Book Review: Jane and the Damned

Jane and the Damned by Janet Mullany
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I did not expect to enjoy this as much as I did. After reading many of the Jane Austin adaptions I was expecting more of the same, but Jane and the Damned didn't dissapoint.
Jane has just had her first novel rejected by the publishers in an attempt to cheer herself she attends a party with her sister and a friend. Some of the Damned (Vampires) have also come along. While most of the respectibles shun them in fear Jane agrees to dance with Mr Smith, whom she assumes is using a false name, and is quickly turned. The next morning Jane knows she is now one of the Damned and after confiding in her father the Reverend Austen the whole family is on their way to Bath so Jane can take the healing Waters and cure her condition. However while in Bath the French invade and Jane puts her cure on hold to fight the invading force.
The story is mostly compelling and a definate page turner but you have to enjoy it for what it is, its not great poetry or an epic tale is a fun little jaunt into the life of Miss Jane Austen the Damned. Jane is quick witted and eager to fight the french, her manners are impecible even if she does say so herself.

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Quick-ish Cardigan Alteration Project

 I sometimes love to do quick little sewing projets just to personalised someof the basic stuff I buy on the cheap.

I have been meaning to buy a little black cardigan for a while now and the other day we went to check out the Salvo's store near our place.

 

I got this cardigan pretty cheap but thought it looked a little too bag lady just as it was so I made it a sewing project.

 

I still had this cute little bat motif I bought off an etsy seller Dexy And The Wolf and thought the stark contract really works while its still a pretty small addition to the cardigan.

These gorgeous lion head knocker buttons from Lyanwood were the perfect size to replace the boring black buttons that the cardigan came with.

 The sleeves were the hardest to do, specially the one at the top as I had to be careful not to sew the folded fabric together.

Originally the cardigan had 4 buttons per sleeve but I thought having a lions head right at the edge of the sleeve was unneccessary and would probably be prone to hooking on things.



SupaNova 2013 Melbourne

 So this weekend was SupaNova in Melbourne.

YAY!

I applied for a volunteer position on the saturday and sunday and got in.

The weekend before we had our induction and I had a lot of fun on the saturday.

Stuff happened on the saturday night though and made it impossible for me to attend on sunday. SERIOUS BUMMER!

Do you recognise these cars?

 This girl did an AMAZING Mystique!

No that is not Mystiques weapon, she was holding it for a friend.

 

 These ladies were brilliant as the killer bots from Austin Powers

They were always together and moved the same

Pulled it off perfectly!

 CATWOMAN!

She was fantastic as the new catwoman from the newest movie.

 Photo taken by one of the supanova photographers, us volunteers

 The Hobbit panel, no hobbits in site just dwarves

The ultimate queen of SupaNova was Alex Kingston (River, Dr Who's Wife)

She played it up all day and gave the people what they wanted and acting like River the entire time.

Super cool lady. Search for her on tumblr and you will read many funny stories.

 

 

SupaNova Highlights

 

Book Review : The Rats by James Herbert (horror)

The Rats by James Herbert
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

A fun little horror read, only 197 pages a lot of these taken up by graphic descriptions of people being eaten alive by rats.
The human interactions are not greatly written, a lot of "he did this and then she did that" but lets face it, you don't read this sort of thing for the conversations people have.
I like how we are introduced to each of the people before they are attacked by the rats. Privy to a few short minutes of their lives and what they are thinking before the rats come. It does give you that personality to be sorry for that they died in such a way.
I didn't really like Harris, the school teacher turned mutant rat specialist, and found the bits where he is taken into the commitee fold to help with the rat problem perhaps wasn't too realistic. The few plot holes there were I am sure were more due to the shortness of the book and trying to fit everything in. Then again I felt chapter 8 could have been left out completely and don't really see why it was even written.
I have had this book on the shelf for a while and finally decided to pick it up after it was mentioned in another book I had just read, Wicked Girls by Alex MarwoodThe Wicked Girls. I will not go out of my way to find the next book in this 4 part series but if I stumble across it I will definatley purchase it.

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Book Review: Wicked Girls

The Wicked Girls by Alex Marwood
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Wow.
This book is amazing, and tackles the very controversial.
In half a day three little girls all under the age of 12 meet for the first time and by the end of the day one is dead. Bel and Jade are 11 and have never met before, but they are hauled through the court system when it is discovered that they killed 4 year old Chloe. They are reformed and given new identities to keep them safe and are never to see each other or their families again.
25 years later in a little seaside town girls are being murdered and Bel and Jade meet again by chance, now Amber and Kirsty.
The book is very well written and the fact that the aurthor is also a journalist probably helps a lot with writting Kirsty's new life as a freelance journalist.
As we switch POVs and read the story of Amber and Kirsty's new lives unfold we are also taken back every few chapters to read about the afternoon that started it all for them.
The story of the murdered girls in the present is in the background of the story, its just something that is going on and is the reason they see each other again. The murderer is a little pradictable but is not actually the focus of the story so it doesn't matter so much, and the story continues after the crime is solved.
Perhaps the most confronting part of the book is the last few chapters, I really didn't know how I felt about how it ended but felt my eyes welling up.

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