E.J.'s Library.: January 2016

Saturday, January 9, 2016

Little Women Book Review

Title: Little Women

Author: Louisa May Alcott

Genre: Classic, Historical Fiction, Family

Plot: The classic story of four sisters setting out to find their places in the world begins on a cold snowy night around the fire, waiting for Mother to come home. A discussion of Christmas presents takes place and the girls display their unique personalities in their choice of gifts for their mother. As the story unfolds, we watch creative Jo befriend the neighbor boy and take on the intimidating writing world in New York. We watch as Meg polishes her sweet nature and tames her vanity before the trials of marriage and motherhood begin. And silly Amy grows up, becoming more grounded and anchored in the world. All are tied together by their parents' love and their sweet sister Beth who quietly makes a difference in the background.

Readers for years have grown with these characters, experienced their joys and triumphs, their sorrows and heartbreaks, and have grown better for it. And there is always a new generation to share this book with, so curl up with a cup of tea and indulge.

Likes/Dislikes: Growing up I loved this book. I admired Meg, secretly wanted to Jo {we writers all stick together ya know}, wished I had a sister like Beth and, admittedly, I rather hated Amy till she grew up a bit. This book had everything and is so richly written. I can't wait to introduce it to my little daughter and watch her get to know all the characters like I did.

Rating: G- all ages. Highly recommended.

Date Review Written: November 5th, 2015

Thursday, January 7, 2016

Chuck TV Review

Title: Chuck

Starring: Zachery Levi {Chuck Bartowski}, Yvonne Strahovski {Sarah Walker}, Adam Baldwin {John Casey}, Joshua Gomez {Morgan Grimes}, Sarah Lancaster {Elli Bartowski Woodcomb}, and Ryan MacPartlin {Devon Woodcomb}.

Release Date: 2007

Genre: Spy, Action/Adventure, Drama, Comedy

Plot: Your average computer whiz, stuck at a dead-end job at the local Buy More, is Chuck Bartowski. Nothing adventurous or mysterious here, just a really smart guy with shattered dreams of graduating college, a nerdy best friend and a sweet older sister who took care of him when their parents split. However, all of that changes when Chuck receives an email from an old friend and accidentally gets all the CIA's spy secrets downloaded into his brain. Now a target and a potential asset, Chuck is assigned two handlers {NSA John Casey who is rather trigger happy and CIA Sarah Walker who stuns everyone with her good looks, apparently}, Chuck must rapidly adjust to his new life circumstances or die.

Spanning five action packed seasons, Chuck goes on dangerous missions with his new friends and adds old friends to his new spy life, even his sister learns about his secrets after awhile and gets roped into his new spy life. But even as he achieves his dream and becomes a spy, wins the girl and saves his family, Chuck never loses sight of his roots or his good character.

Likes/Dislikes: A friend recommended this show to us and we've slowly been watching it episode by episode. I think we're somewhere in the third or fourth season right now, but since I read spoilers and all the episodes are almost exactly the same, I feel safe enough to review the whole show here. During the first season, watching this lanky guy try to process his new abilities was rather intriguing, but once he becomes a spy and gets a handle on it, things settled into a rhythm that mostly involve a lot of whining about/fighting with Sarah, missions that usually go wrong and girls in short skirts fighting each other. That last bit is particularly annoying to me; I don't want to watch a bunch of dumb girls fight each other in "sexy" outfits. Casey is the smartest down-to-earth character in the whole show {it's a riot to watch him after seeing Firefly} and Chuck's friend Morgan shows the most growth, changing from a weird annoying nerd to a funny responsible man. Ellie and Devon add the domestic side to the cast while the secondary characters of Jeff and Lester are completely disgusting and serve no purpose to the story at all.

Rating: PG-17 and up, mainly for content {sexy girls, very suggestive scenes, underwear scenes, etc.}. Not recommended for teenage boys.

Date Review Written: December 15th, 2015

Saturday, January 2, 2016

The Pharaoh's Daughter Book Review

Title: The Pharaoh's Daughter

Author: Mesu Andrews

Genre: Biblical Fiction, Historical Fiction, Egypt, Action/Adventure, Drama, Romance

Plot: Pharaoh Akhenaten's beloved wife Kiya dies in childbirth, leaving Tut, Anippa and Ankhe motherless at young ages. Anippe in particular is left traumatized after her mother's death and hides in a closet till someone finds her. Adopted by the childless General Horemheb and his lovely wife, Anippe grows up happy, leaving her shattered childhood behind her until, at age fourteen, she is given in marriage to her father's best soldier, Sebek, and sent away to live in the Delta where the new queen tragically lost her first baby while visiting there earlier in the year.

Thrust from lowly daughter to the position of commanding soldier's wife in charge of an estate and Hebrew slaves, Anippe has a lot to adjust to and her sister Ankhe isn't helping. After three blissful months with her intimidating yet kind new husband, Sebek leaves for war and Anippe has a new challenge on her hands; how to have Sebek's baby without getting pregnant and dying in childbirth. Fortunately for her, Tut's ill advised decree that all newborn Hebrew babies are to be executed lines up in an interesting series of events and Anippe finds the answer to her problem floating down the Nile in a basket. Knowing that if her deception is ever discovered, Anippe will pay with her life, she goes ahead with her decision to adopt little Mey as her son and the circle of who knows the truth widens alarmingly till war distracts everyone and Tut is murdered, throwing everything off balance and into a horrible new reality as a bloodthirsty Pharaoh, hardened by war and grief, takes the throne. But Someone has a bigger plan in mind and Anippe will learn that the hard way.

Likes/Dislikes: While I've never cared for the story of Moses {that point in Egyptian history having lost my interest}, this was a very interesting story. I personally seriously doubt that all this happened during Tut and Horemheb's reigns, but the author's choice to set the story during their times was intriguing. It made for an interesting story, yet that little element made it seem more like fiction than historical events to me because I just really don't think it was Tut and Horemheb. You would have to have a very broken bent man like Horemheb was portrayed as to issue orders to kill babies and to gruesomely murder any traitors the way he did when he assumed the throne. I read Michelle Moran's Nefertiti last year and the characters of Mutnodjmet, her husband, and Horemheb and how they were all related to each other was portrayed very differently, adding another annoying element to this story for me. My nit-picking of Egyptian history aside, this story spanned many years in nice little chunks, was beautifully written and showed the harsh realities of that century {especially for women, slaves or not} in such a way as to make you understand how bad it was without going into horrible graphic details that would leave you with nightmares. And the twist at the end of how Anippe survives was brilliant.

Rating: PG-18 and up, mainly for content {violent deaths and executions, thinly veiled talk of marriage activities and bad guys taking ruthless advantage of women off camera, etc.}. Recommended for mature readers only.

Date Review Written: December 15th, 2015

Friday, January 1, 2016

Books to Read in 2016

I was able to read all but two of the books I'd selected to read in 2015 {I couldn't get a hold of the other two and budgets didn't include books :( } so this year, I've selected a few I'm pretty certain I'll be able to get from my library or as a free ebook.