E-readers: aye or nay?

I have had a mental block against e-readers pretty much ever since I found out they exist. My reasons are as follows:

• I love the feel of a book.
• I am worried that if I have an e-reader loaded with 1000 books, my attention span will reduce, meaning that I will vacillate between books rather than commit myself to reading one at a time.
• I like having a house filled with books. I also enjoy having little piles of books around the house; my 'to read' pile, my 'to return to the library' pile.
• You can't borrow books other people have downloaded, or lend other people books that you have downloaded. I enjoy lending other people books, and enjoy borrowing books even more. My sister has a Kindle and recently downloaded a book I want to read. That doesn't help me read it, so I am instead (im)patiently waiting for it to be free at the library.
• I am worried about what e-readers will do to the book industry. I love a good bookshop and there are some excellent ones in Wellington - specifically Marsden Books and Unity Books.
• I like the idea of Amotai seeing me reading books. Not looking at yet another screen.
• I have heard that some conversions from paperback to e-reader have been riddled with mistakes, and in some cases, altered Tolstoy.

Amotai enjoys the classics

BUT, I can see some plus sides to having them. Namely:

• They are easy to carry around. No more having to carry an extra bag to work to allow me to take a tome with me for lunchtime perusal.
• I could download every single Agatha Christie. Awesome.
• You can theoretically read books like Fifty Shades of Grey on the bus and no-one would know that you were reading something rude. Or you could read Salman Rushdie in Iran.  Or enjoy the new Lee Child while in the company of pretentious literati. It would be your little secret, much like listening to the Britney Megamix on your i-pod.
• It is much cheaper than new books.
• I do have far too many books. My sister's boyfriend just returned 7 (!) to me that I had totally forgotten having had lent him. Books are a pain to move.  Even with my current attempts to buy fewer books I still end up going to enough book fairs or being impatient with waiting for library books I still probably end up averaging a new one a month.
• Amotai won't rip an e-reader.
• The NZ book industry is pretty dire anyway, and sometimes I wonder if the Whitcoulls chain as a bookseller does not deserve to be saved. Their business model is terrible, and the owners seem to think that having 50 of one book in a pile is better than having 2 copies of 25 different books. The shops have minimal variety, and don't seem to stock books at all until they have hit a certain level of popularity. I tried to buy the Hunger Games there last July, the staff had never heard of it. Now there are about 100 copies in store, but it's too late - I got it from the Book Depository months before it was stocked.

So, I am still undecided, but think I will hold off getting one for the meantime. To be honest, I've never really been an earlier adapter to any new technology, so am in no hurry to fix something that's not broken. I am interested in your views though ...

Shanghai from the books

It's always strange to travel to somewhere I have read a lot about in fiction, especially when the books I'd read were set in the past. On one hand the place is alive in my mind, but on the other hand it doesn't exist anymore, not as I imagined it anyway. When I eventually make it to Russia I expect to be a little surprised by Moscow and St Petersburg, as I've read so many books set there in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. I know on a rational level that Stalin and even the USSR are long gone (which is a good thing), but thanks to the Bronze Horseman Trilogy, Child 44, and Kate Furnivall's books to name a few, the Moscow and St Petersburg in my mind feature the Stalinist system rather than the Putin-sexy-spies-Russian Mafia one.

The Pearl Tower - clearly not around in the 1930s

This was the case with Shanghai, as the only times I had read about Shanghai the book was set in the 1920s and 1930s. For example, Ishiguro's fabulous When We Were Orphans, and in Belinda Alexander's White Gardenia. I knew on a rational level that Shanghai's notable features had morphed from opium dens, a French concession filled with the French, and Russian emigres to skyscrapers, shopping, and more sky scrapers. Going there, though, I still hoped to find some of the Shanghai from my imagination. At first glance, I was out of luck. Shanghai is home to some of the most impressive sky scrapers in the world, some of which Tane blogged about here. The subway is impressive, and the train to the airport reaches over 400 km p/h. The Bund, Shanghai's famous river walkway, was also a million miles away from what I imagined.

Lucky, then, that we happened to get lost. We were trying to find the subway station that took us to the Expo, and took a wrong turn. After walking through some vacant lots and a part of Shanghai that was much like Canary Wharf, we found ourselves, quite by accident, in the old town. It was fabulous - quirky, picturesque, crazy and interesting. Not only that, but with the right amount of imagination, I could also imagine the Shanghai I'd read about.

I'd been told that old Shanghai doesn't exist anymore, but it turns out I was told wrong. It's a lovely city where the new parts are shiny and impressive, and the old places still exist. I just hope that when I do go to Russia I have a similar experience in terms of seeing some historic infrastructure, and catch a glimpse of what I imagined it to be like from the books.

Books books books

Last year I decided to start writing short'n'sweet reviews of books I've read. It's a little random, and the books I have reviewed are only the ones I had read in the weeks before writing. As I read about two books a week it is unlikely that I will review them all, but here is the link nonetheless to the blog! I am interested in your thoughts ...

http://laurensbookreviews.blogspot.com

Top 100 Books

There are countless lists floating around the internet listing what the best 100 books ever written are. I usually dislike the lists for one of two reasons: the first being that the lists are decided by pretentious idiots who assume that anything that the hoi-palois read can’t have any literary merit, completely ignoring the fact that many of the works they consider literature were effectively The DaVinci Code of their time. The second kind of “top 100” lists that I am not a huge fan of are the ones that are voted by the general public and are effectively little more than a list of a few classics and loads of books that the voters have probably read in the last 12 months. These lists are still interesting and contain some great books, but are far too short sighted to be considered the “top” 100 books ever.

This list, though, I like. It’s from the Telegraph, and has a really good mix of newer books and classics. It also recognises that while some books might not be great, they have had so much popular appeal (and in the cases of The DaVinci Code and Bridget Jones’s Diary have spawned entire genres) they can’t really be ignored. I also like that the Harry Potter books are counted together.

Click here for the list.

I have read 50 of the books on the list. I don’t always agree with their placement on the list (I loved Wuthering Heights but found Jane Eyre self indulgent and boring so do not understand the latter being place 3), and some of the books on the list I thought were boring and/or overrated. These were good books in my opinion, but not top 100 material: in particular Lord of the Rings (don’t shoot me! I have read the first one and have no desire to continue as reading it felt like wading through mud), Brideshead Revisited (in the preface the author himself apologised for it!), The Little Prince, Five People you Meet in Heaven and Emma. Those aside, though, some of the best books I have ever read are also on the list. In particular: Pride and Prejudice, The Color Purple, the Harry Potter books, Catch 22, Life of Pi, The Secret Garden, Gone with the Wind, The Great Gatsby, Lolita, Watership Down, A Fine Balance and Of Mice and Men to name a few.

How many have you read? Do you like the list? Do you want to shoot me for confessing that I do not love LOTR?(I think Tane does. Incidentally, do any of you love LOTR and read it for the first time over the age of 16? Just curious ... )

The Other Boleyn Girl and historical accuracy

A couple of days ago, Tane and I went to see the movie The Other Boleyn Girl. I had read the Philippa Gregory novel about five years ago and had loved it. The true story of Anne Boleyn and her sister Mary has it all - intrigue, incest (or allegations of), a King with too much testosterone and not enough scruples, one sister who became his mistress and had his illegitimate son, and a second that became his wife and lost her head. The story of Henry VIII is so filled with scandal, death and bodice-ripping, if it wasn't such a well documented part of English history is would be very easy to dismiss as legend.

After having seen Henry VIII's armour at Greenwich last year I have little doubt that a man that would wear this might also be the sort of man that would create a new church in order that he could marry the sister of his mistress

Philippa Gregory is onto a winning formula with her series portraying the Tudors in a fictional context. While Gregory took liberties in the book based on Mary Boleyn's life insomuch as she gave the characters life, from what I have read it appears she is fairly historically accurate in her portrayal of events. There is the odd turn of phrase used that doesn't sound like something from the 1520s and 30s , but apart from that I thought it was an excellent book. Historical fiction is always a tricky genre to write in, and very few books get it right to the satisfaction of people who know the period written about, or at least flatter themselves that they do. This isn't unique to Gregory's books, even some Booker winners get it wrong: Schindler's Ark took great liberties when writing about Oskar Schindler, and Oscar and Lucinda talks about coat hangers before they were invented. Not that I really care in either case.

Sometimes I hate historical inaccuracy, sometimes I don't. There is no hard and fast rule about it - for me it often depends on how the inaccuracy is presented, and how good the rest of the book is. As a rule I find that I can overlook details, but not historically inaccurate ideas - especially books where the hero or heroine from days gone has modern ideas about gender, race and class when the bad guys don't. My other pet peeve is what I can only describe as Titanic syndrome - the way almost every single modern book written about either the USA or UK that touches 1912 has at least one character die on the Titanic. That's just me though, and I don't claim to be consistent or rational in what bugs me and what doesn't.

At Henry's palace Hampton Court earlier in the year. Hampton Court is fabulous, a maze of coridoors and badly lit rooms perfect for scandal and intrige.

Before going to the movie I had read a review of it in the Guardian by a man who had enjoyed the movie, but criticised it for being historically inaccurate. The only concrete pieces of "inaccuracy" he wrote about was Anne Boleyn's necklace looking like something from the 1980s and the fact that Eric Bana who plays Henry is not fat. The reviewer has obviously not seen Anne's portrait in the National Portrait Gallery wearing the necklace, nor done his research about what Henry looked like earlier in his life. Nevertheless, I did go to the movie wondering what it would be like.

According to an exhibit here on younger Henry, he may have looked like Eric Bana when he was young. That's certainly a much nicer mental image than this one ...

I liked the movie The Other Boleyn Girl in the end. While it was a bit cheesy in places and the dialogue a bit stilted, there were some great scenes in it and I was moved by the ending in spite of knowing that it was coming. And even if it was historically inaccurate in places, I didn't care as I was too busy enjoying the movie to notice. It wasn't as good as the book, but still did a pretty good job of putting Philippa Gregory's interpretation of events onto the big screen.

I wonder what other people think though - did you prefer the movie or the book? Does historical inaccuracy bug you in books? What about movies?

Interested in your thoughts....

Deer at Hampton Court. Apparently Henry liked to collect antlers as well as wives.

From Jane Austen to Berenstein Bears

In Emma, Jane Austen wrote "Emma had never been to Box Hill; she wished to see what every body found so well worth seeing, and she and Mr. Weston had agreed to chuse some fine morning and drive thither." We also decided to see what Jane Austen had written about, so Megan, Tane and I chose a fine morning to train thither and climb the hill.

"It was a sweet view--sweet to the eye and the mind. English verdure, English culture, English comfort, seen under a sun bright, without being oppressive." - Jane Austen. Oh, and Tane in the foreground too.

Rather than making fools of ourselves while up the hill as Emma did, though, we had a lovely walk through the hills, past some hairy cows, down some lanes, and through a little village filled with houses with names like "Mole's Manor" and " The White House". As Jane Austen wrote, the walk around the hill was indeed dirty. We are hardy Antipodeans rather than wussy regency maidens and men in tight tights, however, so did not lament the need for a donkey to carry us up as is in the book. The cows were so sturdy looking I am sure that they would have sufficed if I did decide to do it in again a corset and round gown next time though.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's an exceptionally hairy cow!

The walks around Box Hill were exceptionally badly signposted and we got quite lost. We found ourselves wandering through sheep paddocks and up roads that seemed to lead to no-where. After a couple of hours, though, we emerged back into civilisation and found that we were in Dorking. Yes, there is a town in Surrey called Dorking, and four months is London still isn't enough not to find that funny. Heh. Dorking. Not only does Dorking have a funny name, but we also found that all of the directions given by locals reminded up a lot of those in the Berenstein's Bears book "Bears in the Night" (out of the bed, under the bridge, past the tree, up Spook Hill) so well became very well acquainted with Dorking's back alleys.

Around the hill, past the sheep, past the lycra-clad cyclists, through the trees, and up Spook Hill!

While we did not have servants to collect us in a carriage afterward as happened in Emma, it was a great day to get out of London and see some of the "English verdure" Jane Austen wrote about. Living in London it can be hard to remember what green fields look like, so it was a fabulous way to spend a Saturday.

In other news, this side of the world seems to be having a crazy sunny and quite warm period at the moment. This may be the best weather we will get until summer 2009, but we are making the most of it. I had to put this pic in taken at Kensington Gardens last weekend to prove it ...

Please note Tane's shorts and Sarah's jandals ..

10 Movies that are better than the books

In the last couple of weeks, I have both read the book Atonement and seen the movie. As to be expected, the book was far, far better. I mean, that's the way it usually is, books are generally like drinking a smoothie as opposed to cordial made from a packet. Tane and I were talking the other night, though, about books which are worse than the movies, movies that are the smoothie to the powdered cordial of the book. This is my list:

1. Brokeback Mountain. The movie was fabulous, and captured the relationship between the two men far better than the book. The book didn't have me thinking "I can't quit you!" (A random aside - is it just me that looks twice at the guys in the Speights ads now?)

2. Once Were Warriors. Alan Duff cannot write. The movie was good, but I would rather poke nails through my eyelids than read anything else written by that man.

3. Zodiac. I loved the movie, but found that in the book the author was too busy telling the story of himself being fantastic to hold my interest.

4. The English Patient. The movie was beautiful. The book was good, but also quite pretentious, at times so over-written I wanted to vomit in my own mouth, and much clumsier in its execution than the movie. Apparently, the book is 'post-colonialism', which explains why it is the way it is. I don't care. Putting an 'ism' on the end of a phrase doesn't necessarily make the book in question a great book. Sometimes I wonder if people are scared to criticise pretentious writing as they fear looking stupid, like they didn't "get" it, when all we need is the little child to yell "but the Emperor is wearing no clothes!"

5. Children of Men. They were both flawed, but the way P.D. James painted the world inhabited by the characters was not as strong as that shown in the movie. I also preferred the adapted plot in the movie.

6. The Constant Gardener. The book was good, but the movie had a heart and soul to it that the book lacked. I empathised with the characters in the movie far more than in the book, and got much more emotionally involved.

7. The Three Musketeers. At least I could finish the movie. The book still sits on our bedside table with a book mark permanently living about half way through.

8. Forest Gump. The book really disappointed me on account of being wayyyy too random.

9. The Joy Luck Club. While the book is lovely, the movie is more coherent and, as a result, better.

10. Clueless / Emma. This was a left field adaption, but I just got more pleasure from Clueless than I did from Emma. Maybe it was because Emma didn't carry a phone that looked like a brick. Heh.

Some other people have come up with a few more that I can't comment on as haven't read the books, but thought I'd post anyway. Namely Sense and Sensibility, Whale Rider, The Pianist, and Bladerunner/Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. Disagree? Got more to add?

It's all about Harry

Like a ba-jillion other people world wide, I am eagerly awaiting the final Harry Potter book. I cannot wait to find out how it all ends, and hope that J.K Rowling ignores all the stupid 'Save Harry' and 'Keep Writing the Books' petitions and winds the series off in a way that maintains its literary integrity.

There are a few things I'd love to see happen in the last book, like something cool to do with Neville Longbottom and something horrendous to do with the Dursleys. I also wonder if Harry's scar is a horcrux, and how the final battle with Voldemort will play out. I wonder, is Snape good or bad? And the most burning question of all - will Ron and Hermione finally get it on?

Guess I just have to wait and see, and ensure that I live in a bubble for the time it takes to read it to not find out about what happens before I manage to read it myself.

My favourite of the books: Half Blood Prince and the Goblet of Fire
Least favourite of the books: Chamber of Secrets and the Order of the Phoenix
Character I would least like to see die: Ron.
Characters I most like: Fred and George, Neville and McGonagall
Characters I least like: Cho Chang and Draco Malfoy.

What about you? Looking forward to the final book, or you really don't care? Do you think HP is fabulous, or over-rated?