Weekly Round Up: Early Edition

Since I will be missing most of the weekend, here's this weeks Weekly Round Up.

1.) WE HAVE A TRAILER!!!!
 Okay, I know I just broke a bunch of Internet grammar rules, but COME ON! Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Sea of Monsters finally has a trailer! Unfortunately, the only way to see it in high quality is if you're willing to cough up ten bucks for a movie ticket to see The Host, but it might be worth it!
  I managed to find one single video on the web, and it's not high quality, but it's still awesome. Check it out!
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xykl5z_percy-jackson-sea-of-monsters-2013-trailer_shortfilms

Is Nathan Fillion great or what? But no matter how great he is, if he doesn't make a few Firefly references in PJO, then I will...uh.... do nothing, but get very upset....I guess......

2.) In other trailer news, Cassandra Clare, author of The Moral Instruments and Infernal Devices books has released stills of the new theatrical trailer which will debut on April 1st. (That better not be a prank...) Anyway, for the full story Click here!

3.) Well, this isn't really "news" but it's still pretty cool.

  The Hunger Games Fireside Chat has released "100 Things to Do Before 'Catching Fire'" video, which is both creative and funny. Go check it out!

And that's it for the week!
  May the odds be ever in your favor, the Force with you, your sword ever sharp (or what ever Christopher Paolini uses to sign off) your wand held high, and your life awesome, good bye for now.

What's Up with Reality?

     If you've been reading this blog for a while (which not many have) you've probably noticed I spend a lot of time on the internet, especially fan sites, which I usually love. The one thing I don't especially enjoy is haters. But the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen a hater say is "I don't/didn't like the book because it doesn't seem/wasn't realistic." Despite that, they love fantasy.
    Is walking into a wardrobe and finding a magic land filled with talking beavers realistic? No. Is living in a world where children are shoved into an arena and forced to fight to the death realistic? No. Is getting a letter accepting you to a school full of wizards realistic? Still no? What about finding out one of your parents is a Greek god? Or that there's a civilization of fairies living under ground? Or that there could ever be a world where love is a disease?
    The answer to all of that is no. None of those scenarios are realistic in the least. The characters aren't that true to life either. What 11 year old would really go off by themselves to defeat a dark wizard who killed his parents without any adult help? Would a 12 year old really have the guts to walk into Hades realm and back? Why would anyone let a bunch of 16 year olds lead the country into rebellion?
    NO!
    And that’s the point! The whole point of reading fiction is because it's fiction. Our beloved characters are not real people, they do not really exist, and their purpose in the real world is to take us into their own. People read fantasy to escape their everyday life. They read to forget that they're just another random unimportant guy in a boring office or that they're just a wimpy high school nerd.
    People love fantasy because it draws us out of ourselves and transforms briefly into the characters we're reading. When they're scared, we're scared. When they're crying, we're crying. When they're safe, so are we. When we read, we leave all reality behind and let ourselves get lost in a world that we could never imagine otherwise. We can fly on the backs of dragons, journey to the end of the earth, fight wars with swords led by a 12 year old general, and just stop being us.
    So what is wrong with unrealistic books?

Weekly (or something) Round Up

 Here's a new feature I'm adding to the blog--Weekly Round Up! Each Monday I'll give a quick (or not so quick) run down of recent Fandom news!
 So here I go.

1.) Ben Lloyd-Hughes, Ben Lamb, and Christian Madison have been casted as Will, Edward, and Al, respectively, in the "Divergent" movie, coming out next year. Yippee! We're one step closer to completing our Divergent cast!

2.) Cassandra Clare's new book "Clockwork Princess" has finally arrived, leaving the whole Mortal Instruments fandom in a state of complete emotional overload and the urge to strangle/hug/scream at Cassandra Clare.

3.) The Hunger Games Fireside Chat (http://www.hgfiresidechat.com/podcast/2013/03/hunger-games-fireside-chat-podcast-100 has just aired it's 100th episode! I stumbled upon this amazing gem in the middle of 2011, while browsing the internet for Hunger Games news, and was so glad I did--if you're a Hunger Games fan, click on the link and check it out!

That's all for this weeks Weekly Round Up! Tune in next week for another Round Up!

Happy (belated) Pi Day!

  Happy Mathematical and Food-like Pi day!
  Today is the day when nerds from all over the world congregate and celebrate the magical nerd number that the geometrical world seems to revolve around! ( That really didn't make sense but it makes me sound smart, so...)
  In honor of  this Day of Extreme Math Nerdiness with Regular Nerdyness (which is the correct way to spell the state of being of being a nerd? I'll never know...) here are some Pi related things to go check out.

 First, a stupidly ridiculous song I made up about Pi.
  Yes, I'm that much of a geek.

Happy happy Pi Day, may all your dreams come true!

I wish I brought some pie with me so you could taste it too

Happy happy Pi Day, we all know it's the best

to celebrate this holiday we'll have a Pi/pie fest--er, uh... Festival? But that doesn't rhyme.....

(And I don't know why the font is blue either... I guess I'm just having one of those weird days...)

   And next, since no holiday can be perfect, here is a video about the wrongness of Pi. Ha ha ha, I am such a negative person..... Sigh.

          Okay, so now that you've wasted all this time learning aobut a holiday that has probably already ended, since most of you won't read this until the 15---

  Oh forget it. Just go get some pie and leave a dozen comments under this blog about the ways you celebrate Pi day, and the correct way to spell "Nerdieness" Then get some more pie. And bring me a slice too.....

Oh, and I don't own the video.

The Internet Grammar Rules.

  Ah, Grammar. One of the many joys of speaking. But after you've memorized everything from how to punctuate a quote to learning when to put a hyphen, what else is there to learn except the innumerable Internet Grammar Rules, right?
  To be perfectly honest, I have very little clue what I'm talking about. I've never actually seen a printed list of these "Internet Grammar Rules" but everyone seems to assume that somewhere out there in the deep recesses of the internet, there is an actual list that actual people follow and that everyone else on the internet not only recognizes these rules to be true, but follows them religiously. And may the internet overlords help you if you fail to follow them.
  So what are these complicated rules that everyone seems to quote? Since there's no actual list, this is a hard question to answer. But here are some general ones that most people seem to recognize. Feel free to quote this list and share it to your friends.

1.) Thou shall NEVER use capitol letters to indicate shouting or emphasis. EVER.
    This is also a rule in regular offline writing to. Despite that, if you take out Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (book five) and open it to page 824 in the U.S. Paperback edition,  you will see that when Harry is shouting,  JK Rowling writes his shouts with caps lock, not italicization. I guess the rich/famous are above the law. Or maybe it's because she's British...

2. Thou shall not use LOL/ikr/me 2 in a blog/web post. It is considered unprofessional. 
    LOL.

3. Thou shall not use exclamation points to much! It's annoying!!! And when you do use them, don't use more than one!!!!

4. Thoushall always usecorrect spacing when writing.

5. Just because you add a :) or a ;) to a the end of a mean comment doesn't make it less mean.
  This is just commen sense, folks. Seriously.

6. thou shall always Start sentences with a capitol Letter, and Omit random Capitol letters throughout thy sentence.

7. Unless numbering something, thou must type out numbers.
  This goes for writing in general too.

8. Thou shall not use more than three periods in a row…….
  Another true-to-life grammar rule, according to Microsoft. When you are typing out a quote nad want to make it appear that you are being cut off, use "--" instead of "...."

Non-grammar Internet Rules.

9. Thou shall never debate fictional character teams on the internet. Thou shall pay if thy dare to break this rule.
  Seriously. Don't walk into a virtual room full of Team Jacobs and brag about Edward.
  Similarly, don't walk into a virtual room full of Hunger Game fans and talk about Twilight. You will really pay for it if you do.

10. Thou shall not start an argument on YouTube.
      More common sense.

11. Thou shall not rub theses rules into everyone’s faces in every single thing thy posts.

12. Thou shall, however, quote these and give me credit for taking the time to type these up.

  Anways… that was your grammar lesson for the day. Leave your own grammar rules in the comments!

Another Unread Book Series

   I may be jumping the gun a little by posting this, considering I've only read 3 of the 5 published books in the series, which still isn't concluded, but I just had to post this.
  If you need a good, non-cliché, original, non-romantic, action packed fantasy novel, the "Eli Monpress" series should be at the top of your To-Read list. Not only is this book a fresh take on just about everything, but it combines some of the greatest elements of writing all in one series. It has comedy, plenty of action, extremely loveable and imaginative characters, and a new kind of plot.
  The series focuses on Eli Monpress, a thief who's lifelong ambition has been to push his bounty past a million. To accomplish this, he sets up extravagant thieveries each more daring than the rest, and he gets away every time.
  Well, almost. See, his bounty has captured the attention of quite a few bounty hunters, each wanting a piece of his bounty. It also captured the attention of The Spirit Court, who sends a young spiritualist named Miranda along with her ghost hound to protect a national treasure from Eli. In this story, a spiritualist is a wizard who is able to communicate with spirits, like moss or fire and stuff. If I try to explain it much further, it sounds weird, but just like in the case of Artemis Fowl, it's totally not.
  Along the way, Eli's helpers, a superb swordsman named Josef, and a demonseed (read the book to find out what that is!) named Nico, help him along, get into trouble and despite being secondary characters, actually have interesting character arcs.
  Okay, so that's the positive stuff. Here's what was kind of off-putting for me.

         1.) Personally, it took a while to get into it. Just like with Percy Jackson and the Olympians, The Hunger Games, and even Harry Potter, I was hesitant at first before getting sucked in. The first half of the book (and the very end) was a little bit slow at least in the first book, but the rest is pure gold.
     2.) There seems to be a lot of villains. But hey, isn't that a good thing?
   3.) Eli is so awesome your head may explode. And he only gets better as the series goes on.
But after you get past those, the books are awesome.
Read. Them. Now.


 

From Page to Screen: What NOT to do.

  To some people, 2013 is the Year of the Snake. To others, it's the Year of the Multiple YA Novels Being Brought to Life on Screen. "The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones," "Beautiful Creatures," "Catching Fire," "Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Sea of Monsters" and "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" are just a few. Maybe Twilight and Harry Potter inspired them. Maybe the reaction to The Hunger Games gave people hope. Whatever the reason, 2013 shall be movie packed.
  However, along with the mind-blowing-epicness that will ensue, mistakes shall be plentiful. Here are a few do's and don’ts for the movie directors who will never read this blog ever in a million years. Sigh...

1.) Get the hair color right. And all the other character details, too. One of the biggest complaints from fans to the directors is "HEY! That character looks NOTHING like he did in the book!" Take "Percy Jackson and the Olympians." Annabeth has blond hair and grey eyes. Alexandra Daddario has brown hair and blue eyes. Most fans can look past the eye color, but come on! How hard is it to buy a can of hair dye? 

2.) Get the ages right too. Percy Jackson is not 16 in the book. He's 12. Enough said.

3.) Get the plot r--actually, just read the book. It describes the characters in great detail. It explains the plot. It takes care of the plot holes.

4.) Market the movie correctly! Don't make it seem to Twilighty. That is probably the worst comparison YA book fans could ever imagine! (Why is that? Twilight was a huge success.) Don't overplay the romance if it's an action book and don't market a middle grade book to teens and vice versa. It just. Doesn't. Work.

5.) Keep doing what you're doing. Despite all my complaints, I have to admit, any director willing to take on an adaptation of a young adult book is brilliant in my book. Thank, directors, for bringing our characters to life on the big screen, bringing new ideas to the table, and promoting them to all the world. You've introduced thousands of fans to new books, and gave the old fans something to cheer about. Forget all the negativity towards you and focus on the positive stuff. You're changing lives. You're giving people something to root for. You're ending world hun--
  ... Okay, I went a little crazy there. But seriously, thank you, directors of the world, for the movies, there will always be someone out there (me) who loves every inch of them, flaws or not.

And thanks to everyone keeping with my blog despite the chaotic posting schedule. You rock. *

*As you can see, I'm feeling a bit over-sentimental tonight. My apologies for the weirdness.