For those who need links to interesting articles in large easy to find sources, here are a couple:

- Stephen Metcalf discusses Lolita at 50. Let me just admit here that this is one of those books I just didn’t get. I really wanted to be one of the smart kids, but it just didn’t happen.

- Interesting NYT article on authors and blogs. Some read them and interact with them, some have friends or assistants who send them bits and pieces, while others ignore them altogether.

- If you are still interested in Narnia after all the recent hubbub surrounding the movie, here is a review of a book I hope to get to soon The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C.S. Lewis By Alan Jacobs. Ironically, I am going to put off reading the review until I can read the book.

Well kids, I am back to offer another lame apology about how content is down, etc. Just because it is lame doesn’t mean it isn’t sincere.

“Real life” has kept me from posting much here other than the odd book review or two. The next couple of weeks won’t be much better I suspect. What with a business trip, the holidays, NFL football with playoff implications, and various other things (wife, child, house) impinging on my time I can’t see a end of the year bonanza coming on.

As traffic drops off to the odd Google search that leads here, I am furtively working to make the transition to the new site as seamless as possible. If all goes well, visitors to this site will see the same as visitors to eponymous blog domain, but I will only be posting to one blog. The new look should load faster as well. I appreciate your patience in the inevitable cases of glitches and whatnot. I will initiate the change sometime next week.

I hope all of you are having a joyous holiday season and that your travels are safe and your families don’t drive you insane.

I am not signing of for the year or anything, I just thought I should get this information posted in case anyone was wondering.

Author and critic Dale Peck is not exactly the type of person you might expect to be writing children’s books. Whether you think about him as a “gay writer” or as a “hatchet man” literary critic, his career doesn’t exactly scream “young adult fantasy adventure.” So when I noticed just such a book out from Mr. Peck, I felt it was worth a read.

The Drift House is the first in a fantasy adventure series for young adults. The story centers around three siblings - Susan, Charles, and Murray Oakenfield - who are sent off to stay with an eccentric uncle in Canada in the aftermath of September 11 (their family lives in New York City). Uncle Farley’s house - as the title implies - is far from ordinary and after a violent rain storm the children find themselves floating helplessly out to sea.

The resulting story involves “The Sea of Time,” mermaids, a giant whale, a multi-lingual parrot, time pirates, a magical dumbwaiter, and all sorts of adventure for the Oakenfield children. Interestingly, the book’s website indicates that Peck was inspired - in part - by C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia series:

Shortly after “the towers came down” Dale visited a friend on Cape Cod who dreamt that the ship builder’s home he lived in had floated out to sea.

“The image captivated me, and I immediately sketched some notes. I took my cue from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe—another children’s book set against the backdrop of war: the four children are sent out of London during the Blitz to stay with a mysterious, slightly eccentric professor,” explains Dale. “The children in the Narnia books leave their house behind, of course. Mine get to take theirs with them.”

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If you are interested in reading a dry history of the British Eighth Army, please read Richard Doherty’s A Noble Crusade: The History of the Eighth Army 1941-45. Otherwise, stay away from this book.

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The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood is the third book in the Canongate’s Myth series which calls on engaging writers to re-imagine or re-tell classic myths of their choosing. I have previously covered Weight by Jeanette Winterson and A Short History of Myth by Karen Armstrong.

The Penelopiad tells the story of The Odyssey from the perspective of Odysseus’s wife Penelope; sort of. Obviously, Penelope doesn’t fight in the Trojan war or follow Odysseus on his trials and travails as he seeks to get back to Ithaca. Instead, Atwood tells the story of the wife who was left behind and the twelve maids who were hung upon his return. Both Penelope and the maids look back from the grave - or the afterlife in Penelope’s case - to tell their side of the story.

The twist Atwood brings to the story centers around what really happened during those twenty years Odysseus was gone and what role the maids played. In her introduction she makes clear she doesn’t trust the official version told in the Odyssey and that the hanging of the maids always “haunted her.” It seems clear that Atwood is trying to provide a more well-rounded portrait of Penelope than the simple patient and long suffering wife of legend or the devious slut of gossip and rumor.

In telling her side Atwood’s Penelope assumes the style of a celebrity tell all, but one with a good natured tongue-in-cheek tone. Penelope isn’t bitter but rather resigned to the reality of the way the world works.

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The story of the Spanish Armada that sailed in 1588 is one of a struggle between a power hungry empire (Spain) and a relatively poor, developing nation (England). Neil Hanson’s The Confident Hope of a Miracle brings a fresh perspective to this topic. The book is a fascinating history of the battles fought on the Armada’s voyage and the leading persons who influenced the events surrounding the Armada.

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As I noted on Friday, I decided to re-read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe in preparation for watching the movie. In retrospect that turned out to be a mistake (more on that when I review the movie), but I did enjoy re-reading this children’s classic.

For those of you living in a cave, let me recap the basic story line. Four children are sent off to a professor’s country house during the London Blitz of WWII. Exploring the house on a rainy day they find a wardrobe that turns out to be a portal to a magical world. This world, Narnia, is under the control of the White Witch who keeps it in a perpetual winter - without Christmas! The children, who appear to be the fulfillment of an ancient prophecy, soon find themselves deeply enmeshed in this fantastical world.

The true ruler of Narnia is Aslan, a giant lion, who returns at the same time the children arrive. Together they must battle the White Witch to return Narnia to its former glory and end her reign of terror.

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The wife and I happily got a baby sitter and are off the to see the Chronicles of Narnia movie tonight. I will finish re-reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe before we go but I am avoiding movie reviews until after I see it for myself.

Of course I will report back here with my thoughts and reactions, so stay tuned.

In case you haven’t been scoring at home, I was intrigued by the Canongate Myth Series and read them on my recent Thanksgiving vacation. I began my review of the series with the introductory book A Short History of Myth which wasn’t a retelling of a classic myth but rather, as the title makes clear, a quick overview of the subject. Today we begin the fiction component of the series.

Weight is the story of Atlas and Heracles as retold by Jeanette Winterson. Despite its short length, 150 pages, it is not an easy book to get a handle on. Besides a creative re-imagining of the classic Greek myth Winterson weaves in aspects of autobiography, history, sociology, and science. She not only tweaks the story but infuses it with her own life and the history of the planet. Your reaction to the book will likely be heavily influenced by how you react to the sections that don’t deal directly with the myth. I found the writing fluid and poetic, and the storytelling captivating, but the philosophical musings a but over-the-top at times and the insertion of the autobiographical details unnecessary and distracting. Even with these minor flaws, however, Weight is a interesting and enjoyable read.

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Sorry about the radio silence lately. My computer was infected with a spy-ware virus and was unusable for a good chunck of yesterday and today. I think I have patched things back together and I will look to post some reviews soon.

Next up: the next two volumes of the Canongate Myth series I discussed here and here. After that, a children’s book by Dale Peck.