Follow Friday and TGIF!

Friday's meme day in the blogosphere, and I love getting to visit with new and old people every week to see their answers to the questions posed.

TGIF is a weekly feature created and hosted by GReads!

This week at Books and Threads
Sunday: In My Mailbox 
Top Ten Tuesday: Books I Want to Reread
Waiting on Wednesday: Audition and Bunheads 

Review: Slayers by C.J. Hill
Review: All You Desire by Kirsten Miller
Review: Ten Things We Did (And Probably Shouldn't Have) by Sarah Mlynowski
Review: The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things by Carolyn Mackler

This Friday's Question:

Banned Books: How do you feel about the censorship of the freedom to read? Do you think the education system needs to be more strict on what children are exposed to in books?

I absolutely do not believe in censorship or book banning of any kind.  I believe that children - and adults - pick up and read books that they need to read.  If they're not mature enough to understand the book, they'll totally miss the 'objectionable' content.  Not to mention that telling any curious child he can't read a book will just inflame his interest, and he'll find a way to read it.

With the enormous amount of information flying at all of us every second now, I think it's really important for children to learn how to filter out the unimportant stuff and differentiate between what's legitimate or not.  Books are probably the easiest way for parents to teach children about this since the parent can review the book first and help the child understand it.  Books are also a way to open conversations about tough topics - bullying, death, stress, friendships, boyfriends, life, morals, and more. 

So yeah, books are important to me (uh, yeah, I work at a library), and the freedom to read is even more important. Which is why I talked my boss into letting me put up a Banned Books Week display last Sunday.  You know what pleased me most?  The majority of the recently challenged YA books were already checked out.  Heck yeah.

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Follow My Book Blog Friday is a weekly meme hosted by Parajunkee's View and Alison Can Read to feature a different blogger every week and let all of us stop by to say hi!

This week's featured blogger is Starcrossed!

Q. What book that hasn't been turned into a movie (yet) would you most like to see make it to the big screen, and who would you like cast as your favorite character? 

I don't know!  I'm always so afraid of the movie or TV show not measuring up to my love of the book so I obsess and worry over it way too much.  Like the proposed Vampire Academy movie scares me because I freaking adore those books, and what if Rose isn't perfect and badass and Dimitri isn't a freaking hot and giant Russian and ugh, they'll cut my favourite plot threads and probably focus solely on the love story instead of the awesome Moroi politics and Rose and Lissa's friendship and argh...

Clearly I have issues.  That being said, I think I like books to movies more if the books being made into movies aren't my absolute favourites.  Like I loved the Game of Thrones show and Master and Commander a few years back with Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany.  Though I also really enjoyed the recent Tomorrow When the War Began movie, and I utterly adore that series.  I'd be really excited if  Peter Jackson (who owns the rights. I'm not picking him randomly) ever makes Naomi Novik's Temeraire books into a movie because dragons during the Napoleonic Wars would be so amazing on the big screen.

So what I'm trying to say here is...I mostly pass?

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Book Blogger Hop is a weekly meme hosted by Crazy for Books that allows us to connect with and support other book bloggers who love books just as much as we do!

In honor of Banned Books Week, what is your favorite “banned or frequently challenged book”?

Such a hard question!

For the recently banned/challenged books, I'm going to say Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, and (of course) Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling.

As far as the older books or classics go, I'd have to choose Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood and Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut.  Even if mentioning the last one makes me feel like a pretentious jackass.

Follow Friday and TGIF!

This week's featured blogger is Liz over at The World of the Spork Master!

She's all kinds of hilarious, and anyone who likes sporks is good by me so go on over and check her out.




Q. Do you have a favorite series that you read over and over again? Tell us a bit about it and why you keep on revisiting it?

I'm one of those people who rereads books all the time so I could probably list off 30 or so different series that I've gone back to over and over throughout the years.  But I'm going to try not to.  So let's just take Harry Potter as a given since...yes.


1. Tortall by Tamora Pierce.  I first read the Alanna quartet when I was in elementary school (and when the covers were SO terrible), and I loved the story of the girl who dressed up as a boy to become a knight.  I loved her magic and the chivalry and the King of Thieves with his knives and the Prince who chose her as his Squire even though he knew she was a girl. 

I forgot about the books for years though, as one does, and came back to them when I found Trickster's Choice at the bookstore and discovered that Pierce was still writing about her world!  Ever since, I've kept rereading the different quartets and duos that make up the Tortall world because they're all filled with great stories about knights and spies, thieves and cops, dragons and rebellions, and lots of awesomely strong girls and boys.

2. Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead.  This is a newer series obviously, but I've reread the poor books - especially the first four so many times.  I love the world Richelle created and how it's so very different from what you'd typically consider in a vampire novel.  I love the strength of Rose and her utter loyalty to the people she loves.  And I love the love story.  Of course.

3. The Drina Books by Jean Estoril.  Another childhood series, this one about a would be British ballet dancer in mid-twentieth century London.  Drina can be such a Mary Sue, but I love her and her struggles and they're some of those books that I love to curl up with when I want to shut the world out.

4. The Shoes Books by Noel Streatfeild.  Yup, childhood favourite again, and again, books about children on stage.  Between these books and the Drina books is it any surprise that I knew British slang almost better than US slang when I was little?  I wanted to go to Madame Fidolia's Children's Academy of Dancing and Stage Training so, so, so badly. 

This Friday's Question:

Reading Challenges: Did you sign up for any this year?
How has your progression been?

I've never signed up for a single reading challenge!  I've paid attention to them on Goodreads or blogs for a few years, but I've never actually signed up.  Maybe I should for next year?  What ones do you guys recommend?

BBAW and TGIF!

How is it Friday already?  But Book Bloggers Appreciation Week is coming to an end, and it's been a great week of getting to know other bloggers and enjoying everyone's posts about this fantastic community!

One last prompt then from the week:

The world of blogging is continually changing. Share 3 things you think are essential tried and true practices for every blogger and 1-3 new trends or tools you’ve adapted recently or would like to in the future.

I don't think I've been blogging long enough to have any tried and true practices!  But I think one of the things to remember is that we're always getting better at what we do, and it's important to let your habits and practices change as things make sense to you.  But then I think that about everything so I can't say it's restricted to blogging!

One of the things I've adapted recently is the use of letter grades to preface my reviews.  I feel like I want to indicate in some way - beyond my often lengthy reviews! - my overall thoughts on the book, but I'm unsure if this is the best way for it.  It's so difficult to decide what letter grade to give!  And then how do I distinguish between them and...it's been a bit of a crap shoot so far.  I'm not sure I like them, but I can't think of a better way to go about it.

I've also tried to be more aware of linking to Amazon to purchase a book and to Goodreads to find more reviews and thoughts on it.  I'd love to start the practice I've noticed on other blogs where one links to other bloggers' reviews of the same book, but I'm not sure I'm quite that organised yet to start it!


And now on to two Friday memes that I've been wanting to participate in for weeks and finally am!


 

 This week's featured blogger is Alaskan Book Cafe who's a snarky outdoor lover with as many problems picking a favourite book as I have!  Go check her out! 

Q. It's that pesky magic book fairy again! She has another wish: What imaginary book world would you like to make a reality?

Such a difficult question!  I'm tempted to answer Harry Potter's world since it's just so well-drawn and magical, and I desperately (still!) want to go to Hogwarts!  But I think I'll have to go with an older book world - can't I have Narnia be real?  I've always wanted to crawl through my wardrobe and end in up in that magical land with Talking Beasts and Cair Paravel...

This Friday's Question:

Book Disappointments: Have you ever come across a book you were so stoked to read, but it failed miserably in your eyes?

 Haven't we all?  It's a very, very depressing fact of reading that sometimes the books we look forward to disappoint us utterly.
I'll choose three books that I read before starting this blog that left me colder than I'd hoped.  I'm sure these books have people who love and adore them, but for some reason, they were not for me.

Where I Belong
by Gwendolyn Heasley

I loved the idea of a fish out of water story - the New York socialite moving to rural Texas, but I couldn't connect at all with the rather spoiled main character of Corinne.

...and maybe as a slightly country (though Northern country) girl myself, I hate the implications about how New York is always so much better!

Die for Me
by Amy Plum

It's set in Paris!  About sisterly bonds!  There's a swoon-worthy love affair and scenes set in the sidewalk cafes that abound in the City of Lights.  How could I not love this book?

But I didn't.  And I'm still really quite sad over that.

 The Pickwick Papers
by Charles Dickens


Any Dickens really that's not Tale of Two Cities or Hard Times could go here, but Pickwick Papers disappointed me the most.  I tried to read it right after falling in love with the descriptions of it in Little Women, but...no.

Dickens is just too overly indulgent in his writing.  It turns about and about and never goes anywhere. To be fair, this is a problem I have with most 19 century male English or American novelist, but Dickens, oh Dickens, I want to love your work!