Month: November 2020

I wanted to read ten books this month! In an alternate universe, I read twelve. In this one, I read three. I started two more and I’ll finish them both this month. In the meantime, here’s what I finished!

1. Wyrd Sisters, by Terry Pratchett – Aaron has been a fan of Terry Pratchett for practically his entire life. Recently, he downloaded ten of his favorites onto my Kindle! Remembering that I wanted to have a Halloween theme for my books in the month of October, I decided to read a book about witches! Wyrd Sisters is part of Pratchett’s “Discworld” series, but works as a standalone as well, lucky for me. It’s a bit of a satire on Macbeth, focusing on the witches who use similar spells as the ones in the Scottish play!
   Granny Witherwax, Nanny Ogg, and Magrat Garlick are given a baby by an escaping servant after the king is slain. The baby is said to be the true heir to the throne! The witches agree to help usher the baby to safety and ensure his rightful place as king when the time comes.
   Wyrd Sisters is more funny than scary, to be sure! It’s witty and played very straight. The witches are fearless and are mostly unintimidated by the events that befall them. Things like being captured by the enemy and nearly killed are less traumatizing moments for them and moreover inconvenient instead. The tone of the novel felt very similar to when I read The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in September. It’s very similar to Aaron’s sense of humor! I believe that means I will enjoy the other books in Pratchett’s canon.
   As I said, I thought Wyrd Sisters to be very funny, and I hope it gets a modern film adaptation! Here were a few of my favorite lines:“The night was as black as the inside of a cat.”

   “I feel like women in general are like this – we don’t super care who has the most power, as long as we get things done.”

   “Particles of raw inspiration sleet through the universe all the time. Every once in a while one of them hits a receptive mind, which then invents DNA or the flute sonata form or a way of making light bulbs wear out in half the time. But most of them miss. Most people go through their lives without being hit by even one. Some people are even more unfortunate. They get them all.”

   “The Ogg grandchildren were encouraged to believe that monsters from the dawn of time dwelt in its depths, since Nanny believed that a bit of thrilling and pointless terror was an essential ingredient of the magic of childhood.”

   “Demons don’t care about the outward shape of things. It’s what you think that matters.”

   “Only in our dreams are we free. The rest of the time we need wages.”

    

2. Something Wicked this Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury – A spooky carnival? Sign me up for this one! I’ve only been to Halloween Horror Nights once. Everyone I know now is too scared. Weirdos. This novel is ALSO inspired by Macbeth, albeit mostly (if not entirely) in its name only. It takes place in the mid-twentieth century, and is a somewhat chilling story about friendship. I kind of wish this had been required reading for my classmates and I in high school!
   Will and Jim, best friends closer than brothers, are on the verge of their fourteenth birthdays when a mysterious carnival comes to town. The townspeople are enchanted by the scents and sights and sounds, but Jim and Will discover something far more sinister at play, particularly at the hands of the carnival ringmaster of sorts, Mr. Dark.
   I was surprised by how much I liked this book! It wasn’t as scary as I thought it would be, but parts of it did keep me on the edge of my seat. I wonder if the film version would scare me. I find the relationships between the boys, and the relationship between Jim and his late-in-life father Charles, to be simply wonderful. It is a positive depiction of love between friends and father-and-son, which I think there is a lack of in most modern pop culture.
   I imagine that’s why so many guys revere Lord of the Rings so much; not that Tolkien’s masterpiece cannot be enjoyed by women, but that the idea of adventure and friendship (without any kind of homoerotic subtext), is so rarely done right. This is the sort of story that should be given to guys, and give them room to TALK ABOUT THEIR FEELINGS. I see so many men discussing how they feel they cannot properly express their feelings without coming off as effeminate or weak. THAT’s what’s weak right there. If only we were all more communicative and empathetic. We’d all be a much more kinder society.
   I’m rambling. Here’s a few good quotes:“Like all boys, they never walked anywhere, but named a goal and lit for it, scissors and elbows. Nobody won. Nobody wanted to win. It was in their friendship they just wanted to run forever, shadow and shadow.”

   “Mr. Dark nodded, pleased. “What’s your name, boy?” Don’t tell him! thought Will, and stopped. Why not? he wondered, why? Jim’s lips hardly twitched. “Simon,” he said. He smiled to show it was a lie. Mr. Dark smiled to show he knew it.”

   “Evil has only the power that we give it. I give you nothing. I take back. Starve. Starve. Starve.”

3. American Psycho, by Bret Easton Ellis – I must have seen this movie at least five times by now. It’s the same story, but it feels so different. Apparently when this book was released, it was so obscene that it was wrapped in bookstores. Censors didn’t want people reading it in public, or chance an unready bystander sampling its horror. I don’t agree with censorship, but at least this time, I totally get it.
   Patrick Bateman is an investment banker in the 1980s, and when he’s not at the office (where nobody appears to do any work), he’s either at the most exclusive men’s clubs, the gym, the most expensive restaurants and dance halls, or slicing and dicing up whomever he pleases from the side of the road. Or is he?
   The movie is far more vague with Bateman’s violence. In the book, you learn about each facet of each murder. Each violent, tortured victim is given a horrific death, and the reader knows every morbid detail.
   I am not easily shocked. This book shocked and disturbed me. One particular scene had me horrified to the point that I wondered what kind of a person could write such a thing (I’ll give you a hint: it involves a rat). Thankfully (but not thankfully) I listened to the book on Audible, and the Audible featured an interview with the writer, Bret Easton Ellis. Ellis details that while he certainly never murdered prostitutes or had homicidal fantasies, when he was at the peak of his career (prior to writing this novel), he was surrounded by the banality of money. The clothes everyone wore, who you knew, which parties you went to, where you lived, all the pabulum, was so all-consuming to him that Ellis felt like he couldn’t escape. In the interview, he instantly felt disarming, you know? Like he ISN’T a serial killer. No offense, but Bateman totally comes off as a serial killer.
   To be sure, Patrick Bateman is just the worst. His constant mentions of who designed his suit, his friend’s suit, the dresses of his girlfriend or whomever he’s drinking with that week, gets so tiresome. Ugh, we get it, you have money. His near encyclopedic knowledge of music is much more explored in the book over the movie, as is his time on the receiving end of Lewis Carruthers’ affections. Those bits make him more interesting. The book features a lunch with his younger brother as well as a lunch with his college girlfriend, both in which Bateman is so painfully cringeworthy that it makes you wonder who he really is. We never really know. All we really know is that this guy HIGHKEY idolizes Donald Trump (who, as memory serves, was THE guy of New York City in the eighties, nineties… and now he’s in the White House. More on that later). Trump is mentioned roughly once a chapter, though he never personally appears in the novel. It’s all about getting in the same room as him, partying with him, going to Trump Tower, seeing him at the same restaurant. Oof. Give it a rest, buddy!
   I am still not sure if I found this novel to be too disturbing to be enjoyable. There were points where I didn’t want to finish it, but I pressed on, because at my core, I did want to see how it ended (even if, again, I know the ending after having seen the movie multiple times). The conclusion is so thought-provoking to me. I know I was thinking about it for several days after finishing it. I also decided to look up the short-lived musical version that lives only in clips on Youtube. It didn’t last long, unfortunately, and it didn’t have the funding to be done right. Still, the finale feels the most real. Maybe that’s a flaw. Either way, I want reservations at Dorsia.

I’m hoping I read closer to my ten-book a month goal this month! I’ve read one, started another, and have two in my back pocket to finish from this month. Hopefully I spend more time reading this month. The year is coming closer and closer to an end, and it seems like each day goes faster. That’s how winter works, you see.