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quietprofanity Nov. 2nd, 2007 05:46 pm)
quietprofanity Nov. 2nd, 2007 05:46 pm)Books without Pictures Read
Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte
I wish I could give some glowing review about how underrated Anne is and be all iconoclast but I really got a feeling of, "Yeaaah, she's pretty much coasting on her sisters' backs to eternity." (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
kannaophelia's going to kill me for saying that.) I wasn't all that interested in the story, but then again for around 200 pages of "I'm surrounded by vapid snots who won't listen to me and they actually expect me to smile about it" ad nauseum ... it wasn't too bad, either.
But I liked parts of it ... maybe enough to like it overall. Rosalie was a pretty well-drawn character. I also liked Matilda, imperfect little bitch she was. And I liked the romance at the end, too - very sweet and cute.
I also liked Agnes Grey ... for a rather odd reason. Over the years of reading Victorian/Edwardian novels I've met SO many preternaturally good, Christian women who are THE LIGHT AND HOPE of the hero's life and lead him to the true path and on and on and on or are so wonderful that everyone who meets them is either struck dumb by their goodness (or, if they're evil, wants to rape them). But I have to say this is the first time a genuinely good Christian woman became real to me. And I really liked how Anne portrayed her resentful and critical feelings beneath her insistence to do the right and proper thing ... and even gave her some opportunities to stand up for herself on occasion. (I'm not sure how I totally felt about her, "By the way, when I talk about how good I am ... I'm not bragging, I'm just shocked at how much they don't want to improve themselves."
Tales of the Slayer, Vol. 1
Yes, I read a frockin' Buffy tie-in novel. Look, I like the idea of learning about past slayers, kay? Melaka Fray is one of the best comic superheroines ever. Alas, so much of this book ... I mean, my expectations were low and this book still managed to fall beneath them. Even Greg Rucka's entry had problems. (An ancient Grecian woman saying she's "a damn good slayer". Wut?) Plus, the Elizabeth Bathory story was the biggest load of pointlessness, ditto for the uninspired "southern slayer who lives out in the boonies." The Virginia Dare story takes about ten pages to get anywhere. I did like the concept behind the tale of the German slayer as told by the most incompetent watcher ever ... except the story is far too over-detailed for somebody trying to spit out his last missive to the universe (He actually spends time writing about how awful his handwriting is while he fears the vampire is going to kill him). Still, the black slayer in the 1950s story was pretty good. And I REALLY liked the story of the slayer during the French Revolution. That probably strayed too far from the mythos, but it worked really well in of itself. I almost want to copy it forimayb1 and myself and bookmooch the rest ... I don't know. I probably won't be getting the other three, at any rate.
'Salem's Lot by Stephen King
I was having SO MUCH fun reading this book even if, except for one instance early on when Ben and Susan are pondering the presence of evil in the world and feeling the overall dread of it, I wasn't scared. It was a fun adventure story most of the time. But when it went into the tragedy of a dying town I really felt for the citizens when King detailed their transformations into vampires. I also liked Matt Burke a lot, he seemed like a very cool, brave guy ... even if he was in a hospital bed throughout most of the third act. Father Callahan was also pretty interesting ... not totally sure if I want to read the Dark Tower and find out the rest of his story, but I haven't ruled it out.
But then one thing nearly threw me out of the book around a-little-after-the-middle. [SPOILER ALERT!!] Now, I knew when I met Susan that she was pretty much obvious dead meat and that she wasn't going to be highly developed. But she didn't seem stupid and was a pretty charming character who actually had a life and hopes and so ... I figured I would be okay if I didn't expect to much (ah, those famous last words again).
And then came one of her last scenes, in which she tries to do reconnaissance at the Marsten house with a cross around her neck and a stake. We think she's doing okay ... but then a few chapters later we learn Mark, the AMAZINGLY SMART 12 YEAR OLD, stumbles upon her. And then we get subjected to him thinking chauvinistic things like "That stake isn't going to kill anyone. She's dumb, but she's got guts. I like that!" [gag] And then, to make matters worse, when they team up, Susan pretty much recognizes that Mark is AMAZINGLY SMART 12 YEAR OLD and then steps back and lets him lead ... and eventually dies.
I'm sorry, but
I don't care HOW smart this kid is. Mark could have been freakin' baby Einstein but I think about 90% of women would have had some kind of motherly instinct kick in to protect the kid. (BTW, you can replace "motherly" with "big sisterly" if you're such a freetard that associating the instinct to care for a human being smaller and weaker with being a mother inexplicably offends you. Plus, Ben clearly becomes Mark's surrogate father later so blech.) It just doesn't make sense, it seems to fall into some adolescent fantasy of having a boy rescuing a girl and managing to do it at a prepubescent age because he's JUST THAT AMAZING, and it makes the fact that out of all the good guys she dies first even MORE of a drag.
The whole young-girl-wants-hunchback-ass-now-that-she's-a-vampire was also pretty creepy.
That being said, there were a lot of "bad women" in the book. And in the general sense I don't mind that and won't pick it apart. There were a lot of bad men in the book too. I just think the heroine, even a heroine who was destined to be WiR'd by her very existence, deserved a bit better.
Books with Pictures Read (Selected)
Good-bye, Chunky Rice by Craig Thompson
I don't think I really like Craig Thompson as a person, mostly because of all his "I am so much better than all of those stupid superhero comics fans. Do you see how they bag and board their comics? Isn't that repulsive? No wonder nobody likes us, because the people who gives us money are so damn GROSS." So ... yeah. Alas, he is a genius, so I keep reading.
The book was pretty good. Not as good as Blankets, but I'm thinking that's his magnum opus for a super-long time. The story itself I wasn't into (I can't really get behind weird people on a boat ... although I think I saw those conjoined twins on TV once) but the art was GREAT. And the layout? WONDERFUL. Especially the scenes where one character is hiding under a box. I also really liked the relationship between Chunky and Dandele.
And, and, AND ... Thompson actually did the (supposedly) unthinkable in comics: he made a female animal character without obvious gender markings (like long eyelashes or a bow) or as just "the girlfriend." Actually ... weirdly enough, Chunky and Dandele don't give off a "blighted romance" vibe, even though they talk about how much they love each other (as friends). But if they were both boys, I'd say their relationship was "slashy," if that makes any sense at all. Maybe the fact that they're a turtle and a mouse changes the dynamic.
But anyway, it's a book worth your time, if not the best.
Flight Vol. 1
A gift from47nite. I liked this pretty well. It didn't effect me very strongly emotionally, like some anthologies have been able to do. But there's a lot of really cute and very talented art here.
Pet Shop of Horrors by Matsuri Akino
I actually finished this manga awhile ago and never got to talk about it. So far, it's my favorite manga, but I liked the beginning much better than the end. Even though I liked Chris, when he entered into the story it lost a lot of its focus. (I mean, wtf was with Leon? "I hate you and want to arrest you ... BUT WE'RE GOING TO THE BEACH!" Um ... kay.) Still had some great short stories overall, though. I [heart] the ghost dog in particular.
Also, Lum's a really fucking crazy bitch in the first chapters of Urusei Yatsura. ... I still love her.
TV Watched
Buffy Season 7
I ... don't have a lot to say. The season was alright. Buffy was a bit bull-headed at the end, but I really felt for her in her season six descent so it was good to see her pulling herself back together. (Like I think I'm doing now). Loved Angel coming back in the end. Still think Kennedy is a freaking brat. Not sure if I think Caleb was an effective villain or too much of a "Boo, Hiss! HATE HIM HATE HIM NOW!" cipher. But overall ... it was good. I even started to like Andrew, although I don't love him by any means.
The Osbournes Season 2 1/2
[sigh] I enjoyed this. Damn me and my bad, bad taste sometimes. I still like this stupid thing as much as I liked it when I first came out ... with a few exceptions. More like, I notice more things, such as ...
1.) Why did I ever like Kelly's music? It's ... really not good. And I used to quite like it. I liked every song on her first album and now I find it unbearable. I wonder what happened, because I know my music taste hasn't improved THAT much. I mean, I still like a few (very few) Creed songs, for fuck's sake.
2.) Sometimes I wonder why I ever liked Kelly. She is SUCH a drama queen and can sometimes be outright nasty with little to no provocation. Okay, she was also 18 at the time and I was 18 too. (I'm literally only a couple of weeks older than her.) And honestly, I remember why I liked her. When I first started watching the show I had a crappy job where I had to be nice to people who treated me like idiot dog turds and I liked to tune in to watching a chubby chick who was able to tell people off. It was also nice to see a celebrity who my age who actually seemed to have strong opinions ... even mangled and hypocritical ones. But ... man, she doesn't do herself any favors in this DVD. Hope she's managed to cool out in the ensuing five years.
3.) Oddly enough, I liked Jack better this time around. He was always my least favorite when I initially watched it, mostly because I think listening to guys talk about drugs is one of the most boring things ever but ... eh, it seems like from the commentary he managed to pull himself together. And learning through a magazine awhile ago that Kelly also faced drug problems, she just was able to hide it better might have changed my mind. Also, his reaction to Ozzy begging for nitrous while getting his teeth cleaned ("Oh yeah, you're not an addict!"), and Ozzy buying over a $1,000 worth of kitchen supplies and over $600 on British candy ("I can see it now, the E! True Hollywood Story ... where did you spend all of your money from your career? On British chocolate!") made me laugh.
4.) Ugh. I need to start working out. If Ozzy can run five miles and I can't, that's REALLY REALLY BAD.
5.) I think I know why the Osbournes are the way they are. Sharon doesn't love her family in spite of their flaws, she loves her family BECAUSE OF their flaws. Of course, considering that her response when Ozzy bit the head off a dove was to piss her pants laughing, that's not too surprising. But when I heard her say on the commentary, "Kelly is SUCH a drama queen -- I love her!" I realized this was a woman who, when their kid rubbed shit on the walls, probably just laughed and didn't go "WHY THE HELL DID YOU DO THAT? NO!" (which my parents would have done) and probably would have just laughed it off and then bragged about it to her friends.
And ... I'm done. Bye!
Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte
I wish I could give some glowing review about how underrated Anne is and be all iconoclast but I really got a feeling of, "Yeaaah, she's pretty much coasting on her sisters' backs to eternity." (
kannaophelia's going to kill me for saying that.) I wasn't all that interested in the story, but then again for around 200 pages of "I'm surrounded by vapid snots who won't listen to me and they actually expect me to smile about it" ad nauseum ... it wasn't too bad, either.But I liked parts of it ... maybe enough to like it overall. Rosalie was a pretty well-drawn character. I also liked Matilda, imperfect little bitch she was. And I liked the romance at the end, too - very sweet and cute.
I also liked Agnes Grey ... for a rather odd reason. Over the years of reading Victorian/Edwardian novels I've met SO many preternaturally good, Christian women who are THE LIGHT AND HOPE of the hero's life and lead him to the true path and on and on and on or are so wonderful that everyone who meets them is either struck dumb by their goodness (or, if they're evil, wants to rape them). But I have to say this is the first time a genuinely good Christian woman became real to me. And I really liked how Anne portrayed her resentful and critical feelings beneath her insistence to do the right and proper thing ... and even gave her some opportunities to stand up for herself on occasion. (I'm not sure how I totally felt about her, "By the way, when I talk about how good I am ... I'm not bragging, I'm just shocked at how much they don't want to improve themselves."
Tales of the Slayer, Vol. 1
Yes, I read a frockin' Buffy tie-in novel. Look, I like the idea of learning about past slayers, kay? Melaka Fray is one of the best comic superheroines ever. Alas, so much of this book ... I mean, my expectations were low and this book still managed to fall beneath them. Even Greg Rucka's entry had problems. (An ancient Grecian woman saying she's "a damn good slayer". Wut?) Plus, the Elizabeth Bathory story was the biggest load of pointlessness, ditto for the uninspired "southern slayer who lives out in the boonies." The Virginia Dare story takes about ten pages to get anywhere. I did like the concept behind the tale of the German slayer as told by the most incompetent watcher ever ... except the story is far too over-detailed for somebody trying to spit out his last missive to the universe (He actually spends time writing about how awful his handwriting is while he fears the vampire is going to kill him). Still, the black slayer in the 1950s story was pretty good. And I REALLY liked the story of the slayer during the French Revolution. That probably strayed too far from the mythos, but it worked really well in of itself. I almost want to copy it for
imayb1 and myself and bookmooch the rest ... I don't know. I probably won't be getting the other three, at any rate.'Salem's Lot by Stephen King
I was having SO MUCH fun reading this book even if, except for one instance early on when Ben and Susan are pondering the presence of evil in the world and feeling the overall dread of it, I wasn't scared. It was a fun adventure story most of the time. But when it went into the tragedy of a dying town I really felt for the citizens when King detailed their transformations into vampires. I also liked Matt Burke a lot, he seemed like a very cool, brave guy ... even if he was in a hospital bed throughout most of the third act. Father Callahan was also pretty interesting ... not totally sure if I want to read the Dark Tower and find out the rest of his story, but I haven't ruled it out.
But then one thing nearly threw me out of the book around a-little-after-the-middle. [SPOILER ALERT!!] Now, I knew when I met Susan that she was pretty much obvious dead meat and that she wasn't going to be highly developed. But she didn't seem stupid and was a pretty charming character who actually had a life and hopes and so ... I figured I would be okay if I didn't expect to much (ah, those famous last words again).
And then came one of her last scenes, in which she tries to do reconnaissance at the Marsten house with a cross around her neck and a stake. We think she's doing okay ... but then a few chapters later we learn Mark, the AMAZINGLY SMART 12 YEAR OLD, stumbles upon her. And then we get subjected to him thinking chauvinistic things like "That stake isn't going to kill anyone. She's dumb, but she's got guts. I like that!" [gag] And then, to make matters worse, when they team up, Susan pretty much recognizes that Mark is AMAZINGLY SMART 12 YEAR OLD and then steps back and lets him lead ... and eventually dies.
I'm sorry, but
WTF?????
I don't care HOW smart this kid is. Mark could have been freakin' baby Einstein but I think about 90% of women would have had some kind of motherly instinct kick in to protect the kid. (BTW, you can replace "motherly" with "big sisterly" if you're such a freetard that associating the instinct to care for a human being smaller and weaker with being a mother inexplicably offends you. Plus, Ben clearly becomes Mark's surrogate father later so blech.) It just doesn't make sense, it seems to fall into some adolescent fantasy of having a boy rescuing a girl and managing to do it at a prepubescent age because he's JUST THAT AMAZING, and it makes the fact that out of all the good guys she dies first even MORE of a drag.
The whole young-girl-wants-hunchback-ass-now-that-she's-a-vampire was also pretty creepy.
That being said, there were a lot of "bad women" in the book. And in the general sense I don't mind that and won't pick it apart. There were a lot of bad men in the book too. I just think the heroine, even a heroine who was destined to be WiR'd by her very existence, deserved a bit better.
Books with Pictures Read (Selected)
Good-bye, Chunky Rice by Craig Thompson
I don't think I really like Craig Thompson as a person, mostly because of all his "I am so much better than all of those stupid superhero comics fans. Do you see how they bag and board their comics? Isn't that repulsive? No wonder nobody likes us, because the people who gives us money are so damn GROSS." So ... yeah. Alas, he is a genius, so I keep reading.
The book was pretty good. Not as good as Blankets, but I'm thinking that's his magnum opus for a super-long time. The story itself I wasn't into (I can't really get behind weird people on a boat ... although I think I saw those conjoined twins on TV once) but the art was GREAT. And the layout? WONDERFUL. Especially the scenes where one character is hiding under a box. I also really liked the relationship between Chunky and Dandele.
And, and, AND ... Thompson actually did the (supposedly) unthinkable in comics: he made a female animal character without obvious gender markings (like long eyelashes or a bow) or as just "the girlfriend." Actually ... weirdly enough, Chunky and Dandele don't give off a "blighted romance" vibe, even though they talk about how much they love each other (as friends). But if they were both boys, I'd say their relationship was "slashy," if that makes any sense at all. Maybe the fact that they're a turtle and a mouse changes the dynamic.
But anyway, it's a book worth your time, if not the best.
Flight Vol. 1
A gift from
47nite. I liked this pretty well. It didn't effect me very strongly emotionally, like some anthologies have been able to do. But there's a lot of really cute and very talented art here.Pet Shop of Horrors by Matsuri Akino
I actually finished this manga awhile ago and never got to talk about it. So far, it's my favorite manga, but I liked the beginning much better than the end. Even though I liked Chris, when he entered into the story it lost a lot of its focus. (I mean, wtf was with Leon? "I hate you and want to arrest you ... BUT WE'RE GOING TO THE BEACH!" Um ... kay.) Still had some great short stories overall, though. I [heart] the ghost dog in particular.
Also, Lum's a really fucking crazy bitch in the first chapters of Urusei Yatsura. ... I still love her.
TV Watched
Buffy Season 7
I ... don't have a lot to say. The season was alright. Buffy was a bit bull-headed at the end, but I really felt for her in her season six descent so it was good to see her pulling herself back together. (Like I think I'm doing now). Loved Angel coming back in the end. Still think Kennedy is a freaking brat. Not sure if I think Caleb was an effective villain or too much of a "Boo, Hiss! HATE HIM HATE HIM NOW!" cipher. But overall ... it was good. I even started to like Andrew, although I don't love him by any means.
The Osbournes Season 2 1/2
[sigh] I enjoyed this. Damn me and my bad, bad taste sometimes. I still like this stupid thing as much as I liked it when I first came out ... with a few exceptions. More like, I notice more things, such as ...
1.) Why did I ever like Kelly's music? It's ... really not good. And I used to quite like it. I liked every song on her first album and now I find it unbearable. I wonder what happened, because I know my music taste hasn't improved THAT much. I mean, I still like a few (very few) Creed songs, for fuck's sake.
2.) Sometimes I wonder why I ever liked Kelly. She is SUCH a drama queen and can sometimes be outright nasty with little to no provocation. Okay, she was also 18 at the time and I was 18 too. (I'm literally only a couple of weeks older than her.) And honestly, I remember why I liked her. When I first started watching the show I had a crappy job where I had to be nice to people who treated me like idiot dog turds and I liked to tune in to watching a chubby chick who was able to tell people off. It was also nice to see a celebrity who my age who actually seemed to have strong opinions ... even mangled and hypocritical ones. But ... man, she doesn't do herself any favors in this DVD. Hope she's managed to cool out in the ensuing five years.
3.) Oddly enough, I liked Jack better this time around. He was always my least favorite when I initially watched it, mostly because I think listening to guys talk about drugs is one of the most boring things ever but ... eh, it seems like from the commentary he managed to pull himself together. And learning through a magazine awhile ago that Kelly also faced drug problems, she just was able to hide it better might have changed my mind. Also, his reaction to Ozzy begging for nitrous while getting his teeth cleaned ("Oh yeah, you're not an addict!"), and Ozzy buying over a $1,000 worth of kitchen supplies and over $600 on British candy ("I can see it now, the E! True Hollywood Story ... where did you spend all of your money from your career? On British chocolate!") made me laugh.
4.) Ugh. I need to start working out. If Ozzy can run five miles and I can't, that's REALLY REALLY BAD.
5.) I think I know why the Osbournes are the way they are. Sharon doesn't love her family in spite of their flaws, she loves her family BECAUSE OF their flaws. Of course, considering that her response when Ozzy bit the head off a dove was to piss her pants laughing, that's not too surprising. But when I heard her say on the commentary, "Kelly is SUCH a drama queen -- I love her!" I realized this was a woman who, when their kid rubbed shit on the walls, probably just laughed and didn't go "WHY THE HELL DID YOU DO THAT? NO!" (which my parents would have done) and probably would have just laughed it off and then bragged about it to her friends.
And ... I'm done. Bye!
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