Book-A-Week

Books!

Okay, sports fans, it’s been a while. Let’s get things rolling again, why don’t we? With this return comes a new project.

A-Book-A-Week

Yup, I’m going to read and review a new book every week. I’m a creature that craves habit and honestly, reads slow. I’m lucky if I can finish a romance novel in two weeks, and you know those aren’t generally long reads. The first few weeks might be a bit cheating, I’ll admit it. I have a couple of books that need to get finished before I start. The only one that I’ll actually count is Bayou Moon by Ilona Andrews. Come on, I’m on page 46 out of 462. I think that’s forgivable? Okay, maybe it’s a warm up. We have to start somewhere.

Questions?
Are they all going to be romance novels? Maybe? I can’t promise they won’t, but I do read Urban Fantasy, Science Fiction, Young Adult, and other such things. Sad to say (well not that sad), but I have a back log of romance novels waiting. Seriously though, some will be great. Unicorn Vengeance. Doesn’t that sound awesome?

Have you read these books before? No, that would be cheating! I’m also not using books that I’ve already gotten a healthy amount into. Right now, I have Sabriel by Garth Nix, Highlander Unmasked by Monica McCarty laying around my room more than half done and then Gena Showalter’s The Darkest Kiss more than 90% done in my iTouch, so there’s other books that will get finished and might get reviewed, but they won’t count to my goal.

This goal isn’t very ambitious. Why not a-book-a-day? I’m hoping to have a job sooner than later and as nice as it would be even posting a book review every day won’t bring me in the cash I need to do my Big Move come this summer.

Is there any reason you might pause? Well, there is the Big Move I’ll be making this summer. That might throw things off just a bit. Also, if anything by Kresley Cole gets released, well, sorry whatever-book-I’m-reading, but Kresley Cole takes priority. Oh, right. and finals. That makes things screwy sometimes.

How long will you be doing this? How long you got? Seriously, I’m going to aim for a year and ideally continue on and keep in good practice of getting through a book every week. I think that’s respectable!

Who are you talking to? Why, you of course. I’ll just keep talking to no one and eventually it’ll be someone! Yes, I am very optimistic when I want to be. Just ask Literary Napkin.

Can I suggest a book? I can’t promise I’ll get to it soon, but I’m willing to hear suggestions. Like I said, though, there is a backlog that just keeps getting bigger. Shh, don’t tell, but I picked up a cowboy romance novel just today with a missing child and a detective agency. I’m a sucker for these things.

And now that this place has a more clear purpose, maybe I’ll also remember to blog about other things as well, huh?  Any more questions, ask away! Happy reading!

 

 

*Image by Ruth and found here.

Romance & Me (& you!)

I’ve always been drawn to stories about people, especially their relationships. One of the first series I read was Anne McCaffrey’s Harper Hall Trilogy. The first two books enthralled me, following gawky, tall, and talented young Menolly as she left her home, knowing she’d never fit in and do or be what she wanted, then how she has to learn to fit in later at the Harper Hall, a world full of men that assume she thinks she’s better than them and women who think they’re better than her. All the while, she’s caring for this herd of tiny dragons, known as firelizards, finds an almost father figure in the old Masterharper Robinton, a strong friend in the impish Piemur, and an eventual love interest in Sebell in the later books. When I got to the third book, though I did like Piemur, I often found myself skimming along until I found Menolly and Sebell again, knowing that their relationship was going to blossom into something interesting.

Another series I enjoyed was Phillip Pullman’s Sally Lockhart series. A Victorian mystery involving drugs, death, and unsavory individuals all circulating around Sally as she tries to learn about the fate of her father, the truth behind her birth, and what the strange dreams she’ll have actually mean. Early on, she befriends Frederick Garland, a photographer who’s low on money, but full of generosity and love. I was 14 when I read this series and while perhaps not the topics commonly suggested for that age range, I devoured these novels and followed Sally’s journey willingly. The only thing that deterred me was when she lost Freddy. The was the second time I can remember actually crying over the fate of a book character, I was almost more invested than Sally at times. That relationship being so suddenly over made me take a pause with the rest of that series.

Looking back, I can see that I didn’t just hunger for relationships, I hungered for love stories. For a while, I also held to the stigma of romance novels. I never tried them out seriously until I was maybe 20-21. I took a quiz and they sent me free romance novels from The Harlequin Blaze series. The books were a bit cheesy, one had an uptight business woman who was trying to talk a computer game designer into helping her company, but was instead seduced into lightening up. The other was a klutzy woman who worked with a sex toy company and ended up working together with a male co-worker on a sexy project. Sadly, this is about what I recall and I’m not sure where those two books have gotten to since then. Since then, I stepped slowly into the genre before being immersed in it over the last couple of years. Honestly, I couldn’t be happier!

It’s funny looking back at how I read these books and how I read books now. I don’t think much has changed, though I’m if anything more patient! Now I just think I need to revisit my YA roots more often for those more innocent relationships. I recently read an article about bad boys in YA and realized I knew all of two of those “bad boys” listed. What does anyone else think? Were you digging for love stories as a kid? Did you have a copy of “My Lady Mischief” hidden under your bed?

Salvaged Parts

One of the things I like doing online is stalking artists. Hi. Yes, if you draw pretty pictures I might be quietly waiting to see an update and hopefully remembering to attempt to leave a comment or two here and there when you blog. I like free art and pretty pictures like I like kittens and colorful scarves (a lot!). I’m a sporadic con-goer and one of the things I like doing is buying page to card size artwork in the Artst’s Alley. Something I’d hang or display is usually going to be fanciful, but still likely feel at least somewhat cartoon-ish. That’s just what attracts me, to be honest. I love real landscapes and vivid scenes, but the colors and life you get in characters that aren’t drawn exactly to life, but to style and personality? I love to hold that near to me and just enjoy.

I felt like this, only it wasn't crack.

One thing that tends to be my real time killer these days is slice-of-life comics. Artists lay out their days and events of their life for me (and everyone) to read and appreciate. Sometimes they’re sweet, sometimes silly, sometimes tender and sad. I’ve cried for some, I’m man (well, woman)  enough to own up to that. A couple I really enjoyed recently, by which I mean I took far too much time away from homework to read comics from, come from Dustin Harbin and Lucy Knisley. Harbin is a new discovery, but I’m about half way through his hourlies. I like how he draws himself and his friends, his style seems simple and clean to me at least. This is me who has very little artsie know how. Pretty much just high school art classes and an Art major roommate for a year. Knisley keeps her work a bit more real, but works with meaning and objects a great deal. Her recent downloadable work, Salvaged Parts, is spoken about and sold here. I put down the two dollars and I would gladly buy it in a hardcopy format. I never lived with someone for the time she had, and no break up is ever the same, but her work struck me still. You read about someone helping themselves and the things that get them through something, it makes you want to be better, to get through your own trials.

Dangerous and Embarrassing Internet

To be honest, I used to draw a ton. There’s still stuff online, I have a portfolio that I don’t know if I’ll try to salvage though when I move or if it’ll just get tossed in the attic along with my childhood. There’s a painting behind me right now that I was told had so much meaning by my teacher, but to me it was just an image I had in my head that seemed cool. I miss drawing. I miss painting. I love these fabulous (to me) artists online that put themselves out there and it makes me want to do it as well. But I know I’m a good writer and a rather mediocre artist. I know my word crafting is much better than my doodles. I say this, and I keep glancing at a drawer that has a pad of drawing paper and a set of colored pencils in it. Hmm.

Before I go reflect, let me just toss out those links again. Lucy Knisley! Dustin Harbin! If you like things they or any artist does, you should buy things. A lot of people who draw pretty online things do it for free and could use support from fans once in a while. Or a lot, even. I promise I’ll buy something from both of them and other people if I can actually make it to a con they’re at. And note, the first image is from Knisely while the second is from Harbin, and both are not by me in the slightest.

Series for Young Adults

I follow a lot of reading and writing Twitters these days, so I see a lot of interesting links. One of which is this article at Reading Teen about the “Epidemic” of the series. I thought this was an excellent post! It really got me thinking. Why do I shy away from Young Adult series, but will dive head first into a Romance series? Why indeed!

Young Adult, or so is my experience, is all about keeping the story going. Take Twilight: the key conflict of will he or won’t he bite her is carried on until the final book. Which admittedly, resolved many things, though oddly. I can’t talk too long on that series, it’s a whole different post of it’s own. Harry Potter does this as well. The books are still somewhat dependent on the previous one, but really all that you need to understand is Harry is an extraordinary little boy raised by very human people and coming of age in a magical world that both hates and loves him at varying times. These are the series that I know and I know if I just picked up Eclipse or Half-Blood Prince without prior knowledge, I might be terribly lost.

Kresley Cole’s Immortals After Dark series, for one example is fantastic. You can pick up any book and have at it. Sure, several books cross over, both “No Rest For The Wicked” and “Wicked Deeds on a Winter’s Night” involve the same big tournament and the trilogy she’s working on now all involve the same main abduction event. Still, each book is self contained. I don’t need to read NRftW in order to understand the events from WDoaWN. I read both and simply see a different point of view. Then in nearly every book we see some of the same characters make cameos, the sooth saying “nucking futs” proto-Valkyrie Nix who is yet to have her own book who Cole has also allowed to slip into the work of fellow authors as well. The villainous Lothaire keeps popping up and obviously has his own evil vampire agenda and is one of the few long lasting villains that popped up from the get-go. He has also been nearly promise his own story.

Here’s my suggestion: YA take a page from the Romance genre. I crave a good series is the Romance genre for the pure fact that if I like the setting, that I can stay there for longer with different couples. Though sometimes it’s good to start at the beginning (I have a dear friend who usually won’t start anywhere but), you can still fully comprehend as much as you need to without having to follow a series, cliffhanger by cliffhanger.

Why can’t this happen in Young Adult? This is a legit question and I want to know what other people think. Is it because they want to keep to the same hero? I didn’t read Harry Potter as young as some kids did, but I know I and friends of mine were often interested in this misadventures of the kids that weren’t Harry and the gang. I wanted to know what was going on elsewhere and for others in the same world, and Young Adult never satisfied that enough for me. Also, if you have suggestions of books that do this, please share! I’m dying to be proven wrong honestly.

Things I Learned (and Should Get)

• Measure, measure, measure. THEN cut! (Items I Need: New scissors and a large cutting mat)
• My sewing machine is possessed. She likes to catch the ends of my thread and make this giant mess along the line I’m sewing so I have to seam rip out the seam and then re-stitch it.
• Silk catches on pins like a mofo. It’s evil, but soft and shiny.
• Just because the light on the iron is on doesn’t mean that the iron is on.
• Irons can smell nasty.
• How to Clean an Iron! Fill it 1/4 full of white vinegar. Set it to steam and use it on a clean rag. Iron until clean. Repeat with water if it doesn’t fix. This just cleaned the holes in the soleplate. I learned this technique here and it seems good!
• Measure more. (Also need: A clear plastic LARGE ruler)
• The silk setting on the iron doesn’t melt plastic pin heads! (Yay! But I still need glass head pins. One day.)
• Purple metallic shiny pins are the wrong choice for working with shiny purple silk.
• With that, yellow matte color pins are an excellent choice.
• Measure MORE!
• Don’t assume you’re pinning in a straight line because it looks straight. It might be slanted or just not straight. At all.

Picking Books (for sewing!)

Starting out on my endeavor to get to work on my sewing skills, I picked up some books. These should be coming in any day now, thanks to Amazon! The question that I had trouble with was what would were good books to use to start off with? I have some experience, as I mentioned, but very casually. So I read over Green Apples and checked out her book recommendations for one thing. Then I pulled them up and checked out the reviews!

• First, read the 1 and 2 star reviews. Look for problems you feel like are things you couldn’t work with. If this is a sewing book, are they issues with the projects? Do people find it too simple or advanced? Are the projects for children and you have none or know none?
• If they are no 1 or 2 star reviews, then check out the 3 stars, but this is a pretty positive thing as so many books at least have a couple negative reviews.
• Don’t forget to consider the price as well. The three books I just picked up were all under 15 dollars, so we’ll see if that’s good or bad soon enough! Watch out for the style of print it is, spiral bound books don’t seem unusual and are a bit cheaper.
• ALWAYS look at the “Frequently Bought Together” and “Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought” sections. It’s a real help when you’re looking for similar types of books and easy to forget.

So, along with my current copy of “Sewing For Dummies” by Jan Saunders Maresh (which I’ll make a solid review of later!), I have 3 books on the way. “Sew U: The Built by Wendy Guide to Making Your Own Wardrobe” by Wendy Mullin, “Sew What! Skirts: 16 Simple Styles You Can Make with Fabulous Fabrics” by Francesca DenHartog, and “The Perfect Fit: The Classic Guide to Altering Patterns” We’ll just see how they work out!

Hello world!

“Welcome to WordPress.com. This is your first post. Edit or delete it and start blogging!”

A sweet welcome! My name is Aden and I’ve been meaning to start a blog for a while now. Now you’re thinking “Who are you and why should I read your blog?” Well, we took care of the basic who, but I’m a 24 year old English major who likes reading and writing. I have a strong interest in romance and fantasy/sci-fi novels, and a itch to attempt sewing my own clothes because I just can’t find things that have the right fit and look like I’d like. Also, if I bought things I liked from the stores I go to, I’d be dressing like a little old lady librarian before my time.

So what will be here? Book reviews (there is a large stack of novels waiting for me this summer) and project posts. Maybe if something strikes me, I’ll make a good rant about something or other. But books and projects, that’s what we’re in for!