Read These Now

The Ex-Debutante


Author-Linda Francis Lee
The Gist- An ex Texas debutante comes back home, after running away to Boston, to help handle her mother's divorce and the disasterous debutante ball.
What I Loved- I'm a sucker for anything Texas related and it had a very cute ending. It was a tad predictable but it was good, light reading.

Spoiled


Author-Heather Cocks
The Gist-Spoiled daughter of a celebrity suddenly finds out she has a half sister she never knew about. The half sister finds out she has a spoiled half sister she never knew about. Drama ensues!
What I Love- This book has SERIOUS series potential! I can see it being turned into multiple books and maybe even a TV show. The drama between the two sisters was great and many of the supporting characters were actually funny and well written too.

Bumped


Author-Megan McCafferty
The Gist- A world where people become infertile at age 18 and teenage girls are the most prized people in society. The girls auction off their "services" to people and get money etc... in exchange for having babies.
What I Love- The concept of this book was brilliant. I must admit though, there were some things I really didn't like about this book. I think McCafferty could have executed it in a better way. That being said, I am recommending it because I think she deserves the chance to redeem herself with the second book.


The Luxe


Author-Anna Godbersen
The Gist- Gossip Girl meets Dangerous Liasons meets The Age of Innocence. The end.
What I Loved- The drama! Haha. When I say it is Gossip Girl, I mean, IT IS GOSSIP GIRL. There is a different level of drama since it is set in Manhatton in the late 1800s but it still works. There are 4 books in the series, Luxe is the first. I should mention that the creators of Gossip Girl are actually planning to bring this show to the CW as well.

The Lying Game


Author-Sara Shepard (Think Pretty Little Liars)
The Gist- Twin sisters switch lives. OK, way more complicated than that but I don't want to give anything away.
What I Love- This book has good series potential written all over it. There are some serious twists and turns that happen towards the end that set things up for a good series. This book, like everything else I read, is also being turned into a TV show airing on ABC Family next month.

Summer and the City


Author-Candace Bushnell
The Gist- Book 2 in The Carrie Diaries series. We get to follow young Carrie Bradshaw around NYC and we get to see her meeting with Miranda!
What I Loved- Young Miranda was priceless! She was so funny and actually made me like her character a lot more. I should mention that this franchise is also being turned into a movie. I vote Blake Lively for Carrie!

The Jessica Darling Series


Author-Megan McCafferty
The Gist- We follow Jessica Darling from high school, through college, and then into adulthood. We see her life through her journals and get to take part in all her trials and tribulations.
What I Love- 1. I'm a sucker for books made up entirely of journal entries! 2. I'm a sucker for a good, dramatic, drawn out, love story. This series has both!

Twenties Girl


Author-Sophie Kinsella
The Gist- A girl is haunted by the ghost of her great aunt (who grew up in the 20s).
What I Love- This book was so amusing! I expect nothing less than hilarity from Kinsella but I really enjoyed this book. It was fun reading about all the trouble seeing the ghost of your great aunt can get you into!

Identical


Author-Ellen Hopkins
The Gist- Through poems we follow the lives of 2 twin girls and all their drama.
What I Love- The main thing I love about Ellen Hopkins is the way she writes. She tells the stories through poetry instead of the standard way of writing books. The twist at the end of this book was COMPLETELY unexpected and brilliant!!! Don't read anything about it because it will spoil it for you!

The Sociopath Next Door



Author- Martha Stout, PhD
The Gist-People are crazy! Haha. No really though, people are nuts. 25% of the population are sociopaths. That is scary.
What I Loved- She compiled stories and research from her 25 years of working as a psychiatrist and provides great insight into a broad range of sociopaths. It was interesting to read about the many forms that a sociopath can take. They aren't always blood thirsty killers.


The Walsh Family Series






Author-Marian Keyes
The Gist- You follow 4 of the 5 (hoping there shall be a book 5!) Walsh sisters through their lives. Each book is dedicated to a certain sister and brings a different dynamic.
What I Love- Anybody Out There is one of the best books I've ever read. It is probably the most serious of the series but still has all the charm and amusement Keyes is known for. All the books are pretty much hilarious!


Feed


Author- Mira Grant
The Gist-Zombies are everywhere. Zombies eat your brains. People hunt zombies. The end.
What I Love- This book takes the zombie story to a completely different level. It is a brilliant look at modern day media and politics with amusing zombie stories thrown in. There are a couple of brilliant surprises at the end too.

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The Horror That Is The Hunger Games Casting

Peeta, Katniss, Gale


Sigh, WOE IS ME! OK, yes, I know I'm dramatic but I'm a lover of books. By now I'm sure you've all figured out I read all the time. When you read a story, especially a trilogy, you form a certain attachment to the characters in the book. This can be a good and bad thing. I mean you spend all this time, years even, imagining the way these characters look then the authors sell out and let studios ruin it! This is exactly what happened with Twilight (seriously don't even get me started) and it's happened again with Hunger Games!

Let's discuss the descriptions of these characters.

Peeta-Peeta is described as having "ashy blond hair that falls in waves over his forehead", blue eyes, and a stocky build. He is also very strong from lifting hundred-pound bags of flour at the family bakery.
Katniss-Katniss has strong survivalist instincts due to her difficult past and is a wonderful archer. Katniss has straight long black hair, which she normally pulls back into a long braid, olive skin, and gray eyes
Gale-Just like Katniss and most people from the Seam, Gale has black hair, olive skin and shares Katniss's grey eyes. They look so alike that people believe them to be cousins in Catching Fire.

Now I know you can change hair color but some of these are fundamental things that you honestly can't change. I mean was it that hard to find a darker skinned brunette to play Katniss? I mean really. Nothing about that girl says olive skinned, dark eyes, hard life etc... The annoying thing is she could have been great as one of the other characters or tributes from another district. It's infuriating! Yes, I realize that's dramatic but oh wells!

Gale I'm on the fence about while he's not my first choice I think he could pull it off but Peeta is horrid casting! In fact, Peeta may be the most horrid casting ever; EVER! I mean worse than Kristin Stewart as Bella and that's saying a lot. He is NOTHING LIKE PEETA AT ALL!! Nothing! What bugs me most is that he's uggo! I mean sorry but Peeta is not uggo. WHY oh why have they done this to me! I honestly screamed out loud NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! when I found out who they cast as Peeta. I mean this kind of stuff honestly makes me want to stop reading books. Again I say, yes, it's that serious!

The only comfort I get is from the all the other people ranting online about the casting choices. I'm glad we're all on the same page and the name of that page is rage. It's just annoying and regardless of what anyone says, *cough cough* E Online, I will not give these people a chance. Why you ask, well let me tell you why. The studio that's doing Hunger Games, from the start, only planned to use people on contract with their studio. Josh Hutcherson aka Peeta and Liam Hemsworth aka Gale both are under contract with that studio. This means that regardless of their feelings when the studio picked them they couldn't say no and the studio is also probably saving a lot of money by picking them over someone outside of the studio. I can't help but feel that if they had gone outside the studio they could have found a better Peeta. It just pisses me off so much!

In the end I am willing to give the movie a chance because the books are so good but alas I will never accept this Hutcherson as my Peeta, just like I've never accepted Stewart as my Bella. If only these people would get my permission before making these horrible casting choices! :D Yes, I know I have delusions of grandeur but I also know you love it! HA!

I Am Number Four Review (Mild Spoilers)

Let's start from the beginning. About 2 months ago I saw a random trailer on TV for I Am Number Four. Immediately after seeing the trailer I thought "I shall research this!" and the first thing I found was that it was based off of a book. Unlike most people when I find out something is based off of a book I go out of my way to read the book first (I'm currently reading Water for Elephants for this very reason). I think it's important to read the book first because 99.9% of the time important things are left out of the movie. I also like to decide how characters will look in my head first. Anyway, I read this book in about 2 days, that's with working 16 hrs of those 2 days as well; needless to say it was fantastic! This made my excitement over the movie even greater!

The premise of the book is there was a planet similar to Earth called Lorien and a group of evil aliens came and destroyed the planet. Apparently this same group of aliens is now on earth hunting down Loriens and plotting to take over. Nine children and 9 guardians escaped and were sent to Earth to live. There was a spell put on them to keep them safe and if they are to be killed they have to be killed in number order. The book/movie starts with the death of number 3 and the main character is 4, thus I Am Number Four. They all discover when one is killed because of a scar that is burned into their flesh after each one's death. If at any point more than one of them is in the same place together the spell is broken and they're all up for grabs (this is important later).



So Friday, with limited expectations, I went to see the movie and I must say I was pleasantly surprised. After finishing the book I wasn't sure about Alex Pettyfer as John but he actually ended up being great casting. He embodied the character perfectly as did Dianna Agron. I'd like to pause to say that Agron's voice drives me nuts. For those of you that don't know who she is she plays Quinn on Glee! She has this overly breathy voice that really begins to grate on the nerves after a while. Aside from that, her portrayal of Sarah was spot on.

The blonde one


The movie itself was very fun to watch. It had amusing lines/scenes and most of the casting was great. I did have a bit of an issue with the guy they cast to play Sarah's ex boyfriend, Mark. He didn't really fit what I was thinking of in my mind. I think the main issue was he's supposed to be hot and I don't think he was. He also was to be a star of the football team and I got more nerd vibe from him. That being said that one casting issue doesn't really bother me because nothing shall ever be worse than the casting catastrophe that was Twilight. Don't even get me started on Taylor Lautner as Jacob!!!!



Mark


I would give the movie a solid A. As far as movies based on books, especially young adult books, this one rocked. It was true to the book as far as characters and plot go for the most part. I did have some fundamental issues with specific things that happened in the movie vs the book. My main issue was with the introduction of 6. OK, SPOILER ALERT skip the rest of this paragraph if you haven't read the book/seen the movie. Number 6 comes at the end of the book and saves the day! It's one of those cool things where you honestly are so distracted by the 10 other things happening that you don't even see it coming. There are no hints given to the reader that she will show up in the book. Her coming completely changes the course of the big battle scene in at the end and it's such a great surprise! In the movie, you see #6 within the first 25 minutes. FAIL. They don't tell you who she is but she's tracking him throughout the whole movie and then shows up at the end. There's no real element of surprise like there is in the book. Again I say, FAIL!



That's 6



The Older man is Henri, John's guardian.

My second major issue was with how everyone discovers John is, shall we say, different. Again, SPOILER ALERT, stop reading now if you plan to see the movie and/or read the book. In the book without getting too specific there's a party, a fire, and John runs into a burning building to save Sarah. People take videos of it put it on the internet and then the bad aliens come to find John. This is also how #6 finds him. In the movie, all this minor nonsense happens and John goes to the party, the cops show up, and then John just begins flashing his powers all over the place. It's really, REALLY, unrealistic.

Aside from those two things I didn't really have any other major issues. I was mildly irritated by the powers that #6 and John have. Read the book and you will understand what I mean. I also had a major issue with something in reference to Henri's character. Without saying anything, something major happens to him and when it happens in the book it makes WAY more sense than when it takes place in the movie.



In the end I found this film to be refreshing. I loved the book and enjoyed the movie as well. I'm very excited for the rest of the books to come out. It's odd when a movie actually comes out before the entire series is finished but oh well. The next book will be out on 08/23/11.

So get your ass to the library or your local bookstore and go get I Am Number Four and then go see the movie!! And yes, you have to go in that order! :D