Choker

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Choker by Elizabeth Woods
Simon and Schuster, 240 pages

Sixteen-year-old Cara Lange has been a loner ever since she moved away from her best and only friend, Zoe, years ago. She eats lunch with the other girls from the track team, but they’re not really her friends. Mostly she spends her time watching Ethan Gray from a distance, wishing he would finally notice her, and avoiding the popular girls who call her “Choker” after a humiliating incident in the cafeteria.

Then one day Cara comes home to find Zoe waiting for her. Zoe’s on the run from problems at home, and Cara agrees to help her hide. With her best friend back, Cara’s life changes overnight. Zoe gives her a new look and new confidence, and next thing she knows, she’s getting invited to parties and flirting with Ethan. Best of all, she has her BFF there to confide in.

But just as quickly as Cara’s life came together, it starts to unravel. A girl goes missing in her town, and everyone is a suspect—including Ethan. Worse still, Zoe starts behaving strangely, and Cara begins to wonder what exactly her friend does all day when she’s at school. You’re supposed to trust your best friend no matter what, but what if she turns into a total stranger?

Talk about choosing a very creepy book to start my year. Choker by Elizabeth Woods is one of those books that I had no idea what it was about, but I read it because I saw good reviews from other blogging friends. Note that I said saw and not read, because I thought it wasn’t something I’d be able to get a copy of anytime soon, but thanks to Simon and Schuster’s Galley Grab, I got an ebook copy.

Choker comes from what Alexis Henning and Sydney Powers start calling Cara Lange after she chokes on a piece of carrot during lunch at their school. Quiet, almost invisible Cara was hardly noticed in school until that incident, and even being saved by her crush Ethan Gray didn’t help. What helped her to gain a bit of confidence back and make friends was when her childhood friend Zoe, shows up out of nowhere. Cara’s life improves significantly as she makes friends and catches Ethan’s attention, but weird things start to happen too and she can’t help but wonder if her best friend is somehow involved.

This book ups the creepiness by making things seem so ordinary and yet you know something…well, weird is happening in the background. I really and truly feel sorry for Cara, here. I’ve had my loner moments back in high school, but Cara doesn’t just go by unnoticed but people pick on her too! Sometimes I want to shake her and all and tell her to be more assertive, because nothing is really going to happen if she allows herself to be just that. Zoe definitely comes off as a stronger personality than Cara but you’d know right from the start when Cara and Zoe were playing in Zoe’s mom’s room with her pills (no best sleeping pills, I think) that there’s something odd about Zoe, which was proved further as the story went on.

I’ve often said before that I would rather have a love issue than a friendship issue because friendship issues hurt more. Of course, I have no experience in the love issues department, but friendship issues, I’ve had a lot. I hated it when I had fights with my close friends because it’s hard to find someone else who will sympathize with you. Choker reminded me of those reasons, and it was a breath of fresh air to read something that is not romance, even if it is very creepy.

If you think you know what will happen in the novel based on my review…well, you’re wrong. There’s a twist in the end that caught me (and other readers, for sure) by surprise, and even if it isn’t an entirely new concept, I thought it was a great (albeit creepy, again) way to turn the story around.

Choker is a solid debut from Elizabeth Woods. Don’t let the pink cover fool you. Choker is out in hardcover from Simon & Schuster. You can read an excerpt of the book here.

Rating: [rating=4]

My copy: e-book ARC from Simon & Schuster Galley Grab

Cover and Blurb: Goodreads

Other reviews:
Attack of the Book
The Bookologist
Presenting Lenore

Posted in: Reviews \ Tagged: , , , , , , , , ,

Filipino Friday: Goals and Resolutions

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Filipino FridayI meant to host Filipino Friday last week, but all the hoopla and celebrations for the turn of the year caught up with me and I totally forgot about it. Ooops. Sorry Chachic!

But anyway, here I am! To those unfamiliar, Filipino Friday is a weekly (or sort of weekly) discussion among Filipino Book Bloggers about anything book or book blogging related. I’d like to start off this year’s discussion with something that I am sure everyone did or is still doing now that the new year is upon us: reading goals and resolutions.

I’m fond of setting goals and resolutions, because I believe in the power of setting one. That’s one of the big reasons why I love the new year because it allows people to start with a blank slate and leave whatever they don’t want to bring into the new year from the past there. I am also slightly nuts about setting challenges for myself, so I am always open to joining challenges that I like, or even some challenges that I am not sure I like them just so I can try to go outside of my comfort zone. So here’s this week’s question: what are your 2011 goals and resolutions as a reader and (Filipino) book blogger? Do you plan to read more books from last year, or do you plan to concentrate on a certain genre only? Do you want to up your stats, your comments or network more? Are you joining reading challenges or are you winging it? Do you plan to buy more books or less? Do you have a reading order ready for the books you will read for January, or even in the next months or the whole year?

I’ve already posted about joining the TwentyEleven challenge, which I hope helps me try new books and genres that I haven’t read before. I’ve also decided not to put a number on the books I plan to read this year after I’ve reached 100 last year — although I wouldn’t mind reading more than the number of books I read last year. I have set other goals for myself, though:

  • Read 5 classics – I’ve been setting a 10 book goal in a year, but I know that I will never reach that number because I read classics too slow. I read 3 last year (5 if you count the C.S. Lewis books, which I am not sure are classics), so this year, I’m aiming for a lower number from 10, but higher from the total I read last year. :)
  • Read at least 20 books by Filipinos – I really enjoyed Project 20:10 last year, and even if I didn’t reach the target 20 books, I’m happy that I tried. I have discovered many good Filipino fiction last year because of that challenge. I want to do that again this year.

As for resolutions? I haven’t set a final list, but here’s what I have from the top of my head:

  • I will embrace my Mt. TBR. No more stressing over the number of books I have or will have. Sure, I still think I have too many, but I will not stress over it anymore. I figure, as long as I can read and love reading, I will not stop getting books, so why fight it?
  • However, I will avoid impulse buys. I am very bad at impulse buys. Book buying is my kind of retail therapy, so whenever I am sad or angry or emotional, I tend to get more books. :P I will try to stop doing that…by doing what, I am not sure yet. But I will avoid impulse buys as much as possible.
  • I will allow myself not to finish books. Best example is the book I posted about yesterday. However, I will only probably do this for review copies, if I really cannot stand it anymore. I will still attempt to finish the books I bought with my own money, no matter how much I end up disliking it. I have very high tolerance, anyway. :P And while review copies are nice (and free), I will not force myself to love the book or finish it if I have lost interest.
  • I will keep on writing honest reviews and find ways to improve my reviewing. I know I tend to ramble on my reviews, so this year I’m going to work on that. :P
  • I will clean out my shelves twice this year. No, not dusting or re-arranging (although I would do that), but I will weed out books that I know will find better homes somewhere. If I know I won’t re-read it anymore, then I can give them to someone who will love it more than I do.
  • I will attend more bookish events this year. I think this is self-explanatory? :)

So what about you? What are your reading/blogging goals and resolutions this 2011? I know some of you have already posted your goals and challenges in your blogs, so feel free to leave a link for them below and I can do a round up here, too. :)

I’m sure most of us agree that 2010 has been a good year for us Filipino Book Bloggers, so here’s to hoping 2011 will be an even better year. :) *cheers*

Posted in: Challenges, Reading Quirks \ Tagged: , , , , , ,

Invasion (C.H.A.O.S. # 1)

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Invasion (C.H.A.O.S. #1) by J.S. Lewis
Thomas Nelson, 320 pages

He didn’t ask for the job, but now all that stands between us and chaos… is Colt.

Colt McAlister was having the summer of his life. He spent his days surfing and his nights playing guitar on the beach with friends. He even met a girl and got his first car. But everything changes when his parents are killed in a freak accident.

He’s forced to leave his old life behind and move to Arizona with his grandfather. The only person he knows at the new high school is a childhood friend named Dani. And Oz, a guy he’s sure he’s never met but who is strangely familiar.

But what if his parents’ death wasn’t an accident? His mother, an investigative reporter, was going to expose a secret mind-control program run by one of the world’s largest companies. Before she could release the story, what if agents from Trident Biotech made sure she couldn’t go public?

Vowing to uncover the truth, Colt gets drawn into a secret world of aliens, shapeshifters, flying motorcycles, and invisible gateways.

The Invasion has begun.

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I requested Invasion by J.S. Lewis from Booksneeze, so I had zero expectations when I started reading the book, too. Invasion is the first book in the C.H.A.O.S. series, and the first book tells the story of Colt McAlister, orphaned at 16 after his parents died in a car crash. Soon after he moved with his grandfather in Arizona, weird things start happening such as weird creatures chasing him, and random people trying to kill him for some reason. Soon Colt finds out that his mom was about to release a story about mind-controlling chips from a huge and powerful corporation, Trident Biotech. As Colt tries to uncover the mystery of his parents’ death, he runs for his life with his friends and he encounters all weird creatures and high technology, and he realizes that there may be more to this than he thought it was.

Invasion has 57 chapters, which I found a bit daunting when I started reading. These were short chapters, however, which made it for easy albeit a bit shallow reading. There is strong world building in Invasion, backed with interesting facts and information with how aliens and different creatures have been hidden among humans since the start. If you liked the setting in Men In Black, this book provides the same kind of world. Just like other books that involved conspiracies, action wasn’t lacking in this book: chase scenes, fights, random people trying to kill the heroes are a-plenty here. There’s also enough secret hideouts, mysterious people and advanced technology to excite sci-fi fans around.

However, I never felt invested in the characters. I liked Colt, Oz and Danielle, but I didn’t feel like I knew them for real. It may be because of how the story flowed or maybe even because each chapter is too short for me to glean much about who they are and what makes them tick. There also seemed to be a crowd of secondary characters all over the place, and while I get that it’s needed to build the new world that Colt is moving into, it was kind of hard to keep track of them. The overall premise was interesting, and it does make for an interesting read but I felt that I would be more interested in this if it were a movie instead of a book.

I think Invasion is still a good book, but I think it’s not for me. Perhaps it’s my age, or my lack of scifi knowledge and love. I like my aliens and wild worlds with chase scenes and explosions, but this one just failed to capture my interest. Maybe younger boys or longtime scifi fans would enjoy this more than I did.

Invasion by J.S. Lewis is already out in hardcover, published by Thomas Nelson. Thanks to Booksneeze for the review copy.

Rating: [rating=3]
→ I didn’t really finish the book, but I thought it had enough potential to get a 3-star rating.

My copy: ebook, review copy from Booksneeze

Cover: Booksneeze
Blurb: Goodreads

Other reviews:
Pessimistically Optimistic Meanderings
The Pumpkin Pie Patch

Posted in: Reviews \ Tagged: , , , , , , , , ,

TwentyEleven Challenge

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I apologize for the lack of posts here lately. I haven’t been too busy with work since the new year came, but I have been busy meeting up with friends and finding quiet times to read hence the silence. I’ve only read one book in 2011 so far, and ever since I decided not to set a number of books that I need to read this year, I think I have gone easy on myself.

But a reading year won’t be that fun if we don’t join any reading challenges, right? So here’s my first reading challenge for 2011, and it’s the one I’ve been thinking of joining since 2010.

One of my goals in 2011 is to explore other genres and not just stick to the ones I’ve been reading lately. I’ve learned that variety is always good in reading as it stops you from having the (dreaded?) slump, and it gives you more chances to discover things you like or don’t like in literature. Darren‘s TwentyEleven challenge seemed like one of those challenges that would help me do just that, and so it is the first challenge I’m joining for 2011. :)

There are eleven categories in the challenge, and each participant should read a minimum of 1 and a maximum of 2 books in each category, to reach the 20 books in the challenge. Each book can only be counted for one category, and it must be read from January 1, 2011 to December 31, 2011. The book read can be also counted for another challenge, so it doesn’t have to be exclusive for this challenge.

Here are the categories, and the books I know from my TBR that could possibly fit the category:

  1. To YA or not YA…
    Okay, this one works like this… Tend to read more Young Adult than Adult Fiction books then read one or two adult fiction titles, vice-versa if you don’t tend to read much Young Adult.

    • Havah: The Story of Eve by Tosca Lee
    • On the Edge by Ilona Andrews
  2. …With a Twist.
    This one focuses on sub-genres, read a lot of chick-lit, then try a paranormal romance! Fantasy? Why not give some Steampunk a go, like a bit of Space-Opera in your Sci-Fi then pick up a military Sci-fi book. Like your Contemporary Literature, give a Young Adult Contemporary a chance. Well hopefully you get the idea!

    • Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card (SciFi)
    • Captain Corelli’s Mandolin by Louis de Bernières (Historical)
  3. Hot off the Presses.
    Read a book published (in your country) in 2011? Then it counts for this category.

    • Blue Angel, White Shadow by Charlson Ong
    • TBD
  4. It Wasn’t Me! (aka Bad Bloggers*)
    Books in this category, should be ones you’ve picked up purely on the recommendation of another blogger count for this category (any reviews you post should also link to the post that convinced you give the book ago).
     * Bad Bloggers: Is hosted by Chris of Stuff as Dreams are Made on.

    • Howl’s Moving Castle by Dianna Wynne Jones (recommended by Chachic)
    • Dust City by Robert Paul Weston (reviewed by Chelle)
  5. Show it Who is Boss!
    Tackle that overflowing T.B.R. pile! Books for this category must be already residents of your bookshelves as of 1/12/10.

    • The Scarlet Thread by Francine Rivers (bought in January 2007 :o)
    • The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis (bought in 2008)
  6. Bablefish.
    Read books that are translated from a language that is not your own.

    • TBD. Any suggestions? :)
  7. Will-Power? What Will-Power? (aka: The Henry Ward Beecher Memorial.)
    You know that quote I have in my blog-header… “Where is human nature so weak as in a bookstore?” Recognise yourself in it? Then this is the one for you! Bought a book NEW during 2011? Then it counts for this category. Second-hand books do not count for this one, but, for those on book-buying bans, books bought for you as gifts or won in a giveaway also count.

    • Haven’t bought anything in 2011…yet! Wait for this one. :P
    • Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (bought January 9, 2011)
    • Saving Francesca by Melina Marchetta (bought January 10, 2011)
  8. Mind the Gap.
    Need just one more book to compete that duology/trilogy/series then read it for this one! (Obviously as this is for that final book you need to complete it, then you can’t read two books from the same series! And it clearly can’t be your first or penultimate read!)
    Because not everyone reads a series in order, this is for the last book you need to read, not necessarily the last book in the series…

    • The Iron Queen by Julie Kagawa
    • My Soul to Keep by Rachel Vincent
  9. Back in the Day.
    Re-read an old favourite or two for this category.

    • Will have to choose between a Sarah Dessen or a Jasper Fforde book, since I am planning to marathon their books as their new ones get released this year :)
  10. Way Back When.
    Read books that were published before you were born for this one, whether that be the day before or 100 years prior!

    • Emma by Jane Austen
    • Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Caroll
  11. Slim-Pickings
    Got a novella you want to read? Then this one is the one for you! Any books between 90-150 pages count.

    • Rage by Jackie Morse Kessler
    • Reaper by Rachel Vincent

Of course, the books listed here can still change as the year goes on. Flexibility is the key to reading challenges, I figured.

Are you joining the TwentyEleven challenge? Or are you joining other challenges? Do share them so we can cheer each other on. :)

Posted in: Challenges \ Tagged: , ,

The Chronicles of Narnia # 4: Prince Caspian

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Prince Caspian by C.S. Lewis
The Chronicles of Narnia # 4
Publisher: Scholastic
Number of pages: 240
My copy: paperback, bought from Scholastic Book Fair

The four Pevensies help Caspian battle Miraz and ascend his rightful throne.

Narnia…the land between the lamp-post and the caste of Cair Paravel, where animals talk, where magical things happen…and where adventure begins.

Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy are returning to boarding school when they are summoned from the dreary train station (by Susan’s own magic horn) to return to the land of Narnia — the land where they had ruled as kings and queens and where their help is desperately needed.

* * *

When the movie Prince Caspian came out, I watched it without having read the book, so I had zero expectations. All I thought after I watched the movie was it was a little bit long, and I squeed when Aslan showed up. I didn’t really like it as much as the first movie on the first watch but it got better when I watched it for the second and third time. Eventually, Prince Caspian became one of those movies that I like watching over and over again, despite my friends’ complaints of it not being faithful to the book, etc, etc.

But how many times have we learned that movies are never equal to the books, and that Hollywood will always, always change something in the book for reasons we do not know and still get angry about?

Anyway, so I finally read Prince Caspian just before the year ended. From the initial impressions of my friends who read the book before watching the movie, I was prepared to see glaring differences compared to the movie. I wasn’t sure what I’d like more, of course, but I’ve learned to read with an open mind.

I was surprised to find out that there really wasn’t much difference. Well, okay, it is different in terms of how the story flowed, and how the sequences were made and how dark it feels and the romance (yes, it never existed in the book). But I can see why the movie people diverged from the book. Prince Caspian is not really an exciting book. While there was a battle, many struggles for both Caspian and the Pevensies, and even some black magic, the way it was written just doesn’t shine as much as The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. A Lewis fan and friend told me that Caspian is the book he tends to skim over, and while I didn’t really skim through it, it did prove to be very fast reading as I got through 3/4 of it while I was getting my hair done in the salon. Then I stopped so it took me a while to actually finish it.

But I’m not saying that Prince Caspian is a bad book. It just wasn’t exciting as its predecessor.* There were no extravagant rescues, there were no betrayals or resurrections. My favorite part, as always, was when Aslan showed up. It wasn’t quite like how it was done in the movies, but I liked how Lewis wrote it so that the other Pevensies didn’t see Aslan immediately because of the fear that was in their hearts. That’s the same in our faith walk, don’t you think? We can only see God when we let our fears go. And once we see Him, things will never be the same.

There’s this one passage in the book that I really loved, because it sounded so poetic and beautiful:

But all night, Aslan and the Moon gazed upon each other with joyful and unblinking eyes. (p. 213)

Prince Caspian is a good book. Perhaps I’d learn to appreciate it more when I re-read it, but it certainly made me appreciate the movie more. I think it’s time for another re-watch. :)

* NOTE: I must say that I am reading the Narnia books in order of publication, so when I say predecessor, I meant The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and not The Horse and His Boy.

Rating: [rating=3]

Other reviews:
Bookie Woogie

Reviews of Other Narnia Books:
#2: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe

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