Happy Easter!

This is not late, there are 50 days of Easter!

Aren't these daffodils in my front yard AWESOME?!

Happy Easter!  He is Risen!

The Tripods Attack! by John McNichol

I know what some of you are thinking.  More sci-fi?  Well, sort of.  The Tripods Attack is actually more than just sci-fi.

This book is the first in the Young Chesterton Chronicles series, featuring G.K. Chesterton as a youth in an alternate universe; alternate meaning instead of electricity, everything is run by steam, the Civil War in the U.S. ended up with the Confederate states splitting, Texas became its own republic, and California is its own country.  Actually two.  There's other smaller stuff, but that's the gist of it.

The Tripods Attack stands out though mostly because of its characters, who are a mix of real life people (like G.K. Chesterton, H.G. Wells, C.S. Lewis, and even J.R.R. Tolkien!!) and fictional characters (like Father Brown, Doctor Watson, and another girl who I really want to mention but can't because that would be a major spoiler; let's just say she lives on Prince Edward Island).  And I think that Margaret Sanger is in there, but I'm not sure, her last name is never actually mentioned.

So as you can see, its a pretty mixed cast, and that's what makes it really fun!  The author was able to keep the identities of the fictional characters and I think it was fun to see what the younger versions of some of my favorite authors might've been like.  It was also cool to see the authors interact with their characters.

The book was very exciting, and I love how the author was able to get Chesterton into several debates on different subjects and bring in themes from some of Chesterton's books.  And as for the sci-fi part, I was a little afraid that the sci-fi would clash with the classic characters, but McNichol was able to bring the two elements together in a way that worked really well.

I highly recommend this book, especially for young teens who like sci-fi and the classic authors.

A Cat in Paris

My younger sister saw this movie while she was at a friend's house, and she badgered all of us until we watched it.  I have to say, I understand her enthusiasm now.  I thought this was going to be a cutesy movie about a girl and her cat, but it wasn't!

'A Cat in Paris' is about a cat named Dino (pronounced dee-no) who leads a double life: during the day he lives with a mute little girl whose father was recently killed; at night he is the partner-in-crime of a burglar.  The little girl gets mixed up with some gangsters and it's up to the cat and Niko (nee-ko), the burglar, to save her.

This movie is really cool, even though it's a pretty simple concept there's a lot of drama throughout.  I really like Niko the thief, he kind of seemed like a Robin Hood, he was so sweet to Zoe, the little girl.  The movie never gives any background on Niko, so it makes you wonder why he was stealing, but in the end he stops stealing.  Zoe was really cute too, even though she doesn't really talk until the end, you still get a good sense of her character.  Kudos to the animators!

Speaking of animators, the animation in this movie is interesting.  It reminded me of the animation for those animated versions of books?  The animation looked really cool though.  You know how when someone moves really smoothly people say they're fluid?  Well when someone was sneaking around (especially Niko) they looked literally fluid.  I thought it was really cool.

The soundtrack for this movie was really neat too.  It was a mix of that creepy adventure music, plus French music, and an American sounding song that I don't know the name to :P

This movie was a real treat to watch, the plot was engaging, and the characters had depth!  I totally recommend this movie, especially as a family movie night.  It's not too scary that the littles can't watch it, but it's not too boring and little-kiddish that the older people can't watch it.

I look forward to watching this one again soon!

Odd Thomas

Ack!!  I've been working on this review for a month now, and I'm finally putting it up, I can't believe it's been this long!!

I got 'Odd Thomas' for Christmas, and I was going to save it for a new reading list, but I was so excited by what Monica at Spilled Ink and my Grandmother (who's so hip and up-to-date that she reads novels like Odd Thomas) have been saying about the Odd Thomas books that I told myself I would just read the first couple of chapters and that's it.  Yeah.  Well, that did NOT go as planned.

I couldn't put the book down!!

Odd Thomas felt fast paced, but it really wasn't.  To put it into perspective, the book is 500 pages, and the book covers a time span of 48 hours.

Yeah. 

Even though Koontz takes 500 pages to cover a 2 day timespan, the book doesn't feel slow at all.  The book feels super fast-paced, and you'll find yourself saying 'Just one more chapter!' and then 10 chapters later, 'I should probably stop now.'

I really like most of the characters in this book.  Odd is just so sweet, and I love his attitude towards everyone and everything.  I like how he calls people he respects 'Sir' or 'Ma'am' even if he is really close to them, like Ozzie.  My view on Stormy Llewllyn, Odd's 'best girl' as he calls her, is kind of mixed.  At the beginning I just really didn't like her, she was sooo sarcastic, and I thought sometimes she was bit mean to Odd.  Towards the end she grew on me more, and I was able to really see something in her relationship with Odd.  She still isn't my favorite character in the book, but my appreciation of her character has grown.

One thing I really love about this book is the Catholic element.  It's really awesome to see that an author can write a book with Catholic elements, and the book (and the author) can still be a success!  Of course, the book isn't a Catholicism-in-your-face type of book, and the good points with the Catholicism are very much balanced out by all the ugliness that Odd Thomas encounters throughout his adventures.

A word of warning, this book contains some mature content, a LOT of scary, gross, guy-dead-in-the-bathtub moments, and some language.  Definitely don't let a 10-year-old read this.

All things considered, this is an awesome book, you need to acquire it now if you don't already have it.  It will keep you on edge the whole time, and it has quite a few twists and turns along the way.

The Hobbit: Battle of the Five Armies

I recently saw the last part of 'The Hobbit'!!!!!!  Hooray!!  I remember three years ago finding out that not only was Peter Jackson going to be so mean as to make the Hobbit into three parts, but the last part was going to be released in 2014!!!  I remember thinking, What?!?!??  I can't wait that long!!!  Three years is so far away!!

But it's here!!!  It's here!!  The moment we've been waiting for is here!!!!  And I have to say, the wait was worth it.  

A while ago Monica and I of Spilled Ink wrote a post on her blog with a list of items that had to be included/excluded from this, the third Hobbit movie.  And, surprisingly, almost every single one of those bossy demands were met!  Many spoilers ahead!!  Gandalf wasn't rescued by the Eagles, Kili does die, Bard does kill the dragon, Beorn comes in at the Battle of Five Armies, Thorin dies as well, there were only 5 armies at the battle (even though they kind of screwed up who the armies were, but there were only 5), Gollum doesn't make an appearance, and Peter Jackson apologizes for everything he screwed up in the past! 

Actually, I made that last one up. End Spoilers.

But if Peter Jackson had expressed his deepest apologies and said that he hoped this movie made up for what he did with 'The Desolation of Smaug', then I would be satisfied.  That's how awesome this movie is.  It almost makes up for the second Hobbit movie.

I haven't really been reviewing the movie, have I?  I guess I've just been gushing and gushing.

But there's so much to gush about.  I really like how Thorin was slowly going crazy (not trusting the other dwarves, becoming obsessed with finding the Arkenstone, etc.), and how that was linked to the 'sickness that lies on all dragon hoards'.

Okay, enough gushing.

I liked how they embellished on the White council driving Sauron out of Dol Guldur.  Except for one part, which I'll mention in a second.  In the book Gandalf barely mentions it to Bilbo.  The movie was very true to the book.  I know some people don't really like the side story with Azog, but in the movie it's used as an opportunity to include some legends of Middle Earth that aren't well known.

There really wasn't much about this movie that I didn't like.  The one thing that really bugged me, was when Gandalf gets rescued by Saruman, Elrond, and Galadriel, and Galadriel uses her power as an elf and a wielder of one of the elven rings to fight off Sauron, and she turns into like, this evil-looking sorceress lady, kind of like in the scene with the Mirror of Galadriel in the Lord of the Rings?  I'm not sure how I feel about that.  I mean, why do they portray her like that?  I can almost get the scene with the Mirror (that's what she would become anyways if she had the One Ring), but not this instance.

I highly recommend this movie, for lack of better words, let me just say that it was awesome :)