Theme Thursday: Candy...

Caramel
Apples
Never
Don't
Yum

Magpie Tales #17...Angel at Heart

she is what
a frozen desert cannot weather
no icy winds can touch her
no whipping sand can smooth her
even years buried cannot mark her
time slips between stone and metal
and even birds avoid her
her lifeless eyes open wide in surprise
mouth agape to catch the ashes of a cigarette
when men lent to light it and stayed
watching her, expecting something
but what, from a cold bust?
something more than shock,
recognition...and a blink
to moisten dead eyes that can see now
I see it now why she looks the way she does
ecstatic and afraid, on the verge of flight and staying put
to see far beyond her gaze, to see the End
she sees it, and she fears it, but she wants it
to be no longer an immovable immortal...statue
but to be
an angel
at last

Nostalgia

As I go back and label old posts, all the way back to September 2009, I can't help but giggle.

So many memes, so many stories, so many poems. And my most often used label is 'murder,' 'suicide,' 'death.'

Ah, the memories...

Another thing is looking back at all my old Magpie Tales. This is week sixteen, can you believe it? I was so naive when I stared it, such long stories, needing so much work. I think I am better now {I hope}.

Theme Thursday: White

a diamond held up to the light is worthless
inflated to something special, precious
the real diamond is what comes from it
from facets that catch and release it
light that is every colour, any colour, but no colour
sprayed like the grotesque homicide of a faerie
across a surface that becomes three dimensional
with the the waves of light; violet, red, and clover
that caress the shores of chipped paint and peeling wallpaper
land in a cove where light bounces off tiles and chrome
and all in your kitchen, no renovation required
to make a palace worthy of you


I forgot it was Thursday today! oops! I planned to schedule this post a few days ago, but forgot. This week felt strange; Monday felt like Friday, and so did yesterday. I don't know what today feels like...Tuesday?:)

Magpie Tales #16...Pinch-Toe Shoes

Yes I know, I missed it!
Today is Wednesday, and sadly the deadline for Magpie Tales is Tuesday. Despite my aforementioned excuse, I really should have posted. The thing is, I didn't find the prompt very...inspiring. No insult to willow or the shoes.
But now I am free of my academic chains for a whole three months, I shall get down to the very strict business of writing.
Ah yes, that forgotten word.
I have never missed a Magpie yet (I count it among one of my greater accomplishments considering my acutely tiny attention span). I don't count a day late as missing it, as long as it gets posted at all, so I will try something.

hairy as a yeti, stocky as a hobbit
big foot, left foot, they don't even stock it!
your feet are so big they don't fit in the car
your shoes are so enormous, leather shouldn't stretch that far!
but with a pair of teensy heels, you can be the fool
squeezing swollen ankles into pig trotter lumps
you think you look cool
Here's the sad truth, it's untrue you look nice
your red cheeks make your arms look like boiled rice
you look like a lobster three days dead in the sun
you can't even walk, let alone run
you totter and titter at your helpless state
no one can help you, they'd collapse with the weight
your support yourself on your umbrella with stains
it's so crushed outwards it can't stop the rain
you waddle and wallop people aside
never even changing your stride
it's a fact of life people get in your way
they would, when you eat the whole buffet
When your put on your pinch-toe shoes,
I can't help but giggle and watch you lose
what's left of your dignity, (not much to start)
your fat is in layers right down to your heart
some hearts are frozen, waiting to be thawed
but your heart is stuffed with acres of straw
if you were a scarecrow, you'd feed forty cows
not to mention three donkeys, four hens, and ten sows
you are funny to watch, but thrice super-sized
means you are a walking hamburger waiting to die
when you go, it won't be without a fight
on your way down you'll suffocate twenty knights
all the king's men and his horses too
can't even begin to consider moving you
they'd slip a disc or rupture their spine
or whatever happens when you try to roll a giant swine
you'd lie there and rot, the birds would pick you clean
there'd be a giant graveyard where you and the knights had been
and on the ground at the tip of your knee
they'd find a pair of little shoes under the cheery tree
they'd figure out that you had died of skeletal overdrive,
if not for the shoes, you'd still be alive.
it just goes to show
they don't make them in your size for a reason, you know!

‘Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry’ Book Review

We read ‘Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry’ in school this year. Needless to say after you've read the review, I wasn't too fond of it. Not least because I felt like we were being insulted by being presented with a book far below the reading standard of our class (the reading level is 9-12 years old!). However, our teacher maintained that some students still had difficulty with it. 
I also have a bias of being subjected to slave literature and racism literature consistently throughout primary school in America to teach me the valuable lesson that enslaving other humans seems not to be a smart idea, though many people got (are getting) away with it. I may not condone slavery, but I still feel this is propaganda, even if it is the accepted truth.
I would have been far more receptive to a novel about Irish people, possibly the immigrants in Boston, New York, and England who were discriminated against, as long as we're on racism and discrimination. We do go to school in Ireland, yes?
Just one more disclaimer...I have not read the other two books about the Logan family, so I don't pretend to base my opinions on the entire "series." This is coming from the perspective of reading a single novel.
Andddd here it is!

A book set in Depression Era America, where a family struggled to keep their land and keep together amid many hardships. Sound familiar? ‘The Grapes of Wrath?’ No this novel is ‘Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry’ by Mildred Taylor.

The story is set in Mississippi where the Logan family is discriminated against because they are black. Besides the fact that this topic has been virtually exhausted, and one more novel about racism in the south, or racism in the north, or slavery in America, can’t be too much better than all the forerunners like ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ and ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin,’ one has to wonder at Taylor’s motivation for writing the novel. She says herself that the novel is based on stories her father told her as a child. Perhaps the rest of us would have benefited more had they stayed unpublished.

The novel is told through the point of view of a nine-year-old child, Cassie Logan. Successful, well-written, and thought-provoking novels like ‘The Boy in the Stripped Pyjamas’ have pulled a point of view like this off extremely well. However, Taylor uses language like ‘…I stood up dusting my bottom…’ amid large words like ‘…emaciated-looking…’ that even a well-educated nine-year-old is unlikely to know.

The plot? Well let me put it this way; it is like climbing a hill where each time you think you are nearing the top, you see there is another small hill, and then another, and when you finally scale the summit, you find that it is all a huge disappointment. You can’t see for miles, and looking back the way you came, you feel only a sense of regret for the wasted time you spent climbing.

Somehow each time the children are singled out by a white person they find a way to get back without getting caught. When they are splashed continually by the Jefferson Davis school bus, they dig a ditch to stop it in its tracks. They are not caught of course, nor are they later when Cassie beats up a white girl for forcing her to step into the road.

Cassie’s brothers are somewhat stereotypical; there is her older bother Stacey, still a child but trying to be a man, younger Christopher-John, who is learning to make his own decisions, and impeccable Little Man, who must always be clean.

Taylor uses dialogue very effectively as slang and confusing phrases are kept to a minimum. However, I doubt it was too much of a challenge to her, being born in Mississippi. The only other good point are her descriptions such as ‘…the narrow sun-splotched road wound like a lazy red serpent…’ which are beautifully executed but don’t add much to characterization or the plot, the main drives of this novel.

Each major conflict is not resolved in a realistic manner for the 1933 time frame. Then along comes the end, which just leaves you wondering what all the build-up was about. Mildred Taylor can certainly build up the tension, but she releases it more like a slow leak than a big burst. The end is the only major event that is solved in a historically correct fashion, in my opinion. It is as if, by writing the novel about growing up, Taylor felt the only way to achieve a ‘big-bang’ ending was to let Cassie see the world through rose-coloured glasses right until the very last page.

The message of the book is; life is always fair until it isn’t. Everything works out at first, then one time it doesn’t, and you finally realise that all the other times something had to give, but you just couldn’t see it because you were a child. It’s okay now though, because you’re old enough to worry about taxes, and ponder the fleeting nature of dust and the permanent nature of racism.

The bad points about this book far outweigh the good, and I have to say that readers who have enjoyed other books written about the same time and with similar themes are likely to be grossly disappointed.

The only people I would recommend to read this book are those ‘tired men’ described by G. K. Chesterton, who said, ‘There is a great deal of difference between an eager man who wants to read a book and the tired man who wants a book to read.’ 

I don't pretend my views are fair or kind, but they are honest as far as honest about my opinions can go.

I would also like to say that I loved 'The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas', enjoyed 'Uncle Tom's Cabin', and didn't really like 'To Kill a Mockingbird,' though that might change with a re-read.

Now...after that lovely review, if you would like to buy the book (or leave a particularly nasty comment on Amazon, which I don't suggest), here you go. 

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

I give it:

Plot: **

Characters: ****

Voice: ***

Originality:

Dialogue: ***

 Which means:

And....I'm back!

Firstly, I haven't been blogging for five or so days, because of my Summer Exams (that's my excuse anyways). But I meant the title more like a "I'm coming back to myself."
Recently, all my posts have been fiction, but, while it's brilliant and all, that doesn't really say anything about me, just that I write good (only kidding, write well). I was reading over my previous posts, like from August 2009, and I was thinking, you know what, I really like my voice. I like to read my own writing! As a reader.
That's just a bit weird for me.
I was at a party on Saturday last, lots of writers and musicians which was great. Anyways, it was suggested that I do book reviews on the blog, because people like other people's opinions about stuff before they buy it.
I thought I dunnno, meh... Then I thought it over again, and I thought hmmmm, nice idea. Then I thought, well...I don't buy all that many new books (none). Then I thought, well who cares, right? It's my blog, and I am in charge, and I say I like the idea.
And since I already had a book review....


EDIT: MM has informed me that technically it's not my blog, it's our blog. "But you know, Aoife, if you want it that way, I'll just crawl in a corner and die back off."
Okay okay, so it's not my blog. Make it yours too MM; post something enlightening or entertaining :P