February 2012 Wrap-Up

Books Read and Reviewed (15 books)

1. Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs
2. Fables: Super Team
3. American Vampire by Jennifer Armintrout
4. Night of the Necromancer by Kyle West and Jelani Sims
5. Zombie Blondes by Brian James
6. A Gentleman Always Remembers by Candace Camp
7. An Affair without End by Candace Camp
8. The Stupidest Angel by Christopher Moore
9. Sunshine by Robin McKinley
10. MacBeth by Shakespeare
11. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
12. Doctor Who: Through Time and Space
13. The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs
14. You are So Undead to Me by Stacey Jay
15. Undead Much by Stacey Jay

1,000,000 Page Goal

Monthly Total: 4712  pages
Pages Remaining: 933,037 pages

Current Read

Flirting with Forever by Gwyn Cready

The Long Weekend by Salita Kalhan

Books Won (0)

Books I Gave Up On (0)

Challenges Completed (0)

Comments

I thought I would hit a reading rut this month.  So thankful that it didn’t happen.  I have some great plans to keep this reading streak going. 

Next Month’s TBR

• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
• Henry V by Shakespeare
• Immortals series by Alyson Noel
• The Mammoth Book of Regency Romance
• Palace Circle by Rebecca Dean
• Allison Hewitt is Trapped by Madeleine Roux
• Aftertime by Sophie Littlefield
• First Days by Rhiannon Frater
• Rise Again by Ben Tripp
• Pure by Julianna Baggott
• The Lost Summer of Louisa May Alcott
• Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters

 

Undead Much? by Stacey Jay

Title: Undead Much? (Megan Berry #2)

Author: Stacey Jay

Publisher: Razorbill 2010

Genre: Zombie

Pages: 304

Rating:   4 / 5 stars

Reading Challenges: Zombie; Support Your Local Library; Read Your Name – U

How I Got It: Library Loan

Megan Berry – Zombie Settler extraordinaire – just wants Pom Squad to trounce Cheer Team in this freakishly funny follow-up to You Are So Undead to Me. But someone’s turning coma victims into settler-resistant uber-zombies – and everyone thinks it’s Megan’s fault! Well, except for super-creepy male cheerleader Aaron. (Ew!)Meg’s also being stalked by a hot – albeit undead – seer named Cliff. Can Cliff’s premonitions help Megan stop a zombies-on-ice deathscapade and discover who’s really behind the coma-killer crusade before an entire army of undead rise up? And when Megan’s boyfriend Ethan grows jealous of Cliff, will it end their intra-settler romance?

Another surprise.  I really didn’t think I was going to like this one, and I was wrong.  It was a fun zombie book with enough gore and creep out factor to keep me reading.  I don’t think I liked it quite as much as the first one.  Really the first one could have been a stand alone.  This one continues her story and adds lots of conspiracy layers.  I still liked tha Megan actually acted like a 16-year-old.  Even though I wanted to smack her a few times for her immaturity.  It was fun.  Not overly amazing.  It’s not going to appear on my Top 10 list for the year, but it was a great two day read.

 

  

 

Quote Wednesday – Anne of Avonlea

“Perhaps, after all, romance did not come into one’s life with pomp and blare, like a gay knight riding down; perhaps it crept to one’s side like an old friend through quiet ways; perhaps it revealed itself in seeming prose, until some sudden shaft of illumination flung athwart its pages betrayed the rhythm and the music; perhaps . . . perhaps . . . love unfolded naturally out of a beautiful friendship, as a golden-hearted rose slipping from its green sheath.”
L.M. Montgomery- Anne of Avonlea

I seem to have a thing for quotes about love the last couple of weeks.  But I found this one, and absolutely love it.  Anne of Avonlea is one of my childhood books.  I wanted to be Anne.  I wanted to live in her village and fall in love.  This quote speaks to how I see love and romance.  We should not expect all the fiery love-at-first-sight nonsense.  Instead, look for the love that creeps up on you.  The one that has been there growing, but you have been too busy to notice.  There you just might find your one true love.

 

You are So Undead to Me by Stacey Jay

Title: You are So Undead to Me  (Megan Berry #1)

Author: Stacey Jay

Publisher: Razorbill 2009

Genre: Zombie

Pages: 272

Rating:   4 / 5 stars

Reading Challenges: Zombie; What’s in a Name – Creepy Crawly; Support Your Local Library; States Challenge – Arkansas

How I Got It: Library Loan

Fifteen-year-old Megan Berry is a Zombie Settler by birth, which means she’s part-time shrink to a bunch of dead people with a whole lot of issues.All Megan wants is to be normal – and go to homecoming, of course. Unfortunately, it’s a little difficult when your dates keep getting interrupted by a bunch of slobbering Undead.

Things are about to get even more complicated for Megan. Someone in school is using black magic to turn average, angsty Undead into flesh-eating Zombies, and it’s looking like homecoming will turn out to be a very different kind of party – the bloody kind.

Megan must stop the Zombie apocalypse descending on Carol, Arkansas. Her life – and more importantly, homecoming – depends on it.

I have a confession: I thought this was going to be an uber-stupid teenage novel about the right hair or getting the cute boy. I thought was going to make fun of this novel and wonder how it even was published.   But I was wrong (mostly).  Megan is a teenager.  She does care about making the dance team and getting a date for the Homecoming Dance.  But she’s also a settler with a lot more power than she thinks.  She make act immature at times, but she is fifteen.  It’s refreshing to see a young adult novel where the young adult actually acts like a young adult, not an adult stuck in a teenage body.  I think I would have been over the moon with this book if I was fifteen.  Megan Berry would have been my hero.  Even as an almost-30-year-old, I really enjoyed this book.  I enjoyed it so much that I picked up the sequel to read next. 

 

  

 

Music Monday — 2007

As part of my ongoing celebration for my 30th birthday, I am highlighting some popular songs from throughout my years.  Songs were picked based off of a list of Grammy award winners and Billboard Top 100.  Then, I chose my favorites to highlight.  

Year: 2007

Book: Lost in Austen by Emma Campbell Webster

Music Selections:

1. The White Stripes “Icky Thump”
2. Amy Winehouse “Rehab”
3. Maroon 5 “Makes Me Wonder”
4. Paramore “Misery Business”

 

 

The Sunday Salon #3

Listening To: Just my giant iPod shuffle.  Nothing specific, going where the shuffle takes me.

Book finished:  Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets; Macbeth; Doctor Who: Through Time and Space; The Year of Living Biblically

Reading: You are So Undead to Me by Stacey Jay

Making Lists: Getting my birthday month prizes ready for my first ever blog giveaway (check back on March 1st!)

Around the house: Does anyone else get this great feeling when all the towels and sheets have been washed and put back in their place?  I do.  I love that clean and orderly feeling.

From the kitchen: I was going to bake some muffins this weekend, but it seems we don’t have any room in the freezer to store them.  So baking will be next weekend.  We are slowly working through our freezer meals and I have to say I love it.  I don’t have to think as much about dinner.  We just eat whatever I pull from the freezer the night before.  Speaking of…  I need to pull something out as soon as I finish this post.

On the Web: I’m feeling the temptation of Pinterest…  It’s calling my name.  But I know that if I join, it will turn into a new time-sucker.  I must resist.

Weekly Quote: I absolutely adore my Quote Wednesday post from Persuasion by Jane Austen.

Crafting: Absolutely none.  I was going finish my Disney scrapbook, but needed to get my blog in order for March.  Hopefully next weekend.

Work Observations: How can people use this many supplies in a week?  Are they eating them instead of their lunch?  Sometimes I really wonder.

Watching: More Bond (we’re on to Timothy Dalton) and Stargate.  The server went down a few days ago and it’s currently in the rebuilding process.  So we had to make do.  And by make do, I mean we had to rely on our ~1500 dvd discs physically sitting in the basement.  How have we survived the week?

Wondering: How dedicating the month of Lent to reading, reviewing, and blogging counts?  Isn’t Lent supposed to be about giving something up, recognizing the sacrifice of the Hebrews under Egyptian rule?   Apparently some book bloggers (I won’t name who) have decided that reading and reviewing is a sacrifice…  just another ridiculous “I fit religion to how I live my life” moment.

From Nature: We’ve been having very warm temperatures for being the end of February.  I’m a little scared that this means we’re going to have multiple late freezes or a drought this summer.

Shopping Scores: I’ve been planning our Spring Break road trip and so have been on the hunt for lap desks for the boys.  I have a laptop desk, but it has ridges.  J has a smooth one, but it’s way too big for 9-year-old laps.  I searched Amazon, but the bad pictures didn’t give me an idea of relative size or ridge or no ridge.  Amazingly enough, I found perfect flat with bean rests at Hobby Lobby.  Search mission accomplished!

Project: Preparing my blog for March birthday madness.  I have posts scheduled for every day in March on top of my usual memes and book reviews.  I have just a little more to finish before it’s completely ready.

Picture: My TBR bookshelf.  Originally I was going to read everything on the shelf and only refill when it was completely empty.  It’s turned into I refill whenever I finish a few books and the rest plus library books spill over to and into the ottomon.  Really not working so well.

On Friday I made myself a little list of weekend-to-do.

• Library crawl — I made it to the newly remodeled library.  They have a much better adult fiction selection than the one I usually go to, but I didn’t see a Young Adult section at all.
• Prep my huge collection of March posts —They are 90% done.  I just need to add a bit of writing here and there and it will be done.
• Finish my Disney trip scrapbook — Nope, not done at all.
• Catch up on Downton Abbey — Nope
• Catch up on The Vampire Diaries — Nope
• Laundry/dishwashing/bathroom cleaning — I did get all of the laundry and dishes done.  The bathroom was Swiffered, but that’s it.  I think that’s enough.  We don’t make huge messes, so it was just a bit of tidying up.

 

The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs

Title: The Year of Living Biblically

Author: A.J. Jacobs

Publisher: Simon and Schuster 2008

Genre: Nonfiction

Pages: 416

Rating:   3 / 5 stars

Reading Challenges: Dewey Decimal — 200s; Mixing It Up — Journalism and Humor; A to Z — Y

How I Got It: Library Loan

Raised in a secular family but increasingly interested in the relevance of faith in our modern world, A.J. Jacobs decides to dive in headfirst and attempt to obey the Bible as literally as possible for one full year. He vows to follow the Ten Commandments. To be fruitful and multiply. To love his neighbor. But also to obey the hundreds of less publicized rules: to avoid wearing clothes made of mixed fibers; to play a ten-string harp; to stone adulterers.

The resulting spiritual journey is at once funny and profound, reverent and irreverent, personal and universal and will make you see history’s most influential book with new eyes.

I read Jacob’s first experiment The Know-It-All about him reading the Encyclopedia.  I laughed out loud through most of the book.  So I went into this book with high hopes.  A secular Jewish man living in NYC decides to follow the Biblical rules.  I thought I would laugh at his escapades; at least chuckle.

Unfortunately, I grew more and more angry as the book progressed.  Jacobs begins noticing things about life in his episodes.  I can appreciate these.  For example, he realizes that his life is bombarded with media.  Once he turns it all off, he enjoys more life.  I can get it.  But then he gets way too obsessive over these rules.  I just can’t get behind these at all.  In discussing parenting, he comes to the conclusion that he must impart religion to his son otherwise he will end up an atheist criminal or a crazy fundamentalist.  This seems like a strong either-or concept  as opposed to a rational parenting choice.  Another point of contention is the whole creationism vs. evolution debate.  In discussing he comes to the conclusion:

“I believe that’s a key motivation to creationsim: the need to feel less inconsequential.  I remember Mark Looy–the publicist for the Creation Museum–saying, ‘Evolution says that we are the product of random processes.  That we evolved via pond scum.  When we say that, we’re not applying much value to humanity.  If we say we’re a product of accidents and random processes, how much purpose and hope does that give to our youth’” (page 107)

I have multiple issues with this: 1. Evolution is not ‘accidents and random processes,’ it’s adaptation to the purpose for better chances of survival.  2. Why does evolution lead to not valuing humanity? It doesn’t.  We  can value life for the sake of life.  3. Purpose and hope is a human concept.  One that we can consciously impart.  It’s these types of discussions that I just had trouble getting through.

In the end, Jacobs ends up as a “reverent agnostic” but one who still plans on observing the Sabbath and praying to God (which God, I’m not sure).  At times, I agree with his observations about modern life.  I applaud his taking the time to examine his life.  I just have issues in some of his conclusions.  For these reasons, I gave the book 3 stars.  It’s well-written… just not for me.

  

 

Weekend Plans

Many around the book blogging community are participating in a GoodReads Catch Up Readathon hosted by Once Upon a Chapter.  I thought about it.  I do so love my readathons.  But then I started thinking about everything else I wanted to do this weekend and next week.  And the readathon started to seem like a chore.  So I won’t be participating this time around.  I have some other things that I want to get done today, tomorrow, and Sunday:

• Library crawl — Yep that’s right, a library crawl.  I’ve lived in Omaha for over 6 months and still haven’t been to most of the branch libraries.  So I decided this would be the perfect time.  And the library closest to my house just reopened after a huge renovation project.  I want to find the best magazine, children’s, and graphic novel areas.  Those always seem to be lacking at the branch I usually go to (it’s right between home and work). 
• Prep my huge collection of March posts — I’m gearing up for a month long event celebrating my 30th birthday.  I have posts scheduled every day.  Plus, I’m hosting a big giveaway (tune back in March 1st for details).  I need to have all of that basically ready to go by March 1st so I don’t get behind.
• Finish my Disney trip scrapbook — I have less than a third to go…
• Catch up on Downton Abbey — I just started season 2 the other night and have been itching to get back into it
• Catch up on The Vampire Diaries — I’m only one episode behind.  Unfotunately, I have to watch it on cwtv.com because our server went down the other day.  It’s rebuilding, but will probably take a few days.
• Laundry/dishwashing/bathroom cleaning — Oh the joys of chores.  I need to schedule these, otherwise they never get done.

Quite a list of things for this weekend.  And on top of all that, I am toying with a self-imposed readathon on Sunday… But I guess I have to get through most of the list first. 

Btw: A double check on my GoodReads Challenge shows that I am 8 books ahead of my goal (total 200).  I think that will hold me for awhile.

 

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling

Title: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Author: J.K. Rowling

Publisher: Scholastic 1999

Genre: Young Adult Fantasy

Pages: 352

Rating:   5 / 5 stars

Reading Challenges: HP; My Years

How I Got It: Own it!

This one is a reread for me.  It’s been awhile since I read the series.  I remember reading the first couple of books out loud to the boys when they were infants.  SO that’s what eight years ago?  I read the last few books as they came out, but overall it’s been awhile.

Instead of doing a traditional review, I thought I would just give you some of my reread thoughts.  Things I noticed, things I loved, quotes I like, etc.  And then I will have a mini review of movie vs. book.

Book fun:

• Favorite scene: From this book I have a few favorite scenes.  First, the introduction of Gilderoy Lockheart in Flourish and Blotts is too cringe-worthy.  I want to get away from him just like Harry.  But the way Rowling writes it, I see everything play out in my mind.  Second, I love Harry and Ron’s arrival to Hogwarts (car and whomping willow), but especially the scolding they get from Snape.  He’s so scary.  I love it.  Finally, I love the Deathday Party for Nearly Headless Nick.  I can almost smell the rotten food.
• Favorite character:  I’m going to have to god with Tom Riddle for this book.  Even though we don’t meet him until Chapter 13, it’s just an amazing reveal.  We’re as much in the dark as Harry until the final showdown in the Chamber.  He is such a memorable character!
• Favorite expressions: “Definitely dodgy” (Ron) {I really think we Americans need to start using the word dodgy, Love it!], “load of dung” (Fred), “great sizzling dragon bogies” (Filch)
• I forgot how slow this book seems to be.  The basilisk doesn’t petrify it’s first victim until page 146.  And then everything just seems to happen at once.
• Rowling spends a lot of time in the beginning of the book discussing the wizarding world and points from the first book.  I guess given the that this is book two and it was targeted at elementary students, it would make sense.  But for me, I skimmed through parts of a few chapters to get to the new information. If I’m remembering correctly, this decreases as the books go on.
• Tom Riddle was a prefect and won a trophy for “closing” the Chamber.  I completely forgot how accomplished he was while at Hogwarts.  It puts a whole new spin on the sociopath angle.

Favorite quotes:

• “Because that’s what Hermione does,” said Ron shrugging.  “When in doubt, go to the library” (255)
• “It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.” (Dumbledore) (333)

Movie fun:

Overall I really like this movie adaptation.  It follows the book fairly completely.  The story retains the suspense and disbelief without all of the repetition of the backstory.  The Hogwart’s world is beautiful and moody.  And of course, Alan Rickman’s Snape is one of my favorite characters to see on the big screen.  It’s great to see the kids starting to grow up and come into their own.

My favorite scenes:  The dueling club.  I absolutely love the grandeur.  Plus, Lockheart versus Snape is just the height of movie drama.  And don’t you just love Lockheart’s dueling outfit.  Hee hee

Things I wished to see, but didn’t:  The Deathday Party.  I love the house ghosts and wish they could have worked in more scenes with them, especially Nearly Headless Nick.  I know it would have added too many minutes to the movie, but still it would have been nice.

 

Macbeth by Shakespeare

Title: Macbeth

Author: William Shakespeare

Genre: Classic Play

Pages: 204 (Cliffsnotes complete edition)

Rating:  5 / 5 stars

Reading Challenges: Shakespeare; Support Your Local Library

This is only my second time reading Macbeth; the first time was way back at the beginning of college.  In review the play, I think it has grown on me.  The political intrigue and psychological elements have become favorites.  I really enkoyed tracing Macbeth and Lady Macbeth’s gradual downfalls.  Lady started out cold and merciless and eventual commits suicide over her guilt.  Macbeth starts with guilt and gradually grows more cold and calculating.  I love seeing the resversal of roles.  I find it fascinating how many people suspect Macbeth of Duncan’s murder and yet fail to do anything until the very end of the play.  I really emjoyed this one.  Can’t wait until next month’s selection: Henry V (new read for me)