Is it really difficult to be a ‘Good’ hero?

Have you ever imagined that you become an invisible man? I'm sure that you've once dreamed of having a supernatural power such as flying, teleportation, psychokinesis or something else cool. People have craved and imagined them for a long time. There are a bunch of movies dealing with special abilities. There are two movies, which impressed to me so much. One is Jumper(2008), story of telepoters called Jumper. The other one is Hollow man(2000), story of the mad scientist who successfully becomes invisible by science experiments, just like Griffin, the main character in this book.

The story of The Invisible Man begins with the appearance of a stranger putting a bandage to his entire body. People simply think that he might be hurt bad, so he tries to hide his body. However, while the man stays at an inn, he is getting more and more hysterical everyday. There is a sound of clinking bottles and murmuring of voices from his room, and some mysterious events are happened in the town. By the time people feel suspicious about him, he unwraps the bandage and announces that he is invisible as a result of success of his experiment. The man disappears without paying his room charges.

The invisible man finds Marvel, a homeless man, on the street and threatens him to follow his order. He forces Marvel to steal money or food by providing help. The invisible man's unpredictable and uncontrollable crimes become known to people. One day, Marvel runs away from the ruthless man and tries to hide himself in a bar. The invisible man follows Marvel to catch up with him, but he gets hurt from the people at the bar and makes a near escape. The man trespasses on Dr. Kemp's house and asks for help. After Kemp treats his wounds, the man reveals himself Kemp's old classmate, Griffin. Griffin tells the story how to become an invisible man and his plan to make a terror. Kemp judges Griffin to be very dangerous, so informs on him to the police.

Policemen secretly come to arrest Griffin. As we all know, the main character is never caught by the police so easily. Anyway, Griffin manages to slip out of the house with injuries. Referring to Kemp's advice, both police and people try to isolate Griffin from any help. he can not sleep well or eat food, because people bring dogs to find Griffin and watch everywhere. Griffin loses his temper and back to Kemp's house to attack him, but he is finally caught by people, and he meets a tragic end.

I had two questions when I finished reading the last page of the story. The first is, why the man who has special ability always use it to commit the crime? He could gain both fame and wealth by using the ability, like Iron Man or members of Fantastic 4. The second one, which sounds rather weird, is why didn't Kemp-or whoever was close to Griffin pour flour to him? Then, they can easily find where he is even though he is invisible..

Like the invisible man in this book, or the mad scientist in the hollow man, Many people dream of having supernatural power. No one says that is wrong desire to have. However, when the power happens with violence and unethical act, we can say that is completely wrong. The 'power' could be money, high social status or something else, not only the supernatural power existing in our imagination. I guess the author wanted to tell us that the one’s desire to rule the people by the power would end in tragedy, after all.

We should enjoy crimes 'in text' only!

American crime stories

retold by John Escott

Oxford (stage 6)

My Score: ★★★★☆ 3.5/5.0

I love criminal stories. They usually have robbery, cheating, murder.. and all bad things. Those interesting elements make me keep reading. (because They provoke curiosity about next story. I never mean I like crimes in real life! )
This book contains seven crime stories. Some stories are short, but the others are rather long.

1. Death Wish -by Lawrence block

The beginning part of the story was interesting. It revealed how Mark prepared to take revenge on Edward, who killed his wife on purpose. I thought, it's a good thing we don't have legal guns in Korea. Whew!


2. Death on Christmas Eve - by Stanley Ellin

This is the shortest story, but the most impressive one. I was in a little shock when I read the reversal in the last part. I want to give this story the top rank!


3. The Heroine -by Patricia Highsmith

One's desire to be accepted as an essential person could make him cruel. This phrase came out to mind: It is hard to fathom the real minds and intentions of men.


4. Ride the Lightning -by John Lutz

I was disappointed because the crime was not planned meticulously, and detective Nudger couldn't show his ability at all. I miss Sherlock!


5. The Lipstick -by Mary Roberts Rinehart

Elinor died after falling from the hospital building. People believed that she committed suicide, but her sister Louise didn't believe it and tried to find the truth herself alone. Louise never would be close to the truth if a little girl suddenly hadn't appeared and gave the important clue to her.


6. Lazy Susan -by Nancy Pickard

I think this is a kinda comedy story. Can Laziness of someone really turn into crime? If so, I could be a professional and habitual criminal already... Anyway, It is the second one I recommend you to read in this book.


7. The Gutting of Couffinal -by Dashiel Hammett

Ughh! I never like Russian novels or short stories because of terrible name of characters! How do you read-or remember when their names are Zhukovshi or Pleshskev? I can't even imagine how they pronounce it. lol  Moreover, the story was kinda boring, so I'd like to give the lowest grade on it!

Overall, I enjoyed the stories because they had different kinds of crime. Some stories gave me stress a bit, though.

It could be valuable for you to try what you don't like before!

What do you have in mind when you hear the word 'reading'? Well, two years ago, I would say "yuck!" or "eww!". Fortunately, I don't feel the same about reading now. Can you believe I enjoy it and even recommend my friends to try to read? It was a 3-month-class, which gave me a chance to change my mind about reading.

I was not a sort of person who likes to read a book before I took a class with Professor Nelson in my sophomore year at University. Nelson welcomed us to join his 'exciting reading class', but his words were not so trustworthy because of his serious look. During the class, students should read at least three books in a week and made book reports with those books. That is to say, students should tried hard to read and read, so that one could score higher than others in the class.

Honestly, I didn't enjoy reading at all because I usually thought reading is one part of study. Obviously, reading English books is helpful to improve one's English skills. This is true. However, it could be a burden when it turned to a mandatory thing, especially for the student who have to do it anyway. Well, I thought I made a bad choice and felt sad to be deceived by his words. It wasn't so exciting, and the class gradually became a kind of competition just like 'Who read the most this week?'.

Of course, I also eagerly participated in the competition. I mainly chose books, which had easily understandable stories regardless of  their genre. It was my strategy to read as much as possible in a short time. After reading more than twenty books, I naturally discovered my taste in reading. I felt bored when I read love stories, growth novel or SF genre. Also, I hoped them to be end soon with those stories. Otherwise, the genres such as detective, crime, mystery and horror were quite different from what I mentioned above. They made me feel nervous during reading and curious about the next story. It was the starting point for me to enjoy reading itself.

After knew exactly what my taste was, I could save time choosing books to read. I mastered the series of Sherlock Holmes during the class. There were Agatha Christie, Edgar Ellen Poe, Stephen King and so on, my favorite authors. I didn't get stressed by reading, because it was not an assignment to me anymore. One day, professor Nelson kindly asked me to try other genre after he reviewed my book reports. I understood what he meant, but I kept reading in my way. I believed that enjoyable reading was only exciting reading to me! At the end of the class, I could see a lot of books on the list in my book report. I remembered the score was great, too.

It's been two years since I took the class. Now nobody forces me to do so, but I visit school library to borrow short stories books. I can't say I'm a bookworm, but reading becomes one of my favorite things. I am truly thankful for that. What if I did not join the Nelson's class? What if I gave up reading in the class? If so, I'm sure that I still have a bias against reading: It is such a boring thing. I learned that judging something that I've never tried before is kind of dangerous behavior. It deprives people of opportunity to find one's precious part of life. I would be aware of it, and try to take a positive view of everything I meet.