Bookish Things

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Goldberg on Vampires

I subscribe to The Goldberg File - Jonah Goldberg‘s email newsletter, which is hilarious.

In his latest missive, he mentions his appreciation for the vampire ouevre:

I can understand why John Miller wants the culture to move on to werewolves, Frankenstein, mummies, or whatnot, but I don’t think that’s likely. Vampires are better literary devices for, I think, obvious reasons. Werewolves are nice people who turn into mean animals. Mummies are zombies wrapped up in Ace bandages. Frankenstein is a DIY zombie with a slightly better operating system. (Note: Lord knows I’m not dissing Zombies. But two points need to be made on that score. Individual zombies are not particularly scary or interesting. For zombies to work cinematically, pretty much the whole word has to go zombie. Second, even then it’s not like there are a huge number of plot innovations for zombie themed movies). Meanwhile, vampires are smart and wise (thanks to their age) and they can have sex and so on. Oh, and they’re subversive: They live among us.

He then expands on a thought I’ve had myself, which is why I never read the sequels to Twilight (aside from the terrible movie, which is the other reason I won’t be continuing with the stories in either dead tree or celluloid versions).

But I do have a problem with the vampire mania sweeping pop culture. There’s something gross about it.

In Twilight, the romantic lead is Edward Cullen, who’s about 120 years old and falls in love with a 17-year-old girl.

In Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel was born in the 1700s, and he’s in love with Buffy, who’s 16 or so when the relationship starts.

In The Vampire Diaries, Stefan Salvatore is about 160 years old. His girlfriend seems to be about 17.

In True Blood, Bill Compton is roughly a century-and-a-half old, and he seduces a woman in her early twenties.

Anyone see a trend here?

Put True Blood aside, since it’s intended for adults. Imagine if the 17-year-old girls in Twilight, Buffy, or Vampire Diaries were being seduced by 65-year-old guys. That would be gross. But when the teenage girl is seduced by a guy two, three, four times as old, it’s like-totally-OMG-super-romantic. Why?

The explanation, according to the girls, seems to boil down to: Because he’s good looking. Because he’s mature. Because he’s mysterious (“I’ve never met anyone like him!”). And because he’s at war with his urges.

The problem is that if you take away the good-looking part, you’re describing a run-of-the-mill dirty old man. If you keep the good-looking part, you’re describing a slightly younger but really, really sleazy dude who cruises high schools looking for jailbait.

Ick.

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Friday, February 05, 2010

Books: Cranford

I finished listening to Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell yesterday. As I said on FB:

*In my best British accent* Mere words cannot express how much I love the lovely writings of Miss Gaskell. My esteem for dear Miss Matty knows no bounds, which I believe was the aim of Miss Gaskell in the telling of the Cranford Amazons. *British off* This will be a favorite above all others for a very long time. In addition to the greatness of Miss Gaskell’s writing is the narrative perfection of Ms. Porter. She is unmatched.

5 stars out of 5.

And I see that Miss Gaskell wrote two other Cranford stories, so I’m off to see if there are audio versions of them as well. If not, I’ll just have to find the time to sit with the dead tree versions.

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Monday, November 02, 2009

What’s the Word on Joyce Meyer?

My small group is doing Battlefield of the Mind next. I don’t know anything about Joyce Meyer. For those who are fans or familiar with her, what can you tell me about her theology?

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Thursday, October 22, 2009

Books: A Duty to the Dead and The Attack

I’ve gotten a lot of books read on the commute lately. The last two were outside of my normal reading materials and I thought I’d mention them in case anyone is looking for something new to read.

A Duty to the Dead by Charles Todd - the author was recommended by a librarian friend who seems to enjoy reading the same things I do. We compare favorite authors a lot, so when she sent me a list of authors that I had not read yet, I thought I’d give them a try. Todd came up to bat first.

The winning first in a new WWI series from the bestselling mother-son Todds (A Matter of Justice and 10 other Inspector Rutledge mysteries) introduces Bess Crawford, a resourceful British army nurse who’s injured when her ship is sunk in 1916. While convalescing in England, Bess is tormented because she’s put off delivering a message from Arthur Graham, a dying soldier under her care for whom she’d developed strong feelings, to his family. Her own brush with death prompts her to travel to Kent and transmit Arthur’s cryptic last words to one of his three brothers.

I chose this particular novel because it is a stand-alone. Todd has a series of novels featuring a certain Inspector and because I couldn’t get the first one in audio format, I went with the stand-alone instead.

I liked the book very much. The story was compelling, the characters well written, and the narrator was excellent. 4.5 stars.

The Attack by Yasmina Khadra - This was on sale at Audible.com a few weeks ago, so after becoming intrigued by the plot synposis and thinking that I needed to branch out in my reading I bought it.

Dr. Amin Jaafari, an Arab-Israeli citizen, is a respected, dedicated surgeon at a hospital in Tel Aviv. He has learned to live with the violence that plagues his city and works tirelessly to help the victims brought to the emergency room. But one night, a deadly bombing in a local restaurant takes a horrifyingly personal turn, when his wife’s body is found among the dead, bearing injuries that match those typically found on the bodies of fundamentalist suicide bombers.

As evidence mounts that his wife, Sihem, was responsible for the catastrophic bombing, Dr. Jaafari must face the inescapable realization that the beautiful, intelligent, thoroughly modern woman he loved had a secret life that was far removed from the comfortable, assimilated existence they shared.

I had several problems with this book. First was the narration - either the translation from French to English was poor or the writing was weirdly stilted in areas or the narrator was just a bad reader. I was never able to pin it down. There were parts where the prose was lyrical and beautiful. There were parts where the prose was overly cliched. And there were parts where the prose made no sense. At one point I looked up my account to make sure I had gotten the unabridged version of the book because I felt like I had missed whole parts of the story somewhere - I had the full version, so there was some bad writing/translation in there.

My other issue was the story itself. I know the author was trying to present a mostly non-partisan view of the goings on with Israel/Palestine, but I don’t think it worked. And there was no light. It was dark from the beginning to the end. It was morose. Then again, the subject matter is not light-hearted either so maybe I shouldn’t have expected any lightness.

That said, my general impression was that I liked it. 3 stars.

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Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Cloudy With a Chance of Irritable

I’m cranky this afternoon.

I blame the lack of chocolate.

There is no opportunity for any either since the deli upstairs is now closed.

One more hour until I can go home. At least I am listening to a good book this week. It’s one of those books that you think about all the time when you can’t read it because you’re supposed to be working.

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Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Product Endorsement: The Bible Experience

My uncle gave the whole set of The Bible Experience CDs to me for Christmas a couple of years ago. Sadly, I have only now started to give them a listen.

Uncle Bill, thanks again for an awesome gift.

I’ve been convicted about my lack of time in God’s Word lately and since there isn’t much spare time in my day when I am actually at home, I thought I’d give this version of the Bible a listen on my morning commutes. After a challenging morning, it was just what I needed.

I listened to about half of the first New Testament CD (Matthew) on my way to work this morning and it is amazing! It’s straight up Bible, but the voices are rich and there are dramatic story telling elements (such as the voices of crowds in the background) and music added. This may be how I actually get the whole Bible read - I am willing to bet even Leviticus and Numbers will be easier to “read” in this format.

The only downsides I can think of are these: 1) some of the more well known actors might be a distraction (Samuel Jackson as God, for instance) and 2) there’s no real study time with this format. However, since the only spare time I have these days is in the car, then I’m going to take advantage of it to at least do some basic “reading” of Scripture.

Even if you are able to spend more time in your Bibles, I highly recommend The Bible Experience, especially if you’re an aural person.

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Saturday, August 22, 2009

Books: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

I love Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. I do not love the zombie oeuvre. However, I had read good things about Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith and Jane Austen, that I took the time to listen to it.

1. The narrator was perfect. Her very proper British accent was as you’d expect to hear. What jarred was the interjection of the violence of the zombie parts. However, having it read in that very proper British accent was oddly amusing.

2. About halfway through I had the thought that Wuthering Heights, with the depressing moors and characters, might better suit zombie additions to the original. I can totally see Heathcliff battling them. Not that Darcy and Eliza Bennet didn’t do well, but it seemed sort of off. As I said on FB, P&P might be better suited with the addition of vampires - less earthy than zombies.

3. I can see it being made into a movie easily. I know that she already played Eliza Bennet, but Keira Knightly came to mind since she did the war-torn Guinevere very well in King Arthur. Not to mention her gigs battling pirates, too.

4. I both loved it and hated it.

4 stars out of 5.

If you like zombie stuff and are a fan of P&P, then you will like this adaptation very much.

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Thursday, August 13, 2009

Blog Tour: Your Jesus is Too Safe

When I started to blog 7 years ago, one of the first blogs I started to visit regularly was The Thinklings. It is still one of the go-to blogs for me every day. One of the founding Thinklings is Jared Wilson. In the weird way of blogging, I consider Jared a friend even though I have never met him in person. So we’re friends in the ether, but we are brother and sister in Christ and have enough real life contact (we’ve swapped Christmas cards, that counts, right?) that I do call him friend. I was honored to be one of the few to whom he sent the manuscripts for his two unpublished novels for review - I loved both and still hope to see them in actual book form sitting in one of my bookcases. Now I’m one of the happy many who have had a chance to read Jared’s first published book, this time a non-fiction work, Your Jesus is Too Safe: Outgrowing a Drive-Thru, Feel-Good Savior. And I’m pleased to be a part of the blog tour of his book. For more information on the tour, see this post at Jared’s solo blog. While you’re there, click around the place, there’s some really good stuff there. I confess that I haven’t quite finished the book yet, although I have read about 3/4 so far. It’s a challenge to find the time with my full-time job, parenting a toddler and infant, and everything in between. I’m actually surprised that I have been able to get any of the actual dead tree book read at all since most of my actual reading these days is done by listening to audiobooks in the car on my commute to and from work. But what I have read is excellent and powerful, with solid theology, and as a nice bonus it is funny in places, too.

Cutting through the glossy, modern perceptions of Jesus, Jared C. Wilson returns to the gospels for twelve raw, realistic portraits of Christ in this revolutionary book. Your Jesus is Too Safe offers a clear image of the historical figure of Christ in his biblical and cultural context. Ideal for readers dissatisfied with the “Buddy Jesus” that has pervaded the evangelical landscape, Your Jesus is Too Safe provides a devotional, inspirational survey of Christ and his kingdom with a conversational style, humor, and a solid theological foundation.

The blurb grabs your interest, but when you start to read the contents, you realize that this is a good, meaty, thought-provoking, convicting, and fun read about Jesus. There are plenty of Scriptural references to back up his points about who Jesus is and who he is not. I know that I appreciate the reminders and the challenges to my complacency to accept the often weaker, inaccurate, and misleading portraits of Jesus in our current churches and culture. I appreciate Jared’s passion to make Jesus fully, truthfully known. My favorite bonus bits in the book? The footnotes, which reminded me of Eggar’s A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. Since I wasn’t sure I would be able to post a review, I asked Jared a few questions about his faith and the book. 1. As general background, please tell us about your spiritual journey: a) how you came to faith in Jesus Christ and b) how you came to the place where you wanted to write this book. I grew up in the church, and my earliest memory of professing faith was when I was about 6 years old. I don’t remember praying the sinner’s prayer or anything, but I remember knowing week to week in Sunday school that it was really important to do. I do remember being baptized when I was in the 2nd grade. When I was 12, like most kids that age do, I went through a crisis of sorts in which I wondered about my salvation. The church was showing those cheesy late 70’s “Thief in the Night” rapture movies then too, and that didn’t help. I was deathly afraid of everyone being raptured in the middle of the night and getting left behind, and of course having my head chopped off in the tribulation. So I said the prayer again and was baptized again a few years later. I don’t point to any of these incidents, really, as when I “got saved.” It was until later I began to see them all, as weird and juvenile as they were, as just signposts along the way of working out my salvation, which I believe was secured for me on the cross. I got saved 2,000 years ago, give or take. The book really came out of a convergence of things in my life. Ten years or so ago a coworker in a bookstore handed me a copy of a book by N.T. Wright called The Original Jesus that really pushed my thinking about Jesus and the four Gospels. I really felt like I was seeing them for the first time. And that kind of began my intellectual journey in the historical Jesus stuff. And then about 5 or 6 years ago I began sort of a Gospel renaissance in my life, sort of a combination of embracing a more Reformed theology, getting under the mentorship of some really gospel-centered writers and pastors, and then a personal crisis the brokenness of which I cannot even put into words as of yet. But all of that left me with the stripped down all-importance of the gospel in my life and the preciousness of Christ. So the book is sort of the outworking of my interest in the historical Jesus and my passion for gospel-centeredness in my life and in the evangelical church at large. 2. What is/are the driving factor(s) that got you writing Your Jesus is Too Safe? Two things, really: Believing that nobody ever was harmed by fixating on Jesus, and in fact that fixating on Jesus is how we get closer to God. And believing that the evangelical Church is pretty much Jesus-stupid. I’ve sat through church services where his name isn’t even mentioned. Jesuslessness is huge. And the problem the Introduction of the book sort of sets up is that even when Jesus is mentioned or taught in our churches, he is frequently a pale or perverted version of the Jesus we see in Scripture. 3. Is there one main point that you hope people will take away from the book? Yes. Well, two (or three). That we are worse than we feared but we are loved more than we imagined. And that Jesus is all-surpassingly awesome. 4. Finally, on a more frivolous note: a) what is your favorite movie of all time and why? “Casablanca.” It’s just dang near perfect. Bergman is beautiful, Bogie is badass, the dialogue is brilliant. I just love it. And the dueling anthems in the cafe scene gives me goosebumps every time. b) what is your favorite novel of all time and why? That’s a hard one. I’m gonna say C.S. Lewis’s Perelandra. Lewis’s “true myth” stuff really resonates with me, and this particular book of his captures those concepts so poetically. It’s really a thrilling book, in addition to being wise and adventurous. But I could have easily said Paul Auster’s New York Trilogy or John Updike’s Rabbit Redux or Graham Greene’s The End of the Affair. c) what is your favorite non-fiction book of all time and why? Lewis’s essay collection God in the Dock. I think more from that book has influenced more of my thinking than anything else. But again, this is so hard to pin down. Lewis’s Mere Christianity is a favorite too. For a much more in-depth review of Jared’s book, see IMonk’s review here. For a much better interview, see IMonk’s interview here.

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Thursday, July 16, 2009

Books: The Spellman Files

I saw The Spellman Files by Lisa Lutz mentioned at Rude Cactus. His review of the third in the Spellman series sparked my interest so I check out the audio version of the first novel from the library. It didn’t disappoint.

First, the characters were well written. I felt like I really knew the people and I grew to care about this nutty family as the story progressed.

Second, the way the story was told was well done. Flashbacks and current time played well with each other and moved the plot and the mystery along at a good pace.

Third, the narrator was fantastic. I don’t care how well a novel is written for the page, if the narrator stinks then the book will stink for me.

I liked the book so much that I immediately put the second in the series on the hold queue at my library. It has arrived and I’ll pick it up tonight on my way home from work. It’ll have to wait until I’m done with my current book, but it’s next in my mental queue of commute listening.

If you like quirky characters and a fun story, then you will like The Spellman Files. 4.5 stars out of 5.

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Monday, June 29, 2009

Random Monday

Billy Mays, too?

Movies: Blood Work was OK.

Books: Shadow of Power by Stever Martini was pretty good, although I figured out the major mystery about halfway through the first chapter.

Food: Judging from the Roasted Mango-Chipotle sauce we had on our chicken last night, Bronco Bob’s sauces are awesome. I have a sample jar of the Raspberry-Chipotle sauce as well that I’m saving for some salmon in our future.

I’m on worship team this weekend. Our church is only having services on Sunday morning since July 4th is on Saturday. That will make things easier for our family. I have mixed feelings about it since it will be my first time back since having Molly Ann and also since our worship leader left. That is a whole long story about which I still feel weird. His leaving was a surprise and under odd circumstances. I miss him a ton as a worshipper and I know that I’m going to miss him more as our team leader. I’m very curious about what kind of person will come in to replace him - it’s hard to imagine anyone else, really.

I’ve posted a bunch of new items at Ticklish Giggles recently and there’s a new theme as well.

Happy Monday.

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Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Books

I’ve updated by books information in the sidebar. I took a reading/listening hiatus over the holidays to listen to music for a while. But I’m back to listening to books on my commute.

I started to listen to a Patricia Cornwell novel on my trip to Phoenix, but I found it more depressing than her last books. What has happened to her? Her characters have turned into maudlin, ridiculous caricatures of themselves. I deleted the book from my MP3 player after only having listened to about 1/3 of the novel.

Based on Jared’s recommendation, I downloaded Rabbit, Run by John Updike from Audible.com - I get one credit per month, so this was the one for January. Like I said in the comments of Jared’s post, I’m not sure when I’ll get to listen to it since I have borrowed audiobooks from the library that need listening to before I can listen the stuff I own.

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Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Truth is Stranger Than Fiction

On my commute home last night I was listening to the Mike O’Meara show on the radio and caught his interview with Craig Glazer, author of The King of Sting.

Craig Glazer’s story began in 1971 in a student apartment where, as a freshman at Arizona State University, he got ripped off trying to buy marijuana. Fueled by fantasies drawn from movies of the era like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, in which the hero was just on the edge of the law, Glazer decided to strike back at the dealers. With his partner, the streetwise Vietnam veteran Don Woodbeck, he orchestrated his first “sting,” posing as local law enforcement. He walked away from that first sting with $50,000 and a high he couldn’t get from any drug. So began Glazer’s career as the King of Sting.

From Boston to Phoenix, Kansas City to Las Vegas, Glazer, Woodbeck, and their crew set up cons and raked in a fortune in cash and drugs, eventually becoming so successful that Glazer was hired as an undercover cop by the Kansas State Attorney General’s office to help capture some of the most notorious criminals in the Midwest. The outlaw lifestyle began to take its toll, and one by one, the crew members got out while they still could. Glazer and Woodbeck headed to Hollywood, where they hooked up with an agent and tried to sell their remarkable story. But even with the glitz of Hollywood and the promise of a movie deal, they still weren’t willing to give up the game. Woodbeck tried one last sting, a set-up that went horribly wrong and left him dead. Despite the danger, Glazer then attempted the ultimate sting in Los Angeles, all on his quest to become famous, even if meant becoming infamous.

The interview was riveting because Glazer is a natural story teller. What struck me was that in his telling of his story, he didn’t really try to glorify himself or the illegal things he did. He really just wanted to tell it because he knows it is an interesting tale. He freely admitted that he was an idiot.

I plan to add the book to my hold list at the library (if they have it).

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Books: Twilight

I never thought I would read Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. I certainly never thought I would enjoy it if I did read it. And yet both happened.

I succumbed to the hype. I borrowed the audiobook version from my library and from the first words I was hooked. Not only is the writing very well done, but the narration is excellent, too.

So book two is on hold at the library and now I’m excited about the movie as well, although I’ll probably have to wait for the DVD to come out to see it.

4 stars out of 5.

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Monday, July 21, 2008

Movies: The Kite Runner

No doubt the book is better than the movie, but The Kite Runner (movie) is one of my favorite movies in the past few months, if not this year.

After spending years in California, Amir returns to his homeland in Afghanistan to help his old friend Hassan, whose son is in trouble.

From his first words, Hassan broke my heart.

The movie is hard to watch at times. The cinematography is beautiful (it was filmed in China) and brutal. The story is compelling - two boys living in a harsh country whose lives are torn apart by one pivotal incident and then a war, and then the man who returns to his homeland as an adult to find that things are worse.

I highly recommend the movie, with 4 stars out of 5.

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Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Books: Lady Killer

I finished listening to Lady Killer by Lisa Scottoline on the commute this morning. I have two major points to share:

1. If you’re a fan of Scottoline, then you will most likely enjoy this novel. I prefer her Rosato firm centered stories, of which this is one. The story was good, the characters were colorful, the mystery took a turn I didn’t quite expect. And we learned a bit more about Mary D.

2. If you’re a fan of Scottoline, then you must listen to her novels instead of reading the dead tree versions. Especially if they are narrated by Barbara Rosenblat. She is the best audiobook narrator I’ve listened to - I laughed out loud a lot - partly because of the spot on dialects she did for the characters and partly because it was written well. She is fantastic.

4 stars out of 5.

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