The Help was stunning. If you need to leave and want a quick summary of what I thought of the book, that is it right there. This book was stunning. It was good-stunning; it was bad-stunning (but not in a bad way); it was attention grabbing stunning; it took the whole wide range of stunning and packed it into a 522 page book, as though with no trouble at all.
A few years ago, there was a huge commotion about this book. Everywhere I went that sold or loaned books, there was a few prized copies displayed prominently on a shelf where everyone could see them. Chapters stores had tables dedicated to this book (and, it became a ‘Heather’s Pick’), local Costco’s had mounds of this books piled sky-high in their book section. Everyone talked about it; this book had really made quite a splash. To be honest, I am not even really sure why I am reviewing this book – you have probably read it already. And if you haven’t, why have you not read this book yet? My guess is that you are probably like me, late to get onto the popular book bandwagon, and that’s alright, there’s no shame here. I do it every single time a book gets popular. For example, the Hunger Games came out, what, in 2008? Didn’t read any of them until last year, didn’t even finish the series until the end of this summer. Percy Jackson? Came out in 2005/2006, I did not even look at them until a few years ago. And I know these are all children’s books and Young Adult examples (although the Hunger Games is much too violent in my opinion for any child), you probably get my point, because it is not only these books, but multiple others as well. My other problem is getting on the book bandwagon too early, reading books before they are popular, but that is a whole new can of worms that I do not intend on opening today.
The Help was stunning. If you need to leave and want a quick summary of what I thought of the book, that is it right there. This book was stunning. It was good-stunning; it was bad-stunning (but not in a bad way); it was attention grabbing stunning; it took the whole wide range of stunning and packed it into a 522 page book, as though with no trouble at all.
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Hello everyone, Happy New Year!!! I hope that you all have a wonderful 2015, and that 2014 was great too. Watch this next week for special posts coming up because of the new year. In other News, we turn 1 in 3 days! That's right, on January 4th, it is our blog's birthday! Cue the birthday music! Is there such thing as birthday music? I know that there's Happy Birthday (did you know that someone copyrighted Happy Birthday? I don't know who, but they did, which is why they don't sing it on TV shows very often anymore.), but I'm not sure about anything else. So, Yay! After the review, I'm going to give you guys my very own version of A Short Guide to Staying Warm in the Winter By a Canadian. http://picturesimagesclipart.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/top-beautiful-disney-happy-new-year-clipart-1.jpg
I don’t know if people are publishing more books that just aren’t good or if I am just getting more and more picky (I prefer the term ‘selective’) or if it is a combination of both but I have not in recent trips to the bookstore been able to find any books of interest. The same applies to the library. It is not that my innate desire for books has deteriorated, rather that I have read most – it can’t possibly be all, can it? – of the good books that I have access to. I haven’t taken a book out from the library that I have finished in easily a few weeks. At the only local bookstore I constantly find myself leaving empty handed, which is good for the pocket, I guess, but I can seriously feel my gray matter up there rotting away from the lack of new reading material. Anyways, I recently had the opportunity to spend an hour and a half at my local bookstore, which I spent looking over every single book (not exaggerating) that was in the Adult and Young Adult section, as well as the table of books on display, both recent additions to the store and staff recommendations. I shook my head at seeing some of my favourite books not being enshrined as they should be, but moved on, knowing there was nothing I could do. After what was just shy of two beautiful hours, I walked up the counter, paid, and left. With one book. That I have read multiple times before (if you are interested in knowing, it was Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys, a WWII historical fiction, and it is very, very good). To be fair, I have wanted to personally own a copy of this book for a year or two, but still, doesn’t it say something either about the bookstore or about me that I spent such a long time in this bookstore, in booklover’s paradise, and came out with only one book? I don’t know what this world is coming to. Hi everyone! I'm back! So, I do have a good excuse for last week: I didn't read much. Or at all, really. I'll tell you all about it after I do the review, okay? Good. So this week, one of the books I read was The Chaos of Stars by Kiersten White. I'm not sure if I've told you guys before (and I'm sorry, I'm not going through all of our old posts just to find out), but I'm a huge Kane Chronicles fan. So, when I saw that this had Ancient Egyptian gods and goddesses in it, I had to read it. It was really weird at first because they all had different personalities than Rick Riordan's versions of them! I knew, going in, that they wouldn't be the same, but it still sort of caught me off guard. A piece of advice though, about this book; it may be, at times, tempting to skip over the little blurbs about the godly family and Isadora's dreams. Don't do it. There's important things in there. I can't imagine having read the book without reading those bits. Once upon a time, people wrote good books, and once upon a time, people read them. Oh wait, that’s today. And a hundred years ago, and a hundred years before that, probably continuing this tradition of storytelling that may have existed thousands of years ago, with drawings etched in dirt and carved in stone walls, left for the viewer to entertain the thoughts about the possible meaning. But really, isn’t that how writing is today? Isn’t it also how reading is today?
Required reading books have acquired quite a nasty name for themselves, supposedly torturing little children all over the world, numbing brains internationally. And I had heard of Siddhartha having such a similar reputation. I was required to read this for my English class, and was prepared for the ultimate agony. Unfortunately, I was disappointed. In fact, this book was not that bad. Rather than a slow mind-numbing, I only experienced a slight bit of pain. I admittedly did not love this book, but all of the people who hated on this book were in my opinion overreacting a little bit. My sister didn’t like it, but that was most likely because she was sicker than a dog when she had to read this book. Not the best time for required reading. Hello, everyone! So today I am going to talk about some of my favourite books of all time: the Cherry Ames series. I haven't read all of them (they are surprisingly hard to find), but I adore the ones that I have had the chance to read. I firmly hold the opinion for all the world to see that Cherry Ames is worlds better than Nancy Drew. Her books are more interesting, they are written consistently (In case you didn't know, 'Carolyn Keene' isn't a real person. It's just the name they used so that the series was all written by the 'same' person.), and the problems she solves are more realistic (at least, from the ones I read). They've recently reprinted the series, but I'm holding out to find them in some of the older bindings (I like them better). One by one the collection will grow. I have always wanted to read this book. When I was younger, I was tempted to buy it, just for the cover alone, which is great! But I felt like the topic was not one that I should be reading about. And to be honest, I am very glad that I have not read this before I did. It is a very heavy topic, and one that I do not think that I could have tackled at any point in my life before just now. As it was I read this in what equates to two sittings. One sitting being every possible moment throughout the school day (I made the moments close enough together that I barely closed the book), and the other sitting being at ten-thirty that night. I should have read it in three or four sittings, but that second time I was reading, I knew I needed to finish it right then and there, and so I stayed up until twelve-thirty in the morning, reading (thank goodness it was a Friday). Just as I got to a spot that I thought I could possibly stop at, my eyes kept reading and my hands kept turning the pages. This was definitely a page-turner, in fact, I feel that this book taught me what a page turner truly was. |
AuthorsJason and Elizabeth are brother and sister book addicts who somehow manage to get along (most of the time). They reside in Canada with their dog Becky, and one (slightly insane) fly-hunting cat named Fish. Oh. And their parents. They're important too. Archives
July 2016
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