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Maurice Reads in Bed
In the beautiful month of May I have read:
- Julian Barnes' The Porcupine
- Margaret Atwood's The Edible Woman
- George Lucas' The Phantom Menace - the Illustrated Screenplay
- RL Stine's The Suprise Party
- Terry Brooks' The Phantom Menace
- RL Stine's The Wrong Number
- Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time
- RL Stine's The Cheater
- RL Stine's The Stepsister
- RL Stine's The New Girl
- RL Stine's The Prom Queen
- Richard Beard's X20
- Douglas Adams' Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
With finishing Julian Barnes' The Porcupine I've now read everything he's published in book form. For those of you who don't know, I'm a Barnes fan - he can't really do much wrong in my opinion (except rambling on in French or about France (although I thought Flaubert's Parrot to be absolutely fantastic)). And, no, I don't know anything about him. I don't know how old he is, I don't know where he lives, I don't know what education he's followed - nothing. This is simply because I really don't care about who he is. It doesn't matter at all, and might possibly even spoil his novels for me (you never know - he could turn out to be some fascist or something if you dig too deeply).
Back to The Porcupine. The title doesn't refer to the prickly animal, but to Stoyo Petkanov, the former president of an Eastern-European country whose counter-revolutionary forces have overturned the Communist government, and who is now tried for 'crimes against the country'. Well, let me correct that, he's tried for things they believe they can find him guilty of in much the same way as Capone was tried for tax-evasion rather than homicide, smuggling & the lot. Moreover, he's tried by a lawyer (Peter Solinsky) who is determined to have him convicted. If only because his father had been exiled by Petkanov back when. The whole event is broadcast on live tv and we also follow the reactions of a couple of people who are watching the event, commenting on it.
In the meantime, the country is in ruin, like most of the countries who overturned their Communist governments are in ruin: nothing's for sale, money is scarce, electricity suffers continual blackouts, warm water is mostly unavailable, things are in disrepair, and so on. The novel reflects this, as it is one of Barnes darkest works.
So while Solinsky believes the cat is bagged (or the porcupine is bagged), Petkanov tries his best to turn the tables, changing things round and shifting points of view in the way only Barnes can. And while all these things are happening, the result of the trial starts not to matter anymore (at least not to us, the readers), but different things take over, about which I can't tell you because it would spoil the novel and I want you to read this one.
Indeed, on a scale of recommended to not recommended I'm giving this a 'one of Barnes' best'.
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I read Margaret Atwood's The Edible Woman. I liked it, even though the main character, Marian, is such a nitwit, Peter, her boyfriend, is such a jerk and I involuntarily identified with the 'weird one', Duncan. The story: Neat girl with rebel soul (hidden deep, deep down) has to choose between neat man with good job (Peter), or skeletal construction studying English (Duncan), or none of the above (Yay! That's Atwood!)
There's also some subplots, one involving Marian's room mate who wants to get pregnant, but doesn't want to get married because (and I'm doing this form memory, so the correct quote eludes me) it's bad for the child.
And , of course, there's Atwood's style of writing which is essentially enough to keep a novel interesting. Take for example the fact that the story is divided in three parts; the first is written in the first person, the second written in the third, and the thirs part written in the forst person again. The significance? Read the novel.
On a scale of recommended to not recommended I'll give this a 'Atwood bordering on the rom com'
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Well, since George Lucas' The Phantom Menace - the Illustrated Screenplay was available now I couldn't resist and just had to read this one, if only to see if my suspicions held any truth. And the answer, unfortunately, is that they did. Of course I can't judge the film as a whole, but you can't have form without content, and the screenplay is one important aspect of the content.
In essence, what this story amounted to was a rewrite of A New Hope and Return of the Jedi. There's the wizened old Jedi (Qui-Gonn Jinn), the brass youngster who still has much to learn (Obi-Wan Kenobi), the alien who owes a life-debt to one of the main characters (Jar Jar Binks, who, in this case, also functions as the 'comic relief'). There's the promising young apprentice found on Tatooine (Anakin Skywalker), the sinister baddie (Darth Maul) and his master (Darth Sidious), the royalty figure in distress (Queen Amidala). There's the obligatory duel-over-a-deep-pit, just like the obligatory torpedo-into-the-reaction-chamber and last but not least, the happy ending combined with the funeral of a Jedi.
No way is this some kind of pre-echo, this is blatantly plagiarising your own work in a rather lame way.
But it gets worse. In the 'not seen before in Star Wars' department there're some dreadful things. All of a sudden, Jedi have some kind of midi-chlorian count which determines how Force sensitive they are. How come none of this was mentioned in ep. IV, V or VI, which, after all, are supposed to be after this one? Is it possible Yoda and Obi-Wan could see the future, but not the past? (Stephen Hawking, eat your heart out) Also, it turns out that Anakin doesn't have a father, which makes his some kind of virgin birth. Haven't we heard that somewhere before?
Nonetheless, this is, in itself, entertaining stuff, and probably aimed at people who were too young to have seen any of the other Star Wars films (hence the comic relief, which, to me, comes across as a burden to the story). But that is also it's main problem: it fails to appeal to a more adult audience, an audience who'd like to see an epic arc expanded beyond what was already known, not a reptition of what we have all seen before.
The Phantom Menace appeals to the child in you, but only to the child in you. but I guess the rather infantile title has given as much away.
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I read RL Stine's The Suprise Party only because I have to make a 40-hour module concerning younf adult fiction, centered around a writer or a theme. I chose a writer and now I'm stuck reading 3 omniba (or is it omnibuses?) of Fear Street stories by RL, while I'll never be able to finish the assignment in time. If only because I have no idea how to go about it. So if anyone has an idea or info about either RL Stine or about the Fear Street series, please mail me!!! (I'm rather desperate - my degree depends on it and I'm wasting my time away reading Star Wars screenplays).
Right, back to The Suprise Party. The story is really quite simple: someone was killed some time ago and now there's a chance people are going to find out who it is, so the killer tries everything in his powers to stop them. And so enter the classic horror-things: funny phonecalls, threatening notes, creepy happenings, stalkings, attempted murders and the lot. Plus your usual assortment of teenagers (girls, of course, as they scream louder - even in books), red herrings and parents who don't really understand what's going on at all.
I was rather suprised (har har) when I read this novel as I thought it'd be full of impossible-type stuff, you know, like in A Nightmare on Elm Street or Night of the Living Dead and stuff, but it was pleasent to discover it was all more or less within the realm of the possible (excusing one plot-twist which sounded implausible). I hope the other stories will be along similar lines (i.e. logically possible, rather than occult, and entertaining) as there's eight more to go through (not to mention the writing of the whole module).
If asked to rate this book, I'd say it'd deserve a 'pleasent way to waste your time'.
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Terry Brooks' The Phantom Menace is the novelization of the film with the same name, and while everybody in the civilised world knows when it'll be released in the US, poor Holland is holding the whole event off until the end of September. This means that reading the story is, for now, the only way I can get to know anything about it. But let's start with a question:
How is it possible that two different ways (1 screenplay, 1 novelization) of telling the exact same story can lead to two different opinions?
Is it:
a) The reader lacks the cinematic imagination to project a screenplay in his mind.
b) George Lucas is a filmmaker, not a writer.
c) Novels appeal to the reader on a different level, forcing him to focus on different aspects rather than the 'pure' story the way a screenplay does.
Write your answer on a postcard and send it to...
Why I was wondering this is because now that I've read the novelization I suddenly see things a little differently and the horror of the bad quality of the screenplay has been diluted up to the point where there's a shimmer of hope in me. Seriously, the novel's better than the play. Things are less 'humorous' for a start. Then there's the level, which is higher than the level at which the screenplay was aimed (if you remember what I said about the screenplay being aimed at children). The novel is more along the lines of young adult literature, if you ask me.
Still, there are some things wrong with the novel. Most noticeably, the characters are always either chagrined (the word appears at least 20 times) or sweaty (again, at least 20 times of being sweaty, wiping sweat off a brow, sweat dripping down, etc.).
BUT WHAT'S THE STORY????
Okay, I'll tell you, though I should keep in the spirit of the unofficial websites and say that the following bit contains SPOILERS. There's a boy called Anakin Skywalker, who is nine years old and has some strangeish powers, like being able to sense things, having a weird affinity with machinery and having visionary dreams. Not that it does him a lot of good - he's a slave on a desert planet really quite far away from anywhere, Tatooine.
Meanwhile, elsewhere in the universe, the universal baddies (commercialism/capitalism embodied by a cowardly race of aliens and under the banner of something called the Trade Federation) occupy a peacefuil planet and two Jedi Knights (for those who have no idea what Jedi Knights are I'll quote one of them: "guardians of peace and justice through the universe" - they also have telepathic, telekinetic and other peculiar powers, collectively called the Force) try to help the queen of the planet. While trying to help Queen Amidala by shipping her to the Galactic centre of the Universe, Coruscant, they crash land on Tatooine where they meet up with Anakin.
One of the Jedi, Qui-Gon Jinn, finds out that Anakin isn't just any old slave kid, but that he's really really powerful in the aforementioned Force. Anakin falls in love with Amidala immediately and prophesies, 'I'm going to marry you.' So, after a number of events, they head for Coruscant, taking Anakin with them to present him to the Jedi Council in order to obtain approval to train him in the ways of the Jedi. The council disapprove as Anakin is too old and too angry (and we all know that anger leads to the dark side of the Force. You see, the Force is divided in two, the light and the dark side. No points for guessing what side would contain what emotions. Anyway, Qui-Gon is pissed off at this and to vent his anger the whole party moves back to the besieged planet and kill and/or capture all the evil-doers. In the process Qui-Gon gets killed by the really really evil Darth Maul, who is a Sith Lord (which means he's adept in the dark side of the Force instead of the light side, 'cos then you're called a Jedi), and forces his apprentice, Obi-Wan Kenobi, to train Anakin in the ways of the Jedi.
The end.
Recommended? Not recommended? I'll give this a 'better than the screenplay', as well as a 'recommended in comparison to the other works of science fiction I've read'.
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RL Stine's The Wrong Number is not much different than the other one I read by him, "The Surprise Party", although the killer here is revealed sooner and there's no real red herring suspect.
The story is as follows (commercial writers to be, take heed - his is a short 'how to'). Two girls make prank calls but are found out by the half brother of one of them (the main character), who is generally quite the weirdo and he makes some not-so-funny calls. One of them resulting in them listening live to a murder taking place. Woa!
So, as you do, they go investigate and promptly get caught by the police who lock them up, being convinced that the half brother is the killer.
This leaves the two girls to find out who the real killer is, which they promptly do, but the police doesn't believe them and they cannot gather enough evidence to substantiate their suspicions. That is, until it is too late and they burgle the killer's house, he comes home, locks them up, wants to kill them and then the police arrive and everything is okay and there's the end joke.
Pfffff! 7 more of these to go. Anyone know a good 'urban legends' website?
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Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time is indeed brief - just under 200 pages and covers pretty much the main theories from the time of Aristotle and Ptolemy to Newton, Gallileo, Einstein and himself and his contemoporaries. And this book is something I've always wanted to read, simply because I may have an alpha mind, I've got a beta heart which irresistably draws me to these things (somwehere along the line of TBR books is a book on superstring theory). Besides, the kids in my class wanted to know what was beyond the universe and I got stuck halfway through trying to simplistically explain the theory of relativity and the curvature of spacetime. (If you're wondering why this question was asked in an English class, don't ask me, as I was as suprised.)
The problem is, of course, the alpha mind. Hawking, although doing it rather simplistacally, still managed to lose me somewhere along the line when quarks, particle/antiparticle pairs and 'spin' came up. This will mean I'll re-read the book at a later date, after the bits of information that have sunk in are digested.
But what can I say about this book? Well, that it's clear, and sometimes even humourous, especially in relation to the purely scientific books that are available on the subject, but also that it's probably somewhat outdated by now as it was first published in 1987 and not revised since (and surely things must have happened over the last 12 years). His views on the origin of the universe and the place black holes have in the universe at large are very interesting, especially because he allows God to play a part in a number of these theories, which I hadn't expected at all (I thought all scientists were inherently atheist), but also that he imposes limits on the degree of divine intervention possible in the universe as we understand it to be.
All time favourite part of the book for me must be the anthropic principle: "We see the universe the way it is because if it were different, we would not be here to observe it."
So can I recommend it? I'm not sure if I'm in any position to say anything about the book right now, though I suppose that if you're curious there are far worse places to start a quest for knowledge about the origins, present state, and future of the universe.
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RL Stine's The Cheater is no different from the previous two stories I've read by him (and probably no different from the following 6 I'll be reading). There's a girl, Carter, who dates a guy, Dan, and who has a judge for a father, who's working on some case or other at the time. Now, the father is the instigator in a way. Carter has to perform well in advanced math, but she can't and so she is offered the chance to let someone else, Adam (from the 'wrong side of the tracks'), take the test for her in exchange for one date.
Yeah, right. Adam turns out to be a demanding little bastard, not being afraid to stoop low enough to blackmail her. She receives all kinds of threats and horrible things happen to her. Horrible! Get a grip! I've lived in the worst parts of England for quite some time and what she's having to deal with is just fun, really, nothing that serious - it's just that the little rich girl cannot handle herself outside of the beauty parlor, but that's another matter.
Then Adam turns up dead. Shot. Uh-oh! Now who did that? Of course it wasn't Carter (she's rich & female & the main character so no way), so who was it? Well, the only other person who it could be - Dan. Enter moral of the story about honesty & all and the end joke and everyone's happily playing chess.
In short: Read one, read all & I wish I had chosen Pike now (but it's too late).
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Fourth in the series of nine is RL Stine's The Stepsister. If you're wondering why I'm still briefly summarising these stories, it's because I need to be able to distinguish between them at a later date, and if I don't write 'em down I'll be sure to mix 'em up. And why bother you with it? Playing for strokes (positive or negative), of course. ;)
So what's The Stepsister about? Again, it's more thriller than horror as this one too is within the realm of the logically possible (i.e. no ghosts, ghouls or monsters). The main character, as always a teenage girl, is called Emily and lives on the infamous Fear Street (oooh! spooky!) with her mother and older sister, Nancy, when her stepfather brings home his two kids to come and live with them. One is sullen and withdrawn, Rich, and one is Jessie. A rather weird kid, all in all, but not too unpleasent at first.
Of course, this is where the trouble starts. First Jessie pulls off the head of Emily's favourite teddybear and then she does someother peculiar stuff, like making late night phonecalls and sneaking out late at night. (The plot thins.) We also find out that Emily's biological dad died some time ago when they were camping, which is why her mother got remarried. Weird stuff starts to happen then. Emily feels more and more threatened by her stepsister who at all times claims she's innocent and has nothing to do with, for example, the murder of Emily's dog, the putting of peroxide in her shampoo, locking her into a burning bathroom at school or pushing her down the stairs.
Then the whole family goes camping and we enter the climax of the story, when Emily, Nancy and Jessie are asked to gather wood for a fire. At one point Emily and Jessie are alone and Emily gets so frightened without Nancy there that she runs away, entering, of all places, an abandoned cemetery, where she's pushed inside an open grave and is attacked with a shovel by... Nancy!!! (Well, of course it's Nancy, she's the only one you were never supposed to suspect, so she must be the one.) Jessie then comes to her rescue and all is well. Even Nancy doesn't die, but instead gets help (isn't that wonderful?).
Surprisingly, the story doesn't have an end joke. Perhaps because there's little to joke about, but perhaps also because RL Stine doesn't want to be too predictable (har har).
On the ever-tipping scales this reads 'read one, read all'.
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Thundering on through what seems like an endless amount of RL Stine books we now arrive at The New Girl. The back of the book reads, 'She's pale as a ghost, blonde and eerily beautiful - And Anna Corwin seems to need Shadyside High's star gymnast, Cory Brooks, as much as he wants her. But he can't get her out of his mind - he's losing sleep, skipping practice, and acting weird. Only Cory's friend Lisa knows the truth: Anna Crowin is dead and living on Fear Street.'
Yeah right. 1) Dead people don't live. 2) Ghosts don't come to school (they have better things to do). Conclusion: 1) Anna isn't dead, or 2) Anna isn't Anna at all but someone else.
So what happens? Well, RL Stine changes tactics once again and instead of the main character being a teenage girl, this time it's a teenage boy (major departure, I'm sure you agree). And this teenage boy, Cory Brooks, is a star gymnast, but he keep screwing up because of Anna, whom he's spotted one time and cannot get out of his head since.
After doing some investigative work he discovers that Anna is dead - she doesn't have a permanent record, and when he calls her number there's a voice who keeps telling him that there's no Anna living with them. Even when he comes to her house he's told that she's dead by a rather peculiar character called Brad (who, because of his peculiarity can't be bad because he's suspect). Still, he keep seeing her, wants to see her and some weird stuff happens, as it always does. This time it's threatening phonecalls and a dead cat. And someone (Brad) pushes Lisa down the stairs, although that's an accident.
So what happens next? Well, it turns out that Anna is indeed that, which means that Anna isn't Anna at all, but her sister, Willa (with such a name it's not that strange to want to change it to something normal). Willa may or may not have killed Anna, and then started taking on her personality, acting weirder and weirder all the time until she totally loses it and attacks Cory with a letter opener.
Of course, all's well that ends well, so here too everything turns out okay and apart from poor Willa and the innocent cat, nobody gets killed. Indeed, we have another happy ending with Cory dating Lisa. Aww!
Interestingly enough, there's sentence in the book that reads the following: 'A small Toyota, jammed with a [sic.] least six teenagers, honked as it sped past him.' (p.41) Now comes the interesting bit. This is what can be read in The Stepsister, 'A white Honda Ciciv roared past them, at least six boys crammed in like sardines.' (p.124)
Later on in The New Girl it says, 'He put on the brights just in time to see a large gray animal scamper out onto the highway. Whump. There wasn't time to slow down. A single bump told his he had run it over.' (p.73) And the following can be read in The Prom Queen, 'I gasped as I saw a shadow dart into the road. I slammed on the brakes. But not in time. I felt the car jolt. I felt a bump. Something was under my tires.' (p.78)
Paint by number much? There's of course a dozen more similarities (Gary Brandt and Lisa Blume keep popping up, every story mentions Simon Fear's burnt mansion, phones ring, notes are passed, opets get murdered, etc.), but these have nothing to do with the story in itself - the teenagers/boys just speed by and the whump/bump lead to nothing special at all. It's not even a proper cliffhanger!
I wonder whether Robert Lawrence just has a rolodex with 'ideas' which he randomly takes out and makes into a story. One can imagine one of the cards reading 'car with 6 drives past', and another card reading, 'driving over an animal(?)', along with cards that say, 'Lisa Blume', 'threatening phonecall', 'pushing someone down the stairs', 'kill a pet', 'enter weirdo', etc. One of the most terrible of the cards must read something like 'big blue eyes & long blonde hair'. God! Next time I see someone with big blue eyes and long blonde hair I'll have to kill her just because they're the ever-willing victim in every one of his stories. Then again, it might break the concentration of my class is I start teaching with bloody hands and a dead person in one of the desks.
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RL Stine's The Prom Queen.
From the rolodex of RL Stine:
[enter: silver dagger-shaped letter-opener with sharpened edge] -- sometimes used as a weapon, sometimes used to incriminate an innocent character. (cf. The New Girl and The Prom Queen)
[compare one of the characters to a movie/pop star] -- 80's movie stars, actually. Thusfar we've had: Molly Ringwald, Daryl Hanah, Madonna and Cher. (cf. The Surprise Party and The Prom Queen)
[one of the characters must wear jeans and a green top] -- these can be sweaters or tank tops or T-shirts. Obligatory useless 70's fashion statement. (cf. every story)
[let main character (if girl) suspect boyfriend or other girl's boyfriend] -- this is a must, as there have to be as many red herrings as possible, but the killer must be acquainted/well known to the main character.
[always make sure the real killer is never suspected] -- here too, the killer must be a friend of the main character or family or an acquaintance.
[name make and type (if known) of car] -- if car is used.
[check difference between LCD and LED] -- oops! He forgot that one. LCD is a liquid crystal display, used in calculators an digital watches. LED is a light emitting diode, like the light that flashes when your harddisk is being accessed or the light on the tv to indicate it's on or off. LCDs don't flash red. LEDs do. 'The red LCD light blinked twice, then faded out.' (The Prom Queen, p.138)
[story must never be more than 170 pages] -- preferably somewhere between 158 and 168 pages.
Shall I go on? Well, no, but let's look at the differences between The Prom Queen and the other stories:
-- It's written in first person perspective instead of the usual third person point of view
-- There's more than one death - in fact, there's 4 all in all, and 2 almost deaths. A gorefest almost!
-- It's loosely based on Agatha Christie's Ten Little Niggers - the first one to apparently die, in this case, is the one who's bumping off the rest.
-- There ar no other significant differences.
Conclusion: now it's easier than ever to write your own RL Stine story and make millions overnight. Just follow these handy rolodex pointers, mix in a bit of a well respected suspense writer if the plots really start running thin and - hey presto - you have a story!
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Richard Beard's X20 is, I guess, not a book entirely suitable for the non-smoker (i.e. someone who's never smoked), as all the characters in this book smoke, quit smoking, try to quit smoking, get others to smoke or quit smoking or othwerwise do smoking-related things. This includes the two animals in the novel, a dog who loves the smell of pipes and a cat who's addicted to ashes and the smell of tobacco.
Amidst all this is the main character, Gregory Simpson, who tried to quit smoking and thus occupies his hands writing the novel you're reading, telling his recent history a-chronlogically, and basically divided into four parts: before he started smoking, after he started smoking, while he is smoking and when he tries to quit smoking, dividing the whole novel into 20 days, each day telling bits and pieces on these four parts.
Simpson's entire life is smoke-related: his uncle smoked (and died of lung cancer), his mom and dad desperately try to convince him not to pick up smoking, his college friends Julian Carr (rather familiar last name, eh), and Lucy Hinton both smoke and try to get him to smoke. Lucy even goes as far as to sleep with him in order to make him try a cigarette. He sleeps with her, but breaks his promise and doesn't smoke. Next to that are people like Theo, who is a botanist specialised in the tobacco plant (also heavy smoker, also dies of lung cancer) and who lives with Gregory. Theo also hands out free cigarettes to people who need them. Then there's Walter, a 104-year-old smoker, and his friends who, together with Gregory and Theo form the Suicide Club (the name's meaning is obvious), and Walter's daughter Emmy, who is a militant anti-smoker.
All in all, Gregory's life is an empty one (containing just smoke, so to speak), and he rejects the two girls, Lucy and Ginny, he meets on account of them a) wanting to get him to smoke (Lucy), or b) because they don't smoke (Ginny). Indeed, smoking is the only constant in his life, rejecting everything else from it and leaving him with pretty much nothing at all.
Beard's style is good. Considering this is a first novel it might even be called excellent. Obviously, he's paid a lot of attention to his contemporaries who have already established their names as good writers. Even though the storylines cross all the time, it's easy to follow them all without effort, creating a narrative strand not unlike, say, Ondaatje's novels, which comparison is enforced by all the bits and pieces of extra information Beard manages to squeeze in about, among other things, opera and Paracelsus, without it looking strained or contrived.
On the scales of recommendation, this old smoker gives it a whole-hearted 'satisfaction of the first cigarette of the day combined with a cup of coffee early in the morning'.
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Douglas Adams' Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency was, in the words of the author, 'A thumping good detective-ghost-horror-who dunnit-time travel-romantic-musical-comedy-epic.' Where exactly the romantic and the musical bits fit in I'm not sure, but what the hey.
This story is too elaborate to start to summarize, or even to name anything without having to link it to everything else (hence the holistic in the title), but there's an Electric Monk (who believes things for you, so you don't have to believe them yourself), Richard MacDuff, employee in some computer company whose boss is shot dead and a ghost, a centuries old, highly peculiar don, many more characters and, of course, Dirk Gently, whose Holistic Detective Agency isn't introduced until we're halfway through the novel.
Now try to think of the connection between all these and another ghost who is 4 billion years old, stir it for a bit, reverse the logic, mix with some quantum mechanics and let Douglas Adams do the rest while you're wondering how on Earth he came up with the things he comes up with.
On the whole, a very nice stepping stone towards John D. Barrow's Impossibility, which is about the limits of science and the universe, and one highly entertaining book, so on the scale of recommended to not recommended I give this a 'yes'.
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