In honor of March being Women’s History Month—coming up in only a few days—I’ve decided to talk about one of the more kick-ass heroines in literary history: Lisbeth Salander. Known in the States as The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (who also enjoys Playing With Fire and Kicking Hornets’ Nests), the star of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium series refuses to let stories of mistreated women get swept under the rug.

Salander is the socially remote hacker who can memorize pages of information instantly and has a seething hatred of the injustices, especially those against women. Larsson himself shared many of Salander’s sympathies; he had witnessed a gang rape of a young girl when he was 15 years old. He allegedly couldn’t forgive himself for not saving the girl, whose name was also Lisbeth. (Larsson’s original title for the first book was Män som hatar kvinnor, translated as “Men Who Hate Women”). According to Larsson’s website, he had written synopses for ten books prior to beginning writing the series in 1997, and he signed a three-book contract with Swedish publisher Nordstedts in 2003. At that point, he had finished the first two books and was writing the third. Soon after, rights were sold to German and Norwegian publishing houses, and Larsson made changes to the first two books and finished the third. However, tragedy struck as, a few months before the series debut in 2004, Larsson suffered a heart attack and died. He hadn’t had a chance to see what an instant success his Millennium series was in Europe, and later, in the States. After its US release in 2009, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has been on the NY Times Bestseller list for a whopping 26 weeks. Talk of a US film version was immediately underway, based on the success of the Swedish adaptation starring Noomi Rapace in 2008.

Noomi Rapace as Salander. Furious, no?

Rooney Mara's Salander. She looks like she'd be cold!

For those who have seen Rapace in action, I’m sure we can agree that her perfectly piqued eyebrows and steely glare convey Salander’s utter distrust of society at large, as well as the fortified walls of anger she’s built up.

In the American version, Rooney Mara (A Nightmare on Elm Street, Social Network) has nabbed an Oscar nomination for her role as Salander, alongside a dashing Daniel Craig as the hard-hitting journalist Mikhail Blomqvist. As far as Salander’s character goes, Mara seems to have the rail-thin aspect down cold, which Larsson repeatedly stresses in the books. In a flare of her own bold style, Mara expresses Salander’s social alienation with all-but-invisible bleached eyebrows. But I’m not quite sure yet if she embodies the fury. And that may be a crippling mistake, because Salander herself is female fury incarnate.

WARNING, if you haven’t read the books, stop reading NOW to avoid spoilers!

Long story short: Lisbeth is pissed, and reasonably so. She had the misfortune of being the product of a negligent, callous, and cruel father who regularly beat her mother to the point of giving her permanent brain damage. And if that wasn’t enough, Lisbeth’s pleas to save her mother were completely ignored by every authority figure she reached out to. So Lisbeth reasoned that the only way to protect her family was to do so herself. But after she tries to prevent her father from coming back, she’s locked in a mental institution and declared legally incompetent. The injustices spiral out of control from there, and Lisbeth has to fight society to prove herself competent, a struggle not uncommon in women trying to break into a “boys’ club” workplace.

In a world reliant on technology, Salander’s hacking prowess affords her enormous power—although she only uses it for good. (Note: “Good,” in Salander’s terms does not in any way rely on society’s definition, but rather her own sense that unfair acts of cruelty cannot go unpunished.) In Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, Lisbeth calls herself and her hacker friends “information junkies.” But as she makes more powerful enemies in her dealings with Blomqvist, she’ll need all her talents to protect herself from a lifetime of unfair imprisonment.

Larsson filled all three books with accounts of women abused or ridiculed by men who felt the need to assert their dominance. Like a larger and European Gotham City, Sweden seemed to be home to the most corrupt villains, plagued (like Batman’s nemeses) with a fixation of sorts. But unlike the Riddler or the Penguin, Larsson’s villains were consumed with some form of misogyny. I couldn’t help but picture an invisible Bat signal go off in Salander’s head as she sits in a hotel room listening to a couple’s argument turn physical in the next room. After that, it’s nothing but BANG! KERPOW! KABLOOEY! (or however those sound effects would sound coming from a hacker. CLICK! CLACK! HIT ENTER!)

So here’s to the unsung hero of Sweden’s Gotham, and to the writer whose inspired work was cut so tragically short.

Game of Thrones valentines courtesy of artist and illustrator Chris Bishop

Live-blogging is a thing that people do, right? I thought so. Be riveted (but also confused a lot of the time!) along with me as I wade through A Clash of Kings: A Song of Ice and Fire, Book Two, by George R. R. Martin (henceforth “GRRM”). A note: that I should do this only occurred to me yesterday. I devoured Book One and I’m three-quarters of the way through Book Two, so we’re starting this live-blogging kind of in the middle. But if my math is correct, I have approximately ninety thousand pages left until the end of the series, so. Now’s as good a starting point as any.

A quick scene-setting, sketched from memory. We open on Book Two, at 81% complete, according to my Kindle. Things have changed a lot since Draco Malfoy chopped off Boromir’s head in Book One so that he could rule Narnia. (Kidding.) Stannis is marching on King’s Landing. Renly is dead? Joffrey is a little punk bitch who, if the universe is just, will get his come-uppance. Cersei, the Queen Regent, is heartless monster who also dabbles in some light incest now and again. Arya Stark is…hiding? Honestly, I can’t remember. Who is Roose Bolton? Sansa Stark is afraid of everything. Jon Snow is off discovering the Land of the Lost north of the Wall. Catelyn is at a place called Riverrunn, accompanied by what I assume are other good guys. Bran Stark is fleeing the confusingly evil Theon Greyjoy with his two besties, Osha and Hodor. (Hodor is the real hero.)

Feb. 1, 4:02 pm. What is “a rasher of bacon?” I picture a bunch of bacon strips woven together into a bacon rug. And if that’s wrong, well then I don’t want to not be eating it.

Feb. 3, 11:13 am. Is leather better at being leather when you boil it? I can only assume so, since boiled leather is apparently the fabric of their lives. (Now a tiny voice is singing the Cotton commercial in your head.) Bonus live-blog: How is it that a kind of fabric has commercials? It’s not like the cotton people are competing with the powerful ad agency pushing linen. Or burlap. Or anything but cotton. Why advertise?

Feb. 3, 11:17 am. I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: I love Hodor so much! Osha can stay, too. Bran…eh. Take him or leave him. More likely leave him, on account of he can’t walk. Amirite?

Feb 4, 7:22 pm. Horses, ravens, direwolves, boars, and pigeons. There are really only like five kinds of animals in GRRM’s magic world. Also maybe “shadowcats.”

Feb. 6, 8:39 pm. WHAT! Cersei tried to have Tyrion killed in the heat of battle! On second thought…no. Not at all surprised. That’s just like her.

Feb. 6, 8:41 pm. So Davos the Onion Knight keeps his severed fingers in a pouch around his neck. That is the coolest “when you’re older” story you could ever hope to tell your kids, honestly.

Feb. 9, 7:45 am. This is what it’s like to finish every chapter and start the next one: Tyrion Tyrion. Tyrion, Tyrion, Tyrion. Tyrion. Whew. Wait, Danaerys? OHMYGOD I FORGOT ABOUT HER.

Feb. 9, 7:47 am. Bran is alive! In other news, Bran is an animorph! (More like: BRANIMORPH. Eh? Eh?)

Feb. 9, 7:59 am. Alternate titles, if I’d had my way: “Milo and Hodor.” “Kourtney and Khodor Take King’s Landing.” “Hodor Two: The Hodoring.” “Looks Who’s Hodoring.” “Look Who’s Hodoring Too.”

Feb. 10, 9:13 pm. Years of voting Democratic has left me rooting for the Wildlings and I’m NOT SORRY. Shunned by the special interests of the southerners…all the blue-collar (fur-collar?) Wildlings want is a chance to rape and pillage, which is obviously their right as Americans.

Feb. 11, 8:31 pm. When did this series get so…magicky? Yes, there were some dragons and ice zombies in the first one. But now Melisandre is birthing evil spirits to kill kings, and Bran can be a sleep-wolf? Don’t push it, GRRM. I’ll go along with you and enjoy wanton murder, rape, incest, and child abuse, but I draw the line at too much magic.

And now, ladies and gentlemen, we begin Book Three: A Jig of Dragons! No, seriously, it’s called A Storm of Swords? A Murder of Crows? A Pod of Whales? This is devolving. (Really, though, a group of crows is actually called a “murder.” You’re welcome, for the nightmare.)

Feb. 12, 1:01 pm. Oh GOD the Others are coming! Someone warn the men of the Night’s Watch: Ben Linus is NOT to be trusted. He is a scheming son of a bitch.

Feb. 12, 1:13 pm. I think GRRM must sometimes wake up suddenly in the middle of the night, sweating with the realization that he’s completely forgotten about a character for the last 400 pages.

Feb. 13, 7:42 pm. This series has 10% more characters than I can keep straight in my head at one time, which makes my reading process feel like one unending streak of discovery. Every new chapter, I am like a baby discovering that cell phones are INCREDIBLE.

Feb. 13, 7:46 pm. My GRRM name would be Morgynn Hubbard. Ser Morgynn Hubbard. No, LORD Morgynn Hubbard to you, swine.

Feb. 13, 7:47 pm. In my mind’s eye, Brienne of Tarth looks like Louie Anderson. Now she looks like Louie Anderson in your mind’s eye, too.

Feb. 14, 5:02 pm. Now that we’re into Book Three: A Song of Rape and Guts, I’m starting to get really attached to Danaerys’s dragons. You know, in the same way that I got attached to Ned Stark. (The same way that Ned Stark was attached to his head.) God damn you, GRRM.

Feb. 14, 5:07 pm. Hooray! Arya Stark has fallen in with some people who are neither all bad nor all good! This is getting confusing, though, like the Star Wars prequels were confusing—confusing on a visceral level, like, “Hey, those guys are dressed like stormtroopers. But we are rooting for them? And Yoda is fighting alongside them? Ten year-old Morgan does NOT UNDERSTAND.”

That’s all for now. More live blogging as I plod my way through the rest of this series!

-Morgan

Beyond the plot, however, McEwan’s writing just fell a little short for me. And I found Saturday to be much of the same. Minus the tearjerking meta-story.

I know, I know, Ian McEwan is amazing—as 1001BYMRBYD says, “Saturday is the work of a novelist at the height of his powers.” But, but… Objectively, I understand this. McEwan’s mastery of language is truly stunning. His ability to take a single moment and turn it into pages of tiny thoughts and details is admirable.

But honestly… There’s a reason why moments don’t last very long. It’s because they’re not very interesting.

And this, Blob readers, is where my most shocking bibliophile/English major secret is revealed: I don’t actually have great taste in literature. I spent my undergraduate years nodding along and feigning interest when my fellow English majors mused at length on the use of gerunds in “Goblin Market.” (Or something like that. I don’t know.)

When I get right down to it, I read books like a lot of people watch TV: for its properties of escapism. Not in a depressing way or anything, but there’s just nothing better than finishing a book and just for a second not being able to remember where you are or what time it is because you were just that much into the story.

And I just couldn’t do that with Saturday. It’s the story of one day in the life of a middle-aged British neurosurgeon. He’s married, has two grown kids, and is worried about terrorism in the post-9/11 world. He also likes racquetball and is pretty good at his job.

Seriously. If you take away McEwan’s word mastery (and, to be fair, a pretty cray scene toward the end that I won’t spoil), that’s pretty much what I got out of this book.

This isn’t to say that I don’t like realistic fiction, or don’t appreciate writers making the most of small moments. I do. It’s just that there’s got to be something else besides the realism or small moments that grabs me, even something as small as identifying with a character. I just didn’t find it here.

What are your thoughts? Ever read any McEwan? How do you feel about realistic fiction?

Watchmen–

As you know, Watchmen is a graphic novel, and is widely considered to be one of the best of that genre. Even better, it manages to make a name for itself among traditional novels. I’ve been meaning to read it for some time now, and in my quest to add more titles to the (lamentably small) list of graphic novels I’ve read, I was looking forward to diving into this one. And hype or no hype, I was not disappointed.

The novel pulled me in right away with its vivid illustrations and Rorschach’s famous speech about seeing the city’s “true face.” In just a couple of pages, Moore sets the tone for the rest of the novel–and a very dark, gritty, honest tone it is. Watchmen takes place in an alternate version of 1985, in which superheroes exact their vigilante justice on New York City and even have a hand in shaping world events. However, these aren’t your grandpa’s superheroes. Rather than being paragons of virtue who inspire the populace with their bravery and goodness, they’re actually pretty normal people who want to fill the void that government and law enforcement has left when it comes to stopping and punishing criminals who have fallen through the cracks. With the exception of Doctor Manhattan and one or two others, they fight crime with skills and equipment born of their own genius and hard work, rather than with supernatural powers bestowed upon them by a caprice of fate.

And just like normal people, they are fallible. They make mistakes and judge wrongly. Their outlook on the world becomes nihilistic as they realize that their work will never be done, that the evils humanity can create are boundless, and that even their best efforts are often destined to go awry. They’re the most self-aware superheroes I’ve ever seen, and have an attitude of irony and self-disparagement that often lapses into outright embarrassment about their work, their efforts, even their own costumes. They know that some may see them as ridiculous, and they know that their task is probably hopeless, but they soldier on, almost as though they don’t know what else to do. Throughout the story, most of them are just barely able to hang on to the belief that what they’re doing is worthwhile. In short, I think Watchmen presents the most likely vision of what superheroes would be like if they lived in the real world.

At first glance, Watchmen has a certain dystopian flavor about it. However, I think it would be inappropriate to attach that moniker to it, when all is said and done. Rather, I saw Watchmen as a novel that describes what happens before the fall that causes a dystopian society to arise. The setting Moore chose for such a story couldn’t have been more apt–minus the flashbacks, the majority of the novel is set during the height of the Cold War. In the novel, as they were in real life, tensions between countries are extremely high; one tiny misstep could set in motion any number of scenarios, few of them good. In Watchmen, World War III is looming, and the heroes are trying desperately to stave off disaster–a feat that becomes increasingly difficult as members of their band are killed off in mysterious circumstances.

One thing I really loved about Watchmen was the mock “excerpts” Moore included, from biographies, letters, comic books, and all manner of other documents “written” by the characters. These bits of writing served as foils for whatever was happening in the story either directly before or after each excerpt. All of them brought out important nuances and realizations that would  have gone unnoticed otherwise. The most memorable (and the most chilling) of these was the sections in which a pirate comic a young man is reading perfectly mirrors the conversations and events going on near him. As the comic’s character descends into madness, so does the world around the reader.

I was also very struck by the symbolism and foreshadowing in the story. It was like a well-woven tapestry–at first, the elements of the story coexisted yet didn’t seem to relate in any clear way, but slowly, as the story developed, things that once seemed inconsequential ended up fitting together perfectly to reveal an intricate yet clearly understandable whole. It was absolutely beautiful to watch the pieces clicking together one by one (I could almost hear the satisfying “snap”), stark and shocking as the final picture often was. It was the kind of writing that makes me stare in open-mouthed awe, a feeling that is immediately followed by the sudden urge to throw my own stories out the window, only wishing I could write something so great, something that is equal parts elegantly simple and wonderfully complex.

Watchmen is one of the darkest books I’ve read, but it’s also one of the most honest. It takes a good, unflinching look at the fallibility and ugliness of humanity, at the meaninglessness of trying to save humans from themselves. And yet, just when things couldn’t get more dismal, something happens to restore the tiniest bit of faith in humankind. Something occurs that shows us that, just maybe, all is not lost for these characters and their world after all. It’s this perfect mixture between darkness and light that makes reading Watchmen such a heady, powerful experience. Only when you explore humanity’s depths can you truly appreciate its heights.

And now, let’s hear your side of the story–have you read Watchmen? What did you think? What did you notice in it that I didn’t? What did you enjoy most about it (or not enjoy, as the case may be)? Let’s hear some opinions!

Gary D. Schmidt’s Okay For Now was selected as the Barnes and Noble Recommends book for 2011. Subplots and repeated story elements begin immediately with 8th grade Doug moving with his jerk brother, abusive father, and beautiful mother to Marysville, New York. Marysville has “the dump,” his family’s new home, a library that is only open on Saturdays, and a whole town full of people who hire, hate, and befriend Doug and his family.

A few things made this book really stand out for me. It is set in 1968 and 1969, years that included both Vietnam and the first steps of men on the moon. They also included Joe Pepitone, a player for the Yankees and Doug’s role model, who he meets before the start of the novel and who Doug never lets you forget. Doug also quickly develops new interests, which include denying a crush on a cute girl who visits the library every Saturday to watch him develop his new drawing skills.

Doug quickly develops a passion for the art of John Audubon. Throughout the book, Doug learns the techniques of drawing from a kind librarian. As he learns how to use each lesson in his art, such as portraying balance and direction, he learns how to use them to improve his own life. As his life changes for better or worse, the reader understands his emotions through the way he interprets the mentality of the subjects in Audubon’s paintings. Doug determines he wants to save the library’s collection of the paintings, which as being sold off one-by-one to improve the financial situation of the town.

 I was impressed by the author’s ability to round out such a young protagonist so realistically. He has the basic concerns of every kid his age, but he also develops an understanding of the people around him far more than I ever did at his age. He grows exponentially with each passing chapter, and affects the lives of those around him for the better. The plentiful secondary characters each bring something different but equally important to Doug’s life. By the end of the book, Doug’s life changes completely.

 Okay for Now was the first young adult BN Recommends novel. It is also one of the few novels I have read that seems geared specifically toward adolescent boys. However, I have to say, it is one of the better YA novels I have ever read (and that’s a lot). I recommend this book very highly for all readers. I also feel that young adults studying English would benefit highly by considering the plentiful foreshadowing and the mirrored elements between subplots.

Taking a break from reading on my Nook Simple Touch

As far as publishing news is concerned, this is the hottest debate since the invention of paperbacks (or possibly, since sliced bread). Especially hot topics center around the health effects of different eReader screens, the effects on readers’ attention spans, and even decreased reading speeds—see this NY Times discussion for more information. Such radical new changes and concerns leave publishers and readers wondering: Where will the industry be in 10 years?

So let’s look at the benefits of both formats, so we can see where our priorities are. Here’s the rundown of all the eReader functions I think are the coolest:

1. Portability: You can carry anywhere from 1,000-3,500 books (internal storage) in one device (although you cannot read it while lifting off or touching down on a plane).
2. Price: With the majority of eBooks ranging anywhere from $0.99 to around $25, they are often significantly cheaper than their physical counterparts. The pricing is highly dependent on the type of book, though: books that are more abundant (diet books, genre books, etc.) are going to be cheaper, while books there are fewer of (literary fiction) will be more expensive.
3. The ability to multi-task on more advanced Readers (checking email, web browsing, games, apps).
4. Interactive kids’ books, including functions like interactive illustrations, audio storytelling, and the ability to record yourself telling a story.
5. Ease of use: You can manipulate the text (font, size, line spacing) and purchase books in seconds.
6. Multiple content formats are supported, so on the more advanced Readers you can read PDFs, HTML, Word/Excel/PowerPoint documents, CBZs (comic books), or notes (TXT), in addition to either the standard EPUB eBook file or Amazon’s exclusive AZW format, depending on which Reader you decide to go with.
7. Library books: More books are becoming available at more libraries in eBook format, for use on the most popular Readers.
8. Electronic recommendations, based on what other readers have bought.

All in all, I love eBooks for the possibilities they offer, most of which were unheard of in the industry until their invention. My Nook Simple Touch is my best friend when I travel, providing that I don’t lose it somewhere (knock on wood!). But good old pBooks have their advantages, too. Here are just a few:

1. Community/human recommendations: Books, as some may fondly remember, are normally sold in a bookstore. Bookstores are filled with books, people who love books, and usually a source of caffeinated drinks. You can have a drink, tell other people about your favorite authors, and get recommendations that are more relevant to you than an automatically generated list of books in the same genre.
2. Simplicity: Books are straightforward: you open it up, you read it. They won’t run out of battery, freeze, or malfunction in the middle of a story’s climax. And for those not-so-tech-savvy readers out there, there isn’t anything they need to learn before they pick up a book, other than how to read it.
3. The ability to take physical notes in the margin. Recent research on different styles of learning has increased educators’ awareness of better ways to help students learn. Although styles vary depending on different individuals learning different subject matter, I’ve personally always felt inclined to the visual style; I feel like I learn better after physically writing notes, as opposed to typing or tapping the same notes in. I’ve made notes in several books on my Nook, which I love as a Reader, but in a classroom situation, I’d still prefer a print book for absorbing information better.
4. Tactile stimulation: In my experience as a bookseller, I can’t count how many readers get into passionate conversations about a book’s feel and smell. Since memory is triggered best through smell, the best way (in my opinion) to involve children in reading is by associating good memories with the physical touch and smell of books, in addition to the inherent visual concepts involved. And speaking of connecting, I figure that there is no better way for me to connect with my favorite authors than by reading a printed book, which, with a bit of imagination—never lacking in avid readers—can transport me any day to a Victorian England manor, surrounded by members of the Brontë family. Sound nerdy? Yeah, that was me in college. Plus, the academic prestige of owning a wall-length bookcase (one of my more realistic aspirations) is enough to make anyone a collector.
5. Longevity: Although Nook and Kindle offer backups of books purchased from their sites on some type of Cloud, technology has been known to fail in the past. If an eBook reader doesn’t, for instance, have a home computer, their books are as good as lost the second their Reader breaks, leaving them completely bookless until B&N or Amazon sends them a new device. And for those of us who are uneasy about the omnipotence of the Internet and the possibility of such power falling into the hands of an evil mastermind (see Mark Bowden’s Worm), the weight of a physical book will reassure us that no one can take our favorite story away from us until they pry it from our cold, dead hands. Ok, maybe that’s a stretch. But you have to admit, nothing beats physicality as far as security is concerned.

There remains the paranoia that books will become as cheap to the public and, eventually, as unprofitable to publishers as songs are in the music industry. However, those industries are completely different. A recorded song remains the same in every context, with very subtle differences that the majority of listeners don’t even notice. Therefore, the format with which that the consumer purchases or listens to the song is irrelevant. Books, on the other hand, have specific formats designed by their publishers, and involve a number of complexities that can only be displayed in print. Footnotes, for example, cannot be seen side by side in eBook version; they are often linked to endnotes of some sort. This difference may seem subtle, but it ends up slowing the reader down. Imagine reading King Lear without having footnote translations on the same page as the Shakespearian English. If I personally had to follow an endnote link for every other word in the play, I might not have agreed with Edgar’s aside, in which he sees a grain of truth in Lear’s insanity: “Oh, matter and impertinency mixed/Reason in madness!”

To me, Shakespeare will always look better in printed form.

All in all, I think that eBooks and print books can live side by side, as long as there are people out there who love to read a mix of books. The eBook revolution is certainly here to stay, but I believe that print books won’t die out completely. Yes, publishers and bookstores will have to invest in eBook technology to keep up with the times, but this is not a print-icide, people. As long as students still physically write down answers to homework and tests, as long as artists use physical canvas for their work, people will want the option of holding a book in their hands. Plus, I’m convinced that nerds like me will continue to hoard print books until they are able to fill up that wall-length bookcase. And they probably won’t stop there.

Over the past six months or so, when people outside the literary world have asked me what I’m reading, I’ve frequently caught myself telling people that I’m really enjoying the current dystopian trend in YA literature. And while that is hardly a lie, I’ve come to realize that, aside from The Hunger Games and Divergent, I haven’t actually read very many current dystopian YA novels (this is an important classification, as Lois Lowry’s The Giver and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale are two of my all-time favorite books). You see, the problem with reading YA books at my age is that it’s difficult to find books that don’t sound as if they were written specifically for preteens (in all honesty, if I hadn’t grown up with Harry Potter and watched Rowling’s writing mature with each novel, I think it would be difficult for me to stomach The Philosopher’s Stone).

However, sitting in MHT over Christmas (and bemoaning the lack of real bookstores), I decided I needed more YA in my life so I took to my Kindle to tell me what I should read. I’d heard mixed reviews on Ally Condie’s Matched, and after reading a quick sample decided that the protagonist was just a little too immature/whiny/naïve for me (You were matched with your best friend. You could certainly do a hell of a lot worse. Stop complaining). But then I stumbled across a special offer for Lauren Oliver’s Delirium (teen angst and naivety and dystopianism for just $2.99!). Had it been it’s full price, I probably wouldn’t have bothered, but my plane was about to board and I wanted something to read.

Cue downward spiral. Oliver is not Collins, by any means, but after my initial mockery of the book, I found myself hooked by the premise. Oliver’s characters are not particularly noteworthy, and the plot was fairly predictable, but her dystopian concept was, at the very least, intriguing.

Lena Haloway lives in an alternate version of our contemporary United States—one in which society is government-regulated and amor deliria nervosa (better known to us as “love”) is considered a dangerous disease. In fact, deliria is so dangerous that, once they turn eighteen, every citizen must undergo brain surgery in order to render themselves incapable of (and immune to) love. But not everyone agrees with the government’s assessment of love, and so a community of Invalids (the “uncured”) lingers in the Wilds outside these gated communities, forming a growing resistance that threatens Lena’s perfect world.

As this is a typical YA novel, and one that is heavily centered on the concept of love, Delirium quickly deteriorates, becoming more a Romeo and Juliet tale than a sophisticated look at love and government manipulation. Lena meets Alex, an Invalid boy and active Resistance member, and soon begins to question the beliefs that have been instilled in her since birth as she experiences her first love.

As with all YA dystopian novels these days, Delirium is the first in a yet-to-be-completed trilogy. But, though Delirium ends on an arguably shocking note, I can’t say I’m dying to read its sequel (though I will admit to having read the first chapter on Facebook). What Delirium lacks, more than anything, is characters that I care about. Alex is cookie-cutter teen perfection—he’s cute, he’s charming, and he makes Lena believe in love. And Lena, despite an intricate and interesting back-story, is rather bland.

What I liked about Delirium though, other than the fact that it was a fun and easy read that helped kill several hours of flying time, was how it addressed that age-old question, “Is it better to have loved and lost, or to never have loved at all?” It caused me to imagine a world without love, to consider whether being in love is more a blessing or a curse, and whether love is really worth all that shit that accompanies it (we’ve all seen someone fall apart from heartbreak, if not experienced it ourselves). And the best part of Delirium? Oliver doesn’t answer that question. In fact, I felt that the novel’s ending more supported the government’s point of view than anything else—but I suppose that’s why there are still two more books to come.

And now I’d love to hear what you all think! What are your opinions on the quality of YA fiction? Are there any dystopian novels you’ve read that deserve the sort of praise The Hunger Games is receiving? And for those of you who have read Delirium (or even those of you who haven’t), if you had the option, would you go through with the procedure? Sound off below!

What did I learn from reading Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley? One: Patricia Highsmith is a BAMF. Two: I might be a sociopath.

Let’s take that one at a time.

Patricia Highsmith was a woman (duh). She wrote TTMR in the 1950s. So what did I expect going into this book? Certainly not, as 1001BYMRBYD puts it, “the line Highsmith draws between psychosis on the one hand, and class envy and sexual yearning on the other.”

Outwardly, protagonist Tom Ripley is endearingly awkward, a nervous young man eager to please and be pleased. Only the reader is privy to his secret thoughts and actions, which include severe paranoia and insecurity, insatiable lusts for material goods and storytelling, and, you know, a couple of murders.

1001BYMRBYD goes on to say that

…it is possible to read [Tom Ripley's] deviant behavoir both in relatively straightforward terms as a symptom of a mental illness and as a complex manifestation of bourgeois amitions and repressed homosexual desire.

After reading this critique, I was pleased to find my own interpretation of Tom’s character as “complex.” The treatment of any kind of sexuality, homo or otherwise, in this book was fascinating to me because it is at once so obvious and so repressed. Tom Ripley is profoundly asexual in his tastes, becoming repulsed multiple times by thoughts of underwear or bare flesh. However, his obsession with his wealthy friend Dickie Greenleaf seems to indicate something beyond platonic admiration. What’s unclear, or at the very least called into question, is whether his fascination is with Dickie as a man or with Dickie as a tool through which Tom can achieve his dream of freedom through material wealth. Highsmith herself gave conflicting answers to the question of Tom’s sexuality in interviews.

As I mentioned, Tom’s “symptoms of mental illness” include severe paranoia and insecurity. This, obviously, is where my worry that I might be a sociopath comes in. Despite his complete narcissism, amorality, manic tendencies, whatever else he is, Tom is a very relatable character. In his relationships with other characters, he tends to latch on to small comments, moods, or actions and instantly assumes the worst. This—sadly—I found quite familiar. (I guess the only redeeming part of that is that I didn’t find his subsequent decision that everyone hated him and so he must kill them as familiar.) And so, I found myself rooting for him to escape from the police and be friends with everyone, despite the very real fact that I knew he was a murderer. It was very unsettling.

…Tom thought, if only he hadn’t been in such a hurry and so greedy, if only he hadn’t misjudged [Dickie], then none of this would have happened, and he could have lived with Dickie for the rest of his life… If only he hadn’t put on Dickie’s clothes that day—

Even though my copy of Highsmith was a collection of three Ripley novels, I don’t think I’m mentally prepared to move on to the next one immediately… I might have to detour into the Mindy Kaling book that’s been sitting on my shelf before I can return to Tom Ripley.

The first book on my list this year was Divergent by Veronica Roth, which was deemed one of the best books of 2011, with good reason. As you can see, I’m still on the dystopian kick that I’ve been on since I wrote about dystopian YA in my first post. And I have to say, I absolutely adored this book. I found it refreshingly original, which is saying something for a book that’s part of such a saturated market. Beyond that, it had so many strong and wonderful characters to love, and even a few that I loved to hate.

But though Divergent is original in some ways, there was something very interesting in it that reminded me of other books I’ve read and loved. In Tris’s Chicago, society is divided into five groups, called factions (Abnegation, Candor, Amity, Erudite, and Dauntless), each with its own coordinating quality that defines them. When the members of each faction turn 16, they must decide whether they want to stay in the faction they were born into, or if they want to transfer to a new faction with which they feel they identify better. One of the main themes of the story is the choice Tris makes about which faction to belong to and the irrevocable changes that it causes in her life.

Besides inspiring some interesting thoughts about the consequences of such a simplified and rigid societal system, these groups made me think of something I’ve noticed in the past. Wonderful books like Harry Potter and The Hunger Games (I do read more besides kids’ books; I swear) also have a set of groups that make up their society. Heck, even The Lord of the Rings gets in on the clique action with its various races.

These groups, in my opinion, are a significant part of why such books are so well-loved. Of course, much of their popularity is due to the fact that they are skillfully written, or at the very least, entertainingly written. But whether or not the authors realized it at the time, they were cooking up a pretty compelling recipe for success. And here’s why–when a reader reads this kind of book, they invariably ask themselves this question: “If I were one of the characters in this book, where would I fit?”

We’ve all done it. We’ve wondered which characters would be likeliest to accept us into their ranks, and which groups we’d most like to join up with, even if the two don’t necessarily coincide. Some of us are fans of so many things that we’ve started to consider ourselves Hufflepuff Amity Hobbits from District 4. We won’t name any names, of course.

In any event, there’s a few important things that this question does for readers. It causes them to be honest with themselves about which group their personal qualities line up with the most, and they must wrestle with themselves as they learn the difference between the qualities they want to have versus those they truly possess. They learn more about which attributes they consider desirable, and they become inspired to work toward attaining them. They are reminded of the need to belong that they’ve had since they were young enough to know what the concept meant. They are made to ponder the importance of having a group of friends they can trust, as well as why they need to be thoughtful when it comes to choosing just which friends those will be. They see that, while it seems like there are countless things that make us different, the reality is that all of us want the same thing–somewhere to belong.

I love reading these stories because of the way they make me think, and sometimes I wish there were more books like them. They represent humanity and its common societal needs with a starkness and honesty that few other methods afford. They strip such needs down to their bare bones and allow us to think about why they’re so important and what their consequences are with regards to our view of ourselves and our interactions with others. And in my opinion, those are excellent things for a book to do.

Let’s hear what you’re thinking–do you like books with groups, like the ones I talked about, or do you think the concept is overly simplistic and cliched? Do you think such books are important, or are they just gimmicky? What have books like these taught you about yourself or others? How have they made you think? I’m sure I’ve just scratched the surface here, so I hope you’ll share your thoughts!

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, written by Jonathan Safran Foer, was released in 2005 and was one of the first novels concerning the aftermath of 9/11. Oksar Schell is a young, possibly autistic boy dealing with his newly widowed mother, a possible final scavenger hunt from his late father, and a secret about his father’s final words. He travels across New York City to discover his final message, and discovers instead histories and characters that drive his growth as a character. The end, of course, leaves a hint of finality and a whole lot of “what just happened and what does it mean?” I have thought about that last question for weeks.

One of the many beautiful things about Extremely is Foer’s exposition. Many parts feel like short stories about individuals, worked magically into a longer narrative about a city and a culture. One may have made me cry (the sixth borough, anyone?). The book also incorporates a flip book, images of Oksar’s clues, and occasional long, one paragraph monologues that look daunting but are so very insightful. Reading Foer, and Extremely Loud, is like that delicious first taste of Thanksgiving dinner. But it lasts for a whole novel.

I’m excited for the movie because of talented, proven cast selected to represent this book of Foer’s, and also to see the reaction the US gives to it. Again, it deals with the aftermath of 9/11, and I am so intrigued to see how people react to the intelligent, but hopeful and innocent adventures of Oskar, looking for that one last message from dad.

Foer is one of my very favorite authors. If you enjoy this book or movie, check out either adaption of Everything is Illuminated! Also, I was lucky enough to see him speak in person shortly after the 10-year anniversary of 9/11 and thank you, Mr. Foer, for your support of college and community reading programs!