Book Review: Over Sea, Under Stone

“Once upon a time... a long time ago... things that happened once perhaps but have been talked about for so long that nobody really knows. And underneath all the bits that people have added the magic swords and lamps they're all about one thing - the good hero fighting the giant or the witch or the wicked uncle. Good against bad. Good against evil.” 

 

A lot of people like Fridays because they mean the end of the week.  I like Fridays because they're my hump-day.  It's the fourth night of my seven nights, so after tonight, we're on the home stretch.  However, I will say that I also just enjoy my job a lot.  So, even though I love seven off more, I don't hate my seven on. Last night was a very slow night at work.  That means that I got to finish a book!




Over Sea, Under Stone is about three children who find a map that has some shocking connections to King Arthur and King Mark.  It is, in fact, a map to the grail!  What follows is their quest for the grail, as well as trying to avoid the evil people.  It's not really clear who they are, or what they want.  But they do know they're evil.

It wasn't until the middle of this book that I put two and two together that Over Sea, Under Stone, the first of The Dark is Rising books, is written by the same author as Victory, which I reviewed back in December.  I had similar feelings.  It wasn't a book (like Twilight or, to a certain extent Divergent), where I thought, "These are awful!  Why do so many people like this?"  But I was thinking, "A lot of people love this series.  I'm not impressed."

The entire book was good enough, but felt like a second-rate version of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, complete with kids staying in some old, respected guy's house, and finding a legendary thing.  Behind a wardrobe, no less!  And they were British and discussed handkerchiefs and stuff too.  The characters were real enough, but didn't pop off of the page with any distinguishing characteristics from most any other characters.

I went to the library and got the second one.  I don't know why.  I really think that I'm developing a finish-what-you-start mentality with book series.  But over all, two stars.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Over-analyzing Disney Movies: The Little Mermaid--Why Eric is White.

Image
I have recently noticed a trend of just purely over-analyzing Disney movies.  In this category, I also include the fascination with photoshopping Disney characters to swap genders, races, or eras, as well as making princesses have "realistic" body shapes (which is something I could write a whole other post about, and it wouldn't be pretty.  Spoiler alert:  I find it to be one of the most unempowering trends of recent years).  However, I sometimes wonder at how much people are reading into Disney movies.  Today, I'm going to over-analyze their over-analysis. I recently read that the fact that Eric is a white prince is a representation of how we white-wash racial expectations for our children.  I'm not even sure what that sentence means.  It seems to have a lot of buzz words.  But I'm going to show you today, using evidence from the film, why Prince Eric is, in fact, the correct color. (I will, however, say that Eric is the only Disney prince who legitimatel
Read more

Derevaun Seraun! Derevaun Seraun!

James Joyce is my kind of guy. He made puzzles that I like to think are just for me. He was a great lover of languages, and he is sometimes called the father of a literary technique called polyglotism. This is when you insert other languages in there. Just 'cuz. So, in James Joyce's wonderful story, "Eveline" there is a phrase that nobody knows what it is. Even to this day. "Derevaun Seraun! Derevaun Seraun!" Many people believe it to be corrupted Irish Gaelic. Needing a break from homework, I have approached this by taking the words and then transliterating them into Irish Gaelic, trying to create Irish Gaelic that would be spoken by someone of this status in this time in Ireland. Nationalist, but not educated enough to actually understand all the ins and outs of the language. I came up with two possible phrases that I find very probable. And I'm not pretending to solve the mystery. If Joyce experts over the years have not discovered the mean
Read more

What does it mean to be a Russell?

Image
As many know, most European families (not all, but most) have a coat of arms, a crest, a motto, all that good stuff. So, I decided to look a bit into what being a Russell means. And maybe I'll do the same for Hatches, because I am a Hatch too. The last name Russell is Scottish and means "Red-headed" and derives from the Norman name of Roussel. The Russells are a well-respected Highland Scot clan, complete with Scottish crest and tartan: The motto on the crest "virtus sine macula" means "Virtue without blemish." As Scotland incorporated more and more into England, the Russells became nobility in that world as well, and were thus presented with a coat of arms: And yes, the motto written on that one is "che sara sara." You've got to admit, that's pretty gosh-darn cool. It really does mean "Whatever will be, will be." And in honor of that:
Read more