No Take Backs!

I'm a very indecisive person.  If we go to a restaurant that I've been to at least once I will probably get the same thing I got the last time but I will stare that menu down as if I'm trying to decide which wire to cut on a device that's set to blow mere seconds before the waiter comes.  Then I still make everyone else go first before I'm forced to finalize my decision.

Quick! The blue one, cut the blue wire!....  I mean I'll have the chicken strip basket, please.  Thank you.

I hate decision making.  Especially, big decisions... like my food. (joking. XD) I wouldn't be surprised if, on that magical day when my future agent tells me my book has been picked up and when it's all ready to be published, I decided that something should have gone differently in my book after everyone has already read it.

So why are people so upset at J.K. Rowling?

Awhile ago, Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series, said in an interview that Harry should have married Hermione.  (Here's the article I read about it.  http://cnn.it/1bRw10w)  That apparently enraged a lot of readers.

Awkward.....

I can understand that.  I get a little defensive when someone doesn't love a book as much as I did or thinks a part of it was bad.  That's normal...  I think.  But it's almost going to far.  Why be upset that an author makes a comment about her own characters in her own book?  It wasn't an unreasonable thought.  I can't say that I haven't thought of them ending up together myself.  Especially after that dance scene in the tent...


This kind of reminds me of what happened with Veronica Roth's Allegiant. (Here is a VERY VERY SPOILERY post from Roth's blog about the ending. http://bit.ly/1khO05H  
I'll try not to be spoilery here but if you would prefer to look away this is your warning.)


She got so much backlash about the ending of the trilogy.  It's kind scary as a writer to hear about it.  I mean, comments?  Ok.  Letters?  Alright.  But I heard rumors of death threats and a petition for her to rewrite it...  Death threats???  Way too far.

I'm sure that none of the decisions either Rowling or Roth made for their characters were taken lightly.  They love their characters as much we do.  In real life, we tend to think back on big decisions and wonder 'was that the best way to go?'  These characters and others, however real they feel to us, are not in fact alive.  But much like real life, things are going to happen to them that we won't like and we can't just go back and rewrite a part of it and pretend that the original never happened.

....Unless you do a fanfiction of it and are able to live in very deep denial.  But I think that's for another blog post.

A Poem on a Poetic Kind of Day

I thought that I should post something today so here's a poem I wrote.  Happy Valentine's Day everyone!  :)

Trash to Treasure

Every fall he cleans the gutters
Such a chore it makes him mutter
Then when he starts to get some rain
The old gutters drip by his window pane
His neighbor said 'they're just like rubble!
Get new ones that won't make puddles.'
So he paid to fix them right away
He got some new gutters the very next day
Then winter came, his favorite season!
His favorite for so many reasons
But the best was the decor
Nature itself put at his door
He picked up his camera, put a hat on his hair
But when he ran out his icicles weren't there
It was water the old gutters dripped on his head
That in winter would make those bright crystals instead
Though damaged, imperfect, they were still capable
Of using their flaws and making things beautiful

All About Books #1

I saw these questions on Elisabeth's blog over at The Second Sentence.  They're all questions about your favorite books and reading habits and everything. I liked reading her answers and thought they were fun questions so I thought why not answer them too?  I think I'll break them into two parts though.  Let's get started!

1. Your favourite book as a child? My favorite book as a child probably had to have been I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly.  I believe I have the version that says retold and illustrated by Nadine Bernard Westcott.  I still have that thing committed to memory.  When I got a little older I was stuck on The Kids in Ms. Colman's Class by Ann M. Martin.  I read them until I was way past their reading level.  I remember my mom taking me to the book store to buy one for me and being done with it before we got home!

2. What are you reading right now? I just started Deadline by Mira Grant, the second book in the Newsflesh Trilogy.  The first one, Feed, was great.

3. What books do you have on request at the library? Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell (And now I have a couple of the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare.)

4. Bad book habit. Getting library fines.  I have a bad habit of doing that.  I've even had to pay for books outright sometimes because I kept it or lost it for that long...

5. What do you currently have checked out from your library? The whole Newsflesh trilogy by Mira Grant and Fangirl  by Rainbow Rowell.

6. Do you have an e-reader? Kind of.  I have the Kindle for PC and have a few books on there but I completely forget about it.

7. Do you prefer to read one book at a time, or do you tend to read several at once? One at a time.  Sometimes I put down a book for another one that I've been waiting on but that still feels like one at a time.

8. Have your reading habits changed since starting a blog? I can't say that it has.

9. What was your least favourite book this year? Well, I've only read three books so far this year and I'm pretty fond of them so I'm going to go for one I read last year.  I'd have to say Pure by Julianna Baggott. I don't know if I was just really excited for another book or what but I just couldn't get in to it.  I will go back to it because I liked the story.  It just seemed that I couldn't get excited about it.

10. What was your favourite book this year? For 2014?  I would have to say Feed by Mira Grant.  That thing was an emotional roller coaster.

11. How often do you read out of your comfort zone? Not as often as I should.  I would probably find something I liked if I branched out a little.

12. What is your reading comfort zone? Young Adult I think.  It's the first section of the library that I go to when I go to browse.

13. Can you read in the car? Yes.  I love reading in the car.  Otherwise, I'm either sitting there staring at nothing (unless we're on a road trip or something) or driving.  *shudder* I hate to actually drive.  It's boring.  Lol!

14. Where is your favourite place to read? The car.... or the bathroom.  Wait, wait!  Before you judge, I will have you know that my bathroom is the most comfortable and quiet place in the house.  I'm just saying.

15. What is your policy on book-lending? You can borrow books from me, but I will bother you about it after a week or so and keep doing it until you give it back...

16. Do you ever dog-ear in books? Nope.  Though I have used the dust cover for a book mark before.

17. Do you ever write in the margins of your books? No.  That's kind of a pet peeve.

18. What about text books? Hmmm.  I think I can remember writing in text books before.

19. What is your favourite language to read in? Has to be English.  I don't know any others well enough.

20. What makes you love a book? Humor.  It doesn't have to be a 'funny' book but I do appreciate a character who I feel like I could understand.  Like someone that I could be friends with.  Perhaps I mean a good character voice in general then?  Not necessarily just humor.

21. What would inspire you to recommend a book? Sometimes I read a book that I just have to talk about.  Like I actually can't help but to talk about it as if the people were real and whatever just happened was said and done right in front of me. (Just ask my sister.)  THAT is when I recommend the book (to my friends that read, that excludes my sister) because I can't talk about it if it will spoil the ending and I MUST talk about how funny/stupid/ridiculous/horrible whatever happened just was.  Therefore said book is given as assigned reading to everyone and is due ASAP.

22. What is your favourite genre?  Hmmm... *looks up a list of genres*  I believe that I'm more into Fantasy and Dystopian.  I've been reading a lot that I would call that these days.

23. What is a genre you rarely read but wish that you did? Mystery.  I would love to try my hand at figuring out who did it and with what (My bets are on Col. Mustard with the candlestick) but I tried once and just couldn't get in to it.  I need to give it another go.

24. Favourite biography? That's a tough one because I will admit to not reading many of those.  I do however remember having to do a project for school awhile back that I had to read one.  I can't remember the name of it but I'm pretty sure it was about Charles M. Schulz, the man who wrote the Peanuts comic strip, and liked it quite a bit more than I thought I would.

25. Have you ever read a self-help book? If self-help includes books that are kind of like text books then yes.  I tried to teach myself sign language once.  Didn't last long by myself.

26. Favourite cookbook? There's a couple from America's Test Kitchen that I like looking at.  And for whatever reason I'm fond of the cookbooks that come with kitchen appliances like blenders and such.  However, there is a cookbook that my school made when I was in kindergarten and it has a pretty good looking recipe for I believe they were Pizza Squares by yours truly. (However, I could not find said cookbook to make 100% sure that's what I did.)

27. What is the most inspirational book you have read this year? I was going to have to say none, but come to think of it I would have to say Mira Grant's Feed.  Strangely enough, reading a story about a group of bloggers success, how much more seriously blogging is taken in their day, and the kind of change that they made by doing it made me want to post more on my own blog.  It really did inspire me.


That's enough for now.  I'll post the other half of the questions some other time.  Feel free to grab the questions from me and make your own answers!

Writing A to Z

So I remember last year when I was on twitter and I was always seeing #atozchallenge at the end of tweets.  This year I FINALLY caught on to it before the event started.

Turns out that the A to Z Challenge takes place every April where you take it upon yourself to write a blog post every day except Sunday, which happens to be 26 days.  Not only that but you need to choose a word for each one to use as a prompt and they must be alphabetical order (Day 1 - prompt that starts with A, Day 2 - B, etc...).  That happens to conveniently give one letter for each day!

I'm going to go for it this year!  It sounds like fun and so why not?  Now the only thing is to figure out what to write...  Lol.  Think I might try a story.  Just post a little every day until I get to the end on the last day.  This is going to take some more thought.

Any of you giving it a go?  Returning for another try?  Any tips or tricks to the trade you're willing to offer?  I'm all ears.