Discovering the Classics

Pride and Prejudice

2012-02-17T23:20:00.002-05:00

I started reading Pride and Prejudice about 24 hours ago and am already 15% done. (If I had a nickel for every time that happened...) For all my dreading of Austen and agony of suffering through this book in AP English, it's not actually as bad as I had anticipated. I really am attributing this to the edition that I happened to find at the library.

The library that I go to is generally not as well-stocked as other branches, but it was the closest, so I stopped in on the way to dinner. The website said that they had a copy in, but when I got there I couldn't find it. I checked the young adult paperback racks a few times, and finally found a copy. I think I was expecting a penguin edition or an old one with tiny print and yellow pages. However, the copy I found was kind of an over sized paperback that claimed it was the "insight edition." As I looked inside, I saw that every page or so had a note in the margin from the publisher, including things such as historical notes and tidbits about Austen's life. The notes are almost like footnotes, except much more accessible, and on the side of the page rather than the bottom. For me, the notes are WONDERFUL because they help keep my attention on the story and give background that is generally lost on me.

It also helped that I was hired to do nothing but read today, so I got 10 or so chapters done. It's actually a more interesting story than I originally thought in high school. But we'll see. I won't write my opinion of Darcy at this point because people would probably come after me with pitchforks or something. I'll have to see if he's really any better than Rhett Butler, who is much more interesting than a grumpy rich dude with lots of books. (cue Anchorman reference: I'm very important. I have many leather bound books and my apartment smells of rich mahogany. Haha, I wish that was in the editors notes).

Anyway, I'm hoping to finish this book before February is over. It might be fun to finish while I am recovering from wisdom tooth surgery.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Check!

2012-02-15T22:34:00.002-05:00

I just finished THGTTG this morning (title is too long to write out every time). The beginning was entertaining and captivating, but as the book went on, it got a little too involved and strange for me. I think part of it was that this book is actually part of a long series, and so not everything could be resolved in the first book. However, it was a fairly quick read, with many many short chapters, so while it was not challenging, it was kind of hard to keep track of. I guess science fiction is not really my thing, but I enjoyed it nonetheless.

My next book I think will be Pride and Prejudice. We'll see, though. I know how things turn out when I plan to do something...

The Giver

2012-01-24T23:05:00.003-05:00

Today I read The Giver by Lois Lowry. I had not intended to read an entire book today, especially such a heavy book, but I was subbing in a middle school and was basically overseeing study halls all day, so I found a book in the room and started reading. The book that I found was The Giver.

I read The Giver in middle school, too. I remember starting it in fifth grade and being confused, but then finishing and liking it when we read it as a class in sixth grade. I remember being confused by the ending though, and was hoping that when I finished, I'd have a more definitive answer about what happened. Even though it's not the most uplifting book it was definitely interesting to read, and I noticed much more than I did (or remembered that I did) in middle school.

Basically, The Giver is about a boy named Jonas who lives in a controlled society where no one sees colors, there are no feelings, and the society is run by a very strict set of rules. At age twelve, children become adults and get assigned to jobs in the community. Jonas gets selected to be the new Receiver, a very honored and respected position. There is only one Receiver in the society, and he (or she) is in charge of holding all memories for the society. Jonas becomes the new Receiver, and the old Receiver becomes known as the Giver. The Giver transmits memories to Jonas of things he has never before seen or experienced, from simple things like colors, snow, sun, and sledding, to pain and war. Jonas is not allowed to speak about any of his training or new memories to anyone, so as a result he forms a special bond with the Giver, while simultaneously feeling more and more isolated from his family, friends, and community. Eventually, Jonas finds out that if he leaves the community, the memories will leave him and find homes in the people of the community. Jonas and the Giver decide that the would be beneficial to everyone because people should know about good and bad things, and not be kept from knowledge. Therefore, one night Jonas escapes his house. He takes with him a baby, named Gabriel, who has been staying with Jonas's family for extra care before he is given to a family. The evening before Jonas escapes, Jonas's father tells the family that Gabriel will be released (aka euthanized) because he cannot sleep through the night, despite so much extra care. Jonas decides to save Gabriel's life and therefore takes him along when he runs away. For the first few days, there are planes out searching for Jonas, but after a while the planes disappear, and Jonas and Gabriel get farther and farther from the community. They get very hungry, and the weather gets cold. They are very cold, and at the end stumble upon a sled at the top of the hill. They get on the sled and go down the hill. The ending is unclear whether Jonas is lucid or living within his memory. He has either escaped and found a new community that may take him and Gabriel in, or he and Gabriel have frozen to death.

Despite reading this book at age 11 and now mid-20's, the ending is no more clear. There's evidence either way, but no definitive proof about what actually did or, to disprove something, did not happen. It's hard to say if this story had a happy or sad ending because it's unclear what actually happened. If Jonas made it to another society, it would be a happy ending, but if he died it would be sad. Either way, he got his wish of choice and free will, and the choice to die/leave was all his own, and if he died, at least he died experiencing life, sensations, and colors. Either he died living or he is still living.

Even though it was a children's/young adult book, it was still very thought provoking. It's a book that makes you appreciate the way things are in your society now, and reminds you not to take things for granted, even simple things like color and love. So even though I didn't set out today to read a book, I did, and it was refreshing.

(I am also in the middle of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, with Pride and Prejudice up next. More to come!)

Bridget Jones's Diary: Check!

2011-12-31T00:11:00.002-05:00

A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE!!! I finished another book!!

So not only was this book hilarious and so so entertaining (to the point that I rarely checked to see what percent of the book I had finished), it was also the PERFECT book to read just before new years.

Bridget's diary covers a full year of her life. It starts with a list of new years resolutions, most of which fall by the wayside even though she tries to keep track of them. It then chronicles her life with her friends, parents, work, and love interests. And by the end of the year her life is not the perfect life she imagined but she did accomplish some of the things on her list of resolutions.

I think the thing about this book is that it brings out how hard it is to change yourself. Bridget struggles with her weight (although it would have been more realistic if she weighed closer to 150 than 125), her alcohol consumption, smoking, and her constant checking of England's version of Caller ID. She is insecure and hopes that overnight she will be able to quit smoking and drinking and suddenly be a size 0. She tries to quit smoking a few times throughout the book but still smokes by the end. Similarly she drinks and weighs 2 more pounds in December than she did in January. But her personality and the ability to see so many people in her is what makes her such a likable character.

I didn't really realize, although I have seen the movie many a time, that this book would be such a perfect read around New Years time. (I also failed to realize that the movie was based on a book, which is embarrassing). I am a huge fan of holidays in general, but I don't tend to enjoy New Years very much. I think people like that it's a new beginning (which leads to overcrowding of gyms for about a month) and a fresh start--the perfect time to rid themselves of bad habits, just like Bridget. For me it's TOO much pressure to change, and I start having new years like moments randomly throughout the year, suddenly deciding in July that I'm going to run a marathon some day and also learn to cook (which ironically doesn't seem terribly compatible, although this is a real life example). With each passing year I feel like I am in the same spot I was in the year before and before and before, and this year I feel no different. Another year has passed and I am still unemployed with several degrees, living at home, and single. I have no prospects on any of those fronts, and I desperately hope at this time every year, that the new year brings good things. And while I don't find myself with a dream job, a house, and an engagement ring, I do find redeeming qualities of this year, just as Bridget found that after a year she had at least solved one of her dilemmas. I haven't really solved mine in as black and white terms as Bridget did, but I think on each of the fronts I am closer to what I want eventually. And like Bridget, I need to be patient and look back after some time has passed, although it is OK to get frustrated on the way. Overall, if I can get even a little closer to my goals in 2012, I'll be content.

I read this book in 2 days. I got it from the library thinking it would be an easy read, but I didn't realize it would go so quickly (same with The Secret Garden). This brings this year's total up to 10:
* Jane Eyre
* Catcher in the Rye
* The Lovely Bones
* The Wind in the Willows
* The Little Prince
* The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe
* 1984
* Little Women
* The Secret Garden
* Bridget Jones's Diary

So, while I missed my original goal of 12, I did read one more book than last year, which I am going to count as "winning" (although I did read more than 12 books this year--Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Water for Elephants, The Two Towers, The Horse and His Boy--some just weren't on the list or didn't count as one book because it's part of a series). I still have books that I haven't read yet and they're the same ones I've been listing for a year or so. My goal is to read the ones I have waiting before taking any more out of the library or purchasing any more online. Ones not on the list that I want to read include:
* The Girl Who Played With Fire
* The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest
* Treasure Island
* Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn
* Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
* Beatrice and Virgil (a new book by Yann Martel)

Looking back, it's interesting that over half of my 2011 books are intended for children or young adults. Not sure where I'm going with that, but just thought it was interesting.

I think to deal with my current romantic situation, I will be trying to read more books with romantic themes. Bridget Jones was a good introduction to that. At some point this year I'm going to bite the bullet and read Pride and Prejudice. I'll be trying to find others in a similar vein (although not all Austen...ick! Not all at once, anyway). When I get annoyed with that, as I no doubt will, I'll resume with the ends of series that I've started and other non-romantic publications to get back on track.

My goal for 2012 is going to be 12 books (aka numbers to cross off the list) again, to allow for books that are long. Even though I will most likely have more free time, I don't want to be choosing books based on pages in order to meet a yearly goal. Who knows if this blog will even be still going in a year. Anyway...

Cheers and Happy 2012 to you!

The Secret Garden: Check!

2011-12-27T14:17:00.004-05:00

In the last 24 hours or so, I have started and finished reading The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. I watched the movie semi-recently, so I had an idea of the plot before I started reading. However, I really enjoyed this book so much more than the movie.

I thought it was interesting how both the garden and Mary started out figuratively and literally ugly, for lack of a better turn, and how they worked together to grow from each other and both began to flourish. I also enjoyed how Mary and the garden helped to heal Colin, who was not a cripple at all but instead a bratty little nincompoop who wanted everything his way. I am glad that it had a happy ending though. (I really wanted an epilogue where Mary and Dickon got together, though. Too bad they weren't a little older).

This book has made me want to read A Little Princess as well. I watched that movie a few weeks ago and it reminded me of The Secret Garden because both girls had moved from India to England. I discovered that both books were written by the same author, but that the author herself had never been to India, which is what I would have expected based on the beginning of those two books. I also would have never guessed that she spent her adult life in Tennessee of all places. Interesting.

So, that brings this year's total to 9. I'm wondering if I can squeak in another book, but chances are I won't. Ah, well...I tried. I really would like to finish Lord of the Rings, but I just don't have the patience for it. Maybe the new year will bring some renewed energy for that series. I really want to find out what happens to Frodo, I just can't deal with 100+ pages of whatever is going on with the others. If that one fails again, I'll try again with Midnight's Children, Middlemarch, Sherlock Holmes, or even venture out into some Pride and Prejudice to spice things up.

Little Women: Check!

2011-11-28T10:23:00.003-05:00

I finished Little Women last night. Overall, I enjoyed it, but I definitely liked the beginning of the book better. I think it's because they were more carefree and less concerned with finding husbands. My favorite part was when Jo met Laurie in the curtains. I feel like everything worked out as it should have. Amy definitely got less annoying as the book went on. When she turned down Fred I could tell she no longer wanted to marry only for money. I thought this was an enjoyable book and one that could be read over and over. I got this one from the library but may look into purchasing it at some point.

Next up: probably Lord of the Rings or Midnight's Children. LOTR to finish the series and Midnight's Children because I started it and never finished. That will give me 9 books for the year!

I'll also be rereading A Christmas Carol in preparation for Christmas...except I'll be doing that when it gets cold. One can hope.

Little Women: 60%

2011-11-19T00:49:00.002-05:00

For a while I was glued to this book! Then Meg got married and nothing interesting has happened since. Jo wrote a book and is behaving like an idiot. Amy is being annoyingly vain. Beth is so freaking frail. And the dad is back from the war, which is good, but no longer suspenseful. So...we shall see.

I really enjoyed part 1 of this book, but since getting to part 2, the "action" (if you can even call it that) has kind of died down, and the most that has happened is that Jo has insulted Aunt March (big surprise there!)

So...the reading continues. I can't wait to finish so I can watch the movie(s)!

Little Women: 30%

2011-11-10T22:34:00.002-05:00

In spite of all the books I own and have started, I decided to go with Little Women. So far I'm 30% through it, and it's pretty enjoyable so far. Sometimes I feel like it gets a bit preachy, especially when the overly righteous mother starts teaching the girls morals, but other than that it's going well. So far not much has happened in the way of plot, but I'm sure it's setting up for things to come. Every chapter is a new story about things that happen to the 4 March girls, but not a continuation of anything except their friendship with Laurie. We'll see how that goes.

Beth bothers me a little though. She is so meek and bashful that it's almost annoying to read. She also keeps saying how stupid she is, which I don't readily accept either. Additionally, she is too good for a normal person that she doesn't seem like a believable character. Maybe I'll feel some sympathy at some point, but if not it won't be the first time I don't sympathize with the right characters.

Sad and Pathetic

2011-11-08T11:07:00.004-05:00

So, here it is, November 8th, and I've only checked 7 books off the list. My goal for the year was 12, but at this point if I can get to 9 it'll be a miracle. I definitely read more books than 7, but many of them didn't count because they were not on the list or because they were part of a series that needs to be checked off all at once.

I spent a lot of time over the past few months NOT reading because of other things going on. Last night, though, I started experiencing a little withdrawal, so I began reading Middlemarch. This is the fifth book (at least) that I have begun and not yet finished. I have such good intentions too!

Middlemarch is about 800 pages. I'm hoping that one is good and goes quickly. I'm also at the beginning of The Return of the King (to check off #2), Midnight's Children, Sherlock Holmes, and Little Women. I also started Oliver Twist about a year ago and have yet to pick it back up. I also owe myself the third Harry Potter book. I think I have so many unread books on the shelf that it makes me overwhelmed at the thought of finishing all of them. Maybe if I get desperate I'll go on a Narnia spree and finish that number instead, even if it means reading 4 books instead of 1)

So, I'll hopefully be finishing at least one of those books this year. I'll probably also read A Christmas Carol several times before Christmas (even though that one's already checked off) on account of my super awesome illustrated book that I found last year at Hallmark. It's probably one of the nicest books I own.

So, here's to Middlemarch, or whatever other book I attempt to finish by the end of the year. Good luck to me!

Is it bad that I don't care about Merry/Pippin/Gandalf, etc.?

2011-09-14T10:27:00.002-04:00

I have decided to finish up the LOTR series that has been bringing me down for over a year. I've read the first 5 pages so far. I know it takes a little bit to get into a book, but I think this one is different. The first half is all about the random characters that I don't really care about, and the second half is when Frodo throws the ring into the volcano. All I'm really interested in is the second half, but I can't just skip the story. I wish it was more integrated so I would keep reading in order to find out what happens to Frodo. I hope I can get through it before work and school pick up again.

Oh what a project this is turning out to be!

30%

2011-09-05T14:12:00.002-04:00

I just wanted to update with the statement that I have officially read 30 books from the list, which is more than double what I started out with. Before setting out on this adventure, I had read 14, and then last year I read 9 and this year so far I've read 7, so hooray for being farther along than I thought I was!

(I have actually read more than 7 books this year, and to be even more clear, some of the numbers on the list are actually several books. I'm getting very close with Lord of the Rings, and making progress in the Chronicles of Narnia. So, 7 for this year and 9 for last year are actually numbers crossed off the list and not actual books. Ergo, reading The Two Towers and The Horse and his Boy don't count until the last of the series are finished....which is a little bit of a rip off but possibly that much more satisfying when it's done)

How long until I get to 40%? We shall see, we shall see....

1984: check!

2011-09-04T21:08:00.002-04:00

Another one crossed off my list!

So this was definitely an interesting read, and as predicted, something happened right after I posted last. And it did involve the girl and the thought police.

The ending was not quite what I was expecting, but it worked nonetheless. I definitely have more respect for Orwell after reading this book, as opposed to the misery that is Animal Farm. It is interesting how he juxtaposes Winston and Julia. They believe the same thing and have similar ideologies, but are different ages. In other words, Winston can remember times that were different from the year 1984, while Julia has grown up as a child of the party, and puts up a good front in order to disguise her true feelings.

One of the more terrifying ideas in the book was that of doublethink and altering the past. At one point, Winston noted that if O'Brien believed he was floating and Winston also believed he was floating, regardless of whether he was floating or not, he was floating. The making up of lies and forcing others to believe them was definitely an interesting concept. Bush thought we were going into Iraq to get weapons of mass destruction, and if Americans believe that, then that's what we're doing, regardless of why the war started in the first place. Orwell definitely is a strange thinker...

Additionally, the passages and chapters about Winston changing facts, deleting references to people who had disappeared, switching papers back and forth between Eurasia and Eastasia to convince the public of the truth were mind boggling too. Essentially, Winston and others work to destroy the past and make it relevant only to the present. The fact that Winston was one of the only ones who could remember the past was interesting, but vague. It could be that others could remember the past but were so brainwashed that they accepted everything Big Brother said without question, or that Winston was legitimately one of the only ones who could remember. I think the former is more likely because Winston did talk to a prole who could remember things, so it's likely that the party has brainwashed memories out of people. While I am glad I do not live like Winston, I feel there are enough eerie coincidences or foresight by Orwell to be just a little off put.

I don't feel the need to analyze everything that happened in the second half of the book, but I will leave you with some quotes I enjoyed.

"'Who controls the past,' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.'" (p. 34)

"Perhaps a lunatic was simply a minority of one." (p. 80)

"The best books, he perceived, are those that tell you what you know already." (p. 200)

I wasn't expecting to like that book, or even have it influence me as it did. Kudos to Orwell, I guess. Next up is most likely Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Knowing me, though, I may come back with something completely different and not even something on my shelf. We'll see about reading though...school starts again on Tuesday so my free time may vanish before my very eyes.

Mid 1984

2011-09-03T10:15:00.002-04:00

I decided to read 1984 for a few reasons:
1. My friends recommended it. Most likely they read it in high school. High school book are generally dry and analyzed to death, and therefore widely read in sparknotes versions, so for several of them to recommend this one, it had to have been pretty good.
2. My aunt gave me 3 books for Christmas last year: The Lovely Bones, The Catcher In The Rye, and 1984. I figured I should have them all read before Christmas comes around again (IN LESS THAN 4 MONTHS!!!)
3. I owned the book and it was small enough to fit in my purse to take to work and read there in the case that the kids I watch wanted to play together and not fight.

Additionally, I borrowed the audiobook from the library and listen to that when I work out. I do like music when I work out, but I also use music when I study or write papers, so in general I am pretty good at tuning it out or having it for background noise, and that doesn't work as well on a treadmill. Audiobooks, on the other hand, require concentration, which means that I am concentrating on listening if I don't want to hear the same thing 10 times over. This consequently also means that I am not focusing on how far/fast I am running or how tired I am or how heavy my 2lb weights feel.

All that being said, I am 35% done with the book, and have just finished part 1. It is surprisingly interesting for being a) Orwell, b) negative utopia, c) a little slow moving.

a) The only other Orwell I have read is Animal Farm, twice, and I did not enjoy it either time. I had to read it as summer work before 9th grade, and I didn't understand it because we had never learned about Russia, and I didn't really get what this had to do with anything else. So, while I did not expect to like Orwell for all these reasons, I am actually enjoying this book.

b) Also in 9th grade, in our unit with Animal Farm, we had to read a short story called Harrison Bergeron by Vonnegut. From what I remember, it was about a society where people are pulled down to the lowest common denominator. If one person is in a wheelchair, everyone has to be. While there are significant holes in the story (that mainly show that Vonnegut did not account for all types of diversity) I feel that Vonnegut has a point even in today's society where sometimes this happens in schools. At the end of the story, Harrison Bergeron pulls out of the chains and can fly. Ninth grade me was utterly confused and having a "question mark question mark" what the hell moment. Probably if I read it today I could figure out the ending. Anyway, Harrison Bergeron is another example of a negative utopia where people are supposed to be equal and happy in theory, but this does not work in actuality. Yes, everyone supporting Big Brother would get rid of a lot or partisan politics and political tension (our current situation in Washington comes to mind) but it's not realistic by any means. Any while in 1984 so far there are the party supporters and the proles, in a real society there would be countless other groups putting in their two cents. Though negative utopias don't exactly mirror real society (just as regular utopias don't mirror real society) I think 1984 has enough merit, issues and negligible holes in reasoning to make it valid and readable.

c) I have probably said this before, but my favorite movie is It's A Wonderful Life. And true to the title, the movie goes through the life of George Bailey: his childhood, his adult life, his marriage, his job, etc. and it doesn't get to "the good part" (disclaimer: I think the entire thing is good) aka the part with meaty plot until the last hour or so. So, in general, the movie sets itself up for over an hour and then tells a story with what it's set up. The first half of the movie is vitally important, but you can't appreciate it until you have seen what happens in the second half. I am not positive, but I have a feeling this is kind of like 1984. Having just finished part 1, I feel it is mostly setup with just a hint of plot. I've enjoyed it because I like stories about people's everyday lives. It's A Wonderful Life and Gone With The Wind are about peoples' lives and I love those two the most so far. Even Anna Karenina has its mundane parts that give away so much about the characters and lifestyle.

However, there is a distinct difference between any of those and 1984. The other books and films I've mentioned only have to set up characterization, family structures, time period, cause and effect, etc. We as readers (or viewers) can take for granted the ways in which people interact; the rules, laws, and social norms; feelings and relationships; even the things these characters might have in their houses. 1984 has to set up all of that, as well as characterization and structure and time period and cause and effect. 1984 shows a completely different world than the other works I've mentioned, so it has to start from scratch. Therefore, while I do feel it is moving slowly, it is for good reason and no more slowly than the others.

Overall, I'm excited for the rest of the book. I am hoping things will pull together at the end, and maybe an event or another character will appear to get the ball rolling. Maybe it'll be the spy girl or the super creepy thought police.

As a side note, I thought the picture on the front cover (and the little one on the spine) was a flower (or an exploding sun/space object), but my friends have informed me that it is in fact an eye. The fact that an eye is looking at me from my bookshelf creeps me out a little, so I'm going to continue to pretend it's a flower.

Water for Elephants, or straying from the list

2011-08-25T18:09:00.002-04:00

Once again I have strayed from the list, but to my defense, the book took less than 2 days to complete AND it was a vacation book (most of which I read at home). Water for Elephants was entertaining and definitely something different from what I have been reading as of late. Sometimes I think it's good to read something more current. I didn't really like the book until about halfway in, but once I got there it was hard to leave unfinished.

My next up was going to be another stray from the list, The Girl Who Played With Fire, but seeing as that is due back to the library and not renewable, I'll pick something from my reserves. Last night I was at a party where everyone was raving about 1984 (disclaimer: This was not a party related to books, this was a birthday party where someone mentioned they were reading 1984 and everyone listening said how wonderful it was) so I'll probably start with that. I am in the middle of Midnight's Children, but losing interest and making no progress so I'll leave it for a while and try 1984 as something different. (It's probably also easier to finish by the beginning of school once again....blech!)

The Horse And His Boy: Check!

2011-08-22T21:37:00.002-04:00

Well...I finished the third book of the Narnia series. I generally don't really enjoy these books even though I probably should. However, this one was even worse, probably because the 4 kids were not in it really and basically nothing happened the whole time. Basically I have nothing to say about it except that it's getting me slightly closer to finishing the series (although I'm not even halfway yet). I guess I'll keep trying to plug along at this one even though it's really not my favorite.

I'm also working on Water For Elephants, which I was reading as a vacation book. It's pretty good. I'm about a third of the way through it. My favorite part of it so far is the real circus pictures from the 1930's or so. I'll finish that one next even though it's not on the list. Then I'll probably start The Girl Who Played With Fire before refocusing on the list...maybe trying some Sherlock Holmes or LOTR again.

I'm too cluttered to focus on reading right now, though. I'll come back to it eventually.

The Lion, The Wtich, and The Wardrobe: Check!

2011-07-21T19:23:00.003-04:00

I just finished The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe today. I really only had about 30 pages to go, because I listened to most of it on audiobook in the fall and forgot to finish. It was less thrilling than the movie, but I did enjoy the book and the movie, and I was glad to have some of the movie's images in my head.

I don't pretend to be a biblical scholar, and I'm not, but I'm sure that this book is chalk full of biblical references that went right over my head. I know that Aslan is a symbol for Jesus, but only because I've heard it elsewhere...I would not have figured even that obvious piece out for myself. I enjoyed the book well enough, but surprisingly not as much as Lord of the Rings (gasp!).

Next up should be the rest of the series, but we'll see how far I get with that one. I've already read the first two chapters of the third book, The Horse and his Boy. My favorite teacher read us The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and then for some reason she bought me The Horse and His Boy to read in the summer. I tried and tried and I NEVER could finish it because I found it too dull. I think I expected Lucy, Edmond, Susan, and Peter to be in it, but they were not (or at least they are not in the beginning). But we'll see how this goes, hopefully quickly as it's a children's series.

The Little Prince: check!

2011-06-29T08:24:00.003-04:00

This weekend I went on a road trip that took approximately 10 hours each way, and on the way back I listened to the 2 hour audiobook of The Little Prince to pass the time. What an interesting book! It was definitely shorter than I imagined, and I didn't know there would be the narrator as a character in it...I thought it would be a story of a prince from outer space who went random places and then returned home. I guess my impression of the story was not too far off.

There were a ton of great quotes in the book, but I'm a little upset that I did not mark them down because I was driving. I loved the humor in the book, and the idea of looking at things from a child's point of view. Fresh from teaching kindergarten, some of the things the little prince said made perfect sense to me.

Enjoyable. The storyline was a little bizarre, but it had a wonderful message of friendship and innocence and perspective. I thought it was a wonderful story.

Next up: Midnight's Children. I was reading it before I left and I'll be continuing. I'm only a couple of chapters in right now, but I'm enjoying it...it reminds me of the beginning of Life of Pi right now a little bit as they are both set in India. Hopefully it is excellent because it was highly recommended by the man at the bookstore.

Next up....

2011-05-15T11:41:00.002-04:00

I finished Girl With The Dragon Tattoo this morning. It was excellent. I'm going to wait a while before jumping into the next one, though, because my head is still spinning a little bit. I have not been into crime novels in the past (mostly because they sounded creepy and thus did not give them a fair chance) but this one was very good. If you can get past some violent and sexual scenes, this book is for you! I read approximately 300 pages yesterday, which was basically all but the very end of the book.

I'm deciding what to do for my next book. I'll go back to reading from the list, but I'm not sure what to do. This choice changes daily, and I can't seem to make up my mind. Yesterday, I was leaning toward something short, which at the current time is either 1984 or The Secret Garden. Then I started thinking that Middlemarch should be my kickoff to summer book instead. However, I've been toying with the idea of Sherlock Holmes instead. While I have two volumes of Sherlock Holmes, I have found that the many of the stories are short and could easily be set aside. Also, maybe I'll keep with the mystery theme that I have going.

It's another rainy day...a good day for reading and avoiding other stuff I have to do.

A little more than halfway!

2011-05-14T17:54:00.002-04:00

Holy Crap! That's all I have to say. I'm already more than halfway through and this book has kept me interested the whole way through.

Highly recommend!

Wow!

2011-05-10T19:04:00.002-04:00

Girl with the Dragon Tattoo--Awesome so far!

I'm not really into crime novels, or books that are complicated, or super suspenseful. However, once in a while I get a book in my hands that I have a hard time putting down, that goes quickly, and I can find myself reading a hundred pages at a time without even noticing (The Da Vinci Code comes to mind). So, this one definitely is worth reading, and worth being slightly sidetracked for, as it's not on my original list. I'm only about 150ish pages in (644 pages total) but it's awesome so far.

I also love stories where there are two seemingly unrelated characters whose stories I know are meant to intertwine somehow. Anna Karenina has an example of this. The Two Towers did to an extent, except that there are books that start with two characters who then part, but the author tells us their stories simultaneously after their parting (i.e. The Lovely Bones, The Two Towers). However, I find the first kind more interesting because, apart from the two stories that the author begins telling, there is also the anticipation of how the characters are related enough to be in the same book.

For example, Anna and Levin are the protagonists in Anna Karenina, and they are protagonists of their own stories within the same book. The fact that Anna and Stiva are siblings and Levin is his friend is not enough. The book is titled Anna Karenina, so why even bring Stiva's friend into it at all? However, later in the book, Levin and Anna meet, giving way to an earth shattering comparrisson of the two characters, and an obvious look at each character's journey throughout the book. Anna started well-off and then began a downward spiral when she started her affair with Vronsky. Likewise, Levin started off in total despair when Kitty had turned him down, but eventually married her and began an incline. The meeting of Anna and Levin lets the reader put together the fact that Anna and Levin have stories that are mirror images of each other, which becomes more apparent as the story ends.

I'm anticipating the same to be true with Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist. The fact that Lisbeth is investigating Blomkvist is not enough yet...these two must be connected in some way. After all, this book is titled after the female lead just as Anna Karenina is, but so far I have heard the most about Mikael's life on the island with Henrik. We will have to see what Lisbeth is up to soon. I also wonder what all of the facts about domestic violence against women in Sweden is about, seeing as the only thing of that nature to have happened so far is the speculation of murder of Harriet. With the attention this issue, as well as public acclaim for Salander's character, she must take on a larger role in the story as it continues.

Ok! Onward!

The Wind in the Willows: Check!

2011-05-01T16:20:00.002-04:00

That brings the total for 2011 up to 4. Woo hoo!

Overall, I don't have that much to say about this book. I had high expectations because I used to like the Disney version. However, the book version left something to be desired. There were a lot of stories that didn't really tie into the main plot or theme, and the overarching story of Toad being reformed only showed up in a few chapters. I wish I had known that going in, but too late now. Not the best book I've read on this list by far (although probably not the worst either).

Next up: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo/The Secret Garden (probably...)

The Two Towers: Check!

2011-05-01T15:25:00.002-04:00

After a day and a half of straight reading (thanks to some sort of illness I've no doubt picked up from school) I have finally finished The Two Towers! It ended on an interesting note, but unfortunately the next book starts with 140 pages of Pippin, Merry, and Gandalf, which means approximately another month until I get to read about Sam and Frodo again. While I liked the organization in the second book because it helped me keep the adventures of different characters straight, I wish it would be a little more interspersed in the third so that I wouldn't be so reluctant to start it.

Overall, though, I did enjoy thish book, and though I got a little lost in the battle scenes involving the Legolas/Gimli/Aragorn trio, I though the book was overall pretty enjoyable. Most of it made sense, probably because I watched the movie before starting to refresh my memory. I'll probably do that again be starting the third book.

My plan is to finish the series this summer, knocking #3 off my list for good! However, I'm not quite ready to commit to that just yet. My plan now is to finish The Wind in the Willows and then take a break from the list with The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. Upon finishing that, my choices are

*1984
*Midnight's Children
*Middlemarch
*The Secret Garden
*Sherlock Holmes
*War and Peace (although I'm trying to save that one for last!)

We'll see what happens when I get there, I guess, but ciao for now and I'll probably be back momentarily with a recap of Wind in the Willows.

Itching to read

2011-03-21T10:16:00.002-04:00

Even though I'm still in the middle of The Two Towers, I have been itching to read some other books that are sitting on my shelf, untouched. A lot of them seem like springtime titles to me, so I decided to start one of them, hoping I could finish it quickly. That isn't working out to well. I am not in the middle of both The Two Towers AND The Wind in the Willows.
It's not that The Wind in the Willows isn't good; it's just that it's not what I expected. I was expecting something a little more like Mr. Toad's Wild Ride from Disneyland than a book that reads more like Winnie the Pooh. So far all we've seen Toad do is drive his carriage into a ditch and become obsessed with cars. The story is more about Mole at this point, as a new member of the riverside community.

The picture of toad hypnotized by a motercar was more what I was expecting. When I was little we had that movie and I used to watch it over and over. I guess five chapters into the book I would have expected to see toad a little more. But to be fair, we did just meet Badger.

I may do a little snooping to find out why Grahame wrote this book. For this book, I'm having a hard time believing he just decided to write a random book about some animals who live near a river. There are already several mentions of Badger hating society, and toad being obsessed with the latest greatest invention. Additionally, Mole is innocent and knows hardly anything about life on the river. There's something going on in that, I just don't know enough about the historical context of the book. I'll have to look into that a little bit.

I Love The Two Towers?

2011-03-03T18:33:00.002-05:00

Seriously! I never thought I would, and actually judging by my enjoyment of the movies, I was preparing to like this one less than The Fellowship, but I am pleasantly surprised! I'm not sure if it's because I'm actually enjoying it, or if it's because I had such low expectations. I'm not sure which and honestly I don't really care.

So far I'm in the middle of chapter 4, in which Pippin and Merry are at the Ent's house, which I am picturing as a walking tree that took them into a cave, but I'm thinking that's not the whole story.

It's really too bad I have so much stinking work to do, because I would really just like to dedicate my time to this book. I'm thinking as spring approaches and things start to wind down for a month or two, I'll have enough time to really enjoy this one and the one that follows. Yay LOTR!! I'm so glad to be enjoying it finally, since everyone else in the world seems to love it. I'm also glad that the nice looking set of Tolkien books I bought was not a waste of money.

The Two Towers

2011-02-21T19:07:00.002-05:00

Last night I started The Two Towers (finally)

So far I've read about 10 pages. What I was surprised by so far is the fact that the first half of the book is all about Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, Merry, and Pippin and what will happen to the five of them. The second half shows the journey of Frodo and Sam. I’m relieved at this because I was worried about keeping track of the events of 3 or more groups of characters at a time, but it looks like Tolkien has taken care of that worry for me. I was also worried about not remembering the events of the last book since I read it almost a year ago. However, I was surprised how quickly it came back to me. Even though I’ve been dreading this for a while, I’m excited to continue reading and find out what happens. Yay for finally being excited about LOTR (like a normal person, haha)!!

The Lovely Bones: CHECK!

2011-02-12T13:36:00.002-05:00

I finished The Lovely Bones this morning. I thought it was pretty good: well written, interesting ideas, realistic (except for the bizzare happenings of the last 20 pages). I'm honestly a little surprised that so many people have read it. There were times where I thought the story was at a little bit of a stand still. At one point, I thought an elaborate plot was going to develop, especially when Lindsey sneaked into George Harvey's house and stole his drawing. Basically, I thought Lindsey and her dad would solve the mystery, but no such luck. Things just went on as usual.

Usually, I like books that go on and on without a whole lot of action or suspense. Remember, my two favorite books are Gone With The Wind and Anna Karenina. Therefore, this book of Suzie watching the earth from Heaven should be up there on my list because it was about a bunch of people dealing with a murder of a loved one. However, I was a little disappointed because my sister told me it was a "page turner." To me, this book wasn't a page turner. It was interesting, intriguing, thought provoking, and there were some exciting parts, but there was never a part that I couldn't put down. Maybe my idea of a page-turner has been tainted by The Hunger Games, which is the ultimate page turner. I'm not sure why, this book just wasn't as exciting as I thought it would be.

I'd have to say my favorite part was when the father was explaining to Buckley, who was 4 or 5 at the time, what happened to Suzie using monopoly pieces. He told him what pieces everyone used, and that Suzie was the shoe and that she was out of the game. And for a while this seemed to work, and Buckley put the shoe on his dresser until one day it disappeared.

My favorite character was Lindsey. I thought her reaction to the news was completely realistic in that she threw herself into exercise. She started with a fitness regime at home, then joined the boys soccer team. This exercise motif ended with the several mile run home in the rain after graduation. I'm not sure if this would have happened had Suzie not been murdered, and perhaps she would have been missing on that day had she not been able to run home.

The Suzie going into Ruth's body part was weird, and we'll just leave it at that.

I've been itching to finish Lord of the Rings, so I think the two towers will be my next book. Tata!

The Lovely Bones

2011-01-17T20:16:00.002-05:00

I started the Lovely Bones a couple of days ago. I've read chapters 1 and 2, and it will probably go slowly due to class readings. However, so far it is intriguing. Chapter 1 was a little rough with the content (rape and murder) and I have a feeling it is going to be depressing, but there has to be a reason why everyone likes it so much.

So far I'm very interested in Sebold's idea of heaven. Whatever Susie desires (within reason) can appear to her if she can explain why she wants it. She and Holly ended up with a duplex because they wished for it so hard. I'm also interested in what happens to Lindsey because her reaction to her sister's murder sounds like a reaction I would have. She has not had any sort of emotional reaction yet, has remained painfully rational, and has thrown herself into exercise. From experience, though, I know that this will eventually backfire, so I'll keep an eye on her.

This book is definitely pretty good so far; interesting enough to keep me reading, but not a page turner that will keep me from other things. We'll have to see how the other 90% of the book holds up!

Catcher in the Rye: Check!

2011-01-08T12:55:00.003-05:00

This book started out ok and got progressively worse. I don't have a lot to say about it except that Holden was driving me crazy from like chapter 8 on. Everything was "depressing" but it wasn't things that were depressing. Holden got depressed watching people walk down the street or do normal things. Question mark?

I can't say that I'm disappointed that this book is over, although I didn't hate it as much as some people I know. It wasn't as offensive as I thought it would be. The language was bothersome but what I really hated was when he would call everybody "old so-and-so," even his 10 year old sister Phoebe. That was annoying. He was just so negative about everything and thought he was entitled to everything and I'm glad that book didn't go on longer than it did.

Another thing I wasn't particularly fond of was the fact that absolutely nothing happened. I could write a book about nothing. One day, I drove home from school. On the way home I stopped at the gas station, but I didn't talk to anybody. I really didn't. It was too depressing to fill up the car and spend all my dough on gas. Then I drove past the grocery story, only I didn't stop on account of I wasn't hungry. I didn't really want to go home, but I figured I'd chew the fat with my folks, so I drove to the house and went in. Man it was depressing. Too bad I miss my roomies, But don't worry, I ended up in the loony bin so it's all good.

WOO!! I'm done with that. That brings 2011's total up to 2 already. Good thing I have a head start, because from here on out I'll be reading exclusively for class unless I get a break or get everything done ahead of time. I'll probably update if I read anything really spectacular for class, but as far as I know it's a few young adult and picture books, so it could be hit or miss. Actually, one that I have to read is The Hunger Games, which is FANTASTIC (and also awesome because I've already read it...which means I have a head start in class too). So, I'll be reading for class for a while, and if I get a spare minute, I'll probably start Sherlock Holmes since that book is basically a book of short stories of <20 pages, or longer stories of around 100, which still is not bad. That way I'll be able to get through a book without focusing on it exclusively or having to remember what has been happening before. That plan, I believe, is a good one. Elementary, my dear Watson!

This is a goddam book, it really is.

2011-01-03T23:08:00.003-05:00

Catcher in the Rye...oh dear...

A couple of summers ago, I was a nanny for a family with several young children (we're talking 4 kids that were in kindergarten or younger) and one of them would add "it really is" or some variation thereof after every sentence that was the absolute truth. As in, "my favorite food is soup, it really is," or "I drew this for you! I really did!". This particular 3-year-old, however, had a hard time saying "r", so really it sounded like "my favo-wit food is soup, it wheely is." I can still hear her voice in my head to this day. And when I'm reading The Catcher in the Rye, this is what I am hearing every time Holden says "it really is," or any of its variations.

So far, I'm a little over a quarter through it. This seems amazing, as the rest of the books I've read have been considerably longer and thus have taking more than 52 pages to get a quarter of the way through them. Jane Eyre, for example, took 114. Gone With The Wind took 260! (which happens to be 45 pages longer than Catcher in the Rye!) So this book has been a quick read so far.

Not much has really happened, except for "goddam" every 2 or 3 words. I'm not offended or anything, it's just annoying because linguistically it's unnecessary. But I do see Salinger's point of using, which is to add to Holden's character as an angsty, skeptical teenager. So far Holden's told us a little about his life, how he got kicked out of school, went to see his professor, got in a fight in his dorm, and then left for the city. On the train he ran into someone's mom that he knew from school and gave her a load of crap about how awesome her son was. This is not the greatest book I've ever read but it's quick and easy to understand, and I have to admit I'm interested in what is going to happen to Holden. I've heard of a lot of people who REALLY REALLY WHEELY (haha) hate this book. So far I'm not sure why, but I'll keep reading and see if I can find out.

My favorite quote so far:
"What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it." (p. 18)

Interesting thought, original, and sort of true. I'm not sure what I would ask the authors I particularly like, or if Salinger would count as one (I'm not sure, I haven't read the entire book yet) but I'm pretty sure I wish I were friends with Tolstoy and Suzanne Collins (of the Hunger Games...if you haven't read it, you should!) and probably J. K. Rowling too. We'll see what other interesting souls come out of this project.

Off to read more Catcher in the Rye and see what dilemmas Holden gets into next. I really am!

Jane Eyre: Check!

2011-01-02T20:51:00.004-05:00

My first finished book of the new year!

Unfortunately Jane Eyre didn't finish before the end of 2010 but it was the first of 2011. Overall, I liked it alright...it wasn't the best I've ever read but definitely not the worst.

I liked Jane's strength even though she did not have a particular reason to be strong except her character. She was a poor orphan with no relations and could have easily given up, but didn't. Go Jane!!

So, I'm going to take Jane's conviction here and apply it to 2011. No longer will I be defeated in relation to the job search, money, housing, school, etc. In the new year, I'm taking the Jane Eyre approach!

Speaking of the new year, Here's the updated list of books I've read:

Prior to 2010: 14 Books
*Harry Potter Series
*To Kill A Mockingbird
*The Bible
*Wuthering Heights
*Shakespeare
*Anna Karenina
*Winnie the Pooh
*The Da Vinci Code
*Anne of Green Gables
*Of Mice and Men
*The Inferno
*Watership Down
*Hamlet
*Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

2010: 9 Books
*The Hobbit
*Gone with the Wind
*The Great Gatsby
*Alice in Wonderland
*Animal Farm
*Life of Pi
*The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night
*A Christmas Carol
*Charlotte's Web

2011: Obviously at least 1 so far. Others I have available (aka waiting patiently on the bookshelf) include:
*Lord of the Rings (the rest of the series)
*1984
*Catcher in the Rye
*The Time Traveler's Wife
*Middlemarch
*(War and Peace: I have this waiting but I've decided this is going to be the LAST one I read in order to go out with a bang!)
*Chronicles of Narnia
*The Lion, The Witch, And The Wardrobe
*The Lovely Bones
*Midnight's Children
*Oliver Twist (this one's at the library but I need to finish it I believe)
*The Secret Garden
*The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

So this year's goal is 12 books, which is 3 more than 2010. However, considering that I started in March, and took a month to read Gone With The Wind, as well as a month plus some hiatus time to read Fellowship of the Ring, I think this is definitely do-able. While my course load this spring may not be conducive to pleasure reading, I think I can make up for it in the summer, over breaks, and during the fall when there will be considerably less going on.

This is a difficult decision, but I think the next book I read will be The Catcher in the Rye, as well as The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which is supposedly good...we'll have to see. In closing, I have high hopes for 2011 in many respects, including this project. Happy 2011 everybody!

Jane Eyre: 63%

2010-12-30T23:44:00.002-05:00

I guess I spoke a couple chapters too soon. This book is getting better. Since last entry, Jane and Rochester have become romantically involved, been engaged, and I am just now to the part where she is refusing him after finding out about the insane wife in the attic. Ridiculous, Charlotte Bronte, but exciting nonetheless. I'm not sure I would have come up with crazy lady in the attic as part of any plot but perhaps I am just not that creative. In any case, this book is much better now and has captured my interest.

I just thought I'd update to take back what I said before, but as I still have 175 pages to go, and I'm determined to finish before tomorrow at noon (when I leave for new years festivities) I'm off to attempt to finish.

HAPPY NEW YEARS!!

Jane Eyre: 29%

2010-12-29T12:05:00.003-05:00

Honestly, I'm a little disappointed by this book so far.

All the things I've heard about Jane Eyre, the number of people who actually like it because they have read it and not just seen the movie (did somebody say Pride and Prejudice?) I really expected to like this book by now.

To be fair, it's not an extremely difficult read, and I have read up to this point before. (The book was assigned to me in high school and I read about this far before getting too busy to continue). I remember liking the book when I read it before. However, I would have expected some sort of plot to develop by now.

Normally, I am the kind of reader and movie-watcher who loves a whole lot of nothing. For example, my favorite movie of all time is It's A Wonderful Life. Now, many people have seen this movie and probably if you haven't see the whole thing, you've seen the end. For me the real end is the last 10 minutes, but the end portion, the part with Clarence the angel, lasts about 40 minutes or so. In this part, Clarence shows George what the world would be like without him. This really is the only part of the movie with a plot. The rest of the movie (the 1+ hours) chronicles George's life from a young boy to a middle aged married man, including his marriage and his career. However, watching that part of the movie is like watching someone's life pass before your eyes. Don't get me wrong, I love the whole thing because you really need the beginning to appreciate the end. In general, movies like this are really the kind that I like. Others include Big Fish and Forrest Gump.

The beginning section of this book is reminding me of the beginning of It's A Wonderful Life, except that I am not sure what the point of the beginning is. There were many chapters documenting Jane's years at Lowood that were not all that influential as of yet. I'm hoping things pick up since I know that this story eventually becomes a love story between Jane and Rochester, but seeing as how Jane just met Rochester that obviously hasn't happened yet. I'll keep going though and see how things turn out in the next few chapters.

And hopefully I can finish today or tomorrow and bring my 2010 total up to 10!

Update

2010-12-26T22:26:00.002-05:00

December 26: 5 days until the new year, with hopefully another book to squeeze in before the year comes to a close.

A couple days before Christmas I started Jane Eyre. I'm currently on chapter 5, which is really not too far, but if I play my cards right I will have lots and lots of reading time this week. It's good so far. I read about a third of it when assigned in high school and I remember liking it, but just not having time for it. Hopefully I'll have time for it this time around seeing as it's pretty much a staple in literature.

For Christmas I got several books on my list:

...and one that wasn't (because I have heard good things about it and need to read it to keep up with today, haha)

So, basically I have my work cut out for me! I've got these 5 books, plus the 7 others that I ordered previously (AND Oliver Twist that needs to be finished so I can check it off already!) which is approximately how many books I've finished this year. I'm doing my best but I have a feeling this spring will be a little sparse, seeing as I am taking more classes than I usually do, but I'm hoping it will be ok. I'll just have to pick an interesting short one to read during that time, or one with shorter sections (Sherlock Holmes maybe?). I'll be back with a post of whichever book I choose to finish before new years and a cumulative update of which books I've read so far this year and prior to this year. See you around New Years!

A Christmas Carol

2010-12-21T16:18:00.002-05:00

Here's what happened with Oliver Twist. I got it out of the library, I was making zip-o progress on it, and after 3 renewals (aka 9 weeks) of hardly reading it, I was not allowed to renew again and so I returned it. This is unfortunate. This is book #2 (second to Lord of the Rings) that I've stopped midway through. I do plan to finish the book at some point.

On the plus side, I did read A Christmas Carol. I have been looking for a nice copy of the book, preferably hard cover with some illustrations, but Amazon, Borders, AND Barnes and Noble left me disappointed. What I found were tiny books with tiny words, paperbacks with meaningless pictures on the front, or hardcover volumes containing about 10 stores several hundred pages long, and A Christmas Carol only took up about 100. So, I had given up hope. Then, while Christmas Shopping in Hallmark, I came across one of the most beautiful copies of any book I've ever seen. It was in the middle of the Dept 56 Christmas Dickens Village things. It's hardcover and has beautiful color illustrations by P.J. Lynch and is unabridged. It was a little pricey and more than I would normally pay for a book, especially of that size, but it was so nice that I couldn't resist.

So, I read it in about a day. It's December 21st and what is more Christmas-y than Dickens' classic story. I'm sure everyone knows it, so I won't summarize. Having read an abridged version out of an anthology in seventh grade (and being forced to read it and not understanding a thing) I didn't feel like I had a complete grasp on the written version. It was really a good story and not entirely as dry or drawn out as Oliver Twist was. So, that's another one off my list!

I'm hoping to be able to finish another book by the new year. (Something tells me I'll be getting some books for Christmas this year!). Which one it is is yet to be determined. Maybe I'll be able to plug away at Lord of the Rings again. Other choices include Jane Eyre, Pride and Prejudice, The Secret Garden, or whatever appears under the tree Christmas morning!

Merry Christmas!

Oliver: 24.5%

2010-12-04T00:12:00.002-05:00

SO CLOSE to being 1/4 done!

Surprisingly, this book is actually getting BETTER! Maybe the reason that I hate Dickens is because I never got far enough into the books to start enjoying it. I'll openly admit that if I were assigned Oliver Twist for school (one of the few of Dickens that I was not) I would have stopped about 30 pages in when Oliver was at the funeral parlor. (Then I probably would have watched the movie and selected very specific passages to talk about in class so it would look like I knew what I was talking about...that is the way I survived English class). Regardless, Oliver Twist is getting exciting.

Currently, Oliver has just been found by Nancy on his way to deliver some books for the wealthy man. I'm pretty sure he's going to be taken back to Fagin even though he probably wants to stay with the man and find out whose picture was hanging above his bed. This guy is probably his grandfather. I think that is how Dickens works.

In the movie Bill Sikes is way creepier. Maybe I just have not yet discovered his creepiness. We'll see. I'm not a huge fan of shady characters, and am usually not too concerned when people are not shady, but I've seen Oliver! the musical several times and I'm pretty sure Sikes is a bad guy, and that he's made bad by more than just being friends with Fagin, who encourages stealing. We'll see. I still have 75% of the book to go....this is gong to be interesting.

Just Kidding!

2010-11-29T19:08:00.002-05:00

Just kidding, everyone! I AM in fact making a little progress on Oliver Twist despite the insane amount of work I have due this week. Basically, it is a far more appealing choice than any of the reading for class that I have to do, as sad as that is. I am now 50 pages in instead of 28 or wherever I was before, and already Oliver has met the Artful Dodger (who has an actual real name that I've already forgotten, but nonetheless, I was shocked!) and Fagin and seen the dirty room where they all live. Fagin has not yet taught them how to pick a pocket (or two) but I'm sure that's coming up soon. I'm surprised how quickly the story picked up after Oliver got out of the funeral parlor. Hopefully the 20 pages I just read are not the most exciting part of the whole book. We'll have to see, I guess.

On a different topic, I tried to look for a copy of A Christmas Carol that I liked today and I couldn't find one :( Either they are paperback and super small, or paperback with a strange picture on the front, or hardcover and containing a bunch of other stories that I'm not interested in, or itty bitty hardcover for an absurd amount of money for a story that is less than 100 pages long. Half the price of Gone With The Wind, which is over 1000. What's up with that? So, I'm debating and trying to figure out which one I dislike least. Oh well...

So that's it for now! Hopefully I'll get a little farther in Oliver later

Hiatus #3

2010-11-27T11:44:00.002-05:00

We are on hiatus once again...surprise surprise...and this time once again for grad school getting in the way of my good time. This time I have to type things that are already in books and assemble them into a binder. Oh, joy. Hopefully all this pointless work gets done asap so that I can get back to reading as well as the holiday season and be able to read A Christmas Carol in December instead of January. We can only hope...

(The hiatus would probably be much improved if Oliver Twist was at a good part, which it is not...in fact, it's at the same part as it was 2 weeks ago)

Until we meet again...

Oliver Twist

2010-11-21T09:26:00.002-05:00

Let me start off by saying that the only things I can think about right now are quilts, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 1 movie, Christmas, and Thanksgiving. However, I have been keeping true to this project and am attempting to read Oliver Twist, however dull it may be.

I chose to go with Oliver Twist next because I want to read A Christmas Carol in December to prepare for Christmas. However, I wanted to get into a Dickens mood first, so I picked a story with which I was familiar, mostly from the Broadway version "Oliver!" which is a little different so far but not much. So far we have seen Oliver born and growing up in a workhouse, asking the obvious "Please Sir, I want some more," and then getting shipped off to the funeral parlor. That's as far as I've gotten what with so many other things going on. I'm determined to get through this one and then A Christmas Carol, which I'm pretty sure I've read at least parts of before back in seventh grade...like I was able to figure out what it was saying then, HA! (Why is it English teachers always pick books that kids don't really care about and can hardly decipher anyway? says the future English teacher).

With all the homework and Thanksgiving preparations I have ahead of me in the next two weeks, I am not sure at what pace I'll be reading Oliver Twist, but I hope to make at least some progress on it. I'm currently on page 29 out of 419, so I have not even made a dent yet. I plan to get to at least 100 before I write again and make any judgments on the book. Still trying to keep an open mind...trying being the key word. Ah well. Maybe something a little more substantial and interesting next time.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

2010-11-07T15:16:00.009-05:00

I am now 66% into the last of the Harry Potter books, a mere 260 pages from the end of this extraordinarily long and complicated series. It has been extremely exciting so far, and I can't wait to finish the book, possibly tonight or tomorrow if all goes well. Harry, Ron, and Hermione have found and destroyed the locket and are trying to locate other horcruxes. They have also heard from Luna's father about the deathly hallows and have tried to figure out if it is a true story or merely a fairy tale. Additionally, they have broken into the ministry and been taken to the Malfoys' house, but are not at Bill and Fleur's cottage on the sea. So far Hedwig, Mad-eye, and Dobby (*tear*) have died. Depressing, but very involved. Their most recent plan is to break into the Lestrange's vault at Gringotts. Should be interesting...

Not many more pages to go, but still a lot of story to get through. I'm 94% done with the series at this point. This is going to be quite the accomplishment once I finish. On the other hand, there are still 78 books on the list left for me to read, including more intense and lengthy series like this one. Bring it on!

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

2010-11-01T15:12:00.009-04:00

I'm now about 25% into Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, book #6. This one is going much quicker than the last one. For some reason this one seems to be more popular with Harry Potter fans.

Overall I'm getting a little Harry Potter-ed out. However, I need to make it through the seventh book before the movie comes out. Book 6, though, should go quickly since it's more exciting and thought provoking than the previous ones. Also, with the end in sight and being more than halfway done, the motivation is there. As long as I continue plugging along, all should go well.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

2010-10-16T10:52:00.003-04:00

Now I am 45% done with the Harry Potter series. I've finished the first four books and the first chapter of the fifth book. (Did anyone else notice how in the fifth book the print gets smaller?) I feel like I've been reading so long and I haven't even reached the midway point of this series. That is absolutely ridiculous but also fantastic because that means that there is still so much more story to go!

Originally, the beginning of this book scared me. The part where Harry gets taken to Sirius' house was particularly stressful for me and I did not want to continue reading. I haven't gotten to that part yet but now that I know what happens I'm sure it will be easier on my nerves. The first time I read this book I read a lot of it in one day because I couldn't wait to find out what happened. I'm guessing (since it's so long) that many things were cut from this book too, just like in Goblet of Fire. Therefore, it won't be a complete repeat of the book. Additionally, the halfway mark of this book occurs later than the halfway point for the series. I'm excited to continue the journey through the world of Harry Potter.

I'm also continuing to keep ahead of schedule, which is nice. Last week I came a little close to falling behind but my 200ish pages last night made up for that. I'm probably feeling a little more optimistic than I should. I feel like I'm nearing the end and that I'm almost finished, but I have not even reached the halfway point. Maybe it's that I'm onto the fifth book out of seven, which means I'm more than halfway through the books but not the pages. It's still going to take a long time but it will turn out OK, I hope.

Yay Harry Potter!!!!!
ps. today I am going to a corn maze and all I can think about is the third task of the Triwizard Tournament and hoping I don't find any creepy things inside!

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

2010-10-10T22:16:00.002-04:00

I am now one third done with the entire series of Harry Potter, which puts me about 40% into the fourth book. I tend to like the parts where Harry, Ron, and Hermione are at Hogwarts best, so for me this one had a bit of a slow start too (as in, it took them 160 pages to get onto the Hogwarts Express, but definitely not that long for some action to start). Even though things were happening I wanted the meat of the story to start. That just happened where I left off. I ended just after the Goblet of Fire spits out Harry's name on page two hundred seventy something.

I'm starting to get into some of the events that were cut out of the movie (as so much was in this book because it's so much longer and more complicated than the others). I remember some of the action but not the character development or subtle plot points. There is also a lot of foreshadowing that I've picked up on now going through the books for the second time. (While it is my second time reading this book, and will be my second time for books 5 and 7, it will be my third time through 6 and my umpteenth through books 1-3). I also had read somewhere a long time ago that all the things that Harry and Ron make up when they're doing their Divination homework actually come true, so I'm on the lookout for that as well.

While this project is starting to become more and more daunting even as I get closer to the end, I'm still enjoying it. I think the thing that has changed is the amount of other things I have to do besides read Harry Potter. Therefore, I'm trying to get ahead in case this week decimates me. There are just so many things to do that getting Harry potter finished before the movie comes out is just one more thing that has to get done this fall. Add it to the list. There are like 100 things already on it.

At least I'm determined and interested in finishing this project, unlike my homework.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

2010-10-05T09:13:00.002-04:00

I'm now a little more than halfway through the third book in the series. I'm making good time, if I do say so myself. I'm three and a half days ahead of schedule, which means on the schedule I should be finishing up the second book today. Something tells me things are going to slow down in books 4-6. We'll see. Here's the cover.

This book is better than I expected. I remembered not liking it very much when I read it initially. I also remember really liking Chamber of Secrets, which this time I thought was just so-so. Prisoner of Azkaban is more exciting than the other two so far without being too dark. And the fact that there is a movie will definitely understand the ending. Reading it when I was younger, I had no idea what happened in the end and how any of it was possible (the parts where Scabbers turns into Pettigrew, the time travel part, etc) but having seen it I can now picture what happens much better.

I just got out the fourth book from the library. I'm kind of dreading reading it because of how dark the movie is, but somehow I think the books are a little more uplifting, especially since a lot of the comic relief (minus Ron, of course) are cut out of the movies for time's sake. It probably also has to do with the book being almost pea soup green, which makes me not want to read it much, but oh well. Probably will finish book 3 in the next 2-3 days and then begin number 4 this weekend. I've been on this Harry Potter mission for a week. I'm impressed. 918 pages down, 3,182 to go! 22% done with the series.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

2010-10-01T10:33:00.008-04:00

I'm now into the second Harry Potter book on page 140, which is currently ahead of schedule. This book actually isn't as exciting so far as the first one, which surprised me. I remember reading it all in one day in seventh grade for a book report because I was so excited about what was going to happen next. Still good, and still part of the series. I'm already 40% done with it and I just started it yesterday.

So not only is this series absolutely wonderful and attention-grabbing, it also reminds me of my younger days in middle and high school. I read the first three books before there were any movies made, so the way I pictured the places in the book were nothing like the movie. It's interesting to see how my mind has changed. Instead of always picturing the movie set, or always picturing my own image, I imagine a sort of hybrid. However, parts the did not make it into the movie ever, for example, Nick's Deathday party, are still the way I imagined them when I was 12. Weird, huh? It's funny how my mental pictures come back just how they were before even though I haven't read the book since then and haven't really thought about these images. The mind is a strange thing...

Anyway, I'm not as far ahead of the schedule as I thought, so I'd better keep ahead before next week puts me behind!

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

2010-09-29T10:53:00.002-04:00

I haven't been keeping to the plan. So sue me.

In light of the new Harry Potter movie coming out on November, I've decided to switch to Harry Potter mode. I thought they were worth a reread because a) they're fabulous, and b) I remember absolutely nothing about them except what was in the movies. Last summer (as in, the summer before this blog came about) I read the sixth book in preparation for that movie, but I was still unclear what had happened before or after it. It was a mess to read those books out of sequence. Therefore, I'm starting at the beginning.

People say that the books get better as Harry gets older, but I'm not convinced this is the case. I'm pretty interested in what is happening to Harry, so much so, in fact, that I read 130 pages last night before bed. It brought back all the memories of when I read it the first time, when I was just turning eleven and upset that my Hogwarts letter didn't come too. So, I am not convinced yet that this book is boring, uninteresting, etc. because, quite frankly, it's been a while since I've read 130 pages all at once (and in less than 2 hours). Granted, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone moves along at a rapid pace, and is generally at a lower reading level than the other books on the list. I'm currently on page 154, which is a page away from being halfway through. I tried to read more this morning and then fell back asleep for three hours. It's a rough life, sleeping and reading Harry Potter...

I figured it all out. The Harry Potter Series is 4,167 pages long. To finish the series on or before November 19th, when Part I of Deathly Hallows comes out, I will have to read at least 81 pages per day. Currently I am 3.7% through the entire series. RIDICULOUS!! This is going to be an intense project WITHIN an even more intense project. Therefore, this book should take less than 4 days to complete. It took me about an hour to read the 81 pages last night, so if that keeps up, I can just read an hour before bed every night and I'll be golden. I can also over-read on the weekends to catch up or get ahead. I'm also considering buying the books except that I have no room for them as well as no money. Oh well....

Anyway, thumbs up for Harry Potter 1! Maybe I'll finish that one today and move on to Chamber of Secrets!

Book-Buying Frenzy!

2010-09-25T10:21:00.003-04:00

I've spent the past 24 hours in a book-buying frenzy as a result of a Barnes and Noble sale on classics. Here is a list of my most recent additions:

-The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (and other stories)
-The Complete Sherlock Holmes, Volume I
-The Complete Sherlock Holmes, Volume II
-Middlemarch
-Treasure Island
-The Secret Garden
-Film: Gone With The Wind
-Film: Casablanca

Yup, lots of classics. I realize that these purchases will only cover 3 books on the list (Middlemarch, Sherlock Holmes, and The Secret Garden), but the others will cover the books to be added to the list when the first is done, along with Don Quixote and others that didn't make the top 100. Unfortunately, I am only in possession of the first 3 books on the list as the rest are coming from an online order. Now we can play a game of how long is it going to take me to read these books since I still have ones from before (LOTR, War and Peace) that I haven't read yet. Oh well, I'll get around to them all eventually. This project is going to succeed if it's the last thing I do!

(It's also going to last for several years) haha

The Magician's Nephew

2010-09-24T23:52:00.003-04:00

"Now the trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed."

I just finished The Magician's Nephew. I listened to the entire book on book on tape, which was an interesting experience for me, because I generally tend to zone out when listening for extended periods of time, especially if I'm not taking notes. I liked the story, although it was a little tedious at times. I'm not sure how reading the entire series is going to work out, although I'm anticipating it being easier than Lord of the Rings.

I am familiar with The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, but I did not know The Magician's Nephew. I have a feeling it was read to me in fourth grade, but I can't remember if it was this book or Castle in the Attic (or maybe both). It was interesting at the end to find out how this book ties in with that one, which is the next in the series. Additionally, I had never thought of the beginning of Narnia, or knew that there were other worlds besides that one. And having just found out that this book was not the first written in the series, I enjoyed how C. S. Lewis worked with his previous innovation to make the prequel make sense.

One thing I did not enjoy were the Biblical references. I'm sure I did not get them ALL because I am not well versed in Bible stories. However, this means that if I could pick them out, they must have been pretty obvious. The part with Digory picking the apple in the garden and the witch trying to tempt him to take it for himself...DUH! How much more blatant could you possibly be? There were also references to Noah's Ark as well as Aslan as God creating Narnia, etc. There were probably a lot of others that I missed, but many well known ones made it in. I'm wondering if this will continue throughout the series. I have heard about the Aslan as Jesus in the second book, but throughout the other 5 I wonder if it will be the same level of allusions.

I'll end with another quote I enjoyed.

"When things go wrong, you'll find they usually go on getting worse for some time, but when things once start going right, they often go on getting better and better."

First Steps into Narnia

2010-09-21T15:07:00.002-04:00

I've finally done something productive! I've started The Magician's Nephew, which is book 1 in the Narnia series. For whatever reason, I decided today that I was sick of music and decided to listen to the book on tape that I've had for a month or two but haven't listened to. Surprisingly, it put me in a good mood, which was a breath of fresh air after my period of woe-is-me I'm unemployed BS.

It's an interesting story. So far, Polly and Digory have met and started exploring, and then Polly was offered a ring by Digory's uncle, touched it, and then vanished. In the second chapter, Digory's uncle explained to him his personal history and introduced him to the idea of Narnia. And that's where I ended.

So, not a TON has happened so far but it was very enjoyable nonetheless and definitely helpful for escaping a life of woe-is-me-I-need-a-job. Maybe a few more chapters later or tomorrow (but with any luck I won't have time because I'll be subbing).

Woe is me, but Narnia is distracting me from it.

End of Hiatus II

2010-09-11T18:24:00.002-04:00

The Hiatus is over!

I've finished Mockingjay, come back home, and now have ample time to read now that I am once again unemployed....especially since reading seems to distract from my many moments of insecurity regarding this issue....

I guess next is The Two Towers. Hopefully it goes quickly. I'm really not in the mood to read more Lord of the Rings but I need to finish them up so that I can move on with my life. So, up next, The Two Towers, regrettably.

Hiatus....again....

2010-08-30T21:59:00.002-04:00

So, after a fairly successful summer and definitely productive last 2 weeks, I'm going on hiatus from this project again because....
a) I lack the motivation to read The Two Towers
b) I am in the middle of Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins and I need to finish that before anything else. (It's fantastic...a little slower to start than The Hunger Games or Catching Fire, but great nonetheless...if you haven't read those, YOU NEED TO!!)
c) This weekend I'm going out of town for a few days
d) School is starting again soon...blah

As a heads up, though, this fall I'm definitely going to read The Two Towers, and hopefully Return of the King, if there's time. Then I'm going to have a winter of Dickens to hopefully get a good chunk of that out of the way. I'm starting in November with Oliver Twist (because I know that story) and then A Christmas Carol in December. I'll spend January on Dickens too. In February (because of Valentine's Day, mostly, even though I am not a huge fan of that holiday) I'm going to read some Austen. I'll definitely read Pride and Prejudice and maybe Emma too. I'm hoping to get a chunk of that out of the way as well. Then next spring I can pick some that I think sound interesting, maybe get some that I've never heard of before. In the meantime, I'm going on hiatus until...
a) I finish Mockingjay
b) I feel motivated to read The Two Towers
c) I get back from my mini road trip
d) Life calms down and I have a "real" schedule and/or "real" free time
The end. This project is definitely more involved than I thought it would be when I started 6 months ago, but it's a good challenge, and a perfect opportunity to broaden the mind and fill up my bookshelf with impressive volumes.

Until next time....

Four Legs Good, This Book Bad!

2010-08-26T20:25:00.004-04:00

I just finished Animal Farm. Not my favorite. I didn't like it any more than I did the summer before 9th grade when I had to read it for school (which explains why I own it, haha).

I am going to skip all talk of allegories to Communist Russia because I feel like it's been beaten to death by common knowledge, sparknotes, and my 9th grade English teacher. So, what is left to talk about? In my opinion, not much. I'm exhausted and this book did not interest me in the slightest, so I'll keep it brief.

1) Title: Animal Farm: A Fairy Story. WHAT? A fairy story? I'm guessing Orwell meant fable or folk tale or something because there was no fairies, magic spells, etc. Some fairy tales are indeed gruesome, but I'd rather read my (nonexistent) children those than Animal Farm.

2) I did appreciate the last chapter, when after many years none of the new animals understood the procession by the boar's skull and had no idea about what the purposes of the old rituals were. So often histories get lost so that the original meaning is no longer understood. I think that's somewhat of a universal. After many years, it's to be expected that meanings get transposed and altered.

3) There is a creepy Animal Farm animated movie that I found on youtube while I was looking for the picture of the book shown above. I watched 10 minutes of it and was extremely creeped out. The fact that an animated movie exists for this, though, means two things: a) that people are willing to subject themselves to this story in their spare time, and b) children are probably watching it because it's animated. AHHHH!!!! (The part where they're supposed to be singing "Beasts of England" is extremely weird...everyone just starts making noise in strange rhythms).

So...not my first choice. Definitely toward the bottom of my list. Would not recommend, etc. Next up: The Two Towers (unless this weekend involves a lot of driving, which it very well might, in which case it might be the first in the Narnia series, the Magician's Nephew). Cheers!

Charlotte's Web

2010-08-22T20:28:00.003-04:00

"How about 'Pig Supreme'?" asked one of the lambs.
"No good," said Charlotte. "It sounds like a rich dessert."
"How about 'Terrific, terrific, terrific'?" asked the goose.
"Cut that down to one 'terrific' and it will do very nicely," said Charlotte. "I think 'terrific' might impress Zuckerman.
"But Charlotte," said Wilbur, "I'm not terrific."
"That doesn't make a particle of difference," replied Charlotte. "Not a particle. People believe almost anything they see in print."
p.87-89

Templeton was down there now, rummaging around. When he returned to the barn, he carried in his mouth an advertisement he had torn from a crumpled magazine
"How's this?" he asked, showing the ad to Charlotte. "It says 'Crunchy.' 'Crunchy' would be a good word to write in your web."

"Just the wrong idea," replied Charlotte. "Couldn't be worse. We don't want Zuckerman to think Wilbur is crunchy. He might start thinking about crisp, crunchy bacon and tasty ham. That would put ideas into his head. We must advertise Wilbur's noble qualities, not his tastiness. Go get another word, please, Templeton."

The rat looked disgusted. But he sneaked away to the dump and was back in a while with a strip of cotton cloth. "How's this?" he asked. "It's a label off an old shirt."

Charlotte examined the label. It said PRE-SHRUNK.

"I'm sorry, Templeton," she said, "but 'Pre-shrunk' is out of the question. We want Zuckerman to think Wilbur is nicely filled out, not all shrunk up. I'll have to ask you to try again."

"What do you think I am, a messenger boy?" grumbled the rat. "I'm not going to spend all my time chasing down to the dump after advertising material."

"Just once more--please!" said Charlotte.

...When he came back he had a strip of blue-and-white cardboard in his teeth.

"There!" he said, triumphantly. "How's that?"

Charlotte read the words: "With New Radiant Action."

"What does it mean?" asked Charlotte, who had never used any soap flakes in her life.

"How should I know?" said Templeton. "You asked for words and I brought them. I suppose the next thing you'll want me to fetch is a dictionary."

Charlotte's Web, published by E. B. White in 1952, is one of the most beloved children's stories of all time. I myself, being an avid reader in childhood as well as a teacher of elementary children, had never actually read it until today. I loved the animated movie as a child and I liked the Dakota Fanning version. I'm not sure why it never occurred to me to read it. I do remember starting it, reading part of the way through, and abandoning the book because I didn't like it. Compared to other children's books I've read, many of them published more recently, E. B. White is wordy, and some of the larger themes are not easily grasped by children.

In the beginning of this book, I was not too impressed. I knew the story, but I was not really sure why this particular story resonated with readers more than other ones (Because of Winn Dixie, for example, which is my personal favorite). Toward the end of the book (which took me less than a day to complete), I realized that it wasn't the plot of the story itself, but the message it sends. The book bursting with second chances, friendship, loyalty, miracles, life and death, and new beginnings. It certainly wouldn't be an easy book to teach, but it would be worth it simply for the messages. It also has innocence everywhere, no thwarting of plans, betrayals, just a simple story full of good morals.

I love all the characters in the book; Charlotte and Wilbur have a special place in my heart, but my favorite character is Templeton the rat. Now, I have not special affliction toward rats, I don't think they're cute, I would be horrified to find one living in my house. However, Templeton, for his rough exterior, is really kindhearted and good. Sure, Charlotte, Wilbur, and the gander have to bribe him with food to get him to do anything, but I'd bet he would have done it anyway. I think he prefers to act put out by any request they have. However, in the end he has a breakdown moment where he feels unappreciated. Clearly he's not in a good place here; his speech reeks of self pity, but I don't blame him after the treatment he got. It's not that the other characters are particularly mean to him, but they have been bribing him rather than thanking him. In the end, whether he meant to or not, he saved Wilbur's life many times over.

"So!" he said, in disgust. "So it's old Templeton to the rescue again, is it? Templeton do this, Templeton do that, Temple please run down to the dump to get me a magazine clipping, Templeton please lend me a piece of string so I can spin a web...Ho, ho. And what thanks do I ever get for these services, I would like to know? Never a kind word for old Templeton, only abuse and wisecracks and side remarks. Never a kind word for a rat...My, my! I notice that it's always me you come to when in trouble. But I've never heard of anyone's heart breaking on my account. Oh, no. Who cares anything about old Templeton?...Who made trip after trip to the dump?" he asked. "Why, it was old Templeton! Who saved Charlotte's life by scaring that Arable boy away with a rotten goose egg? Bless my soul, I believe it was old Templeton. Who bit your tail and got you back on your feet this morning after you fainted in front of the crowd? Old Templeton. Has it ever occurred to you that I'm sick of running errands and doing favors? Who do you think I am, anyway, a rat-of-all-work?"

Lots of quotes today. Mostly ones that I liked; things that were funny, things that were full of emotion, things that were absolutely true, things that were just adorable. Regardless of this being a children's book, it's worth a read no matter what your age. I'll leave you with a couple more quotes I enjoyed.

"What do people catch on the Queensborough Bridge--bugs?" asked Wilbur.
"No," said Charlotte. "They don't catch anything. They just keep trotting back and forth across the bridge thinking there is something better on the other side. If they'd hang head-down at the top of the thing and wait quietly, maybe something good would come along. But no--with men it's rush, rush, rush, every minute. I'm glad I'm a sedentary spider."
p.60

"What a gamble friendship is!"
p.41

Life of Pi: CHECK!

2010-08-21T19:29:00.003-04:00

Just finished Life of Pi. Unfortunately, this book was kind of a let down. It was claimed "A story to make you believe in God" but I am not convinced. It's possible that I read it with an overly critical eye (I can do that when it comes to religion), but for me it was just another story of a teenage boy surviving in the wild. It also reeked of The Old Man and the Sea, which I read in high school and HATED. The middle got tedious...there are only so many ways you can describe fishing and butchering fish.

A few quotes I enjoyed:

"I speak in all modesty as I say this, but I discovered at that moment that I have a fierce will to live. It's not something evident in my experience. Some of us give up on life with only a resigned sigh. Others fight a little, then lose hope. Still others--and I am one of those--never give up. We fight and fight and fight. We fight no matter the cost of battle, the losses we take, the improbability of success. We fight to the very end. It's not a question of courage. It's something constitution, and inability to let go. It may be nothing more than life-hungry stupidity."
p. 148

"The worst pair of opposites are boredom and terror."
p. 217

"What a terrible thing it is to botch a farewell...It's important in life to conclude things properly. Only then can you let go. Otherwise you are left with words you should have said but never did, and your heart is heavy with remorse."
p. 285

So, overall, disappointing, but it held my attention for the most part. The beginning section was my favorite. I think I am beginning to become very interested in India. According to the man at the bookstore the other day, Midnight's Children also deals with India so I may be reading that one soon. Immediately next up: The Magician's Nephew (first of the Narnia books, #33). That one I have as a book on tape, so I'll be listening to it as I run. In print form, maybe Charlotte's Web. I need something light and uplifting.

Life of Pi: halfway done

2010-08-20T23:26:00.000-04:00

I am almost halfway through Life of Pi. Where I have stopped, Pi has just listed all the things that he has found in the lifeboat. I've never been a person who is into survival, camping, anything in that realm, and so I skimmed the list and moved on. I can always reference it later.

My biggest problem in this section, Pi in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with a hyena and a tiger that he just discovered, is HOW DID HE NOT KNOW THE TIGER WAS IN THE BOAT!?!? I mean, maybe his lifeboat is larger than I am picturing it, but still, I feel like it would be impossible NOT to know there was a tiger in there. Pi says his boat is about 100 square feet, which is approximately the size of the room I am in. I can say with absolute certainty that if there was a 450 pound Bengal tiger in here, I would know it.

Additionally, I am having a hard time trying to picture what the lifeboat looks like. I can understand the size and shape of the boat, and that it has seats across similar to a row boat, except one was broken by the zebra. It seems like there is a tarp that is going across the top of the boat, or maybe under the seats, and the tiger is under the tarp, but then wouldn't you know that the tiger was under there? You would either see a large lump, or you could peek under and see a tiger. I just don't get it.

And whatever happened to this being a story about believing in God? I think I admitted in the last post that I am not particularly religious or spiritual, but I am extremely interested in that topic in general. I usually only can see the bad in religion (politics, intolerance, hypocrisy) but if there arguments for its good, I like to hear them. This story especially seemed like it would be one of those arguments, but not in an overbearing way. Episodes about why Pi chose to convert to several religions at once, and the conversation between the three holy men were interesting and something that was new to me. However, Pi vs. a hyena and a tiger does not seem so very close to that story. I'm sure it will come together. This story has had quite a bit of foreshadowing already so I'm sure the religious piece will come full circle. Pi's lesson about how animals are vicious, and that omega animals perform for trainers because they have nothing to lose, are already beginning to relate to the tiger, Richard Parker, haha. Thirsty None Given, haha.

I hope the survival part of the book, which lasts for 140 more pages either goes quickly or gets more interesting. Me and intense survival books generally do not get along.

Life of Pi: First Impressions

2010-08-14T15:46:00.000-04:00

I decided to go with Life of Pi because for whatever reasons I am still procrastinating LOTR. I have read the first seven chapters, which takes me approximately 8% through the book. So far this book is about an Indian boy who was named after a pool and enjoys swimming. Thrown in there as well is a defense of zoos, which I found very interesting.

Pi's father runs a zoo, so he takes a few pages telling his reader why zoos are not as inhumane as people believe them to be. He starts by saying that zoo enclosures are to animals what houses are to people; a condensed environment that has everything necessary all in one location. Both bring security to its inhabitants. While Pi recognizes that people think animals should be out running free, he believes that the animals have everything they need in the zoo, including abundant food and lack of predators. He also cited examples where animals who had escaped their enclosures eventually returned to them because that was their home. In the wild, Pi notes that predators are around, animals are always fighting over turf, and food is scarce. The zoo solves all of those problems for animals. He also says that the animals have rituals that they do daily, and noticing a change in the pattern and timing can help alert a zookeeper that an animal is feeling ill or that something is wrong. It was a very interesting and compelling argument, and while I agree with much of what Pi argues about zoos, I also believe that most animals belong in the wild.

Some quotes I especially liked:

p. 6 "I have nothing to say of my working life, only that a tie is a noose, and inverted though it is, it will hang a man nonetheless if he's not careful."

WORKAHOLICS BEWARE!!

p. 19 "The Pondicherry Zoo doesn't exist any more. Its pits are filled in, the cages torn down. I explore it now in the only place left for it, my memory."

Connection to my life: I attended a high school that was in pretty rough shape, and although it was not the best conditions for learning (windows that were welded open so the snow could come in, the smallest gym and auditorium in the county, cafeteria not able to fit all the students assigned to lunch at that time, no track, trailers outside for extra classroom space, etc.) it holds a special place in my heart because despite its flaws it had character. Sure, I got snowed on almost daily for a few months during English class, but eventually such frustrations became jokes. It did not have the facilities to compare with the other area high schools, but it was my school. In my senior year, the district started a fairly intense renovation project that began to change the look and layout of the school. The floors and ceilings were stripped, sections of the school became forbidden due to men in haz-mat suits getting rid of asbestos, and lights were dangling from wires giving the look of a mine shaft. This too, became more character for the school. They ripped up the parking lot, the fields, the hallways. There were construction vehicles all over the place. Our homecoming game was a home game an hour away because we didn't have a football field. My sports team played at an elementary school instead of the field normally used. For graduation, we wanted to wear hard hats. Anyway, you get the picture. The last memories of me at my high school included this construction vehicle, mine shaft, dust and gravel picture in my head.

The picture in my head does not exist anymore. My freshman year of college, the rebuilding of the school began. A wing was added, the gym was changed, the library moved into the auditorium, the auditorium moved into the old gym, there was a new gym wing built out the back, the bus loop changed from the front of the building to the side, and the old back of the school was now the front. There is a state of the art track with a football field inside and new bleachers and a circular amphitheater in front. The old trees and ivy covered brick is gone and was replaced by a monster that has no resemblance to the old school and does not fit the location anymore (in a historic village). For this reason, I do not go in the school and prefer to remember it as it was. My younger sister attended this school too, but the updated version. If I was forced to attend something at the school, a concert or game, perhaps, I had to force myself to pretend that she was going to a different school, and that this school was not mine. For some reason this made me feel better, even though I know it is irrational and it's the same school only renovated with none of the charm of the old building. So, from this very long digression, I can understand what Pi is going through with his zoo from his childhood gone. And although this quote, very short and at the end of the chapter, hardly amounts to much, I am made to believe that it causes him great pain.

So, that was a longer and way more involved entry than I meant to write, but from this I think it's clear that Life of Pi is going to be a very thought provoking book. The Author's Note claimed that it was a story to make you believe in God. (I'll be honest, I don't really know what I believe. I know that organized religion is not for me, that praying seems irrational, and that you have to work hard and not take for granted that someone will help you out. However, I'm convinced that coincidences don't exist and that ghosts are real.) So, this book is clearly going to take on religion as a topic, which will be interesting given that Pi studies religion as well as zoology at university. Religion discussed with science will be something interesting and new for me, and it will be interesting how Pi will be able to balance these two partially opposing ideas.

Anyway, that's the beginning of Life of Pi. I'm anxious to keep reading. It'll be dense and thought provoking but I hope enjoyable at the same time.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

2010-08-13T10:32:00.002-04:00

I just finished reading 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time.' This book, besides being a fabulous vacation book (defined as interesting, small, and not a page turner that has you reading all of vacation when you are supposed to be out and doing things), was a really interesting book that had a lot of new perspectives on many different things. I realize that is vague, so I'll go into a little more detail. Essentially, this is the story of a teenage boy who sets out to figure out who has stabbed his neighbors dog. In the process, his story becomes one of family and truth and independence. I'm sure there are a lot of stories like this. However, this book is told in the first person by a teenage male speaker with autism. I think the fact that I am a special ed teacher drew me into the book, but you do not have to have any background in autism to appreciate the book. The speaker, Christopher, tells his story of his investigation into who killed his neighbor's dog. However, about half the chapters have nothing to do with his story. Instead, they are about math problems, his beliefs about various subjects like science and math, and his past. Christopher is an extremely logical person who does not dwell on sadness and has very unique and not always acceptable ways of dealing with his problems. Here are three quotes I especially liked:

"All the other children at my school are stupid. Except I'm not meant to call them stupid, even though that is what they are. I'm meant to say that they have learning difficulties or that they have special needs. But this is stupid because everyone has learning difficulties because learning to speak French or understanding relativity is difficult and also everyone has special needs, like Father, who has to carry a little packet of artificial sweetening tablets around with him to put in his coffee to stop him from getting fat, or Mrs. Peters, who wears a beige-colored hearing aid, or Siobhan, who has glasses so thick they give you a headache if you borrow them, and none of these people are Special Needs, even if they have special needs" p. 42=43

"Mr. Jeavons said that I liked maths because it was safe. He said I liked maths because it meant solving problems, and these problems were difficult and interesting but there was always a straightforward answer in the end. And what he meant was that maths was not like life because in life there are no straightforward answers in the end." p. 61-62

"And whenever I thought about the future I couldn't see anything clearly in my head and that made a panic start. So Siobhan said I shouldn't think about the future. She said 'Just think about today. Think about all the things that have happened. Especially about the good things that have happened.'"

Those excerpts give an accurate look at the writing style of the book. It is easy to follow along but sometimes when Christopher starts to explain math problems it gets a little tough, although I understood most of those parts. Additionally, they were not vital to the story so if it was problematic those parts could be skimmed or skipped.

So, interesting perspectives, unique protagonist, chapters labeled by prime numbers, etc. Pretty cool stuff in this book. I highly recommend. And I'm ranking it between Anne of Green Gables and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

Next up: ? Before vacation, I was thinking about resuming Lord of the Rings with The Two Towers, but I think I'm still in the mood for something lighter. And after reading Haddon, I think I'm in the mood for another coming of age type story. So, I may start instead with Life of Pi. Although there are still a great many books that are on my shelf that have yet to be read so you never know...

Books I've read to date (and their ranking order)

2010-08-01T10:07:00.000-04:00

I am 17% done with this list (as in, I have read 17 books from the list). I feel like after finishing Gone With The Wind I am accomplished and victorious and almost done but that is far from the case. As far as Gone With The Wind is concerned, 17% is 176 pages in where Scarlett just becomes a widow and moves to Atlanta and hardly anything has happened yet! Clearly I have a LONG way to go (especially considering that some of the list items are multiple books, such as Lord of the Rings, Narnia, and His Dark Materials). Now that I think of it, I read Gone With The Wind as a break from Tolkien but it may be several books before I return to LOTR because it's so dense. Even though Gone with the Wind was long, it did not require a ton of concentration.

My next book, from the list, anyway, (I have a couple that a friend gave me to read that are not on there) will be #59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night by Mark Haddon, which I have deemed worthy of bringing on an airplane. It looks interesting, sounds interesting, reads quickly, has pictures, equations, and diagrams, and last but not least has a cutout of a dog on the front cover. If that doesn't scream fun book, nothing does! And the narrator has Autism, which will be interesting for me because I am a teacher and a nanny and that kind of thing interests me. I love that this list has some contemporary books, like that one and the Lovely Bones to break up all the Dickens and Austen and Steinbeck.

Another one(s) I may be tackling simultaneously is/are #33 and #36 Chronicles of Narnia/The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe, which is a part of the Narnia series. I have those on books on tape from the library which I may be listening to on vacation or perhaps when I'm exercising. (I did that to finish the Great Gatsby and it worked out pretty well.) I'm also thinking a plane ride coast to coast is the perfect opportunity to watch Gone With The Wind as a reward for my accomplishment.

Ok! Without further ado, here is my list from favorite to least favorite. From now on when I finish a book I will be ranking it on this list as well so that when I finish this project I'll have all the books in order. Here it goes:

21 Gone With The Wind
31 Anna Karenina
4 Harry Potter Series
5 To Kill A Mockingbird
7 Wuthering Heights
40 Winnie The Pooh
42 The Da Vinci Code
46 Anne of Green Gables
29 Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
9 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
16 The Hobbit
22 The Great Gatsby
94 Watership Down
98 Hamlet
6 The Bible
70 The Inferno
61 Of Mice And Men

It was actually harder than I thought trying to figure out which books I liked more than others, especially in the middle, and especially since I read some of them a long time ago. But here it is for now, and others will be added as I finish. Eventually I'll publish the revised list with the extra books my friend and I added that we thought should be included in this list but were not for some reason. I know of a few of them, but once that gets finalized, that will be up here too, and probably in the list section on the right of this entry. But I won't think about that now, I'll think of that tomorrow, when I can stand it :)

Victoire!

2010-07-31T13:50:00.001-04:00

VEEK-TWAR!! (yes, my high school did in fact expose me to French class bingo)

I have finished all 1037 pages of Gone With The Wind. Actually, I finished yesterday and started writing an update, but I had to stop for some reason and now it is lost. Anyway, I ABSOLUTELY LOVED this book. Even though the last hundred or so pages were pretty rough, I still enjoyed it. In fact, I think this may be one of my favorite books of all time. Next entry I'll list the books I have read in the order that I liked them.

ANYWAY I'm not really in the mood to do a huge character analysis or anything like that, so I think today I will be agreeing or disagreeing with Sparknotes in my interpretation of the book, characters, themes, etc.

Sparknotes says that Scarlett embodies the South from pre-war days, through war days, and then through reconstruction as she changes from belle to widow to rich businesswoman. Ashley is supposed to be the old south and Rhett the new south. This all makes sense to me. But what about when Rhett walked out on the second to last page? The New South left Scarlett? hmm.....that is not making as much sense anymore. I prefer to think of it as Ellen representing the Old South, as well as Bonnie. Ellen's manners, habit of never having her back touch the back of a chair, keeping the books on the plantation, and nursing the sick show the charm of married women in the old south. However, during the war, the Old South dies and thus so does Ellen. Bonnie, named after the Bonnie Blue of the Confederate flag, also shows the old south. She is spoiled, shown off, and comes from a wealthy family. Even though she is born and raised in the New South, Rhett, treats her like a belle and expects her to be one as she grows up. She also resembles Gerald, who is another reminder of the old times. She too dies, showing the collapse of that sort of society. The fact that she dies in the same way that Gerald does is no coincidence either and draws more attention to the old days, especially with the flashback Scarlett has as Bonnie is jumping the gate.

I read the rest of sparknotes and in general it was on target, while at the same time a little sparse.

I'm not really sure what else to say...I've typed this entry at least twice because it kept getting erased/internet crashed. I admire Scarlett's perseverance in the face of her world crashing around her and everyone she loves leaving her. I admire Rhett's nonchalance and habit of stating things as they are. And I admire Mammy for stating things as they are as well, and controlling Scarlett, who is controlled by no one.

Overall, a great book, exciting read, highly recommend. The end. Tomorrow is another day.

Gone with the Wind: 80%

2010-07-27T18:22:00.000-04:00

Less than 200 pages to go!

I feel very accomplished but I love the story so much that I wish it were several more thousands of pages. I love the style of writing, the characters, the details and the way that everything is connected. Scarlett ended up in Atlanta begging Rhett for money, trying to sell herself, and eventually got married to Frank Kennedy because he had money. She then bought a couple of sawmills and ran them to make money. One day on the way to one of the mills, she got attacked and Frank ended up dead trying to avenge the attack as part of the Ku Klux Klan. Scarlett was sorry, not that she had killed Frank (indirectly), but that she was going to hell. Then Rhett proposed to her while Frank was dead in the parlor. Ridiculous.

I LOVE THIS BOOK!!!! I'm sad I only have a couple hundred pages to go :(

There's not much to say about this section, although I was drawing parallels between Scarlett and Gatsby in terms of getting a plan to make money and doing anything to make that happen. Both, now that I think about it, are in love with someone who is married. But Scarlett carries through with her goal and having known hunger never wants to be without money.

However, I am not sure why she is blaming herself so much for Frank's death. While I understand that she disobeyed him when he asked her to stop going out to the mills because it was unsafe. Scarlett, in turn, talked to Frank to make sure he was not part of the Klan. Therefore, both disobeyed the requests of the other, and both got hurt for it. Unfortunately Frank didn't make it out of his attack alive, but in my opinion it was not solely Scarlett's fault that he had been killed. If he had listened to Scarlett, he would not have been involved in the Klan. At the same time, if Scarlett had not visited the mill, she wouldn't have been attacked. Perhaps being a gentleman, Frank had to seek revenge, but Scarlett did not want that either; on the evening of her attack she wanted Frank to stay home and comfort her. Therefore, I believe Frank's death is just as much Frank's fault as Scarlett's.

I'll be honest. I have seen the movie start to finish at least twice, but have watched the first half and the last 5 minutes many times. Therefore, the ending piece is a little fuzzy. I'll watch the movie at some point after finishing the book. I can remember parts from the movie as they happen in the book but I can't remember details much, especially related to the Scarlett and Rhett marriage, which consumes part 5, where I am now in the book. I remember that they lived richly, had a child who died, Rhett got drunk and pushed Scarlett down the stairs, and of course the "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn." Other than that, I can't say I remember much about them as a couple.

That being said, here's my prediction. Rhett and Scarlett are two people who are not well respected or received in Atlanta, mostly because they have taken opportunities that were given to them that others did not take. Displeasure with Scarlett also has to do with the fact that she is a woman doing work for men, showing herself in pregnancy, etc. (That whole bit really annoys me, not that I would consider myself a feminist by any means, but people know about sex and that sex leads to babies and that pregnancy happens and leads to women the size of trucks, so....what is the big deal? It happens to everyone, why can't they go shopping or for a walk? And men have to be like, "Oh, gee, Mrs. So-and-so, what a surprise, a baby!" while thinking in their head like 'oh, I haven't seen her in a while, she must be knocked up!' What's the big deal? But that's besides the point.) and that she is being 'indecent.' They both don't care about their reputations or what people think, but both are concerned with their appearances, having luxurious things, etc. So, based on that, their marriage will be more like a facade. Their relationship, besides being about passion, is more of a love-hate relationship, which, when combined with passion can only end badly. I'm thinking they will live some time with luxury but at some point Scarlett will have to either give up on Ashley or leave Rhett altogether for her to be happy (We all know what happens in the end, who are we kidding?). Thinking back, I can't remember a time when Scarlett was ever truly happy. Even in the very beginning she was pining for Ashley and never did she get her chance.

Yeah, so, a third unhappy marriage, but this more fun than the other two. I'm interested to see if Scarlett ends up in Atlanta, seeing as how she and Rhett are bound to live in the lap of luxury (while Atlanta cleans up and becomes a nice place again, which is inevitable if they live there due to the Scarlett-Atlanta foil). And I want to know what happens to her children Wade and Ella, since they don't exist in the movie.

I have been thinking the whole book about who my favorite character is. IT IS DIFFICULT! I'll elaborate later if I get to it, but I love Scarlett, for as stupid as she seems she actually has some sense except about love. I love Rhett for his frankness, the way he is matter of fact about everything. The third character I love, which I discovered today, is Mammy. There was something she said in the chapter I read today that really struck me. Maybe I'll add it next time, but it was something about even though she is free, she still represents Miss Ellen and she was not going to let Scarlett go off unsupervised and find someone else to raise Ellen's grandchildren. The way Mammy protects the family that she grew up with is a story that often gets lost in the movie and in civil war stories in general. I mean, I grew up in New York (state, not city) so I didn't grow up with the same set of civil war attitudes as those raised in the south, but the message I got was that all slaves hated being slaves and hated their masters and after the emancipation proclamation, all the slaves ran away and came up north to work except for the ones that ended up as sharecroppers. While most of the O'Hara's slaves ran away, and freed slaves were some of the criminals in Atlanta, Mammy, Pork, Dilcey, and Prissy still stayed with the O'Hara's out of loyalty. I was unaware that loyalty of this kind existed in the south between slave and master. My view of slavery pretty accurately matches those of the reported northerners in the book who asked Sam of the bloodhounds and beatings. At the same time, I realize that Mitchell grew up in the south and that her story may be skewed also. Even if slave loyalty was extremely rate, it still draws attention to Mammy as a character and makes me admire her for her devotion to Ellen (who, by the way, represents the old south, thus why she is dead and Scarlett is less like her every day--I love symbolism!)

It's really too bad that Mitchell didn't write more books or a sequel or something--I know there's a sequel but I'm afraid to read it...this book seems so complete (minus the phillipi thing, haven't found out what that is yet) and the writing is so good that if the sequel sucks I'd hate to ruin this book for myself. Currently it may be surpassing even my favorite book, Anna Karenina. We'll have to see with these last 190 pages!

Gone With The Wind: The rock bottom section

2010-07-20T22:19:00.000-04:00

After laying Gone With The Wind to rest for a week or so due to vacation and lack of interest for a few days, I'm happy to say that I'm reading it again with a vengeance. Within the past 2 days, I've read 131 pages (which doesn't sound like a lot but that's 65 pages per day while working which I find impressive).

Last I left off in my blog, Scarlett had just disgraced herself at the dance auction. Since then there's been a lot of description of sick/wounded/dying soldiers, how jealous Scarlett is of Melanie, and how Rhett Butler won't be received by the townspeople. The Yankees kept getting closer to Atlanta. Scarlett kissed Ashley before he left after his furlough, as well as Rhett on the night they escape from Atlanta. Rhett joins the army in the eleventh hour. Scarlett, Prissy, Melanie, Wade, and the baby take the road home to Tara, which is miraculously still standing. Scarlett's father is tired and confused, her sisters are sick, her mother is dead, and all the slaves are gone except Pork, Mammy, and Dilcey.

Normally, I am the kind of person who doesn't hold much sympathy for anyone who has screwed up their own life. I can't feel sorry for Scarlett pining for Ashley after so many years because she knows she can't have him. There's no way I'm rooting for that to work out (even disregarding the fact that I love Rhett). However, so many events in Scarlett's life are so incredibly out of her control that I can't help but feel awful for her. There's no food, no medicine, no cotton to sell, no livestock, her father is not who he was, her mother died the day before she returned home, her sisters are sick, she's stuck in her old house that no longer feels much like home with a son she doesn't like and the wife and child of the man she loves. I am pretty sure this is what rock bottom looks like.

And then there's the argument that if it weren't for her promise to Ashley, Scarlett would have returned home already and seen her mother before she died. However, in this scenario, Scarlett probably would have also come down with typhoid and died. The end. Game over. No 600 more pages to read.

I've seen the movie several times and I know what ultimately happens. However, with so many pages left, I'm wondering what the movie may have been leaving out. Surprisingly, though, not much has been cut out at all (except Wade, who hardly appears in the book anyway). We'll have to see about that...

Two things I noticed:
A quote I read today while at work.
"Make him hush. I can't stand it," said Scarlet, taking the horse by the bridle and pulling him to a reluctant start. "Be a little man, Wade, and stop crying or I will come over there and slap you."
Why had God invented children, she thought savagely as she turned her ankle cruelly on the dark road--useless, crying nuisances they were, always demanding care, always in the way. In her exhaustion, there was no room for compassion for the frightened child, trotting by Prissy's side, dragging at her hand and sniffing--only a weariness that she had borne him, only a tired wonder that she had ever married Charles Hamilton."

I'm a nanny. I can relate. I thought it was especially funny that I read it at work during nap time.

Another thing I noticed: As Atlanta declines, so does Scarlett. I mentioned this in my last Gone with the Wind entry. First, Atlanta becomes very busy with soldiers and people as a result of the railroads. Even though there is a war going on, it's still a hubbub of excitement. On the same page, it mentions that Scarlett had never been happier as a result of seeing Ashley. Is it a coincidence that both Scarlett and Atlanta had become more vivacious at the same time and on the same page? Absolutely not. Furthermore, as Atlanta burns, Scarlett falls apart. She calls for Rhett to take them away, and then loses her mind when she is trying to pack. She starts misplacing things around the house, trying to bring good china instead of a sunbonnet and gloves. Furthermore, as they leave Atlanta, which is presumably burning more, Scarlett deteriorates physically, becoming tired, sunburned, and getting blisters on her hands. By the time they reach Tara (note: they are no longer in Atlanta, therefore Scarlett is further physically from Atlanta which is symbolic for her) she is not the Scarlett we first saw at Tara on page 1 (or in my edition, page 3). She has lost the life she knew at Tara, the way of the south, and the life she had been been brought up to live. While Scarlett realizes that as the south changes, so must she (e.g. she drives the carriage by herself, she starts drinking, she slaps Prissy and calls her names) Mammy still clings to the past, telling Scarlett that she should have worn gloves to drive the carriage. I mean, I'm not sure of the importance of gloves, but when your city is burning and enemy soldiers are coming, I'm finding gloves to be the modern day equivalent of making sure you have your license when you're evacuating for a hurricane or something. However, Mammy, having brought up many young girls in the old south, knows no other way and perhaps cannot imagine what Scarlett has been though.

So, this section has seen things go from bad to worse. Perhaps a little more uplifting things are in store? I hope so, how much worse could it get?

I'm also still waiting on the "As God as my witness, I'll never go hungry again" part. I don't think I'm there yet....or else I passed it. But to be fair, I have not yet got to a part with Scarlett digging up yams.

The Great Gatsby

2010-07-18T22:28:00.001-04:00

Recently I took a road trip to the northeast to visit a couple of friends in med school. Even though I am currently still in the middle of Gone With The Wind, the library did not have that on audiobook (on CD) for my car (and I wasn't about to shell out $50 to Amazon for it either,) I chose another book from the list to listen to for part of the car ride. The Great Gatsby seemed a perfect choice because it was short and because I was somewhat familiar with it. Truth be told, The Great Gatsby is one of those books that falls under the category of "books I was assigned in high school that I read on Sparknotes," along with A Tale of Two Cities, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, The Odyssey, Lord of the Flies, Huckleberry Finn, and Pride and Prejudice. This is not to say that I didn't read ANY of these; I usually started with such good intentions of this being the book that I actually finished, but time restraints usually won. Either I was too busy to actually do the reading, or the book was not interesting enough for me to bother finishing. I remember reading most of The Great Gatsby, up to chapter 6 at least. The point of that rant was a) I made it through high school by avoiding classic books, and b) I did not have to pay 100% attention to Gatsby in the car.

So, this being a particularly famous book, and one I remember liking in high school (the parts I read, anyway), I had high expectations for the book which were basically squashed. I found it surprisingly wordy and insignificant, which is ironic because that is the picture of upper class life that the novel paints. While I understand this major theme, I'm not quite sure what to make of it.

What I find most striking about the book is the evolution of Gatsby. He was a poor mid-westerner who one day made up his mind to be rich and did everything he could to achieve his goal. Not everything he did was legal, some was particularly shady, but overall, Gatsby became a wealthy man. Modern day Machiavelli? I'd say so. His rationale was a little shaky (needing to impress Daisy even though she was married) but his efforts were rewarded with money. He threw elaborate parties to impress and lure Daisy in. In the process he lured in many others, but Gatsby seemed uninterested in them, as shown by his removed presence at his parties. I admire his determined nature, but can't help but be bothered by all the emptiness. He did what he did to get Daisy, which ultimately failed, not only when she chose Tom but also when he was shot by Wilson. Gatsby did not want to be rich for himself, although he did seem to enjoy that lifestyle, and I think that's where he went wrong. While money cannot buy happiness, achieving an important goal can bring happiness. In my mind, Gatsby had a worthy goal (even though it involved money) but the reasoning for his goal was what lead him to feeling empty. And while I can admire his do or die nature, I can't help feeling that Gatsby needed some other interests, friendships, and relationships to make his life worthwhile.

"There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy, and the tired."

I'm not sure why I like this quote so much. I guess when it comes to relationships, everyone falls into one of these categories, more or less. I also believe you can be in two categories at once. Either you are into someone, or they are into you, or both, which covers pursued and pursuing. I'm not sure if busy refers to people too busy to be in relationships, or people who are currently in relationships, but for now I'll go with both. And the tired I presume are not looking for any sort of relationship, and are perhaps bored or frustrated with that sort of thing. I'm not sure which category I fall into, maybe a mix between pursuing and busy, if that's possible. Maybe I'll do some work in this department and think about it some more. Maybe if I bring this quote up on a date I'll find out if the guy is a book geek like me, haha.

So, thus is my analysis of The Great Gatsby. Next entry will probably be getting up to speed in Gone With The Wind.

Reputation

2010-06-24T14:40:00.001-04:00

"Until you've lost your reputation, you never realize what a burden it was or what freedom really is."
--Rhett Butler, while dancing with Scarlett at the charity ball

Rhett Butler is my hero. Even though he is a scoundrel only concerned with money, he always speaks the truth. It doesn't matter whether he will be accepted or not. It doesn't matter whether his ideas are scandalous and not generally liked. When he brought up the fact at the Wilkes' barbecue that there was not a single cannon factory in the south, everyone went berserk. However, he was only bringing up facts (although they fell on deaf ears, clearly).

Scarlett, on the other hand, always cares what people thinks about her. However, she has such an analytic mind, she finds a way to do what people think is acceptable while also looking out for herself. When she flirts with everyone at the barbecue, everyone sees Scarlett's personality when in fact she is trying to make a point to Ashley. She goes to Atlanta for what everyone thinks is her health, but her real motivation is so that she can be with Ashley's family. Then eventually she finagles the reasoning of dancing at the ball to be helping the cause when in fact she just wants to dance and have a good time, and does not feel an ounce of grief for Charles.

This reputation statement, though, shows that Scarlett is about to fall from the good graces of society, as Rhett Butler has done, for doing something socially unacceptable. What society doesn't realize is that Scarlett has already done something unacceptable by marrying someone not for love or practical reasons, but to get closer to another man. She is only in Atlanta for that reason, and wearing black for someone you are not truly mourning is disrespectful as well. However, the people (minus Butler, of course) are unable to see through Scarlett's facade. Basically, Mitchell paints the southern gentlemen, ladies, and belles as ignorant and rash and the character not even received by his own family as having any shard of intelligence. Probably the exception to this would be Ellen O'Hara, but she only shines because she was good at the life she led in the culture of the old south. The post-war climate will not suit her.

There are many other quotes that I have loved but as I am now currently 200 pages into the book it's hard to go back and find them, so from here on out I'll be a little better about updating.

Something I thought was interesting was the description of when Scarlett and Melanie turned in their wedding rings. Scarlett, first, was thankful that she did not have any beautiful jewelry on because then she would have had to follow the norms and donate them to the cause. In essence her "mourning" was a blessing in disguise. However, she did notice that her wedding ring was jewelry and then took it from her finger and threw it onto the pile. Melanie then did the same thing, telling Scarlett that she was so brave (ha! If you only had a brain...). Anyway, Melanie really has to pull the ring off her finger, which shows the kind of attachment she has to her husband that she cannot pull her husband (symbolically through the ring) from her finger, while Scarlett has no problem casting him aside. And you can tell she wants to, because mourning would have given her an out to not donating anything, but she clearly chose to do it.

So, without the thought of Charles lingering around her, and her clear insubordination with the norms of mourning, I'm guessing Scarlett just casts her reputation off and continues her life without regard as to the townspeople's thoughts of her.

Wow. Long tangent. Getting back to the quote though, It's definitely true that reputation can be both a blessing and a curse. If you have a bad reputation, it lingers and there's not much you can do to change it no matter how hard you try. If you have a good reputation, you feel expected to live up to it no matter what you feel like doing. Personally, my reputation (i think, at least) is that I am quiet and I follow the rules, and it's definitely hard to break out of that when so many people know that about me. And once someone has a reputation it's hard to see them outside of that. Lucky for Scarlett, she had a way to break out and ruin her reputation, and win her freedom, as Rhett Butler puts it. Now that it's ruined, Scarlett can do whatsoever she pleases and is no longer confined by the ideas of others. I'll be looking to see whether she speaks her mind a little more too.

Additionally, Scarlett and Atlanta were Christened in the same year, which is, to me at least, as good as Margaret Mitchell screaming from the book "PAY ATTENTION!! SCARLETT AND ATLANTA ARE FOILS!" Anyway, Scarlett visited Atlanta when she was small, back when it was a new town, just developing. It grew quickly and was now the center of trade for the south, connected with many other cities. It is bustling and always busy, but because it is so new it is rough around the edges. Scarlett even says about it when she first arrives, "I'm going to like it here! It's so alive and exciting!" And if that statement doesn't describe the both of them, then lock me up!

I'm only one fifth of the way into this book. At least is it not as tedious for me as Lord of the Rings

it's only when like marries like can there be any happiness

2010-06-22T22:20:00.000-04:00

I don't have much time to write (Have to be up before 6 tomorrow, eek!) but I just wanted to document how fabulous I think this book is. I'm already on page 160-something. Already Scarlett is a widow with a small child. They are about to go to the ball to help the Confederacy. Next time I'll put in some quotes (most of which made the movie) that I especially liked and tell why at one point during my reading I discovered that I was exactly like Scarlett (in some respects...I certainly hope I am not like her completely!) As for now, peace out!

Gone With The Wind

2010-06-16T20:07:00.000-04:00

FINISHED THE FELLOWSHIP!!! finally....

I think I'm going to continue my pattern of hiatus from LOTR and take a break before I head into "The Two Towers". And by break I actually mean reading over one thousand pages of "Gone With The Wind."

I ordered Gone With The Wind to get free shipping on something I had to order for school, since I knew I was going to be buying it anyway. I've read two chapters so far, and besides being completely racist (but probably historically accurate in that department) it is fantastic. It probably helps that I have seen the movie several times, and really like the story. I'll put in some quotes and noticings in my next entry. For the time being, though, I'll get back to homework and hopefully I'll be able to read a little more tonight.

Hiatus

2010-06-06T20:04:00.000-04:00

I am officially on hiatus from this book project due to grad school. It's really a shame, especially since I am mid-LOTR series (30 pages from the end of the first book). I'm hoping that between class and nannying I'll have a little time to finish up the Fellowship. Then it will be only a couple of weeks before I can resume with The Two Towers, which is slightly shorter (yay!) My goal is to finish up this series by the end of summer.

I also have to find a thrilling vacation book to take on the plane with me. Our family vacation is coming up and since we will be flying across the country, I've decided I had better use that time to read a good book. Hopefully something exciting and not something that involves intense concentration (read as: I am not bringing LOTR or War and Peace on vacation with me...and ESPECIALLY not War and Peace because it is heavy). I do have the Life of Pi sitting on my bookshelf waiting for me, so I'll have to preview that one to make sure it'll keep my interest for 5 hours straight, or find a different one from the list.

My friend and I have worked on revising this list to accommodate our own tastes. We've added a few books that we feel should be on the list (I'm not sure how many as of yet) and have decided that if a certain book is REALLY not working, we can move on to another one (read as: I will probably not read Dickens and she will not be reading Steinbeck). I'm still really excited about this even though I a) am burnt out from reading about how kids learn to read and spell, and b) have no time to actually read for pleasure.

See you July 1st, when class is over!

75% !!!

2010-05-17T21:15:00.000-04:00

My goodness this is a long book!!
75% in and they are mid-Mines of Moria. There is still so much stuff that still needs to happen. Looking back (so far) I have enjoyed all of the description and back story but while I am reading I just want to get to the end. I was hoping that I could finish the entire series before my summer class begins next week but apparently that is not a possibility; I'll be lucky to finish just this book. I still have about 95 pages to go, and if I finish that it will be perfect timing for a 6-week hiatus from real reading in the name of getting my homework done. Blah. I am SO not excited for that.

It took me a while to get through the second chapter of book 2. There is back story out the wazoo. While I definitely see the necessity of it, the amount seems a bit excessive. Also, I am wondering if their various travel mishaps are going to be important later on. I can understand if every misstep shows the significance of something, but there are a few too many that just kind of hint at the fact that the journey is hard. Believe me, I can sympathize. Hiking and camping without any food or shoes are definitely not for me. We'll see if they get any luck in the mines (probably not though, I seem to remember a tomb and a fight scene).

Conclusion: These books are long, detailed, and epic. They are fantastic but you really have to commit to reading them because if you miss so much as a sentence you are hopelessly lost.

The Fellowship of the Ring (50%)

2010-05-09T07:54:00.000-04:00

I finally made it to the halfway point in this book. It has been slow going, not because I don't like the book, but because I often get bored reading. Also, I was out of town for a few days without the book, but now that I am in bed with the plague I can make a little more progress.

Frodo and company finally made it to Rivendell. It only took 12 chapters. In the movie it happened so quickly and the majority of the movie was about the fellowship, but so far that has not even happened yet. It's amazing how much the film cuts out, although I can't say there was any scene I wish they had added from the beginning.

In this section, the 4 hobbits running away from the black riders reminded me of Jews trying to escape the Nazis. I'm not sure if that is what Tolkien had in mind, but keeping with the WWII motif it makes sense. Strider then is one who is helping them out but who is not immediately in danger himself, and using his connections to ensure their safety. He leads them to Rivendell, a safe haven.

Not a lot has happened, so I guess I'll end there. I'm sure it will get more exciting in Book II

The Fellowship of the Ring (the first 25%)

2010-04-26T20:49:00.000-04:00

Wow! I am enjoying The Fellowship of the Ring SOOO much more than The Hobbit, but I do realize now the importance of reading the Hobbit beforehand; there are so many references to it that I would miss had I not read it first. As of right now, I have read the first 6 chapters, and even though Frodo and company are barely out of the Shire, I am completely engrossed in the book. I thought it would be pages and pages of the dullest part of the Hobbit, but there is so much more to this story and I think that is one of the things I really enjoy about it. I think today I read something like 60 pages!

I have recently seen all three movies for the first time, and the themes behind the story and especially behind the ring itself really reminded me of World War II, and realizing that the books were published in the midst of the war, I am even more convinced of this. Therefore, I have been searching for evidence of parallel events and such. However, the fact that the ring has so much power to corrupt men, and that the entirety of Middle Earth ends up fighting over power speaks to World War II quite a bit I feel. So far, though, there has not been much battle so the WWII parody remains to be seen.

The only thing that I am not liking about this book is the fact that when I finish I still have 2 more to go before I can check it off my list. On the bright side, these three combined are not as many pages as War and Peace, so there are still challenges ahead.

Next up: The Fellowship of the Ring

2010-04-22T10:28:00.000-04:00

I have started reading The Fellowship of the Ring, but thus far I am only 9 pages in and therefore, I don't have a ton to say. However, I am anticipating this book being a little more exciting than The Hobbit (although I think the background was necessary) and easier for me to grasp since I have seen the first movie several times. So far they are preparing for Bilbo's "eleventy-first" birthday party and that's about it.

As much as I do want to read this book next, I also have some others that I would rather read first. I'm not sure if I'll do this simultaneously with another, since I think it's going to take me a while to get through. I guess I am so interested to find out what happens in all of them that I get distracted and can't decide. Luckily I bought 6 books at a time so I am going to make sure I finish those before choosing one that I don't have yet so that I don't spend too much money on books I haven't read or get slammed with library fines. But classes have ended for 5 weeks, and it's currently vacation, so I think now is as good a time as any to get the Lord of the Rings series over with now that I have a lot of time on my hands.

So, I guess this section of the blog will be consumed with LOTR 24-7. This is going to take a while...

The Hobbit: check

2010-04-20T19:17:00.000-04:00

I FINALLY FINISHED THE HOBBIT!!
To be honest, the point I made in my last entry still stands. However, I was happy to see that Bilbo did not slay the dragon. Having the dragon die at the hands of someone else was slightly disappointing to the part of me that was very into the story, but it was exciting to the part of me that hates all things cliché.
So as much as I liked the Hobbit, I did not find it as interesting as I had anticipated, but I am excited to get to the Lord of the Rings books. I do enjoy Tolkien ‘s writing style, but I think I am slightly distracted at the current moment by the Madonna episode of Glee that is coming on in 1 hour and 20 minutes, which is hindering my ability to say anything intelligent.

Next up: The Fellowship of the Ring

What's SO Great About The Hobbit?

2010-04-19T23:46:00.000-04:00

Let me start off this post by saying that I am in fact enjoying reading The Hobbit.

But here's the deal: I have read numerous books about people or creatures wandering through the woods and making a long journey for some epic purpose. Some books by Brian Jacques come to mind; I spent an entire summer reading him on summer during middle school. So, if this is the case and many characters from books have made epic journeys just like Bilbo and his band of 13 dwarves, why is this book so much better than the others? Tolkien created an entire world, but so did Jacques. The characters are just as memorable. Perhaps Tolkien's writing style is better, but from what I can tell, the story itself is at the heart of this matter. Why do people love the story of Bilbo more than that of any other wandering character from literature?

I know that the Lord of the Rings series is currently quite popular because of the movies that have come out within the last decade. However, I know that these books were also popular before that. I have come to realize that The Hobbit is a good book, I am just wondering how much better it actually is than others. Also, I know this is just an arbitrary list of books that I am reading. Thus, The Hobbit may not actually be one of the best out there (although I would bet money that it is on the best books ever written list) so my question in this entry may be null and void.

Perhaps the ending will answer this question.

Still reading the Hobbit....

2010-04-14T20:30:00.000-04:00

My life has been rather hectic these past few weeks, so I haven't been as into my reading project as I would have like to have been. Bottom line: I am still reading the Hobbit, just at a snail's pace. Luckily, though, all my projects are now over (FINALLY!!!) and I can devote myself to this project again. (and the weather is getting nicer so I can be outside and fight paleness at the same time!) Plus, next week is spring break so I won't be doing ANYTHING all week, which will be fantastic because I can just read (and shop a little...as a reward for doing school stuff/working).

Tonight, though, I think will be Hobbit-reading night and the next thing I write will actually relate to me having read something instead of the opposite.

The Hobbit-Part 1

2010-03-30T11:38:00.001-04:00

I'm up to chapter 7 in the Hobbit. So far Bilbo has set out a journey with the dwarfs but got separated from them in a cave and found Gollum's ring. Then he tricked Gollum into showing him the way out of the cave and back to the dwarfs.

I have tried to read this book at least once before and it ended probably before page 20. This time I got past the part where nothing happens for a while and on to something a little more exciting. I like it, so I ordered the whole series (along with a couple other books on the list) and they should be arriving soon!

So...that's all I have to say about the Hobbit so far...lame, right? I should have way more to say considering it's such an epic story, but oh well. School work and trying to find a summer job (let alone a real job) have taken all my energy.

Books I HAVE Read

2010-03-27T18:12:00.000-04:00

I mentioned before that I had read 13 books on this list. I should probably list out what they are:

4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
76 The Inferno – Dante
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl

I'm debating rereading some of these...it has been a long time since I have read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Anne of Green Gables, Animal Farm, and Winnie the Pooh. Although I remember loving these books (not Animal Farm, though) I can't remember much about them besides what I can recall from movies and tv shows. So, to be fair, I may end up reading these again.

Also, I will probably, along with my friend, who is now embarking on this journey with me (so that when we get an apartment together we can have a lot of impressive books out) revise the list slightly, or at least take off a few of the books we will never read and substitute a couple that we will. Although I suppose I can report on that when it happens.

Favorite book so far: Anna Karenina, hands down. (I also really like Because of Winn Dixie, but that's not on the list. I guess it's the teacher in me.)

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland-part 3

2010-03-27T17:15:00.000-04:00

"Cheshire-Puss," she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. "Come, it's pleased so far," thought Alice, and she went on. "Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"

"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.

"I don't much care where--" said Alice.

"Then it doesn't matter which way you go," said the Cat.

"--so long as I get somewhere," Alice added as an explanation.

"Oh, you're sure to do that," said the Cat, "if you only walk long enough."

So true! If you don't have an ending goal or desired result in mind, there is no way you can choose the wrong path. In this part of the book, at the very least, I feel like the cat is the only source of reason. And that is what I like the most about the Cheshire cat--the character who is a talking animal that can appear and disappear at will, relocate to other locations in a flash, and make only parts of his body appear in thin air is the only character in the book worth listening to.

...replied Alice; "and I wish you wouldn't keep appearing and vanishing so suddenly: you make one quite giddy!"

"All right," said the Cat; and this time it vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone.

So, I finished Alice in Wonderland. I really was interested in the details from the book that contributed to continuity among film versions. One example I noticed was the queen's croquet game. In both the Tim Burton version as well as Disney's animated version, the mallets were flamingos and the balls were hedgehogs. This detail did indeed show up in the book. Another detail that I thought Disney may have taken liberties with, but was actually in the book was the painting the roses red part. Being unfamiliar with Carroll's story until this point, I wasn't sure how much of these films were people's interpretations influencing each other vs. how much was actually included in Carroll's writing. However, I was confused when I got to the end of "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and I had not yet met Tweedledee and Tweedledum. They do show up in "Through the Looking Glass," which I am currently reading.

Burton's version, although it uses many characters from Carroll's two books, does not follow the storyline much at all, save for the key-table-eat me-drink me part from chapter 1. However, the plot in the Burton version seemed much more cohesive than Disney's animated version. Before reading the book, I though that perhaps Disney was in a strange stage with its movies and perhaps having disjointed scenes was part of the style. However, each chapter in "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" as well as "Through the Looking Glass" tells about a new place or person that Alice met. However, there is not really much of a story in "Wonderland" besides Alice looking for a white rabbit and exploring. I was interested in the book because I wanted to see what would happen to Alice next, or who she would meet, but as far as a plot driving the story forward, there is not one that stands out in my mind.

I am not enjoying "Through the Looking Glass" as much as "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" although it is answering my questions about characters I did not encounter in the first book (the Tweedles, the singing flowers) and things I knew were coming (Walrus and the Carpenter, the Jabberwocky). I'm on chapter 5 of that one now, with about 70 pages to go.

One last quote from "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"

"Every thing's got a moral, if only you can find it"
-spoken by the Duchess

I love this quote as well because if you really look for it, you can find a moral or reason for everything. I guess there is a lot of truth in this book that is embedded and spoken by mad people and thus disregarded by the reader due to the character's mental state.

Next up: THE HOBBIT

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland-Part 2

2010-03-23T15:28:00.000-04:00

"Who are you? said the Caterpillar.
This was not an encouraging opening for a conversation. Alice replied, rather shyly, "I-I hardly know, Sir, just at present-at least, I know who I was when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then."
I am up to chapter 6 in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland now. I'm going to do a summary of chapters 2-6 for my own purposes (spoiler alert!) and then talk about what

Summary: Alice grew to 9 feet in the hall, and then cried, and then shrunk back down so that she was swimming in the "pool of tears" (title of chapter 2). At that point, she came across a swimming doormouse that lead her to shore. At the shore, Alice met a dodo bird that had everyone running in a circle to get dry. The White Rabbit appeared again, thought Alice was someone named Mary Ann, presumably his maid, and she followed him back to his house. In the house, Alice saw more "Eat Me" cakes, so she ate them and grew (point #1). Alice then grew too big for the house and was entirely stuffed inside. The White Rabbit found his friend Pat and Bill, a lizard, to determine what was in the house and to get it out. When they realized that it was Alice, they started throwing more "Eat Me" cakes at her, so she ate the cakes and shrunk once again. She ran from the house, encountered a dog, ran from the dog, and then came upon a large mushroom with a caterpillar smoking hookah on top. The caterpillar and Alice talk in circles and Alice comes to the conclusion that she doesn't really know who she is anymore, and is frustrated with changing sizes so often (point #2). The caterpillar walks away, telling Alice that one side of the mushroom will make her grow, while the other side will make her shrink. She bites the growing side and becomes taller than trees. A bird thinks that she is a serpent, and although she tries to reason with him, telling him that she is a girl and not hunting eggs, he does not believe her. She then eats more of the mushroom and shrinks to her regular size (point #3). At the end of chapter 6, Alice encounters a little house, about as tall as she, and so she decides to find out what is inside, but not before shrinking a little more as to not frighten whoever or whatever is inside.

END OF SUMMARY

In general, the growing and shrinking is getting a little old at this point. It is making it increasingly difficult to figure out what size Alice is at any particular point in the story. Also, I can't remember another book I have read where a character shrinks like this. So, I've come to the conclusion that shrinking means something, but I'm not sure what exactly.

Point #1: When Alice eats the "Eat Me" cakes while inside the Rabbit's house, she says "I know something interesting is sure to happen....whenever I eat or drink anything: so I'll just see what this bottle does." Alice is indeed very curious about her new surroundings, and adventurous to be trying whatever she comes across, hoping that it will bring about some welcome change. She goes on to say "I do hope it'll make me grow large again, for really I'm quite tired of being such a tiny little thing!" and then she grows too big for the house. There are definitely tones of "be careful what you wish for," but also the idea that it's not always luck that puts one in a strange situation.

Point #2: Because Alice keeps eating everything in sight, hoping things will happen to her, she is really bringing all the changes upon herself. Her desire to get into the garden in the beginning of the book started this, and as she grew and shrank even more, more problems arose. If she had, in the first chapter, brought the key with her, or unlocked the door when she was tall, before drinking to become small, all of these problems would not even exist. Alice is frustrated with her lot at the beginning of chapter 6, but in reality she has no one to blame but herself. She followed the rabbit, and she drank and ate strange food and drinks, so she is the only one responsible. Luckily there are creatures in Wonderland to help her out so far, providing her with cakes and drinks, or a magical mushroom in the case of the caterpillar.

Point #3: At this point, Alice has realized, thanks to the caterpillar, that she is in control of her size. Due to her experience with the bird in chapter 6, she now has the foresight to make herself the correct size for each new event or setting in Wonderland. Although, she desires so much to be her regular height, but who is to say what is actually "regular" in Wonderland, or even in general. And is Alice able to know if she is the perfect height that she is used to being? I'm wondering if I had grown and shrank and was transported to a magical land, and given a mushroom, as Alice was, I'm not confident that I could make myself the height that I am now.

I do love the caterpillar, though. I found him very creepy in the Disney version of this movie, and also saw the caterpillar played by the voice of Snape in Tim Burton's version. However, in the book he seems less grumpy. Although he does have very short answers, he is testing Alice to see if she knows herself. I mean, if I were a caterpillar smoking hookah on a mushroom, and some teeny tiny girl comes up and looks at me, I would ask her who she is as well. And if she couldn't answer, I would become frustrated with her. I love that he gives her the mysterious mushroom to try to make her happy (as if that could happen....human nature comment, what?) I kind of wonder though, what makes that mushroom so special. Maybe the hookah seasoned it, haha.

I think that's where I'll leave Alice for a day while I start my grad school homework, which consists of reading a Twilight-esque book. I feel like perhaps that is not the most scholarly thing but I guess I can comment on that later.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland-Part 1

2010-03-23T01:06:00.000-04:00

So far I have only read chapter 1 (it's all I had time for this morning before a meeting.) At the end of the tenth page, Alice had already followed the White Rabbit, fell down the rabbit hole, landed at the bottom, tried the key in all the doors, shrunk, and started growing. Based on this, I'm exciting because it seems like the action will be fast. Looking through the book it looks like there is a lot of poetry. I'm not sure what the purpose of this is--whether it is Carroll's style or if this was typical of literature in his time period. Nothing super interesting to report this time. Maybe I'll have more interesting things to say once the book starts getting more trippy.

Book List

2010-03-23T00:08:00.000-04:00

My friend spoke of the following list of books a couple of days ago:

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens

11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot

21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame

31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne

41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan

51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville

71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Inferno – Dante
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt

81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White x
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton

91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Apparently the majority of people have read 6 of these books. I have read 13, cover to cover. Probably about 10 more were assigned to me at some point in high school, and if I was lucky I made it through the first chapter. I was not much of a reader in school, but now that I am out of college and no longer forced to read these books, I'm going to try again. I think for me, knowing that someone was forcing me to read anything made me want to read it less, so, I'm trying again on my own terms.

The inspiration for this project came from a few different places. First, the friend who sent me this list is starting her own blog and it looked like fun, so here goes my attempt, in a "Julie and Julia" sort of fashion. Also, I've always been interested in works that are deemed "classic," and even more intrigued by the notion that hardly anyone has read or watched any of these classics. I tried to make it through AFI's 100 greatest movies of all time or one of those lists, but got distracted and never actually finished, so maybe movies will make an appearance too.

But I guess the thing that really got this going was my going to see Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland (in 3D, no less) last weekend. Even though I woke up on Monday with blurred vision, no balance, and convoluted depth perception, (hopefully due to the 3D experience), I still was interested in the story of Alice in Wonderland. I started to see similarities between that movie and the animated Disney version, and I began to wonder what Lewis Carroll had actually written that made the images in both films so similar. So, on a shopping trip to get fabric for a new purse I am making (another project), I stopped at Barnes and Noble and picked up a copy of Alice's Adventures In Wonderland and Through The Looking-Glass, first published in England in 1865 and 1871, respectively.

In future posts, I will probably talk about my new project as a whole, as well as the books I am reading and how it's going so far. Even though I would, as a rule, start with #1, I am starting with #29 because
1. I don't want to start off this long journey with a story that I do not like i.e. Pride and Prejudice. (So sue me, I really don't get the hype...but I can talk about that later when I try to read it again)
2. I already have Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
3. I'm contemplating going really crazy and reading out of order (gasp!)

Also, there is NO way I am reading the Bible OR the Complete Works of Shakespeare. Just throwing that out there. I have read parts of both of these before, and having been an (almost) English major, I've read enough Shakespeare to know what he is all about. As for the Bible....I actually did try to read that once simply because I wanted to know ALL the stories. And, surprisingly, I did get through Leviticus before I abandoned that project. However, I feel like I know what I need to know from that one and it's not meant to be read cover to cover anyway. Plus, if I'm going to read a religious book like that, I might as well read something that I am not as familiar with. So, I'll contemplate that one later.

As for now, I'll enlighten you with my reading of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (#29).