Announcements

First of all: Tenth Avenue North's new album The Light Meets the Darkness is out today. Check it out on their website or on iTunes (or Napster, or wherever it is you buy your music). It's awesome. Awesome awesome awesome. Seriously you guys. I adore that band.

Also: my final AP exam of this year is tomorrow morning. AP Lang. To all of you out there who are taking that AP exam or another one, good luck! And if you've already taken one/some, I wish you luck anyway, and I'll use my time turner to send it back in time for you?

AND(!), as if the new Tenth Ave. North CD wasn't awesome enough, Maggie Stiefvater, author of SHIVER, has posted a video trailer for the upcoming sequel, LINGER:



Very very cool, no? AND(!) she's running a contest on her website. You can win lots of cool things. You should go check it out. (The link's for her blog, not the specific post, because I copy-pasted the wrong thing and I'm too lazy to go back and change it, but the blog is awesome too.) I can say this, because I've read an ARC of LINGER: It is awesome. Maggie Stiefvater is awesome.

I think that's it in the way of announcements right now. New music! AP exams! AND a totally awesome book trailer and contest thingy! Gonna go watch LOST now. Love to you all,
Bex

It's Not Monday Yet

One of my bestest friends turns 17 today. Happy birthday, KD! I love you! ♥

And speaking of "happy," I'm almost done watching the second episode of ABC's new show, HAPPY TOWN. It's kind of weird, but I like it. Mystery and intrigue and murder and creepiness...very awesome. Check it out.

I should be doing work right now. I should be working on the illustrations for my children's book for creative writing, or maybe my precal homework, or I should be updating my thesis paper because I have a long way to go before the deadline two weeks from tomorrow and my mentor still hasn't emailed me back. Mostly I should be working on the children's book, because it's barely started and I have to turn in a finished, bound book on Tuesday.

(Incidentally, I think requiring the creation - not just the writing but the creation - of a children's book is kind of a stupid assignment. Some of us like our stories a bit too mature for five-year-olds. Some of us cannot draw worth beans. Some of us would rather be writing novels about spies than little kids' stories. Sure, I love reading children's books and I love playing with kids and I would never give anything inappropriate to a little kid, but I don't want to write a children's book. I want to write about Chelsey and Gavin and Matt.)

But anyway, my point was that I really need to be working, and I'm not. And I can work on all of that stuff after school tomorrow, but I have 3 different places to go after school tomorrow (one of which is Staples, where I will bind my children's book). Agh. Mondays. But today is not Monday. Not yet.

Never do today what you can put off until tomorrow....right? Today's for worrying about it. >.<

In case you hadn't noticed, that was me acknowledging that my habit of procrastinating and worrying is a BAD IDEA. Don't try it. Please. Trust me, it does not work out well.

Random side note before I go: If you have not ever read the webcomic xkcd, you should. Go go go.

Love,
Bex

Your Body Is Here, But Not Your Soul...

I'd like to apologize for my absence over the last couple of days. What with the stress of the AP U.S. History exam (which I think went reasonably well, if you're interested) and the Combined-Late-Birthday-Party-for-SH-and-Early-Birthday-Party-for-KD-and-No-More-APUSH Party of Awesome at KD's this weekend, blogging has been not so much at the forefront of my mind.

But hopefully I can make it up to you by sharing an awesome book. It's called THE DEVOURING, it's by Simon Holt, and I don't recommend reading it after dark if you scare easily.

Regina "Reggie" Halloway is a huge fan of horror stories. Stephen King to Edgar Allen Poe, she's read it all and she loves it all. So for Reggie and her best friend Aaron, the journal about the Vours is nothing unusual. They scare themselves with chilling stories of demonic beings who possess those who are most afraid on Sorry Night - the winter solstice - and then confront their own worst fears in a joking effort to tempt the Vours to them.

But the next day, Reggie's little brother Henry starts acting weird, pulling the hair off his favorite teddy bear, lying to their father, playing with fire and avoiding the snow. When Aaron looks into Henry's eyes and sees his darkest fears, Reggie and Aaron begin to suspect that the Vours may be all too real - and that one of them may be possessing Henry. The problem? The woman who wrote the journal didn't know how to get rid of them.

I'll admit it took me a little while to get into the story, but once I did, I did not want to put the book down. It was very very good, and I will definitely be looking for the sequel (SOULSTICE) at the library as soon as I get the chance. I would absolutely recommend THE DEVOURING - but if you tend to freak yourself out easily, be careful with it. I didn't think it was that bad on the "scary" scale, but then again, I don't scare easily, so I dunno. I really really enjoyed it and I think you should go read it. :) Find out more at the series website.

I do think it would make for an excellent horror film. Not a slasher movie, because those are stupid and this is totally NOT like that. But a genuine scary movie that you wouldn't want to watch alone after dark? Oh yes. Definitely. As SH described it, I made the Becky-Happy-Writer-Pose when I mentioned the idea, so I see a potential adaptation in the works. XD Seriously, guys, it was a GOOD BOOK. You should read it.

Love,
Bex

Shade

This morning I finished yet another excellent book. I've been blogging about books much more often since I stopped having a book-centric blog...perhaps I should try again with that, make this my "random bits of a teenage writer's life" and then have another blog that's just about books. Thoughts?

But back to the amazing book I was reading. I actually found it through the Simon & Schuster PulseIT website, a program that lets teens read books online for free in exchange for feedback about the books. They used to send out free books once a month, but then they switched to the e-books program to save money. Honestly, it made me kind of sad, because I really don't like e-books - I can't carry them to school or read them at the dinner table or curl up on the sofa with them, I have to sit in front of my computer with internet access. But my rant about e-books is for a different time.

Anyway, so I went on the website, saw a book that looked interesting, opened the e-book to read the inside jacket and see what it was about. I swear I never meant to get sucked into it and just keep reading...but I did.

The book about which I am speaking is SHADE by Jeri Smith-Ready. It's an absolutely fantastic book and you will not - repeat, will not - want to put it down. The premise is this: Almost seventeen years ago, on the night of Aura Salvatore's birth, a mysterious event called the Shift occurred. Everyone born after the Shift - "post-Shifters" can see ghosts. Ghosts can only interact with the living, and they contact post-Shifters so that they can accomplish whatever they need to do to be at peace. Most of the post-Shifters are more annoyed and/or frightened by their violet visions than interested in helping. Aura included. Until her boyfriend, Logan, dies.

While Aura is mourning Logan's death and attempting to carry on a relationship with ghost-Logan, exchange student Zachary Moore arrives and is assigned to be Aura's partner on her thesis project (another school that requires senior thesis projects! Yay for relating to the characters!), which is about megaliths. Aura wants to find out more about the Shift. Which means finding out more about Zachary as well. Throughout SHADE, Aura struggles to balance her relationships with the living and the dead, all while searching for clues to the event that has made her and all the other under-seventeens of the world able to see the dead.

I think what I really loved about this book were the characters. While the premise is blatantly fictional - people don't see ghosts, definitely not everyone under seventeen - the characters were hauntingly (haha, bad pun) real. Aura's grief, Logan's frustration, Zachary's frustration, Aura and Megan's friendship - all of it is wonderfully, painfully real. I also love that the readers aren't being hit over the head with the fact that "YES. THIS WORLD IS WEIRD. THERE ARE GHOSTS." The ghosts and the supernatural aspects of it figure in significantly to the major plot - there'd be no book without the Shift and the ghosts - but it's all just there. It's part of the world. There are no lengthy explanations of why this world is so different; it just is, and we understand that.

And then there's the fact that I am now desperate for a sequel, which considering this one just came out is not a good thing. I don't wanna have to wait!!! SHADE does wrap up a complete storyline in and of itself, but it also leaves a lot of unanswered questions about the Shift and Aura's past that could(/should) lead to a sequel. Plus I really don't want to give up Aura and Zach and Logan just yet. So - please, Jeri, can we have another one? :)

Definitely read SHADE if you get the chance. It's a wonderful, well-written book that I absolutely recommend. I will caution you that there is some strong language, but I think it only makes sense for the story and I don't think it distracts from the rest of the book at all. Readreadread, people. It's awesome. Find out more at author Jeri Smith-Ready's website (her blog is pretty cool too). 

Catch ya later, interwebs! Love,

Bex

Mini-Blog: Friends

I know I posted something somewhat similar to this a while ago, but I just want to say it again: I really think I have the best friends in the entire world ever. Not gonna name names (er, initials, because I don't do people's names on the internet) because I'd accidentally not list someone and that would be bad, but you guys know who you are.

I love you guys. I really do. I honestly don't know where I'd be without you. ♥ ♥ ♥

And to the rest of you out there who maybe read this blog, I apologize for my atypical sappiness. It's just that my friends are really really awesome....if you've got someone out there who's really really awesome for you, maybe you should let them know, too.

G'night, everybody. Much love,
Bex

BooksBooksBooks

I'm kind of torn. I know I promised to blog about THE RECKONING ages ago, and then I kind of forgot, so really I should talk about that one first. But I finished this other amazing book today (BEFORE I FALL) and I kind of really want to talk about that one too. I want to talk about both of them, but I suspect that would take up a lot of room and I'd hate to go on for so long that I get boring and fail to interest you in these awesome books.

So I propose the following solution: A COMPROMISE! I'll try to be brief, if you'll keep reading and trust me that these books are worth it. Kay? Kay.

First up, THE RECKONING by Kelley Armstrong. I should start off by telling you that it's the third book in a trilogy, so please please please don't just go out and pick up this book from the shelves of your library or Barnes & Noble unless you've already read THE SUMMONING and THE AWAKENING.

The premise of the series is that Chloe Saunders sees dead people. She gets put into a group home for troubled children. But Lyle House turns out to be a home for supernaturals - kids with magical powers. Supernatural powers are hereditary in this world that Armstrong has created, but Chloe, Simon, Derek, Liz, Tori, and Rae (among others) are special. And the Edison Group made them that way through genetic experimentation. The kids' superpowers scare them - and so they want them gone.

I'm really not sure how much more I can say without providing way more spoilers than I am remotely willing to give, but you'll just have to trust me that the fast-moving storyline and incredibly well-developed characters make these novels compelling and interesting and lots of fun to read. I absolutely recommend them. But please read them in order. Also definitely check out Kelley Armstrong's website and the Darkest Powers trilogy website.

Now I'm worried that I didn't do a good enough job pitching them. They're awesome, guys. Readreadread.

And now I get to talk about BEFORE I FALL by Lauren Oliver. Oh my gosh, you guys. It was amazing.

So, I have to confess, for the first quarter, maybe the first third of the book, I didn't like it at all. I was reading it because my dad (who read it for a YA lit class that he teaches) asked me what I thought of it (IknowIknow - reading chick lit because my dad told me to? Weird, right?), and what I thought of it was "typical trash novel. Sex, alcohol, pot, the popular crowd. Yuck."

I was wrong. Yes, at the beginning of the novel, Samantha ("Sam") Kingston and her friends, Lindsay, Ally, and Elody, are - there's no other word for it - bitchy. They're mean to everyone, they're bullies just because they can be, they can get away with anything and do whatever they want. They talk about sex a lot, and they drink a lot just because they can, and they smoke and cut class and all that other stuff that gives teenagers a bad reputation.

But then Sam dies. And after her nightmarish last day, she wakes up again the same morning. She relives her last day seven times over. During this miraculous final week, she changes. Sam starts to understand things about the world around her, and about herself. The question is, will one day be enough to change everything?

By the end of the novel, I didn't hate Sam or her friends. I will confess that there were a couple of parts near the end that almost made me cry. I sat down and read the entire second half of the novel this afternoon, even though I had(/still have) a DBQ to do for APUSH. It was fantastic. Lauren Oliver has some kind of magic with storytelling, to be able to create a character so real and to change the reader's attitude toward her so completely. It is absolutely worth suffering through the first couple of long chapters (although the prologue may be compelling enough on its own; very well set up) to get to the rest of the story. READ IT. Please.

You can find out more about the author and the book on Lauren Oliver's website. You guys, I cannot get this story out of my head. Read it. It's fantastic.

Love,
Bex

College Searching: Sewanee

I have now returned from Sewanee, Tennessee. As I mentioned, I was there to visit The University of the South, aka Sewanee. I can tell you right now that the campus is gorgeous. So much nature! As much time as I spend in front of my laptop or on my couch with various books, I love nature. And the architecture is lovely. Here are a few pictures, to prove my point:

The All Saints Chapel

McClurg Dining Hall

Another view of the chapel

Another building. And grass. And trees.

The stone architecture and the arches and towers and everything is very castle-like. And the trees and grass and everything, and you could see stars at night...it was beautiful. Which is definitely a strong selling point. Plus it looks like Hogwarts and if you have a high enough GPA you get to wear a black Harry-Potter-like robe ("gown") to class. Which for a Potternerd like me is pretty awesome.

Other pluses included:

-the dorms/rooming situation. The dorms were nice, and after your freshman year you get to pick your roommate, and the students said that freshman roommates are usually matched up really well.

-the size. It's a pretty small school, and I like that. Everyone knows everyone, and you get to know/work with your teachers pretty closely, and it seemed like a really close-knit community.

-the theater program. Oh my gosh. I have fallen in love with the theater program. Acting + playwriting and screenwriting + directing + set design + costume design + lighting + learning how to dance (including ballet, which I've always wanted to do) + it's mostly applied to film and TV, which is definitely an area I'm interested in.

-the sciences. The impression I got was that I could fill the general distribution science requirements with astronomy and a lab course involving exploring plant life in the forest. Stars + nature + significant lack of chemistry = YAY.

-they'll teach you how to ride a horse.

-the fact that they have PE credits that I would take even if it weren't required. Sewanee requires two PE credits (one freshman year, one sophomore year), which would normally not be a good thing since I'm ridiculously uninterested in sports, but you can earn PE credits through courses like fencing, beginning riding, beginning ballet/tap/jazz, and principles of aviation. Umm, yes please.

-everything in the curriculum seems very writing-intensive. This is a good thing for someone who writes as much as I do.

But there were some things I was not so impressed with, as well:

-Granted, I did not eat much of the dining hall food, but I wasn't particularly impressed with what I did eat. The desserts were great, though, and there were lots of options that I didn't try which I'm sure would have been good.

-The English program was a bit of a letdown. I mean, it's kind of their big thing and it's all very writing-intensive, but creative writing courses don't count toward the major and it's a lot more focused on specific types of literature than I necessarily want. All of the English courses are literature-based. Don't get me wrong, I love literature and reading and all that, but there don't seem to be any courses that are specifically about writing. Except creative writing. Which, like I said, doesn't count toward the major.

-AP credits count as electives. You can't get out of any general distribution classes with AP classes. Which kind of sucks, because I was hoping that taking AP Calc next year would get me out of college math.

-It's kind of out in the middle of nowhere. I don't think I'm exactly a big-city kind of girl (traffic eeek), but I like to be around civilization. I love nature, but I want to be somewhere that I can do other things as well. It's heavy on the nature and significantly lacking in manmade entertainment. Which means not as much TV (probably good), but no bowling or swimming pools or anything like that (bleh).

And then some things I'm not really sure about. It was impossible to tell what the atmosphere is really like. Everyone was being really nice and friendly and all, but that's probably because for this weekend, that was their job. And academically...I'm really not sure if this is what I'm looking for.

I think it'll be easier to tell once I have something else to compare it to. I didn't fall instantly and immediately in love, but it did seem like a very nice school (and I adore the theater program, I think) and I have by no means crossed it off my list yet.

Unfortunately, I still have school tomorrow, so I need to go work on my homework. Until tomorrow, interwebs!

Love,

Bex