karen.d

I have listening the Orson Wells radio adaption of 'War of The Worlds' and think that it works so much better than the book (I think it's something to do with the time frame the book is set in, that really put me off). I would be interested to see how you could put this story into a musical!

Great Review! I have heard so much about this book and how good it was, but never really knew what this was about. After reading the synopsis and your review, I think I am going to have to buy this book.

How wonderful! I think because you have the connection with the zoo, this might be an even better read for you. After reading the book, I would really love to go and visit Dartmoor Wildlife Park. I hope you enjoy the book.

'We Bought a Zoo- The Amazing True Story of a Broken-Down Zoo, and the 200 Animals That Changed a Family Forever' by Benjamin Mee Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers ISBN: 978-0-00-743182-3 Length: 313 Pages Opening Line: 'Mum and I arrived at Dartmoor Wildlife Park in Devon for the first time as the new owners at around six o'clock on the evening of 20 October 2006, and stepped out of the car to the sound of wolves howling in the misty darkness.' Review: Up until a few weeks ago, a group of friends (a mix of Spanish and English) and I would spend our Wednesday nights going to a discount evening at our local cinema. Not only did this provide an excellent form of Spanish practise for us Brits, but also a very enjoyable evening for all. This is on hiatus at the moment, but one of the films we have been to seen, is 'We Bought A Zoo' with Matt Damon and Scarlett Johansson. Having enjoyed the film (despite being a little schmaltzy), the end credits revealed that this film was based on a true story, told in the book I'm about to review. The story surrounds Benjamin Mee the writer of a DIY column buying a zoo with his family, despite none of them having any experience of animals whatsoever. The majority of the book deals with the problems Benjamin faces learning the many rules and regulations necessary to reopen Dartmoor Wildlife Park and also family tragedy. Being a animal lover, I knew that this book was going to be right up my street. Mee's writing is warm, funny and contains many interesting facts on animal psychology/behaviours and very amusing anecdotes about the individual animals within the park. Mee also deals with his personal tragedy with sensitivity and even at times, humour. In most of my reviews, I can always find something within a book that doesn't quite work, but with 'We Bought a Zoo' I can't find anything negative to say. The only disappointed I felt when reading this book, was that it had to end. Is this book worth a read? If you're an animal lover like I am, 'We Bought a Zoo' is definitely worth a read. Even if you aren't, I still think that this story of taking on the unknown is very good read. One word of advice, forget the film version of this, just read the book. It's brilliant.

A few days ago I started 'The Art of Racing in the Rain' by Garth Stein, but this morning my friend lent me a copy of 'The Dandelion Clock' by Guy Burt, so I have decided to put 'The Art of Racing in the Rain' on hold for for now. Guy Burt isn't really a mainstream writer (as far as I know), but I loved his books 'After the Hole' and 'Sophie', so I'm looking forward to reading 'The Dandelion Clock'.

Thanks! I have only read a few pages of this, but so far, so good.

This afternoon, I finished the wonderful book 'We Bought a Zoo' by Benjamin Mee and continuing the animal theme, I am just about to start 'The Art of Racing in the Rain' by Garth Stein.

'Sunday Snippet' It's funny how some of the books I have read are arduous and quite frankly a chore to get into and others, I whizz through. 'We Bought a Zoo' by Benjamin Mee, is the latter. I will probably finish this book today and I have thoroughly enjoyed it. Whilst with 'The Passage' by Justin Cronin I mentioned that this would be better in film form, I think that 'We Bought a Zoo' works perfectly as a book. The film version has the bare bones of the story, but the book version provides the flesh to tell this interesting story. Here's a 'snippet': Page 276: I didn't help, pointing out that by the tiger house (for want of something to say while we waited for the keys to arrive) there was blood on the padlock of the external door. 'We Bought a Zoo' by Benjamin Mee.

Yes the film was a bit shmaltzy, but I kind of enjoyed that. The film has no shmaltz, but plenty of humour and is really interesting.

I'm already 100+ pages into 'We Bought A Zoo' by Benjamin Mee and I'm finding this much more insightful and entertaining than the film version. I'm definitely enjoying this so far.

I've just had a go and it works! Thanks for your help

Thanks Frankie Just to check, to have a spoiler in a post, I have to press <> button next to the 'Image' button, then insert the text in the box and press ok. Is that correct? I understand what you mean about setting up the story, but I found the 'stop/start' pace of the story/storylines sometimes uncomfortable reading.

'The Passage' By Justin Cronin (Contains Spoilers!) Publisher: Orion Books ISBN: 978-0-7528-9784-4 Length: 766 Pages Opening Line: 'Before she became the Girl from Nowhere- the One Who Walked In, the First and Last and Only, who lived a thousand years- she was just a little girl in Iowa, named Amy, Amy Harper Bellafonte.' Being a door stop sized novel, I was bit hesitate about reading this novel. However, the cover alone pulled me into giving this a go. I wouldn't say that I was completely disappointed by this novel, but I certainly wouldn't say that this was the best book I have ever read. 'The Passage' is a book that is hard to get into for starters. It took me over 200+ pages, before I could comprehend where this book might be going. The set up is rather slow and a few times I contemplated abandoning this altogether. However, I would recommend to anyone who is/contemplating reading this novel, is to stick with it, the story gets better. What I would say with this novel, is that I think that this would translate better on film rather than on paper. Whether or not Justin Cronin had a film in mind when writing this novel, I do think that the vast landscape and multi layered story plot might be better explained on the big screen. A lot of dialogue could have been better though. Sometimes I didn't feel like the characters where real people talking and the speech felt a little disjointed. I also felt this novel was an amalgomation of many things (books and films) that I have seen before. In all fairness, a lot has been done in the apocalyptic/monster genre in the case of films and literature, so there is many more places for 'The Passage' could go with it. However, I felt that this was orignal enough, to keep my interest. Is this book worth a read? Yes I do think that this novel is worth a read. 'The Passage' is not without flaws, but the suspense and cliff hangers Cronin creates makes me want to read the sequel, if only to have some answers to the numerous unanswered questions left, in this novel. Apologises if the spoiler didn't work on this review. Can anyone help me with this?

I saw the film version of this a while ago, I thought that it would be interesting to read the book.

'Sunday Snippet' Now that I have finished 'The Passage' by Justin Cronin, I can add a different 'Sunday Snippet' rather than have continual extracts from the same book! I haven't really progressed past the prologue of 'We Bought a Zoo' by Benjamin Mee, so I haven't formed any opinion of this yet. Here's the first sentence of the novel: Page 1 : 'Mum and I arrived at Dartmoor Wildlife Park in Devon for the first time as the new owners at around six o'clock on the evening of 20 October 2006, and stepped out of the car to the sound of wolves howling in the misty darkness.' 'We Bought a Zoo'- The Amazing True Story of a Broken-Down Zoo, and the 200 Animals That Changed aFamily Forever' by Benjamin Mee.

I have this book waiting to be read! I look forward to reading what you think of this.

No you can't do much more with the genre. That's why I felt that 'The Passage' was a lot of stuff already done, rehashed and with a different name on it. I did enjoy this however, even if it isn't entirely original.

Yes this is exactly what I was thinking during the novel too! Although I have only seen the mini series of 'The Stand' and not read the book, I was thinking that Cronin had copied a lot of the elements of 'The Stand'.

Throughout 'The Passage' I had the feeling that Justin Cronin didn't know where the story was going a lot of the time, I found that partly frustrating as many times, he would build up a relationship between certain characters, only to kill them off. What is the point of investing your reader's time and emotions on characters, only to bring that to an abrupt/pointless end!?

But is it right for an author to build to something, only to never really progress to some form of understanding of what that something is? (does that make sense?) I know some things are revealed, but I didn't feel that I learnt much of what was going on at the end. It's a good way to sell the sequel I suppose!

I wouldn't say that this had the best cliff hanger I have ever read, it's certainly good though. I did feel a little cheated by the end actually, because it left me with more questions than answers to what this was all about.

Thanks for that. I might preorder it myself. POSSIBLE SPOILERS IN THIS NEXT BIT I think the fundamental thing, if someone decides to do a film version of 'The Passage' (I have a feeling that someone is making this into a film already) is to get the look of the 'virals' right. Films similar to genre of 'The Passage', like '28 Days Later' got the 'monster' element of the story right, because the make up wasn't too over done and so they were scary. Whoever designed the monsters in 'I am Legend' however, did a terrible job and the CGI elements were laughable and artificial.

After over a month of ploughing through it, I have FINALLY finished reading 'The Passage' by Justin Cronin. This is not a book without flaws, but in general I think that this is a very good read. During reading this book, I couldn't help but think that this would probably translate better on screen than on paper. What does everyone think? Nevertheless I will be buying the sequel to 'The Passage' when it comes out. Does anyone know when that is likely to be? Now I am just about to start reading 'We Bought a Zoo' by Benjamin Mee. Having seen the film version of this, I want to read the true account of how one man could resurrect a broken-down zoo.

So I FINALLY finished 'The Passage' this afternoon, after ploughing through it for the last month or so! I think that it has its flaws, but in general is a very good read. Pontalba, I was right with my prediction, this book finishes with a lot of cliff hangers! I will definitely be buying the next installment when it comes out to find out what happens. Will write a proper review of this soon.