Book Review: Blue Bloods-Melissa De La Cruz

The Book that I just finished reading is called Blue Bloods. For a change this book is written in third person view. This means that it’s not a diary of thoughts like a lot of books that I read previously are but a description of events using “he” or “she”.

The point of view jumps from person to person, and a couple of times I wondered how many more characters were going to be introduced to take over the point of view. Even after getting a bit over whelmed by the constant change of view, each character has a great impact on the story.

The author of this book-Melissa De La Cruz grew up in Manila and moved to San Francisco with her family. She majored in art history and English at Columbia University. Even though she was a huge horror and sci fi fantasy reader when she was young, she never expected to become a fantasy/vampire writer. She always thought she would be a farcical kind of writer and also a poet.

The book occurs in New York City. Schuyler Van Allen, the protagonist is a sophomore at a prestigious private school where she is an outcast at her school with only one friend- Oliver. Her family used to be one of the wealthiest in the city, but not anymore. She doesn't know her father, her mother has been in a coma in the hospital for most of her life, and she lives with her grandmother, that doesn’t even treat her like family.

Suddenly, when she turns fifteen, there is a mosaic of blue veins visible on her arm. She starts to crave raw food, and she is having flashbacks to ancient times. Then a girl from her school is found dead, drained of all her blood. Schuyler doesn’t know what to think. When the most popular guy in school shows interest, her world turns into a new reality where she learns that most of New York’s wealthiest people are actually vampires. They don't really die; they come back in the future generations as someone else with the same soul. Now an ancient group of extremely powerful vampires called Silver Bloods is after all the Blue Bloods alive on earth. They were considered a fairytale but now due to all the mysterious deaths everyone realizes that they are not immortal to the Silver Bloods. They must find a way to stop them, before anyone else gets hurt.

Melissa de la Cruz makes a fun world, easy to read, with characters that you love and hate.

Melissa’s writing style and tone isn’t exactly what you call expressive. Her style is written
informally because it’s a teenage story, and it’s meant for young adults. It has many details and descriptions, making it an easy task to visualize the book’s setting and characters in my head and the book pacing is well set.

She uses biblical mythology for the backstory of the characters. In her interview she said “I'd always loved the story of Paradise Lost and Lucifer's Fall, and in my book, I really wanted an explanation for why vampires are in the world. It just seemed so natural - of course! Vampires were cursed to live on Earth with Lucifer when he fell from grace. There's a lot of great stuff in the Bible, and I grew up in a very strict Catholic tradition.”

The theme of this book is Action/Mystery/Romance/Social.

Romance- because throughout the book a love triangle is created. Action/Mystery- Silver Bloods have come back, and we have to find out who they are. Social- main characters are in High School, so there are cliques, enemies, and friends.

Personally I really enjoyed reading this book. It wasn’t the typical twilight based vampire book but an original story where all the characters are unique and interesting in their own way.

Reading Log

Book: Artichoke’s Heart By: Suzanne Supplee

I knew nothing about this book when I picked it up besides the fact that I liked the cover. Its brown background covered in chocolates wrapped in pink grabbed my attention. I was probably just hungry, but after reading a few pages, I decided to stick with it. And I’m glad that I did.

This is the story about a sixteen year old girl Rosemary Good, who is 200 pounds overweight. She knows she's overweight but everyone else insists on telling her that. Her mom buys a treadmill for Christmas. Her aunt always has a disapproving remark. The popular girls at school tease her and that's been going on since middle school when she wore a green puffy jacket to school and they started calling her "Artichoke." Rosemary finds comfort in the junk food she has stashed in her room.

The plot in this book is very realistic. Author Suzanne Supplee put so much into her characters. Rosemary is a fantastic character and her growth throughout the book is realistic. I was cheering her on the whole way through and felt as though I was on the journey with her. I'm looking forward to reading more from this author in the future.

The character I could connect the most with was Rosie; I loved how her attitude changed as the book progressed. There's a number of times where Rosie would realize something just doesn't matter, or she'd see things a different way, or someone would say something to her that opened her eyes. In some of these instances, even my attitude was changed. It’s amazing how a novel can change your perspective and make you view yourself differently.

While I was reading I was picturing how hard it is for Rosie to lose weight and how bad she feels about herself. She obviously tries but something always happens and she gets depressed and starts eating again. Pg. 31 “I just can’t believe I’ve packed on thirteen pounds. Thirteen pounds! How did that happen? How can I make it stop? Why can’t I make it stop? What if it never, ever stops? What if I’m twenty-five and still tortured by talking scales and well-meaning bakers who keep trying to feed the fat girl. What if at my ten-year class reunion I am still the Artichoke?”

I have no problem connecting or understanding the novel. Everything the author is trying to say is written in a clear, easy and understandable way.

If I could have any character as a friend and if I could jump in the story I would definitely pick Rosie. If I was there with her I could encourage her to eat healthy without making fun of her or forcing her to do anything. I would talk to her and tell her that she should first understand that she’s doing it for her own good and not for anyone else. And I would stop her from drinking the Pounds-Away from the beginning, which would cause her fewer problems.

This book doesn’t really fit together with other books that I’ve read previously. But the plot is somehow similar. The main character has a goal he/she want to reach, he/she faces some challenges along the way but in the end their goal is achieved and the character always learns something from it.

I haven’t done anything similar to what the characters experienced in the book because the whole book is about Rosie trying to lose weight but nevertheless I really like the story and I enjoyed reading it

This book’s ending was exactly how I predicted it. It was a happy ending to a simple, easy read book.

The author uses a lot of literary term to make her story even a better read. Some of the examples are: simile (“I looked like a fat doughnut”) Characterization (“Kay-Kay is the cheerleader/homecoming court/Miss Spring Hill beauty pageant winner/bluebird club kind of girl with beautiful blonde hair up to her shoulders and sky-blue eyes.”) Onomatopoeia (“Baam” when she dropped the box and everyone stared at her) and Imagery (when she describes the treadmill as a monster that she is scared of and how it could change her life if she only tried.)

This book reminds me of my life in a way. My aunt used to be a bit overweight and she was feeling very self-conscious about it. She used to get on these diets where she only drank water for 3 days straight and we were all worried about her. But eventually we convinced her that she can get rid of her extra weight if she starts taking yoga classes and eats healthy. And in the end she did lose all the extra weight, even though it was challenging which is exactly how it happened in the story.

While reading today the part that I could visualize the most was when Rosie’s grandmother came and was very surprised to see Rosie looking really pretty, Rosie was so proud of herself that evening. Pg. 188 “Rosie, honey, you look so pretty I can hardly take my eyes of you. How much weight have you lost exactly” “As of this morning. I’ve lost a total of thirty-eight pounds (I counted my 203 weight just to make the accomplishment even more impressive)”

Reading Log 3

Book: Crazy Beautiful by Lauren Baratz-Logsted

Today I finished my book it is about the two main characters, a boy named Lucius Wolfe who is starting in a new high school, after the explosion that blew off his hands and left him with hooks, his family moved, changed towns. And Aurora Belle whose mother has recently died after a long illness, and she and her father need a new start in a place.

I loved the character of Lucius. I thought that, overall, he was very well-drawn with an appropriate level of complexity, although I thought his reasons for mixing the chemicals could have been better explained. Aurora, however, got on my nerves. She was sweet, but really almost too sweet. I also wondered where the grief was for her mother, neither she nor her father seemed much affected by the death of her mother.

The idea of having a teenage boy being a double amputee, but finding love is just brilliant. But I just couldn’t connect with any characters because they weren't developed that well and they didn't grow throughout the novel. I felt like I didn't know Aurora at all and only knew Lucius in the slightest.

While I was reading today I was picturing Lucius’s pain and sorrow for what he’s done, how badly he wants his hands back. “In the beginning I used to look at myself in the mirror all the time, repulsed by what I saw, trying to surprise my own new image by jumping out at the mirror from the sides.”

I didn’t have any problem connecting or understanding the story. Everything the author is trying to say is written in a clear, easy and understandable way. The words she uses are pretty simple and based on the paragraph you can easily understand it and there was no need to look it up in the dictionary.

I haven’t done anything similar that the characters experienced in the book because even though the book is based on the world that we live in, the events in the book have nothing in common with me. The main character in the story blew off his hands so thankfully I don’t want to have experienced anything that he did. None of the events, setting or characters remind me of my life, my life is just too different then the characters in my story.

The author uses a lot of literary features in the story such as: Metaphor (when Lucius first sees Aurora he thinks she is perfection he compares her to a dark angel. “She is some sort of dark angel.) Simile (“her eyes are like the color of serene ocean) Characterization (“Misty is a smaller version of mom, tiny, cute and blond……”) Onomatopoeia (“Baam”) and Imagery (when he is describing his room as some sort of a prison with plain white walls) These Literary features make the story really interesting. And make you want to read more.

The plot, for the most part, was well done. It was very realistic. The story was both similar and not similar enough to the traditional story of Beauty and the Beast. It was like the book was told in a more modern way then the original Beauty and the Beast. The ending was perhaps a bit rushed; I would have liked the conflict to be drawn out a little bit more.

The part of the book that I visualized the best was when Lucius actually kissed Aurora and that he realized that she liked him all along and he never understood that before. She was always the first one to reach out for him. “Yes, her lips taste like salt from the chips, sweet from soda, but I hardly notice that as I drown in the sensation of soft welcome.”

If I could have any character as my friend then would choose Lucius. If we were friends then he wouldn’t feel alone in the whole world and if I could jump in the story I would’ve probably stopped him from trying to create an explosive chemical that is similar to a bomb because he was apparently mad at everyone. Maybe if I was there he wouldn’t have done that. “What happened to me wasn’t an accident. I mean it was an accident that it happened that day, that way. But there was nothing innocent about what I was doing. I was practicing to do harm somewhere, sometime, maybe”

This book is very similar to the Beauty and the Beast book. This is like a modern retelling of Beauty and the Beast. In both books the main female characters that are really pretty and popular among other people fall in love with “the Best” in this case it was Lucius, a guy who had hooks instead of hands. Usually no one would even look at them but the female characters feel the attraction and eventually fall in love.

The ending was no surprise at all. It ended exactly as I thought it would. I was a bit disappointed by that because I was hoping for an intriguing ending. I know it was a short book, only 208 pages but I figured the author would have gotten to the point and not waited to the last page to have everything play out.

How Happy is the Little Stone

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Health Project GHB

Street names: Liquid Ecstasy, Scoop, Easy Lay, Liquid X, and Goop.

Drug Classification: Sedative-Hypnotics.

How it is used: Ingested in a liquid mixture; most commonly mixed with alcohol.


Length of effects: 1.5-2.5 hours

• Short-term effects: At lower doses it can cause: anxiety and produce relaxation.
  Combining use with other drugs such as alcohol: can cause nausea and difficulty breathing.
  Withdrawal effects: can cause insomnia, anxiety, tremors, and sweating.
  
• Long-term effects: As the dose increases, the sedative effects can cause sleep and eventual coma or death.
  It has been used a lot in cases of date rape.
  It is odorless and tasteless which causes people to slip into someone's drink without detection.
  

Videos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TpoUoabm55k&feature=related

"The Pearl"

1) Family is the most important thing in life!
Agree-Family is definitely the most important thing in life. Without it you will be lonely and selfish because you only care about yourself and thus you become self-centered. For example a rich guy who achieved all his goals in life suddenly realizes that he missed out a lot by not spending time with his family and friends when he had the chance to. And now they turned their back on him, and he now understands that he has no one to share all he’s achieved with.

2) Sometimes winning the lottery is a bad thing!
Agree-Because you will suddenly become well known for your luck and many people would want to take that away from you. You will live in a constant fear for your life. Also, with all that money people might start gambling and therefore they would be in a risk of losing all their possessions.

3) Our lives are ruled by fate, no matter what decisions we take, our lives are already planned out for us!
Disagree- Our actions are our own and we ourselves are responsible for them not destiny or anything like that. People make their own decisions based on what they think is right, and that has nothing to do with fate. Maybe we do have a purpose in life but I think our future builds up by the actions and decisions we make. Our future changes all the time based on our choices only.

Reading Last Chace (part 2) by Sarah Dessen

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