Boyett, Steven R.: Elegy Beach

[calico_reaction]

Comments

[calico_reaction]

It's okay. :) And hey, I got through it, so I hope you do too. I'd love to hear someone else's thoughts, to see if I'm being OVERLY anal. :)

[calico_reaction]

ARIEL is good. Not perfect, but good, especially when you peel back the layers. :)

And oooh, I'm looking forward to FIRE. But what's this QUEENE OF LIGHT you refer to?

[janicu]

Hmm. So you liked it eh? :P

I'm a bit surprised that Ariel and Pete show up in this book, the excerpt made me think it was set in the same world, 20 years later, with all new characters. Interesting. I guess I could go either way.

I still want to read ELEGY BEACH. I think I'm very oblivious to grammar and punctuation in books, so maybe it won't bug me as much as it did you.

[calico_reaction]

Definitely enter the giveaway then! :) I'll probably post it early next week. :)

But hey, I was surprised too. Wasn't what I was looking for, but oh well.

[madwriter]

The sort of thing that takes me five seconds to realize:

There could be a character in the book who was better educated and "translates" the manuscript into something the reader will understand.

[calico_reaction]

That's another way of looking at it, for sure. Have you managed to get your paws on this one? Do you plan to?

[tenaya_owlcat]

Wow, this rant sounds like the one I want to write about Amy Efaw's After. O.o

I have Elegy Beach on request from the library, and I think I'm glad for it. I had a chance to buy it last week and didn't take it. I'm still going to be interested to read it, even though I'll likely have the same reaction as you. Style choices like that have so much potential to backfire that it's not even funny. O.o

[calico_reaction]

Once you read it, I'd love to hear your thoughts! Please let me know! :)

[tenaya_owlcat]

Well, I finished it. I'm going to write a review for my website, but in general... I felt like I was reading Ariel all over again. Too many similar elements.

Two questions for you (since no one else I know has read the book), and I'll try to make them as un-spoilery as possible:
1. What the heck do you think Ariel meant by "There never was a dog"?
2. If the spell done at the end of the book was supposed to radiate west, then wouldn't Ariel and Bob have been unable to go to the shore that night?

[calico_reaction]

1) I think the dog was a metaphor for the girl Ariel tried to raise. So if you substitute "girl" for "dog" and take what happened to the dog literally, well then ...

2) I think the spell spread west from that point, so wherever they were at, the coast line where they were at may not have been as west as the point of the magic?

There's a lot of stuff inferred in the novel. Like that line I quoted in the review? It made it sound like Ariel was the one responsible for the Change to begin with. I STILL don't know what that whole exchange was about!

[madripoor_rose]

Hi, found your journal while looking for reviews of the book, which I just finished reading today. Under the influence of allergy medicine. Which is kind of why I'm looking for reviews...(there never was a dog, what does that mean?) but totally agree with all your points.

I was a fan of Ariel, one of those with a childhood connection to the book, and found this a very...empty...reading experience. Fred does deserve his own story.

[calico_reaction]

Heh, I hear you. The only thing I could figure out what the dog was a metaphor for the little girl. So instead of Ariel killing the little dog, she killed the little girl?

There was too much alluded to without enough context for the reader to make correct assumptions. Like that one and the exchange I mention in the review between Pete and Ariel, you know?