Major Blog Award Catch Up

I don't know what it was about last week, but I received three blog awards!

First, thanks M.E. for the Liebster Award!

Second, thank you Crystal Licata for One Lovely Blog Award!

I've gotten these two awards before, so I'm passing on giving them out again, but seriously guys, I love it when people think of me when they give out awards.

And so last of all, I want to thank Krista for the Beautiful Blogger Award!

And so for this award I'm passing it on to five awesome bloggers!

1. Jaye Robin Brown
2. S.P. Bowers
3. E.R. King
4. Erin
5. Ruth Josse

Again, thank you M.E., Crystal, and Krista. And be sure to follow those I've passed the award on to. :)

As for me, I'm in finals week. I'm hoping to finish mine by tomorrow, but I might be pushing it as late as Thursday. But after that, I am FREE and going back home to California where there is relative warmth in comparison to where I am now and most other places in the U.S. And once I'm done with finals I'm going to start work on revising FORGET ME NOT. Isn't it the most wonderful time of the year?

Book Review: Forgive My Fins by Tera Lynn Childs

Title: Forgive My Fins
Author: Tera Lynn Childs
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Genre: YA (fantasy)
Why I read it/how I found it: MERMAIDS

Description:
Lily Sanderson has a secret, and it’s not that she has a huge crush on gorgeous swimming god Brody Bennett, who makes her heart beat flipper-fast. Unrequited love is hard enough when you’re a normal teenage girl, but when you’re half human, half mermaid like Lily, there’s no such thing as a simple crush.

Lily’s mermaid identity is a secret that can’t get out, since she’s not just any mermaid – she’s a Thalassinian princess. When Lily found out three years ago that her mother was actually a human, she finally realized why she didn’t feel quite at home in Thalassinia, and she’s been living on land and going to Seaview high school ever since, hoping to find where she truly belongs. Sure, land has its problems – like her obnoxious, biker boy neighbor Quince Fletcher – but it has that one major perk – Brody. The problem is, mermaids aren’t really the casual dating type – when they “bond,” it’s for life.

When Lily’s attempt to win Brody’s love leads to a tsunami-sized case of mistaken identity, she is in for a tidal wave of relationship drama, and she finds out, quick as a tailfin flick, that happily-ever-after never sails quite as smoothly as you planned.

Review:
MERMAIDS! I haven't read a book about mermaids ever, I think. Unless you count the Hans Christian Anderson story. But, anywhoo, I will say to this book that I loved the world it created. My favorite part was diving down in the sea to go to Thalassinia and seeing how Childs structured their world. That was fantastical and magical and I loved it. But...as for the rest of it...I was not as wowed as I'd hoped starting this book. Generally, I don't have too much of a problem with MC's annoying me. But I did with Lily. She had these "problems" and got all woe-is-me about them, when frankly I didn't see them as too much of a problem if she stopped being so idiotic and stubborn. I'll have you know I've never called an MC a whiner before, until I read Lily. She complains a lot and thinks her life is the worst ever. Overdone. I can't even see why Quince liked her. He was pretty cool, and made most of the book okay to go along with, but why he was attracted to Lily, I will never know. I wished that the plot would have been a little less predictable, but unfortunately...it was. Very much predictable. I knew what would happen about fifteen pages in.

Other info: This has a sequel, Fins Are Forever. Tera Lynn Child's website is here.

If you happen to have read an awesome mermaid book, please let me know about it! I'm dying to read a book about my favorite mythical creature that I can gobble up and adore!

My Top Ten: Book Covers

All right, so this has nothing to do with improving writing like my other Top Tens, but this one's just too much fun! :) I may have loved the book, I may have hated it, or fallen in the middle, this list is just of covers that I think are beautiful.

1.

2.

3.

4. For me, this one is all about the actual book cover. A computer screen can't give justice to the sheen and color of this one:

5.

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10.

What about you? What are some of your favorite covers?

Book Review: Gregor and the Prophecy of Bane by Suzanne Collins

Title: Gregor and the Prophecy of Bane
Author: Suzanne Collins
Publisher: Scholastic
Genre: MG (fantasy)
Why I read it/how I found it: Sequel to Gregor the Overlander.

Description:
In the months since Gregor first encountered the strange Underland beneath New York City, he’s sworn he won’t ever go back. But when another prophecy, this time about an ominous white rat known as the Bane, calls for Gregor’s help, the Underlanders know the only way they can get his attention is through his little sister, Boots. Now Gregor’s quest reunites him with his bat, Ares, the rebellious princess Luxa, and new allies and sends them through the dangerous and deadly Waterway in search of the Bane. Then Gregor must face the possibility of his greatest loss yet, and make life and death choices that will determine the future of the Underland.

Review:
I really love this world that Collins created. She always manages to show that nothing is black and white, everything has gray. This theme especially rings true in this second book of the Gregor series. I find myself very involved in the different creatures in the Underland, not just the humans, and finding ways this works in our own world. I loved the characters in this, too. Boots is just as adorable as ever, I loved getting to know Ares more, and Twitchtip was another awesome addition to both the theme and the cast of characters. I appreciate what Collins is able to explore here for younger readers, which I frankly think kids aren't being exposed to early enough these days. The ending is really thrilling, and goes for a total twist that you never expect. I'm looking forward to finishing this series.


Other information: This is the second of fives books in the series. Suzanne Collins's website is here.

PerNoFiMo is FINISHED!

Last night I officially completed the first draft of my W.I.P. Time to blow the horns! WHOOOO!!! Personal Novel Finishing Month has been a success.

So, for anyone who's curious (and me to record):

Working Title: Forget Me Not
Genre: YA Fantasy
Idea came: March 4, 2011
Bumps along the way: I started to write it seriously around April, but had to scrap it mid-June and start over.
Finish date: November 30, 2011.
Word count: 67,000
Brought to you by: Josh Groban, Josh Groban, and oh yeah, Josh Groban. I couldn't listen to anything but him for some reason. Especially this song:

For those curious about the premise of it, let's just say that when I heard this song I was kind of freaked out about how well it fit my MC's situation:

(As you might tell, music is huge for me when it comes to writing).

And right now is really the perfect time for me to be finishing up my first draft, because now I can focus on my last week of class and finals week. Then over Christmas break I'll be able to dive right into revising.

So since November tends to be a productive month for finishing projects, have any of you finished a draft lately?

Announcing A Writer's Guide to The Hunger Games!

I've been a huge fan of The Hunger Games for a long time now, in case you haven't noticed. And whenever we're given the advice to "see how published books have done it" I've always flipped back to The Hunger Games Trilogy. And so earlier this month I decided to start a blog just on that--seeing how Suzanne Collins manages to capture her audience in this series.

This week I made my first two posts on it. So if you're a fan of The Hunger Games or just want to get insight into how Suzanne Collins manages to hook so many readers, be sure to follow my new blog--A Writer's Guide to The Hunger Games.

In other news, I'm now 62k words into my W.I.P. with three more chapters, two more days, and three thousand more words to meet my goal.

What book do you always look at to see how the author did it? How's your W.I.P coming along?

Somebody Has a Gun

 

I've read a book somewhat recently that I feel sort of takes Michael's stance on action. It's like the author was thinking, "Well, as long as things are blowing up and people are fighting, that'll make my book interesting!"

I wish sometimes authors (and screenwriters and anyone making a story) could see that they're pulling a Michael here. Now, obviously there needs to be action, and for some stories it's appropriate to have guns and that type of action. People have guns in TV shows and movies because it is exciting, like Michael said. But Michael fails to realize that usually before the big fight that he wants to emulate in his improv class, there's character development and conflict and mystery. They may start out with a big scene, but then it peters out and we get the plot. Bursts of action may come in the middle, but sandwiched between those there's other crucial elements that make a story interesting and worth reading/watching.

But really, seeing/reading anything that just seems to down on the action without incorporating other elements can just be tiring. This may be more of a jab toward action movies than books, but this is something we can all fall into and I've been thinking about.