Tag Archives: Books

Book Review: Looking For Alaska

I know, I know, so many John Green books lately. I bought 3 of them in the same day, so yeah. I promise the next book I review will be written by someone else.

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As with everything I’ve read by him so far, I loved Looking For Alaska. Miles “Pudge” Halter goes off to boarding school, looking for his great perhaps. There he meets Chip “The Colonel” Martin, a pranking master, Takumi the unlikely MC, and Alaska Young. Miles is a fan of biographies, and even more so of famous last words. It’s a morbid fascination, but not as bad as some interests.

Alaska is a wild, messed up girl. She drinks, she smokes, and lives life dangerously. She’s kinda the very definition of a Manic Pixie Dream Girl. She’s a master pranker as well, and the pranks that Alaska and The Colonel pull off are legendary.

But late one night, something terrible happens, leaving Miles with a Virgins Suicides type situation.

Final Verdict: I recommend this book, I adored it, for the exact comparison that I made above. The book ends feeling very much like the Virgin Suicides, and that is one of  my all time favorite books.

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Off to the Market

Last Friday I went out to go to the Library and was sorely disappointed to find that it had closed early. So instead my husband suggested I take a wander around our local market. While there I managed to pick up a few pretty things and I thought I’d share them here.

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It was nice to be able to wander around all by my lonesome, and pick out flowers, some pretty drinks and a few books. I know my book buying has been a bit out of hand lately. I can’t say that it’s going to change anytime soon. Though I am going to try and cut it down to one at a time.

I know carnations aren’t considered one of the best flowers, but I adore them and their scent. I thought that these mini pink ones were absolutely darling, and perfect to put in this random empty mason jar I had. The bouquet on the left came home with me because of the interesting vase, pretty colors and the fact that none of those flowers made me sneeze.

I picked up the Izze Sparkling Juices on a whim, because the looked pretty and I’m looking for an alternative to sodas. i don’t usually drink fizzy drinks, but sometimes I just really want one and thought these would fun to try.

 

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Mug Swap with But First Coffee

Yesterday I mentioned I had another exciting post for today, so here it is. A blogger friend of mine Kallie from But First Coffee, sent out an email recently asking if anyone wanted to help get the word out about her mug swap. Since I adore Tea and Coffee and adorable mugs I of course said Sign Me Up!

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Starting today, until the 17th you can sign up using the form below to be assigned a partner for your mug swap, but there are some rules. Ya know, just to make everything fair so here they are.

1. The Rules:
        1. Sign up using the below form. Open to everyone (not just bloggers) and is International.
        2. Sign ups close February 18th and you will receive your partner by the 20th at the very latest.
        3. Spend 1-2 weeks chatting with your buddy, getting to know them.
        4. Send out a mug to them before March 6th.  The MAX you should spend on the mug is $20.  If your buddy is international, then reduce that to $15 MAX to incur shipping charges.
        5. I’d love to see your mugs when you get them.  Use the hashtag #BFCMugSwap (because apparently mug swapping is a thing and its already got a handful of taken hashtags!)
        6. Share it! Make sure to tell your friends about the swap on twitter and instagram!
Here’s the form:

I think the best part is the mugs can be from anywhere. I’ve already been looking at mugs and of course places like Anthropologie and Starbucks have cute mugs, but did you know that Chapters in Canada and Barnes and Noble in the US have some pretty amazing mugs too? I’m not surprised books and tea (or coffee) definitely go hand and hand. ← See what I did there? I’m really excited about this and I can’t wait until I get assigned my partner. I hope you guys are as excited as I am! Leave me a comment below and let me know if you sign up!

 

Disclaimer: I’m hosting this swap as a fun way for people to connect and have fun swapping a mug.  However, I can’t be held responsible for your partners actions.  I like to believe everyone will be fair and only sign up if they intend to swap a mug, but there is always an off chance that someone is dishonest.  If you haven’t heard from your partner or do not recieve a mug, please email me to let me know ([email protected]) and I will do the best I can to rememdy it.

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Blogmas Day 6: Book Wishlist

I don’t know about you guys, but I keep a Wunderlist of books that I plan on buying. It’s kinda out of hand, because on top of that I mostly check out of the library a bunch of Mass Market Mysteries (my mom says they’re penny dreadfuls). Ya know the kind that only take you a couple hours to read, so they’re the books that I’d really only ever read once, except the Aunt Dimity series by Nancy Atherton because I’ve read that series a bazillion times.

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Then factor in that when ever I enter a book store I get incredibly distracted and find other books that I want to buy as well and end up walking out with 6 books, but only one of them was on my ever growing to buy list. Really the only sure fire way to check books off my to buy list is to ask for them for Christmas or some other gifting holiday like that. Which I totally forgot to do this year and now everyone is done shopping. Congrats to everyone for getting it done early, boo on me for forgetting.

Anyways I’m getting off topic, I have a huge wishlist of books that I’m slowly checking off, the only problem is I keep adding in about 3 books for everyone that I check off. So I thought I’d share with you my most wanted books. Obviously I can’t tell you anything about them, because I haven’t read them yet.

  1. Variant by Robinson Wells
  2. The Eye Of Minds by Lex Thomas
  3. Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
  4. Gothic Charm School: An Essential Guide for Goths and Those Who Love Them by Jillian Venters
  5. Frozen by Melissa De La Cruiz
  6. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
  7. Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
  8. Unwind Series by Neil Shusterman
  9. The Selection Series by Kiera Cass
  10. Matched Trilogy by Ally Condie
  11. The October List by Jeffery Deaver
  12. Disquiet by Julia Leigh
  13. A Certain Slant of Light by Laura Whitcomb
  14. The Maze Runner Trilogy by James Dashner
  15. The Fallen Series by Lauhttp://fashionandhappythings.com/wp-admin/post-new.phpren Kate
  16. Ruby Red by Kerstin Gier

Some of these are recent additions to my list, so of them have been on the list for quite a while. And this is no where near the complete list. The full list is closer to All The Books Ever than it is to just 16. It’s also not my To Be Read pile, I’ll probably do a post on that next week.

What books are on your wishlist?

 

 

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Real Books Again

Note: I know there should be a book review up, but yesterday was my birthday and I took the day off to spend with my family. Since Howl has been ill, I’ve been incredibly stressed and torn between trying to keep up with my blog and just spending time with my family trying to cope with a very sick puppy. Taking my birthday off was a much needed break, and I am feeling much better. This weeks Stylish Sunday’s will be what I wore on my birthday, and then there will be a “What I got for my Birthday” up next week since I want to include what I got from my parents and I won’t be seeing them until Sunday. Now on to today’s actual post:

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I’ve been buying more and more books lately. They’re less expensive than makeup and clothing and give me just as much joy. I’ve bought 7 books total in less than 2 months. That’s more books than I’ve bought in a long time. Really for a while the only books I was buying were ones recommended by Katie of ChapterStackss, and those were on my nook, mostly I was just reading library books on my nook, and getting the Free Friday books.

fashionandhappythings-0126I bought Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, which has been called the most misinterpreted book ever written. According to the Author, it’s about Technology causing the death of literature as we know it. I adore Ray Bradbury, and could easily call him my all time favorite author. Since my copy of this book had long since fallen to pieces, I decided that I should repurchase it. Even though before his death Bradbury gave permission for his books to be sold in Ebook format, it just feels wrong to buy his work in anything other than physical media. I probably will buy them as ebooks, but only after I already own the actual book.

fashionandhappythings-0127I also picked up The Fault In Our Stars by John Green, this book has been making the rounds as being completely awesome for a while and I don’t know why I hadn’t bought it before. Since it’s being made into a movie soon, I decided that I should probably read it, since I like to read the book before the movie.   I actually don’t know much more about this book than what I’ve heard from Youtubers who’ve read the book, but I can say that with this book being as hyped up as it is, I will be reviewing in as soon as I finish it.

It might be a while before you see reviews on these books since I have library books and other books I’ve bought to read first. But I will forewarn you that anything written by Ray Bradbury will always receive a glowing review from me, and you should probably read the books and be the judge for yourself.

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