I had heard a lot of varying things about it from other people before I finally saw. Some said it was good, some said it wasn’t, and many said it was way too long. I have to say thatI agree with the way too longness—those fight scenes took forever and they didn’t seem terribly necessary in advancing the plot. That being said, I still liked the movie. And it was really funny, I found myself laughing through the whole movie. However, maybe I just have a really weird sense of humor since my friend and I seemed to be the only ones in the theater laughing. However, the funniness is why I say this movie is frolicking good fun and worth consuming. Otherwise, that sword fighting scene with the giant wheel was enough to drive anyone crazy.

Yummy yummy. I’m eating them slowly so I can savor them.

McKinley shouldn’t have attempted a reworking of this story. Her fist book, Beauty, told the story much much better. In Rose Daughter, I tended to get lost in the descriptions and back story.

So far I’ve read the first three sections of this book, and if I didn’t have to get up and go to work tomorrow I would stay up late and read more. It’s inspiring. It took me two and half hours to read the first 45 pages because I kept stopping to take notes and jot down ideas about things I’d like to teach and do in my English classes in the fall. While I don’t agree with absolutely everything that hooks postulates, what I’ve read so far has really enabled me to generate my own ideas about the way I want to conduct my classes in the fall and exactly what I want my students to get out their freshman English class. And I do feel that a lot of what she has to say can really be used to great benefit in the college classroom.

I’m all excited about school starting now. I can’t wait to start teaching again in the fall.

Very amusing. I was laughing so hard that I was crying at some points.

It’s Ulysses. Enough said.

I’ve read this book so many times. So good.

This is one of those books that I can read over and over again. And this is mainly because I really like Beauty. She’s a character I can really get behind—smart and bookish.

So yummy that I ate a whole bag today. I really shouldn’t have done that though because it made me sick. I think I’ll stay away from the circus peanuts for a while. Still, they were pretty darn tasty.

In just about every Miyazaki film I’ve seen, there are these cute, silent characters. These are my particular favorites (although it’s hard not to love Calcifer in this movie) because they say so much without words. And Miyazaki doesn’t disappoint in Howl’s Moving Castle. To me, characters like Turnip Head are the most unique and interesting in the movie and they really contribute to the overall plot and vision of the movie.

Of course, overall, this film is just good. The story is original and interesting, like all the Miyazaki films I’ve seen so far.