From Page to Screen: The 100

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From Page to Screen: The 100

All right, all right I broke the rules. Yes, I watched the TV show before reading the book. Sue me, it happens on occasion, not many but it does. So of course having seen the show first you would assume that I would like that better than the book, that she show would be my baseline to which I compared every little detail and aspect of the story that Kass Morgan so meticulously created.

And that’s where you’d be wrong.

I mean of course I’m going to notice the differences between the two, characters, language, setting, etc. and there are some MAJOR differences! (Um, Jasper & Monty? Hello where are you guys?)

Now at two-thirds of the way through the Morgan trilogy I’ve come to the conclusion that the differences between the novel and the show are not bad, not in any way. Sure the differences are pretty obvious and I find myself searching for those characters I fell in love with on the show but at the same time I got to meet new characters, who I fell in love with for entirely different reasons! We’ve got our favorites around to tether us all together (Clarke, Bellamy, Octavia) and yes Octavia Blake is still chasing butterflies and making friends with the Grounders (Earthborns). Bellamy Blake is ever the protective older brother of his little sister and one half of the only set of siblings in space. Clarke Griffin is actually a doctor guys! Well almost, she kind of gets arrested before finishing training and you can kind of piece together what happens from there.

Maybe I am not judging this adaptation as harshly because I watched the show first and had already resigned myself to the changes that had to be made to stretch a three book trilogy into a whole show. Even still I find myself enthralled with the world, the same basic story, and not minding those changes in the least. It’s clear to me that the books and the show can have two entirely separate fan bases without ever really needing the other; but it is also possible to be a fan of both, as I have recently become part of that category.

For anyone that has seen the show but not read the books yet, I implore you to give them a try! They are a world apart and just as thrilling. Fans of the show we have Jason Rothenberg to thank for keeping the integrity of the story but should praise him for creating such a fantastic world of his own. The TV show is and adaptation in its truest form.

CWTV

For those in the back the meaning of adaptation, according to Oxford Dictionaries, is …

• The action or process of adapting or being adapted
•  A movie, television drama, or stage play that has been adapted from a written work, typically a novel
• Biology A change or the process of change by which an organism or species becomes better suited to its environment

Ironically it’s the last one that I think is most relevant in this instance. This is a case of Jason Rothenberg taking the idea created by Kass Morgan, changing and altering it to fit its new medium. What Morgan does in three books Rothenberg has to stretch over as many episodes and seasons he can muster. So yes, while I am the nerd that would gladly sit through a seventeen hour Harry Potter movie if it meant nothing had to change, I make an exception to my general rule. The 100 is fantastic regardless of whether fans came by page or by screen.

My 2015 Reading Challenge

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My 2015 Reading Challenge

As of January 1, 2015 I gave myself a reading challenge for the year. I planned to read 25 books between January 1^st and the stroke of midnight on December 31^st. Now I am a self-proclaimed bookworm, reading, books they’re my favorite pastime. My favorite activity when I have nothing else to do. So twenty-five books that probably doesn’t sound like a lot in theory my challenge should be somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty or one hundred; several of my Goodreads friends challenged themselves with a number that far surpasses mine.

There are a few reasons why I didn’t give myself a higher goal, why I didn’t push myself to complete a greater challenge. First and foremost, life; as any bookworm knows as much as we’d all love to sit around all day engrossed in whatever novel currently has our attention every once and a while the novel must close for a little bit. There are other responsibilities that need to be attended to on a daily basis and not all of them can be done with one’s nose buried in a book. Look I love that sometimes when things are truly slow in my office I can spend a few minutes reading, but that doesn’t mean I get to shirk my actual job responsibilities just because an incredible plot twist demands my full attention! So as difficult as it is I must admit to being a grown up and focusing my attention on other tasks for a while and return to my book later.

And you know what? Some days, as much as I love reading, as much as it relaxes me and offers an escape, sometimes a nap just sounds a whole lot better!

Okay, so life has not gotten in the way and I can read whenever I want! (If only) I still want a variety of the novels that I read. Sure there’s nothing wrong with a little fluff every now and then, a book so easy I barely need to turn my brain on to understand the content but if that’s all I read I’d be bored out of my mind! I like something that will challenge me and makes me think, something that requires my full and undivided attention lest I miss a minute detail pivotal to the entire plot. I want the books with complicated characters with layers that I have to dissect to understand. Laini Taylor’s Days of Blood and Starlight took me almost three weeks to read because I took my time with it, gave it the attention it so rightfully deserved and required. But before I became engrossed in the Taylor’s world and followed Karou on her journey between our world and elsewhere I read a piece of fluff about a girl who thought it was the end of the world because she was a twenty-one year old virgin. (Spoiler Alert: she lived, there are worse things in life than being a virgin … imagine that!)

Of course with variety you get a hit and a miss, for example City of Heavenly Fire; probably one of my biggest disappointments on my challenge list. Took me over a month to finish it because I was lacking the motivation to continue with another page. I am no quitter though and continued on as if I were actually interested in the outcome. So I had the good, the bad, the in between and I did not give up on a single one of them. I finished every book I started during my challenge period.

I fell behind schedule and read furiously to catch up, only to end up ahead of schedule at some point by four whole books! So I set myself a twenty-five book challenge because I felt twenty-five was an appropriate number in which I could enjoy what I was reading. I didn’t feel I needed to sacrifice anything just for the sake of completing my challenge. Each book I read brought something new for me to enjoy, despise, pick apart and think about long after I had closed the final cover. I allowed myself to suffer from more than one book hangover in the last year and I enjoyed every minute of them (as horrible as they seemed at the time).

Twenty-five books! Next year I think I’ll my sights a little higher, not much, but maybe a little. Who knows what 2016 will bring for me?

xoxo

Anything can happen in Just One Day ...

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Just One Day

     By, Gayle Forman

Anything can happen in just one day …

Here’s why I love Gayle Forman so much, why I have yet to be disappointed in any of her books that I have read, her characters, their circumstances, their problems and their solutions are real! Although she is a fiction writer she chooses real life situations that could actually happen to someone on the street. She focuses on the choices people make day to day and the ways in which we as humans are shaped as individuals. If I Stay/Where She Went depicted how trauma can change you irrevocably, the way it will shape the person you were into almost someone new entirely.

Just One Day, and subsequently Just One Year, show us how happiness and spontaneity can change you. Allyson the ideal and dutiful daughter bound for Pre-Med at her father’s alma mater on a European adventure, which was anything but. Allyson had all the makings of living the typical white picket fence life of being complacent, not happy. I mean sure she’d tell herself she’s happy and that the choices she made were the right ones, but let’s face it she didn’t choose any of it! Her whole life up until the point she met Willem was decided for her by someone else, and even everything after.

Somewhere there is a girl, or even a boy, that will read this book and related so much to Allyson because their entire life has been steered for them by their parents. Every moment planned and not a second squandered, no place for free thinking or self-discovery. Willem is the unlikely catalyst in the change that Allyson so desperately needed in her life. That catalyst for the reader is hope; hope that they can take back control of their own lives, make their own decisions and find their own happiness. Willem didn’t do much he just made her an offer and it was an offer that Allyson had to decide to accept or reject on her own, sure Melanie was there telling her not to do it, but Melanie wasn’t the one being offered a day in Paris.

Okay so let’s face it, strange European boy offering unsuspecting American girl to spend the day in Paris together after meeting for all of an hour, I’ve seen Taken of course red flags go up! This has all the makings of disaster written all over it. But let’s talk realistically Allyson, practical, reliable she may have been sheltered her entire life, she may not have made many decisions like this one for herself but she’s got a gut instinct. Speaking as a reliably practical person, your gut instinct flares up in a big way screaming “DANGER, DANGER” if something is truly bad for you. Her gut said she could trust Willem and she could! Willem was not, it turns out, one of the bad guys that mothers warn their daughters about he was one of the genuine ones, one of the good ones.

Post-Willem: Yes I was upset when Allyson awoke the next morning and Willem was gone, I’d had higher hope for him. But deep down in my gut I knew there had to be more to the story than Willem just taking off and disappearing.

Now I have read the Twilight books and no I do not think any girl should fall apart just because a guy leaves her. But Allyson’s breakdown was somehow different than just being abandoned by a guy. Allyson’s depression didn’t feel to me like it was tied solely to Willem, though she may have believed that. Allyson’s depression was tied to the fact that Willem gave her a glimpse, showed her a life where she is in control and is making her own decisions. She is finding her own happiness without her mother, father, teacher, Melanie whispering in her ear steering her in another direction. He simply let her be.

So when Allyson starts fighting back, starts trying to take back control of her life of course there is push back from her parents. Her “best friend” disappears. But really that’s okay, because part of finding yourself if finding happiness for yourself. She may not have Melanie anymore but she’s made better friends in Dee and Wren. Allyson learned how to work and earn what she wants and thus it makes her appreciate it more. She found her niche.

She gets closure! I think that’s really what I was rooting for in the end, not so much that she gets back together with Willem but that she finds closure. She needed to make peace with the person she left behind and the one that Willem helped her become. Romantically linked or not he helped change her in a way she didn’t know she needed to change. He helped her grow up.

And the story is fiction, so we need a little faith, trust and pixie dust to get us there but in the end Allyson gets her closure. She finds what she is looking for. She takes charge of her own life. Now that is a character worth rooting for.

Because anything can happen in Just One Day.

I don't have time ...

You don’t have time for a lot of things! Why is reading any different? 

It bothers me when anyone claiming to have a passion for reading will so cavalierly utter words such as, “I don’t have time.”

You find the time! No one said you have to read a whole book in one sitting, one day, one week or one month. Time is a wonderful thing; it is always there and moving and time won’t judge you for your slow reading. Your brain will not judge you for the long lapses between chapters, it will rejoice in the moments that you allow it to spend in an imagined world.

Reading is a passion like any other and if you truly are passionate about it you will find the time to feed that passion. A few pages here, a chapter or two there, a few minutes waiting in the doctor’s office or a few hours lounging on the beach. 

There is always time for what you are passionate for. So find the time, find the time for your passions, the way you would the mundane daily tasks.

An Excerpt!

Amelia kept vigil at the window late into the night and soon fell asleep there. I had to move my sister from her spot in the window seat to her own room down the hall, as I’ve done many times before. Amelia has always been tiny, which is why she gets tossed in the air during basketball games, but to me she’s always just been my baby sister that I need to protect.

Gently placing her in her bed I make sure to pull the covers up around her shoulders and shut the door as I leave. It was on the return trip to my own room I heard my father come home, my mother waiting at the door for him; they spoke in hushed tones that only I could hear. I chose to remain hidden behind the wall and not go out onto the landing

“It was another,” dad says calmly, his tone tinged with sadness and anger.

“What?” mom gasps quietly. “Who? How?”

“I don’t know,” dad replies. “But I’m going to find out.”

“I don’t understand I thought there were precautions, protections in place to prevent this,” mom whispers.

They move to the kitchen and I listen; a plate is placed in the microwave and the timer is set. The hum of the appliance makes me refocus; I need to block out the machine and focus on the voices of my parents. In the few moments it took to adjust I missed a few words of their conversation but not much.

“They will not come for us,” dad states. It’s a firm promise to my mother, it’s a promise to protect us but from what I’m not sure. We live in suburbia, nothing happens here but the occasional egging on Halloween and maybe a missing bicycle or two.

“You can’t really promise that anymore though can you? This is the third one this year, Amelia …”

“She’s coming of age I know.” Dad sighs; I can picture him loosening his tie in my mind and slouching in his chair.

“You must protect her,” mom pleads. “I couldn’t stand it if …”

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“Marguerite I will not let anything happen to Amelia.” His voice is firm and determined.

The microwave timer alarms making me wince with the sudden piercing in my ears. One of my parents stops the chiming and the plate is moved from the microwave to the table, my father’s leftover dinner.

“I know it’s irrational and I don’t get to keep her forever. But she’s my baby.” Mom’s voice is wavering and my heart goes out to her, my sweet, sweet mother who’s affectionate but rarely cries.

“It’s not irrational Marguerite and I will protect her for you. I will do whatever I can to keep her safe.”

“Thank you.” 

NaNoWriMo 2014

Excuse my brief pause in blogging this week as I prepare to throw myself, wholeheartedly, into NaNoWriMo this year. November is right around the corner and I plan to do even better than last year.

My final word count for November 2013 was 53,055. Let's see if I can do better this time around!

I've already got my concept in mind and a few notes here and there to refer to. I've got plot points I want to hit. All in all I'm way more organized this time around, so I'm hoping that this year's novel is infinitely better than last year's.

The Maze Runner

The Maze Runner by, James Dashner

Today a review! No complaints, no nit picking, just a straight up reader review of a book I recently finished. Now bear in mind I have not yet seen the movie, I do plan to, but as of right now all I know is the novel. That being said ... not one of my favorites.

I will respect and give praise to James Dashner because it was quite the concept he had. He came up with a very intriguing world; a

world that is in shambles and essentially experimenting on children in an attempt to fix it. Their memories wiped the Gladers must rely purely on their own human nature and desire to survive, to escape.

The memory wipe I think impacted my opinion on the characters. Since they did not remember the outside world they were never really sure what they were fighting, struggling to return to. The Gladers were essentially like mice in a cage being forced into certain situations. Their lack of memories made me question why they didn't try harder to remember? In my opinion knowing as many facts as possible, having as many memories as possible, would be essential to a successful escape.

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Let's recap, they only figured out how to solve the Maze after Thomas's attack on the Grievers. His pure need to remember and his willingness to do anything to get his memories back are what the Gladers ultimately needed.

The book; not one of my favorites! I will probably continue reading the rest of the series and I am planning on seeing the movie while still in theaters but I don't know that I will recommend it. I have my hopes for the movie, particularly in regards to the environment in that I hope it is visually stunning. I hope the casting and the actors draw me closer to the characters. And as always I hope the essence of the book, the life's blood of the story, seep off of the screen to the viewer because that's the most important part of any adaptation.

Blue Bloods: Gates of Paradise ... The End

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Let me just start out by saying that Melissa De La Cruz's Blue Bloods series I have been following since my early high school years! So now that I've finally finished the series I'm left with that usual feeling of sadness. I'm finally done with characters I've been following for years, the story is complete and it's time to move on to something else.

That being said, the sadness I felt was not as profound as other series I've been following for years. I mean I was following Ally Carter's Gallagher Girls series for almost the same amount of time and yet I felt a deeper sadness over the graduation of Cammie & Co. than I did for the Blue Bloods that finally found salvation. 

Unfortunately I know exactly why my sadness is not as profound ... a typo on the last page.

Put aside for a moment that writing and being published is what I want to do as my career; I'm a bookworm! I love to read and I've been a reader since I knew what books were. So a typo in a book is like a knife in the heart to me, but on the last page ... it makes me want to hurl said novel at the wall and scream. In those last few moments of being in that world that the author has created I'm ripped, rather abruptly, back to reality and have to think and process what the line is supposed to say rather than what the words on the page actually read.

And truly the most unfortunate part is that I wish I could say this was the only typo I'd found in the entire book, sadly that was not the case. There were several bumps along the road and while those were frustrating enough the last page really just killed it for me.

I don't even place the entire blame solely on the author; I understand that when you are close to a project your brain will automatically correct mistakes without actually correcting them. But there are so many people involved in publishing a book, an agent, an editor, a publisher, proofreaders that for the sheer amount of mistakes I found was astounding! How could just so many typos and mistakes fall through the cracks and make it to the final copy? Especially such a glaring on as the one on the last page!

I finished this book days ago but this still makes me annoyed when I think about it! When this is your job these are the kinds of mistakes I, nor any reader, wants to see. Proofread, double check, edit, revise, give it to someone else to read, anything to prevent these types of mistakes that will pull your reader from whatever it is you have written.

**For the record: We'll almost there.

Three paragraphs remained after this line and made the ending completely unsatisfying because there simply was not enough time left to re-immerse myself into the world again.

My Fellow Bookworms

So I have now been tagged twice in a post like this one! My pledge sister has asked me Julia & my fellow library nerd Janice to name 10 books that have left a lasting impression on me. At first I thought ONLY 10? How could I ever choose a mere 10? I’ve read probably a few hundred books in my lifetime and I’m being asked to choose 10!

I really did think it was an impossibility it would be too difficult for me to narrow down those hundreds to a handful. But let’s think about this for a moment, shall we? A lasting impression implies that when you think of a place, an object, a person, or even an event there’s something in particular that immediately comes to mind.  My father has always told me that a first impression is a lasting impression. You only get once chance at a first impression so make it count!

Good advice for me as a person and the same can be said for a book. You only get one first impression and that first impression is what I used as my criteria to choose my 10. So here it is, my list of 10 Books that Left a Lasting Impression on my Life.

Charlotte’s Web by, E.B. White

This book will always hold a special place in my heart. That spider and that pig made me hooked on reading. I read my copy so many times the binding is being held together by tape. Thanks to E.B. White I entered a world similar to my own, yet very different. I learned not to judge someone just because they may be different. But thanks to Charlotte and Wilbur I also learned that friends may leave, but the good ones are never forgotten.

The Harry Potter Series by, J.K. Rowling

Okay so this is technically encompassing 7 books, but hey Harry Potter isn’t just a book … it’s a generation. I discovered Harry, Ron and Hermione when I was nine years old and between the 7 books and 8 movies stayed with them until well into my 20s! This entire series will forever be special to me because this trio were my friends when very few others would be.

The Glass Castle by, Jeannette Walls

To anyone that has not read this stunning biography I highly recommend it! This is a story about family and about not being family. It taught me to appreciate what I have because not everyone is so lucky. But even in the worst of times there are ways to make the situation bright and find a silver lining.

Define “Normal” by, Julie Anne Peters

I feel like this title should speak for itself. I saw a post earlier that said; normal is a setting only on the washing machine. “Normal” is not a box that a person can be shoved into to fit.

The Fault in Our Stars by, John Green

This is a newcomer having only read the book at the beginning of this summer but I find this book to be beautiful. I loved everything about it; the story was frank and real. The language was nothing fancy or pretentious. The writing made me feel as if I could be speaking with a friend, listening to their story myself. But mostly because this is a story about life when death is a constant theme.

Out of Sight, Out of Time by, Ally Carter

I love all of Ally Carter’s Gallagher Girls series from the very beginning I have loved Cammie & Co. But this one just stuck with me in a way the others did not. After Cammie’s lost summer looking for the Circle and trying to find answers about her missing father she was returned to a life very different from the one she left behind. I loved this one because once Cammie returned to Gallagher Academy she was seeing life through the eyes of a spy, a real spy, while her friends still had the blinders of school on and try as they might her friends just did not understand.

Styxx by, Sherrilyn Kenyon

There are no words to describe Styxx, but merely just that there are two sides to every story. This addition to Kenyon’s Dark Hunter series blew everything I thought I knew out of the water. Just when I thought I had it all figured out the ever-surprising Sherrilyn Kenyon proved me wrong, there is so much more to learn.

Hush, Hush by, Becca Fitzpatrick

Bad guys sometimes make the best good guys, even if those bad guys are fallen angels.

Nancy Drew Mysteries by, Carolyn Keene

Probably my favorite shelf in St. Aidan Elementary School’s library. I read each of those yellow spined books religiously, over and over again. Nancy was always getting the job done and solving mystery after mystery.

Story of a Girl by, Sara Zarr

“School slut” this is a title I’m sure no girl wants to carry. Deanna however was labeled a slut when she was nothing more than a young, confused child. This is a story of a girl that was taken advantage of and how it affects her in her formative years of growing up. How her past shapes her and her ability to move past it.

I now nominate Melissa Alves, Aine O'Rourke, Meghan Collins, Megan Janczewski & Caroline Fallon, which 10 books have left a lasting impression on your lives?