Book Blog Hop 14

Friday couldn’t come quickly enough this week. Yes I love my job, and the nice amount of money it’s just put in my bank account has done wonders to take the edge off the tiredness, but deary me I am shattered. Again. lol

The question this week is:

When you write reviews, do you write them as you are reading or wait until you have read the entire book?

I always write my reviews after finishing. I think the ending of a book has such a huge bearing on your over all feeling about it, it seems silly to start writing a review before you’ve finished it.

Take Minority Report (the film, because I can’t think of a book equivalent, and though I think Minority Report is a book, I haven’t read it) for example. Great film until the last five minutes. Ruined the whole thing. I wouldn’t bother watching it again, wouldn’t recommend it to a friend, certainly wouldn’t feel like it was money well spent if I had bought it (fortunately I didn’t), and yet, like I said, I was enjoying it til the last five minutes. Endings are so powerful, so important. I have to stick it out til the end before I can form any opinions.

How about you guys?

Book Blog Hop 13

I am always too tired to post this on Fridays now. Full time work is exhausting after a three month break XD.

This week we are honouring our favourite bloggers. I’m a huge fan of All Things Urban Fantasy. I particularly love the Cover Art Coverage feature – so nice to see all those lovely book covers (and of course, the reviews are fab too!)

And now for a contest…

Down the Rabbit Hole is having a 100 followers giveaway. Some great books on offer for both American and International followers, so go check it out!

INTERNATIONAL Giveaway on The Undercover Book Lover!

Another fabulous giveaway open to us International bloggers over on The Undercover Book Lover. I fancy the ‘Awesome’ prize pack, how about you?

Review: The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Title: The Hunger Games

Author: Suzanne Collins

Series: The Hunger Games #1

Genre: YA Future Dystopia

Publisher: Scholastic

Summary (from Goodreads)

Could you survive on your own, in the wild, with every one out to make sure you don’t live to see the morning?

In the ruins of a place once known as North America lies the nation of Panem, a shining Capitol surrounded by twelve outlying districts. The Capitol is harsh and cruel and keeps the districts in line by forcing them all to send one boy and one girl between the ages of twelve and eighteen to participate in the annual Hunger Games, a fight to the death on live TV.

Sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who lives alone with her mother and younger sister, regards it as a death sentence when she steps forward to take her sister’s place in the Games. But Katniss has been close to dead before—and survival, for her, is second nature. Without really meaning to, she becomes a contender. But if she is to win, she will have to start making choices that will weigh survival against humanity and life against love.

What’s Good About It

Lots. Euh, so my reading list for september has gone completely out of the window. First off, I’m so insanely busy I don’t really have time or energy to read anything heavy going. Then I manage to finally get my hands on this. I said I would only have a look then get back to what I was supposed to be reading. Yeah, three hours later…

So, this book was good enough to suck me in and not let go. It gripped, hard, from the very first sentence.

I’m a fan of a good dystopia. I like the idea of civilisation gone to hell, and the heroes that emerge from the ashes. And Katniss, the heroine of the series, is certainly memorable. Awkward and unsure of herself, until she has a bow and arrows in her hand, she’s vulnerable enough to be sympathetic, but kick ass enough to be interesting.

Yes the story isn’t particularly anything new. We’ve seen ‘killer reality TV show’ in a number of guises, from Battle Royale to Doctor Who. It’s a colourful enough premis to get away with being familiar, and the characters make it great.

I don’t really need to go on much more – this series gets enough blog space as it is, and I’m terribly behind the game, what with Mockingjay out… This was a great book. ‘Nuff said.

What’s Not So Good

Not so much a criticism of the book but of forming opinions and conclusions before reading. I don’t know where this came from, but I had this impression of Peeta as a character that was totally unlike what he was actually like. What he was like was fine, but it wasn’t what I was expecting, and for that reason it took me about half the book to get over it. Very silly of me.

Rating: 5/5

Giveaway on My Neurotic Book Affair

Fantastic giveaway going on at My Neurotic Book Affair and it’s International! So get entering

Book Blog Hop 12

Oops. Missed the official start of the Hop yesterday due to being totally incapacitated with a headache. What a week! I’ve not stopped until just now.

So, this week we are sharing our favourite post from the last three months. The one I had most fun doing,  sharing with other bloggers, and discussing, was the Top 100 YA Books. I always think of myself as well read, but these lists always make me feel I’m not. But, they do add loads of great books to my ever growing TBR pile!

But the post I thought about the most, deliberated and slaved over, before finally gathering up the courage to post was my short story, No Such Thing as Fairies. Posting it inspired me to write some new short stories which hopefully will be ready to post soon.

What are your favourite posts?

Review: Midnight Alley by Rachel Caine

Title: Midnight Alley

Author: Rachel Caine

Series: Morganville Vampires #3

Genre: YA Urban Fantasy

Publisher: Allison & Busby

Summary (from Goodreads)

Claire Danvers’s college town may be run by vampires but a truce between the living and the dead made things relatively safe. For a while. Now people are turning up dead, a psycho is stalking her, and an ancient bloodsucker has proposed private mentoring. To what end, Claire will find out. And it’s giving night school a whole new meaning.

What’s Good About It

Much of the same as the last two really.  There’s a step up to the mythology, and a bit of explanation about why Morganville, which makes the whole series start to make a bit more sense.

The politics deepen and the ‘who’s on which side’ intrigue continues to develop nicely. It’s a shame the series feels a bit like the ideas are coming as the books are written, rather than planned out before hand. The addition of Captain Obvious in particular was a bit clumsy. He could have (read should have) been introduced before. It would have made the world of Morganville a lot richer.

But, these are just quick reads, and as a quick read it was fine – entertaining, fast paced, with some good suspenseful moments and enough intrigue and plot to justify the continuing series without becoming samey. Just not enough to make it something stand out.

What’s Not So Good

Do any of these characters grow? I liked them in the first book, but I’m rather bored of Shane doing the dumb hero thing, Claire risking her life for knowledge and everybody making out with each other. There was a good bit at the end where Claire showed a darker side to her personality, but it was brushed over in a way that suggests to me that it won’t be developed or explored. Which is a shame, because it would have made her a hell of a lot more interesting.

The whole Michael/Shane fall out got a bit boring after about page five too. It just seemed shallow and pointless. I don’t mind main characters butting heads, but while I get why Shane was mad at Michael, I wanted to see more conflict. He would have been torn up about hating his best friend and still having to live with him and face it every day. There should have been more guilt tormenting Shane. I just don’t buy that he could hate Michael so totally.

Rating: 3.5/5

Teaser Tuesday: Midnight Alley

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers

Morganville Vampires #3 up this week. I’ve swapped it on to my reading list for the September Reading Challenge, as I’m never going to get through the long, chunky books I chose with the pressures of work at the moment.

My teaser:

His eyes opened, and they were all pupil. Scary owl eyes. ~ pg 150, Midnight Alley, Rachel Caine.

Battle of Britain 70th Anniversary

I had the good fortune to be invited to a celebration of the Battle of Britain the other night. Three hours chatting to local noteworthies in ‘Lounge Wear’ and my only pair of black shoes, which have four inch heels, was a tad uncomfortable (read: my feet are still killing me now) but it was worth it for a spectacular display by the Red Arrows. I get invited to all the happening parties. (read: I was a plus one…)

I’ve seen the Red Arrows in action before at the Farnborough Air Show, but this was a really up close and personal display – they flew right over our heads, just above the hanger we were standing in front of.

They did loads of incredible stunts. Unfortunately I only had my other half’s camera phone to take pictures with, and often they flew past too fast and all I caught was the colourful smoke they left behind!

After nibbles and drinks, we were invited back outside to watch a spitfire display. Only they didn’t tell us it was starting and I very elegantly jumped out of my skin when it blasted overhead. Classy. I’m glad I wasn’t holding a drink.

While this Spitfire didn’t do some of the insane ‘we’ll fly really really close to each other and make it look like we’re going to crash’ stunts that the Red Arrows did, it was still a magnificent perfomance. It’s incredible really – the plane is 70 years old, and still going, still operable. There are very few cars that are 70 years old that I’d drive, and they don’t go in the air and loop the loop. It really is a testament to the incredible craftsmanship that ultimately won us the Battle of Britain.

A Brief History Lesson

The Battle of Britain was considered a crucial victory and a turning point in World War 2. Had it been lost, the world would likely be a very different place today. Hundreds of planes and pilots battled above Britain, but though the Luftwaffe had superior numbers and pilots with more experience, the RAF had the advantage of home territory and superior planes an by the end of October 1940, some months after the campaign to take Britain began, Hitler postponed his plans to invade Britain. The skies over Britain were defended.

Books on the Battle

Such epic events, though tragic and horrific, do inspire some great literature. I had a peruse on the internet looking for some good fiction books, but found it quite tricky to find anything. There are some good lists on Amazon for Non-Fiction books on the Battle of Britain, and after a bit of digging I found a list of fiction about World War Two. It surprises me how small this list is. I thought there would be loads, but then, almost all of the war books I can think of are set during the First World War.

I’m going to read The Book Thief by Markus Zusak next. It’s been on my TBR pile for about three years, and I’ve never quite got round to picking it up. It seems fitting though, to read it now on the anniversary of such a momentus event.

Do you know any great fiction books set around the Second World War?

Books on the Battle of Britain

Book Blog Hop 11

The question this week is: Do you judge a book by its cover? Answer: Yes and no. Okay, so I am as drawn by sparkly beautiful book covers as the next person, but having a terrible, or just plain boring, cover won’t necessarily put me off a book. I tend to judge books by their blurbs, and a first page or two, but I will be less likely to pick up an ugly book. My pet hate though is when you read a book and find that the cover model totally doesn’t match the character. Why do they do that?

In other news…

Writing From the Tub is hosting a giveaway of Trash by Andy Mulligan. Sounds like an amazing book so go check it out!

Do you judge books by their covers?