Author: Sumthinblue

Nutcracker finger puppets!

The last two weeks have been particularly stressful, and I’ve gone on a bookish rampage (*guilty)* that doesn’t seem to show signs of letting up — not with the Manila International Book Fair coming up in a couple of weeks.

I was trawling at one of my favorite branches of a bargain bookstore today and found a Nutcracker finger puppet set! Now you know I collect all sorts of bookish miscellany – book gadgets, bookmarks, bookish toys, and practically anything book-related – so when I saw this battered box on the shelf, I couldn’t resist getting it for my collection. It was pretty cheap, too, at only P65, an awesome deal for four adorable finger puppets! Just in time, too, as September marks the start of the Christmas season here in the Philippines.

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The Red Pyramid

Egyptian culture has always been a special interest of mine since I was a high school sophomore, when most of our subjects for the year were tied up with Afro-Asian civilization. One quarter of that school year was devoted to Egypt, and I remember being fascinated with the history of pharaohs in Social Studies class (my personal favorite was Hatshepsut!), and Egyptian mythology and the concept of afterlife in Literature class.

I actually like Egyptian mythology over Greek mythology so even though I wasn’t all that fond of the Percy Jackson series, I was eager to try out The Red Pyramid, the first book in Rick Riordan’s new series, The Kane Chronicles.

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Quarter Quell Live Action Role Play (LARP)

Yesterday’s Mockingjay Launch Party was such a blast!

I’m still wading through hundreds of event photos, and am in the middle of writing an article about the event for Manila Bulletin, but I know you’re all waiting for one thing, anyway: the major highlight of the Mockingjay Launch Party — the Quarter Quell Live Action Role Play (LARP)!

Last year, the Hunger Games LARP at the Manila International Book Fair was a huge success, and I was lucky to be one of the few people to cover it. Of course, this meant the Mockingjay launch party wouldn’t be complete without a LARP, and Scholastic upped the ante this year with the Quarter Quell!

24 tributes representing the 12 districts of Panem participated in this year’s Quarter Quell LARP, competing for exciting prizes from Scholastic and National Book Store.

Here’s a recap of the Quarter Quell LARP (based on the events in Catching Fire) which is easy enough to replicate in case you’re planning your own Hunger Games party!

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The Mockingjay has landed!


(first published in Manila Bulletin)

The long wait is finally over for fans of Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games trilogy, as “Mockingjay,” the final installment in Scholastic’s hottest property since Harry Potter, was released worldwide this week.

Since “Mockingjay” was announced in December 2009, fans have kept an eye on the countdown clock as they held their breaths on the fate of the series heroine, Katniss Everdeen, and the nation of Panem. Much of the fandom is based online: fan pages, countdown counters and badges, miles of fan fiction, online book clubs and book discussions, and blog tours.

“Mockingjay” has been so highly anticipated that even those in the literary circles were scrabbling about for advance copies, but to no avail. Scholastic kept it under wraps, more closely guarded than “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” that furor ensued all over the internet when Andrew Sims, administrator of Harry Potter fan site mugglenet.com, tweeted that he got ahold of a copy nearly two weeks before the release.

And when a video of Suzanne Collins reading the first few paragraphs of “Mockingjay” was posted on the internet one day before the release, fans all over the world hung on to her every word.

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Have you read Mockingjay yet?


I just wanted to post a note to say that I finished Mockingjay last night after I quarantined myself from the internet for about four hours. It turned out to be a good decision because spoilers were flying around (how rude of some people).

Then I wrote a spoiler-free review that will be published in Manila Bulletin on Saturday — quite tricky because I didn’t want to reveal important information about Hunger Games and Catching Fire either!  I’ll post the review here when the issue’s out.

Meanwhile, the Mockingjay launch party is on Sunday (squee!) and I’m busy prepping for that — I can’t wait!

Toodles for now, and to all Mockingjay readers, happy reading!