Exercise

Day 1 - Fall Workout
9666 steps
7779 moderate steps @ 57 mins
399 kcal
4.41 miles

I ran almost 2.95 miles and walked the rest meeting Billy C for lunch and then going to the post office. I had energy all day, but my legs started to feel sore by the end of the day.

I am currently up way later than I should be and I hope I can get myself motivated to do the same thing tomorrow.

THE KNIFE OF NEVER LETTING GO (Chaos Walking Trilogy, Book #1) by Patrick Ness

Before I finished reading the book, I took a look at a few reviews that complained about confusion, and the story not becoming clear before page 100. Now this isn't Shakespeare, but like reading Shakespeare, you have to get into the cadence of the writing. There is a lilt to it that's necessary for the reader to fall into, which I found quickly and loved.

Toby and his talking dog Manchee discover a "Quiet" near the swamp and when they do, all hell breaks loose and his world is never the same. The Quiet, turns out to be Olivia, who's scouting vessel crashed on the planet killing her parents. Toby wants to be hard and grown up, or what he considers a Man. But what he discovers is that he already is a Man by taking on the responsibility of protecting Olivia from the men of Prentisstown and himself from being what they want him to be.

I loved this book. The funny thing is I almost never read it. I had read about it a year ago when it first came out, but thought it sounded odd from the descriptions I was able to read at the time. But over the past year, it kept popping up in my search of material and I finally read a starred review in Publisher's Weekly for THE ASK AND THE ANSWER. So, I decided to go for it anyway and read the material fulling expecting not to like it.

Some of the best surprises come from where you least expect it. I didn't say much about the story because anything I do say would give it away. I just say to anyone who may come across this mini review. Do yourself a favor and read a book by an incredibly good writer.

DEVIL'S KISS by Sarwat Chadda

This is an interesting book and character of Bilquis aka Billi, the only female Knights Templar at the age of 15. The archangel Michael aka Mike Harbinger is out to repeat The Tenth Plague in London in order to bring people back to their faith and to God.

In this book, The Templar are a rag tag group group of 5 or 6 Londoners consisting of one young 15 year old girl who's father is very cold and distant, only focusing on her training as a Templar. Billi resents all this training and wants to be a normal girl when she meets Mike just as her former friend and fellow Templar Kay comes back into town. Kay has changed from that gawky boy he was and is interested in getting closer to Billi. But she is interested in the mysterious Mike. Only to find out that Mike is the Archangel of Death and is using Billi to get to The Cursed Mirror, the last of the Holy relics not lost and still in the Templar's possession.

When Billi realizes what Michael is up to, she must step up to the plate and become the Templar she never wanted to be, but is destined to become.

MONSTER REPUBLIC: The Divinity Project by Ben Horton

Kids turned into monsters by a mad scientist and then thrown away only to fight back. That's the premise of this YA action adventure. The writing isn't great, but there's a kernel of a great idea in this book.

Cameron is the all around (want to say All-American, but it's set in the UK) great guy. He's good looking, the jock on campus, and the perfect girlfriend and even stands up for the underdog (kids being bullied). But his eagerness to do the right thing puts him the the wrong place when an explosion happens at the nuclear power plant the class has been taken to on a field trip. When Cameron wakes up, it's to the face of a young covered in fur. She tells him they have to move, but all Cameron has are questions. Why is he so stiff, why is he laying on a metal slab and where are they? There is no time for questions before the Bloodhounds are on them and Cameron's body starts fighting and doing things he never was able to do before. What's more, he's doing them without thinking, by instinct and has to force himself to stop.

When Cameron finally sees his reflection, he's not the same boy he was before, he's made up of parts of other people and metal and machinery. There's even a gun that comes out of his arm. He learns of the Monster Republic, a group of rejects that were thrown away by the great, but crazy Dr. Fry.

Cameron goes through a lot of things in a short time. He tries to go to his family, who don't recognize him and wont listen long enough to hear that he is their son and brother. The Monster Republic don't trust him, because he's not technically a reject, he was liberated by Rora, the unofficial leader of this rag tag group of misfits who have no place in society due to the way they look and act because of the experiments done on them by Dr. Fry, his girlfriends isn't his girlfriend anymore because she's been altered by Dr. Fry as well, and finally his best friend from his old life turns him in because Dr. Fry is holding his mother.

Cameron has to learn that he can't go back to his old life and find his place in the Monster Republic, but show them that they don't have to stand for what has been. It's time to fight back.

I like the lessons in the book. Not everything stays the same and if you rely on what you look like, you must look deeper to figure out who you really are and who you want to be.

As I said, before the writing isn't great, but the story is a great idea.