Finished!
That's not quite the same relief I felt on finishing the Tales of the Otori series, which was a release from a tale that had become somewhat tedious and slogging. Finishing the Twilight series was more like getting to the end of a particularly terrifying zip line--it was exhilarating, crazy, and impossible to escape, but in the end, great to have your feet on the ground again.
This massive final volume is actually broken into three books, a change of format from the other three, which were one book each. It's a little discordant, and I wonder if Meyer was caught unaware by her success and ran overboard, trying to up the ante to something more epic. One example of this is when she used a quote from Empire, a recent military thriller by Orson Scott Card, to open a new section. I can't fault her taste in literature, OSC is one of my favorite authors, but for me the quote was not only jarring (I'd just finished reading Empire), but inappropriate. The conflicts in the two books are of different scales and different focus, and it feels like Meyer is trying to borrow gravitas. On the other hand, the three-book format gives us a nice long escape from Bella's head when the second book is narrated by Jacob. This is very welcome, so I'm not going to complain too much.
Meyer reminds me a bit of the fantasy author R.A. Salvatore. They both tell engaging stories that capture the imagination and create memorable, fun characters. And they both have serious failings in the prose and dialogue department.
One more rant, and then I'll let it rest: I heard a rumor that for Meyer's next book, she was working on a point-of-view switch, where she told her original story from another character's point of view. Okay, so she's an Orson Scott Card fan, and that worked really well for him in Ender's Shadow. So I was thinking, what would be a good character for a retelling of this series? It should be someone who can give us angles we've never seen, and expand the universe and the complexity of the story, so probably not a main character. I decided that Leah, the only female werewolf, would be a perfect fit. The werewolves are an enigmatic group, there's a lot going on in the background that we don't see. Plus, as traditional opposites, they're every bit as cool as the vampires are lame. And Leah's got a personal tragedy that's only halfway resolved by the end of the series. She's also one of the few characters that isn't happily paired up with someone by the end of the series, and she's deliciously nasty to everyone--she'd be perfect. I was quite looking forward to another take on the series from her point of view, and then I found out who the second point of view character actually was.
Edward. The guy who's been there throughout the entire series? The guy who's gone to painful lengths to tell us exactly how he feels about everything, especially Bella? Yeah, that guy :-p And that's probably a good way to sum up the series.
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
Still reading Twilight :-p Not too much new to comment on for this one, other than a further observation on what's appealing about the books: the series is essentially a fanfiction of itself. (I feel like the term incestuous applies here, but in the interests of making this a quick post, won't try too hard to work it in)
This volume in particular seems to be extremely indulgent with its readers; every scene you want to see, every exchange between the romantic rivals, every vindictive, humorous, and romantic element is fully drawn out, sometimes painfully so, in a way that's usually only found when fans run wild with their favorite characters. Maybe that's common in the modern romance novel? Or is it unique to this series? Do I care enough to do the research myself? No. :-p
I don't know if I've ever read a Dickens novel that I didn't like, and Nicholas Nickleby is no exception. It's Dicken's third novel and has a much more continuous, cohesive story than Pickwick Papers, but it isn't quite as funny or light-hearted. If you're trying Dickens for the first time, I'd say this isn't a bad place to start.
I'd love to write more, but my backlog of reviews is growing, so these next few are going to be pretty short :-/
Labels: classics
Continuing with the Twilight series, I'd say this second book is a actually a tiny bit better than the first, but still continues the original's fine traditions of melodrama and the tone of a dime-store romance novel. Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure that the advantage is due to Edward's disappearance for about 75% of the book, a happy coincidence that is unlikely to occur again in the series. To be fair, Edward himself isn't quite that bad, but Bella's constant gushing and mooning is.
So, if all I'm going to do is complain about how bad these books are, why do I bother reading them at all? That's the frustrating part: despite the horrible writing and painful romance scenes, I found myself looking forward to this book, and once started, it was hard to put down. That in itself leads a secondary motive for continuing--trying to figure out what causes this effect. I feel like I'm watching both myself and the books under a microscope the whole time, trying to dissect the magic that's made them so popular.
I have noticed a few things. For starters, the non-romantic dialogue can be quite amusing from time to time, not just the so-bad-its-funny stuff. Also, Meyer really knows how to build up a scene: you'll know what's going to happen, and you'll be looking forward to it (or dreading it, sometimes), but she plays the anticipation game, drawing it out and putting you on the edge of your seat. The werewolf/vampire contrast makes things kind of interesting too, and several of the characters tend to grow on you after awhile.
Lookit me, I finally said some nice things about the series!
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.
Finally finished! Its kind of sad when that's the first impression I have of finishing a series. But that's honestly about right. By the fifth book the beauty and novelty of the setting has begun to lose its effect, and as I discovered awhile ago, the story isn't particularly interesting and the characters tend heavily towards annoying.
Although I appreciate that Lian Hearn gives her Hero the full classical/archetypal treatment, I think I've realized why Takeo in particular is such an annoying character. He's basically a perfect 21st century man, with social, mental, and moral outlooks and attitudes that are extremely modern. He'd be a paragon of politically correct virtue in any book set in the 21st century, but is jarringly out of place in feudal Japan, even fantasy feudal 'not-really-Japan-at-all-we-promise'.
To be fair, his rather unique upbringing gives him good reason to hold views that do not match his time, but it just seems all too convenient and contrived. * shrug * Maybe that was the whole point of the book, and I'd be more forgiving if those coincidentally modern morals aligned more closely with my own. Any dissenting opinions are welcome :-p
Labels: fantasy, Tales of the Otori
