Goodreads: Pros and Cons

I was going to write quite a different post today, but I got sidetracked and went down an Internet rabbit hole, ending up on goodreads.com. And it occurred to me that after using Goodreads since about 2014, I have a number of opinions on it...both good and bad.

Pros

• Goodreads lets you track which books you've read when. This is by far my favorite feature of the website.  Especially when I'm reading a long series of books, I tend to forget which ones I've read. I can't remember whether or not I've read Carry On, Jeeves because I'm getting it confused with Thank you, Jeeves. Goodreads gives me a place to keep track of all that. 
• Goodreads lets you see what your friends are reading. This is very helpful when your friends have similar taste in books. I've discovered so many good books by seeing them on friends' Goodreads updates!
• Goodreads lets you review books easily.  There's a 5-star rating system for those who just want to give a quick impression of whether they liked or disliked the book. (Usually I fall into that category.) But you can also leave as detailed a review as you'd like. When I absolutely love a book and want all my friends to read it, or when I detest a book and want to warn everyone against it, I'm likely to take some time and write a review.
• Goodreads numbers books in order within a series. I hate reading books in a series out of order, so I like this feature a lot!
• Goodreads lets you set your own reading challenge. This is another one of those things that you could do on your own with pencil and paper, but Goodreads makes it really convenient and also tracks whether you're ahead of or behind schedule.

Cons

• Goodreads book recommendations are terrible. I don't know that I have ever read a book that Goodreads has recommended to me. None of them has ever been appealing enough for me to actually read. They say they base their recommendations off the books on people's "read" shelf; I don't know what algorithms and lists they're using to make these recommendations, but they're not working for me. The only way I find new books on Goodreads that I actually want to read is by looking at what my friends are reading.
• The Goodreads blog has an obvious leftist slant. I can't stand to read the Goodreads blog because it seems every other post is advertising books by third-and fourth-wave feminists. When it's not doing that, it's advertising books about gay marriage. 
•  Goodreads can distract people from actually reading books. If I turned all the time I spend on Goodreads into actual reading time, I would surely be farther along in my reading than I am now!

Do you use Goodreads? If so, what are your thoughts about it? Please let me know in the comments!

Movie Review: By Way Of The Stars

Recently my sister and I discovered a six-hour miniseries called By Way of the Stars, which ran from 1992 to 1993. It was produced by Kevin Sullivan, who produced the Anne of Green Gables movies and Road to Avonlea, and it features quite a few of the main actors from Road to Avonlea. On a scale of 1 to 10 (with 1 being absolutely horrible and 10 being the Colin Firth Pride and Prejudice), I would give this movie a 9. Or possibly a 9.5.

The story centers around a boy named Lukas (Zachary Bennett) in 1800's Prussia.  Everything is going well for Lukas until he sees evil Count Otto von Lebrecht (Hannes Jaenicke) murder a man...and Otto realizes Lukas has seen the murder!  In no time Otto frames Lukas's father for stealing and has him clapped in prison. He intends to murder Lukas as well.

Lukas has a plan: to get himself and his father to Canada and far away from Otto.  With the help of a family friend, he helps his father get free from prison.  But the father and son get separated.  Lukas starts off for Canada by himself.  But soon he has a traveling companion--Ursula von Knabig (Gema Zamprogna), Otto's teenage niece, who now knows about the murder and is running away from her uncle.

Lukas and Ursula's trip is filled with dangers...hungry bears, con artists, river rapids, warring Indian tribes, and the indefatigable Otto, to name just a few.  But it's also filled with good moments.  They meet kind people on a wagon train who help them.  Ursula meets a young surveyor named Ben Davis (Michael Mahonen), and a romance begins between the two young people.  Lukas meets a young Cree brave, Black Thunder (Eric Schweig) who is impressed by his courage and wants to help him find his father.  And that's what Lukas wants more than anything in the whole world.

A lot of this movie rides on the acting skills of Zachary Bennett, who plays Lukas.  If he hadn't been so good at his role, the whole story would have flopped.  Lukas has to be mischievous, brave, stubborn, heartbroken, terrified, generous, and overjoyed, and all of these things have to be convincing.  They are convincing.  Lukas makes the watcher care about him and what happens to him and his father.  I cried when Lukas cried and rejoiced with him when he was happy.

The supporting characters in this movie are great, as well.  Lukas's father Karl (Christian Kohlund), a hot-tempered artist with a fierce love for his son and a passion for justice, is a complex character who goes through a lot of growth throughout the story.  Count Otto, so outwardly charming and friendly to those who don't know his dark secret, is a well-done villain.  (I nearly howled every time he appeared again just a couple steps behind Lukas and Ursula.) Ursula is a great sidekick for Lukas, being spunky and determined, and her romance with Ben is adorable.  (I'll admit, it makes me happy that her name is Ursula.  I don't see characters with my name very often.)  There are many other great characters...Lukas's grumpy grandfather, Ursula's saintly mother, the wagon train leader and his wife, the priest at Fort Garry, and a kidnapped girl named White Feather, to name just a few.

One of the things I always look for when I watch a movie is the costuming, and this movie didn't disappoint me!  The costumes of the Prussian nobility and the Prussian lower class look good (I haven't done research to see if they're authentic to the time period, but they could be.)  Lukas's outfits are especially good as he goes from blacksmith's apprentice to horse trainer to boy on a wagon train.  The children's clothes get gradually raggier and dirtier, just enough to be realistic, the more they travel.

The musical score for this movie, done by John Welsman, is also gorgeous. So is the scenery, especially the Western scenery.  I'm not sure if it was really all shot in the wilderness (the only filming location I can find listed is Uxbridge, Ontario), but it looks like it.

Because I like putting faces to names, here are a few pictures of the main characters in By Way of the Stars. 

Lukas (Zachary Bennett)

  

Lukas has a big heart and great courage.  He loves animals, especially horses.  He's always finding himself in trouble!  You may recognize the actor as Felix from Road to Avonlea.

Count Otto von Lebrecht (Hannes Jaenicke)

  

Otto is pure evil...but unfortunately most of the people close to him don't know it!  He's determined to catch Lukas and kill him so Lukas can't tell anybody about the murder he witnessed.

Ursula von Knabig (Gema Zamprogna)

  

Proud of her position as a count's daughter, Ursula starts out as a stuck-up, spoiled girl.  But traveling across the wild West, she comes to see that true worth doesn't come from someone's rank in life; it comes from the way they act.  You may recognize the actress playing Ursula as Felicity from Road to Avonlea.

Karl Bienmann

Lukas's father is an artist, a dreamer, and a fighter for justice.  He goes to the New World to escape Otto and then goes on a long journey to find his missing son.  On the way, he struggles to understand the attitudes of the people in the United States about race following the Civil War.

Ben Davis (Michael Mahonen)

Ben is a young surveyor traveling west.  He's kind, honest, and sacrificial.  He has also fallen head over heels for Ursula von Knabig.  You may recognize the actor playing Ben as Gus Pike from Road to Avonlea.

Francoise (Tantoo Cardinal)

 

 Francoise is the kindly wagon train leader's wife.  She gives out good advice right and left!

Black Thunder (Eric Schweig)

Black Thunder initially distrusts Lukas, but ends up respecting him deeply for his courage.  He works hard to help Lukas and his father find each other.

In summary: This is an exciting, heartwarming movie with great acting and beautiful costumes, music, and scenery.  I recommend it highly!

A note: If you watch this, make sure you get the 6-hour version.  There's an abridged version out there that has been cut down to two hours and leaves out most of the story.  You can find the full version available to rent or buy on Gazebo TV through Sullivan Entertainment's website.  (You can buy a physical DVD from them too, but since the company is in Canada it's pretty expensive for them to ship to the US.)

If you've seen this movie, I'd love to hear your thoughts on it!

 

My Favorite Short Story Collections

As much as I love reading novels, I also really enjoy short stories.  They're especially good when you don't know what to read and don't want to commit to a lengthy work.  Here are a few of my favorite short story collections.  I'd love to hear your favorites in the comments!

The Complete Works of O. Henry

O. Henry's short stories speak eloquently of the pains and joys of the human experience.  His characters deal with familiar themes--love, poverty, misunderstanding, and so forth.  The settings for the stories vary; O. Henry's characters may live in the middle of bustling New York City or the vast plains of the West.  His writing style is humorous with a touch of pathos.  A couple of my favorite O. Henry stories are "The Ransom of Red Chief" (a classic) and "Madam Bo-Peep, Of the Ranches." 

End of the Drive by Louis L'Amour

If you like Westerns, you should try Louis L'Amour's short stories.  He wrote a lot of them, and I haven't been able to read many of his collections yet, but one that I really like is End of the Drive.  It contains seven fantastic short stories and one novella, "Rustler Roundup."  In L'Amour's stories, brave men and women of the Wild West face incredible odds from outlaws, rich men running towns, corrupt judges, and the like.  The suspense in the stories is enough to keep you on the edge of your seat, but at the same time you can read with the comfortable knowledge that in a L'Amour story good will always triumph over evil in the end.

The Complete Father Brown by G. K. Chesterton

I've mentioned these stories before on this blog in my post about fictional detectives.  They're not just mysteries; they're also studies in character.  Father Brown, the hero of the stories, understands human nature through shepherding the people of his parish.  He can solve crimes because he understands the motivations behind the criminals' actions.  The stories are often scary, usually humorous, and full of Catholic wisdom.  Some of my favorites are "The Blue Cross," "The Queer Feet," and "The Flying Stars."

All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot

 

 

It may be cheating to put this book on here, because All Creatures Great and Small has an ongoing storyline as well as individual stories.  But in general it behaves like a short story collection, so I'm putting it in this list.  Herriot's tales of his life as a veterinarian in the Yorkshire Dales of England are exciting, entertaining, and heartwarming.  (One warning: he does talk about animal diseases and operations in a lot of detail, so if that bothers you you probably don't want to read this book!) If you like this book, you'll enjoy its sequels: All Things Bright and Beautiful, All Things Wise and Wonderful, The Lord God Made Them All, and Every Living Thing.

Lord Peter by Dorothy L. Sayers

 

 

Usually Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries run to hundreds of pages.  This book is the one exception.  Lord Peter's cleverness and wit shine through every one of these short mysteries, which range from mysterious hieroglyphics on tile floors to little boys accused of stealing peaches to murders.  (I just bought this book at a used bookstore a couple weeks ago and can hardly wait to start re-reading it!)

 

 

Why I Love Inter-Library Loan

First of all, I'm sorry for this post being a day late.  Library work and a lot of driving yesterday left me with no time to write blog posts!

I've always loved libraries, ever since I was little.  Starting when I was about five, my parents would take me to the library and keep an eye on me in the children's section while I looked at books.  I would find some great books--(and, admittedly, some duds)--to check out, and for the next day or so it would be nearly impossible for my parents to drag me away from the books to do school or chores.
I suppose my parents must have curated my book selections to some extent, since this was the late 90's and there was plenty of garbage in the children's literature section along with the good books. But the whole experience left me with a deep-seated appreciation for libraries which continued through grade school, high school, and college. 

The only thing that always frustrated me was the limited number of books in any given library.  I wanted more Edith Nesbit books?  Too bad.  I was interested in G.K. Chesterton?  Good luck finding even one book by him in the public library.  Then I discovered inter-library loan and all that changed.

I'm not sure how it works in all the US states, but in Michigan, using a service called MeLCat (Michigan eLibrary Catalog), it's possible to get books from all over the state.  You just have to have a library card from a participating library.  Instead of being limited to the books in your local library, you can now find almost any book you want.  (The only books I've failed to find on inter-library loan, so far, are books that are long out of print.)  Even some big university libraries, like Wayne State's Purdy-Kresge Library, are involved in the inter-library loan program!

There are only a couple downsides to inter-library loan.  One is that books can take a week or two to arrive.  In my opinion, though, it's well worth the wait!  Lately I've been making my way through a lot of P.G. Wodehouse, some Louis L'Amour novels, and some sequels to The Scarlet Pimpernel...none of which are at my local library.  The other downside to inter-library loan is that they usually don't let you check out very many books at a time (I believe five is the limit here in Michigan).  This one is harder for me to work with, but I try to send back my books quickly after finishing them so I'm allowed to check out new ones.

Inter-library loan has expanded my reading horizons greatly.  I no longer walk into my local library and groan about how few books there are there that I would ever want to read.  Nowadays I walk into the library, go straight to the front desk, and pick up the books that have arrived for me from faraway libraries.  It's wonderful.  I don't know who was responsible for starting the inter-library loan program in Michigan, but I would like to shake their hands and thank them.