Book Review: Spellwright by Blake Charlton

Blake Charlton is dyslexic. He was able to overcome it by reading fantasy novels in seventh grade. That inspired him to write. Spellwright is his first novel, and it is an outstanding one. It follows the story of a cacographer, the equivalent of a dyslexic wizard - he misspells spells left and right. He ends up becoming part of a major prophecy even though a few years before it was determined that he was not the one the prophecy spoke of. This novel was very well thought out and I was very impressed. It was very unique and creative. It was a bit obvious that this is Charlton's fist novel, but he has more to follow and I am sure his writing will only improve. He plays with words a lot, which I enjoy. It was fun to read a completely brand new fantasy novel.

Book Review: The Tree House by Doug Thayer

This semester I am in a Latter-Day Saint Literature class. We just finished reading The Tree House by Doug Thayer. It is a novel about a Mormon boy named Harris who grew up in Provo, Utah. It is a coming-of-age novel and follows Harris as he grows up, goes through high school, serves a mission, and gets drafted to fight in Korea during the Korean War. At the beginning of the book, Harris has normal worries that any teenage boy would have, like getting a job so he can earn money to buy a car when he turns sixteen so he can take girls on dates. Harris also goes through dozens of trials that are hard for some of us to imagine coping with, but at the same time he has some trials that many Latter-Day Saints go through, like gaining a testimony. The book is divided into sections starting with Harris' young life in Provo, then following him on his mission to Germany right after World War II, then to Korea to fight in the trenches, and at the end it wraps back to Provo, Utah. The writing style of this book is unique; Thayer writes mostly in short, choppy sentences, kind of like a young man would think. I personally enjoyed Thayer's writing style. The Tree House was not a particularly exciting novel, but I feel like it had good messages and ideas. I enjoyed the section about his mission, but the part about Korea was hard for me to get through. Overall, I think this book is one that most Latter-Day Saints should read.

poofy hair and Converse

The other night, my roommate and I went to a UVU Institute Halloween dance. Nikki, my roommate, goes to UVU. We decided to dress up all 80's. It was really fun! We googled 80's stuff and referenced the Cosby Show for some fashion advice. We cut old t-shirts so they would be off-the-shoulder and we wore lots of eye shadow. We were able to improvise leg warmers by wearing tall socks over our skinny jeans. The dance was a lot of fun and basically Nikki and I looked awesome. :)

"what do I do? oh, I just get paid to stand in stairwells..."

Today I worked at the stadium for the football game. This other girl and I were putting napkins and spoons in all the Loges (the boxes where fancy people sit). There are two floors of Loges. We were trying to go up a floor so we could finish, but we got locked in the stairwell! We weren't in there very long, but it was kind of ridiculous. Luckily, the girl I was with had a different girl's number who also works at Catering, and luckily we had our cell phones. So she called the other girl who then radioed our Captain, who then came to rescue us. So today I got paid to stand in a stairwell.

Goodbye Summer

Utah has decided to ditch summer. I dislike this decision. This week it's been rainy and very cloudy and we've had some thunder and lightning. Now, I'm excited about the rain because I'm an Oregonian, but I will miss sitting outside in the sun. And Utah seems to have the shortest fall possible. Last year, it seemed to jump from summer to winter, and I'm hoping it'll be bit different this year. But at least I work inside for football games this year, so I won't freeze during work. Mt. Timp has snow, so the rest of the mountains will follow soon. Goodbye Summer! I'll miss you!

Back at BYU as a SOPHMORE

Yup, true story. I am now a Sophmore at BYU! I'm living in an apartment that's about 17 minutes from the middle of campus. I still work at BYU Catering and I'm still an English major. My roommates are great and classes aren't so bad either. I've gotten tons of goofy injuries and it's only been one week! I smooshed my hand between a door and a cart at Catering and it got scratched up and bruised. Then I scraped my hand - the same one- on my wall while trying to make my bed. And then just today, I scraped my basket across my leg by accident and now I have a big old ugly scratch. It's apparently the year for getting beat up but hopefully we won't have a repeat of the Dishwasher Incident! I would LOVE to get some letters! Here's my address:
1565 N University Ave. Lodge #159
Provo, UT 84604
GO COUGARS!

Book Review: Princess of the Midnight Ball by Jessica Day George

This was another one of those books I just happened upon at the public library. I am always interested in anything to do with princesses and the cover of this book was intriguing.

Princess of the Midnight Ball is a spin off of the Twelve Dancing Princesses fairy tale. I am not familiar with this fairy tale at all and apparently there are multiple variations. Anyways, in this young adult novel, twelve royal sisters are forced to dance for a horribly wicked king - King Under Stone who is no longer human. Every night, they must travel down an enchanted staircase into a world that is below ours. This world is full of darkness and strange creatures that resemble humans. King Under Stone plans for the princesses to marry his twelve sons and when their children have children, they will be able to once again move about in the real world and survive in sunlight. But Galen, a young soldier-turned-gardner shows up and has some tricks up his sleeve. Of course, good triumphs over evil.
I was pleased to discover that Jessica Day George is LDS. She attended BYU and now lives in Salt Lake City, Utah. I thought she did a fantastic job with this novel. It was one of those books that I didn't want to put down. Her writing was impressive and the details she gave were fantastic. (She didn't go overboard though; it was not like Anne of Green Gables.) The story was obviously well thought out and this is a novel that is good for almost any age (I am 19 and loved it, and I passed it on to my sister who is 13 and I'm sure she'll enjoy it too). I would definitely put Princess of the Midnight Ball right next to Ella Enchanted and Goose Girl on my book shelf, no questions asked.