Warm Bodies: A Fresh Perspective From a Rotting Body

Introducing Warm Bodies, by Isaac Marion, a zombie love story that- wait, what? A zombie love story? Well, now I have heard everything. Vampires and werewolves seem likely enough candidates for paranormal romance, but zombies? They’re rotting! They can’t talk (well, in this book, they can form short, drawn out sentences)! They eat human flesh (which is somehow much worse than drinking blood to most people. I don’t know how that one slipped by)! And yet, despite all of this, Isaac Marion has created a zombie protagonist who is not only compelling, but a romantic interest. Most importantly, R is an anomaly in the zombie world. That’s how it always starts, isn't it?

For starters, R is quite a philosophical and contemplative zombie, which even he admits is strange and unnatural. Sure, he shuffles around an abandoned airport with a bunch of other zombies, but he wonders why zombies are the way they are. He muses a lot, wondering “How did this start? How did we become what we are? Was it some mysterious virus? Gamma rays? An ancient curse? Or something even more absurd?” Marion subtly gives back story to the apocalypse, either through R's thoughts or flashbacks from humans (I’ll get to that soon). R also contemplates about the purpose of being a zombie. He remarks that he could remember a time when he was purposeful and accomplished things, but now he just wanders an airport and eats flesh sometimes. He says “being dead is easy.” I myself have been wondering and even asking my friends if they’d rather live a simple life without responsibilities or worries, or if they’d rather live a full life currently, wrought with emotion, challenges, pleasures and hardships.

Everyone picks the latter choice.

R would as well.

Everything is flipped turned upside down (thanks, Will Smith) when R, his friend M and a small hoard of zombies attack a recon group of humans in the city. R kills a boy and takes a bite from his brain (those with weak stomachs, beware), instantly flooding him with the boy’s memories. The boy Perry’s memories are exactly the reason he likes brains; they’re his drug of choice and make him feel alive. When he sees the blonde girl form the boy’s memories, his girlfriend Julie, R is quite taken with her. He saves Julie, brings her back to the airport to protect her and to keep her safe. As R spends more time with Julie and revisiting Perry’s memories, R starts to feel alive and fall in love with this headstrong, beautiful girl. Of course, teenage romance just isn't easy, especially when the object of your affection’s dad wants you dead. This time for good.

I don’t want to give anything else away, but I would like to make the disclaimer that this book is pretty gritty at times. Don’t expect some light and fluffy paranormal romance novel. There is strong language at times. However, don’t let these deter you from reading this book. Despite the language and somewhat graphic descriptions, there is a lot more at heart to this novel than shock value. This is definitely not Twilight, and it doesn't ruin zombies either. It’s not just a simple love story. Marion describes zombies in a pretty gruesome and sometimes rather explicit way, especially when it comes to zombies’ actions in their attempt to feel human again. There actually is a battle where people get hurt, and gasp! Some even die! It's an actual book, instead a long fanfiction Stephanie sneezed out one day and handed to her publisher. Actually, Cracked.com did a funny piece on how to turn awful fanfiction into a bestseller. Twilight meets all 6 of the criteria. 

The best part about Warm Bodies is that it isn't a simple love story. R’s muses about how the zombie apocalypse started, what it is to be human, the interference of  the Boneys and who they are in our society (the people who want things to stay the same, no matter what) etc. These are all things I found myself relating to. I was able to stop and think about those questions and what they meant to me. Unfortunately for people I know, this also means I now ask them “what if” and “would you rather” questions, much to their chagrin.

The writing was concise, yet descriptive enough to get the picture. It was nice to have a break from the exhausting over-descriptive prose that appears in some novels I read. The characters are compelling and the story line is certainly unique. Besides, just check out what he wrote for his Amazon.com bio: “I've written a few books, but most of them are terrible. Warm Bodies is the only one so far that's worth your time. I'm about to turn 30. I'm 6'3. White. Left handed. Mildly bearded. I write strange stories about strange events, often from the perspectives of strange things. I apologize in advance for any injury or inconvenience.” If that’s not enough of a clue to his writing style and sense of humor, then I don’t know what is.

Hey! He really is mildly bearded!

I would definitely recommend Warm Bodies to anyone who likes a little bit of romance, but also wants adventure, battles, zombie apocalypses, and likes the idea of being able to change.

I saw the movie a few weeks after reading the movie and I thought it was pretty good. The book didn't have too many complexities and it wasn't too long. These, along with a plot people can follow and like, are pluses in Hollywood studios’ books. It was Hollywoodified, what with casting a Caucasian actress for the part of a black girl, and changing the ambiguous age of R to definitely teenage. It added more humor, simplified the plot, and ditched the zombie wife and adopted zombie kids, but they rather cleverly kept the two kids in the movie as random characters who view scenes in a detached manner sometimes. I would say it’s a good companion to the book, more of a lighter, more humorous, more quirky teenage comedy romance adventure than anything else.

Oh good, well that narrows it down. Also, people keep comparing it to Twilight, but I didn't really see a connection, other than the fact that it has a boy with pale skin, a girl, romance and conflict. And the girl can look a little like Kristen Stewart at times, but she acts so much better. And her character isn't painfully awkward. On the one hand, you lose some of the complexity of the philosophical internal monologues, but on the other, Nicholas Hoult is a stunning actor and I can’t help but be drawn to an interesting movie plot with some inclusion of romance. And if it takes place during a zombie apocalypse, even better.

Animal Farm, or, Farmacology: Power is the Drug of Choice for Animals

Before I jump in with talking about Animal Farm, can we please acknowledge that title? I am legitimately proud of that title. Honestly. I literally fist pumped the air after coming up with it. I appreciate puns and witty wordplay, and I can only hope that other internet adventurers are similar. 

Obligatory explanation because my sister told me this joke might not make sense to people: Pharmacology literally translates to the study of drug in Greek, and now it is "the branch of medicine and biology concerned with the study of drug action" (courtesy of Wikipedia) I know it's a bit of a stretch, but I had to choose between clarity and the integrity of the pun. And I know it's pharmacology and not farmacology- the joke wouldn't have hit home as well if I had used correct spelling. I wanted to make a joke about pharmacology and how religion is the opiate of the masses, but there wasn't much mention of religion in this book so...

I know summer has just started for many people, which means it’s time to scour the newspapers for those lists of new books to pick up this summer. Or, in my case, it means to cross some old ones of my list first, especially when some of them are considered classics. In this case, it was Animal Farm by George Orwell. While many people read it for a high school English class, somehow I slipped through that one. I did, however, have to read A Tale of Two Cities. That was torture.

I am nothing if not a slave to culture, so I decided to cross the classic political satire off that long reading list of mine.

Animal Farm is a thinly veiled social commentary for abuse of power, especially in the cases of fascist and communist dictatorships. I don’t mean thinly veiled as an insult here; Orwell had a point to make and was not going to obscure his references, his characters or his message by writing subtly or complexly. That being said, the reader can easily decipher his meaning and decide if they agree with him.

As someone who disagrees with injustice or taking advantage of people, I was easily angered by the farm injustice and some of the animals. (Hey, I was Orwell’s target audience!) Even more frustrating was that this actually happened and even occurs to this day, but to different degrees and circumstances. It’s a quick read, and if you have an appreciation for classic literature, I would rent or buy this book ASAP. You may want to have the internet handy to look up references, which character means which and situations that the farm occurrences represent. For the sake of clarity, I will include some links to websites that do exactly that, because honestly, summer means no thinking or work. There’s something to be said as holding true to your mantra, isn't there?

1. Spark Notes, because it saves our ass in not only classes but in leisure reading, too, apparently.

2. Someone’s blog on class stratification.

3. A study guide pdf on the entire book- handy! 

Picture on right by chrisoatley on DeviantART, picture on right by John Lee on keebs.com. 

It was a refreshing change of pace to read a classic work of literature with a message and metaphors and symbolism, wasn't it? Well it's not going to happen again. I'll go back to reading my mindless, entertaining novels, thank you very much. 

Society Girls: More of that Brit Chick Lit

This week here at Brumbles Publications (if you can call a blog that even), we’re gonna switch it up! So far, I have reviewed dystopian fiction, young adult, an autobiography, science fiction, humor, and fantasy. Which, granted, isn’t too diverse, but hey, it’s better than reading the same genre every week. This week we’re reviewing chick lit!! Hooray! Something light and fluffy and not hard to concentrate on during finals week! And even better than that, it’s British chick lit.

Let me start off by saying one of the best, funniest, most entertaining and well-written chick lit books I’ve ever read is Playing James by Sarah Mason. (Holly Colshannon is a reporter for the Bristol Gazette and is assigned a piece that entails she follows Detective James Sabine around. Holly is clumsy, hilarious, outgoing and pretty impetuous. She is such a funny character, and naturally, chaotic and hilarious mishaps occur all around her, usually because of her doing.) I’m not reviewing that book because I read it a while ago and I just think you should read it, if you like a little Brit Chick Lit every once in a while.

The Colshannon adventures continue with Holly’s sister, Clemmie. Clemmie was an art appraiser until her boyfriend got her fired, so she took a year off to travel. Now she’s back in Cornwall to recover when Holly drags her into the missing case of Emma McKellan, who was a writer for the Bristol Gazette until she disappeared just days before her wedding. It’s like mystery lite, but with more eccentric characters and no murder. Of course, no book could top Playing James, so it’s tough to read a book by the same author and expect the same thing. But I’ll try.

Clemmie is a lot like her sister in the sense that she’s clumsy, headstrong, happy-go-lucky and funny, but she’s less successful career-wise and she has a very eclectic sense of style. To me, she was the slightly odder  but no less lovable one of the pair. Just because she wasn’t Holly didn’t mean she wasn’t endearing. Holly, on the other hand, was more subdued than in the first book. Perhaps it was because we were seeing Holly from another character’s point of view and we couldn’t hear the running monologue in her head or get her perspective on events. Or, maybe it was because Holly had to be toned down a little to make Clemmie shine. Either way, you get the effect that this isn’t another book about Holly, but Clemmie was the focal character. It is her book after all.

I loved the main plot of locating Emma because there was just as much hectic chaos and interesting turns of events. The rest of her large and eccentric family is more present in this book, and as I am from a large family, I can relate to that aspect. Except for the animals. We did not have a zoo in my house at any time. The romantic aspect of the book was predictable, but that is to be expected. I mean, come on, that’s the point of chick lit. People wouldn’t read it if it weren’t predictable. I mean, could you imagine a chick lit (not a drama book, there’s a difference) where one of them dies in the end or middle? 

Oh wait, that does exist! Introducing,Nicholas Sparks: killing off characters in Chick Lit since 1995. 

So if you’re looking for something to read on the beach, or in your room, or on a bus, or pretty much anywhere, but you just want to be along for the ride in a funny British rom com book, I would bring Playing James and Society Girls. I can guarantee you will laugh. Unless you have no sense of humor, in which case, get off my blog and go buy one. 

Night Circus: What's Black and White with Hints of Red?

“The circus arrives without warning.

No announcements precede it, no paper notices on downtown posts and billboards, no mentions or advertisements in local newspapers. It is simply there, when yesterday it was not.”

The whole idea of the Night Circus is simply charming. That is honestly the best word I can use. I’ll have you know, however, that charming just barely beat out about 10 other words: mysterious, intriguing, beautiful, elegant, ethereal, magical, provocative, dreamlike, captivating and exciting. These are only some of the words that could describe this book. There are hundreds more, but I highly doubt someone would want to read several paragraphs of synonyms. If you do, go outside, man. Stop going on thesaurus.com and go live your life. 

The idea for the Night Circus starts when wealthy and eccentric businessman Chandresh Lefèvre decides to hold these magnificent Midnight Dinners, to which he invites some people with unusual, if not extraordinary talents. Mme. Ana Padva is a former Romanian prima ballerina who now has a unique and gorgeous eye for fashion, Ethan Barris  is an amazing architect and engineer who can create almost anything, Tara and Lainie Burgess are jacks of all trades (dancers, librarians, consultants, actresses etc) who create a sense of atmosphere, Mr. A.H. is a mysterious man in a gray suit and Tsukiko is a contortionist of unparalled talent. Together, they create Le Cirque des Rêves. 

I had heard the book described as a mysterious circus and people wear red to distinguish the true enthusiasts  but the book is so much more than that. Marco and Celia are two children picked to be rivals by two opposing magicians, but “magicians” is an understatement. Prospero the Enchanter, also known as Hector Bowen, has a talent for magic that is beyond tricks and illusions. It’s….well, it’s more like magic, really.  His daughter is chosen to compete in a game of skills against Marco, a young boy selected by Bowen’s main opponent, Mr. Alexander H. (usually just A. H.). It is a test to see if more unconventional methods and the practical application of magic works better than a more studious and academic approach through books. However, as Celia and Marco compete through this circus, everyone’s lives in the circus becomes more and more tangled in the competition and the stakes constantly rise.

The great thing about this book is that the writing juxtaposes the theme and the purpose of this book perfectly. The writing is so graceful and descriptive, yet subtle at the same time. This is the Night Circus; it is not ostentatious or outlandish, but it is beautiful, rich and elegant. Everything Erin Morgenstern describes is just stunning: the food, the clothing, the locations, the circus, the tents and the acts within them. Describes isn't even the right word. She paints it for you. The foods at the Midnight Dinners sound so delectable. Every word she chooses is perfect and makes you hungry at the same time. I’m getting hungry just thinking about it! Oh wait, it’s 7:15 and I am currently making dinner. Whoops.

Seriously, I just ate and I'm hungry again. What the hell?

The circus she creates out of words seems so real, and again, the descriptors are chosen with great contemplation. It’s just a beautifully written book for a beautiful circus. But that doesn't do it justice, because the circus is so much more than that! It’s mystery, it’s something that some of us may dream of at night, it’s a place to escape to, somewhere beyond the natural confines. Such an imagination deserves applause in my book, but I am a bit biased as I like to think of myself as imaginative as well. Look, I’ll create something imaginative right now! Uh, this group of humanoid mythical beings go on a quest to defeat a dragon and claim the treasure! And there’s a wizard there, and trolls, and elves and…. Oh crap. That’s the hobbit. No wait! Okay, how about toys that wake up when their owners are gone and they have adventures and stories and maybe a fight and…. That’s Toy Story.

Moving on.

I could not put this book down, and I would heartily suggest you pick it up and give it a go. It is also nothing like Water For Elephants if that's what you're worried about. Except it has a love story and takes place in a circus... but that's beside the point. Who wouldn't want to read an enchanting tale about a magical circus, two young lovers, exotic locations, fascinating characters, an ongoing battle and impossible acts? I know I would. Wait, I just did. 

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe: Don't Panic. Continue Not Panicking.

“The Story so far:

In the beginning the Universe was created.

This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.”

-The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Douglas Adams

Could there be a more perfect beginning to this book? No, there is not. The opening to the book, perfectly combining humor, satire, history and science (I’m being facetious here) sets the bar pretty high for Douglas Adams’ sequel to the brilliant Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Luckily, he set the bar himself and knows how to vault over it like the literary genius/comedian that he is.

I do not think I can summarize the plot of this book, if the difficulty of wrapping the first book up into a neat little abstract has anything to say about it. The best I can do is give you a short play-by-play of the highlights of the book, so about every other paragraph (and that’s just an average). I think just the best of the best will suffice.

The introduction of Ursa Minor Beta, or “one of the most appalling places in the known Universe,” is just genius. It “is excruciatingly rich, horrifyingly sunny…[and] it can hardly be insignificant that when a recent edition of Playbeing magazine headlined an article with the words ‘When you are tired of Ursa Minor Beta you are tired of life,’ the suicide rates there quadrupled overnight.

Not that there are any nights on Ursa Minor Beta.”

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (also known as Milliways), is a pretty hilarious concept, too, but only because your preconceived notions of the context of the word “end” here are shattered. When he writes “end” in the same phrase as “universe,” we all think of physical end, as in location, but Douglas Adams means “end” as in “destruction.” The restaurant is protected by a time bubble that resets itself every meal period so the diners can witness the end of the Universe. As it is a “time location” and not a “location location.” This way, you can come back multiple times.

As usual, Douglas Adams likes to shoot all your ideas about time travel and relativity to hell. Also, he introduces an amazing new tense that tells you how “to describe something that was about to happen to you in the past before you avoided it by time-jumping forward two days in order to avoid it.” Of course, that means that you must describe the event differently depending on if you’re talking about it in the future, the past, natural time, etc. It is known as the Future Semiconditionally Modified Subinverted Plagal Past SubjunctiveIntentional. This is to replace the “Future Perfect.” I cannot even describe this tense. It is practically a new language even J. R. R. Tolkien might be a little proud of.

"Legolas! What wioll haven do your elf eyes willan seen?"
"They're willing taken the hobbits to Isengard!"

The existence of a spaceship so black you cannot make out its shape or even tell how close you are to it, let alone distinguish any of the controls in the ship. Because it’s black on the inside, too.

Then there's the almost-paradox of writing the guidebook: “The simplistic style in which [the statistics of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy] are written is partly explained by the fact that the editors, having to meet a publishing deadline, copied the information off the back of a packet of breakfast cereal, hastily embroidering it with a few footnotes in order to avoid prosecution under the incomprehensibly tortuous Galactic Copyright laws. It is interesting to note that a later and wilier editor sent the book backward in time through a temporal warp, and then successfully sued the breakfast cereal company for infringement of the same laws.” Amazing. Simply amazing.

I hesitate to disclose my favorite part of the novel, the end, but truthfully, I don’t think you can really have spoilers in a Douglas Adams book. Each sentence is not so much a an event not to be disclosed to non-readers, but more of another piece of an adventure. A stepping stone, if you will. If each Douglas Adams book were a ladder, each chapter is simply a piece of wood (or metal, depending on the type of ladder you’re imagining) that makes up the ladder. If you remove a splinter or even a rung, the entire ladder will not fall apart, but it does take away from the ladder’s essence.

So when I tell you my favorite part, it does not make the story unreadable. In a way, it’s like the universe itself; the story and the universe are infinite and could continue in any direction indefinitely.

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe ambled along, delighting me with every page, but the best (and funniest) part was the ending. Arthur and Ford end up on this spaceship, Ark B, to find millions of bodies in suspended comas. What kinds of people are they? “‘Hairdressers, tired TV producers, telephone sanitizers, insurance salesmen, personnel officers, security guards, public relations executives, management consultants, you name it.’” Why, you ask? And actually, Ford and Arthur essentially ask it themselves. “‘The idea was that into the first ship, the ‘A’ ship, would go all the brilliant leaders, the scientists, the great artists, you know, all the achievers; and then in the third, or ‘C’ ship, would go all the people who did the actual work, who made things and did things; and then into the ‘B’ ship–that’s us–would go everyone else, the middlemen.’” As funny as it is, it just keeps getting better. The planet they came from, Golgafrincham, sent Ark B off to “rid themselves of an entire useless third of their population. The other two-thirds stayed firmly at home and lived full, rich and happy lives until they were all suddenly wiped out by a virulent disease contracted from a dirty telephone.” Oh, the irony.

Of course, the downside to sending a colony of people such as these off to a new planet is that some things hold precedence over others. For instance, hairdressers electing to create curling tongs instead of developing fire. And in creating the wheel, the marketing department must first decide on a color. And instead of exploring the area, their film producers make a documentary on the indigenous cavemen in the area.

  

"I've always been told hairs before bears. As in protecting yourself from bears. You'd be surprised
 how much perfectly styled tresses can ward off danger."

But the most hilarious of all, and most satirical, is that they develop a fiscal policy. Ford wants to know how they can have money when they don’t make money. As a response to saying it doesn't grow on trees, the management consultant says “‘Since we decided a few weeks ago to adopt the leaf as legal tender, we have, of course, all become immensely rich… But we have also run into a small inflation problem on account of the high level of leaf availability, which means that, I gather, the current going rate  has something like three deciduous forests buying one ship’s peanut.’” So, to revalue the leaf, they are going to burn down all the forests. I cannot stress how loudly I laughed at this point.

I think Douglas Adams just sat in his room and decided to make fun of everyone he could think of. And as they say, the pen is mightier than the sword. The worst part is that I can actually see this playing out in similar situation, if to a lesser degree. I am just glad that Adams has commemorated it on paper. And, er, Ebook/tablet screen.

The book ends with Arthur trying to teach the cavemen to play Scrabble with rocks, “‘but they only word they know is grunt and they can’t spell it…. [He’s] probably spelled crzjgrdwldiwdc again, poor bastard. I keep on telling him there’s only one g in crzjgrdwldiwdc.’” Man, on a triple word score, that word would be pure gold.

A Natural History of Dragons: Quit Dragon Your Feet and Read This Book Already!

Look at the cover! It's so pretty!

If you’re anything like me, and I pray to God that you’re not, then you are horrified by the thought of just purchasing something without having “sampled” it yet. And in this case, I am of course referring to books and movies. Only on two occasions have I purchased a book because I thought it might be good and it turned out to be a BIG MISTAKE. And I mean “big” in the sense that I wasted several hours of my life attempting to read and like these books, but failing. And more than that, my competitive streak deflated at the thought that I was not returning to finish those books. Since then, I have not bought anything I haven’t read, seen, tried on, sampled, whatever.

It’s a good thing, then, that recommendations exist! I would feel much more at ease buying a book or movie from a source I valued, and such was the case of this book. Hank Green (for those of you not familiar with Nerdfighteria/Nerdfighters, Vlogbrothers, YouTube or John Green, the author of several best-selling Young Adult fiction novels, is an entertaining and pretty geeky vlogger whose videos I watch, and you should too) recommended several books in an early April VEDA video. Now, the other two were science fiction novels, and true sci-fi literature is something I have not delved into too deeply. But the third piqued my interest, partly because it had the word “dragons” on the title. Ever since How to Train Your Dragon, I have been started loving dragons. Hank Green's recommendation was interesting, as well. He described A Natural History of Dragons by Marie Brennan as “If J. K. Rowling, Charles Darwin and Jane Austen had a baby, that would be impossible. That would be a messed up baby. But if they wrote a book together, it would be this book.”

Is that not one of the strangest combinations of writers you've ever heard of? Okay, maybe not "ever". I could wrap my head around the Jane Austen and Charles Darwin part of it, and the Jane Austen and J. K. Rowling part, but could not fit all three of them together coherently. So I got it. And I read it. And I liked it.

One of the hardest questions I've ever had to answer. 

A Natural History of Dragons: A Memoir by Lady Trent by Marie Brennan is about a Victorian Woman named Isabella, and she is fascinated by dragons. Because dragons exist in her world, which is also Victorian England, but it’s called Spirling, but Brennan isn't fooling anyone, and she knows it. The just knows that Spirling is basically England, but with dragons. Isabella is fascinated by the anatomy and engineering of dragons. She wants to know how they work, how they behave, what they eat, what their lifestyles are like, where they live, everything. She is scientific, curious, headstrong and adventurous, a combination which often leads her into trouble and danger.

She and her husband join a small observation party, to study the rock wyrm(dragons) in Vystrana. This country is essentially Russia or some similar Eastern European country, but it’s hard to place it exactly. Lately, there have been dragon attacks, and this hardy group decides to find out the cause and stop the dragon attacks.

There is a good deal of intrigue and mystery as to why these dragon attacks are happening, and it’s not as simple as it would seem.  I love mystery, and often books with mystery have kept me up until early hours (6 a.m. one time) in a desperate attempt to finish the book. This book had enough intrigue to keep my attention, but not enough to stay up  too late (early?). I would gladly sacrifice several hours of sleep for the right book, but this was not such book.

The characters themselves are likable, and I liked that Isabella was adventurous. However, because this book is largely plot-based and mystery-driven, none of the characters have very strong personalities. They do not do outrageous things, have hilarious sayings, have a lot of character development or develop strong relationships. In fact, it was fitting to the writing style, given the fact that this book is set in Victorian times and Isabella is compared to Charles Darwin. In this sense, Brennan wrote it in a Victorian English style, but not so much that if Jane Austen were to rise from the dead and for some reason decide to pick up this book, she would not confuse it with one of her peers’ works. That might drive away some readers who lack the patience or tolerance for a less-than-dynamic writing style/voice.

The ending, too, wrapped a little too quickly and neatly for my taste. It was confusing, especially since the book is largely plot-based. I mean, I can understand wanting to finish a book that has already been going on for 300 pages, but this was a little too simple. It is just a book for entertainment, and Brennan knows that her readers are not expecting some profound declaration about the current state of society. In a way, the ending is satisfying.

There are some really gorgeous works of art by Todd Lockwood; he does fantastic fantasy art found here and here. If you like art, then I would suggest checking out his stuff.

Just of a few of the, well, few illustrations in the book. 

All in all, it was something you might like if you like scientific, adventurous and a little bit of dry humor, (“Between that and the abseiling, I think I left enough skin behind on those rocks to cover an entire person”), then you would not be remiss in reading this book. I mean, come on! It has dragons in it! If that’s not enough to convince you, then I don’t know what is.

A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Just Don't Panic

Thank God I have WiFi so I can update this blog post about sci-fi!

Was that too forced? Yeah, I thought so, too. But it is true, if it is corny. Speaking of sci-fi and humor, it’s time to review a book! This week: Douglas Adams’ A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy!

I realize that it has been around for a long time, what with being published in 1979 and all, but I only got around to reading it a month or so ago. And now that I have read it, I don’t know what took me so long to start reading it! It made me laugh out loud, and the plot and characters were interesting and compelling enough to keep me hooked. To get the humor, I would have to say you have to like slightly sarcastic, very silly, and at times dry British wit. As I mention later, if you like Doctor Who or Monty Python (or if you have good taste, you like them both), you would like this 5 book series.

I found I was pleasantly surprised by how the book moved along and didn't know much about it beforehand, so I would recommend just closing out of this web page, getting your hands on the nearest copy of this book and digging in. It’s not that long of a read, anyway! I really don’t want to ruin anything for you. Or you could just let me spoil the unadulterated joy of reading something unique and completely new fiction. It’s your choice.

Have you read it yet? Or do you need your interest piqued a bit more?

Ugh. FINE. I’LL LET YOU INTO SOME OF MY INSIGHTS. But don’t say I didn't warn you. Er, recommend to you. You know what  I mean.

Arthur Dent, a middle-aged British man is dragged on an interstellar adventure by his eccentric friend, Ford Prefect. They meet up with Zaphod Beeblebrox and Trisha Macmillian(the only other Earthling) and travel through a series of hilarious hi-jinks that lead to the ultimate question: What is the meaning of life?

If the names above don’t put you off (and you haven’t even read the names of other planets, races and alien characters), then strap in for a hilarious and ever twisting ride, because there isn't really any other way to describe it. It’s like Monty Python and Doctor Who in book form with a character resembling any other character played by Martin Freeman, who usually plays a slightly annoyed guy who gets dragged into adventures over and over in different genres, and for that reason is cast as Arthur Dent in the movie.

To be fair, he plays that role REALLY well. 

I could try to separate the plot and the humor, but they just go hand in hand so well together! For starters, the whole thing starts off with Arthur’s house being torn down to make way for a new highway. Then the Earth is destroyed to make way for an inter-galactic highway system; oh, the irony. That’s exactly the kind of thing Douglas Adams does in his book: he mercilessly pokes fun at anything and everything. It’s honestly some of the most brilliant stuff out there! A depressed robot? People being tortured by having to listen to some awful poetry? The answer to the meaning of life being 42? Totally brilliant! I mean, who thinks of this stuff? He is truly inspired.

I think my favorite part was when they have the Answer to the meaning of life, but now they have to find the Question to the Answer, and as it turns out, the Earth was the final computer to calculate the Question, and it was just moments away from discovering the Question before it was destroyed to make a hyperspace bypass. Amazing.

Don’t even get me started on the infinite improbability drive! Just bloody brilliant.

I have been reduced to fragments and incomplete clauses, that’s just how great this book is. I can’t even- I just can’t describe it to you. You’ll just have to take my word for it and read this hilarious and intriguing book, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, in bookstores since 1979.

Edit: I've just seen the movie, and maybe it was just me, but I wasn't very impressed. I think it’s just one of those things that your imagination can get perfectly, but there isn't yet a way to get that onto the screen just right. 

Game, Set, Matched

Okay, I lied. I'm too eager to just post one book review a week. Do you know how many books I've read recently that I can review? At least 6! That means this thing would last about a month and a half, and that's not even including the books that I will read! (I'm really hoping this isn't a phase and that I will continue to review books at least once a week, but given my track record, I can't promise ANYTHING. 

Oh my God! It's the main character of the book! It all makes sense now!
Note to readers: if you can't picture the main character, just look at the cover. Also, I do have to give props to the designer of the cover, but it's a bit of a stretch to say it's the representational of the theme of the book. 

            Boy, dystopian futures are all the rage right now, huh? You can almost certainly pin it on the Hunger Games trilogy in 2008, and ever since then, it’s been a jump-on-the-bandwagon-sci-fi-YA-fiction freak fest. Okay, the freak fest part I don’t mean, because I do happen to enjoy a healthy dose of sci-fi, but I really wanted to end that very hyphenated phrase with alliteration.

             Matched, by Ally Condie is no different than several other YA dystopian futuristic novels; it has a teenage girl who is a little more special than everyone else somehow in a society with a strict, orderly and oppressive government in the future, but so far in the future we've found life on other planets, just renamed countries and odd names and stuff. Oh, and there’s a boy she likes. And another that she did, but doesn't.

The point is, this book wasn't special enough to separate it from all the others in its field. I mean, she has a crisp writing style and paints a picture of the world Cassia is living in well enough, but not so much that you want to beat your head against the wall as you exclaim, “WE GET IT. YOU CAN DESCRIBE STUFF.” However, we never really get to know the main character. Even after 369 pages (heh heh), I’m still not entirely sure what her personality is. I know she loves her family, is really good at sorting, and really likes this guy named Ty.  Other than that, what else do you know about her? Not a whole lot, which doesn't bode well for this book. Aren't dystopian futures about the people in that universe and the events that occur? She doesn't do a great job of letting us get to know Cassia. That is, unless Cassia is a vapid airhead, in which case, she does a great job of fleshing out the main character. I mean, Condie puts in a few places that Cassia’s personality test predicted some rebellion and fierceness, but we never really get that! OK, so she secretly broke a few rules, but not in a way I would truly classify as rebellious.

           And then there’s the other characters: Xander, whom we get a good idea of him as a 2-D character: handsome, smart, rule-follower, affectionate, a real golden boy. Ty, the other love interest, is quiet, very smart but hides it by acting perfectly mediocre, tormented by his past, and mysterious. He’s probably the only truly likable character; that is, he’s the only one you really feel anything for at all.

            The plot moves along well, but all this “Oh my goodness, I love this one guy but am matched to another” junk was starting to fray my nerves. Unfortunately, it’s a pretty substantial part to the story.

The best thing about this book is the possible future she creates; the perfect society run by the government (literally called The Society) which regulates everyone’s lives to a tee to ensure a perfect and equal life for everyone. I thought she could have really expanded on this idea, the balance between a world without diseases and obesity, a world without unemployment, really old age or depression/strife, but also a world without the freedom of choice, creativity, or rebellion. Now there’s a topic I was really interested in: is it worth it to trade cancer for a government assigned job and mandatory relocation when necessary? Is it worth it to trade diabetes and obesity for tasteless food perfectly designed to your body’s needs? (Obviously, no one wants to be obese, but would you choose to be perfectly fit if that meant you had to eat bland porridge for three meals a day?) Well, you get the point. But that whole trade offs of personal freedoms for a perfect society intrigues me.

           All in all, if you’re a sixteen-year-old girl, which I am not, you might enjoy this more than me. Unless you like Twilight and obsessive teen girls, then this is less your style, but more than the Hunger Games. (My point is that she at least didn't go over the top with the lovey-dovey “let’s just be together forever even though we’re 17” sort of stuff.) However, I would recommend the Hunger Games if you have been living under a rock or in a hole, or God forbid, under a rock in a hole.  *Shudder* Or Divergent/Insurgent, which I thought were pretty decent, even other people didn't like those two. At least there was no love triangle, though! 

Bossypants: A Review

      Upon the shocking revelation that I will be reviewing books (Whoa! Your like totes the first person ever to review books online or in general!!! OMGZ lolololol you shuld b an editor!) Yes, that was poor grammar and spelling ON PURPOSE.

            Here goes nothing!

            Anyone who has any sense of humor or has any respect for American sketch comedy has heard of Tina Fey. If you haven’t, and I highly doubt that, I would suggest holing up in your room, locking the door, popping some popcorn and watching several straight hours of the best of SNL. The nineties edition. And then watching all 7 seasons of 30 Rock, because that show is amazing. She says in her book that they didn’t have many viewers, and that honestly shocked me. I love that show, and I can’t imagine why more people didn’t watch it! Probably off watching The Big Bang Theory. Losers. (Now, it’s not like The Big Bang Theory hasn’t made me laugh, but just because it’s about three scientists and an engineer does NOT make it a smart comedy. Plenty of people have written about this, and I do not have the energy to get into an argument about this. You can read some other people's extensive rants about it here and here.  

            But I digress. The point is that if you love comedy or have a sense of humor, you would love Tina Fey’s book! She’s funny, fresh, funky, fantastic and all other words beginning with “f”! Okay, not all words, but you get my point. The book chronicles important moments (i.e. hilarious things that happened to her and not so much the sentimental ones) from her childhood to current day, but not so much that you have to take a break.

            If you like reading and learning about how it is that she went from awkward child in Pennsylvania to an awkward adult in New York, and along the way worked in sketch comedy and became a writer for SNL. I adore SNL, so I was extremely curious how one goes from just an average person to someone working for a major network, especially on a big hit show like SNL.

            I know a lot of you are thinking that you already don’t have enough time to read, let alone waste your time actually reading nonfiction, but I can assure you, it’s still entertainment, and you get to pick up little funny Fey tidbits along the way!

            Just buy it, alright? Or get it from your local library! Because everyone knows I hate paying for stuff, so I prefer the library.

Next week: I review the third Percy Jackson Heroes of Olympus, Mark of Athena. See ya then!

It's Book Reviewing Time

How long has it been since my last blog post? A while? Don’t remind me.

However, I would like to offer this exciting piece of news! I am going to be posting weekly book reviews of books that I am reading. You see, for a while, I was the type of person who would make semi-passionate speeches about how e-readers are destroying our culture and the book industry, blah blah blah. It was exactly the type of argument a ranting and not-quite-believing person with a case of sour grapes would make. I would like to point out that I do not actually believe in that argument; in fact, I believe e-readers are perhaps enabling people to read more, such as having an iPod might cause you to listen to music more often. It is the sort of speech I would make though, as I often try to rationalize why I do not want what I want. Needless to say, it rarely works. (Once, when I was a very immature person in eighth grade told my best friend that, when she got a cell phone, she was going to get cancer because I read an article about it in the New York Times. Wasn't I horrible eighth grader??)

Long story short, I was allowed to have my mom’s old Nook Color (she got a Galaxy tablet for her birthday, and man, that thing is the bomb!) and I immediately set about buying any book I have read and liked or any book I was interested in reading. So now, having read quite a few books (6 exactly, not including re-reads) in 2 weeks), I have decided to start reviewing the books and leaving them here on my blog for other people’s enjoyment. I cannot promise that there will be any sort of pattern or genre that I will choose (I like pretty much anything, as long as it is well-written), but I can promise weekly book reviews!

Feel free to leave your thoughts about the book or about my review, whether you agreed, disagreed, whichever. Also, I love getting suggestions for books, so feel free to leave recommendations! 

Just how geeky/nerdy are you?

Ah, the age-old question. We all want to quantify that part of us that everyone has (I'm looking at you, snotty girls in my eighth grade class) in different degrees. Insert binary joke because... well, because NUMBERS. Being "geeky" or "nerdy" has recently has become more acceptable, what with the internet so rampantly consuming our lives. Not that I'm complaining; I love the internet. The only problem is, how do we define "nerd" or "geek"? We all have different things that qualify us as one of those two things. For instance, things on my own personal nerd list include: obsessing about tv shows/books and the characters in or on them, Doctor Who, Supernatural, Star Trek, certain board games (Settlers of Cattan cough cough) and playing certain video games (World of Warcraft, Dungeons and Dragons, League of Legends, Warhammer). Now, doing or liking these things doesn't make you a nerd, but I would qualify those things as nerdy or geeky. I spend a lot of time looking at art online(especially comic book art- it's so cool!) and know a lot of superheros and superheroines. I know random facts, am a big fan of Certain Gameboy/Ninento games (Pokemon, Legend of Zelda, Mario, Kirby), obsess over TV shows, and own a wand from Harry Potter world. Do those things make me a nerd? Maybe. It's up to you to choose I think. There is a lot of stuff I haven't done that I qualify as nerdy. But you know what? I'm proud I wore a Batman shirt today. I am happy that I can freak out over plotlines with my friends. I am less proud that I speak in memes sometimes, but hey, we take the good with the bad.

Here are just a few geek or nerd quizzes you can take if you want to find out, even though the numbers and scores are kinda irrelevant, if you really think about it.

http://hellogiggles.com/quiz-are-you-a-nerd
http://www.matthewbarr.co.uk/geek/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baEnrIQko9k
http://www.nerdtests.com/ft_nq.php

Some of the questions in various quizzes have to do with math and science things, some are about unpopular things that you might do/have, nerdy activities you might have partaken in, or things that you like that are considered geeky. It really is up to the person, seeing as how I've gotten different scores depending on the quiz. And I would say I am a Nerdfighter. So to sum it all up, John Green and Simon Pegg, take it away!

A Hair to Remember

Recently, I got a haircut for the first time in 6 months because everyone was telling me my hair was really long. All I noticed were all my darn split ends and how difficult it was to brush it everyday.  When I finally decided to get a hair cut, I of course did that girl thing where I ask all my girl friends what girl hair cut I should get and what girl thing I should try. Girl.

One of my friends suggested I tell my stylist (that sounds way too fancy. Hair cutter? Salonist? Woman wielding the scissors?) to surprise me. That was received with a lot of "No!"s. Firstly, I am definitely not that adventurous to try out something like that! Sure, I'll walk on a frozen lake. Sure, I'll loosen my seat belt on roller coasters to catch more air. Definitely, I'll go talk to that guy just because my friends told me they didn't think I could. Yes, I'll stay up all night on a school night because... well, the same reason as the previous example, come to think of it. So the moral of the story is to get me to do something, just tell me you don't think I can do it. But ask me to ask someone to "surprise me"? Do you realize how semi-permanent a hair cut is? That takes real commitment! I don't get my hair cut but once every 6 months, so that's 6 months of dealing with my decision! No, I don't think I'm being too dramatic! This whole thing makes me want to- SET MYSELF ON FIRE. 

Yes, I stole a joke from the amazing show Arrested Development. 

The point is, I can't just say "surprise me!" So after a fun day of my friend and me taking measurements of our faces to determine our face shapes (here's the website I used) and then using various apps to put different styles on my head, it came down to bangs or layers. Bangs, as it turns out, require a lot of upkeep, so I chose layers to frame my face.

"I'd like to look like her. No, not just her hair, I meant everything. Can you do that?"

The point is, I miss my long hair. I tried to side braid it, and the layers kept sticking out and making it look ridiculous.

Now I can't have my hair blow black in the wind like Pocahontas, can't put it up into a messy bun the same way, can't side braid it. But with the hair cut, I get to have more stylized hair, i get to flip it without looking like a moron, there are no more split ends, it doesn't get messy or tangled as easily and I don't have to use as much shampoo or time brushing it. 

It's the constant pendulum swing, much like our political system in America. I have donated my hair to Locks of Love more times than 3 times. It's the constant push and pull between long and short(er) hair. I want the benefits of both long and shorter hair and styled hair, but I don't want the downsides of either of those. The fact that I've cut off twelve inches of my hair several times before and still have had long hair a few times after that is a constant reminder that HAIR GROWS BACK. Sure, styles go in and out. 

Some styles should never have come in. (COUGH COUGH EIGHTIES I'M TALKING ABOUT YOU COUGH)

But despite that, hair grows back, and if you look back at some photos in which you have a bad haircut, who cares? Everyone has embarrassing photos! I have plenty because for some reason I think it's better to look unattractive on purpose than on accident. Hence all the silly faces. Who doesn't look back at pictures and go "Oh my God, I can't believe I let you guys talk me into wearing that dress!" or think they really should have tried harder that day. It doesn't matter, because in 10, 20, even 30 years it's going to be outdated anyway. There are so many women who are posting on the internet about what they should do with their hair.  This girl's blog is even asking strangers on the internet what haircut she should get!

I  need to make a decision... I know! I'll ask the internet!

This other girl couln't spot a troll a mile away. 

I just think girls get a lot of crap about caring too much about hair and fashion and all that for a reason: if you are a girl and you've can't relate to this blog post AT ALL, my hat is off to you. How many guys post on the internet or rave to their friends about what haircut they need to get? The answer is not many. They describe haircuts with numbers and don't often switch it up. True, they get haircuts more often so aren't stuck with their decision for a long time, but still. Look at the evidence.