Labor Day Catch-All

I have a couple of updates for reading challenges and other miscellaneous happenings, so I’m going to write about it all in this one post so hold on tight as I switch gears often!

First, Venessa and I have been enjoying the newly renovated Lake Jackson Library Branch.  We had been looking forward to this all summer and it was worth the wait.  The renovated building is larger, well lit and includes more shelf space, a lot more computer terminals and seating.  The children’s section has the best spot near the windows making it bright and cheery, the YA section has some comfy reading nooks and my favorite spot is the reading room.

On our first visit Venessa checked out the movie Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron and has watched it nearly every day (we recently renewed it for another week because she couldn’t part with it).  I think it’s cute because I recently discovered The Black Stallion and The Black Stallion Returns is streaming on Netflix.  I grew up with both of those movies and watched them constantly, especially The Black Stallion Returns.  And do you know how I watched them so much?  By checking them out from the library!

Doctor Who: Asylum of the Daleks

Season 7 of Doctor Who premiered on September 1st, did you see it?  I bought it through Amazon and I think it’s an okay start.  Daleks are Daleks and I feel like we’ve been there done that with them and I’m more excited about next weeks episode with dinosaurs on a spaceship.  But if this season continues with more stand alone type adventures, I’m all in.  I’m also very curious how the new companion will work out because SPOILER ALERT she was a human turned into a Dalek who was destroyed in this episode.  How does she go from destroyed human-Dalek to companion?  We’ll see!  And another thing, am I the only one not on board this Amy-Rory divorce because Amy can’t have any more children?  This seemed odd considering Amy is smarter than that and should know Rory by now and remember that he did wait 2,000 years for her.  And I know they didn’t get to raise River but she’s still around, she’s still their daughter and it felt like she was forgotten in this episode.  They did make up but there's probably more challenges to come for those two so I guess we’ll see how this works out.  END SPOILER ALERT 

On the reading front, the Summer In Discworld reading challenge hosted by Tales of the Marvelous has ended and I was pathetic.  I only read two Discworld books which I don’t find as very impressive stats but of course, they were great reads and I know I can always count on Discworld to lift me out of a reading funk.  Check out the review site for the Summer In Discworld challenge to see what others thought of Discworld: http://www.blenza.com/linkies/links.php?owner=MarvelousTales&postid=27May2012a&meme=9886

And here are my two reviews:

Guards! Guards! (Discworld #8)
Night Watch (Discworld #29)

With the end of summer and Halloween just around the corner you know what that means... the R.I.P. VII reading challenge!

Yes, it’s back and this will be the second time I will be participating.  I think Carl can see my bookshelves from his part of the country.  Last year I participated in the group read of Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman because I happened to have a copy.  This year there will be a group read of The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman and I also happen to have a copy too.  I’m hoping Venessa will finally let me read it aloud to her.  She says it’s scary but this is the same little girl who would cover her eyes while watching Doctor Who  but would then sneak out of bed to watch over my shoulder.  So, back to the R.I.P. Challenge which runs from September 1st through October 31st.  This challenge, or rather, experience, has different levels to participate and can include any book/short story/movie/TV show that fits within these categories:

Mystery
Suspense
Thriller
Dark Fantasy
Gothic
Horror
Supernatural

Visit Stainless Steel Droppings for more details.  I’m not going to commit to a level this year.  I’ll just see what I read and watch.  I’ve already started reading The Orphan’s Tales: In The Night Garden by Catherynne M. Valente which fits in nicely as a Dark Fantasy and it is absolutely wonderful so far.  Other books I have on my shelf that I’d like to read for R.I.P. are:

World War Z by Max Brooks

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (for the group read)

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote

Hell by Robert Olen Butler

The Hangman’s Daughter by Oliver Pötzsch

Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

The Orphan's Tales: In The Night Garden by Catherynne M. Valente (Currently reading)

The Lantern by Deborah Lawrenson (I asked for this book because it was a group read last year)

We’ll see what movies I’ll watch.  I’m going to try and get a viewing of Army of Darkness in and Evil Dead 2.  I’ve also been watching Dark Shadows off and on over the last three months so I’ll probably watch some more.  So if you want to see all the action here’s a link to the review site: http://ripviireviewsite.blogspot.com/ and blog or not, everyone is welcome to participate.

So that’s it!  Hope everyone has been enjoying their three day weekend!

Night Watch by Terry Pratchett (Discworld #29)

Commander Sam Vimes is about to be a father.  But he has been forbidden from his wife’s side.  What’s a good copper to do besides wear a hole in the carpet pacing?  Catch bad guys!  And Carcer, known murderer, bad guy extraordinaire, has been spotted and the Watch has him surrounded.  Joining the hunt is the best thing Sam can think of to keep him occupied.  But a harrowing encounter with Carcer atop the Unseen University Library during a freak magical storm sends Vimes and Carcer back in time.  Their presence alone disrupts the thread of time but when Carcer murders John Keel, the man who mentored a young Sam Vimes, the older Vimes must assume Keel’s identity and mentor himself if he is to be the Sam Vimes that he is.  Even if time has been disrupted certain events must take place: teaching a young Sam how to be a copper, being the face of a revolution and grabbing hold of Carcer to bring him to justice and back to the timeline they belong in.  If Sam fails, the life he knows, will never be or have been.

Oh time travel what a tangled web you weave and Pratchett handles it wonderfully though there were moments that confused me but I think that’s just the nature of time travel and this is Discworld after all.  Night Watch is also quite dark and gritty, and I’m often surprised by this at times because the humor and fantasy elements are hilarious and outrageous.  Pratchett doesn’t shy away from violence and the truth and motivations behind the mob mentality, rebellions and class warfare.  There’s also plenty of light moments and comedy.  I don’t know how Pratchett is able to balance everything out but he does.  There are moments that make you cringe, nod your head in agreement, stifle a laugh; his books are very engaging.

I really loved seeing the younger versions of Sam, Colon, Nobby and Vetineri.  A skinny, street urchin, pickpocket Nobby is the cutest, filthiest thing ever and Vetineri is just as sly and smart as an assasin just as he will be a sly, two-steps-ahead-of-you patrician.  And of course, Sam is Sam, always the copper, always determined to do what is right and he has become one of my favorite characters, not just from Discworld, but also from the fantasy genre altogether.

Guards! Guards! by Terry Pratchett

Captain Sam Vimes of the Night Watch is a drunk.  There is a dragon loose in his city.  Why is there a dragon?  They’ve been extinct for ages.  But some overly ambitious Elucidated Brethren have summoned it and it’s wrecking havoc on poor Ankh-Morpork and Sam will not have it!  So that means Sam is going to have to sober up, his men will have to find their courage to stop it.  And with luck - quite a bit of luck, actually - perhaps they can manage to not get killed along the way.


Back when I read Snuff I became a fan of Sam Vimes.  I met him at a point in his life where he’d already achieved so much, he is a husband, a father and Commander of the City Watch, having gained a few more titles along the way.  I’d always wanted to see what he was like before that and I got my opportunity to do so in Guards! Guards!  This Sam is so very different yet he is the Sam I met in Snuff.  In Guards! Guards! we meet Sam for the first time, drunk and mumbling to himself in the gutters.  He is just a captain of the Night Watch, with only two men under his command.  Not much is expected of them and they actually prefer it that way.  But Sam will not stand by to let a dragon destroy his city.  When he came to his senses and knew he would have to do something about it I couldn't help but feel proud of him; that was the Sam I got to know in Snuff.


I also got to meet Lady Sybil Ramkin, Sam’s future wife (I am not considering this a spoiler since I already wrote about her in my Snuff review), an eccentric heiress who is an expert on swamp dragons, the very small brethren of the very large dragon causing chaos.  She also plays a big part helping Sam and the Night Watch towards a future or being more than just mall security.  It’s also nice to see the beginnings of their romance.  They’re so cute!


The Patrician is back too and this book just made me like that guy even more.  I also got to meet some new people: Colon, Nobby, Carrot, the Librarian and Errol, the swamp dragon.  I’m not sure if Errol makes much of an appearance in other books but I had to talk about him because he plays an important part in the fight against the dragon menace.  We learn from Lady Sybil that swamp dragons will often re-work their plumbing, sometimes with messy results, but Errol manages a way to re-work his plumbing that made me do a double take before realizing that what I read was what I read.  It’s so delightfully hilarious and silly (and gross).  Colon and Nobby are the grizzled veterans; grizzled veterans in the way that they know where all the good watering holes are at.  The Night Watch takes on Carrot, a human raised by Dwarves (visions of Elf can not be helped with this scenario).  Carrot is very naive and the conversations he has with Colon and Nobby are great when they try to explain how the non-Dwarf world really works.  And there’s the Librarian, a wizard-turned-orangutan after a spell gone awry, who does not concern himself much with the goings on of humans but when someone dares steals a book from his library he is dead set to find it, even if he must communicate by charades.


A great cast of quirky, unique characters... check!  Excellent and witty dialogue... check!  A laugh out loud storyline... and check!  I’m sensing a pattern with these books and I’m liking it.  So far, the 3 out of 3 I’ve read have been fantastic.  I have not been disappointed and once again I’m looking forward to more!

Summer In Discworld

Well, I’m still in the middle of the Once Upon A Time Challenge and all is going well.  But that won’t stop me from joining along on another reading challenge.  This one took no second thoughts about participating.  It’s the Summer In Discworld challenge hosted by Tales of the Marvelous.  So you know what that means?


Lots of Discworld!


I’ve already dipped my toe into Terry Pratchett’s Discworld on two occasions, with Snuff and Going Postal, and I’m looking forward to more!  And of course, I am all stocked up so this gives me a good excuse to haul these books out of the bag they've been sitting in since I bought them.


Now, it’s all about having fun and enjoying the experience of this strange flat world that sits on the back of four elephants who stand upon a turtle floating through space.  There will also be a group read for Going Postal, which I recently read and loved and can’t wait to see what others think.  More details can be found here.

I’m a bit late writing this since the reading challenge started on June 1st, but it continues on through August 31st so there is still lots of time to enjoy a silly adventure or two in Ankh-Morpork.  So join along if you can, you won’t regret it!  And don’t forget to check out those who will be taking the plunge as well: http://marveloustales.wordpress.com/2012/06/01/summer-in-discworld-reviews/

P.S.  I'm about 100 pages into Guards! Guards! and it's fabulous!