Queen Mindi's Castle

...and 4 other things I like.

1. The ABC Family series version of 10 Things I Hate About You (that awesome movie with Heath Ledger and Julia Stiles) is my new favorite thing. Kat is now my hero. (first two episodes available here)

2. Look at this! I thought Disney was too cool for princess movies now. Finally they realized that princesses are like 50 times better than those lame Disney Channel Original Movies.

3. Okay, this trailer is lame and shows nothing, but I'm still ridiculously excited about the movie. Percy Jackson for the win.

4. A friend lent me this book. I read the intro and first story and was like, "um, authors, can I marry you?" and just now I read the second story and realized I am going to have to marry every single author in the book. It's THAT AWESOME.

5. Saw Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince yesterday. I have to admit, I got a bit teary-eyed when Dumbledore died. But the rest of the movie was so funny, with its various romantic subplots and Harry and Ron being awkward teenage boys and Slughorn being himself. But I think the director has something against birds--there were THREE different scenes that I noticed where birds died/exploded/were incinerated, in different contexts. And remembering the bird-eating Whomping Willow from the third movie, I'm thinking this is not a new thing. (Just wait for the next movie, when Hedwig bites it...the director's gonna love that one.) Possible symbolic and/or thematic meanings of random bird deaths in Harry Potter? Discuss!

thing 1: woot! am caught up on JulNoWriMo. am starting to worry that it might be bad because am writing it so quickly... there are a lot of boring unnecessary conversations (one of them was about Twilight haha). oh well. i can edit them out later.

thing 2: harry potter tomorrow. it looks awesome and scary. i love how they started innocent and cute and suddenly get really dark. i get shivers just looking at the trailer. me and friend are going to go see it... can't wait!

thing 3: finished SHIVER. was really really really awesome and amazing. think i will buy a copy for myself when it comes out.

thing 4: first real day at work today. 5 hours on my feet. i am very brain-dead. thus the no caps. being a salesperson is not fun, but i'm getting paid, so it's worth all the pain of fake smiles and false cheeriness. (and at least i had at-work entertainment... my manager was hilariously gay and kept talking about getting burned while fake tanning earlier in the day. lulz. oh and the trash can outside randomly caught fire.)

answer: a package containing an ARC of this:

 

YAY.

Will be reading it tonight or tomorrow so I can send it on soon. Exciting! It looks awesome just from reading the back cover and flipping through the pages.

And as for the obligatory JulNoWriMo update: I am behind. Very behind. Not irredeemably so, but at least two days behind. The reason? I have writer's block. And also, it has been sunny, and I have been sitting outside to try to turn my ghostly pale skin a slightly less brilliant shade of white. I tried to convince Spark to come with, but Spark does not like the outdoors. Thus, no typing.

Then last night I got inspired on the wrong story... and finished a chapter of "The Queen's Knight," but wrote only 900ish words on "Hiding Places." (NEED. BETTER. TITLE.)

But on the bright side, it's turning out well so far. I'm surprised at how, well, cool Alex Jefferson is. I mean, considering he's partially based on my dad. (oooooh, burn.) But seriously, he's just as much a main character as Linzie, which is good because it's what I hoped would happen.

Aaand that is all for now. Off to attempt to write some more...

The Kingdom Keepers by Ridley Pearson. Summary here because I'm too lazy to write one myself.
( mild spoilers and moderate flaming )

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis.
I haven't quite finished this, but I'm really enjoying it. It's an interesting, intelligent, and insightful twist on spirituality and the meaning of religion. For those of you who don't know, this book is composed of letters from a senior devil to his less experienced nephew, who is trying to ensnare a young Christian man (the "patient") in sin and damn him for eternity. Not exactly light reading, but worth it. I'd recommend this book if you're looking for a more serious read and have an understanding of the history of Christianity and teachings of the Bible. It's no Chronicles of Narnia (which is to say, kids would probably find it dead boring) but if read in the right frame of mind, it's very good.


9007 words of JulNoWriMo. Still behind. I WILL catch up! >:(

I have returned from the mosquito-ridden wilderness of Alaska. No, I was not eaten by a moose, though I did eat part of one. (No, really. I had moose hash and caribou spaghetti. Exotic.) Also, Alaskans make the best salmon dishes EVER.

I got to see two wolves pretty close up; a lot of faraway bears and two really close (but behind a fence in a wildlife preserve); a moose in someone's driveway and some baby moose in the wildlife preserve; three foxes; and I got very intimately acquainted with a lot of mosquitoes, though I will not be missing their company.

So, vacation was cool (Alaska in the summer is actually quite nice... the sun never goes down, it's awesome) but I'm glad to be home.

Also, I've been working on JulNoWriMo... I'm at 5,700 words, a couple days behind, but I wrote about 2000 words on the plane yesterday and plan to write more today. Thankfully, I'm not on the work schedule for this week (apparently the manager forgot I was coming back), so I have some time to recover from vacation.

I have a few other things to share... two of them are reviews, but I'll save those for the next post. The other one is an excerpt from my JulNo novel. My mom read part of this over my shoulder (it happened to be the part about the "surviving eye blinking") and was like, "What are you writing?" which of course made me extremely proud of it. ;)

 

( Nearly two hours after the accident, Aiden Sanders regains consciousness. )

Wrote draft of query letter last night... my very first. *wipes tear* Now have to find out who to send it to, and how. Not to mention, stop fiddling with The Protagonists long enough to call it a final draft.

Btw, without the Query Shark I would have been at a complete loss for where to begin and what to say. It's a really great resource, if anyone is thinking about querying soon.

Also, I came up with a title for my JulNoWriMo: "Hiding Places." I don't really like it that much, but it was the best I could come up with, besides "My Dad Is Not Dead." Guess it'll be my new working title.

Leaving for Alaska tomorrow! Hope it will be fun. (that is a bit doubtful since it is a road trip. My family is always much easier to love when I can avoid them 75% of the time.) Will be writing JulNoWriMo by hand for last 5 days of trip... if the mosquitoes haven't carried me off by then. Am going to REALLY miss Spark (my laptop).

See you all in... *counts on fingers* thirteen days! (hopefully will survive that long without succumbing to Internet withdrawal or various wildlife attacks.)

<3 Mindi

Okay, so now that I'm definitely doing JulNoWriMo, I need a title for my story! Right now all I have is a working title and a detailed plot outline of the first half of the book. Here's a summary:

16-year-old Linzie Jefferson's dad is the bane of her existence (or so she likes to think). They're constantly butting heads: he's a hardcore Christian with a deep hatred of the media (it's "evil" and "rots your brain," not to mention "it's turning all of America into stupid clones"), and she's her school's ASB secretary, with an interest in politics and big dreams of becoming a TV anchor.

But what Linzie doesn't know is that her dad has another reason for sheltering her from the media--a long-hidden secret that could take away not only her respect for him, but also their privacy and the very existence of small-town life as they know it.

When Linzie accidentally finds out--and promptly reveals--her dad's secret, she and her dad are both thrown into constant media attention. At first, it's everything Linzie ever dreamed of, but as events unfold, it soon becomes apparent that this new life is full of vicious people and painful truths just waiting for their chance to hurt her and everyone she loves. Maybe her dad was justified in hiding all these years, after all...

I'm thinking of titling it with her Internet screenname or something, but the problem is, I don't have a clever enough idea for that. Help?


( The Last Olympian review... SPOILERS )

Started work today. Was kinda confusing and whoa-too-much-info-at-once!, but I think it'll be a good job. It's infinitely better than, like, McDonalds.

Oh, and I signed up for JulNoWriMo today. I'm gonna try it, even though I'll be starting 5 days late because of my upcoming Alaska vacation. I guess I'll just bring a notebook with me and write like mad by hand. I've got my plot all ready and am excited to write it! 50,000 words, 26 days--I can do this! woot!


Anyway! Book reviews! I haven't finished The Last Olympian yet, but so far it's good. (I just love Percy. He's not one of those heroes who are like "I'm so awesome, everyone worship me." He actually acts like he's 15. Plus, his dialogue and narration are just funny... and the chapter titles... like "I drive my dog into a tree." I love that his pet hellhound is named Mrs. O'Leary, lol. And I'm a sucker for Greek mythology reference jokes.)


The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan. This book was so sad, although I don't know what I expected... the whole premise was based on the post-zombie apocalypse plight of the remnants of the human race. The ending did have a sense of hope for the future, but it was bittersweet because of [insert spoiler here]. All in all, I liked it. It was a cool, original idea, and it had bloodthirsty zombies in it... not to mention a domineering cult of nuns. Yep. Pretty awesome.

MAX by James Patterson. The best I can say for these books is that they are entertaining, although some parts require a little bit more suspension of disbelief than I'd like (98% human, 2% avian, and they can grow GILLS? Really?). I also don't particularly like the save-the-environment message that the author's been trying to hammer into us during the last few books. If you're going to make a political statement, children's books are not the place.
But the plot is exciting, I'll give it that, and although some of their narrow escapes are kind of unbelievable (*cough* growing gills on cue) they kept me reading. Also, Fang is hot. And Max stopped being crazy and bipolar in this book long enough to make out with him several times... :D

Hunted by P.C. Cast and Kristen Cast. I think it may be impossible for Zoey to function without at least three potential boyfriends on a leash at all times. Seriously. This is getting kind of weird. (and for the record, I dislike Erik and am voting for Stark.) Anyway, in this book Zoey and her gang are hiding out in these tunnels with the undead red vampyre kids. The evil Kalona thinks she's his long-lost girlfriend, but that doesn't stop the Raven Mockers from almost killing her on several occasions; Stark is acting like a total jerk, but may still be a good guy underneath his scary undeadness; and one of the red fledgelings has been writing prophetic poems that may or may not spell out how to make the evil guy run away. Oh, and her human ex-boyfriend Heath will not stop following her around.
Yup, mostly this book was just an excuse to remind us how many people are in love with Zoey, with a big not-quite-final battle at the end. But I like this series despite the MC's Sue-ness. It's like sugar for your brain, only...not very sugary. Okay, bad metaphor--I mean it's bad for you but kinda delicious.

tagged by ladywater 

1. Grab the nearest book.

2. Open the book to page 54.

3. Find the seventh sentence.

4. Post the text of the sentence in your journal...along with these instructions.


Aaand the nearest book happens to be MAX by James Patterson:

"School is out," I said firmly. "Next question."


(another round of book reviews coming soon, btw, including not only the above, but also "The Forest of Hands and Teeth," "Hunted," and possibly "The Last Olympian.")

I think everyone who regularly reads this journal has already been tagged, so... if this looks fun to you, feel free to snag.


in other news: I GOT A JOB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (this deserves extra exclamation points since I am almost twenty and have never had a paying job before.) I'll be working at Aeropostale in an outlet mall for the summer. Woohoo! Minimum wage has never been such an exciting prospect...

...because, in addition to our silly traditions (like high school seniors stealing a giant chicken statue and parading it around at Homecoming), occasionally stuff like THIS makes the papers.

I'm sure a lot of LSHS girls were very disappointed after reading that. After all, it would totally make sense for there to be Twilight!vampires here. Small town... frequently rainy... dull... hey, we're even in the same state as Forks!

*is highly amused*



(in other news, AM OFFICIALLY ON SUMMER BREAK! *dances*)

I've said it before and I'll say it again--the idea for this book is PURE GENIUS. (and might I add, for the record, that I came up with the idea for "The Love Interest" BEFORE I found out about this book's existence. LJ proof ftw.)

Anyway, it took me this long to read for two reasons: (1) I've been ridiculously busy with dead week and finals and stuff, and (2) this is the kind of book you savor slowly (like Elizabeth biting into the heart of her ninja foe), not devour in one gulp (like a zombie feasting on the innards of Mr. Bingley's hapless servants).

You have to be paying attention to catch all the hilarious little changes. Not one page of this book is without some small change or reminder of the zombies, even though at times you manage to almost forget. It's all the old lines we know and love, twisted in ways that are equally shocking and hilarious, and probably have Jane Austen spinning in her grave. (though not rising from it, I hope.)

The plot: the five Bennet sisters are renowned for being both beautiful and deadly--they've been trained in China for years to be expert zombie slayers. The last thing Elizabeth Bennet needs is a distraction from her duty to God and His Majesty in protecting England from the "strange plague" of undead. But such a distraction does of course appear, in the form of dark, proud, formidable warrior Mr. Darcy. Add a few unexpected plot twists (her best friend catching the plague; her sister marrying, under questionable circumstances, a man who's just been in a terrible carriage accident that leaves him paralyzed for the rest of his life) and you get a wonderful classic tale of "ultraviolent zombie mayhem" that teaches us all that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Oh, you've gotta love this book. It's freaking amazing. So many good lines... here're a couple of my favorites:

A classic scene, with a little extra attitude thrown in:

"You either choose this method of passing the evening because you are incapable of sitting quietly, or because you are conscious that your figures appear to the greatest advantage in walking; if the first, you are but silly girls undeserving of my attention, and if the second, I can admire you much better from here. In fact, the glow of the fire casts quite a revealing silhouette against the fabric of your gowns."

"Oh! Shocking!" cried Miss Bingley, stepping away from the fireplace.

And this is just pure LOL:

She remembered the lead ammunition in her pocket and offered it to him. "Your balls, Mr. Darcy?" He reached out and closed her hand around them, and offered, "They belong to you, Miss Bennet." Upon this, their colour changed, and they were forced to look away from one another, lest they laugh.

I could go on quoting, but instead I'll just say... if you love Pride and Prejudice and have any sort of sense of humor at all--or even if you hated Pride and Prejudice because it was too boring, and want to see it transformed "into something you'd actually want to read"--you MUST read this book. It's awesome and hilarious and is definitely taking up residence on my shelf of Favorite Books Ever.

It is so hot.

86 degrees Fahrenheit right now, but I think it must have hit ninety earlier in the day. To some of you this may sound like nothing, but to a western Washington native, this is just weird. We're used to rain and clouds and a high of 68 (and that on a good day).

Also, I feel I have more right to complain because I'm living in a dorm room without air conditioning. (well, the building does have AC, but it's controlled from a mysterious place known as "elsewhere in the building," and clearly whoever is controlling it is, like many residents of this particular university, an energy-conserving hippie.)

...in other news, I might do this. But I'm not sure yet if I'll have enough non-vacation time during July... need to check. I have this awesome story idea burning a hole in my idea notebook, though, and I'm not sure if it wants to wait 'til November. (Seriously, novel writing months are like the highlight of my sad jobless-college-student-trying-to-be-an-author life right now. NaNoWriMo, in all of its crazy self-doubting, word count obsessing glory, was one of my favorite months of my writing career thus far...)

Last final in one week. *deep breath* I think I'll make it... if I do my projects NOW and not at the last minute... which means I need to get off LJ and go do some work.

Ew, my keyboard is all hot and sweaty. >.< ONE MORE WEEK.

with a load of fangirling about the New Moon movie trailer (mostly SHIRTLESS JACOB). Please stand by.

http://www.mtv.com/videos/movie-trailers/395235/trailer-premiere-new-moon.jhtml#id=1612947

SQUEEEEE. Jacob haters, just try to diss him now!


Okay, non-fangirly comments: KStew is boring and I still don't like her; RPattz is attractive, but has nothing on Jacob; and what did they do to poor Laurent's eyes??


Taylor Lautner going around shirtless and growing a fur coat at random intervals is the ONLY reason I will watch this movie. Well, that and Dakota Fanning as an evil, sadistic vampire with super torturing powerz.

Is long and rather boring.

Well, okay, it's not as boring as some things I COULD be reading. But it's not an easy read, as I am now discovering upon setting the goal to read it in one weekend. I'm not even halfway. The five-page paper on this book is due twelve days from now. IHATEDEADWEEK AARGH.

It really doesn't help that my mom grew up as Frank Herbert's neighbor, and says that my uncle used to catch tadpoles in his pond. She calls him "that funny old guy."

At least I understand it more than I did when I first read it, which was several years ago when I wasn't quite as well-versed in the sci-fi genre as I am now (thanks to my Comp Lit: Sci Fi class, which is the reason I'm reading it in the first place). But I'm kind of wishing I'd done a page count search on the reading list for the final paper and picked the book with the least amount of pages. *headdesk*

Also, a word of advice? Never, ever try to write a research paper with a group. I did this. My group members now hate each other. One is "controlling and doesn't work well with others," the other is "a slacker who forgets to come to group meetings." And the third one hasn't even shown up since the second meeting because of "work."

Summer in less than two weeks. Must try to survive until then.

So... all things considered, I liked this book. It wasn't my favorite of them (that would still be The Lost City of Faar-- ♥ Spader!) but it wasn't my least favorite either... it explained EVERYTHING which was awesome. I hate it when books don't explain stuff to me (*cough*The End*cough*). I'm easily confused, okay? :P

( comments of a spoilery nature )

Just watched the Star Trek movie with my sister. Hahah, it was fun. I was the only one of us who'd seen the original series and knew all the characters, so I started being all, "Oh, that one's totally going to die... but he won't die, don't worry, he's in the original series." And when Kirk got marooned on the ice planet, I was like, "Hey, it looks like he just landed on Hoth! Now there's going to be a beastie thing that wants to eat him..." and like five seconds later there was actually a beastie thing that chased him into the cave! It was amazing. :D But I was very confused about Uhura and Spock's relationship... it was so random, like, she talked to him maybe once and then all of a sudden she's kissing him in the elevator? Um, did I miss something important here? :/

It was entertaining, I'll give it that--but I still like Star Wars better.

Also, while on the subject of reviews, I started on The Soldiers of Halla today. I'm so glad he's FINALLY explaining stuff... the last book left me really confused and with way too many questions, but now they're being answered so it's all good. I won't say anything else... but my review of the book should be up soon.

Anyway, the big event of this weekend was getting our family portrait taken today. It amazes me how it took two weeks of prior planning to coordinate our outfits, when my sisters and I often match our clothes purely by accident. (last weekend Julie and I went to a funeral with our parents and we both managed to wear black skirts and green shirts. We had to spend all day explaining that it was accidental because people kept commenting on it.) But yeah, we spent pretty much the last two weeks arguing off and on about color combinations and what colors look good on us. That's what you get for organizing a family portrait with three teenage daughters. We're not at the age where it's cute to wear matching frilly dresses anymore. :P We finally decided on blue and white, even though that's the color that EVERYBODY does in their portraits... but it was a good day for an outdoor photoshoot so hopefully it turned out okay. I think we almost broke the neighbor's fence in the process, but he doesn't have to know that.

Off to read some more... ttfn!
 

THIS.

Their ending cover of "Don't Stop Believing" just made me cry :')


...it's like High School Musical, if HSM was, you know, good.


P.S. Kevin McHale makes a good lookin' wheelchair-bound nerd.


ADDED LATER:

My Glee obsession, part 2: I have now watched this video so many times I can't even count them. And I think I'll have the song in my head for the next week.



Also? I'm beginning to ship Arty/T-T-Tina.

I just finished reading it, having procrastinated half the day on numerous more important things (finishing RD of final paper for sociolinguistics; doing tomorrow's reading for Comp Lit: Sci Fi; folding laundry) and now that I've finished it and can breathe again, I have one thing to say: IT WAS SO WORTH IT. Wrinkled laundry in a pile on my bed and probably staying up to a ridiculous hour to get my homework done? Who cares? This book was FANTASTIC!

 

( Review contains SPOILERS )

Bottom line? If you haven't read these books, READ THEM. If you've read the first two, definitely read this one.

...if I had The Last Olympian too (and possibly The Awakening), I think I would die of awesomeness.

Reviews on the above coming soon! (I can tell you right now, without even reading more than a few random lines and having only flipped through and looked at the illustrations, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is going to be one of the best books EVER.)

Now the problem is, between reading these and pretending to have a social life, how am I going to get any homework done this weekend? D: School, like a zombie, has taken over my life and started eating my brains... can't wait for summerrrrrrrrr... blah.

In other news, my kittycat Artemis is missing. :( She was going to turn one year old next Wednesday. I am very sad, but I'm still hoping she'll come home... maybe carrying a kitten or something like pets always do in books/movies. (Even though we got her fixed so it's kind of improbable.)

Okay, off to read!
--Mindi

For years, Grace has watched the wolves in the woods behind her house. One yellow-eyed wolf--her wolf--is a chilling presence she can't seem to live without. Meanwhile, Sam has lived two lives: In winter, the frozen woods, the protection of the pack, and the silent company of a fearless girl. In summer, a few precious months of being human . . . until the cold makes him shift back again.

Now, Grace meets a yellow-eyed boy whose familiarity takes her breath away. It's her wolf. It has to be. But as winter nears, Sam must fight to stay human--or risk losing himself, and Grace, forever.



[this is for Team Ravelda--or Team Raving Pen, whatever--for this contest. Btw, I read Lament by this author and it's pretty awesome, so I'm not just doing this for the free books and the 5-page critique! Okay, I am, but I wouldn't do it for a bad author, so there.]