"Hollow City" is the sequel to "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children" by Ransom Riggs. I really enjoyed the first one, and this one was great, too. It amazes me how he's able to incorporate these old, bizarre photos seamlessly into the story. The children have rescued Miss Peregrine, who is stuck in bird form, from the wights and are searching for another ymbryne to help her return to her human state. All the other ymbrynes have been kidnapped, though, until the kids get a lead on Miss Wren, who is hiding out in London. They finally do find Miss Wren, but when she changes the bird back to human it's not Miss Peregrine but her evil brother, Caul. He and the other wights take the children and Miss Wren captive, but they manage to escape and end up in Jacob's present day. It'll be interesting to see how this turns out!
"June Bug" by Chris Fabry was a little too sentimental for my taste. June Bug lives with her dad on the road: they criss cross the nation in an old, broken down RV. They meet a lot of super nice (read: unrealistic) people who help them out, perfectly willing to take complete strangers into their home, feed them, clothe them, offer to adopt June Bug, etc. Anyway, at a Walmart in Colorado June Bug sees a missing child poster for Natalie Edwards, and realizes it's her. She starts pestering her "dad", Johnson, and we eventually learn that Johnson saved Natalie when her real mother tried to have her killed. He held onto her because she gave *him* a reason to live. I think I'm too cynical to be charmed by books like these.
"I'll Take Care of You" is another amazing true crime read from Caitlin Rother. A wealthy Newport Beach inventor, Bill McLaughlin, throws over his wife for a hot young piece he meets in a singles column, who then proceeds to steal from him and cheat on him with a hot young guy. So when Bill is murdered, the police immediately suspect his decades younger girlfriend, Nanette, and her boyfriend Eric. It took the police and the DA's office 17 years to prosecute, but in the end they were both found guilty. Good. Men, let this be a lesson to you. Poor Bill learned the hard way.
Friday, February 28, 2014
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
Carthage; Hollywood Hellraisers; Fangirl; Lookaway, Lookaway
"Carthage" by Joyce Carol Oates was as usual deeply disturbing. Cressida Mayfield has always been odd, the "smart one" to older sister Juliet, the "pretty one". Juliet gets engaged to Brett Kincaid, who enlists after 9/11 and comes back injured from Afghanistan. He breaks off his engagement to Juliet and becomes strange, different. Cressida has always had a secret crush on Brett, and when he comes back changed, she thinks this is her chance, since now they are both different. But when she doesn't come home after sneaking out to meet Brett at a bar, all eyes of the town turn to him with suspicion. Brett at first denies having hurt Cressida, but later confesses to murdering her and burying her body. Seven years later in Florida, we meet Sabbath McSwain, who is really Cressida Mayfield. After Brett rejected her, she ran away from home and ended up working for a professor. When he takes her to a prison and she goes inside a death chamber, Cressida realizes she needs to go back home to make things right. Very twisted, but good.
"Hollywood Hellraisers" by Robert Sellers was great fun. Marlon Brando, Dennis Hopper, Jack Nicholson, and Warren Beatty all raised hell and had a great time doing it. It's honestly a miracle any of them survived for as long as they did.
"Fangirl" by Rainbow Rowell was so charming and awesome. Cath and Wren are twins, and off to college. Cath wants to room with Wren while Wren is eager to break away from her twin and pursue her own identity. For years the girls have collaborated on a fanfiction based on a popular bestselling book series very similar to Harry Potter. Cath continues the fanfiction, which takes up a lot of her life and almost makes her miss out on a chance to fall in love with Levi. It was really great.
I have mixed feelings about "Lookaway, Lookaway" by Wilton Barnhardt. I liked parts of it, but some of it wasn't so good. It was very similar to "The Sound and the Fury" by William Faulkner (and he mentions Faulkner many times) in looking at a decaying Southern family told from varying points of view from different family members, and ending with the point of view of a friend of the family who is African American. Not a single character was completely likeable, but that's pretty realistic: everyone has faults. Still, I don't know. I just didn't care for how hard and mean everyone ended up being.
Speaking of Faulkner--I visited Rowan Oak this weekend. It was incredible, and I'm still in shock I think :)
"Hollywood Hellraisers" by Robert Sellers was great fun. Marlon Brando, Dennis Hopper, Jack Nicholson, and Warren Beatty all raised hell and had a great time doing it. It's honestly a miracle any of them survived for as long as they did.
"Fangirl" by Rainbow Rowell was so charming and awesome. Cath and Wren are twins, and off to college. Cath wants to room with Wren while Wren is eager to break away from her twin and pursue her own identity. For years the girls have collaborated on a fanfiction based on a popular bestselling book series very similar to Harry Potter. Cath continues the fanfiction, which takes up a lot of her life and almost makes her miss out on a chance to fall in love with Levi. It was really great.
I have mixed feelings about "Lookaway, Lookaway" by Wilton Barnhardt. I liked parts of it, but some of it wasn't so good. It was very similar to "The Sound and the Fury" by William Faulkner (and he mentions Faulkner many times) in looking at a decaying Southern family told from varying points of view from different family members, and ending with the point of view of a friend of the family who is African American. Not a single character was completely likeable, but that's pretty realistic: everyone has faults. Still, I don't know. I just didn't care for how hard and mean everyone ended up being.
Speaking of Faulkner--I visited Rowan Oak this weekend. It was incredible, and I'm still in shock I think :)
Sunday, February 9, 2014
The System; Born Round; Sourland; Last Night at the Viper Room
I haven't been reading at all lately because I got a new phone and now I spend all my free time playing with it.
I know, I know, I'm ashamed of myself, too.
Jeff Benedict's "The System" was an interesting look at college football. He spent two years observing and interviewing everyone he could get his hands on in some of college football's most prominent systems, from coaches, to athletic directors, to boosters, big donors, and hostesses. He detailed all the faults as well as what works, and how it's so corrupt no one even knows how to really regulate it. Powerful stuff. I'm not a huge college football fan, but I do watch some, so it's amazing to me how it works from the inside.
"Born Round" by Frank Bruni hit home. He was overweight as a kid, always hungry, always eating. He has spent his whole adult life yo-yo dieting (not familiar *at all*). He's in his forties now, and is (at least when this book was written a few years ago) at a good, healthy place despite being a prominent food critic for the New York Times. It was a great read that gives me hope: if Frank can do it, I can too.
"Sourland" by Joyce Carol Oates was an good collection of short stories. I'm not normally a big short story fan, but these were good. The pain from losing her husband shines through in many of them.
And finally, "Last Night at the Viper Room" by Gavin Edwards looks at the all too short life and tragic loss of River Phoenix, dead twenty years ago of a drug overdose at the age of 23. In light of Philip Seymour Hoffman's untimely overdose, it really makes me sad how Hollywood seems to ruin so many bright and promising talents. Some people can survive and even thrive, but others just can't take it. Poor River. What a talent. It would have been amazing to see him mature.
I know, I know, I'm ashamed of myself, too.
Jeff Benedict's "The System" was an interesting look at college football. He spent two years observing and interviewing everyone he could get his hands on in some of college football's most prominent systems, from coaches, to athletic directors, to boosters, big donors, and hostesses. He detailed all the faults as well as what works, and how it's so corrupt no one even knows how to really regulate it. Powerful stuff. I'm not a huge college football fan, but I do watch some, so it's amazing to me how it works from the inside.
"Born Round" by Frank Bruni hit home. He was overweight as a kid, always hungry, always eating. He has spent his whole adult life yo-yo dieting (not familiar *at all*). He's in his forties now, and is (at least when this book was written a few years ago) at a good, healthy place despite being a prominent food critic for the New York Times. It was a great read that gives me hope: if Frank can do it, I can too.
"Sourland" by Joyce Carol Oates was an good collection of short stories. I'm not normally a big short story fan, but these were good. The pain from losing her husband shines through in many of them.
And finally, "Last Night at the Viper Room" by Gavin Edwards looks at the all too short life and tragic loss of River Phoenix, dead twenty years ago of a drug overdose at the age of 23. In light of Philip Seymour Hoffman's untimely overdose, it really makes me sad how Hollywood seems to ruin so many bright and promising talents. Some people can survive and even thrive, but others just can't take it. Poor River. What a talent. It would have been amazing to see him mature.
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