Life of a Random

My first, may I add, Sunday Swoons as co-hoster of...well...Sunday Swoons. It feels awesome. :D It has been great working with Briana! She's fun and SO nice, so you should totally go check out her blog . Like right now. Shoo. I think you'll like this post as I happen to know for a fact that many of you are fans of chocolate. I was right, wasn't I? This week's theme: If Couples Were Food... (Pick any kind of food to compare fictional couples to.) The rules are simple. 1. You're welcome (and encouraged) to use the Sunday Swoons button, but remember to cite me as the source. 2. You can post in whatever style you like--list, discussion, etc. as long as you follow the topic we give OR you can do a post on the opposite of the given topic. 3. Your posts don't have to have anything to do with books you're reading right now, they can be past reads as well. (It's nice if you put a link to the Goodreads page of the book or some o...

Or something like that... I recently got a new laptop and one of the perks is that it's touchscreen. And when I've been coveting my sister's touchscreen solely because she got to use the paint tool which allows you to paint with your fingers on the screen , you can bet that's one of the first things I'm going to play around with. Since I haven't done any pencil drawings or acrylic paintings recently (but wanted to do a post on my art), I'm going to be showing you a few of my digital drawings. They aren't AMAZING but they're good enough that I feel okay about putting them out into the great big wide internet. ;) I did this one with watercolors for the rocks the waterfall is going down and the waterfall (and all other water) itself. I also used the watercolors on the person and boat because I wanted them to have a sort of dreamy feel. I used pastels for the vine that covers the whole left rock face, the water foaming up at the bottom, and th...

Courtesy of: RIVALS by Doug Solter Publication Date:  September 23, 2014 Genre(s): Contemporary Eighteen-year-old Samantha Sutton is back for a new racing season in Formula One. The hot new racing star of Wolert Porsche has everything she wants. An awesome team. An awesome car. And the perfect boy. But her optimism sinks when her boss steals arch-rival Emilio Ronaldo away from Ferrari and makes the jerk her team's number-one driver. Stressing about Emilio, Samantha struggles with her new public life as a teen sports star. Finding time to be the best girlfriend to Manny proves more and more difficult. It also doesn't help that Manny's ex-girlfriend Hanna shows up. The girl treated at a mental hospital for poisoning his grandmother's dog. The pressure on Samantha becomes unbearable. Paranoia, mistrust, and jealousy take over. She lashes out at everyone as the world seems determined to bring her down.  Can Samantha rise above it all and win the world ...

Surprise! You may have noticed that I take part in a link-up called Sunday Swoons once in a while. Well, recently the completely awesomesauce creator of Sunday Swoons Briana (from Reader, Writer, Critic ) invited me to co-host it with her! I accepted (duh) and now we're just working together to brainstorm topics and improve it to the best it can be. This next Sunday we'll be hosting our first dual Sunday Swoons posts. :D I'm so excited about this! Thank you a million red M&M's, Briana. <3 So...my blogglings...Come to the dark side and take part in this awesomeness. *wiggles eyebrows* Wait. You want to know what it's all about? I mean...okay. Even though it sounds good enough for you to join no questions asked, right? ;) Let's dive in. Sunday Swoons is where you talk about the topic of choice (*cough* our choice) related to romance. This gives you an excuse to gush over and rant about all things romantical. And if anyone is like, "Why ar...

This cover reveal is courtesy of: PLAYING BY THE RULES by D'Ann Burrow Publication Date: November 10, 2014 Genre(s): Paranormal, Young Adult Designed by: Okay Creations Kennedy Thatcher believes in playing by the rules.  The rules are there to keep her safe.  That’s why her mother created them.  The first rule, never tell anyone what you can do, is the most important rule of all.  Kennedy’s mother made her promise not to ever let anyone know her secret.  She’s a Finder.  Being a Finder is dangerous.   If she uses her abilities too much, she could get hurt.  Or she could lose her mind.  Only her mother knows Kennedy’s secret, and now her mother’s gone.  Her mother didn’t follow the rules. When her father travels out of town on business, she’s sent to visit her Aunt Loretta.  As just a few days turns into maybe a week and merges into you-might-spend-the-first-semester-here, Kennedy is a true fish out of w...

Today is a day for a short, sweet post. I debated posting this for next week's Sunday Swoons post for  Briana's feature on Reader, Writer, Critic , but I decided I would do it today since it's closer to Sunday (I'm such a genius). This week's theme is: Romance Pet Peeves (That Happen All  the Time in Cookie Cutter YA) Briana basically covered all the bases ('case she's awesome like that) so I decided to sort of wander onto a different topic that's been on my mind recently. And which I hope you'll discuss and agree and disagree with in the comments. ;) So...hm, how do I lead into this? Every relationship ever written in fiction (but I'm going to focus on YA) begins with the common symptoms: tingling, nervousness, jumpiness, jitteryness. All around acting like you stole from the cookie jar. Multiple times. There's that boy/girl. A connection. Something that feels like an electric shock, which personally doesn't sound to com...

As you may  notice when you read the book information further down, this is an ARC of a book that was published in May. *cough* I'm catching up on reading. Anyways, I hope you enjoy! But be aware that some things may have changed since the version I read was not the final copy. Tallyhoooo. Publication Date: May 27, 2014 Publisher: Harlequin Teen Pages: 400 Source: NetGalley Format: ebook ARC Series: Steampunk Chronicles (#4) London's underworld is no place for a young woman, even one who is strong, smart and part-automaton like Mila. But when master criminal Jack Dandy inadvertently breaks her heart, she takes off, determined to find an independent life, one entirely her own. Her search takes her to the spangled shadows of the West End's most dazzling circus. Meanwhile, taken captive in the Aether, Griffin King is trapped in an inescapable prison, and at the mercy of his archenemy, The Machinist. If he breaks under the hellish torment, The Machinist w...