Top Ten Tuesday #3

This week was a freebie!

I went with Top Ten YA feminist friendly novels.

Disclaimer: These are only ones I have read and make my inner feminist squeal with delight, where as a lot of books makes my inner feminist squirm or yell obscenities. I have plenty more that are recommended to me by feminist friends and bloggers, but alas I have not read them therefore I cannot attest to their strength to be on this list.

My criteria was pretty simple. The female characters are the focus of the story. The MC is proactive in her life and decision making. She is full of action and established personality not in relation to male characters. Gender norms are broken or challenged. They are not Mary Sues.   

1. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
2. The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart
3. A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray
4. Graceling by Kristin Cashore
5. Girl Goddess #9 by Francesca Lia Block
6. Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
7. The Book Theif by Makus Zusak
8. The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
9. The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan 
10. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Ann Brashares

"When your only female character exists to be bartered and abused, that is lazy writing. When you raise the stakes by threatening a woman with rape, that is lazy writing. When you demonstrate the “seriousness” of a situation by describing a brutal rape, that is lazy writing. When you inject emotion into a flagging scene by making the man throw the woman against the wall, that is lazy writing. Not only is it lazy writing, but when rape is used lightly and cheaply as a convenient narrative device, it hurts people.
Try harder." - Monica Byrne

Book Review: Entwined by Heather Dixon

From Goodreads.com: Azalea is trapped. Just when she should feel that everything is before her . . . beautiful gowns, dashing suitors, balls filled with dancing . . . it's taken away. All of it. The Keeper understands. He's trapped, too, held for centuries within the walls of the palace. And so he extends an invitation.Every night, Azalea and her eleven sisters may step through the enchanted passage in their room to dance in his silver forest. But there is a cost. The Keeper likes to keep things.
Azalea may not realize how tangled she is in his web until it is too late.

 My Review: I got this on my nook when it went on sale and I am so glad I did. Let's start with the cover shall we? It is a  vibrant, eye catching, INCREDIBLE cover! I'm actually kind of over the trend of zomg!poofy dresses on the covers of many books. This is one is flawless though. It really fits with the tone of the book which begins on page. The tone is mysterious and lush. Everything shimmers and sparkles with magic and silver imagery. The book is based off the Grimm's fairy tale of the 12 Dancing Princesses. Actually the original story is very glum and misogynistic. I am glad this book swayed away from that and took many liberties from the original tale. I also really enjoyed the love interest of the MC. He was adorable, I wish there was more of him within the book. The villain is creepy and well flushed out. Dancing, and skirts swishing, knights, and enchanted ballrooms oh my! I love retellings and recommend you check this book out of you do too.

My Reaction in GIF form:

Top Ten Tuesday #2

Top Ten Books I'd Recommend To Someone Who Doesn't Read Young Adult

1. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. Duh. This is a no-brainer. I believe this has made a believer out of many.
2. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. It truly is a cross-over book.
   
3. Graceling by Kristin Cashore. This breaks free of stereotypical associatations with teen books.
4. I Am the Cheese by Robert Cormier. Aaaahhh. This book is so good and timeless.
5. Unwind by Neal Shusterman. Original and suspense and amazing.
6. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. Emotional and real no matter what age.
7. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson. This book was a game changer for the genre. 
8. A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray. The writing. The characters. The setting. Perfect.
9. A Certain Slant of Light by Laura Whitcomb. No words. I can't.
10. The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman. Dark, disturbing, and daring.

A great young adult book makes the teenage reader feel like an adult, and the adult reader feel like a teenager again.

In My Mailbox #2

In My Mailbox is a weekly meme hosted by The Story Siren.

I only have one this week:

 Pirates! by Celia Rees

Call me crazy but if you want to but in order to know where young adult books are going, you have to know where they've been. I don't always feel the compulsion to read exactly what's been released this week. I know there are a whole heck of a lot of amazing books published before 2009. I'm going to save this read for the summer.

Book Review: Angelfall by Susan Ee

From Goodreads.com: It's been six weeks since angels of the apocalypse descended to demolish the modern world. Street gangs rule the day while fear and superstition rule the night. When warrior angels fly away with a helpless little girl, her seventeen-year-old sister Penryn will do anything to get her back.

Anything, including making a deal with an enemy angel.

Raffe is a warrior who lies broken and wingless on the street. After eons of fighting his own battles, he finds himself being rescued from a desperate situation by a half-starved teenage girl.

Traveling through a dark and twisted Northern California, they have only each other to rely on for survival. Together, they journey toward the angels' stronghold in San Francisco where she'll risk everything to rescue her sister and he'll put himself at the mercy of his greatest enemies for the chance to be made whole again.

My Review: I ate this book up! It made me stay up all night and read. The writing is simple but it's suspenseful and has great tension from beginning to end. It's an E-book for only .99! It's literally the best thing I read all year (ha, it's the first book I finished completely). Let me just say I cannot wait for the second one to be released. I also love supporting independent authors and the digital book community. 


My Reaction in GIF form:

Road Trip Wednesday: Penname

Road Trip Wednesday is a ‘Blog Carnival,’ where YA Highway's contributors post a weekly writing- or reading-related question that begs to be answered. In the comments, you can hop from destination to destination and get everybody's unique take on the topic.

We'd love for you to participate! Just answer the prompt on your own blog and leave a link - or, if you prefer, you can include your answer in the comments.

This Week's Topic

If you couldn't use your own name, what would your pseudonym or penname be?

 

 

This is SO easy for me. In my neighborhood with the other kids, we constantly played those "name" games. You know the ones. What would your porn name be? or whatever. Some take your childhood pet's name and your mom's maiden name or such and such. We loved making up our own silly ones. The one that always stuck with me through the years has been this one: take your middle name and the street you grew up on.

That makes my pseudonym: Nicole Creed.

Ahh! I love it! I always said that would be my pen name if I ever became a famous novelist. Ha. I still might consider this, who would have foresaw this social media business though?

Hey and you never know when you may need a fake name...for you, anything. Just sayin'.

Top Ten Tuesday #1

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish

 Top Ten Five Authors I Wish Would Write Another Book

1.  Stephen Chbosky - He wrote The Perks of Being a Wallflower. It shook my 14 year old self to the core. It was life changing. I can't even put into words how this book makes me feel, it makes me feel EVERYTHING. I would read anything, any other book he wrote.
2. Emily Bronte - Only wrote the epic genius that is Wuthering Heights. I have no doubt that if she hadn't died so young any other book would have shown incredible depths of characters and human nature.
3. Suzanne Collins- Come on woman! I KNOW you have it in you! Dazzle and amaze us one more time!
4. Laura Whitcomb - I read both her books. One was so beautiful and amazing, and the other I didn't care for at all. But that's alright. I love A Certain Slant of Light so infinitely that I would read another by her in a heart beat.
5. J. K. Rowling - I would be there release day for whatever she chose to write next with bells on!

I could only think if five!