3 posts tagged “diana wynne jones”
hmm. well, it's been a long time since i've read anything, so maybe this wasn't the best reintroduction back into literature for me, but it was fun for a while. there might have been several things where i set myself up expecting it to be like the first book though, so again, my fault on the expectations.
the main character, charmain (is that really a name? cool!) is mostly just really unwilling to do anything, so i didn't really feel like she did anything productive to advance the plot any further. in fact, it almost felt as if there wasn't really a plot--thanks largely in part to charmain's attitude of not wanting to do anything as a protagonist. i don't know, that just really didn't help in the way i ended up seeing this.
the character of peter was also very annoying at the best of times; howl was annoying in the first book, but in an adorable way. peter was kind of cute at times i guess (the strings for direction) but otherwise didn't really mean much to me as a character. the most loveable character in this entire thing is still howl, and that's kind of sad to me, because it was a character i'd already known, and i had wanted to meet new ones who i could enjoy reading about just as much. but again, i'm way too picky for my own good.
overall, i'd say that it was a generally slow plot, and what really made it crawl was the characteristics of charmain in general. i guess that doesn't really mean much when i generalize it that much. oh well, doesn't matter. i'm tired as fuck and i can't think of anything else to say about this, only that howl is adorable as usual. yes, i will not be able to stop talking about howl, and i want more sophie and howl romance! i feel like i would've enjoyed this much more if it was written in the point of view of sophie again, just as another episode of adventures for howl and sophie and of course, my dear beloved calcifer. what happened to the unexpected twists of old? miss those :(
and what's up with the ending here? nothing.. happened. it seemed almost as if she was in a hurry to get rid of these characters herself so she just ended at the first sentence she thought she could try to make a break for it. i'm not sure if i'm the only one who feels this way, since i haven't read any other thoughts on this, but.. shrug. that's that then, i guess. i guess i could always go back and read the first one :(
finished it in the early hours of morning, but was wayy too sleepy by that point to do anything else. so here i am now, instead. to sum things up, it was a cute book, but i definitely liked the first book better. maybe it's because i read that one first, but mostly i think i like sophie a lot better than abdulluh as a main character. maybe i tend to be biased toward female protagonists? i mean, regardless of which.. i can't help but notice abdullah doesn't seem to learn as much by the end of the book. and the romance in the first book was neatly done, nice buildup going and all; abdullah and flower-in-the-night meet for two nights, and it's a done deal. an inner part of me is screaming WTF?
but this book had its funny moments. for some reason i don't find it as funny as the first; again, this may just be a matter of taste. the first book kept me laughing every other page, and this one.. i guess i would smile every now and then, but that was about it. maybe reading it straight through would have something to do with it too, and the environment i was in (i read this one mostly at school over the course of several days). or again, maybe i set my expectations way too high to enjoy anything else i might've gotten. regardless. abdullah annoyed the hell out of me.
abdullah seems to believe women should be demure and softspoken, which kind of pissed me off from time to time, but i understand that the culture she's trying to portray is something pretty close to any genuine arabic culture and the way they think. i couldn't help being annoyed that despite flower-in-the-night having obviously a lot more gifted qualities than it initially seems, abdullah seems to be "in love" with her simply because she's beautiful. anything else is just a plus, and for him they take a backseat, even by the end of the book. any ideas why that might piss me off?
overall, it was good, but it wasn't great. not as cute as the first, but i will still definitely read the third to see what's going to happen next. cameo appearances from previous characters are always fun :)
teehee, this is the cutest book i've read in a while. i mean, granted, this is a children's book, so it had better be cute! i share the sentiments of someone else whose review i read, in that i wish i'd stumbled upon this at a younger age. more fun for the mind at that age, i'm sure. but now i'm totally determined to see the movie too.
a bit weird to imagine an old woman and a young guy falling in love, of course. howl was thoroughly charming most of the time, although the vanity thing did annoy me a hell of a lot. it was cute though, in that way that all men are children one way or another. the reason for why he was the way he was did make sense, since i was really by that point doubting how howl could possibly come out looking justified for being a skirt chaser. i simply cannot count the amount of times i laughed out loud reading this. too too cute.
anyway. it did seem to me that the ending was rather hastily done though, but i guess it can't be helped when THAT many things are getting wrapped up in one scene. how the hell did justin and sullivan split? that was kind of out of the blue. but i got my happily ever after and i'm not complaining. calcifer got his happy ending too! makes me want to burst with hearts and stars all over the place. neat stuff.
so yeah, off to stick my bookmark in the next, or hold the companion novel for this. i mean, while i'm at it, might as well, right? hopefully more good stuff to savor.
