Degrees of Affection

My review of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, as well as what the whole series has meant to me over the years can be found here.

Finally! I've never had a book of this series (barring The Horse and His Boy) give me such problems before, but I think I read 4 + books while I tried to read this. What makes it stranger is Caspian is one of my favorites of the Narnian series: all four of the Pevensies return, young Caspian is one of my favorite Narnian characters, REEPICHEEP, and for the first time you really understand the time differences between our world and Narnia.

Perhaps this is one of the only challenges I'm not doing well with because a) actual time limits smaller than 1 month reminds me of school and not knowing rather to speed up or slow down, and b) I had to read on of these books for college and had the same problem. The Narnia series, for me, does not seem to be a good one to force read.

Still, for all of this, I enjoyed rereading this book. Like the previous book, different things strike me every time I read them. This time, I was struck by the source of the Telmarines, Bacchus and Silenus in Narnia (not the type of mythical characters I would put in these stories), Aslan grows bigger as the children age, the tree and water spirits were locked away until Aslan returned (the land subjected? no son of Adam guarding and keeping the land from overgrowth, etc?), and Edmund sides with Lucy when she first sees Aslan - he remembers what he did in LWW and has grown from it.

The saddest moment for me is Peter's news he relates to Lucy and Edmund before they return to the train station. While one one level I can understand why this happens, I would be crushed.

Well, on to Voyage of the Dawn Treader; hopefully I'll get through that one quicker.