Book Review: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

 

Goodreads Summary: In this historic romance, young Elizabeth Bennet strives for love, independence, and honesty in the vapid high society of 19th century England.

Goodreads Rating: 4.26 stars with over 3 million ratings

Genre listing: Classics, Romance, Fiction, Literature, British Literature

Goodreads Challenge: 46/60

2020 Reading Challenge: #7 a book from Project Gutenberg (Find the full challenge here) Get ready for 2021's challenge (here)

Book Review:

Merry Christmas Eve, readers! I am off work for the next four days, and I am super excited. I plan to read at least one more book and do a final for one of my classes. Just an FYI about the 2021 challenge. There was an issue with the PDF printable version that I published. I'm not sure what's going on with it, but I took my link for the pdf down and replaced it with Tress's. Sorry for any inconvenience. You can find her post about the challenge (here). 

I had been attempting to read something for the Project Gutenberg slot for a while, but I honestly couldn't bring myself to read a classic. I thought that maybe if I went with one I was already familiar with from movies, it might go better. I adore the Pride and Prejudice movie with Keira Knightly, so I thought this would be a good option. (Side note, if I refer to 'the movie' in this post, it will be this version of it.)

Being familiar with the story helped, but some parts were overly dry and formal, making it hard to read. This is typically what makes it so I can't get into classics. Once the story progressed, it was a lot easier to get into, but it was a rough beginning for me. I'm not really going to dwell too much on Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy. That was all as expected for me, and I enjoyed it. 

I was delighted to get a more in-depth look at the character's personalities than what I had previously known. The scenes pretty much read like I'd expect them to, though maybe not in the order I was expecting them. Obviously, there were some scenes in the movie that weren't in the book. I was really pleased to see that one of my favorite lines in the film was directly from the book. 

"If any young men come for Mary or Kitty, send them in, for I am quite at leisure." -around 97% of the book.

I don't know why, but this line just amuses me. 

One thing I was really surprised at how much more ridiculous Lydia was in the book. In the movie, it was incredibly underplayed and glazed over how much of a scandal it was. There's a good chunk of the story dedicated to all of the things that had to be done to find her and Wickham and cover up their running away. I feel like, in the end, they kind of got Karma for just being awful. Somehow, Mrs. Bennet was even more vapid and ridiculous in the book. I pretty much just had to roll my eyes during her scenes. I don't really feel like she cared about whether or not her daughters were happy in their marriages (which, I get is part of the times) but just cared about how their marriages made her look. 

It took me a little bit to get into the story because of the formal wording, but I really liked the story. Because of my love of a movie version of it, it felt familiar. Truthfully, I'm mostly just in this for the sly snark like this:

"I must trouble you once more for congratulations. Elizabeth will soon be the wife of Mr. Darcy. Console Lady Catherine as well as you can. But, if I were you, I would stand by the nephew. He has more to give."

Hidden Star by Nora Roberts

Goodreads Summary: Diamonds can be a girl's best friend…or her worst enemy. Bailey James can't remember a thing, including why she has a satchel full of cash and a diamond as big as a baby's fist. It's clear she's in big trouble, and Bailey desperately needs private investigator Cade Parris to help her live long enough to find out just what kind. The moment the coolheaded detective laid eyes on Bailey, she almost had him forgetting who he was. Surely she isn't a criminal—but how can he unravel this mystery if he keeps tripping over his heart?

Goodreads Rating: 3.87 stars with over 9,000 ratings

Genre listing: Romance, Contemporary Romance, Mystery, Fiction

Goodreads Challenge: 22/60

2020 Reading Challenge: #33 a Book with the word "Star' in the title (find the full challenge here)

Book Review:

I ended up picking this book because I needed something for #33. What few Nora Roberts books I've read are kind of hit and miss for me. I'm not a huge romance fan. I'll read it if it's mixed in with a bigger plot, but I'm never really wanting to read something that's solely romance. Luckily, there was a little bit of mystery in Hidden Stars to keep me entertained.

I think I would have liked this a lot more if Cade wasn't an absolute sleazebag through most of the book. Ugh. I wanted to pepper spray him and have sexual assault charges filed on Bailey's behalf. (No, that's not an attempt at humor. I felt like his actions were borderline sexual assault through most of the book.) The majority of the book, I thought it was gross how he was coming on to her so strongly and being demanding with her. Bailey had amnesia, hired him to help her figure out who she was and what happened to her, but he just had to hit on her the entire time, despite her requests for him to stop. 

As I said before, I'm usually not a huge fan of romance. If I read it, I like for there to be some building to the characters feeling the way they do. I want it to make sense. Maybe part of that is because my husband and I were friends before we started dating. For me, the whole spend a weekend together, and wanting to get married wasn't realistic, and I rolled my eyes at it a lot. 

I thought the take on the amnesia was interesting. I liked the idea of Bailey still being who she was, even if she didn't realize it. Despite my disdain for his sexual advances on Bailey, I thought that his way of helping her find herself was thoughtful. He took the time to explain well you probably do this because of this reason, or if you hate this food before, you probably still hate it. Putting the pieces together like that made the private detective job make sense and fit well within the story.

I think what saved this book for me was the mystery. The idea of Bailey being a gemologist and jewelry designer appealed to me because I make jewelry and, at one time, thought about becoming a gemologist. I wasn't really sure where the mystery was going to go, or what Bailey actually saw. I wasn't expecting her connection to the culprits. This was the part of the story I really wanted to read. How she got her memory back, what happened to her, and why was the diamond so valuable. 

Overall, I did like the book. It was a short read, which I got through quickly. I liked Bailey a lot, but couldn't stand Cade. The mystery kept me entertained. I do tend to think that Nora follows a couple of formulas for her books, and I could kind of see already how it was setting it up for the other two books in the trilogy. I don't know if I'll pick up the other two. I enjoyed it, but not enough to where I feel like I need to continue on with the trilogy.

Book Review of 1984 by George Orwell

Goodreads Summary: The year 1984 has come and gone, but George Orwell's prophetic, nightmarish vision in 1949 of the world we were becoming is timelier than ever. 1984 is still the great modern classic of "negative utopia" -a startlingly original and haunting novel that creates an imaginary world that is completely convincing, from the first sentence to the last four words. No one can deny the novel's hold on the imaginations of whole generations, or the power of its admonitions -a power that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time.
Goodreads Rating: 4.13 stars with over 1.9 million ratings
Genre Listing: Science Fiction, Dystopia, Literature, Fantasy, Philosophy, Politics, British Literature
Get the Book: Amazon, Book Depository
Book Challenge: #6 A Book that's considered a classic

Book Review:

I finished a classic! Woohoo! I feel like I should get some kind of award when I actually finish a classic. I don't know what it is, but I have a hard time reading them. 1984 by George Orwell was a bit of a rollercoaster for me. At times I found myself completely engaged in it and not able to put it down, but then there were a lot of occasions where I felt like it was painfully boring and I just wanted it to get on with the point. I really didn't find myself getting into it until around 40% and after that my interest in it was sporadic at best. 

Given that this book was produced in the late 40s early 50s, it's actually a bit terrifying. There were definite places that I could draw some connections to modern day. I can also see why this year purchases of it have skyrocketed, but I'm not going to dive any further into that subject. You all can infer what you want from it, and leave it at that.

I thought the idea of Winston's job was really interesting and how there are entire organizations to altering previously recorded information. The workers in the party just seem to go with it and update it as needed and no one but Winston seems to question it. I also found it interesting, and terrifying, that the entire culture was built on hate and fear. The world that Orwell created seems dark and awful, which I suppose is what Big Brother intended. 

The imagery created was something I really enjoyed. I thought that Orwell went into a surprising amount of detail about the devices used, the scenery, and just the every day to day life of an outer party member. The gadgetry almost seemed a little steampunk to me, but given that this would have been 30 years into the future for Orwell, I thought it was pretty incredible that he created it. 

I didn't really get the relationship with Julia, and I really disliked her. She seemed really vapid to me and like she just hated the party because it was something to do, and nothing to do with her actual thoughts. I honestly could have done without her in the story, but I suppose Winston's relationship with her is what progressed him into diving further into his own thoughts. 

The ending surprised me quite a bit. I was expecting something completely different, but I'm not disappointed in the actual ending. It fit really well with the darkness and bleakness of the story, and honestly, I think it made everything a bit more interesting.  The one thing that really threw me off was the chapters that were written from "the book." I felt like they were dreadfully boring, and honestly, I mostly skimmed them so I wouldn't fall asleep.

Overall, I enjoyed the book. I can see why it's a classic. It's not going to be my favorite book ever, but I'm glad I took the time to read such an important classic. I definitely think that it's the backbone and inspiration of a lot of dystopian books that are out today.

Book Review of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

Goodreads Summary: Dorothy, the Tin Woodman, Scarecrow, the Cowardly Lion, and a host of other curious creatures come to life as they set out on an exciting quest down the Yellow Brick Road in search of the elusive Wizard. Reset in large, clear type and accompanied by 20 beautiful black-and-white illustrations. A selection of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. After a cyclone transports her to the land of Oz, Dorothy must seek out the great wizard in order to return to Kansas.
Goodreads Rating: 3.95 with 169,706 ratings
Genre Listing: Classics, Fantasy, Children's stories, Adventure, Literature, 
Get the book: Amazon , Book Depository

Review:  

Edited 12/1/2016
Oh, my gosh I  read a classic, which is a huge accomplishment for me. I hardly ever read classics. I have a hard time getting through old stories. I started reading this because my friend Leslie invited me to join a group on Goodreads that does certain themes each month. July was classics. It ran for about a week I think. I intended on reading more than one book, but Chris and I were in the middle of moving.

Before I get into my review, I need to talk about my sort of obsession with the Wizard of Oz. My mother instilled this passion in me from a very young age. It was one of her favorite movies. Back in the day before DVDs (Yeah, I'm that old) I remember that the Wizard of Oz was shown on TV once a year. That was the only time I ever got to watch the movie. We watched it every year, which was fantastic. When I got older, I fell in love with different versions of the story. I love Wicked, Oz the Great and Powerful with James Franco, and I even love the mini-series Tinman with Zooey Deschanel (this one is my favorite). Despite my love for the story, I had never read the original Wizard of Oz book by L. Frank Baum. Tragic I know.

So when Leslie told me about the Classics readathon, I knew what I had to read. Regarding page length, this book is a short read, but it took me a while because of the formal language. It's got a weird vibe to it. It's light and reads like a kids book, but holy hell is this book morbid. I was not prepared. It goes into very graphic details of the characters killing their opponents and what not. I was pretty surprised, but from what I hear, all of the classic kid's stories are super dark. While it is labeled as a children's story, I would not let young kids read it.

I was surprised at how different this is from the movie. I guess I always assumed that the film was similar to the book since I didn't know any differently. There's a lot of differences, like another witch, silver shoes instead of ruby shoes, a lot more adventures, and a lot more of characters and enemies. I was also surprised to learn that the winged monkeys aren't bad. They're just essentially slaves to whoever owns the Golden Cap.

Overall I thought it was cute, and now my Wizard of Oz obsession has grown a bit more. If you decide to read this, don't go in expecting just to be reading the movie, and prepare yourself for some pretty morbid death scenes.