Quick update + book
I'm home. I was a bit rushed getting out of town, but I'm back now and all is well. I've managed to visit various family members (some multiple times) and check in with some friends (though not enough yet). I've also started some chores, which is good since I've got a huge list before I go. If nothing else, I don't have anywhere to stay in Japan yet, and that's kinda important.
I got straight A's this semester. I'm happy, but a little confused. For various reasons, my "finals period" extended across about two full months, and was intertwined with preparing for a first year review and getting all of this summer study stuff in order. By the time I could actually focus solely on my finals, I only had a handful of days to do what should have taken at least two weeks. Luckily I had done a fair bit of research for one of them, but still... I wanted to do better. I may have a chance to do better on all of them - it looks like they could all be ongoing projects.
It's more than a little absurd to say this, but despite the tons and tons of reading I did for my classes, I'm only on book four of the 50-book project. That should creep up shortly, however, as I got a number of books from the library today. Well, we'll see. Summer'll be busy, fall'll be full of classes... how is it that I read so much, and yet so little?
5. Skies of Dawn by Fuyumi Ono
The third book in the Twelve Kingdoms series, and the last one we're likely to see for awhile due to Tokyopop's demise. I love the series, but dislike this book. Yoko returns to be one of this volume's three stars. She's joined by Suzu, a Japanese girl washed into the Twelve Kingdoms, and Shoukei, a princess whose father was killed before he could destroy his kingdom. I think my problem with this book is that the author's intent outstripped her abilities. Suzu and Shoukei are supposed to be immature in certain ways, and grow up over the course of the book. But the way they're immaturity is depicted doesn't really suggest that they're being immature. For instance, Shoukei is constantly getting in trouble because she didn't try to keep her father on the right path, but she's depicted as being a child at the time, and there is zero evidence that anyone, anywhere ever suggested to her that she should do other than she did - until after her father's death, at which point basically everyone she meets insults her, hurts her, embarrasses her, punishes her and so on. At one point, an entire town gangs up on her and tries to kill her in extremely gruesome fashion. In light of this, the two characters' maturation process felt very forced, and was a major problem for me. Finally, I guess since Ono made three girls the main characters she felt that most of the other characters had to be men, but it had an off-kilter effect. The particularly icky part, for me, was that the two supposedly immature girls were almost exclusively told what to do by men. (There was one female character who set Suzu off on her journey, but she gave only a light warning before never showing up again, and she in fact helped Suzu do what she had already wanted to. In contrast, Suzu's journey is derailed by an obnoxious boy who repeatedly insults her, but whom she becomes inordinately fond of for no believable reason at all.)
Yoko's story, on other hand, went much better. Plus, all three stories flowed together at the end, which was by far the most enjoyable part of the series. These books are aimed at young adults, but I wouldn't really suggest it for teenagers. The insistence on young women behaving a certain way (and that they should be held responsible for deviating from that way even when they were never told what it was) makes me wary of suggesting it to anyone who wouldn't take one look at those aspects and call them nuts. In general, I'd suggest trying the first two books for the neat and detailed world, active female characters and fun stories, but leave this one alone. Still, I read this book (despite knowing that it represented the story arc of the anime that I most disliked) just to round out my Twelve Kingdoms knowledge, and I imagine others will, too. It's not that bad, it's just that some aspects stick in your craw.
I got straight A's this semester. I'm happy, but a little confused. For various reasons, my "finals period" extended across about two full months, and was intertwined with preparing for a first year review and getting all of this summer study stuff in order. By the time I could actually focus solely on my finals, I only had a handful of days to do what should have taken at least two weeks. Luckily I had done a fair bit of research for one of them, but still... I wanted to do better. I may have a chance to do better on all of them - it looks like they could all be ongoing projects.
It's more than a little absurd to say this, but despite the tons and tons of reading I did for my classes, I'm only on book four of the 50-book project. That should creep up shortly, however, as I got a number of books from the library today. Well, we'll see. Summer'll be busy, fall'll be full of classes... how is it that I read so much, and yet so little?
5. Skies of Dawn by Fuyumi Ono
The third book in the Twelve Kingdoms series, and the last one we're likely to see for awhile due to Tokyopop's demise. I love the series, but dislike this book. Yoko returns to be one of this volume's three stars. She's joined by Suzu, a Japanese girl washed into the Twelve Kingdoms, and Shoukei, a princess whose father was killed before he could destroy his kingdom. I think my problem with this book is that the author's intent outstripped her abilities. Suzu and Shoukei are supposed to be immature in certain ways, and grow up over the course of the book. But the way they're immaturity is depicted doesn't really suggest that they're being immature. For instance, Shoukei is constantly getting in trouble because she didn't try to keep her father on the right path, but she's depicted as being a child at the time, and there is zero evidence that anyone, anywhere ever suggested to her that she should do other than she did - until after her father's death, at which point basically everyone she meets insults her, hurts her, embarrasses her, punishes her and so on. At one point, an entire town gangs up on her and tries to kill her in extremely gruesome fashion. In light of this, the two characters' maturation process felt very forced, and was a major problem for me. Finally, I guess since Ono made three girls the main characters she felt that most of the other characters had to be men, but it had an off-kilter effect. The particularly icky part, for me, was that the two supposedly immature girls were almost exclusively told what to do by men. (There was one female character who set Suzu off on her journey, but she gave only a light warning before never showing up again, and she in fact helped Suzu do what she had already wanted to. In contrast, Suzu's journey is derailed by an obnoxious boy who repeatedly insults her, but whom she becomes inordinately fond of for no believable reason at all.)
Yoko's story, on other hand, went much better. Plus, all three stories flowed together at the end, which was by far the most enjoyable part of the series. These books are aimed at young adults, but I wouldn't really suggest it for teenagers. The insistence on young women behaving a certain way (and that they should be held responsible for deviating from that way even when they were never told what it was) makes me wary of suggesting it to anyone who wouldn't take one look at those aspects and call them nuts. In general, I'd suggest trying the first two books for the neat and detailed world, active female characters and fun stories, but leave this one alone. Still, I read this book (despite knowing that it represented the story arc of the anime that I most disliked) just to round out my Twelve Kingdoms knowledge, and I imagine others will, too. It's not that bad, it's just that some aspects stick in your craw.