Author Spotlight - Cornelia Funke

In my last (and most popular) post, I gave you guys a list of my favorite authors and books. I thought that I would spend a little more time on some of my favorite authors to really give you the full view of their work. First up, my very first favorite author. This was the author I first named as a favorite when I was younger, but has really held up over the years: Cornelia Funke.Cornelia Funke is a German author who writes fantasy books. Her books are the kind of books that make me want to learn German because if her books are so beautiful when they are translated, I can't imagine how beautiful they must be when read in their original language. She creates these amazing new worlds that I always love falling into. Ever world she creates is totally different, but they are all obviously very carefully constructed. The first book I read by Cornelia Funke was Inkheart.
Inkheart is story about a girl named Meggie, who has grown up without a mother. She lives in a world of books, as her father, Mo, is a bookbinder. They live in a house that has books stacked up to the ceiling in every room. I adore this book, it is still one of my very favorites and I love to return to it every couple of years. The sequels are just as amazing, if not better. Inkdeath is one of the best finales I've ever read in a series. Beautiful finish. These books are for those who love to read, along with those who just want a book that was put together with the utmost care.

   

Inkheart series: 5/5

The next book I read by this author was Dragon Rider. This book is intended for younger audiences than Inkheart was, but it is also a very large book. I think this just shows that Cornelia Funke doesn't underestimate kids. They can read big books, no matter how young they are. I adore Dragon Rider. The world she creates fascinates me, and I fell in love with every single character. I have read this book more times than I can count.

Dragon Rider: 4.5/5

As I continued on my list, I read The Thief Lord. This book takes place in Venice, Italy in the past. It is about a group of orphan boys who follow their brave leader, Scipio. As I was reading the book, I kept thinking that it was odd that Cornelia had written this book that wasn't fantasy, and was actually all very much possible, but she sprung that element of magic on me before I knew what was happening. And the fact that the book didn't all take place in a magical world, but still had that magic in it, was a really nice change.
The Thief Lord: 4.5/5           
(I plan taking this book with me to read if I ever see Venice)

These are just the most highly rated of Cornelia Funke's books. She has also written a children's series called Ghosthunters, a couple of stand-alone books called When Santa Fell to Earth and Igraine the Brave, and one of my favorite fairy tale retellings, Reckless. I am eagerly anticipating a book 2 to go along with Reckless, which will be called Restless. I can't wait! I hope you will read some of these amazing books and that you too will come to see how beautiful Cornelia Funke's books are. Happy Reading!

     

 

“Stories never really end...even if the books like to pretend they do. Stories always go on. They don't end on the last page, any more than they begin on the first page.” 

-Cornelia Funke, Inkspell

My Absolute Favorites

Since my last lists have been the most popular of all of my posts, I thought I would create another one. I thought I would try something a little different this time, though. Instead of giving you a list of my favorite books, I am going to give you a list of my favorite authors, and my favorite books by those authors, plus the list of budding authors I could see on my favorites list in the future. These authors either haven't written enough books to make a a real decision, or I haven't read enough of their books to decide.

Favorite Authors:

1. J. K. Rowling
2. Cornelia Funke
3. Shannon Hale
4. James Dashner
5. Nancy Farmer
6. Ted Dekker
7. Christopher Paolini
8. Gail Carson Levine
9. Alex Flinn
10. C. S. Lewis

Potential Favorites:

1. Suzanne Collins
2. Kristen Cashore
3. K. L. Fogg
4. Ilsa J. Bick
5. Veronica Roth
6. Diane Setterfield
7. Dan Wells
8. Obert Skye
9. Michael Grant - for the Gone books (Lies is my least favorite, but all great besides that)
10. James Patterson - The Maximum Ride books (getting worse and worse, unfortunately)
11. Scott Westerfeld - The Uglies books (All great, but I didn't love the last 2 Midnighters books)
12. Lois Lowry
13. Ally Condie
14. Jane Austen - Pride and Prejudice (absolutely amazing)
15. Moira Young - Blood Red Road (amazing, book 2 to come out soon)
16. Cassandra Clare

Favorite Books:

1. The Harry Potter series (yes, all 7 books. I can't pick favorites out of those) - J.K. Rowling
2. The Inheritance Cycle (book 3, Brisingr, is probably my favorite) - Christopher Paolini
3. The Books of Bayern (I adore book 2, Enna Burning) - Shannon Hale
4. The Inkheart series (can't pick a favorite!) - Cornelia Funke
5. Ella Enchanted - Gail Carson Levine
6. The Thief Lord - Cornelia Funke
7. Dragon Rider - Cornelia Funke
8. The Hunger Games (I adore all 3, even Mockingjay) - Suzanne Collins
9. The Circle books (That is Black, Red, White and Green) - Ted Dekker
10. The Giver - Lois Lowry
11. The Serpent Tide (I don't love books 2 or 3) - K.L. Fogg
12. Ashes - Ilsa J. Bick
13. The Maze Runner series (can't pick favorite) - James Dashner
14. The 13th Reality series (I just want book 4!) - James Dashner
15. The House of the Scorpion - Nancy Farmer
16. The Sea of Trolls (check out the amazing audio book) - Nancy Farmer
17. Book of a Thousand Days - Shannon Hale
18. Beastly - Alex Flinn
19. The Chronicles of Narnia (If I threw a dart, probably Dawn Treader and Last Battle are my favorites) - C.S. Lewis
20. The Matched Books (Crossed is better than Matched) - Ally Condie
21. The Graceling Realm books (Graceling is my favorite) - Kristin Cashore
22. The Mortal Instruments (I think book 4 is the low point, all the rest are amazing) - Cassandra Clare
23. The Thirteenth Tale (as if I haven't raved about that book enough) - Diane Setterfield
24. The Leven Thumps books (can't pick a favorite) - Obert Skye
25. The John Cleaver books (I like the 2 that I have read, still need book 3) - Dan Wells

Well, I just hope I haven't overwhelmed you. Please give me feedback on my posts so far so that I can hopefully write the things that YOU, the reader, want to read about. Also, suggest books you love. Happy reading!

4-Part June Wrap-Up

Happy summer, readers! I have been reading like mad all summer, and I have actually gone down to only 2 behind in my goal, but I went from 7 behind to 2 behind in one week, so I know I will catch up. I finished reading Bitterblue, the whole Green Mile series, The Devil Wears Prada, Midnight in Austenland, Insurgent, The Replacement, Grammar Snobs are Great Big Meanies, The Dangerous Days of Daniel X, Bruiser, and, finally, I am NOT a Serial Killer. Wew, I have been doing nothing but reading this summer. I am not going to summarize these books, I will just let you know how the writing is and the overall opinion I had of the book.

Bitterblue, book #3 in the Graceling Realm, by Kristin Cashore. Fantastic writing, though I think it took a while to get going. I think I like the first 2 books more, but book 3 was still amazing. It was also nice to read about someone in the world of Gracelings who wasn't a Graceling, nice new view on things. I highly recommend the series. Book 1 is called Graceling

Rating: 4.5/5








Green Mile books by Stephen King. In order: The Two Dead Girls, The Mouse on the Mile, Coffey's Hands, The Bad Death of Eduard Delacroix, The Night Journey, and Coffey on the Mile. These books get better as they go along, I promise. The first 3 are good, but I love the last 3 more. The final book is my favorite. Warning: some language. This is Stephen King, after all.

Rating (average): 4/5



The Devil Wears Prada Lauren Weisenberger. If you have seen the movie, this is nothing like that. Names are the same, and I think some characters have the same personalities as described in the book, but that is where the similarites end. I didn't like this book. I didn't sympathize with the main character, but I was still mad at other characters for treating dear old Andy the way they did. So, overall, I hated all of the characters. And if you want me to like a book, give me a reason to empathize with the main character at the very least. Warning: again, bad language.

Rating: 2/5




Last of all for today, The Replacement by Brenna Yovanoff. Ok, this book kept leaving me feeling.... empty. I just kept feeling like I was reading a good book, but I wasn't reading it like it was a good book. The characters were nice, but they didn't feel real. The story wasn't all there. Just overall, it seemed like this book should be good, but it didn't quite feel right. Warning: some bad language in this book. It is no Stephen King, but there IS language. You have been warned.

Rating: 3/5

That's a Classic!

Alrighty, I haven't written in a very long time. I feel like that is how I start every post, but I just always end up having big gaps between posts! I have been reading like a crazy person because I am trying to catch up with my goal of 100 books in 1 year on goodreads. I am still 7 books behind... but I know I can do it this year! I finished the first 5 books of The Green Mile so I only need to read one more. I read the first book of Septimus Heap, Magyk. I finished Pride and Prejudice. Last night I finished City of Lost Souls (WOW!). Oh my gosh, still so much to read. I'm in the middle of Bitterblue, book 3 in the Graceling Realm series, and I am reading Green Mile: Coffey On The Mile (part 6) and finally, I started reading The Devil Wears Prada. We'll see how that turns out.
I'll try to do a couple of quick reviews. I assume you all know the story of Pride and Prejudice, wirtten by Jane Austen? Well, I had never actually read it. I kept avoiding it and avoiding it because I thought it was too hard. I read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith instead and I loved it! But finally for English this year I decided I would muddle through it, if only to say that I had.
Oh wow, I loved it. Somehow I had been totally oblivious to that amazing element of romance (I know, only by being an idiot or just resistant to reading the book could do that to me). I was caught up in all of it, and I was reading avidly every night, wanting to know if Darcy and Elizabeth could make it work, even when I knew how it ended! And I got all girl-who-is-watching-the-end-of-a-romantic-comedy giddy about the last few chapters. I felt like melting when it got romantic. And after a while, I hardly noticed the writing style and I understood it all perfectly. This is truly a classic that I will always love.


Rating: 4/5
Also, I read Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare. This one was A LOT harder to get through than Pride and Prejudice, but there was a reason I was able to get through it: have any of you seen the movie She's the Man? Well, that is the story of Twelfth Night. Twin brother and sister get split up, sister dresses up as a boy, meets the Duke as his serving boy, Duke goes after the super cute Olivia, twin sister (Viola) gets mega jealous as she has fallen in love with the Duke, everything goes to crap. Or something like that. I love the movie, so I decided to read the play, and let me tell you, my advanced knowledge of Twelfth Night helped me by a million percent to understand the play. I'm not saying it all suddenly came to me like Shakespeare was speaking like a 21st century teenager, but I found myself understanding a lot more.
Another big help was reading the full breakdown of the play on Shmoop.com and I related back to it every now and then if I got lost. I have decided I can really enjoy reading Shakespeare, so long as I have lots of access to things that help me to understand it! Anyway, I really loved this classic too!


Rating: 4/5

Clear Skyes

Just a reminder to everyone, go get on the waiting list for City of Lost Souls by Cassandra Clare! It came out at the beginning of the month and the waiting list at my local library, at least, is already very long. For those of you who haven't started the Mortal Instruments series yet, I highly recommend it. I won't say that it is a coming classic, like I believe Harry Potter to be, but it is still a really goo series. Very fast paced and fun. Onto our book, Pillage by Obert Skye. Now many of you might ask why his name sounds familiar. I'll tell you: because he wrote Leven Thumps! Pillage is about a boy who has to move in with his uncle after his mother's death. Beck (the boy) thinks his uncle is extremely strange and the two don't exactly hit if off, but after a bit of time, an odd bit of info comes into the light. Beck's family has a curse. A curse that allows members of his family to make plants grow on command and, this is the weirdest part, make dragon eggs hatch!
OK, I really love the Leven Thumps books. I read them super quickly and I gave a copy of the first book to my little sister to read just a few months ago. This high opinion of Obert Skye, plus the very cool book cover, made me think that Pillage might be even better. I mean, Leven Thumps is great, but this book has dragons! Unfortunately, I was very let down. This book was not that good. Honestly, it was far too short for the story that Skye was trying to write. The book honestly felt forced, and I wanted way more. Sorry, Pillage, but you just don't measure up to the Leven Thumps standard.

Rating: 2/5

Of New Books and Old

Hey there, readers. I can't believe it is already May 6th! Time is just flying by. I am so sad I wasn't here to update you on the fact that Insurgent by Veronica Roth and Bitterblue by Kristin Cashore both came out on Monday! I have been excited for both of them for so long now and I am dying to get my hands on a copy of both of them. Fantasy readers, I beg you to go read book one by Kristin Cashore, Graceling. It will blow your mind. It was the first adult fantasy book to really hold my attention. Also, I don't think I have forgotten to mention to my dytopian-loving readers that Divergent is worth your while. So please go to your local library or go buy a copy of these books, because they are all very very good. Also, The City of Lost Souls, book #5 in the Mortal Instruments is coming very soon. I am talking 2 days away, people. And since I am on a very very long waiting list, those of you who get your hands on it before me, please let me know if I have to read the rest of the Infernal Devices books before I read this one! 

OK, now onto the book that I actually have read. The school year is finally finishing up, which means that I am just about done with school required reading for a few months. Usually the books we have to read in school just drive me insane, but I finally got my hands on a classic that I really enjoyed: Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck. This book follows George and Lennie, men who travel and work together to scrounge up whatever money they can in the hope of someday having some land of their own. But Lennie can be trouble. George says he just isn't bright, but we as future readers know it is more than that. Lennie doesn't understand most things and even as old as he is, his only real joy is in touching things that are soft. Like rabbits, or the fabric of a nice dress. But sometimes his limited understanding can get him and George into a lot of trouble.

This book just blew my mind. It was really nicely written, and it was really short so it didn't take me that much time at all to read. The characters didn't have a lot of time to be developed, and yet I understood them perfectly. I understood their motivations and feelings and felt like I was right there in the book with them. I understood George's anger at Lennie and I wanted to hug Lennie for just always trying to make it better when he knew he had done something wrong again. This is a beautifully written book, and it should be read by all children so that they can have an understanding of the value of some of these classics. This is one of the good ones. 

Rating: 4/5

The Westing Game

Hey, two days in a row. It is really a miracle! Still no word on info from our good friend Neal Shusterman. I'm really hoping I'll be able to figure it out soon. But if not, don't worry. I will still review Unwind very soon. And if you have already read Unwind, check out the Coming Soon page for the date for the sequel, Unwholly, which I am very much looking forward to. Also, I hope everyone is excited for the release of Insurgent which comes out so very soon! I can't wait to get my hands on a copy. Divergent was amazing!
Anyway, as promised, here is my review for The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin. This is a mystery, so I won't summerize too much. In fact, I am just going to quote the blurb from Goodreads.com because it says exactly enough, in my opinion: "When an eccentric millionaire dies mysteriously, sixteen very unlikely people are gathered together for the reading of the will...and what a will it is!" 
This is one of my favorite mysteries. I grew up reading Nancy Drew and this is just the perfect book to read if you enjoyed those, and even if you didn't. It is a perfect mystery, one of the few I couldn't figure out until the end when Ellen Raskin finally revealed the truth! It says in the introduction of the copy I read that Ellen Raskin didn't plan out how this book would turn out because she thought that was no fun. She wanted to be just as surprised as the reader. This astounds me even more because this book has a complex mystery I would have had a hard time writing, even if I had known how it was going to end.

This book is read by many younger audiences and adored, so be warned, this isn't Agatha Christie mystery writing. You won't have to read the book twice to understand and enjoy it - which was my experience with Christie's Murder on the Orient Express. Good book, by the way. This book is still simple enough to be read by younger children but complex enough and fun and creative enough to be enjoyed by generations. And by the way, people, I would love to have this book on my shelf. My birthday is only, well, 11 months away.... But Christmas is coming up! Actually that is still 9 months away.... Well, hopefully I can have my own copy someday. Read it!

Rating: 4/5