And the Winner is....

First of all, speaking of "The winner is..." I watched a few minutes of the American Music Awards last night and I honestly was laughing. It has become comical to me that celebrities think they are SO cool and SO important. For reals. JZ, do you really need to wear sunglasses all the time? even when you are in a dark theater? Lady Gaga, who dresses you? you look like a freak and your songs are terrible, as in morally terrible. Jennifer Lopez, your performance was ridiculous. Okay, I just thought it was hilarious.

The book for December is....The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. This book has received a lot of praise and has been a best seller. For those reasons, I hope it isn't too difficult to get at the library for those of you who plan to check it out. When I first heard about this book I didn't think the plot sounded all that interesting, but I've heard so many people (with good reading taste) talk about how interesting this book is, so I thought I'd give it a shot.

Here is a brief summary:

Katniss is a 16-year-old girl living with her mother and younger sister in the poorest district of Panem, the remains of what used be the United States. Long ago the districts waged war on the Capitol and were defeated. As part of the surrender terms, each district agreed to send one boy and one girl to appear in an annual televised event called, "The Hunger Games." The terrain, rules, and level of audience participation may change but one thing is constant: kill or be killed. When her sister is chosen by lottery, Katniss steps up to go in her place.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Manipulation

I finished Ender's Game last night. Overall, I really liked the book, althoug I felt like it dragged a little bit in the middle. The theme that stood out to me, was manipulation. Ender's entire life was manipulated; the fact that he was born at all as a third child, his confrontation with Stilson, getting him to go to Battle School, shaping his relationship with his peers, and the list could go on and on. The interesting thing was that Ender was always very aware that he was being manipulated and that everything that was happening to him was part of the adults' plan for him, yet he continued to play their games. I think he didn't resist because he didn't know what kind of life he'd be living if he wasn't at battle school; he didn't know any other life. Part of me is disgusted with the adults in the book for being so manipulative and partially taking away Ender's agency, but the other part of me is impressed that they were so successful at predicting his actions and where they could lead him. In the end, I felt sad for Ender. His life was not his own for the first eleven years of his life and then once the final battle was over, he still couldn't live a normal life, he was just left hanging. Good pick Randi! I've always wanted to read this book.

Who's Next?

Who chooses the book for December?

ender

Well, I think Cami has a great idea about posting questions about books we're reading. I think it's a good thing to do to keep our minds fresh as we have all been out of a school a while now. So, here's a question about Ender's Game:

Why does Orson Scott Card use a young boy as the protagonist in a book about a great war between humanity and aliens?

I am flying through this book because I really like and one of the things that keeps going through my head is a sympathy for these young children. As I read I find myself forgetting how young Ender is...6 when he goes to Battle school! I mean, six! And then he will remind us or he'll have a birthday and I'll remember how little he really is. I think it is smart and interesting of Card to use children in this novel because I feel like the children represent humanity in it's purest, most vulnerable form. Children are easily molded; easily taught. So, when they get to school, they are manipulated into machines. "Society"--or Battle School--changes them. Wow, I am thinking about a lot of things from Freud class I took at BYU-I, but I'll spare you that drivel on here. Anyway, children from the womb are pure and perfect. Society changes them. I'm not sure I answered the question. Hmm, I'm still thinking.
What do you think?

Commentary on the Religious Undertones of Dracula

I don't know if it's because I'm Mormon, for whom religion is life, but I found myself noticing the religious undertones as they related to the sexual undertones. First of all, I really didn't see that many sexual undertones. However, I found myself mourning for the misunderstood doctrines of Christ.
If Dracula's bite represents sexual relations, then it really should be considered rape. These women did not invite them into their homes; nor did they have control to say no. Yet, despite this, they were considered lost to God as if they had voluntarily broken His law. A similar scenario occurs in Tess of the D'Urbervilles. She is considered unclean because she was raped; and the sad thing is that they believe there is no hope.
I just want to sit these people down and explain the power of repentance. I want them to understand that even if they had chosen to sin, they could still change through the redeeming love of Jesus Christ.
The men kept mourning Mina's situation, but since she never indulged in the things that were tempting to her, as a vampire, there was nothing to mourn. She should never have had the mark on her forehead because God was always with her.

Logistics

I love having this book club and I'm so proud of us for keeping it going for over a year now!! I was in D.C. last weekend with Debbie and Kim, and we were discussing our love for the book club. However, we have two suggestions that might make it even better (maybe there were more, but I can only remember two).

Suggestion #1: More discussion of the books. Obviously, our separation makes it difficult to discuss the books, but we are all smart people and I'm sure we can think of some solutions. Some ideas are a conference call, having the host (person who chose the book) post questions throughout the month or maybe at the end of the month and we can all respond to them, ????? I'm sure there are lot of other things but I can't think of any right now. Do you guys have any suggestions? My preference would be to NOT do a conference call. I used to think that was a good idea, but we live in a total of three different time zones and it gets complicated. I also like to be forced to write my thoughts. Not being a student anymore, I have found that my writing skills are suffering and I'd appreciate the opportunity to work on them.

Suggestions #2: It would be nice if we chose books at least one month in advance so we have time to either buy it or check it out from the library. I think this will increase the likelihood that we all finish the book by the end of the month. An example of this would be announcing December's book on Nov. 1st.

What do you all think of these ideas? Does anyone have anything else they would like to change or add? Who is choosing the book for December? I think it is Anjanette's turn, if she is still participating. How do you spell her name? I know I always get it wrong.

book for november

Ok, so for November I have chosen Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card.
I am usually not really into science fiction, but this is one of my Sister-in-law's favorite book so I figured we should give it a try. The summary sounds pretty interesting. And, some people are interested in this, Card is LDS. I also read a short story by him in one of my literature classes in college and loved it, so this should be good. Here is a plot summary for you:

In the novel's opening, the government selects Andrew "Ender" Wiggin for training at the elite Battle School. At Battle School, the commander Hyrum Graff publicly recognizes Ender as the most intelligent attendee. This acknowledgment causes other students to resent Ender, isolating him from most of the other children. Ender soon ranks among the school's elite child soldiers, eventually achieving the school's top rank. Even after his success the other children continue to ostracize him. Ender attempts to escape his isolation and frustration in various ways, but experiences little comfort until he receives a letter from his older sister Valentine, reminding him of his reasons for attending Battle School in the first place.

The Battle School brass soon promote him to commander of a new army in the school's zero-gravity wargame league. He molds his young soldiers into an undefeated team, despite working with an inexperienced army. Ender's army implements innovative tactics, abolishing old methods like the use of formations in the battle room.

The Battle School administration promotes Ender to Command School ahead of schedule. In command school, and under the tutelage of Mazer Rackham, the legendary hero of the Formic wars, Ender plays a game very similar to the Battle Room, where he commands ships in a 3-D space battle simulator. His subordinate officers are fellow students advanced early from the battle school who later become known as "Ender's jeesh." Each day the games become increasingly grueling, and Ender is slowly worn down to exhaustion. Waking and sleeping blend together as Ender nearly loses his sanity, though still maintaining his military innovation and leadership.

Ender's "final exam" consists of a scenario where bugger ships outnumber Ender's fleet a thousand to one near a planetary mass. Ender orders the use of a special weapon, the Molecular Disruption Device, against the planet itself, destroying the simulated planet and all ships in orbit. Ender makes this decision knowing that it is expressly against the respectable rules of the game, hoping that his teachers will find his ruthlessness unacceptable, remove him from command, and allow him to return home.

Soon after Ender's destruction of the "simulated" Formic fleet, Rackham tells him that all the simulations were real battles taking place in Formic space. After Ender realizes that he is responsible for the destruction of an entire race, the guilt of the genocide sends him into a coma.

When Ender recovers, his sister Valentine explains that he will not be allowed to return to earth because his special skills are too dangerous to fall under the control of his feared brother Peter. He is made Governor of the first human colony on a Bugger world and they leave together on the first colony ship. While scouting out locations for future cities, Ender discovers a message from the Formics—expressed in the form of terrain matching that of the key fantasy game Ender played while in school—that leads him to an unborn Formic queen who can communicate with him through a psychic link. She explains that her race was initially unaware that humans were sentient creatures. The Formic defeat in the Second Invasion awakened them to humanity's true nature, and they resolved not to attack Earth again. With direct communication impossible between the species, the only connection they were able make was with Ender's dreaming mind, but he did not know he was fighting a war.

Ender realizes that the Formics left this one Queen for Ender to find, forgive and take to a new home. Leaving out the fact that one 'Bugger' still lives, Ender writes a book in the Queens voice under the pseudonym "Speaker for the Dead" entitled The Hive Queen, wherein he tells the story of the Formic race.

And, I want to talk about Dracula soon, so when I finish my last few pages, I'm going to write something about it. Love that book!