These treatises on stuff and materials and interesting items or snapshots in time are called "microhistories" and I have to admit that they're really one of the only nonfiction that I actually look for to read. I'm not alone - they're hugely popular. This one should be a lovely addition to the library's collection.
Stuff Matters
Mark Miodownik
ISBN: 9780544236042
Read September 27, 2014
Miodownik starts with a traumatic childhood experience - getting slashed across the back by a homemade razor knife weilded by a would-be-mugger - and uses that as his starting point for his fascination with materials sciences and with the properties of the natural and built environments we surround ourselves with.
Each chapter deals with a different material, although the chapters themselves are named for a property that the author associates with that material (minor quibble: it would have made it easier to reference and cross-check if he'd included both association and metal)
For reference, the chapters are:
Indomitable (Steel)
Trusted (Paper)
Fundamental (Concrete)
Delicious (Chocolate)
Marvelous (Aerogels)
Imaginative (Plastics, specifically collodion)
Invisible (Glass)
Unbreakable (Carbon/Graphite/graphene/Diamond/Carbon-fiber/nanotubes)
Refined (Porcelain)
Immortal (Bio-materials and "cyborg" parts)
Synthesis (Materials Science 101)
Miodownik has a fun and breezy writing style, his examples are delightful, and the chapters are just long enough to get his point and his fascination (obsession?) across without being belabored. It's obvious that he's English, but that's a bonus for me, and doesn't impact on the universal nature of scientific and material interest. I finished this slim collection off with the hope that it sells well and the author enjoyed the writing process, so that perhaps there will be a sequel!
Tuesday, September 30, 2014
Tuesday Storytime: Owlets
Not just owls, my friends, but Baby Owls!
The Littlest Owl
Caroline Pitcher, illustrated by Tina Macnaughton
ISBN: 9781561486144
Fluffy oversized dry-brush watercolor? and colored pencils. Adorable and fuzzy.
"It's so fluffy I'm gonna DIE!" So the story isn't the most amazing thing, but you guys - these little owl babies are so fluffy and fuzzy and downy and adorable with their teeny little beaks and quizzical expressions.
Ahem. The story is straightforward; a quartet of owl babies are born, but the smallest is always too tiny. Still, it's determined (no genders here) and by the end of the story perseverance and hard work pays off and it finally manages to fly.
Little Owl's Night
Divya Srinivasan
ISBN: 9780670012954
Stylized oval owl-baby with enormous green eyes spends a happy evening exploring the night woods.
This was on the list today mainly for the artwork, because I like to have as many different styles and presentations of art as I can. These are graphic and streamlined and very dark, but still perky and upbeat. It's an impressive feat. Again, the story itself takes a back-seat to the art. Little Owl is going through his regular night, visiting friends and seeing the sights, until dawn approaches and Mama tells the bedtime story of "how night ends." I do love that possibly-spooky animals like bats and foxes are dealt with as friends and as normal, soothing parts of the night.
Owl Babies
Martin Waddell, illustrated by Patrick Benson
ISBN: 1564021017
A classic, with a trio of frightened-looking fluff-balls prominent on each spread.
Owl Mother is GONE, and Sarah, Percy, and Bill are not happy about this. They venture outside to look for her, but stay miserably perched on a branch together, imagining terrible things that might have happened (while baby Bill simply moans "I want my mommy" over and over again) until the magic strikes and in a glorious spread, Owl Mama flies in, wings in full spread. It's a beautiful and dramatic solution to the baby owl's worries, and after a quick reassurance, the story ends with them all safe in their nest again. Lovely finish. This is another brilliant example of how dark pages don't have to be slow or dreary - the texture work is simply stunning, and the intricate backgrounds and surfaces are a delightful contrast to our other two stories today.
The Littlest Owl
Caroline Pitcher, illustrated by Tina Macnaughton
ISBN: 9781561486144
Fluffy oversized dry-brush watercolor? and colored pencils. Adorable and fuzzy.
"It's so fluffy I'm gonna DIE!" So the story isn't the most amazing thing, but you guys - these little owl babies are so fluffy and fuzzy and downy and adorable with their teeny little beaks and quizzical expressions.
Ahem. The story is straightforward; a quartet of owl babies are born, but the smallest is always too tiny. Still, it's determined (no genders here) and by the end of the story perseverance and hard work pays off and it finally manages to fly.
Little Owl's Night
Divya Srinivasan
ISBN: 9780670012954
Stylized oval owl-baby with enormous green eyes spends a happy evening exploring the night woods.
This was on the list today mainly for the artwork, because I like to have as many different styles and presentations of art as I can. These are graphic and streamlined and very dark, but still perky and upbeat. It's an impressive feat. Again, the story itself takes a back-seat to the art. Little Owl is going through his regular night, visiting friends and seeing the sights, until dawn approaches and Mama tells the bedtime story of "how night ends." I do love that possibly-spooky animals like bats and foxes are dealt with as friends and as normal, soothing parts of the night.
Owl Babies
Martin Waddell, illustrated by Patrick Benson
ISBN: 1564021017
A classic, with a trio of frightened-looking fluff-balls prominent on each spread.
Owl Mother is GONE, and Sarah, Percy, and Bill are not happy about this. They venture outside to look for her, but stay miserably perched on a branch together, imagining terrible things that might have happened (while baby Bill simply moans "I want my mommy" over and over again) until the magic strikes and in a glorious spread, Owl Mama flies in, wings in full spread. It's a beautiful and dramatic solution to the baby owl's worries, and after a quick reassurance, the story ends with them all safe in their nest again. Lovely finish. This is another brilliant example of how dark pages don't have to be slow or dreary - the texture work is simply stunning, and the intricate backgrounds and surfaces are a delightful contrast to our other two stories today.
Storytelling: Little Gold Star, Robert D. San Souci & Sergio Martinez
Little Gold Star: A Spanish-American Cinderella Tale
Robert D. San Souci, illustrated by Sergio Martinez
ISBN: 9780688147808
Re-read September 19 for storytelling development.
I think I'll be adding this one to my collection of titles - I love the way the story flows, and the way that the Virgin Mary and the Holy Family seamlessly (mostly) fall into place as the beneficial "godmother" or "dead mother's spirit" of the basic Cinderella that most Americans are familiar with.
Teresa is a good daughter, but her stepmother and stepsisters are hateful to her. When her father gives her a little white lamb, they slaughter it and force her to wash the fleece. A fish steals it away (oddly enough) and a beautiful lady dressed in blue appears to offer help for a price. Teresa does her tasks as requested with a good attitude, and the Virgin blesses her, evidenced by a gold star appearing where she was touched by the Mother of God.
Stepmom and sisters are jealous, and the two sisters are sent out to get the same blessing (shades of Mother Hulda/Diamonds and Toads) but they of course are useless and bad, so they get cursed with horns and donkey ears respectively - stepmother is too wise to even try.
After the local plantation owner sees Teresa and her star at church, he decides to host a festival, and the family attends - he dances with Teresa, but custom dictates that they dance looking at the floor. Teresa's stepmom, seething with jealousy, pounces and shames her into running away while he's busy dancing.
He stops by the family's house the next day, the family cat alerts him to where Teresa has been hidden away, and he asks for Teresa's hand. Stepmother can't say no to the landowner, but does set 3 impossible tasks for Teresa - here the tasks are a barrier for marriage where in usual Cinderella the tasks are for denying permission to attend the initial party. Teresa tries all day to achieve them, then relies on a miracle from the Holy Mother to save the day.
An interesting coda has the stepmother and daughters becoming less hateful as they are influenced by Teresa and her noble husband, and slowly losing the horns and donkey ears as they become kind and selfless themselves.
As always for actual published books, I'll need to find other examples of this particular variation, so that the story I tell doesn't rely too much on one author's language and cadence. There are several reasons for this, but the most important is that the printed and published version here is subject to copyright, and as a performer and an author and an artist, I want to be respectful of intellectual ownership and rights. Other reasons are less prosaic: the more examples I have, the more rich the story becomes, the more language options I have available, and the more I can add to or synthesize in to make it a powerful tale that stands alone as an oral tradition, not requiring illustrations to enhance the story. (Although I have to say, these illustrations enhance so beautifully!)
Robert D. San Souci, illustrated by Sergio Martinez
ISBN: 9780688147808
Re-read September 19 for storytelling development.
I think I'll be adding this one to my collection of titles - I love the way the story flows, and the way that the Virgin Mary and the Holy Family seamlessly (mostly) fall into place as the beneficial "godmother" or "dead mother's spirit" of the basic Cinderella that most Americans are familiar with.
Teresa is a good daughter, but her stepmother and stepsisters are hateful to her. When her father gives her a little white lamb, they slaughter it and force her to wash the fleece. A fish steals it away (oddly enough) and a beautiful lady dressed in blue appears to offer help for a price. Teresa does her tasks as requested with a good attitude, and the Virgin blesses her, evidenced by a gold star appearing where she was touched by the Mother of God.
Stepmom and sisters are jealous, and the two sisters are sent out to get the same blessing (shades of Mother Hulda/Diamonds and Toads) but they of course are useless and bad, so they get cursed with horns and donkey ears respectively - stepmother is too wise to even try.
After the local plantation owner sees Teresa and her star at church, he decides to host a festival, and the family attends - he dances with Teresa, but custom dictates that they dance looking at the floor. Teresa's stepmom, seething with jealousy, pounces and shames her into running away while he's busy dancing.
He stops by the family's house the next day, the family cat alerts him to where Teresa has been hidden away, and he asks for Teresa's hand. Stepmother can't say no to the landowner, but does set 3 impossible tasks for Teresa - here the tasks are a barrier for marriage where in usual Cinderella the tasks are for denying permission to attend the initial party. Teresa tries all day to achieve them, then relies on a miracle from the Holy Mother to save the day.
An interesting coda has the stepmother and daughters becoming less hateful as they are influenced by Teresa and her noble husband, and slowly losing the horns and donkey ears as they become kind and selfless themselves.
As always for actual published books, I'll need to find other examples of this particular variation, so that the story I tell doesn't rely too much on one author's language and cadence. There are several reasons for this, but the most important is that the printed and published version here is subject to copyright, and as a performer and an author and an artist, I want to be respectful of intellectual ownership and rights. Other reasons are less prosaic: the more examples I have, the more rich the story becomes, the more language options I have available, and the more I can add to or synthesize in to make it a powerful tale that stands alone as an oral tradition, not requiring illustrations to enhance the story. (Although I have to say, these illustrations enhance so beautifully!)
Monday, September 29, 2014
Nonfiction: Liar Temptress Soldier Spy, Karen Abbott
Liar Temptress Soldier Spy: Four Women Undercover in the Civil War
Karen Abbott
ISBN: 9780062092892
Read September 25, 2014
This was an impressive undertaking, but I think that the author slightly shot herself in the foot narratively by limiting her quotations to actual letters or family recollections. That meant there was a lot of text about what was going on around the characters, and a lot of text about what the women were doing, but not as much from their "voices," which, while I understand her wanting to keep her history as pure as possible, isn't really the best narrative choice when you've got four women to switch back and forth from, and despite your attempt in the title to differentiate, ALL of them at one point are spies.
Other than that difficulty, which did make it occasionally difficult to keep straight between Rose and Elizabeth, I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Our "heroines" are:
Belle Boyd, a teen with more passion than sense, "spying" for the Confederacy in a contested portion of Virginia (then West Virginia).
Emma Edmondson (later Edmonds) who ran from an abusive father in Canada before joining the North as private (and courier, and mail carrier and nurse and aide-de-camp and spy) Frank Thompson.
Rose O'Neal Greenhow, a Confederate lady living in Washington, spying for the Confederacy through brazen flirtations with political officials on both sides.
Elizabeth Van Lew, staunch Abolitionist living in Richmond Virginia, in the heart of the new Confederate capital, rescuing Union prisoners and creating a massive spy ring that included a house servant who cleaned up Jeff Davis' own personal study.
We run chronologically through the war, staying with whoever was experiencing the more interesting events, or in busy times, jumping back and forth through the months to follow each of them in detail. because Belle and Emma were so different from each other in their personalities and jobs, this didn't create much trouble, but as mentioned before, did get occasionally confusing between Rose and Elizabeth, each doing essentially the same things for the different sides.
There were also a few tonal missteps, the most jarring during a scene where Rose O'Neal Greenhow, the Confederate spy, was taken to court on suspicion of treason. Her words blaze all down both pages, recounted most likely from the court transcriptionist, and they are heavy and oh so genteel. At the bottom of the page the author has her return home to her daughter who begs for a story in yet another direct quotation, and then in the author's words, Rose obliged, "making it all up as she went along, and letting the good guys win" (emphasis mine). The "good guys" is your word choice? Really? After that stunning example of the English language and formal behavior, "the good guys win?" Just really stunningly out of place. There were a couple of moments like that.
More confusingly, there were places where the meaning was unclear: both Belle and Emma recount, and Abbott carefully transcribes, events that could not possibly have taken place, but in each case, the recounting (both in quotations and in authorial writing) is extensive and vividly recounted, just as all the other events. Either before or after, the demurral exists, but is always faint or opaque, leaving me confused about the actual events. This really bugged me. Again, the dedication to "truth" in historical record makes the resulting narrative confusing. That isn't good. If your sources are making shit up, make it crystal clear in the narrative in the moment that they are fabricating, rather than mentioning it in passing in the note before the text.
Other than those few minor niggles, I enjoyed the stories of these brave women greatly. We need more history like this, including everyone from the past who experienced the events, not just the privileged members.
As a final note, I must say that General McClellan is about the most worthless field general (and the most personally egotistic) I have ever heard of. Useless man. I hope he never realized how much death and suffering resulted from his lack of ability.
Karen Abbott
ISBN: 9780062092892
Read September 25, 2014
This was an impressive undertaking, but I think that the author slightly shot herself in the foot narratively by limiting her quotations to actual letters or family recollections. That meant there was a lot of text about what was going on around the characters, and a lot of text about what the women were doing, but not as much from their "voices," which, while I understand her wanting to keep her history as pure as possible, isn't really the best narrative choice when you've got four women to switch back and forth from, and despite your attempt in the title to differentiate, ALL of them at one point are spies.
Other than that difficulty, which did make it occasionally difficult to keep straight between Rose and Elizabeth, I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Our "heroines" are:
Belle Boyd, a teen with more passion than sense, "spying" for the Confederacy in a contested portion of Virginia (then West Virginia).
Emma Edmondson (later Edmonds) who ran from an abusive father in Canada before joining the North as private (and courier, and mail carrier and nurse and aide-de-camp and spy) Frank Thompson.
Rose O'Neal Greenhow, a Confederate lady living in Washington, spying for the Confederacy through brazen flirtations with political officials on both sides.
Elizabeth Van Lew, staunch Abolitionist living in Richmond Virginia, in the heart of the new Confederate capital, rescuing Union prisoners and creating a massive spy ring that included a house servant who cleaned up Jeff Davis' own personal study.
We run chronologically through the war, staying with whoever was experiencing the more interesting events, or in busy times, jumping back and forth through the months to follow each of them in detail. because Belle and Emma were so different from each other in their personalities and jobs, this didn't create much trouble, but as mentioned before, did get occasionally confusing between Rose and Elizabeth, each doing essentially the same things for the different sides.
There were also a few tonal missteps, the most jarring during a scene where Rose O'Neal Greenhow, the Confederate spy, was taken to court on suspicion of treason. Her words blaze all down both pages, recounted most likely from the court transcriptionist, and they are heavy and oh so genteel. At the bottom of the page the author has her return home to her daughter who begs for a story in yet another direct quotation, and then in the author's words, Rose obliged, "making it all up as she went along, and letting the good guys win" (emphasis mine). The "good guys" is your word choice? Really? After that stunning example of the English language and formal behavior, "the good guys win?" Just really stunningly out of place. There were a couple of moments like that.
More confusingly, there were places where the meaning was unclear: both Belle and Emma recount, and Abbott carefully transcribes, events that could not possibly have taken place, but in each case, the recounting (both in quotations and in authorial writing) is extensive and vividly recounted, just as all the other events. Either before or after, the demurral exists, but is always faint or opaque, leaving me confused about the actual events. This really bugged me. Again, the dedication to "truth" in historical record makes the resulting narrative confusing. That isn't good. If your sources are making shit up, make it crystal clear in the narrative in the moment that they are fabricating, rather than mentioning it in passing in the note before the text.
Other than those few minor niggles, I enjoyed the stories of these brave women greatly. We need more history like this, including everyone from the past who experienced the events, not just the privileged members.
As a final note, I must say that General McClellan is about the most worthless field general (and the most personally egotistic) I have ever heard of. Useless man. I hope he never realized how much death and suffering resulted from his lack of ability.
Storytelling: Finn McCoul, Irish mythology
I'm starting out my storytelling posts by showing off the stories that I have told in the past.
One of the more interesting ones I've done was for a graduate school class teaching storytime techniques and resources. The assignment was to perform as a storyteller, but the twist was that there had to be a "something extra" - either an audience participation, a song, a variant language - something that would make it stand out.
I worked with a friend of mine and created a variant of a myth about Finn McCoul, and we told the story in tandem; me in English, and her in American Sign Language. It was a really fun experience, and I greatly enjoyed the process of developing the story for my personal uses.
The first two stories I told were based strongly on a single book, and that is not really a best practice for storytelling. In fact, if I re-add either The Little Old Lady or The Fortune-Teller to my repertoire, I will want to go in and do the same things to them that I outline here. The reasons are varied, but the important ones are protecting the original author's copyright and intellectual rights, and to create an ideal version of the story for an oral tradition (instead of primarily visual in the case of picture books), for my expected audience, and for my personal storytelling style.
All that blather out of the way, here's what I did to create the Story of Finn McCoul and his Brave Wife:
I knew from the start that I wanted the story to be told in English and ASL, and thought that Irish mythology had a lot of interesting stories that would lend themselves well to the oral tradition (having started there) but also to the lovely visual impact of ASL gestures.
I want to keep things secular (personal preference for public library-sponsored work) so all of the beautiful mythos surrounding Saint Patrick was unfortunately out.
I want to keep things simple (the audience was intended to be adults and children) so all the interlocking tales of the fae were right out.
I needed a story with a narrative arc to help hold the audience's attention (I'm not good enough to tell a wandering tale with no structure) so the short folksy anecdotes about leprechaun tricks were also out.
That left the wonder tales that often featured the giant Finn McCoul or his antagonist CuCullain. I researched the stories that I could find about those characters (reference list is at the bottom of the post) and then synthesized them into a short story based on the tale of Oona (Finn's wife) outwitting CuCullain, who was trying to find and beat up Finn.
Once the actual tale was decided on, then my friend and I altered the narrative as necessary to make the flow of language in English and ASL match up as best as possible, and made a few tonal changes to the story; taking out much of the violence and any mention of death.
It was strange to me how even though the final version was so very personalized and altered, it was still a very close match to the original versions, many of which were more different from each other than my version was from any of them.
Without the constraints of a timed class assignment, and of matching the flow of ASL, I will probably go back and alter the story again before re-adding it to my collection, to make it a bit more complex and longer.
Resource List for Finn McCoul stories:
Tales of Irish Myths:
The Tale of Cu Chulainn
The Children of Lir
The Tale of Finn Mac Cool
Collected & Re-Told by Benedict Flynn
Read by: Dermot Kerrigan & Marcella Riordan
Naxos Audiobooks, 2000
ISBN: 9781608478514
One of the more interesting ones I've done was for a graduate school class teaching storytime techniques and resources. The assignment was to perform as a storyteller, but the twist was that there had to be a "something extra" - either an audience participation, a song, a variant language - something that would make it stand out.
I worked with a friend of mine and created a variant of a myth about Finn McCoul, and we told the story in tandem; me in English, and her in American Sign Language. It was a really fun experience, and I greatly enjoyed the process of developing the story for my personal uses.
The first two stories I told were based strongly on a single book, and that is not really a best practice for storytelling. In fact, if I re-add either The Little Old Lady or The Fortune-Teller to my repertoire, I will want to go in and do the same things to them that I outline here. The reasons are varied, but the important ones are protecting the original author's copyright and intellectual rights, and to create an ideal version of the story for an oral tradition (instead of primarily visual in the case of picture books), for my expected audience, and for my personal storytelling style.
All that blather out of the way, here's what I did to create the Story of Finn McCoul and his Brave Wife:
I knew from the start that I wanted the story to be told in English and ASL, and thought that Irish mythology had a lot of interesting stories that would lend themselves well to the oral tradition (having started there) but also to the lovely visual impact of ASL gestures.
I want to keep things secular (personal preference for public library-sponsored work) so all of the beautiful mythos surrounding Saint Patrick was unfortunately out.
I want to keep things simple (the audience was intended to be adults and children) so all the interlocking tales of the fae were right out.
I needed a story with a narrative arc to help hold the audience's attention (I'm not good enough to tell a wandering tale with no structure) so the short folksy anecdotes about leprechaun tricks were also out.
That left the wonder tales that often featured the giant Finn McCoul or his antagonist CuCullain. I researched the stories that I could find about those characters (reference list is at the bottom of the post) and then synthesized them into a short story based on the tale of Oona (Finn's wife) outwitting CuCullain, who was trying to find and beat up Finn.
Once the actual tale was decided on, then my friend and I altered the narrative as necessary to make the flow of language in English and ASL match up as best as possible, and made a few tonal changes to the story; taking out much of the violence and any mention of death.
It was strange to me how even though the final version was so very personalized and altered, it was still a very close match to the original versions, many of which were more different from each other than my version was from any of them.
Without the constraints of a timed class assignment, and of matching the flow of ASL, I will probably go back and alter the story again before re-adding it to my collection, to make it a bit more complex and longer.
Resource List for Finn McCoul stories:
Tales of Irish Myths:
The Tale of Cu Chulainn
The Children of Lir
The Tale of Finn Mac Cool
Collected & Re-Told by Benedict Flynn
Read by: Dermot Kerrigan & Marcella Riordan
Naxos Audiobooks, 2000
ISBN: 9781608478514
Finn McCool
Told by: Catherine O’Hara
Music by: Boys of the Lough
Rabbit Ears Productions, 1991
ISBN: 1570990255
Format: VHS Cassette
Told by: Catherine O’Hara
Music by: Boys of the Lough
Rabbit Ears Productions, 1991
ISBN: 1570990255
Format: VHS Cassette
A Treasury of Irish Myth, Legend, and Folklore
Containing: Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry
Edited by: W.B. Yeats & Cuchulain of Muirthemne,
Arranged & Translated by: Lady Isabella Augusta Gregory
This collection Compiled and Edited by: Claire Booss
Avenel Books, 1986
ISBN: 051748904X
Format: Hardback Book – 704 pages.
Containing: Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry
Edited by: W.B. Yeats & Cuchulain of Muirthemne,
Arranged & Translated by: Lady Isabella Augusta Gregory
This collection Compiled and Edited by: Claire Booss
Avenel Books, 1986
ISBN: 051748904X
Format: Hardback Book – 704 pages.
Finn McCool and the Great Fish
Written by: Eve Bunting
Illustrated by: Zachary Pullen
Sleeping Bear Press, 2010
ISBN: 9781585363667
Format: Picture Book
Written by: Eve Bunting
Illustrated by: Zachary Pullen
Sleeping Bear Press, 2010
ISBN: 9781585363667
Format: Picture Book
Mrs. McCool and the Giant Cuhullin: An Irish Tale
Written and Illustrated by: Jessica Souhami
Henry Holt & Co, 2002
ISBN: 080506852X
Format: Picture Book
Written and Illustrated by: Jessica Souhami
Henry Holt & Co, 2002
ISBN: 080506852X
Format: Picture Book
Fin M’Coul: The Giant of Knockmany Hill
Written and Illustrated by: Tomie de Paola
Holiday House, 1981
ISBN: 082340384X
Format: Picture Book
Written and Illustrated by: Tomie de Paola
Holiday House, 1981
ISBN: 082340384X
Format: Picture Book
Finn MacCoul and His Fearless Wife: A Giant of a Tale from Ireland
Written and Illustrated by: Robert Byrd
Dutton Children’s, 1999
ISBN: 0525459715
Format: Picture Book
Written and Illustrated by: Robert Byrd
Dutton Children’s, 1999
ISBN: 0525459715
Format: Picture Book
New Picture Books! Deer Dancer, by Mary Lyn Ray & Lauren Stringer
Oh what a pretty book.
Deer Dancer
Mary Lyn Ray, illustrated by Lauren Stringer (this duo also did my favorite Red Rubber Boot Day)
ISBN: 9781442434219
This is such a sweet book. A girl practices her dancing in a woodland glade, and is delighted when a deer stops by. After a ballet class doesn't go as well as she would like, she's back to the glade to practice, and an impromptu pas-de-deux blossoms between the two dancers in this magical space they share.
I'm not quite as thrilled with this one as with Red Rubber Boot Day, but it is beautiful and lyrical and expressive and filled with green growing life and joy. Should be lovely for storytime with Miss Lina's Ballerinas (Grace MacCarone & Christine Davenier, ISBN: 9780312382438) and either Amazing Grace (Mary Hoffman & Caroline Binch, ISBN: 9780803710405) or Dancing in the Wings.
Deer Dancer
Mary Lyn Ray, illustrated by Lauren Stringer (this duo also did my favorite Red Rubber Boot Day)
ISBN: 9781442434219
This is such a sweet book. A girl practices her dancing in a woodland glade, and is delighted when a deer stops by. After a ballet class doesn't go as well as she would like, she's back to the glade to practice, and an impromptu pas-de-deux blossoms between the two dancers in this magical space they share.
I'm not quite as thrilled with this one as with Red Rubber Boot Day, but it is beautiful and lyrical and expressive and filled with green growing life and joy. Should be lovely for storytime with Miss Lina's Ballerinas (Grace MacCarone & Christine Davenier, ISBN: 9780312382438) and either Amazing Grace (Mary Hoffman & Caroline Binch, ISBN: 9780803710405) or Dancing in the Wings.
Friday, September 26, 2014
Juvenile Fantasy: The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of her Own Making, Catherynne Valente
The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of her Own Making
Catherynne Valente
ISBN: 9780312649616
Re-Read, finished September 24, 2014
This book, y'all.
I first read this book back in 2012, when I wasn't keeping as scrupulous a review record of what I was reading. I didn't review it then, because I couldn't ever think of anything to say other than how much I liked it. Strangely enough, the more a book has touched me, or the more I feel like it fits, the less I find I can coherently say about it directly. It's a challenge.
This book is a beautiful and illusion-shattering psychology manual on the topics of humanity and growing up, dolled up in a fancy-dress-party disguise as a romp through Fairyland by a little human girl named September, and the friends and enemies she makes as she quests.
It is amazing. It made me cry, and made my heart ache, and made me wish that I had even a clock with my name on it. I want a library to be my ancestor, and for a trio of married witches to tell my future in moldy soup, but I also want to scoop just about all the characters up into a great big neverending hug and lie through my teeth that everything will be all right, and not to worry about such big terrible things as life and betrayal and fairness.
I discovered recently that there were a couple of sequels: The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There, and The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland and Cut the Moon in Two. I hate reading sequels after there's been a long break between reading the first, so naturally I had to go back to this one, and oh god, it hurts just as badly as it did on the first read. It's painfully beautiful and true and wild and good.
I will leave you with a much more excellent (although not much more on-topic) review of this book from one of my favorite authors and people; Patrick Rothfuss, from over on Goodreads.
Catherynne Valente
ISBN: 9780312649616
Re-Read, finished September 24, 2014
This book, y'all.
I first read this book back in 2012, when I wasn't keeping as scrupulous a review record of what I was reading. I didn't review it then, because I couldn't ever think of anything to say other than how much I liked it. Strangely enough, the more a book has touched me, or the more I feel like it fits, the less I find I can coherently say about it directly. It's a challenge.
This book is a beautiful and illusion-shattering psychology manual on the topics of humanity and growing up, dolled up in a fancy-dress-party disguise as a romp through Fairyland by a little human girl named September, and the friends and enemies she makes as she quests.
It is amazing. It made me cry, and made my heart ache, and made me wish that I had even a clock with my name on it. I want a library to be my ancestor, and for a trio of married witches to tell my future in moldy soup, but I also want to scoop just about all the characters up into a great big neverending hug and lie through my teeth that everything will be all right, and not to worry about such big terrible things as life and betrayal and fairness.
I discovered recently that there were a couple of sequels: The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There, and The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland and Cut the Moon in Two. I hate reading sequels after there's been a long break between reading the first, so naturally I had to go back to this one, and oh god, it hurts just as badly as it did on the first read. It's painfully beautiful and true and wild and good.
I will leave you with a much more excellent (although not much more on-topic) review of this book from one of my favorite authors and people; Patrick Rothfuss, from over on Goodreads.
Storytelling: The Fortune-Tellers, Lloyd Alexander, Trina Schart Hyman
The Fortune-Tellers
Lloyd Alexander, illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman
ISBN: 9780140652330
First told spring 1997, purchased for storytelling library Sept 2014.
This was the second story I learned and told, at another storytelling festival. Lloyd Alexander does a beautiful job winding up a fantastical mystical story without ever leaving the totally mundane world. It's the picture book equivalent of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore and I loved every minute of learning and telling it. It doesn't hurt that for me at least, studying the text also let me spend hours looking at Trina Schart Hyman's beautiful artwork.
Summary:
A young carpenter grows frustrated with his life's seeming gridlock, and goes to visit an old magician in town, who gives him cryptic, but very positive answers to his questions. A typical example: "Do you see me rich?" "Rich you will surely be, on one condition: that you earn large sums of money."
With answers like those, the carpenter's heart is soothed, and he heads home, full of joy. Of course, halfway there he thinks of more questions to ask this generous prophet, and he turns right back around - to find him gone! The land-lady barges in before the carpenter can figure anything out, and mistakes him for the magician - obviously having magicked himself young and handsome. She demands her own fortune be told, and the carpenter, no slouch in the brains department, promptly recycles the pleasant words the prophet had for him. Soon he's figured out the trick, and made himself a rich, famous, and well-beloved figure in town, but whatever happened to the poor soothsayer? His bad luck - falling out a window was the least of it.
My favorite element of this story is getting finished with all of the nod and wink fourth-wall stuff where the audience and the fortune-teller, and then the carpenter, know what's up with the circular "predictions" that don't promise anyone anything, and then we move directly on to the hugely fantastic unfortunate circumstances of the actual soothsayer after the carpenter left his rooms.
Lloyd Alexander, illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman
ISBN: 9780140652330
First told spring 1997, purchased for storytelling library Sept 2014.
This was the second story I learned and told, at another storytelling festival. Lloyd Alexander does a beautiful job winding up a fantastical mystical story without ever leaving the totally mundane world. It's the picture book equivalent of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore and I loved every minute of learning and telling it. It doesn't hurt that for me at least, studying the text also let me spend hours looking at Trina Schart Hyman's beautiful artwork.
Summary:
A young carpenter grows frustrated with his life's seeming gridlock, and goes to visit an old magician in town, who gives him cryptic, but very positive answers to his questions. A typical example: "Do you see me rich?" "Rich you will surely be, on one condition: that you earn large sums of money."
With answers like those, the carpenter's heart is soothed, and he heads home, full of joy. Of course, halfway there he thinks of more questions to ask this generous prophet, and he turns right back around - to find him gone! The land-lady barges in before the carpenter can figure anything out, and mistakes him for the magician - obviously having magicked himself young and handsome. She demands her own fortune be told, and the carpenter, no slouch in the brains department, promptly recycles the pleasant words the prophet had for him. Soon he's figured out the trick, and made himself a rich, famous, and well-beloved figure in town, but whatever happened to the poor soothsayer? His bad luck - falling out a window was the least of it.
My favorite element of this story is getting finished with all of the nod and wink fourth-wall stuff where the audience and the fortune-teller, and then the carpenter, know what's up with the circular "predictions" that don't promise anyone anything, and then we move directly on to the hugely fantastic unfortunate circumstances of the actual soothsayer after the carpenter left his rooms.
Thursday, September 25, 2014
Short Story (sort of): The Road to Levinshir, Patrick Rothfuss, from Epic collection
So this marks the third time I've read this particular story, and I suppose it makes me a bad consumer of tales to not remember the other two instances well enough to notice the differences that Pat blogged about.
I first read this exerpt in Rothfuss' actual book The Name of the Wind, because I don't tend to read short stories (I want the worlds to be bigger, and last longer, and the ones that I like the most are rarely the ones with attached series or novels associated). A year or so later on, I was thumbing through the 2009 Year's Best Anthology (ISBN: 9781607012146 , edited by Rich Horton) in a used bookshop and saw "Rothfuss" and thought, Oh Yay! and was a couple of paragraphs in before I realized that I was re-reading, and by then thought - eh, screw it, it was a good book, so I sat down in the aisle and read it again.
Well, earlier this week, I did the same exact thing with the Epic collection; it arrived at the library, I saw "Rothfuss" and grabbed, and got a few paragraphs in before going "Oh, come on!" in bemusement at myself for not at least recognizing the fricking title this time around. Of course I read it again. What a silly question.
So, because this blog started after I read all of Rothfuss' works, I am enthusiastically recommending them to anyone who would like something amazing to read. If you like short stories, there's this one, which is technically a section of The Name of the Wind, but that book is freaking massive and epic, and this is a nice little snack-sized morsel of story. There is also the story The Lightning Tree featuring another character Bast in the Rogues collection, and a novella called The Slow Regard of Silent Things, coming out later this fall about yet another character Auri who is also amazing. The actual epic novels are two so far: The Name of the Wind, and The Wise Man's Fear. The last will be titled The Doors of Stone, and if you even dare to whisper about a publication date I will find you and beat you over the head with all of the above publications.
The Road to Levinshir
Patrick Rothfuss
From: Epic: Legends of Fantasy
John Joseph Adams and GRR Martin, editors.
ISBN: 9781616960841
Re-re-read September 24, 2014.
Our first-person narrator invites us along as his road trip is interrupted by what he hopes will be a pleasant break with his gypsy-like "family" of people, the Edema Ruh. Sadly, his hopes are dashed as things are not even remotely what they seem to be. The hero is to a Mary Sue what Deadpool is to the 4th wall. You know he is, but he doesn't seem to know he is, but the story DOES seem to know he is, which implies all sorts of unfortunate things for both the character, and the surroundings. It's lovely. Read it, then go read all the other things.
I first read this exerpt in Rothfuss' actual book The Name of the Wind, because I don't tend to read short stories (I want the worlds to be bigger, and last longer, and the ones that I like the most are rarely the ones with attached series or novels associated). A year or so later on, I was thumbing through the 2009 Year's Best Anthology (ISBN: 9781607012146 , edited by Rich Horton) in a used bookshop and saw "Rothfuss" and thought, Oh Yay! and was a couple of paragraphs in before I realized that I was re-reading, and by then thought - eh, screw it, it was a good book, so I sat down in the aisle and read it again.
Well, earlier this week, I did the same exact thing with the Epic collection; it arrived at the library, I saw "Rothfuss" and grabbed, and got a few paragraphs in before going "Oh, come on!" in bemusement at myself for not at least recognizing the fricking title this time around. Of course I read it again. What a silly question.
So, because this blog started after I read all of Rothfuss' works, I am enthusiastically recommending them to anyone who would like something amazing to read. If you like short stories, there's this one, which is technically a section of The Name of the Wind, but that book is freaking massive and epic, and this is a nice little snack-sized morsel of story. There is also the story The Lightning Tree featuring another character Bast in the Rogues collection, and a novella called The Slow Regard of Silent Things, coming out later this fall about yet another character Auri who is also amazing. The actual epic novels are two so far: The Name of the Wind, and The Wise Man's Fear. The last will be titled The Doors of Stone, and if you even dare to whisper about a publication date I will find you and beat you over the head with all of the above publications.
The Road to Levinshir
Patrick Rothfuss
From: Epic: Legends of Fantasy
John Joseph Adams and GRR Martin, editors.
ISBN: 9781616960841
Re-re-read September 24, 2014.
Our first-person narrator invites us along as his road trip is interrupted by what he hopes will be a pleasant break with his gypsy-like "family" of people, the Edema Ruh. Sadly, his hopes are dashed as things are not even remotely what they seem to be. The hero is to a Mary Sue what Deadpool is to the 4th wall. You know he is, but he doesn't seem to know he is, but the story DOES seem to know he is, which implies all sorts of unfortunate things for both the character, and the surroundings. It's lovely. Read it, then go read all the other things.
Storytelling: The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything, Linda Williams & Megan Lloyd
The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything
Linda Williams, illustrated by Megan Lloyd
ISBN: 9780690045840
First told Fall 1996, purchased for storytelling resource Sept 2014.
This is an excellent example of a storytelling-friendly picture book. It's prime content for Halloween, which is one of our few remaining "tale-telling" holidays. It's got a repetitive and building climax inside a simple framework story, allowing easy expansion or contraction depending on the audience. It's got a somewhat scary feel to it, with a sweet homey twist payoff at the end. It's not too juvenile or pandering to distance adults, and it's not too scary or "adult" to confuse children.
I still remember most of it, and if I had to give a storytelling performance on pain of death, this is the one I'd pull out.
With Halloween approaching, and me getting back into storytelling, I wanted to re-visit my first foray into performance arts.
Summary:
A little old lady lives alone, and needs to fetch edibles from the forest. She's heading home along the path when she encounters various articles of clothing, from shoes to pants to shirt to gloves (each with a distinctive sound or movement "Clomp Clomp" for the shoes, "wiggle wiggle" for the gloves) culminating in a giant pumpkin head that says BOO! She startles and runs back to the house, and once safely at home, her natural bravery reasserts itself, and she stands up to the now-assembled creature and puts it straight, assigning it a job in the garden as a scarecrow since it likes scaring people so much.
Linda Williams, illustrated by Megan Lloyd
ISBN: 9780690045840
First told Fall 1996, purchased for storytelling resource Sept 2014.
This is an excellent example of a storytelling-friendly picture book. It's prime content for Halloween, which is one of our few remaining "tale-telling" holidays. It's got a repetitive and building climax inside a simple framework story, allowing easy expansion or contraction depending on the audience. It's got a somewhat scary feel to it, with a sweet homey twist payoff at the end. It's not too juvenile or pandering to distance adults, and it's not too scary or "adult" to confuse children.
I still remember most of it, and if I had to give a storytelling performance on pain of death, this is the one I'd pull out.
With Halloween approaching, and me getting back into storytelling, I wanted to re-visit my first foray into performance arts.
Summary:
A little old lady lives alone, and needs to fetch edibles from the forest. She's heading home along the path when she encounters various articles of clothing, from shoes to pants to shirt to gloves (each with a distinctive sound or movement "Clomp Clomp" for the shoes, "wiggle wiggle" for the gloves) culminating in a giant pumpkin head that says BOO! She startles and runs back to the house, and once safely at home, her natural bravery reasserts itself, and she stands up to the now-assembled creature and puts it straight, assigning it a job in the garden as a scarecrow since it likes scaring people so much.
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
Random Romance Read: Sins of a Wicked Duke, Sophie Jordan
Sins of a Wicked Duke
Sophie Jordan
ISBN: 9780061579172
Read Sept 22, 2014
Short version: Erk. Non-consensual crap all over the place here.
Snarky Summary: An obvious prologue sets up at least a trio of novels about three dissimilar young girls who meet in a brutal boarding school as children. This story focuses on Fallon. She's Irish, she's an orphan (her father died on a trip overseas to collect garden plants for a noble), she's tall and strong and has wild red-gold hair. Due to her height, beauty, and her hair, she keeps getting molested by the sons and husbands of her employers when she's trying to work as a maid, and in rejecting their advances, gets sacked. After meeting a notorious noble rake, she hatches a plot to work as a manservant instead, chops off her hair, and goes for it.
Dominic (obviously the "Demon Duke" has to be named Dominic) and I'm confused about his ducal nature as his grandfather is a pastor in a small country town? Anyway - actual peerage aside, he's spent his life working hard to be unfeeling and careless and wicked because his grandfather (the aforementioned pastor) was too hard on him when he was a young child.
Fallon ends up as Dom's valet, much non-consensual intimacy happens - and this is really irritating, because the whole POINT of her working in disguise as a man was that she was trying to avoid this crap, and the hero spends the whole time pawing at her because he can't help himself, and besides, she likes it, so it's all ok and he's not doing anything wrong because he's just passionate. God in heaven. Give me a freaking break.
Anyway. Plot contrivances related to her father's untimely death lead Fallon to a lonely life in a cottage in the small town where the grandfather is the pastor. She becomes a sort of nursemaid to him (despite the fact that everyone in Society has to know that she was Dom's valet while dressed as a boy, because all the servants knew), the wayward Duke returns when the grandfather is on his deathbed (and don't even get me started on how the whole death and funeral bits were just ignored) and yay now they are married (erm, what?) and have a daughter!
I like the idea of heroines in male drag, I like "rags to riches" stories, and I would have liked this if there had been any attention given to the process of passing, to the actual historic situation of servantry and the Ton, and if the hero hadn't been totally rapey.
Sophie Jordan
ISBN: 9780061579172
Read Sept 22, 2014
Short version: Erk. Non-consensual crap all over the place here.
Snarky Summary: An obvious prologue sets up at least a trio of novels about three dissimilar young girls who meet in a brutal boarding school as children. This story focuses on Fallon. She's Irish, she's an orphan (her father died on a trip overseas to collect garden plants for a noble), she's tall and strong and has wild red-gold hair. Due to her height, beauty, and her hair, she keeps getting molested by the sons and husbands of her employers when she's trying to work as a maid, and in rejecting their advances, gets sacked. After meeting a notorious noble rake, she hatches a plot to work as a manservant instead, chops off her hair, and goes for it.
Dominic (obviously the "Demon Duke" has to be named Dominic) and I'm confused about his ducal nature as his grandfather is a pastor in a small country town? Anyway - actual peerage aside, he's spent his life working hard to be unfeeling and careless and wicked because his grandfather (the aforementioned pastor) was too hard on him when he was a young child.
Fallon ends up as Dom's valet, much non-consensual intimacy happens - and this is really irritating, because the whole POINT of her working in disguise as a man was that she was trying to avoid this crap, and the hero spends the whole time pawing at her because he can't help himself, and besides, she likes it, so it's all ok and he's not doing anything wrong because he's just passionate. God in heaven. Give me a freaking break.
Anyway. Plot contrivances related to her father's untimely death lead Fallon to a lonely life in a cottage in the small town where the grandfather is the pastor. She becomes a sort of nursemaid to him (despite the fact that everyone in Society has to know that she was Dom's valet while dressed as a boy, because all the servants knew), the wayward Duke returns when the grandfather is on his deathbed (and don't even get me started on how the whole death and funeral bits were just ignored) and yay now they are married (erm, what?) and have a daughter!
I like the idea of heroines in male drag, I like "rags to riches" stories, and I would have liked this if there had been any attention given to the process of passing, to the actual historic situation of servantry and the Ton, and if the hero hadn't been totally rapey.
New Picture Books: Florence Nightingale, by Demi
It's been a while since I've seen a Demi picture book, and I was happy to see one come in. This biography is beautiful and comprehensive, while staying clear and simple for the youngest listeners or readers.
Florence Nightingale
Demi
ISBN: 9780805097290
Stylized, airy, minimalist compositions of collaged paintings and mixed media.
Demi is a beautiful artist, and the work for this biography of Florence Nightingale is lovely as usual. I'm personally glad to see a Demi work that is not about a spiritual or religious figure, and Nightingale is a delightful choice.
What is interesting is that I thought I knew a decent amount about her, and really I didn't (or had forgotten). I was surprised that her last name really was Nightingale, and that her sister's name is Parthenope (and isn't Parthenope Nightingale a mouthful?). Florence was raised as a lady of leisure, and her family strenuously disapproved of her desire to be a nurse, but she persisted. Over time she worked for poorhouses, military hospitals in Turkey, and presented her studies and practices to many developing organizations (including the Union government during the Civil War). She lived to be ninety years old, and inspired the creator of the Red Cross, among many others.
A Timeline at the end of the book, followed by a very short Further Reading section, allows interested young scholars to use this book as a stand-alone reference, or as a jumping off point to explore further.
Florence Nightingale
Demi
ISBN: 9780805097290
Stylized, airy, minimalist compositions of collaged paintings and mixed media.
Demi is a beautiful artist, and the work for this biography of Florence Nightingale is lovely as usual. I'm personally glad to see a Demi work that is not about a spiritual or religious figure, and Nightingale is a delightful choice.
What is interesting is that I thought I knew a decent amount about her, and really I didn't (or had forgotten). I was surprised that her last name really was Nightingale, and that her sister's name is Parthenope (and isn't Parthenope Nightingale a mouthful?). Florence was raised as a lady of leisure, and her family strenuously disapproved of her desire to be a nurse, but she persisted. Over time she worked for poorhouses, military hospitals in Turkey, and presented her studies and practices to many developing organizations (including the Union government during the Civil War). She lived to be ninety years old, and inspired the creator of the Red Cross, among many others.
A Timeline at the end of the book, followed by a very short Further Reading section, allows interested young scholars to use this book as a stand-alone reference, or as a jumping off point to explore further.
Storytelling Development
Way back when, in the misty years of high school mumblty-peg years ago, I worked as a volunteer for a public library summer reading program, and as part of that program, the staff encouraged the young volunteers to become involved in community cultural activities.
During those summers working with the library in my teens, I was an artists' model (that was fun, and I got a few portraits out of the experience) developed my interest in backstage theatre through a variety of productions, got hands-on with puppetry, and participated in community storytelling events.
Well, now that library school is over and done with, and I'm finally settling into the routine of my new exalted position as a librarian (with all the various hats that accompany the title) I'm feeling an urge to get back into some of those interests.
Theatre isn't on the table right now (but might be in the future) and puppetry is a little too involved for my available storage space at home and work.
Storytelling? I remember that I enjoyed it more than acting, and that it was less involved than puppetry (at least, comparing the way I did puppetry and the way I did storytelling). There is an active storytelling community meeting just a few miles away from my workplace. At least one of my co-workers in the children's department is an active storyteller with that group.
So, with a trepidatious heart, I am thinking about getting back into performing for audiences who aren't toddlers (or are distracted by their toddlers). As part of that, I'll be researching (naturally) and looking at picture books (also obvious) to find legends and fairy tales and myths and folk tales to develop into a repertoire.
The posts for these will be noted as "Storytelling." We'll see how it goes!
Tuesday, September 23, 2014
William Shakespeare's The Jedi Doth Return, Ian Doescher
Finally got to finish out the trilogy tonight, sad that it's over, but it was a fun ride while it lasted.
William Shakespeare's The Jedi Doth Return
Ian Doescher
ISBN: 9781594747137
Read September 23, 2014.
William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, A New Hope
William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back
Our last installment has no more singing Ugnaughts, but we do get Ewoks speaking pidgin English, which is an interesting choice. The author comments in the afterword that keeping track of everyone's speech patterns after three whole books/films-worth of characters was a little daunting, but I think it all went smoothly. I don't know that I would have given the Ewoks that sort of dialect, but I did like a thoughtful line from Leia on Endor:
"It is not we who welcome them, I err.
For 'tis their moon, their home, their dwelling place.
'Tis surely they who kindly welcome us,
'Tis truly they to whom our thanks are due..."
There are other truly lovely moments scattered throughout - Luke's soliloquy bracing himself before confronting Jabba, the Emperor's delightful evil monologue embracing his destiny as master of pain and suffering and death, Vader's slow growing realization that his evil is no match for his feelings as a father.
Like the author, I like Jedi way more than I should. I know it's cheesy, I know the Ewoks are a bit of a joke, but I can't help it. It's always been my favorite, with the stark themes of love and loss and the hard-won lessons of maturity, of being better than your parents while still loving them.
I think I was most happy reading this when the language from the film didn't even need much changing to fit this Shakespearean conceit. Reading this homage is light and fun and easy, but then a powerful moment from the movie transfers over almost unchanged, like when Luke confronts Vader in that industrial grim corridor on Endor. "'Tis but the name of thy true self, which thou hast but forgotten. Furthermore, I know that there is good within thee yet, for thy great Emperor cannot have driven it from thee entirely." That is sooo close to Luke's impassioned speech that, minus the thees and thous, it is essentially what was spoken in the film. That language and that scene was powerful then, and it still is now, even with a bit of frippery and fun draped over it. That's why I love Star Wars.
William Shakespeare's The Jedi Doth Return
Ian Doescher
ISBN: 9781594747137
Read September 23, 2014.
William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, A New Hope
William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back
Our last installment has no more singing Ugnaughts, but we do get Ewoks speaking pidgin English, which is an interesting choice. The author comments in the afterword that keeping track of everyone's speech patterns after three whole books/films-worth of characters was a little daunting, but I think it all went smoothly. I don't know that I would have given the Ewoks that sort of dialect, but I did like a thoughtful line from Leia on Endor:
"It is not we who welcome them, I err.
For 'tis their moon, their home, their dwelling place.
'Tis surely they who kindly welcome us,
'Tis truly they to whom our thanks are due..."
There are other truly lovely moments scattered throughout - Luke's soliloquy bracing himself before confronting Jabba, the Emperor's delightful evil monologue embracing his destiny as master of pain and suffering and death, Vader's slow growing realization that his evil is no match for his feelings as a father.
Like the author, I like Jedi way more than I should. I know it's cheesy, I know the Ewoks are a bit of a joke, but I can't help it. It's always been my favorite, with the stark themes of love and loss and the hard-won lessons of maturity, of being better than your parents while still loving them.
I think I was most happy reading this when the language from the film didn't even need much changing to fit this Shakespearean conceit. Reading this homage is light and fun and easy, but then a powerful moment from the movie transfers over almost unchanged, like when Luke confronts Vader in that industrial grim corridor on Endor. "'Tis but the name of thy true self, which thou hast but forgotten. Furthermore, I know that there is good within thee yet, for thy great Emperor cannot have driven it from thee entirely." That is sooo close to Luke's impassioned speech that, minus the thees and thous, it is essentially what was spoken in the film. That language and that scene was powerful then, and it still is now, even with a bit of frippery and fun draped over it. That's why I love Star Wars.
New Picture Books: Big Bug, Henry Cole
Only a couple new titles in today, but really lovely ones.
Big Bug
Henry Cole (On Meadowview Street)
ISBN: 9781442498976
The viewpoint shifts each spread and alters the concept of big and little in relation to size and perspective.
I just got finished reading On Meadowview Street for my storytime today, and then this one appeared and made me love Cole all the more. I can't wait to pair this with a few other homey farm or rural life portraits for a storytime. Right now I'm thinking about Eugenie Fernandes' Busy Little Mouse and Ashley Wolff's Come With Me (about a boy and his puppy). But back to Cole. We start with a BIG BUG, a ladybug on a leaf, in beautiful closeup. Then we zoom back to show the big leaf, and now our bug is little. Another zoom gives us a big flower, and the leaf falls away to insignificance, then a dog makes the flower seem small, and so on until we reach the big country sky above, then scoot back down to a tree, then a barn, then a house, then a window, and back to our doggy friend again (with another teeny tiny friend barely visible on his nose).
Big Bug
Henry Cole (On Meadowview Street)
ISBN: 9781442498976
The viewpoint shifts each spread and alters the concept of big and little in relation to size and perspective.
I just got finished reading On Meadowview Street for my storytime today, and then this one appeared and made me love Cole all the more. I can't wait to pair this with a few other homey farm or rural life portraits for a storytime. Right now I'm thinking about Eugenie Fernandes' Busy Little Mouse and Ashley Wolff's Come With Me (about a boy and his puppy). But back to Cole. We start with a BIG BUG, a ladybug on a leaf, in beautiful closeup. Then we zoom back to show the big leaf, and now our bug is little. Another zoom gives us a big flower, and the leaf falls away to insignificance, then a dog makes the flower seem small, and so on until we reach the big country sky above, then scoot back down to a tree, then a barn, then a house, then a window, and back to our doggy friend again (with another teeny tiny friend barely visible on his nose).
Tuesday Storytime: Yardwork
Autumn is finally here! The weather is cooling (at least sometimes) and gardens and yards are winding down for the fall and winter. We looked back at the joys of yardwork and gardening for one last time before we turn to harvests and pumpkins and drizzly grey days.
On Meadowview Street
Henry Cole
ISBN: 9780060564827
Lush green spaces become less manicured and more wild as a young girl adds trees and a pond to her front yard.
Caroline has moved onto Meadowview Street, but there aren't any meadows - just flat green yards with no trees and no wildlife. First she saves a few wildflowers from the mower, then a few more, then the whole yard (dad sells the lawnmower), adds a tree and some birdhouses, and finally a pond, while the neighbors peer over the fence in wonder, then slowly begin to transform their own front yards. Sweet and fairly non-preachy sermon about the boredom of monoculture and the joys of nature.
Up, Down, and All Around
Katherine Ayres, illustrated by Nadine Bernard Westcott
ISBN: 9780763623784
Rhyming repetitive stanzas celebrate various garden veggies growing up, down, and around.
I really was hoping I would find another book that was actually about yards/grass/mowing/landscaping, but it was not to be. This one was short and cute and a good length for the middle slot in today's storytime, and it was close enough to go along. Starting with a short prep scene of hoeing and planting and watering, the story is off and running along various plants that grow UP (corn, peppers, okra) grow DOWN (carrots, potatoes, beets) or AROUND (cucumbers, green beens, tomatoes) before all of them are gathered and served for lunch. While I like the visuals of Growing Vegetable Soup a lot better, this one is pretty catchy to read.
Stanley Mows the Lawn
Craig Frazier
ISBN: 9780811848466
Stylized ground-viewpointed abstracted visuals of grass, mowing, and human figures.
I LOVE the artwork in this book. The story itself is a little slim, and once I can find another good grass or yard book, this one is going to move to the middle slot because it is so short and quick. Stanley can't see his boot tops over the grass, so he breaks out the reel mower. Up and back, up and back, straight paths mowed in the grass, until Stanley sees Hank the snake (and vice versa) and decides to make things a little more interesting for them both, turning his yard into something more resembling modern art. Short and catchy, and the visuals are really just stunning.
On Meadowview Street
Henry Cole
ISBN: 9780060564827
Lush green spaces become less manicured and more wild as a young girl adds trees and a pond to her front yard.
Caroline has moved onto Meadowview Street, but there aren't any meadows - just flat green yards with no trees and no wildlife. First she saves a few wildflowers from the mower, then a few more, then the whole yard (dad sells the lawnmower), adds a tree and some birdhouses, and finally a pond, while the neighbors peer over the fence in wonder, then slowly begin to transform their own front yards. Sweet and fairly non-preachy sermon about the boredom of monoculture and the joys of nature.
Up, Down, and All Around
Katherine Ayres, illustrated by Nadine Bernard Westcott
ISBN: 9780763623784
Rhyming repetitive stanzas celebrate various garden veggies growing up, down, and around.
I really was hoping I would find another book that was actually about yards/grass/mowing/landscaping, but it was not to be. This one was short and cute and a good length for the middle slot in today's storytime, and it was close enough to go along. Starting with a short prep scene of hoeing and planting and watering, the story is off and running along various plants that grow UP (corn, peppers, okra) grow DOWN (carrots, potatoes, beets) or AROUND (cucumbers, green beens, tomatoes) before all of them are gathered and served for lunch. While I like the visuals of Growing Vegetable Soup a lot better, this one is pretty catchy to read.
Stanley Mows the Lawn
Craig Frazier
ISBN: 9780811848466
Stylized ground-viewpointed abstracted visuals of grass, mowing, and human figures.
I LOVE the artwork in this book. The story itself is a little slim, and once I can find another good grass or yard book, this one is going to move to the middle slot because it is so short and quick. Stanley can't see his boot tops over the grass, so he breaks out the reel mower. Up and back, up and back, straight paths mowed in the grass, until Stanley sees Hank the snake (and vice versa) and decides to make things a little more interesting for them both, turning his yard into something more resembling modern art. Short and catchy, and the visuals are really just stunning.
Monday, September 22, 2014
Picture Book Haul: Shaun Tan's Rules of Summer
Oh boy.. not really sure about this one.
Rules of Summer
Shaun Tan
ISBN: 9780545639125
In a lot of ways, I think of Shaun Tan as the slightly more graphically-inclined psychological twin of Neil Gaiman. They both write these amazing, off-kilter stories that manage to be simultaneously totally ominous and cautiously optimistic, and with an edge of mystery and danger. I think that like Coraline, many adults are going to read this (look at this) and say "Oh My GOD, the CHILDREN WILL FREAK OUT!" because we as adults freak out, while the children reading it just shrug and say "Yep, life is crazy weird and unfair, and basically sucks a whole lot, but it is what it is."
So, what exactly is this?
Not sure. It will probably be very different for everyone, depending on how optimistic or pessimistic they are, whether they were an older or younger sibling, whether their siblings got along with them, deferred to them, or beat the shit out of them, whether they are confident or worried about being caught faking adulthood, whether they had (and remember) the utterly insane and totally horrific imaginary lives of children...
The outline - and a stark and grim outline it is - is in two parts. The artwork shows an older boy and a younger boy (the jacket flap identifies them as brothers, but the story (such as it is) doesn't make that obvious or necessary) engaging in various activities in a world of monstrous beings, where the older boy is confident and successful, and the younger is screwing up or being screwed over. The narration simply recites the Rules of Summer, which infers that the younger boy is violating said rules, thus explaining why his life is sucking so much.
A deeper look at the artwork and the mood of the progressing story shows a much grimmer story, where the two boys seem to live in a world where they are outliers and strangers, and where a hostile force (the black bird) is monitoring them closely every moment of their lives, and eventually breaking them apart.
Now for the interpretations:
On a fairly straightforward approach, it tells the story of a younger boy who is constantly trying to be loved and accepted and respected by his older brother. It tells clearly how powerful that desire can be, and brutally reveals how the people you love can (will?) betray and wound you deeply, and poses the question (to the readers at least - one of the final Rules is "Never ask for a reason" and an even later is "Never wait for an apology") of whether trust and love are enough of a compensation for that inevitable betrayal that appears as the coming of winter.
On a different slightly slanted approach, it tells the story of two young people trying desperately to survive and find enjoyment in a world that seems to be arbitrary and punitive and designed for beings and understandings that are manifestly NOT theirs. In this approach, the older boy is more of a guide, perhaps passing on these rules because of past negative experiences of his own. Here the reader wonders about things like parents and society and the history of this world.
In an even different angle, it shows how hard it is to be an older sibling, tasked with caring for (or even raising) a younger one. The older one tries hard to include the younger, and to instruct him in what he needs to learn to get along in society, but the younger continually screws up and causes trouble that the elder then has to resolve or otherwise mitigate. In this reading, the black bird becomes a visual representation of frustration and burnout, with the elder brother finally falling prey to temptation to offload his responsibilities for a much shinier alternative, and then trying to atone for his temporary lapse.
Whatever interpretation you bring, it's a gritty, dark story of responsibility and love and the connections between people and their world, where life can flip from being cruel and arbitrary to being wondrous and fulfilling - sometimes even in the same exact moment.
Rules of Summer
Shaun Tan
ISBN: 9780545639125
In a lot of ways, I think of Shaun Tan as the slightly more graphically-inclined psychological twin of Neil Gaiman. They both write these amazing, off-kilter stories that manage to be simultaneously totally ominous and cautiously optimistic, and with an edge of mystery and danger. I think that like Coraline, many adults are going to read this (look at this) and say "Oh My GOD, the CHILDREN WILL FREAK OUT!" because we as adults freak out, while the children reading it just shrug and say "Yep, life is crazy weird and unfair, and basically sucks a whole lot, but it is what it is."
So, what exactly is this?
Not sure. It will probably be very different for everyone, depending on how optimistic or pessimistic they are, whether they were an older or younger sibling, whether their siblings got along with them, deferred to them, or beat the shit out of them, whether they are confident or worried about being caught faking adulthood, whether they had (and remember) the utterly insane and totally horrific imaginary lives of children...
The outline - and a stark and grim outline it is - is in two parts. The artwork shows an older boy and a younger boy (the jacket flap identifies them as brothers, but the story (such as it is) doesn't make that obvious or necessary) engaging in various activities in a world of monstrous beings, where the older boy is confident and successful, and the younger is screwing up or being screwed over. The narration simply recites the Rules of Summer, which infers that the younger boy is violating said rules, thus explaining why his life is sucking so much.
A deeper look at the artwork and the mood of the progressing story shows a much grimmer story, where the two boys seem to live in a world where they are outliers and strangers, and where a hostile force (the black bird) is monitoring them closely every moment of their lives, and eventually breaking them apart.
Now for the interpretations:
On a fairly straightforward approach, it tells the story of a younger boy who is constantly trying to be loved and accepted and respected by his older brother. It tells clearly how powerful that desire can be, and brutally reveals how the people you love can (will?) betray and wound you deeply, and poses the question (to the readers at least - one of the final Rules is "Never ask for a reason" and an even later is "Never wait for an apology") of whether trust and love are enough of a compensation for that inevitable betrayal that appears as the coming of winter.
On a different slightly slanted approach, it tells the story of two young people trying desperately to survive and find enjoyment in a world that seems to be arbitrary and punitive and designed for beings and understandings that are manifestly NOT theirs. In this approach, the older boy is more of a guide, perhaps passing on these rules because of past negative experiences of his own. Here the reader wonders about things like parents and society and the history of this world.
In an even different angle, it shows how hard it is to be an older sibling, tasked with caring for (or even raising) a younger one. The older one tries hard to include the younger, and to instruct him in what he needs to learn to get along in society, but the younger continually screws up and causes trouble that the elder then has to resolve or otherwise mitigate. In this reading, the black bird becomes a visual representation of frustration and burnout, with the elder brother finally falling prey to temptation to offload his responsibilities for a much shinier alternative, and then trying to atone for his temporary lapse.
Whatever interpretation you bring, it's a gritty, dark story of responsibility and love and the connections between people and their world, where life can flip from being cruel and arbitrary to being wondrous and fulfilling - sometimes even in the same exact moment.
Picture Book Haul: A Library Book for Bear, Two Little Birds
We got so many new books in, and I liked most of them, but again, just going to feature my absolute favorites from the pile.
A Library Book for Bear
Bonny Becker, illustrated by Kady MacDonald Denton (The Sniffles for Bear)
ISBN: 9780763649241
Bear and Mouse are back again, and this time they're off to the Library. Bear is really not interested - he has seven whole books at home already - what more does he need? And of course, once he gets there, he's even more determined not to be impressed: too many books, too many topics, and OF COURSE HE USES HIS QUIET VOICE!. Mouse is discouraged and agrees to head home, but the library storyteller saves the day with an excellent book about a brave bear and some pickles. Cute and sarcastic addition to my growing collection of storytime books about going to the library.
Two Little Birds
Mary Newell DePalma
ISBN: 9780802854216
A beautiful and peaceful mix of painting and collage illustrates a gentle and nonfiction narrative of two orchard orioles from the Northeastern US across the country and the ocean to the Yucatan, and then back. Beautifully told, and the little birdies are so expressive. An author's note at the end explains their migration, and reminds readers and listeners to care for nature.
A Library Book for Bear
Bonny Becker, illustrated by Kady MacDonald Denton (The Sniffles for Bear)
ISBN: 9780763649241
Bear and Mouse are back again, and this time they're off to the Library. Bear is really not interested - he has seven whole books at home already - what more does he need? And of course, once he gets there, he's even more determined not to be impressed: too many books, too many topics, and OF COURSE HE USES HIS QUIET VOICE!. Mouse is discouraged and agrees to head home, but the library storyteller saves the day with an excellent book about a brave bear and some pickles. Cute and sarcastic addition to my growing collection of storytime books about going to the library.
Two Little Birds
Mary Newell DePalma
ISBN: 9780802854216
A beautiful and peaceful mix of painting and collage illustrates a gentle and nonfiction narrative of two orchard orioles from the Northeastern US across the country and the ocean to the Yucatan, and then back. Beautifully told, and the little birdies are so expressive. An author's note at the end explains their migration, and reminds readers and listeners to care for nature.
Picture Book Haul: Halloween books, I Am a Witch's Cat, and Ten Orange Pumpkins
Loads of picture books in today, and LOTS of them are Halloween/fall books. I'm thrilled with that, because Halloween is my favorite holiday, but I wanted to highlight my two absolute favorites.
I Am a Witch's Cat
Harriet Muncaster
ISBN: 9780062229144
Freaking ADORABLE. A little girl dressed up in a black cat pyjama suit wanders and frolics around informing people of all the things that make her homemaker mother actually a witch. Of course, it's all nonsense, as the illustrations clearly show a normal family and normal house. Until the last page where mom's night out has an entirely different meaning. I especially like that there's no indication one way or the other if mom is single, divorced, or married and enjoying a solo night out. The illustrations are equally awesome - on first glance, they look like straightforward collage or paper-mache, but a closer look reveals intricate created environments using cardboard and fabric and wires and paper cut outs and god knows what else amazingly transformed into living rooms, gardens, and shopping marts. Too cool. (Also a perfect length for storytime, so I have another good Halloween book that isn't too specifically Halloween - have to be careful about that in the Bible Belt.)
Ten Orange Pumpkins: A Counting Book
Stephen Savage (Little Tug)
ISBN: 9780803739383
(Phobia warning: GIANT (nonrealistic) SPIDER!)
I love our black cat companion. I love the subtle color-fades on the spreads. I love the stylized shadow-box scenery. I don't love spiders. BUT the rest of the book is so lovely, and the spider is likewise stylized (even though ENORMOUS) that I can make it through. Great progression, great reveal, simply delightful artwork. Excellent all around.
I Am a Witch's Cat
Harriet Muncaster
ISBN: 9780062229144
Freaking ADORABLE. A little girl dressed up in a black cat pyjama suit wanders and frolics around informing people of all the things that make her homemaker mother actually a witch. Of course, it's all nonsense, as the illustrations clearly show a normal family and normal house. Until the last page where mom's night out has an entirely different meaning. I especially like that there's no indication one way or the other if mom is single, divorced, or married and enjoying a solo night out. The illustrations are equally awesome - on first glance, they look like straightforward collage or paper-mache, but a closer look reveals intricate created environments using cardboard and fabric and wires and paper cut outs and god knows what else amazingly transformed into living rooms, gardens, and shopping marts. Too cool. (Also a perfect length for storytime, so I have another good Halloween book that isn't too specifically Halloween - have to be careful about that in the Bible Belt.)
Ten Orange Pumpkins: A Counting Book
Stephen Savage (Little Tug)
ISBN: 9780803739383
(Phobia warning: GIANT (nonrealistic) SPIDER!)
I love our black cat companion. I love the subtle color-fades on the spreads. I love the stylized shadow-box scenery. I don't love spiders. BUT the rest of the book is so lovely, and the spider is likewise stylized (even though ENORMOUS) that I can make it through. Great progression, great reveal, simply delightful artwork. Excellent all around.
Friday, September 19, 2014
Assassin's Gambit, Amy Raby
Assassin's Gambit
Hearts and Thrones #1
Amy Raby
ISBN: 9780451417824
Read Sept 16, 2014
Faux-historical 'roman empire' fantasy romance.
This one isn't a random romance read - I picked it up because it actually seemed like it would be decent. And it was!
Vitala is ethnically Riorcan, but appears to be a member of the Kjallan Empire, which has driven her small country into poverty and slavery for several generations. She's a freedom fighter, an assassin, and she has been trained for one single purpose - seduce and kill the young Emperor Lucien.
Of course, things never go according to plan, and the rest of the novel works through the implications of usurpers, dynastic squabbles, political relations, and ethnic tensions. And the really fascinating thing is that it actually worked really well. There might have been a place or two where a close look revealed the plot wheels grinding away, but for the majority of the book, I was totally willing to follow our two main characters along as they work out their political and personal difficulties.
The fantasy was minor and backgrounded despite being important to the plot on several occasions. It was fairly standard 'fantasy world magic' with wards and healers and specialized magic schools divided by class or country.
Technology was interesting - the country was an obvious Roman analogue, but they had gunpowder, cannon, single-shot personal guns, and explosives.
There was a fair amount of frank sex or sexual situations throughout - the main character is an assassin, trained to kill through (and with) seduction and sex, and that is dealt with quite plainly, as are several rape or dubiously consented sexual scenes.
The next in the set is Spy's Honor, which jumps back in time to a younger Lucien and his cousin Rianne (who makes a small appearance in this story).
Hearts and Thrones #1
Amy Raby
ISBN: 9780451417824
Read Sept 16, 2014
Faux-historical 'roman empire' fantasy romance.
This one isn't a random romance read - I picked it up because it actually seemed like it would be decent. And it was!
Vitala is ethnically Riorcan, but appears to be a member of the Kjallan Empire, which has driven her small country into poverty and slavery for several generations. She's a freedom fighter, an assassin, and she has been trained for one single purpose - seduce and kill the young Emperor Lucien.
Of course, things never go according to plan, and the rest of the novel works through the implications of usurpers, dynastic squabbles, political relations, and ethnic tensions. And the really fascinating thing is that it actually worked really well. There might have been a place or two where a close look revealed the plot wheels grinding away, but for the majority of the book, I was totally willing to follow our two main characters along as they work out their political and personal difficulties.
The fantasy was minor and backgrounded despite being important to the plot on several occasions. It was fairly standard 'fantasy world magic' with wards and healers and specialized magic schools divided by class or country.
Technology was interesting - the country was an obvious Roman analogue, but they had gunpowder, cannon, single-shot personal guns, and explosives.
There was a fair amount of frank sex or sexual situations throughout - the main character is an assassin, trained to kill through (and with) seduction and sex, and that is dealt with quite plainly, as are several rape or dubiously consented sexual scenes.
The next in the set is Spy's Honor, which jumps back in time to a younger Lucien and his cousin Rianne (who makes a small appearance in this story).
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Honorverse: A Call to Duty, Timothy Zahn, David Weber, Thomas Pope
A Call to Duty
Book 1 of Manticore Ascendant, of the Honorverse
David Weber, Timothy Zahn, Thomas Pope (go BuNine!)
ISBN: 9781476736846
Read September 15, 2014
Thanks to Dragoncon and a good friend, I got this way earlier than I should have (official pubdate is nearly a month off on October 7). I got my mitts on it on September 2nd, and I've been trying to hold off (to avoid spoilery bits) but I ran out of other things to read so here we are.
The good:
No endless meetings with talking heads. Not to say that there aren't both meetings and talking heads, and sometimes both, but they're short. Succinct even.
No characters we really know. Everyone here is from way back when, in the mists of Manticore's founding days, and the only character that has even shown up is Mr Long, of A Call to Arms short story from the Beginnings anthology, and that almost doesn't count since it was obviously planned to be a teaser.
Haven are the good guys. Like actual nice people with a functioning star system and neighbors who aren't either subjugated or frightened of being subjugated.
The navy SUCKS. Now, why is this a good thing? Because it gives us something to work out over the series - the question of how it went from mothballs to a national institution is an interesting one, and it's nice to have reasons to keep reading besides the immediate plot and characters. For a world as well-imagined and totally invested as the Honorverse, having this sort of 'background information' as part of the plotting and character motivation is really cool, and very fun to read.
The bad:
One of the downsides of making a stickler into your main character is that it's suddenly difficult to get a picture of them as a full person. Travis isn't quite jelling for me, and I know this author, and I have loved his characters (in fact, I love several of them in this book) just - none of them are the MAIN character. This might turn off less devoted fans of the Honorverse (translation: readers who aren't slavering fanatics like me) and that would be very sad.
The pacing is a little - fragmentary? Segmented? Disjointed. Piecemeal. None of those are quite what I want. I liked the individual sections very much, and I followed the chronology of the narrative just fine, but each time the overall scene shifted, it was a very BIG shift, and I can't quite put my finger on why. It was very peculiar, and frankly a little offputting. Each big break was an opportunity to out the book down, and I'm not used to those places being so obvious. Very weird.
The (totally unbiased and scientific) Verdict:
YAY! A new Honorverse book! Read all the books! Love them! Pre-order them from your favorite bookstore!
Seriously tho, a solid if slightly rocky new installment. Very much worth the read.
Book 1 of Manticore Ascendant, of the Honorverse
David Weber, Timothy Zahn, Thomas Pope (go BuNine!)
ISBN: 9781476736846
Read September 15, 2014
Thanks to Dragoncon and a good friend, I got this way earlier than I should have (official pubdate is nearly a month off on October 7). I got my mitts on it on September 2nd, and I've been trying to hold off (to avoid spoilery bits) but I ran out of other things to read so here we are.
The good:
No endless meetings with talking heads. Not to say that there aren't both meetings and talking heads, and sometimes both, but they're short. Succinct even.
No characters we really know. Everyone here is from way back when, in the mists of Manticore's founding days, and the only character that has even shown up is Mr Long, of A Call to Arms short story from the Beginnings anthology, and that almost doesn't count since it was obviously planned to be a teaser.
Haven are the good guys. Like actual nice people with a functioning star system and neighbors who aren't either subjugated or frightened of being subjugated.
The navy SUCKS. Now, why is this a good thing? Because it gives us something to work out over the series - the question of how it went from mothballs to a national institution is an interesting one, and it's nice to have reasons to keep reading besides the immediate plot and characters. For a world as well-imagined and totally invested as the Honorverse, having this sort of 'background information' as part of the plotting and character motivation is really cool, and very fun to read.
The bad:
One of the downsides of making a stickler into your main character is that it's suddenly difficult to get a picture of them as a full person. Travis isn't quite jelling for me, and I know this author, and I have loved his characters (in fact, I love several of them in this book) just - none of them are the MAIN character. This might turn off less devoted fans of the Honorverse (translation: readers who aren't slavering fanatics like me) and that would be very sad.
The pacing is a little - fragmentary? Segmented? Disjointed. Piecemeal. None of those are quite what I want. I liked the individual sections very much, and I followed the chronology of the narrative just fine, but each time the overall scene shifted, it was a very BIG shift, and I can't quite put my finger on why. It was very peculiar, and frankly a little offputting. Each big break was an opportunity to out the book down, and I'm not used to those places being so obvious. Very weird.
The (totally unbiased and scientific) Verdict:
YAY! A new Honorverse book! Read all the books! Love them! Pre-order them from your favorite bookstore!
Seriously tho, a solid if slightly rocky new installment. Very much worth the read.
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Graphic Novel: Hawkeye (collected issues: Hawkeye #1-11, Young Avengers Presents #6)
Hawkeye
Writer: Matt Fraction
Artists: David Aja, Javier Pulido, Steve Lieber, Jesse Hamm, Francesco Francavilla
Cover Artists: David Aja, Annie Wu, Francesco Francavilla
Color: Matt Hollingsworth, Francesco Francavilla
Letterer: Chris Eliopolos
ISBN: 9780785184874
Graphic Novel: Hawkeye issues #1-11, Young Avengers Presents #6
These are so much fun!
Poor Barton has such bad instincts. He gets himself into all sorts of scrapes that he really ought to know better than to get into, and only his truly astounding durability - and sometimes a little help from his friends - gets him back out in (mostly) one piece.
If you've ever wondered what the Avengers do when they're not on duty, here's the answer for Hawkeye at least - gets the piss beaten out of him by the tracksuited "Bro" gang, as well as other bad guys that he just happens to piss off in passing. He's good at that, almost as good as Spiderman, really. Unfortunately, he doesn't show Spidey's acrobatic prowess in avoiding getting hit, and he literally spends the entire comic collection acquiring and working off various injuries (sometimes serious ones) due to his extracurricular activities. Makes me wonder if perhaps he isn't safer ON the job than off it!
Writer: Matt Fraction
Artists: David Aja, Javier Pulido, Steve Lieber, Jesse Hamm, Francesco Francavilla
Cover Artists: David Aja, Annie Wu, Francesco Francavilla
Color: Matt Hollingsworth, Francesco Francavilla
Letterer: Chris Eliopolos
ISBN: 9780785184874
Graphic Novel: Hawkeye issues #1-11, Young Avengers Presents #6
These are so much fun!
Poor Barton has such bad instincts. He gets himself into all sorts of scrapes that he really ought to know better than to get into, and only his truly astounding durability - and sometimes a little help from his friends - gets him back out in (mostly) one piece.
If you've ever wondered what the Avengers do when they're not on duty, here's the answer for Hawkeye at least - gets the piss beaten out of him by the tracksuited "Bro" gang, as well as other bad guys that he just happens to piss off in passing. He's good at that, almost as good as Spiderman, really. Unfortunately, he doesn't show Spidey's acrobatic prowess in avoiding getting hit, and he literally spends the entire comic collection acquiring and working off various injuries (sometimes serious ones) due to his extracurricular activities. Makes me wonder if perhaps he isn't safer ON the job than off it!
Tuesday, September 16, 2014
Tuesday Storytime: Pigs in Strange Circumstances
Because JUST Pigs by themselves aren't nearly as fun to work with. :) Three excellent books, the storytime as a whole was a teensy bit long, but the individual stories (while long) had such good flow and interest value (at least for the parents) that they all went through quite well.
The Princess and the Pig
Jonathan Emmett, illustrated by Poly Bernatene
ISBN: 9780802723345
Junior Library Guild honor.
Love this book. Pigmella is a runt piglet rescued by a farmer at the market. Priscilla is the infant Princess. A dirty diaper and an inept Queen precipitate a mix-up between the two, which everyone tries to explain based on their preferred reading material, and then the story progresses as Pigmella (now a lovely girl in a loving family) blossoms, while Priscilla... well, she's just a pig. Bonus points for an illustration of the concept of putting lipstick on a pig for no real benefit. At the end, the honest farmers do try to set things right, but the royals will have none of it, and at least Pigmella has a happy ending.
Little Pink Pup
Johanna Kerby
ISBN: 9780399254352
nonfiction, photo-essay
I try to read nonfictions whenever I can, and I also try to use books with really nice photography as often as I can, so it's especially nice when the two converge. Not the most earthshaking plot, and the text is a little heavy-handed about the adoption./fosterchild overtones, but lovely sweet pictures illustrate the early life of the runty piglet Pink and his foster family of dogs. Cute, and longer than it seems at first.
Pigs Aplenty, Pigs Galore!
David McPhail
ISBN: 0525450793
sharp graphic style, lots of strange pigs, lots of stuff going on visually
I actually picked this book out as my keystone for this theme. I read it once before with a different theme (I think unwanted houseguests) and really enjoyed the poetry and flow and the sharp-edged illustrations. This is pretty common for me - I usually find one single book and think, ooooh! - and I picked it out in MARCH for a Pigs in Strange Circumstances storytime. Needless to say, the summer reading program didn't lend itself to pigs, and furthermore, the programming and otherwise busy library life kept me from even looking for companion books until last month. So, here it finally is, and I'm happy to say I loved reading it again, and thought that the overall theme was great fun. Here we start with the narrator slipping on a banana peel and falling, then experiencing a strange episode (or nightmare?) where pigs from far and wide converge on his home for a pizza party. Bizarre on the face of it, but a fun and quirky read.
The Princess and the Pig
Jonathan Emmett, illustrated by Poly Bernatene
ISBN: 9780802723345
Junior Library Guild honor.
Love this book. Pigmella is a runt piglet rescued by a farmer at the market. Priscilla is the infant Princess. A dirty diaper and an inept Queen precipitate a mix-up between the two, which everyone tries to explain based on their preferred reading material, and then the story progresses as Pigmella (now a lovely girl in a loving family) blossoms, while Priscilla... well, she's just a pig. Bonus points for an illustration of the concept of putting lipstick on a pig for no real benefit. At the end, the honest farmers do try to set things right, but the royals will have none of it, and at least Pigmella has a happy ending.
Little Pink Pup
Johanna Kerby
ISBN: 9780399254352
nonfiction, photo-essay
I try to read nonfictions whenever I can, and I also try to use books with really nice photography as often as I can, so it's especially nice when the two converge. Not the most earthshaking plot, and the text is a little heavy-handed about the adoption./fosterchild overtones, but lovely sweet pictures illustrate the early life of the runty piglet Pink and his foster family of dogs. Cute, and longer than it seems at first.
Pigs Aplenty, Pigs Galore!
David McPhail
ISBN: 0525450793
sharp graphic style, lots of strange pigs, lots of stuff going on visually
I actually picked this book out as my keystone for this theme. I read it once before with a different theme (I think unwanted houseguests) and really enjoyed the poetry and flow and the sharp-edged illustrations. This is pretty common for me - I usually find one single book and think, ooooh! - and I picked it out in MARCH for a Pigs in Strange Circumstances storytime. Needless to say, the summer reading program didn't lend itself to pigs, and furthermore, the programming and otherwise busy library life kept me from even looking for companion books until last month. So, here it finally is, and I'm happy to say I loved reading it again, and thought that the overall theme was great fun. Here we start with the narrator slipping on a banana peel and falling, then experiencing a strange episode (or nightmare?) where pigs from far and wide converge on his home for a pizza party. Bizarre on the face of it, but a fun and quirky read.
Monday, September 15, 2014
Nonfiction: Why Don't Students Like School? Daniel T. Willingham
Why Don't Students Like School
Daniel T. Willingham
ISBN: 9780470279304
Cognitive science provides answers to how best to teach and motivate students to learn.
I came across this via the footnotes in the book Curious and was surprised to find it actually in our library catalog.
Here Willingham provides 9 discrete cognitive science concepts that are, in his words: "so fundamental to the mind's operation that they do not change as circumstances change" (italics in original) and that meet three other criteria: "using vs ignoring a principle had to have a big impact on student learning" "an enormous amount of data... to support the principle" and the principle had to "suggest classroom applications that teachers might not already know."
Nicely reasoned set of concepts, and a great way to set out your purpose ahead of time.
Here are our principles, by the way, paraphrased wildly by me:
1) People are naturally curious, but we are not good at thinking.
2) Skill is based on a robust platform of "rote" knowledge
3) Memories are formed based on what we think about strongly or very often.
4) Context is key when learning anything new - we relate new things to familiar ones.
5) Practice makes permanent; about 10 years for most areas of study.
6) Novices and Experts think differently, and that's ok.
7) Learning "styles" or "abilities" (ie, kinesthetic or verbal learners) don't matter to learning UNLESS the content is that style (in other words, learning to sing the Star Spangled Banner vs learning ABOUT the Star Spangled Banner).
8) Intelligence is not static - hard work impacts IQ, knowledge base, and thinking skills.
9) Any skill has to be purposefully practiced to improve.
And there you have it.
He goes through each principle in a chapter, and lays out the science, the real-world implications, the applications in a classroom, some basic questions and answers, and why it's important. I love it when authors are systematic and organized like that.
Strongly considering adding this to my personal childhood development collection.
Daniel T. Willingham
ISBN: 9780470279304
Cognitive science provides answers to how best to teach and motivate students to learn.
I came across this via the footnotes in the book Curious and was surprised to find it actually in our library catalog.
Here Willingham provides 9 discrete cognitive science concepts that are, in his words: "so fundamental to the mind's operation that they do not change as circumstances change" (italics in original) and that meet three other criteria: "using vs ignoring a principle had to have a big impact on student learning" "an enormous amount of data... to support the principle" and the principle had to "suggest classroom applications that teachers might not already know."
Nicely reasoned set of concepts, and a great way to set out your purpose ahead of time.
Here are our principles, by the way, paraphrased wildly by me:
1) People are naturally curious, but we are not good at thinking.
2) Skill is based on a robust platform of "rote" knowledge
3) Memories are formed based on what we think about strongly or very often.
4) Context is key when learning anything new - we relate new things to familiar ones.
5) Practice makes permanent; about 10 years for most areas of study.
6) Novices and Experts think differently, and that's ok.
7) Learning "styles" or "abilities" (ie, kinesthetic or verbal learners) don't matter to learning UNLESS the content is that style (in other words, learning to sing the Star Spangled Banner vs learning ABOUT the Star Spangled Banner).
8) Intelligence is not static - hard work impacts IQ, knowledge base, and thinking skills.
9) Any skill has to be purposefully practiced to improve.
And there you have it.
He goes through each principle in a chapter, and lays out the science, the real-world implications, the applications in a classroom, some basic questions and answers, and why it's important. I love it when authors are systematic and organized like that.
Strongly considering adding this to my personal childhood development collection.
Sunday, September 14, 2014
Early Reader: The Would-Be Witch, Ruth Chew
The Would-Be Witch
Ruth Chew
ISBN: 0803880847
Early Reader:
Robin and her little brother Andy are intrigued by Zelda, the quirky owner of the bits-n-bobs antique store that just opened nearby. Robin is especially taken by the beautiful but troublemaking white cat named Pearl. Andy is more distracted by a sub-plot at home involving two beautiful salt and pepper shakers shaped like birds, brought to life by a pot of "magic" cleaning salve.
Ruth Chew is one of those authors who I wish I would have found when I was a child. The story here is cute and fairly bland, but witches were totally verboten when I was young. Strangely enough, in this particular story, it isn't the old quirky lady who has arcane powers, but the two children (via the cleaning salve), and I gather that is similar for most of Chew's stories.
Notable scenes:
Robin and Andy shrinking down due to the molted silver feathers of Salt and Pepper.
Kids flying on a dustpan.
Zelda getting broom-flying instructions from Robin.
Zelda in tears because she wants to be a witch, but keeps failing the entrance exam.
The cauldron of ?? that has to be hot to work.
The snippy creepy black cat coven in the basement of the abandoned apartment building.
Ruth Chew
ISBN: 0803880847
Early Reader:
Robin and her little brother Andy are intrigued by Zelda, the quirky owner of the bits-n-bobs antique store that just opened nearby. Robin is especially taken by the beautiful but troublemaking white cat named Pearl. Andy is more distracted by a sub-plot at home involving two beautiful salt and pepper shakers shaped like birds, brought to life by a pot of "magic" cleaning salve.
Ruth Chew is one of those authors who I wish I would have found when I was a child. The story here is cute and fairly bland, but witches were totally verboten when I was young. Strangely enough, in this particular story, it isn't the old quirky lady who has arcane powers, but the two children (via the cleaning salve), and I gather that is similar for most of Chew's stories.
Notable scenes:
Robin and Andy shrinking down due to the molted silver feathers of Salt and Pepper.
Kids flying on a dustpan.
Zelda getting broom-flying instructions from Robin.
Zelda in tears because she wants to be a witch, but keeps failing the entrance exam.
The cauldron of ?? that has to be hot to work.
The snippy creepy black cat coven in the basement of the abandoned apartment building.
Saturday, September 13, 2014
Early Reader: The Silver Balloon, Susan Bonners
The Silver Balloon
Susan Bonners
ISBN: 0374369135
Read Sept 11, 2014.
JuvFiction: A city boy sends a helium balloon "message in a bottle" and strikes up a correspondence and mystery gift exchange with the elderly farmer who finds it, learning confidence (and research skills) in the process.
This was really cute, and really short. I especially liked the author's end-note about not letting balloons go in real life, due to the potential harm to wild animals and to avoid litter in the natural environment.
Greg gets (and sends) various 'mystery items' through the post from his friend, and uses relatives and friends of the family and research trips to the library to figure out what they all are. I especially loved that the librarian featured so strongly and positively in this story, and that she and her relative in the natural museum are the key to solving the final mystery, and bringing Greg and his pen-pal together.
Super cute, and great for kids interested in nature and natural history especially.
Susan Bonners
ISBN: 0374369135
Read Sept 11, 2014.
JuvFiction: A city boy sends a helium balloon "message in a bottle" and strikes up a correspondence and mystery gift exchange with the elderly farmer who finds it, learning confidence (and research skills) in the process.
This was really cute, and really short. I especially liked the author's end-note about not letting balloons go in real life, due to the potential harm to wild animals and to avoid litter in the natural environment.
Greg gets (and sends) various 'mystery items' through the post from his friend, and uses relatives and friends of the family and research trips to the library to figure out what they all are. I especially loved that the librarian featured so strongly and positively in this story, and that she and her relative in the natural museum are the key to solving the final mystery, and bringing Greg and his pen-pal together.
Super cute, and great for kids interested in nature and natural history especially.
Friday, September 12, 2014
Nonfiction: Waking Up, Sam Harris
Waking Up: A guide to spirituality without religion
Sam Harris
ISBN: 9781451636017
Read Sept 10, 2014
Nonfiction: neuroscience, atheism, meditation practice, altered consciousness, the "self"
I don't think I've ever been proselytized by a hard atheist before.
I don't exactly know what to do with this book. I want to like it, but I come away from it much like you would a conversation with a "true believer" or the seriously drug-addicted ("seriously, man... just try it, man... It'll open your EYES, man!"). Harris very much believes what he's saying, and he believes that the evidence supports him, and he believes that if we try meditation, we'll understand it also. It's cool, man, I don't need any koolaid right now, thanks.
It's hard tho - he really does strenuously think that this is all about science and understanding the mind, but then he spends the majority of the book furiously pointing out how science doesn't have a clue (mainly because trying to figure out consciousness is like looking for the Big Bang or the Garden of Eden (depending on your allegiances) - you're working from echoes and ripples and consequences and shadows.) So here's this concept that he wants to present as scientific, but the science isn't there yet, but he's really really passionate about it, so he's just going to present his own personal experiences instead... and that's where it gets a little iffy.
Because anecdotes aren't data. They never will be, they just can't be. For all the time he spent drilling Dr Eben Alexander's "near death experience" (and don't you think for a minute that I didn't enjoy that section IMMENSELY more than any good-hearted person should have - and as a side-note, someone (ahem, Harris) going on about the benefits of boundless love and a sense of oneness with all people should perhaps not seem to enjoy himself quite so much in the process of skewering another fallible human...) he doesn't seem to see that he's done much the same thing with this book: he's presented his own experiences (and to be precise, lots of other people's experiences) as data points. You just can't have it both ways and be fair.
Still, I greatly enjoyed the interesting and quite literal mind-blow that was learning about the precarious nature of consciousness and sense of self. I think it's an interesting quirk of humanity's evolution, and wouldn't it be a laugh if the only thing keeping us from being a species of telepaths and empaths is this strange factory default where we only think that we're all alone inside our heads because our wires run that way?
So, final verdict: I'm glad I read it, but it's more of a polemic than a treatise. Which I think is a bit of a shame, personally.
Sam Harris
ISBN: 9781451636017
Read Sept 10, 2014
Nonfiction: neuroscience, atheism, meditation practice, altered consciousness, the "self"
I don't think I've ever been proselytized by a hard atheist before.
I don't exactly know what to do with this book. I want to like it, but I come away from it much like you would a conversation with a "true believer" or the seriously drug-addicted ("seriously, man... just try it, man... It'll open your EYES, man!"). Harris very much believes what he's saying, and he believes that the evidence supports him, and he believes that if we try meditation, we'll understand it also. It's cool, man, I don't need any koolaid right now, thanks.
It's hard tho - he really does strenuously think that this is all about science and understanding the mind, but then he spends the majority of the book furiously pointing out how science doesn't have a clue (mainly because trying to figure out consciousness is like looking for the Big Bang or the Garden of Eden (depending on your allegiances) - you're working from echoes and ripples and consequences and shadows.) So here's this concept that he wants to present as scientific, but the science isn't there yet, but he's really really passionate about it, so he's just going to present his own personal experiences instead... and that's where it gets a little iffy.
Because anecdotes aren't data. They never will be, they just can't be. For all the time he spent drilling Dr Eben Alexander's "near death experience" (and don't you think for a minute that I didn't enjoy that section IMMENSELY more than any good-hearted person should have - and as a side-note, someone (ahem, Harris) going on about the benefits of boundless love and a sense of oneness with all people should perhaps not seem to enjoy himself quite so much in the process of skewering another fallible human...) he doesn't seem to see that he's done much the same thing with this book: he's presented his own experiences (and to be precise, lots of other people's experiences) as data points. You just can't have it both ways and be fair.
Still, I greatly enjoyed the interesting and quite literal mind-blow that was learning about the precarious nature of consciousness and sense of self. I think it's an interesting quirk of humanity's evolution, and wouldn't it be a laugh if the only thing keeping us from being a species of telepaths and empaths is this strange factory default where we only think that we're all alone inside our heads because our wires run that way?
So, final verdict: I'm glad I read it, but it's more of a polemic than a treatise. Which I think is a bit of a shame, personally.
Thursday, September 11, 2014
The Gospel of Loki, Joanne M. Harris
The Gospel of Loki
Joanne M. Harris
ISBN: 9781473202351
Read Sept 10, 2014
Old Norse Mythological Cycle re-telling, possibly related to two novellas: Runemarks and Runelight.
The title itself is interesting, taking the flyting (think modern celebrity roast) poem "Lokasenna" and expanding it into a biased account of a larger narrative regarding the Aesir and Vanir of old Norse mythology.
Is it proper mythos? Nope. Anyone who reads fantasy novels to get actual real-world religious or mythological understanding really ought to know better. Not that they can't be read and enjoyed, nor that they can't be correct or insightful at times, but if this work is what you're basing your understanding of Norse mythos, or using to influence your personal way of life, or to establish your worship practices? Please just don't.
Is it mythic? Nope. The characters use odd and strangely dated slang ('chillax' would be the worst example, but there are many others, including a reference to a "teenage dirtbag" that literally made me roll my eyes). The mythic stories are hung into a vaguely chronological framework, and worked into episodes of a larger struggle (heralded by the "inevitable" approach of Ragnarok) between Loki and the Aesir and Vanir family and associates of his blood-brother Odin. The focus on family squabbles and individual mythic stories makes the whole seem much less epic in scope - even the eventual arrival and descent of Chaos (ie, Ragnarok itself) is framed as a personal struggle between Loki and the various people who have wronged him (the list is quite long at this point).
Is it fun? I thought so! It was a quick read, the stories themselves were familiar - Loki convincing Thor to dress up as a bride, the death of Baldur, Odin as the Wanderer, Loki's flyting episode - all were there, as well as many others that I've either forgotten or never learned (or were made up?).
Loki himself is the perfect unreliable narrator, his narcissism preventing him from ever making deep attachments or from casting himself as the eternal victim or from plotting over-reactive revenge for any slight. He reminds me of a family member, and I read the whole with a conflicting sense of exasperated affection and a burning desire to smack the shit out of him. That seems to be pretty accurate for the character.
Not earthshaking, not the best I've ever read, but for a very light-hearted introduction to the utter pompous asses of the Aesir and Vanir, and the utter self-absorbed vanity that is Loki, there are many worse things to read.
Joanne M. Harris
ISBN: 9781473202351
Read Sept 10, 2014
Old Norse Mythological Cycle re-telling, possibly related to two novellas: Runemarks and Runelight.
The title itself is interesting, taking the flyting (think modern celebrity roast) poem "Lokasenna" and expanding it into a biased account of a larger narrative regarding the Aesir and Vanir of old Norse mythology.
Is it proper mythos? Nope. Anyone who reads fantasy novels to get actual real-world religious or mythological understanding really ought to know better. Not that they can't be read and enjoyed, nor that they can't be correct or insightful at times, but if this work is what you're basing your understanding of Norse mythos, or using to influence your personal way of life, or to establish your worship practices? Please just don't.
Is it mythic? Nope. The characters use odd and strangely dated slang ('chillax' would be the worst example, but there are many others, including a reference to a "teenage dirtbag" that literally made me roll my eyes). The mythic stories are hung into a vaguely chronological framework, and worked into episodes of a larger struggle (heralded by the "inevitable" approach of Ragnarok) between Loki and the Aesir and Vanir family and associates of his blood-brother Odin. The focus on family squabbles and individual mythic stories makes the whole seem much less epic in scope - even the eventual arrival and descent of Chaos (ie, Ragnarok itself) is framed as a personal struggle between Loki and the various people who have wronged him (the list is quite long at this point).
Is it fun? I thought so! It was a quick read, the stories themselves were familiar - Loki convincing Thor to dress up as a bride, the death of Baldur, Odin as the Wanderer, Loki's flyting episode - all were there, as well as many others that I've either forgotten or never learned (or were made up?).
Loki himself is the perfect unreliable narrator, his narcissism preventing him from ever making deep attachments or from casting himself as the eternal victim or from plotting over-reactive revenge for any slight. He reminds me of a family member, and I read the whole with a conflicting sense of exasperated affection and a burning desire to smack the shit out of him. That seems to be pretty accurate for the character.
Not earthshaking, not the best I've ever read, but for a very light-hearted introduction to the utter pompous asses of the Aesir and Vanir, and the utter self-absorbed vanity that is Loki, there are many worse things to read.
Nonfiction: Eats, Shoots & Leaves by Lynne Truss
Eats, Shoots & Leaves; the zero tolerance approach to punctuation
Lynne Truss
ISBN: 0592400876
Finished Sept 9, 2014
Very funny, very very British. Loved the enormous section on commas. Would have actually enjoyed a bit more of the history of the punctuation marks - the little bits that were included were neat and much more chronologically and culturally varied than I had expected.
This edition (or perhaps even the original) even did a good job including the "American English" versions of names, but I was surprised that while she mentioned the "en dash" by proper name, she didn't go into the various (and peculiar) differences in usage between the en dash (the short one) and the em dash (the longer one, sometimes called a "horizontal bar"). Small quibbles compared to the fun of dealing with whether the punctuation should be inside or outside of the parentheses, er, brackets. :) (she's not really fond of emoticons either - I wonder what she thinks of emoji?)
Have to say I felt sorry for all the poor grocers who got totally pilloried in the course of the book, especially as concerns the use of the ' to indicate posession not plurality, as is the apparently widespread misconception.
Lighthearted self-deprecatory fussiness over correct behavior in the best way.
Lynne Truss
ISBN: 0592400876
Finished Sept 9, 2014
Very funny, very very British. Loved the enormous section on commas. Would have actually enjoyed a bit more of the history of the punctuation marks - the little bits that were included were neat and much more chronologically and culturally varied than I had expected.
This edition (or perhaps even the original) even did a good job including the "American English" versions of names, but I was surprised that while she mentioned the "en dash" by proper name, she didn't go into the various (and peculiar) differences in usage between the en dash (the short one) and the em dash (the longer one, sometimes called a "horizontal bar"). Small quibbles compared to the fun of dealing with whether the punctuation should be inside or outside of the parentheses, er, brackets. :) (she's not really fond of emoticons either - I wonder what she thinks of emoji?)
Have to say I felt sorry for all the poor grocers who got totally pilloried in the course of the book, especially as concerns the use of the ' to indicate posession not plurality, as is the apparently widespread misconception.
Lighthearted self-deprecatory fussiness over correct behavior in the best way.
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Gemsigns, Stephanie Sautler (Book 1 of REvolution Series)
Gemsigns
Stephanie Saulter
ISBN: 9781623651602
Dystopian near future, post-apocalypse, cloning, gengineering, gene therapy, social order, racial tensions, caste systems, slavery, human rights.
First off, I have to say that the author was very lucky that I did not have anything else I was interested in reading when I read the prologue/chapter zero. She is also lucky that I did not read that bit while I was still in the library, or it would have gone right the hell back onto the shelf. That was some pompous self-congratulatory word play and storyline musing going on in there. (The note on the jacket copy about wanting to write literary fiction didn't help her case with me either.)
However. I got past that, and the writing from then on was excellent! I had a great time reading, I enjoyed the story immensely, and I am glad to see that there is a series supposedly in the works. I have concerns about the worldbuilding and minor nits about characterization and plotting, but then I ALWAYS get snippy about worldbuilding, and characters and plots are difficult. For a first attempt? Pretty damn solid writing. I hope to someday do as well myself.
It's hard to summarize the world without getting into either plot-spoilage or my own worldbuilding gripes, but I'll give it a shot: (If you want to avoid spoilers of how the world got how it was, and learn about the world through the course of the book, stop reading now. It's all explained pretty well through in-universe sources over the course of the narrative.)
Seriously. Spoilers for worldbuilding.
Cool?
The world's population, some years from now, succumbed to a plot-device, er, disease, that necessitated massive advances in genetic engineering to ensure the survival of the species. Most religious and cultural objections were steamrolled (and subsequently eradicated) in the urgency, and the few outliers (social or religious) were isolated either willingly or unwillingly into ostracized camps of extremely small token minorities, while everyone else got on with the new reality of homogenized religious, cultural, and social mores which have made wars, violence, and "racial" differences largely an unremembered part of pre-disease history.
Due to the massive scale of the disease, the gene therapy for cure and prevention of the disease was scaffolded into further gene manipulation to provide the reduced population of normal humans with additional disease resistance and general health and long life. After all that work was put in, corporations realized they could encourage further modifications to create genetically-enhanced specimens to perform tasks which were now too hazardous or difficult to risk with precious rescued normal human lives.
Because it's important to know the difference between these creations (who are expensive and useful) and normal humans (who are precious and untouchable) the corporations designed obvious markers into the genetic expressions - glowing unnaturally colored hair becoming the standard. Adapted gene-lines were also distinguished by the presence of conditions which were negative expressions of useful traits: Enhanced visual light spectrums often came with synesthesia or migraines. Data-hacking or enhanced memory could result in autistic-like mentalities. Enhanced hearing, underwater breathing, or extra organs (for donation) all made obvious physical changes to the body. These mental or physical handicaps were not of concern to the corporations, as long as they did not too badly impact productivity. All of this was in stark contrast to normal humans, who by this point are all preternaturally healthy and largely physically homogenized. This all made identifying genetic property easier for the corporations, and easier for normals to think of them as "other" and to dismiss.
Eventually, these properties (GeneticallyModified, G-M, pronounced "gem") realized they were being used as slaves, rebelled, society was made aware of horrific systemic abuses by major corporate entities who "owned" these genetic profiles (and the resulting Gems), a limited Declaration of general universal human rights was created, and at the beginning of our tale, we're in London, preparing for a convention to decide on the possible avenues for granting limited or modified "human" rights to the recently emancipated populace of Gems.
Whew. That took some telling. Isn't it an interesting concept? Don't you want to read about the events leading up to this historic Conference, and the Gems and norms who will play a part in shaping the new social order?
I will mention my niggles, in vague and general terms, just to have them out.
1) The world is largely black&white. Evil is very evil, good is very good, no one is grey. In a situation and society such as described in the book, that seems a peculiar narrative choice.
2) Despite evil being very evil, most of the evil happens offstage, and not to main characters. Evil is also terribly incompetent and fragmentary.
3) There is one plot-point that is very difficult for a southern American to accept the way it was presented. I understand that things are quite different in other parts of the world, but as an American living in the Bible Belt, I can quite firmly say that particular revelation would not have been possible in any city near me, at any time in the future, regardless of the chaos and death between now and then. It was unfortunate, because it took me quite out of the story at a time when the climax was just getting rolling, and also because it really wasn't necessary to present it that way. In fact, it could have been built obviously into the narrative with no real difference in outcome. It seemed to be a cheap "look how different the future is!" trick, and it just fell flat for me.
4) There is a particular genetic modification that is difficult to rationalize from the explanations given. (I am prepared for this to be explained or dealt with in further books, but it is bothering me.)
5) One of the characters spends the entire book with hints dropped constantly at as to the nature of their genetic modification, and then the ending doesn't deal with one whole aspect of the hints. (Again, this could be purposefully kept for another book.)
6) General place-keeping tab for worldbuilding niggles that are too picky to really inflict on everyone else, but still bother me!
Overall, really glad I read it, and a really good debut by a new author.
Stephanie Saulter
ISBN: 9781623651602
Dystopian near future, post-apocalypse, cloning, gengineering, gene therapy, social order, racial tensions, caste systems, slavery, human rights.
First off, I have to say that the author was very lucky that I did not have anything else I was interested in reading when I read the prologue/chapter zero. She is also lucky that I did not read that bit while I was still in the library, or it would have gone right the hell back onto the shelf. That was some pompous self-congratulatory word play and storyline musing going on in there. (The note on the jacket copy about wanting to write literary fiction didn't help her case with me either.)
However. I got past that, and the writing from then on was excellent! I had a great time reading, I enjoyed the story immensely, and I am glad to see that there is a series supposedly in the works. I have concerns about the worldbuilding and minor nits about characterization and plotting, but then I ALWAYS get snippy about worldbuilding, and characters and plots are difficult. For a first attempt? Pretty damn solid writing. I hope to someday do as well myself.
It's hard to summarize the world without getting into either plot-spoilage or my own worldbuilding gripes, but I'll give it a shot: (If you want to avoid spoilers of how the world got how it was, and learn about the world through the course of the book, stop reading now. It's all explained pretty well through in-universe sources over the course of the narrative.)
Seriously. Spoilers for worldbuilding.
Cool?
The world's population, some years from now, succumbed to a plot-device, er, disease, that necessitated massive advances in genetic engineering to ensure the survival of the species. Most religious and cultural objections were steamrolled (and subsequently eradicated) in the urgency, and the few outliers (social or religious) were isolated either willingly or unwillingly into ostracized camps of extremely small token minorities, while everyone else got on with the new reality of homogenized religious, cultural, and social mores which have made wars, violence, and "racial" differences largely an unremembered part of pre-disease history.
Due to the massive scale of the disease, the gene therapy for cure and prevention of the disease was scaffolded into further gene manipulation to provide the reduced population of normal humans with additional disease resistance and general health and long life. After all that work was put in, corporations realized they could encourage further modifications to create genetically-enhanced specimens to perform tasks which were now too hazardous or difficult to risk with precious rescued normal human lives.
Because it's important to know the difference between these creations (who are expensive and useful) and normal humans (who are precious and untouchable) the corporations designed obvious markers into the genetic expressions - glowing unnaturally colored hair becoming the standard. Adapted gene-lines were also distinguished by the presence of conditions which were negative expressions of useful traits: Enhanced visual light spectrums often came with synesthesia or migraines. Data-hacking or enhanced memory could result in autistic-like mentalities. Enhanced hearing, underwater breathing, or extra organs (for donation) all made obvious physical changes to the body. These mental or physical handicaps were not of concern to the corporations, as long as they did not too badly impact productivity. All of this was in stark contrast to normal humans, who by this point are all preternaturally healthy and largely physically homogenized. This all made identifying genetic property easier for the corporations, and easier for normals to think of them as "other" and to dismiss.
Eventually, these properties (GeneticallyModified, G-M, pronounced "gem") realized they were being used as slaves, rebelled, society was made aware of horrific systemic abuses by major corporate entities who "owned" these genetic profiles (and the resulting Gems), a limited Declaration of general universal human rights was created, and at the beginning of our tale, we're in London, preparing for a convention to decide on the possible avenues for granting limited or modified "human" rights to the recently emancipated populace of Gems.
Whew. That took some telling. Isn't it an interesting concept? Don't you want to read about the events leading up to this historic Conference, and the Gems and norms who will play a part in shaping the new social order?
I will mention my niggles, in vague and general terms, just to have them out.
1) The world is largely black&white. Evil is very evil, good is very good, no one is grey. In a situation and society such as described in the book, that seems a peculiar narrative choice.
2) Despite evil being very evil, most of the evil happens offstage, and not to main characters. Evil is also terribly incompetent and fragmentary.
3) There is one plot-point that is very difficult for a southern American to accept the way it was presented. I understand that things are quite different in other parts of the world, but as an American living in the Bible Belt, I can quite firmly say that particular revelation would not have been possible in any city near me, at any time in the future, regardless of the chaos and death between now and then. It was unfortunate, because it took me quite out of the story at a time when the climax was just getting rolling, and also because it really wasn't necessary to present it that way. In fact, it could have been built obviously into the narrative with no real difference in outcome. It seemed to be a cheap "look how different the future is!" trick, and it just fell flat for me.
4) There is a particular genetic modification that is difficult to rationalize from the explanations given. (I am prepared for this to be explained or dealt with in further books, but it is bothering me.)
5) One of the characters spends the entire book with hints dropped constantly at as to the nature of their genetic modification, and then the ending doesn't deal with one whole aspect of the hints. (Again, this could be purposefully kept for another book.)
6) General place-keeping tab for worldbuilding niggles that are too picky to really inflict on everyone else, but still bother me!
Overall, really glad I read it, and a really good debut by a new author.
New Juv Arrivals: Shipbuilding, Leeches, and adorable crafted worlds
Got some new arrivals today, and some interesting ones in the batch!
The Shipbuilders
Colonial People Series, by Cavendish Square
Ann Heinrichs
ISBN: 9780761400059
(entire series possibly useful for Mill Story)
nonfiction: colonial life, colonial trades, historical work and crafts
Really in-depth overview (for a juvenile book) of the shipbuilding process from a lot of different angles. Covers the reasons behind colonial shipyards developing, to the various craftsmen (usually men) involved in the processes, to detailed descriptions of some of the processes (sawyering, rope-making, and sail-making were highlighted), to implications of the trade on the Revolutionary War, to developments in ironsides and steam ships, to modern replica and recreation work.
Lovely illustrations and modern photographs of re-created ships. The use of photos instead of old line drawings for the majority of the illustrations really makes the concept more lively and clear; a very good choice.
Includes a glossary of terms, a resources page, and a comprehensive index of terms, subjects, and illustrations.
Leeches Eat Blood!
Disgusting Animal Dinners Series, by PowerKids Press
Miriam Coleman
ISBN: 9781477728819
nonfiction: life science, "eww, gross" subjects
So, did you know that leeches and worms were in the same family? I didn't. Other nifty leech facts - the big sucker is actually their head, but it's only there to keep the leech attached. Their actual mouth is in the small sucker on their rear. Ok, eww. Factual, freaky, and matter of fact about these repulsive and fascinating little creatures, and even a nice coda about their modern use in science due to their nifty anti-coagulant spit. Have to say, having done both, I'd rather a medicinal leech than a medicinal mosquito! At least the leeches don't leave nasty itchy spots. There is a delicate balance maintained between presenting information and glorying in the eww gross a leech impulse, and I'm impressed by that.
Hank Finds an Egg
Creator, Rebecca Dudley
ISBN: 9781441311580
Wordless picture book: scenes entirely created, posed, and sequenced by the creator.
This is an adorable book. A plushy little anthropomorphic animal (looks like a cross between a teddy bear and a monkey) is wandering an old-growth forest and finds an egg beneath a tree. It immediately spots the nest above, and spends an afternoon trying to return the egg, but failing (basket isn't high enough, neither are the stumps gathered, neither is the ladder constructed) and it camps overnight with the egg until morning, when the parent of the egg arrives to make the delivery much easier. Immediately afterwards, the hatchlings emerge, providing new friends for our sweet protagonist. The jacket flap and the title indicate that our little friend is named Hank, but without that info, the stuffed cutie (and the feathered parent and subsequent hatchlings) could be anyone or any gender.
The Shipbuilders
Colonial People Series, by Cavendish Square
Ann Heinrichs
ISBN: 9780761400059
(entire series possibly useful for Mill Story)
nonfiction: colonial life, colonial trades, historical work and crafts
Really in-depth overview (for a juvenile book) of the shipbuilding process from a lot of different angles. Covers the reasons behind colonial shipyards developing, to the various craftsmen (usually men) involved in the processes, to detailed descriptions of some of the processes (sawyering, rope-making, and sail-making were highlighted), to implications of the trade on the Revolutionary War, to developments in ironsides and steam ships, to modern replica and recreation work.
Lovely illustrations and modern photographs of re-created ships. The use of photos instead of old line drawings for the majority of the illustrations really makes the concept more lively and clear; a very good choice.
Includes a glossary of terms, a resources page, and a comprehensive index of terms, subjects, and illustrations.
Leeches Eat Blood!
Disgusting Animal Dinners Series, by PowerKids Press
Miriam Coleman
ISBN: 9781477728819
nonfiction: life science, "eww, gross" subjects
So, did you know that leeches and worms were in the same family? I didn't. Other nifty leech facts - the big sucker is actually their head, but it's only there to keep the leech attached. Their actual mouth is in the small sucker on their rear. Ok, eww. Factual, freaky, and matter of fact about these repulsive and fascinating little creatures, and even a nice coda about their modern use in science due to their nifty anti-coagulant spit. Have to say, having done both, I'd rather a medicinal leech than a medicinal mosquito! At least the leeches don't leave nasty itchy spots. There is a delicate balance maintained between presenting information and glorying in the eww gross a leech impulse, and I'm impressed by that.
Hank Finds an Egg
Creator, Rebecca Dudley
ISBN: 9781441311580
Wordless picture book: scenes entirely created, posed, and sequenced by the creator.
This is an adorable book. A plushy little anthropomorphic animal (looks like a cross between a teddy bear and a monkey) is wandering an old-growth forest and finds an egg beneath a tree. It immediately spots the nest above, and spends an afternoon trying to return the egg, but failing (basket isn't high enough, neither are the stumps gathered, neither is the ladder constructed) and it camps overnight with the egg until morning, when the parent of the egg arrives to make the delivery much easier. Immediately afterwards, the hatchlings emerge, providing new friends for our sweet protagonist. The jacket flap and the title indicate that our little friend is named Hank, but without that info, the stuffed cutie (and the feathered parent and subsequent hatchlings) could be anyone or any gender.
Tuesday, September 9, 2014
Nonfiction: Curious, Ian Leslie
Curious: the desire to know and why your future depends on it
Ian Leslie
ISBN: 9780465079964
Read Sept 7, 2014
Interesting read about curiousity, how it works, why it's important, and how it's been regarded historically-speaking.
The author gets a little fired up about "progressive" ideas about education and how they all totally miss the point, which seems to be a bit of axe-grinding. (I'm not contesting his premise that curiosity needs to be fed with regular and quality applications of knowledge, but I am a bit iffy on his emphatic extrapolation that all forms of "progressive" educational policy (montessori, child-led, etc.) are total rubbish that are ruining children's minds.)
The most interesting idea that was presented is a dichotomy between puzzles and mysteries; puzzles having a solid answer, and mysteries being more amorphous or complex or potential-filled to be locked down into something so simple as "an answer."
The notes at the end are also worth checking out - the author doesn't rely on them to explain the book contents (which are taken care of IN the book, a practice I heartily endorse) - but to enhance or travel further down a particular rabbit-hole of interest. I LOVE it when notes are interesting and further the context and information presented.
Finally, a shout-out to the cover. Nicole Caputo should be congratulated for her sparse and striking design, as should Michael Duva of Getty for the picture itself. Simply brilliant.
Ian Leslie
ISBN: 9780465079964
Read Sept 7, 2014
Interesting read about curiousity, how it works, why it's important, and how it's been regarded historically-speaking.
The author gets a little fired up about "progressive" ideas about education and how they all totally miss the point, which seems to be a bit of axe-grinding. (I'm not contesting his premise that curiosity needs to be fed with regular and quality applications of knowledge, but I am a bit iffy on his emphatic extrapolation that all forms of "progressive" educational policy (montessori, child-led, etc.) are total rubbish that are ruining children's minds.)
The most interesting idea that was presented is a dichotomy between puzzles and mysteries; puzzles having a solid answer, and mysteries being more amorphous or complex or potential-filled to be locked down into something so simple as "an answer."
The notes at the end are also worth checking out - the author doesn't rely on them to explain the book contents (which are taken care of IN the book, a practice I heartily endorse) - but to enhance or travel further down a particular rabbit-hole of interest. I LOVE it when notes are interesting and further the context and information presented.
Finally, a shout-out to the cover. Nicole Caputo should be congratulated for her sparse and striking design, as should Michael Duva of Getty for the picture itself. Simply brilliant.
Tuesday Storytime: Mice
I love mice. They're cute and furry and there's eleventy bazillion picture books about them.
Today's lineup:
Seven Blind Mice
Ed Young
ISBN: 9780399222610
Caldecott Honor Book, colorblock mice and textured elephant against a black background.
Ed Young is a genius, and I love this book. It's fairly short, easy to read and for kids to understand, and the contrasts between the actual elephant body part and the interpretation that the mouse makes is really startling. The trunk-to-snake transformation was especially a hit. I also really enjoy the size contrast between the panels with the mice (in various configurations) and then the panels with the mice appearing as tiny little color blobs against the enormity of the textural tan elephant body parts. The ONLY thing that bothers me (and I freely admit to overthinking things) is that I'm a little bummed that it was a white mouse who figured out the puzzle of the elephant. I know that in color theory for light, white is the combination of all colors, but it still bugs me. (/overthinking)
Mouse Mess
Linnea Riley
ISBN: 0590100483
Halfway between naive and pop-art, a chunky brown mouse trashes a kitchen as he eats.
This one is a first read for me, and I really liked it. The fun here is that the mouse works his way steadily through various foods, leaving a huge mess behind him, and then at the end, finally notices the state of the kitchen, and immediately blames it on the absent humans before self-centeredly heading back to bed and leaving the mess behind. Funny, short, and simple.
Mice
Original rhyme by Rose Fyleman, illustrated by Lois Ehlert
ISBN: 9781442456846
Mixed-media collage of funky big-eyed, big-toothed mice and various household objects and foods.
Lois Ehlert is a master of creating amazingly textured collage creations, and this one is no different. Set to the old rhyme "I think mice are rather nice..." it does drag a wee bit with stretching the rhyming lines out onto multiple spreads, but the illustrations are so quirky and the rhyme so short that I almost don't mind the stretch. The end has a lovely surprise as the narrator is revealed to be someone who perhaps thinks mice are "nice" in a very different way that initially imagined.
This set as a whole is really nice, because all three of them feature black or dark backgrounds, but each of them is still as totally different as can be. I really love showcasing the variety of artistic styles and types of presentations that can work within picture book format, and I was very happy with how it turned out to be so varied this time.
Bonus book (under consideration but too long for my age-group)
Library Mouse
Daniel Kirk
ISBN: 9780810993464
Beginning of a series, text-heavy. Notable artificial 3-D animated feel to surfaces and textures.
Sam is a library mouse, and he loves his home near the children's department. Every night Sam read from the books in the library, and he soon decided that he wanted to write a book himself. So he wrote it, illustrated it, bound it, and shelved it (alert readers will note that he shelves his books in the right places), where it was subsequently found by the library patrons. He does this again and again, writing lots of different books, and eventually the library wants to know who their mystery author is. Sam doesn't want to give up his secret identity or get evicted, so he creates a clever ruse that encourages other patrons of the library to become writers as well. Interesting story, serviceable illustrations, and a great introduction to demystifying the writing process for very young kids. Seems like it would be excellent for classroom use.
Today's lineup:
Seven Blind Mice
Ed Young
ISBN: 9780399222610
Caldecott Honor Book, colorblock mice and textured elephant against a black background.
Ed Young is a genius, and I love this book. It's fairly short, easy to read and for kids to understand, and the contrasts between the actual elephant body part and the interpretation that the mouse makes is really startling. The trunk-to-snake transformation was especially a hit. I also really enjoy the size contrast between the panels with the mice (in various configurations) and then the panels with the mice appearing as tiny little color blobs against the enormity of the textural tan elephant body parts. The ONLY thing that bothers me (and I freely admit to overthinking things) is that I'm a little bummed that it was a white mouse who figured out the puzzle of the elephant. I know that in color theory for light, white is the combination of all colors, but it still bugs me. (/overthinking)
Mouse Mess
Linnea Riley
ISBN: 0590100483
Halfway between naive and pop-art, a chunky brown mouse trashes a kitchen as he eats.
This one is a first read for me, and I really liked it. The fun here is that the mouse works his way steadily through various foods, leaving a huge mess behind him, and then at the end, finally notices the state of the kitchen, and immediately blames it on the absent humans before self-centeredly heading back to bed and leaving the mess behind. Funny, short, and simple.
Mice
Original rhyme by Rose Fyleman, illustrated by Lois Ehlert
ISBN: 9781442456846
Mixed-media collage of funky big-eyed, big-toothed mice and various household objects and foods.
Lois Ehlert is a master of creating amazingly textured collage creations, and this one is no different. Set to the old rhyme "I think mice are rather nice..." it does drag a wee bit with stretching the rhyming lines out onto multiple spreads, but the illustrations are so quirky and the rhyme so short that I almost don't mind the stretch. The end has a lovely surprise as the narrator is revealed to be someone who perhaps thinks mice are "nice" in a very different way that initially imagined.
This set as a whole is really nice, because all three of them feature black or dark backgrounds, but each of them is still as totally different as can be. I really love showcasing the variety of artistic styles and types of presentations that can work within picture book format, and I was very happy with how it turned out to be so varied this time.
Bonus book (under consideration but too long for my age-group)
Library Mouse
Daniel Kirk
ISBN: 9780810993464
Beginning of a series, text-heavy. Notable artificial 3-D animated feel to surfaces and textures.
Sam is a library mouse, and he loves his home near the children's department. Every night Sam read from the books in the library, and he soon decided that he wanted to write a book himself. So he wrote it, illustrated it, bound it, and shelved it (alert readers will note that he shelves his books in the right places), where it was subsequently found by the library patrons. He does this again and again, writing lots of different books, and eventually the library wants to know who their mystery author is. Sam doesn't want to give up his secret identity or get evicted, so he creates a clever ruse that encourages other patrons of the library to become writers as well. Interesting story, serviceable illustrations, and a great introduction to demystifying the writing process for very young kids. Seems like it would be excellent for classroom use.
Monday, September 8, 2014
Nonfiction: what if? by Randall Munroe of xkcd
What If? Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions
Randall Munroe
ISBN: 9780544272996
Read Sept 6, 2014.
This was an awesome tour of applied sciences. From the standard "what if the sun went out?" to the specific "what if I went swimmng in a spent-nuclear-fuel pool?" to the obviously very concerning (sooo many questions about lightning strikes!) we get researched, fact-based answers (and some cartoons and bonus snarking) that reveals the usually pretty terrible things that would happen in most of our daydreaming "what if" scenarios.
Damn good writing, explaining, and selecting interesting questions to deal with. Including the un-answered "Weird (and Worrying) Questions" was brilliant.
My favorite probably is the detailed and gruesome explanation of why the periodic table is not at all like pokemon.
Randall Munroe
ISBN: 9780544272996
Read Sept 6, 2014.
This was an awesome tour of applied sciences. From the standard "what if the sun went out?" to the specific "what if I went swimmng in a spent-nuclear-fuel pool?" to the obviously very concerning (sooo many questions about lightning strikes!) we get researched, fact-based answers (and some cartoons and bonus snarking) that reveals the usually pretty terrible things that would happen in most of our daydreaming "what if" scenarios.
Damn good writing, explaining, and selecting interesting questions to deal with. Including the un-answered "Weird (and Worrying) Questions" was brilliant.
My favorite probably is the detailed and gruesome explanation of why the periodic table is not at all like pokemon.
Picture Book C&C: The Reluctant Dragon, and The Reluctant Dragon (abridged)
The original Reluctant Dragon first showed up as a chapter in Dream Days, by Kenneth Grahame (of Wind in the Willows fame) and was subsequently adapted by just about everyone, in just about every format imaginable. The one I read as a child was illustrated by Michael Hague (who remains my favorite illustrator of that particular story), and was first published in the 1960s. I've compared it to a more recent edition that was abridged by Inga Moore (Six-Dinner Sid) from 2004. I was trying to find a version short enough to use for my toddler-level storytime, but even her abridgment was way too long for my needs. (For the curious, I ended up with Tomie DePaola's The Knight and the Dragon which covers very nearly the same territory.)
The Reluctant Dragon
Kenneth Grahame, illustrated by Michael Hague
ISBN: 9780030640315
Holt, Rinehart, & Winston 1983, hardcover, 42 pages.
The Reluctant Dragon (abridged)
Kenneth Grahame, abridged by Inga Moore, illustrated by Inga Moore
ISBN: 0763621994
Candlewick, 2004, hardcover, 52 pages.
(page count is higher due to greater number and size of illustrations)
Short verdict: Classic wins, but not by much.
Longer verdict:
Illustrations - I like the bright crisp colors and the almost Kate Greenaway romantic childhood English feel of Inga Moore's version, but despite the appeal of a bright sky-blue dragon cavorting in flowery meadows under the sun, I still prefer the super-detailed and slightly more "realistic" drawings of Michael Hague. Classic wins out for me, but for people preferring brighter colors or slightly more cartoonish presentation, Moore's is lovely. Finally, Moore's is unquestionably the more richly illustrated - nearly all the pages are illustrated, and there are many full spreads.
Language: For the very young, the abridgment elides many of the adult or unpleasant asides, but I feel like some of the interest and peculiarity of the original language is lost along the way. For parents or teachers looking for a version with fewer objectionable elements, the abridgment is likely to be much preferred: the drunken dragon at the end is made simply tired, many of the double-entendre asides by the adults or the dragon are removed or rephrased to alter their meaning, and most interestingly, the villagers baiting the badger for sport (and the creature's subsequent rescue by Sir George) is entirely removed from the story.
So - either one is delightful, but I remain firmly on the side of my own childhood favorite (most likely because it IS my childhood favorite) despite a beautiful presentation by Inga Moore.
Nonfiction: Happiness by Design, Paul Dolan
Happiness by Design: change what you do, not how you think
Paul Dolan, PhD
ISBN: 9781594632433
Read Sept 5, 2014
First off, it is an excellent premise, and I totally agree. We think about "being" happy, but what makes us happy (or contented, or purposeful) is what we're doing, and how we think about what we're doing. We need to figure out what we think about the most, and DO things that correlate with those thought-patterns (and also provide pleasure or purpose) to work with the architecture of our minds to become happy as a habit, or as a life-pattern, rather than trying to find interesting special occasions or special activities which take effort and often don't work as well as anticipated to impact our happiness.
Secondly (and on a much less happy note) I feel like this book wasn't as powerful as it might have been. My two main concerns are the content value, and the advice value.
For the content, it very strongly feels that this was a series of lectures or inspirational speeches that was heavily padded out into a book. There just wasn't enough substance here for me to really feel like it deserved a full book, and I was shocked at how little was actually in there. The book starts with explaining the study of happiness, the ideas of public policy, and the science behind what we do and how we think. At the halfway mark, we finally get into the "change what you do, not how you think" bit, and I was very ready for the author to get on with it. I would have liked a broader and quicker brush over the current state of affairs and why it isn't working, and a much more robust section on the neuroscience and behavior studies supporting specific ideas for maximizing happiness.
For the advice, to my surprise, even though the title practically promised concrete advice, there was actually very little there as well. In fairness, there was a lot of general advice, which perhaps was what the author preferred, but I've found that people like specifics, especially in what are essentially self-help books. If we were as savvy about our happiness as to already know what we needed to do to be happy, perhaps we would not be reading a book about it for advice, no? Despite having a very intriguing and promising premise, it gets bogged down into digressions on public policy or on attention limits and attention deficits. I think that a breakdown of his advice into more concrete, action-oriented sections, with specific suggestions for activities in each (perhaps geared towards different "personality types" to fine-tune the approach) would have made the second half of the book a lot stronger. An irony is that the author specifically and repeatedly brings up the point that we remember the last bits of something and judge the entirety by the feelings sparked by the ending.
Those are my two main quibbles, and I do think there is a lot of potential here - it just seems to me like potential that would be better met with a TED Talk or a lecture series, or perhaps a Q&A with the author to brainstorm specific ideas for happiness creation, or perhaps a judicious hard edit and restructuring.
Paul Dolan, PhD
ISBN: 9781594632433
Read Sept 5, 2014
First off, it is an excellent premise, and I totally agree. We think about "being" happy, but what makes us happy (or contented, or purposeful) is what we're doing, and how we think about what we're doing. We need to figure out what we think about the most, and DO things that correlate with those thought-patterns (and also provide pleasure or purpose) to work with the architecture of our minds to become happy as a habit, or as a life-pattern, rather than trying to find interesting special occasions or special activities which take effort and often don't work as well as anticipated to impact our happiness.
Secondly (and on a much less happy note) I feel like this book wasn't as powerful as it might have been. My two main concerns are the content value, and the advice value.
For the content, it very strongly feels that this was a series of lectures or inspirational speeches that was heavily padded out into a book. There just wasn't enough substance here for me to really feel like it deserved a full book, and I was shocked at how little was actually in there. The book starts with explaining the study of happiness, the ideas of public policy, and the science behind what we do and how we think. At the halfway mark, we finally get into the "change what you do, not how you think" bit, and I was very ready for the author to get on with it. I would have liked a broader and quicker brush over the current state of affairs and why it isn't working, and a much more robust section on the neuroscience and behavior studies supporting specific ideas for maximizing happiness.
For the advice, to my surprise, even though the title practically promised concrete advice, there was actually very little there as well. In fairness, there was a lot of general advice, which perhaps was what the author preferred, but I've found that people like specifics, especially in what are essentially self-help books. If we were as savvy about our happiness as to already know what we needed to do to be happy, perhaps we would not be reading a book about it for advice, no? Despite having a very intriguing and promising premise, it gets bogged down into digressions on public policy or on attention limits and attention deficits. I think that a breakdown of his advice into more concrete, action-oriented sections, with specific suggestions for activities in each (perhaps geared towards different "personality types" to fine-tune the approach) would have made the second half of the book a lot stronger. An irony is that the author specifically and repeatedly brings up the point that we remember the last bits of something and judge the entirety by the feelings sparked by the ending.
Those are my two main quibbles, and I do think there is a lot of potential here - it just seems to me like potential that would be better met with a TED Talk or a lecture series, or perhaps a Q&A with the author to brainstorm specific ideas for happiness creation, or perhaps a judicious hard edit and restructuring.
Friday, September 5, 2014
Nonfiction: Unruly Places, Alastair Bonnett
Unruly Places: lost spaces, secret cities, and other inscrutable geographies
Alastair Bonnett
ISBN: 9780544101579
Finished Sept 4, 2014.
This book wasn't exactly what I was expecting. Based on the blurb and the cover, it seemed to promise more of an urban exploration sort of vibe, very down to earth, lots of pictures of abandoned buildings and secretly trespassing into areas forgotten by most. The sort of story where parkour as a celebration of space is treated non-ironically.
Instead, we have this odd little tome of a book, full of scholarly meanderings and callbacks to ancient theories of philosophy and college flirtations with the benefits of anarchy, and wild geographic rambles from the garbage vortex (not exactly what I would think of as a "place" in sense that the cover promised) to political enclaves to cruiseships to the rise and fall of Sealand, to the "marginal spaces" that children claim for their own imaginative play.
So, it wasn't what I expected, but it was an interesting read. I wasn't (perhaps because I wasn't expecting it) really fond of the overly pedantic professorial tone - I felt I was being talked down to a bit, or like listening to that one relative who goes on forever about the deep and meaningful concepts that he learned in school and life.
On the other hand, I was introduced to a variety of places that I would not ever have otherwise known about, and while some were not very historically or universally interesting (Did the highway median really deserve a place in the book? And the "dogging" site? Was that necessary?) there were lots of places where a urban explorer or a parkour maniac would never think to visit and talk about.
So, overall verdict: a bit ponderous (especially given the smallish size and lots of page breaks) but an interesting travelogue to the strange and overlooked places of the world, with a hefty side order of philosophy and thoughts on human nature and preferences.
Alastair Bonnett
ISBN: 9780544101579
Finished Sept 4, 2014.
This book wasn't exactly what I was expecting. Based on the blurb and the cover, it seemed to promise more of an urban exploration sort of vibe, very down to earth, lots of pictures of abandoned buildings and secretly trespassing into areas forgotten by most. The sort of story where parkour as a celebration of space is treated non-ironically.
Instead, we have this odd little tome of a book, full of scholarly meanderings and callbacks to ancient theories of philosophy and college flirtations with the benefits of anarchy, and wild geographic rambles from the garbage vortex (not exactly what I would think of as a "place" in sense that the cover promised) to political enclaves to cruiseships to the rise and fall of Sealand, to the "marginal spaces" that children claim for their own imaginative play.
So, it wasn't what I expected, but it was an interesting read. I wasn't (perhaps because I wasn't expecting it) really fond of the overly pedantic professorial tone - I felt I was being talked down to a bit, or like listening to that one relative who goes on forever about the deep and meaningful concepts that he learned in school and life.
On the other hand, I was introduced to a variety of places that I would not ever have otherwise known about, and while some were not very historically or universally interesting (Did the highway median really deserve a place in the book? And the "dogging" site? Was that necessary?) there were lots of places where a urban explorer or a parkour maniac would never think to visit and talk about.
So, overall verdict: a bit ponderous (especially given the smallish size and lots of page breaks) but an interesting travelogue to the strange and overlooked places of the world, with a hefty side order of philosophy and thoughts on human nature and preferences.
Thursday, September 4, 2014
Short Story: The Lightning Tree, Patrick Rothfuss
Rogues
GRR Martin & Gardner Dozois, editors
GRR Martin & Gardner Dozois, editors
ISBN: 9780345537263
Short Story Collection, only read The Lightning Tree by Patrick Rothfuss
Read Sept 4, 2014.
Dear Mr. Rothfuss,
I only just now got around to reading your short story. Please write about Bast and children and secrets and favors and lies and satyrs forever.
Yours truly,
Shisho.
PS - Oh this story was so damn amazing. Your language makes me cry. Your craft makes me green with envy. Your storytelling makes me gape like a child. Your understanding of humanity draws me in like a crackling bonfire on a dark cold night. My face burns from sitting so close, but it's worth it to feel like I'm part of the fire, at least for as long as I can stand the pain.
Never stop burning.
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