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Showing posts from October, 2013

Amanda's Short Halloween Story

Okay...I wrote this for Writer's Club at school...for the Halloween short story contest we had at our meeting today. I won. OMYGOSH X'D ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The candy bar lurked silently among the other elaborately colored and crinkly-wrapped sweets. This chocolaty piece of delicious indulgence looked ordinary enough, with the exception of a magnetizing and alluring aura, which pulled many a child into a trance, as well as bestowed upon them a burning desire for that one candy bar. This candy bar had a mysterious history that was completely unknown by anyone; no-one expected a piece of sugary deliciousness to be a source of evil. However, every Halloween, this candy bar has reincarnated itself from the stomachs of its victims, and returned to its permanent spot within a bin of candy at the same store year after year. This Halloween was no exception, and the candy bar was once again hungry; it was once again a predato

Jasmine's Post About Allegiant

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Spoilers for possibly more than Allegiant as I will be comparing to another series. Read at your own risk. The wave is made of all the tears of fangirls and fanboys. Allegiant. Where to begin... Okay, overall, I thought the book was really good. Now, the whole plot was very similar to that of the Maze Runner series. Think about it. Pretty much the same thing.  The whole thing with Tobias was starting to get a little old but I kind of get what was going on there. Tobias found out that he was "Genetically Damaged" and not Divergent, but a person who had traits that seemed like those of a Divergent. He had defined himself as a Divergent his whole life, so when he was told that he wasn't, he was confused and has to like figure out who he is if he wasn't Divergent. Still, he sulked....a lot. And Tris said all those things to him to try get him to feel better. Yet he still went out and participated in the attempt to get the death serum. Now, in that part, I t

Can't Stop Laughing

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GOOD MORNING EVERYONE. Go read a book. ~Amanda

Amanda's Likes/Dislikes in Books

So, I'm following Tyler's lead and making this post : 3 What I *Do* Like In Books: - A good plot - Characters I can relate to - Characters I can cheer for - Comedy (a sassy character!) - Unique plot devices (twist endings? Never-saw-that-coming cliffhangers? Riveting moments? YES) - Depth to the plot/characters (Hi, I'm a girl I'm this old I'm in this place oh I died. The End. = NO) - A good range of aforementioned characters - An antagonist with a legit motive (I'm gonna rule da world! >:D I'm gonna keel ur family! = NO) - Not *too* much left to the imagination, but not drowning in description, either (AMEN) - Action/violence - Suspense - Plot elements that keep me thinking and guessing -Scenes that make me cry or almost cry -Romace (as in, a legit couple who legitimately love each other) (for a bad example, see Twilight) What I *Don't* Like In Books: - Sex scenes - Lame antagonists - Lame endings - Blatant

Dying Update

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Just waitin' for Tyler's reactions to: The Fault in Our Stars ☑ The House of Hades Allegiant Just waitin' for Jasmine's reactions to: The House of Hades ☑ Allegiant     TFiOS. <3   ~Amanda

Engie Life: What Makes Me Like Books

I think a post like this has been needed for a long time. I got around spewing about how good books are, yet you don't know *why* I think that. So, this post highlights what I like in a good book (and I don't like). Naturally, all this is subject to my opinion. What I *do* like: - A good plot - Characters I can relate to - Comedy.  - Characters I can cheer for - Unique plot devices - Depth to the plot/characters - A good range of aforementioned characters - An antagonist with a legit motive - Not *too* much left to the imagination, but not drowning in description, either - Action/violence - Suspense - Plot elements that keep me thinking and guessing What I *don't* like: - Overly graphic scenes. Doesn't matter what kind of graphic we're talking about. See the 'Not *too* much...' line above.  - Lame antagonists - Lame endings - Blatant overuse of foul language - Not having a character I can love to hate - Being ov

Book Review: The Fault in Our Stars

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WARNING :  The  following post  contains  spoilers! The contents of this post are entirely in my raw, biased opinion and should therefore be taken with a grain of salt. Oh.  Oh my.  Excuse me while I go crawl over there and never look at life the same way again whilst simultaneously picking up the shredded fragments of my feelings and hopelessly trying to mend them back together to form a single coherent unit.  ... Like I said in the First Impressions post for this book, this is not a book I'd typically read. That said, I had almost no expectations going into it initially. Sure, there was enough hype surrounding it to form a second moon, but that doesn't mean I have to expectations of it.  And then I started reading it.  ... Oh. My. Cabbage.  This book.  Is probably one of the best things I've ever read.  What did I like about

Jasmine's Reaction to HoH (No Spoilers, I promise)

I literally just finished HoH. OH. MY. GOSH. It was amazing! There were so many feels! As I was reading the last 200 pages or so, my fingers were sweating as I held the book because it was just THAT GOOD. So many feels, I seriously was close to crying a few times. And I almost never cry. Yeah.  I'll probably start Allegiant tonight, and I'll post again when I finish that. ~Jasmine

House of Hades and Allegiant (No Spoilers Present)

So, I recieved HoH and Allegiant on Thursday. I am a little over halfway into HoH. I would have read more, but I have been having a lot of headaches lately and reading doesn't exactly help a headache. I am reading as fast as my head may allow. After I finish HoH, I shall read Allegiant and then continue with my rereading of Catching Fire (which was interrupted by the arrival of said books).  Tyler has told me that he has finished TFioS but he can't post a review until he gets to a computer. So, waiting on that. Just keeping you all posted. Ok, bye. ~Jasmine

SORRY GUYS UGH

It just kind of occurred to me that I never REVIEWED The House of Hades and didn't do a formal review for The Fault in Our Stars and I haven't reviewed The Great Gatsby. Oops. I PROMISE that I will DO MY BEST to do those reviews this weekend, if possible. I'm busy all day today... Thank you for your patience!!!!!!!!!!!! :D ~Amanda

Dying

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Just waitin' for Tyler's reactions to: The Fault in Our Stars The House of Hades Allegiant Just waitin' for Jasmine's reactions to: The House of Hades Allegiant   ~Amanda

BOOK REVIEW: ALLEGIANT BY VERONICA ROTH

"According to Roth, the storytelling style of Allegiant is different from Divergent and Insurgent . She said that "[The first two] are heavy action, violent books. The third book has action, it’s not not action-y, but a lot of my interest has moved towards the societal struggles and the wrestling Tris is doing inside of her head. I’m an action girl, I still love action, but I think it’s a little more balanced now." ^This quote is from Wikipedia. And this quote is completely true. The action in this book takes up about 10% of this book. The other 95% consists of whining, anger, rifts in relationships, distrust, trying to trust, lying, trying not to lie, damaged genes, pure genes, stupid cliché experiments and tyrannical government, etc. The other 5% is a good ending. The only thing that saved this book for me was the last ~100 pages. The first 400 pages SUCKED. Absolutely horrible. The writing is horrid. There is a mistake. The scenes with Tris and Tob

The Fault in Our Stars: First Impression

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~This post serves as a place to tell the world about my first impressions of a given book after having read only a small portion of it. There might be light spoilers, but nothing too detrimental to the impact or flow of the plot. After all, I've only read the first few chapters~ The Fault in Our Stars is probably one of the most over-hyped books I've encountered recently. And to put it bluntly, it's not a book I would ever pick out to read if left in a book store with no advice to follow except the questionably moral little voices in side my head.  But with that said, over-hyped things tend to have a reason to be over-hyped. And with that comes in the inevitable fact that everyone around me that has come in contact with the thing is subsequently unable to shut up about it.  As stated in several of my other posts, if person A is unable to put a lid on the can of topic B, then topic B must be something bordering on good.  Mostly.  I mean, we

Book Review: Legend

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WARNING! This  post contains spoilers (FOR MORE THAN JUST LEGEND)!   The contents of this post are entirely in my raw, biased opinion and should therefore be taken with a grain of salt.   You know what I like? Violence.  You know what I also like? Intrigue.  You know else I also like? Kids diddling about with sharp pointed object and devices that launch sharp pointed objects. You know what Legend has? All of them! You know what's starting to get old? Love triangles. You know else is starting to get old? Dystopian governments that are initially made out to be the best thing ever than in the timespan between the prologue and chapter 4 the protagonist is already plotting to overthrow them.  Just face it: Dystopias and love triangles are getting a bit cliche in novels, especially young adult ones. They all seem to follow the same formula of a guy and a girl and guy and s

LIST OF RELEASE DATES

I need to write this to organize all these crazy dates!!! THE LIFE OF A BOOK NERD. Release Dates for Books: Allegiant by Veronica Roth - October 22nd, 2013 Champion by Marie Lu - November 5th, 2013 November 19, 2013 - World After by Susan Ee Divided by Elsie Chapman - May 27th, 2014 The Blood of Olympus - Fall 2014 (no release date yet of course lol too early) Movies: The Fault in Our Stars - June 6th, 2013 (SO. EXCITED. FOR. THIS.) Ender's Game - November 1st, 2013 Catching Fire - November 22nd, 2013 Divergent - March 21, 2014 How to Train Your Dragon 2 - June 13th, 2014 The Maze Runner - September 19th, 2014 Mockingjay Part 1 - November 21st, 2014 ~Amanda

WAT.

"Ender's Game is going to be released in two weeks!" SHOOT!!! I HAVEN'T FINISHED THAT BOOK YET. I'M 100 PAGES IN. But then again...it hasn't captured my attention... :x So that's why I haven't finished it. ~Amanda

Book News

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So, in continuing the barrage of House of Hades posts, my copy has not yet arrived. As some of you readers may remember, my Amazon order consisted of House of Hades, Allegiant, and Champion, all of which have different release dates. The delivery of House of Hades would have been delayed until the release of Champion in early November, but Amazon decided to send HoH by itself and it should be arriving as early as Friday!  Yay! This is very good news! It seems as though I will be the last author on the blog to read it, as Amanda has lent her copy to Tyler this weekend. When I get mine, I shall read it very quickly, especially since this coming week consists of two midterms, meaning that I won't have to study for tests and I will hopefully have less homework. It is very hard to write this at the moment because for some reason the little blinking line that tells you where you're typing is not showing up...but I am on a role, so I will forge on!  Yeah, so Allegiant comes out on Tue

R.I.P...

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The following contains minor spoilers for The House of Hades. You've been warned.     ~Amanda

My Reaction to The House of Hades Overall

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This post contains no spoilers.   The ending...was beautiful. So...sad...yet beautiful. The book overall was awesome. Ignore some certain parts containing Nico *shifty* But overall...oh my gosh... <3 I loved it. ~Amanda

Reading The House of Hades Today

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Today will be 99% devoted to reading and finishing The House of Hades! I'm scared, guys. I am already 100 pages in...which leaves me with 483 pages to read today. I'm guesstimating that it will take me approximately 5 hours to finish the book, if not 5 and a half! LET'S GO. ~Amanda

Amanda's Reaction to The House of Hades

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THIS POST CONTAINS NO SPOILERS. My reaction to receiving The House of Hades:   My reaction to the first few pages of The House of Hades: My reaction to the first 50 pages of The House of Hades: My reaction to Gaea: My reaction to the anticipation of reading the rest: My reaction to The House of Hades overall: GUYS. ~Amanda