Do Not Tamper With

Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay

My rating: 1 of 5 stars

This review WILL CONTAIN SPOILERS and CAPSLOCK because I have so much to rant about.






The first 100 or so pages of this book are good. Not particularly well written but the story is intriguing and there is some genuine emotion. I was moved when Rachel was re-apprehended by the Nazis because she fought so hard and became so ill, all for nothing, that it was tragic. More tragic than the situation with Michel if you ask me. I liked Sarah’s chapters.

Where this book fell absolutely flat to me was Julia and her ‘plight’. But a few things I’d like to mention about the people around Julia first.

Bertrand. I didn’t understand why Julia claimed to love her husband and find him so charming but all she seemed to feel toward him was contempt and annoyance. And rightly so because he was an arrogant jerk!

Julia’s daughter Zoe was …not a child. At all. I’m so sick of the wise-beyond-her-years kids. Sarah had a reason to be mature, Zoe was just badly characterized and a tired trope.

Finally there’s Julia herself. I really, really didn’t like her. At first I just found her boring in a “Bleh, get back to the tragedy of human suffering!” way but as the story progressed and Sarah’s chapters were dropped I began to find Julia, her problems, and her goals insufferable.

So, ok, you’re pregnant after 2 or 3 miscarriages and your husband doesn’t want the kid. Yes, that’s a problem and I was mildly curious how it would turn out. But then you decide not to go through with an abortion because this baby is the most important thing in your life.
So you randomly fly from Paris to the USA.
Then USA to Italy.
In the matter of days.
And then you feel a little annoying ‘tug’ and think nothing of it.
WOMAN YOU HAVE HAD 3 MISCARRIAGES, YOU ARE IN YOUR MID 40′S AND ARE RANDOMLY GALLIVANTING ACROSS THE GLOBE GHOSTCHASEING BUT YOU CLAIM THIS BABY IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING YOU ARE A HORRIBLE, IRRESPONSIBLE, SELFISH PERSON AND A BAD MOTHER!

Seriously?!

Even all that aside, the amount of arrogant rich white woman hubris Julia has is revolting. Why should she dig up the past? What right had she? Obviously Sarah wanted to keep it behind her. Obviously she didn’t want to burden her family with it, nor the Tezac’s wish to remember the burden of it either.

And then of course there was all this eternal monologue about how Julia “would always remember the tragic day they rounded up those Jews” and “She knew what it was like” because she wrote an article about it. That is just as bad as “I know what it’s like to be in a wheelchair/blind/raped because I played one on TV”.

Finally, the writing. While the writing wasn’t strong, I never really seemed to notice a problem with it until near the end. The word “Ironic” 4 times in 4 pages? Really?
And it was “ironic” that you missed Paris after moving back to New York? No it wasn’t! Remember near the beginning of the book Julia, where you said you had always loved Paris, more than in the romantic cliche way, but in all the other ways? You had always felt a tug and longing from and for Paris! You met your husband there, you had friends there, you had your daughter there, you had a good career there. Of COURSE you would miss it! There is nothing ironic about that!

There was an awful lot of telling, not showing. One of the most blatant examples occurs after she almost has a miscarriage and is told to lie down and work from home. We’re told that. And the time just zooms by! We don’t get Julia’s frustration at being bed-ridden, at her lingering pain or guilt that she almost caused the loss of a third or fourth child, or anything like that. Nope! “I remained horizontal while my 11 year old made me breakfast in bed for X amount of days.”

Am I supposed to be getting some sort of parallel from all this? How humanity hasn’t change much since the Holocaust? That the problems of the upper-class are just as valid as the tragedy of thousands rounded up then carted off to death camps?

You know what? I was going to give this book 2 stars but no. One. One star for Sarah and Rachel and Michel. No stars for the rest of this book.

Now I’m off to watch the movie adaptation.



View all my reviews

2011 Art meme by ~AnarchicQ on deviantART

Baroness Camazotz by ~AnarchicQ on deviantART

Camazotz has stolen Baron Samedi’s hat.

Apparently I’ve been artfully productive. I guess Cthulhu clicked something in me.

So. NecroRaver. In a tub. Yep.

NecroRaver – Clean by ~AnarchicQ on deviantART

We all know that scene, where the drug addict ODs and is awoken by a cold shower and a nice round of vomiting.
NecroRaver here is half-way there. Already in the tub, with the shower running. Cut out the middle man.

I like the loose sketchiness to this one and I don’t think I’ll expand upon it. And I know the perspective is shot but I don’t mind. Also, Necro has long toes!

Inspired by Depeche Mode’s “Clean”.
Drown in the irony.

So, after I did my Skull of Cthulhu I was struck by the desire to try to do a Baphomet. So I did.

Baphomet by ~AnarchicQ on deviantART
I don’t like it as much as Cthulhu. It needs to be tweaked here and there in the wings and the pentacle.

I also did an Anubis because he is my favourite mythological entity and requires all my love.

Anubis by ~AnarchicQ on deviantART
He turned out better than Baphomet I think, but Cthulhu is still my favourite.

Maybe I’ll try more. We’ll see.

This has been floating around various online galleries so I thought I’d do it.
- What sort of artist would you most identify yourself as?
Casual, hobbiest

- What would be your secondary identity?
Pinup/character artist

- What forms of art do you dabble in, but don’t excel at?
CompletelyDigital

- How would you describe your ‘style’?
Lithe, lanky and angular with sharp edges.

- What medium do you favor most?
Pencil and Photoshop

- What are your favorite subject matters?
Elves and skinny guys.

- What are your least favorite subject matters?
Technology, vehicles, furniture.

- List your Artistic Strengths
Hair, shoulders, elf ears, elbow joints, outfits/clothing.

- List your Artistic Weaknesses
Perspective, proportion, backgrounds, cars and technology.

- Which of the above weaknesses would you most like to see improve?
Perspective

- Adult Content. . . yes/no?
Yes. A good throat slitting or tasteful nudity is necessary to replenish the muse.

- Adult Subject Matter you favor?
Female nudity, bondage, couples with strategically placed limbs covering nudity.

- Schooling/Training received in the arts?
Some life drawing of male nudes.

- Schooling/Training you’d still like to have?
I would like to know more about screen-printing and just printing in general.

- Would you consider yourself prolific, or a ‘quality over quantity’ sort of artist?
Quality over quantity. I don’t draw unless motivated. Or if it’s a commission.

- Would you considering yourself a Fine Artist, or a Commercial Artist?
Casual artist.

- Where would you like to be in five years?
It would be nice to have actually produced something for the masses to enjoy.

Many writers, professionals, freelance,  indy and new alike seem to subscribe to the idea of  “You’re not a writer if you don’t write every single day”. I can’t and do not write every single day. But that doesn’t mean I am not a writer. The way I see it is as long as I am writing, and making progress, then I am a writer.

However, there are certain things I require in order to get real writing done.

1) Tea.
I need tea, or occasionally pop, before I write. I need the comfort of warm tea or the subconscious, overlooked action of reaching out for a drink then quaffing. Not only is tea warm and comfy but I think the time I take to drink is the equivalent of my brain coming up for air.
It also helps if it’s dreary or rainy outside but that’s not always the case and one can’t control the weather.

2) Inspiration.
I need to be inspired. I need to have ideas that are ready to spill forth from my fingers. Make no mistake, I always have ideas. I spend probably 90 percent of my time thinking of my various stories and characters. I never have a shortage of ideas, they’re just not always in order. Or sometimes there is gaps between scenes or situations. I have to have some sort of inspired path to follow. I feel lucky the rare times the story just seems to write itself.

3) Options.
I call it hop-scotching through stories. I have at any one time at least 2 stories going on. I can work for weeks on one story and then suddenly switch to the other. It’s refreshing.

4) Music, TV or silence.
I don’t like to write when people are around. I find them distracting. Everything I write has a specialized playlist exclusive to the story. I prefer to listen to their respective playlists while writing but sometimes that’s not always possible. Ambient TV sound is sufficient as long as it’s something unexciting.

5) The internet.
This might seem counter-productive but I prefer to write with an internet connection for research purposes. I like having an idea or fact and being able to check it’s accuracy in a second rather than going back later.

6) My laptop.
I like typing over pen and paper writing though I will write on paper if I have to, obviously. Sometimes one is stricken with inspiration and IT MUST BE WRITTEN RIGHT NOW!  so you grab the nearest pen and paper and write it down. Or take a memo in your not-a-smartphone-phone at 2 am.
But laptop is best.

7) Room to move.
If I am stuck I have a tendency to get up and walk around the room saying “Such and such happens and then…..?” and just try to think of the next logical step in the story or dialog or what have you. This is necessary.

Blogging/researching publishers/submitting/making lists counts as writing.
Gathering your resources counts as writing. It helps drive your progress forward. It counts.

So that is the madness in my method. It works for me. As long as I’m making relatively steady progress then I am a writer. It doesn’t really matter how I do it, just as long as I get there.

Well, it’s October, that magical time of the year when ghosts and vampires come out to play and everyone is digging out their collection of scary movies to watch all month.

Last night I watched Let Me In, the American remake of 2008′s Swedish film Let The Right One In, for the first time.

If you’ve payed attention to my Goodreads lists, you’d see the book Let The Right One In is one of my all time favourites. Best vampire book ever and the 2008 movie is one of the best vampire movies ever. So when I heard they were remaking a movie that was, in my eyes, practically flawless, I was dubious.

And then I heard it was going to be more true to the book. Well, ok then, at least it won’t be a shot-for-shot remake because the original movie did leave things out of the book.

So after seeing it what did I really think?

THERE ARE SPOILERS FOR THE BOOK, MOVIE, AND REMAKE BEYOND THIS POINT. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

LtROI is a perfect example of less is more while Let Me In is a perfect example of how CGI does not make a good film. Eli always fed in shadow while Abby was a CG Spidergirl. I guess they tried to make her look nimble and tricky but she just ended up looking silly. There was a weight to Eli’s clamp-and-kill method and the weird acrobatics of Abby were stupid.

The sexual ambiguity was all wrong too. When I first watched LtROI, when Eli says “I am not a girl.” I read that to mean “I am not a child, I am a woman.” until, of course, the big reveal. In Let Me In, when Abby says those same words I felt only that she meant “I am not a child, I am a woman.” And that was that.

I will say I liked the car crash scene and the results of Abby’s caretaker post-acid-bath. I felt more of connection between Abby and him than Eli and Harkan. The pool scene was done well.

Owen was good enough, Abby was good enough.

The scene were Owen doesn’t let Abby in is, again, less good in the remake. The overly-dramatic score mixed with Chloe Mortez’s shaking just made it look over-done.  And THEN Owen actually asked “is this what happens when I don’t let you in?” You don’t have to explain it! Eli walked in, braced himself, then it happened, quietly and horrifically.

The entire “Be more for a little while” scene was missing, which is to be expected since they cast aside the entire gender issue.

The cop was needless. I say this because there was a cop in the book and if you’re going to have a cop then have THE cop, with the cop’s backstory!

Now, beyond all this, is my biggest criticism.

Virginia.

Believe it or not Virginia and Lacke’s love story was one of my favourite parts of the book. It was tragic and beautiful. Her slow transformation from normal woman to vampire was very intense.
In Let Me In, we only get glimpses of what was supposed to be the Virginia character, she gets bit, she goes to the hospital, the nurse opens the curtains then POOF! Dead.
We didn’t see her slow descent, her struggle, or her active choice to have the blinds open and choose to end her suffering. It all just sort of happened. It wasn’t character development, it was nothing more than a cool scene.

I’m trying to decide if I hadn’t seen the original nor read the book if I would have liked Let Me In. Maybe, because it would have been a break from Twilight-mania and a breath of fresh air, but comparing it to the original just prooves that a bigger budget does not make something better.

Truly, less is more.

I don’t blog a lot and I know no one is wondering why that is or want an explanation but I’m going to give one anyway because it’s an excuse to blog.

I don’t blog a lot because Dave Sim is a misogynist.

I don’t blog a lot because Bobby Crosby is a douche.

I don’t blog a lot because Anne Rice is insane.

I don’t blog a lot because Peter David hates spoilers.

I don’t blog a lot because Gene Simmons is full of lulz.

Knowing all these things I cannot bring myself to enjoy their work. When I try to pick up something they created, I sense only their contempt and their sense of entitlement. I can’t forget what they have done or said.

I don’t want that to happen to me.

I’m only starting out and I have this apprehension about saying or doing the wrong thing. I, the writer and you the reader don’t need to be friends, but there should be a sense of mutual respect between us. I know that I have views that some my find “problematic”. I laugh at rape jokes, I don’t hate Frank Miller, my sense of feminism doesn’t extend past the point of “I as a woman have a right to choose to stay at home and be a mother and wife and not some workaholic if that’s what I want to do with my life (Protip: It’s not. I hate kids.).”, I don’t feel the need to champion for social justice and as a disabled person I find the whole concept of “Ableism” freaking annoying and far too PC for it’s own good.

I only want to entertain people and get my stories, art and characters out into the world, nothing more. If and when I eventually put my prosthetic foot in my mouth, either by the misinterpretation of others, bad wording on my part or out of context quotes I hope that whatever I might say will not colour future readers to my work and they will be able to separate it from me. Just because I write or say something, does not mean I necessarily believe and endorse it or if I do, that I won’t change my mind sometime in the future. People change.

I have no agenda, I only try to live my life according to the following: Give to whatever cause you feel is important if and when you can and be decent to your fellow human beings. Also, everything will kill you, even the air, so relax and enjoy life while you’re here.

Don’t argue on the internet, point and laugh at those arguing.