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July 13, 2004
Howl's Moving Castle: a Digression
The trailer for Miyazaki's next film, Howl's Moving Castle, is online now. It's based on a book by Diane Wynne Jones, one of my favourite authors. One of my favourite authors because I really like her books, and tracked them all down in the lean years when it was necessary to scour second-hand bookshops for rare hardbacks, and one of my favourite authors because she's a really nice person.
We went back to Borders for another accident (there's something about large bookshops with everything on one level and coffee to drink while you're browsing), and I picked up River of Gods. The link there is to a Guardian review by Chris Priest, who really has no business accusing others of writing books that are difficult to follow. This is the first Ian McDonald I've read, and I conclude that I've been discriminating against his books for no better reason than that he has the same name as my father.
Anyway, back to Diana. In Borders there was an entire shelf of her books, all matching jackets and special promotions on the new one and all sorts. This may reflect the fact that her novels include several excellent and critically-acclaimed tales set in various schools of magic; a theme she's been exploring for decades.
Digressing again but staying on theme: Marianne's very fond of Jill Murphy's The Worst Witch, another pre-Potter series of books about witches-in-training. On 'come as a character from a book' day at school she dressed up as Mildred Hubble. I warned her that people would mistake her for Hermione. "Who's Hermione?" was her response. One of the joys of Saturday was that I pressed Charlotte's Web onto Marianne, who had read Stuart Little repeatedly after seeing the film, and she came home and read it cover to cover.
And I'm really looking forward to seeing Howl's Moving Castle.
Posted by Alison at 10:01 AM | Comments (4)
July 07, 2004
Short Bicycle Rant
I want to live in a world where people don't think it's funny to shout "You've Lost Someone!" to a woman cycling back from school on a tandem.
And perhaps even a world where it's considered peculiar for people to drive around in vehicles with three (or more) empty seats.
Posted by Alison at 09:09 AM | Comments (2)
July 03, 2004
New Vincent motorbikes
Another illusion cruelly shattered.
Posted by Alison at 09:33 AM | Comments (0)