happy easter!

Hope you have a fabulous day!

the library dun-dun-DUUUUNNNN

Today was miracle at the library day.  I’m not joking.

Today I was talking to my sister (well IM-ing because that’s what we do around these here parts) about this story here.  So if you remember from this post here, I hit the library jackpot and got books I was super excited to find.  Four of the eight were 7 day loaners.  Usually the 7 day books are impossible to get and can never be renewed because there’s always a wait list for them.  I’ve been reading three of the four since yesterday hoping to finish by today (the day they’re due), but I'm only about 2/3 of the way through with them.  I hate returning books late.  If you want to know why you can read this post here.

So I signed onto my Santa Clara County Library app on my iPhone (probably my favorite app ever) and crossed my fingers that I could renew at least The Iron Queen because I hadn’t even started that one.  I still have to read The Iron Daughter – which I have.  I was able to renew all four!  This, my friends is what I like to call a library miracle.

When I was online I noticed that I had a couple of books ready for pick up.  One was a vegan cookbook I wanted to try out so I figured I would stop by the library and pick them up.  When I got there, not two, but four books were ready for me to pick up and one of them is The Dark and Hollow Places by Carrie Ryan.

I had to restrain myself from doing a happy dance in the library. 

Have you read Carrie Ryan’s Forest of Hands and Teeth books?  YOU MUST!  They are AMAZING!  Let me tell you about them.

The first book is called The Forest of Hands and Teeth (duh) and it takes place sometime in the future, but that’s really just a guess.  At some point a disease has spread in the world infecting people like crazy and turning them into zombies.  Mary has lived in her village her whole life and has known nothing else.  As far as she knows there is no life outside of the fences that keep her town safe from the zombies.  Until one day a stranger appears and Mary begins to challenge everything she’s ever been told.

In The Dead-Tossed Waves there’s a completely different set of characters and circumstances and it seems to take place some 15 years or so after TFH&T.  Towns are still protected by fences and guards, but we get a glimpse of what is happening outside the fences and what the disease is really capable of.

I usually am not a big fan of series in which no character from the previous novels are carried over.  What I like best about series book is that you feel like you’ve gotten to know certain characters so well, but these books are just so good.  They’re scary and hopeful and fantastically written.  I'm not doing a very good job of selling these books, I know, I just don't want to give too much away!  You must read these books!

So anyway ... yeah, I’ve got to stay away from the library until I finish these books.

if i stay

Usually I try to stay away from spoilers in my reviews.  Especially if I liked the book because I genuinely want you to go out and read it, but I don’t think that I can avoid the spoilers this time.  However, before you sign off (only to come back after you’ve read the book, of course) let me tell you that I thought this book was magnificent.

Mia is a 17 year old high school senior on the brink of everything.  An unexpected snow day leaves her and her family with the promise of a day full of good friends and time together.  Something happens along the way and Mia is left forced to make a decision that will literally change her life forever.

So that’s the generic synopsis.

This was a super short read for me.  I checked it out on my Nook from the library today and finished it in a little under an hour.  It was 119 pages on my Nook, but I’m not sure how that translates into printed word form, but still it was a quick and easy read.

Well, I take that back.  It wasn’t an easy read.  It was one of those books that grabs your heart and squeezes it so tight you actually feel as if you can’t breathe and you must set the book down for a second.  The story is devastating and unbelievably sad, but I couldn’t stop reading it.  I had to know.

**********Now come the smallest little spoilers I can manage.**********

I love that Mia wanted to spend time with her family.  That she wasn’t ashamed of taking her brother (who was 10 years younger) trick or treating.  I find that it’s too common in YA fiction for the main character to loathe her family in that teen angsty way.  It was refreshing to find something different.

I spent the first half of the book on the verge of tears.  The cataclysmic event starts almost immediately.  You’re left in disbelief, much like Mia is.  The writing is melodic and lyrical and I would catch myself rolling the phrases around in my head to try to commit them to memory.  I wanted to remember them.  Desperately.

Gayle Forman infuses a humanity to the story that is generally missing in YA.  In a place where things are so clinical and distant she finds a way to show you how incredibly beautiful people can be.

“The anesthesiologist absentmindedly strokes my temples through her latex gloves.”

The struggle people go through in a time of great devastation to strive for normalcy.

“…Gramp sees me and he strides across the floor to my bed.  “Hello, duck,” he says.”

If I Stay is a love story not so deftly hidden in this tragedy.  Almost as if recollecting, Mia recounts meeting her boyfriend Adam, falling in love and struggling with choosing a future with or without him.  It’s about loving the people who are there for you and finding out how they pull themselves up and fight for you, especially when you can’t do it for yourself.

“The funny thing was, I never really bought into Kim’s notion that they were somehow bound together through me – until just now when I saw her half carrying him down the hospital corridor.”

I kept on valiantly throughout the book, holding back tears and nearly choking on the lump that had formed in my throat.  Until I got here:

“I know that all the magic kisses in the world probably couldn’t have helped him today.  But I would do anything to have been able to give him one.”

I lost it.  Even typing that out just now tears are blurring the screen.

A book doesn’t have to be happy or have some socially conscience message to be a good book.  It doesn’t necessarily have to have a happy ending to be a favorite.  It just has to make you forget where you are and feel something.  Gayle Forman accomplishes that in spades.

explain this to me

Emma has a million barbie dolls or whatever, princess dolls, monster high, you know what I mean.  She got these two for her birthday this past weekend and has been on me non stop to remove the 700 twistie things to get them out of their boxes. 

Five minutes after brushing their hair they become naked.  None of her barbies stay clothed for more than a couple of minutes.  It’s so predictable.  She has tons of barbie clothes yet none of the barbies are wearing them.

I just don’t get it.

glimpses of the weekend

This weekend was a busy one.  We went to check out my sister’s new house and then we had a combined birthday party for Emma, Paris & Johnathan.  It was a long weekend full of family and fun!

Beautiful backyard!

So many pretty flowers blooming in the yard.

Chloe seemed to be the only one interested in bubbles.

Emma’s roasting her rock ‘marshmallow’.

Dominic is showing me that it’s a moon rock, not a marshmallow.

Across the street, a castle in the front yard!

Cute tea party decoration at the birthday party.  Paris had a Mad Hatter Tea Party the weekend before with her school friends.

So excited to be in matching dresses!

Cupcakes by Sweet Simple Things.  Always awesome!

Even though Aaron’s not a ‘little’ kid he can’t escape the Happy Birthday song!

I don’t know why, but I love this picture so much!  My nephew is seriously the cutest little boy I know.  He ate all his lunch and waited patiently for his cupcake and then he ate all the frosting and asked for another!  He’s usually so on the go it’s hard to catch a good picture of him.  I might just have to print this one up and put it on the wall!

So that was our busy weekend.  Glad to have survived it!  Now Emma’s counting down the days until her birthday party with all her preschool friends and other buddies.  We go from a party with 6 kids to a party with around 20 kids.  *sigh*  Least we have a couple of weeks to prepare for that one!

Hope everyone had a great weekend!  Here’s looking forward to a quiet week.  I hope!

project 365, week 15

What a busy week!  Books, belly aches & birthday parties!  I’ve been lagging on the blog and keeping up with my bloggie friends and it doesn’t look like next week will be any less busy!  I’ll just keep snapping away though, hoping to get some good pics!

4.11.11 – Just some marbles in a candle holder in Emma’s bathroom.  Playing around with Hipstamatic a bit using the flash.

4.12.11 – Another Hipstamatic pic taken mostly because I remembered I didn’t have a picture for today and I spent most of the day feeling like poo so I drank this to help settle the babe in the belly.  Ginger Ale is gooooood stuff!

4.13.11 – We’re not coffee drinkers in this house, but we are some tea guzzlers!  We’ve got more tea than you can shake a stick at (whatever that means)!

4.14.11 – Today Emma graduated from Jelly Fish to Puffer Fish.  She’s got her t-shirt and certificate (or as she calls it, her birth certificate) to prove it.

4.15.11 – As I mentioned in this post here I went into the library to pick up one book and walked out with eight.

4.16.11 – My sister and her family are moving into a new house and the entire backyard has jasmine all over!  I love it!  It smells heavenly!

4.17.11 – Since these three are all only a couple of weeks apart we decided to throw a combined family birthday party for them.  They had a blast and surprisingly, the dresses held up pretty well!

braver than she believes

Today this greeted me in the mailbox:

A postcard from the lovely Busy Bee Lauren.  She really is just the sweetest.  Isn’t it so much fun to get mail that is from a real live person??  I think it is.

I started reading Lauren’s blog quite some time ago and have seen so much happen to her in the last few years.  She is inspiring, hilarious and multi-talented.  She’s been working on finding her bliss, trying to match how she feels about herself with what we all know she is on the inside & the outside.  And I know it’s hard.  I’ve been there.

What never ceases to amaze me about Lauren is that even when she’s feeling not so great about herself she always takes the time to think of others.  Taking time out of her day to send out some postcards just to brighten someone else’s day…it doesn’t get nicer than that.

Now, if you’re not reading Lauren’s blog already I gasp in disbelief and insist you run on over right now and get yourself acquainted with the Lovely Lauren.