The Story of Ferdinand

The Story of Ferdinand

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays. I grew up performing in musicals and plays and dance recitals, so I will always be a theatre girl at heart. Halloween gives me a reason to dress up...full-out costume.

My dog and boyfriend hate it because I make them dress up too...full-out costume.

This year our family costume was inspired by the children's book The Story of Ferdinand by Munro Leaf.

I first heard about this book when watching The Blind Side, and I had to get a copy for myself.

A bull who loves flowers.
He's sent to a bullfight.
All he wants to do is smell flowers.
The End

The Story of Ferdinand is a simple story with black and white illustrations. There are no special effects, no superheroes, and no crazy villains. A classic story is timeless whether it was written 5 years ago or 50 years ago. It's nice to know that such a story has lasted the test of time. A good children's book doesn't trend, it stays consistently read by each generation.

Title: The Story of Ferdinand

Author: Munro Leaf

Publisher: Grosset & Dunlap 

Published: March 31, 2011 (First published January 1, 1936)

Available: Amazon, Book Depository, and Barnes and Noble

Señorita and her Matador

Olé!
(Reason #5 to never get rid of your old prom dresses.)

With our little bulls

Ferdinand the bull-dog

The Night Circus

The Night Circus

What a magical cover for a magical book! Seriously, I know they say don't judge a book by its cover, but how could you not pick up this book?

The Night Circus is beautifully written with an air of old world mystery. The two main characters, Celia and Marco, are used as pawns in a game to see which magician is stronger. Their chess board is a traveling circus where every night they must create a new object or tent full of magic that's meant to astound and mystify.

Yes, there is a love story between the Celia and Marco, but it was their magic that kept me drawn to the book. Every night I wanted to see what the new tent would hold. And every night I was not disappointed. The Night Circus creates a world that I so badly want to be a part of. I would do anything to be able to visit Le Cirque des Rêves. The setting of the book is a huge win for me because it is so unique. Circuses are generally thought of as playful with bright colors, but this one takes it to the next level as something powerful filled only with the colors of black and white. A sophisticated circus with a hint of danger...isn't it delicious?

This book is full of mystery...A circus that only opens at night. A cast all dressed in black and white. Two magicians locked in a deadly game. These are the ingredients for a memorable book, but add in beautiful writing, and you have a 5-star book!

Don't forget, all 5-star books are available for giveaway. Scroll down to the bottom of the post to enter!

Title: The Night Circus

Author: Erin Morgenstern

Publisher: Anchor Books

Published: July 3, 2012

Available: Amazon, Book Depository, and Barnes and Noble

a Rafflecopter giveaway
RULES OF GIVEAWAY:

1. Must be 18 years or older to enter (or have parental consent as I'll need your address)

2. Must live in a country where the Book Depository ships to (Do they ship to my country?)

3. Must love books

If It Sits, I Licks

Everyone needs to 1) take a look at this adorable puppy 2) take a look at the author name listed next to this adorable puppy. 

There are a lot of perks to working for a small publishing house, one of them being when they are looking for an author to write a quote book on dogs, I get to call dibs. I'm a dog person to my very core, so when Familius published If It Fits, I Sits last year, I bit my tongue and said things like "It's such a cute book." In my mind though I was thinking, "A dog book would sell better, because cats are the devil." I've only had bad experience with cats and I have the scars to prove it. 

Well, here we are a year later and If It Sits, I Licks is in the works. All the quotes for the book have been gathered, and I've written chapter intros that are now with my editor for revisions. All that's left are designing the quotes and choosing pictures to correspond with each quote. 

To give you a better idea of what we are creating, here are a few sample spreads from If It Fits, I Sits (which by the way was written by our managing editor...see what I mean about small publishing house perks?)

We are looking for high-resolution photos of dogs with personality. Whether it be loving, naughty, tail-wagging, or droopy eyed, we'd love to include a wide variety in our book. 

Here's where you can be a part of this book. Familius is looking for dog Instagram accounts that would like to be considered for inclusion in this book. If your dog has an Instagram account, comment on this post with the account name (i.e. @darciedog) and we'll take a look. 

All photos that are included in our final book will be credited, so while your dog may be the star, your name will be printed in the book's index. 

These books will be distributed nationally, and represented at international rights shows for foreign publication consideration. This will definitely bump up your Instagram game!

If you have any questions, you can include them in the comments section or email me at my work address erika@familius.com.

Giveaway!

So I (like the rest of the world) read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo. It's a book all about cleaning out the clutter, and getting rid of objects you never knew were unnecessary. 

Kondo's method for decluttering and tidying up revolves around the question, "Does this bring me joy?" Every item you own should make you happy! This includes all those books that are jammed into your bookshelf, scattered across your desk, and hidden under your bed. 

While tackling my bookcase I realized that I own a lot of books that I never got around to reading, books that I won't read again, or books that I no longer need. As I sorted through my little library, holding each title in my hands, I asked myself, "Does this book bring me joy?" If the answer was no the book was put in the donate pile. 

I chose a few titles from that pile that I think others will like, titles that might bring someone else joy. Take a look at what I'm giving away:

• Creativity Ink
• The Nanny Diaries
• The Interestings
• Handmade Weddings
• Alice in Wonderland
• The Kite Runner
• The Dogist

If you see a title you want here's what you have to do to win it:

1. Find my instagram page @bookfaire
2. Go to the post that has this giveaway image
3. Comment with the title you want to win (only one comment per person)
4. If you are the first to comment, the book is yours!

U.S. residents only for this giveaway. I'm paying for shipping and want to keep this cost efficient (don't worry, there will be other international giveaways). 

Good luck, and Happy Reading!

Shelf to Shelf

I've been told by multiple people that when it comes to books I am an extremely critical reader. I nitpick the details and am known to shoot down New York Times bestsellers because the author can't write worth a crap but somehow everyone thinks the book is genius.

What can I say? 

I think it has to do with the fact that my reading time is very valuable to me. I don't get a lot of downtime to read, so when I do pick up a book, I expect it to be worthwhile. 

Yes, I am a harsh critic, but to every con there is a pro. When I feel a book deserves praise, I sing it from the mountain tops. I'll recommend the book to friends and strangers alike, buy copies to give away as gifts, and of course write about it here on the blog. 

Because a 5 star book is hard to find (in my opinion), I've decided to take it one step further and do a #shelfshare link on every book from here on out that gets a 5 star rating on The Book Faire. Books are pricey, and I know that all bookworms hate choosing between that book sale and buying milk (for Captain Crunch Berries). To help out I want to share the books that I think are worth the milk money. 

When a book gets a 5 star rating, I will host a giveaway. Here are the rules for entering:

1. Must be 18 years or older to enter (or have parental consent as I'll need your address)

2. Must live in a country where the Book Depository ships to (Do they ship to my country?)

3. Must love books

That's it! Three requirements, and no limitations on how many entries you can submit per day (or per hour, or per minute...although that would be a bit obsessive of you.)

The number of books I'll giveaway will depend on the cost of the book.

I hope that this allows a few extra readers to get their hands on a book that I think is a worthwhile read!

DIY Book Flowers

April showers bring paper flowers...at least in my house they do! 

Now before anyone gets upset that I cut up a book to make this craft, know that all my "free game" books come from the thrift store. It saves me money and I'm able to make something new from something someone else gave away. 

So, here are the steps that I took to make this bouquet of paper flowers.

Before you start, you'll need the following materials:

- Book Pages (duh)

- Scissors

- Floral Wire

- Wire Cutters

- Hot Glue Gun

STEP  ONE

Trim the rough edges from the paper.

STEP  TWO

 Cut your pages into spirals. 

At the very interior of each spiral cut a semi circle to form a base for your flower. 

I played around with the spiral on the left to give that flower a little more textured. 

STEP  THREE

Starting on the outer edge, curl the spiral. 

If you want your flower to have a smaller bloom, twist the spiral tightly. If you want a bigger bloom relax your grip. 

STEP  FIVE

Hot glue the base of your flower to the bottom of the spiral. (The semi circle was important!)

Here's a sample of a few of the blooms I made. 

You can see how different they look depending on how tight they were twisted.

STEP  SIX

Decide how tall you want your flowers to be (this will depend on the vase height). 

Cut the wire to that length and twist the top once around the handle.

STEP  SEVEN

Bend the wire to 90° and hot glue it to the bottom of your flower. 

STEP  EIGHT

Arrange your flowers and put them some place sunny...and filled with books!

Sea of Poppies

Sea of Poppies

This book was meant to cover my Reading Resolution to read a book set in a foreign country. A plot surrounding a slave ship being used in the illegal India/Chinese poppy trade sounds intriguing, doesn't it?

I thought so too, until I trudged through 160 pages and then called it quits because I was tired of waiting for the story to start. Every chapter introduced at least three new character, and after 6 chapters of meeting new people, I had a hard time keeping everyone's back stories and motivations straight.

If you enjoy authentic historical fiction, then you will probably enjoy Sea of Poppies. After starting this book I realized that I prefer my historical fiction to be mostly fiction with a touch of history :)

Amitav Ghosh did his homework using authentic "seaman talk" (at least that's what I dubbed it). It's lingo that was so confusing there was a whole chapter at the end of the book just to serve as a dictionary. Normally when foreign language or lingo is incorporated into a novel, you can use context clues to learn the meaning of the word. Not so with this "seaman talk" where whole conversations would go by and I was left thinking, "I hope that wasn't important." While I understand the author's desire to keep the text authentic, when the reader has to flip back and forth from the back of the book to the front of the book just to understand what the dialogue means, it kills the plot flow.

I didn't finish the book, so I don't feel that I have a right to rate it. Other people gave it rave reviews on Goodreads. I suggest you borrow it from the library and see if it's to your reading taste.

Title: Sea of Poppies

Author: Amitav Ghosh

Publisher: Back Bay Books

Published: January 17, 2014

Available: Amazon, Book Depository, and Barnes and Noble

Life After Life

Life After Life

How do you pass the time when you're making a 12 hour round-trip drive for work...alone? 

Normally I stock up on Twizzlers and Josh Groban CDs, but this time I decided to try something new. Audio Book!

I checked out Life After Life from my local library, and I have to say it was nice company. I've never listened to a complete audio book before. I prefer the feel of having a book in my hands, to hear the character's voices how I would imagine them, and to read as much or as little as I want. 

Life After Life is the tale of one girl on a journey to get her life right, no matter how many times it takes. Through a form of reincarnation, Ursula repeatedly lives and dies throughout the book. In a game of "Is this the right choice?" Ursula's decisions lead to her drowning, dying of the plague, starving and other extreme circumstances. But as soon as her life is over, the refresh button is hit and she begins it again. What's unique is that when she is reborn, her life is the exact same but she doesn't remember any of it. 

This probably wasn't the best option for my first audio book. Life After Life involves a lot of year jumping, going from past to present and then back to the past which becomes the present. If that sounds confusing, try following it over an audio book :)

Once I got used to the time jumping, I was intrigued by the plot. It's like the choose your own adventure books I read when I was younger. One set of choices could end the story after three pages. You start over at the beginning and try a different set of pages, to find that the story lasts a little longer this time. Can you imagine living life this way? Getting third or fourth or fifteenth chances to live your life the way is was meant to be?

Life After Life shows how even the smallest decisions can have the largest impact in our life and in the course of history. What small decisions will you make today that will shape the rest of your future?

Title: Life After Life 

Author: Kate Atkinson

Publisher: Back Bay Books

Published: January 17, 2014

Available: Amazon, Book Depository, and Barnes and Noble

The spring blossoms are pretty amazing right now, so I took some shots and added a few quotes from the book. Feel free to share! 

Never Let Me Go/ On Such a Full Sea

Ever since The Hunger Games dystopian plots have taken over fiction titles...and not just YA.

Two books on my Goodreads list were Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro and On Such a Full Sea by Chang-Rae Lee. Well, I went to the library and these two were both on the shelves, so I checked them out. I don't purposefully try to read books that are similar in plot lines, so I was interested to see how these two books would compare.

I know. I know. Every book is different, and you shouldn't compare one title to the next. But just because you shouldn't doesn't mean you don't. 

I read Never Let Me Go first, so I'll start here. 

Kazuo Ishiguro is an author that I read in high school. His book The Remains of the Day is considered a classic read, so naturally the English department had that on our required reading for the year. Never Let Me Go had a very similar tone to The Remains of the Day, which unfortunately was not my favorite book. 

Never Let Me Go follows a group of children that were raised in Halisham, a mysterious boarding school. As they grow from children to teens to young adults, the main characters Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy reflect on their time spent together in the secretive institution.

Ishiguro is a beautiful writer in terms of the language and his ability to create visually memorable scenes. He writes like a painter, putting emotion onto paper in a way that the reader feels his words. A wonderful writer, BUT his story is written like one long flashback. It was hard for me to get drawn into the story when the plot line kept getting interrupted by, "It reminded me of when" or, "I thought back to the year." 

The jumping from present to past to the even further past and then back to the present was jarring for me. Just when I was digging into the scenario on hand, the year would change, the location would change, the personality of the characters would change and I'd have to refamiliarize myself with story. 

***SPOILER ALERT***

The ending was a little predictable. A group of children are in a private institution...no one is allowed to leave and no one is allowed in...when the children reach a certain age they are sent away and never come back. Come on, what do you think is going on? 

Science experiments? Organ Donations? Clones? It sounds all too familiar. 

Title: Never Let Me Go

Author: Kazuo Ishiguro

Publisher: Knopf

Published: March 14, 2006

Available: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Book Depository

Then there's On Such a Full Sea.

This book involves a young girl, Fan, who leaves her city unit B-Mor in search of her boyfriend. She's pregnant and when he goes missing, risks her life and her unborn baby's life to find him. Fan meets a strange array of characters on her search, and when I say strange, I mean it feels like they are straight out of a beautiful but odd Cirque du Soleil performance. 

The book is futuristic, and Lee takes liberty to make it a bleak and crazy future. There were portions of the book that I had to reread because I'd think, "Wait, what just happened?" I felt like I was reading someone's trippy dream journal because the plot jumps from one really weird situation to the next really weird situation. It had the hint of a Tim Burton movie, where each character is so unique and memorable, but everything is so dark. 

I did think that Fan was well written and Lee created unforgettable characters and situations. There are also some very beautiful passages from this book that are both wise and poetic:

"It's not that we're too fearful or comfortable, too cautious or reluctant, but that, as we have never experienced life outside these bounds...the reach of our thoughts has a near ceiling. Imagination might not be limitless. It's still tethered to the universe of what we know, and as wild as our dreams might be, we can't help but read them with the same grounded circumspection that guided our forebears when they mapped out our walls."

"And too intense a longing, everyone knows, can lead to poor decisions, rash actions, hopes that become outsized and in turn deform reality."

Three stars. Same rating...different reasons!

Title: On Such a Full Sea

Author: Chang-Rae Lee

Publisher: Riverhead Books

Published: December 2, 2014

Available: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Book Depository

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

Not going to lie, what got me to pick up this book wasn't the fact that it was a New York Times #1 Bestseller. It wasn't that the series has creepily unforgettable cover photography. It was the fact that when this book is spine out it says, "YA Riggs" and that makes me ridiculously happy.

When sixteen-year-old Jacob witnesses his grandfather's murder, the creature involved in the death haunts Jacob's dreams and reality. To solve the horror behind the murder, Jacob travels to a mysterious island to uncover the truth. What he finds is Miss Peregrine, her home for peculiar children, and secrets that only time will reveal.

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children is a unique story that ties in real (and really creepy) black-and-white photos with an equally eerie plot. There are monsters, children with supernatural powers, and time travel in every chapter. These topics aren't in my usual reading repertoire, so there were portions of the book that I was tempted to skim over. The photography that is mixed in throughout the book is engaging and so unique, but what really kept me turning the pages was the authorship.

Ransom's writing is b-eautiful!

Ransom has mastered the blending of prose and poetry so well that it didn't matter that the story was supernaturally far-fetched. I won't be reading the rest of the series because the subject matter wasn't my favorite. But I recommend you at least check out and read this first book, so you can 1) see the clever way the book is designed and 2) get a taste of Ransom's beautiful writing. 

Title: Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children 

Author: Ransom Riggs

Publisher: Quirk Books

Published: 4/6/2013 

Available: Amazon, Book Depository, and Barnes and Noble

My Reading Resolution–2016 Edition

Here is one resolution I know I can keep...a reading resolution. 

A lot of readers like to set a goal of how many books they will read during the year: 50, 85, 101. I'm past the stage where I can stay up until two in the morning reading, so time constraints would make my reading goals seem weak sauce to you night owls. 

Instead, 2016 will be a year of branching out. YA fiction is my go-to, but there are so many other books out there that are worth exploring, I just need to give myself a push. This "To Read 2016" resolution list is to help keep me well-read. 

Feel free to join in, or make a list for yourself!