We Need to Talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver

Last month’s Book Club pick: We Need to Talk about Kevin by Lionel Shriver. Honestly, I had a lot of preconceptions about what this book was about and, since I always read the last sentence of a novel but never the back, I really thought I had a handle on it.

Honestly, nothing could have prepared me.

A (new) friend described the novel as “earth-shattering”; I would have to agree. It was so well written, with genuine intrigue and mystery, that I felt compelled to find out exactly what Kevin did that needed any more talking about. The characters seem …real. Eva, as cold-fish mom, was in equal turns adorable and abhorrent. Her self-flagellating style (as the entire book is written in letters to her husband, Franklin) is so brutally honest that I can’t help but wonder: is she exaggerating? does she really think this? is she making herself to be worse than she really is? All the other characters are seen through Eva’s eyes, and yet she paints them with the same unyielding honesty so they too seem true.

mantra

Sometimes, I feel completely overwhelmed.  

Doesn't happen often.  

I like swimming in a big pond with sharp-toothed fishies,

 darting about, through the murky waters and the shimmering seaweed.  

I like it because it reminds of those dreams I had as a kid where I breathe underwater.  

But sometimes, 

just sometimes, 

I swallow a mouthful and end up 

gasping and choking and floundering.

I'm lost in the deep dark 

and I feel like I have nowhere to go 

and if I don't figure it out right away, 

I'm going to drown.

It is then, 

especially then, 

that I repeat my mantra:

Start where you are.  Use what you have.  Do what you can.

Over and over until I'm a calm little crab once again, 

crawling about the depths, 

shaping the wild ocean 

one snipped barnacle at a time.

Now Playing: Wrath of the Titans

The only time I found any amusement in this movie was when it made fun of itself: "Perseus? Oh yeah - the whole "Release the Kraken" thing" - haha.  They had a cool Queen Andromeda, but who was nothing like her mythological counterpart.  And then there was the whole plot line, which made absolute nonsense of what can often be garbled myths to begin with.  Ugh.

I wouldn't even rent it: 2 out of 5 stars.

Now Playing: The Hunger Games

I avoided watching The Hunger Games on its opening weekend.  While I truly loved the books, I was not prepared to battle the crowds.  Still, even on a Wednesday night, it was packed with people.  You know, the annoying kind of newbish theatre-goer who has to explain every scene to the person next to them. 

Anyway, on to the movie.

It was...good.  As with the Harry Potter series or Percy Jackson or even LOTR, it's hard for me to put aside obvious comparisons of the movie to the book.  I know it's unfair, but I can't help it.  (Perhaps this is why Game of Thrones is just so good - because you have 10 hours to tell a book, not a mere 180 minutes).  Keeping aside the fact I can count three noticeable changes from the book, the movie was done very well.  And even the changes were ones with which I could agree for the most part.  Could there have been a little more Gale?  Did I miss the Mayor's daughter? Did Haymitch get too soft?  Did I miss the muttations?  Maybe, maybe.  In the end, it doesn't matter.  As a standalone product, THG was an excellent movie.

Now Playing: John Carter

Last night, I ventured out of quarantine to the movie theatre for John Carter.  Based on Edgar Rice Burroughs' A Princess of Mars, I was a little leery of a Disneyfication of yet another classic.  I mean, they'd already renamed the work and toyed with the characters a little, but okay.  I'm up for some mindless movie mayhem after all the deep films we've been ingesting. 

It was okay.  I thought the story was paced a bit slow, but nothing terrible.  LilBro fell asleep complete with loud snores (much to giggleworthy delight of the girls sitting behind us).  I thought the special effects were done quite well, especially the interaction between the live action players and the CGI models.  Really well done.  (Who wouldn't love that cute Woola; I can see the stuffed versions versions of these on sale at the Disney store now...).  And Taylor Kitsch by the uber-cool (and relatively unknown) Lynn Collins.  had all his scenes stolen by the As an origin story, it's not bad.  We probably could have rented it.  3 out of stars.

typhoid mary

After months (bordering on years) of being illness-free, I am struck down.  I blame it on the unholy coupling of "Spring Forward" and unseasonably (unreasonably!) warm weather.  Within three days, I went from a slight tickle to coughing fits that induce sharp pains in my left arm.  A very supportive DK assumed point at work and took care of all my duty manager commitments; half my department is either currently ill or recuperating.  I suggested a full decontamination of the department.  I wish we had windows at work: it can't be healthy to have all these semi-sick people (who have taken flu shots so they don't feel ill enough to stay home, thereby infecting the rest of us) breathing in recycled air.  Long story short: am sick at home.

I ordered a BUNCH of spicy food from the local Thai place; it's the only thing I can taste.  And then, it happened.  I ran out of cough syrup.  NOOOOOoooOoOoOooO!

How To Score Boyfriend Points:

Through Black Spruce by Joseph Boyden

I was supposed to have read Through Black Spruce by Joseph Boyden for January's Book Club.  I confess to have taken almost three months to finish it.  Now that I'm done, I have mixed feelings.  TBS is the 2008 Giller Prize winner, a prize that has given me such gems as A Fine Balance, Late Nights on Air and The In-Between World of Vikram Lall.  Excellent - and intimidating - company indeed.

As per usual, spoilers abound and I can't help it.  A more cogent reviewer will be able to talk about this book, its high and lows, without ruining plot, but I make no such promises.

Should you read it?  Yes.  Should it be the very next book you pick up?  Probably not - especially if you haven't read those listed above.