Book Review--Princess Academy by Shannon Hale

Every time I read a book by Shannon Hale, I end it thinking, "I want to BE Shannon Hale." I'm giving this book 5 stars because I love her prose. I love how she writes. It's as if she pays special attention to each sentence and makes sure that each sentence is perfect and almost musical.

I really love Miri. I love that she is a strong character and at the same time, isn't sure what she wants until the end. There were times I was able to relate to Miri, thinking back to being in grade school and wanting the friendships I felt I saw other girls having without me, not caring that I was excluded, but at the same time hating it. Then only realizing later that it was partially my own fault for not taking the initiative.

I'm debating reading it to Megan. There is a scene that I think will scare her, but I think in the end, she'll be fine. Especially if we read through it to the end so she can see it ends ok after the scary stuff.

Book Review-- The Ice Cream Theory

The Ice Cream Theory by Steff Deschenes

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


If I could it would be somewhere between 2.5 and 3 stars. Or maybe I'd do 3 stars for the first half of the book and 2.5 for the last bit.

This was the most recent book club book. I enjoyed a lot of the stories and found Deschenes to be an amusing writer. However, she is quite stuck on herself. The first 2/3 of the book contain stories about mostly friends and family and how they are like certain ice cream flavors. The last 1/3 of the book is about guys that she dated and the ice cream flavors they are like. It's that last 1/3 of the book that lost me. I got tired of her dropping the guys because she got scared, or didn't want to be committed, or whatever.

The whole idea is that people are like certain flavors of ice cream for a reason. Or rather, that certain flavors of ice cream have human characteristics (however you want to look at it). But, she didn't really do a good job of showing that through the book. It was more, "I ate ice cream with this person and most of my memories associated with that person are centered about that flavor ice cream, so that person is said ice cream." Or, "This person liked this flavor best and this is why they are like it since it's their favorite." It was all based on her memories of what ice cream she ate most often with each person instead of what each person was actually like.

That being said, I did enjoy a lot of the stories and I enjoyed her description of each ice cream's personality and there were times I laughed out loud to myself. If you decide to read it, stop when she starts all the stories about internet dating :)

Also, I think according to her I'd be vanilla because I'm pretty conservative. I have a problem with that since I only ever have vanilla in my freezer if I'm planning on making root beer floats.  :)



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