Author Signings: Ally Condie, Julie Berry, Darren Shan, Maggie Stiefvater

There's been a bunch more author events! Time to catch up with a few pictures!

DARREN SHAN

Here we are with Darren Shan, famous for the Cirque du Freak series.
My daughter-in-law was ecstatic to meet him so we gave her the position of
honor... to be straggled by him! I guess this is his trademark pose.
How fun is that!?

My DIL Jenniffer talking to her most favorite author!

Darren Shan reads from his book.
And he knows how to read!
I'm wondering if he does his own audio books. He's dang good!

JULIE BERRY

Here we are with Julie Berry, one of my favorite authors.
I can' wait to read this latest book, The Passion of Dolsa.

Julie Berry gave us a most awesome medieval history lesson.

ALLY CONDIE

Here we are, (sister Megs included) with Ally Condie.
Toto won a shirt with Ally's face on it. Funny!

Talking with Ally Condie.

Ally Condie signing books.

Sister Megs got to visit and attend this event with us. We had a blast!

MAGGIE STIEFVATER

Maggie Stiefvater signing books.
I love her look!

We had a pile go together for this one.
Kathy, Jenni Elyse and Jenny. 

There was a huge crowd and we are glad we got a spot to sit!


That's it until the next time! What authors have you seen lately?

April 2016 Reading Recap

An April picture: hiking in southern Utah

These are the books I read this month:

The Pages Between Us by Lindsey Leavitt: A fun middle grade book about two friends who write stuff to each other in a notebook they pass back and forth between them. Cute!

The Winner's Kiss by Marie Rutkoski: The conclusion to this awesome and intense series. Does everything end happily ever after for Erin and Kestral.. or not?

Winter by Marissa Meyer: The conclusion to this awesome and intense series! So many stories and angles to wrap up! And who wins the war? The evil queen or the handsome prince?

DNF: Memoris of a Geisha by Arthur Golden: I just... couldn't get invested. Bottom line for me on this one was.. too too boring. Sigh.

Plans for May:

• Finish Summerlost which I started this weekend.
• Read Burning Glass for book club
• Maybe give Bluescreen a shot too. 
• I'd love to get my hands on The Raven King

What did you read this month?

Saturday Snapshot... On Sunday: Kids and Food and Currently

Share your pictures of the week (or the past) from Saturday Snapshot hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads! 

Here's a couple of random pictures from me:

We went to a restaurant in the area that is getting rave reviews.
I enjoyed the food a lot, but the prices are pretty crazy!
#BlackSheep

All my kids!
Spouses and grand babies included!

And I thought I'd stick a quick CURRENTLY post here too! 'Cause it's been awhile.

Listening: I posted a bunch of songs yesterday that I'm currently listening to. But I can share another one:



Ah, it's so pretty. I love the ballads as much as I love the dance-y poppy ones. I'm currently fascinated with this particular dude since discovering he had a great part in the Descendants of the Sun. (Review of that to come this week.)

Watching: We are all caught up on Survivor! Maybe we'll actually watch the final episodes live? Not sure. We'll see. I think that's the only "currently playing" show I'm watching these days. I'm in the middle of a kdrama called Boys Over Flowers which is popular enough to actually be on Netflix, but sheesh. This show. I will have so much to say when it's time to review it! Just... don't watch this one for your first kdrama experience!! Yeah, no.

Reading: Just started Ally Condie's Summerlost and it's awesome so far! Here's hoping I finally figure out the balance between reading and kdrama's soon!

Writing: I've been trying to spiff up my first 10 pages for the conference coming up and they are so terrible that I want to scrap them and start over. But I'm not finding the guts to do it yet. I have only five days left. Think I can manage this?

Blogging: I'm doing okay, don't you think? It's still happening. Not sure I'm keeping any readers, but I hope so! I plan to participate in Armchair BEA in a couple of weeks. Join us!

Health Watch: zero zero zero

Misc:

• We've had lovely lovely rain this week!
• This past week was an awesome down week. This next week is going to be awesome crazy. Deep breaths.
• Um, I guess nothing else to interesting has happened this week. Stay tuned!

Sing Along Saturday: Let's Dance!

AH! I can't believe almost forgot about sharing music today, because, you KNOW I've got music to share! Oh my word. I can't even tell you about how much fun this week has been discovering music that I can't get enough of and all of it makes me want to dance. All of it. How am I going to choose one to share?

I can't!!

So I will share a few and here's hoping you actually click and listen. Because if you don't, what fun is that? NOT FUN AT ALL!

Okay, as you know, kpop as taken over my world. I absolutely love it and can't seem to get enough. Why? Because... it makes me want to dance.  It makes me happy. It's bright and fun and upbeat. Here's a couple "new to me" songs (aka. not Super Junior songs) that I have loved this week, songs that make me want to dance like no one's business:

This one called Fantastic Baby by BigBang:
(the lyric version highlighting the singers)



This one is RingDingDong by SHINee... the music video version which will show you their dance:




And one more that makes me want to dance! Here's Speed with Don't Tease Me. Be sure to watch the move they have at 2:30 in. Sheesh.



But, it's not just kpop that I love to dance to. How about a song from my Zumba life: Suavemente



And I tried to find one I loved to dance to from the pre-kpop days (wow it feels like forever ago, but has only been a few months) and came up with this one. Sadly, it's still a weird song, but such a fun one. I've been to see these guys (Blue Man Group) live and they MAKE you get up and dance during this song, the finale of their show. So much fun!! Anyway, here is just the song (and lyrics) so it can be a good quality version which will hopefully make you want to get up and dance:






So, did you actually listen to any of them? Did they make you want to dance... or not?

What do you like to dance to? Share in a post and come link up over at Bookish Things and More!

How Watching Kdramas Helps My Writing

LOL! I had to post this because I'm watching BOF this very moment,
well, as soon as I hit the publish button!
I'm truly part of the club now!

If nothing else, watching kdramas is reinforcing to me the components of what makes a good story, and what keeps people watching/reading. And that even if tropes and cliches are used, they still work, even if they are used over and over again... they work! So I give you:

Ten Ways Kdramas Will Help With Writing

1. There's always always a sad and tragic back story. Why is this person scared to swim? Or drive? Or drive in the rain? Or why are they so closed off? Or obnoxious? Or why do they not care about living? Why are they so worried about their looks? You can bet there's a story behind it all! And you can bet that we'll get a flashback or a clue some other way. Everyone has a story before the story. It makes characters so much more dynamic and layered.

This back flash incident explains many things.

2. All the characters are facing so many issues. Well of course this is a must or there's no story, right? Seems like characters are often facing unemployment, or bullying, or PTSD, or body image issues, or abandonment issues, or friend troubles.. and on and on and on.

Working off the fat!

3. There's always a symbolic talisman. Sometimes a puzzle piece symbolizes a friendship from the past and it that's lost then, all is lost. Or a random pen chosen from a pile of random pens suddenly defines a whole relationship. Or perhaps a certain flower suddenly embodies all the emotions of the characters. Or a rock picked up on a beach now stands for endurance and consistency.  I love it how writers manage to always fit something like this in and give random things such meanings!

Ah, that flower! It becomes so much more!

4. All the lovely quirky characters. There's always a sidekick friend, or a colleague, or boss, or family member that is a little bit crazy. Usually in a fun comedic relief sort of way. They sure have a way of stealing the scene sometimes and keeping things real.

Crazy characters / scene stealers!

5. Here's to vulnerable sympathetic villains. (Usually.) I mean usually the villain or antagonist gets their sad and tragic back story too and then you're all like, oh... now I get it! Now I understand them! And sometimes the villains are just too dang cool to hate. But also, it's true, sometimes they are awful and you just want to wring their necks!

One of my favorite "cool" villains!

6. That first kiss is a long long long time coming! Ah, the "almost" kisses! So many! Almost... and then bam, interruption. Or bam someone changes their mind, or bam they fall asleep, or fall down, or the rain comes, or they are too drunk... or... or...or... but then finally, just when you can't stand it anymore. It happens! Ah, it's the best... book, movie, TV, drama!

Will they or won't they?

7. And then, once they finally get together then so so many things continue to keep them apart. So now we as viewers/readers are on the edge of our seats again. Will it all be okay? Will everything work out? We kept guessing, even though we are pretty sure it's going to be happy ending. It's the best kind of torture!

And then... an earthquake happens!

8. Hospital scenes are so very cathartic! Wow, what's with the so many hospital scenes?! (Actually I was just watching one last night where they faked a hospital scene and the girl was pouring out her heart and then he opened his eyes and said... "Yes, what do you want to say to me?" I was dying! So...real or not real, hospital scenes bring out ALL THE EMOTIONS and are perfect for causing all the defenses and walls to drop. I better stick some into my stories!

And now, he lets it all out!

9. Chapter/episode cliffhangers are a thing. Want your readers to keep turning pages? Want your watchers to never ever go to bed? Cliffhangers! Even if you don't like them they WORK! I've taken to stopping my drama watching in the middle of episodes instead of the the end because it's pretty much impossible to ever quit otherwise.

In which we have a literal cliffhanger!

10. Happy endings! Is this a spoiler? I hope not, but no matter how bad things get there's almost always a happy ending, and we can all get behind that, can't we!? Yes, yes, we can! Here's to happily ever afters!

And they lived happily ever after!

And that, my friends, is how I'm justifying the kdrama thing for now...I can incorporate it all back into the writing! Agreed?

Book Review Thoughts: Winter by Marissa Meyer

Book: Winter by Marissa Meyer
Genre: YA Fantasy
Rating: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

I remember the day we, a bunch of bloggers and I, got to have a special gathering at the library with an unknown author, Marissa Meyer, who was launching her first book, Cinder. I remember thinking, eh, a Cinderella retelling. Maybe. We'll see. I don't know.

Flash forward a few years and out comes the fourth (or fifth. or sixth...depending on how you look at it) book and this author is now extremely popular and everyone is in love with her characters and this series.

I love it when that happens.

I read the first books reluctantly thinking they would just be the same old same old, but then I was sucked into one of the best retelling worlds I've ever read and absolutely loved it.

This, the final book in the series, was a fabulous, though a bit long, ending to the adventure. All our people are together, finally, trying to stop the evil queen and reclaim her kingdom (aka. the moon.) There are a gazillion ups and downs so much in fact, that I sort of got whiplash, with our characters together, then separated, hurt, then better, lost, then found, captured then escaped. Over and over and over again! But even with that, I was hanging on to every page and turn and event.

I loved that even though the book was long, the chapters were very short, which makes a reader feel like they are totally flying through it! (Still, how long did it take me to read this? Way too long!)

I won't go through the specific things that happen in this book, but just know if you are a fan of this series, I'm pretty sure you'll eat this book right up.

Here's to looking forward to whatever Marissa Meyer has in store for us next!

Bottom Line: Would you love and extremely mash up of fairy tale retellings and genres? Then you MUST read this series!

Other Reviews:

Meyer has really been so incredibly thoughtful in her creation and it truly is a lovely masterpiece of storytelling. From Don't Be Afraid of the Dork

At some point I forgot this series was based on fairytales because of how original Meyer's world building is. Sometimes I would catch glimpses of the original tales and it really shows how a good adaptation can work, especially with Winter's story. From Books and Sensibility

All in all I loved the series. It's easy to overlook some minor annoyances when you love the characters and world the author has created. From Alternate Readality

This series has a wonderful intricate plot and amazing characters! You CAN have both! From Kami's Library Thouhts

Kdrama Review: She Was Pretty

Drama: She Was Pretty
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Starring: Park Seo Joon, Hwang Jung Eum, Choi Siwon, Go Jun Hee
Rating: ❤❤❤❤❤


With the review of this drama, I will have caught up with past dramas watched and can now add this link to my new drama page. Yes!

This drama has a soft spot in my heart. It's the one I feel is perfect to start newbies out with, because it has all the aspects that make these dramas so much fun. It's also the drama that started the whole Super Junior craze and the drama that once I was done watching I knew that I for sure had been captured into whatever this thing is... the Korean Wave, the kdrama rabbit hole, the obsession...pick your description. This drama sealed the deal.

So here's the sum up of the story: Our girl is looking for a job, and as she is on the computer, she sees that she has an email from her childhood friend and first love. She is so excited that he's back in Korea after living in New York for years and she makes plans to meet him and get reacquainted.

Well, when she goes and sees him from afar she realizes that he has changed quite a bit. He has gone from a pudgy shy awkward kid to a gorgeous confident businessman. She looks at herself. She has also changed. She has gone from a popular pretty girl to a frumpy skinny unemployed frazzle haired crazy woman. She chickens out in meeting this guy and has her gorgeous friend and roommate fill in and pretend to be her. They think they can pull this off because the friend tells the guy that she is going to study abroad the very next day.

The two roommates

Well. Of course that doesn't work and things get WAY out of hand from there. The biggest problem being that when our girl does get a job, guess who ends up being her boss? Yep. It's him. And he's NASTY! He's a big fat mean jerk and she's all like... what happened to him and why would I want to be his friend???

The crazy boss

Well, of course, she still does and the connection runs deep. But he is, you know, thinking that his childhood friend is her gorgeous roommate. And the gorgeous roommate is all like, wow, this guy is pretty sweet and wow, I think I like him. (She doesn't see his nasty boss side!)

Complicated!

Meanwhile, one of the other guys she works with (aka. Reporter Kim) sees through EVERYTHING and figures it all out and falls in love with her in the meantime. (And again here we go with the second male lead syndrome!)

Siwon as Reporter Kim

Siwon in Super Junior

So complicated!

I love it!

The acting in this one is fun and fabulous. The situations are crazy funny. And heartwarming. And even sad at times. The messages about relationships, all kinds, and finding yourself and your place in the world are awesome. As I said, at first these dramas might seem superficial and silly, but always always, there is a lovely deep thought and message to ponder in the end.


Clips to the theme song of the show:




And here's Siwon himself singing another song from the show with clips that illustrate the second male lead syndrome that I keep talking about:




Anyway, this is a really good one to start with if you want to give a Korean drama a try!