Book Review: Thaw: Winter's Queen

 

Summary: A slightly pampered girl allows her avoidance behavior to isolate her from the world... and it's only when she takes the final step that she realizes the wall she's built in the name of safety is also the one that will hold her prisoner forever... unless she discovers how to destroy it. 
  The only one who can break a neurosis... is the one who has it. 
Combining elements from the Snow Maiden, Schneekind, Snegurochka tales with those of the Snow Queen; Winter Queen continues a new series: THAW. 

Thoughts: I admit, I was pretty disappointed with this book. While the prequel had already forewarned me that the author (E. Kaiser Writes) was retelling Disney's Frozen, I was still hoping for some originality with the way the main points were reached and carried out. Obviously that didn't happen and I felt more like the author had simply renamed the cast. I still suggest it for a read aloud to young children as they might thoroughly enjoy the Frozen aspect without wanting much else from the plot (little girls in particular should enjoy this). 

Content: Zip. Perfectly clean aside from a tiny bit of violence and someone might have died. They don't go into much detail about and I was pretty surprised to find something like that in such a book but again, it wasn't very clear. Aside from that there isn't a thing though I do disagree with some of the messages in this story, I leave it up to parents as to how to interpret them to young children (nothing offensive simply not my interpretation of certain situations).

Book Review: Dave At Night

Summary: If nobody wants him, that's fine.He'll just take care of himself.

When his father dies, Dave knows nothing will ever be the same. And then it happens. Dave lands in an orphanage—the cold and strict Hebrew Home for Boys in Harlem—far from the life he knew on the Lower East Side. But he's not so worried. He knows he'll be okay. He always is. If it doesn't work out, he'll just leave, find a better place to stay. But it's not that simple.
Outside the gates of the orphanage, the nighttime streets of Harlem buzz with jazz musicians and swindlers; exclusive parties and mystifying strangers. Inside, another world unfolds, thick with rare friendships and bitter enemies. Perhaps somewhere, among it all, Dave can find a place that feels like home.

Thoughts: Again, I love books about little children and Dave at Night fell right into that category! I loved this book! I loved Dave and felt so bad for all the boys at the HHB! It is not a good thing to be an avid reader of character pain and a firm believer in helping hugs so I spent most of the book thanking Solly (the first person to take an interest in Dave) for his kindness with almost as much gratitude as Dave himself. I also loved Irma Lee. She came off as a little spoiled (I wasn't too happy with the way she treated her parental figure) but she was a sweetheart none the less and became unabashedly fast friends with Dave. The ending wasn't exactly perfect but was still good and made me happy!

Content: There are a few mature themes in this book so parents be aware. The boys get severely beaten by a man who doesn't even care if he kills them in his rage (are you beginning to see why they need hugs?) along with unhealthy temperatures and food, abandonment, and ridicule. Solly and Dave also wheedle money of people by selling fake fortunes. There are a few name callings (all in Yiddish) and the HHB (Hebrew Home for Boys) tends to get called the Hell House for Brats on occasion. I can't remember but there might have been an instance of D* once or twice. That's all.

Book Review: The Thief Lord

Summary: Two orphaned brothers, Prosper and Bo, have run away to Venice, where crumbling canals and misty alleyways shelter a secret community of street urchins. Leader of this motley crew of lost children is a clever, charming boy with a dark history of his own: He calls himself the Thief Lord.

 Prosper and Bo relish their new "family" and life of petty crime. But their cruel aunt and a bumbling detective are on their trail. And posing an even greater threat to the boys' freedom is something from a forgotten past: a beautiful magical treasure with the power to spin time itself.
 *Summary from Amazon

Thoughts: I'm going to let you all know right away that my goal is to seek out and devour every single book with adventure and children in it! I love interactions with little adorable, resourceful boys and girls with helpful older people (not necessarily always adults). Consider yourself warned!
  Ahem, anyways, the point of that was to say, we loved this story! Prosper is an exellent older brother though his decision of running away may be frowned upon his desire to take care of his little brother is admirable and adorable! I also found Scipio an endearing character (another one of my favorite types!) and the rest of the children were a wonderfully humorous and fascinating cast! I enjoyed quite a bit of Victor's time (at his expense) and lived in jealousy of Ida for the ending half of the book.While the ending may not wrap up the way most people expect (or want) I was thoroughly pleased and will definitely be returning to reread this treat at a later time. If you enjoy books on Italy, adventure or children (especially adorable children) I highly recommend this!

Content: Virtually nothing. A few instances of "Drat!" and guns are thrown around a little (in case you have a problem with that) though only one was actually fired and no one is hurt. There is also magic in here, very little, but it's there. The children steal quite a bit, there's a lot of lying and Scipio has understandable problems with his family. Like I said, nothing really but here it is for those of you who like to know.

Book Review: Quest For A Maid

 Summary:  Meg Wright is nine when she hides under a table and hears her sister Inge kill the King of Scotland by witchcraft, setting in motion a treacherous power struggle.
  Aware of her older sister's powers of sorcery, which have been used to help secure the Scottish throne for Robert de Brus, Meg realizes she must try to protect the young Norwegian princess who has been chosen as rightful heir.
Summeraries from Goodreads and Google Books.

Thoughts: This was a great historical-fiction about two sisters, Scotland, and the Maid of Norway's fateful journey. I love Scottish history and the author here did a great job in representing the Scottish accents and ways of life in her writing. The relationships and character development were handled well and the characters themselves were so fun and lovable! From little Davie to her interactions with the Maid, I loved Meg through and through. The story is fascinating though its more fiction than fact with its pieces of magic and great cast of people who weren't there, in fact the first half of the book is more for setting and introduction rather than the main story which means quite a few of the events are fictional. With that said, the pace was slow though not lagging and made for a pleasant quiet read though there were happy tears in my eyes by the end!

Content: A few flirtatious remarks are made to the girls, though nothing problematic. The biggest problem was the language. In keeping true to the old Scot's ways, the author has a few instances of both B's and I think there was an instance or so where D was used but it never got any worse than that and all were usually few and far apart.  

Book Review: Thaw: Winter's Child

    

Summery: A barren king and queen pray for a child, and when in their loneliness, they make one out of snow, their prayers are answered in a special, and unusual way.
Sometimes, when we get what we wish for, we don't know what to do with it.

Combining elements from the Snow Maiden, Schneekind, Snegurochka tales with those of the Snow Queen; Winter's Child introduces a new series: THAW.

Thoughts: Despite the stories claim to several winter fairy tales Winter's Child is pretty much a retelling of Disney's Frozen. Sticking to the first few scenes of the movie it introduces and gives background to it's Ana, Elsa, Hans and Kristoff characters while not really trying to move out of the Frozen theme. We even get some stone-folk resembling the trolls. Despite this it is a cute story and I'm sure younger children will really enjoy it as a read aloud though they may find the questions at the end of each chapter a little annoying. Over all a sweet but simple and predictable story. I hope the author finishes with her Frozen them and continues past it to truly make the characters her own.

Content Advisory: There is nothing to be said. Perfectly clean and filled with bunches of cute little kids (Hess was a favorite ;)!

*I was provided with a free ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

Begin Your Novel Writing Contest!

 

 Not sure how many of you are aware of this neat little site but I found Kingdom Pen awhile back when looking for encouraging material for young, Christian, writers/authors wanna be (there is a difference!). While the action on here has been a little slow they've started picking it up again and here is the excitement! For all you aspiring authors here's an interesting contest and one of the easiest to enter! No need to wrack your brains for a new story or pull out a great idea and fit it to a word count! For those of you already working on novels all that's required is the first paragraph or so, something between 75-200 words. Fun right? This contest is set up for young and mostly aspiring authors so there is an age limit, all participants must be 13-19 years old. For those of you in this age group, you might want to check it out, it's fun, free, easy to enter and the prize doesn't hurt! ;)
Here are the details!

Welcome!

Welcome one and all! For starters, the title has next to nothing to do with the blog, we simply wanted something different...if pointless. For those wondering, it means Story Blossoms and was just a pretty way of writing it!
Secondly I am only going to warn you once that we're going to be posting all manner of things on here (if we manage to post at all!) everything from reviews on film and books to possibly short (hopefully short) stories and maybe even the occasional recipe or anything else that might catch our fancy! We would appreciate comments, feedback and criticism (just please make sure it's all appropriate please! There might be children reading!).
Thanks for bothering, and I'm going to apologize ahead of time for all delays, drops, and long time periods of ignoring this blog. For all you wishing to put up with us and forebear, I welcome and thank you heartily!