Well crap. I created this to publish on Saturday, and then forgot about it.

Better late than never I suppose.

2005 Banned Books Top Ten
1. THE DAILY SHOW WITH JON STEWART PRESENTS AMERICA (THE BOOK): A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction, by Jon Stewart and the writers of The Daily Show
2. A WRINKLE IN TIME, by Madeleine L’Engle
3. IN THE NIGHT KITCHEN, by Maurice Sendak
4. KING & KING, by Linda De Haan and Stern Nijland
5. 1984, by George Orwell
6. THE HANDMAID’S TALE: A Novel, by Margaret Atwood
7. BLESS ME, ULTIMA, by Rudolfo Anaya
8. THE PERKS OF BEING A WALLFLOWER, by Stephen Chbosky
9. THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN, by Mark Twain
10. WHAT MY MOTHER DOESN’T KNOW, by Sonya Sones

Banned Books Week at the ALA

The Sandman Vol 6: Fables & Reflections (1993) Neil Gaiman

This may be my favorite Sandman collection. There are several different tales told, some in the past, some in the far past, and all excellent.

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Death: The Time of Your Life (1997) Neil Gaiman

This may be one of favorite Neil Gaiman graphic novels.

Foxglove is on tour and Hazel is home with Alvie, the child she was pregnant with in The High Cost of Living. Foxglove is falling apart at the seems, and Hazel has made a deal whose time is up.

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Death: The High Cost of Living (1994) Neil Gaiman

It’s hardly a surprise that Neil Gaiman would write a comic about Death. In Sandman she was usually far more likable than her brother, Dream, the hero of the series.

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The Sandman Vol 5: A Game of You (1992) Neil Gaiman

Barbie, who we first met in The Doll’s House, has moved to New York City after her break-up with Ken. She hasn’t dreamed for two years, when she was pulled into the dream vortex created by Rose Walker, but Barbie’s Dreamworld is not content to remain lost.

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The Sandman Vol 4: Season of Mists (1991) Neil Gaiman

Season of MistsSeason of Mists is the story of Dream’s journey to Hell to free Nada, after he is confronted by the fact that he unjustly sent her there ten thousand years before. All the stories in Seasons of Mists are part of a single tale, of Dream’s trip to Hell, and the aftermath of that trip.

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The Sandman Vol 3: Dream Country (1990) Neil Gaiman

Dream Country is the third book in the Sandman series. In this collection of short stories, Dream is peripheral character for the most part, though in “Facade” Death appears instead.

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The Sandman Vol 2: The Doll’s House (1990) Neil Gaiman

There is a vortex in the Dreaming, that Dream must control before it destroys the Dreaming. He must also find four of the major arcana that have wandered from the Dreaming: Brute and Glob, the Corinthian, and Fiddler’s Green. Meanwhile, Rose Walker searches for her younger brother, and discovered that she has a before unknown grandmother–Unity Kinkaid.

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Today’s word of the day is perfect.

execrable \EK-si-kruh-bul\ adjective
1 : deserving to be execrated : detestable
*2 : very bad : wretched

It perfectly describes last night’s movie. Though really, I think wretched fits better. As in, “yesterday evening we watched Alexander and it was wretched.”

How on earth did they manage to make a movie about Alexander the Great so bad? Especially when the acting was so good? But, no. I was bored even through the bashing with swords bits. The scenes between Alexander and Hephaistion were nice, as were the dancing girls, but beyond that?

The jumps in time really were execrable, interrupting the flow of the story, time and again. If I had to point to the single biggest problem I had with the movie, that would be it.

The accents were confusing–if they were from the same region, why did they have different accents? As he traveled, encountering different accents made sense, but why would a group of people living in Macedonia–especially a group of children who grew up together–have different accents? It just made it even harder to keep track of who was who, which was already a next-to-impossible job.

And his eyebrows. I couldn’t stop staring at his eyebrows. They were so brown. And his hair was so blonde. My disbelief kept jumping up and saying, “that’s just odd looking. Why wouldn’t they have been bleached in the sun like his hair?”

I just don’t get it. I LOVE history. And a movie where the guys run around scantily clad the whole time should have plenty of redeeming qualities. But no. I just kept asking, “is it over yet?”

So, bah. Hopefully the rest of the movies we rented will be better.

So.

As you have undoubtedly noticed, in addition to Random (but not really) I keep a book blog where I post reviews of the books I read.

Mostly because it allows me to keep track of how many books I’m reading.

But that’s not the point.

The question is this: I’ve started out just writing about the books I’ve read, and talking about whether I liked them or not. And I frequently conceed that just because I hate something doens’t mean that someone else won’t like it. So in light of that philosophy, and in light of some of the book review sites I’ve been perusing, when I review a book, should I give it a score or a grade based upon how much I liked it, or should I leave things the way they are?

I can see advantages and disadvantages of both ways. Sometimes I may not be completely clear about how much I like or dislike a book, and so a grade or score may make that more clear. But on the other hand, I don’t want to discourange people from reading a book just because I disliked it, and so if I gave a book an F might someone consider that more than the points I made about why I disliked the book?

I dunno.

So please share your opinion on the subject. And if you have no opinion about this subject, feel free to share an opinion on another subject.

The Sandman Vol 1: Preludes and Nocturnes (1989) Neil Gaiman

The first volume in the Sandman series, Preludes and Nocturnes tells of Dreams capture by Roderick Burgess, his eventual escape, and his recovery of his bag of sand, his mask, and his ruby.

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Thanks to Tom I was alerted to the existence of “Serenity” the comic books.

So yesterday I made my first purchase of a comic book. I’ve previously picked up a series that had been bound into a graphic novel, but this is an honest to God comic book and Michael made me write the check. However, Gary only had 1 and 3, so I’m waiting for 2. But Michael gets to read them first, to let me know whether they’re cliffhangers or if I can go ahread and read them.

Shiny!

The Wild Wood (1994) Charles de Lint

Eithnie feels like she has lost something in her paintings, and is wandering the woods near her home searching for the soul that used fill her paintings.

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The Mark of Zorro (1919) Johnston McCulley

I had a Zorro book as a kid. I have no idea where it came from–I’m sure my mom didn’t buy it for me. It may have been left at the house by the previous occupants, like the James Bond books I eventually read and loved.

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