All by Sarah Moon

Links & Things + Books for Cheap

Links & Things + Books for Cheap

Sarah Moon
Links + Things
Recommendation Roundup: November 2014

Recommendation Roundup: November 2014

Sarah Moon
Books, Recommendation Roundup

My reading habits have been all over the place lately. 

For a few days, I binged on all the comics I could find. Then, I blew through Amy Poehler's book. And, it took me most of the month to listen to the final audiobook in Alexandra Bracken's Darkest Minds trilogy (I'll write more about that series later). I've continued to read the Sirantha Jax series slowly, and am kind of bummed that I'm approaching the end. Probably my two favorite reads this month were both graphic stories: Ms. Marvel and Seconds (thanks to my friend Kinoko for the recommendation). And now I'm kind of in a reading funk--not much is working for me. 

In other news, Sandra's been blowing through review books, so her recommendations are filled with newer titles, if you're looking for something fresh. 

As always, click through on the book cover image for more info!

Sarah Recommends

3 Quickie Contemporary Romance Reviews

3 Quickie Contemporary Romance Reviews

Sarah Moon
Books

If you're having a rough week, it's probably not a good idea to read a novel set in hell--literally. A guaranteed happy ending is more the ticket in these situations. 

I recently picked up an assortment of contemporary romances, and have a few thoughts I'd like to share. Each of these novels belongs to a series of interconnected novels, but can be read as standalone stories. 

Recommendation Tuesday: Ms. Marvel by G. Willow Wilson

Recommendation Tuesday: Ms. Marvel by G. Willow Wilson

Sarah Moon
Books

Recommendation Tuesday started as a joke and is now an official thing. Basically, this is my way of making Tuesday a little more awesome. If you've got a book to recommend on this or any Tuesday, tweet me at @FullShelves and I'll help spread the word.

View all of the past recommendations over here. 

Ms. Marvel, G. Willow Wilson's comic about teen superhero Kamala Khan, came highly recommended by many, many people. I usually don't care for the big comic publishers (Marvel, DC), largely because they're too slick for me, but the glowing recommendations from friends, plus the ridiculous controversy around meant my interest was piqued--and I pretty much loved it. 

Stream-It Saturday: Now Is Good

Stream-It Saturday: Now Is Good

Sarah Moon
Movies

It's always interesting to find a surprise book-to-movie adaptation. Damn studios and their name-changing ways. I added British flick Now Is Good to my Netflix queue after watching How I Live Now, because I was looking for more YA-ish movies from the UK. I thought that film took some risks you would be unlikely to see in American films.

When I finally got around to streaming Now Is Good, the story and characters' names seemed immediately familiar. A quick Google told me that I wasn't nuts, that Now Is Good is an adaptation of a book I'd forgotten I'd read, Before I Die by Jenny Downham. (I didn't forget I'd read it because it wasn't good, because it was. Rather, it was a long time ago.)

Storify: Mockingjay Disappointment

Storify: Mockingjay Disappointment

Sarah Moon
Movies

Guys, I wasn't happy with Mockingjay, Part 1. As someone who's enjoyed both movies--especially Catching Fire--and the The Hunger Games books quite a lot, I have some gripes. 

So, as any reasonable person would do, I took to Twitter to air my grievances. It's Storyfied below.

(Note: Minor spoilers ahead.)

Amy Poehler's Yes Please is Pretty Fantastic, Y'all

Amy Poehler's Yes Please is Pretty Fantastic, Y'all

Sarah Moon
Books

I have a weird relationship with celebrity-penned books. I loved Mindy Kaling's book and cannot wait for her follow-up, out next year. I really loved Esther Williams' memoir, Million Dollar Mermaid. But, I haven't been a fan of many others. (Including the one written by the female comedian that everyone but me adores.) 

However, I do love Amy Poehler.

I can tell you my very clear memory of first being exposed to her: It was the late-1990s and I was still able to stay up and watch late night television and she played Andy Richter's Conan-obsessed little sister and it was bonkers. I'm certain I'd never seen anyone quite like her before. When she joined the cast of Saturday Night Live, I even managed to stay up and watch her quite a bit. 

 

What I'm Watching: Fall 2014

What I'm Watching: Fall 2014

Sarah Moon
Television

Am I the only person who's pretty disappointed with the new television this year? Aside from a couple notable exceptions, I haven't been excited about much of the new stuff on the tube. (Ugh, I just realized that loads of people these days probably don't even know why it's called "the tube.")

Now that we're fully into the fall television season, I thought I'd continue my tradition of sharing what I'm watching--and a few I'm not. 

Blue Lily, Lily Blue by Maggie Stiefvater Tarot Tour & Giveaway: The Strength Card

Blue Lily, Lily Blue by Maggie Stiefvater Tarot Tour & Giveaway: The Strength Card

Sarah Moon
Books

You know how much I adore Maggie Stiefvater's novels, especially her current series, The Raven Cycle, which is like nothing else I've read. 

Gansey thought of how strange it was to know these two young men so well and yet to not know them at all. Both so much more difficult and so much better than when he’d first met them. Was that what life did to them all? Chiselled them into harder, truer versions of themselves?

The third and most recent installment, Blue Lily, Lily Blue, published last month and left me impatiently tapping my fingers for the final installment of the series. We've talked a lot about this series on CEFS, and everything we've said before holds true for Blue Lily, Lily Blue. There's magic infused in this series, but the real magic in found in the complex dynamics of Blue and the Aglionby boys, Ronan, Adam, Noah and, of course, Gansey. 

Recommendation Roundup: Oct. 2014

Recommendation Roundup: Oct. 2014

Sarah Moon
Books, Recommendation Roundup

We're back with our monthly roundup of recommended reads!

My picks this month really demonstrate my weird, er, eclectic taste, I think. I'm recovering from a killer month, schedule-wise, so I'm hoping to get in some more writing about some of these books, because I read some interesting ones in October. 

In Which I Bake November Cakes

In Which I Bake November Cakes

Sarah Moon
Bookish Finds, Books

It's a known fact that Maggie Stiefvater is cool as hell and that her books are pretty damn outstanding. It's hard to pick a favorite--and I won't--but there's a special place in my heart for her lone standalone novel, The Scorpio Races, which has a unique connection to the month of November, 

It is the first day of November and so, today, someone will die.

In addition to the month of November being when the novel's titular races take place, there's a special cake Finn and Puck eat in the novel, November Cakes. 

Finn finds my left hand, opens my fingers, and puts a November cake in my palm. It oozes honey and butter, rivulets of the creamy frosting joining the honey in the pit of my hand. It begs to be licked. Someone nearby screams like a water horse. My heart goes like a rabbit’s.

Maggie created a recipe for this fictional cake (though, read through to the end and you'll find that it's not so fiction for me), and the first of November seemed like the perfect time to bake them. I generally followed her recipe, though I bake like a champ, so I made some adaptations on the fly to suit my tastes. 

Recommendation Tuesday: Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng

Recommendation Tuesday: Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng

Sarah Moon
Books

Recommendation Tuesday started as a joke and is now an official thing. Basically, this is my way of making Tuesday a little more awesome. If you've got a book to recommend on this or any Tuesday, tweet me at @FullShelves and I'll help spread the word.

View all of the past recommendations over here. 

It's not often I find a work on literary fiction that has a story as compelling as its prose--hence, I don't recommend it very often. Sparkling, thoughtful writing is wonderful, but it feels awfully vapid when the story falters. Or it's filled with dull Middle Aged Man Angst.

Discovering Celeste Ng's Everything I Never Told You was an unexpected surprise, as result. While imperfect (as all novels are), it hits so many notes that make worth checking out, even if you normally avoid literary fiction. It's a historical novel, though the 1970s time period is one of the book's less-developed aspects, but more than anything it's a story of family and marriage. 

Power & the "Tough Enough" Narrative: Rites of Passage by Joy N. Hensley

Power & the "Tough Enough" Narrative: Rites of Passage by Joy N. Hensley

Sarah Moon
Books

When listening to the audiobook of Joy Hensley's debut YA novel, I kept recalling a huge news story from my youth: Shannon Faulkner's two year-long fight to be granted admission to The Citadel, South Carolina's public military college. When the court finally forced the college to allow her admission to the Corps of Cadets, she lasted only a week, having spent much of her time in the school's infirmary.

Years later, Faulkner revealed that she was subject to intense abuse, and feared for not only her own life but the lives of her family members, thanks to death threats she received while at the school. 

It was a gut-wrenching thing to watch on the news when I was a teenager. I'd been rooting for Faulkner to succeed, to win for every girl who wanted to smash any number of boys-only clubs (institutional or social) that were inaccessible to us girls.

Recommendation Roundup: September 2014

Recommendation Roundup: September 2014

Sarah Moon
Recommendation Roundup

Read any good books lately? We've got a few recommendations for you, if you're in need. (And who isn't, if we're going to be honest.)

My best read of this past month was hands-down RIck Yancey's The Infinite Sea. Man oh man, was that a killer sequel. It's been interesting reading the reviews of it, because it's a slow-paced novel that's not working for everyone. Laura, lucky girl that she is, has already read the next installment in The Raven Cycle and loved, loved, loved it. I think it's up next for me. And, Sandra recovered from her anger about the second book in Barry Lyga's I Hunt Killers series enough to read the final novel and grudgingly admits that it was pretty good. 

Stream-It Saturday: The Fosters (TV)

Stream-It Saturday: The Fosters (TV)

Sarah Moon
Television

In my continuing selfless service to the world (ahem), I'm always looking for the next awesome thing to stream. And, of course, I must share my finds with you fabulous folks. Hence, Stream-It Saturday.

Check out all my previous recommendations over here. 

Apparently, I am the target demographic for ABC Family--who knew? Between the show I'm spotlighting today, The Fosters, and my new binge-watching addition, Switched at Birth, I am a fan of the network, apparently. 

Recommendation Tuesday: The Infinite Sea by Rick Yancey

Recommendation Tuesday: The Infinite Sea by Rick Yancey

Sarah Moon
Books

Recommendation Tuesday started as a joke and is now an official thing. Basically, this is my way of making Tuesday a little more awesome. If you've got a book to recommend on this or any Tuesday, tweet me at @FullShelves and I'll help spread the word.

View all of the past recommendations over here. 

The uncertainty of my own experience is crushing. I am drowning in an infinite sea. Sinking slowly, the weight of the lightless depths forcing me down, forcing the air from my lungs, squeezing the blood from my heart.

I feel kind of ridiculous recommending a big book with a big publicity push behind it, but it's a rare sequel that enthralls me as much as the original. 

The Fifth Wave was one of my favorite books last year, thanks to its editor literally shoving it in my hands and I clicked preorder on the follow up, The Infinite Sea, before it even had a title. The sophisticated plot, overwhelmingly ominous tone and captivatingly complex characters stood out in the sea of lookalike post-apocalyptic novels

Podcast Episode #26 - Talking with Courtney Summers About Everything, Part 3

Podcast Episode #26 - Talking with Courtney Summers About Everything, Part 3

Sarah Moon
Podcast: Season Two, Podcast

We were lucky to recently spend over three hours (!) talking with noted Supernatural expert Courtney Summers. (We hear she writes books too.) We covered a range of subjects from zombies with fashion sense to writing characters experiencing trauma and everything in between. 

You can find the first part of this conversation over here, and the second right here--we highly recommend listening to them in order. In this episode, we chat about books, but we spend the bulk of our time talking about television and women's representation, and Justin Timberlake and the 50 Shades of Grey movie trailer.

Connect with Courtney: Website | Twitter | Tumblr | Facebook 

If you've not read Courtney's books, two are now available in a nifty bind-up that will have a Justin Timberlake song frolicking in your head for days, What Goes Around. 

How to Support the Podcast

If you enjoy the Clear Eyes, Full Shelves podcast, you can say thank you by enrolling in a free trial of Audible (I've been a subscriber for a year now and love it) or by clicking here the next time you're shopping on Amazon. This helps support the hosting and production costs of the podcast.

We certainly appreciate all the support, tweets, shares and all-around enthusiasm we've received for the podcast! 

Recommendation Tuesday: Dust Chronicles Series by Maureen McGowan

Recommendation Tuesday: Dust Chronicles Series by Maureen McGowan

Sarah Moon
Books

Recommendation Tuesday started as a joke and is now an official thing. Basically, this is my way of making Tuesday a little more awesome. If you've got a book to recommend on this or any Tuesday, tweet me at @FullShelves and I'll help spread the word.

View all of the past recommendations over here. 

If I were to make a list of novels for people who really love the X-Men movies, but are fed the hell up with the ridiculously thin characterization of the women, Maureen McGowan's Dust Chronicles trilogy would be high on that list. 

Recommendation Roundup: August 2014

Recommendation Roundup: August 2014

Sarah Moon
Books, Recommendation Roundup

Now that the bulk of summer is over, I've been working on catching up with my summer reading list, of course. 

I was so excited to read Stephanie Perkins long-anticipated new novel, which didn't disappoint me in the least (I do think it'll be a love it or hate it story for folks, though--Keertana wrote a fantastic review that resonated with me in terms of why I'm in the love it camp). I was also lucky enough to read a way early copy of Liza Palmer's 2015 novel, Girl Before a Mirror, which is absolutely stellar. I think it'll be a bit polarizing, but in a good way. There are a lot of layers to dig into and I can't wait for it to be in the world so I can talk to people about it! 

I also wrapped up reading The Dust Chronicles series by Maureen McGowan, which I really liked (read that series if you liked Divergent, The Darkest Minds or Legend--it's got all the action-y bits that fans of those books will love, and some good social issues things as well). And on the series front, I read the second book in Chuck Wendig's rad YA series, Blightborn. 

Enough chat! On to our recommendations!

Load More