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[blodeuedd]

The Doomspell (Cliff McNish): The title seemed pretty cool so I borrowed it, thinking it would be a children's fantasy in the same vein as Harry Potter or His Dark Materials. In a word, no. This is the first book of a trilogy (or series) and concerns Rachel and her brother Eric, who are transported to a mysterious world covered in perpetual winter, ruled over by a powerful witch. Sound familiar? Yeah, I thought so. This witch, Dragwena, has been kidnapping children from Earth for centuries, and makes them grow into deformed, dwarf-like hunchbacks who have to serve her or be killed. Rachel, it seems, has incredibly powerful magical abilities, so the witch wants to turn her into another witch; the former children, on the other hand, think she's the child-hope from an ancient prophecy.

One thing that really annoyed me was barely any physical description of Rachel and Eric, nor are we told how old they are. We get that information for some secondary characters, but not for the main ones. It may seem like a little thing, but I feel it's important to know their age when the characters are children. All we know is that Rachel is the eldest, and I figure she's about ten -- though there's a bizarre, almost-romantic scene with her and Morpeth, who's over five hundred, which is pretty creepy.

The main problem is that the writing isn't all that good. It's not bad, exactly, but there's hardly any character development at all. It's mostly action the whole way through, with occasional pauses when it seems the author thought, "Right, what are the characters thinking? Rachel was worried about her brother getting hurt. Okay, back to the action." What makes this even more puzzling is that at the end of the book, there's a chapter from the next volume, involving completely different characters who are fleshed out -- in three pages, no less! -- at least twice as much as anyone in all of The Doomspell's 200+ pages. So what gives? Also, whoever proofread this thing (if, indeed, anyone did) should be sacked. At one point, "X and Y arrived and did Z." Then, not two paragraphs later, "X and Y arrived and did Z." with only slight differences in wording between the two sentences. And I was very puzzled indeed when the witch's claws were described as having long fingernails on the ends, just as the physiology of witches was hard to understand: is it four jaws she has, or four rows of teeth? And does "tattooed eyes" mean she has no eyes, only tattoos? Or does she have regular eyes with tattoos on them? Because she seems to use her eyes the way normal people do.

Another thing that bugged me was the description of the witches' home world, a planet covered in storms where witches apparently just fly around and practice spells. I know I'm usually the annoying one who, while watching a movie, will point out inconsistencies in the plot or ask how such-and-such is possible, but think about it. How do they reproduce? Do they just spend their incredibly long lives riding the winds and casting spells at each other? Wouldn't that get dull after a while? Is there a very high suicide rate?

As you might have guessed, this isn't a book I'd recommend. Still, it was a very quick read, I finished it in two days as bedtime reading.


The Handmaid's Tale (Margaret Atwood): The year (secondary 4, I believe?) we read Brave New World and Animal Farm in English class, we didn't read this book, though I'm pretty sure the teacher talked about it a bit. At any rate, I knew the story, and I'd seen a part of the movie, probably on television, which perhaps confused me more than it should have. The part I remember seeing was the Salvaging, so I kept expecting that scene, but it comes near the very end of the book; I was beginning to think it wouldn't be there. Anyway, I knew it would be a very depressing read, so this was my subway reading for the past week, though I finished it before bed last night, as I had only twenty pages left to go. And despite my preventative measures (two chapters of Fushigi Yuugi between that and lights out) I still managed a horrible dream about being trapped in a similar, cult-like situation (I managed to escape). This was a book I felt I *should* read, CanLit and all that, but I'm glad to say that it was a good read, engrossing and chilling, as it should be. The mixing of religion and politics is a terrifying thing.


America's Next Top Model, Season 7: I was accidentally spoiled regarding the winner (I found out about it on a website I didn't expect it from) but even if I hadn't, I'd have known as soon as the final two were announced who it would be. This season's super-bitch was sent home fairly early, which is good because she was seriously crazy and gross, but the remaining ones were entertaining enough. "It's every little girl's dream to grow up and be a Cover Girl!" It is? Of the challenges, the celebrity couples one was neat and I liked the circus freaks one as well. The final fashion show was pretty silly, but I can't wait to see what next season's will be, since they seem determined to make it weirder and weirder every finale. As for the contestants, what the hell was Jaeda doing there? If ever a contestant on this show looked like a man, it was her. No wonder she was so distraught about getting her hair cut, from afar no one would misake her for a woman anymore. But she wouldn't shut up about it! And Melrose? Why would you want to be called that? No offense to anyone who was named Melrose by her parents (it's not your fault) but to have chosen it yourself... I wish the twins had done better, they were cool-looking. Young and naive, but not stupid. They'll learn, I guess.