Korea
This is a 30 second slide video using www.animoto.com. Try it! Its very fun, and easy if you have access to online pictures, through picasa, flickr, photobucket, or just using pics on your computer. It takes just a few seconds to create the show.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Friday, January 22, 2010
The Alchemist, Paolo Coelho
The most translated book in history, much loved and cherished across the world, but it was Carson's one word recommendation that got me to read this 174 page classic: 'brilliant!'
It occured to me recently that there must be many follwers and copiers of Coelho; I was talking to a colleague who described the book 'The Secret.' The 2 books have similar messages, that if you want something hard enough, things will fall into place and either the universe will conspire to help you, or it will come to pass because you create your own luck. I think I'll go with "The Alchemist" since it is fiction, and still packs a great message without preaching.
It is a pretty religious book though. I liked it a lot although I am not sure it will change my life, as many have stated it has. I must say though, that there have certainly been times when I think that I wanted something so badly that I made it happen through sheer will and positive thinking, even when the odds were not in my favour.
Coelho has had an interesting life as documented in "Paulo Coelho: A Warrior's Life," by Fernando Morais.
It occured to me recently that there must be many follwers and copiers of Coelho; I was talking to a colleague who described the book 'The Secret.' The 2 books have similar messages, that if you want something hard enough, things will fall into place and either the universe will conspire to help you, or it will come to pass because you create your own luck. I think I'll go with "The Alchemist" since it is fiction, and still packs a great message without preaching.
It is a pretty religious book though. I liked it a lot although I am not sure it will change my life, as many have stated it has. I must say though, that there have certainly been times when I think that I wanted something so badly that I made it happen through sheer will and positive thinking, even when the odds were not in my favour.
Coelho has had an interesting life as documented in "Paulo Coelho: A Warrior's Life," by Fernando Morais.
4 Comics
"Leave it to Chance" by Paul Smith, and James Robinson, -junior hard cover, bright colours, nice production, big pretty pics, well drawn, good story, fun super-hero type comic for grade 4+.
"Scott Pilgrim & the Infinite Sadness," Vol. 3, by Bryan Lee O'Malley, seems to have turned into quite the big thing. A movie, a video game, and now fans are anxiously waiting for the 5th and final volume. I must say that after I bought this book, I read the first few pages and thought it was a little lame. After I saw it on a 'best of the decade' list, I thought "really?" I became more curious when I found out that the author is Canadian, and gave it another chance. It is very funny and cute, all about teens and their lame issues. I laughed hard, and in the end I'll give it 2 thumbs up.
"Akira", Vol. 2, by Katsuhiro Otomo. One the classic mangas of all time, but a little wierd for me, not my favourite, maybe because I am not so much of a manga fan. Not much of it makes sense to me. The art work is great and help make the book exciting and tense.
"Twenty years ago Katsuhiro Otomo's Akira revolutionized the West's perception of Japanese animation and to this day is a landmark in film-making and storytelling."
Read more at Suite101: Katsuhiro Otomo's Akira: A Review: Looking Back at the Greatest Manga-Based Animé Ever Made http://anime.suite101.com/article.cfm/akira_review#ixzz0dNDXgNE2
"The Color of Heaven," (note the American spelling, but it was published there so I shouldn't change it)by Kim Dong Hwa, is manga (manhwa in Korean) from Korea.
This book is the 3rd in the Color trilogy, and is very beautifully told through the text and the images. It is the story of a mother's relationship with her daughter as she grows up, falls in love and gets married, eventually leaving with her husband. The story is tender and heartfelt, the art simple and elegant, and I liked it a lot.
"Scott Pilgrim & the Infinite Sadness," Vol. 3, by Bryan Lee O'Malley, seems to have turned into quite the big thing. A movie, a video game, and now fans are anxiously waiting for the 5th and final volume. I must say that after I bought this book, I read the first few pages and thought it was a little lame. After I saw it on a 'best of the decade' list, I thought "really?" I became more curious when I found out that the author is Canadian, and gave it another chance. It is very funny and cute, all about teens and their lame issues. I laughed hard, and in the end I'll give it 2 thumbs up.
"Akira", Vol. 2, by Katsuhiro Otomo. One the classic mangas of all time, but a little wierd for me, not my favourite, maybe because I am not so much of a manga fan. Not much of it makes sense to me. The art work is great and help make the book exciting and tense.
"Twenty years ago Katsuhiro Otomo's Akira revolutionized the West's perception of Japanese animation and to this day is a landmark in film-making and storytelling."
Read more at Suite101: Katsuhiro Otomo's Akira: A Review: Looking Back at the Greatest Manga-Based Animé Ever Made http://anime.suite101.com/article.cfm/akira_review#ixzz0dNDXgNE2
"The Color of Heaven," (note the American spelling, but it was published there so I shouldn't change it)by Kim Dong Hwa, is manga (manhwa in Korean) from Korea.
This book is the 3rd in the Color trilogy, and is very beautifully told through the text and the images. It is the story of a mother's relationship with her daughter as she grows up, falls in love and gets married, eventually leaving with her husband. The story is tender and heartfelt, the art simple and elegant, and I liked it a lot.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Frozen in Time
I really enjoyed this account of Franklin's expedition to find the Northwest Passage, written by John Gieger, with Owen Beattie. Beattie is the forensic anthropologist from Edmonton who led several teams of experts to the north starting in 1981. The history of the voyages is very interesting, which includes the many many disasters that occurred as the English, Americans, Norwegians and others tried in vain to find the way through the ice in the 1700's and 1800's. Finally, Beattie's group exume 3 bodies from Franklin's crew and take samples to be analyzed back in Edmonton. Their discoveries make for good reading.
Monday, January 4, 2010
"A rapid fire accounting of readings"
Hi beautifuls, I am just going to mention quickly several recent and forgotten readings:
-Welcome to the NHK, a manga, originaly an all text book in Japanese, written by Tatsuhiko Takimoto, illustrated by Yoshitoshi Abe. I bought this one at the United Lirbrary Services, a warehouse type store that sells only to school libraries. Then I noticed the parental advisory on the cover and thought I should read it before lending out to the kids. I learned a lot about Japanese culture, some of which is disturbing. Loli-con is a fetish or infatuation with Lolita girls, done with manga. Hikikomori are people who don't leave their house, because they are having trouble with the pressures of modern life or are too afraid to come out. Otaku are people who love manga, or anime, or gaming so much that they are a sub-cult. The book is full of self-denial, self loathing, and angst, mainly from the one central character who is finding it hard to admit he is a hikikomori. The parental advisory comes from the loli-con inferences, but like so much manga, there are many ways to take the subtleties of the cultural references, and it is quite interesting. Reading manga for the first time can be tough if you are not up on the references, and honorifics, but it gets better. This book helped a lot.
The plot is a little thin in the manga version but worth a read. There are more to come in the series. You may want to save your reading for other manga or comics if it is that genre you seek.
Iron Man, Ultimates, written by Orson Scott Card. I liked 'Ender's Shadow'(not a comic) by Card so thought I'd check out this comic. Its pretty good but still just a comic.
I am reading The Colour of Heaven, by Kim Dong Hwa, part of a trilogy (Heaven, Water, Earth) about a girl and her mom in Korea. The images are beautiful, and add a certain grace to the story that is entrancing, and the story is heartfelt, all about love.
Bluesman, by Rob Vollmar & Pablo Callejo, is a strikingly beautiful book. It is a murder mystery/cop story, illustrated in a kind of 'comic noir' style that I find very compelling just for the art. They have a compilation out now which I am trying to buy. The one I read was book 3, which has a good story.
Same Difference and other stories, by Derek Kirk Kim is a graphic novel of some of his early writings. I liked it for its humour, poignantcy, and art. His drawings portray a lot of emotion but are not over the top as some manga artists can be, which often detracts from the story. Kim is of Korean ancestry, but American. The 12 short stories are funny and quirky.
Fables, by Bill Willingham with a plethora of artists, is a series of comic books set in modern times NY. The Fables, -Boy Blue, Red Riding Hood, The 3 Little Pigs etc., have been banished from Fableland by 'The Adversary' and now have taken refuge on earth. They face all the problems of modern life as well as battling beings from off planet. Fables is brilliant. I have read 2: Animal Farm and March of the Wooden Soldiers, and I plan to read them all because I love the cleverness of the writing.
Oishinbo: Ramen and Gyoza, by Tetsu Kariya, art by Akira Hanasaki is a graphic novel all about food. I love it for that alone but also because it is so funny. A young reporter travels around the city searching for the best ramen and gyoza. He is lazy but has a great mind for food, and his nemesis is his father who is a great chef. The reporter teaches his friends about food with sound theory, another reason I love it.
Burn, by Camilla D'Erico, who is from Vancouver, is the artist and Scott Sanders is the writer. I liked it a lot. It is a futuristic graphic novel about a boy who gets attacked by a robot. Robots are trying to take over the world, and have tohe ability to repair themselves, but in this case the robot takes the body of the boy, Burn and creates a cyborg. Burn then shares his brain with the robot as they struggle to learn what they have become as a new being.
Hellboy, by writer Mike Mignola and a host of artists is a fantastic and dark comic billed as a horror story. It is a lenghty series of over-priced books so don't buy them new unless they are 1/2 price. 'Wake the Devil' is the one I just read and its great. Mignola likes to fight the Nazis. The art is beatiful, dark but brightly coloured and the stories are exciting as Hellboy, the spawn of Satan, but a good guy, smashes stuff up, including the bad guys. Strangley this set did not make many people's 'best of the decade' comics, although it certainly should.
Cairo, by G. Willow Wilson, art by MK Perker, is a graphic novel about genies, politics, and crime. It is an action packed love story, a mix of myth and reality, drawn in black and white with intricate shading and beautiful layouts. The sequences are well done; Perker uses many different techniques to link the forms together which add positively to the visual aspect. I loved it.
One Bad Rat, by Bryan Talbot, is a story of a teen girl who is running away from her abusive father. It is one of the most well respected graphic novels ever, for its homage to Beatrice Potter, the girl's love of reading, the way Talbot lovingly tells the story with his images and for the way the heroine is able to confront her parents. It is a difficlut story becuase it speaks of pain, but untimately of survival.
-Welcome to the NHK, a manga, originaly an all text book in Japanese, written by Tatsuhiko Takimoto, illustrated by Yoshitoshi Abe. I bought this one at the United Lirbrary Services, a warehouse type store that sells only to school libraries. Then I noticed the parental advisory on the cover and thought I should read it before lending out to the kids. I learned a lot about Japanese culture, some of which is disturbing. Loli-con is a fetish or infatuation with Lolita girls, done with manga. Hikikomori are people who don't leave their house, because they are having trouble with the pressures of modern life or are too afraid to come out. Otaku are people who love manga, or anime, or gaming so much that they are a sub-cult. The book is full of self-denial, self loathing, and angst, mainly from the one central character who is finding it hard to admit he is a hikikomori. The parental advisory comes from the loli-con inferences, but like so much manga, there are many ways to take the subtleties of the cultural references, and it is quite interesting. Reading manga for the first time can be tough if you are not up on the references, and honorifics, but it gets better. This book helped a lot.
The plot is a little thin in the manga version but worth a read. There are more to come in the series. You may want to save your reading for other manga or comics if it is that genre you seek.
Iron Man, Ultimates, written by Orson Scott Card. I liked 'Ender's Shadow'(not a comic) by Card so thought I'd check out this comic. Its pretty good but still just a comic.
I am reading The Colour of Heaven, by Kim Dong Hwa, part of a trilogy (Heaven, Water, Earth) about a girl and her mom in Korea. The images are beautiful, and add a certain grace to the story that is entrancing, and the story is heartfelt, all about love.
Bluesman, by Rob Vollmar & Pablo Callejo, is a strikingly beautiful book. It is a murder mystery/cop story, illustrated in a kind of 'comic noir' style that I find very compelling just for the art. They have a compilation out now which I am trying to buy. The one I read was book 3, which has a good story.
Same Difference and other stories, by Derek Kirk Kim is a graphic novel of some of his early writings. I liked it for its humour, poignantcy, and art. His drawings portray a lot of emotion but are not over the top as some manga artists can be, which often detracts from the story. Kim is of Korean ancestry, but American. The 12 short stories are funny and quirky.
Fables, by Bill Willingham with a plethora of artists, is a series of comic books set in modern times NY. The Fables, -Boy Blue, Red Riding Hood, The 3 Little Pigs etc., have been banished from Fableland by 'The Adversary' and now have taken refuge on earth. They face all the problems of modern life as well as battling beings from off planet. Fables is brilliant. I have read 2: Animal Farm and March of the Wooden Soldiers, and I plan to read them all because I love the cleverness of the writing.
Oishinbo: Ramen and Gyoza, by Tetsu Kariya, art by Akira Hanasaki is a graphic novel all about food. I love it for that alone but also because it is so funny. A young reporter travels around the city searching for the best ramen and gyoza. He is lazy but has a great mind for food, and his nemesis is his father who is a great chef. The reporter teaches his friends about food with sound theory, another reason I love it.
Burn, by Camilla D'Erico, who is from Vancouver, is the artist and Scott Sanders is the writer. I liked it a lot. It is a futuristic graphic novel about a boy who gets attacked by a robot. Robots are trying to take over the world, and have tohe ability to repair themselves, but in this case the robot takes the body of the boy, Burn and creates a cyborg. Burn then shares his brain with the robot as they struggle to learn what they have become as a new being.
Hellboy, by writer Mike Mignola and a host of artists is a fantastic and dark comic billed as a horror story. It is a lenghty series of over-priced books so don't buy them new unless they are 1/2 price. 'Wake the Devil' is the one I just read and its great. Mignola likes to fight the Nazis. The art is beatiful, dark but brightly coloured and the stories are exciting as Hellboy, the spawn of Satan, but a good guy, smashes stuff up, including the bad guys. Strangley this set did not make many people's 'best of the decade' comics, although it certainly should.
Cairo, by G. Willow Wilson, art by MK Perker, is a graphic novel about genies, politics, and crime. It is an action packed love story, a mix of myth and reality, drawn in black and white with intricate shading and beautiful layouts. The sequences are well done; Perker uses many different techniques to link the forms together which add positively to the visual aspect. I loved it.
One Bad Rat, by Bryan Talbot, is a story of a teen girl who is running away from her abusive father. It is one of the most well respected graphic novels ever, for its homage to Beatrice Potter, the girl's love of reading, the way Talbot lovingly tells the story with his images and for the way the heroine is able to confront her parents. It is a difficlut story becuase it speaks of pain, but untimately of survival.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Dennis Foon
Another good Canadian kid, Dennis Foon, well he is now I guess after he realized that Vancouver was a far better place to live than Detroit.
Foon is a playwrite and novelist, who has done some interesting things in his life, see: http://www.dennisfoon.com/foon/biography.html.
Skud is told in the distinct voices of 4 very different teen boys. It is about bullying, gang violence, thoughtfulness, friendship, relationships and more. I really liked it. It is nice and short and easily read in a day or 2.
Green Thumb Theatre comes around to schools with plays about youth and their troubles, and they are well respected for doing so. Their work is valuable.
14
Hunger Games
I liked this book despite its lack of any redeeming qualities such as moral message or historical interest. It is plot driven, exciting, and a little distrubing since it involves children fighting to the death in a Roman gladiator type contest broadcast to a large audience via television. It was a bit of a guilty pleasure for me; I hoped the central character would win even though it meant all the other kids in the contest would have to die.
Katniss is not even that endearing as a character, being cool hearted and arrogant, but she has a strong sense of duty to her family, and is a fabulous hunter and provider even though she is only about 14 years old. They grow up fast in the future USA (called Panem), where the proles have no power to fight the power, and the government is cruel and faceless.
Suzanne Collins borrows her ideas freely from other and better books set in god-less societies such as Brave New World and 1984. These stories are somehow intriguing while they warn readers. Oh yeah, the movies Network, Mad Max, Death Race 2000, Running Man, They Shoot Horses Don't They? and many others assisted Collins I'm sure. Also, a book which I have not even heard of until just now called Battle Royale (1999) appears to be the plot of Hunger Games (2008). It is set in Japan and could be a metaphor for the ruthless competitiveness in society. It was made into a movie and then a graphic novel series. It was rejected for prizes because of its violent content.
I've noticed a popular trend to 'Lemony Snickett' character's names to parallel their personalities or their jobs. An example in Hunger Games is Effie Trinket, one of the sponsors for Katniss in the game. She has a pink wig, is shallow and self absorbed. She is a trinket. Also, Peeta is a baker, get it? Pita?
I am sometimes troubled by the portrayal of the post apocalytic future world by unimaginitive writers as being the USA. Governments have fallen, new borders, powers, and nations have been created, and yet too often they haven't expanded past the borders we know today. To me this either narrows the story's scope of the world, or points to the authors' ethnocentrism. I don't see the point of changing everything, but not really.
The reading level is YA, grade 7 and up, but the idea of an ultra-violent reality TV show pitting children against each other is adult level. It is quite the phenommenon really; consider this Hunger Games role play at a Manilla book fair. Its great! Kids go around pretending to kill each other for the games. I'm disturbed.
Katniss is not even that endearing as a character, being cool hearted and arrogant, but she has a strong sense of duty to her family, and is a fabulous hunter and provider even though she is only about 14 years old. They grow up fast in the future USA (called Panem), where the proles have no power to fight the power, and the government is cruel and faceless.
Suzanne Collins borrows her ideas freely from other and better books set in god-less societies such as Brave New World and 1984. These stories are somehow intriguing while they warn readers. Oh yeah, the movies Network, Mad Max, Death Race 2000, Running Man, They Shoot Horses Don't They? and many others assisted Collins I'm sure. Also, a book which I have not even heard of until just now called Battle Royale (1999) appears to be the plot of Hunger Games (2008). It is set in Japan and could be a metaphor for the ruthless competitiveness in society. It was made into a movie and then a graphic novel series. It was rejected for prizes because of its violent content.
I've noticed a popular trend to 'Lemony Snickett' character's names to parallel their personalities or their jobs. An example in Hunger Games is Effie Trinket, one of the sponsors for Katniss in the game. She has a pink wig, is shallow and self absorbed. She is a trinket. Also, Peeta is a baker, get it? Pita?
I am sometimes troubled by the portrayal of the post apocalytic future world by unimaginitive writers as being the USA. Governments have fallen, new borders, powers, and nations have been created, and yet too often they haven't expanded past the borders we know today. To me this either narrows the story's scope of the world, or points to the authors' ethnocentrism. I don't see the point of changing everything, but not really.
The reading level is YA, grade 7 and up, but the idea of an ultra-violent reality TV show pitting children against each other is adult level. It is quite the phenommenon really; consider this Hunger Games role play at a Manilla book fair. Its great! Kids go around pretending to kill each other for the games. I'm disturbed.
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