Helmet 2017 Reading Challenge

Hello again!

I decided, out of general interest, to participate in the Helmet 2017 reading challenge. (Helmet means pearls, for those interested!) It's arranged by the Helmet libraries of Finland, and you can find the challenge in English here.

The idea is to be inspired by some/all of the fifty categories and read books from them. I copy-pasted the categories here, along with the books I thought I might read for each of them. Subject to change when I read something out of the list or just change my mind & I'll link the reviews here too when I get around to reading them!

1. A book’s name is beautiful - The Reason You're Alive, Matthew Quick

2. A book discussed in reading blogs - Senlin Ascends, Josiah Bancroft
3. Finnish classics - Tuntematon sotilas, Väinö Linna 
4. A book inspiring wellness and wellbeing - We Should All Be Feminists - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
5. A book about travelling in the wild - The Thirty-Nine Steps, John Buchan
6. A book with many storytellers - Carry On, Rainbow Rowell
7. A book written under a pen name - Animal Farm, George Orwell
8. A book about Finnish history - Akvarelleja Engelin kaupungista, Jukka Viikilä
9. A book inspired by some work of art - The Story of Kullervo, J.R.R. Tolkien
10. A book with a beautiful cover - Charisma, Jeanne Ryan
11. A book written by an acknowledged professional - Shadowmagic, John Lenahan
12. A book about politics and politicians - The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood
13. ”Your story” book - Suomen historia, Petri Tamminen
14. A book you’d choose by its summary on the book cover - Heartless, Marissa Meyer
15. A book about a hobby - History is All You Left Me - Adam Silvera
16. A book which has got some award abroad - Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, Gail Honeyman
17. A book cover colors are blue and white - Eurooppalaiset unet, Emma Pulkkonen
18. There are no less than four words in a book’s name - It Only Happens in the Movies, Holly Bourne
19. A “one day story” book - Thirteen Reasons Why, Jay Asher
20. A book about a disabled or seriously ill person - Am I Normal Yet? - Holly Bourne
21. A hero story or a book about a brave person - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, J.K. Rowling
22. A book with illustrations - Artemis, Andy Weir
23. A translated book - The Danish Girl, David Ebershoff
24. A book about solving a crime - I Let You Go, Clare Mackintosh
25. A book where nobody dies - Pollomuhku ja posityyhtynen, Jaana Kapari-Jatta
26. A family story - Rikki, Reija Glad
27. A book about a place where you live (or where you come from) - Metsäjätti, Miika Nousiainen
28. You have read only one book by this author before - Totta, Riikka Pulkkinen
29. A book’s main character can do something which you would like to learn - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K Rowling
30. There is a word ”feel/feeling” in a book’s name - Love & Gelato, Jenna Evans Welch
31. Fantasy book - Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, J.K. Rowling
32. A book that has inspired a work of art - Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, J.K. Rowling
33. A book about India - When Dimple Met Rishi - Sandhya Menon
34. A book about the times when you were not born yet - A Study in Scarlet, Arthur Conan Doyle
35. There is a proper noun in a book’s name - The World According to Bob - James Bowen
36. A biography or memoir - Geisha of Gion, Mineko Iwasaki
37. A book by an author who has written more than 20 books - The Lady in the Van, Alan Bennett
38. There is a wedding in a book - Kissani Jugoslavia, Pajtim Statovci
39. A book about aging - Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, J.K. Rowling
40. A book by a writer who comes from a different (from yours) culture - In Order To Live, Yeonmi Park
41. There is an animal on a book’s cover - Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them - J.K. Rowling
42. A debut book - Ruskeat Tytöt, Koko Hubara
43. A book that you have planned to read for a long time - A Game of Thrones, George R. R. Martin
44. A book about faith or religion - Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane, Lisa See
45. A book about a Finnish woman - Paras mahdollinen maailma, Riikka Pulkkinen
46. A book by a writer from Oceania - The Bone Sparrow, Zana Fraillou
47. A book that would cover two subjects from the challenge list - The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue, Mackenzie Lee
48. A book about something which you know only a little bit - Down the Rabbit Hole, Holly Madison
49. A new book of 2017 - They Both Die at the End, Adam Silvera
50. A book recommended by a librarian - Caraval, Stephanie Garber

Anyhow, I can't think of any good finishing words for this so I'll just leave it to be. Have a good day, you!

The City of Woven Streets - Emmi Itäranta

'Hyvästit oli sanottu moneen kertaan, mutta aina haudattu toisiin sanoihin, eikä niitä lopulta ollut sanottu kertaakaan. Niin me tulemme tänne yhä uudelleen jäähyväiset askeliamme painaen. Ne ovat ikuisesti myöhässä ja poissa paikoiltaan: mennyt hetki, jota emme tunnistaneet silloin, kun se oli ulottuvilla, ja jonka aavetta emme siksi koskaan lakkaa kantamasta mukanamme.'

'Goodbyes had been said many times, but always buried in other words, and in the end they weren't said even once. So we come here over and over again with farewells weighing our steps. They are eternally late and out of place: the past moment that we didn't recognise when it was within reach, and the ghost of which we will therefore never stop carrying with us.'

I have a nice hardback of this but how
many fireplace pictures can one have
in a row? Also, how pretty is that
cover?

Hey! Happy new year! I finally read a Finnish book in what is really 2017 and not eagerly all too early. It's my birthday tomorrow so it's nice that I'll get to start a new book for the occasion. 😃

I got this book from my mum last Christmas and finally got around to it (I must admit I rarely get around to reading anything as far as I'm concerned...). It's a Finnish book but it's also English, curiously. What I mean is that this book was written in Finnish and English at the same time, side by side by the author.

The City of Woven Streets is one of those books with an intricately built world that don't manage to utilise it as well as one would wish, but still make tremendously good stories. The world of this one is quite literally a city of woven streets, as the main character, Eliana, is a young weaver from the House of Webs. She lives on a small island plagued by floods where people are separated by skill and those who dream are put away. One day, a girl with her tongue got off is brought to her, with Eliana's name tattooed on her palm with invisible ink. What's up with that, that's the question. At the same time, an illness thought to have been conquered starts to plague the island. And dreams, also.

As I said, the world is more intricate than what the story might deserve. The island is very interesting, but Eliana's obviously limited view of it doesn't provide enough insight to make much use of this fact. She lives in a very secluded environment and through the length of the whole book only sees the streets maybe once or twice. She has a brother in a different house but he doesn't provide much information about his way of living either, the one or two times we see him. Maybe if this book could have had another main character with a world view different from Eliana's, it would have helped to utilise the environment better. Or even a sequel, because the end was rushed and heavy on description, leaving quite a bit to be desired. There's also some threads of plot points that are visited very very very briefly and never returned to, which further made me want more.

Eliana as a character was a little bland. I didn't get much out of her personality and I couldn't tell you all too much about her. Whatever backstory there was is written much too poetically to provide much information. Maybe everyone in this world lacks individualism and this is just a token of that, but as a main character, I didn't really warm up to her. This is not to say she doesn't go through some heavy personal growth, though. That was really nice.

The language of this book is really, really pretty and technically speaking the book is very well made. After the initial hook of the mute girl and the tattoo, it was also pretty easy to get into, though some of the pages upon pages of description didn't keep me fully interested.

All in all, I'd give this a 3.5 stars and recommend it. If you like poetic books with well-built worlds, you'll like this. If a great story is everything to you however, I would maybe not advise you to read this book.

Gisellen kuolema - Siiri Enoranta

'Minulla ei ollut ketään. Tiesin että saisin jos haluisin, eikä se ollut kehuskelua vaan fakta. Saisin jonkun hyvän kiltin hellän joka hitaasti syövyttäisi minut kuoliaaksi.'

'I didn't have anyone. I knew I could get if I wanted, and it wasn't bragging but a fact. I could get someone good kind tender who would slowly corrode me dead.'

I've had this book sitting in my bookshelf for a while and as I really loved Nokkosvallankumous (which I'll probably review when I decide to go through my favourite books again) and quite liked Surunhauras, lasinterävä, I decided to finally read it while eating the first and last gingerbread of the year. The fireplace really is doing magic to my reading.

Gisellen kuolema (The Death of Giselle) is a story about Joel and Linnea, two siblings. It's the story of Linnea, a ballet dancer who will never dance ballet again, a broken dream with nothing left. This story is mostly told through Joel's eyes, Joel who's always been distant from her sister, who's always been in the shadow and the lesser one. Suddenly Linnea returns to their broken home, Linnea who was never supposed to return, and Joel is left to be the only one who can sort of connect with her. They both need each other to give something neither of them has left.

The book is raw and poetic and emotional, and it left me with a weird sense of sadness I don't quite get. There's drugs and sex and alcohol, but there's also earnest feelings and conversations and the longing to be a child again. It's often mentioned that this book is, yes, indeed incest, but it didn't feel like as central to the book as I thought it would. More so, I felt the broken family and the need for another person to understand you to be in the forefront. The pain of losing and the fear of never having anything to lose again. Everyone has their own problems and their own means of trying to navigate through life and Joel seems to find them all repulsive even though he's not any better. Their home is extremely broken even though at first it was so difficult to point out why. Maybe it's not really anything to grasp at, or maybe it's a bit of everything, but for this book it certainly felt fitting.

As a piece of literature I felt that this book was extremely well-written. The style is very artistic and liberal and the description very earthy and Finnish and suddenly urban and wild again. The dialogue is also very believable, mostly because of the dialect and because the characters don't seem to feel the need to talk just for the sake of exposition or saying something smart. Of course, it can be left up for debate whether or not a teenage boy would actually think of all these poetic things of someone's eyes being deep wells filled goldfish swimming around restlessly, but that's what first person point-of-view literature usually gives you. I forever wish for these books to get an English translation because I've not really read anything like these books before and I can imagine people would want to. I want everyone to read them. This is easily her least fantasy-like story, but I wouldn't say the others are any less realistic because of that.

Rating-vise I'll put this nicely between Nokkosvallankumous and Surunhauras, lasinterävä at 4/5. It's really worth reading, a cohesive, beautiful story in under 150 short pages. I could read it again despite the heartbreak it gave me, and I'm sure it would reward that second read by unravelling something within its pages I didn't understand before.

Happy New Year, by the way. I took a bit of an accidental head-start to reading Finnish things but I'll try and keep at it next year!

PS. I accidentally somehow ordered the two Siiri Enoranta's books I didn't yet have online halfway through writing this. So expect me to review those as soon as I feel like I've survived reading this one!

Kaksi ihmistä minuutissa - Inkeri Markkula

'Lepakot ovat minusta ihmeellisiä. Astrid, elämäni rakkaus, sytytti minussa palon niitä kohtaan. Astrid sytytti minussa lukuisia liekkejä, ja vaikka maailma hänen jälkeensä sammutti niistä useimmat, rakkaus lepakoihin jäi.'

'I find bats wonderful. Astrid, the love of my life, awakened in me a fire for them. Astrid lit in me multiple flames, and even though the world after her put out most of them, the love for bats remained.'


Mum got me this book for Christmas and as part of the 'read more Finnish stuff' thing and also because it was really good, I just gobbled it up in front of the fireplace over the course of a couple of days. Really pleasant stuff.

Kaksi ihmistä minuutissa (Two people a minute) is Inkeri Markkula's first novel. It's about many things. It's about malaria, death, love, misery, hopelessness, hope and loss. It's about Alina, a Finnish woman from the north who's lost her spouse and who can't have the life she was supposed to have with her daughter. She's also a researcher, cold facts and different types of malaria and nights spent at the laboratory. She's broken and a little bitter but at the same time she's so much more, and it's very easy to consider her to be a real person.

She meets Lotte, a German doctor who's been working in Thailand for longer than what most people can manage. Lotte wants her to come there and help. Alina takes the offer to leave her broken home but says she'll be back, to see her daughter in three months' time. Lotte is almost more real than Alina, for she too has felt loss, but she's also lived in the village for so long and felt compassion and joy and love. Where Alina is samples and lab coats, Lotte is human beings and emotions.

There's also Kian, a boy who grows too fast even though he grows just like he should. He's young but intelligent and like Lotte, I too wanted to guard him from the cruelty of life. There's Kian little sister Po, who's too young to understand but of course not too young for malaria. It's cruel in how real it is, and I'd love to pretend these things are fiction when they're not. The setting, mostly Thailand, was also very alive and felt real. I wanted to visit even though sometimes I certainly didn't want to.

Malaria is cruel. I've heard this said as a concept, but it never touches you when it's numbers (two people a minute) and not actual people. These people were so well-crafted, they were actual to me. This book, more than any statistic I've ever heard, made me think about it. It raises questions like how do you explain that rich people never have to suffer from this, but it doesn't preach or underline. The author is also a biologist and while she doesn't specialise in malaria (she likes bats though), it provided the book with a certain sense of authenticity. I don't know if she'll continue writing but if she does, I'll certainly continue reading.

The book is split into chapters and the chapters are distinguished from each other by years. The current one is 2012, but it also often goes to 2008, 2003 and even 1994. These chapters are sprinkled in between the present moment like little treats, and they're woven into the story so carefully that I never really felt like I was reading a flashback. It provided the characters with backstory that was much appreciated, and I took them with pleasure.

The shortfall of this book is that it's poetic. It's poetic and beautiful and raw, but sometimes it leaves a little too much to be guessed. I wanted a few more answers and a few less questions, especially towards the end when I was starting to realise there wasn't much more space for hints. The ending also left me a little cold, because I did not know what was going on and not in a pretty, poetic way. Rather, in a "I'll never see this person again and this is the last thing they tell me?" sort of way. There's so many questions, and the last chapter of the book basically focused on the few things I actually didn't care about.

Altogether, Kaksi ihmistä minuutissa was very good. As a first work especially, it was extremely well made. It wasn't perfect, but for a couple of days I lived it. I bothered my boyfriend with my thoughts and ranted and quoted and suffered and enjoyed. I'd recommend it even with its few faults. Not sure if mum will like it but I'll try to convince her anyway.

'Metsä huokaa, me hengitämme sen huokaukset. Ajattelen, että malarialla on kovin kaunis koti.'

'The forest sighs, we breathe its sighs. I think about how malaria has a very beautiful home.'

Every Exquisite Thing - Matthew Quick

I took so many pictures of this book
In better lighting
But this is where I finished reading it
Near 2AM on Christmas night.

'And I thought about my parents being maps who lead me to places I didn't want to go -- and it made a shocking amount of sense, using the word maps to describe parents. It almost made you feel like you could fold Mom and Dad up and lock them away in the glove compartment of your car and just joyride for the rest of your life maybe.'

Every Exquisite Thing is Matthew Quick's newest young adult novel that came out last summer. Since I really liked The Silver Linings Playbook and since I've been casually piling up the rest of his novels in my book shelf, I convinced my boyfriend to buy this one for me. ♥ And I finally finished it now that I'm back home for the holidays, hooray!

So. Nanette O'Hare, 18, has always done what's expected of her. She's never acted up, and she plays in her high school football (soccer as the Americans in the book insist on calling it) team and she's really good at it. She doesn't even like it.

Then she reads a book given to her by a teacher she really likes, a long ago out-of-print novel called The Bubblegum Reaper that ends up transforming her whole life like a parasite. She befriends the reclusive author of her new favourite story and he in turn introduces her to Alex; another troubled young soul that got something real out of the novel. Together, they want to solve the mystery of the novel, but also the mysteries of themselves. Also, they talk about books and poetry and life. There's also a lot of side stuff definitely worth getting into, but I won't describe that because finding out is part of the fun.

I never liked Alex much as a character. He was probably okay and really not badly written but just not my cup of tea in the slightest. He was too violent and too off the handle. He was also broken and really needed help and it should have probably made me sympathise but it didn't. Nanette I liked. She knew she wasn't the same as other people in her football team, but she never thought it made her somehow superior to the others, and that was really cool. I really liked the way Nanette's parents were written. At first they were a bit absent but when they realised Nanette needed them, they were very attentive and really did their best to help. I don't think we get enough of parents acting like parents should in ya novels these days.

When it comes down to style, this book is easy to read. The chapters are short and interesting and provided enough variety to keep me interested, much like how I remember finishing The Silver Linings Playbook three years ago in a hotel room in Vienna because I could not put it down and I had to know more and everything right now. The style of this book wasn't too heavy or too light, and it flowed nicely. The Bubblegum Reaper itself is also a very interesting story and I enjoyed that. It's pretty cool when you have a book in a book that's made to sound so good that you want it to be real. There's also some cool poetry within the pages of Every Exquisite Thing and sometimes I felt like I was studying more than one piece of art at the same time.

Like I said when I read Sorta Like A Rockstar by the same author, I was a bit annoyed by how American this book was. Less so than the previous example, thankfully. That one had USA coming out of my ears by the time I was 2/3 of the way through. But like, I suppose I lost some degree of enjoyment I would have had if this book wasn't set in Generic American High School That's Like Every Other American High School Ever #67548392045. I'm bored. I know why people complain about high school stories so much. I love reading about youth but the high school, it's all the same. Also!! Unlike Sorta Like A Rockstar, this one doesn't have an eye roll-causing ending. Awesome!

By the by, my mum always says about some movies I like that they're affectionate songs about the freedom and the insanity of being young. I feel like this book is one of those too. It celebrates how no one seems to know where they're supposed to be and how that's okay. It celebrates the recklessness and the insanity of losing yourself, only to find something new. At some point it felt almost hopeless, like the book was never going to amount to anything but endless depression, but that's part of it too. That's life, that's youth. You don't have to know where you're going just yet.

I suppose it is most likely Mr. Quick will never write another novel I'll love quite as much as The Silver Linings Playbook (though I do think it would help if he wrote more for adults and less for the me of right now), but I'm surprisingly okay with that. All in all, this one was a solid, thought-provoking read that I'll be delighted to give a 4/5.

Also, Merry Christmas!
I really really want to read more Finnish stuff in the upcoming year since it's a hundred years for this fine country, so wish me luck!

Did I Mention I Need You? - Estelle Maskame

'He studies the new Converse closely, and he finally decides on a spot along the rubber. He concentrates on what he’s writing, and when he’s done, he takes a step back and watches me, waiting to see my reaction. However, when I glance down, it’s not lyrics that I see. It’s three words, scrawled messily in his handwriting. Three words, and they’re in Spanish: No te rindas.'

This is the second book in the DIMILY trilogy and I wish I had spent this time somehow... better. The premise is this; Eighteen-year old Eden is in love with her stepbrother Tyler. She goes to spend most of the summer with him in New York, a year after the last time they saw each other. Eden's started dating Tyler's best friend, Dean, in hopes of forgetting her forbidden attraction towards what is kind of like a family member.

This book, the series as a whole, is kind of like a drug. I know it's not good for me or good as a whole either, it doesn't leave me satisfied but for a while, it kinda feels good. It's easy to read since nothing much ever happens and you could easily skip pages upon pages of Eden describing her outfit and the Times Square, and I can't say I didn't just skim through some of it. The plot is fairly thin through most of the book, including some very painfully constructed, fake tension scenes, third wheels that came and went, and friendships that weren't really worth much in the end (Didn't I say Eden and Rachel didn't seem like good friends? I rest my case.). There's a ton of manufactured drama that always ends up having little to no effect on anything.

I wish we had seen how Eden's life was when she wasn't with Tyler. We've just skipped a whole year of her apparently falling in love with Dean and apparently being friends with Rachel and also, moving to a new city. I believe her old best friend, the one who was kinda important in the first book, just disappears in the process? But none of that is apparently of any interest because Tyler is what we care about.

It's a downfall of this series that to me at least, it reads a lot like fanfiction (this is probably because it was published on Wattpad first). What I'm saying is that it reads like something by a young author (which it is) published on a site where romance with a lot of manufactured tension and cliffhangers left and right is candy, regardless of whether the story follows through with that tension or just falls flat and starts building up for the next big twist. I think it would probably be more enjoyable if read with that slow pace of waiting for the next update to be published, rather than wafting through all the twists at once like I've been doing.

On the bright side, Tyler's been having some growth while in New York. He's overall more likeable and a little more mature, but still with that bad boy vibe that evidently makes him attractive in Eden's eyes. There's also his roommate from Boston, Snake, who's the restless rootless happy-go-lucky roommate. Then there's Emily, Miss Perfect Brit to make Eden jealous for no rational reason. I guess Eden is just so in love...

Also, I mentioned that Tyler and Dean are best friends, yes? Well, this doesn't seem to be worth anything at all when Eden cheats on her boyfriend over and over and over again. Which she feels bad about but continues to anyway because she's in love and that supposedly makes it okay. It doesn't. You don't cheat on a person you supposedly care about multiple times with their best friend and just proceed thinking that you're still a good person. Eden and Tyler really suck for doing this and no amount of 'omg I'm a horrible person'-thinking (which there is a lot of, granted) will fix them in my eyes. Dean is a good guy - everyone in the book acknowledges this - but I'll never forgive him if he somehow forgives these two. No one needs friends like this in their life. Urgh.

Anyway, I'm gonna see this series to the bitter end at some point in time, so be looking forward to that. Meanwhile, I can't really see a reason to recommend this to anyone.

The Martian - Book vs. Movie

I came, I conquered, I finally belatedly watched The Martian! I've been ill so it seemed like a good time. Also, exams are coming and who wants to study?

Mars is the prettiest part about this film (especially since the
CGI isn't all that amazing)

The Martian (directed by Ridley Scott) stars Matt Damon as Mark Watney, a botanist whom his crew on the Ares III mission accidentally leaves on Mars, thinking that he's dead after he's hit by a dust storm. He now has to survive hundreds of sols alone in a Hab only meant to last for 31 and make his way home with no means to contact any other human beings. We also see NASA and stuff every now and then.

It's a pity to say, but the pacing of the movie felt way off. Where's all the hard work that goes into escaping a planet? Yeah, I know, it's not as interesting as the stuff that was included. But what about all the stuff that is just happily left unexplained? There's dozens of times in the movie that we skips twenty sols or so - fair enough, they were probably less important - but then we see Watney do some random stuff that probably has something to do with the Great Escape, without much explanation what he's actually doing or why. I was lost a lot of time even though I had read the book (almost a year ago, granted), so I can't imagine what it's like to watch him tape some stuff or rip the Hab apart when you really don't know why he decided to do just that. Especially since in the book, it all makes so much sense! Reading the actual book, I feel like I can understand his every motive and I appreciate that.

Mark Watney is a solve it all -kind of a guy. He knows lots of stuff about machinery and elements and all that, and he's motivated to actually make it out alive. My favourite part about Watney in the book is that he's incredibly optimistic at the face of anything and everything. It's even mentioned that it's the reason he was put on Ares III to begin with - he gets along with people and lightens the atmosphere. In the movie though, it's obvious that Hollywood decided it's better if we see Matt Damon frown constantly and mope around whenever he's not doing anything (and even when he is).

Spoilers aside, the movie also ends somewhat later than the book, a fact I did not enjoy. I mean, when they had to cut all that important stuff out, why did they decide this was worth being added? Priorities, off, if you ask me (not that you did, really).

That being said, the movie deals with the main media of the book rather well. The book is written almost completely in journal entries Mark types on a computer - instead the movie shows him making a video log. That works quite well and I appreciate it because I was worried it would kind of suck on the silver screen.

Altogether, I heavily recommend reading the book if you're interested in pretty realistic adventures on Mars. But if some pretty well filmed space mishaps are more your thing, find a copy of this movie. It's not badly made (though it's not as good, either). Thank you @Alex for convincing me to read/watch this!

Fun fact of the day (I really hope someone somewhere finds this at least half as interesting as I do): Most of the movie is filmed in a Jordanian desert and Jordan thought it was so cool they even used it to promote tourism. That's pretty darn cute. "Literally out of this world." Maybe one day I'll go to Mars then.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - J.K. Rowling

'"I'm not going to be murdered," Harry said out loud.

'That's the spirit, dear,' said his mirror sleepily.'

Progress! Another Harry Potter down! Just looking at Goblet of Fire's audiobook length (21 and a half hours!!) makes me wonder how long the next one will take. Challenge accepted though! I'm going home for Christmas break so I guess I'll listen to it while driving around. I hope it'll have a lot of stuff not included in the movie.

Prisoner of Azkaban has Harry Potter return to Hogwarts, only to hear that yet again, someone's out to kill him. Surprise! This time it's Sirius Black, a serial killer who has recently escaped the super-safe prison that is Azkaban. Another, more pressing worry are the guards of said prison, the Dementors. They're creepy little creatures that suck all the happiness out of you, and they make Harry feel ill for obvious reasons - he has a lot of horrifying memories to be left alone with.

The best part about these books, when put into a competition against the movies, is that these things happen in the midst of the characters' daily lives. Harry doesn't go from one very important plot point to another - he goes to classes and plays Quidditch and sees his friends and studies and all that. The plot points that are important are weaved into all of this other stuff that's also going on, because life is important as it is and not just when someone's existence is being threatened by some mysterious creatures.

Anyway, I never liked the movie much. I didn't like the plot points it chose to emphasise, I didn't enjoy the pacing, I stopped rewatching it after a couple of tries and never tried again. The book though, the book was very good and somehow the plot was so much better than I remembered. Also, I really liked Lupin's character. I really liked Buckbeak. I liked the changes this book brought to the formula that has already been quite solidly established. I liked the darker tones as well.

I still don't feel like giving this a full score of 5/5 just because this still isn't the kind of a book that would make me a huge fan of the series and that would be like the best book ever. I don't know why and what I'm looking for in this series, but it's so loved I just want it to be just as amazing as people keep telling me. Ehh.

On a mostly kinda halfway related note, I finally went to see Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (which I wish to propose we rename Fantastic Beasts (They Are Everywhere). It was pretty good but not amazing - and honestly, I don't know why we need to keep reviving this universe if not for money. Well, maybe I'm just jaded and not excited enough. Fantastic Beasts was quite nice though. I'd like it so much more if it was a book first, though... But I get that that's a whole lot of effort to write.

Oh, by the by, my Patronus is a Fox, according to the Pottermore quiz. I can live with that. I said that I like rocks.

A Street Cat Named Bob - Book vs. Movie

The movie looks pretty gorgeous sometimes

I actually went to see this last week and I thought I'd put this in the same post where I reviewed the book... but then I realised I actually had quite a lot to say so maybe it's better if I put it in a post of its own.

If you read my review of the book, you'll already know that I a) enjoyed it and b) feared that the movie adaptation would be too much of a feel good flick without the actual depth and darkness of the book - living on the streets, battling addiction et cetera. Turns out I was worried about all the wrong things.
The premise is the same; James Bowen (played by Luke Treadaway, of whom I'd admittedly never heard of before but who's British, of the right age and does a good job) is living on the streets and meets a cat named Bob (played by the actual Bob and around six other cats, all of whom named in the credits. I only remember Oliver but it was cute!). Since he now has Bob, James decides that it's time for him to kick addiction and get himself off the streets. It's a feel good idea, but I don't think it translated right to the big screen. Or rather, I would've done it very differently - less Hollywood (or whatever the UK equivalent is) and more loyalty to the source material.

The darker the movie got, the more I felt like it wasn't actually trying to tell a story as much as it was trying to jerk some emotions out of me. Additionally, they've added some scenes not in the book that just made me feel so uncomfortable in the wrong ways. There's a scene where James goes to visit his father, breaks a vase, takes down the Christmas tree and has Bob run around a house with someone severely allergic to cats. I get artistic license and all but this wasn't in the book, therefore I assume it's not factual, therefore I wish they didn't make me suffer through it. Also, James is written to be a complete idiot. thicker than bark in this version. It's part of Book-James' character that he's very knowledgeable about cats. Movie-James needs to be told that a male cat should be neutered and that vets aren't free and he doesn't even understand the simplest hints that his father doesn't want him around. I was insulted about this because the book lead me to believe that James was actually pretty sharp and instead we get this mess.

Left to right: James Bowen, Bob, Luke Treadaway
and the worst part about this movie (nothing against her
personally though)

I think however that the worst part about this movie was Betty, Jame's Bowen's girlfriend(?) who was played by Ruta Gedmintas, Luke Treadaway's actual girlfriend. You see, I remember Belle from the book as a very likeable person. She's on the streets like James, they've dated at some point but it didn't work out, she takes care of Bob when James leaves to visit his mum in Australia. She's kind-hearted but mostly not very much there, because this is simply not her story. What do we get instead, in the movie? We get Betty, hippie vegan artsy hipster with pink hair who goes to pickets against animal cruelty and thinks she's smarter than James and better than him because she's not battling with addiction like he is. She even gets upset at him for... what? Trying to get his life back on track? Worse yet, she's always, constantly and endlessly on show. The story portrayed in the movie is almost as much about her and James' relationship as much as it's about Bob??? The book never mentioned a Betty but Belle has mysteriously disappeared for the movie, so I'll go ahead and assume this is how she was replaced. Sure, the two characters have chemistry but if any story didn't need a boring, extremely cliché mass-produced love angle, it's surely this one. It's a book about how a man's life was saved by a cat!! Also, Betty names Bob and it made me salty. In the book, it goes like this:

'By now I’d given him a name: Bob. I got the idea while watching a DVD of one of my old favourite TV series, Twin Peaks. There was a character in that called Killer Bob. He was actually schizophrenic, a kind of Jekyll and Hyde character. Part of the time he would be a normal, sane guy, the next he would be kind of crazy and out of control. The tom was a bit like that. When he was happy and content you couldn’t have wished to see a calmer, kinder cat. But when the mood took him he could be an absolute maniac, charging around the flat. I was talking to my friend Belle one night when it dawned on me. ‘He’s a bit like Killer Bob in Twin Peaks,’ I said, drawing a blank look from her. But it didn’t matter. Bob it was.'

In the movie, it goes something like this:

Betty: *in an off-handed manner* Oh, he told me his name's Bob.
James: What?

Because as a hippie vegan hipster, she talks to animals. It's later written off as a joke but it still felt somehow very annoying. I mean, if I was a vegan hipster, I'd be annoyed at these stereotypes. As a moviegoer and book-reader, I'm just annoyed at what an easy out they feel like. Belle was a side-character. Betty is a walking, talking, cliché annoyance that just doesn't go away.

You guys did your best, really.

All in all, this movie doesn't receive very high recommendations from me, but if you're a avid cat lover and somehow can't read the book, if you can laugh at incredibly stereotypical hippy vegans and if you don't want a movie that can be clearly put in a category, maybe I can tell you to go see this messy attempt of producing an interesting story in a new media. It was not worthy of the book, though.

Hopefully next time when I write about a book vs. a movie, it'll finally finally finally be about The Martian! It's certainly been a long time in waiting. 

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - J.K. Rowling

A patch of scarlet swam past, and Harry heard a soft clatter of claws beside him.
"Fawkes," said Harry thickly, "You were brilliant, Fawkes."

This was always my favourite of the movies. I love the Chamber of Secrets and I love the monster dwelling there and I love Fawkes (I was quite when I got to the part of the quote), and yet this one also has all the things I hate the most. I was always uncomfortable with Harry's broken arm and the Polyjuice potion and tried to busy myself with other things while these things were happening. Urgh.

I don't know anyone who doesn't have a general idea about these books but you're so fortunate if it's all ahead of you still! So, this one has Harry trying to get back to Hogwarts, only to be stopped by elf Dobby, who's worried about terrible things happening to Harry in Hogwarts if he goes back. In Hogwarts, someone's opened the Chamber of Secrets, and no one even knows what that means, except that it's sure to be trouble.

I do like this book, really. I just wish it had more of the things I liked and less of the things I didn't like. I enjoyed Tom Riddle (fun fact: in the Finnish edition his name is Tom Lomen Valedro for, well, you can imagine why if you've read the book) so much and I loved being in the Chamber of Secrets and I wanted more time for these things. I suppose it's not as pronounced in the movie since it had to cut a lot of stuff out, but darn I felt like the daily life took a bit too much emphasis here. It's not a bad thing in general - it's actually what really sets the books apart from the movies - but... Chamber of Secrets... the heir of Slytherin, give me more... There's some nice things about the daily life, too, of course. Whenever we go into more detail about the more minor characters, it feels like a new kind of candy I didn't know existed but now want more of. It's great.

We were in Slytherin at the Sittning, if you were interested! It was a lot of fun!

I still don't feel like this was an amazing read, though. Maybe I've seen the movie too many times and grown disenchanted, but I'm still waiting for a Harry Potter book to blow me away. I thought I'd get more of my favourite things when I read this book but that didn't happen and I'm pretty salty about that. I guess you can't have everything. I'm really glad to be finally reading these books though - I feel a little less uncultured and they keep me company while walking around sometimes.

I already started Prisoner of Azkaban yesterday, right after finishing this one. I'm pretty excited since it's always been my least favourite of the movies and thus I've not watched it until boredom, haha. Besides, the first part with the Dursleys has been interesting so far.