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Title : The Girl Who Drank the Moon

Author : Kelly Barnhill

Genre : Children Fiction/Fantasy

Rating : 8.2/10

‘There is magic in starlight, of course. This is well known. Moonlight, however. That is a different story. Moonlight is magic. Ask anyone you like.’

Every year the people of the Protectorate leave a baby as a sacrifice to the witch who lives in the forest. But the witch, Xan, is a kind one. She rescues the children and delivers them to welcoming families on the other side of the forest, nourishing the babies with starlight on the journey.

But one year, Xan accidentally feeds a baby moonlight instead of starlight, filling the ordinary child with extraordinary magic. Xan decides she must raise this girl, whom she calls Luna, as her own. As Luna’s thirteenth birthday approaches, her magic begins to enrage – with dangerous and thrilling consequences...

The cover state that this is a New York Times bestseller winner of the Newbery Medal 2017, and I understand why it got the award.

The story is great and sweet and warm. It teaches you about love, the true love of a family. Even it reminds me of my family and my grand father, it also almost made me cry nearing the end of the story. But no, I didn’t cry.

For a book without a single illustration inside, it has a perfect amount of pages and easy to read. Even though it doesn’t have a single illustration inside, I still enjoy reading it which is a positive sign for a book (at least for me). The storyline is somewhat predictable, but it’s light and still fun to read.

I like how Barnhill write a naration about the legend of the witch told by a mother in some chapters, give the readers some hints to solve the mistery by ourself. Moreover, the book contain several beautiful poems which become one of favorite parts of the book. Even though I didn’t quite understand the poem (because it’s already hard to understand poem itself, moreover for a non english speaker like me), but I just love reading such a beautiful phrases arranged into one, don’t you?

Anyway, it also has such a beautiful ending, because there is the part of the ending which is happy and there is another part which is sad. It’s quite balanced if I must say. But one thing I can assure you, the ending won’t leave you with question mark about the unsolved mystery.

Title : The School for Good and Evil #4: Quest For Glory

Author : Soman Chainani

Genre : Fantasy

Rating : 8.3/10

The students at the School for Good and Evil thought they had found their Ever After when they vanquished the malevolent School Master. Little do they know that their world is about to grow bigger-and so are their stories.

In order to graduate, everyone must complete a fourth-year “Quest for Glory”. Not only are these quest dangerous and unpredictable, but the stakes are high: success brings eternal adoration, and failure means obscurity forever.

For their quests, Agatha and Tedros are trying to return Camelot to its former splendor as queen and king. For her quest, Dean Sophie seeks to mold Evil in her own image. But soon they all feel themselves growing more isolated and alone...

When their classmates’ quests plunge into chaos, however, someone must lead the charge to save them. If Good and Evil can’t find a way to work together, neither side will survive.

After knowing the title for the third book, The Last Ever After, I thought this series will end with the trilogy. Never did I know, that Soman Chainani decided to prolong the series. Truthfully, the first time I saw the book on the bookshelf of a book store in town, my mind literally went like, “What? Why is there another sequel of this book? What’s left to be told when they already found their happy ending?” But I decided to buy the book anyway, hoping to find something I wish to know that is still unsolved from the third book.

The fourth book, however, will not tell you the unsolved mystery from the last book (or at least anything that I wish I knew after reading the third book, you can read my review of the third book for reference). The mystery remains unsolved, and a new adventure begins. Well, it’s not completely new story actually, because it will tell you the life of the students from the School for Good and Evil after the School Master defeated.

As we know from the last book, and also from the synopsis above, Agatha and Tedros are back to Camelot to become the queen and king, while Sophie remains at the school as the new Dean of Evil. It sounds boring at first to become a story, but at this point, something happened. As I said before, a new adventure started with some new characters who doesn’t appear in the first three books. With the conflict between The Lion and The Snake from Camelot's ancient tale, the book will tell you the story from 3 points of view, Sophie, Agatha, and Tedros, unlike the previous book.

This is actually what I felt when I read the first chapter of the book, boring. The book is 568 pages thick and I need about 5 months to finish it. Among that 5 months, I spent more than 4 months only to reach page 210. It was hard to read the book because I’m not that excited by the story. But after I reached page 210, things got a lot better and better. I finished the rest of the book just in a week.

Soman is being clever in this book, because the plot and the twists is so much better even more than the second book (which is the best among the series in my opinion before I read this book). Even I didn’t pay attention at all for the humor (if there is) because I’m too focused on the story itself. As I read the book, my mind is busy trying to guess any possible scenario about what will happen next or what is the reason behind the story. But, before my curiosity is answered, the author will give even more twist to the plot. The story is also well written as I can feel my emotion is ragged as I read about Agatha act dumb blinded by so-called love. And I can feel my heart beat as I read the final chapter, knowing that soon I will know the reason behind all. But again, I’m wrong. The mystery remains unsolved even after I finished the last page of the book. And from this, I know that the series will continue to book #5.

Overall, the book is quite good, it has the feel like the second book, but better (I guess). Thus, I give this book 8.3/10. I wonder how is the fifth book will get? Will it be as good as this one?

***

I think this is the longest title I've ever write. But, really guys, I just want to state that this is really easy to make. Before I tell you about the recipe, I want to tell you a little story.

***

So, I've had a trouble skin for a while now. I have a lot of pimples that won't get away from my face. Then, I do a little research on internet how to get rid of my pimples. It says that I have to maintain my sugar intake, and one way to do it is switching my consumption of white flour with wheat or oatmeal. So I was thinking like, "Oh, oatmeal seems nice as a snack, since I get hungry pretty easily". I know it usually be eaten as breakfast, but I always eat rice for breakfast. It's just Indonesian thing. Fast forward to future, I bought a bag of instant oatmeal (400 gr). I started making my first bowl of oatmeal the very next afternoon, and I just realized that I DON'T LIKE THE TASTE at all. It tastes slimy and cold (even if I used hot water) and awful (even if I put a lot of honey and raisin in it). I just don't want to eat it anymore, but I hate to throw away food as well.

The End.

***

So, because of that I started to search for an oatmeal cookie at youtube so that I don't have to throw away the rest of oatmeal that I've bought.

I searched for no bake recipe because it's easier and because I don't have such fancy cooking utensil like oven. And I found one:

Put a tablespoon of butter in a pan, turn on the stove in low heat
Put 1/4 cup of dark chocolate, 2 tablespoon of sugar, 1/4 cup of milk, mix well
Put the mixture in low heat for about 2 minutes
Remove the pan from the stove and add 1 cup of oatmeal, mix well
Shape your cookie by adding 1 tablespoon of cookie on the parchment paper and freeze it for about 30 minutes.

But, I don't have all the ingredient so I just skipped some ingredients or being smart, switched with other ingredients. So, here is how I made my cookie:

Put a tablespoon of butter in a pan, turn on the stove in low heat
Put 1 sachet of instant hot chocolate and 1/4 cup of water, mix well. (instant hot chocolate is easy, because it's already contained chocolate, milk, and sugar)
Put the mixture in low heat for about 2 minutes
Remove the pan from the stove and add 1 cup of oatmeal, mix well
I don't have parchment paper, so I just shape it in a container! And freeze it for about 30 minutes.

And voila! My super easy no bake oatmeal cookie is done (I don't want it to look messy if I shaped it into round shape like real cookie, so I just shaped it into a bar, and it's a lot easier).

Finally, it tastes better than a regular bowl of oatmeal. It's sweet, chocolatey, and soft (not slimy!). I'm happy!

Title : Furthermore

Author : Tahereh Mafi

Genre : Children Fiction/Fantasy

Rating : 8/10

Once upon a time, a girl was forgot...

In a world brimming with colour and magic, Alice’s pale skin and milk-white hair mark her as an outcast. For the people of Ferenwood, colour and magic are one and the same. Alice is determined to prove her magical abilities and solve the mystery of her father’s disappearance.

To do so she’ll have to travel into the mythical, dangerous land of Furthermore. But nothing there is as it seems, and Alice may never find her way home...

This is the first book that I finished in 2018, although I started it a few months back in 2017 tho. And also, this is the first book that I purchased from BookDepository. Yo guys, I have to tell you that I love that site, because they have so many books that I couldn’t find in my local bookstore! Their packaging is also a top notch! I only purchased 2 things one time, this book and a postcard book, yet they pack it in 35x28x11 cm box with this huge and thick bubble wrap (not the usual bubble wrap that I loved to pop, it’s not popable!). More over, they free shipping worldwide yo! I couldn’t ask more. But I just have to admit tho, that it took quite a while for the book arrived at my house. But hey with that services, I can be patient a little bit more.

Anyway, back to the topic. About this book, Furthermore, I’m also quite satisfied with it. First thing first, the cover book is just beautiful. The illustration is drawn very well and represent the story very well. You know, I’m that kind of girl that judge a book by it’s cover (literally). And this book, ladies and gentleman, also has the most magical and wild imagination that I’ve read for a while. When I read the first part of the story, I thought that it would be another version of Alice in Wonderland, just because the main character’s name is Alice, and she has an adventure in a magical world. But it turned out to be different with Alice in Wonderland, it’s just Alice in Furthermore!

Overall I like the new and fresh story, and also I like how Tahereh Mafi put herself as the third person, the narrator. I imagined it like the narrator that we often heard in fairy tale / disney movie, which not only focused to the story, but also to the reader.

But, as always, when I read a book, I also have some things that I’m not really like about it. First of all, this book is lack of illustration. You know how much I love illustration in a book, but besides that, illustration also can be very helpful for the reader to portraying the story. And the last thing is that I’m not quite sure where the climax is supposed to be. Because I think that the climax is like in the middle part of the story, but after that it’s still followed by another conflicts. I felt like it’s weird to put the climax in the middle part of the story and then add another conflict afterward, it will made the end part of the story is being rushed and not satisfying. At least that’s what I thought about this book.

I just realized that I gave Tahereh Mafi’s book a similar score with his husband’s, Ransom Riggs. Oh, when the first time I google her, I found out that she’s married to Ransom Riggs. I felt really familiar with that name but I couldn't remember who he was at that time. It turned out to be the author of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. By the way, I’ve actually finished reading the second book of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children: Hollow City. But it has been quite a while and I can’t remember how I felt about the book, all I can remember is how I compare the book with the movie. It’s nothing like the movie. I think the movie is all about the first book and also a llittle amount about the third book. There’s nothing about the second book in the movie.

Anyway, that’s all for today’s book review. Currently, I’m already reading another book, but it’s quite old (but not very old, I mean, the hype for this book is already over). So, see you again when I finished the book.

Firstly,

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2018!

Wow 2017 seems end quite fast and yet, I just realized that I'm not quite productive last year, like I only finished reading 2 books and only write once in this blog. I'm so disappointed in my self.

And so, because of that, I decide to be more productive this year. I'll try to post 'anything' in this blog that come to my mind. That's why I've been renovating this blog and writing this very first post in the first month of 2018!

***

Like what it said in the title, in this post I will tell you about my lunch today. No one cares about it, but you might find it interesting. (Or no?)

So, I packed strawberry sandwich for lunch today. I like eating bread/sandwich because you nearly need nothing to make it. It convenient for lazy people ~~like me~~ or boarding children (do I translate it right?) who don't have complete kitchen set at the moment.

***

1. Spread butter all the way to the edge on your favorite plain bread (it could be white bread or wheat bread). Do you know that butter has quite high Vitamin A content, it's a vitamin that is good for your skin. If you use one tablespoon butter (14 gram), it can provide 11% of your daily recommended allowance.

2. Slice a lot of strawberries and put it on your bread. You don't have to arrange it prettily because it will be covered anyway.

3. Layer it with some honey, because for God sake, strawberry and honey is a pair made in heaven!

4. Cover it with another slice of bread.

5. Put it in a container and your strawberry sandwich is ready to go!

***

That's what I ate for today, but sometimes I made it with another filling combination too. Here is what I highly recommend for the combination:

Cream cheese and strawberry
Condensed milk and cheese
Tuna, sliced chili, and mayonnaise

If you want to be a little advance, you can fry it too like what I did in the picture below

Flatten your bread with rolling pin (or anything that works actually, for this recipe in the photo I used my spoon).
Spread some chocolate sauce and top it with strawberry only in 1/4 side of the bread. Peanut butter&banana / condensed milk&cheese / tomato sauce&cheese&pepperoni/sausage actually will taste good too.
Beat an egg in a bowl.
Make a roll of the bread and dip it in the egg and cover it with bread crumb.
Fry it until golden brown. Enjoy it while it's still warm.

***

And that's all for this very first post in 2018. I hope you have a wonderful lunch tomorrow and a wonderful year ahead! See you in the next post!

Title : The Toymaker's Apprentice

Author : Sherri L. Smith

Genre : Children Fiction/Fantasy

Rating : 7.6/10

Stefan Drosselmeyer is a reluctant apprentice to his toymaker father until the day his world is turned upside down. His father is kidnapped and Stefan is enlisted by his mysterious cousin, Christian Drosselmeyer, to find a mythical nut to save a princess who has been turned into a wooden doll.

Embarking on a wild adventure through Germany, Stefan must save Boldavia’s princess and his own father from the fanatical Mouse Queen and her seven-headed Mouse Prince, both of whom have sworn to destroy the Drosselmeyer family.

Before read this book, I don't have any expectation about this book. Reading the first and the second part of the book, I thought it was a light, new, and refreshing story. But by the time I reached the last part of the book, I just realized that it's just another version of The Nutcracker story! I'm amazed how Sherri L. Smith write the story so that the reader (or perhaps, just me) realized about "The Nutcracker" story nearly the end of the book.

But, as a read the book, I wonder when will the story end. Which means it contains a lot of pages (nearly 400 pages) and only a few pictures (Oh I love a picture inside a book!). From the story itself, I expected that there will be a lot more story about The Boldavia Kingdom family. But until the very end there's no another story. And I realized that Sherri L. Smith write about Clara (or Marie) once in a while (in Stefan's mind) to always remind the reader that a character called Clara (or Marie) is exist and rather important in the end of the book. But how come that they can be in love with each other with just a one time meeting. There should be more story about they're being together.

As a non-english speaker, I feel that the english isn't as simple as the other books I've already read. But above all, a few plot twists still got me with the story.

***

Title : Sabtu Bersama Bapak

Author : Adhitya Mulya

Genre : Fiksi

Rating : 7.8/10

“Hai, Satya! Hai, Cakra!” Sang Bapak melambaikan tangan.

“Ini Bapak.

Iya, benar kok, ini Bapak.

Bapak cuma pindah ke tempat lain. Gak sakit. Alhamdulillah, berkat doa Satya dan Cakra.

…

Mungkin Bapak tidak dapat duduk dan bermain di samping kalian.

Tapi, Bapak tetap ingin kalian tumbuh dengan Bapak di samping kalian.

Ingin tetap dapat bercerita kepada kalian.

Ingin tetap dapat mengajarkan kalian.

Bapak sudah siapkan.

Ketika punya pertanyaan, kalian tidak pernah perlu bingung ke mana harus mencari jawaban.

I don’t let death take these, away from us.

I don’t give death, a chance.

Bapak ada di sini. Di samping kalian.

Bapak sayang kalian.”

Ini adalah sebuah cerita. Tentang seorang pemuda yang belajar mencari cinta. Tentang seorang pria yang belajar menjadi bapak dan suami yang baik. Tentang seorang ibu yang membesarkan mereka dengan penuh kasih. Dan…, tentang seorang bapak yang meninggalkan pesan dan berjanji selalu ada bersama mereka.

Satu hal yang terfikir oleh saya ketika selesai membaca Sabtu Bersama Bapak. Ini adalah buku parenting yang bagus. Daripada menyebutnya sebagai buku fiksi, saya lebih suka menggolongkan buku ini ke dalam buku panduan parenting. Ya, karena pesan-pesan di dalamnya sangat cocok dijadikan panduan untuk mendidik anak (dan mencari jodoh serta membangun rumah tangga yang baik sepertinya).

Buku ini memang sudah terbit cukup lama, tahun 2014. Teman-teman saya juga sudah tamat membaca buku ini. Sedangkan saya baru selesai membaca buku ini beberapa hari lalu karena filmnya sudah terbit. Saya memang ingin membaca bukunya terlebih dahulu, karena kebiasaan buruk saya, kalau sudah nonton filmnya, pasti nanti akan malas untuk membaca bukunya. Yah saya memang suka telat heboh sih kalau menyangkut buku terbitan lokal...

Ceritanya cukup menyentuh dan mengharukan. Terlebih karena alasan pribadi, buku ini hampir dapat membuat saya menangis. Pesan-pesan yang terkandung di dalamnya sangat banyak dan mudah dicerna sehingga saya berani untuk memberikan nilai yang cukup tinggi untuk buku ini. Beberapa pesan yang terkandung dalam buku ini sangat membukakan pandangan saya dan membuat saya banyak belajar. Beberapa pesan juga sangat menusuk hati dan kadang bikin meleleh sendiri kalau dibayangkan (ini bagian cerita Saka yang mencari jodoh). Beberapa juga sangat quote-able, jadi cocok buat yang suka mengutip quote-quote untuk diposting di media sosial.

Tapi yang saya sayangkan dari buku ini adalah beberapa bagian cerita yang mengandung unsur sensual. Padahal buku ini juga banyak dibaca oleh remaja-remaja berusia di bawah 17 tahun. Saya pun membaca buku ini dengan meminjam dari adik sepupu saya yang masih duduk di bangku SMP. Ketika saya membaca bagian cerita yang mengandung unsur sensual tersebut dan mengetahui kalau adik sepupu saya sudah membaca cerita itu terlebih dahulu jadi membuat saya malu. Yang baca dan nulis siapa, malah saya yang malu...

***

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