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Tuesday, January 23, 2018

What I'm Reading Tuesday

     Okay! Welcome to another edition of "What I'm Reading Tuesday," A long forgotten day of the week where I share what I'm reading that week and how I'm feeling about the books. This week I am kind of excited because I'm reading a couple books that I am LOVING.

Splintered by AG Howard is an Alice in Wonderland retelling. We all know AG Howard for Roseblood, but I found this gem browsing through Goodreads. It's a trilogy, the other other two books are called Unhinged and Ensnared. Alyssa is a relative of Alice Liddell, the woman who inspired Lewis Carrol's book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. The curse of hearing everything in the world around you speak has come upon each woman in the family line as soon as they get their first period. Alyssa has held it together, creating art with the creatures that are speaking to her, silencing them in a cruel, but beautiful, way. Alyssa's mother, however, did not fair so well. She is in a mental institution that Alyssa and her father visit every week to see her mother. That's as far as I've gotten in the book right now, but I'm really enjoying it.



     I have been waiting for this book forever. Everybody was raving about it but neither of my digital libraries had it and my local library didn't have it, so I asked them to get it. And they did! Really quickly too! (They also got Hunting Prince Dracula by Kerri Maniscalco and Cruel Prince by Holly Black, but we'll talk about those when I start reading them.) My library is actually really great about getting books that I recommend, I think that they're glad to have someone utilizing the building so often and so eagerly. I just finished chapter six last night and I am already loving it! Definitely check it out if you're into horror/murder mystery type books.



King's Cage by Victoria Aveyard is the third book in the Red Queen series (book 4 comes out this year) and I will say, it's been a rough one. I have been "reading" this book since November 13th and I feel like Mare is excessively whiny and overly dramatic, which is sad because I really enjoyed books 1 and 2. I still want to finish it because I want to know what happens, it just might take me a while to get there.










Thursday, January 18, 2018

I Used to Be Pretty Good at This

     I remember when I used to post on here a few times a week... Maybe I need to just dedicate one day a week to the blog and schedule things to post so that I at least have something going up.

     So I had a whole month off of school, I had planned to have reviews up a few times a week as well as update y'all on my knitting. I posted one review. One. Yes, I worked on them, but didn't finish many. Do you know what I actually did? I binged video podcasts on YouTube and TV shows on Hulu and Netflix. I mean I did work too, so I wasn't just lazing around in PJs eating chips and watching TV. I also worked on my bullet journal a lot. It's set up through February, but I'd like to get it set up through May since that's when my semester ends.

     I'm knitting pretty much every day, but I'm hardly finishing anything because I'm either starting something new or I ran out of yarn and need more. I'm participating in the Harry Potter Knit and Crochet House Cup again, so I'm getting in at least one project a month, even if it's something small like a blanket square.
     I'm hoping to attend DFW Fiber Fest in April in Irving, TX. I had hoped to put in my name for the SSK lottery, but some things came up and it just wasn't in the budget. Driving to DFW and staying in a hotel for a couple nights is much easier on my wallet right now than having to pay for a retreat, food, flight, and possibly a hotel. It's still one of my dream retreats, and I'd still love to go to Rhinebeck, but I need to save and work my way towards it.

Currently Knitting
  • Campside Shawl by Alicia Plummer
  • Owl Cardigan by Mari Chiba
  • Cozy Neighborhood by Joji Locatelli
  • vanilla socks
  • Speckled Space Socks by Amanda Stephens
  • Monkey Socks by Cookie A
  • The Doodler by Stephen West
Finished
  • Find Your Fade by Andrea Mowry
  • Color Affection by Veera Valimaki 
  • Monster Longies by Kristine Jorksogen
  • Crocheted a baby beanie
  • Felici "Slumber Party" socks
     Even over my break, I didn't read as much as I hoped to. I started a ton of books but I only finished a couple of them. I only finished 28 books last year, per Goodreads, which is only a little over half of my goal. Instead of upping or decreasing my goal this year, I decided to keep it the same. Maybe I'll actually hit 50 this year.

Currently reading:
  • Stalking Jack the Ripper by Kerri Maniscalco
  • Splintered by AG Howard
  • King's Cage by Victoria Aveyard
  • Shadowfever by Karen Marie Moning
  • Crown of Midnight by Sarah J Maas
Finished
  • Darkfever by Karen Marie Moning
  • Bloodfever by Karen Marie Moning
  • Faefever by Karen Marie Moning
  • Dreamfever by Karen Marie Moning
  • Ruby Red by Kerstin Gier (audiobook)
  • Princess in the Spotlight by Meg Cabot (audiobook)
  • Throne of Glass by Sarah J Maas
  • The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot (audiobook)
     Again, sorry for the radio silence. The best place to keep up with me is on Instagram (click the icon in the sidebar).I'll try to get some more reviews up soon!

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

Book Review: Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon

* This review contains spoilers! *


Everything, Everything
Nicola Yoon
310 Pages
YA - Contemporary, Romance

     Everything, Everything, though a quick and easy read, was probably one of the best books I've read. Madeline Whittier is a girl who has lived her whole life in a sterilized, filtered house with nurses who take care of her during the day and her mother, who is a doctor, taking care of her in the evening. She is said to have Severe Combined Immunodeficiency, or SCID, an extremely rare disease in which there is a severe defect in both the T- & B-lymphocyte systems. (www.scid.net) Basically, you're allergic to the world. You can't go outside, you can't interact with people, and you miss out on living your life because of this. Madeline, or Maddy, has learned to live with this, though, and is content with her life... Until she meets Oliver Bright. 
     Oliver "Olly" Bright moves in across the street from Maddy, and they quickly become friends.  They IM and e-Mail back and forth into the wee hours of the morning, and unbeknownst to them, are deeply in love. Okay, rewind. After Olly and his family move in across the street, he and his sister bring the Whittier's a "hello" gift. After Mrs. Whittier profusely denies the gift and shuts the door on the siblings, Olly becomes more curious of Madeline. They start by just writing to each other and miming at the windows across from each other, and eventually move to IM and e-Mail. 
     Carla, Maddy's nurse and probably her favorite person on the planet, notices that Madeline is hiding something, and eventually finds out about Olly. After hounding and begging Carla, Madeline convinces her to let Olly come over for a visit while her mom, Pauline, is at work. They visit about once a week, and eventually, they end up kissing.
     All is well for a while, until one night when Olly's father, an abusive alcoholic, starts beating on Olly who is defending his mother. Madeline, ignoring her mother completely, runs out to make sure Olly is okay and is dragged back home. Pauline begins demanding to know what is going on and Maddy tells her. Carla is fired, though Maddy begs her mom not to, and Pauline takes off of work to take care of Madeline until a replacement nurse is hired. 
     The replacement nurse is all business. She only allows Maddy the internet to do schoolwork, no phone, only things that she cannot use to communicate to anyone. At this point, Maddy is depressed. She misses Carla, she's mad at her mom, she hates her new nurse, and all she does is spend time alone. Until she decides she's had enough. She leaves a note for her mom, buys plane tickets to Hawaii, packs a bag, and heads to Olly's. Olly is obviously concerned for her safety, but Maddy lies and tells him that she's taking these new pills that are on trial and she will be okay. Reluctantly, but excitedly, he agrees to go with her to Hawaii.
     In Hawaii, they eat, dance, swim in the ocean, and they also end up having sex. That was quick, wasn't it? They hardly knew each other, kissed some, couldn't talk to each other for months, and now they're in bed together. Anyway, Maddy starts to get really sick. She ends up in the hospital and her mom is called to come and get her. Maddy gets taken home where her mom never leaves her side. 
     Maddy eventually gets better, but Olly's mom ends up leaving her abusive husband which means that Olly and his sister leave with her. Maddy still can't talk to anybody because her mom's afraid she's going to run off again. One day, Maddy gets an email from the doctor who cared for her in Hawaii that pretty much said "You don't have SCID." A little back story before we get to the twist, Maddie lost her father and brother in a car accident when she was younger. Of course this means that her mother only had a daughter left and she would do anything to keep her safe, as any mother would. "Anything" includes secluding her only child and telling her that she's allergic to the world. The whole facade is complete with an air-lock entrance and air filtration system, making people go see a doctor and be disinfected before coming over, and a bunch of other crazy things. This lady obviously did her research before she decided to raise her daughter like this. Maddy goes into her mom's office and finds her medical records. She had been tested for SCID by multiple doctors and they had all said that she didn't have it, yet her mother decided they were wrong. She didn't want to lose her daughter too, and that is what she told Maddy when Maddy confronted her about the lies.
     At the end of the book, Maddy finds Olly in a book shop in the town where he now lives and we're kind of left with a cliffhanger.
     I really enjoyed this book, and the plot twist at the end really brought the whole book together. I think Maddy's mom is insane for having done that to her, and I hope that there aren't parents who would do that to their child, but as psychology student, I know that there are but also that those parents should have gotten help to cope and that Maddy's mother needed a lot of help. This book is great for a quick, fun read, but it also has some meaning behind it as well.

     I'd love to hear what you thought of the book, tell me in the comments below!

Source
Callao Designs and Barb Ballard © Copyright 2013. (n.d.). The SCID Homepage. Retrieved March 29, 2017, from http://www.scid.net/

Tuesday, August 22, 2017

Life / Book / Knitting Update

     As I sit here and write this, I am at work. Since I last posted on here in March, I have had two jobs, graduated high school and started college. (Officially as of next Tuesday, but I've already cracked open my textbooks.)

     I guess we'll start with the jobs. I started working at one of the local hotels towards the end of March until the end of June. I won't get into the specifics here, but I quit. At the end of July, I started working at the other local hotel, which is where I currently write to you from. I really enjoyed the hotel environment and wanted to stay with it. My new boss is great, and totally accommodates my schedule and being a student. Down side? I'm a night auditor. This basically means I come in at 11PM and clean up, run the end of day reports at 4AM and then have breakfast out between 5-6AM. Not many people check in after midnight so I get a lot of time to read, knit, and study.

    Graduation was pretty great! My mom surprised me and had the party at our family reunion so that everybody could be there. It had been in the works for months and I had absolutely no idea!

     I start college on Tuesday, August 29th. I've already taken two semester's worth of classes, but the college I'm at right now didn't accept most of them so I'm still considered a freshman. This semester I'm taking Biology for Science Majors w/lab, Essentials of Lifespan Development(Psychology), Interpersonal Communication (Speech), and College Algebra. I'm pretty excited, I've already gotten through the first chapter of my speech and psychology textbooks, and my biology textbook should be here Friday. I didn't buy an algebra textbook because it wasn't required and I wasn't spending $300 on a book I wasn't going to need.

     As for reading, since this blog is primarily reading and knitting, I've finished 15 books since I last posted a "Finished Reading Friday." I'm working on reviews tonight as well, but here's a list of what I've finished.

  1. Uglies by Scott Westerfeld (Audiobook)
  2. Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee (Audiobook)
  3. Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver
  4. Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon
  5. Marked by PC & Kristin Cast
  6. Betrayed by PC & Kristin Cast
  7. The Siren by Kiera Cass
  8. Carve the Mark by Veronica Roth
  9. Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo
  10. Seige and Storm by Leigh Bardugo
  11. Ruin and Rising by Leigh Bardugo
  12. A Court of Wings and Ruin by Sarah J Maas
  13. Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick
  14. Caraval by Stephanie Garber
  15. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by JK Rowling
     Books I'm reading (currently and just haven't finished.)
  1. Passenger by Alexandra Bracken
  2. The Diviners by Libba Bray
  3. The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot (Audiobook)
  4. City of Bones by Cassandra Clare
  5. Crescendo by Becca Fitzpatrick
  6. Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor 
  7. Neanderthal Seeks Human by Penny Reid
     Knitting Update:
     The last time I posted a finished object was in November, so I'll share from there! Links go to my Ravelry project pages so that you can see photos!

Finished Projects

  1. Monster Longies by Kristine Jorskogen 
  2. Matching hat
  3. Three Ponytail Hats (I didn't take photos of the other two)
  4. Vanilla Socks out of Sara's Texture Crafts yarn (Didn't get an FO photo, but there's a progress shot.)
  5. Vans style baby sneakers by Showroom crochet
  6. Hermione's Everyday Socks by Erica Lueder
  7. Exploration Station by Stephen West
  8. Tube Socks in Paton's Kroy "Singin' the Blues"
  9. Socks in Knit Picks Felici "Soft Serve"
  10. Flax by TinCanKnits (I'm such a horrible friend, this baby was born over a month ago...)
  11. Breezy Cardigan by Hannah Fettig 
     I won't even list my WIPs because I know I won't get them all. Check my Rav page for a good idea. 

That's all for now, folks. I'll try to remember this little corner of the internet more often.

Thursday, March 30, 2017

Book Review: Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo



Six of Crows (Six of Crows #1)
Leigh Bardugo
YA - Fantasy
462 Pages

     I won't lie, I did not finish this book...Yet? I am undecided as to if I will finish it or not. Six of Crows had such rave reviews that I felt the need to pick it up and read it immediately. I couldn't get into it, the writing was great and it sounded like the plot of a heist to kidnap the man who invented the most deadly Grisha drug would be very interesting. I felt that I had a hard time relating to the characters, and honestly, I only really liked Nina and Mathias' relationship. The characters, to me, did not play off of each other very well, though they were very thoroughly and descriptively written. You could clearly see each character's personality, but they were all so different, and the point of view switched so often, that I just had a hard time keeping up. 
     Maybe I will pick this book up again one day, but probably not any time soon. I am thinking about picking up the first book in the Grisha trilogy to see if that is more my speed.