Author Archives: mel

Day 6 – Book you’ve read the most number of times

This had to be a book from childhood, for me to remember reading it over and over again.

I wonder a little if children will have less of these types of ‘favourite books’ in the future, with e-publishing bringing down the cost of books and so much free stuff on the internet, TV channels coming out of your ears and games / apps to distract you as well. There so much more choice now to spend your free time, I wonder if reading in childhood will suffer a little from it. Will kids still hold on to a dog-eared copy of their favourite book, that they saved up their birthday money to buy and (because books aren’t cheap) that they read over and over, to get their money’s worth?

We’ll see.

Anyway, this is exactly what my book is. Matilda by Roald Dahl. The first few times I read it, I borrowed it from the library. Thankfully, my family isn’t anything like hers, but I did like the idea, as a young girl that I wasn’t unlike Matilda – I liked reading and libraries, I wasn’t so great at telekinesis, but I could dream, couldn’t I? Sometimes I would sit and read it in the library, whilst I waited for my Mum and sister to pick their books – life imitating art, eh?

When my birthday came and a lovely book token with it, I bought my very own copy. I still have it now and it’s quite tidy and not too dog-eared to say how many times I read it. It still has the ‘This Book Belongs to….’ sticker in the front, that I used to put in all my special books – just in case my little sister thought about sneaking off with them 😉

Day 12 – A book you wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t

Day 13 – A book that disappointed me

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After my first year at uni, I spent the summer temping as a copy typist at a local authority (obviously honing my future typing skills!) It was quite a ‘traditional’ working environment, with a fixed one hour lunch break, and I don’t know about you, but it takes me about five minutes to eat a sandwich, so I had plenty of time to fill in (unless it’s a footlong from Subway, but who can eat a whole one of those?)

Anyway, it was around this time I decided that, as a ‘student of literature’, I should actually make an effort and read as many of the ‘classics’ as I could – it would certainly help! Things went well during my lunch breaks as I went through 1984 and Brave New World (one of them makes my favourite classics list and probably explains my original love of dystopian lit). I took a detour through gothic lit then, with Dracula and Frankenstein – unabridged, naturally; before finally hitting The Catcher in the Rye.

It was a more modern book, set in America, with a teenage character – how could I not enjoy it?

Hmmm.

Well.

I just didn’t.

I think it was mainly because Holden got on my nerves. The writing style was interesting and engaging, but I just didn’t like Holden. He had a bit too much of the preppy, self-centred cynicism going on, and when you’re catching up with someone on your lunch break – yeah, you don’t want to spend time with that guy. Even Winston in 1984 hadn’t depressed me to the degree that Holden did. Maybe I didn’t care because he didn’t care? Maybe I should try reading it again and see if I like it better a second time. Maybe I’ll wait until I’ve read everything else I might want to read, before going there again. (Maybe I’m more like Holden than I care to admit.)

Ten Things on “The Catch in the Rye”

I liked:

– the point of view telling of the story works well and has a ‘feel’ of the teen angst that a lot of new YA has
– the snapshot of life from another point of view

…In true slacker style, I’m not quite in the mood for finishing this now, perhaps I’ll come back to it another time.

Day 18 – A book you wish you could live in

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After a few days off, I’m back on the 30-day challenge wagon again! This was one of the easiest posts to answer in the challenge…

You know it, I know it – pretty much every Muggle in the world knows it, that’s why JK Rowling sold so many books – the magical world of Harry Potter is one of the best book places that anyone could want to live in.

I missed the first few years of hype around Potter and ‘kidult’ fiction (as it was being called at uni, which is where I was at the time that it started gathering pace). Then came the films…it irritated me that LotR and Potter were being geared up for a big Christmas film showdown in the media – to me the stories weren’t comparable, from what I understood of HP – and I thought it was stupid to make the comparisons between them. There was also a part of me that wondered if Potter wasn’t a bit of a rip off of one of my childhood faves: The Worst Witch – magic boarding school, broomsticks and pets – all sounded familiar…

So – what changed? Well, with my super exciting social life *cough* I found myself at my parents house one evening and Dad was just settling down to watch The Chamber of Secrets. He’d already read several of the books and was a big fan of the first film for ‘bringing the magic and wonder of Harry’s world to life’. I sat down and watched, and – as you do – fell for the series…ghosts in the bathroom, giant snakes and magic books that suck you inside them, and the wonder of all the well-developed ‘magic’ lessons – it was so much more than I had expected (sorry Worst Witch!)

After that, I read all the books, watched the films and waited like every other fan for the next instalment (JK had only gotten to book 4 at that stage) – admittedly, I never queued up at midnight dressed in a cloak – but I did pre-order and devour the books as soon as I got one in my hands. I remember walking everywhere with The Deathly Hallows: eating my breakfast with one hand, in the bath, it went with me everywhere for the 48 hours I read it in – then I had to start all over again, because I’d read it so fast, I felt like I hadn’t gotten all of the details.

The detail of the world is – I think – one of the biggest reasons it is so appealing: from transport to money, sweets to clothes, every aspect of Harry’s life once he discovers who he is, is like a fantastic version of our own reality. Having seen one of the films first, I didn’t have to worry about the debate of book Vs film, I think it’s easier to accept that way around sometimes – as the books add to what you liked in the films, rather than detracting from them. My issue came once I’d read the books: I wasn’t a fan of films 3 and 4 originally (The Prisoner of Azkaban is still my favourite book in the series and it was a big let down on first watching, there is so much detail in the relationships – and the Marauder’s Map – it was just too quick in the film, and it felt like they could have let it go a while longer, with more scenes without much trouble), but I’ve learned to go with them now. Films 5 and 6, I prefer to the books in some ways, as I felt there was a lot dragging in the books and wow, was Harry grumpy in The Order of the Phoenix! I was actually worried for how things would go in the final book – but I thought it was the perfect finish 🙂

Anyway, so that’s me – along with many people I imagine – who choose Hogwarts and Harry’s world to live in. Whenever we ask this question on the blog in interviews, this answer comes up the most. I think many adults who choose this are really choosing to go back as a child: we want to go to Hogwarts, do the magic lessons and be just like Harry, Hermione and Ron. Don’t get me wrong, I like Mr Weasley well enough, but I don’t imagine working at the Ministry is much less mundane (after a while) than any other job 🙂

What’s the closest I’ve come to escaping my Muggle life? Well, I’ve seen the Hogwarts Express in York, and in Kings Cross Station I’ve ‘pushed’ my trolley through the wall in platform 9 and 3/4 – I have the photographic evidence to prove it! In Florida, I loved looking out the bedroom window each morning and seeing the towers of Hogwarts in the distance – yes I know it wasn’t real, and Wet and Wild slides blocked some of the view – but with the suspension of disbelief… If you ever go there, look at the young children who see the broomsticks ‘floating’ in the wand shop, or laugh from their hearts when Ron makes it snow inside the classroom in the castle – they believe in that world and all the fantastic things that happen there, who wouldn’t want that to be real?

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How about you? What book world would you want to live in – fancy joining me at Hogwarts? 😉

Day 3 – The Longest Book

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For Day 3 of the challenge, I thought I’d actually try the day 3 post – must be feeling conventional today 🙂

I was a little stumped on this one as I’ve not necessarily read lots of l-o-n-g books. Some certainly felt very long (you’ll see more on that when I post on Ulysses) and others are more complicated to read and so feel longer than they might actually be.

To help me with this post, I headed over to Amazon to check out the ‘official’ page lengths of some of the books that immediately sprang to mind as being my longest reads.

The first book I though of was Fingerprints of the Gods by Graham Hancock – mainly because I remember it being very ‘weighty’ every time I pulled it out from the bedside table to delve into another chapter (it is not the type of book you read in a single sitting). It also hurts a lot if you knock it off the bookshelf and it gets your toes – even in the paperback version I have!

The Blurb “Fingerprints of the Gods is the revolutionary rewrite of history that has persuaded millions of readers throughout the world to change their preconceptions about the history behind modern society. An intellectual detective story, this unique history book directs probing questions at orthodox history, presenting disturbing new evidence that historians have tried – but failed – to explain.

This groundbreaking evidence includes:Accurate ancient maps that show the world as it last looked during the Ice Age, thousands of years before any civilisation capable of making such maps is supposed to have existed; evidence of the devastating scientific and astronomical information encoded into prehistoric myths; the incredible feat of the construction of the great pyramids of Egypt and of megalithic temples on the Giza plateau; the mysterious astronomical alignments of the pyramids and the Great Sphinx; the antediluvian geology of the Sphinx; the megalithic temples of the Andes; the myths of Viracocha and Quetzalcoatl….”

This was an interesting, albeit quite intense, semi-non-fiction book (depending on if you agree with the evidence of the historical re-write and the connections made). I found it really interesting as research for creating my own fictional mythologies for a book series I’ve been dabbling with for several years – The Elementals – it gave me lots of ideas about how real myths and evidence can be turned to show a whole range of different possible explanations and world histories. Possibly not what the author intended, but that’s certainly how it was for me. But after all that, it only comes in at a measly 794 pages (according to Amazon).

There were a number of long books I tackled at uni, particularly on literary theory and criticism – one of the ones I enjoyed the most was the core text which introduced a range of approaches and schools of criticism: from Freud to Marx, Bakhtin to the masculine ‘gaze’ of cinema – there was a lot to get through in them. But, a cursory look at Amazon tells me that they hit a mere 587 pages – not as long as it seemed at the time!

To win this challenge, it had to be the heavy-weight of English literature… So, I just toddled off to the bookcase to check and, oh yes, at 2552 pages, the Complete Works of Shakespeare, by the RSC, with additional essays on each play MUST be the longest book I’ve ever read. Admittedly, it’s a single book, gathering together a number of smaller works, but I’m hoping for the sake of the challenge that it counts. Unsurprisingly, I didn’t read it in a weekend! I read several of the plays and essays at uni for the unavoidable Shakespeare module – the ever-popular Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth and Twelth Night all making the cut, as well as some of the less popular ones, which I actually found I enjoyed more: Titus Andronicus (any revenge story you read after this pales is comparison to the awful retributions that are thrown around in this play); Troilus and Cressida, and Coriolanus.

A few years ago I began reading the plays I hadn’t already covered, in the interest of being thorough as much as anything else – I read the rest of the history plays we hadn’t already covered: the ‘Richards’ were my favourites, esp. Richard II, if you like your kings to be drama queens 😉 I also did the sonnets, which I’d only ever read the ‘popular’ ones before.

So, although it took me around eight years to get through the entire book, I did manage it – and at 2552 pages has to ‘count’ as my longest book.

Day 16 – A Thought-Provoking Book

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A Thousand Splendid Suns was the second book I read by Khaled Hosseini – the first being the best selling Kiterunner.

Despite only having written a few books Hosseini is one of my absolute favourite authors: he writes so beautifully and realistically that you are transported completely to the places he takes you to, no matter how alien. He also delivers unflinchingly real characters, no matter if they are good or evil, beautiful or vile, they will make you feel.

Synopsis: “A Thousand Splendid Suns is a breathtaking story set against the volatile events of Afghanistan’s last thirty years—from the Soviet invasion to the reign of the Taliban to the post-Taliban rebuilding—that puts the violence, fear, hope, and faith of this country in intimate, human terms. It is a tale of two generations of characters brought jarringly together by the tragic sweep of war, where personal lives—the struggle to survive, raise a family, find happiness—are inextricable from the history playing out around them.

Propelled by the same storytelling instinct that made The Kite Runner a beloved classic, A Thousand Splendid Suns is at once a remarkable chronicle of three decades of Afghan history and a deeply moving account of family and friendship. It is a striking, heart-wrenching novel of an unforgiving time, an unlikely friendship, and an indestructible love—a stunning accomplishment.”

I found this a thought-provoking book on two counts: the setting in Afghanistan, over a number of years and ever-changing environment; and the female characters at the centre of the story.

Like many people, my knowledge of Afghanistan’s history is limited to what I’ve seen on TV over the past decade and odd elements prior to that with with Soviet invasion and British before that. This book brings the world to life – just as The Kiterunner did – the people that live there, how they live, what is different to my life and sometimes surprisingly, what is the same. A world that you think you know, is brought to life, more completely and realistically through the characters you meet.

Where The Kiterunner is a story about one man’s life and (mainly) the men around him – Splendid Suns is about a female experience: a young girl growing up in a family with academic parents (both of them), and how that changes as the country moves from one regime to another. I was struck over and over again by this book at the depth and variety female relationships can take – the hardships they can endure and how they find strength to protect the very dearest things they possess. The ‘wives’ story at the centre of the narrative is heart-breaking, and the bond they share through their similar experiences is something that I would never have imagined, but also found completely believable. There is a ‘love story’ entwined through the other narratives of the book – but the indestructible love of the blurb is that of family, motherhood and sisterhood, rather than romantic. The honesty of feeling throughout the story, both good and bad, is so clear that I believe few would read this book and not find it thought-provoking. It challenges you – possibly as a ‘western’ reader, to review what you believe about the place you see on the TV – and it certainly sent me out to read more about the history and environment of the book I had enjoyed so much.

Day 28 – Your Favourite Quote from a Book

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Anonymous

When I said I was going to try the 30-day challenge – I should have pointed out that I’m giving it a go(ish) – rather than delivering the full 30 posts.

Because I’m not really up for a ‘Woman Vs Books’ challenge of epic proportions, I’ve picked my favourite days and topics from Becky’s list, and will post them over the next few weeks. Of course, in line with my logical thinking, I’ll not be doing them in any kind of order, I just picked the ones I liked best 🙂

So, let’s get started, with the first post – Day 28 ‘Your Favourite Quote from a Book’

“It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live.” Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, JK Rowling.

Made it onto my list off the top of my head, then I trundled off to have a quick flick through the quotes I’ve marked on Goodreads in the past. I found that most of my favourite quotes aren’t from fiction books – and the person whose words I love the most come from Albert Einstein:

“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not sure about the universe.”
“Logic will get you from A to Z; imagination will get you everywhere.”
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.”

I loved that for someone with such a scientific mind, he understood the importance of art and imagination – science and logic alone will only get you so far – the leaps forward are in the creative minds that bend the rules. I have the ‘reality’ quote on a picture above my ‘ready/writey’ chair.

I think this is my favourite one for love/relationships – so simple, but such an honest feeling:
“If you live to be a hundred, I want to live to be a hundred minus one day so I never have to live without you.” ― A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

There are a number of other ones by AA Milne that touch on similar themes – love and loss, without being cheesy – perhaps it’s because Piglet and Pooh had such an open simple relationship, that this makes sense to me…? I love honey too 🙂

How about you – what are your favourite quotes?

The 30 Day Book Challenge

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Back in August 2013, one of my favourite book bloggers did this challenge, and I popped in every day to check out her posts. (Becky blogs at Blogs-of-a-Bookaholic – http://beckysblogs.wordpress.com/ ) For me, I’d spent most of Spring and Summer 2013 trying to avoid reading – because if I don’t, I struggle to write as much and over a year on from when I wanted to release RMT I had to focus on that.

Now that The Rainbow Maker’s Tale is finally out there, and I’m well on my way with Outlanders, I thought I could give myself a bit of a writing break and do some reading again. (It’s not really cheating if I’m writing about reading, is it?) Anyway, I’ve collected a whole bunch of books for my TBR list, which need to be started and that I really want to read 🙂 so be prepared for a bunch of reviews as I get through them, and if you’re interested – come back and check out how I do with my book challenge.

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The aim of the 30 Day Book Challenge is to to try and post everyday for 30 days. On each of these days you answer one of the book related questions below. And that’s it! It’s really that simple! Why not try it for yourself?

DAY 1. – A book series you wish had gone on longer OR a book series you wish would just end already.
DAY 2. – Favorite side character.
DAY 3. – The longest book you’ve read.
DAY 4. – Book turned into a movie and completely desecrated.
DAY 5. – Your “comfort” book.
DAY 6. – Book you’ve read the most number of times.
DAY 7. – A guilty pleasure book.
DAY 8. – Most underrated book.
DAY 9. – Most overrated book.
DAY 10. – A book you thought you wouldn’t like but ended up loving.
DAY 11. – Favorite classic book.
DAY 12. – A book you wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t.
DAY 13. – A book that disappointed you.
DAY 14. – Book that made you cry.
DAY 15. – A character who you can relate to the most.
DAY 16. – Most thought-provoking book.
DAY 17. – Author I wish people would read more.
DAY 18. – A book you wish you could live in.
DAY 19. – A favourite author.
DAY 20. – Favorite childhood book.
DAY 21. – Book you tell people you’ve read, but haven’t (or haven’t
actually finished).
DAY 22. – Least favourite plot device employed by way too many books you actually
enjoyed otherwise.
DAY 23. – Best book you’ve read in the last 12 months.
DAY 24. – Book you’re most embarrassed to say you like/liked.
DAY 25. – The most surprising plot twist or ending.
DAY 26. – Book that makes you laugh out loud.
DAY 27. – Book that has been on your “to read” list the longest.
DAY 28. – Favorite quote from a book.
DAY 29. – A book you hated.
DAY 30. – Book you couldn’t put down.

Mel Cusick-Jones

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