This Week On Mulberry St...

Good Sunday morning to you! It's supposed to be a lovely day where I'm at, hopefully that's the case for you.

Yes, its another new layout. The last one didn't have an option to see older posts except by way of archive, and that annoyed me. Also, it was much too dark.

This week, I'm reviewing Last Dragon by J.M. McDermott. Here's a quick little synopsis;

An intricate web of stories weave together to tell a tale of revenge, justice, ambition, and power. Zhan has been sent to find her grandfather, a man accused of killing not only Zhan's family, but every man, woman, and child in their village. What she finds is a monstrous shell of a man, a city of angry secrets, a family dissolved by ambition, and a web of deceit that will test the very foundations of a world she thought she understood.

A tale of revenge that grows into something more, Last Dragon is a literary fantasy novel in the tradition of Gene Wolf and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. J.M. McDermott brings the fantasy genre to new literary heights with a remarkable first novel that will leave critics and readers alike in stunned awe.

I'm currently in the process of finishing up the novel, I'm really excited to share it with you this week.

In other news, yet another YA book series has been turned into an ABC Family "Original Series". First Pretty Little Liars, now Nine Lives of Chloe King. Has anybody seen it? Any opinions on the show? I haven't read the book, but the show is frustrated and slow, as far as I've seen. Every episode is the same, and it's too angsty for me. Maybe it gets better?

In other other news, HBO's Game of Thrones has popularized the novels so much that I almost fear buying them (I so hate following the crowed, you know). I hear good things from all the customers I've rung up. Any thoughts on that?

What's up with the whole book-into-movie-or-tv-show craze, anyway? It's making me crazy. Not that I don't enjoy seeing my favorite characters up on the big screen, but I do like an original story now and again. If the author did a good enough job writing the book in the first place, the movie is just a bonus. Most of the time the story gets changed anyway, so that's just a bit annoying.

That's it for Mulberry St. this week. Have a great Sunday!

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This Week On Mulberry St...

First, a new name and a new layout! Head on over to the about pages to find out more.

This week I'll be reviewing Debris by Jo Anderton. I'm really excited for it, I think the book has great potential. Here's a little blurb from the publisher, courtesy of goodreads.com;

In a far future where technology is all but indistinguishable from magic, Tanyana is one of the elite.


She can control pions, the building blocks of matter, shaping them into new forms using ritual gestures and techniques. The rewards are great, and she is one of most highly regarded people in the city. But that was before the “accident”.


Stripped of her powers, bound inside a bizarre powersuit, she finds herself cast down to the very lowest level of society. Powerless, penniless and scarred, Tanyana must adjust to a new life collecting “debris”, the stuff left behind by pions. But as she tries to find who has done all of this to her, she also starts to realize that debris is more important than anyone could guess.


Debris is a stunning new piece of Science Fantasy, which draws in themes from Japanese manga, and classic Western SF and Fantasy to create this unique, engrossing debut from the very exciting young author Jo Anderton.

That will be posted next Saturday. Until then, I'll have something for you. I just need to figure out what that will be first. Have a great week, everybody!

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Post Title Here

So I'm renaming the blog. But I don't have a name yet. So until I have a name, it will remain Blog Name Here.

I'm in a reading slump. I spent the last month and a half researching books to read, things to write about, creating blogs for reviews, and so on and so forth. Now I think I've reached the stagnant point of all that, where I realize I still want to do all of that, but it's not all I've got it cracked up to be. It takes work and time and I already work and it takes most of my time. When I'm home, I'm lazy. I'd rather spend hours watching mindless Lifetime dramas (laugh, go ahead. it's ok. I laugh at myself) than reading a book that makes me think and wonder. However, it will be done. Eventually.

I got my first approved galley today. I'm super stoked, and I'll probably end up reading and reviewing that book before I finish Last Dragon. Also, I read Bumped. I even spent money for it, I thought it had potential as a satirical book. I hated it. I'll explain why in a soon-to-be review.

Lastly, I know the blog isn't even a month old and there's probably no one who cares, but it's getting a major revamp. Soon.

I just wanted to post an update before everyone thought I disappeared.

So, in short, reading is hard, galleys are awesome, and work sucks.

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Radio Silence, A Solar Ocean

I love to read. When I read, it's almost as if the world goes silent, and all that's left is me and my book. I read almost anything, from teen urban fantasy to contemporary realism to whatever folks are calling it now. Mostly, I just say if it's a book, I'll read it. I don't promise to enjoy it, and I don't promise to finish it. But I'll read it. There's some books I refuse to read, and that usually because it's on a topic I don't agree with, or I already know the ending and I don't want to bother with a book where I don't like the ending.

My favorite books are the strange ones. Books like The Book Thief, where Death is a character and the writing is beautifully sad, and most of the book is told through observations that challenge how you can write a book (or at least challenge how I write a book). I like books like The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland (...), books written for a child but equally as readable by an adult. The Girl (...) is a beautifully written fairytale that I feel like I can enjoy, childish or not. It is for these reasons that I like books like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, a book so strange that I'm almost tempted to not like it, except that it challenges, and builds, and causes me to ask questions of myself. Even more so, though, it is because of this that one of my favorite genres is steampunk. Steampunk takes history and edits it, melding bits of past and future and creating a world that exists within our own. Lastly, I adore dystopian fiction because it just plain challenges. It makes me think about my world, and about the rules and ideas that are instilled in us, and it makes me wonder.

Not surprisingly, that pretty much describes me as a person. I like to think that the types of books a person reads can show somewhat of an insight into their character, and I think that's very true of me.

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