Movie Monday #1

Over recent weeks I have been sensing the urge to watch The Book Thief but I never really found the time to do so. I don’t know why I didn’t watch it earlier; I really should have! It was an amazing movie!

For all those who don’t know, The Book Thief  is a movie (based on a book) which tells the story of a young girl during World War II; she basically falls in love with books, words, reading, writing etc.  but along the way she encounters situations such as book burnings and all the upheaval which occurred during these terrible years.

Actually at one point during the movie, I was googling all sorts of information about book burnings and authors; I wanted to know why it happened, what books were included, what authors were included, why were their books “bad” and it just opened a Pandora’s box for me, I needed to know everything!

I think movies like The Book Thief give the audience a different ideas to walk away with; that is to say, I walked away from this movie with a stronger attachment to the written word and the power of language as well as a sense of really trying to live life to the fullest.  But I feel like someone else watching this movie may gain a different feeling or belief just based on what they feel is important in life.

My one regret about this movie is actually watching the movie at all; LET ME EXPLAIN! I loved the movie and I loved the cinematography, I loved the cast and I generally loved it, BUT I think I should have read the book. I always prefer books over movies and I think if I had read the book, it would have done a lot more justice to the story, but you win some and you lose some. I probably might still try and read the book, but I really like some of the magic or (insert word here that I currently can’t think of) may be somewhat taken away simply because I’ve already seen the movie and I know what's going to happen (this doesn’t occur, for me, so much if I read the book first and then see the movie).

Never the less, it was a beautiful movie and I really loved the story. Excuse me now while I go hug my book collection…

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Book Post #1

Recently (and by recently, I mean at least 2 months ago) I finished reading The Picture of Dorian Gray. I love the classics, I really do. There’s nothing better than picking up a book that predates your parents and falling into a world of etiquette, intrigue and odd sense of timelessness. I studied literature in University, it’s my thing, I love getting lost in books and I love the adventure of each and every story.

However.

For some reason the classics have been killing me lately. The Picture of Dorian Gray wasn’t the first, in fact Dracula may have been the catalyst for my sudden declining interest. I can’t read them. I just can’t handle it. The language is driving me nuts, the countless chapters in which nothing eventuates is driving me bonkers and I’m finding the characters void of any really character. When I read a book, I want to cry with a character, I want to be happy with a character, I want to get angry AT a character and want to throw the book across the room. But these feelings have been declining and I haven’t felt my usual self when it comes to literary classics.

In order to remedy this problem, I’m going to read what I like to call Junk Food Novels. I call them JFN’s because they are just like what junk food is to your health. You know junk food is bad for you, you know you’re not going to get any nutritional value from it and yet you can’t help but get a few moments of bliss when your eating it. Which is like JFN’s; I know these books aren’t good for me and I know I’m not going to learn anything ground breaking but I also know that for a few moments, I’m immersed in a whole new world in which I can get angry at the characters.

So here are some of the books I’m going to be reading over the next month (or three), this is also called “That time I didn’t feel like changing my camera settings, so please excuse the horrible quality”:

 

	That Part Was True - Deborah McKinlay
Recipe for Scandal - Debby Holt
	That Loving Feeling - Carole Matthews (Lets be honest, I got this book because it reminds me of a song)
The Overnight Socialite -Bridie Clark

I will review each and every book I read on completion of reading them so stay tuned. I will probably be reading them in this order.

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