#70: Destined to fail

i love reading. i used to really love reading. in elementary school, there was a time where i read three books a day. it would take me less than two hours to polish off a volume of the boxcar children, or nancy drew, or, my favorites, the babysitters' club. i was always a little bit impressed that they got the apostrophe right on that one.

then i hit middle school, and teachers didn't understand why i was reading my book in the middle of their class. i was reading because it was the second half of class, when they give us "homework" time, and i had already finished my homework! i don't know why they bothered giving middle schoolers 40 minute periods when we only learned during the first 20 minutes. and now they want us reading books...for class? it was madness.

and then i was in high school, with real work and real books to read. and i started to dislike reading. i still love children's books, they're pretty much the best. adult books are either pointless or dry. i mean, pointless isn't necessarily a bad thing. meg cabot (her adult books)(er, as opposed to her teen books) are hilarious and a fun treat. but in class i was supposed to "discuss" things, and everybody just made shit up. the people who were the best at making stuff up got the best grades. fact of the matter was, i just didn't care. and, the best part was, the people who read sparknotes and not the books got better grades. because they got all the important info without getting confused about things in the first place.

so, college. college, college, college. even more books to read, bullshit to spout out. but now, i don't have the chester county library to retreat to. the stanford libraries are vast and hold millions and millions of books...but they're scary. and all the books look the same. people don't go there to get some nice fiction, they go there to study and research and do un-fun things.

and, i stopped reading.

literary books were boring. as were popular ones. the whole "chick lit" phenomenon was just annoying to me. have you read those books? all the protagonists are whiny bitches. the devil wears prada: whiny bitch who loses all her friends. confessions of a shopaholic: whiny bitch who is financially illiterate. bridget jones's diary: whiny bitch who's just whiny.

i mean, of course i read. but it was mostly rereading books i enjoyed in elementary and middle school. alice in wonderland! tarzan of the apes! jules verne! and, of course, harry potter.

and now, i have on my list to read 25 novels. i've read two. and so, i have two lists of complaints.

Complaints about Kidnapped, by Robert Louis Stevenson
ok, so this kid grows up poor and then his parents die so he's off to seek his fortune. little does he know, his father was the rightful heir to a grand fortune, but his uncle's got it all. and his uncle doesn't want the kid (david) to get the fortune...so he pays somebody to kidnap him and sell him into slavery in the colonies. not bad. david meets alan on the ship, and they whoop ass and comandeer the ship. and then there's a shipwreck.

and then begins all the bad bits in harry potter and the deathly hallows--wandering. only at the end, there weren't any good bits to redeem it. alan and david wander for a couple hundred pages that i just skimmed. wander wander wander back to david's uncle's house. david can't actually get his fortune back without lawyers and a lot of time. so he's like well i never wanted that much anyway, just give me some income. so. after being sold into slavery, wandering the countryside and falling ill many a time, david is content with 2/3 of the income his property gets. and his uncle can keep the house, the land, and the other 1/3. even though it was never supposed to be his uncle's anyway.

did i read that whole book for that? the beginning of the book had swashbuckling and action and fun things. and the ending didn't. buzzkill.

but, kidnapped wasn't anywhere near as horrible as wuthering heights.

Complaints about Wuthering Heights, by Charlotte Bronte
i disliked every character in this story, except for those whom i was ambivalent to.

mr lockwood: ambivalent. i feel like the only reason he existed was because charlotte thought a story within a story would be fun. it works in the princess bride. it doesn't work here. 85% of the book is mrs dean narrating, so why bother with lockwood?

mrs dean: ambivalent. i wanted to like her, i really did. and i do realize that if she had actually done anything, she would have been out of a job and house. and, you know, the story. but she just stands by and has all these opinions, and then does nothing about anything.

heathcliffe: where the hell did he come from? mr earnshaw just up and brought home a child? like finding a stray cat or dog. only a stray HUMAN. wtf? and then he's mr earnshaw's favorite? what? okay, he's catherine's best friend and they make mischief. i like mischief. and then catherine gets engaged and he up and disappears. that's okay too. and then he comes back for catherine and tries to steal her away. which is okay, though three years too late. i mean come one, heathcliffe. you disappeared when they got engaged, and didn't speak up during the speak now or forever hold your peace part. *
and he got a fortune? it's okay to amass a fortune and not tell me right away. but i want to know eventually! like in les mis. gosh, i loved les mis.
and then heathcliffe is just surly and irritating for the rest of the book.

*side note: in atonement it was okay for her not to speak up. but i really wish i didn't read the epilogue. and, the war part was a lot of wander wander wander. but overall, i liked it.

catherine: whiny, spoiled, arrogant, bitch. warner in legally blonde, if you will. i love you heathcliffe but here's edgar. and he has money. i like money. and he's really bad in bed. but it's not like we have sex anyway, because i'm SO whiny and spoiled that i go into fits! fits, i say!

joseph: holy crap joseph. every time you talked i just skipped over it. because i just could not understand anything you said.

edgar: pussy.

isabella: idiot.

linton: snivelling pussy!

cathy jr.: i liked her when she was young and likeable. and then she fell in love with her cousin. her cousin! and then later she falls in love with her other cousin! you know why catherine had fits? because her parents were probably cousins too! i like cathy jr until she went stupid. stupid as in still likeing her snivelling cousin when he treated her like crap.

hareton: ambivalent. it's not totally his fault, heathcliffe fucked this boy up. but he was just always so surly. and i guess he doesnt get to see too many women, as he gets excited when he sees cathy jr and reaches out to touch her hair. who does that? who just goes around petting people?

let's see if madame bovary is any better. i'm forseeing a lot of whining.