Instead, I’d like to share with your a little something that will always bring me joy: Ace of Base. Or, more specifically, bands that I adore doing Ace of Base covers.

Firstly, the leader of the fanclub and one of my favorite musicians for his sheer literary prowess, The Mountain Goats (John Darnielle) with “I Saw the Sign”. Now, there are a ton of different versions floating around YouTube, but my very favorite is the six-minute audio-only version I got from a friend. So, here you go:

I promise you, it’s worth the whole six(ish) minutes. And if you’ve never before listened to The Mountain Goats, give them a go. I’d recommend Tallahassee, The Sunset Tree, Heretic Pride and We Shall Al Be Healed as good albums to start with. In no particular order.

Did I mention he was prolific?

Maybe I should post a good compilation list. There’s a lot, a lot, a lot of Mountain Goats stuff to sift through. A lot of it is dark, a lot of it is lo-fi, but it really is a brilliant collection of work.

Jukebox the Ghost is a band that I had the pleasure of seeing when they opened for Ben Folds in April of 2009. I’m almost afraid to admit it, as much as I like Ben Folds, but I think I enjoyed Jukebox’s set more that night. Their album lived in my player for months, it was on constant repeat on my MP3 player, and I definitely gave at least one person that album for Christmas. They’re brilliant and catchy, they sing about the apocalypse, and they’re bringing piano rock back with a vengeance.

Imagine my delight when, while strolling through the iTunes store, I noticed they were on a compilation album. Of cover songs. Doing “It’s a Beautiful Life”.

Some YouTube-age for you, since they’re pretty silly dudes.

And, as a little extra, a video of their single “Empire” from the album due out in September. They are both absolutely worth the 99 cents I spent on them.

Never fear - I’m still reading lots of interesting books and watching entirely too much television - Community, anyone? - but I’ve been purposefully putting off an update for two exciting reasons. One, I’m moving over a thousand miles away to start grad school in the fall. The plan was to move this very weekend, but that has fallen apart in spectacular fashion, so I’ve moved my focus on to Reason Two For Lack Of Updates. Being, of course, YAMCast. Now that my mad-dash to organize my life into hundreds of cardboard cartons has slowed to a leisurely crawl, I can get the tech set up to bring my YA yammer straight to your earholes.

Expect that in mid-June. For now, I’d like to leave you with the following movie trailer. This is decidedly the worst premise for a romantic comedy that I have ever seen:

Making the choice for more energy-efficient products and organic foodstuffs is becoming more popular, and therefore more available. That’s not to say the problem is anywhere close to being solved, but the need for green solutions has entered the public conscious. And by that I mean it’s all over the mainstream media.

In 2008 there was the increasingly popular documentary Food, Inc. that told us all about the wastefulness and uncleanliness of our nation’s food industry. Then there was the No Impact Man documentary in 2009 that let us follow the lives of a New York family as they tried to leave no negative impact on the planet, environmentally speaking. They went to extremes, certainly, but it was (and is) an experiment in just how much wastefulness we can do without. And, I admit I haven’t watched it yet, Food Revolution is this season’s TV newcomer, but it’s in the same ballpark.

It seems that as a nation we’re somewhat open to a change in our diets, provided it isn’t too pricey, but there’s something that still scares the begeezus out of us - germs.

Quick! Everyone break out your miniature disposable bottle of hand sanitizer - the GERMS are here! We may all get swine flu if we so much as look at a child with the sniffles! I think someone three blocks away just had a coughing fit - excuse me while I break out my SARS mask. (Or rather, buy a brand new one. Can’t be too safe, you know?)

When it comes to germs, our newfound green sensibilities seem to fly straight out the window. We still opt for the cleaners with bleaches in them. We use rolls of paper towels instead of reusable rags. Disposable paper products - toilet paper, tissues, diapers, feminine products - are a huge percentage of our country’s waste. We break out the antibacterial hand sanitizer at every opportunity.

Kleenex knows this. They anticipate and welcome our fears and know these fears overpower our thinking. And so, they have concocted a new, shiny product for us to buy, which they advertise like so:

A clean, fresh towel every time.

Every time.

According to Kleenex’s own website, “People in the U.S. dry their hands on cloth bathroom towels approximately 200 billion times a year.” So, in perfect Kleenex World, 200 billion of these disposable paper towels will end up in our landfills every year. What?

Now, I’m not one to advocate a completely paperless home existence, but I do think there’s a line, and Kleenex is crossing it. Sure, dispose of your toilet paper. We’ve figured that one out. Reusable cleaning rags instead of paper towels. Easy. Facial tissues are great, but try to use one up completely before you chuck it. Allergies anymore make it almost as wasteful to be machine-washing little loads of handkerchiefs every day. Diapers are a problem that need addressing, and I’m not saying you need to craft your own tampons but there are less wasteful alternatives. (A post for another day, assuredly!)

These disposable hand towels are wasteful and unnecessary. And thankfully, other people (David and Shea) find it a real kick in the teeth that they’re advertising this garbage (literally - ha!) right around Earth Day. Honestly, I thought it was a joke at first. Not to mention the fact that all this germophobia in recent years is leading to new, stronger germs, as well as children who have been so insulated from them that their immune systems can’t do their job. Kleenex’s own beloved CDC has expressed concern over these antibacterial products, and Anne Marie at About.com gives it to you short and sweet.

At any rate, I’m going to keep using my disgusting hand towel. My parents let me get sick as a kid, so I’m pretty sure my immune system is up for the challenge.

The City of Ember (2003)

Sometime in 2004 I picked up Jeanne DuPrau’s The City of Ember. It must have coincided with one of my collegiate re-readings of The Giver, because I remember the similarities standing out in a glaring way. I shelved The City of Ember with disgust, and forgot it existed. Until, that is, I saw the previews in 2008 for the film adaptation. I remember groaning aloud in the theater, explaining to friends that it was a terrible book.

I had an English professor in college with whom I took many, many classes. One thing she taught us was that reading is not a passive experience. You don’t read something, tuck it away, and that’s that. You enter the reading with your whole life’s accumulation of experiences. You interact with the book and it changes you. Your relationship with a book when you read it at 18 will be vastly different than when you read it at 40. Never has this been clearer to me than with this book.

Last week I ordered the film The City of Ember through Netflix. I settled in for an evening of masochistic glee, only to find that I was genuinely sorry I had to pause the movie to meet some friends. I thought about it while I was away, and I was glad to come home and finish it. Was the movie really so much better than the book? Had they changed it so much? I didn’t think they had, but I couldn’t remember. Six years is a while. So I pulled it out again (I can’t get rid of books) and sat down to read.

The film is visually incredible. Granted, there are great sections at the end that scream COMPUTER GENERATED in very loud, contrasty tones, but I mean before that. Perhaps it was the charm of post-apocalyptic self-contained societies, but the shabby clutter of electrical Ember was thrilling to look at and explore. The premise being that the town was stocked to survive for 200 years, but we’re about forty years past that, so everything is patched and re-purposed and very in right now.

Doon Harrow (Harry Treadaway) and Lina Mayfleet (Saoirse Ronan) in City of Ember (2008)

I found it was nice to have these visuals with me when I read the book again. I usually prefer my own imaginings, but I think in the case of The City of Ember, I had been at a loss six years ago to come up with a very compelling image of the city. The movie does it beautifully. I particularly liked the costume for Lina Mayfleet, and the exteriors of the city as she ran through delivering her messages.

I also noticed the similarities to The Giver less. Or maybe there just weren’t as many as I though. Man-made post-apocalyptic village? Okay, yeah, that’s not just Lois Lowry. I think she’s got the monopoly when it comes to YA lit though. Then there’s Assignment Day for all the twelve year-olds. This is when they’re given theit jobs within the community. The process is different, but the base concept is the same. Hey, maybe that’s what the end of the world calls for? You get to be a kid until you’re twelve, and then you better pull your weight. Maybe they’re tuned in to something the rest of us aren’t privy to. But aside from the job of Messenger (which DuPrau beat Lowry to, clearly), and keeping the villagers purposefully ignorant, I can’t find anything. And all that’s fairly coincidental, if not unavoidable. Rage dismissed. I was wrong.

City of Ember (2008)

The plots between the book and film stay in line almost perfectly until the end. In both cases we are given the background up front - Ember had been built underground to save the last of humanity. Their eventual escape, however, is made much more theatrical for the film. (Strangely enough.) Lots of automated and impressive machinery. I admit, I found it thrilling. After reading the escape in the novel again, I don’t think it would have been quite as climactic. Good choice.

The book does attempt to give us some background on the actual building of Ember. It started with a base of 200 people (100 infants, 100 elderly) who are assigned into family units (oh hey, more Giver) and the elders are supposed to say nothing of their lives before Ember. The new generations will grow up in ignorance until, 200 years later, the instructions for their departure are revealed. Except that doesn’t happen. The movie doesn’t even touch on this. I realize I’m getting awfully niticky about an allegory, but these are the things I want to know. How long would it take, really, to build an underground city that will sustain about 200 people, give or take, for 200 years? All the supplies they had to fill the storerooms with? Do you build extra homes so people can move out when they’re older? How do people repair the generator without understanding it? What government even funds this?

Okay, yes, now I’m getting too serious. But some of the questions are valid. I picked up the first sequel a few months ago at a used bookstore. I saw that there are others - another sequel, and a prequel. I really hope some of my issues are addressed. I think the plot would be too childish if some of the logistics weren’t made clear. If anything, I’d like to know why the town was made in the first place. I’ll just have to read it and find out.

Bottom line, I really, really enjoyed my second encounter with The City of Ember. I’d recommend it, both the book and the movie.

Podcast!

On an unrelated note, I read Going Bovine a few weeks back. I found that the entry I was writing about it was entirely too long, and I still had so much I wanted to say about it. So, the first episode of YAMCast is going to be about Libba Bray’s Going Bovine, the graphic novel by Bryan Lee O’Malley Lost at Sea, and the teenage existential crisis. Hopefully I’ll be discussing it with a friend of mine, but I’ll totally talk to myself about it. If anyone out there is the weebiverse has some thoughts or opinions and wants to join us, hit me up and we’ll include you one way or another.

How to Traib Your Dragon (2003)

To my shame, I did not know at first that this film was based on a book series. It wasn’t until I started reading up on it over on Wikipedia that I heard of the books’ existence. Naturally, I had to go to my local bookstore before movie time and grab a copy. I didn’t finish it before seeing the film, but I have finished them both now and let me just say, they are dramatically different.

And, in a stance I rarely take, I must say that I liked the movie a lot more.

Firstly, Novel Hiccup is just over ten years old whereas the film hiccup seems to be in his mid-teens. Novel Hiccup and the other boys of his village are undergoing their initiation into the tribe wherein they have to capture a baby dragon and train it to the satisfaction of their elders. Their dragons are equivalent in size and use to hunting dogs, Hiccup’s ends up being the smallest and most common-bred of them all, despite the fact that he’s the chief’s son and should have a “worthier” dragon. On the other hand, Film Hiccup is thrown into initiation as a last resort wherein he must kill dragons. He captures a rare Night Fury by accident and their relationship grows from there.

Without getting too spoilery, Novel Hiccup and his class face being banned from their tribe but are presented with a last-minute chance to redeem themselves by saving the island. The same applies to Film Hiccup, but the circumstances vary. Cleverness wins out over brute strength and dorky kids everywhere find hope in Hiccup being accepted by his very Viking clan. Even the cantankerous Toothless (who talks throughout the books but does not, thankfully, do so in the films) finds a heart and comes to Hiccups aid, therefore redeeming himself in the end.

How to Train Your Dragon (2010)

The film, however, adds an element that I’d like to draw attention to. When Hiccup first comes across the fallen Toothless, the dragon has crashed into the forest – thanks to Hiccup’s bola-firing contraption. After some half-hearted attempts to slay the dragon, Hiccup sets him free only to discover that Toothless has an injured tail and can no longer fly, Through the ever-helpful use montage we see the clever and mechanical minded Hiccup craft a device that augments Toothless’ broken tail. The previously disabled dragon now has the power of flight restored to him by the same person that (inadvertently) took it away.

Here’s the really spoilery bit. After the climactic final battle, it’s revealed that Hiccup has lost a leg. A crude prosthetic has been crafted for him, though it is still very difficult for Hiccup to walk. Toothless props him up as he walks, and later Hiccup climbs aboard – his mechanical leg fitting perfectly into Toothless’ flight-control mechanism. Separately they have very limited mobility, but together they can fly.

All in all, I loved the film. This little addition is the only sticky wicket for me, as I’m not quite sure what it’s saying about disabilities. I don’t think it’s trying to send any kind of message on purpose, but I think the feel-goodness intended didn’t quite come across. Toothless could have suffered some more temporary type of debilitation and still made a bond with Hiccup, and we could have come out of this film happily-ever-after. As it is, our heroes are both crippled for life and must depend on each other to survive. And it’s clearly Hiccup’s fault.

Do the ends justify the means? Possibly. The entire village is now at peace with, and working harmoniously with, their neighboring dragons. Hiccup may have injured Toothless, but he got his karmic retribution and now everybody is safe. Clearly he’s got the girl as well, and Toothless is a pretty big deal himself. So, in a way, it is happily-ever-after. You make do with what you’ve got, and they’ve got quite a lot going for them.

Frankly, I don’t think kids are going to care. It’s a spectacular movie, and one I’d feel good about recommending to children and adults alike. It really is one of Dreamworks’ best offerings to date. The book is a great read as well, and I intend to pick up some of the sequels in the future. They may be full of crude (yet hilarious) drawings, but they aren’t written in a condescending way. They’re definitely on the strange side, but I can’t say I have a problem with that.

The Giver (1993)

I first encountered The Giver in 1997, where it was a required portion of my curriculum. It was a novel concept to me at the time, and I think that my classmates got a lot of enjoyment out of it as well. It presents a utopian society where everything runs smoothly and efficiently - on the surface, at least. We learn later, of course, that there are terrible atrocities occurring behind closed doors, and that much of the information we take for granted has been taken away from this village. Things like color and sunshine, but also painful things.

At the end our protagonist escapes into the unknown. All we know is that he is headed towards another small town. I remember my class being tasked with completing his story. I don’t remember what we decided happened, but lucky for future generations, Lois Lowry has taken the guesswork away.

Gathering Blue deals with an entirely different town, and the girl with a gimp who lives there. This time, instead of pushing for the importance and freedom of knowledge, Lowry blatantly presses the moral of accepting everyone, despite their differences, because they all have unique talents to offer. Not that it wasn’t an enjoyable read, but it felt very “Hey, remember that time I wrote that awesome thought-provoking kids’ book? Yeah, I did it again.”

At the end of the novel, the heroine and her friend discover that same village from the end of The Giver. Gasp! She doesn’t stay, but we learn her father lives there and that she’ll go there eventually. Mmm, smells like a sequel!

Which brings us to Messenger, the novel set in that mysterious village of… Village. That’s her thing - naming things as obviously as possible, because everything is a giant metaphor. Did you get it? THE METAPHOR? Should I type it bigger?

Messenger (2004)

METAPHOR.

There you go. And the metaphor Messenger is trying to get across is this: Jesus died to save America, so knock it off and hug an immigrant.

Our hero/Jesus, who is Gathering Blue’s little friend from last time, lives in Village/America. They used to be nice people until they started trading their deepest selves away for material goods, or other frivolous crap. (He who dies with the most toys still dies?) It used to be that strangers could find refuge in Village/America, but now all the not-nice-anymore villagers are building a wall and locking them out. Oh, and the forest around them is strangling to death the people it doesn’t like.

Oh! And now Giver and Gathering Blue have magical powers, allowing them to see ‘beyond’ and ‘ahead’. Which I don’t recall them possessing before, but I guess the time for believability has passed. (Yes, I know, the transfer of Giver memories is malarky, but for some reason I’m allowing it.)

Anyway, Matty/Jesus has a gift too, and that seems to be dying in order to fix the world. Because we know that everything will be great and no one will make THAT mistake again. Phew!

I don’t know. I think that once was enough. Once was awesome. Not that I don’t fully support the importance of teaching new generations to not be assholes, but I feel like the next book in the series is just going to be called “Don’t Be Such An Asshole.”

Lois Lowry is now in her seventies. While I may not agree with her specific thought-vehicles, I do agree that she’s got the right ideas and that a little compassion on everyone’s parts would go a long way. But sadly, Lois Lowry is not the only old person who feels the need to preach about the necessary course of the future, though she’s looking to be the sanest.

I encountered a guest at my store today telling a young mother about “Crystal Children” and explaining that the little girl in the mother’s cart may be one of them. Cue eerie cult music here.

I came home and looked this thing up, and quite honestly, I’m only about halfway through this super professional and utterly authoritative website on the phenomena. Crystal and indigo children and adults (which are you? Take our quiz! Everyone’s a winner!) are slightly varied groups of reincarnated individuals who have come to crush our useless government and educational systems to replace them with joy and light and unicorn farts of productivity.

I’m all for revamping the education system. It’s a big part of why I want to work in a school. However, I don’t fancy myself some Indigo Warrior with a shimmery aura and a soul of the ancients. It’s called progress, and it tends to happen every now and again.

It amazing the forms such good, basic advice can take. How simple lessons like “Question everything” and “Be compassionate” have to be dressed up is ungainly metaphor or whackadoodle mysticism to be accepted by the masses. (Or in this case prevalent minorities.)

In lieu of a concrete conclusion to my disjointed whitterings, I leave you with a short video about the Crystal Children, in all their astonishingly incomprehensible glory:

I saw this over at engadget and Geekologie and the more I think about it, the more impressed I am by this technology. In the video they talk about saving space with mobile devices, so this interface is a way of expanding your teeny gadget to a useable size. Which will be great, once it doesn’t require a big honkin’ armband with a baby octopus of wires attached to it.

Aside from the novelty aspects of controlling your iPod without touching it directly, I’m extremely interested to see where this goes in terms of people with physical disabilities. So far the programs are using various points in the arms and hands that produce distinct bio-sounds, but it stands to reason that the rest of the body could be mapped as well. People with limited motor function could have controls mapped to their range of motion that correspond not only to their music player, but their phone and computer as well.

It’s just a thought, and it’s a lot of work ahead, but I think this is definitely some tech to keep an eye out for in the future. I just have to learn to quit drumming my hands when I rock out, or I’ll accidentally dial my mother.

There was one book I went back for at the last minute - Avalon High, by Meg Cabot. My copy is bright pink and very girly, a category which does not exist in my library. It gets as girly as the Georgia Nicholson novels, and those books at least have the decency to put on a green plaid every now and then. Yes, I’m judging a book by it’s cover here. Its color, in fact. I might be a little bit book-racist.

Pink or no pink, I was pulled back to it because it’s a modern re-telling of the Arthurian legend. Ever since I landed in an Arthurian studies class my freshman year of college, I have had quite the soft spot for all tales Arthurian. I had actually forgotten that the book was hiding on my shelf until Merlin showed up on Hulu and I tried to give it a watch. (That’s going to be another post in itself, I can feel it.) I couldn’t stop thinking about Cabot’s book, so I turned Merlin off and spenth several hours last night devouring Avalon High.

It’s not a lengthy, detailed novel. It’s fairly superficial in places, but we are talking about the author of The Princess Diaries. This is not a slam. I like a good fluffy read more often than I’ll admit, and this one absolutely did the trick. In fact, I may actually pick up The Princess Diaries because of this book, pink covers and all.

The premise behind Avalon High is that a teenager, named Elaine, begins at a new school and finds herself in the middle of what seems to be a modern version of the Arthurian story. There’s Lance, Jennifer, A. William Wagner, Marco and Mr. Morton, all playing out their historic roles as Lancelot, Guinevere, Arthur, Mordred and Merlin. Except that these replays have never yet resulted in the true re-emergence of the sleeping King Arthur, and its looking pretty bleak. Of course, its up to our protagonist to save the day.

It’s pretty cheesey that Elaine’s mom is conveniently an Arthurian scholar, but I’ve known at least two in my life, so I guess I’d be just as prepared should I find myself in a surreal repeat of history. What I do love about this, though, is that her mom’s interests lie with the Lady Elaine of Astolat, or the Lady of Shalott. Elaine struggles with having a suicide as her namesake even before she arrives at Avalon High, and when all this starts unfolding she refuses to be cast as the Lily Maid. It’s a perspective I’ve never come across, and all the hokey moments add up to a truly spectacular whole.

And while we’re on the subject of cheesey done right, I’d like to add that Meg Cabot references things like iPods and Starbucks in this novel and I don’t want to set her on fire for it. She uses the references when they actually add something to the situation, and the whole premise of this book relies on readers knowing approximately what decade we’re in. There is a solid reason for confining the story the way she does, and Michael Scott needs to take note.

(By the way, I’m still stuck on page 50 of The Alchemyst. Ugh.)

Also, this book inspired me to dig out all my old Loreena McKennit albums. I had quite a thing for her version of The Lady of Shalott back around the time I was in that Arthurian class. That, and The Mysts of Avalon film, but lets just all agree we were weirdos in college. It was a nice bout of reminiscing.

Which led me to Peter David’s Knight Life. Again, not somethingg I’ve encountered since that fateful class, but still a book I’d recommend. Another modern-day take on Arthur, but with adult players and a more political setting. Vey humorous too, if I recall, and I fully intend to grab the sequel in the not-so-distant future.

Lucky for you, I save just about everything I’ve ever typed up for a class. This is from my handout on the book in the Spring of 2005:

Knight Life - Peter David
Merlin slowly shook his head. “Someone is going to have to talk to you, long and hard, about slang.”

THESIS:
No matter what era the Arthurian legend is set in or what era it’s rewritten in, good triumphs over evil. However, in more modern takes on the legend, women play a more prominent role – in both the good and the evil. The character representing Guinevere takes in into her own hands to hunt down and fight Morgan Le Fey while Arthur is busy elsewhere, and Morgan Le Fey cannot count on Modred to work for her, so she does much of the work herself.

SYNOPSIS:
King Arthur and Merlin have both been freed from their respective caves of imprisonment and are now in modern-day New York City. Rather than declare himself king, Arthur Penn does what any rational centuries-old man of royalty does when he finds himself in a completely different world than what he is used to – he runs for mayor.

I can’t remember what the quote about Merlin is in direct reference to, but now I want to reread it and find out. Also, it would appear we have a theme here, what with female-hero driven Arthurian tales. It would be an interesting genre to explore, if there are more to be found. Sadly, I think they fell out of print. Hm.

Back to the Bookmine!

Peter, Walter, and Olivia

I digress. A few months ago I was encouraged - nay, ordered - to start watching Fringe. I was hooked immediately. Not only is our leading lady a badass (in a relateable way), but her sidekicks are a father-son team comprised of scruffyness and insanity. At some point in the series we find out that Jacksonville plays a pretty big role in Olivia’s life, and in the most recent episode they took a little trip to my hometown.

Except for the part where they didn’t. Despite the rest of the show being a crazy chase of paranormal activity all over New York and Boston and other such places with fantastic establishing shots, their roadtrip to the south was without visual credibility. They arrived at their destination - an abandoned daycare on a closed naval base - to find a small nondescript building with the word ‘”Jacksonville” in the name. The rest of their trip played out in interiors.

I understand it. Budgets and soundstages and all that. But I suppose Jacksonville isn’t big enough to exist in stock footage just yet. I was excited just to hear us get mentioned. We’ve arrived! Television has informed the world that we do, indeed, exist! A nice, wide establishing shot would have been awesome, but I’ll let it go for you, Fringe. I find your closed naval base in my backyard completely believable. This town is lousy with them.

It’s easy to write about big cities and sneak stuff in. All kinds of things can happen in TV New York because it’s so huge - who can argue? When you get to smaller cities (okay, we’re pretty huge landwise) it gets harder to sneak stuff in. A Chinese drug ring operating in New York City? Sure! In Jacksonville? Yeah, no. Maybe some Wellfare scams. Lots of shootings. That’s about as exciting as it gets here, and COPS pretty much has the market cornered on television episodes that cover those aspects of this town.

If all that wasn’t exciting enough, Jacksonville got mentioned again the next week in an episode of Past Life. They “visited” the glaringly fictitious Sunflower Apartments hoping to find clues to a murder. Really? Sunflower? The state flower of Kansas? Just because the word has ’sun’ in it does not mean it’s appropriate. Down here we name things after alligators, native Indians, the beach, and citrus. Take your pick. But they were spot-on with the senseless murder, so we’ll just take what we can get.

Whats-Her-Face, Angry Cop Guy and some other people from Past Life

It feels like Past Life is being touted as some sort of Fringe Lite while Fringe is away. Blonde lady lead with her reluctant backup, chasing the weirdness, blah blah blah. Except that Past Life is so distressingly bland and dull that I can’t be bothered to remember anyone’s name of care for them in the slightest. On top of that, they’ve forever pigeon-holed themselves whereas Fringe gets to deal with the entire spectrum of strange. And Fringe may have, like, twenty-some episodes on Past Life, but that’s no excuse for a sadass premise.

I’m intrigued to see if this trend continues. Are more references going to be made to Jacksonville? Will we someday be a TV hometown? True, we lack a distinct personality, but there’s got to be potential hidden in this sad, vacuous pit somewhere, right? We had the Superbowl that one time. We’ve got the military. We have colleges without being a college town. We have beaches. We have a horrifying lack of culture. We have gang violence and sub-par public transportation and thirteen malls. We’ll get there.

The moral of this post is: Watch Fringe. It is good and Walter is a delightful crazyperson.

I am on page thirty-six.

I am on page thirty-six, and I am in an abusive relationship. This book is beating me with its stupid.

As a reader of fantasy, I bring with me a certain set of expectations when I read a fantasy novel. Because of the fantastic element, I wholly believe that these stories should border on timeless. The mundane aspects ought to be kept generic to achieve this. A sentence like “she got into her 2001 silver Saturn and blasted the new Modest Mouse single Float On” makes the mundane entirely too specific and unless it’s completely relevant to the plot¹, I don’t want to hear it. Just tell me she got into her car.

Okay, yes, I know that “car” brings with it a specific time period. That time period is an eon compared to the span of weeks that “Float On” was considered new. Getting into a plain old car is something we can change easily with our imagination, updating the setting to fit our (futuristic) needs. She got into her hover-car? Bam. She got into her 2146 AstroCar Plus and blared- Yeah, my brain is tired already. I’m sure future-rock is terrible anyway.²

My point is, the more pop-culture references that get dropped, the harder it is to budge a story out of a specific date. And this is the way Michael Scott writes. I’ve already heard about iPods, earbuds, Bluetooth headsets (the ear doodads are ALWAYS specified), The Simpsons, Quake, Doom, and the male protagonist’s inability to navigate Myst.³ Michael Scott, I don’t care.

Am I supposed to care? Am I supposed to be fourteen and hugely impressed that these teen-aged twins have similar interests as myself? Assuming I’m a fourteen year-old reader of books (which I was, at one point), these kids have already been painted as non-readers, so I’ve already failed to connect. So, maybe this is to encourage the non-readers out there that books can be fun! They can involve non-readers just like you, out there playing football and video games and not reading. Wait, what?

To reign in my tangent: Pop culture kills. It’s distracting. Harry Potter mentioned the Playstation about halfway through the series and I’m still seeking counseling for that colossal mood-killer. This is a fantasy book - quit tying the fictional mundane to my real world. It isn’t cute. And also, stereotypical teen know-nothing airhead protagonists make me sad. But that’s a rant for another day.

More importantly, there is a gaping plot-hole at this point. It has been slightly acknowledged by our dear Nicholas Flamel (cleverly hiding behind the name ‘Nick Fleming’) so I really hope it’s tended to in the future. Like, in the next ten pages would be great.

The titular ‘Alchemyst’, Nick, has had in his possession a book for the last, oh, seven hundred years or so. This is where all of his secrets and spells and whatever-ma-jiggers are - you know, where the immortal life, disease-killing, youth-forever, awesome Philosopher Stone-type secrets are. And it’s finally been snagged by his big bad arch nemesis who has been after it for almost five-hundred years.

John Dee has been after the secret of immortality. For five hundred years. Yep.

…

There has to be a reason, right? Because I’m pretty sure he’s already figured out the hard parts. Is there a fantastic casserole recipe in the back? OH, and speaking of the back, our weeny teen boy managed to pull two pages out. They are, of course, the two most important pages in the entire book.⁴

Sigh.

I really hope this book gets its act together.

1. I think I just challenged myself. Now I have to write a novel where the big bad wizard is destroyed only by blaring “Float On”. I apologize.
2. You kids get off my space-lawn!
3. Has he never heard of Google? Come on, Michael Scott, don’t you want to drop that name too? Maybe give us even more irrelevant drivel about this kid?
4. They are not a casserole recipe.