Book Awards Reading Challenge

Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall
Bill Willingham, et al.

I'm a big fan of Fables judging from the fact that I actually read what volume I can find, which somehow translates to my reading the series out of order at times. Yeah, tsk tsk tsk. But this anthology is special indeed. It's not exactly part of any of the ongoing Fable arc but more of a backstory (uh, backstories) that give us a glimpse of the lives of our favorite Fables before they all sought refuge in Fabletown.

And what better way to start the storytelling than to have Snow White sent as an ambassador to the Arabian Fables? All stories therefore follow the route we all know as Scheherazade's plight with the Sultan when Snow White realized that she had to keep her wits with her in order to relay her mission not to mention keep herself alive in the process.

Ten stories in all, eleven if you include the backbone, A Most Troublesome Woman illustrated by Charles Vess, which basically covers Snow White's arrival at the palace and her eventual discussions with the Sultan that goes on until the end of the book. Ten stories? Yes, ten. Some give light to what we know of our favorite Fables. Others are new tales of Fables even I barely know (or I'm not sure if they even appeared in any of the Fable volumes just yet).

The Fencing Lessons is the real story of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves in relation to the series, obviously. Remember in the first volume where Snow White was easily angered at the mere mention of the dwarves? Here we meet a very much in love newlyweds - Snow White and Prince Charming - so the question remains, what happened? Well this one sheds some light into the topic and somehow started the breakdown of the marriage. Lavishly painted by John Bolton and well told in fact. Though I think Snow White here pretty much resembled Chinese actress Shu Qi on a handful of angles. Seriously.

The Christmas Pies is a short and sharp story on how the Reynard the Fox outwitted the goblins and helped a bunch of animals escape the homelands.

A Frog's-Eye View is the heartbreaking tale of Prince Ambrose, the frog prince. We are familiar with him as the janitor of Fabletown yet we have no idea of his story altogether. Oh goodness, probably the saddest part of the anthology altogether and ably illustrated by the much-loved James Jean.

The Runt is Bigby's story, of how he came to be the Big Bad Wolf we used to hate in the tales. Again we encounter Mr. North as Bigby's father.

A Mother's Love is a very short tale of loss and enchantment.

Diaspora Part 1 bring us the sisters Snow White and Rose Red around the time they were fleeing the soldier's of the Adversary. Along the way they encountered the Gingerbread House where uh, they find the witch in the oven. Yes, that's Frau Totenkinder. This is where the story break into The Witch's Tale, in which the powerful witch detailed her betrayal and eventual accumulation of power through the practice of her craft. Then Diaspora 2 concludes with the sisters taking the witch with them and ended with a wolf. Oooh and uh that part we all know from the short story included in Fables: Legends in Exile.

What You Wish For is basically a short story telling people to be careful. Hahaha!

Lastly, Fair Division as illustrated by Jill Thompson, is Old King Cole's tale of sacrifice during the time of his and other Fables' escape from the homelands.

Whew.

The stories are all so engaging I didn't want it to end. In fact I reread it just now. I've probably reread it twice since I finished it a month or ago. Well, considering that I can't find a copy of Wolves and I'm itching to ramble about Sons of Empire already I only have this to reread. So yes, I jumped over Wolves. Hahaha.

And I can't seem to choose a favorite from among the stories though I love Diaspora (with The Witch's Tale included) since we see the difference between Snow White and Rose Red more clearly and the sibling dynamics is so real. Plus, I always have a soft spot in me for Frau Totenkinder. And now I know why this witch is helping Fabletown. I adore the drawings done by Tara McPherson. It's whimsical, colorful and so cartoony and somehow brings us back to the times when we were kids and fighting with siblings and such. Or maybe that's just me. Then the shift to Esao Andrew's take on The Witch's Tale is simply unnerving.

Oh poor Ambrose! Now I understand him more! And King Cole as well! And like it or not, even Prince Charming.

Can I stop now before I ramble myself into oblivion?

Oh and people new to Fables can actually pick this up ahead of any of the available volumes as it is a prequel. I can imagine those reading this one first and then pursuing the series altogether. The nuances of characters will make more sense or there's a deeper understanding to them once you've read this one. I mean deeper than your previous knowledge of them through the different volumes obviously.

I'll stop now.

Get this, read this and enjoy!

-----
Fables: 1001 Nights of Snowfall won the Eisner Award for Best Anthology in 2007.

Amsterdam
Ian McEwan

There are writers whose stories you forget after you put the book down. Or let's say you enjoy a novel and consider it one of the best reads of the year and yet a few months after that you can barely recall the intricacies of plot or the manner of writing, only the feeling that at the time you turn in the page you were smiling like crazy. Then there are writers whose stories haunt you after turning the last few pages of the book. And not just that, the story nestles in your brain and much as you want to expunge it (oh gee, such a strong word) you can't. You feel like you lived in the story. You know the characters or rather you thought you know the characters and yet the author expertly tricks you to his chosen reality.

I've read Amsterdam at least a couple of weeks ago. I still can't get over it. Let's see why.

There are three ex-lovers of the now-deceased but very much married Molly Lane attending her funeral. One, Julian Garmony, is a politician with high hopes of becoming a Prime Minister in the near future. The other two are friends Clive Linley and Vernon Halliday. Clive is a musician, a composer selected to present his latest masterpiece in a program at the turn of the century. Vernon is the editor of a newsmagazine with a steadily declining readership. All three shared a past with Molly at different times in her short life but she married a rich publisher named George Lane.

After the funeral George contacted Vernon and showed compromising photos of Julian Garmony taken by Molly. Considering Julian's promising political career and the fact that his politics isn't well-liked, Vernon pursued to have the photos published, something that Clive didn't like as he takes it as an affront to the memory of Molly. The rest of the story details the events of Vernon's pursuit, of Clive's struggle to compose music, of Julian's composure in public on the imminent publication of the photos and eventually, of an ending that in part was expected by me and yet the real ending (so to speak) particularly the last paragraph or so was a complete and total surprise it pulled the rug off my feet. Because in that last few sentences of the book you think you know what the story is all about and yet, alas, you're completely off the mark. And once you accept it as that you realized that you've been taken for a ride and you very well understand the reasons why. Irony is a good weapon of choice indeed.

On another layer it is a story of friendship. Molly Lane died of a debilitating disease with such swiftness that the two old friends thinking of a future filled with the pain and suffering similar to Molly's promised each other that they'd help each other end it all if and when necessary. It's the kind of friendship forged in years of companionship, a friendship that never doubts until now, when Molly is dead is everything is not as it should be.

To me it's another delicate handling of a story that could've gone completely wrong in another writer's hands. And McEwan is a masterful storyteller capable of fine-tuning the characters until the feel so real to the point you wish you could wring their necks or scream at them, somewhat.

While the politics can be treated simply as such and the portrayal of news hounds as is, I loved the way McEwan managed to make composing music read like you're listening to it. Well, maybe that's just me. I'm tone deaf and I couldn't sing to save my life (gee, I've been using that phrase a lot lately) but I love listening to music. I love separating different instruments in my mind. I love shielding other sounds and retaining just the melody one time, just the guitars another. Again, it's just me. And McEwan captures composing music in a manner that is understandable to someone like me.

I've read four McEwan stories so far, all four different and yet all managing to disturb me one way or another. Disturb in a good sense, that is. I'm sure to read his other novels and he's elevated now to the ranks of writers I'd follow to death. Or something to that effect.

Not very many people share my adoration of McEwan or this book but to me it's always a case of hmmm, what works for me uh, works for me. Right?

-----
Amsterdam won the Man Booker Prize of 1998.

Dead Until Dark
Charlaine Harris

Finally I finished a book in just one sitting!

And it's the first in Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire Series with Sookie Stackhouse as the lead character. The book that started it all for Alan Ball thereafter deciding to adapt it to the small screen. Yes, this is the first book in the series that gave birth to HBO's True Blood.

Sookie Stackhouse is a telepathic waitress in a bar called Merlotte's, in a fictional town called Bon Temps located in Louisiana. In Sookie's world vampires just came out of the coffin (literally) after the development of a synthetic blood for them to drink instead of eh, human blood. Sookie's been waiting for a vampire to show up in Merlotte's. And when a vampire did show, her world turned upside down.

The vampire in question is handsome, enigmatic Bill. Yes, Bill. A normal name. Not as imaginative as Lestat or as romantic as Armand. Bill Compton, a true son of Bon Temps. He served in the Civil War before he became a vampire. Sigh.

For Sookie who had to control herself and put up mental shield not to hear the thoughts of the people around her, the presence of Bill is comforting. She can't hear his thoughts at all! And amazingly enough, she's not affected by his glamor.

So yes, it's partly a love story, partly romance. Yes, it's between a vampire and a human.

It's also a mystery. Women are being killed in Bon Temps and the murderer is on the loose. Two of them are known to have been intimate with a vampire due to bite marks. And Sookie's brother Jason is a major suspect because of his previous relationships with them. Until Sookie's beloved grandmother became a victim as well. People are now suspicious of the vampire mainstreaming with them.

Hmmm.

It's a quick enough read. Enjoyable as well. Just the right combination of humor and horror. Enough to take you away from everyday life for the couple or so hours to read it.

I picked it up because I've seen a handful of episodes of True Blood. The advantage to seeing the adaptation first is that now I read the words with the Southern accent in mind. Hahaha. The disadvantage is that I know now where the series deviated from the book, so to speak. Plus, I also know the killer. I've no idea if the show will retain that ending though, hahaha.

I already mentioned that I like watching True Blood. Here's Sookie and Bill played by Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer.


But the tv series is more graphic. Well, tv is a visual medium so what else do I expect, particularly from a cable channel at that. And I already mentioned that there are changes from the book itself which is understandable. The show amplifies certain characters that make them more interesting, more layered than the handful of lines afforded them in the book. Plus the additional storylines are apt for a one hour show that combines supernatural mystery with a love angle.

I do love the fact that the show retained the tone of the book. So there are moments while watching the show that I have to just laugh at the dialogue. I treasure those moments in the book as well.

Allow me a moment of shallowness by adding that I love the cover. The cartoony drawing of Sookie and the vampire is fun. Plus it's glittery. Ok, moment of shallowness over.

I'm actually reading the second book now. Tsk tsk tsk. What will happen to me after the 12-episode season is over and I finished the rest of the books as well? Tsk tsk tsk.

-----
Dead Until Dark won the Anthony Award for Best Paperback Original in 2001.

American Born Chinese
Gene Luen Yang

Three seemingly different threads of stories actually comprise a whole, only it doesn't look that way at first.

It starts with a folk tale from China called the Monkey King. Aah, the Monkey King. I remember watching a movie or something once starring Thomas Gibson titled The Monkey King. I don't remember much except that it starred Thomas Gibson. And the costumes. Or that some people were in costumes. Darn. But I digress. I'm not familiar with the story of The Monkey King but in this graphic novel it seems we meet him at the start of the tale.

It shifts to the States where Jin Wang, a son of two Chinese nationals who emigrated there, just transferred to a school where he is the only student of Chinese-descent. That until he meets Wei-Chen from Taiwan.

Then there's the panels where it seems we are watching a situational comedy with a Chinese relative visiting an all-American boy named Danny, making the latter totally ashamed.

The three threads somehow make one beautiful pattern in the end which obviously I won't spoil for you. The story is not titled American Born Chinese just because, right?

It's basically a story about fitting in; the Monkey King not wanting to admit he's a monkey but a god, Jin Wang is an American-born Chinese trying to fit in to his new school and his only friend is an immigrant from Taiwan named Wei-Chen, and the Danny thread with his shamefaced thoughts of having his Chinese relative spoil his perfect, all-American life.

Fitting in is difficult everywhere, more so when one reaches adolescence. You don't have to be an immigrant or descended from an immigrant to know that. But it gets more difficult if you try to fit in with a different culture, with a different set of values and this is apparent in Jin Wang's case. There are and always will be stereotypes no matter how much we all try to steer clear from them.

Lovely way to bring all the tension and difficulties of growing up Chinese-American in the States without losing the Chinese identity behind.

-----
This book won the Michael L. Printz Award in 2007.

The Road
Cormac McCarthy

Just remember that the things you put into your head are there forever, he said. You might want to think about that.

You forget some things, dont you?

Yes. You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget.

I'll be frank and say that the reason I wanted to read this in the first place is that Viggo Mortensen is playing the role of the man traveling the road with his son. I mean, when I heard that Viggo signed on I immediately wished for a copy of the book. Not that wishes do come true (but in this case it does, I had to pay for my copy though) and by the time I got around to this one I already read No Country for Old Men and was blown by it (not to mention the movie version).

That is a pretty long paragraph to say that my prime motivating factor in buying this was an actor who played Aragorn in Peter Jackson's version of Lord of the Rings. Enough said. Let me discuss the book.

It's sometime in the future and two people are walking down the road. A future that is bleak, post-apocalyptic. A man and his son traverse scorched plains searching for food to keep them alive. Along the way they see remnants of things past: the houses left behind, the dessicated corpses of those who didn't survive what - a bomb, an explosion - who knows exactly, it was never mentioned. But we are left with the man and his son. Both unnamed. Both trying to survive. And there are others like them; searching for salvation or god knows what, desperate for food and companionship. Or just plain desperate.

It's a future as cold as that coldblooded killer named Chigurh in No Country for Old Men.

Again, McCarthy manages to disturb me not just of images of a future that is dark yet all too real but of thoughts and feelings that are all too relevant now. My heart races at the thought of some of the survivors killing each other and yet, desperation is indeed a motive. Some scenes are too gruesome to mention even but like I said, everything that McCarthy conjures in this powerful story is relevant in the here and now. It is a bleak future but it is also a part of who we are as people, who we can be when the going gets tougher and tougher each day.

But above the seeming darkness there is still love. And hope. The love shown by the father to the son, relentlessly rallying the boy to survive amidst the desolation of winter with nothing but the clothes on their back and hardly any food to eat. There's hope in a handful of apples found along the way, the scent of which brings back memories of a not so distant past of warmth and laughter. Still, the love is shared only by the two of them, and hope like the apple comes and goes.

In a world where rules don't apply what separates men from beasts? Good from evil? Is survival reason enough to forget one's humanity? These aren't the only questions I asked myself. And there are times I had to put it down because the image in my head gets too disturbing, afraid that if I think of them at all then it becomes all to real. But the image is still there, as gruesome as the future painted by the author.

I was actually reminded of a conversation between Kaylee and Simon in Joss Whedon's short-running Firefly series. In an episode, Kaylee was practically telling the young doctor that out there in the black, in that wide expanse of the universe where the ship Serenity sails looking for business, good manners don't matter. Something that Simon objected to; to him manners become all the more important. Something to that effect.

Of course McCarthy somehow made that entire conversation all the more serious and disturbing in this story which practically deals with the same thing. Yeah. Manners. Morals actually. How you deal with yourself when you're trying to survive. How you deal with others who aren't on the same page as you. How you deal, period.

Read this. You should.

-----
This is my last book for the first Book Award Reading Challenge. The Road won both the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2007 and the James Tait Black Memorial Award in 2006.

The Year of Magical Thinking
Joan Didion

I've read this book sometime last year. I have to admit it took a long time for me to read for personal reasons. For one thing it was a book given by a friend a couple or so weeks after my mom passed on. I tried reading it a couple of months after the fact and gave up. Then there's the part where I can't seem to read anymore because my eyes almost always fill with tears and I just had to close the book and think happy thoughts. Ok, that didn't sound right.

But the initial difficulty passed as did time. Maybe sadness and grief work that way. Maybe I was still in denial, in my own state of magical thinking. When I picked the book up again last year, more than a year after I received it in the mail, I was ready. Still hurting but ready nonetheless.

Didion's book is an account of the twelve-month period after her husband, John Dunne, died of a massive heart attack. At the time of his death their daughter, Quintana Roo, was sick and admitted to another hospital for septic shock. And while the book covers the process of grieving, it basically embraces the power of marriage and family, and eventually the notions of the one left behind, as in this case the widow Joan.

This is my attempt to make sense of the period that followed, weeks and then months that ut loose any fixed idea I had ever had about death, about illness, about probability and luck, about good fortune and bad, about marriage and children and memory, about grief, about the ways in which people do and do not deal with the fact that life ends, about the shallowness of sanity, about life itself.

There is clarity in her perceptions that those who have lost someone can relate with. Maybe that's why I cried while reading. Or at times I just had to stop.

Grief is different. Grief has no distance. Grief comes in waves, paroxysms, sudden apprehensions that weaken the knees and blind the eyes and obliterate the dailiness of life.

And while there is clarity, there is also a sense of repetition which is understandable. This is magical thinking after all.

Survivors look back and see omens, messages they missed.

They remember the tree that died, the gull that splattered onto the hood of the car.

They live by symbols. They read meaning into the barrage of spam on the unused computer, the delete key that stops working, the imagined abandonment in the decision to replace it. The voice in my answering machine is still John's. The fact that it was his in the first place was arbitrary, having to do with who was around on the day the answering machine last needed programming, but if I need to retape it now I would do so with a sense of betrayal.

Didion gives a voice or an echo of what's it like to lose someone. A voice for those of us who can't find it yet, for those who stammer and mumble incoherently, for those who want to get out of that state of denial because there is plenty here, and plenty more room for thoughts of moving on and remembering well.

But for others whose grief are unfathomable, this is just an echo because theirs that can never be defined. They can never be assuaged by thoughts that others have felt that same hollow feeling inside. And I can understand that.

It took me more than a year to finally read the book and a handful of months to finally post about it. I'm just glad I did both: read and finally post about it.

-----
This is technically speaking the second (or third) book I read (I'm not really sure) for the Book Awards Reading Challenge but obviously I only posted about it now. But this would count as my eleventh book in all. The Year of Magical Thinking won the National Book Award in 2005 for nonfiction.

Island of the Blue Dolphins
Scott O'Dell

Remember the news about the photographed uncontacted Amazon tribe a couple or so weeks ago? I was reminded of that while reading this story about Karana, the girl left behind on the Island of the Blue Dolphins.

Although the tribe called Ghalas-at where Karana belongs wasn't exactly uncontacted, they basically live peacefully in a contained environment within the island. That is until the Aleuts came hunting for otters and then eventually caused the massacre of most of the tribesmen of Ghalas-at.

After the massacre, another ship bearing friendly men offering to rescue the tribe off the island came and took the surviving members into another ship. Karana, also known as Wonapalei or The Girl with the Long Black Hair jumped off the ship in order to be with her brother Ramo who failed to make it to the ship on time. The ship didn't come back for them because of the rough seas. And for sometime the two siblings hope that it would eventually, to no avail.

Some shocking events led to the death of Ramo and Karana was eventually left alone to fend off for herself for around eighteen years on the island. Those years form the meat of the story; how Karana pulls off the feat, living alone, living under fear of the Aleuts who eventually came back to hunt more otters, and then living well without any other human on the island.

What intrigued me is the fact that this story is based on a real-life account of a woman only referred to as The Lost Woman of San Nicolas. Scott O'Dell imagined the life she learned to live while left alone in the island. And what a life that is!

It brings to mind that Tom Hanks movie Castaway. At least that part where she searches for caves and eventually builds a place for her to live. The book is written from Karana's point of view and most of it is limited to survival at the start and eventually how to live. Obviously she is a strong woman to make it on her own. But the book rarely deals with her feelings of loneliness until the time that the Aleuts left the second time. Maybe because her tribe taught her to be tough. Maybe her culture taught her not to wallow. But she sure had a lot of resolve to stay alive and live with the challenges of having wild dogs, of foxes, of not having anyone to talk with on the island and yet she never appeared depressed. Oh gee, maybe it's because I'm so used to reading books that deal with depressive feelings that I look for it in everything I read! Kidding.

Karana is indeed admirable in that way. I can see this book as required reading for young children because of the lessons one can learn from Karana's strength, her change of perspectives after living alone for years, and her eventual longing for human company in the end.

One teeny tiny point is that Karana's memory, or that of the author failed her at one point at came up with the name Kimko who was never mentioned from the beginning and she must have confused it with Nanko, the guy her sister Ulape loves, and the chief Kimki who left the island in search for other safe islands earlier on. Again, no spoiler there. I just have spurts of attention to details thing that gets to me so when a name comes up that wasn't even mentioned before I blame the editor for failing to notice it even.

Then again, maybe it is indeed Karana's memory failing her eventually.

Other than that it's just an ok read. It's quite easy to read. Enough to pass the time while waiting in line for something and it's ten or so pages short of 200 pages. But my heart never raced that much for Karana; maybe because I sensed early on her strength and resolve, that she would be able to tackle everything that's thrown her way. And after reading the final few pages I was right.

-----
This is my tenth book for the Book Awards Reading Challenge. The Island of the Blue Dolphins won the Newbery Award in 1961.

The Bloody Chamber
Angela Carter

Metaphors make the world vibrant. Words come alive when a writer deftly adds them in the mix, subtly or otherwise, and somehow brings a story to life. I love metaphors. I am awed by authors who uses them well. Angela Carter is one of them.

His wedding gift, clasped round my throat. A choker of rubies, two inches wide, like an extraordinarily precious slit throat.

Gee, that image will probably stay in my head for the better part of the week!

There are as many ways to rewrite beloved fairy tales as the number of angels standing on top of a pin. Did that make sense? But in that varied ideas of retelling, there's always the comparison with the known tale, justified or otherwise. So it takes a master manipulator to stretch well-known tales of old into something new, something different, something sexy, something scary and yet something truly original just the same. This is what The Bloody Chamber is all about. It's reading fairy tales in a new light.

Composed of ten renarrated stories in all, the venerable Ms. Carter managed to play with the tales and make them fit our adult mind. Not that fairy tales are meant exclusively for children, no. What I mean here is that she writes the tales with the adults in mind. I mean gee, you wouldn't exactly be reading this paragraph to your very young children, would you?

Then he kissed me. And with, this time, no reticence. He kissed me and laid his hand imperatively upon my breast, beneath the sheath of ancient lace. I stumbled on the winding stair that led to the bedroom, to the carved, gilded bed on which he had been conceived. I stammered foolishly: We've not taken luncheon yet; and, besides, it is broad daylight...

All the better to see you.

He made me put on my choker, the family heirloom of one woman who had escaped the blade. With trembling fingers, I fastened the thing about my neck. It was cold as ice and chilled me. He twined my hair into a rope and lifted it off my shoulders so that he could the better kiss the downy furrows below my ears; that made me shudder. And he kissed those blazing rubies, too. He kissed them before he kissed my mouth. Rapt, he intoned:' Of her apparel she retains/Only her sonorous jewellery.'

A dozen husbands impaled a dozen brides while the mewing gulls swung on invisible trapezes in the empty air outside.

To think that's not exactly the most graphic of descriptions there is in the entire book. Believe me when I say there are lots of them.

The ten stories include The Bloody Chamber, an adaptation of Bluebeard. Two takes on Beauty and the Beasts titled The Courtship of Mr. Lyon and The Tiger's Bride. Puss-in-Boots is based on Puss in Boots, hahaha. I have no idea where The Erl King is based. Sorry. The Snow Child is based on Snow White. In The Lady of the House of Love, the lead female sleeps during the day so more or less this is akin to Sleeping Beauty, as there is also a mention of that tale in this story. Two stories based on The Little Red Riding Hood titled The Werewolf, and The Company of Wolves. I also don't know where Wolf-Alice is based on. Hahaha. My apologies.

But more than the ever present theme of woman's sexuality, the tales are practically meant for the lover of fairy tales of old and seeing the other side to it. In The Bloody Chamber, there is that mother-daughter bond highlighted by Carter. In The Lady of the House of Love, the Countess defies the role left for her to play by her ancestors of old. Women as property in both The Tiger's Bride and Puss-in-Boots. Both pureness and corruption are prevalent in the stories with wolves.

But there are conventional tales as well. The Courtship of Mr. Lyon is practically a rewriting of Beauty and the Beast down to the last scene. There is a damsel in distress rescued by a dashing debonair in Puss-in-Boots.

I'm just rambling. This is a book that shouldn't be missed by those who adore fairy tales to bits.

It's dark, it's delightful, and it can be read in one sitting or savoured one story at a time. But this I guarantee; there is power in Ms. Carter's words, power that make you see these old tales differently. As powerful as her description of that choker of rubies that is "bright as arterial blood."

I mean gee, that's ultimate coolness. Writing a fairy tale and using the words arterial blood in it as a description forebodes darkness and everything else that could happen in it.

-----
This is my ninth book for the Book Awards Reading Challenge. This won the Cheltenham Festival of Literature Award in 1979.

Atonement
Ian McEwan

I remember buying this book years ago in National Bookstore. Years, yes. My copy of Atonement is old, probably from the first batch of trade paperback release. I didn't even have a blog, much less a book blog then! The reason I probably didn't read this then is because I needed the time to grow old and be floored by the story now.

Yes, it floored me. I never used that description before. It is a story that quietly builds up a crescendo, lulls you into a sense of comfort and then eventually pulls the rug from under you much, much later when you think you're safely ensconced in a pillowy softness of an almost-happily ever after. And I think I have to write this down now before I fall further into the depths of my disorientation and attempt to pick the pieces of myself in the process.

I already posted that I was deeply worried about Robbie and Cecilia earlier as well as my hate for Briony but that would make sense only to those who have read the book or have seen the film. I haven't seen the film yet which I heard from good sources a faithful adaptation of the book. Now I want to. Again, I digress.

In a nutshell: Briony Tallis, the thirteen-year old wannabe writer accuses Robbie Turner, the son of the Tallises' cleaning lady, of assaulting her cousin Lola Quincey one summer night in 1935 while searching for the missing siblings of Lola in the garden of the Tallises' house in Surrey. Cecilia Tallis, Briony's older sister is in love with Robbie. The events prior and leading to the twins' disappearance is the heart of the accusation and the heart of the entire book. I wouldn't know how to put all that into words without sounding like I'm writing a case digest of a crime - all cold facts and none of the raw emotions involved - when in fact everything about the book speaks of how emotions affect the decisions we make and the paths we take as we live through trying circumstances.

The accusation is what Briony is atoning for in the story. Because it destroyed Robbie Turner's future, incarcerating him up to the time he volunteered for an early release to join the English campaign against the Germans in France.

Obviously I will not speak further of the story. But I will heap praises to Ian McEwan, with a scowling "How could you?" thrown in for good measure in between. Oops, sorry.

The writing is excellent. Using perspectives of the different characters of the book we get a sense of who they are, what they are like and where they are coming from. The difficulty (and genius of using this voice is that) we also see the bigger picture; so when things start happening a voice in your head starts screaming "This isn't happening" or "This is so unfair" or even simply "NO!" all to no avail.

There is also a war element in the story that brings to mind the harshness of the bombing attacks, the long journey to reach the beach only to find none of the boats that would take the soldiers back to England. There is the same attention to detail when McEwan deals with the nurses' training in the hospital - the way the sisters drum responsibility to the probationers, the cleanliness of the floors, the whiteness of the sheets, chilblains on the nurses hands - all evoke images in black and white, or sepia, your mind's eye picturing scenes in vivid detail.

Objectively speaking it's also a book about writing; what the author chooses to do with the material at hand. This thought is there from the moment we meet Briony and her early attempts to stage a play called The Trials of Arabella from the very first pages of the book.

In the end it is Briony's story, Briony's atonement. She with the writer's mind, her head in the clouds, conjuring a story to suit her reality. I mentioned I was starting to hate her to bits. I realize that the reason for the hate is that I understand her so much, I relate to her a lot and it is a very scary thought. Because it entails accepting gullibility, guilt and cowardice as well. And I can be very gullible, guilty and cowardly too.

I don't know if I made much sense so my apologies, I'm still trying to pick myself off the floor. Maybe I can go back and post about the book again much later. One thing is certain, I'm turning into an Ian McEwan fan. Goodness, so much for torturing myself with this heartbreaking yet unbelievably beautiful story.

Holes
Louis Sachar

This is an unlikely story about an unlikely hero being sent to an unlikely camp; but no matter how unlikely everything is you just keep on reading and reading and reading until you get to the end, page 234 and ask yourself "Gee, this is an unlikely triumph of a book!" then thank the fates or gods you believe in for the opportunity to peruse it. Of course that last part is a bit dramatic, how unlikely of me. Then again, not so. Hahaha!

I first heard of this book from my friend Anj, who raved about it last year while I was practically close to my panic mode - I took the bar exams September so around that time I haven't been reading fiction - and filed the thought (well, the book title) in mind. I was searching the bargain books at Book Sale last month when I found a good copy for only Php 40.00 (which is equivalent to one US dollar) and forgot all about it until I picked it up Friday night and finished it early Saturday morning.

How exactly should I ramble about this unlikely story? I don't think I can. Hahaha! Basically it's about a young boy named Stanley Yelnats being sent to Camp Green Lake after being convicted of a crime he didn't commit. The Yelnats have a long history of bad luck for failure of the great-great-grandfather to fulfill a promise made a hundred or so years back; not one of them is ever really successful at anything. So the young Stanley is used to the bad luck and the family is used to blaming their "no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing-great-great-grandfather" if only jokingly as the Yelnats have good hearts.

In Camp Green Lake the boys are required to dig holes five feet wide and five feet deep to build character, so the Warden says. I did mention the story as unlikely, right? Like hundreds of times, right? Yeah, I know I exaggerate a lot. But like I said you just read on because there's something about Stanley, something about the holes, something about luck changing its course for the better, something about old family stories and everything coming in full circle when the story ends. If I say a word more then it would be unfair for those who have yet to read and enjoy the book.

I was about to title this post as Karma Chameleon, something which I thought that those who have read this book might understand, then I remembered how weird my mind works and maybe the song just kept playing in my head from the time I reached the halfway mark of the book. Maybe I'm just pushing it too far because I'm merely aiming for that title and not the entire song altogether. Is it obvious I'm rambling? But the title now is apt; for those who have read the book and for those merely wanting to know the very basic of the unlikely plot. Well, as apt as my weird thoughts can conceive every so often.

A story that I cannot quite label and yet I find satisfying nonetheless. A story about hope, friendships, acceptance, diversity, things that makes us all too human, and things that bring out the beast in us. I know I'm jotting down universal themes of serious books, right? Right.

-----
This is my seventh read for the Book Award Reading Challenge and again, I'm not following the list I made. Hahaha! Holes won the Newbery in 1999.

Hotel du Lac
Anita Brookner

This tells the tale of Edith Hope, a guest at a Swiss hotel of the book title. The first time we encounter her she's writing a letter to a man named David, describing the hotel and the apparently abrupt departure from England that she went through. We also learn that Edith is a romantic fiction writer who publishes under an assumed name. Either that or Edith's her assumed name. Gee, this really sounds like I'm rambling about it.

Nearing winter there are only a handful of guests at the hotel. There's the rich and elegant Mrs. Pusey and her daughter Jennifer who both love to shop. There's Monica with her dog named Kiki who both love to eat. And then there's the mysterious and handsome Mr. Neville who apparently has his eyes set on Edith.

As she gets to know the guests and muses about their apparently screwed up lives Edith has no choice but to face up her own mess, why she was forced into exile and what she would do afterwards.

Since I am not at liberty to say what her mess was, I can only add that this is a thoroughly engaging and thoughtful read. Partly about desires and the choices that we make. Partly about settling down or wanting to settle down. Partly about myths on love, marriage and being who we want to be. A lot of complicated issues deftly brought out with this story that is well-written and to the point.

Consider the following train of thoughts:

"And anyway, if she's all that liberated, why doesn't she go down to the bar and pick someone up? I'm sure it's entirely possible. It's jsut that most women don't do it. And why don't they do it?" she asked, with a sudden return of assurance. "It's because they prefer the old myths, when it comes to the crunch. They want to believe that they are going to be discovered,looking their best behind closed doors,just when they thought that all was lost, by a man who has battled across continents, abandoning whatever he may have had in his in-tray, to reclaim them. Ah! If only it were true," she said, breathing hard, and spearing a slice of kiwi fruit which remained suspended on her fork as she bent her head and thought this one out.

No, I don't love you. But you have got under my guard. You have moved and touched me, in a way in which I no longer care to be moved and touched. You are like a nerve that I had managed to deaden, and I am annoyed to find it coming to life. I shall do my utmost to kill it off again as soon as possible. After all, I am not in the business of losing my centrality.

Lovely, lovely words. More like a real-life unfairy tale. Whatever that means. Heartbreaking and true. And I could read the book over and over again and still be mesmerized by it. Although of course I needed the two weeks or so to finally recover from it and post something. Now I think I'd like to read more of Ms. Brookner.

-----
This is the sixth book I read for the Book Awards Reading Challenge. I think I'm forgetting the list I made already but hopefully I still have time to finish them off. Hotel du Lac won the Booker Prize in 1984.

The Giver
Lois Lowry

This post is long overdue by about five or so months. I was too busy last year to come up with something resembling a post about this after I finished reading it. Let's hope I remember my feelings now that I'm finally posting. Hahaha!

This is a widely read book. It's sometime into the future and a seemingly perfect community is presented to us where everyone has a distinct place in the society, everyone living equally so to speak. Cliches like "Keeping up with the Joneses" don't apply because hey, in this future nobody seems to be above everyone else and it's perfectly normal to be that way.

Twelve-year old Jonas was given the important task of being the Receiver of Memories, a job that only the adults have heard of and none of the younger ones are familiar with. It is only much later when he realized why he was selected for such job.

The present Receiver of Memories, also called The Giver, is already old and having the same eyes as Jonas. Jonas was startled to find out that the seemingly perfect community is not what it looks like. The everyday normality of community life is shattered in the eyes of Jonas when the Giver passed on to him the memories of life lived previously - of colors and shapes, of snow and summer, of pain and love - and the truth about the community even. After learning much from the Giver, Jonas plotted his escape from the community. But escaping the community is an unpardonable crime.

This much is obvious, those who have read The Giver will come out of the experience shaken. It is that powerful. Lowry juxtaposes an unfeeling future to a painful past. A future that is so afraid of diversity it is willing to sacrifice what makes us human so we could live perfectly normal good lives. And there is something wrong with having a perfectly normal good life. Free will is taken out of the community and only controlled by a chosen few, those behind the scenes who believed that it is better to live a gray, dull life that is uneventful than risk pain. The pain that caused wars, the pain that kills. And with that you also take out the joys and laughters. Because you can't simply take away pain without taking away the pleasures. So no laughter and tears. No feelings. Real, human feelings at least.

And yet I think there are people out there who would rather have the seemingly perfect community in this book. I mean who wouldn't want not to keep up with the Joneses, right? But it's also human nature to want what we don't have. Or to be different for that matter. Oh well, that's just one aspect of discourse. There are many more topics for further conversations about this book which I think should be read by everyone.

A future world without music is not for me. Or that without colors. I may live a dull, uneventful life but I'd rather have the option to feel than live in that future community. That's just me. What about you?

Ringworld
Larry Niven

Louis Wu is old, 200 years old in fact, but this is the future so it doesn't really matter. What matters is that Louis Wu is also bored as hell and itching for an adventure.

In comes Nessus, a Pierson's Puppeteer. In the Known Space universe of Larry Niven, the Puppeteers have the most advanced technology there is. And Nessus is looking for travel companions for a mission he is not quite ready to reveal but sure leaves Louis Wu and the rest of the recruits interested.

The other recruits? A Kzin species named Speaker to the Animals. Described as ferocious, he joined the mission because he was intrigued. And the payment to them all - technology for a spacecraft that is far too advanced than what is known to humans and the other alien inhabitants of planet Earth - is enough bait for him in hopes of helping the Kzins in somehow defeating the human race sometime.

Then there's Teela Brown, another human. With no flight training to speak of and with hardly any experience at all in space travel save that she has been to Mars or probably partied on the moon (I'm trying to remember her background, I don't want to flip through the book because it's packed somewhere in this house with other books I'm planning to send home as I'm lacking space on my shelves already).

All four set off towards Ringworld, a ring-shaped structure that encircles a star. A structure that is highly advanced and built to hold inhabitants in its vast inner surface. I don't think I'm explaining it well, I need to review my science knowledge. Hahaha!

Imagine a large ring then and set it on a dark, dark surface and call that space. Place a little sun at the center. Imagine the ring's inner flat surface to contain the air that we breath, the seas that we swim in, lands that are both fertile and deserted. And that the ring's system holds all things in place. Then imagine it orbiting, revolving around that little sun. It's a self-surviving system, a created universe. It's an ideal structure for a universe where Earth and other planets faces the possibility of overpopulation.

I was so into the book that it didn't really matter if I wasn't able to recall my early science formula of mass, gravity, inertia and so forth. Hahaha!

It's not just a book of descriptions though. The story of the four in itself is enthralling. Of course I see Ringworld through their eyes but that's not just what the book is about. The four main characters have their own stories to tell and that's part of the book's strength. As the tale unfolds we learn of the wars between the Kzins and the humans, of why Teela Brown was actually recruited, and what does Nessus get from this mission at all?

Interspersed with this is one of my favorite parts in reading a science fiction book - the technology, obviously! This was written in 1970 and yet Larry Niven already imagined a world where teleportation, among other things, is quite normal with transfer booths! And I could actually see and feel the Earth of the future in Louis Wu's eyes.

And yet despite that the book never lacked in feeling. Niven understands the worn-out traveler Louis, of a world that is getting smaller everyday and a planet that somehow is losing its identity and all in a matter of a couple of paragraphs into the book even prior to Wu's recruitment. Niven shows the same care for the other characters, making me glimpse at their lives, their thoughts all throughout the book and making me root for them all the more!

The last paragraph teases us into a sequel or something to that effect. The mission to Ringworld could end there in the first book. But as in all missions where a major discovery is found, there are and will be questions and further probe. And I finished the book August of last year wanting to know more about Ringworld and its engineers. Maybe sometime in the future.

Stranger in a Strange Land
Robert Heinlein

This is purportedly the most popular science fiction book of all times.

It won the 1961 Hugo Awards.

I've read this as part of my additional reads for the challenge. I know I keep saying that, so I apologize. I still wouldn't trade my Final Twelve list. I'll go through that, promise.

But as for this being the most popular science fiction book of all time, I do not understand why. I don't grok it at all.

With that I guess it's quite obvious I didn't have the pleasure in grokking the story of the Man from Mars.

Here's the link to my thoughts on the book.

Lost Boy, Lost Girl
Peter Straub

This book won the Bram Stoker Award in 2003 if I go by the list provided here. As this is not part of the Tentative Twelve list I came up with that somehow revolved into a Final Twelve in my book blog, I'm including it as an additional read as I plan to go through the Final Twelve after all. There's no rush, the deadline is next year. Hahaha! I probably need to update the list (as well as my extras) later.

For now here's the link to my thoughts on Lost Boy, Lost Girl. This is a really lovely book.

Lisey's Story
Stephen King

I haven't read Stephen King in a while. Unlike others who buy every SK book available, I have managed to get by with only a handful of his books. I've seen the movies though. I'm not really sure how faithful they were to the written works but one of my favorite films include The Shawshank Redemption.

Some books I dearly loved like The Stand, The Green Mile, The Eyes of the Dragon and the Dark Tower (even if I haven't read the last book from that series, for one reason or another I had it shelved until I reread all six books prior to it), one scared the hell out of me (The Shining), and one somewhat creepy (It) but all of them are generally more than your average good reads. There was a time I wanted to buy The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon but I never got around to doing that. I was more like the occasional fan. If I like what I read at the back of his book I'd probably buy it. That's how I had all the abovementioned books (except The Eyes of the Dragon which was gift). Plus I have On Writing, still unread. Gee, I'm stressing myself with two of my unread Kings!

And Lisey's Story will be part of my treasured King books (despite my paperback copy which somehow bleeds ink and smudges some letters after turning the pages). It was such a pleasure to read.

It's a story about love, marriage, letting go when the dearly beloved passed on and the love that endures after death. It's also a story about families and the blood ties that either gives strength or destroys, of sisterhood and the unspoken commitment to be there for each other no matter what happens.

It's also a tale of madness. One that kills and one that restores and refreshes one's senses. A madness that believes that not everything is at it seems and that this world is but one of many.

Reading Stephen King is opening yourself to his world, his language, his manner of laying down the tale. You either get him or not. You either love the play of words, the atmosphere he creates and the characters who mouths stuff you may or may not understand. I initially had difficulty with some of the accented words and I had to speak (at least in my mind) some in a Southern accent, which I have to admit I have very limited exposure to since I'm not from the US nor anywhere near it.

But what's more important to me than the accents or even the made up words that can be a bit tricky (I sometimes turn back the pages to recall what the hell SOWISA means even if I know the context from whence it came) is how everything falls into place in the end. And in this, the master of horror never disappoints.

One last thing.

I knew I have read BOOL before. I just can't remember where. A search pointed me to Wikipedia's entry on Lisey's Story stating that the phrase "Bool! The end!" appeared in "Wizard and Glass" which is the fourth book in the Dark Tower series. It's also the book that reeled me in because of the Dave McKean illustrations.

-----
This post originally appeared in my blog titled as Strap It On.

I didn't know that this book won the Bram Stoker Award for 2006 until now. So I'm including this in my additional reads for the Book Awards Reading Challenge as well. Of course I still plan to go through the rest of my Final Twelve as I've read one on the list and another two off from my pool of books. My thoughts on those books to follow, hopefully soon.

These are my tentative twelve selected from my actual pile of books.

1. Ringworld by Larry Niven (Hugo/Nebula)
2. Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie (Booker/James Tait Black Memorial)
3. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez (Nobel)
4. Nights at the Circus by Angela Carter (James Tait Black Memorial)
5. Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle (Booker)
6. Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier (National Book)
7. The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood (Booker)
8. Perdido Street Station by China Miéville (Arthur C. Clarke)
9. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon (Pulitzer)
10. Life of Pi by Yann Martel (Booker)
11. Atonement by Ian McEwan (National Book Critics' Circle)
12. A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson (Royal Society Prize)

I'll finalize the list by the end of the month. For now I'll start with one of these and will revise as I go along. Or I could retain this and simple add additional titles much later. Happy reading to everyone!