Paper Towns

 

Just finished my second John Green novel; Paper Towns. UGH! This book was a roller coaster for me. It was really exciting in the beginning, climaxed WAY too quickly, started to resolve, then got super dull until the last 50 pages. Then exciting again! The characters in this novel were slightly more realistic than those in The Fault in Our Stars. I believed that these kids were in high school, that they were falling in love for the first time, and that they had NO CLUE what the hell they were doing with themselves. I liked the end of the book more than I liked the book overall. The kids all wanting so badly for anything to seem real, and right, and theirs. I had no trouble relating to Margo. I have always felt trapped. I have always been hungry for adventure. The difference is that I’ve never reached out to grab it.

Paper Towns
by John Green
http://www.johngreenbooks.com
My Rating: Yep! Two thumbs up. The story drags a little, but so does life. Fun, fast read! Do yourself a favor… Read anything by John Green. You’ll be hooked. Watch his videos too!

“Against YA: Adults Should be Embarrassed to Read Children’s Books”

“Against YA: Adults Should be Embarrassed to Read Children’s Books”

Ok. I’m not feeling defensive today. I read this article once, and hated it. I wanted to defend the shit out of YA because reading is reading. I made a list of all of the things I wanted to say in defense of YA. I let myself get upset over someone else’s opinion. Then I stopped. I really thought about what I wanted to say, and then I read the article again. It wasn’t until my second read through that I realized I kind of agree with the article. 

I wanted to say something like, “The cool thing about being an adult is that I get to make decisions about what I read”, “When I was a kid you couldn’t pay me to pick up a book”, and “I want to read the book before I see the movie”. That’s probably true for most of us. But as well trained decision makers, we should be challenging ourselves. We should be curious, and continue to question everything, instead of letting Hollywood dictate what comes next. 

There were some words used in the article that give it a very negative feel for me. 

“Should”: No one is allowed to apply obligation to MY feelings. 

“Embarrassed”: WHY?!?! Again, I am an adult, fully capable of making my own decisions. If I am embarrassed by those decisions, it’s because I’m not being true to myself. Embarrassment seems a lot like an emotion we use to bully others, to shame them into conforming to more “acceptable” social standards. Reading YA isn’t like tripping up the stairs, or getting caught singing in the shower. We don’t have to feel silly about our decision to READ A BOOK. 

“Children”: I agree; YA is sometime very shallow and empty. It sometimes lacks complex endings so that it can be neatly packaged for a younger audience. But the topics most of these books are written about are NOT for children. They are merely adult ideas that have been watered down a bit for idiot teenagers who still have a romantic idea of how life works. And sometimes, as an adult, it’s nice to be slightly removed from a reality where everything isn’t totally sugar coated to remember how fantastic life seemed when we were YOUNG ADULTS. 

 

Long story short; YES!!! Challenge yourselves when you read. Read often. Read whatever the hell you want, but don’t forget that you’re always learning. So don’t settle for one genre, or author, or age range. Taste everything until you realize that your tastes are evolving, and then taste everything again! 

 

And then read this: http://www.nerve.com/books/a-young-adult-authors-fantastic-crusade-to-defend-literatures-most-maligned-genre

 

I Missed the 1st of the Month Again!!!

WHAT ARE YOU READING!?!?

The Fault in Our Stars

Have you ever been in love? Have you ever thought you were in love, but really had no idea what or how you were supposed to feel? John Green makes putting “love” into words seem easy in The Fault in Our Stars. Green shows us that love IS patient, and kind, but also how dirty and painful love can really be. The relationship between Hazel and Augustus always seems real; never like a dream, a fairy tale, or a work of fiction. How perfect to find a fairy tale in a world where it seems impossible for them to exist.

The Fault in Our Stars
by John Green
http://www.johngreenbooks.com
My Rating: * * * * * / All of the yes! / I’d read it again. / I read it while I was at work, and cried in my cubical. / I will continue to read anything John Green writes.

Who’s read it? Let’s talk about it!

Reader’s Block

I have this weird thing where I start a book, have a hard time getting into it right away, keep trying to read it but am completely distracted by the thought of not being able to get into it, so I start another book hoping to come back to the one I don’t like. THEN, I never come back to the original.

But I also hate that I don’t finish things I start.

Is there such a thing as readers block?

Maybe I’m just distracted too easily.

 

Books I’m currently reading…

1. The Gunslinger

2. Divergent

3. The Bell Jar

4. Life of Pi

 

I think there are more…

I have a problem. Maybe I’m addicted to the high of starting a new book.

 

Side frustration; kind of similar… I’ve been trying free writing, and it’s ALWAYS about how I don’t know what to write about. So that’s annoying.

 

Any pointers?

Also, What books have you started but haven’t finished?

Ok… I’ve been fucking up!

I have been pretty much MIA for over a month now.

I’m still reading, but slowly. I hate using busy as an excuse, especially when during my free moments I’m catching up on the next episode of Fringe. The last few weeks have been a little nutso with my little sister getting married. But now she’s hitched, so I can’t use that as my excuse anymore!

I’ve been thinking a lot about this blog, and how things work here. Or, rather, how they aren’t working.

I get caught up in my insecurities EVERY time I try to write. I can’t focus on what I want to say, and instead worry about what you want to hear. I get so worried about my grammar, that I write and rewrite sentences until I can’t remember how punctuation is even supposed to work. I have no structure, and too much structure all at once. I meant for this project to be fun, and interesting, and exciting, and it is beginning to feel like a chore. BUT I don’t want to give up.

Being uncomfortable is how we grow.

I’m just going to change things a little. I’m going to try and challenge myself a little more. And I’m going to try to write what I think, what I believe, and what I want.

If you have any suggestions, ideas, comments… let me know! I’d really like to try new things, and develop my process.

I WILL still read 52 books this year, come hell or high water.

I WILL still blog about each of them.

and I WILL still practice, no matter how uncomfortable things get.

 

If you read this, thank you. If you don’t, thank you too; I’ve never been, and probably never will be, good at selling myself. But maybe by talking about things I care about in a way that seems natural, I can make some new friends, and have some good conversations along the way.

 

SOOOOOOOO…

Since I missed May 1st!!!!

WHAT ARE YOU READING?!?!

Do you ever have this problem?

So… I’m reading a book right now, and I just can NOT get into it. It’s a book I’ve been told time and time again that I will LOVE. Hell! I can tell I would love it on any other day! But for some reason, right now, I would rather read ANYTHING else.

I hate giving up on a book, but I know if I just put it away, and try again another time, I will have a better time with it.

Help!

How do you deal with readers block?

Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

 

Jacob, a seemingly ordinary child, comes to find that his life is a bit more…peculiar than he ever could have imagined.

I had no idea what to expect with this one. The title reminds me of Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends. With that in the back of my mind, I think I was expecting a playful story about a boy and his friends. The cover photo also lends itself to a haunting feeling of loneliness and loss. Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children is a little of all of those.

This story made me think about how ordinary my life seems most of the time. I found myself wanting to go to Miss Peregrine’s home to meet all of the peculiar children. I wanted to have adventures with them, and learn about individual lives.

The novel was written, by Ransom Riggs, around a collection of old photos he, and others, have collected over the years. The photos are all real. I think Riggs was very brave for writing these children’s stories. For exploring the unknown, and giving each soul in the images a voice. Even if the stories are merely fiction, the once real boys and girls were given a new pulse to explore a new world.

I sometimes caught myself starting at each photo. I wondered what each person was really like. Where they lived, what kinds of food they liked to eat, why they looked so sad or happy, and what happened to them in the end. While I can’t know what actually happened to these children, knowing the peculiars has been an exciting adventure thus far.

This is a story of friendship, love, and a little bit of time travel. It is a great Young Adult Fiction that adults still capable of make-believe can also enjoy.

Check back soon for an entry about the sequel; Hollow City.

OH!!! DID I MENTION!?! This is ALSO a graphic novel!? Well, It is!

 

TITLE: Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

PAGES: 352

AUTHOR: Ransom Riggs

ALSO WROTE: Hollow City; Taking Pictures

WEBSITE: http://www.ransomriggs.com

 

The Diary of a Wimpy Kid

So I’ve read a handful of the Wimpy Kid books in the last week or so, so I guess I should include them, right?

Greg is your average 6th grader. He cares about video games, surviving middle school, and girls. His parents just don’t understand him, and his brother is in a cool,high school, rock and roll band.

I can’t completely and accurately talk about how these characters are, because I haven’t finished the series. But I do feel confident in the reasons I haven’t continued to read the books. (I might finish them sooner or later, and I’m not disregarding them at all. But I have kind of lost interest.)

Greg, I think BECAUSE he is so young, is very mischievous. He is kind of a little con man. He tricks his friends into doing things for him, he lies, and he takes advantage of others a lot. He takes pretty much everyone around him for granted, and he only thinks of himself. I understand that this is how kids are. But I am already half way through the series and I’m not sure I’ve seen Greg learn any lessons. He gets away with everything, and when he does get in trouble he just gets his video games taken away.

The illustrations are adorable, and the format of the books is interesting, but Greg is not really a role model. And maybe that’s not the point. Maybe kids can easily recognize his bad habits and still enjoy the sarcasm of the book with out being influenced by him.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid is a silly Saturday morning cartoon in book form. If you want a quick and easy read, with funny illustrations, this book is nice. I think it is also a great series for reluctant readers. But the first half of the series has very shallow content, and limited character development that didn’t hold my attention for very long.

 

TITLE: Diary of a Wimpy Kid

AUTHOR: Jeff Kinney

PAGES: Around 200 pages per book. (8 books total, so far)

ALSO WROTE: The Wimpy Kid Do It Yourself Book; The Wimpy Kid Movie Diary

WEBSITE: www.wimpykid.com

 

What Are You Reading!?!?

Happy March 1st, friends!!!

What books are you reading right now?