octavia_cade's Reviews (2.64k)

One of the most appalling things I've ever read. And I think what's so affecting about it, what's so very horrifying, is the unflinching honesty behind it. Wiesel is very clear, very aware, of the damage that is being done inside himself, the lengths to which he is driven by cruelty and privation. I'm not talking here about the rage he feels towards God - which seems entirely reasonable under the circumstances - but the effects of concentration camps on his perceptions of family and hope. The transformation of his father from someone to be loved and protected (with as much protection as any adolescent child can give a parent) to a dead weight, a burden which Wiesel is tempted to lay down... the anger he feels at his father's weakness, the realisation that the son would likely benefit from the father's death... it's horrible, and completely, utterly understandable.

This is one of those books that everyone should read. Short and hard and terrible.

Slow-moving and disturbing, with a couple of fantastic villains. Mrs. Danvers is the highlight of Rebecca, of course, and I finished the book feeling sorry that there wasn't more of her. Well done as this story is - and it is very well done - I'd far rather have seen more of the old bat plotting than read through another attack of the vapours from our milksop narrator, the most interesting thing about whom is her lack of name.

It really is extraordinarily clever though, that lack. It's the perfect underlining literary trick, and part of me wonders if Rebecca would have had such success if we'd known the name of the second Mrs. de Winter. I suspect it still would have been a best-seller, but there would have been something so much blander about it...

A collection of poetry that focuses on retelling Bible stories in vivid little snapshots. There's a strong focus on women, which is appreciated, and underlying themes of expectation and of absence.

The language here is really beautiful, though I think it faltered occasionally when encompassing the odd reference to other (future) occurrences or references. The comparison to Grendel, for instance, smacked me right out of the "Virtuous Woman" poem, as the word "Grendel" comes with imagery (with environmental imagery, specifically) that doesn't fit with the collection as a whole. Otherwise it was remarkably consistent.

Full of blood and ghosts and curses, murdered kiddies and a drowning in malmsey. As such it's consistently amusing! Always something going on, though it does drag in the middle a bit. Richard himself is convincingly nasty - certainly nastier than Richard II, but not nearly so entertaining I think (the characterisation of number II was excellent, a pure portrait of vacuous self-centredness). What I find difficult to grasp, though, is just how easily this nasty creature gets others to do his bidding. I mean, I know he's the king and fond of beheading, but still! "I killed your husband, but give me ten minutes to sweet-talk you and you'll marry me next!" "Hey you, want to slaughter some little boys? Alright! Let me know when you're done." "I've had your wee sons killed, how about recommending me in marriage to your daughter? Granted it seems like a bad idea now, but give it a few minutes, you'll come around..."

At least Margaret never went soft. No-one holds a grudge like that old horror - I was deeply delighted to see the wretched objects of some of her curses pleading with her to stay and teach them how to curse like that! Never change, Margaret. Never change...

Fun and funny bubblegum read, perfect for when it's been a long day and you need something undemanding that isn't television. I'm kind of surprised by how much I enjoyed it considering that I find Bridget deeply, I don't know, perplexing? For someone who's supposed to be Everywoman, I've never actually known a woman who is fundamentally this silly. This isn't the first time I've read the book, but she continues to come off as fake to me. An exaggerated construct for the purposes of humour, a clown in a woman-suit.

And that's fine. She is funny. I just wish I'd spend more time laughing with her than laughing at her.

There were parts of this that made me want to rate it higher than three stars. Namely, Rincewind trying to explain to the child revolutionaries just how revolutions tended to end for people like them. And Twoflower standing up to Hong, and Twoflower's daughter-that-took-after-her-mother. But these tended to be overwhelmed by a lot of other stuff.

Don't get me wrong: that other stuff was funny. I enjoyed reading it. But honestly, I don't care that much for Rincewind or Cohen or the rest. I don't think it's much of a coincidence that the parts where I liked Rincewind best he sounded distinctly like Sam Vimes going on about bad kings and the power of the nobles. And the book as a whole felt just a little bloated to me - like it could have been focused a little more on the revolutionary meat and less on everything else. But then that's Rincewind for you: constantly distracted, and constantly distracting.

This... wasn't great. The writing's pretty basic, and the author is in love with adverbs. I had some hope for the story what with the whole coyote thing, because we don't have them in my country and so to me they're new and interesting, but in the end I was less struck by the coyotes than by Xander and Willow, who both appeared to have been lobotomised. Add in an extraordinarily rushed ending, and... eh.

Mediocre is the best that can be said of it.

I'd probably give this three and a half stars, if Goodreads were capable of half stars, so rounding up to four it is. As is typical for Maugham, the characterisation is very very good, and if this doesn't hold my interest to quite the same level as The Painted Veil then I still gobbled it down in a couple of days.

I have a great sympathy for Larry and his desire to loaf, and I was with him nearly all the way up until the end - until, I should say, the chapter in which he goes on about his Indian experiences and the Absolute, which I'm sorry to say was interminable, not up to Maugham's usual standard. Unlike Larry, I am not a religious person who doesn't believe in God. I'm a disbeliever all through, and the more he wittered on about becoming one with the universe the more tedious I thought him. Still, there aren't a lot of characters like him in the books that populate my shelves, and for the most part I'm very glad of the variety he provides.

There's a great concept behind this - taking the religious figure of Jesus Christ and splitting him into two different individuals: Jesus the man, and Christ the myth. The two are twins, and their brotherly relationship isn't always the best as both have different ideas as to how to do things, and different interpretations of the same event.

While it was an easy, enjoyable, and occasionally thoughtful read, after grasping that basic concept at the beginning of the book, it was clear just how it was going to go and what the ending would be. And, no surprises, everything trundled on as expected. I liked this story, I thought it was interesting, but for me the execution didn't quite rise to the same level as the concept.

I liked this, but I just couldn't get into it more than that. It's no Richard II, that's for sure. If anything, it put me in mind of The Comedy of Errors, my least favourite Shakespeare play thus far. This is, I realise, something of a ridiculous comparison, but it's in the ridiculousness that the comparison lies. There seemed to me to be too much (supposedly) funny stuffing at the beginning of this - pranks and tricks and general silliness. (It's hard to believe that Henry V developed from this jackass; the change is totally unconvincing.) That being said, all of them still seem like a pack of self-important windbags and my sympathy lies with none of them. Still, the play improved out of sight in the second half, once the battle begun and people stopped acting - for the most part - like utter fools.

There are some fantastic insults in here, though.