This is a must-read for any Canadian interested in national history. It’s amazing how many times the “national dream” came close to going bankrupt. I’m surprised it was built at all because of all the problems encountered during those five years.

I love how Tom is sort of a drama queen and how he talks about marriage. It’s such an honest portrayal of a young male character.

First of all, this is a really slow book and then Blackmore skips over all the exciting parts, like the battles. He gives the excuse that he doesn’t like to write about things like that.

And then there’s the characters. Both John and Lorna are not believable. He’s the tall, handsome farmer who is intelligent and good, the strongest man in the the area. Lorna is petite, shy and is the prettiest girl anyone has ever seen. Did I mention she has a delicate temperament and is constantly fainting? Spare yourself the trouble and don’t read this.

I really loved this book, despite the fact that time trael novels usually confuse me. It felt real and the end was really sad.

I did wonder about one thing though. If his kid was going back and seeing him, wouldn’t he have noticed this kid showing up in different times and not aging?

I really thought I wasn’t going to like this books because I already know the Horatio Hornblower series and Peter O’Brian’s books. But Kent pulled me in despite the fact that I was thinking, great, another story about an englishman who rises through the ranks of seamen.
And even though I read the 5th book first, the story still made sense.
Completed August 17, 2005.

I really liked this book though it was a bit raw and by that I mean raunchy, meaning that it’s not the type of book that I would usually read. But at the same time it made the story real. It made me believe it.
Completed July 26, 2005.

This book was amazing. The pictures are beautiful and it’s so interesting to find out how the power of the chess queen emerged as the power of queen in Europe did. Especially Isabella of Spain.
Completed August 16, 2005.

To me this sort of felt like Shawn of the Dead where people were completely oblivious to what was going on in their lives. That or either the town didn’t care about the murder. Nasar was essentially a martyr. He was killed for something he didn’t do and the town does nothing even though they know. As always, this book goes deeper than I can because Marquez is such a genius but still, very enjoyable.
Completed July 27, 2005.

This book by Daniel Defoe was interesting if a little hard to get into becuase of the language. It’s also very obvious that it was written by a white, Christian male a very long time ago.

One thing that I took issue with is Defoe’s depiction of wolves near the end of the story. He talks about how they’re traveling through the the mountains and this wolf attacks the guide. Defoe’s explanation is that the wolves were hungry and were going after the horses Crusoe and his “band” were riding. Wolves don’t like humans; in fact, they go out of their way to avoid them so it doesn’t seem accurate to say that they would attack horses being ridden by humans.

Then Defoe exaggerates when he says a pack of one hundred came racing at his group. No such thing. He also mentions finding dead horses eaten by wolves. That’s believable but he also mentions men eaten by wolves. Right.

I understand that the book was written hundreds of years ago but hey, I’m a fan of wolves.

Complete August 13, 2005

This is a fairly long book and can get extremely tedious at times when Don Quixote goes into one of his spiels. But the crazy stuff they get into keeps it interesting. In the end, you’re wondering who the crazy one is. I think the ending is sad, mainly because it didn’t have to happen that way. But some people just like crushing dreams. Completed July 26, 2005.