forget your Unified Theory of Everything

The Hunger Games trilogy

Wed, 02 Mar 2011 20:04:14 GMT

I finished this a couple weeks ago. The short version is, I had too many problems with this series to really like it. My favorite things about it were the pacing of the first book and Katniss. My least favorite things were the pacing of the other books and clumsily handled themes. Below are lists of likes and dislikes about the book, with explanations. If all you want to read about The Hunger Games is squee, I suggest you stop when you get to the section labelled "dislikes".

Spoilers galore.

( What I liked and didn't like about the Hunger Games trilogy )

I would be interested in discussing The Hunger Games with anyone who has read it. My whole review thing is horrendously long, so I understand if you don't want to read the whole thing. But come on, tell me what you thought about the series! I guess a bunch of people liked it, and I'd love to hear why. I'm interested in the movies (are they really happening?), even though the books ended up not particularly sitting well with me.

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sci fi, fantasy, and mainstream today

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 05:44:00 GMT

I’ve always loved the fantasy genre. When I was younger, I had two major problems with it:
-It was sort of looked down upon. I saw fantasy/sci fi authors writing about it themselves, that it was not a “respected” genre, and the flack the writers receive for not being “literary” or “serious”. Mostly I didn’t like this because my sophomore English teacher told my mom she wished I’d read higher brow novels instead of reading Dune.
-When I was around 6-12 years old, I could never find anything aimed at me I wanted to read. I liked the fantasy novels, but they were some hard reading for a 9 year old sometimes. There was A Wrinkle In Time and Narnia and some others, but finding things was hard work!

I feel like all of that is different now. And I feel like the number one cause or effect is named Harry Potter.

( amiright? )

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Reason #1 why I like books so much

Wed, 18 Aug 2010 08:03:24 GMT

The nature of reality trips me up a lot, to the point where sometimes I can’t say stuff because I’m confused about what’s real or not. So I figured I’d say stuff about the nature of reality. This is kind of teenage existential angst stuff, the stuff I was worrying about when I was sixteen, the kind of stuff I think you’re supposed to get over by now, unless you take up a career in philosophy, religion, or theoretical physics.

I’m aware the fact that I sit around contemplating the universe probably comes off pretentious. I’m also aware that other people before me have done so better and already thought of (and probably have specific jargon for) all the things I’m saying.

Mostly I must just like to hear myself talk. I love words and I love writing and I love saying things and things being said. So I do also love to discuss, so I have a request for trippy existential books and discussion of trippy existential books at the end. You can skip to that part if you want. Or just not read at all. I won’t be hurt!

( Existential angst. )

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Book List

Sat, 05 Jun 2010 04:03:02 GMT

I want to keep a list of all the books I have read this year, in case I ever get time to review them (unlikely).

Finished
Invisible Cities - Italo Calvino
The Leisure Seeker - Michael Zadoorian
Man In The High Castle - Philip K. Dick
Love In Infant Monkeys - Lydia Millet
Demon's Covenant - Sarah Rees Brennan
Leviathan - Scott Westerfield
Reading Lolita In Tehran - Azar Nafisi

In progress
Daniel Deronda - George Eliot
Locksley - Nicholas Chase
At The Water's Edge - Carl Zimmer

Next Up
Remarkable Creatures - Tracy Chevalier
Harold and the Pursuit of Happiness -
The Girl Who Played Go

On Hiatus
Cosmos - Carl Sagan

I don't know how it can possibly be that I've only finished five books so far this year. Possibly all the fanfic . . . But Daniel Deronda should count as six!

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