Forbidden by Tabitha Suzuma

Title:

Forbidden

Author:

Tabitha Suzuma

Rating:

4/5

How can a love to pure be so sinful?

Two siblings, Maya and Lochie fell in love with one another. They had to step up to the role of a pair of parents to their younger siblings. Their father walked out of their lives and their mother was too busy with her new boyfriend and being an alcoholic, she is in no state to look after her children.

Troubles with school. Trouble with personalities. Struggles to keep the family together and home straight. They support each other. Their love grew deeper with everyday that passed by. Their only problem is: They came from the same mother. They had to keep their relationship discreet. They studied the options they have. Where they can possibly go in the future.

They live in hopes that their love would remain.
It does remain but not in the way the planned.
p/s:
If there is anything I would like to say about this book, it is tragic.
I would have given is 5/5 if it weren't because of the ending. I can't help being a sucker for a happy ending. Happy ending for this book is probably if they eventually found out they are not actually siblings that they can just continue loving each other and have children together. Tragic tragic tragic. It is all I can say about this book.

My first read by Tabitha Suzuma. Definitely a page-turner. :)
On the downside, I finished reading this book on a Friday morning before I went to work. I was sooooo low the entire day. Another book hangover..... :|

 

Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon

Title:

Steal Like An Artist

Author:

Austin Kleon

Rating:

5/5

Bite-size tips and guides on getting the brain juice flowing. This book is not limited to only aspiring artists. From my point of view, it could help anybody who wishes to create or craft something. Be it writing a novel, sewing, music writing, cooking..anything at all. Anything that involves the activity of creation will benefit from this book.

10 tips given. There are few that many have subconsciously been applying in creation process. 

1. Steal like an artist

2. Don't wait until you know who you are to get started

3. Write the book you want to read

4. Use your hands

5. Side projects and hobbies are important

6. Do good work and share it with people

7. Geography is no longer our master

8. Be nice (the world is a small town)

9. Be boring (it's the only way to get work done)

10. Creativity is subtraction

My favourite tip is the analog and digital segregation at the work desk(Use your hands.). Analog is way to go. It lets one be free. Sketch something. Erase it. Move it. Cut it. Paste it. Digital is just too rigid. It confines ideas. Stealing is an art of its own. 

Get inspired. Be you. Create what you want. ;)

[Release Day Blitz] Autumn and Summer by Danielle Allen

It is always awesome to have another author to love. In my case, I have fallen in love with Danielle Allen's since her first book Back To Life. I just couldn't wait for more! Previous reviews on 2 of her books:

Back to Life
Back to Reality

Earlier this month, her fans are greeted with another good news; new book release.
Here it goes, AUTUMN & SUMMER!

~ Synopsis ~

Is it better to have loved and lost or to have never loved at all?

Sexy, successful and stylish, Autumn Jones believes in love. She believes in the all-consuming, mind blowing enormity of love. She believes in the euphoric state of loving and being loved. She believes in it because she’s had it once. And when it was lost, she was devastated, but she never stopped believing in the existence of love. Unwilling to settle, she learned from the past and moved on with the expectation that she’ll love again. 

Beautiful, talented, and slightly jaded, Summer Wilson believes in sex. She believes in the all-consuming, mind blowing enormity of good sex. She believes that love exists, but Prince Charming does not. At least not for her. She’s seen the downside of love—insanity, heartbreak, infidelity, divorce—and she dates with the expectation that she won’t ever subject herself to that type of vulnerability. Instead, she chooses to love her family, her friends, and her work. And although she enjoys the company of men, her heart is hers and hers alone. 

Best friends since elementary school, Autumn and Summer kick off the summer by embarking on a dating experiment. Unfortunately, expecting the unexpected doesn’t prepare them for what the dating world has in store.

~ Teasers ~

~ Dreamcast ~

~ Autumn and Summer Playlist ~

“Back to Black”

Amy Winehouse

“Light Years Away”

Mozella

“Ready For Love”

India.Aire

“We Might Be Dead By Tomorrow”

Soko

“Everything Has Changed”

Taylor Swift

“Can’t Be Love”

Laura Izibor

“Hometown Glory”

Adele

“The Worst”

Jhene Aiko

“Turning Tables”

Adele

“Sweet Thing”

Mary J. Blige

“Take Away”

Missy Elliott

“Sunday Afternoon”

Rachael Yamagata

“My Heart Still Beats For You”

Anna Ternheim

“The Love We Had (Stays On My Mind)”

Joss Stone

“Un-Thinkable (I’m Ready)”

Alicia Keys

“I Shall Believe”

Sheryl Crow

“The Words”

Christina Perri

“I Will Be There”

Odessa

“For Real”

Amel Larrieux

  ~ Author Bio ~

Life is good! 

I am a married event planner and life coach. My awesome friends and family and my amazing husband make my life sweet. I love to have fun and enjoy the life I’ve been blessed with. I love shopping and football with equal fervor. I’m an amateur movie critic (i.e. my husband and I watch and critique a lot of movies for fun). I love to read and I enjoy sharing my love of books with anyone who will listen. I love music. A good lyric with a good melody can paint a vivid picture and invoke such a range of emotions. I have a soft spot for most mediums of creative, artistic expression.

With degrees in psychology, human services, and marriage and family counseling, I have a unique perspective on life, love and the pursuit of happiness. As an author, I combine an active imagination and life experiences to create stories that are easily relatable and intentionally intriguing. I want to offer you a peek into someone else’s life and for you to get lost in their story, their trials, their triumphs. My ultimate goal is to create a character or a story that stays with you long after you’ve put the book down.
So in a nutshell: I plan. I teach. I read. I write. I watch. I critique. I shop. I play. I love.
To know me is to love me.

XOXO

~ Social Media Links ~

Website: www.authordanielleallen.com

Twitter: www.twitter.com/XOXO_DAllen

Facebook: www.facebook.com/DanielleAllenAuthor

Goodreads: www.goodreads.com/XOXO_DAllen

Click here for Giveaway!!

Panic by Lauren Oliver

Title:
Panic
Author:
Lauren Oliver
Rating:
4/5

Bestfriends Heather, Natalie and Bishop were at the panic game. The annual game with a jackpot of $50,000. Natalie was determined to play while Heather and Bishop gives support. The game started with a jump from a cliff. Rage and frustration triggered Heather to make the jump. Plus, she could use the money to bring her sister Lily a better life. 

Bishop was frustrated that Heather decided to join but he supported his bestfriends anyway. The game has gotten more attention this year as the jackpot is $75,000; the highest in history of the game. The game itself is a mystery. No one knows who the judges are. No one knows who holds the jackpot but one thing they know for sure is someone is watching them.

Most participants had to face a near-death experience. They kept on playing with 1 player eliminated in every round. Everyone has their own objective being the game. The game unfolds what's underneath a friendship, family and other people in their surroundings. There were broken hearts and kids who ran away from their mother. There are also newfound love. Or rather, an acknowledged love.

The judges had to keep going with the challenges. The players keep daring themselves into facing their fears. Cops and hospitals were involved. There were fire and deaths. Will the players keep playing til the end?

p/s: If there is anything I love about Lauren Oliver, it has got to be the realism elements and how love, family and friendship intertwines in her story. This is one of her standalone novel. My previous reads were her Delirium trilogy. I will most probably move on to Before I Fall when I'm done with a few books in my TBR pile. More about panic? Think fear factor. Think teamwork. Think maybe...Hunger Games? A little bit of all but in a very real settings. It is not called realism if it is not real . ;)

Me Before You by Jojo Moyes

Title: 
Me Before You
Author: 
Jojo Moyes
Rating:
5/5

Lou thought she had her life sorted out. Everything seems stable until she was laid off her job. Her world turned upside down when she couldn't get a job suitable for her. To make matters worse, she will soon become the breadwinner for her family. She was left with no choice but to take up the job offer to be Will Traynor's companion. Her only motivation is the rate per hour.

Arrogant Will had all one would ever wished for. He lived in the big city with even big dreams until he met an accident. He was unable to come to terms of his condition that he decided to just end his life. Over the time, Lou and Will eventually accepted each other and learned from each other. Lou's life took a complete turn with Will's determination to get her to live a fulfilling life like he did before the accident. 

Her mission is to keep Will happy and belief in life. What she did not know is the love that is budding between them. Will has somehow accomplished his mission but will Lou ever meet hers?

p/s: Picked this up from my favourite local bookstore. Been on my wishlist. Love reading it. It took about 2-3 chapters to get into the story and then, to never putting the book down. I love the characters, the storyline and how everything seems to real but as always, I prefer a happier ending. ;) Ending of this story is very bitter and very sweet at the same time that I can't decide which is more. Anyhow, still a good book!

The Book Depository

Overview

Online bookstore based in UK which offers free shipping worldwide and best of all, they ship available books within 48hours. :) To read more or to make a purchase, go to http://www.bookdepository.com/

How To Purchase

1. Assuming you have added your desired books to the cart, view the cart.

2. Verify the books in the cart and its quantity.

3. Click the Checkout button. For this example, I am checking out using my PayPal account. Instead of clicking the purple Checkout button, I clicked on the yellow "Check out with PayPal" button.

 4. The link will take you to PayPal login page. Key in your credentials and click on the "Log In" button.

5. Verify the items listed in the order summary pane on the left and the shipping address for the order. Click "Confirm" button when done.

6. PayPal will proceed to process the payment to The Book Depository. Page similar to the following will be displayed.

7. When done, you will be redirected to The Book Depository page. Reconfirm the delivery address and click "Place your order" button. This will confirm your placed order.

8. The following will be displayed upon confirmation. Order number is displayed as well. This can be used to track the status of the order in future. You are done with your purchase at this point. Well done!

9. You will receive emails on your confirmed order as well. One from The Book Depository and another one from PayPal.

How To Track Order
1. To track order, take note of the order number. Click on the "Track order" link at the top of the page.
The following will be displayed. Key in the Order number and the email address you have used in the order. Click "View".

2. Related order and its' status will be displayed.

Hope this is clear enough. Have fun bookshoppping! :)

Online Converter - convertfiles.com

Friday is always a good day for sharing. Well, everyday is good for sharing but Friday makes it extra special because it is the final weekday. ;) If you are often on the lookout for an online converter to convert your documents (images, music and etc), I recommend http://www.convertfiles.com/

Why convertfiles is amazing.

A. It is online

No download or installation required. 

B. Easy to use

It is pretty straightforward but I'll show how a document conversion on convertfiles is done below this list.

No registration required. Converted files are ready for download immediately. Few other converters requires you to email the converted files but with convertfiles, it will be right there for you upon its readiness. :)

C. Extensive options of conversion available

convertfiles allows you to convert almost everything. If you are on kindle, you can easily convert your documents in other formats into .mobi. If you would like it your documents to be converted to words from pdf, convertfiles could do it too! 

Categories of conversion available:

• Document
• Drawing
• Presentation
• eBook
• Video
• Audio
• Image
• Archive

How to Convert epub to mobi

1. Launch your internet browser and go to http://www.convertfiles.com/

2. Fill in the fields accordingly.

3. Click Convert.

4. Selected file will be uploaded for conversion.

5. Upon completion of the upload, file will be converted.

6. Once it is ready, link for download will be displayed. 

7. Save the file to your local drive. Done!

Now anything can be read from any of my devices! :)

Happy Friday to all!

Anna and The French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins

Title: 

Anna and The French Kiss

Author:

Stephanie Perkins

Rating:

4/5

Anna was sent to Paris after she has planned how her senior year would be and which university she will apply to. Thanks to her dad. She had to leave behind her pet, younger brother, Sofia(her car), and almost-boyfriend and Bridge, her bestfriend. Well, she practically had to leave behind her life in Atlanta and start go through a new beginning in Paris.

Being a new senior student is never easy. It is even more difficult when you do no speak French. She is only lucky it is an American School in Paris. She made friends with Mer, St.Clair, Josh and Rashmi. Things grew manageable. Anna was able to feed her desire for films as her school is surrounded by theaters. Towards the end of the year, drama took place. She had to face challenges with her friendship and love life. 

Paris became her happy place. She shared a number of similarities with her new friends. She then had to worry about going back to the States. How she will keep her newfound love. How she will ever be apart from him.

p/s: Picked this up when someone on Goodreads mentioned it in Fangirl review. It was deemed to be super sweet. In my opinion, it is not that sweet but it is nice that it has a happy ending. Ending that I am satisfied with. :) If you love the school-dormitory settings, you would love this. If you love Paris and would like to explore the city in bits and pieces,  pick this up!

Lauren Oliver in Malaysia

Fell in love with her writing when I started reading Delirium series. If you have not read this, stop wasting time. Pick it up. It will definitely be hard to put down! (Atleast, that’s what happened to me.) I simply love it when stories are enveloped and “blended” with reality. It makes more sense that way. It makes it more real in its own way.

There was a book fair hosted my MPH earlier this year which I decided not to go because I simply have too many books waiting to be read. Apart from that, I do not have that much space for my books here in the attic. :( Got to start figuring out how to manage all these books. Else it will take up more space than anything else.

Back to Lauren Oliver. She was most probably invited by MPH for meet the fans session. There were 2 venues; the book fair itself and MPH Mid Valley Megamall. Since Mid Valley is much nearer to my last project site, I ran to see Oliver there. Session was quite short but it was enough to cover all the fans’ book with her autographs. There was probably a little overview talk by Oliver but I guess I missed it; had to grab lunch!

When I got to the bookstore, it was not easy to miss where Oliver is as there was already a swarm of school kids lining up with books in their chest. I was hoping someone was there to help take few pics of me with Oliver. After few minutes, my wish came true. A friend got there to get her books signed as well. Yes, I am lucky to have friends who loves books as much as I do. That way, my addiction is not that severe and sniffing books is totally fine.

While we were lining up, we overheard the kids complaining “What are old people doing here?” lol C’mon! It is young adult and since when there are age limits for genres? Ok, you kids can’t be reading new adult. :p And guess what? We also wondered. “What are the kids doing here? Shouldn’t they be in school? Furthermore, they are from the International School and their school session ends at 3pm.” 

Anyway, I only brought 1 book to be signed. My precious little paperback Delirium. Oliver commented that she feels like eating it. It is very small. It is a version not available in the States apparently. Guess what Oliver? We don’t get much hardbacks! :( Most of the time, we only have tall paperbacks. I was lucky to have a few hardbacks on my shelf. The bookstores are probably making sure the books are affordable for the local market as well. As for me, I don’t mind hardbacks especially if the author is my favourite! 

Here are some shots with Oliver.

Here is Li Zan. Made her pose with her book. haha Pop to her blog here. Our love for books are almost identical. We can go all day talking about books but that might drive other people around us crazy so we don’t.

If there is anything to say about Oliver, she is very friendly and if you were to talk to her about writing, she is very encouraging! :) Looking at her makes me feel like she is just the right creator for Alex, Hana and the rest of the characters in Delirium. I somehow placed her in the series together with all of them. My imagination is something, right? ;)

A little show off moment. She said "Ruzanna? That's a cool name." hihihi If only she would name one of her characters with my name. (*dreamy* tralalalala*)

p/s: This happened in March. I didn’t get the chance to blab until now. Gotta pick up Oliver’s other books. Next book is definitely Before I Fall. I know…I know…I will get there. Just can’t keep buying anymore books for the time being. Atleast not novels coz there are just too many that everyone in the house might kill me. haha

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell

Title: 

Fangirl

Author:

Rainbow Rowell

Rating:

4/5

Twins. Cath and Wren. Close as knit until Wren decided to go on without her twin when she enters freshman year. Cath initially had a hard time getting used to new life without Wren. She felt too lost that even their love for Simon Snow could not help her. 

Wren is on her own planet, Cath struggled with studies, boys and herself. She was just not used to being without Wren and not used to have to open up to other people around her. Confused. Frustrated. Scared. 

While she struggled, she could not write. She just can’t find the juice to write. She managed to get a class under the guidance of a well known writer but she almost threw that away too.

The peak in this story happens when things went wrong. Incidents that almost took away Wren’s and her father’s life. Cath almost gave away her studies. However, it all ends well with everything around her fall into its place. 

p/s: It feels like forever since I last wrote any book reviews. Am putting the blame on Mr.Work! Can’t give this book 5 stars; I prefer a more extensive ending. A more definite happy ending. :p

Brought this book along during my trip to Medan, Indonesia recently. Started reading when the plane took off. My husband complained the book is too thick so it is heavy. C’mon honey, it is only 438 pages including acknowledgement. And it is paperback. I carried my backpack most of the time. :p Occasionally brought the book to dinner and breakfast. I just couldn't put it down for too long. On the flight back, I sat next to my mom. She said “Next time if you really need to bring a book to travel, bring a small and thin book. Why do you have to bring such a thick book?” Seriously? :| She must have teamed up with Mr.Husband. When the flight was descending to land, she said “You are not supposed to read when there are people around. You need to chat. What’s the point of meeting if you don’t talk to people?” Errr….Sorry ma, Rainbow Rowell had me at hello. As always. Now I can’t wait til her next book!

2014 Challenge

Hola! This post is about 3months late but hey! It is still 2014 :)

 

Another year of reading challenge. Looks like my goal is getting lesser. From 100 to 50 and now to 30. Well, goals have to be feasible. ;)

 

How did I do last year?

Sadly, didn't meet the goal set...but only by 13 books. That's not too bad right?

 

 

This year, it will be just 30.

Guess I am reading lesser as I get more into stitching. From my POV, this number is still reasonable.

 

For those on Goodreads, feel free to buzz me.

https://www.goodreads.com/ruz_911