booksoftheweek: The Mysteries/The Ill-Made Mute

I'm all fairied out.

I just read two books back-to-back that dealt with fairies: The Mysteries, by Susan Tuttle, and The Ill-Made Mute by Cecilia Dart-Thornton.

The Mysteries is about a private detective who specializes in finding lost people. It all started when his dad disappeared, and he "accidentally" discovered where he went. He fantasized about the dad just suddenly disappearing, but the truth was a bit more mundane than that. Then he gets recruited to find a girl who has disappeared--and may have been taken by the king of fairies...

The Ill-Made Mute is the first book in a traditional fantasy trilogy, set in a world much like Ireland. The world, called Erith, is populated by both seelie (harmless) and unseelie (evil) wights, living alongside humans. The Ill-Made Mute is actually a person called Imrhien, who is dreadfully ugly. The person, because of that ugliness, is scorned by other people, and is miserable as a drudge. The person manages to leave the town in order to search for the truth...

Each novel is sprinkled liberally with stories about fairies. In fact, a couple of the stories actually appear in both novels--the one about the midwife who is taken to the land of faerie to birth a child, for example--that I'm beginning to get all fairied out. The last book I reviewed, Shadowmarch, also dealt with fairies invading the land of humans.

So, anyway, back to the books: The Mysteries was a pretty compelling book. It was fun seeing the detective's efforts in finding the missing girl--the snippets about other people becoming missing throughout the years was very interesting. The ending was the most frustrating part--because it leaves you hanging. ARGH! I guess it's a good thing, that I got so invested in the characters that I wanted to find out what happens in the end.

Similarly, the best parts in The Ill-Made Mute dealt with the stories about the different types fairies. The parts where the main characters go through the land of faerie was also very interesting and proved quite a fast read. One thing spoiled it for me, though: the book jacket reveals the "twist" with Imrhien. Of course, you could see it coming from a mile away.

One unfortunate thing about The Ill-Made Mute: it becomes a Mills and Boone novel at some point. Ick.

Anyway, I'm working through the other two books in the trilogy. Stay tuned.

(off to watch Fairly Oddparents now!)

ARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHH

OKSTATE LOST! CURSES!

Well, so long bracket.

Bracket Busted - for others

Hey, there's hope after all: Wake Forest lost! So now I'm on even footing with the others--three teams left standing in the final four.

Let's see what today brings...

Bracket Busted!

Argh. Gonzaga lost. And I had them in my Final Four!

And Illinois won too. Ugh.

Not good. *sigh*

Kobe: Best evah?!? Um...nope.

Ever hear of Mychael Thompson? Out here in LA he's one of the folks at the Loose Cannons on XTRA 570. He's also the color commentator for Lakers games on the radio, and a member of the Showtime Lakers in the 80s.

He also said that Kobe Bryant is the best player in the NBA right now. Because Kobe made the winning shot with under a second to go against Charlotte. Let that sink in. Against freakin' Charlotte, a team with only 12 wins!

Yo, a great player won't even let it get down to that final shot. He would've gotten his teammates to blow the last place NBA team out of the water. Yes, Kobe's good. Heck, he's very good. But the best player right now? Hey, I don't hear people talking about him as MVP.

Let's see...in my admittedly "uneducated" opinion (since I only have a passing interest in the NBA), I can think of several people who might be as good as Kobe is:

Lebron James
Dwyane Wade
Tracy McGrady (yeah, as a pure shooter...allegedly can't defend, but I don't watch enough)
Manu Ginobili
AI
and the bigs: Shaq, Duncan, KG, Amare Stoudamire, Dirk (apples to oranges, though)
...and li'l Stevie Nash, who, if life is fair, is the MVP of the league

Mr. Thompson was even saying Kobe might be better than Jerry West just because Kobe's made that last second shot against Charlotte. Jerry West! The Logo! Now, I won't deny that you probably want Kobe taking the last shot in the game, and I admire his guts in wanting the ball, but heck, Mike Bibby also likes taking the last shot. Larry Legend he's not, though...

Then again, what should I expect? After all, he is biased, being a former Laker and one of their play-by-play announcers. It's just sad hearing such ignorance from him.

Bah, humbug to the NBA. It's March Madness!

It's March Madness!

Yup, it's that time of the year again. 64 teams, only one of which can be the top dawg. Of course, I'm in a pool. Now, I've never won a pool or a fantasy league in my life, so maybe this is a good place to start (doubt it, though).

Anyway, my final four as of today (subject to change!):

Oklahoma St
Gonzaga
North Carolina
Kentucky

and Oklahoma St takes it all vs North Carolina! Eddie Sutton wins, denying Roy Williams yet again!

Um...Illinois not there? Duke (one of my favorites, but sadly, no depth whatsoever)?

So, that's my initial-close-your-eyes-pick.

Yikes.

bookoftheweek: Shadowmarch

The latest bookoftheweek is Shadowmarch, by Tad Williams. Now, the only other work I had read was the Memory, Sorrow and Thorn series, which was good, but dragged sometimes. I look back fondly at that series, though, so I decided to give Shadowmarch a chance.

How do I describe Shadowmarch? Well, I think of it as Song of Ice and Fire meets Dragonlance Legends. Song of Ice and Fire because, well, there's the nobility, there's the imminent threat of the China/Japan "other race" (think the Horselords in ASoIaF), you have a woman who is suspiciously like Daenerys, being wed to a powerful man kinda like Drogo (although more powerful and more eeeeeeeeeevil). She's also on a collision course with the Western kingdoms (although without dragons...unless bees can be considered dragons). And then there's the Shadowline creatures (the names escapes me at the moment), who are eerily similar to the Others (those fine folk beyond the Wall). Legends because, well, two of the main protagonists are twins, with one being strong (Briony) and the other weak (Barrick), but somehow has "mysterious" powers. The added twist is that Briony is a girl!

It's an okay read (although it took me nearly two weeks to get through...not as gripping as Covenant), but you can sense that he was really trying to channel George R. R. Martin. Kinda like Martin-lite, but not really succeeding in doing so. Gregory Keyes (Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone) did a better job at this, in my opinion.

There are some interesting characters, though, and the story picks up at the end, but it doesn't stack up to the world building of Tolkien, Martin, Donaldson or Jordan (or even Glen Cook). I'll finish the series to find out what happened, though.

Raaaaace!

I admit it. I'm a Romber fan. The latest installment of The Amazing Race is a lot better than the previous one with * and Victoria; all the teams are distinct from each other, and everyone just seems to be enjoying the thing. Unlike last season, when you couldn't tell all the models apart, and everything just seemed painful.

A lot of people are hating on Rob and Amber, though, because of how they were in Survivor. Gotta admit, I hated Rob the first time I saw him (I didn't watch All Stars, though). But I always thought Amber was kinda cute, although she was just Jeri's sidekick at the time.

They're great in TAR, though! They're extremely competent (so far...), and even Rob's "evil" machinations are just funny. They weren't as irritating as Colin, or *.

So, I'm rooting for them to win. Just because. I also like The Braff brothers (those Zach lookalikes), and Team Redneck (alas, they are gone)...in general, though, nobody really "evil" to hate. Better than last season, though, when I only began to like Jon & Kris towards the end...

Pinoys in Sports and Entertainment, Part II

Okay, I think these are the most famous ones I know or have found through Google:

• Roman Gabriel, Rams QB
• Lea Salonga, Kim in Miss Saigon
• Tedy Brushci, Pats LB
• Tia Carrere, Actress
• Lou Diamond Phillips, Actor
• Rob Schneider, Actor
• Tetchie Agbayani, Actress
• Jennifer Rosales, Golfer
• Dorothy Delasin, Golfer
• Jocelyn Enriquez, Singer
• Pancho Villa, Boxer
• Apl.de.Ap, of Black-Eyed Peas
• Phoebe Cates, Actress

Not so famous, but worth a mention

• Benny Agbayani, MLB (don't know what team he's on now)
  
• Jasmine Trias, American Idol contestant
  
• Camille Velasquez, American Idol contestant
• Nia Peeples, Actress
• Shannyn Sossamon, Actress (First Knight)
  

Then there are the TV personalities/actors (Lexa Doig of Andromeda, Dante Basco of Hook, and others) that I'm not too familiar with. Apologies.

Then there's Prince, the Purple one. Is he or isn't he? Not quite sure...