Review: NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR by George Orwell

Winston Smith is a lonely man living in the London of our dystopian future, with Big Brother watching every move people make and the Thought Police ready to take any dissenters down. Winston hates Big Brother and has a vague desire to join "the Brotherhood," a group lead by Emmanuel Goldstein, the Enemy of the State. But it isn't until Winston falls in the love that the Thought Police really come after him...

If Animal Farm is George Orwell's vision of communism, Nineteen Eighty-Four is his vision of totalitarianism. And just for the record, I'm already really annoyed at writing out "ninety eighty-four," so from now on it's just 1984. Okay? Okay.

I didn't enjoy 1984 as much as Animal Farm. Or, you know, at all really. There is sooooo much exposition about this and that and how everything works that it tried my patience. Winston is a misogynistic wet blanket and I had trouble caring about what happened to him, even when it was horrifying.

That's not say I think 1984 is a bad book, just that it's more about the world of the novel and ideas than story and characters. And some of the ideas are really brilliant! Things like Big Brother and the Thought Police are already part of the lexicon, but what I found fascinating was the concept of doublethink:

To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again: and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself. That was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word ’doublethink’ involved the use of doublethink.

This, combined with newspeak, the language of Big Brother, allows people to say anything and mean nothing. There's no longer an opposite of good, because why use the word "bad" when you can just say "ungood"? The ultimate goal of newspeak is to eliminate most words altogether. After all, as long as the word freedom exists, people will remember there was such a thing.

Memory, both historical and personal, serves a major role in 1984. Government altering history and the short-term memory of its citizens was touched upon in Animal Farm, but in 1984 that loss of memory is a cornerstone of the narrative. Winston doesn't know for sure it's 1984, can barely remember his mother and sister or any incident from his childhood, and is eventually completely brainwashed into forgetting he ever hated Big Brother. The only reality is the one created by the state. Everyone is sharing in a delusion, their view of the world slightly twisted until they're all participating in massive "group think." Anyone who doesn't conform to the universal opinion isn't just wrong, but considered insane, even though they're only sane people in the bunch. This isn't just a case of looking at the world through rose-colored glasses, but of "two and two make five": it's not logic, it's not reality, but it's the truth because Big Brother says it is. It reminded me of the empty Obama chair from the GOP 2012 convention.

Anyway, an interesting book. I'm not sure I would universally recommend it like I would Animal Farm, but if you're into dystopian fiction, 1984's the mother of all dystopian novels. It's also the only one that's ever really sent a chill up my spine because not only could it happen, it nearly did.




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Thoughts on THE HOBBIT by JRR Tolkien

Once there was a hobbit named Bilbo Baggins who was very respectable, at least until a wizard named Gandalf tricked him into going on an adventure with a bunch of dwarves to steal a dragon's treasure.

This was my first time reading The Hobbit. Remember that ugly-ass cartoon based on the The Hobbit that they used to show sometimes on Saturday mornings? Yeah, that removed any desire I might have had to read the books. Ever. (It's kind of weird how awful those cartoons were--I think there was a LotR one, too--because they actually seemed to follow the books pretty closely. But without any artistry or interpretation.) Anyway, I didn't intend to read The Hobbit now; however, I was googling something--I forget what--and came across the audiobook on YouTube (fun fact: The Hobbit was in the public domain in the US until January of this year, which means you can still find the audiobook and eBook versions for free online). I hit play just out of curiosity and was totally sucked into the story.

Surprisingly, I thoroughly enjoyed The Hobbit--in fact, I would say it's impossible not to like this book. There's something very innocent and disarming about it. I absolutely fell in love with Bilbo; he is an awesome character. And the stand-out scenes in The Hobbit absolutely sparkle. I loved the beginning where the dwarfs come to Bilbo's house, when he trades riddles with Gollum, and when he steals from Smaug. Smaug was awesome as well!

That being said, I do have one major beef and few minor ones with this book. I'm not sure I would have gotten through it if I had read it rather than listened to it. I mean, for one there are NO WOMEN anywhere in this novel. All the main characters are men. And even the minor characters. I mean, I've read books from the 19th century that were written by men, take place almost entirely on a battlefield, have five characters, and they still manage to fit a female character in there. So how about a shout out for the ladies, JRR? I really wonder how any of the peoples in his novels manage to self-populate considering the ratio of women to men. Maybe we should have put some more thought into that and less thought into how the Elves talk, hmmmm? Why on earth would I be interested in a book with no women in it? Answer: I wouldn't. Secondly, The Hobbit feels uneven at times (especially at the end, which seems to go on and on). Then Tolkien goes into a political rant wherein Smaug is equated to a dictator whose death brings instability and infighting to the region, and the book gets slightly academic. Read: boring.

The no women thing aside, though, The Hobbit was a fast, fun read. Unless of course you start to think about what it all sets into motion in Lord of the Rings, in which case it's actually kind of chilling. But try not to think about that.

Book Review: QUIS CUSTODIET by Manna Francis

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?--a Latin phrase traditionally attributed to the Roman poet Juvenal, which is literally translated as "Who will guard the guards themselves?" or "Who watches the watchers?" It is frequently associated with the political philosophy of Plato and the problem of political corruption, but the original context had nothing to do with Plato and instead referred to the problem of ensuring marital fidelity. (via wikipedia)

Toreth is looking forward to his assignment auditing the Greek branch of Investigation and Interrogation, where he can catch some sun, enjoy the per diem, and basically do no work for three or more weeks. The only thing he isn't happy about is leaving Warrick behind in New London for that entire time. When he finds out our old pal Carnak is in New London working for Warrick's company while Toreth's away, he has a spaz and starts obsessing over Warrick cheating on him. Meanwhile, the Greek office actually does require some investigating. Worst paid vacation ever!

Quis Custodiet was a definite improvement over Control. I liked the new setting of Athens, and getting some stories from other characters' eyes gave the series a much-needed change-up. As the title indicates, the stories in this book are basically all about trust and leeway allowed, both politically within the Administration and in personal relationships. Both Toreth and the Administration are paranoid about betrayal because they themselves can't be trusted. On the flip side, Warrick and the other average citizens of the Administration don't even expect fidelity and honorable behavior; it's simply not going to happen (although it does seem like Toreth's slowing down quite a bit in this novel--he must be getting old). They're just happy if they get what they want out of the bargain, which in Warrick's case is sex. So by that analysis one could say that Toreth's and Warrick's relationship is a synecdoche of the Administration's politics.

That being said, I do still think Warrick's being shunted into the background more and more, and his character is becoming much harder for me to connect with. He just seems way too accommodating and not very autonomous, whereas Toreth still pretty much does what he wants. Not that he would be Toreth if he didn't!

In any case, it seems like this series is refocusing on the outside world of the Administration now and not exclusively on Toreth and Warrick's relationship, which is probably a good move on the author's part.

Book Review: CONTROL by Manna Francis

In the fourth Administration series novel, Toreth and Warrick both face issues of control--or lack thereof--in their lives. For the most part these short stories address PTB's (for those of you who are not Buffy fans, that's the Powers That Be--the dominating forces of government and corporates that the average citizen in this dystopian world has very little protection against), but they also show Toreth and Warrick figuring out who is in control of their relationship, and which of the two men can better control himself.

Aside from the first story, I didn't feel like there was a lot of character development happening in this volume. At one point Toreth grumbles that he's bored, and I can't help but wonder if Francis wasn't thinking that herself while writing this. I hope that's not the case, but it definitely feels like there's not as much thought put into this book as there was in the other three. It seems like Warrick just gets more accommodating and Toreth gets more possessive, and everyone (except Annoying Dilly) is hunky-dory with that. That didn't bother me in the previous books because 1. I wanted Toreth and Warrick to stay together, and 2. I understood why Warrick put up with Toreth and vice versa. But in this book I had more and more trouble sympathizing with either of them or understanding why they're still together.

One of the more interesting revelations in this book was Toreth's attitude toward Warrick's job. It's been obvious since the first book that Warrick has major issues with Toreth working for I&I, for very good reasons as we find out; but in this novel it becomes obvious Toreth hates corporates as much as Warrick hates the Administration. Really both corporates and the Administration can get away with whatever they want, so there's not much difference between the two, other than corporates have more money.

Overall this book was okay, but I hope it's just an aberration in the series and the next novel is more interesting.



Musical notes: "Helena Beat" by Foster the People

Book Review: GAMES AND PLAYERS by Manna Francis

Proposed alternate title: Val Toreth and the Challenge of the Really Real




In this Administration novel, both Warrick and Toreth deal with how whacked their perception of reality is... then again, what perception of reality?

Throughout Games and Players, Toreth is criticized as being a psychotic because he doesn't consider people as "real." It all starts with Carnak, a socioanalyst sent to compile a report on I&I, who just happens to know Warrick from back in the day. He finds Toreth interesting because he knows Toreth does consider at least two people as "real"--Warrick and Sara--which to his mind makes Toreth an unusual parainvestigator. But after witnessing Toreth interrogate a prisoner, Carnak decides Toreth is a terrible person and that he's going to fuck with his mind.

There's a certain irony here of course, because Carnak doesn't consider anyone as real, and is therefore arguably more psychotic than Toreth is. But whatever the reality of the two men's psychology, the nature of Toreth's job allows Carnak to feel morally superior to him; and I think that's true of everyone in this novel, including Sara. Even Warrick feels that way to a certain extent, at least until he realizes he's behaving like a child.

Toreth may not view everyone as a Real Person, but then who the hell does? Do you think of people on the news as being "real," or homeless people, or the person who hands you your coffee at Starbucks? Looking beyond one's own reality is part of learning how to be human and growing up, and even then the whole world can't be "real." In actuality, many people have less of a grasp on reality than Toreth does, and simply use other people to play out what goes on in their own heads--like Toreth's old teacher, Gee, for example. At least Toreth's able to distinguish between reality and fantasy, which Warrick doesn't and doesn't want to.

Like Quid Pro Quo, this novel is organized into shorter stories and novellas that I read for free on Manna Francis' website, and all of them deal with reality and perception to some extent. I have to admit that while I've been enjoying these stories before now, I just considered them fun and gratuitous light reads. But at some point while reading this novel, I suddenly started thinking this was the greatest series ever! Why? I'm not sure. But Francis has a great grasp of her characters and the more I read about them, the more I want to read about them (except for Dilly, she's annoying). Plus, I don't think it's just fluff; I think Francis does have something to say beyond writing a m/m romance. Subtext, yo.

I definitely recommend these books! They're totally glom-worthy.

Book Review: QUID PRO QUO by Manna Francis

Quid pro quo, def. (From the Latin meaning "what for what") indicates a more-or-less equal exchange or substitution of goods or services.

Toreth and Warrick, having bonded over certain secrets related to the Sim-Tech case in Mind Fuck, are continuing their not-a-relationship. But even though it's "just fucking," their lives are slowly entangling and they start exchanging more than just bodily fluids. Addresses, gifts, friends, bouts of jealousy--for two people who have no interest in being in a relationship with one another, they certainly do a pretty good imitation of it.

Unlike the first book in this series, this novel is more or less all about Toreth and Warrick's relationship. Which in one respect is totally fine with me, since I thought the plot to Mind Fuck was boring anyway. But on the other hand, I kind of missed reading a book with a plot (I know, I know), not to mention seeing Toreth at work and catching up on all the office gossip and politics at I&I. That element's still there, just not very much.

To be honest, I also felt like Toreth was occasionally emasculated by removing him from the context of I&I, especially in the "Family" chapter; but then Warrick has moments when he's emasculated as well. He's definitely the Betty Draper in this relationship, but more because the concept of monogamy is as foreign to Toreth as it is to Don Draper. There's a give-and-take between Warrick and Toreth that makes their relationship one of equals (I suppose that's where the title came from). Although the book is very clear that socially and economically, Warrick is a class (or two or three) above Toreth, you've got the whole BDSM thing going on, where Toreth is definitely the dominant, so it's weirdly balanced.

I read Quid Pro Quo on Manna Francis' website, where it's organized into short stories. Mind Fuck had a vaguely yaoi/manga feel to it, but because QPQ is so episodic, it definitely feels like a prose version of a manga. Which I love! The stories are loosely connected, most especially by theme, but take place with unknown gaps of time between them and can stand on their own. My favorite was "Pancakes," partly because I love pancakes (haha--but seriously, I do love pancakes), and partly because that seemed like the major turning point in the book where both characters realize they're together because of more than just sex. It was really well-done and a great piece of writing.

Like MF, Quid Pro Quo has some faults, but overall it's well-written and entertaining. Definitely addicting and worth checking out if you read and enjoyed the first book in the series!

Book Review: MIND FUCK by Manna Francis

Some time in the future, Europe is controlled by corporations and the Administration, a dystopian-like government that has no tolerance for insubordination. Political crimes are sent to Interrogation and Investigation, a FBI-like government agency authorized to employ psychoactive drugs, torture, and even death in the pursuit of anti-authoritarian conspiracies.

One of the best I&I investigators is Val Toreth. Concepts like "rules" and "morality" are pretty flexible to Toreth, which incidentally makes him a perfect I&I investigator, and possibly the only person who can solve several murders at Sim-Tech corporation and live to tell about it.

When I first started this novel, I was under the impression it would be one of those books where the plot was merely a thinly-veiled excuse for the characters to get it on, BDSM-style. Perhaps it was the subtitle of "Original Homoerotic Fiction," displayed a the top of every page, who knows. HOWEVER, I was completely wrong. Mind Fuck is essentially a straight-forward mystery novel whose main character happens to be bi-sexual and in a BDSM relationship with one of the main suspects--Dr. Keir Warrick, the joint-director of Sim-Tech and the creator of the technology being developed there.

I like mysteries, but I have a lot of pet peeves about them, which is why I don't read that many. Two of my biggest pet peeves are when 1., the main character doesn't do shit to solve the case and 2., ignores obvious clues, and Toreth is guilty of both in this book. He gets every break in the case handed to him on a silver platter, and the investigation doesn't feel like it progresses logically. If Toreth had paid attention to clues and figured things out for himself, the book would have been a lot shorter, and I wouldn't have had to sit through boring Sim-Tech interviews that had no point. I also really didn't give a crap who the killer was, and I still figured it out about 100 pages before Toreth did.

So the middle of this book was pretty frustrating. The only thing that kept me reading was Toreth, who is an awesome character. Kris from Kris 'n' Good Books (who recommended Mind Fuck to me) called him an absolute bastard, and he kind of is, but at the same time he also has a great sense of humor--or perhaps it's simply ironic detachment--and he's a total badass. I kept picturing him as Gabriel Macht in my head because the personalities of Harvey Specter and Toreth are pretty similar (as are their secretaries), and I love both of them for pretty much the same reasons. It's impossible not to root for Toreth, and happily he redeems himself--as a sleuth, I mean--in the last quarter of the book, which had several twists I did not anticipate at all and was a very intense, gripping wrap-up the story.

Warrick, meanwhile, is supposed to be the "good guy" in this scenario, but I spent the majority of the book hating him. Like Toreth, I developed a perfect picture of Warrick in my head; except in this case he resembled one of my former professors, and it really creeped me out. I also didn't find him any more ethical than Toreth (although what constitutes morality in this world is somewhat unclear), unless you consider a holier-than-thou attitude to be a sign of virtue. However, by the end of the book, like Toreth, he did redeem himself and I warmed up to him considerably. Both characters do good and bad things for maybe not the best/worst reasons; but they do have reasons behind their actions, which makes them understandable if not sympathetic.

As for the writing style itself, it has a lot of personality and subtle humor in it, which serves to lighten what could be a really heavy and depressing story. Francis also doesn't talk down to the reader--there is a lot of complex science and computer engineering here that's never dumbed-down. Fortunately, as a reader, you don't really need to comprehend the mechanics to get what's going on; it just helps to build the believability of the setting and underscore the danger the characters face.

By far the greatest strength of the novel are the characters, though, who are complex and fun to read about, even the more minor ones like Sara, Toreth's secretary, or Lee in Justice. I am definitely going to read the rest of the series, if only to revisit them.

If you're in the mood for a morally ambiguous, character-driven mystery with sci-fi and dystopian elements, I highly recommend this book. Even though I had some problems with the mystery, overall it's very well-written and entertaining. And, to make it even better, you can read it for free on the author's website.



Musical notes: "Raw Sugar," by Metric

Book Review: DANGEROUS DESIGNS by Dale Mayer

Story Dalton is a 17-year-old high school student trapped in a small town with no friends. All the people who lived there and shared her interests in art moved away except for her, and she and her mom are treated as outcasts thanks to her mom's hippie candle shop and Wiccan religion. So to put it bluntly, Story's not happy.

Then she finds a pencil on the ground and weird things start happening. She loses stretches of time. She can't concentrate in school at all, she can't stop drawing, and sometimes she finds herself trapped in an abandoned mine shaft on the edge of town with no idea how she got there. Luckily, the handsome new guy at school, Eric, is around to keep rescuing her. In fact, it's downright odd how he keeps showing up, almost as if he knows where she is.

Colette from A Buckeye Girl Reads recommended this book to me, and I'm really glad she did--it's totally up my alley. It combines sci-fi elements with YA romance and an artistically inclined heroine. The beginning was a little slow, but once I got about 20% into it, the story just flew by. It was really fun.

That being said, this is one of those books that Jane from Dear Author might say proves readers don't care about quality. I don't know if Dale Mayer has an editor look over her work or not, but if she doesn't, she needs one; and if she does, she needs to find another one. And possibly ask for a refund. This book is riddled with so many errors I had to stop highlighting all but the most annoying. Things like using too instead of to, it's instead of its, question marks where there should be exclamation marks, mixed metaphors, continuity issues, leaps in logic, using words incorrectly, and repetition. The mixed metaphors were probably the funniest of the mistakes--would you like to "come out smelling like a queen bee"? No? Okay then (I think Mayer meant "smelling like a rose" there).

Because of all the mistakes, I can't really call this book good. It's definitely not up to the standards I'd expect from a hold-in-hand book; and if it had been a paper book, I probably would have started snarling in annoyance and never finished it. I did honestly enjoy reading it, though, mainly because of Eric and his romance with Story, but also because it was just plain entertaining. It's a sweet story with some quirky geekiness thrown in, and I really identified with Story. I kind of want to give this book a hug (and I would, if it was a paperback).

I guess Jane is right and readers don't care about grammar, even picky readers like myself. What can I say, I guess my standards are lower for eBooks, especially self-published eBooks. The bare bones of a good story are there, but it doesn't have the focus to develop any larger themes, and it certainly doesn't have the polish of a novel published by one of the major NYC publishers. If you don't think that will bother you, then you should give Dangerous Designs a try. It's a damn site better than My Blood Approves, that's for sure.



Musical Notes: "Two Against One," by Danger Mouse and Jack White

Movie Review: COWBOYS & ALIENS

First released: 2011
Starring: Harrison Ford, Daniel Craig, Olivia Wilde
Directed by: Jon Favreau
Based on: The graphic novel by Scott Mitchell Rosenberg

Jake Lonergan wakes up in the middle of the desert. He has no idea who he is, where he is, how he got there, or why he has a metal thing strapped to his wrist. After finding some tight-fitting clothes, he makes his way to the nearest town, where he quickly deduces some very pertinent information: one, he has an absolute gift for punching people in the face. Two, he's an outlaw who stole from the cattle baron, Mr. Dolarhyde, who also happens to run the town Jake is in. And three, the thingy on his wrist blows up alien spaceships.


'What the...?!'

This movie is pretty dumb, which is fine. Believe it or not, I have a pretty high tolerance for dumb movies (or so I like to think). But what really bothered me was that it was surprisingly one-note. As I overheard a little kid telling his dad as they left the theater, "That was kinda boring."

No movie with as many explosions and special effects as this one should be boring. That's, like, a rule.

Part of the problem is that it's super-derivative. As the preacher, who for some reason acts as the doctor even though there's another character named Doc (?), said, "I've seen bad men do good things and good men do bad things." Uh, isn't that line straight out of No Country for Old Men? Like literally a direct quote? And isn't that scene where the alien breathes in the little kid's face and drool drips from its pointy teeth an almost EXACT COPY of that scene in Alien where the alien breathes in Sigourney Weaver's face and drool drips from its pointy teeth? Come on, guys.

Daniel Craig was also a huge disappointment. Item the first: he only took his shirt off once. Item the second, he did nothing in this movie except scowl and point his wrist thingy at aliens. Honestly, the monoexpression of scowl was enough to make me suspect he has really bad teeth and not lifting his upper lip is part of his standard contract. And item the third, his American accent was suuhuhuper sketchy. Why didn't he just speak normally if he had that much trouble with it? It's the American West, for god's sake, there are people with different accents.



Anywho. The film wasn't completely bad. The biggest plus was Harrison Ford, who played Colonel Dolarhyde. I gotta say, the guy's still got it. Heck yeah. While Craig was phoning it in, Ford was bringing it to the table. Almost as if he believed he was in a good movie! To be fair, Ford's character had most of the good lines and the only discernible story arc in the entire narrative, but still.

The other thing I liked was the Indians. When the movie started, I naturally thought--because of the title--that the aliens were a metaphor for Indians. And about twenty minutes in, I quite frankly was really missing the Indians. But! I was wrong. The aliens are actually a metaphor for European colonialism and the western settlers band together with the Apaches to defeat them. I was so happy to see Indians in the picture my brain didn't explode with annoyance when they used peyote and there was a lame vision sequence straight out of a 1960s B-movie. Yes, let's just ignore that.

Overall, this movie is worth a Saturday afternoon viewing at home, but paying to see it in the theater? Meh. I expected everyone on this project to have a lot more fun with it, considering it's about cowboys and freaking aliens, but it felt like a chore and the ending was anti-climatic. All I have to say is, thank god for Harrison Ford.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke

I am so proud of myself for finishing this book.  Hooray! 

My friend Vicki bought this book for me.  Wasn't that nice of her?  It's supposed to be an "adult" version of Harry Potter--and if you interpret adult to mean "hang on to your granny panties, because this is going to take a loooooooong time," (rather than, "HP:  the Skinemax version") you'd be right.  This book is almost 800 pages long.  And it's small type.  And it's not 800 pages of action-packed suspense, either.  Which brings me to the point of this mini-rant:  I object to the term "Harry Potter for adults."  Like I have so much more time now that I'm an adult to read really, really long books.  Right.  Now that I have things like a job, and bills, and responsibilities, I find myself thinking, "Hey, you know what I need?  A book so thick and dense with plotlines that I will completely lose track of what the main plot is in the middle, or even wonder what the original plot was."

But in the end, I did finish it.  So it can be done!

The central idea of the book is what if--what if the Napoleonic Wars were won, not purely by military finese on the part of the English, but by magic?  The book takes place during the Late Georgian/Regency eras, and centers around two magicians who were prophecied by the Raven King (the greatest magician in English history) to bring magic back to England.  The first is Mr. Norrell, an older gentleman who sets out to help win the war against Napoleon using magic.  The second is Jonathan Strange, a younger man that Norrell takes on as his pupil.

However, the war with Napoleon isn't really the central plotline of the book.  Oh no.  The true heart of the tale lies in a deal Mr. Norrell makes with a fairy king, The Man With Thistle-Down Hair (I'm planning on naming my first-born son this, btw), to bring a young woman back from the dead.  He doesn't do this out of the goodness of his heart; he does it in order to gain the attention of her fiance, an MP, in the hopes that the war department will finally start taking magic seriously and allow him to help with the war effort.  And, like most deals made purely in self-interest, it turns out to be a deal with the devil.  The Man With Thistle-Down Hair uses the young woman, who quickly marries her fiance and becomes Lady Pole, as an entry point into the human world, where he wreaks all sorts of evil and mischief (as fairies are wont to do).

The first half of the book is hard to get through, or at least it was for me (I'll explain more about that later).  However, the story starts to get really interesting by page 450--in fact, right around the time when Arabella Strange, Jonathan Strange's wife, is captured by The Man With Thistle-Down Hair.  After that point, I really enjoyed the book.  Here's what I liked most about it:

John Childermass

Childermass is the sexiest thing, animate or inanimate, in this book!  All right, he's the only sexy thing in this book.  But damn, rawr.  ;)  He's smart and cunning; at first he appears to be amoral, but then acts with more honor as the book progresses; he has a checkered and mysterious past, with brief stints (that we know of so far) as a pickpocket and a sailor (which I'm going to just assume means pirate, because that makes him even sexier); he can read tarot cards, which is a very attractive feature in a man; during the course of the book he is shot and stabbed; and he is the only character who ever meets the Raven King (although he immediately forgets it).  If this was Ivanhoe, Childermass would be Brian de Bois-Guilbert.  In the romance novel version follow-up to this book, which I've already written in my head, Childermass and Lady Pole fall in love and have a torrid affair that shocks all of London society.  Poor Sir Walter Pole!  But really, how can he compete against Childermass?  Not possible.  He should just give up now.

Jonathan Strange's Pupils

Jonathan Strange takes on three pupils later in the book.  Two of them are young aristocrats and absolute boneheads.  They're freaking hilarious.  It's like watching Larry and Mo trying to do magic.

The Society of York Magicians

As I mentioned before, at the beginning of the book, there is no magic in England.  There are, however, societies of magicians who research magic, hold conferences on magic, debate magic, and write articles about magic, all without ever having tried, or having any intention of trying, to do magic.  I have to admit this seemed very reminiscent of art historians to me.

And here's what I didn't like about the book:

Mr. Norrell

Mr. Norrell is the magician who opens the book.  Unfortunately for us, he's a terrible character.  From the description on the book jacket, I expected him to be a magical version of Dr. House--i.e., entertainingly grumpy, terrifyingly intelligent, and if not a good person, a person with his own code of honor.  However, Norrell is nothing like that.  He's a cautious scaredy cat who's a terrible judge of character, and who doesn't care about anyone but himself and his books!  There are no redeeming qualities to Mr. Norrell.  Part of the reason it's so hard to get into the book is that Norrell is the main character for the first third of the story, and he's completely unlikable and unsympathetic.

The Footnotes

Yes, this book has footnotes.  A lot of footnotes.  I strongly suggest you skim over them or skip them altogether, or your head may explode.

The Ending

The ending leaves many questions unanswered.  What happens to Lascelles in Fairy?  What does the new book by the Raven King say?  If The Man With Thistle-Down Hair's dead, why is Lady Pole still alive and the darkness around Strange and Norrell still intact?  These questions are kind of annoying, because hellooooo, you've just written 780 + pages, you couldn't add a few more to wrap things up???  But the most disappointing thing about the ending was the meeting between Jonathan and Arabella.  It left me, in all honesty, clusterfucked.  I don't want to say what happened, because that would spoil the ending for people who haven't read the book yet, but let me put it like this:  imagine you're having sex.  And you've been waiting a really, reaaalllllllly long time to have it.  And you're about to go O when the other person says, "Well, it's been fun," and leaves.  Like wtf--could you at least give me some emotional closure, here?!?!?!?!  Argh.

At first I thought that this was a pretty good book, overall, but I think that was just the thrill of having actually finished it and not needing to look at it again.  Now that a few months has passed since I read this book, I've decided I hate it.  The end.  Sorry, Vicki.

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