A book a week: Senior Project May 2, 2011
Posted by Christine in a book a week, art, Class, interesting, Random.Tags: blurb.com, original illustration, poetry book, self publishing, senior project, writhe crackle and stir
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front cover of my self-published poetry book
Go to http://www.blurb.com/books/2135085 to see a preview of the inside.
I’ve mentioned a few times that I’m making a book for my senior project. Well, it’s all put together now and in the system. Since they don’t do perfect binding or hardback printing in town I had to send my file to a book making website. Most of these sites are for personal/professional photography and trade sized books. The site I used had a lot of options for size and covers and paper stock. Mine is a an 8 inch by 10 inch image wrap, that means it’s a hard back cover without a jacket, and the cover art is printed directly on the front.
There are twelve original poems on the inside paired with images that I made for my senior project class and for part of my illustration classes. Now all I have to do is wait for it to get shipped to me and we’re in business. Speaking of business, there is another cool thing about sites like this. Most of them allow you to sell your books on their site. You set your price and how you want to get paid and wa-la your book is out their in the world available to potential buyers. You only have to order one copy for yourself (at least on this site), and then you’re good to go. Once I get paypal figured out I’m going to do this myself so if you want to order a copy just follow the link. I won’t mind if you don’t though since its going to be about 36 bucks a copy plus shipping. (Because I did a hard cover image wrap it was not exactly cheap to print).
All in all it’s been a pretty cool senior project and I got to learn about self publishing via the interwebs. Cool
Books! April 18, 2011
Posted by Christine in a book a week, interesting, Random.Tags: books, cover art
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Last week I realized I’ve been working so intensely, and for so long, that I was going into maniac mode. I figured out that some of the stress had to do with the fact I would go to bed without reading anything before bed, which wasn’t good because this is usually how I de-stress. Everyone has something like that. What’s yours? Feel free to comment below.
So I took the time and went to the library and I am infinitely happier and more at ease. So I thought I’d take the time to bore you with my recent selections. Feel free to accuse me of judging books by their covers. I LOVE jacket design, I can’t help it! Anyways, I think I got some goodies:
Break Plans: Woolf/Wolf March 13, 2011
Posted by Christine in a book a week, festive, interesting, Random.Tags: books, spring break
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This Thursday night I had my last class before break. We had a critique over our latest project; redesigning the School of Creative Arts brochure for next year. This whole week in fact I’ve been pretty busy finishing up projects, all four of them. So at 8:45 that night I was pretty delirious with glee. You could pretty much tell everyone really needed the break.
My m is going to Florida, and I was planning on going to a Bright Eyes concert with a friend, but because of funds-issues I am homebound most of the week. Not that I’m complaining. This means I have even more time for homework, yay! I’m planning on getting the rest of the images completed for the book I’m working on and doing some writing too.
In the meantime though, I also want to get some nice literature in my system. I finished our book for creative writing On Beauty by Zadie Smith (thumb up) and am now free to get some more non-scholarly stuff read. My first selection is To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf that I picked up super cheap at a library sale (seriously… a nickel).
My second choice I picked up at the library in the Pope John Paul building at school. There is a little bookshelf on the upper level full of books without call numbers because they are all donated. The deal is, if you take a book you leave one of your own. I picked up The Wolfman by Nicholas Pekearo a little while ago but since I’ve only really had the time to study and occasionally sleep I’ve only had the opportunity to crack it open once. It seems to be really well written though. You can read a synopsis at amazon by clicking this link:
http://www.amazon.com/Wolfman-Nicholas-Pekearo/dp/0765320266
As ever, I also got a couple of audio books to listen too while I work. Mrs. Dalloway by Woolf again and The Invisible Man by HG Wells. You never know with audio books though because you might not like the actor’s voice. I feel pretty sensitive to voices myself. I couldn’t listen to the Harry Potter books because the actor for those bothered me. Maybe because he was an old dude and the characters (not to mention most of the readers) were young and even the author was a woman.
50 of the BEST BOOKS EVER! (in no particular order) January 22, 2011
Posted by Christine in a book a week, Random.Tags: best books ever, boyle, bradbury, bronte, capote, harper lee, king, koontz, oates, orwell, yeah!
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Thought I’d begin with the cover art since I’m a book jacket lover. Here are all the best books (that I can think of) I’ve read since about the fourth grade. Feel free to share some of your own 🙂
East of Eden–John Steinbeck
The Dark Tower Series–Stephen King
To Kill a Mockingbird–Harper Lee
In Cold Blood–Truman Capote
A Wrinkle in Time–Madeleine L’Engle
The Girl Who loved Tom Gordon–Stephen King
Jane Eyre–Charlotte Bronte
Follow the River–James Alexander Thom
The Island of the Blue Dolphin–Scott O’Dell
A Mango Shaped Space–Wendy Mass
Golden Grove–Francine Prose
Looking For Alaska–John Green
Speak–Laurie Halse Anderson
The Windsinger Trilogy–William Nicholson
Holes–Louis Sachar
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn–Betty Smith
The Bell Jar–Silvia Plath
I’ll Take You There–Joyce Carol Oates
A Picture of Dorian Gray–Oscar Wilde
Love in the Time of Cholera–Garcia Marquez
Sabriel–Garth Nix
Harry Potter–JK Rowling
The Uglies–Scott Westerfield
Cold Mountain–Charles Frazier
Dinotopia (mostly the artwork)–written and illustrated by James Gurney
American Gods–Neil Gaiman
Anansi Boys–Neil Gaiman
Gone with the Wind–Margaret Mitchell
The Chronicles of Narnia–CS Lewis
Anne of Green Gables–Lucy Maud Montgomery
The Lovely Bones–Alice Sebold
The Five People You Meet in Heaven–Mitch Albom
1984–George Orwell
Rebecca–Daphne Du Maurier
Canaan Trilogy–Marek Halter
Pride and Prejudice–Jane Austin
Dune–Frank Herbert
The Hobbit–JRR Tolkien
Odd Thomas–Dean Koontz
The Jungle–Upton Sinclair
The Secret Life of Bees–Sue Monk Kid
Wilde Child–TC Boyle
The Lost Years of Merlin–TA Barron
Atonement–Ian McEwan
The Great Gatsby–F Scott Fitzgerald
One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest–Ken Kesey
Farenheit 451–Ray Bradbury
Edgar Allan Poe Complete Works
The Chocolate War–Robert Cormier
And Finally, I’m not sure why but it randomly popped in my head. One of my Mom’s hand-me-down books from childhood:
The Wonderful Flight to the Mushroom Planet–Eleanor Cameron
A book “a week” Sweetwater Creek September 16, 2010
Posted by Christine in a book a week.Tags: Anne Rivers Siddons, book, recommended, Secret Life of Bees, Sweetwater Creek, weekly
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This week’s book is by Anne Rivers Siddons. I’ve been listening to it in the car via audio book and it is definitely a thumbs up. The story is sort of a coming of age story about a young girl named Emily who lives on an old plantation near the ocean. Her father runs a kennel for spaniels and Emily helps train them. She has two brothers she doesn’t identify with, a housekeeper, an aunt, a dead brother who talks to her in her head sometimes, and her best friend is her dog Elvis. Her life is changed drastically when the troubled daughter of a wealthy plantation owner decides to spend a summer at Sweetwater looking after the dogs with Emily and her family.
Even though the main character is a thirteen year old, I would not classify this as a young adult novel since there’s a lot of heavy subject matter like suicide, self-destruction, abandonment, obsession, loss, and longing, either in Emily’s life or other characters and their side stories or back stories. The imagery and writing style are also pretty emotionally-charged and often quite beautiful. It can get a bit aggravating at times to hear about how Emily felt drunk on some beautiful part of the day or raw with one emotion or another, but the story, in my opinion, is still worth reading or listening to. If anyone is a fan of The Secret Life of Bees, I would recommend this to them for sure.
Book of the Week: The Trouble with Magic August 5, 2010
Posted by Christine in a book a week.1 comment so far
One of the coolest parts about this week’s book is that it was written by a lady from my hometown South Whitley Indiana (I went to school with one of her kids). Not only did she write it in Northeast Indiana but the setting is a fictional town called Stony Mill located in you guessed it, Northeast Indiana. Here’s a review of the series:“Madelyn Alt is the national bestselling author of the witchy and hip Bewitching Mystery Series, published by Berkley Prime Crime. The Bewitching Mysteries features small town single girl and fledgling empath Maggie O’Neill, her witchy boss, and an unlikely circle of ghost hunting friends, the N.I.G.H.T.S., as they investigate increasing levels of paranormal disturbance–not to mention a series of unrelated murders–in Maggie’s hometown of Stony Mill, Indiana. ” http://www.readingwithtequila.com/2010/05/spotlight-series-bewitching-mysteries.htmlMy review: This book really is a lot of fun to read, perfect for a hammock or a beach blanket.
A Book a Week: Lisey’s Story July 15, 2010
Posted by Christine in a book a week.Tags: a book a week, audio book, commuting, horror, stephen king
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I listened to this this book by audio on the drive to school during my summer class. It was amazingly long, but I have to say stellar, and had my brain busy in the car for at least a month. As always with King, the story was both tragic and horror-filled. But the main story centers around a middle aged widow who has lost her husband and is quite heart-felt.
I am really picky about audio books, and I usually end up returning about half of them because I don’t like the author’s voice. But this one is read by Mare Wennengham and she does a terrific job as the voice of the main charcter Lisey.
One of the things I like most about Stephen King novels is that if you read enough of them, you start to catch little coincidences and overlaps in his books. For instance, one his favorite settings is Maine, and he mentions Shawshank prison a heck of a lot. I found a link on wikipedia where it lists all the connections in Lisey’s Story to his other books. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisey’s_Story#Connections_to_other_works_by_King
I would recomend this audio book to: anyone who loves audio books, Stephen King fans, and commuters.
Any Stephen King fans want to share your favorites? You know what to do.
A Book a Week: The Hunger Games Trilogy July 8, 2010
Posted by Christine in a book a week.Tags: Borders, mass communication, media, science fiction, summer reading
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The Hunger Games Trilogy was just completed and the last book Mockinjay comes out on August 24. So in honor of this occasion I’ve made it this weeks book(s).
The Hunger Games (2008) is a young-adult science fiction novel written by Suzanne Collins. It is the first book of the Hunger Games trilogy. It introduces sixteen-year-old Katniss Everdeen, who lives in a post-apocalyptic world where a powerful government called the Capitol has risen up after several devastating disasters. In the book, the Hunger Games are an annual televised event where the ruthless and evil Capitol randomly selects one boy and one girl from each of the twelve districts, who are then pitted against each other in a game of survival and forced to kill until only one remains.
I read the first book this winter and have yet to get to the other two. The final book Mockingjay has just been released. It seems that everyone else is in a rush to catch up with the series too, since it’s checked out of every library I’ve been to so far. It was a real fast paced read and pretty action packed with a grander message about society and the media. If your into young adult science fiction I would compare it in quality and theme to The Uglies books by Scott Westerfeld. And If you haven’t read that, I suggest you put it on your list because its excellent.
Been doing some research and it looks like The Hunger Games is going Hollywood. Its even being called the next Twilight. Anyway, no reason to skip the books. But I can definitely see this as a movie since it had a definite cinematic quality such as action, brisk pacing and the like.
Random Editorial: Here’s a random thought: consider the themes of the latest and most popular young adult books and film adaptations. They’re all really kind of dark. I mean, teenagers killing each other, dark wizards bent on death and destruction, vampires run amok. What’s the deal? In my day we read American Girl and Babysitter Club. Nowadays the heroine is saving the world instead of saving up for college. (Then again, way to go for female empowerment.)
In my mass communication class sophomore year we talked about how the attitude of society can be reflected in the media…I wonder what these popular book series say about our youth? As another unrelated aside, our mass communication here at Saint Francis is an amazingly interesting and useful class. It was definitely one of my favorites.
American God’s: A Book a Week June 23, 2010
Posted by Christine in a book a week.Tags: a booka week, American Gods, Neil Gaiman
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Find a nice hammock, beach towel, lazy boy, window seat, porch swing, or fold-out chair because I—
—Just finished American Gods by Neil Gaiman a few days ago and I have to say it is now one of my favorite books.
To get in my top ten (or twenty maybe, a big approximation here) a book has to be original and re-readable. This is definitely both of these things. It also has a boat-load of really colorful, complex characters which is sort of obvious from the title. The plot is surprising, rich, suspenseful and sad. I really got to love the main character Shadow by the end of the book. And as heavy of a read as it was (not to mention bizarre), I laughed too. And to top it off Gaiman is a Brit, how’s that for giggles?
Since this is my first Gaiman book I’m very excited because now I have more good books of his to read (hello Neverwhere). One of my friends has read one of his children’s books, The Graveyard Book, and really liked it. I tried it too, but after a few pages I couldn’t really go further. I think all I needed was an adult book from him and bam, instant fan.
Note: If you don’t really like zombies, gruesome murder, or sexually graphic literature you probably won’t want to read this (or most other mythology). Not that it’s all about these things, just fair warning.
Go ahead, read a review (it’ll probably explain and intrigue you a lot more than I can), and the book! Follow the link here.
http://www.curledup.com/american.htm
And feel free to leave a comment, suggestion, or question, you know you want to.
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Book of the Week: ____________. July 19, 2010
Posted by Christine in a book a week, Random.Tags: a book a week, comment, fill in the blank, suggest a favorite
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I’ve been feeling mostly brain-dead today. I don’t really want to suggest any more books because everything that comes to mind seems to fall into the same sort of categories (fantasy, sci-fi, classics). Of course I love these but I thought this week I would ask again if anyone had a recent favorite, or an old favorite, or maybe the best book ever put to paper.
My boss Rodney said this was lame. Maybe so. Nevertheless I am personally challenging him to leave a book of the week recommendation. Now I am shaking my fist in his general direction and leering with one eye closed. He doesn’t seem to notice, oh well.
Mostly I am just hoping to bring something new and exciting to this category and have a good discussion via the comment wall. I think even if a couple of people comment this should be an interesting experiment.
Let’s do this thing.