Ooooo, I love a good suspense novel, and Stephen Fry's book Revenge hit the spot. A retelling of The Count of Monte Cristo, the novel is an excellent update to that fine story. The book follows the travails of Ned, the victim of a prank that goes very, very wrong and lands him in a mental asylum for years. The pacing was great, and even though I pretty much knew how things would end (having read TCoMC), I couldn't wait to get there with Ned. Fry's more known for his comic novels (and for being part of a comic duo with House's Hugh Laurie). Given my enjoyment of Revenge, you can expect to see at least one of those comic efforts further down this list.
100. Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
99. The Cat Who Covered the World by Christopher S. Wren
98. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
97. Emily the Strange by Anonymous
96. Anathem by Neal Stephenson
95. The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron, illustrated by Matt Phelan
94. A Thief in the House of Memory by Tim Wynne-Jones
93. Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv
92. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green
91. Beauty by Robin McKinley
90. The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle
89. The Unicorn Sonata by Peter S. Beagle
88. Revenge by Stephen Fry
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Friday, February 6, 2009
100 Books Update
Just a quick update today! I finished the laugh-out-loud funny An Abundance of Katherines by John Green a few days ago. My husband discovered this author through his (the author’s not my husband’s) daily video blogging as part of the Brotherhood Project 2.0. If you need a good laugh, check out the book and check out John and his brother Hank’s year-long web “correspondence” on YouTube. I’ve not laughed this hard in a loooooong time.
Beauty is a retelling of the Beauty and the Beast story. This was Robin McKinley’s first work, and I’ve read and enjoyed several of her later books, so it was hard to pass this up when I saw it on the library’s new acquisitions shelf. While the story isn’t new, the telling is good, and I enjoyed it!
P.S. I did finish Last Child in the Woods, but I think I've said all I'm going to say about kids today not getting the outdoor free time that I had as a child. Read the book if you wish. It's good but not earth-shaking.
100. Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
99. The Cat Who Covered the World by Christopher S. Wren
98. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
97. Emily the Strange by Anonymous
96. Anathem by Neal Stephenson
95. The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron, illustrated by Matt Phelan
94. A Thief in the House of Memory by Tim Wynne-Jones
93. Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv
92. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green
91. Beauty by Robin McKinley
Beauty is a retelling of the Beauty and the Beast story. This was Robin McKinley’s first work, and I’ve read and enjoyed several of her later books, so it was hard to pass this up when I saw it on the library’s new acquisitions shelf. While the story isn’t new, the telling is good, and I enjoyed it!
P.S. I did finish Last Child in the Woods, but I think I've said all I'm going to say about kids today not getting the outdoor free time that I had as a child. Read the book if you wish. It's good but not earth-shaking.
100. Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
99. The Cat Who Covered the World by Christopher S. Wren
98. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
97. Emily the Strange by Anonymous
96. Anathem by Neal Stephenson
95. The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron, illustrated by Matt Phelan
94. A Thief in the House of Memory by Tim Wynne-Jones
93. Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv
92. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green
91. Beauty by Robin McKinley
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Next Books
As I referenced in my entry below, I just finished some books on children without mothers. I admit that I have a real weakness for juvenile fiction and young adult fiction. Whenever I visit a bookstore or the library, I always check out the latest in juvie lit and YA. So when I found myself dragging a bit in reading Last Child in the Woods, a nonfiction discussion of the need of children for nature, I hit the library for a few good, short reads to get me through.
The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron was a book I stumbled on at Borders or Barnes & Noble over the summer. Because I'm making a conscientious effort not to buy books but to check them out from the library, I noted the title and added it to my library to-read list. A Newberry Award winner, the book is a tender and sensitive look at the efforts of ten-year-old Lucky to cope with the loss of her mother, the absence of her father, and her fears about her French caregiver Brigitte leaving her, too.
The book is infused with humor, and Ms. Patron clearly has a finger on the pulse of what makes young children tick. I loved the childish intelligence and insight of Lucky and her friend Lincoln. Lincoln, worried that people will assume that the children in their town of 43 souls are stupid, amends the traffic sign to read "Slow: Children At Play." (It's something I wanted to do as a child!) Lucky, eavesdropping on local twelve-step meetings, has a beautiful, child-like understanding of the "higher power" credited by the recovering addicts as their salvation, and she seeks her own "higher power" in an effort to attain the stability she senses she's lost with the death of her mother.
It's a sweet and funny book, one I would like to read with my daughter one day.
Touching on similar themes of loss, A Thief in the House of Memory by Tim Wynne-Jones, has the feel of a thriller or ghost story as sixteen-year-old Declan Steeple comes to terms with the departure of his mother six years before. Through dreams and memory, Dec has, in a sense, a vision quest that leads him to accept truths about his mother as well as about his father and even himself ... truths that he has hidden from himself in an effort to cope with his mother's departure. While not as sweet or tender as Lucky, this book was also worth the read. I came away feeling that I knew Dec and his friends. Even though some characters appear briefly, they are so well "drawn" by Wynne-Jones, that you feel you know them, and they certainly reminded me of people I know.
So, here's the latest run-down, including Last Child in the Woods, which I'll finish today but blog about later. :)
100. Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
99. The Cat Who Covered the World by Christopher S. Wren
98. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
97. Emily the Strange by Anonymous
96. Anathem by Neal Stephenson
95. The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron, illustrated by Matt Phelan
94. A Thief in the House of Memory by Tim Wynne-Jones
93. Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv
The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron was a book I stumbled on at Borders or Barnes & Noble over the summer. Because I'm making a conscientious effort not to buy books but to check them out from the library, I noted the title and added it to my library to-read list. A Newberry Award winner, the book is a tender and sensitive look at the efforts of ten-year-old Lucky to cope with the loss of her mother, the absence of her father, and her fears about her French caregiver Brigitte leaving her, too.
The book is infused with humor, and Ms. Patron clearly has a finger on the pulse of what makes young children tick. I loved the childish intelligence and insight of Lucky and her friend Lincoln. Lincoln, worried that people will assume that the children in their town of 43 souls are stupid, amends the traffic sign to read "Slow: Children At Play." (It's something I wanted to do as a child!) Lucky, eavesdropping on local twelve-step meetings, has a beautiful, child-like understanding of the "higher power" credited by the recovering addicts as their salvation, and she seeks her own "higher power" in an effort to attain the stability she senses she's lost with the death of her mother.
It's a sweet and funny book, one I would like to read with my daughter one day.
Touching on similar themes of loss, A Thief in the House of Memory by Tim Wynne-Jones, has the feel of a thriller or ghost story as sixteen-year-old Declan Steeple comes to terms with the departure of his mother six years before. Through dreams and memory, Dec has, in a sense, a vision quest that leads him to accept truths about his mother as well as about his father and even himself ... truths that he has hidden from himself in an effort to cope with his mother's departure. While not as sweet or tender as Lucky, this book was also worth the read. I came away feeling that I knew Dec and his friends. Even though some characters appear briefly, they are so well "drawn" by Wynne-Jones, that you feel you know them, and they certainly reminded me of people I know.
So, here's the latest run-down, including Last Child in the Woods, which I'll finish today but blog about later. :)
100. Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll
99. The Cat Who Covered the World by Christopher S. Wren
98. The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
97. Emily the Strange by Anonymous
96. Anathem by Neal Stephenson
95. The Higher Power of Lucky by Susan Patron, illustrated by Matt Phelan
94. A Thief in the House of Memory by Tim Wynne-Jones
93. Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv
Princesses Without Parents (or Why Does Disney Kill Off Parents?)
My recent reading has been about young characters with absent mothers (and, in one case, an absent father as well), which made me revisit an old topic of thought: Disney animated movies and what they seem to have against mothers. As I thought about it, though, I realized that not only do most Disney characters lack mothers, but they also lack fathers.
Think about the Disney “princesses.” Cinderella and Snow White’s mothers are dead, their fathers also presumably, and they’re left with “evil stepmothers.” Briar Rose (of Sleeping Beauty fame) has parents, but they’ve sent her off to live with fairies for protection and then fallen into a long, deep sleep under the influence of a spell. Little mermaid Ariel doesn’t appear to have a mother, and her father, what with having a fishy kingdom to run and all those other mer-children and young adults to look after, has, not surprisingly, little time to focus on leg-longing Ariel. Belle – who rescues the Beast – also appears to have uninterested parents at best … I don’t recall ever seeing them in the film.
The other three “princesses,” each have a father, but it’s a father that they must save in some way, switching the traditional parent-child dynamic. Jasmine has an ineffectual Sultan father at risk of losing his kingdom to the evil Jafar. Mulan has a father who is unable to answer the call to arms from his emperor due to physical disability so Mulan does it for him. Pocahontas must rebel against her father, Chief Powhatan, to save the British settlers.
Beyond the princesses, the Peter Pan children presumably have parents… parents who leave them in the constant care of a dog Nana. Mowgli is off roaming the jungle, having been stolen from his parents.
The animal heroes don’t fare much better: Bambi’s mother is killed by a hunter early in the film. Dumbo’s mother is locked up as deranged similarly early. As for Simba, his father is murdered by his uncle, and who knows where his mother has gotten of to. (Hamlet anyone?) For each character, these are pivotal events in the plots of their lives.
(Hey – even Miss Bianca and Bernard of The Rescuers, who are ostensibly the heroes, go to rescue a little girl they who is, you guessed it, an orphan!)
At best, in each of these movies, the protagonist’s parents are background characters, people who have little role in their children’s lives. Occasionally, the fathers (but not the mothers) are sources of danger or conflict, the cause of the characters’ adventures. At worst, the parents are traumatically dead.
So what is it about the absence of parents that is so powerful that it appears over and over and over as a theme in the movie fare we show our children? Perhaps the absence of parents frees the characters in some way. Lacking parents, these characters have the freedom to have adventures, to be heroines and heroes. Often, the loss or inability of a parent actually spurs the adventure. And, let’s face it, some of these films are scary, particularly because the characters are doing it, by and large, alone. Oh, maybe they have a few loyal sidekicks, but they don’t have the support of their parents, and that makes life frighteningly challenging for the protagonist and makes the movie interesting for us viewers. And while a life without parents is scary and certainly lacks the firm stabilizing influence parents provide for children, such a life also has, dare I say it, excitement. That’s a powerful message for our children.
And I’m not so sure about that message, though it does appear to be a strongly American one. After all, it is the clearly stated goal of most American parents (most Western parents even) for their children to “leave the nest” and start “lives of their own.” Perhaps these movies just tap into our culturally-imbued sense that our primary role as parents is to prepare our children to go off on their own adventures then for us to bow gracefully off stage into the wings of our children’s lives.
Regardless of the roots of the message, it is one to which I pay attention, and I encourage other parents to notice it as well. While I have no intention of banning Disney films in our house, I do plan to introduce the ones with more traumatic scenes (like Bambi – I still remember sobbing when Bambi’s mother dies…) later and cautiously. I plan to talk with my daughter about the messages these films send. (Hey, I haven’t even touched on the “every girl must have her prince” message. That’s for another blog.) And I plan to reassure her that absent parents in movies do not translate to absent parents in her life.
Think about the Disney “princesses.” Cinderella and Snow White’s mothers are dead, their fathers also presumably, and they’re left with “evil stepmothers.” Briar Rose (of Sleeping Beauty fame) has parents, but they’ve sent her off to live with fairies for protection and then fallen into a long, deep sleep under the influence of a spell. Little mermaid Ariel doesn’t appear to have a mother, and her father, what with having a fishy kingdom to run and all those other mer-children and young adults to look after, has, not surprisingly, little time to focus on leg-longing Ariel. Belle – who rescues the Beast – also appears to have uninterested parents at best … I don’t recall ever seeing them in the film.
The other three “princesses,” each have a father, but it’s a father that they must save in some way, switching the traditional parent-child dynamic. Jasmine has an ineffectual Sultan father at risk of losing his kingdom to the evil Jafar. Mulan has a father who is unable to answer the call to arms from his emperor due to physical disability so Mulan does it for him. Pocahontas must rebel against her father, Chief Powhatan, to save the British settlers.
Beyond the princesses, the Peter Pan children presumably have parents… parents who leave them in the constant care of a dog Nana. Mowgli is off roaming the jungle, having been stolen from his parents.
The animal heroes don’t fare much better: Bambi’s mother is killed by a hunter early in the film. Dumbo’s mother is locked up as deranged similarly early. As for Simba, his father is murdered by his uncle, and who knows where his mother has gotten of to. (Hamlet anyone?) For each character, these are pivotal events in the plots of their lives.
(Hey – even Miss Bianca and Bernard of The Rescuers, who are ostensibly the heroes, go to rescue a little girl they who is, you guessed it, an orphan!)
At best, in each of these movies, the protagonist’s parents are background characters, people who have little role in their children’s lives. Occasionally, the fathers (but not the mothers) are sources of danger or conflict, the cause of the characters’ adventures. At worst, the parents are traumatically dead.
So what is it about the absence of parents that is so powerful that it appears over and over and over as a theme in the movie fare we show our children? Perhaps the absence of parents frees the characters in some way. Lacking parents, these characters have the freedom to have adventures, to be heroines and heroes. Often, the loss or inability of a parent actually spurs the adventure. And, let’s face it, some of these films are scary, particularly because the characters are doing it, by and large, alone. Oh, maybe they have a few loyal sidekicks, but they don’t have the support of their parents, and that makes life frighteningly challenging for the protagonist and makes the movie interesting for us viewers. And while a life without parents is scary and certainly lacks the firm stabilizing influence parents provide for children, such a life also has, dare I say it, excitement. That’s a powerful message for our children.
And I’m not so sure about that message, though it does appear to be a strongly American one. After all, it is the clearly stated goal of most American parents (most Western parents even) for their children to “leave the nest” and start “lives of their own.” Perhaps these movies just tap into our culturally-imbued sense that our primary role as parents is to prepare our children to go off on their own adventures then for us to bow gracefully off stage into the wings of our children’s lives.
Regardless of the roots of the message, it is one to which I pay attention, and I encourage other parents to notice it as well. While I have no intention of banning Disney films in our house, I do plan to introduce the ones with more traumatic scenes (like Bambi – I still remember sobbing when Bambi’s mother dies…) later and cautiously. I plan to talk with my daughter about the messages these films send. (Hey, I haven’t even touched on the “every girl must have her prince” message. That’s for another blog.) And I plan to reassure her that absent parents in movies do not translate to absent parents in her life.
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