strange and random happenstance

The Princess Bride by William Goldman
Published by: Ballantine Books
Publication Date: 1973
Format: Hardcover, 399 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Buttercup grew up on a farm in Florin. She was a reputed beauty, the great Count Rugen and his wife one day visited the farm to see for themselves. They saw a girl with potential, if she'd bathe, and the Countess saw a very attractive Farm Boy. Though Westley never took notice of the Countess, his heart belonged to Buttercup. The day Buttercup realized she loved him in return he set out into the world to make their fortune. The day he died was the worst of her life, but she emerged from her suffering the most beautiful woman in the world. A woman who could never love again. When Prince Humperdinck offered her his hand in marriage, she was straightforward with him, as he was with her, she will never love him yet she will marry him because otherwise he will kill her. When she is unveiled to the people of Florin they instantly idolize her and the Prince, a warmongering bloodthirsty man, realizes that his plan to have his bride kidnapped and killed framing the county of Guilder is going to go off perfectly. He didn't count on the man in black. The Prince's three assassins, Inigo, a wizard with a sword, Fezzik, a giant that can't be beaten, and Vizzini, a Sicilian with the most cunning mind in the world, kidnap Buttercup with little problem. But when they are crossing Florin channel to Guilder they realize they are being followed. Their pursuer is the man in black. First he bests Inigo, then he bests Fezzik, once he bests Vizzini, Buttercup and her ransom are his. Though that isn't his plan. Buttercup boasts to this masked man that her Prince will come, the masked man says that she is heartless and he should just kill her. That is when the game changes. With fire swamps and out-sized rodents, miracle men and six-fingered swords, can true love find a way back from being mostly dead? Or will evil triumph? After all, life isn't fair.

Ask anyone of my generation what their favorite film is and I bet they answer The Princess Bride. Sure, there are other films of note, from Star Wars to Willow to Empire Records, but The Princess Bride IS the film of my generation. We watch it when we're sad, we watch it when we're happy, when we used to gather in each others apartments in college and had time to waste we'd put it in the VCR. It's the biggest, snuggest, comfort blanket there is. Yeah, suck it gravity blanket you have nothing on The Princess Bride. I can still remember when I first watched it. The summer of 1988 was the hottest on record in Wisconsin. We didn't have central air but the way the upstairs rooms were designed in my house my parents room, my brother's, and mine all had connecting doors. We pulled the shades down, we placed one air conditioning unit in my room and another in my parents, opened all the doors and lived in those three rooms for the summer, leaving occasionally to go to the pool or the movie theater and one memorable outing to Perkins when the air raid sirens went off. I was lucky in that my room became the TV room. We had a tiny TV/VCR combo unit my Dad had gotten for his art gallery and we placed it on an old table we had and rented all the tapes we could. One of these was The Princess Bride. I was instantly in love with it. I watched it again and again, my face inches from the TV as Inigo and Westley fought along the Cliffs of Insanity. I checked out that tape so much that summer that the video store let me buy it off them eventually, and I still have that old copy, though many different DVD releases have been purchased since. In college I was lucky enough to see it on the big screen, but it's an odd experience seeing it with a bunch of drunks who recite every single line of dialogue. But then again, it is the film of my generation.

I don't know when I realized there was a book written by William Goldman. For years I believed there was an S. Morgenstern and William Goldman was a hack, but what can I say? I was an impressionable ten year old and I wanted to believe that a book this wonderful, this magical was real. Of course it IS real, but in it's own special way. But the truth is when I first picked up this book I couldn't see it for what it was. I loved the book because of the movie, and the book seemed to fill in all these little gaps for me. Therefore I felt like this book was the film's bible, an annotated version of the film where I was just waiting for my favorite lines to appear. I finally knew why Fezzik was so scared to be left alone in Greenland! I FINALLY understood the fencing banter between Westley and Inigo on the tops of the Cliffs of Insanity. I knew where Fezzik found the four white horses as well as why he rhymed. All these pieces fell into place and I developed an even greater love of the movie. But as that was happening I was also falling in love with the book. There are rare occasions when I love a book and it's adaptation. There are even rarer occasions when I love them but admit that they are two totally different things. Yet here this is true. The movie adaptation of the book is funny and wonderful, but also a lovely fairy tale with oodles of romance. The book, the book is snarky and barbed and self-aware and almost an anti-fairy tale and yet it stands on it's own and is a classic in it's own right. The Princess Bride as originally written by William Goldman is a mine of the meta (meta was already a thing but just) and takes what is expected and subverts it. Pirates and thieves are good while Princes are bad and it's all just perfect, in a way all its own.

Yet there is an irony built into the book. This book is "abridged" wherein Goldman omits all that he thought boring and insinuates his own voice over the voice of "Morgenstern's" with the liberal use of italicized text. These interruptions, along with the introduction, are the framing device that, tweaked here and there, became Peter Falk reading to Fred Savage in the film. While the interruptions are entertaining, being an author fictionalizing his own life and then commenting on another author who doesn't exist, the introduction is a little self-indulgent. There's a bit too much "Hollywood" and not enough grounding in reality. The pool scene which seems to be a Dudley Moore fantasy from any of his various seventies and eighties films is just a bridge too far. Therefore I would seriously like any of you who've read this book to answer truthfully, how many of you have actually read the introduction after the first time you've read the book? Just as I thought. None of you! I can not count how many times I've read The Princess Bride, but I'm pretty darn sure I've read the introduction exactly two times: the first time I read the book and then this time. The irony in all this is that the readers are abridging an "abridged" book as they read it. I've often wondered why there's never been a version released without the introduction, or in this anniversary edition's case, the two introductions. Perhaps it's to show the readers that are under the same delusion I was that Morgenstern is nothing more than the creation of Goldman, and that while the introduction is uneven and pretty unnecessary, it shows the complete breadth of Goldman's talents. Who knows? Perhaps we may get answers in five years when the inevitable fiftieth anniversary edition is released...

Those people who have only ever watched the movie and never read the book are missing out because they never get to see the depths of the friendship between Fezzik and Inigo. Yes, they were wonderfully brought to life by André the Giant and Mandy Patinkin and you could see the friendship between them, but in the book their friendship is the backbone that holds the story together. This is especially seen when they enter the Zoo of Death! At this point if you haven't read the book you're wondering WTF is the Zoo of Death!?! Well, the Zoo of Death was obviously not included in the film for budgetary reasons. Why have Count Rugen's little torture chamber for Westley buried underground beneath four levels of animals that the Prince loves to hunt and kill when a smaller chamber accessed via a tree would serve just as well? But the movie's loss is our gain! Because here we can see that their codependency is based on actually caring for each other. They followed Vizzini because they both were searching for a purpose in life and Vizzini made that purpose easy, just do as he said. Yet while entering into that partnership the two outcasts found each other. Inigo will gladly trade rhymes forever when Fezzik is down, and each knows how to push the others buttons, not out of malice, but in order to have the other be the best person they can be. The reward of all this is in the end when Fezzik saves the day. He learns to think on his own and starts to become more than just a frightened little boy but a man. In fact I would say that, at least in the book, these two are the stars. We never learn much about Buttercup or Westley's backstory, but Inigo and Fezzik have these fleshed out pasts that lead to this adventure and you can see their futures stretching out in front of them, and you just want to be on that adventure as well.

Which makes you wonder, is there ever going to be another adventure? Ten years after The Princess Bride Goldman did write another short story under the pseudonym of Morgenstern, The Silent Gondoliers, which was reissued in 2001, which was right when people were wondering if Buttercup's Baby was going to be out soon. The thing is I don't really know what's up with Buttercup's Baby. For those who don't know when the twenty-fifth anniversary edition was released twenty years ago now there was almost a hundred new pages added to The Princess Bride. No, it wasn't Buttercup going to her training, or anything omitted from the original text as a joke, it started out with a new introduction by Goldman in the vein of his original introduction, some young woman hitting on him for no reason, followed by some references to a son he never had, you get the idea. What was fun was he expanded on the missing "Reunion Scene" which I'm sure if you're a hardcore fan you wrote in for. And no, I'm not going to spoil that for you. After much toing and froing, including references to Stephen King, whose books Goldman has adapted for the screen many times, you get to the meat, a new chapter! We see all our favorites, Fezzik, Inigo, Westley, Buttercup, and their daughter Waverly. Yes, that's right, they have a daughter who is soon to endure a kidnapping, much as her mother did years before. It's a very solid beginning to a new story that ends on a literal cliffhanger. So I can't help but wonder why did Goldman write it? He could never hope to eclipse the success of The Princess Bride and making Buttercup's Baby into a movie would be verboten, so why? My best guess is that this was a little gift to the fans, a thank you for all the support over the years. Will we get more? I don't know, and honestly, I don't think that was ever the plan, and Goldman's getting up there in age. But ask me again in five years...

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Abridged, Buttercup, Buttercup's Baby, Count Rugen, Fezzik, Inigo Montoya, S. Morgenstern, Stephen King, Sweet Reads, The Princess Bride, The Silent Gondoliers, Vizzini, Westley, William Goldman, Zoo of Death

Bookstore: Half Price Books Brookfield

Location: Brookfield, Wisconsin

Why I Love Them: While there are many Half Price Books that I have visited on my book buying excursions, the Milwaukee area used to have a Half Price trifecta. It was a triple crown winner if we're going with a metaphor that is very important with what is happening tomorrow. The three stores covered the three income brackets of the city, there were the lower, middle, and upper class stores. In the recent past it shouldn't come as a surprise that the store catering to those of a lower income closed. The middle class location remains unchanged and it's still the first Half Price location I ever went to requiring a key to use the bathroom. But the upper class store in Brookfield, which is to Milwaukee what Maple Bluff is to Madison, has just gotten better over time. Their rise to be the cream of the crop coincided with the downfall of another local chain. In 2009 Harry W. Schwartz Bookshops announced that they were closing after 82 years in business. Two of their locations were being liquidated (a sale from which I got much plunder) while one would reemerge as Boswell Book Company. The reason this is important is that the rather small and unassuming Half Price Books in Brookfield moved across the boulevard into the old Harry W. Schwartz location and their Renaissance began. They started having more books behind glass and more Folio Society editions. Harry W. Schwartz no longer had a stranglehold on the neighborhood and Half Price Books used this to soar to new heights.

Best Buy: As for my best buy... this is going to be a sad story. A story of the one that got away... Easily one of my favorite books of all time is William Goldman's The Princess Bride. From the first time I read this classic I knew I could never have enough editions of it. I have my original paperback edition, the movie tie-in edition, the standard British trade edition, the 25th Anniversary hardcover edition, the 30th Anniversary American trade edition, the audiobook read by Rob Reiner, the American trade edition with the couple dressed like Westley and Buttercup from the movie though there's totally something wrong with his mask, an old hardcover book club edition, the swanky Folio Society edition, and lastly the Easton Press special edition. But you will notice the one thing I lack, the one thing I long for: a first edition. Back in 1996 I passed on a first edition because at the time I was still convinced that the book existed in some form other than "the good parts version" by William Goldman. Yeah, I still can't fully explain why I thought this was the case, but my own ignorance let a first edition slip through my fingers. Many many years later the Half Price Books in Brookfield had a first edition. I remember it was quite pricey for it's condition, which means I'm guessing it was $250 or so. I pressed my face up against the glass and time and time again whenever I went to Milwaukee I would see if the book was still there. Finally one day I had a 40% off coupon and was determined to buy it. But I was too late. Now they go for at least double up to ten times what I thought was too pricey... But I live in hope...

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Brookfield, First Edition, Folio Society, Half Price Books, Harry W. Schwartz, Milwaukee, Rob Reiner, Support Your Brick and Mortar, The Princess Bride, William Goldman

The Princess Bride by William Goldman
Published by: Ballantine Books
Publication Date: 1973
Format: Hardcover, 399 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Buttercup grew up on a farm in Florin. She was a reputed beauty, the great Count Rugen and his wife one day visited the farm to see for themselves. They saw a girl with potential, if she'd bathe, and the Countess saw a very attractive Farm Boy. Though Westley never took notice of the Countess, his heart belonged to Buttercup. The day Buttercup realized she loved him in return he set out into the world to make their fortune. The day he died was the worst of her life, but she emerged from her suffering the most beautiful woman in the world. A woman who could never love again. When Prince Humperdinck offered her his hand in marriage, she was straightforward with him, as he was with her, she will never love him yet she will marry him because otherwise he will kill her. When she is unveiled to the people of Florin they instantly idolize her and the Prince, a warmongering bloodthirsty man, realizes that his plan to have his bride kidnapped and killed framing the county of Guilder is going to go off perfectly. He didn't count on the man in black. The Prince's three assassins, Inigo, a wizard with a sword, Fezzik, a giant that can't be beaten, and Vizzini, a Sicilian with the most cunning mind in the world, kidnap Buttercup with little problem. But when they are crossing Florin channel to Guilder they realize they are being followed. Their pursuer is the man in black. First he bests Inigo, then he bests Fezzik, once he bests Vizzini, Buttercup and her ransom are his. Though that isn't his plan. Buttercup boasts to this masked man that her Prince will come, the masked man says that she is heartless and he should just kill her. That is when the game changes. With fire swamps and out-sized rodents, miracle men and six-fingered swords, can true love find a way back from being mostly dead? Or will evil triumph? After all, life isn't fair.

Ask anyone of my generation what their favorite film is and I bet they answer The Princess Bride. Sure, there are other films of note, from Star Wars to Willow to Empire Records, but The Princess Bride IS the film of my generation. We watch it when we're sad, we watch it when we're happy, when we used to gather in each others apartments in college and had time to waste we'd put it in the VCR. It's the biggest, snuggest, comfort blanket there is. Yeah, suck it gravity blanket you have nothing on The Princess Bride. I can still remember when I first watched it. The summer of 1988 was the hottest on record in Wisconsin. We didn't have central air but the way the upstairs rooms were designed in my house my parents room, my brother's, and mine all had connecting doors. We pulled the shades down, we placed one air conditioning unit in my room and another in my parents, opened all the doors and lived in those three rooms for the summer, leaving occasionally to go to the pool or the movie theater and one memorable outing to Perkins when the air raid sirens went off. I was lucky in that my room became the TV room. We had a tiny TV/VCR combo unit my Dad had gotten for his art gallery and we placed it on an old table we had and rented all the tapes we could. One of these was The Princess Bride. I was instantly in love with it. I watched it again and again, my face inches from the TV as Inigo and Westley fought along the Cliffs of Insanity. I checked out that tape so much that summer that the video store let me buy it off them eventually, and I still have that old copy, though many different DVD releases have been purchased since. In college I was lucky enough to see it on the big screen, but it's an odd experience seeing it with a bunch of drunks who recite every single line of dialogue. But then again, it is the film of my generation.

I don't know when I realized there was a book written by William Goldman. For years I believed there was an S. Morgenstern and William Goldman was a hack, but what can I say? I was an impressionable ten year old and I wanted to believe that a book this wonderful, this magical was real. Of course it IS real, but in it's own special way. But the truth is when I first picked up this book I couldn't see it for what it was. I loved the book because of the movie, and the book seemed to fill in all these little gaps for me. Therefore I felt like this book was the film's bible, an annotated version of the film where I was just waiting for my favorite lines to appear. I finally knew why Fezzik was so scared to be left alone in Greenland! I FINALLY understood the fencing banter between Westley and Inigo on the tops of the Cliffs of Insanity. I knew where Fezzik found the four white horses as well as why he rhymed. All these pieces fell into place and I developed an even greater love of the movie. But as that was happening I was also falling in love with the book. There are rare occasions when I love a book and it's adaptation. There are even rarer occasions when I love them but admit that they are two totally different things. Yet here this is true. The movie adaptation of the book is funny and wonderful, but also a lovely fairy tale with oodles of romance. The book, the book is snarky and barbed and self-aware and almost an anti-fairy tale and yet it stands on it's own and is a classic in it's own right. The Princess Bride as originally written by William Goldman is a mine of the meta (meta was already a thing but just) and takes what is expected and subverts it. Pirates and thieves are good while Princes are bad and it's all just perfect, in a way all its own.

Yet there is an irony built into the book. This book is "abridged" wherein Goldman omits all that he thought boring and insinuates his own voice over the voice of "Morgenstern's" with the liberal use of italicized text. These interruptions, along with the introduction, are the framing device that, tweaked here and there, became Peter Falk reading to Fred Savage in the film. While the interruptions are entertaining, being an author fictionalizing his own life and then commenting on another author who doesn't exist, the introduction is a little self-indulgent. There's a bit too much "Hollywood" and not enough grounding in reality. The pool scene which seems to be a Dudley Moore fantasy from any of his various seventies and eighties films is just a bridge too far. Therefore I would seriously like any of you who've read this book to answer truthfully, how many of you have actually read the introduction after the first time you've read the book? Just as I thought. None of you! I can not count how many times I've read The Princess Bride, but I'm pretty darn sure I've read the introduction exactly two times: the first time I read the book and then this time. The irony in all this is that the readers are abridging an "abridged" book as they read it. I've often wondered why there's never been a version released without the introduction, or in this anniversary edition's case, the two introductions. Perhaps it's to show the readers that are under the same delusion I was that Morgenstern is nothing more than the creation of Goldman, and that while the introduction is uneven and pretty unnecessary, it shows the complete breadth of Goldman's talents. Who knows? Perhaps we may get answers in five years when the inevitable fiftieth anniversary edition is released...

Those people who have only ever watched the movie and never read the book are missing out because they never get to see the depths of the friendship between Fezzik and Inigo. Yes, they were wonderfully brought to life by André the Giant and Mandy Patinkin and you could see the friendship between them, but in the book their friendship is the backbone that holds the story together. This is especially seen when they enter the Zoo of Death! At this point if you haven't read the book you're wondering WTF is the Zoo of Death!?! Well, the Zoo of Death was obviously not included in the film for budgetary reasons. Why have Count Rugen's little torture chamber for Westley buried underground beneath four levels of animals that the Prince loves to hunt and kill when a smaller chamber accessed via a tree would serve just as well? But the movie's loss is our gain! Because here we can see that their codependency is based on actually caring for each other. They followed Vizzini because they both were searching for a purpose in life and Vizzini made that purpose easy, just do as he said. Yet while entering into that partnership the two outcasts found each other. Inigo will gladly trade rhymes forever when Fezzik is down, and each knows how to push the others buttons, not out of malice, but in order to have the other be the best person they can be. The reward of all this is in the end when Fezzik saves the day. He learns to think on his own and starts to become more than just a frightened little boy but a man. In fact I would say that, at least in the book, these two are the stars. We never learn much about Buttercup or Westley's backstory, but Inigo and Fezzik have these fleshed out pasts that lead to this adventure and you can see their futures stretching out in front of them, and you just want to be on that adventure as well.

Which makes you wonder, is there ever going to be another adventure? Ten years after The Princess Bride Goldman did write another short story under the pseudonym of Morgenstern, The Silent Gondoliers, which was reissued in 2001, which was right when people were wondering if Buttercup's Baby was going to be out soon. The thing is I don't really know what's up with Buttercup's Baby. For those who don't know when the twenty-fifth anniversary edition was released twenty years ago now there was almost a hundred new pages added to The Princess Bride. No, it wasn't Buttercup going to her training, or anything omitted from the original text as a joke, it started out with a new introduction by Goldman in the vein of his original introduction, some young woman hitting on him for no reason, followed by some references to a son he never had, you get the idea. What was fun was he expanded on the missing "Reunion Scene" which I'm sure if you're a hardcore fan you wrote in for. And no, I'm not going to spoil that for you. After much toing and froing, including references to Stephen King, whose books Goldman has adapted for the screen many times, you get to the meat, a new chapter! We see all our favorites, Fezzik, Inigo, Westley, Buttercup, and their daughter Waverly. Yes, that's right, they have a daughter who is soon to endure a kidnapping, much as her mother did years before. It's a very solid beginning to a new story that ends on a literal cliffhanger. So I can't help but wonder why did Goldman write it? He could never hope to eclipse the success of The Princess Bride and making Buttercup's Baby into a movie would be verboten, so why? My best guess is that this was a little gift to the fans, a thank you for all the support over the years. Will we get more? I don't know, and honestly, I don't think that was ever the plan, and Goldman's getting up there in age. But ask me again in five years...

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Abridged, Buttercup, Buttercup's Baby, Count Rugen, Fezzik, Inigo Montoya, S. Morgenstern, Stephen King, Sweet Reads, The Princess Bride, The Silent Gondoliers, Vizzini, Westley, William Goldman, Zoo of Death

The Great Train Robbery by Michael Crichton
Published by: Dell
Publication Date: May, 1975
Format: Paperback, 266 Pages
Rating: ★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Edward Pierce plans to steal the Crimean Gold shipment. This won't be an easy heist. Firstly, he plans to steal the gold from a moving train. Secondly the gold is in two Chubb safes requiring two keys each, for a total of four keys needed. Thirdly, he doesn't know where the four keys are located. Finally, he is willing to take his time to get it right, meaning it's more then a year till he will see the gold and there is a lot of outlay of cash in the meantime to get the right people for the job and to keep them in silent ignorance. With his screwsman Agar ready to copy the keys they set about finding their marks. Two of the keys are held in the railway office, which will be a problem in itself, and the other two are held by men who work for the bank and these are their marks. Even if they succeed in getting all the keys copied and getting them all to work, a year is a long time and changes might happen to the accepted routine of the gold shipment. There could be simple changes to the timetable, or there could be massive changes, like the safes being overhauled. And even if they get away with it, whose to say they won't be eventually caught? This is an audacious scheme that could go down in history, one way or another.

If, prior to reading this book again, you were to ask me what are my top Crichton books I would have replied without hesitation, Congo, Sphere, and The Great Train Robbery. These I have gone back to again and again over the years. The Great Train Robbery easily solidified my obsession with Victorian England and set me on the path to a historical fiction addiction that has never let up. I remember it as an action packed thrill ride with just the right amount of historical context. This is not a phrase I would use anymore. The book hasn't changed in these intervening years, but I have. My reading tastes have expanded and been refined and what was once a thrilling read came across as disjointed and almost laborious. The best example I have by way of comparison is when I re-read all of Jane Austen's books. I had a very distinct hierarchy that was blown to bits when I picked them up again. Northanger Abbey surged from last place to be near the top, whereas Mansfield Park declined. But there was no more precipitous a decline then Emma. Ranking in the top three Emma became my most hated of all Austen, her behavior, while amusing and laudable to a teenager, annoyed the heck out me the more "grown up" me. The Great Train Robbery is the Emma of Crichton; oh how far it has fallen.

When I was younger I was very gullible when it came to books, which is very odd when you realize what a skeptic I am in regard to everything else. But if a book said it was "true" I believed it. Therefore when William Goldman said that his book, The Princess Bride, was an abridgement of the book of the same title by S. Morgenstern I believed it. In fact I spent probably a good few years annoying people in my belief and my desire to get a hold of the "real" book as I saw it. Yes, this might be naive, but what can I say, I was a teenager without the vast resources of the Internet. Therefore it was a logical conclusion that I assumed The Great Train Robbery with Crichton's desire to always make his books "real" actually happened. I was totally flummoxed that the only "Great Train Robbery" happened in 1963. I was convinced this couldn't be right. Thankfully I have been redeemed a bit in this belief by finding out that there was the "Great Gold Robbery" that Crichton based his book on, so I was partially right. Why I felt the need to have this truth I don't know, but it made the book something more to me.

The facts and figures that are sprinkled throughout the book lend veracity to it. When I first read The Great Train Robbery it was my first book that presented history in an approachable manner. I learned more truths then most textbooks print, and that might be why I so wanted the heist to be real; the glamor of a story provides a more interesting world any day. But re-reading it all these facts and figures actually don't lend themselves to the narrative. They might have educated me at one time by now all they do is interrupt the narrative flow. As for the narrative itself? Well, there isn't that much story, which the facts and figures do a good job of disguising. Also, what I found very aggravating this time around was that so much of the "history" and the "commentary" went beyond the timeline of the heist, aka 1854-1857. The book references events, periodicals, and statistics so far in the future, some more then a hundred years in the future, that it lacks the feeling of "now" and makes it more academic. Crichton has always had a problem balancing narrative with an overabundance of facts. In the middle of his career he seemed to find a happy medium, but at the beginning and again at the end of his career he let the research overpower the narrative and us readers are left feeling bored waiting for the story to resume.

What I found most annoying though was Crichton's desire to use the argot of the time. But instead of lending character and flavor to the book he seems to be using it to purposefully obfuscate the story. The language at times gets so bad that characters don't understand each other and what they say has to be translated. Say what? If your own characters don't understand each other then how does the story work exactly? How am I to understand what they are saying? Everything needs to be explained and this makes the narrative, what there is in between the plethora of facts, even more clunky. The only reason I can think for Crichton to do this was that the historian in him took over. He had all this vast research of facts and figures that he kept throwing into the heist narrative he obviously must have had reams of research as to the argot of the criminals living in The Holy Land. So instead of dumbing the book down to make it palatable, ie legible, he made the language 100% realistic and decided that either he would explain it or just leave his readers muddled. As someone who reads a lot of books with slang and argot, I have to say he really let the ball drop on this one. It doesn't work, and hence The Great Train Robbery's swift decline in my definitive ranking of his books.

But there's also a part of me that wonders, was the book Crichton's end goal for this story? He was already doing films at this time. In 1973, two years before this book came out, he wrote and directed Westworld. The rights to The Great Train Robbery were bought right when the book came out. Within three years the movie was already in pre-production with Sean Connery attached. Crichton would eventually direct it and it would be released in 1979. If you look at the book not as a book but as a treatment for a film it makes far more sense. The narrative, minus all the extraneous historical details, is a quick, fast, and fun heist. But in order to translate it from page to screen you would need to know all these extraneous historical details in order to capture the time period just right. Yes, the details lend reality to the book, but as they are presented in the book they don't work. If Crichton had wanted to write the best book he could there would have been more integration, more cohesion. BUT if he was looking towards another medium as the end goal? Why bother? Just lay the facts out, have the narrative interspersed, and wait for the time for the film to be made. This theory makes sense of the book in my mind. It also makes me very excited to watch the movie again to see if this theory of mine holds up...

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Argot, Congo, Crichton Celebration, Emma, Heist, Historical Fiction, Jane Austen, Michael Crichton, Movie, Sean Connery, Sphere, The Great Train Robbery, The Princess Bride, Victorian, Westworld, William Goldman

Eaters of the Dead by Michael Crichton
Published by: Ballantine Books
Publication Date: March, 1976
Format: Paperback, 181 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

Ibn Fadlan has left Bagdad, City of Peace, as an ambassador to the King of Saqaliba who is interested in adapting the Muslim faith. Traveling up the Volga he and his party encounter many strange and unfamiliar people. Ibn meets a group of vikings who are encamped along the river awaiting the death of their chieftain. Ibn befriends the heir apparent, Buliwyf, which is awkward when another heir tries to assume the mantle of chieftain. Before the matter can be resolved a messenger arrives begging Buliwyf's help. The great King Rothgar is being besieged by monsters that come out of the mist and is in need of a great hero. Buliwyf is that hero. For this epic journey and the battle to come they need thirteen warriors to make up their company, and it is propitious that the thirteenth is a stranger, so they take Ibn with them, much against his will. While Ibn didn't count on this journey, he recounts the vulgar but heroic viking race he is stuck with for posterity. If they live he will have a story to tell about a brave race brought to their knees by mist; but first they must survive.

Of all Crichton's books Eaters of the Dead holds the unique distinction of the book I care least for. It creates neither love nor loathing in me. Eaters of the Dead is just there. A short book about vikings that I couldn't care less about. Yes, the cover of my edition does amuse me, because it has that distinction of being so very late eighties. Is the viking on a Tron esque battlefield? Is the viking trapped in a video game matrix? The skulls on sticks could almost double as palm trees. Other then that, I have rarely given this book a second thought. In fact when the book was being adapted into a movie, unlike every other Crichton adaptation, I didn't even bother to see it. In fact, as I write this, I haven't seen it to this day. Would I say this book was a misstep for Crichton? Not really. I think he needed to do it as an experiment to get it out of his system. He needed to show that he could write something different, even if I didn't care for that different. And this is very different, being first person, being all in the past, and apparently being the settlement of some argument he was having with one of his friends.

The apparent history of why Crichton felt a need to write Eaters of the Dead was that one of his friends labelled Beowulf as being boring. Crichton disagreed. To win this argument Crichton wrote a boring retelling of Beowulf. So I think his friend won the argument. I'm not saying Beowulf is boring, I'm saying that Crichton's attempts to prove that it is a riveting story resulted in a snore worthy book. One of the problems is Crichton is unable to move past his modern mindset. He has always been at the forefront of technology and research, with his books often predicting trends; and while writing about something that happened in the tenth century A.D. he couldn't help but anachronistically slip a few things in, mainly man's similarity to apes, otherwise called "research for Congo is seeping into this story." But the worst was a bizarre post narrative meditation on what exactly the "mist monsters" were. The "Grendel" or "Wendol" here isn't some mythic monster but some Neanderthals that have survived with concurrent evolution. Say what!?! REALLY!?! Um no. Beowulf is a myth and epic story that isn't mean to be explained by evolution. Crichton needed to think about what it looked like to people of the time NOT people of our time. This takes us out of the moment and changes how you look at the book, and not favorably.

Crichton has basically been spending the whole book in second guessing and invalidating his story with his "faux" history, hello Neanderthals. It is fairly obvious that Crichton was a fan of William Goldman and in particular his book The Princess Bride. After all, Ian Malcolm was only "mostly dead" and therefore able to be resurrected for his star turn in The Lost World. They probably even knew each other, being authors who had crossed over into film. When The Princess Bride came out three years prior to Eaters of the Dead I'm sure the interrupted style of the narrative with faux history and the "abridgment " of the "original text" was something fresh and new. In Eaters of the Dead Crichton tries something similar and fails miserably. It's almost as if Crichton missed the whole point of what Goldman was doing. The interruptions were to poke fun at the story, to add something more, and usually that something more was levity. With "faux" history you can never take yourself too seriously otherwise you end up sounding like a textbook. Look to authors who successfully use the footnotes, ie, Terry Pratchett, Susanna Clarke, and Lisa Lutz. They all add some fun with the facts. Crichton misses the boat and it feels like he's taking himself too seriously and with the Neanderthals previously mentioned he seems to almost have a need to make a myth real instead of an enjoyable read.     

The biggest misstep that Crichton made in structuring this book, aside from the "faux" historical framing device, was deciding that it should be a first person narrative. I believe it is the only book he wrote this way, though I have a slight inkling that maybe Disclosure might be first person, but I have no desire to dig up the book to find out. Yeah, I'm lazy at the moment, deal with it. The problem isn't so much in having it first person, but in having it first person with Ibn as the narrator. Ibn would be a prime example of an unreliable narrator and a complete ass. He's the king of the backhanded compliment and derides the vikings for their customs, which he then takes part in as he feels like it, all while saying how disgusting they are. Look how horrid and smelly they are and will fuck anything, oh, I can fuck the slaves too, yeah! Plus, I don't get why Crichton grafted on this true story to the Beowulf myth. I don't think it was to try to push the veracity he was so desperate to claim. The only reason I can think of is to have an outsider to relate to for us non-vikings. But there's no chance anyone is going to relate to Ibn the ass, so his purpose is therefore pointless. Unless Crichton really wanted us to hate the narrator...

Plus Ibn as narrator restricts the story so much. We don't get the grandeur and depth that is possible with this story by being forced into the confines of this bigoted ass's mind. Think how awesome vikings can be? Seriously, to make them boring Crichton should be awarded a special prize. Just look at what's popular on television right now! The History channel has a huge hit with a show just called Vikings! Also how about the whole How to Train Your Dragon book and movie series? This is a culture that we are fascinated with. Their achievements for the time where amazing and Crichton made them boring. Seriously boring. I mean, how did he do this? Maybe the people reading this when it came out in the mid-seventies saw something I didn't, but I seriously doubt it. If there's one Crichton book I would say to skip without compunction it would be Eaters of the Dead. Seriously, skip it. Move along now.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Beowulf, Congo, Eaters of the Dead, Ian Malcolm, Lisa Lutz, Michael Crichton, Neanderthal, Susanna Clarke, Terry Pratchett, The Lost World, The Princess Bride, The Thirteenth Warrior, Viking, William Goldman

Curtsies and Conspiracies by Gail Carriger
Published by: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication Date: November 5th, 2013
Format: Hardcover, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Does one need four fully grown foxgloves for decorating a dinner table for six guests? Or is it six foxgloves to kill four fully grown guests?

Sophronia's first year at Mademoiselle Geraldine's Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality has certainly been rousing! For one thing, finishing school is training her to be a spy (won't Mumsy be surprised?). Furthermore, Sophronia got mixed up in an intrigue over a stolen device and had a cheese pie thrown at her in a most horrid display of poor manners.

Now, as she sneaks around the dirigible school, eavesdropping on the teachers' quarters and making clandestine climbs to the ship's boiler room, she learns that there may be more to a school trip to London than is apparent at first. A conspiracy is afoot--one with dire implications for both supernaturals and humans. Sophronia must rely on her training to discover who is behind the dangerous plot-and survive the London Season with a full dance card.

In this sequel to bestselling author Gail Carriger's YA debut Etiquette & Espionage, class is back in session with more petticoats and poison, tea trays and treason. Gail's distinctive voice, signature humor, and lush steampunk setting are sure to be the height of fashion this season."

Though the first book did let me down, I'm still optimistic that this one will redeem this new series for me.

Sherlock Holmes: The Will of the Dead by George Mann
Published by: Titan Books
Publication Date: November 5th, 2013
Format: Paperback, 336 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"A young man named Peter Maugram appears at the front door of Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson's Baker Street lodgings. Maugram's uncle is dead and his will has disappeared, leaving the man afraid that he will be left penniless. Holmes agrees to take the case and he and Watson dig deep into the murky past of this complex family."

George's writing plus Sherlock Holmes, um yes!

Bellman and Black by Diane Setterfield
Published by: Atria/Emily Bestler Books
Publication Date: November 5th, 2013
Format: Hardcover, 336 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"ONE MOMENT IN TIME CAN HAUNT YOU FOREVER.

Caught up in a moment of boyhood competition, William Bellman recklessly aims his slingshot at a rook resting on a branch, killing the bird instantly. It is a small but cruel act, and is soon forgotten. By the time he is grown, with a wife and children of his own, William seems to have put the whole incident behind him. It was as if he never killed the thing at all. But rooks don’t forget . . .

Years later, when a stranger mysteriously enters William’s life, his fortunes begin to turn—and the terrible and unforeseen consequences of his past indiscretion take root. In a desperate bid to save the only precious thing he has left, he enters into a rather strange bargain, with an even stranger partner. Together, they found a decidedly macabre business.

And Bellman and Black is born."

While me and Setterfield's first book didn't quite get along, it can't be denied that it left an impression, so I might just pick up this one.

The Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon by Alexander McCall Smith
Published by: Pantheon
Publication Date: November 5th, 2013
Format: Hardcover, 272 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series is moving to the fall!

In the latest book in the beloved best-selling series of mysteries set in Botswana, Mma Ramotswe is asked to help the proprietor of the Minor Adjustment Beauty Salon, who is having trouble with her business. The salon has suffered some unfortunate events, including face cream that burns the skin. Could someone be trying to put the salon out of business? Meanwhile, on the home front, Mma Makutsi is going to have a baby. But in Botswana—a land where family has always been held above all else but which is on the crossroads between old and new—this may be cause for as much controversy as celebration."

Ok, I just love this title. It's just too too funny.

The Princess Bride by William Goldman
Published by: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Publication Date: November 5th, 2013
Format: Hardcover, 496 Pages
To Buy

"Here William Goldman’s beloved story of Buttercup, Westley, and their fellow adventurers finally receives a beautiful illustrated treatment.

A tale of true love and high adventure, pirates, princesses, giants, miracles, fencing, and a frightening assortment of wild beasts—The Princess Bride is a modern storytelling classic.

As Florin and Guilder teeter on the verge of war, the reluctant Princess Buttercup is devastated by the loss of her true love, kidnapped by a mercenary and his henchman, rescued by a pirate, forced to marry Prince Humperdinck, and rescued once again by the very crew who absconded with her in the first place. In the course of this dazzling adventure, she'll meet Vizzini—the criminal philosopher who'll do anything for a bag of gold; Fezzik—the gentle giant; Inigo—the Spaniard whose steel thirsts for revenge; and Count Rugen—the evil mastermind behind it all. Foiling all their plans and jumping into their stories is Westley, Princess Buttercup’s one true love and a very good friend of a very dangerous pirate."

Well here's a conundrum... I will probably buy this because of my compulsive need to own all editions of this book... but, how can this imagery jive with the movie. Because, let's face it, I'm going to totally be comparing every single illustration to the movie.

Grimm: The Icy Touch by John Shirley
Published by: Titan Books
Publication Date: November 5th, 2013
Format: Paperback, 320 Pages
To Buy

The official patter:
"Portland homicide Detective Nick Burkhardt discovers he is descended from an elite line of criminal profilers known as "Grimms", charged with keeping balance between humanity and the mythological creatures of the world."

I'm always interested when shows get popular enough to warrant books. Now if this book was all Monroe all the time, I'm even more interested!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Alexander McCall Smith, Diane Setterfield, Finishing School, Gail Carriger, George Mann, Grimm, Monroe, Sherlock Holmes, The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, The Princess Bride, William Goldman