Book 54: Casino Royale by Ian Fleming

Casino Royale was an interesting book and not really what I expected.  I'd never read a James Bond book before this one and my only impressions of the character came from the films.  In those, Bond is a suave, confident ladies man with expert knowledge of firearms and fighting in general.  In the book, the character is much more nuanced.

What's most interesting to me is that the two versions of Bond, movie and book, are not incompatible.  What makes the Bond in the novel different is the inner dialogue.  You still get the impression that he is projecting a confident, smooth exterior, but internally, he knows what could fail in his current plans or his life in general, he makes minute observations and acts on them.  He has hopes and fears and insecurities just like everyone else, he's just good at hiding it.  Much of the film Bond is still there, however.  He drinks something close to his trademark vodka martini, he drives a fast car, he shoots at double agents and he gambles large sums of the government's money.

In fact, this last part makes up the primary plot.  There is a Soviet agent who has recently embezzled and squandered a large amount of Soviet money.  In order to make up the difference he's going to try to win the missing money back in high stakes gambling.  Bond is ordered to find him and make him lose even more thereby sealing his fate.  I won't tell you how things end up, but it gets more interesting than that.

The plot was a bit simplistic and the writing was a little rough but being Fleming's first novel it's understandable.  It was a good suspense / spy novel with a very insightful look at a well-known character.  Bond in the book is not perfect, he makes plenty of mistakes and it makes him much more human.  He's a person in the novel instead of a stereotype.  I really liked this one and am definitely on board to read the next novel in the series.  7 out of 10.

Book 53: Le Vicomte de Bragelonne by Alexandre Dumas

For this year I've changed the way I'm making these posts.  Instead of having one at the beginning of the week and then editing in a review after finishing the book, I'm going to simply make one post each Saturday when I should have completed that week's reading.  Onward!

This book has a rather complicated history.  When first written it was serialized over a period of about 3 years.  When put into book form it comprised 269 chapters.  For obvious reasons it has since been split up into multiple volumes.  Even this, however, has been complicated.  It is possible to find The Vicomte de Bragelonne split into 3, 4 or even 5 books.  The version that I'm reading is split into 4 books with individual titles:  Part 1 is Le Vicomte de Bragelonne, Part 2 is Dix Ans plus Tard (Ten Years After), Part 3 is Louise de la Valliere and part 4 is L'Homme au Masque de Fer (The Man in the Iron Mask).  The narrative for Le Vicomte de Bragelonne covers events around the year 1660 about ten years after the events in Vingt Ans Apres (Twenty Years After) and around 30 years after The Three Musketeers.

The main characters from the original novel are still here.  D'Artagnan is still a lieutenant in the royal musketeers while his friends have retired to private life.  Athos is a nobleman, the Comte de la Fere, and lives on his own estate with his son Raoul de Bragelonne (the title's Vicomte).  Aramis has become a priest and been promoted to Abbé or Abbot d'Herblay.  Porthos married a wealthy woman who later died and left him her fortune.  The story, while named for Raoul, does not principally involve him, though it does show a turning point that may be the launching point for his later career.

I found the plot engaging throughout as was the case for the first two books of this series.  It follows D'Artagnan on his adventures fighting enemies and helping allies in both England and France.  He joins up with Athos for the first half of the book with Aramis and Porthos showing up in the second.  One thing that I find very interesting about the series is that, while friends, the former Musketeers are often at odds with each other.  In the previous book, two of the Musketeers were on one side of a civil war with the other two on the opposing side.  In this book, D'Artagnan is on a mission for his King, while two of his friends are quietly propping up one his the King's ministers, his chief rival.  It makes for a lot of complicated plot twisting as they would never harm one another, but would gladly sabotage each others plans.

I'm still reading these in French in order to take the rust off my language skills, but the story should translate very well.  These are books of high adventure and gentlemanly deeds and should appeal to anyone who likes intrigue, swordplay, daring plots and backstabbing ministers.  Overall, I'd give this book about a 7 out of 10.  It was entertaining and interesting but lacking in any real substance.  Still it's a lot of good fun and I'm looking forward to the next episode.

One Year Round-Up

  52 books in 52 weeks has been one heck of a project.  Overall, I loved it!  I went through 5 science-fiction, 7 English Literature, 7 Fantasy / Horror, 5 American Literature, 5 Contemporary Fiction, 5 Children's Literature, 4 World Literature, 4 Mysteries, 4 Non-Fiction books, 4 Classics and 3 Graphic Novels.  I was able to finish the Harry Potter series, the Game of Thrones series and the rest of Jane Austen's novels.  I was introduced to Agatha Christie and William Faulkner and re-introduced to Charles Dickens, to whom I took more of a liking this time around.  I think my favorite book in this project was To Kill a Mockingbird, it was simply beautiful.  My least favorite? ... not sure, maybe the Game of Thrones series.  

I plan to continue my project, which is why I called this post, Year One.  I might change things up slightly in the future, maybe add more genres or space things out differently but I'll keep updating my thoughts on each book as I finish it.  Thanks for staying with me for an entire year and we'll see where the next one takes us.  It's been a fun ride.

Book 52: The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

I would assume that most people have heard of this story from one place or another, mostly from the 1937 film version.  It's been remade with everyone from Michael Jackson to the Muppets.  There are now book told from various points of view, most recently from the Wicked Witches vantage point in the book series Wicked.  I, myself, was only familiar with these retellings and had never experienced the original work, but I found myself wanting to explore these books (yes, it's a series) mostly as potential bedtime story material for my kids.  My oldest is getting to the age where he may have the attention span for longer books and this story seemed like something he might like.

The main characters of the book are the same you'd remember from any of the other material: Dorothy, Toto, the Scarecrow, Tin Man and Lion, the Witches (good and bad) and the Wizard of Oz.  There are a variety of minor characters, however, that were completely new to me.  Dorothy's journey to Oz is quite a bit more complicated in the book and she, therefore, visits a variety of new places, meets many interesting characters and has a number of odd adventures.

After reading the book, I now think of the book and movie as two completely different things.  The film is more stylish, it emphasizes and expands some aspects of the story (especially the conflict between Dorothy and the Wicked Witch) while omitting other sections.  It's a great story and, in it's way, faithful to the spirit of Baum's work, but it feels different, like a porcelain doll version of Raggedy-Ann.  The book is much more innocent.  It's a child's-eye view of the world.  Some of the situations and their solutions are nonsensical but they have an internal child's logic that makes it fun.

I definitely plan to read this book to my kids.  It's fun, it's interesting and it's well written.  I also plan to continue the series to see where it leads.  The movie wraps up pretty neatly at the end but the book leaves some room for sequels.  I'd recommend this book to anyone that enjoys children's literature or really anyone that likes light-hearted fantasy/adventure books.  9 out of 10.

Book 51: Pulp by Charles Bukowski

Another enjoyable book by Charles Bukowski.  It checks in at 208 pages and was another quick read.  It was also Bukowski's last novel and was published in 1994, shortly before his death.

The novel is dedicated to bad writing, which stole my heart.  It is a sort of pulp novel but really plays with the conventions of the pulp novel, satirizing and almost ridiculing it.  It starts out as a detective crime novel but branches out to other pulp themes such as alien invasions, mafia loan sharks and death, hunting someone who has so far escaped her.

The characters are good, the protagonist, Nicky Belane, is a detective, a Henry Chinasky stand-in and a thinly-veiled reference to Mickey Spillane.  He is hired by several people, including Lady Death, to solve cases.  He's not a very good P.I. but he blunders and punches his way to solutions to most of them.

While not as good as most of his earlier books, this novel was enjoyable and a very funny commentary on the pulp genre.  I would definitely recommend this book to anyone that liked his other novels and anyone that likes books by authors like Hunter S. Thompson, Tom Robbins or Ken Kesey.

8 out of 10.

Book 50: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

My poor book cover is in bad shape, but I like the design so I decided to scan it and post it anyway.  This was a short, little book, 284 pages, which belies it's content which is amazingly deep.

The characters are very deep and very human.  Atticus is a model gentleman and father.  He struggles with himself and believes he should do more for his children than he's able, but isn't that how all fathers should be?  His children are intelligent and curious and he pulls no punches in explaining reality to them.  He believes that they are capable of understanding it and, for the most part, they are.  Exploring complex ideas from the point-of-view of a child is a big part of what makes this book so good.

The real plot to the book starts in the second half, though there are signals from near the beginning that it is coming.  It centers on the trial of a black workhand accused of the attempted rape of a white woman.  The book addresses a multitude of themes simultaneously from this point forward.  While the subplot of Boo Radley shows the attitudes of the children toward someone different: from fear to curiosity to understanding, the main plot addresses other, higher themes.  Atticus, being the consummate gentleman, finds his beliefs leading him from fair play to equal rights while the town battles itself between racism and social discrimination.  The black defendant is clearly innocent, but the accuser, though poor, white trash, is still white.  How the town deals with these attitudes is explored well and realistically while the children view the events from an innocent point of view, calling into question social norms and why they exist.

This is now one of my favorite books of all times.  It addresses many important themes and does it in a way that doesn't feel exceptionally heavy.  It gets the message across without feeling preachy.  I would highly recommend this book to anyone, no matter their reading preferences.

10 out of 10.

Book 49: Le Morte d'Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory

While the title of this book is in French, it is actually written in English.  In fact, it is one of the oldest known pieces of literature in English.  Written around 1500, Malory compiles here many of the French and English Arthurian romances.  It has since become, probably, the foremost reference for Arthurian legend and has become source material for newer works.  I know a bit of Arthurian legend from The Sword in the Stone, the movie Excalibur and Monty Python and the Holy Grail (more accurate than you'd think), but I'm interested to see some of the stories that I don't know.

It's in two volumes and I could break it up into two parts, but I'm going to read both.  Volume 1 is 468 pages and Volume 2 is 533 pages, giving 1001 pages or 143 pages per day.  Ouch.


REVIEW:

This was a very interesting read to me.  I've always been interested in Arthurian legends, but have gotten most of my knowledge of Arthur and his knights from much more modern sources:  The Sword in the Stone, Excalibur and Monty Python.  This book was written around 1500 and is one of the oldest known pieces of literature in English, though the title is in French.  This book and other books like it served to really begin the idea of chivalry, a concept that didn't really exist outside of literature.

Possibly due to it's age, the book reminded me most of Gargantua and Pantagruel.  It was a collection of short adventures loosely structured into a narrative.  There were some events that were covered from more than one point of view and a couple of conflicting stories.  Overall, however, it serves as a very comprehensive collection of almost all of the stories of Arthur and his knights.  From the marriage of King Arthur to Gwenyvere to the tales of Arthur's greatest knights: Launcelot, Tristram and Gareth, to the Search for the Holy Grail to the death of Arthur himself, it's all here.

The book was huge, in fact it was two books.  I probably should have broken them up into two entries here, but I really wanted to do it all in one go.  I'm rather glad that I did as the stories kept me interested and carried me along through the end.  I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in exploring King Arthur, chivalry or knights and adventures as well as history in general and England in particular.  It could probably do with some modern editing, but I'd be afraid that they'd cut out something interesting in order to make it move faster.

8 out of 10.

Book 48: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke

I have not seen much about this book, but what I have seen has all been positive.  It is, apparently, a book about wizards and witches in an alternate England with supernatural overtones.  It has something in common with Harry Potter in that respect, but it is supposed to be a more mature, more peculiar take on the idea with more alternate history than fantasy.  Also in common with Harry Potter, this book is massive at 782 pages.

I'm looking forward to reading a book with no preconceptions.  It can sometimes backfire if the book ends up being terrible, but I'm hoping for the best.

782 pages means 112 pages per day.


REVIEW:

On paper, this book sounds like a Harry Potter-type book.  An award-winning, 800-page book about an alternate, magical England.  It's even written by a woman.  However, it becomes very quickly evident that this is NOT Harry Potter.  The book is set in the early 1800s and more accurately, is written as a book of that time.  As such, it comes off as more of an alternate history book than a magical fantasy book.  The writing is very good and you never get the impression that it's a modern author trying to write in an older style.  I've read a number of books from the period and other books attempting to fit themselves into the period and this book feels a lot like those.  Magic is treated, almost, as a natural science and the practitioners of  magic behave accordingly.  The story started out slow but eventually picked up and led down more interesting paths.  One of the most interesting aspects of the book were the footnotes.  Extended footnotes are almost a hallmark of Regency / Victorian writing, especially scientific writing, and the footnotes in this novel are some of the most interesting ideas in the book.

Unfortunately, for me, very little can save a book set in this time period.  The reserved manners, somewhat pompous speech affectations and utter civilization of the characters does not lend itself well to action.  Neal Stephenson tried really hard to stay faithful to the Regency Era in his Baroque Cycle, a novel focusing on the early history of Science.  But even his books, though well-written and full of interesting information, fell flat.  I just found it boring and this book was having the same problem.  Someone like Jane Austen is able to overcome these limitations by showing the passions behind the characters' manners and Charles Dickens is able to (sometimes) overcome them with the emotional situations of his underprivileged protagonists but it's a very tricky feat.

The book was an interesting read but was a challenge to finish.  While I respect Susanna Clarke's ability as a writer and her subject matter is deep and interesting, the period of time just doesn't lend itself well to anything exciting, which is what this book lacked most.

6 out of 10.

Book 47: Lady Susan by Jane Austen

This is the final Jane Austen novel on my list.  I believe that she's written other short stories, etc. but I've now read all of her novels.  It's an extremely short piece (80 pages) and one that I've not really heard much about before.  I have heard that this was the first novel that Jane Austen started but the last to be completed.  Some of that roughness is bound to come through.

80 pages in one week;  12 pages per day... might finish a little early.


REVIEW:

This book was a lot different than I thought that it would be.  The book is written entirely in the form of letters between the characters.  The main character is Lady Susan Vernon who has just recently been widowed and is seeking an advantageous second marriage.  She's been chased out of the house of some friends due to her flirting and meddling and is now preparing to move to the house of her brother and his family.

The character of Lady Susan is one of the worst seen in Austen's work.  She has very few redeeming qualities. But she is attractive, intelligent and shrewd; and expert at manipulating people and events in her favor.  She likes to play the innocent card, but her letters to her friends show her true nature.  Which shows the true brilliance of this style novel.

Because of the limitations of scope inherent in a set of letters you don't get to see the events as they unfold, only the after-effects and the reactions of the characters.  You do get to see their more private feelings and motivations, however, so you have a mix of limited point of view but enhanced personal insight.  It's really quite interesting.

The ending was good, but a little rushed and I wish that the fate of the characters had been more thoroughly explored.  I'm going to miss Jane Austen and it's been a great time reading her work.  She's still one of my favorite authors and reading all seven of these books has given me a good view of her range and limitations.  This book in particular was not one of her best but was definitely one of her most creative.

7 out of 10.

Book 46: The Last Command by Timothy Zahn

Time to finish off another series.  Seems like I've been doing a lot of that lately.  This one will mark the end of my Star Wars reading for a while.  It's been fun and I'm looking forward to the ending, so here we go.

467 pages makes 67 pages per day.


REVIEW:

This was a great finale to a great series.  Finally all of the various plotlines from the first two books are resolved.  The things that were great about the first two books are here as well: characters are written well, stories are complex and interesting, battles are exciting, dialogue is well-written and meaningful.  Some of my favorite parts of this book are the Jedi battles.  In this slightly-expanded Star Wars universe there are already several Jedi or Jedi-in-training: Luke, C'boath, Leia, Mara Jade.  Between them there are at least 3 lightsabers (one of which has a cool history!).  So the final battle between the good Jedi and the bad is exciting and engaging.  This, coupled with the ending of the other plotlines made the conclusion of this series quite satisfying.

The only part of the ending that I thought was not perfect was the space battle.  It built up and built up into a huge event, but eventually ended quite abruptly, with some major events happening "off-screen". This made it a little less satisfying, but still not bad.  The good part about having a well-written ending is that you could easily stop reading here and be finished with Star Wars.  It provides a nice resolution to the film series as well as this series.  Unfortunately, for me, I'm even more interested in the other Star Wars books now and I would actually like to continue reading these.  I know that at some point they become a little silly and I would like to stop before then, but I might give the next few books a try sometime.

Overall, I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys Star Wars and, more inclusively to anyone who enjoys science fiction.  There is enough here to engage even those people who are not really into Star Wars and it can be enjoyed as much as any other Space Opera type book.

8 out of 10.

Book 45: The Walking Dead, Compendium 1, by Robert Kirkman

I've come back around to the graphic novel genre and decided to catch up a bit with the Walking Dead series.  Of course, I'm a fan of the show and I'd read a few of the comics quite a while ago but I was quickly approaching the point where the show would catch up to my reading.  I saw that this compendium was on sale on Amazon for about $30 and it contains the first 48 issues of the comic.  I quickly picked it up and am now reading through them.  It's about 1000 pages but illustrations take up quite a bit of the page.  The series is now around issue 96 so we should see another compendium any time now containing the next 48 issues.

1008 pages means 144 gory, violent pages per day.  Can't wait...


REVIEW:   Holy crap.  This book is a real rollercoaster of emotions.  Never have I been so affected by a comic.  In the beginning, you have a sense of hope and optimism as Rick explores this new world in search of his family.  Very soon, however, things start to get more and more complex and more and more dark.  But let's start with the good stuff.

The art in the book is amazing.  There are great depictions of zombies and they are so detailed that you can tell what they were before the apocalypse from the details of their clothing, etc.  The characters and settings are also equally detailed which adds a lot of realism to the book.  Some of the individual drawings, in particular, a couple of the two-page spreads are works of art.

As good as the art was, however, the story really takes the prize.  The realism of the settings is echoed with the plight of the survivors.  They are reduced to a nomadic lifestyle, struggling to find food and survive against bitter odds.  As soon as someone lets down their guard, they die.  Ultimately, the story ends up being less about zombies and more about what happens to society when the morals and laws of civilization are lost.  It's an epic story and and both the story and art heighten the experience.  Roads choked with abandoned cars, the ruins of suburban housing tracts, empty hospitals and prisons, etc. really bring home the state of the world.

It is also, however, a seriously depressing book.  Following all these people through their troubles and learning to understand their individual situations only to have them killed a few issues down the road is demoralizing.  You feel as the survivors feel, that maybe it's not worth making connections when any of them could die at any time.

Overall, I will definitely pick up the series again (it's already on issue #98) but it will take a little while to get over the trauma of this book.  It's depressing to see the world crumble around you only to watch it built back up through painstaking effort only to have it crumble again worse than before.  It's a masterpiece of human drama in extraordinary circumstances just for the emotional rollercoaster Kirkman takes us on.

9 out of 10.

Book 44: The Sweet Life in Paris by David Lebovitz

For my non-fiction selection this time around I'm reading a book that was loaned to me by my sister-in-law.  It is written by a guy who has written several cookbooks, mostly on desserts, though this book is more about his life in Paris and dealing with Parisians.  My sister-in-law tells me that it's very funny so I'm giving it a shot.

It's quite short, at 269 pages, so I only need to read about 39 pages per day.


REVIEW:  I like the way this book is structured.  Each chapter consists of a short narrative, almost a blog post, giving a specific lesson learned about living in Paris.  The stories are well-written and typically very funny.  The role of food is prominent as the author's life is deeply immersed in the culinary world.  And, at the end of each chapter is a recipe, usually somewhat related to the story and always mouth-watering.

I think the only thing I really didn't like about the book was that I read it too quickly.  The ideal way to read this book would be to read each chapter, then prepare the recipe at the end.  In this way, I think you might be able to savor each.

The book shows Paris, and especially, Parisians, in a light that is sometimes quite ugly, but he goes a long way toward redeeming them by the end.  Parisians may be superficial, vain, pushy and condescending but they also live in one of the world's great cities, a world capital in food, culture, finance and politics... and they know it.

The Sweet Life in Paris is a quick, light read.  Nothing of any real depth, but very enjoyable.  It's great for anyone interested in food or Paris or both.

7 out of 10

Book 43: The Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie

Every time I come back around to the Mystery genre I think that I should probably branch out a bit and try some other authors.  But Agatha Christie is just so good!  I am trying something slightly different... instead of reading one of her Hercule Poirot books, I'm trying the first Miss Marple book.  Maybe next time I'll try a different author, but for now, I'm going to enjoy some more of this one.

247 pages is an easy 36 pages per day.


REVIEW:  Well, this is the third Agatha Christie novel that I've read and I still have not been able to guess the ending correctly.  The first two that I read were sort of gimmicky in that the endings were based more on the author's tricks than on a cunning plan.  This one, however, got me.  It was solely due to the plan by the guilty party that I was duped.

As I mentioned in the intro, this is the first Miss Marple book that I've read.  It was definitely a different style than the Poirot mysteries.  Miss Marple took almost a back-seat to the story.  Most of the book was narrated by another character, the vicar of the title's vicarage.  Occasionally, Miss Marple would show up and give some subtle clues or ideas and then disappear again for a few more chapters.  It's almost a stretch to even call it a "Miss Marple mystery" when she is hardly in the book at all.  She does show up at the end to wrap up the case, though, and since this is the first appearance of the character, I'm giving it a bit of leeway.

The book was very fun, though, and I raced through it, excited by the thrill of the case.  Christie writes some very memorable characters and very clever plots.  One of these days I'll actually figure out the mystery before the end but, until then, I look forward to being outsmarted a few more times by Ms. Christie.

8 out of 10.

Book 42: Twenty Years After by Alexandre Dumas

Book 42 brings me back to world literature which, in this case, is book two of the d'Artagnan Romances.  This one takes place, as the title indicates, twenty years after the events in the Three Musketeers.  The first book was simplistic but good so I'm expecting something similar from this one.  I've decided that, if possible, I should read my books in their original language so, after a quick trip to a nearby library, I found this one in French.

This edition is 885 pages which means 127 pages per day.  That's a lot!


REVIEW:

Surprisingly, I enjoyed this book more than The Three Musketeers.  The first novel is far more popular and well-known, but this one had a lot more complexity.  It begins 20 years after the events in The Three Musketeers:  D'Artagnan is still a lieutenant in the musketeers, Porthos has become very wealthy with three large estates, Athos is a count and has his own land and Aramis has become a priest.  The first part of the book involves D'Artagnan seeking out his old friends to aid him on a mission.  It turns out, however, that he is only able to recruit Porthos as the other two hold opposing politics and refuse to help him.  It's this split between the four old friends that adds a lot of the complexity.

While D'Artagnan and Porthos pursue their own goals, Athos and Aramis pursue parallel but opposite goals.  They have decided that they will never directly oppose each other even though they are on opposite sides.  Watching the four friends come together to accomplish the same goal and helping each other while still, technically, enemies was quite enjoyable.  It required a complex crafting of the plot on the part of Dumas.

Overall, I enjoyed the complex plot, the reunion of the four friends and the constant action, both political and military.  I'm actually looking forward to the next installation of the d'Artagnan romances which, I believe is supposed to follow the next generation of characters, Athos' son Raoul.

8 out of 10

Book 41: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling

Here it is.  The final chapter in the Harry Potter saga.  I'm a little bittersweet about this one.  On the one hand, I'm very eager to finally see the final result of this series.  But on the other, I'm a little sad that it will be over once I finish this book.  I haven't seen any of the movies beyond the 5th one, Order of the Phoenix, so this book, like the last are virgin territory for me.  I'm finding that that makes them more interesting.  I have no idea what's going to happen and it's exciting!

Well, this is a big book, but they go quickly.  759 pages makes 109 pages per day.


REVIEW:

This is it, the culmination of the series.  I was unbelievably excited to get to this book.  I finished the previous one early and started on this one as soon as possible.  The previous book was a cliffhanger of sorts and getting answers to all the questions brought up from the beginning the series was enticing, to say the least.  The book starts out with a some great action and continues to deliver some epic scenes throughout.  In fact, Rowling has progressed amazingly as a writer and gives some of the most memorable scenes that I've read in any fantasy book.

The book was not perfect, however, there were a couple of things that detracted from it.  At one point the plot seemed to slow to a standstill for several chapters.  Eventually the plot picked up again but it relied on a bit of a deus ex machina to get it started.  In fact, several plot points seemed to rely on handy coincidences to be successful.  It was not fatal to the book, however.  Even with some of these plot conveniences and slow bits the novel was a tremendous success and the only other problem I had was with the epilogue.  After all the action had resolved and the story reached its climax, the very end seemed a bit awkward and poorly written.  I've been told that it was written a long time ago, but it could have been done better.

I think the biggest disappointment with the book is that now there's no more Potter.  Overall, I'm really glad that I decided to read the series and didn't dismiss them as kiddy books.  It's definitely a series that I will always remember fondly.

9 out of 10

Book 40: Damned by Chuck Palahniuk

So, this one is cheating a little bit.  I listened to this book about a month ago as an audiobook.  Because of the start-and-stop nature and the length of time it took to finish the book in this format (I listened to it each night while doing dishes for about three weeks), I feel like I might not have gotten the full experience that I would have reading the paper version.  Therefore, I'm now reading the "real" book in order to debunk this idea or confirm it.  If, at the end of the week, I find that there are things that I missed while listening to the audiobook then I will probably stick with text.  Otherwise, hell, I might just pick up a few more audiobooks because it sure made dishes a bit more fun.

The physical version of this book is 246 pages or 36 pages per day.

REVIEW:  This was a fun read.  I didn't find that there was any difference between the audio and text versions of the book, and I didn't find that I missed anything by listening to the book rather than reading it.  It was definitely faster to read the book and I got a little surprise at the end when I saw that it said "To be continued...", but I'm not sure if that's just a joke on the author's part of if this really the first part of a series.  I really can't see where the book would go from where it left off, but hey, maybe Palahniuk knows what he's doing.

The book in general is very funny.  Palahniuk's version of hell is simultaneously disturbing, disgusting and hilarious.  I love the idea that the arch demons are really just ex-gods that nobody believes in anymore, hence making them angry and cruel.  The main character, Madison, was also very funny.  She constantly berates the reader for underestimating her intelligence and her vocabulary and ridicules the hypocrisy of her ultra-liberal yet highly materialistic jet-set celebrity parents.  I also found the parallel Palahniuk draws between the main group of characters and an analogous group of characters from a movie (I don't want to spoil it) to be very entertaining, though he ultimately didn't really do anything with this concept.

The main draw for the plot was that each character seemed to be in hell for a relatively minor offense (marijuana overdose, wearing white after Labor Day, etc.).  You know that there must be more to their stories, but the author strings you along with hints for most of the novel.  Unfortunately, after the "big reveal", there is a lot less to drive the story forward.  It feels like the narrative just starts to continue on the momentum of the first two-thirds of the book without a lot of direction.  Eventually, you get an ending without any real resolution and are stuck with a "To be continued..." to really drive the ambiguity home.

Weak, ambiguous ending aside, the book was quite fun to read and very funny in many places.  Another good Palahniuk novel though not among his top works.

7 out of 10.

Book 39: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey

I've always liked this movie, but I've never read the source material.  Since I found a copy of the book recently I thought I'd give it a try.  I've also tried to read some other works by Ken Kesey without much luck.  I've always found him to be a little too off-kilter for me without much of a focused story. When telling people that this is the next book I'm intending to read I've been told a few times that it's really good.  So here goes...  It's about 330 pages, so that makes about 48 pages per day.

REVIEW:  I've been trying to get this book review going for a while now and I keep getting stuck.  It's just such a difficult novel to do justice to.  Let's just jump right in.

Kesey writes some extremely interesting characters.  The focus of the book is Randle McMurphy, a minor criminal, con-man and hooligan who has been given a short prison sentence and decides to feign insanity in order to serve out his term at a mental asylum, which he assumes will be comparatively easy and comfortable.  The inmates of the asylum are expertly written and very believable.  Rather than writing over-the-top, ranting and raving lunatics, Kesey has created complex characters with subtle problems that keep them from living normal lives.  The character that really shines for me, however, is that of the narrator, "Chief" Bromden.  Because everyone believes him to be deaf and mute and, therefore, harmless, he (and, therefore, the reader) is allowed access to areas normally off-limits giving a behind-the-scenes view of the hospital and the staff as well as the patients.  In addition, the Chief's inner dialogue gives realistic and sometimes disturbing views into the mind of a schizophrenic and a view of the ward from someone who probably actually belongs there.

Overall, the story is one of the individual versus the system.  Nurse Ratched has established an strict regimen in the ward and McMurphy is set up to resist and attempt to overthrow it.  It's a theme that is repeated many times in books from this era, especially the dystopic novels, in which I would nominally include this book.  The struggle of McMurphy to assert his independent nature against the authoritarian regime of Nurse Ratched is a war with battles won by both sides, though the ultimate outcome is never really in question.

The only bad things that I can think of about this book are really in comparing it to the film.  I don't really want to get into a film review here, but any review of the book would be incomplete without addressing it.  First, the novel is much better than the film.  I love the film, it is one of my all-time favorites, but there is so much in the novel that just can't be expressed visually, including the mental illnesses of the inmates.  This could be why the focus of the film shifts away from Bromden toward McMurphy.  It would be difficult, if not impossible, to effectively show the inner dialogue and conflict of the Chief.  Randle is extroverted; Bromden is introverted.  One makes for decidedly better viewing on film.  Finally, a minor gripe.  Because I'd seen the film (several times) before reading the book, I had mental images of the film characters in my head while reading.  For the most part, this didn't really bother me, but the descriptions of the characters don't necessarily match the film depictions.  Especially, in the case of McMurphy.  Great as Jack Nicholson is, he doesn't really look like Randle Patrick McMurphy.

Overall, it was an amazing book.  One of the best I've ever read.  Though it's a short book, it packs in so much that it took me a while after finishing it to process it all.  I just set down the book and sat where I was, thinking.

10 out of 10.

Book 38: The Epic of Gilgamesh by Anonymous

This will be the oldest book that I've read so far.  It was first written in ancient Mesopotamia sometime between 2000 and 1800 BC.  That makes it around 4,000 years old.  It was written in cuneiform script on clay tablets, some of which have been badly damaged in the intervening years.  Through painstaking efforts the tablets have been pieced together, cross-referenced with other tablets telling the same story, transliterated, translated and made mostly whole.  I've seen references to this epic in several other pieces of literature and I'm quite interested to read it first hand.

REVIEW:  I find that I still love reading classic literature.  Anything that transcends the ages comes across as deeply human.  I also find them very entertaining.  People get the idea that the Classics are all very prim and proper, but anything older than the Victorian era is really very far from proper.  There is a lot of sex, drinking and violence in any of the ancient works and this one is no exception.

The story follows the adventures of Gilgamesh and his friend Enkidu as the cause trouble throughout ancient Mesopotamia.  Enkidu was originally a wild-man who lived with the animals until he was seduced by a prostitute.  They had sex for 7 days and then she told him that he should enter the world of men.  Enticed by his new friend and the other luxuries of the ancient world, beer, bread, etc. Enkidu begins living as a human being.  He meets Gilgamesh for the first time as his future friend is intending on enforcing his right of prima nocta at a village wedding.  Enkidu prevents him and fights him.  After the fight they become fast friends and set off together on many adventures.

One of the bigger surprises to me was the story of the Deluge late in the narrative.  This story is a direct ancestor of Noah's flood from the Judeo-Christian mythologies.  In the Gilgamesh Deluge a man named Utnapishtim is ordered by the gods to built a boat.  On that boat he is told to load his family and the "seeds of all the animals".  After this is done great rains build up and flood the world.  He is afloat for 6 days and then lands at the peak of Mt. Nisir.  Utnapishtim then sends out birds to see if the flood is receding.  The first few fails to find land and return to the ark but, eventually, he sends out a raven who does not return, implying that it has found land elsewhere.  The similarities, I assume, are obvious.  Considering that ancient Mesopotamia contained the same lands as the middle-east today, I suppose it's not surprising that there would be similar myths from both traditions.

The Epic of Gilgamesh was a very entertaining read and I would highly recommend it to anyone.  The version that I read was translated from the original tablets by the author and included a lot of information about how it was put together and where missing information was found and added.  I really can't think of any negative aspect of the book except, maybe, that some of the passages were somewhat repetitive.  Though, honestly, I felt that the repetitions added a mystical quality to the narrative, so I didn't mind it.

10 out of 10.

Book 37: Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen

Last time I read Jane Austen it was the last book she wrote, Persuasion.  This time it's the first she wrote, Northanger Abbey.  I've heard that, like Persuasion, it's not as polished as her "big" novels, but I'm interested to see how it plays out.  It's making me a bit sad that I only have 2 more Austen novels to read.  Maybe I'll try to drag it out a bit.

At 256 pages it's going to by tough to drag it out... that's only 37 pages per day.

REVIEW:  This book was a very pleasant surprise for me.  I've read almost all of Jane Austen's novels now and just have left some of her minor works.  They are all supposed to be either early works, like this one, or unfinished works that were posthumously edited together.  Either way, they are shorter, unpolished novels that may not hold up to her master works.

However, Northanger Abbey turned out of be one of my favorites!  This is the first novel that Jane Austen wrote, though not the first published.  As such, it is a little raw in places but it does not suffer for it. What really surprised me, though, is that it was so funny!  The main character in the book, Catherine, is 17 years old and really comes off as young and naive.  She jumps to conclusions constantly, usually way off-base, and gets herself into embarrassing situations because of it.  The narration is also quite witty and addresses the reader directly in many places.  Because of this, the novel has a much more intimate feel to it, as though Austen is telling you the story personally.

As usual, reading Austen is always a pleasure.  She, and therefore her characters, are smart, funny, witty and complex.  I would highly recommend this novel to anyone that has enjoyed her other works, and would even recommend it to others who have not.  I'm going to place it squarely in my top three of her works, right behind Pride and Prejudice and Emma.

9 out of 10.

Book 36: Dark Force Rising by Timothy Zahn

What's this?  A Star Wars book?  Yes, I felt it was time for a bit of fluff.  I like to read a few of these kinds of books now and then just for fun.  The series (this is the second book) starts about 5 years after The Return of the Jedi and continues the story from there.  Other than the original films, these are the best Star Wars stories I know of.  Instead of the prequel trilogy, Lucas should have filmed these.  I've read this set a long time ago and wanted to re-read them.  Before my little project here started I read the novelization of the prequel movies, the original movies and these seemed like the logical place to go from there.

At 440 pages it's only 63 pages per day.  Shouldn't really be a problem.


REVIEW:

This is the second of the Thrawn trilogy of Star Wars books.  It picks up where the last left off.  Leia and Chewbacca are on a mission to try to recruit a mysterious species for the New Republic while Luke, Han and Lando are searching for a long lost fleet of starships that could turn the course of the conflict between them and the remnants of the Empire.

The best part of these books are the characters.  Zahn writes the heroes exactly as you remember them from the movies.  Their personalities fit perfectly.  His new characters, especially his villain, Grand Admiral Thrawn, are well fleshed-out and believable with realistic personalities and motives.  Thrawn as a villain is way above what you would expect from a Star Wars novel.  He is well-cultured, subtle, intelligent and devious.  There are plenty of times when the heroes are one step ahead of him, but many other moments that he outwits them.

There are plenty of plots and counterplots to weave, on both sides, in this book.  It reads as a kind of treasure hunt.  Both sides are looking for the same thing, the Dark Force, a fleet of 200 powerful dreadnoughts, and they bounce around the galaxy following leads and false-leads.  As the end of the book approaches it turns into a race, the victor of which may tilt the balance of power in their favor.

Another thing that I particularly like is the level of detail included in Zahn's universe.  Zahn describes things like spacecraft controls, weapons effects and even Luke's Jedi powers in very believable and engaging ways.  It makes the experience much more immersive when these details are done right.

Overall, the book is a lot of fun.  The characters are accurate and familiar, the villain is sufficiently devious and challenging and the action is non-stop.  If they would make this trilogy into movies it would be many times better than Episodes 1-3.

9 out of 10.