...And OFFICIALLY joined ANOTHER FANDOM! *Initiate?*

I've been very busy for the past couple of months because of endless research works and loads of assignments being given to us in class. Fourth year college - is really a very tiring phase. I tell you that. Those were the reasons why I haven't read a book for a long time now and I have gone HIATUS in my blogging activities *missed it A LOT, shout outs to my ROBSTEN DREAMS FAMILY*. 

My hands and eyes were literally itching to read a book and get to fangirl again with the story and characters in it. Well. I corrected that error already over the weekend. Guess what I read? Uhmmm. Does Tris and Four ring any bell? 

Guess you figured out what I read already. DIVERGENT it is! Hoping that I'm not that late yet to party with you, guise! Blame school for not allowing me to read this one in an earlier time. Boo. 

But, this book didn't disappoint me. I immediately joined the FANDOM upon reading the first book. 

It was so good that I finished it in one sitting, gosh what a page turner we have here! The pacing of the events in the book would not leave you bored to death and wait for an epic scene to happen. BECAUSE EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS BOOK IS EPIC! ASDFGHJKL Fangirling really hard. Divergent is not just some typical dystopian book out there, it really lets your mind work and work and work. Especially that we're seeing it in Tris' Point of View. 

I really love reading books with romance in it and this book didn't fail me in that aspect too. The ANGST AND ROMANCE in Divergent is totally in BALANCE. Angst not overpowering ROMANCE. Balance balance balance.  

What would you expect from me after reading this book? Haha! 

TADA! I PROCEEDED IN READING INSURGENT. As usual, read it again in one sitting for only a couple of hours. I just can't seem to put this book down, feels like it's already glued to my hands until I really finished it. 

The world Ms. Veronica Roth created is just .... AMAZING! I can't think ... AAAAH! How everything is weaved from simple information to another. How detailed everything is. From the names of the FACTION to the PERSONALITIES/ATTITUDE one should have in a given FACTION. *Names of the FACTION - is really really COOL* Whoo! It really is a good read and I enjoyed it so much! 

I guess, I can't wait for the last book ... dying to know everything. What a tease in the ending of Insurgent.

I'm also so stoked for the movie adaptation of this one! After reading the book, I already jumped into the "Shailene Woodley is perfect for Tris" boat. I can see her already in character and with the recent MTV interview she did from Sundance, yes totally fit for Tris. 

Now. The Dilemma is - who'll be the -perfect FOUR/TOBIAS? Uh-oh. Haha! I have several names in my mind. *Tapping my fingertips* Please announce who'll play Four already. *dying to know* Haha! 

So. That's it for now. 

This is another post from ME: the FANGIRL of ALMOST ALL OF THE FANDOMS!

Bye! xxx

- Amanda <3 

[FEATURED] Wendy Higgins, Author of Sweet Trilogy

Hello there, guys and gals! 

It's been a couple of days already since my last post and I'm sorry for that. I've been juggling everything that I'm handling - from the classes that I'm taking up (senior student in college over here, we're getting thrown with LOADS of stuff) up to the Facebook pages (Uhmm. About five-six pages, I think) that I'm managing. So yeah, I'm terribly sorry.

But not to worry. My blog post tonight is for BOOK JUNKIES, WENDY HIGGINS and SWEET EVIL fans out there. Yuhoo! Where are you, guys? Come out, come out where ever you are! I'm sure you will love this one! 

Just my luck again. For I was given a chance to interview Ms. Higgins and was also given a simple treat by her. You have to check and read through this whole post before you see what she gave me. No peeking at the bottom first! 

Well. I'm stopping myself from this point and will just give you everything that I asked her on our "email" kind of an interview. Enjoy reading through her answers!

Let's get started with by knowing more about Ms. Wendy Higgins.

Q: Can you tell us more about yourself? 

A: I'm ordinary for an author...boring, even. :) My first priority is my family, namely taking care of my two children (Autumn-6 and Cayden-4). I'm married to a veterinarian and I write from home when I can, which is not as often as I'd like.

Q: Who is your favorite author and what is it that really strikes you about their work?

A: I adore Jennifer Armentrout. She writes a perfect mix of action, intrigue, and romance, plus she's great to her fans.

Q: What books have most influenced your life?

A: Gosh, I think every book that I read leaves some sort of mark, big or small, good or bad. But I'll go with: The Poisonwood Bible, Twilight, Good Omens, Angela's Ashes, and The Bible. 

Q: Do you recall how your interest in writing originated? Any person who inspired you in creating your own line of books?

A: Just always loved writing stories, from the time I learned to write at five. My mom was not a big reader or writer, but she encouraged me every step of the way.

Now we go to the part where I asked her questions about being an Author and her book SWEET EVIL. 

Q: How did this book, Sweet Evil, came about? How did you come up with the title?

A: I was bombarded with inspiration, thoughts of angels and demons on earth, their children, what life would be like for them, and how a young girl would handle being torn if she were both angel AND demon. It was all very sudden and rushed. I'd never been more intrigued by anything in my life. I originally called it Angel Prophecy because I suck at coming up with titles, lol. The publishers are the ones who suggested the title Sweet Evil. :)

Q: When did you start writing this? Is there any dream behind it (just like the birth of The Twilight Saga) or any inspiration for this? Are the scenes in the book somewhat based on someone you know, or events in your own life?

A: I began writing as soon as I got the idea in late August 2009. It took 7 weeks to write the first draft of 85,000 words. I don't think I could ever do that again - it was crazy!  It's not based on a sleeping dream. It was more like a daydream and nonstop brainstorming. I was inspired by all aspects of my life, but it's all fictional. Nothing in the book is based on true events.

[FEATURED] Jodi Meadows, Author of the INCARNATE Trilogy

Hello there, my blog readers! 

Bookworm. Raises my right hand and automatically shouts "PRESENT!". Ever since I was a kid, I already have this fervor in reading. The evolution of my reading materials went from children's book to educational books, Harry Potter series to The Twilight Saga and then I fully ventured in other Young Adult books and series. 

Reading is actually my addiction, these books that are published daily are just to die for stuff. That's also why I'm following authors on my Twitter account, I love to be updated on what they're currently doing. 

In this blog post, I'm just so lucky to be given this chance to interview a very witty and fun author - Jodi Meadows. I really love this interview that I did with her because her answers to my questions are so precious. You'll have to read everything below this introduction that I'm doing, for you to get what I mean! 

Well, enough with me and let's proceed with the Jodi Meadow Blog Interview. 

The first part of the interview is for you to get to know more about the author.

Q: Can you tell us more about yourself?

A: When I was little, my sister and I used to go to this forested park in Texas. At least, it seemed very forested to us. There was a river, which we could cross on stones, and a shallow cave on the other side. I wanted to live there. At least until my hands got dirty and I wanted to wash them.

Q: Who is your favorite author and what is it that really strikes you about their work?

A: I have lots of favorite authors! Trying to pick just one or two causes incredible guilt in my soul region. So let's just say lots and lots of favorites, and an author usually becomes a favorite because they consistently write characters I become attached to, worlds I yearn to explore, and prose that captures the mood of the piece perfectly. Basically, my favorite authors are amazing.

Q: What books have most influenced your life most?

A: A few books that really influenced me early on were THE BLUE SWORD (and prequel) by Robin McKinley, WILD MAGIC (and series) by Tamora Pierce, SABRIEL by Garth Nix, THE GIVER by Lois Lowery, WINTER OF FIRE by Sheryl Jordan, and WAIT TILL HELEN COMES by Mary Downing Hahn.

Q: Do you recall how your interest in writing originated? Any person who inspired you in creating your own line of books?

A: I've always loved telling stories, but the first time I realized that one could tell stories -- write books -- as a legitimate job was when I was 11 and my teacher read WAIT TILL HELEN COMES to the class. I got out a spiral notebook, wrote several pages of a story (that was eeeeeerily similar to WAIT TILL HELEN COMES, and declared myself a writer. A year later, I did the same thing with WILD MAGIC. I hadn't yet read widely enough to know there were more stories than those, but I was on a path and that path involved an obsession with books.

ABOUT BEING AN AUTHOR AND THE BOOK INCARNATE

Q: How did this book, Incarnate, came about? How did you come up with the title?

A: I stole the idea from ninjas, obviously. The title used to be Erin Incarnate -- I liked the sort of play off "evil incarnate" -- but Erin's name changed to Ana and my publisher wasn't keen on a person's name in the title. So we just shortened it to INCARNATE, which worked fine for me.

Q: When did you start writing this? Is there any dream behind it (just like the birth of The Twilight Saga) or any inspiration for this? Are the scenes in the book somewhat based on someone you know, or events in your own life?

A: My dreams are never very linear. They'd make terrible stories. I honestly don't know what exactly inspired the idea, but there are aspects of the book that are similar not just to my life, but to a lot of people's. The feelings of being new, or being alone, or being different: those are pretty universal feelings. When Ana's learning how to play the piano and she needs soooo badly to be good at it: that's something I struggle with when it comes to writing, but I've also dealt with it in music and dance.

[FEATURED]: Interview with Iko - Talks about the band, The Twilight Saga and fans!

Hey there, my dear readers! 

I'm so stoked about this blog post that I'm creating. Guess what? I'm super lucky because I got to interview ... IKO! I know, I know a now familiar name, especially to the Twilight Saga FANDOM. Come on. Heart of Stone. Who wouldn't know and love that song included in the Breaking Dawn Part 2 soundtrack? 

This photo was attached on the email that was sent to me! :)  

After the official release of the track listing for the soundtrack, I immediately followed all the artists' twitter accounts. Hey. I would not want to miss a chance to get noticed by them. A fangirl's gonna do, what a fangirl's gotta do! 

Anyways, wondering how I scored this interview? THE POWER OF TWITTER! Just this December, I think during the first or second day of Christmas vacation, I tweeted @ikomusic if I could do an interview with them. Testing my luck there. As you can see, it ended up positively. Because when I checked my twitter account in the morning I saw a tweet coming from that account and yeah. Thus, causing me to fangirl really hard. *jumping up and down* *yelling around the house* and all those kinds of stuff. 

Well, enough with that. Let's just start with the interview already. 
Here it goes. 

Get to know more about Iko 

Q: To get started with, can you at least tell us more about your band?

A: We are Iko from Devon, UK. Founded on myself and Neil Reed as writing partners. We write songs about heartbreak and have recently been on the Twilight Breaking Dawn Part 2 soundtrack.

Q: How did you get started?

A: Neil and I met when teenagers who have been in other bands, but Iko was started by us after our first band dissolved. We were working long hours doing temporary jobs and this inspired our first album 'I Am Zero'. We wrote an album over about 4/5 months and recorded it in 10 days.

Q: How did you come up with the name, Iko?

A: We wanted something simply and sad to fit the mood of our first album so Iko, which is Japanese for 'orphan' or 'one outside/an outsider' felt appropriate.

Q: Who do you consider as your musical inspiration/s?

A: The first band I ever loved were The Smashing Pumpkins. But we have a variety of influences. Neil grew up classically trained so things like Rachmaninoff have influenced his piano playing, and for me it was Radiohead, Death Cab for Cutie, The Cure that made me want to write songs and make records.

Q: What makes you different from all the other musicians?

A: Well maybe the mixture of classical and popular is reasonably unusual. But people say my voice sounds unique, and a little like a woman so I suppose it's that.

Q: Name at least one musician you'd like to work with in the future.

A: I'd love to sing with Bjork. I think she's amazing.

The Twilight Saga and the song Heart of Stone 

Source

Q: Were you already a fan or have already read the book even before being linked to it?

A: Yes we already loved the saga before we were even involved. We'd both seen them all. Just made it extra exciting to then have our song chosen. I read the book before writing the words because I wanted the lyrics to be strongly influenced by Stephenie's words.