As you can imagine if you've read the other titles in this series, Becky Bloomwood is going to shop her heart out while pregnant so that her future baby can have just as many shoes and clothes as its mother. Meanwhile, her job as a personal shopper is on the rocks because of a lack of customers, and her decision to hire a celebrity obstetrician turns out to be one of the worst mistakes she's made yet.
This was fun, though not quite as hilarious as previous efforts in the series. It's worth reading just to find out what Becky's up to now, but I hope that future books by this author will be back to her previous standard of readable comedic fluff.
Thursday, April 12, 2007
The Mauritius Command by Patrick O'Brian
I hate to say it, but this book was disappointing! I think it's because it was closely based on an actual campaign, when the British decided to take the islands of La Reunion and Mauritius off the French in 1810. It seems that French ships were plucking valuable British navy ships and Indiamen out of the ocean, and the Royal Navy wasn't interested in putting up with this any longer.
Anyway, the action in this book was somewhat confusing, but not in a readable sort of way. There were too many ships, too many captains and other assorted secondary characters, too much action happening on land and not enough in the water.
I'm hoping the next novel in the series is more interesting. I think it's about Aubrey taking a ship to the Galapagos. Whee!
Anyway, the action in this book was somewhat confusing, but not in a readable sort of way. There were too many ships, too many captains and other assorted secondary characters, too much action happening on land and not enough in the water.
I'm hoping the next novel in the series is more interesting. I think it's about Aubrey taking a ship to the Galapagos. Whee!
Monday, April 02, 2007
Three books by Gordon Korman
Blogger won't let me put all the titles into the post title, so here they are:
No Coins, Please
Who is Bugs Potter?
Bugs Potter Live at Nickaninny
Back when I read The War With Mr Wizzle, I commented that I frequently re-read the three Gordon Korman novels listed above. And for whatever reason, yesterday when I woke up it felt like the day to re-read them. I managed to actually find them on my daughter's chaotic bookshelves and settled down for a day of fluff and laughter. I don't know if I find these books funny simply because I am so fond of them and have read them so many times over the years, or whether an adult who approaches these books for the first time would enjoy them, but I do genuinely laugh out loud each time I read them.
No Coins Please has got to be my favourite Korman book. It's a goofy story about two guys from Montreal who get the bright idea of being counsellors for a travelling summer camp program to earn some money. Instead of staying home and painting houses, they get to escort six eleven year olds all over the United States visiting major tourist attractions. Unfortunately for Dennis and Rob (our heroes), they get stuck with Artie Geller, a boy who has a genius for illegal money making schemes. While they frantically deal with his disappearances in every major city they visit, he is busy racking up hundreds of thousands of dollars which he keeps in the briefcase he carries everywhere he goes.
Who is Bugs Potter is the comical tale of a rock music-obsessed teen drummer who is chosen to participate in a high school band festival in Toronto. By day he takes part in rehearsals and tries to get out of the many "boring" trips to museums, symphonies and lectures; by night he puts on a fake moustache and sneaks out of the hotel to attend the concerts of a number of bands with ridiculous names (all of which are his favourites). Each night he gets a chance to jam with the band and, unknown to him or any of the other band festival participants, his fame is steadily growing. Bugs is hilariously dim and his long-suffering roommate, a flautist from Boston, is a great counterpoint.
Bugs Potter Live at Nickaninny is the sequel to Who is Bugs Potter. Where the first book answered the question of what would happen to Bugs if you put him in his natural element, the second takes him out of it. Bugs's family decides to take a camping trip to a lake in the middle of nowhere, someplace in northern Ontario. Deprived of his concerts and drum set, and told to work on a makeup science assignment during the summer, Bugs manages to surround himself with music, an assortment of new "pals" and, bizarrely, anthropologists from all over North America who are drawn to the remote lake by the promise of a huge discovery.
Any of these books makes a great light read for those days when I'm kind of brain-dead. My 11 year old likes them too and would also recommend I Want to Go Home, a Korman book about a guy who does absolutely everything he can think of to get away from his horrible summer camp.
No Coins, Please
Who is Bugs Potter?
Bugs Potter Live at Nickaninny
Back when I read The War With Mr Wizzle, I commented that I frequently re-read the three Gordon Korman novels listed above. And for whatever reason, yesterday when I woke up it felt like the day to re-read them. I managed to actually find them on my daughter's chaotic bookshelves and settled down for a day of fluff and laughter. I don't know if I find these books funny simply because I am so fond of them and have read them so many times over the years, or whether an adult who approaches these books for the first time would enjoy them, but I do genuinely laugh out loud each time I read them.
No Coins Please has got to be my favourite Korman book. It's a goofy story about two guys from Montreal who get the bright idea of being counsellors for a travelling summer camp program to earn some money. Instead of staying home and painting houses, they get to escort six eleven year olds all over the United States visiting major tourist attractions. Unfortunately for Dennis and Rob (our heroes), they get stuck with Artie Geller, a boy who has a genius for illegal money making schemes. While they frantically deal with his disappearances in every major city they visit, he is busy racking up hundreds of thousands of dollars which he keeps in the briefcase he carries everywhere he goes.
Who is Bugs Potter is the comical tale of a rock music-obsessed teen drummer who is chosen to participate in a high school band festival in Toronto. By day he takes part in rehearsals and tries to get out of the many "boring" trips to museums, symphonies and lectures; by night he puts on a fake moustache and sneaks out of the hotel to attend the concerts of a number of bands with ridiculous names (all of which are his favourites). Each night he gets a chance to jam with the band and, unknown to him or any of the other band festival participants, his fame is steadily growing. Bugs is hilariously dim and his long-suffering roommate, a flautist from Boston, is a great counterpoint.
Bugs Potter Live at Nickaninny is the sequel to Who is Bugs Potter. Where the first book answered the question of what would happen to Bugs if you put him in his natural element, the second takes him out of it. Bugs's family decides to take a camping trip to a lake in the middle of nowhere, someplace in northern Ontario. Deprived of his concerts and drum set, and told to work on a makeup science assignment during the summer, Bugs manages to surround himself with music, an assortment of new "pals" and, bizarrely, anthropologists from all over North America who are drawn to the remote lake by the promise of a huge discovery.
Any of these books makes a great light read for those days when I'm kind of brain-dead. My 11 year old likes them too and would also recommend I Want to Go Home, a Korman book about a guy who does absolutely everything he can think of to get away from his horrible summer camp.
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
HMS Surprise by Patrick O'Brian
Oh yeah! I'm on a roll here! I'm tearing my way through this great series.
However, before I tell you what I think of this book, I found this fun quiz on one of the many many litblogs I read.
1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 23.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next three sentences in your journal along with these instructions.
So here goes -- the nearest book, of course, being HMS Surprise:
So there you have it, folks - a sample of Patrick O'Brian's knack for the long sentence which is at once replete with incomprehensible naval jargon and still very readable.
That was fun - I think I might do it for future books I write about here.
Anyway, about the book. In this installment, Captain Aubrey finally gets a decent command -- although he doesn't see it that way. He is asked to take an ambassador to China, an extremely long and treacherous sea-voyage which has little possibility of taking home the prize that he needs to help clear his massive debt so he can marry his sweetheart. Meanwhile, Dr Maturin continues to pine for a woman who's no good for him, but manages to distract himself with the local wildlife wherever he goes (and I really do mean wildlife - this guy is crazy for animals, insects, plants, you name it). He manages to acquire two odd pets before the journey is over, and they go over a little better than the bees he installed in the Captain's cabin on the last voyage.
I love these guys! I want to take Dr Maturin home and clean him up and feed him. All he needs to do is play his cello for me and I'll consider it a fair exchange.
However, before I tell you what I think of this book, I found this fun quiz on one of the many many litblogs I read.
1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 23.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next three sentences in your journal along with these instructions.
So here goes -- the nearest book, of course, being HMS Surprise:
"Hands wear ship," said the lieutenant of the watch, more from form than anything else, for not only did the Lively have a crew that had worked together for years, but also she had carried out this manoeuvre several hundred times in this very stretch of water and the order was scarcely needed. Routine had taken the edge off the Livelies' zeal, but nevertheless the boatswain had to call out "Handsomely, handsomely, now, with that bleeding sheet"; for the crew had been brought to such a pitch of silent efficiency that the frigate ran the risk of darting her jib-boom over the taffrail of the Melpomene, her next ahead, whose talents and sailing qualities could not have recommended her anywhere.
However, round they went in succession, each wearing in the spot where her leader had turned; they hauled their wind and re-formed their rigid line, heading for Giens once more, Naiad, Melpomene, Lively.
So there you have it, folks - a sample of Patrick O'Brian's knack for the long sentence which is at once replete with incomprehensible naval jargon and still very readable.
That was fun - I think I might do it for future books I write about here.
Anyway, about the book. In this installment, Captain Aubrey finally gets a decent command -- although he doesn't see it that way. He is asked to take an ambassador to China, an extremely long and treacherous sea-voyage which has little possibility of taking home the prize that he needs to help clear his massive debt so he can marry his sweetheart. Meanwhile, Dr Maturin continues to pine for a woman who's no good for him, but manages to distract himself with the local wildlife wherever he goes (and I really do mean wildlife - this guy is crazy for animals, insects, plants, you name it). He manages to acquire two odd pets before the journey is over, and they go over a little better than the bees he installed in the Captain's cabin on the last voyage.
I love these guys! I want to take Dr Maturin home and clean him up and feed him. All he needs to do is play his cello for me and I'll consider it a fair exchange.
Monday, March 26, 2007
Post Captain by Patrick O'Brian
In this sequel to Master and Commander, aside from the obvious promotion of Jack Aubrey to Post Captain (gee, way to pick a title, there!), plenty of other stuff happens to our pals Aubrey and Maturin. They fall in love, fight over a woman, Aubrey is chased by debt collectors, and Maturin begins a potentially promising career as a spy. Who could possibly suspect an eccentric intellectual who forgets to wash his face and has moss growing on his overcoat?
Though the naval jargon continues to be totally incomprehensible in book two, I continue to find the story of Captain Aubrey and Dr Maturin utterly intriguing. There's something compelling about their exciting, romantic, cramped and dirty life on board one of Nelson's navy ships that keeps me reading, even while I continue to have no clue what a xebec is. (I have a feeling that if Hornblower is still reading this blog she will be able to fill me in.)
I was saying to my husband the other day that I feel like the universe has conspired to introduce me to this fabulous genre, naval adventure fiction. In spite of having many other interesting books on my shelf at the moment, I am gobbling up the Aubrey-Maturin series; and when I found myself without an Aubrey-Maturin book one day last week, I picked up the first book in the Horatio Hornblower series from the library at my university. So now you can consider yourself warned.
Though the naval jargon continues to be totally incomprehensible in book two, I continue to find the story of Captain Aubrey and Dr Maturin utterly intriguing. There's something compelling about their exciting, romantic, cramped and dirty life on board one of Nelson's navy ships that keeps me reading, even while I continue to have no clue what a xebec is. (I have a feeling that if Hornblower is still reading this blog she will be able to fill me in.)
I was saying to my husband the other day that I feel like the universe has conspired to introduce me to this fabulous genre, naval adventure fiction. In spite of having many other interesting books on my shelf at the moment, I am gobbling up the Aubrey-Maturin series; and when I found myself without an Aubrey-Maturin book one day last week, I picked up the first book in the Horatio Hornblower series from the library at my university. So now you can consider yourself warned.
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