Review: Bloomability by Sharon Creech

Book: Bloomability by Sharon Creech
Genre: MG
Rating: A-
For: Fun
From: The Library


I decided to pick this one up solely on the recommendation of Becca Wilhite in her Authors Pick Five post from awhile back. In that she said, "she (Sharon Creech) has created my other tied-for-favorite boy character in this book. He's Guthrie, and I'm half in love with him, even if he is twelve." So, of course I needed to find out what was so cool about Guthrie.


First of all, this book is about a girl whose family is sort of falling apart at the seams. Her dad can't keep a job, her brother keeps getting in trouble and eventually jail, her sister gets pregnant, etc etc. So, they decide to send her (Dinnie is her name) to be with her aunt and uncle who just happen to run a boarding school in Switzerland, while the rest of them try to work things out.


Well, as you may imagine, she is not happy with this decision at all. She misses her family, she wants to be with them to help with things, and she feels very abandoned. And then, she begins to feel like she has actually been kidnapped. But of course, as the days go by and she begins to make friends and learn new things and have her world broaden in a big way, she realizes that this experience may not be so bad after all.


Guthrie is one of the friends she makes during her adventure. And the thing about him that makes him so cool is his complete and total joi de vivre. He has a personality that is extraordinarily positive. He enjoys everything and everybody. He's the kind of person we all love to have around us. Simply, a happy person.


So yes, I enjoyed this book. At times it got a little preachy and covered many  issues. (I meant to make a list but didn't and now it's been too long since I actually finished the book that I can't really remember them!)  For the most part, it wasn't too distracting and was done in such a way that kids would understand and hopefully "get it." 


Bottom line: I liked it quite a lot.


Other Reviews:


Teen Book Review


Author Sharon Creech's official website.

A Bit of Me(Me): Broadway!

Today's question from There's a Book:

Have you ever seen a Broadway musical? Do you like theater?

Once again, are you sure you want to ask me this question? Sheesh this is really opening up a can of worms here because I LOVE Broadway! We've had season tickets to the theater in SLC for going on 15 years and they bring in four (usually) wonderful shows each year starring the New York touring companies. (Now and again they even bring us the original stars like Carol Channing and Donny Osmond and Hayley Mills.) Also, we usually get season tickets for the local summer outdoor theater and have seen tons of stuff there too. Not to mention the fact that every year we go to both the high school and junior high school's musical shows and they do such and excellent job that you forget you're not watching professionals!

My all time favorite shows are:

Les Miserables: the 10th anniversary concert is all over YouTube and I can't pick a favorite, but the dude that plays Enjolras, which you can see in this song, is stunning... and this song also shows cute Michael Ball playing Marius.

Jekyll and Hyde: I just highlighted this one the other day with a link to my favorite song, Confrontation.

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat: with Donny of course (when I saw him in this show, I had my two oldest kids with me, and he thumbs uped at them during the finale! So cool!)

Forever Plaid: such a fun silly show

The Scarlet Pimpernel: drama and comedy in one! My favorite song,  Into the Fire.

The Secret Garden: yes, based on the beloved book. I love every single song, but the one I especially love is the two brothers singing about the girl they both love, Lily, who is now dead. It's called Lily's Eyes (not the best quality video of this but this one is sung by the "real" guys.)

The Music Man: I love love love the train scene right at the start. When they did this at the high school years ago, my son got to be one of these guys.They did an awesome job.

West Side Story: Tony's Something's Coming is the best

Fiddler on the Roof: mostly I'm familiar with the film version of this one, and yet another where it's so hard to pick a favorite song! But the rich man song.... it's got to be the classic of this one!


Close in the running:

The Phantom of the Opera
Cats
Wicked
Oliver!
Evita
Into the Woods
Seven Wives for Seven Brothers
Beauty and the Beast
The Lion King
Chitty Chitty Bang Bang
Annie Get Your Gun
Hello Dolly
Oklahoma!
Miss Saigon
Camelot

Other ones I've seen that I really really enjoy:

Peter Pan
Sound of Music
The King and I
Mamma Mia
The Pirates of Penzance
All Shook Up
Hairspray
Once Upon a Mattress
Children of Eden
Little Women

And even with that list, it just barely skims the surface of the stuff we've seen and loved. Yes, we love Broadway around here! And now you know why I end up comparing my books read to shows I've seen!

This year the four shows we'll be seeing (one coming up in just a couple of weeks) are The Color Purple, Mary Poppins, Les Miserables and Young Frankenstein.

Some shows I haven't seen but would LOVE to:

Aida
Starlight Express
Whistle Down the Wind
Spamalot

Whew, I don't know about you all, but I had a blast making that post! :)


What shows have you seen and loved? Or dare you admit that you aren't a fan of musical theater?

Stuff and Such

Here's what I'm thinking this week:

** It's been sucky week. On Monday, my 36 year old brother-in-law collapsed while jogging and has been on life support since. The prognosis doesn't look good and my sister-in-law and her four young boys (along with the rest of us) are just waiting now to see if a miracle happens before she has to make that dreadful decision. Why does it take such drastic events to make us realize how precious life is?

** In better news,  the weather this week has been the perfect fall! I'm loving it!

** I finished one of the books I bought last week at the big library event: Swoon at Your Own Risk by Sydney Salter. Very fun. Reminds me a lot of Meg Cabot's books.

** I'm thinking I really need the Prince of Persia soundtrack. Yeah, that's what music I'm thinking of today.

** Oh boy and for my Josh Groban update... watch this video of him interviewing himself about groupies. He's a hoot and so much enjoys making fun of himself. I love it. I think there's more like this coming and I can't wait. Oh, and there's a new music video too.

** I watched The Vampire Diaries last night and saw Damon reveal more of his true self than ever before. It was  a hold-your-breath moment! The things he covers up with all that bad boy stuff... wow.

** I really wish there was a good movie in the theaters currently. My birthday is next week and that's all I want to do really is go see a fantastic exciting awesome movie. Harry Potter comes out a week too late to fulfill this wish. Oh, well.

** I've been a crappy commenter lately. Sorry for that everyone!

** I'm also getting behind in reviews. For me, this usually isn't a problem I deal with, but lately, yes.

**  I'm afraid that it's time to start thinking Christmas shopping. Double, triple ugh.

** Our neighbor gave us a huge bag of apples from her tree. I'm thinking I need to make apple crisp or some such thing.

** All you NaNoWriMo-ing people make me want to write a book... if only I knew how.

What's on your thoughts today?

Character Connection: Samwise Gamgee from The Lord of the Rings

For a Character Connection post today, I wanted to highlight one of my all time favorite characters:

Samwise Gamgee 
from The Lord of the Rings

(portrayed here by Sean Astin)

I only read these books a few years ago back when the movies came out. I think I've said before, I just hadn't gotten around to them before that, and after that first movie, I read all three before the second one came out. I went into them thinking it was all about Frodo, I mean he IS the hero of this story, right?

Wrong. By the end, I knew that Sam was far and away the definite hero. I don't think there's a single other literary character that can match him in loyalty, faithfulness, steadfastness and pure courage. He is amazing. I love him with all my heart.

There are many many scenes depicted in the movies (taken straight from the books) that prove this, but my all time favorite one, the one that gives me chills and makes me weepy every time, is this one from the very end of the first movie, The Fellowship of the Ring:



Do you have a character crush you'd like to share with us? Head on over to Jen's at The Introverted Reader and link up!

By the way, speaking of favorites and hobbits and crushes, did you hear that Richard Armitage is playing the dwarf leader, Thorin, in the new Hobbit movie?  What think you of that people? :)

Review: Bleak House by Charles Dickens

Book: Bleak House by Charles Dickens
Genre: Classic
Rating: B+
For: Classics Challenge and Read Along
From: Bought it years ago

On the off chance that there's someone who wants to read my final thoughts on Bleak House, here they are:

I don't know! :)

This reading experience reminded me a little bit of the time I was in 8th grade and for some reason decided that I would read Great Expectations for my 10 minute beginning-of-class-silent-reading book. I still have the little notes that we had to write down every day after reading to report what we read and it amazes me that I came up with something to report because all I remember was being in a huge daze and fog. I remember something about an old lady, a rotten cake, a boy named Pip and girl that was awfully mean to him.

Of course, I've read it again since then and it's now one of my all time favorites!

Bleak House was like this experience in the sense that I felt like I was in a fog for much of the time. There were many chapters that I just didn't get and wondered what they had to do with anything. However, there were many chapters that I loved and thought were very interesting and intriguing. My guess is that upon a re-read, I'd "get" so much more.

To help me understand things, I checked out the BBC series from the library and watched along with my final few pages of reading. There were lots of moments where I thought, "Wait? When did THAT happen?" or "Oh boy, I must have missed that part entirely!" Too funny. And of course I really really enjoyed the movie, and in fact, got much more emotionally involved and found myself quite weepy several times.

Oh wait? Would you like a summary of this book? Let me try.

So there's this case being heard in court that's gone on and on. It's because they don't quite understand who the dead dude wanted to name as beneficiaries of his will, or actually he had too many wills. It was all very confusing. But anyway, two of the main characters, a boy and girl who are cousins, are hoping that the court will rule in their favor. In fact, the boy becomes obsessed with this idea, much to the sadness of his guardian uncle, and many other people involved.

Meanwhile, their friend who shares their uncle as her guardian, learns about her parentage, which is quite a surprising shock to her and to her mother who thought she was dead from birth. Despite this, she is a stalwart girl and ends up being the glue that holds everyone together. Her mother, however, falls apart.

Mixed up in all of this, we have several deaths, several love stories, several bad schemes, and many secrets. And tons and tons of characters. They were overwhelming at first, but in the end, I found them all quite interesting, and it was fun to see how my feelings for them changed drastically over the course of the book...and perhaps also influenced by the movie.

All that makes for quite a good story, if you can understand it! Mostly, I just think I was rusty on my Dickens and seriously shouldn't let such a long time go by again before reading another one!

Bottom line: I enjoyed.... most of it!

Other reviews:

Age 30+... a Lifetime of Books
Bookworm1858
To Read or Not To Read
Books and Chocolate
The Zen Leaf

I may have posted this trailer already, but in case I didn't, or in case you missed it the first time, here it is:

Authors at the Library

This past Saturday one of our local libraries (the "other" one, not the one where I work) held their first annual Teen Book Festival. Headlining the event was Scott Westerfeld.  (As you probably don't remember, he's one of the authors I choose for my dream BEA panel...) So of course I was excited! It was free, but you had to have tickets to go to his presentation, and of course those tickets were gone in the first couple of hours of distribution weeks ago, and of course I didn't get any. But Melissa from One Librarian's Book Reviews came to the rescue and got two extras and said we (me and Jenny) could use them!

So, off we went!

First we heard Scott Westerfeld's presentation. He began by telling how Uglies came about. He said he had a friend who moved to LA and was flustered by going to the dentist and being told he needed to get on a five year "teeth beautification" plan. That gave him the idea of what if what if.... and Uglies was born.

When the book came out in Japan, he was surprised that it had pictures. It made him wonder why we don't have pictures anymore... in big people books. It used to be that we did (like Bleak House that I just read!) but the camera came along and here in the this county anyway, it made illustrations less accepted. Anyway, that morphed into an idea he had .... and Leviathan was born.

He then showed us several pictures from both Leviathan and Behemoth and talked a little about the story itself, without spoilers...mostly!

So after that we stood in his signing line and I got both Leviathan and Behemoth signed. I had no questions for him, and he was sort of an all business non-chatty author signer, so it was a little awkward. But aren't they all? (See my post here!)

Me

Melissa
 (and can you see Scott's wife Justine Larbalestier in the background?)

Then we stood in Brandon Sanderson's line and this time when it was my turn, I chatted with him whether he wanted to chat or not. Here's what went down:

Me: So I'm trying to making my way through the Wheel of Time series, I just got done with #4 and loved it!
Him: Oh, really? That's my favorite one too!
Me: Really? Cool!
Him: Yeah, and then 5 and 6 are similar in feel so I bet you'll really like them too. But the later ones concentrate more on side characters, so I guess then it depends on which characters you like.
Me: Oh, my favorite character is Perrin, no question!
Him: Oh, well then, book 4 is his best book... so..
Me: But I really like Min too, is there much more about Min coming up?
Him: Yes there is.
Me: And Lan, I'm really anxious to learn more about Lan too!
Him: Yes, him too! Both Lan and Min will be prominent in later books. Also, there's some Mat stuff that will blow you away. Stuff you can't even imagine right now!
Me: Awesome! Well, hopefully I'll get them all done one of these days so I can read your stuff there at the end!
Him: Cool.

The Two Brandons!

Then I had J. Scott Savage sign my "real" copy of Far World: Land Keep. He said, "Don't I know you?" So I reminded him from where.

After that we went to a panel already in session about YA Fiction with Sara Zarr, Carol Lynch Williams and Ann Dee Ellis. Much of the same stuff was covered as many of the panels I've gone to in the past. I'm guessing the authors get sick of discussing the same things over and over again!

When that was over, we went back to the author signing area where all the authors had now switched over, and I had Sara Zarr sign all three of her books for me. Then Sydney Salter signed two of hers, and Wendy Toliver signed one, and Carol Lynch Williams signed one. Whew! That was fun!

From right to left: Sara Zarr, Wendy Toliver, Sydney Salter and Dene Low.

While waiting in line for these authors, I kept snapping pictures of Nathan Hale because whoa, he looked especially dashing and I couldn't help it!

Then back to the panel we went, to hear Ally Condie, Lisa Mangum and Bree Despain talk about romance in YA fiction. It morphed, as these things usually to do, to publishing and writing hints and helps. We really wanted to ask this question: "So, what's up with all the love triangles?" But we never got a chance. Oh, well. Next time!

So, in the end, I had twelve books signed by seven different authors. (One of those books, however, was a special request by Ibeeeg of Polishing Mudballs, and will shortly be sent off to her!) Yes, it was loads of fun, and with that, I think my author encounters have come to an end for the time being. It's been a whirlwind of a couple of months, but I think things will calm down now!

Review and Guest Post: Unbroken Connection by Angela Morrison

Book: Unbroken Connection by Angela Morrison
Genre: Romance
Rating: A
For: Fun
From: I bought it from Amazon.

Early last year I came across Angela Morrison's book Taken by Storm and loved it. What an  intense emotional love story! Besides that, I loved the writing. When I found out there would be a sequel, I was quite happy and really looked forward to it. 

However, the author came across a few bumps along the way (I've included her story about that below if you're interested) and I wasn't sure we'd get to read that next book after all. But with lots of perseverance, Angela made it happen and this last week I managed to get a hold of the book, and it was one of those times when I felt the need to to drop everything else and just read.

It did not disappoint, I totally enjoyed this continuation of Michael and Leesie's story. They are in different parts of the world for this book, carrying on their "friendship" through email and chat. Michael's teaching diving in Thailand, and Leesie's at school. They think they are not really together any more, but they don't really know what's going on now, do they? Yeah, things get pretty complicated and it appears there's going to be no real solution in sight. I feel for them. 

In the end, a whole new complication arises, one that I didn't see coming and yes, there were some pretty good weepy moments! So be prepared!

Like Taken By Storm, this book is told in three unique ways. From Michael's point of view by way of his dive logs, which is basically his diary. Then there's Leesie's  raw emotional poems which she shares with no one. And then we have Leesie's chats with her brother, her friend, and of course Michael. I really enjoy this fun set up, and it makes for really quick reading.

Bottom line: I loved it!

Other Reviews:

Once Upon a Bookcase
Windowpane Memoirs

Angela Morrison's official website

As an added bonus, she has started a new blog, Cayman Summer, where she is sharing the whole process of  writing book number three in this series. Be sure to check that out!

Finally, here Angela tells the publication story for Unbroken Connection:

Getting UNBROKEN CONNECTION, the second novel in Michael and Leesie's saga, to readers has been quite a journey. When I first pitched it to my editor at Penguin after TAKEN BY STORM went off to the presses, she told me they loved the story, but they wanted me to write stand-alone titles, like Sarah Dessen or Janette Rallison. Razorbill's publisher asked me to write the same story for different characters. I, gulp, refused. Like any writer, my characters are very real to me. UNBROKEN CONNECTION was Leesie's story and nobody else's. I told them I'd save it for her. I couldn't give it to strangers. 

So to fill the second novel spot in my contract with them--they signed me for two books when they bought TAKEN BY STORM--I had to come up with a whole new novel pronto. That led to my second Penguin release, SING ME TO SLEEP (March 2010). SING ME TO SLEEP was inspired by a dear friend's son, and I wrote it to honor him and the Amabile Choirs of London, Canada--that were a huge part of his life. That was an amazing experience I'll always cherish. I keep hearing from readers who are deeply touched by it. The Amabile guys choir was so enthusiastic about it they recorded, "Beth's Song," for my trailer. I wrote the lyrics for the book, and the extraordinary LDS artist, Harriet Bushman, composed the music. You can download it on iTunes and help support their music. 

By the time SING ME TO SLEEP was done, I'd signed with an agent. We submitted a proposal for UNBROKEN CONNECTION as my option book. My contract stipulated that I must submit my third YA novel to Razorbill. The proposal was met with silence.

Perhaps I should have written another stand alone title, but as an artist, I needed to continue Michael and Leesie's story. They wouldn't leave each other alone. They wouldn't leave me alone. I prayed. And started writing. When I finished the novel, my agent loved it. We sent it to my editor.

More silence.

Three months later while I was packing for my trip up to Canada to celebrate SING ME TO SLEEP's release and Amabile's 25th Anniversary Festival, I got a call from my editor. She was leaving Razorbill--venturing out on her own. UNBROKEN CONNECTION lost its best advocate at the company. 

The following Monday morning--after an amazing weekend in London, Ontario signing books, getting to finally give my friend Joyce a long awaited hug, and hearing Amabile perform "Beth's Song" live--I got an email from Razorbill's publisher rejecting UNBROKEN CONNECTION. 

My agent was at a loss. He faded away into silence and then dropped me when I reminded him of my existence.

But my readers and bloggers rallied around. One of them started a FaceBook group to support UNBROKEN CONNECTION. Another had her graphics designer create an icon to share around the web. Their encouragement gave me the guts to release it independently.

Remember "The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost? I memorized it in grade school--not because I had to, but because I loved it. I think it's the only poem I can recite. Do you recall the ending?

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood

And I took the one less traveled by

And that has made all the difference.

Life is full of "no"--whether you're a writer, a three-year old, a teen, or a parent.

Remember, "no" isn't the end of the journey. It's simply a redirection--a new path. Maybe a better path. 

If you are an aspiring writer, don't let rejection stop you. Rewrite your query letter and send it out to more agents and editors. Seek professional critique. Take classes. Revise your novel to fit a market better. Publish an ebook. Blog your novel. Investigate independent publishers, regional presses, and print on demand services like CreateSpace.

I'm not going to lie--publishing with a giant New York publisher is a heady whirlwind, and I'm doing my best to land a new agent and another contract. But it can also be a muddy, frustrating road full of pot holes. It can maim you artistically if you let it. And these days there are many, many roads in the woods. I'm having a lot of fun following a new one.

All my love,

Angela