Books

So I finished Wizard's First Rule a couple nights ago. I must say I was disappointed. After 800 pages of building to the climax, everything gets neatly resolved in a tight little package in 20 pages. Man, would I love to have sat down with a red pen with Goodkind. He's got a great story, but he just buries it in a lot of unneccessary exposition and description and dialogue. The first 600 pages could have been shortened to at least 400. And the torture stuff that made me squirm earlier did amazing things to the character of Richard. In fact, it made me wonder why Goodkind waited 600 pages to do it. And his timeline was bizarre. First it seemed like winter began a mere week or two away from the start of the book. Then as we read about those two weeks (maybe even longer), Richard gets tortured and kidnapped for a month and it's still not winter. WTF?? So I won't be reading the next installment in that series. But I will thank Goodkind for making me squirm so I can try to do the same thing to my readers every once in a while. But I don't think even I can handle doing that for 70 pages.

So I bought the new Harry Potter book last night. Costco was selling it for nearly 50% off. Can't pass up a deal like that. And I really like the way it's started. The Dursleys have finally rounded out. Well, Uncle Vernon seems to be hesitant to leave his flat status, but way to go Aunt Petunia! Mark's teasing me that he knows who dies. Well, in 800 pages, I'll know too. :)