Happily Ever After...A Challenge Completed

It's time to bid farewell to the Once Upon A Time Challenge. It's been such a wonderful experience and I'm truly going to miss this one. As I've mentioned on other blogs, this has been so much more than just a book challenge to me. I've met so many other wonderful bloggers out there and it's been great to see others exposed to the genre of literature that I've loved for so long. It's been a great journey and I got much more reading out of it than I expected! I was worried about fitting in the 5 books that I chose and ended up reading 12. Here's the list:

1. The Last Unicorn by Peter Beagle
2. Hart's Hope by Orson Scott Card
3. Moonheart by Charles de Lint
4. A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin
5. The Complete Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde
6. A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare
7. The Rest Falls Away by Colleen Gleason
8. Fablehaven: Rise of the Evening Star by Brandon Mull
9. Sandman: The Dream Hunters by Neil Gaiman and Yoshitaka Amano
10. Rises the Night by Colleen Gleason
11. Beowulf translated by Seamus Heaney
12. The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly

And once again, a HUGE thank you to Carl for hosting this amazing challenge. No one else could've made it quite the experience that Carl did, offering us such wonderful incentives to read along the way, whetting our appetite with all kinds of knowledge and links, and inspiring us along the way to pick up a pen and to try our hand at writing our own stories. It's been great. Now on to the RIP challenge! Well not quite yet....

The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly

Two nights ago, I closed the final pages of A Midsummer Night's Dream and declared an end to my journey through the Once Upon A Time challenge...But then thunder rumbled outside my window and the rains came...and John Connolly's The Book of Lost Things called to me. So I made myself a cup of tea and began the journey through this amazing book with the following opening passage:

"Once upon a time - for that is how all stories should begin - there was a boy who lost his mother."

This passage, while it may seem a bit dreary, really sets the tone for the novel. It is first and foremost, a book of tales...a "once upon a time" story. It is also a coming of age story, represented well by the picture of a boy losing his mother, a boy losing that childlike innocence.

David is our main character and is very close with his mother. They share a love of books, a love of reading, a love of fables and tales. When his mother becomes ill and dies, David feels that he is somewhat responsible for it because of his failure to be there for her as much as he should have or to perform his ritualistic compulsions that he has created as much as he should have. Shortly after his mother's death, there are new additions to the family. In the midst of all of this, the Germans are attacking near David's home in the middle of World War II.

Books are now beginning to whisper to David. At first they are subtle voices, just faint whispers or coughs, but soon distinct voices are heard and one clear voice is that of his mother's. Following that voice one night, David finds himself in the middle of an air raid from a German plane and when he lifts his head, it is in a world unknown to him. Here is the world that he has read about in every book on his shelves. It is beautiful and sinister. Danger creeps around each corner and strange things lurk in shadows. It is the a land of fairy tales, but not the fairy tales of Mother Goose....these are the tales where modern tales get their origins. Not quite so cheery.

He continues to hear his mother's voice and learns that he must make a journey to the king's castle where he can find The Book of Lost Things which will hold the key to his mother and his return home. Along the way there are adventures galore as we watch David grow from a child to a young man in this beautiful and terrifying tale.

This is one of the most imaginative books I have read. The language is beautiful and I love the way that he has weaved classic tales into his own work and has made them his own - painting them in a new light while preserving the original perfectly. I've never read anything by Connolly, but I will certainly be picking up more of his books after this one. The last few pages of this book were quite emotional. I had goosebumps while reading them and haven't had such an emotional response to a book in ages. This is a book of grief and loss. Of acceptance, of guilt, of experience, humility, growth, strength, bravery, and wisdom.

This book was truly an engrossing and inspiring experience and the shocker of the year so far. Not in that the story itself had a shocking plot...it was just much more powerful than what I expected. I was blown away. I think that this one should be on everyone's reading list. I don't usually rate books, but if I did, this one would definitely earn a 5/5 plus some.

Other Reviews:

Melody

A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare

What a wonderful closing to the Once Upon A Time challenge. When I opened the first pages of this play, a smile came across my face as I rediscovered the beauty of Shakespeare's language. I hadn't read any of his work in years. A Midsummer Night's Dream is one of my favorites of his and is a piece of literature that just exudes magic.

When I think of Shakespeare, I think of his use of language and his gift with words. I forget how skilled he was at coming up with fantastic stories and characters though. What a wonderful comedy this was! Who else could come up with the queen of the fairies falling in love with a mortal with an asses face! Genius! I would've loved to see his plays performed for the first time on stage. That must have been a fantastic experience.

So many classic moments in this play. Puck is one of my favorite dramatic characters ever created, and his line "Lord, what fools these mortals be" is one of my favorite lines. It sums up my feelings on life at times. If we were to step back and look at certain situations, surely they would seem almost comical at times. One of my favorite scenes in this play is when Demetrius awakes after being "anointed" by Puck and has joined Lysander in falling in love with Helena and Helena responds with "O spite! O hell! I see you are all bent to set against me for your merriment." It gave me a good laugh.

Like I said before, a perfect, magical wrap up to a perfect, magical challenge. I've enjoyed this experience and with two days left, I think I'll still be able to fit in John Connoly's The Book of Lost Things!

And one more thing. Like I haven't plugged it enough, BUT...if you enjoyed this play, may I highly recommend Orson Scott Card's Magic Street which is a fantastic urban fantasy where you will find some of these same fantastic characters in a modern setting including Puck and Titania. Signed copies can be found on his website for $8.99.

I leave you with Puck's famous last words:

If we shadows have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended:
That you have but slumbered here,
While these visions did appear.
And this weak and idle theme,
No more yielding but a dream,
Gentles, do not reprehend.
If you pardon, we will mend.
And as I am an honest Puck,
If we have unearned luck,
Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue,
We will make amends ere long-
Else the Puck a liar call.
So good night unto you all.
Give me your hands, if we be friends,
And Robin shall restore amends.

Beowulf translated by Seamus Heaney

Here's another one I can add to the "books I never read in school but should have" pile. I would've enjoyed reading this book in a classroom setting. Particularly in college. Beowulf was a wonderful experience made even more enjoyable by Seamus Heaney's mastery of the English language.

Beowulf is a 3,182 line epic poem written "sometime towards the end of the first millennium A.D." It is the story of Beowulf, a hero called upon to rid a city from a monster named Grendel who is descended from Cain of biblical reference. The poem follows Beowulf through his battles, ceremonies, and his remaining days.

The translation here is phenomenal and I enjoyed Heaney's use of language as much as I enjoyed the story. This passage for example, painted a delightfully creepy image for me of the place leading to where Grendel's mother lived:

A few miles from here
a frost-stiffened wood waits and keeps watch
above a mere; the overhanging bank
is a maze of tree-roots mirrored in its surface.
At night there, something uncanny happens:
the water burns. And the mere bottom
has never been sounded by the sons of men.
On its bank, the heather-stepper halts:
the hart in flight from pursuing hounds
will turn to face them with firm-set horns
and die in the wood rather than dive
beneath its surface. That is no good place.

This version was nice because it also included the entire text written in it's original old-English. Not that I could read or understand any of it, but it was nice to be able to make out the couple of word origins that I could. It also has little notes in the margin to explain some things that may not always be so obvious to the reader. Very pleasurable experience here.

What made me even more excited was that as I was reading this, I continually reminded myself that Neil Gaiman has written a screenplay for Beowulf. No word on when and if the film will be filmed and/or released, but no doubt that would be an amazing thing.

I'm glad that I read this one and am looking forward to Grendel by John Gardner next which is the story through the monster's eyes. Should be interesting!

A Day Of Reading and Reflection

I've felt very "blah" today. Not necessarily a bad thing, but not the greatest either. It made for some good reading as I'm nearly done Beowulf in preparation for reading Grendel for the Banned Book Challenge. Beowulf's great and if you haven't read it, I highly recommend Seamus Heaney's translation of it. Full review coming later.

The Once Upon a Time Challenge is officially completed, though I still plan on fitting in a reading of A Midsummer Night's Dream and maybe John Connolly's The Book of Lost Things if there's time. I'll miss this challenge a lot. I read fantasy throughout the year, so it's not the genre I'll miss, but it's the amount of discussion on fantasy literature that I'll miss. Though I know there are so many great fantasy bloggers out there ;)

So aside from reading, today's been a day of self reflection. Where I am now, where I've been in the past, where I'm going in the future. I'm happy with where I am now. I don't think I was fully aware of that because I never really took the time to just sit and think on it, but I am. I've achieved many of my goals but feel short changed sometimes because there's no immediate result aka I don't have a job right now. I'm surrounded by people who love me and I have a great support system in place and I appreciate that. I forget to focus on the positive sometimes and get wrapped up in the negative and sometimes take others down in that negativity. That's got to end. Negativity is hard to avoid and easy to get caught up in, but I've got to learn to fight it. No point in dwelling on things. Focus on the future. And that's what I'm doing. I've scheduled an appointment to meet with the head of the PhD program in Counseling at UNO next week. I'm really excited, though as I look at the application, I don't know how great my chances are at getting into the program. That's basically why I want to meet with her. She sounds really nice and sounded interested in meeting with me, so that should be good. Also applied for a slew of new jobs today, so keep your fingers crossed!

OK, off to finish Beowulf! Til next time....

A Game Of Thrones by George R.R. Martin

How do I describe A Game of Thrones? Simply put, it is a journey - and a remarkable one at that. This is my first adventure into high fantasy aside from Tolkien, whom I consider to be almost a genre of his own. I was so very pleasantly surprised with Martin's writing and story telling ability.

To be honest, I wasn't sure I was going to like this book at first and it almost became a "did not finish" about 200 pages into it. But when it picks up, it really picks up. I can see how this is almost expected with the beginning of a high fantasy tale. There's so much to set up! A Game of Thrones is the story of exactly what the title is. It is the story of numerous families playing "a game" or battling for the throne. But the story is so much more than just that. Martin's strong point is his character development.

The chapters are each titled after a character in the book and center around that character while drawing in other characters and connecting story lines. Martin tackles epic scenes, beautiful landscapes, fierce battles, politics and relationships all with a mastery of storytelling. The further I got into the book, the more I attached myself to the individual characters. Where at the beginning I was invested in two or three character, I was invested in nearly all of them by the end of the book. My favorite of his characters may be Jon, the bastard child of Lord Eddard Stark and Daenerys, the wife of Khal Drogo. Quite remarkable characters and a beautiful story.

So much more than just a fantasy tale. What we get here is true human drama and everything involved with it - death, pain, happiness, sorrow, betrayal, love, lust, jealousy and all of those other emotions. I will definitely be picking up book number two in the series, A Clash of Kings.

While not really related to the story line, I enjoyed Martin's description of how dragons came to be and I'd like to share it with you:

"Once there were two moons in the sky, but one wandered too close to the sun and cracked from the heat. A thousand-thousand dragons poured forth, and drank the fire of the sun. That is why dragons breathe flame. One day the other moon will kiss the sun too, and then it will crack and the dragons will return."

Rises The Night by Colleen Gleason

Prepare yourself for one of the best rides of the year with this book. Rises The Night, the second novel in Colleen Gleason's Gardella Vampire Chronicles series is phenomenal! I hate to say that I was surprised by this book, because that typically has a negative connotation, but this book was even better than the first...and I loved the first!

Everything is grander in this book. The scenery is more epic, the battles are bigger, the passion is more intense, the bites are bloodier, the plots are more complex, and the emotions are heavy. This book had my heart pounding at times and Colleen goes places that you think are off limits. This book really becomes a suspense/thriller at times.

I'm hooked on this series and I'm thrilled that we're promised three more books. I'm just upset that now we have to wait until February for The Bleeding Dusk, the third installment.

Rises the Night takes place a year after the events of The Rest Falls Away. An ancient evil has been discovered and brings our heroine to the city of Rome in the early 19th century where she once again must use her skills as a Venator, a vampire killer, to protect humanity. Sebastian fans will be pleased with this book as he gets much more time in the pages of this one.

As I said before about The Rest Falls Away, Rises the Night is one of the best books I've read this year. So much fun and a ride that anyone can enjoy. I'm hooked on this series and don't want to see it end any time soon. Colleen Gleason is a fresh voice in the horror genre (I'd rather call it horror than paranormal romance as a guy ;) and one that I look forward to reading for a long time to come. Extremely well written, always surprising, heart stopping at times, and always suspenseful. Give me more!

Sandman: The Dream Hunters by Neil Gaiman

The Dream Hunters is the first book I have read this year that I would recommend that everyone should own a copy of. What a special book. It's quite a beautiful tale told through the lustrous words of Neil Gaiman and the amazing oil paintings and charcoal sketches of Yoshitaka Amano. Both are among my favorite artists of today, Neil being one of my favorite authors and Amano my favorite artist.

The Dream Hunters is Neil's version of a Japanese folk tale called The Fox, The Monk, and the Mikado of All Night's Dreaming. It is the story of a solitary monk who tends a temple on the side of a mountain in Japan. One day, a fox and a badger decide to fool the monk into leaving the temple so that they may make it their home. Though they fail in doing so, the fox falls in love with the monk in trying and transforms into a woman.

While back in fox form, the fox one day over hears a group of demons speaking of plans for the monk's death. The monk will have 3 dreams. In the first he will dream of a box, in the second, a key, and in the third, the key will open the box. When the box is opened, the monk will be caught in the world of dreams and will therefore starve and thirst to death leading to his death. The fox goes to the King of All Night's Dreaming to try to help her monk.

This was one of my favorite Neil Gaiman work's that I've read. The whole book was such a moving experience. The tale was beautiful. Neil was able to keep the feel of a traditional Japanese folk tale. Amano's artwork never ceases to amaze me. There's no artist like this man. So much emotion and detail captured in his paintings. Amano and Gaiman work together perfectly. As I mentioned earlier, I can't imagine anyone not enjoying this tale. It's a fairly quick read at 126 pages and is a pleasure to read. This one pulls at the heart strings and paints a world that the reader can get lost in. Enjoy.

The Complete Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde

This is actually the first time I've read Oscar Wilde. I started The Picture of Dorian Gray a long time ago, but never finished it for some reason. His compete fairy tales were wonderful! I loved them all. They were all quite unique, but revisited common themes seen in children's fairy tales. The moral lessons were the same.

The book is broken up into two separate collections. The first is called The Happy Prince and the second is A House of Pomegranates. Wilde must have loved pomegranates as I think they are mentioned in nearly every fairy tale in the book.

The Happy Prince consists of 5 tales:

The Happy Prince: A statue of a prince asks a bird friend to deliver precious gems on his body to people who are in need in the town so that they may survive and in turn is deemed to be no longer beautiful.

The Nightingale and the Rose: A Nightingale makes the ultimate sacrifice in the form of a song so that a a boy may win the heart of a maiden.

The Selfish Giant: A grumpy giant closes his courtyard off to children so Spring refuses to come back leaving Winter to constantly blunder him. This one has a very bizarre ending in my opinion.

The Devoted Friend: A friend accepts a small favor and is expected to do entirely too much in return.

The Remarkable Rocket: A rocket (firecracker) who is quite arrogant ends up being the bottom of the bunch.

and A House of Pomegranates consists of 4 tales:

The Young King: A King has a series of dreams which lead him to no longer want the royal treatment once he sees what it costs others.

The Birthday of the Infanta: A dwarf who performs for the Infanta on her birthday becomes obsessively in love with her and is disillusioned on his way to finding her.

The Fisherman and His Soul: A fisherman gives his soul to be with a mermaid and learns the hard way the price that he has paid for doing so.

The Star-Child: A Child falls from the sky, is taken in by a family, and grows to have a horrible attitude. When he tries to redeem himself, he finds that it may be too late to do so.

Wilde's writing was remarkable and a pleasure to read. Fairy tales from this era are my favorite! The tone, the setting, and above all, the language is just perfect. The English language was at the perfect point for fairy tales at that time. Many of the stories had Christian themes to them, something that I didn't expect from Wilde. I found that interesting. This is definitely a collection that I hope to one day be able to read to my own children as they fall to sleep. Beautiful stories with classic lessons.

Fablehaven: Rise Of The Evening Star by Brandon Mull

Fablehaven: Rise of the Evening Star is Book 2 in the wonderfully magical Fablehaven series. I loved it! Even better than the first one in my opinion. For those who haven't read the first one, Fablehaven is the name of a refuge for mythical and magical creatures. It is one of five such preserves in the world. Fablehaven is owned by the grandparents of Seth and Kendra, our two main characters. Common characters in the books are fairies, brownies, naiads, trolls, imps, golems, and satyrs. Great fun!

This second book in the series poses a threat to Fablehaven. Each of the five magical preserves in the world holds a unique artifact with a magical power. The location of the artifact is kept secret even from caretakers of the preserve. If all 5 artifacts were found and united, they could be combined to unlock a prison that holds demons, devils, and monsters that are unimaginable and could quite literally bring about the end of the world. The Society of the Evening Star is after these artifacts.

Trouble is breaking loose when a strange new student arrives at Seth and Kendra's school. To keep them safe, Seth and Kendra's grandparents decided to have them spend the summer at Fablehaven and tell their parents that they could use the help around the house as an excuse. After all, there's a giant frog trying to eat Seth...how would you explain that one to mom?! When Seth and Kendra arrive after facing some strange circumstances, they find that help has been called in to Fablehaven. Three new faces are there: A potions master, a relics collector, and a magical critter collector. It soon becomes obvious that there's a traitor among the crowd. But who could it be? And how much damage could they cause?

This volume has ten times the magic and adventure of the first one. It was so much fun and I caught myself holding my breath at times. Seth gets himself into trouble as usual and Kendra has acquired some pretty cool abilities. There's tons of new creatures introduced in this book and it all climaxes into an amazing scene of magic and puzzelry! And the ending just leaves you dying for more. And it's coming in 2008.

Mull's writing is wonderful. Perfect for kids and yet perfectly enjoyable for adults as well. I didn't want this one to end at all. One of my favorite reads of the year so far. He also announces at the end of the book that he has another new non-Fablehaven book coming out in the Fall called The Candy Shop War. Looking forward to that one as well.

Brandon Mull is a promising author and I'm really looking forward to what this guy does with his career. This series will be the perfect one to get into with Harry Potter ending in July.

Moonheart by Charles de Lint

One of the things that I've come to love about Charles de Lint is his ability to capture the essence and spirit of the fantastic and to portray that perfectly to the reader in a way that brings out a glow like a child discovering magic for the first time. With Moonheart, de Lint once again has captured my heart and brought me on a journey that I loved every second of.

Moonheart is a very complex story. There are many interweaving story lines which works very well with the theme of Native American souls, spirits, and connectedness. It begins as the story of Sara Kendell. Sara co-owns a wonderful little antiques and book shop in Ottawa called The Merry Dancers. One day, while unpacking one of the boxes from an old estate, Sara discovers a painting of two Native American men, and a medicine bag which contains a gold ring, a bone disc with a quarter moon on one side and a stag on the other, and a feather. The contents of this box are what goes on to form a truly amazing and epic story.

Sara lives with her uncle, Jamie Tams. Jamie is more of a friend to Sara and is the co-owner of the shop. Jamie is also the owner of Tamson house where they live. Tamson house is a wonderful thing. The house is a character in itself. It's a giant house encompassing an entire city block and has had numerous occupants coming and going throughout the years. It's an old house with all of the wonderful features of an old house. There is a courtyard in the middle of the house that is more like a park with beautiful gardens. Here's where the twist comes in. The house exists not only in Ottawa, but in the Otherworld as well.

While at a diner one day, Sara is approached by a stranger, a musician, named Kieran Foy. What eventually ensues brings her to this Otherworld. The otherworld is a beautiful, rich forest untouched by mankind. It is inhabited by Native Americans who practice ancient magics and follow ancient ways. The contents of the medicine bag tie Sara to this world now, and we soon learn that fate had it arranged that way. When all of the inhabitants of Tamson House are spirited away to the Otherworld, the battle against an ancient evil, an ancient feud begins. The ancient evil is a being named Ma'lek'a and it's allies are the Tragg'a and both are truly horrifying creatures.

This only begins to touch on the story. I could go on for pages and pages describing this wonderful book to you, but I recommend that you read it yourself. There are many wonderful characters in this book, and I came to love so many of them. Blue, Taliesin, Hengwr, Tucker, just to name a few.

I love the cover art for the book. It was done by David Bergen and sums up the feel of the book perfectly! Bergen also did the cover art for Greenmantle, I believe, another great book of de Lint's. There's also a highly desired version of this book with art by Charles Vess which was published by Subterranean Press. I'd love to get my hands on a copy of that.

It took me a long time to read this book. It's definitely not a sit down and read it quick book. It was much like reading Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell to me. Very rewarding, but I couldn't plow through it. I loved it though, and it has definitely secured me as a de Lint fan. All of the de Lint themes are here...magic, Native American folklore, music, the power of bonds and ties in humanity. De Lint's writing is wonderful. I'll leave you with one of my favorite passages that I feel sums up the feel of the book:

Tonight he stood alone, his back to the Bearstone and his gaze searching the shadows that lay in amongst the pines, waiting for the one he knew would come. A trembling touched the air, soft as a breath across the strings of his harp. The scent of pine resin and sea were swallowed by the heady odor of apple blossoms, rich and pungent as they are in the spring. Sometimes his grandsire came in the shape of Taliesin's own craftfather - old Myrddin, black hair greying, but still tied back at the nape of his neck, golden eyes deep with dreaming. And sometimes he was the green man in a cloak of oak leaves and mistletoe, face like a fox, narrow and brown. Tonight he came as a stag, brow heavy with twelve-pointed antlers, his reddish-brown coat gleaming in the starlight, his eyes heavy with riddles.

"Are you content?" he asked the bard.

Taliesin inclined his head respectfully. "Content indeed."

I'm Overwhelmed With Cool Stuff!

So first of all, I get home and see that I won the contest for Carl's Once Upon a Time Challenge and will be the recipient of an Endicott Studio Tshirt and a signed Print from Terri Windling. How frickin cool! I chose Tree Woman and Child. I love that print. It's beautiful. Congrats to Quixotical and Marina as well, two more winners! By the way...Endicott Studio is a wonderful thing and they donate to a lot of children's charities and need money to continue to support themselves. I highly recommend that if you have a little extra, contribute to them. In return for your contributions you can get beautiful Terri Windling prints and Endicott Studio tshirts that are really cool!

Then, I got my grab bag from Subterranean Press. I ordered one of these $99 grab bags and was hoping that I wasn't getting ripped off. I definitely didn't get ripped off. 9 beautiful, mostly signed and numbered editions came very quickly worth over $450 dollars. Wow. Here's what I got:

Charles Stross' Missile Gap (Deluxe Hardcover Edition)
David J. Schow's Havoc Swims Jaded (Deluxe Hardcover Edition)
The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg (This one's gorgeous!)
Dead Names: The Dark History of the Necronomicon by Simon (Signed, Limited, Numbered)
Kealan Patrick Burke's Currency of Souls (Signed, Hardcover, Numbered)
Tim Powers' A Soul in a Bottle (Signed, Limited, Numbered)
James P. Blaylock's 13 Phantasms (Chapbook)
Peter Crowther's The Spaces Between The Lines (Deluxe, Numbered, Hardcover)
Terry Lamsley's Made Ready & Cupboard Love (Signed, Limited, Numbered)

Ready for this one......I nearly lost my breath when I saw it:

Mirromask by Neil Gaiman & Dave McKean (Signed, Limited, Numbered, and BEAUTIFUL)

I know this book alone costs $125 because I thought of buying it (but couldn't bring myself to since I already have the regular copy). I was blown away that they put this in a grab bag. All of the books sound great.

And finally, I also got an Email from booksprice.com offering me a free book. I chose Storm Front by Jim Butcher (The first in the Dresden series). They're a really great site! I checked them out. You type in the book, cd, game or dvd that you're looking for and they show you a list of different retailers and who has what for the best price. Great tool for us book buying addicts! :D

What a great treat of a day after complaining about losing all of my books yesterday! Gotta love that positive karma :)

It's Gonna Be A Good Monday!

Or so I'm telling myself. It's my mantra of sorts for today. Why is it going to be a good Monday, you ask...That is because after a little over a month of waiting, we get a brand new episode of Heroes tonight!! I'm so excited. It felt like such a long wait. I haven't felt this excited about a TV series in a long time. Heroes is every geeks dream (which is why I love it). Super powers, villains, heroes, blood, guts, and wonderful art by Tim Sale. Does it get any better than that? Today is going to feel like such a long day as I wait in anticipation of tonight.

I can check the first chore of the day off. Went to the internship this morning and I think my happiness for Heroes wore off on my patients. They were all in such a good mood today and we had a really good process group. Next up is 6 hours of school and then I can come home and relax....and watch Heroes.

There's another great series on TV that I've just started watching and it's on Lifetime of all channels. It's called Blood Ties and it's the story of a cop whose best friend is a vampire and together they solve paranormal mysteries. How cool! It's a little bit cheesy, but I'm liking it so far. It comes on Sundays at 9:00 Central time.

I'm in the middle of Charles DeLint's Moonheart right now for the Once Upon a Time Challenge and I'm loving it so far. This is my second DeLint and I'm starting to feel that he deserves to be right up there with Gaiman. He's a remarkable storyteller and I just enjoy his books so much! I'll be sure to post the review as soon as I finish it.

Did I mention that Heroes comes back tonight?

The Rest Falls Away by Colleen Gleason

Wow! What a fun read. The Rest Falls Away is one of the most refreshing books I've read in a long time. Newcomer Colleen Gleason offers so much to her readers. I haven't read a page turner like this in ages. Last night I breezed through 180 pages of this book which is an accomplishment in itself in these time constrained days. I just couldn't put it down.

The Rest Falls Away is the first book in the promising Gardella Vampire Chronicles. It's classified as a paranormal romance. Now, I never thought that I would read a romance novel, but everyone was giving this book rave reviews. And now I see why. Don't be afraid of this on, men! It's not what I thought a romance novel would be. Sure there's a few steamy scenes in the novel (which are very well written), but it's a romance in the traditional form of the word. And a beautiful one.

This book had me at hello. It starts off with a bang in the prologue and just doesn't let go. It's smart, sexy, heart pounding, romantic, and horrifying all in the same breath. I found myself smiling at times when reading this book and clutching my chest at other times.

It is the story of Victoria Gardella Grantworth, the next chosen venator. A venator is a vampire killer or slayer, whichever term you prefer. Victoria is celebrating her coming out in two ways. First, she is making her debut onto the dating scene and second, she is making her debut as a new venator. On the night of her coming out ball, Victoria makes her first kill as the stake slides into a vampires chest and a "poof" is heard. She also meets the man of her dreams that night, The Marquess of Rockley, Phillip.

Victoria is a wonderful character. Colleen is able to make her very human to the reader. She is frail but strong, tough hearted but a hopeless romantic, smart and strong headed yet her heart melts at times. The reader can feel her struggle between the two lives that she must live and try to keep seperate...her life as a vampire killer and her life as a lover. What a classic character that I very much look forward to following in this series.

All of her characters are brilliant. There is Max, another venator that is Victoria's partner in crime and protector at times. Max and Victoria seem to constantly get on each other's nerves, yet there's a love there. Looking forward to how these characters progress. There is the old, wise Aunt Eustacia who teaches Victoria everything she needs to know about being a venator. There is the oh so slimy Sebastian who we really don't know what to think of. Very mysterious character. And then there is Lilith, the centuries old vampire that is so elegant and chic, yet so mysteriously horrible.

Gleason's writing is brilliant. One feels that they are reading a vampire novel written by Jane Austen. The story is set in 19th century London and has plenty of balls, horse drawn buggies, old mansions, and eccentric aunts drinking tea. Her writing is a pleasure to read and flows easily and perfectly.

Gleason has come onto the scene with a blaze and I can't wait to see what is to come with the second installment, Rises the Night which debuts in June. Colleen has a wonderful blog with updates on the series and some wonderful insights into her thought process.

I'm counting this as a bonus read for the Once Upon A Time Challenge. It seems to fit well into this one. Here's hoping for many more books to come from her for many more future challenges.

The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle

"The unicorn lived in a lilac wood, and she lived all alone. She was very old, though she did not know it, and she was no longer the careless color of sea foam, but rather the color of snow falling on a moonlit night. But her eyes were still clear and unwearied, and she still moved like a shadow on the sea."

So begins Peter Beagle's, The Last Unicorn. What a fantastic book! This one has been on my to be read list for a long while and thanks to the Once Upon a Time challenge, I finally got around to it.

The Last Unicorn is everything that a fantasy should be. It has unicorns to begin with, magicians, gypsies, old kingdoms, kings, princes, magic, an old castle on top of a hill, and a giant red bull.

It is the story of a unicorn who is on a quest to find others like herself. Along the way, she meets a magician and a gypsy sort of woman. They are on a quest to find The Red Bull who must be defeated in order for her to find the other unicorns. Plenty of magic, fighting, wizardry, love and loss occur along the way, all in breathtaking fashion.

The unicorn is a wonderful, powerful character. Unicorns are one of the first things that pop into my mind when I think of fantasy. Even white horses look magical in real life because of the idea of a unicorn. Peter Beagle's unicorn is the definition of what a unicorn should be. She's mysterious, powerful, beautiful, glowing, and magical. She reminded me a lot of Yvaine from Stardust even though Yvaine wasn't a unicorn. Read the book and you'll understand why. I thought of Stardust a lot while reading this book. It has the same magical theme, and is a classic fantastic fairy tale like Stardust is. In fact, I'm hoping that there's one scene involving a unicorn in Stardust that does not make it to the film because it was very upsetting just reading it.

The red bull was a wonderful character in The Last Unicorn. He is described as an enormous red bull who's size is more than one can imagine with horns like lightning and a sort of electricity coming off of him. He is also blind. He herds unicorns into the sea. Wonderful fantasy character and even though he's somewhat of a villain I still loved him.

The illustrations are done by Mel Grant and I loved them. They were exactly what they should be and I can't describe them much better than that. Black and white illustrations with a very "sketched" look that fit perfectly with the story.

This was my first book of Peter Beagle's. The man is an extraordinary writer. His descriptions are so detailed and beautiful and so different from any other authors I've read. He has a wonderful way with words and creates a beautiful story here. The next issue of Orson Scott Card's online magazine Intergalactic Medicine Show is supposed to have an interview with him and a new short story by him. Can't wait for that.

There's also an animated version of The Last Unicorn out there that I'd like to check out. It's always good to see a book translated into a movie and I believe that Peter Beagle wrote the screenplay for the movie.

Book one of the fantasy challenge down, and what a wonderful book it was!

I May Be Broke, But I've Got Peter Beagle

Thanks to Carl, I had to go spend money on a book today :p. It's really not his fault though, it was my choosing. One of the books that I signed up for for the Once Upon A Time challenge was Peter Beagle's The Last Unicorn. Now, I have all the other books that I'm reading for the challenge sitting on my shelf, but I just had to have this one first even though I had only $18.99 in my checking account (it's called being a grad student). On the positive side of being a grad student, my stipend should be coming in in about 4 days, so I'll manage.

I tend to do this alot with books. I have probably about 50 books sitting on my to be read shelf, including the other 4 books I'm reading for the challenge, but I still manage to always "need to buy" another book. That's one thing I like about these challenges - I can commit to reading some of these that have been sitting on the shelf, lonely and abandoned for far too long. Unfortunately though, I don't own the rest of the books that I signed up for for the Banned Books Challenge, so I'll have to be buying those. It's worth it though.

So now I just need to finish Fahrenheit 451 tonight for the banned books challenge and then I can start The Last Unicorn. Can't wait!

Another great thing about these challenges is that I'm getting to meet all of these other great bloggers out there who have also signed up for the challenges. And with fantasy being my favorite genre, there are lots of new friends out there!

Once Upon A Time Challenge

Carl has officially posted the details for the Once Upon A Time Challenge, and I'm so excited about it! This challenge covers my favorite genre - fantasy, fairy tales, mythology, and folklore. I really hope that lots of people participate in this challenge. It's a genre of literature that can appeal to anyone. You don't have to be a fan of wizards and knights to enjoy fantasy, the genre branches off in so many directions. If there's anyone out there that's looking for something to read for this challenge, let me know what kind of stuff you like and I'd be more than happy to help you find a perfect fit.

My List:

1. The Last Unicorn by Peter Beagle
2. Hart's Hope by Orson Scott Card
3. Moonheart by Charles DeLint
4. A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin
5. The Complete Fairy Tales of Oscar Wilde

Bonus: A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare (A perfect wrap up to the challenge)

Now hopefully, I can finish all of these by June 21st, Midsummer Night's Eve, in addition to the Banned books challenge which ends in June as well.