woodge blog

books, movies, pix, living in Sweden, random observations

Tavi goes to the dogs

Ca5_princepsfury_hc

 

Princeps' Fury (Codex Alera, Book 5) ~ Jim Butcher
Paperback: 640 pages ISBN-13: 978-0441017966
 
In book five of the six book series, Tavi travels to Canea, Gaius Sextus sends Bernard and Amara on a dangerous mission deep in vord territory, and Isana is up north on an impossible peace mission. Once this book gets going it's tough to put down. There's a surprising finish but at the same time this book lays a lot of groundwork for the big finish. I'm reading book six right now. Love this series.
[amazon] [started 24 dec 2011, finished 21 jan 2012]

interesting word usements and idiomatic provenances

Etymologicon_400

 

The Etymologicon ~ Mark Forsyth
Hardcover: 288 pages ISBN-10: 1848313071 ISBN-13: 978-1848313071
 
The subtitle sums it up pretty nicely: A Circular Stroll Through the Hidden Connections of the English Language. Forsyth, the man behind the blog Inky Fool, is obsessed with where words come from and with wit takes you on a roundabout journey through his obsession. I started reading this fully thinking, that I'd pick it up here and there when I needed a break from my current fiction in progress. But I pretty much read this book straight through and enjoyed it very much. The target audience is definitely word nerds, though. One chapter I enjoyed was titled "Concealed Farts." In a nineteenth-century dictionary, the author found this definition for fice:

A small windy escape backwards, more obvious to the nose than ears; frequently by old ladies charged [blamed] on their lap-dogs.


He continues:

And fice itself comes from the Old English fist, which likewise meant fart. In Elizabethan times a smelly dog was called a fisting cur, and by the eighteenth century any little dog was called a feist, and that's where we get the word feisty from. Little dogs are so prone to bark at anything that an uppity girl was called fiesty, straight from the flatulent dogs of yore. This is a point well worth remembering when you're next reading a film review about a 'feisty heroine.'


You can also find some corrections at this link.

[started 25 dec 2011, finished 1 jan 2012] [book depository] [amazon]

zippy retelling of Grimm tales

Ataledarkandgrimm

 

A Tale Dark and Grimm ~ Adam Gidwitz
Paperback: 256 pages ISBN-10: 0142419672 ISBN-13: 978-0142419670
 
This was a book I had planned to read aloud to the kids but when my eldest was starved for reading material, I threw this one his way. He read it in about 3 sittings -- faster than I did anyway. He was delighted by it and recounted many of the fun parts to his younger sister. Any fan of fairy tales will be happy with this one. It manages to combine some of the best of the Grimm tales into one story featuring Hansel and Gretel. The author uses a lot of clever narration, jumping in here and there to address the reader directly, stuff like "Make sure any little kids around aren't listening to this next part." After devouring the first half of the book, my son couldn't wait to tell me that Hansel & Gretel "had their heads cut off!" And my daughter added, "But they put them back on again!" And the author slips in some genuine bits from the source material to educate you a little about the fairy tales. It's told in a breezy, no-nonsense manner that makes for a fast, fun read.
[started 17 dec 2011, finished 23 dec 2011] [amazon]

impossible in many ways

Worldhouserestoration

 

Restoration ~ Guy Adams
Mass Market Paperback: 432 pages ISBN-10: 0857661183 ISBN-13: 978-0857661180
Angry Robot; Original edition (July 26, 2011)
 
This book essentially finishes the story begun in The World House which I read last March. A random selection of people, upon discovering an odd puzzle box and dangerous situations, find themselves trapped in a mysterious house that defies logic, has endless corridors, rooms, and dangers.  In this story they realize that they must somehow re-imprison the Prisoner who was inadvertently loosed in the first book. This Prisoner is evil and has god-like powers. It's not going to be easy. Not everyone will survive. And in this go-round, a train is added to the House. It can be somewhat confusing tracking the various characters and I often lost sight of their motivations and relationships. But I stuck with it and got a better handle on things in the latter half of the book. You might classify this story as fantasy but horror would be a closer fit. Though it combines elements of both. I just wish the plotting had been clearer.

[started 22 Nov 2011, finished 16 Dec 2011] [amazon]

let's ditch those pesky kids

Willoughbys

 

The Willoughbys ~ Lois Lowry
Paperback: 176 pages ISBN-10: 0385737769 ISBN-13: 978-0385737760
 
Some weeks ago I bought four books to read to the kids. This is the second of them. It's a lot shorter than the previous one, we read the whole thing over a span of nine evenings. It's pretty cute and has a nice sense of humor running throughout. It also does some shout-outs to some classics of young adult literature. When it mentioned The Secret Garden, for example, my two kids immediately understood the reference as we'd that one about a month and a half ago. This story is about four kids (of the title) whose parents are awful people who want to get rid of them. It's a bit short on conflict and the story resolves itself very neatly albeit fairly quickly. But what it lacks in plotting it makes up for in sly humor. It wasn't as rabidly received as The Mysterious Benedict Society, but the kids gave this story glowing reviews. [amazon]

four plucky kids

Mysteriousbenedictsociety_b1

 

The Mysterious Benedict Society ~ Trenton Lee Stewart
Paperback: 512 pages ISBN-10: 0316003956 ISBN-13: 978-0316003957
 
I was fishing around for another book to read to the kids and this one had many glowing reviews. They were pretty much hooked from the get-go. In this story four young kids answer an newspaper ad that proclaims "Are you a gifted child looking for special opportunities?" All four are in various circumstances in which they don't have parents around. There are two boys and two girls and they become secret agents for the kindly Mr. Benedict. Both of my kids (Luke, 9, and Kajsa, 7) would beg me to read more when it came time to wish them a good night. Luke begged to read ahead but I refused since this was our chosen read-aloud book. So, over the course of a month, I read from this nearly every night. They loved it. And at certain passages they would laugh aloud. When I finished it the other night they wanted to know if we could get the next in this series. They said we should read all of them. High praise.
[amazon]
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