The Book Theif

The Book Thief

*****

"I'm haunted by humans."

"You save someone.  

You kill them."

"It amazes me what humans can do, even when streams are flowing down their faces and they stagger on, coughing and searching, and finding."

The Book Thief is a phenomenal story told from the point of Death himself.  It's sad, happy, warm, cold, black, white, and glorious.  A world so real is wrapped around you in Zusak's warm blanket of words and metaphors, where one girl steals a book from the snow, and from then on the story is unstoppable.  Nazis parade down Heaven Street, a jew writes in a basement, a girl scrapes her knee playing soccer.  A dusty book is slipped from the shelf of the mayor's library, and a bomb explodes.  Death comes, life unfolds.  The Book Thief encompasses the best and the worst of what is human, and tells a story of a young girl experiencing life in one one of the worst times in human history.  One of the best things about Zusak's writing style in The Book Thief was the way he described words as physical objects, and it made his own words that much more tangible.  This book seems to hold everything we know about the world in it's black type.  Life, love, hate, desperation, loss.  It's humanity, and it's waiting in the pages of this eerie, beautiful book.   

The Three Musketeers

The Three Musketeers

By Alexandre Dumas

****1/2

Teaser

Mixing a bit of seventeenth-century French history with a great deal of invention, Alexandre Dumas tells the tale of young D’Artagnan and his musketeer comrades, Porthos, Athos and Aramis. Together they fight to foil the schemes of the brilliant, dangerous Cardinal Richelieu, who pretends to support the king while plotting to advance his ownpower. Bursting with swirling swordplay, swooning romance, and unforgettable figures such as the seductively beautiful but deadly femme fatale, Milady, and D’Artagnan’s equally beautiful love, Madame Bonacieux, The Three Musketeers continues, after a century and a half of continuous publication, to define the genre of swashbuckling romance and historical adventure.
Barbara T. Cooper is Professor of French at the University of New Hampshire. She is a member of the editorial boards of Nineteenth-Century French Studies and the Cahiers Alexandre Dumas and specializes in nineteenth-century French drama and works by Dumas.

Review

I enjoyed this book, mostly because of the lofty feeling Dumas' style creates. Alexandre Dumas has a very wholesome writing style, and it keeps the story satisfactory to read throughout the over 700 pages. The plot itself isn't the only thing that pulls you into the world of swords, wine, and musketeers; Dumas' writing style and the extremely interesting and lovable characters make the book intriguing when the plot is slow. D'Artagnan, the protagonist, is very bold and entertaining and the other characters teach him lessons in humility. The many different components of the Three Musketeers make it a clever story with many wise lessons embedded in Dumas' world of bravery and friendship.

Pretties

Pretties

By Scott Westerfield

Science Fiction, Romance, Adventure.

***

Review

Over all this was a generally good book, though I think it is my least favorite in the series because Tally is a pretty, and that really changes how you perceive the book and story line. What I did like was the insight into New Pretty Town that you never got before, and how the book did have entire different mood. Scott Westerfeld shines in leaving you breathless and waiting for more, and he really makes you think about how life would be under rule of our physical appearances. Over all, it was a good sequel, and it really left me waiting for more action.