Magyk: Septimus Heap, by ??? The Harry Potter is arguably one of those once-in-a-lifetime phenomenons, so I'd be crazy to expect that anything would or could match Harry Potter for plot, character, or overall imagination. But I'd hoped that this might be good enough. The best that I can say is that it was okay enough. The son of the seventh son, hence Septimus, is at the heart of this book. It doesn't take too long to figure out who among the characters is the real Septimus, given that Septimus allegedly died at birth--so much for suspense. And there's too little character development to cause me to care about really any of the characters. Jenna or the Queenling? Seems nice enough, but other than that she is the adopted daughter of the Heaps who looks nothing like them, there's not much more to say. Nicko? He's one of the Heaps, and he knows his way around a boat, but so? Marcia, the ExtraOrdinary Wizard? Other than that there's only one, who gets the penthouse suite of the Wizard's Tower, it's not clear how the ExtraOrdinary Wizard is different from the Ordinary Ones.
Maybe it's not fair to compare Septimus Heap to the Harry Potter series, but when I think of what I knew after the first book, I understood that Hermione was a know-it-all with the brains to back it up, and even in the first book, her character developed as she learned to moderate her annoying know-it-allness. I understood the charcters of Fred and George Weasley. It was clear that Ron felt the insecurity of being the youngest son in an old wizarding family. Heck, even Neville Longbottom was drawn well enough that I felt like I knew him because I had known kids like him growing up. Not to mention that the creatures JKR created were not only creative, they existed to push the story further. Plus, Harry Potter appealed to both kids and adults.
Maybe the other books in the Magyk series will accomplish more of the things I was looking for, but ultimately, this first one was a book that I could put down quite easily, and it did not spark my interest enough to want to read the others in the series.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
2(Jane Austen) + Perry.
Well, I finished Sense and Sensibility, and then, since I was in "Jane Austen mode," I figured I might as well go ahead and read Emma. But one can stay in JAM only so long before one has to return to the non-JAM world. That's where, The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog, comes in. So here goes.
Sense and Sensibility. I did it! I finally finished this book, having started it a couple of times before becoming distracted during the first chapter. I liked it, but hadn't gotten far enough into it to feel compelled to finish it when life (and other books) got in the way. Anywho, I enjoyed it. Typical Jane Austen fare, where much of the tension centers around young women who must find a spouse or risk eternal vulnerability. And as is so often clear in JA books, even marriage is no guaranty of security, as Mrs. Dashwood finds out when her husband leaves the vast majority of his property to his son from his first marriage, notwithstanding that the son already has a house in London and is well-provided for, leaving his three daughters and their mother essentially without a home. Of course there is the rogue man (Willoughby) who toys with Maryann's affections. And in this book, we get the rogue female, if you will, in the form of Lucy Steele, who dashes Elinor's hopes for domestic happiness by disclosing that she is secretly engaged to Edward Ferrars, whom Elinor hoped to bag--I mean marry. It all works out in the end as both women end up with the right man--Ferrars in Elinor's case, and Col. Whathisface in Maryann's case. Elinor who is "sense" in the beginning becomes more sensible, and Maryann who is "sensibility" develops (finally) good sense. The one thing you can count on is that everyone will marry happily in the end, and have enough income to have servants. Life is good.
Emma. Yet another book that I started but only now finished. Poor (or rather rich), determined Emma, the neighborhood "matchmaker." Having fixed up her governess, she is convinced that she can do the same for Harriet, a girl with no known parentage and limited means. As one would expect, it all goes awry, to the despair of Harriet. And then there's Frank Churchill, whom Emma takes great delight in using him as her sounding board as she bad-mouths Jane Fairfax, of whom, at bottom, Emma is jealous of. What a surprise she ultimately has coming about the real deal between Jane Fairfax and Churchill. And although Emma is determined to remain single, in part to care for her invalid father, in the end, we know, it's JA! There will be a marriage, and in fact, there are three: Emma, Harriet, and Jane all find their true loves. And they're all going to be mostly fat and happy.
Having read two JABs back-to-back, I find myself torn about whether I like JA or not. I like the stories, and there are complex themes, and even a hint of feminism at times. JA was one of the gentry and her characters live in that world. The servants exist only to serve and to provide a tidbit of gossip from time-to-time. On the other hand, the portrait of the rich is not particularly complimentary. They sometimes come across as insensitive and self-centered, or even shallow--after all Frank Churchill rides off to London (16 miles!) simply to get a haircut. That's seems extreme even today! They mostly do nothing, except sitting around playing cards, eating, and gossiping. In the end, I like Jane Austen, but I feel like a traitor or an outsider. She didn't write about people like me by any stretch of a comparison. But I suppose I'll eventually read the only JA novel that remains to be read, i.e, Northanger Abbey. Indeed, I'll probably even re-read most if not all of them.
The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog by Dr. Bruce Perry. A friend, who adopted an older child, recommended this book, and I have her to thank for it. Perry is a child psychiatrist/researcher who used this book to illustrate some his principles and findings regarding children who have suffered very difficult childhoods.
One chapter addresses how they addressed the needs of the Branch Davidian children during the seige and in the months thereafter and what they learned about children from that disaster. He talks about a two boys, one from a middle-class family and one from a poor family, with a mentally challenged mother, both of whom were left totally unattended during the first months of their lives and how it impacted their futures. Their needs for food and shelter were met, but they missed the warm touch and rhythm that comes from a care-giver who rocked and cooed to the children. There's the little girl who, despite her high caloric diet, failed to gain weight and was thought to be the first documented case of infant anorexia. As it turns out, her mother, who loved her dearly and sought help for her, had never been mothered herself as a child in the foster care system who had been moved every six months so that she wouldn't form any attachments. She didn't know how to form an attachment with her own daughter, and thus, the child failed to thrive. Mama P. was the answer--a foster parent who intuitively knew that damaged children need to be rocked and babied to make up for what they missed without concern for their chronological age.
And of course, there's the boy who was raised as a dog. After his grandmother died, her live-in boyfriend, who knew little about raising children, treated him like a dog. He wasn't cruel, he just failed to provide the boy with what he needed.
In short, the thesis of the book is the importance of patterned, repetitive conduct to help children form the attachments that they need to grow up to be healthy adults. In addition, he gives a glimpse in how he and those in his clinic go about helping children. He does a lot of coloring with the kids. It allows them to begin the therapy at their own pace.
Perry appears to be a phenomenal shrink, with uncommon insight. A bit arrogant, but with the intelligence and the success to back it up. Ultimately, the value comes in helping me to understand some of the things we've learned about the children we've fostered. Time well spent.
Sense and Sensibility. I did it! I finally finished this book, having started it a couple of times before becoming distracted during the first chapter. I liked it, but hadn't gotten far enough into it to feel compelled to finish it when life (and other books) got in the way. Anywho, I enjoyed it. Typical Jane Austen fare, where much of the tension centers around young women who must find a spouse or risk eternal vulnerability. And as is so often clear in JA books, even marriage is no guaranty of security, as Mrs. Dashwood finds out when her husband leaves the vast majority of his property to his son from his first marriage, notwithstanding that the son already has a house in London and is well-provided for, leaving his three daughters and their mother essentially without a home. Of course there is the rogue man (Willoughby) who toys with Maryann's affections. And in this book, we get the rogue female, if you will, in the form of Lucy Steele, who dashes Elinor's hopes for domestic happiness by disclosing that she is secretly engaged to Edward Ferrars, whom Elinor hoped to bag--I mean marry. It all works out in the end as both women end up with the right man--Ferrars in Elinor's case, and Col. Whathisface in Maryann's case. Elinor who is "sense" in the beginning becomes more sensible, and Maryann who is "sensibility" develops (finally) good sense. The one thing you can count on is that everyone will marry happily in the end, and have enough income to have servants. Life is good.
Emma. Yet another book that I started but only now finished. Poor (or rather rich), determined Emma, the neighborhood "matchmaker." Having fixed up her governess, she is convinced that she can do the same for Harriet, a girl with no known parentage and limited means. As one would expect, it all goes awry, to the despair of Harriet. And then there's Frank Churchill, whom Emma takes great delight in using him as her sounding board as she bad-mouths Jane Fairfax, of whom, at bottom, Emma is jealous of. What a surprise she ultimately has coming about the real deal between Jane Fairfax and Churchill. And although Emma is determined to remain single, in part to care for her invalid father, in the end, we know, it's JA! There will be a marriage, and in fact, there are three: Emma, Harriet, and Jane all find their true loves. And they're all going to be mostly fat and happy.
Having read two JABs back-to-back, I find myself torn about whether I like JA or not. I like the stories, and there are complex themes, and even a hint of feminism at times. JA was one of the gentry and her characters live in that world. The servants exist only to serve and to provide a tidbit of gossip from time-to-time. On the other hand, the portrait of the rich is not particularly complimentary. They sometimes come across as insensitive and self-centered, or even shallow--after all Frank Churchill rides off to London (16 miles!) simply to get a haircut. That's seems extreme even today! They mostly do nothing, except sitting around playing cards, eating, and gossiping. In the end, I like Jane Austen, but I feel like a traitor or an outsider. She didn't write about people like me by any stretch of a comparison. But I suppose I'll eventually read the only JA novel that remains to be read, i.e, Northanger Abbey. Indeed, I'll probably even re-read most if not all of them.
The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog by Dr. Bruce Perry. A friend, who adopted an older child, recommended this book, and I have her to thank for it. Perry is a child psychiatrist/researcher who used this book to illustrate some his principles and findings regarding children who have suffered very difficult childhoods.
One chapter addresses how they addressed the needs of the Branch Davidian children during the seige and in the months thereafter and what they learned about children from that disaster. He talks about a two boys, one from a middle-class family and one from a poor family, with a mentally challenged mother, both of whom were left totally unattended during the first months of their lives and how it impacted their futures. Their needs for food and shelter were met, but they missed the warm touch and rhythm that comes from a care-giver who rocked and cooed to the children. There's the little girl who, despite her high caloric diet, failed to gain weight and was thought to be the first documented case of infant anorexia. As it turns out, her mother, who loved her dearly and sought help for her, had never been mothered herself as a child in the foster care system who had been moved every six months so that she wouldn't form any attachments. She didn't know how to form an attachment with her own daughter, and thus, the child failed to thrive. Mama P. was the answer--a foster parent who intuitively knew that damaged children need to be rocked and babied to make up for what they missed without concern for their chronological age.
And of course, there's the boy who was raised as a dog. After his grandmother died, her live-in boyfriend, who knew little about raising children, treated him like a dog. He wasn't cruel, he just failed to provide the boy with what he needed.
In short, the thesis of the book is the importance of patterned, repetitive conduct to help children form the attachments that they need to grow up to be healthy adults. In addition, he gives a glimpse in how he and those in his clinic go about helping children. He does a lot of coloring with the kids. It allows them to begin the therapy at their own pace.
Perry appears to be a phenomenal shrink, with uncommon insight. A bit arrogant, but with the intelligence and the success to back it up. Ultimately, the value comes in helping me to understand some of the things we've learned about the children we've fostered. Time well spent.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Ending the year on serious note
The Emperor of All Maladies, by Siddhartha Mukharjee.
Can a book about cancer really be compelling without being depressing? Um, yeah. The New York Times listed this book as one of the best of 2010, so I figured why not. An biography of cancer--what an intriguing concept. And Mukharjee does recount cancer from its earliest known roots to the present day. It is, as any biogrpahy must be, a recount of history. But more than any biography of a living person, it is the science behind a living cell in which something has gone terribly wrong. Mukharjee recounts the theories over time that have explained cancer, from black bile to the current understanding of a cell mutation. Not surprising, treatment has changed as understading has grown. On the other hand, as much as scientists have learned, there is still so much not known or understood about cancers.
Perhaps the most startling thing is how much of what is conventional knowledge now has been discovered only within my lifetime. For example, until the 1960s, the deforming radical mastectomy was fairly standard treatment for all breast cancers, even though there'd been little to no research to confirm its effectiveness or even its necessity. Indeed, many of the research methods that are fairly common-place have been in use for only a relativly short time. For example, one expects that a cancer diagnosis today means surgery, followed immediately by a cocktail of different chemotherapy drugs and/or radiation. As I learned when reading Death Be Not Proud, chemotherapy had its genesis in WW2 and the experience with mustard gas. But for many years, there was an ongoing rivalry and lack of cooperation between surgeons, whose hubris made them unwilling to consider any other form of treatment beyond surgery, and oncologists. Plus, until recently, different treatments were tried serially, moving to the next one when treatment failed (e.g. surgery, followed by one chemo drug, followed by another chemo drug, etc.) Only recently have scientists really grasped that there is no cure for cancer, but there will have to be many cures for many different cancers.
In short, what becomes abundantly clear is that cancer is daunting. According to the author, 1 in 3 women and 1 in 2 men will be diagnosed with cancer during their lifetimes. Gains have been made towards cure, but many people will still die after suffering through dibillitating treatment. But there is hope that with greater understanding of how cancer works, there will be other successes like Gleevic, used to put victims of chronic myeloma leukemia into permanent remission, and Herceptin, which cures those women with estrogen-dependent cancer.
It was a compelling book. I couldn't put it down.
Currently reading: Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen.
Can a book about cancer really be compelling without being depressing? Um, yeah. The New York Times listed this book as one of the best of 2010, so I figured why not. An biography of cancer--what an intriguing concept. And Mukharjee does recount cancer from its earliest known roots to the present day. It is, as any biogrpahy must be, a recount of history. But more than any biography of a living person, it is the science behind a living cell in which something has gone terribly wrong. Mukharjee recounts the theories over time that have explained cancer, from black bile to the current understanding of a cell mutation. Not surprising, treatment has changed as understading has grown. On the other hand, as much as scientists have learned, there is still so much not known or understood about cancers.
Perhaps the most startling thing is how much of what is conventional knowledge now has been discovered only within my lifetime. For example, until the 1960s, the deforming radical mastectomy was fairly standard treatment for all breast cancers, even though there'd been little to no research to confirm its effectiveness or even its necessity. Indeed, many of the research methods that are fairly common-place have been in use for only a relativly short time. For example, one expects that a cancer diagnosis today means surgery, followed immediately by a cocktail of different chemotherapy drugs and/or radiation. As I learned when reading Death Be Not Proud, chemotherapy had its genesis in WW2 and the experience with mustard gas. But for many years, there was an ongoing rivalry and lack of cooperation between surgeons, whose hubris made them unwilling to consider any other form of treatment beyond surgery, and oncologists. Plus, until recently, different treatments were tried serially, moving to the next one when treatment failed (e.g. surgery, followed by one chemo drug, followed by another chemo drug, etc.) Only recently have scientists really grasped that there is no cure for cancer, but there will have to be many cures for many different cancers.
In short, what becomes abundantly clear is that cancer is daunting. According to the author, 1 in 3 women and 1 in 2 men will be diagnosed with cancer during their lifetimes. Gains have been made towards cure, but many people will still die after suffering through dibillitating treatment. But there is hope that with greater understanding of how cancer works, there will be other successes like Gleevic, used to put victims of chronic myeloma leukemia into permanent remission, and Herceptin, which cures those women with estrogen-dependent cancer.
It was a compelling book. I couldn't put it down.
Currently reading: Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen.
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