Reading A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray. On Chapter 12, which my Kindle says is 30% completed. So far, our heroine, Gemma, is a plucky, sarcastic mess. Typically angsty for the typical YA heroine reasons and frustrated because she's better than everyone else she knows. I'm already frustrated by the familiar YA trappings, like that ( Read more... )

Finished reading Mike Vasich's novel, Loki. And I liked it a lot. Beginning to end, I couldn't put it down. It's a pretty straightforward retelling of the classic Loki myths all leading up to, of course, Ragnarok (Armageddon), but with one BIG TWIST and an awesome Loki pov. Loki's journey from despised yet ardent Asgard patriot to disillusioned, ( Read more... )

Just finished reading Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro, after having watched the film version with Andrew Garfield, Carrie Mulligan, and Keira Knightly, and I stand in awe. A gorgeous book and a gorgeous film, though I wish I hadn't seen the movie first because some of my favorite aspects of the film were different in the book, and I felt their ( Read more... )

I don't know where I got the bright idea to tackle Tolstoy's War and PeacePerhaps it was my Kindle lust, which has resulted in my rabid hoarding of every ebook I can get my hands on-- books I'll probably never read but must have on my Kindle for some reason. Or perhaps it was because I have a friend who is not typically a reader but for some ( Read more... )

I expected at the end of the Hunger Games trilogy to come back here raving about how much I loved the series and how everyone should go out immediately and read these. Yeah. But that was the silly, young ingenue that twas I twenty some hours ago. Now, the emotionally damaged wreck that I am today has to drag herself over broken glass to tell you ( Read more... )

Gah, so busy it hurts. Damn you, Academia! However, I have found time (in, like, two-second pockets here and there) to fall completely in love with two new things.

1. The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. Once again, I almost missed out on an amazing read because I was initially put off by the first few pages. You might recall that I have a ( Read more... )

In the world of books...

I don't know if I've ever waxed poetic on my weird obsession with Tori Spelling on here, but she has a new book out! I loved her previous two books, and this latest one-- Uncharted TerriTori-- was just as fun. I breezed through it in a few hours. Wish I could give that much undivided attention to my academic reading! Next ( Read more... )

Finished A Clash of Kings and am into A Storm of Swords.

In trying to describe the series to my aunt, I said, "It's like Harry Potter for adults! If everyone around Harry, instead of dropping like flies in the last book, started dying right away in the first book and never stopped dying. Friends, relatives, acquaintances-- all dead! Or maimed! Or ( Read more... )

For some reason, livejournal ate my layout, so I've downgraded to one of their generic layouts. Do not like. I always have the hardest time finding layouts that I like for some reason (picky?) and always end up making them myself, but I don't have the time to make a new one right now. *Pout ( Read more... )

I finally finished that leviathan of a book. Man, that was a good (long) read. I realized that it's hard to convince other people to read a book when your pitch includes the line, "After the first 400 pages, things really start to take off! Wait, no, it's worth it! Seriously ( Read more... )