The Road

I'm loving The Road by Catherine Jinks. It's not just murderously scary, it's also supernaturally spooky - not my usual story tape scene. But it is very good. It is so tense and absorbing that even my partner - who often pretends to find story tapes annoying - has been caught listening with interest.

I'm not surprised because I am a big Catherine Jinks fan. When I was a teenager and going through my "All YA is beneath me, because I've read Wuthering Heights" stage I made an exception for Catherine Jinks' Pagan series. I loved those books with an hysterical passion that saw me ending friendships if someone didn't like them, or even just didn't love them.

When I was a teenager I believed that the books you liked defined your identity. (In my view, anyone who didn't like reading wasn't even a proper person.)

It reminds me of the great video serious Talking Faiths presented by the Immigration Museum. Students pair up to talk about their faith and identity. All the participants are very respectful and keen not to judge the other's perspective.

But in this video there is a sudden moment of discord. Two girls are cheerfully discussing Harry Potter (1:50) when it is revealled that one of them is a Twilight fan and the other one isn't. No amount of awkward giggling can disguise the fact that this budding inter-faith friendship has hit a rocky patch. The Jewish/Muslim thing was fine but the Twilight/non-Twilight divide might be a breaking point.

Fortunately later in the video they're back on less controversial topics and chatting happily about wearing the hijab (4:35).

So my point is - if anyone doesn't like The Road then I don't like you. (Same goes for John Brown Rose and the Midnight Cat.)

Does my head look big in this?

I currently listening to a book by Randa Abdel-Fattah about Amal, a Melbourne school-girl who decides to wear the hijab full time. The book has the excellant title, Does my Head Look Big in This?

I enjoyed listening to it yesterday as I took up the baking burden and made the weekly muffins.

As usual, once the muffins were in the oven I was off and Googling about the book and author. That's how I discovered the website Photoshop Disasters and this photo. And that's how I lost another hour of my life looking at pointless shit on the internet.

Getting ahead of myself

While I was working my core on my fit ball (hilarious! that is actually true!) I started listening to Joel and Cat Set the Story Straight, by Nick Earls and Rebecca Sparrow.

The book is dual perspective, with Joel's story written and read by Nick Earls and Cat's story written and read by Rebecca Sparrow. Happily, both authors do a good job as narrators.

The plot involves Joel and Cat writing a tandem story for an English assignment, with each of them taking turns to write a paragraph. This makes me extremely curious about the writing process for the book.

Questions occur: Did Earls and Sparrow use the tandem method to write Joel and Cat? Did they map out the plot beforehand? Did either of them make the other one change bits? Are they on together?

When I read books I am a terrible skipper to the ender. I frequently go to the last page or flick through to see if a character keeps being mentioned. With story tapes you theorhetically can't do that. Except, you sort of can if you Google the book, or look at reviews on Goodreads, or look up the author on Wikipedia etc. Recently I have not been able to resist reading spoiling reviews/interviews/articles of the books I've been listening to.

So I am determined not to impact my experience of Joel and Cat set the Record Straight by reading about it. Dammit, I will form my own opinions of the work, and let the plot unfold at its own pace.

I am finding it hard to resist the temptation to Google. Very hard. Like my core. (That is not true, core is not hard despite agressive once a week fit ball regime.)

Undine

I'm listening to Undine by Penni Russon read by Melissa Eccleston. I am immature and obvious so I will refer to the main character as Undies, even though I like her and the book.

Undies is a Year 11 girl living in Hobart who seems to be discovering that she has nautically-inspired magical powers. (I'm only 2 discs in so there's a small possibility that the book is really about the devastating effects of mental illness.)

I am enjoying Undies' story very much. Apparently it's a trilogy and I can see myself listening to the next two books as well. I am extremely impressed with the narrator Melissa Eccleston - she adds just enough inflection and intonation to make it interesting without being distracting.

You can listen to a sample here.

The only thing that I don't like about this recording is the music (you can hear it at the start of the sample). Actually I think the music is quite appropriate, but I keep getting a a fright when it starts because it is a bit jarring and spooky. Mind you, I am easily scared by music, which is why I can't watch Doctor Who.