Sunday, June 9, 2013

Summer Falls by Amelia Williams

    I recently finished the book Summer Falls, by "Amelia Williams." Summer Falls is a book released by BBC programming. Amelia Williams is a character on the BBC show Doctor Who, who in the earlier series, was transported into the past, to 1954, after traveling with the protagonist, the Doctor, for most of her life. The book is marketed as released in 1954 (even though it was released in 2013.) In the first episode of season 7, a boy is shown carrying this book. One of the main characters, Clara, comments on it, saying "the eleventh [chapter] will make you cry." Right now, the Doctor is on his eleventh regeneration, or form. I believe this is a clue on how the departure of the current Doctor will be a tragic one. Leading off of this, I have drawn many conclusions on how the book references the show in many forms.
     In the book, there is a character, the Curator, who I believe is based off of/is the Doctor. When asked what his name is, he says to the main character, Kate, "I'm in between names at the moment. I am having a holiday from them." The Doctor, in the show, keeps his name a secret, and this is why he asks people to call him "the Doctor." He also has other names, and tells people he is never set on one. He also keeps his "shed" under a tarp, because it is undergoing repairs. For a lot of reasons, I think the "shed" is the TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. The TARDIS is a time-traveling 1963 London police box which in my opinion looks a lot like a shed.). The Curator says to Kate "The 1950's aren't that bad. I do love the fifties." To me, this seems like a strange thing for someone living in that time would say. It sounds more like something a time traveler, or more likely the Doctor would say.  When Kate's whole town is frozen over and nobody can leave or get in, the Curator is able to. Kate notices that the Curator seems to be calling her on the telephone from his car, as she can hear engine noises as he talks and he says to her that he is "traveling to her right now," yet Kate realizes that phones have not yet been invented for cars, so what mode of transportation could he have been using? In my opinion, BBC used the Curator as a name for the Doctor. 

Saturday, June 1, 2013

Sever By Lauren DeStefano (Spoilers)

    I am currently reading the book Sever, which is the third book in the Chemical Garden Series by Lauren DeStefano. The series takes place in the future, a world where the cure for cancer goes horribly wrong and causes males to only live to age twenty-five and females to the age of twenty. Rhine Ellery is a sixteen year old girl living in New York, when she is kidnapped and brought to Florida to be put into a polygamous marriage. Having escaped the mansion,(and the oppression of her terrifying father-in-law, Housemaster Vaughn) Rhine and her former attendant and lover Gabriel set for Manhattan to find Rowan, Rhine's brother. They arrive at the Ellerys' to find that it has burned down. Rhine is captured by Vaughn and brought back to Florida, where she undergoes horrific medical procedures revolving around her having Heterochromia (the condition of having two separate colored eyes). When she wakes up, Cecily,her sister wife, 14, is pregnant for the second time. Linden, her ex-husband,who Rhine has mixed feelings for, arranges for the three of them to stay with Linden's kind uncle in order to escape from Vaughn until Rhine can proceed back into New York to try and get back to Rowan. While there, they learn that Rowan, believing Rhine is dead, has joined forces with Vaughn to find a cure for the virus. He is also a terrorist bomber.
     After learning about the good that Vaughn has done, mixed with he evil, Rhine is very unsure how to feel about him. For the past three books, the reader has been convinced by Rhine to hate Vaughn with a burning passion, that he is a very evil old man. Now, with Vaughn's abrupt change in character, both Rhine and I feel very confused. Rhine listens to Vaughn talk about hope, renewal, and how he has found a cure, and how this cure is them, while he inserts needles into her willing brother's eyes. If I were Rhine, I would be wary of Vaughn. Evil people can have good sides, and so on.