The Booking Through Thursday question for this week is:

1. In your opinion, what is the best translation of a book to a movie?
2. The worst?
3. Had you read the book before seeing the movie, and did that make a difference? (Personally, all other things being equal, I usually prefer whichever I was introduced to first.)

And, by all means, expand this to as long a list as you like. I’m notoriously awful myself at narrowing down to one favorite ANYTHING. So, feel free to list as many “good” or “bad” movie-from-books as you like. (Heaven knows that’s what I’ll be doing….)

One of the best was Jane Austen’s Persuasion. I had seen the film before reading the book, but the film made me want to read the book, and I was delighted to find the film kept very closely to the book. I liked the film version of Sense and Sensibility much better than the book.

I loved the first Anne of Green Gables film, and I felt it was very close to the book. That film also inspried me to read the whole series of Anne books plus several other things L. M. Montgomery has written. The second film, Anne of Avonlea, strayed from the book but was still pretty good. The third, Anne of Green Gables, The Continuing Story, was a total disappointment. By this time I had read all the books and I thought the one about Anne’s first year of marriage was so sweet, and I hoped they would make a film of it. I know a film can’t capture every detail of a book, and there are some scenes of narration that might need to be acted out somehow, etc. — but when you basically just use the characters and the setting and then write your own story, that’s fanfic, not an adaptation. I get all frustrated and stirred up every time I think of this film too much, so let’s move on..

I thought the whole Lord of the Rings series was excellent. I had seen the first film without reading the book, and read the book afterward. Then with the second film I read the book first. Reading the book first enhances the understanding of what’s going on in the film, but it takes the edge off the anticipation of wondering what’s next. I tended to think more in terms of “how are they going to film this?” rather than what was coming next in the story. But seeing the film first made some of the book seem dull — I kept wanting to get to the scenes I had seen in the film. I did see the third film but haven’t read the book yet.

Les Miserables is a play or musical rather than a film, but I saw it on a video of the 10th anniversary of it. In that video it wasn’t acted out, but the characters were in costume and sang most of the songs. I had checked it out from the library when I saw it there on the shelves and decided to see what all the fuss was about. I fell in love with the gorgeous music and the story. But when I looked up the whole set of lyrics, there were some very vulgar places that made it so that I don’t think I could ever see the play in good conscience. I did read the book and loved it and want to read it again some time. It’s a wonderful story of love and redemption. I’m told it is hard to find a copy of the whole original book because there were long tedious parts in it about industrialization, etc., but the two abridged versions I read were wonderful and contained no vulgarity at all, even when dealing with Fantine’s profession. I did later see a film adaptation with Liam Neeson and Geoffrey Rush that I thought was truly awful.

I loved Little Women with Susan Sarandon and Winona Ryder. I saw a couple of older versions but I don’t remember much about them.

I thought the book The End of the Spear was much better than the film.

Probably several more examples are going to come to mind all through the day. 🙂

I’ve written here before about Sharon Hinck‘s books, The Secret Life of Becky Miller and Renovating Becky Miller, and how they spoke to my heart. So when I first knew that she was writing another book, The Restorer, I knew it was a must-read.

It’s a different genre than the Becky Miller books — in a way. I suppose you could call all three “mom-lit,” though I am sure they would appeal to others as well. The heroine of all three books is an ordinary mom dealing with life and faith. But Susan Mitchell of The Restorer is pulled into an alternate reality or parallel universe, so this book is more of a fantasy.

One of the things I like best about it is that at first it doesn’t feel like a fantasy. It feels very real, especially when Susan first finds herself in a very different place from home. The confusion and rationalization she experiences are, I think, exactly what anyone would go through if they really did find themselves in her situation.

Susan finds herself in a reluctant leadership role designed to draw people back to “the Verses” which tell of “the One.” She struggles with whether she can handle it and how she’s supposed to handle it since she is unlike previous Restorers. There are some wonderful unexpected twists, spots of humor, and most of all truths about reliance on the One. I don’t want to tell too much about the story because I think readers will enjoy the discovery along the way, and I don’t want to take away from that. It’s very loosely based on Deborah’s story in the book of Judges.

To me the best of Christian fiction has a good story, a sense of humor, an interesting plot, characters and conflicts that seem genuine, and it conveys Biblical truth something like an extended parable, speaking simply to the heart without browbeating. And I believe Sharon Hinck is among the best of Christian fiction writers.

Let me know if you read this book and what you think.

I forgot to mention in all of spring’s busy-ness that I won a book in one of Katrina’s Books-Galore give-aways! I received not just a copy, but an autographed copy of Scrap Everything by Leslie Gould. Thank you Katrina and Leslie! Leslie is a new author to me, and I am looking forward to exploring this book!

These are the other books I hope to read this summer:

The Ultimate Weight Solution by Dr. Phil McGraw. I started it for the Spring Reading Thing but haven’t finished. It’s good — I just have to labor more with non-fiction.

The Princess Bride by William Goldman. This was also on my spring list, but I just didn’t get to it. I had to order it because neither the library nor the bookstore had it.

True Light by Terri Blackstock. This just came out in early June. It’s the third in a series.

The Restorer by Sharon Hinck. In progress, loving it!

Cassidy by Lori Wick. Lori, Terri, and Sharon are all authors whose books I eagerly anticipate before they hit the shelves and usually get them as soon as I can.

The Potluck Club Takes the Cake by Linda Evans Shepherd and Eva Marie Everson. I first picked this up when it caught my eye on the shelf in my Christian bookstore. I wondered about it at first — Christian characters should be flawed, because real Christians are, but these ladies FLAWED! It was neat to see how they all grew in their faith through the series. A different touch in this series is that every chapter is written from the point of view of one of the characters.

Summer by Karen Kingsbury, next to the last, I think, of the Baxter family series, coming out later this summer.

Only two other non-fiction titles, though I have many stacked up on my shelves: Spirit of the Rainforest: A Yanomamo Shaman’s Story by Mark Ritchie, recommended by Jungle Mom, and In the Best Possible Light by Beneth Peters Jones, about Biblical femininity. I’ve been thinking a lot about this topic for a long time and am looking forward to what she has to say.

Added: Sweet Dreams Drive by Robin Lee Hatcher.

One Candle To Burn by Kay Washer

If I finish all those, I have a TBR list compiled from recommendations I’ve seen here and there. 🙂

Continuing on a weekly (for the first one) or daily basis:

Queen of the Castle: 52 Weeks of Encouragement for the Uninspired, Domestically Challenged or Just Plain Tired Homemaker by Lynn Bowen Walker.

Daily Light on the Daily Path compiled by the Samuel Bagster family.

Wonderful Words by Stewart Custer.

And, of course, the Bible, best book ever. I’m currently in Esther, reading straight through: Job is next.

(Graphic courtesy of Anne’s Place)

The Booking Through Thursday question for this week is:

Since school is out for the summer (in most places, at least), here’s a school-themed question for the week:

1. Do you have any old school books? Did you keep yours from college? Old textbooks from garage sales? Old workbooks from classes gone by?
2. How about your old notes, exams, papers? Do you save them? Or have they long since gone to the great Locker-in-the-sky?

I don’t have any text books from elementary or high school — those all had to be turned back in to the school. Workbooks, notes — I don’t know if I have any from that time. If I do, they’d be in boxes of papers in the shed that I need to go through.

I do have several texts from college days: probably all of the ones from my Bible courses, several from my home economics courses: nutrition, meal management, child care, and sewing books. I also kept the textbook from History of Civilization (the first history class I liked, largely due to the teacher, and the last one in my curriculum), from my English and American Literature classes, from my Advanced Composition and Rhetoric class (that course title scared me, but it was just a basic writing class) and my trusty Harbrace College Handbook from freshman English which was a quick reference guide to basic rules of English. I also kept notes from several of those classes (and actually do have them in a filing cabinet by subject rather than in a box!) One special project I kept was a study of what the Bible had to say about raising children. I did keep several research papers I wrote as well.

Now — have I looked at any of that since school days would be a different question. 🙂 Actually, I have looked at many of the textbooks for reference. Some of them are outdated now and much of the information can be found online, but some I would keep because I know where to find what I am looking for easily. Others I keep for sentimental reasons. Probably through the years to come some of them will be gleaned out as I make room for more books (unless I want to start a library….)

I just finished reading Persuasion by Jane Austen this morning, and so far it is my favorite of the Austen books I have read. I have a video of it from 1995 with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds as the main characters, and the video, as I remember it, is remarkably faithful to the book. The book I checked out from the library is an Oxford World’s Classic with footnotes in the back explaining some of the practices Austen refers to or phrases she uses and several appendices explaining the “ranks” of the time as well as dances, the navy, etc. There was also an alternate ending, several lines of which were included in the video (now also available on DVD).

Persuasion was Austen’s last novel. The story flowed, for me, much better than Sense and Sensibility did. There is no witty repartee such as there was in Pride and Prejudice and there is a lot less sarcasm than in either of those books, though peoples’ foibles are in evidence. Persuasion is the story of Anne Elliot. She is the quiet and not very well-favored daughter of a man who, despite his initial wealth, has gone into debt due to indiscreet spending. His late wife had economized and kept things in check, but with her gone, the expenses rose. The best way to deal with the situation and “save face” among their social set was to move to Bath and rent their home to others.

Anne’s father and older sister don’t dislike Anne so much as they just disregard her as being of any importance. It’s not clear why (unless I missed it) except they are both selfish and vain creatures and seem to disregard anyone who can’t raise them in their social standing. So when the younger married (hypochondriac and complaining) sister, Mary, is ill, Anne is sent to help her.

Seven years earlier Anne had been in love with a Frederick Wentworth, but had been persuaded by a longtime family friend, Lady Russell, who has more or less taken Anne’s mother’s place as adviser, that it would not be a good match. As it turns out, the wife of the couple renting Anne’s home is Frederick’s sister. Anne doesn’t feel she’ll meet him, though, since she is out of town visiting her sister and will then travel on to Bath to her new home. But she is surprised to find him among the party of friends of her sister’s in-laws.

Frederick, now Captain Wentworth who has made his fortune in the Navy, is still smarting from Anne’s earlier rejection, so their conduct around each other is very polite but distant. Anne discovers her feelings for him have not changed.

It is peace time, so naval officers have time to spare, and Captain Wentworth is looking to get married. He seems very interested in Anne’s sister’s sisters-in-law. And later Anne’s estranged cousin, Mr. Elliot, attempts to make amends with the family, and people seem to think that he will eventually marry Anne…

If you don’t know the story, I’ll leave you there to find out what happens.

I liked Anne’s character. Somehow she has escaped the foolishness of the rest of her family and seems not only normal, but reasonable, kind, thoughtful, and gracious. I don’t remember if this is stated, but it seems she took after the mother who had passed. One thing that spoke to me was that, in situations where many of us would have been miserable (such as with the complaining sister), she was glad that she was able to be of use to her family. To my shame, I have to confess that that’s not what I would be thinking in the same situation, and that was a rebuke to me.

Overall it is a very sweet story about the power of different types of persuasion and the ease of being persuaded the wrong way by outward appearances. Anne learns to avoid being at the mercy of others’ persuasions and learns to know her own mind.

The Booking Through Thursday question for this week is:

1. Do you cheat and peek ahead at the end of your books? Or do you resolutely read in sequence, as the author intended?
2. And, if you don’t peek, do you ever feel tempted?

I used to look at the end in my undisciplined youth. 🙂 But I found that actually spoiled the story for me. Part of the enjoyment is the unfolding of the story itself, the anticipation, the guessing of what’s going to happen.

I had a similar experience with Christmas presents when I was a child. I was playing near the Christmas tree when I realized that some of the wrapping paper on the presents was light enough to see through. I came back later when no one was around and investigated and made out what most of my presents were. I was delighted! Until Christmas morning when there were no surprises left. Then I was bereft and deflated. I never again yielded to the temptation to find out what my presents were ahead of time.

I’ve come to love savoring the story, not just finding out the ending — unless it is a really boring book. There are times when I am reading through kind of a dull part of a book that I’ll skim through the next few pages and see where it’s going, and I’ll usually come back and finish the dull part before going further. But I do like the save the end for the the last thing.

The Booking Through Thursday question for this week is:

Almost everyone can name at least one author that you would love just ONE more book from. Either because they’re dead, not being published any more, not writing more, not producing new work for whatever reason . . . or they’ve aged and aren’t writing to their old standards any more . . . For whatever reason, there just hasn’t been anything new (or worth reading) of theirs and isn’t likely to be.

If you could have just ONE more book from an author you love . . . a book that would be as good any of their best (while we’re dreaming) . . . something that would round out a series, or finish their last work, or just be something NEW . . . Who would the author be, and why? Jane Austen? Shakespeare? Laurie Colwin? Kurt Vonnegut?

I guess the two I would love to hear more from are Janette Oke and Elisabeth Elliot. They both have written prolifically and I don’t feel anything else is needed to finish or round out anything — I just like reading them both, and they are both at an age where we’re probably not going to have any more books from them, and that makes me sad.

Janette Oke was the author who first got me started reading Christian fiction. I loved her gentle “voice” as an author and the godly wisdom imparted through her stories.

And speaking of godly wisdom — Elisabeth Elliot has been a source (or maybe conduit would be a better word?) of that to me for years.