Somewhere along the line, this clown named T.L. Tedrow decided he should write stories about Laura Ingalls Wilder (of Little House on the Prairie fame) as a grownup. The series is called The Days of Laura Ingalls Wilder and it is, in short, a whole lot of garbage. I picked the first one up at the library on a whim, because I am a huge dork and absolutely love anything related to the Little House books, and was appalled at how terrible it was. This evening, I spent a not insignificant amount of time writing a review on Amazon of said book (which certainly doesn't deserve to have this much thought dedicated to it), and since this is my blog and I can do what I want, I will now post this review for your edification and entertainment.
My review of Missouri Homestead (The Days of Laura Ingalls Wilder, Book 1)
I picked this up at my local library expecting something like the other spin-offs of the Little House series (the Martha, Charlotte, Caroline, and Rose Years books). I grew up reading and loving the original series, and I'm also a fan of historical fiction in general. Coming from that background, I was sorely disappointed and even upset by the liberties Mr. Tedrow has taken with this material.
First off, while I understand that historical fiction is by necessity "fiction," this book completely disregards the things we *do* know about the characters. Almanzo calling Laura "Laury" instead of "Bess" is particularly jarring. Also pointless and irritating was the name change of their farm from "Rocky Ridge" to "Apple Hill." Worse yet, Tedrow seems to completely ignore nine books' worth of existing characterization and turns the thoughtful, determined yet caring Laura into a headstrong, domineering harpy. "Demanding" indoor plumbing, indeed! Almanzo is similarly flattened, being presented as little more than a dimwitted hillbilly. Their relationship is turned into a cheap sitcom caricaturization in which their interactions seem to consist entirely of bickering.
Tedrow's own characters, the "Youngun" children, are absolute fluff. The simple fact that they have rhyming names - Larry, Terry, and Sherry - should clue you in to the level of thought that went into these caricatures. (Also, "Youngun"? Not a name. Just sayin'.) He clearly added them to add easy appeal to younger children, but they end up being just the comic relief, and have no bearing on the main plot.
Even worse is the character of Maurice Springer. I'm not sure why he's there at all, honestly, as he does nothing to progress the plot. It's also problematic that, as the lone black character in the books (apart from his wife, Eula Mae, who is little more than a name on the page), he seems to exist primarily to aid and abet the Youngun children in their hijinks. Whatever that is, it's not progressive.
Speaking of the main plot, it's paper-thin. Laura is writing a column for the local newspaper (which, to Tedrow's credit, she actually did do) and gets tangled up in a plot by some unscrupulous lumbermen to make it look like a fungus is attacking trees in the area so that they can cut down more of them. The bad guys as characters have all the nuance and depth of Snidely Whiplash; even for a children's book, I was disappointed. It read more like a cheap Nancy Drew knockoff than a Little House book.
In short, if the author hadn't requisitioned the Laura Ingalls Wilder name, this book would be mediocre at best - a useless but mostly harmless piece of juvenile fluff. As it is, I honestly think it's an affront to Laura's name, and the author should be ashamed of himself for trying to ride someone else's coattails, instead of writing a story that's actually worth reading.
Showing posts with label books. Show all posts
Showing posts with label books. Show all posts
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Friday, January 7, 2011
H*ck Finn
In case you haven't heard, a "Twain scholar" named Alan Gribben, with the help of a small publishing company called NewSouth, is publishing an edited version of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn which removes all instances of the "n-word," replacing it with the word "slave." Huck is a regular on lists of banned books, generally due to its use of this word, and Gribben says he hopes that its removal will let the book reach a wider audience by removing the offensive content. A laudable intention, I'll grant, but bowdlerizing Twain is not the way to accomplish it.
Gribben says the inspiration for the project came from comments he heard from teachers: "After a number of talks, I was sought out by local teachers, and to a person they said we would love to teach [Tom Sawyer], and Huckleberry Finn, but we feel we can't do it anymore. In the new classroom, it's really not acceptable." I would argue that the fault here lies not with Twain's language, but rather with the teachers. I read Huck Finn in high school, and it was not a big deal. The teacher did not make a speech of any sort before we read the book, and offered no disclaimers or apologies for its content; instead, we had spirited class discussion about the book, including the language used, its meaning, Twain's intentions as a satirist, and the implications of various aspects of the text, both in the 19th century and today. If students cannot understand the concept of context, then it is the teacher's job to explain it to them. If the teacher is uncomfortable talking about difficult subjects with their students to the point where they simply refuse to do it, then that person is not qualified be a teacher. Rather than "less offensive" books, we need teachers who are willing and able to properly teach their students, which for English teachers includes helping them examine satire, providing proper context for literature, and not shying away from problematic parts of books.
(As far as number of people reading the book, it is also worth pointing out that there is a not-insignificant number of people, including teenagers, who set out to read books precisely because they have been banned, as promoted by the ALA's Banned Books Week, among others.)
Gribben also added a personal anecdote about his daughter's experience with the book: "My daughter went to a magnet school and one of her best friends was an African-American girl. She loathed the book, could barely read it." I don't doubt it. But that is the very point: satire makes people uncomfortable. It points out societal problems, in the hope that ridicule will make people think about what is going on and hopefully eradicate the problem. It's the same thing Jonathan Swift was doing when he advocated eating babies, and it's the same thing Jon Stewart did a couple weeks ago when he pointed out the hypocrisy of the Republicans who were blocking the 9/11 responders health care bill in Congress. The fact that the n-word still makes people uncomfortable only shows that racism still exists today, and far from being censored or banned, books like Huck Finn neet to be read as they are so that people continue to think about these issues that make them uncomfortable, and what they can do to stop them.
Another thing to take into account is Twain himself. He was on the record numerous times during his life as being absolutely opposed to people changing his work. Furthermore, at the beginning of Huck Finn, he puts the following note:
Removing the "n-word" from Huck Finn is tantamount to whitewashing. Sure, the racism is still there, but it's not nearly as viscerally affecting to hear someone called a "slave" as it is to hear them called a "n----r." The satire is rendered toothless when the ugliness it's pointing at has been removed. Sure, people who wouldn't have read the book before might be a bit more likely to read it, but what's the point if it's not the same book?
Gribben says the inspiration for the project came from comments he heard from teachers: "After a number of talks, I was sought out by local teachers, and to a person they said we would love to teach [Tom Sawyer], and Huckleberry Finn, but we feel we can't do it anymore. In the new classroom, it's really not acceptable." I would argue that the fault here lies not with Twain's language, but rather with the teachers. I read Huck Finn in high school, and it was not a big deal. The teacher did not make a speech of any sort before we read the book, and offered no disclaimers or apologies for its content; instead, we had spirited class discussion about the book, including the language used, its meaning, Twain's intentions as a satirist, and the implications of various aspects of the text, both in the 19th century and today. If students cannot understand the concept of context, then it is the teacher's job to explain it to them. If the teacher is uncomfortable talking about difficult subjects with their students to the point where they simply refuse to do it, then that person is not qualified be a teacher. Rather than "less offensive" books, we need teachers who are willing and able to properly teach their students, which for English teachers includes helping them examine satire, providing proper context for literature, and not shying away from problematic parts of books.
(As far as number of people reading the book, it is also worth pointing out that there is a not-insignificant number of people, including teenagers, who set out to read books precisely because they have been banned, as promoted by the ALA's Banned Books Week, among others.)
Gribben also added a personal anecdote about his daughter's experience with the book: "My daughter went to a magnet school and one of her best friends was an African-American girl. She loathed the book, could barely read it." I don't doubt it. But that is the very point: satire makes people uncomfortable. It points out societal problems, in the hope that ridicule will make people think about what is going on and hopefully eradicate the problem. It's the same thing Jonathan Swift was doing when he advocated eating babies, and it's the same thing Jon Stewart did a couple weeks ago when he pointed out the hypocrisy of the Republicans who were blocking the 9/11 responders health care bill in Congress. The fact that the n-word still makes people uncomfortable only shows that racism still exists today, and far from being censored or banned, books like Huck Finn neet to be read as they are so that people continue to think about these issues that make them uncomfortable, and what they can do to stop them.
Another thing to take into account is Twain himself. He was on the record numerous times during his life as being absolutely opposed to people changing his work. Furthermore, at the beginning of Huck Finn, he puts the following note:
IN this book a number of dialects are used, to wit: the Missouri negro dialect; the extremest form of the backwoods Southwestern dialect; the ordinary "Pike County" dialect; and four modified varieties of this last. The shadings have not been done in a haphazard fashion, or by guesswork; but painstakingly, and with the trustworthy guidance and support of personal familiarity with these several forms of speech.It says right there that the language used in the book's dialogue was done "painstakingly" — Twain knew what he was doing and he did it on purpose. And this isn't a matter of something being lost due to language change, either; he meant exactly what it sounds like to us today. Some words were considered perfectly acceptable in the past, and no longer are; for example, in the past, black people could be described as "colored" in polite conversation, but today that would be a faux-pas, at best. The "n-word" is not one of those words. It has never been anything but an insult, an offensive term for people thought to be inferior. The difference is that modern society has, for the most part, accepted that people are not superior or inferior because of race, and so it is no longer considered acceptable to use that word.
I make this explanation for the reason that without it many readers would suppose that all these characters were trying to talk alike and not succeeding.
Removing the "n-word" from Huck Finn is tantamount to whitewashing. Sure, the racism is still there, but it's not nearly as viscerally affecting to hear someone called a "slave" as it is to hear them called a "n----r." The satire is rendered toothless when the ugliness it's pointing at has been removed. Sure, people who wouldn't have read the book before might be a bit more likely to read it, but what's the point if it's not the same book?
Saturday, May 30, 2009
distraction
So, for my final paper for Young Adult Lit, I chose to write about The Perks of Being a Wallflower. Now that I sit here, trying to actually write the paper, it occurs to me that I should have picked any other book for my topic, because I like this one waaaay too much, and so when I go to look for something in it, I get distracted and start reading it again. And then I've wasted huge amounts of time reading when I'm supposed to be working.
I hate finals.
I hate finals.
Monday, May 11, 2009
the perks of great books
I am currently reading The Perks of Being a Wallflower for my Intro to Young Adult Lit class. This is the second time I've read it. The first time, I devoured it whole in a single evening (right before my eye surgery, you may recall). I wanted to read it again shortly after that, but I was scared to, because I liked it so much that first time that I was worried another read-through would not have the same impression. I mean really, emotionally speaking, it hit me like a train. Books don't usually do that to me. So I was leery of reading it again.
Come to find out, I needn't have worried. I started it again last night, and it was just as good as I remembered. I had to make a concerted effort to actually put it down and go to sleep, because it was 4 AM and I was dead tired—if my eyes hadn't kept closing of their own accord, I probably would've read it all through in one sitting again. I'll almost certainly finish it tonight, or tomorrow at the latest, because once I pick it up again, I won't drop it until it's done. It's that good.
Of course, that's actually kind of a problem this time, because I have to write a critical response for class, meaning something a little more in-depth than just "OMG♥♥♥♥♥!!!!!" I'll probably end up reading it again before I have to write the response. And I can actually do that, because I'm almost three weeks ahead on the reading for that class. Now if only my other classes inspired such a work ethic.
Anyway. Go read this book. Seriously. Do it now.
Come to find out, I needn't have worried. I started it again last night, and it was just as good as I remembered. I had to make a concerted effort to actually put it down and go to sleep, because it was 4 AM and I was dead tired—if my eyes hadn't kept closing of their own accord, I probably would've read it all through in one sitting again. I'll almost certainly finish it tonight, or tomorrow at the latest, because once I pick it up again, I won't drop it until it's done. It's that good.
Of course, that's actually kind of a problem this time, because I have to write a critical response for class, meaning something a little more in-depth than just "OMG♥♥♥♥♥!!!!!" I'll probably end up reading it again before I have to write the response. And I can actually do that, because I'm almost three weeks ahead on the reading for that class. Now if only my other classes inspired such a work ethic.
Anyway. Go read this book. Seriously. Do it now.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
in which there is some long-overdue Twilight hate
A preface
[I'll admit, I read all four books. All my friends were doing it, and it seemed like the thing to do. I know, I know, peer pressure is bad. Well I found that out. Anyway. I have lots of problems with the Twilight series, some of them more fleshed out in my head than others. Probably first and foremost are issues of content, that is, subjects, themes, and particularly the disturbingly anti-feminist messages that seem so glaringly obvious throughout the books. However, I'm in English-student mode this evening, so this post will focus mainly on form and style. Okay, disclaimer out of the way. ¡Adelante!]
So, I've made this rant to a few people now, but I really just want to put it out there: speakers of American English DO NOT SAY "ER." Y'know, "er," the little filler word they use in place of "uh" in the Harry Potter books. They don't. Think about it. Have you ever, EVER, in conversation, heard a speaker of American English say "er" without consciously thinking about it? No. No you haven't. Because speakers of American English do not say it. They say "uh."
Now, the reason it's in Harry Potter is because the British *do* say it; however, spoken with a British accent, "er" would be basically indistinguishable from the American "uh." It's the same sound. They just spell it that way because they're British, and their 'r's don't work the same way ours do.
However, whenever I see it in a novel by an American, about American characters, it ticks me off, because it is WRONG. And it is particularly prevalent in one of my favorite targets of hatred, the Twilight series. Stephenie Meyer loves "er." Seriously. Pick a section of dialogue from any of those books, and besides horribly stilted and crappy prose that would make you cringe to hear out loud, you will also find "er" in large quantities.
I'm fairly sure this is because of Harry Potter, and the semi-creepy fetishization of all things British that has followed those books' rise in popularity among some groups on this side of the pond. I mean, you read any half-decent Harry Potter fanfiction (or even the truly terrible, actually), and you will likely find "er." And really, the only things that distinguish Twilight from really crummy fanfiction are that 1) the characters' names are not recognizable from a previously published work (though their personalities are generally direct lifts from any number of stock characters throughout the history of FOREVER), and 2) you're reading it on paper, not a computer screen.
And besides that, it really does have all the hallmarks of truly terrible fanfiction. The heroine is an obvious Mary Sue (didn't Meyer even come right out and say that Bella was based on herself? I can't find it now, but I'm sure I read that somewhere...), with a "flaw" (klutziness) that is supposedly major in her life, but perceived as everyone around her by adorable and/or endearing. The characters are, for the most part, completely and utterly flat. Seriously, some of them have real potential—the dad, hello?!—but Meyer just leaves them blank, with a few tacked-on adjectives or superficial descriptions serving as placeholders for depth. The dialogue is stilted and cheesy, and the prose in general is overly descriptive and weak (I love adjectives and adverbs far more than is healthy for a creative writing major, and even I was fed up!). And the entire plot is glaringly predictable: Edward wins. Edward is going to win from the first moment Bella sets eyes on him from across the cafeteria. Those die-hard Jacob fans were fooling themselves the entire time, because Bella's feelings were were described so heavy-handedly, it was like Meyer took one of the Cullens' baseball bats and whacked the reader over the head with it, shouting, "EDWARD IS GOING TO WIN!" Really. Just like that.
But the coup de grâce, the absolute most truly terrible fanfiction moment, was the child's name in Breaking Dawn. I thought real people knew you weren't supposed to combine two fairly normal names into some strange, exotic-sounding bit of nonsense and then label a person with that. Seriously. Reneé: perfectly respectable name. Esme: a little soap-opera-y, but okay, I can deal with that. But Renesme?! If there were a kid named that, she would be laughed out of kindergarten, by the teacher if no one else. The epilogue to the Harry Potter series was bad enough, what with the kids being named things like "Albus Severus" and "Theodore James" or whatever the hell they were...I remarked to numerous people at the time that I loved the book, up until that, at which point it sounded like bad fanfiction. Which is exactly what the Twilight books sound like, except all through.
Oh and speaking of Harry Potter, I must express my extreme distaste with the near CONSTANT comparisons between Stephenie Meyer and J.K. Rowling.* They have both written extremely popular series of (at least nominally) fantasy books geared mainly towards children and/or young adults. This is where the comparisons should end. While I recognize that J.K. has her faults as a writer, her stories were well plotted, her characters were (for the most part) fleshed out and realistic, and the books were genuinely entertaining. The Twilight books share none of these characteristics. Even Stephen King thinks so—in what is probably my favorite bit of reporting ever, he is quoted in the U.K.'s Guardian as saying, "The real difference [between Meyer and Rowling] is that Jo Rowling is a terrific writer and Stephenie Meyer can't write worth a darn." Now, let's be honest kids, Stephen King is not a stellar writer. He writes entertaining stories that sell well (though I found his Dark Tower series to be highly enjoyable). And if even Stephen King thinks you're a bad writer, well, that's saying something, y'know?
Anyway, I'm beginning to exhaust my hate for the evening, but I do want to quote this passage from an article in Time Magazine, contrasting Meyer's writing with J.K. Rowling's:
*But, you might be saying, isn't that exactly what's going on in most of this post? And I would answer you no, what I am doing is contrasting, not comparing, which is entirely different and completely warranted in this situation.
[I'll admit, I read all four books. All my friends were doing it, and it seemed like the thing to do. I know, I know, peer pressure is bad. Well I found that out. Anyway. I have lots of problems with the Twilight series, some of them more fleshed out in my head than others. Probably first and foremost are issues of content, that is, subjects, themes, and particularly the disturbingly anti-feminist messages that seem so glaringly obvious throughout the books. However, I'm in English-student mode this evening, so this post will focus mainly on form and style. Okay, disclaimer out of the way. ¡Adelante!]
So, I've made this rant to a few people now, but I really just want to put it out there: speakers of American English DO NOT SAY "ER." Y'know, "er," the little filler word they use in place of "uh" in the Harry Potter books. They don't. Think about it. Have you ever, EVER, in conversation, heard a speaker of American English say "er" without consciously thinking about it? No. No you haven't. Because speakers of American English do not say it. They say "uh."
Now, the reason it's in Harry Potter is because the British *do* say it; however, spoken with a British accent, "er" would be basically indistinguishable from the American "uh." It's the same sound. They just spell it that way because they're British, and their 'r's don't work the same way ours do.
However, whenever I see it in a novel by an American, about American characters, it ticks me off, because it is WRONG. And it is particularly prevalent in one of my favorite targets of hatred, the Twilight series. Stephenie Meyer loves "er." Seriously. Pick a section of dialogue from any of those books, and besides horribly stilted and crappy prose that would make you cringe to hear out loud, you will also find "er" in large quantities.
I'm fairly sure this is because of Harry Potter, and the semi-creepy fetishization of all things British that has followed those books' rise in popularity among some groups on this side of the pond. I mean, you read any half-decent Harry Potter fanfiction (or even the truly terrible, actually), and you will likely find "er." And really, the only things that distinguish Twilight from really crummy fanfiction are that 1) the characters' names are not recognizable from a previously published work (though their personalities are generally direct lifts from any number of stock characters throughout the history of FOREVER), and 2) you're reading it on paper, not a computer screen.
And besides that, it really does have all the hallmarks of truly terrible fanfiction. The heroine is an obvious Mary Sue (didn't Meyer even come right out and say that Bella was based on herself? I can't find it now, but I'm sure I read that somewhere...), with a "flaw" (klutziness) that is supposedly major in her life, but perceived as everyone around her by adorable and/or endearing. The characters are, for the most part, completely and utterly flat. Seriously, some of them have real potential—the dad, hello?!—but Meyer just leaves them blank, with a few tacked-on adjectives or superficial descriptions serving as placeholders for depth. The dialogue is stilted and cheesy, and the prose in general is overly descriptive and weak (I love adjectives and adverbs far more than is healthy for a creative writing major, and even I was fed up!). And the entire plot is glaringly predictable: Edward wins. Edward is going to win from the first moment Bella sets eyes on him from across the cafeteria. Those die-hard Jacob fans were fooling themselves the entire time, because Bella's feelings were were described so heavy-handedly, it was like Meyer took one of the Cullens' baseball bats and whacked the reader over the head with it, shouting, "EDWARD IS GOING TO WIN!" Really. Just like that.
But the coup de grâce, the absolute most truly terrible fanfiction moment, was the child's name in Breaking Dawn. I thought real people knew you weren't supposed to combine two fairly normal names into some strange, exotic-sounding bit of nonsense and then label a person with that. Seriously. Reneé: perfectly respectable name. Esme: a little soap-opera-y, but okay, I can deal with that. But Renesme?! If there were a kid named that, she would be laughed out of kindergarten, by the teacher if no one else. The epilogue to the Harry Potter series was bad enough, what with the kids being named things like "Albus Severus" and "Theodore James" or whatever the hell they were...I remarked to numerous people at the time that I loved the book, up until that, at which point it sounded like bad fanfiction. Which is exactly what the Twilight books sound like, except all through.
Oh and speaking of Harry Potter, I must express my extreme distaste with the near CONSTANT comparisons between Stephenie Meyer and J.K. Rowling.* They have both written extremely popular series of (at least nominally) fantasy books geared mainly towards children and/or young adults. This is where the comparisons should end. While I recognize that J.K. has her faults as a writer, her stories were well plotted, her characters were (for the most part) fleshed out and realistic, and the books were genuinely entertaining. The Twilight books share none of these characteristics. Even Stephen King thinks so—in what is probably my favorite bit of reporting ever, he is quoted in the U.K.'s Guardian as saying, "The real difference [between Meyer and Rowling] is that Jo Rowling is a terrific writer and Stephenie Meyer can't write worth a darn." Now, let's be honest kids, Stephen King is not a stellar writer. He writes entertaining stories that sell well (though I found his Dark Tower series to be highly enjoyable). And if even Stephen King thinks you're a bad writer, well, that's saying something, y'know?
Anyway, I'm beginning to exhaust my hate for the evening, but I do want to quote this passage from an article in Time Magazine, contrasting Meyer's writing with J.K. Rowling's:
Rowling pieces her books together meticulously, detail by detail. Meyer floods the page like a severed artery. She never uses a sentence when she can use a whole paragraph. Her books are big (500-plus pages) but not dense--they have a pillowy quality distinctly reminiscent of Internet fan fiction. (Which she'll readily grant: "I don't think I'm a writer; I think I'm a storyteller," Meyer says. "The words aren't always perfect.") Whereas Rowling's works maintain a certain English reserve, Meyer's books are full of gusting emotions. Bella never stops gasping and swooning and passing out and waking up screaming from nightmares. Her heart is always either pounding or stopping. (Bella's histrionics don't feel at all unrealistic. When you're writing about adolescents, melodrama and realism are the same thing.) Rowling labors over her intricate plots, but Meyer's stories never bend or twist or branch. They have one gear, and she guns it straight ahead till the last page.This passage in particular, and the article in general, were written in what seemed to be a praising tone. That makes me sad. If any of the above were ever said about a piece of my writing, I'd probably want to throw it out and start over from scratch. If this is what the public wants, I shall never, ever be published. And I can't find it in my heart to say that'd be an entirely bad thing.
*But, you might be saying, isn't that exactly what's going on in most of this post? And I would answer you no, what I am doing is contrasting, not comparing, which is entirely different and completely warranted in this situation.
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