The Princess Bride by: William Goldman

Synopsis:

What happens when the most beautiful girl in the world marries the handsomest prince of all time and he turns out to be...well...a lot less than the man of her dreams?

As a boy, William Goldman claims, he loved to hear his father read the "S. Morgenstern classic, The Princess Bride. But as a grown-up he discovered that the boring parts were left out of good old Dad's recitation, and only the "good parts" reached his ears.

Now Goldman does Dad one better. He's reconstructed the "Good Parts Version" to delight wise kids and wide-eyed grownups everywhere.

What's it about? Fencing. Fighting. True Love. Strong Hate. Harsh Revenge. A Few Giants. Lots of Bad Men. Lots of Good Men. Five or Six Beautiful Women. Beasties Monstrous and Gentle. Some Swell Escapes and Captures. Death, Lies, Truth, Miracles, and a Little Sex.
In short, it's about everything.
[as stated by the publisher]

The Princess Bride is one of my favorite movies. Ever. I love it! So, naturally, it was bound to happen that I would pick up the novel somewhere along the way. Now, this is an abridgement of sorts from the novel by S. Morgenstern. As stated in the synopsis, Goldman removed anything all the parts that didn't entail to the fairytale/adventure story he loved that his dad read him as a child.

In the book, Goldman explained to the reader what was happening during the parts he got rid of. While some of the parts seemed sort of interesting (like seeing how Buttercup trained to become a princess), most of them seemed as boring as Goldman made them out to be, so I'm glad he left them out.

That said, I loved the book. The movie definitely stayed true to the story! I loved the characters and all the delicious satire and wit that's sprinkled throughout this novel. It's wonderful. One of the best "fairytales" I've read. I also love the interactions between Fezzick and Inigo and the interactions between Buttercup and Westley. So amazing!

I think this book has something for every sort of reader. It has adventure, it has wit, and it has romance. I would recommend it to anyone who likes fable sorts of stories, but also loves to laugh.

I will definitely be rereading this book at some point in time. I loved it!

Overall rating: 9/10

Pariah by: Bob Fingerman

Synopsis:

The world is in chaos. A zombie plague has devoured every nation on the planet. New York City is no exception. Imagine eight million zombies. Shoulder to shoulder. Walking ...

[from barnesandnoble.com]

With Halloween coming up right around the corner, I thought I would dip in to some of the more scary books that are waiting to be read on my shelves. I'm so glad I picked Pariah up first.

Pariah, amongst the problems it may have with it, is a horror novel. The zombes in this book are not pretty. They are decaying, flesh-eating, zombies. And that's what I love about it. Nowadays I've seen authors try to beautify zombies. You cannot make a zombie pretty. They eat people; devour them limb from limb. That's what zombies do, whether they have a slow walk or run (but, that's another debate entirely). Fingerman portrayed zombies just the way I love them, wildly gory and gruesome. I loved being able to get back to the old school horror.

Now, the characters left something to be desired. I liked them (most of them; Eddie got on my damn nerves), but I felt they were a little two-dimensional. I know that when an author has so many main characters, it's hard to put a lot of background into each character without dragging on and on, but I just felt like they weren't as strong of characters as they could have been. They served their purpose, but I kind of wanted more. I really wish we had gotten some explanation on Mona. At least a background on her! But, we got nothing. Which, I understand to a point. I think he wanted to let the audience decide for themselves if Mona was just a regular girl or if she was more of a Jesus figure.

And I wish we had gotten a more solid ending! The end really left me wanting more. It was kind of anti-climatic.

All in all, it was a pretty solid book. I'll definitely reread it, if only to get a shot of zombie goodness.

Overall rating: 7/10