WOMEN ARE THE BEST


1) Ladyhawke - Back of the Van http://www.sendspace.com/file/9yvl5f

2) Duffy - Mercy http://www.sendspace.com/file/xw9wz8

3) September - Cry for You http://www.sendspace.com/file/g346dm

4) Rihanna - Umbrella http://www.sendspace.com/file/k5g8zw

5) Asobi Seksu - Thursday http://www.sendspace.com/file/xdg036

6) Irene Cara - What a Feeling http://www.sendspace.com/file/jcr9hi

7) Carly Simon - Nobody Does it Better http://www.sendspace.com/file/j6qf2c

8) Beyonce - Irreplaceable http://www.sendspace.com/file/rgzjyo

9) Celine Dion - I'm Alive http://www.sendspace.com/file/mpzkng

10) No Doubt - I'm just a Girl http://www.sendspace.com/file/fq37lp

11) Dusty Springfield - Son of a Preacher Man http://www.sendspace.com/file/xmfwum

12) Dido - Thank You http://www.sendspace.com/file/3ttdct

13) Natasha Bedingfield - Unwritten http://www.sendspace.com/file/odqu94

14) The Gossip - Standing in the Way of Control http://www.sendspace.com/file/ieouma

15) Pat Benatar - Shadows of the Night http://www.sendspace.com/file/qqdlsc

16) Madonna - Who's that Girl? http://www.sendspace.com/file/cnvih1

17) Rilo Kiley - Give a Little Love http://www.sendspace.com/file/nc5o98

18) Garbage - When I Grow Up http://www.sendspace.com/file/8fwg86

19) Rilo Kiley - Silver Lining http://www.sendspace.com/file/zs1kik

I decided to add one more "uplifting" song

20) The Corrs - Breathless http://www.sendspace.com/file/kvb6eh

Hopefully my goal of 50 books in a year will be obliged this year... I'm doing pretty well so far.

#1. The Memory Keepers Daughter by Kim Edwards 12/15/07 - 1/03/08
I didn't like this book. I usually HATE female writers because they write WAAAY too emotional and if I want to be emotional I'll rather be watching Oprah, you know what I mean? This book is about this doctor who of course marries a "beautiful" girl who gives birth to a baby who is mentally disabled. As soon as the baby arrives the doctor takes it away and tries to put it in a hospital while telling his young wife the baby died. Of course his lie gets him in the end because his wife eventually finds out years later that the nurse who was in love with said doctor was the one who took care of the daughter all along.

It's a good concept for a book but because it was written with too many flowery words and too "girly" and takes about two pages just to describe the house and the snow and shit like that I just couldn't take it anymore. At least I read til the end which I usually don't do in books that are way too girly and over descriptive and trying too hard to be an "Oprah's Book Club."

I know I'm describing this work in a very simple manner but what's the use for elaborating on a book which made me roll my eyes too many times to care. UGH! No character name is even worth mentioning is this book. Talk about Chick Lit. This takes the cake and that's pretty sad considering I'm a chick.

#2. Book of Unforgettable Travels from the files of Conde Nast Traveler 1/2/08 - 2/28
I was given this book by my friend Dana on my birthday because I love to travel and I'm old enough to know that I need to travel as much as I can before it's too late. I love all the destinations in this book. The one about Iceland interested me so much I want to go there one day. The descriptions about Savannah were wonderful and would love to go there too. One of the things I love about the book was how the travel writers were detailed enough to tell us where to go and what to do in less "touristy" places. Someday it would be so much fun to just go backpacking all over the place with just me, my camera, and some water (but of course I wouldn't mind a nice male traveler that might pass me by and walk along with me).

#3. The Sunflower by Richard Paul Evans 2/28/08 - 3/23/08
Another book about some high maintenance chick who hates getting dirty and the guy who changes her. All right - so the beginning started out well (the beginning meaning the first two pages) and after that it all went down hill because of it's sugary sweet oh so cliche happy ending story. My friend thought I might like this story because I love stories about philanthropy. This is about an orphanage in Peru where a doctor (the guy who changes the high maintenance chic) provides for children who were abandoned by their parents because they just couldn't take care of them anymore. High maintenance chick (who was scorned by a runaway groom) arrives in Peru with a little coaxing from her friend. At first she does not like anything. The poor hotel that isn't exactly the Ritz, the food which isn't exactly a five star restaurant, the weather which isn't exactly Hawaii, but then of course everything changes when high maintenance chick meets doctor, falls in love with doctor, fall in love with kids doctor provides for and la di da. This book had so much potential but I found it too cliche (How many stories like these are in circulation anyway?). It sucks. I love the kids but none of these characters seemed real to me at all and I couldn't stand one more story of high maintenance chick looking at herself and wonders where she's gone wrong and in the end of course, she doesn't think about the Ritz or fixing her hair, she's thinking about doctor and kids. UGH... it's one cliche after another. Good for you high maintenance chick!! You are finally not selfish anymore. How wonderful for you.

#4. The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory 3/23/08 - 4/21/08
Sure it's historically inaccurate and the movie sucked big time but I couldn't put this book down. Now this is one (albeit trashy) chick lit that I truly enjoyed. I loved bitchy Anne who was so manipulative and greedy and smart and jealous. I loved fat Henry and oh so innocent and naive Mary. I love George with his incestuous and homosexual affairs and Anne's last days inside the Tower of London before she got beheaded. It's not my favorite book in the world but I loved it none the less. After reading two books which erased some of my brain cells this one actually gave some of it back.

#5. On Beauty by Zadie Smith 4/21/08 - 5/6/08
This story was OK. Zadie Smith is well known because of her other book White Teeth. A big family saga about two families, one liberal, one conservative, one mixed raced with a black American mother (from the South! with a horrid Southern dialog only someone who is NOT American would think is correct) and a white British father, and the other a British African family. It's mostly set in the East coast in a fictional Ivy league university setting. There are a lot of issues explored. Culture, race, sex, sickness, death but there were also the cliche characters who populate this story. There's the younger son who tries to hide his well to do upbringing (and his half white self) by pretending to act like he's some kid from the ghetto, then there's the daughter who is way too smart for her own good and the ultra conservative professor with a slutty daughter who sleeps with both the liberal father and his religion seeking son, etc... I really like Smith's writing, no part of the book was ever boring. But a British writer who only spent a couple of months (a year?) in America cannot write a whole book about America and its culture. American kids were talking in British slang (being American, the difference in speech was very noticeable). One great example as an Amazon reviewer pointed out, is this, "Who you on the phone to?" (which is completely British) when normal American kids would say "Who you talking to?" Or "Who are you on the phone with?" She also writes about Thanksgiving, our national holiday, which happens on the fourth Thursday of November but of course Smith hardly stayed in the U.S. long enough to know this, because in her book, Thanksgiving as set on a Friday! haha. Smith's version of America is a stereotype. And there were too many British terms for it to be a novel set in "America." When I was reading it, I was pretending it was set in London. It's America set in Smith's London. It's America written by a tourist.

#6. Choke by Chuck Palaniuk 5/6/08 - 5/22/08
Like all Palaniuk novels this one was interesting from the get go. When I read this all I can think about is Edward Norton because main character and sex addict Victor Mancini of Choke sounds eerily like The Narrator/Tyler Durden of Fight Club. Victor likes to make people heroes in various restaurants he goes to. He lets people save his life so therefore they can feel better about themselves and in turn they'll remember him forever and send him checks which he uses to pay for the hospital his mother is in. Palaniuk's writing is as always attention grabbing. It grips you and won't let you go until the very end. You find your self breathing a sigh of relief because you realize that you are better than the people he writes about. They are all the bottom of the barrel yet all of them have some sort of heart where you feel sorry for them and realize that what they're doing makes sense. It's because of this Palaniuk is one of my favorite writers. He is officially cool. If you know someone who don't like books to begin with let them read Palaniuk's works because I can guarantee that they would not stop reading. No matter how crazy his stories are it makes sense somehow. For example, here is Victor's explanation on why he needs people to save him.

Somebody saves your life and they'll love you forever... It's as if you're their child. For the rest of their lives these people would write me. Send me cards in the anniversary... They call you on the phone. To find out if you're feeling okay... or if you maybe need cheering up or cash. You gain power by pretending to be weak. By contrast, you make people feel so strong. You save people by letting them save you. All you have to do is stay fragile and grateful. So stay the underdog. People really need somebody they feel superior to. So stay downtrodden. People need somebody they can send a check at Christmas. So stay poor...

#7. The Gathering Anne Enright 5/22/08 - 6/5/08
Irish lit at its best or worst? I like reading European literature. I've been interested in Irish literature recently because I'm planning to take a trip to Ireland next March, however the story of the Gathering about a large Irish family getting together after the death of the wayward older brother did not really give me anything to hold on to. I loved reading about the time the grandmother and the grandfather eventually met, even when the initial man Veronica (the narrator) imagined her grandmother with wasn't the one she ended up with. I wanted to learn more about Liam (the brother who committed suicide) I wanted to learn more about everyone to make it more memorable. In the end, it just felt like I was done with the book and that was that and nothing left an impression in my brain.

#8. After Dark by Haruki Murakami 6/5/08 - 6/15/08
Haruki Murakami is one of my favorite authors and I always like reading every one of his books, including this one even though nothing much happens. So this is about an ordinary girl Mari who has a beautiful sister who everyone admires. Mari's sister sleeps like Princess Aurora - sleeping all day and all night but no one knows the reason why. Mari on the other hand doesn't sleep much at all and during her late night insomnia she encounters interesting characters from a Chinese "sex slave" to a young musician who had a crush on her model sister. Nothing was really solved. It felt like "a day in a life" of a young Japanese girl with some kind of "supernatural" element thrown in. Murakami is a story teller. No matter how ordinary the story he always makes it extraordinary.

#9 White Horses by Alice Hoffman 6/15/08 - 6/21/08
Even since I've read Here on Earth by Alice Hoffman, she's always been a very reliable author for me. She knows how to make me turn the page even when some of her mystical writing gets in the way. Plus, she really has a way of writing about tall, dark and handsome men, even when these men aren't exactly Prince Charming but rather more "Heathcliff" type characters. This is about a dysfunctional family, about a girl named Teresa who has always believed in a fairytale about a dark handsome stranger who would save her and take her away one day. As she grows up, she starts to believe this "stranger" is her brother Silver who is mean, arrogant, selfish... but Teresa for reasons unknown has always been intrigued by him. There is incest and rape and physical abuse in this story and Alice Hoffman does well with weaving all of these elements together because in the end not all dreams come true and not all fairytales end in happily every afters.

#10 The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri 6/21/08 - 7/14/08
I HATE this book. I was actually surprised I hated it so much because there was a lot of praise about it and I mean Lahiri won the Pulitzer Prize for goodness sakes! This book had no heart. I did not like Gogol or Nikhil as he prefered to be called. I too share something in common with Gogol because my parents are immigrants and as I was growing up they try to instill in me the cultural traditions as well but this book didn't really explore any of that except in the first few chapters. I don't feel anything for the characters and Lahiri does not write how they feel, does not write about who they really are, does not even really write about the most important thing and that is the struggle of Gogol to find himself (and when he did "find" himself it was too little too late). I had to skip through paragraph after paragraph of stereotypical descriptions of a WASP family who live in the east coast and Gogol wondering why his parents couldn't be like the parents of his WASP girlfriend and why they don't eat cheese or drink wine. It's so fucking trite and by the middle of the book I just wanted to throw it away. It is written in present tense and nothing captured me. I asked my co-worker who is Indian and who has read the book and seen the movie about her opinion of Lahiri's tale and she just laughed and started her opinion with two words: It's stupid (she went on for more detail but in short, it is Stupid because she could have done SO MUCH MORE!) How can you write about an important matter of immigration, of culture, of trying to find yourself and in the end, nothing was solved and nothing was learned? I was so disappointed.

#11 - East of Eden by John Steinbeck 7/14/08 - 7/27/08
After reading a lemon, I'm glad I've got to discover East of Eden again. A lot of people are put off by this masterpiece because of the book's thickness. It also takes awhile to get used to the family sagas. This is my favorite book of all time. The last time I read this was almost 4 years ago and I'm happy to have read it again. Caleb and Lee are my favorite characters. They represent so much of us and so much of who we want to be. We all try to be good people but we all have faults. God made us that way. We are selfish and mean and jealous but we strive to be better people. I remember a particular scene where Caleb felt guilty for being so jealous of his good and golden younger brother Aron and wonders why anyone could love him but Abra (Aron's first love)tells him why...

Abra: I think I love you Cal
Cal: I'm not good.
Abra: It's because you're not good.

Steinbeck's writing is beautiful. Now, unlike Lahiri's work where emotion was hard to find, East of Eden has every emotion you could want and nothing of it is trite or weak. Caleb Trask has got to be one of my favorite characters in Literature. He's the very symbol of the everyday man, he is not good but because he realizes he isn't perfect and tries to be better, he is almost too good.

#12. A Spell of Winter by Helen Dunmore 7/27/08 - 8/5/08
Helen Dunmore is a good writer but I just couldn't get my heart and soul in this novel because nothing whatsoever was explained!! The heroine is named Cathy and she and her brother has been kept in a house somewhere in England to fend for themselves with the help of a maid and a rather disturbing nanny. Their mother ran away and their father went to a nut house - why their parents abandoned them and why they were kept in the dark was never explained. Cathy and Rob become close because they only have each other and eventually they begin a secret affair and is found out by her obsessive nanny. Things go on from there but when Cathy eventually leaves the dreary house behind and eventually marry, nothing seemed right at all because again, nothing was solved. I was like, "what? that's it?" The description on the back of the book glorified it as some kind of Gothic horror story but horror story it was not.

#13. We were the Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates 8/5/08 - 9/1/08
I thought The Namesake takes the prize for Worst Book I read so far this year but surprisingly it is this book that takes the cake. The story started out okay. Oates introduces us to a very PERFECT happy family who live in a PERFECT large farm... with PERFECT kids who have CUTE nicknames such as "Button, Baby, Ranger and Pretty Boy" (doesn't it just want to make you eat sugar?) and PERFECT farm animals who have also have oh so SWEET and CUTE names too. OH goody goody gosh!!!! I had to skip parts of this book because you find yourself reading TWO WHOLE PAGES of useless descriptions of farm animals and directions and even the mother's red hair! Seriously, how many times does Oates have to tell us that Corrinne the mother, has red hair and wears glasses? and that Marianne the daughter is so beautiful and popular? well, it seems every other page she has to do this because apparently we're too stupid to figure anything out.

To put it simply this story is about a PERFECT SWEET family whose lives fall apart on Valentine's Day because Marianne, the oh so perfect beautiful daughter nicknamed "Button" (believe me, Oates had to remind me on every third page or so that Marianne's nickname is Button and that she is a cheerleader and very popular because she is so NICE!!) got raped. Michael the Dad, couldn't deal with what happened and eventually Marianne is sent away and eventually because of the rape, the oh so perfect and handsome father becomes a fat alcoholic, Corrinne the mother who has to save everything shuns her daughter away and so on and so forth.

I hated this book. Not one of the characters are worthy of being remembered. In the end, I was just pissed off because the characters were unrealistic, after being shunned for 20 years the daughter was not even a tiny bit ANGRY??, most of the characters were caricatures, and I did not feel sorry for any of them not even Marianne who seems like such a doormat. By the end of the book she was around 30 years old and Oates still writes her as a "virginal" 16 year old who is nice and forgives every one which makes her more pathetic and idiotic.

Anyway to summarize this book even more, I shall put a review here from an Amazon.com reader because I completely agree with the comment and will urge more people to NOT READ THE BOOK even when it is free or you have nothing better to do or if you're stuck with this book because someone super glued it to your hand:

A family of unappealing characters with pitiable interpersonal skills live in a junk-cluttered, animal-fur covered (I couldn't stop thinking how smelly) purple house out in the boonies. Some pathetically stupid high school students make the predictable dumb mistakes, and launch this family into several decades of evil deeds towards each other that display their deplorable morals and illustrate how dysfunctional they were from the very start. (What do you expect from parents that address their children through their pets??)

I didn't believe once in their "gift for happiness": those people were not likeable and certainly not enviable as narrator Judd claims. Oates over-worked that point, and then drags readers through one pathetic turn after another until, in the last 15 pages, everything suddenly, implausibly, becomes sunny and rosy, forgiven and healed. Too late: the reader is so beyond nauseated to as be incapable of sharing in the apparent relief and re-birth the characters ostensibly enjoy at an overdue family reunion.

I hated it. Oates uses silly techniques which makes things worse. For example, the narrator begins his self-righteous and bitter story by taking the reader on a driving tour of his hometown. So trite -- it goes so far as to include the directions! Then it gets worse: I was repeatedly frustrated and infuriated by the excessive use of foreshadowing, fragmented memory and flashback to build up events. Ultimately, the events were never fully brought to light as they end up being obscured by useless tangents that are cluttered with digressions and idiotic descriptions of irrelevant details. Moreover, it was supremely irritating to have to skim 25% of the text to skip over pointless character-developments of pets and the mother's antiques/junk.

I don't recommend this book to anyone. Rather, I DISrecommend it as the worst book I have ever forced myself to read (I had to for a book club). It digs up that gray, bitter, ugly feeling of remembering something or someone bad that you have worked long and hard to forget about or grow out of. Painful, pathetic, useless, just pray it'll fade away.

#14. Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman 9/2/08 - 9/5/08
NOW THIS IS A WONDERFUL BOOK! Finally, after reading the god awful We Were the Mulvaneys, I got to read a book where everything is a page turner and every character made you react to them, even when they are supposed to be the bad guy. This is a very popular and well known book in the U.K. (it's titled Black and White here in the U.S.) The characters live in a world where Crosses (Blacks and other people of color) are the ruling class and the naughts (whites) are the minority. Much of the racism in this book is very reminiscent of the Civil Rights movement in the U.S., the Apartheid history of South Africa, and the IRA rebellions in the UK. The story is about Sephy (a Cross) and Callum (a nought) two best friends who grew up together and eventually fall in love with each other despite belonging to different classes/races. There is so much in this YA book to make you read every single page and never stop until the end because it really pulls you in, it makes you think about everything and some scenes stay with you for a very long time even after you have read the book. There are beautiful and innocent Romeo and Juliet moments, there is action, and there is terrorism. It's a great book. This is the first YA book I've read in a VERY long time and I'm so glad I was able to read such a great work!

#15. Blue Diary by Alice Hoffman 9/5/08 - 9/11/08
It took awhile to get really involved with this book. It's told through many different perspectives but the one I liked reading best was 6th grader Kat's point of you and is told in first person. It's basically about a rape and a murder done by a tall dark and handsome man (whom everyone respects), 15 years before when he was some crazy guy who didn't care about anyone but himself. He changes when he meets and marries Jorie and is glad his awful past is buried but the past comes back to him when his picture is shown on the news and is reported to have murdered a 15 year old girl. I liked this book actually. Hoffman sometimes gets a little descriptive and whimsical with her writing but I can get past that because it's a good story and it's done in a way to make it a page turner as well. It's not the best book I've read so far this year but it's good enough for reading by the pool, the beach, or in your backyard.

#16. Peony in Love by Lisa See 9/12/08 - 9/16/08
When I read a couple pages of this book, my heart sank because it reminded me of "Memoirs of a Geisha" and I absolutely HATED that book because it was inaccurate, it was superficial, and it was idiotic. In the beginning of "Peony in Love" all Peony did was talk about her beauty and how she was going to be married and how she was going to be the perfect wife.. I rolled my eyes... BUT I'm so glad I kept reading because this is a GREAT book and it kept me reading and wanting to know more about Chinese history and culture especially what happens after death. I love the mother best I think. She is made to be the stereotypical Chinese mother in the beginning... cold, regal, proper... but when See delved more into her character I admired her so much. It was very sweet and the ending was beautiful.

#17. In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner 9/16/08 - 9/25/08
It's funny. The reason I read this book started because of my co-workers brother of all people. He said though he's a guy, the movie In Her Shoes was very good. A straight guy recommending a chick flick? How rare is that? So I watched it and liked it and even shed some tears! ah! And I am the kind of girl who rolls her eyes on hackneyed and cliche chick flicks and literature. I really liked the movie so I had to read the book and I'm happy to say the book was even better. The book delved more into the Maggie character - a character we are supposed to hate because she's a thief, she's a slut, she's a mess... Maggie is the beautiful and skinny sister who gets anything she wants just by strutting her beautiful body around town, while Rose the chunkier, smarter sister is the less attractive one, the one with low self esteem but owns a number of expensive and AMAZING shoes and has the money. Maggie is thrown out from Rose's apartment (after she does the unthinkable deed of sleeping with her sister's boyfriend and gets caught!) and after ten months of being apart, both Rose and Maggie grow up, change for the better and realize they need each other. Many things happen in between of course - Rose gets engaged, Maggie "goes" to Princeton, and they realize they have a Grandmother! The book was funny, enjoyable, I still love the EE Cummings poem in the end. It's beautiful!

Medium: General
Subject: Summer
Title: Old School Summer in the Suburbs
Notes: Love the summers in the 'burbs. Some long lasting songs to last throughout the summer days. Most of these songs have a little irony to them especially from the innocence of the covers BUT it is what the suburbs are all about. The innocence on the outside but the dark and funny secrets inside that facade of innocence.



( Songs and Descriptions )

Medium: General
Subject: Summer
Title: Old School Summer in Da Hood
Notes: Some of these songs are more than 10 years old and still great to listen to especially just driving around in the summer time. You don't even have to be in Cali or in NYC to appreciate it. It's rare to have some hip-hop here so I figured here's one for the summertime and if you aren't a hip-hop fan, give it a try. More than anything, it'll make you want to dance.



( Songs and Descriptions )

Have you ever thought about what role you play in some of your friendships? Are you the leader, the follower, the sidekick?


( I think I was born to be the sidekick )

It's amazing what you can do in a course of eight hours while being bored and annoyed at work. During lunch awhile back, my friend Cathy and I discussed some issues about our lives that are strange, sad, depressing, and unique. We decided to one day write about it all and call it "The Vegas Girl's Guide to a somewhat Fucked Up, Wonderful Life" or something like that.

Cathy still has yet to put her interesting stories into words and though my life is pretty normal compared to hers we all have interesting stories to tell don't we?

So here is one about SPORTS dedicated to all you obsessive SPORTS FANS out there like me.

( I tell myself if maybe I didn’t watch, Favre would throw another of his touchdowns )

2006 50 Book Goal List

Brussel Sprouts --- Bad, Bad, Bad
Doritos --- Blah, Good But Blah
Chocolate --- YUMMY
Cotton Candy --- DELICIOUS

1. Shot In The Heart by Mikal Gilmore

--Cotton Candy--

I remembered Mikal Gilmore giving interviews about his brother a long time ago and read a lot of his articles in Rolling Stone. Shot in the Heart is about his childhood and also about his infamous brother named Gary. Gary Gilmore, who had a bad childhood full of abuses and bad boy doings grew up to be a murder and was the first person to be executed (he wanted, almost pleaded to die) after the government decided to bring back the death penalty. It's a very engaging book. Gilmore's memories were very vivid. This is why I enjoy bios and autobios because the author's life becomes your life for awhile and it becomes your world. This book was great. I couldn't stop reading it.

2. The Magician's Nephew by C.S. Lewis

--Chocolate--

The "prequel" of the Choronicles of Narnia series is about Polly and Digory two children who first discover the world of Narnia with all its magic. I don't really need to explain much. It's a great and wonderful story and it has all the imagination a kid could possibly want. It doesn't even compare to Harry Potter.

3. Daughter of Fortune by Isabele Allende

--Chocolate with a hint of cotton candy--

I love this book. It was full of romance of course and I don't really like much mushy stuff because mushy stuff can lead to corny lines and doings and all things corny but man, I was caught up in all of Eliza's tale from Joaquin to Tao-Chen... it was great. I didn't really want it to end. Isn't it nice to just read a good nice book where you aren't bored of reading it all? I recommend it to everyone. A story of a girl who as a baby was left in a basket outside the door of a rich English family living in Chile. She grows up to become a civilized young lady, smart and educated but falls in love with a poor boy who fleds to California and where she too fleds to follow the man she fell in love with only to find another man who becomes the real love of her life. Oh lala. I became a sucker for the romance.

4. Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire

--Doritos with some chocolate--

I loved Wicked because of it originality and its freshness and its imagination. But this second book of Maguire's which is the Cinderella tale told through the ugly stepsister who isn't really that mean at all didn't really interest me as much as Wicked. I shouldn't be comparing but this book was a bit boring. It still has the humor and the imagination yet it just didn't grab me. I did like the relationship between Iris and Caspar.

5. Hotel New Hamshire by John Irving

--Chocolate--

As I mention many times over I'm a fan of John Irving and being a fan of John Irving you get to know his writing style and themes. So of course there's always the free thinking guy with strong women and there are the usual themes of circus animals, love, prostitutes, incest, families, and weird sexual desires. Hotel New Hampshire isn't the best Irving book but he sure knows how to tell a story to make you laugh and interested and totally be into the story. The movie with Jodie Foster and Rob Lowe couldn't compare for some reason even though it was oddly accurate and true to the book. I think it's because the book was just vivid and I loved the story of John and Suzie the bear. I mean there are bears, the opera, and blind men with bears and a brother and sister falling in love and midgets and writers and homosexuality and love and death and a dog named Sorrow which eventually became a stuffed dog which eventually would always follow them. The theme overall is one line... "Keep passing the open windows"... A perfect line to always say whenever there's sorrow following you.

Movie Rambles

Brokeback Mountain
What can I say? I actually really liked this movie. The script stayed true to the little novella with a few extras in between. This movie really got to me. It's a nice story and I think Jake Gyllenhaal did a great job. His Jack was the more open one and I still can't believe Anne "Princess Diaries" Hathaway did this whole topless scene. That surprised me. What next? Kelly Clarkson doing a nude scene in Justin to Kelly 2? heh. But anyways... back to the story. Heath Ledger on the other hand was trying to do something I can't even explain. Was he trying to hide his Aussie accent because in this movie his speech is so garbled up, like he had marbles in his mouth. Then again, I'm so used to this kind of speech because my dad talks like he has marbles in his mouth too. When I was younger I would sometimes laugh whenever he scolds me because I could not understand him.

The movie was well put together though. You can see the pain, the love, the drama, the uneasiness, the two characters were going through. This was especially shown on Ledger's whole character. That whole scene when they first parted ways... it just shows you how much he starts to really feel. While Gyllenhaal's Jack Twist may be the more "emotional" one because he actually put what he thought and felt into words, the whole character of Ennis was totally devoted to the one person he really cared about though he didn't realize how much he did care and love until the end when it was too late. There's this scene in a coffee shop when Ennis finally realizes who he really is and it was just totally painful to watch. It really reminded me of that last scene in "Y Tu Mama Tambien" although it was just played out very differently. The former finally letting himself go and finally living, while the latter running away from it. I'm still thinking about it now... because I keep thinking what if? That's a sign of a great movie right there. When the movie still makes you think about it.

The women of this movie were exellent, especially Michelle Williams. Though I didn't watch Dawson's Creek much (too annoying), I've always like Jen much, MUCH better than Joey. Compared to Holmes, Williams can at least act.

The 40-year old virgin
This movie really surprised me because I usually don't watch movies like this because I don't like movies like this. I'm used to the subtitled, art-house fluff but my sisters started to tell me they couldn't stand to watch weird, subtitled movies anymore so I rented this and I'm so glad I did because I liked it a lot. It was enjoyable and it really did have this innocence to it. I loved the part where Andy takes his girlfriend's daughter to this pre-natal clinic and he's playing around with the vagina model wondering where the penis should go and eventually breaking the damn thing. Little subtle lines all over the movie just make me laugh. It was the most fun I had watching a movie. No wonder everyone was praising it.

--->One of the infamous quotes:
Cal: You're *gay* now?
David: No, I'm not gay I'm just celibate.
Cal: I think? I mean, that sounds ga- I just want you to know this is like the first conversation of like three conversations that leads to you being gay. Like... there's this and then in a year it's like, "Oh you know, I kinda wanna, ya know, get back out there but I think I like guys" and then there's the big, "Oh I'm I'm a g-gay guy now".
David: You're gay for saying that.
Cal: I'm gay for saying that?
David: You know how I know you're gay?
Cal: How? How do you know I'm gay?
David: Because you macramed yourself a pair of jean shorts.
Cal: You know how I know *you're* gay? You just told me you're not sleeping with women any more.
David: You know how I know that you're gay?
Cal: How? Cuz you're gay? and you can tell who other gay people are.
David: You know how I know you're gay?
Cal: How?
David: You like Coldplay.

Three More Books until the next year...

Shoot... I'm a bit short on my *50* books per year list but what can I say. I liked the list I had a year before. For some reason I enjoyed a lot of those books.

36. Kaffir Boy by Mark Mathabane **1/2
I should like this because it is heartbreaking as hell and it is a true account of South Africa's aparthied system told through the eyes of Johannes (who later goes by Mark), a black South African living in the ghetto, having police raides every night, and trying not to get caught in the system the whites had passed down upon the Natives so that they would forever be lower than dirt. The work "Kaffir" is a derrogotary word to describe blacks in South Africa. A reminiscent of that "n" word we all know so well. Mark's telling of his story is inspiring but for some reason, I had a hard time actually having feelings for the book. For some reason it was just there, like it is what it is and he overcame it. I'm glad Mark overcame it. I'm glad he had the determination to escape the hell his country offered him from the very beginning and I'm glad his life is better. It was just that I didn't enjoy reading it. Does that sound a bit superficial? I feel guilty for not liking the book because it is about a country I desperately want to visit because of its history but what can I say? It was a good autobiography but other than that, it is one of those books that I would not remember.

37. Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro ***1/2
What's up with all the 1/2 stars? Thanks to youkosiren from fucking_read who suggested this book to me. I loved it and just like "The Remains of the Day" it is very subtle in its storytelling and it is depressing and shocking. However if I do say something about it, I would give it away. In the beginning, the story seemed so full of life along with all its adolescent problems. But little by little, the story starts to get deeper and deeper on what life is really about. What society is really about. And can we really do this? Is this ethical? Is this evil? Is this right? Kathy never really questions it until the end when all she really does is to accept her fate because she had learned long ago that she has no soul anyway. Reading the life she lead and all her passions though it just makes it depressing to know that this girl and all the others really can really LIVE, but because of fate it just wasn't meant to be.

38. Jarhead by Anthony Swafford **
It was OK. As was the movie. The trailers made it cool. Military stories are nothing new. There were funny, horrible, shocking moments in the book but otherwise it seemed just blah. In the end, a book that should give you the author's opinion of the first Bush, the war, the Middle East, Saddam, etc... gave me nothing at all. I just didn't feel it.

FRENCH MOVIES ARE COOL

- The Dreamers -
I don't know if this movie actually made it in theaters here in Vegas last year because of its strong sexual content and NC-17 rating. The Dreamers is/was Bernardo Bertolucci's most recent movie. The story is set in 1968 where this young American goes to Paris and studies there for a semester where he encounters the student riots there (wasn't like 90% of the world in riots anyway?). So, while watching movies, he takes an interest in these two twins, a brother and a sister and eventually he makes friends with them and even stays with them in their grand apartment while their parents are away. So... here the story starts. Two boys and a girl talk about politics, act out memorable movie monologues, argue about who's a better actor... Buster Keaton or Charlie Chaplin? (in my opinion, I'd pick Buster Keaton) and of course have sex with each other. The sex between the brother and the sister is only hinted but they do walk around naked and sleep on each other's bed naked so who knows? I heard that before Bertolucci decided to cast Michael Pitt as the American, he picked Jake Gyllenhaal but he didn't want to do it because of all the strong sexual content. I can clearly understand why this movie is NC-17. No way could this be an R. Anyway, I didn't like this movie very much. I did enjoy the beautiful cinematography, Eva Green and Louis Garrel are beautiful French babes but the movie didn't interest me at all. It was easily forgotten in my short attention span memory. Movies should retain in your minds at least. I did like the history lesson about what was happening in France during our own riots and Civil Rights movements but what else was there? I didn't care for the self-discoveries or the discussions of movies or politics... it felt contrieved. As for Bertulucci, I should have just watched The Last Tango in Paris.

- The Chorus -
Heh! I remembered when the main song for this movie was nominated for Best Song at the Oscars and Beyonce did her best to sing in French with a bunch of choir boys. If the actual chior boys did sing it, it would have given a more meaningful effect. But what can you do? The Oscars wanted ratings.

This movie was the biggest hit at the box office in France last year and I can see why. It's funny, it's dramatic and it has cute little kids who can sing. I think of it as a French Dead Poet Society. It's even set in the past (in the 40's to be exact). Or maybe a French version of Mr. Holand's Opus? It's a simple story really. Out of work teacher/wanna be composer gets a job as a prefect for a wayward boys school. His kids are trouble makers and some teachers can't handle them at all but of course he can because he has their wit and he treats them as equals. To keep their interest going as well as writing a masterpiece for himself he writes a composition for his students and they accept him well enough. He finds a miracle in a boy named Morhange, who is described as someone with a face of an angel but has the heart of a devil. The boy can sing like a beautiful angel as well and it's wonderful to hear. The movie is inspiring although it is cliche. But what can you do with a teacher/student story anyway? I love the music. Call me a sucker but I love listening to children singing.

- Ma Vie en Rose -
This has become one of my FAVORITE movies. It's original and funny and memorable and dare I say it? Cute but with a lot of heart. This is the story of a boy named Ludovic who thinks he's a girl. He's seven and all he wants to do is dress up like a princess. For awhile his parents play along with it because they think it's just a phase but when he takes an interest in Jerome who happens to be his father's boss's son (who in the beginning does take a liking to Ludovic also) things begin to fall apart. Ludovic even tells his grandma that when he grows up to be a girl he wants to marry Jerome. Heh. What I liked about this movie was that it really plays with the innocence of children. When Ludovic was asked by a psychiatrist for example why he thinks he's a girl, Ludovic has a simple explanation. Before he was born God had thrown an XY chromosome at his house but because the Y chromosome fell in the garbage, he was born with just an X. Therefore, though he's a boy, he's also a girl. A "girlboy" as Ludovic calls himself. Heh. This is all played out in childlike fantasy too. In Ludovic's eyes everything is pink while in his parents eyes all they think about is what other people see. That their son will grow up to be gay, how they are humiliated in their neighborhood, how they are looked down upon because of their weird son. I've got to say, one of the most heartbreaking things about this movie is about how Ludovic's parents can't cope with Ludoc's behavior even blaming him for what has happened to the way their life was going downhill. The scene in the ending where the mother confronts Ludovic almost made me cry. <-- I'm a dork that way. Only because I think that this is a child who knows who he is and despite being in an open minded society what would really happen when all eyes are on you and society is there to judge you and your family? I loved this movie. I think everyone should watch it. Ludovic is played by Georges Du Fresne who is just very natural. What he does, what he believes himself to be, everything to him seems so easy. Like wanting to be a girl is just a natural thing, why do others, like his parents, try to make it so difficult?

More Book to add on to the list

33. Wicked by Gregory Maguire****
I truly loved this book. I mean what can go wrong with a book that's still on the best seller list, that has a broadway musical inspired by it, and is all about the life and times of Elphaba; otherwise known to Dorothy and friends as the Wicked Witch of the West? I liked the fact Maguire made Elphaba human unlike the evil way she was portrayed in the movie. Elphaba is funny, smart, passionate, stubborn, and definitely stands up for what is right and what is wrong like protecting "Animal" rights which the Wizard wants to get rid of. She seems to be the only one with her head on straight even when in the beginning many people were scared and weary of her because of her green skin. Her preacher father even brought her along to many of his missions to show would be believers that even a "green girl" can still be good. She was even friends with Galinda who was to become "Glinda the Good Witch". I loved the funny lines, the characters, the situations. I mean, you know a book is good when an old lady starts saying lines like: "You always had an eye for the fellow with a decent helping of sausage and hard-boiled eggs." I have to say that WICKED is one of the best books I've read so far this year. It's truly wonderful and I had such a great time reading it.

34. Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx***
Woohoo... The little short story that could. Hah. Realizing that Mr. Ang Lee's little movie about two gay cowboys who love each other is about to be released in theaters, I just had to read Proulx original story. And yes, it's a short story but what a story it is. It is told simply really, two young men meet in a ranch in Montana and then just one day... they began to love each other. It's a love story sure but it's a lot more than that. I was expecting something more but what more can you write about? I especially loved the ending... which is shown a little bit in the previews for the movie.

35. Dance, Dance, Dance by Haruki Murakami***
I've said it before, I truly do like Murakami alot because he likes writing these normal situations like eating donuts and reading a newspaper and watching tv in his stories but for some odd reason it just never gets boring. This book is the sequel to "The Wild Sheep Chase" which became one of my favorite books this year. And yes, it does connect to everything eventually. Still, as most sequels go, I liked the first book better and I do think it could have gone without this little book. But I bet the "Sheep Man" fans wanted this book and it started getting stranger and stranger as it finally wrapped up the little twists. I do have one complaint about this book though but it's a little thing really. One of the caracters in the book was this Filipino prostitute whom Murakami wrote as someone who speaks very broken English. The thing is though, Filipinos don't speak in broken English, bad grammar maybe but NOT broken English how can they, when other than Tagalog, English is practically the national language as well and you learn it from Kindergarten on. Anyways, that was my one gripe. But then again, maybe it was due to the translations.

Hah! I actually finished a book in two days! Then again, it's a YA novel so I don't think that's hardly worth celebrating about. Still, it's from one of my favorite YA horror writers so, it's worth it I think.

32. Witch by Christopher Pike**
I've been a fan of Christopher Pike's since I was in Jr. High. When R.L. Stein's "Goosebumps" books were popular and everyone collected them, I was surprised how boring it was and how much a better writer Christopher Pike is compared to his fellow YA writer. I didn't understand it. How can R.L. Stein be known to so many people while Pike isn't? Well, a lot has to do with Pike's reclusiveness. Not that he's a hermit in any way, but I have never seen a picture of this guy and there aren't many things about him around the net at all. I mean "Christopher Pike" is just his pen name which was taken from the original Star Treck series. Hell, for all we know, it's probably Stephen King writing these horror novels for Young Adults everywhere and just wanted to use an alter ego (Mr. Pike isn't Mr. King of course but he could be. His real name is Kevin McFadden but what else do we know about him?).

So anyway, while everyone was collecting "Goosbump" books, much like Harry Potter and A Series of Unfortunate Events now, I was collecting Christopher Pike because I felt he can understand teenagers much better than Stein. I hate it for example when Stein does first person perspective and then the characters describe themselves while looking in the mirror. For one thing, people don't describe themselves when they look in the mirror and they certainly don't describe themselves while they're writing in their diary. Pike knows this at least and he knows that teenagers are more intuned to sex, to music, to various other things. In other words, he knows what's going on unlike JK Rowling and others who try to write teenagers but DON'T know what's going on.

That's all I have to say.

Now about Witch.

I didn't like this story as much as I liked his other stories. This was published in the early 1990's so obviously, it's a little outdated but it did keep me interested. It's sort of like that show "Charmed." Witch is about this girl named Julia who is a witch with healing powers as well as a seer who can see the future. Her mother was also a healer who died trying to save a girl who got severly injured in a motorcyle accident. This girl eventually dies and since her mother tried to save her causing the girl's injuries to transfer into her mother's body, the mom dies also. This incident as far as Julia knew didn't connect to anything but once she sees the future in a pond where a boy was dying in her arms she decides to take matters into her own hands. Turns out the girl is connected to her somehow but I shall not go into details. It was an entertaining story but from other Pike books I've read before, it's only mediocre. I recommend reading "Fall into Darkness" instead along with "Scavenger Hunt" which really freaked me out when I read it the first time oh so long ago.

31. Empire Falls by Richard Russo****
I really enjoyed this book. For all its craziness about the people of small town Empire Falls, Maine; it reminds me a lot of the themes in various John Irving books, but whereas Irving would go to the more weird stuff that has to do with sex and other things... Russo is a little more on the subdued believable side. I love books like these. The type where you care for the characters and want to know what they are all about. It's just a simple story about one small town but I remembered when ads were being shown for the HBO movie and it said something about how Small towns always have a story to tell which in this case is very true. But I think that's true for all small towns because small towns are always the ones who are spewing out the serial killers and movie stars you know? This is a wonderful book. It won the Pulitzer Prize! You can't go wrong with that.

MORE BOOK OPINIONS!!

It only took me exactly FIVE months (how odd is that?) to read another 15 books but hell, I'm getting there. I have only 20 to go with my goal of mine but with the rate I'm going I don't think I'm going to make it at all. Oh well, but at least I like the majority of the books I've read so far. So there.

And Now here it is... as always... the ratings go like this:
**** AWESOME!! , *** COOL , ** EH , * PUKE MY GUTS OUT

16. Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown ***
This was a good book and I can see why everyone talks about it because of all its theories about Leonardo (DiCaprio) Da Vinci however, I do like Dan Brown's other book better. I was a bit bored with the Da Vinci Code because it wasn't as intense as his previous book. While to me the other book was a page turner, this one made me want to just finish it so I could start with my next book. Which tells you something about it. I guess, if you read this first you would like it more than Angels and Demons, since I read Angels and Demons first I like that one better.

17. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez****
Now this is what you call an "epic". A story of a village named Mocondo and a guy who started it all named... Buendia. From the look of the cover, from even the title, I had the impression that the story would be one long depressing story of a family dying. Well, part of that is true but what I loved about it was that it was very whimsical. It reminded me so much of "Zorba The Greek." Whimsical because Marquez made the unbelievable, the magical, the outrageous, so believable and so easy. I loved it all the more and not many writers can write fantasy and magic and get away with it you know. This book made me laugh, made me smile, although confused sometimes because as each generation is born, all of them have similar names which would leave me to go, "Didn't this guy die already?" and then I realize that this Buendia was the son of Buendia. Geez.

18. Here on Earth by Alice Hoffman****
As soon as I read the first pages of this book I was instantly addicted to it. I couldn't help it. It is after all, reminicent of one of my favorite books, 'Wuthering Heights'. So as usual, there is a "Catherine" this time named March and a "Heathcliff" named Hollis. Even a little Cathy and a Hareton too named Gwen and Hank. Heh. It's what I call, an updated version of the book without all the confusing Old English symbolism stuff people tend to hate. So yes, to me Here on Earth felt like something that was to me a guilty pleasure much like all the V.C. Andrews books I read in Jr. High especially the Dollanganger series. I was very much in love with it and I began to hate it because it got me so interested and I didn't want to finish it because I didn't want to end. I did like Heathcliff much better than Hollis though because although both of them are the antisocial, sociopath, Othello, type characters... at least Heathcliff was a character who stood out. I don't know how to explain it but I'm definitely in the Heathcliff fanclub and not Hollis. <--- I'm a dork.

19. The World According to Garp by John Irving****
I don't know what it is with John Irving books but it always captures me. It's always weird and strange but it's always heartwarming too. So really this is a story of TS Garp and his mother Jenny and because I saw the movie first, I would always picture about these two characters as Robin Williams and Glen Close. Which is rather sad in a way because I don't like Robin Williams very much. But anyway... Like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, John Irving too is one of those writers who can write something so whimsical and unbelievable but making it believable. I think this is THE best book in his writing career so far and the ideas from this book are present in his other books. I loved this story. I loved Garp and how innocent all these characters are. From Jenny's opinions of sex, to former football player Robert turning into Roberta, to Garp's writing... to everything else. It's so complex and so full of life. I loved it very much.

20. Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Cohelo***
This is the story of Veronika of course. It's also a story about suicide told in a very straight forward manner. Although Veronika has family and friends and is beautiful she feels her life isn't very important because she feels like she can't do anything to change the world. Why live if you can't do anything that doesn't make an impact? So she decides to commit suicide but fails ending up in a mental hospital with other people who really don't belong there. Eventually Veronika who was told her life was soon to end, begins to befriend people at the hospital who eventually inspire her to live again, to not waste something so precious as life. Paulo Cohelo even puts himself in the story stating that he too was committed into a mental hospital by his parents because they didn't accept his decision of wanting to be an artist. In Brazil back in the day, being a writer was not an accepted profession so they committed him to straighten him out. I would like to say that I did like this book but it isn't my favorite.

21. Peace Like A River by Leif Enger NO STARS
Honest to god, this is the WORST book I've ever read in my entire life, worse than Violin, worse than Belinda, WORSE than Perks of Being a Wallflower. I could not stand it. I could not even finish it. This is what I mean when some writers can't write fantasy fiction because it just turns out to be overly stupid and this is the worse case of it. A family tracking down a brother who is supposedly a murderer? A sister who has an IQ equivalent to Einstein as the writer makes it seem and who is only nine years old and has the vocabulary of a 40 year old writer and can also write western poetry, a father who has "magic powers" and can walk on air just like Jesus! and Ruben, the brother who is sickly but manages to write his memoirs like someone who wasn't listening in English class when the teacher told him about how writing flowery words along with the over use of the thesaurus isn't a very good idea. Ugh. How can anyone possibly read this book and not throw up? It's written so old school that I thought I was reading something that happened in the 1860's and not the 1960's. It's like what the fuck is this?

-Here is part of a review from Amazon: The reviewer took the words (and the examples) right out of my mouth.

Here's another example of what I mean. Teenage boy, on the run from law enforcement, decides to break into locked store. But first, he pauses in an alley to feed "fruitcake to a choleric hound." Now, I don't know what a dog with cholera looks like, but evidently Enger does. Probably, he just meant sick, or scrawny, or mangy, but these wouldn't have sounded literary enough. Likewise hound. No mere dog, this, nor yet a mutt. And I would be willing to bet Enger tried out "choleric cur" and "choleric canine" first, but decided they were a bit too rich, even given his penchant for overwriting.

No matter, the boy gets into the store but is detected by the owner, who is upstairs taking a bath. Owner comes down naked, with a bat, and goes for boy. You would think, wouldn't you, that even a seventh-grader could depict this scene in bold, stirring prose? Well, maybe a seventh-grader should have taken the contract; here's the Enger treatment. "Straight toward Davy he pranced, picking up speed, while Davy went leaping away toward the window. Had the man not opted for a late soak my brother's career might've ended on the spot, but wet feet and wood floors make jeopardous allies, and the storekeeper went down in a sensational and profane tangle as Davy's shoulders were clearing the sill."

Precious, isn't it? "Jeopardous" is especially good. Enger likes that one quite well, but not as well as his pet, "ropy." My personal favorite is "grue," as in "a tale of grue," which is supposed to mean a gruesome tale, I guess. But I'm feeling a bit ropy myself now, and so must quit. But do yourself a favor, and prance clear of this tale of irk.

And believe me... EVERY PAGE IS LIKE THE EXAMPLE GIVEN ABOVE. How can anyone read that much crap in so many pages all at once?

22. Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro**
Talk about a total diffent book from the previous and what a much better writer Ishiguro is compared to the ass wipe Enger. Heh. But anyway, so this is about a butler named Stevens and his life of service in Darlington Hall. I shall not go into it but Ishiguro really knows how to portray and write about an old English butler before, after, and around the time of WWll. It's not a page turner, but it was certainly a good read. I especially loved Stevens' interactions with Miss Kenton. It's like a budding romance but so very subtle. It's like flirting old school style. Um. Very old school style.

23. Chocolat by Joanne Harris**
Ah, more whimsical books! So, yeah... unfortunately Johnny Depp wasn't in the book to keep me a lot more interested but still it was OK I guess. A witch and her daughter who makes an otherwise depressing little town come to life again. I liked it but yeah, it didn't really "lift me up" or anything. Nor was it a page turner as I hoped it was nor was it as "magical" as I thought it was. I enjoy books that make me smile. Reading Irving books do that for me and others books which seem to be written so easily and so perfect that it makes me want to just write myself. Harris's book is "OK" that's all. I liked Roux though. Or maybe because I just keep picturing him as Johnny Depp.

24. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut**
The great book about a regular joe, no, a regular pilgrim... named Billy Pilgrim who time travels because he was abducted by aliens. For some reason, this time around I've been reading alot of fantasy/whimsical fiction. What's that about? So everyone has probably read this already, it's been hailed as one of the best books in history. It's a good book but hell, I don't really like books like these, I don't usually read books like these so it didn't really get my blood boiling. Vonnegut though is awesome. Here's another great writer who doesn't need a thesaurus to write a GREAT novel. Leif Enger, please take notes (I still can't get over the fact that I actually managed to stomach most of Peace Like A River before I wanted to stop and throw up).

25. Mr. Timothy by Louis Baynard**
I've wanted to read this book for so long because I've always wondered what it would be like if classics had a sequel. I mean if there was a sequel to Wuthering Heights about Cathy and Hereton, you bet I would read it. Mr. Timothy is the sort of sequel to "A Christmas Carol" without Charles Dickens happy happy ending. Tiny Tim isn't so innocent anymore, he isn't the same boy anymore who would say "merry Christmas everyone." Tim is 23 in this novel, his parents died and his brothers and sisters have drifted apart but Mr. Scrooge, nicknamed "Uncle N" is still there in his life and worries about his well being. But Tim, who still has a bad leg but is finally without his crutches doesn't want to rely on his Uncle so he gets a job at a whorehouse/brothel (heh, I wonder what would Dickens think about that?) as a tutor. He plays dective along with a little boy named Colin (who is a very Dickens like character) to a murder investigation which involves young girls who are raped and murdered. It's a dreary take on the seemingly happy yet hard life of Timothy Cratchit. It's depressing and dark but I loved the language because it really feels like I'm reading another Dickens novel. It didn't really move me as I thought it would but I'm glad I finally had a chance to read it.

26. The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides***
I enjoyed this book a lot. Reminds of Bret Easton Ellis but written in a much better fashion. Five sisters who are so full of life if given the chance but because of their paranoid parents especially their over powering mother who does not want them to go out, interact or do anything "fun"- decide to commit suicide one fateful night after their youngest sister commited suicide a year before. It's very well written and amusing narrated by an unnamed narrator who was a former neighbor. Just by description alone I would think it's just your run of the mill teen story but it isn't. Eugenides is a genius. A story that's less than 300 pages but like I said, so well written that it makes it amazing and it's done so simply too. That's what I liked about it the most.

27. The Wild Sheep Chase by Haruki Murakami****
This book was awesome. I read it so fast because I couldn't stop reading it. It's basically about this guy from an advertising company who recieves a letter one day about a certain sheep in one of photos he used in his ad. An odd sheep that had a star on its skin. This said sheep is supposed to be special, going inside people's bodies to make them do things (hmm... again, weird fantasy stuff but manages to be believable). So because this guy is made to look for this sheep because otherwise he was going to get killed or something equivalent to being killed he and his girlfriend, who has great ears (don't ask) look for this sheep all over Hokkaido. Hence the title "The Wild Sheep Chase". It's a weird premise and it's an even weirder book but damn, Murakami is one good writer who always manages to keep me reading no matter how rediculous the story becomes. I love it.

28. Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling***
(As written in my other LJ)
I admit, I was quiet surprised by it because Rowling’s writing doesn’t really excite me and sometimes it takes me so long to get into the story. It’s seems like it’s just there because you have to read it because you already read the other 5. Like with The Order of Phoenix it still seems like she’s writing them younger than they supposedly are. I mean, half of these characters are sixteen and it still seems like I’m reading about eleven year olds. But at least it started getting interesting in chapter seven or something and not chapter forty. And, “Won, Won?” I won’t even go there. It seems so unbelievable.

29. The Human Stain by Philip Roth***
So this is a story about Coleman Silk who is black. He was raised in a respectable black family, with an optomotrist father and a mother who was one of the first Head Nurses in New Jersey who happened to be black. The Silks however, as Coleman came to find out, were much more accepted in their NJ neighborhood because they were light skinned. Coleman especially was light with soft curly hair and green eyes. Because of this, Coleman, after dropping out of Howard University and eventually joining the military as a white man (because he learned he can "pass" and because of other reasons...) began to live his life as a Jewish man and eventually living a life of lies until the day he died. Coleman Silk would like to think that he would have kept this secret from ever coming out if only he wasn't accused of being called a racist at the university he was teaching at. He was so surprised with this racist accusation because he was the least likely person to be accused of that. Philip Roth is an acclaimed writer and I can definitely see why. This story is so well written that I find myself thinking about Coleman Silk and his life while I'm about to sleep and how if he did it this way and that maybe his life could be different. Then I realize I'm thinking about a fictional character in a book. But see, that's how good books are supposed to be. It makes you think about it even when you're not reading about it.

30. Note From My Travels by Angelina Jolie***
Well you know, I have to read this since I still have this celebrity crush on Angelina Jolie because she is just so damn hot and a she's a humanitarian too. This book is about her UNHCR work in Asia and Africa along with South America. The book is very easy to understand. Written in diary format about the daily lives of refugees from around the world. How desperate their situations are, their lives, the dangers in their countries. I have to admire all the volunteers, the staff of the UNHCR and other organizations who risk their own lives to save the lives of others. It truly inspires me and make me think about how we are so lucky in this country to be where we are. All the proceeds from this book goes to the UNHCR. I hope everyone who reads this book will be inspired as well and volunteer.

Book Reviews!!

Well as I had done last year, my goal to read 50 books a year is still active. As of right now... I've read more than 15 books. However, here is a short and simple review of the first 15 books I've read so far this year.

**** AWESOME!! , *** COOL , ** EH , * PUKE MY GUTS OUT

1: Women In Love by DH Lawrence ***
-DH Lawrence has a real knack for writing about fashion and clothing of the early 20th century. This book is basically about two sisters who fall in love with two friends who love each other greatly in a platonic sort of way. Who can forget the whole naked wrestling scene between the two men? Lawrence really can describe such things with a kind of eroticism that's actually tasteful. Is there such a thing? Anyway, it's a great book and to me anyway, it was a page turner. For some reason Women in Love reminded me of the Y Tu Mama Tambien. But that's just me.

2: Cry, The Beloved Country by Alan Paton ***
-A story about South Africa. A story about the injustice of apartheid. A Story about a father and his son. A beautiful and important story that should be read by everyone. It's a little sad that Paton never got a chance to see his country be a democracy but he will always be known to me and to many as one of the best writers and humanitarians out there. Who truly believed that his country can come out of its evils and become a nation of equality.

3: White Noise by Don DeLillo *
-I did NOT like this book at all. I hate books like these where the author is trying to be cynical about modern day society and trying to be clever with it. White Noise is a social commentary about society. The title is perfect. White noise, distractions you see and hear everywhere you go, wherever you are. I have to admit there were some funny lines but I just wanted to finish it as quickly as possible because it wasted my time. In the end, instead of finding it witty, I just rolled my eyes.

4: Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis **
-I usually like BEE's writing but this first novel is just OK for me. As usual, the characters are full of 20 somethings that are doing everyone and anyone and snorting and shooting anything and everything at any time. I found it amusing and a bit sad and pathetic in some parts. I completely understand a lot of the things that are troubling the kids in the book because I've seen it with my own eyes with a lot of my fellow classmates. However it was just too much. I liked his second novel, Rules of Attraction much better.

5: A Summer To Die by Lois Lowry **
-I love reading children/YA books. The nostalgia of it all takes me back. My favorites that I still read even now would be the Fudge series by Judy Blume, there's Jerry Spinelli who's always, always good. I mean Maniac Magee and Star Girl? Heh. Awesome. Of course, there's Beverly Cleary and the master of all children/YA books, Roald Dahl. This book was recommended to me by shigure actually, when we went to the used books area of the LV library. Anyway... as you can see from the title, it's about a death. However, I just found it too contrieved. Honestly... some of the events just seemed too easy and obvious. There were no twists and turns, nothing. I think I would have felt the same way if I read it in 6th grade. It lacked feeling and heart that the authors that I mentioned above have in a lot of their works. Especially, Dahl's. In the end I didn't care but it still made me nostalgic and made me think a lot of my childhood home in WI.

6: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton **
-Not bad. Not that great either. I did learn a bit about the society of NY in the 20's. Because I saw the movie first, I kept picturing Michelle Pfeiffer and Winona Ryder as Wharton described the characters even though in the book, the descriptions of May and Ellen are totally the opposite of both Ryder and Pfeiffer. Oh well. In the end, I guess I would recommend it but not enthusiastically.

7: Billy Dead by Lisa Reardon ****
-One of my favorite books I've read so far this year. I think I've raved about it already in one entry of my personal LJ so I won't bother repeating it. It's just very out there. A brother who comes home because his oldest brother has been murdered. But by whom? Everyone in town hated the older brother because he was rough, abusive and an absolute trash. So everyone is a suspect really. However because of the murder, family history of love and loss resurfaces and everything just becomes a page turner. OH lala... I love it.

8: Shampoo Planet by Douglas Coupland *
- I like Douglas Coupland. I really, really do. However, (to be cliche) this book is a snooze feast. It's similar to "White Noise" with its critic on society's "excess" and how we as a society will try any new trend, any new piece of machinery, and new drug that can/will make us slim, pretty, or happy. But whatever. The more authors try to make fun of the "Uselessness" of society the more I roll my eyes because I for one don't buy the hype. I mean what next? A novel about ipods, the disgusting publicity hog Paris Hilton, and the is she/isn't she anorexic Lindsey Lohan? No thank you.

9: On the Road by Jack Karouac **
-I think everyone knows what this story is about. Dude takes a road trip to many different places, meets all kinds of chracters and writes about his experiences. However, after reading all the praise and finally reading it, I didn't find it very interesting at all. I was like OK. So what? That's it? What now? Nothing? Ok then.

10: The Enlish Patient by Michael Ondaatje ***
-Beautiful book and beautifully written. I loved the whole Kip and Hana story. I'm a sucker for those things. It's similar to the way I felt about Cathy and Hareton from Wuthering Heights. Which was why I kept reading the ending of WH over and over again when I was obsessed with the book. Really, I'm a dork.

11: Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt ****
-Bio's always make such interesting reading. In fact, from the 45 books I read last year, three were biographies and those three were definately one of the best books I've ever read. And Frank McCourt's memories of his early childhood in NY and then eventually moving and growing up in Limerick, Ireland was something I truly enjoyed reading. The movie which I saw after reading this book did not have the heart the book had. Although McCourt grew up very poor, with an alcholic father who eventually abandoned the family, and a mother who tried her best, it was written and told very honestly and to the point without an ounce of self-pity, with such heart, nostalgia and care that even the nastiest of characters didn't seem all that nasty. I don't really know how to explain it but it was clear to me that though McCourt certainly had a miserable childhood you know he would never ever trade those experiences and those times with his family for a much better one if he was given the chance.

12: Violin by Anne Rice No stars
- See previous post down there... So over the top and totally contrived and boring and so full of flowery words that I didn't even want to finish it. The ONLY book I've read that never finished. ECH... ECH... ECH... I guess it's even worse than the Puke rating.

13: Catch 22 by Joseph Heller ***
-The classic World War 2 book and a favorite of most everyone. Now this is the way a "critique" of society and what's going on in the world should be written. The contradictions, the humor and all those classic catch 22 situations. It's unforgettable.

14: Memoirs of a Geisha bu Arthur Golden *
-It's not the worst book I've ever read but still, I did not like it at all. I did not care at all for the main character. I found her to be totally materialistic and incompetent and totally narrow minded. I wanted to choke her. The minor characters I found more enjoyable to read about... Pumpkin (as she grew up to be crass and blunt I totally enjoyed every page she was in), Nobu (great character who wasted his time on stupid main character) and even the "bitch" Hatsumomo (there's usually always that bitch role in a book right?)... at least she had life in her even when her evil deeds made her have that stereotypical bitch role. All the talk of Kimonos and various makeup and the whole "Chairman this" and "Chairman that" and everything just made me roll my eyes. I just wanted to say, Just STFU already. It made me think of Miaka crying out for Tamahome every 2 seconds. No... make that every second. I couldn't stand the main character. It did not feel any "heart" in her at all.

15: Spiral by Koji Suzuki ***
-The sequel to Suzuki's novel called Ringu. The American movie versions of his previous book and this one has been totally taken apart and ruined... which is weird because it was based on the Japanese versions based off the the original Ring and its sequel Spiral. Still, the Japanese movies are closer to the book. I guess that's how movies are watered down to whenever its a different version of something else. Anyway, Suzuki has been called the Japanese Stephen King and I can clearly see why. It's a very intruiging book and Suzuki, can describe scenes so brilliantly that it stays in your mind forever. For awhile there, Sadako and her ability to "create" was floating around in my dreams and that creeped my out a little bit.

Scrubs

I love Scrubs. I used to watch it sporatically sometimes but this year I've been trying to watch it every week. It's a little hard now that I've been working but thank goodness next week I'm going to be at my regular schedule which means I can catch it. It's so funny and totally random. I loved how everything they say automatically pops up no matter what. Just like "Arrested Developement" but Arrested Developement is a little more kinky and odd especially with the whole incest theme that they try to hide but not really hide. The characters work so well together. I love The Janitor, The Todd... the whole supporting cast is just awesome. I wished NBC would advertise it more. They really have no idea how great a show it really is. It's soooo much better than Friends which I found so god awfully pretentious that I just can't watch it. It's not even funny. Why oh Why did people like it so much? I just don't understand. But Scrubs is another story. It's smart without really trying to be... I think The Office is trying to do that but I don't think it's working for them. The thing is, I think The Office is trying to hard and therefore I don't think it's that funny but Scrubs isn't trying at all. It's just naturally funny. I don't really know how to explain it but that's how it is. It's just there to entertain and therefore I'm entertained. I loved the little small lessons at the end and the music! I love the music for this show. It's amazing. Guided By Voices, Joshua Radin, Cary Brothers... Ahh... I can go on.

Violin By: Anne Rice


I first have to say that ever since I started reading books frequently, one after another, I've never once stopped in the middle and just completely chuck it out of my sight forever. Even for books that I absolutely hated in the end like Cold Mountain and White Noise. But for Anne Rice's Violin... it took me to that point. I just couldn't read the damn thing up to the end.

A lot of it has to do with the writing style. I like Anne Rice. One of my favorite books of hers, is The Feast of All Saints but the two recent Rice books that I've read, Belinda and Violin were just terrible. But Belinda is a masterpice compared to Violin. The writing tries too hard with all its dreamy descriptions. I think Rice was trying to be one with the flowery words of poetry and such but in the end it doesn't work. I found myself skipping pages, rolling my eyes, and sighing because it's so full of empty SHIT. So much dripple I couldn't stand it. And I wanted to finish this book. I wanted to finish it so much because I did not want to read a book that I can't finish. I needed to finish it. And Alas, I just couldn't. It was all too much. Too much shit, too much of everything. I just didn't care about the characters anymore and I especially didn't care about the narrator Triana, who goes on and on descriping shit after shit with words that are trying to be "beautiful" but comes out empty. It's supposed to be emotional, it's supposed to be somekind of love story but I just can't connect to it. After 150 pages... I just wanted to throw it somewhere where I can't find it anymore.

How can this book be so damn boring? So damn trite? So damn empty and full of words that are all full of shit? I thought Belinda was Rice's worst book but Violin now takes its place. I was also reading the comments of this book at Amazon.com and almost every single review is a negative one. I'm SO HAPPY that I'm not the only one that thinks Violin is a book that's perfect for kindling.

My First Entry... I wished Greymatter worked but since we swiched hosts it's been "deactivated" and I have no idea how to do it over again. There's something wrong with the configuration I think, but it's ok. My old "Review" blog has been turned into this "new" blog and now I'm all set and ready to go with the reviews of many, many, things... of course, I not so much as review them as I go into tangents and "yaddi yaddi yaddas" if that makes any sense.

Paul Newman is the star of this layout... well not really a layout but more of a "background" than anything else. He was such a handsome man back then, espcially in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" WOW. He's still a pretty handsome older man now but back then... wow. No one can compare. At least in my opinion. Sure, there's Jude Law, Ryan Phillippe, Ewan McGregor, Jesse L. Martin (wow), Takeshi Kaneshiro (double wow), and Gary Dourdan (Damn, Warrick puts all the CSI guys to shame) but Paul Newman. He's beautiful. Anyway... I should stop.