From the monthly archives: April 2009
Rating: 
In a remote Hertfordshire village, far off the good coach roads of George III’s England, Mr. and Mrs. Bennet — a country squire of no great means and his scatterbrained wife — must marry off their five vivacious daughters. At the heart of this all-consuming enterprise are the headstrong second daughter Elizabeth and her aristocratic suitor Fitzwilliam Darcy, two lovers in whom pride and prejudice must be overcome before love can bring the novel to its magnificent conclusion.
Altogether now: FINALLY! After two years of being on my to-be-read list, I have finally, finally read Pride and Prejudice, the so-called “mother of all chick-lit”. I bought my copy of the book in 2006, when after reading through a lot of instructions on how to write chick lit for my 2006 NaNoWriMo novel, I keep on getting references to Pride and Prejudice. It suddenly became a requirement for me, because I want to write chick lit, and what better way to learn it than to read old ones too, right?Now, I’ve mentioned it a lot of times here — I am not a fan of classics. The only classics that I ever read more than once were A Little Princess and Anne of Green Gables. I found the language daunting and some of them unbearably long. *looks pointedly at copy of Vanity Fair on to-be-read pile* I told myself back in 2006 that I’d read 10 classic books in a year but I only got as far as To Kill a Mockingbird (which I loved). I tried to read Pride and Prejudice a couple of times after I bought it, but like The Time Traveler’s Wife, I keep on getting distracted by other books, or I would stop reading it for a couple of days and feel completely lost whenever I’d get back to it. After discussing Austen stuff with some Wrimos and getting a suggestion to read it when I would be least interrupted, I set out to read it during the Holy Week. But The Time Traveler’s Wife took up my time during vacation so I couldn’t afford having uninterrupted time to read this. I can’t possibly wait until next Holy Week again, right? So I made a resolve to read at least a couple of pages everyday just so I wouldn’t get lost.
In a time where the modern technologies we know of such as computers, iPods and flash drives don’t exist just yet, is the world of Mr. and Mrs. Bennet and their five daughters. Pride and Prejudice is basically about Mrs. Bennet trying to get her daughters married — because really, what is there better to do? Okay, I’m being harsh on Mrs. Bennet, sorry. :P But the story is really about getting the Bennets married, first with Jane, the eldest, especially when the friendly Mr. Bingley arrived. However, there was another gentleman with Bingley, the brooding Mr. Darcy, who manages to insult Elizabeth Bennet too early in the story by saying that she is not handsome enough to tempt him.
It all starts from there — Elizabeth dislikes Darcy, and then she gets to join him for a couple of days because Jane gets sick when she visited Caroline Bingley. Then Darcy seems to be having a change of heart, with the notice of Elizabeth’s “fine eyes”, but his pride was too high for him to actually admit that.
Then started the teasings (or teazings, as Austen wrote) from both sides. Elizabeth gets an interesting proposal which she declines, learns her best friend is marrying, crushes on an officer who turns out to be Darcy’s enemy, and then finds out that Bingley has left the country without a word to her sister. In an effort to move on (or somehow, catch Bingley again), Jane goes to London while Elizabeth visits her best friend who is married to the benefactor of Lady Catherine de Bourgh, who is the aunt of Darcy.
I’m going to stop there because revealing things after this would spoil the story, but that is exactly where things started getting better in the story. I admit I kind of trudged through the first part of the book because of the language, but when there was more Elizabeth-Darcy interaction, I was thrilled. There was something about the way they “sparred” with each other that made it very, very romantic.
As with the few other classic books I read, there’s a lot of things going on in the story that sometimes felt like they didn’t really need to be there but turns out it has somewhat of a role to play for the ending. Well, okay, Anne of Green Gables did have a lot of short anecdotes about Anne that made her endearing and didn’t necessarily have a connection with the ones at the end, but Pride and Prejudice has them, and Austen managed to tie them all very neatly in the end. :)
In fewer words…I loved it. Okay, I may not really LOVE it, but I really, really liked Pride and Prejudice and I wouldn’t mind re-reading this one because of all its quirkiness and class. :) I even watched the 2005 movie version which was also good, but I kind of wish the second proposal was more faithful to the book. Ergo, I must watch the 1995 BBC version, yes? :)
Ah, Mr. Darcy. ♥
Every Sunday ever since January, I sit down with my planner and write down my Big Rocks for the week. I learned this thing with my 7 Habits training at work, what they recommend for time management: figure out the roles that I have the play for the week, month or a specific period and then write down things to do for those roles and plot them within the week. Those things would come in first, and other things will squeeze in between those.
Now I’ve managed to follow that thing quite closely, and I feel my week is incomplete without setting my Big Rocks.
However, lately, I realized that the Big Rocks I’ve been setting are always limited to the period that it was made — for the week. And lately, I never really realized how much my Big Rocks are every week. By how much, I mean how little. It’s like…my life is “planned” weekly, and there were no big goals accomplished every week. It’s almost always the same — submit weekly reports, pay bills, etc, etc. It’s all the same…and frankly, it’s monotonous.
So today I was thinking, what the heck do I want to do for this year? I mean, last year I had Sydney, the other year I had the job hunt. This year…what? What big thing am I willing to take a risk for? Where am I going?
Is this what quarter-life crisis feels like?
But I’m not even 25! *headdesk*
Talk about feeling totally inadequate all of a sudden.
…there’s more, but I’ll reserve it for the next post.
Rating: 
This is the extraordinary love story of Clare and Henry who met when Clare was six and Henry was thirty-six, and were married when Clare was twenty-two and Henry thirty. Impossible but true, because Henry suffers from a rare condition where his genetic clock periodically resets and he finds himself pulled suddenly into his past or future. In the face of this force they can neither prevent nor control, Henry and Clare’s struggle to lead normal lives is both intensely moving and entirely unforgettable.
It took me a long time to stick to reading this book without being distracted by any other one in my to-be-read pile. I’ve had this book for almost a year, and I was really curious about the story when I first saw this book. But somehow, after reading through the first few chapters, it just…bored me. Maybe it was because the first few chapters involved Henry jumping through time for the reader to make sense of his condition and to establish his history with Clare, before the story starts flowing in an almost sequential manner.
I admit it was really a chore for me to continue reading the book. I don’t know why. Probably it’s because the book feels too serious to me, and it almost read like a classic and we all know how hard it is for me to get through a classic book. Maybe it’s because I didn’t really connect with any of the characters, even if they were pretty solid. Or maybe it’s because of all the sexual parts of the book that is normal for couples — especially the ones trying to conceive — but the ones that were done before their wedding was really…well, it’s really an issue against what I believe in, which isn’t really necessary to discuss in this review.
However, after the part of their wedding, I started to get more into the story. I don’t know why or how, but I started to be more interested in what was going on. I found myself rooting for Henry and Clare’s relationship, especially when they were trying to conceive. I found the same joy when their daughter was born, and the sadness when Henry found out what would happen to him sometime in the near future.
The ending was sad, and yet quite satisfying. It must have been a really hard thing for Clare to keep on waiting for Henry, not knowing where he was at a lot of times when he’s time traveling, or not knowing if she should believe when she sees two different Henry’s in front of her (makes you wonder how Henry would get identity theft protection if ever he wanted one).
I can’t say that it’s one of my favorite books, and I honestly can’t say I would be willing to read this one again. I didn’t think it was an Omg what a totally amazing book like some people thought it was, but it’s a pretty good one, and I’m glad that I finished it and I got to know what happened.
I’m probably watching the movie, just to see how they would interpret it in the big screen. :P
Rating:
Colie expects the worst when she’s sent to spend the summer with her eccentric aunt Mira while her mother, queen of the television infomercial, tours Europe. Always an outcast — first for being fat and then for being “easy” — Colie has no friends at home and doesn’t expect to find any in Colby, North Carolina. But then she lands a job at the Last Chance Cafe and meets fellow waitresses Morgan and Isabel, best friends with a loving yet volatile relationship. Wacky yet wise, Morgan and Isabel help Colie see herself in a new way and realize the potential that has been there all along.
After finishing this one, I have read all of Sarah Dessen’s books except for Lock and Key whose paperback version is still not out. So let’s just assume I’ve read everything from this point. :P
Sarah Dessen is here with another great book, Keeping the Moon. I didn’t really understand why that is the title of the book while reading it, until the subject of the moon was brought up. And it tied up pretty nicely with a very nice ring to it. :) Anyway, Dessen has done it once again with a good storyline that is not only fit for young adults but also in those who are past that age but is still worried about impressions and looks. In this book, Colie was a fat kid who used to have a fat mom until her mother (and her) lost weight. Her mother became Kiki Sparks, fitness extraordinaire, and she just became Colie, who was somewhat missing all her flabs. On her mother’s European tour, she gets sent to her aunt, who is somewhat weird (with her outrageous outfits and the notes found on everywhere around her house), and meets a wacky cast of characters – Morgan, Isabel and Norman.
More than the story, it was the characters that drew me in the novel. There’s Mira, Colie’s aunt, who, as mentioned earlier, was kind of eccentric, and did not care one bit about how other people thought about her. There’s Morgan, the overdramatic neighbor who is in love with a baseball player and would make deviled eggs when she’s upset. There’s Isabel, Morgan’s housemate, who scares Colie at first because of her attitude towards her, but turns out she actually has an interesting past. And finally, there’s Norman, the guy who lived in Mira’s apartment, an artist, and a rummage sale freak with all odds and ends found in his room (I bet if he could find a way to squeeze in some automotive lifts in his room, he’d have those too).
As with other Dessen books, this was set over the summer, where a lot of things happen. Colie goes from a reserved girl who hid herself from the crowd because of what people at her school say about her, to a girl who learns to appreciate herself for who she was, and learns that she deserve respect just like every other person does. She draws strength from the people she meets over the summer in her confrontation with a bully, and then finds that she can also give strength to other friends who needs someone to be strong for them.
It’s a really nice story, and I liked reading it because it had a really nice message about perfection, self-respect and self-image. :)
Some of my favorite quotes in the book:
If something doesn’t work exactly right, or maybe needs some special treatment, you don’t just throw it away. Everything can’t be fully operational all the time. Sometimes, we need to have the patience to give something the little nudge it needs. (Mira)
You should never be surprised when someone treats you with respect, you should expect it. (Isabel)
Today I did something unthinkable.
I went to the office on a Sunday.
Now it wasn’t really the first time for me to be in the office during a weekend. Last year, I was found in the office on a couple of Saturdays to attend IBM Club events, but I never really considered that as work, you know? But today, I went to the office not to work too, but because of our domain’s strategic planning.
Getting up on a Sunday to go to a place other than chuch is really a big effort, and honestly strategic planning sessions aren’t really the most fun thing in the world. But because this year was all about stepping up, I had to be there. Even if I had to drag my feet while I prepared in the morning.
But you know what? Despite the day of the week that I spent at the office pantry, I actually enjoyed myself. In a weird way. Not that I would want to do this all the time, but it made me appreciate my job a little bit more than I used to. Now, I know I’m probably the one of the few people who really love her job, to the point of raving about it repeatedly on her blog, so this is really nothing new. But today, while planning initiatives and (half-)listening to the others and playing the trust fall thing, I realize that I am lucky to be where I am. I am lucky to be in a well-paying job, doing the things that I love doing, excelling in the things that I do, and being in a team that cares not only for the job but for my well-being too. I like how I know there are opportunities for growth over the horizon for me, and that other people trust me enough to do things and deliver.
It’s not about being a corporate slave, but really just loving what you do. And I’m glad to be in a place where my job doesn’t really feel like a job. Most of the time, at least. ;)
I don’t really know what’s in store for me for the next few months, or years, but I can definitely say that I’ll be staying here for now. :) I can’t imagine being anywhere else. :P
* * *
After the strategic planning I went around Eastwood for a while. I looked for swimsuits, then went to National to check out some books (yet again), found some I wanted to buy but didn’t (yay), ignored some box cutters and finally settled down inside the airconditioned Eastwood Mall. I also found out that Starbucks has Dark Mocha Frapp again. Yay. But it’s not like I always go to Starbucks nowadays. :P After hanging out there I went to mass, then headed home and now I’ll be spending the rest of my weekend continuing Pride and Prejudice and hopefully finish it.
Happy Sunday everyone. :)
Rating:
Carly McKay’s life is going just fine until she produces a television piece on psychic quilt maker Brandywine Seaver and receives a quilt with an enigmatic reading telling her that everything is about to change. And it does. She loses her job and her best friend (who proclaims his unrequited love for her). And her mother, who deserted the family seventeen years ago, returns, sending Carly into a serious tilt.
Convinced it’s the quilt’s fault, Carly races down to the small artists’ community of Bilby, Arizona, to confront its maker, and ends up renting a cabin from her. Carly even starts to enjoy her reimagined life, until her old life comes calling. Now Carly has to decide what parts of each world she wants to patchwork in…and how much she’s willing to leave to fate.
I’ve been curious with Lani Diane Rich’s work ever since I learned that she wrote her first novel during NaNoWriMo, so when I finally got a chance to read one of her books, I grabbed it immediately. Look at that cute cover. :P
The Fortune Quilt starts with Carly’s sister’s wedding and with Carly, her younger sister Five and her dad making bets at who will be disturbing Ella’s wedding because of a dream that Five had. Turns out the disturbance was meant for Carly, from her ex Seth, and she was saved by Ella’s ex Will. Then we meet Carly’s best friend Chris, and the quilt maker Brandywine, and now we have the cast of characters complete. You just know something is going to happen right after all that normalcy.
And so it happens. Carly receives a quilt from Brandywine that apparently contains her fortune which Carly scoffs at, and then her world turns upside down. What’s a girl to do then? She runs away, not to any Vegas hotels (which is too far) but back to Brandywine, and into another cast of wacky characters in the town of Bilby.
In a way this book reminds me of The Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella but with less spaz from the protagonist. There was the same tone of running away from the old life and finding a new one as the character is in the new place. However, Carly is a focused and smart woman who got her life turned upside down by forces that she couldn’t understand, while Samantha in The Undomestic Goddess got to where she was because she was too workaholic. And again, Samantha just feels a bit more of an airhead than Carly was.
The other characters in The Fortune Quilt were also hilarious — from the gay couple with their daughter, Brandy, Janessa, the grumpy man who always buys charcoal from the art store and sexy Will, who becomes Carly’s love interest in the story (you can tell from the first chapter).
This is a very fun read. It had just the right combination of humor and seriousness, and it’s a good way to get myself into Lani Diane Rich’s works. :) I’m definitely reading the other ones she has. :P
So I was talking to my dad yesterday while waiting for our call to come on and he told me that my brother’s laptop arrived earlier that day and he was test-driving it. It was a Toshiba laptop, 16″ with something like 4GB memory and 512MB Video card and Intel Core 2 Centrino processor. I’m kind of vague with the specs since he picked it out himself without my help and I’m really kind of not good with hardware until now. Yeah, I’m such a loser.
Anyway, I suddenly remembered that I had some books (yes again) that I want to order off Amazon before my dad goes home so I go check it out. I picked out Havah and Demon: A Memoir by Tosca Lee and 45 Master Characters by Victoria Schmidt. Because I still have that feeling of having too many books to read for the past two weeks, I really couldn’t think of anything more to buy. All of the books were about $30, which is probably almost the same price I’d pay if I buy them here (if they were available, that is). But the fun thing about this is that I remembered I had an Amazon GC from my Associates account, which means I get $10 off.
Ah, I love online shopping. My brother’s laptop was bought on sale compared to prices here, so he got it for a really good price, and the books I will buy? Well, I’m just glad I have a GC. :P
And of course, I will still pay for that, but that’s why I have posts like this. :P
I’m kind of glad I can afford these kinds of purchases already; at least I wouldn’t get the bewildered look that Howie Mendel gives his son on the video below when he said he purchased an Xbox using his dad’s credit card. :P
Rating:
At this school, everyone’s a geek. And Miranda Bloom still can’t fit in…
Miranda is a math genius with divorced parents, an evil stepmother, and no boyfriend in sight. She can’t even fit in with the other geeks at the Nottingham Independent School for high-IQ students, because they actually have useful talents. Miranda, on the other hand, is known as “The Human Calculator,” which doesn’t amount to much when people have, you know, their own calculators.
Then Miranda gets stuck planning the school’s Snowflake Gala. And as she struggles to find a date and drum up some school spirit at Nottingham-aka “Geek High”-she finds that who you are means more than where you fit in.
I found this book and picked it up because I thought the cover was cute and the premise was interesting. I like geek books, and I was still on my young adult novel mode, so this seemed perfect.
I don’t know if it’s because I just finished reading Robin Palmer’s Cindy Ella recently shortly after I read this, but this one read a lot like that. I liked the story, I liked the characters and the entire thing, but there wasn’t really anything new about it, at least for me. The usual cast of characters were there: Miranda and her two sidekicks/best friends, her evil stepmother (who seems really evil), her stepsister who eventually becomes her friend, the guy she likes, the guy she ends up liking and the huge problem that is set on her because she tries to be different from what everyone expects her to be. It just feels a bit too formulaic and similar with what I’ve read a few books back.
Maybe it’s my own prejudices, but for now this book is just an okay book. Nothing too stellar, just one of those nice young adult books to read. Maybe when I get a copy of the sequel I’ll change my mind.
I was never the one who went away to vacations during Holy Week. Ever since I could remember, I was always at home. Our families had specific Holy Week traditions: mass on Holy Thursday, Bisita Iglesia ((Doing stations of the cross by visiting 14 churches)) during Good Friday followed by lunch, then we stay at home for the next days until we go to Easter Sunday mass.
Ever since I graduated from college, I’ve made Good Friday afternoon a time to pray on my own. I usually stay in my room, read, and then wait for 3:00 pm. Once the time comes, I open up my Bible, pray and reflect on Jesus’ sacrifice. I usually end up crying when I try to comprehend how much it all meant and cost. Suffice to say, after a very inspiring Palm Sunday mass, I found myself praying for a meaningful and different Holy Week this year. Other than the idea of a long vacation from work, I was also looking forward to a serious Good Friday prayer time.
It’s amazing how easy I forget the things I pray for, especially when they’re not prayers of intention. :)
I didn’t exactly forget my prayer last week actually. But I held on and was anxious to follow the schedule I set for myself last Friday: Bisita Iglesia, then lunch and my 3:00 pm prayer time. I had my readings ready, my Holy Week playlist ready, my journal and a couple of hankies (because I know I was going to be crying) and even an idea of a text message to send to friends after it. It was my personal time with God to praise and thank Him for giving Jesus to us, and there was nothing else I wanted to do more than that.
Sounds good, doesn’t it? Holy, even.
But of course, God had other plans. Continue reading »
While I was on a long and quite different Good Friday yesterday (more to this on a later post), I suddenly wondered (for the nth time in the my entire life): how did the people who knew Jesus back then felt during this very day?
I try to put myself in the crowds. If I were present in that time, where would I be? Would I be one of Jesus’ followers? Or would I be one of the people shouting for His crucifixion? Would I even care at all?
If I were one of Jesus’ followers, and He asked me to come with Him to Gethsemane, would I stay awake for Him while He prayed? (I’m afraid I kind of know what the answer to this question is. :( )
If I followed Him when He was taken, and I was asked the same questions that Peter was asked, how would I have answered? Would I tell them the truth even if it meant I could die too, or would I answer like Peter, even after swearing my loyalty to Jesus?
If I didn’t follow Him there, would I have followed Him the way John did as Jesus walked to Calvary? Would I have stood at the foot of the cross, heart breaking at the sight of my friend who is being punished unjustly before my eyes? Would I have stood beside Mary as she cried for her only Son?
Or would I have hid in the upper room, scared to be found and connected with Him, confused on why all these is happening?
If I were one of the people in the crowds and the guards asked me to help Jesus to carry His cross just as how Simon was asked, would I have said yes, too? Or would I pretend it wasn’t me they were calling and hide instead? Would I have said an excuse just so I wouldn’t have to accept the responsibility?
If I were one of His followers back then, one of the women who helped bury Jesus in the tomb, how would I have felt after doing so? Would there be a sense of hopelessness, the feeling of “What now?” after? What would happen now? I believed in Him, but He’s in the tomb, and it is over. How do I go back to the way it was before?
Why did He have to die?
Or…would I be a Judas Iscariot, selling Him out and then being so wracked with guilt afterwards that I couldn’t ask for forgiveness? Would I be so blind and crazed that I would decide to just end it all myself by tying a rope around my neck and hanging on a tree?
Or would I even really care about all that happened at all?
