Self-Ed 8/4/08

Read this week:
Harmony
Anne of Windy Poplar (completed)
Anne's House of Dreams (in progress)

Comments: Anne's House of Dreams is just as entertaining as I remember. I just love Lucy Maude Montgomery's quirky side characters. Miss Cornelia Bryant makes me laugh.  Even though this book is a lot darker to me than the previous four (or perhaps because of that), I find that this is still my favorite.

JunkMale
Frankenstein (completed)
Robinson Crusoe (in progress)

Comments:
Frankenstein was not as enjoyable as when I read it in high school, for whatever reason. At times, I found it to be entirely pointlessly verbose, so I would briefly skim those parts. After all, one can only handle so much of passages like this:

The mountains, o! would that you could have seen the mountains. We have not such mountains in my native country. They reached up towards the sky to touch the heavens, and indeed, it seems as though the mountains and the heavens were one. Where the snow capped peaks reached the heavenly clouds, one could scarcely tell where one ended and the other began. Indeed, the heavens were the boundary of the mountains, but the mountains, in turn, seemed to challenge defiantly their boundaries. Equally splendorous to the peaks were the valleys. Delicate streams of crystalline water gaily trickled their way through them; the intercourse between the tributaries, the Providence hewn precipices, and gossamer whisps of cloud would have been enough to bring tears to my countenance, were it not for my circumstances.

I made that up, and it's probably only slightly exaggerated. Seriously, let's just say "There were mountains. There were clouds, and there were streams. It was a pretty sight." On with the story, please.

As for Robinson Crusoe, I am thoroughly enjoying it. I like reading about survival situations, although I probably wouldn't like the situation much if I were in it. I'm alternating between a free eBook from PlanetPDF (at work) and a paperback when I'm at home. The chapters are divided up differently and have different titles, so it's somewhat of a minor chore to find out where I left off.
Harmony finds books like these utterly boring because there are no other characters, but I don't have a problem with that. I believe my 3rd grade teacher read Hatchet to my class, and I remember thoroughly enjoying that. Harmony found that book to be boring as well. (perhaps she is crazy)