Once Upon a Bookshelf

Seven months ago, Willow was in a horrible accident. She was driving herself and her parents home after a night out. Her parents had had too much to drink, so asked her to drive home – through one of the worst storms of the year and Willow with only her drivers permit. The car swerved out of her control, and Willow had to witness the brutal death of both of their parents.

Now, Willow is living with her brother, his wife and their newborn child. She’s started a new school where she hasn’t made any new friends, she’s working part-time at a library to help her brother pay for their expenses, and she’s become a cutter to deal with her pain. One afternoon, while working at the library, she meets another student at her school – Guy – who is determined to help her as much as he possibly can.

Do you ever finish a book and find that you are completely unsure of how to respond to it? Even after a couple of days spent thinking about it, I’m still not sure what to think about Willow. Now, to be fair, I had a feeling that this was going to be the case before I had even started it. I was nervous about it – it could so easily go so wrong. Or it could be so enjoyable, but I would feel weird enjoying it because the subject matter is so … uncomfortable.

Hoban did a good job dealing with it. It felt like she really understood what she was writing about. If this was published about 10 years ago and I was dealing with someone who didn’t get this kind of stuff, then I would have wanted to recommend this book to them. Because it explains why a person may be depressed, it shows that it’s not something you can just decide to do or not to do, it goes into what that person may be thinking and feeling. It also shows why a person might consider cutting themselves – it never says that it is the right thing to do, or that it’s a good thing to do, but it shows sort of what the mentality might be for the person who does cut. And it can be uncomfortable getting into a character’s head where those sorts of thoughts are going on.

So it was a tough book to get through. I don’t normally like reading about that stuff at all. Depression is hard to read about as it is something I already have to deal with, and I’d rather not have to read about it if I don’t have to. But there was something about this book that drew me to it.

This book had some really good things going for it though. The secondary characters were brilliant. About half way through the book, I was worried that Guy was going to be completely one dimensional, and too perfect, but thankfully it turned out that he had a few flaws. And then there was Willow’s brother David … ah! I had a total crush on him. I wish the book had had more David in it, and that their relationship had been explored more.

And it was realistic. As I said before, it totally came across that Hoban knew what she was writing about. It felt real, how Willow jumps to her own conclusions about why David doesn’t talk to her like he used to, how Willow has such massive mood swings, how hard it is to actually care about anything, how Willow believes that letting herself feel anything other than pain is the worst thing for her … It was all just so real.

So I’m torn. I wouldn’t read it again, but I’d probably recommend it to someone… but possibly not to someone else who already deals with some of that stuff.

Okay, count me as the newest obsessee of Repo! I mean, I’ve known for months now that I’ve LOVED the music, but I finally saw the movie last night, and wow.

I will admit that when I realized that this was made by the same people who made the Saw movies, I seriously reconsidered purchasing it, because I really Do Not enjoy scary movies. But I’m so so so happy that I bought it.

It’s a dark movie, obviously, given the subject matter. In the 21st century, there is a pandemic of organ failures – a lot of people die from it. Out of the chaos rises GeneCo, a company that does organ transplants. If you can’t afford one, they will partially fund it. But if you can’t make any of your payments, they will send the Repo Man to take back the organ that you got.

So yes, dark subject matter. But oh, it was a gorgeous movie. The music is brilliant (but I knew that already). It’s all singing, as per usual for an opera. Sometimes it felt a little awkward, but for the most part it was brilliant. The costumes were awesome. The setting was creepy; it felt futuristic yet somehow gothic. It was just all-around beautiful (in a dark sort of way). Yes, there were parts that were gory, but it was done in such a way that it definitely did not seem realistic at all – I think this was definitely a factor as to why I loved this and wasn’t really squeamish at all about it.

The cast was brilliant – Anthony Stewart Head! Sarah Brightman! Lots of others! Lovely people! Even Paris Hilton wasn’t as bad as I had expected her to be.

I also loved the use of comic book panels to tell the backstory of each of the characters. Because the characters all had a past that (in all honesty) could have made up a whole new movie of its own, it was certainly an effective way to explain it without making it confusing (which it could have easily become).

So yes, brilliant movie! Will be watching it again soon. And now I’ve been listening to the soundtrack all day. Oh, wonderful stuff!

Sir Richard Sedgeley and Lady Mary have come upon hard times, and are no longer able to afford to keep up their castle. The castle has been in the Sedgeley family for five hundred years – and before that, belonged to the royal family for five hundred years. But a castle doesn’t make much income – few tourists come to this out-of-the-way castle in the middle of the English countryside, so Sir Richard has been looking at other opportunities. When a young American appears and offers to buy the castle in order to transform it into a museum, Sir Richard, Lady Mary and their two faithful servants starts questioning whether there is anything else they can do to keep the castle – including searching for lost treasure with the help of the castle ghosts.

Death in the Castle sits right on the edge of being almost a ghost story. It’s also almost a gothic novel. It’s certainly got the setting right – an old English castle, with dungeons, the frequent mention of ghosts, windows that don’t belong to any rooms… It’s just missing the atmosphere. But what it lack in atmosphere, it makes up in other areas of the novel.

Quite the cast of memorable characters in this book, I have to say. There’s Sir Richard and his wife, Lady Mary. Sir Richard is somewhat manic, and (as it turns out) rather crazy. Lady Mary is a sweet, almost timid woman, who turns a blind eye to her husband’s madness, and convinces herself (instead) that the castle is haunted. Then there’s Wells and his granddaughter Kate. Wells is the grumpy old butler, who has had to deal with (and hide) his master’s madness for many a year, while Kate is a bubbly young woman who loves Sir Richard and Lady Mary, but has no idea what’s really going on in the castle. And then there is John Blayne, the dashing young American who is trying to buy the castle, in order to transport it from the rural English countryside to … Connecticut.

The plot was a little unsurprising, but I wish it had gone a little bit more in depth in regards to Sir Richard’s madness. I would’ve loved to see more of the world from his perspective when he believed he was the king of England and had to defend his castle from the intruders (the Americans). It was such a short book, and quite the quick read, that I would’ve happily read more of what was going on in the lives of the characters.