Bad news & Good news

I'm sorry to say that the online book club that I talked about earlier is done for the year. If it will be coming back? Possibly but the good news is that the people who made the online book club that I recommended has made a Summer Reading Club!

This is also an online club, but the library doesn't send you books. Instead, it is a chat based forum where you can recommend books and just talk with other readers. It is a lot of fun and I encourage you to join!

Click here to join the Summer Reading Club and get chatting now!

Join an Online Book Club!

Starting a book club can be hard. I mean gathering the people, picking the books. And the hardest part is actually discussing it at the meetings! Not to mention the fact that if you're hosting you'll have to provide enough snacks and drinks for everyone. It's all a hassle and it takes some time to plan.
Well here's a way to enjoy the fun of a book club but skip the hassle that comes along with it. Join an online book club!
Click here to join a really simple, easy, and fun online book club!
Every day, Monday through Friday, you'll receive in your email a five-minute selection from a chapter of the book chosen for that week! And then by the end of the week, you’ll have read 2-3 chapters! Every Monday they start a new book!

See? Nice, fun, simple, and hassle free! And not only that but you'll get to read some really cool books selected by teens just like you!
You'll also get to choose the genre of books you'd like to read! You'll have the following as your options:

• Teens
• Good news
• Thriller
• Mystery
• Classics
• Nonfiction
• Fiction
• Romance
• Business
• Science fiction
• Pre-publication
• Audio

So join the online book club and have fun! =)

Keep a Book Journal!

A book journal is a great place to react to what you read! You can find out exactly how you feel about the characters, you can gain insight about the theme or plot, and you can expand your overall enjoyment of the book! Build a list of questions on the book and answer them as you read and as you start your life-long habit of keeping a book journal!

Here are a few starter questions. Feel free to use or even expand them:

1. Write down your thoughts--after reading the opening chapter(s) of the book. How do your impressions change (or do they) after reading half the book? Do you feel any differently after finishing the book? Would you read the book again?
   
   
2. What emotions did the book invoke: laughter, tears, smiles, anger? Or, was the book just boring and meaningless? Record some of your reactions.
   
   
3. Sometimes books touch you, reminding you of your own life, as part of the larger human experience. Are there connections between the book and your own life? Or, does the book remind you of an event (or events) that happened to someone you know? Does the book remind you of what happened in another book you've read?
   
   
4. Would you like to be one of the characters (acquire a personality trait)? Which of the characters would you become, if you could? Why? If there's something about the character that you'd want to change, what is it?
   
   
5. If you were the author, would you have changed the name of a character, or altered the location of a scene? What does the name mean to you? Do you have a negative connotation associated with the name (or the place)? What would you name the character instead? What would you use as a setting?
   
   
6. Does the book leave you with questions you would like to ask? What are they? Would you like to direct your questions at a particular character? What questions would you like to ask the author of the book? Are they questions that you may be able to answer by reading more about the author's life and/or works?
   
   
7. Are you confused about what happened (or didn't happen) in the book? What events or characters do you not understand? Does the use of language in the book confuse you? How did your confusion affect how you liked the book? Is there anything that the author could have done to make what happened (or didn't happen) more clear?
   
   
8. Is there an idea in the book that makes you stop and think, or prompts questions? Identify the idea and explain your responses.
   
   
9. What are your favorite lines/quotes? Copy them into your reading log/journal and explain why these passages caught your attention.
   
   
10. How have you changed after reading the book? What did you learn that you never knew before?
    
    
11. Who else should read this book? Should anyone not be encouraged to read this book? Why? Would you recommend the book to a friend or fellow classmate?
    
    
12. Would you like to read more books by this author? Have you already read other books by the author? Why or why not?
    
    
13. Write a brief summary or review of the book. What happened? What didn't happen? Capture what it is about the book that stands out (or doesn't stand out).
    
    
14. Write about the characters? Which one is your favorite? Is there a character you hate/detest/despise? Why? What traits could you change about the characters that would change how you think about them? Do you think that any of the characters represent real people? Does anything about a particular character seem to be related to the author's true personality--who the writer is?

***For an online book journal go to***:

http://www.paperbackswap.com/book_journal/index.php

***or***

http://www.bookswellread.com/home.php

Books to be reveiwed this summer of 2009

I've got a TON of books stacked up in my room waiting to be read and reviewed! And I'm gonna be to one that reviews them for you! So that way you know what's the hottest reads for the summer and what's not!

Books soon to be reviewed:

1. Bliss
2. Cathy's Ring
3. Pretty Little Liars
4. Ghostgirl
5. Uglies
6. 13 Little Blue Envelopes
7. The Heartbreakers
8. And MANY MANY more!

Keep posted on this blog! I promise to be back soon with reviews!

What if... Everyone Knew Your Name

I absolutely love this book! Choose your own destiny books are always a personal favorite of mines. And it's been FOREVER since someone has made another choose your destiny book so I have to give the authors of this book some praise. And since it's been so long since I read a book like this (I think the last time I read a choose your own destiny book was like back in 2001) I liked this book even more because it brought up memories of when I used to reading choose your own destiny books and how excited I would get to see the outcome of my choice. And I started reading this book immediately because I couldn't wait to feel that excitement again.
A fifteen year old named Haley Miller with an average weight and height, but a below average sense of style just moved from her old, embarrassing home in California to her new, exciting house in the suburbs of New Jersey where she will be attending public school for the first time ever. With so much going on, she faces many choices and YOU will be the one that gets to make the decision! If you read about her and don't seem to like her, make her life miserable! If you think she should catch a break, throw her a bone every once and a while. If you like the way she sounds, make her life perfect! IT'S ALL UP TO YOU!


Ratings:

overall book rating: 5 stars*****

*RATINGS FOR THE
1. series excellence: 5 stars*****
2. writing: 5 stars*****
3. characters: 5 stars*****
4. story: 5 stars*****
5. realism: 5 stars*****

* IT IS
1.edgy: 5 stars*****
2.emotional: 4 stars****
3.unforgettable: 5 stars*****
4.challenging: 3 stars***
5.thrilling: 5 stars*****

* GOOD FOR
1. just for fun: 5 stars*****
2. discussion: 5 stars*****
3. rereading: 5 stars*****
4. finding yourself: 5 stars*****
5. sharing with friends: 5 stars****

Website:

www.thewhatifbooks.com (This website may possibly have been discontinued and is not guaranteed to work.)

Blue is for Nightmares

This book is one mystery/thriller you won't want to put down! Stacey Brown, a student at a coed boarding school, has just recently gotten over a traumatic event in her life. See Stacey is not normal. She has premonitions about upcoming disasters in her dreams. She is starting to have these premonitions but in them is her best friend Drea. And it also involves a stalker who is out to get Drea. Stacey doesn't automatically jump to conclusions. Until she does a card reading for Drea and sees the death card. And until she notices that a strange man is continuously calling Drea and knows what she's doing while he's tlaking to her. With all the clues just lining up, Stacey's on the clock to find out who's stalking Drea before he gets his hands on her. And possibly kills her. This book was a big page turner. I wanted to stay up as late as I could just to read it. Every chapter left me wanting more and was ALWAYS suspense filled. I'm BEGGING you to buy this book! And if you read it and don't like it then you need a doctor to fix that messed up brain of yours!
Go to www.lauriestolarz.com to not only see Blue is for Nightmares but other books the author, Laurie Stolarz, has written. Also get a bio on the author, see awards her books have won, sign up for the newsletter, and more!

Ratings:

overall book rating: 5 stars*****

• RATINGS FOR THE

1. series excellence: 5 stars*****
2. writing: 5 stars*****
3. characters: 4 stars****
4. story: 5 stars*****
5. realism: 5 stars*****

• IT IS

1. edgy: 5 stars*****
   
2. emotional: 5 stars*****
   
3. unforgettable: 5 stars*****
   
4. challenging: 4 stars****
   
5. thrilling: 5 stars*****
   

• GOOD FOR
  

1. just for fun: 4 stars****
   
2. discussion: 5 stars*****
   
3. rereading: 5 stars*****
   
4. finding yourself: 3 stars***
   
5. sharing with friends: 5 stars*****

Awesome book websites

There are some really awesome websites that review and discuss the hottest of the hot books. I'm a member of them and I think you guys should check them out:

1. teenreads.com
2. randombuzzers.com
3. bookdivas.com

These websites give out free books too so you're definitely gonna wanna check them out and become a member so you can get some free advantages and newsletters!!!

13 Reason Why

This book is absolutely great! This book is about a teenage girl named Hannah Baker who commits suicide and records the reasons why she ended her life on audiotapes. The reasons are actually people who did something to her that messed her up emotionally and mentally. Before she killed herself she mailed the tapes to the first person on her list. After listening to their story (or listening to all the stories) they're told to send the tapes to the person after their story. This story has been questioned by parents. They don't think that a book about suicide is the appropriate type of book for their kids but they are completely wrong. Teenagers who have read this book and were having suicidal thoughts have actually gotten help after reading this. They said it made them realize that they need to get help with their depressions. The author has gotten many letters from kids all of the country thanking him for making such a book that taught them a lesson rather than giving them ideas. This book has opened their eyes to see that no matter what they are going through or how hard life is suicide is NEVER an option. This book isn't only for teens who have depression or suicidal thought but for any teen willing to read a good book!
Go to www.thirteenreasonswhy.com for reader comments, reviews, a synopsis of the book, a small excerpt from the book, and other links to more websites about 13 Reasons Why

overall book rating: 5 stars*****

• RATINGS FOR THE

1. series excellence: 5 stars*****
2. writing: 5 stars*****
3. characters: 5 stars*****
4. story: 5 stars*****
5. realism: 5 stars*****

• IT IS

1. edgy: 5 stars*****
   
2. emotional: 5 stars*****
3. unforgettable: 5 stars*****
   
4. challenging: 5 stars*****
   
5. thrilling: 5 stars*****
   

• GOOD FOR
  

1. just for fun: 4 stars****
2. discussion: 5 stars*****
   
3. rereading: 5 stars*****
   
4. finding yourself: 5 stars*****
   
5. sharing with friends: 5 stars*****

New changes in my book blog

Sorry I've been gone so long but I come bearing new book reviews! But there will be a change in the format I use when writing book reviews so enjoy!

Serafina67 Urgently Requires Life

Review:

Serafina67 DEFINITELY requires a life

This book was definitely not one of my favorite books. The book is told in blog entries and the book started off interesting and sounding like an average teenage girl's life but towards the end it started to lose it's realism and also started to get less interesting. It took me forever to read it because I would always either fall asleep while reading it or not bother to read it at all when I had time to read. I tried hard to like it but you can never force yourself to actually like a book. Either you like it or you don't and I definitely did not like this book. At the end all it sounded like to me was a teenage girl babbling about how sorry her life waz instead of actually saying interesting stories about her life. Also what lost the book for me was the acronyms they used. Me being a teen I know about all the acronyms used such as when I text and I say stuff like ttyl, brb, ect. But the acronyms used in this story waz so weird and confused me so bad I had to but the book down and think about it before I went on so the book could make sense to me. But when I never got what it meant I waz just confused for that part of the story. What I recommend the author should have done to prevent that was probably put a key at the beginning of the book and say what each acronym meant. But of course they didn't do that which left me confused for most of the book. Also the comments that the main character and her online friends would leave each other would be about stuff not mentioned in the book and/or blogs that the main character wrote so that made the book even more confusing. I looked at other books the author, Susie Day, had written and saw that she didn't have much experience at writing books that were actually interesting especially to teens. "Serafina67 Urgently Requires Life" was her most interesting book out of the whole lot of books she has written which is quite sad because this book isn't that interesting. So I suggest you don't read this book (unless you are interested in reading book that are half good and half terrible) or any of the other books Susie Day has written. Trust me you don't want to waste your money on this book.

Ratings:

overall book rating: 2 stars**

• RATINGS FOR THE

1. series excellence: 3 stars***
2. writing: 5 stars*****
3. characters: 4 stars****
4. story: 2 stars**
5. realism: 3 stars***

• IT IS

1. edgy: 1 star*
   
2. emotional: 1 star*
   
3. unforgettable: 1 star*
   
4. challenging: 1 star*
   
5. thrilling: 1 star*
   

• GOOD FOR
  

1. just for fun: 5 stars*****
   
2. discussion: 1 star*
   
3. rereading: 2 stars**
   
4. finding yourself: 1 star*
   
5. sharing with friends: 2 stars**

Picture:



Website:

http://www.susieday.com/

101 Things to Do Before You're Old and Boring

Review:

A book for everyone adventurous!

This book is great for anyone with time on their hands and looking to learn more about what they are capable of doing. This book tells you to do stuff that you should do in life (before you're old and boring!) such as keep a dream diary, start a blog or do activities fun such as run up escalators going down and run down escalators going up! These things you will look back on later in life and say "I'm glad that I've done those things." And you would never think to any of the things in the book without the book. I actually hadn't ever heard of a blog until I looked at this book and now I have one. This book will definitely ask you things that will surprise you but will also excite you because you will be able to try stuff new and exciting! Trust me if you are bored such as during the summer and you have nothing to do and you are waiting for adventure and you want to try new thing you will definitely want to buy this book and you will not regret it because the things you do with this book will stay with you for a lifetime.

Ratings:

overall book rating: 5 stars

• RATINGS FOR THE

1. series excellence: 5 stars*****
2. writing: 5 stars*****
3. characters: 1 star*
4. story: 1 star*
5. realism: 5 stars*****

• IT IS

1. edgy: 5 stars*****
   
2. emotional: 5 stars*****
   
3. unforgettable: 5 stars*****
   
4. challenging: 5 stars*****
   
5. thrilling: 5 stars*****
   

• GOOD FOR
  

1. just for fun: 5 stars*****
   
2. discussion: 3 stars***
   
3. rereading: 2 stars**
   
4. finding yourself: 5 stars*****
   
5. sharing with friends: 5 stars*****

Picture:



Website:

http://www.101thingstodobook.com/ (there will be more books just like "101 things to do before you're old and boring" at this website.)

Cathy's Key

Review:

Part 2 to one of the best books I've ever read

This book has even more twist and turns than part one Cathy's key. Same features just more drama. I recommend that you DEFINITELY read this book but only if you read the first one. Of course it's a rule of reading that you can't read the sequel unless you read the first book so follow the rule. Besides reading the first book will make the second book that much more interesting and better. Read my review about the first book to get my conception of this book. They are pretty much the same because, of course, they are both the same book pretty much. READ BOTH BOOKS! Trust me you won't regret it.

Ratings:

overall book rating: 5 stars

• RATINGS FOR THE

1. series excellence: 5 stars*****
2. writing: 5 stars*****
3. characters: 5 stars*****
4. story: 5 stars*****
5. realism: 5 stars*****

• IT IS

1. edgy: 5 stars*****
   
2. emotional: 5 stars*****
   
3. unforgettable: 5 stars*****
   
4. challenging: 5 stars*****
   
5. thrilling: 5 stars*****
   

• GOOD FOR
  

1. just for fun: 4 stars****
   
2. discussion: 5 stars*****
   
3. rereading: 5 stars*****
   
4. finding yourself: 1 stars*
   
5. sharing with friends: 5 stars*****

Picture:




website:

http://www.cathyskey.com/

Add on about doubletalkwireless.com

http://www.doubletalkwireless.com/ is a website that a character in Cathy's Book created and it's a real site too! And when you go there it will say it's under construction but that doesn't mean the site is down. They just say that to get you to leave but the site actually works perfectly!

Cathy's Book

Oh be4 I start my review I just wanted to add how this is my first review on my new blog! Yay me!! Ok... regaining professional attitude...
Oh and p.s. don't ask me what I'm doing up so late becuz it's a long story! Ok professional person now....

Review:

Probably one of the best books I've ever read

This book is a great book that I would recommend for anyone 11 or up. I usually don't talk back to books (only movies/tv!) but for this I had to talk back because of all the different ups and downs and drama that the book gave. It was so interesting I got a journal and took notes about the book. And twelve year olds don't usually do that. They just read the book and move on to another one but with this one I went on to different websites that talked about the book and I commented and wrote down the notes/comments that other people wrote on there and kinda compared notes of theirs and mine's. Another thing that really moves me so to say about this book was how interactive it was. In the book they had many different websites to go to and even phone numbers to call. And when you called and they didn't answer (they never answered because it wasn't like the characters were real) you could leave a voicemail for that person. Then they had some of the characters' email addresses and I emailed it and they actually emailed me back (it was an automated email to send to whoever sent an email to that address but still). It was like the whole story was real which is why for the email rating above I rated the realness of the book 5 stars. On one of the websites that talked about the book there was a big motion that the book was possibly real or based on a real story. A lot of people went searching for the authors email address and sent loads and loads of emails demanding the truth on whether the story was real or not because they thought that maybe the author would just say it was fiction when it really wasn't. The author went to the website and put up a post saying "no the story was fictional and as far as I know not real!" But then people started to say that she was a liar and sent another bunch of email saying that she was a liar and that they knew that she was lying. Finally she said once and for all to all of them that the story was not real and gave facts to prove it but the point is that the realism of it was so big that it started a big movement on one of the sites. It's definitely not like most books. I gave it to my friend to read after I was done and her views on it were exactly the same as mine. So to all of you reading this I really recommend you read it 1000%!

Ratings:

overall book rating: 5 stars*****

• RATINGS FOR THE

1. series excellence: 5 stars*****
2. writing: 5 stars*****
3. characters: 4 stars****
4. story: 5 stars*****
5. realism: 5 stars*****

• IT IS

1. edgy: 5 stars*****
   
2. emotional: 4 stars****
   
3. unforgettable: 5 stars*****
   
4. challenging: 4 stars****
   
5. thrilling: 5 stars*****
   

• GOOD FOR
  

1. just for fun: 4 stars****
   
2. discussion: 5 stars*****
   
3. rereading: 4 stars****
   
4. finding yourself: 1 stars*
   
5. sharing with friends: 5 stars*****

Picture:
(There are two pics. The blue one is the american version and the black one is like the UK version. If you should ever wanna buy the book buy the american version. The UK version is known to have marks on the books and missing pages.)



websites:

1. http://www.cathysbook.com/(American website of Cathy's Book)
2. http://www.doubletalkwireless.com/
   
3. http://www.cathysbook.co.uk/ (UK website of Cathy's Book)
   

What is book blog?

A book blog is pretty much a blog where you give reviews and ratings and talk about books you've read. Well that's what my book blog is going to be about anywayz ;) . Sorry I couldn't get better definition of what a book blog is! But anywayz I'm going to give you reviews/ratings on really kool books that are either very awesome or terribly sucky (or in between) and, if I can figure out how, I will put up a picture of the book so you will know how it looks like in case you should wanna go out and buy it. So if you're into reading books you should definitely read my very professional-like book reviews!! =)
Oh and you're welcome.... ;)