I've Been Doing Some Reading Lately

Hello, how are you?  I know, it's been over a week, but what can I say...

As the title says I have been doing some reading lately, and a few of the books that I have read have been completely different...  For me that is.

Firstly there is the fantastic book The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night by Mark Haddon.  I know, I am late to the whole thing again because there's a stage version of it that has just won several awards, and there are also talks in place to make it into a film with Brad Pitt producing apparently (that doesn't mean that he will be in the film by the way, because he doesn't always feature in films that he is a producer for - he is a great actor though).

For those who don't know, the central character of the story (Christopher Boone) is someone who suffers from Aspergers according to the blurb on the back (it is not specific in the book, and Mark Haddon said that he left that completely open to interpretation).  While outside wandering he finds a poodle dog named Wellington on a neighbour's yard dead with a garden fork in it, and he decides to try and find out what happened.  The book is a fascinating read because Christopher is also the narrator of the tale, and it is written as though the character himself was writing it, so you get his workings out, his thoughts, his puzzles, and all sorts of really interesting stuff that just adds so much to the whole thing.

Some people might think that these things are superfluous, but I think that they are necessary and by the end it is almost like you are inside the mind of that character, and you completely understand him and feel for him.  The book has some great surprises and takes some fantastic twists and turns.  I was enthralled by the book.

Before that I read the book The Pearl by John Steinbeck, which was another really good read.  It told the story of mexican pearl diver Kino, and as wikipedia says is an exploration into man's greed.  People dive for pearls hoping to make money by selling them to make their lives better, and Kino seems to have found the greatest pearl ever, and this book is basically the story of what happens to him once he has found it.  It also talks about the superstitions that people have and how they "read events".  It was another good book by Mr Steinbeck, and I look forward to eventually reading more his work (I've read another of his books lately as well - Of Mice And Men, another fantastic read).

If truth be told read On The Road by Jack Kerouac a couple of years ago and, to be honest, I think that I really forcing myself to read it and maybe didn't enjoy the book because of that reason and it was the first fictional book that I had read in over ten years.  As I've said to Louise recently, I will read that again because now that I am more into reading I might at some point enjoy the book.  There were parts about On The Road that I really enjoyed, and I think that I could get much more of a kick out of it if I read it again some time in the future.  That is a reason why I have been reading Steinbeck, because I want to get into some serious classic American literature.

Where did I get this image from?

After finishing the Mark Haddon book I read a Marlon Brando biography written by former actress Patricia Bosworth, which told me so much about the man that I hadn't known.  It was a fascinating read, full of some great tidbits, and I really did enjoy reading it, even if at times I felt awful that he didn't recognise how great an actor (and presence) that he was.  It is a shame that it was a wasted talent, and I think that he could have done so much more if, to be honest, he hadn't been so much of a pain in the neck to a lot of people.  I know that he was a force of nature, but in a way it would be nice to see what would have happened if he had not been so much like that, but then would he be the same actor that he was?  That is just my thinking after reading about his life.  I do know that from reading the biography I'm not sure if I fancy reading his autobiography, because he is so self-deprecating about his own talent.  His acting in The Godfather, Streetcar, and all those classics are absolute gold dust acting wise.

When I finished the Marlon Brando book on Sunday morning at about half past one in the morning at work I started on the book The Kite Rider by Geraldine McCaughrain (I hope that I have spelled that correctly).

The story is set around the period of the Chinese Song dynasty (960-1279), and is about a young 12-year old boy named Haoyou Gou whose father is killed by Di Chou, the first mate on a ship. Di is envious of Haoyou's father Pei Gou because of Haoyou's mother's beauty.  He believes that by killing Pei, that he could eventually have Pei's wife as his own.  I could carry on, but I would spoil the whole story, but suffice to say that I really enjoyed the book so much that it has become a personal favourite.

The adventures that Haoyou and his cousin Mipeng get involved in are amazing to read, and the fact that the whole Kublai Khan coming from Mongolia to invade China and then looking at Japan is going on in the background adds so much to the beautiful tapestry that is weaved throughout with gorgeous scenery and character descriptions that really take you into that world.  I was completely lost in that world and couldn't put the book down.

As I said I started reading The Kite Rider around half past one in the morning on the Sunday, and I finished it at around one o'clock on Monday morning at work.  I don't read that much at home, so all in all I read that book in less than ten hours!  That is how much I enjoyed the book.

There we go then, something completely different for one of my blogs then - book reviews.  I enjoy all four of those books.

Thank you for reading, please take care.

April 29 2013 (42 years, five months, and three days old).