Apology for pop-up ads

Well, this is a learning experience! The fine folks at Flooble did not make it clear that using their "free" Chatterbox would mean that visitors to my blog would get some "delightful" pop-up ads. They wouldn't be so very bad, if the ads in question were not of a mildly "adult" nature. I hope that you all have good pop-up blockers. Meanwhile, I'll be looking for another source for having a tagboard; I like having a way for visitors to share what they're reading.

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Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events

Okay, I finally watched the movie. And it wasn't bad. Anytime you try to put three books into one movie, you know you're going to lose something. I've stopped having very high expectations of books-turned-movies anyway. You really have to just appreciate them for what they are, rather than criticize every little difference from the books. If you want to enjoy them, anyway.

So it was interesting to see what they did keep, what they rearranged, and what they added. I've read the first three books in the series, and part of the fourth. Plus I've talked a bit with students who have read them all. So I realize that there is some conspiracy going on deeper than just Count Olaf wanting the Beaudelaire fortune. At least I think there is. Anyway, there were strong hints of that conspiracy in the movie. The trick is that we probably don't learn the full story on that until the thirteenth book, whereas they had to give some kind of wrap-up in the movie to have it end in a satisfactory way.

I did like all the actors. The kids--Emily Browning (Violet), Liam Aiken (Klaus), and Kara and Shelby Hoffman (Sunny)--were really quite good. They seemed better than the Harry Potter trio, actually. More natural, less halting. And Jim Carrey wasn't too over the top; he actually came across as Count Olaf, not just Jim Carrey being wild again.

So now I'm wanting to read more of the series to see how the conspiracy unfolds. The books are short enough that I'm going to reread from the beginning. I want to be sure to catch all the clues I can. I wonder if there are fan sites in which they catalog and debate every clue like Harry Potter fans do...I bet there are. I already found some fan sites for individual actors, like Liam Aiken.

Here's a few links that might be of interest:
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events -- official movie site
Internet Movie Database-- Information about the movie
Lemony Snicket-- the official web site for the author and the series

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Diggers by Terry Pratchett

I picked up Truckers, the first in The Bromeliad Trilogy by Terry Pratchett, on a visit to the Book Bin in Corvallis, Oregon. The cover, showing small people in the cab of a truck, was appealing. The story was even better. It's the story of a nome named Masklin whose little band of nomes is struggling for survival in the great outdoors. In desperation, Masklin leads his group, despite much dissension, onto the back of a human truck. This truck takes them to the Store where they find thousands of nomes who don't believe in the Outside. Well-established views of the world are challenged and stretched as these two groups meet and as they learn that they must leave the Store before it is demolished.

The way Pratchett portrays the point of view of these small, fast living creatures is one of the great delights of the books. Here's just a taste from Diggers: "Masklin's little tribe had once lived in a highway embankment beside rolling countryside that was full of things that were hungry for fresh nome. The idea that you could die simply of not being alive anymore was a new one to them." In Diggers, the nomes continue their attempts to create a home for themselves despite the challenges of Winter and the encroachment of humans. Only Masklin seems to realize that they have a destination much further on than they can even comprehend. I'll have to read the final book, Wings, to find out if they make it.

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Blackbeard's Cup and Stories of the Outer Banks by Charles Harry Whedbee

I picked up three collections of Outer Banks legends in the bookstore of the Maritime Museum in Beaufort, North Carolina, on a recent trip to the beach. I hoped they would be useful for my students' study of North Carolina history. As you may sense from my posts to date, historical legends are not my primary interest, so I started reading this collection more out of a sense of duty than pleasure. And I would say that I "worked" my way through the first few, especially since each one starts with historical context before diving into the tale at hand.

However, that work did have its reward as the stories began to grow on me. They definitely give the reader a sense of the salty flavor of life on the Outer Banks. There are stories of mysterious lights, famous pirates, colonists lost at sea, treasure maps, the hauntings of sailors' ghosts, and daring rescues. It's all history washed down with strong doses of mystery and adventure.

The teacher in me could see reading these to a class who would mark locations on a map, create a timeline, and add illustrations to really bring the stories to life. Or perhaps learning some of them well enough for dramatic storytelling. I'm not sure how many students would sit down and read these on their own, but they would lend some flavor to the study of North Carolina history.

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Experiments

I've been experimenting with additional features for this blog. Some things are working and others aren't. I'm very pleased that I was able to add pictures to posts. And I think I've got a "tagboard" in which you can tell me what you are reading--check in out on the sidebar to the right. As I experiment with posting to that tagboard, it seems like it works only intermittently. Dunno why. Anyway, use the comments on this post to let me know if you've tried to post, and it didn't work. To give credit where credit is due: I'm using NVNCBL Chatterbox (http://chatter.nvncbl.com/) .

Update: After some initial success, the NVNCBL Chatterbox didn't seem to be working at all. So I removed it and tried another free one, this time from Flooble (http://chatter.flooble.com). This one seems to work. The downside is that near the bottom they add an advertising link. I suppose that TANSTAAFL* applies here as everywhere. Anyway, let me know what you're reading these days!

*There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

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The Wizard's Dilemma by Diane Duane

Okay, you might have noticed that I lean heavily towards fantasy...I admit it. Although I really DO read other things, too. In any case, I just finished The Wizard's Dilemma, the fifth book in Duane's Young Wizards series. I was about to say that I enjoyed it, but I'm not sure if that's quite the correct word.

I read it because I care about the two young heroes, Nita and Kit, who stumbled across wizardry at about the same time and quickly became partners in the first book, So You Want to Be a Wizard. I say, "stumbled," but that's not exactly the right word either. And as the wizards in this series know, we all need to be careful about how we use our words, seeing as they have the power to define our worlds. Anyway, it felt like stumbling when Nita came across her wizard's manual in the library that day that started it all. Even if the Powers That Be knew what they were doing by placing it in her path.

After initial skepticism, Nita decides that this wizardly career guide might be for real, so she takes the Oath, promising to use her power to serve Life as best she can. She teams up with Kit and the two rookie wizards face their first Ordeal, a contest against the Lone Power with stakes of nothing less than the Book that fully and exquisitely defines the universe.

The subsequent books in the series continue to pit Kit and Nita against the many faces of the Lone Power in the many places and times it attempts to exert its control through fear and death and anger. They explore the depths of the ocean and the extent of their willingness to sacrifice themselves for Life in Deep Wizardry. In High Wizardry, Nita's younger sister Dairine finds her own call to wizardry through a computer software version of the wizard's manual. A huge Star Wars fan, Dairine's Ordeal takes her to the reaches of outer space. Worried that Nita is spending to much time on wizardry, her parents send her to visit her aunt in Ireland in A Wizard Abroad. But the struggle between the forces of Life and those of Death are carried on everywhere, and Nita learns that Ireland's magic lies especially deep.

In all of these books, themes of life and death, truth and deception, evil and redemption underlie the work of wizards. There is a sense of greater purpose that gives the characters and their choices weight, explicit without being preachy. Spells and the use of magic are more complex and scientific-sounding than the "swish and flick" taught at Hogwarts, and wizards always pay a price in the necessary expenditure of energy. Nita and Kit discover the ubiquitous nature of life as they begin to hear the voices of trees and even "nonliving" objects like rocks and cars. The diversity of sentient life in the universe is further portrayed in characters such as a white hole with the hiccups, whales who are the wizards of the seas, a conscious silicon planet, random beings traveling through an extraterrestrial Grand Central Station, and more.

I started this post with The Wizard's Dilemma, and I'm finally ready to get back to that. Did I enjoy it? Well...there is a certain darkness to this series, as you might imagine with an antagonist like the Lone Power. This installment is especially difficult for a couple of reasons. One is that the Life at stake is Nita's mother's and the Death that is trying to exert itself is cancer. Secondly, the relationship between Nita and Kit is more strained. Earlier in the series there was more camaraderie and even some awkward confusion about the nature of their friendship, but now, an argument and bad timing put distance between them. All of that keeps it from being light summer reading. But I care enough about Nita and Kit to keep following them through these dark times. And always, there are moments of sweet celebration amidst the poignant struggle to serve Life.

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The Guardians of Ga'Hoole by Kathryn Lasky

Exciting news! According to Variety.com, "Warner Bros. has acquired film rights to Kathryn Lasky's children's fantasy series 'Guardians of Ga'Hoole.' " The films will be done with computer generated imagery. The author will be writing the screenplay, which gives us hope that the films will actually follow the books. There doesn't seem to be any information yet as to when the first movie might be released.

The Guardians of Ga'Hoole series begins with the adventures of the young barn owl Soren in a world of various owl kingdoms, heroes, and villains. In the first book, The Capture, Soren is pushed out of his nest and picked up by some scouts from St. Aegolius Academy for Orphaned Owls. The Academy is definitely no Hogwarts: it's more of a prison camp in which owlets are brainwashed to forget their own identities and are never taught to fly. Even in this harsh environment, however, Soren is able to find a friend in Gylfie, a petite elf owl, and together they maintain their hope and plan to escape.

The series introduces readers to several varieties of owls and details of their behavior, most of which seems very true to actual owls. Lasky has also created special vocabulary such as "yarping" and "going yeep" to allow the owls to describe special aspects of their lives. Yarping is the act of coughing up pellets of indigestible bone and fur, and going yeep is when an owl becomes so upset that it forgets how to fly. Lasky's owls also have their own cultural traditions in the form of tales, songs, and beliefs that guide them. My daughter and I have really enjoyed learning about owls while we follow the adventures of Soren, Gylfie, and the other owls they meet.

Lasky, Kathryn. The Capture. New York: Scholastic, 2003.
---The Journey.
---The Rescue. 2004.
---The Siege.
---The Shattering.
---The Burning.
---The Hatchling. 2005.
---The Outcast. Available September 2005.

McNary, Dave. "Fantasy in WB future: Studio laps up Lasky's 'Guardians' books." Variety.com. http://www.variety.com Search for "ga'hoole." Viewed 23 June 2005.

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Song of the Lioness Quartet by Tamora Pierce

Years ago, a teenaged friend recommended this quartet of fantasy adventure books to me, as it was her favorite series at the time. More recently a frequent visitor to my library told me how much she liked several of Tamora Pierce's fantasy books. For whatever reason, it took me some time to finally get around to reading them, but I'm quite glad I did!

Some months ago I finally read Alanna: The First Adventure in which our heroine trades places with her twin brother Thom, so that she can train to become a knight and he can further develop his magical Gift. Since there have been no recent warrior maidens, Alanna has to pretend to be "Alan" which of course presents many difficulties. However, Alanna perseveres in both maintaining the charade and in the physical challenges of training as a knight. While a handful of her closest friends become aware that she is a girl, it is only after her knighthood that her true gender is revealed to all.

As the series continues with In the Hand of the Goddess, The Woman Who Rides Like a Man, and The Lioness Rampant, Alanna makes lasting friendships, becomes highly skilled in combat, foils evil plots against the royal family, travels to distant lands, comes to terms with her own magical Gift, seeks a purpose to her life, and enjoys and struggles with romantic relationships.

I always appreciate strong female characters like Alanna. Pierce does an especially good job showing how Alanna struggles to be both a knight--independent, strong, ready for combat--and to enjoy more "feminine" parts of life--wearing a pretty dress when she wants to and, more importantly, finding a lasting relationship that won't put her in a cage. My thanks go out to Caroline and Brea for putting me on to this series.

Pierce, Tamora. Alanna: The First Adventure. New York: Simon Pulse, 2005.
---In the Hand of the Goddess.
---The Woman Who Rides Like a Man.
---The Lioness Rampant.

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Swallowdale by Arthur Ransome

Just finished reading Swallowdale tonight. Excellent old-fashioned summer adventure, first published in 1931. It's the sequel to Swallows and Amazons which I read last summer. In Swallowdale, the four Walker children--Captain John, Mate Susan, Able-seaman Titty, and Ship's Boy Roger--return for their second summer on the lake, ready to exercise their imaginations, as well as their sailing, exploring, and camping skills. Due to an unfortunate (or fortunate?) incident, they become "shipwrecked" and have to set up camp in a small valley up the moor on the east side of the lake, rather than on Wild Cat Island, the heart of many of last summer's adventures. Despite constraints imposed by a very imposing great-aunt, the two Blackett girls--Captain Nancy and Mate Peggy--are able to join the Walkers for some adventures, including a hike up the local peak named Kanchenjunca by the children. Great fun! I'd like to join this crew.

Ransome, Arthur. Swallowdale. Boston: David R. Godine, 1985. ISBN 0-87923-572-1

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Testing the waters

I've heard just enough about blogs to decide I want to try it out. My thought is that Skoobdoog would be an outlet for my thoughts about books I'm reading. Maybe some of those thoughts are worth sharing. We'll see how it goes.

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