Apologies, Indianapolis, a Parrot and John Green

First off, I apologize a thousand times for the lack of posts lately. Last week was the last week of school, so I had exams all that week, and the weeks before our teachers decided to load us with as many assignments and papers they could. This still is no excuse. But school has ended, and I shall try as hard as I possibly can to make up for this during the summer.

Anyway. You're probably wondering what I did over the weekend. Actually, you're probably not, but I'm going to tell you anyway.

On Saturday morning, my family and I went up to Indianapolis, IN for a wedding. We then spent the night at a hotel [Embassy Suites] and left the following day. This hotel had four half-glass elevators, a ton of greenery [I think they wanted us to feel like we were outside?], and was just very nice in general. Along with the greenery and outside-ness, there was a parrot. A loud parrot. By one set of elevators. Named Sweetie.

The Pineapple Symbolizes Hospitality. [At least that's what I was told.]

That's great, Silver. I'm glad you went to a seemingly awesome and hospitable hotel, but what does this have to do with anything?

Well. After the wedding was the reception, which lasted until about 10:30PM. So we [I, my sister and brother, and a few others around our age from the wedding] went swimming/hottubbing. After that we went and ate pizza and then walked around the hotel/played cards/did absolutely nothing until about 1AM. Around this time, most everyone decided to go to bed, but I was not tired at all. So, because there was nothing else to do [the pool closed at midnight], I decided to go see how Sweetie was doing/sit by the fountains in the lobby/read downstairs. All of this was to take place in the lobby/dining area on the first floor.

After grabbing my book, I rode down one of the half-glass elevators, lying down and staring out of the glass as I rode from the 6th floor to the 1st [which happened to be kinda fun]. I decided to see what Sweetie was doing first. I couldn't see her until I came out of and around the elevators. I then learned that she was sleeping, so I decided to go sit on the bridge over the water in the lobby/dining area* and read An Abundance of Katherines.

I walked over to the bridge, looked down, and saw a man lying across it, sleeping with his face toward me. I started to back up slowly, as to not wake him, when I saw his head pop up. He looked faintly familiar in the dark, but I figured I had just seen him walking around earlier or something.

We stared at each other for a minute before I said, "Sorry for waking you. I'll go over there."

"No, no, no. You didn't wake me. I was just thinking," the Mysterious Man told me.

"Oh. Okay." I turned to leave anyway.

"No, wait," he cried. "I need your help."

I twisted back around with questioning eyes.

The Mysterious Man pulled out a notebook from under him that I hadn't seen and sat up, Indian-style. He then began to read from a filled notebook page, with a slightly familiar voice. Figuring this could take a while, I sat down facing him. After he had read for a couple minutes, he looked up at me from the page. "Well?"

Looking straight at him caused a wave of recognition to crash over me. I didn't know the Mysterious Man personally, but I knew who he was. "You're John Green," I gasped.

The Mysterious Man

"Yes," he replied simply.

"The author of Looking for Alaska."

"Yes, but-"

"And Paper Towns."

"Well, yeah. But I-"

"And this," I told him, holding up my book.

"Yes, I wrote that too. And I co-wrote Will Grayson, Will Grayson with David Levithan. But I also wrote this." He held up his notebook. "And I really need to know what you think of it."

"Oh. Right. It was really good. About an eight out of ten." He looked at me with eyes that clearly wanted to know more. "It's the name. I mean, no one's going to like a character named Randall. In fact, I completely hate him right now."

This is what people named Randall look like.

"You know nothing about him!"

"That's irrelevant. It's an awful name. You need something like Joey... or Ryan."

"Okay? Well if I change his name to Ryan, would it be better?"

"Absolutely. If his name is Ryan, then it's a ten of ten. "

John Green sighed out of relief. "Thank you, thank you, thank you. You have no idea how much you've just helped me."

"Glad to be of assistance."

"Well, now that I know that my prologue is okay, I think I'm going to go home."

And with that, John Green stood up, walked across the rest of the bridge, across the lobby, and out the front doors of the hotel.

And that, dear readers, is what I did over the weekend.**

-SilverLining

*I'm telling you. They were trying to make it as outdoorsy as possible.

**Well, kinda. I should probably point out that everything after where I went to the bridge wasn't quite accurate. And by "n't quite accurate," I mean that I may have made it all up. John Green does live in Indianapolis though, so it had a bit of verisimilitude.

In My Mailbox (SL-4)

IMM is a weekly meme started by The Story Siren. Here's her original post. And mine.

-How to Ditch Your Fairy by Justine Larbalestier

-So Yesterday by Scott Westerfeld

-Magic or Madness by Justine Larbalestier

-The Bermudez Triangle by Maureen Johnson

-Famous Last Words compiled by Ray Robinson

What's in your mailbox this week?

-SilverLining

In My Mailbox (SL-3)

IMM is a weekly meme started by The Story Siren. Here's her original post. And mine.

-An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

-Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld

-The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

-Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

-Mythology by Edith Hamilton

-SilverLining

Girl at Sea by Maureen Johnson

Sometimes you have to get lost...

The Girl: Clio, seventeen, wants to spend the summer smooching her art-store crush, not stuck on a boat in the Mediterranean. At least she'll get a killer tan.

The Mission: Survive her father's annoying antics. Oh, also find some underwater treasure that could be the missing link to a long lost civilization.

The Crew: Dad's absentminded best friend Marlin, his scary girlfriend Julia, her voluptuous daughter Elsa... and then there's Aidan, Julia's incredibly attractive, incredibly arrogant research assistant. What's going on behind Aidan's intellectual, intensely green eyes, anyway?

As Clio sails into uncharted territory she unveils secrets that have the power to change history. But her most surprising discover is that there's something deeper and more mysterious than the sea--her own heart.

...to find what you're looking for.*

----

A summer on the Mediterranean. Sounds great, right? Now add in the other factors - being almost completely shut out from all civilization: no phone, no computer, almost nothing. The "crew" from above. No drawing because the boat is too shaky. And the guess that another art store worker is busy with her art store crush. - and you get Clio's summer.

At the very beginning of the book (the first, like, 10 pages), I didn't think that it was quite my cup of tea. But, as I wasn't very far in, I figured that it'd pick up at least a little bit. Just a little bit more, and it started to pick up. A little more than that, and I was hooked. It took a little bit to get to it, there was romance, drama, and amazinggg adventure.

Each character had crazy defining characteristics, and I don't think that there was a single "normal" character in the book. Normally, I would think of this as overkill - just way too much ridiculousness, and, quite frankly, I generally lose track of who has what going on for the first half [or so] of the book - but Maureen Johnson made it work perfectly; I didn't get the people or their quirks mixed around at all.

As the novel was in first person, I got a first hand experience of everything that Clio felt, and I found myself feeling the same way she did. I felt anger at her mom, disappointment about the trip, more anger towards her dad, frustration with not being able to communicate with the outside world, confusion about Aidan, determination, a bit of happiness, and even more.

Long story short, it was good... really good; I most definitely recommend it. Go pick up a copy and get ready to travel to a crazy adventure on the Mediterranean Sea that explores anything and everything that can happen on a boat.

Rating: 9.2/10

Age Range: Young Adult

Genre: General Fiction/Realistic Fiction

Publication Date: May 29, 2007

Publisher: HarperTeen

*summary from inside flap

-SilverLining

Review Policy

You never know when an author/publisher/publicist will stumble by, so I figured it can't hurt to have a review policy in place.

Reviews:

-We mainly review Young Adult/Middle Grade novels, and together we'll read pretty much anything that is YA/MG.

-A review contains:

~the title and author

~a summary [usually from the book's cover]

~our thoughts on it

~our rating

~the book's information [publisher, date published, etc.]

-We will be completely honest with the review. If we read it and think that it was fantastic, it'll get a great rating; if we fell asleep while reading it, it's going to get a poor rating. [Although if we accept it for review, we're already interested in it, so it probably won't get below a 5 (no guarantees though)].

-We do not guarantee that the received book will be reviewed within a set amount of time, however, we will get it reviewed ASAP [and if it's not yet out, we'll get it done before it's publication date (assuming we receive it at least a few weeks ahead of time)].

-You're welcome to specifically request one or both of us, and we will [most likely] stick to that request.*

-Email us with the basic book information [title, author, publishing house] and if you have a preference of who receives and reviews the book, and we'll get back to you as soon as we can.

Interviews, Giveaways, and Guest Posts:

-As long as you're a YA/MG author, we're more than happy to have interviews, have guest posts, and host giveaways.

-We would prefer to have read the book for giveaway or at least one book by the author to be interviewed/guest post. [It makes for better interview questions and that way we can review the giveaway book.]

-Again, you're welcome to ask that one of us interviews you, and we'll [most likely] stick to that.

Contact us at silverush[at]rocketmail[dot]com.

*However, if one of us is requested and that person does not have time or can't review it, then it might get shifted to the other. Also, if neither of us have time/can review it, it might get turned down [although it will most likely be reviewed by the person requested, and it probably won't get turned down].

Why Do You Read?

While exploring the musings of my favorite bloggers [even though I really needed to be doing homework], I came across Choco [in which a girl reads] 's post "why do you read?" where she discussed why she reads now, why she used to read, etc. [after she finished... well, I'll just let you read it for yourself]. Her last two sentences were "What about you? Why do you read?" And this, dear readers, is my answer:

It all started when I learned how to read [I have no idea when that was. I just know that I did, in fact, learn how]. My favorite book in the world was Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss. [if you haven't read it, I would go read it now because it's pretty much the most genius book ever written...] I progressed in my reading skills until I read my [and my older sister's-although she first read it a few years before I did] very first chapter book [which I still own.... along with Hop on Pop] : Opening Books by Mae Knight Clark. [I've always counted it as a chapter book, although it's not a traditional one.]

Once I could read real books steadily and without help*, I read almost anything I could get my hands on: from Sideways Stories From Wayside School to the Mary Kate and Ashley books to the Nancy Drew Notebooks to the Magic Tree House books to everything else in the library. Anytime I got to go to a bookstore, instead of browsing the books, I would sit down right in the middle of an aisle where I found a good book and read [which was nice because we would stay in every bookstore we went to for at least an hour]. And that's what I did as a child: I read.

**

As I grew physically and mentally and became an older child, I started moving from the Magic Attic Club books and the Boxcar Children [along with the aforementioned books] to books by Sharon Creech, [others by] Louis Sachar, Roald Dahl, etc. Even as I hit the tween range, I was a bit hesitant to walk across the library to the three bookshelves [yes, only three. My local library is super small.] that made up the YA section. I stuck with my friends in the JF section until about 7th grade when I finally became confident enough [and even then it took a lot to walk all the way across]. And now, I automatically walk straight to the YA section, although I sometimes hit up the JV/picture books/adult fiction.

So there's a brief history of my reading life. But that didn't exactly answer the question.

Why do I read? I read because I'd rather be in Narnia than in this world, in Europe than in the U.S., in Greece than in Ohio. I read because when you crush on book characters, you don't need to worry about saying/doing the wrong thing in front of them.

Why do I read? Because it transports me to a different world, whether it be completely realistic or total fantasy. I read because "books are the ultimate Dumpees: put them down and they’ll wait for you forever; pay attention to them and they always love you back." ***

Why do I read? To take a break from the dramas of my life and listen to the dramas of others'. I read because I care about whether Charlotte will manage to save Wilbur and whether Harry will defeat You-Know-Who; I care about the crazy school of 30 floors with one classroom on each floor and whether Sam-I-Am can convince him to eat green eggs and ham.

Why do I read? The answer is simple: I read because I love it.

So... Why do YOU read?

-SilverLining

*Actually, I read everything before then. I remember going to the library one time and checking out SIXTY Easy Readers. Sixty.

**In case if you were wondering/care at all, I read the Harry Potters sometime in between being a tot and a tween, however I don't remember exactly when [although I think I read them in the summer after 2nd grade/year of 3rd grade... I had a reading level considerably higher than my grade was.]

***Quote by the ever fabulous John Green.

The Elements of a Good Book (1): The Prelims

When you think of a good book, what do you think of? Is it quirky characters? Amazing settings? An epic romance? A tragic ending? Most likely, you think about the plot line: was it good? bad? average? I, however, think that there are several things that play a part in your decision of how a book was, and through a series of posts, I plan to explore them.

Although most would start with the obvious plot line, I’m starting with what you think of a book before you even start it.

The Cover

“Don’t judge a book by its cover,” the old saying tells us, but how many of us actually don’t? Not many, I’m sure. [For most of us, it's not even possible.] I’ll be the first to admit it: I judge books by their covers all the time, and it’s one of the main factors that helps me pick up a book (assuming I know nothing about it).*

We all have different opinions on covers. For instance:

I, personally, like the cover on the right a lot more: it’s striking, elegant, simple, draws my attention; the cover on the left, however, is a little too boring, yet busy, and I find it kind of ugly. Therefore, I think that I’ll like the right book more than the left one without knowing anything about it. On the other hand, you might adore the left cover with all of your heart, but abhor the right cover.

To make it simple: covers matter. And so do

Titles

Let’s face it: most of us would much rather be reading a book with an intriguing title like Leviathan than something boring sounding like Troll Fell. And yes, I pick out my books based on how cool sounding/entertaining/not lame the title is. I wouldn’t even consider picking up a book like Troll Fell because I don’t like the title, so I think it probably won’t be a very good book. And right below/beside the titles are usually the

Authors

I have a massive crush on John Green and a massive girl-crush on Maureen Johnson**. Because of this, I will gladly pick up any book written by either of them [and several other authors] at any given time. I love all of their books, so a new book by them is bound to be amazing, right? And because I have these crushes, I want to love every book ever written by them ever. And the same way, if I’ve read a few books by an author and hated them all, I’m bound to hate their newest book also. So I probably won’t even give it a chance because I already don’t like it.

Summaries

On almost every book, there’s a brief summary of the book. Most people will pick up a book and read its summary (assuming it has passed the cover-title-author test). If a book sounds good from the summary, most people will read it/like it. If it doesn’t, then they won’t. Simple as that.

Others’ Opinions

There are always books that wouldn’t pass our cover-title-author test, but we read them anyway. Why? Because of what others have to say about them.

If my best friend who has the exact same taste in books as I do loves a book, I will too. It’s set before I even start the book, so I don’t really have a chance to form my own opinion.*** Also, if John Green says he loved a book, I decide that I will too because I love John Green, so I have to love the same books he does. Likewise, if my favorite YA book blogger gives a book a 10/10, it must be fabulous, so I run to a bookstore to purchase it without knowing anything about it.

There are also books that we would be drooling over because they pass the cover-title-author test with flying colors, but our best friend/author crush/favorite blogger hated it, so we automatically do too.

Others’ opinions don’t give us time to form our own opinions of things, or we alter our opinions so that they’re not as extremely different from others’.

Conclusion

Covers/Titles/Authors/Summaries/Other Opinions matter. We care about all of these, whether we embrace it or deny it, and our opinions of books form before we've even begun to read.

-SilverLining

*Just a sidenote on covers: Steph Su has a feature on her blog called Cover Lust where she finds the most amazing covers and posts them up for all to see. I suggest checking it out.

**The author; not the character from Rent. And I do realize that this could be considered really odd/creepy. What I mean is that if she ever asked me if I wanted to hang out/be best friends [which I realize is highly unlikely], I would say yes without second thinking.

***This [and the next examples] isn’t really how I think, but some do.