Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - J.K. Rowling

Title: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter #4)
Author: J.K. Rowling
Pages: 636
Published: 2000
Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult
Rating: 5/5

It is the summer holidays, and one night Harry Potter wakes up with his scar burning. He has had a strange dream, one that he can't help worrying about...until a timely invitation from Ron Weasley arrives: to nothing less than the Quidditch World Cup!

Soon Harry is reunited with Ron and Hermione and gasping at the thrills of an international Quidditch match. But then something horrible happens which casts a shadow over everybody, and Harry in particular... (via Goodreads)

Thoughts: This is my first re-read of this book (I have re-read the first three books a number of times that I have forgotten how many times I have actually forgotten how much I have re-read those three) and it was the first time that I listened to the audio version of the book (listened to it as I read the book) and I have to say that from my limited experience with audiobooks, that the reader for the Harry Potter books is one of the best that I have heard.  That aside, this book is probably not my favourite one of the series, but it does definitely set up the action for the final 3 books and is definitely more darker than the previous 3, which always had something light-hearted mixed in with the books, but you can start to see the shift in which Lord Voldermort is going to play a bigger role in the series and a bigger role in Harry, Ron, and Hermoine's lives from this point on.

Overall, the writing was really good for the age group targeted (10+) and because I slowed down and read it while I listened to the audio, I noticed things that I hadn't noticed before, like the fact that the S.P.E.W. storyline seemed to be dropped by the 3/4 mark of the book (which explains why that storyline doesn't appear in the movie).  And quite honestly by that point, I was more interested in the primary action of the Triwizard Tournament rather than whatever Hermione was trying to do for the house-elves, even if it was admiral thing on her part.  I also noticed the storyline of Hagrid's in which Dumbledore asked him to go and do something top secret over the summer, which is explained in the next novel.  The storytelling by Rowling is very good and the book does jump off from the end of the third book and by the end you can see that its going to get a lot darker before things start to clear up in the wizard world.  Highly recommended and can't wait to reread Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

Rebel Angels - Libba Bray

Title: Rebel Angels
Author: Libba Bray
Pages: 548
Published: 2006 (first published 2005)
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Historical fiction
Rating: 4/5

Gemma Doyle is looking forward to a holiday from Spence Academy-spending time with her friends in the city, attending balls in fancy gowns with plunging necklines, and dallying with the handsome Lord Denby. Yet amid these distractions, her visions intensify-visions of three girls dressed in white, to whom something horrific has happened that only the realms can explain.

The lure is strong, and soon Gemma, Felicity, and Ann are turning flowers into butterflies in the enchanted world that Gemma takes them to. To the girls'' great joy, their beloved Pippa is there as well, eager to complete their circle of friendship.

But all is not well in the realms-or out. Kartik is back, desperately insisting to Gemma that she must bind the magic, lest colossal disaster befall her. Gemma is willing to comply, for this would bring her face-to-face with her late mother''s greatest friend, now Gemma''s foe-Circe. Until Circe is destroyed, Gemma cannot live out her destiny. But finding Circe proves a most perilous task. . . . (via ChaptersIndigo.ca)


Thoughts: I really enjoyed this one.  The book had a good pace throughout the book and there wasn't exactly anything wanting for a little action.  There were a few moments in which I got a little freaked out (aka scared) and had to put the book down and read something that was a little less freakish.  Overall it was a pretty good book and would recommend it older young adult readers (those probably those 15 years and above) and those not afraid of things getting a little frightening.

14383 / 15000 pages. 96% done!

Little House in the Big Woods - Laura Ingalls Wilder

Title: Little House in the Big Woods
Author: Laura Ingalls Wilder
Pages: 238
Published: 2004 (first published 1932)
Genre: Classics, Historical fiction, Young Adult
Rating: 4/5

Wolves and panthers and bears roam the deep Wisconsin woods in the late 1870's. In those same woods, Laura lives with Pa and Ma, and her sisters, Mary and Baby Carrie, in a snug little house built of logs. Pa hunts and traps. Ma makes her own cheese and butter. All night long, the wind howls lonesomely, but Pa plays the fiddle and sings, keeping the family safe and cozy. 

Thoughts: This is one of those books that you read when you were young and you come back later and read, either to your own child or by yourself.  While it reminds oneself how much simpler life was almost 140 years ago, it also reminds one that it was also a much harder existence because one had to make everything one ate and wore; there was no grocery store to get butter, cheese, milk and bread and one couldn't just hop in ones car to go and get a new outfit at the local store.  Its an enjoyable read at any age.

13835 / 15000 pages. 92% done!

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - J.K. Rowling

Title: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Author: J.K. Rowling
Pages: 317
Published: 1999
Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult
Rating: 5/5

Harry Potter is a very unusual boy. He can't wait to get back to school after the Summer holidays! But that's not the only unusual thing about Harry; Harry's school is Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and Harry is a wizard! But when Harry, along with his best friends Ron and Hermione, go back for their third year at Hogwarts, the atmosphere is tense. There's an escaped mass murderer on the loose, and the sinister prison guards of Azkaban have been called in to guard the school ...(via Chapter.ca)


Thoughts: This was the 3rd or 4th time that I have read this book and is one of my favourites in the Harry Potter series  and was probably the best one that was adapted to film (its also my favourite movie and was the first one that I saw of the Harry Potter movies), but I digress.  One thing I like about the third book is that it deals with stuff that is still fairly light and fun (the Maurader's Map, the trip to Hogsmeade), but also deals with quite a bit of darker factors in the the story that have implications in later books (the introduction of the dementors, Lupin and Pettigrew, etc.). In other words, it has a nice balance of the elements that were in the first two books, but also is a nice introduction into the darker elements that come into more prominence over the next four books.  Recommended highly.

13035 / 15000 pages. 87% done!

A Great and Terrible Beauty - Libba Bray

Title: A Great and Terrible Beauty
Author: Libba Bray
Pages: 403
Published: 2005 (first published 2003)
Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult
Rating: 4/5

It's 1895, and after the suicide of her mother, 16-year-old Gemma Doyle is shipped off from the life she knows in India to Spence, a proper boarding school in England. Lonely, guilt-ridden, and prone to visions of the future that have an uncomfortable habit of coming true, Gemma's reception there is a chilly one. To make things worse, she's been followed by a mysterious young Indian man, a man sent to watch her. But why? What is her destiny? And what will her entanglement with Spence's most powerful girls-and their foray into the spiritual world-lead to? (via Chapters.ca)

Why I read this book: I had wanted to read this book for a number of years, as I had heard that it was quite a good book and I was intrigued.  

Thoughts: Really enjoyed the book.  I found that the book had a good flow to it and there was rarely a moment in which there was an awkward; everything had a purpose to it, almost as though the author planned it that way.  Even though the characters may have seemed rather self-centered, they were actually quite developed and fairly rounded out.  While I don't read a lot of thrillers, there was portion of the book towards the end of the book that got me a little creeped out that I had to put the book down and go to bed.  Overall a pretty good book.

9875 / 15000 pages. 66% done!

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - J.K. Rowling

Title: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Harry Potter #2)
Author: J.K. Rowling
Pages: 366
Published: 2004 (originally published in 1998)
Genre: Fantasy, Fiction
Rating: 5/5

Ever since Harry Potter had come home for the summer, the Dursleys were so mean and hideous that all Harry wanted was to get back to the Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry. But just as he's packing his bags, Harry receives a warning from a strange, impish creature named Dobby who says that if Harry Potter returns to Hogwarts, disaster will strike.

And strike it does. For in Harry's second year at Hogwarts, fresh torments and horrors arise, including an outrageously stuck-up new professor and a spirit who haunts the girls' bathroom. But then the real trouble begins--someone is turning Hogwarts students to stone. Could it be Draco Malfoy, a more poisonous rival than ever? Could it possibly be Hagrid, whose mysterious past is finally told? Or could it be the one everyone at Hogwarts most suspects...Harry Potter himself! (via Goodreads)


Thoughts: I really liked it.  I liked how Rowling moved the story along, while also leaving in the whimsy of the first book.  I found that during this book one got a sense of looming darkness that the books seem to get as the story progresses along.  While the main characters are starting to mature, you also see that they are still children in some senses.  They are still children and have that curiosity, but they are also keenly aware of the fact that they are growing up and that things will change as they grow up. Another excellent installment in the series.

4155 / 15000 pages. 28% done!

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - J.K. Rowling

Title: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
Author: J.K. Rowling
Pages: 332
Published: 2004 (originally published in 1997)
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy
Rating: 5/5

When a letter arrives for unhappy but ordinary Harry Potter, a decade-old secret is revealed to him. His parents were wizards, killed by a Dark Lord''s curse when Harry was just a baby, and which he somehow survived. Escaping from his unbearable Muggle guardians to Hogwarts, a wizarding school brimming with ghosts and enchantments, Harry stumbles into a sinister adventure when he finds a three-headed dog guarding a room on the third floor. Then he hears of a missing stone with astonishing powers which could be valuable, dangerous, or both.

Thoughts: I really liked it.  I had forgotten how much I liked the book until I sat down and read it again.  While the book seems to start off slowly, it has a purpose and once I was in the middle of the book, the action seemed to get quicker and that more intense and I really didn't want to put it down, but my body wouldn't allow for me to do so.  I really like how Rowling allows to go into a world that is one of pure fantasy, but also one that entirely enjoyable.

1645 / 15000 pages. 11% done!

The Long Winter - Laura Ingalls Wilder

Title: The Long Winter
Author: Laura Ingalls Wilder
Pages: 352
Published: 2004 (originally published in 1940)
Genre: Classics, Historical fiction, Children's literature
Rating: 4/5


The adventures of Laura Ingalls and her family continue as Pa, Ma, Laura, Mary, Carrie, and little Grace bravely face the hard winter of 1880-81 in their little house in the Dakota Territory. Blizzards cover the little town with snow, cutting off all supplies from the outside. Soon there is almost no food left, so young Almanzo Wilder and a friend make a dangerous trip across the prairie to find some wheat. Finally a joyous Christmas is celebrated in a very unusual way.

Thoughts: I really enjoyed it, but like the family, I found the winter to be a tad tiresome.  When I did find it tiresome, I went to the internet to find out how much of the story is true and actually is very faithful to the events of the winter of 1880-81 in the De Smet, S.D. area.  What I found fascinating was that nobody in the area died, although if it had lasted longer there probably would have been some deaths.  The reason that I classified the book as young adult because the book is longer and also Laura was 13/14 during the time period that the story takes place, despite the fact that the storyline is fairly simple and straight forward and is geared towards readers ages 8 to 12. 

1313 / 15000 pages. 9% done!

2011 YA Reading Challenge

Here are the rules:

1. Anyone can join. You don't need a blog to participate.  Create a post about the challenge and and click HERE to sign up.
--Non-Bloggers: Post your list of books in the comment section of the wrap-up post.

2. There are four levels:

--The Mini YA Reading Challenge – Read 12 Young Adult novels.

--The "Fun Size" YA Reading Challenge – Read 20 Young Adult novels.

--The Jumbo Size YA Reading Challenge – Read 40 Young Adult novels.

--The Mega size YA Reading Challenge – Read 50+ Young Adult novels.

3. Audio, eBooks, paper, re-reads all count.

4. No need to list your books in advance. You may select books as you go. Even if you list them now, you can change the list if needed.

5. The Challenge starts on January 1, 2011 and goes until December 31, 2011.


I am going for the Mini Size


Here is my list:
1.  The Long Winter
2.  Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
3.  Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets 
4.  A Great and Terrible Beauty 
5.  Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
6.  Little House in the Big Woods
7.  Rebel Angels 
8.  Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire