Maria's Mélange

As of the posting of this stop on the Heartless blog tour - there are SIX DAYS left until the book releases into the wild (on November 8th). You still have plenty of time to preorder and snag a copy the very first day it is on the shelves! When I first heard about this Countdown Blog tour, I wasn't sure what each day's task would be. I loved this book enough to happily volunteer as tribute - even if my task ended up being something like "make a picture of a character from Heartless out of M&Ms and hat pins". (True story, that's actually what I said in my email!)  A black heart for Heartless I did participate in many of the other Heartless Countdown activities.... as you can see by some of my favorite photos. My copy of Alice in Wonderland           Tea time with Heartless (and my puppy) Everyone deserves a crown       My assigned task, though, was much easier than handcrafting person...

Wonder Women: 25 Innovators, Inventors, and Trailblazers Who Changed History by Sam Maggs (Goodreads Author) , Sophia Foster-Dimino (Illustrator) Hardcover, 240 pages Published October 4th 2016 by Quirk Books ISBN 1594749256 (ISBN13: 9781594749254) I can’t get enough of books that showcase amazing ladies from history. So often, though, we get the same ten biographies. I adore Sally Ride and Eleanor Roosevelt, but I also want to know about women who have been more neglected by publishing until now. So when I heard that Sam Maggs was going to share the stories of another twenty-five history changing women, I knew I wanted to get my hands on that book. Maggs splits the history-making ladies in her book into five chapters: Science, Medicine, Espionage, Innovation, and Adventure. We get substantial information on five women in each chapter, but we also get seven shorter biographies at the end of each chapter. As an added bonus, each chapter concludes with a Q&A with a woman ...

It's been a while since Batty About Books hit the trail. Last year seemed so crazy - so hectic - that we really didn't get a chance to read anything together. What would it take to get us moving? What kind of book would push us to get the band back together again? Well... take a LOOK at this one. Shadowshaper by Daniel José Older (Goodreads Author) Hardcover, 304 pages Published June 30th 2015 by Arthur A. Levine Books (first published January 1st 2015) ISBN 0545591619 (ISBN13: 9780545591614) (Join us on our blogs  (Kathy is at The Brain Lair ) , on  Facebook , or Tweet/IG with #BattyAboutBooks and/or #Shadowshaper. We'll post brief thoughts and quotes from the text during the week.) I'll admit, I had heard about this book before seeing the cover. There were rumbles about this being an intriguing storyline. When I saw the cover, though, I was hooked. FRONT: + The first thing that strikes me is the strength in that face. So often I feel lik...

Welcome to my little corner of book heaven. Here's what I read the last two weeks. Don't forget to visit the lovely hosts of this meme -  Teach Mentor Texts  and  Unleashing Readers . There are links to a LOT of posts there! Cybils Short List - I completed these titles in the past two weeks. Young Adult: I LOVED this book! I need to read the rest of the series, although I am sad that my favorite character is gone. Zombies and journalism... oh, yeah. PopSugar - over 500 pages Intriguing look at Levana's early life and what made her the woman she is today. Short, but will make the wait for Winter easier. PopSugar - 2015 release We need a LOT more historical fiction set around the Suffrage movement. This was a great one. PopSugar - Cover Love Intriguing premise for science fiction - we have aliens we are desperately hoping will make an alliance with us, so we set up an "exchange" program. I liked th...

Just one more post on my favorites from last year - and then I promise I'll jump right into all of this year's reading. Science Fiction / Urban Fantasy Cress The first two books in this series made it onto my "not published in 2014" list. I'm so thankful I got an ARC of this book, and that looking at that book got me moving on reading the series. I love the science fiction spin on the fairy tales and I LOVE the characters. I can't wait for Fairest and Winter to come out this year! Firebug I just adore Lish McBride. I love her snarky dialogue and I love her characters. Review and interview: http://www.mariaselke.com/2014/09/firebug-blog-tour-q-and-giveaway.html If you want a little taste of her writing style, check out this short story. It has the main characters from Firebug. It doesn't spoil anything from the book and it doesn't expect you to know the plot already.... http://www.tor.com/stories/2014/12/burnt-sugar-lish-...

(http://doctorwhogifs.tumblr.com/)  Yeah.... it's been a while. Totally my bad. I got in a slump (though I have been reading) and I haven't been posting to my blog hardly at all.  Since my last It's Monday post was over a month ago, I am certainly NOT going to try to cover everything I have read in the past six weeks. I love you all too much to do that to you. I'll just snag a few of my favorites and call it a week. This non fiction picture book biography is delightful. It comes out in October, so I will do a full review closer to publication. Put it on your list... you want it. I'm guessing this is already on the radar (or already read) for most of you... but definitely make sure you get the grand finale of the Silver Jaguar series. Perfect for younger middle grade readers. They will eat it up! Pardon the mess.... An amazing selection of nonfiction picture books. My favorites in this pile were The Noisy Paint Box , Handle with Care , Fea...

And so it ends… Welcome to all those who decided to do a read-along with Batty. Welcome to those who are just stopping by the blog to hear about Not a Drop to Drink . Today’s post has some spoilers, since it is hard to write about the end of a book without them! Want to join in the fun? Check out our… Facebook Page Tumblr For those of you who are new to our Batty Chats - Maria’s thoughts with Kathy’s responses are hosted here on the Melange. Kathy’s (aka @thebrainlair) thoughts with Maria’s responses reside on The Brain Lair . Take a peek at both of sides and add your own voice into the mix! Don’t forget to check out our discussion of: Cover Appeal Part One (pages 1-95) Part Two (pages 96- 195) I had some mixed feelings about the ending chunk of this book. Once again, I think sometimes the way we are reading the book - dividing it into smaller pieces - calls greater attention to some of the problems I might miss if I just gobbled it down quickly. Kath...

Happy Star Wars Day to all! There are some amazing Star Wars books on the shelves today - with even more on the horizon. With the excitement over Star Wars Rebels and Episode VII building, I'm sure that they will continue to be easy to find. Take, for example, this upcoming series that was recently announced.. Dark Horse has ongoing comic series , and Chronicle Books has Jeff Brown's  Jedi Academy and adorable picture books (two are already out, and Goodnight Darth Vader is coming in July!) Yet the books that feature actual Star Wars characters and story-lines are just the tip of Sarlacc pit. If you jump in *, you'll find that authors writing today love to lace their stories with pop culture references to Star Wars. * I wouldn't recommend jumping into the Sarlacc pit, though, unless you relish the thought of being digested over several thousand years. In fact, perhaps I should try to find a better metaphor? Here are a few of the books I...

Not a Drop to Drink by Mindy McGinnis  - Part One  (pages 1-95) Welcome to all those who decided to do a read-along with Batty. Welcome to those who are just stopping by the blog to hear about Not a Drop to Drink . Today’s post has some spoilers , though I tried to stick to things that happen early in the story.   Kathy’s post kept much more spoiler free. Want to join in the fun? Check out our… Facebook Page Tumblr For those of you who are new to our Batty Chats - Maria’s thoughts with Kathy’s responses are hosted here on the Melange. Kathy’s (aka @thebrainlair) thoughts with Maria’s responses reside on The Brain Lair. Take a peek at both of sides and add your own voice into the mix! Don’t forget to check out our discussion of: Cover Appeal Questions: Why is water a problem? I know that Lynn and her mother are concerned about the quality of the water in their pond and the local streams, but what happened? I’m hoping we get some of the o...