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August 08
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Nic
gave
 
to:
Midnight for Charlie Bone (The Children of the Red King, Book 1)
by Jenny Nimmo
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my rating:
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read in August, 2008
Nic said:
"No one could be more surprised than I am about how much I liked this book. I picked it up because, between the cover art and the "boy with supernatural powers goes to a special school" jacket description, it screamed "Harry Potter rip...more
No one could be more surprised than I am about how much I liked this book. I picked it up because, between the cover art and the "boy with supernatural powers goes to a special school" jacket description, it screamed "Harry Potter rip-off" to me. This encouraged me to read it for several reasons:
1. To find out whether I was wrong to, well, judge a book by its cover.
2. To see whether it actually was a blatantly, perhaps humorously, shameless rip-off.
3. To see whether, perhaps, it was just enough of a rip-off of Harry Potter (which I loved) for me to like it.
As it turns out, it wasn't what I would call a rip-off at all. I think the cover (plus the Potter-esque titles of the sequels: "Charlie Bone and the Invisible Boy," etc.) skewed my assumption. In the British tradition, boarding school stories are quite common when writing for young people. Just like orphan stories, they create situations in which a child protagonist must fend for him/herself rather than, as one might realistically expect, going to parents for help; this makes the protagonist more active, heroic, and interesting. Boarding school stories are also great for exploring dynamics between kids in environments with relatively few adults. And of course, supernatural powers are common in fantasy.
The writing could be a little less than polished at times, but was mostly compelling; ditto the plot. What sold me was the cast. The good guys were generally fun, sympathetic, and likeable, while the bad guys were pretty fun to dislike, and could be a little genuinely creepy at times.
I'm not going to rush out and buy this book (I got it from the library), but I will read the sequels, and would definitely reccommend it to others, particularly kids. (I felt it would be most appropriate for kids around the age of the protagonists - that is, ten or so. The baddies just weren't quite threatening enough for me to believe they'd be able to hurt anyone, really - which, in a way, I liked, but some cynical/jaded teens or older people might find it boring.)...less
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August 04
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Nic
gave
to:
Chasing Harry Winston: A Novel (Hardcover)
by Lauren Weisberger
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in August, 2008
Nic said:
"This book that manages to be shallow, catty, and unlikely all at the same time. So much so that I admit, though it isn't my usual, that I found it somewhat entertaining - but not all that much. During a time of long workdays and not enough sleep, i...more
This book that manages to be shallow, catty, and unlikely all at the same time. So much so that I admit, though it isn't my usual, that I found it somewhat entertaining - but not all that much. During a time of long workdays and not enough sleep, it certainly gave me a trip out of my everyday life. However, of the three main characters, I only found one to be at all relatable, let alone likeable. The POV wavers, and the author describes - at length - every outfit every character wears, ever. This makes some sense in context, both because one protagonist is fashion-obsessed and would notice these things and because the outfits are glamorous to the point of being alien, and make up an integral part of this bizarre and not-really-believable world of the over-privileged.
Most of my specific issues with the story relate to the character of Adriana. I feel that the author makes her so overwhelmingly successful with her strict "play hard to get, or you don't get men's attention" rules that the book seems to really be endorsing this idea, which I think is BS. Also, I got tired of how everywhere Adriana went, men basically stared and drooled. Twice - twice! - a mere gesture on her part (one time it's no more than "her sexy hair flick") is enough to make multiple male bystanders groan audibly. This seems kinda unrealistic. Also, the level of self-absorbed meanness she shows through the first three-fourths of the book at least makes me wish we saw Adriana humbled somehow. It never happens. The only thing I will say for her is that I very much liked the development with the parrot....less
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Nic
gave
to:
Hidden Turnings: A Collection of Stories Through Time and Space (Hardcover)
by Diana Wynne Jones
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in August, 2008
Nic said:
"I don't think DWJ chose these stories - I think she just sent around to the authors she liked asking for stories (based on the foreward). Mostly, the stories didn't impress me much. I'd already read "The Master," the only DWJ one included...more
I don't think DWJ chose these stories - I think she just sent around to the authors she liked asking for stories (based on the foreward). Mostly, the stories didn't impress me much. I'd already read "The Master," the only DWJ one included. That one seems to me like one of her less-coherent stories, though I like it largely for its vivid-but-not-really-explained weirdness....less
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August 03
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Nic
gave
to:
The Creative Writing MFA Handbook: A Guide for Prospective Graduate Students (Paperback)
by Tom Kealey
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in July, 2008
Nic said:
"The actual writing in this book was sometimes rough and sometimes a bit patronizing, but I found two things extremely helpful: the sample chart for keeping track of what materials each grad school required, and the list of MFA (and MA, and PhD) prog...more
The actual writing in this book was sometimes rough and sometimes a bit patronizing, but I found two things extremely helpful: the sample chart for keeping track of what materials each grad school required, and the list of MFA (and MA, and PhD) programs in the back of the book. The list is not entirely comprehensive, though; for a few more programs, try http://www.awpwriter.org/...less
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July 19
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Nic
gave
to:
Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography (A Series of Unfortunate Events)
by Lemony Snicket
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in July, 2008
Nic said:
"Okay, this book acknowledged most (but not all) of my questions, then systematically didn't answer them. Seriously. It was a bit interesting - a collection of fake articles, journal entries, letters, etc. - but had little relevance to the issues ab...more
Okay, this book acknowledged most (but not all) of my questions, then systematically didn't answer them. Seriously. It was a bit interesting - a collection of fake articles, journal entries, letters, etc. - but had little relevance to the issues about which I was hoping to learn more. Also, at times, the writing crossed the line from "humorously silly" to "annoying and somewhat difficult to read." The entire book seemed to really lack a point, and certainly didn't even pretend to have a plot. But I have to say, the most frustrating thing was the way the chapters were titled with relevant questions (ex. "Why is Lemony Snicket recording the story of the Baudelaires?") which were then crossed out, supposedly by Snicket, and replaced with questions about which I really didn't care. Had it taken me more than a couple of lazy hours to read, I would have skipped this book....less
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Nic
gave
to:
Plum Lucky (A Stephanie Plum Between the Numbers/Holiday Novel, #3)
by Janet Evanovich
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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July 13
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Nic
read and liked
Becky's
review of House of Many Ways:
"I really enjoyed reading this book. The writing was excellent, and it was certainly almost a sequel to Howl's Moving Castle, although calling it the sequel is perhaps unfair to Castle in the Sky.
Vague spoilers follow:
It did rath...more
I really enjoyed reading this book. The writing was excellent, and it was certainly almost a sequel to Howl's Moving Castle, although calling it the sequel is perhaps unfair to Castle in the Sky.
Vague spoilers follow:
It did rather fail as a traditional novel for two reasons. First, there was nothing much holding it together thematically. Charmain's character development was interesting and coherent, but it had no real bearing on the endgame of the plot, beyond the fact that it allowed her to be in the right places at the right time. And all the other plot things that were going on were interesting in their own right, but their relationships to one another were questionable. Really, the story had all the randomness of real life, but this made it less of a story.
Secondly and relatedly, the plot was undermined by the fact that one of the characters was, of course, Howl, and the bad guys could not possibly be any match for him. Once certain facts were established and certain events unfolded, he simply saved the day. This is totally realistic, but again, makes the story feel less important. Califer's part in saving everyone did add some tension, but not enough. Ultimately the plot and tension would have been enough for, say, an episode of a television series, where an interesting premise need not be accompanied by really high stakes, but it didn't feel like a fully-formed standalone novel.
However, I still entirely enjoyed reading it. Sure, tightly-constructed, high-stakes novels are ultimately preferable, but if DWJ wants to publish fun little stories like this one involving everyone's favorite foppish wizard, I'm not complaining....less
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House of Many Ways
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July 10
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Nic
gave
to:
The Last Battle (rpkg) (Narnia)
by C.S. Lewis
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in July, 2008
Nic said:
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
This one wasn't as bad as I'd feared in terms of me wanting to noogie my younger self for totally not getting the Christianity thing. Yes, there are some things that jumped out at me now - especially...more
So, I've now finished rereading Narnia.
This one wasn't as bad as I'd feared in terms of me wanting to noogie my younger self for totally not getting the Christianity thing. Yes, there are some things that jumped out at me now - especially Lucy's comment that there in our world a stable once held something bigger than the whole world - but I can forgive Little Nic for not seeing it. I didn't used to read anything except what was on the page.
The action itself was really pretty good, as was the whole end-of-the-world bit. Sucks to be Jill and Eustace's parents back home, but I guess they'll make it eventually.
That was actually an interesting point for me: everyone is supposed to have died in this railway accident (though the idea that the train actually hit Peter et al. is pretty crazy - they were out on the platform, right?), yet Jill and Eustace go to Narnia instead of straight to inside the stable. You could interpret this as Aslan choosing where to put them, but it seems like if they were dead in England, they'd be dead in Narnia, and go straight to the post-Narnia super-Narnia where Peter and everyone went. The idea I had is that - possibly due to Aslan's intervention or whatever - they were not dead immediately, but maybe lay comatose in a hospital or something, and didn't die in England until they went through the stable door in Narnia....less
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July 05
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Nic
read and liked
Crazy Uncle Ryan's
review of The End (A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 13):
"This left me with a lot of unanswered questions. I don’t feel like I really understand what exactly VFD (either the villains or the volunteers) were really up to. Ultimately, I was a bit disappointed with this one because throughout the whole ser...more
This left me with a lot of unanswered questions. I don’t feel like I really understand what exactly VFD (either the villains or the volunteers) were really up to. Ultimately, I was a bit disappointed with this one because throughout the whole series I had been waiting to find out what was going on and I never really did....less
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