Tick Tock Tick Tock

Chime by Franny Billingsley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Song for this book: Saved (Acoustic) -The Spill Canvas

I won this book from a Goodreads giveaway.

From when i first saw the cover of Chime i was intrigued. The picture is just so haunting and beautiful. It pulls you in. I read the description many times over and despite that all I could remember about the book was the amazing cover.
Although, that might not be the only reason. From the description I found the exact plot line hard to grasp. I couldn't seem to pin-point a time era for this piece and that made me hesitant to pick this book up. But I assumed all my questions would be cleared up as a read.
I found the beginning a little difficult to jump in to. I was slightly disoriented, and I don't know all that much about witch craft besides what one would learn from Sabrina the Teenage Witch so I'm not going to say it was the easiest read for me, but I kept reading ready to learn more.
The truth is I only really understood half the story. The things happening in down, got it down check. The swamp, the old ones, "mucky face", the "brownie"... not so much. I was really confused. Luckily I love Eldric so my attention was not lost. I really liked the story, despite it being a more difficult read, and my not understanding bits, I loved the plot and the ending was amazing. So if you are up for a challenge and a great story, go for it!!

Official Overview:


Before Briony's stepmother died, she made sure Briony blamed herself for all the family's hardships. Now Briony has worn her guilt for so long it's become a second skin. She often escapes to the swamp, where she tells stories to the Old Ones, the spirits who haunt the marshes. But only witches can see the Old Ones, and in her village, witches are sentenced to death. Briony lives in fear her secret will be found out, even as she believes she deserves the worst kind of punishment.

Then Eldric comes along with his golden lion eyes and mane of tawny hair. He's as natural as the sun, and treats her as if she's extraordinary. And everything starts to change. As many secrets as Briony has been holding, there are secrets even she doesn't know.



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Here's to Old Friends, Old Cars, and New Loves

Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



There is something about Stephanie Perkins' writing that is so darn addicting. She writes these characters in a way where you can't help but care about them and soon she has them wrapped around your little finger.

Lola is a budding costume designer. She has a different wig for every occasion. She lives in San Francisco with her 2 gay fathers. She has a bad-ass rock'n'roll boyfriend, Max. A best friends who aspires to be Nancy Drew, Lindsey. And a dog named Heavens to Betsy. Despite her parents disapproval of her boyfriend, life it going alright for Lola.
Until the Terrible Bell Twins move back next door. Calliope, the self entitled figure skating goddess. And Cricket, her handsome(in a geek chic kinda way), shy, mechanical genius brother. The Nice Guy. Lola decided 2 years ago when they moved away that she hates both their guts and has spent most of those 2 years trying to forget about them. With their return come the arousing of all those old feeling Lola has tried to suppress. But she has a boy friend now.
With the help of her new friends and co-workers Anna and St.Clair (!!!) along with her parents, Lindsey and her embarrassment of a birth mother, Norah, Lola tries to make sense of her emotions and seek what is real.

Lets start with the obvious plus here: Anna and St.Clair are back!! that's right everyone's favorite Parisian couple is back for more. This time Anna and St.Clair are both working at the movie theater that Lola works at. Etienne also lives in the same dorm as Cricket at Berkeley.
Another thing that i feel i most mention is Max's car. Max drives a '67 Chevy Impala. To some this may sound extremely unimportant and stupid that this effected me so much, but im a geek like that. Because any self respecting, Dean Loving, Castiel Crazy, yellow eyed demon hating, Moosekateer who watch Supernatural know that the Winchester's (mainly Dean) are famous for their '67 Chevy Impala. I mean you can google it. so the mention of this amazing vehicle really sealed the deal that i was gonna love this book.
And while i think that Anna's book was more up my alley with the school in paris and her story, Cricket definitely gave St.Clair a run for his money. They are complete opposites, and so I love them both in different ways. Overall it was a great companion novel. I loved the reoccurring themes in both books. Perkins has a way with dialog. ANd her characters are so real you want to hug them.
So if your an Anna fan or just a fan of great realistic YA check this book out!!
I also just wanted to mention, has anyone noticed how incredible detailed this cover is? You can tell it was made just for this story. From crickets pinstriped pants, to his rainbow rubber bans, to the star on his hand. The fact that they are sitting on a windowsill with a lavender house behind them, and Crickets hair is standing up. I mean every little detail is right on the money with this. I don't think I have ever seen a book cover so greatly accurate with its book. Bravo, person in charge of cover art, brava.

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Amazon Princess vs the Poison Apple

Amazon has just released there new Kindle Family. The latest and Greatest being the Kindle Fire. 

Think of this as the option in between an ipad and and itouch. The Amazon Kindle Fire is about the same size as your typical Kindle. But this one has a multi-touch color screen, compatible with android apps, cloud connection and a super cool new browser, Amazon Silk.  

When I heard about the Amazon Fire i took it as a sign. I have been fed up with apple and all of their new encryption on my music downloads and limiting my authorization on certain items. You can't even make an MP3 of your itunes music these days due to the encryption. I for one have had enough. I decided I am making the switch to amazon. Lets face it, amazon is way more user/customer friendly. They have better deals, wider selections, and the almighty Cloud! Yes, apple did you release their new cloud drive. But come on Steve Jobs Amazon has had their's out for months now, what ever happened to Apple being a trend setter?? Plus with amazon, unlike with the icloud, you get unlimited access to your files for any computer. Not just 5 authorized ones like with steve's idea.  Yeah so thanks for the good times apple, it was fun before you started limiting my musical and video experiences to certain computers with slim to none sharing ability. We get it you dont want people mass distributing your stuff, but have you ever considered the idea that some...(most) of your customers just want to make a harmless MP3 for their car but they can't thanks to you. (actually you can but it is a hassle) If people were really downloading music for those reasons, they wouldn't be paying for the songs in the first place, they would be getting for free off the web.

So that is why i decided to try to make the switch. it's going to be hard but i have had enough. Now my big question is whether i want the Kindle fire. On the one hand I have never really had an interest in the iphones or ipads, i just don't need all that stuff on my phone, and its a big time waste. With the pad i figured it was so big why not just use the laptop? But i feel with this size and all the amazing new amazon features, such as the super fast Silk browser Fire might be worth it. It is bigger and faster than my phone for internet uses, yet smaller and easier to handle and travel with than a laptop or ipad. Hmmm i'm going to have to sleep on this one. either way I am very excited for the advancements of amazon. I wish them the best!!

Amazon Kindle Fire

Introducing Amazon Silk | Amazon Silk: 


'via Blog this'


What do you think:
of the Amazon Fire?
Apple or Amazon?
Do you mind the restrictions on itunes?
leave a comment below!

Lola & Anna & Vulcans Oh My!

As you may have noticed in my cute little widget on the side of the page, there is 2 weeks left until Steph Perkin's new book Lola and the Boy Next Door hits shelves and/or set thru the whisper net onto your Ereader. Either way this is very exciting!
Lola is Stephanie's second book the first being of course Anna and the French Kiss. If you know nothing about Steph's writing I just want to say please don't judge a book by it's cover. The cover art may seem a little juvenile and cheesy. The title may seem a little cliche and very Chick lit-y.. And the author may have blue hair. But if you just put any reservations aside and open the book I promise you will be pleasantly surprise with what you find. In fact it will probably leave you wanting more. Good thing Stephanie just posted a cute little bonus scene the other day! 
The scene was written for the HelpWriteNow auction to benefit southern storm relief in America. The Winner Richard Grooms got to pick a theme for the piece and he chose:  Vulcans . It's a cute little scene and you can read it Here. And for those hardcore Anna fans there will be a second bonus scene out next month. So make sure you check out Stephanie Perkins click any of the links above for more info on her or her writing. 

Smart is so Uncool

Here I go again. Not blogging for weeks. A girl friend of mine just showed me her blog today and I remembered I need to stop by here. So let's start off with Goodreads is down right now or something for some reason. This is not okay. What am I supposed to do with myself if i can't check up on the latest books and reviews? Well lots of things but most of those I would rather not do. So instead I am here talking to myself. (and maybe someone somewhere out there [under the pale moonlight] reading this)
In my English class, American Lit II, we cover the time period 1880-1950 in literature. Right now we are reading The Awakening by Kate Chopin. It is a relatively short read and covers women's roles in society in the 1800's before the women's suffrage campaign. I am surprisingly enjoying this read and was really looking forward to discussing it in class. However, I forgot two important pieces of information. One, I'm not in an Honors class anymore. 2, not everyone likes to read as much as I do. Now let me set something straight, I like to read but not usually school books. I was in honors English class for the past couple years and rarely did I actually read the books assigned. But still we had great conversations about what we were reading. There were always some kids with a genuine interest in the text. But as my teacher began asking questions about the reading I realized that almost no one around me was really enjoying this book. Okay I'm not judging but seriously only one other person seemed to really be experiencing the book like me instead of just reading it and scanning for information that might be on the quiz the next day. Most of the student's came in the room and said something along the lines of, "I don't understand what they are trying to say," "It's all just gibberish" or "why can't they translate these books into modern day English." I just didn't understand the first two comments. This book was extremely easy to comprehend. It is very light writing and fresh for the time period. Try reading Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights  and then come back and tell me Kate Chopin is hard to follow. The last comment up there about translating old books I just found offensive. I don't want to be hypocritical, I used to wonder that same thing when I was younger but Once you open you mind to the classics your mind is forever changed. There is such a beauty and an elegance to older works like this one by Kate Chopin, or Jane Austen or the Bronte girls. How could you ever want take the beauty of their writing and dumb it down to a reader's digest form of writing so these lazy kids will read it? It would be a crime. I hate to say it, because I do read a lot of contemporary lit, but there is a class in the older pieces that you just can't find anymore.
So this really put a damper on my day. Not only did I not get my discussion on the book like I wanted but I looked like one of the loser over achievers in class cause I gave to many answers on the book and raise my hand too many times to give my opinion. I hate it how it is so uncool to be publicly smart. This is something I know a lot about and it really troubles me. It is uncool to raise your hand more than 3 times in a class period because then people mark you of as an overachiever and will mock you for it. It is uncool to read books in school during free time  instead of playing on your phone or talking. As a person who does this a lot I know what this is like. I am constantly written off as a bookworm. I read a lot and I read fast. I don't make a big deal out of it, in fact I try not to bring it up at all. But when I am with some people  and I relate something to a book or something I always get a "of course you read this in a book" or a "How fast did you read that one?" It can really get old. I'm not ashamed of my reading, I just hate how my reading for fun in Highschool is such a BFD. If I said I saw it on tv nobody would give me any crap about it but the fact that I am literally looking at letters on a page... So lame.
And don't even think about bringing your kindle to school. This is one of the worst rookie mistakes. The act of bring a kindle to school shows 2 things: 1) that you read enough to use a kindle [aka you are a nerd] 2) you look like you are wanting attention. People think you are trying to show off and give you crap when really you just wanna sit down and read you effing Ebook. Excuse you that it was cheaper and fast to get in on amazon than drive over to Barnes&Noble. Oh and that part about wanting to read your ebook.. yeah you can forget about it. If you are seen reading from your kindle people who have no manners or respect for someone trying to escape into a book will rudely interrupt you and  say "Waoh! is that a kindle?" no dumbshit it's a piece of boiling lava I'm reading off of. Then they will ask,"So how do those things even work?"  Well you see I wear rubber gloves since it is hot lava. and I bang it against my head when I want to turn the page. "do you like it" Not I hate it and that's why I continue to read off it. Or you get the second option of response to seeing your kindle, "OMG you are sooo cool with your little kindle." Okay thanks for that sarcasm. Can I please get back to my book now?
To sum up this rant of a post: I am pissed off and saddened by the treatment of young readers and Students who show interest in an unpopular topic. I don't know how but I feel that the view of reading and literature for young people in our country needs a change. I joke with my friend about how she thinks reading is too hard or boring and I try not to judge her but if it was anyone else I would be thinking  That is is really lame and pathetic that you feel that way. Only a person who is trying to not enjoy a good book can possibly find it boring. And as for hard, well sure maybe if you didn't pass 1st grade phonics but come on people. Just because you have to physically hold the book and use your imagination instead of sit in front of the TV and have it tell the story to you free of effort, doesn't mean it's hard. It just means you are too lazy to try.

A Lose Lose Situation

Every Little Thing in the World by Nina de Gramont

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



This book isn't for everyone. And while there were some bits of this story i enjoyed, I just don't think I am one of those people. I could tell from the beginning that no matter how this book ended I was going to be disappointed. But that is bound to happen with a book like this. It was well written, it just wasn't for me.



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Lightning Strikes the Heart.

Betrayal by Mayandree Michel

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Yes Finally! This book was so very long, it seemed endless at times. In a way I really enjoyed this because I really got to know the characters and the whole story. But on the other hand, it was soooo long. I kinda just wanted to finish it. And I wasn't upset when it ended. I realize this is the 1st in a series but I really wasn't left with that great longing to read the next book. By this I dont mean I don't intend to read the next one, simply that Michel wrapped up the end so nicely there was little to complain about. In fact she may have wrapped it up too well for a series, b/c why mess with a good thing? Either way I have to hand it to her, she has a way with endings. there are view authors I can say the same about. While the beginning was rather rough and choppy, confusing and at times more than a little frustrating, once she finally gets into her story it all just comes together. The last 3/4 of the book were a truly capturing reading.

*note: this is my Goodreads review I intend to add more soon!

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