Braaaiiiiins!

Yes, I'm going to be writing about zombies. I've recently finished the book "World War Z: the oral history of the zombie war" by Max Brooks and it just blew me away. I'm not actually a big zombie fan (I'm more of a vampire girl), so I only read this because it was the book club choice for last month. I reluctantly picked it up, and then I couldn't put it down.

The books is the story of the survivors of the zombie apocalypse. It is really well-written and well-researched. I know, it may sound a little silly, research for a zombie book, but because of the nature of the book, research was key. The premise of the story is that the narrator is hired to write a report about the world's reaction to the zombie invasion. In order for the book to work as well as it did, Brooks really had to have a good understanding of how different cultures, religions and governments work. He needed to be able to capture how a Chinese peasant would react differently to an Israeli general or a South African politician. Without that understanding, the book would not have the power that it did.

I thought that Brooks really captured how different people would react, which made the book believable (an odd choice for a book about zombies, but there you are). I was immediately drawn into the story, and what I loved was that it seemed to be less about zombies than about how humans react in the face of disaster. This book could have been written about any world wide disaster. I really enjoyed how Brooks looked at the reactions of both the higher ups and the ordinary people. He allows the reader to really see how this disaster would affect EVERYONE. To me, that's important. If I'm going to see myself in a book (which is important to me), the characters need to be people I can relate to. This even goes for books as far out there as novels about zombies.

I really recommend this book, even for those who roll their eyes at the thought of a zombie book.

The Land that Anne Built

This past August, I had the opportunity to make my first pilgrimage to the Land that Anne Built, AKA Prince Edward Island. I had wanted to visit PEI for years, but I had never managed the trip. In planning this vacation, my DH and I had many discussions about where to go. He was pushing for a quick trip to Nova Scotia, but I held out for PEI. I think he was afraid that I would spend three days dragging him around to every single nook and cranny of PEI that had something to do with L.M. Montgomery or Anne Shirley. It may have been tempting, but I restrained myself and we only spent a day on Anne related sight-seeing. I have to save something for my next visit. ;)

Was the visit worth it? ABSOLUTELY! Not only did I fall in love with PEI, but I loved seeing everything Anne related. Has the province gone overboard? Yes. You can't go into a shop without finding Anne memorabilia. The Anne books are sold everywhere and you can't turn around without hitting an Anne doll. Somehow, though, it works. The whole island is based on tourism and Anne is the tourist lynch pin. The do kitch right in PEI. I was actually very impressed with myself. I did not go crazy with buying souvenirs. I bought a set of the Anne books and not much else. I should have bought the Anne hat (braids included!) but I didn't. Oh, yes, raspberry cordial. I bought four bottles of cordial. Now, to make it perfectly clear, this cordial is NOT the same as the cordial which made Diana Berry sick. This is non-alcoholic cordial; it is basically raspberry pop.

On this trip we went to 1. The Anne of Green Gables Museum 2. L.M. Montgomery's birthplace 3. Green Gables and 4. The Village of Avonlea. As we toured around, I have to admit, it became difficult to tell fact from fiction in the area around Cavendish. The Anne of Green Gables Museaum is the home of L.M. Montgomery's Campbell relatives. It is still owned by the Campbells, but they have opened it up to the public. That is all straight fact. Montgomery spent her summers here as a child and she was married here. When you tour the museum there are lots of photos of Montgomery and you can see her bedroom upstairs. It is when you leave the museum that the fact/fiction line begins to blur.

When my DH and I finished in the museum we went outside and went on "Matthew's Carriage Ride" to see The Lake of Shining Waters. Now, a lake was there, but there isn't really a Lake of Shining Waters. That lake was a literary creation of L.M. Montgomery. Matthew was also a literary creation. There never was a real Matthew Cuthbert. He never took Anne on a carriage ride from the train station to Green Gables. It's hard to remember that, though, when you are in a carriage being pulled by a horse. I was beginning to feel that the fictional characters were real.

This disconnect from reality becomes even more pronounced when we actually reached Green Gables. There is a real house, but the true occupants were not the fictional Cuthberts. The house had belonged to a cousin of L.M. Montgomery's, but you won't find any evidence of them at Green Gables. Green Gables as an attraction (and National Historic Site!?) is all about Anne Shirley. This makes it hard to remember that we are talking about fictional characters. As you tour the house, one of the first rooms you see is Matthew's bedroom. Well, it couldn't REALLY be Matthew's bedroom because he never existed! That doesn't matter at Green Gables, though. The fiction continues when you go upstairs and look at Anne's room. The house is set up like a museum with plexi-glass partitions keeping you from entering the rooms. This adds to the realism of the place.

Realism is completely thrown out the window when you get to the Village of Avonlea. Since Avonlea is not a real place, some enterprising person has created it. For a fee, you can enter through the gates and be transported to Turn of the Century, small-town Canada. There are dirt roads and wooden sidewalks and various buildings to explore. Throughout the day, costumed actors replay scenes from the books. When we were there, Anne was busy hitting Gilbert over the head with a slate. We decided not to stay at the school to participate in Miss Stacey's math class, but that was another option. The village is small, and there are definite anachronisms (Cow's Ice Cream, anyone?) but none of that matters. My DH and I sat in the church for awhile to listen to some gospel music and then explored the barn area. We did not, however, get a chance to milk a cow. It was another way to experience Anne.

The trip offered a great opportunity to learn more about the life of one of my favourite authors as experience a slice of fictional life. I think that PEI, and the town of Cavendish in particular, have it right when it comes to capitalizing on a popular literary figure. I can't wait to go back.

Have any of you taken a literary pilgrimage? If so, where did you go? If not, where would you want to go?

Hungry for Hunger Games

While taking my Librarianship course this summer, I was introduced to the Suzanne Collins trilogy of The Hunger Games. I have now read the first book, Hunger Games and the second, Catching Fire. I cannot say enough about how much I love these books. The third book in the series, Mockingjay, comes out tomorrow, and I can't wait to read it. Although these books are written for a YA audience, every adult I know who has read them, loves them. I recommend them for anyone 13+.

Hunger Games is a dystopian novel about life in what used to be North America. The heroine of the story is 16 year old Katniss Everdeen; she and her family live in District 12, a coal mining district. The districts are under the strict control of The Capital, and every year, in order to demonstrate the subservience of the districts to The Capital, one boy and one girl from each of the twelve districts are selected to compete in the Hunger Games. These games are horrific, and the competitors are fighting to the death to be the victor. The twenty-four contestants fight each other until only one is left.

Katniss and her fellow District 12 contestant Peeta, are underdogs, and we read the story to see how and if Katniss manages to survive. This book works because the characters are so well drawn. I really cared about Katniss and Peeta. When Peeta declares his love for Katniss, it adds a new dimension to the story; if only one can survive, what happens to to the love story? This story is much, much more believable than that of say, Edward and Bella. These are characters that you really can relate to. Although the book is set sometime in the future, the reality of the poverty that Katniss lives with, her struggles to keep her family together, her struggle to survive in the horrific world of the Hunger Games, it is all very real.

Are there elements of fantasy? Of course there are; it is fiction, after all, but because of the strength of the characters, it blends really well. I think people looking for a gripping story with well-developed characters will love this story.

I will update you when I have finished the third book.

In Defense of Sookie

Well, I find myself in the unfortunate position of having to backtrack slightly. A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about books as mind candy; my example was a series of books by Charlaine Harris - the True Blood series. I believe I argued in favour of reading books of substance, and I didn't feel that these books had that substance. Since then, I've been involved in a Facebook conversation with someone who has such a low opinion of the books that she won't even read them. I found myself defending them. Whoops. What happened? How could I go from suggesting that the True Blood series is mind candy to defending them publicly on Facebook?

I guess, when it comes down to it, a little candy isn't too bad. I would never suggest that the True Blood series is great literature, but I don't think there is anything really bad with it either. It's fluff, but so what? Is it expecting too much of myself to only read 'good' literature? Should I have these really high standards for myself? Does that lead to disappointing myself? Should I just accept the fact that I have low standards for reading, or try to 'improve' myself.

I'll have to come back to this, I think I have a lot to think about.

Brilliant! Absolutely Brilliant!

Faerie

Time for yet another confession. I love faerie stories. Notice the spelling. I'm not talking about fairy tales, but rather, faerie tales. Celtic mythology, although I really know very little about it, really appeals to me. Stories of the ancient Celtic gods, of the Seelie and Unseelie courts, of kelpies and brownies, all these are really appealing to me. I've recently finished reading three YA books that tell stories of faerie, as well as reading a most definitely adult book of faerie. Wondrous Strange and Darklight are the first two books in a trilogy by Lesley Livingstone that revolve around Kelly, a young actress who discovers that she is the long lost daughter of Auberon, king of the faeries. I really liked Wondrous Strange, but was not as impressed with Darklight. The premise of these stories is linked to Shakespeare stories, and I found it worked really well with the first story, but was weaker in the second. The story just didn't stand up. That's when I was introduced to Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr.

One of the women in my course told me that Wicked Lovely was a much better book than Wondrous Strange, and boy, was she right. It tells the story of Aislinn, who attracts the attention of the Keenan, the Summer King. It is a much darker story, but in the end, it was much more satisfying. I can't wait to read the next book(s) in the series.

I think I'd like to read more stories about faerie in the past. The books I've been reading have all had faeries in the modern world; I want to know where the stories came from. I need to look up some Irish/Celtic mythology. I want to know where the stories came from. I know that Shakespeare is the one who changed our perceptions of fairies, but I'd like to know what they were like before.

Face, Meet Palm

Yes, I need a good face palm. I wrote a long, long entry about my favourite books, and I left out one of my all-time favourites. How could I have forgotten To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. Somehow, I did. It wasn't even on my list of books to go through. I was horrified when I realized that it wasn't there, and I decided it wasn't enough to simply add on to my last entry, so I'm creating an entire entry about To Kill a Mockingbird.

The irony is that when I first read Mockingbird, I really didn't like it at all. I can still remember it - I was in Grade 5 at Hawthorne Public School in Ladner, BC, and I was buying books from Scholastic. Does that still happen? We would get a brochure every month with the latest books from scholastic, I would select the ones I wanted, and my mother would write a cheque which I would bring into the school. My teacher would then send in the order, and a couple of weeks later, my books would arrive. One month, Mockingbird was among the books I order. I would have been 10 or 11 at the time, and although my reading level was exceptionally high, I don't know that my maturity level was developed enough to understand the book. When I read it then, I really hated it. I didn't pick it up again for another 14 years or so.

When I moved to Colombia to begin teaching English there, To Kill a Mockingbird was one of the books I was expected to teach. I re-read it, and fell instantly in love (14 years later). I loved the story, the characters, the lessons ... really, I loved everything about it. I really loved Atticus Finch. When he was named the number one hero from the AFI, I really understood it. I taught Mockingbird for three years in Colombia, and another couple of years when I returned to Canada. I haven't taught it as a class novel for a number of years now (mostly because I've been teaching history), but I would love to teach it again.

Although it was written in the 1960s, and set in the 1930s, I truly believe that it is not dated. The lessons it teaches are still as valid today as they were forty or seventy years ago. Racism still exists, an unjust justice system still exists, people fighting against prejudice still exist. In some ways, teaching this book may be more important than it was twenty or thirty years ago. Unfortunately, a number of people seem to believe that the issues brought out in Mockingbird are not issues any more. I wish I could agree.

My love for To Kill a Mockingbird reached a new level when I read the book Mockingbird by Charles J. Shields. I had never known how much of her own life Harper Lee had put into her novel. The fact that the character Dill was based on Truman Capote just blew me away. Sometimes, learning more about an author or their inspiration for their work can lessen my enjoyment of the novel itself, but that didn't happen for me in this case. This is also one of the rare instances where watching the movie didn't take away from my enjoyment of the novel. The movie version is amazing. The scene where Atticus has just lost the court case brings a lump to my throat every time.

I love, love, love, this book.

The Bard - At Last

I'm sitting in the computer lab during my class, and I'm finished all my work. I'm now two weeks ahead on my assignments, so I thought I'd finally write that post on Shakespeare in the real world.

I've recently read Wondrous Strange by Lesley Livingston, which is the story of a young actress in New York who discovers that Shakespeare's story Midsummer Night's Dream, is actually real! The actor playing Puck? He's actually the real Puck. Oberon? Yep, he's real too. I found this story to be absolutely enchanting. The idea of having an actress perform one of Shakespeare's plays and discover that it wasn't fiction, really worked well for me. There are two other books in the series - Darklight has the Kelly, the main character, preparing for a production of Romeo and Juliet. The Bard really does provide rich material for mining. I found this to be a great combination of Shakepeare and modern faerie literature.

The next book I read was Shakespeare: The World as a Stage by Bill Bryson. This was a more traditional biography of one of the English speaking world's most beloved authors. I found this book fascinationg because it really showed me how much we think we know about Shakespeare is actually guesswork. Shakespeare scholars have spent hundreds of years studying him, but they still know very little. I think my favourite part of this book was the section on the Shakespeare de-bunkers; you know, the ones who believe Shakespeare couldn't have written Shakespeare. Bryson does a very good job of showing that he most certainly could have written everything he wrote, and that all the contenders for the "real" Shakespeare couldn't have been Shakespeare. I'm sure I'll pull this book out again before I start my Shakespeare units with my classes; I wouldn't want to give them facts that aren't really facts.

The final book I read recently concerning Shakespeare was Fool by Christopher Moore. I've already spoken about one of Moore's other books (Lamb) and this one is no different. Moore takes a well-known story and makes it lewd and crude. I never really got into this story. It's basically the story of King Lear, not one of my favourite plays to begin with. Moore makes the fool the narrator, and also the protagonist. Edmund writing a letter to discredit his brother? The Fool's idea. Regan and Goneril's deaths? The Fool's idea. Yep, pretty much everything that happens is because of the Fool. Oh, the witches from Macbeth show up as well. I can't really say anything too negative about the book, but I just never bought into the story. It was all abit to obvious. You don't know where to go with the story? No problem! I'll have a ghost come in and direct things. It just didn't work for me.

What about you? Any adaptations of Shakespeare that you really liked or really didn't like?

A Few of my Favourite Things

This entry is going to be about a few of my favourite books of all time! These are books I can read over and over again and not get tired of. I know some people who never re-read books; their argument is that there is so much good literature out there (nevermind all the bad literature) that why on earth would they want to read something that they have already finished? I can understand this argument, but I don't agree. To me, books are old friends, and I like to visit my friends over and over again. The following list isn't in any particular order; it's basically as I thought of them. I'm sure I've forgotten some, but this should do for now. Without further ado - here are a few of my favourite things.

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery. The red-haired little orphan who captures hearts wherever she goes. I loved reading the books as a child, and I loved watching the made for tv movies when I was a little older. Anne was just so engaging. She was always getting into trouble, but it was never very serious trouble. Her on-going relationship with Gilbert I found very believable. Her life wasn't easy, but she was a survivor who ultimately triumphed. In the later books, she grows up and her life continues to have its ups and downs. I still love Anne.

The Nancy Drew series by Carolyn Keene. Like Anne, Nancy was a spunky girl who didn't let anything stop her. Maybe I'm drawn to these characters because it's who I wanted to be. I was able to live a far more exciting life through the pages of the Nancy Drew books than I ever did in my real life. Nancy was smart, and she was observant. She taught me the value of noticing the little things. She was also safe. She had a boyfriend, but it was a very innocent relationship. I saw the movie that came out recently and was terribly disappointed. The Nancy I knew and loved was not the character I saw on the screen. My imagination was much more vivid than the images I was being given. I can't wait to share Nancy with my nieces. They are a little young now, but in a couple of years I'll read the books to them. I really hope they enjoy them as much as I did. I still have all my old Nancy Drew books. Due to space limitations they are in a box in my storage area, but when I have more space, they will have a prized place on a book shelf.

The Belgariad series by David and Leigh Eddings. I first discovered this fantasy series when I was in high school, and I was hooked. I liked the characters and I believed the stories (yes, I know - they are fantasy books with magic and wizards and so on, but they are believable.) Eddings has a wonderful sense of humour, and reading some of the scenes in the book made me laugh out loud. The best part is, I laugh every time I read them. Unfortunately, as he got older, his books became more formulaic. I knew exactly what the general plot line would be, what the hero would be like, and what the enemy would be like. I still really enjoy the books. Every time I run out of new books to read, I head straight to an Eddings books.

Little House on the Prairies by Laura Ingalls Wilder. Ahh, the struggles of a family of pioneers struggling to make a living in the American west during the late 1800s. Ma and Pa; Mary, Laura, Carrie and Grace. These were characters I really liked. Laura was again (are we sensing a theme here) a spunky girl who didn't let things get her down. She struggled with bad teachers but then became a teacher herself. The family suffered greatly, but stuck together. I almost cried when Pa was lost in the blizzard. Losing a child, crop failures, and other tragedies seemed to stalk the Ingalls/Wilder families, but the message that by sticking together these things can be overcome is a really good message. This is one time where the television show was not a disappointment

Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. Ah, the struggles of impotent anger. Poor Max. No one will listen to him and when he acts out, he gets sent to his room. This is where the brilliance begins. Where the Wild Things Are is a children's book, but it is very powerful. I think everyone can empathize with Max; I know that I did. The pictures of the monsters on the island, and how Max deals with them were very engaging.

Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte. This was my favourite novel when I was an angst ridden teenager. The tortured love story of Heathcliff and Catherine just spoke to my soul. Not that I had any idea what they were really going through. When I was reading Wuthering Heights I had never been in love, and I certainly had no idea what obsessive love was like, or how destructive love could be, but there was something in the book that just really spoke to me.

Love You Forever by Robert Munsch. This is a children's book that I didn't read as I child, and I think I'm glad that I was too old to read it (or have it read to me) when I was a child. As an adult, I love the idea of the never-ending circle of love, but as I child, I would have been traumatized by the thought of my parents growing old and me being responsible for them. Also, the idea of the mother sneaking into her son's apartment is just slightly creepy, but I understand what Munsch is trying to say. This is a book that makes me cry every time I read it.

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon. I first came across the Outlander series when I was working at the CBC. The department I worked in received hundreds of books for their consideration, and once a year or so, they would have an auction of the books that they didn't want; any that didn't go at the auction would be put out for the taking. I picked up the third book in the series, and I was really intrigued. I sought out the first book of the series and I was hooked. The premise is that a World War Two nurse slips through a hole in the universe and ends up in 18th century Scotland. The idea of the modern, twentieth century woman living with the clans of Scotland leaves lots of room for interesting story lines. As a history buff, I love all the historical detail. The stories cover the Jacobite rebellion, the breaking of the clans, the exile to the New World and the American Revolution. It is just fascinating reading. I wish I could meet a Jamie (I love my husband with all my heart, but my literary crush would be Jamie Fraser).

I get the feeling I'm going on and on, so I'll stop here. What are some of your favourite novels?

Update

Hello all,

This is a very quick note to say that I haven't forgotten about my blog, and I know what my next topic will be, but it will be awhile before I get to it. For my next entry, I'm going to be writing about Shakespeare outside of his own writing. I'll be discussing Wondrous Strange by Lesley Livingstone and Shakespeare:The World as a Stage by Bill Bryson.

I begin my librarianship course in a couple of weeks, so I don't know how much time I'm going to have to read, but as soon as I've read both books, I'll get to it.

Sarah

Edit: This post on Shakespeare may be slightly delayed, as I've found yet another book on Shakespeare to included. This means yet another book to read before I can do my post on the Bard.

Playing with Language

I've been thinking a lot about what I like in books, and I've discovered that one thing I don't usually like is when authors play too much with language. I really didn't like Finnegan's Wake or A Clockwork Orange. I guess I found them pretentious. It's as though Joyce and Burgess were saying "look at me! I'm so clever! I can make a novel completely incomprehensible and be seen as a genius." It really irritates me. I want to be challenged by a novel, but not irritated by it. I sometimes think that author's get carried away with their own "brilliance". Is it really necessary to create a new language?

See, but now we have a problem; I don't think Tolkein was being pretentious when he wrote a new language for The Trilogy of the Ring. His elvish language really seemed to fit naturally into the story, and didn't take away from my enjoyment of the story. Now, it may have taken away from other people's enjoyment, but it didn't detract from mine. I guess it's all just a really personal thing. I don't know why A Clockwork Orange irritates me but The Fellowship of the Ring doesn't. For me, it comes down to the necessity of the language to the work. Burgess had a good idea, but I don't know that the language changes were necessary.

One work where I feel that the changes to the language that the author made really worked was Ella Minnow Pea, by Mark Dunn. I was just blown away by this book, which was given to me by a friend of the family. I had never heard of this book, but David felt that I would enjoy it, and I really did, so I have to thank him for introducing me to this great book. I would recommend it to pretty much anyone. The premise of the story revolves around a small island that had been the home to the man who created the phrase "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." We are all familiar with this sentence, which uses all 26 letters of the alphabet. Ella Minnow Pea raises this sentence to great import.

In the story, the island of Nollop is the home of Nevin Nollop, the creator of the sentence, which is engraved on a memorial in the main square. When letters begin to fall off the memorial, the island's government takes this as a message from Nollop that these letters should no longer be used. The novel is a series of letters written by Ella (Ella Minnow Pea = LMNOP, get it?) that reflect the ever more difficult task of writing and creating language as letters are removed.

Although I most enjoyed the book because of the way the language is used, there are many other themes, such as totalitarianism, freedom of speech etc. This novel really stands the test of time, and I highly recommend it.

How do you all feel about books that play with language? Do you admire the authors or think they need to get over themselves?

A Change of Pace

For this entry, I am digressing from my purpose of discussing books to discuss the theatre for a moment. Since it's my blog, I figure I can talk about whatever I want to talk about. Who's going to stop me? Last night, Sean and I went to a play at the Luminato festival. Now, I'm not a big theatre going. It's too expensive, and I hate being crowded into a seat that's too small, so I don't usually go. We went last night because the director and creator of the piece is an acquaintance of ours. Erika Batdorf is a talented writer, performer, and director who also happens to be a Baha'i in Toronto. How could we not go and support her? So, we went.

The play is "One Pure Longing: Tahireh's Search" and it was an hour long performance about finding one's voice. I was just blown away. Now, as I said earlier, I'm not a big theatre goer, and I'm certainly no expert on drama or dramaturgy or anything like that, but I thought this piece was just amazing. It was in no way a linear drama, and there was almost no plot. This made it difficult for me to get into immediately, but before too long I was just completely engrossed.

The play opened with breathing. Just breathing. This went on for so long it was almost painful. The anticipation just built and built and built until someone finally spoke. Well, chanted in Farsi would be more accurate. Many of the words in the play were those of Tahireh, a 19th century Persian poet and early Babi. She unveiled publicly and was eventually killed for it. Her story is that of a woman struggling to find her voice at a time when oppressed peoples all around the world were also struggling to find their voices. "One Pure Longing" is an expression of those people.

The cast was phenomenal. My personal favourite was Meegwun Fairbrother, an Ojibwe actor. He was just amazing. He certainly found his voice. There was African dancing, Farsi chanting, Ojibwe singing and English speaking. What a mix. It all came together beautifully.

I wish the play was on for longer, but hopefully it will come back soon.

Brain Candy

We all know that junk food isn't good for us. We know that we should eat our fruit and veggies and stay away from the processed foods and sugar, but that's no fun at all. We would be much healthier if we could all stick with eating what is good for us; is the same true for what we read? Would we be healthier in our minds and our spirits if we only read "healthy" books? Of course, the question then becomes, what is a healthy book? Is it good enough to simply be reading? Or should we choose the books we read with care?

At my last book club meeting, we somehow got onto the topic of Harlequin romance novels. It turns out we all went through a phase where we were reading those. Although we all enjoyed reading them, looking back, we were all struck by the messages in them. There are a number of plots where a woman is raped, and then ends up married to her rapist. What does that tell young women who are reading those books? Does it teach them to be strong and stand up for themselves? No. It tells them that they are incomplete without a man, and that since they have been raped, they are damaged goods. What a terrible message. Am I a better person for having read those books when I was a teenager? I don't think that they damaged me, but I don't think I've been improved by reading them.

I've also spent a lot of time in the past little while reading YA literature, and today I'll wade into the Twilight vs. Harry Potter debate. I come down firmly on the side of good old Harry. Bella, the heroine of the Twilight series is desperate to spend the rest of her life with her man. She is not concerned with furthering her education, or spreading her wings and developing as an independent woman. All she can think of is being with Edward. She gets married at 18 and immediately has a child. I'm not saying that this is automatically wrong, but the message that is given in Twilight is that a woman is not complete without a creepy, stalkerish man. Harry Potter is much more independent. He is not perfect, but he works with his friends to improve the world. I think that's a great message. He solves problems, is constantly learning, and he depends on his friends. I would much rather any children I may have read Rowling's books than Meyer's books.

I've just finished reading the last two Sookie Stackhouse novels, and I have to wonder if they are just Twilight for grown-ups. Is there something life-affirming and uplifting about them?

SPOILER ALERT!!!

In the second to last book, Sookie ends up married to Eric, but she didn't want to marry him. He tricked her. What kind of message is that? The man should get what he wants and what the woman wants doesn't matter. Eric claims that he's only doing what is in her best interest, but again, what kind of message is that? Women can't take responsibility for their own destinies? We need men to decide what is good for us? Grrrrrrr.

So, if these are the messages in the books, why am I still reading them? What does it say that I will continue to read the Sookie novels and enjoy them? Am I just letting down my hair and enjoying myself? Who knows. I guess it will require a little more thinking.

Educational Musings (4)

There have been many changes at work recently with regard to the choice of novels to teach and how to teach them, and they've made me think about what's important when it comes to teaching literature in high school. First, a few questions: what's the most important thing when teaching literature? is it interest on the part of the students? what about increasing breadth of reading? maybe a knowledge of the 'canon' of English literature? or it could be an increased knowledge of Canadian literature. As you can see, there are lots of things to try to figure out.

At the school where I work, we have had a pretty traditional set of novels for the students to read. In grade nine, they read The Chrysalids; in grade ten, Lord of the Flies; in grade eleven, it was always Catcher in the Rye, but when I started teaching it, I was teaching The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time because I couldn't stand the thought of reading about Holden any more. There was more choice in grade twelve: Fifth Business, Joy Luck Club, Handmaid's Tale, and most recently, The Kite Runner.

When I started teaching English at this school, I was a little horrified at how white washed and old the novels were. We were teaching nothing but DWEMs (Dead, White, European, Male) and that wasn't the population of the school at all. With a student population that was largely Asian and South Asian, why were were only reading about Europe and North American? Shouldn't the students see themselves reflected in the literature? I did work with with a couple of other teachers to add Kite Runner and Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time to the curriculum, but I think there is a long way to go.

There is now a move to stop teaching core novels and to only use literature circles. Literature circles are when students read different groups of novels at the same time. The books can be chosen for interest, or for reading level, or for a mixture. I'm intrigued with the idea of these circles, because I'm tired of hearing that the core novel is "boring" or "gay". I would love the students to want to read what we're reading. I'm nervous though, because I'm not sure that a group of 5 14 year olds will be able to draw the themes of the novel out the same way with much less guidance from me. A whole class working together to figure out what an author is trying to say can be more effective than a small group. I'm willing to give it a try, but I do have concerns.

To be honest, I'm spending tomorrow working with two other teachers to create a unit that incorporates "differentiated instruction" and we're planning to look at literature circles and see how we can build effective ones. Differentiated instruction basically means that we understand that students learn differently and our teaching methods should take this into consideration. Sounds fairly self-evident, doesn't it? I wish it were that simple. I really want my students to do the best they can, and I do want school to be enjoyable for the students, but I do think that teachers have expertise in their subjects, and that we do know what we're doing (well, most of us and most of the time). I worry that all this administrative meddling will ultimately do more harm than good.

Having all this written down, unfortunately, hasn't cleared up my thinking any. I'm just confused as I was before. I'll just keep on being the best teacher that I can be. I'll incorporate new techniques into my teaching if I really believe that they are going to help my students, but I'm wary of all the jargon and will think long and hard about how new thought is brought into my classroom.

If you had to pick books to teach to high school students, what would you pick and why? I'd love suggestions.

A Second Look (3)

To make a long story short, based on an earlier blog about book clubs, my book club decided to read Emily's Quest by L.M. Montgomery. Now, although I have always been a major fan of the Anne of Green Gables series, I have never read the Emily books. Since Emily's Quest is the third book in the series, I decided to take this opportunity to read the first two Emily books as well. Boy, was it ever an eye opener. Now I want to re-read all the Anne books to see if my impressions of those will be different as well.

I've read the first two Emily books so far, and I am finding them almost unbearably sad. As I'm reading them now, I keep wondering how much of herself L.M. Montgomery put into them. Emily's story is painful to me now. Her family seems so unloving and non-understanding. I find it so hard to empathize with Aunt Elizabeth. I get indignant just reading about her. How dare she read Emily's letters to her father? How dare she open the mail that is sent to Emily? How dare she decree that Emily can't go to high school unless she gives up writing? These things seem so unfair. I just want to reach through the pages and shake her. And don't even get me started on Emily's other aunts and uncles. They are horrible, horrible people.

I feel so sorry for Emily, because her life seems so unfair. I can see that she doesn't shrink from her own shortcomings, which I like; I'm not a fan of perfect characters because they irritate me. Emily doesn't irritate me because she admits her flaws. Characters like Aunt Elizabeth and Aunt Ruth do irritate me because they are highly flawed but won't admit that they have any flaws. I'm not too sure why these fictional characters have struck me so deeply. On the one hand, it is definitely a sign of a great writer that the characters seem so real; on the other, I wonder just how real they are. How much of Lucy is in Emily? How many of the incidents related by Emily were experienced by Lucy?

I want to cry when I read about Emily's need to write and how her family mocks her efforts and her achievements. Her life seems unfairly difficult, and in some ways unnecessarily difficult. Yes, it's terrible that her beloved father dies when she is 11 and she becomes an orphan, but it is unnecessary that none of her family want to take her in. Her mother's relatives do nothing but tell her how difficult and unruly she is. Sly is the word most often used to describe her, and it's simply not true. She is an imaginative child who needs love and support. All she gets is disappointment and disapproval.

I have to wonder what I would have thought about Emily if I had read the books when I was 11. Would I have seen her life the same way I'm seeing it now? Would I be as upset by her circumstances as I am now? I'm also wondering how I'll feel if I re-read the Anne series. Anne was another orphan who had a fairly difficult life. Will I find the same things in the Anne books that I'm finding in the Emily books? Maybe L.M. Montgomery wrote herself into Emily the way things really were and wrote herself into Anne the way she wished things had been. Maybe Anne is the ideal and Emily is the reality. I don't know enough about L.M. Montgomery to be sure.

I am sure that I'll be reading Montgomery's journals in the not too distant future. I would like to see what her life really was like; I know it wasn't a bed of roses, but I don't know the details. I'm always interested in how real life affects fiction, and I think in L.M. Montgomery's case there will be a lot of overlap.

Has anyone else had an experience of re-reading a favourite from childhood and seeing it in a completely different way? I'm feeling very unsettled by reading the Emily books. It's not a comfortable feeling.

Abandon hope, all ye who enter here ... (2)

.... or not, depending on how you're feeling. For those of you who recognize the quotation, well done. It is, obviously, Dante Alighieri and this post will discuss Dante and a book that references Dante heavily, The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl. I have a sneaking suspicion that this post could be slightly disjointed since my mind is running in two directions at once, and I'm going to try to deal with both thoughts in one post. One one hand, reading The Dante Club made me think about Dante and his role in our literary canon; on the other, I have a number of thoughts about the novel itself.

First, Dante. I must confess that I have never read anything by Dante, including The Divine Comedy. I am certainly familiar with the concept behind the story, and know some famous quotations (such as the title of this post); I've even seen it performed by Theatre in the Mud. If you ever go to Theatre in the Mud, be sure to stay out of the splash zone. I wonder if that says something about me. Should I be more familiar with Dante? His is certainly one of the biggest names in world literature, and I feel somewhat less than fully cultured for not having read at least The Divine Comedy. Am I being too hard on myself? I'm familiar with Chaucer and Shakespeare, Hugo and Stendahl, but not Dante. I'm always looking for new works to share with my students, but Dante has never crossed my mind.

Is my lack of familiarity with Dante due to him writing in classical Italian? I'm not sure. I have never thought of myself as being a snob about only wanting to read English speaking authors, but that seems to be the case. My familiarity with translated works is definitely lacking. Reading The Dante Club, and the passion with which men like Longfellow and Wendell Holmes worked on translating Dante's work into English has made me want to read The Divine Comedy. Maybe that will be my summer reading.

Now, onto the novel that inspired this post. The Dante Club is a murder mystery set in 1865 Boston. It is the story of how "The Dante Club" solves the mystery of who is killing men using punishments from Dante's Inferno. The premise is really interesting. The main characters are well-known figures from literature and publishing. "The Dante Club" is made up of poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, author Oliver Wendell Holmes, historian George Washington Greene, poet James Lowell and publisher James Fields. This is historical fact. These men came together after the American Civil War to translate Dante's Divine Comedy into English. What happens as a result of this collaboration though, is purely a work of the author's imagination.

In the novel, a mysterious murderer stalks the streets of Cambridge, Mass. killing prominent men in horribly painful ways. The members of the Dante Club come to the horrific realization that the murders are being taken from Dante's travels through Hell in The Divine Comedy. As is so often the case in murder mysteries, the police are horribly incompetent, and it falls on these literary powerhouses to solve the murder. I found this to be a great idea for a novel, and I for the most part, I really enjoyed it.

As someone who is passionate about history, I loved the description of life in Boston and Cambridge in the post-Civil War era. It really struck me as realistic. Matthew Pearl really did his research when writing this novel. The differences in the university system really struck me. The idea that the Harvard Corporation would work to prevent Dante from being studied in English was just fascinating. The underlying racism and anti-Catholicism also rings very true. The fear of immigrants from Ireland and Italy was true to life. Another realistic feature was the treatment of the soldiers coming home from war, and the internal terrors they faced. All in all, it was a well done novel.

There was only one aspect of the book that I didn't particularly enjoy. The author kept hinting that there was actually an evil force at work, and that by translating Dante, the authors may have actually released evil into the world. I found this to be a stretch. Pearl had a great novel already; there is enough evil in the human characters; why hint that there was anything supernatural? I felt that it was an unnecessary complication in the book. That's only a mild criticism; overall, I enjoyed the novel and recommend it to others.

Nostalgia (1)

I wrote a blog about a fictional book club and the way these women decided to choose books to read. Reading the story and writing the blog got me thinking about the books of my childhood. I have always loved reading, and I have been surrounded by books my entire life. Actually (confession coming), when I was a child and I needed to be disciplined, by parents would forbid me from reading. Trying to think of my favourite books is going to be hard.

In terms of early childhood, I remember a couple of favourites. One was Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No-Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Voigt. I loved that story. I really felt like I could relate to Alexander. He never got anything he wanted, and he just wanted everything to go well. Wouldn't we all like to move to Australia on occasion? I was also a big fan of Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are. Again, who hasn't wanted to just escape from our daily life and become king (or queen) of the monsters. I still enjoy reading those books.

As I got older, and began reading to myself, there were a number of favourites. As I stated in an earlier post, Nancy Drew was always a favourite. Hmmmm, as a girl I loved mystery stories and I still do; I guess some things never change. Sorry, brief moment of introspection. Along with Nancy, I also read Trixie Belden, the Bobbsey Twins, and Enid Blyton's Famous Five. Children solving mysteries was obviously something I really enjoyed. I don't know what it was about those mysteries, but I could really lose myself in all those stories.

Another set of stories in which I could get lost were the Anne of Green Gables series by L.M. Montgomery. Anne Shirley was such a great heroine. I just loved how spunky she was. No one ever took advantage of her. Her life wasn't easy, but she made the most of it. She may not have been the most popular, but she managed to achieve everything she wanted. As a result of my last entry about the book club, I want to re-read L.M. Montgomery's works; I also want to read her journals and the new biography that Jane Urquhart has written. There is so much more to see when looking at her work from an adult perspective. Actually, my book club has decided to read Emily's Quest as our book for next month. This means that me being me, I've bought all three of the Emily books to read - Emily of New Moon, Emily Climbs and Emily's Quest. I'm sensing another blog entry for the near future.

On a slightly different note, a big part of my childhood was being read to. My mother would read to me and my brothers every night; it was a wonderful end to every day. I can't remember everything she read, but the memory of having her read to us is a wonderful one. I do remember reading The Wind in the Willows and Anne of Green Gables with my mother. I know that if and when I ever become a parent, reading together as a family will be a really important part of the day.

What are some of your favourite childhood books? These could be books you read yourself or books that were read to you.

Lamb

I'm already struggling with what I should say about Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal. The title alone is a hint as to why this may be a difficult entry. I wasn't sure I even wanted to read it, but I believe in learning how other people see the world and the place of religion in the world. First though, it's important to know how I see the world. I'm a member of the Baha'i Faith, and the teachings of Baha'u'llah strongly influence how I see the world. As a side note, if you are interested in knowing what some of those teachings are, I would suggest www.bahai.org as a good place to start. Being a Baha'i means that I don't follow an orthodox Christian view of Christ or the events of the Bible, even though I firmly believe that Jesus Christ did bring the word of God to humanity. Well, with that out of the way, onto the book.

Lamb tells the story of Christ through the eyes of his best friend Levi, known as Biff. Biff has been brought back to life in order to complete his gospel. He is the one who knows what happened to Jesus, known in the book as Joshua, when he was a child. That's right, Lamb is the story of Jesus before he begins preaching. Christopher Moore has taken the first 30 years of Christ's life and imagined what it could have been like. All I can say is - it was an eventful life. According to Biff, he had Jesus travelled from Galilee to Kabul to Nepal to Tamil and then back to what is now Isreal. The premise is that in order to learn how to become The Messiah, Jesus and Biff must find the three wise men who visited at the time of his birth.

Through these visits, Jesus learns the variations of the Golden Rule and how it can be used in the message of what will become Christianity. This is where I have my first problem. I didn't know how to take this idea when I first met it. My first thought was that by having Christ learn about compassion and justice from the Magi was taking away from Christ's revelation, but then, I started thinking that what this really did was show how the messages of the different religions all come from God. In the Baha'i Faith, this concept is known as Progressive Revelation. I don't agree with the idea that Christ's revelation actually came from Gaspar, Melchior and Balthazar, but the idea that the Christian message shares ideas with Taoism, Buddhism and Hinduism is a good one.

The novel does a good job of showing Christ's human side. It shows him struggling with trying to understand his role in the world, with the guilt of not being able to help everyone, and with being gone when Joseph dies. The character of Biff is there to show the weakness of humanity and all the temptations we feel. He is a big fan of sex, and wherever Jesus goes to learn his lessons, Biff learns more about sex. Biff seems to spend a lot of time in the company of various concubines and prostitutes, and he tries to tell Jesus what he's missing, since the one instruction Jesus has received is that he is not to know women.

When I read Lamb, I thought that the author was trying to be irreverent and anti-Christian, but in reading his notes after the story, the one thing that really struck me was that he says that his perspective was that Christ was who he said he was; he was not trying to take away from Christ's message in any way. I really appreciated that. I'm still not sure what I think about using a Manifestation of God as the main character in a fictional work like this; I guess I'll have to keep thinking about it. I think that the image and idea of Jesus Christ are oven used in inappropriate ways, and if I read a book like Lamb, am I contributing to the irreverent view of Christ? I just don't know.

Any thoughts?

Vacation Books.

Sean and I have recently returned from a week in Washington, DC, and I've been thinking about vacations, and books, and books read on vacation ... you get the picture. Given the nature of the vacation, I didn't pack any books to bring with me, but it didn't take long before I was desperate for something to read. I bought two books while on vacation, and my choice of reading material was definitely influenced by the vacation I was having. Does anyone else find this happens?

The two books I bought were The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara and The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. The first book is a story of the Battle of Gettysburg as seen through the eyes of a number of the participants, and the second is set in Germany during the 1930s. Coincidently, Sean and I spent one day exploring the Gettysburg battlefield and another day at the Holocaust Museum. I highly doubt that I would have chosen either one of those books if we had rented a cottage by the beach or gone to a Caribbean resort. The material would not suit the locale. Does anyone else find themselves doing this?

When I go on vacation, I seem to choose book that fit the trip. A visit to the east coast to visit my parents requires lots of light reading; mysteries and historical romances would be high on the list. A visit to a cottage with Sean, or up to Moosonee like we did last year, requires something a little deeper. With few distractions, I can read something a little more substantial. A trip like that would have literary fiction of some sort. That's when I would read Through Black Spruce or Three Day Road. I haven't actually had a beach or resort vacation in more than a decade, so I don't even know what I would bring; I'm guessing it would be seriously light reading.

I have now now finished Killer Angels, but I haven't started The Book Thief yet. I really enjoyed The Killer Angels and Sean says he wants to read it as well. It tells the story of the Battle of Gettysburg, a pivotal battle in the American Civil War. What is so interesting about The Killer Angels is that Michael Shaara used the journals, letters and diaries of a number of key participants in the battle to craft his story. It is a multi-perspective story that flips between the Union and the Confederacy. The reader gets to see how the battle was seen from the point of view of the generals and the average soldier. If you enjoy history, I would recommend it, but I don't think it's for everyone.

Now, I want to know - am I the only one who chooses their vacation literature based on the type of vacation they are going on? Or am I insane? Let me know your thoughts.

Book Clubs

I've been a member of a book club for years now. It's been probably close to 10 years that I've been choosing and reading books with this group, and it's been great. The group has definitely changed over the years with members moving or disappearing and others joining, but the core members have been the same for the last six years or so. I think finding the right mix is really important. My book club is very laid back, and on occasion, we haven't discussed the book we read (oops). I would hate an uptight book club; that would not be me at all.

This entry was inspired by Stuart MacLean's Vinyl Cafe Diaries. The Vinyl Cafe is a radio program on the CBC that tells the stories of Dave and Morley. Vinyl Cafe Diaries is a book that has collected a group of these stories in print format. One of the entries in the Diaries is about Morley joining a book club. Now, the humour of the story comes from the fact that all the women in the book club are completely pretentious, and that the club is no fun at all. What I found most interesting about the entry was the list at the end. Morley and her friend decide to start their own book club, and they have five categories of books to read. Here is their list:

1. A book about a man I could marry.

2. A book I read in grade school.

3. A book that mentions chocolate favourably.

4. A book I want to read because I saw the movie.

5. A book my husband would quit after the first chapter.

When I read these categories, I thought they would be a fabulous base for a book club. I also started thinking about what books I would put into each category.

1. Pride and Prejudice is the first one to come to mind. Who wouldn't want a Mr. Darcy? Outlander by Diana Gabaldon is another one. Jamie Fraser makes me swoon!

2. This one is harder. To Kill a Mockingbird would definitely make the list. I loved it. I also read a lot of Nancy Drew, so maybe re-reading Nancy Drew and comparing her to a more "grown-up" female detective would be an interesting choice.

3. The only one that comes to mind immediately is Like Water for Chocolate. I'm sure there are a million others, though. Chick Lit is full of chocolate.

4. I actually just finished reading Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief because I saw the ads for the movie. I'm also looking forward to re-reading Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

5. My husband would quit reading most of the books I read, so that's not hard. Any chick lit is going to be high on his "not to read" list.

Well, now it's your turn. What books would fit into those categories for you? I can't wait for more suggestions.

Good Wishes

I just wanted to wish everyone, whether you celebrate it or not, a very happy Ayyam-i-ha. Have a wonderful time.

Me, a Janeite?

What exactly is it that makes one a Janeite? Does one have to quote extensively from Pride and Prejudice? Must one compare all men (unfavourably) with Mr. Darcy? Is it forbidden to enjoy the works of the Bronte sisters? If these are what make one a Janeite, then I fall far short of the measure. However, I have just finished reading Michael Thomas Ford's novel Jane Bites Back, and it makes me realize just how much I have read and seen around the whole Austen oeuvre.

I follow a blog on the world of Jane Austen, I have seen movie versions of most of Austen's works (Colin Firth IS Mr. Darcy), as well as Becoming Jane and Lost in Austen. I find Austen very easy to get lost in. She creates real worlds with real characters. Even two hundred years after she was writing, you can feel the honesty in the writing. I think it is this honesty that makes Austen so enduring as a writer.

There is now an entire industry of novels that either re-write Austen novels, have Austen herself as a character, or tell a story of how others have been changed by an Austen novel. I've read most of them. In my book club, we have read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies which takes the plot and language of Pride and Prejudice and inserts zombies. Elizabeth and Darcy bond while slaughtering hordes of the ravening undead; what's not to like? We've also read The Jane Austen Book Club which is about a group of women in California who decide to read the books of Jane Austen and begin to realize that their lives mirror the lives of the Austen heroines. The third book we as a book club have read in the Austen oeuvre would be An Assembly Such as This by Pamela Aiden. This is the first of three books that tells the story of Fitzwilliam Darcy from his perspective. Wow, my book club has spent a lot of time on Jane Austen inspired books. Maybe we are all closet Janeites.

I have just finished reading Jane Bites Back which turns the world of Jane Austen on its ear. It tells the story of Jane Austen who is a vampire running a bookstore in upstate New York. Yes, you read correctly, Jane Austen is a vampire. All I can say is - Lord Byron really is "mad, bad, and dangerous to know." The premise of the story is that Jane Austen runs a small bookstore, is trying to deal with a love life, AND with getting her newest novel published - a novel that has been rejected 116 time! It is really a fabulous book, and I encourage everyone to read it.

Maybe I am a Janeite. What do you think?

Dem Dry Bones

I've just finished reading "206 Bones" by Kathy Reichs. I was at Chapters on Sunday, and when I saw the latest Reichs book in trade paperback, I just had to have it. I've always been a big fan of her writing, so I was really looking forward to diving into the latest Tempe Brennan whodunnit. It was going to be the perfect accompaniment to a hot bath, a hot cup of tea and (unfortunately) a cold. I was sadly disappointed.

I normally love the Temperance Brennan stories. I find that they are well written, with engaging characters, believable plots, and interesting forensic details. The fact that Kathy Reichs is a forensic anthropologist herself adds a layer of honesty to the writing that is often missing from mystery novels. I really appreciate that honesty and knowledge. I also love the fact that many of the stories are set in Montreal, with the corresponding French thrown in for good measure. Tabarnac!

Sadly for me, "206 Bones" fell short of my expectations. I just couldn't get into the story, and I found myself oddly unsatisfied as I was reading it. I really just wanted to get it over with. I was never able to sink myself into the world of Temperance Brennan, her on-again,off-again boyfriend Andrew Ryan, or the eponymous bones. Something just wasn't ringing true for me. I still haven't been able to put my finger on exactly what the problem was with the story, but I'll try to figure it out as I write about it.

My biggest concern was that the plot seemed unbelievable. There were far too many coincidences to be entirely plausible. I don't want to give away any details of the plot, but Brennan is being set up, four different deaths are linked - or are they? She has a mysterious enemy AND a neighbour out to get her. Are they the same person or are there two problems to be dealt with? Ooooh - the tension!

And then there is the relationship with Detective Ryan. The two of them are together, then they are apart, then together, then apart. We get it already! The two are conflicted. The backstory is becoming a little ridiculous though. Temperance is separated from her husband (has been for years) but they haven't gone through with a divorce. Do we sense that the flame may still be flickering for Temperance and Pete? But wait! Pete is engaged to the beautiful, young Summer! Should Tempe go back to Ryan? Welllll - Summer wasn't at Christmas dinner. Could there be trouble in paradise? Is Pete still in love with Temperance?

And Ryan's love life isn't any less complicated. He may be in love with Temperance, but his heroin addicted daughter has just shown up and so he feels he needs to try to make it work with the mother of said daughter. What?! His 18 year old daughter shows up and NOW he wants to make it work with his ex? Oh wait, now they are just friends and are living separately. It's beginning to read like a script for a soap opera.

Maybe Reichs is running out of original ideas; or maybe all her creative ideas are going towards the television show that has been created from the Temperance Brennan character "BONES". It's a great show, but maybe the creative juices are running a little low. All I know is that this was not the reading experience I expected. Maybe my next book will be better. I'm reading "Jane Bites Back" which is a novel about Jane Austin the vampire. I'll keep you posted.

Nancy, Nancy, Nancy

Hi. My name is Sarah and I'm a Nancy Drew fan. Whew. It feels good to get that off my chest. I understand that the first step to solving an addiction is admitting that you have a problem. Is there a NDA (Nancy Drew Anonymous) group anywhere? I've loved Nancy Drew since childhood. I always wanted to be in her circle of friends. It would be Nancy, Bess, George, and Sarah. Then I just needed a football playing boyfriend and it would all be great.

I've read a number of criticisms of Nancy Drew, but I don't care. I can see where the critics are coming from, but nothing has diminished my love of Nancy. I can remember reading an article in Ms. magazine about how Nancy had become less independent since her creation, and how that was a reflection on the time. According to this article, when the first Nancy Drew books were written, during the 1930s, Nancy was a highly independent young lady who managed to extricate herself from her messes on her own. By the 1950s, she was always waiting for Ned to come and rescue her. It didn't matter to me at all. I continue to love Nancy.

I read another criticism that stated that the Nancy Drew books were racist. Nancy and her father lived in River Heights, which seemed to be a completely white city. All the bad guys seemed to be "swarthy". Ok, so white is good and dark is bad. I can see where the criticism is coming from, but I still love Nancy.

I just can't stop loving Nancy. I love how each story follows a formula; I love how the danger is never too dangerous; I love how gentle the books are; I love everything about them. I, however, did NOT like the movie version of Nancy Drew. It completely ruined the stories for me. I wanted to like it; I wanted it to add to my love of all things Nancy, but I couldn't.

I have all the Nancy Drew books, and will never get rid of them. I can't wait to read them with my nieces (and hopefully my step-daughter) when they get a little older. My goal now is to own all of them in the same cover. I like the hard cover yellow books that have a small picture of Nancy with a magnifying glass on the spine. All my books are currently in my storage area because I don't have room for them in the apartment, but they will travel with me wherever I go. I will never leave my Nancy behind.

The White Pine Program

The White Pine Program is part of the "Forest of Reading" set up by the Ontario Library Association. Since I'm now working in the school library, I have become much more familiar with the program, and I think it's just great. The "Forest of Reading" is set up so that children and adults can become familiar with Canadian literature. Every year, members of the Ontario Library Association select a number of books to be considered for the "Forest of Reading". The White Pine Program, which is the focus of this post, is for students in high school. This means that many of the books selected belong to the Young Adult category of books.

Young Adult books have come a long way since I was a teenager. I remember Sweet Valley High and the books put out by Scholastic. These books always seemed really simplistic to me, so I ended up reading adult books, even if I wasn't emotionally ready for them. Unfortunately, they were the only ones that didn't appear childish to me.

I'm trying to read all the White Pine books for this year, but I'm not sure I'll get through all of them. I've read two of the books for this year, The Uninvited by Tim Wynne-Jones and The Landing by John Ibbitson. I absolutely loved the Wynne-Jones book, and was quite bored with the Ibbitson book. Next on my list will be Getting the Girl and Wondrous Strange.

The Uninvited is a mystery about a young woman who goes to spend the summer at her father's cottage in Ontario and what happens to her when she gets there. There are numerous threads running through the story, and a number of twists that would are quite unexpected. Dan Brown could learn a thing or two from Tim Wynne-Jones. Another good thing about The Uninvited is that it has aspects that will appeal to all sorts of readers. It has a strong female character, but it also has strong male characters. There are lots of relationship issues, but also drama, mystery, and a little violence.

Unlike The Uninvited, which kept me interested from page one, I never really did get into The Landing. The Landing is the story of a young man growing up in in a town like Bracebridge. The novel is set during the Depression and is really a coming of age story. Ben lives with his mother and uncle and works providing fuel and cigarettes to rich tourists from the south. A chance encounter with a rich widow from New York opens up new opportunities, and challenges, for Ben. Unfortunately, I never really cared what happened to Ben and didn't even finish the novel. I skipped to the last few pages and that was good enough for me. This doesn't mean that others might not find the book interesting, but it wasn't for me. I would have to think very carefully about who I would suggest read The Landing.

An Old Favourite

I mentioned in my last post that this one might be about my least favourite books, but I've decided that topic is simply too depressing for this early in my blogging life, so instead, I'm going to discuss one of my all-time favourite authors.The author in question is David Eddings.

I first read a book by David Eddings when I was in high school, and I was just hooked. He had a style of writing that really appealed to me (and still does). His books are fantasy books, written with a great deal of humour. I found the characters likable and believable, and cared about what happened to them. This is important to me as a reader. If I can't or don't relate to a character I'm unlikely to enjoy the book.

Eddings' books are set in a mythical world that can easily be related to our medieval world. He's a lot like Gay Gavriel Kay in that way. The characters live in castles or villages, dress in doublets and carry swords or rapiers. What can I say, the history teacher in me loves that. Of course, they also use magic and fight dragons, but that just adds interest to the stories. This is the one peeve I have with Eddings - each of his series follows a very similar plot line. There is a quest for a mysterious jewel of great mystical power, a child who may or may not be a god, and a couple who love each other deeply but do nothing but squabble. You do get a sense of what is going to happen, but it's like watching a movie you've seen before; it's an old friend.

The first series from David Eddings is The Belgariad. It is a series of five books which tells the story of Garion, a young man growing up on a farm with his Aunt Pol. One night he and his aunt steal away from the farm and go on a search for an item which has been stolen. Over the course of this search, Garion learns of his destiny. He is to face the evil god Torak and restore balance to the world.

After completing this series, Eddings wrote The Malloreon, which continues Garion's story. Eight years have passed since the ending of Enchanter's End Game, the final book of The Belgariad. In this new series, a new evil has risen in the land, and again, it is up to Garion and his friends to save the world.

After writing these ten books, Eddings went back and filled in some of the back story by writing Polgara the Sorceress and Belgarath the Sorcerer. These two books give the background to two of the major character of both The Belgariad and The Malloreon.

This group of novels was my favourite for a long time. I read his other books, but nothing rang quite so true as the twelve books dealing with Garion, Polgara and Belgarath. If you enjoy fantasy novels and haven't read anything by Eddings, I would really suggest beginning with Pawn of Prophecy, the first novel in The Belgariad.

I hope that I have piqued your interest, and you look for some of his works.

Getting Started

Well this is it - my first attempt at blogging. Let see how it goes. I've thought about starting a blog for quite some time, but always felt that I didn't have anything important enough to say. I think I've finally found something about which I can speak with some authority - what I'm reading. Yes, dear reader, I am going to discuss books I'm reading, books I've read, books I liked and books I hated. Perhaps I'll even get some suggestions.

So, what am I reading now? I'm reading The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown. How sad is that. My first blog entry will be about a Dan Brown book. I haven't finished the book yet, but so far I am finding it fairly cringeworthy. I am willing to give most books a chance, but this one is pretty bad. I can almost see Dan Brown sitting down to write his latest "thriller" with screenwriters at his shoulder. I'm confident that a movie will be made of this before too long.

I usually enjoy thrillers, but there is really nothing thrilling about The Lost Symbol. The plot twists can be seen coming from a mile away. I don't want to give anything away, because you may still want to read it, but I can't really say that there were any surprises. Robert Langdon receives a mysterious message, there is a damsel in distress, lots of mysterious symbols that only he can decipher, an insane and odd looking bad guy (this time he's tattooed instead of an albino), and a mysterious organization. If you've read The Da Vinci Code or Angels and Demons you've read The Lost Symbol.

On the upside, I'm thrilled to be reading this just before taking a trip to Washington. Reading about all the DC landmarks just a few weeks before visiting makes me want to go all the more. Reading about the Capital, whether the secret rooms exist or not, increases my excitement for going. The plot revolves around someone high up at the Smithsonian Institution, so it will mean even more when my darling husband I and get there. See, there's definitely a good part to reading The Lost Symbol. I doubt that I'll try to join the Eastern Star, but I will enjoy my trip to Washington.

Well, I think I will sign off now. I'm thinking my next post will be a list of my least favourite books.