Th Reading Lair

Archive for August, 2010

  • Mockingjay (book 3 in The Hunger Games Trilogy)

    Monday, August 30th, 2010

    Mockingjay.JPG

    District 12 is gone. Peeta has been captured by the Capital. And while the other Districts wage an all out rebellion, Katniss and Gale are secreted away to the underground colony in District 13–the leaders of which plan to use Katniss’ Mockingjay status to fuel the revolution through to completion. Except Katniss is tired of being a pawn in other people’s war games.

    Exhausted, drained of passion, and a bare survivor, Katniss emotionally implodes until she’s little more than a carcass, useful to no one–especially Peeta, who, for all her swearing to protect in the arena, is out of reach. Or so she thinks… But when President Snow dangles Peeta across the airwaves, taunting Katniss with the thin reality that she might still save him, Katniss pulls herself together long enough to become the symbol the Districts are looking for.

    But will it be enough?

    Revolution requires a price, and this one will be even higher than Katniss can imagine. Or most likely endure.

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    What I liked:

    1. Ms. Collins’ prose. As always. Perfect.
    2. Katniss’ compassion.
    3. The Capital’s underground passage system and the mutts crawling through it. Nice and creepy.
    4. Haymitch and Katniss’ relationship.
    5. Cinna’s handwritten note, “I’m still betting on you.” (I cried.)
    6. The multiple layers of relational tension between the characters.
    7. Kaniss’ singing (toward the end) when she has been emotionally stripped to the bone. Beautifully poetic. (And realistic.)
    8. Much of the emotional and psychological accuracy of the novel.
    9. The irony that we, as fans of this series, can be compared to the fans of the Capital’s Hunger Games. For instance, below, when I list what angered me…I’m pathetically aware it is because I wanted the Games and the love story and the happy ending without the bitter undermining of reality.
    10. Buttercup.

     

    What made me throw a sissy-girl fit:

    1. Ms. Collins stripped Peeta down, shredded out his insides, then handed him back on a platter and called it “real.” For this reason alone, I was sad.
    2. The anti-war message. While not inappropriate, the level of reality to which Ms. Collins took it shadowed the characters in the book and robbed her readers of a satisfying story arc. While Mockingjay is a realistic take on war and its devastating effects—socially, emotionally, physically, and relationally—at the end of the day this book is a YA novel, not a Tom Brokaw war documentary. Reality in fiction is good, yes. But not at the expense of the story.
    3. The bait and switch tactic. The above wouldn’t have bothered me nearly so much if I hadn’t walked away feeling tricked and robbed. I fell in love with The Hunger Games for the beautiful imagery, incredible characters, fabulous plot, and promise of tension—both romantic and social. Somewhere along the way between the ending of book 1 and the ending of book 3, Ms. Collins got sidetracked into reality…and took us with her. (Can you hear me kicking and screaming?)
    4. Methinks she took the old writer’s adage “kill your darlings” too far. And those she didn’t kill, she taxed and tortured beyond emotional recognition so that I actually wished she HAD killed them. Katniss… Peeta… Haymitch… Ms. Collins, I love you. But you gave us hollowed-out victims when we were begging for victors.
    5. Katniss. It began to feel as if most of the book surrounded her curled up in a fetal position, confused and unable to make choices unless forced to. And aside from short spurts of passionate mutiny, all of Katniss’ choices are made for her. As one reviewer put it–Katniss spends the book reacting to circumstances, rather than acting with conviction. Instead of seeing her develop and grow to arrive at some form of internal strength and conviction, we see her unravel at the seams so that even in the end, we don’t get the pleasure of Katniss choosing between Gale and Peeta. Life happens TO her. Being the mockingjay happens TO her. And she has nothing left.
    6. The lack of romantic tension. (Okay…seriously? Katniss doesn’t know who she’ll fall in love with until the last 4 pages?) I desperately wanted the bleakness of the story (and of Katniss’ war-ravaged self) to be off-set by romance blooming. *sigh*
    7. The ending involving Gale.
    8. The one paragraph “relational” summary at the end telling that Katniss and (I won’t spoil this—so we’ll just say “the boy she ends up with”) “grow together.” Sorry, this was NOT enough for me. My sister called it right–I could have gotten over everything else in the book had we been offered one last chapter of watching Katniss and “boy she ends up with” actually growing together. I mean–what did that look like? Walk me through it please! Because after all–I spent 3 books with these people. At least allow me the pleasure of seeing their relationship as it finds resolution.

    Obviously the fact that I feel so strongly on all of this reveals how much I adore the trilogy and its author. So, for that alone, Suzanne Collins–FABULOUS job.

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    What’s the mood noise of the moment?  Linkin Park:  What I’ve Done

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    Posted in Book Reviews | 16 Comments »

  • Catching Fire (book 2 in The Hunger Games trilogy)

    Friday, August 27th, 2010

    Catching fire.JPG

    Katniss and Peeta not only survived The Hunger Games, they effectively humiliated the Capitol in their defiance. Now back home in District 12, Katniss’s internal confusion (and friendship with Gale) ushers in a cold front that borders on glacial over her and Peeta’s private relationship. Except in this next season their very public romance must flare up hotter than ever. Because intended or not, Katniss and Peeta’s act of survival / love / rebellion—whatever you want to call it—in the Games has sent out a spark of unrest in the Districts. And it’s up to the two of them to diffuse it. Or else lose the ones they love.

    The question is…can they?

    And SHOULD they?

    The civil turbulence roiling just beneath the surface of the individual Districts inadvertently flickers awake…alive…on Katniss and Peeta’s victory tour, igniting into an unstable rebellion with the introduction of the next Hunger Games and the realization that Katniss—the Districts’ symbol of revolution—their Mockingjay—is going back into the arena. With Peeta.

    And let’s face it…this time NO one is playing by the rules.

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    What I liked:

    1. Suzanne Collins’ writing. EXCELLENT. Involved. Engaging.
    2. The ebb and flow between tension and humor. Ms. Collins nails this flawlessly.
    3. The flavor of characters, especially Mags and Beetee.
    4. The dialogue between the tributes in the arena.
    5. Katniss’ comment, “Oh, the fun we two have together,” in reference to President Snow.
    6. Cinna’s channeling of his emotions through Katniss’ dress at the televised interview. (I cried.)
    7. Cinna. *sigh*

    What *only slightly* annoyed me:

    1. Their re-entry into the Hunger Games. I wanted this second book to move further ahead rather than repeat what worked so well in the first novel. Unfortunately this made it feel more like an intermission to me instead of the next season.
    2. The way it ended. So fantastic, but so frustrating. (I wanted more!)
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    What’s the mood noise of the moment?  Smashing Pumpkins:  Tonight, Tonight

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    Posted in Book Reviews | 9 Comments »

  • Cooking with Tim Kennedy

    Monday, August 23rd, 2010

    Say HELLO again to our most manly friend, Tim Kennedy. The MMA ultimate fighter / husband / book reader I interviewed a few months back. You know—the interview in which I realized that all of my childhood friends may or may not have purposefully allotted me the Wookie role in our endless hours of Star Wars reenactments? Yeah…that interview.

    Anyhoo…seeing as we’re currently discussing The Hunger Games trilogy (ultimate fighting of the future, anyone?), I’ve decided to interrupt the book reviews to say I’ve done as promised. I’ve pulled a few strings (or perhaps just sent an email) and asked Tim for one of his fantabulous reading recipes. And because he’s THAT kind of guy, he sent us a super tasty one. Fondue. With an entire bottle of Chardonnay in it. I made it last week…just to try it out for all of you obviously, and, well…let’s just say I’ll be making it again. Soon.

    So you know the deallio: Give us curious folk a comment on how your weekend went (and whether you watched Tim’s fight—er…does anyone else have a serious issue with that ruling??? 2 words: Take. Downs.) before reading on through the deliciousness below ;-).

    Tim Kennedy’s Recipe for Fondue

    Ingredients:

    1. 1 garlic clove
    2. 1 bottle dry (good) Chardonnay
    3. 4 cups sharp cheddar
    4. 2 cups Gruyere cheese
    5. 2 cups mozzarella

    For Dipping:

    1. apples
    2. pears
    3. French bread
    4. sirloin
    5. baby corn
    6. mushrooms
    7. (side note from Mary: I also included grapes and large chile peppers to dip in ours)

    Turn on your fondue pot. Bruise the garlic and rub it thoroughly throughout your pot.

    Pour the wine into the pot for 3-5 minutes uncovered, and until it begins to steam but not boil.  (Have all your dipping sides prepared sliced/cubed at this point–French bread into cubes, apples into slices, steak into strips, etc…)

    Gradually add your cheese and pepper.

    Lower heat to low/medium and cover for 6 minutes. (I typically lay out all the dipping material at this point.  My wife [that'd be Tim's wife, Ginger] is a vegetarian so I usually separate some for her into a smaller fondue pot so my sirloin doesn’t get her sick.)

    Enjoy.

    Oh we will, Tim. We will ;-) . Thanks.

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    Posted in Reading Recipes | 5 Comments »

  • The Hunger Games (a book review)

    Friday, August 20th, 2010

    Also known as “the best book I read last year.”

    Hunger games.jpg

    North America is gone, her remaining inhabitants collected into 12 Districts—all impoverished, all separated from each other, all fighting for bare existence, and all serving the lavish Capitol whose wealth and technology provide its residents with perfect health and pleasure while the Districts starve. Rebellion is not an option–not with the high fences, and merciless guards and guns, and the yearly Hunger Games to keep people in line.

    For the Districts, everything comes down to Survival: The only technique the citizens know and the one relentless weapon the Capitol uses for control both in daily life and in the Games–a once a year lottery where two kids are taken from each district and placed into a massive arena to fight to the death.

    24 kids.

    One winner.

    Think American Idol meets Gladiator…for youth.

    In District 12, this year’s lottery falls to the baker’s son, Peeta, and by proxy to Katniss who volunteers to substitute herself in place of her 12-year-old sister…something that hasn’t been done in their District for decades. But Katniss is small in size and not likely to survive. And if she does? Peeta and Katniss have become friends–perhaps even more than friends—and how do you team up together in an effort to outlive everyone else, just to turn and kill each other. And how do you destroy the one person willing to lay down his life for you?

    What I liked: EVERYTHING.

    1. Okay, seriously. The plot. FABULOUS idea, Suzanne Collins. Do you hear me? Fabulous.
    2. The characters. Flavorful and rich. Especially for a young adult novel.
    3. The first person, present tense writing. Which, I should say, I normally detest with a sick passion. Basically, it’s hard enough to write in first person without your main character sounding self-obsessed and whiny, but it’s that much harder to put her in present tense. Normally, it comes out sounding something like, “I am breathing my own breath at this moment. Now I stand and walk to the mirror, and I am looking in it, wondering how so many guys can be in love with me when my eyes are the color of storm clouds and my hair like a silky raven. I take another breath and turn away. There is a knock on the door. It’s Alfonso. I can see him through the pane and he is as beautiful as me.” Yeah. Pretty much. Mercifully for us all, Ms. Collins’ writing does NOT sound like this. Instead, her mastery of it pulls the reader into the lovely, sweat-soaked, bloody face of the story as an active participant.
    4. The fighting. Full of tension and detail.
    5. The fact that I had tears streaming down my face both times I read it. And I threw the book across the room when I was finished.
    6. Peeta. Always and forever.

    What annoyed me:  Nothing. Except people who don’t like this book. Although, in all fairness, I’ve never met any. 

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     What’s the mood noise of the moment?  Silversun Pickups 

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    Posted in Best & Worst Books, Book Reviews | 20 Comments »

  • So I wrote a short story…

    Friday, August 13th, 2010

    Imagine my delight yesterday when I cranked open the ol’ eyelids, pulled my knee-socks and sweatshirt on in an effort to ward off the creepy ocean chill steeping through my bones, found needed latte, drove an hour to work, fired up the laptop (also known as “my preeeeecious”), and discovered my short story (or short short–for those of you fastidious types) in our local SLO City Newspaper.

    If you’re interested in reading it, clickety-click your way HERE; then click again on the SLO City News and scroll down to page 11. The story is titled “Benefits Included,” and, yes, I hope it prompts you to smile ;-) .

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    What’s the mood noise of the moment?  Eisley:  Silverspring cover

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    Posted in A bit of brag | 13 Comments »

  • Wuthering Heights (a review)

    Monday, August 2nd, 2010

    Proud and steady on my list of Top 10 Favorite Novels rests the beloved “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Brontё. Traumatic, grief-soaked, appalling—it goes against the grain of what I most desire in a book, and yet I can’t ever seem to unravel myself from its horrific beauty. Because that’s what it is, you know–a thing of beauty.

    Against a backdrop of bleak, cloud-curdled skies and barren Yorkshire moors, Ms. Brontё weaves her story around the ominous Wuthering Heights, a manor house whose walls keep secrets better than the housekeeper, Nelly Dean. At times through tears—other moments through revulsion—Nelly’s memories are bequeathed upon our narrator, Mr. Lockwood, in a tragic tale of romance between the gypsy orphan, Heathcliff, and the exquisitely arrogant Cathy.

    We see Cathy and Heathcliff’s relationship originate in late childhood, and while she and her brother Hindley torment Heathcliff to no end, Cathy soon falls in love with him. Sadly however, like many a young female her love is finicky—swinging wildly between compassion and selfish vanity, to the taunting of Heathcliff’s emotions. Hindley, whose level of cruelty and abuse only amplify when his father dies, takes over Wuthering Heights and treats Heathcliff as a slave, humiliating him and despising his bond of spirited devotion with Cathy. Over the years, Hindley encourages Cathy into a relationship with the neighboring Linton family in hopes that Cathy’s undisciplined heart will reject Heathcliff for the niceties of proper society and Edgar Linton. Eventually he sees this wish fulfilled and Cathy betrays her love for Heathcliff and commits her future to Edgar, with the reasoning–”It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now; so he shall never know how I love him: and that, not because he’s handsome, Nelly, but because he’s more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same; and Linton’s is as different as a moonbeam from lightning, or frost from fire.”

    After a life of mistreatment, this abandonment from his one, needed friend nearly rips the heart out of Heathcliff. He leaves to seek his fortune and nurse his brokenness into revenge—henceforth becoming a monster in sole pursuit of ruining others.

    And here emerges what I truly love about the book…it’s what Brontё does so well: The multi-layered journeys her characters take–the paths chosen for them and the ones they choose–which bring them to such levels of brokenness that even the reader, though at once horrified and repulsed, is also moved to pity by the events the poor creatures suffer through. And while, as the book proceeds, one feels antipathy at Heathcliff’s unadulterated cruelty toward others—those who have wronged him and those who have not—the reader is turned to greater nausea by the pretty, petty Cathy whose years of emotional fastidiousness have helped mutilate Heathcliff into the man he is (as well as driving a stake into the heart of her honorable husband, Edgar). I find the novel, in this way, very similar to Wilde’s “The Picture of Dorian Gray,” where the obvious monster (Dorian) is in reality a sort of puppet for the passive-aggressive master (Lord Henry) who prefers to direct and destroy life without ever accepting responsibility.

    In the case of “Wuthering Heights” the puppet-master is Cathy, and it is only on her deathbed that reconciliation is found, if merely for a moment, between her and Heathcliff. Shortly after, she dies in childbirth–abandoning Heathcliff yet again–while he waits outside under the stormy sky, his rain-soaked curses revealing the depth of his anguish: “Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living; you said I killed you–haunt me, then! The murdered DO haunt their murderers, I believe. I know that ghosts HAVE wandered on earth. Be with me always–take any form–drive me mad! only DO not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! it is unutterable! I CANNOT live without my life! I CANNOT live without my soul!”

    The years hemorrhage by after Cathy’s death, and we watch as Heathcliff’s life further uncoils, tearing apart everyone near him until bitter and cracked, he becomes obsessed with Cathy’s ghost and his miserable existence–eventually, mercifully, to the disregard of his own hatred even. And it is in this season, this last breath of the book–when we are exhausted of the sadness–that Ms. Brontё allows hope to niggle its way into Wuthering Heights. Offering us an ironic twist of life and joy with which, like Heathcliff, we can reflect back in grief while looking forward in peace.

    So…there you have it, dearest reading friendlies…my thoughts on Emily Brontё’s Wuthering Heights.

    Have you read it?

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    What’s the mood noise of the moment?  A sample.

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    Posted in Best & Worst Books, Book Reviews, Book Trailers, Literary Classics | 9 Comments »

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