utter randomonium

I Love Everybody (and Other Atrocious Lies) by Laurie Notaro: A collection of autobiographical essays from one of the funnier writers I’ve come across. Though in places too acerbic to be truly uproarious, once you get into Notaro’s groove her rants and tangents range are pretty darn funny. There were times I laughed aloud – no mean feat, considering I was reading this on an exercise bike. Her descriptions of the tampon flying out of her purse, the spontaneously exploding pants, and her attempts to “love everybody” while at CostCo on a weekend were particularly memorable. A short book, but good for a quick laugh.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

No Greater Sacrifice by John C. Stipa: Independently wealthy archaeologist Renee and troubled history professor David are summoned to a small village in France to hear the reading of a will. Though ostensibly strangers, it turns out the pair met a couple years before while vacationing (separately) in Rome, and their pasts intertwine even more. Their romance blooms in fits and starts, which didn’t really interest me all that much but luckily was not a huge chunk of the story. Rather, the plot focuses on a strange artifact, broken into pieces and scattered throughout Europe. Finding and reassembling them becomes an obsession for Renee and David. The flavor is distinctly reminiscent of Dan Brown, except with far superior writing and less exasperating characters.

I think my favorite part was how our heroes pursue the secret of their inheritance purely out of personal interest and thirst for adventure. Yes, they’re being chased by bad guys, but that’s external drama and does not drive their quest. They could have simply forgotten about it and gone home, but of course then we wouldn’t have had a story. Luckily, Renee and David let their curiosity get the better of them, and have some grand adventures in the process. Parts were clearly written with a camera lens in mind, but that actually made the action easier to visualize. Though I was still slightly confused as to what the Big Secret ended up being in the end, I had no problem keeping track of the myriad of players. All in all, a good first novel.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Everyone has little things in books that bug them, ranging in reaction from minor irritation to a full-on “if this is there I will stop reading immediately.” Here are some of mine, in no particular order:

• A man falling in love with a prostitute (a.k.a. the hooker with the heart of gold). It’s been done, people. Done to death.
• Conflict/drama caused entirely by people not telling each other things. This drives me insane. Yes, I get that people have secrets, but too often characters hold back because (1) they have a martyrdom complex and don’t want to burden anyone with their problems, or (2) they think people just wouldn’t understand, and don’t even give them the chance to decide. It’s dumb, and it’s even worse when it’s the entire reason pretty much everything in the plot happens. If I can read a book and think “if they’d only told each other everything from the start, we could have avoided pretty much the entire story,” it really irritates me, and it’s a sign of weak writing.
• Large amounts of foreign language. I was going to say it only bugs me when it’s not translated, but it also bothers me when people say things in a foreign language and it’s immediately translated into English. The occasional word is fine, but paragraphs or entire conversations get very tiresome. It’s a great word-padding trick for NaNoWriMo but I’d rather it were left out of published novels.
• Conversations that are described instead of printed. Jane Austen was particularly bad about this, but she’s far from the only offender. The only exception to this is if the information would be a repeat of what the reader already knows.
• Stories that don’t end. Now, I don’t need all the loose ends to be tied up, but I do need a story to have a satisfying (though not necessarily happy) ending. When it just stops and it’s left totally up to the reader to decide what happens (such as in The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber), I feel like I’ve completely wasted my time reading it. If I wanted to write my own ending, I would have written my own story. Finish what you start!
• Authors that don’t do basic research. I’m not talking about little anachronisms in historical fiction; I mean truly basic information that anyone with even a passing acquaintance with the topic would know. James Patterson is a good example. He sets many of his novels in the DC metro area (which happens to be where I live) and then makes such glaring mistakes as inventing a mysterious city in Virginia called Church Falls and asserting that locals refer to the Smithsonian Institution as “The Smithy”. (We don’t. Seriously, nobody says that.) If you want to make up stuff, don’t set it in a real place. All you’re doing is irritating the natives.

I’m sure there are more I’m not thinking of. What are your pet peeves in books?

Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan: The paths of two teenagers, both named Will Grayson, cross one fateful night. Their stories are told in alternating chapters, and their personalities (and writing styles) are different enough that it’s easy to keep track of who’s narrating. But despite the title and narrators, this book is in many ways more about the larger-than-life Tiny Cooper and his struggles with identity, love, and musical theater. I loved and empathized with all the characters. I was at times horrified and delighted at the various twists and turns in the plot, always wanting more more more. And this is one book I wish came with a soundtrack so I can actually hear all the songs in Tiny Dancer/Hold Me Closer. In short, I was completely and utterly sucked in. This was my gym book – that is, the book that lived in my gym bag to be read while on the exercise bike – and I found that I didn’t want to get off the bike when my thirty minutes were up. Now that, my friend, is the mark of an engrossing book. I’ve already added pretty much the entire combined catalogs of Green and Levithan to my wish list, and I hope fervently that they write another book together. Highly recommended.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Messenger by Lois Lowry: Matty is the messenger for Village, the one who can brave Forest to deliver messages between various settlements. The story begins at a pivotal moment in his life: he’s discovered a wonderful and terrifying ability, he will soon receive his True Name, and Village, founded as a sanctuary for refugees, is considering closing its doors. It is the third of a loose trilogy that began with The Giver (a truly excellent novel) – that is, it takes place in the same universe and has some overlapping characters. I never read the second book, Gathering Blue, but I didn’t feel like I needed to. Truth be told, I wasn’t that impressed with this story. It was too predictable, even for a young adult book. Maybe I’d have liked it better had I read Gathering Blue (or at least more recently read The Giver) but I doubt it. Usually I like dystopian tragedies but this felt forced. All in all, not one of Lowry’s better books.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

Hollywood Moon by Joseph Wambaugh: It’s never a dull moment for the cops of Hollywood Station. The overarching plot is about a master of disguise, a handful of con men, and a handsome teenager just beginning to embrace his inner psychopath. In addition, there are plenty of little asides along the way – funny and/or poignant conversations between the cops, bizarre incidents with criminals, and the like – which keep the action moving. All the characters were great, but I enjoyed the surfer cops the most. Something about the lingo makes me chuckle every time. As far as I can tell, this is the third Hollywood Station book, but I didn’t ever feel like I was missing something. My only real complaint was that the ending felt a touch forced. However, the rest of the story was so good I can overlook that.

I listened to this on audio, read by Christian Rummell, who was absolutely excellent. Not only is he a great narrator, but he is also the man of a thousand voices. Even his female voices are convincing and distinct!

Also posted on BookCrossing.
Read for the Books Won Reading Challenge.

High Fidelity by Nick Hornby: It’s rare that I pick up a book based on its movie, but this time I did. I really enjoyed John Cusack as Rob, though I’d heard that Hornby had been surprised at the quality of the film, since to him the book was very much about living in London and yet the story was almost seamlessly transplanted to Chicago for the movie. Anyway, this book is brilliant. It’s the story of Rob, a thirty-something owner of a semi-failing record shop, and his life after his girlfriend leaves him. Rob is obsessed with music, top five everything, his past, and himself in general. His manner of narrating is at once painfully honest and absolutely hilarious, and I laughed out loud on several occasions. The time flew by whenever I was reading. I’ll definitely be looking up other Hornby books in the future.

Also posted on BookCrossing.

The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman: I’d been looking forward to this last installment of His Dark Materials, both just because I thoroughly enjoyed its predecessors, and because I wanted to find out the twist ending that had inspired such polarized reactions among my friends. Without spoiling anything: I understood the ending, and it made sense with the rest of the story, but it still made me sad. Other than that, I can say that I very much enjoyed these books, and the characters will stay with me for a very long time. I admit I got a little confused with the Biblical metaphors here and there, but the rest of the adventure was quite satisfying, and I’d love to read more stories set in that universe. Definitely recommended, but not for sensitive young readers. There’s a lot of violence.

Malice by Chris Wooding: I received this book for Christmas and was surprised to find that the embossing on the cover protruded a half a centimeter, which is way too thick to fit very well on a bookshelf. But that’s neither here nor there in the long run. The story itself has a pretty standard set-up: Luke gets his hands on a supposedly dangerous comic-book that turns out to actually be dangerous. He gets sucked into its horrific world and his friends go in after him. Luckily, there are plenty of twists to keep things interesting, such as the motives behind the existence of Malice, Kady’s past, and Justin’s secrets. The art, unfortunately, is pretty poor, to the point where I was having trouble distinguishing between the characters. I was a little disappointed in the ending as well, which is more or less a cliffhanger to be (presumably) resolved in the next book. I understand the purpose behind that tactic, but I was a little disappointed nonetheless. I think, had the story wrapped up in a single volume (or I had the second volume at hand), I would have felt differently. I could see someone in their early teens really enjoying this.

Sweeney Todd
Signature Theatre
4200 Campbell Ave., Arlington, VA
February 9 – April 4, 2010
Buy Tickets

My husband and I saw this show on Thursday night, the 11th, and thoroughly enjoyed it. We’d decided to go because we’d enjoyed the movie and knew the play would be longer, fuller, and better. And indeed, it was. Staged in a black box-style setting with sparse but deliciously detailed sets, we were absorbed in the ambiance of the show even before the lights went out: smoke machines, blood dripping into buckets, randomly dimming light fixtures, and assorted noises set the mood. The play started all at once, and instantly we were pulled into the action of this crazy musical horror-comedy.

The cast, over all, was just great. The ensemble was very tight, though sometimes they were singing so quickly I couldn’t understand them. Sweeney Todd himself (Edward Gero) had some of the best facial expressions, adding humor and depth to character. This was when I was especially glad for the intimate setting, because I was able to actually see his face more often than not. Mrs. Lovett (Sherri L. Edelen) was simply a delight. I was introduced to this character via Helena Bonham Carter, whose singing voice in that role, er, leaves a bit to be desired. Edelen was able to balance the ridiculous accent, the droll inflection, and the crude mannerisms with a striking voice that was both funny and pleasant to hear.

Now, while I feel Tobias Ragg (Sam Ludwig) did a marvelous job and has a beautiful voice, he was simply too old to play the character. Toby is supposed to be, at the very most, a teenager, but the fellow playing him was clearly well into his 20s. This is no fault of the actor’s, to be sure, but it did distract from the realism a little bit. The other youngish male lead, Anthony (Gregory Maheu), looked distractingly like Jude Law. This says nothing about his performance, which was fine, but it’s all I really have to say about him.

The villains were fun: I actually preferred Chris Van Cleave’s Judge Turpin over Alan Rickman’s (and I love me some Rickman, so that’s saying something), and Beadle (Chris Sizemore) repeatedly cracked me up with his falsetto shenanigans. Saving the best for last, Johanna (Erin Driscoll) was absolutely lovely. Many of the notes she had to sing were incredibly high, but she nailed every one solidly and beautifully.

All in all, a wonderful show. Go see it if you can!