So Long 2012... It's Been Real.

Oh 2012, where shall I being? You were not the best of years... in fact, you might have been the worst ever. I spent most of the year under the weather in one way or another. Even managed to land a lovely case of the shingles! Shingles... at 36! And let me tell you, it is one of the most painful things ever! Even worse than having needles stuck in your back, which I also had done this year. I learned that knee surgery will be in my near future and I'm ending the year with a migraine that's been around for almost 2 months. But, I'm still alive and I've avoided any hospital visits, so bright side there!

There were also couple of national tragedies that hit a little too close to home for me, namely Superstorm Sandy that hit the coast at the end of October and the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown... a small town 20 miles North of me. Both events shook me pretty hard and really made me be more aware of my feelings on certain topics.

But it wasn't all doom and gloom this year. There were a number of good moments. Spending 3 days in NYC at BlogHer `13, two of the days with my friend Laura, was awesome. Spent a day at New York Comic Con. Hit a few excellent toy events. Made some new blogging friends. Became a devoted Whovian. I also discovered my personal style when it comes to clothes and rediscovered a number of passions that were dormant in my life. Now more than ever, I can comfortably say what I like... and don't like, without caring what people think.

As for my resolutions from the start of 2012, they were mostly a bust:

• Do Project Life - this is going to be interesting... since I rarely leave the house - I made it *maybe* 5 weeks? It just wasn't a good fit for my lifestyle.

• Do Project 52 - going to focus this project on macro images - I lasted 7 weeks. 7. I'm pretty sure I narrowed my topic down too much, which became not so much challenging, but uninteresting.

• Lose 50lbs - I want to/need to lose more, but I'm being a bit of a realist with this goal - Nope, in fact, I think I ended the year weighing more than I started.

• Build readership on all 4 of my blogs  - Ended up with 7 inactive blogs. Yikes!

• Start up Pop Hearts Studio  - Nope, did nothing with this and I'm now not sure if I ever will.

• Try to find my drawing style  - Thought about it, did nothing. 

• Create, Create, Create  - I made a few things, wish it was more.

Then there was the 2012 Goodreads Reading Challenge - only completed 4 books out of my goal of 10. I have bookcases full of books waiting to be read and only managed 4. And for Christmas, I added some new books to my collection, so I'll be attempting the reading challenge again.

Oh, and NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) in November... I lasted 19 days. Which was better than 2011, but still wasn't the entire month. Honestly, if it wasn't for the election or SuperStorm Sandy, I don't think I would have even made it 19 days. Those two topics alone gave me a weeks worth of posts!

Something I did manage to do pretty well with is my word of the year. I picked CONFIDENCE, and I thing I did a pretty good job of it. Did I waver a bit, absolutely! But over all I'm kind of proud of myself.

Anyways, I'm going to put all of that behind me and know that 2013 can only go up from here!

The Hunger Games Trilogy

When a book is really good, I lose myself in it completely. A no sleep, do nothing until it is finished kind of lose. This is how I was with The Hunger Games trilogy. I was inspired to start the book by some friends of mine on Twitter and they just happened to be on the Kindle my dad got for Christmas. So even though I hate the Kindle... I dove in. Three days later I had all the books read. It's going up there on my list of favorite book series.

Here are my reviews of each book. To avoid any spoilers, I did some sections of the review in white. Just highlight over that area to read the review.

© Goodreads.com

Well, where to start. This book, it was a little "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson, a little of TV's Survivor, a little Lord of the Flies by William Golding, and a whole lot of amazing. Suzanne Collins is a great writer. She really knows how to write an engaging, albeit disturbing, story. Her characters are interesting, the story is fairly unique, and the parallels to today's society are interesting, whether she meant to make a statement or not. Overall I throughly enjoyed the book once I looked past the main purpose of the games.






Overall Review: ★★★★★

© Goodreads.com

Catching Fire was a great book, though not as great as the first one. I found it to be a tad repetitive and not as quick paced. But it was good filler and a great set up for the final book. Collins still knows how to tell a great story and I'm glad to see some of the secondary characters fleshed out some more.


Spoilers - Please do not read if you plan to read the series:
I will say the game arena in the Quarter Quall was very creative and found the clock setup and an excellent why to distinguish it from the first games.




Overall Review: ★★★★★

© Goodreads.com

I have to say, I was a bit disappointed in Mockingjay, the final book of this series. The book felt rushed, the characters very undimensional, and it was very violent. I just wasn't satisfied with how a lot of the plot lines were wrapped up. There is more I want to say about this, but I want to avoid spoilers, so I wrote those parts below.


Spoilers - Please do not read if you plan to read the series:
Initially I was upset about Prim. I though it was cruel and senseless to kill her off, but the more I think about it the more it was called for. It's what drove Katniss the rest of the book and gave her a reason to no longer love Gale. Speaking of Gale, here is some of what angered me about this book... Gale. Where was the closure? I mean he didn't even try to fight for her in the end. Just took a job in District 2 and that was it. No visiting her in the hospital, no talk about why she killed Coin. Nothing. I want some closure! I wanted to see Katniss forced to choose between her two loves. Which leads me to another sour note... Peeta. She just settled. Where is the no marriage/no children Katniss? She gave in to having kids? What is that? She went from strong and independent to someone who just needed a guy around.  Though maybe part of it was from her being damaged by the events, but still... Or maybe I'm just bitter because for most of the story I was team Gale. Besides those two points my biggest issue with this book, like I mentioned, was the overall feeling that the ending was rushed. Till the end everything was well thought out and had great timing. But the last couple of chapters were hurry up and get it over with. I mean for a girl like Katniss who had a speech for every injustice, to just shoot and be done. Where is the speech? Where is the Mockingjay speaking out for the cause. Surely there needed to be some explanation to the people. And then to not even read about the trial, just the highlights. Really that could have been a whole chapter with Katniss being aloud to defend her actions. Instead they played the crazy card? The whole ending, it just seem that is wasn't thought out very well.


Overall Review: ★★★★

Have you read The Hunger Games trilogy? What did you think of it?

2012 Reading Challenge

April has read 4 books toward her goal of 10 books.

hide

4 of 10 (40%)

view books

A Tale Dark and Grimm

I have signed up to do the Goodread's 2012 Reading Challenge and so far I've gotten one book read. Not bad for the first week of 2012! As I finish a book, I plan to do a review of it here. My first book:

A Tale Dark & Grimm

by Adam Gidwitz

I had high hopes for this book when I first added it to my must read list, mostly because I love stories of twisted fairy tales. And for the most part the story lived up to my expectations. So much if I was to rate on just the fairy tale it gets 4 stars, however, and this is a big however, during the book the author interrupts the story to either warn you about what is coming or to explain something. I found this very annoying and unnecessary. Okay, we get it, the story is not one to read to little or sensitive kids. But you don't need to keep repeating it, even if  you are doing it in a playful manner. So on commentary alone the book gets only 2 stars. Combining the two I give this book an overall review of 3 stars. 

Overall Review: ★★★

2012 Reading Challenge

April has read 1 book toward her goal of 10 books.

hide

1 of 10 (10%)

view books