Reading wise, I just finished two books. One is Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver which is going to get it's own post which will probably be lengthy because it was such an amazing book that I think EVERYONE should read. The other was amazing too, I'm just too lazy to type up a lengthy review right now :p It's The Last Exit to Normal by Michael B. Harmon. SO good!! It was up for the Nerds Heart YA tournament last year and made it pretty far. It's about a 17 year old boy named Ben who moves to a country town called Rough Butte after his father admits to being gay and starts a relationship with another man and divorces his wife. Living in the city, Ben turns to drugs, fails out of school and falls in with the wrong crowd so his father makes the decision to move their family to the country to live with Edward (his partner's) mother.
Needless to say, Rough Butte is a bit of a culture shock to Ben who tends to wear his hair in spikes, skateboards and knows nothing about farm life, but he soon relates to an 11 year old boy who lives next door who is being abused by his father and no longer is in touch with his mother. And there's also the fact that he's fallen in love with Kimberly Johan, a local farm girl. I can certainly see why this book made it so far in the tournament and I would've loved to see it right up there with Charlie and My Most Excellent Year in the finals. I didn't want it to end. Ben was such an excellent character....His dad was a realistic character...the story was REAL! No one was "right". The book wasn't preachy in the least bit. The book didn't try to justify anyone's behavior and I think that's what I loved more than anything. It portrayed everyone as just being human and being able to make mistakes and showed that that in itself doesn't make you a good or bad person. It's what you do and who you ultimately are that determines that. Great book and I'd recommend it to teens and adults alike!
And because I haven't done a Friday Fill Ins in a LONG time, I figured I'd go ahead and do it this week :p
1. Sandwiches and beer – the best food to take on a picnic. Oh, and you have to have nuts to feed the squirrels and bread for the ducks!!
2. Summer is the worst effing season of them all! It is evil!
3. I could live in flip flops. Seriously, if I could get away with wearing them at work, I would.
4. To love someone is a wonderful thing and I do it as often as I can.
5. When I go to visit Debi in August I so want to find a nature trail and go on a long hike.
6. When I crave food, it’s usually chocolate. Or sometimes something really bizarre and I have to have it that second and I will go to the ends of the earth to get it :/
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to taking it easy after work, tomorrow my plans include relaxing, running some errands and doing whatever the hell I want to do! and Sunday, I want to play in the garden, read some books, drink some coffee, and just have a damn good day!
Hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!!
Friday, May 28, 2010
Friday Rambles, Fill-Ins and a Short Review
How's everyone doing this Friday? I'm recovering from a three day migraine and sympathizing with all of my other migraine buddies. Sounds like lots of people are getting them as the seasons start to change over once again. Now we're going into my most dreaded time of the year...the heat months. Some people just love summer...I can't STAND it. It always just sucks the life and the energy out of me and it's doing it early this year. We've already had heat indexes in the hundreds and I just can't stand it. I'll take the winter any day over the summer. I went and played in my garden for about 5 minutes yesterday and was dripping sweat :( I just pray for rainy days! I love rain in the summer...it's my only relief.
Aside from the heat drain, things seem to be going well over here. Anyone else jealous of all of the BEA folk? ;p I'm enjoying hearing all of the sideline reports over twitter of what's going on. It sounds like a lot of fun and it sounds like there's a lot of promising books coming out! Can't wait for all of the reviews of all of the ARCs to start rolling in!! I always love the roundup posts of the book conventions that follow...so we should have those coming up soon. I'm voting for vlogs from everyone ;)
Reading wise, I just finished two books. One is Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver which is going to get it's own post which will probably be lengthy because it was such an amazing book that I think EVERYONE should read. The other was amazing too, I'm just too lazy to type up a lengthy review right now :p It's The Last Exit to Normal by Michael B. Harmon. SO good!! It was up for the Nerds Heart YA tournament last year and made it pretty far. It's about a 17 year old boy named Ben who moves to a country town called Rough Butte after his father admits to being gay and starts a relationship with another man and divorces his wife. Living in the city, Ben turns to drugs, fails out of school and falls in with the wrong crowd so his father makes the decision to move their family to the country to live with Edward (his partner's) mother.
Needless to say, Rough Butte is a bit of a culture shock to Ben who tends to wear his hair in spikes, skateboards and knows nothing about farm life, but he soon relates to an 11 year old boy who lives next door who is being abused by his father and no longer is in touch with his mother. And there's also the fact that he's fallen in love with Kimberly Johan, a local farm girl. I can certainly see why this book made it so far in the tournament and I would've loved to see it right up there with Charlie and My Most Excellent Year in the finals. I didn't want it to end. Ben was such an excellent character....His dad was a realistic character...the story was REAL! No one was "right". The book wasn't preachy in the least bit. The book didn't try to justify anyone's behavior and I think that's what I loved more than anything. It portrayed everyone as just being human and being able to make mistakes and showed that that in itself doesn't make you a good or bad person. It's what you do and who you ultimately are that determines that. Great book and I'd recommend it to teens and adults alike!
And because I haven't done a Friday Fill Ins in a LONG time, I figured I'd go ahead and do it this week :p
1. Sandwiches and beer – the best food to take on a picnic. Oh, and you have to have nuts to feed the squirrels and bread for the ducks!!
2. Summer is the worst effing season of them all! It is evil!
3. I could live in flip flops. Seriously, if I could get away with wearing them at work, I would.
4. To love someone is a wonderful thing and I do it as often as I can.
5. When I go to visit Debi in August I so want to find a nature trail and go on a long hike.
6. When I crave food, it’s usually chocolate. Or sometimes something really bizarre and I have to have it that second and I will go to the ends of the earth to get it :/
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to taking it easy after work, tomorrow my plans include relaxing, running some errands and doing whatever the hell I want to do! and Sunday, I want to play in the garden, read some books, drink some coffee, and just have a damn good day!
Hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!!
Reading wise, I just finished two books. One is Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver which is going to get it's own post which will probably be lengthy because it was such an amazing book that I think EVERYONE should read. The other was amazing too, I'm just too lazy to type up a lengthy review right now :p It's The Last Exit to Normal by Michael B. Harmon. SO good!! It was up for the Nerds Heart YA tournament last year and made it pretty far. It's about a 17 year old boy named Ben who moves to a country town called Rough Butte after his father admits to being gay and starts a relationship with another man and divorces his wife. Living in the city, Ben turns to drugs, fails out of school and falls in with the wrong crowd so his father makes the decision to move their family to the country to live with Edward (his partner's) mother.
Needless to say, Rough Butte is a bit of a culture shock to Ben who tends to wear his hair in spikes, skateboards and knows nothing about farm life, but he soon relates to an 11 year old boy who lives next door who is being abused by his father and no longer is in touch with his mother. And there's also the fact that he's fallen in love with Kimberly Johan, a local farm girl. I can certainly see why this book made it so far in the tournament and I would've loved to see it right up there with Charlie and My Most Excellent Year in the finals. I didn't want it to end. Ben was such an excellent character....His dad was a realistic character...the story was REAL! No one was "right". The book wasn't preachy in the least bit. The book didn't try to justify anyone's behavior and I think that's what I loved more than anything. It portrayed everyone as just being human and being able to make mistakes and showed that that in itself doesn't make you a good or bad person. It's what you do and who you ultimately are that determines that. Great book and I'd recommend it to teens and adults alike!
And because I haven't done a Friday Fill Ins in a LONG time, I figured I'd go ahead and do it this week :p
1. Sandwiches and beer – the best food to take on a picnic. Oh, and you have to have nuts to feed the squirrels and bread for the ducks!!
2. Summer is the worst effing season of them all! It is evil!
3. I could live in flip flops. Seriously, if I could get away with wearing them at work, I would.
4. To love someone is a wonderful thing and I do it as often as I can.
5. When I go to visit Debi in August I so want to find a nature trail and go on a long hike.
6. When I crave food, it’s usually chocolate. Or sometimes something really bizarre and I have to have it that second and I will go to the ends of the earth to get it :/
7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to taking it easy after work, tomorrow my plans include relaxing, running some errands and doing whatever the hell I want to do! and Sunday, I want to play in the garden, read some books, drink some coffee, and just have a damn good day!
Hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!!
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