I'm excited for this new series on Hulu, as I am a fan of Anne Rice's early works, in particular Interview With A Vampire and the Vampire Lestat.
TV: Vampire Chronicles
Hulu has picked up
Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles
TV series. The
author and her son, Christopher Rice, will executive
produce alongside
Anonymous Content's David Kanter and Steve Golin. The
project, which has
been in the works since 2016, "will begin with the
story told in The
Vampire Lestat and be an entirely open-ended story
that could span
multiple seasons," TheWrap reported.
Paramount
Television and Anonymous Content optioned the rights to 11 of
Rice's Vampire
Chronicles books for adaptation in 2017, one year after
Rice began
developing the project. Paramount TV president Amy Powell
said at the time:
"It is undeniable that Anne Rice has created the
paradigm against
which all vampire stories are measured. The rich and
vast world she has
created with the Vampire Chronicles is unmatched and
sophisticated with
'90s gothic undertones that will be perfectly suited
to captivate
audiences. The series is full of compelling characters led
by Lestat,
arguably one of the greatest original characters, literary or
otherwise."
I have been a fan of Irving's early works for 30 years. My favorites include The World According to Garp, Cider House Rules, A Prayer for Owen Meany,Trying to Save Piggy Sneed, The 158 Pound Marriage and The Water Method Man. There are a few later works that I read and didn't like, so I haven't read his new stuff, but I still think he's a fantastic prose stylist and deserves this Literary Prize.
John Irving is
this year's recipient of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize
http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz37653097's
Ambassador Richard C.
Holbrooke
Distinguished Achievement Award
recognizes authors
for their complete body of work. Irving will be
presented with the
award October 28 during the Dayton Literary Peace
Prize Gala.
"John
Irving's body of work creates worlds that allow the reader to
explore the
contradictions of twisted morality, the consequences of
suspicions of the
other, the absurdities of pride and ignorance, and the
tragedy of a lack
of sympathy and empathy for our fellow humans:
characteristics
that make peace unreachable," said Sharon Rab, founder
and chair of the
Dayton Literary Peace Prize Foundation. "Through
books--especially
Irving's books--readers learn to understand and
identify with
people who are different from themselves."
Irving commented:
"Novels and stories invite people into a writer's
worldview. For
forty years and counting, I've written about sexual
difference and
sexual minorities--at times, when the prevailing literary
culture labeled it
bizarre or niche. I've written with the hope that the
bigotry, hatred,
and flat-out violence perpetrated on sexual minorities
would become a
relic of the past. In that sense I've written in
protest--I've
written protest novels. And yet, if I've written
characters whose
stories give them access to the breadth of human
experience and
emotion, I've done my job as a writer. Novels are my
platform; if a
prize helps bring attention to my subject matter, then I
welcome it."
I adored the first movie in this series, and I'm excited to see this one as well.
Movies: Fantastic
Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald
"Young
Newt--and the youngest Dumbledore we've seen yet--is revealed in
this exclusive new
photo from Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of
Entertainment
Weekly reported in featuring a photo in which "we see
professor Albus
Dumbledore (Jude Law) and an alarmed-looking Newt
Scamander (Joshua
Shea) at Hogwarts in a flashback scene from the
upcoming Harry
Potter-verse film."
Scamander's
connection with Leta Lestrange (Zoe Kravitz) is "one of
those
relationships where there was definitely great love there," Eddie
Redmayne, who
plays grown-up Newt, told EW. "But was it ever a
full-blown
relationship? I don't know. But certainly, she's somebody who
has touched him
hugely. At the beginning of this film you realize she's
now in a
relationship with Newt's brother so, of course, that comes with
great
complications."
Law also said he
"knew the books and the Harry Potter films pretty well,
my children grew
up with them so I grew up as an accompanying adult. And
I'd seen and
enjoyed the first [Fantastic Beasts] film. Then I had the
good fortune and
opportunity to sit with J.K. Rowling shortly after we
started work on
it. She gave me a very good sense of Albus's life
journey and who he
was and what was happening in his head and his heart
and his world for
this particular story."
The Queen of Sorrow by Sarah Beth Durst is the third and final book in the Queens of Renthia series, all of which I've read and reviewed on this blog. In this final volume, there's more than a bit of emphasis on the romantic relationships of the Queens, and their relatives, and there are the inevitable battles with spirits of land, sea and air. What I liked most about the book was the finalization of those relationships, and headmistress Hanna's tough love and diplomacy that was put into play in Semo. The older women in this book kicked some serious butt and did it with wit and style, which, being an older gal myself, I appreciated reading (I am getting tired of reading about teenage girls who triumph over their own self loathing and mean spirited classmates to save the day and get a really cool boyfriend. It's just so overdone). Here's the blurb:
The battle between vicious spirits and strong-willed queens that started in the award-winning The Queen of Blood and continued in the powerful The Reluctant Queen comes to a stunning conclusion in The Queen of Sorrow, the final volume of Sarah Beth Durst’s Queens of Renthia trilogy.Queen Daleina has yearned to bring peace and prosperity to her beloved forest home—a hope that seemed doomed when neighboring forces invaded Aratay. Now, with the powerful Queen Naelin ruling by her side, Daleina believes that her dream of ushering in a new era can be realized, even in a land plagued by malevolent nature spirits who thirst for the end of human life.
And then Naelin’s children are kidnapped by spirits.
Nothing is more important to her than her family, and Naelin would rather watch the world burn than see her children harmed. Blaming the defeated Queen Merecot of Semo for the kidnapping, Naelin is ready to start a war—and has the power to do it.
But Merecot has grander plans than a bloody battle with her southern neighbors. Taking the children is merely one step in a plot to change the future of all Renthia, either by ending the threat of spirits once and for all . . . or plunging the world into chaos. Publisher's Weekly: The thrilling and sometimes melancholy finale of Durst’s Queens of Renthia trilogy continues to expand the world of Renthia, finally bringing the story into Semo, the neighboring country that had attacked the land of Aratay in the previous book. Naelin—one of Aratay’s two queens, capable of commanding the wild nature spirits of the land—learns that her children have been kidnapped by Queen Merecot of Semo and is forced to bargain to retrieve them. Naturally, everyone’s plans go awry (including those of Naelin’s fellow queen, Daleina), and both countries find themselves fighting for survival. As Durst’s scope expands, she still has time for character growth (including a nice focus on Daleina’s younger sister, Arin, whose exploration of her bisexuality ends up tying directly into her own quest to help save the nations), and for some sharp twists. Younger fans of Durst’s YA works might be surprised by just how adult the story gets at times—Naelin and Daleina both enjoy a lot of sex, and death is plentiful and sometimes horrific. The well-crafted denouement wraps up the entire adventure perfectly
Though I gather we are supposed to learn to love the bad/evil sociopaths in this final book, I still couldn't understand why Daleina didn't just kill that wacko Merecot and rid the world of her evil ambition once and for all. I also didn't understand why Hamon's poisonous mother wasn't killed. She's a murderer and poisoner and even her son barely wants anything to do with her, but somehow she gets a 'get out of Renthia free pass' why? Because she cackles and is witty while being evil? I think Daleina ends up looking weak and stupid for insisting on friendship with Merecot the apricot, and Daleina's husband the healer looks even weaker for stitching up his mother when he should have let her die. Still, I liked Naelin and Ven's journey, and the prose was sterling, helping along a nicely-paced plot. I'd give it an A, and recommend this book to anyone who has read the other two and needs closure.
Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman is one of those bestsellers that gets a ton of good ink and hype for at least a couple of years after it's published. Espeically now that it was selected as a book for actress Reese Witherspoon's Book Club (and doubtless will be optioned by her film company). Like A Man Called Ove and Olive Kitteridge, the public seems to be fascinated by crabby middle aged or senior aged curmudgeons who are also misanthropes, and don't hesitate to judge those around them harshly and with vitriolic glee. Eleanor is even more of a hermit than Ove and Olive, and she reacts to those around her with cold and 'logical' scorn. Though she's obviously bright in a somewhat Autistic fashion, she's naive and innocent of nearly all popular culture and music, due to her horrifically abusive upbringing. Here's the blurb:
No one’s ever told Eleanor that life should be better than fine.
Meet Eleanor Oliphant: She struggles with appropriate social skills and tends to say exactly what she’s thinking. Nothing is missing in her carefully timetabled life of avoiding social interactions, where weekends are punctuated by frozen pizza, vodka, and phone chats with Mummy.
But everything changes when Eleanor meets Raymond, the bumbling and deeply unhygienic IT guy from her office. When she and Raymond together save Sammy, an elderly gentleman who has fallen on the sidewalk, the three become the kinds of friends who rescue one another from the lives of isolation they have each been living. And it is Raymond’s big heart that will ultimately help Eleanor find the way to repair her own profoundly damaged one.
Soon to be a major motion picture produced by Reese Witherspoon, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine is the smart, warm, and uplifting story of an out-of-the-ordinary heroine whose deadpan weirdness and unconscious wit make for an irresistible journey as she realizes. . . The only way to survive is to open your heart.
This is the problem that I have with books like this; they all claim to be "warm" or "warmhearted" and "uplifting" when in reality they are none of those things. Eleanor is an alcoholic, nasty, judgemental bitch, her mother is a psychopathic evil abusive bitch, and nowhere in their story is there anything warm or uplifting. It's tragic and horrific and the only way that Eleanor is going to survive isn't by opening her heart, but by sitting down with a competent therapist and dealing with her childhood abuse PTSD (she finally does this, and it makes her, nearly overnight, into a decent human being...voila!) Why anyone would fall in love with her, and deal with all her mental BS is beyond me. Still, I'd imagine this will be a juicy role for Reese W and company. The prose was decent, if not outright amusing at times, but the plot meandered. I'd give this book a C+, and only recommend it to those who aren't depressed and like anti-heroines.
Dear Mrs.Bird by A.J.Pearce is a fascinating story of an aspiring journalist in London during the Blitz of WWII. Because I am a huge fan of British lit in general and comedic wordsmiths like PG Wodehouse in particular, I was really looking forward to this novel. Fortunately, it delivered a great story with interesting characters,for the most part. My problem with the novel came when I couldn't understand why the protagonist, our plucky heroine Emmy, seemed to have zero self esteem or faith in herself and her decisions. When her so-called friend Bunty accuses her of being the cause of her fiance's death, though he was killed when a bomb went off and obliterated the nightclub they were dining at, Emmy actually believes this line of bologna and feels terrible guilt and anguish over it. Here is the blurb: An irresistible debut set in London during World War II about an adventurous young woman who becomes a secret advice columnist— a warm, funny, and enormously moving story for fans of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society and Lilac Girls.
London, 1940. Emmeline Lake is Doing Her Bit for the war effort, volunteering as a telephone operator with the Auxiliary Fire Services. When Emmy sees an advertisement for a job at the London Evening Chronicle, her dreams of becoming a Lady War Correspondent suddenly seem achievable. But the job turns out to be working as a typist for the fierce and renowned advice columnist, Henrietta Bird. Emmy is disappointed, but gamely bucks up and buckles down.
Mrs. Bird is very clear: letters containing any Unpleasantness must go straight in the bin. But when Emmy reads poignant notes from women who may have Gone Too Far with the wrong men, or who can’t bear to let their children be evacuated, she is unable to resist responding. As the German planes make their nightly raids, and London picks up the smoldering pieces each morning, Emmy secretly begins to write back to the readers who have poured out their troubles.
Prepare to fall head over heels for Emmy and her best friend, Bunty, who are gutsy and spirited, even in the face of a terrible blow. The irrepressible Emmy keeps writing letters in this hilarious and enormously moving tale of friendship, the kindness of strangers, and ordinary people in extraordinary times.
Mrs Bird is a loud and horrible old trout whose advice generally consists of telling people they're stupid and that they need to buck up and move on. When Emmy reads the letters from sometimes desperate young women, she can't help but feel compassion toward them and want to help, because she knows that Mrs Bird will refuse to even read their pleas. The fact that the evil old stodgy Editress, as she calls herself, actually tries to sue Emmy when Emmy takes matters into her own hands is just beyond the pale. The ending makes it seem as if Emmy has actually won, in a sense, and retained her job because she has made the magazine, which was losing readers, so popular that the publisher can't help but notice. However, Mrs Bird isn't fired, as she should have been, and Emmy isn't put in her place as advice columnist, which is bizarre. The rampant sexism from nearly all the men in the book is apparently a product of the era. At any rate, the prose was wonderfully British and the plot swift and sure. I'd give this book a B, and recommend it to those who like WWII tales with female protagonists.
Smoke And Iron by Rachel Caine is the 4th book in the Great Library series, and I would assume that we are coming close to the final book. There was a lot of pain and suffering in this volume, and the main characters barely made it through, so I can only hope that they are able to fix everything in a final volume. Here's the blurb: To save the Great Library, the unforgettable characters from Ink and Bone, Paper and Fire, and Ash and Quill put themselves in danger in the next thrilling adventure in the New York Times bestselling series.
The opening moves of a deadly game have begun. Jess Brightwell has put himself in direct peril, with only his wits and skill to aid him in a game of cat and mouse with the Archivist Magister of the Great Library. With the world catching fire, and words printed on paper the spark that lights rebellion, it falls to smugglers, thieves, and scholars to save a library thousands of years in the making...if they can stay alive long enough to outwit their enemies.
the "Scooby gang" of the Great Library do manage to rout the bad guys in this installment, but they don't quite complete their plan because the head villain manages to escape. Still, the excellent ray gun that Thomas creates, and the plan of Jess and Brendan (and the machinations of the most political member of the gang, Khalila) all culminate in a coup at the Great Library that sets the stage for some big changes in book 5. The prose was clean and clear, the plot a foxtrot of POVs that came together to create a satisfying story. I'd give this book a B+, and recommend it to anyone who has read the previous three novels in this series.