Show Me 5 Saturday: Catching Fire (The Hunger Games #2) by Suzanne Collins

From That's A Novel Idea and Find Your Next Book Here

1 book I read: Catching Fire (The Hunger Games #2)

2 words that describe the book: Young adult dystopian (Three, but it works!)

3 settings where it took place or characters you met:

Finnick Odair - One of the former tributes from District 4, Finnick initially comes off as pompous and confident, qualities which make Katniss dislike him. Eventually, during the Quarter Quell Games, he shows that outside appearances aren't all they seem to be.



President Snow - Although we heard of him in the first book, we never actually met the man at the head of the Capitol. He's just as cruel and sadistic as he's portrayed from afar, and the worst of him is yet to come.


Mags - Another victor from District 4, Katniss takes pity on her advanced age and teams up with her early in the Quarter Quell Games. She proves to be much more useful, and incredibly self-sacrificing, than Katniss originally thought she was, once again proving to Katniss that she can't always trust first impressions.

4 Things you liked and/or disliked about it:

I liked that, even though things seemed horrible and bleak in the first book, they just keep getting worse. I know this sounds really terrible of me, but it's the whole "The night is darkest before the dawn" thing: Things can only get worse before they get better, and people have to be tested to their absolute limits to find out what they're made of.


I liked that, in the midst of all the horrible things brought on by the Capitol, Katniss still has time to worry about "typical" teenage things such as love. It made the horrors of Panem seem a little less relentless.

I liked that there are hints of what's going to happen in the final book of the trilogy, but you don't actually piece together the puzzle until you've read it all. That thread of the story is what makes other series, such as Harry Potter, so appealing.

I liked that Katniss evolved as a character, even though less than a year elapses between the end of the first book and the start of this one. She's even more jaded and angry than before because of what she witnessed during the Games, but her experience also taught her to hold her loved ones a little bit more close.

5 Stars or less for your rating?

I'm giving the book 5 stars. Although I can't put it exactly into words, this was my favorite book of the trilogy.

The Whys and Wheres: Personal library

Challenges: Read 'n' Review Challenge

Review: The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games #1) by Suzanne Collins

Title: The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games #1)

Author: Suzanne Collins

Pages: 384

Source: Library

Rating: 10/10

Challenges: Read 'n' Review Challenge

Summary (From back of book):

In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister's place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before -- and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she will have to start making choices that weigh survival against humanity and life against love.

My Two Cents:

I was pretty late to the Hunger Games train, but I'd read the buzz about it on Twitter for months before I picked up the series. I'm big into dystopian literature, but I was a bit hesitant as to a young adult series involving a fight to the death. Just seemed a little too brutal for me.

Boy, I'm glad I finally picked up this trilogy.

Collins creates a world where people have just enough freedom to talk about how much they despise their government, but not enough that they can actually do anything about it. They all hate the Hunger Games and the controls the government puts on them. They all try to find small ways around the controls. But, they can't (Or don't) actively fight the Powers That Be. It's all pretty classic dystopian, but for some reason the people of Panem seem a little less settled into their world than the people of, say, 1984 or Brave New World.

Katniss was a great choice for a main character. She's got just enough fear of the Capitol to keep her in line, but she's openly rebellious (Which sets her up for later in the series), so her defiance during the Games doesn't come from nowhere. And while she's had to take care of her family for many years, she's still naive enough in a lot of ways to be a believable teenager. Collins strikes the right balance between making Katniss a strong hero and an inexperienced young girl.

A lot has been made by critics of the trilogy that it's too violent and disturbing to be marketed at young adults. They feel the concept of a people oppressed by their government is valuable, but that pitting teens against one another in a fight to the death is barbaric. I say it's a ridiculous criticism.

Literature's job is to make its readers think. In this case, Collins wants the reader to think about what life could be like if we allow the government to have too much control. While much of the traditional dystopian canon isn't so violent (1984, Brave New World), Collins shows that humans can resort to terrible things in order to keep control. These are important issues that a lot of adults don't even think about, and I believe that using young adult literature to get kids thinking about these possibilities early is commendable. I'd much prefer my teen reading a book that raises incredibly important, disturbing questions that lead to family discussion than if he or she read nothing but books about sports teams or mean girl cliques (Not saying these type of books are all bad, but there's a difference between books that are just there for entertainment and books that actually make a person think). The issues Collins brings up are ones that a lot of adult authors are afraid to broach, and I laud her for being gutsy enough to make her readers uncomfortable.

This is a book (Series, actually) that kept me up at night and held the need to do laundry at bay. I couldn't stop reading even though I felt sick to my stomach much of the time at the sheer barbarity of the words on the page. It got me thinking and talking, and one co-worker and a customer of mine have since read the trilogy and we still talk about it from time to time. This is, I think, one of those enduring works of young adult literature that everyone, young or old, needs to read at some point.

Show Me 5 Saturday: The Final Solution by Michael Chabon

From That's A Novel Idea and Find Your Next Book Here
 




 
1 book I read: The Final Solution: A Story of Detection

2 words that describe the book: Detective fiction

3 settings where it took place or characters you met:

Setting: England

The 89-year-old Detective: It's never fully said, but it's very obvious that this once-famous detective-turned-beekeeper is the Sherlock Holmes of legend. He still retains much of his mental acuity and deductive reasoning, but loses a lot of the quirks that made him so interesting in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's canonical works.

Linus Steinman: A 9-year-old mute whose past includes seeing some hideous things. When his parrot pet disappears, it's up to the Detective to find out what happened and what's made Linus lose his speech.

4 Things you liked and/or disliked about it:

I liked Chabon's writing. I've never read anything by this Pulitzer Prize-winner, but his prose is the stuff of legends. He's a master of the clever turns of phrase and immense vocabulary.

I liked that the mystery centers around a set of numbers that could be anything: A code, a math problem, a phone number. I don't know why this was so intriguing to me, but I think I enjoy it most when the mysteries in books are a little more brainy and a little less whodunit.

I didn't like the way Chabon basically ruined all that was good about Sherlock Holmes. This may sound harsh, but I have a HUGE fond spot in my heart for the eccentric detective (I'm also not a fan of Robert Downey Jr.'s portrayal of him, but that's another story for another day) and I don't like seeing the things that once made him so interesting just gone. Sure, he's older and retired, but he should not lose the ability for witty repartee that made him so intriguing in the past.

I liked that Chabon wrote an entire section of the book from the parrot's point of view. It was, in my opinion, the most charming part of the book. I wish there would have been more of it!

5 Stars or less for your rating?

I'm giving the book 3 stars. I was just disappointed in this one. It would've rated higher if Sherlock Holmes hadn't been so lame.


The Whys and Wheres: Library

Challenges: Read 'n' Review Challenge; Take Another Chance Challenge (Challenge 11: All in the Family)

Review: Red Hook Road by Ayelet Waldman

Title: Red Hook Road

Author: Ayelet Waldman

Pages: 335 (I have an ARC, so page numbers in the final version may differ)

Source: Publisher

Rating: 6/10

Challenges: Read 'n' Review Challenge; Take Another Chance Challenge (Challenge 11: All in the Family)

Summary (From back of book):

Set on the coast of Maine over the course of four summers, Red Hook Road tells the story of two families, the Tetherleys and the Copakens, and of the ways in which their lives are unraveled and stitched together by misfortune, by good intentions and failure, and by love and calamity.

My Two Cents:

I really didn't have many expectations going into this book, so I can't say I was as "disappointed" as a lot of the reviews I've read are saying. Overall, I liked this book and enjoyed Waldman's writing, but I can't say I loved this book.

Waldman is a fabulous writer. She has a gift for conveying the varied perspectives of different characters on one event. She's also great at describing her setting. In fact, the picture she painted of the area of the Maine coast in which this book is set was probably my favorite part; it made me want to go visit Maine in the summer.

She also has the ability to create some pretty vivid, memorable characters, whether you ultimately like them or not. My favorite character was Mr. Kimmelbrod, the virtuoso violinist and grandfather of the Copaken family. He was devoted to his students and their music, and at times standoffish with his family, but you could tell that deep down, he loved them. I think maybe it was his emotional detachment to the situations presented in the book that allowed me to like him so much, as every other character spent the entire novel so overwrought with emotion and the ghosts of the past.

As much as I enjoyed Waldman's writing and her characters, I felt as if a lot of the plot was just too contrived. There was just too much happenstance in everything going on surrounding the accident that it started to become unbelievable. Also, (nearly all) the characters' unwillingness to move on and dig themselves out of the pit of despair was maddening. I just wanted to scream, "Get on with your lives already!" sometimes.

Show Me 5 Saturday: The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events #1) by Lemony Snicket

From That's A Novel Idea and Find Your Next Book Here
 




 

1 book I read: The Bad Beginning (A Series of Unfortunate Events #1)

2 words that describe the book: Juvenile suspense

3 settings where it took place or characters you met:

Violet Baudelaire - A 14-year-old who, along with her two younger siblings, is suddenly orphaned by a house fire. But, that's not the worst thing to happen to the Baudelaires in this book. Violet is smart and cares deeply for her siblings, something you don't often see in juvenile or young adult literature.

Count Olaf - The Baudelaires' mysterious distant relative, Count Olaf is an eccentric, mean man who wants only the children's money. He forces them to cook and clean his house, and even attempts to trick Violet into marrying him. He's one of the biggest creeps I've ever met in literature.

Justice Strauss - Count Olaf's next door neighbor, she has a gorgeous library to which she allows the children access. She cares for the Baudelaires, but she's just another oblivious adult who only does what the law says is right.

4 Things you liked and/or disliked about it:

I liked that Snicket didn't talk down to the readers in this book. He didn't simplify the language, yet he offered up explanations and definitions when he used a larger word. I think it's important for children's literature to challenge the readers instead of just being a breezy good story.

I liked the Baudelaire children. They are great characters who I just wanted to spend the entire book rooting for.

I didn't like that nothing really good seems to happen to the Baudelaires. I know that's the premise of the book, as this is a "series of unfortunate events," but it was just one bad, depressing thing after another. I don't think I can read the rest of this series if it's just all going to be this way.

I didn't like how creepy Count Olaf was. I'm sorry, but in a book aimed at older juveniles (Ages 8-12), I don't think it's appropriate to have an old man try to trick a young girl into marrying him, no matter that it doesn't really happen. Just a little too disturbing for me.

5 Stars or less for your rating?

I'm giving the book 3 stars. It was well-written, but there were just too many things I didn't like about this book for me to rate it higher.


The Whys and Wheres: Library

Challenges: Read 'n' Review Challenge

Read-a-Thon Mini-Challenge: Armchair Traveling

Marg over at The Adventures of an Intrepid Reader asks us to write a post sharing some of the sites and places from the books we're reading. These can be books read for the read-a-thon, or they can be books we've read in the past.

Here's my answer:

My favorite books to read are books set in the United Kingdom. England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, I'll take it all. I'm such an Anglophile that I just love imagining the rolling hills and misty mornings right along with the characters' experiences.

My all-time favorite place to read about, though, is Oxford. I think this stems from my living there for a semester in college. It's such a beautiful city with so much amazing history that you could study the buildings and places until you're blue in the face and still not know everything about it!

My favorite Oxford books (And I've got more on my bookshelves to read!) that you should read, also, are:

Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh - This book tells the story of two friends who meet at Oxford and, let me tell you, there are some pretty accurate depictions of the residential Oxford colleges (although fictionalized) and the Isis.

The His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman - In this series, we get both a realistic and an alternate version of Oxford that is at once true-to-life and engaging. Pullman does a great job making the real Oxford recognizable in the alternate Oxford, and I can't tell you how much I wanted to run along the city walls right alongside Lyra.

Dewey's 24-Hour Read-a-Thon

Well, I'm getting a horribly late start today, mostly because I COMPLETELY forgot that today was the Read-a-Thon!! I happened to look at Twitter yesterday and saw all sorts of people talking about the Read-a-Thon and thought, "Wait, it's October 9 already?!?!?!"

So, here I am, starting 4 hours into this shindig. And, sadly, I don't have a whole free day to devote to the fun. :(

Instead, I will be reading for 45 minutes, then participating in mini-challenges, then cleaning my house for 45 minutes (Whee!!), then doing some more mini-challenges, and starting the whole process over again. Hopefully, I'll be able to get my house cleaned in just a few of these time blocks so I'll have more time to devote to reading! Of course, I also have to be at work at 6 a.m. tomorrow morning, so I can't stay up too late. Sad...

Anyway, here are a few of the books I plan to/might tackle this read-a-thon:

1. Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human by Harold Bloom
2. Ulysses by James Joyce
3. Infinite Days by Rebecca Maizel
4. The Distant Hours by Kate Morton

So far, I've read a bit of the Bloom book. Now, it's onto dishes. When I return, I'll crack open the next section of Ulysses.

See you all around!