Wednesday 14 November 2012

Internet-less

Hi Everyone - I just wanted to give you a very quick update as I am at work right now! I have finally moved into my new place, but I have no internet! And worst of all we have no idea when we are going to be getting it! Since its a new building, they haven't set up the service and can't say when they will be able to! Argh! Very frustrating!!

Also, while moving I stepped on my ereader and broke it :*( Very Very Sad! I have bought a new one already, but I still feel bad for doing that to my old one (I loved her very much!)

Anyway, just wanted to let you know why I was MIA last week and into the foreseeable future!

Tuesday 6 November 2012

100 Followers Giveaway WINNERS!!

Hello All!!

If you entered my 100 followers giveaway, this is a post you will want to read! I decided I would pick 3 winners, and the first one would get first choice, the next second, and the third last of the books I had available. I will contact the winners in order, letting them know which book(s) is/are no longer available. SO, the three winners are:

Winner 1: Eric Townsend
Winner 2: Nhã Khuyên Lê
Winner 3: Monica R

I will be contacting you all in order, so if you are winner 2 or 3 and don't hear from me for awhile, that is because I am waiting on the winner before you to make a choice on what book they would like :)

Again, a huge thank you to everyone who makes the choice to follow and read this blog, and when I reach my next milestone (whatever I decide that will be) I will host a bigger and better giveaway!! Yay!! So tell all your friends to follow me so that will be soon :)



Top Ten Tuesday - November 6, 2012

Top Ten Tuesday Freebie! I'm going to choose a topic that was done while I wasn't participating in this, and that is:


Top Ten Fictional BFF's

1) Jessica Darling from the Jessica Darling Series by Megan McCafferty

Jessica Darling kind of reminds me of a mix between me and some of my other friends from high school. I could totally see us being BFF.

2) Ron Weasley from the Harry Potter Series by JK Rowling

Who wouldn't want to be BFF with Ron?? Sure Harry and Hermione are more useful, but I consider myself to be plenty useful, and comic relief is sooo much more important.

3) Jessica Wakefield from the Sweet Valley Series' by Francine Pascal

Popular Jessica Wakefield, if I were friends with her than that would mean that I probably fulfilled one of my childhood dreams of being part of The Unicorns. So yeah, BFF for sure.

4) Sookie Stackhouse from the Southern Vampire Series by Charlaine Harris

I don't want to be burdened with being able to read minds, but it sure would be helpful to have a friend that could!

5) Tessa Gray from The Infernal Devices Series by Cassandra Clare

I'm not totally sure what drew me so much to Tessa, but I really liked her character and can easily see myself being friends with her.

6) McLean Sweet from Whatever Happened to Goodbye by Sarah Dessen

Same thing goes for McLean, not sure why, but she was definitely BFF material.

7) Georgia Nicolson from the Confessions of Georgia Nicholson Series by Louise Rennison

More comic relief for my ever so dull life. Georgia definitely knows how to keep things dramatic!

8) Jacob Black from the Twilight Series by Stephenie Meyer

Jacob is a hottie wolf, and well, that's enough for me!

9) Claudia Bloom from Tart by Jody Gehrman

Claudia needs me for a BFF, she needs help from someone! I really identified with her (and she is the only person on my list that is my age!)

10) Liz Lemon from 30 Rock (not a book, but she is seriously the best!)

My BF is always joking that Liz Lemon could be me, we are very similar!

Saturday 3 November 2012

Moving Week Blues

I'm sure most people have moved at least once in their life. It can be a real pain. I thought it was pretty crappy when I was younger and my family moved, and all I was responsible for packing was my bedroom. Through university I pretty much moved every year, but even then I didn't have a WHOLE lot of stuff, only 2-3 car fulls. Two years ago when we bought this house was the first time I really had to move furniture, and even then we were moving from a 1 bedroom apartment (that was soo tiny!) to a whole house. Well, we decided to buy a second house, and now the moving part is going to be such a headache!

Just packing and labeling and cleaning the house was bad enough, but now we are facing some huge delays at the hands of moronic lawyers. Which is SO frustrating. We will be renting the house we live in now to tenants (and becoming a landlord is another first for us!) so when our closing date on the new place got delayed, we had to delay our tenants (THANK GOD they were so flexible - we could have been homeless if not!!) and now we still have no idea when we will get to move!

I have been living out of packed boxes since Thursday, as that was when we were supposed to move, and now we have our movers scheduled for Friday. We are hoping to get the keys a little earlier so we can do the painting that needs to get done, but ARGH! I am so super frustrated over this! I won't go into detail about why the house isn't closed and ready for occupancy, but I can say that it is because a lawyer (not ours) didn't do their job! And that's what makes me the most angry, that its because simple paperwork wasn't processed that it didn't happen. Its not a problem with the builders, or suppliers, or anything in my control, its just laziness!

I haven't been doing much else but cleaning and packing and making phone calls to continuously change dates of everything, so I had to get this rant off my chest! BF and I are about ready to go postal! Our plan was to buy another property in 2-3 years and do the same thing (rent and move somewhere else) but this experience has definitely left a bad taste in my mouth!

Friday 2 November 2012

Feature & Follow Friday - November 2, 2012

Hello Everyone and Welcome to this week's Feature and Follow Friday! I hope everyone is still riding high on their Halloween candy sugar rushes! I didn't get to really do much for Halloween this year, as we were supposed to move yesterday... but that didn't happen. There are a select few people out there who I want to strangle, but that is another story for another day!

This weeks features are both new to me, so its very nice to meet you both :)

First from Parajunkee, we have Katie at
Fiction Predictions
I was lucky enough to be Katie's 99th follower, which of course takes me to the "I've got 99 problems but the B---- ain't one" place from my younger years. Oh Jay-Z *sigh*

Anyway, back to Katie. Katie appears to be pretty new to the blogging world, but she looks to have great taste in books, so you should stop by and visit her!

Second, from Alison Can Read, we have Megan at


Love Literature Art and Reason

Megan has been blogging for about as long as I have been, and she has reviewed quite a few books that I haven't yet heard of, so I may have to log onto Goodreads and check them out! She is also a Team Stefan, which you really don't see a whole lot of (but I can relate - as by the books, I am too {by the show though, I'm totally torn - I love both!!}) So, if you haven't yet, drop by her blog and say hello!

This week's question is:

Q: What is a deal breaker for you in a book? For example, do you abhor love triangles? Or can’t deal with bad editing?

A: I think for me it really depends on the book. If there is something I like about the book (the actual story, the characters, etc.) I can look past a lot of things that would have been a deal breaker in other books. One thing that does bother me a lot though is when you can tell an author busts out a thesaurus every now and then. I hate when a book is mostly done in simple easy to understand language and then all of a sudden a word like 'Masticating' is thrown in there. It just doesn't fit, pick a style and go with it. I know that it's nice to use different words for things instead of just saying 'said' all the time, but you still need to make sure your target audience knows what the F you are talking about! 

Thursday 1 November 2012

A Game of Thrones by George R.R. Martin


A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, #1)

Goodreads Summary: Long ago, in a time forgotten, a preternatural event threw the seasons out of balance. In a land where summers can last decades and winters a lifetime, trouble is brewing. The cold is returning, and in the frozen wastes to the north of Winterfell, sinister and supernatural forces are massing beyond the kingdom's protective Wall. At the center of the conflict lie the Starks of Winterfell, a family as harsh and unyielding as the land they were born to. Sweeping from a land of brutal cold to a distant summertime kingdom of epicurean plenty, here is a tale of lords and ladies, soldiers and sorcerers, assassins and bastards, who come together in a time of grim omens. 
Here an enigmatic band of warriors bear swords of no human metal; a tribe of fierce wildlings carry men off into madness; a cruel young dragon prince barters his sister to win back his throne; and a determined woman undertakes the most treacherous of journeys. Amid plots and counterplots, tragedy and betrayal, victory and terror, the fate of the Starks, their allies, and their enemies hangs perilously in the balance, as each endeavors to win that deadliest of conflicts: the game of thrones.

Why I Read This Book: Initially, I had marked this book as 'To-read' without thinking too much about it. I knew it was popular, and it sounded good, so fine. Then I decided to make it a 2012 TBR Reading Challenge book on the list I officially made for that. I owned the first book, and that was what I had based making that list on. I put it off and put in off in favor of shorter books. Then, I had some friends start raving about the TV show, and I wanted to watch too. But, I said no Jessica, read the books first. So I am. I always figured I would like the book but for some reason I was not overly excited to read it (old-timey fantasy is not one of my 'normal' genres).

Review: Wow, this book was fantastic. It was extremely detailed, and have several different sub plots which helped you get to know the characters better. I am not normally drawn to fantasy books, but I have read a few and liked them all (with the exception of when I tried to read The Hobbit, but I think I was too young for it when I started that). Often I prefer to watch fantasy things that read them. I loved Harry Potter, Narnia, Fablehaven as books and movies, but they were written for a younger audience. I often find with fantasy books for adults that they are SO detailed that I lose interest and find them a bit boring. I did not find this with A Game of Thrones at all, it was exciting pretty much right from the beginning. I think it helped that you didn't really need to keep TOO many characters straight, as is often the case with massive world building novels. Since there was about 8 different POV's the book was told in, you got an indepth look at the 5-6 characters that were closest to them, and I was able to keep most everyone straight.

I don't want to say much about this book, because I don't want to give anyone spoilers, but even if you think this isn't "your kind" of book, I would still give it a try because it is seriously a great read. It's pretty long thought, just under 900 pages, and its only the first of a long series! It goes without saying (but I will say it, because that's kind of how a blog works) I really look forward to A Clash of Kings! (book 2)

Rating: