Behind the Bookshelf: Myra McEntire

Today's Installment:  Myra McEntire!


I got to have an interview a little while ago with the ever fabulous Myra McEntire and she kindly gave me some answers. Read her blog if you want to know what true AWESOMENESS is. If you're too lazy, that's cool. Just sit back, grab a glass of Coke and enjoy this post.

Myra McEntire is the author of the debut novel, Hourglass coming out June 14. She lives in Nashville, the country music capital or America where her lyrical talents go sadly unappreciated. She’s chosen, instead, to channel her “mad word skills” into creating stories infused with her love of music


Alrighty interview ON!

Q: Favorite Food/Junk food?

Myra: Italian. CHEESE. I MUST HAVE CHEESE.

Q: So.. I heard you like Doctor Who and Vampire Diaries (you're breaking my awesome-meter here.…). If you could spend a day with any of the characters from any of your favorite shows, who would it be and why?

Myra: I'd just like to watch Damon work his wiles on the humans. That persuasive thing he has going is hot. It could just be the big eyes.

Me: Everyone loves Damon. It's all in the eyes.

Q: What can we expect from Hourglass besides a love triangle, hidden secrets and time travel?

Myra: See, I didn't think it was actually a love triangle. I sort of saw it as a two-and half sided angle. You read it and tell me. :D

Me: OOHHH  *goes to Amazon and repeatedly refreshes* Hourglass must come sooner!

Q:  Emerson is the personification of (pardon the language) kick-ass. (She can travel though time peeps!) What was the most fun part about writing Emerson?

Myra: When "she" would say things I didn't expect. My favorite is "buttered biscuits and honey."

Me: Characters tend to do that.

Q: What do you prefer: the geeky boy; the bad boy or any boy with a sword?!

Myra: Can I have all three? Rolled into one? Because a bad geek with a sword would be the SHIZZZ.

Me: It would! Thanks Myra for this fun interview and remember people, Hourglass comes out June 14th (HUZZAH!!)

And that concludes this installment of BEHIND THE BOOKSHELF. Thanks guys!

XO
-Jaz

Craziness lead to the FUNK

Hey blog readers! I'm SO SO SO SO SO SO SO (repeat 100X) Sorry I haven't been blogging more. School is coming down like there's no tomorrow and I got sick. Boo. Here's a list of reasons why I'm out of my funk and not blogging daily.


Reason's WHY I'm in a FUNK:

1) My older brother just moved out. Home life feels so whacked out now that he's not here to bask in my weirdliness.

2) My sister is about to leave for College and I'm slowly spiraling into madness as my two weird (and awesome) siblings are leaving me. NOO!!

3) my social life (read: NO JOKING ABOUT IT). Friends and some falling out. Went through a dark patch (which lasted about 5 hours) (to the said people: I have a hitlist that needs to be finished by senior graduation so....)

4) my HALF SISTER (who i had no IDEA about) is coming tomorrow. Read: major WHOA factor. Also, unknown uncle (just recently known about). MAJOR WHAMMY IN MY LIFE CAUSED THE FUNK.

5) School. Gah, no words can describe this circle of hell. Hell has NOTHING on Middle school (rabid teens, traveling in packs, smell for blood, yanno the works).

6) I got sick. Well technically, I got sick last Saturday 'till Monday. Then it came back Friday night (adding to the DARK PATCH), i felt like dying. In a hole. It was baaaaaad. Plus side, Vampire Diaries recording kept me company, as well as Doctor Who and Angel so sick weekend was fine.


7) While stalking Twitter, I found out that the cover for Clockwork Prince shall be unveiled May 25 at BOOK EXPO AMERICA but Mundie Moms will gladly show it on their site at 10:00 a.m. Sickness instantly better.

8) HOLY MOTHER OF ALL THINGS VAMPIRE DIARIES SEASON FINALE. SOO. GOOD. SO. MANY. QUESTIONS. FOR SEASON 3.
hint: a deal is struck and things end smack in the middle of rock and a hard place.

9) I GOT AN INTERVIEW WITH MYRA McENTIRE, NO WORDS CAN DESCRIBE MY HAPPINESS WHEN SHE RESPONDED TO MY EMAIL. Plus. she's a fellow Doctor Who fan. SCORE :) so tomorrow, I'll be posting up the interview.

Later my peeps.
Jazmin :)

Across the Universe (No, not the Beatles movie) by Beth Revis

paperback cover

Goodreads says:  Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship Godspeed and expects to awaken on a new planet, three hundred years in the future. Never could she have known that her frozen slumber would come to an end fifty years too soon and that she would be thrust into the brave new world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules.

Amy quickly realizes that her awakening was no mere computer malfunction. Someone - one of the few thousand inhabitants of the spaceship - tried to kill her. And if Amy doesn't do something soon, her parents will be next.

Now, Amy must race to unlock Godspeed's hidden secrets. But out of her list of murder suspects, there's only one who matters: Elder, the future leader of the ship and the love she could never have seen coming. 

Across the Universe is a sci-fi/dystopian that was amazing. It’s about our main girl, Amy, who joins her parents on the ship Godspeed in space to get into the future. They are cryogenically frozen for 300 years to make it to a brand new earth. One day, someone tries to murder Amy and she wakes up before the 300 years are up. Now she is stuck on the Godspeed with no idea of who anyone is, except that they all have given control to Eldest, a dictator and Elder, Eldest's heir. Elder is fascinated with Amy but he can't let that fascination get in his way if he's to become the next Eldest. Amy has to unlock Godspeed’s secrets when she wakes up to prevent more people from dying. I loved it! I do feel bad that it took me so long to get around to reading it. Elder and Amy were wicked cool, and their chemistry started off like this:


Elder: Girl with red hair, totes pretty.
Amy: what the hell is this place am stuck in?


and then it turned into:


Elder: I care for this girl. A Lot.
Amy: Hmm. I like this boy BUT considering what he tried to do... (read it, I won't say). It was pretty awesome. I also liked the whole 'in space' thing; I haven’t read many sci-fi novels in forever and AtU was definitely amazing. One thing I did not like was the very near rape-y scene when everyone was like in heat or mating (that was just... eww *shudders*)


Anyways,pick this one up! You cannot miss this debut novel!


Final Verdict: 8/10 Stars

Sea Change by Aimee Friedman

On the iPod: If You Run - The Boxer Rebellion

Goodreads says: Sixteen-year-old Miranda Merchant is great at science. . .and not so great with boys. After major drama with her boyfriend and (now ex) best friend, she's happy to spend the summer on small, mysterious Selkie Island, helping her mother sort out her late grandmother's estate.

There, Miranda finds new friends and an island with a mysterious, mystical history, presenting her with facts her logical, scientific mind can't make sense of. She also meets Leo, who challenges everything she thought she knew about boys, friendship. . .and reality.

Is Leo hiding something? Or is he something that she never could have imagined?

Sea Change is a mermaid story but with unlikely mermaids. Miranda is a levelhead 16 year old who loves science and cares less about boys and clothes (HOLY CRAP!!! SOMEONE STOP THE PRESSES!). She leaves her home of New York to meet up with her mom on Selkie Island, Georgia to a house her grandmother left to her mom. Selkie Island is a odd island with its old century charm and strange history and Miranda find herself drawn to this place she knows nothing about. Then she meets Leo, a local boy who has Miranda on a string (although he doesn’t know it). Sea Change is so, so good! I loved Miranda and Leo who had that great chemistry as well as sweet moments. Now I tend to steer clear of mermaid stories since one nearly made me want to stick my head underwater and just stay there, but Sea Change grabbed me by the collar and said, "Hey, read me. I'm a mermaid story and I guarantee you'll love me."

Yes, books do talk to me :P. No, I don't need a psychiatrist.

I thought Sea Change was a decent mermaid story, but is it just me ... or are more mermaid stories now involving some incredibly hot boy being a mermaid and a plain girl falling in love with it. (Am I right or insane?). Also the cover. Boy looks like RPattz...

Anywas the verdict: 6/10 stars.

Behind the Bookshelf: Andrea Cremer

YUSSSS!!! Today is my first installment of Behind the Bookshelf. Today we have * DRUM ROLL PLEASE* Andrea Cremer partaking in Behind the Bookshelf.

Andrea Cremer wrote Nightshade (possibly the most Awesomesauce debut book of 2011) with the sequel, Wolfsbane coming out this summer (July 26) and Bloodrose set to come out Spring 2012. Here's my interview with Andrea!

Q: Who’s your favorite team to be in? (Yanno like Team Jace or Team Simon (Mortal Instruments); Peeta or Gale? (Hunger Games) Or my personal favorite; Team Shay or Team Ren?)

Andrea Cremer :That’s tough – there are some great contenders out there! I think my favorite team of the moment is Team Nick vs. Team Alan in Sarah Rees Brennan’s Demon’s Lexicon series. I adore Nick but Alan is so intriguing!

Me: hmm, so I've heard. I guess I should read Demon's Lexicon now...

Q: What would you rather be in your books; A Keeper, A Guardian, or a Searcher?

Andrea: I’d want to be a Guardian. I love wolves and I’d love to have the ability to become one.

Me: If you could spend a day with any one of your characters, who would it be and why?

Andrea : I would spend it with Mason – he’s hilarious and sweet. He’d be a wonderful person to hang out with.

Me: Tru that.

Q: What helps you get into the writer mode? A Cup of Tea? Blasting music? Or just go with the flow on whatever is mixing in that wonderful brain of yours?

Andrea: All I need to write are coffee (black and strong!) and music. I create playlists for all my books. The right songs help transport me into the world I’m writing.

Me: What’s your favorite guilty pleasure (music, television, books, etc…)?

Andrea: Playing World of Warcraft with my husband and watching television – Supernatural, Doctor Who, and Buffy J

Me: Can you say, my new best friend? Andrea's a beast. *drools stares at Sam and Dean*

Q: How’d you get the (insanely wicked and super-schmazing) idea for the Nightshade series?

Andrea : Calla was the inspiration for Nightshade. I knew she was a girl and that she was a wolf. Creating the world of Nightshade meant inventing a wolf mythology that reflected the way I see wolves – as beautiful, intelligent and social rather than the way werewolves usually appear in popular culture.

Q: What’s your favorite word (other than schmazing,‘cause yanno look at it)?

Andrea: I have many favorite words, but one is sanguinary. It means bloody.

Alrighty, this was one spectacular interview with Andrea Cremer. Thanks a bunch to Andrea, and you readers!

If I Stay by Gayle Forman

If I Stay is a beautiful and gripping tale of love, family and the choices we all make. Mia is living an ordinary life with dreams of getting in Julliard because that girl has some serious cello playing skills. One day when she’s driving out with her family to meet family friends, they end up in a car accident. Mia then has an out of body experience as she notices her current situation, comatose, and the people who love watch over her body as they pray and hope for her to come back to them. Mia has a choice to make, if she wants to stay or if she'll leave. If I Stay is a graceful and haunting tale, having a steady pace but keeping you hooked. I absolutely freaking loved If I Stay because Mia is there but not really and you see family and friends come in and out of the hospital as they wait for Mia to emerge from her comatose state. She has a reliable best friend, Kim and awesome boyfriend Adam, who instigate possibly the coolest/craziest plan to get into Mia's hospital suite (hint: it involves a famous celebrity and that was just bomb).
If I Stay is a must read. No exceptions, just READ it.
The sequel, Where She Went is out. Now let me go find it.

My review: 8 Stars

An Idea.. That Will Now Be a Regular Thing

Alrighty, peeps so you guys know who I do interviews with authors when they can (because writing is DEMANDING) so I want to make the interviews on here unique. Myra McEntire does The Fort over at her blog, CJ Redwine has fun installment with Captain Jack/Spork of Doom and the Werellama, I'll be doing Behind the Bookshelf (since you know, my blog is called Wondeful Bookshelf of Jaz, so it's only fitting I do Behind the Bookshelf). Behind the Bookshelf is an idea that I just came up with this morning when I remembered I had sent interview questions to Andrea Cremer, author of Nightshade. So as soon as I can put the interview up (which wil be by tomorrow, I PINKY SWEAR, cause that stuff is legit), Behind the Bookshelf will be a regular thing everytime I get an interview.

Muchas gracias,
Jazmin.

10 Reasons Why You SHOULD be Reading Curse Workers series by Holly Black

So, in a previous post I've written about Holly Black and her Curseworkers series. Now, if you aren't hooked by reading the back covers, I'll give you ten reasons WHY Curse Workers series is bomb.

10) There's Magick. Not Tinkerbell magic, this is the real shiz. Everyone has some type of magick but with that comes blowback. I'll explain that next.

9) The Blowback. See when the characters in the Curse Workers use magick, there's a price to pay. It's Karma basically, let's say you're a Death Worker (kill someone with just your touch) the blowback you get is slowly dying yourself. The same goes with Luck/Memory/Dreams, if you do bad magick, you get bad blowback. It's BEAST.

8) Cons. Man, do I love a good con. I blame my friend Kelsey for involving me with Leverage (btw CONS!!!). So anyways in White Glove, there are mini cons going throughout (like Cassel being a bookie at school) and then there's the big con at the end where EVERYTHING CHANGED. I may not have the skillz to be a con-man or mobster, but I'll live it through Holly Black's series.

7) Cassel. Hot boy, like no joke. Cassel is such a messed up and flawed character but you love him BECAUSE of these flaws. He tries to convince you he's bad, but whenever he's nice to his friends/family you see that he's just misunderstood. I LOVE MISUNDERSTOOD BOYS, they always tend to be hotter...

6) The Family Business. Even though Cassel doesn't have any 'special' curse worker ability (snerk, YA RIGHT. read White Cat to see why), his family is always close (but for a totally different reason...) as they do cons/jobs together and they do it right. I wonder if I can start the Family Biz when I get older, so TIME TO BECOME A CON ARTIST.

5) The girls. Alright, before you think of me as some weird person, I gotta say Holly Black's female characters are MOXIE. They do things for the people they love (Daneca in the series, Maura in Red Glove, Lila...) and even though that sometimes goes south, they only want best for those they love (except you Lila, you better prove me wrong in Black Heart or I'll make a vodoo doll for you)

4) The Bad Girl/Bad Boy (Lila and Cassel's chemistry). So in Red Glove, these two have some nice moments until yanno somewhere near the late middle. Lila is a spoiled girl but not enough parent love (I've heard that song sung before) so she's a tad pyschotic (probably those years where she was 'dead' added to that) but you can't deny that she and Cassel have some great moments (read Red Glove for more on those moments as well as the flashbacks to when they were kids). I have the vodoo Lila doll ready just in case she does something totally unforgivable in Black Heart.

3) The Zacharov Crime Family . Man, the Mob is in here and I love that. I enjoy crime families that want to kill someone (albeit it's a character I like so...) but I just love how if you get one on your side, they're like your best friends but if there on the opposite side you better make sure you can hide REAL GOOD from them.

2) The twists Black just throws in there like she's dealing cards. That's bloody brilliant as well as how she just keeps you hooked that you have to keep reading. (I finished Red Glove in 3 hours. 3 friggin hours. I regret nothing.)

1) The covers. They ooze of mystery and intrigue and gorgeousness.