Book Recommendations - The Veritas Project

The Veritas Project

 Veritas: meaning truth.

The Veritas Project is a government-funded project investigating supernatural occurrences. The team consists of Nate and Sarah Springfield, and their twin children, Elisha and Elijah, a Christian home-schooling family, who use a Biblical approach to accomplish their missions.

There are only two books in the series, the first being Hangman's Curse, but with this particular series they don't necessarily have to be read in order.

Hangman's Curse: 
Seemingly random students at a school become suddenly sick and begin acting oddly, losing their sanity and believing they see a ghost named Abel Frye. On all of the affected students' lockers, a hangman symbol is placed by a mysterious person or being. Elisha and Elijah Springfield enroll as students to investigate.

25 Book Questions

It's Hannah, answering 25 Book Questions just 'cause. My mom asked if we could do a similar questionnaire with books, so I modified the music questions. Books have more to do with writing anyway, right?  


1: A book you like with a color in the title: Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery. This includes the whole series, but my favorite is Anne of Avonlea, I think... I might have just liked it cause it had the prettiest cover. Gosh, it's been a long time since I read those.

2: A book you like with a number in the title: The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien. Lord of the Rings, wink wink. 

3: A book that reminds you of Christmas time: Becky Garcia by Elspeth Campbell Murphy.

4: A book that reminds you of someone you would rather forget about: Um... Nope. Got nothing.

5: A book about drugs or alcohol: Hmm... I don't know if there are any of those... there's probably a Frank E. Peretti book about that. No, I've just remembered. The Icebound Land by John Flanagan has a lot about a drug called warmweed. It's not strictly about drugs, but it has drugs in it. Not in a positive light, mind you.

6: A book that makes you happy: Just about any book by John Flanagan... except maybe Halt's Peril. Rosencrantz and Gildenstern are Dead by Tom Stoppard is funny, too. The Derwood Inc. series by Jeri Massi is also hilarious.

7: A book that makes you sad: The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis. The Last Guardian by Eoin Colfer. Halt's Peril by John Flanagan. Brisingr by Christopher Paolini. These are books that make me merely sad. See also "a book that breaks your heart".

8: A book that you never get tired of: I don't know if there's a single book, but I'm quite content to read the Enola Holmes books by Nancy Springer several times over. Harry Potter is good for repeat-reading too.

9: A book from your preteen years: Hmm. The Dawn Treader by C. S. Lewis. The Chronicles of Narnia is one of my favorite series ever.

10: A book that is a retelling of another story: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis. Or maybe even the whole Chronicles of Narnia series. It's a retelling of the Bible: The Magician's Nephew being when Aslan created the world; The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe being when Aslan (Jesus), as the son of the Emperor-Over-The-Sea (God), sacrificed himself for a traitor and was resurrected to triumph over evil; and The Last Battle relating the events of Revelation, etc.

11: One of your favorite classic books: Not sure what "classic" entails... I guess I'll say Beowulf, then, which is about as classic as they come.

12: A book from the year that you were born: Oooh! Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone by J. K. Rowling. Special.

13: A book that makes you think about life: Do Hard Things by Brett and Alex Harris, The Courtship of Sarah McLean, by Stephen B. Castleberry.

14: A favorite book with a person’s name in the title: Gypsy Rizka by Lloyd Alexander.

15: A book that moves you forward: Do Hard Things, by Brett and Alex Harris. 

16: A book that you think everybody should read: The Holy Bible, by God. Good stuff. But I also think every teenager should read Do Hard Things.

17: A book by an author no longer living: Rakkety Tam by Brian Jacques. Or the whole Redwall series, as a matter of fact.

18: A book from another country: Oh, a whole lot of the books I've mentioned. If I have to pick one, let's say Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer. The author lives in Ireland.

19: A favorite book from a favorite series: Abandoned by Jeri Massi, from the Derwood Inc. series.

20: A book that makes you want to fall in love: The Viking Quest series by Lois Walfrid Johnson is pretty good. Most fairytale books by Gail Carson Levine...

21:  A book that breaks your heart: Hmmm... what counts as "breaking my heart"? The ending of The Return of The King by J. R. R. Tolkien was really depressing. Left Behind by Tim Lahaye and Jerry B. Jenkins can get pretty heart-breaking, both the kids and adult series. And... oh, gosh, the Seven Sleepers series by Gilbert Morris. The Final Kingdom made me cry. Oh, and another book that makes me sob like a baby is the Courageous novelization by Randy Alcorn. My word. If you haven't seen the movie Courageous by Sherwood Pictures, you should watch it. You know, I'm actually pretty emotional when it comes to fiction. I say emotional, Trinity says sappy...

22: A book by an author you love: For a long time I'd say Gail Carson Levine was my favorite author, and The Two Sisters of Bamarre is one of my favorites from her.

23: A book that you remember from your childhood: Elsie Dinsmore by Martha Finley. Heavens, that series was traumatizing. Mama used to read it to us before naptime, and we often dreaded it, because, besides Elsie, none of the kids ever "did good"... and the girl just had a horrible life. I read this book again a few years ago, and for some reason it wasn't quite so bad.

One of our several, disorderly bookshelves,

24: A book that has many meanings to you: Should I at all include the books I am writing in this list? Those have many meanings to me. But if not, perhaps one of the books Mama used to read to us when we were little. I know I've already put The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe on here several times, but that book means a lot to me. When I was younger, I used to hate it being read to me about as much as Elsie Dinsmore, mostly because Edmund "did bad". I hated it to the point of disliking the spot on the bookshelf it sat on whenever I walked past. But later, in 2005, we got to see The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe film. Now, back then, we didn't see very many recently released films, or DVDs for that matter, so Narnia was revelatory to me. I left the room during the Stone Table scene - it was super scary and made me cry - but Mama wanted us to see it, I assume because of how it related to the crucifixion, and sent me back in. I spent most of the scene hiding under my blanket (I was only seven at the time... and give me a break, The Little Mermaid scared me).
But once we finished the movie, in the following days... and weeks and months... it got to be one of my favorite movies. And I knew there was a book about it, but I'd never read it, so I finally finished The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. So it has many meanings to me.

25: A book that reminds you of yourself: The Mildred Keith series by Martha Finley were great, but we accidentally sold it, so I haven't read it for years. The Big Green Pocketbook is a kid's book that I used to read a lot that is reminiscent of my... big... green... purse. The Enola Holmes series by Nancy Springer, too, and again, the Derwood Inc. series by Jeri Massi. And the first six Trixie Belden books.

So there you go. Not even a fifth of all the books I've read in my lifetime. I was going to say tenth, but I'm not really sure how many books I have read, so I'll say it's a fifth to be on the safe side. And there's at least 153 books here. When there should be 25. Oh, well. Reading's awesome.

Book Recommendations - Beowulf

Beowulf 

by Unknown

Translated by Seamus Heaney

Beowulf, son Echtheow, spoke:
"Wise sir, do not grieve. It is always better
To avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning
For every one of us, living in this world
Means waiting for our end. Let whoever can
Win glory before his death. When a warrior is gone,
That will be his best and only bulwark.
(lines 1384-1389)

Okay. 

First of all, I'd like to say that the previous book recommendations... however funny and interesting and involved those series are, they are basically fantasy fluff.

This is a really hard, deep book to read, and yes, I would recommend it. But it's one of the oldest manuscripts, and it was originally in Old English, a dead language. That means people can translate it and read it, but no one really speaks it any more to communicate. 

This book, translated by Seamus Heaney, is a bilingual edition - on the left hand side you have the Old English, on the right hand pages you have the modern English. It's really fascinating, seeing the comparisons between the languages. For instance, the equivalent of daughter is, if memory serves, dochter. See? And the introduction at the beginning is interesting too, talking about the history of Beowulf, what translating it meant, and how poetic Beowulf really is. 

Now, since this is such an old book, dated somewhere between the 8th and 11th century, it's not a terribly easy read, not at all, but in my opinion, if you can get through it, it is worth it. And if you've read Lord Of The Rings, The Hobbit, or The Inheritance Cycle, then you can really see the influence this story had on them. While he was still alive, J. R. R. Tolkien notably presented a lecture on Beowulf, and mentioned how it was among his most valued sources. And then there's Hrothgar, a main character in Beowulf, the one Christopher Paolini's dwarf king was named after.

When I first opened up Beowulf to read it, I saw the first lines:

So. the Spear-Danes in days gone by

And the kings who ruled them had courage and greatness.

We have heard of those princes' heroic campaigns.

And I just thought, "Wow. This is gonna be good."

And it was. A bit hard to get through, but still, I don't think I'll look back and think, "Oh, what a waste of time that was. Beowulf was useless. I could have done something else with my time." Which would be my opinion with some books.

There's my opinion on the book. Now a little bit about it. 

Beowulf is mainly a story about a hero of the Geats in Scandinavia. He hears about the plight of King Hrothgar, whose mead-hall is under attack by the monster Grendel. Beowulf takes several of his best men and sails to meet Hrothgar, pledging to defeat the monster or die trying. Hrothgar welcomes him into his hall and Beowulf makes ready to battle Grendel. 

I am not too great at synopses, am I?

In any case, I give it...

I'll say four stars. It was purty, purty good. Not the epic-est read-this-now-everybody-on-the-whole-world book, but worthwhile, I think, quite worthwhile.

Update: Oh, I forgot to mention. Yes, this was definitely written from a Christian viewpoint, for those of you who are concerned. But also I warn you, this gets a bit graphic in its descriptions, talking a little bit about bursting muscles and severed heads and bloody butchered corpses (Beowulf's words, not mine), so if you have a bit of a delicate constitution, you may not care to read it.

So the Geat People, his hearth companions,

Sorrowed for the lord who had been laid low,

They said that of all the kings upon the earth

He was the man most gracious and fair-minded,

Kindest to his people and keenest to win fame.

(closing lines 3178-3183) 

Book Names

Ooh la la! Es Hannah, in accordance with prophecy.

(Don't bother making sense of the preceding sentence.)

Hey! One of fellow blogging acquaintances just announced a two-week hiatus. What a coincidence! We just had one of those! Unplanned and unannounced though it was. And completely my fault, really. It was my turn to post, and I just went, "Huh." And then chronic procrastination and so on.... So I'm going to pick up the slack again. Sorry.

As always, I am having trouble picking a subject for a post. Trinity has been doing a lot of writing posts lately. But I can't make myself post my stuff because two reasons:

1) It's not very good.
2) I have a morbid fear of releasing a single secret about what's going to happen in my books.

So what on earth do I do if I don't post some of my work, some of my writing, on this writing blog...

I will find out.

Today I'll say something about a subject I've been considering. Names. Specifically, the names or titles of books.

In fiction, names have a lot of power. Just read the Inheritance Cycle, that's got names written all over and up and down it. At one point I started reading a series (I think it was Animorphs), and they mentioned a lot about powerful names. And I know that names are important on books. It's one of the first things that you register when you look at the book, along with whatever picture is on the cover. It's what you refer to the book by ("...hey, I just finished reading Cinder by Marissa Meyer, it was awesome..."). It's one of the most important things about a book, for a writer.
And please tell me how everyone out there chooses a title for their books. I am going bonkers. And a bonkers me is not a rational or sensible person.

Looking at names of popular books (popular fiction books, I should say), I'm trying to find a trend. A few noticable characteristics are that the name is intriguing, that it's to the point, and that it doesn't give anything away. Usually. It makes you curious: "Where is Gorlan, and what are these Ruins?" It doesn't go on and on, like this: "Hey, have you read The Really Big Battle At The End Of A Super Exciting Book Where There's This Guy That Meets A Girl Who Fakes Her Death So Please Read This Book? It's really interesting." And you can't go: "Ooh, here's a cool book. The name is Trouble... I bet at the end they all die, except for the main character, who ends up loses his left elbow in a street fight with the gangster that killed his grandmother on his father's side, the one who raised him from a child and was actually a nurse during World War II. Huh."
Here's a list of trends I noticed:

1. A description of a person. A dramatized name for the main character, or one of the main characters. It could be used as their title in battle, like, "Look, it's The Chosen One!" for Harry Potter, or "Beware, The Thunderer," for Thor. These are everywhere. Just look at some of your favorite books, or the favorite books of a sibling.
For example:
The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
The Queen Of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner
The Prisoner Of Azkaban by J. K. Rowling
The Last Guardian by Eoin Colfer
The False Prince by Jennifer A. Nielsen
The Royal Ranger by John Flanagan
The Whipping Boy by Sid Fleischman
Oh, and as you may have noticed, most or all of these titles start with the word the. It seems to be mandatory. But it must still work (all of these books are best-sellers, aren't they?).

2. An object in the book. Maybe it's the one object the main character is questing for, like the Sorcerer's or Philosopher's Stone. or maybe it just shows up, like the Silver Chair.
The Goblet Of Fire by J. K. Rowling
The Mark Of Athena by Rick Riordan
The Eternity Code by Eoin Colfer
The Silver Chair by C. S. Lewis
The Candlestone by Bryan Davis
Hey, these names start with "the" too!

3. An organization. A bunch of people or a secret society. Slightly less common, but still out there.
The Fellowship Of The Ring by J. R. R. Tolkien
The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart
The Order Of The Phoenix by J. K. Rowling
The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner

4. An event. The Big Party, The Happy Moment, The Time Of Awesome... you know.
The Battle Of The Labyrinth by Rick Riordan
The Arctic Incident by Eoin Colfer
The Return Of The King by J. R. R. Tolkien
The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis
The Siege Of Macindaw by John Flanagan
The Darkest Moment by Erin Hunter
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

5. A place.  An important location. Most of the book probably depends on this very place!
Isle Of Swords by Wayne Thomas Batson
The Chamber Of Secrets by J. K. Rowling
The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien
The Icebound Land by John Flanagan
Forest Of Secrets by Erin Hunter
Gone-Away Lake by Elizabeth Enright

6. A short word. Brief but vague. Probably a name or a description. This has been used a lot in recent movies released, like Brave and Tangled and Oblivion.
Cinder by Marissa Meyer
Eldest by Christopher Paolini
Outcast by Erin Hunter
Magyk by Angie Sage

7. A vague term. Maybe something that a character said, like Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle In Time.
A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L'Engle
Dragon's Breath by E. D. Baker
Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow by Jessica Day George
Venom and Song by Christopher Hopper and Wayne Thomas Batson
Circles Of Seven by Bryan Davis

And second only to the book title in importance (or maybe it surpasses it) is the main character's name! Like Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, Leven Thumps, and Artemis Fowl. Maybe that's why there are so many "This Person and...", like Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Everyone knows the name of the main character. It's probably an easy to remember name - Harry Potter. Like Paul Bunyan. To the point. If it were something like Xavier Beauregard... you know, it'd be harder to say Xavier Beauregard and The Chamber Of Secrets. We'd call them something like: The Wizard Kid series, The Irish Genius Chronicles, and The Adventures of the Demigod Dude.

I like making lists. They make everything so orderly! But mostly I only do it when writing, because if I didn't have a sense of organization, my head would explode.

So that's the end of my random thoughts on the matter. It's hard to keep up with Trinity's more exciting posts about.... them. But we will try to start posting more regularly. Adios, amigos!