May-hem in my mind. (Big Dreams Blog Update #20)

Update Day is today, and that means re-capping my very uneventful May.

First things first. For those of you out of the loop, and there’s about 16 of us currently in this blog hop, Update Day is part of the ‘DO YOU HAVE A GOAL?’ blog hop.

Hosted by authors Misha Gericke and Beth Fred, it’s also informally known as the Big Dreams blog hop because all of its bloggers share one big crazy dream they have and they blog their adventure towards achieving that goal. Then on every last Friday of the month we gather and dictate said adventures in a monthly re-cap post. So everyone knows what’s been going on with each other. Like playing catch up. ^^

If you’re interested, sign up is right over here or click the banner above. (<-- clicky, clicky!)

And it’s entirely my fault. I had set one goal in particular, and I failed spectacularly. To put it short, I wanted to continue writing steadily on-wards from my early finish in April’s Camp NaNo, instead I burned out really quickly.

The first half of the month I spent writing off and on, and then I fell in love with this one project and started writing daily until the high wore off and I realized that I’d have to start from scratch – the story just wasn’t picking up where I wanted it to pick up. I already am aware that I have a problem plotting and organizing and figuring out where to begin, and this usually results in a lot of petering around, a.k.a. false start pages.

After 1.5 weeks of back-and-forth writing then scrapping, I decided to take a break again and focus on reading and pursuing other hobbies (*ahem*playingLoZ*ahem*).

So I did that, and here I am a week and a day later still sorta clueless as to how to start writing again. And I always get this feeling at the end of a hiatus from writing. I would almost equate it to forgetting how to ride a bike, or the fear of potentially having forgotten to ride a bike.

Not to say my writing-free break was useless. I did do some blogging, and more reading than typical and a lot more thinking. I realized I’m not very good at reading through what I’ve written, as in I write, write, write and never read.

Yeah, you read that correctly. So far I’ve never read anything I’ve “finished” before. And then it hit me: I don’t even know if I’ve ever finished a novel before, at least not if I’ve never read it.

Which makes sense…

I was pretty convinced that I hated editing. I don’t hate editing as much as I’m scared to read what I wrote and hate, well, my writing and myself.

 -- basically there was a lot of mayhem going on in my mind when it had no business there.

Since this personal blog is to document my journey on the road to becoming a published author, and my million-word goal for this 5-year blog hop is to help move me along, I decided to scrap the words I currently have totaled towards that one million and to start from scratch with the works that I have READ after finishing writing them. It’s not enough to whip something up, believe it’s done and count it towards what becomes an arbitrary goal. Especially if I’m not taking the time to submit myself to the mess my writing can be and grow from the mistakes I’ve made.

The rest of the rules of my one million goal – found here! – remain the same though.

And as far as my reading goes, I’m all right with that. I DO want to do a vlog in the future discussing the balance between writing and reading simultaneously. I think I finally found a balance between the two, or at least a balance that works for me.

Until then, enjoy the last few weeks of spring. See you in June!

BOOK REVIEW (53) Colonial Madness

BOOK REVIEW:

Colonial Madness

We're time-travelling -- err, wait! No, we're not!

I hate to admit this, because it makes me sound like an awful person, but I do judge books by their cover. I mean, I'll judge them by the cover and then pass them by, but sometimes I do stop long enough to read the blurb and an excerpt if that's available and it might change my mind. But what can I say? I'm a sucker for cover quality.

Not that this takes away from this book. No, the cover of Jo Whittemore's Colonial Madness is stunning! Seriously, I love most of the covers coming from publisher Aladdin Mix. They're so colourfully attractive!

Colonial Madness follows Victoria "Tori" Porter as she joins a family competition with her mother. You see, Tori and her mom have only each other and they're floundering money-wise as her mom isn't very good balancing the finances with her seamstress business. When the opportunity to inherit family wealth comes to play, Tori jumps at the chance to convince her reluctant mother to join.

Of course they have to play and win the game to get the money and property prize, and that means Tori and her mom have to follow the rules: for 2 weeks, all contestants have to live a colonial life. For Tori and her cousins, Angel and Dylan, that means no cells, no social media, no fast food, no toilet paper, no makeup and pretty much everything associated with the 21st century. And naturally hilarity ensues...

Seriously I laughed almost every other page. Don't believe me?
Check out some of these quotes I riffed:

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Tori is sooo funny, and sometimes it was quite intentional. Her relationship with her mom warmed my heart -- still warms my heart. At one point she thinks that the reason she never missed the father who died before she really knew him is because her mother happened to be really good at playing both purported roles of parenting. ^^ Awww.

There's also a romance! Who doesn't love love?

Tori meets and instantly falls -- and literally as she crashes into him the first time -- for Caleb, one of the staff members and judges of the colonial competition. Caleb seemed adorable. He really liked Tori and there was none of the wish-washy stuff I can't stand sometimes. On the one hand I read to find out who won the competition, but I also interested to see how Caleb and Tori would work out their new-found young love. They're both in their early teens presumably and they lived miles and states apart, AND both of their families are struggling money-wise, so I didn't see them hopping a plane to try to continue the physical aspect I guess social media would come in handy.

Caleb also dislikes hummus!

Ah! A book bf after my own heart...

All in all, enjoyable book. It had all the things I wanted, humor, romance and a HFN, so if you're interested in the same elements at the moment, check out Colonial Madness!

My verdict:

✮✮✮✮✮

(5 stars)

BOOK REVIEW (52): The Fisherman and his Wife

BOOK REVIEW:

The Fisherman and his Wife

I've been holding onto this review for a while. Not sure considering I finished reading this picture book in a few minutes...

Anyways before I begin the review, for those of you who are not aware of the folk tale of "The Fisherman and his Wife", or you haven't come across variants like Charles Perrault's fairy tale, "The Ridiculous Wishes", essentially this is a story about the flaw of hubris and seeking too much and being dissatisfied forever.

It's usually an abysmal tale; what you would call a cautionary story that isn't meant to necessarily give a HEA, say like "Cinderella" or "Snow White". The story of the fisherman and his greedy wife are just meant to teach you to be satisfied with what you got and not ask for anything too extravagant, or on the flip side teaching you to be satisfied with what you got.

So having read the back jacket I learned that the author and illustrator, Rachel Isadora, lived in Africa for a long time and that explained this inspired African themed retelling. It was beautifully put together.

I'm not sure what variants of this tale exists out there -- and this is sort of the bane of fairy tales and folk stories, as there are sometimes differences, big or small, that are available out there -- but I read only one variant, aside from Perrault's version which has the same theme only different story, cast, situation, etc. This variant is much shorter and it culminates into three wishes from the greedy wife, the last of which the magical prince-turned-fish does not grant.

Isadora's tale has the poor fisherman going back to the fish a total of six times, each time asking for a grander life scheme. The fifth time she asks to be a pope...

This was weird to me, because A) it's quite religious, and B) it's a children's book and if I were reading it to a child that would probably go over their head.

And the sixth and final time, the greedy wife asks to be God. Not a god, mind you, but God. Again, the monotheistic Christian vibe through me for a loop. Though I was still sorta relieved that she didn't get her wish!

Never read this fairy tale or are you interested in reading another variant?
Then hunt down Rachel Isadora's The Fisherman and his Wife.

My verdict:

✮✮✮✮

(4 stars)

BOOK REVIEW (51): Teenage Mermaid

BOOK REVIEW:

Teenage Mermaid

Okay this next book is an MG. Maybe upper MG because the characters are 15, but the style of writing, like the tones/airs of the characters made me think they were in junior high, so like ages 11-12 instead of they're being 15. You know, if any of that makes sense.

Still I’ve wanted to read Ellen Schreiber’s Teenage Mermaid for about a year now, mostly because I haven’t read a mermaid story yet. Yeah. I tend to avoid that paranormal creature because I think the author would have to get really creative to get around the whole ‘tail for half-a-body’ thing. Also I usually can’t get sex off the mind. How do mermaids have mermaid babies??

So we got mermaid Waterlilly or just ‘Lilly’ and her “Earthdude”, high school sophomore Spencer. Now like most mermaid meet cutes, I’m sure, they meet because they both have a love for the water. I mean, Lilly has no choice, but Spencer ditches school – yeah, I know, I know – to spend time on the beach. 

On one of these mornings he ends up drowning only to be saved by Lilly who happens to swim by (ironically she’s late for school too). It gets weird here, but stay with me: I guess what happens is that Lilly resuscitates him with a kiss while he’s still underwater.

I’m not a lifeguard or anything (and just between you and me, Internet, I failed my only CPR test back in high school), yet I’m sure this isn’t how you bring people back to the living world. Just sayin’.

So she saves him and he decides to take a souvenir, Lilly’s family necklace – the necklace that her mom keeps locked away and would totally ground her for if she stole it and lost it in the process, and to a human or an “Earthee” on top of that.

Basically Lilly is wading with sharks here if she doesn’t manage to find Spencer and the necklace before her mom finds out it’s missing.

Also as a heads-up now, although I should have mentioned this earlier, this story reads like a contemporary and much happier version of Hans Christen Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid”. In order to get out on land and retrieve her family’s heirloom necklace, Lilly goes to the depths of the ocean to visit Madame Pearl, a “witch” sea creature.

I don’t know what Madame Pearl was. It didn’t describe her as a mermaid – unless I missed it, and there wasn’t much of a description for her other than her “porcelain flesh” being “puffed up like a blowfish” or something along those lines.

Lilly requests a transmutation potion from Madame Pearl who delivers and the next day Lilly finds herself washed up on the beach with human legs.

…AND you can put the rest together I’m sure. If not read the book. It’s written in 1^st person perspective from both Spencer and Lilly’s POVs. It read all right considering their voices didn’t sound identical. I find it takes decent writing to not make that mistake. (Although from a writer’s perspective I’d just avoid it).

If you happen to pick up Teenage Mermaid, expect that:

1)      a short and quick read.

2)    Lilly’s gonna be more annoying than Spencer

3)     That these two are frustrating with all this lovey-dovey crap

4)    The ending will make you want to punt the book

And as for that last point, if you don’t believe me just continue reading this little excerpt from the book and then re-think my point:

WARNING! SPOILER A-HOY!

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“I thought she was a mermaid!”

“She is!” [Lilly’s bff] shouted.

“But she’s drowning!”

Lilly’s sparkling blue eyes were shut, her glowing skin sallow, her spirit withering away.

“She’s drowning of a broken heart! Only you can save her,” [Lilly’s bff] cried.

“CPR? Help me take her back to shore.”

“No! With the kiss of love!” [Lilly’s bff] said hurriedly. “That’s what Madame Pearl said—the kiss of love.”

***

I should explain though.

The “kiss of love” is supposed to be a game changer for a mermaid and human couple. Lilly’s great-grandfather was supposed to have been human when he fell in love with her mermaid great-grandmother and gave her the necklace heirloom that Spencer took during their creative CPR.

Supposedly Madame Pearl tells Lilly that there’s a myth of the full moon and a kiss between a mermaid and human that can change the human into a mermaid and unite the two lovers in soul AND body/species.

Nowhere does it mention mermaids…drowning. Lulz at the irony. Seriously. What a cop out.

Kinda.

You see I’ve read Ellen Schreiber’s two series, Vampire Kisses and Full Moon, and after going through the total of those 12 books, I can say that she likes to end off very vaguely. Like they read as HEAs, but there’s this element of WTFery where other characters are pushed aside when they sure as heck would be affected by the decision of her teenage couple.

I mean, what the heck Spencer? What about hating that his mom abandoned him and his father and so suddenly? How does abandoning his father for a girl he met a few days ago make him NOT unlike his crappy mother?

So read with caution. Keep your mind open and finish it through before slamming the book.

I did like Chainsaw, Spencer’s wealthy, perverted and nerdy best friend and Spencer’s hair (he kept changing the colour in the story), and some of the funny dialogue. The author has a knack for humor, and I believe her bio mentions that she was a standup comedien(ne) at some point in her life.

Anyways, give Teenage Mermaid a chance. Who knows? Maybe this one’s a book for you…

As a side note, I wonder if that bland and straightforward title was a nod at the 80s film, Teen Wolf. Only the plot is very different.

My verdict:

✮✮

(2 stars)

BOOK REVIEW (50): Equilibrium

BOOK REVIEW:

Equilibrium

I don’t read too much women’s fiction, mostly because it’s got too much life in it and it’s dreary. Not that life is necessarily a downer -- just that this genre produces heavy, slow reads in terms of pacing.

But I wanted to read Lorrie Thomson’s Equilibrium since its 2013 release because it looked like an interesting book. What drew me in was the POV switch between mother and daughter. What kept me reading were the ups and downs each faced around their new relationships, and their navigation of life without their husband/father.

I didn’t always like Laura Klein or her teen daughter, Darcy. Laura could be annoying in her unspoken assessment of others and though genuinely I found it realistic, on the other hand I’m used to fiction – like category romance – where what you see is typically what you get in a character. For instance, I thought Laura disliked her bubbly friend, Elle…but she doesn’t. She just gave me an initial impression that she didn’t appreciate how the other woman-slash-neighbour popped in and made herself at home.

Darcy was also kinda an irritating character to follow, and perhaps more so as she’s a hormonal teenager who doesn’t know how to handle her father’s suicide. And no, that’s not a spoiler. It’s obvious AND readers find out from the start. No one pussyfoots around it. At least not entirely. Some characters are pretty blunt. *cough*Aidan*cough*

Both Klein women also have romantic subplots, because nothing says moving on like meeting a man and having that new-found “love connection” be threatened by the irrational idea of betraying an old (dead) love. NOTE: the novel begins at the almost one year anniversary of Jack Klein, Darcy’s father and Laura’s husband’s suicide.

I liked Troy. I kinda wish that he got a perspective just because I loved that he was this combo of “jock-nerd”. He was adorkable! But he was young too, I think 13-14 to Darcy’s 17, and I couldn’t imagine he would have much to say. Unlike Darcy he was a straightforward kid. Mostly he told it as it was, one of those blunt characters along with Elle, Laura’s gregarious friend.

Overall it’s a decent book once you got over the pacing, and the lengthy prose… I did love the ending. I’m a sucker for HFN (or HEAs), so I was happy considering the bleak start. So pick it up if you have the desire for women’s fiction.

My verdict:

✮✮✮.5

(3.5 stars)

BOOK REVIEW (49): Dark Chocolate Demise (Cupcake Bakery Mystery #7)

BOOK REVIEW:

Dark Chocolate Demise

Finally I caught up to Jenn McKinlay's Cupcake Bakery Mystery series. Book 7, and the latest release, Dark Chocolate Demise picks up a few weeks later (I believe) after the events of Book 6 (go read Review 47 for info on that story).

So Mel still has a rocky love life, and yet again murder finds her, only this time it hits closer home -- as in no one she loves is a suspect, but rather the intended victim. You see the murder victim looks so much like one of her friends, Mel realizes that the next time this killer strike she could lose a lot more than several nights of sleep.

You know what I love about this series, and Mel in particular, is that cozies with their amateur sleuths can lose me if the MC doesn't actually have a life outside the murder mystery itself. Thankfully Mel does have a life. She's actually usually concerned with her bakery, and there's steady pacing between the mystery and her business and personal life.

I seriously don't know what else I could say without spoiling the novel.

Angie and Tate are still Angie and Tate.

Angie's brothers remain grossly protective...and a little cute. Seriously. They really do care for their sister, it's weird.

As far as Mel's love life goes, I'm rooting for Detective Martinez but he's kinda lost out I think. I mean, it was probably a no-brainier, but a girl can dream of her fantasy choice in this not-really love triangle.

And on a similar note everyone working at Fairy Tale Cupcakes have significant others. That was a little weird I had to admit, but I'm also a sucker for romantic conflict and HEAs (or HFNs, which this is more of).

I guessed the bad guy pretty early on, just because cozies usually introduce the culprit. Although really any well-written mystery will introduce the culprit at some point, and usually I find it's either A) someone you least suspect, someone close to the MC or B) someone who made a super-brief appearance.

And because I'm really running out of non-spoilery things to say, I'm going to wrap this up but know that I loved the book! Now go read through Books 1-6 and then pick up Dark Chocolate Demise, you're in for a treat.

My verdict:

✮✮✮✮✮

(5 stars)

BOOK REVIEW (48): Abby and the Playboy Prince

BOOK REVIEW:

Abby and the Playboy Prince

Back to baby land with Raye Morgan's Abby and the Playboy Prince. Though to be honest there isn't a lot of page time for baby -- and the cover basically suggests that Abby and her player prince are pretty much more than the stars in this fairy tale union.

Now where to start?

Let's begin with the beginning, shall we? Once upon a dark and stormy night there was an abandoned castle and a girl who broke into said castle with her baby partner in crime, and a prince who has no clue that his castle is harboring a fugitive until she tumbles into his bed. Well, he did help her there...

Prince Mychale of the fictional lands of Montenevada just wants peace and quiet for the next few days. And Abby Donair's being there puts his plans on hold, especially when her baby cries. Although he's pretty intent on kicking her out, the good Prince changes his mind when Abby nurses him to health because he gets super sick at one point (dratted vertigo).

During the patient's recovery Abby and Mychale fall head over heels in lust...and err, later love. But of course it's not going to be as easy as that. For one, Abby is a wanted woman -- in all the wrong ways -- and Mychale is in the middle of negotiating a marriage with another woman.

What I loved about these two is the teasing banter. Clearly they both like each other and I couldn't get over the fact they were stuck in this beautifully described castle. Maybe I should start sneaking into castles, too?

The baby, Brianna, was so adorable. I'd love to say she was a prop, but she was a baby. As I'm sure you can all imagine she didn't have much lines. Still my heart was all pitter-patter whenever Mychale interacted with her. Something about alpha males and babies puts me in the best of moods. ^^

Awww. See what I mean?

The external conflict didn't take away from the important internal romantic-blocking problems between Abby and Mychale. It was just enough intrigue that added a layer of problems that made me flip the pages quicker to the epilogue.

So if you want a fairy tale love, "father-daughter" moments, and a HEA -- yeah, that wasn't a spoiler, we're talking romance here folks -- pick up Raye Morgan's Abby and the Playboy Prince and I guarantee you'll want to go back and read Book 1 of this trilogy, titled The Royals of Montenevada and Book 3 staring the king of Montenevada himself, Prince Mychale's eldest brother.

My verdict:

✮✮✮✮✮

(5 stars)