Bloggin 'Bout Books Blog

10 Worlds I'd Never Want to Occupy or Characters I'd Never Want To Be Hello Lovelies! As always TTT is hosted by The Broke and The Bookish . This week's topic is centered around universes and people we would NEVER want to be a part of. 1. The Maze Runner universe You all know I thought those books were crap. And the universe would be horrible for me. First of all, I'm a lady so I'd probably die immediately from something stupid. Secondly, the first part of the universe is just a huge maze, and I would not want to run that maze, no thank you! Third, the universe is so badly built I'd probably find a plot hole and fall to my death.  2. The Book Thief universe Okay, yeah I get that this is actually our own universe just several decades ago, but I don't want to live then! Nazi Germany and losing like all the people you love to war, no thank you! 3. New World (from Chaos Walking) Having to hear every dude's thoughts all the ...

Mal the Mischievous Mermaid by Tiffany Mandrake  is a delightful little chapter book for young readers. It might be a middle grade book before MG March, but I got too excited at work to wait. It took me about twenty minutes to read, and it was quite entertaining. I initially got excited about the book because the back says something about not all fairies being nice. It was so refreshing to see something that didn't paint girls as sugar and sweetness. I'm really into the idea of people not telling girls that they have to be sweet. Nobody ever tells boys that. So I was excited to see this book about supernatural creatures trying to get into the "Abademy of Badness". Unfortunately, it was quite as exciting as I wanted it to be. Sure Mal doesn't listen and she lies. But in the end everything she ends up doing, kind of ends up being good. Like she takes a tooth from a kraken, but it cures the kraken's toothache. It's not actually about being bad; it...

Hello Lovelies! It's been another week, another cold front here in Missoula. Good thing my snowflake graphic is still mildly seasonal! This week I... found a puppy with my roommate! It took us a few hours to get him back to his owner, but we managed it eventually! watched Sherlock Episode 1 with my friends. watched Teen Wolf!!!! (I'm too obsessed with this show, it's probably detrimental to my health.) watched There Will be Blood, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (the original, it was darling!), Days of Heaven, and some Criminal Minds. went to Trivia Night with a couple coworkers. We got second place! It was pretty awesome. This week I read... the rest of Neil Gaiman's Fragile Things. Check out my review here . some of Special by Scott Westerfeld. It's hard work. some of The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster for my bookclub! Still waiting for The Ask and the Answer and Monsters of Men --grrrrr, should have gone with extra quick shipping. This we...

So obviously you can't look inside, but this was the only picture I could find of my edition, so ignore that for now. Or head to Amazon and look inside! Anyway, Fragile Things: Short Fictions and Wonders by Neil Gaiman is a collection of short stories and poems. I saw a lot of bad reviews of this before I started reading it, so I guess I was pleasantly surprised by it! I really enjoyed these stories for the most part, although some of them did feel like they were unfinished bigger projects. My personal favorites were... The Fairy Reel--a short poem about splitting one's self in two. October in the Chair--a delightful short story about the month's taking turns telling stories and the story October chooses to tell. Forbidden Brides of the Faceless Slaves in the Secret House of the Night of Dread Desire--this is a hilarious story about someone who is supposed to write dark and dreary semi-horror stories but can't help but turn them into comedies Instructions--...

Hello Lovelies!! It's me, your average 18-29 year old white female college graduate in a suburban/urban setting with a household income that's pretty tiny. Why do I mention this? Because I saw this infographic of "who in America is reading--and how". And that's what I want to talk about today. To be clear, I'm not very good at math or interpreting surveys (or studies, but I feel like this one is more of a survey in nature) or anything like that, so I could be reading this all wrong. If you are an expert, please correct me in the comments! This is just what I'm seeing out of this infographic. First of all, I think the standards for this are pretty low which is a good/bad thing--the only require you to have read 1 book (Yes, that's right ONE) in the last year to qualify for this study. I think that's great because sometimes people don't have time to read a lot of books and sometimes people are slow readers and frankly, it's good that p...

Hello Lovelies!! As always TTT is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish  and you should check them out because they're pretty freaking great. This week's prompt is a Reading Wishlist -- y'know the things we wish we could read about more often. 1. Other types of relationships! As you all know, I am so. over. love triangles! Or love angles as my friend reminds me they'd be more accurately called. I want single devoted relationships; I want polyamorous relationships; I want relationships that are strictly platonic! BRANCH OUT FROM THE NORM. 2. More believable world building! I'm thinking worlds I can believe in. I'm talking Harry Potter with muggles and multiple schools and whole undiscovered parts of regular cities. I'm talking The Knife of Never Letting Go with Spackles and semi-familiar landscapes full of treacheries. I don't want lame pseudo-different places. The Maze Runner series sounded so promising but "shuck" came off as false an...

Hello Lovelies!! I got a little tied up yesterday with life, so I'm a day late with my week in review. Fortunately, not a whole lot happened this week. Let's see here... This week I... worked. A lot. Or maybe it just felt like a lot because I had a wonky schedule since I went home last week. went to Oula a couple times, which was awesome and I love it. cleaned up my house a bit. took some books into my local used bookstore (yay! Paring down my book collection aka one of my New Year's Resolutions! ) watched several movies from Empire Magazine's 500 Greatest Films list (aka one of my other New Year's Resolutions! ) I was a big fan of The Apartment . This week I read... THE KNIFE OF NEVER LETTING GO!!!!!!!!!! Seriously everyone needs to read it. The New World (A Chaos Walking Novella) Ketchup Clouds. This week I added to my book collection...kind of a lot. Oops. (It's a PROCESS guys, okay??) These are most of the books I got this week. F...

Ketchup Clouds by Annabel Pitcher  is an interesting look at life as a teenage girl with a terrible secret. I can't quite decide how I feel about it though. I'm going to try to keep this review spoiler-free, but if I change my mind I'll make it clear. There were several things I really liked about this book. First of all, I'm pretty sure they come from a mixed race family. Which the cover (of course) doesn't really indicate, but a passage on the second page of the book, does indicate. Or at least I read it that way. Also, Zoe's (the main character's)  sister is deaf. She signs through out the whole book. I love that Pitcher included a character with a hearing disability and didn't neglect them. I think it would be easy to be like "oh this person has a hearing disability so they don't talk a lot." Dot is six years old. She talks all the time! She's your typical six year old--she gets into things, she has a lot of questions, she ru...

I know, I know...I'm supposed to be reading "old books" before "new books," but I couldn't resist reading this tiny prequel novella really quickly. This is the review I just posted on Goodreads for it: This prequel novella is a great addition to the world of Chaos Walking. I've only read the first book so far, and I think reading this novella directly afterwards was a good idea. It's relevant to the first book as a whole, while not giving away anything that may happen in the future. Instead, (as prequels should do) it clarifies the events of the first book in a new way. It's a quick read, and it's worth it. I don't have much to add to that in this format, except for my points for the Prequels & Sequels Challenge!! My first points of 2014, woohoo!! +2 for reading the prequel novella The New World by Patrick Ness. ------ 2 points total!

I AM DEAD SERIOUS. STOP READING THIS. STOP IT. GO FIND A COPY OF THIS BOOK. AND IF YOU FIND A COPY OF THIS ONE, GRAB THE SECOND AND THIRD WHILE YOU'RE AT IT. YOU WANT MORE INFORMATION?!?! FINE. I haven't felt this fanatic about a book series since I read The Hunger Games three or four years ago. The Knife of Never Letting Go is the first book in the Chaos Walking series. I had heard of it from someone I follow on another website--she mentioned it was her favorite book and since I think she has good taste, I put it on reserve at my work. If we saw a copy, I would grab it and read it. Instead, John Green and Maureen Johnson tweeted links to a free download of it on Wednesday morning. I'm not particularly fond of ebooks because the only device I can really use is my phone (I get too distracted on my computer to read ebooks). I downloaded it anyway. I read quite a bit of it, but then I ran some errands and generally tried to be productive. I kept thinking about it. ...

Hello Lovelies! This is gonna be a three part blog post today so feel free to skip around to what interest you. Things that are on My Mind Since I've been loving talking about something new every week, I think I'm just gonna call this "Things that are on My Mind". Today what's been on my mind is the hook in a book. Not the opening line or whatever "special" premise the author or agent might call a hook, but the part of the book that sinks its teeth into you to get you to keep reading.  I started The Knife of Never Letting Go  yesterday morning, and I can't stop thinking about it. I could hardly stop reading to write this blog post! Suffice it to say I'm definitely hooked. But what was it that hooked me?? How did I go from, oh someone I know likes this book, I'll give it a shot to ARGH WHY DO I HAVE TO PUT THIS DOWN TO EAT?? WHY DON'T I HAVE A THIRD HAND?? I think for this particular book it's the anticipation th...

Hello Lovelies!! This week's topic on TTT hosted by The Broke and the Bookish  is Top Ten 2014 Debuts I'm Excited For! This was a tricky one for me because I don't typically know about debuts before they're released, but I managed to stumble across a few. 1. It's already come out, but I haven't picked it up yet. I'm so excited to read Look at that cover! It's so fantastic. And the synopsis sounds amazing. Check out the Goodreads here. 2. Landry Park by Bethany Hagen Seriously just the first line in the description drew me in to that one. Downton Abbey meets The Selection, whaaa???? 3. The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton.    Look at that cover!!!!!!!! I don't judge books by their covers (not at alllllllllllllllll) or at least I try really hard not to, but when a book had an awesome cover, it just calls to me. But it also sounds really really beautiful and sad.  4. A Mad, Wicked Folly by Sharo...