So, as I start my new year back in the States, I say to you:

May life grant you more happiness than hardships, may the sun always shine on your path, may you have good health and none of the bad, and may God grant you more love than you know what to do with.

Bonne Année

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I’ve written about Anberlin before, but this post is mainly about Switchfoot. They are by no means a new band, in fact, they’ve been around for years. I knew about two of their songs, but I was blown away by their performance. They truly know how to entertain a crowd and they sound absolutely stunning!

Their current album, Vice Verses is a well crafted work of art! I’m not big on buying whole albums, mostly because I never like enough songs to justify paying for the entire thing – but I preview the album and I found myself clicking buy song after song until it made more sense to pay for the entire album than each individual song.

Some of my favorite songs are:

1. The War Inside (track 3)
2. Restless (track 4)
3. Dark Horses (track 8 )
4. Vice Verses (track 11)
5. Where I Belong (track 12)
6. Needle and Haystack Life (track 13)
7. Always (track 20)
8. Red Eyes (track 24)

You can now understand why I had to buy the album, I could keep adding songs to this list, but then I might as well just include the complete track list. Go to iTunes or amazon and have a preview of the songs. You won’t be disappointed. Promise!

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My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Vivian Gandillon relishes the change, the sweet, fierce ache that carries her from girl to wolf. At sixteen, she is beautiful and strong, and all the young wolves are on her tail. But Vivian still grieves for her dead father; her pack remains leaderless and in disarray, and she feels lost in the suburbs of Maryland. She longs for a normal life. But what is normal for a werewolf?

Then Vivian falls in love with a human, a meat-boy. Aiden is kind and gentle, a welcome relief from the squabbling pack. He’s fascinated by magic, and Vivian longs to reveal herself to him. Surely he would understand her and delight in the wonder of her dual nature, not fear her as an ordinary human would.

Vivian’s divided loyalties are strained further when a brutal murder threatens to expose the pack. Moving between two worlds, she does not seem to belong in either. What is she really—human or beast? Which tastes sweeter—blood or chocolate?

I’d like to give you my heart, but since that might be inconvenient, I’ve brought you someone else’s.

I want to first say, the book is a million times better than that crappy movie “adaptation” that they did a couple of years ago. I was so excited that this book was finally getting some screen time. Now I wish they’d just left it alone.

Anyway, this review is about the book, not the movie, so onward…

Vivian is the epitome of self-confidence and the damage a boy can do to your self-esteem. She is a little larger than life in the beginning of the book. She is in mourning, yes. But everything knows she’s beautiful, including her. The puppies are fawning over her and she loves it. But, as Fate always does, she falls for the one person she can’t possible have – a human boy.

I liked Vivian, I thought she was confident, brave, smart, and knew what she wanted. Which is why I didn’t understand her fascination with this human boy who was nothing like her. I also really loved Gabriel. He was assertive without being ridiculously mean. He was amusing and sweetly gentle to Vivian. At the end, he helps her figure out what it truly means to be herself and to be a decent person (although, she already was a decent person. She just had a hard time judging people…I mean she was just completely off in reading people).

And so I leave you with this little quote that pretty sums up the entire novel:

He was raw and sharp and rich and throbbing with life. He was sweet blood after a long hunt. How could she have mistaken Aiden’s kisses for this? They had been delicious and smooth like the brief comfort of chocolate, but they had never been enough.

Safe reading!

View all my reviews

Swim

Si ou pa ka naje, pa jwe nan dlo. (Translation: If you can’t swim, don’t play in water.)

Santana (Naya Rivera) and Mercedes (Amber Riley) sang this mash-up with the Troubletones, and they KILLED it. I mean after making it their (well, you know…), they murdered it, skinned it, and ate it for dinner. Yes, people – it was that good!

I’m going to stop talking now and just let you play the video.

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My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars

Seven half-bloods shall answer the call,
To storm or fire the world must fall.
An oath to keep with a final breath,
And foes bear arms to the Doors of Death.

Percy is confused. When he awoke from his long sleep, he didn’t know much more than his name. His brain fuzz is lingering, even after the wolf Lupa tol him he is a demigod and trained him to fight with the pen/sword in his pocket. Somehow Percy manages to make it to a camp for half-bloods, despite the fact that he has to keep killing monsters along the way. But the camp doesn’t ring and bells with him. The only thing he can recall from his past is another name: Annabeth

Hazel is supposed to be dead. When she lived before, she didn’t do a very good job of it. Sure, she was an obedient daughter, even when her mother was possessed by greed. But that was the problem – when the Voice took over he mother and commanded Hazel to use her “gift” for and evil purpose, Hazel couldn’t say no. Now because of her mistake, the future of the world is at risk. Hazel wished she could ride away from it all on the stallion that appears in her dreams.

Frank is a klutz. His grandmother says he is descended from heroes and can be anything he wants to be, but he doesn’t see it. He doesn’t even know who his father is. He keeps hoping Apollo will claim him, because the only thing he is good at is archery – although not good enough to win camp war games. His bulky physique makes him feel like an ox, especially infront of Hazel, his closest friend at camp. He trusts her completely -  enough to share the secret he holds close to his heart.

Beginning at the “other” camp for half-bloods and extending as far as the land beyond the gods, this breathtaking second installment of the Heroes od Olympus series introduces new demigods, revives fearsome monsters, and features other remarkable creatures, all destined to play a part in the Prophesy of Seven. (via Goodreads.com)

This is really a 4.5 star book. Explanation is a spoiler, so don’t read it if you don’t want to know! I’ve marked where the spoiler begins.

This was an excellent read. In fact, I focused solely on this book and managed to read it in two days (which was a huge deal as I’ve taken extra long to read these days! hmph…). This book is not about Percy Jackson. I mean, he’s in it, and we get to read his chapters, but it is not about him. Instead, Riordan tells the story of the last two members of the Seven, Frank and Hazel.

I have to say, Frank’s story line felt like the strongest to me in this book. His background was fleshed out more and his story continues beyond this installment of the series. His parts of the book hold the most action as well. And we see a lot of the conclusions in those sections.

Hazel started out great, but the resolution of her past is explained in the first couple of chapters that she narrates. The rest of the story is about her being worried of telling Frank and Percy. I do find it fascinating about that tidbit about Sammy, but I can pretty much guess what that’s about without waiting for the third book.

Tyson and Mrs. O’Leary make an appearance and so does Nico.

The book ends in a frustrating cliff hanger, but it also signals the beginning of the epic quest that will apparently span for the next three books. (If I am not mistaken about this being a 5 book series.)

Spoiler ahead:

Now, the reason why this book did not get a 5 star rating is because I felt the writing could have been better. Towards the end, especially, it felt as if Riordan got tired and just started telling me what was happening instead of showing it to me. And I thought you needed a god’s help to kill the giants, but Frank and Hazel killed Alcyoneus without any help. Other than that, the jokes weren’t that funny and Percy’s voice seemed different somehow (although I’m willing to let that one slide on account that its been so long since I’ve read PJ&O).

View all my reviews

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Snow White and the Huntsman Trailer | boxofficeBUZ.com.

Lips red as blood

Hair black as night

Bring me your heart,

My dear, dear Snow White.

So because I feel that it is my duty to my readers to bring fresh content to my blog, *cough cough* I am going out of my way to see and review this movie for you all.

There are so many reasons why I want to see this:

1. Charlize Theron is in it and she so makes up for Kristen Stewart.
2. The huntsman is Chris Hemsworth aka Thor. And I can vouch for his hotness…I mean, I’m not the only who’s seen Thor, right?
3. I love dark, gritty fantasy movies. Some of my recent favorites include KickAss and Suckerpunch.
4. I definitely appreciate Disney movie remakes, whether in film or book format.
5. I’m semi-obsessed with Snow White right now since “Once Upon a Time” is on ABC on Sundays at 8pm (had to plug that in…post to come about that little gem!).
6. And finally, in the previews, Kristen Stewart doesn’t speak. I’m taking that as a sign that the producers are aware of her weaknesses and are planning accordingly.

Summer is a long time to wait for a movie, but this looks like it will be worth it. We shall see, people…we shall see.

Click on the picture or link above for the trailer!

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Bones Episode Review: “The Hot Dog in the Competition”.

So, I wanted to write a post of the TV show, Bones. I’ve been dragging my feet about, but a blog that I follow, http://whenitsgood.com/, writes episode reviews for shows that they are watching. I thought this was an excellent review, and in lieu of my post, I wanted to share this one with you!

I’m going to try to share a new blog post every Monday. I find that the things that fascinate me are usually already written about…by someone else. Why should I be the only one who gets to read about them?

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So there you have ladies and gents. The entire thought process…yes, yes, I am rolling my eyes too.

Oh, here’s the link: https://www.facebook.com/sayTaina

Safe reading!

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My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Dragon’s Milk is the first book in The Dragon Chronicles. Kaeldra’s search for dragon’s milk to save her sister leads her to an endangered dragon kyn.

So, I got this book from a Scholastic book fair at my job last year. Not because I had nothing to read, but because I can’t say no to book sales.

Do not let the description of the book fool you. This book is not about Dragon’s milk. There is a setup plot about dragon’s milk, but the real story is about way more than that.

So, the protagonist of the story, Kaeldra, is an outsider living with people who are not really her family but have taken her in. She wakes up one night, feeling as if something were wrong. She had her clothes on and was getting ready to scoot before the noise and the destruction woke everyone else up.

That’s how we, the reader, get introduced to the back story. Obviously, there’s something not quite right about Kaeldra. She doesn’t look like anyone else in town. She’s taller and has the greenest eyes imaginable.

Her adoptive sister gets really ill one day and Grandmyr tells her the only thing that will save the life of the little girl is dragon’s milk. So Kaeldra goes off to find dragons.

After only a few days of travel, she finds the cave where the dragon’s are and makes a deal with the mama dragon to come back and watch the babies.

A few months into this arrangement, the mama dies and Kaeldra is left with the task of finding a way to bring the dragons safely to their kyn.

This is where the meat of the story is. We follow Kaeldra around as she goes farther and farther away from the only home she knows and learns about what kind of person she truly is. She also learns about her mother and the story behind her family and her green eyes.

As the story progresses, we meet people who seem to be friends who turn out not to be and enemies who end up being friends. And the ending has a surprise that is just heart breaking.

The pace of the story is a little slow with little action throughout and very quick resolutions. Although, Fletcher does and excellent job with the way she shows Kaeldra’s growth into a brave, strong woman.

Safe Reading!

View all my reviews