Birthday and Christmas Book Haul!

I'm back! I hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas (or if you don't celebrate it, a very nice holiday/family-seeing time), and I hope that everyone has a very happy 2014. 

I can't remember whether I said or not, but my birthday was at the beginning of December, and I turned 17 - and I got a lot of books. I also got loads for Christmas last week, so I thought I'd combine them and do a gift-book haul. It's a long one, I'm afraid...

1. The Perks of Being a Wallflower, by Stephen Chbosky. I haven't read this before, although I've seen the film (with Emma Watson in), and so for a while I've wanted to read the book because I really enjoyed the film. It's about a boy who's going through a rough patch, and how he survives high school.

2. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, by Carson McCullers. A couple of months ago, I asked on Twitter for more classics to read, and this is one of the ones that came up quite a lot. It's about a deaf-mute called John Singer who becomes the confidant of everyone in his small town, and I thought it sounded really interesting.

3. Between Shades of Gray, by Ruta Sepetys. Now this one I have read before, and oh how I cried. It's  set in 1941, and is the story of a Lithuanian girl called Lina, and how she is moved from labour camp to labour camp by the Soviet Russians. It's a very moving read which I would recommend to anyone.

4. The Girl Who Fell From The Sky, by Simon Mawes. I wrote about this last week.

5. How Language Works, by David Crystal (Nerd Book #1). This is a book all about language, how it is formed, how languages die, how we perceive speech and dialect and multilingualism, to name just a few. I'm really looking forward to reading this as Linguistics is something that I'm very passionate about and I want to take further.

6. 84 Charing Cross Road, by Helene Hanff. This true story is a collection of letters between Hanff, in New York, and the booksellers at 84 Charing Cross Road, London. They become firm friends and I'm excited to read it.

7. Vivian Versus the Apocalypse, by Katie Coyle. I discovered this book by watching a video by Sanne Vliegenthart (booksandquills - there's a link under the 'My Favourites' tab), who works for Hot Key Books, the company which published this book, and I immediately wanted to read it. It's about a girl whose parents disappear after a religious rapture, which she doesn't believe in, and how she and the others who are left behind deal with what comes next.

8. The Story of English in 100 Words, by David Crystal (Nerd Book #2). This book tells the story of the English Language, and how it evolved over time, by using 100 words that all represent significant changes in the language's development.

9. The Lost Estate (Le Grand Meaulnes), by Alain-Fournier. This is the English translation of a book that I have in the original French, but haven't been able to understand much of - hopefully with the help of this translation, I'll be able to work my way through the French.

10. The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, by Rachel Joyce. I'd heard good things about this book, and when I read what it was about, I was intrigued and so I am looking forward to reading it. It's about a man who unexpectedly leaves home, and walks from one end of the country to the other, in order to "save someone else's life."

11. Where Angels Fear To Tread, by E.M. Forster. Again, I've seen the film and wanted to read the book - it's about a widow who embarrasses her late husband's family by running away to Tuscany and  becoming involved with a much younger man.

12. The Hobbit, by J. R. R. Tolkien. I felt I had to read this because all my friends are raving about both the book and the film, so I'll be reading this before I see either of the films. I think it's a prequel to Lord Of The Rings...?

13. The Night Rainbow, by Claire King. This is a book about a young girl named Pea growing up in the South of France, whose neighbour Claude may be keeping a secret...

14. Some Kind of Fairy Tale, by Graham Joyce. This is, according to the blurb, about woods and clearings, folk tales and family histories, and I'm really looking forward to reading it.

15. The Isobel Journal, by Isobel Harrop. I was looking through this the other day, and it's so beautiful! A lovely book full of sketches and photos that completely sum up the life of a teenage girl - and she studied English Language A-Level!

16. Wordsmiths and Warriors, by David and Hilary Crystal (Nerd Book #3). This book picks out moments in the history of the English Language that were specific to a certain place, and tells you all about the development and what it means to the town/city/village today.

17. Last, but by no means least... Behind the Scenes at Downton Abbey! Need I say more? :)

The Girl Who Fell From The Sky by Simon Mawer, among other things.

So although I did babysit last Saturday (the 14th - sorry again), I didn't have abundant free time as I was watching The Paradise and re-reading The Fault in Our Stars, which I reckon are perfectly adequate excuses for not writing.

I did my speech at the dance show.... and I didn't die!! I was petrified before going on, but after that, it was fine! I didn't have much time to think about it after, which probably helped: I had to go on, talk, go off to give Miss the microphone, then come on again and dance. Two days later, I had to talk to my tutor group because I wanted to be a tutor rep (I didn't get it, by the way), and I wasn't scared at all! This can only be a good thing and it means I'm one step closer to becoming a teacher, as overcoming my glossophobia was one big obstacle in the way. Hopefully now I am on the way to eradicating it completely, and this has made me very happy.

One of the books I got for my birthday was called "The Girl Who Fell From The Sky" by Simon Mawer, and this weekend I read it. It didn't take me too long to read, and so it was ideal for whiling away a Saturday afternoon after work. It's about a young woman called (among other things) Marian Sutro, who gets drafted into the SOE to go undercover in France during WWII. She has to do loads of training, including but not limited to shooting a gun and setting up a secret rendez-vous in Bristol. 

Eventually she finds herself parachuting into Southern France, then she travels to Occupied Paris in order to seek out a nuclear physicist who is of great use to the British government and scientific community. It was a fantastic book which I really enjoyed, and would highly recommend to others. One thing I really liked about it was the words, phrases, sentences and even whole conversations in French, which anyone who has read this blog before will realise is something I really like. It appealed not only to my literary nerd nature, but also to my language nerd nature, and I really love books that do that.

That's all I can think of to write for now, and I probably won't write again until the new year, so to all those who celebrate it, Merry Christmas, and to all those who don't, Happy Holidays, and to everyone, have a happy new year, and I'll see you all again in 2014 :)

I am 17!

So again I must apologise for neglecting this blog. Sorry.

But it was my birthday on Friday, and now I am 17! Loads of my friends are getting driving lessons for their birthdays, but I'm not - turns out my parents' cars are the two most expensive to insure for under 24s. Instead, I got.... a Cambridge satchel!! It's a 15", and it's red. I like red. I also got a red spotty purse and lots and lots of books (not complaining). One of my other best gifts was a sheep hottie which I have named Minimoy. I suppose I must now give context: the French name for the film "Arthur and the Invisibles" is "Arthur et des Minimoys", and it took my friend and I a long time to work out the word "Minimoy" when we had to translate a film review. We have since adopted it into our respective idiolects, along with "le wifi", which my French teacher thoroughly hates.

It was our school music concert yesterday evening, and I was performing as part of the second steel band, Panem (formerly Pan O'Chocolat - don't even ask). We played "Hot Hot Hot", and had a really great time, although we had to say goodbye to our old LSP (Leader of Student Progress - Head of Year), as it was his last concert before he leaves to be Head of Music at a new school after Christmas. It was very sad - he was our LSP for five years, from year 7 to 11, and I will miss him enormously, as he was a fantastic influence, and he was very easy to talk to.

In a whirlwind week of performances, it's our school dance show tomorrow, and I will be in two dances, and I'm also being a runner, and I have to introduce one of the dances. To 400+ people. It would be an understatement to say that I am terrified. I haven't done public speaking since year nine (three years ago), and I absolutely hated it. So that'll be fun.

Anyway, au revoir and adiós, and I'll try to update you on the speech on Friday, as I'm babysitting then, and will have (hopefully) abundant free time.