The Code of the Woosters, by P. G. Wodehouse

Picture from Bing Images.
Extremely disturbing book cover,
fantastic book. :P

Bertie Wooster's task was simple. All he had to do was visit an antique shop in Brompton Road and convince the owner to lower the price of an eighteenth-century silver cow-creamer. But when things go wrong, and Bertie finds out that the woman he was once accidentally engaged to is threatening to cancel her wedding to one of Bertie's old friends, our hero is determined to get them back together--and, once again, the answer lies in securing the very same cow-creamer, and also in finding a little brown notebook in which the groom wrote some very unflattering things about his future father-in-law. That's my best attempt at explaining the plot. :P A much more coherent summary can be found here. But if you really want to know more about it you should go read the book. *nodnod*

I grabbed this book off the shelf when I wanted something fairly short and entertaining to read and was seriously laughing within the first few pages. P. G. Wodehouse is a good writer, and Bertie is a hilarious narrator. Combine the two, and you have a very enjoyable book.

The plot is seemingly simple, but right when you think everything has finally been fixed, Wodehouse throws in another twist that makes you laugh, shake your head (or roll your eyes), and keep on reading until the end.

I don't normally read books that are purely supposed to be funny, because a lot of times the humor is too slapstick for my taste, and the characters annoy me more than anything else. But Wodehouse is a master. None of the characters in this book are overly annoying, I actually found the book extremely entertaining, and did I mention that Bertie is hilarious and ridiculous and endearing? And Jeeves is just awesome.

Another thing that I have to mention: there was hardly any swearing or anything like that in this book at all. Wodehouse gets major bonus points for that.

Anyway, if you like humor, the first few decades of the twentieth century, and British literature, go look up P. G. Wodehouse right now. I will definitely be grabbing more of his books off the shelf in future.

~Kellyn~

P. S. I am determined to review All Creatures Great and Small...as soon as I figure out how to write the blog post on it. Inspiration has not been my friend when it comes to that post, for some reason.

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

"The sun sets in the west (just about everyone knows that), but Sunset Towers faced east. Strange!
Sunset Towers faced east and had no towers. This glittery, glassy apartment house stood alone on the Lake Michigan shore five stories high. Five empty stories high.
Then one day (it happened to be the Fourth of July), a most uncommon-looking delivery boy rode around town slipping letters under the doors of the chosen tenants-to-be. The letters were signed 'Barney Northrup'
The delivery boy was sixty-two years old, and there was no such person as Barney Northrup...."


The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

The Westing Game is a favorite book of mine, if for nothing else because of the unique layout of the story and the way the plot progresses. Generally, in a mystery novel, there are a couple of main characters, a victim of some sort, and a trail of clues and plot twists that lead to the resolution of the mystery. While, of course, clues and plot twists are essential to a mystery story, in The Westing Game, there are several main characters and a rather unorthodox "victim." The main characters all have distinct personalities, and, well, perhaps the book itself can describe them better-

"Who were these people, these specially selected tenants? They were mothers and fathers and children. A dressmaker, a secretary, an inventor, a doctor, a judge. And, oh yes, one was a bookie, one was a burglar, one was a bomber, and one was a mistake. Barney Northrup had rented one of the apartments to the wrong person."

While the book is a fairly easy read, the quality of the mystery is not. I, myself, have read the book three or four times. The first time I read it, I was held in suspense until the very end. The flow of the story was so beautifully complex that I was never able to guess the ending. It was immensely fun going back through the book again, looking for all the subtle hints and connecting elements. The unique layout of the story keeps you interested all the way through; it keeps the gears turning in your head as each character finds a new piece of evidence to further the "game" these tenants are in the midst of.

I quite enjoy this book, and would recommend it to anyone who wants a fun, light read and an intriguing mystery.

~Katie~

 

That Hideous Strength, by C. S. Lewis

According to C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength is a fairy tale for grownups. You have villains that are clearly villains, and heroes that are clearly heroes, and high stakes (They just have to save the world again. No biggie.), and even magic of sorts.

The main characters are Mark and Jane Studdock, a newly-wed young British couple who aren't getting along as well as they thought they would. As they grow farther apart, they find themselves on opposite sides in a battle between the blatantly evil National Institute of Co-ordinated Experiments  (oh, the irony), and the small group resisting them.

The first half of the book starts out pretty slowly, and the villains are, well, bad, and not very pleasant to read about, especially if you're reading the book for the second time.  And the ending has a very different feel from the beginning, because it's much more fantasy-ish. Also, That Hideous Strength is the third book in C.S. Lewis' Space Trilogy, and though it technically can stand alone, the ending would be very confusing if you haven't read Out of the Silent Planet and Perelandra.

I started reading the Space Trilogy because I grew up reading The Chronicles of Narnia and wanted to check out some of C. S. Lewis' other fiction work. I enjoyed the trilogy, but I probably won't be re-reading the first two books very often. I liked That Hideous Strength much more because it's set on earth and starts out fairly normally, allowing the reader to adjust before the really strange things start happening.

Things I liked about the book:

I love the way that Lewis takes a neutral couple not directly involved with either side and uses them to illustrate the differences between the N.I.C.E. and the group of people who stand against it. I also like Mark and Jane, although when I re-read it I really just wanted to slap some sense into them and tell them to stop trying to be too modern and politically correct and start behaving like decent people. :P Really, though, it's amazing to watch Mark's change of heart (it happens to Jane, too, but it's not quite as marked.), and to mentally yell at him when he's being an idiot and to cheer for him when he finally sees the light.

And Mr. Bultitude. Mr. Bultitude really made the book for me. Even though he's only in a small part of the book, he provides a wonderful bit of comic relief when things really begin to get disturbing.  C. S. Lewis's way of describing animals and giving them personalities is just amazing. I found trying to picture a bear "meditatively boxing a punch-ball" quite entertaining. XD

Things I didn't like about the book:

The villains are bad. Like, send-shivers-down-your-spine-how-could-they-possibly-be-so-convoluted bad. I know that those are the best kinds of villains, but that doesn't mean I have to enjoy reading about them.

The book does get kind of strange in the middle/end. Once Merlin is introduced (Yes, that Merlin) the whole feel of the book switches completely and leaves you thinking "Okay, what just happened?" If I remember correctly, this is also when the villains start to get really bizarre.

There's some swearing. And it isn't just the obviously bad characters who do it. After a while I just wanted everybody to shut up.

Overall, I enjoyed the book, and I would recommend it to teenagers who like science fiction and C. S. Lewis and want to be challenged by a book that makes you think a little.

~Kellyn~

I'm Not Dead...

...I'm just having problems actually finishing blog posts. And it's also really hard for me to not majorly overthink things when I'm trying to review books. I keep thinking that my reviews have to be all professional and intellectual, and that's not the point. :P

So. List of  reviews that I've started working on:

-Three Men in a Boat
-That Hideous Strength
-All Creatures Great and Small
-North & South (The BBC miniseries)

I promise that I will have at least one of these finished and posted by the end of the week, and yes, you can hold me to that. I think I need accountability.

~Kellyn~