Which Characters from my Favorite Books am I?

I saw this from Margaret at Weird Zeal this summer, and loved it. Mostly because I’m secretly in love with Buzzfeed-style quizzes. So even though it’s not really a tag, I am unabashedly stealing it. Hope you don’t mind Margaret!

Six of Crows

Quiz: Which Six of Crows character are you? (Grishaverse.com)

What I think I’ll get: I don’t know, I haven’t read this series. So sue me.

What I got: Kaz

Y’all tell me, is that good? I don’t know that I completely agree with this assessment, I’m not usually considered a leader or tricky… but I do like to plan things!

Do I Have That Book? Tag

I saw this tag on Kristin Kraves Books forever ago. She always does the most interesting tags! She didn’t tag me, but it was just such an interesting post that I saved it! And then … never got to it. So here we are! This should be interesting because I have a lot of books, but not that much variety. Well, let’s see what happens, shall we?

1. Do you have a book with deckled edges?

Oh, thousands. The first one that comes to mind is Eragon, which I was absolutely obsessed with in high school. Personally I’m not that in to deckled edges (GASP!). I like to play with the pages while I read, and that’s a lot harder to do with deckled edges. But I’m not going to complain about them either.

90s Movie Tag

I saw this tag oh so many months ago on The Bibliphagist, and I just looooooove 90s movies so much that I bookmarked it for a rainy day. And since I’m feeling like a tag this evening, here we go!

She’s All That

An odd pairing, but they still fit perfectly

I mean, like, every couple in The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet! It’s kind of the point of the book, that it explores how relationships might become more complex if we discover more life out there, and how that will re-define what we think of as a weird relationship. Like, how do inter-species couplings work? What about how different planets have different ways of thinking about family and relationships? Can you have a relationship with a computer? It’s all so BRILLIANT, but it’s also touching and relatable, and GAH! Read it!

Sorting Hat Sunday: Percy Jackson

Percy looked around the Great Hall awkwardly. He didn’t belong here. All of these kids, they’d grown up knowing who they were. They were more powerful than him, they probably didn’t all have ADHD, the probably knew what the heck they were doing. But Percy didn’t.

Percy didn’t even know what he was doing here. His mom hadn’t explained anything, she’d just hurried him onto the mysterious red train on a platform Percy couldn’t even see almost moments before. He guessed it had something to do with his dad, but he’d never met him.

Whatever, at least he was away from Stinky Gabe. There was no way anyone here was as bad as Stinky Gabe.

Feeling reassured, he stood up a little straighter. He would make his mother proud. Whatever challenge Professor McGonagall was about the place before him, Percy would face it as best he could. As long as they didn’t ask him to read anything… Gods forbid.

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Percy Jackson

I’ve put off sorting the Heroes of Olympus, despite it being the only book anyone has ever requested, specifically because I was worried that everyone would just end up in Gryffindor. Because, I mean, they’re heroes. Seriously, where else would I put Percy? Seaweed Brain wouldn’t fit in Ravenclaw (seriously, his utter lack of basic vocabulary is frankly embarrassing) and he doesn’t have an ambitious bone in his body. One could make the argument for Hufflepuff, except for that he’s pretty lazy. This is a no-brainer.

Calendar Girls November: Best Middle Book in a Series

 

I’ll be honest with you guys, the actual answer to this prompt for me is not the book I’m going to be picking. You see, of the three The Lord of the Rings volumes, The Two Towers is my favorite. But I’ve always considered The Lord of the Rings to be one novel. It was published as three because at the time a 1,000 page novel was unthinkable, but Tolkien intended it to be one book. And the three books don’t really stand on their own. They’re meant to be read back to back to back.

So I’m not picking that.

Instead I had a very difficult time choosing between two books, both in the same series. It’s a five part series, and books three and four are both AMAZING, and I love them for different reasons. It’s so hard to choose!

So, as I do, I chose the one that made my heart gush all the romantic feels. Especially the end. Good gargoyles, that end!

My favorite middle book in a series is…

Back to School Book Recs

Well folks! It’s official, summer vacation is over. I now have an ENTIRE WEEK of the 2018/2019 school year under my belt, and I am determined to make it a good one.

I heard someone say recently that August feels more like the new year than January, and for me that is so true. I find myself making all kinds of New Year’s Resolutions, about being a teacher and just about life in general. So if your New Year’s Resolution is to read more, or to promote a culture of reading in your family, this is the post for you!

I’m going to be recommending my favorite book for kids in each grade level K-12. I can’t guarantee that each book is going to be right for every kid in the world, but I’m trying to recommend things that I think most kids will like. I’m especially paying attention to books I think would be enjoyed by both boys and girls.

So here we go! Back to school recommendations coming your way.

Elementary

Kindergarten – Hop on Pop

This is kind of a long book, so if you’ve never read anything substantial with your kids before, you might want to ease into this one! I recommend subtly skipping pages in the middle so they feel like they’ve accomplished something big.

What I love about Hop on Pop is that beginning readers can work on their phonics and sight words with the big words at the top of the page, but then parents can read the longer sentences. But by the end of the year they should be able to read everything in this book, with help, of course. I also love how silly and fun this is, perfect for young imaginations! It is impossible to go wrong with Dr. Seuss.

Top 5 Animal Sidekicks

One thing that can really make a good book GREAT for me is a fun animal buddy. You know, that fuzzy companion that just really gives you the feels. The one that if anything bad happens to you WILL take down the author, and I think you all know which one I’m talking about. Today I want to celebrate these wonderful creatures in all their fluffy glory!

1. Hedwig

Art by rattenfanger

from Harry Potter
If you don’t care about Hedwig you either haven’t read Harry Potter or you don’t have a heart. There, I said it. She’s beautiful and sassy and affectionate and Harry’s first friend. An entire generation adores owls because of Hedwig.

The Cliche Book Tag

I always like a good cliche, and this tag is full of them! Thanks to The Orangutan Librarian for tagging me!

Actions Speak Louder Than Words
A book that wasn’t or couldn’t be better than the movie.

This question comes up a lot, and I always choose the same 2 or 3 books, so let’s do something different this time! The Princess Diaries is a book that I really liked as a young teen, but compared to the movie is awkward and lame. The characters are so much more likable in the movie!

The Grass is Always Greener on the Other Side
A Rags to Riches or Riches to Rags Story

Haha, can I choose The Princess Diaries again? In all seriousness, Thomas Cromwell is the original pull-yourself-up-by-your-own-bootstraps guy, so Wolf Hall is a great example! I’m so nervous to see what happens to him in the third book, whether he’ll fall back down to rags. And I know I could just look it up, but I don’t want to spoil the book for myself!

What’s In My Bookshelf Tag

It seems like a million years ago that Naty tagged me in a Tag she created herself, the What’s In My Bookshelf Tag. I really really enjoyed it, but she tagged me after I went back to work from maternity leave, and safe to say I didn’t have a lot of time for blogging. So now I’m finally getting to it! Thanks for the tag Naty! If you’ve never visited her blog, you should, she rocks!

Rules:

• Link back to me so I can see everyone’s answers! (Naty’s Bookshelf)
• Also link back to the person who tagged you!
• Name one book for each category; try not to repeat books to make this more fun!
• Tag at least 5 people

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A Library Book

I currently don’t have any library books, I’ve been working on my Christmas gift/Reddit Gift Exchange stack. But later this week (maybe tomorrow???) I’ll be heading to the library to check out Shadow and Bone and it’s sequels. I typically read an old YA series I never got around to during summer vacation!

Favorite Dragon Books

It’s not much of a secret around here that I absolutely love dragons. Any type of dragon! Big dragons, small dragons, tame dragons, wild dragons, evil dragons, dragons that fly, dragons that don’t, fire breathing dragons, gold hoarding dragons, intelligent dragons, non-talking dragons, I pretty much love them all. My favorite dragon books usually present dragons in a new or different way from the books I’m used to reading.

So without further ado, and in no particular order, here are some of my favorite books about or featuring dragons.

His Majesty’s Dragon

An alternate history of the Napoleonic Wars where in addition to the army and navy, each side has an aeronautical division.

“When HMS Reliant captures a French frigate and seizes the precious cargo, an unhatched dragon egg, fate sweeps Captain Will Laurence from his seafaring life into an uncertain future – and an unexpected kinship with a most extraordinary creature. Thrust into the rarified world of the Aerial Corps as master of the dragon Temeraire, he will face a crash course in the daring tactics of airborne battle. For as France’s own dragon-borne forces rally to breach British soil in Bonaparte’s boldest gambit, Laurence and Temeraire must soar into their own baptism of fire.”

If you enjoy historical fiction and fantasy, this mash-up is absolutely brilliant!