Tale of Imagination

Gerald, Kathleen, and Jimmy hope to find adventure when they set off to explore the woods, but they get far more than they bargained for when they discover the Enchanted Castle.

At first they seem to be in a fairy tale come true, until a friend turns invisible, thanks to a magic ring that she can’t remove. Adventure follows adventure as they seek to control the magic – but the magic has a will of its own and it is all they can do to keep up.

Faced with sleeping princesses, magic rings, and moonlit gardens filled with enchantment, the children must use all their courage and ingenuity to control the magic and solve the mystery surrounding the Enchanted Castle.

Title: The Enchanted Castle
Author: E. Nesbit
Illustrator: Paul Zelinsky
Published: 1907
Publisher: Books of Wonder
Pages: 288
Genre: Children’s Fantasy

E. Nesbit’s imaginative and superbly well-written, The Enchanted Castle is a modern children’s fantasy story, which is even more surprising since it was first published in 1907! This incredible writer’s works have inspired several other children's writers over the years including C. S. Lewis who mentions some of Nesbit's characters in one of his Chronicles of Narnia books.

If it wasn’t for my online reading group, The Childrens Books of Yesterday choosing The Enchanted Castle as January's group read, I probably wouldn't have picked up the book on my own. I have heard of Nesbit before but I didn’t think it would really appeal to me. Was I ever wrong!

Just about everything a kid has ever imagined- invisibility, growing tall, growing older, even turning into a statue- happens to the four children in this novel... and they can’t seem to stay out of trouble! I liked both Gerald and Kathleen more than any of the other characters because Mabel and Jimmy were both immature and annoying characters. Eliza was another favorite character even though she refused to believe her own little adventure with the magic ring but adults always do, don't they? I couldn’t imagine not being completely terrified those Ugly-Wugglies though!

Many of Mrs. Nesbit’s books have been made into movies over the years and The Enchanted Castle is no exception. It was made into a TV series in 1979 by the BBC but that’s about all the information I can find on it. I’ve included several of the illustrations from my book here which are by Paul O. Zelinsky who has also illustrated some of Nesbit’s other stories (you can click to enlarge).

The Enchanted Castle has now passed into public domain so several sites have uploaded the entire book but the Gutenberg Project’s version is one of the best and LibriVox has the audio book online too. I also found an interesting article about E. Nesbit’s works by the New York Review of Books.

Melting the Ice Man

Never get in the way of a mission...

The job was supposed to be dead easy—hand–deliver some legal papers to billionaire philanthropist Harry Van Dorn’s extravagant yacht, get his signature and be done. But Manhattan lawyer Genevieve Spenser soon realizes she’s in the wrong place at the wrong time, and that the publicly benevolent playboy has a sick, vicious side. As he tries to make her his plaything for the evening, eager to use and abuse her until he discards her with the rest of his victims, Genevieve must keep her wits if she intends to survive the night.

But there’s someone else on the ship who knows the true depths of Van Dorn’s evil. Peter Jensen is far more than the unassuming personal assistant he pretends to be—he’s a secret operative who will stop at nothing to ensure Harry’s deadly Rule of Seven terror campaign dies with him. But Genevieve’s presence has thrown a wrench into his plans, and now he must decide whether to risk his mission to keep her alive, or allow her to become collateral damage….

Title: Cold as Ice
Author: Anne Stuart
Series: Ice Series
Published: 2006
Publisher: MIRA Books
Pages: 360
Genre: Romance- Adventure, Contemporary

Cold as Ice is the second novel in Anne Stuart's romantic suspense Ice series which involves an organization called the Committee and their "employees" who save the world by eliminating the bad guys. Each book in the Ice series is about one of the Committee's individual members (which you are introduced to in the previous novel, Black Ice- Bastien Toussaint's story) and their current mission.

Peter Masden, aka the Ice Man is one of the best operators the Committee currently has, especially since Bastien retired but even he is no match for the lawyer Genevieve Spenser! They seem perfect for each other from the very beginning even if they drive one another insane. Even if I didn’t like the romance genre (which I love), I’d still like the Ice series because of the action packed suspense. The car chases, blowing up houses and boats, world destruction threats, you name it, Cold as Ice has it!

Although I really enjoyed reading the second book in the Ice series, it wasn’t as great as the first book but I did enjoy it and I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the series. Hopefully the heroines will start being as real as the males in the stories.

Anne Stuart’s Wikipedia entry has a complete bibliography of all her books and you can find an excerpt of Cold as Ice here. ARA also has a 2006 interview with the author about the entire Ice series.

The Ice Series:

• Black Ice
• Cold as Ice
• Ice Blue
• Ice Storm

Love That Transcends Time

Dr. Kate Forester (Sandra Bullock) has finally found romance. Trouble is, it’s a long-distance relationship. She’s in downtown Chicago. He’s in a remote lakeside suburb. And there’s more: She’s in 2006. He’s in 2004. It begins when Kate moves out of her visually stunning lake house and leaves a note for the next tenant, architect Alex Wyler (Keanu Reeves). They begin a correspondence and soon come to realize they are meant for each other... and that, somehow, they live two years apart. Can they ever meet? What would happen if they tried? Magical and emotionally rich, The Lake House is a love story for 2004, for 2006, for all times.

Title: The Lake House
Release: June 16, 2006
Genre: Drama-Romance
MPAA Rating: PG
Writer: David Auburn
Director: Alejandro Agresti
Produced By: Sonny Mallhi
Distributed By: Warner Brothers
Run Time: 98 minutes
Official Site

One of the sweetest, romantic movies in years, The Lake House stars two of Hollywood’s best actors, Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock reunited for the first time in 12 years. Some of the movie is actually kind of confusing because it messes with time until you stop trying to make sense of the temporal paradox. This film was based on the South Korean movie called Il Mare.

I’ve always thought Sandra Bullock was a great actress but she’s never actually made me cry before like she did in The Lake House. It was such a good movie! I was able to figure out the “major plot twist” pretty early into the movie but that didn’t stop me from worrying that I might not get my happy-ever-after ending.

The setting is one of the most important things in the whole film and believe me, it’s a gorgeous , if unusual piece of architecture designed by Alex’s father played by the stately Christopher Plummer. It wasn’t hard to believe that such a beautiful place could make people love it so much at all. I also really liked the dog Jack and how vital she was to their getting together.

Imdb.com and Wikipedia both have articles on The Lake House and Hollywood.com has cast interviews and the movie premiere.

Trailer:


The View Interview:


The View 2:

Love at Last Glance

Lucy Kelson (Sandra Bullock) – a brilliant attorney with a strategic mind who's more interested in saving her Coney Island neighborhood than in earning a big paycheck – is presented with the opportunity to do both when she accepts a position as chief counsel for real estate tycoon George Wade (Hugh Grant).

However, the handsome, charming but totally self-absorbed Wade pushes Lucy to the limit by treating her more like a nanny than the Harvard Law School grad she is. When Lucy decides to quit, her two weeks notice makes them realize they have fallen in love.

Title: Two Weeks Notice
Release: December 18, 2002
Genre: Romantic Comedy
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Writer: Marc Lawrence
Director: Marc Lawrence
Produced By: Sandra Bullock
Distributed By: Warner Bros.
Run Time: 101 minutes
Official Site

Hugh Grant and Sandra Bullock; the king and queen of romantic comedies, finally get together in one of their own in writer Marc Lawrence’s directorial debut Two Weeks Notice.
It’s the classic plot line of girl falls in love with annoying man and neither doesn’t realize that they love one another until it’s almost too late but with Grant and Bullock holding the reins you know you’re in for a treat!

I had been in the mood for a good romantic comedy when I stumbled across Two Weeks Notice and when I realized who was in it I knew I would love it before I even watched it! Sandy and Hugh are just incredibly charismatic and have this ability to have chemistry with whomever they’re co-starring with so you truly believe that they will fall in love.

Most people believe that if you’ve seen one romantic comedy, you’ve seen them all and that may be true to an extent but I honestly believe that ones like this become almost like comfort food for when life gets you down and you need to believe in fairy tales. Even when they pair a lawyer with a playboy.

Wikipedia and imdb.com have plenty of information on Two Weeks Notice but About.com also has a text interview with the stars of the film available.

Trailer:

visit videodetective.com for more info

Bloopers:


Interview:

A Great Knight Read

Men in tights...
... never looked so good. At least that's Pepper Marsh's first impression when she attends a jousting competition at the Renaissance Faire in Ontario. An unemployed and unattached software engineer, Pepper has had enough of the computer geeks in her dating pool. She yearns for a man of yore. A man not afraid to stare death in the face and laugh at it. A man with a big lance...

Pepper's cousin has promised to find her a knight in shining armor, on the condition that Pepper walk around in wench garb. With her mind on her embarrassingly revealing bustier, Pepper promptly steps into the path of an oncoming steed... and is rescued by sexy Englishman Walker McPhail. Once the wild man of jousting, Walker has let a brush with death keep him out of the ring. Though his emotions are clad in almost impenetrable armor, Pepper finds Walker infuriatingly sexy- and she’s about to go medieval on his heart...

Title: Hard Day’s Knight
Author: Katie MacAlister
Published: 2005
Publisher: Signet Eclipse
Pages: 346
Genre: Romance-Contemporary

Saucy, quirky, and fun would be the best way to describe any good wench and of course any Katie MacAlister book! This is especially true in her contemporary romance Hard Day’s Knight which is set in a present day Renaissance festival complete with jousting of course.

I’ve actually never had the pleasure of going to a Renaissance Fair before but MacAlister did a good job of making the audience feel like the setting was very real. I do however think she went a little too far into some details that I could have cared less about but I suppose someone would have complained about it if she hadn’t. Either way, you can tell MacAlister did her research and really enjoyed working on this book.

As much as I liked all of the characters in this book I would have to say the grumpy feline Moth completely stole the show! I’ve noticed that even if I love the characters in this authors books, I’ll always like the animals more. They have just as much personality as their owners (especially Moth) but they don’t necessarily have to follow the rules of typical animal sidekicks.

Hard Day’s Knight was an interesting short book that I enjoyed and that I learned more about jousting and wenching than I ever could want to know. I wouldn’t mind if there was a sequel to Pepper and Walker’s story but mainly because I’d like to see more of Moth. Now I just need to find a Renaissance festival around here somewhere and get a pair of those devil horns for my kitty too!

If you would like to read an excerpt from Hard Day’s Knight there is one available on MacAlister’s website and if you would like more information on the author and her books, Wikipedia has an article. There is a behind-the-scenes podcast for this book as well. As I mentioned, MacAlister did some research before she wrote this story including joining the International Wenches Guild and talking to people from the Seattle Knights performance troupe.
Other Katie MacAlister Posts by Me:

• Blow Me Down
• Ain't Myth-Behaving