MY READER'S BLOCK: Foul Matter Take Two

SCAM artist alert

Apparently there is someone calling himself "Luigi Calloway" out there who is claiming to be associated with the Mount TBR Reading Challenge. He is contacting authors and telling them if they pay him, then their books will be used for the challenge. It's possible he's also telling people they must pay to participate in any way. Please know that there is absolutely no charge associated in any way with this reading challenge and that this person does NOT represent me or anything associated with my blog. I DO NOT endorse anything that he claims.There will NEVER be a reason for anyone to have to pay for participation in any way for any of my challenges. If only people who exert this much time and effort on scamming people would put it into something worthwhile....like reading their own books! A message to Luigi: Please cease and desist contacting authors (or anyone) in my name or claiming to represent this reading challenge. You absolutely DO NOT.

Thursday, April 29, 2010

Foul Matter Take Two

While this is, indeed, a funny book and a terrific send-up of the publishing industry, I'm still caught up in what I found to be a running theme: the past. Ned and Saul both spend a lot of time thinking about this subject. Saul says about himself, "I live in a houseful of artifacts. It's drenched in the past. I never change anything, beyond turning a desk around so that it faces a window. I want it to stay the same." Ned feels like he's lost the past--in part because he "lost" his parents when he was young. "He wished he hadn't been so careless of the past....His parents had died within a year of each other, and he was orphaned. Everyone made sure he was aware of this particular disgrace, as if he'd been careless with his parents as well as with the past and now look what had happened." Grimes makes some very good observations about how the past can haunt us or envelop us or even weigh us down...I do wish she had brought it to some kind of closure in the final chapters, though. She seemed to abandon the theme....perhaps losing it like Ned "lost" his parents.