Blue Is For Boys by Jack Thompson

Review time!

I do this so seldom that I thought it was high time for a book review. :-3 I had to do a double post today because I know if I leave it until tomorrow I'm just not going to get this post done at all. Or it'll get shoved back until Christmas. T__T *sniff*

Okay, so now onto the review!

Sure it was a weekend of fun and excess, even if he might not remember anything of that 72 hours of fun and excess, but for Ravi it's quite sure that if it were anything important it would come back to him in due time. And why should he have a reason for concern? Until of course he realises his amnesia has brought along with it a new and strange tattoo and turned his pee bright blue. That perhaps isn't as normal.

But Ravi's nightmare has only begun and we will be sharing in the horrors and humours of the repercussions in store for him. And as we will find, this is one weekend that will change his life forever.

The Monkey Speaks!

This is a short story which I thoroughly enjoyed because of the great prose and the hilarious jokes. It's fresh and witty. Moreover the story also takes a new outlook on modern society as a sort of side product. But it never interrupts the flow of the story and this is one story easy to get hooked onto. If there were any negatives to point out, I'd have to say it's a shame it's so short. I could gladly read 15,000 more words about Ravi. Although I really liked the ending, which was good and left me satisfied about the story (not one of those that make the whole book sound like it was cut off in the middle of the sentence. Did I drop some pages on the way home from the store?)

I give this story 5 stars out of 5!

Highly recommended!

If you'd like to buy the story, there is a link on Jack Thompson's webpage.

Makeover Time!

Yes, when you're behind on your writing and you've got some spare time at the computer, logic states the first thing you should do is of course revamp your blog. ^_^;; But it was time for a bit of a makeover.

Let me know what you guys think of the new look! Better? Worse? Needs a little something? You're just stopping by for the free cookies? All feedback is welcome. :) Or if you just want to chat, by all means (I will cave and procrastinate at some point for sure, an answer is most likely).

I've also added an new entry onto the "Links" page. It's a blog by a friend of mine, KathrineROID. She blogs about writing techniques, reviews as well as listing internet sites useful for writers. She also currently has two posts which list the fantasy and science fiction subgenres, which I found infinitely helpful! (So now when those writing sites ask you "what kind of fantasy?" if you've struggled answering that question like someone else *cough* this should help you out!)

Highly recommended!

Do head over if you've a moment to spare. :)

The Diary of Jane - Breaking Benjamin

Do you know when you hear a really good song and it completely just gets you in a fantastic mood? There's something about that song which just totally blows you away no matter how many times you listen to it?

I discovered the band Breaking Benjamin maybe a year ago. But I'm only recently discovering their list of incredible songs. And right now, the one that I'm most in love with is the acoustic version of The Diary of Jane from their third studio album Phobia. The melody of the song is really something else, especially after having heard the other version of Diary of Jane.

For anyone who is a friend of Rock music, I strongly recommend giving BB a trial run. The acoustic Diary of Jane is somewhat different from their usual style, so by all means give a quick listen to their other tracks. :)

Phobia is available for listening on Spotify as well as is their second album, We Are Not Alone.

Check it out ;)

The Dog Prince by Fun London

So a few days late but here it is! I promised to write about a short story by Fun London called The Dog Prince. First book/story review I've ever done as well. ^_^

This is the story of how a dog became the prince of an entire country, for indeed without him there would have been no country to rule at all.

Set about 5000 years ago in the small kingdom of Brink, the story tells of the young boy Ammed and his trusty friend Paint and their adventure during the Festival of Loaves.

There's a short excerpt of the story on Fun London's webpage which you can read here.

I really enjoyed the Dog Prince! The most pleasant surprise for me was how well it was written for a short story. Personally I struggle with short stories because I can't really get my head around how to fit the many ideas in my head into such a limited number of words. Literally I worry that my description will end up over-short and the reader will be left seeing question marks. But The Dog Prince definitely didn't fall into that question mark category, no sir. My favourite part was how easy it was to picture the world and action.

I think its a great tale, and from a writer's point of view a good example of a well written short story.

I warmly recommend it. The Dog Prince is on sale at Amazon.com, there's a link on Fun London's page and it's only $2.99. Go ahead and check it out guys. ;)

Take A Leaf From Someone Else's Book

Isn't it interesting that before you actually go out and do something in practice that there are some questions and difficulties about said subject that just won't occur to you beforehand? I definitely learned that when I came to fighting my first fight scenes. Well granted it was NaNoWriMo time and of course the rule there will be "WRITE IT, no one cares about the quality." It's wonderful to just be able to write anything that pops into your head since you're confident that this version will never see the light of day anyway. But oh the woe when editing comes about.

So a friend of mine suggested the Mistborn trilogy by Brandon Sanderson, said the fight scenes are well written. I finally managed to buy the first book, and I'm loving this!

Okay, so I might be at a bit of a disadvantage since I've never really been good with thick books (and now I've got myself a two-incher). But text is so addictive XD

On a similar note, I made the mistake of taking in the date and...screamed. NaNoWriMo 2010 is just around the corner, and I've got to get plotting! And I'm definitely going to win this year, because it's a nice and lovely even year. I'll be completing Arkanos, the story that I had to drop back in JulNoWriMo 2010.

Although, armed with Brandon's Mistborn and a few example style tips from the text, I should be able to write fight scenes easier. But hey, it's NaNoWriMo. So push come to shove, I'll just hum and tap the keyboard aimlessly!