Review of Twilight (BtVS Season 8)

Author: Joss Whedon, Georges Jeanty, Brad Meltzer
Published in 2011
Thickness: 156 pages
Personal rating: 4 stars

I have slayed the rut of the three stars and given this a deserved 4 star rating!

I am a Buffy Summers fan from the first hour and was seriously stricken when season 7 proved to be the last televised (but thinking back, they did a good thing to end it on a high instead of just milking the cow until it's dry and it was really a great finale. Chosen has been one of my very favourite episodes of all time).
Then I read the news of an upcoming season 8, in comic style and I was thrilled all over again!. I'm not a comic reader but latest evolutions in the field, have made me one. Not only Buffy but also the graphic novels of The Dark Tower and The Stand (Stephen King). I even found out that my very favourite Bradbury (Fahrenheit 451) is up for it too.

I've read all of the comics from Season 8, and it started out strong. All the slayers having their powers, promised for a bad guy beyond imagination. Beyond 'The First' which had to be the biggest so far (although my favourite must be Glory (style and evilness in one move) (by the way: a great little reminder of glory in this comic I'm reviewing ^^).
And as promised, they delivered us 'Twilight'. No, not the Stephenie Meyer franchise but a really bad guy. Bad to the bone.
And as we follow the fight in every new graphic novel, we come upon a mesmerizing revelation. BIG SPOILER AHEAD!! 






Twilight is Angel.. (Yay, angel is back, always fancied him). And I must say the reaction of Buffy is somewhat surprising and yet not so strange after all.
I loved this seventh episode of Season 8. It is all a bit ethereal, but nonetheless very in the style of the buffyverse that has always been there.
Not much to say about style, it's pop culture references, jokes and references to the aired show which all brings back happy youth memories.
I was 13 when I first saw Buffy (on English television, barely understanding the words) and I'm now almost turning 27 and still a fan.
Being pregnant, I can not do but hope that when I give birth to a lovely girl (which is not certain yet, could be a boasty boy too!) is that I can inspire her to watch the series for herself, no matter how outdated it might be by then.. but the next picture says why..

No harm intended towards Twilight fans, just a personal opinion. :)

Well.. I've been a very busy bee reading wise and I'm not tired yet!
Tata.

Review of Eclipse

Author: Stephenie Meyer
Published in 2007
Thickness: 629 pages

As Seattle is ravaged by a string of mysterious killings and a malicious vampire continues her quest for revenge, Bella once again finds herself surrounded by danger. In the midst of it all, she is forced to choose between her love for Edward and her friendship with Jacob —- knowing that her decision has the potential to ignite the ageless struggle between vampire and werewolf. With her graduation quickly approaching, Bella has one more decision to make: life or death. But which is which? (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/428263.Eclipse_Twilight_3_)


Seems like I'm handing out only 3 stars lately. Am I in a rut? God, I hope not! Maybe I need a break from the YA for a while. 
Eclipse got read finally, even with the Sookie breaks in between I managed to finish up this third installment of the legendary (good or bad, you fill in the blanks) Twilight series. I myself don't find them tremendously good, but not bad either. It passes the time and sometimes that's what reading is for me. Not an investment, but an enjoyment. 


Eclipse has much more to offer than the previous novel New Moon. I didn't like that moaning and falling apart, way too dramatic, even for a highschool girl. Twilight still is my number one, but I do find Breaking Dawn the second in command, even though almost everyone in the twilight-universe isn't backing this up. 
This is my second read of Eclipse, but while I breezed through it the last time (read all four of them in a weekend), I don't seem to have the same feeling about them. But I promised myself to read them all again once and by god if I don't respect my own promises. 


My thoughts in short, is that Twilight is a path for Bella and in Eclipse she has come upon a fork in the road and she isn't sure which way to take. Is Edward the one for her? After he abandoned her once and after him clearly not wanting her to become a vampire herself. Jacob was there for her while she was hurting from his sudden departure and in that time he has found a way into her heart, albeit in a less obvious way that Edward gained entrance. 
Is Jacob the one for her? Sometimes it feels like he doesn't 'want' Bella, for being with her, but mainly because she will get to live and Edward won't have her. I feel the pathetic little part of love more palpable in Jacob, than I do in Edward. Jacob is too immature to know what love really is and he is doing what most do of his age, putting their first love on a pedestal and be warned to one who tries to shake those foundations. 


Bella herself is torn between Edward and Jacob because, like in the previous novels, she seems to be guided by the current instead of choosing herself. She is a selfcentered little person, but most girls are at her age, so what can we expect. The only thing that seriously aggravated me is the continuous low self esteem and the guilt trips she constantly has. Lighten up Bella, you've got two gorgeous guys wanting you. Nothing wrong with the way you look and enjoy it while it lasts. 


In the end she chooses obviously for Edward and an eternal life with him. I felt sorry for Jacob, but life isn't always fair. The fork in the road wasn't really a choice she had to make, as it both would have led to the same end, but one directly and the other with a serious heartbreaking detour. I guess Bella had her walking shoes on. 


And now enough with the metaphores and I'm ending this review. One left to reread and since it is my second favourite I will probably like it better. 

Review of Dead Reckoning

First published in 2011
Thickness: 325 pages

With her knack for being in trouble's way, Sookie witnesses the firebombing of Merlotte's, the bar where she works. Since Sam Merlotte is now known to be two-natured, suspicion falls immediately on the anti-shifters in the area. But Sookie suspects otherwise and she and Sam work together to uncover the culprit - and the twisted motive for the attack. But her attention is divided. Though she can't 'read' vampires, Sookie knows her lover Eric Northman and his 'child' Pam well - and she realises that they are plotting to kill the vampire who is now their master. Gradually, she is drawn into the plot -which is much more complicated than she knows. Caught up in the politics of the vampire world, Sookie will learn that she is as much of a pawn as any ordinary human - and that there is a new Queen on the board . . . (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7981206-dead-reckoning)


I postponed writing this review. 
Why? 
Because I wasn't sure what I thought of it. I'm still not entirely positive or negative about this 11th installment in the Southern Vampire aka Sookie Stackhouse series. 
For starters it was better than the previous novel. Man, I'll tell you again, that was a bad little piece of fiction, not entirely rubbish because it still features a lot of recognizable characters I learned to love and cherish, but they didn't do a very good job in Dead in the family. 
But to get back to the topic, Dead Reckoning was better, if only infinitesimal. 

The action was better, the novel had more structure, but in the end I wasn't enthralled by the whiney Sookie. What happened to that girl that stuck up for herself. It seems that 'love' has taken the fight out of her. I yayed for her when she released herself from the bond between her and Eric (Thanks Amelia!!) but her reaction afterwards was just plain pathetic. 
And to be truthful I wondered why she didn't inform Eric beforehand (he might try to talk her out of it?? That was the answer she gave herself) God, I felt like she was more and more becoming like Bella instead of the powerful Sookie. 
 
In the end, she came through though. I wonder what direction she will take now. I still don't like her with Eric. 


And just to throw them in. A few things that bothered me. 
  Sandra Pelt.. She was there, and then not, and then again, and then not again, until she met an untimely death. She seemed like an annoying fly that keeps bugging you, but mostly I felt like it was meant as a pagefiller. What to do with Sookie when all things quiet down for a while?? Oh wait, let's worry for her life, as Sandra Pelt is after her again. 
  What was with the naked hideout in Bill's house? Does she really need to turn his head around like that? I know it was from a survival point of view, but still.. it felt quite redundant. I was glad to hear what became of him and Judith (see previous novel). 


Well, that's it. Still looking forward to the next one, although with less anticipation than before. 

Review of Dead In The Family

Author: Charlaine Harris
First published in 2010
Thickness: 311 pages

Sookie Stackhouse somehow survived the Faery War, but life never seems to get easy for Bon Temps' telepathic (but tip-poor) barmaid. In the tenth instalment of Charlaine Harris's resilient Southern Vampire series, Sookie and heartthrob Eric Northman come under intense regal scrutiny, but there are dangers even closer at hand: The doors to Faery slammed shut before some Fae were able to return and they're holding Sookie very personally responsible.  (Source: www.goodreads.com)


I didn't get too excited (and with this series you can take that quite literally, ^^) by this 10th installment of the famous Southern Vampires series. 
Why?
It was sloppy, written too fast with no real thread through the novel. Things seem to happen and not all that happened was explained. (Whatever happened further with Bill and Judith??) Instead of reading someone reaching some goal, or trying to survive a certain twist of fate, I read about a girl where random things happen and many many people take advantage of. 
Sookie tries to tell herself that she's an independent woman who stands her own ground, but in this novel I very much thought the opposite. 
The relationship to Eric doesn't feel credible either. A love affair can't be about the spectacular sex all the time, that's just sheer lust confused with intimacy. When I read it, I was sure that the right choice for Sookie was under her nose from the very beginning, her boss Sam. The feelings are there, but she seems terrified to act upon it. Don't know what's holding her back. She could have it all,  instead of having a boyfriend that never ages and won't give her a family she one day might want. 


Well, of course I know that many people have different opinions of what Sookie should do, and in the end it's the writer that calls the shots, but I do hope she will get a happy ending, still living and not stonecold and never-aging. With what these novels tell me, being a vampire isn't all that fantastic either. 


In comparison to other the other Sookie Stackhouse novels, this one is mediocre, if not the least so far.

Review of Prey

Author: Michael Crichton
First published in 2002
Thickness: 348 pages
Read in Dutch
Personal rating: 2 stars

High-tech whistle-blower Jack Forman used to specialize in programming computers to solve problems by mimicking the behavior of efficient wild animals--swarming bees or hunting hyena packs, for example. Now he's unemployed and is finally starting to enjoy his new role as stay-at-home dad. All would be domestic bliss if it were not for Jack's suspicions that his wife, who's been behaving strangely and working long hours at the top-secret research labs of Xymos Technology, is having an affair. When he's called in to help with her hush-hush project, it seems like the perfect opportunity to see what his wife's been doing, but Jack quickly finds there's a lot more going on in the lab than an illicit affair. Within hours of his arrival at the remote testing center, Jack discovers his wife's firm has created self-replicating nanotechnology--a literal swarm of microscopic machines. Originally meant to serve as a military eye in the sky, the swarm has now escaped into the environment and is seemingly intent on killing the scientists trapped in the facility. The reader realizes early, however, that Jack, his wife, and fellow scientists have more to fear from the hidden dangers within the lab than from the predators without.
Extract from Goodreads.

Personally this novel couldn't intrigue me. The back of the book definitely gave me hope, otherwise it wouldn't have left the library in my bag, but in the end I think I'm just not smart enough to read this novel. The story seems simple enough, a technologic swarm of microscopic robots that have gone on a killing spree, but the technical mumbo jumbo that comes along with it, is a bit like a foreign language to me. Jibberish. 
Even with a IT-husband, I couldn't get into the momentum of this novel, and I truly tried, because I actually liked Crichton's Jurassic Park and Next. I guess this theme just doesn't do it for me. 
But what I do want to mention is the excellent moral of this story. Even with needing background info to read this story, preferably a degree in computer science, I felt the lesson to be that we humans tend to create something without truly seeing the possible consequences. This has happened in the past, and will surely continue in the future. Crichton's prologue touches a few sore spots in our society in which he is completely right, in my book. 
So, my recommendation is, that if you see this book lying in the store or in the library and you don't feel like you have any feel to programming or nanotechnology, pick it up and read his prologue. That's what matters. May he rest in peace, Michael Crichton was definitely on the dot where technology would and will take us.

Review of The Book Thief

Author: Markus Zusak
First published in 2005
Thickness: 554 pages (Black Swan edition)
Personal rating: 5 stars

The Book Thief, as the back says, is a story narrated by Death about a girl, an accordionist, some fanatical Germans, a Jewish fist fighter and quite a lot of thievery.

That's absolutely right, but it is so much more at the same time. This novel has been proclaimed to be a very well written piece of proze and I wholeheartedly agree.
Following the life of Liesel, living on a German street, named Himmel street, in a town near Munich, she does what she has to, to survive. In the meantime she touches the lives of those around her in such a way that they almost all are mesmerized by her.
As you see her struggle to understand the Germany under the influence of Hitler, she tries to make sense of how words seem to have given her happiness and caused so much pain at the same time.

As the title might have given away, this novel is about books, most of them stolen. Not for the maliciousness of the act, but for the sheer need of words and sentences to read.
As Liesel suffers to learn to read properly, she stumbles upon books in the most peculiar, often thieverous ways you can imagine, but she doesn't steal what she doesn't need.
The words that make up those novels become one of her most precious belongings and she uses them whenever they can soothe, or bring a smile to someone's lips.

The story itself is written in a strange way, often with death interrupting the flow of the story to bring a little clarity or to just share or confess something.
It reads like a train, I often had to hold myself back not to speed things up too much, as this is a story I wanted to enjoy for as long as possible.
I felt for Liesel, I felt for her best friend Rudy, for her Papa and her Mama. For her brother that died on the way to Himmel Street and her real mother that left her at the station to be taken care of by others. I felt for Max, the Jew her family hid in the basement and that got his eyes burned while watching the stars when everyone else was sheltering for a possible air raid, for the jews that paraded by on their way to Dachau, for the mere injustice that was Germany in the early 1940's.
In the end I cried, I really cried. Not a single tear or a little wetness of the eyes. I actually had to put the book down to dry my eyes and calm myself a bit before I could read on.

A magnificent book, is all I need to say. The rest you have to discover for yourself.

Review of Enduring Love

Author: Ian McEwan
First published in 1997
Thickness: 247 pages (Vintage edition)
Personal rating: 2 stars

Enduring Love is about a man with a frantic obsession for our protagonist, after both witnessing a terrible accident.
While on a picnic in the Oxford country with his wife/girlfriend/significant other, Joe Rose watches a balloon, the kind people use to enjoy the countryside from above, in trouble. Due to strong winds and a miscalculations of the 'driver' the balloon ends up floating towards power lines with just a little boy in the basket.
But not before Joe and a few other bystanders try to keep the balloon grounded. This fails and they have to let go, which all of them but one do. The one who keep hanging on, is being jerked upwards only holding a rope and comes to a lethal fall a little later.

The others of the so-called rescue team watch him fall and try to make sense of it all, most of all try to put the biggest blame of themselves, trying to see it as an act of God, not something they had in control themselves.

During this turmoil, one of the other bystanders, Jed Parry, that helped in trying to save the boy, develops an unhealthy obsession with Joe. He believes that Joe led him on and is now terrorising him, wanting so much and giving so little.
Jeds obsession leads to devastating results, while Joe himself faces the ridicule and disbelief of his immediate surroundings.
In the aftermath of a terrible accident, Joe has been led to a path where he could lose it all by the means of one disillusioned man who believes he needs to show Joe what love is and show him the path to eternal salvation.


Ian McEwan has been letting me down lately.
I've read Atonement which is simply extraordinary and gave him a place amongst my favourite authors. Not having read anything else of his, I was positive this has to be a guideline for his other works of fiction and not a one time lucky fluke.
Now, I'm not so sure anymore. Early this year I tried to read Solar which I abandoned early, and while I finished this novel, I wasn't blown away by it. All the time I thought there would be an incredible twist, but it followed the most cliché path it could've taken.
And while I'm trying to find the emotional state of Joe or Jed, all I seem to waddle through is a lot of egocentric rambling that seems to have as only reason to show the characters intelligence, by which I translate it to be the author's intelligence.
Now, having had a try at the mighty pen myself, I do not judge how a author does his magic, but in this case it was a bit much. Too many side subjects that didn't help the story, it just distracted me too much and I kept thinking a work of non-fiction would be an option for Ian McEwan to have a vent for his all-over-the-place intelligence. It seemed out of place here.
I believe, but I might be wrong, that when someone is faced with something terrible, perhaps even life-threatening, he isn't thinking of Keats or some references to biology or science, even being highly educated. In the end, the survival instincts of people are pretty much the same, whether they work at a car factory or give lectures on quantum physics.

Only two stars because I expected better, but I'm giving him one more chance to claim fame, before he is being bumped from my favourite author list.