The Sunday Post #89 - Blogging From A To Z

The Sunday Post is hosted by The Caffeinated Book Reviewer. It’s a chance to recap the past week, talk about next week, and share news. It’s Monday, What Are You Reading? is hosted by Book Date. I get to tell you what I’ve read recently.

Blogging From A To Z

The Blogging from A to Z challenge starts on April 1. My theme is bookish memories. This challenge will probably be the most half-baked and self-indulgent thing I’ve ever done on this blog, but I’m going to give it my best shot. I hope you guys like personal posts because you’re going to get a whole month of them. Every day in April (except Sundays), I’m going to write a short post about how books and book blogging have impacted my life. Brace yourself. Posts are coming.

On The Blog Last Week

• On Monday I reviewed Guts: The True Stories behind Hatchet and the Brian Books by Gary Paulsen.
• On Tuesday I showed you what I’m planning to read this spring.
• On Wednesday I reviewed This Savage Song by Victoria Schwab.
• On Thursday I did the “Get to Know Me” tag.

On The Blog This Week

• On Monday I review Make Good Art by Neil Gaiman.
• On Tuesday I recommend some books under 200 pages.
• On Wednesday I review The Wave by Morton Rhue.

In My Reading Life

I’m still working through IT by Stephen King. I’ve read about 900 pages. I still have around 200 pages to go. I’m going to slay this book-beast!

In The Rest Of My Life

Five things that made me happy last week:

1. Yesterday was my birthday. I guess that shouldn’t make me happy because I’m another year closer to death, but I ate a bunch of junk food and didn’t exercise. That always makes me happy. (Even though the junk food and lack of exercise probably brought me even closer to death.) The universe won’t punish me for skipping a workout on my birthday, right?
2. Burritos and chocolate cake.
3. My mom got me 5 days of Nutrisystem for my birthday. We’ll see what happens with it.
4. I’m petsitting my friend’s dog again. I like playing with him because he’s so bouncy! (The dog, I mean, not my friend.)
5. Nicole @ Feed Your Fiction Addiction wrote a post about her reading habits that made me laugh. Also, it mentions everybody’s favorite subject: Me! 

Take care of yourselves and be kind to each other! See you around the blogosphere!  

The Get To Know Me Tag

I’ve seen this tag going around and took the liberty of tagging myself. Mostly, I just wanted an excuse to do a bunch of stupid Internet quizzes. Who doesn’t like those?

Get To Know Me

What is the meaning of your name?

Now you know what the “A” in “Aj” means. Sorry to the eight quadrillion other Ashleys in the world, but I kinda really hate my name. When I was a kid, the town I lived in was so small that we needed to combine classes at school. In my combined 1^st and 2^nd grade class, there were 12 students. Four of them were named Ashley. Who wants to be part of a domesticated Ashley herd? Not me.

What is your Myers-Briggs Personality Type?

I’ve had to take this test a bunch of times for school/work/doctor reasons. I guess people put a lot of faith in it. Every time I’ve taken the test, I’ve gotten ISTJ. I like to believe I’m more creative and rebellious than the test gives me credit for, but it’s pretty accurate:

Basically, if you’re not a dumbass, we’ll get along swimmingly.

Some famous real-life ISTJs: Angela Merkel, George Washington, Condoleeza Rice, George H.W. Bush.

Some fictional ISTJs: Eddard Stark, Stannis Baratheon, Hermione Granger.

What is your zodiac sign? 

My birthday is two days from now, so according to the first website that came up on Google, I’m a Pisces.

I laughed pretty hard when I saw this. I’m probably the least sentimental person ever.

What Hogwarts house would you be in? 

What are your learning styles? 

The VARK questionnaire says these are my learning styles:

I guess this is expected. Reading and writing are what I do, so it’s not surprising that I learn from books.

Are you more of a left-brain or right-brain person? 

Is this quiz real science? It doesn’t seem like it. The quiz asked me to touch my head, and then it asked which hand I used to touch my head. Obviously, I used the hand that wasn’t clicking the mouse to take the quiz. I don’t have much faith in this one.

What is your blood type?

No idea. There isn’t an Internet quiz for that. Do most people know their blood type? How do you find out? I guess it's not important because if I’m ever bleeding to death, I’ll be too freaked out (or too unconscious) to remember my type.

What career are you meant to be in? 

According to this quiz, I’m supposed to be a writer. Does that mean that professional dog petter isn’t a real career? I’m pretty sure I’m meant to pet dogs. I’ll also pet other animals. I’m versatile like that.

Which Divergent faction do you belong in? 

The factions quiz says I belong in Candor. Here’s my candid opinion on Divergent: I don’t understand the hype.

What does your birth order say about you? 

I’m a middle child. The description on this website is fairly accurate, but I’ve never had many friends. I’ve always been a loner. Also, is this real science?

Do you want to do this tag? Consider yourself tagged.

Review: This Savage Song – Victoria Schwab

This Savage Song – Victoria Schwab

Kate Harker wants to be as ruthless as her father. After five years and six boarding schools, she’s finally going home to prove that she can be. 

August Flynn wants to be human. But he isn’t. He’s a monster, one that can steal souls with a song. He’s one of the three most powerful monsters in a city overrun with them. His own father’s secret weapon. 

Their city is divided. 

Their city is crumbling. 

Kate and August are the only two who see both sides, the only two who could do something. 

But how do you decide to be a hero or a villain when it’s hard to tell which is which?

Review: I don’t like urban fantasy. It combines two of my least-favorite things: cities and cliché fantasy creatures. I’ve never been able to get into non-horror books about vampires and werewolves. Monster romances are just . . . yuck. Monsters are supposed to be scary, not sexy!

Then I heard that Victoria Schwab was writing an urban fantasy book without any romance. I like Schwab’s other books, so I thought I’d give it a try. And, it was good. Not perfect, but really good.

This Savage Song takes place in a world where violence breeds literal monsters. August Flynn is one of those monsters, but he doesn’t want to be. He hides his monstrous tendencies and tries to blend in with the humans. Kate Harker is a human who wants to be a monster. She thinks if she can be horrible enough, she’ll win the approval of her violent father. When the city’s monsters rise up and try to seize control, Kate and August are forced to flee. Can they get along well enough to survive?

“But the teacher had been right about one thing: violence breeds. 

Someone pulls a trigger, sets off a bomb, drives a bus full of tourists off a bridge, and what's left in the wake isn't just shell casings, wreckage, bodies. There's something else. Something bad. An aftermath. A recoil. A reaction to all that anger and pain and death.” – This Savage Song

The concept of this book is what drew me to it. Monsters being left behind after violent acts? How intriguing is that? The humans in the story are way more monstrous than the monsters themselves, which makes sense, I guess. The humans are the ones creating the monsters in the first place. It’s all very allegorical.

Victoria Schwab’s writing style always pulls me into her books and makes them hard to put down. It’s descriptive, but it’s not dense. Once the action gets going, the plot moves at breakneck speed. I can get lost in Schwab’s worlds and read hundreds of pages without noticing that hours have passed. This Savage Song is a pretty big book, but I finished most of it in a day.

“I mean, most people want to escape. Get out of their heads. Out of their lives. Stories are the easiest way to do that.”  - This Savage Song   

The best part of this story? No romance! Kate and August are just frenemies. That might change in the sequel (this is a duology, I think?), but it’s refreshing to read about a boy/girl friendship. Young adult literature needs more of those. Not every deadly situation has to lead to true love.

As interesting as the concept and friendships are, This Savage Song isn’t perfect. The plot takes a long time to get going. I think I was over halfway through the book before the plot really hooked me. At the start, I was just reading for the characters. I also found some obvious typos that made me glare furiously.

Just like with Schwab’s other books, the world-building in this one is murky. I never got a clear picture of the city’s layout or fully understood what monsters can/can’t do. For example, metal is supposed to keep monsters away, but they’re around metal all the time. It doesn’t seem to deter them. Violence is supposed to breed monsters, but does “violence” only mean killing? The characters are constantly slamming each other against walls, and that doesn’t create monsters (I don’t think?). I spent chunks of the book feeling mildly confused about the world.

Finally, the main characters are similar to the main characters in Schwab’s other novels. I probably shouldn’t complain because I like the characters, but I am. The girl is a violent badass; the boy is sweet and sensitive. I’ve seen this before.

Despite my criticisms, I’m eagerly awaiting the next book. I’m confident that my confusion will be cleared up. I have faith that the finale will be epic. 

Top Ten Tuesday: Books I’m Reading This Spring