Stardust and the Rest of the Year’s Best

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I finished reading Neil Gaiman’s Stardust just in time for the end of the year.  After finishing this book, I can say I read 23 books this year, which is nearly 2 a month — not too shabby.

Stardust is the story of Tristran Thorn, the child of a Dunstan Thorn of Wall, a Victorian village in England that just happens to border the realm of Faerie, where Tristran journeys to retrieve a falling star to win the love of Victoria Forrester.  Along the way, he meets many other interesting characters, some of whom are in search of the star for less noble purposes.  The star, who is called Yvaine, has a stone which can determine who will be the next Lord of Stormhold and a heart that will provide the Lilim, three witch sisters, with enough years to help them survive into the next age.

I enjoyed this book, but it has some fairly significant differences from the movie, which I also liked.  For one thing, the ending was much more dramatic in the movie, although I liked the last conversation between Yvaine and the Witch Queen in the book; I don’t believe this conversation takes place in the movie.  I really do like Gaiman’s writing style, which is humorous and whimsical and reminds me very much of J.K. Rowling’s style, which I hope he would consider to be a compliment.

I posted a list of the books I have read and linked them to my reviews in a previous post.  Of those books, the ones I enjoyed most were the following:

My first book of the new year will be The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde.

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Review: To the Bright Edge of the World, Eowyn Ivey

Re-Reading Harry Potter: Hermione and House Elves

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Books of 2008

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It seems like a good time to do a recap of the books I’ve read this year.  Unfortunately, because I took some online professional development courses in the early part of the year and returned to grad school in August, I have not had much time to read.  I finished the following books this year (links take you to either my review or the Goodreads page).

So that’s 22 books this year, which is better than last year’s total of 14 by 8 books.

Of course, I’ve started others and set them aside, but the only one I have a shot at finishing before New Year’s Day arrives is Neil Gaiman’s Stardust.

Considering how busy I was, I guess I shouldn’t feel too bad, but I do need to make more time to read.  As I have said before, it feeds my soul.

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BookCast Podcast

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I started doing something new with my classes each Friday this year.  I shared book reviews for books I thought they might enjoy.  Over time, in order to save class time, I began recording these reviews as BookCast podcasts.  I am not sure if my students are listening to them or enjoying them (they don’t know it, but using the class blog and responding to what I do for them at that site will be a grade requirement next semester), but I thought I’d post them here as well, for those of you readers who might truly enjoy them.  Keep in mind the podcast is aimed at teenagers; however, you might find some new reading material among the reviews.

BookCast 1: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll and The Coffin Quilt by Ann Rinaldi.

BookCast Episode One

I’ll add the other BookCasts over the next few weeks and from thereafter, I’ll cross-post the BookCasts here.

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TLC Book Tour: Whispering in French, Sophia Nash

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Studs Terkel

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I have not abandoned this blog, I promise you, but grad school has made it difficult for me to read as much as I’d like.  Not reading as much means no book reviews.  I’m finished with the semester, and I’m re-reading junk food favorite Twilight in addition to my new copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard.  I am enjoying a study of Macbeth with my juniors.  I begin Romeo and Juliet again in January, and I love teaching that play.  In addition, I also get to teach A Midsummer Night’s Dream for the second time ever and The Taming of the Shrew for the first, so I’m looking for some good times with Uncle Will.  I will probably blog about any experiences teaching these plays at my education blog rather than here.

I came upon the New York Times article about the memorial service for Studs Terkel today.  I listened to a long recording Terkel did with people who discussed the Great Depression, and it reminded me so much of what my grandfather did when he sent me a long letter about some of his experiences.  My life is richer for having heard his history, and now I can pass it on.  That’s what is valuable about the stories of the ordinary man in addition to politicians and famous folk, and that’s what Studs Terkel really understood about compelling stories — they are our stories and our voices, and our lives are richer when they are heard.  I listen to This American Life often as a subscriber of their podcast (which is where I heard the Terkel recording), and every week I find something new and enjoyable about the stories of people.

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The Graveyard Book

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I finished listening to Neil Gaiman’s latest novel, The Graveyard Book, at Neil Gaiman’s official site for young readers.  On his recent book tour, Gaiman read a chapter (or in the case of chapter 7, a half a chapter) at each stop on his tour.  Videos of his readings were posted on the site.  I’m not sure how much longer they are available, or if they are permanent, but do yourself a favor and enjoy Gaiman reading his work.  He does it very well, and it’s a gift not all authors have.  For instance, I have heard J.K. Rowling read her work on video, and while she wasn’t bad, she wasn’t a particularly good oral interpreter.  Gaiman changes voices for his characters, giving them different dialects and accents, and his emphasis in the right places draws out much of the humor of the book.  And there is quite a bit of humor in the book.  He’s a wonderful reader.

The Graveyard Book is the story of Nobody Owens — called Bod for short, a young boy who wanders into a nearby graveyard after his parents are murdered and is raised by the spirits who inhabit the graveyard.  We should all have such an education!  As Silas, Bod’s guardian says, “It is going to take more than just a couple of good-hearted souls to raise this child. It will … take a graveyard.”  Gaiman’s novel is a nod to Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book.  Bod is given the freedom of the graveyard by the spirits, and until he is grown, they promise to look after him, for the man who killed his family is still out there, waiting.

The book was a pleasure from start to finish, and more so as a result of Neil Gaiman’s superb oral storytelling skills.  I plan to purchase a copy for my classroom library and will recommend the book to my students.  I think it very generous of Neil Gaiman to share his book in this manner, and I am grateful for the experience of hearing him read the book, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

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Neil Gaiman Reads

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I never outgrew a fondness for being read to, and if you didn’t either, you might want to check out this site, which features videos of Neil Gaiman reading his new novel The Graveyard Book in its entirety.  You can browse inside the book at Harper Collins’s site, and you can check out an NPR story about Neil and Neil’s blog.  Neil is one of the most accessible authors, and really seems to care about his fans.  What more perfect book for Halloween than a tale of a boy raised by ghosts in a graveyard?

What are your favorite Halloween books?  Are you participating in the RIP Challenge this year?  I couldn’t because I didn’t feel I should commit to a reading challenge with grad school taking up extra time.  I really wanted to do the challenge this year, when the chill in the air is the perfect accompaniment to a gothic novel.  I also really enjoyed my selections from last year, though I still haven’t finished Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell.  I honestly did enjoy what I read, and I do want to finish it, but I found it was a challenging and very long book, and perhaps would be best to read when I feel I have time.

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Breaking Dawn

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Earlier this evening, I finished the final book in Stephenie Meyer’s vampire saga.  Breaking Dawn was not, in my estimation, as good as its predecessors.  I felt the book had a variety of problems that boil down to one main issue.  I expect books about the supernatural to stretch my credulity, but this book went over my credulity line.

Spoilers follow, so stop reading now if you intend to read the book and don’t want plot details revealed.

In this novel Bella, Meyer’s protagonist, marries her Edward (who was a little too bossy and controlling — and yes, he may be from a more patriarchal era, but I still don’t like it) and inexplicably gives birth to a half vampire/half human child.  The birth would have killed her except Edward is able to heal Bella’s injuries by making her into a vampire.  As a vampire, much of the quirks that make her personality accessible to teenage girls — her insecurity and clumsiness — fall away in the face of her superhuman powers.  And she defies the mold by displaying amazing self control and powers, considering she is a newborn vampire.  Meanwhile, Jacob inexplicably imprints on Edward and Bella’s daughter Renesmee.  Never mind she’s not part of the Quileute tribe.  See what I mean?  Finally, another vampire glimpses Renesmee and thinks Carlisle’s coven has done the unthinkable — created a vampire out of a child.  Supposedly it’s a crime to create child vampires because they have vampire strength and no control.  The Volturi — the guardians of the vampires’ secret — descend upon Bella and her family, but she’s not about to give up without a fight.

I believe the best book in the series remains the first, although I liked parts of each of the others, even this one.  However, Breaking Dawn was easy to put down for long periods of time, and it was difficult to pick up again sometimes.  I had eventually read through too much of it to put it down.  Once I invest in a book by a certain number of pages, I tend to plow through.  Overall, I was disappointed with this book, but the series as a whole is a satisfying, fun read.

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The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

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First, the good news is that I was able to generate quite a lot of interest in a book club among the teachers at my school.  They graciously allowed me to select our first book, and I chose Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows’s The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.  It’s a perfect book for book clubs, and I believe I had read as much somewhere, but I’m not sure where.  I was taken by the title.

The book is populated with memorable characters who tell their story through letters.  As this is one of only a handful of epistolary novels I’ve read, I’ll call it a unique storytelling device that works well to reveal the plot.  Much better, in fact, than I think a straight narrative would have because it allows for the otherwise risky device of multiple narrators to work much better.  The novel is the story of a writer named Juliet Ashton, who reminded me of Dorothy Parker.  I’ll be curious to see if my book club members thought of her, too.  By chance, Dawsey Adams, a pig farmer on the Channel Island of Guernsey comes upon one of her books in a used book store, and he enjoys it so much that he writes to her.  Over time, Juliet develops friendships with Dawsey and his friends, who formed the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society during Germany’s occupation of the island during World War II.

Any book focused on a setting ought to leave the reading feeling a desire to visit, and that’s precisely how I felt.  I have never thought even once in my life of going to Guernsey, but just like John Berendt’s characters in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil bring the city of Savannah to life and have caused a cottage industry around tourism related to the book, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn something similar happens to Guernsey; however, increased tourism will likely depend on how popular the book becomes.  My favorite books — the ones I couldn’t put down even if they were not literature with a capial L — were all populated with memorable, realistic characters I wish I could know in real life, and now I have one more book to add to that list.

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