Anthem by Ayn Rand

               

Ayn Rand was one of the most controversial political writers of her day. I’ve been interested in  reading some of her literature, but her thousand plus page book, Atlas Shrugged, seemed a little daunting, so I settled for her shorter novel Anthem. Anthem seemed to sum up her philosophy of objectivism in a nice little cocoon. 

                Objectivism is a philosophy created and advocated by Ayn Rand. Her stance was that one’s moral compass should be what makes one happy and the only way to achieve happiness is through non-invasive and laissez faire government. 

Anthem is set in a dystopian society; the government has eradicated the word “I” and every -citizen works for the advancement of “we”. Equality 7-2521 is the hero of this book who looks and sees flaws in this type of society. The whole book is written in journal format as Equality seeks to understand why his society is flawed, how he breaks away from it, and his discovery of the word “I”.                            

I agree with what this book advocates. I came to the last two chapters and a bitter bile raised in my mouth at these words:

“Many words have been granted me, and some are wise and some are false, but only three are holy: “I will it””

and

“My happiness is not a means to any end. It is the end. It is its own goal. It is its own purpose.”

and

“And now I see the face of a god, and I raise this god over the earth, this god whom men have sought since man came into being, this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride. This god this one word:

“I”

I truly believe that we as people will never achieve true happiness through pursuit of our own gain, but we achieve happiness through giving our lives to something bigger than ourselves, God and service to others.  Our will should never be the ultimate end. Even Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane prayed “Not my will; but thine be done.” 

Some may argue that if we were to live in a society that Ayn Rand advocates we would be able to pursue happiness like religious happiness, but let’s be realistic not everyone would pursue religious happiness. Our society would be total chaos. There has to be some form of government like John Locke advocated or we would all be in a state of nature (a.k.a chaos). 

                However, I don’t advocate a society like the one that Equality lived in, because I don’t think that all our actions should be dictated. But I would say that if we lived in a society that took away every freedom except our freedom to worship and serve God as we choose I don’t think that it would be right to be insubordinate to that government. Jesus said render unto Ceasar’s what is Ceasar, and also that we are to lead quiet lives. 

This book really made me question if I wanted to read Atlas Shrugged as I had planned on at the beginning of this summer. Her ideas seem selfish and self-serving in my eyes. I also feel that no matter how much we petition and advocate for a change in government; it will never be perfect. We are humans and flawed; therefore, everything of our making and design will be flawed as well.

Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine

Ella is blessed? No, I believe the right word would be cursed. When she was but an infant, the fairy Lucinda bestowed on her the gift of obedience; which, quickly turned into a curse. Whenever somebody commands something no matter who it is – Ella has to obey.

                Instead of being humble and full of servitude, Ella’s curse makes her rebellious and delightfully spunky. Ella’s kind mother dies leaving her to be watched by a callous father. Who in turn marries Dame Olga for money. Therefore Ella has to learn to put up with an evil step mother and her terrible daughters, Hattie and Olive. Does this sound familiar to you? You guessed it! It’s another Cinderella story, just Cinderella with a twist.      

                Ella tries to find Lucinda to break the curse, because her life becomes quite unbearable when Hattie discovers her secret. But it is to no avail. Ella will just have to figure out how to break the curse herself. And along the way she’s going to fall in love with a prince, save a kingdom, and have to get home all before the clock strikes twelve!

                Parent’s don’t hesitate to pick up a copy of this for your young daughters; this book is clean, innocent fun.

Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick

Our society is in a total vampire hype thanks to Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight series. It’s ridiculous how much teen literature is out there about the living dead (however, the latest word on the street is that mermaids are going to be the next big thing. So we’re just going to have literature about creatures who don’t wear enough clothing to make socks for a flea). And I absolutely refuse to read another vampire series, because I really can’t stand Twilight. Anyway’s sometimes I just like to read brainless literature, and I thought to myself “Self, why not try this book that your kindle keeps recommending to you?” and then I found it for four dollars at a book store. Steal! And then I read it, and I face palmed myself. 

So, instead of vampires this book is about angels – fallen angels. So the plot… well there’s not much of one. Nora our heroine (?) gets forced to be lab partners with a drop dead dreamy hunk (twilightish????  I think so!) named Patch. Except this hunk of a guy seems to  know everything about her, and he won’t tell her anything about himself. Nora and her best friend Vee go to great lengths to find out anything about this mysterious dream guy. Nora attempts to not fall for this hunk of a guy, but she falls flat on her face. Her little heart can’t stop fluttering whenever Patch is around.

About the same time that Patch comes on the scene, two suave and debonair guys also appear. Elliot pretends to be interested in Nora, and quiet Jules shows an interest in Vee. Of course, Patch doesn’t like that and flirts incessantly with Nora. Then Nora realizes that a man in a ski mask is stalking her and her first thought is mysterious Patch. She tries to confront him, but it’s hard to confront someone with a ridiculous amount of self-confidence. Nora’s life is put in danger repeatedly and then she finally finds out the truth. Patch is a fallen angel who wants to be human. According to the book of Enoch the only way for him to do that is to sacrifice a female who is the desecendant of his vassal nephilim (which is a half human half angel being), and guess who that is? Nora. Oh yeah so he wants to kill her (sound faintly twilightish again???).  Will Patch’s desire to kill Nora outweigh his lust – excuse me - love? Guess you’ll have to read and find out… or just go pick up a copy of a chick flick worth reading. 

This book was relatively clean there weren’t any sexual scenes (except for a couple steamy kisses) and I didn’t catch any bad language except for one use of word h---. Patch does make a few innuendo’s toward Nora which are totally inappropriate (I would smack a guy across the face if he flirted with me the way Patch flirts with Nora). And Nora’s best friend Vee is very immoral. She basically thinks of guys like pieces of meat. 

I really wouldn’t recommend this book to anyone. It’s just not worth the few hours that it will take you to read it, unless you’re in the mood for an extremely sappy romance with no plot.

The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale

              I tutor in the library at school, and every time I come across a student who enjoys reading I pick their brains for good books to read. One of my clients suggested that I read the children’s novel The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale. I’m so glad I did.

              This book took me back to my childhood, because it was exactly like the stories that I enjoyed reading as a little girl. It was simply a fairytale. Shannon Hale is apparently known for taking fairy tales that are not well known and embellishing them into good, clean stories for children. The Goose Girl was actually a story written by the Brothers Grimm, but I must say I like Shannon Hale’s version much better. 

                I think that one of the reasons that I enjoyed Shannon Hale’s story so much was her ability to produce beautiful narration. Let me just give you a couple of examples of passages that caught my breath (and believe me there were many): 

                Ani looked toward the stream and held a branch of her beech tree as she might hold a hand. The river birches were leafing brilliant – hundreds of thin, gold coins dangling from their arms. It was perfect as though their green leaves had been a falsehood all those months and just now the trees showed their realness, their pure autumnal yellows. Ani felt a stirring, a hope, a winged thing waking up in her chest and brushing her heart with its feathers. 

and

                It was not a game of young warrior testing their strength or a match of pride, but a bout of death, each warrior watching his opponent’s eyes, fighting to end that life, their swords desperate vessels of their will. With each blow the other hoped to meet flesh, and each blow brought sword on sword, and the clanging was a wicked rhythm. 

                I’m such a nerd, but I just couldn’t help but love how beautifully this book was written; it kind of made me want to cry when it was over. But guess what? There’s a sequel! And I’ve got it sitting on my shelf!

 There are three languages: the language of people-speaking, the language of animal-speaking, and the language of nature-speaking (but nobody knows how to talk to nature anymore). Ani is the princess of Kildenree, but she thinks she is an awful ruler, because she does not have the language of people-speaking like her commanding queen mother or her controlling lady-in-waiting Selia. Ani is very different from others because she has the gift of animal-speaking which is nearly non-existent. Ani is particularly fond of talking to birds and horses. However, horses are quite difficult as you must hear them whisper their true names after they are born to be able to talk to them. Since, most people are resilient to different; Ani’s mother tries to smother Ani’s abilities by keeping her locked away inside the palace and away from the animals that Ani dearly loves to talk to. After Ani’s father dies, she is forced by her mother to go to their rival country Bayern to marry the Prince to make peace between the two countries. 

                On the way to Bayern, Ani is betrayed and overthrown by Selia, her lady in waiting. Ani escapes to the capitol city in Bayern and watches as Selia struts in and claims to be the princess. Ani is unsure of what to do since she does not have the gift of people-speaking and is not manipulative like Selia is. Therefore, Ani begins to work for the king and tend to his geese; waiting for the right moment to make her case known. Along the way Ani learns to stand up for hers, how to connect with people, and how to love another person. 

                I can’t emphasize enough how clean and good this book was. I would recommend this book for girls (and boys if they’ll read a book about a princess) 10 and up.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

I heard about this book when it was first published and Stephanie Meyer was a big fan of it, so I automatically shied away from it. I really didn’t want to read something as shallow as the Twilight Series. But I have been hearing a lot of hype about this book online and among various friends; I figured I’d better give it a shot and see what it was all about.  Low and Behold, it was only five buck in the Kindle store! 

Anyway, I really liked this book! It was so refreshing to see a main stream literature that was actually pretty decent. Just a warning for parents this is not a good book for young kids. They will absolutely not get it! 

This book is about a dystopian society that reminds me a lot of the Roman Empire. The setting of the story is in futuristic North America where the U.S. has crumbled and has been split up into thirteen districts (the thirteenth was destroyed trying to revolt against the totalitarian government.)Every year a country called the Capitol holds the “Hunger Games”. Each district has a boy and girl (between the ages of 12 and 18) chosen to represent them in the annual games. They compete in a vast arena and have to face surviving in the wilderness.  Oh and did I mention the games are a fight to the death. Only one person can survive the games. 

The sad thing about the Hunger Games is that you can’t volunteer to be in them. Once you turn twelve, your name is put into the cup for your district, and then you get enough grain to feed your family for about a month. And as you get older your name gets put in more times depending on your age. You can even add your name multiple times in exchange for more grain, just so you don’t starve. The heroine of the story, Katniss, from District 12, puts her name in multiple times every year just so she can supplement her familys food supply with her illegal hunting.  Katniss world is shocked when the day of the reaping comes (the day that candidates are chosen for the Hunger Games) and her little sister, Prim, is picked! Katniss valiantly steps forward to take her baby sisters place, and along with her the boy Peeta is selected to go with her to the Hunger Games.

It is sickening the way that people in the Capitol respond to the Hunger Games which is exactly like the games of Rome when gladiators were bated against each other. They eat up watching these children fight, bleed, suffer, and eventually die all for the sake of entertainment. And the ultimate ulterior motive is so that the Capitol can reinforce the idea that to resist them is futile. 

The whole message of the book is do you resist a government that could crush you, or do you stand by and watch it suffocate the way you live? Peeta wistfully tells Katniss,  “I keep wishing I could think of a way to show the Capitol they don’t own me. That I’m more than just a piece in their Games.” (figurative and literal! Did you catch that? ;-)) Katniss and Peeta both set out and without realizing it defy what the Games aren’t meant to signify. First Katniss, befriends another contestant while in the arena, and comes to call her a friend. When her little friend dies she weeps over her body and sings softly. Showing compassion that another human being has died, and she despises the fact that people have to die to survive. The Capitol is not impressed; they expect the contestants to be happy when another contestant is dead because it just brings them closer to victory. And I can’t tell you what happens at the end of the book, because it’s the ultimate defiance, so just go buy a copy and read it. My review isn’t really doing this book justice. 

Rebellion isn’t talked about in this book, but I definitely will be in the sequel (which I think I’m going to have to go get very soon!). The book does have a bit of a love story between Peeta and Katniss. Typically, I can’t stand romances where to girl is oblivious to the fact that the guy likes her. I just want to say “What a ding-a-ling?!” But this story I actually understood why Katniss wasn’t sure. She is never sure if Peeta’s affections are real or if he’s playing some angle to stay alive in the games. However, that doesn’t stop her from showering him with quite a few kisses (not somethin’ I’d be doing if I wasn’t sure what a guys motives were).

Objectionable Content for Parents

 -Katniss has to undress fully for a designer so he can design her costumes for the Games

-One character dies a pretty awful death. It made me a little queasy.

Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech

Don't judge a man until you've walked two moons in his moccasins.

I have extremely mixed feelings about this book. I read it when I was really young and forgot pretty much everything that happened in it.  I just re-read it, and I can't really remember why I loved it so much. Definitely an interesting story, and while I'm usually able to figure out what's going to happen in a book; I was completely thrown for a loop at the end of Walk Two Moons (maybe I just didn't want what happened to happen).

The basic premise of the story is about a girl named Salamanca (Sal) Tree Hiddle (I know what a name) who is on a road trip with her grandparents through the northern parts of the United States. They are going to visit Sal's mother who is supposedly in Idaho. Throughout the book, Sal is telling her grandparents the story of her friend Phoebe Winterbottom. Sal realizes that while she is telling her Grandparents Phoebe's story that she is telling her grandparents her story as well.

After Sal's mother leaves her and her father, they move to a new town where Sal befriends Phoebe who lives next to a lady named Ms. Cadaver (yes, like a dead body) who is Sal's dad's new "friend". Phoebe is convinced that Ms. Cadaver is a murderer who has buried her husband in the backyard (Phoebe has a vivid imagination). Phoebe's mom also starts receiving strange visits from a young man who Phoebe is convinced is a lunatic (I take it back - Phoebe is paranoid). At the same time that this starts happening, strange messages start appearing like:

"Don't judge a man until you've walked two moons in his moccasins"


"In the course of a lifetime, what does it matter?"


"You can't keep the birds of sadness from flying over your head, but you can keep them from nesting in your hair"

Phoebe is, of course, convinced that the lunatic is behind it. However, soon Phoebe's mother takes off for a few days without telling anyone where she is going, and Phoebe is devastated. She tries to cope by saying her mother was kidnapped, but she just feels abandoned by a mother who she thought loved her. Sal's heart goes out to Phoebe, because she still harbors fresh wounds for her mother deserting her. In the end Phoebe's mother comes back, but Sal's doesn't and we finally learn why. But I can't tell you that! Because it would give away the ending.

I think one of the reasons that I love this book is because it is filled with so many quirky characters (and I love quirky people). There's the paranoid Phoebe who makes me laugh. Sal's grandparents are a laugh throughout the story, because they never do what they are supposed to do. Like in one scene, they are visiting Ol' Faithful, and Gram (Sal's grandmother) tries to go under the guardrails to get a closer look. Gram also exclaims "Huzza! Huzza!" when she get's excited about something, and Gramps (Sal's grandfather) always calls his wife "gooseberry"; which I think is sweet. Then there's the english teacher Mr. Birkway who is described as having a "few squirrels in the attic of his brain". And finally Sal talks about her mother, and you can't help but like her. In one flash back scene, Sal talks about her mother and how much she loved the outdoors. She watched her mother throw her arms around a tree and kiss it. I know it sounds weird; you'll just have to read it. I guess I appreciate people who just enjoy life, and Sal's mother, Sugar, is one of those people.

Objectionable Content for Parents
-First off, Sal never prays to God in the book instead she prays to trees. In the book she says "This was easier than praying directly to God. There was nearly always a tree nearby." Sal like her mother loves trees. I don't get why praying to a tree is easier than praying to God - I guess it's supposed to make for a better story????????
- In the book it says that Gramps cussed when a driver cut him off. Gram's doesn't like it and threatens to go off with a fictional character called the "egg man" who apparently she ran off with for three days earlier in her marriage, because she couldn't stand Gramps cussing. However, she tells Sal, "Don't tell your grandfather, but I don't mind a few hells and damns. Besides, that egg man snored to beat the band."
-In addition, Gramps uses the euphemism "gol' darn" several times in the book and "Lordy".
-The word "hell" is used once.
-When Phoebe's mother comes back she brings the "lunatic". Who we find out she had before she was married to Mr. Winterbottom. Mr. Winterbottom never knew that she had a child out of wedlock. They don't go into details, but Ms. Winterbottom keeps repeating "I'm not respectable!"
-Sal kisses a boy named Ben a couple of times. ( I like how it's described - "I felt like a newly born horse who knows nothing, but feels everything")

Once again, I don't feel like this is a good book for young children. This books deals with feelings of desertion, being satisfied with what one has in life, not judging someone until you know the full story,  overcoming grief, and dealing with death. The ending of the book will leave you tearing up, reaching for the tissues, and maybe gasping when the full story is revealed. I guess, this book can just be summed up by saying life doesn't always go how we planned, but still find joy in the small things, and "that's the way it is. Huzza! Huzza!"