• Craig Mnure, sad victim of the Dot Com boom is alive and well! His old website is back for everyone to enjoy and he has discovered the joys of Web Number Two’s Point Oh!

    Yes, not only can you relive the joys of the tossing the coo poo game, and singing along with the Craig Mnure Big Band, you can join in the Craig Mnure International Blog. Craig tells me he’s going to take a while getting used to it and making it look yucky, but in the meantime, if you need advice on Manure, plumbing or the simple life, go to Craig’s Blog and drop him a line.

    It is rumoured that he has plans for YouTube, just as soon as he can get an old video camera from eBay. (It takes a while for the post to get out to Bronchs Chair, so don’t hold your breath.)

  • Those wonderful people at WordPress.com have given us snow on our blogs. That’s what all the little white dots are falling across the page as you read this. They follow the mouse direction too.

    If you are reading this on RSS or faceBook come and see it here!

  • If you search back through my blogs, you’ll find that I was most enthusiastic about The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. I liked that book so much, I bought a copy for a friend’s eleven year old son’s birthday. I couldn’t wait for the next part of the trilogy. So when The Ask and the Answer came out, I put it to the bottom of my pile so as to savour the anticipation even more.

    So why do I say do not read this book? After all, I was compelled to finish it. Patrick Ness delivers and draws you on and on. It’s the word “Children’s” on the front of the book that worries me. THIS IS NOT A CHILDREN’S BOOK.

    The Knife of Never Letting Go deservedly won the Guardian Children’s Fiction Award, telling the sometimes brutal story of a boy learning to grow up fast in exceptional circumstances. The treat of violence was always there, but was mostly “off screen”.

    The Ask and the Answer is brutal, with graphic scenes of torture and genocide. Mayor Prentiss provides excellent lessons in mind control and perfidy for anyone wanting to know how to work a successful gang.

    Yes, Todd and Viola’s bond shines through and provides the power to fight the evil all around them, but that power is not love. I don’t know what it is, but I sense it could be used for evil at a moments notice. Todd has no positive role models – is he strong enough and clever enough to work things out for himself?

    I won’t be getting this for my friend’s son this Christmas, as I’d planned, it would be immoral of me to do so, but I can’t wait for the last book to come out – probably another nine months to go.