Amy C. Shaw

Fringe Series Overview

January 11, 2014 • 9 Comments

After watching all five seasons Fringe starting last summer and going through December, I can say without a doubt I am a fan. I was evangelizing the show even when I was only in the first season, believing so much in the potential it showed. And it met most of that potential. I will have to say that despite how much I love this show overall, that other than the absolutely perfect emotional closure I got in the series finale, the show never quite gave me everything I wanted from it. But it did give me a lot. Since the show is so unique, I wanted to focus on some on the aspects of the show that really stood out, as well as favorite characters and episodes.

There are spoilers sprinkled throughout, SO what you will see is SPOILER the spoiler written in white that you can highlight if you’ve seen all of the show and then END SPOILER. Everything else is CLEAR to read!

Favorite Episodes by Season

Season One

While watching the series, my favorite episode of Season One hands-down was “Bad Dreams.” I just found the story fascinating, I loved meeting another Cortexiphan kid, and it would definitely still have to be my favorite case-of-the-week episode from the first season. But if I look back at the series as a whole, it would probably be one of the more mythological episodes, but I won’t know for sure until I re-watch. But here are some possibilities/runner-up favorites: “The Arrival,” “In Which We Meet Mr. Jones,” “The Equation,” “Ability,” “Inner Child,” and “There’s More than One of Everything.” Overall, even though I did not give season 1 one of my two 4.5 star rankings (I mostly gave it 4 stars because I didn’t think the John Scott storyline was handled well after the pilot), I think I would consider it my second favorite season.

Season Two

When I looked back at all the episodes from Season Two, it was clear to me it was my favorite season of the series. I think season two was the closest to being exactly what I wanted Fringe to be. My absolute favorite is “White Tulip” for all its wonderful symbolism, but I have several other episodes I love a lot too: “Dream Logic,” “August,” “Jacksonville,” “Peter,” “Northwest Passage.” and “Over There (Part Two).” Also extremely noteworthy: “A New Day in the Old Town” and “Brown Betty.”

Season Three

Season Three is a strong season for the mythology of the show and for the character development, but it stressed me out and aggravated me SO FREAKING MUCH! Because of this, it was a little harder for me to determine a favorite episode, but I think I’ll go with the finale, “The Day We Died,” because it was so intriguing. Some other episodes I liked: “The Abducted,” “Entrada,” “Subject 13,” and “Bloodline.”

Season Four

This season was another frustrating one for me that I honestly think I could only bear because of my unbounding love for Lincoln Lee. Every other character was just acting so frustrating with the SPOILER timeline reset affecting them END SPOILER! Overall, it might be my least favorite season, despite Lincoln Lee. My favorite episode is probably either “Everything in its Right Place” or “Letters of Transit,” and a couple others I liked pretty well were “Wallflower” and “Back to Where You’ve Never Been” (the former mostly because of MILD SPOILER cute Olivia-Lincoln moments). END MILD SPOILER

Season Five

Season Five was feeling pretty grim until the last five episodes, which I love all so much I just have to consider them a collective favorite: “Black Blotter,” “Anomaly XB-6783746,” “The Boy Must Live,” “Liberty,” and “An Enemy of Fate.” They finally delivered on what I had been waiting the entire season for!

Favorite Characters by Season

Season One: Peter

Season Two: Peter

Season Three: Olivia

Season Four: Lincoln

Season Five: SPOILER September/Donald END SPOILER

I loved me some Peter in the first two seasons, but he got really frustrating in season three. In hindsight, I also have to give some love to Charlie in the first season. In season three, with so much crap hitting the fan, I found the one person I was most concerned about and rooting for was Olivia, and she completely won me over as a favorite. In season four, all bets were off when Lincoln Lee arrived in his good guy glory. At that point, I wanted to stop watching regular Fringe and watch a Lincoln Lee spin-off show instead! And then in season five, as mentioned before was not a favorite season of mine, and so when we finally get to what I consider “the good stuff” and finally figure out the mystery with SPOILER where September is and that he is actually this mysterious guy Donald they have been looking for and that he has humanified and is now even more awesome than ever before!!! I was just so excited!!! END SPOILER.

When I look at the series as a whole, I think Walter definitely has to be the most intriguing character with the strongest arc, and John Noble did a crazy amazing job playing like 50 versions of the character (OK, maybe not 50, but I did lose count!) with just little nuances to separate them.

Characters that were definitely underutilized: Astrid sadly never really got to rise to the occasion, which I hated so much because Jasicka did a great job and she deserved more screen time. But the relationship between her and Walter, I loved. Their scene together in the finale made me cry.

I definitely would have liked more Charlie. And Gene the cow… duh. We always need more Gene.

The Glyphs

You know those symbols that come up for each commercial break (and are also sprinkled throughout the show as Easter eggs)? They’re there for a reason! If you’re a die-hard fan you already know, but for the uninitiated, these glyphs are part of a code. Each one stands for a letter, depending on both the symbol and the placement of the the yellow orb around it, and when you put the glyphs together for each episode, they spell out a word pertaining to either the current episode or foreshadowing something for the next episode. Sometimes they’re vague, sometimes they’re obvious, but they’re fun! If you’re going through the series, you can download the Fringe glyph add for iPhone or Android to crack the code every episode. I think this was a really unique twist to the show that just adds another layer of intrigue to it.

The Title Sequences

You know how most shows just have one basic title sequence that looks the same week after week, year after year? Not Fringe! They had several! Since everything after the initial blue sequence contains spoilers for plot points in the show, I made all of those white.

Blue Sequence: This is the first title sequence we get, which lists a plethora of fringe sciences, many of which would be included in the show.

Retro Sequence: For the two episodes set in 1985, “Peter” and “Subject 13,” where we learn more about Walter discovering the alternate universe and the immediate consequences, a retro-looking version of the Fringe title sequence rolled out the fringe sciences of yesteryear, many of which are now a reality.

Red Sequence: The red title sequence represents an episode that prominently takes place in the alternate universe, AKA the Redverse. In “Entrada,” we see a mix of the blue and red sequences as the two universes got more equal episode time. This sequence also includes what is considered fringe sciences in the Redverse.

Gray Sequence: The gray sequence was for the season 3 finale episode “The Day We Died,” in which we see a possible future where the Redverse has been destroyed and the Blueverse is on the brink of going down the same path. This sequence includes what is considered fringe sciences in this possible future timeline.

Amber Sequence: This was for season four, to indicate an altered timeline where Peter actually died as a boy. Most of the fringe sciences listed are not too unlike those from the initial sequence, though they are new words.

Future Sequence: This is the sequence for “Letters of Transit” and all of season 5, set in the future where the Observers have taken over. It’s scary to think that things like “private thought” are considered fringe in this future.

The Storylines & The Message

There were so many… where does one begin?! I will now get my biggest gripe about Fringe out there now, and that is that I think it had the tendency to bite off more than it could chew. Sometimes it tried to set something up, only for the “answer” to feel weak and incomplete (First People, Sam Weiss, Mr. X, John Scott, ZFT, etc.) or to not be followed through at all (Olivia’s stepfather, Big Eddie, Rachel and Ella, Etta on invasion day, etc.). And then there were things that they tried to build up as really epic (SPOILER Peter is completely erased from the timeline! END SPOILER) but then it turns out to not be nearly as big as we thought (SPOILER Well not so much erased but more like he died when he was a boy after all so you guys never knew him, but he’ll come back because love conquers all… END SPOILER). As much as I loved so many of the intriguing story arcs throughout the series, most of them honestly did not deliver as fully as I would have liked. In fact, entire seasons were dedicated to many of these plot points, and while they all ended on pretty high and mostly satisfactory notes, I was still left with more questions than answers.

But this series is very much about one thing, and it’s good to know this if you haven’t started watching yet: it’s about LOVE.

The love between a father and son. Between friends. Between lovers. Between a mother and daughter. It’s about how far you would go to save someone you love, or to be with them.

And it’s about humanity. This is something you’ll especially see as you get to the end of season five, that the show is asking questions about what makes us human. And that’s why it’s good sci-fi, a good show, and worth investing your time in it.

The characters are wonderfully flawed and quirky and intelligent and caring. And when the show’s over, you honestly feel like you’ve become disconnected from an amazing group of friends.

But don’t just take my word for it. Take Walter’s word for it. Watch Fringe…

And I still feel like I have only scratched the surface here! What about Massive Dynamic and Nina and Broyles and William Bell and Brandon and the shapeshifters and LSD and the Observers and everything else?! There’s just so much!!!

May I also recommend The Fringe Podcast as a supplement to your watching? It’s wonderfully fun, informative, and insightful. My experience would not have been the same without it.

Also see: Fringe reviews for seasons 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5.

Are you a future Fringe fan or a current one? (There are no other options, BTW.) Tell me what you love about the show or what about it has piqued your interest!

My Top 10 Movie Anticipations for 2014

January 9, 2014 • 31 Comments

Thanks to Yahoo’s list of most anticipated films of 2014, I was able to comb through and figure out what was coming out and what I am anticipating as well!

10. The Monuments Men

Expected Release: February 7, 2014

The premise seems interesting, and of course the cast is star-studded. As long as this one isn’t full of vulgarity (it hasn’t been rated yet) I’ll be interested to see this one.

9. Divergent

Expected Release: March 21, 2014

The trend of adapting YA books to the big screen continues in 2014, and other than Mockingjay (duh), this is the one I’m most looking forward to seeing.

8. Unbroken

Expected Release: December 25, 2014

This has the potential to be amazing, and as you may remember I raved about this book as my favorite read of 2013. But also because of my deep love for this story, I really want to see it done justice. I am excited to see that Garrett Hedlund is in the movie, though I don’t even remember the person he is portraying. I am also a little wary because Angelina Jolie is directing it and I have no idea what her directing chops are like, and the Coen brothers wrote the screenplay (I saw True Grit and was quite unimpressed). So basically, this means it will probably win Oscars and I’ll hate it. I hope I’ll like it. I want to love it.

7. X-Men: Days of Future Past

Expected Release: May 23, 2014

The trailer for this one really amazed me. It looks incredible, but I am still slightly wary, which is why it’s only #7 on my list. Other than X-Men: First Class, which I am hoping this movie will be along the same vein of, I have remained largely unimpressed with the X-Men franchise. But I hope this one is as awesome as the trailer makes it seem.

6. The Hobbit: There and Back Again

Expected Release: December 17, 2014

It’s hard for me to be super pumped for this one since I actually haven’t seen the second installment of The Hobbit trilogy yet, but I’m hoping once I do that I’ll be more excited for this final chapter! (Or I assume, I mean, I guess we never know with Peter Jackson…)

5. Interstellar

Expected Release: November 7, 2014

I want to be way more excited for this, because Christopher Nolan is my absolute favorite filmmaker AND storyteller. I just think he does incredible work. But the first trailer bored me, and I’m not a huge fan of Matthew McConaughey or Topher Grace. I want to be super excited, but I’m actually very wary. The only reason this movie is even on this list, and especially at this point on this list, is because of my love for C. Nolan. So please prove me wrong about all my current feelings about this movie, Christopher Nolan. Please release a better trailer soon and remind me why I love your stories so much. Please prove me very, very wrong.

4. Transcendence

Expected Release: April 18, 2014

This sci-fi thriller looks like it has the potential to be AMAZING. But, I’m trying to keep my excitement in check after Oblivion burned me in 2013. The director has worked on a lot of Christopher Nolan’s movies, so that’s somewhat promising.

3. How to Train Your Dragon 2

Expected Release: June 13, 2014

I ADORED How to Train Your Dragon, and it is easily one of my favorite animated films. The sequel looks pretty good, and I’m hoping it delivers!

2. Captain America: Winter’s Soldier

Expected Release: April 4, 2014

Captain America is my favorite of the Avengers because Steve Rogers!!! He’s the perfect 1940’s gentleman, and I love his character. So naturally, I am excited about his second movie. And Hayley Atwell and Dominic Cooper are both credited to reprise their roles on IMDB so… that’s also interesting. Of course, it might just be flashbacks to torture me and remind me that Steve and Peggy are living decades apart now. *cries*

1. The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part One

Expected Release: November 21, 2014

After the amazingness of Catching Fire this last year, how can this not be my number one anticipation?! OK, I think the pacing in Mockingjay the book is actually really crappy and it’s my least favorite book of the trilogy, but I have faith it’s going to be good, and I’m excited!

mockingjay-fanart — Some lovely fan art.

Others I might be interested in: The Giver adaptation, Exodus (with Christian Bale!) and Noah are both Biblical adaptations that can be interesting or just weird, Edge of Tomorrow is a Tom Cruise sci-fi movie that could have potential, and The Maze Runner adaptation.

The Amazing Spider-man 2 will be a renter.

And who knows what else may spring up on me! I hope I see a few more new movies this year than I did last year!

What movies are you anticipating in 2014?

My Top Ten Goals for 2014

January 7, 2014 • 24 Comments

Short intro for this list: Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Today’s topic is my Top Ten Goals/Resolutions for 2014 (bookish, not bookish, or a blend).

Long intro: When 2013 came to an end, I wasn’t super reflective. I do think I grew in some ways in 2013: as a writer, as a wife, and hopefully as a person, but I also struggled with things I’ve always struggled with, frustrated that I just could not move past them. 2013 wasn’t a great year or a terrible year, but just like every other year of my life it was important, because just like every other year of my life it shaped me. But New Year’s has gotten to where it feels so blase to me, which is the biggest reason why I didn’t feel the need to reflect on New Year’s Eve and makes all kinds of resolutions for the new year.

But that being said, making goals for myself, regardless of the time of year is important to me. Last February I decided to start this blog and set some writing goals for myself. Well, I failed at the writing goals, or… maybe not. I did fail at meeting the specific goals, but as I look back on them now I realize they weren’t really the right goals for me. I did write more, increasingly more thanks to NaNoWriMo, a goal I had not set for myself in February of last year but I achieved and am so proud of myself for having accomplished it. This year, I have more writing goals (in addition to reading and blogging goals) for myself that may or may not get met, because they may or may not be the right goals for me. But the bottom line of these goals is to pursue them, the heart behind them, and take the steps I need to at this point in time for my life. I don’t want to bite off more than I can chew, but I don’t want to hold myself back either. This year, I want to continue to strive for balance.

All that being said, here are my goals for 2014, related largely to writing, blogging, and reading.

Reading Goals

1. Read Les Miserables

I know this is a crazy goal. This book is over 1000 pages long. But my sweet husband got this book for me after I mentioned it on the blog, and the good thing about him doing that is that it was the push I needed to actually motivate myself to read this chunkster. So here’s the goal: to take as much time reading this book as I need, chapter by chapter, this year. Instead of sitting down with this book and reading it straight through, I will read a few chapters here and there, at my leisure, and my only goal for finishing is to have it done by the end of the year. And if I have to carry it over to next year, as long as I’m still reading it, I don’t think that should be marked as a failure. The resolution is to just keep moving forward. The goal is completion by December 31, 2014.

2. Only Read What I Want to Read

This may sound a little silly, but this year I found it easy to get so caught up in what other people hyped that I would start reading books I didn’t have much interest in. This did pay off sometimes, but sometimes it backfired. I read about a fifth of what most of my fellow book bloggers read last year, so I have to be selective. So that means I am going to try this year to more carefully choose what exactly I read, based on multiple reviews and dissecting what people are saying in those reviews. I may still end up disappointed, but that’s OK, but you can still learn from reading something you don’t love.

3. Continue to Expand My Reading Horizons by Reading the Following…

Here are a few more reading goals rolled into one…

1 more Jane Austen book: I read Pride and Prejudice in college, then in 2012 and 2013 I made the effort to read another one of her works in each of those years (Northanger Abbey in 2012 and Persuasion in 2013). I love her stories but not her writing style, so it is a little bit of a challenge for me. This year I am thinking I’ll probably read Emma.

1 classic science fiction book: This will probably either be Ender’s Shadow or Do Androids Sleep of Electric Sheep?. I really want to read more in the science fiction genre as my appreciation for science fiction in TV and movies has grown.

1 writing book: In 2012 I read a writing book as well as in 2013, and I think both helped me some. I believe that as a writer, it’s important I continue the practice of reading books about writing. There are some books about plotting I might like into, or Stephen King’s writing memoir On Writing.

1 non-fiction book: In addition to the writing book, I want to read another non-fiction book. The one I feel is the most likely candidate right now is 1776, but it’s possible I may choose to read an autobiography, a psychology book, or even a science book (if I can find one my unscientific brain can comprehend). Of course, I think reading more than one would be ideal, but I’m aiming for at least one. (I read two last year.)

Blogging Goals

4. Blog When I Want to Blog

I have been pretty much doing this for the past few months, but I want to try even harder to not feel too much pressure from inconsistent blogging this year. I do think consistent blogging is great, but I have other things in my life I need to manage, and more passions to pursue. But I certainly have no intention of leaving you all hanging completely. I have met some wonderful people in the blogsphere and I’m not leaving you now! 🙂 If it wasn’t for you, I know I wouldn’t have kept the blog going this long.

5. Blog Only Meaningful Content

I think this goes hand-in-hand with my previous goal. I want to blog not only when I want to, but also what I want to.

Writing Goals

6. Focus on One Writing Project at a Time

This is going to be crazy hard, because I have bad writing ADD. I have literally started over a dozen novels, but how many have been completed? Four. Two of those four belong to a much larger story arc of a series that I still have not completely worked out yet, and one I just wrote this last year for NaNo. (The other is my long labor of love that I have been working on since high school, but I am giving it more room to breathe right now) This year, I want to focus on my story from NaNo. Start revising and rewriting, get beta readers, rewrite and edit again, get more beta readers, rewrite and write again, and then hopefully, if all goes well…

7. Start Querying Agents

Last year, I set a goal to start this process in March 2014. That was unrealistic because up until November, I was still suffering from Writing ADD. If I am fortunate enough to feel that my project is ready for querying this year, it will be later in the year. Right now, I am thinking I would love to start this process in September, but if I start at any point this year I would love that. And if I don’t, hopefully 2015 will become that year for me. Again, as long as I am actually working on writing and not getting distracted and doing the very best I can, I will be satisfied with that progress.

8. Make Writing a Top Priority

I let writing fall by the wayside most of the year for blogging and reading. I don’t really regret it because blogging helped me write, helped me read, and helped me better understand the publishing process and industry. And of course I can’t regret reading because it helped me write, and of course it’s just rewarding in of itself. Really, writing and reading will probably be more a joint top priority, as I will probably read during lunch at work and write when I get home. But blogging will definitely suffer a little because of this schedule, and I hate that, but…

Life Goals

9. Pursue my Passions More Seriously

This is vague, but I have specific things in mind when I say this, some of which I mentioned here. Writing, creativity, stories are all my passion, and I want to more seriously pursue ways to incorporate these things in my life. Blogging helped me with that some this year, but I do feel I want to pursue other routes with these passions this year.

10. Prepare for 30

As much as I have a hard time acknowledging this, I’m in my late twenties now, and I’m not getting any younger. With 30 not too far down the road for me, I want to try harder over the next few years to make a more conscientious effort to prepare for the third decade of life physically especially, by eating better, becoming more active, buying better skincare products, etc. I am sure there are other ways I need to prepare for 30, so I will be trying to recognize those and do them as I go.

What are your goals for 2014?

My Rankings of 2013 Movies Seen

January 3, 2014 • 21 Comments

Very surprisingly, I have only seen 10 new releases from 2013, 9 in theater and only one outside the theater (usually, I would have rented all the summer movies I missed by now!). This isn’t due to a lack of interest so much as a lack of time, and then forgetting to hit up Redbox for rentals (because I’m lame and don’t have Netflix yet. One day I’ll cave). Because of this, I have yet to see several movies I was anticipating this year or later became interested in, including, most notably, The Book Thief and the second installment of The Hobbit. So all this being said, this is based solely on what I have actually seen so far, and I certainly intend to see more.

Out of the nine 2013 movies I watched, I gave 1 at 4.5 star rating, 6 of them 4 star ratings, and two 3 star ratings. The one I did not review I would say is a 3 star movie, which I do elaborate on later. Also, I have included what number the movie ranked on my most anticipated movies of 2013 list I created last March. On with the rankings!

1. Catching Fire

I was so excited for this movie so much that I made a list of my Top 10 Anticipations for the movie. And I looooooved this movie! It was a definite improvement over the first installment of The Hunger Games movie franchise, and I cannot wait to see it again!

Ranked #2 among my most anticipated movies of 2013

2. Star Trek: Into Darkness

There are a few things in this movie that bother me more in hindsight than they did while I was watching it, but… I still love the movie overall. So many feels. Many tears shed. And there were truly a lot of great moments. Not to mention what JJ has done to bring in new fans into the franchise.

Ranked #3 among my most anticipated movies of 2013

3. Iron Man 3

I know a lot of people did not love the third Iron Man movie, but something about it resonated with me. Tony was more real to me, the twist of the villain truly surprised me, and oh yeah, he goes to Tennessee (where I live!). Look, it’s an Avengers movie, not Oscar material. Enjoy it for what it is.

Ranked #4 among my most anticipated movies of 2013

4. Monsters University

I was anxious about a prequel to my favorite Pixar movie, afraid that it would get the dreaded Disney sequel treatment, but I found that this story was great in its own right, as well as providing us additional insight to the characters we already knew! Again, it’s fairly light, but has a message that I think is actually very relevant for kids and adults alike, that you can’t necessarily do anything you want, but if you work hard, you’ll find your place!

Ranked #7 among my most anticipated movies of 2013

5. Thor: The Dark World

Thor’s second movie proved to be another fun and interesting exploration into the Marvel universe as well as Thor’s. And though I’ve never considered myself a Loki fan, he completely stole the show in this movie.

Ranked #6 among my most anticipated movies of 2013

6. Ender’s Game

I really enjoyed this adaptation quite a bit, but it was just too short and everything felt too fast. It left me wanting more, but thankfully, everything it did show looked really good and felt true to the book.

Ranked as an honorable mention among my most anticipated movies of 2013

7. Man of Steel

This was a movie that I really enjoyed when I watched it, but I have forgotten about a lot since my viewing of it. I loved all the flashback stuff about Clark Kent growing up. I hated the all the freaking property damage that was caused by Superman and Zod’s battle over who is more indestructible. This movie was considerably better than the 2006 Superman Returns, but Superman still doesn’t have the same impact on me as Batman does.

Ranked #8 among my most anticipated movies of 2013

8. The Wolverine

If I was ranking these movies more objectively and less subjectively, this would be lower on the list. But I had fairly low expectations for this movie and they slightly exceeded them, mostly in the stinger scene but oh well. It was pretty fun. Some of it lacked logic and it bothered me that the evil villain lady looked like a Poison Ivy wanna-be but… whatever. It wasn’t as good as X-Men: First Class, but probably better than the other X-Men movies.

Ranked as an honorable mention among my most anticipated movies of 2013

9. Oblivion

This movie was undoubtedly my biggest disappointment for movies in 2013. The trailer led me to believe that this was the most awesome, epic sci-fi dystopia story EVER and it just fell way short of what I expected. Overall though, it was still a pretty decent movie, which is why I rated it 3 stars, but I had so many problems with it. Why weren’t you EPIC, Oblivion?!

Ranked #1 among my most anticipated movies of 2013

10. World War Z

I never would have seen this movie if it had been left entirely up to me, but I was with a group and decided to keep an open mind. Despite the fact that it’s on the bottom of my list, I didn’t hate this movie at all. In fact, since I had low expectations for it, I almost enjoyed it. I say almost because 1.) This isn’t exactly a fun movie and the subject matter is pretty dark and 2.) I don’t have a desire to re-watch it. The funny thing is though, I am almost interested in reading the book, because from my understanding it delves more into the parts of the movie that were lightly skimmed over that I think would be fascinating to explore (i.e. more about the nature of world politics that happens rather and less of Greasy Haired Brad Pitt running away from zombies). Needless to say, putting this movie at the bottom of the list is not at all meant as a diss for a movie I had zero interest in seeing, and though I never reviewed it, I would give this movie a rating of 3 stars. I liked it alright.

Not ranked among my most anticipated movies of 2013

What were your favorite movies of 2013?

My Top 10 Books I Read in 2013

December 31, 2013 • 22 Comments

Top Ten Tuesday topic is a meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Today’s topic is the Top Ten Books I Read In 2013. I am listing them in order of my absolute favorite of the year to my 10th favorite. These probably won’t be very surprising if you’re a regular reader here since I’ve talked about them so much, but here they are once again!

1. Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand: 5 Stars

This was one of three nonfiction books I read this year, and it was far from an easy read, but it was extremely rewarding. It’s the terrifying story of an American who became a POW in Japan during WWII, and how he healed afterward. It’s an amazing story that I think everyone reading this blog should read. I can’t recommend it enough.

2. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak: 5 Stars

This is the hauntingly beautiful tale of a young girl living in Germany during WWII with a desire to read every book she can. This book has some of the most lovely prose and imagery that I have ever read, not to mention the emotions and the characters! Another one you should definitely read if you haven’t already (and one I might not have discovered were it not thanks to all you out there in the blogsphere!).

3. Start. by Jon Acuff: 5 Stars

Before attending Jon Acuff’s Start Night and reading this book, I was toying with the idea of starting this blog. This non-fiction book about “punching fear in the face” pushed me forward with blogging, writing in general, and slowly letting go of the fears that I have for too long have allowed to hold me back. And in case it sounds like typical self-help, it’s not. It’s much funnier, as well as realistic and practical.

4. For Darkness Shows the Stars: 4.5 Stars

Genetic engineering + Jane Austen adaptation = a total Amy book. I really, really enjoyed this one, but there were a few things that kept me from giving it a full 5 star rating. But the world building, characters, and story were all great, and I’m so glad I read it. I’m currently reading the follow-up Across a Star-Swept Sea and I think I might even love it more!

5. Cinder by Marissa Meyer: 4 Stars

This was one book that got so much love among bloggers that I couldn’t ignore it, and I’m so glad I didn’t! Marissa Meyer crafts such an interesting world filled with such lovable, unique characters that you can’t help but root for. This book got 4 stars for being pretty predictable, but it was definitely a favorite for me this year!

6. Scarlet by Marissa Meyer: 4 Stars

I did not love the second Lunar Chronicles book as much, since I didn’t connect with Scarlet and Wolf as well as I did with Cinder and Kai, but the action was great and the story was still so interesting! I’m dying for Cress!

7. Pivot Point by Kasie West: 4 Stars

Kasie West’s debut really took me by surprise. It’s basically a contemporary meets paranormal (but not of the vampire variety) or light sci-fi (however you want to categorize it), and the story and the characters kept me engaged throughout. I am looking forward to seeing how Addie’s story finishes.

8. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card: 4 Stars

This was not the most fun book to read, but it was a very good story and extremely thought-provoking. I don’t think I really even realized how many questions it raised in my mind until months after I had closed the book. Or how much I cared about the characters. And I still need to read Ender’s Shadow! If you’ve read some of the light sci-fi YA out there but not this, I would recommend it as your next step into the genre, but know that’s it’s darker. But it’ll really get you to thinking. The movie is worthwhile too, though a very truncated version of what happens in the book.

9. What’s Left of Me by Kat Zhang: 4 Stars

This was another pleasant surprise for me. When this was the first choice of book for a book club I joined, I was intrigued by the premise, and curious about how I would like it when I saw several mixed reviews. Though some of it was confusing, overall, I really connected with the main characters and really enjoyed it. I also had the chance to meet Kat Zhang in person, and she’s really sweet! (She’s also very personable on Twitter!) I felt the follow-up was not as strong, but still a good read.

10. Allegiant by Veronica Roth: 4 Stars

Despite its highly controversial ending, for the most part, this book won me over as a fitting conclusion to the trilogy. Did I love everything about it? No. But it was nice to finally get answers to questions I’ve had since Divergent.

What were your favorite books that you read in 2013?

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