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Dec. 28th, 2007 12:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
blodeueddMmm, curry... You're so delicious!
I forced myself to do some sewing today, because I haven't been doing so well in my proposed blitz, so I'm almost done lining the pencil cases. Only two more to go, and they're already pinned, which is half the battle. Once I'm done today's reviews, and my curry, I'll finish those up.
White Oleander (Janet Fitch):
I finished this book thirty seconds ago -- that's officially the quickest I've ever gone from consuming to reviewing! Also, I'd like to state for the record that each time I think of this title, I get "Oleander", by Sarah Harmer, stuck in my head. And that as I read this on the subway, I was more than once completely lost in the words, and shut down my brain's usual multi-tasking functions; normally, I can quite easily remain aware of my surroundings while being immersed in book, and it's rare that I completely loose track of where I am.
What to say, what to say? It's a heart-wrenching book, for all that I (foolishly) started it in an annoyed state of mind, much as I did Brick, because of the super-poetic language. It's incredibly lyrical, is what it is. It's perhaps disingenuous of Astrid (the narrator) to claim that she didn't inherit her mother's poetry, as the book is really a poem in prose, but if you can forgive that, you'll soon be wrapped up in Astrid's often unfortunate, always fascinating, life.
I always have a hard time connecting with stories of dysfunctional mother-daughter relations, mostly because my own mother has always seemed to me the archetype of what a mother should be*, and when we differed, it was never in any way because of how she acted out her role as parent. In this case, I was accutely able to feel both sides of it, maybe because while the story is Astrid's, and we're obviously going to respond to her more strongly, Ingrid's way of doing things is maybe closer to what I would do if I were only thinking of myself, and so I can understand, but not condone.
The ending was perfect in its simplicity, true to the character of Astrid, and it managed to bring closure without conveniently boxing up the past. The imagery of the suitcases struck a particular chord in me, and I thought it was a most beautiful way to sum everything up.
Final verdict: 8.5/10
* One day, I'll write about The Goddesses Within (by Jane Shinoda Bolen), which is a book that had a profound impact on my life. Where I'm so much an Athena (and, to a lesser degree, Artemis) it's not even funny, my mother embodies all those loving, nurturing qualities of Demeter, maybe because her own mother was exactly the opposite, in many ways.
Carnivale (second season):
At first, it felt like everything was on fast-forward, but anything would have been, compared to the plodding first season. What I want to know is, why didn't they pace it that way from the start? Maybe then we would have gotten the rest of the story!
I'll admit that I wasn't too hopeful starting out, but I was quickly charmed (or at least intrigued) by this new Ben Hawkins, who finally seemed to want to do something, instead of run away. The same goes for most of the other characters, who were apparently jump-started between seasons. After having viewed this season, the first one seems like a painfully slow pilot episode, that could have been effectively done in half the time.
Sadly, I missed out on the impact of the last episode, because for some reason the episodes I downloaded were mislabelled: 23 and 24 were switched around! Thus, I found myself mightily confused when, in (what I thought was) episode 23, the carnival was suddenly set up and doing business in New Canaan, and Sofie washeal -- er, doing stuff that she had no business being able to do. Still, it didn't occur to me that I had actually missed out on anything, even though I did wonder what the season finale was going to be, seeing as how these shocking things were going on in the second-last episode. Then, when I started (what my computer told me was) episode 24, I couldn't figure out why it felt like we'd gone back in time. After some minutes, I realised what was going on, but it was too late by then, so I just shrugged and kept on watching.
Overall, as I said, this season was much better paced than the first, and managed to follow the different threads in a much more satisfying way. My biggest problem with the first season was how the Brother Justin thread was being given as much weight as everything else, without it being justified, and it all seemed to be going nowhere fast; in the second, everything was balanced in a much more satisfying way, and although I knew there wasn't anything more forthcoming, it was hard not to feel disappointed. It should have been like this all along! My only complaint, regarding the pacing, was the many, many times that it was obvious that something was going to go wrong with the ferris wheel, that someone would get hurt. I was sure it would be while Sofie was helping out with it, and when it wasn't, I thought that it was a lot of foreshadowing for nothing -- good thing something finally did happen, or I would have wondered what that was all about!
Final verdict: I hereby adjust my review for season 1, dropping it to 7/10, and award season 2 a whopping 8/10.
Hee hee, the wine makes me write... maybe not-as-profound-as-they-could-have-been reviews. Bloh.
Now. time for strawberries and banana with cream!
*licks lips*
I forced myself to do some sewing today, because I haven't been doing so well in my proposed blitz, so I'm almost done lining the pencil cases. Only two more to go, and they're already pinned, which is half the battle. Once I'm done today's reviews, and my curry, I'll finish those up.
White Oleander (Janet Fitch):
I finished this book thirty seconds ago -- that's officially the quickest I've ever gone from consuming to reviewing! Also, I'd like to state for the record that each time I think of this title, I get "Oleander", by Sarah Harmer, stuck in my head. And that as I read this on the subway, I was more than once completely lost in the words, and shut down my brain's usual multi-tasking functions; normally, I can quite easily remain aware of my surroundings while being immersed in book, and it's rare that I completely loose track of where I am.
What to say, what to say? It's a heart-wrenching book, for all that I (foolishly) started it in an annoyed state of mind, much as I did Brick, because of the super-poetic language. It's incredibly lyrical, is what it is. It's perhaps disingenuous of Astrid (the narrator) to claim that she didn't inherit her mother's poetry, as the book is really a poem in prose, but if you can forgive that, you'll soon be wrapped up in Astrid's often unfortunate, always fascinating, life.
I always have a hard time connecting with stories of dysfunctional mother-daughter relations, mostly because my own mother has always seemed to me the archetype of what a mother should be*, and when we differed, it was never in any way because of how she acted out her role as parent. In this case, I was accutely able to feel both sides of it, maybe because while the story is Astrid's, and we're obviously going to respond to her more strongly, Ingrid's way of doing things is maybe closer to what I would do if I were only thinking of myself, and so I can understand, but not condone.
The ending was perfect in its simplicity, true to the character of Astrid, and it managed to bring closure without conveniently boxing up the past. The imagery of the suitcases struck a particular chord in me, and I thought it was a most beautiful way to sum everything up.
Final verdict: 8.5/10
* One day, I'll write about The Goddesses Within (by Jane Shinoda Bolen), which is a book that had a profound impact on my life. Where I'm so much an Athena (and, to a lesser degree, Artemis) it's not even funny, my mother embodies all those loving, nurturing qualities of Demeter, maybe because her own mother was exactly the opposite, in many ways.
Carnivale (second season):
At first, it felt like everything was on fast-forward, but anything would have been, compared to the plodding first season. What I want to know is, why didn't they pace it that way from the start? Maybe then we would have gotten the rest of the story!
I'll admit that I wasn't too hopeful starting out, but I was quickly charmed (or at least intrigued) by this new Ben Hawkins, who finally seemed to want to do something, instead of run away. The same goes for most of the other characters, who were apparently jump-started between seasons. After having viewed this season, the first one seems like a painfully slow pilot episode, that could have been effectively done in half the time.
Sadly, I missed out on the impact of the last episode, because for some reason the episodes I downloaded were mislabelled: 23 and 24 were switched around! Thus, I found myself mightily confused when, in (what I thought was) episode 23, the carnival was suddenly set up and doing business in New Canaan, and Sofie was
Overall, as I said, this season was much better paced than the first, and managed to follow the different threads in a much more satisfying way. My biggest problem with the first season was how the Brother Justin thread was being given as much weight as everything else, without it being justified, and it all seemed to be going nowhere fast; in the second, everything was balanced in a much more satisfying way, and although I knew there wasn't anything more forthcoming, it was hard not to feel disappointed. It should have been like this all along! My only complaint, regarding the pacing, was the many, many times that it was obvious that something was going to go wrong with the ferris wheel, that someone would get hurt. I was sure it would be while Sofie was helping out with it, and when it wasn't, I thought that it was a lot of foreshadowing for nothing -- good thing something finally did happen, or I would have wondered what that was all about!
Final verdict: I hereby adjust my review for season 1, dropping it to 7/10, and award season 2 a whopping 8/10.
Hee hee, the wine makes me write... maybe not-as-profound-as-they-could-have-been reviews. Bloh.
Now. time for strawberries and banana with cream!
*licks lips*
