"The City of Ember" and Buccaneers season

I just finished "The City of Ember" tonight. I must say that the book is drastically different from the movie. I see why they would change things though, a direct conversion would have resulted in a very short movie with very little conflict.

Ember follows the actions of two children who have recently come of age in a city located deep underground (although the children don't know this at first, it is pretty apparent to the reader from the beginning). These children are horrified at the dwindling resources in their city and embark on a quest to find a way out of Ember.

This book is much more a children's book than I suspected it might be. The related movie got my hopes up for a slightly older audience...say in the teens instead of the less than ten type audience. Then again, I'm not sure if most children will get the 'twist' at the end of the book.

In general "The City of Ember" was a quick and entertaining read, although I'm not honestly sure if I'm going to read the next book in the series.

The Buccaneers.

What can I say? After starting the season 9-3, the Bucs dropped the last 4 games to end up 9-7. A winning record yes, but not one to be overly proud of seeing as how we dropped from fourth to ninth in the league in defense in those 4 weeks. The defense gave up records for most rushing yards, and matched the most touchdowns thrown against them in 10 years.

Clearly something broke down at the end, and I have my suspicions that it was Monte Kiffin. It seems to me that either he gave up, or the players decided they weren't going to play for a guy who left them. Either way, the Bucs now own the number 19 overall draft pick in the 2009 NFL draft in April.

What to draft...

...that depends a lot on who we resign over the offseason. 2 of our wide receivers contracts are up at the end of this year, and Antonio Bryant NEEDS to be resigned. I don't think that the Bucs will resign him though. I think he will want to go someplace that has more of a killer instinct than the Bucs have at the moment.

That being the case, we will need wide receivers. Badly. Michael Clayton will not be resigned. He is looking for a big payday and quite frankly has not earned it here.

We could still use another cornerback...although I think a late round one would be the best option at this point.

We need a weakside linebacker. Although there has been some discussion of Cato June filling that role for us when Derrick retires...that just means we would need a strongside linebacker instead.

Running Back? Quarterback? I don't think we will need a running back with Caddy probably returning before training camp next year. Caddy and Graham will be a powerful duo to deal with in the backfield. QB? yeah. I think we will go with another aged veteran. Either to give time to develop Josh Johnson, or to stop gap waiting for one of the excellent quarterbacks coming out in two years.

Defensive Tackle. Ahhh...now heres the crux of the situation. Our defensive scheme DEPENDS on a strong, dominating, kill the bad guys DT. We don't have one now. I forsee us either going out and getting the biggest strongest tackle we can on the freeagent market...or using our first round draft pick on one.

Lastly. The next book will be "Still Life with Crows" in continuation of the Pendergast series while I wait for "The Scourge of God" to come out in paperback. School is starting up pretty soon too, so it will probably take me a while to finish.

Happy New Year :)