Wannabe Writer's Ink

Wannabe writer with hobby of art. Stay and you'll glimpse a small piece of my heart.

Recent Media Consumed

Books

  • The Case Against The Case for Christ (concurrent with a THIRD read of the Case for Christ) by Robert M. Price. I am put off by Price’s contemptuous tone in this book and it makes it difficult for me to pay attention to what he’s saying when he’s constantly attributing desperation and ignorance to the other side, switching it up from time to time with straight up mockery and derision. For someone who claims to want reach Christians with a truth they shouldn’t be afraid of, he doesn’t appear to care about slapping them in the face and insinuating their idiocy. After wading five hours into this book concurrent with Strobel’s book, I come away with the overall impression that The Case for Christ makes stronger and more coherent arguments. In the first couple of chapters of The Case Against, I felt like I was promised clear and obvious rebuttals but this was not delivered. After a while, the arguments got a little more coherent but were still full of venom and bile and occasionally reminded me of the type of logical stretches that frustrated me when reading some of Paul Copan’s apologetics. I bumped Price up to two stars for raising a few questions that are worth following up on. I wanted to grind through to the end so I could say I listened to it all, but I can’t. I spent five hours on this book and I would prefer to find someone more respectful with clearer reasoning when looking for an opposing voice. Maybe Bart Ehrman, but never again Price.
  • Vinegar Hill by A. Manette Ansay. I’m not completely sure what to make of this novel. I remember seeing its cover on the shelf many years ago, and perhaps trying to read it, but being turned off by how realistic a life it described at a time when I was more interested in fairies and dragons. Now I have read it in full and I can appreciate the mastery of description and setting this author has. On the other hand it is a grim, grim, grim three-generation-curse-type story. I wonder if people really think like these characters. I do not question that these sorts of terrible things happen, I just wonder if this is a way people pull together imagery in their heads as the things happen, or if it is author’s license to embellish. It is worth keeping for writing study, though it is not a tale I will return to often.
  • Guards! Guards!, Men At Arms, Feet Of Clay, Jingo, The Fifth Elephant, Night Watch, Thud!, Snuff by Terry Pratchett. I’m plowing through the Discworld series, which can be read either in order of the books put out or by character arcs, and I choose to go by character arcs. This arc follows Watch Commander Samuel Vimes, head of the City Watch (police) and boy howdy. I don’t know where to start. I could start by saying that the last one, Snuff, was just gorgeous and had an unexpected somberness to it. Watching Commander Vimes develop was a treat, especially as you really get to understand how much of an inner demon he has to keep on a leash. A thoroughly enjoyable character arc, and I look forward to starting up the next arc which is, apparently, about the Grim Reaper of Discworld, Death himself.
  • The Other Side of Darkness by Melody Carlson. A re-read of a book I’ve had for many many years. I don’t remember how I first found this book, but it was an anomaly that in the time period when I was mostly absorbing fantasy novels, I owned a Christian mental illness novel in my collection. It’s a look into a mother and wife struggling with OCD and anxiety. I’ve read this many times before, but this is the first time I read it while holding onto an idea that my husband and I worked out about the order of anxious thoughts: anxiety often comes first and out of nowhere, then it latches onto anything that could possibly constitute a cause whether it is correct or not. As I read this story, that concept was inherent throughout the book. It is a good novel, and a good reminder that my anxiety and obsessive thoughts are not accurate representations of reality.
  • Cool It by Bjorn Lomborg. I have studiously avoided the climate debate. I hear all kinds of crud about misinformation, denial, lying, and skewed data. I won’t stand here and say, “Here be the answer!” but this book has recaptured my attention and let me see that it is possible to look at this problem without losing your mind. I found this book because I’d seen a few interviews with the author, and the author is shockingly realistic about worldwide situations in a way that makes him seem optimistic. What I mean is, he presents the good and the bad that we the human race are facing side by side, and surprisingly there’s an awful lot of good in our present and near future. In this book, he takes apart several of the climate change data skews, but not with the intent to deny climate change. Global warming is, as he stresses over and over, very real and man-made. It is not, however, the end of the world, or even the most urgent problem we are facing, or even the place we can do the most good at the lowest cost. He takes that tack that we really need to be able to have rational conversation about the topic again, and that we are losing public attention on the topic due to increasing exhaustion and skepticism over scare tactics that do not reflect reality. That is the premise of this rather short book, taking a level look at global warming and putting it in its appropriate place on the list of concerns facing humanity. I ended this reading somewhat more hopeful, more willing to listen to the climate debates, and looking for more books written by Lomborg. A last thought: This is one of those books that seems to me to be a bridge-building book between two sides of a polarized debate, and because of that I'm seriously considering reading it on my Youtube channel.

Movies

  • Disenchanted. I have mixed feelings about this but mostly positive. The songs got better as the movie went on, and I particularly liked the theme of memories and the power of good memories. Given that a lot of sequels flump their landings, I think this did fairly well as a follow-up.
  • Avatar: Way of the Water. Gorgeous, and well worth the wait. More holes in the story than the first time, but I found it mostly forgivable given the jaw-dropping beauty on screen nearly every second of this lengthy film.
  • A Boy Called Christmas. I picked this up to watch because I was commissioned to make the scarf the main character wears. I… am very conflicted. The movie is clearly trying to go for the feeling of wonder that most Christmas movies evoke, but it keeps cutting itself off at the knees with cynical jokes. On the one hand it will say something deep and true, and the next moment it will laugh nervously at itself for saying such whimsical things. To me, it looked like the overall writing and character motivations disintegrated halfway through. I would not recommend this movie, especially if you're looking for a film to evoke the wonder of the season.
  • Pinocchio (Matteo Garrone). It’s very weird. Kind of interesting. It does, as far as I remember my last reading of the book, track very closely with the original story of Pinocchio which is a bit of an anomaly since a lot of retellings seem to track closer to Disney’s interpretation. I got over halfway through and while it is not a bad movie, I’m not interested enough to finish.
  • Pinocchio (Disney, live action). Another one I haven't finished. I'm starting to let myself stop watching a movie if I'm losing interest. This one is interesting to some extent and certainly not nearly as bad as I thought it would be, but it doesn't GRAB me or sink me into the story, so I'm giving myself permission to walk away.
  • Pinocchio (Guillermo Del Toro). I took leave of my senses and screeched at my sister in little text sound bites for about thirty minutes of intermittent messages about how good this movie was. I won’t give a whole lot of movies 10/10 but this is one that deserves it. I have never, ever seen Pinocchio told like this, and the stop motion is incredible, and the symbolism is breathtaking, and it just tickles me ten ways that this version was done by a master in horror movies and creature design.

Games

  • Dishonored. Talk about a grim game. I thought Skyrim was grim, but it’s got real competition here. You play as Corvo, bodyguard to the Empress of Dunwall and her daughter. The Empress is murdered and her daughter abducted, and you are framed for it. You escape and, with the help of a chaotic-neutral godlike figure and a strange clockwork heart that speaks with the Empress’ voice, you embark on a mission to clear your name and retrieve the Empress’ daughter. I played through trying not to kill anyone so I could reach the more hopeful ending, and I succeeded. Even so, the rampant corruption and betrayal in the story is painful. It’s so well written and it’s a lot of fun to play with the game’s mechanics to be as sneaky as possible. I don’t know if I could ever do a murderous play-through since it’s already so grim, but I’ll come back to it in a couple years and see. There are two extra DLC chapters that set you as the assassin who murdered the Empress. You are seeking redemption from the act, and you uncover a background plot. Creative and compelling, these are also worth playing if you go through Dishonored. I will definitely be playing the sequel game.