You are currently browsing the monthly archive for February 2008.
reading summary: 8 total; 3 manga, 1 ya fantasy, 1 fantasy, 1 science fiction, 2 mystery; 1 unfinished; 2 reread (both mystery, 1 unintentionally). I think I started a couple of others and got distracted; maybe I should spend less time on line and read more books (and either watch more things from netflix or cut my subscription down); also, I should stop letting things sit as drafts for months.
The series itself is the adventures of the extremely repressed and homophobic (asexual, really; he’s not interested in women either, though he’s not as rude about it) NATO Major Klaus Heinz von dem Eberbach, who often crosses paths with the extremely flamboyantly gay Earl Dorian Red Gloria, also known as the art thief Eroica. Generally, Klaus has a mission and runs into Eroica who is interested in the target for different reasons, and they end up working together. This series was started in the mid-70s and the style of the art is very different from any current series. The series was on hiatus for a while, but I think it’s still currently running (at least with occasional chapters). It is a fairly episodic series; each mission is a complete story (though the current arc started in v8 and continues into v10), but there are recurring characters and the past is occasionally relevant. There is a theory that the “Red” should actually be “Led”; his character design is similar to the 70s Robert Plant, and he has henchmen named James (with floppy black hair), Bonham, and I think there’s a Jones somewhere. The first volume features a trio of psychic teenagers and a crazy Interpol (?) agent; Klaus makes his first appearance at the end of that volume, and the teenagers are never seen again, thankfully.
I read v8 when it was released in January 2007 and have so have no idea why Klaus and Mischa the Bear Cub (KGB) are sitting in a bar in a small town in Spain trying to outdrink each other while waiting for their men; of course, being drunk, they start fighting eventually, much to the bartender’s dismay. Klaus is actually drunk, which surprised me; possibly his drunkenness is why he handed the important papers to the waiter for safekeeping (bad enough) without realizing that the waiter was Eroica in disguise (even worse). I think the papers are a KGB report that NATO somehow acquired; Klaus was to take it somewhere, Mischa wants it back, and Eroica wants to use it to trade for a painting. Eroica wants Klaus to chase him, so he goes to Rome and then to Egypt; the Major follows with some difficulty. Eroica’s accountant James sees an opportunity for income and makes several copies of the report with the intention of selling them to various agencies. Unfortunately, an outsider (who has a grudge against Eroica) gets one of the copies and wants to negotiate with all three; Eroica gets drunk and starts to do a striptease; and Mischa and Klaus convince him to steal the papers. All of them are planning to double-cross the other two and take the papers and run.
I do like this series; I giggled my way through reading this volume. There’s not a lot of character development, and they are all a bit one-dimensional, with their defining traits often exaggerated to the point of ridiculousness (James’ attitude towards money is an extreme example: he will do anything to get it and is extremely reluctant to spend it; he wears patched clothes by choice, he buys second-hand and out-of-date equipment, and his greed was the catalyst for part of the plot in this volume), The major’s occasional violence towards Eroica and Eroica’s acceptance of the violence does bother me a little, and I can’t help but wonder if Eroica’s obsession with the major is a case of wanting what he can’t have.
The full name of this is Flora Segunda: Being the Magickal Mishaps of a Girl of Spirit, Her Glass-Gazing Sidekick, Two Ominous Butlers (One Blue), a House with Eleven Thousand Rooms, and a Red Dog; it is her first novel. I kept running across mentions of it, I’m a sucker for that sort of title, it sounded like something I might enjoy, and the library had it. I have mixed feelings towards this book, but will give the next one a chance; I liked the setting and style and liked Flora, at least (though I think she was the only character I liked; I was somewhat sympathetic towards her father even though he was crazy; Udo and Valefor were annoying) and was interested enough in the plot to read the whole thing.
This is apparently the first of a series, despite there being no mention of it anywhere on or in the book. I hate that and was annoyed when I realized it. The plot as described on the jacket is more-or-less resolved, the pacing wasn’t bad (it’s not like it was a single book split into two), but there are any number of loose threads left hanging at the end. Some of these are questions about the past that were affecting the present, but a couple were unresolved issues in the present. The ending does indicate a likely direction for one of the issues, but also raises further questions about the past and future. It wouldn’t have made any difference in my decision to read it, but it would have affected my expectations of the book itself; I read it assuming it was a stand-alone and expected more of a resolution and had too many questions left at the end to be satisfied.
Thirteen-year-old Flora Fyrdraaca lives in Crackpot Hall, one of the four great Houses in the city of Califa (the House with Eleven Thousand Rooms); all of the great Houses have magical butlers (the butler is a magical construct called a denizen and keeps the house in shape). Her mother banished theirs, so they only live in a small portion of the house (access to other parts is impossible without the butler’s power). One day, in a hurry, she takes the elevator instead of the stairs (forbidden due to its unpredictable behavior) and ends up in the library, where she meets their denizen, Valefor, who is a shadow of his former self. He convinces Flora to give him a little of her Will and to help find a way to restore him completely; in return, he helps her with some of her chores. She does not take much convincing; she is responsible for herself, her schoolwork, her father, the housework, their five dogs (one red), and their two horses. Flora and her best friend Udo (the Glass-Gazing Sidekick) have a variety of adventures while trying to find a way to restore Valefor (and eventually Flora herself).
Flora’s mother is the Commanding General of the Army, and is mostly absent, her father is mad (PTSD, either hides in his room or has episodes of screaming and throwing things outside of it) and her older sister Idden is elsewhere in the army. There was war with the neighboring Huitzil Empire (the Huitzil are technically overlords, but let Califa mostly go its own way), and he was captured and was a prisoner for three years (with torture). There was also a first Flora (segunda = second); for some reason, she was with her father in a war zone and was also captured and was never seen again. The second Flora is quickly approaching her fourteenth birthday, at which point there will be a party (her Catorcena) with presentation to the Warlord, and she will officially be an adult. As a Fyrdraaca, she is expected to enter the army, but she does not want to. There was a famous Ranger (scout/spy) during the war named Nini Mo; Flora reads the novelizations of her adventures and wants to be like her; unfortunately, the Rangers were disbanded after the war. Any time she has to make a decision or a plan, she thinks of it in terms of “What would Nini Mo do?”
I liked Flora and enjoyed the book while it was set in the house; once she left the house and the real action started, I found it hard to read. I can’t really put my finger on what I didn’t like, but I think part of it was that I didn’t really like Flora and Udo’s interaction. Together, they were the really obnoxious and annoying know-it-all type of teenagers and I don’t think I liked Udo much, anyway; he was occasionally a bit patronizing towards Flora. Valefor was also annoyingly whiny and manipulative, but didn’t bother me as much, both because he was a minor character and because Flora caught on to what he was doing quickly. I was glad that Flora and Udo’s plans didn’t always work as expected and occasionally had disastrous results; it seemed realistic that two thirteen-year-olds would not have the experience necessary to have their plans work every time, though it did make for somewhat painful reading. Hopefully once Flora and Udo are more mature, they will be less annoying.
The names bothered me; they were all over the place culturally. I guess I should assume from the names that Califa is a bit of a melting pot with a Spanish-speaking culture at its base, but I found the random names and combinations of names distracting. I ran across a review somewhere where the reviewer thought Califa = California, which would explain the melting pot names with Spanish undertones; the names still seem like they were pulled out of a hat with no real rhyme or reason. The neighboring Huitzil are obviously Aztec-ish; Huitzilopochtli was the Aztec war and sun god; there are bird-people from the empire called Quetzals, and the names mentioned evoke the Aztec culture.
So I’d always kind of wondered where these pictures of Ju-ken came from; I know they were on his blog and were from the Super Soul Sessions with Brian Setzer/Hotei/Char, but didn’t know what he was playing that needed that sort of bass with sparkles and flames:
Poking at Google wondering if Brian Setzer was involved with Hotei’s album Monster Drive (answer: no, possibly was supposed to be originally and Hotei did a rockabilly album anyway) led to youtube, which led to this from the Brian Setzer only part of the Super Soul Sessions (Rock this Town and Fishnet Stockings):
I’d assumed Setzer took his own band along for his parts (Back Streets of Tokyo on one of the music shows used his band, though they may have been touring in Japan at that time). I was wrong; he used Ju-ken and Shue (酒井愁), and there’s actually a short bass solo near the end. Despite being the first billed, he only had three songs on his own (and two Setzer vs Hotei and four Setzer vs Hotei vs Char, along with nine Hotei and seven Hotei vs Char; I’m not sure what the distribution of compositions for the vs parts are), so it makes some sense that he didn’t bring his whole band over and that they just used the same backup band for the whole thing (there was also a Japanese keyboard player in the other parts; I’m too lazy to go back and figure out who he was).
Ju-ken looks like he’s enjoying himself; on a long-gone blog entry (with a picture of an autographed T-shirt), he said something like that this was something he’d always remember and he was happy (or maybe honored or maybe both) to have the opportunity to play with these people. I wish I could remember what he said about that bass; I’m fairly sure he doesn’t own it (not in his gear, and probably too expensive to buy and not use regularly), but don’t know whether it was the company or a specific person who loaned it to him. On the King DoubleBass Japanese site, there are a couple of pictures of a similar bass; I don’t think it’s a standard finish (they do sparkles and flames and sparkly flames, but a yellow bass with sparkles and red flames doesn’t seem to be a standard option). He used to link to the site, and was actually mentioned on it, but they don’t seem to have anywhere for artists on the Japanese site any more (and it’s all flash, so archive.org is useless, and the base template for their site looks awfully familiar).
I think I’m going to have to get this DVD eventually. Random fangirl-ness on its own is not enough to justify the cost, but I like Hotei and have fond memories of the Stray Cats and like what I’ve heard of Char, but I’d been hesitant because the reviews on amazon.jp were generally negative (and my Japanese is not good enough to be sure why), but a few clips from the televised version finally made their way onto youtube and I want to see more.
I’d started watching these adaptations last year; the earlier ones were The Murder at the Vicarage and The Body in the Library; I am enjoying them despite their flaws (or maybe because of them; comparing to the source and otherwise nitpicking can be fun). I read or reread the book last year when I first started watching these; I wasn’t sure if I had read it before or not. Knowing the murderer made perfectly innocent-looking scenes a bit creepy and some scenes were hard to watch knowing that a character just set himself or herself up as the next victim.
One Friday, the local paper for the rural village of Chipping Cleghorn has an ad in the personals section announcing a murder at Little Paddocks at 6:30. Letitia Blacklock, who lives there, is surprised to see the ad, but (correctly) assumes all the neighbors will show up out of curiosity. Also living at Little Paddocks are Doris Bunner (Bunny), a childhood friend; Patrick and Julia Simmons, distant cousins (in the book, rent-paying and studying and working in a nearby town); Philippa Haymes, renting and working as a gardener nearby; and Mitzi, the Eastern European refugee help. The neighbors are Col. Easterbrook (single here, married in the book); Mrs. Swettenham and her son Edward; and Lizzie (?) Hinchcliffe and Amy Murgatroyd, who share a cottage and who in the book are old enough to be the mothers of the younger characters, but are significantly younger here. Patrick, Julia, Philippa, and Edward are all around the same age (young adult). The book also had the vicar and his wife (known as Bunch) as characters; the vicar was mostly in the background anyway, and Bunch’s personality and relationship with Miss Marple (mother as friend) were given to Murgatroyd.
Everyone outside of Little Paddocks assume the ad is an invitation to a murder-game sort of party, so at 6:30, everyone is gathered, Ms Blacklock is about to offer cigarettes and break out the sherry, when the lights go out, someone throws open the door and demands valuables, and shots ring out. Once there is light, they find the body of an unknown man; he turns out to be Rudi Scherz, who worked at a resort hotel in a nearby town. Miss Marple was staying at the hotel at the time, and gets herself invited to stay with the daughter of a friend (the vicar’s wife in the book, Murgatroyd in the movie) so she can investigate. She spends most of her time talking to people, and several conversations that were between other characters are now with her. A motive is discovered: Miss Blacklock might inherit a large sum of money in the near future from her ex-employer. The money was left in trust to his wife, who is dying; if she dies first, it goes to his sister’s children (they did not speak after her marriage), and several people are the right age to be the sister or her husband or the children. More people are killed, people start accusing each other, and eventually the remaining cast gathers at Little Paddocks so that Miss Marple can explain everything. They actually made the ending less dramatic than in the book (no attempted murders at the last minute), which surprised me.
My biggest complaint with this was an extra added subplot; the eliminating or combining of minor characters and the reworking of scenes to include Miss Marple didn’t bother me (though the changed ages and appearances of a couple did) and the random change of an off-stage character from “trying her hand at acting” to “living in sin” and the removal of a small romantic subplot bothered me a little but didn’t have much of an effect on the story. The removal of Col. Easterbrook’s wife and the addition of a romance between him and Mrs. Swettenham wouldn’t have been too bad, but making Col. Easterbrook alcoholic and Edward Swettenham jealous and mean bothered me. This is a murder mystery; there is plenty of angst and conflict without adding more. I also don’t know why they had Mrs. Swettenham tell Miss Marple all about the relationship and her past in the middle of a crowded shop.
I have the usual problems with Miss Marple in this one; she should be frail and white-haired and fluffy and self-effacing, but is not. I have no problems with Geraldine McEwan’s acting, but the character she is portraying is not the Miss Marple of the books. She was a bit snide towards Inspector Craddock at the beginning and he is impatient with her (in the books, he’s heard of her from his uncle and seeks her aid). I find myself wondering if these were filmed at once and then shown or each filmed and then shown and adapting to criticism; Miss Marple has layers of shawls and is knitting more and is less vigorous in this one, even though it’s chronologically before the adaptation of The Murder at the Vicarage, at least (that was explicitly 1951, this is explicitly 1949). She is more of a background character in this one, which may be why she seems less vigorous. She is occasionally snide, which the book version would never be. They also left out her tendency to compare people to others she met in the past. Also, she cried over someone’s death, which is just wrong.
I had a few random continuity and other minor issues in this one. The missing pictures were noticed but never explained. Inspector Craddock is impatient with Miss Marple and warns her not to play detective when she shows up in Chipping Cleghorn, but lets her read the letters from Letitia to Charlotte for no apparent reason (he has no interaction with her between these events); in the book he warns her because he is worried about her. The random Clue reference bothered me, though it’s possible time-wise (according to Wikipedia, Cluedo was first published in England in 1948, and this was set in 1949). I was happy to see Miss Marple knitting, but they either needed to teach her to be convincing or not show her actively trying. I’m no expert, but it looks like she has one knitting needle, the motions tell me “crocheting”, and the yarn’s just looped over her hand, not in her fingers at all. There also seem to be more ends to the yarn than there should be and there are more colors in the scarf than there are on the table (and the one missing would be the one she’d need next if the pattern continues). I have no problems with the acting overall, but did not find Col. Easterbrook’s loud drunkenness (especially at Bunny’s party) convincing.
This one has not-so-gratuitous lesbians in Murgatroyd and Hinch; it is not explicitly stated in the book, but the are at the very least very close friends, and it is not unreasonable that in post-war England, finances would make sharing a house necessary. The way they are described (Hinch is manlike or manly or mannish, Murgatroyd is more feminine) and the fact that there have been other lesbian couples in other of Christie’s novels makes me think that a couple was the appropriate interpretation, though. I am glad they used that interpretation; it would have been a bit hypocritical of them not to after adding gratuitous lesbians to a different book. In the book they are Murgatroyd and Hinch or (Miss Murgatroyd and Miss Hinchcliffe), even to each other, and it is disconcerting that everyone (including Hinch) calls Murgatroyd “Amy” in the movie. Murgatroyd is described as “fat and amiable” with a “curly bird’s-nest of gray hair” in the book but has a thin blonde actress; Hinch is described as having a “short manlike crop” and wears trousers often, as she does in the movie. I wish they had left them at their original ages, but I guess they decided that fat middle-aged lesbians were no good.
Next: The 4:50 from Paddington aka What Mrs. McGillicudy Saw, which I’m kind of afraid to watch because it’s one of my favorites.
info at imdb
