Books, Movies, and Chinese Food

Summary from BN.com: Nature is out of balance in the human world. The sun hasn't shone in years, and crops are failing. Worse yet, strange and hostile creatures have begun to appear. The people's survival hangs in the balance. To solve the crisis, the oracle stones are cast, and Kaede and Taisin, two seventeen-year-old girls, are picked to go on a dangerous and unheard-of journey to Tanlili, the city of the Fairy Queen. Taisin is a sage, thrumming with magic, and Kaede is of the earth, without a speck of the otherworldly. And yet the two girls' destinies are drawn together during the mission. As members of their party succumb to unearthly attacks and fairy tricks, the two come to rely on each other and even begin to fall in love. But the Kingdom needs only one huntress to save it, and what it takes could tear Kaede and Taisin apart forever. After finding myself enthralled with Malinda Lo's first book, ASH, I was looking forward to reading the follow up to it. I was a ...

Summary from BN.com: In the wake of her father's death, Ash is left at the mercy of her cruel stepmother. Consumed with grief, her only joy comes by the light of the dying hearth fire, rereading the fairy tales her mother once told her. In her dreams, someday the fairies will steal her away, as they are said to do. When she meets the dark and dangerous fairy Sidhean, she believes that her wish may be granted. The day that Ash meets Kaisa, the King's Huntress, her heart begins to change. Instead of chasing fairies, Ash learns to hunt with Kaisa. Though their friendship is as delicate as a new bloom, it reawakens Ash's capacity for love-and her desire to live. But Sidhean has already claimed Ash for his own, and she must make a choice between fairy tale dreams and true love. Entrancing, empowering, and romantic, Ash is about the connection between life and love, and solitude and death, where transformation can come from even the deepest grief. This book is not normally the t...

Acclaimed authors Holly Black ( Ironside )and Cecil Castellucci (Boy Proof ) have united in geekdom to edit short stories from some of the best selling and most promising geeks in young adult literature: M.T. Anderson, Libba Bray, Cassandra Clare, John Green, Tracy Lynn, Cynthia and Greg Leitich Smith, David Levithan, Kelly Link, Barry Lyga, Wendy Mass, Garth Nix, Scott Westerfield, Lisa Yee, and Sara Zarr. With illustrated interstitials from comic book artists Hope Larson and Bryan Lee O'Malley, Geektastic covers all things geeky, from Klingons and Jedi Knights to fan fiction, theater geeks, and cosplayers. Whether you're a former, current, or future geek, or if you just want to get in touch with your inner geek, Geektastic will help you get your geek on! I will not lie. I am a total geek. I have admitted this many times and I will not be ashamed. I am a Star Wars nerd, I watch Lord of the Rings marathons, I read the entire Harry Potter series at least once a year, I know e...

Computer whiz Erin Swift is ready to start eighth grade. The Year of Humiliating Events (aka, seventh grade) is behind her and she's ready to rule the school. But eight grade comes with its own set of problems for Erin to navigate, including her first boyfriend, her first break-up, and the fact that her mom has been treating her more like an eight year old than an eighth grader. Even worse, there's a new girl at Molly Brown Middle School who is determined to remake Erin in her bad-girl image, and former crush Mark "Cute Boy" Sacks has been acting strange lately. But as Erin 's school year once against hurdles toward disaster, a personal tragedy forces her to realize that things, and people, aren't always as bad as they seem. Can she save what's left of eighth grade before it's too late? This was a really cute book to read. I'm always a bit wary of when adults try to talk in a teen's voice and computers are involved. For some reason, no matte...

As the last season of Family Affair comes to a close, prime-time teen star Kaitlin Burke is no closer to deciding what she wants to do after the show ends. Struggling with career choices and bummed over a ridiculous catfight with her BFF, Liz, Kaitlin is so mixed up she even starts to semi-bond with her archnemesis, Sky. Worst of all, she falls in with two of Hollywood's biggest party fiends when one of them asks her, "Don't you ever do what you want to do?" Shopping sprees and the Tinseltown nightlife seems fun at first, but soon Kaitlin realizes that being a paparazzi princess just might be her downfall. I've learned so much from reading this series. All the secrets that are told in this book really gives an insider's look to the Hollywood industry. This time the reader learns what needs to be done when an actress is making a change in her career and the steps that must be done to keep that career going. I felt that this book showed Kaitlin as more of a H...

I'm giving away 5 brand new copies of today's book! Leave a comment with your email address so I can contact you if you win. I'll pick a name and announce the winners on Wednesday June 17 . US and Canada addresses only (No PO Boxes). Good luck! PLEASE LEAVE A WAY FO R ME TO CONTACT YOU!!!! ENTRIES WITHOUT CONTACT INFO WILL NOT BE ENTERED. "Don't worry, Anna. I'll tell her, okay? Just let me think about the best way to do it." "Okay." "Promise me? Promise you won't say anything?" "Don't worry." I laughed. "It's our secret, right?" According to her best friend Frankie, twenty days in Zanzibar Bay is the perfect opportunity to have a summer fling, and if they meet one boy ever day, there's a pretty good chance Anna will find her first summer romance. Anna lightheartedly agrees to the game, but there's something she hasn't told Frankie---she's already had that kind of romance, and it was ...

*Although the books I review on my blog are almost always Christian fiction, there will be a few spotlighted regular fiction titles I will review from time to time.* The filming for sure-to-be-blockbuster movie Pretty Young Assassins has wrapped, and teen movie star Kaitlin Burke returns to life on the set of primetime drama Family Affair. After ten seasons of filming the hit favorite TV show, Kaitlin would have thought that she could see any curveballs coming, but with a plotting new actress on set, all bets are off. The new diva, Alexis, makes even Kaitlin's long-time nemesis Skye seem like a puppy in comparison. Can Kaitlin keep her sane boyfriend, her insane job, and her composure in the face of this new star power? Like stories such as X2: X-Men United, sometimes the bad and good guys must come together to defeat a greater evil. They have to put aside their differences for a time and join forces. They may go back to their old ways after the battle is over, but for a brief t...

It seems like the summer of dreams come true for Hollywood celebrity princess Kaitlin Burke: the media loves her (again), super-cute and funny Austin Meyers is finally her boyfriend, and she's starring in a blockbuster movie by her all-time favorite director Hutch Adams. What could be sweeter? But life on set is not nearly as perfect as the designer makeup and couture costumes. And with a slimy ex-boyfriend and a scheming new publicist on the scene, it's about to get a whole lot messier.... This book truly made me feel like a Hollywood insider. Kaitlin is the type of actress I would want to be. A normal fun girl who also happens to live a glamorous life. I loved all her tips and secrets of the Hollywood world. It brings everything into a whole new light now about the industry. While there are things are truly glamorous and wonderful, there's also a lot of hard work, fakery and deceit to get ahead. It's sad that she doesn't have the normal relationship with her p...

*Although the books I review on my blog are almost always Christian fiction, there will be a few spotlighted regular fiction titles I will review from time to time.* It's hard not to notice Terra Cooper. She's tall, blond, and has an enviable body. But with one turn of her cheek, all people notice is her unmistakably "flawed" face. Terra secretly plans to leave her stifling small town in the Northwest and escape to an East Coast college, but gets pushed off-course by her controlling father. When an unexpected collision puts Terra directly in Jacob's path, the handsome but quirky Goth boy immediately challenges her assumptions about herself and her life, and she is forced in yet another direction. With her carefully laid plans disrupted, will Terra be able to find her true path? Written in lively, artful prose, award-winning author Justina Chen Headley has woven together a powerful novel about a fractured family, falling in love, travel, and the meaning of true be...