One of my favorite composers to play. Here is Robert Schumann's rarely played Gesänge der Frühe, Op.133 performed by the exquisite Mitsuko Uchida.
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I read this on the recommendation of someone whose opinion I respect, although I understand that we have different tastes in literature. I like character and plot driven stories, he's more into world building and provocative concepts.
OK, I'm talking about my husband, but that is beside the point. This book was on his shelf and it looked intriguing so I gave it a shot. There were elements I liked and elements I did not like.
Of course to be fair, it was written for a younger audience, won the Newberry in fact, but I have to chalk up her target audience as another criticism. The plot and cast of characters were quite complicated and I know I would have lost interest in the book at that age. In fact, if I wasn't able to speed read, I would not have gotten through it at my present age.
Plot premise:
Sixteen people have been carefully selected to live in Sunset Towers. It turns out that they are all potential heirs to Sam Westing, a business tycoon who disappeared years ago, but lives on an estate near the Towers. Shortly into the story, Sam is found dead in his house. But he seems to know he would die, furthermore he has left instructions for his heirs to follow in order for them to acquire their share of his fortune.
The kicker: Westing claims he was murdered. By one of them! The first person to discover the culprit will win one hundred million dollars. The heirs are paired up and each pair given a set of clues. Each list of clues are incomplete so they need to find out the other pairs' lists to solve the murder mystery.
What I liked:
It was an intriguing mystery. I wanted to know what was going to happen and that kept me going to the end. And I will say without divulging anything that I found the ending satisfactory. It ended the way I like stories to end, with a resolution, like the "Amen" chord at the end of a hymn.
I also liked that, although the characters started out immensely unlikeable and cardboard thin, they actually started showing other dimensions as the story progressed and as I said, I do like where they all ended up.
OK, criticisms:
I felt the characters were a bit stereotyped and a few of them not very believable. In fact, I wish she had less characters and concentrated more on developing them. Some of them had real potential to be very interesting, but they stop short.
Some of the characters were not very believable. The girl nicknamed Turtle is so immature, she runs around kicking everyone in the shins, that for a good third of the book I thought she was around eight years old. It turns out she's thirteen. Sorry, this book was written in 1978. I was thirteen in 1978. I had hit hormonal adolescence big time. Boys were not yucky they were fascinating and while I had my hopeless crushes, I did not express it by kicking the objects of my desire in the shin.
Also, it was very hard to keep track of who everyone was and what the clues led up to. I found myself backtracking and re-reading pages frequently.
All in all, not a bad read, just not a very good one.
View all my reviews
The Westing Game by Ellen RaskinMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
I read this on the recommendation of someone whose opinion I respect, although I understand that we have different tastes in literature. I like character and plot driven stories, he's more into world building and provocative concepts.
OK, I'm talking about my husband, but that is beside the point. This book was on his shelf and it looked intriguing so I gave it a shot. There were elements I liked and elements I did not like.
Of course to be fair, it was written for a younger audience, won the Newberry in fact, but I have to chalk up her target audience as another criticism. The plot and cast of characters were quite complicated and I know I would have lost interest in the book at that age. In fact, if I wasn't able to speed read, I would not have gotten through it at my present age.
Plot premise:
Sixteen people have been carefully selected to live in Sunset Towers. It turns out that they are all potential heirs to Sam Westing, a business tycoon who disappeared years ago, but lives on an estate near the Towers. Shortly into the story, Sam is found dead in his house. But he seems to know he would die, furthermore he has left instructions for his heirs to follow in order for them to acquire their share of his fortune.
The kicker: Westing claims he was murdered. By one of them! The first person to discover the culprit will win one hundred million dollars. The heirs are paired up and each pair given a set of clues. Each list of clues are incomplete so they need to find out the other pairs' lists to solve the murder mystery.
What I liked:
It was an intriguing mystery. I wanted to know what was going to happen and that kept me going to the end. And I will say without divulging anything that I found the ending satisfactory. It ended the way I like stories to end, with a resolution, like the "Amen" chord at the end of a hymn.
I also liked that, although the characters started out immensely unlikeable and cardboard thin, they actually started showing other dimensions as the story progressed and as I said, I do like where they all ended up.
OK, criticisms:
I felt the characters were a bit stereotyped and a few of them not very believable. In fact, I wish she had less characters and concentrated more on developing them. Some of them had real potential to be very interesting, but they stop short.
Some of the characters were not very believable. The girl nicknamed Turtle is so immature, she runs around kicking everyone in the shins, that for a good third of the book I thought she was around eight years old. It turns out she's thirteen. Sorry, this book was written in 1978. I was thirteen in 1978. I had hit hormonal adolescence big time. Boys were not yucky they were fascinating and while I had my hopeless crushes, I did not express it by kicking the objects of my desire in the shin.
Also, it was very hard to keep track of who everyone was and what the clues led up to. I found myself backtracking and re-reading pages frequently.
All in all, not a bad read, just not a very good one.
View all my reviews
17 comments:
i like "Spring Song". Mrs. M has been trying to get me to read Ludlum, but so far i've resisted... i may succumb if get desperate, tho... this sounds like an interesting plot, but i'll probably never run into a copy of it; or wouldn't remember if i did: the joys of aging... it's sad to think of all the authors out there that one will never have a chance to complain about... grin and bear it, i guess...
Hi Sharon, I love the premise of the story. I think the idea of people setting up complex situations such as this after their deaths is intriguing, at least for literally purposes.
I could not access your link but I found the Schumann piece. There was a time when I seemed to be listening to Schumann a lot but I do not think that I ever listened to Robert Schumann's Gesänge der Frühe before. It is an impressive work.
This is one of my most favorite books from my childhood, I absolutely loved The Westing Game. Then I read it as an adult to my class of 4-5-6 graders and it did not translate well as a read aloud. I had to explain a lot, and even display pages on the projector so the kids could see the lists and such. My 6th and 5th graders really liked it but I agree that it is insanely complicated and it makes sense why 4th grade and under would not be interested. The many characters were also problematic when trying to keep everyone straight - though I made it into a good long-term lesson as we wrote down a lot of info to help keep everyone straight.
Hi Sarah! I did not realize you were a teacher. General education? My favorite memories of grade school was when the teacher read aloud to me.
My husband read this book as an adult and really liked it. Like I said, I wish the characters were more focused on. I like character driven more than plot driven stories.
Hi Brain, glad your were able to eventually access the link. I need to test mine.
This plot was really complex and I had to reread quite a bit. I'm not sure how a younger audience would respond to it. But there were a lot of books I loved as a kid that I don't relate to anymore.
That's a great way of putting it and my husband would agree. I spend as much time complaining about books as I do enjoying them. My pendulum swings one way or the other. I love a book or hate it. No half ways.
It's true that not all books reach the same audiences. I think about the sort of books I am writing. There are those that would not care for them and I think, well, not their cup of tea.
I have taught in the Behavior Skills Program in my district for the last seven years - a self-contained classroom for students verified with emotional disturbances, ODD, ADHD, Austism, PTSD, and so on. So many acronyms, it makes me cry. It's a stressful job so after seven years there, I will be moving to a Resource position, so still Special Education, but the school is full-inclusion so I will be co-teaching and supporting those students with academic and behavior needs in a gen ed classroom.
That is very interesting. I taught music for nine years in a Title One grade school. Texas state law dictates full inclusion so I had it all, Autism, Emotionally disturbed, Asperger's...you name it... I even had all the deaf students. Not to mention the "normal" kids and combined classes in order to fit everybody. My average class size was 35. Of course I only had them 45 minutes each. I learned how to make each minute count. I had a very structured class time.
It was trying, but also very rewarding. One kid who was very autistic, low i.q....drove me crazy, but at the end of the year after our music program, his mother came up to me and told me that my music class was the only reason he liked going to school. That was humbling.
That you worked solely with kids with these challenges commands my greatest respect. Kudos to you!
both of you deserve medals, imo...
Thanks, Mudpuddle. I appreciate it. :)
Thank you Mudpuddle, that is much appreciated!
Sharon - I think full-inclusion is great for the kids who can be successful, but I am curious about the deaf students - were they in full inclusion all day? Did they have a para with them, or devices to "hear" (read) what was going on??
Hi Sarah. The deaf students had interpreters that were with them all day, they were fully included in their homeroom class, P.E. and my class music.
I have to tell you it was amazing what they could accomplish in my class. On the recorder, they followed my fingering. Also on the guitar and dulcimer. They danced with the rest of us. They kept time on the Orff instruments, and when we played games like Hot Potato or Freeze Dance the interpreter flicked the lights when I stopped the music.
What was really cool is that we all, deaf and hearing, learned how to sign the songs I taught. I also learned a lot of sign language to communicate with them, even though they had an interpreter.
They also liked to put their hands on my giant speaker to "feel" the music.
amazing work; it must have been quite satisfying... and occasionally sad, as well...
Yes it was both, but I think we had more fun and hilarity than sadness. The deaf children were all of them characters each in their own way.
I haven't read this book but my kids have. My youngest enjoyed it. She has 4 older brothers so she's sometimes into shin kicking. :)
Hi Carol. Well, maybe in the case of brothers, I can see that...there were times as a youngster I would have liked to kick my sisters in the shin, and other places.
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