Ammunition > Heroics

Yeah, no posts for a while... xP
I was in Iowa this weekend. We went to a teppanyaki place. I had calamari. It was good.

I finished Bone. The ending seemed really sad at first, but then I decided it was OK because it was pretty optimistic, and after all, totally happy endings are kind of stale. Of course, I saw the ending coming a mile away (it's obvious how it's going to end the whole time), but that didn't change the fact that it was kind of disappointing at first. But then I realized that if he had done it differently, it would have been even more sad. It kept it interesting anyway; like I just said, "and they all lived happily ever after" is dull.
Anyway, I've decided that Bone is the second best comic book ever (after Fullmetal Alchemist -- although that's assuming she doesn't send it downhill awfully, since it's not finished yet).
Then I decided that I was going to make a list of "really excellent fiction". I wrote down some stuff. I have fifteen entries... I may have forgotten some things, but it probably won't be too much longer than that in the end.
I got to thinking, because a lot of the things on my list are "children's books". I began to wonder why all the good books are for kids. I think I figured out why.
Any good, fun, fast-paced story without any dumb, tedious junk in it is automatically labeled a "children's book" because that's the kind of thing that appeals to kids. It seems to me that books "for young adults and teenagers" are usually good, fun, slightly slower-paced stories with dumb, tedious junk in them, and books "for adults" are bad, unfun, poorly paced stories with dumb, tedious junk in them. Most of the good fiction seems to be written for kids, and a lot of the stuff that isn't is immediately pegged as children's literature anyway. It's kind of weird, but I'll get over it. It's not like I limit myself to books written for "my age group" anyway. =P
There are other cases wherein a book seems to target a certain demographic and as a result probably loses a lot of potential audience. For example, you might read a summary on the back of Chaim Potok's The Chosen and think "Oh, this won't make much sense to me because I'm not Jewish." but then you'd be missing out on a fantastic book (it's not on my list... maybe it should be). I've also read Twilight (yes, seriously), and I probably wasn't a part of that target audience, either.
...That was an experience that warrants a story all its own. Maybe tomorrow.

I'll probably post my list here when it's done.

That Daisuke Amaya interview still hasn't gone up yet. =(


:::Source expected
:::28.04.09