Pump Six and Other Stories: Audio

Pump Six and Other Stories by Paolo Bacigalupi is a collection of short stories all with a type of social consciousness wrapped into the fantastical stories. While I enjoy a heavy story with a message from time to time, this collection was simply too much for me all at once. I should maybe have read one here and one there in between other books and stories. Every single story in this book is depressing and makes you fear for the state of the world.

The first story, "Pocket Full of Dharma" is a fascinating story about a boy in futuristic China who comes across the Dalai Lama in a most unusual way.

"The Fluted Girl" is a tale about our obsession with perfect bodies and celebrity set in a world at once futuristic (in it's upper class and medical procedures) yet also medieval (in it's serf system).

These are easily the best stories in the book. When I got to ... I had to skip it. The soldiers in the story who are able to regenerate body parts and are simply fascinated by a stray dog who can't turned my stomach. Maybe it has a happy ending, I'll never know.

Maybe one day I'll revisit some of these stories individually and see if they strike me differently. Right now, I guess I'm simply not in the right frame of mind for them.

The Friday 56: Four Past

Rules:
* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of this blog.
*Post a link along with your post back to this blog.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

HAPPY FRIDAY!

Can you believe I almost FORGOT it was Friday. I got up, let the dogs outside, made coffee, was up for a little while and then it hit me IT'S FRIDAY. It's weird how you can lose track of the days when you don't have a schedule. The vacation has been nice but I am starting to get BORED. I will actually be glad to go back to work on Monday, even if it is the same old job and not the new one (still keeping fingers crossed!).

Today's selection comes from The Lanogoliers, a short story in Stephen King's Four Past Midnight, since I had it out yesterday to talk about. It never got put away.

"We'll have to capture him as soon as we land," Albert said, scraping one hand feverishly up the side of his face. "You, me, Mr. Gaffney, and that Brittish guy. He looks tough."

I'm thinking of changing the logo for this meme. In your comments today, please let me know if you like it or want to keep the old one.

My Favorite Reads: The Queen of the Damned

My Favorite Reads is hosted by Alyce on her blog At Home With Books. The idea is to take a book you read before you started blogging and tell your readers about it.


Just like high school girls are today, I was a teenaged vampire fanatic. The only difference is my vampires were what vampires should be: dangerous and exciting not broody and pathetic. Oh, yeah I loved the whole Angel/Buffy thing and he was broody but he was never pathetic. And of course, that was before Spike came along. Spike is what vampires should be. However, before there was Buffy the Vampire Slayer, there was the Vampire Chonicles by Anne Rice. No one does vampires like Anne Rice did. Too bad she found Jesus. (Literally: Christ the Lord)

Like all teenagers, I thought everything I discovered was new. No one had ever seen it before I laid eyes on it. Because of this I didn't know that Queen of the Damned was part of a series. I picked it up because it looked like something I would fall in love with. And it was. It happens to be the third book in the Vampire Chronicles, following Interview with the Vampire and The Vampire Lestat.

I now know that seeing the book in the first place was probably not an accident. Considering it was originally published in 1988 and I read it in 1993, it was probably part of some marketing strategy. I read it about a year before the movie Interview with the Vampire was released. There was most likely some big display in the store featuring the books. Though why I chose that book and not Interview is lost in the pages of my history. The title probably sounded much more interesting. And, I was also going through a phase of the bigger the book the better. Since Interview has 352 pages and Queen has 512, I'm thinking that might be the reason. I clearly remember once in high school, an adult commenting on the thickness of my book (I think it might have been Scarlett: 832 pages). She seemed shocked that I'd be willing to read something that long. I felt at once contemptuous of her and proud of myself. It was clear she didn't think it worth her time to read something that long, therefore I was better than her. Isn't teen-think wonderful?

The thing is, Queen of the Damned IS the better book. Not just because it's bigger, but because the story is so much more complex and the characters more defined. In Interview the characters are very one dimensional. It's a good book, but people do things because they are good or evil in Interview. They are not either good or evil in Queen, even Akasha.

I will say now, that I have never seen the movie. I saw the previews and that was enough for me. I don't believe they did Akasha right and I don't want to see her portrayed that way. It was never supposed to get the big release it did anyway. It was supposed to be one of those straight-t0-video movies but when the actress/singer playing Akasha died, it got all that attention. I can't even remember right now who that was. Sad, huh?

The Angel's Game: Audio

The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon is the story of David Martin, a young writer in Barcelona, Spain in the early part of the 20th century. Growing up in poverty to a father who could not read and disdained books, David eventually finds a small group a book lovers who encourage his desire to be a writer. Through the years he is contacted by a mysterious French publisher, Andreas Corelli, who wants David to write an even more mysterious book. He life, his home, and his friends all become suspect as he discovers exactly what he is supposed to write and the writers before him who have not been able to accomplish the task....

I was completely engrossed with this story and found myself often already home from my long drive without remembering the journey. I was intrigued by the mystery David finds himself in the middle of and kept discovering that what I had predicted would happen, didn't. And that always makes me gloriously happy. When an author sets up a storyline to go in one direction and misleads you into thinking it's going another, it doesn't matter what the genre: This is a good book. If that can be done well, the author deserves many prizes and much fame, both of which Zafon has received. I don't like being able to predict a story too soon, that makes it boring. When the moment of realization came for me near the end of this story, it was so stunning I actually had to turn the cd off and take a break from the book to digest what I had just learned. It came out of nowhere but made complete sense. Zafon had been setting it up all along but so carefully, it was so hidden, that I never saw it coming. Beautiful is all I can say.

If there is one thing that I have to criticize, that would be the pace of the first part of the book. Up until right before the start of Part 2, it is fairly slow. The early years of David's life and his interactions with Christina and Pedro are sometimes redundant. But for me, this was not enough to detract from the greatness of the book. Yes, I am pouring out the love of this book shamelessly. I even decided to wait a week before writing my review so I could try to write a more objective review. Not possible. Simply put, I loved this book. The only thing that happened with time to think on it, was that I came to like the ending. At first I felt cheated but as I put more time from when I listened to it, I grow to think it is the ONLY way it could have possibly ended. In Part 1, I was beginning to wonder if it was supposed to be a modern telling of Dracula, with David playing the part of Jonathan Harker. This may and may not have some validity but I won't say anymore on that. Sadly, the truth of Corelli is never told. We are left to make our own inferences. But I have an idea and I'll guess that I'm not far off.

Short Stories: Dreams

Hey look, I got stories up two Saturdays in a row! Let's see if I can keep this up!

I am continuing the stories from Stephen King's Just After Sunset. I have really enjoyed these stories so I've read them fairly fast and want to share them all with you. Hopefully soon I'll get back to the Orson Scott Card book of stories.

This is from Harvey's Dream

As Janet makes deviled eggs one morning, she notices her husband Harvey sitting at the kitchen table, looking old and disheveled. He is not normally like this but it haunts her to see him this way every weekend, as if it foretells the future. Harvey begins to tell her of his dream, a nightmare really. As he talks, Janet becomes increasingly scared. He describes looking out the window to see a dent in the neighbor's car, which Janet noticed this morning. He describes opening the fridge to see a plate of deviled eggs made and ready to eat. He describes noticing his shadow in the bright sunlight, which "never looked so bright or thick," just the way Janet had thought of his shadow before he began talking. And then Harvey talks about what scared him in the dream...

From Rest Stop

John Dykstra is a famous writer but no one who knows him knows this. This is because he uses a pen name, Rick Hardin. He is contemplating just where he and his alter-ego separate as he pulls into a rest stop one night. He hears the unmistakable sounds of a woman being beat by her boyfriend in the bathroom. He is struck paralyzed by the indecision of what to do until he realizes he doesn't have to do anything as John Dykstra but he CAN do something as Rick Hardin.

I haven't made comments on these so far because to say over and over again that I liked them would be redundant. It's much more fun to describe them and let you decide, but I didn't like Rest Stop. I felt it was dull and pointless and I didn't like the "hero."

Dead Until Dark

Dead Until Dark is the first book in the Sookie Stackhouse novels by Charlaine Harris. This is the series that the HBO series True Blood is based on. In fact, the reason I began reading this book was because I enjoyed the tv show so much. If you're not familiar with the storyline here's a little to entice you:

Sookie Stackhouse is waitress in Bon Temps, a small town in Louisanna. She is also a mind reader. When a man comes into the bar where she works one day, she realizes immediately that he is a vampire. This is fairly exciting for Sookie for a couple of reasons. One, she's never met a vampire before. Two, she can't hear his thoughts. This is welcome relief from the many thoughts of other people constantly floating into her head all day everyday. Soon she is wrapped up in a world of vampires, shape changers, and a serial killer. Will she be the next victim?

Ok, wanted to try my hand at writing a blurb instead of using the back of the book. What do you think? :))

It was little weird reading this since I had already finished season 1. There isn't much difference between the first book and season 1 except a few extra storylines in the show that aren't in the book. That seemed a little backward to me. Normally there's more in a book but this is a tv show and not a movie. I guess they can do more. I started watching season one but when I realized how close they were, I decided I wanted to read the books first and will wait until season 2 comes out on DVD. I like that Bill and Sam in the book are less intense than they are in the show. They both have a bit of a sense of humor about their lives that is not shown in the show. What I didn't like is that apparently Sookie's best friend on the show, Tara, is completely made up! She's not in the book anywhere! I really like her and whoever made her up for the show did a good job of fitting her into the storyline. I'm still holding out hope that maybe she shows up in one of the later books, so if I'm wrong please tell me so I'm not waiting around for her.

Friday 56: Sookie!

Rules:
* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.
* Turn to page 56.
* Find the fifth sentence.
* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of this blog.
*Post a link along with your post back to this blog.
* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

HAPPY FRIDAY!

I have a bad habit of waiting until late in the day to do the 56 lately so I'm posting the night before this time while I'm at the computer and thinking about it. Otherwise I might get wrapped up in that extremely addicting game of Farm Town and never make it back.


This week the book closest to me is the one I'm actually reading, not what's posted on my blog as what I'm reading. (Maybe I should fix that). I got hooked on the HBO show True Blood so I decided to read the books and see if they're any good. So far they're pretty fun. Kind of in the realm of fluff but, I tell you, ever so much better than Twilight (which I will hate till my dying day). The only think that bothers me is Sookie's best friend in the show doesn't appear to be a character in the book. I really like her, so that's sad for me. I'm only on page 151 so, if she shows up later or in another book, someone let me know. It won't be a spoiler. It will simply keep me from wondering all the time. If she's simply a creation of the writers of the show, they did a good job of making her fit with the rest of the crazy people in Bon Temps. Anyway, here's my 56 for this week:

"Her young man was killed in the war"
"The Civil War."
"Yes. I came back from the battlefield. I was one of the lucky ones. At least I thought so at the time."
Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris

I added a little more simply because I liked this conversation.

My Favorite Reads: House of Leaves

My Favorite Reads is hosted by Alyce on her blog At Home With Books. The idea is to take a book you read before you started blogging and tell your readers about it.

This week I chose House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

From Wikipedia:

The format and structure of the novel is unconventional, with unusual page layout and style, making it ergodic literature. It contains copious footnotes, many of which contain footnotes themselves, and some of which reference books that do not exist. Some pages contain only a few words or lines of text, arranged in strange ways to mirror the events in the story, often creating both an agoraphobic and a claustrophobic effect. The novel is also distinctive for its multiple narrators, who interact with each other throughout the story in disorienting and elaborate ways.

Danielewski expands on this point in an interview: "I had one woman come up to me in a bookstore and say, 'You know, everyone told me it was a horror book, but when I finished it, I realized that it was a love story.' And she's absolutely right. In some ways, genre is a marketing tool."^[2]

House of Leaves has been described as a "satire of academic criticism."

Plot:

House of Leaves begins with a first-person narrative by Johnny Truant, a Los Angeles tattoo parlor employee. Truant is searching for a new apartment when his friend Lude tells him about the apartment of the recently deceased Zampanò, a blind, elderly man who lived in Lude's building.

In Zampanò's apartment, Truant discovers a manuscript written by Zampanò that turns out to be an academic study of a documentary film called The Navidson Record.

The rest of the novel alternates between Zampanò's report on the fictional film, Johnny's autobiographical interjections, a small transcript of part of the film from Navidson's brother, Tom, a small transcript of interviews to many people regarding The Navidson Record by Navidson's partner, Karen, and occasional brief notes by unidentified editors, all woven together by a mass of footnotes. There is also another narrator, Johnny's mother, whose voice is presented through a self-contained set of letters titled The Whalestoe Letters. Each narrator's text is printed in a distinct font, making it easier for the reader to follow the occasionally challenging format of the novel.

Why I chose this novel:
I recently picked up Danielewski's second book Only Revolutions, which I was not even aware of until I saw it on sale at Barnes and Noble the other day. The minute I saw the book I was so happy that no other book in the store could hold my interest.

I so loved House of Leaves that anytime I come across someone who's read the book, I just gush with them about the book for as long as they will let me. This is usually a long time, because anyone else who's actually finished the book generally loves it as much as I did. It's the most amazing and unique book I've ever read. I'm not finding Only Revolutions to be as amazing and unique, but I am enjoying it's difference from everything else I usually read.

The story told in The Navidson Record within House of Leaves is such a crazy and engrossing story that sometimes when I think about the book, that's the first thing I remember, even though the part that made the most impact on me upon finishing the book was Johnny's story. I guess what I remember most is that The Navidson Record was so strange, that it even affected Johnny and all those who read it, including me.

This book is a little difficult to get through if you like being a passive reader. You have to constantly switch back and forth between different stories and footnotes (which become a story in themselves), all sometimes within the same page. Sometimes you have to read a few pages and then flip back to start again on a page you've already read, but in a spot you haven't read yet because there is a separate story there. Anyone who hasn't finished the book cites this as the main reason. I have yet to hear anyone say they are not fascintaed by the story within the Navidson Record but they sometimes say they were bored with the footnotes or Johnny's story. Trust me, if you can get through the parts you don't like, you'll realize eventually they are part of the story and you will not be disappointed.

Audio: Rebecca by Daphne DuMaurier

I have to admit that I never read Rebecca by Daphne DuMaurier before. I wasn't even sure of the plot. How this happened is beyond me. You would think a book as well known as this with it's hooks in pop culture would have found it's way to me before this, but alas, it had not. I recently finished listening to it and was IMPRESSED. Now I get it! I understand why this book is so popular!

If you're anything like me, and do not know what this book is about, let me explain a little. Our never-named heroine is the companion to Mrs. Hopper, an older lady whom our heroine despises, and on vacation in Monte Carlo when she meets Maxim DeWinter. Maxim is recently a widower and obviously still worked up over his wife's death. There is not really a whirl-wind romance, as there is very little romance in it, but shortly afterward Maxim proposes to our heroine. The new Mrs. Winter returns with him to Manderly, the family estate that had been run by the previous Mrs. DeWinter: Rebecca. Rebecca is like a ghost haunting Manderly. Her touch is everywhere. The servants continue to run things as Rebecca did, especially Mrs. Danvers. Mrs. Danvers appears to feel a special dislike for the new Mrs. DeWinter, since Mrs. Danvers was very close to Rebecca, and she seems to be doing things just to make the new bride uncomfortable. Mrs. DeWinter is very young and easily intimidated. Along with her name, we are also not aware of her exact age, it seems to around 18-22 or so, though I would guess the younger end of that spectrum. As she tries to adjust to her new surroundings, she is constantly inundated with reminders of Rebecca, and inferences that she may not be good enough to fill her shoes. The more our heroine hears of Rebecca, the more it seems the beautiful ghost is everywhere. The final straw may be when she sees the old bedroom, which Mrs. Dancers continues to keep ready as if in wait for Rebecca's return.

First of all I was a little confused by the proposal. The proposal is closer to a business proposition than a marriage proposal but I have to remind myself that marrying for romantic reasons was only common in recent history. It may have been more common when Rebecca was written but it was still also fairly common to marry for economic reasons. What was ocnfusing about it is that Maxim doesn't seem to have any reason at all for marrying this girl. He doesn't appear to love her and she comes from unknown economic background.

Then, I was just plain annoyed with the fact that the poor girl has no name. I understand the reasoning for it. She feels insignificant and inferior to Rebecca. But there are times when it's just awkward for her not to have a name. Like when Maxim comments that her name is remarkable and odd. If we're not going to know it, then this comment is simply a distraction from the story. It brings too much attention to the fact that DuMaurier is not going to name her. I remember reading last year a book (unfortunately I don't remember the name of it) in which the heroine is never named, but it's so well written that you don't even notice! Bringing attention to it, as DuMaurier does, takes you out of the story.

I was also very irritated with how easily intimated and cow-towed she was throughout most of the book. I know that I might be a little intimidated if I came into that situation but I would stick up for myself. Even when I was 18 I would have stuck up for myself. It's not until the end of the book that she begins to "grow up" a little and grow a backbone.

In spite of all this I really did like the book. I kept waiting for the next shoe to drop, because I KNEW it would. I was not all that surprised when Maxim told his wife his big secret. I just knew something like that had to happen. I kept waiting for Mrs. Danvers to get what was coming to her. And I kept wondering, after all this, what would make them leave Manderly. If they could survive that, why would they ever leave? We know from the beginning of the book that something has happened to make them leave, as the first line (and most quoted) of the book is "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderly again." The description of her dream is so eerie and beautiful. It sets up DuMaurier's prose perfectly but it also perfectly sets up the constant question in your mind of, "What's going to happen?" I think what finally happens, is the real surprise of the book. Maxim's secret is nothing compared with this. The shocker of it is wonderful.

I think it may be the writing style that I loved so much. Would I have liked this book as much without it? Don't know. I like a good ghost story and I love the old gothic stories. Even though this was written in 1938, I kept having to remind myself when they said "car" they really meant car and not horse drawn carriage. It's just written that way. I kept picturing an older time.

If you have not read Rebecca but enjoyed Jane Eyre then you will love this book. In fact, my comparison is not the first. I came across an interesting tidbit while looking up the history of the book. Apperently there was a Brazillian author, Carolina Nabuco, that claimed DuMaurier stole the idea for Rebecca from her book, The Successor. From Wikipedia: Nina Auerbach alleged, in her book Daphne du Maurier, Haunted Heiress, that du Maurier read the Brazilian book when the first drafts were sent to be published in England and based her famous bestseller on it. According to Nabuco's autobiography, she refused to sign a contract brought to her by a United Artists' worker in which she agreed that the similarities between her book and the movie were mere coincidence. Du Maurier denied copying Nabuco's book, as did her publisher, claiming that the plot used in Rebecca was quite common. However, this plot was fairly common, including Jane Eyre, which was older than both books. It's amazing to me that people are so sensitive that they would see something similar and shout foul. I wonder if Nabuco ever considered the fact that her plot was so similar to Jane Eyre? Also from Wiki: Nabuco's A sucessora (The Successor) has a main plot similar to Rebecca, including a young woman marrying a widower and the strange presence of the first wife — plot features also shared with the far older Jane Eyre.

So, all this to say that even with the few quirks, I really enjoyed this novel and wish I had found it much sooner.

Interesting....Plagiarism?

I've been watching the HBO series True Blood recently. I don't have cable so I have to get from other sources, which means I haven't watched it as it was shown. If this has already been discussed and I missed it, sorry. I'm a little behind.

I'm only on episode 3 and I haven't finished it yet but I couldn't wait to write this. I might be completely off base here but I think Stephanie Meyer stole the entire idea for Twilight from the Southern Vampire Series (which True Blood is based on) by Charlaine Harris. There are just too many coincidences, and not in the way every vampire story has coincidences. Vampire who's in love with a human who's best friend is in love with her and might (not sure about this yet but looks like he might be) a werewolf. In this series it's the human that can read minds and she's attracted to the vampire initially because she can't read the vampire's mind. Makes a whole lot more sense than the other way around. They never explain why Edward can't read Bella in Twilight but it's explained easily when it's the human with the psychic ability. I can not wait to read this series if it's anything like the tv show. So far it is so much better than Twilight. There's also a trio of bad vampires, 2 men and a woman who "nest" together and want to go after Sookie (the main character). Sound familiar? Harris' series was started in 2001 and Meyer's was started in 2005.

Audio: The Ruins by Scott Smith

In the wild interior of the Yucatan, far from the lazy beaches of Cancun, two young couples and some newfound friends venture to the site of an ancient Mayan temple, in pursuit of another in their group.What started out as a day trip spirals into a nightmare when they reach the ruins...and discover the terrifying presence that lurks there.

I'm not quite sure what to say about this book (but I'm sure it will come to me as I write). It was a good story but I can't necessarily recommend it. I like horror, I love horror, but to me horror is about not knowing what's happening. The psychological factor in horror is so much scarier than the blood and guts. This book was all blood and guts. At one point I simply had to turn it off for awhile because it was truly disgusting. The long, seemingly never-ending descriptions of how one of the guys cuts himself (over and over), the very detailed descriptions of horrific death, and the constant reference to all types of bodily fluids just about did me in. This is gross not horror. And yes, it would be horror if it was happening but listening (or reading about it) doesn't make this a horror book, just a gross book.

Besides all this though, the story was well written. There were no parts that I thought had dubious explanation. It was well thought out and every thing that happens is believable. Unfortunately, I got the impression Smith wrote this to be a movie instead of a book. In fact, there is a movie based on the book, which I'm sure is even grosser than the book. I won't be seeing it.

Your Heart Belongs to Me by Dean Koontz

I listened to Your Heart Belongs to Me by Dean Koontz in the car. There have been few audiobooks I've listened to lately that I didn't at least like a little. This one made me want to slam my car into the ones closest to me at high speeds. Seriously, I used to like Dean Koontz, but I think lately he's simply trying too hard. It' not working. From the back of the box:

At thirty four, Internet entrepreneur Ryan Perry seemed to have the world in his pocket - until the first troubling symptoms appeared out of nowhere. Within days he diagnosed with incurable cardiomyopathy and finds himself on the waiting list for a heart transplant; it's his only hope, and it's dwindling fast. Ryan is about to lose it all...his health, his girlfriend Samantha, and his life.
One year later, Ryan has never felt better...Then the unmarked gifts begin to appear - and the chilling message: Your heart belongs to me.
Ryan is being stalked by a mysterious woman who feels entitled to everything he has. She's the spitting image of the twenty-six year old donor of the heart beating steadily in Ryan's own chest. And she's come to take it back.

Ok, I went against what I said in my last review and typed out most of it because in this case, not only do I not care if I give too much away (I don't think it does) but I also need someone else to explain the story so I could launch straight into why I don't like this book.

Like I said, I think Koontz is trying to hard with this book. He is obviously trying to write in the style of Edgar Allan Poe. It was obvious throughout the book, that he was trying to write a book that was not only mysterious but creepy and with a message at the same time. There's even a character who is a fan of Poe. It's a very big moment in the book. One where Ryan begins to make sense of some weird happenings. It just annoyed me.

The problem was he kept trying to explain the message. If there is a message in the story, readers are not stupid. We'll see it. We'll get it. Stop telling me what the message is. Also, the book is peppered with too many instances of Koontz trying to be clever with the language, to the point that it was distracting and I kept rewinding parts so I could write it down and find out if I was right (no, that doesn't really make sense) or if I was wrong (actually, that word does work there but you didn't know this obscure definition). So here are some examples and you tell me if you think I'm right or wrong:

1. Her "eyes were lustrous with grief."
I can't explain exactly why I think this is wrong except I don't think that's how lustrous should be used. Stars are lustrous with the light the shine down, eyes can shine when reflecting light but lustrous seems wrong. I might be reaching on this one but definitely not the next.

2. The "night was narcoleptic."
The night can not be narcoleptic. A time of day cannot have a disorder that makes it fall asleep instantly.

3. "He had narrowed his many possible futures to this one aneurysm in the time stream."
Ok, I about ran off the road when I heard this one. Really??? Here's the definition of aneurysm: A localized widening (dilatation) of an artery, vein, or the heart. At the area of an aneurysm, there is typically a bulge and the wall is weakened and may rupture. The word "aneurysm" comes from the Greek "aneurysma" meaning "a widening."
Koontz actually contradicted himself and I don't think he knows it.

4. "Light shaped the room, smoothing every sharp corner with a radius."
I looked this up just to make sure, but in NONE of the definitions of radius does it make it synonymous with curve, which I think is what he means here.

There were several more before I started writing them down, but I simply couldn't make myself listen to the beginning again just to get them for you.

Another thing, the girl that is after him talks about a type of religion in China that has been outlawed and many people are going to prison over. He calls this "Falanga." I might be spelling it wrong, so please let me know if I am, but all I could find when I looked this up was torture:

Noun

1.

falanga - a form of torture in which the soles of the feet are beaten with whips or cudgels

Koontz makes it clear he's naming the practice that sends these people to jail not the torture they receive once they get there.

The thing that really did me in was the end. Ryan's big "Ah-ha!" moment comes when one of the other characters tells him he needs to "offer yourself as a victim all the rest of your life" in order to set things right in his life. WHAT??!! I realized later what was probably meant was for him to live his life for other people instead of the selfish way he had been living. This does not mean being a victim. Those are completely different things. Then at the end comes the overall "meaning" of the story. It was just so arrogant and self serving I couldn't believe it. It basically boiled down to this: I now know the meaning of life and am going to tell you what it is. You should listen to me because I lived through my horrible experience only so I could pass this on. That means I know what everyone else needs better than they do.

Uggghhhh, I apologize to anyone who might have read and liked this book. I am very harsh in my criticism of books I don't like. I welcome all comments, good and bad!

Duma Key by Stephen King

I have read a large number of Stephen King's books. I was a semi-fan of his until a friend moved in with me, and then I began reading way too many (or she might think I still haven't read enough)! I like his style. A lot of people who are turned off by King are not opposed to his horror but to his style. They think he gets too wordy and spends too much time on the descriptive stuff. He can spend a fairly long time describing some one's house or the country side so some people get bored. I like it. I'm a visual person and when I read this stuff I can see it in my head like a picture.

Speaking of pictures, this is exactly what Duma Key is mainly about. Edgar Freemantle is the head of a contracting company who is crushed with a crane. When his wife asks for a divorce, he takes the advice of his shrink and heads out of town for awhile. The place he picks is a little island just off the Tampa/St. Pete area of Florida. Now I lived in this area and when King states at the end that he took liberties with the Florida geography in the book, he's not kidding. Somehow this didn't seem to bother me so much. It wasn't so overtly done that it would be annoying to those that are familiar with the area. The island, Duma Key, is not a real place but the picture King paints of it is very detailed and beautiful. It makes me wish it was! Edgar has some artistic ability before he arrives at Duma but it is greatly enhanced by the mysterious supernatural power (it IS Stephen King guys!) that emanates on the island. From the back of the book:

After a terrible construction site accident severed his right arm, scrambled his mind, and imploded his marriage, the wealthy Minnesota builder faces the ordeal of rehabilitation alone and enraged. Renting a house on a stunningly beautiful and eerily undeveloped splinter off the Florida coast, Edgar slowly emerges from his prison of pain to bond with Elizabeth Eastlake, a sick old woman whose roots are tangles deep in Duma Key. And as he heels, he paints - feverishly, compulsively, his exploding talent both a wonder and a weapon. For Edgar's creation are not just paintings but portals for the ghosts of Elizabeth's past...and their power cannot be controlled.

I have to say that this is probably the first King novel where the main character is not my favorite person. I just love the friend he makes on Duma, Wireman. Wireman in my imagination is a very large (tall and muscular not fat) black man with a very soft voice. I honestly can't remember if he described as being black but, even though he speaks a lot of Spanish throughout the book, that's how I picture him. If this were to ever be a movie I could see Michael Clarke Duncan playing him. The funny thing is, I do remember that Edgar psychiatrist IS described as a very large (fat) black man with a voice like James Earl Jones but for some reason I didn't see him that way in my head! It's funny what our imaginations do when we're reading.

I really enjoyed this book and am glad I finally picked it up again after all this time. There were parts of the story I simply could not stop thinking about when I put it down and never once had to remind myself what was happening if I spent more than a day away from it (as sometimes happens with books that don't make an impression). The weird part for me was that 200 pages before the end of the book, I felt that the story was ending. It's not that there was another part of the story beginning, it really did end for 200 pages. I still enjoyed the 200 pages but kind of had the feeling of "isn't this over yet?"

If you have ever enjoyed a Stephen King book, pick this up. You will love it!

Book of the Dead

I listened to this book by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child on my way to and from work (it's a long drive) as well as any other time I was briefly in the car. Each time I got back in, I felt as if the time between listening had been simply the intermission for the story. I was instantly drawn back in the crazy lives of these characters. I was a little confused at times when story from the characters past was brought up. It was done in such a way that made me feel I was missing a book in a series, which I realize now that I am. I had read Relic several years and vaguely recognized some of the character names from that story but it's been so long that I pretty much only remember that it was a book about a plant that turns people into monsters when they become addicted to it. Oh, yeah, I also remember that the movie changed some very important parts of the story but aside from the fact that the cop in the movie was actually two people in the book I don't remember that either! hehe, so I'm not writing about that one!

Apparently Book of the Dead and it's two previous "chapters" involve many of the same characters I first became acquainted with in Relic. I am surprised that I genuinely like these novels. For the most part they mysteries in the Sherlock Holmes style, something that generally bores more. Even though I now realize that I missed two books in this series and I will probably go back and read them, I don't feel like I was left out of the loop. The writing in this book is very well done. The authors have filled in people like me on the storyline while not boring those who probably read the others books. I've read authors who go on for pages describing back story to the point that you want to rip those pages out and just GET ON WITH IT. This is not done that way. So while I was little confused at first, by the end of the story I knew all that was important without the story getting bogged down.

The storyline itself is fascinating. It's like a modern day Set and Osiris, except this isn't dismembered and brought back by his wife. Or I guess you could argue that Pendergast's time in prison is a death and he is reborn when he is free. He's certainly not the same person he when he emerges. All around the struggle between brothers is the subplot (so we think at first) of the re-opening of an old exhibit at the Museum of Natural History: The tomb of Senef. This tomb is supposedly cursed and people begin dying in very strange ways...What will happen?

If you're interested in listening to an audiobook, like I did, I highly recommend this one. The narrator, Rene Auberjonois, reminded me of being read to as a child. He did different voices for the characters (without getting hokey). The constant tension in the story was heightened by his reading style. There were times when I had extra time between classes and stayed in my car instead of going into the school early just so I could hear the next two minutes of story. It was simply that good.

Dead Zone

Can't say that I'm much of a fan of the show but this was a very good book. I've been making my way through a lot of Stephen King lately since my last roommate was a big fan and I had only read a few of his books before moving in with her. Now for someone who didn't read this book when it came out almost 30 years ago, it was a little scary but not in the normal Stephen King way. The book itself didn't scare me so much as how similar the bad politician is to my favorite politician of today. The things that Johnny sees for this guy are so earily acurrate for someone else that he could have been shaking hands with that someone else. Now of course I can't mention that someone else's name because then I'll have the Secret Service after me saying I'm advocating assassination. NEVER. I don't believe in killing for any reason (which is why I hate this someone else so much). This book simply makes me wonder who SK had in mind when he wrote that book. Is it purely coincidence that the time line for the future of the bad politician in the book is only about 5 years off? Was there someone in 1979 that SK saw as so scary and on his way to leading the country even though no one else would have believed it? Can something like that be coincidence and if there was no one in his mind at the time, could it be that the idea came to him from a source outside himself? hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm