- The Casual Vacancy is just four days away. Are you excited? Nervous? What are your plans for reading the book? I intend to set aside every possible spare moment to get through it as quickly as possible and start posting about it this weekend.
- I recently wrote an article for a new, amazing, yearly collection called The Molehill. My contribution is called “Jesus and the Dragon Quest.” Tons of amazing stories, poems, and essays in this.
- Speaking of essays I’ve written, I don’t know if I ever posted on my contribution to Light Shining in a Dark Place. It’s a book on theology in film, and my essay is called “Parable of the Poltergeist.”
- Yes, the Doctor Who weekly post idea fizzled fast, mostly because it seems to me there wasn’t a lot of energy around the idea, and perhaps fewer Doctor Who fans in the pub right now than I thought. I will post an overall review of the first five episodes, rather than a weekly review of each episode, followed by a review of the Christmas episode.
Scattered Notes
by Travis Prinzi on September 24, 2012
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{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
sorry for not being here much to contributed to the whovian population at the moment – but I am looking forward to any of your thoughts regarding the current season…
Ally, no need to apologize at all! I just figure we’ll get more discussed with a fuller picture of the overall season’s trajectory, anyway. “Dinosaurs in Space” and “A Town Called Mercy” were great standalone episodes, but not as much commentary is needed on them. I still need to watch this past Saturday’s episode.
I still need to finish watching Saturday’s as I fell asleep during it! (Has more to do with me being sick than with the episode though I must say – don’t take that as a bad sign for the episode or anything, lol)
You’ve got G.K. Chesterton writing for The Molehill? That’s pretty amazing!! Or is that just a pseudonym for Mr. Pond?
That being said, I really would like it if they put out an eBook of The Molehill. I’ve drastically cut down on my purchase of physical books.
And regarding The Casual Vacancy, I have no plans to read it anytime soon. At least not as long as the eBook version is $18.
And I’m a Doctor Who fan, but of the past series not the revived series. I’d probably be a fan if I watched the current seasons but just really haven’t tried to get into it. Hopefully some other fans will be interested in your reviews.
I’m going to buy Casual Vacancy the minute it hits the shelves and read it immediately. I cannot wait! A new book by J.K. Rowling! I know it will be great. I am really excited.
Travis, I WISH I was a Doctor Who fan. I’ve never seen it, and it’s a lot like Lost, which I only ever saw three or four episodes of: everybody talks about it like it’s awesome, and I just haven’t gotten to it yet.
I’ll be very much looking forward to your reviews of A Casual Vacancy! I’m in line for a reserved copy at the library, but part of me strongly suspects that it’s not going to be my type of book. Harry Potter was pretty universal, an authorial feat which is difficult to duplicate. Ergo, I’ll be reading every word you post, spoilers included, with great interest…
I’ve actually been looking forward to your reviews on the Doctor Who episodes. We have had some great ones and I wanted to see your perspective on them. I meant to tweet you about it but just didnt get around to it. I hope to read some more soon but I guess I wasn’t really contributing to the post.
I also apologize – since I am not able to watch the current Doctor Who season over here (I am likely to watch it next year on DVD), I avoided the discussions for fear of knowing too much about it in advance.
As for the Casual Vacancy, it will hopefully arrive on my Kindle tomorrow morning when I switch it on and check for new items. I will set aside everything else I am currently reading for it, but I am not sure if I am excited or not. I know it won’t be Harry Potter, but then I hope it will be very “British”, so I still hope I’ll like it.
Honestly, I’m surprised there’s not a lot more excitement on this site about Rowling’s new book coming out! We’ve spent years extolling her brilliant imagination and story telling abilities, and the transformative powers of her message. Many books have been written about her books! This site would not exist if not for her writing.
I have great faith that A Casual Vacancy will be wonderful, and that I’ll want to read it again, but whether it is a “hit” or a “miss”— she’s human, so it’s possible— I will be a loyal reader for life. My three kids grew up with her stories, and they were an immensely fun and thought-provoking addition to our family life.
I will eagerly read whatever she writes, because I know what she’s capable of. She’s a wonderful writer with “the power to imagine better,” and she has a good heart.
I really cannot wait to have A Casual Vacancy in my hands and be about to embark on a journey through a new world J.K. Rowling has created! I am just as excited as I was waiting for the latest Harry Potter book to arrive.
Well, the other reason I’m not too enthused about The Casual Vacancy, aside from the eBook price, is that it just doesn’t sound like the kind of book I would like to read. At 47 I’m becoming a bit choosier about what I read, and I’m not going to read a book I don’t have a real interest in just because Jo Rowling wrote it.
good point revgeorge – I think a lot of us have found we have to be a lot pickier about our books (it was one thing as a kid when one had time to check out 10 books from the library on a Saturday morning and have most of them all read by Sunday night (and re-read our favorites all the time)).
I will be reading The Casual Vacancy – but that is mostly because I just found out we are getting it in our lease books at the library, so I figure I might as well read it during the time we have it, and then decide if I want to actually own it – since it’s probably not the type of book I would otherwise read or purchase if anyone OTHER than JKR was writing it… I otherwise had been pretty on the fence about it when I thought I would need to purchase it myself
phoenixsong58, thanks for your enthusiasm! It reminded me why I bothered to put a hold on the book at the library.
My own hesitation is based on the fact that ACV is obviously going to be a very different type of story from HP, a type that I–like Ally and revgeorge–would not likely be drawn to had anyone but Rowling written it. Judging from the reviews, I think there’ll be things I love about it, but also things which, like various scenes in The Hunger Games, I’ll sincerely wish I had never read.
I’m very much with Jenna on this one. I need to put a hold on it at the library- I do in general avoid books with lots of swears and sex because of my vivid imagination (one of the many reasons I won’t touch 50 Shades with a ten foot pole) that leaves the scenes in my mind for eternity. And, as I know JKR is capable of writing memorable scenes and characters, I must say I’m a little apprehensive, even though the themes she covers in TCV are things I”m interested in. At the same time, as one of the Common Room links said, I admit I’m reading more for escapism than I used to, which makes reading “contemporary literature” or whatever the genre is, not as fun. I’m a natural cynic anyway and don’t necessarily need more ammunition to convince me of man’s depravity and selfishness. All that to say…we’ll see. I look froward to lurking on the discussions about the book at any rate.