The Heir: What did I like about it?

I'm sure we can all relate to a time when we were young children, dancing and twirling around in tutus with shimmering tiaras on our head (which were of course 100%  plastic but in our imaginations they were encrusted with jewels and magic) and a world of fantasy awaited our days. But honestly, don't we all wish we went back to those days, where all of our dreams await? But I'm happy to report, we can all tour those wonderful dreams in one of my new favorite books called The Heir.

 Confession time: I am a speed reader with anything so I could usually just be like a sponge and absorb up the book in one day, and I'm not really that ashamed to say that this is exactly what happened with this book. Yes, I am THAT person. But I couldn't help it, its a real problem. And what is the root of this problem? Books like The Heir by Kiera Cass. If there was one word in the dictionary that I could use to describe what I liked about this book it would be simply everything. Okay that might be exaggerating it quite a bit but seriously, I loved this book.

(I mean just LOOK at that dress!)



 

 

 

 

 



What is there not to like about this cover. Its completely eye catching and just tell me of a girl who wouldn't give to have that dress or that hair (or to be a the heir). This is actually the 4th book in the series, and was for the most part an unexpected addition. The three books before this follow the love story of Prince Maxton and America during their Selection process, and this book follows their Daughter Eadlyn. But here's the twist. She is going to be the next queen and when she turns 18, she is expected to have her own Selection. My thoughts after realizing that: Ahhhhhhhh. I mean that idea is just completely perfect because now the readers can get a view of the Selection from an entirely new set of eyes as she is now the one choosing her husband. If that wasn't perfect enough, you can still follow the love story of her parents but also her own (unwilling) love story unfold as well. The characters were also very easy to get wrapped up in because they are so relatable and you just want all of them to have a Happily Ever After in the end. I'm a sucker for romance books and I've also been a sucker for princess themed books since I was little so this was just the perfect book for me.

 

If there was to be one thing that I strongly disliked about this book it would have to be the ending. Why? Because she left it on such I big cliffhanger that I couldn't even deal with my emotions when I flipped that last page and discovered there was nothing on the other side. I mean yeah sure I guess I could wait another year for the next book to come out but COME ON. Ugh. I cant.

 

But I cant hold that against her. When it has to be done, it has to be done. Besides that I would have to say it was one of my favorite books that I've read in a while, and I completely recommend it. I'm plenty sure I could list other reasons why I enjoyed this book so much but if I did that then knowing me I would give away everything that happens in the plot, and we don't want that right? But first start at the beginning of the series with The Selection. Trust me, you wont regret it.

 

In case you missed it here's my blog post on the first book of the series:http://emilytreadingblog.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-selection-there-is-just-something.html

 

Bye!

An Abundance of Katherines

According to the Merriam- Webster dictionary the definition of an abundance is...

Abundance: a large quantity of something

This is found in the title of the book and basically describes most of the plot in one word. Confused? Just wait. To start off this book review I shall give a short summary (or in my own words a very very long one).

 The main character in this book is named Colin, and he is a child prodigy/genius/socially awkward human being. In a weird kind of turn of events he has only dated girls with the name of Katherine, 19 girls in total. This starts off the plot of the book because most of these relationships lasted any where from 10 minutes-3 months until Katherine number 19. Colin thought that she was the one until she broke up with him, leaving him a total mess. It was then when his only friend Hassan (an interesting/total opposite version of Colin) convinced him to go on a road trip to clear his mind. The two then find themselves in a town called Gutshot, Tennessee where they find their lives will never be the same again. I'm sorry was that vague? Sorry, not sorry. You'll just have to read the book and find out the rest and what exactly happens in that small town. But to give you more information it involves the Archduke Franz Fernindad, a girl named Lindsey, a couple pigs, and multiple flashbacks with Katherine's 1-19. I hope that confused you enough that you will pick up the book and read it!

One of the reasons I really enjoyed this book was because it was written by the one and the only John Green (I have a mild obsession with his writing). I've wanted to read this book for a while now but I haven't gotten to it until this spring break when I needed a good book to read on vacation. And oh boy am I glad that I decided to read this one! This book is like a mixture of The Fault in Our Stars and Paper towns, which are two of my favorite books. There was SO much humor in this book I found myself laughing at every turn of the page. Even just the thought of the plot line gets me laughing because who comes up with the idea that someone has dated 19 Katherine's?? The characters were also very relatable but also out there at the same time and that is something that is very hard to find. This is a very easy book to get into because it flowed really well and had words that could easily be read but at the same time had advanced words within it.

I would have to give this book 5 stars. One star because it was so good that I read it in a day (whoops!) and because of the title. Another would have to be because of the characters, as you could relate to most of them and started a connection with them while you were reading. These characters were some of the funniest characters that I've read in a while too which leads to star number 3: humor. This book strays a bit away from my normal mystery genre but I enjoyed it just as much if not more. It had just the right mix of realistic fiction, adventure, and romance. The 4th star would go to the idea of the story, Just the idea of Colin having dated only girls with the name of Katherine blows my mind, especially since the coincidence of there being 19 girls with the same name in one town. Weird. But the last star would have to go to the book overall. It was just so enjoyable and brought me into the plotline that I can tell this will become a new hit one day and maybe end up on the big screen. Until then don't wait until the last minute like you do with everything else in life, read this book!

 

Who IS John Green?

I'm sure that if I throw out the name John Green you immediately think of the scrawny writer with glasses that has created iconic stories. And I admit that I thought that too, because I never thought to go deeper into the pages of the book to see who exactly wrote this and what their meaning was for each and every word choice. In my definition of that, it included a quick Google search of "John Green" and pages beyond pages of information came flying out towards me. By that point I almost decided to chance prompts because that much reading and investigating didn't seem that appealing towards me but I pulled through for this blog post! This is what I found out...

John Green is wildly known for being an award winning author for book such as The Fault in Our Stars or Paper Towns. But before that he was born in in Indianapolis, Indiana and moved constantly from Michigan to Alabama and then Florida. In college Green had a double major in English and in Religion Studies. After college he intended to become a priest, but his career direction quickly changed after working in a hospital with ill children (where he later got the inspiration to write the Fault in our Stars). For a couple of years he then went on to write for newspaper columns and also as an editor.

The first book that Green published was Looking for Alaska, which was awarded and even thought of becoming a movie but John turned it down because of the deep connection that he wrote that book to his childhood. His second book that was published was An Abundance of Katherine's (which by the way is on my reading list!). His next book that he wrote is definitely one of my FAVORITE books of all time and is also being made into a movie very soon which is Paper Towns. Greens most famous book by far is The Fault in Our Stars which has sold over a million copies and was made into a movie, and its easy to see why. His writing just brings out emotions in people as the topic and characters touch the audiences heart (which maybe ill talk about in a future blog post *hint* *hint*). Personally I was first in line for one of the premiers and brought a tissue box that came in handy.

Some of you may or may not know what John Green is up to besides writing, but ill let you know that he is famous for more than bringing Ansel Elgort onto the big screen (thank you John for blessing us with his beautiful face). John Green and his Brother Hank are famous for a YouTube channel called VlogBrothers. Their channel reaches over 2.5 million subscribers and was originally created over a bet. Yep, that's right Hank and John had a bet that they would go one year without using text-based communication . Their way of communication with each other was though daily video blogs, or "vlogs" as they called them. They posted this on YouTube and quickly had a vast amount of followers viewing their daily vlogs. The two brothers are also the creators of VidCon, where all the You Tubers come together in a very big meet & greet. Besides VlogBrothers John is also very active on YouTube with his series called crash course history where he gives a lesson visually appealing to audiences in fun ways. One of these ill put a link to below, which is actually very interesting and helpful!

After all of my digging up into who John Green really is I've
found that this author is much more than the words that I have read on the pages.




Crash Course History WWII: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q78COTwT7nE

His Website: http://johngreenbooks.com/

 

 

Timeline:

Theme: Censorship causes diminished individual thought.

 

 

The Hearth and the Salamander:

1. Montag meets Clarisse McClellan, a seventeen year of girl who challenges the way things are in society.
2. Montag and his fellow firemen go to a woman's house who is suspected of hiding books, in order to burn them. While they are there Montag discovers hundreds of books that the woman had kept hidden, and steals one of them for himself. The woman chooses to die in the fire with her books, which confuses Montag.
3. Montag begins to question the book burning that is going on in his society and becomes more interested in reading and knowledge, contrary to Beatty’s and Mildred’s wishes.

• “And for the first time I realized that man was behind each one of the books. A man had to think them up. A man had to take a long time to put them down on paper. And I’d never even thought that thought before,” (Bradbury 49). -Montag to Mildred

The Sieve and the Sand:

1. Montag becomes obsessed with the idea of books and plans to meet a man named Faber, a person he had previously met at a park.
2. When Montag talks to Faber, and learns the history of books and the real truth behind government censorship. Faber and Montag formulate a plan in which they plant books in houses of firemen to spark suspect in them.

• “I’m not thinking. I’m just doing like I’m told, like always...I don’t want to change sides and just be told what to do” (Bradbury 88). -Montag to Faber

3. Mildred hosts a party with her friends and her parlor “family”. Montag becomes upset when he sees this and brings out a book to read to them, despite the original plan they had.
4. Montag goes back to work where Beatty confronts him about what he has been doing. Montag acts like nothing is wrong and they leave when they are called to burn a house.  

Burning Bright:

1. Montag is forced to burn his own house.
2. Montag kills Beatty, then runs away. While on the run, he almost gets run over by a group of thrill-seeking teens driving a beetle.
3. After walking farther, Montag comes across a group of people who, just like him, have explored the ideas inside books.

• “We read the books and burnt them, afraid they’d be found” (Bradbury 142). -Granger to Montag

4. The city is completely destroyed by bombs. Montag and Granger lead the development of a new society that is built upon meaningful ideas and books rather than emptiness.

This theme is important to our understanding of the story because…

We see the influence that books had on Montag and the decisions he would make throughout the novel.

This theme connects to our modern-day society because…

Books have shaped prominent ideas in our world today, and have allowed people to develop individuality and meaningful thoughts.

Live Original

To be honest I don't think I would've ever picked up this book if I saw it laying down on a bookshelf in Barnes & Nobles. I don't think I would've given it the light of day because I was judging the book by its cover (pun intended). I can literally see you guys giving me a strange look like," Um, Emily why are you talking about this book that you would've never read..."  Trust me! Hang on I'll get to that just another backstory.

It was a normal Wednesday night, or so I thought. Okay maybe not as dramatic as that at all but it was a Wednesday night and I was watching as my phone continued to blow up from a Group Me chat (you guys know what it's like) except this one was different. Not only were there 80+ people on that group chat, but they were all obsessing over this one girl and the book that she wrote. "Okay this is enough" I thought and went over to my  phone and opened the dozens of messages that awaited me. Message after message these girls from my bible study kept on raving on what a good book this was while at the same time obsessing at how they wanted to meet her so bad (which I can relate to thank you very much). Who is this girl? Her name is Sadie Robertson and some may know her for starring in a TV show called Duck Dynasty or Dancing with the Stars. I trusted the judgment of the girls in the GM and decided to go and get the book on my Kindle. And oh boy am I so glad I did. 

Can I go ahead and say she is one of my new role models? Yes, the answer is yes. Sadie wrote this book when she was 16, and even after being famous and in the public eye, she has remained completely normal and grounded to her beliefs. This is a non fiction book, which I NEVER read and I actually loved it. She has the ability to just teach lessons page after page. Some of these I've never even thought of and it's made me so much more aware and thoughtful of a person after reading this book.

" You cannot control what other people say or do or how they act. You can only control how you act in response to them"(Page 59).

This is a part of the book that I highlighted while reading because I just felt like it was a strong message. I mean growing up I've always heard the "golden rule", but I've never really thought about applying it into my life. This is just a great message for high school kids because we tend to get absorbed into those kind of things. This is just one of the many lessons that she talks about in the book which is just so perfect to hear about because trust me, it is not boring! I never found it as work when I've read this and I enjoyed myself for every word.

Just so you know so it doesn't come as a shocker she does bring religion a lot into this book, which I actually loved because I tend to forget a lot about that during the school day or during class and I'll just start reading and it makes me feel so much better. Just the fact that Sadie added little Bible verses in the chapters made me so happy as I highlighted every time I saw one. This is definitely a book that can change someone's views on life, and I recommend it. You might be a little apprehensive at first, but trust me you won't be able to put it down.

Blog Post is a Mystery???

I sincerely cannot help myself when ever I start a new book- I have to finish it. Especially when its a really REALLY good book. I, like many, am guilty of finishing a book the day that I start it. Its bad; I mean I've read a 300 page book in a day just because I became so obsessed with it. I hate to say this but that is exactly what happened this Winter break when I drove to Cleveland. What is this book you might ask? Its called The Confessions of the Paris Mysteries, and I'm obsessed with it. I know I can practically hear you guys saying," Wow Emily, another mystery book. What a plot twist." But the thing is I seriously love love love mysteries so I tend to lean towards those when I walk in the book store. Okay, Enough of my rambling on with the post.

This book is about, you guessed it, a Paris mystery. The story focuses on a 16 year old girl named Tandy. Her and her siblings had just gotten temporarily moved to Paris after her parents had been murdered. Her parents being murdered weren't the only crime that Tandy has had to solve; she just had to prove that her brother didn't murder his girlfriend, and also has solved a serial killer killing off private school girls. In this particular book, it also includes a bit of romance as the reader gets more insight of what exactly happened to her lost love James. Intrigued yet? That's all I'm going to give you on the plot line, I don't want to spoil it for you. But if you want to know more about her other stories that lead to this, you can read the other books before this, which I completely recommend because I had no idea about those books before I started to read it.

If you enjoy mystery, suspense, and multiple different mysteries in one book, then let me tell you this book is for you. 

Personally after reading this book I felt like there were giant empty holes while reading the plot line and I had no idea why. It wasn't that the author was being careless and not paying attention to the plot line, it was that I picked up the book that was right in the middle of the series! I plan on reading the other books in the series next because they will definitely fill in the plot line and clear my confusion on what happened in their past. 

An important update I must add is that I've read the book before the Paris Mysteries, and I DEFINETLY recommend that as well. But please don't read it in the same order as I have because I still have not read them in order and I still haven't read the first one that started it all. Whoever is reading this drop everything that you are going and go read this book, I can't stress enough on how good this was.


FOR MORE INFO: http://www.jamespatterson.com/books_confessionsThree.php#.VPe5XtE5Dug

The Selection

There is just something about the perfect fairytale that every young girl often dreams about. Why do you think that almost every girl has dressed up in some sort of Disney princess costume at least once? Well it could be the big dress that seems to just trail behind you after each step, the sparkling tiara sitting upon your perfectly curled hair, or your Cinderella glass slippers chiming as you walk down the hallway. Don't even try to deny it, I know you've envisioned this before. Well, the cover of the Selection exactly portrays this vision.

                                                 ( can I PLEASE have this dress?!?!?!?!)


The Selection revolves around a 16 year old girl named America Singer who comes from one of the lowest castes in her country. She gets a prestigious opportunity to join 35 girls to try to become the next queen, as the prince just came of age for the throne.
 

"35 girls. 1 crown. The competition of a lifetime."

I can practically see some of you scratching your heads saying," That sounds familiar...?". Oh yes you are correct. Does the show The Bachelor ring a bell? This piece of text comes from the real world, which I personally LOVE The Bachelor so it is to say the least the best book ever. What are the connections between the two? Well for one thing there are about 30 girls competing for one mans heart. This man is the Bachelor, who is the one choosing who to keep and who to go. Another similarity is the fact that they are both a " reality show". In both all of the girls are being filmed and the whole country gets to follow their journey. One major difference is that in The Bachelor, the man isn't royalty while in The Selection, he is a prince. Needless to say I prefer the books because what girl doesn't LOVE a fairytale??

I mean you can practically relate this back to any childhood fairytale that has a girl falling in love for a prince; Cinderella, The little mermaid, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty. I think this is what makes the book so appealing to many girls. It allows us to explore more of these stories in a Young Adult genre while still appealing to the same ideas. I hope you guys can give this book a shot because it is really a great read (maybe even give it a rose??). I haven't finished this book yet, but ill keep updating about my thought about this book, and the rest in the trilogy. Now, this post lives Happily Ever After. The End.