On "The Road to Roswell": A Book Review

Title: The Road to Roswell
Author: Connie Willis
Genre: Science Fiction

About the book...

Francie is headed to Roswell for Serena, her college roommate's, wedding, presumably to talk her out of marrying the bride groom who is alien obsessed, hence why they are holding the wedding in Roswell during a UFO festival. When Serena sends Francie to grab something from the car while trying to get things squared away for the wedding at the UFO museum, little does she suspect that the funny looking tumble weed in the front seat is an alien ready to kidnap her and with a point of his tentacle make her drive all over the state.  

What I think...
Connie Willis is one of the few living authors I actively keep track of and regularly read*. Not all her books and stories appeal to me, but I'm usually willing to give them a try. As far as sci-fi goes I'm not usually a spaceships and aliens person with a handful of exceptions and after the first thirty pages I almost gave up on this one. However, I'm glad I kept reading. 

This book does veer on the sillier side, which given the topic isn't particularly surprising. The characters, which keep getting added to the abduction group, were such a quirky mix including a paranoid alien hunter, a little old lady, and a western movie enthusiast that make a nice addition to the more grounded Francie and Wade, a hitchhiker that the alien picks up, and the alien, who they begin to call Indy (after Indiana Jones) just becomes more and more amusing as the story goes on.  

Willis loves putting movie references in her contemporary works and I loved how this book focused on a mix of alien and western movies, including having each chapter start with a quotation. I also appreciated that you didn't need to have seem all of the movies referenced to have the book make sense! 

I do have to mention the dedication, which, I was delighted (but not surprised) to see included Eleanor Cameron and John Wyndham who fall into my exception category and are two authors of space/alien books I adore.

To sum it all up...
A fun alien encounter with a rather abrupt ending that I hope meanings a second book might be coming!

*My other Connie Willis book review on Doomsday Book can be found here.

On "The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm"

Today marks the US release date for one of my all time favorite fairy tale movies, The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm, which came out August 7, 1962. It tells the fictionalized story of Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm and their journey from more serious scholarly work into the world of fairy tales and is delightfully interspersed with three fairy tale segments of "The Dancing Princess" (a pet peeve of mine--the Grimms' story is "The Twelve Dancing Princesses", but I do like the segment), "The Singing Bone" (complete with puppet dragon), and "The Elves and the Shoemaker" and presents everything in true 1960's fairy tale portrayal goodness!

Earlier this year I finally broke down and bought the MGM Records Deluxe Edition album, so I thought today would be a fun day to spotlight it and share some interesting facts about the movie! 

The fun thing about this album is that under the record is an inset with a book about the making of the movie, so that's where the images you'll be seeing come from.

This was one of the first films MGM made using the three camera Cinerama process (the other being How the West Was Won, which they actually devoted a page to in this book).

I absolutely love all the little sketch images!

The legendary George Pal directed the stop motion fairy tale segments, with other segments being directed by the notable Henry Levin, and it is made up of a truly delightful cast including stars such as Laurence Harvey, Claire Bloom, Barbara Eden, Russ Tamblyn, Terry-Thomas, Buddy Hackett, Jim Backus, and Ian Wolfe (the seemingly perpetually old man that appears in a ton of 60's shows usually as a grump and who's career spanned the 30's-90's).  

The movie was filmed in Rothenburg ob der Tauber, a Medieval Franconian City in Germany. According to the book, props used in the movie were enthusiastically provided by local museums including a cannon used by Napoleon during the Napoleonic Wars, street signs, and books by the Grimms. At one point in the movie, the brothers travel on a steam propelled side-wheeler, which in real life was named the Oskar Huber. This was used for film service "just three days before it was scheduled to retire to a spot of honor in the famous ship museum at Mainz". The film crew also had special permission to "borrow" so to speak a cobblestone road

In terms of award nominations, the movie did fairly well, being nominated in 1963 for Academy Awards for Best Music, Best Cinematography, Best Production Design, and Best Costume Design (It won this one!); and with Golden Globe nominations for Best Actor-Motion Picture Drama (Laurence Harvey) and Best Motion Picture Musical.  

For added fun you can watch the trailer on IMDb here!

♥🏰♥