How I Write

How I Write

Review coming soon

Looking for Alaska

Looking for Alaska

Review coming soon

Anthem of a Reluctant Prophet

Anthem of a reluctant prophet

It has been a week since finishing this book. so forgive me if I struggle to give a direct punchy review, as its effect has worn off of me a little – in future I shall endevour to review titles I read as soon as I have read them.

Luke Hunter, the first person lead character of this title, can see how people are going to die. He’s young, he’s struggling to find his way in the world, yet this gift is a curse and he wishes to be no media whore to the baying masses that want association with his ‘God-like’ ability.

This book, carries along well to begin with, however by the middle of the book, I did start to lose faith in the power of the plot. I hoped it would include more and more visions of death and how Luke faces up to his gift, perhaps include more and more characters that try to take advantage of him etc. However, no. The book falls into line to deal with the young life and concerns that wouldn’t be out of place in any teen(ish) novel, dipping occasionally back to the ‘prophet of doom’ hook that made me pick up, buy and read in the first place.

Was this a good book? yes. Was it what I expected? not really. I’m happy to have read it – and will recommend it to friends, but warn them not to take the back cover too literally. I feel the marketing hype selected the punchiest aspects only to hook us into purchasing – the tale is more a young life with a twist than anything else.

I most state though, that this is a rich story. I could visualise it well and really would love it to be made into a film. Kind of ‘Dogma’ meets ‘The Wonder Years’ in a contemporary ‘emo’ 2008 lifestyle.

over 300 pages of reasonable font, average page, nothing special margins and quite normal kerning and lineheight. Great, great cover art and choice of font though – I was sold on it alone. 

No Plot? No Problem!

No Plot? No Problem!

I have the feeling that most readers, secretly (or publically) want to be writers… and if you agree, then you like me, could do with the right read to write right. Enter this title. I dug through an entire shelf before settling, as i really liked the different approach it took. NP?NP! takes on the angle of ‘finishing’. The hardest challenge any writer will face. And it does it beautifully. So if you’re thinking ‘I could do this’ but have never gotten round to actually commiting yourself, then be sure to check out this book first. Its the perfect kickstarter… trust me!

The formating is really good, its a small sized book, not quite pocket sized, but that’s okay, the paper is really good quality, nice and flickable /thumbable, great font, loads of excellent formating… and at around 175pages its no struggle to get through. If only all novels were written with this degree of formating! 5stars.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

The Perks of Being a Wallflower
This is one that i’ve been meaning to put up for a while now, even tho I’m not sure why. This is a book that’s been taunting me for ages…. I first heard about it years ago… then stumbled upon it in Waterstones one day. Its not normally appealing, the formating is very standard, apart from the diary form ‘chapters’. I recall narrow margins and pages of text, which makes it very unappealing. However the story of a nobody observing the world and school he exists in, reminds me a little of myself. I don’t know if I’ll ever read this… but its a grower for sure… this is probably one of my favourite books that I haven’t read yet.

oh I’ve just checked my phone: 200 pages, Good paper & font, cheap but bad kerning.

Life on the Refridgerator Door

Life on the Refridgerator Door
This is probably my first true ‘girly’ book, which I’m regretfully proud of. Regretfully, because I guess I should have found one a lot earlier. But anyways… not very many pages, and short well formatted chunks of text. Basically this is what it says it is, notes left on the fridge door about the relationship between a mother and daughter (if I remember correctly). Whilst I didn’t read much of this book in the shop, it did make a large enough impact on me to ‘phone-it’ … hate reading? you’ll love reading this.

The Long Dry

The Long Dry
119 pages, big margins & paragraphs. Good linespacing, font and the paper was reasonable. Odd story, but a quick read. I’m not sure what caught my eye about this read, there was possibly a bunch of them together on the shelf which did it. Anyways… i sat and scanned the pages whilst making notes in my phone. It looked like it was all descriptive, but hidden within the blocks of paragraphs, there is dialogue, which is nice. Tho I’d rather it be sectioned off personally. This is a quick book, the story didn’t grab me at all, but it could be one of those life changing reads… if only we give it a chance. Seek it out, and give it a thumb.

Last Light

words don’t sell books, pictures do!
(guns don’t kill people, rappers do!)

Last Light
The way to promote mountains of text is through mountains of pictures. Here’s a book that might attract a few visionaries, who happen to ‘gleee’ at the thought of being scared to death about what happens to humanity when the worlds oil runs out.

http://www.scarrow.co.uk

The End Of Mr Y

The End Of Mr Y
This was a surprise find. Its big bold red spine grabbed my attention and was stunned to see the pages were all black (not the faces, but just the edges). I knew this would be a good one, cause anyone going to that length for presentation alone, deserves to be purchased. The cover is quirky, the back cover is equally as mysterious…. and even tho its states itself as being ‘a thrilling adventure of love, sex, death (ed: yawn) … and time-travel’ <– Ooo ello, this raises an eyebrow. Sooo… all this manages to get me to to open the pages and have a flick through… lovely big line-spacing, and a decent font, but other than that its pretty standard format, normal margins, lots of pages of unthrilling text and paragraphs that don’t really look much like paragraphs at all, cause the indents and gaps aren’t big enough. But either way, I sat for a bit and read the first few pages. Thankfully, its a contemporary tale, set in the ‘now’ which makes it much more palettable in my (pun) book, I’m gunna give this one a go anyway… I’ve bought it so I might as well.

I’ll probably add more this once I’m done, or mid way at least. Worth checking out I think. 4 stars for the black edged paper alone, how often do you see that??

the average american male

the average american male
Wow, this is a good’un. A cool front cover, not that many pages (250ish), tiny chapters (the first is called ‘Christmas with Mom and Dad’ and the word count is 3 ‘Same old bullshit’) perfect. It gets better. Apparently it sparked a youtube storm… which is probably a load of bollocks as I haven’t had chance to check it out yet… but the story is about a guy thats young enough to know what he wants in life (sex) and old enough to know what he doesn’t want in life (commitment… and a partner with a fat ass). This book is absolutely incredible, I only bought it today and have read half of it already and I don’t want it to ever end. If this was a blog or a channel on youtube, I’d check it out every day for years. Women need to read this to know how we (men) think… and men need to read this to laugh at how fucking ridiculous we are and confirm that we’re not alone. Oh and the paper is average, loads of dialogue (makes for quick reading), smallish font (boo!) … standard margins… nothing special on the formating front but the subject matter is worth it.

A full 5 stars awarded. If you don’t buy this book, you are an arse.

Edit: a youtube frenzy? uhh no. However the clips are funny: