Should you read the book or see the movie? Part 5

The Lord of the Rings (1955) by J.R.R. Tolkien vs The Lord of the Rings films (2001-2003) - The book is one of my favorite of all time... and the movies are pretty darn good. While watching the movies you can really tell that Peter Jackson also loves the books. Verdict: Read the book and watch the films

Atlas Shrugged  (1957) by Ayn Rand vs Atlas Shrugged: Part 1 (2001 film)- To say I disliked the book is an understatement. I was ready to hate the movie but I really couldn't. I have to say Taylor Shilling gives a pretty good performance and the problem with the book really isn't the first third. Still I wouldn't recommend the movie either. Verdict: Avoid both.

David Copperfield (1850) by Charles Dickens vs David Copperfield (1999 BBC mini-series) - The book has a ton of stuff in it and it would be pretty difficult to make a completely faithful adaptation. The BBC mini-series is pretty good and since Daniel Radcliffe plays young David it made me see the possible influence this book had on the Harry Potter series. Verdict : If you have the time read the book, but the mini series is good too.

Inherent Vice (2009) by Thomas Pynchon vs. Inherent Vice (2014 film) - For such a weird book, the film version does a great job of being very faithful to the novel. I enjoyed both so... Verdict: Read the book and see the movie.

The Exorcist (1971) by William Peter Blatty vs. The Exorcist (1973 film) - I enjoyed both versions of this. The movie is a classic and the book adds some depth to the secondary characters. Verdict : Both are great.

Perfume (1985) by Patrick Süskind vs. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer (2006 film) -  The movie was pretty good and faithful to the book but the novel is just so creepy and gives more depth to the characters. Verdict : Read the book.

Jurassic Park (1990) by Michael Crichton vs Jurassic Park (1993 film) - The book has some problems: shallow characters, unnecessary subplots, too much emphasis on computer interfaces, etc. The film fixes most of these. Verdict : See the movie.

The Hellbound Heart (1986) by Clive Barker vs. Hellraiser (1987 film) - I enjoyed both and they are pretty similar but... Verdict: See the movie (if you like really weird scary movies).

Mystery Book # 22 The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan

Lucinda and I are slowly watching every Alfred Hitchcock film in chronological order. One of his earlier films is based on The Thirty-Nine Steps, so I figured I'd read it before watching the movie. And I have to say that I don't see how this book ranked so high on this list... The plot is fairly simple. They guy, Richard Hannay, finds out about an international conspiracy and is then chased all over the English countryside by unknown people while he figures out what to do. Buchan's style is very plain and basically one thing after another happens to this guy and he just narrowly escapes everything. The main character isn't well developed and he just goes from situation to situation. The book is short but a lot of stuff happens so I felt like none of the scenes really had a chance to build up the suspense that could have been there. I'll give this one a B.

Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgramage by Haruki Murakami

My wife knows that I'm a fan of Haruki Murakami and for my birthday she gave me his newest book Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgramage. It isn't on any of my lists so I'll keep this short... The book is about a 36 year old guy who is a bit of a loner. The reason for this is that twenty years earlier his four closest friends all decided to suddenly cut off all contact from him. I enjoyed the book because it has the usual stuff you find in a Murakami book.... weird dreams, side stories with no point, people disappearing, questions of identity, random stuff just happening, etc... though this one doesn't have any cats... and of course a whole bunch of unresolved plot points. It isn't as good as The Wind Up Bird Chronicle but better than 1Q84... I'll give it an A-.

Book # 7 - The Return of the King (The Lord of the Rings Book 3 of 3) by J.R.R. Tolkien

One of the more interesting things about The Return of the King, at least to me, is the 100+ pages of appendices at the end of it. It isn't that the information in there is riveting... I'm just fascinated that it even exists and that Tolkein felt compelled to include it all. In a way it just shows how devoted he was to developing the entire world of Middle Earth to the tiniest detail. But really... it is just so much an overload of information that it is kind of comical. Though in a way reading the whole thing is essential to getting the whole Lord of the Rings experience. First off it includes the story of Aragorn's and Arwen's relationship which is arguably very important to the story and is barely mentioned in the main text. It also includes more details on the backstories of the dwarves of The Hobbit and some of Gandalf's motivations for helping the dwarves get rid of Smaug. It also includes a summary of over six thousand years of Middle Earth history and complete family histories of major hobbits, the kings and stewards of Gondor and the kings of Rohan. After that it includes super detailed descriptions of several languages of Middle Earth and exhaustive details of how to pronounce Elvish words.

I'm not sure if it is despite or because of the ridculous appendices, I've got to give it an A+. As a whole, The Lord of the Rings is one of my favorite books.

Horror Book # 26 - Night Shift by Stephen King

Despite having read several Stephen King books I had somehow never read any of his short story collections. Night Shift is his first collection of stories and for the most part the stories are all scary and pretty varied. The book starts out strong with Jerusalem's Lot which is a Lovecraftian story about a cult of vampires. After that the rest of the first half of the book is good but not great. Three of the stories are about inanimate objects coming  to life (there are killer trucks, killer army figures and a killer dry cleaning machine). The second half is much stronger though since most of the stories don't have supernatural elements. This includes The Ledge about a man forced out on a building's ledge; Quitters, Inc. about a company with a novel way to get people to quit smoking; and Children of the Corn about weird kids in corn fields. Overall the collection was scary and probably caused a few nightmares. The short story format suits King well since it doesn't all him to go on and on like he sometimes does. I'll give it an A-.