HALLOWEEN COUNTDOWN! Review: The Geeky Chef Strikes Back by Cassandra Reeder

Title: The Geeky Chef Strikes Back: Even More Unofficial Recipes from Minecraft, Game of Thrones, Harry Potter, Twin Peaks, and More!
Authors: Cassandra Reeder
Format: egalley
Pub. Date: September 15th 2017
Source: Publisher


Book Description:

The Geeky Chef is back with even more delicious, real-life recipes from your favorite sci-fi and fantasy books, movies, TV shows, and video games. Discover the foods you've always wanted to taste from realms like The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter to The Legend of Zelda, Firefly, Minecraft, Final Fantasy, and more.

In the Geeky Chef Strikes Back, author Cassandra Reeder has imagined the delicious foods in these faraway worlds and created recipes that are sure to transport you to galaxies far, far way. So if you've found yourself craving Pumpkin Juice from Harry Potter, Lingonberry Pancakes from The Big Lebowski, Norma's Cherry Pie from Twin Peaks, Wife Soup from Firefly, or the White Dragon Noodles from Blade Runner, then look no further. With easy step-by-step instructions and fun theme photos, these creative recipes are perfect for your next big viewing party or your standing reservation for a party of one. Fantasy foods are fantasy no longer!

Review:

★★★★

Cooking? Awesome. Fandom cooking? Even better. I'm really grateful I got to read this.

The book is divided into sections based on type including an introduction, non-alcoholic drinks, alcoholic drinks, appetizers snacks and sides, soups and stews, main courses, cakes and cupcakes, pies and tarts, and other desserts. It makes it easy to navigate, based on what sort of food you're in the mood for.

Let's talk about the good first. I really like that under each recipe title, it tells you whatever video game or show that the recipe came from. Beneath that, for every recipe there's a little paragraph that explains the context such as what episode in what season, or why the food is relevant to the plot, things like that. The recipes are in short, concise, numbered steps and for almost all the recipes there's a color photograph of the finished project. They're themed to the show/fandom, which is pretty cute. There's also adorable little doodles in the empty white spaces that fill the book out a bit more and make it seem a bit more whimsical. There's a mix of recipes from video games, television, and film.

I also really appreciated that when a recipe called for meat or animal product, the author offered up substitutions on how to make it vegetarian friendly. There's also a bunch of tips sprinkled throughout the recipes.

It's really a good book for beginners. First, you have the numbered, easy steps and all the photos. But quite a few of the recipes are also a bit of a "cheat", like using canned cherries or Cocoa Puffs.

At times this book kind of had a weird tone at times (I know it's a cookbook, hear me out!). There's a recipe from Doctor Who, in which the author explains in a way that makes it sound like she's annoyed, how many fans ask her for a Jammie Dodger or Jelly Babies recipe. Like, THESE THINGS ALREADY EXIST! ...So? So do a few of the other recipes in the book (Pumpkin Juice, for example). That doesn't mean you can't make your own version; my Pinterest feed is filled with "homemade" versions of Oreos and Poptarts. It just seemed a weird thing to put in there. It was also a little weird when she talked about My Little Pony and how a show for little girls turned into a show for adults... But then she only really talks about bronies. I mean... Little boys watch it, and so do adult women. Just weird.

Anywho, back to the good. Some of the recipes that I'm most excited to make include Ambrosia (The Sims), Herring and Pumpkin Pot Pie (Kiki's Delivery Service), and Dauntless Chocolate Cake (Divergent).

Other than the weird nitpicks that I've mentioned, this is a pretty good cookbook. For me personally, it was a bit video game heavy, but it's impossible to nail everyone's fandoms exactly. From Breaking Bad to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, there's recipes here you're bound to get the reference to, and that you'll want to eat. It's approachable for any cooking level. It's great if you host viewing parties, or a theme party, or even Halloween (which is why this is included in my Halloween countdown!). It's a book for the nerd cook in your life, and it's one that I'd use in my kitchen.

I received a copy in exchange for my honest review.

Review: Afterparty by Ann Redisch Stampler

Title: Afterparty
Author: Ann Redisch Stampler
Format: Paperback ARC
Pub. Date: January 7th 2014
Source: Won


Book Description:

Emma is tired of being good. Always the dutiful daughter to an overprotective father, she is the antithesis of her mother -- whose name her dad won't even say out loud. That's why meeting Siobhan is the best thing that ever happened to her...and the most dangerous. Because Siobhan is fun and alluring and experienced and lives on the edge. In other words, she's everything Emma is not.

And it may be more than Emma can handle.

Because as intoxicating as her secret life may be, when Emma begins to make her own decisions, Siobhan starts to unravel. It's more than just Dylan, the boy who comes between them. Their high-stakes pacts are spinning out of control. Elaborate lies become second nature. Loyalties and boundaries are blurred. And it all comes to a head at the infamous Afterparty, where debauchery rages and an intense, inescapable confrontation ends in a plummet from the rooftop.

This follow-up to Ann Redisch Stampler's Where It Began, reveals how those who know us best can hurt us most.

Review:

★★

Sometimes, every once in a while, there comes a book that feels like a case of "it's not you, it's me". I believe that this is one of those times. I'm glad a lot of other people seem to have enjoyed it, but it wasn't for me. This review will be vague, because there's a lot of potential spoilers.

The writing style wasn't one that I found enjoyable. It was full of long, flowery sentences that seemed extra detailed just for the sake of a word count. I thought maybe I'd warm up to it as the book went on, but alas I did not. The pacing was also rough. Sometimes the book jumped forward a day, sometimes a week. It was jagged and awkward and hard to keep up.

And then there's the characters. 99% of the time when I don't like a book, it's because of the characters, and this isn't the 1% for me. I didn't care for any of them. Not like "oh, I connect and understand these characters but I dislike them" but as in, I don't care at all what happens in your lives. For me it was a hyper-dramatic version of the 2003 film Thirteen. There's a good girl who doesn't want to be so good. Enter the super crazy, abusive, manipulative cool bad girl who is her downfall. There wasn't anything about her that made her unique, or someone that I could understand being friends with in the first place, let alone the friendship that follows. Think of all the things parents think are the end of the world: drugs, sex, and alcohol, and multiply the drama by 100, and that's what Siobhan gets them into. The main character is generic and forgettable, and doesn't really grow that much by the end of the novel . So, it felt largely predictable in parts.

And the end? What a let down. It didn't make up for my other issues with the book, so I was just left frustrated.

I will say that though it has nothing to do with the story, the cover is gorgeous.

As I said, I think this is a case of it's not you, it's me. So, if you like teenage drama type stories like Pretty Little Liars or Gossip Girl or things like that, go for it. Maybe you'll have a better time.

Mini School Review: Clybourne Park by Bruce Norris

Title: Clybourne Park
Author: Bruce Norris
Format: Paperback, 210 pages
Pub. Date: Published 2011
Source: SIU Bookstore


Book Description:

CLYBOURNE PARK spans two generations fifty years apart. In 1959, Russ and Bev are selling their desirable two-bedroom at a bargain price, unknowingly bringing the first black family into the neighborhood (borrowing a plotline from Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun) and creating ripples of discontent among the cozy white residents of Clybourne Park. In 2009, the same property is being bought by a young white couple, whose plan to raze the house and start again is met with equal disapproval by the black residents of the soon-to-be-gentrified area. Are the issues festering beneath the floorboards actually the same, fifty years on? Bruce Norris's excruciatingly funny and squirm-inducing satire explores the fault line between race and property.

Review:

★★

I had to read this play in one of my American literature classes in college. It was my least favorite piece of literature of the semester.

The book is a sequel of sorts to Lorraine Hansberry's play "A Raisin in the Sun". For the record, that's not one of my favorite plays either. I know it's a classic, but I went into reading "Claybourne Park" without the expectations that other people who loved Raisin in the Sun did.

It's boring. I know that's the least helpful word to describe a book, but it's what it was. It was loud, full of people talking over each other but not really going anywhere. While this made it easy to read in class, it's really easy to struggle with set, the bigger plot, and even character descriptions because that's not really what the constant talking is about. The jokes (yes, there are some) aren't funny. The drama seems anticlimactic. The characters seem no different from characters I've seen before, which makes this book/play pretty forgettable. Like a show on TLC I don't want to watch: generic people yelling at each other

I understand the message and the point the play is trying to make, and I appreciate it. But when it comes to the actual piece, not for me. Maybe if you enjoyed "A Raisin in the Sun", or actually get to see this played out on stage, you'll have a better time with it than I did.

Review: Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon

Title: Everything, Everything
Author: Nicola Yoon
Format: eARC
Pub. Date: September 1st 2015
Source: Delacorte Books for Young Readers


Book Description:

My disease is as rare as it is famous. Basically, I’m allergic to the world. I don’t leave my house, have not left my house in seventeen years. The only people I ever see are my mom and my nurse, Carla.

But then one day, a moving truck arrives next door. I look out my window, and I see him. He’s tall, lean and wearing all black—black T-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, and a black knit cap that covers his hair completely. He catches me looking and stares at me. I stare right back. His name is Olly.

Maybe we can’t predict the future, but we can predict some things. For example, I am certainly going to fall in love with Olly. It’s almost certainly going to be a disaster.

Review:

★★★★


This book has such an interestingly done concept. It led me to thinking; what would I do if I became smitten with a boy and I couldn't leave the house? Of course I have no such answers, but it jumpstarted a bunch of scenarios and questions. I was hooked on this book within a few pages, and I couldn't put it down until it was over.

First, let's talk about the characters. I loved them. I appreciated that they were diverse. It's worth noting that I knew the main character, Madeline, wasn't going to be Caucasian because she described Oliver as being white. I found that fascinating and it goes to show the lack of diversity in writing because, I can't remember the last time I read a character description that said they were white. I always assume. So, points to this book for making me think about this, and for including a mixed race female lead character. As for Madeline herself, I appreciated how smart she was, and that she was always making book references. That's a girl after my own heart. I am also devastatingly in love with Oliver. It's no mystery to me why Madeline was in insta-like. This annoys me a little bit in books, but in this case, I'll make an exception. He's from a broken home but has a charming smile and is spontaneous. One of him to go, please.

The main plot twist was pretty predictable, though. I caught it within a few pages, thanks to a favorite film of mine entitled "Repo: The Genetic Opera". Regardless, it was an interesting plot idea, and I feel that Yoon did it well. It had a mix of really good righting and a sense that she did her homework on Madeline's illness and the consequences of having it. I also really liked that the prose of the novel was interspersed with Madeline's little doodles and diary pages. It shook things up a bit and was a nice change of pace.

What I didn't like, was the ending. I'll talk about this vaguely as to avoid spoilers. The ending felt too rushed and too sudden, and I was left with no closure. It felt like a cop out wrap up of "oh all is forgiven close the curtains", and I don't think that's realistic. I was expecting a more dramatic resolution of drama and anger and consequences, but I wasn't given that, and it left me disappointed with no more pages. If I had just been given a little bit more of a conclusion, I think it would have been a perfect rating, but I just can't get over that feeling of disappointment.

That said, it's worth reading for most of the plot, and for the characters. I hope that you fall in love with Oliver just as much as Madeline and I did, and that you'll cheer on Madeline to overcome illness and take a chance on life. I recommend this for fans of young adult romance who don't mind a little instalove, fans of bookish and diverse characters, and fans of books that circle around medical illness.

I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. Thank you.

Review: This Is Where It Ends by Marieke Nijkamp

Title: This Is Where It Ends
Author: Marieke Nijkamp
Format: eARC
Pub. Date: January 5th 2016
Source: Sourcebooks Fire


Book Description:

10:00 a.m.
The principal of Opportunity, Alabama's high school finishes her speech, welcoming the entire student body to a new semester and encouraging them to excel and achieve.

10:02 a.m.
The students get up to leave the auditorium for their next class.

10:03
The auditorium doors won't open.

10:05
Someone starts shooting.

Told over the span of 54 harrowing minutes from four different perspectives, terror reigns as one student's calculated revenge turns into the ultimate game of survival.

Review:

★★★

This book gave me a case of the feelings.

I finished this book awhile ago now, but I had to let it stew around in my brain for awhile before I could properly and professionally write out my thoughts about it. There are some things that this book does very well, and other things that it does rather poorly, and so in the end I ended up giving it a neutral three out of five stars.

This is a tough book to read, not in its grammar or lexicon, but because of the overall plot. School shootings are tough stuff, scary stuff. Stuff that we unfortunately see every day on the news, and that some of us have personally been affected by, in some form or another. In my case, fortunately, no one was injured despite shots being fired. But even that is something that has stayed with me. It's a rough call to reality that it could happen at any school, to anybody, and that's terrifying. And yet, in its terror, this book is mesmerizing. I read it in one go, because I couldn't put it down. Thankfully I was on a train for 8 hours, so I had time to spare.

It took awhile to get used to the format of this book. It's comprised of four distinct, separated points of view. I'm not overtly fond of switching POVs, especially when it's four of them. That said, I think Nijkamp handled it fairly well. After a while it became easy to switch gears and decipher whose chapter was whose. I was disappointed that in these four points of view, the shooter wasn't given a voice. That's the voice I most wanted to read about, and I was left a bit sad that I didn't get that opportunity.

I appreciated that in addition to the separate points of view, the author also had mixed media strewn throughout the book. There is prose, as is standard in a novel, but also snippets of text messages, tweets, and blog posts. It brings the story into this decade and makes it feel more realistic. I think teens will relate to it more because of this incorporation of technology.

I do think that this book pulls out every single card in its literary deck, though, and it seemed like it was just for the purpose of saying the book included them. Different races? Check. Gay characters? Yup. Deaths of students, deaths of parents, rape, abuse, mental illness? Yup, all present. That's not a bad thing. I'm all for diverse characters and plots. I also know that everyone has their own story. But when it feels like it's all just plopped into the book for the sake of being plopped, it turns me off a bit. It also left me a bit confused. Part of one of the subplots of this story is that the town is a rather small and judgmental one, which is why so many people have so many secrets. This makes it hard to come out of the closet as being LGBT, because it is not a welcoming place. I was confused then why the quarterback who is so esteemed was a black character? Again, nothing wrong with having a black character. YA needs more of them. But when it's being drummed into the plot how small-minded the town is, this part doesn't seem to fit well. Maybe I'm just reading too much into things. It wouldn't be the first time.

I also wasn't happy with the ending, for a few reasons. I'll refrain from spoilers. Plot wise, I feel that it was kind of a cop out. The end chapters felt super rushed and I knew where it was going, and I didn't want it to go there. And when it ended it just felt like you had been running at an okay pace, sped up, and then hit a wall. It was just over. I'm not a fan of that at all. I also feel like the writing was a bit insensitive. I've lost friends to suicides and murders, and I promise you, I would never describe the loss of a beautiful human life as being able to see "brain" everywhere. It's crude, it's crass, and it's ultimately juvenile. It turned me off for sure, especially when mixed with this anger-inducing ending.

Unrelated to the content of the book, I absolutely love the cover. I think it sums up the plot well, and really makes a rather stunning point. I honestly forgot the title of this book at one point, but I remembered "the one with the broken chalk". It's a cover to be remembered.

I'm not sorry I read this, and I'll likely even read it again in the future. Like I said, there's high points and low points. It sucks you in and makes you confront life in a way that can be hard to swallow. There's some issues in it, but I would still recommend giving it a read. If you are a young adult reader who likes intense, emotionally driven books then this book might be for you.

I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinions. Thank you.