I have a little problem when it comes to books. I have an addiction. I freely admit that. I admit that left to my own devices, I could easily got through 1, maybe 2 books in a day...that is if the publishing companies would just keep up. I guess it's a good thing I have other hobbies, or I would have long molded into my couch by now.
Why do I read. Hmm...it's a pretty easy answer. I read for the escapist entertainment it provides me. The more unrealistic and fantastical, the more I'm drawn to it. I'm not interested submersing myself in realism. I don't reject it completely, but I've always been happiest with one foot firmly anchored in my real life and the other flailing away in another world filled with magic, courage, and warped human (or not so human) perception.
HARRY POTTER VOL. 1-7by J.K. Rowling (COMPLETE)
So in August I started off my reading marathon with the odyssey of Harry Potter. No...not just the final book in the 7-book installment, but all 7...in one week...one after the other. I'm sure many, many, many people have already reviewed, critiqued, ripped apart, and analyzed every tiny detail of J.K. Rowling's epic legacy, so I'm not really going to try.
I've probably read the first 4 books at least 4 times each. I know them well, but have always felt compelled to read them over again when a new book was released. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is by far my favorite book in the series. I've always been a sucker for an underdog and a good competition.
As the series wore on, I felt my enthusiasm wane for the repeating format of a school year crammed into 400 pages of predictable magic. I've never been a huge fan of time constraints within the story, and I just became more aware of it as I read on.
Don't get me wrong. I still enjoy Harry Potter, but I probably took on a little too much by reading the complete series all at once. To top it off, I capped off my HP marathon by watching the movie of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Yikes.
Anyway, despite my disappointments (mainly to overexposure), I will give HP my vote simply for getting 5-year-olds excited when they see a book that's over 400 pages long. In a digital world where most people barely have the attention span to read a hastily typed text message on their phone - this, if anything, is huge. That makes me happy.
THE INHERITANCE TRILOGY VOL. 1 & 2
by Christopher Paolini
I wasn't sure what to expect when I picked up these books at Costco. I had heard great reviews about the Inheritance trilogy, as well that the author and started writing the first book, Eragon, when he was only 15. Great story, great writing...great. But in the end, that was not what swayed me to buy these books.
I am, without a doubt, a complete and utter sucker for a well made book.
And well...these were a pair of really well made books. In a set. With DRAGONS one it. Wow. You got me there.
Okay, okay...not the most intelligent of choices, but still...still. *sigh*. No excuses. Anyway, these books had been sitting on my shelf for about 5 months before I decided to pull them down and crack them open. I was coming off my Harry Potter binge, and like a bad habit, I couldn't stop. I end up reading a lot of garbage that way.
I'm thankful that the Inheritance books are far from garbage. Incredibly grateful. Nothing makes me sadder than a beautiful book that's a horrible read (Okay, I lie. Bad tasting cupcakes could make me sadder).
For a young writer, Paolini has great way of telling a story without being pretentious. There's no unnecessary padding that can bog down a fantasy story. Many authors feel the need to explain EVERYTHING, down to the different items that are packed into a trunk (The Princess Bride), or require 10 pages to explain how a person moved from one room to another (Robert Jordan). Many readers enjoy this. I don't. By the way, I blame my university background for padding my sentences unnecessarily with "pretentious" words.
I throughly enjoyed the flow of the story across both books. They aren't cookie cutters with each other, and is there isn't a neat and tidy ending to each. If you're going to write a great trilogy, that is probably what is best. Honestly, how can you NOT love a well written story about magic and dragons? Nice dragons, that is. Ones that talk in your mind and allow you to fly with them on their backs. My dreams are made of this stuff. I'm eagerly anticipating the third book, Fricaya, but it seems that it may be a wait before it's released. I'm willing to wait for the ending of this one.
DEATH NOTE VOL 1-12 (Complete)
Written by Tsugumi Ohba; illustrated by Takeshi Obata (Graphic Novels)
In the world of graphic novels, a picture can be worth a thousand words. Very rarely, though, are words as important as the picture. Death Note bring new weight to actually "reading" a graphic novel with its delightfully dark and morbid story of a brilliant young student who comes upon an otherworldly way of removing the bad in order to create a "new world".The title is your first clue as to the method. In Death Note's universe, there is a "Death God World" outside of the realm of the living world, filled with reapers who carry black notebooks in which they can write down the names of humans in order to kill them.
That's right. Instead of the horrifying image of a reaper cutting your soul to pieces with a massive scythe, instead you are killed (at a distance no less - kind of like modern day war, no?) by having your name written down in a little black book.
Wow....the possibilities that could be had with that last comment...leaves me almost speechless.
Anyway, the student, whose name is Light Yagami (or Raito Yagami), happens upon a Death Note outside his school. It had been dropped on purpose by a bored, disillusioned death god, named Ryuk, looking for a little pick-me-up to brighten his immortality. To facilitate this entertainment, Ryuk had conveniently written down instructions on how the Death Note is used, and some (not all) of the rules that bind it.
The human whose name is written in this note shall die.So our teenage protagonist decides to try out this Death Note out of sheer curiosity. He's convinced (mostly), that this is a sick little prank that someone with too much time on their hands has put together. To his complete dismay, it actually works, and along with this incredibly power to kill any of those he knows name and face, he can now see the Death God Ryuk and converse with him too.
This note will not take effect unless the writer has the subject's face in their mind when writing his/her name. Therefore, people sharing the same name will not be affected.
If the cause of death is written within 40 seconds of writing the subject's name, it will happen.
If the cause of death is not specified, the subject will simply die of a heart attack.
After writing the cause of death, the details of the death should be written in the next 6 minutes and 40 seconds.
Light sees his chance to change the world using the Death Note by ridding the world of all who would do evil. Then he would become "God" in this new world. As a side note, Ryuk is greatly entertained and enjoys eating apples in the living world.
Before you know it, criminals are dropping dead of heart attacks left, right, and center, in prisons all over the place. There are whispers of a killer that fans are calling "Kira". The international politicians are beginning to panic and call in a super sleuth, code name "L", a genius at solving unsolvable cases.
And THAT'S when things get interesting. This story has its moments of dark, gory violence, however, it's not as gratuitous as you may think. Everything about this series is deliberate, very much like an epic chess match between two geniuses or a battle between two superior swordsmen. This is reflected in the struggle for dominance between Light and "L", whether it's a war of words, or a well-played match of tennis (literally). Death Note is an engrossing, mesmerizing narrative, that pokes apart the warped human mind in the midst of absolute power. Loved it.
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