Book Review: Find Momo: Hide and Seek With an Adventurous Border Collie - Andrew Knapp

 Find Momo: Hide and Seek With an Adventurous Border Collie - Andrew Knapp

Momo is a border collie.  He's hiding in all of these photos.

5/5 (it was amazing)

This book was adorable.  Momo is such a likable dog!  The scenery in this book is gorgeous.  I loved turning the pages and figuring out where Momo was hiding in the picture.  Some were easy to find and some were more difficult to find.  I looked at this book with my 6 year old and she absolutely loved it.  Left it sitting on my coffee table and my 9 year old picked it up and enjoyed looking at it.  Great book for all ages!

Book Review: Hollow City - Ransom Riggs

Hollow City - Ransom Riggs

The extraordinary journey that began in Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children continues as Jacob Portman and his new-found friends journey to London, the peculiar capital of the world.  There, they hope to find a cure for their beloved headmistress, Miss Peregrine.  But in this war-torn city, hideous surprises lurk around every corner.  And before Jacob can deliver the peculiar children to safety, he must make an important decision about his love for Emma Bloom.

Hollow City draws readers into a richly imagined world of telepathy and time loops, of sideshows and shapeshifters--a world populated with adult "peculiars," murderous wights, and a bizarre menagerie of uncanny animals.  Like its predecessor, this second novel in the Peculiar Children series blends thrilling fantasy with never-before-published vintage photography to create a one-of-a-kind reading experience.

3/5 stars (liked it)

I love the cover of this book and love how this picture is in the book and it's a character we meet.  This book was full of action as the children are always on the move.  We meet many new characters and I hope we come back to some of them in the next book.    I really like how things/characters will be described in a section of the book and then you turn the page and there is a picture to accompany the description.  The pictures are all very interesting and I think there was just the right amount of pictures.  Also I really like section at the beginning that contains the Peculiar Personae.  This has the names, pictures and description of powers of the major characters in the book.  This was great especially for someone who read the first book a while ago to remember who each person is.  Overall a very interesting book and I can't wait to read the third book in the series.

Book Review: Howl's Moving Castle - Diana Wynne Jones

Howl's Moving Castle - Diana Wynne Jones

Sophie has the great misfortune of being the eldest of three daughters, destined to fail miserably should she ever leave home to seek her fate.  But when she unwittingly attracts the ire of the Witch of the Waste, Sophie finds herself under a horrid spell that transforms her into an old lady.  Her only chance at breaking it lies in the ever-moving castle in the hills: the Wizard Howl's Castle.  To untangle the enchantment, Sophie must handle the heartless Howl, strike a bargain with a fire demon, and meet the Witch of the Waste head-on.  Along the way, she discovers that there's far more to Howl-and herself-than first meets the eye.

4/5 stars (really liked it)

So I have to admit that I watched the movie before reading the book, which is not what I usually do.  I LOVE, LOVE the movie and I LOVE, LOVE the book.  Although both have their differences they are both very entertaining.  I love the characters of Sophie (old Sophie more so than young Sophie), Califer and Michael.  As well as Sophie's two sisters Lettie and Martha.  Howl is likable and not likable at the same time, he is so vain and not at all nice at times.  But as Sophie finds out, he is more than he seems.  I love seeing Sophie grow as the book progresses.  I will definitely read the other books in the series.

Book Review: Teardrop – Lauren Kate

Teardrop – Lauren Kate

 

Never, ever cry…Seventeen-year-old Eureka won’t let anyone close enough to feel her pain.  After her mother was killed in a freak accident, the things she used to love hold no meaning.  She wants to escape, but one thing holds her back:  Ander, the boy who is everywhere she goes, whose turquoise eyes are like the ocean.  And then Eureka uncovers an ancient tale of romance and heartbreak, about a girl who cried and entire continent into the sea.  Suddenly her mother’s death and Ander’s appearance seems connected, and her life takes on a dark undercurrents that don’t make sense.  Can everything you love be washed away?

2/5 stars (it was ok)

I really wanted to like this book.  The cover is beautiful and it sounded very interesting.  I just did not care for the characters and didn’t find the actual story that interesting.  Ander doesn’t seem that caring and not very likeable.  And Eureka (what kind of a name was that) is whiny and selfish.  Overall the book was okay but I won’t be reading any more from the series.

Book Review: Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card

Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card

In order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race’s next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers.  A brilliant young boy, Andrew “Ender” Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother Peter, and the person he loves more than anyone else, his sister Valentine.  Peter and Valentine were candidates for the soldier-training program but didn’t make the cut—young Ender is the Wiggin drafted to the orbiting Battle School for rigorous military training.

Ender’s skills make him a leader in school and respected in the Battle Room, where children play at mock battles in zero gravity.  Yet growing up in an artificial community of young soldiers Ender suffers greatly from isolation, rivalry from his peers, pressure form the adult teachers, and an unsettling fear of the alien invaders.  His psychological battles include loneliness, fear that he is becoming like the cruel brother he remembers, and fanning the flames of devotion to his beloved sister.

Is Ender the general Earth needs?  But Ender is not the only result of genetic experiments.  The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway for almost as long.  Ender’s two older siblings are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways.  Between the three of them lie the abilities to remake the world.  If, that is, the world survives.

4/5 stars (really liked it)

My son and I read this book together.  Although I found that the battles were repetitive by the end of the book I understood why all those battles were in the book.  The book starts out with Ender being 7 years old and going in Battle School.  Everything that happens to him, from being isolated and constantly being tested is done by the teachers to make him the perfect general to defeat the Buggers.  By the end of the book Ender is 11 years old and ready for the Bugger war.  Although the ending surprised me quite a bit.  I will definitely be reading the next books in this series.

Book Club:

The Night Strangers – Chris Bohjalian

 

In a dusty corner of a basement in a rambling Victorian house in northern New Hampshire, a door has long been sealed shut with thirty-nine 6-inch-long carriage bolts.

The home’s new owners are Chip and Emily Linton and their twin ten-year-old daughters.  Together they hope to rebuild their lives there after Chip, an airline pilot, has to ditch his regional jet in Lake Champlain after double engine failure.  The body count?  Thirty-nine—a coincidence not lost on Chip when he discovers the bolts in his basement door.  Haunted by the accident, he and his family struggle to start again—unaware that sometimes the past will find you.

Bohjalian delivers a poignant and powerful story with all the hallmarks readers have come to expect: a palpable sense of place, an unerring sense of the demons that drive us, and characters we care about deeply.

The difference this time?  Some of those characters are dead.

2/5 stars (it was ok)

I picked this book up expecting to be really scared but was disappointed.  Maybe I’ve just read too many scary books and my scary meter is too high.  This story follows a pilot that is haunted by 3 ghosts of the passengers from the flight he crashed.  Also in the mix are these “herbalists” that refuse to call themselves witches.  I think the author either need to stick to ghosts or witches or written them to connect with each other more.  This book felt like two separate books.  Also the way it is narrated when we are following Chip, we are Chip and everything he does/thinks is referred to as “you”.  Also I did not care for the ending.

Our next book is:  Crow Lake - Mary Lawson