"Bad Kitty" - Michele Jaffe

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A weekend in Vegas with my family. How crazy-slash-shocking-slash-dangerous could it be?

Meet Jasmine [1], forensic supersleuth and unwitting victim of a naughty feline.

Her book is:
36% Las Vegas mystery
49% unstoppable crush [2]
15% fashion emergency
100% the cat’s fault [3]

[1] That’s me! Hi.
[2] Is that all you’re going to say about Jack? Aren’t you going to mention him? I mean, other than as a crush? If I were reading this, that’s what I could want to know about. I’m just saying.
[3] That’s it? The. End.? What about the wedding I ruined and Alyson and Veronique’s Crimes Against Fashion and…yes, I know. For the book. Inside. Zipping it.

(yes, those footnotes are intentional.)

REVIEW:

My friend gave me this book last Christmas. When I saw it, my first thought was "Huh, a Meg Cabot clone, but probably with inferior humour and a stupid plot." But it was a book. That someone had given me. Of course I was going to read it.

I soon found myself wondering why Michele Jaffe wasn't a lot more popular in the teen chick-lit scene, because I actually found myself giggling out loud more times than I could count. And let me tell you, I am not the kind to actually laugh out loud simply from reading a book, because my sense of humour is rather weird, and the only other author who has succeeded in this quest is Jaclyn Moriarty. Usually I just smile. This book was a crack-up and I'm looking forward to reading the next in the series.

I did have some qualms though. For instance, the plot. The book tries to be a 'mystery thriller', and the narrator, Jas, is an amateur detective who then goes about trying to solve this mystery. However, like so many police procedural TV shows, all the clues suddenly coalesce in the detective's mind during the last five minutes and are wrapped up so quickly you find yourself wondering "Hold on - who was that guy anyway?" In this case, the speech given by our detective in one of the final chapters - you know, the one where she recites all the clues and how the realisation about who the culprit was came to her in a sudden flash of inspiration at the last minute - winds up all the leads in a slightly tangled mess which was quite confusing.

Also, many of the situations and characters veered out of 'deliberately-bizarre-in-order-to-be-humourous' territory into the 'just-plain-ludicrous' category. This applies especially to the final climactic scene where all the lead characters are in big trouble - but of course they get out of it - where everything that occurs is entirely unrealistic and contrived.

But I forgive Michele for these flaws, and for spelling her name with only one 'L', because I understand they tend to be commonplace in this brand of fiction, and also because it was just plain fun to read.

RATING:

Very silly. Very funny. 4 STARS

Quote by Stephenie Meyer on age limitations for books

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Stephenie Meyer, author of the Twilight series, said something in a video interview that I completely agree with. Quote:

“I didn’t make any kind of conscious effort to write an adult novel. For me, those lines are actually kind of irritating. I don’t think there should be a certain section of the bookstore that you can’t go into – a good book is a good book, and if it’s a good book you should read it! Just because it was written so that ten-year-old could enjoy it too, that doesn’t mean that an adult can’t get a whole lot out of that novel. I’m hoping that my books help people cross those lines, that they don’t feel like “Oh well, that book is in a section of the store where I don’t belong.” You belong anywhere a good book is.”

The video can be seen on the Amazon.com page for her novel The Host.

REVIEW:
I'm at a slightly awkward age in terms of "where I belong in a bookstore". I'm eighteen, and next year I'll be a uni student, so I'm in that horrible transitory age somewhere in between 'teenage/young adult' and 'adult'. When I go look in the 'teenage' section, I feel too old to be there, and when I look in the adult section, I feel too young. (This could be largely due to my entirely irrational self-conscious tendencies, which make me feel as though everyone is judging me.)

However, being "in transition" is somewhat advantageous: I can still identify with many of the teenage characters in the young adult books, while also enjoying the added sophistication that comes from adult novels. For instance, my guilty pleasure when it comes to books is Anthony Horowitz's 'Alex Rider' series. Since they are written for an intended audience of younger-teenage male readers (Alex is fourteen in the books), I definitely don't fit into the intended demographic. But they're still very entertaining books. Meanwhile, right next to those books on my bookshelf (literally!) sits Michael Crichton's "Next", which is very definitely an adult novel, dealing with complex themes and containing several sexual references.

Hence, I don't really like age barriers. (Although, nevertheless, some books are definitely too adult for younger readers - perhaps books should carry classification ratings in the same way that movies do). I still enjoy teenage novels, even though most people would say I'm too old for them. Why should I be 'too old' for them? Because they don't have the level of intellectual complexity I should be dealing with now that I'm legally an adult? Matthew Reilly is one of my favourite authors, and he writes action thrillers for adults, but they don't exactly contain a great deal of content designed to make me think. In fact, they're largely rubbish. But I mainly read for entertainment. And I think if a book is entertaining, then I should feel entitled to read it, no matter where it belongs in the store.

RATING:
How does one rate a quote? Not sure. But I agree with it. 4 STARS

Intermission

I was talking to my best friend Jen the other day in English, trying to figure out a time she could come over to watch the latest couple of Doctor Who episodes she'd missed (I'd recorded them.) However we weren't able to decide on a suitable time - because something got in the way.
"Stupid school!" she complained, emphatically slapping the desk. "It gets in the way of all our favourite TV shows!"
It also gets in the way of other hobbies, too.
In the past three weeks, I have only read 118 pages of a 583-page novel (that sounds like a lot written down, but it's a standard-sized novel...I should be able to finish that in a few days!) I highly doubt any more reviews will be forthcoming for quite some time.
So, with my first exam only 45 days away, I have to back off on the recreational reading and attempt to throw my unwilling self into study instead. I should be able to return to reading stuff and writing reviews when the damn HSC is over...and the partying begins.
Adiós!

"The Kite Runner" - Khaled Hosseini

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Amazon.com product description: "In his debut novel, The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini accomplishes what very few contemporary novelists are able to do. He manages to provide an educational and eye-opening account of a country's political turmoil--in this case, Afghanistan--while also developing characters whose heartbreaking struggles and emotional triumphs resonate with readers long after the last page has been turned over. And he does this on his first try.
The Kite Runner follows the story of Amir, the privileged son of a wealthy businessman in Kabul, and Hassan, the son of Amir's father's servant. As children in the relatively stable Afghanistan of the early 1970s, the boys are inseparable. They spend idyllic days running kites and telling stories of mystical places and powerful warriors until an unspeakable event changes the nature of their relationship forever, and eventually cements their bond in ways neither boy could have ever predicted. Even after Amir and his father flee to America, Amir remains haunted by his cowardly actions and disloyalty. In part, it is these demons and the sometimes impossible quest for forgiveness that bring him back to his war-torn native land after it comes under Taliban rule. ("...I wondered if that was how forgiveness budded, not with the fanfare of epiphany, but with pain gathering its things, packing up, and slipping away unannounced in the middle of the night.")
Some of the plot's turns and twists may be somewhat implausible, but Hosseini has created characters that seem so real that one almost forgets that The Kite Runner is a novel and not a memoir. At a time when Afghanistan has been thrust into the forefront of America's collective consciousness ("people sipping lattes at Starbucks were talking about the battle for Kunduz"), Hosseini offers an honest, sometimes tragic, sometimes funny, but always heartfelt view of a fascinating land. Perhaps the only true flaw in this extraordinary novel is that it ends all too soon. --Gisele Toueg "

REVIEW:

I have always been someone who wants both sides to a story. When two of my friends fought, I didn't just listen to one and bitch with them about the other - I sought out both of their opinions before making any judgement. When I began getting involved in debates about science and religion, I was mainly reading creationist literature, so I took biology as one of my subject in my senior years of high school to get the 'hard science' I was missing. And these days, most of the time when the media talks about Afghanistan and the Middle East, it's in a decidedly negative tone. After all, who was it who flew those planes into the Twin Towers on September 11?

It's for this reason that The Kite Runner becomes a much-needed antidote to the biased attitudes of many (reinforced by the media, of course). At a time when many Afghanis are probably crying out for their side of the story to be heard, this book has launched itself onto the bestseller list, and at least one of their stories can be told to everyone who reads it (and judging by the statistics on BookMooch, that's a lot of people - it is currently in second place on the 'Most Frequently Mooched' list.)

The tale of Amir, the protagonist, is beautifully told - after reading action-packed thrillers for a while, the different style of prose was at first startling, however I soon got used to it. Hosseini paints characters so incredibly real, so real that even the most hard-hearted of readers couldn't help but feel for them. The bleakness of their situations only heightens the sense of heartache one feels while reading - this is not a novel to read when you need cheering up, it's one to read when you need waking up to what goes on in the world we live in.

Nowhere is the utter depravity of human nature more starkly highlighted than in The Kite Runner. You may not enjoy it, but it will certainly make you think.

RATING:

Not what I'd usually read at all, but I'm glad I did. 4 STARS

'Buttons' (video) by Sia

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There are no words to describe this. You simply have to watch it to understand it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUkje1lw4cA

REVIEW:
Despite the fact that you can't really 'read' a video, and this is a review site for stuff I've read, this just kind of got to me. My overall response to seeing this video clip can be summed up in three letters:

WTF?

You know you must be famous when you can make a video that consists entirely of lip-synching your song while contorting your face into grotesque positions by way of clear plastic (warning: danger of suffocation. keep away from children), stockings (retired bank robber perhaps?), pegs (which made me cringe just to look at) and sticky tape (not its most productive use). It's as though the singer said 'Hey, let's see how stupid and unglamorous I can look with this put on my face!' Followed by 'Hey, let's make this into a video clip!'
One question: why? Were you out of your mind and/or drunk and/or stoned when you made this?
Sia, I'm sorry, but you look like a complete idiot. I watched an interview with you talking to someone on a bus, and you seemed like a quirky, charming sort of person. But this video clip does not "make any statements about true beauty" (as one commenter claimed), nor does it make any statement at all, apart from perhaps "I'm bored so am mucking around with various materials in front of a camera". It's painful and sometimes very, very disturbing to watch.
The song is alright though.

RATING:
Singing with a stocking over your head just makes you look like a moron. 1 STAR

"Next" - Michael Crichton

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"Is a loved one missing some body parts? Are blondes becoming extinct? Is everyone at your dinner table of the same species? Humans and chimpanzees differ in only 400 genes; is that why a chimp fetus resembles a human being? And should that worry us? There's a new genetic cure for drug addiction--is it worse than the disease?

We live in a time of momentous scientific leaps, a time when it's possible to sell our eggs and sperm online for thousands of dollars and to test our spouses for genetic maladies.
We live in a time when one fifth of all our genes are owned by someone else, and an unsuspecting person and his family can be pursued cross-country because they happen to have certain valuable genes within their chromosomes...
Devilishly clever, Next blends fact and fiction into a breathless tale of a new world where nothing is what it seems and a set of new possibilities can open at every turn.
Next challenges our sense of reality and notions of morality. Balancing the comic and the bizarre with the genuinely frightening and disturbing, Next shatters our assumptions and reveals shocking new choices where we least expect.
The future is closer than you think. "

REVIEW:

This is such an ambitious sort of book I doubt it would have succeeded if it weren't for Michael Crichton's best-selling status and reputation. In fact, my mum (also a fan of Crichton) tried reading it but put it down quite quickly as it "was just too complicated". I have to admit, it was.

This is not the kind of book you read as you're getting ready to fall asleep - it requires concentration. It was even getting to the point where I felt like writing down a list of the main characters and a short description for each, just for reference. Crichton juggles many lead characters at once, with many complex scientific scenarios as well, not to mention the fully fleshed-out personal lives of each character - their career paths, their wealth, their upbringing, their various sex partners, the lot. Their stories are all told 'at once' so to speak - a chapter about Rick, followed by a chapter about Josh, followed by a chapter about Lynn, and it's five chapters before we get back to Rick's story, which has since moved on slightly, and then we're back to Josh again and then a new character with a new situation is introduced and - you see what I mean. (There are even two different primary-school-aged boys called Jamie. Confusion city.)

These characters and their stories all interweave and connect as you move through the book, so the experience is sort of like watching a tapestry being constructed, but only seeing one distinct section being worked on at a time. The issues tackled in this one are also pretty hefty - it's all about genetic researchers and their crazy experiments and the big pharmaceutical companies who just want to make money. Occasionally, some elements of the story became slightly ludicrous - a genetically modified parrot with incredibly high intelligence levels who can perfectly mimic voices and sounds, do arithmetic, and hold coherent conversations sometimes provided comic relief, but other times was simply too ridiculous and the situations seemed contrived.

Because of all the different plotlines being juggled and told at the same time, I felt that there were too many loose ends not tied up at the end of the book. Following all these different storylines proved difficult, but possible - as long as you were concentrating very carefully.

RATING:

Thought-provoking stuff that raises many questions about issues that arise in today's genetic industries, but the sheer amount of different plotlines and characters muddled the message. 3 STARS

CSSA General Mathematics Trial HSC Paper

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General Instructions:
-Reading Time: 5 minutes
-Working time - 2 1/2 hours
-Write using blue or black pen
-Calculators may be used
-Use Multiple Choice Answer Sheet provided
-A separate formula sheet is provided
-Write your Centre Number and Student Number at the top of this page.

REVIEW:
I hate maths. Also, after doing this exam today, and finding it to be the first exam paper that I have failed to completely finish within the allotted time, I am convinced that there is clearly not enough time to finish everything in two-and-a-half hours. Three hours are needed. We get three hours for the science papers, and for my senior science exam, I only needed about two-and-a-half. Why can't we have the same amount of time for maths? It's just as time-consuming to nut out how much tax Marie has to pay on her taxable income as it is to write about the impact mobile phones have had on society. There were way too many questions and not enough time, and I swear there were more financial mathematics questions than there were other questions, which take the longest to do. Unbalanced.

RATING:
I hate maths. 0 STARS