The Good, the Bad, and the Nasty of 2005

Martha Vialli (with Karen Krizanovich): Bad Advice: A Nasty Little Book for Good Girls Who Want to be Bad
Roadside Amusements (Trade Paperback), ISBN 1-59609-088-X

At least this book comes with a warning. Bad Advice: A Nasty Little Book for Good Girls Who Want to be Bad tries to be like Cameron Tuttle's Bad Girl's Guide series and fails miserably. This book gives advice on how do to 366 different things -- get back together with your boyfriend, trip up your office enemy, steal a taxi, get Granny's jewels now, etc. Only the advice truly falls in the category of nasty. Most suggestions involve hurting others (usually emotionally but sometimes physically) to accomplish the task. Crank calls, blackmailing a boss, even purposely serving meat to a vegetarian, Vialli stops at nothing to try and be cute in this book. I found one or two items mildly amusing, but the vast majority of the advice left me shaking my head and thinking "How cruel… and how stupid." Usually I recycle books by passing them on to charities, but this one has an urgent appointment with my trashcan. And I pity anyone who actually coughs up the $14 to buy this piece of dreck.

Gregory Maguire: Son of a Witch
Regan Books (Hardcover), ISBN 0060548932

A sequel to Gregory Maguire's Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, Son of a Witch follows the adventures of Liir, the supposed son of Elphaba. But even he doesn't know if she really gave birth to him. She certainly did little to mother him. She found her animal experiments more interesting (just where do you think those flying monkeys came from?) After Elphaba's untimely and soggy demise, Liir heads for the Emerald City with Dorothy and her crew, only to end up nearly dead by the side of the road a dozen or so years later. Maguire goes back and forth between Liir's recovery in a mauntery and his travels to find a childhood friend and a stint in the army. Although this book answers some questions left from Wicked, it just didn't quite grab me as much as Wicked did. Still, it makes for a solid read, though definitely pick up Wicked first, otherwise the politics and history of Oz could confuse the reader.

Christopher Paolini: Eragon
Knopf (Paperback), ISBN 0375826696

Another "Let's jump on the Harry Potter/Lord of the Rings fantasy bandwagon" tale, Eragon finds the title character, a teenage boy, suddenly in charge of a blue dragon after finding a blue gem which turns out to be an egg. The dragonriders vanished long ago, but Eragon seems to be named after one of the greatest. As the dragon Saphira grows, bad guys come after the pair, eventually torching Eragon's uncle's home, killing the uncle in the process. So off boy and dragon set, embarking on a long and difficult journey. This plot borrows heavily from both the Harry Potter series (the boy with the painful past and who possesses lots of amazing powers) and Lord of the Rings (especially the bad guys on their trail and the lengthy quest where they meet elves and dwarves). Paolini began writing the book at age 15 and, while a decent story, his youth shows. And it reads very much like a Mary Sue story -- the amazing hero with awesome skills and powers. Eragon turns out to be the first in a trilogy; I'm not sure I'll read the other two.

Mary Roach: Stiff: The Curious Life of Human Cadavers
W. W. Norton & Company (Hardcover), ISBN 0393050939

Not for the faint of heart -- or stomach -- Stiff: The Curious Life of Human Cadavers takes the reader on a death trip. Mary Roach discusses just how many different jobs dead bodies can do, such as being crash test dummies (obviously not the ones on seatbelt commercials), join the army (the better to test bullets and bombs) and be forensic scientists. Or at least teach those CSI guys a thing or two about how bodies decay in various locations and climates. Roach adds a lot of wit and humor to her extensive historical and scientific research. I can't wait to read her next book, Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife.

Jen Foote

Jen Foote recently moved to central Florida, where she is a copy editor and page designer at a small daily newspaper. She is ecstatic to live an hour away from the ocean.

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