"There is No Dog" by Meg Rosoff

When Bob, the adolescent god of Earth, a small, unwanted planet (Simply placed upon Bob as none of the other celestial deities wanted it), falls in love with a human, and more importantly mortal, girl, the world turns upside down. Bob wreaks havoc on the little planet, and his under rewarded, fed up assistant, Mr. B, can do nothing to stop it. At the same time, his much ignored pet, Eck, the last one of the Ecks, is gambled off by Bob's mother to be eaten, and Bob does not care in the least. It falls on the shoulders of Estelle, a logical young immortal being, who is the daughter of the very god trying to eat Eck, and of course, Mr. B, while they also try to stop the world from being thrown into an environmental disaster from hormones. 

I just reread this book, and I am disappointed by the amount of appreciation I gave it. Though, the things I don't like about it still stand, I enjoy it much more than I did when I first read it. The book is funny, sarcastic, dynamic, and borderline blasphemous. All things I enjoy (though not specifically blasphemy, I just enjoy questioning beliefs and norms given to humans).  The book, though silly at times, takes up a couple serious questions. First of all, obviously, "Does God exist?" Followed by, "Why does God, if he does exist, do what he does?" "Who gave God the right to do these things?" All of these are woven quite nicely into the plot, and leave you with something to think about at the end.

Some problems that I had with this book were that the pace changed drastically at the end. They sped it up too much! I don't like when people rush books, especially at the end, which makes it seem like they weren't committed, and just threw it out there when they got bored. 

The actually end, in theory, was great however. It wasn't executed well, but it worked very well for the plot. It told so sweetly the companionship- love-friendship-(?) of Mr. B and Estelle. I wanted them to be together the whole book. I also wanted to punch Bob in the face. He was one of the most annoying, bratty characters I've ever read. Which I guess was the point, but, oh, God, did I want him to get thrown into space. Also, what is with the bureaucracy of these immortal, all powerful beings? They just throw the obviously worst choice into the job? Who does that? Don't they take any sort of progress report? I mean Bob did great things at first, but he was a whiny baby, not even capable of taking care of himself, let alone a whole planet. 

Some of the writing style of the author put me off a bit too, which had to do with the skimmed end of the book, but it was still enjoyable.

"Romeo and Juliet" by William Shakespeare

I finally have officially finished Romeo and Juliet, by, of course, Shakespeare.

Of course, this is a really famous piece of literature, and set a lot of standards, and is a super-classic, and is one the most produced pieces of theater ever.

I'm going to try to review, respond, whatever these are, to it without acknowledging this.

So first of all, I have to say that personally, I don't really like Romeo... or Juliet... Their characters, I feel, are fairly weak in the overall play. Of course, 'fate' and the 'the stars' are giant themes in this play, but I feel like they barely did anything besides die.

This is some kind of blasphemy, I know it.

But, I suppose some disbelief must be suspended. The time period this was written in was as much superstitiously believing in fate as it was believing in the Church. But still, I think that Romeo and Juliet's characters are mostly whiney and then dead the whole play. Juliet starts out fairly bearable, but gets as bad and bland as Romeo at the end. I'm not saying she didn't love Romeo, she committed suicide for him (though I do believe this was mostly due to her dislike of being controlled by her parents and not making her own decisions. Which is a little funny as the fates control her anyway the whole play.), but I think that if it would have been more interesting for me, as a character, if Juliet had been more active in trying to prevent her wedding to Paris, or more active in reuniting with Romeo. 

Some have claimed that they are the ideal representation of young love and the brashness of teenagers, but I doth protest. I know many teenagers that would have handled any situation similar to those of these Capulets and Montagues better then they would have, and smarter than they would have as well.

I think the rest of the characters were very well built, and all had clear motives and wants for their actions. This made the characters more easy to believe, even with fate intervening. I guess my biggest problem was with fate. I think that's fate hand is too much involved in Romeo and Juliet's relationship forming without enough thought from either one fo them them to make it myself really feel for their hardships or relationship.

This all is, of course, my opinion, which is clearly skewed as I live in a different time than when the play was written. Many of these behaviors were much more normal, such as quick courtships, or arranged marriages (by the stars or by parents). Just this play, to me, in my current postion as a person in this world, is just really touching the surface of what it could have been. I would have loved to see more of Juliet's struggle against marrying Paris (there's really nothing wrong with Paris, and she's known him for longer than Romeo. The only problem I see is that it seems she didn't want to do what her parents wanted her to.), and I think more of how Romeo views his and Juliet's family's quarrel. 

People kept talking about how this play has been relevant for such a long time because of it's themes when I read it with my class, but I think that some of these themes will be less and less easy to relate to as we progress in society and culture. 

"Half Moon Investigations" by Eoin Colfer

Half Moon Investigations  is by far one of my favorite books. I read this in something like fourth or fifth grade, but I try to reread it every year or so. There are so many reasons why this is a great book, so I'll try to keep is brief.

1) Eoin Colfer. Colfer is a really strong author, and is really well known, in my age group, most likely for the Artemis Fowl Chronicles, or series or whatever it's title is. The reason Colfer is such a successful youth writer is that he can keep the content youth appropriate, but make the story itself mature. What I mean by that is Colfer doesn't over sexual or over dramatize the pre-teen and teen experience to make it a good and still interesting read for teenagers and pre-teens, but doesn't make it hard to believe that these characters are, in fact, teenagers. He's able to make the tone of the story really mature, and develops these characters to be their own person, and doesn't try to make them 'squares.' These children are their own characters with their own wants and desires, that make them really believable.

2) Tone. I love the tone of this book, which has to do with the speil about tone and maturity I wrote up there. This book, to me, pretty much reads as a witty noir for teens. But the best thing about it, no matter how cheesy that may sound, or you may think it will be, Colfer retains really individual and interesting ideas in the story that keep it in modern context and in a relatable place for teenagers. He's able to take a mystery about a fiercely competitive talent show and add at least three fight scenes and menacing kidnapping scene, and a little bit of gore. Talent. Also, this book really makes me want to go to Ireland.

3) Mystery. Colfer is able to write a great mystery story. He leaves enough clues sprinkled around the book for people to deduce it on the own, but keeps you guessing the whole time. This makes the story really a great deal of fun to read, let alone the second or third time, when you start to really notice the little hints Colfer drops throughout the story.

So I guess the point of this was...
Eoin Colfer is a very good writer.

"White Cat" by Holly Black (Curse Workers Series #1)

I've almost come to the end of the book, "White Cat" by Holly Black, the first book of the Curse Workers series. The book tells the story of Cassel, a non-worker in a well known family of workers who work for one infamous working crime families. In the world of the book, "workers" are gifted individuals who can manipulate certain elements of a person- whether it is their emotions, luck, or even their very life. I've really enjoyed this book so far for multiple reasons.

I really liked the unique mythology and magic in this book, specifically the workers. Though the abilities they possess aren't unique only to the book, the way the author portrays these powers make them very interesting. I like the idea of "blowback" being established in the book, putting a limit on these very powerful powers. I also love that the powers are used in a mob or mafia style setting. In many books using magic, most of the people using this magic are good, but when you think about it, unfortunately, most would be using the magic for their own advantage, such as crime in the mob. People are selfish, it's the bottom line.

I also like how Holly Black wrote the characters in the book. She made the main chara
cter, Cassel, quite weak, but is a boy. It breaks the boundaries of female characters having to be weak, and men always having to save them. In fact, towards the end of the book, a stronger female character mostly controls the events that occur that change the plot. Holly Black as an author, to me, has shown she can write many different kind of characters as well. I've read a lot of her work and am further impressed with the diversity in her characters that make each one of them interesting on their own way. Many authors seem to reuse the same kind of character in each other their books.

As I've mentioned before in posts about Holly Black and her work, she creates an amazing universe around her books, one that makes sense and that you can get lost in, which is one of my favorite parts of her books. I can't wait to read the rest of the series, and to further 'get lost' in the Curse Workers world!