Maybe it could win an Emmy…

Occasionally, I feel the need to read a book simply for entertainment.  This need seems to always come during the summer.  As summer unofficially began this past weekend and the pool opened, I decided to read the second novel in Lisa Lutz’s Spellman series, Curse of the Spellmans.

The novel includes the same smart comedy contained in the first book, The Spellman Files.  The novel or the series would not win the Pulitzer or Nobel by any means, but it could win an Emmy if it was made into a sitcom.  A sitcom in book form is probably the best way to describe the book and the series.  I have to admit that I’ve been known to enjoy a sitcom or two over the years (or decades, actually).

The second novel again tells the misadventures of the the Spellman family and their Private Investigation company.  The story is told by the middle daughter, Isabelle, a thirty-year old reformed delinquent.  Her sixteen year-old sister, Rae, makes for a likable sidekick as they perform Lucy and Ethel-type antics while investigating their suspicious new neighbor, John Brown, known throughout the book as “Subject”.

Henry Stone, a mild-mannered cop, gets caught up in these antics much to his dismay.  However, as the story progresses, he becomes more attached to the sisters than he cares to admit.  One of the humorous parts of the first novel was Isabelle’s fascination with the old tv show, Get Smart, and her detailed knowledge of every episode.  In the second novel, Henry Stone introduces the girls to the series, Dr. Who.  Isabelle and Rae tend to want to only watch the newer episodes, while Henry insists that they watch episodes from forty years ago in spite of the poor special effects.

It seems Henry and Isabelle could perhaps strike up a more romantic relationship in the future, but like most sitcoms, it will probably take a while for them to actually express their feelings to each other.  Numerous distractions will probably keep them apart for at least a few more episodes… I mean books.  There’s at least three more of which I’m aware in the series.

“There was a sound of thunder.”

I’m not sure where or when it originated, but there is a theory known as “the butterfly effect”.  It’s premise is that a butterfly in, say, Peoria could flutter it’s wings and ultimately it would lead to a typhoon in the Indian Ocean.  In recent weeks, I’ve heard this theory used in stories about time travel.  If someone goes back in time and changes one little thing or perhaps one big thing, the “present” world would no longer be life as we know it.  Stephen King’s novel, 11/22/63, deals with this idea and the BBC science fiction television show, Dr. Who, uses this concept even if they haven’t necessarily called it that on the show that I’m aware.

Now I have read Ray Bradbury’s short story, “The Sound of Thunder”.  I learned of this story because it was mentioned in King’s novel. It involves a character named Eckels who is an avid hunter.  He hires a company with a Time Machine to take him into the past about 65 million years so that he can shoot a T-Rex.  In “Jurrasic Park” fashion, he heads back to Dino land with the assistance of several guides (who have been there before).  He’s severely warned to stay on the “Path” that’s been laid out for him.  Venturing off the path could cause him to step on a mouse – or a butterfly – and cause all kinds of changes to the present (like which president got elected).  Eckels’ encounter with the T-rex is more intense than he thought it would be and he tracks mud and other things into the time machine and brings it back to a slightly different present.  “There was a sound of thunder” is the line that chillingly ends the story.

Bradbury’s writing has always interested me.  I read one of his more autobiographical novels a number of years ago, Dandelion Wine.  It opens with a great paragraph of a boy waking up on his first day of summer vacation.  In “The Sound of Thunder”, Bradbury writes a paragraph describing Eckels’ first step from the Time Machine that is reminiscent, at least in style, if not content, of that opening paragraph:

The jungle was high and the jungle was broad and the jungle was the entire world forever and forever.  Sounds like music and sounds like flying tents filled the sky, and those were pterodactyls soaring with cavernous gray wings, gigantic bats out of a delirium and a night fever.

I find it fun to read stories and novels that are related to other stories and novels that I’ve read.  King also mentioned a short story by Shirley Jackson (of “The Lottery” fame) called “The Summer People”.  I might have to read that one sometime soon.