Tuesday, January 27, 2009

[2-6/50] Oh the excitment!!

So, I'm suppose to be reading one book at a time but a book worm can never do such a thing!!
Sooo, because I'm a bookworm
these are the 6 books I'm currently "reading":
*Skin
*Sight
Blue Bloods
The Hunger Games
Paper Towns
The Host
*= checked out from a library
= I own
The ones that are checked out are the ones I'm more likely to read right first because they are due on the 9th of Febuary in the year 2009 =]

Saturday, January 24, 2009

AHHHH!! [#1]- Those With Wings & Rave Master [NEWS]

[Akia] I recieved an email today from Tokyopop that went like this....[Tokyopop] Hey all you Fruits Basket fans! We have another new series by Natusuki Takaya right over the horizon. And though it doesn't come out until March, we're hooking you up with a juicy sneak peek now!



[Akia] Can I just say, about time Tokyopop!!! Tsubasa: Those With Wings (Tsubasa o Mostu Mono) was released after Phantom Dream and before Fruits Basket in Japan. Tsubasa has a total of 6th volumes =D I'm looking forward to buying this one because I don't plan on buying Phantom Dream any time soon (the art is pretty horrid. No offense).

Also, the email mentioned that Rave Master will join Sci-fi channel's Ani-monday line-up on March 21, 2009. YES! I know a lot of people are going to complain about this because apparently the Rave Master anime wasn't that good (I beg to differ! I remember being excited for each new episode when it used to air on Cartoon Network). Ohhh, now I'm excited for March!!

Friday, January 23, 2009

Skinned [bought the book] (review)

****

"A person is created by God./ Gifted with a natural body, a divine soul. A person thinks and feels, is born and dies. A person has free will. You, on the other hand, are a machine. Built by man. Programmed by man. You may look like a person and act like a person; you may even, in your own way, believe you're a person." Skinned; pg. 175

Look at that cover! I actually picked up this book because the printing I bought has a comment on it by Scott Westerfeld (of Uglies and Midnighters fame) who happens to be my current favorite YA author- "A spellbinding story about loss, rebirth, and finding out who we really are inside." *faints from her fangirl-ness* Ok, this blog entry is not suppose to be about S.Westerfeld (no matter how fantastic his YA novels are). Besides that, I picked up this book because of the type of series it is- young adult sci-fi. I happen to love YA sci-fi =D


The book opens with Lia Kahn (a rich girl who is, not a surprize, the most popular girl in school and on the interwebs) somehow trying explain that she is dead yet not. This is because her little sister, Zo, asked Lia to do a huge favor which resulted in Lia getting into a car accident (the cars autopilot ended up malfunctioning) that resulted in her mortal death but her Skinned birth. To be Skinned, in this book, is to be downloaded into a fully prostetic (robotic) body after having razor thin pieces of the brain scanned into a computer. Chapter one set up the story really well, and was nicely paced. I haven't read such an orderly book start since Uglies, which made me, the reader, extremly pleased. I went on to chapter 2 with enough knowledge behind what a Skinner (person who has recieved the download- Skinned- process) is and how one might think- at least, in Lia's case. I felt like a mech-head (I would use the term skinner, but in the book if you have recieved the download process, skinner is suppose to be an insult).

No matter how awsome the first chapter is, the chapters that followed seemed to drag. At least, untill page 187 where Lia meets some of her own kind- er... at least they were suppose to be like her (but what's a good story without a twist? this is where that twist occurs for Skinned). At this point, the book became one that I could not put down. The pages before seemed either like the author was trying to fit too much at once or too little, but by page 187 Wasserman got her act together resulting in a nice reader experience where the reader, in this case me, became Lia Kahn, the skinner. I mean, mech-head. A teenager struggling with the fact that what she now is has many advantages, but the sacrifice for these advantages is ones mortality.

Overall, Skinned had a nice start, rough middle, and crispy end. The first chapter was brilliant because of the pace and structure of the story, but by the next chapter and on, I became a little frustrated with the stories structure yet by the time Lia meet some of her own kind, I realized why this story is written the way it is- to have a non-organic flow. Lia's no longer and org (mech-headders term for organics- humans), thusly, the way she tells her story would have to have some geometrical sort of style. In the end, I'm left wanting to reccomend this story to all sorts of readers: sci-fi addicts, YA fannatics, people looking for something to read that is along the lines of the Uglies series, bored people and anyone in between (unless you don't like chessy romance, because there is some in here. Really well done chessy-ness if I may say so).

Oh, I'm so sure I did not tell you! By the time you finish this book, you'll long for the next one. That's right, folks! This is the first book in a series- a trilogy. The next book, Crashed, is set to be released in September of 2009. You can check out Wasserman's site to learn more.



"I was a ghost in the machine./ A mech-head./ A Frankenstein./ A skinner." Skinned; pg.32

Ok... if you've seen anything in the Ghost in the Shell franchise, you'll understand my surprise when I saw "a ghost in the machine" in Skinned. I actually would not be surprized if Wasserman got this little piece of her story from the GITS franchise, because it is an amazing one that spans 3 movies, an ova and 2 anime series. GITS also tells the story of a character that has a fully prostetic body and a cyber brain (but in GITS, almost everyone has a cyber brain which makes having a cyber brain the way to go while in Skinned, having a downloaded brain is seen as messing with what God created- at least for a radical group that tries to harm Lia in the book). Other than that, I did not find very many connections between the two because in GITS everyone knows they are still human where as in Skinned, Lia struggles to find proof between her still being 'alive.' I like this connection (because I'm an anime nerd).

Saturday, January 10, 2009

Blockbuster Online

Heyyy, hey! Just in case you've never heard of Blockbuster Online, I'm posting about it!! What Blockbuster Online is... hmm. It's a site where you make a list of videos to be sent to you via snail mail (mailbox) and you get to keep the videos as long as you want. Once you send a video back (I get three at a time. You can pay more for more videos at a time, but 3 is the minimum), another will be shipped to you. You can also trade these envolopes (the videos ship in an envolope) in at a Blockbuster store for an emidiate rental and a new video will still be sent to you!

Saturday, January 3, 2009

January 3, 2008 (7:54pm)

For minuet by minuet updates of what I'm reading/watching, be sure to follow-stalk me on Twitter-> akiachan (I always follow the people that follow me... unless they are creepy)
And if you are looking for Twilight updates, follow -> twiakia
I'm currently reading:
Skinned [YA Novel]
Bogus to Bubbly [Uglies series guide book]
1/2 Prince [manga, waiting for chpt. 6]
Bakuman [manga chpt. 16+]
Deadman Wonderland [manga chpt. 2+]
D.N.Angel [manga vol. 13+]
Ga-rei [manga chpt. 1+]
Kodocha [manga chpt. 1+]
Kurozuka [manga chpt. 8+]
Lament of the Lamb [manga chpt. 3+]
Love Monster [manga chpt. 16+]
Lovely Complex [manga chpt. 1+]
Shugo Chara [manga chpt. 1+]
Solanin [manga chpt. 1+]
Tsubasa Chronicle [manga chpt. 50+]
Yesterday I read:
Lament of the Lamb [manga chpt. 1&2]
I'm currently Watching:
Akikan [anime ep.1 (pre-screen version)]
Beck [DVD 4 -english dub-]
Casshern Sins [anime ep. 3-5]
Chaos;HEAD [anime ep. 5-12]
EF: A Tale of Melodies [anime ep. 4-12]
Ga-rei-zero [anime ep.2-4]
Kurozuka [anime ep. 7-12]
Yesterday I watched:
Bridge to Terabithia [movie]
_____________________________________________________
Yeah, yeahh... I know I've been "reading" Skinned for over two weeks now!! I happen to be very distracted with manga and anime and schoollll right now. And I just realized I STILL have to go to the art musem, design a poster to warn teenagers about drinking, finish coloring a huge art project, study for anatomy andddd finish my english paper (it has to be between 5-6 pages)- all in two days. I've decided NOT to list manga that I've bought under 'what I'm reading', but I will post them under 'what I read yesteday' =] Sometimes the manga I buy sits on a shelf for over a year (Amazing Agent Luna v.1-3 omnibus was unread for almost a year). AND, now I will be putting all these lists in ABC order for ease of comparing what I was going to read to what I have read!! You know I rule ^_^ I saw Solanin at Barnes and Nobles today.... but it was $2 out of my price range, so I purchased From Bogus to Bubbly (I seem to like buying series guides these days. I've almost got the Bleach one, and I've bought the Fruits Basket fan book and I'm excited for the Twilight one) and the Janaury issue of Anime Insider.
____________________________________________________
I finished downloading Chaos;HEAD today and also downloaded some anime previews, trailers and made an anime line-up video (oh yea, I also DLed the first episode of Akikan today, but it;s the prescreen version so there is no opening or ending theme on it)!! Be sure to visit my other blog for those and also please visit this youtube account for up to date anime previews and trailers as well as line up videos then visit this youtube account to keep up with my vlogs and what ever else I post on that account!! I'll be downloading the rest of Casshern Sins. OHHH, I also finished DLing EF: A Tale of Melodies since I last posted in this blog (I know the previous entry -i mean two entries ago- said that I had episodes 1-12 of EF: A Tale of Melodies, but one of the episodes wasn't DLed yet and I know the same was true for Chaos;HEAD, but several of those files were screwy). =D

Friday, January 2, 2009

January 2, 2008 (11:58pm)

I found scans of Lament of the Lamb today, soo I'm also reading that manga.

January 2, 2008 (7:46pm)

For minuet by minuet updates of what I'm reading/watching, be sure to follow-stalk me on Twitter-> akiachan (I always follow the people that follow me... unless they are creepy)
And if you are looking for Twilight updates, follow -> twiakia
I'm currently reading:
Skinned [ya novel]
Solanin [manga chpt. 1+]
Kurozuka [manga chpt. 8+]
Love Monster [manga chpt. 16+]
Shugo Chara [manga chpt. 1+]
Tsubasa Chronicle [manga chpt. 50+]
1/2 Prince [manga, waiting for chpt. 6]
Bakuman [manga chpt. 16+]
Deadman Wonderland [manga chpt. 2+]
D.N.Angel [manga vol. 13+]
Kodocha [manga chpt. 1+]
The Wallflower [manga vol. 1]
Fruits Basket [manga vol. 21]
Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories [manga vol. 1]
SA [manga vol. 2]
Dorothy of OZ [manga vol. 1-4]
Code Geass: Lelouch of Rebellion [manga vol. 1]
((there are probabbly others that I can't recall at the moment...))
I'm currently watching:
Wanted [movie]
Batman: Gotham Knight [movie/ anime]
Gai-rei-Zero [anime ep. 2+]
Kurozuka [anime ep. 7-12]
EF: A Tale of Melodies [anime ep. 4-12]
Casshern Sins [anime ep. 3-5 (going to DL the rest once done DLing Chaos;Head)]
Chaos;HEAD [anime ep. 5-12]
((there are others, but these are the ones I'm watching like now, as in they are on my MP4 player or are next to be on my MP4 player. Yo))