The Kari AnnAlysis

Posts Tagged ‘librarything’

Alice is kind of at a low point in her life. She got fired from her job for exposing a secret about her boss, so now she’s jobless.

Yes, she has a Harvard degree, but without a life plan, there is nothing to do with that piece of prestigious paper. So, she folds it up and takes up a hobby: Following Polly.

Polly was the popular girl at Harvard. She spoke to Polly once, because she needed help breaking into her room. And although they lived by each other, Polly never spoke to Alice again. This really pissed Alice off. So, to get by for a few days, and make a life plan, she decides to follow Polly. I mean, that’s a rational choice right? There job market is in a slump thanks to the economy.

It’s all going great and Alice is hitting the hottest spots in New York until Polly turns up dead. And yes, Alice was hot on her heels, spotted and the crime scene and is now the prime murder suspect. She has to keep a low profile from police, but stay out in the streets, following like she does best, to find out who the real killer is. And she enlists a little bit of help in the man who she has been in love with for more than a decade. Too bad he doesn’t know she exists until she’s a murder suspect.

This was such a cute book! Alice is one of those characters that you want to help, even though she may be in a pickle. You know she isn’t the killer. Yes, she may be a bit crazy, taking up following instead of getting a job, but she isn’t a cold-blooded murderer. You want to close your eyes and open them in one of the book scenes and shake the cops and tell them she isn’t their girl.

But there’s also a great love story in this book. Two awkward souls, searching for the truth, are put into a situation where they can both help. Alice can do a little following to clear Charlie’s dad’s name and Charlie is friends with the cop who arrested Alice and maybe Charlie can get a little info that will help Alice found the real killer.

Even though I imagine most of us don’t know what it feels like to be a murder suspect, but I can guarantee I wouldn’t have the guts that Alice does, fighting for my own freedom, on the lam. But I think there’s one thing we can agree on, at least I think I can speak for the ladies: That one guy in college that you saw in class, the library, anywhere and everywhere, but never had the guts to talk to and always wanted to. I use college, because that is where Alice met Charlie, but I know this also happened in high school and continues to happen to people in adulthood. And Alice obviously has a bit of stalker tendencies, and unbeknownst to Charlie, Polly may have not been his first victim! I really hope someone will share a stalker story on the comments section. That would make my day.

The one thing I didn’t like about this book was a personal preference about Alice. I hate to even talk about character traits, because they aren’t my characters and I don’t want people to talk about my babies (characters), but I know it happens. At first, before I got to know Alice, I was turned off a little by her. I mean seriously, you have a degree from Harvard and take to “following” someone to pass the time? You may have a vendetta because Polly didn’t want to braid your hair and drink strawberry daquiris with you, BUT YOU HAVE A DEGREE FROM HARVARD! You are smart enough to make better friends, or at least smart enough to hire someone else to do you following for you

I also will go ahead and answer your question “Why are you using the word follow instead of stalking?” Ok, I admit that Alice is a Grade-A stalker and she’s pretty good at it, but I love  her and don’t want her to be a stalker, so I may have down played it a teensy-tinsy bit. There’s a fine line …. ok no there isn’t. You follow, you’re a stalker. But trust me, you read Alice and Polly’s story and you’ll hate to use the word stalker too.

I give Following Polly 4 bookmarks.

ISBN: 978-0312571092
Released: June 2010
Author Website
Kari got this book from LibraryThing Early Reviewers Program

We all had those major high school crushes growing up. For Brooke, it’s Scott Abrams is that lucky guy, only he doesn’t know it. Brooke finally gets the courage to tell Scott how she feels about him, but before she gets a chance, he tells her he is moving to New York. This can’t be happening. Brooke and Scott are meant to be together, and all of her dreams are being crushed before her eyes.

But not so fast. Brooke is not giving up on her one love. Her parents divorced a few years back and luckily for Brooke, her dad lives in New York. What a coincidence huh? So Brooke makes the trek, but it’s not as she hoped. Her dad spends all of his time in the office, he is never home for dinner, Scott has a girlfriend and it doesn’t take long for her BFF’s at home to start falling away from her. But Brooke doesn’t give up and finally realizes that everything happens for a reason.

I am still meh about how I feel about this book. I know that teenage girls are boy crazy and would do anything they could to get their crush to date them. This seemed to be extreme to me. But hey, it’s fiction for a reason.

I did like all of the growing that happened in this book. Brooke, who was a grade A slacker, with genius IQ realizes her potential and actually sees making something of herself in the future. She learns who her true friends are and learns a lot about herself. All the makings of a fairy tale.

I did feel bad for Brooke, but only a smidge. She wanted this boy, followed him to a new state, although they’d only talked once and she finds out he has a girlfriend. Well, duh! If he’s such a hottie, of course he isn’t going to be single Brooke also spent a lot of nights at home, by herself. For most teens, this would be a dream. Talk on the phone, play on the computer, eat junk food, watch trashy tv, or even leave to explore the city. Brooke got tired of this easily and wanted more. I personally would have loved the alone time, but I am a structure person too. So, I felt for her in that sense.

And how about moving to a place like New York City? I mean she could have moved to Point Pleasant, WV, where you can check out the Mothman statue, for about five seconds then run out of things to do. She’s in the city that never sleeps. She has endless possibilities of how she can spend her time. NYC was a very lucky place for her love to move!

Let’s face it. If we were faced with this situation in high school, we probably would have given up our friends, family etc. to follow our crush. And some of your crushes may have moved and you seriously thought about what it would be like if you could move with them. Unfortunately, the cards probably wouldn’t have stacked up quite like they did for Brooke, kind of a perfect scenario for following the boy she wanted to spend the rest of her life with. Kudos to her though for following what she wanted. I would like to say I could’ve done it, but probably would have chickened out.

So Much Closer was a quick, cute, high school love story read. I give the book 4 bookmarks.

ISBN: 9780670012244
Published: May 3, 2011
Author Website
Kari got this book from Librarything

Gwen is a dance through and through. Some kids like video games, others like basketball, Gwen’s passion is dancing and choreographing dances. Pretty deep for a teenage girl. But all of that is risked when she and her father go skiing one early morning and come face-to-face with an avalanche. Now Gwen takes the blame she and her father’s injuries and has an intense pain in her leg that may sideline her for good.

Avalanche Dance is a very quick, fast paced story of friendship through the rocky times. Gwen’s former BFF is spending time at Gwen’s house, but not because they’re being chummy. It’s because she got into a heap of trouble and is doing her community service at Gwen’s house. At a time like this, sometimes it’s best to put your faulty past on the back burner and move on with someone who really cares.

This book is a little deeper than some of the other YA books I have read this year, which is always a good thing. It’s not about boys and drama, it’s more a story of a girl overcoming pain and regret.

There were a few times I had a conflict with the characters. I wanted to tell Gwen to get off her butt and do something. Yeah, she’s feeling guilty, but sitting around, looking out the window isn’t going to help. I also feel bad for her friend Molly at time. Molly did ditch Gwen for the party kids, but there are a number of times in the book she reaches out to Gwen and is shut down, but doesn’t quit trying.

I give Avalanche Dance 4 bookmarks.

ISBN: 978-0887769580
Released: October 12, 2010
Author Website
Kari got this book from LibraryThing

Through the past almost two years of blogging, I can’t believe the world that has opened up to me. I started out with a small blog on my Myspace page that was sparked by my love for Jane Eyre.  I decided I wanted more, tried Blogger and WordPress and ended up with my own domain, which I love! I feel so powerful

Through all of my research to find out what people wrote about, what I liked to read and what blogs I liked, I have found so much. I wanted to share some of my favorite booking websites with you guys, so you can get your feet wet, if you already don’t stop by them.

1. Goodreads.com: I have been on Goodreads for a while now. It was one of the first bookish websites, other than blogs, that I found. I copy all of my reviews to Goodreads and compulsively check the giveaway pages. After months, I am still absolutely in love with this site. On a daily basis, I log in to see what new books have been posted. Now the enter vs. win rate isn’t very high. I have won three books from Goodreads, but it still keeps me coming back. I also love that on the site, there is a trivia. You can do general trivia, or only questions for the books you have read. As my library grows, so does my trivia number. I opt to only do trivia for books I have read, so I tend to run out from time to time. I try to add a few questions, although recently I keep forgetting, just to keep the trivia pool filled.

2. Librarything.com: Librarything is known for its book giveaways. They have two ways to sign up for books. The first is through the Early Reviewers Giveaway which is open for a month. There is also a Member Giveaway. I tend to find more books through the Early Reviewers Giveaway. These are primarily new books that are getting ready to be published. The Member Giveaway has nearly any book anyone wants to give away. Now, my ratio here isn’t wonderful either, but better than on Goodreads. I have won 5 books from these programs.

The next two websites are sites that I have just come across the past couple of months and I love, love, love them!

3. BookMooch.com: I had always heard about this website and about Paperback Swap. I never wanted to get rid of books, so I never went to them. That all changed a couple of months ago when I realized I had two book shelves filled with books and no where else to put them. And that’s just in my bedroom. So, I went through my books, kept the ones I loved, and posted the ones I was so-so about. I can not believe how fast some of them have gone. If you’ve never been on the site, you post a book that you are willing to send someone and you get a point. For every point you get, you can Mooch (request) a book from anyone else on the website willing to send to you. The only price you pay is shipping for the people who request from you. So I may not really be clearing out my shelves, because I am replenishing them with other books, but it’s giving me a chance to try new ones and try ones that I am not 100% sure about because I know I can post it and get a new one in return. I have received 7 books from this program and am waiting on 4 others!

4. NetGalley.com : If I had to choose right now, I would say that this is probably my favorite booking website. NetGalley has a list of hundreds of books that you can read for free and review. The one fallback for some people will be that all of these books are read online. There is a program you can download to your computer and read right from there. I don’t mind doing this, because I know it is saving me shelf space. The awesome thing about this site is if you have a Kindle or a Nook, you can have the books sent there. I am getting a Nook in the next month (yay for birthday presents), so I am looking forward to being able to read on there instead of toting my laptop with me everywhere. Now my laptop is just a little Netbook, so it’s not a huge hassle, but it’s still something else I have to bring with me on a daily basis when I am reading a book from there. So far, I have read and reviewed 7 books on NetGalley and I have 14 still to go. And out of the books I have to read, one was published last month, the rest are anywhere from the end of August until mid-November so I have plenty of time to get through them. If you don’t mind reading on your computer, or have some form of e-reader, I HIGHLY suggest this site.

5. Crazy Book Tours : I never really thought I would take part in Book Tours. They just seemed like a lot of work… well, it seemed stressful to have to read a book within a given time period, review it and make sure you get it mailed out. I am normally extremely organized, but when events that happened within the last week, including an awesome family weekend and a horrible day in bed with a virus come around, you can’t always be on top of things. But I ran into this website, posted from Jen on twitter and found some books that I thought looked really good. I have only read one book for this tour, but have signed up for a few. I just got another one in the mail and my 14 day clock starts. After taking part in one, I think I might expand my horizons. This site hosts adult fiction, non fiction and memoir books. My #6 will be for those of you interested in YA tours.

6. Around the World Tours : This site is held together by Princess Bookie. I have run across it a number of times, but never signed up. As stated before, a timeline of when things have to be done scared the crap out of me. Now that I know I can take part in this and get some awesome new books, I am going to sign up for more. I have not signed up for many on Around the World Tours, but as soon as this post is saved, that’s my next goal. One of my goals for the year was to read 25 books from the YA genre. I finished that last month, but I still want to stick with that genre, while I’m still in my early 20′s and allowed

I hope that you guys will check out and enjoy some of these websites! Are there any that you like that I missed? If so, please leave them in the comments section and I’ll definitely check them out. I’m always up for new bookish websites and fun!

Rooms tells the story of Micah, an extremely wealthy techie who has everything he could want. He is the top dog of his company, has a penthouse suit, awesome car and an amazing partner turned girlfriend. But it all gets turned upside down when he receives a strange note from his uncle, who he didn’t really know. The note tells Micah there is a house waiting for him, on the beach of a town he hates. Once he finds his amazing house, he can’t seem to leave. He is intrigued by how the house speaks to him, literally and phsyically and how much he enjoys this new life. The problem, when there are good changes at the house, something also changes in his old life. He must decide which life fits him best.

I won this book off Librarything and it was definitely not what I expected. I saw the cover and guess I didn’t read the description all the way. I thought it was going to be more of a thriller-type book, instead of a religious book. The idea was very creative, and it was well-written, it just wasn’t my cup of tea.

I wish I had more to say about this book. There wasn’t anything in particular that I didn’t like, it just didn’t do it for me. I know that isn’t a great explanation, I just can’t think of anything else to explain it.

I give Rooms 2 bookmarks.