I am an avid book reader. I can read through an average size 300 page book in a day, stopping for meals, if I am in the zone. And I am in the zone fairly often. These Christmas holidays alone I have read ten novels and a bunch of books and articles for my thesis study. I love love love books.
One of my fav authors at the moment is James Patterson, especially the Alex Cross series. If you don't know them then let me give you the run down (SPOILER ALERT):
Alex Cross is a big black dude. He is over 6 feet tall and built like a mac truck; all muscles. He is a detective who lost his wife to a mindless killer and has got a bit of a saviour complex out of trying to deal with that one. A workaholic, he goes through relationships like they are going out of fashion and seems to be so blinded by pretty woman that, in one case, he doesn't notice that they are a serial killer.
He loves his kids and his Nana Mama (his grandmother who raised him after his parents were killed), is a Dr of behavioural psychology and attracts psychos like bees to honey.
He is bad ass.
I love it!
The thing is, my thesis is on morality and ethics in video gaming and the biblical viewpoint on violence in these games. I am being convicted about the glorification of violence and death in media.
So the last time I read an Alex cross novel (about a week ago) I spent most of the time wondering what God thinks of it. I have to admit it, it kinda ruined the experience a tad for me.
Only a tad.
Because when I think about it, Alex Cross hates violence but works with people who are violent and so ends up in situations where violence happens. The great thing about the novels though is it shows the emotional impact that this violence has on him.
Instead of him being the hero who walks calmly away from the destruction all around him, he weeps when his friends die, he goes into shock when he has to kill people, he panics in moments of craziness and protects his family out of desperation more the heroism.
He acts, in short, like a real person would.
And something about this really appeals to me. The violence isn't glorified in the books, even though it is there in bucketfuls, it is more seen as part of a messed up world that people have to do something about.
And when it gets a bit nasty, I just switch off my imagination, or skim read the descriptions.
I am not gonna go to the film.
Firstly, movies ruin books (except maybe in the case of LTR).
9 times out of 10 what the producer imagines from the book is not what I imagined and I come away disappointed. And then I can't read the book again without imagining the producers characters. It annoys me, coz I like to re-read books until the pages fall out!
Secondly, movies glorify violence in a way that books don't. In a book you can 'hear' what the character is thinking about a situation, 'see' the emotional impact, and grieve with them.
The movie for Alex Cross is going to be a Hollywood extravaganza focusing on the badges getting taken down, the gunfights, and Cross's huge biceps. The books are action filled, the movies will use that.
In the gruesome bits it will show it in detail. My mind is still innocent enough that it can't imagine the scenes that are described in the book, or it does so in a way that it doesn't see it happening to real people. On screen the reality of the violence is that much more real. It isn't imagination anymore, it could have happened to your next door neighbour. And as my husband can testify, I get upset and cry for the families of the extra's in films let alone the main characters.
And once those images are in my head there will be no getting rid of them. The emotional Alex Cross, who tells his bff Sampson that he loves him, will be lost to me forever.
I am just not prepared to let that happen.
He acts, in short, like a real person would.
And something about this really appeals to me. The violence isn't glorified in the books, even though it is there in bucketfuls, it is more seen as part of a messed up world that people have to do something about.
And when it gets a bit nasty, I just switch off my imagination, or skim read the descriptions.
I am not gonna go to the film.
Firstly, movies ruin books (except maybe in the case of LTR).
9 times out of 10 what the producer imagines from the book is not what I imagined and I come away disappointed. And then I can't read the book again without imagining the producers characters. It annoys me, coz I like to re-read books until the pages fall out!
Secondly, movies glorify violence in a way that books don't. In a book you can 'hear' what the character is thinking about a situation, 'see' the emotional impact, and grieve with them.
The movie for Alex Cross is going to be a Hollywood extravaganza focusing on the badges getting taken down, the gunfights, and Cross's huge biceps. The books are action filled, the movies will use that.In the gruesome bits it will show it in detail. My mind is still innocent enough that it can't imagine the scenes that are described in the book, or it does so in a way that it doesn't see it happening to real people. On screen the reality of the violence is that much more real. It isn't imagination anymore, it could have happened to your next door neighbour. And as my husband can testify, I get upset and cry for the families of the extra's in films let alone the main characters.
And once those images are in my head there will be no getting rid of them. The emotional Alex Cross, who tells his bff Sampson that he loves him, will be lost to me forever.
I am just not prepared to let that happen.
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