The Complete Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm

Incredibly dark fairy tales, most I had heard before in one rendition or another but many of them I had not. Almost every story involved death, decapitation, and made absolutely no sense at all which of course holds true to the fairy tale portion. As I read the book I made a game of it, ending all of the stories in my mind with, “and then he died.” which came true in about 70% of the stories. As an adult I was able to laugh and squeal in delight at the fables, but I doubt these stories would be suitable for young children. That being said it made for a delightful bedtime read, and I’m glad to have read it. The translation in this version was easy to follow and understand, and from what I have read from other reviews held very true to the book.

5/5 stars

Review: The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

I admit, I saw the movie before I ever read the short story and I wish it had of been the other way around. I enjoy books much more than movies, but the fact was that I enjoyed the movie so much I wanted to read the book. I picked up the audiobook narrated by Ben Stiller for free on amazon which happened to come around by coincidence.

As a few others have mentioned, the fact that it is so short, is exactly the point. It highlights “the wispy nature of one man’s substance along Main Street, America, the story is meant to be here one moment, then gone.”

All of us have daydreamed at one point in time or another, and wished we could live through them. We wish we could perform heroic acts, but tend to quietly go back to our mundane existence. This is a reminder of that, and I enjoyed it quite a bit. The book is short enough that there’s really no excuse not to give it a read or a listen and pay tribute to James Thurber.

4 / 5 stars

Review: Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

For some reason a lot of the classics that my friends had read back in high school were not books that I was ever introduced to, so I have spent a lot of time over the last few years catching up on some classics. Not only because they’re books that everyone should read at least once, but because I honestly enjoy the writing style of these books and the stories are usually entertaining. I’m not sure if it is because I just like to read about worlds that are so different from the one that I currently live in, but they’re enjoyable none the less.

Despite what most would think, I have never seen a movie version of this book before, and I had no idea what it was really about. I mean, obviously it was about a guy who went around the world in 80 days but anyone could guess that from the title. For some reason I thought that the adventure took place in an air balloon – which is not the case at all.

The book is about Phileas Fogg and his French servant Passepartout. Phileas is challenged to travel around the world in 80 days by a group of rich men he hangs out with. It just happens that there is a pretty large size robbery just as he leaves, and police are convinced that his leaving the country and this robbery are linked. While he is busy trying to win the wager of being able to make the trip, the police are chasing him down and interacting with both himself and Passepartout. It makes the whole adventure even more endearing and while the book is incredibly outdated to the point of being almost rude (there are many stereotypes) I still found it a really good read and not at all what I expected.

4/5 stars