Bookish Thoughts

Shirley Jackson is one of those authors who just sticks with you. I'm not entirely sure what it is about her writing, but it haunts for years. I read  The Lottery  in high school, and I still think about it from time to time. I'm sure that  We Have Always Lived in the Castle  will be no different. It gets scarier the more I think about it, which is a little strange, but it also keeps getting better. And it's so short that I have no doubt I'll be re-reading it in the future. Probably to celebrate Halloween. The narrator is a young woman named Merricat who, strangely, reminded me a lot of Rothfuss' Auri. When  The Slow Regard of Silent Things  came out earlier this year, Rothfuss took pains to warn his readers that it was an unusual story with an unusual protagonist. Sure to be unlike anything they'd read before. Well Rothfuss has likely never read this book, because the two are more than a little similar. Merricat and Auri have a lot in common. They are ...

I'd forgotten how much I like this book. For some reason, the sixth book always gets lost in the shuffle for me. Must be because it's the penultimate book. I expect it to just be build up for the final book. And in some ways it is. This is the book that introduces us to Horcruxes and fills in Voldemort's past. But there's also a lot of fantastic stuff in here. Even if it does put some strain on Rowling's decision to use a limited third-person perspective. I love all of the relationship stuff that begins happening in this book. Ron and Hermione's jealous dance around each other is perfect and so typical of first romances where people are too scared to just say what they want. Harry's crush on Ginny is wonderful, too, if a little cheesy with the chest monster metaphor. The moment when they finally kiss still thrills me completely, and I always wish she was more of a presence in the final book so that we could see them together a bit more. Overall this book...

Bless Me, Ultima  is a book I missed back in high school. My sophomore year was American Literature. The school decided to start a new class that combined American Lit with American History into a single 3-hour class. But because I was science track, I opted for the regular, easier english and history classes that year. And I ended up with a different reading list because of it. So while all my friends read and fell in love with  Bless Me Ultima , I was keeping busy with  The Great Gatsby  and  Catcher in the Rye . (My friends probably read those, too. I think the advanced class had an expanded reading list, not a different one.) Recently I saw this book on a best-of list, then encountered it at a used book store for $1. Which meant that I basically had to read it. I think I may have enjoyed this book more had I read it in a classroom setting. It reads like a lot of the other books I read for school, heavy on the metaphor. And each chapter works fairly well ...

The first and only time I attended a midnight book release party was when this book came out. It was the summer before my senior year of high school, so a couple of friends and I were easily able to make the trek to the nearest Barnes and Noble by ourselves. The party itself was geared to a much younger audience, but we were bookish and happy to spend some time browsing the shelves before the book was officially released. On the way home I sat in the backseat and read the first chapter aloud for the benefit of the driver. This is also the first time I spoiled myself for something. I care less about this now. I know the shapes of stories well enough to understand what's coming, and spotting the clues is a big part of my enjoyment. But at the time I was genuinely upset that I'd figured out Sirius was going to die from the blurb on the dust jacket. I was even more upset when the text proved my prediction correct. Despite that I remember being excited when this book first came ...

Wyrd Sisters  is a giant step up in the quality of  Discworld  books. There's an interesting and complicated plot, driven by the actions of a cast of delightful characters. There's a wonderful subplot concerning a storm who hopes to one day make it big. There's sharp and subtle commentary on the nature of ruling and of fiction and rumors. And there are enough Shakespeare references to make your head spin, given that this is largely a parody of  Macbeth . It's no wonder that a majority of the fandom considers  Wyrd Sisters  to be the first good book in the series. It is often recommended as a starting point, even though it's technically the second book in the "witches" subseries. But it's so much smarter and more fun and better plotted than anything came before. The first few books can be off putting to people new to Discworld, though they are fun in their own right. But it's so refreshing to get to this point and see the Discworld I've grown ...

It can be difficult to read someone else's favorite book. Especially if you end up not liking that book. I'd like to be diplomatic and say that I just encountered this book at the wrong time in my life. And maybe that's true. I'm too accustomed to these tropes to feel any suspense or surprise. The book was clearly written for a younger audience. At the same time, I'm tempted to say that this book is just objectively bad. Merlin is an arrogant, foolish boy who makes nonsensical decisions in order to advance the plot. He fucks everything up, but manages to right it all in the end because he's going to be a great wizard and we can't let him actually kill his mother. He gains wisdom and humility far too easily because they are distilled to seven lessons that can be expressed as cheerful platitudes, like "Love is the strongest bond" and "Every life is precious". Worse, the author doesn't trust the reader to remember simple details or m...

Goblet of Fire  is the big, transitional book that takes this series to the next level. The world expands, Voldemort returns, and Harry takes some important steps on the road to adulthood. It's nearly twice as long as the previous book, which I remember being super excited about when it first came out. This time around I was a little worried about the length. But it turns out (and I should have remembered) that this book is still excellently paced. It drags a bit at the end when two entire chapters are devoted to exposition and monologuing, but up until that point the story moves along really well. This is one of the first books that I can remember waiting for. I didn't have to wait long, less than a year. But I was still incredibly excited to finally get my hands on  Goblet of Fire . I had elaborate plans to read the entire thing in one sitting, much as I had with  Chamber of Secrets . It was a bit long for that, and I wasn't really allowed to skip family meals. But I ...