Friday, October 24, 2014
Cinematic Moments: Into the Woods (12/25/14)
For several months I've been (here and there) incorporating "Read of the Town" posts that basically discuss books before they are released. They may be highly anticipated or books that I'm personally looking forward to reading. I write them to get a conversation started amongst readers like myself, and maybe to share something new with someone who may be on the fence about that particular author or book. Ever since I started doing "Read of the Town" posts I've wanted to do the same kind of posts for movies. Not just movies coming out but classic movies as well (doesn't matter the decade). And not until the (small yet significant) buzz about Into the Woods did I finally figure out how to do it. So, allow me to elaborate further, and please do look for more "Cinematic Moments" to come.
Every movie that comes out now gets its momentum from the cast involved, the trailer, and lastly the actual storyline. Sadly enough it's usually in the order. I like to think it wasn't always that way. I like to think that back when movies were in black and white and there wasn't so many ways of advertising, a movie had its storyline and its actors to rely on to get people to go to the cinema. But I digress.
This Christmas there are at least 8 movies I know I want to see. The one at the top of my list, and probably on many others, is Into the Woods. For many it'll be because of Meryl Streep (has she EVER done a bad movie??) but for me I'll have to admit it's Johnny Depp (I love everything he does). Also, I'm a fan of the play which I saw with Bernadette Peters playing the role now taken over by Meryl. I wonder if there's a reason why they went with Meryl instead of Bernadette? I'd like to think she was asked and declined as opposed to not been asked at all. If you know don't tell me! lol
So, there was a bit of drama with the opening teaser trailer. Not sure why since the fact that it's supposed to be a TEASE should signal why it didn't give much away, but people wanted to know "where's the singing?" I'll admit I was kinda asking the same thing. Now there's a longer trailer where the actors talk with praise about the whole experience (see below) and we get singing, but there is still some apprehension that it might not be what we expect?? Uhm, have you SEEN the Broadway play? If you have then I can't imagine where you'd be disappointed.
1st Official Trailer
The Story Featurette
Or maybe the problem is how Johnny Depp's character of The Wolf looks? As revealed on one of four Entertainment Weekly covers for the movie: (all 4 covers below)
Will you be going to see Into the Woods this Christmas? Do you give much stock to critics or even to trailers when determining if a movie is worth going to the cinema? Let me know!
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
Read of the Town: Beijing Bastard by Val Wang
Two things I'm learning to love about newly released and coming soon books: Titles & Covers!
Both are amazingly true about THIS books title and the cover. Based on both I feel I must get my hands on it and read it cover to cover, with hopes that the story is good, but we'll get to that later. Firstly, the title is Beijing Bastard! And lastly, here's the cover. Take a few minutes to enjoy all it's nuances then read on to get an exclusive interview with the Author, Val Wang, as well as a synopsis of the book.
What inspired you to write this book?
From the moment I arrived in Beijing, the city as I found it, as it had been for decades and even centuries, was in the process of disappearing. I lived for my first month with relatives I barely knew in a courtyard house in the old city and it gave me both a unique vantage point onto the city and an instant emotional attachment to it. The city was at a special moment in its history and there was an urgency to capture it before it vanished beneath the wrecking ball. But as the city was disappearing, another city was emerging and in this moment of transition, people seized the opportunity to create new lives and identities, and I wanted to document this as well. Young expats, artists from the provinces, entrepreneurs, we all both feared and thrived on the uncertainty.
What made you decide to go to China? How did your family react?
While many people assume I went to China to “search for my roots,” the truth was quite the opposite. I went to China as an act of rebellion, to make a life for myself far away from the stifling expectations of my family and to somehow turn myself into an artist. Chinese, unfortunately, was the only foreign language I spoke! The irony that I went to China to make that new life is not lost on me.
My parents weren’t happy at all. They thought I was throwing away my top-notch education and all the opportunities it afforded me in the States. To them, moving to China was a step backward into a past they’d worked so hard to leave behind. I can see now that part of it was their fear of opening the wounds of their own exile and immigration. Me living there forced them to confront their relationship with China and in the end, allowed them to forge a new, hopefully positive relationship with it.
What do you find is the most common misconception Americans have about China? Why do you think that is?
You wouldn’t believe how many people tell me that they find China “mysterious.” This is a very old idea about China, about the East, that it is an Other, a foil for how the West would like to see itself – rational and knowable. This idea of China as the Other seems to have special currency now that the country’s ascent threatens America’s dominance in the world. But really, Chinese people are just like you and me, they experience the same yearnings, fears and other assorted human emotions.
How did your upbringing prepare – or not prepare – you for what you found in China? How did living with your family at the beginning of your time in China set up your time in Beijing?
Growing up in a Chinese immigrant household gave me the language skills and basic level of cultural understanding to make China feel somewhat familiar and navigable when I arrived. But I pretty soon realized that the immigrant version of China I’d grown up with wasn’t the same as China itself, which felt foreign. I’ve heard it said that immigrant communities tend to preserve the values and ideas that are actually in flux back in the “old country.” This was especially true for China, which was in a state of upheaval when I got there. I thought I’d find this really uptight place but instead I found somewhere wild and chaotic, and just to my liking.
Living with my family in a courtyard house gave me a very visceral attachment to the old city and made the costs of modernization very personal to me, right from the start. I felt like I had a stake in how the city developed. It also let me know that my intention to move to China to get far away from my family and their Confucian psychodramas was not going to happen in the way I’d planned. I’d moved to the wrong place to do that!
What drew you to the contemporary Chinese artists and what did they have to say about China?
To me the artists symbolized freedom. To see people living in a repressive society and finding a way to say what they wanted, how they wanted, was inspiring. Plus, living in China was disorienting and it was hard to trust any stories, either from the state-run media or the Western press. Artists got to tell the truth, their truth, about how they saw China and the world. Visual artists expressed the alienation that many people in China were feeling, especially young people. Documentary filmmakers told stories about how modernization was radically altering intimate relationships. Their insights helped me to decode what was going on in China and in turn taught me how to craft my own vision of the country and the world. In many ways they became my surrogate parents who told me it was okay, even good, to be an artist.
Beijing is a character in this book – how would you describe its personality and are there character traits that have survived the successive waves of modernization?
Beijing to me is a stubborn granny, loquacious and full of complaints, sitting on a tiny stool watching the world go by and gossiping with her friends. I imagine that during the time I lived there she started exporting knock-off Ming Dynasty furniture, and in the years since I left she has taken up hip-hop dance and started her own local troupe that tours the region. The tiny-stool days are in the past for her, but her equanimity and her resilience are not.
Have you been back to China since you left? What were your impressions? Do you keep up with the people in your book?
I’ve been back a number of times. The first few times were pretty miserable – there were whole swathes of the city that I didn’t recognize, and didn’t particularly like, and I was still grieving about being gone. But when I went back for the summer in 2008 to work during the Olympics I was finally able to accept that China was going to keep changing, and that I could have a part in it if I was willing to accept that nothing there could be counted on to stay the same. China is more a part of the world now and the rise of capitalism has raised the overall standard of living, but for all of the gains, there are also losses, often of intangibles. Many of my Chinese friends in the city complain that their lives that revolve around work and money feel empty and that no one has the time to hang out with friends anymore, all of which sound suspiciously like the complaints of friends in New York or other large metropolises around the world.
I keep up with most of the people in my book, though one notable exception is my filmmaker friend Yang Lina, who’s gone through tough times since I left and who even mutual friends can’t find. I am still in touch especially with my family, though of course I don’t call them as much as I should. In fact, I owe Bobo, my uncle, a call this week. I’ve got to remember to do that.
Rebelling against parental expectations is a major storyline of your book. Now that you are a parent, how do you think you will raise your children? What do you hope their relationship with China is?
My time in China was a paradox: I went to rebel against my past but of course the harder you run from something, the harder it chases you, and I ended up having to look questions of family and expectation and disappointment in the face. Parenting is full of similar ironies: I resented going to Chinese School every Sunday growing up but now I’m sending my sons to a Mandarin-immersion day care. I tell myself that the difference now is that it’s possible for my children to go back and forth. I plan to take them soon to visit China so they can begin a relationship with the place, which I hope they’ll want to continue on their own as they get older. I hope to raise them with less rigid expectations than my parents had for me but maybe everyone needs to rebel against their parents, at least a little?
What do you hope readers will take away from reading Beijing Bastard?
I hope readers feel like they’ve gone on an epic, swashbuckling journey through turn of the century Beijing, from doomed courtyard houses in the center of the old city through underground art exhibitions on the fringe, meeting along the way a fascinating and funny selection of its residents they had no idea even existed, like a People’s Liberation Army dancer turned avant-garde documentary filmmaker, all seen through the eyes of a young Chinese-American woman trying to find her wings and fly while weighted down by 5,000 years of Chinese history and the expectations of anxious immigrant parents back home. That’s all I want.
Synopsis:
Both are amazingly true about THIS books title and the cover. Based on both I feel I must get my hands on it and read it cover to cover, with hopes that the story is good, but we'll get to that later. Firstly, the title is Beijing Bastard! And lastly, here's the cover. Take a few minutes to enjoy all it's nuances then read on to get an exclusive interview with the Author, Val Wang, as well as a synopsis of the book.
A Conversation with Val Wang, author of BEIJING BASTARD
What inspired you to write this book?
From the moment I arrived in Beijing, the city as I found it, as it had been for decades and even centuries, was in the process of disappearing. I lived for my first month with relatives I barely knew in a courtyard house in the old city and it gave me both a unique vantage point onto the city and an instant emotional attachment to it. The city was at a special moment in its history and there was an urgency to capture it before it vanished beneath the wrecking ball. But as the city was disappearing, another city was emerging and in this moment of transition, people seized the opportunity to create new lives and identities, and I wanted to document this as well. Young expats, artists from the provinces, entrepreneurs, we all both feared and thrived on the uncertainty.
What made you decide to go to China? How did your family react?
While many people assume I went to China to “search for my roots,” the truth was quite the opposite. I went to China as an act of rebellion, to make a life for myself far away from the stifling expectations of my family and to somehow turn myself into an artist. Chinese, unfortunately, was the only foreign language I spoke! The irony that I went to China to make that new life is not lost on me.
My parents weren’t happy at all. They thought I was throwing away my top-notch education and all the opportunities it afforded me in the States. To them, moving to China was a step backward into a past they’d worked so hard to leave behind. I can see now that part of it was their fear of opening the wounds of their own exile and immigration. Me living there forced them to confront their relationship with China and in the end, allowed them to forge a new, hopefully positive relationship with it.
What do you find is the most common misconception Americans have about China? Why do you think that is?
You wouldn’t believe how many people tell me that they find China “mysterious.” This is a very old idea about China, about the East, that it is an Other, a foil for how the West would like to see itself – rational and knowable. This idea of China as the Other seems to have special currency now that the country’s ascent threatens America’s dominance in the world. But really, Chinese people are just like you and me, they experience the same yearnings, fears and other assorted human emotions.
How did your upbringing prepare – or not prepare – you for what you found in China? How did living with your family at the beginning of your time in China set up your time in Beijing?
Growing up in a Chinese immigrant household gave me the language skills and basic level of cultural understanding to make China feel somewhat familiar and navigable when I arrived. But I pretty soon realized that the immigrant version of China I’d grown up with wasn’t the same as China itself, which felt foreign. I’ve heard it said that immigrant communities tend to preserve the values and ideas that are actually in flux back in the “old country.” This was especially true for China, which was in a state of upheaval when I got there. I thought I’d find this really uptight place but instead I found somewhere wild and chaotic, and just to my liking.
Living with my family in a courtyard house gave me a very visceral attachment to the old city and made the costs of modernization very personal to me, right from the start. I felt like I had a stake in how the city developed. It also let me know that my intention to move to China to get far away from my family and their Confucian psychodramas was not going to happen in the way I’d planned. I’d moved to the wrong place to do that!
What drew you to the contemporary Chinese artists and what did they have to say about China?
To me the artists symbolized freedom. To see people living in a repressive society and finding a way to say what they wanted, how they wanted, was inspiring. Plus, living in China was disorienting and it was hard to trust any stories, either from the state-run media or the Western press. Artists got to tell the truth, their truth, about how they saw China and the world. Visual artists expressed the alienation that many people in China were feeling, especially young people. Documentary filmmakers told stories about how modernization was radically altering intimate relationships. Their insights helped me to decode what was going on in China and in turn taught me how to craft my own vision of the country and the world. In many ways they became my surrogate parents who told me it was okay, even good, to be an artist.
Beijing is a character in this book – how would you describe its personality and are there character traits that have survived the successive waves of modernization?
Beijing to me is a stubborn granny, loquacious and full of complaints, sitting on a tiny stool watching the world go by and gossiping with her friends. I imagine that during the time I lived there she started exporting knock-off Ming Dynasty furniture, and in the years since I left she has taken up hip-hop dance and started her own local troupe that tours the region. The tiny-stool days are in the past for her, but her equanimity and her resilience are not.
Have you been back to China since you left? What were your impressions? Do you keep up with the people in your book?
I’ve been back a number of times. The first few times were pretty miserable – there were whole swathes of the city that I didn’t recognize, and didn’t particularly like, and I was still grieving about being gone. But when I went back for the summer in 2008 to work during the Olympics I was finally able to accept that China was going to keep changing, and that I could have a part in it if I was willing to accept that nothing there could be counted on to stay the same. China is more a part of the world now and the rise of capitalism has raised the overall standard of living, but for all of the gains, there are also losses, often of intangibles. Many of my Chinese friends in the city complain that their lives that revolve around work and money feel empty and that no one has the time to hang out with friends anymore, all of which sound suspiciously like the complaints of friends in New York or other large metropolises around the world.
I keep up with most of the people in my book, though one notable exception is my filmmaker friend Yang Lina, who’s gone through tough times since I left and who even mutual friends can’t find. I am still in touch especially with my family, though of course I don’t call them as much as I should. In fact, I owe Bobo, my uncle, a call this week. I’ve got to remember to do that.
Rebelling against parental expectations is a major storyline of your book. Now that you are a parent, how do you think you will raise your children? What do you hope their relationship with China is?
My time in China was a paradox: I went to rebel against my past but of course the harder you run from something, the harder it chases you, and I ended up having to look questions of family and expectation and disappointment in the face. Parenting is full of similar ironies: I resented going to Chinese School every Sunday growing up but now I’m sending my sons to a Mandarin-immersion day care. I tell myself that the difference now is that it’s possible for my children to go back and forth. I plan to take them soon to visit China so they can begin a relationship with the place, which I hope they’ll want to continue on their own as they get older. I hope to raise them with less rigid expectations than my parents had for me but maybe everyone needs to rebel against their parents, at least a little?
What do you hope readers will take away from reading Beijing Bastard?
I hope readers feel like they’ve gone on an epic, swashbuckling journey through turn of the century Beijing, from doomed courtyard houses in the center of the old city through underground art exhibitions on the fringe, meeting along the way a fascinating and funny selection of its residents they had no idea even existed, like a People’s Liberation Army dancer turned avant-garde documentary filmmaker, all seen through the eyes of a young Chinese-American woman trying to find her wings and fly while weighted down by 5,000 years of Chinese history and the expectations of anxious immigrant parents back home. That’s all I want.
Synopsis:
A humorous and moving coming-of-age story that brings a unique, not-quite-outsider’s perspective to China’s shift from ancient empire to modern superpower
Raised in a strict Chinese-American household in the suburbs, Val Wang dutifully got good grades, took piano lessons, and performed in a Chinese dance troupe—until she shaved her head and became a leftist, the stuff of many teenage rebellions. But Val’s true mutiny was when she moved to China, the land her parents had fled before the Communist takeover in 1949.
Val arrives in Beijing in 1998 expecting to find freedom but instead lives in the old city with her traditional relatives, who wake her at dawn with the sound of a state-run television program playing next to her cot, make a running joke of how much she eats, and monitor her every move. But outside, she soon discovers a city rebelling against its roots just as she is, struggling too to find a new, modern identity. Rickshaws make way for taxicabs, skyscrapers replace hutong courtyard houses, and Beijing prepares to make its debut on the world stage with the 2008 Olympics. And in the gritty outskirts of the city where she moves, a thriving avant-garde subculture is making art out of the chaos. Val plunges into the city’s dizzying culture and nightlife and begins shooting a documentary, about a Peking Opera family who is witnessing the death of their traditional art.
Brilliantly observed and winningly told, Beijing Bastard is a compelling story of a young woman finding her place in the world and of China, as its ancient past gives way to a dazzling but uncertain future.
Thursday, October 9, 2014
#NaNoWriMo 2014 (Year Two)
It's getting close to that time of year again! If you remember, last year I participated in my very first NaNoWriMo and came in just over the 50K goal! In introduced a female lead by the name of Sterling Addams who would be solving crimes and mysteries taking place in the underground world of the New York City subway system. At the time I wanted to work exclusively on my Sterling Addams Mystery novels every November. But this has changed!
Last Winter felt like it lasted FOREVER! In that time of constant cold, one that I thought would never leave the city, I came up with an idea for a Young Adult novel. After fleshing it out for several months I discovered the only way for me to truly do this story justice was to write 3 novels (at least). I wanted to write this during the Summer, but I couldn't. I just wasn't in the "write about Winter cold" kind of moods in the middle of June!
With that said I'm switching it up this year and I'm going to work on this Young Adult novel I've had on my mind since it's conception earlier this year. Originally my idea had two female lead characters. Best friends. They are still in the story, but I just wasn't connecting with them. Not like I was with the lesser character. I became attached to him right away and I just knew he had to be my main character. So, without further ado, here is a sneak peek (and VERY rough draft) at the synopsis:
Thirteen years ago today I was born in a small hospital, in a small town, named Snow, located in the great state of Texas, on a day my parents always like to remind me was one of the hottest that year! My life has never been easy, especially when I started going to school. I stutter. Mostly when I'm nervous, which is almost every time I'm called on in the classroom. But what's worse is not so much the stuttering as the shaking. The more I stutter, the more I shake. And when I say shake I mean classmates would break out in the hokey-pokey during recess and claim they were mimicking me. I've tried to control it but I can't. So now my closest friends (of which there is few) and my worst enemies (of which there are countless) all call me by the same name, "Shakes."
Nothing amazing ever happens in my town ironically named Snow. I say it's ironic because of what happened at this years Fourth of July picnic. The weather, for as far back as I can remember, has always been just about perfect on this day. The whole town gathers to celebrate Abigail Martin's birthday because her extremely rich parents thought it only right that their daughter should be born on a day when fireworks are a natural occurrence. The town doesn't complain because it means the Martin's pay for all the decorations, fireworks, and free food you could ever hope to get your hands on! Only this year, just as Abigail is about to cut the kick, the signal for the fireworks display to begin, both she, and I, seem to freeze in time, as what appeared to be a snowflake lands on her nose and disappears just as quickly as it appeared. No one else noticed it, but we did.
On July 5th our town wakes up to a dusting of snow on the ground. Not just our town, but after listening to the news, the entire United States, and parts of the world, that wouldn't normally have snow this time of year, or at all, now see it falling...and not stopping...
Abigail and I, with a little help from friends and people we meet, quickly realize it is up to us to get to the bottom of this snow storm and stop it before it's too late!
Oh, I forgot to mention one more thing: My name is Frank Cunningham and I'm blind.
Tuesday, September 9, 2014
Horrorstör: A Novel by Grady Hendrix (ARC Book Review)
"It was dawn and the zombies were stumbling through the parking lot, streaming toward the massive beige box at the far end."
Review: I have several ARC's in my possession but "point of fact" this is my very first one I'm actually reviewing BEFORE the books is released. When I first got word about this book and to look for it in the mail, I was VERY excited! I mean, just LOOK at that cover. I'm a HUGE fan of the IKEA catalogs. Notice I said of the catalogs and not of the actual store. To be honest, I've only been to IKEA once in my life. And once was enough for me to totally get the feeling Grady was trying to instill in the reader!
I want to first talk about the design of this book before I get into the actual story and sheer "true-to-life" creepiness about it!
It has the look and feel of an IKEA catalog. I know because the second I held it in my hand all I had to do was reach out and grab the Fall Preview IKEA catalog I just received in the mail a few weeks prior to compare the two. The dimensions are the same and for the exception of the stock paper used (IKEA uses magazine-type paper vs ORSK which is a more book-tpe paper) they are identical. I've had several people try to catch a glimpse at the cover of this book as I was reading it, probably wondering the same thing "why does her IKEA catalog look like a book?" I never bothered to correct the thought written all over their faces. Now, delving beyond the cover to the actual pages and chapters within it also has a feel of a catalog. There is the order form and map of the store in the first few pages as well as a blurb on the mission statement of the store. Each chapter is titled as a piece of furniture that makes appearances in the novel as the story progresses. I love the names of the furniture, just as obscure and unpronounceable as that which comes from IKEA itself!
As far as the story goes, I don't normally read thrillers. I prefer to watch them in complete darkness on the big screen. And even then it doesn't happen very often. Perhaps once a year at most! But I was too intrigued by the cover, look and feel of this book! It also helped that it's a short read considering the 400+ page novels I've been reading lately!
The premise is simple: large store is haunted by evil. Yep, that's it. But as simple as that might seem, it's much more complex once the mystery of who the evil is and why they are doing the haunting in this particular store unfolds. I was hooked from beginning to end even though I found myself cringing at certain moments, I had to keep reading to find out what happened next. And as the chapters progressed the pieces of furniture being highlighted as the titles got creepier and creepier, but I didn't care. I found myself wanting to know how they would be used and on whom. But perhaps I'm giving away too much?
If you frequent big box stores then perhaps this might scare you more than you'd like. I know for myself I'm glad I don't have to worry about visiting an IKEA store any time soon. It's 3+ hours away travel time for me to get to it! But from the one time I went I'll tell you, a lot of what Grady describes here as the look and feel of ORSK (the knock-off version of IKEA) is exact. I'm sure there really is a team of people who designed the store in that maze-like fashion specifically for sales purposes? I mean, doesn't anyone who has a store do the same thing? I would just hate to be in a place of that size, with virtually no windows, when the sun goes down, during a black-out! Nuh-uh! Especially not after reading this book!
Thanks for the scare Grady!
And be sure to get your hands on this book when it hits bookshelves Tuesday, September 23rd!
Synopsis: Something strange is happening at the Orsk furniture superstore in Cleveland, Ohio. Every morning, employees arrive to find broken Kjerring bookshelves, shattered Glans water goblets, and smashed Liripip wardrobes. Sales are down, security cameras reveal nothing, and store managers are panicking.
To unravel the mystery, three employees volunteer to work a nine-hour dusk-till-dawn shift. In the dead of the night, they’ll patrol the empty showroom floor, investigate strange sights and sounds, and encounter horrors that defy the imagination.
A traditional haunted house story in a thoroughly contemporary setting, Horrorstör comes packaged in the form of a glossy mail order catalog, complete with product illustrations, a home delivery order form, and a map of Orsk’s labyrinthine showroom. It’s “a treat for fans of The Evil Dead or Zombieland, complete with affordable solutions for better living.”—Kirkus Reviews.
Horrorstör
by Grady Hendrix
243 pages
Quirk Books, 2014
Suspense / Thriller
Read in 7 days
Labels:
ARC,
Book Review,
Horrorstör,
IKEA,
Orsk,
Quirk Books,
suspense,
thriller
Read of the Town: The Monogram Murders by Sophie Hannah
Whether it's from controversy or excitement, the buzz around this book that's released today is palpable. I know I've been "at odds" myself with whether or not I'll be reading this book. For starters, David Suchet portraying Hercule Poirot for the last time in the final episode (and book) written by famed Agatha Christie aired on PBS not too long ago, called Curtain. Now I pride myself in being a fan of both Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot and I must admit I've had open conversations with people who know the characters both very well as to who they think would outwit the other? I'll tell you the answer changes as often as the rising and setting of the moon! But I digress...
My point is, Curtain, for those who are fans and have read it so they knew what to expect, and to those who haven't because (like myself) you're reading them in order, realizing she's written 88 such stories centered around Hercule Poirot, you are probably a bit surprised by how it's possible for him to appear in a new novel? Me too!
It's not uncommon for a greatly loved character to rise again even after the author who created, cultivated, and nurtured, that character, has come and gone. See 007 as probably one of the best examples of that. His estate picks someone to carry on the legend, the story, and for them it works. Now, without spoiling Curtain for those who haven't watched the episode or read the book yet, although I can't see how you wouldn't guess what it means by the title, I am skeptical about how it's possible to write the next Hercule Poirot Mystery? Unless she's gone back in time to some earlier cases and an earlier time in his life? I wouldn't be against that of course since, as I'm reading the novels and watching the episodes of the same titles, I often wonder who and where he was before we see him as the great detective with his "little grey cells"?
To conclude, I will be buying and reading this novel. Only because my curiosity wouldn't allow me to simply ignore it. I've already heard some stark reviews from people saying "it's not the same" and in my mind I'm thinking, of course it won't be! Not sure what I'll be expecting when I start, but I know I won't be expecting Agatha Christie to come through in all her glory. I hear Sophie Hannah is not too shabby in the mystery/suspense realm so I'm willing to give her a chance, are you?
My point is, Curtain, for those who are fans and have read it so they knew what to expect, and to those who haven't because (like myself) you're reading them in order, realizing she's written 88 such stories centered around Hercule Poirot, you are probably a bit surprised by how it's possible for him to appear in a new novel? Me too!
It's not uncommon for a greatly loved character to rise again even after the author who created, cultivated, and nurtured, that character, has come and gone. See 007 as probably one of the best examples of that. His estate picks someone to carry on the legend, the story, and for them it works. Now, without spoiling Curtain for those who haven't watched the episode or read the book yet, although I can't see how you wouldn't guess what it means by the title, I am skeptical about how it's possible to write the next Hercule Poirot Mystery? Unless she's gone back in time to some earlier cases and an earlier time in his life? I wouldn't be against that of course since, as I'm reading the novels and watching the episodes of the same titles, I often wonder who and where he was before we see him as the great detective with his "little grey cells"?
To conclude, I will be buying and reading this novel. Only because my curiosity wouldn't allow me to simply ignore it. I've already heard some stark reviews from people saying "it's not the same" and in my mind I'm thinking, of course it won't be! Not sure what I'll be expecting when I start, but I know I won't be expecting Agatha Christie to come through in all her glory. I hear Sophie Hannah is not too shabby in the mystery/suspense realm so I'm willing to give her a chance, are you?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)