Character Development

Seeing as I've only finished the first book of the Dresden Files and the characters were introduced more than they were developed, I'll go with the first Stephanie Plum novel One for the Money.

Even if I'm only about half way through it, the main character, Stephanie Plum has changed a lot already. At the beginning she was broke and looking for a job, and now she has one-as a bounty hunter working for her cousin. Her new job put her in a lot of situations that have already had an immense impact on her behavior and attitude from the beginning up until now. She's gotten a lot tougher, and she's not even afraid of her own gun (well, at least not as much as she used to be) anymore.

The book is equal parts amusing and dramatic so I'm really enjoying it so far! It's going to be really interesting to see where this series goes. (I'm still keeping up with Dresden though.)

The Dresden Files

I've started a new book, Storm Front, Book 1 of the Dresden Files.

So far it's about this wizard named Harry Dresden, "the only professional wizard in the Chicago phonebook." He hasn't had very many jobs, (understandably, most people think he's a fake) but suddenly he's got a missing persons case, and the police want his help on some "strange murders" when he goes to investigate, magic has obviously been involved but he doesn't know who could've had enough power to accomplish it. When he starts to poke around for clues a crime lord threatens him not to look into it and an agent of the White Council (the people who make the wizard laws and stuff) thinks that he was the one to commit the murders!

That's about the first eight chapters and I haven't gotten any farther yet. Honestly I have no idea what's going to happen next. Everything in this series is new and I don't know what to expect from this author so I'm going in blind. I expect that eventually we'll find the wizard/mage that killed those people, but that's a given. Maybe the missing person case and the murder are tied to each other. That seems likely. Otherwise I've got nothing, but so far I am enjoying this book immensly!

Anime Review-Mahou Shojou Madoka Magica

NOT THAT ANYONE CARES but I just finished the most awesome anime ever! Mahou Shojou Madoka Magica (Magical Girl Madoka.)
So regardless whether or not you will ever watch this anime and regardless if you watch ANY anime at all, I have to say something about this one for a moment. Still, on the off chance that you do watch anime, I'll avoid spoilers.
Oh my gosh...I have just finished the final episode, which I think might be the most emotionally draining episode of any anime ever! (Except maybe Clannad...maybe).
The first two episodes looked normal enough, I wasn't impressed. By episode three, this show made it clear they meant business. Episode six came with several new revelations, as did episode 8. By episode ten I was sure this anime was a masterpiece, but the two part final confirmed it. I don't care how short of a series it was, this was one of the best animes I have ever seen! I think I just stared at the screen for a few minutes afterward...I can't even say enough times how amazing this anime was!
Now, normally I don't really like Magical Girl shows at all, often I find them a bit boring and clichéd, but this was no ordinary magical girl show, that was obvious by episode three. So even though by the title and opening credits, I wouldn't be caught dead watching it, I was intrigued enough to watch the whole thing. I mean, it's only twelve little episodes long, it won't even take that long. That was probably the real reason I watched it, most magical girl animes have seventy episodes a season, five seasons out already, four movies, and three OVAs (original video animation, usually short stories about the characters) so I find them a bit annoying because they take ten episodes to say what could have been said in one! However, in this show, each and every episode from start to finish was stuffed and overflowing with so much going on I actually had to watch one of the episodes twice! 

These girls mean business!

NEVER EVER EVER judge and anime by it's cover! That's what Madoka taught me! What I assumed would be another happy little girl's show turned out to be one of the most intense, heartbreaking, and beautiful stories ever woven with adorable Japanese animation.

As a side note if you do watch it, this show is not for the faint of heart. Watch it at your own discretion.

Jelicoe Road-Final Post

I'm finally done with Jellicoe Road and my final thought is:

This is a beautiful book.

I liked the parallels in the last chapter like how the book opened with Narnie's parents dying and it closed with Taylor's mom dying. Everything just seemed to fall into place. Even if there was a little sadness at the end it was overwhelmed by how complete and happy the ending felt. I think I'm adding this book to my top-ten list! It was great! Everyone finally has all their histories sorted out (Hannah was Narnie by the way, not Tate, I got it mixed up who was Webb's sister I guess, thinking back that makes so much more sense now.) It's hard to sum up just how much I enjoyed this right now, it started off a little slow but once I hit the halfway point it was definitely worth my top-ten list. In short Jellicoe Road=Awesome!

At the end there were several parallels drawn between Narnie and her group and Taylor and her friends. I get the feeling that no matter what they will always be inseparable until the end of time. Part of me wants to say I wish it was longer, but at the same time…I feel like it’s perfect the way it is. All the stories that wanted to be told were told, and it just feels complete in every way. Maybe the only thing that could have been added would be more elaboration about Jonah’s past and his killing his father, but enough was said to make it clear, and it doesn’t need any more.

To be honest I am really really impressed. I’ve only written fan fiction and a few short stories that stay firmly hidden away deep in well-organized folders that I typically don’t show all that many people, so I can hardly be called a writer, but I still feel like I say too much, or not enough whenever I write a story, but this story feels like it has that perfect balance of just enough being told, not too much and not too little. The characters feel like real people. The detail doesn’t get in the way and it’s not completely sparse. It just feels very well done to me. It almost makes me want to ask the author her secret to perfect writing, but I’ll probably get an answer like: editing. Oh well.

I totally loved this book and would recommend it to anyone who wants something new to read!

Full points man! 5 stars 10/10 whatever you need me to say!

Jelicoe Road Post 4

I wanted to get to chapter 20 before I did this, but I'm going to settle for 18 right now, that means I have 9 chapters left so I should be done by the time I do my next post. I'm stopping here, becuase, wow, info-dump time!

What's new?
Turns out the kids from Hannah's story might-check that, porbably are real people who lived on Jelicoe road a long time ago. Webb apprently disappared and Hannah is definietly connected to him-she has the same last name after all. Hannah might be Tate. I wonder who Narnie, Fitz, and Jude are in the real world? Part of me thinks the Brigader was one of them. Maybe the Hermit too.

Jessa keeps bringing up the serial killer, I wonder if he has any significance. He didn't seem very important at all, but now I'm wondering if we'll ever find out who it is.

Griggs didn't go to the train station to run away like Taylor first thought, he went there to commit suicide.

Jonah, Chaz, "Raffy" (Raffaela), and Taylor all seem to be developing a friendship. Jonah and Taylor are on and off about romance right now. Too bad it seems that this will be spoiled once the holidays are over.

The territory wars started out as a friendly game between friends. It's horrible to think how violent and competivie and bitter the wars have gotten over the years!

What Taylor saw the Hermit do was blow his brains out and that's why it's truamatic.

So, yay for lots and lots of new info! Especially about the kids.
For some commentary I am loving this book more and more the farther I get into it! At the beginning it was kind of slow and confusing, but now I can't wait to go read some more. Again it's late like last time and I want to have enough time to get all this down before mom or dad kicks me off the computer. Predictions:

Hannah=Tate
Disapeared Kid=Webb
Brigader=Jude
?????=Narnie
The Hermit=Fitz

I pick the Hermit as Fitz because who else is left? I picked Jude as the brigader because he's always hanging around and is obviously a millitary dude. Maybe Hannah could be Narnie, since Narnie seemed to be the main character and Hannah wrote the story while changing the names of the people she knew? But I'm pretty sure Hannah is Tate because of the last names and Webb is her brother. All I need to figure out now is who Narnie is!  It's weird becuase I can't think of any other adults who might be Narnie. Maybe Narnie disappeared or died? After all the hermit is dead and so is Webb, I suppose it's possible.
Even if this story isn't in the mystery genre I can still try to figure this all out! Figuring out stories isn't that hard especially with a limited amount of characters to work with, now if they suddenly drop a bunch of characters on you at the last minute that just doesn't feel fair...but anyway I digress.

Anyway I'm totally loving Jellicoe Road!!! I can't wait to read some more!! Goodnight everyone! See you in class tomorrow!

Jellicoe Road Post 3

(Sorry for the not-creative title)

OK so I've finally figured out what Narnie's story is all about:

It's Hannah's manuscript. It's the story Hannah wrote and left lying all around the house. Taylor's read it out of order and thinks about it (and Hannah) a lot so that's why the boy in her dreams says the same thing as Webb did. Anyway, still don't know where Hannah has run off to so mysteriously, but she did call and then Taylor got all mad because nobody came running to get her. I haven't read as much as I had wanted to by my third post but this weekend has been completely insane.

So it's Sunday night and we have B-day tomorrow and I'm all like: "Well crap! I still haven't found anything cool to write about!" (Implying that my last two posts were cool) Just saying that as a disclaimer because I didn't prepare anything ahead and this is stream-of-consciousness writing here. I promise next time I'll do better. THANK GOODNESS I took a quick picture of that worksheet with the questions for group discussion, I'll use that.

Anyway, I'm going to rattle off some answers to that question sheet. I'll pick two I can rant about for a bit.

What do I think will happen next?

Do I like the author's style?

First off, to the second question short answer: Yes. I think the style flows best during high-energy scenes like when Taylor is hiding from the brigadier or when she and Ben were attacked by the Cadets. Even if those scenes are very brief they do shine, and it really shows. Maybe it's because I enjoy books with a lot action though, so perhaps it's just me. I also do like the two-stories thing between Taylor and Narnie, that way it stays interesting, just as Taylor's story has taken a bit of a dip and is slowing down, suddenly we're treated to an odd little fragment of Narnie's story that makes us wonder about the big picture of all of this.

Still wondering where all this is going anyway.

What do I think will happen next? That's a tough one. What's happened right now is that Hannah has vanished without a word to Taylor, the Brigadier is creepy, Taylor discovers why the Prayer Tree might be a good thing to get for Team Jellicoes instead of letting the Townies keep it, and for Narnie's story she, Webb, Tate, Fitz, and Jude will always be Best Friends Forever (or will they...? I have a bad feeling about this. It's way too happy to stay that way, I'm a little paranoid about it.) I do think we will see Hannah again, but I don't know if it's going to be in a few pages or in the last chapter, but I have a gut feeling she's far from out of the picture (especially since she wrote the duel story going with Taylor's) there's something she's not telling us. Something that we need to know that will become some kind of revelation in the story. Or not. I could be totally wrong.

I give my literary guesses about books about a 50/50 chance of happening unless I'm reading When They Cry, because nobody, not even Chuck Norris, knows what the heck is going on in that series.

Off topic, sorry. ANYWAY. I want to know more about the Brigadier, I mean why is he hanging around Taylor all of a sudden, and sure he's a little weird about it, but I want to know why. I'm tossing this idea out into the air: wouldn't it be weird if he was Taylor's dad or something? I think she mentioned that her mom never told her who her father was. And if it wasn't important they wouldn't tell us. That's the basis for about 60% of my book-reasoning. The other 40% is me pretending that I haven't read spoilers and correcting "guessing" the ending. (Don't worry, I haven't read any spoilers about Jellicoe Road. Honest.) If there's no reason for us to know, why even bother wasting paper for it? Unless they're trying to throw people like me off what's really going on. (O_O) Even so, there's no reason for it to be the Brigadier, it could have been that weird homeless guy that nobody wants to talk about and was supposedly very traumatic for Taylor. They've mentioned that a few times. My best guess from the context he's mentioned is that he either did something very bad, or was killed in front of Taylor or something. I don't have any guesses about what territory the Jellicoes are going to get, I'll just wait and see for that.

Goodnight! I hope everyone enjoyed the weekend! See you in class tomorrow.

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