Night Star By Allison Noel

Damen and Ever are immortals. Not the blood-sucking, sun hating, garlic fearing type, just the ones who are unbelievably gorgeous and have eternal life. Sounds like "Happily Ever After". The only problem is that they can't touch each other without Damen dying. A rogue immortal named Roman was after revenge when Ever killed his immortal obsession Drina. The only reason Ever killed Drina was because Drina was after her, because Drina was also in love with Damen. That is some seriously messed up love square. Damen is dying, and Ever must either A) trust Roman and take an elixir from him to save Damen's life or B) watch him suffer and die. They're soul mates, so you can imagine which option she choose. The only problem was that Roman tricked Ever in to adding her blood into the mixture, if she wouldn't have done it they would truly live "Happily Ever after" but since she did if they're DNA ever intermingles Damen will burst into flames and become a pile of ash. Trying to win the antidote to the elixir Roman gave her, she gives him what he truly wants. To see where the dead immortal Drina resides in the afterlife. A place called "shadowland" is where dead immortals go, they live in total isolation and darkness forced to watch their past lives but only all of the mistakes they've made. She gives him a glimpse of this, and just when he is about to hand over the antidote Ever's reincarnated first love Jude kills him. Destroying the antidote in the process. Will Ever be truly happy in her life, or be tormented by true love. The series Immortals starts with Evermore, Blue Moon, Shadowland, Dark Flames Night Star, and ends with Everlasting.

Just Listen

I am only half way through this book, but so far it's pretty good. This book is told by Anabel's point of view, who is around 17 years old. Anabel has a rough time at school, especially because of her previous friend Sophie. Sophie is the most popular girl in school who is very mean to everyone. This is why Anabel decides not to be friends with her anymore. After the fall-out with Sophie, Anabel doesn't have many friends and she's also having a hard time at home. Her sister, Whitney, is severely ill with anorexia and almost dies during the book. Anabel's parents are always focused on Whitney after the incident, so Anabel doesn't get much attention around the house. It is when she meets Owen Armstrong that her life starts to change and get better. Together, they learn many things, especially the value of friendship and how they can learn different things from each other, since they are such different people and like different things.

The author, Sarah Dessen, really describes each character in detail. She shows Owen and Anabel's personalities very well, as well as revealing the conflict that the characters must go through at the very beginning of the book. She also describes Whitney's personalities and how its hard to live with someone who has to be watched over all the time, even though she's in high school. I like this book also because there are many different conflicts in Anabel's life, so it definitely keeps you reading.

This book is very good so far and I recommend it to anyone looking for a good, realistic fiction book to read.

Gathering Blue - blog post 1

I recently started reading Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry. The book is kind of the sequel to The Giver, a book I enjoyed when I read it a few years ago. I only started the book a couple days ago and am just to page 12. The book is a little confusing because so far the author has not explained usual parts of the culture and traditions of the people in the book. It is not even clear when the book is meant to take place. As of page 12, I have learned about Kira, the main character, who is a recent orphan. A lot of the early pages are spent describing Kira mourning her mother by camping at her grave. Kira is afraid that she will be kicked out of the village because she was born with a mangled leg and cannot do hard labor. She has no one else in the village that will take care of her and her home was burned down so that the sickness that killed her mother doesn’t spread. She only has one friend, a tyke (child) named Matt. The other women in the village don’t like her and want to take her land from her. She is very scared that they will succeed. The book has been pretty good so far and I am excited to get into it more.

Gathering Blue - blog post 3

Kira has been working very hard on the robe that the singer will be wearing on the day of the gathering and Thomas has also been working hard preparing the shaft for the sing. When the gathering of the villagers finally happened and Kira has been introduced as the weaver of the future and Thomas the carver of the future. Now Kira’s friend Matt has brought her father from a far land that is not supposed to have existed who is said to have died years ago and holds the secret to find the long lost color blue. As Kira explains her mother’s fate she starts to learn of the cruelty of her village. Kira has the opportunity to follow her father back to the land of the people that her own and other village’s left for dead but decides to stay in the end. I think she does this because she feels as the fixer of the robe she has the power to change the future of the village. I found this book very interesting yet a bit dull I think that there are more exciting choices out there so I would not
necessarily recommend it.

A Northern Light

Right now I am halfway through the historical fiction novel A Northern Light by Jennifer Donnelly. So far, I'm really liking it. The book is set in the early 1900s, from the point of view of sixteen year old Mattie Gokey, when a body of a girl turns up in the lake near the hotel she works. So far, Donnelly has been weaving two stories from Matties point of view into the book. The first one is the chain of events that leads up to Mattie working at the hotel, while the other is what Mattie is doing after the girl dies. Every chapter or so the view point is switched. I think this is a really unique way to write a story, and so far it's working really well. I want to know what Mattie's doing with the letters that the dead girl gave her, but at the same time I want to know how she got to working at the hotel when her father was so strict about having Mattie take care of the farm since her mom died and with her brother gone she's the next oldest. The author also does a great job of making the historical elements play a part in the story, but not one that's blatantly out there, like the author wrote it straight out of the 1900s with no other thought that culture could be different.
My favorite part of the book has to be Mattie's "word of the day". Mattie is a writer, and each day she flips to a page of her dictionary and points to a word, which she then memorizes the definition of and tries to use it that day. The chapter titles of the days before working at the hotel are written as the words of the day, however when it's the hotel story there is simply no chapter title, which I think is just a really cool way to show that working at the hotel has changed Mattie, or maybe she just doesn't have time for the things she loves anymore.
I'm really excited to read the rest of this book.

Gathering Blue

’m reading Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry. The first post I wrote was only upthrough page 12, but I am now up to page 106. Kira finds out from her little friend Matt that Vandara isgoing to try to get the Council of Guardians to kick her out of the village andgive the women her land for a place to pen in the village’s tykes (kids). The Council knows about Kira’s talentin weaving. They decide to giveKira’s land to Vandara and the other women, but Kira is saved for the job ofrepairing worn out parts of the Singer’s robe.


A little backgroundinformation:
The Singer is a person who sings a long song once ayear that describes the history of the villagers. The Singer wears a special robe has pictures of all the major eventsthat happened in the past. It isvery ancient and is kept in a special place. The Singer also carries a special shaft that has carvings onit to help him know where he is in the song.

Kira goes to live in a special part of the Council building,she is given all the tools and supplies she needs. Kira has a large living space with a real bathroom andrunning water, someone brings her good food. But there is one problem. She doesn’t know how to make the dyes needed for the threadsshe will be using since her mother died before she taught her. So Kira visits the person who worked onthe robe a long time ago and she teaches Kira how to make some of thedyes. Also living in the Councilbuilding is Thomas whose is assigned to work on the Singer’s shaft. Kira is not allowed to read or write(because she is a girl) so Thomas makes her a special box to store her threadsthat has pictures on it to help her remember which plants make whichcolors. There is a lot to rememberabout dying thread and Thomas helps by writing it down for her. She spends her days working on the robeand planning the garden she will plant to make dyes for her threads.

CAL

Goose Girl

I have just started reading the goose girl and so far it has been a great book. This book is slightly below my reading level but still a very good read. This book is about a young princess named Ani, who is about to become Queen, until her mother sends her away and gives Ani's brother the crown. Ani gets sent away to marry a king, not in her kingdom. It is a years journey to get to this kingdom, and on the way Ani is betrayed by her lady-in-waiting Shelia. Shelia's goal is to take Ani's title and marry the young king in Ani's name. Ani ran away from her party and is now lost in the woods trying to find a way out. That is my stopping point in the book.