The Dead Girls’ Dance

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Book: The Dead Girls’ Dance by Rachel Caine

Published by Penguin Group

Purchased for my Nook (256 pages)

Genre: YA: Paranormal

Find out more: Goodreads~Barnes And Noble~Amazon~Rachel Caine

Goodreads Summary: Claire Danvers has her share of challenges—like being a genius in a school that favors beauty over brains, dealing with the homicidal girls in her dorm, and above all, finding out that her college town is overrun with vampires. On the up side, she has a great roommate (who tends to disappear at sunup) and a new boyfriend named Shane, whose vampire-hunting dad has called in backup: cycle punks who like the idea of killing just about anything.

Now a fraternity is throwing its annual Dead Girls’ Dance and—surprise!—Claire and her equally outcast best friend, Eve, have been invited. When they find out why, all hell is going to break loose. Because this time both the living and the dead are coming out—and everybody’s hungry for blood.

I just love this series, even thought I’ve only read the first couple books.  It picks up where Glass Houses left off.

I just love the characters but they were all over the place.  Like the thing Michael did at the end?  Not what I expected.  Monica didn’t seem like her usual  crazy, threatening self either.

I really enjoyed the race to save Shane from being burned alive.  Definitely a lot of mystery- even though it was pretty obvious Shane would be saved at the end.  Things between Shane and Claire seem rushed, especially at the end, but overall, it wasn’t as bad as it could have been.  I didn’t like Shane as much in this novel but hopefully he’ll be more like the Shane we met in Glass Houses.  Eve was just okay, and Michael is really interesting.  He’s still him, and I’m really curious as to what Caine does with him in the rest of the series.

I really love the town of Morganville and how I can picture everything so clearly.  Plus, I love the way the town is set up and structured and how they deal with things.  And Shane’s relationship with his dad (who is slightly crazy but still interesting) is also interesting.  Plus, learning about his sister and his mother and how they died was interesting.  Learning about characters is good, and so far, Caine seems pretty good about pacing the little tidbits we get.

Morganville is a crazy town, but I love that about it.  And I love that things aren’t progressing slowly- Claire and her friends seem to get more and more involved with the craziness.

It gets a 5 out of 5.  It was fun, and I just love the vampires in this series.

Top 8 Bookish Confessions

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Top 10 Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers from all over share their own lists based on the topic of the week.  You can find all top 10 Tuesdays here.

Top 8 Bookish Confessions

I had a really hard time with this one- it seemed so easy but maybe I wasn’t in a book confession kind of mood.  Or something.  I honestly have no idea.  Anyway, here are my bookish confessions.

  1. I don’t mind if my series don’t quite match up.  The covers don’t need to match, and I don’t mind if some of them are paperback and some are hard-cover.  The only thing I’m really picky about is format- if one copy is on my nook, then the rest of them need to be on my nook…or a physical copy, if that’s what I have…speaking of the whole e-reader debate…
  2. Pet Peeve: When people refer to “real books.”  You know, as opposed to the imaginary ones.  I get what they’re trying to get at, but it annoys me because of the implication that certain types of books/formats are better than others.  A book is book, no matter what genre or format it’s in.
  3. I sometimes buy books based on the cover…or the title.
  4. Serious confession: Sometimes, I’m still scared to say what I really think about books because I don’t want to be judged for what I like or dislike…especially if I seem to be in the minority.
  5. I try not judge people for what they read, because everyone has their own interests…but I will judge them for how they talk about other books and its fans.  I don’t care how much you like or dislike something…just don’t be rude or mean or anything.  Calling people stupid for liking or not liking something?  Not cool.
  6. I miss reading romance novels.  Why did I ever stop that?  I must get on this…eventually.
  7. I dog ear books…but only if they’re my copy.  Because it’s totally rude to do that to a poor, innocent library book.
  8. I love my e-reader because I’m less likely to throw it at a wall if I’m annoyed with a book.  Same thing with library books…no way I’m throwing that at a wall!

What are some of your bookish confessions?

GG 1 x 2: The Loreleis’ First Day At Chilton

Posted in Season One, The Gilmore Girls Project by

The Loreleis’ First Day At Chilton originally aired October 12, 2000.  It was written by Amy Sherman-Palladino and directed by Arlene Sanford.

In this episode, we see Rory’s first day at Chilton, where we learn you get extra points for singing the school song in Latin.  And Chilton is not a place where cutoffs and cowboy hats are considered fashionable.

This episode gets off to a funny start, with Lorelei waking up late because her fuzzy alarm clock didn’t go off.  The cutoffs and cowboy hat?  It’s because she woke up late, couldn’t pick up her dry-cleaning, and thus had nothing to wear.

The rodeo comment by Rory was hilarious.

Of course, we get our first look at Chilton a few minutes into the episode- it definitely looks like an elite prep school in New England.  Or at least, what I imagine an elite prep school in New England to be.  I love how Lorelei starts to go off on tangents when they’re meeting the Headmaster- and what I love about the series.  It’s just full of tangents.

I love the crap Lorelei gets for wearing shorts for Rory’s first day at Chilton.  Part of me would love to go to Chilton, because it doesn’t seem like your typical school.  I don’t know what what’s going on with Chilton, but it seems like they have majors.  In high school.  And with the classes and the class schedule, it seems more like college than high school.

I forgot how annoying and high-strung Paris was in high school.  She’s just like that, period, but much more amplified at Chilton.  The Rory-Paris relationship is an interesting one, and it starts off a little bit hostile.  Don’t worry, though, it changes.

Jackson cracks me up, and I love the relationship he has with Sookie.  I love them on their own, but when you get them together, hilarity ensues.  And Michel is hilarious.  Babette is one of my favorite characters.  Actually, I love the colorful people that populate Star Hollows.

We meet quite a few characters in this episode- Paris, Madeleine and Louise (who I can never tell apart), Headmaster Charleston, Tristan, Jackson and Babette.  And Mick, who later turns into Kirk…which is one of those weird continuity errors and a tale for another episode.

Pop culture references include The Shining, Alice In Wonderland and The Dukes of Hazzard.  Plus a few I probably missed because I wasn’t on the look-out.  I really need to pay attention to these things.  What I did notice, however, was the first reference to Al’s Pancake World.  Spoiler alert- for all the time Al’s is mentioned, we never actually meet Al or see Al’s Pancake world, which is a disappointment.  That’s one place and person I’d love to see.

Favorite line: From Emily: “Do you want a ride or is your horse parked out front?”

Miss Patty, to her dance class: “you don’t want to drop harry potter, then he’ll die and you’ll never know what happened.”

Final thoughts: I liked this episode.  It’s introducing us to a lot of the people and places, which continues for at least one or two episodes (if not more).  And that seems like a really low estimate, but it’s the first season and all, so it’ll take time before we meet everyone.  Especially with the huge cast that Gilmore Girls has.

This episode gets 3 out of 5 mugs.  I liked it, but it’s average.

My Soul To Take

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Book: My Soul To Take by Rachel Vincent

Published by Harlequin Teen

Purchased for my Nook (279 pages)

Genre: YA: Paranormal

Find out more: Goodreads~Barnes And Noble~Amazon~Rachel Vincent

Goodreads summary: She doesn’t see dead people, but she senses when someone near her is about to die. And when that happens, a force beyond her control compels her to scream bloody murder. Literally.

Kaylee just wants to enjoy having caught the attention of the hottest guy in school. But a normal date is hard to come by when Nash seems to know more about her need to scream than she does. And when classmates start dropping dead for no apparent reason, only Kaylee knows who’ll be next…

I thoroughly enjoyed My Soul To Take.  It’s about banshees (or Bean Sidhe)!  It’s a nice change from reading about ghosts (which I haven’t read a lot of) or vampires or fairies.

I love how Kaylee has to fight the urge to start screaming when she senses that someone is going to die.  What I loved most was the addition of male bean sidhe, who work with females in order to bring someone back to life.  That was a really good move on Vincent’s part, because it’s not something I’d associate with them.

I don’t blame Kaylee for thinking she was crazy- I’d think I was crazy too.  Her dad was irritating, the way he just bailed on her, but I totally get why he did.  I wasn’t expecting her aunt to make a deal with a reaper in exchange for youth, but at the same time, it wasn’t a big surprise.

I really liked the reapers and how one is going rogue.  I can’t wait to see how this resolves itself.  That, combined with the bean sidhe made this book really interesting.

It did take a little bit to get into it, but once you did, it was hard to put down.  I just loved reading about a different legend, because banshees aren’t something you read about in the world that is YA paranormal.  There was a lot of world-building, but it was so interesting that I didn’t really care.

I really want to know more about Aiden and Brendan.  And Tod and Nash.  Both sets of brothers and the relationships they have with each other intrigue me.

My Soul To Take gets a 4 out of 5.  It is different, which is good, and it was really mysterious and fun.

The Body Finder

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Book: The Body Finder by Kimberly Derting

Published by Harper Collins (352 pages)

Purchased for my Nook

Genre: YA: Paranormal

Find out more: Goodreads~Barnes And Noble~Amazon~Kimberly Derting

Goodreads Summary: Violet Ambrose is grappling with two major issues: Jay Heaton and her morbid secret ability. While the sixteen-year-old is confused by her new feelings for her best friend since childhood, she is more disturbed by her “power” to sense dead bodies—or at least those that have been murdered. Since she was a little girl, she has felt the echoes the dead leave behind in the world . . . and the imprints that attach to their killers.

Violet has never considered her strange talent to be a gift; it mostly just led her to find dead birds her cat left for her. But now that a serial killer is terrorizing her small town, and the echoes of the local girls he’s claimed haunt her daily, Violet realizes she might be the only person who can stop him.

Despite his fierce protectiveness over her, Jay reluctantly agrees to help Violet find the murderer—and Violet is unnerved by her hope that Jay’s intentions are much more than friendly. But even as she’s falling intensely in love, Violet is getting closer and closer to discovering a killer . . . and becoming his prey herself.

I really liked The Body Finder.  I thought Violet’s ability to sense the dead and imprints that their killers leave behind was an interesting one.  I wasn’t too surprised to see that there was a serial killer taking and killing girls and that Violet used her abilities to figure out where the girls were buried and who was behind it.

I wish we saw more of her ability and what she can do with it.  It was interesting enough, with different people having different echoes, and a serial killer absorbing the echoes of all of the people they’ve killed.  I really liked how she could see or hear them.

As for the romance…really obvious.  At least Jay and Violet were best friends first, which is a nice change from the love at first sight romances.  And no love triangles, which is also nice.

Violet, other than her creepy ability to sense the dead, actually seemed relatively normal.

Something I just loved was seeing the serial killer in action.  It made everything much more creepy.  Plus, it felt a lot more real, as opposed to just being there.  Creepy ability + getting into the serial killer’s head = a suspenseful book!

I give it a 4 out of 5.  It started off a little slow but picked up.

 

Whirl

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Book: Whirl by Emma Raveling

Published by Mandorla Publishing (258 pages)

Purchased for my Nook

Genre: YA: Paranormal/Fantasy

Find Out More: Goodreads~Barnes And Noble~Amazon~Emma Raveling

Goodreads Summary: Seventeen-year-old Kendra Irisavie is an ondine, a water elemental caught in the middle of an ancient war with the Aquidae, immortal dark demons who will stop at nothing to destroy the fragile balance of the Elemental world.

Fierce and independent, Kendra has always played by her own rules. Gifted with the powerful magic of Virtue and trained to be a deadly fighter, she has spent her life breaking hearts and getting into trouble.

When her life explodes one violent night in a northern California city, a dark stranger appears, promising answers to her mysterious past.

Alone and with no one to trust, she must now navigate through a dangerous new world, face the temptations of a forbidden romance, and remain true to her duty and destiny.

All while the Aquidae continue to hunt her down, in the hopes of eliminating her forever…

I love the concept of Whirl.  It kind of reminds me of Vampire Academy, in the the society is structured and how the school is set up.  But obviously with water elementals instead of vampires.

Okay, so Kendra falling for a prince and being the chosen one was a little obvious.  But there were a couple other guys I could see her with, and I’m not completely sure who she’ll end up with.  You have Tristan (the prince) and Julian, and I could see her with either one.  There was the possibility of her and a friend, but that’s not going to happen because he (unfortunately) died.  I like that it’s not completely obvious.  It’s a nice change from a lot of other books, where you know right off the bat who the main character will end up with.

I love that the water element is the focus, and that there are elementals who have Virtues (or super-special abilities) and elementals who don’t have any Virtues.  I thought Raveling did a great job with coming up with her own terminology- which is even explained at the end.  I wish I had read it first, but either way, I’m glad she included it.

I haven’t come across anything involving the elements to this degree.  I’m sure they’ve been in the background of something I’ve read, but they’ve never been the focus.  I just love this idea!  I really do.

Kendra was way too independent, and was determined to do things on her own.  I guess part of it is that she grew up “rogue” with her mother.  So while she’s the chosen one who has to defeat the Aquidae, she’ll (hopefully) learn that she can trust others enough to let them help her.

I did find some of the other characters more interesting.  Like Nexa.  I sort of want to know more about a mission she was on.  And I thought Julian and Tristan were interesting characters.  I was hoping for more scenes with both of them, but I’m really hoping we’ll see more of them in the rest of the series.

I think Whirl deserves a 4 out of 5.  It really is an interesting idea, and I love the idea of water elementals.

Favorite Books, Continued

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Because I can’t leave this topic alone, I decided to share some of my other favorite books since I started blogging.

  • The Sky Is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson.  I laughed and I cried, and I just loved Lennie and Joe.
  • The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern.  This is a captivating book that slowly draws you in.  It’s magical and dreamlike and I just love it.  The way I love a lot of things.
  • In Honor by Jessi Kirby.  I love how Honor goes on a road trip to fulfill her brother’s last wish.  I don’t know what it is with me and books that deal with loss and grief, but I just love them.  And this one is one of my favorites.
  • The Morganville Vampires by Rachel Caine.  Okay, so what if I’ve only read the first 2 books in the series?  It’s still one of my favorites, and I just love the characters and the town.  I can picture everything so perfectly.
  • Cinder by Marissa Meyer.  I love Cinder!  It has cyborgs and Cinderella and the Lunar people.  And it takes place in New Bejing!  What’s not to love.
  • North Of Beautiful by Justina Chen.  I love Terra and found her to be a character I really understand.  It’s heart-wrenching at times, and there’s just something so beautiful about it.
  • Divergent by Veronica Roth.  I can’t believe I forgot about Divergent.  I don’t think it would make my top 10, but definitely top 20.  It really is a great book, with lots of action and a really interesting society.
  • Unearthly by Cynthia Hand is another one I forgot about.  I love the angels in Unearthly and…I just love this series.
  • Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling.  No list is complete with mentioning Harry Potter.  It’s my favorite of the books I’ve re-read, and it’s one I keep going back to.

This was really fun, and there are a lot of books that I really love.  I’m sure I’ll find a few more between now and the end of the year, given how many books I’ll probably read over the next few months.  Happy Thursday!

Anna Dressed In Blood

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Book: Anna Dressed In Blood by Kendare Blake

Published by Tor Teen (211 pages)

Purchased for my Nook

Genre: YA: Paranormal- Ghosts/Horror

Find out more: Goodreads~Barnes And Noble~Amazon~Kendare Blake

Goodreads Summary: Cas Lowood has inherited an unusual vocation: He kills the dead.

So did his father before him, until he was gruesomely murdered by a ghost he sought to kill. Now, armed with his father’s mysterious and deadly athame, Cas travels the country with his kitchen-witch mother and their spirit-sniffing cat. Together they follow legends and local lore, trying to keep up with the murderous dead—keeping pesky things like the future and friends at bay.

When they arrive in a new town in search of a ghost the locals call Anna Dressed in Blood, Cas doesn’t expect anything outside of the ordinary: track, hunt, kill. What he finds instead is a girl entangled in curses and rage, a ghost like he’s never faced before. She still wears the dress she wore on the day of her brutal murder in 1958: once white, now stained red and dripping with blood. Since her death, Anna has killed any and every person who has dared to step into the deserted Victorian she used to call home.

But she, for whatever reason, spares Cas’s life.

Anna Dressed In Blood got my attention because it’s about ghosts.  Not vampires or fairies or mermaids.  But ghosts!  They’re rare, it seems like, so I knew I had to read it.  Actually, there is a dash of horror, which seems equally rare in YA.

I liked it, and I loved seeing Anna’s story.  Okay, so Cas falling in love with Anna was a little unbelievable.  It is a paranormal book, though, so I’m willing to overlook that.  I do wish Blake had stuck with horror with a touch of paranormal, instead of the paranormal romance it seemed to turn into.  Cas as a character didn’t work for me, and I can’t exactly pinpoint why.  It is nice to see a male protagonist for once, but…I just didn’t really care about him either way.

But back to Anna.  Her story and the curse her mother put on her was interesting.  And I liked the creature that killed his dad.  Blake did create an interesting world, full of people with different abilities.

I don’t think I’m interested in reading the next book.  At least not right away.  It gets a 3 out of 5.  I liked it, but it’s not one of my favorites.

Top 10 Favorite Books I’ve Read Since I Started Blogging

Posted in Top 10 Tuesday by

Top 10 Tuesday is hosted by the lovely folks over at The Broke And The Bookish.  Every week, bloggers from all over share their own lists based on the topic of the week.  You can see all past top 10 Tuesdays here.

Top 10 Favorite Books I’ve Read Since I Started Blogging

I was so happy to see this topic!  I’ve read a lot of books in almost 2 years of blogging, and there are some that really stand out.  The ones that I work into any list I can…the ones I repeatedly recommend…the ones I can’t stop thinking about.  Anyway, here are my 10 favorite books since I’ve started blogging!

  1. Hate List by Jennifer Brown.  I’ve read this book a couple times and I can’t help but cry for about 5 or 10 minutes after.  It’s just so emotional.  I don’t know why I’ve connected with it so much, but I have.
  2. Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson.  Another one that I’ve really connected with.  I just love Laurie Halse Anderson, period.  But this is one of my favorites by her.
  3. Reason To Breathe by Rebecca Donovan.  This book is haunting and I feel anxious every time I think about it.  Anxious, like oh my god, I can’t believe that happened to her kind of anxious.
  4. The Fault In Our Stars by John Green.  This is my favorite John Green book, and both times I’ve read it, I’ve cried.  Actually, I think I cried harder the second time.  But I just love it.
  5. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.  This is my favorite book (and series) I read last year.  It’s so good, and there are a lot of really interesting things to think about.
  6. The Iron Fey series by Julie Kagawa.  This is one of those series I can’t stop talking about.  I just love the creativity and the details in this series.  And I’m super-excited about The Lost Prince, which is the spin-off to this series.  I’m hoping it lives up to the really high expectations The Iron Fey set.
  7. Wings by Aprilynne Pike.  Another series I can’t stop talking about.  Like The Iron Fey, I just love the creativity in this series.  Fairies being really similar to plants is totally believable.
  8. Need by Carrie Jones.  Yet another series on the list.  But this is one of my favorites.  You can’t go wrong with pixies…just like how you can’t go wrong with fairies.  It’s fun and I love the mythology in the series.
  9. Paranormalcy by Kiersten.  Clearly, I am a fan of series, because they’ve taken over my list.  But the one thing that sticks out is how Evie is pretty kick-ass and STILL LOVES SHOPPING, PINK AND SPARKLES.  And she has a taser named Tasey.  That’s pretty rare, at least in the books I’ve read.  Plus, it’s fun and doesn’t take itself too seriously.
  10. The Uglies by Scott Westerfeld.  I love the Uglies, and it’s one of my favorite dystopic series.  Actually, I haven’t read a lot of dystopic novels, but this one stands out because I thought the idea of a pretty committee and how the society was structured according to looks was really interesting.

And here are some honorable mentions: The Sky Is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson, The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern, In Honor by Jessi Kirby and The Morganville Vampires by Rachel Caine.

GG 1 x 1: The Pilot

Posted in Season One, The Gilmore Girls Project by

The pilot episode originally aired October 5, 2000, was written by Amy Sherman-Palladino and was directed by Lesli Linka Glatter.

In this episode, Rory gets accepted into Chilton, an elite prep school in Hartford.  Her mother Lorelei has to make amends with her parents in order to borrow the money for Rory’s tuition.  But it comes with strings attached- in the form of a weekly Friday night dinner.

Seeing this episode was such a trip.  It’s not as fresh in my mind as some of the other episodes, and seeing how different a lot of the characters looked (in comparison to the series finale) was a little startling.  It was also strange to see how different some of the sets looked, especially Luke’s Diner, Emily and Richard’s house and Lorelei and Rory’s house.

So much is set up in this episode- we see a lot of the places and meet a lot of characters that will stick around for the rest of the series.  I’ve already mentioned Luke’s, Lorelei’s house and Emily’s house, but Chilton will be a pretty important location over the next few seasons.  Same thing with the Independence Inn and Miss Patty’s.  Plus a few other locations that we’ll see over the course of the series.

As for other characters (besides the Gilmore’s anyway), we meet Sookie and Lane, who are Lorelei and Rory’s best friends, respectively.  We also meet Luke, Miss Patty, Mrs. Kim (Lane’s mom), Michel and Dean.

One thing I really love about this series is the different relationships between Rory, Lorelei and Emily.  And really, that’s what the series is about: mother-daughter relationships.  You get a pretty good sense of the kind of relationship between the three of them…but I’m a big fan of the series, so that might be coloring my perspective a little.

I love the humor and pop culture references.  It’ll be fun to try to figure them out.  In this episode, references include West Side Story, Rosemary’s Baby, Moby Dick, Flo Jo and RuPaul.  One interesting thing to keep in mind for this show is the fact that their scripts were double the length of your standard hour-long drama.  Most are around 4o to 45, I think, but Gilmore Girls was usually somewhere in the 80-page range.

Funny lines and scenes: “RuPaul doesn’t need this much make-up.”

Lorelei persuading Luke to give her more coffee at the beginning of the episode…complete with her very own mug.

There’s a scene were Lorelei goes to her parents house, and they’re trying to figure out what holiday it is.  It kind of implies that she only sees them during the holidays.

Final thoughts: For a pilot episode, it’s pretty good.  I have the feeling that if it were to air today, it probably would be cancelled way too early.  There aren’t as many good one-liners as I remembered, but it was fun to watch.

Let’s see…rating time!  Given how much Lorelei and Rory love coffee (as do I), I think I’m going to rate things on a scale of 1 to 5 coffee mugs.  And this episode gets 3.5 mugs.