On the surface, The Lovely Bones sounds like it's going to be a very depressing book; thirteen year old Suzie Salmon is raped and murdered, and watches her family from the afterlife. And while the first part of the book is just as bad as you'd imagine with that premise, it grows into a beautiful story as her family rebuilds (eventually, and mostly) from the tragedy.
I'd heard the title of the book bounced around for a long time before I actually read it, and it well deserves the popularity. It's essentially a book about people; the characters are correspondingly well developed, and their individual stories are lovingly and compassionately told.
One thing that I had fun with in the book was comparing Sebold's version of the afterlife with C.S. Lewis' from The Great Divorce. (Minor spoiler warning) In his version, purgatory and hell are the same place, a gray dreary zone where you can have any material possession you want simply by wishing for it, but where nothing material brings joy. In Lovely Bones, Suzie's personal heaven is like a more cheerful version of Lewis' purgatory -- bright and cheerful, where you can make anything happen simply by desiring it. But Suzie's real desire is for her family, and the joys of her personal heaven seem to be only pleasant distractions. I thought the similarities between a Christian's fiction of purgatory/hell and a secularist's fiction of heaven were interesting, but kind of sad for Suzie.
It isn't until much later in the book that we learn Suzie's personal "heaven" is not the final destination--only a stopping place for her to heal and develop before she can join her grandparents and (we assume) all the other souls in 'true heaven'. That revelation in the story brought tears to my eyes. It was beautiful, a vision of purgatory (even though the word was never used and probably wasn't intended, that's exactly what was going on) that didn't revolve around the punitive, dark version so often imagined, but is based on healing and cleansing for a soul before reaching its final destination.
End theological aside
Anyway, a very good book, highly recommended!
Labels: fiction
This book was another one that I picked up used because it was a title I'd never heard from a famous author. I loved Kipling's stories while I was growing up, and although The Light that Failed is very different from his adventure stories, Kipling's captivating storytelling and compelling voice comes through in full force.
The story is a romance between a young war correspondent who returns to England to find that the artwork he'd been sending home for the last few years has received moderate fame, and his childhood sweetheart who is herself an aspiring artist.
I made the mistake of looking the novel up on Wikipedia before I'd finished it, and reading the plot synopsis of an old movie adaptation. The ending described by the article was even more depressing than the book's title had lead me to expect, so I picked up the novel to finish with a heavy heart. Luckily, however, the book's ending was, although similar to the movie, much less depressing and more uplifting, so that'll teach me to wander around Wikipedia with more caution.
Overall, a very enjoyable little novel that I'd recommend to anyone with a fondness for Kipling.
Yep, I did it. I finally gave in and read the latest fangirl craze that's spawning all the vampire-themed novels, movies and TV shows. Despite the tepid to horrified reviews I'd heard, despite the fact that I've always considered vampire stuff to be rather silly, and despite the creep-out factor I get every time Robert Pattinson shows up on posters and magazine covers, I gave it a try.
Somewhat to my surprise, therefore, Twilight wasn't quite as painful as I expected. Granted, that was partially because it was often so bad that it broke through to hilarious. But not completely.
The story itself isn't bad at all, good enough to have me looking forward to the next book. It's cliched, of course, but stories become cliche for a reason. The secondary characters are well done, and I might even like the two main characters if they weren't so cursed annoying.
Unfortunately, the core of an engaging world and a decent story is destroyed by terrible, horrible, no-good prose and narrative voice. I blame a very large part of this on the first-person point of view. First of all, the main effect of a brooding Byronic hero is destroyed when you only see him from his lover's point of view--Bella only see the good in Edward, which is as it should be. The reader is supposed to see the torment, angst and eventual triumph of good over evil or whatever, but because we only see through Bella's eyes, there's no real development of the duality. Second, you can tell us that Edward is a very good looking guy the first time we meet him, and then maybe once more as the relationship really gets going, but after that we'll remember, I promise. You don't have to remind us in every single paragraph for the remainder of the book. And finally, if you're going to build up to a dramatic rescue and crazy vampire fight as the climax of the book, don't make your only POV character unconscious for the vast majority of it. That was a big disappointment >_<
I could go on, but as I mentioned earlier I liked the book enough to continue the series, so there's really no point in picking it apart bit by bit. One more thing I'd like to share though--one of those so-bad-it's-funny moments:
Ever since these books have hit it big, I've been seeing derrogatory references to "sparkly" vampires--often comparing the Twilight variety to the real bad-boys of modern vampire lore. I just assumed that it was just a way of saying that the Twilight brand were wussy little vampires, too pretty and sweet to deserve the name. Nope, silly me :-p Meyer's vampires quite literally sparkle in the sunlight, as if they had crystalline skin o_O
Really? Sparkles?
I read this book almost a year ago, back when I was actually posting, but I've got it queued, so here goes:
I tend to associate Jack London with icy cold settings and dogs (whether White Fang or The Sea Wolf, there's still plenty of cold + dog connotation), but it turns out he traveled and wrote about the sunny south as well. (No dogs in these either, for what it's worth) Not that the stories are any less brutal than his northern tales, but the change of scene and the cultural backdrop is refreshing.
I remember the stories being somewhat hit and miss, some were very good and interesting, while others were just . . . strange. Expect difficult subjects that might get you banned from the local high school such as slavery, other forms of exploitation and violence. However, London is known for moving past the "Noble Savage" stereotype to show all people as individuals, and these stories are prime examples.
Labels: fiction, short stories
This book first caught my eye because the title seemed so offbeat, even though at the time I didn't know that Balzac was a famous French author, which makes it even more so. Once I read a bit about the synopsis though, I was even more interested: Balzac & the Little Chinese Seamstress takes place during the Chinese Cultural Revolution of the 1970s, and I'm not only unfamiliar with that time period, I'm unfamiliar with (but interested in) Chinese culture in general. It seemed like a good chance to learn.
Overview
The main character (who remains unnamed in the English translation) and his best friend Luo-Luo are sent from their home to a remote mountain village as part of the Down to the Country Movement, a program that attempted to 're-educate' privilaged urban youths by sending them to work with peasant farmers for an unspecified amount of time. It's quite a culture shock--possibly comparable to sending a city youth of today back in time to a pioneer farm of the early 1800s--and because the boys' parents are seen as political dissidents, they have very little chance of returning home. (no-one actually says 'political hostages', but that's the basic idea)
Enter the Little Chinese Seamstress--daughter of the tailor in a nearby town, beautiful and literate--a rare flower amid the muck that comprises the rest of the boys' experience on the mountain. (She doesn't actually have a name either, Luo-Luo is the only character with a real name.) Predictably, both boys fall head over heels for her, even though Luo claims that she's 'not sophisticated enough'.
Next, enter Balzac. The boys manage to get their hands on a cache of translated Western novels, all of which are strictly banned, and whole new worlds open before them. Balzac, Hugo, Flaubert, Dumas, and even Dickens introduce them to adventure, intrigue and romance. And Luo decides that these are the perfect tool for improving the Little Seamstress' "sophistication".
Recommended for: Pretty much anyone :-p
Parental Worries: The two boys are about 17, and when you throw in a bunch of French literature and a pretty young girl, things are bound to get . . . adult. Not too much detail though, I'd give it a high R rating.
Audiobook Comments: Read by B. D. Wong, a fact which by itself raises the book's awesomeness twofold. That's because I'm only just recovering from a massive Law and Order addiction, and B.D. Wong plays a psychiatrist in the Special Victims Unit incarnation of the show. Fangirlishness aside though, he really does a very good job.
Ramblings:(Spoiler Threat: Low)
Although I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book, the ending caught me completely off guard, and I was left thinking "what's that supposed to mean?" It was a very contradictory, ironic and almost tragic ending; I couldn't figure out what take-home-message or statement the book was trying to make with it. Then I remembered that I've been reading nothing but fantasy, adventure, and kick-to-the-face moral stories for awhile, so I needed to fine-tune my analysis. For one thing, the story is semi-autobiographical, so one of the main purposes is to illustrate a piece of history, to open a window into a time period that is not particularly well-known. It does a very good job of that--surprisingly good, considering that it takes place in an isolated backwater village. It's also a coming of age story, so there's quite a bit about human nature and lots of colorful characters.
And of course, there's the literature ^_^ The impact of The Count of Monte Cristo or Madam Bovary on a mind accustomed to tepid Communist propaganda is profound, beautifully written and fully explored. My one complaint is that the main character's favorite books, with the exception of Monte Cristo, were virtually unknown to me, so I couldn't wholeheartedly mirror his joy as I could have if he'd been discovering some of my old favorites.
Overall, a very good book and a refreshing break from my fare of late.
Labels: fiction
I could take the easy way out (and help catch up on my growing backlog of reviews to write) by summing up this book in one word: torture. And half way through the book, that's about what I was ready to do, but I persevered for your sake, dear reader. (or was it because I'm too stubborn for my own good? I always forget :-p )
Oh well, I wasn't actually expecting to enjoy Slaughterhouse 5; I'd heard it compared to Catch 22 far too many times for that. But I'll give most books a try, especially if they are as influential as I've heard S5 to be. On the whole, I definitely don't consider my time wasted and I'm glad I finished it--the ending (and particularly the afterward) made it worth reading.
Overview
The book's introduction tells of an encounter between Vonnegut and the wife of his old war buddy, when he visited their home to pick up material for his book. She accuses him of writing another war story that will be turned into a Hollywood thriller, with dashing, heroic men playing the lead roles, when in reality the soldiers were nothing but scared boys. She fears that his story will inspire more babies to run off to war and spill their blood needlessly, but he promises her that there will be no role in his book for John Wayne or any other Hollywood hero. He kept his promise, and there is nothing in his book to inspire war lust or heroic fantasies. But neither is there anything to inspire a reader to love his fellow man, cherish his family, or care for anything in the world.
Plotwise, the book follows the life of Billy Pilgrim, a man who has become unstuck in time. Billy experiences his life in stops and starts--his wedding night one instant, and a night in a German prison camp the next. This tends to make Billy very detached, and we watch his experiences in WWII Germany running side by side with his life before and after the war. His war experiences are more or less linear though, so we follow him up to and through the fire-bombing of Dresden. Oh, and somewhere along the line, Billy gets abducted by time-traveling aliens. Well, not really time-traveling, more like time-exempt--they can see and move in the fourth dimension as easily as we can move through the third. (Yeah, it's supposed to be random)
Recommended for: Anyone interested in reading Important Books. (not a bad reason, that's why I read it :-p )
Parental Worries: Lots. Sex, violence and utter despair, in detail.
Audiobook Comments: Read by Ethan Hawke, which goes to show that if your book is famous enough, you can get a big name to read it. Hawke has a beautiful voice and he does a good job, but for some reason it makes me smirk.
Ramblings (Spoiler Threat: Moderate)
The thing that gets me about this book is the utter detachment. There is no affection between any of the characters, the closest we get is brief recognition of a kindred spirit in passing. Billy has no love for his wife, his children, nothing. He probably loves the porn star that the aliens bring him as a mate, but I'm pretty sure that was all a delusion anyway, so it doesn't count. The main theme of the book is inevitability; Vonnegut isn't calling for an end to war, he merely illustrates its horror. The theme of inevitability is at least partially responsible for the book's detachment--since Billy knows what is going to happen throughout the span of his life, he has no drive to change things or react in any way.
One device Vonnegut uses that really gets under my skin is the use of the phrase "so it goes". Supposedly, that's what Billy's aliens say whenever someone dies, because they not only see the event as unavoidable, but they also see all time at once, so that the person is never really gone. On the surface, it's a beautiful sentiment--death is inevitable, so accepting it and remembering the person's life is a good response. However, he uses it ad nauseum--any time death is mentioned, whether its a person, an animal, an insect, a figure of speech. This takes it from a beautiful idea to a way of belittling human life and the magnitude of its loss, of making it insignificant.
I have to say though, despite all my whining, that this book probably wasn't meant to be enjoyable. It describes horrible events, but for the most part events that actually happened and should not be forgotten. I'm slightly torn as to whether the stark, bleak way the entire story is presented was unnecessarily morbid, or if it the tone was needed to convey the actual shock and horror involved in the WWII events. I'm not referring to the descriptions of the war, (I have no problem with those being as stark and ugly as they really were) but the events in Billy's life afterwards and their juxtaposition with the war stories evoke a special kind of horror and disgust all their own. For instance, we flip between Billy's night in a prison camp to his wedding night and back again. I'm leaning towards unnecessary.
Again, I don't consider my time wasted, but I won't be re-reading S5 if I can possibly avoid it.
