bookshelves of doom

Not an Onion article:

Stephen King plots The Shining sequel.

Stephen, I love you. 

But I'm asking you.  Please.  FOR THE LOVE OF GOD.  LET IT BE.

ANOTHER ONE??

I really, truly thought that the title of the book had just been changed.  And the cover art.  And the publisher.  And the author.

But, no.  As if one Scarlet Letter sequel wasn't enough.

This turn of events makes me want to punch myself in the face.  Because then maybe I could ignore the heartache.  Ag.  Ag ag ag ag ag.

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Previously:  How NOT to pull me in with your advertising campaign, #24.

How NOT to pull me in with your advertising campaign, #24.

This blurb...

"Have you ever closed The Scarlet Letter and yearned to see what the future holds for Hester Prynne and her headstrong daughter Pearl?"

...makes me want to run screaming.  Is the Austen fanfiction not enough?  Must we really be subjected to Hawthorne fanfic, too?? 

OH, THE HUMANITY.

Slush Reading, Seuss Style.

From Jim C. Hines' Slush I Read:

Do you like fanfic with vamps?

I do not like them Mary Sue.
Why do these vamps all worship you?

Go!  Go!  Go read the entire thing, it all its hilarious glory!

(via OUP)

Ron Howard and H.P. Lovecraft?

Really?

Oookay.

From the LA Times:

"Look, it's challenging, but if we get it right, it could be really original and psychologically interesting and scary in a great way. And it's a graphic novel, this is new territory for me."

Well, here's hoping that it works.  If it does, I'll totally give him a high-five.

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In related news, due to @wendigratz, I now need to buy The Stars Are Right.

This will not be a popular opinion.

The only thing?

That could make?

A Sweet Valley High movie more annoying?

Making Diablo Cody the boss of it.

...

...

Yes, I was one of the four people on the planet who didn't like Juno.

(news via @ecwpress)

Not Tim Burton's Alice.

Hmmm.  I do like the shrinking room.  And the cast is way more interesting than Tim Burton's cast.

So, should I give Tin Man another chance or what?  I watched the first installment, but the pacing was so weird and it seemed like it was trying too hard and sometimes Zooey just... doesn't doing it for me.  And I found Claire from 90210 ridiculous rather than menacing.  Those lame tattoos?  Also... she's CLAIRE.

(via educating alice)

EW's suggestions for the Next Big Picture Book Movie.

I find it interesting and amusing that they reversed the gender roles in The Giving Tree, with Philip Seymour Hoffman in the title role and Abigail Breslin as The Taking Child.  Their re-imagining of Green Eggs and Ham is funny, too.

But it's the thought of Michael Bay directing Goodnight, Moon that slays me:

Goodnight, Moon: The source material consists nearly exclusively of scenes of a young boy saying goodnight to various things in and around his bedroom. Director Michael Bay hopes to maintain the original’s basic structure while replacing "saying goodnight to" with "exploding into an infernal fireball" and "a young boy" with "Will Smith." Also, the Moon killed Smith’s family and he’s out for revenge.
Sample Dialogue: "Say goodnight, Moon." *EXPLOSION*

Yes, I'm still laughing.

When the book trailer may be better than the book.

Summer of Fear -- Lois Duncan

Things are good for Rachel Bryant.  She's almost sixteen, she's dating her shaggily handsome next-door neighbor, she and her best friend are tight as tight can be -- and it's lovely, lovely summertime.

Until the accident.  Her aunt and uncle die, and suddenly, a grieving cousin from the other side of the United States -- a girl Rachel hasn't ever even met -- is moving in.  For good.  Into Rachel's room.

At first, Rachel is determined to make the best of it -- to welcome Julia into the family, to console her, to become her almost-sister. 

But there's something not right about Julia.  Something... evil.

This being a Lois Duncan book, that's 'evil' with a capital 'E' and an additional pile of lowercase 'e's:  Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeevil.

I hadn't read this one since I was in middle school.  It holds up in some respects, not so much in others.  The majority of the book -- the Summer of Fear itself -- is a flashback.  The first few and last few pages are set in the misty future, where Rachel says things like:  "For too long now I've dwelt upon the past."  The tone of those sections reminded me very much of Flowers in the Attic, actually.  Which, I guess, given the fact that FitA was published three years later, isn't all that surprising.

Some of the dialogue is pretty unbelievable ("Do you recall the name of the village nearest to where they lived?" (16)), as is Rae's voice ("There I received another shock, for the ugly red splotches were not confined to my face." (79)), but... I didn't care.  I think because the book is so very 1970s (the flared pants, going to Dustin Hoffman movies, etc.), because the emotions underneath the stilted writing feel genuine and right, because Rae's almost-overnight estrangement from everyone she loves adds to the horror of the situation, AND because everyone's refusal to believe -- let alone try to understand -- her is something that I know I identified with when I read it Back in the Day.  Oh, and of course, Julia is super-ultra creepy, so together, somehow, it all works. 

That isn't to say that I didn't groan occasionally.  Or that I didn't find the fact that nobody took issue with Peter immediately developed the Serious Hots for his cousin -- Serious Hots equaling, in this case, talking about marriage -- strange.  Or that I didn't think it was hilarious that the friendly professor who lived down the street just so happened to be an expert on witches and also a believer in the occult.  Or that I didn't think of Poison Ivy once or twice or thrice.

I did all of those things, and more.  But Lois Duncan still works for me.  She still manages to creep me out and she still keeps me entertained.  And sometimes that's all I'm looking for.

Ok, WOW.  I had no idea that there is a movie based on this book.  Directed by Wes Craven and starring Linda Blair, no less!  It looks terrible, in the best possible way.  I'm totally adding that one to the Netflix queue, and bumping it right the hell up.  (Josh is going to be so mad!  BONUS!)

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Book source:  My personal library.  (I have no idea when I bought it.  Or if.  It may have just appeared.  I've started to suspect that my books are secretly reproducing.)

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I read this for the R.I.P. IV challenge.

Philip Pullman may top himself controversy-wise.

Silly me, I didn't know how he could possibly get people more revved up than he did with the His Dark Materials trilogy.

But I was obviously not thinking big enough:  his new book, a re-telling of the life of Jesus that challenges the gospels, will be called The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ. 

But then, maybe since it's a book geared to adults, it won't be controversial.

Maybe.

Oh, who am I kidding?  Philip Pullman can't blow his nose without being controversial.

But I thought...

...that Edward Cullen DIDN'T like Wuthering Heights.

Why am I even thinking about this?

"My gay young tapeworm."

I'm currently listening to The Code of the Woosters.  Good god.  Even though I've read it 46 bazillion times, the audio version has me laughing like a maniac on my drives to and from work.

From the book:

A thing I never know, when I'm starting out to tell a story about a chap I've told a story about before, is how much explanation to bung in at the outset. It's a problem you've got to look at from every angle. I mean to say, in the present case, if I take it for granted that my public knows all about Gussie Fink-Nottle and just breeze ahead, those publicans who weren't hanging on my lips the first time are apt to be fogged. Whereas if before kicking off I give about eight volumes of the man's life and history, other bimbos who were so hanging will stifle yawns and murmur 'Old stuff. Get on with it.'

I suppose the only thing to do is to put the salient facts as briefly as possible in the possession of the first gang, waving an apologetic hand at the second gang the while, to indicate that they had better let their attention wander for a minute or two and that I will be with them shortly.

Seriously, has the world ever had a better narrator than Bertie Wooster?

Rather gorgeous.

Even though between the two of us, Josh and I probably own three complete sets of the Ripley books, I find that I am tempted by this:

Click through for more images, including shots of each cover.

So pretty.

The Case of the Two Watsons.

(via Hark, A Vagrant!, which I will be following from now on.)

Children's books too bleak, blah blah blah.

It seems that every couple of years, someone starts a round of realism-in-literature-is-too-much-for-children-to-handle.

This time, it's Anne Fine*.  Which I think is interesting, because, like the author of the essay I just linked to, I think of Fine as an author who does deal with some pretty tough stuff, and does it realistically.

Anyway.  The Guardian also has some thoughts on rewrites for a bunch of children's books to make them cheerier.  I'm sure that someone could "improve" The Chocolate Warby adding in some Rocky-esque training scenes which would lead to an ending that doesn't make the reader want to stab herself.

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*Actually, hasn't she gone off about this before?  Oh, wait.  I'm thinking of her blistering review of Melvin Burgess' Doing It.  Which I really liked.  The book, I mean.  It was amazingly raunchy, yes, especially towards the beginning, but I remember the character development being very strong and I also remember feeling that a whole lot of the book was in line with what I remembered from high school.  But that brings us back to the children's-literature-shouldn't-be-TOO-realistic argument.  Which, in case you're wondering, I don't buy.  I'm not saying that all books should be gritty and rough -- but I don't see why, with the bazillions of books out there, noneof them should be.  Yeesh.

Lookalikes.

Washington Irving:

 

And the Wizard of Oz:

Don't you think?  Maybe it's just the hair.

That furry book.

Now.  While I'm very curious about the Wild Things movie, I'm not really interested in the novelization of the original book.  I just don't see the point, when the original was perfectly perfect as it was.  It doesn't have me gnashing my teeth or anything, just disinterested.  But, whatever.  The decision to offer a furry version of the book just struck me as rather gimmicky, and reminded me that pain-in-the-ass monster book (I don't remember what it was called, but it was covered in extremely fake shaggy black fur) we had to deal with at the bookstore.

However.  All that didn't prevent me from finding this tidbit from a brief interview with Dave Eggers in the New Yorker very interesting:

“The Wild Things” will come in a fur edition, I hear?

It was just an idea I had, that it could be cool to have a book covered in fake fur. I told Maurice about it, and he told me a story of someone trying the same thing, with real fur, back in the sixties. I guess they made thousands of them, wrapped in some kind of real fur, and sent them to a warehouse for a while before shipping them to stores. By the time they came to ship the books, the warehouse was full of moths, and most of the fur had been eaten. Anyway, we went to a printer in Singapore about this, and they sent us a bunch of faux-fur samples. We chose one that’s usually used to repair small holes in mink coats. I think we ordered more of this fur than had ever been ordered at one time. The result looks pretty good, though. Very creepy.

(via Powell's)

A.C. Doyle.

If anyone still doesn't understand my love for Hard Case Crime, I give you the cover of the December 2009 release:

 

I am so happy that other people think about stuff like this.

I am even happier that other people think about stuff like this and ACTUALLY TAKE ACTION:

Choose Your Own Adventure #2: Journey Under the Sea
Analysis of paths and outcomes

"What exactly, Thomson asked, are your politics? "Fishing," Ransome replied."

Sir Arthur Ransome:

Author of Swallows and Amazons.  (Knew that.)
Won a libel trial against Lord Alfred "that jerk" Douglas.  (Didn't know.)
Proposed to "virtually every eligible woman of his acquaintance".  (Didn't know.)
Ran away from his wife and daughter... (Didn't know.)
...and ended up shacking up with Trotsky's personal secretary.  (Didn't know.)
British spy.  (Knew that.)
Possible double agent for the Russians.  (Didn't know.)

Note to self:  Ask the director to order this book.

PS to self:  Will you be able to convince her to import it?

PPS to self:  BE VERY CONVINCING.

Some reading lists.

Lesley Blume picks Must-Read Classic Children's Books at NPR.

Will Davis picks his Top Ten Literary Teens at the Guardian.

Ontario school pulls Mockingbird from Grade 10 curriculum.

From TheStar.com:

The classic literary novel To Kill a Mockingbird is being pulled from the Grade 10 English course at a Brampton high school after a parent complained about the use of a racial epithet in the book.

Harper Lee's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, which challenges racial injustice in America's Deep South, will be removed from curriculum at St. Edmund Campion Secondary School following a lone complaint from a parent whose child will be in Grade 10 this September.

More Alice.

Okay, so if you were going to cast Tim Curry in a re-imagining of Alice in Wonderland, you'd cast him as the Mad Hatter, right?

You wouldn't waste all that crazy on a teeny little part like the Dodo*, right?

Not this guy.

Although I'm going to have to watch it -- even though it's a (I shudder as I type this) SyFy** original -- if only for Harry Dean Stanton as the Caterpillar***.

(via Fuse#8)

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*Not that I'm anti-Dodo.  I love dodos.  We should clone them like in the Jasper Fforde books.

**Really.  WHAT were they thinking?  SyFy ≠ cool/hip/futuristic or whatever the crap they were going for.

***Have I posted about this before?  It all seems so familiar...

Incompatible.

That's the only word to describe my relationship with Heathcliff and Cathy*.  Regardless of the setting, era or their names, I think I'll always want to punch them both in the face.

So, due to nothing other than my own issues, I've decided to stop reading The Heights, Brian James' contemporary re-imagining of Wuthering Heights.  Because otherwise I might get more violent than I already am.

But someone else with a higher tolerance for their assiness should read it to let me know how it is. 

Because I am curious.  And I'd like to know if I should just get over myself and keep reading.

Maybe I'll talk my long-suffering co-worker into taking it home.

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*Oh, except for Heathcliff in Wuthering High.  But he was funny in that one.  And he was played for laughs in at least one of the Jasper Fforde books, too.

Better on a bigger screen. With a connection that doesn't crap out.

I first saw this trailer on jonbean's iPhone, and as wonderful an experience that was, I must admit that I enjoyed it much more this time around:

"...he's turned it into his without giving up mine."

I really do want to see this one.  But I'm worried about seeing it in the theater, as I can't even make it through the trailer (or this featurette) without bursting into tears.

I DON'T KNOW WHY.

(via educating alice)

Will Arnett reads from Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.

I do love him.  And, of course, Judy Blume:

(via 100 Scope Notes)

What would Our Jane think?

So, everyone and her mom already knows that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is being followed up (same publisher, different author) with Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters*, right?

But did you know that there's one called Mr. Darcy, Vampyre due out in a couple of weeks?  (The author says her inspiration was from BtVS -- she says "The dynamics between Buffy and Angel reminded me of the dynamics of Lizzy (Bennet) and Darcy."  Huh.  I guess maybe at first.  But I don't really see it.  And how could Darcy hang out with Bingley all the time if he was a Secret Vampire?  Is Bingley a vampire, too?  What about Lady Catherine?  She would be a good vampire.  DAMNIT.  Now I have to read it.  DAMNIT.)

I guess I shouldn't be surprised -- what with the huge popularity of the paranormal AND anything Austen, we were bound to see multiple mash-ups.  But I can't help but see anything after P&P&Z as just riding the wave, pretending to the throne, or any other applicable cliché.

That doesn't necessarily mean that I won't read them**.

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*Which I have to say, based on title alone, seems to be trying a bit too hard.

**Or at least start reading them.  I have to admit that I lost interest in P&P&Z partway through -- I felt it read mostly like an abridgment of P&P, just with some zombies thrown in.  I'll get back to it at some point, because I don't want to miss Lady Catherine's ninja army.

First images from Wonderland.

WAY CREEPY.

Which could work very well.

I'm feeling a bit more optimistic.

[Later:  Hmmm.  While I love the scenery, the make-up might be a bit too much for me.]

Isn't this, like, REALLY OLD NEWS?

The New York Times explores the possibility that the youth of today may not connect with Holden Caulfield.

The Fugs...

...reference BOTH Sweet Valley High and Thursday Next.

Rock on, ladies.

Lost in Austen.

After reading Liz B.'s reaction to Lost in Austen, I bumped it to the top of our Netflix* queue.

There was a bit of grumbling from Joshua, but as he was still in the doghouse for that whole Nellie Oleson thing, I paid him no heed.

It's about a modern day Austen-o-phile who, due to a magic door that leads from her bathroom to the servants' quarters at Longbourn, switches places with Elizabeth Bennet.

I LOVED IT**.  It made me guffaw (again and again) in a very nerdly manner.  I loved the casting, and I loved that it WASN'T Pride and Prejudice.  Same characters, but with lots of little differences, and a totally different story.  Amanda tries and tries to make the story go in what she thinks is the right direction, but it all keeps blowing up in her face.  It was lovely and funny and CUTE, and I watched the whole three hours in one go.

Must buy a copy of my very own.

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*Speaking of, have you noticed that Faerie Tale Theatre is available through the Netflix Watch Now thingie?  We watched Aladdin last night.  Yay.

**And Josh asked me to pause it when he had to leave the room, so he liked it too, no matter how much he might protest.

Emily the Strange lawsuit: in backwardsland.

I am so very off my game -- this story broke a couple of weeks ago:

So, in an example of how twisted our legal system can be, Cosmic Debris (owners of the Emily the Strange property) has sued Marjorie Sharmat and Marc Simont.

There's a bit more in this SLJ article.

(via Tea Cozy and You Thought We Wouldn't Notice)

I must return to River Heights.

Nancy Drew and the Secret of the 3 Black Robes

I had no idea...

...that someone had written -- let alone published! -- an unauthorized sequel to Catcher in the Rye.

The Agatha Christie Murders.

Sounds like a book title, no?  Well, it probably will be one at some point, if it isn't already. 

From the Guardian:

Police in Iran believe they have caught the country's first female serial killer and are claiming she has disclosed a literary inspiration behind her attempts to evade detection: the crime novels of Agatha Christie.

Emily Climbs: Emily Byrd Starr, #2 -- L. M. Montgomery

Leave it to L. M. Montgomery herself to explain why I love her -- and her creations -- so very much:

It was not, of course, a proper thing to do.  But then I have never pretended, nor ever will pretend, that Emily was a proper child.  Books are not written about proper children.  They would be so dull nobody would read them.

All of her friends are going away to Shrewsbury High School, and it looks like she's going to be left behind at New Moon.  But then she makes a difficult and heart-breaking deal with Aunt Elizabeth -- Emily will be allowed to go to school for three years if she vows to write no fiction at all during that time.

Emily Climbs follows our Miss Starr as she grows up (from almost-fourteen to seventeen) and begins to find her place in the world.  As you'd expect from a Montgomery heroine, she gets into scrape after scrape; despairs on occasion but always eventually throws her shoulders back, dusts herself off and tries again; is hounded by unfair gossip; discovers romance; saves at least one small child; and is occasionally is aided by the most unlikely people.  And as you'd expect from a Montgomery heroine, ultimately, she triumphs over all adversity.

Just like last time, I dog-eared practically the whole book.  Which of course, ended up being less-than-helpful.  But, for me, some of the highlights:

• Emily's musings on words and writing:  "Big words are never beautiful--'incriminating'--'obstreperous'--'international'--'unconstitutional'.  They make me think of those horrible big dahlias and chrysanthemums Cousin Jimmy took me to see at the exhibition in Charlottetown last fall."

• Her three-page diary entry refuting a city slicker's claim that nothing ever happens in Blair Water: "...Elder McCloskey, who thought it wouldn't do to say 'pants' in a story he was telling about a missionary, at prayer-meeting, so always said politely 'the clothes of his lower parts'..."

• The narrator's voice -- I quoted a bit earlier, but there are many other asides to the reader ("Remember that I am only Emily's biographer, not her apologist."), and I loved them all.

• Emily's adventures (of course), which I will not list because if you've read it, you'll remember and if you haven't, you should. 

• The fact that I came around about Teddy very early on.  I was so surprised by my abrupt emotional about-face, but there it is.  I rather love him now.  He and Emily totally belong together.  As do Ilse and Perry.  And I will be Very Put Out if it doesn't All Work Out.  I continue to be completely skeeved out by Dean.  AND HE'S A JERK ABOUT EMILY'S WRITING, ALL CONDESCENDING AND NOT WANTING HER TO SUCCEED.  I hadn't thought about it much until now, but I rather hate him.  Hence my use of the Caps Lock key.  Sorry about that.

• The Cousin Andrew plotline.

• OH MY GOD EMILY'S INADVERTENT EAVESDROPPING ON MRS. ANN CYRILLA AND MISS BEULAH POTTER!!!  I ALMOST DIED LAUGHING.  (Do you think LMM left the 'e' off of Mrs. Cyrilla's name because she's so horrible?)

• Emily and Aunt Ruth's relationship.

• Everything about the Perry and Emily alone at night misunderstanding, the Emily kissing a man on the street misunderstanding, and every other misunderstanding (and there are many) and embarrassment she endures.  Poor girl.  I certainly cringed with her, but never so much that I stopped enjoying myself.  I guess that this all falls under "Emily's adventures", but there are so many that it's worth mentioning twice.

• Horrible Evelyn Blake and the fact that Emily can be very catty.  "Evelyn is wearing her hair in the new pompadour style this year and I think it is very unbecoming to her.  But then, of course, the only part of Evelyn's anatomy I like is her back."

• The fact that Emily is a snob.  And that Ilse calls Emily on it.

• Emily's reason for feeling sorry for Evelyn Blake's failed exams.

• Miss Royal's interview.  I died.  Many times over.  Seriously.

• The beautiful parallel bits at the beginning and end:  Emily's first inkling of her feelings for Teddy early on in the graveyard, and her more breathtaking and so-gorgeous-it-hurts realization during the blizzard of just how much her feelings for him have deepened.  I love Anne Shirley and Gilbert Blythe, but nothing in their courtship -- not even the night that Anne thinks Gil is going to die -- touches this. 

I just requested a copy of Book #3 via BookMooch, but it'll be a while before it gets here.  Sad.

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Previously:

1. Emily of New Moon

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I read this book for the L. M. Montgomery mini-challenge.  My challenge post is here.

The Sherlock Holmes trailer.

Okay.

I love me some Robert Downey, Jr., but I'm not sure if I can get behind this:

Huh.

It's odd that this PW article on the upcoming Emily the Strange book didn't mention the similarities to Rosamund from the Nate the Great series that were commented on last year.

I mean, it's related, right?  And I would think, of interest.

Ah.  It was mentioned in the comments section.

[A bit later:  I just checked the Discussion page on the Emily the Strange Wikipedia article, and it looks like the Emily/Rosamund debate continues -- so I'm assuming that there's been no new news.  Or news at all, really.]

Revisiting two classics.

Harriet the Spy at Unshelved.

Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret at Fine Lines.

Two links I meant to post yesterday.

• First up was this article at PW (via Jackie on Twitter):

Four members of a library board in West Bend, Wis., were dismissed last week for refusing to remove controversial books from the library’s young adult section—and yesterday, the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, the National Coalition Against Censorship, the Association of American Publishers and PEN American Center criticized the firings.

An earlier article from a local paper says that the board members were "not reappointed", which is different than being dismissed (at least in my mind -- being dismissed would suggest that they hadn't been allowed to serve out their terms).  BUT.  If the city board members voted against reappointing the library board members solely because the library board members refused to vote in favor of pulling those books, it kind of amounts to the same thing, doesn't it?

• And, if you haven't seen it yet:  The Art of Penguin Science Fiction.  (Thanks for the reminder, HBS Steve.)

Some booklists.

The five children's laureates choose their favorite children's books... and a couple of writers at the Guardian have responded with their own.  (Yay for the second list -- Diana Wynne Jones and Joan Aiken!)

I'm sure this will prompt many more lists.  I say:  Bring 'em.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

Yep.

Seth Grahame-Smith, co-author (with Jane Austen) of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies*, has landed a two book deal.

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*Which I'm currently reading and enjoying -- it reads exactly like what it is:  an abridged version of P&P, with mucho gore, many battles, zombies and ninjas.  It's pretty choppy, but fun regardless.  And the cover art is even better in person.

Ellen Page as Jane Eyre?

I'm sorry, but I'm just so not there. 

At all. 

Even remotely remotely.

(via Never Jam Today)

I'm in love.

This is a musical version of H.P. Lovecraft's "The Shadow over Innsmouth" composed by the HPLHS:

(via SF Signal)

Because the Jane Austen/zombies mash-up isn't enough...

...there's a movie called Pride and Predator in the works.

I'm so there.

This one's for Mali:

John Christopher's Tripods trilogy is being adapted for the big screen.

Beezus and Ramona: The Movie??

I had no idea it was even in the works.

I am trying to reserve judgment until I know more, but it's difficult.

That didn't take long.

Fox picked up Narnia.