TBR Intervention (9)

Last Week

I am calling last week a "so-so" success.  I got a lot of reading done (success), but I did not get a lot of the TBR Intervention reading done (fail):

I finished it!  I loved it!  My review is up. 

I am almost done--close enough that I think I will be done by the end of the day.  I love it!!  I have been recommending this book to everyone I know--particularly those with kids 8-13 years old.  Review coming soon.

This is my epic fail--because I have not even started this book.  And with my giveaway--I need to read the books before I give them away!  So this one is going back on my TBR pile for a while.

This Week

My new supervisor has been recommending the Kitty Norville series by Carrie Vaughn.  I read the first one this week--and now I have to read the next one this week (absolutely have to know what happens next!):

Summary (from back cover):
Werewolves Do It Better

The country's only celebrity werewolf, late-night radio host Kitty Norville prefers to be heard, not seen.  But when she's invite to testify at a Senate hearing on behalf of supernaturals, her face gets plastered on national TV.  Kitty's been in hot water before, but jumping into the D.C. underworld brings a new set of problems.  And a new set of friends and enemies, including the vampire mistress of the the city; an uber-hot Brazilian were-jaguar; and a paranoid, Bible-thumping senator who wants to expose Kitty as a monster.  Kitty quickly learns that in this city of dirty politicians and backstabbing pundits, everyone's itching for a fight.

Adam Rex is coming to my favorite local bookstore (changing hands) so I am going to start my giveaway reading with:

Summary (from back cover):
Doug Lee is undead quite by accident--attacked by a desperate vampire, he finds himself cursed with being fat and fifteen forever.  When he has no luck finding some goth chick with a vampire fetish, he resorts to sucking the blood of cows under cover of the night.  But it's just not the same.

Then he meets the new Indian exchange student and falls for her--hard.  Yeah, he wants to bite her, but also wants to prove himself to her.  But like the laws of life, love, and high school, the laws of vampire existence are complicated--it's not as easy as study Dracula.  Especially when the start of Vampire Hunters is hot on your trail in an attempt to boost ratings...

Searing, hilarious, and always unexpected, Fat Vampire is a satirical tour de force from one of the most original writers of fiction today.

I also had a few books I have been waiting for at the library--and of course they have all come at once.  So I have to get them done before they are due.  For this week I am focusing on finishing:

Summary (from inside flap):
Crank. Glass. Ice.  Crystal.  Whatever you call it, it's all the same; a monster.  And once it's got hold of you, this monster will never let you go.

Kristina thinks she can control it.  Now with a baby to care for, she's determined to be the one deciding when and how much, the one calling the shots.  But the monster is too strong, and before she knows it, Kristina is back in its grips.  She needs the monster to keep going, to face the pressures of day-to-day life.  She needs it to feel alive.

Once again the monster takes over Kristina's life and she will do anything for it, including giving up the one person who gives her the unconditional love she craves--her baby.

The sequel to Crank, this is the continuing story of Kristina and her descent back to hell.  Told in verse, it's a harrowing and disturbing look at addiction and the damage that it inflicts.

I read Crank and it affected me--it's hard for me to say that I loved it because it is not a story to love.  But it will always stick with me.  

And of course I have to be listening to a book.  This week I think I am going to focus on listening to: 

Summary (from Amazon):
“Ruby, where is your mother?”

Ruby knows that the game is up. For the past few months, she’s been on her own in the yellow house, managing somehow, knowing that her mother will probably never return.

That’s how she comes to live with Cora, the sister she hasn’t seen in ten years, and Cora’s husband Jamie, whose down-to-earth demeanor makes it hard for Ruby to believe he founded the most popular networking Web site around. A luxurious house, fancy private school, a new wardrobe, the promise of college and a future—it’s a dream come true. So why is Ruby such a reluctant Cinderella, wary and defensive? And why is Nate, the genial boy next door with some secrets of his own, unable to accept the help that Ruby is just learning to give?

It feels like I have been away from Sarah Dessen too long!
 
What books do you plan to read this week?  Have you read the books I am planning?  What did you think?

TBR Intervention (8)

Overall, I am very happy with the results of my TBR Intervention this week--I am however not as satisfied with my follow through with reviews.  I am so far behind on getting them written and getting them posted.  I have a major paper due tonight--so I am hoping to get caught up on blogging tomorrow!

Last Week

I finished The Fellowship of the Ring this week! I am so proud of myself! I loved it--and I cannot wait to review it for you all!


Lola and the Boy Next Door was awesome!  I think I may even like it more than Anna and the French Kiss
but in many ways I do not even need to pick because Anna and St. Clair were back!  And playing important roles in this one.  I cannot wait for Stephanie Perkins' next book!  This review is also coming.


Okay now for my one failure. I did not even get to Supernaturally because I realized I had a library book coming due that I had to finish. But I will be starting it this week--I promise!


I have not finished this one--but I started it and since finishing The Fellowship of the Ring was such a monumental accomplishment for me--I think at least getting this one started this week is a major accomplishment.  I love it so far!!  If you have not read this one--you should!!

Next Week

First, I am committing myself to finishing the two books that I did not finish last week.  But I am adding the book I am still working on from last week (the library book that has to be finished before the due date!):

Summary (from inside flap):
It's 1996, and Josh and Emma have been neighbors their whole lives.  They've been best friends almost as long--up until last November, when everything changed.  Things have been awkward ever since, but when Josh's family gets an America Online CD-ROM in the mail, his mom makes him bring it over so Emma can install it on her new computer.  When they sign on, they're automatically logged onto Facebook...but Facebook hasn't been invented yet.  Josh and Emma are looking at their profile fifteen years in the future.  Their spouses, careers, homes, and status updated--it's all there.  But it's not what they expected.  And every time they refresh their pages, their future change.  As they grapple with the ups and downs of what their lives hold, they're forced to confront what they're doing right--and wrong--in the present.

I wanted to read this book because I loved Jay Asher's first book Th1rteen R3asons Why.  So far, this book has not disappointed me--and I think I may like it even better!

So what do you plan to read this week?

The Book Addict Attends YAllapalooza

Who: Tom Leveen, Cecil Castellucci, C.J. Hill (AKA Janette Rallison), Adam Rex, Robin Brande, Amy Fellner Dominy, Aprilynne Pike, Bree Despain, Anna Carey, Kiersten White, and James A. Owen
Where: Burton Barr Central Library in Phoenix, AZ.
Hosted by: Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe, AZ.
When: 4pm on January 28, 2012 (but again I got there early so I had a wonderful seat--again).

I wish I had pictures--but the authors panel was in front of a beautiful window and the light from behind made it so I could not get a good picture.  But it was a fantastic view behind a fantastic authors panel.

The only author at the event that I had read before going was Kiersten White (I loved Paranormalcy).  So I went hoping to learn about a bunch of new-to-me authors--and this event delivered in spades!

Here are some highlights I collected that have firmly moved some of these books onto my TBR list:
1) Tom Leveen encouraged future writers to be honest with their characters.  That is what it takes to write characters that people care about.  And always take the opportunity to prepare and learn about the process and not just focus on the end product of having written a book.


2) Cecil Castellucci loves Star Wars.  And the first thing she remembers writing was a sequel to the original Star Wars movie.  This story really inspired me because I remember writing all kinds of fan fiction of alternate endings or continuations or episodes for my favorite books, movies, and television shows.


3) Janette Rallison (AKA C.J. Hill) recommends that new or aspiring writers keep a notebook with them at all times because you never know when you will be inspired or when you will get an idea and you will want to write it down because it may not come back to you again in the same way. 


4) Adam Rex wrote The True Meaning of Smekday as a way to explore history and in particular the way that the British colonies affected the Native American people when they came to America.  So he brought that idea to the future with aliens--but he is glad that the book does not come across as having such a forced lesson that it is not also fun.  I bought Fat Vampire, but now I want to read Smekday just as much if not more! It is on my wishlist!


5) Robin Brande was an attorney who was inspired after 9/11 to change careers and do what she loved and what she was passionate about: write.  She said repeatedly that a big part of being a good writer is to get out into the world and live an interesting life.  It is much more believable to read interesting stories if you have had interesting experiences.


6) Amy Fellner Dominy encouraged aspiring writers to not focus solely on the end goal of writing a book.  Take any opportunity to write, and through all of it develop the love of writing.


7) Aprilynne Pike really kept a smile on my face the entire panel.  She was very witty--and it made me so glad that I got the first book in her series!  I also got a glimpse of book 4 in the series and I cannot wait to get to it!  But the thought that struck with me was when she said she wrote for teens because she had always been raised to love teenagers.  Her parents could not wait until she and her sibling grew to teenagers because they knew it was such a fun and exciting times of their children's lives.  And now she cannot wait until her own children are teens because she knows it will be a fun and exciting time of her children's lives.   


8) Bree Despain always loved to write.  The story that stuck with me the most was that she wrote her assigned high school English journal as a fictional story because her life was "boring."  She was also an aspiring actor who took a job as the theater director for a camp.  She was supposed to help the kids in the camp put on a three hour play--which was a tall order when many of them had trouble reading.  But she wrote a cinderella-murder-mystery for them to perform which ended up being a big hit!  I wish I had had a play like that to do when I was in high school.


9) Anna Carey said that it is never too old to start writing especially if that is what you love.  She told us that the hero in her novel came to her first--but more of the voice of the hero then the fully developed character that we find when we read her book.


10) Kiersten White said that she gets her ideas from taking two seemingly-unrelated-ideas forcing them together and then seeing what happens.  For instance, for Paranormalcy she said that she was struck by what would happen if vampires (a feared being) had been hunted almost to extinction and so now they needed to be protected as an endangered species.  What mechanisms would need to be put into place to protect the vampires as well as the humans?


11) James A. Owen impressed me so much with his drawings (I did not know he drew his own illustrations until I met him!).  My favorite story was when told about his first "published" work: Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Jim Owen Age 6.  He found a copy of this work on eBay and was bidding for it.  When he lost--he reached out to the person who won.  It turned out that he knew the person--and that person now claims to have the most complete James A. Owen collection.  :)

I also had to share the amazing drawing he did with his signature in the book! I could not believe that he did this freehand.

Overall--it was an amazing event to participate in and next year I want to do the writers conference too!  I had so much fun that it is all I have been talking about all day!