Mini-Reviews

Roald Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes — Roald Dahl’s work is always a brilliant read and this was no different. It’s short and fun, but who doesn’t love parodies of tales meant for children?

Dracula the UnDead (audiobook) — This was my first experience with an audiobook and I was mildly interested at best. The story itself got quite tedious and predictable after awhile and I think that listening to it being read just highlighted the bad things about this book.

Cautionary Tales for Children — It must be my morbid sense of humour, but I thought all of the tales in this book were extremely hilarious.

Franny K. Stein books 3-7 — I’m in love with this series! It’s so cute and I’m even more excited to cosplay Franny for Halloween. I want more after the seventh book and the supplemental books.

Doctor Who: The Last Voyage (audiobook) — Ugh. This took place in the Tenth Doctor era and was read by David Tennant. Did not enjoy this story.

Warriors: Cats of the Clans — I enjoyed getting to see full colour illustrations of the cats and read their biographies! I think I should have waited until I was further in the series, though. There were quite a few cats and storyline mentions that I didn’t recognise at all.

Dewey: There’s a Cat in the Library — This is the easy reader version of Dewey by Vicki Myron; I’m a sucker for this story. I wish I’d gotten a chance to meet Dewey.

Doctor Who: The Dalek Conquests (audiobook) — I really, really enjoyed this. It was part audiobook, part omnibus/programme guide. It’s a pretty genius idea.

Ashley Learns About Strangers — Short and useful book by the Duchess of York about a little girl who learns the importance of not wandering off while shopping with her mother.

Manners with a Library Book — I want to make every single patron I deal with at work read this book. It’s filled with common sense about how to treat library books, but common sense isn’t so common anymore.

The Little Prince (audiobook) — THIS WAS AMAZING. Why did I not do anything with this work sooner? Some parts of this were just so beautiful that I started to cry.

Anne Frank: The Anne Frank House Authorized Graphic Biography — I’m so glad I read this; it was really well done and still had me tearing up at the end.

Garfield: Potbelly of Gold — Oh, Garfield, you silly cat.

The Adventures of Ook and Gluk: Kung-Fu Cavemen from the Future — From the author of Captain Underpants; this was not as good and I won’t be reading the next books.

50BC #37 – Tenth Grade Bleeds by Heather Brewer

Title: Tenth Grade Bleeds
Author: Heather Brewer
Series: The Chronicles of Vladimir Tod
Published: 2009
Summary:  Vlad must battle the evils of tenth grade while being hunted down by vampires who want him dead because of who he is.

I love the Vlad Tod books. The vampire world that Brewer has created is filled with just enough of a mix of traditional and modern vampire lore to keep me interested. I also just geeked out during the references to Vampire: The Masquerade. (If anyone else reading my blog played the game, too, omg I’ll really like you and we should be friends.)

But these books really aren’t about vampires; they’re about a boy who is just trying to go through life with the hand he’s been dealt and figuring out what “normal” is and how to be it. Vlad has to deal with hormones (human or otherwise) and constantly being left behind by the uncle he loves.

I’m on the Teenreads.com Blog!

When I got the notification in my inbox that my answers had been featured in this edition of  “If You Ask Me…”, I was ecstatic for many reasons: 1) I answered those questions a long time ago! 2) I’d forgotten I’d submitted something to TeenReads.com! 3) YEY BEING FEATURED! (If only I was given an opportunity to link their readers to my blog, but that would have been pushing it.)

Here is the entry I’m talking about. Oh, and I’m Danielle. Hi.

50BC #36 – Warriors (The New Prophecy): Moonrise by Erin Hunter

Title: Moonrise
Author: Erin Hunter
Series: Warriors: The New Prophecy
Published: 2005
Summary: The chosen cats continue on their journey and meet trouble from some other cats that come from tribes, not clans. They also get caught up in another prophecy from different warrior ancestors than their own.

This may be looking into things too deeply for a junior fiction novel, but I like how the author(s) approached the subject of belief systems that differ from one’s own. (Star Clan and Tribe of Endless Hunting were the examples in this novel.) I like the way things were phrased. One of the examples of what I’m talking about, and I’ll be paraphrasing (sorry), is that while the Tribe of Endless Hunting is not the Clan cats’ warrior ancestors they are someone’s warrior ancestors and that means that they deserve respect.

It took me a bit longer to read this book because someone posted unmarked spoilers on a website I used to use and that just slowed my reading mojo down. The spoiler was so sad and even though I knew it was coming, I couldn’t help but feel sad and start to tear up when I read it. These books can get so sad sometimes.

The ending to this one is just killing me and reading the preview for book three just made things worse! I need to find out what happens to the captured cats!

50BC #35 – Warriors (The New Prophecy): Midnight by Erin Hunter

Title: Midnight
Author: Erin Hunter
Series: Warriors (The New Prophecy)
Published:  2005
Summary: There are new prophecies from Star Clan and the focus shifts to the chosen ones; one of whom is Brambleclaw, the son of the now deceased Tigerstar.

I’m so glad to pick up the next series of these books and I’m really glad that Brambleclaw and Firestar’s kits are part of the focus of this series because Brambleclaw grew on me during the end of the original series. I also really like how the author(s) took on the phenomenon of twin telepathy.

Leafpaw and Squirrelpaw are definitely on their way to becoming cats that I really like in this whole world of books! I’m so glad that the cats I knew and loved from the original series are still in this series, even though these books aren’t about them.