2-fer-1

The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti

Hardcover: 336 pages
Publisher: The Dial Press; 1 edition (August 26, 2008)
ISBN-10: 0385337450

From The New Yorker
This striking debut novel is an homage to old-fashioned boys-own adventure stories, and unfolds like a Robert Louis Stevenson tale retold amid the hardscrabble squalor of Colonial New England. The sheer strangeness of the story is beguiling: a one-handed boy, tainted by his upbringing in a Catholic orphanage and with little to offer but a head full of lice, is adopted by a con artist, and enters an underworld of ruthless mousetrap-manufacturing barons, feisty chimney-dwelling dwarves, and, perhaps most terrifying of all, black-market dentists. In keeping with the gothic tradition, Tinti writes with an arch, almost camp sensibility. While on a nocturnal grave-digging excursion to procure bodies for a crazy scientist, for instance, the pair encounter an assassin, who tells the twelve-year-old hero that he was made for killing. Will the boy ever discover the truth of his past? Its good fun watching him find out.

Ren is a  young boy, with only one hand, who lives at an Orphanage and is oft told that no one will ever want a one handed boy.

One day a man named Benjamin Nab comes and says Ren is his brother and takes him from the Orphanage.  But, it quickly seems as if this Ben is no one other than a con-man and thief and plans to use Ren to soften some hearts so that handouts come their way.

Ben meets up with his friend Tom and they go about trying to survive.  Then one day they meet up with a "doctor" who offers to pay them well to dig up bodies for him.  One of the first bodies they dig up just so happens to still be alive!  The man is huge, he tells Ren he is a murderer for hire.  Ren still befriends the man.

While in this town they find that there is a Mouse Trap Factory where most of the town woman work. Somehow, these characters manage to intertwine to tell the story of Ren, and the story of the parents he never knew.

It was an enjoyable little book.  Nothing spectacular, but at least I didn't set it aside!

There were some interesting characters but none that captured me to hope there would be more when the book was finished.

Will I read it again some day?  Probably not.

It was good... just not "wow".

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(Second Post.. same day.. due to Verizon outage)

Huh?

I'm not sure what's going on with me...  I guess it could have to do with the aloneness of loosing my brother.  And the oddness living with David, who I think right now is glad for my company, but will one day decided enough is enough.  I dunno.

What I do know is that I set a book aside.  Something I almost never do.  The book I picked up in it's place was a small book, and one that didn't need much of a brain to follow it. (probably a good thing).  Then I picked up the next book, one I know I should enjoy since I read the first two books to the trilogy, and although not many others care for the series I found it enjoyable. ( not "wow".. but enjoyable) And I find I am rereading sentences (and it's not a brainy book) and still not grasping what I'm reading.

What's going on with me?  Why is everything I read seem not interesting, when I know I should be enjoying them. Why do I find it necessary to reread a paragraph I just read and then sit there and say, "huh?"   What's wrong with me?

Then to make things worse, I am on line checking blogs when all of a sudden I am kicked off of aol. Huh?  I rebooted but it would "time out" and not let me on aol. Huh?

Then I check IE and it won't even load the Google home page.  Ok.. now I'm upset!

I called Verizon Tech Support (since I have verizon dsl) and they can't seem to find the problem, though they do say there IS one.  I am told to call back in an hour if things don't get better.

They got no better.

I called back.

This time, before I get to a live person to talk to, it says Verizon is having trouble in NY and Long Island, but doesn't mention New Jersey. 

Back to another tech.  He has me try some things which of course I can't do since nothing is loading in IE.  He tells me he will call ME back in an hour, he suspects the "outage" in NY and Long Island is also in NJ.  He calls me back in an hour and verifies this. 

Hooray.

*dang it*

They have no idea how long it will take to fix the problem.  It's already been over 6 hours.

Not a happy camper here.. no internet and my reading leaves something to be desired. *sigh*  So, I did two loads of laundry (fun, fun), changed my bedding, and took a bath... still no internet.  grrrrrrrrrrr.

addendum:

the book I am reading is getting better.. but still not that "can't put it down" feeling.