Bill Klatte and Kate Thompson

"It's So Hard to Love You: Staying Sane When Your Loved One is Manipulative, Needy, Dishonest, or Addicted" by Klatte, Bill and Thompson, Kate New Harbinger: 2007

I checked this book out of the library because I am having difficulty with boundary issues with someone in my life and wanted to read a book before purchasing it. I had gone into the catalog of the public library and chose it from the description and it is easily what I need. It is full of advice but in small manageable sections. There are lots of examples of people so that the reader can easily identify.

For me, I am having pain just reading about the information so appreciate the fact that I don't have to read cover to cover but can skip to the appropriate sections that I need addressed. For example, the authors described different terms such as enmeshed which I believe I fall into and then examples of people who are and possible antidotes for such behavior. They also go into definitions of those who do too little and too much in this area.

The authors have the opinion that those who read this book still want to help their loved ones, but they don't want to enable them or make them worse. They are not advocating a complete break but ways of helping our loved ones with problems in such a way that they have a better way of getting help than simply everyone falling out of the boat and drowning. The sub-tittle is staying sane and this is the book to help the reader do just that.

Both authors are very knowledgeable and provide expert information on dealing with the people who have addictive and similar problems because when you are caught in their situations you have it too to some degree. The bottom line is tough love though but in a way that gives the loved one a chance on escaping his or her problem and not sink you in the process.

Hoarding

"The wise man does not hoard. The more he helps others, the more he benefits himself." Lao Tzu

If I had the desire to hoard, and I do, it is to hoard books. I love to see their spines lined up on a bookshelf, all different widths, colors, titles and will often steal a look at my book case above the computer desk just to feel the comfort and warmth, books have always given me. Before I left to go to Korea in March 2010, I had a huge library in my house. Every room had its own bookcase and often it was one bookcase lined up on the walls. Ah, it was wonderful. Then, in my absence, my ex-husband feeling anger towards me gave away the entire collection to the library. When I found out in Korea, it plunged me into a deep grief that has yet to heal. My name was not in those books and I can't get them back. He chopped the bookcases into wood and left them in a pile in my yard that I am still trying to get rid of.

I think I learned about hoarding then. Now, I live in the master bedroom of my house and all of my books including library books reside here. I still love books, but hoarding is something that needs to be looked at and examined. I had hoarded clothes, but I did not mind losing them for I had lost weight and did not fit into them anymore. I am planning on moving again but will not have the huge number of things anymore. I will just make use of public libraries, electronic readers although I am not fond of them as I am for the real thing and reading a book and giving them away.

There is limitless worlds in books and I love exploring all the different ideas and truths that are included in them. That has not changed. It is the medium that has changed for me. I still think living in a huge library would be fun but not practical. I read books on collecting ever so often; but people often collect for value and not for the pure joy of reading. I am of the reader sort and don't care so much for the value of the books itself. Getting books out of print is a joy and love Google Books for having them online for this reason. If I was a very wealthy person, I would get a great deal of happiness just donating valuable books to collections available to the public. I will never forget the library in Korea that had English books that one could check out. There were hungry readers, both Koreans and foreigners, who would come everyday just to read their favorite books.

Maryanne Wolf wrote in her book, "Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain", (HarperCollins: 2007) that the skill of reading is not natural to the human brain. Many people have great difficulty reading. Jackie Stewart, the Scottish racing driver talked about rejection as a child because of his dyslexia and how deeply he felt about his inability to read. Many people echoed his feelings. I was lucky. I am dyslexic, but it was in mathematics that it shows as numbers do not show patterns as words do. Emotionally and personally, reading was a natural for me.

I had a rough beginning as a child and books provided the relief I needed to make the transition to adulthood. It seems natural to me now that I would hoard what gave me so much pleasure and happiness during those times and continues to do so now. I will be forever grateful for all of the authors and their words who gave me the courage and strength to survive the bad times and the knowledge to face the unknown. There is a saying that you can't take your riches with you in death. The same goes for everything else. You can sleep in only one bed at a time, drive one car at a time and live in one house at a time. I can read more than one book at a time, but a whole house full of books was just a bit too much.

Joshua Kendall

"The Man Who Made Lists: Love, Death, Madness, and the Creation of Roget's Thesaurus" by Joshua Kendal

Putnam: 2008

Peter Mark Roget was born in a family of madness and grief. If anything saved him from these facts, it was the creation of his Thesaurus more than anything else. Joshua Kendal endeavors to produce the circumstances for this and in doing this he writes a biography that is as much entertaining as it is factual and knowledgeable about his subject. Yet, I can't help but think there is more to this story that Kendal with all of his immense research will never uncover, but what he does is fascinating and told well. Even the book itself with its chapters illustrating parts of Roget's definitions are well done.

The Roget family is beset with a genetic make-up for depression but how much is genetic and how much is environmental? That may never be known. Even one of his children seems to have inherited some of the madness and certainly Roget's mother and grandmother had it. Suicide was there too. In the darkness of the night when Roget felt madness and depression closing in around him, he classified words from an early age. It turned out to be his saving grace. His sister and daughter could not create a life of their own as insanity kept them at home. Yet, Roget had no clue as to why his relatives behaved the way they did although he was a medical doctor.

This was a time when science was waking up and making great strides in discovery but not for him. The Victorian Times was also a time when people hung onto their Christian faith and ignored many of the scientific discoveries such as the new science of Evolution by Charles Darwin and Alfred Wallace.

Kendall was careful in bringing in the world in which Roget lived in so that all of the information available could be seen in all of its implications. Some biographies, one has to look things up for more information. This is not necessary here. Yet, there is so much that is not known but not because the Kendal did not do his research but because the information simply does not exist.

The writing is clear and the information is well organized. It was enjoyable as it was informative about a remarkable man in a remarkable age. I could not put this book down.

Paul Theroux some short stories

I was introduced to Paul Theroux's work many years ago by his train books. I have read all of them through the years starting with "The Old Patagonian Express" when it came out in 1979 in hardback. I was so impressed with it that I gave it out as presents to friends and then read the rest of his travel books over the years. They remain my favorite books on train travel. I have always considered the author to be a very gifted writer and his prose is very wonderful to read.

The book that I am taking Theroux's short stories from is the following:
"The Pen/O'Henry Prize Stories: The Best Stories of the Year 2009" Edited by Laura Furman Anchor

The 22 small stories in this book are very small, often just three paragraphs long. Theroux states: "The essence of fiction writing-and travel writing too, is storytelling." The author states his influence is folk and fairy tales and this is evident in these wonderful quick and short stories.

The author said he likes to collect them and has about a hundred of them which he likes to call "Long Story Short" because that is the expression story tellers often use when recounting them. He feels that this form is one of the oldest forms of literature in the world and often told at leisure by people sitting around a fire.

Many of them are told in first person and take on the persona of different people who live assorted lives. Because the stories were so short, detail was not necessary so it would seem to be fun for a writer to create and fun for a reader to read because the author put enough in to make them very interesting. I could see people leaning forward in a circle around a fire to listen to these stories. Some of the protagonists were men, some women and all of the stories were believable.

The only question that I had in my mind was whether or not they were published as one block of stories or published in assorted publications? Would a publication print such short stories all by itself? I tended to think they were published as one block.

Carol Heding Munson

"Complete Slow Cooker Cookbook" by Carol Heding Munson Sterling: 2003

There are lots of recipes on the Internet, but I shop at the Redding Canned Foods Outlet which has many things there including fresh meat and produce. One never knows what will be there, but if it is there the price will be nice. The store backs the quality and I have taken back some things and got my money back or replacements.

During the winter, I use my crock pot quite often. I had a very nice one that I bought there a while back which went into my son's kitchen. So, I went there and bought another one for about half the price which made me very glad. I went to Barnes and Noble to pick up a cook book since my son permitted my ex-husband to get rid of my books here at my house while I was in Korea and without my permission. They included many crock pot cook books. The books were donated to the public library and went into their permanent collection. ( I was very angry and the ex-husband is not allowed in this house again. I had given permission for my clothes to be donated as they did not fit me anymore but nothing else.)

Barnes and Noble had some books on crock pots recipes on sale and one of each to a table and went through them. They were all about the same price but not the same. The following was what I wanted in a cook book:

1. I wanted a cook book that would lie flat and would not need something that would hold the book open while I read it and prepared the recipe.

2. I also wanted recipes that did not use prepared ingredients such as Campbell soups for many of them have gluten and other unwanted things in them.

3.I wanted recipes that used simple things and had alternatives such as canned beans or dried beans soaked over night. I don't like labels as I will choose whatever is on sale.

4. I also wanted a book that had an index that was accurate. I found one book with an index that was not accurate. I threw that to the side immediately.

5. I like pictures but not too many. If you have full page pictures, you don't have as many recipes.

6. I wanted a size that would make it small enough to slip in my big purse so that when I was going to the store and I did not know what I was going to make until I saw what was there I could just choose from the book what I was going to make. I could print a recipe from the Internet if I knew what I was going to make. I often don't when shopping at the Outlet.

7. I wanted a book that would use recipes for crock pot of the size I bought which is medium although I bought a large one at a second hand store which was supposedly tested and on sale. I haven't tried it yet but there must be a few recipes I could use if I want to use it later.

8. It would be nice if the recipes were gluten-free but not expected; however the recipes must be able to be converted by me to be gluten free. That is another reason that I don't want recipes to be over-loaded with certain products. For example, I can't use soy sauce. I want alternatives. I am pretty knowledgeable so can switch things but can't do all kinds of switching such as dumplings and the sort.

The above cook book met all of these expectations nicely. There were many recipes that I could use and convert. I could even make some of the meat recipes into meatless ones. It called for substituting dry ingredients with canned. There are pictures but not an abundance. Some of the recipes are main dishes and some are not. What is really important is that many of the recipes call for ingredients that are not too costly. What else would someone make things in a crock pot other than convenience. It means the cook needs to work and keep an eye on the pocketbook.

Ironically, it was also the cheapest priced at $7.98 and 224 pages.

I will report on a black bean and corn chili that I will be going to the store to shop for and cook later today.
January 21, 2011
P.S. The black bean and corn chili turned out excellent. I had to substitute a few things but it did not hurt the main recipe at all.

Libraries

When I was a kid, the public libraries were my life line to civilization, to education, to books which saved my life at a time when I needed it most. I could not afford to buy a book although on occasion I was able to buy a second-hand book from a thrift store. Now, that times are hard in today's economy because of unwise spending, attempts are being made to make up for this on the backs of the less fortunate. This means the young, the poor, the old and disabled and those who can least afford it. One target by the new governor of California , Jerry Brown, is the public libraries.

While Republicans debate tax breaks for those in the upper income levels, it will be those who have no access to the Internet, books, newspapers and to college education that will be carrying the burden of past policies of a broken economy. I am not near the income that is supposedly needing further tax breaks, but I make enough money to buy my own books. I have a college education. I am in no danger of being homeless, but turn the clock around and if I was suddenly back in the 1960's or 1970's I would be in trouble. I would not be able to use the public library to even read the books I did read during that time.

I used to do housework to support my children when I was just out of college with a college degree and would take left overs from my employers in order to feed my children. I could not find a decent paying job until my name came up in the government lottery and my score was high enough to qualify for a job. I never stopped working and retired several years ago so I could work at home. At the time, government jobs paid less than private sector jobs but that was for men and not for women. For women, they were the end of the rainbow for they paid pretty close to what men were paid. I never left government employment. Now, it is government workers that are paid more. It's ironic.

I lived in libraries and got to know the librarians over the years. They were very kind to me and would often hold books under the counter before hold policies were in place. When there was a scandal about "The Last Temptation of Christ" by Nikos Kazantzakis, it was a librarian that gave me the one copy from underneath the counter for me to read. It was an astonishingly beautiful book that gave me a wonderful introduction to Kazantzakis that I was never to forget. I remember reading "Lady Chatterley's Lover" by D.H. Lawrence and realizing that the book was a great book not because of the sex described in the book but because of many other factors. I learned not to depend on what was in the press about books as many journalists never read the books they wrote about.

I learned to do my own research. It was what Rachel Maddow said yesterday on her show. You can't do research on everything on the Internet. She said there is the evident lack of information on sexual matters but there is the lack of information about gun control because of the strength of the gun lobby. Maddow said you still need to use the library. Barnes and Noble is a wonderful book store but they don't carry out of print books. You still need to use a library. If an author is not popular, it will not be in a book store.

Authors fall into popularity and out of it all of the time. The library carries all of them. Some authors are no longer read because of politics or they are associated with the wrong schools of thought. They are still sitting on shelves in libraries as long as no one has noticed them there. Right now there is a ongoing controversy about "Huckleberry Finn" by Mark Twain. A publisher is going to take some of the "bad words" out of it so it can be put back into the classrooms. Most libraries have the book with the offending words in it. The Library of Congress is supposed to have all of the books.

I believe in free speech which includes saying or writing whatever one wants in a book. Everyone has the right not to read something if it is offensive. I have a Tweet account and every so often I find an account that is offensive to me and will "unfollow" it. I have that right. I have done it only once. I did not report it as offensive as it might not be to someone else. Books can't just jump off the shelf and force the reader to read it. It is the same for my television and for movies. People will complain about what is on television. Well, don't watch it. Turn the darn thing off. I do. I would rather read anyhow.

I intend on writing letters to different people about the importance of the libraries including Governor Brown. I can't think of anything else I can do at this point. When a large portion of the population does not have access to knowledge such is in libraries they will become tools of those who eat at the underbelly of civilization such as the brown shirts of Germany in the 1920's. We, as a people, can't afford this.

Reality and novels

At a local book store, there was an effort to start a book club and I showed up with high hopes. There are so few book clubs in my city. There were three people, counting myself, who did come which seemed a disappointment; but I thought we might be able to pick up some people in the future. My hopes were crushed when one member, a high school science teacher, said that there will not be any books that were fiction. He was very authoritarian and sure of himself being able to set the rules. The other member was a housewife that did the books for her husband's construction business. She said she just wanted to read and did not care what the book was. I asked the teacher why he he would not consider novels.

"Novels are not based on reality." He said firmly. "We should deal with truth only."

Needless to say, the book club never went anywhere. The first book we read was on the Ancient Greeks and the Science teacher said he could have done better. I liked the book, myself. I never went back and it did not attract anymore members and folded.

I have heard this argument before that novels portray life in a fictional mode and do not represent reality. In the Victorian Period, girls were often forbidden to read novels because there was too much reality in novels that girls who were thought to be innocent and pure,were not able to face although many women in the poorer so-called classes in Europe and America, had to deal with a very harsh reality in their lives. They just could not read about it.

D.H. Lawrence put sexuality in his books and stories and poetry. Many people thought of him as a pornographer although his work is considered mild today. Lawrence did more in his books than put sex in. He put the changing reality of England in his books and that also offended many people. A novel does best when it does put reality in the story. People can identify what is going on in a story or novel with what is happening in their lives even if it is described on a planet in another solar system.

Again, I have heard the complaint that novels do not describe reality but are fiction and thus not based on truth. I have heard this from pulpits when I was required to go to church as a child to opinions from people I have known over the years. To my mind, the opposite is true. An author takes what he or she sees as reality and creates a story for people to follow in a book. If it was not plausible, people would not read it. Harry Potter is a boy people get to know in J.K. Rowland's books although the circumstances of wizards and witches are not something that people see everyday or at all. The characters are totally reality based although the circumstances are not. Everyone knows of a man who is ambitious and evil to a fault and gathers followers around him, only to be defeated in the end. An example would be Adolf Hitler. History is full of such people. The character, Sherlock Holmes, was based on someone who was a real person that the author knew.

Novels are truth otherwise no one would read them. What is reality? It is a version of what is before our eyes and can be different. Even history differs from historian to historian. Some biographies are really novels and some novels are really biographies. Transcripts of court proceedings are full of eyewitness accounts that are unlike each other. Some people question whether or not there is a reality but many realities to chose from.

I read "The Last Temptation of Christ" by Nikos Kazantzakis and I never considered the fact that it was true. It was one great book. It was one very good version on the life of Jesus Christ and it may or may not have been accurate. I am not a Christian so it had no significance for me since I am a Buddhist. I will bring up another book, "Siddhartha",a novel by Hermann Hesse. This is a novel on the life of the Buddha that I do not consider to be accurate but a great read. This brings into this discussion why people read novels and that is to read about other people's lives and versions of those lives so that they get clarity about their own. I am sure there are other reasons. Who know what is true and what is not as long as it resembles the truth?

It was a shame about that book club at the book store. The teacher was very dogmatic and looked upon the other woman and me as his students which was out of line. When I was a teacher in high school, I did not run a democracy. A book club of adults is by definition a democracy. He did not understand that, but then his wife was the manager of the book store. He knew he could get away with it. When he said he could write a book as good as the writer of the first book we read, I told him as I said to all wannabee writers: "Then do it." To the best of my knowledge he never has. I am sure he doesn't read novels either which is his loss.

Why read?

The question at the beginning of the post is why read? I don't expect to answer this fully here because the subject area is too vast. I can't even expect to state definitively why I read except that I prefer to read over other forms of gaining information such as watching videos, films, television, movies and so on. I find it so much more satisfying and fulfilling.

There are times I will watch a favorite program such as The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and will laugh and laugh at the end of the 30 minute program including commercials. There will be some spots in it that I will enjoy more than others and might revisit it on the website. I might watch The Stephen Colbert Show. Colbert is a young and energetic performer who is very talented, but I still prefer Stewart. In 30 minutes, the show is over and I go back to what I was doing before I stopped to watch the show. Stewart is not someone I pick up when I feel like it and then put it down when I get tired unless I am reading one of his book.

When I was a child, I lived in a very dysfunctional situation with parents with huge problems and in a neighborhood also with problems. I found comfort in books. I learned to read in school and my mother had a few books in the house that I read from cover to cover more than several times. I had a favorite aunt who taught me how to use the public library and signed me up for a card. My mother and father never took me there. I walked there often. I also had an imagination which helped and grew when I started to read. There was those few times I went to the show with my family and that was included in my imagination and there was the television still in its infancy. The television was a source of some of my problems as it showed the McCarthy Hearings which were a problem since my mother was born and raised in Russia and the neighborhood had their own witch hunt and picked on my family because of that. Some of our neighbors were ugly and I never forgot that. Books were a refuge and solace from that. This was the early 1950's. I felt I was rejected by people both in my family and neighborhood for who I was but never by a book.

I have two sons. One son rarely reads and watches television most of the time he is awake. The other one rarely watches television and reads often. The one that reads works and owns two companies. The one that does not read has a family of four children and a partner. Each is successful in his own way. The second one is disabled. I took them to the library often when they were growing up. I buy books for my grandchildren. I don't use the library anymore since I had to pay for books that I returned and they said I did not. I do use their second hand book store though.

When I had no choice, I used the library but learned to read too fast because of the due dates that were stamped in the books. That was better than not reading at all. Now, I buy the books and read them at a much slower pace. In college, I was a fast reader. I don't read all that fast anymore because I missed the richness of the language and the way a book was constructed. I also was in a hurry to read all the books I could. Now, I even re-read books as I did in Korea.
It was very fruitful to have done so.

I read children and young adult books now. When I was a young adult there were little to read but now there is a rich treasure of good books to read. Scholastic Press puts out wonderful books at a good price. Unfortunately, it is hard to find such books at a second hand store. There are many books in a second hand store that I don't read, but I have never ran out of good authors although I did when I was in my younger years. I like the current variety that is available and the books written by authors in other countries that are now translated. I find that often I am so familiar with authors that are now translated that it is hard not to skip ahead. An example is C.G. Jung who I am reading now. At one time, I considered learning German to read him. Now, I don't have to.

I am a writer and in order to remain a writer I have to read. I want to read authors who are better than me. I want to see innovative writing but not writing that I can't figure out what is happening. I resisted the group of writers know as the"Beats" for a long time since I got the impression that they were far out of the norm that I was used to. The first book I read out of this group was "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac which forever changed my idea of who they were. I have since read other books by other so-called Beats. I usually try writers who win the Nobel Prize for Literature if I had not read them before. I read authors who win prizes such as the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award, and so forth just to get names of writers I have not read before. I choose books for their covers, from the recommendations from Bookmarks (I highly recommend this source) Magazines, other writers, Oprah and everyone else that seems to know what is a good writer.

I intend to change this blog which was about books that I had read into more about books in general and anything that comes to mind. I don't seem to have many readers, but if anyone has any recommendations I promise to take it on.

A new direction for this blog, somewhat

I stopped writing in here because I had no access to books for a while. That did not mean that I was not reading for I never stop reading. It was that I was doing it a bit differently. A few people who did read this blog for time to time stopped because I was not adding posts. That was certainly understandable.

I spent a lot of money getting things that were taken from my house including my car. I am living in one room in my house while my youngest son and his family live in the rest of the house. In turn, he takes care of the place and pays the utilities. I will have to wait until I make up for the loss of someone who took it upon himself to clean out my house including hundreds of books, my furniture including bookcases, cars, and so much I can't even put down without bursting into tears. That person no longer has access to my house. That also means not buying books for now.

I can dream though. One book that I am dreaming about is "Bird Cloud, A Memoir" by Annie Proulx. I had read "The Shipping News(1993) and loved it. What has really endeared Proulx to me is the book of short stories, "Wyoming Stories" that I checked out of the library. It included the finest short story I have ever read in my life, "Brokeback Mountain." It appeared in the magazine, The New Yorker. I went to see the movie and thought it was very good but the short story was absolutely outstanding. The use of flashback which was not in the movie and his talking about the relationship he had with his friend and lover was haunting and the movie caught some of it.

The memoir which is listed in the magazine, Bookmarks (No.50 Jan/Feb 2011) states is about the building of her dream house on 640 acres in Wyoming. I just want to know more about who this author is. The house went hundreds of thousands of dollars over budget. I have never built a house in my life and can't see myself doing it. I did buy a new car once and that was nice, but that was years ago. I drove it until it was time for it to go to the junk yard.

One of the reasons I loved Proulx's short stories is that they were easy to understand although not simple plots. They were written in language that used language that is in use today and in simple prose but clear and concise language. When she talked about Wyoming, one could see it quite readily. I did not have to go there in person to see it although I had. Too often I read a story and I don't really understand what is happening. That is one of the reasons I love reading W. Somerset Maugham's stories. There is no doubt what is happening and where my feet are in the telling of it. Perhaps that is why I love murder mysteries.

Catch-up

When I was in Korea, I gave all of my books away to my ex-students. I was going to give them away to some English Teachers but they were members of a Christian Church that did not believe in reading books outside of their faith. So, I gave them to students that wanted to improve their skills and also taught English on occasion. All of the books that I had were classic books but were considered risque by some as they were by such writers as Balzac and Camus. Until I came home, I just re-read the short stories of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle on my reader.

Since then, I have returned to the United States and continue to read. I am reading Oliver Sacks, Carl Gustav Jung, and Joseph Campbell as well as some Beat Writers. Unfortunately, I left my Sony Reader in Los Angeles and some books that I was reading there too when I left. Luckily, I got out of Korea before the weather got so bad all over the world and before the rains really hit California. I am working on my own book of short stories.

I have learned to Tweet and am enjoying it very much. One reads a lot when there are tweets out there. I am now watching television but I am watching pretty much the same programs as I did before except more of PBS since I could not get everything. I watch Countdown, The Rachel Maddow Program and The Daily Show and The Stephen Colbert Show. Those were the ones I was watching in Korea. I also follow them by Tweets. Stephen Colbert is especially fun to follow. I do these blogs and have a Facebook account. I now buy the New York Times from time to time as well as follow their tweets. I watched my first Masterpiece since coming back and it was alright.

I have never not read, and I am hoping the books I was reading in LA will be coming in the mail soon from my son in Los Angeles.

Have fun reading.

Shannon Hale

"Princess Academy" by Shannon Hale Bloomsbury: 2005

I bought this book in the train station in Busan, Korea. I was there trying to find anything I could in English. This book looked interesting and I read young adult fiction. I wanted to love this book, but I ended up not liking it at all. It was a best seller and had on it the seal of the Newberry Prize (honor). It had to be good but not only did I not like it as an adult but I doubt if I would have liked it as a youngster either.

It is the story of a 14 year old girl who lives on a mountain where everyone else works the quarry. There is a separation between those who live in the mountains and those who are in the valley. Then comes the improbable news that it has been foretold that someone from Mount Eskel, where she lives, will become the wife of the crown prince. All of the girls in the area who are of marriageable age must attend a special princess academy and compete to be the princess bride.

This whole story centers around girls trying to find husbands although some other things happen but the basic thrust is getting the prince. Secondary is the protagonist, Mira's, crush on a boy of her own village. This story seemed to be a Harlequin Romance story for girls. Boring, boring, boring. Fourteen years of age is way too young to think seriously of marriage and to have it in a book aimed at girls seems outrageous.

Someone else gets the prince and Mira finds herself the envy of the village when the boy of her dreams finds her attractive too. Sorry if this spoils it for you, but there are lots of wonderful young adult novels that do not encourage young ladies to just opt out for marriage. There has to be something else out there for women. I knew it when I was a young girl and I certainly know it as a senior citizen.

Someone must of loved this book. I would rather have my money back. Still, the book was written well and there is a group of people out there, I suppose, who love romances who might like this one. I love romances too, but again there is more to life than a marriage and children. I think I got bored just writing this.

Additional Note: "The Hero" By W. S. Maugham

Additional Note: "The Hero" by W. Somerset Maugham Google Books: 1908

If you have your own book journal, you can stop the presses, so to speak, and add something to what you published. I wish I could add this to the last post I wrote on this book, but once you put the pictures in a post, the post itself becomes unstable. This additional note will have to do.

I thought about this review all day. I knew I left something out regarding my reactions to this book. I still like the book. There is no question on that, but it addresses a situation that I have argued in my life with friends and family. It is the question of Captain James Parson's reluctance to marry his fiance, Mary. She had been waiting for him for five years. He had asked her to marry him when he left to go to war in South Africa. It is basic to the plot of the book. James no longer wants to marry her and learns to finally detest her and finds he would do anything than marry her.

During the last election, there were two people running for election, Senator Barack Obama and Senator John McCain. One of the criticisms that some of my friends had was that when McCain came back from Viet Nam he was a POW, he did not want to be married to his wife anymore although she waited for him. She had gained weight from an automobile accident she had. He divorced her and married a wealthy woman who was very beautiful. I agreed with some of the those who said that he did a dishonorable thing.

Then I remembered in my childhood my aunt who was so good to me as a child who raised my mother when they left Harbin, Manchuria to live in Beijing, China. She had met my uncle in Beijing and they fell in love and she came to this country and then sponsored my mother five years later. It was later that I found out that my uncle divorced his wife to marry my aunt. My aunt and uncle were happily married for over 50 years until he died.

I could go on about people I knew who left one spouse to marry others because they were unhappy and went on to live happy lives. I decided that no one should be forced to live with a spouse they don't want to live with. That is like living in the dark ages. In the book, I thought with the present state of things that maybe James could have married Mary and just had affairs on the side, but he was not the sort to do that. His parents were happily married and he wanted the same.

I was a bit of a prig when growing up. Luckily, I grew out of it. I was raised by a church culture who stated that once you are married you are married for life. A man does not have a right to divorce a wife and get a new one. It is hard on the woman, but harder if she has to live with a man who can't stand her. I still hear those so-called rules in Christian churches that the only way a man can get a divorce is for adultery. If a woman's husband is an alcoholic and beating the crap out of her she is out of luck according to their rules. He has to leave her for another woman for her to get a divorce and for her to be able to re-marry.

Maugham was writing that book during a time when honor and those rules were more strict than they were when I was a kid and certainly worst than the 21st century. Maugham was a gay man who could never come out but stayed in the closet for his entire life. James was in an intolerable situation and his way out may have seen a bit extreme but it was in keeping with who James was.

W. Somerset Maugham

"The Hero" By W. Somerset Maugham Google Books: 1908

Captain James Parsons comes home from the Boer War in Africa to a small town in England, injured and a hero with the Victoria Cross. Everyone is so proud of this local son of Colonial Parsons. What they did not count on was the boy they sent off to war is not the same man who comes back. They are not happy with what war and the world has done to him. The same goes for James. He does not like how he and English life has changed either.

I thought I read all of Maugham's novels but was surprised to find it in Google's Books. This is a faulty novel to be sure, but the faults are minor to the really important things that are in this early novel. The character, James Parsons, is well developed and balanced and the reader sees how much he loves his parents but hates the life style that they live in. He also has learned while in Africa how very much he is capable of full blown passion and love although the woman he had fallen in love with was part of the current world and ambitious she is still a woman that sets his blood racing. Still, he tears her letters up because to love her means to hurt too many people he loves in his life.

The people in his home village are set in their ways and so sure they are right. They are Christian and of course God is on their side. When James questions this saying that the Boers were equally convinced that God is on their side and were just like the British people except they could not survive the war they were scandalized. They told him that he had no idea what he was talking about. James was there to fulfill their expectations of the world and not the other way around no matter what his experiences were.

This book could have been set in today's world except for the solemn promise of James' engagement to Mary. James was caught in the wishes and desires of the people he loved. He no longer wanted to marry Mary because he found out what it was to be in love with a woman who could make him desire her. Mary just wanted to do what was expected in her society.

If people stood out and were different, then society would trim him down to fit. They attempted to do this with James with tragic results for James. Over and over again they used the excuse that if he cared for them he would buckle down and do what was was honorable instead of what he wanted to do. Maugham used foreshadowing effectively to show this. It was done well in this book and an indication of the use of it in later works. The author never tells the reader everything to complete the story in the book. They can look for it in the hints and details in the story. Maugham does not enter the story like Hercule Poirot and spell it out for the reader. I like that aspect of his writing.

The writing was excellent although some parts of the book did seem like a play. I never lost interest in the story or in what was to happen to James. Mary was very well developed as well as James parents and Mary's mother. I would like to see this book more read than it is currently. Everyone can read it as it is either free or the cost very nominal.

Haruki Murakami

"Norwegian Wood" by Haruki Murakami translated from the Japanese by Jay Rubin Vintage:2000

There is a fast food restaurant next to the book store all under the big roof of Home Plus in Daejeon, Korea where I go to see people when I want a break from my writing. I still write, but I do it by hand instead of the laptop in my apartment. In the summer, I came to sit in the yellow and orange chairs and tables to escape the oppressive humidity and heat and so did a large number of Koreans.

Before I buy by rice burger, I often make a run into the bookstore and go to the section on the back wall that has the sign, "ESL" and there are several books there in English and I search most of the time in vain. This time, I spotted this book by Haruki Murakami and grabbed it. He is one of my favorite authors and although I had this book sitting on a shelf at home, I had not read this particular book of his although I had read several of his others. I was very pleased to see it there and it was the only one there. I bought it.

When I read it, I was careful not to mark it or spill anything on it as I am going to donate it to the English Library of the University across the street. They do not have any of his books there. Most of the books that they do have are the books one can get for free off Google Books for they are public domain books with some exceptions. One of them are the Harry Potter books which the bookstore also has.

The author is a Japanese citizen born on January 12, 1945 and is a writer, translator, teacher, professor, former jazz club owner and marathon runner. He has lived in Japan and in the United States. Many of his books feature music including "Norwegian Wood". He got the idea to write his first novel when he was 29 years old while sitting at a baseball game and started it when he got home writing between working at the jazz club. He had no training in creative writing. He sent it to a contest and won first prize. His success with this novel, "Hear the Wind Sing", encouraged him to keep writing. He is now considered an important figure in postmodern literature.

I have read several of his books but "Norwegian Wood" is not among my favorite. I am inclined to like such novels as "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" and "Kafka on Shore." I loved his autobiography, "What I talk about When I Talk about Running." I have not read all of his books he has written as of now but plan to keep finding other titles when I get back to the States. "Norwegian Woods" is a novel that is still well worth reading. It was a huge hit with the Japanese especially the youth when it came out in 1987.

"Norwegian Wood"'s title is from a Beatles song of the same name. The novel is a basic coming of age story of a young man, Toru Watanabe told from the perspective of the older Watanabe who is remembering his youth as an university student living in Tokyo in the late 1960's. There are many people in the novel that play a part in Watanabe's life but there are three main people who cast a shadow over the entire novel, one who was his best friend but commits suicide early in the novel. The other two are women who represent sexuality although they are not similar. One of them is his best friend's old girlfriend and the other is the new girlfriend with a complete different set of issues. All of the people Watanabe meets all have a hand in shaping the man he is to become at the end of the novel.

Joseph Campbell said boys need rituals to become men. Women have their first period and presto they are women. It is far more complicated for boys to achieve manhood. Maybe that is why there are so many coming of age stories and books for men than there is for women.

In "Norwegian Wood", the protagonist becomes a man with the help of women. Sometimes men need a male mentor but in this book Watanabe gets his help through women. Maybe this coming of age issue with men left me outside the bubble of understanding here as I am a woman. I don't know. There were so many people willing to help this young man grow into a self-sustaining and independent man. I could not help thinking that much of what was happening here was a little autobiographical. I never had this feeling with this author's books before.

Campbell is right. Girls just become women with our first menses when we become capable of bearing children. At that point, we spend much of our time convincing the young men we don't want to have children until we are ready. Men just want to have sex. Watanabe never spent much time worrying about getting any of the women he slept with pregnant. He just wanted to have sex. Then later when we have husbands or a permanent partner, we are too busy with children and husbands to wonder if we are women or girls. We are mothers and that takes most of our time. Of course, this is a gross generalization, but I think an appropriate one.

As I wrote earlier, this is a book well worth reading for other reasons other than the simple fact that it is a coming of age novel. There are other things here that are worth considering. Murakami is a writer, a great writer for many reasons and it shows in this book. There are levels of meaning that reach down into the reader, male or female that make it well worth the investment of time in reading this novel. For instance, there is a viewpoint that the student movement of that period of the 1960's was largely weak willed and hypocritical and that maybe most student movements are doomed to fall into this category. There is also a great deal about mental illness and about self-healing vs. the mental health field and how effective it really is.

A professor at the university said it was just a Japanese book. I was surprised that he would think that. It may have been popular in Japan, but it is far from being just a Japanese book. Murakami is far from being just a Japanese author. The book has implications that reach far beyond Japanese shores. Murakami has always expressed a fascination with American culture. His books show a worldliness that makes his books not only remarkable but a necessity for all readers to consider.

Anne Perry

"Dark Assassin" By Anne Perry Ballantine: 2006

I have noticed that I have been writing less and less about the author's background and more and more about the work itself on this blog. In this case, however, the author's background is fascinating and may be already known to many readers and that is Perry was convicted of murder as a teenager. She and a friend murdered the mother of her friend because she wanted to separate them. Perry's parents were separating and both girls wanted to live with Perry's father. They were tried and convicted and served five years in prison and neither saw each other again. For more detail, the reader can look up the case on the Internet. A movie was made regarding the case and a documentary is being prepared on it as well. Perry and her friend had a rich fantasy life and created many stories. With that background and the background of being tried for murder and convicted, Perry has turned out to be a very good writer of mystery novels.

This is not the first novel I have read of this author, but I tend to read widely in this area and lean away from period murder mysteries with the possible exception of Sherlock Holmes. In this case although I did not have much choice in the book since I am still in Korea and can only read what is available, I am very glad I purchased this book for it is an excellent book about a period of time in London when the London Sewerage System was created.

The London Sewerage System is part of the water infrastructure system serving the city of London and was developed during the late 19 century at the time of this novel was set. It was made clear that the River Thames was an open sewer with terrible health problems such as cholera epidemics. There was what was called "The Great Stink" of 1858 that was so bad that Parliament finally agreed to fund the creation of a modern sewerage system. It is the construction of this sewer system that is central to the plot of this novel.

Many cities have interesting underground cities such as Edinburgh,Scotland and Portland, Oregon but I had no idea that there was such an underground of rivers and streams and of people who lived underground and many who lived their whole lives under London. I also had no idea that this sewer system was part of other novels and books such as Neil Gaiman's "Neverwhere" in 1996. The BBC also featured it as one of the "Seven Wonders of the Industrial World".

The book starts with William Monk who has recently been appointed superintendent in the River Police in a boat patrolling the Thames. They look up and see a couple on the Waterloo Bridge in a deep discussion and suddenly both fall into the river, the woman falling backwards. They rush to where they are but the river is so dank and filthy that they are dead before they can fish them out. Is it an accident or suicide and the man simply an accident? Monk starts to investigate and finds more questions than answers.

The investigation and relationships of the people involved is almost second to the building of the sewer and what makes this novel so remarkable is the way Perry handles the descriptions of the underground, the people building the tunnels and the police trying to make sense of what is happening both underground and on top. The reader can feel the muck under the shoes and boots of the people walking the tunnels and can hear the machinery as they dig the deep tunnels where the sewer pipes will go and where the bricks will be laid.

I went to London in 2002 and used the tube or underground subway often to get around London. It was deep and I would take several escalators and stairways to get to the train platforms. It may not have been the sewer, but I could see how London had such a underground. One time before going to my rooms, I ate a small dinner at a restaurant and the place started to shake really hard. I was concerned as I did not think England had earthquakes. I looked around and no one seemed to notice. Everyone was eating. Then I realized that the tube was right beneath me. This sort of shaking was happening when the building of the sewer was occuring and when there was cave-ins.

What happens to people who are injured in the building of the sewer? What was happening to people who lived near the river? How did people ignore the plight of those who got sick on the filth of what was floating in the river? Perry did her homework. She even had a court scene that was well done or seemed plausible.

At the end, things are tied in a believable ending although it seemed a bit drawn out. Still, it was done well. I learned a lot from that period and about London during that time. I also appreciated the richness of the relationships of the characters. It is an evolving book and one that I want to pick up again with another adventure and title.

W. Somerset Maugham

"Rain and Other Stories" by W. Somerset Maugham YBM SI-sa: no publishing date listed

This is one of those books that I bought from Home Plus here in Korea that is half English and half Korean. The stories that is included are the full version of the original stories. I have mentioned before in other posts that I first read short stories by Maugham as a young teenager because I had nothing else to read in the house and it was a book my mother had. Normally, I did not care for short stories until I read this author's stories set in the South Pacific. There are only three short stories in the collection and I remember reading all of them in that particular volume.

The first one is "Rain" and I remember how shocked I was reading that story. Three films were made from this story. One was a silent film in 1928 starring Gloria Swanson called "Sadie Thompson " which was based on a play that was taken from the short story. Another was "Rain" filmed in 1932 starring Joan Crawford and the third was "Miss Sadie Thompson" filmed in 1953 starring Rita Hayworth.

Reading it again this time I had the advantage of my age and the fact that I read "The Summing Up" a book about the author's philosophy about writing. I knew he liked to include himself in the plot of much of his fiction as an interested observer. He got this idea from reading Henry James. In this case, the author appeared as Dr. Macphall. Maugham was a trained physician although he did not work very long in the field. The setting was in Pago Pago in the South Seas.

The main characters was Miss Sadie Thompson who was a prostitute. She was thrown out of one red light district and on her way to another. All of them including a missionary husband and wife and the doctor and his wife were forced to stay at Pago Pago until they were cleared to continue on their journey elsewhere because of a measles outbreak elsewhere. It was when the missionary, Davidson, discovered Thompson's true profession that the real action of the story begins. He is incensed that she is allowed to stay in the same house as they are and entertain men in her room.

In a slow dance, he starts to tighten the rope around her neck until she is without anything to do and then he goes to the governor and convinces him to throw her off the island on the very next ship which would take her to San Francisco. Thompson begs Davidson to let her go on another ship because prison awaits her if she goes back to San Fransisco. Even the doctor cannot convince the missionary to let her go on a later ship that would take her to Australia. Davidson wants her to pay for her sins. Then Davidson tries to convince her to give up her way of life and become a Christian. She begins to do that. Slowly, the noose tightens around Thompson's neck but it begins to tighten around the missionary's neck as well. She walks onto the ship that will take her to San Francisco and prison but with her old ways back saying that all men are pigs and the missionary ends up slitting his own throat.

There is a reason this story has stood up. It is written and paced extremely well. Maugham was a successful playwright but this group of stories showed the public that he could write short fiction. The book was very successful. He never looked back and saw himself as a professional writer.

The story was written in prose that was easy to read and yet showed the place where the travelers were at. Maugham had been there. He had written that he could not use complex prose that was popular at the time. It is no longer in vogue although the way he writes then is now very much still in style. He could control the language and make it say what he wanted it to say and give the mood and image of what was necessary to the story.

The next story is "Red". It starts out as a captain of a small vessel carrying cargo makes its way to an island. Everyone is described and there is a good reason for it. The captain is portly, not particularly good looking, sloppy and drinks a bit too much. He knows where there is an opening in the reef for the ship to slip in and goes ashore to a small house where a man lives. The man tells him a story about the big tragedy of his life of how he came upon this beautiful spot and fell in love with his beautiful woman who was in love with a young man named Red who was kidnapped by a ship long ago. The young man was as beautiful as the young girl was and they were lovers and lived an ideal life until he was kidnapped. Shortly after he left the girl had a stillborn child. She waited and waited for his return. The man who was sick fell in love with her and wanted to marry her and she refused because she was waiting for Red. He married her anyhow and she burned down the house and he rebuilt it anyhow. Many years have passed and she never loved the sick man who recovered and she just served him. He ended up hating her. Then the woman came in and asked him something. She had gotten old and gray and then left. The captain finally admitted that he was Red. He went back to his ship. The man saw how much he cheated himself and told the woman after she asked who the captain was that he had just told him that his brother was sick at home and he needed to go home. She did not recognize the man sitting there as her lover, Red and the man decided not to tell her.

The last story was "Honolulu" and it started off as if it was a travel essay. The story is in the 1st person by a traveler who listens to a story told by a captain who invited them on his ship. The traveler had been told that the captain although he was a captain of an inferior ship because of a loss of command that resulted in loss of life was a very pleasant man. He had a beautiful woman who was his partner. He told the story that happened a few years before just after he bought a girl from her father that the first mate wanted and started to make him ill by praying him to death. His girlfriend found out what to do and tricked him into gazing into his image and then throwing the image into the sea. His first mate then died and the captain recovered. The traveler was amazed that this beautiful woman would do so much for the captain but he was told she was another girl since the other girlfriend ran off with the cook the year before. He has a new one.

As I said, when I read these stories I stayed with them the first time and being surprised at the ending. Now, I can see how Maugham used women characters to move the plot especially the last two stories. Still, these are good stories and well done. I have read other stories by this author and found them compelling as much as I found his novels fascinating reads. I have read everything by Maugham. Here in Korea, I am limited on what I can get my hands on.

Sometimes in fiction, the plot is more important than the characters. Maugham said that he thought Anton Chekhov did not put enough warmth in his characters and I would have to agree. There is no doubt that Maugham put a great deal of thought in his characters. He said he always started with someone real that he knew in creating his characters and then changed and modified them to fit the story he was working on. I think you have to care about someone in a story for it to work with the reader or with it is with me. If I don't care one way or the other about anyone in a book or short story I usually put the thing down and don't pick it up again.

I am leaving Korea in a month and an half and one of the things I am going to do is hit a book store. I have been dreaming about going to a Barnes and Noble and getting more short stories by Maugham or maybe ordering them if they don't have them. Oh....I can't wait. I really like this author as he writes uncommonly well.

Roald Dahl

"Matilda"by Roald Dahl Puffin Books: 1988 illustrated by Quentin Blake

I love books by Roald Dahl but not all of them equally. This one is my favorite. I read this one in the United States and I saw the movie based on this book in the States too. Then while I was in Home Plus, I saw this book sitting on a shelf and I grabbed it. Ah, I will read it again. Then after I read it, I looked on the Internet for the movie and I found it to my surprise and watched it again. Well, I am ready to put in on my book journal. I opened the cover to put down the details and then I started to read it again. Finally, after finishing it, I found the movie on You Tube and watched it again. Please forgive me reader, I really love this book. The movie is great too, but the book is better but both are wonderful.

I think many girls reading this book identify with Matilda. I grew up in a family that did not really know I was around. When I was missing, no one noticed. When I asked for a book, my mother thought I was a bit odd although we did not have the same television viewing habits as Matilda's parents had. Her parents watched it all of the time. We did not. It was an aunt who taught me to use the public library and I walked several miles to the library alone just to use the library and carried the books home to read them in trees. Note to the reader, no one ever looks up into trees so no one ever saw me. I was not allowed to stay in my room during the day and beside I shared one with my sister.

I wish I could say I was as smart as Matilda is and that I taught myself to read. No, I learned to read in school but once I started there was no stopping me. I just loved looking at Matilda going through all of the books in the public library and the librarian who helped her. I had a librarian who helped me. The illustrations really caught the niceness of Matilda and the way she was so hungry for knowledge.

Finally, she started school and she meets a wonderful teacher, Miss Honey. As smart as Matilda was, she was well liked by her fellow students but not by Miss Trunchbull, the kid-hating headmistress. Dahl makes it all sound so believable. There is magic in the world and the author is the one to record it.

Matilda does get a family that deserves her although I did not. Still, there is enough wonderful magic in the story that it gives the reader the hope that all will turn out well for everyone in the end.

It's hard to believe that Dahl used to be a fighter pilot during World War II and a spy for the British but he led a very exciting life. He must have led an exciting inner life too. I will be reviewing more Dahl books as time goes by.

I had "Jamie and the Magic Peach" but I lost it. Here in Korea, children come up to me and stare and sometimes say hello. We, Americans, are almost always teachers. One very special little boy came up and he was so delightful that I gave him the book. I hope he is able to read it someday.

Martha Grimes

"The Winds of Change: A Richard Jury Novel" By Martha Grimes Signet: 2005


I have not read a Martha Grimes book for sometime and was not going to however as mentioned before I really don't have much choice here in Korea. In this instance, I am glad I did. I really enjoyed this book although some parts made me uncomfortable because the subject matter concerned the sexual exploitation of children and the author wrote about it convincingly.

Jury as a homicide detective is called to investigate the death of a child who was shot in the back. He begins a trail that leads to a cold case of a missing girl in another town. Soon other people are brought into the puzzle which includes Brian Macalvie of the Devon and Cornwall Police and Melrose Plant. Grimes does an excellent job describing the characters including children in a very convincing way. Murder is a terrible crime but the sexual abuse of children is the murder of their souls. Clues pile up but seem random until Jury begins to make sense of the mystery and solves it in the end although he risks everything including his own career to save those who are still alive and suffering.

In society, there exists a class of criminals who feel that they are doing children a service by introducing them to the so-called pleasures of sex and they will pay very handsomely to do so. Then there are those who work hard to defend the innocents from their depraved and sick behaviors. Unfortunately, those with money often win more than those who can protect the young. It is a constant battle to save the children and some will break the law to do it. "The Winds of Change" portrays this conflicts realistically.

I have every intention of reading Grimes again if this book is any indication of the quality and well plotted thoroughness of her writing. I don't remember why I stopped, but this book keep me reading well into the night.

George Gissing

"The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft" by George Gissing

This is another thin red book that is in both English and Korean that I bought at Home Plus in Daejeon, Korea. I never heard of this writer or the book. I just took a chance on it. I have never been so pleasantly surprised as I was with this author. To think, I discovered this English novelist who lived from November 22, 1857 to December 28, 1903 in a country whose primary language is not English. He died at the age of 46 from emphysema from an ill-advised winter walk. He is buried in France.

"The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft" was the most autobiographical work of Gissing and it brought him much acclaim. He had been able to retreat to a more private life to write after receiving a late legacy. This is a story of that new beginning of his writing life.

In the book, the author writes as if he is writing a journal and he writes clearly his love of books, his home, the walks and nature and what he sees on them, his housekeeper and other things in such a way it is warm and comforting to the reader. I can see why Gissing is included in this series of books to help the Korean learn English for the book is easy to read but interesting and well written. The reader can readily see what Ryecroft is experiencing around him.

I looked up Amazon Books to see if any of Gissing books are in print and was happy to see quite a few of them are. I had looked up his name in Google Books and expected to see his novels sitting there forgotten since he had lived so long ago. Not so. He is read now and they are all in print. I can understand it. When I get to the USA in December of this year, I will buy one. I loved this book. What a wonderful mind and eye he must have had to have written the way he did.

J. & W. Grimm Part III

This is a third thin red book that is written in English and Korean on stories by the Brothers Grimm. This book contains the stories of "The Town Musicians of Bremen" and "The Sleeping Beauty". In contrast with the other two red books, there are small drawings in this book that illustrate the stories.

The first story is one that every senior citizen would love. In "The Town Musicians of Bremen" a man had a donkey that served him faithfully by carrying his sacks to the mill, however because the donkey was getting older the donkey's strength began to fail. The man thought that it was time to get rid of it. The donkey was no ass and left one morning before the man got up because he thought his days were numbered. The donkey thought he might become a musician in the town of Bremen or as he thought to himself: it couldn't hurt. After he traveled down the road he met a dog who was in the same position as he was. His master was thinking of killing him because he could not hunt as well as the younger dogs. He joined forces with the donkey to become a musician as he thought he could beat the drums. Then they met a cat who had a mistress who wanted to drown her as she was getting too old to catch mice like she did when she was younger. The donkey and the dog said she could join them and be the singer. Then they walked past a farm and found a cock who was looking at the real possibility of being in the soup that Sunday because he was getting too old to crow in the morning. He joined the group. Off they went to Bremen.

Since they could not reach the town of Bremen in one day, they looked for a place to stay and found a cabin in the middle of the woods that had a bunch of robbers who were sitting down to eat. They decided to sing and the robbers ran from the cabin into the woods. After a while and after the donkey and his friends went in and ate and went to sleep the robbers sneaked back into the house and tried to find out what was going on with the house. The cat scratched them, the dog bit them and the donkey gave them a good sound kick and the cock crowed. The robbers were convinced that the cabin was haunted by a witch and ghosts and left permanently and the musicians found a permanent home and lived there happily ever after.

The second story is "The Sleeping Beauty". Everyone pretty well knows this story of a king and queen who wanted a child and finally got one, a girl. They had only 12 plates of gold so could only invite 12 fairies to the fairy portion of the party following the birth of the princess. The one that was not invited came anyway and said that the princess on her 15th birthday would prick her finger on a spindle and die. Since the last fairy did not get a chance to make her wish, she modified this wish and said that the princess would only fall asleep and the kiss of a prince would awaken her. The king in an effort to make sure this did not happen outlawed all spindles although it was not known what his subjects did for clothes. Maybe they had Walmart Stores. Anyhow, on her 15th birthday, the princess found a spindle in a room that was locked. She had found a key and sure enough it pricked her and everyone fell asleep. This vine with horrible stickers grew all around the castle and another king took over the land for one hundred years. Many other princes heard of the legend of the sleeping beauty but could not get through the stickers and perished. Obviously, there was that darn surplus of princes again. Then one hundred years to the day a prince came by and thought he would try his luck. The vine parted for him and he found the 15 year old princess and kissed her and she woke up. These days he would have been arrested but he got to marry her right away after everyone woke up.
It is unknown whether the king got his kingdom back though.

I think I am more cynical during this re-reading of these fairy tales. In fact, I am sure of it. I see magic being more than some prince marrying someone and they living in some castle forever. I don't think I ever liked that part anyhow. I saw what marriage did to my mother and what it did to the ladies of the neighborhood. It was not such a great job. At least if one lived in a castle one had servants and time to read a book or go to a party ever so often. If one did not like the prince anymore, there were plenty of rooms to move into. That was not possible in a three bedroom ranch house in the suburbs or an apartment in the city. Since men make more money than women and in those days rarely paid child support, times were hard for women if they wanted to live without their princes and that was when I was younger. It is still hard for women now especially men and women running for office wanting to repeal some of women's rights or abolishing the civil rights act. However, these are fairy tales.

Still, we have to be very grateful for the Brothers Grimm for collecting these stories which may have been lost if they did not do this. They inspired others to do it and the tradition is strong and part of our cultural heritage no matter what part of the world each of us are from.