Books 2008 / IV.
50BookChallenge #29:Hide And Seek by Ian Rankin [1990].
Genre: Crime Novel.
Page Count: 318.
Synopsis: At night the summer sky stays light over Edinburgh. But in a shadowy, crumbling housing development, a junkie lies dead of an overdose, his bruised body surrounded by signs of Satanic worship. John Rebus could call the death and accident--but won't. Instead, he tracks down a violent-tempered young woman who knew the dead boy and heard him cry out his terrifying last words: "Hide! Hide!" Now, with the help of a bright, conflicted young detective, Rebus is following the girl through a brutal world of bad deals, bad dope and bad company. From a beautiful city's darkest side to the private sanctums of the upper crust, Rebus is seeking the perfect hiding place for a killer.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: I like Rankin's style, so I enjoyed this book - mostly because Inspector Rebus doesn't happen to be the stereotypical hero: he's middle aged, is becoming a bit overweight and has his fair share of troubles dealing with what life throws at him.
The book itself didn't quite manage to keep me as fascinated as Strip Jack but it was a good read.
50BookChallenge #30:Legacies by F. Paul Wilson [1998].
Genre: Thriller.
Page Count: 510.
Synopsis: Jack, a fix-it man who specializes in solving people's problems (and who, as far as the authorities are concerned, doesn't even exist), does a favour for a friend--he recovers some toys stolen from a hospital--and winds up helping a woman solve a deadly mystery from her past.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: Again, nice book that entertained and kept me occupied. As it is most often the case it had its share of cliches and moments that were to be expected but it was fun. So you could say I'm not enthusiastic about it but I'm also not appalled or something. Actually, I seem to be pretty 'meh' about it ;)
50BookChallenge #31:Grave Peril by Jim Butcher [2001].
Genre: Fantasy/Thriller-ish ;)
Page Count: 490.
Synopsis: Harry Dresden's faced some pretty terrifying foes during his career. Giant scorpions. Oversexed vampires. Psychotic werewolves. It comes with the territory when you're the only professional wizard in the Chicago area phone book.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: Like most of Butcher's books this was fun. No deep, meaningful story with a hidden message to improve your life but rather pure entertainment. And I was perfectly fine with that because that's what I was looking for. I'd say if you're looking for something fun and relaxing - a wild mixture of a thriller, mythology and a grown-up Harry Potter? Try this series.
50BookChallenge #32:The Book In Which The World Vanished by Wolfram Fleischhauer [2003].
Genre: Historical/Suspense.
Page Count: 487.
Synopsis: In 1780 young physician Nicolai Roeschlaub gets tangled up in a series of suspicious murder mysteries. Along with an enigmatic young woman Nicolai sets out to solve these mysteries.
Personal Thoughts: The book isn't nearly as bad as the clichéd summary might make you suspect. The mysterious woman doesn't hold the answers to the world's secrets (quite honestly, I found her slightly stupid and annoying), Nicolai isn't a super-hero-esque character who saves everyone but rather a frightened young man who wonders just how he got himself into so much trouble and the ending? Is sort of cool.
50BookChallenge #33:The Swarm by Frank Schaetzing [2004].
Genre: Techno-Thriller.
Page Count: 987.
Synopsis: Whales begin sinking ships. Toxic, eyeless crabs poison Long Island's water supply. The North Sea shelf collapses, killing thousands in Europe. Around the world, countries are beginning to feel the effects of the ocean's revenge as the seas and their inhabitants begin a violent revolution against mankind. In this riveting novel, full of twists, turns, and cliffhangers, a team of scientists discovers a strange, intelligent life force called the Yrr that takes form in marine animals, using them to wreak havoc on humanity for our ecological abuses. Soon a struggle between good and evil is in full swing, with both human and suboceanic forces battling for control of the waters. At stake is the survival of the Earth's fragile ecology -- and ultimately, the survival of the human race itself.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: The book starts out strong and immediately captures my attention. In fact, for the first - let's say 600 pages or so - I was barely able to put it down. I loved the semi-scientific set-up (because we all agree that in the name of literary freedom some facts had to twitched and altered but hey! It's a novel, not a textbook) , the characterisation and the way people dealt with the madness. Unfortunately, I felt it lose a bit of its pace toward the ending but still, I'd say this one os a must read.
50BookChallenge #34:Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen [published 1818].
Genre: Gothic novel.
Page Count: 236.
Synopsis: The story’s unlikely heroine is Catherine Morland, a remarkably innocent seventeen-year-old woman from a country parsonage. While spending a few weeks in Bath with a family friend, Catherine meets and falls in love with Henry Tilney, who invites her to visit his family estate, Northanger Abbey. Once there, Catherine, a great reader of Gothic thrillers, lets the shadowy atmosphere of the old mansion fill her mind with terrible suspicions. What is the mystery surrounding the death of Henry’s mother? Is the family concealing a terrible secret within the elegant rooms of the Abbey? Can she trust Henry, or is he part of an evil conspiracy? Catherine finds dreadful portents in the most prosaic events, until Henry persuades her to see the peril in confusing life with art.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: All right, at first I was bored. And yes, it surprised me that anything written by Jane Austen could bore me but this book started out very meekly in my opinion and even the brilliant characterisation of the supporting characters didn't quite excite me. That changed once the parody started and I admit there were several instances where I laughed out loud. So I'd say that once you get into the story it's entertaining but definitely not my favourite Austen.
50BookChallenge #35:The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Jay Fowler [2004].
Genre: Fiction.
Page Count: 288.
Synopsis: In California's Sacramento Valley, six people meet once a month to discuss Jane Austen's novels. They are ordinary people, neither happy nor unhappy, but all wounded in different ways, all mixed up about their lives and their relationships. Over the six months they meet marriages are tested, affairs begin, unsuitable arrangements become suitable, and, under the guiding eye of Jane Austen, some of them even fall in love...
[Summary from the book's back cover.]
Personal Thoughts: Read in preparation for the film. As I hate watching a film and then reading the book, I felt that I had to get my hands on this book. Which, in retrospect, turned out to be a good idea. The book was nice and had a bit of a feeling as if several loosely-connected short stories were tied into an even looser bigger story. It was...nice.
My personal favourite about the book? The quotes about Jane Austen at the end. Highly amusing.
50BookChallenge #36:Bleachers by John Grisham [2003].
Genre: Novel.
Page Count: 183.
Synopsis: The story centres on the impending death of the Messina Spartans' football coach Eddie Rake. One of the most victorious coaches in high school football history, Rake is a man both loved and feared by his players and by a town that relishes his 13 state titles. The hero of the novel is Neely Crenshaw, a former Rake All-American whose NFL prospects ended abruptly after a cheap shot to the knees. Neely has returned home for the first time in years to join a nightly vigil for Rake at the Messina stadium. Having wandered through life with little focus since his college days, he struggles to reconcile his conflicted feelings towards his former coach, and he assays to rekindle love in the ex-girlfriend he abandoned long ago. For Messina and for Neely, the homecoming offers the prospect of building a life after Rake.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: This is a book I read more or less in a daze. I let the story pass me by but - perhaps because I can't relate to football? - I still viewed Rake as a tyrannical man and thought that Neely and the others made too much of a fuss about him.
The story was nice but perhaps I just picked the wrong topic for my taste?
50BookChallenge #37:Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut [1985].
Genre: Novel. Satire.
Page Count: 254.
Synopsis: Galapagos takes the reader back one million years, to A.D. 1986. A simple vacation cruise suddenly becomes an evolutionary journey. Thanks to an apocalypse, a small group of survivors stranded on the Galapagos Islands are about to become the progenitors of a brave new, and totally different human race.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: A weird book that had me shaking my head in places but mostly, even though I thought 'how ridiculous!' more than once, I somehow seemed incapable of putting it down. Consequentially I read it in one sitting, constantly alternating between fascination, amusement and disbelief.
I think I'll read more Vonnegut.
50BookChallenge #38:Lord of the Flies by William Golding [1954].
Genre: Allegorical novel.
Page Count: 282.
Synopsis: A group of British school-boys stuck on a deserted island who try to govern themselves with disastrous results.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: The book was surprisingly full of suspense in my opinion. Seriously, I started out reading it with a laid-back attitude, waiting for things to get interesting and whoa! They did. At some point it felt as if the events came faster and faster and by the end of the book I was sitting on the edge of my seat, biting my nails.
Not to mention that beside the suspense-factor there's also the underlying message but I won't get too much into that because it's obvious anyway (and would be but a poor repetition of things smarter people than me have already said).
50BookChallenge #39:Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella [2001].
Genre: Novel.
Page Count: 350.
Synopsis: At age 25, Rebecca Bloomwood has everything she wants. Or does she? Can her career as a financial journalist, a fab flat and a closet full of designer clothes lessen the blow of the dunning letters from credit card companies and banks that have been arriving too quickly to be contained by the drawer in which Rebecca hides them? Although her romantic entanglements tend toward the superficial, there is that wonderful Luke Brandon of Brandon Communications: handsome, intelligent, the 31st-richest bachelor according to Harper's and actually possessed of a personality that is more substance than style. Too bad that Rebecca blows it whenever their paths cross. Will Rebecca learn to stop shopping before she loses everything worthwhile? When faced with the opportunity to do good for others and impress Luke, will she finally measure up? Rebecca is so unremittingly shallow and Luke is so wonderful that readers may find themselves rooting for the heroine not to get the man.
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: Now that book amused me to no end. I was laughing out loud quite a few times (and I think I managed to draw a few funny looks while doing so, too). It' cute, quirky and entertaining. Very relaxing, too.
50BookChallenge #40:M.A.S.H. by Richard Hooker [1968].
Genre: Novel.
Page Count: 205.
Synopsis: The doctors who worked in the Mobile Army Surgical Hospitals (MASH) during the Korean War were well trained but, like most soldiers sent to fight a war, too young for the job. In the words of the author, "a few flipped their lids, but most of them just raised hell, in a variety of ways and degrees."
[Summary from here.]
Personal Thoughts: Merely calling this a funny book wouldn't do it justice. Yes, I definitely laughed at the doctors' antics and the weird things they got up to but at the same time there's no way that the serious background faded completely. Mostly I was...impressed, I guess. I felt like the laughter that would inevitably come whenever Hawkeye & Co. Did something funny would die in my throat as the next scene suddenly dealt with the things those men and women went through.
I'd recommend the book.