A little quote, just a little quote

"I hope you will have a wonderful year, that you'll dream dangerously and outrageously, that you'll make something that didn't exist before you made it, that you will be loved and that you will be liked, and that you will have people to love and to like in return. And, most importantly (because I think there should be more kindness and more wisdom in the world right now), that you will, when you need to be, be wise, and that you will always be kind." - Neil Gaiman

"May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you're wonderful, and don't forget to make some art -- write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. And I hope, somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself." - Neil Gaiman

Totally stolen from Google Images

Indisputable Winner

I have found it.

My indisputably favorite movie.

Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain by Jean-Pierre Jeunet.

The title in English is just Amélie, but because I like the French one a lot more, here is the translation of it: The Fabulous Destiny of Amélie Poulain. 

This movie... I have grown up with it without ever seeing it. My parents love it too, and so bought the soundtrack. I grew up with the music from this movie. This year, however, I got it for Christmas. 

Wow. I mean, just, simply breathtaking. 

This movie is the story of a young girl Amélie who grew up in a really dysfunctional family. She dealt with it by imaging a whole world of her own, seeing magic and beauty in all the ordinary things around her. Then, when she was old enough to leave home, she moved to Paris. The thing is, Amélie is very, very shy. She is quiet and passive. Until one day, she finds something that changes her life. From then on, she decides that she wants to make all the people around her happy. Thus ensue many adventures of the most delightful kind. 

What I love about this movie, other than Amélie (played by Audrey Tautou) and Nino (played by Mathieu Kassovitz), is how it was shot. It's very unexpected and unconventional. Which makes it very hard to explain. But the effect is beautiful and original, very romantic and fantastical.

I really recommend this movie. It's the kind of film that I believe cinemas were created for: heartwarming, emotional, and profound. 

One warning though, it is rated R, so there are scenes that may be, ah, inappropriate for kids.

And it's in French, but don't let that stop you. Watch it with subtitles, I don't know, but do watch it somehow.

A controversial topic and a stroll through my new acquisitions

For Christmas this year, I asked for, wait for it...

A Kindle.

Get away from me with your torches and pitchforks, I don't need to justify my actions to you.

But I will. Because I think it's an interesting discussion, Kindle vs. Book. 

First off, let me state that I love physical paper books. I love the smell, the feel, I love flipping through the pages. I love books and I always will.

However, I think that Kindles have their place too. They are lightweight, small, and you can carry a thousand books in your pocket, which is very convenient for me because I do tend to travel a lot. 

Now, here's my reasoning. I don't think Kindles and physical books should be in conflict. I think that they actually complement each other. I know people that didn't used to read at all until they got eBooks and were able to access whatever book they wanted at a click of a button. Now, they read a lot and all the time. Then, there are people who just don't want to read on a screen, and so they don't and that's that. I really don't see why there's a conflict. Now, some will say that eBooks are the reason book stores are a dying breed. Well, that may be true, but Amazon is a also a valid cause of death: it's so much easier just to order a book online and have it delivered to your house. 

That said, I do miss bookstores a lot.

So on my brand new awesome-tastic Kindle, I currently have two books: The Fault in Our Stars by John Green (because I love it very much and I really wanted to have my own copy) and Stardust by Neil Gaiman because I can't get my hands on it at the library. I'm really excited to started reading it.

Other than that, my brother got the three book boxset of the Divergent series, and as I haven't yet read Allegiant, which is the last book, I stole it temporarily and am about 2/3 of the way through. I can't really remember the plot line from the other books, but I do really like this series. Yay dystopian fiction!

I'm also currently reading The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente. I'm having trouble getting into it: when I actually do read it, I really like it, but I have trouble making myself pick it up. It's weird. The book is insane, I love it, it's like a modern Alice in Wonderland. 

The last book in the pile is Humans of New York by Brandon Stanton. I follow him on Facebook, on his page also called Humans of New York. He's a photographer who takes pictures of strangers on the streets of the Big Apple and asks them one question. That question usually leads to a very interesting insight into people's minds. It's fascinating and this book is a collection of three years worth of work. It's very inspiring, and a beautiful book. I read it in about an hour, it's basically a picture book, but so worth the time. 

What books did you get for Christmas or any other holiday?

What is your opinion on the Kindle vs. Book situation?

Leave your answer in the comments below!

Happy Holidays! (a little late, but oh well)

The last in the quartet

It is done!

I have done it!

I have finished all four John Green books. (I'm not counting his collabs, because I haven't read any of those yet.) The last one that was left for me to read was An Abundance of Katherines.

Let me start by saying that this may be my second favorite John Green book, after The Fault in Our Stars. It was really funny and witty and I just really liked the story.

So basically, this is the story of a boy named Colin. Colin is a senior in high school and he has just been dumped by the 19th Katherine in a row. Because you see, whereas other boys have types of girls they like such as blondes or brunettes, Colin likes girls named Katherine, with a K. And now, at the end of senior year, Katherine the 19th, or K19, has left him.

To heal (or attempt to patch up, at least) Colin's broken heart, his best friend Hassan takes him on a road trip to nowhere. They end up in Gutshot, Tennessee, looking for the grave of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand (you may have heard of him, he's the one who sparked one of the biggest wars this world has ever seen). They end up meeting a girl named Lindsey and staying at her house after her mother offers them a job collecting stories about Gutshot from the residents. 

Colin, however, is finding it hard to focus on local gossip, because you see, Colin is a former child-prodigy. He is very smart, very good at remembering things and very upset that he hasn't made the transition from "prodigy" (someone who is good at learning things) to "genius" (someone who is good at thinking up new things). Desperate to matter, to be remembered, Colin decides that his mark on the world will be a mathematical formula that can invariably predict the outcome of a romantic relationship. 

The reasons that I liked this book are as follows. 

I liked the characters. I like "John Green's formula" as people call it, the fact that most of his books have a nerdy, quirky boy with the funny best friend, who falls in love with a popular, mysterious girl. I know a lot of people criticize that but I do like it. So Colin. Not an overly likable character. You honestly can't blame the Katherines for dumping him. He's self-centered, very focused on his own intelligence, and yet that's why he's a good character, because how many authors can successfully pull off a smart, self-centered main character and still make the story progress without completely changing who he is? Hassan, the funny best friend, is indeed very funny. I like him. His character doesn't have a lot of depth, he's comic relief, but he's good at what he does. Lindsey, I thought, was a nicely 3-D character. She had several faces, which I liked because don't we all? She was flawed, but not so much that the book focused on it. 

I liked the story, and the setting, because it was the perfect place for stereotypes and John Green did not fall into the trap at all. 

Finally, it's a feel good book. It's not great literature, it won't make you rethink your life, but it's time well spent. It made me read under the desk in class and stay up late at night to read "just to the end of the chapter", which I haven't done in so long and felt so good. So, if like me, you are recovering from a reading hiatus, this is a good book to get you back into reading. If you aren't on a book hiatus, good for you! You should read this if you need a break from the other drama-filled, heavy with sadness, YA books. 

That's all for now!

Pirates, warriors and dogs... what's not to like?

So I recently read a book called The Dust of 100 Dogs by A.S. King.

I picked it up because I liked the cover, to be honest, and because the plot summary was really intriguing.

This is the story of a girl named Saffron Adams, who is actually the 101th reincarnation of Emer Morrisey. See, Emer was born in Ireland in the seventeenth century. When her village was attacked and her parents and brother killed, she was sent to live with her brutish uncle. The only good thing in her childhood was Seanie Carroll, her first and only love. Before she could grow up and marry him, however, her uncle sold her as a wife to a rich man in Paris. Upon her arrival, she runs away and ends up boarding a ship to Tortuga in the Caribbean. From there, she struggles to survive in a world of loveless men, an object among many, no one. But Emer is not one to suffer through a bad situation if she can help it. She escapes once again and becomes a sailor, hidden as a man. Eventually, she becomes one of the most feared pirates of the Caribbean. But she can't escape her past forever. She is eventually cursed to live 100 lives as a dog before she can return to the world as a human.

100 dog lives later, Saffron Adams is growing up in the Middle of Nowhere, Pennsylvania, with all her memories of the last 4 centuries intact.

This was a great book, I couldn't put it down. I read it in two days and loved every second of it. I'm a sucker for pirate stories, I have to admit. It was well written, the plot was really imaginative and I liked how the book starts at the end of Emer's life, then flashes forward to Saffron Adams present day, then back to Emer's childhood, then to Saffron's childhood then back again. It sounds really complicated when I say it like that, but it makes sense in the book. 

I would caution the faint of heart though, she was a pirate and has frequent daydreams of mutilating people who annoy her. Also, she was a sold as a prostitute and the book dealt with rape, so keep that in mind.

Other than that, it was really good, I enjoyed it tremendously. 

Updates and things! (lots of music)

Time for an update, I think.

All righty then, this will be a really eclectic post. I will throw information at you and in between, I will give you links to songs that I have been listening to non-stop, deal? I tried to keep the songs in a sort of theme and not too all over the place. Just click on the name and be whisked away to musical paradise.

1. Come and Goes (In Waves) by Greg Laswell

2. I've finally picked up a book again! It's been so long! (I'm so ashamed, it's been a good three months since I haven't read for fun.) I actually had a list of books that I wanted to read and I went to the library, so I tried to find them. They had one that I was looking for, and I got two others that I hadn't planned on borrowing.

3. Indigo by Tom Milsom

4. These books include: The Dust of 100 Dogs by A.S. King, An Abundance of Katherines by John Green, and The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland In a Ship of her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente. So far, I have read the first and half of the second and have enjoyed both tremendously.

5. The Winner is... by Devotchka

6. I may review The Dust of 100 Dogs soon, because I really liked it and highly recommend it. There are pirates. And 17th century Ireland. And modern-day Pennsylvania.

7. Your Hand in Mine by Explosions in the Sky (this is all instrumental)

8. I went to see a show yesterday called Nerds: Bill and Steve's Excellent Adventures. It was fantastic! I absolutely loved it. My friend invited me to the opening night and it was incredible. The show was actually written and first put on in 2007, and did very well, but then stopped showing. It was re-written to accomodate the progression of technology since then and yesterday was the first time it has been put on since. The show is about Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, and their evolution and rivalry since the 70's. It was hilarious, brilliantly written and very well cast. The actors did a phenomenal job and the music was just... I loved it. If you have the opportunity to see it, you definitely should. (We also got great - albeit useless glasses - and got to meet the cast, which was amazing.)

9. Boy with a Coin by Iron and Wine

10. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green is slowly becoming my second favorite John Green book. The Fault in Our Stars (and probably always will be) my favorite, then An Abundance of Katherines, Looking For Alaska and finally Paper Towns. 

11. The Way We Were by Carrie Hope Fletcher

12. We're reading Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger in English class. As it has been stated several times by famous people that I admire as being their favorite book, and as it has appeared on every single list of "100 books every young adult should read", I'm excited to see what it is. We've only read a few chapters, so I'll keep you updated. I like it so far.

13. I See Fire by Ed Sheeran

14. I've run out of things to update you on, so I'll comment on the weather. It's getting cold, just in time for the holidays, and rather wet, so I'm hoping for some snow for Christmas. I always hope for snow on Christmas. It's happened maybe once in the last nine years.

15. New Slang by The Shins

And that's it!

Since we're having a very music-y post, here are a few more titles (that didn't necessarily fit with this list).

Thks Fr Th Mmrs by Fall Out Boy

I Just Wanna Run by The Downtown Fiction

The Middle by Jimmy Eat World

Not Your Fault by Awolnation

Ready To Go by Panic!At the Disco