Lucybird
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Posts posted by Lucybird
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I do not know of the girl who died but sorry for her family. Norway murders are very terrible and not about Muslims but I hear people saying here it is Christian that murdered people but this is all wrong it was political not religious. People who do not have facts should just shut up unless they know for sure.
The BBC say:
"The judge said Mr Breivik had argued that he was acting to save Norway and Europe from "Marxist and Muslim colonisation"."
So there could be a religious element to it (not that I am saying all Christians hate Muslims). However it does seem from his targets that he was focusing more on the political side.
I think those who were talking about him being Christian were basing on facts from his Facebook profile (something also reported on the BBC) but maybe they were trying to make a point that all terrorists are Muslims. We know little about his motivation as the judge does not want the trial to be a platform for Breivik's views (wisely I think). The BBC also has an article on his manifesto but it says little about his reasoning, although he does refer to himself as a member of The Knights Templar which also suggests some religious link.
I read about that Norwegian fellow today, absolutely awful and utterly (obviously) the wrong way to go about making a statement or getting worked up over how the country is being run but what can anyone do? When someone with no record of criminal or dangerous activity goes off insane like that no one can predict or prevent it. There's only so much you can paint a safe colour with laws and regulations. If someone is intent on committing as much carnage as they can before they are caught, they will do it and that can happen and that's one of the pretty eerie things about sharing the street with fellow humans, which seems quite bizarre when you consider it but it can happen almost anywhere. The gun laws are a lot more strict here yes but we all know in the concrete jungles you can be provided with pretty much everything when you hand over the cash.
From what's been reported of his manifesto it sounds like it was very carefully and cleverly planned too, it would have been very difficult to spot I think.
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The Economics of Ego Surplus- Paul MacDonnold
I was sent a copy of this book free in exchange for an honest review
Synopsis (from Amazon)
Part action novel, part literary novel, part guidebook to economics, The Economics of Ego Surplus is the story of college instructor Kyle Linwood. Anticipating a relaxing summer with his girlfriend and his PhD dissertation, he gets recruited by the FBI to help with an obscure case of terrorist internet “chatter,” which explodes into a shocking, mysterious assault on U.S. financial markets. As the economy melts down and a nation panics, Kyle follows a trail of clues from Dallas to New York City to Dubai, United Arab Emirates. In his quest to discover the truth, he will be forced to confront the assumptions underlying his education as well as his life. But will it be enough to save America from the most brilliant terrorist plot ever conceived?
Review
I must admit I was sceptical about this book. I liked the idea of trying to teach something about economics through a book, but I guess my ideas of economics and of crime novels just didn’t fit together. I was intrigued to see how McDonnold would teach while still making the book entertaining.
I must say I was impressed. It took a little time for the book to get going but once I got into it I really couldn’t put it down! It was pretty exciting and I was waiting to see what the main character and the ‘terrorists’ would do next. I’m not sure if their sabotage of the economy is really plausible but it made for a good read.
I do think I actually learnt a bit too, I think I understand a bit more about how the market works now, and it gives some grounding behind some of the ideas the government have been flying around in the last few years, things such as to keep spending to help the economy recover, something which seemed a little strange to me before. As I was reading it to review I was trying to see if it would teach me anything but I don’t think it would be obviously doing so if you weren’t looking for it.
Actually the main problem I would say is the name, I kind of get how it fits in with the story as a whole but from just looking at the cover I wouldn’t see it as a crime novel, I may not even see it as a novel at all, at least not until I had read the subtitle.
4/5
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Finished The Economics of Ego Surplus was really impressed, especially as the author is an economist, not an author.
Starting The Weight of Silence- Heather Gudenkauf
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Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets- J.K. Rowling
Synopsis (from Amazon, adapted by me)
Harry Potter is a wizard. He is in his second year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Little does he know that this year will be just as eventful as the last ...even getting there is an adventure in itself! The three firm friends, Harry, Ron and Hermione, are soon immersed in the daily round of Potions, Herbology, Charms, Defence Against the Dark Arts, and Quidditch. But then horrible and mysterious things begin to happen. Harry keeps hearing strange voices, and sinister and dark messages appear on the wall.
Review
How much I love his book, for the longest time it was my favourite Harry Potter book, and now it shares that position with Half-Blood Prince (if you have read both you can probably guess what I liked about these two). I must admit part of what I loved about this book is that I felt I was looking for it for forever after having loved Philosopher's Stone- I must have missed it immediately though because I don't have a first, or even second edition. My joy when I found it, finally, though was so strong.
I must admit this is the one book where I really like Ginny, and it's a book where we first really see her (apart from a small couple of glimpses in Philosopher's Stone)
as well as a book where Ginny is a very important character.
I guess I like the funny little moments when she is in front of Harry she seems so young and innocent
and yes I think that picture of her is important, you would never in a million years suspect Ginny, or at least not until she was going to tell Harry and Ron.
Something I do find about the book though is that it really is very, very dark. I know they say that the books get darker, and maybe in ways they do, certainly there is more of a threat a little later on, but at least that threat is known. I mean nobody knows what is happening in the school, nobody knows who is controlling what is happening, and Harry is hearing voices in the wall. Sometimes an unknown horror is worse than one that you at least know something about, at least with the later books they knew the threat was Voldemort and they knew, at least up to a point what they would get from him. Even when you know what this horror is it still seems so unknown and impossible to control
I mean even Voldemort can't kill you by simply looking at you! (As they say in Potterwatch (Deathly Hallows:
“So, people, let’s try and calm down a bit. Things are bad enough without inventing stuff as well. For instance, this new idea that You-Know-Who can kill with a single glance from his eyes. That’s a basilisk, listeners. One simple test: Check whether the thing that's glaring at you has got legs. If it has, it’s safe to look into its eyes, although if it really is You-Know-Who, that’s still likely to be the last thing you ever do.”
And that's not even mentioning giant spiders, or an angry Snape!
What I really like about this book though is the information we get about Tom Riddle. It's really interesting to see where he came from, and a bit of what he was like in school. I find it interesting that even early on I liked this aspect, even when I did not know how important it would turn out to be later on
5/5
Also to let you guys know I am giving away all the Harry Potter books on my blog right now, and you are more than welcome to enter
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I like yours too poppy
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Yeah, the giraffe made of plasters
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I'm reading The Economics of Ego Surplus which is a kind of economic guide in a novel, rather clever actually and I'm quite enjoying it.
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HArry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2, a little disappointing if I'm honest.
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Ok here goes
In the Kitchen- Monica Ali
Dracula- Bram Stocker
Dr Strange and Mr Norrel- Susanna Clarke
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Almost finished with my re-re-re-re-re(etc.)read of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
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now I want a coffee
Ditto
Or specifically a hazelnut latte...yumm
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Has anyone seen the Elastoplast one? Kinda cute
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Syren- Angie Sage
Syren is Book 5 in the Septimus Heap series
Synopsis (from Amazon)
In the fifth book of this Magykal series, Septimus and his friends find themselves on an island whose secrets are as dark and dangerous as its inhabitants. Septimus Heap returns to the House of Foryx with Spit Fyre to pick up Jenna, Nicko, Snorri, and Beetle. But the journey home does not go well and when Septimus and his friends are caught in a storm, Spit Fyre crashes into the Rokk Lighthouse. They are rescued by the lighthouse keeper who is disturbingly sinister, and who has an equally sinister cat …And all the while, Septimus is trying to fight the strange pull he’s feeling to the island and its mysterious secrets.
Review
There is something about the Septimus Heap series in that it takes a while to really get going, you get hints that it will get exciting but it’s only towards the end that it actually becomes exciting with a gradual build. his was still true of Syren, although I do think it got going a little quicker than the previous books. I think I am enjoying the stories more as we go through the series as well, and whereas before I read the other books without and real anticipation I am actually really looking forward to Darke, I just wish it was out already!
Really my main problem with this series is that it isn’t much of a series in the way the books link together. In some ways this one was linked to the other books, and I can definitely see how it may link to the next book, but it also seems in some ways unneccessary to the series as a whole, and as if Sage was just trying to stretch out the books.
3.5/5
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Flesh and Grass- Libby Cone
I was sent a free copy of this book in return for an honest review
Synopsis (from Amazon)
Seventeenth-century Holland was a major power with a large, wealthy middle class built on spices and slavery. Dutch schemes to colonize the New World brought few interested parties, but Pieter Cornelissoon Boom, an early Mennonite with a dream of communal living, brings a few families to Delaware Bay in 1663. Their "Little Common-wealth" is just getting started when the bloody economic rivalry between Holland and England unleashes violence on the coast of Delaware. The Nieuw Netherland colonies swing between Dutch and English ownership in a series of Anglo-Dutch wars. Cornelis, Boom's blind son, tells the story of the community (based loosely on the ill-fated Delaware settlement of Pieter Plockhoy) in its various forms of existence, relying on his exquisite memory of scent.Seventeenth-century Holland was a major power with a large, wealthy middle class built on spices and slavery. Dutch schemes to colonize the New World brought few interested parties, but Pieter Cornelissoon Boom, an early Mennonite with a dream of communal living, brings a few families to Delaware Bay in 1663. Their "Little Common-wealth" is just getting started when the bloody economic rivalry between Holland and England unleashes violence on the coast of Delaware. The Nieuw Netherland colonies swing between Dutch and English ownership in a series of Anglo-Dutch wars. Cornelis, Boom's blind son, tells the story of the community (based loosely on the ill-fated Delaware settlement of Pieter Plockhoy) in its various forms of existence, relying on his exquisite memory of scent.
Review
I quite enjoyed Libby Cone's first book War on the Margins, and when she e-mailed me about reviewing her new book Flesh and Grass I was immediately interested. Generally when I read historical fiction I read fiction based around the two world wars but I thought why not get out of my comfort zone a little.
Unfortunately I didn't find Flesh and Grass as good as War on the Margins. I found it a little slower, and I didn't really feel like I ever got into it. There were elements I liked, I thought the emotions were done really well, and you could really understand how smells were attached to emotions for Cornelis. Historically it was interesting too, but I didn't really get much from it about what it was like to be in completely new place. While events which would bring strong emotions were well described the general day-to-day feelings brought on by moving to a new place were barely touched upon.
I must admit that Libby Cone does have the tendency to write like a historian rather than an author. The topics are interesting but turning them into a story adds little, and it seemed to add less here than in War on the Margins.
3/4
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Finished Flesh and Grass and started a re-read of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
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Took some stuff to the charity shop and ended up coming out with The Weight of Silence- Heather Gudenkauf and Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell- Susanna Clarke
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I learnt to play the violin and the piano when I was younger but I rarely play either now.
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Do let us know what you thought when you've read some
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4, 3, 2, 1
Awful film, so far fetched it was stupid
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The Piano Tuner- Daniel Mason
Synopsis (from Amazon)
On a misty London afternoon in 1886, piano tuner Edgar Drake receives a strange request from the War Office: he must leave his wife, and his quiet life in London, to travel to the jungles of Burma to tune a rare Erhard grand piano. The piano belongs to Surgeon-Major Anthony Carroll, an enigmatic British officer, whose success at making peace in the war-torn Shan States is legendary, but whose unorthodox methods have begun to attract suspicion.
So begins the journey of the soft-spoken Edgar across Europe, the Red Sea, India, Burma, and at last into the remote highlands of the Shan States. En route he is entranced by the Doctor's letters and by the shifting cast of tale-spinners, soldiers and thieves who cross his path.
As his captivation grows, however, so do his questions: about the Doctor's true motives, about an enchanting and elusive woman who travels with him into the jungle, about why he came. And, ultimately, whether he will ever be able to return home unchanged to the woman who awaits him there . . .
Sensuous and lyrical, rich with passion and adventure, THE PIANO TUNER is an unforgettable and haunting novel.
Review
I wrote about the trouble I was having with this book in a very waffley post on my blog earlier this week. It's not that it was a bad book by any means, it was well written, and enough happened for me not to give up but the going was very slow, I was almost halfway through the book before Edgar even reached Burma and really for a book that supposedly is about him visiting Burma that really is something which takes a long time to arrive. I must admit that I found that the pace did quicken as I got further into the novel, and that meant I found the last few chapters actually went comparatively quickly, but two weeks for a book is a long time for me (especially as I had already read six others the same month) and that spoiled my enjoyment a little.
There were lots of sections which got me intrigued and wanting to know more, but often nothing more was said about them which made me a little annoyed as they were part of what kept me reading. In fact the most interesting portion for me was the man with one story, and I think I would have actually prefered a book about him to the book that was actually written! (I checked, it doesn't seem Amazon has a book by Mason about the man with one story, although his second novel, A Distant Country sounds interesting) By the end I did want to know what was going to happen next but the end was a bit of a let down for me, there were lots of unanswered questions which I don't even really have any theories about. I actually got the impression Mason didn't know the answers either.
3/5
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Finished The Piano Tuner Thursday now reading Syren which is the next Septimus Heap book
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So glad you enjoyed The Earth Hums in B Flat. I read it a couple of years ago, and lent it to a couple of friends who had both grown up in a small Welsh town and in the same sort of time period, and they both felt very nostalgic reading it, saying it completely conjured up images of their childhood.
I'm glad people who actually grew up in Wales found it nostelgic, I was slightly worried I was just stereotyping.
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I loved it! But throughout the book I was really sad that I never really read Jane Eyre. I remember my 8th grade English teacher giving us a simple, short version of the book. And I hated it, I thought it was awful. But I'm thinking I won't hate it so much if it's Charlotte's words I read instead of some doofus dumbed down version.
I think you would get more out of The Eyre Affair having read Jane Eyre, worth trying anyway
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Ooh hope you like The Eyre Affair Hyzenthlay
Your Book Activity Today ~ Thread 15
in General Book Discussions
Posted · Edited by Lucybird
I'm reading A Week in December- Sebastian Fawkes, it's being a bit slow to start but I have faith.
Oh and received Emotional Geology in the post from Linda Gillard herself, I won it in a blog giveaway. I seem to be very lucky when it comes to Linda's books!