pet sematary

Blandik:
Ok, the Hunger Games. The plot is set in the near future when America is destroyed, I guess and there's this Capitol which rules the whole country that is divided into 13 districts. The last district didn't like the idea of being ruled by Capitol so as a result they rebelled. The Capitol went ballistic and wiped the district off the face of the earth. As a punishment they run a TV reality show called the Hunger Games. And that means that from each district two people are chosen by lot (one girl, one boy), subsequently herded into an arena and now they have to fight each other. Only one can win.

The story is mainly focused on Discrict 12 where we meet Katniss, 16 years old girl, as far as I can remember. As you've probably guessed she's the one to go to the arena to fight for her life. And that's it. That's the Hunger Games. The Hunger Games that has become a world's bestselling book. It's a trilogy actually.

Roman298:
Pet Sematary. Terrific. Brilliant. I remember going to see the optician. As it turned out, I got stuck there and had to wait for another couple of hours. Luckily I had this book with me Couldn't put it down.

Yes, I have to admit that this book made me think of reading more. However, it's not that I have a grudge against books of their own, it's just that I'm kinda impatient guy who needs to have things done as soon as possible. That's why I prefer TV shows because one episode lasts just a few minutes and it's always themed somehow, which means that in the end of one episode the plot is sorted out and that's it-if you're satisfied with the status quo you can stop watching with a pleasant feeling that everything's all right, if you come across a cliffhanger you can simply keep watching. All that matters is whether or not you feel like watching. With books it's different. There's usually just one main plot and as you read you keep discovering clues leading to a conclusion. For me, this means that I simply can't put a book down because the next time I decide to read on I have to start recollecting what happened previously, I may as well forget some important details and that's exactly what I don't like. I simply can't chill out during reading, that's about the size of it.

Roman298:
I know what you mean. It takes some time to read through a book but as far as I'm concerned I like reading because it helps me enlarge and consolidate my pasive vocabulary. I don't claim it's the most effective way to learn vocab {textbooks might be better in this case) but reading books is fun.
Anyways, I like watching TV shows and TV series as well.

McKay:
Yes, I can confirm that THE HUNGER GAMES is helluva good book. I read it a few months ago and it took me two days to get through. For me it's the shortest time in which I've ever read one book. Thanks for the review too. I'm considering ordering the second book even though I have quite a lot of „to-read books“ on my shelf. Your recap made me hungry to read the second book 

honyk: I'm so thrilled about the second book. Now I have to sell some books to get some money so I can purchase The Catching Fire I hear the final book is already out and that's awesome I might get it as well as long as I remember the plot of the first book.

I'm always telling myself that I should probably start reading books for leaving-exam since the New Maturita is kind of official and how on green earth am I going to make 20 books in Czech? However, choosing between those great books such as the Hunger Games, Catching Fire and reading 20 books in Czech, well, the decision must kinda obvious 

McKay: i've read more than 60 books for my maturita exam and i've made pretty good „ctenarsky denik“ so i can send it to you (or anybody else) if you want. just send me a PM.

don't worry maturita is piece of cake .

mew: Thanks but I need to get through it on my own otherwise I'm not gonna remember it properly. And I hate it when I should learn the plot of books by heart 

everyone:
How do you evaluate books? It's happened to me countless times that after finishing a book I don't even know how to do the rating. What am I supposed to look for in these books to get the review/rating right? From all the books I've read I just liked them all but I can't tell if the book wasn't good or anything. Every book has something. When I read through the reviews people posted on goodreads, sometimes I'm kinda startled how they even reached their conclusion.

McKay – thank you for outlining what Hungry Games are about. As for your general question about book rating – hard to say and definitely hard to recommend a book to someone else – everyone looks for something else in books, likes different genres…For example I have got two good friends who aslo like to read Eglish books, se we used to give one another an english book for Xmas. It was a failure, because we could not fit one another's taste. I used to receive sci-fi, which I dislike..to be honest I did not finish reading of a single book I got that way. We abandoned that even though it seemed as a very noble idea at the beginning. For me the most important thing about a book is its language – style, plot, it must be in some kind ingenious + must at least a bit deal about things that are of interest for me. For example I was quite disasapointed by Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code – all my friends kept telling me it is a frist rate book, so I guess I just expected too much…

• as I am getting older {well, i am not that old} I appreaciate when a book is carrying some message or contains some wise remarks, concerning our doings, perceiving this world – basicaly whatever that may enrich me or make me better in some way. I guess I have already outgrown of books that are only thrilling.

  As for your attitude to maturita and determination to read books on your own and not just to cram their plots by heart – you have got my admiration, that is very wise. I did not pay such attention to maturita and when I started to beef up that stuff some week before maturita, i kind of regretted not having read all the compulsory books on my own – their plots seemed so interesting and valuable…

Thanks for your reply. It's great if you can grasp the meaning of the book. I haven't unfortunately accomplished that. But that will certainly change in the long term.

Has anyone here read The Alchemist? As far as I'm concerned, the purpose of the book was to tell the readers that we should try our best to achieve our dreams and never give up whatever the cost may be. Or did I get that part wrong?

I searched for other Paolo Coelhe's books and his most promising book that caught my attention was Veronika decides to die. From the plot I read I think it must be really riveting and illuminating in a way.

I read the Alchemist some years ago. I reckon you got the point quite right. Especially by adding – whatever the costs may be and I would add – otherwise we cannot really find happines and piece in this world. Making compromises with our dreams cannot make us really happy, sometimes the path to fulfilling our dreams may not be rosy, but we should keep on trying to find a way to make our dream real. Anyway, it is just adding words to what you managed to express in just couple of them.

McKay:
I read The Alchemist about four months ago. Quite easy to read. Actually, the book was translated from Spanish, so I wonder if the translation devaluate it a little. I read some reviews afterwards and some people complained about the translation, they claimed it was too „childish“. I liked it though. It's kind of philosophical, even religious book. The gist I got from the book was: „keep the faith, follow your dreams and if you keep the faith you can achieve anything“.

Thanks for the reply. I was going to ask whether it was originally written in English or not, because I wasn't really sure and couldn't find it anywhere.

honyk: that is the right word – childish. That was my feeling about it – I would recommend this book to teenagers, who are full of dreams and are looking for path to fulfil them. There was somehing charming about the simplicity – maybe it was part of the message the author wanted to transmit that we have got to believe in our powers, have a clear dream and we can reach it – as simple as this.

I propagly did not express myself clearly engough – I meant that maybe the simple, childish language was used by purpose – to subconsciously transmit the message that our doings do not need to be complicated, we can just do with simplicity. Plus I guess there is some quality between simplicity = fairytale.