When finding ways to deal with stress

Hey everyone,

I apologize for not being around in the last week or so. Other than the work card, I honestly don't have a excuse for not posting much on this blog. Things at work have been stressful and with school coming at the end of August, its a hassle to figure stuff out. Now, let me to the actual post of this blog. This is not a book related thing since I'm currently reading the book I want to review next, so I wanted to talk about stress since I know everyone in the world deals with it in many different ways.

As a individual, I find it difficult to deal with stress when it comes to both writing and personal life. Sometimes I would feel anxious and not being able to think straight. Most of the time when I am conflicted with stress, I do talk to my mother and discuss what to do afterwords. However, when dealing with over lapping talking of everyone else and there statements to relax, I feel like I want to kick someone in the ass. Do you guys ever get that feeling? So as a result, I'm either too annoy to deal with things or simply heading towards the path of blasting music into my eardrums.

But lately, I've been thinking. Even though most of my stress is minor compare to the many and unbearable things that have been going on in this weird ass world, how do they deal with it? I mean yes they keep it inside and burst eventually or go to their 'gods' to prey for safety, but are there other ways to deal with things? So, let's figure it out together.

Sometimes people will need to get out of the house to hang out with friends and rant till you can't hold your breath anymore. Or eat. Eat lots of food. Especially dessert. Or go crazy and scream till you are smiling up a storm to people that are staring at you, and so forth. But what if you are not like that? What do we writers/artists/odd balls do?

We binge.

We binge on reading, writing, drawing, watching movies/anime/our favorite shows, and basically everything else.

Us odd balls like to get away from reality whether we are alone or with a small group of friends that have many similar interests. It's like entering Narina, but better because we get to explore our creative sides and maybe figure out if we want to share it witho other people so we can develop a friendship with them and help get rid of the stress we hold inside.

Now I'm not saying the oddball version of stress is a way to go, but it helps out. Hopefully one day everyone on this planet can come together and get along so stress doesn't take over all of us physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritual. Until then, what are your stress relievers? How do you personally deal with it in a positive sort of way? Do you talk to people or escape reality through your passions?

Happy Howling guys.

Book Review: The Restless Dead

The Restless Dead (Ten Original stories of the Supernatural): Written by M.T Anderson, Holly Black, Kelly Link, Libba Bray, Herbie Brennan, Nancy Etchemendy, Annette Curtis Klause, Deborah Noyes, Marcus Sedgwick, Chris Wooding
Release Date: July 10th, 2007
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Format of Novel: Paper back
Summary (From good reads): Enter the murky world of the undead. From a beyond-the-grave stalker to prankster devil worshippers, from a childish ghost of the future to a vampire lover with bloody ties to the past, the characters in these ten original stories will send shivers down your spine. Why do we fear the undead? Find out in this spooky companion volume to GOTHIC! TEN ORIGINAL DARK TAKES, and enjoy another graveyard walk in the company of ten contemporary masters of horror and suspense.
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I remember a few years ago that my mother gotten me this book to read. Thinking that it was a zombie book, I decided not to read it mainly because I'm not a huge fan of zombies in novels. (due to the over popularized books/shows/movies of the creature of the un dead). But since I started my job a couple of weeks ago, I decided to give a chance and man I wish I could slap my past self in the face for being stupid with books. This collection of short paranormal stories kept me on my feet and interested with each page that was turned.

The stories were a weird thing since they were pretty long. I honestly couldn't understand most of the stories that were being told, but as I gotten to the end they were about mainly ghosts, murderers, and the psychological aftermath with the families and individuals that were telling the story. Out of all stories in this book, my top favorite one was Bad Things by Libba Bray. Her story in particular was the one I was most curious about because it was about a young man and his friends trying to figure out what's causing the rise of the satanist rituals and mysterious deaths of other people. The way it was written was a page turner since it felt like you were looking at another thriller and you think that everyone was gonna die at the end, however that wasn't the case. The ending of this short story was very amazing and I was pleased with the way she wrote it as a twist.

With this book, I was pleased with the authors that wrote the ten short stories in this. I was able to understand the concept of some supernatural fiction and the methods of writing longer short stories without chapters. If you guys are aspiring paranormal writers like I am, then pick up this book to explore new authors if you haven't heard of these guys before. :)

Happy Howling!

Book Review: Daughter of Smoke and Bone

Daughter of Smoke & Bone (#1): written by Laini Taylor
Release Date: June 5th, 2012
Publisher: Little, little brown for young readers
Format of Novel: Paper back
Summary (from good reads): ~First book to the trilogy~
Around the world, black handprints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grown dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war.

Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages--not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.

When one of the strangers--beautiful, haunted Akiva--fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?
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This book is a new trilogy I have been hearing about lately and so after getting this from Barnes and Noble about a month ago, I gave a whirl. Let me just say, holy crow! Laini Taylor is amazing! This book is so so so awesome and the world building was truly a wondrous thing to grasp. I literally finished this book within a three day span, despite the fact this book was over 60 chapters. The story itself felt like I was pulled into a fairy tale and an original one at that too.

The simple idea of having the biological and the history of chimeras is truly what sparked my interest for this story. In most young adult literature, it amazes me to see that there are barely any stories about chimeras like the ones you see in this particular novel. I mean yeah there are chimeras in some Young Adult fiction, but they are normally the smaller bad guys. In this case, I was so happy to see that these wonderful creations are both good and evil. I think that with the chimeras in the story along with the angels, it really brought out a originality that I can really grin too when reading it. So as a result to it, when I get the money to do this, I'm going to get up and get the other two books just to see what happens to Karou and Akiva.

And speaking of Karou and Akiva, man oh man did I enjoy their characters. There a balance of each other and they contained that particular curiosity and selfishness that ended up causing them the issues they were gonna face towards the end of the story. But considering that this book is the first one to the trilogy, I'm pretty sure that we are gonna see more craziness soon.

Happy Howling.

Book Review: Incarnate & Progress on camp NaNo

Incarnate (New Soul trilogy #1): written by Jodi Meadows
Release Date: January 31st, 2012
Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books
Format of Novel: Paperback
Summary (From good reads): New soul

Ana is new. For thousands of years in Range, a million souls have been reincarnated over and over, keeping their memories and experiences from previous lifetimes. When Ana was born, another soul vanished, and no one knows why.

No soul

Even Ana’s own mother thinks she’s a nosoul, an omen of worse things to come, and has kept her away from society. To escape her seclusion and learn whether she’ll be reincarnated, Ana travels to the city of Heart, but its citizens are afraid of what her presence means. When dragons and sylph attack the city, is Ana to blame?

Heart

Sam believes Ana’s new soul is good and worthwhile. When he stands up for her, their relationship blooms. But can he love someone who may live only once, and will Ana’s enemies—human and creature alike—let them be together? Ana needs to uncover the mistake that gave her someone else’s life, but will her quest threaten the peace of Heart and destroy the promise of reincarnation for all?

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Hey guys, hope you had a wonderful Fourth of July weekend (for the Americans out there). I'm finally back for a bit since work has been very hectic lately. (I've been getting a lot of hours since I started the job so yeah.. Can't do much sorry). So make the camp nanowrimo short, I haven't been writing. The idea for the project (first draft of it) is still lingering in my noggin, but the writing has not been really successful mainly because of work and partly for the ideal fact I don't feel like writing whenever I do have a day off since I now normally get one or two days off per week.

Now then, in this review, I wanted to discuss Jodi Meadow's Incarnate mainly because I was thinking about this book at work and I still remember reading it a year since I really enjoyed it so much. This story brings out the interesting topic of reincarnation along with the ups and downs with it with Ana, a new soul that was brought suddenly into this magical world. She was one of my favorite characters other than Sam because she contained the natural curiosity a lot of people need to have these days. It reveals the natural observer in her personality which makes her very original since many of the other characters in Jodi's world is already familiar with it since they have been reborn over and over again.

Another thing that sparked my interest in this story was the fantastical world building. Jodi's wording in this book brought out the wonderful imagery that was presented in the story. I fell in love with this world because it related itself to musical elements and the chapter with the masquerade ball was absolutely perfect! I didn't wanted to put the book down afterwords because right after that event, it lead to the huge attack from the dragons and syph creatures (which was awesome as well).

I'm hoping that eventually I will be able to pick up the other two books to this trilogy and the short novella Jodi Meadows wrote for this series so I can discuss it for you guys, but in this I can't. If you guys are looking for a good read, this book is really good and full of wonder images for your creative and day dreaming purposes. She doesn't disappoint her readers and I'm glad she didn't since this novel was her debut one. So enjoy reading and see you guys next time.

Happy Howling!