Dot Hutchison's Blog, page 13

Book Review: Slide, by Jill Hathaway

In the right- or wrong- circumstances, Vee can learn all your deepest secrets. After touching an object with emotional resonance, she passes out and slides into the mind of that person, witnessing the world through his or her eyes. Usually it’s just embarrassing, but then she slides into a girl being murdered. Everyone else believes to was suicide by Vee knows better, so it’s up to her to find the killer before more girls end up dead.

My first couple years of college, my roommate and I used to read and watch mysteries together. About ten minutes before the end of the movie/show or two chapters from the end of the book, we’d pause and write down our guesses and stick them to the fridge with a magnet, and then we’d go back to the book or the television to see if we were right. It gave us a great deal of practice in dissecting clues and double meanings and false trails. I’d say probably 85-90% of the time, we were dead on.

So that being said, there was very little about the path of this book that surprised me. And that was okay because it’s the characters that get to astonish us.

It’s a fantastic concept, especially in that she can’t control the sliding. She can, at times and only ever erratically, exert some minimal influence. She can choose to pick up something with strong emotional resonance, or choose not to touch it, but she doesn’t get to have that power within the event itself. Sylvia is stuck as the ultimate unwilling voyeur. What makes it especially intriguing is that we get these glimpses with absolutely no context. She can try to pull clues from what she sees but she doesn’t get to read their thoughts, so she has to interpret actions and appearances that may be at odds with reality.

Vee is a great character, independent because she has to be, careful, protective, and resourceful. Both in being detective and being her sister’s mother figure, she’s stepped into roles too big for her. And there’s no one to help her. She sees these things but has no one she can confide in about them, because she doesn’t think anyone would believe her. The one time she tried to tell, she got sent to a shrink. That’s enough to make anyone try to hack it on their own. There’s a fine line between self-preservation (protecting her secret) and doing the right thing for others, and sometimes she’s not sure which side of that line she’s on. Her reactions are sincere and real, at times turbulent with the stress of all that’s going on, but always and essentially Vee.

I loved the relationship between Vee and her younger sister Mattie, most of all the transition that relationship undergoes through the book. Sisters, especially sisters close in age and in high school, will always have a unique tension between them. Especially when you compound the difference in age with the difference in maturity and interests. Mattie’s progression is heartbreaking but it gives so much hope for the type of person she could become. They have the moments that bring them so close together, almost clinging to each other for comfort. And they have the moments where they would gladly tear each other’s hair out or do anything to get the other one out of the room or the house.

I would have liked to have known more about Samantha. As Vee’s former best friend, as someone very close to Mattie and her friends, she’s a significant character in the influence she has over the sophomores. The strength of that influence is clear- the value of that influence is questionable. Still, she does extend an olive branch of sorts, and that makes her interesting, because it makes her complicated. I hope we get to see more of her in the next book.

I love Rollins and the friendship between him and Vee, but sometimes the tension there fell a little flat. Everyone has secrets and boundaries, and the communication will never be as open as we could hope for it to be, but their complete lack of communication felt unnatural. Still, there’s hope for Rollins, and he is definitely a character I want to know more.

There was one element that I found rather problematic, but it’s not something I can really talk about it. Spoilers. To dance around it as delicately as possible, there was some long-run timing that raised a few questions.

All in all, this is a beautifully paced mystery where every clue and hint and possibility and false lead is laid out in perfect timing, where we hurt and cheer for the characters in equal measure, and it leaves us wanting more. Check out Slide by Jill Hathaway, out in stores now.

Until next time~

Cheers!

Enjoy the Unexpected

I people watch.

I always have. It started out of curiousity, then developed into a useful exercise for both theatre and writing. When we seek to make characters come alive, whether on the stage or on the page, it’s helpful to look at real people and notice the things they do. When I’m stuck or bored or in the need for some inspiration, I go people watching.

I had to go to the post office last week, which is not something I particularly enjoy doing. It isn’t just the lines or the office being out of my way; it’s that 90% of the time, I get really, REALLY rude employees. I manage to get one woman a fair percentage of the time who actively seeks reasons to deny me media mail. The last time I had to go to her window, I kid you not, she denied me media mail because I had a bookmark in with the book, and bookmarks, I was told, do not count as media mail. So I had to pay twice as much to send out the book because it has a 1″x6″ piece of cardstock between the pages. Just the chance that I might get stuck at that woman’s window makes me dread going to the post office at all.

But.

A package had to be sent out and bribing my brother proved unsuccessful, so off to the post office I went, after checking the Saturday hours. Our branch opens at ten on Saturday mornings; I got there about 9:45. I spent five minutes or so sitting in the car, double checking the address and making sure the packing tape and paper was secure. The last package I had sent out managed to get mangled despite multiple wrappings, and this perfectly, precisely cut square of butcher paper with my address, the recipient’s address, and my tracking number came back to me in an envelope with a “loose mail, so sorry” note. Another time, I got yelled at- ACTUALLY yelled at- for using Scotch tape instead of packing tape, and the guy threatened to make me send the package priority because that was the only tape they offered. I…may have told him to bite me (but the package got there without a problem).

I mentioned that I have bad experieneces at the post office, yes?

So about ten til, I get out of my car and go to the lobby, which opens around eight so people can check their P.O. Boxes or use the automated machine (which I would love to use, but it does not give you media mail as an option). There was an older couple loudly arguing over the best way to send something and whether or not to get insurance, and nearby was a woman who had apparently never seen a copier before. She burned through almost ten dollars of dime copies before she finally got the page correct, but whenever anyone offered to help her, she started swearing and clawing at them with artificial nails so long they curved like talons. You only offered her help once. There were two couples who kept to themselves on opposite sides of the lobby, a young Chinese couple trying to send something to their family members, and a middle-aged Mexican couple trying to pick up a package.

And there were the ones I really enjoyed watching: the family. It was a mom with two boys, one around ten and the other probably four or five. They played war between the aisles of P.O. Boxes and the mother made very sure she emptied out the water pistols. What Mom didn’t realize, as she stood near the table in the middle of the lobby talking with a friend, is that there’s a water fountain at the far end of the lobby, tucked away past three aisles of boxes. I wasn’t sure if the boys had found that, as they were mostly playing in the lobby and first aisle.

About five minutes to ten, a very tall gentleman walked in with a very short woman who could barely see over the enormous box she was carrying. She definitely didn’t see the small boy as he ran in front of her, so she stumbled over him, dropped the box- something definitely broke inside- and the boy raced back to his mother and ended in a dive for her ankles that will probably get him a scholarship when he’s older. Mom was wearing a long housedress, and he seats himself around her ankles and tries to disappear up her skirt. When she sees the woman moaning over the box, she lifts her skirt up past her knees, looks down at her son over an enormous bosom (and yes, it did in fact qualify as a bosom) and very sternly informed him “Tryin to get back up in there ain’t gonna change what you done”. When small boy showed no signs of moving, she bent over, hauled him out with a firm grip on his ear, and marched him over to apologize. The short woman smiled at him, thanked him for his apology, and told him it was no harm done. Her husband, meanwhile, looked relieved- as they left, he mentioned something about ‘that hideous thing’.

My guess? They were trying to regift and were worried about getting caught at it.

Five minutes after ten, the manager finally comes over to unlock the doors, and first one standing in line is the small boy. The manager looks down at him and smiles, clearly recognizing him as a familiar fixture on Saturday mornings. Little boy smiles back, brings up his water pistol, and soaks the front of her shirt.

Yeh, I’d say he found the water fountain.

Manager- still smiling- reaches to the back of her belt, pulls a water pistol, and squirts him back.

SO not what I was expecting that reaction to be.

And I loved it. LOVED IT. It’s a real life moment that’s so much better than fiction, because we don’t have to set it up, we don’t have to make sure we leave all the clues, because everything is already there. Everything about the scene told us what we needed to know. The mother telling her friend they came every Saturday morning to pick up the certified letter with the child support. The Mexican woman who went and found the water fountain because she was thirsty. All the things you gloss over in telling the story, all the things that bog down the narration as unnecessary, but in real life, we take all of that in without really noticing.

I didn’t even mind having to wait half an hour for them to go through three people at the windows, because I kept giggling over the look on that boy’s face when the manager squirted him back.

Enjoy the unexpected- that’s where we find the best of what we do.

Until next time~

Cheers~

Book Review: The Adventures of Sir Balin the Ill-Fated, by Gerald Morris

At his christening, Balin is proclaimed as the victim of a heavy prophecy: he shall be known as the noblest knight in England! But- he'll bring misfortune wherever he goes, bring down two kingdoms in a single day, strike the Dolorous Stroke, and in the end, destroy the knight he loves most in the world. His mother just hopes he'll marry a nice northern girl. As he gets older and starts his adventures, he seems doomed to fulfill this prophecy, but is there a way to escape his fate?

I love Gerald Morris. I have been reading his books since I can't even remember when. I checked them out almost every time I was at the library and read them again and again and again. They made the Arthurian tales come alive for me, and more than that, they made the idea of retellings stick in my head and lodge there in a very satisfactory way. I was incredibly saddened when the Squire's Tale series started drawing to a close- sad, but also content, because everything was as it needed to be. So when I head rumor of a series of Arthurian retellings for a younger audience, I was intrigued.

And they're just as wonderful.

Like the other installments (none of which have to be read in the order in which they're written) this book is laugh out loud funny, with a keen sense of absurdity and a Shakespearean delight in highlighting the ridiculous. And the humor isn't just for kids- adults can fully appreciate the sly, understated wit in the repartee, even as kids giggle over the accidental happenings. They're easy stories but they're not dumbed down, perfect for any child who's ever loved knights and damsels-not-in-any-distress-thank-you-very-much.

The illustrations are perfectly pitched, a little cartoony but not distracting. They help to break up the page for newer or reluctant readers, but there aren't so many that they overshadow the text and the story in any way. This is a perfect book to read aloud with kids. What's more, they'll learn scads of fun words without even realizing they're improving their vocabulary.

There are fabulous lessons in each of the Knights' Tales books, but they're not presented as morals. There isn't a big block of bold print somewhere near the end saying "HEY LOOK AT THIS THING I AM TEACHING YOU". They're presented with the same tongue-in-cheek widsom as all the other accolades and foibles the characters present. Everything Sir Balin does seems to fit perfectly within the bounds of the prophecy, so that even when he deliberately sets out to obfusticate it, he still seems to be fulfilling it. But as his mother, his brother, and the adventurous Lady Annalise remind him, prophecies are just words. Ultimately, his life and his choices are his own, to do with as he will. It's foolish to let a few words by a raving old woman make you scared to live your life. But, as with any wisdom that's granted rather than earned, it takes time for him to appreciate the truth of their sentiments.

These books are a fabulous addition to any home or classroom library, and for more advanced readers, be sure to check out The Squire's Tale, the first book of his older readers series.

Until next time~

Cheers!

A Moment of Shameless Self-Promotion

Thank you guys so much for your congratulations here and on Twitter- it's been a crazy week! It's all happened so quickly that I haven't had much of a chance to figure out how much I can say about the book and things like that. Obviously I'll be talking about it on here at some points, especially as it comes closer to release date next fall, but I don't want to turn this blog into something that's all about my book, rather than celebrating the wide range of amazing books out there. I may be a little wobbly trying to find a balance.

But, here's a start.

This week I ran around like crazy adjusting things and starting things and generally swearing at facebook (I think they make it more complicated each time just to sit back and laugh at us), so here are various places you can gradually find out more about my book Elsinore Drowning.

If you're like me and don't have a Publisher's Marketplace subscription yet, here's a copy of the official announcement:

Dot Hutchison's ELSINORE DROWNING, a contemporary Hamlet adaptation, wherein Ophelia narrates and the roots of her madness are intertwined with modern pharmacology, Celtic and Breton faerie mythology, and her own promise to her parents, to Andrew Karre at Carolrhoda Lab, in a nice deal, for publication in Fall 2013, by Sandy Lu at the L. Perkins Agency (World).

Apparently PM has a rule that all announcements have to be one sentence long; it leads so some pretty funny announcements, really, and by funny, I mean so awkward that you can't help but laugh. Every time I read a PM announcement, I hear several of my English teachers in my head, lecturing us on run-on sentences.

Elsinore Drowning also has a Goodreads page. You can add it to your to-read shelves if you'd like, and I'll be updating details there as I get them.

I also started a Facebook page specifically for author/book type stuff, and funny how that took four times as long as everything else.

And I'm on Twitter as @dothutchison

Like I said, I'll definitely be talking about the book here, but in an attempt not to make it overwhelmingly-Dot-oriented, I'm also going to be keeping a lot of the smaller updates on these other sites.

Until next time~

Cheers!

Book Review: The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins

The Hunger Games.

Once a year, a boy and a girl from each district are selected by lottery and sent to the Capitol as punishment for a failed rebellion. Twenty-four enter. One survives.

Katniss Everdeen doesn't need the Hunger Games to make her struggle for survival; every day is a battle to overcome severe poverty and starvation. Since her father's death, she's done everything she can to keep herself, her mother, and her younger sister Prim from following him, but when Prim's name is called at the Reaping, there's only one more thing she can do. But the Hunger Games are about far more than surviving, and she's in far more danger than she realizes.

The Games are just the beginning.

At first glance, this is a book that seems brutal, and make no mistake, it absolutely is. But what makes it particularly brutal isn't what we initially think, and that's what makes it truly brilliant.

Katniss as a narrator is complicated, largely because she's not particularly complicated as a character. Her motivations are simple: survive, and keep her family alive. That's it. That is the sum of Katniss Everdeen's goals in life, and it's the entirety of her focus. Her attention is narrowed to what will keep her family alive, so she doesn't tend to notice the bigger picture. She doesn't notice people who aren't directly linked to her family's well-being, or at least doesn't give them much thought. She's solitary, awkward, and so much of her energy is put to surviving that every other emotion, every other reaction, is buried.

As a narrator that becomes problematic, mainly because her stoicism and her determination to just get through things- in other words, to be stronger than her mother- can create a flat affect that distances us from what's going on around her. In one sense, this is a necessary conceit of a narrator- no matter how overwhelming and emotional a scene, the narrator can't break down because his/her words are what carries the story. In another, though, it's hard to invest in her as much as we'd like to, because even as she builds a wall between herself and the rest of the world, she keeps us on the other side of it as well.

Still, she's a solid character, strength with deep vulnerabilities, a good heart tempered by bitter experience and an inability to trust other people's motives. We root for Katniss because even though she's had a crap life, she hasn't ever given up. No matter how bad it's gotten, no matter how much she's had to struggle, she's come through it. That determination, that deep well of strength, is amazing, and the way she looks at people- the way she pares people and things down to the most essential aspects with little more than a glance- is a mark of a survivor.

This is a world of extremes, pitting the excesses of the Capitol against the deprivations of the outer-lying districts. We see some of the best humanity has to offer, as well as some of the worst. We see what pure adrenaline can do, as well as pure despair. And we see how we become conditioned by the atmosphere in which we're raised. It seems horrific that people in the Capitol can gleefully watch the games year after year, that they can look forward to it in any way, and it is- but that part shouldn't be surprising. We know very early on that this is the 74th Hunger Games- most of those alive in the Capitol have never known a time without the games. They've been literally raised in them, the ultimate in cultural desensitization, and they've never had to face the threat of anyone they know being in them. They've been raised to believe that it's right- worse, that it's natural- and that informs their worldview.

What makes this book terrifying- which it is at its best points- isn't the violence, or the kids killing kids. It's that it doesn't seem as far-fetched as we'd like it to be, and that's not at all a comforting thing. You see these reality shows and most of them are harmless, but then you have people competing for extreme plastic surgery. You have people starving themselves on islands or in deserts or jungles. You have people putting themselves in extreme danger and risk of imminent death for a few minutes of fame and glory. So what happens when they feel the need to go just a little further, do a little bite more to boost the ratings? In the Capitol, in the Games, we have the ultimate falseness of reality television, all the more striking when put against the severe deprivations of true reality in the outer districts.

This book is the Roman circus brought into our current sensationalist mentality. This book shows that when you put enough effort into manipulating the appearance of something, eventually you lose the ability to discern between the truth and the created facade. But it's also proof that appearance is a powerful tool, if double-edged. It's about making choices, about deciding who you are and who you want to be, about what you stand for. It's about deciding the face you want to show to the world- and then deciding how much of that face is truth.

But most of all, it's about the difference between surviving and living.

Until next time~

Cheers

BIG BIG NEWS!

The Lolcats are going to help me with this one: I have BIG BIG BIG news, and big news always goes better with a lolcat or twenty.

Some of you may have noticed that I didn't post on Sunday; there's a very simple explanation for that. My brain right now, let me show it to you:

Well, less with the caffeine than with "OH MY F#*&Y^($Y# GOD IS THIS REALLY HAPPENING?!". Yeh, the brain? It was none so good this weekend. There were lots of questions and worries and what ifs, most of them painfully ridiculous. You know the kind I mean, the ones you know- even as you have them- are stupid and unnecessary but you can't help but freak out over them a little anyway? Okay, so maybe the caffeine does play into it a little.

But now I'm all:

I queried for three years on different projects before signing with the fabulous Sandy Lu, and if I'm honest, there was a large part of me that expected to have to slog just as hard to find an editor to take me on. How much of that was me trying not to get my hopes up to unmanageable levels is anyone's guess. For three years, my computer greeted me with emails that left me wondering:

And some days that led to:

And sometimes, when a bite had seemed particularly promising or I was staring at the decision whether to keep querying a project or start over with something that might be stronger, my wonderful friends and family jumped in with:

But although I didn't know it at the time, there was a light! And not even the ACME train tunnel painted on the rock wall kind of light, but REAL light! Because I found Sandy, who was:

And she sank her teeth into mine!

Now, all of this you've heard before (plus or minus some illustrations), but here's the BIG BIG NEWS! A month ago, after some revisions, Sandy started pimping my manuscript out (because let's face it, that's really what it is, right? As bloggers, we pimp the books we love, and agents do the same thing; it's just a different audience). And now…

And now…

*drum roll please*

MY BOOK SOLD!!!!

The official PM annoucement is yet to come, but Elsinore Drowning sold to Carolrhoda Lab yesterday, and I am…well, over the moon doesn't even seem like enough. It still hasn't entirely sunk in and there's still a lot of work yet ahead of me but…HOLY CRAP MY BOOK SOLD.

So next fall, you'll be able to find my book on a shelf and:

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go dance around the apartment like an idiot again. There's a lot of the dancing going on right now. Feel free to dance with me!

Until next time~

Cheers!

Book Review: The Humming Room, by Ellen Potter

Roo Fanshaw knows about hiding. She finds the small places, the forgotten places, and listens to the sounds of the earth. After her parents' deaths, she's sent to Cough Rock to live with an uncle she's never met, or even heard of. At first sight it's nothing to inspire- a former children's sanitorium, Cough Rock is a cold, forbidding place full of secrets. Like the humming Roo hears through the halls. Like the uncle who vanishes for long periods of time. Like the river boy who isn't tied to anything. But there are other kinds of secrets too, secrets that might be able to reach a lost little girl and give her something she's never known before: a home.

I'll admit, this is a book I first noticed for its cover. It's beautiful and intriguing and it successfully made me want to know more. I read the description and thought: huh, this sounds a lot like The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. Then I read about it in the system at work and went okay, that would be why.

And it's gorgeous.

This hovers somewhere between retelling and homage, taking all the best parts of the source material and adding things new and beautiful and just a little bit mysterious. It steps away from the foundation and becomes something wholly its own.

Roo is an amazing character. Mary Lennox eventually becomes a sympathetic figure, but Roo is someone we root for right from the beginning, as she hides under a porch and listens to the earth as police tramp through the house above her. It's hard not to feel sorry for her- her life has seriously sucked- but we also admire her strength and her resilience. Even when she's determined not to care, when she's trying to be as cold and unaffected as she can possibly be, she has this deep love for living, growing things. She doesn't take any nonsense from anyone, but slowly, carefully, she opens herself up to the many possibilities her new life has to offer.

This is a story that combines the original elements of a hidden away cousin, a dying garden, and a half-wild boy with the beautiful superstitions of a river people. Violet, a native of nearby Donkey Island, combines a no-nonsense good humor with the mysticism of old beliefs. I've never been to the St. Lawrence but after reading this book I feel like I have. It comes alive in the pages, in the many moods of the river, in the patterns of the terns and the mink, even in the neighbor mentality we see in bits and pieces. We see Roo and Jack (the half-wild river boy) and their connection with living things, see Roo's deep yearning for the living things before she even knows how to name it as such.

This isn't a story about a garden- it's a story about a life and lives, about growth and hope and change. Every page is a treasure, a well-written gem that wraps around you and lingers like the deepening song of the earth.

Read this book for yourself, and if you have children- in your home or in your classroom- read it with them. This is not one to be missed.

The Humming Room, by Ellen Potter.

Until next time~

Cheers!

Book-to-Movie Adaptation: The Hunger Games

*If you haven't seen the movie yet, you may or may not want to read this post. It may spoil some of the full impact of the film, and hence your enjoyment.

Every time I get news that a book I love is going to be made into a movie, I get this solid knot of mixed feelings that sits in my gut like a boulder. I simulataneously love and hate getting updates on the process.

There's delight. Yay, this book I love is being made into a movie!

There's anticipation. Yay, this book I love is being made into a movie!

There's dread. Oh crap, this book I LOVE is being made into a movie.

There's fear. Oh crap, this book I LOVE is being made into a movie.

It's not that I don't think books can be made into movies successfully; I think most can. But as a reader, as a writer, as a person with a background in theatre and screenwriting, I also understand that there's a very delicate and elusive balance that very few adaptations manage to achieve.

If a book is being adapted for the screen, it's generally because it had a broad enough audience to make a movie financially feasible. Generally. But that means the movie also needs to be based on a broad appeal. We want to stay true to the story, but sometimes maintaining that broad appeal means sacrificing or changing certain things. It's also true that moving the story from a print medium to a visual medium requires changes. There will never be such a thing as a 100% faithful translation from book to screen. There can't be. We can come close, but it's never going to be absolute.

There's also a point where creative control changes hands. The author created the book, and that book has inspired someone to make something of it. Movies are pretty much visual fanfic.

Yes, I said it. Movies are visual fanfiction.

Because in most cases, the author's control ends where the movie rights are sold. If I bought the movie rights to, say, Robin LaFevers' Grave Mercy and then staged the production as a 70s disco piece with aliens and a dog sidekick….well, there's really nothing that can be done about it. The author can complain, they can tell people not to go see the movie, but that's it. The director's vision- their interpretation- is what comes onto the screen. That also has to be combined with the cinematographer's vision, with the casting director's vision, with the various designers' visions, and with the actor's interpretation and performance of their roles.

There have been some adaptations where I seriously wanted to knock on the gates of Heaven and demand my two hours back they were so bad. As adaptations AND as movies, they just plain sucked.

There have been some adaptations where I really loved the movie- as long as I pretended it had never been a book first. The movie for The Lightning Thief was like that. I really enjoyed the movie. In some respects, I understood why they some of the changes they did. Like…aging the characters up to keep it from being labeled a kiddie movie so it could enjoy a wider audience. Makes sense. And they weren't sure if they were going to be able to push forward with the series, so they changed some pretty significant things in order to cut out the series arc stuff. Like Kronos. Moving from St. Louis to Memphis was a head-scratcher but whatever. Then were things that irritated me a bit more. So long as I separated the movie completely from the source book, I could enjoy it.

There have actually been some where I felt the changes made for a better movie than the book could provide on its own. It's rare, but it happens, usually in books where allegory is strong and the words are more important than the events.

So going into Hunger Games, I was a big ball of stress, trying to remind myself that anticipation was a bad idea because if I got too worked up that it was going to be awesome I would be really frickin' pissed if it sucked. Well, let's be honest, I'd be pissed if it sucked no matter what.

This was, hands down, the single BEST book-to-movie adaptation I've ever seen.

It was always going to be a difficult task to take us from the narrow focus of being inside Katniss' head to a broader visual appeal. We can't spend a movie sitting inside someone's skull. That opens up a lot of opportunity, as well as temptation. If you make some deviations, isn't it so easy to make others?

But the divergences here were amazing, pitch perfect and carefully chosen. They open us up to the astounding background of the Games, giving us a look into a control room and the careful deliberation that goes into creating reality TV. We don't lose anything for that. Take any scene with Donald Sutherland as President Snow and it's enough to send shivers down your spine it's so effin' creepy. Those scenes just ooze malevolence. And we get to see some of what Katniss can only imagine: Haymitch schmoozing the sponsors, the manipulations of the games.

In half of the most emotionally hard-hitting scene of the movie? District 11.

And we get to see Katniss.

That might sound strange, given that we spend three books in Katniss' head, but we don't see her. Not really. We see how Katniss sees Katniss. Here, though the focus is still clearly our girl from District 12, we see her a bit more clearly. It isn't just that she sees herself differently than others see her. It's also that we get to see events happen, get to see her react to them, without having to filter through the narration.

In real life, when we have that many hard-hitting emotions smacking us at once, most of us become somewhat incoherent. A necessary conceit of first person storytelling is that no matter how overwhelmed the narrator becomes, he or she still has to continue telling the story. They can be overwhelmed, but they can't lose themselves in that gut reaction. In the movie, we get to see Katniss reacting without the filter of her narration. We get to see her take care of Prim without her voice telling us all the effort (and touch of bitterness) that goes into it. We get to see how her awkwardness in the interview with Caesar becomes charming and winsome.

And Jennifer Lawrence is amazing. Everything her character is feeling shows on her face, so even when Katniss is lost in her head, we're not left staring at a blank void. We all root for Katniss, but Lawrence makes her come alive with an uncommon poise even in the midst of a break down. We see her stoicism, we see her penchant for survival, her determination, but we also see her compassion. And, something we rarely see in the books, we see her sense of humor. Coming out of Katniss' head is liberating and expansive, but Lawrence brings us back in with every small action and reaction.

The casting of this movie was flawless (or nearly flawless- there are a few small quibbles I could make) even when we diehard fans couldn't quite see it. Lenny Kravitz was a brilliantly understated Cinna, and I loved the design choices when it came to him. In all the glitz and glitter of the Capitol, all the crazy fashions and colors, he stands out for being in plain clothing with just the small hoops in his ears and a bit of gold eyeliner. Just at a glance, before he opens his mouth, before the story progresses, we see the man we'll get to know across the books. Josh Hutcherson as Peeta is charming- a little awkward, well-intentioned, and besotted with a girl he knows doesn't notice him. While reading the book I never paid much attention to Seneca Crane, but here he becomes a captivating character (and I love love LOVE the beard). Gale is a bit bland but there's not much of him here, so I'm willing to reserve judgment for a second film.

And the design was brilliant. Beyond brilliant. There are no accidents in the design, no coincidences or things that just happened to work well. The life we see in the districts is like something out of the Great Depression. It isn't just the clothing and the hairstyles, it's also the choices of colors, of structure. The Capitol is a cacophony of needlessly imposing buildings with a riot of color and fabric on the residents. The minute you see Effie Trinket toddle out onto the platform in District 12, you know you're watching two very different worlds. the Capitol is bright and luxurious, and more than once, kookily ugly. The people are the same. The residents of the Capitol are laughing and smiling, perfectly at ease with not a care in the world other than the inanities of fashion and style. The residents of District 12 are worn and scared, accustomed to scrabbling for every small thing. It's even in the details, right down to the last curlicue in Seneca Crane's beard (seriously, it's a MAGNIFICENT beard).

This is one of the very few movies where walking out of the theatre, I immediately wanted to turn back and watch it again. When it comes out on DVD, I will be watching it again and again, and notice more details each time that blow me away. And I hope to God they progress with the other two movies, and take the same painstaking care as they did with this, because the results will be spectacular.

Have YOU seen the movie yet? Share your thoughts below!

Until next time~

Cheers~

Book Review: Out of Sight, Out of Time, by Ally Carter

Cammie leaves a report at school and leaves the Gallagher Academy for Exceptional Young Women to keep those she loves safe. She wakes up in an Alpine convent with short black hair, injuries, and a hole in her memory extending four months. No matter how hard she tries she can't remember what happened during her summer vacation, and not everyone is convinced she should try, but the reasons she left are still true. Cammie and everyone she loves are in severe danger, and somewhere in those lost memories is the true reason why. Provided she can stay alive long enough to reclaim them.

Every now and then you stumble across one of those books that's extremely hard to talk about because almost everything you say could be a spoiler. This is definitely one of those books. So, bear with me; there's going to be a lot of dancing in this one.

This book is brilliant. Utterly, not-so-simply, fantastically brilliant. It goes all over the place chronologically speaking as Cammie tries to put together the fragments of her summer, but it doesn't necessarily go in order. It's not that this happened, then this happened. It's that she was at this place, so why? What was she hoping to learn or achieve? Sometimes more frighteningly, what did she learn or achieve? Layered through everything is Cammie's panic at simply not knowing. Even when she can respect her mother's warning that the memories might be too terrible for her to hold, there's something terrifying about simply not knowing, especially as she continues to show skills she shouldn't know. Like a loose tooth you can't help but play with, Cammie can't leave those missing months alone.

Cammie has a hard time adjusting, but so do her friends. They've been worried sick for four months, and now that she's back, it's hard not to be a little resentful. It strains a few things, glosses over a few others, to make things more difficult at a time when Cammie really needs all the help and support she can get. Their reactions are perfect. Hard, but perfect, as is the gradual resolution towards an even state.

And of course there's Zach. Zach in a towel, as a matter of fact. Well, there's Zach in regular clothing too, but the timing of the towel is hysterical. In some ways, though perhaps this is horrible to say, Zach is Cammie's guide to how things can get worse. Her dad is missing and presumed dead? Let's talk about his mom. Oh no, her mom forgot their Sunday dinner? His only real parent figure came off the wrong end of a bomb at the beginning of summer. No matter how bad things get for Cammie, she has only to look at Zach to know that things could still be worse. But for Zach, in a lot of ways, Cammie is his guide to how things can get better. Even when the bad things happen, he sees the support from her friends and family, the teammwork that goes into looking for a solution, and knows that things will improve. They may not be perfect, but they'll improve. And they're both grateful for what the other is. Even when things are strained between them, they're a pair.

And here's where the dancing goes crazy because there's so much I love, right down to the details, and I can't talk about it without spoiling things. But it's there. The way everything pieces together, the way things continue to layer through from previous books, the way characters continually surprise us. Even when things are new and astonishing, they're based on things we've already seen, things that make sense as soon we get this new shred of information. And we don't get all the information- even when there are questions that badly need answers, there's the blatant acknowledgment that we live in a world where we don't always get answers. Doesn't mean we stop looking, but we may never find them. And there is SO MUCH to look forward to in GG6.

This book was so absorbing, so entirely immersive, that when I was reading it on break at work, one of the other girls had to poke me and tell me the microwave was done with my meal. By the time I get a break at work I'm generally starving, as I was that day, and the microwave being done is like the start of the races. Didn't even notice it. I actually had to set the alarm on my phone to make sure I wouldn't be late clocking back in. Any book that sucks me in that completely is amazing.

If you've read the other four books in the series, race out and buy/borrow this boook NOW. If you haven't read the other four books in the series?

What are you waiting for?! Go do it!

Until next time~

Cheers!

A Summer Reading Plea

I know, I know, no one who has anything to do with Summer Reading wants to hear about it before most of the schools have even had Spring Break, but those lists are coming out soon, and whether you're a teacher, a parent, or a student, I have something very important to ask you.

As soon as you make/get those lists, PLEASE let your bookstores know!

I'm going to assume that most bookstores are like mine in that we try desperately to get those lists before school gets out, and we try to get all the lists. It's not because we're trying to ruin kids' summers with reminders of the homework they have to do. If we can get all of the lists, and if we can get them early, we can order the books in and have them sitting on a pretty Summer Reading shelf.

Know what that means?

It means no desperately ordering it from three different bookstores three days before classes start trying to get books.

It means no running around to three different bookstores trying to find all the books on the list before you go on vacation.

And, something we see more than you'd think: it means that if the teacher has assigned an out of print or print on demand book, he or she can be notified before school lets out, when there's still a chance of either changing the assignment or making other arrangements.

When we have those lists, we make multiple copies so we can have them behind our registers with all the summer reading books- so even if you forget the list at home or have lost it, we can look up exactly which books your child needs (or that you need, if you're the student). When we have those lists, we can replenish our supply regularly. Does it mean we won't ever run out? No, because it does take time for the books to arrive from the warehouse and we might sell out in the meantime, but it does mean you shouldn't ever have to wait more than a couple of days.

When we get those lists, we also go through to check for ebook availability and pricing, and we keeps track of those.

I know it's only the middle of March, but most of those lists are going to start making their way into the world in six weeks. You don't even have to make a trip to the bookstore to let us know. You can call us and read off the list. You can email it to us. You can fax it to us. You can stick it in an envelope and mail it to us.

Because here's the selfish part: it isn't just that this makes it awfully convenient for everyone running around trying to find the books. It makes life a LOT easier on the booksellers. When we have those books, we get yelled at a lot less.

And yes, people actually yell at booksellers for being sold out of a book. Crazy, right?

If we're able to notify a teacher that an assigned book is out of print and that teacher passes that along to the students and parents, we don't get the people accusing us of being lazy when we say that the title is out of print. Yes, there are teachers who assign out of print books, sometimes by accident and sometimes on purpose. It happens. I can tell you how to look for the book at that point, but I can't actually get it for you.

Every year we send out emails and faxes to every single school in our district. With all the individual teachers and classes, that should amount to several hundred lists. We generally get back a little over a dozen. Through personal contacts- i.e. friends or neighbors that have children in school- we usually manage to get another five or ten. Granted, there's some degree of overlap across high schools, for instance, but there are a lot of unique assignments as well.

So do yourselves, and your favorite local booksellers, a HUGE favor and take a minute or two to send them the lists when you make or get them. We'll get the books in, find any problems with acquiring them, and everyone gets to be a little happier over the summer.

Until next time~

Cheers!