Saturday, July 18, 2009

book: artemis fowl - the arctic incident by eoin colfer

Title: Artemis Fowl - The Arctic Incident
Author: Eoin Colfer

Cannot quite recall how I fell head over heels over the series. Picked up the first one (Artemis Fowl) and now, I'm still thrilled to read another. Seems rather late to read the 2nd book, but it's better late than never. This type of book is suitable for mid-light reading (it goes midway because you'll be taking some time to understand the author's imagination of out-of-this-world tools and technology created in the story). Besides, in this, the nemesis is the one saving the day. Sort of like John A. Davis' Jimmy Neutron Boy Genius in 'some' way. As the saying goes: everybody loves a rebel.

What I liked:
How the author cleverly weaved each character with the whole storyline, making everything sound perfect. Artemis really has great thoughts, wickedly-cunning nontheless. I guess that's what made most readers captivated with the series, they kept wanting to know and learn how Artemis plans his next unexpected move.

What I disliked:
I had a rather tough time in picturing certain scenes where the author explained it with weird vocabulary. The Lower Elements Police sure has a way with words when naming their stuff: technology and all :P

Quotes:

pg 175
Holly: “We’re not giving up, Artemis. We’re regrouping. There’s a difference. We’ll be back. Remember, it’s always darkest before dawn.”
Artemis: “What dawn? We’re in the Arctic, remember.”

book: tuesdays with morrie by mitch albom

Title: Tuesdays with Morrie
Author: Mitch Albom

I went blog-surfing once, when a blogger came up with interesting quotes from this charm. Since then on, I became strongly curious on its contents. Being short on money at that time, reading it had to wait. At last, it was worth the wait, as I managed to borrow it from the UTM Library and the ending was full of tears.

To many, indulging it was contagious and resourceful. You could always learn something from each chapter and yearn for another. This book is cleverly written to allow readers understand that life's greatest lesson is appreciating it. Once you read through, a myriad of practical ways are shared to make your life more meaningful. Also, it helps you prepare towards death and death itself.

What I liked:
The teacher-student realtionship was as close as a father-son relationship. More like a murabbi; someone who touches your life so much, he/she inspires you in out. It left me asking myself, who is that teacher that inspired me till now? Where is he/she now? Or probably, who would I inspire one day? Besides that, Morrie's lessons were relatively close to Islamic teachings on how to live life and prepare for death. Not to forget, Morrie proved through experience and mistakes, you get wiser and more rational.

What I disliked:
Neither the author or Morrie gave an insight that living has a purpose; there's gotta be a reason why you're created and why you're here.

Quotes:
pg 10
“Do I wither up and disappear, or do I make the best of my time left?”
pg 18
“Accept what you are able to do and what you are not able to do”; “Accept the past as past without denying it or discarding it”; “Learn to forgive yourself and to forgive others”; “Don’t assume that it’s too late to get involved.”

pg 21
“There are some mornings when I cry and cry and mourn for myself. Some mornings, I’m so angry and bitter. But it doesn’t last too long. Then I get up and say, ‘I want to live . . .’”
pg 34
“Have you found someone to share your heart with?” “Are you giving to your community?” “Are you at peace with yourself?” “Are you trying to be as human as you can be?”

pg 35
“Dying, is only one thing to be sad over. Living unhappily is something else. So many of the people who come to visit me are unhappy.”

pg 42
“The culture we have does not make people feel good about themselves. And you have to be strong enough to say if the culture doesn’t work, don’t buy it.”

pg 43
“So many people walk around with a meaningless life. They seem half-asleep, even when they’re busy doing things they think are important. This is because they’re chasing the wrong things. The way you get meaning into your life is to devote yourself to loving others, devote yourself to your community around you, and devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning.”

pg 52
“You asked about caring for people I don’t even know. But can I tell you the thing I’m learning more with this disease?” “The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in.” “Let it come in. We think we don’t deserve love, we think if we let it in we’ll become too soft. But a wise man named Levine said it right. He said, ‘Love is the only rational act.’” “‘Love is the only rational act.’”

pg 61
“Sometimes you cannot believe what you see, you have to believe what you feel. And if you are ever going to have other people to trust you, you must feel that you can trust them, too–even when you’re in the dark. Even when you’re falling.”

pg 81
“Everyone knows they’re going to die, but nobody believes it. If we did, we would do things differently.”

pg 82
“The truth is, once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.”

pg 91
“If you don’t have support and love and caring and concern that you get from a family, you don’t have much at all. Love is so supremely important. As our great poet Auden said, ‘Love each other or perish.’”

pg 92
“This is part of what family is about, not just love, but letting others know there’s someone who is watching out for them. Knowing that your family will be there watching out for you. Nothing else will give you that. Not money. Not fame. Not work.”

pg 93
“There is no experience like having children. That’s all. There is no substitute for it. If you want to have the experience of having complete responsibility for another human being, and to learn how to love and bond in the deepest way, then you should have children.”

pg 104
“If you hold back on the emotions–if you don’t allow yourself to go all the way through them—you can never get to being detached, you’re too busy being afraid. You’re afraid of the pain, you’re afraid of the grief. You’re afraid of the vulnerability that loving entails.”

pg 105
“I thought about how often this was needed in every day life. How we feel lonely, sometimes to the point of tears, but we don’t let those tears come because we are not supposed to cry. Or how feel a surge of love for a partner but we don’t say anything because we’re frozen with the fear of what those words might do to the relationship.”

pg 118
“Aging is not just decay, you know. It’s growth. It’s more than the negative that you’re going to die, it’s also the positive that you understand you’re going to die, and that you live a better life because of it.”“You know what that reflects? Unsatisfied lives. Unfulfilled lives. Lives that haven’t found meaning. Because if you’ve found meaning in your life, you don’t want to go back. You want to go forward. You want to see more, do more. You can’t wait until sixty-five.”

pg 120
“You have to find what’s good and true and beautiful in your life as it is now. Looking back makes you competitive. And, age is not a competitive issue.”

pg 125
“These were people so hungry for love that they were accepting substitutes. They were embracing material things and expecting a sort of hug back. But it never works. You can’t substitute material things for love or for gentleness or for tenderness or for a sense of comradeship.”“When you most need it, neither money nor power will give you the feeling you’re looking for, no matter how much of them you have.”

pg 127-128
“If you’re trying to show off for people at the top, forget it. They will look down at you anyhow. And if you’re trying to show off for people at the bottom, forget it. They will only envy you. Status will get you nowhere. Only an open heart will allow you to float equally between everyone.”

pg 128
“Do the kinds of things that come from the heart. When you do, you won’t be dissatisfied, you won’t be envious, you won’t be longing for somebody else’s things. On the contrary, you’ll be overwhelmed with what comes back.”

pg 136
“Part of the problem, is that everyone in such a hurry, People haven’t found meaning in their lives, so they’re running all the time looking for it. They think the next car, the next house, the next job. They find those things are empty, too, and they keep running.”

pg 149
“If you don’t respect the other person, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. If you don’t know how to compromise, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. If you can’t talk openly about what goes on between you, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. And if you don’t have a common set of values in life, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. Your values must be alike.” “And the biggest one of those values.” “Your belief in the importance of your marriage.”

pg 174
“As long as we can love each other, and remember the feeling of love we had, we can die without ever really going away.”“Death ends a life, not a relationship.”

pg 177-178
“There is no formula to relationships. They have to be negotiated in loving ways, with room for both parties, what they want and what they need, what they can do and what their life is like.”

pg 178
“Love is when you are as concerned about someone else’s situation as you are about your own.”

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

smile~

thanx kakchik n kaklong for helping ^^