100 Follower Giveaway!!!

Hooray! It’s finally time! That’s right, my 100 Follower Giveaway is here :) Is anyone else doing a happy dance? No? Just me?

Anyway, if you’re a follower of this blog, the most awesomest blog in the whole wide world, now is your chance to win The Bronte Sisters, a collection of the three great classic novels: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte; Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte and Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte. That’s 3 books in 1! Who wouldn’t want to win this?

So do you want to be well read just like me? Just enter my giveaway!

Requirements:

• Be a follower of this blog
• Have a US mailing address (I wish I could make this giveaway international but I’m sorry, I’m poor!)

What You Need To Do To Enter:

Simply leave a comment in this post stating:

• The email address with which to contact you if you win
• Your blog link (I’ll post it here if you win)
• If you follow me on Twitter, please say so and state what your Twitter name is (because sometimes it’s different you know) because if you do you’ll get an EXTRA ENTRY!

The Giveaway will run from RIGHT NOW April 8 – April 20, 2011 until precisely 9:00 CST. The winner will be picked at random and I’ll announce the lucky winner of the 3 in 1 prize on Sunday, April 24, 2011. So be ready!

Now go forth and enter my lovely giveaway. And be sure to spread the word as well :)

***P.S. I won't be responding to any comments in this post so if you have a specific question, please email me at llevinso.bookreader@gmail.com***

Does the Cover Really Matter?

So as I was looking around Barnes & Noble the other day (you know, shopping for the book that would become my awesome GIVEAWAY prize), I noticed how a lot of classic books have like a zillion different covers and editions to choose from. I mean seriously! And you'd think because they are classics that they're all be pretty classicly-themed covers, right? Wrong. They're all over the place!

I'll give you an example of what I mean. Take a gander at just 8 of the possible covers for the undeniable classic Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte:

Let's go row by row, shall we?

The first is the actual version of the book that I own (so obviously that means it's the best). Pretty simple. I'm assuming this is the lovely (barf barf) Heathcliff's house all dimmed in the moonlight. Kind of haunting right? Eerie? I think that's a good enough cover.

Next is just a beautiful woman's face...I'm guessing Catherine? Well she is the female lead. But kind of a dull cover in my opinion but definitely a normal one for a classic book.

Moving on! UGH!!!! Does that seriously say Bella and Edward's favorite book in the upper corner? And it is all Twilighty. Yuck. Worst. Cover. Ever.

Last one on the top row: I'm assuming this is supposed to be the countryside that the novel takes place in but it is all too bright and cheery for this dark and depressing read. Bad call art department!

Next row...this reminds me of Persepolis for some reason. Anyone else? I like it because it's different and still has that eerie feeling to it. Not reading romance at all so that's a plus.

This next one is the only one I see that has both a man and woman on it, so it's nice that it includes Heathcliff, but it's not reading very dark and disturbing to me. Nice that the moors are involved though.

Almost done. This is very Tim Burton, yes? Which is a nice change of pace and I've seen this treatment on other classics as well but other then having fun with the cover I don't really see the point. It's still just a drawing of a woman. Oh wait, is there a little house in the background?

And last but...well yes least. What the heck is this? I mean seriously! Ferns? What is the point of this cover? Someone didn't feel like doing anything special with this one.

So what do you all think? Which one is your favorite cover? Lease favorite (let's leave out that fern one because otherwise I think this would be a pretty easy question to answer, haha). And can you believe I actually found TWO books that had covers that mentioned Edward and Bella? TWO!

100 Followers Giveaway - It's Happening!

Alright, as the title states: it's happening. I went to the bookstore today and picked out the book I'll be sending to the lucky winner of my 100 Followers Giveaway. Are you all excited? Well you should be because I picked an AWESOME book! You ready?

It's The Bronte Sisters, a collection of three books, one from each sister: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte and Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte.

How great is that? Now the whoever wins can be just like me and read something from each sister! And really, who doesn't want to be just like me, right? And I figure this book is great for anyone because everyone likes at least ONE of the Bronte sisters.

The only thing I have to do now is actually get to 100 followers. I'm 11 away at the moment (damn you #89!). So help spread the word about my blog because the sooner I get to #100 the sooner I'll open up this giveaway and the sooner you'll have a chance to win win win (I say it 3 times because it's really winning 3 books, see?)!!

The day I hit 100 I'll post the rules for entering the giveaway, so be prepared and stay alert...it could happen at any moment...

Review for You - Agnes Grey

Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte
3 stars

This was the story of a young woman named Agnes Grey who, in order to help her family when they come under some hard financial trouble, decides to become a governess. She’s the youngest of two daughters in her family and has always somewhat been babied. They never let her help out much in any way so when she tells them that it is in her mind to become a governess they believe she will be in over her head. But Agnes believes she will be a great success and goes to work for her first family.

She quickly learns that this family, with all their wealth, is basically horrid. The boy likes to torture animals and won’t listen to anything Agnes says and the other children follow suit. They have not one redeemable characteristic. Try as she might she cannot get the children to learn almost anything and the family decides to go another way with their education after not too long. But Agnes is determined not to fail so she advertises for another situation and lands at another house. This family believes in instilling the idea that nothing should be too hard for anyone and the children (who are older than her first charges) should never struggle to find any answers. This results in them not really learning anything…again.

But Agnes sticks with this family for a few years and manages to find some nice aspects residing in the eldest daughter, Miss Murray, but very few indeed. And during that time she tries to correct the children’s horrible ideas when it comes to morality and basic goodness. However it does not really work because Miss Murray spends most of her time trying to trick men into loving her and then basically laughing in their faces, including the object of Agnes’ affection.

Agnes Grey was Anne Bronte’s first novel and also the first one of hers that I read. And I must say that makes me quite happy because I’ve now read something by every Bronte sister! While I did like this book for the most part I could certainly tell that this was her first novel. It had the feeling in many parts like that of a rough draft. It just wasn’t as well crafted as I would expect a full drawn out novel to be. I did notice that in comparing her to her other more famous sisters, Emily and Charlotte, she is much less dark and moody. This had a much lighter heart. It was also much more direct and to the point. Probably why the book was so much shorter than Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights. Anne Bronte did not seem to go on and on in the details of little things as they did. The one part she did get a bit carried away was talking about religion, but that was it.

However, I didn’t like the main character very much. I didn’t dislike her either but it seemed that she had a negative opinion of everyone aside from the members of her own family. It seemed as if she felt she was entirely too great and the rest were entirely too awful. The moralizing got a tad ridiculous and too much for me at times. It kind of seemed like a rich versus poor set up where all the people with money turned out to be wicked and that’s just not the reality and I don’t like it when authors portray things as such. I need shades of gray.

But for a first novel I would say it was pretty good. I didn’t hate it but I definitely didn’t love it. It was a very quick read though, so I definitely didn't feel like it was a waste of my time in any way. I’ve heard much better things about her second (and last) novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, so I’m excited to read that sometime in the future.

Bechdel Test Tuesday!

It's a kind of special week for the Bechdel Test here at the Sarcastic Female Literary Circle. How? I'm highlighting more than one book! For a quick overview of how the test works, check here. Oh, and for those of you that didn't catch my meme last week, it was on Kazuo Ishiguro's haunting tale: Never Let Me Go.

Alright, well I was considering making today's test an All Bronte Test (since I have now read something by all three Bronte sisters) but I have been struggling all day to remember exactly how Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte would apply to these questions and I'm at a loss. I know it had more than one woman but I cannot honestly remember what they talked about. So if you all have better memories than I do and can help me with the grade on that one, let me know in the comments!


But on to the other two sisters...


Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
1. Does it have at least 2 women in it?
It most certainly does. May I also just say this is my favorite book of all time so I'm REALLY pulling for this to pass...
2. Do they talk to each other?
Yes they do! Okay, two questions down. Just one to go. Can it make it?
3. About something besides a man?
YES! While Mr. Rochester and St. John are frenquent topics of conversation among the women in the book that is definitely not ALL they discuss. Morals, education, and their own thoughts and dreams are some of the other things the women talk about amongst themselves. So...

I'm so happy! :)


Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte
1. Does it have at least 2 women in it?
This also has many women in it.
2. Do they talk to each other?
The book is actually mostly women talking to each other. Very few men.
3. About something besides a man?
Another yes! Again while men are certainly discussed it is just one of the topics. You'll hear about some of the others when I post my review later this week...

Well books are just passing left and right today!


So, this was a good day then huh? Let me know about Wuthering Heights in the comments if you can. What do you think of the Bronte sisters?