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Rap Ups & TBRs

December TBR – 2016

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Hi.

Today I’m going to talk about the books I’m planning to read this month. With NaNoWriMo in the past my reading urge is stronger than it ever has been!

The first book I’m actually currently reading and have been reading since October and it is: Coraline by Neil Gaiman. I’m actually only about forty pages till the end, and I’ll probably will finish it today or tomorrow. I’m loving this book so far, I’m pretty sure it’ll end up on my favorites shelf on Goodreads with a five star rating along side it. I ment this to be a Halloween read, but October was crazy and then there was NaNoWriMo, so I have to deal with the shameful fact that it has been two months and I still have not finished this… what? 160 page book? Great.

The next book I’m planning on reading ASAP is: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J. K. Rowling. Yes, I know I’m a terrible person for not reading the Harry Potter series yet, but I’m going to fix that starting this month. I promised myself that it would be the first book I pick up this month and I plan on keeping that promise.

The next book I’m very exited about is: Switch by Ingrid Law. Savvy and Scumble are two of my favorite books in the world and now there’s a third book! I recently re-read the first two, and now I can’t wait to read Switch.

This next book is one I’m currently audio-booking and it is: Between the Lines by Jodi Picoult and Samantha van Leer. I wanted a nice audio book to listin to wile doing other stuff like cleaning, re-arranging bookshelves, coloring, riding in the car, etc. and I stumbled upon this and it was a book I’d heard good things about and the reviews didn’t say anything about bad language or anything so I downloaded it and so far it’s pretty good, I’m only a couple chapters in.

This book is another one I’ve been in the middle of since October: In Too Deep: The 39 Clues book six by Jude Watson. I’ve been working my way through The 39 Clues – five star series by the way – and I was doing pretty good until guess what! yep. NaNoWriMo came around!

the last book I’m planning on re-reading this December is A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. I read this a few years ago and since then I discovered that Charles Dickens wrote four more books that follow it, which I’m very exited about! I think I’m going to try to read one every December starting this December and hopefully ending December 2020. Another reason I’m reading this this month is because my dad asked me to pick out a classic for us to buddy read together, he specifically asked for a shorter, older book. A Christmas Carol is short, older, and fits with the season. It’s perfect!!

I’m not finished yet, I still need to draw something from my TBR challenge jar (if you don’t know what that is this link will take you to a video that explains it) This month’s challenge is to read: A book with an ugly cover. I have a few options for this so I guess I’ll decide later.

So that’s all the books I hope to have read by the new year.

Comment below and say what books your planning on reading this month 🙂 and also a challenge all my readers to read a book with an unappealing cover this month.

Bye!

My Books, NaNoWriMo, Writing

NaNoWriMo Prep

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NaNoWriMo starts in two days!! I’m so excited!

This is my first year participating in NaNoWriMo and I can’t wait to start, but I’m really behind on preparing for it. I’ve already temporarily put aside An American Werewolf in New Orleans and have come up with a new idea to write for NaNoWriMo (which I’m not going to talk about too much yet) I realised too late that it might not have been such a good idea to pick this more complicated story to write for NaNoWriMo but I’m not going to change now!

I’ve done a lot of world building and I’ve invented a lot of characters but they’re not too developed, and all the plotting I’ve really done is coming up with the basic idea and some major plot points. (Give me a break, I’ve had a busy October!) But I do plan on working on the plotting and at least some character development in the next couple days.

I’ve kinda turned the den into a makeshift office as you can see in the picture above. I have my white board that I’m doing my world building on and my computer where I’m building my cast and keeping ideas for my plotline. I have made a soundtrack for my book which currently only has some movie soundtrack music on it.

I feel like I should say something about my NaNoWriMo project, so I’ll give you some vague info on it.  This is a fantasy book as you have probably put together by now. The most interesting thing about it that I’m currently willing to share is that it’s highly inspired by the video game The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, one of my favorite games. And of course my book soundtrack has some of it’s music, I think Song of Storms is kinda the main song for this story right now. The main character is a boy, age 13 (I may change his age) and I have not yet settled on a name for him, I was thinking Lazarus, but I don’t know if that name fits him all that well.

Now I need to come up with a spoof title to refer to it as on this blog, I’m thinking about just using my real working title since I’m pretty sure I’ll change it later, but it does kind of give away something about my story that I don’t want to announce yet so I’ll just use a spoof title. I want to use the Zelda title so maybe something like The Legend of the City. I like that, it fits very well with my story since it does involve a legend of a city (it’s more of a small town but The Legend of the Town doesn’t sound as cool to me). I’m going to go with The Legend of the City.

That’s all I have to talk about today. If you’re participating in NaNoWriMo this year I would love it if you would put your spoof or working title in the comments. Also, if you know any cool suggestions for my main character’s name please put that in the comments too.

Bye!

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Goosebumps: Top and Bottom Three

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Halloween is coming up! One of my favorite holidays! This would be a wonderful time to recommend scary books… but… I don’t read that many scary books, though I have read about thirty of R. L. Stine’s Goosebumps series, so I thought I would recommend some of those.

To me, Goosebumps is kind of a hit-or-miss series, some of them I really like and some I really dislike. So today I’m going to recommend my top three favorite Goosebumps books so far.

I know what you’re thinking, “Only three?” Yes only three. You see, there are a lot of Goosebumps books and I find them to be pretty fast reads and I usually forget whether or not I liked some of them, so yah, only three. To make up for the small number how about I give my least favorite three too? Will that work? Ok! I’ll start with the least favorites so I can end this blog on a high note later.

So, my third least favorite Goosebumps book so far is: Welcome to Camp Nightmare:                                                                                                                  It was just one of the weirder, more boring Goosebumps books. I wasn’t too happy with some of the plot points. It wasn’t necessarily bad, it just wasn’t for me. In this book you follow a boy named Billy whose summer at camp starts edging to demonic.

My second to least favorite Goosebumps book is: You Can’t Scare Me!: Mainly because the title is too accurate. This book wasn’t scary at all. It was closer to realistic fiction than horror. You’re basically following a group of friends trying to prank a girl in their class who claims to be fearless. This was really just very boring for something that’s supposed to be a horror story. (which is usually the problem with the miss side of Goosebumps.)

My number one least favorite of the Goosebumps series so far: Attack of the Mutant:
Keep in mind that I had a stomach bug when I read this and that never improves what I think about a book. This book just seemed more disturbing than scary. It was really just too weird.

Now that I have those behind me let’s move on to my favorite three.

My third favorite Goosebumps book is: The Haunted Mask:                       It was a very interesting story. And it was also a pretty scary story. I really thought that the backstory for the monster was very original, I’ve never read anything like that before. (There’s probably something exactly like it and I’m the only human who doesn’t know about it).

My second to favorite Goosebumps is: Welcome to Dead House:                I believe this is the first in the Goosebumps series and it was a wonderful way to start! It’s probably one of the most scary. The story was just awesome, I thought the characters were pretty cool too.

Now for my very favorite Goosebumps: The Ghost Next Door:            This one has such a creative plot line, it’s just so good! It’s not the scariest book in the series, it’s spooky in the most. But it’s my favorite story-wise. R. L. Stine has come up with some pretty interesting plots and so far The Ghost Next Door is the most interesting, This one really stands out. I just don’t know how to express how much I like this one without spoilers. Maybe I’ll do a booktalk on it sometime but don’t hold your breath.

So those are my favorite and least favorite Goosebumps books of the ones I’ve read so far. Please put your favorite and/or least favorite of R. L. Stine’s books in the comments. Also if you really love one of the books in my least favorites section make sure to post why you like them and why they shouldn’t be anyone’s least favorites.

I’ve used the word “favorite” 19 times in this blog post.
Bye!

Booktalks

Furthermore – by Tahereh Mafi {Booktalk}

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Today I’ll be talking about Furthermore by Tahereh Mafi.

Before I get into spoilerish thoughts I would like to say to those who haven’t read it that Furthermore is an amazingly creative story that takes place in wonderfully magical worlds. Basicly, everything about this book is creative from the world to the characters to the story, even the chapter headings were so different than in other books. The writing style was so poetic it was almost poetry at some points.

I gave this five out of five stars on goodreads, and I put it on my favorites shelf. If you’re a fan of A Wrinkle in Time or Alice in Wonderland I definitely recommend reading this.

Cover reveiw: The cover is very beautiful, probably in my top five covers. It’s kind of busy, but it works and it gives you a good feel for the book, (I almost got it just for the cover.)

Now if you haven’t read Furthermore you should probably leave now because I’m about to get into deeper, more spoilery thoughts.

First of all, that one page prolog was awesome. Great way to start the book. The chapters in Ferenwood just put so many beautiful pictures in my head, which is good since Ferenwood is a world of bright colors and shapes.

Alice was a very interesting character. Her aversion to clothes was an interesting trait. Her power was really cool! And surprisingly powerful. That scene where Alice turned everything black to save Oliver really took this power and showed how awesome it is.

Oliver took a while to grow on me, I never disliked him but through the first half of of the book I didn’t really care for him but by the end I like him.

I was really surprised at the Surrender, for several reasons. One, I didn’t expect all the cool magical powers, it was really awesome. And two, Alice got a black card (score 0) I was sooo not expecting that! Before it went through a list of the scores 1-5, but there was never a moment, not even once, where the possibility of score 0 was mentioned until Alice failed her Surrender.

The first town Alice and Oliver go to, Slumber I think it’s called, I think was a very cool setting. The whole people having dark blue skin with golden tattoos sounds familiar to me but I’m not sure from what. Same for the only-appears-at-night thing. They were both cool elements though.

If you know me you know I’m kinda sensitive about wolves and foxes and can probably guess that I was disappointed when the paper fox turned out to be not as friendly as he first seemed. I mean I was expecting him to end up being evil (it is the world of Furthermore after all) but I was still hoping he would be a little companion to Alice and Oliver on their adventure.

I think Alice made the right choice with the doors, you know the scene where she breaks her ruler in three and gets to pick between fixing her arm, finding her dad, or saving Oliver. Saving Oliver, I think, was the right decision because finding her dad and fixing her arm were things that could be fixed in other ways. I mean they already had plans to both fix her arm and save her dad and what other ways were there to save Oliver? None that I know of.

I like the town of Left. The egg homes were really cool and also, did anyone else notice that where the eggs come from is never specified? Mysterious. The whole time in Left I was going back and forth from “maybe these are the nice people in Furthermore?” and “These people can’t be trusted!”

When we first meet Isal I pictured her as something from mysterious Japanese lore. Them stepping into the paintings was cool, and I was definitely not expecting the painter to turn out to be Alice’s dad, that really caught me off guard. It was a kinda interesting way to find him but I found it to be a pretty abrupt ending, especially with how they got back to Ferenwood. I was thinking “now are they going to go on some big adventure back through Furthermore? Oh yah, Oliver has a door.” It made sense but again it felt a little abrupt.

The scene with Alice and her dad reuniting with the mom was very heart-warming and sweet. I like the way that was done with Alice getting her moment with her mom and then her dad getting his moment. Very nice. And then Oliver pops up, which was nice since that conversation, in my opinion, really drove home the point that they were now friends and the whole adventure in Furthermore wasn’t just a temporary alliance.

I love that the black 0 score card ended up being a you-get-to-try-again-next-year thing. It was a really great, heart-warming happy ending!

That’s all my thoughts on Furthermore. Please put your opinion of it in the comments below as well as a book recommendation for Furthermore fans, such as myself.

That’s all today.

Bye!

Rap Ups & TBRs

September Rap Up 2016

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Today I’m going to talk about the books I finished this September.

The first book I finished is “Passenger” by Alexandra Bracken. I gave this three out of five stars on Goodreads. This is the first book in a duology if I’m right. It’s about a girl named Etta and a boy named Nicolas (I don’t think I spelled his name right) who have to travel through time to find something. The plot was very interesting and the action was great, but there were some romantic parts that were a little too much and slowed down the progression. One paragraph is more than enough to describe a kiss. and I also had to lose a star for bad language.

The next book I finished is “I Survived: The Attacks of 9/11” by Lauren Tarshis. I gave this book five out of five stars on Goodreads. This is historical fiction that follows a boy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. I think the tittle is pretty self explanatory. The “I Survived” books are so good and they make you see just how horrible these events were to live through and that there not some random events you read about in bland history books. By the way, I read this book on September 11th. :]

The third book is actually the Werefox bookclub pick for the month of September and it is “Furthermore” by Tahereh Mafi. I definitely gave this five stars as well as put it on my favorites shelf. In this book a girl named Alice travels through the dangerous land of Furthermore in order to find her father. It was kind of like Alice in Wonderland meets A Wrinkle in Time and I loved it!

This next one is a re-read and it is “Savvy” by Ingrid Law. If you know me, I’m not big on re-reading books so you know I like this one A LOT! I gave it five stars obviously. It’s about a family of people who, on their 13th birthday get a savvy Which is kind of like a superpower. That is a very, very basic idea of what the book is about. If you want to learn more about the plot I recommend looking it up or clicking my link.

Tell your favorite book you read this month in the comments.

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I’m A Book Addict

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So, a booktuber by the name of jessethereader make a YouTube video entitled 25 Signs You’re A Book Addict. And now I’m going to go through his list and discuss whether or not I fit in them.

Sign #1:   When you buy multiple editions of the same book because every cover is beautiful.

I wouldn’t say I did this much if at all, but I think if I loved a book and there was a cover change that was way better than my copy I would probably go for it.

Sign #2:   When you get a book you already own as a gift and you’re ok with it.

I don’t think I’ve ever been in this situation but I think if I did whether or not I’m ok with it depends on which book we’re talking about.

Sign #3:   When you try to read every day.

YES! Especially now since I’ve been in a big reading mood lately.

Sign #4:   When the first thing you do at a friend’s house is scope out their bookshelves.

I feel like I have done this sometime in the past, but the fact that I couldn’t tell you the books my best friend has on his shelf I think I don’t do this (at least not anymore)

Sign #5:   When you take way too many books with you on a trip.

Only if a bag full is too many.

Sign #6:   When pre-order campaigns are your weakness because you need book swag.

Not at all. I’m not even sure what “book swag” is, I think it may just be books, but even so I hardly pre-order books or anything really.

Sign #7:   When you count down the days to a book’s sequel.

I haven’t yet but that seems like something I might do if I really liked the book.

Sign #8:   When you’re the person known for giving books as gifts.

I don’t even remember the last time I gave a book as a gift, so no.

Sign #9:   When you go to a bookstore, not to buy a book, but just to browse the shelves.

Yes, I do this all the time. I also usually buy a book (or three) anyway.

Sign #10:   When the librarians knows you buy name.

Not that I know of.

Sign #11:   When the majority of pictures you post on instagram are of books.

I’m not on instagram, but if I was I’m not sure I would post many pictures of books (that’s just asking for spoilers.)

Sign #12:   When your invited to have a social life, but all you want to do is read.

Not usually.

Sign #13:   When you bring a book with you wherever you go.

I try.

Sign #14:   When your friends all come to you for a book recommendation.

I’ve only been asked in person once, but I do wonder if I would get more without my book review website.

Sign #15:   When you rather work out using  a stack of books than real waits.

YES! YES! YES!

Sign #16:   When you re-read passages from your favorite books every now and then.

This sounds like something I would do… But I have no memories of doing this.

Sign #17:   When you find a little too much enjoyment in re-organising your bookshelves.

probably more than most people.

Sign #18:   When you never leave your house without a book.

This sounds mysteriously like sign #13.

Sign #19:   When you read even though you’re dead tired.

Not usually unless it was just an amazing book.

Sign #20:   When you get random urges to touch books on your bookshelf.

Only all the time.

Sign #21:   When the first thing you do with a hardcover is take off the dust jacket and see what’s on the hardback.

I have been doing this recently. So yah.

Sign #22:   When you make videos online about books.

Not yet, but I probably will one day.

Sign #23:   When you see someone reading a book in public and you have to see what it is.

I don’t remember the last time I saw someone reading in public, but I would defiantly be curios.

Sign #24:   When you avoid all responsibilities because all you want to do is read.

It depends on how good the book I’m currently reading is.

Sign #25:   When you read till your eyes bleed.

I think I read a reasonable amount. I have no memory of my eyes bleeding.

So, I think I’m a book addict over all. Comment below and tell which of these signs are relatable to you.

Rap Ups & TBRs

July 2016 Rap Up

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picture: layoutaday.com

For this blogathon I’ll be giving a summary of my June. three book recommendations, three movie recommendations, a writing challenge, and a writing life update.

June summary:

So this June was very crazy yet successful. First of all, I started this blog! I got my braces on (blah,) started a creative writing club, took a family trip to the smoky mountains, turned 15, then there’s father’s day of course, and best of all… I GOT MY BOOK PUBLISHED!!!!!! (more information about that below.

Books:

All my book recommendations today have been adapted into movies in honor of “The BFG” which comes out today.

So of course this first book is The BFG – by Roald Dahl.
I’m definitely going to see this movie considering a saw that it was coming last year and just had to read the book. This is a link to my review website!

This next book is A Wrinkle in Time – by Madeleine L’Engle.This is one of my favorite books (and movies!) and I highly recommend this to si-fi fantasy fans. Click this for my review!

This last book I liked, but I’m only recommending it to older readers: Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children – by Ransom Riggs.
Now this book has a lot of language and some scenes that may be too scary or disturbing for younger kids. you can get more detail of that here: click me!

Movies:

This first movie is: Freaky Friday.

the next movie recommendation is: Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

This last movie is Into the Woods

Writing challenge:

So these challenges don’t have a due date, you don’t even need to do them! they’re just here to encourage me and other writers to practice and step outside our comfort zones.

last month’s challenge was to write a short story inspired by a piece of classical music. July’s is to write about something that happened to you from someone else’s prospective.

Writing life update:

So as I mentioned earlier I’m now a published author! My new book is called Sea of Trees.
                           You can get it and see more about it HERE!
Now, this next book I’m writing, the one for camp NaNoWriMo, I don’t want to give away the name so I’ll call it: An American Werewolf in New Orleans. It’s about a werewolf, takes place in New Orleans, and it isn’t a horror story. That’s all I’m saying for now.

If you guys have any book and/or movie recommendations for me I’d love to hear them along with ideas for writing challenges, just put those in the comments.

Bye!

My Life

Braces: The First Two Weeks

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Two weeks ago I got my braces. When I first got them they were a nightmare. They aren’t so much now, but still, they aren’t as good as not having them at all.

I’m still flossing, if not before bed in the morning, this still takes forever and is a chore, but we did find this thing called superfloss which cuts the flossing time in half (but that’s still fifteen minutes, which is too long.) I miss those little sticks with floss on them, I can’t use them with my braces but they made flossing take about a minute, which is much better than fifteen.

The orthodontist gave me a little box with strips of wax to put on my braces when they’re poking me or something, and since one of the brackets have been poking my gums, which is extremely uncomfortable, it’s very helpful. The only problem is that I can’t eat or drink with the wax in my teeth so I keep having to take in out.

Ulcers. I don’t know if the braces are the causes of the ulcers but they definitely don’t help. especially with the way the orthodontist told me to brush my teeth (between the gums and the teeth, right where the ulcers are!)

My Life

My Shared Birthday

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Today is my birthday!!! :):):):) And I’m spending it in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. We didn’t come here for specifically this reason. My grandparents have a time share here and we sometimes come down with them.

So far we’ve been to the aquarium, Cades Cove, the Old Mill, I’ve gotten  a pressed penny from each place and have been streetpassed five times.

Anyway, today I wanted to acknowledge some other people I share this special day with:

Phillip Van Dyke: Played in “Halloween Town” & “Halloween Town II”

James Maxwell:  Considered the father of modern physics. discovered electromagnetism.

Mary-Kate & Ashley Olsen:  Played in the TV series “Full House”

Miriam A. Ferguson:  The first female governor of Texas.

Tim Allen:  Stared in the “Santa Clause” Movies and played the voice of Buzz Lightyear in the “Toy Story” movies.

William Butler Yeats:  Irish poet, playwright, and Nobel Prize winner.

Frances Burney:  An English author who wrote: “Evelina”, “Camilla”, and “The Wanderer”.

I was really surprised to find some of these people on this list. Who knew I shared a birthday with all these talented people!

Who do you share you’re birthday with?

Source: http://www.famousbirthdays.com/

My Life

Braces: The First Two Days

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Yesterday I got braces. I didn’t think they were going to be that big a deal but they are!

The process of getting the brackets put on was walking the line between discomfort and excruciating pain!! It got better when they were done, but at lunch a particular tooth was very sensitive and by the time I went to bed every one of my teeth ached! They still ache!

It’s been less than twenty-four hours but it feels like weeks! I don’t think I can put up with this for a year and a half! I guess I should be thankful I only need them that long, but still! over a year!!

Also, it took me half an hour to floss last night. That is not o.k. I have things to do.

I can’t even grind my teeth in anger because that’s very painful!

If you have or have had braces let me say that the comment section is open season for complaining. Feel free to state every last thing you hate or hated about having braces.

Also, if you used to have braces, but don’t anymore please tell us weather or not strait teeth for life is worth two years with braces.

Man, I hate these braces!!