The Whale Rider

The Whale Rider

Witi Ihimaera

My first introduction to this book was actually by watching the movie of the same title. The movie makes me weep, where no other movie has. The book is also deeply moving, and it shows that the film-makers were paying attention to what they had adapted.

Set in modern day, the book centers around a young Maori girl, the latest in an unbroken line of chiefs, until this point, all male. The girl's great-grandfather resents her, and spurns her fierce love for him, searching instead for a boy to impart his wisdom to. The book culminates in a whale stranding, actually, two whale strandings, one mundane and another otherworldly. The second is a memory-whale, an ancestral being, a creature of spirit and being who comes to shore to reconnect with the memory of an ancient friend, the girl's chieftain ancestor.

The story is told from the perspective of the girl's uncle, member of a mostly harmless local biker gang (the girl actually becomes something of their mascot, though the movie leaves out the bikers entirely). Through the uncle's eyes, we see the signs and omens that the grandfather ignores out of stubbornness. We also travel with the girl's uncle to Australia and Papua New Guinea, where we gain insight into the prejudice that builds walls between indigenous populations and the descendants of settlers. In both the book and the movie, the great-grandmother is a powerhouse, a woman larger than life who constantly threatens to divorce her husband (and you really can't blame her).

The movie mostly keeps faithful to the book, though the great-grandfather plays a much larger role in the movie, the themes are held true. It's an enchanting story, exploring the mythologies and mindset of a culture all but cast aside in the tide of western expansion. You grow to love all the characters in this book, and it's an excellent read.

-Very Tasty.

The Wolving Time

The Wolving Time

Patrick Jennings

I am not embarrassed to say that I'm reviewing another children's book, because sometimes you find little gems like this book. As I'm a sucker for all things werewolf, I snapped this one up right quick. The proprietor of my local bookstore is beginning to sense a theme, as this is not the first werewolf story she's seen me with.

The story itself centers around a shepherd boy, living in France in the late 1500's. His mother and father are both werewolves, though he himself has not reached the age where he will decide whether he wants to live as a werewolf or not. He strikes up an unlikely friendship with a runaway, the servant girl of the local priest. The priest is a cruel man, imprisoning innocent people, forcing them to confess to crimes of witchcraft and pacts with the devil before burning them at the stake in the town square. The boy learns that his family is beset by rumors that they too, are witches. Things come to a head and they must flee the village, though friends are reunited and safety seems all but assured just over the mountains.

What most impressed me about this book was the depth of research the author has done. One is introduced to aspects of life as a sixteenth century shepherd without having facts thrown at you. Jennings also gives a good insight into the mindset of the time, the insular view of the villagers, the institution of the church as a tool of fear and control.

Though better logic tells me that salvation cannot be around the corner for this family, I want them to win. You feel for the characters, and the book leaves you hopeful. It is a children's book, but it's a story about so many things, family, friendship, trust, and growing up.

-A Tasty Little Bite

Beasts

Beasts
John Crowley

I opened this battered little book expecting to find a romance with a sci-fi/fantasy twist. At least, that's the impression given from reading the blurb on the back, or taking a look at the cover. I was pleasantly surprised to find this was not the case at all.

The story takes place in a vaguely defined near future, in a United States held very loosely together after a civil war fractured the country. We jump from character to character, seemingly without rhyme or reason, until we reach the point where all of these people (and what a varied term 'people' becomes in this book) rally around the main character, Painter.

Painter is a leo, one of a race of genetically engineered hybrids of man and lion, who finds himself at the center of a political movement he wants no part in. Renyard, a one of a kind fox-hybrid, is a political councilor as crafty and cunning as either fox or man could ever dream to be. Sten, the boy who would be America's king, finds a cause in aiding Painter. The cast of characters is even more varied and supprising than I've room for here.

My only complaint about this novel is that the landscape is too ill-defined. At times, I felt a little lost, when even a simple map would have clarified much. I'm left puzzling over the political landscape when I could be considering the plot or the amazing cast of characters. However, I did enjoy this book quite a bit, and couldn't put it down.

-Surprisingly quite tasty

Frostbite

Frostbite
David Welllington

I'd actually seen this one at the bookstore and avoided it for some time. Something about the cover, something about the addition of "a werewolf tale" after the title, which I felt unnecessary, something about the synopsis on the back, a combination of the three made me shy away. I know I can be picky, but it made it seem like your typical scary "there's a werewolf out to get me" kinda novel. Eventually I relented and bought the book, and I have not regretted it.

The author introduces us into the present, leaving us wondering about the past, before that is introduced in part two. This leaves you wondering about the motives, not of the monster, but the woman alone in the woods, which was interesting. Why did she come to be alone in the woods? What is she doing here? The author hints, but never reveals until things start to fall apart for the characters. It soon becomes apparent that everyone is not what they seem. The lines between the good guys and bad guys blurs. The humans become monstrous and the monsters humanized.

Towards the end, the main character still has unresolved problems, but I was left very satisfied. I even came close to having the warm and fuzzies over the ending. This book finishes off leaving me feeling hopeful for the characters. I really enjoyed reading this book and I've already handed it off to a friend, after I demanded that he read it.

-Pretty darn tasty.

Isle of Woman

Isle of Woman

Piers Anthony

This book's colorful cover caught my eye, crammed onto the shelf at the used bookstore. Since it was about prehistory, I took it home. For some reason, I've been on a pre-history kick for a long while. Give me anything to do with the ice age and I'll give it a shot.

The concept explored by this book seemed pretty interesting. Following a few individuals reborn throughout mankind's history, through it's varied cultures and time itself. We gain insight into our past; alongside these people we make discoveries pivotal to our way of life, explore unpeopled lands, watch pivotal historical events as they unfold.

However, Isle of Woman does not deliver as well as it has promised. The first problem (though only a minor annoyance, really), is the recycling of names throughout the book. It is understood that the author is trying to make it clear that these are the same souls born again, but it can be hard to keep track of where we are and who we are reading about when we read about a completely different Blaze and Bunny and Ember and Scortch just a chapter ago.

The second problem is that the book preaches, just a little. We get a little warning each time, about how mankind has treated the environment. Now, perhaps for me, this is a case of preaching to the chior. I've done the research, my eyes are open, I am aware of the fact that we must change our course, so perhaps thats why I do not like the way in which this book holds my hand and hints at me that we killed the mammoths and the megafauna of Australia, how our moving to cities set in motion a chain of events that has altered climate, etc. I'ts ok, I can read through a little hand-holding.

However, upon reaching the final chapter, which is set in the not-too-distant future, I nearly put the book down for good. We find mankind reduced, after ecological catastrophy on the global scale, to subsisting on farmed algae and ranched roaches. Maybe that's ok too; I love a good post-apocalyptic tale, and oh, what a relief, our two lost lovers, separated at the dawn of time finally reunite. It was like watching two people run into eachother at the shopping mall. "I missed you in the parking lot!" "You weren't in the foodcourt!"

For an idea that had so much potential, this book was very dissapointing.

-Looked better on the menu

Contact

Contact
Carl Sagan

I've always wanted to read this one since seeing the movie, so when I saw it at my local used book store, I picked it up. It ended up being the edition with the movie cover (I try to use the same picture on the blog as the edition I read), which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I don't think it's ideal.

If you've seen the movie, you should consider giving the book a try. However, don't expect it to be the movie. The two, while basically following a similar plot, have little in common. There are a few reasons for this, brevity, for the movie's sake (we cannot go in depth into the main character's childhood in a movie with certain time constraints). Also, the political climate of the time changed between the writing of the book and the production of the movie. In the book, the soviet union has a big effect on the landscape.

Because of the movie, I actually had a difficult time reading this book. Every time I read dialogue with the main character, I hear Jodie Foster. The book did not exactly keep me up late into the night reading, though it did keep me reading at a steady pace. There were parts where the story was suspenseful, though at other times, it dragged on. I can only tolerate so much political back-and-forth.

A far as sci-fi goes, this is a very plausible story. This could all take place tomorrow, and I liked that about this book. It made it more real, you could dive right into it because its all there, ready to be grasped and taken in stride.

All in all, I'm very glad I finally did read this book. It explored themes that the movie could never delve into. Where the movie is a good drama, the book is a treatise on what it means to be human in a universe so vast as to be effectively incomprehensible. It was an excellent read.

-Very tasty

The Year of the Whale

The Year of the Whale
Victor B. Scheffer

This is another used bookstore find. The simplicity of the cover is what attracted me to this one. The silhouette of a whale set against the background of constellations is actually a repeated theme throughout the book. Each chapter (there are twelve, one for each month of the year) is begun with such an illustration.

The book follows the first year of life of a sperm whale calf, born in September. We learn of little calf's adventures and explorations in a world few have actually glimpsed and no human has truly experienced.

Interspersed throughout each chapter are interesting scientific tidbits, historical anecdotes, and information on the whaling industry, which, at the time of the writing of the book, was an actual industry. The Year of the Whale does show its age. Certain scientific studies were still experimenting with what we know today to be fact. The author sometimes poses questions to the reader that have now been answered. Truth be told, it is a bit chilling to read about the whaling industry and its factory ships and explosive harpoons. I am glad that some of the author's dire predictions of hunting to extinction have not come to pass (though we are still too much too careless).

All in all, this was a good read. The author gives incredible insight into the life of a mysterious creature. I cannot imagine the amount of research it took to write this, then the imagination it took to fill in the gaps. While more up-to-date books on the subject have been since written, this book is still a good story.

-Kinda Chewy