Tea and Cakes

I’ve just finished* reading / re-reading the whole of the series to date - three original books, a sequel, and the prequel.

Worlds away from the Stephanie Meyer books, this is a young adult series that I can’t put down and stands up to extra reads. Intrigue, battles, romance, ninjas, the tales have them all. Strong female characters that are important to the plot in their own right and have actual conversations without men in them.

The final book in the series, The Harsh Cry of the Heron, is by far and away my least favourite. It’s as though she had the plot worked out but was tired of the characters. There was potential there for a lot more stories, but perhaps she didn’t want to write them. That’s understandable. To a certain extent I’m just upset by how the plot all ended up too.

So, when the prequel, Heaven’s Net is Wide, appeared in the shops recently I was wary. I wanted to read it, but didn’t have high hopes. I wasn’t disappointed though. I was back with the characters I loved in the land that I loved, learning more about them. I didn’t plan to, but I ended up reading the whole series again from start to finish. It was totally worth it.

*As I write this, a week or so before it’s being posted

Right then. My thoughts on these books.
I loved them, but I also hated them.

Spoilers will be included, so the post is after the jump, (sorry if you’re reading in a feed reader)
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I had big plans yesterday evening.

I was going to write a big old blog post, tidy the kitchen, do some washing, maybe even clean the bathroom, and then get a nice early night.

But before I did all that I decided to just read a chapter of this:

My plans went out of the window. I couldn’t put it down. I didn’t even stop to make a cup of tea. Whole book read, I got to bed at 1am.

To make it even worse, I stopped off at a bookshop on my way home tonight (showing great restraint by not ditching work today to do so), and bought this:

Tonight I’m wiser though: I’m putting the kettle on before I read even one tiny little word.

You know you’ve let the blogging slide when your mum rings to ask why you’ve stopped posting. Sorry mum!

I’ve been lacking writing inspiration, and haven’t felt like posting just a ‘oh look what I made post’, except, now it’s been a while, so that’s exactly what I need to do. I think another small thing may be that I get to be creative at work now, which is awesome, but has affected my blogging somewhat. Ho hum.

So, some random points…

I have another pair of baby socks almost finished and these will be in the post soon, I hope.

Bread making is flying along. Strong flour. It’s all I needed. Haven’t bought bread since and I’m loving the loaves I’m making. Bread making seems to be all the rage at the moment: Of course DaviMack’s been at it for a while, Bridget’s been making potato and garlic bread, Roobeedoo’s at it too, and Cheryl’s been working magic with a borrowed breadmaker. The machine does use electricity, but it seems fairly economical. At knitting on Saturday we were talking about the machine lacking the connection that comes from kneading the dough, but it takes me less than 10 minutes to put the ingredients in the machine, and as someone who barely keeps up with the housework and who finds it a huge effort to cook dinner when I get in, well, the machine’s the only way I’m gonna get bread! (I will still make batches of pizza bases by hand though, as I like the recipe I use).

Back to the knitting, and the terrifying balaclava is almost finished.

Chatting about it in the pub, about how best to decorate it - with the suggested skull mouth thing or with a big curly moustache - Linus suggested putting eyes on 2 sides to give two different options - it’s too late this time, and it would only work with one like this that’s destined to sit underneath a snowboarding helmet, but I loved the idea.

So, aside from a brief obsession with the Ravelry forums, which I’ve reined in to a passing interest, a few long work days, and lots of reading in the bath, what have I been up to?

Well, I’ve finished Kavalier and Clay

This was a wonderful, wonderful read. I was totally absorbed, I bought into the characters, and I was at once sad to finish and happy to leave them to the rest of their lives.

On Sunday we went to see No Country For Old Men, which was one of the best films I’ve seen in a long time.

Now, I leave you with some advice. Say you’ve just finished the pot of coffee, and want to make more, so need to fill the hot glass pot up with cold water to refill the filer machine thingy. With me so far? Now, you don’t want to put cold water in to the hot glass pot, because that might make it break, and you don’t want that. See. I know that. I’m smart.
Anyway, should you find yourself in this situation, I don’t recommend placing your palm flat against the bottom of the pot to gauge how hot it is.
Yep, I’m smart, me.

This was a birthday gift, and I saved it for holiday reading, which turned out to be a good idea - once I got hooked I couldn’t stop and I’m not sure I would have got a lot of anything done if I’d started them in my normal life. This is a collection of 5 kids books, in one edition - the books are definitely kids books, not ‘crossover’ fiction in the way that Philip Pullman’s wonderful ‘His Dark Materials’ books are.

They start off with a touch of the Famous Five about them, but then get much, much deeper, and darker at times too. I really loved the great English legends running through them - King Arthur and Merlin - I would have loved these books as a kid. I do now, but I can imagine how I would have lost myself in them then. They feel like walks on a wet and windy beach followed by mugs of hot tea and toast with butter in front of a roaring fire.

The movie of the second book is coming out soon, but by all accounts the story’s been mashed to pieces, with the main character turning from an eleven year old English boy to a fourteen year old American, among many other things. It’s so unnecessary - his age is important, as it makes the task he has to face that wee bit bigger, and making him American will take away from the Englishness of the books, which I find a real shame. It also suggests that the makers didn’t feel that American audiences would have any interest in an English lead, which I find a bit, well, weird. So, despite the film starring Ian McShane (Lovejoy!) and Christopher Eccleston, I’ll be avoiding it. If you’re going, get your kids to read the book first!

No discussion though, I have no desire to spoil it for anyone.

I picked this up on a Sunday morning planning on reading a chapter or two before I got on with my day, and put it down, finished, later that evening having done nothing else but read all day.

It reminded me a lot of The Secret History by Donna Tart, which was ok, but I don’t know why, I just really got into this. It was a little far fetched at times too, but still I couldn’t put it down.

I’ve been really bad at posting up books, so just a selection to come, not everything I’ve been reading.

The Book of Dave was excellent. Bizarre, very clever, and slightly disturbing, as to be expected from Will Self. It tells two stories, one of Dave, a London Cabbie with custody issues, and one set in the future, where England has flooded and society follows the rules laid down by Dave. The language, the thinking behind how society might work; it’s all so clever and kept me engaged until the very end.

I’m not a huge fan of Will Self’s short stories, but his novels are different. How The Dead Live was great, and this was even better.

A fictionalised account of real events, which is something that often intrigues me - I think this worked particularly well, despite the fact that the plot is frustrating at times (the situation, not that the plot is lacking anything), and that the characters aren’t massively likeable. They’re painted in an affectionate manner though, and the book plays itself out and rounds everything up nicely.

Another holiday read, and one that leant itself well to lazy hot summer days lying on the grass outside the cottage in Sweden.

Some of these stories I loved. More than a few of them left me feeling strangely disappointed. It’s a shame that there were so many unfinished short stories - I would have loved to know where she was going with some of them.
The characters are so clearly realised, and the situations so well described that you feel as though you are there, experiencing everything, but with a greater understanding of the overall situation than the protagonists themselves.