Giant Squid Creations

Having said I’d blog more I’ve not done much at all, sorry about that. So I figure a little reading round-up wouldn’t go astray. I finally got through Clash of Kings – that’s Game of Thrones Season 2 for TV folks – and I’m looking forward to A Storm of Daggers . I also decided not to watch season 2 of the show; I watched season one and enjoyed it but it lacks some of the depth, the story is shifting away from the book and … I don’t need to see that stuff. Finishing it opened the way for me to read Neil Gaiman’s latest, The Ocean at the End of the Lane . It really dragged me in and was a charming tale; I don’t think it’s a match for his other novels but it’s still an addictive read with some great characters and ideas. And finishing that, which didn’t take long, meant I could finally read Shine Light , the third book in Marianne de Pierre’s Night Creatures trilogy. It took me a couple of chapters to get back into the world but once there the story moved along at a good pace. I t...

Last year I planned to read 50 Plays and write a response to each one. I read far less than 50 and only wrote one response. But I figure I might as well share it with you so here it is. Described as a play in five acts, Peer Gynt is very much an episodic narrative with the ongoing fantastic encounters of our ‘hero’ heading inexorably to the final conclusion where, Faust-like he gets an unexpected reprieve. Structurally, the play can be divided more into three than five. The first three acts are adventures in Peer’s youth where he meets Solveig and culminating in his mother’s death; the two together seem to drive him to flee the country. The fourth act is a sample of Peer’s adventures overseas while the fifth act is his return home in old age and his attempt to run from fate (O Sinner Man, where you going to run to?) The episodes in the first phase all follow on one after the other, but there are jumps in time thereafter, which seems slightly incongruous. I can see this play wor...