Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created and hosted at The Broke and The Bookish. Every week they create a new list for bloggers. If you want to sign up, you can go here. This week’s list is for the top ten books I’ve added to my TBR list lately. 🙂
I’m a little worried about this one, it seems like there’s going to be a love triangle. However, it takes place in Paris and reminds me of Anna and The French Kiss so…I’m ready.<3
I’ve never read one of Hannah’s books but I own Not Otherwise Specified. She seems to be awesome on Twitter and I love the summary of this book, so I want to read it. It’s about fairies! ❤
I have no idea what this is about, but it’s by Amy Zhang who last year wrote Falling Into Place. I loved that book, therefore I will read whatever she puts out.
I discovered this book a few days ago but brushed it off because of the 3.00 rating. I’ve looked closer and see there were only four ratings, so I’m giving this a shot! Of course.
Let’s see, it takes place during World War 1 and the main character, Samantha joins a woman’s spy group. Um, spies? YES PLEASE. I’ve been wanting to read books about female spies. I’m ready. ❤
Hi everyone. 🙂 The monthly recap is one of my favorite posts to do even though it’s a bit time consuming. Every month I recap my life, my blog, music, movies, Broadway and book news as well.
~Life~
Life lately has been all right. I had to take two of my cats to the vet this past month, that wasn’t fun. Other than that, not too much has happened. Story of my life, right? Ha. I’ve had a huge reading slump all month which is why I only read one book. 😦 And didn’t review too much. I’m snapping out of it though, I think.
I won a lot of giveaways this month. 🙂 Which I’m now going to list here because, why not?
ARC of Lying Out Loud by Kody Keplinger (From Debby at Snuggly Oranges)
MY HEART AND OTHER BLACK HOLES has been optioned for film by Paramount Pictures with Anonymous Content producing!
Under A Painted Sky by Stacey Lee had a second printing.
The Wrong Side of Right by Jenn Marie had a second printing
~Music~
Oh my goodness, it’s been such a good music month for me. I’ll have to break this into sections.
-Songs I Was Obsessed With-
Shots by Imagine Dragons
Piece By Piece by Kelly Clarkson
Failure by Breaking Benjamin
Happy by Marina and The Diamonds
Forget by Marina and the Diamonds
I’m A Ruin by Marina and The Diamonds
Karaoke by Smallpools
-Albums I Liked-
Piece By Piece by Kelly Clarkson
Froot by Marina and The Diamonds
LOVETAP! by Smallpools
-Discovered Music-
I’ve liked Ayumi for a while, but I kind of never gave all of her songs a whole listen. I found this video when someone shared it on Popjustice. It’s so amazing. ❤ This was a great era for her apparently. This may be is my favorite live video of all time. So beautiful.And when the lights hit and all of the decorations drop, I fall apart. It’s so beautiful.<3 I would have died to see her at this concert. Oh my gosh….
Runaway by Aurora
Young Blood by Bea Miller
Ryn weaver “OctaHate”
Steppin’ Out by Kaskade
Divine Inspiration “The Way” by Divine Inspiration
Fifty Sixty by Alizee
Song Teasers
So gorgeous, it reminds me of I Never Learn by Lykke Li (highly recommended, by the way.
She’s back guys! I’m dying<3
-New Songs-
This song seriously gives me life. ❤ Sounds just like old BB.
I just found this song from Ginger’s tweet on twitter.
I adore this video so so so much. It feels like a movie and I want a movie based on this. It’s so beautiful. I love it so so so much. ❤ It’s so….amazing.
-Newly Favorited Songs-
Fallen Angel by Three Days Grace
You’ve Haunted Me All My Life by Death Cab For Cutie
Believe by Mumford & Sons
Dead Inside by Muse
Emoticons by The Wombats
Crystals by Of Monsters and Men
Can You Blame Me by Matt and Kim
Lifted Up by Passion Pit
~Movies/Musical Related~
OH MY GOSH, BEAUTY AND THE BEAST IS CONTINUING TO BEING CAST.
Okay, so we have Mulan, can we please get a live action version of Aladdin and The Hunchback of Notre Dame now please? Pleaseeeeee.
~TV Show Wise~
Glee ended. 😦 The finale was pretty great though, I wish some things had been different, but I still loved it. Especially the flashback episode.
iZombie launched! I’ve only watched the Pilot so far though. 😦 I was busy last week with something and missed it. I’m so excited for it though because Rob Thomas is behind it. (Adapting it, I mean, he didn’t actually think of the idea himself).
The Vampire Diaries has gone on on a small hiatus and won’t be back until next month for the final four episodes in the sixth season. 😦
i’m working my way through Veronica Mars again. 🙂 This time, I’ve been having my cousin watch it with me. OH! I also got Kaitlin hooked on it as well. So proud. 😉
I’m also catching up on Boy Meets World with season 2, I forgot how good the earlier seasons are because I love the later ones (mostly) so much.
~Purchases (Books, Albums, DVDs)-
~Books Bought~
Liars Inc by Paula Stokes
Written In The Stars by Aisha Saeed
Under A Painted Sky by Stacey Lee
The Wrong Side of Right by Jenn Marie Thorne
Not Otherwise Specified by Hannah Moskowitz
Falling Into Place by Amy Zhang
-Books Pre-Ordered-
A Court of Thorn and Roses by Sarah J. Maas
The Start of Me and You by Emery Lord
An Ember In The Ashes by Sabaa Tahir
All The Rage by Courtney Summers + Bonus book (I can’t remember the name…)
Simon VS. The Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli
-Albums Bought-
Veronica Mars Movie Soundtrack
Imagine Dragons “Smoke + Mirrors”
Fall Out Boy “American Beauty/American Psycho”
-Albums Pre-Ordered-
i pre-ordered a couple albums that have now come out, so if that’s the case, I will also put “(Now own)”.
Marina and The Diamonds “Froot” (Now own)
Kodaline “Coming Up For Air” (Now own)
Smallpools “Lovetap!” (Now own)
Breaking Benjamin “Dark Before Dawn” (Pre-ordered)
Three Days Grace “Human” (Now own)
Death Cab For Cutie “Kintsugi” (Now own)
Muse “Drones” (Pre-Ordered)
The Wombats “Glitterbug” Deluxe (Pre-Ordered)
Of Monsters and Men “Beneath The Skin” (Deluxe) (Pre-Ordered)
Mumford & Sons “Wilder Mind” (Deluxe) (Pre-Ordered)
-DVDS Bought-
Veronica Mars Season 2
Veronica Mars Movie
Amelie
Boy Meets World Season 2
~How Did I Do With My Resolutions?~
I’m still working on these….
~How Did I Do With My Challenges?~
I read Positively Beautiful for the Netgalley and Edelweiss Reading Challenge.
I wrote three discussions for the Book Blog Discussion Challenge.
I read Positively Beautiful for the Debut Author Challenge.
Weekly recap is a pretty self explanatory post. I recap what’s happened in my life, in the blogging world, on my blog and what’s coming up.
Stacking The Shelves is a weekly meme hosted at Tynga’s Reviews where bloggers can link up and share the books they’ve received over the week.
~My Life~
Life? Stress. Chaos. Drama. I’m ready for April now. 🙂
~Highlights~
I attended Paula Stokes Twitter Party for Liars Inc! Co-hosted with Ensconced In Lit. It was fun. I won swag. 😀
I found my ipod! It was….um, on the inside zippered pocket of my purse….apparently that was the one place I thought it couldn’t/wouldn’t be. Ha…
I received book mail! Which I’ll talk about in STS. 🙂
I participated in Bloggiesta, had so much fun with it, learned some great tips, met some great people and I participated in almost every Twitter chat. ❤
I BOUGHT BOY MEETS WORLD SEASON 2.
I went cyber bowling last night. I was awful. But whatever.
I discovered #VeryRealisticYA, aka, the best thing ever. Let me also just say I was one of the first to do it after John Hansen did a ton of them. 🙂 (@ABoredAuthor)
Dahlia is so kindly giving me an ARC copy of The Wrath and The Dawn and I’m so thrilled.
I may will also be featured on a certain blog by the name of… Oh, The Books! 🙂 But it’s a surprise for you guys so still act surprised this week when you see me on there! 😀
~In The Blogosphere~
Holly @ The Fox’s Hideaway started her new feature Get Rec’d!
No, I haven’t read the first twelve, only the first two. 🙂 It was only $3.97 at Walmart so like, why wouldn’t I get it? Ha. Plus it was hardcopy!
Well, that’s it for my week. Let me know how yours was, if you participated in Bloggiesta, if you’re having as much fun with this #VeryRealisticYA tag as I am, what books you’ve won and what’s going on in your lives! I want to know. Have a good week. ❤
Hey everyone! One thing I love about this year is the diversity that a lot of books are having, especially involving LGBTQIA. There are more books coming out with Lesbian and Gay teens and I was so happy to discover None of The Above, a novel about a teenager who is intersex.
You may have seen my post featuring this book in One Day More, a couple months ago because I loved it.
Tonight I am going to be reviewing None of The Above by I.W. Gregorio, a book I have been SO excited about since I saw it up on Edelweiss.
Published: April 7, 2015
Pages: 352
Genres/Themes: Young Adult, Contemporary, Social Issues, Sexuality
Format: E-ARC
Source: Edelweiss VIA Balzer + Bray
Rating: Four Stars
Disclaimer: I received an E-ARC curtesy of Balzer + Bray (HarperCollins) and Edelweiss, this in no way influences my opinion or this review.
What DOES influence my opinion of this book is the awesomeness that this book contains. If you don’t know what it’s about, here’s the Goodreads Summary for you below:
A groundbreaking story about a teenage girl who discovers she was born intersex . . . and what happens when her secret is revealed to the entire school. Incredibly compelling and sensitively told, None of the Above is a thought-provoking novel that explores what it means to be a boy, a girl, or something in between.
What if everything you knew about yourself changed in an instant?
When Kristin Lattimer is voted homecoming queen, it seems like another piece of her ideal life has fallen into place. She’s a champion hurdler with a full scholarship to college and she’s madly in love with her boyfriend. In fact, she’s decided that she’s ready to take things to the next level with him.
But Kristin’s first time isn’t the perfect moment she’s planned–something is very wrong. A visit to the doctor reveals the truth: Kristin is intersex, which means that though she outwardly looks like a girl, she has male chromosomes, not to mention boy “parts.”
Dealing with her body is difficult enough, but when her diagnosis is leaked to the whole school, Kristin’s entire identity is thrown into question. As her world unravels, can she come to terms with her new self?
Cover Thoughts: I love how the cover is mostly white and uses the “O”s in the title as sort of fill-in circles that are given to students on tests. I love how each of them is filled with a different color symbolizing male, female or “none of the above”. It’s really original.
First Line: Dawn is my favorite time of day.
Before The Book:
As soon as I heard about None of The Above, I knew I had to read it. This is the first book I’ve heard of that features an intersex teenager. I can’t imagine what it would be like to find something like that out. I am preparing myself for some serious feels now.
~Review~
And serious feels I felt, mostly those of anger. None of The Above was raw and heartbreaking.
This is a book everyone needs to read. A lot of the characters in None of The Above jump to the wrong conclusion about Kristin (or Krissy) when they found out she is intersex. In turn, they react cruelly and turn away from her. It is heartbreaking, inspiring and moving.
None of the above was such a huge eye-opener for me. Going in, I knew the very basics of what being intersex involved, physically at least. I was still ignorant on the actual scientific details though. None of The Above was really informative but didn’t beat you in the head with the information. It was gradually given and realistically told over time as Krissy and her dad learned more.
Before Krissy discovers she’s intersex, she’s happy, well-liked (she was voted homecoming queen after all), has a great boyfriend, two best friends and she’s a star runner in school. What could be better? This all comes crumbling down when the first time she tries to have sex, it’s extremely difficult for her. She gets an appointment and finds out she’s intersex.
I can’t imagine being in Krissy’s shoes. One night, she wins homecoming queen, quite unexpected and a week later, she learns she’s intersex. Specifically, Krissy has Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome, a form of the many intersex conditions there are.
I found Krissy’s reaction to be very realistic. She was scared, she was worried, and she didn’t know who or what she even was anymore. Did the testes she had make her more of a guy? Was she a girl because she never got her period? Was she now going to be a lesbian? Her confusion was so thoroughly portrayed as she dealt with it. I love how she worried about a lot of the preconceived notions that people have who aren’t familiar with intersex.
What was really realistic was how people acted when they found out Krissy was intersex, including herself. Her friends didn’t understand, her jerk of a boyfriend was a jerk, she was taunted at school because no one wanted to try to figure out what intersex really meant.
My heart ached throughout reading None of The Above because Krissy had almost no one to turn too. She didn’t know anyone in real life who was intersex and all her friends and classmates didn’t understand it.
Both of Krissy’s friends irritated me in None of The Above. Sam, Krissy’s boyfriend wasn’t any better. I just wanted to shake all three characters and tell them to really try to understand.
If that wasn’t enough, Krissy ends up getting tossed off her running team because other teams filed complaints about it. That was really frustrating to read because running was all Krissy had to really depend on. Later cyber bullying happens, real bullying happens and everything just escalates.
I love how much the topic of being female came about. This was a topic that was hit on a lot because Krissy was a woman who had male chromosomes. She didn’t have her period and didn’t grow hair, but did that make her less of a woman for what she didn’t have? Besides sexuality and gender, None of The Above also dealt a lot with self acceptance and confidence. Krissy went through a lot of turmoil trying to figure out who she was. In the midst of all that is romance, which I really liked because it was overshadowed and only played a small part in None of The Above.
I like how she came to grips about herself though in the end. What I really loved is the support that Kristin found. Although her friends had basically deserted her, she found support in a group, she made a friend she could relate to, Gretchen. I loved Gretchen, I like how she poked fun at herself and helped Krissy get through this. She found others, Darren and Julia, that weren’t going to let her being intersex get in the middle of their friendship and treated her like she wasn’t different at all.
~Final Thoughts~
I loved Krissy. I like how she dealt with who she was and how just because she was intersex, it didn’t mean it made her any different from who she was before. I like how she found true friends through her diagnosis. None of The Above dealt with intersex very realistically. At the end of the book, there is an author’s note that talks about the research Gregorio did when writing this book.
One small thing stuck out to me in None of The Above. It happens when Krissy is trying on her dress with her two best friends. She mentions how they were friends since before they were born.
We’d literally been friends since we’d been born, when our mothers bonded in a postnatal yoga class.
That line reminded me of Sisterhood of The Traveling Pants. 🙂 Overall, I really loved None of The Above and I’m so glad I.W. Gregorio wrote it. I only wish it was longer and I found out more about Krissy as she dealt with being intersex.
~Quotes From ARC~
(May be changed in final copy)
Say something often enough and you’ll believe it.
I knew it was stupid for that sentence to hurt. It wasn’t like Shakespeare wrote it with me in mind–he was talking about how Shylock’s daughter disguised herself as a boy to escape his house.
I lost myself in the numbers, and in the equations that I could actually solve.
Was I still my dad’s daughter, or should he start calling me his son?
They say that the best hurdlers learn to compartmentalize. They break down each race into its components and when they perfect the little things, the big picture comes together naturally. So I focused on one piece of my life at a time.
That was when I realized that life was a multiple-choice test with two answers: Male or Female. And I was None of the Above.
Some people eat comfort food,; I take comfort runs.
Maybe I was a glutton for punishment. But this I believed: It shouldn’t be possible to unlove someone so quickly.
Amber’s Rambles is a semi-regular feature at YA Indulgences where I talk about various topics involving books, blogging and the book blogging blogosphere.
Tonight I am going to be talking about Blog Feeds. I use BlogLovin’ while I know others use Feedly. I love BlogLovin’, it keeps all the blogs in on place, I can organize them, I can create collection and it marks a blog “Read” for me after I click on it. I can also save posts, which I love. So it’s basically a win for me. . .
Mostly.
I don’t know about you guys, but when I started book blogging in July, I followed anybody and everybody. What I mostly started following though were big blogs and a lot of my following incentives was “If I follow them, I get an extra entry for this giveaway”.
Yes, I was that person.
It didn’t really matter if I had never before seen the blog in my life. It didn’t matter if they were posting NA, which I’ve never read. I followed them no matter what.
On the other hand, I didn’t just follow blogs with giveaways or “big” blogs.
If I saw a post I liked, I would follow that blog without really examining it at all.
And then I started following music blogs, fashion blogs, photography blogs, art blogs, random lifestyle blogs. You can imagine how chaotic my feed is when I don’t “filter” it in the different folders I currently have.
Of course, this caused a few problems to occur.
Number One:
I don’t know who I like!
The book blogosphere has gotten massive, if I do say so myself. This makes it a bit hard to keep up with the blogs I like. For example, that saving post plus I mentioned above? Yeah, if I think about a past post I liked, I won’t know who it came from. This causes me to not be sure who I like.
This is causing me to go through every. single. blog. on my feed and put them into different categories, which I’ll get into later.
Long point, short: I DON’T KNOW WHO I LIKE ANYMORE. I’ve followed so many blogs I can’t remember why I followed them, which brings me to….
Number Two:
I’m sorry, who are you again?
I can’t remember who people are, chances are if I’ve talked to you on Twitter, I’m now following your blog (or will be, perhaps). This leads to me kind of forgetting who people are and again, me not knowing what blogs I like.
Number Three:
Loss of Comment Love
The bloggers/blogs I do love don’t always get commented on! 😦
When I’m checking my blogs, I generally just go in alphabetical order, so if you’re in the Y’s (like me, I really should have thought this whole blog title through), chances are I won’t ever get to you unless I make it a point to….
check blogs in reverse alphabetical order! Which I have done before.
The bloggers and blogs I love have a mix of names with their titles expanding from As to Is to Ls to Ts to Ys.
I can only check so many blogs in a day. 😦 So I don’t always check my favorites out.
Number Four:
I avoid my feed.
Seriously guys, there are just so many blogs on it and I get too intimidated to even try to comment on any. 😦 I almost created a “FAVORITE favorites folder….
Number Five:
I get to organize!
I now have to go through my feed and unfollow and categorize blogs. I don’t want to, hahaha….
Now this brings me to my point of this post. Over the past couple months, I’ve worked on getting my Feed cleaned out because it is a GIANT mess. If you don’t know, I am participating in Bloggiesta and one of my goals for the weeks was to participate in a mini challenge. I seriously thought about blowing this one off because this specific one is….
Of course, I was only going to blow it off because….why do something this week that I can procrastinate and do some time in the distant future? Ha. It’s like this post was meant just for me. Andi’s post has motivated me to organize my feed reader, which obviously, you guys know I SERIOUSLY need to do.
Andi gave the great tip of organizing the blogs into different folder based on when you can read them. For example, folders for everyday reads, weekday ones, weekends and a folder for blogs we think we want to follow forever. Or for the long haul. 🙂
I thought I would discuss how I am going to organize my feed reader into different folders.
Right now, I have the basic folders of:
Book Blogs (Any blogs not in my favorite blogs folder)
Fashion Blogs
Favorite Book Blogs
Music Blogs
Random (Yep, this is where all those lifestyle, random article blogs are, as well as whatever I followed without giving too much thought…)
I have added these new folders so far:
Possibly Unfollow
Weekends (Blogs I’m not sure if I’m interested in)
When I get done with this, I want to only have these folders (for book blogging):
Everyday Faves (My favorite blogs)
Weekend Wonders (Blogs I’m not sure about following)
New To Me (New blogs I’ve discovered and aren’t sure about following)
Possibilities (Possible blogs to unfollow due to different genres or loss of interest)
Looky, look, see, four nice blogging folders. Four of them. Don’t they look all organized? Yeah, I haven’t gotten that far yet, ha.
Yes, I do have a specific folders for blogs I will unfollow, my feed is that out of control….
This is definitely going to take a bit of time to do, at the moment I am currently following…
Oh, look at that!
751 blogs. Oh! Progress! I thought it was like 981, I have been unfollowing some blogs though 😦 as I’ve been cleaning out my feed.
So, this was such a fun post to do. Let me know what feedreader or system (bookmarks, lists, etc.) you use and how you keep your “reading of the blogs” in control.
And repeat with me: I will NOT follow all the blogs. I will NOT follow all the blogs.
Did you repeat it? Great!
Feel free to give me any tips or, you know, similar experiences you’ve had with following blogs. 🙂
Wondrous Covers Wednesday is a weekly feature where I show and talk about three (generally) YA book covers. 🙂 If you want to see past posts, you can go here.
This week I am going to be showing off covers with….swords. Yes, swords. Why? Because these covers are pretty awesome.
Is it weird if I say I like how pretty the sword is? I like how pretty the sword is. I love the background used, it’s so light and fantasy-ish. It kind of reminds me of a fairytale. I love the reflection in the sword which I didn’t catch at first glance.
While the book may have gotten questionable reviews, I do love this cover. I like the stormy background, the land and the designs surrounding the sword. I love how the land gives me the sense of a journey. It’s also very ominous and gives an interesting contrast compared to the Graceling cover.
So. . . I’m cheating just a little with this one, because that is not a sword on a cover, it’s a dagger. 🙂 All the same, I’ll treat it like it is. Unlike the previous two covers, The Young Elites features a dagger in the title. I loved this. I like how it takes the background rather than the focus of the cover. If I thought Seeker had an ominous cover, this one is even more so. I like how it’s against such a dark clouded background, it really gives emphasis to the mysteriousness aura the cover has.
Hi everyone. 🙂 It’s Top Ten Tuesday. TTT is a meme created and hosted at The Broke and The Bookish. Every week there is a new list for everyone to take part in. If you’re interested in it, you can go here.
This week’s list is about re-reading books from our childhood or teen years. I have to say, I didn’t read too much as a child. Do I lose my book blogger privileges now? 😉 I honestly think I only really read the Babysitter’s Club (+ BSC Little Sister) and R.L. Stine Fear Street books. Those definitely made up the bulk of my reading back then. It’s very unfortunate because I’ve been seeing others lists and they have like Charlotte’s Web, American Girl, Anne of Green Gables and…I have three series. 😦
So, I am going to do books from my teen years, this will most likely overlap with past TTT, but I’ll try to diversify a little. It will be a mix of classics, YA series and one children’s series. 🙂
~Top Books From Teen/Childhood Years That I Would Love To Revisit~
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton
The Crucible by Arthur Miller
Sisterhood of The Traveling Pants series by Ann Brashares
Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer
Blue Is For Nightmares series by Laurie Stolarz
Babysitter’s Club Series by Ann M. Martin
What can I say about BSC? I love those books, I never knew they were so short though until I looked them up on Amazon. And yes… that is Twilight you see. Haha, I’d like to re-read the series just to see what I think of them now. Anyway, here’s my list. What’s yours? 🙂
Hey everyone. I decided I needed to seriously get my blog into shape so…I am participating in the first ever week-long event of Bloggiesta. 🙂
To tell you more,
Bloggiesta is a blogging marathon revolving around ticking off those items on your to-do list and improving your blog while in the good company of other awesome bloggers doing the same thing. Our awesome mascot Pedro (Plan. Edit. Develop. Review. Organize) is ready to break out the nachos, enchiladas, drinks, mariachi music and whack a piñata or two! It’s nothing short of an awesome fiesta! This edition of Bloggiesta runs Monday, March 23rd – Sunday, March 29th.
❏ Set up basic review information for reviews yet to be written (Title/author, etc)
❏ Make basic header
❏ Pin reviews to Pinterest
If you’re participating, let me know! You can follow my progress here and with the #bloggiesta tag on Twitter. My Twitter Handle is @YAIndulgences. I’ll probably add a few more things to this list as I see others’ lists. 🙂
I’m finally almost done with Positively Beautiful by Wendy Mills. Other than that, I started Throne of Glass, but, I just can’t read such a long book right now, plus I have a ton of ARCs I need to get read. Hopefully this week will go better though.
~My Life~
Well, my cat went missing three times in the past day, the kitten, actually. She ended up getting outside three separate times somehow. Fortunately, we found her on the porch every time after that. he’s now sleeping. I believe she’s still sick so….back to the vet again tomorrow. *sighs*
I have also lost my ipod…and earphones…so I’m not happy about that. At all. I lost it somewhere in the house though, so that’s good. Kind of. Hopefully I find it soon. I wanted to add music to it. 😦
~Highlights~
I participated in Paula Stokes’ #MysteryTwitterTheater the past two days. 🙂 I did not win however, but I was pretty legit with my seven text documents and a dedicated (mini) notebook to the case. 🙂 You may still call me Mars (as in Veronica, of course).
I received my Veronica Mars stuff! I am now an official Marshmallow.
I have listened to Marina and The Diamonds Froot and I love it.
I saw The DUFF! I liked it a fair bit.
I won several giveaways, all that extra Tweeting really helps. 😉 (The Orphan Queen, Dead To Me, Anna Banks swag)
I didn’t see too many discussions this week, but I’ve been distracted so…let me know what you saw going on in the blogosphere! I’m interested in what I’ve missed out on.
More Than This Provincial Life is a feature that allows me to talk about shows, movies and music.
I haven’t watched Glee too long. I began last March with watching the first season. I’ve had various experiences with Glee before I ever began watching it “officially”.
1. Season 3 Finale
Ah, yes, I loved that brunette who sang Roots Before Branches as she went to New York and her boyfriend (due to him pushing her to). Of course, that wasn’t enough for me to watch the show.
2. The Quarterback (Season 5, Episode 3)
I remember hearing about Cory Monteith dying, but I never gave it a second though. “Oh, he was that guy on Glee. I wonder how the fans are going to take it?”. Then somehow one day, I began watching pieces of The Quarterback. Small scenes that had been uploaded to Youtube. I watched all that I could of the episode that way. It was heartbreaking to say the least.
3. Finchel (Finn/Rachel)
Watching snippets of The Quarterback lead me to being intrigued with Finchel. Of course, I didn’t know much about them, but I watched various videos fans put together of the two. It was this video that almost made me cry in Barnes and Noble. It was then thinking about The Quarterback episode and the great couple Finchel that would never be, that lead to me walking home alone (normally I’d go with my mom).
My favorite video that got me hooked on them was this one.
Of course, given the context of this video, the song and what happened to Cory, you can imagine it’s not exactly easy for me to watch. It is my favorite video though and the video that made me feel “I need to watch this show now”.
I can’t remember if I owned the first season of Glee before 2/3 or afterwards, but I remember seeing it on sale for 9.96 at Walmart and buying it. That was the best $9.96 I’ve ever spent.
4. The First Season
Of course, I fell head over heels in love with it from the moment Rachel sang On My Own from Les Miserables, one of my favorite musicals. My love for the show increased over the first season, seeing how the show dealt with issues like homosexuality, pregnancy, cheating, etc. The show felt very organic.
Later I watched the second season, I need to know what was going to happen. It went great mostly. Rachel was becoming more unbearable, but I still loved the rest of the characters.
Then the third season happened and I liked the first few episodes, but it was going in directions I didn’t care for.
I lost my longing to watch the show in the 9th episode.
I’d heard what happened to Rachel’s character and the drama involving Kurt and Blaine in the 5th season. I had no interest in watching it.
5. Season 6…
Then season six happened and I knew it was the end. So I watched the first two episodes and I liked them. But I wasn’t hooked like I was for the first two seasons. A few weeks later, I watched the wedding episode and it was amazing to see where some of these characters were after the first and second season. It was great seeing their “endgame”.
6. 2009
I haven’t watched an episode since then until tonight when they did the “double” finale. I always intended on watching this episode, despite not finishing the season.
The first part was “2009” and t was a flashback episode. I loved it all. I loved seeing Rachel’s Type A, driven personality that she had back then. I liked seeing most of the original members together. Of course, Finn, Cory Monteith, wasn’t in the episode, but there was quite a bit of talk about him. I loved that. My favorite part of the episode was the ending, I saw it coming since I could still remember the scene. It was amazing.
7. Finally, The Finale
It was a little hard to get into the finale with some of the drastic changes. Fortunately though, I loved all of the song choices and I was glad to see some unlikely duos. The last episode went through quite a few time jumps, quite similar to Les mis. Fast forward six months, then five years and finally five years again. I mostly enjoyed the episode, even if I wish some things had been changed.
8. The Point
I wish I could say I watch the show from the beginning. I honestly can’t remember the last time I watched a show from the very beginning to the very end. All of the shows I watch I catch when they’ve over or have been cancelled, (One Tree Hill, Ghost Whisperer, Gilmore Girls, Veronica Mars) or when they’re already in their third/fourth season (Pretty Little Liars, Glee). There are a couple exceptions to this, well, one, The Vampire Diaries.
I wish I would have given this show a chance when it first premiered. If I had though, maybe I would have just been disappointed with it like so many fans are (online). I’m never one to jump on the bandwagon, if a show’s popular, chances are I won’t watch it for that exact reason. Glee was blowing up when it first came out and despite me liking musicals, I didn’t want any part in watching it. I could just smack myself for thinking that way.
Anyway, watching the final two episodes was bittersweet to me. I wasn’t there for the beginning, but I was there for the end. I caught the show at such an interesting time, graduation, then again after Cory’s death, watching parts of The Quarterback and then becoming so into the show couple, Finchel.
Overall, I’m pretty sad he show’s over. I’m not sure when I’ll go back to season 3 or if I may just have to rematch the entire show again. However…I have to say, despite never watching it regularly, I am going to miss it.
yaindulgences.wordpress.com 