Tuesday, May 15, 2012

A Little This & That


Nyx Book Reviews is hosting today's Bout of Books Challenge.  I like the questions, so I've decided to share them along with my answers here.


 

Physical Book or eBook? Physical book, but ebooks are great for long, heavy books. I'm looking at you Count of Monte Cristo.

Paperback or Hardcover? Paperback
 
Reality or Make-believe? Both!

Adult or Young Adult?
Young Adult

Dog Ears or Bookmarks?
Bookmarks

Breaking the Spine or Barely Open the book?
Break it! Books are meant to be used.

Tea or Coffee?
Tea...well Pepsi, but for the purposes of this exercise, Tea.

Reading in Bed or On the Couch?
Both (Outside is pretty good, too).

Series or Standalone?
Standalone. It gets nerve-wracking waiting for sequels. (174 days until Days of Blood and Starlight).

Original or TV Adaptation?
Original

Author Crushes or Who-was-that-guy-again?
Who-was-that-guy-again...

Interview or Guest Post?
Interview


Feel free to share your own answers below!


Saturday, May 12, 2012

Bout of Books Goals & Progress

Bout of Books Read-a-thon starts @ 12:01am on Monday! Unfortunately I will not be able to start right away. I need my beauty sleep for an interview. Once lunchtime hits though, it's on!


Bout of Books Read-a-Thon

My Goals:
My primary goal is to sit back and enjoy reading!
I also plan to read at least six books during the week. Crazy, I know!
This blog post will be updated daily.
Finally, I will participate in at least one twitter chat.


Books to Read:
Axe Cop: Bad Guy Earth (Vol 2) by Malachai Nicolle and Ethan Nicolle
Axe Cop Volume 3 by Malachai Nicolle and Ethan Nicolle
The Watch that Ends the Night by Allan Wolf
Hero by Perry Moore
The Girl in the Flammable Skirt by Aimee Bender (Short stories)
Shine by Lauren Myracle

Bonus:
Animal Crackers by Gene Luen Yang
Glass by Ellen Hopkins


Updates:

5/14
Number of books I’ve read today: 2
Total number of books I’ve read: 2
Books:
Animal Crackers by Gene Luen Yang
The Girl in the Flammable Skirt by Aimee Bender (Short stories)

5/15
Number of books I’ve read today: 2
Total number of books I’ve read: 4
Books:
Hero by Perry Moore
Axe Cop: Bad Guy Earth (Vol 2) by Malachai Nicolle and Ethan Nicolle


5/16
Number of books I’ve read today: 0
Total number of books I’ve read: 4
Books:
Started The Watch that Ends the Night by Allan Wolf


5/17
Number of books I’ve read today: 2
Total number of books I’ve read: 6
Books:
Axe Cop Volume 3 by Malachai Nicolle and Ethan Nicolle
The Watch that Ends the Night by Allan Wolf

I can't believe I've read six books already! One that was not originally on the list snuck in there (that happens when you forget your book, doh!). Since I have three days left, I'm going to go ahead and read the other two titles on the list above.


5/18
Number of books I’ve read today: 1
Total number of books I’ve read: 7
Books:
Shine by Lauren Myracle



Mini-Challenge: The Reading Housewives hosted the mini-challenge of combining two faves: Books and shoes! You can depict shoes that match a character or a book cover. I wasn't sure if I was going to participate, but my current read Shine made the decision for me.


Cat: "My feet hurt, however, because I made the mistake of wearing my silver plastic flip-flops with little jewels in the straps" (p. 84).










5/19
Number of books I’ve read today: 1
Total number of books I’ve read: 8
Books:
Hunger Games Tribute Guide by Emily Seife 


5/20
Number of books I've read today: 0
Total number of books I've read: 8
Books:
Started Glass, but didn't finish it until 5/21.





Thursday, May 3, 2012

Bout of Books Read-a-Thon!


 

This morning, I signed up to join in the Bout of Books Read-a-Thon! Things like this are now possible for me since I graduated last Saturday. *happy dance* Getting a Master's degree is very exciting, and having time to read again is the biggest perk so far.

I learned about the event from the Clock Rewinders feature from On a Book Bender. I really like that this event includes participation from the blogging community. As a sporadic blogger, my connection with other bloggers has been limited, so I'm looking forward to the opportunity to take part in something that allows me to introduce myself and my blog to others.

For information about the Bout of Books Read-a-Thon, visit the sign-up page.

Daughter of Smoke & Bone

Daughter of Smoke & Bone by Laini Taylor
New York, NY: Little Brown, 2011
418 pages
5 out of 5

Around the world, black handprints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In the dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grows dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherworldly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages--not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.

When one of the strangers--beautiful, haunted Akiva--fixes his fire-colored eyes on her an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret the truth about herself.

Under normal circumstances, I probably would not have picked up this book. Party, the cover didn't really appeal to me, but also because it's just not my genre. Thanks to the glowing recommendations from my coworkers, I gave it a try. It took about 100 pages for me to get really invested but now it's one of my favorites of 2012.

From the very beginning, Karou is an interesting character; she's covered in tattoos, collects languages, and naturally has blue hair. How awesome is that? Then she meets Akiva, the dark, brooding, but totally hot man toy. And life as she know it is changed forever. Paranormal titles require that the protagonist discover she has a secret power, identity past, etc. and this is no different, but there's something about the writing, and the way the characters interact, and the fact that it's not one-hundred percent focused on the secret Karou discovers that makes it hard to put down.

In the midst of everything she already knows about the demon world and what she discovers, she remains herself and true to the people around her. I've noticed in the limited number of novels I've read in similar genres that the girls just kind of face into their lives, almost forgetting about what they had before. Karou wants to be involved and wants to be a good friend, until she finds she other, more serious matters to attend to.

I loved this book and if you haven't picked it up, I cannot recommend it enough.

The sequel Days of Blood and Starlight comes out Nov. 6.

Also check out The Real Fauxtographer's photo inspired by the novel.

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

April Reads

I've decided to do a monthly listing of all that I've read and maybe highlight titles I really enjoyed. I've seen monthly wrap-ups on a few blogs, some I follow and others I don't. So this idea is definitely borrowed but not copied exactly. As least as far as I know.

I changed the numbering to keep track of the overall number of titles I've read so far.

April Books:

24. There's a Rat in My Soup: Could you Survive Medieval Food? by Chana Stiefel
25. Are You There God, It's Me Margaret? by Judy Blume
26. Amelia Anne is Dead and Gone by Kat Rosenfield*!
27. Boys of Steel: The Creators of Superman by Marc Tyler Nobelman & Ross MacDonald (illustrator)
28. Something About America by Maria Testa"
29. Au Revoir, Crazy European Chick by Joe Schreiber (audio)
30. The Influencing Machine by Brooke Gladstone and Josh Neufeld (illustrator)^
31. Whoogles by Kendall Almerico and Tess Hottenroth^
32. Chime by Franny Billingsly (audio)^
33. Fever Crumb by Phillip Reeve (audio)^
34. Robopocalypse by Daniel H. Wilson^
35. Beauty Queens by Libba Bray (audio)^
36. Sugar Changed the World by Marc Aronson & Marina Budhos^
37. My Boyfriend is a Monster 1: I Love Him to Pieces by Evonne Tsang^
38. Axe Cop Volume 1 by Malachai Nicolle and Ethan Nicolle^
39. Bootleg: Murder, Moonshine, and the Lawless Years of Prohibition by Karen Blumenthal^
40. Wandering Son Vol. 1 by Shimura Takako^
41. Dead on Town Line by Leslie Connor"
42. Okay for Now by Gary D. Schmidt (audio)^
43. A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin
44. Paper Covers Rock by Jenny Hubbard^**

I'm a little ashamed to admit that I've read my first Judy Blume book this month. Even my non-reading friend was amazed that I hadn't read any of her books. A wrong has been righted and I've added titles to all but one of my challenges:

*Debut Challenge (1)
^Best of the Best Challenge (13)
" Off the Shelf Challenge (2)
! New Adult Challenge (1) (Updated 6/30)

Great video about the pervasiveness & dare I saw awesomeness of Judy Blume.





**Update 5/3/12: I originally listed Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey by mistake. Though the covers are different, they have a similar feel and my mistake on Shelfari migrated here. All's fixed!