Book Review- The Imperfectionists

    The Imperfectionists, by author Tom Rachman is a New York Times best seller. The book features eleven chapters from the viewpoints of eleven different characters, all contributing to one major story arch. It reads like a short story and takes the reader a chapter or two to figure out exactly what all these characters have in common.

    The story revolves around a newspaper in Rome. The correspondents are largely American, all having found their way to the paper in one form or another. There's a lot of cubicle mentality happening in the book, so if you're a fan of shows like The Office, this might appeal to you. It's written in the third person point of view, with narration happening between every chapter, stingily giving up details as to how we got to the present.

    They say to never judge a book by it's cover, but I'll admit to being intrigued. Words like "Spectacular", "Magnificent", and "Beguiling" appear next to the publications giving this novel such high reviews. It has the New York Times sticker of approval on the lower right hand corner and a smaller Random House Reader's Circle on the upper right. By all accounts, this should be a great book.

    We begin with a character named Lloyd Burko, an aging and defunct Paris correspondent, who's on his way out. His money has gone the way of his charm, fleeting and currently in the back pocket of much younger lover, whom he allows to get sexual satisfaction from another in light of his now diminished libido.

    The next notable story line features Arthur Gopal. He's probably the most likable character in the book and naturally, the one highlights of reading the novel. If Rachman had stuck to writing the story from Arthur's point of view, I probably would have had a more enjoyable reading experience.

    There are nine more chapters in this book and only two of them are really worth reading. It really felt like the author had a bunch of short stories and slapped them together to make a book. I don't know if the book got so many rave reviews because the publications giving them were all newspapers or if I'm missing something. It felt like one of those dour first novels that writers create because they want to be taken seriously. Avant- Garde or something. There wasn't much depth to the book nor was it one of those light and simply entertaining books that we all indulge in from time to time. The writing wasn't bad but it lacked substance. I didn't learn anything from this book, nor was I entertained in any way. It didn't transport me to anyplace I wanted to be. It was absolutely dreary.

    Unfortunately, I bought this book. I thought I would give it away like I did with Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. I can't hardly give a badly reviewed book out so I'll probably donate it to the library. If you'd like to read it, I suggest you get it there.

Books Made Into Movies- One for the Money

    Last night I watched One for the Money, starring Katherine Heigl. The movie is based on the series of books by author, Janet Evanovich.  If you've never read One for the Money, please close this post and go to your local library.

    There are millions of mystery novels but the reason why Evanvich is so successful is her style of using irreverence and humor, while threading together a love triangle that is pieced tantalizingly slow throughout the series of (currently published) eighteen books. Stephanie Plum is a lovable, crazy, down to earth sort of character that women can relate to and the public can root for. Evanovich writes the love interests for Plum's character with a dash of Prince Charming, a pinch of Rascal, and heaping tablespoons of Handsome. You just can't help but to cheer for the Jersey Girl during every novel.

    The first thing that struck me about this movie was that it.wasn't.funny. I counted the number of times people laughed in the theater. Not one guffaw until we were halfway through. Total laugh count=5 and only twice was it really funny. This is the hallmark of the series! The major part of the book's success was humor and the script writer totally missed it. Devastating.

    When I saw Katherine Heigl as Stephanie Plum, I'll admit to already being skeptical about casting. Stephanie Plum wears spandex and scrunchies. She has this traditional Jersey Girl look, maybe slightly downplayed but she's definitely not hip. Plum's pretty in that every girl sort of way but with an inherited amount of Jersey flash. In the movie, we see no spandex or anything resembling Jersey. Heigl got the brown curly hair right but she looks a bit like she just stepped out of a Tomb Raider game. Wardrobe just took it down a notch by using banana clip and jeans. Heigl's acting isn't bad but the writers didn't give her any of Stephanie Plum's trademark bitchiness or straight on humor.

    Morelli was a bad casting choice, too. He looked too old for the part. Jason O'Mara isn't unattractive by any means but he and Heigl just didn't match up well. He has that rugged look of a 40 year old and she's got that bum college look going on. It all looks a little jail-baitey to me, when you consider that she sold him her cannoli in high school. This could have been overlooked, though, had the writing been better.

    Ranger was decently cast, but not enough attention was paid to him. Grandma wasn't nearly as kooky and fun as I remembered her being in the books and the major scene involving her and Stephanie's gun just didn't play out as well on the Big Screen as I felt it should. Again, the writing sucked. The character of Lulu was really the only shining casting choice.

    The books are funny but One for the Money also has a dark side. They had potential in this movie to display a well rounded story line. Instead, we were shorted. The major scene with Lulu was written off in about two seconds. Ramirez was scary in only one scene and we were left confused as to why he was such a threat. The ending of the movie just appeared. There wasn't this major build up of detail, no big climactic scene. It just kind of happened to you which is the worst kind of ending.

    If another Stephanie Plum movie is made, I'll probably go see it. If the writing is improved, the casting deviations become minor. However, you have to maintain the spirit and style that the book was written in order to make a successful movie based on the book. If I had watched this movie before reading the book, I never would have been tempted to pick it up. As a matter of fact, I probably wouldn't have bothered reading any of the books, which is a real shame and discredit to a wonderfully talented author.

    In short, if you'd like to see another Stephanie Plum movie then you should purchase a ticket. That's literally the only reason I can find to bother yourself to get to the theater. Otherwise, stick to the books. Your imagination will tell a better story.

Friday Give-Away!

This week's book, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet goes to cupsbykim! Thanks to all that entered and I hope you enjoy the read, Kim!

Book Review- Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

  More than just a metaphor, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet takes us on a paper faded journey filled with the subtle sights and sounds of a time long gone.

    It's a love story, a coming of age story, and a historical narrative all wrapped into one. It's also a curious look backward in time, where we meet a young Henry Lee and watch how both small and major events help shape him into the man we come to love by the end of the book.

    The book begins shortly after the attack on Pearl Harbor with a young Henry as the only Chinese student at a local school in Seattle. His strict immigrant parents have chosen to send him there, as opposed to the traditional Chinese school, in hopes that Henry might be viewed and accepted as more American. Like many children born to immigrant families, he is still expected to obey the laws and influence of his Chinese heritage. Henry carefully manages to keep a foot in both worlds until he meets Keiko Okabe, a Japanese girl who like him, works in the kitchen as part of her "scholarshipping" agreement.

     As the relationship between Henry and Keiko deepens, so does the anti-Japanese sentiment in Seattle. Homes are ransacked and shops destroyed. Eventually all Japanese , including Keiko, are rounded up and shipped off to interment camps.

     The drama that unfolds for both Henry and Keiko is captivating. Author Jamie Ford manages to insert beauty and humanity into his characters, which are believable and flawed. The plot is woven with care and devoid of the dreaded holes that plague many books.  Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet ended the way it began; full of promise and a tinge of sadness that the story eventually had to come to an end.

Ikea

    There's something about an Ikea catalogue that makes me want to throw thousands of dollars away on a tiny Swedish apartment, toboggan hats, massive amounts of Gevalia, and very cool bicycles.

    The Ikea book is the girl version of Popular Mechanics. Whereas most men really get excited about articles like "How to Fix those Pesky Wobbly Chairs" and pondering such thought provoking scenarios such as " What if a Cruise Ship Wrecked in Alaska?", most of us girls are truly inspired by home organization remedies. There's something very stimulating about seeing a 3,000 square foot home squashed into exactly 750 feet of cool, refreshing, Swedish undertones all for the low,low price of $129.00.

    It's environmentally friendly,too!

    So we lure you utterly capable men to the Swedish Wal-Mart, sticky-noted catalogue in our grubby little hands, with the promise of inexpensive, yet authentic! meatballs and razor sharp cooking knives.Did we mention that woks are also on sale for $6.99? We know how You love to secretly pretend to be the Iron Chef. We somewhat regretfully gloss over the it's going to take your entire weekend "some assembly required" part. You get suspicious when you see that both of our painstakingly selected floor to ceiling bookshelves and two matching couches all come in extremely flat boxes. We appeal to your masculine nature (the part of you that refuses to ask for directions) and assure you that this is not a Big Deal. You endure this ritual once a year or so, even after you discover our treachery regarding that pesky assembly business.

    We keep this yearly Ikea indulgence close to our hearts because You don't do the whole flowers for the Anniversary thing. Watching Your forearm flex as you wrestle with the Ikea Assembly Project is terribly romantic,too. We have thankfully moved past the relationship phase where anything that requires two people putting something together makes them want to kill each other. Most of the time, anyway. Drywall is still on our Never Attempt Again if we want to stay together list,though. I think it's good that we have a list and know our limits, even if it means that our basement will never be finished.

    Really, it's okay.

    Our local Ikea is over two hours away. Thank goodness, because if it were any closer, our entire home would be filled with shiny, metallic magnetic strips and those cute little containers. Knives, spices, and those unruly paperclips would never be an organizational issue again. We could have bookshelves anywhere! On the ceiling,even. I'm absolutely positive I could make our saltbox colonial go from this:

(no, that's not my house but it's close)..to this swanky, upscale Swedish home in no time!

    I know I'm idealizing the Swedish Experience. I can't even ski. I don't like cold weather and am planning a move to California before I die on this gray frozen tundra that is usually an Ohio spring,fall, winter. I have no resemblance to the beautiful Swedish women who inhabit that territory but I clearly have that Elin Nordegren  reaction to cheating. Sadly, a penchant for golf club weaponry and shiny bicycles are not enough to warrant a move to Sweden.

   They say that imitation in the best form of flattery. If I can't have Sweden, I'd best keep up with my Ikea habit.

Book Review- This Beautiful Life

     This Beautiful Life by Helen Schulman tackles the controversial subject of teenage sexuality and the unintended consequences of life with the Internet. A true Molotov cocktail, this book is sure to get the conversation started at your local book club.

    The book begins with an uncomfortable scene involving thirteen year old Daisy Cavanaugh filming a sexually explicit video for sixteen year old Jake Bergamot. It involves nudity, a bat, and a whole lot of chutzpah that I certainly didn't possess at such a tender age. Daisy hits "send" and Jake pushes "forward", each of them making the same mistake in thinking the video will go no further than the one person they each sent it to. While not a tale as old as time, it's certainly one that's become more common in the face of advancing technology.  No more are salacious details contained to some graffiti sprayed walls of a public bathroom. It's immediate and it's everywhere. 

    This Beautiful Life doesn't make you choose between Jake or Daisy's perceptions in the story. It's a narrative that explores the feelings and decisions that the Bergamot family makes when confronted by the school and Daisy's parents over the video. Jake's parents, Liz and Richard Bergamot, have just moved from idyllic Ithaca to the privileged and affluent Upper West Side of Manhattan. We see Liz struggle to keep up with the demands of motherhood and the expectations that go along with posh parenting. Richard is a typical workaholic, delighting in his ability to provide this newer, more lavish lifestyle. We watch as Jake assimilates into an opulent culture of unbridled freedom, alcohol, drugs, and a private school that has Paris Hilton like connotations.

    Readers are left with a sense of deep sadness for both of these kids, who are judged by society and friends. What Shulman portrays so well is the short sightedness that young people all have and their inability to comprehend a world where privacy meant something else, altogether. 

Books Made Into Movies

Over the course of time, many books have made it to the Big Screen. Some have been amazing and others have been dismal failures.

It's difficult to squash all the intricacies of a 300+ page book into a two hour movie. I'm never envious of the poor soul who has to capture all of that in a script. You can't please everyone and rarely is the movie ever as good as the book.

 Let's take a look at two of my favorite and recent successes:

1. Lord Of The Rings Trilogy- Peter Jackson did the impossible. He took a bazillion page Science Fiction Masterpiece and made it into a brilliant work of art. The characters were memorable, the story line was kept very true to the books, and Jackson fought the battle of traditional movie length...and won. This was the first movie I ever went to a midnight showing for and didn't regret staying up. I was mesmerized by the cinematography. I think Jackson broke through a lot of new territory in making this movie (the same can be said of James Cameron's Titanic) This is a guy who didn't sell out and thank goodness he didn't. If you mess up LOTR, the multitude of Tolkien fans will never forget or forgive you.

2. Harry Potter- If you've never taken the time to read a Harry Potter book, please climb out from under whatever rock you've been under and give it a go. J.K.Rowling is probably the most prolific and creative writer of current time. Her contribution to literature will live forever and that's something most writers never get to say. She's the female equivalent to Tolkien and, like him, her writing is universally appealing to all genders and ages. The Harry Potter movies were visually spectacular. It's unbelievably difficult to capture the essence of a House Elf or Hippogriff, but somehow they managed to do it in these movies. This entire, original, and magical world was played out and perfectly paced through 8 movies.

Here are two of  my more disappointing movie experiences:

1. The Time Traveler's Wife was a major reading experience for me. I was surprised by how emotional I was after reading this book. For a week, I wandered aimlessly around. I looked for fanfic, I dreamed about it. I didn't want the story to end. I was captivated by the complex relationship between Clare and Henry.

When the movie came out, I was excited. There were definitely bonus points for staring Eric Bana, who was shirtless many times in The Other Boleyn Girl. Rachel McAdams was fine with  me,too. When the big day came, I hopped over to the movie theater with some friends and ordered a Big Blue Alcoholic Drink, got out my tissue stash, and prepared to be swept off my feet and for poor Henry to tragically lose his own.

At first I thought,"What's in this drink?" because nothing was making sense. Major plot lines were missing and so were characters. Most importantly, they f'ed up the end! I took out my tissues and grieved over the butchering of a great book.

This movie was almost as bad as Niffeneger's follow up book, Her Fearful Symmetry.

 This might be offensive to some of you.

I wasn't a super fan of Breaking Dawn. I felt like Stephenie Meyer jumped the shark, fell into a Mormon Baptismal Pool, and tried to give everyone a happy ending while the rest of us just wanted someone to die. We wanted a big fang fight, a stake through Aro's heart, and Rose should have sacrificed herself for the kid leaving readers fighting the irresistible urge to bombard a brooding, grieving Emmett with cookies and casserole dishes.

Despite my misgivings, I was determined to see this thing through. All the previous Twilight movies had a great soundtrack so the first thing that struck me was the utter campy-ness of the music. It gave the whole thing a B-movie feel, right from the beginning.

I felt sorry for Kristen Stewart, who's character already lacked depth, and was reduced even more in the wailing, writhing CGI Zombie Birth Scene. Edward's character just seemed inept. I kept expecting him to scurry off to a corner somewhere and numbly nibble at his steel fingernails with his diamond vampire teeth.

The one shining moment in this fiasco was the character of Charlie, Bella's father. He always adds those moments of comic relief. The relationship between Jacob and Rose was fun to watch and the wedding night scene wasn't terrible. You know, because having your partner break the headboard and leaving you black and blue whilst claiming your virginity is such an amazing experience. "Don't worry, Edward. I'm totally into the whole S&M thing! Let's do it again!" 


Sadly, I have one more movie to sit through before I can officially put a fork in my Twilight movie experience.