Squeeee!

There is a trailer for The Golden Compass film on the Yahoo! Movies site via this link here.
And this poster is so beautiful.
It looks amazing! It's got a lot of CG work to it, which makes sense, you could never get a polar bear to wear armor and co-operate. It will be interesting to see if they fuse the CG and live action a little more or if they leave it as a style choice.
So exciting!

Snape Theory Begins!

As noted in previous posts, I have a fabulous Snape theory and I pledged to have it finished before Book 7 arrives. The short version of the theory is this: Snape is ultimately good and wants Voldemort to go down, but he wants to be famous because of it. He wants to be the greatest wizard in the world.
I've been pondering how best to post this theory and instead of a big fat post on the 101 blog I decided to drag it out over the next two months on my newest blog: ElizaB's Snape Theory, Severus Snape: The Epic Hero Wannabe.
I'm very excited about this process but blogger is being a pain and won't let me pretty up the site. Grrrrr!
*cross posted at the 101 blog*

Bookround

Tonight I attended my first Bookround. This is a local book club in New Haven. It works by announcing the book, meeting place, and time online, then members sign up for the books they want to read and discuss. It's perfect for me. I'm not forced into reading anything I don't want to and I can attend the discussion if it fits into my schedule. I've been meaning to attend one for a while, but between one thing and another (and chickening out once) I never made it before tonight.
I had a great time. We discussed To Kill A Mockingbird as part of Big Read New Haven. One of the ladies who works at The Arts and Ideas Festival was there and expalined why they chose this particualr book. 1.) The race issues in the novel were something that New Haven-ites could relate to. 2.) It is available in Spanish. 3.) It's a book many ages can read and connect to because it works on so many levels. So we discussed the race issues, and the ages we were when we read the book initially. This was one girl's first reading, which was exciting to hear. We talked about social class and the difference between kids now and then. It was a good discussion.
I think I will try to attend another. I'm sure there is a difference in the type of book and group dynamic at every Bookround which is exciting. I am voting for the current contenders The Red Tent, The Tao of Pooh, and The Robber Bride. Hopefully I will be able to attend another this summer.

*cross posted at the 101 blog*

A Breath of Snow and Ashes

by Diana Gabaldon
I've made it! I've finished! I have read all the Outlander books! I am done!
What's that?
There's going to be another book! Oh for christ's sake...

Annoyance with the fact that I'm still not at the end of the story aside, A Breath of Snow and Ashes was great. It cooked along at a fast pace with many exciting plot twists. I even stayed up waaay late into the night a few times because the story was so gripping. Less politics-more melodrama!
Editing is still an issue. It tends to get worse towards the end of the book. This time I noted words with letters left out and a sentence that literally repeated a phrase with in itself. Were these flaws buried deep within the text I could have forgiven them. But they were not only at the beginning of paragraphs, but at the beginning of chapters!
Really? Who is it that's not doing their job at Delta? Come on!
Hopefully they will get it together for the final (maybe?) book King, Farewell. It is dubious amongst any press I can find whether there will actually be another book. However Snow and Ashes did not tie everything up, and it left out the chapter printed in The Outlandish Companion. The biggest indicator is that a big hoopla was not made over Snow and Ashes being "THE END." Now DG is no JKR but you'd think they'd make a big deal over the end of a story that has taken 5347 pages so far.

The Outlandish Companion

by:Diana Gabaldon
In Which Much is Revealed...if you really want to know. Truth is, I don't need to know. I don't need to read emails between Ms. Gabaldon and her fans about herbal medicine practices. I don't need to read the birth charts and horoscopes for Jamie and Claire. I don't need a synopsis of all the books I've already read, thanks.
I had checked this out of the library when I had begun The Fiery Cross, intending to blast through FC and the latest book, and continuing on to Companion. Unfortunately (or really rather fortunately) I was only able to skim this before I had to return it to the library. I read the chapters I wanted and skipped such things as character horoscopes, emails between Diana and her readers on various obsessive topics, and bad computer generated images and rehashed descriptions of items like wedding rings, necklaces, and other "Objects of Use."
What I did get out of this book was the process of Diana's writing and research, which was interesting. Just as I suspected she writes random chapters and then strings them together with filler. Enh...whatever works for you. She frequently re-iterates that the first book was for practice and never meant to be seen by anyone, therefore she has been using this series to develop her style and process. OK, I can live with that. Seriously though the editing still needs work, I thought the point of the editor was to help the author string these things together.
The other big point of interest was the chapters of things she has already written for future books. One was for The Fiery Cross, which has been published, although part of that ended up in A Breath of Snow and Ashes. Interestingly the series was intended as 6 books with the final being King's Farewell. But we know A Breath of Snow and Ashes is #6 and the chapter from King's Farewell "Surgeon's Steel" was not in Snow. So I'm thinking we still have one more book to go.

Forever

So the good olde Post Office will be raising stamp prices again on Monday the 14th. They are also producing a "Forever Stamp." Meaning, no matter how high prices go you can always use the Forever Stamp at whatever price you originally purchased it. Considering prices only go up and technology is now way ahead of the stamps and mules they use to deliver mail, a Forever Stamp seems like a good idea.
Or is it?
In Ring Around the Sun a group of mutant humans is secretly manufacturing items like the Forever Light Bulb, Forever Razor Blade, and the Forever Car. Coincidence? Well... yes it probably is-but a creepy one none the less!

The Golden Compass

I overheard recently on Pottercast that The Golden Compass Movie site was up and that it would generate your Daemon for you. Those of you who have read the books know what I mean when I say Daemon. The rest of you, well read the books or check out the http://www.goldencompassmovie.com/ for yourself.

The site is pretty cool and in addition to the Daemon Generator has a lot of the concept art. It looks beautiful, especially those armored bears! The alethiometer was kind of disappointing, you twiddle with it and it reveals...desktop wallpapers! These are nice, but really? Wallpapers?

My Daemon's name is Alvin and is a crow, which means I am "responsible, modest, shy, flexible, and solitary." Yep, pretty much sums me up.

The Fiery Cross

By Diana Gabaldon

I have finally finished reading the fifth installment of the Outlander Series, The Fiery Cross. It took a while for a few reasons,
1. The book is 1443 pages long. That's a bit much even for me.
2. I was too busy to read.
3. Like Dragonfly in Amber, the book stalled out with it's talk of politics.

I was heartened to finish when I talked about the books recently with my colleague and neighbor Amanda. She had also read the first book and loved it. When she moved onto the second book, she too got bored. We realized it wasn't just her or me, it was the book. So I encouraged her to read Voyager-which is my favorite thus far. In turn she encouraged me to skip forward.
Now skipping forward in books is something I don't make a practice of. Garth does it all the time, but my fear is I will miss something important or at least that I'll miss a good bit of gravy. If it's a book I've read a dozen times like Gone With The Wind, I'll skip parts that I'm not keen to re-read again. Like the descriptions of the Civil War battles-snooze!
In Fiery Cross I was trucking along, things had gotten very exciting with a good death fake-out. Then, boom! Mired down in the politics once again. Then another major character nearly dead! More politics. Snooze. Then finally the culmination of a mystery that's been lingering through the last three books. End scene. Again it's Gabaldon's erratic writing style that bugs me, but on the other hand I need to know what happens to these people!
Now I'm on to the last installment (thus far), A Breath of Snow and Ashes. We'll see how we go....