Sweet! Blue hair!

Daughter of Smoke and Bone

By Laini Taylor

Lets play a game; it's called "Guess How Much Teya Liked This Book." I'll give you a hint: Mortal Instruments and Infernal Devices much.

Seventeen year-old art student Karou is a mystery to everyone around her; only telling truths about herself that she knows no-one will believe. But they're true. All of them. Yes, the half-bestial creatures in her sketchbook are real, and yes her hair really does grow out of her head that colour. What with her mysterious scars, her collection of over twenty languages, and her popping off on a regular basis to perform "errands," it's no wonder everyone always asks her Who are you? And it's a question she asks herself every day. But when a series of scorched hand prints appear on doors all over the world and a fiery stranger comes into her life, Karou discovers secrets about herself that she didn't necessarily want to know.

I had already read two of Laini Taylor's books; Blackbringer and Silksinger, so I had a pretty good idea that I was going to enjoy Daughter of Smoke and Bone. What I failed to realize was just how much I would love it. (I mean seriously, being ranked next to The Mortal Instruments is pretty impressive) The imagery used is beautiful, and so vivid, that you can imagine yourself wandering through the markets of Marrakesh, or walking down the cold streets of Prague.

“The streets of Prague were a fantasia scarcely touched by the twenty-first century—or the twentieth or nineteenth, for that matter. It was a city of alchemists and dreamers, its medieval cobbles once trod by golems, mystics, invading armies. Tall houses glowed goldenrod and carmine and eggshell blue, embellished with Rococo plasterwork and capped in roofs of uniform red. Baroque cupolas were the soft green of antique copper, and Gothic steeples stood ready to impale fallen angels. The wind carried the memory of magic, revolution, violins, and the cobbled lanes meandered like creeks. Thugs wore Motzart wigs and pushed chamber music on street corners, and marionettes hung in windows, making the whole city seem like a theater with unseen puppeteers crouched behind velvet.” 

See what I mean?

The plot details come at the perfect timing so that they're spread out enough to keep you hooked, and trying to guess what's happening, but close enough together, that you don't get bored, and move on. You can see the careful structuring that went into this book to keep it mysterious and suspenseful.

Karou is a very well developed character. More of her personality and character, along with her history is discovered as the story progresses.

“She moved like a poem and smiled like a sphinx.” 

Also, she has blue hair, and that's just really cool. She has a very distinctive voice, and a wry sort of humor. In fact, all the characters have unique voices, and I don't mean that just because the audiobook narrator reads each character in a different voice.

While this does not pertain to the story per se, I really like the cover. Despite the saying, when I buy books, covers factor into the decision. Obviously I wouldn't condemn a book purely because of it's cover, but quite often what jumps out at me is a cool cover. I haven't read it yet, but I feel compelled to include the cover of the sequel, Days of Blood and Starlight as well. There's also a post over on Laini Taylor's blog about the cover of the German edition, and the secret it holds within...


Feisty chick-o-meter: 10/10
Age rating: 16+
Rating: 10/10
Book or audiobook: Audiobook
Stand alone or series: Series
Last word: End
Length: 432 pages

Yeah... Loving this book was kind of inevitable

Clockwork Angel, The Infernal Devices: Book One
By Cassandra Clare

So, this is the second Cassandra Clare book in one month-but it’s a different series!

Clockwork Angel is set in the same world as The Mortal Instruments series, but in the 1800s. It centres around sixteen year-old Tessa Gray, who, after her aunt’s death, travels to London to live with her brother. When she arrives, she is captured and imprisoned by two warlocks, the Dark Sisters, who force her to use her power of shape changing – a power she did not realize she possessed – and prepare her for a marriage to the elusive character known only as The Magister. Tessa, now knowing what she is – a warlock – finds herself thrown together with a group of shadow hunters who are trying to stop the Magister from taking over the city, and Tessa has to choose between finding her brother and saving London.

I came to The Infernal Devices Series from the Mortal Instruments Series with a number of expectations about what this new series would be like. Clockwork Angel exceeded them all. It’s just as funny as the first series, but I think this book really ramps it up a notch in terms of the writing and the plot; there are a lot of twists that you don’t expect.

The characters are very different from the first series. It would have been very easy to have a second series with the same type of characters, and the same character dynamics, but all the relationships are very different.

Of course, because this series is set almost 150 years earlier there’s only one character that carries over; the immortal, and flamboyant warlock Magnus Bane, however there are characters who are ancestors of the characters in the Mortal Instruments. Names like Lightwood, Wayland, Herrondale, and Penhollow carry over, even if the individual characters do not.

Tessa is a very interesting character; most heroines from books set in this period, and from this genre, are girls who refuse to behave as society expects of them, and instead wear pants and run off and become highway men, or pirates… Tessa, on the other hand, while she is not a frivolous character,  has the opinion that women should not wear pants or fight. Of course this doesn’t mean she’s not a strong-willed, feisty character. Over the course of the story, the feisty side in her comes out. She’s a very smart well-read character, and is one of the few characters in the story who can “manage” one of the more arrogant shadow hunters - Will – with the witty come backs she always seems to have on hand.

“Dear God,” said Will, looking from Charlotte to Nate and back again. “Is there anything that makes women sillier than the sight of a wounded young man?”
Tessa slitted her eyes at him. “You might want to clean the rest of the blood of your face before you continue arguing in that vein.”
Will threw his arms up in the air and stalked off.Charlotte looked at Tessa, a half smile curving the side of her mouth. “I must say, I rather like the way you manage Will.”
Tessa shook her head. “No one manages Will.” 

If anything, Tessa is proof that you don’t have to hate dresses and femininity to be hard-core.

“If you have a soul of a warrior, you are a warrior. Whatever the color, the shape, the design of the shade that conceals it, the flame inside the lamp remains the same. You are that flame.” 

Feisty chick-o-meter: 10/10
Age rating: 15+
Rating: 10/10
Book or audiobook: Book
Stand alone or series: Series
Last word: Is

How many explosions can you fit into one movie?

Iron Man 3
Starring Robert Downey Jr, Gwyneth Paltrow and Don Cheadle

Much excitement was involved in the anticipation of Iron Man 3. I was not disappointed. Iron Man 3 is pretty much beginning-to-end awesomeness.

Yo, listen up, here’s the story, about a little guy that lives in a blue world, and all day, and all night and everything he sees is just blue, like him, inside and outside*… But I digress.

Iron Man 3 is set after The Avengers, and Tony Stark is building new suits, and refusing to acknowledge just how messed up he is. But when an international terrorist called the Mandarin goes after everyone Stark cares about, not to mention the President of the United States, he has to suit up and blow up lots of things, including an entire oil tanker. Witty dialogue ensues, and oh, did I mention? More explosions. These explosions are not the lame, hokey kind of explosions, though;  they're the kind that makes everyone in the theatre stand up and yell “AWESOME!” or at least they would if everyone lived inside my head.

One of the reasons that I like the Iron Man movies, and The Avengers as well, is that they're about smart people, who just are, without any justification. Sure Tony Stark is a little arrogant, but I like that he can be a genius, and invent all this ground-breaking technology, and be this super cool action hero at the same time. Not many movies now days show amazing, never before seen technology, but Iron Man 3 has some pretty cool gadgets. Also, Stark’s just really funny. Ben Kingsley plays The Mandarin and is a really funny, twitchy character, actually, a lot like an older, slightly less insane Captain Jack Sparrow, without dreadlocks.

I think one of the best parts for me, was that Pepper Potts started defending herself. Gone are the days of Pepper needing to be rescued at every plot development, this time, she actually got to fight and do the saving for once.

Also, the soundtrack is really good, and full of songs to walk in slow motion to, or to blow stuff up to…

I really don’t have any complaints about Iron Man 3. I enjoyed every bit of it. But remember, this is a Marvel movie, so you have to wait until the end of the credits to leave


*Blue (Da be dee) by Italian band, Eiffel 65 is played in the beginning of the movie. (Procede with caution, though, while the song is cool, the music video is a little strange)

Feisty chick-o-meter: 9/10
Age rating: 12+
Rating: 10/10
Number of explosions: I lost count after 37

I want my life back

The Princess Diaries (Why did I watch this?)

Starring Anne Hathaway and Julie Andrews.

For the first movie review ever on this blog, I commence with a movie I really didn’t like (okay, maybe that’s a bit too nice). In my last blog I promised to find a book I didn’t like to review but apparently I have a hard time finding books I don’t like.

Okay so here's the story: fifteen, year-old Social Outcast is an invisible sophomore, with really psycho hair, until her grandmother comes to town and informs her that she’s the crown princess of some imaginary land. Princess classes ensue, with a music sequence where she’s made pretty. But oh no, will she be ready in time for the royal ball? And will she choose to accept her role, or abdicate the throne?

All this I predicted within the first five minutes of the movie, and then that’s it in terms of plot development. No mystery, no plot twist, no ticking time bomb (unless you count being pretty in time for the ball), nothing remotely unpredictable happened in this movie.

I suffered through The Princess Diaries. At the point where they plucked her eyebrows and straightened her hair I shouted “They took her soul!” and about ten minutes after that I started yelling “I WANT MY LIFE BACK,” and kept yelling it throughout the rest of the movie.  I’m sorry, but hasn’t this storyline been rehashed a thousand times, with only minor tweaking?

The one mildly redeeming part of the movie is that Mia (remember, the social outcast?) makes faces during princess classes, and that she stands up to a bully. Once. Yes, this genre of movie does appeal to some people, but can’t we at least have some level variety between plots?

The Princess Diaries is based on a book which is, from what I understand, pretty much the same story line, but over the course of about six books. There is no way I will ever read any of them unless I’m stranded on a desert island and they’re the only thing that will keep me coherent. And maybe not even then.

Feisty chick-o-meter: 5/10

Age rating: 10+

Rating: 2/10