The Infernal Devices Series by Cassandra Clare

The Infernal Devices Series by Cassandra Clare.

 

This review of Cassandra Clare’s fantastic prequel series was written by my best friend. Read it.

DOCTOR WHO – MY FEELS

So I am waiting for the season premiere of Doctor Who which will be tonight on BBC America at 8 pm for me. Part of the pre-marathon is playing the 50th anniversary special and there are just so many feels. I AM SO READY. When they show all of the incarnations of the Doctor working together to save Gallifrey, I actually get choked up. And when I hear David Tennant say, “I don’t wanna go,” for the second time a small piece of me may actually die. THEN THERE’S THE FOURTH INCARNATION’S FACE. UGH. So needless to say, if you aren’t getting ready to watch the season premiere or haven’t all ready watched it, I think you’re a fool.

Sincerely,

A crazy Doctor Who fangirl

Sorry, sorry

I’m apologizing more to myself than to anyone else. I haven’t posted in a few days because I haven’t done much reading. I was in Georgia visiting my college roommate. It was great and I was so glad to see her.

We went to the Atlanta Botanical Gardens and they were gorgeous. But it’s so hot there ALL THE TIME. How does one deal?

Can we talk about Rainbow Rowell?

I read my first Rainbow Rowell book recently – Fangirl. If you’re a real Fangirl, then at least one scene in this book depicts an episode from your life. It’s great. Well great and embarrassing; like maybe Rowell found your diary somewhere or has access to your most fangirl, anxiety ridden moments via YouTube. Anyway, I clearly think that the book is easy to relate and it was a fun read. Anyone have any suggestions on my next Rowell read?

GoT (A Song of Ice and Fire) Update

Well this is the first post about it. So it isn’t an update. 

I started reading A Game of Thrones and I love it. (LOVE) But…

Here’s the real issue. There is a lot going on and some chapters are slower than others. Leave me with Daenerys Targaryen for a little while longer please! Not that I don’t love Jon and Arya, but when I am stuck with Sansa and Catelyn and Eddard for too long I get bored. A summer of Young Adult novels has warped my brain. And I just bought ten more (YA novels). But not to worry! I have not given up! I know that there is so much greatness to come that I would never dare. 

Professional Editing

I just finished up a course called Professional Editing. It might sound a little boring, but I have actually loved it. For six weeks, I have been reviewing every grammar rule that I learned from a grammar workbook in the sixth grade. Every tool an editor might need to make a work nothing short of fantastic. I loved the professor. To wrap up our six weeks together, he issued us a final exam that was simply to write a brief essay explaining what we thought the publishing industry should be doing and how we saw ourselves being involved in making this happen. Brilliant, right? Well here was my answer:

It is my firm belief that every person should read at least one piece of fiction in their lifetime which so immerses him in the content that it is a rude awakening to finish it and be chucked out into the real world. In order for everyone to experience this, every reader has to be comfortable with the carrier of the content. A commuter benefits from an electronic device that affords him great literature and mobility. A book-hoarder benefits from the persistence of legacy publishers which continues to enable him to stock his shelves. A reader with a short attention span benefits from shorter publications produced by sites like Byliner and Atavist, enabling him to complete a great work before getting bored. And then there is a reader like me. I own a kindle and a nook and a tablet with both applications; I am a serial book purchaser in love with hard-covers, paperbacks and mass market paperbacks alike; and I subscribe to both Byliner and purchase stories from Atavist in order to fulfill a quick fix for contemporary literature. I like this literary world in which we live which affords me all of these options in publications. Unfortunately, I do not think that every reader agrees with me. The readers which I have described here feel threatened by each other’s preferred formats. One format to bring them all and in the darkness bind them. Clearly I am being a bit overdramatic, but what if that is not so far off? If we limit ourselves to one format when so many others are endeared to different types, are we not subjecting them to a type of darkness? My future publishing industry would continue to invest in all of these readers to bring them what they want to read and from what they want to read it. And with how strongly many readers feel about the particular format to which they are so inclined to protect, I do not think that the immediate future is far from my ideal. As for my part in this world, I hope to help authors continue to produce great content, specifically by focusing my efforts on the words themselves. It does not really matter to me how the final product is read as long as it is magnificent and shared by commuters, book-hoarders, readers with short attention spans, and word-lovers alike.