Okay, yes I have read the Twilight books (and have seen the movies) and I do watch Vampire Diaries, but I swear I am not a Vampire nut!  More than anything I would have to say it’s the peer pressure of pop culture that has me into Vampires.

With that said, I drove to Houston this past weekend and I share an audible account with my friend Emily and I decided to see what books she had on there I might want to listen to as I drove.  It’s amazing how fast a drive goes by when you’re listening to a book.  I decided to go with “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.”  I saw the preview for this movie when I saw the Hunger Games and while the movie looks a little odd and evoked laughter from 90% of the theater crowd, I actually heard the book was pretty good.

Author Seth Grahame-Smith also wrote “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies,” which I also could have listened to.  But somehow Jane Austen and Zombies just don’t go together in my mind.

Believe it or not, “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Slayer” is actually pretty interesting.  Now, I’m only about halfway through the book and with no road trips planned in the near future, I’m not sure how quickly I will get through the rest of this book.

I have to say, the concept of this book seemed odd to me, but as I listened to the story I could see how Grahame-Smith could come up with such a concept.  I have no idea how many of the “facts” in the book are actually facts or just details added to help the story line, having never really spent much time studying Abe Lincoln I don’t know much about his history.  The things I believe to be true about Abraham Lincoln: he was really tall, he had a beard, abolished slavery, was president, is from Illinois, was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth and his face is on the penny.  Good thing I’m not a history teacher!

It will be interesting to see how Grahame-Smith transitions Lincoln from Vampire Hunter to President of the United States and if he continues to be a Vampire Hunter once elected to office.

Anyone else out there read this book?

I have never before read a Stephen King novel.  I think I’ve seen a couple of his movies but reading his books has never interested me.  That was until I started hearing about 11/22/63.

To be honest before I started this book I hadn’t heard a whole lot about it other than it was really good.  And so far I haven’t been disappointed.  I am well over half way through the book and thought this would be the perfect time to review this book so I can ensure I don’t give anything away.

11/22/63 is a day that most Americans know exactly what happened without really giving it much thought, even if we weren’t alive during that time.  Being from Dallas, I suppose the Kennedy assissination has always fascinated me to some degree.  I’ve been to the 6th Floor Museum and to see Dealey Plaza and I even remember being in elementary school when the 25th anniversary of JFK’s death was remembered.  That is when I was first introduced to this tragedy.

When I first began this book I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how the story could go from a 2011 English teacher in Maine sitting in his classroom reading a story by the school’s janitor working toward earning his GED to 11/22/63 in Dallas, TX.  Then I learned that this book dealt with time travel; but not in a lame or over complicated way.

Jake Epping (the English teacher) is quickly introduced to the portal to 1958 by his friend, the owner of a local diner, Al Templeton.  Jake learns that Al has traveled through time countless times but it is not until Al is on his death bed and realizes he needs Jake to accomplish what he never could; to prevent the assassination of JFK.  Jake is of course leery of this proposition but eventually takes on his dying friend’s mission as his own.

This being my first Stephen King novel, I am really impressed at his writing abilities.  Though I guess to write the thrillers he is so famous for would require him to be a great wordsmith with an amazing ability to stir up his readers’ imaginations.  This book contains mystery, suspense, drama and even romance.  Just when you think the book is on one path it will quickily take a twist and lead you another way.

I have been working on reading Good Christian Bitches for the last few weeks and I’ve been a total slacker about reading.  I’ve barely made progress in this book; not because it’s a bad read or isn’t enjoyable.  I’ve been distracted working on Creative Chaos.  I was so slow in reading Good Christian Bitches that the TV show started before I could make much pogress.  My every intention was to put off watching GCB until I had finished the book but with all I read on Twitter and Facebook about it, I couldn’t wait.

Being a Dallasite, what I enjoy about this book is trying to figure out Kim Gatlin’s code and what the real names of things and places are supposed to be.  That is also what I enjoyed about the pilot, the fact that it was filmed here in Dallas.  I’m disappointed they moved filming back to California, even if it was to be expected.  Would have been fun if more filming in Dallas had taken place.

A few years ago, I actually completed something I never thought I’d be able to do…I wrote a book!  For as long as I can remember this has been a dream of mine.  So, I finally decided to start working on that dream!

After years of reading the “classics” at Trinity Christian Academy here in Dallas and then majoring in English at Texas A&M University, I needed a break from reading.

It wasn’t until a few years after graduating college, when I was working and traveling like crazy for Magic Scraps (a wholesale scrapbook supply company) that I finally started reading again.  I owe a lot of that credit to my friend Emily Foytlin who was always reading these books that looked really fun.  It was then I learned about “chicklit” books and she got both Rachel and I hooked.  As we traveled to our next destination for the next Scrapbook Convention we would be at you could find the three of us sitting on a plane or in airports reading.

As we traveled and read, we started talking about how we couldn’t believe a book hadn’t been written about a girl who scrapbooks.  Well at least as far as we knew.  It was really there that this idea was birthed in me.

I would never put myself in the same category as Sophie Kinsella, Whitney Gaskell or Cara Lockwood…but  a girl can dream, right?

After being out of the scrapbook industry for a year or two, I was finally not traveling and had time to sit down and write.

It probably took me about 2 years to finally finish the book.  We’re all our worst critics right?  I kept writing and rewriting and critiquing what I had written and finally had to say enough!  I spent months trying to get an agent interested in me so that I could get my book published but had no luck.

Then the book sat and collected dust on my hard drive for another 2 years until this year, when for Christmas, when my dad gave me a Kindle…I had an idea…self publish!  So that is just what I am going to do!

My goal is to have the book up and available in the Kindle store by Friday; so keep your fingers crossed and say a little prayer for me that all goes well!

Next up I’ll get it in the Nook store and available on iBooks and then we’ll see if there’s enough interest to actually have it made into book form!

In the mean time, can you “Like” me on Facebook?  And here’s where you can read a synopsis of “Creative Chaos.”

And here is a little sneak peek at the cover that is not quite finished:

I read “The Hunger Games” and “Catching Fire” by Suzanne Collins back in May and June but it took me some time to actually finish the final book, “Mockingjay.”

I loved “The Hunger Games,” it wasn’t at all what I thought it would be about; I obviously had not looked into the story line before I started reading. I just decided since so many people were talking about it that it was probably good.  Going into it I assumed the book was either about a group of people fighting for their survival against starvation or about some sort of eating disorder…boy, was I off.

Never would I have thought this trilogy was about a teenager forced into a game of survival for sport, watched by millions of people.  But I was hooked.  I enjoyed “The Hunger Games” so much that as soon as I finished it I HAD to start reading “Catching Fire.”  I actually found “Catching Fire” pretty entertaining as well and made it through the book quickly as well.

I was so anxious to start “Mockingjay” that I borrowed it from some friends because I didn’t want to wait for it to be in stock at the library.  (Sorry you still don’t have your book back guys!) I started “Mockingjay” in June and was immediately bored.  Theoretically this book is actually very similar to the first two, it just wasn’t as interesting to me.

I put off reading it for months and have just now finished it.  Finally in the last 3rd of the book I did get hooked and actually wanted to find out what happened.  I definitely have to go with the majority on this one and say that book 1 is the best and they go downhill from there.

I’ve heard that some people are expecting “The Hunger Games” movies to be bigger and more popular than “Twilight.”  What do you think? I’m not sure that’s possible.

For a little over a year now, I keep seeing Water for Elephants, and have thought about reading it. Well, I finally did and I loved it!

To be honest I wasn’t really sure what to expect, I kind of had an idea it was about the circus but wasn’t sure what aspect of the circus it was about. The more I read in this book the more I enjoyed it.

Sara Gruen wrote this book in the style of a memoir even though it is a fiction. Gruen stumbled up on the idea of writing about a traveling circus while researching a different novel idea.

This story follows Jacob Jankowski in the 20’s and 30’s, who after the loss of his parents and now where to go hopes on a train to escape, not realizing the train was carrying a traveling circus.

At first Jacob’s presence is met with much opposition until it is learned that he is a vet, well. . .almost. They decide to keep him on to care for all of the animals.

Throughout the novel, the reader is actually presented with Jacob’s story through his flashbacks from his nursing home. We meet Jacob when he is in his 90s.

Despite not knowing much about traveling circuses I still found this story fascinating and highly recommend it. So go out and get it!

I decided to stick with Jodi Picoult and read 19 Minutes.  I have to say, I have enjoyed the other two Jodi Picoult books I have read but this is by far my favorite one so far.

Normally I am not a fan of books that are written from multiple voices. Especially when the voices aren’t divided by chapters like My Sister’s Keeper was, but in this particular case I thought the fact that the perspective or voice the story was being told in continually changed was very fitting.

This book is about a high school shot which is a very chaotic incident and its effects are immeasurable. If this book had been written from one character’s perspective I don’t think I would have enjoyed it. To me this was a very well rounded story because there wasn’t a perspective that was omitted which deepened the impact of the story.

I also enjoyed that this wasn’t necessarily a book about a school shooting, but rather it was a look at the psychology behind why it might happen.

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone and actually have been recommending it to everyone I talk to. If you haven’t read it you should do so right away, I don’t think you’ll be sorry.

Man, have I been slacking lately in the reading category. . .and yes Brett, I do read. . .not sure why that was a shock to you!

I finally finished My Sister’s Keeper, and just in time too since the movie comes out in the next two weeks.

The book was good, but I think the reason I had trouble cruising through this one so fast was that each chapter is from a different person’s point of view and that is just not my style. I find books written that way tricky to follow because I don’t really feel like they flow all that well.

But. . .with that said I think it was important for this book to have been written this way to show the effects that this story had on everyone involved.

If you are not sure what this book is about, here are the basics. A daughter gets diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia at age 2. The only way to save her is for there to be a perfectly match donor for the different needs her body might have. Since her older brother and parents are not a good match the parents decided to create a baby that is genetically a perfect match for the sick daughter Kate.

The only problem with this solution is that no one really seems to think about the effect this will have on Anna. Not too far into the book, Anna approaches a lawyer to help her seek medical emancipation from her parents. But. . .not for the reasons you might think. Only problem is I can’t really talk about that because I don’t want to ruin this book for anyone.

Let me just warn you. . .be sure to have a box of Kleenex near you when you read the book for multiple occasions and don’t forget the Kleenex when you go and see this book play out on the big screen.