28 Feb 2008
By the way…
YUMMY!
I am almost finished (and it was supposed to arrive a week AFTER the Kim Harrison book. Amazon 1. Chapigo 0.)
Archive for February, 2008
26 Feb 2008
Release my book, darnitall!!!
Dear chapters.indigo.ca,
GIVE ME MY BOOK! I pre-ordered the book on December 30, 2007 and it was released TODAY and in fact is in the STORES around town, but have you shipped mine yet? No. Does it look like you plan on shipping it any time soon? No. I had best have a “your order has been shipped” email by the end of today or at the latest tomorrow morning or I am cancelling this order and just going to pay the full price in the store. OR, I will buy the book in the store, read it and then return the one you finally send me. My only fear about that option is that you WON’T send the book for like, another month and I’ll be stuck with two copies.
Not that I don’t love Kim Harrison’s books. 
Just ship my gosh darn book already! The only reason I bought it through you was because I had received gift certificates for Christmas and I had to shop at your store. Normally I shop on amazon.ca because they are much more efficient and don’t really suck as much as you do. And I can say that as I worked for your company for many years.
I want my KH book! Grrr!
Crankily yours,
Cat
[CrankyCat Update : Just got off the phone with Customer Service after inquiring as to WHY my order is STILL awaiting shipment and was told "oh! Well, we do have a ton in stock, I don't know!" Helpful. So in approximately TWO BUSINESS DAYS I should be receiving an email with an "estimated time of arrival" so that perhaps that email will prompt the store to ship my order. Helpful. I know I should probably just cancel the order and walk the three blocks to the store near me and buy my very own copy since they have quite a few in stock. But I won't. Why? Because I bought this one with a Gift Card AND it was almost $15 cheaper than the in-store price. I am not about to pay full Canadian price because that is STUPID and use my own money. But I want my bloody book. Bastards. I knew I disliked this company for a reason and not just because they treat most of their employees like crap.]
23 Feb 2008
Coming soon to a bookshelf near me
Yippee! They are on their way! They are on their way!!
The Dave Barry / Ridley Pearson book and the Kim Harrison book should arrive by Wednesday. Chosen will arrive the first week of March as it is scheduled for release March 4th! Wahoooo!! I am so, so very excited about both the Kim Harrison and PC Cast books! I have been awaiting their arrival for so very, very long. The latest Peter Pan book by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson I discovered while at Disney World as it was in one of the many stored we visited. However I wasn’t about to buy it there (even with our dollar being at par it worked out to be cheaper on amazon.ca).
23 Feb 2008
valiant
valiant : A Modern Tale of Faerie
by Holly Black
There was something about this book that made me not want to put it down, though it wasn’t that I liked the book because I don’t think I did. As much as I liked tithe, I didn’t find the same sense of wonder with this novel.
I don’t think I liked the characters, though my mind is still not made up. The troll character, well, I had a hard time even picturing what he was supposed to look like and didn’t really have all that much of a fey idea of him.
I suppose I could liken this story to a modern-day Beauty and the Beast or the relationship between Goliath and Elisa Maza from the cartoon Gargoyles. I my mind that is how I saw it mixed in with street kids and subway tunnels.
I found the ending rather abrupt and unexciting. I still found the story to be rather rough and not for the younger reader as I did with tithe. I’m not a huge fan of swearing in my YA books, call me a prude or a goodie-goodie if you will, but I don’t like my YA to be so “real”.
Val is a seventeen year-old, Lacrosse player who finds out something unsettling about her mother which causes her to take off from New Jersey to New York and then meets up with Lolli and Dave and his brother Luis and discovers an entirely different world.
It took me one afternoon to read the book and yes, I will be reading Ironside when it comes out in paperback, but I still don’t think I liked it.
22 Feb 2008
A Public Service Announcement
WARNING!! If you have ever read the awesome books that are the Spiderwick Chronicles, do NOT – I repeat – DO NOT go see the horror that is the movie.
DO NOT GO SEE THE MOVIE even if you haven’t read the books.
Do me a favour and just go read the books (or book, if you happen to get the collection like I did).
The movie is heartbreakingly awful and has pretty much NOTHING to do with the actual story that is created by the BOOK. Seriously.
And dude! They couldn’t even shell out the money to hire REAL TWINS! Aren’t there like a billion twin child actors out there?
And WHY did they hire two BRITISH children to play AMERICAN children? I don’t get it! Their attempts at “American” accents were HORRID! Not to mention that boy couldn’t act his way out of a paper bag – and I thought that Harry Potter kid was horrible in the first few HP movies.
I felt sick at the end of this film – ok so I ate way too much popcorn that I’m not supposed to eat in the first place, but still, the story was so altered and the acting was so awful that I was heartbroken and angry all at once. I have no idea why they changed a good thing like they did. I understand some things would have to be cut for length, but to change the entire PLOT??
Shawn doesn’t even want to read the books now, and I am trying to explain to him how much he SHOULD. Because this movie was as much like the books as the Eragon movie was like the Eragon book – NOTHING LIKE IT AT ALL!
I can’t believe I let Shawn spend his money on this and that we just wasted our entire evening. If you’ll excuse me I think I need to go throw up.
22 Feb 2008
All my authors know each other
You know you’re a big fan of a specific genre of book when all the authors on your bookshelves are suddenly quoted on each other’s books. The main reason I first bought The Scent of Shadows by Vicki Pettersson was honestly because it had a quote from Kim Harrison on the front cover. As a HUGE fan of Kim Harrison, I had to try out the book which looked interesting but I still wasn’t 100% sure that it would be my cup o’ tea.
Turns out it was of course.
Through Vicki Pettersson’s blog I discovered Melissa Marr (Wicked Lovely) and was thrilled by new fantastical literature adventures!
And now it turns out that the third book in Vicki’s series, A Touch of Twilight, has quotes from both Kelley Armstrong and Melissa Marr on the cover! I discovered Kelley Armstrong while working at Coles bookstore back in the day and was happy to find out she was a Canadian author and I think through her series I discovered Kim Harrison (I think there might have been a quote on Kim Harrison’s first book(s) from her? My memory escapes me but I do know I was still working in the retail book world at the time.
[UPDATE: Ah! Ha! Kelley Armstrong DID do a blurb for Kim Harrison as proven on Kim Harrison's website!
"Kelley Armstrong A fellow author of shadows. She gave me a wonderful blurb for DWW, and we've kept in touch since. If you haven't found her books, (which I'd be surprised about,) check them out!"
- KH, "People I Know" www.kimharrison.net
**DDW - Dead Witch Walking ]
I feel like I am in one big incestuous urban fantasy ring here and I am loving every minute of it! I find it very cool that authors that I love so dearly are in many cases friends as well as colleagues and spend time promoting the other. It’s probably a stupid thing for me to feel excited about, but I do and I am not ashamed to admit it.
I’m just waiting for C.E. Murphy to turn up on the cover of one of those other books and I think all my main (current) authors will be all part of the same big happy family!
16 Feb 2008
The Blue Girl
The Blue Girl
by Charles de Lint
I LOVED THIS BOOK! And you know something? I was sure I wouldn’t like it at all. There was just something about it that made me think I would be bored or irritated throughout the entire story, but I wasn’t. I was most pleasantly surprised and entertained by this novel.
I did think the ending was a little…meh, but aside from that I was so enraptured by the story and the characters that I didn’t care so much as to be a little sad that it was over. I had tried to read another Charles de Lint book a long time ago (I do not recall which one) and I remember thinking it was boring and not my style so I was very hesitant about this novel. However I needed stuff to read on my vacation and went for it.
I am very glad I did.
Imogene is a punky teen who for some reason catches not only the eyes of the school ghost, and faeries, but also the soul-eaters. She and her new friend Maxine an outcast find adventure and magic among the shadows.
Well written, humour in some places and tears in others. I only put it down because I NEEDED to sleep at some point, or needed to get up, dressed and out the door to one of the Disney parks. Heh.
I am sending this one to Monkey next time I see her. 
So apparently Monkey has this one already and I told her I didn’t want to read it. Um… back to you.
4 Feb 2008
vacation reading
Not sure when I’ll have a chance to post again as I am leaving for my belated honeymoon on Friday. I shall be spending 8 glorious days in Disney World with my wonderful hubby and we’ve both stocked up on books for the plane ride as well as night time reading! This is what I picked up yesterday on our book shopping spree…
The Iris Johansen book won’t take me very long to read, but I am a sucker for her “thrillers”. Both the Charles de Lint and Tim Bowler books looked interesting enough to keep my attention from being waaaaaaay above the groud and about to crash to my death (yes, I am slightly afraid of flying). We’ll be gone from Friday to Friday and I am so looking forward to not waking up to snow and ice and below zero temperatures. Not to mention not having to go to work for a week and a bit. Woohoo!!! See you all when I get back!
4 Feb 2008
Holidays are Hell and Heart of Stone
Oh boy am I behind in posting about books on this blog! In my defence, I haven’t really had a lot to read these days OR even have the TIME to read. Isn’t that horrifying???
The following two books have been read and loved since Christmas…
Holidays are Hell
stories by Kim Harrison, Vicki Pettersson, Lyndsay Sands and Marjorie Liu
The first story I read was the one by Kim Harrison because I am in desperate need of a Rachel Morgan fix (the new book has already been pre-ordered and will arrive at the end of the month – woo!). I really enjoyed this glimpse into Rachel’s past in this short story. It was just as entertaining as the other books and not nearly long enough. Heh.
The second one I read was by the Goddess of Urban Fantasy, Vicki Pettersson and I have to say this was my favorite!! I LOVE LOVE LOVED it! The back story that was explained was just awesome and I love background information on characters that I enjoy, especially if it explains something not quite explained in the main books. I didn’t put this one down at all (not that it was all that long, but I took it everywhere with me in the house when I was reading it). VERY enjoyable.
I am still plugging away at the other two stories. I actually have the book in the bathroom for the nights when I am sick, but not in too much pain that I can actually read something. So far I am enjoying the Lyndsay Sands story, it’s the first I have ever read any of her writing.
Heart of Stone
by C.E. Murphy
So when I saw this book I first thought it was another one of the Urban Shaman series and was so excited and ordered it without hesitation. Imagine my surprise when I got it home and read the author’s web page (linked on the sidebar) and found out it’s a completely new series! The main character Margrit (Grit) is a lawyer who teams up with Alban a gargoyle and they solve a crime. Ok, so it is really much more than that, I trimmed the summary a little, but it’s pretty much the gist of the story. I liked Margrit, but I don’t think I liked Alban and I don’t know about the whole gargoyle thing. I keep thinking of the Disney cartoon from the 90s, Gargoyles (an AWESOME cartoon by the way) and I need to get those ideas out of my head if I want to like this series as much as I want to. Heh. But I am going to get the next two books in the series because I really like the author’s style of writing and sense of humour. I need books in order to survive and these make for very good drugs.
-
Browse
or Currently Reading
Challenges
Friend Me, Follow Me!
