The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer

Title: The House of the Scorpion
Author: Nancy Farmer
Series: Matteo Alacran, Book One
Synopsis: "Matteo Alacran was not born; he was harvested with the DNA from El Patron, lord of a country called Opium. Can a boy who was bred to guarantee another’s survival find his own purpose in life? And can he ever be free?" -Goodreads.


Review: Earlier this moth, I was having a lot of trouble with a reading slump. I had finished a book around the third of April, and then finished nothing until I finished this book, which happened on April twenty-third. I had tried to pick up several books, but none of them was able to keep my attention until I picked up this book. I was enjoying it so much that I started a little book club on goodreads, so that I could enjoy it with others if they so chose.


I initially picked up this book last year from a second hand shop after hearing Regan from PeruseProject talk about how much she enjoyed it in a wrap up. As per usual, I took forever to actually pick it up, but MAN am I ever glad that I did.

This book took me a bit by surprise, as I went into it knowing absolutely nothing about it. The title gives absolutely nothing away about the story itself, and in fact doesn't make sense until a fair way into the book, but when it makes sense, does it ever make sense. I have such a love for this book now, I can't even begin to explain it. All I can really say is that if you haven't picked up this book yet, that you really, really should. It will surprise you, and it will make you fall in love with it. It will make you feel so many different kinds of emotions, and it will make you frustrated in the most fantastic way.

I need the next book in this series. I have to know where the story is going to go, what is going to happen to the characters. I want to say that I am ready for all of the twists and turns it will throw at me, but I could never be prepared for what Nancy Farmer will give me. I can just hope and pray that it will live up to the expectations that I have for it after reading this book.

Rating: 5/5 Stars
Shelved on Goodreads as:

1. Read
2. Books of 2015
3. Favorites

Wow, It's Been a While...

Wow, I've just realized how long its been since I posted on here.
Its been almost six months, and that is just not good.

Hello everybody, if you are still looking at this, I'm sorry I've been away for so long. Things have been a bit hectic with this semester of school and I've been moving all of my stuff into storage so that I can go back home for the summer. Today I wrote my last final exam, so I thought it would be a good time to reboot my blog.

I'm hoping that I can do a bit of an overhaul over the summer. I don't know how much I will truly be able to do, but I hope that I can make it a habit to write on here again.

What will this overhaul entail?

Well, mostly, it will be me actually using this damn thing again. I have lots of books to read, which means I have lots of books to review. I really want to start reviewing all of the books that I read again I loved doing it when I did it, and I still don't know why I ever stopped.

That being said, I also don't want this blog to be nothing but book reviews. I want to have some fun with it! I'm still not entirely sure what other types of posts I will be making, but you can expect to see something different from time to time. It might be a tag, it might be a personal ramble, it might be something about Scarlett (my NaNoWriMo novel) and editing my manuscript, maybe it will even be the return of TARDIS Tuesdays! We will have to wait and see.

I hope that you all are having a lovely day, wherever you may be.
What books are you reading right now? Let me know down below!
I respond to every comment, and I love hearing from you!

Until next time,
Helen.

January 2015 TBR

Hello Everybody,
Since I do not currently have the use of my camera and I can't post any videos on my channel for a while, I thought I would make a blog post with my January 2015 To Be Read, just in case its too late into the month to do it on my channel by the time I have the use of my camera back.

The first thing I plan to read this month is Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin. I have been too intimidated to read this book for a very long time because of how long it is. However, I have always wanted to watch the show and read the books, and I think I'm finally ready to take on the challenge. I did start this in December of last year, but only read about 77 pages. I am loving it so far, I just had some other things that I wanted to read, and unfortunately I am terrible at reading more than one book at once, even if I am doing it right now.

I hope to have this book finished by the end of the month!

I am also currently reading Prophesy of the Sisters by Michelle Zink. I also started this in December, but have only read about 40 pages of it so far. My understanding of it is that Alice and Lia, twin sisters, are prophesied to fight against one another. They both have the same goal, but go about it in opposite ways. So far, I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this book, but I do want to finish it seeing as I also own the second book in this trilogy.

I am also currently reading Neil Patrick Harris: Choose Your Own Autobiography. (For someone who doesn't do well with reading more than one book at once, it is probably a bad idea to be reading three). I am listening to the Audiobook of this one, which is Narrated by Neil Patrick Harris himself. I am just over 10% of the way through, and I am absolutely loving it.

The first book that I plan to pick up after I have finished the previous three is The Scorch Trials by James Dashner. I read The Maze Runner in September, in order to prepare myself for the movie, and I ended up really enjoying it. I finally got my hands on a copy of the sequel, so I am looking forward to reading it. However, if The Maze Runner has mixed reviews, I don't even want to talk about the reviews for this one. In general, the rating is lower than it is for the first book and everyone seems to agree that it isn't as good, but I am still looking forward to seeing what happens to our cast of characters. Who knows? Maybe having such low expectations going into it will make me like it a bit more.

And of course, as if it is any surprise, when I finish The Scorch Trials, I want to pick up The Death Cure by James Dashner, which is the third and final book in The Maze Runner Trilogy. If I do manage to finish this book, which I think I will, then this will be my first completed series of 2015.

I am also hoping that, if I am lucky, I can also start Just Listen by Sarah Dessen. I did technically start this book back in October, but I was in a bit of a slump and couldn't get into it. Now, I am hoping that my mood will be much better and that I can enjoy this book as much as I enjoyed Along For the Ride by Sarah Dessen, which I read in October of 2013.

And finally, if I manage to get through all of those, I hope to read From the Graveyard of the Arousal Industry my Justin Pearson. This is another sort-of autobiography about Justin's life before, during, and after he played in some of the largest band names in the punk sphere. I got this book from my friend Colton for Christmas, and when I flipped through it and read the chapter heads, I was doubled over laughing already, so I'm excited to dive into this one, because it promises a lot of good times and good laughs.










That's it! These are all of the books that I plan to read this month. If you have read any of these books, please feel free to tell me your thoughts in the comments down below. I do respond to every comment I receive, and I love hearing from you!

Lots of Love,
Helen.

Channel Hiatus

Hello everybody,
For those of you who follow my youtube channel, you may have already seen the very very low quality webcam video that I posted yesterday about my channel going on a bit of a hiatus. I have already been gone for a while because while I was at home, my computer wouldn't connect to the internet, so with three weeks of already having no videos, this wasn't fun for me to post.

The cord that I need to use to connect my camera to the computer so that I can upload its contents, as well as to charge it, was accidentally left at my parents house over Christmas break. My Mumzie says that she is going to attempt to send it out as soon as possible, if she can find it. If not, I have to scour tech stores to see if they have a cord that I can use for my camera, and if not, then I will have to buy a new camera all together, and I might not be able to afford that, depending on the price. I'm hoping that she will be able to find the cord quickly and send it to me so that videos can be up as soon as possible.

Videos that you can expect once my cord is back include:
December Book Haul
December Wrap Up
January TBR
Year in Books (2014)
Top 10 Books of 2014
and maybe (but that is a big maybe) a tour of my University book 'shelf'

Hopefully, expecting these videos will be enough to keep you guys here, but I also totally understand if you decide to leave. I'll be back as soon as possible, I promise you that.

Lots of Love,
Helen.

Juliet Immortal by Stacey Jay

Title: Juliet Immortal
Author: Stacey Jay
Series: Juliet Immortal Duology: Book One
Star Rating: ★★★★

"Juliet Capulet didn't take her own life. She was murdered by the person she trusted most, her new husband, Romeo Montague, a sacrifice made to ensure his own immortality. But what Romeo didn't anticipate was that Juliet would be granted eternity, as well, and would become an agent for the Ambassadors of Light. For 700 years, she's fought Romeo for the souls of true lovers, struggling to preserve romantic love and the lives of the innocent. Until the day she meets someone she's forbidden to love, and Romeo, oh Romeo, will do everything in his power to destroy that love." -Goodreads.

Over all I was pleasantly surprised by this story. I found it on the bargain shelf at my local bookstore and decided to give it a shot after seeing Ariel Bissett's review of it, saying that she gave it three out of five stars. I was expecting to enjoy it, but not as much as I did. I ended up falling in love with the story, the only thing that really bothered me was the serious case of Insta-love that this book suffers from. As soon as Juliet takes over Ariel's body, she immediately falls in love with this boy, and she goes back and forth between him and Romeo for quite a bit of the book. The thing that I enjoyed the most about this book, however, was Romeo. 

In the original play by Shakespeare, I absolutely hated Romeo. He annoyed me to no end, however in this book, I really enjoyed him. He was sarcastic and witty, and the way that he would push Juliet's buttons just made me giggle constantly. To be honest, the main reason that I want to continue on with this series is the fact that the next book follows Romeo instead of Juliet, and therefor promises me a good time. I definitely look forward to reading it.

I would recommend this book to anyone who didn't really enjoy the play when they had to read it in school. I am sure that some people who did enjoy it would like it as well, but they would have to be open to the spin that this book takes. It was a fun read, and I thoroughly enjoyed my time reading it.

NaNoWriMo 2014: Day 23

Good Afternoon Everyone!

Today is day 23 of NaNoWriMo, and as of 11:30 this morning, I have 50k words, and Scarlett is officially complete! I still can't believe that everything is said and done, and I am so happy that Scarlett is on paper, even if its a super, super rough draft.

I have spent the last little while working to format it properly for printing so that I can have the manuscript ready for editing and revisions. I love having a printed copy of my manuscript to work on.

This is going to be a super short entry, but I hope that you all are doing well! Have any of you won NaNoWriMo yet, or are you close to winning? Let me know down in the comments!

Lots of NaNo-Love,
Helen.

NaNoWriMo 2014: Day 22

Good Morning Everyone,
Today is day 22 of NaNoWriMo and the word count goal for today is 36,666, and my word count goal is still currently sitting at 40,076. Yes, I know. I didn't write at all yesterday.

I ended up spending some time with my friend Kelly, whom I hadn't seen in almost three weeks, even though we live in the same town and go to the same University. We used to hang out a lot before this month, but things got a bit crazy. We met up at the mall, she helped me with my grocery shopping, we got some lunch, and we went to an early showing of Guardians of the Galaxy which just got to the cheap theatre down the street from my University. We had a lot of fun, although I discovered that Kelly hadn't watched any Marvel movies up until yesterday, so now I have to make her watch everything. Marvel movie marathon, here we come!

Anyway, since I was spending time with Kelly, I decided to take a break from writing for the day (and Isadora gave me permission to do so, since she still hadn't read the three chapters that I had posted on Thursday). Today, I get to finish my last essay of the semester, and then I am going to dedicate my time and energy into writing as much of Scarlett as possible. I think that I can finish it today if I try hard enough, but we will have to see.

Again, this is going to be a short entry, but instead of it being because I'm falling asleep at my keyboard, it is simply because I have said everything that I wanted to say. I hope that you are all having a great time, we are finally in the last week of NaNoWriMo! It is crunch time! Are you keeping up, or is this the week of marathon writing so that you can still get to the 50k goal? Let me know in the comments how your novel is coming along.

Lots of NaNo-Love,
Helen.