Thursday, November 29, 2012

Book Review: Wool by Hugh Howey



In the immortal words of Richard O’Brian in his lyrics for“Planet, Schmanet, Janet,” “A mental mind fuck can be nice.”

To begin with, this is a rather melancholy dystopian story. You follow the main character, Holston, through his reasoning for questioning his life. It’s well written and a solid read. The story grabs you and doesn’t want to let you go.

Holston is going through the remorse and sadness of losing his wife. He questions his life, his home, his government, just as anyone would. The problem is this story is post-apocalyptic and his entire society is holed up in a refurbished missile silo.

Outside is horrid. Air filled with harmful gases and skin torturing winds; or is it?

There is a truth hidden in this society. Those in charge work hard to maintain order and keep the truth hidden. When someone questions the truth, they are allowed to do as they please and go outside. The trade-off is that the person who desires to leave, must take out the cleaner and wool and clean the cameras for the rest of the people staying behind.

Holston doesn’t realize the truth until he goes outside himself and removes his helmet.

I sat for a bit and had to think about this story. It took me a little bit to really wrap my head around the conclusion. I was going to write that I felt a bit cheated in the story until I found out that this is only book one and there is a Wool Omnibus with books 1-5 in it. There is also a prequel titled “First Shift – Legacy” which is book 6 in the series. I have been told that although book 6 is a prequel, you really should read the omnibus first then the prequel so you truly understand the story.

If the other 5 books are as creative as the first, I’m hooked. Book 1 is currently free on Amazon for Kindle but I would recommend the Omnibus for $5.99. As soon as my pennies add up and my TBR pile decreases a bit, I’ll be reading them and sharing more info here.

I just found out that a Book 7 has been released as of November 12, 2012 - Totally on my TBR list now. 




Woot!! And book 7 for your reading pleasure:



Is Laughter The Best Medicine? | Yahoo! Health

As someone that enjoys laughing at herself and stupid jokes, I thought I'd share this article. Enjoy!!!

Many laughs for you!

Is Laughter The Best Medicine? | Yahoo! Health

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Book Review: 50 Shades of Grey (or “The story of how I knew I didn’t care for the Twilight books/movies at all so why did I think I would enjoy this”)


Okay, I’ll admit this right off….I’m an idiot.

I didn’t know that these books (there are three) were basically Twilight Fan Fiction with the names of the characters changed. Ah, the 20/20 vision of hindsight. People were calling it “Mommy Porn” and that intrigued me a bit. I mean I like a little naughty now and then so why not. And there were lots of people swooning over it. (Should have been my first clue but I’m not that quick sometimes.)

Dear heavens above, what a freaking waste of my time, money, and life.

I am going to admit, here and now, in writing, that I could NOT finish the first book. Nope. Couldn’t do it. I got about a third of the way in and all I wanted to do was smack the crap out of Ana and chain Mr. Gray up in a psychiatrist’s office for a year or two. Good grief. You would be hard pressed to find two more dysfunctional people.

I wanted to scream at them. I thought there for a while there was blood coming out of my eyes while I tried to keep them focused on the page to read this crap.

Then one night, I was sitting in my livingroom, with two of my daughters and we got talking about books and 50 Shades came up. I pounced. I told them that I couldn’t figure out why, but the book was just rubbing me the wrong way, I was having the hardest time reading it. I thought it was drivel and painful to read. You can guess what happened next. My girls started busting up and laughing at me. (eyeroll)  I tried to put on my “Mom Face” and glare at them while asking why there were laughing at their mom (this time). Sigh. My eldest reminded me that I hated Twilight. I said that I did. She then told me that, of course, I’d hate 50 Shades because it was just Twilight fan fiction that the author had changed the names in. She said that Ana was Bella and Gray was Edward and Jose was Jacob. I almost cried. Come on, seriously? Ugh.

So, I did what any self respecting mother would do, I laughed with them. Sigh. Then I backed out of the book on my Kindle and removed the books off of her. What a waste of almost $30. Lesson learned.

Now, there are a lot of people out there that enjoyed Twilight and the 50 Shades series and I say “hurrah” to you. I am happy that you do. Everyone should have books/movies that delight them. I have nothing bad to say to those people. Just please, and yes, I am begging here, please do NOT talk about them with me. They make my head hurt.