Highlights of November 2018

November. One of the most wonderful months in the year - and November 2018 (while being more low-key and chill, by my standards) was particularly good! Want to hear about it?

I kicked November off by going to an AMAZING concert with some of my closest friends - it was so incredibly fun and I miiiight have been a little (or a lot) hoarse afterwards from all the screaming/singing I did ;D. Also, pro tip: PLEASE do not wear shoes with a two-inch heel to a concert where you will jump and dance a lot. You will regret it the next day. A lot xD. But Rend Collective knows how to put on a good show, and I had an absolute blast!

... and then of course I came down sick for two weeks after that ;D.

But after I'd recovered (and watched way too much Marvel while I should have been sleeping), I came back to life to find that my mom and all of my sisters had gotten hooked on a new hobby - bullet journaling.

"oh boy," said my brain.

And guess who is now ALSO hooked on bullet journaling? ;D

the mess that was our table on Thankgiving Eve ;D

I've spent the last chunk of November planning out my 2019 bullet journal and I'm having WAY too much fun. I'll probably do a post or YouTube video about it at some point. Speaking of which, I also spent a good portion of Thanksgiving break planning ahead on social media things. And I've got some epic stuff coming for y'all ;D. If you don't want to miss it, you'll want to be following me on YouTube and Instagram, too!

Thanksgiving was a little more low-key this year, but I had TONS of fun hanging out with my family and playing games, and watching the Macy's parade like we do every year. And eating way more food than is good for anyone ;D. It was an epic day, and it was also the day that we always break out AAALLL the Christmas music, which was super fun (and I've had Christmas music playing in my head on repeat ever since then and am I complaining? NOPE)

*whispers* also, I may or may not have already started on all of the Christmas cards I have to make this year. Am I slowly becoming obsessed, yes or no? (there's only one right answer here ;D)

My sisters (Skylar and Jaidyn) also put on their orchestra/band concert at the end of the month, and it was so, so fun to go watch them play! They did so good <3. (and one of the songs that was played was actually composed by my insanely musical sister, Skylar Reese, and that was incredibly cool to hear!!)  

Spoiler alert: I did NOT even attempt to win NaNoWriMo this month *cue gasps of shock* ;D

If you read last month's recap post, I said that in the middle of October I decided to take a break from doing any writing that I felt pressured to do. And turns out, this was the right decision. November was an amazing month writing-wise. I wrote whatever I wanted whenever I wanted without any pressure at all, and I ended up with a full short story that I'm pretty proud of (I actually ended up entering it in a contest last-minute, so we'll see how that goes!).

So, yes - while November was my "chill" writing month, I still got a lot done. I even did some spur-of-the-moment editing! Seriously, you guys - if y'all ever feel that you really need a break from writing, never feel bad about taking one. Sometimes it's an awfully good choice ;D.

I also had time to put a couple entries together for Kathy Ide's Promising Beginnings contest! I'm really excited to see how that turns out *crosses fingers*.

Okay and because I like to be a tease and save the best for last A SMOL PIECE OF MINE MIGHT HAVE BEEN POSTED ON THE WRITER'S DIGEST SITE??? LIKE WHUT?? You can read it here!!! (it's story B, the one about Crow-Man's son!) 

+ part of Sawkill Girls by Claire Legrand

I reread Raven Boys this month. And it was lovely. That is all you need to know.

But you probably want to hear slightly more than that, huh? ;D

- Dear Jamie, Love Rory by Micaiah Saldana. I was so excited to read this sweet story written by my dear friend, and it didn't disappoint! Dear Jamie, Love Rory was so cute and I absolutely loved it! And it's a short story, so I didn't need to feel guilty for not doing writing or some such thing ;D. A solid 4 stars to this story!

- Sawkill Girls by Claire Legrand. No. Just no. I got a few minutes in and just...no. DNFed. 0 stars. Will not be picking it back up. Which was a disappointment, because I've liked the other books I've read by this author! But it is what it is. (and what it is is no)

- Sky in the Deep by Adrienne Young. Okay, it took me WAY too long to read this book after everyone on the Internets was screaming about ;D. But I finally got to it, and I ADORED IT. SO MUCH. Eelyn was just the best and the storyworld was <3. And the plot! The plot was amazing! Basically, 4.5 stars to this book and I love it and maybe I'll get up a review for it soon? We'll see!  

I also read Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi this month, and did a post about it here if you want to see some of my thoughts on it!

On The Blog

On YouTube

 

- PROJECT CANVAS RELEASED! I'm so proud of this book <3 <3 <3. A post went up on the Project Canvas blog about the cover designer's process for creating the epic cover, and it was really cool to read.

- There's been cool pre-order stuff going on this month! Tricia Mingerink is having a really neat pre-order giveaway for her upcoming novel, Decree, and Mary Weber announced the INCREDIBLE pre-order goodies that come with To Best the Boys! And trust me, you don't want to miss it.  

- K.M. Weiland did a SUPER helpful post on how to successfully start a novel with a dream that I highly recommend (because it is HARD to hook me on a book that starts with a dream ;D)

- Rosalie Valentine did a great post with 7 questions to ask yourself during NaNo, but I think the questions go for any time, honestly, so definitely check it out.

- Jane did an epic post on being different online than we are in real life, and it was really great and super thought-provoking. Would definitely recommend it.(and she posted one of the most amazing pieces of flash fiction ever and I LOVE IT <3)

- STARS AND SOUL RELEASED AND I AM STILL SCREAMING. Check out the author's post about it here, or go straight to Amazon and buy thyself a copy like I did xD. 

- also, The Crimes of Grindewald released. Am I excited or am I excited? (*screams happily into the void*)

IT'S CHRISTMAS SEASON, I HAVE CHRISTMAS-THINGS COMING, AND I'M EXCITED.

*deep breaths* ;D

I have a couple fun winter-y posts and YouTube videos planned, and I'm super excited to share them with you! And I may or may not have a teensy smol giveway coming up ... but I don't know which social media platform I'll be having it on yet. SO if you don't want to miss that, make sure you're following me here and on YouTube and Instagram!

SO - I hope your November was amazing, and that your December is even better! HAVE AN INCREDIBLE HOLIDAY SEASON, MY FRIENDS <3 <3 <3.

~ Savannah Grace 

how was your November?

what holiday-things have you done already?

What We Can Learn From Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi

I finished reading the massive, gargantuan book that is Children of Blood and Bone on the first of November (when it really would have been more appropriate to do another Scorpio Races reread, but PRIORITIES, y'all), and I LOVED IT.

LOVED IT.

You guys were expecting a book review, huh? ;D Well, I already posted a review of it over on my YouTube channel (you can find it HERE!), and figured I wouldn't parrot all of that right back at you guys. So here we are with a post that's a little different from a book review, but it's still going to be a ton of fun.

Alright, ANYways, I think it's time we ask the question - what CAN we learn from Children of Blood and Bone?

- How to gracefully handle multiple POVS - 

First person POVS - even just ONE first person POV - can be a little difficult to handle. And CoBaB (does anyone else try to read that as kabob? No? Just me? Okay, carry on) didn't have just one first person POV. It also didn't have two.

It had THREE.

Normally, when there's this many differing POVS, they either a) start to all sound alike or b) I will be far more interested in one POV than I am in the others, and so I'll...ah...skip sections to return to said interesting person's POV. Oh, hush, you've probably done that too ;D.

But the three POVs (two gals, one guy) in CoBaB were all distinct and ALL interesting! How was this done, and how can you do it, too? Well:

- Know how your characters think. Just by reading CoBaB, you could tell that the author really knew her characters - which is super important when writing in multiple POVs. How else are you going to give each of your characters a distinct voice if you don't know how they think?  

- Keep the stakes high for everyone. This was a big portion of the reason why each POV was equally interesting to read - because the stakes were equally high for everyone. Keeping the stakes through the roof for each of your point-of-view characters really helps to keep reader's attention.

- How to build outside-the-box worlds - 

The worldbuilding for Children of Blood and Bone was INSANE, you guys - INSANE. It was super African-inspired and flat-out different from the other stuff I've read. But not only was it different, it was really, really vivid.

I have a weird problem, you guys. I sometimes have a really hard time picturing what the setting is like in the books I read - and I didn't have this problem AT ALL with Children of Blood and Bone. The world seemed to create itself in my head and it was wonderful. But what, exactly, made the worldbuilding so good and easy to imagine?

- Culture. Half of the reason that Children of Blood and Bone had such a vibrant world was because of the culture. CoBaB is very African-inspired, and the culture is, too, which made the world leap off the page that much more. Tying in your culture with your worldbuilding is a seriously great way to take it up another notch. 

- Changing Landscapes. *cheers madly for the fact that this book had vastly differing landscapes* And now we come to the other half of the reason why CoBaB's world was so great - it didn't stay the same. The characters were traveling a lot in the book, and the author changed up the landscape drastically multiple times, I adored the fact that it wasn't always the same.

- How to revive cliche plotlines - 

Okay, I'll admit - Children of Blood and Bone has the same plot line as...a lot of books. The "you're the chosen one, go save the world" type of plot line. I usually will get bored during books like that because GRACIOUS, they're all so similar!

But Children of Blood and Bone wasn't like that at all.

The author did a great job taking a tried-and-true plot line, and spicing it up to keep it from being dry. It's probably one of my top-favorite uses of the "quest to save the world" and "chosen one" plotlines! But WHY did I like it so much, and what saved the plot from dying?  

- Worldbuilding. Oh look, and we return to why this book is so incredibly epic! xD But the worldbuilding was a MAJOR part of why this plotline wasn't cliche for CoBaB. The world was so different that even if the plot had been cut-and-dried, I hardly think I would have noticed. The world was so vivid that it gave extra vibrancy to everything in the book. 

- Throw in a new twist. I can't tell you exactly what the twists were, because #spoilers - but Tomi Adeymi definitely added some great twists to the plot that I did NOT see coming, and this really help spice up the plot, and kept it from dragging at all. Throwing a new spin into an old plotline can ultimately be what saves it!

So, if you couldn't tell already - Children of Blood and Bone was a SERIOUSLY good book! ;D I really, really enjoyed it and would definitely recommend it. (you should ready it for the worldbuilding alone, you guys! And the characters are AH-MAZING <3)

Oh, and like I said - I've done a book review for it over on my YouTube channel, if you want to get more of my thoughts on this amazing book.  I might have raved, just a wee bit xD. So that's there if you want to check it out!

Keep being epic, y'all! <3

~ Savannah Grace

have you read Children of Blood and Bone?

what's your favorite book with good worldbuilding?

Movie Review - Infinity War

   Beware, my friend - major spoilers and gifs abound here with no rhyme or reason. Also, much raving.

   Be thee warned.

4 Stars

I honestly had a REALLY hard time figuring out what to rate this movie, but I ended up going with a very solid four stars. Infinity War was one of the best movies I've seen so far in 2018, and I'm SUPER excited to tell you guys about it!

 - Thanos. WOW okay this is a weird one to start off on. But Thanos was an incredible villain. Not only was he super powerful, but he legit thought that what he was doing was right. It's villains like that that are the scariest. I thought Marvel did an epic job with him - maybe even better than they did with Loki. Loki was a riot, but Thanos felt real. (I might write a Loki vs. Thanos type post later, because I have a lot to say on that topic) 

- THE FEELS. I'd accidentally read spoilers as to who died in Infinity War, but actually watching it happen still hit HARD. Especially Spiderman's. Oh my gracious. I don't think I"ll ever get over that one. And Doctor Strange. And Black Panther. And BUCKY. It was just all so SUDDEN and then the movie just ENDS and - yeah okay, I better stop before I get carried away. xD

- The "teams". The way they grouped the characters together was so perfect - they did everything they could to cause conflict and hilarity (or moments that made people scream YAS because our favorite characters were finally interacting!). It was WAY too much fun watching all of the characters join forces.

- How it pulled everything together. Infinity War was THE BIG MOVIE, the one we've been waiting for for ages - we'd been teased by Thanos showing up a little in GotG, hearing mention of the Infinity Stones (or having the Infinity Stones actually be in some of the movies, like in Doctor Strange), etc. So we all came into this movie knowing it was the climax movie for the Marvel franchise, and we had some pretty large expectations. And Marvel absolutely crushed it, in my opinion. It was great.

- Heaps of language. Which I expected because a) it's a Marvel movie and b) it's a Marvel movie with the Guardians in it. Ahem. But yeah...could have done without it. xD  

- Too many characters. Alright, I WILL say that this was definitely a "it's good for you, but not for me" type thing. I know a lot of people liked seeing all the Marvel characters in one movie (I did, too), and Marvel handled the overload of characters pretty well, but I almost felt like there was just too many people at once? I LOVED having them all there, but I feel like there wasn't enough time to give some of the characters the attention they deserved. So there's that ;D.

- Loki's death. Alright, fine, now I'm really getting picky here - it's not so much that I don't like the fact that he died, but I don't like how they chose to have him die. I mean, in the first five minutes of the movie? Just like that? NO RESPECT, people xD. I don't know, but something didn't feel right about it. Something was off. So...yeah, it goes on the list of dislikes ;D.(*cough* I don't think he's dead *cough*)

Infinty War was a worthy "climax movie" for the Marvel franchise, I REALLY enjoyed it - I loved seeing all the characters coming together as one big massive chaotic team ;D. If you haven't seen it yet, what are you waiting for??? Go! Watch it!

And then we can cry together as we wait for Infinity War 2 to release.

Because that's what we do ;D.

ANYways, those are my (somewhat coherent) thoughts on Infinity War! Now I'm counting down the days until the second half releases, because HOW DARE we be left on such a cliffhanger?? At least they're giving us a Captain Marvel movie to tide us over until then - I'm hoping that one will be pretty good. We'll see!

(also, for those of you deep down in the depths of NaNoWriMo - YOU GUYS ROCK - I just uploaded a YouTube video with tips on how to survive the rest of this month! If you're interested, here's the link <3)

Keep being epic, my friends!    

~ Savannah Grace 

have you seen Infinity War? WHAT DID YOU THINK?

should I do a Loki versus Thanos post?