Morning is waking up (and sometimes it's more than enough)
Finished two in February.
I usually have a weakness for overenthusiasm. But this month -- meh. 0 for 2 on the amazing finds.
The numbering is from Jan 1, 2016.
7. The Letter, the Witch, and the Ring (John Bellairs)
Ah, look at that title. Totes original, bro.
We got through our 3-in-1 Bellairs compendium. Thank goodness.
This one was the best story of the 3 (though not as good as what Book 1, Chapter 1 of the series promised). We shifted the narrative so Lewis's pal Rose Rita was the protagonist. The antagonist wasn't exactly subtle but she was the scariest of the lot so far. Also, the story definitely passed the Bechdel test. Which I don't consider a good in and of itself, but Rose Rita with her road trip with her friend and mentor Mrs. Zimmerman -- it was different from any other kid's book I've read in a long, long time.
But mostly, by the end, I was just glad to finish. (We're ready for something more substantial, and have moved on to Kristin Lavransdatter.)
There was at least one scene that really stayed with me, though. Rose Rita's great internal conflict in this book is that she is on the verge of going to high school and hitting puberty and everyone is talking about how she'll be into dating and boys soon, and she's very much a tomboy and doesn't see that ever changing (I don't, either! And she's going to be a force to be reckoned with when she grows up, but she doesn't see that yet. She reminds me a bit of Kristy Thomas from Baby Sitters' Club -- not quite as awesome, but in the same mold of not yet grown into her tremendous strength of character.)
Anyway, this could have been very tedious, preachy stuff. But one of Bellairs's strengths is that he vividly remembers "the awkward age" and writes it with great emotional realism. The scene where Rose Rita joins a baseball game with the local boys in a town she and Mrs. Zimmerman are passing through was convincingly and memorably done.
8. Shane (Jack Schaefer)
I'm torn on this one. It was a decent story and solidly told. It was so in earnest, not a speck of cynicism, and while you are reading you buy into it.
It was also ve-e-e-e-e-e-e-ry pulpy, and it was hard to get over that.
It's SO MANLY.
Shane was originally a serial in Argosy's that "rose from its origins" to be considered a minor work of American literature -- at least, judging by the standard of what they sometimes teach in school! But, if you don't want to have more than two western/cowboy novels in your curriculum (and you probably don't), then why give that slot to Shane when you could read True Grit instead? At least, I imagine that was the thought process when the local high school unloaded its copies. I agree with their thinking, but I picked up quite a few to stock my classroom library.
The title character is the good outlaw -- with a dark and mysterious past, knowing too much about dealing death for decency himself, but still on the side of righteousness. He comes into town and starts working for the family of the narrator, a little boy who immediately idolizes the stranger. Shane soon becomes a part of the family and, during his short and dramatic stay, impresses upon young Bobby what it means to be A REAL MAN.
I'm exaggerating. They never use the phrase "a real man" anywhere. But you start to infer.
So Schaefer definitely has a one-track mind, thematically speaking, and between that and genre the story was pretty predictable. But it least it was never -- quite -- saccharine. And it did have an important redeeming quality: the lovely, healthy marriage between Bob's parents, and the equally amazing friendship that develops between all three adults, Mr. Starrett, Mrs. Starrett, and Shane.
There is real fandom potential between those three. So much unspoken drama… so much deep feeling.
Silly kid narrator! Go to bed, Bobby -- let someone else narrate a chapter or two. We want to know just how deeply all that sexual tension went!
POSTSCRIPT: Oh, so they made a film adaptation. (Of course they did.) The Western Writers of America (whoever they are) voted it the best Western movie ever made. Gary Cooper was in it. I'll probably be watching it -- at least as background noise to a round of grading. It beat out High Noon, the Searchers, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the rest of which I at least heard of. Maybe this could be a grading marathon…
I usually have a weakness for overenthusiasm. But this month -- meh. 0 for 2 on the amazing finds.
The numbering is from Jan 1, 2016.
7. The Letter, the Witch, and the Ring (John Bellairs)
Ah, look at that title. Totes original, bro.
We got through our 3-in-1 Bellairs compendium. Thank goodness.
This one was the best story of the 3 (though not as good as what Book 1, Chapter 1 of the series promised). We shifted the narrative so Lewis's pal Rose Rita was the protagonist. The antagonist wasn't exactly subtle but she was the scariest of the lot so far. Also, the story definitely passed the Bechdel test. Which I don't consider a good in and of itself, but Rose Rita with her road trip with her friend and mentor Mrs. Zimmerman -- it was different from any other kid's book I've read in a long, long time.
But mostly, by the end, I was just glad to finish. (We're ready for something more substantial, and have moved on to Kristin Lavransdatter.)
There was at least one scene that really stayed with me, though. Rose Rita's great internal conflict in this book is that she is on the verge of going to high school and hitting puberty and everyone is talking about how she'll be into dating and boys soon, and she's very much a tomboy and doesn't see that ever changing (I don't, either! And she's going to be a force to be reckoned with when she grows up, but she doesn't see that yet. She reminds me a bit of Kristy Thomas from Baby Sitters' Club -- not quite as awesome, but in the same mold of not yet grown into her tremendous strength of character.)
Anyway, this could have been very tedious, preachy stuff. But one of Bellairs's strengths is that he vividly remembers "the awkward age" and writes it with great emotional realism. The scene where Rose Rita joins a baseball game with the local boys in a town she and Mrs. Zimmerman are passing through was convincingly and memorably done.
8. Shane (Jack Schaefer)
I'm torn on this one. It was a decent story and solidly told. It was so in earnest, not a speck of cynicism, and while you are reading you buy into it.
It was also ve-e-e-e-e-e-e-ry pulpy, and it was hard to get over that.
It's SO MANLY.
Shane was originally a serial in Argosy's that "rose from its origins" to be considered a minor work of American literature -- at least, judging by the standard of what they sometimes teach in school! But, if you don't want to have more than two western/cowboy novels in your curriculum (and you probably don't), then why give that slot to Shane when you could read True Grit instead? At least, I imagine that was the thought process when the local high school unloaded its copies. I agree with their thinking, but I picked up quite a few to stock my classroom library.
The title character is the good outlaw -- with a dark and mysterious past, knowing too much about dealing death for decency himself, but still on the side of righteousness. He comes into town and starts working for the family of the narrator, a little boy who immediately idolizes the stranger. Shane soon becomes a part of the family and, during his short and dramatic stay, impresses upon young Bobby what it means to be A REAL MAN.
I'm exaggerating. They never use the phrase "a real man" anywhere. But you start to infer.
So Schaefer definitely has a one-track mind, thematically speaking, and between that and genre the story was pretty predictable. But it least it was never -- quite -- saccharine. And it did have an important redeeming quality: the lovely, healthy marriage between Bob's parents, and the equally amazing friendship that develops between all three adults, Mr. Starrett, Mrs. Starrett, and Shane.
There is real fandom potential between those three. So much unspoken drama… so much deep feeling.
Silly kid narrator! Go to bed, Bobby -- let someone else narrate a chapter or two. We want to know just how deeply all that sexual tension went!
POSTSCRIPT: Oh, so they made a film adaptation. (Of course they did.) The Western Writers of America (whoever they are) voted it the best Western movie ever made. Gary Cooper was in it. I'll probably be watching it -- at least as background noise to a round of grading. It beat out High Noon, the Searchers, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the rest of which I at least heard of. Maybe this could be a grading marathon…