Different Seasons by Stephen King
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really enjoy Stephen King, however, I have to be really choosy in what I read of his, because some of his works scare the shit out of me.

This is a series of four shortish stories, and while each story (except the first one) has an element of creepy darkish weirdness to it, they're not bad.

The first story is Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, and the movie remarkably nails it, so I'm not going to discuss it here.

The second story is Apt Pupil, and this is, by far, the most disturbing of the set, but not in a sleep-with-the-light-on sort of way. It's about a boy who discovers a former Nazi officer living in his home town, and rather than turn him in, the boy asks a lot of questions about what the man did during WWII. The boy and the man develop this mutual co-dependent grotesque relationship based on their fascination with mass murder. The content is disturbing, in and of itself, and also because you watch a seemingly normal, albeit precocious, boy turn a corner into someone very dark and disturbed, and even to the end of the book, I found myself wondering how he was going to get out of it, how this boy was going to get back to normal.

The third story is The Body, which was turned into the movie, Stand by Me. It was after watching the movie and seeing in the credits that it was based on a short story by King, that I decided to read the book. The Body is, in a nutshell, a coming-of-age story about four boys. The boys go off on an adventure to find the body of a boy about their own age who was hit by a train. That description doesn't really do the story justice, but I don't think you read coming-of-age stories for the plot so much as for self-reflection and an opportunity to go back and live a different youth.

The fourth story is called The Breathing Method, and is about a man who joins a club where the members tell stories. Except it isn't quite as simple as that. The club has an element of almost Alice in Wonderland-ish mystique to it, where not all doors are open, and not all doors lead to rooms in this world. There's an almost dream-like quality to the club, and while reading the story, I felt at any moment I might be drawn back into reality.

I had a friend tell me she liked reading King because he wrote what we all thought but were afraid to say. I'm not sure I totally agree with that assessment, but I do think King says things we all want to say, only he manages to articulate it so much better than we ever could. As an example, here's a quote from The Breathing Method: Ellen was sixty per cent asleep when I sat down on the bed to take off my shoes. She rolled over and made a fuzzy interrogative sound deep in her throat. I told her to go back to sleep. She made the muzzy sound again. This time it approximated English: "Howwuzzit?"

Captain America and I have lots of conversations where one of us is "sixty per cent asleep" and this is EXACTLY what they sound like, although it would have taken me about 92 sentences to describe them.

At the end of the book (at least in the version I read) is a letter from King to his readers. He says a couple of interesting things in it that I want to share.

But neither of these magazines [Atlantic Monthly or The New Yorker] has been particularly receptive to my stuff, which is fairly plan, not very literary, and sometimes (although it hurts like hell to admit it) downright clumsy. To some degree or other, I would guess that those very qualities--unadmirable though they may be--have been responsible for the success of my novels. Most of them have been plain fiction for plain folks, the literary equivalent of a Big Mac and a large fries from McDonald's.

I disagree with King's assessment of his writing, and I wouldn't have used the word plain, except that King doesn't use flowery language, he uses accurate language. I'm not sure that makes it plain at all.

Finally, he says of this book in particular:

But I've been in love with each of these stories, too, and part of me always will be in love with them, I guess. I hope that you liked them, Reader; that they did for you what any good story should do--make you forget the real stuff weighing on your mind for a little while and take you away to a place you've never been. It's the most amiable sort of magic I know. 

Isn't that wonderful?

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My lifelong fear of being in trouble

So I just finished reading The Rights of the Reader by Daniel Pennac, and chapter 24 got me thinking about something that happened to me in 5th grade. The chapter is only two paragraphs, so I'm just going to quote them here:

You'll never make a boy in the middle of a gripping story understand--you'll never get him to understand through a demonstration intended for him alone--why he must stop reading and go to bed.

It was Kafka who said that, little Franz, whose father wanted him to spend every night counting.

As a child, I never understood why I had to stop reading, but one incident is forever branded in my mind. I was in 5th grade, and every morning, students gave a little presentation on any books they had finished reading. One morning, a boy named Matt Bagley, who was gawky and tall (for a 5th grader), and had what seemed like huge hands to me, was discussing the book Bridge to Terebithia by Katherine Patterson, which was one of my favorite books, by one of my favorite authors. He was tapping the book during his presentation, which is probably why I noticed his hands. AND HE WAS GETTING IT WRONG! It was clear to me that he had not read the book, or if he had, that he had so obviously not understood what was going on, or what made it such a GOOD book. It was incredible how inaccurate his description of it was.

I don't remember exactly what he said, but I remember thinking, I've already read that book, and besides, he's getting it wrong, so I'll just go back to reading what I was reading before he started his report.

But despite the fact that Matt was so clearly in the wrong, I got in trouble FOR READING. And I wasn't even expecting it.

On the first day of school, Ms. Rottenberg (yes, that really was her name), told us the classroom rules, and what the penalties were. The first penalty was your name on the board. I don't remember what the second one was, but the third one was being sent to the principal and so on. Somehow, I missed the part where you'd start anew the next day, and so I thought as soon as you got your name on the board once, you were totally screwed (it didn't occur to me how irrational this was, if for no other reason than it can be really difficult for elementary-aged kids to always behave).

Anyway, reading during Matt's atrocious presentation got me my name on the board. I was told I wasn't paying attention. I was so dumbfounded that I didn't even bother to point out that it didn't make sense for me to pay attention to someone who clearly was talking about a book they hadn't read. And besides, I'm not sure my 5th-grade mind could articulate such a sentiment.

At any rate, my name was on the board, and I was convinced that if I stuck a toe out of line the rest of the year, whatever the second thing was would happen, and the world would come to an end. My parents would disown me, I'd be kicked out of school and become a drug addict and get pregnant and never go to college (okay, and while we're on the subject, why is this always the series of events presented to kids? I mean, every time we discussed drugs and/or sex in school, it seemed like we were all doomed if we ever did either of those things. It was like God was hovering over our health classes ready to send in a wrath of locusts or something). I apparently never noticed if my name was removed the next day or not. It was etched on the chalkboard in my mind's eye, and that was all that mattered to me.

So, little 5th-grade Virginia was terrified of getting in trouble, and the worst part was, I really didn't understand what I had done wrong. I mean, I was READING in SCHOOL! So, more accurately, my fear was, I'd get in trouble for something I couldn't predict would get me in trouble. It would have been one thing if I had known what I was doing was wrong, and was doing it anyway, like the kids who got in trouble for writing on their desks (why would they ever think such a thing was appropriate?). But the fact that I didn't even expect to get in trouble was unnerving.

This is actually a fear that has followed me to this day. I'm a grown-up with legitimate, employable skill sets, and every time my boss calls me into his office, I'm afraid that I'm going to be in trouble. Not that I'm going to be fired, but that that unnamed second thing is going to happen. That somehow, I've done something wrong that I didn't even realize was the wrong thing to do. Chapter 24 was an epiphany for me, and realizing my habit has been instrumental in helping me change it. It makes no sense for me to be so nervous at work. I'm not a brain surgeon--no one is going to die if I make a mistake, and furthermore, it's my boss's job to help me if I do make a mistake.

I'm saddened by the amount of time and energy I've wasted being scared of getting in trouble when I don't expect to, but I'm glad I've finally named that fear. It's a fear of the unknown, a fear of not knowing the rules of the game, a fear I'm still not able to articulate to the depths that it has shaped my life. It was an unexpected find in a book about reading.

The Rights of the Reader by Daniel Pennac
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is hands down, my new favorite book, which is saying something because I haven't had a new favorite book since 1996 when I first read The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara.

This book is a delightful, whimsical treatise on the love of reading. I read entire chapters aloud to my husband because I could not contain my enthusiasm for this book.

Among the highlights of the book are the following passages:

What we need to understand is that books weren't written so that young people could write essays about them, but so that they could read them if they really wanted to.

The road to knowledge doesn't lead into this classroom: it leads out of it.

If you're wondering how you'll find time, it means you don't really want to read. Because nobody's ever got time. Children certainly haven't, nor teenagers or grown-ups. Life always gets in the way.

I could go on and on, but I'm pretty sure I'm preaching to the choir, and besides this book is far better written than my review.

I do have two things to note: this book is written by a teacher, and so the slant is towards why students don't seem to enjoy reading, and what can be done about it. It actually reads very easily, and the logic is straightforward, but it's helpful to know that this is the basic argument behind the book.

The second thing to note is that the chapter on the right to mistake a book for real life isn't about what I thought it'd be about. It's more about how adolescents relate to characters, seeing themselves in them, seeing their lives mirrored in the characters' dramas.

I don't know if I saw myself in any of my favorite characters as a teenager, but I do lose myself in books, which is what I think of when I think of mistaking a book for real life. I feel the heartaches and joys of the characters I'm reading about. I get frustrated when characters make bad decisions. (I also get frustrated with authors for bad writing.) And I love, love, love, when I find a character I want to know in real life. Even though I know they're a product of someone's imagination.

It seems that a book about the love of reading is a little redundant. Clearly people who love reading are already reading, but I think this book is well worth the few short hours it will take you to read it.


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The rights of the reader

I'm currently reading a book called The Rights of the Reader by Daniel Pennac. And it's awesome.

It might seem odd (or maybe not) that I'd read a book about what a wonderful hobby reading is, since I already love to read, but this book articulates everything I love about reading, and learning to read, and discovering books, in better language than I could dream up. When I write my official review, I'm going to pretty much quote the entire thing.

I was having a discussion with a friend the other day about how mind-numbingly dull high school was. I really wanted to skip, say second through fourth grade. Which would have gotten me to high school at point in my mental development when it probably wouldn't have been so dull. (Although, emotionally, on the other hand, it would have been a train wreck.)

I commented to my friend that during the summers, I would easily read seven or eight books at the same time. (Now that I have work and grown-up responsibilities, my max is about 3 before it gets stressful.) What would happen is, my mother would go to the library a couple days a week (it was across the street, and she a librarian) and bring home some books. They'd be on the coffee table, the kitchen table, the dining room table, the porch. Some would make it upstairs into the (accurately, but somehow inaccurately named) TV room. Some would end up on my sister's bedside table, some on mine, some on the floor next to my mother's bed (see, Captain America, I inherited this trait!).

And as we mosied around the house, my sister or I would pick up one book, ask whoever was reading it how it was. We'd sit at the old-fashioned telephone table, waiting for a friend to pick us up to take us somewhere, and start a book that had been placed there as someone ran inside to answer the (land-line) phone (which was, ironically, located not on the telephone table, but in the kitchen, where everyone used to keep their phone). We'd start a book in one room, leave it to get a snack, and begin another as we stood at the kitchen counter (on one leg) eating a bowl of cereal.

We'd tear out strips of the Ladies' Home Journal that my grandmother would bring over as impromptu bookmarks. Sometimes there would be multiple bookmarks in any one book; part of the challenge was remembering which bookmark was yours.

Is anybody still reading this? my mother would yell as she readied herself for a new trip to the library. Sometimes we'd have requests...the second or third or fourth in a series...another book by the same author...a chapter book the kids we babysat were reading so we could catch up and understand what they were talking about when they called us muggles (was this really an insult or are kids just ridiculous?). Yes, even in high school, my mother picked out my books (she was, after all, a librarian).

Who does this belong to? I'd holler down the stairs. My sister would answer her friend, or my grandmother would claim it, or I'd have picked it up babysitting. Books littered my youth the way the shoes accumulated by the front door when we had friends over. (My father had more fits over the shoes than the books...I'm not sure if this was a pick-your-battles scenario or if books just stack better than shoes do.)

Books still litter my house. Instead of getting rid of some of them, we buy more bookshelves. Put the story aside, we're about to have dinner, my husband tells me. Could you put some of these on a shelf, he admonishes, Josafina is cleaning today.

My sister uses rule #2, the right to skip, and rule #3, the right not to finish a book (I can't bring myself to do this). I've mastered rules #4, the right to read it again (somehow Dobby dies EVERY TIME. It's still tragic); #6, the right to mistake a book for real life (um, hello, I have second breakfast EVERY DAY; if second breakfast is real, then by the transitive (or some such) property, Hobbits are real); and #7, the right to read anywhere (most recent bizarre reading location: in a bar during an MMA fight). My whole family uses #5, the right to read anything (I would add the emphasis ANYTHING!!), and #9, the right to read out loud (my sister and I were first introduced to Harry Potter when I read it out loud to her as she was recovering from surgery).

But my favorite rule is rule #1, the right not to read. I've never used it, but it would be a sad day if I had to read rather than got to read.

The Secret Keeper

The Secret Keeper by Kate Morton
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

So you know when you read a book, and people keep talking to you, and you want to turn to them with your best eight-year-old-older-sister-I'm-right-because-I-said-so-voice and say "But I'm READING" because clearly there is nothing more important than reading THIS PARTICULAR BOOK, RIGHT NOW, EVER? That's how the last third of this book is. And people kept interrupting me.

About halfway through the book, when I figured out what Dolly's plan was, I thought, this is stupid. This isn't going to work. It's petty and childish and it isn't going to turn out how she thinks it will. Well, I was both right, and so far from being right I can't believe I was disappointed to figure it out with 200 pages to go.

Kate Morton has an enviable use of language. She describes things in ways I wouldn't have dreamed up, but that are still crystal clear. She does change character voice a lot (which is something I have been noticing more and more after a friend pointed it out to me), but even within chapters, I didn't find it distracting.

The book is broken into a couple of sections that seem rather arbitrary to me, as the sections neither fully focus on, nor are fully described by, the character they're named after.

All-in-all, this is a really good book.

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The book in which absolutely nothing happens

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Okay, maybe absolutely nothing is a bit of an exaggeration, but very little happens, and it takes a while to do so. I saw the movie years ago and thought it was okay. I looked up who played T. Ray, and it turns out it's Paul Bettany, whom I love, and somehow, he was totally unmemorable in the movie. Yup, that pretty much sums things up.

This is one of those books with a lesson to impart, but your hand is held during the imparting, which drives me bananas! I want to shout: just tell me what you'd like me to take away! Stop leading me in one direction or another and JUST.GET.THERE!

Furthermore, there's almost no reconciliation at the end of the book. T. Ray just leaves Lily at August's house. Um, what? He's supposed to be the bad guy, and he hardly makes an appearance at all. He's mean and battling a lot of his own demons, but in terms of fictional bad guys, he's really not so much.

Also, each chapter begins with a quote about bee keeping from a (presumably) expert source on the subject. It gets a little tedious.

However, that being said, Monk Kidd's actual writing is quite lovely. She is clearly a skilled writer in terms of language usage. Unfortunately, this book did so little for me that I'm unlikely to pick up anything else of hers.

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Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was my review the first time I read this book:

With around 30 pages to go, Captain America told me it was time to get ready for bed. I said, "I'm reading THIS book," and he asked if I was going to cry. I said, probably not. Boy, was I wrong.

I'm a crier when it comes to books. Sometimes it's just a few tears. This time it was full on sobs. I haven't cried like that since Dobby died. And it wasn't even over someone dead; it was over a friendship that could not be made whole.

Having taken a few hours to calm down, sleep, and then discuss the series with a friend who also loved them, I have concluded that Hunger Games was the best book in the series, and that while I did enjoy them, the pacing was strange in the last two. Sometimes months would go by very quickly and without much explanation, and sometimes several chapters would span just one or two days. And a lot of events become totally chaotic in the last half of this book. Not it an I-can't-follow-this sort of way, but more like, what-is-going-on!?!?!

To me, one of the most truthful, real moments in the book is when Katniss loses her mind and thinks she can yell at dead people.

Overall, the book is worth the three days it will take you to read it.

A couple of other things to add: I didn't really like how you never learn if it's Gale's parachutes that kill Prim. I mean, Coin, or someone must have ordered the drop. It's as if Collins was afraid her readers would hate her if they were Gale's, but that the readers would also hate her if they weren't (and Katniss ended up trusting  Snow when she shouldn't have, although Snow's arguments that it wasn't him are pretty solid). But I think it was pretty obvious that Coin was not an ideal choice for a new president, so I'm not sure what the concern could have been. And, I think other series, including Harry Potter and GOT, indicate that as readers, we will stick by you, even if you kill off people we really like, even if we think the wrong guy gets the girl, even if you make us wait years between the books, as long as they're worth the read.

Also, there was really no conclusion with Johanna. We never learn what happens with her.

Finally, because this entire series is told from Katniss's perspective, every time she is sedated, or in some other way incapacitated, we, the readers, don't know what's going on until she comes to and someone fills her in. So there's all sorts of things we don't know. For example, Haymitch comments (somewhere in the series, although it may not have been this book) that the Capitol killed his parents and his girl, but never really why this happened, or the effect it had on him (although it's fairly obvious given his drinking). There seems to be something that happens to the survivors of the Games that makes the rest of their lives colored by that experience (which totally makes sense), and my imagination is active enough that I can imagine how that would be, but the horror isn't fully expressed. Even Katniss's nightmares, while scary, didn't grip me with terror.

I loved reading this series, but I also know that it could have been more.

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Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is the review I wrote the first time I read this book:

This book took me three days to read, mostly because my reading was interrupted by having to go to work. I haven't enjoyed reading a series this much since Harry Potter came out. Although that's about as far as I'd go with comparing the series: you're reading enjoyment level will be high.

I generally don't write much about the plot in my reviews, because I always think, I'll learn about the plot from the cover and when I read the book. What I want to know from reviews is, should I read the book? And the answer is, yes!

Because I read this one (remember...I listened to Hunger Games on CD), any young-adulty stuff was less bothering. Or maybe there was just less of it in this book.

I like Collins' writing style. What I really like is that around page 250, you know there's no way you're going to get to "...and they all lived happily ever after." It's both frustrating and thrilling, because you so badly want to find out what happens next. At least I do. But then again, I become a little obsessed with books I love. And the best you get at the end of this one is "some people lived, but not before they were seriously hurt and a lot of other bad things happened."

I can't wait to read Mockingjay!

Having reread it, I wouldn't make any changes to my review, although in the second reading, I noticed more literary gaffes. Most notably, at the very end of the book Katniss and Haymitch get into a huge argument  Except you don't read the argument  You are simply told: Then we are both screaming terrible, terrible things at each other. I think the editor should have said to Collins, alright,  let's hear these terrible, terrible things. It's very easy for the reader to imagine what these things are, but still, it seems a bit of an oversight.

But still, I love this series!

When I told a friend I was rereading the series, she asked me if I wanted to be Katniss yet. I've never found myself reading a book and wanting to be the protagonist. More often, I've wanted to know the protagonist, but as some yet unknown character. My imagination never allows me to be an already created character. I don't know why this is.

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I totally get this

Periodically, I read The Happiness Project blog, and this one resonated with me. I've read about the police theory of broken windows, but I also agree with Gretchen Rubin this idea applies in our personal lives.

although not this much like clutter

My big broken windows are the gigantic stacks of books that I plan to read that are lying around. I've taken to hiding them (no, seriously, I have), because I really want to read them, but I haven't gotten to them yet, and they're starting to look like clutter.

Another thing I read over at The Happiness Project also had to do with clutter...it's tip number 12...and ignore the inconsistent numbers in this blog...the title says 12, the opening paragraph says 11, and then she lists 12. These things happen.

I really like how her friend points out that she can store stuff at the store. That's brilliant!

The sad tale of cleaning out my email

Periodically, the threat level from an overflowing email inbox reaches impending doom level and I have to force myself to go through and clean it out. This, for me, is anytime there's more than, say, 78 emails in my inbox. I'm pretty sure I have a low threshold for impending doom, but I also try really hard to practice the "touch it once" rule with my emails. Anyway, inevitably, there's a whole bunch of stuff that can be deleted because I've already done it (like library reminders), a whole bunch of stuff than can be filed (like stuff I bought at Amazon that's arrived and so everything's fine), and a whole bunch of other stuff that I should either delete or file away for when I have copious amounts of free time (does that every happen to anyone? because if so, c'mon over to my house--I've got a whole bunch of blogs to read, cats-doing-strange-things videos to watch, and double-chocolate-brownie recipes to try).

So here's something I'm trying to come to terms with: I had a ton of fun with NaNoWriMo and I'd really like to write on a regular basis. But I have bills to pay, so I go to work. (And I have a pretty awesome job...too awesome to give up and embark on being-a-writer-for-a-year type projects.) I also exercise a lot because it keeps me from going postal on the freeways in Southern California, helps me sleep through the night (you're welcome, Captain America), and because I really want to fit back into my old pants. Finally, I read a ton. And, push come to shove, I like reading more than I like writing (full disclosure: I like reading more than I like doing ANYTHING else).

I read a parenting article a while ago that said that kids can basically handle three things, and you have to count school as a thing. So if your kid is enrolled in scouts and little league, that's a manageable amount of stuff in their life, but if you throw in choir  they've now got four things (because, remember, you have to count school), you can expect a lot of meltdowns. I don't think adults are so different. If I go to work, and then make exercising and reading my two other things, pretty much everything is fine. But when I add in writing, like I did last November, it was at the expense of the other two (remember, you have to count going to work as a thing, and since it's what pays the bills, I didn't think it was prudent to allow that to be the thing that suffered).

So what does this have to do with cleaning out my email? As sad as it is, currently, the prudent thing for me to do is to sort of put writing aspirations on hold, which means that all of the emails that are links to tips or agents or whatever that would be helpful need to get filed away. This isn't a crisis, but it's still sad to acknowledge that I really don't have the time to try out this particular hobby right now.

But don't despair! I fully intend to participate in Script Frenzy in April and NaNoWriMo again in November!

Life Expectancy by Dean Koontz
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I was expecting this book to feel mass-produced, but it didn't. You know when you read a lot, and you find yourself reading a lot of just okay books and then you find one that you don't want to put down and it reminds you why you love reading so much and you find the book makes you really happy regardless of what is actually going on in the story? This is one of those books.

And there's a great line in the book that I want to remember: Where there's cake, there's hope. And there's always cake.


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Do we all just live in a perpetual state of anguish?

This isn't Cicero.

Sometimes I do what I want to do. The rest of the time, I do what I have to. --the character Cicero in the movie Gladiator.

I was on the phone with Captain America the other night, complaining about how busy I am when it occurred to me that it's all my own fault that I'm busy. The problem, in a nutshell, is that there are so many things I'd like to be doing, or doing a lot more of. 

For instance, I love to read. Probably more than I like to do anything else. And I read a lot, but not nearly as much as I'd like to. I feel like I am so far behind on what I want to be reading that it's actually stressful trying to figure out when I could fit more of it in. But I also feel like I'm so close to getting to a point where I could read as much as I want...like if I could just get caught up, I could stay caught up. 

I feel the same way about exercising. When I'm unemployed, a trip to the gym can take me four hours, door-to-door. That allows me 15 minutes of driving each way, an hour of ellipticalling, 40 minutes of running, 40 minutes of lifting weights, 40 minutes of stretching and the like, 20 minutes in the sauna, and 10 minutes to deal with things like peeing and filling up my water bottle and changing my shoes to use said sauna (don't get me started on how stupid I think that rule is). I get that four hours is a lot of time at the gym, and obviously this would be the long day (the short workout is the alternative days when I don't lift). In real life, I do get to spend about two hours a day at the gym, but then I have days where there is no way I can fit in 30 minutes of cardio. Which, for me, is a stupid amount of time. I have to spend the same amount of time wrangling myself into my sports bra, and the same amount of time stretching, for a whole lot less exercise. I realize this sounds like an excuse, but somehow 30 minutes is just where I say, I have better things to do with my time. If I know I can get in 45 minutes, though, it's worth it. 

So, I'm perpetually feeling frustrated because there are SO MANY THINGS I WANT TO DO, and instead, I have to spend my time at work, or even worse, commuting to and from work. (I am aware that all of my problems are first world problems. As I was discussing with a friend the other day, isn't that sort of the goal? I mean, how awesome would it be if everyone's problems were first world problems?) Don't get me wrong, there is absolutely nothing wrong with my job. The pay is good, the company is good, the people are nice, the hours are even reasonable. It's just not nearly as enjoyable as reading or exercising.

What I was wondering aloud to Captain America the other night, though, is whether or not everyone else lives in this same perpetual state of anguish that I'm in that I'm not doing what I want with my life, or if everyone else has managed to grow up and accept it and I'm still the teenager raging against the world. 

Good Lord, I hope not. 

Fan Fiction

I have been creating fan fiction in my imagination my entire life, but it's only been in the past year or so that I've learned that that's what it's called. It was refreshing to learn that there were other people out there who created fan fiction. I mean, I never assumed I was the only one, but it's not like my friends and I sit around discussing the next imaginary adventures we've thought up for Harry Potter or anything. As opposed to the not imaginary adventures J.K. Rowling thought up for him. Because Harry Potter is real. And I'm Dobby-esque in that I can never just say Harry. It's always Harry Potter.

Although I would like to point out that Robert Pattinson
was Cedric Diggory  before he was Edward Cullen, in case you've forgotten.

(And as a side note, I really don't recommend reading fan fiction. I don't have issue with people taking legitimate characters and doing what they want with them, because once you put art out there, it's out there, and most people don't make any money off it anyway--it's really more like a silly hobby. But the real reason you shouldn't read fan fiction is because, in general, it sucks. Authors like George R.R. Martin (who HATES fan fiction, by the way) get paid to do what they do because they're really, really good at it. There's no way you've thought up something better for Jon Snow to do than he has. Jon Snow couldn't think up something better for himself to do. You, for sure, can't.)

Anyway, I digress. Although this entire post is probably a digression. Anyway, I've been thinking about fan fiction a lot lately, partially because I've been watching this ridiculous new show in which I feel like the characters could be doing a lot more. If only I were in charge. Which, of course, doesn't mean I'll stop watching the show.

The other reason I've been thinking about fan fiction lately is because I've signed up for NaNoWriMo (and I'm way behind. That's what I *should* be doing rather than writing this post), and it's really, really hard to create characters.

I know that's a no shit! kind of statement. But it really is. I have lots of good ideas for what my characters should be doing, but it's really, really hard to make the characters real. They all feel so one-dimensional. Which is why it's so much easier, at least to me, to imagine someone else's character doing stuff.

On the other hand, lots of writers sell books with one-dimensional characters. I'm just not sure that's the sort of thing I'd tell my friends about.

The Tales of Beedle the Bard by J.K. Rowling
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Okay, for starters, I'm not sure I can help but love anything by J.K. Rowling.

This is a great series of fairy tales. I have the collector's edition version, so mine came in an awesome box and the book itself has a scull on the cover and one of those latch things that are on diaries. And some prints. That I'm thinking about framing.

The stories are actually really rather good. They don't feel overly J.K. Rowling-ish...as in, when I read them, I didn't hear Harry's voice reading them. They could stand alone without the Harry Potter series, although I really don't know why you should bother. (Or more accurately, not bother.)

It was also fun that the stories were followed by commentary by Professor Dumbledore and footnotes by J.K. Rowling.

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Hour Game by David Baldacci
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Not surprisingly, David Baldacci's books become predictable and formulaic after a while. This book was an enjoyable, easy read, and I got through it quickly. Sometimes it's nice to just be able to read a book without using a ton of brain power.

Probably the most annoying part of the book was not the predictability, but the chapter where the investigators sit down and review the data...the chapter is designed to look like they're all reviewing the information together, to make sure they haven't missed anything, but the real purpose is to summarize for the readers everything that has happened. Except I don't need the summary because I'VE BEEN READING THE BOOK. And this chapter would not be at all necessary if Baldacci didn't try to incorporate a whole lot of plot lines that don't really add value, and simply create a superficial complexity to the story.

Whatever. It's a totally fine book if you want to read something that doesn't make you think (I'm not judging here--I do it all the time myself!)

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The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This book was utterly disappointing. I SO wanted to like it. I really, really did. It seemed so much like the kind of story I LOVE! I was so frustrated with the book that I actually kept notes on it!

1. I was expecting more whimsy.
2. I was also expecting it to be charming.
3. Technically, I was listening to the book on CD. It was read by the always fabulous Jim Dale, who also read the Harry Potter series. So, unfortunately, I kept hearing those characters. I kept saying, wait a minute! Ron doesn't do that! Or, Luna never says that!
4. It reminded me of The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, which I actually enjoyed because I'm weird like that. But the visuals in the book were somehow less enticing. And there was no Heath Ledger. Or Johnny Depp. Or Jude Law. Or Colin Farrell. Really, why even bother?
5. Because I kept taking notes: The voice kept changing. Sometimes you were addressed, as in, you entered the tent... Most of the time the story was told in third person, but it was distracting when it switched back to...second person...I didn't really think books were written in second person.
6. For a while I thought Isobel was Celia, and I know I'm not the only one. I read a number of reviews saying this exact same thing.
7. There's some seriously confusing jumping around in time.
8. For illusionists/magicians, Celia and Marco are mind-numbingly boring. It's like meeting someone who's just come back from a tour of Europe who wants to tell you all about how much her back hurts after a 14-hour return flight. Good Lord!
9. For a long time Bailey is a nice, albeit useless character. You really don't learn his purpose in the story until the last (or eleventh, for those of you who are counting) CD. I don't know what that equates to in chapters.
10. You also don't have any understanding of why they can't stop competing until about CD nine, when Celia asks Marco to imagine leaving the competition and he suffers immense pain. Apparently the kind of pain that makes you see stars. Except it was so undramatically written that I felt like telling him to man up about it.
11. For a while, I couldn't decide how I felt about Marco and Celia. Then I decided that Marco is creepy and Celia is pathetic.
12. The book started to become interesting in CD nine when ***spoiler alert*** Heir Teisen dies. Also, in this CD, you actually start to learn how Marco does whatever it is he does.
13. At one point my note simply said: this is a frustrating and stupid book.
14. What is the point of the players in the circus not aging? Other than to drag out the misery of the reader?
15. I think the story should have ended one chapter sooner. Then, at least it would have ended with symmetry. KNOW WHEN TO STOP!

In case you're wondering, I kept listening to the CDs because I kept hoping to fall in love. And I didn't have a lot of better things to be doing on my commute.

Seriously, though, don't waste your time!

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The Help by Kathryn Stockett
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really enjoyed this book. I was hesitant to read it at first--I worried that it would be too hokey. I was concerned that the white people would be portrayed as one-dimensional racists, and the black people as one-dimensional victims. But Kathryn Stockett manages to make the characters multi-dimensional, which makes them believable. She also avoids turning the white people into puppets simply proving a point about segregation in the south in the 1960s.

I also found the black people believable, but hard to relate to. For no particular reason, I just don't know a lot of black people (I don't even know if I'm allowed to say "black" but I really dislike "African-American" which is not a term used in the book, but I dislike it because it presumes that I know where someone is from, and also that all places in Africa are the same. I would never say I'm a "European-American," but rather a "German-American," or whatever. And finally, the phrase "African-American" presumes that I know that someone is, in fact, American, when they could simply be a Kenyan. Okay, rant over).

As I was saying, I had a hard time relating to the maids in the story because I have a very hard time imagining what life was like for a black woman in the south in the 1960s. My parents were both in Memphis when Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot. When I've asked what Memphis was like during that time, my mother held a similar view point to mine: how could kids who were fed, nursed, bathed, and cared for by black maids grow up to hate black people? It just makes no sense.

I once read an interview with Whoopi Goldberg in which she said that everyone is either an introvert or extrovert racist. She went on to explain that people either pretend they don't see color, or they just admit that they do. She wasn't complaining or accusing or anything, but I thought it was an interesting point.

Bear with me, as I really am going someplace with this, but when I watched the movie The Joy Luck Club, I kept wondering why I couldn't keep the different characters straight. I had just read the book, so I knew what each character was doing, what their personality was, and their motivations. But I just couldn't keep the actors separated.

Years later, I read that the reason we do this is because back, thousands of years ago, when we were all tribal nomads, anyone who looked like us was likely to be part of our tribe, and therefore distinguishing characteristics were useful identifiers, but anyone who didn't look like us was probably an enemy (presumably fighting over valuable resources and the like), and therefore distinguishing characteristics weren't useful identifiers. Even though socially we've evolved past this, our brains still group everyone in a different race as "them." In fact, there's even a bit on 30 Rock where Tracy Jordan says, "No, you can't leave, Ken. Who's gonna help me tell white people apart?"

So to tie all of these points together, I felt like after reading the interview with Whoopi Goldberg, and especially after I read the science behind it, I felt like I could actually say that I can't tell all black people apart without feeling like I'm a terrible human being and intentionally being racist (I can't tell all of the Indian people I work with apart, either, especially when I'm on the phone with them).

So now, to get back to The Help, the book was really interesting, and I'm actually a little sad that I didn't read it as part of a book club, because I think it would have sparked an interesting discussion. One really interesting point made in the book was how sneaky the white employers could be. One character discusses how the white ladies might destroy a family by firing the maid, and then spreading rumors that she stole or whatever, so the maid couldn't get another job. Then the white lady's husband would talk to the owner of the house the maid's family was renting, and evict them in the middle of the night, and then the maid's husband would get fired because the foreman (or whoever) wanted his wife to stay in the social circle of the white lady who originally fired the maid. It's just mind-boggling to me that this elite power-play could go on and everyone knew about it.

I felt the same sort of horrific wonder while reading the book that I do when I read about women getting the right to vote (what were the men really afraid of? That we'd take over the world? That requires a tremendous amount of effort! That we'd make stupid choices? Or even worse, that we'd make smart choices?) . What were the white people in the south really so afraid of? I mean, deep down, how could they really be so concerned with sharing a water fountain or a bus seat? Did they really think the black people were going to take all of the jobs, all of the opportunities, all of what, exactly?

I think the black people in the south weren't interested in taking everything the white people had. They were interested in the same things that all decent people are interested in: their kids' schools, being safe, having a job that pays a reasonable wage, and in general being treated like a human. That's really not too much to ask for.


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Split Second by David Baldacci
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

My library classified this book as suspense, but I wouldn't go that far. I feel like David Baldacci's books aren't literary masterpieces by any stretch of the imagination, but I find them really, really enjoyable reading.

This book is your sort of typical law-enforcement caper, with the law-enforcement people being framed, and then they have to figure out how to prove their innocence.

In fact, it was so typical that I was nearly able to predict the outcome. I say nearly because there was one little plot twist I didn't take into account. And not only do I not try to predict endings of books, but I'm actually pretty terrible at it.

Nonetheless, I really enjoy reading Baldacci's books, mostly because they're fast-paced and easy to read.

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Bridge of Sighs by Richard Russo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book is really long. I don't find long books intimidating, nor do I generally get bored by them. However, this story is told mostly, although not entirely, from the perspective of Lucy Lynch, and his style is akin to that of Garrison Keillor's. It's slow moving, detailed, and not un-entertaining. However, there were times when I put the book down for days.

However, the last quarter of the book really made up for it. By the time I finished the book, I felt like crying, although I'm not sure why. I guess I felt a little bit like I was saying goodbye to some really good people.

There are a number of character juxtapositions in this book, from Lucy's own parents, to his father and Uncle Dec, to Lucy's father and Bobby's father, to Lucy and Bobby themselves.

It would be easy to paint (pun intended) Bobby as the antagonist, but he's not. He's a very complex character, and that makes him interesting. He's a very real character. You are drawn to him, even though you know he's more volatile, and less deserving of your friendship than Lucy. What's also interesting is that Bobby's not really the focal point of the book: Lucy is telling the story of his town and his life. But Bobby had such an effect on Lucy that you can't help but feel that the narrative is being pulled toward him, or by him, like the tide by the moon.

As a student of the craft of writing, I can't help but feel like I'll never be able to write a character as good as Bobby, and especially in way that makes him not quite the focal point, but somehow the crucial element in the story.

The only reason I didn't give this book five stars is because I was able to walk away from it at times. With a little bit more editing and some tightening up, it would have been a page-turner from start to finish.

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Rereading? Who has time to reread?

I just read an article about the value of rereading. It was actually a review of a book about rereading. The author of the book enjoys rereading but comments (according to the reviewer) that the value of the book can change because you've changed since the last reading. The author really liked Holden Caufield in Catcher in the Rye the first time around, but found him annoying the second. But she found she liked books the second time that she didn't like the first time. I ask you: why would you reread a book you didn't like the first time? There have been two instances in my life where I've done it: the book was assigned by two different English teachers many years apart (The Old Man and the Sea--the man is really old and the fish gets eaten before he can get it home) and when I had a really hard time getting into a book that came highly recommended (Great Expectations--it's hysterical if you get the books on cd version).

My sister and I both enjoyed Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs when we were kids, but both reread it after college and just didn't like it. The story wasn't as good and the illustrations were lame. I was reading it to someone, and it was really hard for me to get into it because it was so much worse than I remembered it. Was it the time--like something trendy that was no longer in, or was it me?

There are some books that I love rereading (the Harry Potter series--I cry--bawl, really--every time Dobby dies!!), and many others that I keep meaning to, but who has time to reread when there's so much unread to read? And on top of that, every time I read an article in the writing magazine (the same one where the article about rereading came from), I find that many authors use craft books to help them become better writers, so now I have a whole bunch of those to read, too!

I also know people who reread only parts of a book. I've never thought to myself, hmmm...I'd love to get lost in ONLY ONE SCENE OF A TERRIFIC STORY! When I reread something, it's because I really miss the characters. I'll say things to Captain America like, I miss Owen Meany. But I've never said, I miss when Rhett and Ashley pretend to have spent the evening at Bell Watling's. Although that is one of my favorite scenes in the book. But it's my favorite because it shows what sort of man Rhett is, and it illustrates some depth in Melanie's character.

Yes, I'm not going to reread a book I didn't like just to see if my perspective changed, but I will reread a book I did like...if I can find the time!