Book Geek Wednesday: Cover Pretties

Once again, Angie, from Angieville delivers some mouthwatering, brain stimulating, squee inducing goods. I absolutely love her cover reveals. Two in particular really caught my eye.

This one, because… well it’s a Jane Eyre retelling. And seriously? I can’t help but be totally excited about that.

Will it live up to the hype? It’s hard to tell. Jane Eyre is beloved by many. Will I at least give it a shot. Heck yes. It’s worth it to see if her ‘Mr. Rochester’, or in this case, Nico Rathburn, the famous rockstar making a comeback, is as dark, broody, and completely sexy as the original.

If April Lindner loves the story as much as we do, I can see her making it a tribute to remember.

The next cover that I absolutely adored was the one for Entwined by Heather Dixon, which is a retelling of the 12 Dancing Princesses, one of my favorite Grimm tales! 😀

I have seen this fairy tale make the rounds more recently, and though it seems to be in several places, it’s nice to see such original takes from different authors bringing a lesser known fairy tale to light.

Entwined won’t be released until March of next year, but it’s definitely one to keep on your radar. As though we could forget that cover. 😉

And lastly, I bring you the last in the Wicked Lovely series. Miss Marr has some serious cover mojo. I envy her. 😀

Isn’t it just stunning?

Any covers you’re drooling over lately? We’d love to see them! Link us!

Movie Magic Monday: Alice in Wonderland

I have to admit something that’s downright unheard of by now, but I’m not the biggest fan of Tim Burton.  Yes, even when he’s gone and put Johnny Depp in almost all of his movies for quite some time now.  I don’t know what it is about his particular brand of Weird, but it’s just not really my thing.

I also have to admit that I can be fairly trepidatious about retold classics.  Especially if they’re classics I was particularly partial to as a kid, which is true about Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland.  If you remember, I had this same trepidation about Frank Beddor’s The Looking Glass Wars.   I was also starting to think that between Beddor’s work, Syfy’s Alice, and the Burton version coming out, maybe that was just a bit too much Wonderland re-working going on at the same time for all of them to be fantastic in separate ways.

Despite all of these doubts, though, I went and saw Disney’s Alice in Wonderland in theaters and was really surprised at how much I liked the film.  Forget liked, I thought it was pretty brilliantly done.  I very much enjoyed that this was an older Alice, who wasn’t really sure if she believed she’d been there before or not, and was trying to wake herself up all throughout the film until she decided—as some of us do in dreams—that she can take control of her own fate, rather than letting it take control of her.  It was a lot of fun to see the exchanges we know and expected from the original story—Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, the Jabberwocky, the Red and White Queen—and see them redone in a fresh and honestly fun way.

Maybe that’s the thing I enjoyed most about the film—that it was so fun.  I had the feeling that most of the actors involved—especially Alan Rickman as the Caterpillar and Anne Hathaway as the White Queen—were just having a ball with their quirky and odd characters.  It was also nice to have a relative unknown in Alice, as she was the one character who the audience really had to feel a tie to, and for me, at least, Burton’s regular acting troupe can be a bit distracting showing up in so many of his films.  Mia Wasikowska was refreshing and relateable as Alice—well, as relateable as a girl finding herself in a whole other world full of strange sights and creatures on the eve of her expected engagement can be.  (As a sidenote, I’m really looking forward to seeing her play Jane Eyre early next year… they’d originally cast Ellen Page, but Wasikowska makes a lot more sense to me in the role, and I love that book more than I can say).

I like also that at the end of the film the audience is left to decide for itself whether Alice has really gone to Wonderland, of if she’s simply had yet another dream, as there are clues either way.  The only thing I can’t particularly say I cared for very much, was Johnny Depp’s bizarre dance scene at  the end.  And I do have to mention again how much I enjoyed Anne Hathaway as the White Queen—she was so delightfully strange, and has come quite a long way from The Princess Diaries, though I loved those films too!

Alice in Wonderland gets a solid A from me.

Thursday Myths & Legends 101: The Gytrash

The Gytrash is a spectral creature of North England myth, appearing to lost or way-laid travelers on lonely roads  as either a large lion-like dog, donkey, or horse.

The creature occasionally manifests itself to lead a lost traveler to the right path, but most encounters are of a more sinister nature, leading the travelers astray, never to be found again.  When the creature appeared as entirely dark, with eyes burning like coals, it’s believed to be at its most malevolent.  It is one of many forms of spectral dogs, in particular, and fairly rare.

The most common reference for a Gytrash is the scene in Jane Eyre, where Jane wonders momentarily if Pilot, Mr. Rochester’s dog who has found her on her way to Thornfield, might possibly be this mythic beast.  She’s reassured when she sees Rochester riding his horse, as “Nothing ever rode the Gytrash: it was always alone.”

For such a small moment in the book, and such a rarely-heard-of creature, this scene has always stuck with me, as has the image of the Gytrash, appearing on dusky roads and luring wandering travelers astray.  There’s something particularly sinister in the idea of what most people would expect to be a subservient creature  leading tired and lonely travelers astray, in the guise of companionship.  This is one myth that I wouldn’t be surprised to feel the tugs of if I were ever to find myself on an abandoned country road in Europe somewhere.  Maybe even here in America, if the conditions were just right.  If I go for a long walk and don’t end up coming home… well, it may well have been a Gytrash that I’ve let lead me astray.  I think I’d keep away from that one with the burning-coal eyes, though… at least I’d hope I’d have enough sense as that.

Book Geek Wednesday: I’m Reading…

Welcome to my first edition of ‘I’m reading’ where I divulge my insanity and the surreal number of books I tend to read at once. Sometimes, one will jump ahead of the pack and will become the new IT book which forces me to devour it at unheard of speeds. But mostly, especially lately, I’ve been flooded with life- my son’s newfound walking skills which leave my pots, pans and tupperware all over my kitchen floor, my writing deadlines, my house which is often a disaster area for toys and baby socks . It’s hard to really sit and enjoy a book when I’m always peeking to make sure the little one isnt bodyslamming the cat.

So here’s the rundown:

Classics: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Print: Lament by Maggie Stiefvater

Ebook: Uglies by Scott Westerfield

So how about you? What are you reading?

Lisa’s Tuesday Perspective: Series vs. Stand-Alones

I admit, sometimes it’s difficult for me to pick up a new book.  I look at new characters, a new mini, fictional world, and it kind of—almost—looks like work.  Even if the words are on the page and all I have to do is read them.  Because the fact is, if I turn just to the right or left, very often I have within my reach a book that’s part of a world I already know and love, and don’t have to think about—don’t have to warm myself up to.

I’m not wholly alone in this, am I?

The fact is, there are about a trillion books in the world that I want to read—but I’m a slowish reader, and unfortunately have a finite lifespan, and much more finite time at my disposal, so if it takes effort to get into a story, I’d rather flit to something else.  Also, I admit, I’m a nostalgic.  I like to visit the same characters again and again, they’re like old friends.  I realize those two arguments completely counteract each other, but I can’t really explain this.  Somehow they’re both 100% true.

Which is why I’m wanting to re-read Harry Potter and Twilight, after only having read them maybe a year ago.  And why I’m bouncing in my seat for the new (and sadly final!) Fablehaven book by Brandon Mull.  It’s also the reason why I’m such a TV junkie, I think.  Also, there’s something… almost legitimizing in a set of books, isn’t there?  If characters work in not just one book, but three, or seven, or several… they’re that much more real, aren’t they?

Then again… oh there’s something satisfying about finishing a good book and looking at it and knowing that it’s done.  That the main character got what they set out to get, and all is more or less accomplished.  Some books could never have been part of a series in the first place—can you imagine a sequel to Jane Eyre?  Yes there are spin-offs of Jane Austen’s books, but… you can see why she didn’t write them herself, can’t you?  The story is done!  Party over!  Whatever the characters do afterwards… well, that’s their problem.

So what’s a more satisfying read for you?  One good book that gets it done in the time allotted, or stretching it out, as long as is conceivably decent?  Of course there are some series that last too long, but that’s a different subject entirely.  I really can’t say for myself… sometimes it depends on the plot—obviously something well-planned out like Harry Potter is going to be pretty satisfying, but then again, I’m re-reading the Anne of Green Gables series right now, and enjoying them excessively, and they are about as far from plot-heavy as you can get.  Maybe more what I’m asking is, what justifies a series?  And is it, after all, a more impressive accomplishment to finish a full story in one book?  Or does it really just take as long as it takes?

There’s no right or wrong answers here.  What do you think?