1. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien - RM 25.00
Review by Fantasy Book Review.
J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit is one of the best known and best loved fantasy books. First published by George Allen & Unwin in 1937, The Hobbit has been translated into 50 different languages and sold well over 100 million copies.
The Hobbit was written by Professor Tolkien for the reading pleasure of his own children, of whom Christopher became the editor of Tolkien's posthumous work such as The Silmarillion and The Book of Lost Tales.
This is a far more light-hearted tale than the Lord of the Rings and introduces to the world's readers the unforgettable Bilbo, Gandalf and Gollum. A book that can be enjoyed by children and adults alike and authors such as J.K. Rowling and David Gemmell class this and The Lord of the Rings as inspirational in their own work.
This is a truly wonderful book, full of adventure, heroism, song and laughter. The landscapes that Tolkien creates are quintessentially English and the Shore and the hobbits could easily be the English of yesteryear. The Shire is left behind soon enough as no adventure is worth reading in which nobody actually goes anywhere. Dwarves, Elves, Goblins, Eagles and Wizards all cross paths with our intrepid, although reluctant hero as the party passes through Rivendell, The Misty Mountains and Mirkwood on their way to the Lonely Mountain to take back the treasure stolen by the great dragon Smaug.
One of the most appealing aspects of this book is that we could all be hobbit with the comfortable life and comfortable living but there is something inside all of us that perks up at the thought of adventures and journeys into the unknown. I think that this is why The Hobbit is such a firm favourite and fondly remembered by all who read it.
2. Johnny Angel by Danielle Steel - RM25.00
Review by Mouthshut.
Story about Johnny - a 17 year-old teenage boy who is a loving son, star brother and lover - who seems to have it all: scholarship to a college, family that adores him, girlfriend ’Becky’ he loves deeply and friends who rely upto him.
Hell breaks loose on prom night when Johnny and his girlfriend along with another couple are caught in an accident. Their car is pinned between a enormous truck and a highway divider. Everybody is injured except Johnny who dies on-spot behind the wheel with a broken neck.
The book tells us how life does goes on even though we think it never will. A family goes through changes as it copes with Johnny’s death. People who are close to him are inconsolable, especially his mother and Becky.
Unable to come in terms with his son’s death, his mother is admitted in a hospital where Johnny appears as an angel. He informs his grief-ridden mother that only she would be able to see him...and in the latter part of the story to his autistic brother.Johnny guides his mother through tribulations as only an angel could.
Once you finish the book, you are made to wonder if that was angel who helped me the other day.
3. Something Rising by Haven Kimmel - RM20.00
Review by Mostlyfiction.
When we first meet Cassie Claiborne, we meet a girl of infinite patience; a girl who picks her shots with a steady hand, using her uncanny ability as a pool player to make the money that helps her and her wounded family survive. This impression is supported as we go back a little in time to her early teens. We find a girl who, in between picking fights and carefully taking care of the abandoned hack she and the local kids play in, waits for her father to return home. Jimmy’s a charmer...if you can call a compulsive gambler and liar who lives with another woman charming, but then if his wife, Laura, distant, extremely intelligent but a bit dreamy, can give up her life to follow him, then maybe you have to admit the man has something to him. The other members of Cassie's family are equally disappointed, even broken hearted by Jimmy's selfish ways.
The whole book is, in its own way, a game of pool, and Cassie is her own toughest opponent. She is (mostly) always calm and in control in front of us, and especially when she’s holding a pool cue, but we get an idea that along the edges there is a great wildness. We know she fights people in school, and later that she has quick, unreasoning spurts of anger, some of which have pretty harsh consequences. The game is this: she keeps moving forward, lining up the next shot, and she ignores everything else. While her mother, Laura, wallows in her regrets, Cassie refuses to acknowledge that they are there. While ignoring everything but what’s on the table is fine for a game of pool, it’s a very bad way to play at life, because something in the peripheral is always waiting to jump out at you. And, of course, we all know that the more you try to repress something, the more likely you are to explode.
Its also a picture of a unique group of people, all of them well characterized and unforgettable. We watch them grow up with her....Puck, who is joyful in his lack of need for employment, and who draws a graphic novel based on the life of his best friend. Emmy, who wants to be a free spirit but who allows herself to be trapped into conformity, yet seems determined to resist seeing it. She makes a strange contrast to Laura...the girl who didn’t do what was planned for her, and, the girl who did. We get a picture of small town life, and how what one person does can warp a family, but not quite destroy it.
Eventually Cassie gets to a point where she does have to face the things she’s been ignoring, and what happens is both bitter sweet and utterly freeing. Her trip to New Orleans, the things and people she sees and how they are described make it seem a place of magic, underlying the lyrical ways Kimmel has of writing, while the resolution to this arc of Cassie’s life leaves us oddly hopeful.
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