:D

On the other hand, been busy but haven't abandoned you guys yet, don't lose hope! >.<

I've just finished rereading Catherine, Called Birdy and Stargirl (one of my absolute favorite books).

I'm still ploughing through "The Deja Vu Experiment." Other people have said that it's like a "self-help book for the author," which I find difficult to understand; however, it does read somewhat like an organization of ideas, but not in a way that is coherent or interesting. I cannot think of anyone who would want to read this book, and I'm not sure why there are characters in it.

There is a character named Diana (I believe she is real, or at least a real person with the name changed), and she is basically the author/narrator's (I really cannot distinguish the two; I am not even sure if they are the same person or not) wife, who has taught said author/narrator a ton about some very very obscure and difficult ideas.

I am not in any way condoning the author for the way he chose to present these ideas, or about the ideas themselves; however, he might want to rethink why he chose to publish his book, as I don't believe this has any appeal (for its target audience, at least, which, according to NetGalley, is Science Fiction enthusiasts).

I'm also not sure: if it is classified as Science Fiction, does that mean that the author believes it is "fiction"? If so, then is the author the first-person narrator of the book (or is it based off of the author)? We never learn the character's name, I think; or it might be "John Galt."

Quickie Review: Stardust by Neil Gaiman

Firstly I just wanna say that y'all continually surprise me with the pageview count <3 :D Keep it up y'all! (click that refresh button! <3) And um please, if you would, check out my other posts? :)

I'm going to actually start using more "jumps" so that I can get more pageviews :3

So click --> to read more.....

The Deja Vu Experiment by J.G. Renato

The Deja Vu Experiment by J.G. Renato
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

ARC courtesy of NetGalley. Thank you NetGalley!

I heard someone say that it was like a "self help book.... for the author." While I don't necessarily agree, I thought many of the ideas in it were interesting, but altogether it was not interesting enough to hold my attention for long periods of time. The books seemed incredibly repetitive, repeating things a lot. What I had a huge problem with, though, was the utter lack of plot.

Now, I'm not sure what genre this falls in. On NetGalley, it was listed as Science Fiction, but that seems almost unbelievable now that I've read it. It's more like a spiritual book, somehow. But for a book this thick (I'm pretty sure it's a thick book. I read it in ebook format though.), I can't believe that it talks about the same exact thing over and over.

There are mentions of a certain "Diana," but the relationship between Diana and the narrator is confusing and not at all well explained: she was a widow, and then she met John, the narrator, and then they got married (?) and then (view spoiler)[she died. (hide spoiler)] Apparently Diana is the one who taught John [you barely hear his name repeated throughout the book anyway, only once or twice] about "the gap", which I won't explain in further detail. "The gap" and the ideas surrounding it make up ~98$ of the book, probably even more. I'll give the author credit; the book does do a great job of explaining just what "the gap" is. But I'm not sure that many people actually want to know.... I was ready to stop reading at around 15% or 30% through...

Mostly, I didn't understand the author's purpose. Or the genre. Or a lot things, actually, about this book.

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Book Update!

First of all, you may have noticed some changes going on concerning this blog :)

I've really worked hard to make an effort and review more books per year, and also achieve more pageviews ;)

But this time, it's actually crucial that I make this blog look good AND include great content and posts for my readers...

Because this blog is actually entered in a competition!

I'm really excited.... And to tie up this post: Once Upon A Book will start looking fantasmic!

I know that the current template is glitchy and buggy and I hope you'll forgive me...

Anyway, books rock!

Current reading list:

The Deja Vu Experiment (really difficult to understand...)
Scarlet
All my textbooks ;)

Pls refresh my page for me to get more pageviews! Just kidding... <3

20 Ways to Draw a Cat and 44 Other Awesome Animals by Julia Kuo *Quickie Review*

Note: As of the writing of this post, Once Upon a Book has 3997 pageviews! Just 3 more to go until 4000~ <3 y'all are the best :)


20 Ways to Draw a Cat and 44 Other Awesome Animals: A Sketchbook for Artists, Designers, and Doodlers by Julia Kuo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I know that this is a pretty high rating considering
a) it's not even a real book (at least by some standards, as it's partly labeled as a sketchbook )
b) at least 1/4 of it is blank... there's blank space on every other page at least.
c) most of the illustrations aren't even in colour.

However, the four stars I gave this book is not relative to others; my personal satisfaction regarding this book was insanely high for almost no reason, except that I really really like looking at the gorgeous illustrations and designs.

I knocked off a star because I didn't particularly like how it's designed as a sketchbook; the paper is not suitable for drawing, and I had thought it would be good as a reference book when making your own designs or copying these, but not to draw in.

Perhaps I'm somewhat biased as I received this book FREE from my school library's book fair book raffle, so I'm super pleased with that :3

Also, just to note, but I read the Chinese version of this; physically it's not much different though, with just an addition of the Chinese name for the animal under each page's heading and a Chinese introduction.

Obviously you have to look out because this book contains barely any words (I would say, fewer than 50 in all, except for the introduction/preface thing), so you may not find this purchase worth it (if you are buying...?) As another reviewer said, this book doesn't contain any how-to instruction, and it seems that some of the designs were produced with graphic-design software, which is pretty hard to replicate by hand. However, it's still a very nice book with pretty illustrations, so.....

More about the pictures:

I really liked them :) Even in (mostly) black and white, they were really inspiring at least to me. Clean lines and not cartoony looking, while still being creative-and-sketchy.

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