Summer Quarter Begins!

It's been a bit of a busy week, summer classes just started at Clark and I've been frantically trying to get back into some sort of a routine. This always takes awhile, I haven't ever scheduled classes at this time of day before (mid afternoon) and so this has messed up my sleeping patterns a bit. This quarter I'm taking four classes, two online, Women's Studies and Intro to Humanities, and two on campus, Intro to Archaeology and Film Study.

Women's studies is definitely...interesting. I found myself reading the material and thinking that the authors were over-analyzing things but as my mother pointed out, I am from a generation that hasn't really had to worry about women's rights, at least not in the way hers did. I should count myself lucky, that I've never really been discriminated against for being a woman. Well I have in WoW but that's a different territory, they can tell me to "Go back to the kitchen" or "Make me a sandwich" but they can't make me do any of that, instead I'll simply tank better than they can or out dps them. This is a new experience and I've decided that while I find it odd, I'll probably be more grateful for what I have after taking this class.

The other class I want to talk about is my film studies class. It's absolutely fascinating, we just watched The Artist, which was a stunning film. Silent films are simply beautiful to me, I love seeing how well people can act without dialogue, it's all about movements, gestures and facial expressions. After watching that, I went and watched a film my teacher had talked about in class, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, which was a bit odd but still very good. I won't reveal the ending here but I bet that back when it came out in 1919, everyone was surprised by it. Nowadays, that twist is used more often so I wasn't that phased by it. While watching this film I was amazed with the performance of the actor who played the somnambulist, Cesare. His name was Conrad Veidt and he was a German actor in the early 1900s. People will most likely remember him for this role in Casablanca, as Major Heinrich Strasser, but he was in a lot of other stuff too. I went and watched one of his other silent films, The Man Who Laughs, a film adaptation of Victor Hugo's novel. That was a truely heartbreaking performance, it was a wonderful film and also starred the lovely Mary Philbin (known for the role of Christine Daae in the 1929 silent version of The Phantom of the Opera). The makeup that Conrad wore in the film would eventually be the inspiration for the comic book character, the Joker. I hope to see more of his films soon, along with more silent movies, they are classics for a reason, every time I watch one I'm blown away, they prove that you don't need big explosions and over the top sex scenes to make a good movie.

That's all for now, nothing to update on the summer reading list because I haven't had the time to really sit down and read. I sort of started James Herriot's Dog Stories but that's it. Hopefully once I get into a sort of routine, I'll have more time to do some serious reading.

Accomplished Writing! Woohoo!

Well, I sat down and did some research and worked more on one of my characters for my story. This may sound minor but it's very tricky nowadays to make an interesting character that isn't a Mary Sue or incredibly angsty or just plain boring. Ideally, I'd like this character to be interesting enough for people to want to keep reading and understand why they are the way they are. This got me confident enough to write three pages of the start of my story, the sort of introductory bit that happens right before the story begins. I can already tell that I need to go back and edit it later but still, this is a start! *does excited little dance*


On another note, I've begun reading "How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy" by Orson Scott Card and I can already tell that this book is slightly dated since he talks a lot about getting stories published in magazines. It really saddens me that that isn't really done quite as much anymore, I mean there are still magazines that take submissions like that but not nearly as many, I used to work in a bookstore and when I put out new magazines, I'm sad to say that we didn't have very many writing ones. Still, I think this book will be a good resource, I'm glad I picked it up at Third Place Books when I was in Seattle.


Tangent real quick here, since I mentioned them. Third Place Books is a WONDERFUL little used and new bookstore on the outskirts of Seattle. It's a bit hard to find, tucked back a ways but it is well worth the effort. The staff was incredibly helpful and didn't give up until they found the book I was looking for. They have a nice selection of used and new books, similar to Powell's in downtown Portland, and as usually happens with me in bookstores, I walked out with a rather large stack of new reading material. On top of that, this store has a very nice vintage books section and a really nice sort of food court. If I ever move to Seattle, which I might for my master's degree, Third Place Books will surely become one of my favorite hang outs!


And on a closing note, I found a very useful quote while reading the Wow.insider posts, this one was about the state of female characters in the lore (which, in case you're wondering, is appalling). The writer of this piece, Anne Stickney said "Write a character. Give that character a really good backstory. Give the character a totally grounded reason for existing and something to be up to in the world. Give the character an interesting history, a believable background, and a purpose for existence. Make this the kind of badass character you love writing more than anything else in the world. Then make it female." 
I agree with this statement wholeheartedly and I'm going to try using thinking that way when creating my characters, female and male. Also, it's worth reading that article since she coins a wonderful phrase while applies to all-too-many female characters in literature: barnacle characters, which as she puts it "a character whose entire existence is dependent on and wrapped around the existence of another" (aka Bella Swan). For anyone interested in reading this article, here's the link to it. Women in Warcraft


Well, that's all for now, I may have rambled a bit but hey, I'm getting back into writing and this is part of it. Until next time!

Summer Reading and Writing Attempts

My "summer vacation" is going to be very short, seeing as how I had about two weeks between the end of spring quarter and the beginning of summer quarter. However, since it's summer I feel obliged to go online, find a good list of classics that I've always been meaning to read, check out a massive stack of these books and ultimately finish three or four of these by summer's end. It's not that I read slow, just with an 18 credit courseload, I'm not anticipating as much reading time as I'd like. My tentative list at the moment looks like this:

1. Anna Karenina, by Tolstoy
2. Possession, by Byatt
3. Dog Stories, by James Herriot
4. The Crystal Cave, by Stewart
5. Jane Eyre (reread simply because it's wonderful)
6. Emma, by Jane Austen

That's it for now, I'm hoping that's not overly ambitious. However, on top of all this I'm once again going to make a stab at working on a novel, this time a sort of science fiction story involving alternate universes. I've decided to try and start out by writing for 25 minutes a day, sort of inspired by something I heard on a podcast. Then maybe work up to working longer, but since I have a bit of a problem with concentrating this might take some time. I'll try and document these attempts here to keep track of them, as well as any interesting tid-bits I've looked up or read about writing. Here's to the summer reading and writing goals!

Random American Literature and Thoughts

I'm working on a critical analysis paper for my American Lit class, three pages of in-depth analysis over Thomas Bailey Aldrich's "Unguarded Gates". Kinda shocking how people used to view immigrants, saw them as lesser human beings coming to our country to ruin things. I certainly hope that in this day and age things are different. I'm glad that people took the time to write things down and express their feeling about these things in a creative manner, it's a good way to see how far we've come.

I wonder who will write the things that will be remembered of our time? There's the famous novelists and such but who'll write little poems like this? Who are the great poets of our time? Maybe I need to get out more or read more. I'd love to see some poems like "Unguarded Gates" that talk about what our country is going through now. What kind of literature will stem from our countries' current state? Or do people not do that any more, is it all lost out there in cyberspace, on a blog, in a video?

Beastly

There are so many retellings of classic fairy tales out there that sometimes it can be hard to find the good ones. Beauty and the Beast has always been a favorite of mine, ever since I first saw the Disney movie as a child (a headstrong heroine who loves books, that's totally my think) and Alex Flinn's Beastly, a modern retelling of the story has to be one of the best I've ever read, right up there with Robin McKinley's Beauty.

The story is about spoiled, arrogant and rude popular boy, Kyle Kingsbury, who one day decides to play a prank on the wrong girl, a witch, and ends up cursed to be as beastly on the outside as he is in the inside. In order to break the spell he must find someone to love him in spite of his ugliness, who he must love in return and for that love to be sealed with a kiss. After many failed attempts, including browsing Myspace, he meets Lindy, a girl with a love for books and a kind spirit. He sets off to try and win her heart and in turn break the spell.

This was a quick read for me, only about two and a half hours, but I loved every minute of it. To see this classic story set in a modern city with all the wonders of technology (computers, credit cards, the internet) while still having all the right magic touches (the full transformation, the mirror, the rose petals) was wonderful. It's literally like someone took the Disney movie and just set it in modern day New York instead of a peaceful little French town.

The characters were all extremely well-written, especially Kyle. In the beginning, you can't help but loathe this guy, we've all met one like him in school and probably despised him a little. He thinks he's all that, riding on his good looks and assuming that the world revolves around him because he thinks he's superior in some way. After his transformation, his personality changes drastically. His blind tutor, Will and the housekeeper, Magda, are his only companions for over a year and he splits his time between them, reading, and caring for the roses he's planted in his backyard. He learns to appreciate the simpler things in life. Lindy was exactly as she should have been. She didn't need to be Hollywood beautiful to win his heart, she was just beautiful on the inside and that was all that really mattered. When Kyle got past her physical appearance, which was fine just not spectacular, he found a real person and by doing so, he became a better person too.

The story is predictable but that's perfectly alright, it's a retelling after all and most people have heard the basic story before. I'd suggest this to anyone who likes fairy tales and GOOD fantasy relationships, ones that promote a healthy relationship. Ok, to be fair, the kidnapping isn't the best example, but he was saving her from her abusive father and gave her a better life. But it's their END relationship that's the one people should strive for.

Beastly - 5 out of 5 stars

Boneshaker

About a month ago when I couldn't come up with any new books I wanted to read, I started looking up steampunk novels, I figured if I like steampunk clothing, wouldn't books be even better? I found a nice list at http://www.sflare.com/archives/ten-steampunk-novels-you-ought-to-read/ and that helped get me into that genre. I'll post later about what I thought about some of the books on the list, but for now, here's a review on a random steampunk book I found in the lovely Gold Room (sci-fi and fantasy) at Powell's.

Boneshaker is a zombie steampunk novel by Cherie Priest, published in 2009. It's set around the Civil War era, in the city of Seattle which is half destroyed by a machine called the "Boneshaker" and whose after-effects left thousands of citizens as nothing more than mindless walking corpses. A giant wall seals off the contaminated part of town, letting it crumble and decay. On the other side of the wall, the widow of the man who created the "Boneshaker" is trying to raise her son Ezekiel until one day, the teen decides to go into the old city and look for evidence that would possibly prove his father's innocence.

I'll admit, it took me a little while to really get into this book but by the time I was halfway through, I couldn't put it down and ended up reading late into the night to finish it. The setting is dark and often times rather depressing, you can visualize how bleak and miserable that city is and it gets to you a little. I live near Seattle and I know how overcast and dreary the weather can be, so that just added to how I visualized the setting. Other than that, the story is well put together, with many fantastic adventure elements, like pirates, airships, underground tunnels and of course, rotting zombies who chase after the characters in mindless hordes, wanting only to tear them to shreds and only being stopped by the forceful removal of limbs or heads.

This is a nice combination of steampunk and zombies, it's not so technical that it makes your mind spin like some steampunk works, there's just enough for it to seem like sci-fi while not being over the top and unrealistic. I'd suggest this to anyone interested in steampunk books, this is a nice, gradual introduction into the genre, one that will hopefully leave readers eager to read more books like it.

Boneshaker - 4 out of 5 stars

Arthas: Rise of the Lich King

So my first book to review is one I finished a little while ago and this is more proof of my little WoW addiction. Being the lore-nut that I am, I picked up a copy of Arthas: Rise of the Lich King by Christie Golden the last time I hit up Powell's.

Usually, I'm a little skeptical about lore books (*cough cough Rhonin cough*) so I wasn't sure if I'd like this. My preconceptions were quickly laid aside as I got drawn into the tale of the fallen prince of Lordaeron. The prologue reminds you that of course this story isn't going to end happily, it's going to show you how a shining prince succumbs to darkness and becomes one of the most powerful and evil beings in all of Azeroth. After that, it dives right into Arthas' past, starting with childhood and continuing on through his years of training as a paladin, his relationship with the talented young Jaina Proudmoore, and eventually to the investigation of the Scourge which in turn sets him on the path to his future.

The novel is divided into three sections, the first is from Arthas' point of view (The Golden Boy) and it mostly details his childhood and the events that began to shape his future self; the second is from Jaina Proudmoore's point of view (The Bright Lady), following Arthas as he matures and embarks on his relationship with her and eventually the events that lead him to Northrend; the third and final section is from the eyes of the vengeful banshee queen, Lady Sylvannas (The Dark Lady) and details all the exploits of Arthas, the Death Knight and how he eventually took up the crown of the Lich King.

Lore enthusiasts like myself won't be disappointed, if you frequent the popular WoWWiki, you'll be glad to see many lore characters make appearances, such as Varian (before the big chin!), Uther, King Terenas, Muradin Bronzebeard, Taretha, Thrall (although a minor roll), and many others. All of these characters are brought to life very realistically by Ms. Golden, so that it becomes even more exciting if you come across something involving them in-game.

When judging this book, I have to look at it two ways. One, this is a lore book and lore books that are decent and actually draw you into them, seem to be few and far between. Two, as just a book, it will make no sense to someone who doesn't know anything about the Warcraft universe. As a lore book, this is absolutely fantastic, I'd recommend it to anyone who wants to know more about the events that led up to the current expansion pack. It provides an in-depth look at the world of Azeroth, one that you won't get just by playing the game. As just a book, it's a good fantasy read, well-written, but probably a little hard to get into and understand who all the people are, where certain locations are, and to understand the total impact of the character's actions.

Arthas: Rise of the Lich King - 4.5 stars out of 5