Year: 2018

Which English translation or edition of The Count of Monte Cristo should I read?

I love books. I love languages. I built welovetranslations.com. 

You can read this post on that site!

So you want to read Alexandre Dumas’ classic adventure, The Count of Monte Cristo. And you don’t read French.

No problem. This massive novel has been available in English since the 1840s. You’ll find a copy in any decent library or bookstore, and if you like reading ebooks, you can download the novel for free because it’s not under copyright. That’s sorted, then.

Not so fast!

As soon as you visit the library or bookshop or click over to Amazon, you realize there are a host of publishers offering a myriad of paperback and hardcover editions and dozens of digital versions. What’s the difference?

Unexpurgated, unabridged, abridged, children’s, illustrated, and film versions are available. Keep reading to learn how to choose an edition that’s right for you.

Continue reading Which English translation or edition of The Count of Monte Cristo should I read?

We Love Queenstown, We Love Katong, and We Love Little India by Urban Sketchers Singapore

Want to see inside? There are links to PDF samples on the publisher’s pages for We Love Queenstown, We Love Katong, and We Love Little India.

Our Neighbourhoods

Thus far, Urban Sketchers Singapore and Epigram Books have produced books of sketches of:

  1. Toa Payoh (November 2012)
  2. Tiong Bahru (February 2013)
  3. Bedok (April 2013)
  4. Queenstown (September 2013)
  5. Katong (April 2014)
  6. Little India (September 2014)
  7. Chinatown (May 2015)
  8. Geylang Serai (January 2016)
  9. Serangoon Gardens (January 2017)

Toa Payoh, Tiong Bahru, and Katong are sold out at the publisher.

When and Why I Read We Love Queenstown, We Love Katong, and We Love Little India

These are attractive locally-produced books.

Genre: non-fiction (art)
Date started / date finished:  08-Dec-18 to 08-Dec-18
Length: 96 pages
ISBN: 9789810766016, 9789810766078, 9789810778217 (paperback)
Originally published in: 2013 and 2014

Sofia and the Utopia Machine by Judith Huang

I struggled to get through this debut novel. I’m kinda glad it exists, though. Singapore censorship apparently does not extend to suppressing the following kinds of sentiments in fiction:

“You think Singaporeans care about human rights? they just care about filling their stomachs and about peace and quiet, that’s all.”

More about the novel here, here and here.

When and Why I Read Sofia and the Utopia Machine

I went to an Epigram Books event involving the author and bought a signed copy there.

Genre: fiction (young-adult, political speculative fiction)
Date started / date finished:  03-Dec-18 to 08-Dec-18
Length: 261 pages
ISBN: ASIN B07KDTHQCT
Originally published in: 2018
Amazon link: Sofia and the Utopia Machine

The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken

I do not plan to continue reading the books in the series. The writing is not nearly as tight, polished, and thoughtful as Veronica Roth’s writing in the Divergent series.

When and why I read The Darkest Minds

I am reading this because I saw the 2018 movie.

Genre: fiction (young-adult fantasy/dystopia)
Date started / date finished:  30-Nov-18 to 03-Dec-18
Length: 518
ISBN: 9781786540249
Originally published in: 2012
Amazon link: The Darkest Minds

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was not very fast-paced for a thriller. For many pages, the journalist character conversed with his ageing employer or sat in a cabin reading documents about an old, unsolved case. The girl is an interesting character. I don’t really want to read any of the other books about her, though. This one had too much sex, violence, and violent sex for my taste. I mean, I like George Martin’s Ice and Fire series, but his characters live in a separate, fictional world, whereas I’m fairly convinced, never having been there, that Sweden is a real place.

When and why I read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

I have finished my book club reading for the year so now I can read stuff that’s just sitting on the shelf…

Genre: fiction (thriller)
Date started / date finished:  26-Nov-18 to 30-Nov-18
Length: 554
ISBN: 9781847246929
Originally published in: 2005/2008
Amazon link: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Who Gets What and Why by Alvin E. Roth

What does “free-market” mean? Does it mean everything is for sale to everyone all the time, for whatever price a buyer and seller can agree on? Maybe not. There are cases where everyone involved benefits from a common set of rules, whether those rules are created by a government, a financial exchange board, a consortium of private hospitals, or a professional association of lawyers and judges.

This book was cheerful, interesting, and accessible. If anything, I found it too accessible; I felt I didn’t need quite so much explanation and exemplification of the relevant concepts. Still, the sections on the “market” for kidneys alone make the book worth reading: markets among large groups of cooperating participants don’t just provide us with a variety of pleasant goods and services, they save lives. With highly trained, specialized minds like Roth’s working on improving methods of organ exchange, we have reason to hope for even better results in the future.

When and why I read Who Gets What and Why

From the title, I would have imagined a law book about wills, but it’s an economics book about markets.

Genre: non-fiction (popular economics)
Date started / date finished:  17-Nov-18 to 25-Nov-18
Length: 231
ISBN: 9780544291133
Originally published in: 2015
Amazon link: Who Gets What and Why

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

The structure of Station Eleven is undeniably clever. (The skill that must have been required is comparable to Toni Morrison’s when she crafted the story of Beloved.) Only gradually do readers piece together the relationships between the characters as Station Eleven skips around in time. Some slivers of story are from the time when a global plague first hits, and some are from the empty, bleak years following the deaths of most of the Earth’s people.

I found the story depressing. I tend to dislike stories about epidemics; they make me feel both disgusted and powerless. Add to my distaste for unstoppable illness the inevitable collapse of civilized society, which gives rise to the spread of lawlessness and dangerous cults, and you have a recipe for misery. The faint glimmer of hope tacked on at the end failed to console me in the slightest.

When and why I read Station Eleven

I keep hearing about this book.

Genre: fiction (speculative fiction)
Date started / date finished:  13-Nov-18 to 17-Nov-18
Length: 333
ISBN: 9780804172448
Originally published in: 2014
Amazon link: Station Eleven

City of Ember (2008)

Never judge a book by its movie. City of Ember (the movie) is only okay, but City of Ember (the book) is fantastic.

Deep underground, the people of Ember have never seen the sun and don’t even know it exists. The builders of their city planned for them to emerge, but that plan was lost and forgotten, and now Ember is running out of supplies, and its generator, without which there is no light, is breaking down. Will the builders return to save the people of Ember, as some believe? Will the mayor come up with a plan for his people? Or will it be up to Lina and Doon to rediscover the lost exit to the surface?

The premise is great. However, the movie lacks the focus of the book because some added elements don’t quite fit, some of the positive thematic messages are missing, and some of the action shots were created with awkward CGI. Also, personally, I’m not fond of Bill Murray.

I think The City of Ember would be great as a television series, because a TV show could spend a lot more time developing the characters and exploring the unique underground world.

Watch on Amazon

See below for a plot summary with SPOILERS in the form of a beat sheet in the style described in Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat.

Continue reading City of Ember (2008)

The Diamond of Darkhold by Jeanne DuPrau

The Diamond of Darkhold, the fourth and last City of Ember book, is not my favorite in the series. Still, DuPrau on a bad day is a better writer than most folks out there!

Here are three of her ideas I particularly liked.

Trogg had a knack for figuring things out, Doon had to admit it. And yet he did not see Trogg as a truly intelligent person. Trogg seemed to think that he knew everything, but strangely enough, it was exactly this that made him seem stupid to Doon. A person who thought he knew everything simply didn’t understand how much there was to know. (120)

Trogg and his family are ignorant and destructive. They think books are useful—for fuel. Doon is horrified that they don’t believe “figuring out squiggles” (reading) can teach them anything they don’t already know. See pages 139–140.

“I don’t agree that it’s good to speak only when spoken to…. If everyone did that, no one would ever speak at all! What you mean is that people should only speak when you speak to them.” (150)

When and why I read The Diamond of Darkhold

I was reminded of The City of Ember when I read The Ship. I decided to go back and re-read it, and read the two sequels and the prequel. (Previously, I only read City of Ember itself and the first sequel.)

Genre: fiction (children’s fantasy)
Date started / date finished:  10-Nov-18 to 13-Nov-18
Length: 285
ISBN: 9780375855719
Originally published in: 2008
Amazon link: The Diamond of Darkhold

Collateral (2004)

In Edge of Tomorrow, Tom Cruise somehow made dying funny. In Collateral, he somehow makes killing funny. And also sad.

The premise is that Tom Cruise, playing contract killer Vincent, hires Jamie Foxx, playing taxi driver Max, to chauffeur him around LA all night, without, of course, explaining that he will be murdering five people before skipping town. What’s a hardworking, law-abiding taxi driver to do, apart from cooperate? Can he improvise a way out of his horrible predicament?

Collateral seems like it could have been an action movie, but it’s kinda not. Although it features crazy driving, shooting, Tom Cruise running, and a police hunt, it’s a drama as much as it is a thriller. The whole story takes place in one night, and dialog seems to take up the bulk of the screen time. It’s more serene than frantic.

The theme is carpe diem. Don’t postpone your dreams! Don’t be afraid of taking risks! Also: Don’t hire yourself out as a contract killer, because if you do, when you die, no one will care!

I hated Tom Cruise’s hair. Was that style fashionable back in 2004? Clamshell phones were. Those are a joke now that smartphones have taken over the world…

All nitpicking aside, I enjoyed the movie. Sure doesn’t make me want to live in LA, though!

The plot summary on Wikipedia is not bad.

This Roger Ebert review is full of praise.

This review at Pajiba calls the movie melancholy and soulful, claiming it may be the best movie Tom Cruise will ever make.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/movie/collateral/id291825916