The Small Assassin

By Ray Bradbury

     Hi, everybody! I have a bit of free time after a shower of homework and I'd like to recommend a very cool story. Now returning with my favorite author. Here comes a story that may make baby-haters like it. This short story comes from a book I previously mentioned "The October Country".

Be afraid! I'm all powerful! I'm smirking at you!

     Alice Leiber has just survived a difficult delivering and she hates her baby. (See, baby-haters must be agreeing with her already.) David, her husband, is told by Dr. Jeffers that it will take time for her to come to love their baby. The difficult delivering that almost killed her must have make her blame the baby. So he must tolerate everything strange she may say.

     So Alice and David head to their home. Alice carrying the baby in her arms like she should but not motherly enough, just as she was carrying a porcelain figure which bugs David. Once in the house, Alice acts indifferent toward the child even though David makes an effort in to her showing some interest for him. Finally when they let him in his crib and head to their own room, Alice tells him she's afraid of him and thanks him for not getting mad at her. She starts explaining to him that she doesn't believe him to be harmless. The baby hates her and wants her dead. He tries to assure her that that can't be possible. Alice explains to him that she can't trust it. People have rules to know right from wrong. Between David and herself love shields each other from the other. But the baby is so new. He doesn't know right from wrong, knows no rules. He's amoral. David tells her that they would teach him but Alice looks reluctant.

     The baby starts crying in the other room and David decides to move the crib to their room much to Alice displease. There the blue-eyes baby gazes from its crib. Lights turn off and David feels Alice rush into her arms shaking. David suddenly remembers he will be out of town for a few days, the help they hired will come on Friday. Alice promises to look after the baby.

I thinks that's everyone's case.

     David heads to work and away. He's too busy and tired from work when he receives a call. It's Dr. Jeffers who tells him Alice is in the hospital with pneumonia. David rapidly returns and Dr. Jeffers explains to him that she got pneumonia due to exhaustion as she was being too good a mother. When the doctor leaves, Alice moans to David. The baby, the baby wouldn't stop crying at night. He wouldn't let her rest. He was all day still but at night he wouldn't let her sleep. He knew she was weak and drives her to pneumonia. She admits he tried to kill him since the first day he was gone. He tried smothering him against the pillow. She just put him upside-down into the pillow and waited, but when she returned the baby was already in her back smiling. Since then she didn't took care of him at all, she believes the help took care of the baby.
   
     Later on, Dr. Jeffers tells David that it wasn't the babies fault. She just tries to blame her troubles on him. He must shower her in love and be patient. Eventually she will understand the baby is harmless and start to love it. And so David does. Four months have passed and Alice seems to become healthier and her fears less frequent. Yet she would still shake in fear when the door to their bedroom opened a few inches for no reason or thought there was something in the hallway. One night while Alice was sleeping in his arms, he heard the baby crying. He decided to get the milk himself. He walked in the darkness and next to the stairs he slipped with something. He felt himself being thrown to the stairs but somehow managed to grab the railway. He cursed and grabbed the thing he had slipped with. He grew pale. It was a small doll he had got for the baby.

I'm sorry! I was just joking when I got you a doll.
I know that you're a boy, that's why it's funny.

     Next morning, when Alice left him in work she told him he couldn't deal with it anymore. She still fears the baby and wants to get away of it for a bit. Have some vacations and leave the baby to someone else. David tells her she will take her with a psychologist and if he decides so they would go on a vacation. David thought for a moment that Alice would start crying but she finally agrees.

     While he is at work he starts thinking if he should tell her about what happened last night but decides not to as that would only freak her out more. Accident are after all accidents. He returns home. Everything is quiet, a few cars honking faraway in the avenue. He slides the key into the keyhole and opens the door. Sunlight falls at the bottom of the stairs from the window and into the doll. But he isn't looking at the doll. He rushes to Alice who is at the bottom of the stairs like a twisted doll that doesn't want to play anymore. Ever. He grabs her in his arms, hugs her, calls her. But she's dead. Desperately he rushes to the baby's bedroom and there he finds the baby gasping with his face red as if he had tired himself by crying. He yells to him, "She's dead!," for no reason.

You're right. I should try throwing them into the stairs.

     In the meantime he must have called Dr. Jeffers but he can't really remember. He slaps him and tells him to snap out of it. He tells him the baby killed her as he tried last night with him. Dr. Jeffers tells him that it's just a baby but David explains to him that maybe what if one baby out of a million was born different. This one could already think, understand and hate. He could start moving faster than the others. That must be why he was always tired even when they didn't hear him cry. He had exhausted himself by climbing the crib and moving around in the hallway! Even so Dr. Jeffers tells him that even if he was right murder is motivated, what could have motivated a baby to kill their own parents. David told him what the thought. What if the baby hated that it was taken away from its peaceful slumber at birth. Sent out into a cold world where he had to provide, see and compete for himself. He hated Alice for that and his father as well. He wanted them death.

     He tells him how he knows now what name he should have. Lucifer. Oh, how he wants to kill him. Dr. Jeffers tells him he needs to sleep. He gives him some sedatives and tells him he will come tomorrow in the afternoon to see him. David goes to his bed and feels his consciousness slip but as he was falling asleep he thought he saw a white thing moving in the hallway.

     Dr. Jeffers arrives in the afternoon as promised. He finds the door open, enters and calls for David. No answer but thinks he just saw a white blur somewhere. He leaves his suitcase in the chair next to the door. He can smell gas. He rushes to the second floor and into David's room. He closes the valve next to the door and opens the windows. While coughing he heads to examine David. His body is already cold. He died some hours ago. He ponders in the hallway. David couldn't have committed suicide, the sedatives he gave him would only lose effect now. A thought slipped through his mind. He went to the baby's room and opened the door. He looked at the crib. It's empty. The baby killed David but the door to his room closed and he couldn't get back. But he would find him. He had brought him into this world, he could send it out of it too. Oh, now he was talking just like Alice and David!

     He went where he left his suitcase and took something out of it. He saw a white blur in the other room. He walked half a dozen small steps to where he was. He raised his hand to sunlight.
   
     "Look, baby, something pretty, something bright"

     A scalpel.

Remember an apple a day keeps a doctor away.

     Oh, such a cool story. I just love Bradbury's short stories. They're the best. Just for your information I don't hate babies but I do believe that they're amoral. It's not new to anyone that babies are selfish. 

     But I think Alice and David lacked luck. I mean, they get the only precocious child in millions and maybe he was also a gifted baby as he already knew you could kill someone with natural gas. Or maybe David suddenly started talking with Alice about how the valve next to their door could kill them when their murderous baby was hearing.

     So, happy reading!

Blade Runner

By Phillip K. Dick

Tired of only being able to care for rocks?
You're in luck, buy an artificial pet.
It will not starve to death!

     Hello, people! If you have read another of my posts or even paid attention to the name of the author you will see that he's the same author to another story we know as Total Recall or as We will remember it for you wholesale. Both, are cool stories. Only difference is that this is a novel and the other a short story. 

     Rick Deckard is a police officer in San Francisco but not the normal blue ones who love donuts. Nope, he's a bounty hunter in this post atomic war world. The Earth has been messed up by the Terminal War there was some decades ago. No one knows how or who but the world is full of radioactive dirt and most of the human population has fled to the colonies in Mars and other planets. Only few have remained on Earth, living in the now empty cities, trying to get past the day and continue their lives while using lead suits to avoid mutation and becoming a special.

     Now this colonies actually are very harsh to live in and lonely so humanity has exceed in the construction of androids so similar to humans that it is difficult to tell them apart. Sometimes these androids kill their owners and flee to Earth. So then Rick Deckard is one of many bounty hunters in the city who can get a thousand dollars by destroying them. And he really wishes for five androids to come. He wants the money to get a real animal just like everybody else. In this world, animals are scarce. Radioactivity killed lots of them and extincted not few of them. Everybody has horses, sheep, goats, ostriches, cats and dogs. Socially speaking, is the right thing: Having empathy toward other living things. But androids are not the same. They lack empathy and bounty hunters use the Voigt-Kampff test to separate android from humans. 

Tired of never finding the phone?
Worry not! This new pet is impossible to lose.

     When the chief bounty hunter of the area gets hospitalized by an android he was assigned to destroy. Rick takes over the mission and heads to the Rosen Association, the business that constructed the new Nexus-6 model, to apply the Voigt-Kampff and determine if it is still effective.There he meets Rachael Rosen and his uncle where they almost trick in to believing the Voigt-Kampff is useless. Rachel Rosen indeed results in being an android they were trying to pass as human to foil the test.

     Having assured the Nexus-6 androids can be identified correctly he heads back to San Francisco and receives a call from his boss. The Soviet Association has sent an agent to help him. Rick meets him, a middle-aged man with a Scandinavian accent. They head to the theater in his car and while travelling the agent happens to be Polokov, the android, who previously attacked his chief. Polokov tries to kill him, but Rick is faster and shoots him in the head.

     He arrives to the theater exhausted with the adrenaline still circling his body. He takes a moment to calm down, reads the report of the android he came to search. His target's name is Luba Luft who is suspected to be an android. He enters while they're still in the middle of rehearsal. He identifies her and later heads to her dressing room. He presents himself as a police officer and tells her he need to apply a test to determine she's not an android. She accepts warily. Rick starts asking the questions but Luba keeps asking him the meaning of words as she doesn't know that much english. Frustrated Rick tries to ask a different type of question, he asks her what will she do if she was invited by a man to his room. Luba asks him suddenly if he could get something from below the furniture. When Rick does it, Luba is pointing a gun at him. She takes his papers and read the questions out loud. She accuses him of being a pervert who only came to make her obscene questions. She calls a cop.
 

Saw Harry Potter but Mom never let you buy an
owl because they're dirty?
Worry not! Electric owls only creep you at night.

     Rick tries to explain to the fellow cop that he was attempting to apply the Voigt-Kampff but the cop doesn't understand what's he's talking about as there isn't a test with that name. When Rick attempts to contact his department, nobody answers. Unable to understand what's going on he tries to convince him showing him the retired android in his car. But things look grim, he asks Rick to come with him to the department. It seems the department Rick talks about is were the old department was before the new one. His boss nor his chief sound familiar to the cop. They arrive to a building Rick has never seen before.

     There he meets Garland, the boss, in the police department. They sent Pulokov's body to investigate just to be sure it is really synthetic. He lets Rick make a call. He calls his wife but the one who answers is another woman. He hangs and returns with Garland. The boss makes him clear that he believes Rick is an android with a false memory. An android used to kill humans. He points out to him how his list isn't of androids as even Garland's name appears. His test, the so called Voigt-Kampff, is a ruse to make him believe humans are androids.

They're everywhere.
Under every blue hat and eating your donuts.

     While Rick ponders, fellow bounty hunter Phil Resch appears. When Pulokov's corpse is confirmed to be one of an android, he insists in applying Rick their own test to prove his humanity. He even accepts applying the test to Garland and himself as he believes even cops should have applied this test. He leaves the room to get the equipment for the test. Garland sighs and admits he's android and how Phil is a fool. Everybody in this department is an android including Phil who happily comes to apply the test that will doom him. Garland takes aim at Phil yet the latter reacts sooner and shoots him. He admits he always thought Garland was an android. Phil helps Rick exit the fake department and both head to the theater once again. Rick confesses to Phil that Garland told him he was also an android but he refuses to believe it. Rick decides to deal first with Luba and then they will deal with his being an android or not.

     They find Luba in an art gallery and take her away to the elevator. Rick wants to finish applying the test to her just to be sure. She confesses she just wanted to be like a human girl and sing in the opera. Phil shoots her as he hears her admitting it. Rick becomes bewildered by his action. He accuses him of being an android as only one can enjoy so much having an excuse to kill. He applies the Voigt-Kampff to Phil only to find that indeed Phil is human. He comes to understand Phil only lacks empathy towards androids. He asks him to read the lectures and applies the test to himself and understand he has started to feel empathy toward androids. After that, Phil and Rick depart.

     Rick returns exhausted to the house but in his way buys a black nubian goat to surprise his wife. He's sad about Luba's death and tries to cheer up with his wife who talks to him about Mercerism (a kind of religion). His boss calls him and hurries him to dispose of the three androids that are left before they run away. Rick sadly departs still not sure if he will be able to kill them as coldly as before. He calls Rachael Rosen to help him retire the androids as she had offered before. When they meet, Rachael sleeps with Rick hoping to make him feel empathy towards the fugitive Nexus-6 that are left but is unable to stop him. Rick confesses his love for Rachael but she admits she has slept with multiple bounty hunters to dissuade them from killing other androids. In the end, he refuses her help and leaves her.

This android only wants a hug...

     He heads to the suburbs where he meets Isidore, a special, outside a building freeing a spider. He has been taking care of the three androids Rick is looking for: Pris Stratton, Irmgard Baty and Roy Baty. After having witnessed how these three androids mutilated the spider he had found and Mercerism displayed as fake by Buster Friendly (confirmed by the three androids as one of them), he tells Rick that they are in the building. Rick enters and in the darkness he hears someone approaching. He confuses her with Rachael Rosen. But it is really Pris Stratton, an android from the same series, who approaches with her arms wide as to hug him. Rick shoots her.

     Having dealt with the most difficult to him, he approaches to Isidore's room where he knocks. Roy Baty asks who he is. Rick fakes the voice of Isidore. Roy Baty opens with Irmgard by his side. As they see Rick both run away. Rick kills Irmgard who was awaiting to ambush him and shoots Roy soon after. When he heads down he finds Isidore lamenting the death of his only friends. He feels sorry for him and leaves.

Bored of your carbon-based toad?
Buy an electric one, fun ensured!

     When he returns home, his wife tells him their goat was pushed off the roof by a woman described as Rachael Rosen. His boss congratulates him by phone for having beat the record by killing six androids in a day. Yet Rick isn't happy at all. He leaves in his car to Oregon, a deserted state and meditates about their condition. He comes to understand he is now Mercer, as he has fused himself with him. He can understand and have empathy for both androids and humans. As he get to his conclusion he finds a toad between the rocks, an extincted species and the favorite animal of Wilbur Mercer. He takes him home and shows him to his wife. Iran discovers the toad is synthetic. Rick becomes a little disappointed but still wants to keep him. Iran calls the electric vet and starts asking instructions to care for their new electric pet.

     Well, this is another story I read this semester. Sometimes Mercerism wasn't that clear to me, it quite confused me how even though Mercerism was proved as fake, Rick and Isidore still could see Mercer as he was some kind of god. 

     But I really enjoyed not knowing if Rick was an android or not. I think that was my favorite part of the story. So I'm planning to see the movie soon.

     Happy reading!

The Emissary

By Ray Bradbury

Same exact book I've got.
Best present ever.

     Long time no see. Since I'm back to school I have read lots of stories I didn't read in vacations. Now that I don't have homework I can finally write something. Once again by my favorite author this is a small story that can be found in the book: "The October Country".

     Martin is a boy who has a dog. So far so good and nice except that Martin is very sickly so he always stays in bed. The only creature that works as an emissary between the outside world and him is his nameless dog who likes to dig in other neighbors' gardens. Dog in his walks brings him leaves, plants and many things for Martin to see and imagine. Martin also uses Dog to bring people to visit him as the dog corners, begs and guides people back home.

     One day Dog brings home the one who should have been his teacher if he went to school, Miss Haight. Martin really loves Miss Haight as she complements Dog as an emissary in ways Dog cannot do. He visits him everyday, brings him muffins, talks to him about many things and she loves Dog. So far a heartwarming story. That is until one Monday his mom tells him that she died a mile away from town. Martin couldn't believe it and asked where she was going. His mom told him they were going to bury her and Martin couldn't believe she could stay idle as Dog when he faked death couldn't stay that long still. Her mom warned him to stop talking like that and Martin had to deal with it. Miss Haight was never coming back.

It seems there's a 25 min movie of it.

     To boot one day Dog doesn't come back home after a week of whimpering and coming late. Martin stood absent in his room, now without his dog to connect him to the world. Just seeing life pass by and get bored in bed. One night his parents went outside, he stood there wishing Dog would come back. Suddenly, faraway he hears a bark. Martin glues himself to the window, waiting, hearing Dog coming closer and closer. He heard him barking at the door and whimpering. Martin couldn't get out of bed and hoped his mom would come back home early so she would open the door for him. The door opened, someone gentle enough had let dog in. Dog rushed upstairs and into Martin's bed. Martin cried how he missed him and hugged him. That is until he detected a strange smell on him. The smell of foul earth, putrified soil. He had been digging and deep.

 

Good dog! You can bring people back to life!

 "Dog was a bad dog digging where he shouldn't. Dog was a good dog, always making friends. Dog loved people. Dog brought them home."

     And now in the dark stairs he heard the sound of dragging feet coming closer and closer. The door whispered in. Martin had company.

     Yep, the loving and scary story of a boy and his nameless dog. I loved it. My favorite short story so far in this book. They've already won me over with the appearance of the dog. I'd love to have a dog like that although I wouldn't want him bringing dead people over. Happy ending, dog comes back, teacher comes back.

Happy reading!

Martian Chronicles: Part Two

By Ray Bradbury

     Hello again, ready for the two last expeditions. Truthfully, I only read until there cause the book wasn't even mine and well I wasn't even paying attention to the owner anymore. So they took the book away from me. Real sob story...

     Luckily, I have the same exact book in my house so maybe if I finish the unfinished Frankenstein I can write more of my favorite book.

 

Cold War didn't have wars but was no joke.

   All was prepared for the third expedition. One man struggled in the wires, asking what he need to do to go with them. He didn't want to stay in Earth, nobody in their right mind would. At most, in two years there was a predicted atomic war so he wanted to go to Mars before that happened. They laughed at him. Haven't he heard of the disappearance of the first and second expedition? Most likely they were dead.

     He didn't care but security dragged him away while he continued to struggle seeing as the spacecraft launched into space.

     Third Expedition

     They arrived to Mars. Captain John Black a seventy year old man, rejuvenated to a forty year old thanks to technology was distrustful of Mars though his crew was eager and enthusiastic. They had been sent to a completely different zone of Mars in case the first two expeditions met a hostile reception. They were the first expedition to be sent with weapons and a bigger crew. He ordered half of his men to stay put and guard the spacecraft while he and the rest investigated the surroundings.

Captain Black, it may be we did a
bad turn somewhere....

     When they came off the ship, they were baffled. Had they made an error? No, they couldn't have but why was this place just like their hometown. The moss and the brick houses, the swings, the wafting scent and white fences, and the music coming from the phonograph: "Beautiful Ohio". They start to making crazy theories about space and time, World War I escapees and the like. Captain Black doesn't like this theories, they seem messed up but soon one of his crewmen, Lustig, starts running towards one of the houses. When he knocks, an old couple appears. They're his grandparents whom had been dead for thirty years.

     They explain to them that they don't know why they are here, but maybe that's a second chance. To them this is Earth; and who knows, maybe what they know as Earth had another before that too. After all, they don't know the meaning of life yet and they can only be happy for this chance. Captain Black thanks the couple for the lemonade and expects to head back to the spaceship only to find his men leaving it and heading towards the different people congregating outside: parents, grandparents, siblings and friends.

     He gets angry, they had orders, his orders and they defied him. Lustig asks him for comprehension as he would do the same. He denies it but soon someone calls his name. Edward is running towards him. His twenty-six year old brother who died when he was nineteen. He forgets his anger and Lustig tells him he's going to be with his grandpas. Edward tells him their parents are waiting for him too. He talks, has dinner and dances with his family. The house is just the same, the same bed he shared with his brother. He couldn't be any happier.

     But now that he had time to stay calm and think things over, he started to organize all that have happened till now. He had just the most unlikely theory and he tried to laugh it off... but what if all the people here in this town were Martians and they had seen them coming from the sky and just hated them. But they had atomic guns and just how would be the best way to trick them into leaving their spaceship and weapons? What if they could see in their memories, his memories, and made all this farce of a town and filled it of beloved parents, sibling and friends. What if his parents sleeping in the other room were some amazing Martians capable of holding such an illusion and had waited till the night with every one of them dispersed so they could get rid of them. 

The moment where your brother suddenly
is something in the skin of your brother.

     Captain Black was now sure that that was right. He slid of the bed and walked to the door. His supposed sleeping brother asked him where he was going. He said he was thirsty and Edward insisted he wasn't. Captain Black started to ran, thinking he may be able to outrun them and head to the spaceship but in fact never reached that door. The next day there were seventeen coffins for the mysterious deaths of seventeen young men. All wept around them but in short intervals their faces distorted into not-so-human faces.

     Fourth Expedition

     Spender distracted himself building a fire waiting for the rest of the people sent to investigate the cities to come back. The had orders to be silent and many were grumbling about it. They had come all over to Mars and instead of celebrating they were doing nothing and waiting. Captain Wilder said it was for the best. When the exploration team came back they reported that neither of the cities was inhabited. The third city was full of corpses. The cause: Pox. It did something different to the Martians that killed them. Spender grieved over it. These Martians had made such an amazing society and cities but died to a disease that didn't even kill children in Earth and with the least menacing name: Pox. 

     They were all somber, Biggs decided to leave the grumbling and incite a party. Soon all started to dance, sing and drink. Only the captain and Spender felt uncomfortable about it. Spender felt that faraway the Martians could see them making themselves look stupid. Biggs started to throw the bottles in the river and baptizing it Biggs River. Spender couldn't stand it anymore, stood up and punched Biggs till he fell into it. It would had turned into a fight if the captain hadn't intervened. He dragged Spender and question him about his reasons: he couldn't stand the idea of him being so disrespectful. He was only the beginning, then all the ambitious money-makers in Earth would come and destroy Mars just as they had Earth. Captain Wilder tried to be positive but Spender sank more and more in his pessimism.

     They investigated the nearest city. Biggs barfed in the intricate floor full of depictions. Spender went alone and since then went missing. Captain Wilder made many excursions looking for him. One day after about a week of him missing. Spender returned. He shot Biggs in the heads and his body sank in the river. He came into the spacecraft. They were making breakfast. Spender just asked what they would think if they were Martians and some people from faraway came and wanted to take your place. Cheroke was the only one who said he could understand as he had Cherokee ancestors. He shot all the people and offer Cheroke to join him but had to kill him when he tried to take out his gun. When he went outside he took his hand to his head and trembled for a moment.

     When Captain Wilder and the rest came by they found the corpses and the cold food on the table. He came to the conclusion that only Spender could have done it and started arming his people. Soon they spotted him through the valleys and made chase. But ordered to cease fire and Captain Wilder stood in a boulder far from his men. He offered Spender a cigarette and let him speak. Spender gave him his reasons. He didn't want people to ruin Mars. If this expedition was successful, soon they would sent loans and loans of people from Earth. So he had to kill them all, if he manages to, the next expedition would take years as this was the last spaceship made so far. He could manage to live till the next expedition, feign innocence and kill them again. Over time, they will cease sending expeditions at all and Mars would be safe for a century at least. Yet he thought he could do it but wasn't sure anymore. But now that he had done it, he couldn't fix things anyway. He will kill the others but not him. Maybe then he would join him in protecting Mars. Captain Wilder said he wouldn't but Spender said that either way he wouldn't kill him. If it make him feel better, he wished for Captain Wilder to believe he went nuts. In any case, if he died he asked him to protect Mars at least for a year to let archaeologists get what they can before they ruin it all.

     Spender ran again. Captain Wilder reunited with his crew and ordered a clean shot to the chest. They gave him chase along the valleys. Spender knew the way better than them but suddenly stood in between the boulders and just stood there. Captain Wilder could see him just between the gap of the rocks. A gap that could make a clean shot to his chest but waited as he wished for him to escape. His crew headed and enclosed every time around him but he didn't tried to flee. 

Guys, let's be careful. We can't break a single window.
That's what Captain Wilder said.

     He had to do it after all. That was Spender's plan. Before his men could reach him, Captain Wilder raised his gun and shot. When he arrived, Spender was dead. He made his crew bury him in one of the martian coffins they found in the cities against their will. Some days later one of his men was in the city shooting windows and peaks of the buildings. Captain Wilder knocked the teeth off his mouth.

     That's the last expedition, fellas. The successful one. Yep, killed all the Martians just like Europeans came to America with all the diseases. No offense, it's the truth!

     Martian Chronicles is a novel full of short stories like this. So I suggest you better read the book if you're interested. I suggest to all Bradbury lovers to get a book in Barnes and Nobles that has Martian Chronicles, The Golden Apples of the Sun, the Illustrated Man and I think that's all (I may be wrong). You will have awesome stories and a cool red book with gold paper. There's something similar for Asimov, Homer and Austen's fans.

     Now enjoy.

Martian Chronicles: First Part

By Ray Bradbury

Mars Utopia.
Reality: Barren deserts, no water

     Hi, long time no see! Vacations are finally here, I while at it I took my time reading a bit of my favorite book. What I have to say of it: Genius! It always manages to draw me in his stories and tales of the conquest of Mars by humanity.

     My opinion: Best book ever! Well, that's my opinion and I really like science fiction so don't try to debate it. I'm serious.

     First Expedition

     Ylla is a normal, small, brownish-tanned, gold-eyed, she Martian living her life boringly normally along his husband Yll. Through a serene and desertic description of her routine and the fading affection between she and her husband, life in Mars is a peaceful and normal existence. 

     That is until Ylla starts having recurring dreams that enlighten her boring routine and which get Yll in a bad temper. Ylla dreams of a giant chunk of metal that comes from the sky, there she meets a strange being who is unusually tall with pale skin, black hair and blue eyes. He says he's the captain with his only company being his attendant and that his name is Nathaniel York. Since this recurring dreams, Ylla starts looking more happy and sings in an unknown language which gets Yll more suspicious. Although Ylla dismisses it as mere dreaming.

     Yll grows furious as he hears her fawning and talking to this man in her sleep about meeting this afternoon. She orders Ylla to stay at the house as they're going to have a visit while he goes hunting. She grows anxious as times passes by and the afternoon comes nearer. She gazes at the sky but convinces herself of staying. Soon she hears the sky thunder in a cloudless sky along the valley where the meeting was supposed to be. A little while later, her husband's gun echoes twice. She shudders at every shot.

     She continues waiting and cleaning unfazed but soon gets overwhelmed and screams in desperation. By the time her husband gets home, she has calmed a bit but mentions she can't remember the song she was singing although she tries a lot. He then comments deliberately clumsy: The visit was supposed to be tomorrow.

That's why one needs to go personally.

     Second Expedition

     Captain Williams and his crew of two men arrive happily on Mars and knock on the first door they could find. There a (middle-aged) Martian woman looks displeased by the interruption. Williams tries to explain how they came from Earth, the third planet in the solar system and how she is the first Martian ever they meet and how she should be just as excited. She nags about how they must want to meet his husband and that he is busy. The captain insists about their exhausting and long intergalactic voyage and how she should show (you know) more enthusiasm. 

     After talking to her husband, the woman sends them to another man who pays them as much attention as the woman and send them another man. Dragging their feet through the village, they finally meet Mr.Ttt who makes them sign some papers with an ominous clause such as euthanasia, but just for the sake of getting past all this procedures the captain signs them and asks if his crew should sign them too only to get laughed at. He gives the captain a key and tells him to enter the building just ahead and lock the door. Mr. Xxx would come the day after to see them. 

     By the time they arrive, they're tired and skeptical about the great welcome they expected. Inside they find a bunch of Martian in large tables all seated who ask who they are. Tiredly he answers he is captain Williams and his crew and that they came from Earth, the room explodes in applause and cheers and soon are surrounded by eager and curious Martians. 

     Just as they're happy by the welcome, a Martian comments how he is also from Earth along other three Martians. This confuses captain Williams and asks where he is from and he is incapable of finding the whereabouts of this city. He asks if this is in America, but the Martian doesn't know what's America. Then another woman exclaims how Earth is a jungle, while another a planet completely covered by water. Soon all the people in there start saying how they come from Jupiter, Venus and the like.

     He gets it, he knows now why they sent them here. He tells his crew they had send them to a mental asylum and they understand they cannot open the door anymore. One of his crew tells him that then is only a matter of convincing this Mr.Xxx that they're not crazy. But captain Williams points out that that will be hard as he points the different Martians capable of creating illusions along the room. Mr. Xxx will think all the appearance, the rocket, and even his crew are an illusion.

And that's why we never send people to Mars...

     The next day, Mr. Xxx arrives wearing a mask with three smiles and captain Williams takes him to see the spaceship and detail him that they're real spacemen from Earth. Mr. Xxx ventures inside the spaceship while captain Williams and his crew wait outside, when he exits he's astounded by the proficiency of the illusion and the balance he manages as not to be any imperfection. He calls him a genius maniac and how he will talk about him in his next conference. The captain insists that it is not an illusion and that his crew is real.

     Mr. Xxx proceeds to put "captain Williams out of his misery" with a gun. He waits for the illusions to disappear but only find the crew screaming and the spaceship that does not disappear. He is amazed again by his ability to make perdurable illusions and proceed to kill his crew and shoot the spaceship only to find it not disappearing yet. He then comes to the conclusion that he has been infected and that the only way to cure himself is with a shot in the head.

     And that's how the first two expeditions ended up. Martians are really similar yet not so nice neighbors. 

     One of the things you may find strange is that actually in this story people could go without the suits, that because they said there was enough oxygen although the air was really thin so they tried not to over exert themselves. After all, this was published in 1950. Also Martians as you may have guessed have telepathy and the like so they can understand human languages.

     Happy reading and vacations (if you have them)!

Fahrenheit 451

By Ray Bradbury

      Hi, everybody! I've been really busy. Yet you may ask how was I able to finish another book but not write another entry... Well, that's one of the mysteries of life. Books can be taken out during class, laps don't.

     Now once again, another novel by my favorite author. Known as the poet among the science fiction writers, here comes again with a novel written in 1953 which strangely seems very alike to our own society.

 

¿Who has big TVs on their walls and likes to listen music all day long using headphones? ¿Who uses all their free time seeing soap operas, programs with destruction derbies, pursue criminals and the like? ¿Who likes to drive fast? ¿Who is with friends but seems to talk more with their iphone?

     If you did answer "yes" to any of these questions you may need to read this book or if you don't want to then maybe seek for the movie.

     Guy Montag is a fireman and what firemen do is burn books because they're a source of controversy and chaos within society. Guy really liked his job until one day he returns home and meets his neighbor, Clarisse McClellan, a cheerful 17 year old girl who is different and questions Guy if he is happy with his life. Guy brushes her off, assuring it but grows hesitant by the time he gets home.

     There he finds her wife, Mildred, in the bed with the seashells (earphones) in her ears staring blankly at the ceiling. Montag doesn't find anything wrong with it as she had been like that since long time ago until he falls with an empty bottle of sleeping pills. He tries to wake her up but he can't, he calls for help and two uncaring men arrive with a machine to replace Mildred's blood and pump her stomach. The men give an insight of the numerous incidents of accidental overdoses growing over the past years before they leave Mildred in his care and frustrated by their indifferent reaction.

I think I've read some of those books... Cool!

     By the time Guy wakes up, Mildred is making breakfast and complaining about a stomachache. She assumes she went to a party and drank too much alcohol. Guy at first played along but finally reveals to Mildred that she had a pill overdose, which she denies. And continues her daily routine which consists in staring at soap operas and reality shows all day long.
     Guy returns to work where he starts questioning the duty of firemen. But as his boss, Beatty, arguments -about how books and the duty of a fireman started since long ago being Benjamin Franklin the first fireman- the alarm rings and they head to investigate a house. Unfortunately, something went off and an old lady was still in the house. They find the books but Guy manages to hide one of them inside his jacket. The rest of the firemen start spraying the kerosene but they have problems with the old lady who refuses to leave. Guy begs her to leave with them as Beatty starts a countdown before they burn the house. The old lady insists and decides to "save them time". She takes a match out of her pocket. The firemen grow pale and run for the exit. The old lady then burns herself and the house.

Looks like a grandma who's seriously lost or dancing.

     Guy returns home shocked after seeing the old lady die. He returns to bed, undressing in the way and hides the book below his pillow. The next morning he asks Mildred to call Beatty for him as he feels ill but she doesn't believes him. He explains her he saw a woman die last night. Mildred acts apathetic and uninterested as she only wants to return seeing the TV. He continues to tell her how he wonders what may books contain to make her burn herself over submitting to the firemen but Mildred brushes it off as crazy. He compares her to Clarisse McClellan who was also different but asks Mildred if she hasn't seen her as he hasn't. Mildred causally answers she heard she died run over by a car. Guy frustrated asks her why didn't she told him sooner but Mildred doesn't care about her death and wants him to either decide to go to work or call Beatty himself as she's seeing the TV.
     Unexpectedly, Beatty arrives to their home as he supposed he would be "ill". Guy feels the presence of the book under his pillow burn below his head. Beatty comprehends Guy about feeling bad about the old lady but that one grows used to it. It sometimes happens. It is something necessary for society as they are harmful snobs who make everybody feel bad because they're not happy with things as they are. Happiness is brought by entertainment, a busy schedule and instant actions. Thinking, which books promote, creates chaos and unhappy people.
     Mildred starts fixing the bed.
     He tells Guy how he was once a rebellious and read many books in his youth but all contradicted itself and didn't tell anything. Having too many options makes all hard to decide, so it's just better to show one. To avoid that kind of behaviors, luckily, children are sent to school each year smaller. Guy then tells him that he met a girl who was different and Beatty recognizes he must be referring to his neighbor, Clarisse, who was recorded in the firemens' reports. He tells him that is for the better, sometimes that kind of children appear. The teachers didn't like her for asking why instead of how. Her house was revised many times but they never found a book but probably the family was nurturing her subconsciousness. He pointed he pitied Guy for being her target as she must have made him feel unhappy.

Definition of a snob

     Mildred then tries to fix his pillow but Guy struggles until Mildred realizes the thing below. She rapidly changes the subject and acts as if nothing. Beatty follows the flow of the conversation and tells them that luckily one day firemen won't be necessary as over time people will become totally uninterested of the content of books. But every time now and then a fireman will grow curious. Guy asks what would happen if one took a book from a house. Beatty tells him that it's okay to fulfill curiosity to see how harmful they are and then burn it by the time he returns to work the next day. Guy asks what if not. Before leaving, Beatty then tells him that his house would be burned and him arrested.

     Guy explains to Mildred how he feels unhappy and wants to see if he can find why in the books. Mildred replays proudly she is happy but Guy tells him that's not true as she almost died from pill overdose. He then reasoning its fair that she knows, shows her his hideout where he hides some of the books he had been taking from the houses he is sent to burn. Mildred grows hysterical and tries to burn them but Guy forces her to read the books along with him to find out if what they say may tell them why they feel and act like that but at the first phone call Mildred dashes and makes plans to see TV in her friend's house.
     He then remembers an old english teacher he met at the park long time ago who had a book and had given him his phone number as Guy had shown interest even while being a fireman. He calls but the man, Faber, believes he wants to trick him into revealing he has books so Guy goes to his house almost getting caught in the subway with the book.
     Faber seeing he is honestly interested lets him pass inside. Where he tells Guy that the book he brought is indeed the New Testament. He asks Faber to help him understand what he reads as it's too complicated for him and that he wants to make a copy of it as his boss will arrest him if he doesn't burn it. Faber tells him it's too dangerous to do that and nobody in his mind would dare take a copy of a book. Even so he's too old and it's too late to fight back. He resents not doing anything when everybody started censoring books. Guy then starts ripping the New Testament and desperately Faber complies to help him. Guy insists that maybe if they stop the firemen they may be able to do something and devises a plan where he plants books in their houses so that there will be discord within the system. Faber decides to aid Guy and gives him a "green bullet" (transmitter) as he knows he will have to face Betty next night and will try to destroy all his confidence in books.

...Faber, how do I read this?

     Guy returns home and feels safer while knowing Faber is in the other side of the line. When he returns home he finds Mildred and his two friends, Mrs. Phelps and Mrs. Bowles, seeing TV. Montag turns off the TV and tries to strike deep conversation with the women. He asks them about their children and Mrs. Phelps replies she doesn't have children as they only serve to ruin one's life. Mrs. Bowles disagrees as she thinks is nice and easy, as they are only home three times a month and the only thing you have to so is turn on the TV like a washing machine. Mildred notices that Guy doesn't participate in the conversation and starts approaching politics to please Guy. The women start talking how it was obvious that the handsome candidate Noble would win over his other competitor who was ugly, small and had a horrible last name.
     He then asks them about Mrs. Phelps's husband. She nonchalantly tells them his husband was sent to war and demonstrates she had had a divorce and that his second husband committed suicide but that she doesn't worry at all.
     Guy angrily heads to the bedroom and comes back with a poetry book. The women are surprised but Mildred lies that it's permitted for firemen to bring a book back home once a year to remember how harmful they are while looking coldly at him. Faber begs him to stop but Guy ignores him. He reads Dover Beach and by the time he finishes Mrs. Phelps busted in tears making Mrs. Bowles to get angry at him and deem books as filthy. They leave while Guy demands them to reflect about their empty lives.

Montag made true the dream of
every salaryman who hates
his boss.

     The next day, Guy returns work and brings along one of the books which he throws in the incinerator in front of his fellow firemen. Beatty then assures he knew he could return to the herd but mentions he had a dream where they argued using quotes to torment Guy into giving up into books as they only contradict each other. The fire alarm rings; Beatty answers the phone and writes down the address and offers Guy to finish blackjack which Guy refuses. Then they head to the truck and drive following the address Beatty wrote down only to arrive to Guy's house. Astonished, he asks who was the one who called. Mildred leaves the house in a hurry and into a cab disappearing from Guy's life. Beatty permits him redemption by burning his house himself and Guy do as he's ask as he has no other escape. When he finally exits, Beatty manages to find out about the transmitter in his ear and takes it from Guy. He menaces with tracking the line and arresting his companion when Guy faces the flamethrower against him. Beatty dares him to do it and so does Guy. Beatty is engulfed in flames. The Mechanical Hound then attacks Guy and manages to inject him barely in the leg but Guy burns him with the flamethrower. He returns to his yard where they were still some books and makes a run to Faber's house.
      While he runs is easy to understand he is paranoid about the police. Yet albeit his murder, what the news tell is only the official start of the war. When he arrives, Faber lets him in and lets him explain what happened. When they see the TV they find that they're making his persecution a hunt to entertain the city. They see how from a helicopter a new Mechanical Hound arrives, how they make him get the scent from the flamethrower and how he starts to track Guy. They become conscious of the trail that he has left over the city until Faber's house. They rapidly organize. Faber lends Guy a case with his dirty clothes and suggests him to run to the wilderness and seek for the vagabonds living there. Guy tells him to activate the sprayers in the garden, clean with alcohol the doorknobs and many things to try to get rid of his odor. They say good-bye to each other. Faber hopes he may see him in the city where he is going to try to make a retired newspaper owner help him print the books.
     Guy makes a run for it. He gazes through the windows where all the people are seeing TV his own hunt. He stops when he sees the Mechanical Hound is approaching Faber's house. It stops suddenly and wavers next to the house but ignores it and continues seeking his trail. Guy returns to running and hears the advances of the Mechanical Hound through his earphones. Little by little, he runs by the streets Guy ran through but at a faster pace. When Guy sees the last row of houses, the news announce they want the cooperation of the people. They ask them that at the count of three everybody looks through their doors and windows, and report the whereabouts of the criminal. Guy tries to run faster and faster as the countdown goes to zero. When the citizens gaze through their doors and windows, Guy had arrived to the river where he has undressed and wore Faber's clothes. He lets himself be dragged by the current. By the time the Mechanical Hound and the police has arrived to the river, Guy had escaped and it had lost its track. They start looking elsewhere in the city.

A simplistic representation
of Montag and the Mechanical Hound.
Use your imagination.

     Guy escapes to the wilderness and finds himself astounded by nature which is unknown. He travels along the wilderness feeling a new sense of freedom and finally meets with the vagabonds. All of them are exiled of society and wait until they can return. They give Guy food and make him drink a substance which will change his odor. They have a small TV and show Guy how to please the public they have killed another man, such as Clarisse McClellan, and lied about him being Guy.
     They reveal to him they have books. That they are the books. Each of them has memorized a book and will wait till society collapse to be able to bring books back.
     Soon enough, an enemy bomber flies above the city and in an instant destroys it. Guy realizes Faber had escaped because he was in his way to another city but he knows Mildred didn't. The leader of the exiled soon compares humanity with the phoenix. It burns itself and revives but there's a difference: it can remember its past errors.

     I was amazed by what Beatty said all the time. He said the most meaningful things by the use of a bad example that's happening. One has to know that he wrote this novel when they were taking out "corrupted" books out of libraries and so this books represent the tension of a possible future. 

     Actually his prefaces and afterwords are very fun. In one, he explains how while trying to publish his book -in a time when no one wanted a book that talked bad about censorship-, he met a young man with little in his pocket who was willing to add his book in his magazine. Later, he meets him again: he was Hugh Hefner.

     Curious things... Well, happy reading!

100 Years of Solitude: José Arcadio's story

By Gabriel García Márquez

     I think this is one of the most curious characters. He literally turns from a mere human to a giant Hulk in this story. 

     José Arcadio is the oldest son of José Arcadio Buendía and Ursula Iguarán and is constantly referred as José Arcadio. Because believe me, there's other three José Arcadios (not including his father). 

     I guess that's something not unusual in families. I do remember seeing a movie where they made fun of how the children of a mexican family were all called Juan, Juanito, Juana, Juanita, Juan Luis, Juana Esperanza, etc. You get my point.

     José Arcadio, the oldest, grows up and is fascinated by Pilar Ternera, an older women who says she can foretell the future using cards. He starts a relationship with her only telling his younger brother, Aureliano. While the gypsies visit  Macondo and bring a festive atmosphere to the couple; Pilar, convinced of his love for her, tells him abruptly that she is going to have his child. José Arcadio panics, hides, meets a young gypsie girl with which he makes love and a day later flees with them. Ursula goes after him but is unable to find him.

Hi, mom, you're
little boy came back!

     He goes missing for a lot of years and suddenly a super macho giant tattooed all over his body knocks at the Buendía's door. When they open the door, he walks through the house surprising the inhabitants till he arrives to the kitchen where Ursula is. She immediately recognizes José Arcadio much to the others astonishment who didn't recognize him at all. José Arcadio is a flatulent-womanizer-Hulk-tattooed-guy who narrates in the diner table how he traveled around the world 65 times, had once to eat a fellow sailor to survive and described the taste as sweet, and had all the prostitutes in Macondo all over him which charged him nothing.
     Rebeca, who is three days away from marrying Pietro Crespi, falls madly in love with him at first sight. Unable to resist anymore she approaches his room at night, José Arcadio recognizes her intentions and asks her to come to his arms where they have a scene similar to a screwdriver destroying the guts of Rebeca. The next day, José Arcadio meets Pietro Crespi and tells him he is going to marry Rebeca. Pietro silently cries and, feeling pity, José Arcadio tells him that if he likes the family there is still Amaranta. Ursula exiles Rebeca and José Arcadio and they start living in front of the graveyard. Rebeca manages to subdue José Arcadio to a working man due to her ability to satisfy his husband's overwhelming desires.

     When Aureliano parts to help the liberals rebels and leaves Arcadio to take care of Macondo, José Arcadio with his great strength destroys the fences of his neighbors while he works his own and robs their land. Arcadio visits them due to this but far from solving the problem decides to help José Arcadio to get the official documents of the plots he stole. Since then Arcadio, who doesn't know Pilar and José Arcadio are his parents, has a great relationship with Rebeca and José Arcadio.
     When Arcadio is shot in the cemetery wall in front of their house, Rebeca manages to say goodbye from afar moments before he dies. Soon after Aureliano is captured and is scheduled to be shot. Rebeca is sure they will shoot him just like Arcadio in front of the cemetery wall but José Arcadio indifferent tells her that there's no way they would be so stupid to shoot his brother in there when they could do it in the barracks. But just as Rebeca predicted, they decided to shoot Aureliano in front of their house.
     Just as Aureliano resigned to his death, José Arcadio emerged menacing from the house with a shotgun pointing at the officials. The officials freed Aureliano and joined him in his mission to save the liberal leader who is to be shot tomorrow in Riohacha. José Arcadio returns to his house and continues his normal life with Rebeca. Some days later, José Arcadio was murdered.

Mom, I'm back again (:

     José Arcadio fell and a line of blood emerged from an nonexistent wound in his head that traveled outside the house, through the roads, the grass, all the way to the Buendía's house where it climbed stairs, turned corners, stuck to the wall to avoid dirtying the rugs and finally led to the kitchen were it reached Ursula. Surprised, she followed the blood line till he found the death body of his son which smelled strongly of gunpowder. They buried him in the cemetery after many days of trying to remove the smell without success. The smell was so strong they did all they could to lessen it but was finally eradicated when the banana plantation added a cover of zinc where he was buried to prevent the contamination it originated.
     Some thought it was a government spy, others suspected Rebeca; the version she gave was that she was in the bathroom when she heard a shot.

     And so that's how the flatulent-womanizer-tattooed-Hulk died. Never was the mystery solved in the whole book. 

     The solitude he had seemed to come from detachment and vices. Yet it somehow surprises me how he really cared for his family. He had a nice relationship with his son, he saved his brother even when he acted as if he didn't care and his blood sought for her mother when he died. Maybe the reason he returned to Macondo was because he felt lonely and even yet he felt out of place in his family. 

     He's really a memorable character due to his strange appearance but has a very humane heart when it's about his family. Not his neighbors nor fellow sailors.

Hope you liked it!

100 Years of Solitude: José Arcadio Buendía's story

By Gabriel García Márquez

     José Arcadio Buendía is the founder of Macondo and first José Arcadio generation. He is married to her cousin, Ursula Iguarán, and I actually think he becomes funny later in life with all his random ideas. He is the father of José Arcadio, Aureliano and Amaranta.

Roosters like doing favors to
other's man's wives it seems.

     José Arcadio Buendía was a young and serene man who marries her cousin, Ursula. But Ursula is scared of having kids with a pig's tail, as other of his cousins who married, so she elaborates chastity pants she wears at night where the act of love has been replaced by a battle of struggles between Ursula hanging to her pants and him wanting to remove them. A year after, people start suspecting that Ursula is still a virgin and start mocking José Arcadio, yet he keeps his serenity. One day while having a rooster's fight, José Arcadios's kills Prudencio Aguilar's rooster. Angrily, Prudencio shouts how he hopes his rooster may make the favor to his wife. José Arcadio, calmly, declares him he will come in the afternoon to kill him. And he does in fact and pierces his throat  That night while Ursula is putting her pants, José Arcadio orders her to undo it and Ursula resigns bitterly.
     At night, Prudencio Aguilar's ghost wanders around the house seeking for water in the pots to clean his wound in the throat. Night after night, he comes and finally José Arcadio promises him to leave town expecting that that way he may find peace.
     It is then when travelling with other men who wished to follow him he dreamed of a town of mirrors and when asked its name, the voices reply, "Macondo". After he wakes up, he decides to establish a town right there and name it after the town of his dreams. José Arcadio helps to distribute land fairly and helps others, while Ursula helps beautifying the town with birds and other things.

Smile to the silly man.
Maybe this is what Melquiades
looked like when he saw José Arcadio
with all his experiments.

     One day some gypsies arrive, who admit they were guided by the song of the birds. They bring artifacts to show and sell and José Arcadio is marveled by it. Melquiades, a gypsie, presents him the magnets and silly José Arcadio buys it, expecting to be able to find gold with it even when Melquíades himself warned him it would not. He bought it with Ursula's dowdry which consisted of her father's golden coins. Frustrated, José Arcadio returns only finding a rusted knight's armor. Melquíades, returns him his money in an act of good faith, and thus become good friends. Before leaving, Melquiades leaves him some artifacts and José Arcadio obsesses with it to the point of leaving all the work to Ursula causing her to resent Melquiades. It is finally one day that he leaves his room and mutters he discovered the earth is round like an orange. The town mocks him but when Melquíades's tribe returns, he proves him right and decides to help him make a workshop much to Ursula's discontent. And so, Melquíades presents him with new inventions and José Arcadio tests them for silly experiments like when he believed he may be able to turn the magnifying glass into a solar weapon and while working in his project sents a letter to the government expecting funds which never reply. Melquíades leaves once again while José Arcadio starts immersing himself into alchemy, melting and mixing Ursula's gold coins in poop expecting to be able to get the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life. He gets his boys to help him but the only interested is Aureliano.

[I will start naming the father José Arcadio Buendía and the son José Arcadio just as the book to avoid confusion]

     After many years, José Arcadio Buendía welcomes the gypsie's tribe to find it different. He wanders asking for Melquíades to finally be told that he has died and has been thrown to the sea in his travel through the world. José Arcadio Buendía returns sadly but is motivated to see what this gypsies have brought. He brings his sons along and so that day was the first time José Arcadio Buendía saw ice and mistook it for the biggest diamond in the world. José Arcadio Buendía and Aureliano where fascinated and paid to touch it several times. He assumed that the transparent sheets of which where made the houses of his dream town where actually ice.
     One day José Arcadio ran away with the gypsies and Ursula went after him hoping she may bring him back. He was left alone with Aureliano and the newborn baby, Amaranta. As months pass he starts missing Ursula and hopes for her to come back. She finally returns as if nothing bringing with her people from the other side of the marsh but unable to find José Arcadio. They upgrade the town and Ursula starts a business which permits José Arcadio Buendía to immerse himself to his workshop only.
     Not long after, Pilar Ternera announces them that she was pregnant and gave birth to José Arcadio's son. José Arcadio Buendía accepts him into the family as he can't stand having someone of his own blood adrift. His name is José Arcadio but to avoid confusions call him only Arcadio.

Creepy girl in the darkness...

     One day they receive in their house a little silent girl which drags a case and a letter announcing she is a distant relative of them which none remembers. They welcome her into their house and name her Rebeca Buendía as she doesn't replies. The girl eats lime and earth but he leaves Ursula and her helpers to deal with it while he continues his never ending experiments. Visitación, one of the helpers who resigned to her kingdom to escape from a devastating sickness, finds Rebeca awake at night with eyes shining in oblivion. She rapidly announces Ursula and José Arcadio that she has the insomnia sickness from which she escaped along with her brother. They don't take it to heart. José Arcadio and Aureliano become unable to sleep but they don't believe it's due to the sickness as its not rare and little by little starts extending through the whole family and through Ursula's business of caramel animals it spread to the town. The busy people didn't feel unhappy about it but little by little came the sickness of oblivion which accompanies the insomnia. They elaborate a method of written notes all over the house and town to avoid forgetting but which know will only work while they still remember how to read.

Houses sure would be cool all year long.

     One day a man enters the forsaken town and heads directly to the Buendía's house. José Arcadio Buendía and Ursula welcome him but act extremely friendly as they cannot remember him. The man feels offended as he actually did recognize that but looking through the walls filled with instructions he came to understand. He took a small bottle from his bag and gave it to José Arcadio Buendía. At once, José Arcadio wailed in astonishment to see Melquíades alive. Melquíades cured the sickness and explained to them that he was too lonely in death so he came back but his tribe expelled him for his overloyalty to life, and asked if he could stay with them. Ursula prepared him a room and he worked in the workshop along with José Arcadio Buendía and Aureliano. There he started working in the scrolls where he told him he foresaw a town with mirrors ("Ice," insisted José Arcadio) and the ending of the Buendía's lineage which he accused as wrong.
   
     Ursula remodels the house due to the girl's coming of age and once again José Arcadio Buendía shows his funny scientific side. Melquiades shows José Arcadio what are the daguerreotypes. José Arcadio then passes all his time in his new found theory of eventually being able to capture God's daguerreotypes if he takes randoms shots in his house. When Ursula buys a pianola from Pietro Crespi, an italian she hired to teach Amaranta and Rebeca how to dance, José Arcadio wonders who may play the instrument and takes daguerreotypes hoping to find the invisible man playing but eventually he disarms the pianola hoping to understand how it works and causing to bring Pietro Crespi once again to fix it. It is then that they discover Rebeca and Pietro have been sending letters to one another. José Arcadio Buendía agrees to their relationship only if he marries her.
     At the same time he has trouble with Moscote, a man sent by the government to control the town, and accepts him into Macondo because he has shown the eagerness to stay by bringing his family. Yet leaves in bad terms as enemies as he doesn't want him to control matters in town.
     He is surprised when Aureliano revealed his wishes to marry one of the Moscote daughters. While Ursula is delighted, José Arcadio Buendía grumbles that he has chosen the enemy's daughter. With a bitter smile, José Arcadio Buendía goes to the Moscote's house along Ursula and Aureliano to ask for the hand of the little Remedios who has agreed to marry Aureliano.

God's still not there but found the red teletubby.

     Melquíades dies one day and as promised, José Arcadio Buendía burns mercury in his room where his corpse remains in bed for three days before burying him in the new graveyard, becoming the first man to die in Macondo. Frustrated that he can't catch God in a daguerreotype he concludes angrily that God mustn't exist. He starts losing it; one day wakes up and goes to the workshop where he tells Aureliano, "It's Monday". And the day after he says, "Once again is Monday". And the day after that, "Why is it still Monday?" And so until one day he starts destroying the workshop and bawls in a demonic language. They tie him to a chestnut in the backyard where he remains and is only visited by the ghost of Prudencio Aguilar which in his loneliness seeks for José Arcadio Buendía.
     Father Nicanor comes to town and decides it's his duty to evangelize this whole barbaric town. He proves God's power by drinking chocolate and levitating. Once when he was performing it again in front of the chestnut, José Arcadio replied in his strange language that it was a trick. Father Nicanor slowly landed and replied in the same language that it was God's power. "That day it was known that the demonic slang of José Arcadio Buendía was actually Latin." Father Nicanor started visiting him hoping to return him his faith. He came to talk and play chess [I believe] with him while he tried to demonstrate him through the Bible, belongings said to be from God's son and the like the existence of God but José Arcadio Buendía stubbornly wanted as only proof: God's daguerreotype. Father Nicanor desisted after a while as José Arcadio Buendía was actually trying to make him lose his faith in God.

Habits die hard and so chestnut trees!

     No one again remembered José Arcadio. He stood there silently looking into oblivion while moss and rain and sun came by where he sat. Ursula, Remedios and later Santa Sofía de la Piedad took care of him while he wandered in his mind through rooms which were all alike until one day he couldn't remember where was the first room and became lost. Aureliano recommended her mother to see him as he was dying. Ursula indeed saw José Arcadio Buendía comatose and crumbling. She drove him to his room and unconsciously due to routine came back to sit near the chestnut. Ursula decided to tie him to the bed and took care of him until he died. That day for some reason rained yellow flowers all over Macondo.
   

     And so the first Buendía died while tied to a tree, at least his consciousness. I really liked his experiments and was sad when he died. 

     I could understand that while he was ignorant he was a fair and serene man which was transformed by knowledge and abandoned his family to live practically in the workshop. After Melquíades died he grows desperate and loses faith in God. Which is curious as it's known that some scientists nowadays don't believe in God and he could be considered as one, a very crappy one at that. I think José Arcadio portrays the loneliness which comes of knowledge and the messy seek for it.

     It's a very epic novel, so I hope you like it. 

     Happy reading!

100 Years of Solitude: Meme's Story

By Gabriel García Márquez

     Hi, guys! I was trying to fit the whole story but I found it almost impossible. So I decided I will write the stories of each character individually. 

     This is Renata Remedios's story. She is the oldest daughter of Aureliano Second Buendía and Fernanda de Carpio, she's a fifth generation Buendía. 

     The reason I decided to start with her story is in fact because it's my favorite and because Mauricio Babilonia, who has an important part in this story, is one of my favorite characters and so are the yellow butterflies.

     Meme always obeyed his mother who she thought was irritating due to her queen complex and did all her bidding to evade her constant scolding but, after his father almost died trying to beat La Elefanta in a food contest, he started to share more time with her. Meme made such a good friendship with his father that he helped as a go-between with her mother. She was permitted to go to Patricia Brown's house which was in the other side of the fence the gringos, owners of the Banana plantation made.

     One day her friend's choffeur didn't come so they asked Mauricio Babilonia, a worker in the plantation, to drive them. He worked in a garage where lots of yellow butterflies surrounded it. He later saw him in the cinema when she went with her dad. He was looking at her and she grew disgusted. It was later that it crossed her mind that the yellow butterflies who she thought were attracted to the paint of the garage were actually following Mauricio Babilonia. She knew without seeing, only by the fleeting of the wings or the sight of the butterflies that he was near. One night she dreamt he saved her, and started growing anxious and couldn't stand the idea of not seeing him. She went to Patricia's house and made all sorts of excuses to be able to go to the garage. He knew instantly the reason she went there. They started seeing in secret, kissing behind the garage, talking and constantly grew more and more restless.
     She decided to meet a woman who was said to be able to see things through the cards and unknowningly met Pilar Ternera, her grandgrandmother. She foretell that she would find rest only in bed. Pilar Ternera instructed her in the use of mustard plasters and other concoctions to evade conception. Unable to resist anymore, she gives herself to Mauricio Babilonia.

     After two months, Fernanda starts suspecting something odd in her daughter and goes to seek for her in the cinema where she finds Mauricio Babilonia and Meme kissing in the darkness. She drags Meme away and keeps her locked inside the house and shooes Mauricio Babilonia from the house. Yet Meme was imperturbable, her routine was the same except for her afternoon baths. Every afternoon Fernanda would grow ill-tempered by the enourmous amount of yellow butterflies inside the house. One day while looking for something in Meme's closet she found the mustard plasters and silently made the connection between them and her afternoon baths. She invited the mayor to dinner and told her to put some guards around the house as someone was robbing their chicken. Later that day, Mauricio Babilonia was shot at the roof where he was removing the tiles to enter the bath were the nude Meme waited for him eager of love. He was shot in the spinal cord and died in bed labeled as a chicken thief.
     Shocked by his scream, Meme became mute and silent. Her mother dragged her to a convent where she didn't oppose at all as she had no will at all. But still all her thoughts were filled with Mauricio Babilonia and would continue until her death in a faraway hospital. The butterflies still followed her to the convent but not long after she did not see another yellow butterfly getting crushed against the fans, that she comprehended that he had already died.

     For anyone of you who may think, "Damn, this is too tragic," that's actually the atmosphere of the book. Although I can't transmit the way the story is written, I can tell you that this is one of my two favorite books of all.

Happy reading!