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Posted: 21 Oct 2012 02:05 AM PDT

THIS week, I learnt that The Wolves Of Willoughby Chase by Joan Aiken turns 50 this month. Fifty! And still in print – but for how long more?

I fear that its days are numbered unless Peter Jackson makes a movie of it, or better yet, the whole series, which comprises 11 books – after all, isn't Jackson turning J.R.R. Tolkien's (75-year-old!) The Hobbit into a three-part movie? With The Wolves Chronicles he won't even need to make it up or steal bits from unreadable prequels. Aiken's rambunctious, outrageous fantasy series is eminently readable and entertaining, full of absurd, colourful and totally unforgettable characters, and plots that will make your eyes pop and your head spin.

The Wolves Of Willoughby Chase (the first book) is probably the most "ordinary" of the bunch, but it still has the ravenous, rampaging wolves of the title, an evil governess named Slighcarp, child abuse in a workhouse straight out of Charles Dickens, and a trio of plucky children whom you want to stand on your chair and cheer for til you're hoarse.

If only Emma Watson or Daniel Radcliffe, or better yet, J.K. Rowling herself would endorse the books, order all Harry Potter fans to rush out and buy the series, or else! I would like to believe that Aiken's series will survive on its own merits, but so many excellent books have gone out of print that I can't help but worry. In fact, two of the books in the series, Dido And Pa and Is Underground are already out of print in the United States; and the prequel, The Whispering Mountain, is not in print at all.

Well, for now, there is a 50th anniversary special edition version of The Wolves Of Willoughby Chase. However, I'm sorry to see that the cover looks virtually identical to the version that was released in 2001. True, it's a variation of the cover of the first edition, published by Jonathan Cape in 1962, but I do think that publishers Yearling could have done more than just slap a gold medal on it.

Never mind, at least it has a lovely introduction by Joan Aiken's daughter, Lizza, which tells how the book came to be written, and also includes a particularly endearing anecdote about Torquemada (whom, along with Lizza and her brother John, The Wolves Of Willoughby Chase is dedicated to) – cat lovers will love the little tale. Oh, by the way, a new audiobook for the Listening Library is now out, read by Lizza.

Now, if you like Dickens, and Jane Eyre, and Philip Pullman's Lyra from his His Dark Materials series and – according to Michael Dirda writing in The Washington Post – steampunk, you should read Wolves and the other books. If that seems like a lot of reference points, well, the Wolves series is a sprawling, many-layered story, set against the backdrop of an alternate historical England; one in which James II never escaped to France, James III is on the throne, and fiendish Hanoverian plots to overthrow him are constantly planned and launched. (Interestingly, the US and South America also feature, as Nantucket and New Cumbria, respectively.)

There are deliciously diabolical villains, brave and bonny heroes, and strange, sinister and supernatural goings-on. Most of the books feature some very dark elements – including murder, child abuse and human sacrifice.

And then there is Dido Twite, one of several recurring characters, and in my opinion, the most significant and beguiling of the lot. Dido does not appear in The Wolves Of Willoughby Chase (as a matter of fact, the book's two main characters, Bonnie and Sylvia Green, take on supporting roles in the rest of the series, not appearing at all in some books) but is introduced in the second book, Black Hearts In Battersea.

She is a streetwise, Cockney waif – a brave, rather obnoxious but thoroughly good-hearted soul who seems to be the template for all the most plain-spoken and tenacious young women in recent fantasy fiction, from Lyra Silvertongue to Potter's Hermione Granger to Seraphina Dombegh in Rachel Hartman's young adult novel of the same name. I want to be Dido when I grow up!

This isn't the first time I've sung Dido's praises in this column. I'm certain I've written about Aiken's series before, but I don't think enough can be said about it, and I don't think I shall ever be done urging readers to buy the books. Go on! Now! This minute!

n Daphne Lee reads to wonder and wander, be amazed and amused, horrified and heartened and inspired and comforted. She wishes more people will try it too. Send e-mails to the above address and check out her blog at daphne.blogs.com/books.

Keeping books alive

Posted: 21 Oct 2012 02:03 AM PDT

Let's make a pact to ensure the longevity of the printed word, urges this bookworm who took a book along when she said her wedding vows.

RECENTLY at lunch in Kuala Lumpur, a book-loving friend whose fingers have been smoothed by years of page-thumbing, showed off the little e-library he had built on his iPad. It's not a new thing, having a virtual library on an electronic device ... but his beaming face has never been so radiant.

I squeaked, though I wished to squawk, "I thought we had a pact to love printed books forever!" He still does, he says, but to him, reading from an iPad is as enjoyable as turning printed pages.

"See how the screen flips just like the pages of a book?" he zealously went on, demonstrating with page after page the miraculous sight of a screen with a page-turning effect. As he leaned closer, I tried in vain to sniff out the bookish aroma that once so naturally emanated from him. Sniff. Nothing. Sniff, sniff. There was nothing but the smell of something metallic, Styrofoam, and aluminium.

The steaming prawn dumplings on the table were left to grow cold while he read out David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas and I obstinately went on secretly sniffing.

But really, I shouldn't lament my friend's enthusiasm. He is, after all, a geek working in the ultra-advanced field of telecommunications. But the fact that he is a technocrat who loves reading printed books makes it hard to accept the impending switch. He is a rarity.

Sigh. The truth is hard to take, but sometimes we suffer for the things we hold dear. Anyhow, I mustn't mourn my failure to bottle my dear friend's bookish smell or worry about the threats traditional books are facing. It is only logical for e-books to thrive in the present age of technology. But lest we have to pay a devil in the future to bring back an invention that has so profoundly and profusely changed our lives, let's get into a feverish groove to keep traditional books alive so they can coexist with their digital counterparts.

But before the practical tips, here's the sentimental quote: "There isn't anything distinctive in the smell, size, shape or feel of the e-book you're buying. Soon, when all books exist in electronic media, there will be no nostalgia in seeing a book any longer."

Indeed, the scent of physical books and the sight of book covers can conjure up memories of a Sunday morning spent reading in bed, an exotic vacation with plenty of reading by a swimming pool, or lonely moments when all one has is a book and rain pattering away on the windowsill and refusing to grant companionship. And those trips to the bookstore on lazy Saturdays will always remain in our minds, and each of those is a moment of ease that is so hard to come by in this increasingly stressful world.

Hence, the soothing musty smell of printed books must continue to soothe, and those little corners in the bookstores must remain like little pit stops of momentary relief and sanity.

Here's what we need to do.

Let books come out of their skin. And with this I mean for bookstores to unwrap all books so as to allow readers to feel, smell, browse through and, potentially, buy them. Don't make your store as solemn as a museum and your store assistants as neurotic as the curators, for by doing so you are pushing books into antiquity. Instead, be intentionally bustling. Make a little bit of noise, jazz up the environment, permit your store assistants to giggle over books.

If a click of the mouse allows people to buy books online, then bookstores must match technology by arranging books in a manner familiar to Netizens, by having book-loving and well-read staff quick to assist and make heartfelt book recommendations.

We owe it to each other to keep books alive, but I believe bookstores hold the key because they store books, not gadgets. Bookstores must be more human-like if gadgets can only be robotic. Booksellers have to be fervent in telling people what to read, rapturous when talking about books, passionate while providing a service to people who want to read, unyielding in retaining those who are still reading books and, most of all, genuinely convinced of the value of books. Only then can they unlock and show others the mysterious joy of reading felt only by bookworms.

And bookstores are the opposite of all this, that's when they are at their worst. Sadly, an Australian friend recently visited a Malaysian bookstore and called it "the cemetery of forgotten books". Books were tightly wrapped, and store assistants, if spotted at all, were busy displaying books as if they were preparing for burials. That comment hurt but was, nonetheless, fitting.

I am constantly reminded of the impracticality of physical books. But at the sight of books scattered all over my home, I am also constantly reminded of those times I spent reading them. My friend's copy of Cloud Atlas is by my bed. It reminds me of the good times we had when talking about Maroon 5, Superman, Adele, Prometheus, sashimi, marriage, childhood, Ipoh, and Taiwanese desserts.

That's what books are for: pleasures as well as memories.

Some of Abby Wong's books remind her of people, but Kazuo Ishiguro's Remains Of The Days bears witness to her marriage – she had it with her when making her vows.

Bestsellers

Posted: 21 Oct 2012 01:59 AM PDT

FOR the week ending Oct 14, 2012:

Non-fiction

1. Guinness World Records 2013 by Guinness World Records Ltd

2. 1D: The One Direction Story by Danny White

3. A World Without Islam by Graham E. Fuller

4. The Lady And The Peacock: The Life Of Aung San Suu Kyi Of Burma by Peter Popham

5. I Declare: 31 Promises To Speak Over Your Life by Joel Osteen

6. The Magic by Rhonda Byrne

7. The Opium War: Drugs, Dreams And The Making Of China by Julia Lovell

8. Total Recall by Arnold Schwarzenegger

9. Unstoppable: The Incredible Power Of Faith In Action by Nick Vujicic

10. Another Forgotten Child by Cathy Glass

Fiction

1. The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling

2. Fifty Shades Of Grey by E.L. James

3. The Sins Of The Father by Jeffrey Archer

4. The Hobbit (movie tie-in) by J.R.R. Tolkien

5. The Art Of Fielding by Chad Harbach

6. Sidney Sheldon's Angel Of The Dark by Tilly Bagshawe

7. Eighty Days Yellow by Vina Jackson

8. 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami

9. The Innocent by David Baldacci

10. The Twelve by Justin Cronin

n Weekly list compiled by MPH Mid Valley Megamall, Kuala Lumpur; www.mphonline.com.

Kredit: www.thestar.com.my

Ahad, 21 Oktober 2012

The Star Online: Lifestyle: Bookshelf

The Star Online: Lifestyle: Bookshelf

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