Review: Water for Elephants

Every once in a while, I read a really lovely book about a time gone by - not so far gone by, but a time almost forgotten. It is one so foreign from our present that it meshes wonderfully with the fiction the author has created.
Water for Elephants, by Sara Gruen, is an excellent example of this. A beautiful novel built around a traveling circus train, it follows the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth circus during the Great Depression.

Jacob Jankowski, the main character, is a "ninety or ninety-three year-old" rotting away in a nursing home in the present. One of his five children or many grandchildren visit regularly, and he lives a tolerable life, if not an interesting one. Bored by his dull present, he recounts his past with the circus.

At twenty-three, he is about to take his final exams to become a veterinarian at Cornell, when he is told his parents have died in an accident. Unfortunately, he also loses his home and everything in it, as his parents mortgaged the house to pay for Cornell, and his father had been working for food. Desolate and broken, Jacob jumps a train that turns out to be the traveling circus of the Benzini Brothers. (The Benzini Brothers do not actually exist as characters in the book, but their circus was bought by a central character.)

He is hired by the manipulative Uncle Al, head of the circus, as a veterinarian, and becomes friends with August, the unpredictable and frightening head animal trainer, who is married to the mesmerizing and beautiful Marlena. Also featured is Rosie, an elephant spontaneously purchased by Uncle Al. At first, Rosie is badly beaten  by August for not obeying commands - until Jacob discovers that Rosie speaks Polish, and will respond to a myriad of commands as long as they are in Polish.

This is not a ground-breaking book. It doesn't unravel any mysteries untouched by man, it doesn't make any sweepingly epic declarations on the state of being human. But it is a beautiful, readable book about a young man, the world of the circus, and his love for a woman and, improbably, an elephant.

Well worth a read if you are into subcultures, animals, true love, and/or historical fiction.
Yours truly,
RR

Planet of the Literary Guilt Monkey Part II

Today I caved to the hype, and checked out a Stieg Larsson - my first, actually. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Multiple friends, family, acquaintances, libraries, and publications have told me that TGWtDT is a book worth reading, but I have just not been able to muster up the urge to WANT to read it. Why? Why, you ask?
(Why yes, I AM blatantly setting this up for a list! How DID you guess???)

WHY I CAN'T SEEM TO READ TGWTDT:
1) It's enormous,
2) the actual main character is a middle-aged man, not someone I easily identify with,
3) the way people say it treats women (not so good), and finally,
 4) it's been publicly lauded as fantastic and multiple people have recommended it to me.

For some reason, while I enjoy recommending books, I rarely enjoy books recommended to me. Especially books like TGWtDT, what with it being pasted all over Time, Newsweek, Macleans, Entertainment Weekly, bookstores, libraries, etc. for the last couple of years.
In short, overexposed.

When a book has been as talked about and praised and recommended as TGWtDT, I just find that it never really lives up to my expectations - much like The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins. While I acknowledge that both books are good, incredibly good, even, I can't seem appreciate them as much as a book I find on my own. This may tap into my block with Jane Austen books, and is definitely something I would like to one day vanquish as Buffy did so many of the undead.

But New Years is a long time away, so I suppose I will just have to tuck my LitGuilt 2.0 away until December - when I can obsess over it with PURPOSE.

Sincerely,
RR

Planet of the Women

Hi all,
Today is (according to Facebook) International Womens' Day!
So in honour of IWD, I have decided to do a post on, surprise surprise, WOMEN.
Below, a list of my favourite female characters:

RR'S FAVOURITE FEMALE CHARACTERS:
1. Mary "Bloody Jack" Faber
She's a pirate/musician/entrepreneur whose adventures start when she is about ten as an orphan on the streets of 19th century London. Reckless, scheming, smart, and funny, all good things.

2. Hermione Jean Granger
Smart, quick on her feet, and a great witch. Also, clearly has social conscience, as evidenced by S. P. E. W.

3. Magdalena "Maggie" Lorraine Quinn
A normal... slightly psychic.... girl just trying to vanquish evil, graduate university, and find a good pair of jeans.

4. Imogene Yeck
She sees fairies, has an imaginary friend who's not so imaginary, dresses thrift store chic, and can pull off being entirely BLUE. Also, knows how to make a few extra bucks here and there, and can defend herself pretty handily in event of a fight.

5. Jane Eyre
Hard core awesome. Doesn't care about husband's blindness and whatnot, but sticks to her morals when offered position as would-be husband's mistress when his secret in the attic is uncovered.

6. Elizabeth Bennet
Ms. Bennet, though possessing faults, is both quick with a comeback and loyal to her family, both traits I admire. Also, she manages to have her own opinions and act upon said opinions in a time when parents basically owned their daughters. Kudos given for not marrying cousin, even under maternal pressure. (I don't care how distantly they were related! IT'S STILL GROSS!)

On a more serious note, I direct your attention to the International Women's Day website. It's been one hundred years since they started, and I think it's amazing how far we've come - but how far we still have to go. Please take a look, it's a great site, and a great cause.
Yours Sincerely,
RR

A Quest for Nerds

You know, everyone has a particular quest. A burden. Something they must struggle through one day.
I have SO MANY OF THESE.
Actually, quite seriously, I have a couple of books I always vow to finish at some point or another.
They tend to be older books, "Classics" that I feel like I have to read in order to be a "real" reader. 

BOOKS I CANNOT SEEM TO READ

1. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings, by J. R. R. Tolkien
3. The Once and Future King, by T. H. White
4. Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy

I have checked all of these books out of libraries multiple times. I have read up to a third of some. I OWN some of them. About once a year, I ACTIVELY SEEK each of them, and attempt to read them.
And then I get stuck. So, so, so stuck. And I start reading something else. And then... the due date comes up, and I return it, and forget about it.
Currently, I am attempting to read J. R. R. Tolkien's The Two Towers, or books III and IV.
I am.... halfwayish.... into Book III.
See, the thing that really gets me is that I HAVE A PATTERN, and I KNOW I have a pattern, but I still can't frigging seem to finish any of the books on that list.
Although to be fair, The Lord of the Rings (LOTR) is pretty much an enormous series. But whatever.
The pattern I wind myself into (every. time.) goes something like this:

Innocent/Naive Self (INS): "Oh, it is *summervacation/springbreak/Christmasbreak/longweekend*. You know what I will do? I will check out *book 1, 2, 3, or 4; see above*. And I will finish it during *summervacation/springbreak/Christmasbreak/longweekend*. And then I can check off a Literary Achievement!"

(I am joking about the Literary Achievement bit. Kind of.)

And the thing is, despite all odds, this happens pretty much every break. I seem to regain my sense of innocence and naivete.

Actually, this Spring Break I'm reading Book III of LOTR.
Or maybe The Once and Future King.
Or Pride and Prejudice.
*Innocent/Naive Self: "OR ALL OF THEM! WE CAN TOTES DO IT!"*

Yargh.
The worst part is the impending sense of Doooom when the end of *summervacation/springbreak/Christmasbreak/longweekend* comes around.
Dooooom................
Doooom................
Dooom.............
Doom...........

And with that cheerful thought, I leave you.
Because I have a lot of reading to do.

RR

The Macklinator!

It's nice to see all my imaginary friends still waiting for me.
Eeeeenyways, I haven't read a heck of a lot lately, but in the last couple of weeks I've seemed to have gotten my groove back. At least literature-ily. Book-ily? I haven't been reading a lot of what snobs would call "Literature".
One of the books I gathered at a library haul was Guyaholic by Carolyn Mackler, who has written books like Vegan Virgin Valentine and The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things. She is cool. There is no other way to put it.
The story of the Valentine family is started in Vegan Virgin Valentine, which I haven't read in a while, but was awesome. Mara is a straight-A senior, focussed and straightforward... until V, her pot-smoking, promiscous, sixteen-year-old niece (YES! her NIECE! I love this book) comes to stay.
In Guyaholic, the Valentine saga is continued with V, who has quit the MJ (I sound so hip... so urban... *crickets*) and embraced both school and the drama program. She's graduating high school with pretty good grades, and in a relationship with Sam, who she met during a "demon puck" incident (a hockey puck, guys. Nothing fairy/fantasy here). But when her mom bails on her yet again, V drunkenly makes a mistake that sends Sam running.
V decides, on a spur of the moment, to spend the first part of summer driving cross-country to Texas and visit her mom on her own terms.
The rest of the book is just pure awesomeness. Why? Why, you ask?
Um, it's a roadtrip. Is there truly anything better than a road-trip to give a story plot and purpose? I don't think so.
What I enjoyed about Guyaholic was both the road-trip format and the characters. V's a really fun character, and I enjoyed going cross-country with her. I really enjoyed that she was traveling alone, just messing things up on her own and then sorting them out independently - but getting help when she needed it. She's a fun character, a little wild, but ultimately just looking for what will make her happy. While suffering from a classic case of Denial, it was Palatable Denial, a conscious suppression of things she didn't want to deal with - and conscious decisions to try to deal with them later.

Overall, definitely worth reading. A fun book with a good ending and spunky heroine.
Also, it's a road-trip book.
I mean, seriously.
RR

PS: There may be grammar/writing errors in this, and trust that they will be edited out. But in the meantime, I am just DESPERATE to get something fresh up. -RR

For Goodlooking Children, Marry Your Siblings

That's right.
A couple weeks ago, I went on an Egypt book binge - Cleopatra, Nefertiti, Nefertari, Selene, Mutnodjmet, etc.
And even though I read a range of authors (all female, but a there were about three different ones) there were a couple of things that kept cropping up: All of the women were *Gorgeous* with a capital G, and all the men were either really hot, or kind of pudgy and useless. All the Egypto-dudes were easily enthralled by womanly charms.
So. Exciting.

I kind of take offense that every author touching on Ptolemy-era Egypt seems to think that the women had to be Supermodel Stunning in order to be rulers. I mean, while it IS true that being good looking can give you a boost in the Charm Olympics, research has indicated that Cleopatra (whose name most likely was actually spelled Kleopatra, but we English-speakers tend to butcher, oh, you know, EVERYTHING, so there you go) was actually fairly plain, with a large, hooked nose, and some royal junk in the trunk. It was her mind that truly fascinated people, and made her one of the most iconic women in history.
The pudgey-or-crazy-and-powerful men thing was kind of annoying too, actually, and this is where m'mind drifted to:
Ladies and gentlemen, I present for your pleasure, an unprecedented glimpse into the men of Ptolemy Egypt! There were only TWO varieties, with ONE subcategory and ONE combo special - let the show begin!

FIRST, we have the Hot But Brash Young Thang, as seen in Ramesses II and Marc Antony. Typically a sleek and muscular warrior incredible in-between the sheets, this young charmer is also promiscuous, but in love with only ONE WOMAN. (It BASICALLYALMOSTKINDOF balances out to monogamy.) Now, the HBBYT has a subcategory: Hot Crazy Young Thang, as seen in Ankhenaten, otherwise known as the Heretic King, for basically pulling a Henry VIII and starting his own church.Also, spreading plague in his own castle.

SECOND, we have Nice But Fat and Useless, as seen in Seti I and Ptolemy XII Auletes. Typically the father or father-in-law of our main character, the Gorgeous And Brainy Princess, he is basically a nice guy, but stupid. Easily bamboozled into following the wishes of Evil Manipulative People, when he dies, his son assumes some of his responsibilities, becoming a combo deal of the two categories described here:

Hot But Brash and Easily Bamboozled Well-Meaning King Who Likes to Sleep Around But is IN LOVE With Only One Woman, or HBBEBWMKWLSABILWOOW. Which, come to think of it, might actually be an Egyptian pharaoh's name.

So, there you go. Books on Ptolemy-era Egypt in a page.

This is not to say that ALL books written by women are about annoyingly oblivious men and hot, smart women - I'm actually really looking forward to reading the new Cleopatra book by Stacy Schiff: Cleopatra: A Life. It sounds really good - especially as it is grounded in meticulous research and a biography by an acclaimed biographer. So, after  I wait for 52 other library patrons to read and return their copies... I'll let you know if it's something new. That actually makes sense.
I mean, I would like to think that one of the most complex cultures in the history of the world was led by people other than fat, promiscous, crazy old men.


RR

Book of Le Moment

I am always bothered when peoples ask for my "favourite book".

Hmm, okay, do you have eight hours or so to spare?

I could go on for hours - and change my mind about a kagillion times as I do - but I have to say, there's this one book that is ALWAYS on the list:

The Princess Bride, S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and Adventure, The "Good Parts" Version, Abridged by William Goldman.

So. Cool.

If you've been living under a rock in Siberia eating moss and drinking snow you melted through sheer willpower and haven't gotten a chance to see the movie, here is the basic story:

There is a girl named Buttercup, who is the most beautiful girl in the world. When her beloved Farm Boy, Westley, was killed by the Dread Pirate Roberts, Buttercup swore to never love again. Ergo, when Prince Humperdinck, ruler of Florin (the country where the book is set), threatens her with death if she doesn't marry him, she's pretty much cool with it.

The characters include Inigo Montoya ("You kill my father....prepare to die!" You knew it was coming), the world's most talented swordsman, on a mission to kill the Six-fingered Man and avenge the death of his father; Fezzik the strongman, looking for somewhere he belongs; and the Sicilian, Vizzini, an evil genius for hire.

I don't think this book could get any better.There are evil giant rodents, and a FIRE SWAMP. I mean, really?
Really?
I don't see how it COULDN'T be a classic.

The story is broken up with (fictitious) pieces from William Goldman's life; his legal woes in trying to revamp "S. Morgenstern's" classic, his cold marriage, his relationship with his son -

it SOUNDS dull, but I like how sarcastic and self-deprecating he is.

The story of The Princess Bride started as a bedtime story for William Goldman's two daughters, and it has that Fairy Tale Feel... sweeping and magical, but grounded with a sense of humour that original (cough cough ANCIENT cough cough) fairy tales don't.

I picked the book up because of the movie. They almost perfectly match, and the movie was impeccably cast - if you have seen the movie, you can picture each actor as their character. Which I consider to be book-to-movie-adaptation gold.
Eenyway. I am very, very sorry for my prolonged absence, and recognize that many of you have left, never to return - but if anyone is still reading, thank you.
Happy New Year,
Radical