The Girl Who Could Fly (sigh)

I wish this girl could fly. But mostly I wish I could read minds... but enough about me, onto the book. This book is about little Miss Piper McCloud, written by Victoria Forester. I learned about this book from Stephenie Meyer's website, after she gave it such an awesome review. She said something about it being sort of X-Men-ish. I just so happen to love the X-Men, so I decided to pick this one up. And I'm glad I did.

Yes Piper can fly, and she does, which earns her all the wrong kind of attention: gossip, headlines, government interference, and the invisible man, Mr. J.
Mr. and Mrs. McCloud are confused, Piper is confused , and so they reach out to the first available hand of help in the form of Dr. Hellion (he he), who runs an institute for kids just like Piper who have special talents. Not to mention a certain cricket.... This is really where the story begins, so without giving anymore away, Let's review it.

I love this book, on a scale from 1 to 10 , 1 being raunchy and violent, 10 being the cutest fluffiest thing you've ever read, I'd give this book an 8. It's cute but smart. It also provides wonderful imagery so the characters and the actions really come alive, and you can see it playing out in your mind relatively clearly. This is definitely something I want to read again, read to my kids, and I'm definitely buying this one. I'm going into the deep recesses of theory here so don't read on until you've read the book. I mean it this time, READ THIS BOOK BEFORE YOU READ ON!!!








Theory: This on the surface is about being yourself. As Piper's phrase goes: "You just can't keep a good girl down." But I think the real meaning is that appearances can be oh so deceiving. A person can feel comfortable and excepting and nice and warm, but in reality their true motives are to create apathy and complacency and really drown out your spirit and snuff out your light. Such people create a world where nothing else matters but acceptance. This kind of person is is embodied in one Dr. Letitia Hellion. Everything about her surface appearance says warmth and love and comfort. But all she is doing is going around snuffing out lights, gathering up the children with special gifts and drugging them and conditioning them for a life of normalcy. You see Dr. Hellion hates anything abnormal, and wants everything to be in it's place and act accordingly. To me this feels a lot like the church system and certain cults that create that all alluring community feeling. This is the way I see it, a person gets born again, and the Holy Spirit comes to fill them up with a love for Christ and an outpouring of revelation and gifts, and then the young christian says, "I need to go to church!" (and naturally, when Jesus is the theme) so off he/she goes in search of like-minded folk who share his/her love. Unfortunately most churches are ruled by an oligarchy, a select few who dictate what where who and how the Holy Spirit gets to move. So if said young christian decides to bless his/her new found Spirit on an undeserving strictly run church, the Spirit and light will surely begin fade (unless he/ she runs for their spiritual life!) Moral of the story: If you can fly then by golly don't let ANYONE keep you down! There are plenty of wolves in sheep's clothing lying in wait to snatch away your gift, because they themselves are too afraid to use their own.

Dropping a Line... Evangeline, by Longfellow

I really love this part of Evangeline. I'm not finished with the whole thing but I wanted to share this with some people that I know will appreciate it.

"Ye who believe in affection that hopes, and endures, and is patient,
Ye who believe in the beauty and strength of a woman's devotion,
List to the mournful tradition, still sung by the pines of the forest;
List to a tale of Love in Acadie, home of the happy."

I'm sure there will be more quotes when I'm done. Here's a tidbit of info though: Longfellow and Hawthorne went to the same college! Must be some strain of awesome writing bacteria floatin in that water.

What I'm Reading....

House of Seven Gables - A Romance by Nathaniel Hawthorne, yeah, the guy who also wrote The Scarlet Letter. I've got to admit his stuff is hard to get into. It seems every sentence is charged with spirituality. So beautiful and poetically done that I find myself reading sentences over and over again. Here is a quote from the man himself on why he writes this way. It can be found in his biography written by Norman Holmes Pearson, Associate Professor of English, Yale University.
" "Everything," Hawthorne said, "has spiritual meaning, which to the literal meaning is what the soul is to the body." " I agree completely Mr. Hawthorne.
Folks this is no light read. If you want to edify both mind and spirit, pick up one of his books.
Once I get into the feel of his books though, I can usual start to read them pretty fast. It's like getting into the rhythm of a poet. Once you find it, it comes to life and becomes almost melodic.
I say this because usually I can read a book and my mind will start to wander then I'll snap back to what I was reading and realize that I had just read an entire paragraph but couldn't tell you what it's about. I'll usually just read it over again quickly and move on. But with Hawthorne's stuff I find that if my mind isn't focused I'll end up reading certain paragraphs over and over again. My mind has to be clear. No distractions. Can't sit in the same room while my husband plays video games or watches tv. No TMZ on in the background. So that's what I'm reading. Review coming soon to a blog-of-the-millennium near you.

Two for the Dough

I like both of these covers.
And I'd like to declare that I want to be Grandma Mazur when I grow up! She's tiny, quick as a whip and carries a .45-long barrel. My kinda woman!
Two for the Dough is the second installment of Evanovich's One for the Money series. Stephanie Plum is the heroin/ victim/ bait of these books. And in this particular book she has found herself the target of Kenny Mancuso, sicko, cutter extraordinaire.
She is a Bounty Hunter by profession, out of necessity. Like the book suggests, she's doin it for money. Her latest FTA (Failure to Appear) is said cutter. She finds herself travelling around to all the local funeral homes which happens to be Garndma Mazur's favorite thing to do in the evenings. I'ma itchin to review, so let's turn this mother out...
Review: This is just the morbid kind of humor that I like. Death, guns, old people, good times.
Evanovich also includes all the every day stuff and her novels span over little periods of time which I like. I can see where Stephenie Meyers gets her influence. I actually picked these novels up in the first place because Meyers, being one of my favorite authors, really likes these books. I always like to see what my favorite authors enjoy. Helps me get in their head more. Example: C.S. Lewis regarded George MacDonald as his "master", so I checked out MacDonald, and as it turned out, loved his stuff too!
Just like the first. Fun, page-turner, if you have the time, pick it up, but you won't want to put it down... Here's a quote:
"I rumbled off to Vic's Video and rented Ghostbusters, my all time favorite inspirational movie. I picked up some microwave popcorn, a kitkat, a bag of bite-sized reese's peanut butter cups, and a box of instant hot chocolate with marshmallows. Do I know how to have a good time or what?"
Why, yes, you do. Sounds like the best time.
Only one bone I have to pick about this book. Steph's jeep gets stolen and she ends up with a powder blue '53 Buick, which I think sounds awesome! But she doesn't like it. I guess I'm just into the retro thing, I would go for the antique before the shiny new toy.

One For the Money Review

I like the cover of this. Very 1950s-mystery-thriller. That being said, it isn't the right one.
One For The Money is about a woman named Stephanie Plum who is out of a job and selling her furniture off one by one to feed herself and her hamster Rex. She ends up working for her Uncle Vinnie and becoming a Bounty Hunter, the worst one ever. Hilarity ensues. If you've ever seen Dominoe imagine her opposite. R-E-V-I-E-W T-I-M-E
Review: This series, to me, reminds me of those little pecan pinwheels my momma used to get when I was a kid. They were small and one wasn't really enough, but by golly they were tasty and not good for you at all. Now if you ate nothing but the the pinwheels you would surely turn into a fat slob and possibly suffer a sugar coma. Well, with this series, it's the same. One definitely isn't enough, so be prepared to want more. But if all you read is Evanovich, your brain will surely suffer for it. Not to say it isn't witty, because it is. It just doesn't edify your mind intellectually, or your soul spiritually.
Evanovich also feels no need to beautify anything. She makes me want to stay the hell away from Jersey. But I like the fact that she didn't try to make Plum overly sexy and girly girlish. She's not too cool or confident, not too smart, but not too dumb. She doesn't shoot three bad guys as she jumps through the air after a major explosion happening just yards away. Actually she kind of hate guns. And is more afraid of herself with a gun then the baddies she's chasing.
I'm not going to bother with a theory, it is just what it claims to be and there are no deeper meanings. Here are some quotes:
"As a backup, I intended to get a quart of defense spray. I wasn't much good with a gun, but I was bitchin with an aerosol can."

Now this book was published in 1994, and in this quote it is painfully obviously so.. "I took a shower and spent some time on my hair, doing the blow-drying thing, adding some gel and some spray. When I was done I looked like Cher on a bad day. Still, Cher on a bad day wasn't all that bad. I was down to my last clean pair of spandex shorts. I tugged on a matching sports bra that doubled as a halter top and slid on a big, loose, purple T-shirt with a large, droopy neck over my head. I laced up my hightop reeboks, crunched down my white socks, and felt pretty cool."

Yup, I remember feeling pretty cool in my white turtleneck and sweatshirt in elementary school. And the bad fashion train moved forward slowly but surely creaking and screeching all the way through my teen years.
Wrap up time: Good vacation books. Or if you can't go anywhere: mental-vacation books.

What I'm Reading...

The Evanovich train pulled in and I hopped on board...
I got the first two at the library, and 48 hours later I was mad because they aren't open on Sundays so I couldn't get the third installment of the 'One for the Money' series. So, I secured my week by putting the next five on hold. Certainly I'll have to get the next 8 put on hold in about 3 days (yes, there are that many.) I don't want to have to be put in the situation of having to watch t.v. on a sunday afternoon again!

The Scarlet Letter

A novel by Nathaniel Hawthorn. The story is set in colonial times when the Puritans came to America searching for religious freedom. Oh, how ironic. Seeing as how the main character of this novel (Mrs. Hester Prynne) finds herself the the victim of a new kind of punishment in the form of the scarlet letter. What does the 'A' stand for ? Amorous? If Mr. Hawthorne mentions what it means it passed right over my head.
It's hard to review this book, I mean, of course it's awesome. Every paragraph is so poetically written and charged with spiritual and patriotic indignation that it's hard to pin anything down and say "here, this is the best part!" If you haven't read this book yet, you are missing out on an incredible story. No, do not see the movie. Get your history from a man who knows it.
I usually search through hundreds of pictures to find the one I like the best to put up on this here blog-of-the-universe. And if you google The Scarlet Letter and hit 'images' you'll come up with some real nastiness. (This is not a suggestion) Point is, the book is not as sexually charged as people like to make the story out to be. It doesn't start with sin. It starts with the CONSEQUENCE! In fact there are no love scenes. Only the aftermath. Which is the point of the story.
Hawthorne doesn't see fit to make Hester a victim, nor is she a heroin, but equally she is not a villain. She is a woman who screwed. up. big. She is now living with it. It is walking beside her in the form of a child who is also doomed to live life as an outcast.
The story starts with Hester walking out of a prison cell holding a babe that is the source of the controversy. She walks over to a scaffold for the entire town to view her and her new symbol. This is the most famous scene from the novel.
The story carries through her life as the town outcast. The priests use her constantly as a reference point in sermons and even in the middle of the street they will stop her and say "take this example of a woman given over sin."
The sin that earned her the scarlet letter was adultery. Her husband sent her to this town to establish a home for them until he could join her. Cut to two years later and we find Hester on the scaffold, her husband in that time had never made an appearance. Which is what made it so obvious that she had committed the offense.
I am by no means done with the discussion on this book. There is simply too much to try and force into one article. I'm going to pick up again on How Hester has established herself in her life as the town scandal.