Remarkably unremarkable

New review on Confederacy of Books, found here.

Title: Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
Pages: 400 pages (hardcover)
Genre: Fantasy
Audience: Young Adult
Other Books: Lament: The Faerie Queen's Deception, Ballad (October 1, 2009)

Sam is a wolf, but he also kind of isn't. Grace is a teenage girl, but she also kind of isn't. They have a relationship, but they also kind of don't.

( Read more... )

m_stiefvater is hosting a drawing, and I kind of want to win it. So I am participating by doing what she says you must do to win the drawing (or be entered, anyway).

This is a teaser from Maggie Stiefvater's BALLAD, a novel involving homicidal faeries and kissing that's coming out October 1st.

He turned towards me. For a long moment, he stood facing me. I was held, anchored to the ground – not by his music, which still called and pushed against the music already in my head and said grow rise follow – but by his strangeness. By his fingers, spread over the ground, holding something into the earth, by his shoulders, squared in a way that spoke of strength and unknowability, and most of all, by the great, thorny antlers that grew from his head, spanning the sky like branches.

Then he was gone, and I missed his going in the instant that the sun fell off the edge of the hill, abandoning the world to twilight.

Buy it here. Enter the contest at Maggie's blog here.

My Saturday post for Blog Every Day for a Year, today consisting of lists - things I like and things I don't. Found here.

Also on France; found here.

On France. Here.

I posted today - as with all Saturdays - over at Blog Every Day 2009. So, if you care, my post is there.

(I didn't need to post this on my Livejournal, because presumably anyone who cares that I post on Blog Every Day 2009 already follows it there on blogspot... I just wanted a post for today)

Book number two (and I'm one book behind on the affectionately-named RaBaDiJ, except not really at all) is The Hundred Secret Senses by Amy Tan. I quite like her writing - we read an excerpt from The Joy Luck Club, her first novel, in eighth grade (so about two years ago now) and, while every other student was either confused or bored, I was enchanted by her prose. It was beautiful (and still is - it's curious how we seem to switch into an absolute past even when something continues into the present, as there or when we describe the traits someone we still know had when, say, we met them, even if they haven't changed significantly).

( Oh, plot )

The book, like Tan's others, is written in elegantly simplistic prose. Although not necessarily highly literary, it is readable and gently thought-provoking, leading the reader through a consideration of the relationships of the characters and the various situations they find themselves in which lead to the (largely unnecessary) pain and desolation they constantly find themselves the victims of. The characters are well-rounded and endearing (enough), although I did at times find the conflict between Olivia and Simon to be tiring and the ending, though probably what was best for the book, emotionally unsatisfying (of course, I should be used to emotionally unsatisfying endings by now - I am a fan of dystopian fiction*), and the book, as a whole, was thoroughly enjoyable.

*1984? Really? Good job, Orwell, making the perfect ending really depressing.

I'm going to say now that my goal for this month this to have an average of one post per day, as well as (at least) one book per day. I've gotten a bit of a late start (it being the second, even if I'm going to set the date of this entry as yesterday - aha). This may be difficult, given that I may or may not have easy access to a computer/the internet after June 23. And June lasts until the thirtieth of June. So. 

Yesterday I wrote an epic post for my requisite Saturday post on Blog Every Day 2009 outlining the extreme basics of the whole of American history (wherein the Great Depression is 'a bit of a downer' and the Revolutionary War was 'a war that lots of people thought really important'), partly out of a quasi-challenge by one of my fellows to tell about where we live (as I extended a challenge to the Canadian participants to tell all of their country). I had originally intended to write about Kentucky, confirming or dispelling various stereotypes, but then I started writing the actual post and couldn't stop. So, if you're at all interested, I'll give you a link.

I'm actually trying to post daily for as long as I can. I'm not sure how long I'm going to last at posting daily - as I'm panicked, and, when I'm panicked, I tend to flap about the house like a trapped insect with an inability to land anywhere (I also struggle with my figurative language). But I'm trying it nonetheless, and this is my post for the twenty-seventh of may.

( I just like having lj-cuts on my entries )

I have a pre-calculus final tomorrow (even though the actual subject on which we're being test is... calculus) and I'm absolutely panicked, as mentioned above. The thing is, I cannot get a bad grade and maintain an A - if I get a B, I will sob for weeks, hate myself, and never (never) get over it. I still wince at the memory of that C I got in math in fifth grade, and all the B's after it. If only B's were from a ninety to a one hundred - but alas, those two extra points may be the death of me. The problem is, though, that I had an A - a good, stable A - earlier this semester, then it fell to a 93 and has been hovering there for several weeks. I just don't know if I'll do poorly enough on this upcoming test to tip the scale and spell my doom. Add to that the fact that if I get a poor grade, it will probably just be poor enough to get me a 91 - and all you need for an A is a 91.5. I plan on groveling for extra credit - I might even cry. I'm honestly willing to do anything that doesn't involve nudity, mutilation, or killing people (although selling a part of my soul is something I am willing to consider).*

*I jest, I jest.

I am more than a bit of a masochist. Now, I abhor physical pain in its many forms - thinking about getting a shot, for example, causes me to squirm uncomfortably and feel like throwing up. But the pain of seeing stupid people - and being so shocked by their close-mindedness and idiocy - is a kind of exquisite agony. This is why I read through conversations on Twilight fan-forums, follow the discussions on the Hulu discussion boards, and spend hours of my life thinking about things posted by people who may or may not be trolls on Fandom!secrets.

I have no excuses for myself - simply explanations.

( Sexism and Misunderstanding )

It's really just generally a tricksy topic. And, having read the myriad comments for the secret on the actual community where it was originally posted (fandomsecrets), the commentors there covered everything I wanted to say much better and more succinctly. Ah, well.

*Well, I'd like to think I've matured. I can say if I definitely have, though.
**Here's looking at you, Big Bang Theory - Penny is a moron. Fix it.

I really don't. Now, I realize that very few people actually care just how often I post on my journal, based on past comments and my current number of friends I don't regret or lament this small number of readers (as I often, when I try to go back and read past entries, end up cringing at my amateurish attempts), and I'm surprised I have any at all.

( Blogging and that )

In miscellaneous news, I want to get a job at a library. There's currently a position as a page open at the closest branch of my local library, for which I am, I think, more than qualified, but I don't know (and even kind of doubt) if it will still be open when school ends - as I cannot apply, because I cannot work the hours required, before then.

At the tender age of nine, I was transferred from the 'normal' school programme to the G&T ('Gifted and Talented,' which does not fit about 98% of all 'G&T' students, myself included) one, then called QUEST - I have no idea what that stands for, or if it's even an acronym. Or if that's how it's spelled (the education here is exceptionally poor). Regardless, I remained in this programme from age nine to age fourteen (grades four through eight), upon which time I, in a fit of insanity, chose to attend my current magnet programme rather than the continuation of my former one, my only other reasonable alternative.

( Oh, Dunbar )

*As in, if I don't, I will punch somebody in the face.
**I just didn't cope well with change.

I can now also be found (on Saturdays, anyway) posting to Blog Every Day 2009, an outgrowth of BEDA (in which I participated this year, and plan on participating in in years to come.

Although I spend a great deal of time cursing my general personality (I'm awkward with people, I have no self-esteem, I have limited understanding of what is acceptable and what is not, I'm a perfectionist who cannot attain even commendable mediocrity - I could go on), I also spend a great deal of time wondering at just how well I am suited for myself. ( Oh, my thoughts - how feeble my mind is )

This all came up earlier as I was talking to a classmate of mine (from German), who has, in fact, been mentioned numerous times on this blog. I had designs on him (although ones I knew would never be realized), but now that same desire which had so consumed me earlier in the year has faded and I look to him simply as a friendly presence in an otherwise hostile class. Regardless, I had at first fancied him to be similarly outside of the mainstream - but, alas, he is not. I know this because he has no great limit to his friends and many of them (indeed, the majority) use the word 'sexy' without a hint of irony. My friends only use it ironically. We belong to different worlds. But even besides that, he knows about teenagers - as he is, indeed, one of them and does, indeed, do the things they are rumored to do. He's promised to inform me of more of the strange facts of teenage life in our next class.

I am hereby declaring the rest of the year BSDTY - or, Blog Sometimes During The Year, wherein I shall post sometimes without a pattern whenever I feel like it. It is revolutionary. I may post every day for a month - I may not post for two months. Every day's a surprise!

Regardless, today I shall discuss my motives for posting and how I am a Facebook stalker. It's going to be very exciting.

( Oh, my mind... )

*The post is really a word I'm trying to deny to myself. I fear that I may be stuck in my present physical form until the wrinkled finally begin to indicate my true age. I'm short, and bustless, and oddly mis-proportioned at the moment, but I 'm taking the recent trend in my face towards sometimes almost having actual acne as meaning that I am yet to undergo massive physical change. Fingers crossed, eh?

Friends, countrymen - the end draws nigh (both the end of BEDA and the end of everything, as everyone knows we're all going to die in the swineaggedon).

I'd like to thank you all (all you no one reading my blog posts) for sticking with me through April, through the boring and the more boring exposures to my mind. I've written several thousand words, most of which weren't saying anything much at all - but you, you darling, non-existent follower, you, stuck with me through the pain and the comma misuse. You were loyal.

I'm kind of amazed, actually, that I have managed to post daily for thirty days. Of course, the end of BEDA isn't that much of a relief, given that I have five thousand others things I need to worry about now (like quizzes, and tests, and exams, and my inability to get an A in physics if I continue doing just as poorly as I have been doing this semester - although my grade seems to have fully leveled out, so meh).

I would say that I wish I had been a better Buddy to my BEDA buddies (as assigned based on how Queen of Sparkles saw RIGHT), or that I'd written better or more serious posts. I believe in regret like I believe in the equality of the sexes or federally funded public schools, or the hidden superpowers of librarians. And now I believe in BEDA. It was fun, and, thus, I have none of the regrets for which I am known (by myself).

Goodbye, BEDA, you've been good(ish) to me.

(sidenote: I did write a post yesterday, but  I just forgot to actually... post it - so I did blog every day... kind of)

I'm still waiting rather impatiently for my iPod. But besides that, I'm also waiting impatiently for this week (and this month, and ... everything) to be over as soon as possibly possible.

ASAP. AQAP, even.

AP exams are absolutely awful. I hate them. I almost hate whoever came up with them. Of course, the logical part of my brain knows that AP classes are a fantastic opportunity both to make myself look better to colleges and because they can get me college credit - and I'm going to graduate high school with fifteen AP credits. Fifteen. Yeah.

Of course, I'm not going to take an exam for all of them. I probably won't take one for AP calc, because I don't really want a failing AP grade to my name (even if no one but myself needs to ever see it), and I doubt whether I'll take one for the AP English Language class that I'm taking next year. Of course, that would make my number of AP exams junior year only two (since I'm taking AP Biology III senior year and taking the corresponding exam then, to increase the probability of getting a five).

I'm also really worried because I don't have any extracurriculars. Obviously, next year I'm going to have French and Spanish honorary society, as well as BETA club, but the two actual clubs I had this year (Cultural Society and Robotics Team) are not options because of how desperately I hated them. Really, they were just ridiculously painful and obviously set up for students who are really social or really smart, respectively, and I am simply neither. I'd really like to just be left to my reclusive tendencies, live alone, and get a simple job with an absolute minimum of stress.

A mortician? Would that work? It has a certain darkly romantic appeal, being a mortician. I doubt it pays well, though, which is (according to my life plan) a big part of how I'm going to choose a career.