I’m going off on a tangent. This post has nothing to do with Christian fiction or even secular fiction, per se. I just finished reading The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi . This is NOT THE VERSION THAT IS MOST FAMOUS VIA WALT DISNEY!!
SPOILERS BELOW!!!

I purchased the Kindle version of this book for only 99 cents, however, there is another Kindle version out there that’s free.

This book was written in Italian in 1881. It’s considered a classic and it’s a fairy tale. If you’ve read The Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Anderson fairy tales, then you can get a taste for what Pinocchio is like because it’s very similar to those, except it’s much longer.

Wait a second. Do you enjoy Christian fiction? Give my books a try.  Now, back to Pinocchio!

This was a very dark story, and I wouldn’t be reading it to my five-year-old child. I think it might be appropriate for ages twelve and over.

I kept seeing things throughout the story that reminded me of the Bible. I’m not sure if that was the author’s intention, though. Pinocchio is a wooden puppet, created by his father, Geppetto. He keeps getting into mischief. For example, instead of going to school, he pawns his schoolbook for the fare to a puppet theater. Whenever he’s supposed to be doing something right, he ends up making the wrong decision. The blue fairy, who’s Pinocchio’s “adopted mother” always forgives Pinocchio for his mistakes (kind of made me think of how Christ forgives us whenever we mess up, no matter how many times). Throughout the tale, Pinocchio finds himself in various mishaps. He tries to find his poor father throughout the book, and Pinocchio’s conscience does get to him as time goes on. At first, he’s an ungrateful puppet, only wanting others to do as he pleases. When Pinocchio finds himself in the belly of a huge shark, near the end of the book, he ends up finding his father within the shark’s belly. They reunite, and manage to escape from this huge beast. That part of the story reminded me of Jonah being the belly of a whale.

Also, the theme of temptation and sin kept popping up, too. Pinocchio would try to do the right thing, but, something, or someone would appear tempting him to do wrong…and he usually did the WRONG thing. Kind of reminded me how, as humans, we can be easily tempted into sin, especially if we’re persuaded by those who have power over our minds.

This story was so DARK!! Pinocchio gets hit with a whip, he’s hung from a tree and almost dies. The blue fairy rescues him from the tree hanging around the middle of the book.

I also noticed the subject of hunger kept popping up. Pinocchio spoke often of being hungry, and he was a lazy puppet! He didn’t want to work for food, and wanted others to bow to his command. It was quite sickening after awhile.

He discovers he wants to be a real boy around the middle of the story. The Blue Fairy promises Pinocchio that he can become a real boy, but, before she can make it happen, Pinocchio, messes up again, not making the right decision. He’s forgiven and changed into a real boy at the end.

Have you read this book, or any other ORIGINAL fairy tales? What do you think of these unusual stories? Usually, people think about Disney’s sanitized versions of these dark, haunting tales…

Update 6/11/2021 – Amazon Prime – I viewed the Italian movie, Pinocchio. From what I can recall, this movie followed the book. You should give the movie a try, especially if you don’t feel like reading the novel!
~Cecelia Dowdy~

I plan on posting a book giveway later this week. You may win a box of Christmas books! 🙂 Check back later for details…

~Cecelia Dowdy~

I’m blogging over at Writers’ Rest today about the movie Inception! Come on over!

~Cecelia Dowdy~

My sister works at the Discovery Channel in Silver Spring and I was worried, shocked, and horrified and I found out about an armed man, James Lee, had entered the building and had fired a few shots and took hostages. It also appeared that he was strapped with bombs. My sister called me quietly from her office, leaving me a voicemail stating that they were in lockdown. My heart was beating hard and I was sweating hard as I prayed and called people that I knew. I was relieved when she called me about ten minutes later and said that they’d exited the building.

I’m glad the whole situation is over. It was just a bit too close to home for me! 🙁

~Cecelia Dowdy~

We’re getting ready to send our child to school this Monday. It’ll be his first day of kindergarten and we’ve been buying uniforms and supplies. We’re still not done with all of our purchases. If you recall, on this blog post, we grappled with sending our son to public or private school. We decided to send him to a private Christian school. I tried to talk to the public school about the curriculum and to the new kindergarten teacher….but all I got was the runaround! 🙁

I was already having trouble with the public school and our son wasn’t even enrolled yet! I couldn’t imagine what would happen once he was a student – I was already frustrated enough! 🙁

So far, I’m pleased that this school has answered my questions and has shown me their curriculum. I was satisfied with what my son would be learning during his first year of school. His first day is this Monday, August 23.

I have some books that I need to review for this blog. I’ll be doing that soon.

~Cecelia Dowdy~

Today’s my birthday and tomorrow is our son’s birthday! He’ll be turning five! We’ll probably go out to dinner this weekend to celebrate!

~Cecelia Dowdy~

I saw this movie yesterday with my husband and all I can say about it is, you have to pay attention.

One thing I didn’t like was that they used the Lord’s name in vain a lot, and that didn’t set too well with me.

I did find the story intriguing, especially since they had the dreams in four layers, a dream within a dream within a dream…

Cobb just wants to see his kids again, and he can’t go home because he’s WANTED. However, a project comes along, a very intriguing and difficult project involving the subconscious and if he’s able to complete this project successfully, he’ll be able to go home to his kids, whom he hasn’t seen in a long time. It’s kind of cool to see people dreaming and how they see their longings in their subconscious mind. It’s also kind of weird to see the dream and then to see others “interrupt” your dream since they’re not supposed to be in that private part of your mind.

I’ve always been intrigued by dreams and when I was in high school, I wrote a paper about dreams and the subconsious mind.

In the book of Daniel, God speaks to others through their dreams and He provided vivid messages while Pharoah was asleep.

It’s hard to talk about the movie without giving spoilers. If you’ve seen this movie, I’d like to know what you thought about it. I’d like to see it again to make sure I didn’t miss anything. I think I got the whole story.

This is definitely a guy flick. I could imagine that a lot of females wouldn’t care for this movie.

Can you imagine being caught in a dream for fifty+ years? Frightening! Dreams and reality become muddled and then it messes with your mind.

This movie was very deep and, like I said, you need to pay attention to every word or you might miss something.

~Cecelia Dowdy~

I’ve been too tired to blog since we returned from our trip last weekend. I’ll probably get some more energy this coming weekend. I’ve been doing a lot of reading and I have three books to review. I also have a scripture I’d like to discuss and share.

~Cecelia Dowdy~

In the book that I’m working on now, I’ve got a major emotional conflict involved. When he was a young boy, the hero’s mother was involved in a religious cult, and it ultimately led to her death. The negative experience has colored his view of all religions and he has nothing to do with Jesus as a result of his boyhood experience.

I was wondering if anybody reading this blog has ever been involved with a cult or know someone who has? If you did, what was your/their experience like? How did you/they get out of the organization? If you feel like sharing the name of the cult, that would be fine, but it’s not necessary.

This inquiring mind wants to know…

~Cecelia Dowdy~