Why I'm So Easily Distracted by Distractions

I'm going to be the first to admit that I am excessively easily distracted. I have a short attention span sometimes and it takes something really interesting to catch and hold me for any long period of time. So, last year when I read something like 115 books, I was hooked into reading constantly and could never pull myself away from my kindle or bookshelves. It was wonderful (expensive, but wonderful) and I think I burned myself out a little bit.

So instead of filling my time with constant reading, I've found some other distractions this year that I wanted to share with y'all and hopefully try to show why I'm so hooked onto random things.

First of all, wedding planning.

It's stressful. I've given myself a year and a half to figure this out but there's so much going on with it. Whether it be picking out flowers, wedding colors, bridesmaids, catering, or whatever, someone always has an opinion and a better way of doing something. A word of wisdom to everybody who knows someone that is getting married: offer support, not advice. I don't need lectures about why I'm not getting married in a church or renting out a huge venue. Plan your wedding, not others.

Secondly, I've discovered Korean dramas.

There's a few big reasons that I'm completely in love with these things...

One of the biggest reasons is that they are clean to watch.

How many times are we watching a tv show or movie with someone and it turns to that sex scene that's so ingrained in Western culture and you can't help but blush and look away awkwardly? I hate that it's so predictable. That's not to say I don't appreciate Western shows but I've just gotten bored of them. In Korean shows, it will literally take a 16 episodes for a kiss sometimes. A single awkward eyes open kiss.

They're also pretty funny. There's a lot of silly misunderstandings, slapstick comedy and ridiculous dancing. One drama talked about having fangirls write fanfiction about the band members and I nearly lost it.

Heartstrings

You're Beautiful

They do have a serious side and that's what really takes the cake for me. I have never cried so much in my life over anything. I sat one day and binge watched a show and went through an entire box of tissues. (That show was Boys Over Flowers and it broke my heart in so many ways. I wasn't emotionally stable for a week.)

You're Beautiful - favorite scene, favorite character

There's real life drama in them. Parents dying, being introverted, the one you love leaving...it's all easy to relate to, despite the sometimes ridiculous situations that the characters are in. Sure, maybe you're cross dressing to cover for your absentee twin brother or your mother is the evil overlord of a multinational Fortune 500 company but watching the one you love be in love with a jerk is something that's universal.

So, if you're sick of the same plot lines of Western shows, want something different, or just want to cry an excessive amount, check out some dramas. 

Look for some reviews of these dramas in the future. I absolutely love them right now. I want to get other people hooked so I have someone to fangirl with. Many are available on Netflix and Hulu and they're super fun to watch.

So yeah...sorry about being distracted. 

I am getting back into my reading but I'm really enjoying these new shows and they are blocking out some of the stress of planning a wedding. Just bear with me. 

Discussion Post: Books about Sports

First of all, I'd like to apologize for the lack of posts recently. As some of you know, I recently underwent my 6th or 7th back procedure and I've been sort of laying low for a few days. It takes a while to bounce back from them occasionally and I'm not recovering as well as I would have hoped. So, hopefully now that I'm feeling a bit better, I can get back to regularly posting and chatting with y'all!

Today, I'm going with another discussion post. I recently received a Netgalley book about soccer and I was beyond pumped. I grew up playing the game and even played in college so I'm a big fan. Soccer is somewhat a black horse in America still and every time I can get my hands on something that positively portrays the beautiful game, I'm on it. I don't discriminate. I love lots of sports and I'm just as eager to read something about basketball or hockey as I am about soccer. 

But this one was a disappointment to say the least. The game writing was awkward and forced and it was boring in the style. I get that soccer is a back and forth game but this sort of killed it. "And they ran up the pitch, and back down, passing and crossing the ball." Congratulations, you've just described every game of soccer ever. 

Not every sports book is like that though and I do have some that I really enjoyed. Tangerine has always been one of my favorites, mostly because it deals with some pretty messed up stuff and a goalkeeper. 

We're pretty interesting players and you think more would be written about goalies. We spend a lot of time standing in goal thinking and then we're asked to do stupidly crazy stuff for the sake of a game. I think it would be a good story. But we don't get any respect to begin with so maybe I'm deluding myself thinking that someone besides a keeper would want to write about a keeper.

The Secretary of Defense, ladies and gentlemen

Anyways, does anybody else read sports books? Do you know any good ones? 

I find that a lot of them are filled with cliches and unrealistic expectations of what certain age groups are able to do. I hate it when I read a book about sports where nobody is trying to improve since they are already the best at what they do. I want to find the gems though. So if you have any recommendations, send them my way!

Until next time...

Versatile Blogger Award

Hello everybody! To everyone in the eastern USA, I hope you are surviving our snowpocalypse and to everybody else, the same applies for Tuesday. I have been nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award by the lovely Rachel over at Rachel's Reading Corner.  I am beyond honored that anyone would ever consider nominating me so much love!  Y'all should check out her blog!

Rules:

The rules are pretty simple:

1. Nominate 15 other bloggers relatively new to blogging. (I used this somewhat loosely) 

2. Let the bloggers know that you've nominated them.

3. Share 10 random facts about yourself.

4. Thank the blogger who nominated you.

5. Add the Versatile Blogger Award picture to your post.

*******

Let's begin with the nominations!

1. Izzy at The Reading Izzy
2. Melissa at Ever So Mela
3. Kitty and Fari at My Little Corner For Books
4. Rocki at Raquel Gabriel's Blog
5. Myra at I'm Loving Books
6. Carole at Carole's Random Life
7. AJ at Read All The Things!
8. Kristen at Pretty Little Pages
9. Paranormal Blogger at Paranormal Books
10. Jennifer at Asterisk Pearl's Book Blog
11. Sandee at Book Ramblings of A Whimsical Reader
12. Jennifer at Heartland Reading
13. Killian at Leaf on the Breeze
14. Naomi at The Perks of Being a Bookworm
15. Courtney at Courtney's Reads 

Everybody needs to go drop by their wonderful blogs :-)

Alright...time for the "Getting to Know You" section of this...

1. I'm absolutely terrified of spiders, despite being in the environmental world. I moved out of my room for 3 months because I had found what I thought were two brown recluse spiders in my bed.
2. I won an international award for my photography portfolio in high school. I also used to write short stories and poetry and won some stuff with that but I haven't had the time to pursue any of that recently.
3. The color scheme for my upcoming nuptials are lavender, plum and steel grey.  Apparently the grey is depressing but it is one of my favorite colors.
4. I'm a shameless and obsessive Harry Potter fan. I was always pulling for Draco and Hermione to get together. Alas...my dreams were shattered.
5. I love shrimp and grits. I will order it from whatever restaurant I go to and have a killer recipe for it myself which leads to my next factoid...
6. I love to cook! My parents and brother got me a massive wok for Christmas and I'm having fun figuring out different ways to cook with it.
7. I am terrible at foreign languages. I have tried for years and years and I was nearly fluent in Spanish for a while. I can still communicate but I suck at it.
8. I'm a Liverpool fan. I tend to use this as self defense in the South where I get asked about my football allegiances. I also tend to look like an asshole doing this.
9. I use the word "y'all" deliberately. A fair number of people like to think that there is a dearth of well educated people from Alabama and I'm out to prove them wrong and still have a fun accent while doing it. 
10. I'm getting into anime again so if anybody wants to recommend any, I'm happy to hear it!

Alright y'all, that's it! I'd like to very sincerely thank Rachel for the nomination! It means a lot that other bloggers are nominating people and it's such a cool and respectful thing to do. 

Also, thank you to everybody who follows me and comments, both here and on Goodreads. It's wonderful to be able to discuss books with others and not feel so isolated in the literary world. Y'all make reading more fun than it already is and I look forward to interacting every day. I think people forget really easily what a single small act can do for others but y'all brighten my world and I'd like to think I do the same for a few as you guys as well.

Much Love,

Computer problems!

So...my computer gave up on me. It stopped charging completely and I had to take it into a repair place to attempt to fix it.

Between that, Christmas, New Years and announcing my engagement, it had been a crazy few weeks and I'm so sorry I haven't been posting!

My laptop should be out in a week or so (in theory) and hopefully I'll catch up soon.

I hope everybody had a safe and fun New Years.  Any resolutions?

Book Review: Guilt Trip by Maggie Farrell

Alright y'all...I know I went AWOL for a week or two but I have a really good reason!  I was down at the beach and didn't have a lick of internet access besides what was on my phone.  We spent the entire week eating good fried food, walking on the beach, collecting shells and generally having a nice relaxing time.  Oh, and....

Yup! I got engaged over the weekend.  He proposed at the beach Saturday morning while we were on vacation and it was perfect.  Everybody I know is really excited but apparently I have been remiss in my upbringing as a Southern Lady as I do not have a date, location, caterer, cake and wedding colors already picked out and on deck.  Ah, well at least I have some ideas.  The color pink is already off the table as well as there is a requirement of bourbon and or scotch to be at the reception.  I think I can accommodate both fairly well.

Moving onto a book review.  This isn't a wedding blog, it's a book blog!  Time to get back into the rhythm of things and I have lots of books coming your way!

I received this book in exchange for an honest review through the Goodreads group, Lovers of Paranormal.

I've honestly been in a bit of a reading slump as far as Read 2 Review stuff goes.  It has been hard to find a really good well thought out book that was intriguing enough to keep me happy with it.  This book broke all my expectations and blew me out of the water!

Guilt Trip by Maggy Farrell is sort of an unassuming book at first.  It is about a young girl who is suffering from Survivor's Syndrome after she escapes a car wreck and her mother does not.  As a way to take her mind off things, her father takes her on a holiday while he photographs the geologic features of the English moorlands and judges a photography competition.  Melissa has been struggling to cope with the events of the last year and is medicated to take the edge off the hallucinations and nightmares that plague her.

Melissa thinks it is just another symptom cropping up when she starts to recall memories that aren't hers but when they start to involve the older yet attractive landlord of the hotel, she realizes that something much more than nightmares is going on.

The cover itself isn't all that thrilling but as I understand it, it is a depiction of some interesting limestone cave features that are somewhat prominent in the book.  I loved that this book included so much as far as geology.  It helps place the setting well and adds to the spookiness of the book.  The pitch black of a cave is a great location for some of the action.

Melissa is a wonderful character to read, mostly because it is so easy to sympathize with her.  She is a victim from the beginning and plays the role well.  I mean, her mother died right in front of her.  I can understand how that would torment you and follow you around everywhere.  Melissa pushes her father away to some extent in order to protect him from her sad realities and instead becomes attached to a much older man.

Luke is somewhere in the range of 35 and she, I believe, is 16.  Yes, it's creepy.  Yes, it is a bit of insta-love but it really works in this context.  He is also the landlord so it adds some more of that forbidden nature to the relationship and local people keep saying that she reminds them of someone else that Luke was somehow connected to.

That's another well written aspect of this book.  There is a small town feel with small town gossip.  While people talk among themselves about rumors and scandal, they do not let outsiders in and that contributes to the thriller feel.  There are closed doors and whispers behind backs that make up a decent portion of the story.

And the plot twists.

This book cannot be predicted in any way.  In the middle of it, you are sort of going "Alright, so x, y, and z are going to happen" but it was so different that what I expected.  It had me flipping pages back and saying "No way!"  It takes a lot for a book to catch me off guard in such a way that it makes sense but this was perfectly done.

So overall, 4 out of 5 stars.  Some aspects of the story could have been written better but it was a great read.

Thanksgiving and a Buddy Read!

Hello all and Happy Thanksgiving!   

The dam at the lake on a nice summer's evening

I'm going ahead and doing this post right now before I leave for the lake where there is little to no internet.  I'll be able to check messages and email and such but it involves a hike and searching for 4G connectivity.  I'm also having struggles with my laptop as well, as it takes a significant amount of effort to even charge the damn thing.  It may be a power cord issue or it may be a time to get a new laptop. We shall see after the holiday I guess.

So yeah, Thanksgiving with my family is always chaos.  We will be cramming 20+ people into a house and trying to all get along for a couple of days.  There will be 11 cousins, a bunch of aunts and uncles and parents, some second cousins, some little children and my father who will probably be in the kitchen laughing and causing subtle chaos.  There is a reason he is called The Puppetmaster.  I have some family members who are somewhat easily offended and he owns them during the holiday season.  The general rule with my father is if you find your blood pressure rising and the hair on the back of your neck standing up, he is just screwing with you to try to get a rise out of you.

There is also the Iron Bowl this weekend, if that means anything to the football fans out there.  I'm from Alabama and I apparently have to pick a side in all of this Alabama/Auburn debate.  Personally, I like Auburn but there is no rhyme or reason to it.  My brother is an Alabama fan and after last year, he is sort of looking for redemption.  It doesn't really matter to me but it is fun to watch him get all upset.

Both of the dogs got baths last night for the occasion and neither was very happy about it.  These are the faces of good dogs who didn't deserve this and are very upset with me right now.

Why did you do this to me? I love you and I never do this to you!

I will be traumatized for the rest of my life!

Tara hates baths to begin with so we usually give her a bath in the laundry sink in the basement where it is easier to contain the escape attempts.  However, Beulah is too big for the sink and it is too cold for the hose so this fiasco got moved inside.  Beulah was so upset that she couldn't figure out how to get out of the door and Tara didn't look at me for the rest of the night.

It will be a 4 hour drive tonight up to Tennessee where my mother and I will spend the next day and a half prepping for dinners and football and such.  Hopefully, I'll be given the opportunity to sit down and relax at some point though which brings me to my next order of business, NEW BOOKS!

Some GR friends and I have started a group that is basically buddy reads for fun, mostly with series or YA books.  We were getting bored with some of the stuff we were reading and realized we were all reading the same books anyways so we started the group just so we can talk with each other about the books and not cram up our reviews.  

This sort of started with the Ghost Bird series and snowballed from there.  We were fangirling (really bad) about our book boyfriends and debating with each other on our reviews and it was hard to keep everything straight.  There was finally a breaking point when we made a list of the next books we wanted to read and then the thread was starting to get long and we had that "Ah, screw it" moment.

We called it Book Talk and anybody can join in!  

Our first read will be Splintered by A.G. Howard and we will start it on Thanksgiving.  Look at this cover. Just look at it.

This book is a new take on Alice in Wonderland and I am super pumped for it.  I've already put it on my kindle and it keeps staring at me.  I will resist though, for just another couple of days. Probably.  It's calling to me though and it is so pretty. I'm like a moth to the flame, I can't resist a beautiful and well rendered cover. It looks like it even has some hints about the plot!

The goal is to finish this by Sunday so we can talk about this book next week and possibly get to the next book in the series soon.  I've heard only wonderful things about Splintered and I am really looking forward to this.  It will be a thing to look forward to over the holiday.

Does anybody else have big plans for Thanksgiving?  Major turkey day or just a day to relax and watch football? Drop me a comment!

Today I'm Reading...

I have far too many books on my plate and not enough time to read them all.  It's an awesome problem to have.

At the moment, I'm reading the Fever Series by Karen Marie Moning for the first time.  I finished the first book yesterday afternoon and the second book early this morning while I was waiting at the tax assessor's office.

Check out that cover. It screams creepy.

Why didn't I read these years ago?  They are seriously amazing books and I cannot put them down.  I'll probably be reading the next book by this afternoon or tomorrow.  I should slow down but I can't. And we can't stopppp...and we won't stopppp.

I'm also on the third book of the Alchemy Series by Donna Augustine.  Shattered is about how all of the world has gone to hell and there are very few people that can (literally) stitch it back together.  Jo has a meltdown and Cormac is a tool.  I love it. More rereads!

Number 4 out of 5 is Shadows of Serenity by Marsha A. Moore.  This is a R2R through Lovers of Paranormal on Goodreads.

Finally, the last one is a guilty pleasure and I probably shouldn't be admitting to it since it is kind of silly.  I'm obsessed with the series though and the next book comes out in 11 days.  Not that I'm counting.  Drop of Doubt, #5 in The Ghost Bird series by C.L. Stone.  This is a reread too.

I love pretty covers but the last one bothers me.  The character of Sang in the book is supposed to be a dirty blonde.  All of the covers have her as a brunette.  This is an easy thing to avoid.  Just get a blonde model or use blonde stock photos.  It's not that hard.

I don't think I have enough books.  No wonder I get migraines.

Has anybody else read any of these?  What did you think?