The Thing That Wouldn't Leave

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to The Magical Mystery Blog.

Today’s entry is a bit of anger induced speculation as to why the topic in question is even happening.

The “Fifty Shades of Grey” franchise is getting a sequel series entitled “Grey” and it will be from Christian Grey’s point of view.  It will be released as a paperback and ebook on June 18^th, 2015 – Christian Grey’s birthday.

Some of you may be rejoicing, others may be cringing and asking yourselves: why of all things, why. To be frank, I honestly do not know why, but it’s evident EL James isn’t done writing.

I honestly wonder if she will use this new venture in an attempt to justify for Grey’s abuse and how he treated Anna. It was already revealed in the first book that he did those things to her because he had a horrible encounter with a rapist. Instead of seeking professional help, he decided to become an obsessed BDSM sex addict. This does not atone for everything he did to Anna.

I also wonder if this new series will show any hopeful sign that James’ writing has improved. While I doubt it, a grammar girl like me can only hope that supposedly one of the best sellers of our generation can actually write well. As a writer myself, I understand that writers’ styles can change with experience and/or experimentation. But given what James has presented to the world so far, I doubt her writing style will change. I say this because if readers enjoyed her writing style, then she'll make certain to repeat it again just to please them.

James also failed to inform people how many books the “Grey” series will be. However, she did say that her idea behind this continuing series is that for every relationship there are always two sides to the story.

It’s not just for a relationship though, that concept applies to almost every single event that happens in life. A cashier and a customer get into a fight?  There’s two sides to that story. A crime scene? There’s two sides (if not more) to that story. There are tons of situations in life that have that ‘two sides to every story’ concept. Why should “Grey” or relationships in general be any different? If she chose not to pursue “Grey”, the Fifty Shades books could easily stand on their own.

James is also trying to utilize this new “Grey” series to lure in more of a male audience because apparently only 20% of men read “Fifty Shades of Grey”.  I’m not sure what the result will be of that venture, but we can only wait and see.

Regardless, it wouldn’t surprise me if there were more merchandise and movies to follow this series. So expect to once more see Christian Grey and “Fifty Shades of Grey” merchandise on store shelves in the future.

Thank you for reading today’s entry. If you enjoyed it, feel free to comment, share, and critique.

So tell me, what are your thoughts on this new “Grey” series?

Lestat Rises from the Coffin in a New Book

Good evening everyone and welcome to a most joyous entry at The Magical Mystery Blog.

Last night, a secret was revealed to the world, and caused it to explode with excitement. Bookworms swooned and shrieked like fans at a Paramore concert. For many, last night Lestat de Lioncourt, an eighteenth century vampire of unfiltered beauty and logic, returned to the world.

Ladies, prepare yourselves for one sexy vampire.

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On March 9^th, 2014 Anne Rice announced that on October 28^th of this year, Lestat would rise from his coffin in a new book entitled, “Prince Lestat”. This book will be the eleventh in her “Vampire Chronicles” series, which features the tales of Claudia, Louis, Armand, Lestat, and tons of other vampires that fans have come to know and love. “Prince Lestat” will show the characters coming to terms with what has happened in the past and what they are doing now.

Originally in 2002 Rice claimed that the “Vampire Chronicles” series had come to a close. This upset fans who wanted to see an aftermath of everything that had occurred in the popular 80s book series. However, at a Q & A session with readers, Rice claimed that she wanted to hear what Lestat had to say about the prior events.

Not only will this be the eleventh book in the “Vampire Chronicles” series, but it will also be the last book to finish it. Rice claims that it will be a “true” sequel to the third book of the series, “Queen of the Damned”.

Fellow readers and bookworms, let’s raise our cups in honor of a fantastic writer, bringing such a terrific character back from the grave. Like many of her books before, let’s anticipate the best, and brace ourselves as we read through the last pages of Lestat de Lioncourt.

What do you think the vampires are doing now and how do you think it will tie into the wondrous tale of “Queen of the Damned”? Feel free to comment and reblog, and as always feedback and followers are welcomed.

Ten Books to Tingle Your Spine

Greetings fellow readers and welcome to The Magical Mystery Blog.

In the spirit of Halloween, I will be listing my top ten reads perfect for this season of foliage and frights. I've often found that reading beneath a tree slowly losing its leaves is often peaceful for reading, especially during the Fall. Even the air gets colder which adds more suspense to whatever story you have at hand. Throughout October, ghosts stories are usually read to heighten the Halloween mood. But my list is a compilation of the haunted, the beautiful, the imaginative, and the damned.

10) Paul is Undead by Alan Goldsher

The title is a play on the famous Beatles hoax of ‘Paul is Dead’ and tells the story of the Liverpool Lads through various Q & A sessions by those who knew them.  Keeping in tune with the past year’s zombie craze, all The Beatles are turned into zombies except for Ringo Starr who is the only ninja in the group.  The book touches on major and minor events this band experienced from the banned image where babies (organs in this case) are draped all over their bodies for an album cover to the Ed Sullivan Show.  It also shows how the band met and how one by one they created a group that would climb to the toppermost of the poppermost.

This book did its job by living up to the zombie hype and even customized the zombies by means of region and bodily functions. Here zombies weren't just walking moaning remains. Instead, they had the power to hypnotize for a specific amount of time and had many other abilities. The images at best were unnerving a bit while the writing was all right. If anything, the zombies were designed more for comedic humor and gross effects. It wasn't that scary but it was good for laughs.

9) Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters by Jane Austen and Ben H Winters

It’s a monster mash when the classic tale of Sense and Sensibility meets the minions of Lord Cthulu. Set in a Bioshock-esque setting of hidden secrets and untamed sea monsters, the Dashwood sisters set out on a quest to find true love. Following the original Sense and Sensibility plot, the only difference is the setting and the half human/half beasts.

This story lived up to the hype of combining a classic with something new and unique. It’s a common form of literature nowadays. This book is a bit unnerving, imagining beautiful girls dating savage unsavory sea beasts. The imagery paints a nautical romantic picture, sure to give your imagination quite a treat. It’s an okay read, perfect for  the chilly months to come.

8) Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz 

To be honest, there’s really nothing horrifying about the writing of this book. The stories are average at best and don’t really pack much fear factors behind them. The only story I can remember that confused me for the longest time until my college years was a witch turning a woman into a horse and riding her. Seriously, I do not see how that’s scary. If anything, it sounds like some lesbian porn gone wrong.

However, I will admit the pictures of this book still haunt me to this day. I have no idea what sort of drug the illustrator, Stephen Gammel, was on or what traumatic event occurred throughout his life to make them draw the things in this book. But good Lord, I have never seen anything so terrifying.

Some people are able to withstand the illustrations and to them I give my utmost respect. But for those like me who can’t, welcome to the club. If you want to know what I am talking about then Google the book yourself. I would post the illustrations here but I’m too mortified to do so.

7) Gill’s All Fright Diner by A Lee Martinez

Duke is your average werewolf and Earl is your every day vampire. While passing through Rockwood, they come across a diner, and decide to grab something to eat. However, no sooner they bite into their meals the trouble begins. With zombies on their heels, a ghost looking for love in their heads, and so many other otherworldly oddities, the duo are bound to one dynamic adventure.

This book is just like a cat: quirky and fun, even while it scratches up your arms. It has humor like that of Paul is Undead but with better writing and a goulash of fantastic concepts. While there are no illustrations scattered throughout the pages, none are needed. This book provides enough ghoulishly glorious imagery to satisfy your imagination.

6) Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury

It’s a beautiful Fall day in a Midwestern town and it just so happens that the carnival is in town. But this isn't your typical carnival of shimmering lights and specialty foods. It’s a carnival from the other side where the owner bears tattoos of his victims, a carousel has the ability to progress your age or decrease it, and unusual beings roam the grounds.

Two boys, Jim Nightshade and William Halloway, are drawn to this mysterious carnival. With every visit to the fairground they find themselves more attracted to the strange, the beautiful, and the dangerous. Not only does this story boggle the mind and raise some goosebumps with its terrifying imagery and unique characters, it also tells the coming of age story between two youths.  With every chapter, they struggle with the changes which are ultimately resolved in the end. If you want to know how, go pick up this book.

5) Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

It’s the classic horrifying story of a scientist creating something from out of a crypt. With the brain of a deceased citizen and a lifeless body, man plays God, and gives this monstrosity life. Bored of his days in the lab, the beast escapes to discover life, to find himself, and to understand the ways of man.

When written in 1817, it was originally started as a horror story. The technology and even the idea of giving life to something dead was terrifying to people in the past. Nowadays, we just see it as something awesome. Today, some people may see this story as the cornucopia of creeps. I’ll admit that it does send shivers down the spine at times but often I find it interesting as a struggle for one to find himself in the world. Frankenstein still lives to this day as an inspiration for zombie tales and satisfies those who love a good read. 

4) Interview With a Vampire by Anne Rice

Before the Meyerpires hit the bookshelves, Anne Rice gave a whole new meaning to the term ‘vampire’.  Taking the old fashioned ideals of a vampire, this famous writer morphed them into her own breed of creatures who were not always evil, and who didn’t always enjoy draining a victim of their blood. She wrote an entire series surrounding the lives of vampires, making them more human than what they are.

Interview With a Vampire begins on a quiet night in New Orleans, where a vampire decides to tell his life story to a journalist. The result is a lavish book filled to the brim with what a vampire’s life consists of. It is more than just running around, drinking unsuspecting victims’ blood. It is a life of death, love, fortune, and danger.  Written to tingle the spine and chill the senses, this story oozed with horror but dripped with details, and strong character personalities. 

3)  Pet Sematary by Stephen King

When the Creeds purchase a new house, they have no idea what they’re in for. Just behind their house lies a cemetery that has magical reviving powers. However, there’s a side effect to this seemingly wonderful idea. Those who return from this graveyard may not be the same person or creature as they were before.

Other than the cemetery’s ability, this book shows the creepy transformation of the characters. The scares really don’t come towards the midway point of the literary piece. But the scares are weaved in wonderfully with the plot of a family living with a terribly mystifying cemetery in their backyard.  

2)  The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaimen

A popular author of modern times, Neil Gaimen wrote this book with moreso plot than scares. The plot revolves around a boy who was placed in a graveyard and raised by local ghosts. He was left there to avoid suffering his parents’ fate of being murdered by a serial killer. The rest of the book consists of him growing up into a very strange but enchanted boy who sees many things.

This book is beautifully written and extremely interesting. It gives a new life to spirits, showing their lifestyles, abilities, and even customs. Gaimen shapes the typical ghosts we've come to know through urban myths and legends. He gives them personalities with touches of their past life. He creates his own specters that are memorable and unique.

1) The Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk

This book is not for the weak of stomach or faint of heart. Since I qualify as both of those, I could not handle this piece of literature for too long. It begins with some strangers getting on a bus and each chapter is their back story. The first few chapters analyzing each character were gut wrenching at best and triggered the gag reflex a bit, but nothing serious. The fourth chapter is when everything goes downhill.

Even my classmates warned me about the dreaded tortures of chapter four but I ignored them. That was a complete mistake. For men, chapter four will make you cringe the most and ladies, although you’re not a man, you just may vomit at this chapter. The wording is intricately detailed throughout the book, adding more scariness to your stomach sinking into your toes. The details put more thoughts into your head, which add to the fear building up in your bones, and boggling your brain.

After nearly tossing my lunch at the fourth chapter, I put my book down, and admitted to my fellow peers that I couldn't bring myself to read past it. This was a defeat on my end because I was on the last page of chapter four before crossing the threshold into chapter five.

So what do you think? Any books you enjoy reading during the Fall? Feel free to comment and as always, followers and feedback are welcome. 

Drunk on Literature

Greetings everyone and welcome to another start of the week here at The Magical Mystery Blog.

As I've mentioned before, I love to read. Reading for me is what breathing is to every living thing. Without it, we would merely die and cease to exist as nothing more than a cadaver.

I have a wide taste in various types of writing, including poetry. One of my favorite poets is Emily Dickinson, a recluse from Manhattan. Brought up as a Christian, she entertained herself with mythologies, biblical tales, and other stories to fuel her poems. During her introverted life, she read and wrote like a religion.

Like any other curious child, I find her book one day while browsing through our school’s library. Since then I have been hooked to her writing, alongside Edgar Allen Poe’s, Henry David Thoreau’s, and many others. Growing up, I often found translating poetry to be fun. To this day, I still find this activity to be fun.

Today I will be doing a rough translation of Emily Dickinson’s poem,” I taste a liquor never brewed.” Below is the poem.

I taste a liquor never brewed,

From tankards scooped in pearl;

Not all the vats upon the Rhine

Yield such an alcohol!

Inebriate of air am I,

And debauchee of dew, 

Reeling, through endless summer days, 

From inns of molten blue.

When landlords turn the drunken bee 

Out of the foxglove's door, 

When butterflies renounce their drams, 

I shall but drink the more!

Till seraphs swing their snowy hats, 

And saints to windows run, 

To see the little tippler 

Leaning against the sun!

The first verse is the introduction to the poem. Dickinson tells us she tasted a brew that’s not normally drunk in a tankard. A tankard is a specific type of drinking mug that is sometimes a pearl shade. Yet liquor or any type of alcohol is not brewed or made in a tankard, it goes through a fermentation process at a factory or brewery. The tankard is crafted (or scooped) to give it a pearl shade. Apparently the brew itself is not your average brew; it's a special one. We do not know what she means as of yet.  

She continues to explain how powerful this specific type of alcohol she drinks is. It is so strong that the vats on the Rhine cannot stop it.  The Rhine in this poem is being referred to as the Rhine River that stretches from Andermatt, Switzerland, cuts through Germany, and spills out at Rotterdam, Netherlands into the North Sea.  There are tons of towns that rest on the Rhine River in Germany and some of them even have breweries. These locations have vats in them of various beverages. Dickinson is saying that the alcohol of her drink is so powerful that the vats of the Rhine River can’t yield how strong her drink is.

In the second verse, Emily informs her audience that she is drunk on air, a degenerate of dew, and is reeling through the summer. From how it appears, she is not inebriated on any sort of physical alcoholic drink but rather nature. She is heavily drinking air, breathing it every day of her life, and enjoying it. She is a “debauchee of dew” (Dickinson); she constantly indulges in the morning dew as an alcoholic does to alcohol. The air and dew have her reeling throughout the days “from inns of Molten blue” (Dickinson). These inns that Dickinson describes could be the sky which at some points during the day has a molten blue shade.

In the third verse, Dickinson uses quotations to emphasize some of her subjects. Throughout this verse, she treats nature like a bar of people and their actions involving alcohol. In the first pair of lines, she refers to a bee as a person getting kicked out of a bar for having too much to drink. The insect is kicked out of the foxglove’s (a flower) door, which is the opening of the flower. The “Landlord” in this case is the flower itself because it has filled the bee to a great degree. In the next pair of lines, Dickinson refers to butterflies giving up their “drams” (nectar); much like an alcoholic would give up their drinking addiction. But as to where the butterflies give up their drams, Dickinson absorbs more of her particular drink.

In the final verse, she claims that she will continue to drink until she attracts the attention of saints and seraphs. These two specific figures are found in one place: Heaven. This could be an implication of her Christian upbringing because angels and saints are thoroughly mentioned in that religion. However, the only way she’ll see these figures is when she is deceased. This concept flows into her final two lines beautifully. Since she is dead in the first pair of lines, she could easily be “the little Tippler leaning against the Sun” (Dickinson) because she has joined the seraphs and saints in Heaven, which is close to the Sun.

So readers, what do you think of this famous poem? Who are your favorite poets? Feel free to leave a comment and followers are always welcomed. 

Beauty - A Deeper Look into Belle

Good morning…evening…afternoon, whenever you read this, and welcome to The Magical Mystery Blog.

Once again I apologize for this being such a late post. My planning skills failed me and I worked late on Friday and an early shift today. Because of my work hours, I didn't have enough time to finish this week's entry until later today. But enough of the past, let’s get on to the present shall we?

As my readers know, I love books. If anyone trapped me in the Pandorica or on an island and filled it with books, I’d be content until I felt like escaping.

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What? It's opening? Forget that, I'm still on Act II of Hamlet.

While I have read tons of books, it’s always hard for me to select my favorite one. Asking me to decide what my favorite book is, is like trying to choose between puppies or kittens: it’s just not possible.  However, I often find that thousands of book titles emerge in my head, and battle for the title of being my favorite book. Macbeth tries to murder the competition while Shibumi fights with The Coachman Rat. It’s a giant literary mess that my mind goes through every time that question is proposed. Yet through the quarrels one book always seems to emerge unscathed. This surviving book is none other than Robin McKinley’s Beauty. 

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Not only was this McKinley’s first retelling but it was her debut book. Published in 1993, Beauty is a re-imagining of Beauty and the Beast but with some changes. For starters, the story is told by our Belle character, Beauty. However, it doesn't begin with her singing about her hometown or entering the Beast's palace. Instead it starts with her telling the audience about her childhood and growing up to be a scholarly plain Jane. From her narration we also receive details about her family, especially her siblings, Grace and Hope as well as Beauty herself.  

Another change in Beauty is that the readers never receive a fleshed out description of the Beast character. I enjoyed this greatly because it allows the imagination to do some creating. We can personalize this Beast to how we please as the story goes on. The details of the palace and the vague images of the Beast help us to understand what type of person he is.

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I don't know about you guys, but the Beast comes off as Jack Skellington to me. Tall, immortal, intelligent. Come on, what Beauty doesn't love that?

Since this was McKinley’s first book, there are a few flaws. One issue is that Grace and Hope sometimes feel like the same person. They are easily interchangeable but become more defined with the challenges they face. The second flaw I find is the ending. While I won’t spoil it for you, I will say that it feels very rushed when compared to the rest of the book. Beauty is drawn out, pinpointing each detail about everything, fleshing out the characters, and creating magnificent imagery. When it comes to the end, it’s only in two to three pages where everything major happens.  I feel as though that the events that happen at the end should have been given the same, slow churned experience.

But what I enjoy the most about Beauty is that it has a lesson that can be taught throughout the years. It teaches readers to accept yourself and be yourself, even when you undergo change. This change could be for the better or the worse but in the end, you will still be you. There can only be one you in this universe; no one else can replicate you because they do not have the same qualities that only you have. You must accept yourself and be yourself to your full extent.

Growing up, Beauty accepts herself as the less attractive member of the family who constantly reads. She is thirsty for knowledge and absorbs it like a sponge takes in water. At the palace, she begins to change, and deny mental aspects of herself she discovers with the aid of the Beast. As she sees more of herself, she still remains the same clever, intelligent, and logical woman.

I give this book five out of five stars because of its lesson, its attention to detail and depth, and its ability to stay true to the original story of Beauty and the Beast while giving it a new light. Beauty and the Beast has always been my favorite fairy tale and this book does an excellent job of retelling it.