Kerrie TAC 2015 Team Caesar SP BrPT ASL (Language Learning Log) Language Learning Forum

Kerrie TAC 2015 Team Caesar SP BrPT ASL
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Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log

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Kerrie
Senior Member
United States
justpaste.it/Kerrie2
Joined 5393 days ago
1232 posts - 1740 votes

Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish

Message 201 of 246

13 July 2014 at 2:19am | IP Logged

So maybe it is time for an update here. I've been "gone" too long!

I've finally sold my house (after 8 years of trying), finally gotten a stable job (which won't make me rich, but will pay the bills), I found my kitty last night after she went missing for three days, and I think it's high time I get my ass back in gear for the TAC and for the Super Challenge.

I have been steadily plugging away with Spanish, although it's been mostly maintenance mode. If I can find the Spanish version of something I want to watch, then I do. I've been watching Charmed again with my daughter. I watched it last time around (for the SC) - I think I watched it mostly in French last time. I don't need the subtitles much, and I have a tendency to ignore them, which feels weird. But my daughter needs them. :D

Here's a run-down of what I've finished in Spanish so far. Some of this I posted in one of the SC updates, but not here.

Dark Places by Gillian Flynn

The first book I read was the Spanish version of Dark Places by Gillian Flynn. Her latest book (Gone Girl) has gotten a lot of attention lately, but for some reason this one grabbed me first. From Amazon:

Quote:

When Libby Day's mother and two older sisters were slaughtered in the family's Kansas farmhouse, it was seven-year-old Libby's testimony that sent her 15-year-old brother, Ben, to prison for life. Desperate for cash 24 years later, Libby reluctantly agrees to meet members of the Kill Club, true crime enthusiasts who bicker over famous cases. She's shocked to learn most of them believe Ben is innocent and the real killer is still on the loose. Though initially interested only in making a quick buck hocking family memorabilia, Libby is soon drawn into the club's pseudo-investigation, and begins to question what exactly she saw—or didn't see—the night of the tragedy. Flynn fluidly moves between cynical present-day Libby and the hours leading up to the murders through the eyes of her family members. When the truth emerges, it's so twisted that even the most astute readers won't have predicted it.

On one hand, it's a good story. A little girl's family is brutally murdered, and her older brother is put in jail for it. Twenty-some years later, as the donation monies are running out, she starts working with "justice groups" that want to prove her brother innocent. At first, she is just doing it for the money, but as she learns more, I think she starts to want to know the truth.

There's lots of violence (obviously), lots of darkness, Satanic crap, drugs, and more stuff that is typically not my thing. From the beginning, it seemed obvious that the older brother didn't do it. And as you go further into the story, you kind of wonder. Maybe he did. The author goes back and forth between Libby's life now (and the investigation), and the days leading up to that fateful night. I kept reading because I wanted to know who did it. But I'm not sure I enjoyed the journey - if that makes any sense. It was gruesome and warped. I suppose if you like that kinda stuff, it was a good book. I suppose it was a good book anyway, since it kept me turning pages until I figured out who did it. It was certainly good for some colorful vocabulary. :D

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

Then I read (the translation of) The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova.

This book got a lot of really mixed reviews. You either loved it or you hated it. Personally, I really enjoyed it. It's a Dracula story. From Amazon:

Quote:

If your pulse flutters at the thought of castle ruins and descents into crypts by moonlight, you will savor every creepy page of Elizabeth Kostova's long but beautifully structured thriller The Historian. The story opens in Amsterdam in 1972, when a teenage girl discovers a medieval book and a cache of yellowed letters in her diplomat father's library. The pages of the book are empty except for a woodcut of a dragon. The letters are addressed to: "My dear and unfortunate successor." When the girl confronts her father, he reluctantly confesses an unsettling story: his involvement, twenty years earlier, in a search for his graduate school mentor, who disappeared from his office only moments after confiding to Paul his certainty that Dracula--Vlad the Impaler, an inventively cruel ruler of Wallachia in the mid-15th century--was still alive. The story turns out to concern our narrator directly because Paul's collaborator in the search was a fellow student named Helen Rossi (the unacknowledged daughter of his mentor) and our narrator's long-dead mother, about whom she knows almost nothing. And then her father, leaving just a note, disappears also.

As well as numerous settings, both in and out of the East Bloc, Kostova has three basic story lines to keep straight--one from 1930, when Professor Bartolomew Rossi begins his dangerous research into Dracula, one from 1950, when Professor Rossi's student Paul takes up the scent, and the main narrative from 1972. The criss-crossing story lines mirror the political advances, retreats, triumphs, and losses that shaped Dracula's beleaguered homeland--sometimes with the Byzantines on top, sometimes the Ottomans, sometimes the rag-tag local tribes, or the Orthodox church, and sometimes a fresh conqueror like the Soviet Union.

Although the book is appropriately suspenseful and a delight to read--even the minor characters are distinctive and vividly seen--its most powerful moments are those that describe real horrors. Our narrator recalls that after reading descriptions of Vlad burning young boys or impaling "a large family," she tried to forget the words: "For all his attention to my historical education, my father had neglected to tell me this: history's terrible moments were real. I understand now, decades later, that he could never have told me. Only history itself can convince you of such a truth." The reader, although given a satisfying ending, gets a strong enough dose of European history to temper the usual comforts of the closing words.

It felt like a suspense story, but it was odd. It was like an exciting stroll through the cultures and histories of Turkey, the Balkans, and Eastern Europe, all of which I am interested in. I didn't feel rushed, it didn't keep me up at night. But every spare second I had, I chose my book over anything else to do. :)

The ending was really odd.

A lot of other reviewers - the ones that liked the book, anyway - said it is one of the best Dracula stories out there, next to Bram Stoker's. I haven't read any others, since I am not usually one for vampire novels. I think it was the history and culture integrated into the story that made it so enjoyable (and believable) for me. I think this would make an excellent movie.

Revolution (2012)

In May, I kind of went on a TV binge, as well. I watched Revolution dubbed in Spanish. I started watching the series last year, when there were only the first ten episodes out. It was interesting. The whole post-apocalyptic thing. Some scientific nerds basically turned the lights off (worldwide) on purpose. To save the world or some nonsense. But they can turn them back on, if they want to. At least, that was the plan (and we all know how that goes!) The first half of season one looked promising, enough to bring me back to see what happened (albeit more than a year later). I probably should have stayed away, because it just got bad, then worse. Thank God they cancelled the show after the second season. :D

The Fault in Our Stars (John Green)

And last, but not least, I just finished up the Spanish translation of The Fault in Our Stars. From Amazon:

Quote:

At 16, Hazel Grace Lancaster, a three-year stage IV–cancer survivor, is clinically depressed. To help her deal with this, her doctor sends her to a weekly support group where she meets Augustus Waters, a fellow cancer survivor, and the two fall in love. Both kids are preternaturally intelligent, and Hazel is fascinated with a novel about cancer called An Imperial Affliction. Most particularly, she longs to know what happened to its characters after an ambiguous ending. To find out, the enterprising Augustus makes it possible for them to travel to Amsterdam, where Imperial’s author, an expatriate American, lives. What happens when they meet him must be left to readers to discover. Suffice it to say, it is significant. Writing about kids with cancer is an invitation to sentimentality and pathos—or worse, in unskilled hands, bathos. Happily, Green is able to transcend such pitfalls in his best and most ambitious novel to date. Beautifully conceived and executed, this story artfully examines the largest possible considerations—life, love, and death—with sensitivity, intelligence, honesty, and integrity. In the process, Green shows his readers what it is like to live with cancer, sometimes no more than a breath or a heartbeat away from death. But it is life that Green spiritedly celebrates here, even while acknowledging its pain. In its every aspect, this novel is a triumph.

One of the best books I've read. I'm looking forward to seeing the movie. Watch the trailer here. This is another one that I suggested to my daughter (before I finished it), and she sped through it in a few days. I have to wait to suggest things to her until I finished with them, so she doesn't spoil them for me. :)

EDIT: Added pictures and links. Does anyone know how to size images on here?

Edited by Kerrie on 13 July 2014 at 2:51am
2 persons have voted this message useful

Kerrie
Senior Member
United States
justpaste.it/Kerrie2
Joined 5393 days ago
1232 posts - 1740 votes

Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish

Message 202 of 246

28 July 2014 at 12:02am | IP Logged

I just finished watching El Tiempo Entre Costuras, which is a new drama on DramaFever.

Quote:

Based on the New York Times Bestseller "The Time In Between" by María Dueñas, a young seamstress's life takes an unexpected turn when she finds herself pregnant, alone, and penniless during the Spanish Civil War. As Spain's alliance with Nazi Germany deepens, she takes on a new identity and becomes an in-demand haute couture stylist for the wives of Nazi officials. But soon she becomes swept up in political intrigue when she begins helping the British Secret Service with coded messages in the seams of her dresses.

I had planned to watch an episode or two a week, but this drama grabbed me and wouldn't let go. I love period pieces, simply because I love to see history and culture brought to life. This was a great story. It had good acting. And the dresses. Oh, the dresses! The costumes were amazing. They did an amazing job with the sets: Madrid, Tangier and Tetoun in Morocco, and Lisbon. I would highly recommend it, even if you're not learning Spanish.

It was interesting to hear Spanish with different accents, as there were Brits, Germans, Arabs, and Portuguese speaking Spanish. It was also fun to hear some German and Portuguese, a lot of which I was able to understand. There was some Arabic as well, but that was lost on me. :D

Edited by Kerrie on 09 August 2014 at 2:14am
4 persons have voted this message useful

BAnna
Triglot
Senior Member
United States
Joined 4620 days ago
409 posts - 616 votes

Speaks: English*, German, Spanish
Studies: Russian, Turkish

Message 203 of 246

28 July 2014 at 12:32am | IP Logged

This looks cool, thanks for the tip!
1 person has voted this message useful

Serpent
Octoglot
Senior Member
Russian Federation
serpent-849.livejour
Joined 6595 days ago
9753 posts - 15779 votes

4 sounds
Speaks: Russian*, English, Finnish^C1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese
Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish

Message 204 of 246

28 July 2014 at 3:28pm | IP Logged

Ohhh wow El tiempo entre costuras looks great. And my mum is going to love it too, I think :D BTW seems like there's a book too.

As for resizing images, I'm afraid the only option is to reupload the smaller image to something like tinypic or imgur. You can do the resizing online at pixlr, picmonkey and other sites like that. at pixlr you can open a link directly :)
1 person has voted this message useful

Stelle
Bilingual Triglot
Senior Member
Canada
tobefluent.com
Joined 4142 days ago
949 posts - 1686 votes

Speaks: French*, English*, Spanish
Studies: Tagalog

Message 205 of 246

28 July 2014 at 6:02pm | IP Logged

I started watching El Tiempo Entre Costuras last week. It's really a great show!
1 person has voted this message useful

kanewai
Triglot
Senior Member
United States
justpaste.it/kanewai
Joined 4887 days ago
1386 posts - 3054 votes

Speaks: English*, French, Marshallese
Studies: Italian, Spanish

Message 206 of 246

29 July 2014 at 3:15am | IP Logged

That looks like a fun show! My Spanish wish-list is growing; at some point I'll need to
stop worrying about Italian/Spanish interference and dive into both.
1 person has voted this message useful

Kerrie
Senior Member
United States
justpaste.it/Kerrie2
Joined 5393 days ago
1232 posts - 1740 votes

Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish

Message 207 of 246

09 August 2014 at 8:19pm | IP Logged

For anyone who is interested, DramaFever is running a promotion for $5 subscription instead of their regular $10, and you get that price locked in.

Five Year Anniversary $5 Subscription Sale

https://www.dramafever.com/signup/premium/?anniversarysale

I don't know how long they are going to run it - it's been running for a few weeks, but it looks like it's still online, so check it out if you are interested.

Edited by Kerrie on 09 August 2014 at 8:19pm
2 persons have voted this message useful

Kerrie
Senior Member
United States
justpaste.it/Kerrie2
Joined 5393 days ago
1232 posts - 1740 votes

Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish

Message 208 of 246

31 August 2014 at 2:20am | IP Logged

Águila Roja returns next Thursday!

1 person has voted this message useful

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