trains, which is a right of passage basically for boys when they turn twelve in William's town. William wants to take Jason back originally to show him that he's a hero, and that people think highly of him, because that's not how they view him in their own time. He actually ends up saving Jason's life, thereby changing the way Jason views him forever. Mrs. Phillips made a point of telling William that his greatest assets were his ability to love and his gentleness, and also that he could do whatever he wanted if he believed in himself. A typical theme in YA lit/children's books, but nonetheless still true, even now.
My one complaint is that things seemed to happen very quickly in these books, and William had an extraordinary amount of luck in the first book. I felt the pacing was a bit rushed, but that's probably in order to keep the younger reader engrossed. And hey, I finished these books in a couple of hours each, so obviously it also helps you read the story quickly. Not that I'm complaining; I'd prefer a fast-reading book to one that's hard to get through. (see: Dracula :D)
I wouldn't purchase these books, I don't think, but they would be a nice library loan. So check them out, if you're interested in magic, adventure and action. You probably won't be too disappointed. :)
Post number thirteen is for the third book in the City of Ember series, The Prophet of Yonwood by Jeanne DuPrau. It's actually the prequel to The City of Ember, but really should be read as the third book, just so you don't spoil yourself, because it's much more fun to see the story unfold than it would be to know ahead of time what's going on.
Here is the usual spoiler space, just in case.
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Book three picks up at some unexplained time period in the future. Things in the world are bleak; there's talk of a nuclear war breaking out due to the made-up "Phalanx Nations" refusing to follow the US's directive to end their nuclear weapon build-up (I think). The narrator of this book is a ten-year-old girl, Nickie. She's from Philadelphia, but has traveled to Yonwood, North Carolina with her aunt, to go through the estate of her great-grandfather, who's just passed away. Nickie's father is away working on a top-secret project, and through postcards that he sends, he relays to her via code that he's in California, although the reader doesn't figure this out until the end of the book.
Yonwood, NC is a strange place. They supposedly have a prophet (hence the title), who was a normal woman who suffered what I've decided is a stroke. She supposedly had a vision right before the stroke, in which she sees the end of the world. She mumbles all these things that are later translated by her friend, Brenda, who then tells the town what God wants them to do. The rules are utterly ridiculous at the start, and continue to get even more impractical: no singing, no music, no movies, and later, no lights, and - the big kicker for Nickie, who's been taking care of a stray in secret and utterly falls in love with it - no dogs. However, Nickie, being a young girl, decides she needs to follow the Prophet's words, so initially follows all the rules and actually walks around the town spying on folks and reporting those who give her a "bad feeling" to Brenda, who investigates (and sometimes punishes) them.
The culmination of the rules is the "no dogs" rule, which completely turns Nickie off and makes her realize how stupid she'd been. Nickie, angry about the loss of her dog, runs to the Prophet's house and yells at her, which wakes her up. The Prophet - Althea - then goes on to say that she was simply mumbling the things she was seeing in her vision. They weren't "words from God" at all - just the ramblings of a sick woman. The book ends with Nickie going back to Philadelphia, where she's told by her mother that her father has been permanently relocated to CA, so they're moving out there, and Nickie is ecstatic because all she really wanted was her family back together again.
We're also told that the secret project Nickie's father was working on was Ember, and that Nickie is the one who left the journal that Lina and Doon found upon their exit from the city. (Nickie was chosen as one of the people to care for the infants, as she was the daughter of one of the Builders, thereby bringing the story full-circle.)
This book was basically just a look at what can happen when you're trying to do the right thing. Sometimes you end up causing more harm than good, as Nickie does, and sometimes you're simply overthinking everything, too. It's also a look at how crazy people can get when they start trying to do God's work, and how utterly out-of-control situations can get. Nickie has a thought that she doesn't want to follow the Prophet's God - she'd rather follow her own, who is loving and forgiving and cares about everyone - and it's a sentiment that I personally believe as well. When we start trying to mold everyone into what we view as the "ideal", things usually go wrong. And in Yonwood, we see that quite clearly, even though it takes a long time for the people of the town to accept. In fact, Brenda, the supposed "mouth of the Prophet" never does accept it; she spends the rest of her life reading over Holy books trying to figure out how to do God's work.
All in all this was a nice continuation of the story. It's not as strong as the first two books and wouldn't stand alone nearly as well, I don't think, simply because the characters were driving me utterly bonkers, but if you're a fan of the previous two books, you should definitely give it a read.
