Postby the_wolfs_howl » Thu Feb 05, 2009 7:45 am
Let's see. I finished Gathering Blue, and read Castle in the Air by Diana Wynne Jones (no relation to the Miyazaki movie Castle in the Sky). It's the sequel to Howl's Moving Castle, but the main character is a guy named Abdullah from a Middle Eastern-styled country far from Ingary, where Sophie and Howl live. He gets a magic carpet and a genie, and has a very Alladin-esque adventure. This was a highly enjoyable book, very much like a fairy tale yet exciting all the same. And everything got wrapped up so completely; at first I thought it was a little unrealistic, but then I reminded myself that it's supposed to feel like a fairy tale, where everything gets wrapped up and everyone lives happily ever after.
Now I'm reading The Amazing Mrs. Pollifax by Dorothy Gilman, which is about a sixty-year-old lady who works with the FBI or something like that. I'm mainly reading this one because she goes to Istanbul in it, and I used to live there, so I thought I might as well. (I noticed some errors in Gilman's Turkish *snicker snicker*)
I'm also halfway through Brightly Burning by Mercedes Lackey. It is awesome. I haven't read any of her other Valdemar books, so I'm new to the world of Heralds (who all have a Companion, which is a mysterious sentient being that looks like a horse). This story is about Lavan Chitward, who discovers he has the Gift of Firestarting (rather violently, I might add), and is Chosen by a Companion called Kalira. I especially like the deep relationship between Lavan and Kalira; they can call each other things like "gorgeous" and "my love", but you know it's not about romance because they're completely different kinds of creatures. Anyway, Brightly Burning has earned its place on my favorites.
You can find out things about the past that you never knew. And from what you've learned, you may see some things differently in the present. You're the one that changes. Not the past.
- Ellone, Final Fantasy VIII
"There's a difference between maliciously offending somebody - on purpose - and somebody being offended by...truth. If you're offended by the
truth, that's your problem. I have no obligation to not offend you if I'm speaking the truth. The truth is
supposed to offend you; that's how you know you don't got it."
- Brad Stine