Well, this book fits squarely into the "Enjoyable Tosh" category and could even be a contender for my "Airport novel of the year" award.
It's the first book of the "Dresden Files", the cases of Harry Dresden a sort of wizard private detective. At first I was a little disappointed as I was hoping for something like Terry Pratchet or Douglas Adams but Mr Butcher takes his fantasy very seriously. The first chapter has a reference to wizards being "subtle and quick to anger" and I would rather read the kind of book that warns you not to meddle in the affairs of wizards as they are subtle and will piss on your computer. It took a while to come to terms with a po-faced book that thought vampires were a subject I should take seriously, I gradually began to really enjoy it. "Storm Front" worked for me as a pageturner. Eventually, I was so into it I got caught in the work canteen reading this silly book about a wizard. You just have to enjoy the magical special effects and ignore the clunking noises coming from the plot. One website described it as "Harry Potter for adults" - I think that's a fair description and I leave it to the reader to decide whether it's complimentary or not!
If you find yourself in an airport, and this is the only thing you kind find in English, relax and buy it, it's mostly harmless.
A quick poke about the internet showed me that "The Dresden Files" has become a TV series on SciFi. I look forward to finding out whether it is watchable when it comes to freeview (sometime around 2020, I guess).
My favourite quote:
"My name is Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden. Conjure by it at your own risk,"
Wednesday 11 March 2009
Thursday 5 March 2009
Molesworth Books by Geoffrey Willans and Ronald Searle
I complained so bitterly about how long and slow-moving "The Dream of Scipio" was that E (you remember E, disapproves of Derren Brown, that one) loaned me her two Molesworth books "Whizz for Atomms" and "Back in the Jug Agane" to cheer me up.
Molesworth is a pupil in the 3rd form at St Custards boarding school (you can use the magic of the Interweb to take a virtual tour round St Custards here ) and the books are not so much stories as short vignettes of school life. In common with "Transpotting", "A Clockwork Orange" and I can haz cheezburger, the Molesworth books are spelled phonetically and written in dialect. By someone who can't spell. This means that it takes a while to get into them. And I'm still not sure what some of the 1950s slang means. The trade mark style of these books makes it tempting to have a punt at mimicry so here are my school days at St Custards Grammar School For Girls:
The scene is the form room of 10b. The gurls are engayged in activities befitting yung wimmen cosmo quizzis, makeup, finding the bits abowt (HEM-HEM) in Shirley Conran books and givving each other annerreksya, ect, ect. But soft! (posh prose) here come their form teacher. Miss Batley teech ART and kno nothing. She woud not recognise the gerund if it started nesting in the art cupboard and drinking the poster paint. (Mrs Roebuck the latin teacher kno all about the gerund and gerundives. She also make us stand by our desks and sa "Salway magistra" like we were at Mallory Towers chiz chiz chiz! ). "Hullo clouds, hullo sky," sa Miss Batley, "Hullo Personal and soshal education worksheets, hullo anti smoeking leaflets ect ect". Miss Batley's antismoeking leaflets do more for the tabacco industry than smoeking beegles. 10b adopt the 1000 yard stair of trormatised veterans when will the torment end ect ect. And still it continue! Now we must do roll pla and try to sell each other drugs but hav scientist found a drug which fry the mind like personal and sowshal edukation? They hav not.
Molesworth is a pupil in the 3rd form at St Custards boarding school (you can use the magic of the Interweb to take a virtual tour round St Custards here ) and the books are not so much stories as short vignettes of school life. In common with "Transpotting", "A Clockwork Orange" and I can haz cheezburger, the Molesworth books are spelled phonetically and written in dialect. By someone who can't spell. This means that it takes a while to get into them. And I'm still not sure what some of the 1950s slang means. The trade mark style of these books makes it tempting to have a punt at mimicry so here are my school days at St Custards Grammar School For Girls:
The scene is the form room of 10b. The gurls are engayged in activities befitting yung wimmen cosmo quizzis, makeup, finding the bits abowt (HEM-HEM) in Shirley Conran books and givving each other annerreksya, ect, ect. But soft! (posh prose) here come their form teacher. Miss Batley teech ART and kno nothing. She woud not recognise the gerund if it started nesting in the art cupboard and drinking the poster paint. (Mrs Roebuck the latin teacher kno all about the gerund and gerundives. She also make us stand by our desks and sa "Salway magistra" like we were at Mallory Towers chiz chiz chiz! ). "Hullo clouds, hullo sky," sa Miss Batley, "Hullo Personal and soshal education worksheets, hullo anti smoeking leaflets ect ect". Miss Batley's antismoeking leaflets do more for the tabacco industry than smoeking beegles. 10b adopt the 1000 yard stair of trormatised veterans when will the torment end ect ect. And still it continue! Now we must do roll pla and try to sell each other drugs but hav scientist found a drug which fry the mind like personal and sowshal edukation? They hav not.
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