Friday, May 31, 2013

Turning anonymous comments off

I'm sorry to do it, but I had to turn off anonymous comments. I apologise to any legit commenters who normally comment anonymously or with a name/URL (unfortunately, you can't turn off anonymous without also turning off name/URL). I suddenly started getting spam comments, and it reached the point where I was having to spend about 15 minutes every day just deleting spam comments.

So, you'll now need an account with Google, Wordpress, AIM, LiveJournal, TypePad, or OpenID to comment here. I think almost all of my usual commenters have either Google or Wordpress anyway. I'll probably turn anonymous back on during read-a-thons and whatnot to allow easier commenting.

Boo spammers!

May 2013 Wrap-Up

Here's a summary of my book-related activity for May.

Books I read (linked to the reviews)

The Andalite Chronicles by K.A. Applegate (reread)
Dime Store Magic (Women of the Otherworld #3) by Kelley Armstrong (TBR pile)
The Testing (The Testing #1) by Joelle Charbonneau (NetGalley)
Wars in Toyland by Joe Harris (NetGalley)
Industrial Magic (Women of the Otherworld #4) by Kelley Armstrong (TBR pile)
The Orphanage of Miracles by Amy Neftzger (NetGalley)
The Testing Guide (The Testing #0.5) by Joelle Charbonneau (free ebook)
Angel on the Ropes by Jill Shultz (NetGalley)
Ten Girls to Watch by Charity Shumway (review copy) (in progress)

Books I bought


Superstitious by R.L. Stine
The 100-Year-Old Man Who
Climbed Out the Window and
Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson


Books I got for my birthday!


River of Stars by
Guy Gavriel Kay
In the Shadow of Blackbirds
by Cat Winters



Books I've been approved for on NetGalley


The First Rule of Swimming
by Courtney Angela Brkic
Love Rehab by Jo Piazza
Three Lives of Tomomi
Ishikawa by Benjamin Constable

Stonewall by Martin Duberman
This Song Will Save Your
Life by Leila Sales


Other ebooks I received for review


Riding on a Beam of Light
by Ramsey Dean


Progress on challenges



I completed the following letters for the A-Z Book Challenge: I, O, and T

I read 2 books for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge.

I read 0 books for the Anne Rice Challenge. You can still sign up!

I read 0 books for the Debut Author Challenge.

I completed the following squares for the Book Bingo Challenge: read 1 book that is released in 2013, read 5 books that are released in 2013, reread 1 book

I read 0 books for the Nerdy Non-Fiction Challenge.

I read 2 books for the Dystopia Challenge.

I read 7 books written by women.

I read 2 books for the Seriously Series Challenge.

Progress on my TBR pile: I added 10 books to my to read list and removed 9, so my pile increased by 1 this month. Not too bad!

Thursday, May 30, 2013

Safe Haven by Nicholas Sparks

Title: Safe Haven
Author: Nicholas Sparks
Publication Date: 2010
Length: 340

Katie shows up alone in Southport, North Carolina, quiet and mysterious. Having run away from an abusive husband, she's reluctant to form relationships. However, she soon finds a friend in her next door neighbour, Jo, and becomes rather attached to Alex, the widowed owner of the general store, and his two children. Now she has to decide between the relative safety of remaining on the run, and risking settling down in one place for the chance of happiness.

It took me a while to get into this book, simply because of the writing. The writing is not good. It's hard to describe, but the closest I can think of is "dumbed-down".

However, eventually I did get sucked into the story. And at that point, I was willing to forgive the writing. Sparks paints a striking picture of life in an abusive relationship. I found it to be terrifying, without seeming overdone or exaggerated, which I really appreciated, because abusive relationships need no exaggeration.

The romance in this story is beautiful. It develops gradually, with difficulties along the way, in what I felt was a really realistic way.

I read this book for the Out of Your Comfort Zone Challenge. Romance is not really my thing. But this book made me feel like maybe I could read some romance, if it was the right kind.

4 stars.

Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Getting the Most out of RootsMagic Version 5 by Bruce Buzbee

Title: Getting the Most out of RootsMagic Version 5
Author: Bruce Buzbee
Publication Date: 2012
Length: 345 pages

This book came with the software when I bought RootsMagic Version 5 at a genealogy conference last year. I still haven't had a chance to really dig into the software itself, but I did try some things out along the way while I was reading.

The main issue I had with this book is that it's clearly aimed at someone WAY less computer literate than me. That's not entirely a fault in the book; technical writing is always hard when you have such a mixed audience. But it meant that I spent a lot of the time reading stuff that was painfully obvious to me, just as someone who uses computers a lot.

The other, more minor issue, was just one of editing. I think this book has been edited and rereleased with each version of RootsMagic, and it shows. Sometimes the same bit of text is repeated in several chapters. My guess is that's a result of content being reorganised, but no thorough edit being done afterwards before publication.

Overall, though, it was a good guide to the software. For someone who's not really computer-savvy, it would probably be really helpful. I just felt that personally, I could have figured most of it out just from using the software and poking around.

3 stars.

Tuesday, May 28, 2013

The Orphanage of Miracles by Amy Neftzger

Title: The Orphanage of Miracles
Author: Amy Neftzger
Publication Date: May 28, 2013 (today!)
Length: about 204 pages (ebook)

Nicholas, along with his friends Maggie and Jovan, live in an orphanage where the kids don't receive any schooling, but instead spend their time trying to create miracles. But no one can tell them how to do it, and no one can remember anyone managing it in the recent past. Nicholas starts to wonder, if the orphanage's purpose is to create miracles to help the king in the way, why are the existing miracles kept locked away in a garden instead of sent where they're needed?

Meanwhile, Kelsey is on a journey in search of a miracle to help her struggling family. Along the way she is joined by a silent boy, a large leopard, and a lovable fox. Her new friends teach her about herself along the way.

This was such a fun story. The absurdity of the orphanage was great. Kids are sent to different jobs, all aimed at creating or catching miracles, but no one knows what they're doing at all. And they each have a plant that they have to take care of, or they'll mysteriously disappear. Maggie, a strong, opinionated girl, is terrible at taking care of her plant, but luckily has her nurturing friend Nicholas to swap plants with her and nurse hers back to health.

Kelsey was really annoying at first, but improves a lot over the course of the story. Silence (as she calls the boy who doesn't speak) is delightful all along, and Megan, the leopard, is cryptic but interesting.

Overall, there's more hunting than I (as a vegetarian) would want my kid to read about, but other than that this is a wonderful fantasy for kids.

4 stars.

Full disclosure: Free ebook copy received from the publisher through NetGalley.

Friday, May 24, 2013

Uglies: Cutters by Scott Westerfeld

Title: Uglies: Cutters
Author: Scott Westerfeld and Devin Grayson
Illustrator: Steven Cummings
Publication Date: 2012
Length: 176 pages

Uglies: Cutters is a graphic novel retelling of Pretties by Scott Westerfeld, from Shay's perspective. It's the sequel to Uglies: Shay's Story. Shay's story in Pretties basically consists of her rejoining the Crims, and starting up the Cutters, a group of Pretties who cut themselves in order to achieve the mental clarity that's so difficult for Pretties to reach.

I pretty much had the same issues with this book as I did with Uglies: Shay's Story. Basically, all the people look the same, which is a particularly big problem in a book like this, where looks are very important to the characters.

Also, Tally really did all the interesting stuff in this part of the story. So watching Shay is not really that great. She doesn't know what's going on with Tally most of the time, so we just catch glimpses of that stuff, and meanwhile, Shay just goes about her business, doing stuff with the Crims, etc. So it's not as good a story as Pretties is.

2 stars.

Thursday, May 23, 2013

Lasher by Anne Rice

Title: Lasher
Author: Anne Rice
Publication Date: 1993
Length: 628

Warning: This is a review of the second book in the series, and may contain spoilers from the first book, The Witching Hour.

Rowan has run off with Lasher, and is now travelling the world with him. Apparently she has stayed with him because her scientific curiosity would not allow her to let him go (which, in my opinion, is straight up crazy). Somewhere along the way, she becomes his prisoner, and he continually tries to impregnate her, leading to multiple miscarriages. Meanwhile, Michael is looking for her, and the Mayfairs are dealing with the women in the family dying of miscarriages.

Later on in the book, Lasher tells his story, and we finally learn more about who he was before he became "the man" to the Mayfairs. It's strange, because Lasher often seems like a sympathetic character when he's telling his story, which is so at odds with his thoughtless cruelty in the present.

I know so many people who loved The Witching Hour and didn't like this book, which I just don't understand! I actually liked this one even better than the first. I especially like Mona Mayfair. I think most people don't like her because she's a young teenager who goes around having sex with older men. But as disturbing as that is, Mona's such a powerful character that I can't help but love her. She has the potential to be a very powerful witch, since she has more Mayfair blood than almost anyone else, thanks to the horrifying degree of incest in her family. (This book actually made me realise I need a family tree to understand the Mayfairs, which I have started creating on my computer, much like Mona did.) But Mona's also powerful in the more mundane ways. Despite her young age, she knows exactly what she wants and isn't afraid to go get it.

This is another one of those epic Anne Rice books. There's so much going on, I can't do justice to it all. You also get to learn a lot more about Julien Mayfair in this book. Lasher is a great continuation to The Witching Hour, and I can't wait to read the conclusion in Taltos.

5 stars.

Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Challenge Completed: 2013 Women Challenge


I finished a challenge! Considering how far behind I usually am on most challenges, it's extra exciting that I finished one in the first half of the year! My goal in the Women Challenge was the highest level available: 16 books written by women. I knew this would be easy for me, because I already read what I think is a pretty even spread between male and female authors. I tend to prefer women authors, though there are some men among my favourites as well.

Check out the books I read for this challenge (and continue to read; I'm still adding to the list for the rest of the year!) on my challenge post. You can see other reviews people have written for this challenge here (which I just discovered; I still have to add all of my reviews there).

Thanks to Peek-a-booK! for creating this challenge! :)

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Animorphs #12 - The Reaction by K.A. Applegate

Title: The Reaction (Animorphs #12)
Author: K.A. Applegate
Publication Date: November 1997
Length: 152 pages

Warning: This is a review of the 13th book in the series, and may contain spoilers from the earlier books.

The Animorphs find out that an a famous teen actor, Jeremy Jason McCole, is going to endorse The Sharing, the cover organisation for the Yeerks. Since Jeremy is the love of teen girls everywhere, the Animorphs know they have to stop this, or The Sharing will have no problem recruiting a whole lotta teenagers. But as they plot to stop him, Rachel starts having a really weird problem: she's morphing uncontrollably, sometimes from one morph to another without even morphing back to human again.

I liked the whole thing with Rachel's allergic reaction to the crocodile morph. It was one of those story lines that gives you more interesting details about morphing. There were also some pretty awesome fight scenes in this one. Overall, it wasn't a particularly groundbreaking book as far as this series goes, but it was enjoyable.

4 stars.

Saturday, May 4, 2013

April 2013 Wrap-Up

Here's a summary of my book-related activity for April, just a wee bit late. The highlight was definitely the 24 Hour Read-a-Thon! There was also the Children's Hospital Book Market, at which I was quite restrained, I rather think, but it still wasn't great for my tbr pile. *smiles sheepishly*

Books I read (linked to the reviews)

The Host by Stephenie Meyer (TBR pile)
The Witches by Roald Dahl (new book)
The Change (Animorphs #13) by K.A. Applegate (TBR pile)
Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins (TBR pile)
Ghosts Beneath Our Feet by Betty Ren Wright (TBR pile)
Go Ask Alice by Anonymous [Beatrice Sparks] (TBR pile)
The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner by Stephenie Meyer (new book)
Wild Children by Richard Roberts (NetGalley) (in progress)

Books I bought


The Short Second Life
of Bree Tanner
by Stephenie Meyer
Night Games
by R.L. Stine
Alone in Snakebite Canyon
by R.L. Stine


The No-Nonsense Guide
to Indigenous Peoples
by Lotte Hughes
The Risen Empire
by Scott Westerfeld
Beneath the Vaulted
Hills by Sean Russell

Child of the River
by Paul J. McAuley
The Spirituality of Mazes & Labyrinths
Atlas, Schmatlas: A Superior
Atlas of the World


Books I've been approved for on NetGalley


The Testing by Joelle
Charbonneau
Angel on the Ropes
by Jill Shultz

Wars in Toyland by Joe Harris


The Orphanage of Miracles
by Amy Neftzger
School Spirits by
Rachel Hawkins
Seduction by M.J. Rose


Red Moon by
Benjamin Percy


Progress on challenges



I did not select a Random Read this month.

I forgot to go out of my comfort zone again this month.

I completed the following letters for the A-Z Book Challenge: H and M

I read 5 books for the Mount TBR Reading Challenge. (I'm caught up on this challenge now!)

I read 0 books for the Anne Rice Challenge. You can still sign up!

I read 0 books for the Debut Author Challenge.

I completed the following squares for the Book Bingo Challenge: read 2 books from your tbr pile, read 5 books from your tbr pile, read 1 book that is part of a series

I read 0 books for the Nerdy Non-Fiction Challenge.

I read 2 books for the Dystopia Challenge.

I read 6 books written by women.

I read 2 books for the Seriously Series Challenge.

Progress on my TBR pile: I added 16 books to my to read list and removed 13 (the 8 I read plus 5 expired NetGalleys that I removed), so my pile increased by 3 this month.