Book Rant: Never Fade

RATING: 4.5

GENRE: Dystopian, YA

SERIES: The Darkest Minds, #2

Hello my lovelies! Today we are discussing the second installment of Alexandra Bracken’s The Darkest Minds trilogy, Never Fade. What this series is about is the majority of the American population under the age of 20 is dead from this plague that targeted children, the children that survive are mutated and have these powers that fall into 5 categories and the government deems them a threat so they are put into concentration camps. Ruby, our main girl has escaped from one of these where she was help for 7 years. That is the first book. This book has so much happening in it, we start out with the Children’s League who obviously doesn’t really care about the children at all they’re just a tool. And the end of the first book, I think we all remember (ahem, we’re emotionally traumatized) by that. Go pick up this book, I didn’t love it as much as the first but it was still fantastic and I can’t wait until the last one! (in October?) Spoilers past here! Bye if you haven’t read the book!

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When we first start this book it 6 months later and she’s on an op for the Children’s League to get back this guy. It was incredibly confusing at first becasue we are given so much information, out of order, all at once. I didn’t remember Rob was a bad guy at this point, I had completely forgotten that relevance which was my bad becasue it’s the entire reason any of the first book happens. Important details. Ah. Should pick up on those. Anyway we get this captive they came to rescue, pull of the bag at it’s Liam!  Oh my god, he’s back in the story already! Nope! It’s Cole, his older brother. At first I didn’t like Cole, I didn’t trust him, partly becasue everything we know about him we heard from Liam and it wasn’t a lot of good things, and partly becasue I don’t trust people over the age of 20 in this book. That changed, super abruptly right at the end, Cole is a RED. An adult has these powers that only kids are supposed to have! I had to read that paragraph twice just to be sure I understood it. How many other adults have powers? I get keeping it a secret, it’s a way more powerful tool if no one expects it, but why not tell Liam? Your brother? That would probably help patch up that relationship and bit for him to understand, Cole has these powers to and he was struggling to figure them out like you were. But before we find this all out, zero trust for Cole. While the shower scene was hilarious I didn’t believe he wasn’t with Rob, or setting some sort of trap. Then Vida shows up and I’m convinced she’s a double agent. Well, she is, but a more evil double agent.

We have this new character Jude and he mirrors Zu a fair bit and what Zu could be. We better see Zu in the next book! But Jude is so sweet and has so much control over himself. He’s also very young, not age wise becasue he is 15, but I found him very naive which made me feel protective of him the same way Ruby did. I love when he’s explain why he doesn’t mind being called Judith becasue he does find anything insulting about being called a girl. It such an odd thing to think about a 15 year old boy saying. When we realize at the end that he isn’t out there with them and Liam and Chubes go looking for him I so thought he was going to come back, maybe hurt but he was so innocent and young he just couldn’t be killed, not like that. And Liam brings back the necklace and still didn’t believe it. Someone comes out of the rubble and I was so hopeful, but it Clancy. It’s just so unfair that Clancy was the one to walk away and not Jude.

When we are first reunited with Chubes at Liam’s house, first I was all “yay Chubes!” then he calls out for Liam and I reread that bit so may times becasue I was so confused. I thought Liam was with him, but no. That was TWICE Alexandra Bracken convinced me he was back in the story, right at the beginning too!  We aren’t even halfway and she’s had my hopes up twice!

I loved the woman with the tickets and how she wrote “Stay Safe” on them when Ruby thought she had her under control. Then Andy who helped them out too, it was really touching to see that not all people were awful and wanted to contain these kids and turn them in for money.

Ruby in the first book was super hesitant about using her powers and in this book, she has no such problems. What she did to Rob with torturing him with the images of these kids he killed and ending up killing him. On the one hand, he probably deserves t and I was so thrilled she had complete control over her powers but on the other hand it was so evil and dark and twisted. She really stooped to the level of the other oranges in my option and I was really disappointed with her becasue I held her to a better standard.  The fact that she feel bad about it gives me hope that she’ll be able to dial it back and not do something like that again, but it was really a bitter-sweet scene. The heart-to-heart she had with Vida about it though was so great. I loved seeing Vida’s character develop becasue she has a tough shell but below that she really cares about her group so those little bonding moments were great.

Fake East River. We are captured and told we are going to “the slip kid” obviously I think it’s Clancy! I’m panicking, get your butt outta there! We can’t be trapped by Clancy again! Have you forgotten last time?! But it’s not him. It’s this fake kid, Knox, and he’s this Blue-as-the-superior-race dictator guy. Clancy was the same for orange, but he at least pretended he was a fair leader and that he gave a shit. We go into that tent and Liam is in the middle of it…oh wait, he’s dying! It was this emotional roller-coaster.  So Ruby goes and she says she’s going to fix it and that was really anti-climatic. I was expecting her bust in and kick-ass but engages Knox in this conversation trying to get him to touch her and her burns her hand with his cigarette. Who does that?! Next day we have the girls fighting in the ring of fire. And this Red comes out! I was a little confused up to this point about what reds actually did but they are fire. They control it, they generate it. Ruby finally gets her shit together and figures out how to control her power and this was probably her best moment becasue she doesn’t hurt anyone or force anyone to do anything, she just frees the red from his “programming” and frees the kids and kicks out the evil leader.

Liam and the mind-wipe. We know he sort of remembers her because he says he recognizes her and he clearly cares about her. He’s on the team that picked her up after the Rob fiasco and he’s freaking out (understandable, our main character was stabbed and captured, I was freaking out too!) Then Ruby sneaks away and Liam comes to comfort her and she tells him that lie! I just wanted to shake her! Stop! Tell him the truth! He’s a big boy, he can handle it! We get this scene in the gas station where Ruby is like “I know you hate me.” and Liam says “Hate you? I love with you! I don’t even know you, but I love you!” And then she takes down the blocks on his mind somehow and immediately I’m super excited because maybe she can fix her parents!

Back together with Clancy, she has a gun on him and she doesn’t shoot! Why would you even let him speak? A) he has the ability to lie like everyone else, seriously you are skeptical of everyone else except him?! B) he can control your mind. When we realize he isn’t there when everyone asks Ruby who she is talking too. Ah! Idiots! Knocking him out and putting him in a closet, sweet victory! But no. he gets out of the closet and escapes a collapsing building being bombed. WHY WON’T YOU DIE?! Then when he appears no one puts a bullet in his head. They want to trade him? No! Why? He could mind control his way out of this situation any minute, if he’s not, it means he’s bidding his time and using you until the opportune moment. But he was helpful becasue we find out that there is a cure to the disease and to the powers. Why Ruby needed that hard copies I’m not sure becasue I’m pretty sure that is what is on the flash drive Cate has safely. Apart from the dramatic revel of them, of course. Where was she keeping them?! I’m picturing a folder or binder, or even if it’s just pieces of paper where have they been? Hidden in her shirt?

This is so long! But there are so many things happening in this book, I didn’t get them all, I know. But I have to cut it off. Bye guys!

Confessions of a Book Blogger

Hi darlings. I started writing a Book Rant on Never Fade and I’m just not feeling it today.  I did something like this last year called 10 Random Facts About Me and today I’m going to give you another completely truthful 10 random facts about yours truly.

1. My perfume is called P.S I love you. It’s a light rose scent with a bit of citrus and it was from Bath and Body Works but it has been discontinued. I have about half a bottle left then I will probably switch to Paris Amour (Essentially the same thing also from Bath and Body Works but it has a vanilla under tone instead of a musk) I have other perfumes, but I don’t wear them much as I find them too strong, especially in summer. Most of them I’ve had for years, does perfume and body mist expire?

2. My bedroom is white with a red accent wall and on one of the white walls I write music, books and movie quotes that I really liked in black sharpie. The most recently added is “I’ll be damned, Cupid’s demanding back his arrow” Begin Again, great movie, I loved it.

3. I must have told you guys this, but I am going to Greece in a few weeks

4. I cannot park in a parking stall that is on my right. I can’t do it. It never works. It doesn’t matter if the lot is totally empty I can never get perfectly in the lines.

5. My number 1 celebrity crush has always and will always be Orlando Bloom. First time I watched Lord of the Rings when I was like in grade…4? I read the books summer before 5 for sure and had a hardcore fictional crush on Legolas.

6. I watch shows on HGTV. That’s the home improvement channel if you don’t know, and it’s a little embarrassing.

7. I will only buy Maybelline mascara.

8. I will not leave the house without doing my eyebrows with an eyebrow pencil. I will go out without foundation or concealer or mascara  or anything else, but my eyebrows need to be done. And this is a recent makeup development. I never used to pay any attention to my eyebrow then just before grad I bought an eyebrow pencil on a whim and it just makes your face so much more expressive and you look more put together no matter what your hair and the rest of your make up is doing. There, beauty thoughts with Lizzie.

9. Lily is my favourite How I Met Your Mother character, not Barney though I do love him too.

None of these are book related! Ok I’ll try and make the last one bookish.

10. I was sorted into Gryffindor by Pottermore.  I was pretty shocked I thought I was going to be a Hufflepuff becasue most people I know are Hufflepuffs but, yeah.

There, out on the internet, more random things about me! Bye guys!

 

*scoff* You read YA novels?!

This is going to be a rant. And it’s something that really, really, really frustrates me to no end. When people immediately pass judgment and look down on books (and by extent the people who read them) simply becasue of where they sit in a book store. YA or Young Adult novel means the following: THE MAIN CHARACTER IS A TEENAGER. A book is categorized into “children” “YA” or “adult” (or this new thing “new adult” that I have never seen in real life) based on how old the characters are. Obviously there are some exceptions made for content reasons but it’s not like (as some people will make it seem) that there is a freaking checklist on what makes a book “adult” or “YA”. Oh, vampire love interest: YA, oh real life problem: adult, oh relationship drama: YA.

You could say you don’t particularly like reading from a teenager perspective, that’s fine. I don’t like much sci-fi. No problem. But don’t look down on me becasue I’m reading a book labeled YA.  I relate better to novels told by teenagers, why? Because I’m a fucking teenager! Even if I don’t relate to the situation, I think very much like these characters. Not all YA books are vapid, frivolous, insignificant drama-ridden novels as they are often portrayed. Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein, YA novel. It about WW2 British spy captured by the Nazis. Won a bunch of literary awards. Wait, this is the point when someone says “so it’s like Twilight/Hunger Games/Divergent/TFIOS?” Because all YA books fall into those categories, right? Harry Potter, have you heard of that one? Only the biggest franchise in the history of ever. IT’S A CHILDREN’S BOOK!  I will admit, a lot of YA books have a romantic element. So do a lot of adult book. There’s an entire genre for it. Romance. Dan Brown’s books all have a love interest, not what the story is about, but its still there! Does that make it automatically YA too? And don’t tell me becasue there is a vampire in it falling in love that it is a YA book. Because I can go into any book store and pick out 10 adult romance novels involving sexy vampires and werewolves and shit.

I read a lot of YA books. I also read “children” books. And “adult” books. And classics. There are well written stories and poorly written stories and the way books fall into those two categories is purely personal.It’s like being in a store that sells only apples and they all look the same and until you bite into them you don’t know if they are good or bad. And you, sir/ma’am, are judging me becasue my apple is from the top left shelf and yours is from the middle right. You haven’t bitten my apple, you don’t know how good or bad it is! Oh, you only read classic, established literature. Good for fucking you. Now PIPE THE FUCK DOWN AND LET ME READ WHAT I WANT WITHOUT YOUR CONSTANT JUDGMENT OVER HOW WELL-WRITTEN MY BOOK IS BASE OFF WHICH FUCKING SHELF I PICKED IT OFF OF!

Book Rant: Vampire Academy

RATING: 4

GENRE: Paranormal, YA

SERIES: Vampire Academy, #1

WARNING: I am REALLY sleep deprived. I went to bed at 4am. Guys I am behind on my Book Blogging. I actually read Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead a few days ago and I am in a mourning period (AKA: Book hangover) When I was reading the book I was enjoying it but not in love with it and I finished it think “oh, that was a decent book.” and it wasn’t until I tried reading another book and no. I could it was too soon! Too soon for a rebound book.

 I  also rented the movie on iTunes and watched that. (I really liked it! It was funny and almost like  satire) I have been avoiding this series like the plague becasue I thought it was going to be like the House of Night series which I have so much hatred towards, but it’s not. Rose is so kick-ass and strong and Dimitri, I have another fictional crush. Does anyone not know the premise of this book? Because I’m so late to the party. In case you are like me and are really behind, Lissa Dragomir is a Moroi princess, a mortal vampire who can control one of the four elements. The Strigoi are immortal, have no access to magic and cannot go out in sunlight. They are also out to get the princess Lissa. Rose Hathaway is a dhampir a mix of human and moroi vampire blood run through her and she is Lissa’s best friend and guardian. Well, self-assigned guardian-in-training. It’s been two years since Lissa and Rose have escaped the wrought iron gates of St. Vladimir’s Academy, a school for Moroi and their guardians to train and learn. Rose and Lissa are on the run but the Academy isn’t keen on letting the princess get away and they find themselves being dragged back to the Academy by a gorgeous male dhampir who becomes Rose’s mentor. But Rose and Lissa ran away for a reason, not everything dangerous is outside the walls. So many booktubers and bookbloggers and reviews have said that you just need to get past the first two book, after that the series gets so much better, but I really enjoyed this book and it gets BETTER?! Spoilers past here!

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Mason is Rose’s best friend besides Lissa and he’s so cute and sweet I just want to hug him! I don’t necessarily want him to be with Rose becasue of Dimitri but I kind of do at the same time. He’s just so awesome, their little flirtation/teasing moments are the best. Like when we are first introduced to him, their banter about thinking about Rose naked. This is a series where you know someone you really like is going to get offed and I really DON’T want it to be Mason, but I’m really scared it will be. Lissa can’t be killed. So far the entire purpose of the series is keep Lissa safe so if she’s dead, oops no more story line.

Christian! I love Christian right when we met him I knew he was going to be this awesome in-depth, interesting character. I did have to agree with Rose at the beginning, he was a little creepy, stalker like. I do love him and I love him with Lissa but constantly watching someone you barely know and then informing them that you have been watching them by mentioning all their secrets you have found out, is a touch on the creepy side. Actually a lot. By the end I was a huge fan of him, I love him and Lissa and how he looks out for her.

Lissa goes through this crazy, power hungry journey to get back at Mia becasue of the stupid rumor she started about Rose being a blood-whore.  And it gets so out of hand and so just frustrating to see Lissa acting like such a child and making it all about popularity . Rose was trying to help her but Lissa refused to let herself be helped. When Rose tells about Lissa’s cutting to save her life becasue she’d gone too far, Lissa just gets so mad and stops talking to her. She told your secret, but saved your life. She’s trying to help.

When Lissa is kidnapped and Rose goes to Dimitri there is the stupid necklace make-out scene. (as in the necklace is stupid and annoying, not the scene.) It was so frustrating!  Obviously I want Rose and Dimitri together, I love that power couple and just having them together kicking ass but I was mentally screaming at the the whole time to go help Lissa! You idiots the necklace has a compulsion on it! Hit pause, get rid of hit, go save the princesses butt then come back to this relationship mess! It took so long after Dimitri first took off the necklace then picked it back up again to figure it out and actually throw it away. I’m not blaming him, but Lissa! Still on the Dimitri subject but back at the middle, Rose has this line that was just so funny: “I was crushing on my mentor. Crushing on my older mentor. I had to be out of my mind. He was seven years older than me. Old enough to be my…well, okay, nothing.” then in the movie the the version of this line was equally funny and I loved how they fit together. “I’m crushing on my mentor, Dimitri, who’s old enough to be…not my father, but like an uncle. Like a disturbingly sexy uncle.” and that line made the original line funnier. Maybe this is just me.

Prince Victor, that little bitch! I did not suspect him through this whole thing! And Natalie! When she came out as a strigoi I was in shock! They were good friends! I thought she was so happy to be part of this “popular royal clique” with Lissa and Rose and she just completely turns on them and has been manipulating Lissa. I do see Prince Victor’s point though, his overall goal makes a lot of sense. Christian beings it up earlier to, I like that parallel. But the moroi need to learn how to fight and use their magic as a weapon. The dhampir’s really get the short end of things, they are almost slaves and the moroi look down on them but they’re constantly risking their lives to protect them against evil, soulless vampires who and stronger and faster than them! What Victor is trying to achieve is like how it was way back when where moroi and dhampir’s fought side by side, neither one was above the other becasue they both mutually needed each other. Like I said, while I support Victor’s endgame, I love Lissa and he can’t just end her life for his vision. What he should have done was explain all this to her and then have her try to become queen so she can enact his idea. But no. he had to kidnap her and make his daughter go Strigoi.

That is it for this book rant!What are your thoughts? I’ll talk to you guy later! Bye!

Book Rant: Lola and The Boy Next Door

RATING: 3.5

GENRE: Contemporary, romance, YA

SERIES: Companion Novel with Anna and the French Kiss

Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins. This is a really cutesy love story. It’s like a happy pill, it has a happy ending, the problems in it are relatable and get worked out with minimum mess. I know, I was in a situation very like Lola’s and for me it did not go NEARLY that well.  But it was nice to see it play out better, I really liked it though I will admit to stressing out about it. I thought she was going to get hurt, she wasn’t, it’s fine. I don’t consider that a spoiler by the way, Lola does not get physically injured in this book.   Most of you are probably like “what? Ok thanks” then there is probably the 1% of you who have read this book AND had the same thought process that I did while reading it.

Anyway, I should probably tell you what this book is about becasue you might be confused at this point. Lola is 17 ad she has a passion for fashion. Well not fashion, costumes. |Fashion is common and dull, costumes are expressive. She doesn’t wish for much: 1) to wear a Marie Antoinette dress to the winter formal with kick-ass boots 2) To have her two dads approve of her 22-year-old rocker boyfriend and 3) to never see the Bell twins again. Unfortunately the Bell’s move back next door  and when Cricket tires to rekindle their broken friendship, Lola is once again faced with her life-long crush for him.

I enjoyed this book, it was sweet. I flew through it. It was incredibly predictable but most romantic, fluffy contemporaries are and I don’t mind it in this case. The characters were good, I loved Anna and I didn’t realized until the end that it was the Anna from Anna and the French Kiss so I guess I should go pick that one up becasue I loved her! There won’t be a spoilery section from this becasue, like most contemporaries, I had nothing to say about them. I liked it, I recommend you go read it.

Bye darlings! Kisses!

I AM OFFICIALLY ACCEPTED INTO UNIVERSITY!

Guys! Guys! Guess what! What the title says! I was officially accepted today!

I don’t know how it works in other places but where I am you get tentative admission first and then when you write your final exams if your average doesn’t meet where it was when you got the tentative admission (within 1-2%, they aren’t that mean) you don’t get it. I don’t even have my exam marks yet. I don’t know what I got. And I don’t ever care! I AM INTO MY NURSING PROGRAM! Dance party! Look at it! It’s a beautiful green check mark!

I can’t breathe right now! I’m so happy and relieved!

 

Book Rant: The Darkest Minds

RATING: 5

GENRE: Dystopian, YA

SERIES: The Darkest Minds, #1

The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken! Oh my god. Oh my God. Oh my God. This book. I think I have a new series to list among my favourites. It’s already in the top 5, after one book! That is so rare, normally it takes until the second.  I can’t even think of a way to explain it and do it justice so here is the beginning of the Goodreads description then I will try and elaborate! “When Ruby woke up on her tenth birthday, something about her had changed. Something alarming enough to make her parents lock her in the garage and call the police. Something that gets her sent to Thurmond, a brutal government “rehabilitation camp.” She might have survived the mysterious disease that’s killed most of America’s children, but she and the others have emerged with something far worse: frightening abilities they cannot control.” This disease appears when you are 10 and it’s fetal. If you don’t die it means the disease triggered something and mutated your genes in such away that instead of killing you left you with special abilities. These kids are set off to concentration camps to be sorted by strength and controlled while the remaining adult public is feed propaganda of the children being cured.  Greens are the most “normal” with their photographic memory and code-cracking skills. Blue is telekinesis. Yellow’s have the power to control electricity. Orange is telepathy and mind control and finally Red, who are all taken and killed.  I think it’s best going into the book not knowing much more than that. Bye if you haven’t read the book! Spoilers past here!

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Jumping straight to Clancy. What was your initial opinion of Clancy? Personally I really liked him and I thought there was going to be a love triangle. What Alexandra Bracken did really well, and what I LOVE when authors manage to do is that I was on the same page as Ruby the whole time. It’s really frustrating when your character realizes something out of the blue that wasn’t foreshadowed and it equally (if not more) frustrating when the answer is so obvious and your character can’t see it! At first I was defending Clancy in my mind, especially when Chubs said the camp was run like the concentration camps/reform centers in the way they all eat at the same time and they all have to work. On the one hand yes, that is like the centers, on the other, realistic hand it has to be set up that way. There has to be structure, they have limited food if everyone could just eat whatever they want whenever they would run out of food. Everyone has to work, again the camp has these “x” number of jobs that need to get done in order to keep running and if you want to reap the benefits of the “tribe” you have to pitch in.   I really thought he was sounding like a spoiled brat, I still think he was actually in regards to that comment specifically. I honestly thought Clancy was being a good leader and not abusing his orange power. It seemed like he used to keep the peace but compared to what we had seen the other oranges doing it seemed positively saintly. Most of his rules seemed to make sense too, the only on that didn’t was the “you can’t leave with out permission.” If he was actually a good leader and not the crazy person he turned out to be “you can leave anytime you want, but you are on your own. I’m not going to risk everyone else to help you if you decided to leave and run into trouble.” I started to distrust Clancy when he talked about wanting to learn how to wipe minds. And then when he paralyzed her and was touching her, alarm! Alarm! Alarm! It seems like he’s doing these things out of jealousy at first but then it just crumbles and he’s a power-hungry dictator.

What was really quite key, especially near the end of the book, is how far is too far? Because at the beginning Ruby wouldn’t use her powers and she wouldn’t stand up for herself and by the end she can not only control them but use them as a weapon. Then we have Clancy who is at first using his powers to help these kids but then he becomes (is exposed as) this tyrant becasue he can make anyone do anything. So where is this line as an orange between using your powers to help people and defend yourself and when does it go too far? I think that’ll also come up more next book but it was interesting and I don’t think that there is a right answer.

This book was so funny, I actually laughed out loud which I don’t always do. Normally it’s a giggle in my brain. When we first meet the boys and Ruby just kind of sits up in the back seat.  “Hi…sup?” and there’s the scolding of Zu about how they can’t just pick up stray kittens! Then immediately after there is this huge chase scene and that was really cool and we got a really good sense of the characters really  quick and how they act under pressure. Ruby has a line at the end of it that made me laugh so hard, I was outside on the deck and my little bro gave me a super weird look but it’s when she punches Liam and says “that was not like riding a bike, you asshole!”

Zu. I love Zu. I love her little girly obsession. When she saw the pink dress, I could picture it so well! And they start playing dress up and oh my gosh, it just so sweet! And I love Zu’s sass even though she doesn’t speak. I’m glad she’s going to California to be with her family , but I am really nervous for her! She has her power down pretty well now but I’m just nervous. A lot of bad things could happen.

OK THAT ENDING! I thought that climatic trying to escape the camp then it all falling apart and then they finally escape all together was going to be the ‘end’ with a bit of a cliff hanger about where they are going to go, what are they going to do, all that “typical” dystopian ending. You know what I’m talking about. The first book more of an introduction to what these people have to deal with and it’s an adventure and then they, not really solve, but they deal with that one thing then the end is them regrouping trying to figure out “where do we go from here?” with the larger societal issue, or just try and figure out how to live their life. So that is what I was expecting. Them driving into the sunset trying to figure out how to fix these camps or maybe going to find their parents. Then end. The Alexandra Bracken just throws us a complete curve ball. HAHA that’s not what happens! Cubes gets shot! Ruby calls the Children’s League and then wipes Liam’s memory! WHAT?!?!?! That’s not in the script! At the end of the first book they are always together as a group! Ready to face this next challenge together! We don’t know where Chubes is or if he’s alive, Zu left earlier and now our main love interest doesn’t remember our protagonist and thinks Chubes has left him like Zu to find his family. It’s looking pretty bleak. This is a really dark book! We ended just about as far away from a happy ending as we possibly could.

Thanks for reading, share your thoughts! I can’t wait to read the next book! Bye!

Book Rant: Kissing Shakespeare

I know, I don’t like the cover either. It looks like she’s wearing the inside of a picnic basket.

RATING: 4

GENRE: Historical fantasy, romance, YA

SERIES: Stand-alone

I have read two Shakespeare based books in a row. The Juliet Club by Suzanne Harper and now Kissing Shakespeare by Pamela Mingle. These books where very different I really enjoyed them both! Kissing Shakespeare, the short blurb is a teenage girl brought back in time to seduce young William Shakespeare, and if you don’t want to drop everything and go pick it up, I don’t know why, that premise sounds pretty awesome to me. But just in case I will give you a longer non-spoilery summary: a young man, Stephan, from the 16th century who can travel in time and he needs the help of present day teenager, Miranda, to stop Shakespeare from choosing a very different career path and by extent save all his works and preserve history. Miranda is a Shakespearean actor like her parents and she’s going to study the Bard and acting at university next year, so who could be a better candidate? How exactly is she supposed to accomplish this feet? Seduce the young William, naturally. Only one problem: Miranda has never seduced someone. Stephan got a very wrong idea about modern youth in his brief visit to the 21st century (turns out Gossip Girl is a bad reference). So Miranda finds herself in the 16th century pretending to be Stephan’s sister, with no idea about customs and speech apart from the Bard’s own work, trying to seduce her idol and convince him he should become a play write. And if she fails, she might never get home.

This is a very fluffy, cutesy book. There is a touch of mystery, lots of romance. Not much fantasy, it really more of a historical-fiction except for the time travel. There’s really nothing know about Shakespeare’s early life so it was really interesting to see how the author built this entire life for him from nothing except a few proven facts. Spoilers past here! Bye if you haven’t read the book!

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This book made me laugh so much. Olivia (I’m going to call her that becasue Miranda is confusing. I forgot her real name by the end) is so hilariously awkward. When she got drunk on her second hour or so of being there I couldn’t stop laughing. I can’t say I was worried. Who would assume she was a girl from 500 years in the future then time traveled back to this time with their nephew becasue he has a vision she needed to save their school teacher. Who is going to jump to that conclusion? No one! Stephan is always all worried about begin overheard but he is the only person with magic in this whole book! They might assume a lot of things, but I doubt the a fore mentioned would make the list.

I loved the seduction between Will and Olivia! Olivia is my spirit animal. I feel for her though, I’m bad at flirting in regular English, if I had to do it in Shakespearean/Elizabethan language I’d
a) sound like I was having tea with the Queen constantly and be super formal, which is not seductive (I don’t think) or
b) and this is the more likely, mess up and swear without thinking and then just not know how to cover it and probably swear again.
When you think about it that way she did a really good job. When Will gave her the gloves and then asked if he could steal a kiss in the library, it was so cute. I know back then it would be super badass and inappropriate but if someone did that now (providing they weren’t a random stranger) it would be “AWWW can I just squeeze you?”

The romance between Stephan and Olivia. I was waiting for this and I had to wait for half the book. Torturous! I was so nervous they were going to get caught. There is no explanation out of that. Maybe start quoting some bible passages. The Song of Solomon: “Thou hast ravished my heart, my sister, my spouse.”? Probably that would be your best bet. Still don’t think it would help you much but better than nothing, I guess.

The burning of the person! Oh my god! That scene was horrible! They didn’t describe to much but in English I had to watch documentaries on the Salem Witch Trials and well with the magic of digital technology you can make it look like a person is being burned to death quite graphically and that’s all I could see in my head.

At the beginning of this I though Thomas was a bad guy just becasue he is working against Olivia and trying to mess things up by making Will a priest. But after Stephan got beaten up horribly for him my mind switched and I understood he’s not a bad person, he doesn’t do bad thing.  He’s just believing in something other people deem wrong and yes he’s potentially screwing up the future by trying to convince Will to move towards religion but how could he know that? He can’t! He’s honestly just trying to help this boy out.

Ok more about the beating. More so after it actually. People arrive and I was instantly less stressed. He has a pulse, people are here, he is going to be good.  Then Olivia asked for ice and everyone was like “what for? why?” and I started panicking again! These people are going to kill him with their stupid non-medicine! This has never, ever come up in any historical fiction or fantasy I have read. The healers always got this and the person is in good hands but in reality OH MY GOSH NO THEY DON’T! They wanted to bleed him! I know it made sense in their old fashioned, un-educated brain but I was freaking out. He just got the shit kicked out of him and lost a bunch of blood and you are taking away MORE?!?! I don’t know how this stupid practice became a popular stupid practice. Did no one notice that as you lose blood you feel weaker? And what about people with hemophilia? (You’re body can’t clot blood therefore can’t stop bleeding so you can bleed to death from a paper cut) Oh his person is sick, better take some blood, oops they died! Maybe I should stop doing that! Meh, nope. Like I said this issue has never, ever, ever come up in any book I have ever read and it really should have in a lot of them.

Jennet, we knew she was no good. She is classic spy material, too goody-goody. There wasn’t much mystery there but I did like seeing it play out and Olivia getting evidence so Stephan would believe her.

It was really frustrating that Olivia had to leave and her thing with Stephan never panned out. The necklace was nice I guess, but I wanted it to work out. Him randomly show up in her dressing room after her performance at the end or something.

Overall I really thoroughly enjoyed this novel.  Just such a sweet, cute read. That’s all for now, bye darlings!

 

 

 

Phone Killer!

Hi there, settle in becasue it’s STORYTIME AGAIN!

Ok so last week or so I was at a party, my after-grad party. It was outside in someones backyard we had made a little tent city and had a bonfire and DJ and all that good stuff. Get to the party, my phone is in my back pocket, turned off. My phone is NEVER in my back pocket. It’s in my hand or in my bag sometimes in my bra (ladies, you know you do that to, admit it!) becasue back pockets are dangerous. Things fall out, you can sit on them and besides being uncomfortable things can break. My phone is also never turned off, but i was low on battery, wanted to save it for an emergency. Not like I wasn’t with 170 people who all had cell phones and in someones backyard. For some reason I thought I needed to save the battery for something important. Anyway, get the the party, my bag is in my tent and I get off the bus meaning to go straight to my tent and throw my phone in my bag. It’s off, it’s not like I need it on me! But it’s cold so I go straight to the fire. I even go to my tent later but completely forget and leave my phone in my back pocket, loose and unsafe. The coat I’m wearing even has zippered pockets! Nope don’t take my phone out of my back pocket.

We’re all dancing, wondering around just having a good time. Around 2:30am I gotta pee. For some reason I do this thing before I go to the washroom where I check my back pockets in case there’s something in there that could fall out and get destroyed. I’m not sure why I started doing this, as I have said there is never anything in my back pockets. Maybe it just a habit I developed after hearing people tell stories of dropping their phone in the toilet. I do this check, nothing in my pockets, I’m good to go. About 5 minutes after this I realize, wait a minute!

My phone was in my pocket! I’m not functioning at 100% at this time, it’s after 2:30 in the morning and I’ve been up since 6 the day before, so I can’t completely recall if I did the check. Maybe I didn’t! Maybe my phone fell out into this port-a-potty! How long has my phone not been there? I search with my friend for about 5 minutes (this yard is HUGE we fit about 70 tents in this yard plus had room for everything else.) then tell the guy’s parents that I lost my phone, just in case someone finds it and turns it in.  Then I go back to the party.

Come morning, I go looking again. I ask around no one has seen it. Two other people have also lost their phones and while I feel bad for them I also am pretty relieved that I wasn’t the only one. I feel like less of an idiot. By the time I leave still nothing. I post in the Facebook group we made for this party asking if anyone has seen it and nothing. Days go by. I’m emailing my boss telling I have no phone (he texts the schedule). Then  on the Monday (party was Friday) this friend of mine, she lives up the road, she goes back to that house to pick up some camping stuff she left and SHE FINDS MY PHONE! Sends me a message on Facebook, next day I drive to her house and pick up my phone and I am so relieved!

I was a little slow on the uptake but as most of you have probably guessed by now, phones don’t work after 3 days outside. The phone is still leaking water when I pick it up. I get a bowl of rice, take it all apart bury it all up but at this point I have realized that this isn’t going to work. So I start trying to figure what a new phone is going to cost. My phone does have insurance that covers water damage, but I really didn’t like my current phone (Samsung galaxy ace 2x, DO NOT RECOMMEND! Least sensitive touch screen  ever and it randomly starts doing things and opening things you didn’t press. Mine once randomly Googled “Germany”. I guess it opened the internet and in my bag some letters were pressed that was close enough to “Germany”)

So today I finally had time to drive all the way out to the nearest Virgin Mobile store (an hour). The one relatively close to my house (30 minutes) closed down. So I finally have time to make this trek. I was talking to a really nice sales guy, it still took 2 hours, maybe just over but after several phone calls and explaining why I wanted to switch phones and cancel the first phone I finally acquired an iPhone for $49/month (same plan I had before) instead of $80/month (minimum plan for iPhones from this carrier) and only had to pay off my old phone ($125) got my insurance transferred to my new iPhone from my Samsung for $60 instead of $140. And my first month is covered and I don’t have to pay for it. I’m feeling pretty proud of myself though I actually did nothing I just had a really awesome sales person who knew what he was doing. I also bought a waterproof, dirt-proof, snow-proof and shockproof case. Hopefully that will keep my phone safe from me. I mean, who just leaves their phone outside for 3 days? Me apparently!

Why are there back pockets?! WHY?!

Book Rant: Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

RATING: 3.5

GENRE: Contemporary, YA

SERIES: Stand alone

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews. I was super hesitant to read this book becasue I thought it was going to be sad becasue of the title and I didn’t want to read a super sad contemporary, romance novel where the girl dies of cancer. But it’s not like that. It’s actually not really sad at all, it funny, upbeat and while yes, has some sad parts, it’s very real. The writing style is very different but I thought it worked really well. Greg is invisible in high school and has worked hard to become so. Simultaneously everyone’s friend an nobody’s, he blends into the background. Earl is the only person who could be called Greg’s friend but Greg sees him as more of a “co-worker.” Greg is on his way to leaving high school without a single hiccup and then his mom forces him to try and rekindle his childhood friendship with Rachel who has just been diagnosed with acute leukemia. Rachel and Greg haven’t spoken since an awkward misadventure in 6th grade that lead to everyone in their Hebrew school calling them boyfriend and girlfriend. But orders have been given by parental command and must be obeyed. I definitely reccomend this book! I flew through it in a day, just wonderful. Spoilers past here!

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I feel about this book how I feel about most contemporary books, I liked it, but not enough to buy it or read over and over. I loved how this was written! In script and bullet points it was so different and interesting.

I loved how much swearing there is in this book. That’s a weird thing to say but let me explain. In so many YA books there’s this idea that you can’t say any bad words. Graphic violence is fine, but as soon as you swear you’ve gone too far! It makes me roll my eyes because you’ll come across a sentence like “He swore under his breath and then ran his sword through her heart, letting the blood run down the blade and over his hand before he jerked his weapon back and deftly severed her neck. Her decapitated head rolled across the polished marble and rest of her mangled body stood swaying for a moment before crumpling into a pool of blood.” So I’m mature enough to read the rest of that but can’t handle the “fuck” at the beginning? This book was just so open and there were no restrictions on anything it was just written and honest to how teenagers act.

Greg is a hateful, flawed character but he’s so truthful about it and he hates himself for it but he also sort of accepts it. “If after reading this book you come to my home and brutally murder me, I truly do not blame you.” He’ll be talking about how he should feel bad he’s just hanging out with Rachel becasue she’s dying but he doesn’t. Which is horrible, but he’s so honest with himself about his short comings you can’t even hate him or be mad with him about it. He knows he doesn’t say the tight thing but he tells you about it. Earl is a great character. He made me laugh a lot becasue some of the things he says you just are like “what?” and you have to laugh becasue there is nothing else to do. Then there’s this other side of Earl who’s really grown up and mature and sensitive but he doesn’t show it much. I honestly preferred Earl over Greg most of the time and at the end during Rachel’s film Greg says that Earl is a much better person than he is becasue he cares about other people more.

I really loved how there was no cheesy romance. And Greg would even say stuff like “now this is the point in the story where Rachel and I fall in love and she makes a miraculous recovery but that’s not how it works.” It’s so true to life there was no really happy ending becasue it wasn’t really an ending.

That is all for this book, let me know what you thought! Bye! Kisses!