Glens Falls (NY) Online Book Discussion Group discussion
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ABOUT BOOKS AND READING
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What are U reading these days? (PART SEVEN) (2011) (ONGOING THREAD for 2011)
Katherine wrote: I read it back in the 60's and just picked up a copy [Alas, Babylon] from my library after I found out my grandaughter is reading it for 10th grade English.What a great choice! I was just talking with my son Eric and his friends about how teachers choosing the right books for required reading makes all the difference. They need to reach our children and make them think, not bore them to death.
I read Ragtime many years ago and really like it. I disliked his latest one about the two reculsive brothers who collected junk. I was disappointed. It was non fiction. The great thing about the movie was the music. nina
Katherine wrote: "Joy, Do you remember hearing that part of Ragtime was filmed in our area? ..."Katherine, I tried to find some info about that, but was unsuccessful.
Started another new book, One Last Scream. Kevin O'Brien is a new mystery author for me---so far it is a good suspenseful thriller.
I'm reading Seekers of the Chalice, a fantasy based loosely on Irish mythology. I'm enjoying it so far. And the prequel of Merlin's Ring, Merlin's Godson, which I planned on skimming, just to get it off my bookcase but started out pretty good. 100+ pages in and it's turning into the same extra-wordy yawn-of-a-book that Merlin's Ring is.
Mary JL, looks like you are a real mystery/thriller fan! :)Jackie, don't you just hate when a book starts with a bang and then lets you down? What a disappointment after investing time in it!
Believe it or not, I've taken Jim's advice and am finally reading Gone With the Wind after all these years! I'm starting to realize what made it such a classic. Not only that, I can't believe how PERFECTLY the characters in the film were cast. Clark Gable WAS Rhett Butler! Scarlet O'Hara WAS Vivien Leigh! Olivia de Havilland was perfect as Melanie. Not sure about Leslie Howard as Ashley though.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0031381/
Gone with the Wind is on my list to re-read. It's been so long since I read that I've forgotten a lot of it.
Joy, I mentioned the movie,Champion,to Jim, but I think you might also like seeing it. I thought it was insprirational. nina
Nina wrote: "Joy, I mentioned the movie,Champion,to Jim, but I think you might also like seeing it. I thought it was insprirational. nina"Here it is on Netflix, Nina:
"Champions" (1984)
http://movies.netflix.com/Movie/Champ...
"The true story of Bob Champion, a British steeple chase jockey who, in the late 1970s, was diagnosed with cancer. Rather than succumb to the disease, however, Bob stages a miraculous recovery and goes on to win the 1981 Grand National steeple chase on the horse Aldaniti." FROM: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085320/p...
I've put it on my queue. Thanks.
Glad you're enjoying "Gone With The Wind", Joy. It was a great movie, but the book is even better. The two together are wonderful, though. You're right about the casting. Gable's use of 'damn' shocked the world at the time & became an iconic line. There's even a condition named the Scarlet Syndrome for her idea that everything would get better if she just went home to Tara portrayed so perfectly by Leigh.
Joy: I am also glad you are enjoying "Gone With the Wind". Like most large books, the film had to cut out quite a bit. The book is so much richer than the movie--as Jim said above, together they make a great, complete experience.
After I finish reading _Gone with the Wind_, I'll watch the film again. Yes, that will make the experience complete.Speaking of the "Scarlet Syndrome", I like her idea of always deciding not to think about troubling things. She would always say to herself that she would think about them later. Not such a bad idea. :) "Tomorrow is another day." (Sometimes Scarlet would forget about the problem completely.) (g)
The book sometimes portrays Scarlett as fairly simple-minded, not able to handle complex ideas. However, in spite of that, she was a survivor.
I, too, haven't read Gone With the Wind, but you are making me curious. It might have to be my next book. nina
Nina, you won't be sorry. GWTW is fun to read, even if you've seen the film. In fact, I think it's even better if you've seen the film because the film is cast so well. I love picturing Clark Gable as I read.
Next month, the Supernatural Fiction Readers group that I help moderate is doing City of Bones, the first volume in the Mortal Instruments trilogy by Cassandra Clare, as a common read. So I started on it a little before March 1 (but not too soon, since the discussion threads on it --regular and "spoiler"-- are already up and active!).
"Writing is not something to be ashamed of but do wash your hands afterwards." Robert Heinlin nina
Werner wrote: "Next month, the Supernatural Fiction Readers group that I help moderate is doing City of Bones, the first volume in the Mortal Instruments trilogy by Cassandra Clare, as a common read..."Werner, I see mixed reviews on this one at GR, anywhere from one star to 5 stars. Very divergent opinions.
Nina wrote: ""Writing is not something to be ashamed of but do wash your hands afterwards." Robert Heinlin nina"That's good advice, Nina, especially if one is reading borrowed books. :)
Heinlein also said it should be done in private.;-)
Yes, Jim. I found the complete quote:"Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards."
-Robert Heinlein, US science fiction author (1907 - 1988)
http://www.quotationspage.com/quote/8...
Joy, re City of Bones, I've found the reaction in my friend circle to be equally mixed. The vote in the group's poll was heavily in favor of doing the read, but one of the two "no" votes came from someone who'd evidently read it already and was quite negative about it. I'm barely into Chapter 2 (I had no chance to read yesterday, or Sunday), so I'm withholding my own judgment for now. :-)
Glad you found the complete quote, Joy. It's a good one. I know "The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo," was reviewed earlier but I have just recently seen the movoe and was surprised they cut out one of the main characters and lots more. Not nearly as good as the book and I though the "tatoo girl" was much better looking than I had been led to believe from reading the book. Did anyone else feel this way? The character they cut out was the woman who worked as editor at the M. magazine. nina
Nina, I haven't read The Girl With the Dragon Tatoo, but I'm wondering how much of the story in the book, Gone With the Wind, was cut out from the movie. I've seen only the end of the movie but will be watching it soon. I'm halfway through the book and am loving it.
I'm now up to 17 books this year that I've read and passed on to make room on my bookcases. I've just finished Far Traveler which was slightly better than I thought. Now I'm starting The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funke.
I'm trying to get rid of standalone and YA novels from my bookcases. No way I'll be reading them again and my To Read list of books I own is out of control.
Jackie, I know what you mean about things getting "out of control." I've been trying to straighten out my virtual shelves at Goodreads. I've created several extra exclusive shelves to get things organized. The labeling is tricky.I'm also going back into my notebooks to see what books I've read which should be added to my "Read" shelf. It's kind of fun reviewing my records. I love to watch movies which have been adapted to film so that I can compare them. So I'm working that sort of thing into my virtual shelves at GR.
BTW, the book you mentioned _The Thief Lord_ sounds like a version of Dicken's Oliver Twist. I read the GR description of _The Thief Lord_ and that character sounds like he could be another Fagin. Fagin, in _Oliver Twist_ takes in homeless children and trains them to pick pockets for him. The GR description says "the Thief Lord leads a ring of street children who dabble in petty crimes." Sounds like a good story. Mysterious characters are always interesting.
It does sound like Oliver Twist. There's been a movie done of it also: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0430674/
Ah, Netflix carries the movie, Jackie. That means I can order it sometime:"The Thief Lord" (2006)
(based on the book which came out in 2002):
http://movies.netflix.com/Movie/The_T...
I like the Netflix description:
========================================================
"Cornelia Funke's novel serves as inspiration for this magical and heartwarming story of brotherhood. Prosper is 15 and his brother Bo is just 6. Having recently lost their parents, they face the prospect of being separated, a future they avoid by running away to the big city of Venice. There, they meet the Thief Lord, a mysterious petty criminal who introduces them to a world of wonder."
=======================================================
Venice, with its canals and alleyways, is a unique setting for the story.
It is! I don't think I've read a modern story set in Venice.This is interesting: A section of the book tells how a little girl of 11 writes to "The publishers of Harry Potter" and wants to know why her favorite author isn't in print in English. The publishers looked into Cornelia Funke and saw how popular she was in her native Germany and decided to translate her books into English.
I, for one, am thrilled to read Funke's work. Inkheart is my favorite YA novel of all time. The idea that the main characters can 'read' themselves into novels and 'read' characters from novels out into the real world captured my imagination, and heart. What a fantastical and wondrous idea.
Yes, I see that the GR review says that "critics have praised Funke as the 'German J. K. Rowling'."
Two of my friends read this free, very short story & gave it glowing reviews. I highly suggest it to everyone. It's pretty incredible how much was packed into this short story about kids & peer pressure. Tears your heart right out.Free from Tor at
http://www.tor.com/stories/2010/11/po...
Make sure you check out their other freebies.
Thanks, Jim. I'll check it out later. Right now I'm doing a scan of my computer. Yesterday I got a window telling me I had some viruses. I did a short scan earlier today and it was OK. Now I'm doing a full scan and don't want to surf the net too much. But I will check out that short story. Thanks again.BTW, I'm still reading _Gone with the Wind_ and each time I read it I silently bless you for encouraging me to read it. It's a wonderful story... and so easy to put down and pick up again without losing the thread of the plot. It's like having a comforting hobby to look forward to no matter what else I have to do. I'll miss that feeling when I'm done reading. It's like escaping into another world. I'm going to have Eddie read it next. I think he'll like it too.
GWTW has also stimulated my interest in the Civil War and I've been streaming Ken Burns "Civil War" documentary from Netflix.
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/Ken...
The documentary led me to read some of Sam Watkins' book online. He was a civil war soldier. I also read more about Mary Chestnut who also lived at that time and kept a diary. The doc quotes these two a lot. The words are read by actors and it's very dramatic to hear them describing the suffering during the war.
Sam Watkin's book can be read online or via a device. It's free. See it at:
http://books.google.com/ebooks?id=Hyh...
(To read via your computer, click on "read on your device". Then scroll down and see "Read on your browser".)
It's called Company Aytch, or a Side Show of the Big Show.
It's great reading! So very readable. There's wit to it as well realism. It's non-fiction.
(Company Aytch means Company H, the company he was in. He was in a Confederate regiment from TN.)
Glad GWTW turned you on so much, Joy. It's cool when a fictional story expands your interest into the facts.The short story is fantasy & I know you'll wonder what's going on at first. Just keep reading. All will be clear shortly.
Jim, thanks for sharing the link; I read the story. Saying that I "liked" it would be a lie --it isn't the kind of story a reader is intended to "like," and if anyone did, he/she would be a sadist-- since it's probably one of the darkest tales I ever read; but the moral vision at the heart of it is one that aims to make readers open their eyes and see what matters. They ought to make it required reading in school --but there are adults that could learn from it as well as young teens!
Brings a whole new meaning to the hackneyed question, "If your friend jumped off a bridge, would you do it, too?" doesn't it, Werner?
Oh, yes --heaven help us, a lot of kids (and too many adults) would answer, "Sure, in a heartbeat!" I hope that if any of them read this story, it'll help them think. (If it doesn't, they're brain-dead.)
I am now reading a Doctor Who novel, Lungbarrow.The critics find it fascinating; I am not very pleased with it at all. I plan on finishing, but right now it's getting barely three stars.
Mary JL, isn't that awful when that happens? It sounds like it would be good. I started The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss. The second novel of The Kingkiller Chronicle. It's just as well written as it's predecessor, The Name of the Wind. Quite a lengthy tome, 995 pages, so I'll be having a good time for a while with this one.
Mary JL, I wonder if the Doctor Who TV series was adapted from Marc Platt's Doctor Who books. IMDb doesn't say:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0056751/
Probably not. I see that the dates for the TV series are 1963–1989. The books seem to have been written later.
Wiki says: "Marc Platt (born 1953) is a British writer. He is most known for his work with the BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who. ... He wrote the Doctor Who serial 'Ghost Light' based on two proposals, one of which later became the novel 'Lungbarrow'.
FROM: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Platt
Sounds like the books came after the films, but all are by Marc Platt... or are they? (See below). I wonder how common it is for films to come first and the books to come later.
I found this at Wiki about the TV series:
===================================================
"Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. ... The programme is listed in Guinness World Records as the longest-running science fiction television show in the world and as the "most successful" science fiction series of all time, in terms of its overall broadcast ratings, DVD and book sales, iTunes traffic, and "illegal downloads".
FROM: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr_Who
==================================================
Also found the following at Wiki:
***********************************************
"Doctor Who books have been published from the mid-sixties through to the present day. From 1965 to 1991 the books published were primarily novelised adaptations of broadcast episodes; beginning in 1991 an extensive line of original fiction was launched, the Virgin New Adventures and Virgin Missing Adventures.
Since the relaunch of the programme in 2005, a new range of novels have been published by BBC Books, featuring the adventures of the Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh Doctors. Numerous non-fiction books about the series, including guidebooks and critical studies, have also been published, and a dedicated Doctor Who Magazine with newsstand circulation has been published regularly since 1979. There is also a Doctor Who Adventures magazine published by the BBC. In April 2010 Hub Magazine released a Doctor Who Special (Issue 116) which collected new articles and pieces from various writers associated with both Classic and New Series Doctor Who, including Andrew Cartmel, Paul Magrs, Joseph Lidster, Mark Morris, Simon Clarke and Scott Harrison (who also guest-edited the issue)."
FROM: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who
***************************************************
Below is a link to a list of Doctor Who novelisations:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_...
Among a great deal of other information about the novelisations, the web page says:
"The only serials never to have been officially novelised are The Pirate Planet, City of Death, Shada, Resurrection of the Daleks and Revelation of the Daleks, due to licensing issues with the original scriptwriters."
So I guess a lot of authors wrote Dr. Who books after the the TV series.
I wonder how that worked legally.
NOTE: I CREATED A SEPARATE TOPIC CONTAINING THE ABOVE INFO AT:
http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/5...
Jackie wrote: " ... I started The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss. The second novel of The Kingkiller Chronicle. It's just as well written as it's predecessor, The Name of the Wind. ..."Jackie, thanks for the links. I skimmed the GR bio of Patrick Rothfuss. It says: "Through a series of lucky breaks, he has wound up with the best agent and editor imaginable, and the first book of his trilogy [Kingkiller Chronicle] has been published under the title The Name of the Wind."
Rothfuss has an interesting academic background and according to the bio: "During this period of time his novel was rejected by roughly every agent in the known universe."
I guess he persevered and was finally successful as an author.
Rothfuss is absolutely the best new Fantasy author to come around in ages. Even his Acknowledgments page in The Name of The Wind was unique and interesting. I was hooked right from the start. Funny how the greatest epics are rejected, another example is Frank Herbert. Dune was rejected by over a dozen publishers, only to be the single most purchased scifi novel of all time.
Jackie, I'm always amazed at authors who don't get discouraged when they suffer one rejection after another. I guess they have faith in their work and they feel that it needs just the right publisher to appreciate it.BTW, while visiting our son, I saw Dune on his bookshelf. I didn't realize he had read it.
When Stieg Larrsson sent the manuscript, The Girl With the Dragon Tatoo, to a publisher, they returned it unread. When he dropped it off at a second publisher, along with the other two books in this triolgy, they agreed to pubish it and gave him 64,000. Soon, after that, he died of a massive heart attack at age fifty. His books are now listed as the second most read books in publishing history and his heirs, brother and father, are the recipients of millions of dollars. His common law wife is contesting but there was no will. As the back cover says, "these books are sleep depriving." I can attest to that. nina
That's unfair, sending it back unread. At least have the courtesy to read it before rejecting it. It seems a bad way to conduct business.
Don't you bet they are sooo sorry that they did that, in retrospect, nina
[I HAVE COPIED AND PASTED THE FOLLOWING FROM ANOTHER THREAD.]-----------------------------------------------------
Nina wrote: "I am suggesting the book, "The History of Love," by Nicole Krauss. My daughter thought it was wonderful and wrote five pages for her book club after reading it. One of my book club members says it is awful. I have not read it; but Amazon reviewers have mostly given it five stars. Have any of you read it and if so, what is your opinion? nina "
Nina, here are the links:
The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
I'll check it out and see what I think. Thanks for telling us about it.
Nina wrote: Don't you bet they are sooo sorry that they did that, in retrospect, They must be kicking themselves in the butt after such a huge money-making mistake.
Nina wrote: "When Stieg Larrsson sent the manuscript, The Girl With the Dragon Tatoo, to a publisher, they returned it unread. When he dropped it off at a second publisher, along with the other two books in thi..."Nina, you have me very curious about the Stieg Larsson books. I'm going to sample them free online at the following eBook links (they provide the first few chapters):
_The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo_:
http://books.google.com/ebooks/reader...
_The Girl who Played with Fire_:
http://books.google.com/ebooks/reader...
_The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest_:
http://books.google.com/ebooks/reader...
BTW, I love the layout of these eBooks. It's just like turning the pages of a virtual book. No scrolling necessary unless you want it.
Joy, Parts of these books are grim; very, but they are extremely well written and you are fascinated by the various characters and the mystery behind them. nina
Nina wrote: "Joy, Parts of these books are grim; very, but they are extremely well written and you are fascinated by the various characters and the mystery behind them. nina"Nina, as I hear what a big hit the books are, I get more curious. I did watch the movie of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" in September 2010. I streamed it via Netflix. I gave it 3 stars. The ending was good. The book must be better than the movie.
http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/The...
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Glens Falls (NY) Online Book Discussion Group
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I don't have any other Lehane novels except the next Kenzie & Gennaro one, Prayers for Rain. If it is part of that series, I'll probably get to it eventually. I'm trying really hard not to buy any more books until I knock down my TBR pile some, though.