Booo

I listened to "Pure Dead Magic" by Debi Gliori, an audio book on tape that I got at a used book sale at the library in the summer. I thought it was kind of fun how the author weaved elements of computers the Internet into the world of magic that usually deals with wands and such.

(45th book of 2010)

My First Inspirational Manga

So instead of continuing with a book I didn't enjoy, I tried out my first inspirational manga.

Serenity--New Bad Girl in Town by Realbuzz Studios

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


My first inspirational Manga. Good believable story. The Christian students were not preachy or anything like that, but real and welcoming. I enjoyed the style of the graphics aw well.



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No Thirteenth Tale for me

I started reading "The Thirteenth Tale" by Diane Setterfield for one of my book clubs.

Actually, I made it to page 78 and I have decided that I don't want to continue reading the book. In the beginning, the premise seemed kind of interesting, but later the abuse, rape, self-mutilation and other evil things described was just too much for me.
I liked the scenes in the book shop and even the mysterious letter and the start of the visit were interesting.

There were a couple of last straws that made me stop reading, as I don't often do that, I finish almost all the books I read. This paragraph may contain spoilers. One was the accumulation of evil things described in the story as mentioned previously. The next one was that Isabelle returned to her abusive brother (and since she didn't know her father had died, to the father who had injured her so viciously just before she left). And she seemed to be very happy about it. I mean, I do know that abuse happens unfortunately, but she chose to go back instead of being happy to escape. That was just too much for me. Third, I have several books that I want to read that I don't want to waste my time with this one. I want to have fun reading a book (even if there are sad or upsetting parts in between) or know that I learned something really important, but this one just went downhill.

I tried...

Another graphic novel

This afternoon I read "Pitch Black" by Youme Landowne and Anthony Horton. A white young woman and a black young man meet in an underground station and he tells her about his life. I don't want to give away any details of the story, but it's quite unusual. Some of the drawings are detailed whereas others are more like sketches. The different amounts of detail and use of only black and white and some gray tones fits really well with the subject. This story is a lot shorter than the the one I read recently about New Orleans. It kept me wondering at the end if such a life would really happen in New York or just parts of it. Interesting for sure and worth the read.

(I'm counting graphic novels as books read, so this is number 43.)

Looking for Alaska

Just a couple of days ago, I finished reading "Looking for Alaska" by John Green (the Wikipedia article has a good synopsis). I got the book from the library and finished it just in time, one day before it was due, so that I could take some notes before returning it.

My first impression when reading the first few chapters was surprise at how much smoking and drinking was going on at the school. It didn't make sense to me why Pudge would start with it, it seemed to me his friends wouldn't have minded if he had said no thanks. There was no strong peer pressure and he seemed to know that it's not good for you. I was shocked at the prank in the beginning, I mean, he could have drowned. That was a severe case of bullying. Lots of things like that seemed to be going on at the school, drinking, smoking, dangerous pranks, etc., but the teachers didn't care much, they rarely "found out", even though there was so much evidence. And the parents didn't seem to care, either. I was really baffeled by that. Anyway, the main story was still interesting, the before part where Pudge gets to know Alaska and his other new friends at this school, and the after part where they're trying to figure out what was really going on that night with Alaska. The religion class was a nice way to weave in some philosophical questions into the story.

I read in the Wikipedia article about the book that the book has been challenged at a high school for content dealing with sexually explicit situations. That's pretty ridiculous considering all the other things that are going on in that story. Although I wasn't interested in such things at that age, the sexual thoughts and actions seemed the most comprehensible to me compared to the prevalence of drinking, the severeness of some of the "pranks" etc.

So I kind of enjoyed the book even though I might not have ordinarily chosen to read it. I read it for the BC in DC book club. I hope I'll make it to the meeting next week.

(50 books in 2010 cout: 42).