authors
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The best way out is always through.
— Robert Frost
Ok, I need to catch up my Harry Potter franchise consumption. I do like the books, for a variety of reasons. (1) Well written. (2) Fun. (3) Provide a cultural touchstone with essentially every child on earth and 75% of college students and some crotchety old people. (4) I like fantasy novels, always will; they are the trashy romance of my book lists. I’ve been feeling nostalgic lately, and reading those books takes me back to high school summers, when I am 98% sure I did not actually have any cares in the world. Seriously. No cares. Anyhow, I think I am caught up on the books (am I? I may not have read the latest slime green one … and I say that with respect to Mary GrandPre), but I do need to see at least two of the movies.
I was one of the three people in the United States who had not yet read the book The Da Vinci Code, and so as a part of my mission to not suck at life this Christmas break, I decided to read it. Also, the remaining two people who have not yet read the book are probably under enormous peer pressure to just read it and get it other with … my apologies to you both. That said, the reading has only lasted an intense couple of days. I casually opened up the book to read a few chapters, and suddenly it was somewhere after 3am, and I was 250 pages in. My mind was certainly thirsty for some novel’age after the textbooks I have been buried in, but the book also happens to take a deathly tight grip on your mind, compelling you to turn page after page and pound through to the conclusion. My expectations were high, yet vague: I avoided even reading the book jacket description so that my experience would be as the author intended; unbiased, greenhorned, vaguely interested. This tactic paid off. Case in point: after hearing the ending to Million Dollar Baby, I still haven’t watched it. Not so with this book … oooh no. I had absolutely effin’ no idea what to expect upon cracking the cover, and was thrilled to be sucked in to a web of thrillingly thrillingsten thrillful plots … the way vacuums suck up dirt or the souls of the authors of bad analogies. Whew, I really can’t write tonight.
C.S. Lewis, the author of the Chronicles of Narnia, never wanted his books turned into movies. Who can blame him? Was the cinematic technology really present any time other than now to bring his world to life? (I don’t know the answer to that, but the rhetorical question sounded cool, and asking questions sure is easier than answering them). Anyhow. Having read the Chronicles of Narnia twice, once as a rather young lad, the descriptive word “beloved” certainly rings true to my ears. Let me back up a few paces and describe to you how I ended up seeing the movie The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.
Author: Madeleine L’Engle - I loved A Wrinkle in Time - maybe I’ll read one of her adult books sometime.
In honor of his recently released book, A Man Without a Country, I thought I would point out a couple of Kurt Vonnegut-type-things today. First, I can not write nearly well enough to do his tremendous writing justice. So, below I will reproduce one of my favorite short stories by him in full. This is likely not legal. However, while I breach copyright in this way, I will point you to buy one of his books or this book, also by him or visit his website. Hopefully that will save me from the/some lawyers.