Chronicles Of Harris Burdick, The: Fourteen Amazing Authors Tell The Tales / With An Introduction By Lemony Snicket (2013) - Plot & Excerpts
This book is based on the book The Mysteries of Harris Burdick, which is a book with 14 pictures that each had a title and a caption, but no other story. The "mystery" is that the author of the pictures, Harris Burdick, had gone to a publisher to see if he liked the material and if it could be published, and then never returned. So we have had these wonderful drawings with no stories to go with them! I love that book, so I thought I would read the stories in The Chronicles of Harris Burdick by some of my favorite authors based on the pictures I love. I liked the stories, but some of the stories didn't match what I had thought of for the picture. But I love Kate DiCamillo and Stephen King, so I can overlook that. Good stories, worth reading. Hint for anyone picking up this book for the first time: skip the first story. Once you have found 3 or 4 stories you like a fair bit, then go back and read the story by Tabitha King if you really want to. It did not speak to me on any level.After reading the first three stories, my high expectations for this book were so severely crushed that I seriously considered taking it right back to the store I had bought it from only an hour before. Having now read all 14 stories, I am so glad I kept going. I found 6 that were wonderful and another 5 that were intriguing in some way, if perhaps also frustrating. So, that leaves the infamous First Three as the only stories with no redeeming features that I could find. I see in the reviews that many people seemed to really like stories #2 and #3, by Jon Scieszka and Sherman Alexie respectively. I have to differ on this because I just can't stand stories featuring main characters who are hopelessly horrible.If you are not familiar with the background of Harris Burdick's mystery illustrations, as I was not before this book came out, it takes a minimum of investigating to gather the relevant "facts." I am personally willing to take at face value the attribution Wikipedia lists for "The Mysteries of Harris Burdick." But at the same time, I certainly appreciate Lemony Snicket taking the time to share his theories in what is possibly the most useful and entertaining Introduction to a book I have ever read.
What do You think about Chronicles Of Harris Burdick, The: Fourteen Amazing Authors Tell The Tales / With An Introduction By Lemony Snicket (2013)?
