Cirque du Freak

Cirque du Freak is a book series by a guy named Darren Shan and its probably one of the best book series I've ever read. I first came across it when I saw the movie in theaters and though it looked like a low budget movie. I wasn't disappointed. Instead I actually liked the movie so much that I decided to read the books. The books are essentially about a boy named Darren Shan (also the author's name) who goes to a circus (the Cirque du Freak) with his best friend Steve and encounters a vampire named Larten Crepsley. In the show, Crepsley performs with a tarantula named Madam Octa. You learn that Darren has a strange fascination with spiders and is immediately entranced by Octa's beauty and later steals her from Crepsley. On the other hand, Darren's best friend Steve has a fascination with vampires and later begs Crepsley to turn him into a vampire. Crepsley declines and Steve, in anger, says he will one day get back at him for turning him down. Darren ends up witnessing the whole thing while stealing Octa. Several days later, Steve finds out Darren stole the spider from Crepsley and acts if he could hold her. Darren hesitates at first, but then agrees to it. But Octa doesn't like Steve and bites him. Frightened for his friends life, Darren goes to Crepsley, hoping he will give him an antidote that will save Steve. Crepsley says he'll save his friend only if Darren agrees to become Crepsley's assistant. Darren agrees and Crepsley saves Steve. Darren later fakes his death so his family thinks he is dead, so he can live a life as Crepsley's assistant.
 (Darren and Larten Crepsley)
Before you jump to any conclusions about Crepsley he is actually my favorite character from the series. At first he may seem like a mean and awful guy but as the series goes on you get to know him more and end up really appreciating his character. There are twelve books in the series but the are all quick reads. The books are dark, especially the second book but are very addicting to read. Out of the twelve, my favorite is the third one titled 'Tunnels of Blood'.

Deathly Hallows

So I saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows at midnight and I would have to say it was probably my favorite Harry Potter movie so far. It was very entertaining, full of action, and followed the book really well. And like the book, it was also very dark. Though I do like dark movies like Tim Burton, I walked out of the theater feeling rather depressed. I think my favorite part in the movie was when Xenophilius Lovegood explained what the Deathly Hallows were and the story of the three brothers, and when Snape talks to Voldemort about where Harry Potter is. I saw the movie again on Sunday and the second time is just as good as seeing it the first time. I hate how part 2 of Deathly Hallows doesn't come out for another eight months because I can't wait that long! But the bright side to it is that it comes out around my birthday. The one part I'm looking forward to in part 2 is The Prince's Tale which is about Severus Snape's past and I'm absolutely in love with Snape's character! I'm also looking forward to seeing the battle of Hogwarts and how they'll be able to transition that from the book into live action. I'm almost done with the book, and reading Deathly Hallows has also made me realize how sad Albus Dumbledore's life was, especially with what happened to his sister Ariana. I hope they add more of his life story in part 2 as well. Reading Deathly Hallows has also made me want to work on my book series some more. I don't want to tell a lot of people about it but just between us the series is called Humanoids and the first is called The Soul Project.

Yu Gi Oh

For the past several weeks I've been obsessing over this series called Yu Gi Oh the abridged series. Its basically a fan video made from the old anime and is made from a guy named LittleKuriboh. He voices over the English dub and uses his own voice which sounds just like the English voice actors. The series is hilarious beyond belief! I think I've wasted countless hours on youtube watching Yu Gi Oh the abridged series when I should be doing homework. I also love the true Yu Gi Oh anime as well which makes me think back to my childhood when I was once obsessed with Yu Gi Oh to the point where I would videotape it every Saturday morning. I think the reason the abridged series its so funny is because of the references they make in the series such as: The Legend of Zelda, Watchmen, and other anime series.
Some of my favorite quotes from Yu Gi Oh abridged are:
1. Screw the rules I have money!
2. Don't you wish your cards games were fun like mine.
3.If there is a problem yo I'll solve it. Take out my deck so the card games resolve it.
I got introduced to this series by my best friend and fellow fangirl Cagney Ryan. She is the person I go to whenever I find a new book or anime I want to talk about. She gotten me into some interesting books too like Cirque du Freak which is one of the best book series I've ever read! Plus we're going to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows at midnight on Thursday. Hopefully I won't be too much of a zombie the next day!
The pictures below are fanarts from Yu Gi Oh the abridged series!
 
Don't be jealous of my weirdness! haha

Hero by: Perry Moore

I'm starting to like Hero more and more as I read it. I can sort of relate to the main character, in the sense that we both have insecurities and both want to make our parents proud of us. I think it's rather sad that Thom resorted to running away from home because he couldn't tell his dad the truth about himself. I think if Thom confronted his dad and told him the truth, I think he would be accepting of Thom instead of rejecting him. Though I am curious as to why Thom's mom decided to up and leave both Thom and his dad. I have a feeling that it had something to do with the fact Thom's dad use to be a superhero and she hated not knowing whether or not she would ever see her husband alive again. Especially after an 'accident' that left his disfigured. I can understand her leaving then, but why leave your only child too? Then again the message in the photo album saying: (To my son. Know yourself.), may be a clue that his mom still cares and thinks about him. Over all as a debut novel, this isn't too bad. Perry Moore describes his characters in an interesting and unique way. The story also flows nicely from one chapter to the next. It will be interesting to what else Moore will write in the future. Plus I like how Moore pulls inspiration from his own life since he is also gay like Thom in Hero.

Nanowrimo

Last week I while was walking to my stressful Comp. 111, I noticed a flyer on one of the bulletin boards in the hallway about an organization called Nanowrimo. I had never heard of them before, but I after I read what it was about I became very interested. Nanowrimo is a sort of writing club online and has contests once in a while. The contest they are currently having is a novel writing project for November and the contest consists of writing a 50,000 word novel about anything you want from November lst to November 30th. I absolutely love writing. In the future, not only do I want to get a job as a journalist, but I want to wrote novels on the side as well. I already started writing a novel that I started about two years ago and just finished this summer. So this contest is sort of a test for me to see if I could finish something so big in a small amount of time. Nevertheless, I'm taking the chance! After I decided to do it, I thought hard about what my novel was going to be about and finally came up with an idea. The novel would be about a young girl named Maxie whose parents are killed when she is ten years old and is taken in and raised by a mysterious man named Gideon who is secretly a vampire. A first, I thought this was a stupid idea because every book I see nowadays is about cheesy vampires, but this idea wouldn't leave me alone so I stuck with it. Plus I got extremely inspired when I found some random drawings on deviantart.com that looked exactly how I envisioned my characters:
Gideon Maxie
Even though I like the idea, I don't know if others will. Hopefully people will. 'Crosses fingers'.