2009 October » Birdbrain(ed) Book Blog

APFOL: Oct 4-10

Posted by Anastasia on October 11, 2009 No Responses »

Oct 112009

Interesting posts and other things that have caught my eye this week. It isn’t actually everything, since I didn’t want to kill myself copy-pasting, so for the entire link collection check out my Delicious page.

And now, I present to you, my readers: Awesome Post Full of Links #6: October 4-10!

Books in General

Princess Diaries author Meg Cabot on Betsy-Tacy novels – WSJ.com
“Author Meg Cabot on why the Betsy-Tacy books give today’s teen lit a run for its money”

Authors & Publishers

Book Pitch Gone Bad: How to Piss Off Those You Most Want to Befriend
“One of the first rules of pitching anyone on doing a favor, especially in the world of social media, is you’ve gotta join in the conversation first. You’ve gotta give a little first. And, at a bare minimum, pretend you know who I am, who my audience is, what I care about and what I write about.” (via @mawbooks)

(Book) Blogging

The Boston Bibliophile: Guest Post: FTC FAQ For Book Bloggers
A super detailed FAQ re: the FTC debacle for those who want some more details on how it affects them.
Scribbit | What Does the FTC’s New Ruling Mean for Bloggers?
Spelled out nice and clear. (via @Chrisbookarama)
Yes, new FTC guidelines extend to Facebook fan pages | The Social – CNET News
“Small-time bloggers freaking out over whether the FTC will really crack down on them may be pleased to know that the FTC at least claims its aim is to make everyone aware of what’s right and wrong rather than to hunt down every Twitter user who may have been given a free toaster or something. Unless, that is, somebody rats them out–and at least one blogger is already raising concerns that angry readers may use the regulations to attempt to get back at blogs they don’t like.”
If you’re requesting a book, please, provide an address « The Book Publicity Blog
I’m guilty of doing this myself. *cough*
A Beginner’s Guide to Joining the Book Blogging Community – Farm Lane Books Blog
Very useful tips from Jackie about getting more involved in the book blogging community! Good for both newbies and oldies– I certainly learned some new stuff!

And

Egmont – GONE
Read GONE by Michael grant for free online until October 31st! It’s pretty long, though, so you might be more comfortable with a paper book…

Book reviews and me

Posted by Anastasia on October 10, 2009 No Responses »

Oct 102009

woman using computer I got to thinking recently about how I use reviews in my book life, both my own and other people’s. Why do I write reviews, and why do I read them? What do I want from them?I’ve tried to answer those questions here, and thus this really freakin’ long thing. I hope you read it despite the length, as I’m quite proud of it and, even more importantly, typing it all out gave me possible carpal tunnel syndrome. Don’t let my pain go to waste!

Why I write reviews

In my own reviews, I try to include all my important reactions, especially those that related to my enjoyment of the book, and I try to include more technical stuff (more on that later). Basically, I use my own reviews as a more detailed reading log. Sometimes I might try to encourage people to read the book, but mostly I try to record how a book affected me and what I thought of it.

So, in my personal reviews I’m recording how I reacted to a book emotionally and intellectually, if I enjoyed it, if I liked the characters or the writing or the plot, if it relates in any way to my own life, and if I learned anything new from reading that book. (I don’t always achieve recording every single one of those points, but I’ve basically got it down.) My reviews are my reading diary, and if they make someone else want to read that book? Fantastic! But I almost think that’s secondary to my personal reasons for writing reviews. (I apologize if that sounds horrible.)

Of course I hope that my reviews encourage people to both read that book and then come back and talk with me about it! The desire to have discourse about a favorite book (or even a hated one) has been steadily growing in me ever since I started this blog, which is partly why I’ve been trying to include some sort of discussion question in my review posts. (It’s probably also why I want to join a book club so badly.)
Continue reading »

Challenge completed! It's the End of the World II

Posted by Anastasia on October 9, 2009 No Responses »

Oct 092009

End of the World

Right on the heels of the third reading challenge I’ve completed this year is the fourth: It’s the End of the World II, also hosted by Becky of Becky’s Book Reviews. I finished this one a little before the deadline, but it as a close thing.

The reason I originally joined this challenge was because last winter I had just finished a class about dystopias (and utopias), and I was dissatisfied with the professor’s book choices. I wanted to see what else was out there, and if it was more interesting than what I had to read for that class. For the most part I ended up with books leaning more towards a sci-fi sort of slant, though I accidentally got a politically-slanted book in there as well. Excepting that one, I loved all the books I read for this challenge and I think they’re pretty different from each other (and from the books I read for my class).

Here’s the final list of books I read for this challenge, with links to any reviews I’ve written for them:
1. Gone – Michael Grant
2. There Will Be Dragons – John Ringo
3. The Girl Who Owned a City – O.T. Nelson
4. Boneshaker - Cherie Priest

My favorite book from this list is probably There Will Be Dragons. It doesn’t have zombies, or kids with super powers, or Ayn Rand, but it does have a massively detailed world populated by Ren Faire people and knights. So, pretty awesome, yeah.

Review: Monster by Walter Dean Myers

Posted by Anastasia on October 9, 2009 No Responses »

Oct 092009

Monster Monster by Walter Dean Myers
Publication: Amistad; Rev. Harper Tempest ed. edition (May 8, 2001), Paperback, 281 pages / ISBN 0064407314
Genre: YA
Rating:
Find @ Amazon or IndieBound
Read: June 2009
Source: Library Book Sale (bought)

FADE IN: INTERIOR: Early morning in CELL BLOCK D, MANHATTAN DETENTION CENTER.

Steve (Voice-Over) Sometimes I feel like I have walked into the middle of a movie. Maybe I can make my own movie. The film will be the story of my life. No, not my life, but of this experience. I’ll call it what the lady prosecutor called me … Monster.

Monster has a very striking cover, doesn’t it? And the insides are just as striking as the outsides.

Summary from Amazon:

Sixteen-year-old Steve Harmon is on trial for murder. A Harlem drugstore owner was shot and killed in his store, and the word is that Steve served as the lookout.

Guilty or innocent, Steve becomes a pawn in the hands of “the system,” cluttered with cynical authority figures and unscrupulous inmates, who will turn in anyone to shorten their own sentences. For the first time, Steve is forced to think about who he is as he faces prison, where he may spend all the tomorrows of his life.

As a way of coping with the horrific events that entangle him, Steve, an amateur filmmaker, decides to transcribe his trial into a script, just like in the movies. He writes it all down, scene by scene, the story of how his whole life was turned around in an instant. But despite his efforts, reality is blurred and his vision obscured until he can no longer tell who he is or what is the truth. This compelling novel is Walter Dean Myers’s writing at its best.

I don’t read a lot of books like Monster, and I mean that on two levels: I don’t normally read literary YA fiction and I don’t normally read books as poignant and hard-hitting.

From the very first page I could tell Monster would be hitting me in a lot of soft places, and that even though it might hurt I should keep on reading ’til the end. It’s not that Monster is unnecessarily harsh or trying too hard to play on the emotions, it’s that the story Monster tells is so relevant to today and that’s what makes it tough: to know that this is really what kids are going through and will go through and it can’t easily be fixed. I really felt for this kid and his story, and the fact that the book doesn’t give us any easy answers– did he do it or didn’t he? is he a bad person or not?– just made it harder to digest.

The books is in diary entries, scripts, things like that, and it does give some distance from the events going on in the book. But I also think it highlights how Steve thinks of his world, like it isn’t really happening to him, like it’s a movie, and it actually keeps the book from getting too melodramatic. I really liked the format, as it so happens.

Monster reminds me a lot of Rule of the Bone or Tangerine, in that it has real people facing real situations, and nothing’s easily separated into good and evil. Things are complicated, and people are complicated, and I think Monster is excellent in showing that. (And, yeah, I think it’d make a great book to read in a class and discuss with people.)

I know I was kind of vague in my review, but that shouldn’t stop you from getting a copy and reading it yourself, okay? It’s really good, and even if you don’t believe me, look at those awards it’s won!

Other reviews: The Librarian’s Lighthouse | Stephanie’s Confessions of a Book-a-holic | My Round File | The Bluestocking Society

Thursday Tea: October 8 (Boneshaker)

Posted by Anastasia on October 8, 2009 No Responses »

Oct 082009

Thursday Tea is a weekly meme hosted by yours truly. To play along, all you need is some tea, a book, and the answers to these questions: what tea are you drinking (and do you like it)? What book are you reading (and do you like it)? Tell us a little about your tea and your book, and whether or not the two go together.

The tea: Remember this Tazo Brambleberry stuff? Yeah, totally drinking it again. The weather is colder now, and so drinking cold tea seems a bit backwards, but it’s really refreshing (and delicious).

The book: I’m about halfway through Cherie Priest‘s newest book, Boneshaker. I’ve been looking forward to reading it since about early September, and while it’s really hard for anything to live up to my expectations, Boneshaker is doing pretty well. I love how it’s steampunk/horror, and though the characters are pretty much always annoying the crap out of me I think I’ll end up loving them by the end.

Here’s a summary of the book from Amazon:

In the early days of the Civil War, rumors of gold in the frozen Klondike brought hordes of newcomers to the Pacific Northwest. Anxious to compete, Russian prospectors commissioned inventor Leviticus Blue to create a great machine that could mine through Alaska’s ice. Thus was Dr. Blue’s Incredible Bone-Shaking Drill Engine born.

But on its first test run the Boneshaker went terribly awry, destroying several blocks of downtown Seattle and unearthing a subterranean vein of blight gas that turned anyone who breathed it into the living dead.

Now it is sixteen years later, and a wall has been built to enclose the devastated and toxic city. Just beyond it lives Blue’s widow, Briar Wilkes. Life is hard with a ruined reputation and a teenaged boy to support, but she and Ezekiel are managing. Until Ezekiel undertakes a secret crusade to rewrite history.

His quest will take him under the wall and into a city teeming with ravenous undead, air pirates, criminal overlords, and heavily armed refugees. And only Briar can bring him out alive.

Do they go together? Hm. I’m going to say yes: the Brambleberry tea is sweet but with a hint of tartness, and Boneshaker is kinda the same. (I’m feeling pretty abstract today, so that’ll have to do.)

What are you drinking/reading this Thursday?

Challenge completed! The Final Frontier Reading Challenge

Posted by Anastasia on October 7, 2009 No Responses »

Oct 072009

I’ve finished my third reading challenge of this year: the Final Frontier Reading Challenge (Space Odity level) hosted by Becky of Becky’s Book Reviews. It took me the full amount of days granted (plus an extra one), but I had a lot of fun.

Probably the best thing to come from this challenge was that it forced me to read an Isaac Asimov book (actually four). I think I’ve found a new author to become obsessed with! I had no idea his books were so good– I’ve heard that they were, and I know how important a writer he was, and I’ve read some stories set in his world(s), but I’ve never actually read any of his books before. And I’m glad I did! I’ll have some reviews up on the books I read (Foundation series #1-4) soon-ish so you can see why.

Here’s the final list of the books I read for this challenge, with links to any reviews I’ve posted for them:
1. Interstellar Patrol – Christopher Anvil
2. Earthseed – Pamela Sargent
3. March Upcountry – David Weber & John Ringo
4. Foundation – Isaac Asimov
5. Foundation and Empire – Isaac Asimov
6. Second Foundation – Isaac Asimov
7. Foundation’s Edge – Isaac Asimov

I’m probably going to continue with the Foundation series for now, but are there any other Asimov books I should definitely read? (Maybe not on the I, Robot side of things.) I think I have his autobiography, as well.

Haiku Reviews: Million Dollar Baby, Whose Body?, A Total Waste of Makeup

Posted by Anastasia on October 7, 2009 No Responses »

Oct 072009

Did you like my last haiku review post? Eh? Well, I had a lot of fun with it, and I’ve decided to do it again! This time I’m doing a more loose version: instead of lines of 5-7-5 syllables, I’m doing short-long-short lines (see here).

This was actually a bit harder than I thought it’d be. Do these sound like proper haikus? Or do they just sound like crappy pseudo-poems? (Help?)

Million Dollar Baby by Amy Patricia Meade
Publication: MIDNIGHT INK (April 1, 2006), Paperback, 384 pages / ISBN 0738708607
Genre: Mystery
Rating:
Find @ Amazon or IndieBound
Read: July 2009
Source: Library

I really wanted to like this.
Mystery writer solves mystery in 1920′s? Awesome!
But this wasn’t.

Everything was forced.
Mystery, setting, people were boring.
Cover was the best part.

Whose Body? by Dorothy L. Sayers
Publication: HarperTorch (June 21, 1995), Paperback, 224 pages / ISBN 0061043575
Genre: Mystery/Detective
Rating:
Find @ Amazon or IndieBound
Read: July 2009
Source: Library

I like the short stories,
And I was expecting this to be the same.
It’s a little different.

Not as snappy
Nor as fun as the shorts; it dragged a little.
But the mystery was good.

I still love Lord Peter,
And I’ll definitely read the rest,
But this was a bit dull.

A Total Waste of Makeup by Kim Gruenenfelder
Publication: St. Martin’s Griffin (December 27, 2005), Paperback, 384 pages / ISBN 031234872X
Genre: Contemporary Fiction, Beach Read
Rating:
Find @ Amazon or IndieBound
Read: July 2009
Source: Library Book Sale