Darkings

Wow, I'm finally part of MOLD4EVR! Let me express my honor and gratitude of being a part of this community of MOLDY bloggers, etc., and how excited I am, etc., and I hope that the future of this blog will be brighter than it already is, etc., etc. *Bows deeply* :)

Now...to the subject of darkings (if you've read Trickster's Queen by Tamora Pierce). Personally, they intrigue me, those imaginative little drops of blood and magic combined (might sound *gross* but that's how it is). I mean...they just sound cute. And fun. Like little tiny round puppies that talk to you.

And also... darkings, I've heard, make really great accessories (the word *necklace* ring a bell?).... ;)

Ella Enchanted

Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine is a wonderful tale about an obedient girl. Or, more so, a tale about a fiercely independent girl forced to be obedient due to a curse placed upon her by the fairy, Lucinda. When Ella is but a babe Lucinda bestows her with the "gift" of obedience that enforces even the simplest of commands. As Ella grows older she resents her curse and is constantly finding ways to bend orders to her will. When Ella is about 14 years old her mother dies leaving her heartbroken, if not for Prince Char. Even through her sadness he entrances her, and vs. versa.

Enter evil step family.

Well, not quite. They aren't family yet but they will be. The evil mother convinces Ella's father that she must be sent to finishing school to improve her oafishness. Her Father willingly agrees. When Ella arrives at the school she becomes finished (through direct orders) and miserable. So she runs away in an attempt to find Lucinda and beg her to remove the curse. On her way she runs into Char (almost literally) who with his guard escorts her to a Giant Wedding where she believes she will find Lucinda. This she does, but with mysterious consequences. Now what happens next, only Ella can determine.

Ella Enchanted is my favorite retelling of Cinderella. Many have read it, many have loved it, and I highly recommend it to fans of fairy tales, and kick butt heroines.

MOLDy Banners and Affiliates

Here are some banners I've have created for blogs and websites. If you would like to support this site, go ahead and copy and paste the code into an "HTML/Javascript" page element. It's that simple.

<a href="http://embracethemold.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img src="http://i170.photobucket.com/albums/u253/Taiger_photos/MOLD/Got-MOLD-.gif" alt="Photobucket" border="0" /></a>

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Phew, that was a lot of coding.

Your new patient

Hello, my name is Taiger.

Hello, Taiger!

I've been a bibliophile for about thirteen years now, and I guess I've gone a bit insane.

*cackles of laughter* Haven't we all?

And guess what . . . I LIKE IT!

*rambunctious cheers*

The Waiting Room 2

Hello! Welcome again to The Waiting Room (yes, it is important enough for capitalization...hmph). Anyway, here are more books. Reader reviews of the books listed are always appreciated!


New Releases:
The Summoning (Darkest Powers, Book 1) by Kelley Armstrong

My name is Chloe Saunders and my life will never be the same again.
All I wanted was to make friends, meet boys, and keep on being ordinary. I don't even know what that means anymore. It all started on the day that I saw my first ghost—and the ghost saw me.
Now there are ghosts everywhere and they won't leave me alone. To top it all off, I somehow got myself locked up in Lyle House, a "special home" for troubled teens. Yet the home isn't what it seems. Don't tell anyone, but I think there might be more to my housemates than meets the eye. The question is, whose side are they on? It's up to me to figure out the dangerous secrets behind Lyle House . . . before its skeletons come back to haunt me.


Lost and Found by Andrew Clements
Although it's a drag to be constantly mistaken for each other, in truth, during those first days at a new school, there's nothing better than having a twin brother there with you. But on day one of sixth grade, Ray stays home sick, and Jay is on his own. No big deal. It's a pretty nice school, good kids, too. But Jay quickly discovers a major mistake: No one seems to know a thing about his brother. Ray's not on the attendance lists, doesn't have a locker, doesn't even have a student folder. Jay almost tells the school -- almost -- but then decides that this lost information could be very...useful. And fun.
As Ray and Jay exploit a clerical oversight, they each find new views on friendship, honesty, what it means to be a twin -- and what it means to be yourself. Entertaining, thought-provoking, and true-to-life, this clever novel is classic Andrew Clements times two: twins!

Coming Soon:
What If... All the Rumors Were True by Liz Ruckdeschel and Sara James (July 8)
After a year at Hillsdale High, Haley thinks she knows what she’s in for as she starts her junior year. She knows what to expect from the it girls, the brains, the rockers, and the artists. She knows how to handle drunken disasters, shoplifting scandals, IM warfare, and out-of-control false rumors. But none of the lessons learned during her sophomore year can prepare her for this dilemma: what’s Haley supposed to do when everything they’re saying about her is true? (A Choose Your Destiny Novel)


Artemis Fowl: The Time Paradox by Eion Colfer (July 15)
Artemis's mother has contracted a deadly disease -- and the only cure lies in the brain fluid of African lemurs. Unfortunately, Artemis himself was responsible for making the lemurs extinct five years ago. Now he must enlist the aid of his fairy friends to travel back in time and save them. Not only that, but he must face his deadliest foe yet...his younger self.

Lordy Lordy.

weeeell. i had intended to post on monday ahead of time but oops its monday and i say oh lordy what am i gonna post? well this is what popped in my head having learned about it only this weekend

on August 6th 2008 we will see the realease of

"The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2" the movie.

wow. was not expecting that. even though the first movie had only tiny inacuracies i still wondered howd they do a second one. well i guess its possible.

idk about other people but i did not read these books voluntarily. my mom got me the first one when i was in sixth grade before MOLD had taken a hold of me and when i was quite quite picky and reluctant in reading.

The first book was cool and okay for me but i didnt have any intention to read the other ones until just this year a friend of mine would absolutely not leave me alone until i had read the second book. (oh how i loath to be forced to read anything, even if it is good). fortunately i liked it.

now as to how the adaptation will go this time. i have not a clue.

What makes a book popular?

Reviewer X asked this question recently, and I decided to blog about it myself.

(And right now, I'm calling Sunday as my day to post weekly ramblings about bookish topics, 'kay? And I realize that this is Monday, not Sunday, but I started writing this on Sunday with the intention of finishing it, but then I felt like watching Music and Lyrics and then my younger brother and I watched Camp Rock and laughed at it and by then it was like ten thirty and I went to sleep.)

When I was younger, I really didn't read that many bestsellers. I mean, I liked historical fiction. That wasn't exactly mega-popular for the most part. I mean, yes, there was American Girl and Little House on the Prairie but for the most part, who read historical fiction? Not many.

Eventually, my reading tastes started to change. I remember when The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants came out. I didn't really want to read it; it didn't seem like my kind of book. (And one of the rules of the Sisterhood...well, let's just say I was positive the book would not be appropriate.) Regardless, I added it to my "list of books to read someday" because it was so popular. And one summer when I was at camp, I bought it and ended up really enjoying it. The same with The Lord of the Rings and Twilight. It seemed like everyone else had read them so I thought that I should.

In the case of The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, one reason I think it became so popular is simply because it was real. You could relate to Carmen, Lena, Tibby, and Bridget. So there probably is no such thing as a pair of pants who fit four girls with very different body types, but it's not really about the pants. It's about four young women who are best friends spending their first summer apart. And the story is real. The characters, their emotions, are real. They don't always make smart decisions, aren't always likable, but they are girls you can know, girls you could be friends with yourself. Despite being a great summer read, Ann Brashares' young adult series has substance. It's not all happy-happy, but nor is it depressing. It's about life. Why wouldn't it be popular?

Gossip Girl and similar series are very popular right now. I've never read Gossip Girl, The A-List, or The Clique. I've read Private by Kate Brian, though. It's about a girl from the suburbs of Pennsylvania who ends up with a scholarship to an elite prep school and what happens when she falls in with the most powerful girls at the school. The seventh book, Ambition, recently came out, and I decided not to buy it. I've already read spoilers online, and I know there's just going to be another cliffhanger, probably more frustration, and it would just probably be a waste of ten dollars. Probably fun to read, but just overall not worth it.

Private is highly unrealistic. Seriously, if you thought the drama in BoBRPGv1 was over-the-top, I don't know what you'd think about Private. But it's addicting. Really. Who doesn't want to read about girls who have like zero self-respect despite seeming super-confident? And who doesn't read about a life they can only dream about: the life of the mega wealthy. I imagine the draw of Gossip Girl is the same.

Reviewer X discusses the Gallagher Girl books by Ally Carter. I have read both these books and I really enjoyed them. They're clean, fun, cute, and just impossible but whatever. Still fun, and that's all they're supposed to be. But then I reread the first (I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You, and for the sake of my sanity, from now on, I'm going to call it LYKY) and thought it was only so-so. It sort of annoyed me, mainly the writing. The premise is so farfetched, and why the writing is just so spy-oriented...it just became "Enough already!" I wasn't sure I hated it, but I'm kind of sorry I reread it because the books are kind of ruined for me now. Actually, I'm hoping that they do make LYKY into a movie (it's been optioned) because it might be a better book than movie.

I think part of what makes the Gallagher Girl books popular is that how many books are about teenage girls who attend spy school? Not that many. I think that books that take place at boarding schools of any kind are popular (Private is another bestselling series, and there is of course Harry Potter) and the Gallagher Academy is like Hogwarts in that it's populated by normal enough kids with super-special talents and the actual building is just so zany and you'd love to take a class or two there someday.

Maybe it's sort of the same draw as Hannah Montana: A mostly normal teenage girl with a huge secret.

Reviewer X brings up The Da Vinci Code, which I've never read. I agree with her that the controversy is responsible for its popularity. Controversy never hurts. However, I must disagree with her discussion of Prep, another book I've never read (but again, set at a prep school). I'm not looking at the Amazon.com page, so I don't know what it's average rating is, but I've seen it appear in many lists and stuff on Amazon.com, and I'm thinking that the number of negative reviews might be a reflection of its popularity. The proportion of fans to non-fans might be the same, but the numbers are larger. Also, if you love a super-popular book, why write a review? Yours is just going to be lost among the other gushing five-star reviews. But if you dislike a bestseller, you want to tell others that they may not want to waste their time and money, that keeping up with the latest trend is just not worth it.

Most people read for fun, so they want fun books. They don't want to have to focus on what they're reading in order to understand it. I know when I'm feeling sick or whatever, I'm more likely to reread one of my favorites or pick up a Meg Cabot book or something similar. Why? Because Meg Cabot's books are entertaining.

It's really hard to pinpoint what is and isn't going to sell well. (Okay, so if you read some editors'/agents' blogs, you'll see that there are some obvious "My goose, what on earth was this person thinking?" type queries, but mostly...) I mean, who knew Twilight was going to be so huge? Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone? How many rejections did J. K. Rowling receive, and what was the initial printing? Bloomsbury was pretty clueless that they were publishing the next literary phenomenon.

So publicity is another thing. I know that I would recommend LYKY simply because it's a pretty easy read (if torturous sometimes) and is fairly entertaining and it's clean. A book being put out on display...talked about a lot...it's going to sell. (So maybe I should just start throwing in Books of Bayern randomly?...) But how does a book get put on display? I don't know. Someone with power really likes that book? And how does a book get talked about? Someone either loves it or hates it.

So really, it comes down to people. Marketing people. Bookstore people. Reader people. And then the readibility/funness/power of a book...that sort of thing. But I don't think it can be pinpointed, my conclusion after this lengthy discussion.

READ BOOKS OF BAYERN BY SHANNON HALE! (Even though I know you guys have. :P)

♥anilee