"Five Seasons of Angel" edited by Glenn Yeffeth

I don't talk about it much on this blog because this is my book blog, not my movies/writing/life blog, but Angel (1999-2004) is my second-favorite TV show of all time.  This spin-off of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003) follows vampire-with-a-soul Angel (David Boreanaz) to Los Angeles as he seeks to make amends for all the harm he had inflicted on others before being cursed with a soul.  It's kind of a supernatural film noir series, especially for the first couple of seasons.

Angel debuted my sophomore year of college, and my roommates insisted I watch the premier episode with them.  I thought it was okay.  Okay enough that I watched the next few with them too, and by episode three, I was hooked for good.  I started watching Buffy with them too, and became a fan of it as well, though not as devotedly.

This book is a collection of essays in which, as the subtitle says, Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Discuss Their Favorite Vampire.  Which is a bit misleading, because several of the essays don't focus on Angel himself at all, so maybe it should say Favorite Vampire Show instead?  But that's just quibbling.  This book, as a whole, delighted me.  Considering I've watched this whole series through twice, once in its initial run and once via DVD, and rewatched many episodes many more times than that, I thought I knew the series and Angel's story arc in it pretty well.  But, in fact, this book taught me some things about the show, pointing out nuances I hadn't noticed, and was generally as informative as it was enjoyable.

My favorite essays were:

• "Angelus Populi" by Don DeBrandt
• "That Angel Doesn't Live Here Anymore" by Laura Resnick
• "A World Without Love: The Failure of Family in Angel" by Jean Lorrah
• "It's Not Easy being Green and Nonjudgmental" by Abbie Bernstein
• "Why We Love Lindsey" by Michelle Sagara West
• "The Good Vampire: Angel and Spike" by Peter S. Beagle
• "Victim Triumphant" by Jacqueline Lichtenberg
• "Death Becomes Him: Blondie Bear 5.0" by Nancy Holder
• "True Shanshu" by Laura Anne Gilman
• "There's My Boy..." by Joy Davidson

Um, yes, that's like half the essays.  There were SO MANY excellent ones! If you're a fan of this series, definitely find yourself a copy of this book.

Particularly Good Bits:

Sometimes, when reality is too grim, fantasy is all we have (p. 4, "Angelus Populi" by Don DeBrandt).

It's all about pain.  Ridicule is a way to get rid of your own by forcing it upon someone else (p. 6, "Angelus Populi" by Don DeBrandt).

If we look at the opening credits of every Angel episode, we see a graphic representation of Angel's eternal isolation.  Yes, there are some changing shots of Angel interacting with the cast of each season, but the end of the montage never changes.  our final image of Angel remains that dark silhouette walking away from us into the night. Angel alone (p. 62, "A World Without Love: The Failure of Family in Angel" by Jean Lorrah).

Lorne's not stupid -- he understands the advantages of being a good fighter -- but he sees it as just another quality, like an ability to read auras: nice if you have it, but nothing wrong with you if you don't (p. 71, "It's Not Easy being Green and Nonjudgmental" by Abbie Bernstein).

Angel reveals that life's victims -- not heroes, but people just like us -- are all that stand between us and annihilation (p. 137, "Victim Triumphant" by Jacqueline Lichtenberg).

In [Cordelia's] humanity, we see the best points of the Angelverse: not the strong defending the weak, but the weak learning how to be strong (p. 185, "True Shanshu" by Laura Anne Gilman).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: R for frank discussions of sexual situations and themes and some bad language.  Not a book kids are going to want to read anyway.

This is my 19th book read and reviewed for #theunreadshelfproject2020 :-)

"Dear Author: Letters from a Bookish Fangirl" by Laura A. Grace

This is one of the sweetest little books I've read in a long time.  It is exactly what the subtitle says: a collection of letters to unspecified authors by a woman who loves their books.

Because Grace never reveals what letter goes to what author, I felt like some of them were written to me.  And that was incredibly encouraging.  In fact, I saved this book to read when I dug back into rewrites on One Bad Apple after taking a hiatus in December.  I'm so glad I did, because it really gave me a little dose of creative oomph every time I opened the cover and read a couple of letters.

If you're an author OR a bookish fangirl, I think you'll dig this book.  I saw on Laura A. Grace's Instagram account that the e-book version is FREE today ONLY, January 13, 2020.  So if you've been thinking of getting this, now would be a perfect day to do so!

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: G because it's totally clean and sweet and innocent.

And yay!  This is the first book I've finished for #TheUnreadShelfProject2020 :-)

"I'd Rather be Reading" by Anne Bogel

What a perfectly delightful book!

Really, reading this made me wonder sometimes if Anne Bogel had been reading my thoughts and copying my life.  I identified with her behavior toward books so fiercely in so many ways!  I'm book-bossy.  I need due dates to help decide what books to read.  I've been known to go to the library multiple times in one week.  I don't have any book twins, but I've got loads of book friends upon whom I rely for recommendations.  I rearrange my bookshelves.  I never have enough bookshelves!  And on and on and on.

I've read Anne Bogel's blog, Modern Mrs. Darcy, a few times, though I don't follow it.  I might start following it now.  We'll see.  But I will definitely be rereading this book in years to come, if only for the sense of, "I'm not alone!  Someone else understands!" that it gave me.

If you're passionate about books, or if you know someone who is passionate about books and want to understand them better, try this book.  It's delicious.

(Another of my Instagram pics)

Particularly Good Bits:

...a bookstore is full of nothing if not possibility (p. 78).

Reading is often viewed as a solitary act; that's one of the reasons I love it, and it's certainly my favorite escape and introvert coping strategy of choice.  But reading is also a social act: readers lovet o connect over good books.  If I read a book that legitimately changes my life (what a find!), or a book that becomes a new favorite, or even a breezy novel that's tons of fun, I can't wait to talk about it with my fellow readers (p. 138).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG for a few iffy words, I think?  Honestly, I inhaled this book so quickly, I don't remember the content.

"A Hobbit, a Wardrobe, and a Great War" by Joseph Laconte

Oh. My. Goodness.

You know how sometimes, lots of people tell you to read a book because they're sure you would love it, and so you find the book, and then you put off reading it for like a year because you're afraid you might not like it as much as they expect you to like it?

Or is that just me?

Anyway, that happened for me with this book, and it just goes to show you how foolish I can be sometimes.  Because this is a great book.

I've been gravitating toward books about WWI lately, I think.  Not intentionally, they just... keep cropping up.  I'm happy about this because I feel like I don't know enough about WWI, and this is all filling in a gap in my knowledge of world history.

ANYWAY!  I'm rambling today.  Sorry.  THIS book is fantastic.  It focuses chiefly on J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, as you may have guessed, especially their experiences as soldiers on the front lines during WWI and how those affected the rest of their lives.  Especially their literary lives, of course, since that's what most of us know Tolkien and Lewis for.  

But it doesn't stop with those two.  It shows, gently and persuasively, how the catastrophic destruction of that war caused millions of people to turn away from God and look to science and technology for their salvation here on earth.  And how that change in the world around them informed the things Tolkien and Lewis wrote about.

I learned so much from this book!  In fact, I told my husband he needs to read it too.  I'm confident he'll also find it fascinating.

(From my Instagram account.)

Particularly Good Bits:

Tolkien and Lewis were attracted to the genres of myth and romance not because they sought to escape the world, but because for them, the real world had a mythic and heroic quality (p. xvi).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  PG-13 for discussions of war-related violence, suicide, and so on.  No cursing or anything like that, just a lot about the realities and horrors of war.

This is my 13th book read and reviewed for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge 2018.

And this review is also part of my Tolkien Blog Party.  Tomorrow is the last day to enter the giveaway and the games, so if you haven't done so already, have at it!  I'll choose giveaway winners on Saturday, and post the game answers and scores too.

Finally, this is part of my continuing quest to read a goodly number of the books I've collected that have to do with Middle-earth and J.R.R. Tolkien, which I've dubbed My Years in Middle-earth.

"Film Noir: Light and Shadow" edited by Alain Silver and James Ursini

This book is a delight.

It's absolutely crammed with pictures.  (Yes, as my Goodreads friends know, I got entirely stuck on page 132 because it was a full-page picture of a certain beloved actor, and I didn't want to turn the page on him.)  It's also crammed with details and observations and information and trivia and facts and theories and... yeah, it is completely wonderful.

But what do you expect from a book with a cover that boasts Dana Andrews and Gene Tierney from my fave film noir ever, Laura (1944)?

The only real problem with this book is that now I have dozens more noir films on my to-be-watched list.  Such a problem to have, huh?  

Basically, the whole book is essay after essay devoted to the visual aspects of film noir.  The essays have titles like "Rooms like Reveries: Interiors and Interiority in Film Noir" (Imogen Sara Smith), "The Gangster and Film Noir" (Alain Silver), "Fragments of the Mirror: Hitchcock's Noir Landscape" (Alain Silver), and "Women's Song and Dance Performances in Film Noir" (Christophe Gelly and Delphine Letort) -- you can see how enticing they are to someone who enjoys this film style!

By far, my favorite essay was "Nothingness and Purpose: Light and shadow in It's a Wonderful Life" by Todd Erickson.  I've always felt that Wonderful Life was a much darker movie that it gets credit for, and so much darker than most Christmas movies -- I heartily agree with Erickson that it has noir in its heart.  

If you're a fan of film noir and love learning about how movies are made, love delving into what's going on below the surface of a story, or just generally love reading about movies, you will probably enjoy this book.

If This Was a Movie, I Would Rate It: a hard PG-13 for some bad language (quoting movie lines, mainly) and non-explicit discussions of adult themes and sexual undercurrents in films.

"The Lord of the Rings: The Mythology of Power" by Jane Chance

There are several different places in this book where I wrote "mind = blown" because the nuances Jane Chance teased out of Tolkien's storytelling were so amazing.

I'm serious.  She brought up things I never, ever thought of, and I'm on my seventh reading of The Lord of the Rings.

I'm trying to find words to explain all the wonderful things I learned from this book, and I'm falling so short.  I'm going to have to re-read it again and again to really internalize and remember a lot of what I learned, but I'll share a couple of the things I found most interesting.

How about the fact that Denethor and Theoden's names are basically mirror images of each other?  Den-e-thor.  The-o-den.  And that their "leadership styles" are also mirrors -- one is a kind and loving leader who "commands through respect and love," and the other is a "tyrant [who] commands his followers by edict, rule, law" (p. 90).  HOW did I never notice this?

Or how about the fact that, while Gollum calls the Ring his "birthday present," it literally is Frodo's birthday present because Bilbo left it to him (along with Bag-End) on their shared birthday?  I mean, dude.  So amazing.  And again, now that I see it, that's so totally obvious, but it's not anything I ever thought of.

My favorite chapter was probably the one at the end, "Heroic Narrative and the Power of Structure."  I love studying the structure of myths and epics, also called the "hero's quest," and how they get used over and over in new and interesting ways.  I'd previously identified a lot of things in LOTR that draw from the classic myth structure, but I had never before noticed that "[i]n each of the three volumes, Tolkien matches the heroic structure of the initial book to that of the second book" (P. 19).  Which means for instance, that in book 1, everyone's at a great gathering at the beginning, Bilbo's party.  At the beginning of book 2, they're at the Council of Elrond.  In book 1, Frodo and friends go down into the valleys and encounter an ancient being who consumes some of them, Old Man Willow.  In book 2, they go down into Moria and encounter an ancient being who drags Gandalf away, the Balrog.  And on and on it goes.

Just fascinating stuff that I not only never noticed myself, but that I, as a writer, would never have come up with!  My appreciation for Tolkien as a writer and storyteller have grown so much while reading this book.

But this book is probably not for everyone.  If you don't enjoy analyzing texts, looking for deeper meanings, and somewhat scholarly pursuits like that, you probably wouldn't enjoy this book.  Certainly you can understand The Lord of the Rings without it.  But if you're like me and have read the trilogy quite a few times and enjoy peeling away layers to see the wordcraft and deeper meanings below a book's surface, I definitely recommend you try this book.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  PG for some discussions of things like violence.  No bad language or anything like that.

I wrote this review as part of this year's Tolkien Blog Party.  If you haven't yet, check out the blog tag and giveaway and other posts for the party!

This is my eighth book read and reviewed for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge 2017.

"Finding God in the Lord of the Rings" by Kurt Bruner and Jim Ware

This is a fantastic little book.  It goes through the whole trilogy in chronological order, pulling out events and examining them in the light of Christianity to see what they contain.  Faith, hope, love, sacrifice, redemption, grace, desire, fear, death, weakness, danger -- there are so many wonderful topics packed into this book!

While it's set up so you could use it as a devotional, reading one section a day, I didn't read it that way -- I gobbled it up as fast as I could, underlining and scribbling madly in the margins.  I'm teaching my niece high school lit again this year, and we're reading The Lord of the Rings together as our first project.  Delightful!  I'm drawing on this book for a lot of the themes we're discussing.

Particularly Good Bits:

Tolkien understood that our lives are part of a grand drama that both transcends and explains our experiences.  The drama's narrative infuses meaning into scenes and events that would otherwise seem arbitrary and meaningless.  Tolkien saw the adventure of our lives, like the adventure of his hobbits, as part of a story that began "once upon a time" and is moving toward its eventual "ever after" (p. xi).

C. S. Lewis believed that our desire for something better is a gift, a way of reminding us of what it is we lost and what it is we hope to regain (p. 2).

Tolkien saw our world as neither completely right nor completely wrong, but rather as a good that has been violated, a beauty marred.  He realized that the only way we can understand that which occurs within time is to view it within the context of that which occurred before and beyond time (p. 4).

The true forces of evil in our world are rarely haphazard or indiscriminate.  The occasional mad gunman notwithstanding, the history of mankind shows that the most destructive wickedness is devious and determined.  Violent insanity is far less trouble than diabolical brilliance (p. 18).

It is only when we humble ourselves by acknowledging that we don't know everything that we are able to learn from others (p. 22).

Middle-earth, in other words, is a hauntingly luminous mirror image of our world.  For we know that the world in which we live is a perilous place, a place where good and bad, light and dark, innocence and horror, glory and depravity march side by side and sleep back-to-back.  We forget this at times, of course.  In the course of our dull daily routines we often grow numbly accustomed to it all.  But there are those moments when we wake suddenly in the middle of the night and remember that we are, after all, surrounded by terrors (p. 33).

It is our human destiny to participate with God in the ongoing work of creation (p. 112).

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  G.  Absolutely clean and God-pleasing.

I wrote this review specifically for this year's Tolkien Blog Party.  If you haven't yet, check out the blog tag and enter the giveaway.  There will be more posts coming this week, including games and another Tolkien-related book review.

This is also my 7th book read and reviewed for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge 2017.

"Wizards, Hobbits, and Harry Potter" edited by Mark Whitlock

This book was not exactly what I was expecting.  I thought it was going to be all about the bad and evil things contained in fantasy fiction, and why we should stay away from them.  The subtitle of "What Your Family Needs to Know" certainly made it sound that way.  But actually, it was a thoughtful discussion of what the Bible says about magic, the power of storytelling, and also how to read fiction in a discerning manner.  My copy also includes a CD of an audio discussion of these same topics, but I haven't listened to it yet.  

This book also discusses the first four Harry Potter books, the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and the Narnia series.  It gives a summary of each book, questions to think about or discuss as a family, and Bible verses that relate to various issues faced by characters in each book.  

I thought I was going to read through this quickly, then put it in the box of books I'll be selling at my yard sale.  Instead, I want to share the discussions of Narnia with my son, as he loves those books, and I know I'll be using some of the questions about LOTR next fall when I read through those books with my niece for her high school lit class.

This is my fourth book read and reviewed for the Mount TBR Challenge 2017.

"Let's Pretend This Never Happened" (A Mostly True Memoir) by Jenny Lawson (aka the Bloggess)

Three reasons why you should not read this book:

1. It's extremely profane and inappropriate.
2. It will make you think and write in the author's style for days, and you will be unable to blog as a result for fear you will sound like a cheap knock-off.
3. It will make you laugh so hard you cry, and you'll do that so often that your sinuses rebel and your nose is stuffed up for more than a day after you finish the book.

You're welcome.

Okay, but if you're not going to be bothered by rampant profanity and endless discussions of personal bodily parts that my children don't know exist; and if you don't mind taking a break from blogging, only to go back to it days later and discover her voice is still there and you can't resist using it just a teensy bit; and if you have a lot of Kleenexes in your house anyway, or already have a head cold and more mucous doesn't matter at this point, then... it is really funny.

Particularly Good Bits (that I promise are not inappropriate at all):

"Potty training is not a fun subject to reminisce about.  It's more like a horrible death march through a haunted forest, and the trees are made of angry bears that you're allergic to" (p. 134) (This is sadly true.)

"Women scare me enough, but bloggers can be even more frightening to deal with.  Most bloggers are emotionally unstable and are often awkward in social situations, which is why so many of us turned to blogging in the first place" (p. 171).  (This is also sadly true.)

"I started to suspect that in the past life he'd been a small and not very good pirate whose specialty was lashing himself to the mast at the most inopportune times.  I could imagine the captain giving him the same pitying but frustrated look when he came up from his nap to find that Barnaby Jones Pirate had lashed himself to the wheel of the ship because he thought he saw a cyclone, which turned out to be some birds" (p. 248).  (We had a dog exactly like that.)

"...there is joy in embracing -- rather than running screaming from -- the utter absurdity of life" (p. 308).  (I heartily agree.)

If This Was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  R.  Or possibly NC-17, except I've never seen an NC-17-rated movie, thankyouverymuch, so I wouldn't know if this really warrants that rating or not.  But seriously, don't read this book.