It's Been A While

So I've been hanging out on Goodreads, posting most of my reviews there...in case anyone was actually reading this, lol.  Come find me...

Joyland by Stephen King

Today's shout out is to my local winter vacationing homeboy, Stephen King, who winters in Casey Key, FL a few miles away from my humble abode.  Everyone in my family assumes that I am a huge Stephen King fan.  In reality, I'm someone who has read a few of his books and ended up disliking more than I enjoyed.  The few books I did really like, however, I would incessantly talk about leading my family to assume that I am a die hard horror fiction fan.  Not so, my friends, not so.

Flashback, 7th grade, the movie Misery is released.  The novel comes out in paperback and when grocery shopping with my Dad, he lets me get a copy.  I devour the book before I see the movie.  This starts my obsession with reading books that become movies.  Anyway, that Christmas, my family now has the perfect gift ideas for me and I get a stack of Stephen King books.  By far, the books of his that I have loved so are The Stand, Eyes of the Dragon, The Green Mile, Four Past Midnight, On Writing and Misery.  There were a few I gave up on...Dreamcatcher, The Dark Tower Series, Gerald's Game, Dolores Claiborne and even more that I wished I had given up on.

The biggest problem I have with finding joy in reading King is that he tends to be a little too verbose on stuff that has nothing to do with the plot.  He rambles, he gets sidetracked...it drives me crazy.  His plots are genius but it's like he sometimes needs a little ADHD medication to get him focused back on the topic at hand.  His wife and son also write and I really enjoyed reading their work.  His wife has a wonderful way with a nice even pace in her novels but the material is not my style, a little too 50 Shades before 50 Shades was popular.  His son, writing under the pseudonym Joe Hill,  has the best of his parents.  He has his mother's way with words and his father's creative muse.  Heart Shaped Box was good, I recommend it and may someday get around to writing a review for it.  Interestingly enough, Joe Hill is usually located right next to Stephen King in the Horror section of the bookstore.  I find this funny for some reason.

Speaking of rambling, I digress...Joyland was good.  It's not his typical type of novel and to my delight was released in soft cover by Hard Case Crime publishers.  I was a hard sell on eBooks but my frugalness won over my love for the feel of paper book in my hands.  This is why I was so happy that I could justify forking over $12.95 for a new release.  Kudos, Mr. King, for recognizing your fans financial statuses.

This story was unlike any other that I read of his.  The closest he's come is The Green Mile and even then they're both so unique in content that it's hard to remember the same author wrote both.  In a way, it's reminiscent of James Patterson who can cover pretty much every genre with the greatest of ease.

The story is told by Devin Jones, recanting a tale of his youth where he took a summer job at an amusement park with a dark, myseterious secret and a spooky haunted house.  Not once does he ramble or get off track in the condense 283 pages.  To be honest, I almost forgot I was reading a King book until every now and again he'd sneak in a really unneeded vulgarity or euphemism for some kind of sexual innuendo.  (Not that I'm a prude, but it really didn't fit in the story.)

In the end, I would really classify this as a whodoneit type mystery and I'd definitely give it a thumbs up.  It's a quick summer read for curling up on the patio during an afternoon shower.  Once you're done, Constant Reader, tell me what you thought...

Until we meet again...

Moloka'i by Alan Brennert

So in my last post I mentioned that I was reading a version of the 'never ending story.'  I finally finished it, thank goodness!

Here's the back story of how I happened upon this book.  My former nursing instructor and I have been sharing books since I was in school.  She loaned this to me after reading it while she was on vacation.  I had seen the book at the bookstore but never picked it up.  Like I said, I'm a sucker for covers and this one just didn't talk to me.  The blurb on the back of the book didn't really catch my attention either but since it was on loan I figured I'd do my best.  A month or so later and I'm finally done with it.

The story was about a young Hawaiian girl, Rachel, who in the early 20th century was diagnosed with Hansen's Disease (a.k.a. Leprosy) and was sent to a quarantine establishment on the island of Moloka'i.  The novel follows Rachel as she grows up and deals with loss, love and leprosy...

It wasn't a bad book it just droned on for what seemed like forever.  The story was interesting enough and I really liked the main character but I felt myself aging with each page I read.  I do have to give the author a great deal of credit for creating a likeable main character who is able to keep the same foundational personality characteristics as she ages in the book. 

What really drove me a little pupule (crazy) was that the author kept throwing in random Hawaiian words in the story as if you were learning a new language.  Don't get me wrong, learning something new is the whole point of reading but if I wanted to learn a new language, I'd pick up a copy of the Rosetta Stone.  I'm the type of reader that process information quickly but if you throw in an italicized word that looks weird, my brain has to stop and sniff it, poke it a little and lick it before it will be processed.  This is why it took me over a month to finish a book that I normally would have within a few days.

My former instructor has told me she's finished Honolulu, another novel by Alan Brennert.  I might take a pass on it for now...

On Mystic Lake by Kristin Hannah

Okay, Imaginary Reader(s), sorry I haven't updated in awhile.  My book reading has come to a near halt due to 'real life' changes.

I work as a nurse and up until recently worked two part time jobs, one during the day and one overnight.  I'm transitioning to a full time day position and just can't quite find the time to finish the books I'm reading.  I'm ready to be done with it though.  Have you ever read one of those books and thought to yourself, "Just get on with it, already, will you?!?"  Yeah, you can imagine how that review is going to be...

Well, speaking of lukewarm reviews, that's what you're in store for today.

I had read Kristin Hannah's Firefly Lane some time ago and couldn't quite honestly remember if I liked it or not.  (Now you see my dilemma and need for a book review/journal?)  So I picked up On Mystic Lake with no real expectations, especially since I am not a huge "romance" novel fan.  Well....maybe a little romance but not the ones that have to describe every sexual encounter in such detail as you have to wonder how many times they brought out their thesaurus to describe the character's reproductive parts...

Anyway, this book was one of those that just seemed like it would never end.  I never really warmed up to any of the main characters, except for the college bound teenager and six year old, both of whom really have not a lot of page time in the book.

The story revolves around Annie, a super busy "household and family lifestyle manager".  Her character spends a good amount of time justifying being a housewife/stay at home Mom that doesn't have time for her husband.  The husband, Blake, is kind of a scummy lawyer, who decides that he would rather make a new life with some hussy at the law firm and dumps Annie on the day their teenage daughter leaves to go abroad in a foreign exchange student program.  Annie runs away to see her father in her small backwoods/mountain-y hometown and to scrape her life back together.  She ends up romancing her high school "sort of" boyfriend, Nick, who married her high school best friend who since died.  Mix it up with Nick's six year old daughter, who is so traumatized by her Mother's death and father's spiral into depression, that she does not speak...until Annie arrives, that is.

The book was well written but honestly was chock full of clichés and stereotypes that felt like it should have been written in the 60's.  In my opinion, the author was trying to go all Nicholas Sparks but ended up like Nicholas Sparks on a bad day mixed with a little Jacqueline Susann.  THEN, to add insult to injury, the ending sucked majorly.  I usually try to avoid the topic of endings but this was such a non-ending that I felt like it was my civic duty to warn you.

There was ONE good thing about the novel (besides the fact that it ended).  The author referenced an old Alan Alda & Ellen Burstyn movie called Same Time, Next Year.  Having never watched (or heard of in that matter) the movie, I was intrigued in the plot.  One night I stumbled upon it on Video On Demand and curled up for the night.  By the end of the movie, I had completely forgiven Kristin Hannah for beating me up with her stereotypes in On Mystic Lake and introducing me to this movie which incidentally, is making it's way onto my top 10 movie list.

Here's the blurb...

 

As a note, I find it ironic that while Kristin Hannah used so many clichés and stereotypes that she referenced this movie which kind of breaks the mold on romantic comedies by making you fall in love with the two main characters who are in a long term adulterous relationship.

 

So back to the book...my two cents, read the book if you're bored and have nothing else to read.  Watch the movie if you're a closet "think outside the box" sappy romantic.

 

 

The Silver Linings Playbook by Matthew Quick

 

*Warning*  I highly suggest watching the movie before reading my review....

I really enjoy reading books that have been made into movies.  I enjoy seeing if the movie matches what I imagined in my head while reading the book.

Needless to say I am one of those people who overuses the statement, "You HAVE to read the book.  The book was sooooooooo much better than the movie."  Most of the time what I watch on screen is no where near what I read on paper.  (With the obvious exception of all of the Harry Potter movies where EVERYTHING was exactly how I pictured it.)

Anyway, this was one of the few examples that I actually enjoyed the movie more than the book.  (Forrest Gump is the only other one I can think of right now...)

Don't get me wrong, the book wasn't bad at all.  I just liked the movie so much more.  I'll try to explain why...

First, the one thing that really ticked me off with both the book and the movie was that they ruined two other books that were on my never ending to read list.  So fair warning, if you've never read Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, plan on reading them first if you don't want the endings ruined.  Oh, also, Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar and J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye too...(I already read those, so they weren't ruined.)

The main character in the book, Pat, is reading these books to better understand his wife, Nikki, a High School English teacher.  In the movie, after reading A Farewell to Arms, he throws the book through a window because he was upset with the ending.  After reading so many spoilers about other novels, I wanted to throw The Silver Linings Playbook through the window...but it was too small of a book and only ended up scaring the cats instead of breaking glass.

There are some ironies between the movie and the book.  In the book, Pat becomes disenchanted with some of the books he's reading because they lack happy endings.  He feels that movies are more optimistic and that teenagers should be reading more positive pieces of literature.  I find this funny because in my opinion the movie had a much better ending than the book.  I also find it funny that in the movie Pat and his family live in Philly but in the book they live in South Jersey...

So besides the fact that I liked the movie more than the book, I have to admit both really struck a nerve.  The book/movie starts off with Pat in a mental health institution.  He gets out, he takes pills.  At first he's a little crazy but then he evens out.  I get this, I really do.  It hit home and scared me.  I've been in institutions, I take pills.  I get crazy and for the most part, I'm evened out.  The reason it scared me is that it made me realize all the crap that everyone in Pat's life does to tiptoe around him in case he had an "episode".  How many people did or do that with me?

On a side note, speaking of mental illness, I find it interesting to know that many mood stabilizers often double as antiepileptics to prevent or treat seizures.  If you tell someone you have epilepsy you don't get the same reaction as you do when you tell them you're Bipolar.  It pisses me off that being Bipolar has a negative connotation to it....anyway, back to the book.

I like Pat, I can identify with him.  I liked Tiffany more in the movie than in the book and can completely understand why Jennifer Lawrence got an award.  Veronica is still a bitch in both the movie and the book.  In the movie there is a definitive shift from the beginning when Pat is starting to take his meds to the end where he seems to have stabilized and is reaching for his silver lining.  It seems in the book that Pat never really reaches his silver lining but the book doesn't rule it out entirely.

Lastly, Pat's father in the book and Pat's father in the movie are really two entirely different characters.  Both have characteristics that help explain some of Pat's behavior but I tend to like Robert DeNiro in the movie more than the jerk in the book.  It's hard to explain but I felt more sympathy for his father in the movie than I did for the character in the book.

So to sum it up, I couldn't put the book down and seriously didn't get up until I finished it.  It's really one of those books that is so well written that you can zoom right through it taking it all in and forgetting about the real world. Like I said earlier, it's not that it's a bad book it's just that the movie is so good that it overshadows the book.

Read it, watch it...love it.  I did.

Check out the author's website for more!  http://matthewquickwriter.com/

Elsewhere by Gabrielle Zevin

I love this book.

I've always been a fan of the Young Adult genre but that stems mostly from being born in the late 70's and growing up with Sweet Valley Twins, Christopher Pike and R.L. Stine.  With that being said, kids now-a-days have Twilight, The Hunger Games and Harry Potter.  Now you know why I'm still reading Young Adult books...

When Borders was still open, their Young Adult section was by far one of the largest in the big chain bookstores.  Everything about their product placement was visually appealing which is one of the main reasons I loved to shop there.  Bonus points to them for making the Young Adult section blend in with the rest of the store so I didn't have to hide my face to not feel like a old creepy person.  Nothing says "Creeper" than a 30 something girl wandering around a bunch of teenagers. 

Well, on one of my many thousands of trips through Borders I stumbled upon this book.  Being the judge of books based upon their covers, this one caught my eye.  So I bought it...and proceeded to read it in one sitting.

The story is about a young girl, Liz, who dies and experiences the afterlife which isn't quite Heaven but is Elsewhere.  I don't want to explain anymore because the author does such a great job laying it all out for you in the course of the story.  To go into any more detail would steal that experience away from you.

There are two types of books that I read.  The ones where at the end I think, "I could have written that wayyyyyy better" and the ones where I think, "Where in the hell did they come up with such an amazing plot?"  This was the latter.  This is my go to "happy" book when I've just wasted any amount of time reading some crappy book that makes me wonder why I continue to read books.  I've bought so many copies of this book because I keep loaning them to people to share the experience with them...needless to say, I've never gotten one copy back. 

Reading this book reminds me of a line in a movie, Garden State.  When Sam first meets Large she's listening to a CD and says, "You gotta hear this one song.  It'll change your life, I swear."

Read this book.  It'll change your life.  I swear...and please feel free to leave comments.  I'd really love to hear someone else's thoughts on this book!

Check out the author's webiste for more!  http://www.gabriellezevin.com/

The Night Strangers by Chris Bohjalian

I stumbled upon this book at a random walk through of Barnes & Noble.  Okay, I have to admit something that I've never admitted to anyone before...

I completely judge books by their covers.

Yeah, yeah, I said it.  Now judge me...

Anyway, the material that the cover is made out of is some fancy paper that makes you want to keep touching it.  I'm such a sucker for any type of expensive paper upgrade.  Although I love reading books on my eReader, the sensory pleasures of touching and smelling paper is the main reason why I have only 100 eBooks and about 500 real ones...I digress...

So I saw this at B&N and picked it up because it looked a little spooky.  Also the author looks just like my doctor which I thought was funny because every time I go to the doctor I think of this book.  My mind is very random about what it links together.  Seriously though, look at them.  TWINS!

Chris Bohjalian, Author

 

 

Dr. Not Chris Bohjalian

 

Twins.

Anyway, back to my thoughts on the book (which also featured twins...weird).  The plot was a mixture of a bunch of random bits of other stories crafted with a buch of original stuff.  While this type of borrowing would usually bother me, the author wove such a beautiful quilt out of the scrappings of other books, movies and current events.  The story line was kind of a Stepford Wives meets The Amityville Horror meets The Sixth Sense meets Practical Magic meets Rosemary's Baby meets The Shining.  He takes the interesting bits from all of these creepy, dark imaginary places and BAM! throws it all together to make it something that you can totally imagine happening next door.

I liked this book.  I really, really liked this book.  I liked it enough to recommend it to someone else and even more so to lend it to someone.  Lending out books to me is similar to loaning someone money.  Only do it if you have the expectation of never seeing it again.  Happily enough the lender returned the book but with no comment on the story...

So I'm curious if anyone out there has read it and wants to share their thoughts on it.  If you haven't read it yet, go out and buy it if only for the feel of the cover alone...

Check out the author's website for more!  http://www.chrisbohjalian.com/