Tag: YA

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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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!

Mockingjay Launch Party!


Calling all Hunger Games fans!

Join Flips Flipping Pages, New Worlds Alliance, Scholastic Philippines, and National Book Store as we celebrate the release of Mockingjay, the highly-anticipated third book in Suzanne Collins’ Hunger Games trilogy. It’ll be an afternoon of fun fandom on Sunday, Aug. 29th, 1-5 pm at NBS Bestsellers, Robinsons Galleria, packed with activities for all Hunger Games fans!

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The London Eye Mystery

 

I was out of town with my cousins last weekend for a special marathon of our current favorite show,The Big Bang Theory, and what is fast becoming a weekend tradition: gaming (the hidden object and action strategy type).  Dianne mentioned a book she read recently, and of course when either of us talks about a book we like, the other eventually reads it (because we feed off each other’s compulsions that way!), and so I ended up borrowing her copy of The London Eye Mystery with me to read in between our marathon sessions.

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