2012 End Of Year Book Survey

1. Best Book You Read In 2012? (You can break it down by genre if you want)

NOT GOING TO CHEAT. I have to say The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. Seriously, this book made me laugh, cry, and want to throw it across the room. That's pretty talented for an inanimate object.

(Shameless self advertisement: Read my review! http://thecontentsofmy-brain.blogspot.ca/2012/10/how-to-cry-for-half-hour.html)

2. Book You Were Excited About & Thought You Were Going To Love More But Didn’t?

HANDS DOWN Rebel Heart by Moira Young. I adored Blood Red Road and recommended it to everyone I knew whether they wanted a recommendation or not and even the people who weren't asking who ended up reading it loved it. It was just that good. So obviously I was PUMPED for the sequel. But it did disappoint me a little. I didn't hate it in the slightest, it was just not as good as I hoped.

3. Most surprising (in a good way!) book of 2012? 

I was most pleasantly surprised by Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake. The only reason I read it was because it kept appearing on people's favourites lists so even though the blurb didn't really draw me in, I decided to go for it. And I'm glad I did.

4. Book you recommended to people most in 2012?

Probably Blood Red Road. It's a known book, but it's not a "thing" the way Hunger Games or Divergent is. So while everyone knew about those two, I could recommend this book and they wouldn't have already heard of it! 

I think these things through.

 5. Best series you discovered in 2012?

This is a hard questions to answer because it's been a year of sequels for me. Lots of the books I read in 2011 came out with sequels and that's what I've been keeping up with so I've gotta think hard for a series I discovered this year...

I GOT IT! It's a tie between Cinder by Marissa Meyer and Legend by Marie Lu. They're both so inventive and they draw you in and make you want to find out what happens next. But, alas, these are the first books so I've got some time before the next installments come out to sate me.

 

6. Favorite new authors you discovered in 2012?

I have to give this one to Kody Keplinger. Her books are not of the dystopian genre, which is mostly what I read. They are just stories of life and boys and normal things but they are SO WELL WRITTEN. I don't know how she does it at such a young age but she is amazing at capturing exactly the right feelings for everything. I mean, she was my age when she wrote her first book. 

7. Best book that was out of your comfort zone or was a new genre for you?

I'm going with outside of my genre being non-fiction. So I read Ellen DeGeneres' biography called Seriously...I'm Kidding and laughed my butt off the whole way and also How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming by Mike Brown which was perfect for me. It told a story, was funny and had science!

 

8. Most thrilling, unputdownable book in 2012?

Enclave, by Ann Aguirre, was such a great book! It was one of those where everything just kept happening and just as you found out something, another thing popped up that you needed to find the answer to and couldn't possibly put it down to go to school or some other trivial thing.
Luckily, it is relatively short compared to the kind of books that I read normally so it was finished in an afternoon and I didn't have to go through drastic measures to keep reading it.

 

9. Book You Read In 2012 That You Are Most Likely To Re-Read Next Year:

I will most likely reread The Hobbit by the great JRR Tolkein. I read it over the summer to prepare myself for the one week we had that was Hobbit themed at my camp but since the movie has come out, I'll probably watch it and then end up rereading it sometime in January to compare the movie version and book version.

10. Favorite cover of a book you read in 2012?

Cinder and A Million Suns by Marissa Meyer and Beth Revis, respectively, take the cake in this category. Cinder was especially creative when combining the slipper from the Cinderella story along with the cyborg twist. And then I love outer space and A Million Suns' cover was so gorgeous!

11. Most memorable character in 2012? 

I'd say I remember Deuce from Enclave by Ann Aguirre the most. She was capable, fought for what she believed in and never let someone else do something for her that she could do herself.

 12. Most beautifully written book read in 2012?

I'm sorry. But beautifully written prose doesn't get to me unless you include confusing me. I need my books given to me straight up, no implying and dancing around the point. And if it doesn't confuse me, then I don't notice if it's nicely written because I am too engrossed in the story. Shout out to all the books that fall under this category that I didn't notice. You guys were great.
But I need a book here so why not Mo Willems Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs. Props if you've read it and double props if you found the Easter egg from Willem's previous books. (Hint: PIGEON)

13. Book that had the greatest impact on you in 2012? 

Took me a while to go through my mental list (slash Goodreads list) of books but when I happened upon Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay I knew it was definitely the one. The first half made you so hopefully and then reality struck and it just made you realize that life probably won't have a storybook ending.

 

14. Book you can’t believe you waited UNTIL 2012 to finally read? 

If I Stay by Gayle Forman. This book came out in 2009 and I only read it last year? What was wrong with me. It was a very intricate story with flashbacks from her life before and you never actually knew what her choice would be until it happened. Tres good. And I liked the sequel even better.

 

15. Favorite Passage/Quote From A Book You Read In 2012?

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer had so many amazing quotes that were very true but also were funny in an understated way. Such as:

"Reading good books ruins you for enjoying bad books."

"Isola doesn't approve of small talk and believes in breaking the ice by stomping on it." 

"I don't want to be married just to be married. I can't think of anything lonelier than spending my life with someone I can't talk to, or worse, someone I can't be silent with."

 

16.Shortest & Longest Book You Read In 2012? 

SHORTEST: Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs by Mo Willems. I still read picture books. How can you just stop reading something you totally grew up with?

LONGEST: Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore. Fun fact, this book came out super near my birthday yet I had to wait for it at the library. I dropped major hints about wanting it as a present but the friends and family did not take heed.

 17. Book That Had A Scene In It That Had You Reeling And Dying To Talk To Somebody About It? (a WTF moment, an epic revelation, a steamy kiss, etc. etc.) Be careful of spoilers!

I'm just going to give this to The Fault in Our Stars by John Green because can you really beat the plot twist of all plot twists? The one that you could NEVER imagine coming and makes you want to read more but also want to make a pyre and burn the book for playing with your emotions? I don't know how my friend (who read it before) me held it in because that is pretty much impossible. You just NEED to tell someone about the injustice of it all.

18. Favorite Relationship From A Book You Read In 2012 (be it romantic, friendship, etc).

Liesel and Rudy's relationship in The Book Thief by Mark Zusak was beyond adorable. Even though they spent most of it as a friendship and only started liking each other near the end, it was just perfect. All their adventures and them being there for each other. I want that.

19. Favorite Book You Read in 2012 From An Author You Read Previously.

Actually, most of the books I read in 2012 were sequels so that's going to be a toughie. Let's just go with Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore because her books are among the tippy top of my favourites list. I had read Graceling and Fire and just fell in love with that world so when it comes to another installment the only answer is YES PLEASE.

20. Best Book You Read That You Read Based SOLELY On A Recommendation From Somebody Else:

I am pretty independent in my book-choosing methods so pretty much none of them were recommendations.  I'm the one that gives the recommendations out to other people. I'm like their Jedi Master teaching them the way of the good books. But my friend lent me the book called The History of the World According to Facebook by Wylie Overstreet which she told me was really good and I think that counts even though I knew about it before. PS it is hilarious and really good.

Looking Ahead

1. One Book You Didn’t Get To In 2012 But Will Be Your Number 1 Priority in 2013?

So many books literally everything is something I want to read and there is never enough time. There's Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green because I NEED to have read every single book of his and also Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor since everyone's been raving about that one and Incarnate by Jodi Meadows because I actually started that but never got a chance to finish it and now I feel bad. 

And those are just some.

2. Book You Are Most Anticipating For 2013?

- Shades of Earth by Beth Revis

- Prodigy by Marie Lu

- Scarlet by Marissa Meyer

- Mind Games by Kiersten White

- Just One Day by Gayle Forman

...to name a few.

3. One Thing You Hope To Accomplish Or Do In Your Reading/Blogging In 2013?

For sure I need to read a minimum of 100 books, that is always a goal I achieve every year and I'm not about to stop now. Also I want to read more non-fiction, especially brain books because they interest me soooo much!

As for the blog I'd like to have a wider audience, maybe 15 followers by the end of the year (I know, aiming high.), and also be able to connect with readers and other bloggers alike, get in on the community of blogging since I am just a noob now.

These are ALL the books I read last year, you can just paste this into the URL thingy at the top of your internet to see them! I'm sad I couldn't mention every one in this End of Year Book Survey so here's their chance to shine.

http://www.goodreads.com/user_challenges/216833

Also, sorry for the slightly late post. Technically I'm still in January so 2012 is recent enough!

Summatives Suck

Microsoft Word doesn't even recognize it as a word because they suck so much.

Literally me.

But seriously, no one appreciates them. Yes, it's nice to not have 30% of your final mark be based on one exam (for some people) but adding a whole layer of stress does not help the matter. Literally no one has time for this. When they decided to implement summatives, they totally did not take into consideration that teachers are already trying to cram the last bit of the course into our heads after realizing we are very behind schedule PLUS we need to put in some time studying for this test that only covers, oh, everything we've done this semester. Why not add in a super project that is also supposed to cover everything learned in the course that takes up so much time to complete.

Absolutely everyone hates summatives, even some teachers. It's hard for them because they have to mark that and the exam all before the due date to have their marks in.

Overall there's just way too much stress. We should be enjoying the new year but instead, we're freaking out about keeping track of all the coursework we need to complete before we just lie down and let exhaustion overtake us.

This rant courtesy of my super stressed out brain.

Don't be insecure girl

Own that ponytail.
Work that updo.


Where your boyfriend at?
Is he tall? Is he hefty?
Is he coming back?


In case you don't know what I'm spewing, this may help you out.

Can I have your number? Can I have it? Can I have your number? Can I? Can I?

These are classic lines that work in any and all situations.

Also: did you know Darrell is played by a girl?

Brainstorm

I just made a brainstorm on future topics for this blog.

Here's the list:
Socks: matching or unmatching?
Reasons it's good to be *blank* (insert short, blond, quiet, etc.)
Useless skills I have
Embarrassing story
Where I'll be at seventy-three
Useless skills I want to learn

I know, real deep and thought-provoking.

While we're on the topic actually, what do you want me to ramble about? Book reviews? My life? My thoughts and opinions?

Resolutions

Before we get down to the nitty gritty of me baring my fixable flaws before, can I say that I have never seen any jokes concerning picture resolution about New Year's resolutions. None. Whatsoever. It's weird cause they can't have all been invented this year. So here I am, laughing my head off at their sheer wit while all y'all are probably giving me hipster looks and telling me they've been around for ages. I must have figured out a way to avoid them until now because I am seriously not new to this whole internet deal.

This is the first time I've actually written something down for my New Year's resolutions, normally I just vaguely think something up. Here goes.

- Stay fit. Most people want to get fit but I am fit. I love sports and have high metabolism which both work to my advantage. But I won't have gym class anymore in university and I am not down to gain the freshman 15, thank you very much. So this is thinking long term to develop habits that'll help me come September.

- Learn a song on the bass each month. The bass is such a cool instrument to be able to play. I don't practice things very much so this might help me grow my repertoire.

- Do homework every night. Even if nothing is assigned. I am the queen of procrastination so this one is going to be a Herculean effort. That I will eventually fail at.

- Keep my room presentable. I am the worst at cleaning my own stuff. Other people's things I love to organize but my own things just get neglected. I've started keeping my bed made which actually makes a difference in how clean my room looks but I hope to get further along.


- Smile at one person I don't know a day. Because spreading happiness is fun. Because you never know how the person's day has been and what your actions do to contribute to it. Because what's the worst that could happen?

- Learn something new. I don't know what exactly but I want it to be a skill that takes time to acquire. Learn to write with my left hand? Take up handwriting analysis? Who knows! (You can tell I wrote the first draft of this by hand since both examples have to do with writing.)


- Be creative. My focus education-wise is all sciency and facts. I love that stuff to death but I really need to keep my brain entertained by creative things as well. So it may be making wall decorations or knitting something. Anything that lets me just release my creativity. (First on the list is find myself a synonym for "creative". I used it far too much in that paragraph.)


- Read 100 books. Easily accomplished seeing as I've done that for the past few years. But it's good to keep it as a goal.

I'm thinking at the end of the year we shall revisit this list and see how much progress I made on it!

ALSO: What do you think of my resolutions? Too ambitious? Too stereotypical? What are some resolutions you've made and do you think you'll be able to keep them?

The Christmas Haul

It's Christmas! Luckily, no one in my family is crazy and we all woke up at a reasonable enough hour this morning. I never see the point of getting up at 4am or something like that since you don't notice time go by while you're asleep. It's not like you're bored and doing nothing, you are completely unconscious and unaware that you are missing out on time. So that's my reasoning for getting a decent amount of sleep on Christmas morning.

But no one cares about that.

So here's an extensive list of what I received this Christmas along with any commentary necessary. Be happy for me, be weirded out by what kind of things I enjoy receiving, or be jealous, whatever you wish.

- Fuzzy socks. For those cold winter nights when my cat is hogging all the blankets.
- Multi-coloured socks. Something you should know: I don't ever wear matching socks but I do make sure that the colours and patterns go together. It's actually a lot of effort!
- A purple shirt.
- A sweater that looks like it's inside out BUT it's actually supposed to be that way. Bonus because the itchy side is on the outside.
- Chocolate. Our tradition is to have those chocolate oranges for Christmas every year but we couldn't find them this year. We remedied that by eating a clementine at the same time as the chocolate. Genius, right?

- The Journal of Awesome. Kind of like a DIY Book of Awesome. I will definitely be sharing some of my AWESOME things here.
- Ice cubes in the shape of guitars and basses. Don't worry, there's an actual reason, my family is not just crazy. This is to commemorate me learning the bass this summer, coupled with my love of ice cubes.
- A pack of assorted blue and green office supplies. You may think this is a boring present but it's NOT. I like those things.
- A notebook. I have dubbed it my beside table notebook to write down all those spur of the moment ideas I tend to have right before dropping off to sleep.
- Burt's Bees chapstick.
- A book called "The Christian World of The Hobbit". Really looking forward to reading this since The Hobbit is one of my favourite books and it'll be cool to see all the Christian elements hidden inside!
- A phone. I know, I'm in my last year of high school and I'm just getting a phone now? It has saved us a ton of money to not have one but now it's pretty necessary with all the extra-curriculars I do and university looming ahead.

I'm not very easy to shop for but "Santa" pulled through! I am extremely happy and plan on enjoying all these things to their full potential.

I'm surprised there was room under the tree for presents
since the cats decided to take up permanent residence there.

My Holiday Life

I was supposed to make this post BEFORE all this stuff actually went down, you know, to warn you that I'm am out and about, going places and seeing people, and won't be online. Well that went very well. I'm so good at this.

Anywho, let me tell you about my life for the past couple of weeks!

We'll start with the last day of school.

Mine was less pretty

I gave and received my Secret Koala gifts. What were they, you ask whilst screaming at my through the computer screen in anticipation. Well, I gave my person a giant cupcake (it used a whole cake batter but definitely was in the shape of a cupcake. I was very proud of it.) and some mustache earphones. From my Secret Koala person, I got some nifty homemade bracelets and the Percy Jackson and the Olympians DVD. Can't say that I'm a fan of the movie but I adore the books plus Logan Lerman is in it which more than makes up for everything.
It was a snow day plus the last day before the holidays so all my teachers completely gave up on the idea of trying to stuff some information into our heads. So, in chem, we decorated our door, making a paper chain Christmas tree and modifying the title of the room to Chemis-tree. (I actually enjoyed that pun very much.) For math, all we did was watch Youtube videos. Cat Person, Dog Person was a highlight for me since the cat person was spot on in acting the way my cats do. Data consisted of us playing telephone pictionary which made for some major laughs, especially when our exchange students didn't know what some of the words were and just guessed. I usually have a spare last but I decided to drop in to my basketball coach's class where there was food and a movie. A good decision on my part, I must say.
And finally, on that same day, my school had our annual talent show which was pretty spectacular. The good ones were amazing and the bad ones still got lots of support from the crowd. I love my school.

A couple days later was Christmas. Now, I'm originally from Brazil even though I live in Canada but that means that most of my family is still over there. That means we don't do very big holiday get-togethers. It's usually just my mother, my younger sister and I. And I like it this way. Yes, I'm sad I don't get to wrestle in the snow with all my guy cousins but it does majorly reduce stress seeing as we don't have to prepare anything at all. With Christmas comes Christmas presents! Which I will tell you about in detail at a later time.

Finally, to end my holiday travels, my friend and I bussed over to Kingston to see another friend of ours from the summer camp I worked at all summer. Many ridiculous inside jokes were created and a total of 7 movies were watched in the span of two days plus one night. Don't believe me? Ask me anything about the following movies:
- The Hobbit (YES I shall do a review later on)
- Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (Meh, it was okay)
- Pitch Perfect (Is there a more perfect movie?)
- The Odd Life of Timothy Green (Liked it more than I thought I would)
- Easy A (Oh Emma Stone, how awesome can you get?)
- What to Expect When You're Expecting (Very droll)
- In Time (Didn't like the concept too much)

 

We then all commuted to the very same camp for the staff reunion where our time was divided between eating that amazing food and collecting bruises on the ice rink while playing broomball. The New Year was counted down right on the rink actually! We paused it at 40 seconds to go, counted down, hugged a minimum of 7 people each then got right back to playing.

The night after I came home, I barfed. At least 11 of us that were at that Staff Reunion had the flu when we got home. Such close quarters would do that to a person.

That is the end of my saga! To be honest, it is one of the way more exciting Christmas break's I've had in a while seeing as I am not a social butterfly in the slightest. Thanks if you actually read the whole thing.

Poll Results: December

This was kind of disappointing. After getting 7 whole votes in my previous poll, I was expecting an increase in number. But, alas, only three got in on the action. I guess the question was slightly too weird.

Here are the results:

Seems like blue was the overall winner with dark blue taking the prize. I am not surprised with these results seeing as blue is a pretty amazing colour.

It would make my life if January's poll got more than a few votes since it means people actually care! New topic is: Favourite Type of Severe Weather