30 Day Book Challenge: Day Ten

Day Ten: The first novel you remember reading.

Black Beauty by Anna Sewell.

Why the hell did a relative give me a gigantic novel when I was six years old? I have no idea. Honestly, it’s not that big. My version is only 208 pages. But as a small child, the novel looked daunting.

However, I was slightly obsessed with horses when I was a child, and everyone knew this. So I tackled it one day when I was sick of looking at it and wondering what went on inside. It seemed to take forever to read it. I think I took several days.

Of course, as soon as I finished, I immediately re-read it, and went through it quite quickly.

This is not the first book I read by myself – I’d read children’s books and the little Beatrix Potter tiny books, but this was the very first adult novel I read. I received it at the same time I received the Animals of Farthing Wood (see previous post) and this was the lesser of two evils (my version of AOFW was 300 or so pages, so it was also a large book for my tiny six year old hands).
Black Beauty is subtitled The Autobiography of a Horse for a reason – it was the first book told from the 1st person point of view of an animal. Even with my own writing, I find I infinity prefer writing 1st person to 3rd person. This book solidified my love affair with animals, and horses in particular. It taught me all about animals cruelty and the ignorance of men.

It’s a simple book. It follows the life of Black Beauty from foal to retired stallion (actually I’m not sure if he’s a gelding, because although he never fathers another horse in the book, someone wrote a bunch of sequels about his offspring). Black Beauty is a beautiful, good-natured, hard-working, loyal horse and unfortunately, he gets handed around a bit after his initial owners have to leave England for warmer weather. He goes through good owners and bad owners. My favourite section is probably when his friend Ginger, an ill-tempered, abused chestnut mare, rebels against the bearing rein (which is a cruel invention!), and also probably when Beauty is a London cab horse.

The chapters are short and to the point. Sewell was certainly writing a book to educate, and each chapter has a lesson to learn at the end, often a moral one. The short chapters make it approachable for children, and a quick read for adults. My own copy travels everywhere with me – it’s always in my carry-on luggage when I fly. I simply adore it.

When You Give Up Something You Love

I’m rewriting some third person point of view chapters into first person for Darkwalker.

I’ve come across my first omniscient “little did he know” type sentence.

Stranger Than Fiction

I can’t fix it in the suitable point of view. Exactly halfway into the book, I give the first hint at the ending, and unfortunately, I have to let it go.

I’m quite sad to see it disappear into nothing. It’s one of my favourite sentences, but it just doesn’t fit no matter how much I tweak it.

It’s also a spoiler, so I can’t post it here. But be guaranteed that it’s the first problem I’ve come across turning my high fantasy from sometimes-third-person-POV to completely-first-person-POV.

30 Day Book Challenge: Day Nine

Day Nine: A book you’ve read more than once.

The Animals of Farthing Wood by Colin Dann.

There are SO MANY books that I’ve read more than once. Almost everything on my bookshelf, I have read more than once. But if I had to pick only ONE book to talk about, it would be this one. My personal version is so well-loved that its cover is filled with creases.

Why?

Because it’s simply wonderful. It’s a children’s chapter book, but like the Harry Potter series, can also be equally enjoyed by adults. It’s the tale of a group of animals whose home – Farthing Wood – is being redeveloped. Helpless to stop their home being destroyed for the good and greed of mankind, the animals decide to set off together for a nature reserve known as White Deer Park, led by Toad, who’s passed the park on his way returning home after being captured.

The animals are a mix of predators and prey, carnivores, herbivores, and omnivores. They make a pact of Mutual Protection, which means they can’t eat each other, basically, and set off, led by Fox and his right-hand man, Badger.

This book made me fall in love with British wildlife and foxes in particular. Being Tasmanian, I find foxes ever so exotic. Odd that I grew up in the only place in the world, bar Antarctica, where foxes do not live. Perhaps that contributed to my obsession. or perhaps it was the brave Fox of this book and his Vixen who helped me love this creature more than any other.

This is a book of my childhood, and I think it is important for children to read it to get an understanding and a respect for wildlife. As a child with a limited book supply, I’d re-read it every couple of months. I just loved it. Now that my bookshelf has expanded, I haven’t read it in some years. I recently got my hands on the complete series, so I will be devouring them soon.

30 Day Book Challenge: Day Eight

Day Eight: An unpopular book you believe should be a best-seller

The Summer Witch by Louise Cooper

Louise Cooper had this uncanny ability to really delve into what it must be like to be insane. It’s like a study of Medieval madness. It leaves me spellbound.

No other author I’ve read can make the most boring or innocuous of scenes (like a stuffy Council meeting) seem riveting and interesting.

The Summer Witch is a beautiful piece of work because everything starts off harmlessly enough, and then Carys (the protagonist) gets in over her head and everything falls completely apart.

But it’s like a frog in hot water – he’ll jump right out if it’s boiling, but slowly heat it and you can easily cook him. That’s what the story is like. Things happen almost innocently, and harmlessly, but they all build up into a dramatic crescendo of madness and magic.

Carys’ greedy father sells her to an old widower, and although she’s a virgin she doesn’t want to stay that way. While her new husband never makes a move on her, she develops a game of make-believe with a scarecrow in a field. She is then granted magical help by mysterious gypsy-folk, and her imaginary lover becomes real. She also gains some magic power of her own, as her new love Robin teaches her the ways of the wild and magic.

Eventually, Carys gets too far over her head, and she’s unable to cope with everything. And also, Robin is awesome. I can’t say more or I might spoil it.

I first read The Summer Witch when I was a teenager, and I’ve been looking for my own version for years. I finally got my hands on one in 2010, but unfortunately, Louise Cooper died of a brain aneurysm in 2009.

Her death is a great loss, because she is my absolute favourite author in the whole world, and she’s not really very well known. She weaves a story perfectly, and The Summer Witch is my favourite of her stand-alone novels.

30 Day Book Challenge: Day Seven

Day Seven: A book that’s hard to read.

American Gods by Neil Gaiman (author’s preferred text).

It’s taken me two months to finally give up on this book.
This book is in fact so hard to read, for me, that I’ve shelved it 385 pages into 640.

I’ve decided to shelve it and maybe wait a few years to see if I actually do care enough to find out what happens next (like China Melveille’s Perdido Street Station, which I shelved a mere 20 pages or so from the ending).

Gaiman surely is a talented writer. I’m not criticising him. I admire and respect his imagination and his brain, and his writing is easy to read.

What I don’t like about American Gods is the emotional detachment of the main characters, and that no matter how hard I try, I simply can’t care about any of the characters, or their mission, or the ‘impending storm’ we’re occasionally reminded about.

I also find an alarming lack of detail in some scenes (so many that I can’t even pull and example – it’s completely scattered), and some overwhelmingly detailed descriptions of things I really don’t care about (such as Shadow’s coin tricks – a coin trick is a visual medium, and having to read about them I more often than not skipped over them completely. I haven’t yet found a reason for them being part of the plot).

It’s an interesting premise, but I simply can’t connect to a character that I only figured out wasn’t white 200 pages in. There is a lot of text (600+ pages) but not enough description to make me care. Shadow doesn’t ask questions, and sure I can figure out what’s going on, but I’ve still got a whole bunch of questions such as WHY is this mission so damned important, anyway? And Shadow’s not an inspiring character: he drifts around and does exactly as he’s told, developing an unnaturally strong loyal attachment to a man that doesn’t seem to care about him.

However, I did enjoy all the little short stories between the actual chapters of the book. Gaiman clearly loves this book and did a lot of research for it, which I appreciate. But I haven’t done the same research, and it’s too mysterious exactly who the characters are all the time. I’m reading to be entertained and educated, and I don’t want to go off and educate myself on the minor and uninteresting characters we come across.

BTW I read Stardust, and absolutely loved it. So I’m not Gaiman-bashing: I adore the man. I don’t like this one book.