Making it Up As I Go

I haven’t posted in a while, and the reason is two fold. First, I have to admit that I’ve abandoned Misfortune yet again. I started, I really did, and I really enjoyed what I read and fully intend to finish it. But, and this is also the second part, I’ve just been in a reading funk lately, and have had a hard time sticking with anything. Since the last post I’ve started and put down at least 5 different books.

But I did manage to read two books:The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury, and Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones.

I don’t know when I first read The Illustrated Man, but I’m sure I was too young at the time. I say that because beside the fact that I was rather precocious in my raiding of my dad’s books, I’ve known the stories in The Illustrated Man for as long as I can remember. As disturbing and thought provoking as some of them are, they’re like a favorite blanket, one I can slip into and feel completely at home. Reading it again this time I realize that it influenced my thinking a great deal, and I can honestly count it among my favorite books.

I can also count Howl’s Moving Castle, even though this is the first time I’ve ever read it. I was prompted to pick it up after I saw Miyazaki’s gorgeous animated version, and while I figured I would love the book even more then I did the movie, I wasn’t prepared for just how much I would enjoy it. While the story is almost entirely different from the film, the book is just as magical, joyful, and imagination inspiring. I wish I had read this as a child, and will definitely be reading to my children once I’ve got some. I’m completely enamored with Howl and the idea of his roaming castle; the door that opens into different towns depending on which way the knob is turned is fantastic. I can’t wait to read Jones’ other books, if they’re anything like Howl’s, I will have a new shelf of loves.

Speaking of books made into films, I recently saw I Capture the Castle, and now I must get the book. The film was beautiful, about a young girl at the edge of adulthood, living with her eccentric family in an abandoned castle. Bill Nighy is incredible as her tortured writer father, and the love story that develops is touching and suprising. If the book is anything like the film, (which I suspect it is), it would be an interesting companion read to Bonjour Tristesse, which I need to read again. I think a trip to the library may be in order. Even though I still have 6 unfinished books from said library. I hate book paralysis.

Current total: 64
Just finished: Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
Currently Reading: Christmas Pudding by Nancy Mitford