Category: Book Reviews

Now They’re Rewriting ‘Goosebumps’

Posted By: leeduigonPosted On:

Amazon.com: Goosebumps: The Scarecrow Walks at Midnight: 9780545178013: Stine, R. L.: Books

Mustn’t scare the snowflakes!

R.L. Stine is the latest victim of Far Left blue-nosing: that is, liberal prigs rewriting his Goosebumps books without his knowledge or permission (https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/03/childrens-author-r-l-stine-says-publisher-made-woke-edits-without-his-knowledge/). Move over, Roald Dahl and Ian Fleming.

Now who would do a thing like that?

Scholastic Books, that’s who.

Oh, them!

Scholastic hovers around out there somewhere to the left of AOC. Somehow they got the rights to Stine’s long-running “scare” series for young readers, and they’re taking the opportunity to castrate his prose. He is reportedly not happy about it!

To paraphrase H.L. Mencken, a liberal is a dindle who deeply fears that somebody, somewhere, is having a good time. Better get all those books rewritten! Wouldn’t want anyone enjoying them!

Lee’s Homeschool Reading List (8)

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Go away, I'm reading Purrnest Hemingway." | Cat reading, Cat books, Cats

Gee, it’s been a while since I’ve added any titles to my Homeschool Reading List. Let me do a little something to remedy this.

The Lost World by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (10 years old and up)

Aunt Millie gave me a copy of this book for Christmas, back when I was 11 or so–and it set my mind on fire! Everything about it was fantastic! Better than the movies! And you know I was a big fan of “lost world” movies. Still am. Anything with dinosaurs in it, save a seat for me.

Young reporter Ned Malone, wishing to impress his girlfriend so she’ll marry him, joins an expedition formed to search for a “lost world” somewhere in the unexplored wilderness of South America. It’s led by Professor Challenger, whose outsized accomplishments are exceeded only by his outsized ego.

This book has everything: adventure, exotic setting, suspense, action, crisp and often witty dialogue, one memorable scene after another… Well, I still read it now and again, don’t I? The Lost World never loses its charm. It’s the great-grandma of Jurassic Park–the first of its kind, and still great after 111 years. Still great fun!

‘A Rave Review for “Cellar Beneath the Cellar”‘ (2015)

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The Cellar Beneath the Cellar (Bell Mountain, 2) by Lee Duigon | eBook | Barnes & Noble®

Things are not so pleasant here, just now–Patty’s hernia, we really need to get that operation–so please pardon me for blowing my own horn a little.

Here’s a review of The Cellar Beneath the Cellar–No. 2 in my Bell Mountain series–by a reader in Australia. He really liked it! Well, why not? The book won a silver medal for fantasy.

A Rave Review for ‘Cellar Beneath the Cellar’

While you’re at it, please send up a prayer for us. We need one.

My Newswithviews Column, March 2 (‘Corrupting America’)

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James bond, James bond party, James bond images

Oooooh! Taboo! Forbidden! Quick, Shoniqua, my smelling salts–!

If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you already know what I think of a) “reparations” for slavery that was abolished 158 years ago, and b) rewriting famous novels to make them conform to current standards of drooling mindlessness.

If not, you can read my Newswithviews column here:

Corrupting America

Wow! Libs do a powerful job of dragging everybody else down to their level! Imagine the mental landscape of someone who says, “I will not read James Bond novels until they’re rewritten to conform slavishly to the views of transgender unionized teachers!” That is moral and intellectual poverty on a scale undreamed-of… until now.

They’re Rewriting James Bond, Too

Posted By: leeduigonPosted On:

Rare picture of Sean Connery as James Bond. Promotional shoot for Goldfinger. | James bond movies, James bond style, James bond

If James Bond were real, there’d be some trouble over this.

Move over, Roald Dahl. Ian Fleming needs a seat on the bus to oblivion.

Willie Wonka, meet James Bond! By and by every fictional character in every novel will be rewritten… to accommodate a popular culture that goes from bad to worse by the day.

Yes, James Bond is being rewritten (https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/rewriting-ian-fleming-james-bond-books-what-is-the-point/). ‘Cause he’s “racist, sexist, imperialistic,” yatta-yatta. (Ask me if I care.) And the books he’s in might offend some chuckleheads out there.

They’re gonna remake the movies, too. Maybe what they’re looking for is a new James Bond who used to be a woman, eats nothing but plant-based foods, apologizes for the continued existence of Britain, and goes on and on about it until the very stones must weep for boredom. Well, they’re always remaking Bond movies. But rewriting the novels that the movies are based on–doing it when the author is dead and can’t defend himself–how much lower can it get?

I mean, come on–if you don’t like James Bond books, don’t read them. How is that so hard? Or would you rather sit up in bed all night because someone, somewhere, is reading James Bond and you can’t stop him? And your life as a liberal is incomplete because you can’t stop him.

How did we ever wind up letting these wretched people tell us what to do?

Public Outrage Saved These Books

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Publisher rolls back proposed changes to Roald Dahl books after backlash - ABC News

They haven’t killed him, after all–at least, not yet.

The publisher of Roald Dahl’s classic children’s books has abandoned a plan to replace them with tarted-up brainless PC rewrites–because a week of loud public outrage has convinced them retreat was the better part of valor (https://dailycaller.com/2023/02/24/roald-dahl-book-publisher-damage-control-after-backlash-censorship-inclusive-rewrite/).

Puffin Books had Dahl’s books rewritten top to bottom in an “inclusive rewrite” (quick, the barf bag!). When regular people found out, and loudly complained, Puffin backed off.

So now they’re gonna keep the originals in print, while at the same time publishing the new stupid gutless fat-head edition. Sort of like riding two bicycles at the same time.

There are lessons to be learned from this.

*Businesses will not knowingly sacrifice themselves to Woke. Not if it means going under.

*No artist’s work is safe from Far Left Crazy.

*There is no limit to what they’ll do if they think they can get away with it.

*Their most passionate desire is to control other people. They don’t want you reading things they think you shouldn’t be allowed to read.

Note: All of this comes crashing down if public education goes bankrupt. And we the people can make that happen by pulling our kids out of the public schools.

In Case You Were Wondering Why We Need a Revival…

Posted By: leeduigonPosted On:

Lisa • (The United Kingdom)'s review of This Man Confessed

Quick, the barf bag!

Our culture’s been sinking into the tar-pit for years now, just getting more corrupted, more depraved, by the day. Heck, look what they were lapping up in 2015:

Polluting Your Mind

Fifty years of feminism, and this is what we get? But is that so surprising, in a country where the number of perversions you espouse is what moves you up the scale in government?

God save us–no one else will. We need A Very Big Revival!

Lee’s Homeschool Reading List (8): ‘Bell Mountain’

Posted By: leeduigonPosted On:

Bell Mountain (Bell Mountain, 1) - Kindle edition by Duigon, Lee. Religion & Spirituality Kindle eBooks @ Amazon.com.

Bell Mountain: Ages 10 and up

My stars! I’m recommending books for homeschoolers, and it never enters my mind to recommend my own books! I’ve only just realized that I’ve  left myself out.

I’ve been surprised, over the years, at how much Bell Mountain has been enjoyed by children whom you’d think were too young to read a novel. Most of the time it’s Daddy or Mommy who’s read the book to them. I’m very happy that my book can be read aloud to 8-year-olds–or even younger–and give them pleasure.

And of course it’s just the first book of a series… and the series has now grown to 13 books, with two more yet to be published… so it should be able to keep you interested for several years. Somehow the books have proved equally appealing to children and adult readers.

In Bell Mountain, a boy named Jack dreams a distant mountain is singing to him. Scripture says there is a bell on the summit of the mountain, waiting to be rung; and God will hear it. Jack believes he has had this dream because God wants him to ring the bell. He sets out for the mountain, accompanied by his friend, Ellayne. The story tells of their perilous journey to the mountain-top–along the way encountering strange beasts, strange people, miracles, treachery: everything that makes life worth living. Or at least worth reading about.

Click “Books” on our home page for descriptions and sample chapters of all 13 books in the series. Available from the Chalcedon Foundation Store at http://www.chalcedon.edu/ .

1957 Socks It to 2023

Posted By: leeduigonPosted On:

Below the Salt: Thomas B. Costain: 9780385048842: Amazon.com: Books

Sometimes you read something that just blows you away. I had that experience last night.

I’m reading Below the Salt, a novel by historian Thomas B. Costain, published in 1957; it was a Christmas gift this year. My mother had it on her bookshelf for ages, but I never got around to reading it.

The plot concerns an elderly U.S. Senator, very wealthy, who resigns from politics and embarks on a special project he wishes to complete before he dies. He feels compelled to tell a story… from medieval history. But first he needs to collect more information.

Here’s the passage that wowed me. The senator is speaking:

“I have a reason for telling the story now. You know what people are saying in all parts of the world, that the present system of government deserves to die. Because some people have easier lives than others, and a larger share of worldly goods, they want everything changed. To achieve complete equality–or what they hope will prove equality–they are willing to forgo the personal freedom we have won so slowly and painfully over the ages, the right to think and say and do what we please. They are willing to bring back the tyranny of absolute government. Ah, if they only knew! If they could look back into the past and see for themselves what mankind has emerged from!”

“Mandates,” anyone? They’ll make ya safe! Honest, we’ll give you back your freedom as soon as there are no more diseases in the world…” And so forth. They’re always offering to protect us. And they always wind up eating us.

Thomas B. Costain saw patterns in history. He would see those same patterns today.

The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ has broken those patterns; but without faith, who can help repeating them? Over and over again…

Lee’s Homeschool Reading List (7)

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The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey (ages 12 and up)

Did King Richard III really murder his two nephews, “the princes in the Tower”? Classic mystery writer Josephine Tey didn’t think so, and in 1951 she wrote and published a book to prove it: The Daughter of Time. “Truth is the daughter of time”–and in time the truth comes out.

But history can be very, very tricky. Finding out “what really happened,” Thucydides wrote, over 2,000 years ago, is the hardest thing about studying history. And he ought to know!

The week between Christmas and New Year’s is just about the best week in the year–at least in the Northern Hemisphere, when it’s so terribly cold–for snuggling up with a good book. And given that the mortal remains of King Richard were only recently discovered under an English parking lot, this 15th-century mystery seems quite timely.

In Tey’s novel, Inspector Alan Grant (not the one from Jurassic Park) of Scotland Yard, laid up with a broken leg, applies modern police methods to investigate the claim against Richard. All I can tell you about it, without spoiling the fun, is that he does a very thorough job and I find his conclusion 100% convincing. So do a lot of people. The book is full of insights into history–how facts are gathered, the role of propaganda, how to decide whom to believe and whom to dismiss… I mean, how do we “know” what we think we know? How many things that we’re sure we know… just ain’t so?

History is chock-full of stuff like that. That’s why I love it.

Many critics think Daughter of Time is one of the four or five best mystery novels ever written–out of many thousands. I’ve probably read hundreds… and I agree!