Time for instant sweats, kids

Good Lord. It is still hot as Hell. At 10am, the heat index was already 95. You step outside and you are instantly covered in sweat. I have to go look at a house this afternoon and I don't think the utilities are turned on inside it. Which means: time to feel and smell like ass.

REVIEWS

Far From the Madding Crowd (by Thomas Hardy)

A FEW SPOILERS . . . not that you will probably care on this one . . .

I keep calling this novel Far From the Maddening Crowd, which I think is a Freudian slip on multiple levels. It starts out interesting to me but as the novel plods on, my attention wavers.

Gabriel Oak lives as a shepherd and his paths cross with Bathsheba Everdene (a cool character name) when she saves him from a fire. Gabriel keeps thinking about her and asks her to marry him. Bathsheba tells him that she does not wish to marry him and indeed, may not get married to anyone at all. She feels that she wants a strong man who can handle her and Gabriel is not he. Bathsheba moves away after this. Meanwhile, an untrained sheep dog causes a disaster and Gabriel loses his flock of sheep. Gabriel has no money and no livelihood so he takes to the road to start over. While walking, Gabriel sees a farm on fire. The people standing around seem clueless so Gabriel jumps in and saves the day. He does not know that the mistress of this farm is Bathsheba. He asks if she needs a shepherd and she agrees to employ Gabriel.

At this point, the story seems like it could present a situation wrought with sexual tension and difficulty. Here's this guy who once loved this girl working for her. Hmmm. Only not so much. A creepy older man named Boldwood is pursuing Bathsheba and she consistently rebuffs his advances. The more she pushes him away, the hotter he gets for her. (TYPICAL.) Gabriel learns that Bathsheba has led the man on and he gives her a piece of his mind. Bathsheba fires Gabriel and he is again without a livelihood.

One of Bathsheba's servants, Fanny, is in love with a man named Sergeant Troy, who seems like a total cad. They are going to get married but because Fanny is late to the church, Troy acts like a dick to her and tells her the wedding is off for now. Troy moves on to Bathsheba and flatters her with forward compliments. She loves this (also typical: women love bad boys) and elopes with Troy. Troy doesn't really love Bathsheba and probably once he got the sex out of his system (if we're being honest here), he is clear that he still loves Fanny and regrets acting like an asshole to her. Fanny is pregnant with Troy's child but she dies in childbirth. Troy is bitter and angry. Eventually, he leaves to go swimming and never comes back. Bathsheba assumes he has drowned.

Bathsheba's sheep fall ill and she knows Gabriel is the only one knowledgable enough to save them. She again re-hires Gabriel and he bails her out.

With Troy out of the way, Boldwood comes back and tries to date Bathsheba again. (Stalker gawker.) She feels pity for him because he has pined for her for so long and she says that after 7 years, she will marry him if Troy does not come back. (They need 7 years before Troy can be declared legally dead since there was no body.) The time passes and Boldwood is ready to announce to the public that he and Bathsheba are going to get married. In soap opera fashion, Troy shows up on that very night and causes a stir. Boldwood gets mad and shoots Troy. Boldwood is arrested and barely escapes being put to death for his crime.

Bathsheba buries Troy by Fanny in what she feels is a fitting tribute. She confides in Gabriel a lot and the two have become close friends. Gabriel grows weary of the turmoil around Bathsheba and he tells her he is leaving. She is upset and the two have a verbal conflict. At the end, however, Gabriel asks Bathsheba to marry him and this time, she accepts.

The things I like about this novel are the notions that carry through to modern society. Independent women still have difficulties in forging lasting relationships. It seems that men assume they only want sex and no commitment or, conversely, that the women are ready to be tamed and saddled with a family. There are still people who get married for money or social status rather than love and friendship. Women still go for bad boys and men still go crazy when the women they want spurn their affections. What I didn't like was the plodding pace. I spent longer than usual reading this novel because it took me longer to get through it. At times, it is also depressing and morose. If you can get past the slow pace and sad plot twists, the book is worth reading. If you can't, pass on it.


Now for a total change of pace . . .

Hannibal

SPOILERS

Since I finished Silence of the Lambs, I knew I had to get moving on Hannibal. SOTL the film follows the novel pretty well and I wanted to see if the same was true with Hannibal.

Hannibal begins several years after the setting of SOTL. Lecter has not been caught and Starling is still working with the FBI. Krendler, a DOJ agent who hates Starling, spends much of Hannibal trying to ruin her. He thinks he can do this if he can prove that Starling and Lecter have a sexual relationship. Meanwhile, Starling is doing enough on her own to sabotage her career. The novel begins with a drug raid gone bad, resulting in the death of a suspect and an FBI agent. The tabloids make fun of Starling and Krendler hopes Lecter will see these articles and come out of hiding to find Starling. Lecter indeed sends Starling a letter, which she turns over to the FBI.

Hannibal is living in Florence and working as a curator. He seems to be a state of relative stability and calm. In America, Mason Verger has a bounty on Lecter and plenty of money to back it up. Verger was a victim of Lecter's. Verger was a child molester, animal abuser, druggie and general pervert and Hannibal gives him a punishment. Hannibal met Mason because his sister, Margot, came to Lecter for therapy after Mason raped and brutalized her. Mason invites Hannibal to his home and demonstrates his auto-erotic asphyxiation penchant. Hannibal gives Mason a drug cocktail including PCP and acid. Mason cuts off chunks of his own face and feeds the hunks to his dogs. Lecter breaks Mason's neck in his masturbation noose. Somehow, Mason survives and lives on a respirator. Mason uses the wealth from his parents' estate to buy whatever he wants, including political power. Krendler joins forces with Verger because they both have interlinked goals. Krendler wants to punish Starling and Verger wants to punish Lecter by feeding him alive, bit by bit, to a pack of wild boars.

Krendler sets about framing Starling by creating bogus letters from and to Hannibal. Nevertheless, Starling tries to warn Pazzi, an Italian agent, to be careful around Lecter because he is more powerful than he seems. Pazzi gets greedy and decides he will work for Mason Verger to get the bounty on Lecter's head. This proves to be a fatal mistake: Lecter discovers Pazzi's plan and kills him in a manner he believes fits the crime. Lecter had been giving a lecture on how artists depict traitors. Lecter hangs and disembowels Pazzi thinking he has treated him as Judas Iscariot was treated.

Lecter leaves his life in Florence and goes to Washington to get closer to Starling, who has been fired from the FBI. Lecter stocks up on weaponry at a hunting show and a rude hillbilly deer hunter at the show pisses Hannibal off. He butchers the man as one would butcher a deer and the authorities are now aware of Lecter's presence in America. As Starling goes to a grocery store, Lecter follows her and Verger's henchmen follow Lecter. When Lecter gets out of his car, Verger's men kidnap him and Starling is a witness. Instead of following the van, Starling calls the FBI to report what she has seen. The FBI does not take Starling seriously and Lecter is left at Verger's home. During the theatrics of setting up Verger's plan for Hannibal to be eaten alive, Starling breaks in. She frees Hannibal but is shot by tranquilizer darts and blacks out. Much of Mason's staff is killed but Mason and his abused sister, Margot, survive. Margot takes a semen sample from Mason so that she and her lesbian partner can have a baby that the courts will allow the great inheritance to go to. She then kills Mason as Lecter told her she should have done years ago.

Lecter takes Starling to a home he has rented. She spends several days in a drug-induced haze as Lecter tries to break into her psyche. Lecter has also exhumed the bones of her dead father as part of his bizarre therapy. Lecter wants Starling to move past her problems with the deceased father and he also wants to fashion Starling into a living version of his dead but greatly beloved sister, Mischa. Lecter kidnaps Krendler and, as in the film, serves pieces of Krendler's brain to Starling while Krendler is still alive. Once Lecter is finished with this course of the meal, he shoots Krendler with a crossbow, dumps the leftover food pieces into his skull, and places the dirty dishes on his lap. Not for the feint of heart, this novel.

Starling does not replace Mischa but she does feel that the life waiting for her outside of Lecter is grim. Starling gets inside Lecter's brain and pushes all the right buttons. Very much unlike the film, Starling offers her breast to Lecter and, presumably, seduces him that night. A few years later, Lecter and Starling are spotted in Buenos Aires living the high life, going to operas and wearing fancy couture. At this point, Thomas Harris tells us as a certainty that they are living and sleeping together and have meshed somehow.

I saw the movie Hannibal several years ago when it was released and the novel is certainly different and, in many ways, superior to the film. The end of the film shows Hannibal on a plane feeding a to-go piece of Krendler's brain to a curious child. It seems like a cheap way to keep the franchise going. Like: "Here's a perfect opening for a sequel, everyone!" I'm more interested in someone explaining why Starling has such a profound change and leaves with Lecter. That would be a film worth making.

END OF SPOILERS


Ok. Time to get moving before I go into the hot-ass house I have to look at.

Next time, I'll hit you up with Hannibal Rising and the link between Hannibal Lecter and Goethe's Mephistopheles.

Ciao.