I guessed the plot really early (unusual for me to be honest) but then with all the weird twists and turns as you can imagine the plot doesn’t really unravel unless the last chapter – and still kept me interested the whole way through.

So what’s the point of all of this crime novel stuff anyway? Is it to keep a sense of thrill throughout the book? Escape from the boredom of our own lives? I wonder sometimes about people who read nothing but this genre, as they can be a bit stressful/hard going at times, almost like a constant adrenaline rush – surely it’s like any drug, something that you desensitise to over time? who knows, as per usual I’m likely pontificating with no real epiphany to arrive at – At the end of the day they’re great novels for flights, public transport, and this week especially short tube journeys…

I’m sure it’s the books and history that I’ve read previously, from reading about the Romanov’s, looking at the history of House of Fabergé, right through ‘Animal farm’ and to the Lacuna, which opened my eyes to not only Trotsky’s escape from Russia, but also the post-war fear that developed across the western world (particularly in the States) through the 50′s and 60′s…

There’s a harsh beauty to Russia that I visualise in my head. I guess a place that I’m not sure would ever be what I’ve created within my own head, and as bleak as it may seem during the depths of winter, I’d still love to go.

So of course, when looking for something to read, I was immediately drawn to this, as a current look at what is going on within Russia today.

Of course this book brings it straight to the fore, the cold, (-30deg celsius? and I found -15 a struggle), the vodka, and of course the inherent corruption. While I did feel that the plot was way too easy to spot, and by the end of the first couple of chapters, I was looking for the flags of up coming plot threads – but even though they were spotted a mile off, it didn’t detract from the impact and sadness to each characters minor story and influence.

It did leave me wondering a bit about the naivety of the main character, what made him think that everything is what it seems on the surface? It did, I admit, make me feel a little cautious of Russia, how easy it would be to get exploited and not see the hole that you were dragged into until well too late, but I still want to go there.

Probably not the best book to start the year with, fingers crossed I find some better books to sink my teeth into over the next few months…

I took this on holiday to Spain, and was so enthralled by it, I read it in a night, not being able to put it down.

Admittedly I read it a while ago, so difficult to bring the mishmash of feelings and thoughts on it to the surface again, and it’s one of those slightly slower books that gently moves through time until you’re in love with all of the characters, their eccentricities, their hopes and beliefs, and at the end I was more than a little distraught that I’d finished it.

It’s not a ‘Believable’ story, but it’s so beautifully woven together, it doesn’t feel like you’re reading it and feeling ‘Well that would never happen in real life’, but in a sense it’s almost autobiographical in the way it’s told (and doing a quick bit of googling, it’s also how the author has referenced it).

I think the most interesting sides to it is the relationship between the protagonist and her brother, while I wont spoil the story, it’s one of the most unusual and up and down natural and unnatural relationships in books I’ve read. I guess in some senses that makes it honest as well, which I guess it why I enjoyed it so much.

It does get slightly bleak in some periods, but that does nothing but add to its beauty and honesty, it’s hard to get across how wonderfully crafted I found this book- I haven’t had a book draw me in like that in a very long time (probably The Lacuna was the last one), I felt so immersed in to where I was being taken, throughout the books inevitable ups and downs.

Also, it’s one of the few novels that has actually caused me to laugh out loud. Strange as I’m fairly open when I find things hilarious, but it’s a very rare occasion that something I’m reading makes me giggle – and of course, unsurprisingly it also had me in tears in some points.

If you’re looking for something that’s at times gentle, at times harsh, has the most incredibly interesting family dynamic – try it out, it’s awesome.

Then people started dying.

And then I got to the second book, and skimmed it as much as I could. Why? I just couldn’t be bothered with the inherent whining of some characters. I got bored with some of the storylines.

I don’t know if this was because my limited attention span during some fairly busy periods at work, or whether I just couldn’t be bothered with the ‘epicness’ of the intertwined threads – but I just found so many of them frustrating.

So I’ve not gone on to finish the series, for starters so many people spoiled a lot of the storylines on Facebook, and I feel I’d get more out of other books for my time. And all the character killing? Bleak bleak bleak. I really don’t want to be depressed for 6 months while I plough through the series. I didn’t finish ‘The Road’ for this reason, and I’m really not bothered by this series either.

Here’s a quote from an Amazon * (yes that’s ONE star) that pretty much sums up how I feel about it.

This was a big dissapointment after all the positive reviews that I read. What exactly was the point of this book?
Was it to prove that even good people are compromised in certain circumstances? If so then Martin achieved his purpose but I found none of the characters worthy of redemption and, as a result, was unable to finish it.

I read fantasy as an avenue of escape. There was no escape here as this book was simply depressing.

gah. Give me a bit of Pug and Thomas or Lyra and Will over this any day!

I’ve read the Brothers Sisters, which I really didn’t enjoy, in fact it just wasn’t even worthy of a blog post (like most of the novels I’ve read this year, George R R Martin, I’m looking at you…) however this, albeit short, was a really interesting read.

While it’s set in the 60′s where university relationships were slightly different to say my high school and young adult relationships, there was still a parity in there on how we look at relationships from our formative years, and how they shape our loves and hates well into the future.

I find it typically difficult to connect with the person I was in the past. I guess London has provided me an escapism that I genuinely needed, and has allowed me the space to develop beyond the shell, avoid thinking about who I was and things that I’ve done, and happily move beyond the pile of metaphorical shit I left behind. However this book has sparked a bit of a “WTF” moment from me, and is causing more than a little bit of second guessing.

What would you give to play some relationships over? Is there one that got away? One that hurt you so much you never forgot it and carried those wounds for years? Were you the one that hurt others? gah so much thinking that it’s spilling over.

I’ve got one of those funny histories that felt like I’d led a lifetime by the time I turned 22. I’d loved, lost, had a very serious long term relationship that I f*cked p entirely of my own accord I think in retrospect to try and get out of it the only way I knew how. It’s bizarre to think that sometimes I see if that particular person has finally joined Facebook, (just checked again, he still hasn’t) and how nervous I get going through the very tiny town where I lived with him for a while, just in case I catch a glimspe of him, and the life he has now.

That’s not to say I’m still in love or like or hate, I think it’s more that when certain people have an effect on you – it does shape who you are, even a decade later.

I’m not the only one, I think everyone has this. It’s that name you can’t speak without a physical reaction, be it positive or negative. It might be one person, you might have 5 (gawd I don’t even want to start with trawling back through to see which still has an effect and which don’t – It might be the most reflective time of year before 2012 kicks in, but I really don’t want to spend the next few days fighting with my inner voice wondering why I drove all these different times in my life so topsy turvy)

So of course a book across these similar lines has intrigued me, and while I felt the climax was incredibly weak, the general consensus being that anything that makes you think as much as this – the lying awake ruminating on “What if”, and “good lord, I know now about me, but what happened to everyone else” is a good thing.

It takes those feelings from a teenager and a young adult, and thrusts it late into the now, and forces confrontation on the feelings of youth and who you were, the well squished away memories that could rear their head and make you feel young again (be that a good or bad thing, I don’t know.)

I love books that make you think, that kick you out of your bubble, your comfort zone, and force you to put something from the book to your own life and challenge it. Well, yes it’s not always a nice feeling, but how will we ever learn not to make the same mistakes if we aren’t reminded?

Hrm, I have a sudden urge to listen to ‘The Cure’ and relive my old lives. Bring it on.

It bought quite a few books before xmas, and this one had stuck out (probably from the internet meme “OMG BEEEEEEeeeeeeeeesss” more than I’d like to admit) but popped up a couple of times in ‘good to read’ lists and we I guess well voted.

It’s an older book (therefore cheap!) with a movie that followed closely after it. The best thing I can compare it to is ‘The Help’ written during a similar period in the southern states of America, segregation and racism key to the thread of the novel.

I could go on about the plot, but that’s not really why I think I enjoyed this book, well – enjoy is the wrong word. I guess provoked a reaction may be better? Similar to the Lacuna, last chapter of the book, I cried the entire way through and for about 30 mins afterwards.

I don’t quite know why, there were questions unanswered, and it should have felt a bit fake and too much of a twee story? I don’t know, but it definitely made me reflect upon my own life and maybe what I would have don in similar situations. Now boxing day is over – it’s out of my head, and I no longer find the content as sad, but I guess I’m still a little reflective on the content, maybe slightly bitter or something.

I would recommend it for a holiday read, something that can be finished in a sitting, and I do think it’s a bit more of a ‘young adult’ novel than the Help.

Fascism or at least the extreme right seems to be gaining popularity in Europe. From the English EDL to the recent Norway attacks that happened while I was half way through, to politically right parties gaining more seats in governments than we’ve seen since pre-WWII. There is a sense of bubbling frustration and anger at immigration, an underlying thought that multi-culturalism has failed and an unusual and backward sense of racism towards cultures that don’t seem to assimilate the same way others do.

It’s within this type of setting that ‘Kingdom Come’ is based. Drawing on this bubbling under current, at the M4 satellite towns near Heathrow and beyond, sport is used as an excuse for violence, only bowing to commercialism and the high place that shopping has within their (our?) lives.

I admit this book took me ages to finish. Parts of it I just didn’t really get, or it felt waffley or over done or unrealistic – but the sense that commerce, and the addiction to ‘stuff’ is a very honest and true part of our society resonated more than the violence/sport association for me.

While I don’t think our culture would as much ‘worship’ a mall, there is more of a sense that you are what you wear/drive/have than ever before.

I don’t think i’d read it again, nothing that feels like a complete chore to finish is really what I wanted to keep reading, but I couldn’t just stop reading it. I do enjoy dystopian novels (1984, Brave New World’ etc) but this didn’t draw me in as much

Some of the content of course went over my head, particularly the sexual stuff was well beyond me at that age, and I still don’t quite understand why it’s seen as a bad thing to have a young person in reading anything at all.

I read Kurt Vonnegut’s'Slaughter House 5′ a few months back and while some of the content is disturbing, its not glorifying horror in any way except in a sense to be brutally honest about it.

The reasoning of banning the novel (too many curse words) is ridiculous. Kids will hear more swearing in a week from their peers than the content in this book. I barely even noticed it myself, and while I have an inherent love of emphasising a sentence with the ‘f’ word in certain situations, I’m certain I don’t swear as much as a teenager might amongst friends…

Why oh why do we default to someone think of the children – children are mini adults, teenagers are adults before their time, and my god I cannot even imagine what it must be like to be a young person these days. While I sound like a bit of an old hag, there were no phones when I was a kid (therefore no ‘sexting’, no social media profiles to bitch about other people on, the concept of bullying was straight to your face (and of course the girl-like backstabbing, oh how cruel young women with a sense of emotional power can be) somehow this doesn’t seem as insidious as what goes on online these days can be. If you don’t believe me, check out the suicide of Megan Meier ) and you know,I don’t even think I really came across drugs until my early 20′s.

So if this pressure and stress on growing up in a new world is now the case (and I do genuinely believe that it’s much more difficult to make ‘good’ choices as a youth these days), what is the harm of a few curse words in a book, that essentially is about preserving the preciousness of life, and to never ever again do the harm to the world that was inflicted in WWII?

Is stopping a few curse words in a novel really going to affect a teenagers mind?

While some commenters have mentioned the infamous Streisand Effect which will send teenagers running out to get a copy of this banned book – I just don’t think that’s the case. While Gen Y isn’t as apathetic as those of us in the mid-Gen crossover, I just don’t think teenagers will care enough within their own stressful and emotional lives, to seek out a novel for the sake of a few extra ‘f’ words.

If I lived in this town, I’d buy a hundred copies, and leave them strategically placed, in bus stops, in cafes, in the school library, with the words ‘I’m Banned’ and a pass along subtext in the front cover. But would it really make any difference?

Banning books does nothing but remove another title from a shelf. Books are nothing but words, pulled together in a strategic way – to attempt to influence the reader in some way, to provoke an emotional response – to have a sense of enjoyment, anger, frustration, to love and support and even hate the characters therein, but what is their influence beyond that? There is of course the Mark David Chapman example, and the young men I’ve met citing ‘A Catcher in the Rye’ changed their life – but is that from an overriding theme? or a few more ‘f’ words than usual dotted through the text?

So this leads me to my next investigation – what other books are banned? While this isn’t an exhaustive list, it shows at least which books have been banned country-wide, a few I’ve read, a few I haven’t, but still interesting nonetheless.

I just hope in the media outrage outside of this ‘town of the banning books’ – that even just a single young person, realises the underlying ethos to this ridiculous banning, and either makes the decision to GTFO, or decides to seek them out, read them, and enjoy them, on purpose…

And now, I am so seemingly addicted to the wealth of ‘interesting stuff’ on the Internet keeping me awake most nights till 1-2am – even my tolerant husband has to remind me occasionally ‘The Internet will still be there in the morning’…  So I’ve decided to try and kick the habit (#longreads, you’ve got me through many a sleepless night – I shall miss you) and get back into reading again.  Stuff the lack of room in the house, we’ll just get another bookcase.

So I did read a few bits and bobs over the last 6 months – and the latest is this – The Princess Bride.

I’ve never seen the movie.  Which is strange considering I AM an 80′s child, but I was more concerned with The Dark Crystal, Labyrinth, and Mighty Mouse.

Seeing this on a second hand bookstand, I decided to give it a shot.

WHAT.  A. WASTE of time. (maybe that’s why I haven’t got back into reading as much as I thought I might…)

It’s a retelling of an old book, and the 25th anniversary version, so full of author commentary stuff that really didn’t add anything to the book – did we really need to go through the slightly strange Stephen King visit?  Did we need to know the whole son/wife palaver?  did we need an interruption in italics to nearly every second paragraph ruining any sense of flow? (maybe there’s a reason why I don’t watch director commentaries?).  It really made some of the tedious bits seem even MORE tedious – and generally slowed down the flow of the novel.

Bits I enjoyed

- Finally I get the internet meme ‘My name is Inigo Montoya – you killed my father – prepare to die’

- Finally I feel like I get the story everyone talks about.

Bits I didn’t enjoy

- The rest.

Was it just made to be a screenplay?  I don’t know.  Was the story really that interesting?  Not really.  Yes there was some interesting characterisation (mr Montoya again, years training for revenge, and I was mildly fascinated by the villan – but that’s cause they’re so easy to hate) and I guess I felt the only female character was a sappy twit who added nothing but shame on her sex and a witless comment here and there that just ruined it for me.

I bet if a novel was created from say – Princess Mononoke – it would be far better than this, even as a post-film novelisation.

I know I will offend a fair few fans of the movie (yes yes, childhoods were based around recreating scenes from this film, I hear you) but I just can’t bring myself to watch it after the painful plough through the novel.

I am tempted to read the original to see if that is much better, I’m sure there were some bits cut that might have been interesting (the princess’s training from commoner to potential queen for example, which was dropped by Goldman- for being boring) or maybe I’m just grasping at straws for a stronger female character.

Maybe even it’s movies like this that have solidified such a ‘There is a perfect man for me out there’ ideal, (or that and Cosmo/Dolly/Girlfriend magazine that we all read growing up), and the embarrassment of being a smart person in those defining years, or even the thought that your one true love will one day come back – even after they broke your heart many years ago – who knows.  I do however believe that stories like this do nothing to encourage women to be proud of who they are, and not need a man to guide who they ‘should’ be – and for goodness sake – women out there, ‘the one’ is a bullsh*t Hollywood construct that is neither realistic or a positive influence on your life!  Don’t WAIT!  Get out there and meet people!  Noone is 100% perfect.  Noone is just who you think they are.  Noone is faultless, or will never piss you off, nor will make you feel amazing 100% of the time – cause if they did?  How fracking BORING would that relationship be!  (And no I’m not suggesting that relationships should be all negative either – just balanced)

Phew.  Rant over.

So yeah, in a nutshell – I didn’t really enjoy this book…

I’ve missed blogging.  Philosophical rants about books that probably mean nothing in relation to what I’ve taken them to be?  Bah, who cares, blogs are all about opinion.  At least this one is anyways…  & Thanks dear friend for reminding me how much I love to rant/rave about stuff like this.  Even if noone else out there reads these, it’s nice to get my thoughts out there on paper sometimes.

It was incredible! Taking the Snow White story, and dropping it into Renaissance Italy – with Lucrezia Borgia becoming the wicked step-mother, and the apple is a part of the tree of life.

Without spoiling the story too much, I was drawn into following how this new Snow white was treated. The dwarves I think are some of the most unusual characters – not being your usual jolly short man (i.e. a miniature ginger comic relief santa – think gimli from the LOTR films) but much more organic than that. Built from stone, they are able to move and transform – which I think made the story so much more well – not realistic, but I guess great to see a completely different take on it.

With the step-mother (well, female who lived in the house) being based on a real person, I was intrigued to find out more about this mysterious woman, and were the family truly known for being poisoners?

Looks like it.

I highly recommend this as a light fluffy read, while it’s dark in places (what true fairytale isn’t? And I don’t mean the disneyfied ones, check out the Brothers’ Grimm version of The Little Mermaid if you’re not sure what I’m talking about…) it’s really enjoyable!