A Wind in the Door- L'Engle

            What a fantastic read, truly fantastic. This is a classic I will reread over and over and over again. The more of L’Enlge I read, the more I adore her. Though Sci-Fi isn’t my favorite genre, I am not opposed to it, and in fact am mostly fascinated with it. These novels are so much more than exploring other planets-they deal with real questions in life we tend to ask ourselves and then just forget about, as she touches on in her introduction. A Wind in the Door deals with themes such as creation, loving the unlovable or your enemy as yourself, whichever is more difficult for the reader.  This book was a little heavy on science/ biology for my comprehensive ability, but as a writer I have a duty to be interested in many things and that includes trying to understand Farandole and Mitochondrion.

             It’s always hard to think of everything you want to say about a book immediately after you finish it, but when you are constantly moving from book to book, you move on, and don’t necessarily make time to reflect on the principles that the author has spent so much time creating for you. What kind of ungrateful un-empathetic self-absorbed literature-lover would I be, if I didn’t take time to marvel at new ideas presented by fellow authors? ( Not that I title myself as such, I have yet to even FINISH an entire fiction work).  After all, isn’t that why we read? To learn and be challenged with new ideas? 

            This was a beautifully written story, with amazing character development, and impressive display of imagery as well as evidence of an extremely creative and imaginative mind.  For example on pg. 133 when she describes the sporos for the first time, as well as on pg. 171 when she describes Calvin’s smile. L’Engle deals with such abstract ideas in this novel, like being with someone when distance isn’t an obstacle-where has no place. She also cracks open the hard exterior of a grown up who refuses to open his mind to new ideas- something we have all experienced, if not ourselves, then watching someone else go through this, or desperately need to.

I am determined to read more about L’ Engle. I have heard she was a Christian, and just recently found out that she died in 2007. How incredible that she lived so recently!!! Possibly, if I was lucky enough, I could have met with her and talked with her about life, and a shared love for story telling and writing children’s novels, though I think her work can most assuredly be appreciated by all ages. I don’t really consider her novels children’s novels.  I don’t know any second graders willing to deal with such advanced language and scientific terms. Then again, she wrote them in a different era.

             To wrap it up, Madeline L’ Engle has done it again. In A Wind in the Door, she emphasizes the selfless kind of love, in which “a man lay down his life for his friends” of which there is no greater kind; of love, that is.  Through a captivating battle of good and evil and an unpredictable ending, the sequel to A Wrinkle in Time, may almost exceed the timeless classic before it. Don’t have a heart attack, I said almost, maybe not quite.

 Cheers, L’Engle, cheers. J

Christmas reading!!!!

    Well Christmas is here! I'm safe and sound at home for now, and I thought I would share my reading goals for the four week break with the few who do read my blog- by the way you guys are awesome! Thanks for doing so!!

SO here are the books I am planning on having read by the time I go back to school:

1. A Wind in the Door ( I'm half way through this one- fabulous read so far! I adore Madeline L'Engle!)
2. Redeeming Love, by Francine Rivers. - If you are a girl, you HAVE to read this book. I decided to make it my annual Christmas read! It is a fantastic historical/ Christian fiction, love story based on the book of Hosea in the Old Testament.  Ask me about it and I'll give you the details. Or just read my review when I'm done with it!
3. Uglies- Scott Westerfield- this is the first of a series by Westerfield, geared toward the young adult audience. My mom told me about it a long time ago, and I have meant to read the series ever since. I'll keep you updated on the read.
4. Dear John, by Nicolas Sparks- my roomate gave this to me as a Christmas gift this year and I'm so excited because I love reading novels before the movie comes out! So bring on the romance! I have never read a Nicolas Sparks before, so I'm anxious to see what his style is like. I've heard great things and can't wait to get started!

 After i finish each novel, I'll try and post a detailed description of the writing style, and the strengths and weaknesses of each, and whether or not I recommend them!  Stay posted, and Merry Christmas!

upcoming projects

     Well tonight I really don't have any homework, so I watched a gruesome episode of House with my suitemates, and I'm finally going to finish Breaking Dawn! I'll blog about it when I finish it. *spoiler alert* I'm at the part where the volturi are comming, and they (as in the Cullens) are trying to get other covens to help join their stand to make the volturi stop and listen rather than just attack them mercilessly. The plot thickened, now I've just got to keep going.
    I'm about to read The Graveyard, by Neil Gaiman, and the Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan. I get to read these for a project I am doing in my Theories of Writing class. The project is to report the literacy that a certain group of people reads/writes and draw inferences and such based on collected data and observations made. I however am doing a genre study on juvenille fiction (ages 9-12). I will also be reading Sent by someone I can't remember and Diary of a Wimpy kid, which had been all the rage throughout american middle schools lately. I'm pretty excited about this but hopefully I'll be able to read them all or most all by next friday when my rough draft is due! yikes!

I'll keep you posted!

Don't Cry Over Spilled Coffee

( This is one I wrote last spring semester, but I didn't have a blog then, so here, enjoy!!!)

Coffee. You pay so much for a small amount at Starbucks and for what? To spill it all over the elevator floor AND walls of Wright Hall. This is my life, and it sucks.

I was on my way back from Vanderbilt in the zipcar to pick up my roommate and take her to starbucks in this shnazzy vehicle. I had a great doctor`s appt, or at least one where they didn`t say that I fail at life, so that constitutes a “ great appointment” . I had a $5.00 bill that I had been holding in my wallet for about a week and decided to just reward myself for a great dr.`s appointment. I even went all the way and got a GRANDE, not tall, white chocolate mocha…mmmmmmm. That about sums up the experience of consuming such a delectable beverage. We get back in the zipcar and drive beck to campus, confused one of our friends by being in a brand new car or for me, even driving a car at all, since I don’t have one.

So I had a box and a bunch of other stuff in my arms along with the coffee, and we get in the elevator and smart me had decided to rest my mocha on the box in my arms. Well the stupid elevator door wouldn`t shut, so I reach down to push the close button and there began the disastrous descent of my $4.42 grande white chocolate mocha. It fell ridiculously fast to the floor, weighed down by it`s precious contents.

There it was…just sitting in a puddle on the disgusting tile floor of the elevator . … no way to save it… completely contaminated. I thought of scooping it up again into my cup, or licking it off the floor, but it was already too far gone. All of that luscious flavor gone to waste. Everything was in slow motion ….the move to push the button and the harsh splatter of the refined liquid all over the floor, my jeans, and (as a friend” later pointed out) the elevator wall. I couldn`t believe it

And the irony of it lies in the fact that about a minute prior to stepping on the elevator I had played out this EXACT scenario in my head…reassuring myself that : no I`m smarter than that, than to just carelessly drop my coffee. I can balance it on my box. Wow I AM an idiot. Ok maybe not an idiot, but I definitely think a lot of myself, not to provide for POSSIBLE human accidents, such as spilling star bucks. I guess I thought I was above spilling something. Hmmm.

So a friend held the elevator door open for me while my roommate (we`ll call her anne) cackled her head off. She obviously thought this was FUNNY. How horrible. How anyone could laugh at freshly spilt coffee, I will never understand. I slumped to the bathroom in an eclectic fit of rage, defeat, and self pity while I took a role of toilet paper back to the elevator.

I continued to tell Anne to stop laughing and that it wasn’t funny, but nothing could be done to stop it. At one point I think she felt bad because she asked : “what can I do?” And I repoded rudely, “nothing, just go back to the room.” This is how truly upset I was. I guess she took that opportunity to rush down to the other bath room and get paper towels. So I was cleaning it up in it the elevator, actually trying not to cry…yes I said it, CRY for goodness sakes and then the friend I refered to earlier (we’ll call her Dorothy”, the sweet person she is, kept saying sweet things to make me feel better, like “ I`m soooo sorry! At least the elevator will smell good!” and then she said something that made me laugh out loud , amidst my bitterness and rude comments, “ I mean it can happen to anyone, one second you`ve got it, and the next thing you know, there it is, right there on the floor”. Something about the way she said it made me giggle and then I realized that it`s just coffee. There are bigger things to worry about. And though it was STARBUCKS, and delicious, I shouldn`t cry over spilled coffee.

And now it`s 12:05 am and I can`t believe I am reliving all of this again . Really ? this is my reason for getting in bed a few minutes late? Wow. I must really love coffee