My summer reading list
And here's my new favorite things!
-How to Tame Your Dragon: Watched this with my housemates a few weeks ago. It was cute and well-done and beautiful, but at the time I thought it was just a decent movie. Then the next day, I went to work... and every time I thought about it, I just felt so relaxed and happy. It seriously put me in a good mood for the rest of the week. I think a lot of my initial lack of enthusiasm has to do with having eaten a bowl full of peanut-butter curry before watching. (PS: when buying curry powder or any other unfamiliar spice product, check for allergens before eating a whole bowl thinking that it's just spicy. #ishouldntbealive #protip)
-Sherlock: The BBC's modern-day AU of Sherlock Holmes. It's up on Netflix, it's only 3 epsidoes (90 mins each), and it is fantastic. You noted that I bought the complete Sherlock Holmes at The Coop? This is why. Sherlock Holmes, no matter what his incarnation, is one of the INTJ's favorite fictional characters to claim, and now I understand. Also, he's a crazy sexy motherfucker in the books. I didn't realize how badly Wishbone had lied to me.
Oh, and the acting in the show is brilliant. The guy who plays Sherlock is decidedly unattractive, but he manages to act out the charisma that high-functioning sociopaths have in such a way that I want to have his babies.
-Tiger and Bunny: is an anime highly endorsed by Yiwan, about superheros who are sponsored by private companies and fight crime as part of a reality tv contest. Tiger is an older superhero with a daughter he doesn't see very often, and Bunny is his upstart angsty revenge-driven new partner. They Fight Crime! And the show shoveled in a flamingly-gay black character whose name is "Fire Emblem", but I call him Twofer. Anime tends to fall into two catagories for me: 1) Anime that is boring, predictable, or just uninteresting or 2) Anime that I really like, but that feels like it's something besides anime. Anime+. Reconstructed Anime. I don't know. But Tiger and Bunny is great, because it feels like a genre anime. It is a superhero genre anime. It's not arty or a social statement or some weird twist on a well-known cliche. But it's still really good and really interesting. I think it's refreshing to watch an anime that manages to engage me and still stay within the bounds of 'typical mainstream anime'.
-The Darkangel Trilogy by Meredith Anne Pierce: Ok, I'll come clean, I've read the Darkangel trilogy multiple times over my adolescence, so it isn't really new to me. Like most kids, I picked it up because I confused Meredith Anne for Tamora Pierce at first. The Washington County Library's copy of the first book had tea spilled on it, causing it to mildew and stink, but I re-read it anyway, holding it at arms length for large portions. Sadly, someone has since reported that it's unreadable, and it hasn't been replaced, since Ohio hates its public libraries and they have no money. It doesn't help that it's out of print, something that I was hoping Twilight's popularity would fix.
Anyway, Alisa and I have been skyping with each other and reading it out loud, and I thought I would throw in an endorsement for it. The first one is a vampire romance, only done right. For one, it takes place on a moon, so days last a month and everything is trippy (this is a Meredith Anne Pierce thing, apparently). But the best part is that the vampire is a total asshole, and the downtrodden little slave girl who is the main character knows it. She openly admits that she really just likes looking at him (he's very pretty... and he kinda sparkles, NGL), and the majority of the story doesn't even revolve around him. It's mostly about her growing a spine and learning to be more empowered, and the vampire only shows up on occasion to flex his wings and be an alluring bad boy who is a total asshole. He isn't even IN the second book. And the world is so good. So is talking to Alisa every night.
-Pride and Prejudice: I've been putting this off forever, but since Alisa read Jane Eyre, I figured I had to return the favor. It's great. I particularly like that Elizabeth doesn't give Darcy a second thought until she sees what a sweet house he has, and then suddenly he ain't lookin' so bad. As someone who finds herself increasingly fed-up with romance, this was a story I could get behind. Better Book Titles calls it "No Romance Without Finance", and while I know a lot of people consider that Just Terrible, I thought it was perhaps romance I've read in a long time.
Alisa has told me multiple times that she enjoyed Jane Eyre largely because Jane reminds her of me so much. This is unequivicoly the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me. Really. I have never been so flattered. I wanted to read Pride and Prejudice and tell her she was just like Elizabeth, as that is how it goes when friends exchange books, but she's only like Elizabeth sometimes. Which brings me to:
-Dealing With Dragons by Patricia Wrede: I picked this up in the library because I was there and why not. It's a YA book about a princess who gets fed up with being a princess and runs off to live with dragons instead. Alisa has talked about it so often during our time as friends that I figured it was high time I read it. It was good. I'm a little old for it, I think, but I enjoyed it immensely because it's pretty much narrated by Alisa, about a girl who is pretty much Princess Alisa. It was like having my roommate back. I miss her.
-Sherlock: The BBC's modern-day AU of Sherlock Holmes. It's up on Netflix, it's only 3 epsidoes (90 mins each), and it is fantastic. You noted that I bought the complete Sherlock Holmes at The Coop? This is why. Sherlock Holmes, no matter what his incarnation, is one of the INTJ's favorite fictional characters to claim, and now I understand. Also, he's a crazy sexy motherfucker in the books. I didn't realize how badly Wishbone had lied to me.
Oh, and the acting in the show is brilliant. The guy who plays Sherlock is decidedly unattractive, but he manages to act out the charisma that high-functioning sociopaths have in such a way that I want to have his babies.
-Tiger and Bunny: is an anime highly endorsed by Yiwan, about superheros who are sponsored by private companies and fight crime as part of a reality tv contest. Tiger is an older superhero with a daughter he doesn't see very often, and Bunny is his upstart angsty revenge-driven new partner. They Fight Crime! And the show shoveled in a flamingly-gay black character whose name is "Fire Emblem", but I call him Twofer. Anime tends to fall into two catagories for me: 1) Anime that is boring, predictable, or just uninteresting or 2) Anime that I really like, but that feels like it's something besides anime. Anime+. Reconstructed Anime. I don't know. But Tiger and Bunny is great, because it feels like a genre anime. It is a superhero genre anime. It's not arty or a social statement or some weird twist on a well-known cliche. But it's still really good and really interesting. I think it's refreshing to watch an anime that manages to engage me and still stay within the bounds of 'typical mainstream anime'.
-The Darkangel Trilogy by Meredith Anne Pierce: Ok, I'll come clean, I've read the Darkangel trilogy multiple times over my adolescence, so it isn't really new to me. Like most kids, I picked it up because I confused Meredith Anne for Tamora Pierce at first. The Washington County Library's copy of the first book had tea spilled on it, causing it to mildew and stink, but I re-read it anyway, holding it at arms length for large portions. Sadly, someone has since reported that it's unreadable, and it hasn't been replaced, since Ohio hates its public libraries and they have no money. It doesn't help that it's out of print, something that I was hoping Twilight's popularity would fix.
Anyway, Alisa and I have been skyping with each other and reading it out loud, and I thought I would throw in an endorsement for it. The first one is a vampire romance, only done right. For one, it takes place on a moon, so days last a month and everything is trippy (this is a Meredith Anne Pierce thing, apparently). But the best part is that the vampire is a total asshole, and the downtrodden little slave girl who is the main character knows it. She openly admits that she really just likes looking at him (he's very pretty... and he kinda sparkles, NGL), and the majority of the story doesn't even revolve around him. It's mostly about her growing a spine and learning to be more empowered, and the vampire only shows up on occasion to flex his wings and be an alluring bad boy who is a total asshole. He isn't even IN the second book. And the world is so good. So is talking to Alisa every night.
-Pride and Prejudice: I've been putting this off forever, but since Alisa read Jane Eyre, I figured I had to return the favor. It's great. I particularly like that Elizabeth doesn't give Darcy a second thought until she sees what a sweet house he has, and then suddenly he ain't lookin' so bad. As someone who finds herself increasingly fed-up with romance, this was a story I could get behind. Better Book Titles calls it "No Romance Without Finance", and while I know a lot of people consider that Just Terrible, I thought it was perhaps romance I've read in a long time.
Alisa has told me multiple times that she enjoyed Jane Eyre largely because Jane reminds her of me so much. This is unequivicoly the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me. Really. I have never been so flattered. I wanted to read Pride and Prejudice and tell her she was just like Elizabeth, as that is how it goes when friends exchange books, but she's only like Elizabeth sometimes. Which brings me to:
-Dealing With Dragons by Patricia Wrede: I picked this up in the library because I was there and why not. It's a YA book about a princess who gets fed up with being a princess and runs off to live with dragons instead. Alisa has talked about it so often during our time as friends that I figured it was high time I read it. It was good. I'm a little old for it, I think, but I enjoyed it immensely because it's pretty much narrated by Alisa, about a girl who is pretty much Princess Alisa. It was like having my roommate back. I miss her.