I am finally done with my classes for this semester! Now I can read all the books that I want choose. The first book that I decided to read, instead of studying for my finals, is How to Teach Filthy Rich Girls. I have only read the first 100 pages, and I am enjoying it so much! I was a little nervous when I first started reading this book. After finishing Everyone Worth Knowing I did not think that I could find a book just as good. However, after reading the first chapter in How To Teach Filthy Rich Girls I knew that I was going to enjoy it.

Right off the bat, the main character, Megan, has bad luck. Things just keep happening to her, and the reader has that feeling that they can connect with Megan. After striking out at her job, more than once, she was sent to Florida to teach two rich girls, helping them get into Duke University, and passing their classes in High School.

As I read the book, I just keep thinking of different things from the media. The twins in the book reminded me of Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. However, the twins in the book are nothing like the real twins. They are much more crazy than the real ones. The twins also reminded me of the Paris Hilton/Nicole Ritchie duo. The girls in the book act crazy enough. The book also reminded me of The Devil Wears Prada. Megan has to leave her boyfriend in New York City while she works with the twins. Even though she just arrived in Florida, she has found a handsome man. I do not know what happens between the two of them yet, but it reminds me of the separation between the main character in Devil and her boyfriend. I was also reminded of the film "What A Girl Wants". Megan had to leave her home to succeed with her job. She is also seen as a foreigner by the twins because she does not wear nice clothing. There is a coming out/benefit party that Megan attends. When she arrives, she looks drop dead gorgous and attracts the eyes of everyone. The two twins finally realize that they will not win and get rid of Megan.

I am very excited to continue the book. I strongly suggest that everyone reads this book if you have enjoyed the other books that I wrote about. You will also enjoy this book if you liked The A-List because they are written by the same author. The book is hard for me to put down, which is a horrible thing during finals. I can not wait to read more, and update you guys on the book! If you guys want to read the book, let me know so that we can talk about it while we read!!

So I finally finished Everyone Worth Knowing and it was definitely worth reading. I am kind of upset that the book ended, because I was so in love with reading it. The second half of the story was way better than the first half, in my opinion. I recommend this book to anyone that loves to read chick novels. There is finally a love interest that is introduced, and every page that I read, I was dying to know what was going to happen. This is a book that you will not be able to put down very easily. The characters are written wonderfully, and the development of the story works at a great pace.

The book gives all of us "normal" people an insight into the world of party planning, but for celebrity hosted events. The company that Bette works for, plans events for Blackberry and Playboy. Famous names are constantly being dropped throughout the book like Lindsay Lohan (my favorite), Jay-Z, and others. Bette and her co-workers are constantly partying. They go to Bungalow 8 everynight, just for publicity. Bette is in the gossip section of the newspaper almost daily. This is the life that almost every girl dreams of, but when reading it, realizes that it is better to read about it and fantasize, rather than actually live it. I do not want to give up the ending, but all I have to say is think about how The Devil Wears Prada ends. Just because you sort of know the ending, please read the book anyway because it is just that good.

Like I said in my previous post, this novel was written by the same author who wrote The Devil Wears Prada. When reading the two books, you can tell that they were written by the same author, but they are different from eachother. I think that this story, Everyone Worth Knowing, was a lot better than Devil. I found that the movie of The Devil Wears Prada was a lot better than the book. However, I could not imagine that if they made a movie for Everyone Worth Knowing it would be better than the book. I found the characters to be more exciting, and easier to fall in love with. It is so hard for me to find words to explain this novel, because it was just so great. I also feel like if tell you anything about the story, you will know everything and won't want to read it. And remember, when you do read the story, do not look at the back of the book to see what happens. Every time I opened up the book, I just wanted to read the ending but I would not let myself. And of course it made the book that much better!

I will admit that I have not finished this book yet. I am only half-way through it, and it is taking me forever to get to the ending of it. This book is one that I chose on my own, so no, I do not have a class to associate it with. The author of the novel also wrote The Devil Wears Prada. And don't get the wrong message, just because I am taking forever to finish it does not mean that I do not like it. I absolutely love the story, it is just that I do not have a lot of time to read it.

For anyone who has read The Devil Wears Prada, or has seen the movie (book is SO much better!!!), this book is very similar. The main character, Bette, starts out working for a banking company. She eventually gets so fed up with it that she quits. After taking a month hiatus, her uncle gets her a job. The job is working with a public relations company. This company is insane. Any woman who loves to gossip about celebrities, or reads tabloids, than you MUST read this book. Bette begins working for this company and gets a somewhat glamorous life. She gets to go out to all different expensive bars, and gets to party with hot guys. This book includes boys, booze, and gossip...what else could anyone else? Bette gets to plan a huge party, and a whole bunch of celebrities go to it. It's all very exciting, and of course it's the life that I want to live (I say that with every glamorous book like this).

Of course as a teenager I am in love with the book. I recommend the book to anyone who enjoys reading teen novels or about the exciting life of women living in New York City. I wish I could tell you more, but I really don't have much to say. I am only half-way through the story. Once I read more I promise to update you on what happens. And if anyone does finish it before me, please do not ruin the ending of it! I am excited to see what happens with Bette and her love interests.

Maria: Or the Wrongs of Women was a great story. It too was not very long, and I read it for my Gothic class. The story is about a woman, Maria, who was put into a prison. Before she was put into prison, she was pregnant, and had her child right before being arrested. The book is a narrative of Maria telling her child that she hopes that it is not a daughter. She says how hard it is for women to survive in society, and how they will never get anywhere. However, she does tell women to continue to fight for their rights, and hopefully someday they will make an impact.

This book is a little over 150 pages, but it is really good. It is written in a very wonderful way. The first part is a third person narrative, but than the characters have their own stories that they tell. Before we learn about Maria, we learn about her guard keeper, and how she got there. Both stories are about how the women were oppressed because of their sex. The stories are very upsetting to read, however, they are very good readings. They keep the reader interested, and everyone hopes that something good will happen to the women. This book was very powerful to read, especially for women. It was painful to read the story as a woman and to see the pain that the women had to go through, and then end up in a prison/asylum.

What is interesting about the story is the ending of it. There is no real ending of the story. It was never finished, and when you get to the end, there are a few suggested endings. While reading the suggested endings, you will think that none of them fit correctly with the story. Some of them are just so absurd, that it is impossible to think of how the author could have come up with them. At least none of them were actually chosen to finish the story. If you guys read the story, I would love to know what you thought about the different endings. Also, if there are any females that read the book, I want to know your reaction to what happened to Maria.

Good Country People is a short story that I read for my U.S. Literature class. It is a really short read, only eleven pages, and I recommend everyone to read it. The story is about a mother and daughter who live on a house located on a farm. They of course are Country people and love anyone else who is Country people. One day, while the mother and daughter are home a young man comes to the house to sell bibles. When he leaves, he has a conversation with the daughter. The two of them decide to meet and hang out the next day. What happens when they are together is very upsetting. I will not tell you what happens since it is the ending, but I am sure everyone will be upset by what happens.

I really enjoyed the story because of the way it is set up. Throughout the story there were flashbacks of when the Bible selling boy came to visit the day before. There was also conversation dispersed within the writing. The conversation is between the mother and one of the women who lives on her property. This makes the story more complex and exciting. This way the story does not just have one story to it, and it's not monotone.

Another great part about the story is the character of the daughter. The daughter's name is Joy. She lost one of her legs when she was ten years old by a hunting gun. She has been unhappy ever since, and now she is a thirty-two year old who lives with her mother. Joy has a doctorate in Philosophy but does nothing with it. She is extremely unhappy because of her situation. What is interesting about her is that she legally changes her name. Since she has never been happy, she does not think that her name should be Joy. She changes it to Hulga, which she thinks is one of the ugliest names that she could choose. However, her mother never calls her Hulga. It is interesting how important Hulga's name is for her to explain how she really feels.

If anyone has a few minutes, I would suggest that you read the story. You guys will love it, and you will have true and honest feelings for Hulga or Joy. I would love to hear what you guys have to say about her and about what happens to her!

Quicksand is a short short story that I read for my U.S. Literature class. The story was around 100 pages, and it was very good. It is about a girl named Helga who is black, but her father was black and her mother white. Helga lives within a black community, Harlem, but she feels like she does not belong. She then moves to Copenhagen where she has an aunt. The location that she lives in is very white, but people do not ignore Helga because she is black. Helga becomes bored with living in Copenhagen, just like she got bored with living in Harlem. When she goes back to Harlem to visit, she realizes how much she misses living there, but she knows that she would never be happy living there for the rest of her life. She also knows that she would not be happy living back in Copenhagen. Helga finally finds a man who she decides to marry just so that she does not have to worry about her future anymore.

I loved reading about the main character Helga Crane. The story is about her trying to find where she feels comfortable and who she is comfortable with. Helga tries so hard to fit in with the people that she thinks she belongs to that she forgets to find out who she really is. Since Helga is so confused, the reader is able to relate to her.

I really enjoyed reading this story. I loved how Nella Larsen wrote it and the descriptions that she used. This story was so completely based about color and fitting in. Helga would always talk about colors of clothes that she is allowed to wear because of her skin color, and what she should not wear. Since color plays such a large role, Larsen uses a lot of colors within her writing. Whenever Helga describes something, she always writes what color it is. As I read through the story, I would circle everytime a color name was mentioned. I must have circled words on each page at least two or three times. I thought that by using the colors it made the story more colorful.

I would recommned this story to everyone. It is a quick read and I think everyone should read it. I would love to hear your comments of the story, and what you thought about Helga. I would have loved to write about the ending of the story, but I do not want to give away what happens. If you guys do read it, I would love to discuss what happens to Helga with you.

Just like most of my other books, I read The Monk for my Gothic novel class. I believe that this is my favorite book that we have read this semester. I just loved how there were so many stories going on in it, and how mysterious it was. Through the whole book I was in suspense to see what would happen. I was also worried that the ending would be horrible, like The Italian, but it was a good ending. This book is extremely messed up in so many ways. Just to sum it up in a few words, the monk becomes addicted to sex, wants to rape a girl, and there is incest. In a lot of the Gothic novels, a common theme is having family relations, however, in this book it moves up to incest.

Matthew Lewis wrote this book when he was only 19 years old. It is crazy to think that someone so young could write such an amazing novel. This book not only has what I mentioned before, but it also includes the devil, and of course, more ragging on the church.

When I first started to read the book I was not sure how much I would enjoy it. There are a lot of similar scenes in it that I saw in The Italian, and I thought that The Monk would be exactly the same. However, once I got into a few pages of it, I realized how wrong my thinking was. This book is so much better than The Italian. When I read it, it reminded me of a soap opeara. Every action that happened in the story was just so extreme.

I would love to explain the book to you guys, however there are so many stories within the novel that it is hard to sum it all up for you guys. One of the stories throughout the novel is about a monk who is loved by everyone. He is 30 years old and he has never left the monestary. He begins to think about sinning, and eventually gives in to the temptations. If you are interested in reading a story about a monk who begins to sleep around and rape girls, than this is the book for you!

Another story in the novel is of a girl who is in the convent and becomes pregnant. The monk finds out and tells the head of the convent. Of course she gets into trouble. This all begins at the beginning of the story. The rest of the story is of her brother trying to find her.

However, don't think that that is what the book is all about. There is so much stuff going on in the book that at times it is hard to keep up with everything. I really enjoyed this book because there were so many stories going on. There were also a lot of stories being told within the novel. The stories help the reader because they are all backstories, explaining what happened to the characters, and why they ended up where they are.

As you can tell by my short descriptions that the church plays a big part in the novel. However, the church is not seen as something good. Instead everyone in the church is messed up. One part that can really show the reader that Lewis was against the church was when one of the characters was lying on her death bed. She has a daughter who has no where to go. The mother, on her death bed, said that she would rather have her daughter go anywhere except entering into a convent.

I hope I have not scared anyone off from reading this book. I know it sounds messed up, and it is, however the really insane parts are not written until the end of the novel. Everything written up till the end explains what is going to happen and why. If you guys do decide to read it, I would love to hear your comments. Especially if you have read The Italian.

I read The Italian for my Gothic novel class. I enjoyed reading the book, however at times it was a little boring. At certain points in the novel, it was also somewhat scary and it gave me nightmares. The book was about a young man, Vivaldi, who falls in love with a girl, Ellena. Vivaldi's mother and father do not agree with the love interest, so Vivaldi's mother decides to do something about her. Ellena gets kidnapped. The first volume of the book is about Vivaldi and Ellena's love blossoming, and after Ellena gets kidnapped, Vivialdi goes searching for her. Of course he finds her, but than they get split up from each other. The rest of the novel is of the two lovers trying to find out if each other is alive, and trying to find each other. If i say anymore about the story, than I will be giving away the ending.

The book was written in response to Matthew Lewis' The Monk. There are a lot of similarities of the two books, however, The Italian is not as crazy as The Monk. In the next post I will be speaking about The Monk because it was such a great book, and I loved it so much.

A big theme with the Gothic literature is the idea of the church. However, instead of putting the Church in a high up place, as something special, it is made fun of. In The Italian, Vivaldi's mother uses a nunnery to "imprison" Ellena. While Ellena is in the convent, she is trapped in a room with no windows. All she has is a bed in the cell. The idea of entering into a convent, in the Gothic novels, was one of the worst ideas that people could have. Characters would rather go other places than be in the convent.

Thinking about this book, I can not recall any one point that I really wanted to write about. I guess I can mention the ending. When I finally got to the end of the novel, I was somewhat dissappointed by it. I was hoping that there would have been a bigger ending to it. Throughout the whole book, things are always built up, and the reader hopes that something good is going to happen. And then all of a sudden nothing happens. If any of you guys feel the same way, I would love to hear about it. This book has on the surface may seem like there is not a lot to speak about, but when really thinking about the novel, there is a lot involved in it. Please let me know what you thought about The Italian, and if you guys have read The Monk as well, I would love to talk to you about comparing the two of them. There are so many similarities between the two books.

I absolutely loved reading The Well of Loneliness. I read it for my Gay and Lesbian literature, which is very different from my Gothic class. I recommend to everyone to read this book. The story begins with a couple expecting a child. They believe that they are going to have a son, and begin calling the baby Stephen. Eventaully they have the baby, and it is a girl. They named the baby Stephen anyway because they were used to calling it that. As Stephen grows up, she tries to act more like a boy, and does not understand that she should behave like a girl. As she gets older, she understands that she is different from everyone around her. She eventaully begins to date a woman, and understands that she is a lesbian and not straight. Stephen's mother kicks her out of the house, and Stephen tries to find a place where she will be accepted.

The first half of the book is about Stephen's childhood, and the second half is about Stephen as an adult. While Stephen is a child, she enjoys to act like a boy. She would dress up as a boy character and pretend to be him. She also enjoyed to go out hunting with her father. Her mother was not very happy about the way Stephen acted, and hoped that she would become more femine as she grew older. As Stephen grows up, her mother finds out that she is a lesbian, and kicks her out of the house. Stephen moves to Paris and becomes an artist. Both parts of the book are interesting to read, but so different from each other.

From the minute I started reading the book, I was addicted to it. It is a long book, but every page that I had read was amazing. Stephen is such a unique character that the reader cannot help but love her. Stephen goes through a huge change throughout the novel and it is amazing to read about it and to see her actually change.

The novel is also so great because of it's time period. It begins in the late 1800's and goes past World War I, so not only does the main character change and grow, but she speaks about the changes in technology. One part that I really enjoyed, that has to do with the technology, is when she spoke about the first car that her family bought. She said that they were the first people within her town to own a car. The description of it was what stood out in my mind. She said the car only went 15 miles per hour. She also said that when people went into the car they had to wear a protective jacket and helmet. We obviously don't have to worry about the protective gear anymore when driving. There is also more than one person in everyone's town who owns a car. I hope you guys enjoy reading about the changes as much as I did!

I advise for everyone to read this novel. This novel may be about a homosexual character, but the main idea of the story is about a young woman trying to fit into a world where women have to act femine and cannot act like men. Stephen loved to wear pants, like men, and could not understand why she was not allowed to wear them. When she went to social functions with her family, she had to wear a skirt or a dress like a proper lady. This book is about breaking the rules of sex and gender and trying to be accepted. If you guys decide to read this, which I hope you will, please let me know what you think! I wrote a paper about this book, just like with Caleb Williams. I compared the book to Frankenstein. I won't go into the paper, since it is not completely done, but if you have read both Frankenstein and The Well of Loneliness I would love to talk to you about comparing them!

The next book that I read for my Gothic literature class was Caleb Williams. It is a wonderful novel about a man running away from someone who is trying to kill him. Caleb Williams is a detective story, like many of the other Gothic novels that I have read. However, this novel could truly be considered a Gothic novel. The book starts off with the main character, Caleb, telling the reader that he is trying to hide from a man who wants to kill him, but no one knows why. This got me extremely interested into the story right from the beginning.

Caleb is a young man who loses both his parents and has no one to live with, or does he have a job to help him survive. One of the men in his town, Falkland, takes him into the house to work. While working for Falkland, Caleb notices that Falkland goes through mood swings. Caleb does not understand why Falkland is so upset and why he always locks himself up for days at a time. Falkland’s servant decides to tell Caleb why Falkland is so upset. What Caleb is being told, is a secret, and once Caleb hears the secret, he wants to talk to Falkland about it, but can not. This makes Caleb snoop around Falklands stuff to find out more information about him.

One of the great things that I loved about Caleb Williams is that there are two different perspectives telling the story. The book is split into three different volumes. The first volume is told by a different narrator, Falkland’s servant. The second and third volumes are told by Caleb. The servant tells Caleb, and the reader, about how Falkland had a rival, and eventually the rival ends up dying. No one knows for sure how the rival died, but Caleb, and others, believes that Falkland killed his rival. Caleb takes it into his hands to try to figure out the mystery.

The rest of the book takes place after Caleb gets caught trying to figure out the mystery. Falkland walks in on Caleb going through a personal chest in the house. Caleb gets scared and tries to run away. He gets caught the first time, but he eventually escapes the second time and is able to stay away. If I tell anymore about the story I will be giving away the ending, but I hope you became interested in the story.

Something that I really loved about this novel was the fact that it was written in first person. A lot of the Gothic novels that I have read were in third person. I enjoyed that Caleb was the one who was actually speaking to the reader, telling what happened. It makes the reader feel more connected to the story. The reader is able to feel more connected to Caleb because the events are actually happening to him, instead of just reading a story about a “fictional” character. If anyone has read this, or wants to read it, please let me know. I would love to talk to people about it.

I wrote one of my papers about the book. I compared it to the idea of the Panopticon, if anyone knows about it. The Panopticon is the idea of someone being in the center. This person in the center is being watched by other people, but they can not see who is watching them. I used this idea because when Caleb ran away, Falkland always knew where he was, but Caleb did not know that he was being watched. I really enjoyed this idea within the novel, and it can be seen throughout other Gothic novels as well. If anyone else has noticed this theme, I would love for you to tell me. I found this idea to be very interesting.

I have read The Picture of Dorian Gray two times now. The first time I read the book was while I was in high school. I enjoyed it when I read it the first time, but I will admit that I did not understand it very well. The second time I read the book was a little over a week ago for my Gay and Lesbian Literature class. Being a little older I understood the story better. The first time that I read the book, I did not understand all the sexual references, and the references to drugs. However, this time I did realize it, and I liked how they were used.

I am really glad that I got the chance to reread this novel because I have forgotten how funny it is. I have read other writings by Wilide and have enjoyed them very much. They are always so funny and they always make fun of the society of the time period. Oscar Wilde was someone who was able to see into society from the outside, and see how ridiculous people behaved. The way he writes his characters is just so creative, and so exciting. Whenever I start a new story about him I always wonder what kind of silly things the characters are going to talk about.

Another reason why I love this book so much is because of its reference to the gothic period. If you have read my other posts, you will realize that I enjoy reading books that were written during the gothic era. I do not believe that the book is supposed to be considered gothic though. However, what else am I supposed to call Dorian's painting. The painting obviously takes on the role of the supernatural. Instead of Dorian aging the picture does it for him. The picture also absorbs all of the sins that Dorian has committed. This idea of a picture changing appearances and the person staying the same is a form of magic. In a sense, Hallward could also be considered the magician since he is the one who painted the picture. Before Dorian enters the novel, Hallward speaks very highly of him to Lord Henry. The image that the reader gets from Hallward is the image of someone who is absolutely amazing. In Hallwards eyes, Gray is a saint. Since this is how Hallward portrays him, and wants him to be, it is how Gray will stay forever. Hallward could have the power to keep people young and alive forever.

The idea of staying young and alive forever sounds wonderful. Especially during Dorian's time. Once Dorian meets Lord Henry, he becomes obsessed with his appearances. If Gray can stay handsome and wonderful looking, than he is considered doing a deed to society. However, I am not sure I would want to live forever. There is so many horrible things going on in the world, I am not sure I want to experience any more than I have to. I also do not know what I would do when all my friends got older. It would be hard to have to continue to have to make new friends. The characters in the novel do understand why people have feelings, they only understand appearances, which I find to be hilarious.

Another character that I really enjoyed reading about was Sybil Vane. I am not sure if I would call her a character in the story, or a character within the story. She is an actress who Gray falls in love with, however he does not really fall in love with her. He falls in love with her acting, and becomes upset when he realizes that she is a real person, independent of her character. I love how her last name is Vane, especially the spelling of it. The way that it is spelled tells the reader that Sybil is someone who is readily changeable. We can see this changing in all of her plays.

I think I love her character the most because in today’s society, people are judged on how they act and behave. People are no longer judged on who they are individually, but rather what they look like, who they hang out with, and the different personalities that they have. Where I am from, people are judged based on the type of sunglasses you buy, the types of bag you have, the brand of pants you wear, etc. I find this to be very annoying, as I am sure a lot of other people do as well. That may be the reason why I love this book so much. Everything that the characters say is so obscured that you just can't help but laugh. If the reader took the book literally, than how are we supposed to really look at our society? Are we supposed to ignore the different ways people act? I hope not.

As much as I loved this book, I will admit that there was a section of the book that I did not enjoy reading. There is a section where Gray goes off exploring the world. After he realizes that he will never age, he decides to do whatever he wants and he travels. I found the first few paragraphs to be interesting, however, by the time I got to the third page I was ready to throw the book down. I understand that Gray is having a wonderful time, and he is seeing new things, but I do not want to read about it. I don't know about you guys, but I am more interested in dialogue and real actions that are going on, not just descriptive paragraphs, especially ones that jump around from place to place. If there is too much description and not enough diagloge in books, I begin to zone out. It is a horrible habit but there is only so much that I can read and take in at one time. I enjoy using my imagination and finding out what happens with the characters. I am one of those horrible people who love to look at the end of the book while I'm still only half way through it.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who has not read it yet. It is an easy book to read and it is very funny. For those of you who have read it, I would love to hear what you guys thought about it! I know that I always miss important/exciting things that happen in books, so if you noticed anything that I missed please let me know!

Vathek is the second book that I read in my Gothic class. As you have read in my earlier post, I really enjoyed reading The Castle of Otranto. When I read Vathek I did not enjoy it as much in the begining. The first few pages of the story were very descriptive. A lot of the characters in the story were real people at one point in history, so there was an explanation of who they were. Reading the history of the characters, the history of the religion, and reading the story was not very interesting, and it took me forever to get through the book. Even though the book is only 100 pages, it took me a full day to finish it. The way the book was written was very dense and hard for me to understand. However, once I got through the book I realized that the story was very interesting. If anyone has read Dante’s Inferno, than they might like this book. Even though the characters in this book are alive, they are destined for Hell and the reader sees the different actions and influences that made the characters considered evil. The end of the book takes place in the "hell" that was created. I really enjoyed reading that part because it was interesting to read the different ideas about hell. Dante had one idea about what Hell was like, and he wrote a whole book about it. In Vathek, Hell was described very differently from Dante's version. The set up Beckford's hell was not what someone would expect. In Vathek the hell was described as some large palace that looked beautiful inside of it. Reading about the different hells made me think about what Hell may really look like. It's also interesting to read about the different reasons why people were sent to hell. In Vathek it was pretty obvious why most of the characters were sent to hell. In Dante’s Inferno the reasons why people were sent to hell can be very debatable. I could go on comparing the two hells, and talking about them, however, there was so much more that happened in the book that was exciting.

This book, like The Castle of Otranto had the supernatural involved in the story. However, in Vathek the supernatural is what caused the characters to be evil. I was upset by this fact. I enjoyed how in The Castle of Otranto the ghosts were not evil, but they were just there in the castle, haunting people. I like to think that the magical people were either for good or just scare others, not for evil. The ideas of how the supernatural’s act in this book made me also think of the idea of having free will power. The characters did not have to do what they did. Vathek, the main character, knew that what he was doing was wrong, yet he still did it anyway. The reason why Vathek did what the magical person said was because he wanted to receive more knowledge. This brings up the idea of taking the easy way out of things. Vathek decided to be lazy, and just do what the magical monster said instead of trying to learn knowledge on his own. You can still see this laziness in today's society. When people don't know something, like a word, instead of looking in a dictionary, they just look on line. People find the easiest ways to gain the most knowledge, but they don't realize that half of the knowledge comes from the way you learn it.

There are three more stories with in Vathek but I have only read one of them. They are called episodes, and they are at the end of the book. These episodes are the stories of the four people that Vathek meets in hell. Before the characters' hearts are turned to fire, the four characters, plus Vathek and his lover, are telling the stories of why they are in the hell. The story that I read was the story of Alasi and Firouz. I am not going to go into the story because it is similar to Vathek, but I will say that it was interesting to read. The stories are so interesting because the reader can see the different stages of the characters become evil. When the stories began, the characters were good people, and liked by everyone. However, after they met their evil counterpart, the characters began to become evil themselves. The best part of watching the characters become evil, was noticing how much persuasion someone can have over someone else. It is interesting to realize that people don't do things for themselves, but they do it to make someone else happy.

If anyone has read Vathek, I would like to know what they thought of it. I would also like to know what else people were interested in when they read the story!

The best part about being an English major is being exposed too many books and authors. In my gothic literature class the first book we read was The Castle of Otranto written by Horace Walpole. Before I started the book, I thought it would be boring, since it's a book for class. However, once I started reading the first few sentences I realized how wrong I was. The book has mystery, suspense, romance, and magic. That combination makes a great book. Another reason why I loved the book so much was because all of the magic and prophecy that is included in the book can be exciting. It is always fun to imagine what life would have been like in the past, or even what life would be like if there were ghosts walking around someone's house.

Not to jump to the end, but what was so great about the book was the fact that some of the characters did not get their "happy ending". One of my biggest pet peeves is how books and movies always have their happy endings. Some movies I will admit should have happy endings. I love to watch comedy movies or little kid movies, and I like to see that the characters are happy at the end. However, some movies should not have their happy endings. Sometimes it would be nice to see the truth, that not everyone is always happy. In this book, at the end, all of the characters do not have what they want. One of the character dies while being proposed too. Another character looses his kingship and does not know what to do. I may be the only one who likes these types of endings, but I am hoping to find more like it.

I really enjoyed the female characters in the novel. I found them to be very empowering, and having control over their lives, as well as controlling the fates of others around them. It is exciting to realize that even though men were supposed to have complete control over their family, the women in the story had control and power. Considering a man wrote the book, it is nice to see that he thought women had power. He could have had the women be silent and not contribute their thoughts or actions. However, if this is how Walpole presented women in his novel, should I, the reader, feel like he has misrepresented the era of the novel? The reason why I love to read books from different time periods is because I love to learn how people lived and behaved during different times. But if I decide to read a novel from the gothic period, than I should expect it not to be a true representation of the time period.

The reason why I say that a book from the gothic period is not a true representation of the period is because there are usually supernatural or magical events going on in the story. In The Castle of Otranto there are ghosts in the castle that continue to pop up throughout the story. Reading about the ghosts popping up can be exciting, never knowing when they're going to show up. With all the supernatural things going on in this novel, has made me realize how much I enjoy reading gothic books. I enjoy everything that happened in this book, and I hope to read more gothic books and see what happens in them. I would love to hear about different gothic novels to read. I am always looking for books to read, but I am always unsure what to get. I would also love to hear what people had to say about The Castle of Otranto and their opinions of the characters.

I just finished reading A Million Little Pieces by James Frey. I know all about the controversy that went on between him and Opera Whinfrey when he was on her show but I still wanted to read the book anyway. I found the book to be intense, and scary but also very interesting. The book was intense because of everything James went through, and everything that he wrote down. Frey was in a really bad place in his life with all the drugs he did and all the issues he had with his friends and family. Oprah may have given him crap for making up parts of the story, but she should have also praised him for writing what he did. It must have been hard for Frey to live his life before rehab and after rehab as well. It must have been even harder for Frey to relive everything he went through and write it down. It must have also been tough for Frey since rehab is a very private thing, and now he is sharing it with millions of people. I admire him for both his novels and hope that he writes another.

However, now that I just wrote that statement about Frey, it makes me think, did Frey really care about writing his story? Maybe he just wrote the book for all the attention. That could explain why he made up parts of the story. He could have thought that his life in rehab was not very exciting and that no one would want to read the book, hence the extra parts. I wish I had seen the Oprah episode where Frey was on it so that I knew which parts were true and which were false. I think if I had known the parts that were false than I would have enjoyed the book better. The whole time I was reading, I just kept thinking to myself "is this what really happened". I would have been happier not knowing anything about the book, or knowing everything about it, but not being in between like I was. Knowing which parts were false would help me understand Frey better, and understand his way of thinking. His drug habit could have been because he needed attention in his life, and using was one way that he knew how to get it. Now that he doesn't use drugs anymore, he needs another way to get attention in his life. Writing books is another way for people to notice him.

I have just done some research to try and find what really happened between Oprah and Frey. The information is pretty interesting, and now I understand why Oprah became so upset. It seems that Frey has altered a lot in his book. However, I feel that some of the alterations were necessary since he wrote so much about different people. All the characters were based off of real people, and Frey could not have shown their true personalities for fear that someone might have realized who they were. Here are some websites that you guys can go to look at to see what went on. There is one link to MSN videos. You may have to type in "James Frey", and then some videos will show up. The other website is Oprah's. The video version of the conversation is not shown, but there is a conversation written down that you guys can read. As I read it, I must admit that I was pretty shocked of what I saw. I hope you guys enjoy the links, and please tell me what you thought about them, either individually or in comparison to the book!

MSN Link

Oprah Link

I wish I did not analyze the book as much as I just did but now my thoughts are somewhat cleared up about the book and Frey. I wish I had more incite about his life, and I know that whenever I read a memoir I am always going to wonder if what happened to the author was real or not. However, I still enjoy reading memoirs because it lets the reader look into someone else's life with no judgement, which I love doing. I hope to hear what other people thought of "A Million Little Pieces" and "My Friend Lenord", Freys other memoir. I would also like to know if anyone had any other suggestions of what memoirs to read.