Tara ,'Empty Places'
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
Loved, loved, loved it ... until the end, and then I was just crushed by the stupidity of the ending.
Passage. I spent the last 100 pages intrigued because I thought she was going to pull out something brilliant at the last minute, but nope. It just. keeps. going.
I think Passage was a hard book to end - the actual end was okay, but the getting there was, as you say, tiring. I think the book needed a lot of editing that it didn't get. It could easily have been 2/3 as long, and better for it.
In Passage, I kept getting hung up on the timing. Because the one character is experiencing something that happened very fast, and the other characters were living through weeks or months, and yet the chapters were intertwined, and it confused me terribly.
I can't say that Passage wasn't ambitious, but I don't think it really worked all that well.
Was it in Natter that someone suggested numbering the conversations? Passage = #28
eta: Though I hasten to add, I agree.
Also, the ending of the movie of A Clockwork Orange is so perfect that I was disappointed to find the book didn't end the same way!
I don't know about the rest of the world, but in the US the ending of the book is the same as the movie - the last chapter was cut. Kubrick, who'd read it in the US, didn't find out about the other ending until later (not sure if it was prior to, during, or after filming) and hated it.
As for HANNIBAL, I must admit I really liked the ending because it was SO twisted and wrong. I spent the whole book going "this isn't going where I THINK it's going, is it?" Yep, that's where it went. But I was in a hugely misanthropic state of mind that year, which I'm sure was a contributing factor.
in the US the ending of the book is the same as the movie - the last chapter was cut
Not anymore -- I don't know when it was restored, but recent editions have the complete, original ending.
Not anymore -- I don't know when it was restored, but recent editions have the complete, original ending.
Ack, I wasn't clear enough - I meant back when the movie was made. I actually have the chapter from when Rolling Stone published it, and just have it stuffed into my old paperback copy.
Also, I don't think the non-US editions had the unofficial glossary. Is that still in the US edition?
Not to completely commercialize the discussion, but one ending I hated was the ending of Stephen King's It. Great book, wonderful characterizations of the kids and their friendships, creepy-spooky clown in the sewer, blah, blah, and then...the "reveal" of the evil just sucked. After 1,100 pages or whatever it was, I expected something a little more sophisticated than a big fat spider . A definite against-the-wall moment for me.
Also, I don't think the non-US editions had the unofficial glossary. Is that still in the US edition?
I don't think so. (At least mine doesn't -- the 1988 edition, with the "Check it out, we're letting Americans read the WHOLE BOOK now!" blurb on the back.)
When I read Clockwork Orange in high school (around 1997), it had all the chapters in it. (It was for a choice-reading assignment: we got a list of about 50 books, and had to read one from the list. My teacher told me to make sure I got a copy that had the final chapter.) I don't remember whether it had the glossary or not; I know I had a copy of the glossary when I was reading it, but it might have been a photocopy that my teacher gave me.