A Matter of Magic

Mairelon the Magician and The Magician’s Ward make up my personal favorite book duo ever! Another book by Patricia C. Wrede, these are some of the only books that outdo her Enchanted Forest Chronicles (see my review here).

The easiest way to get these books now is probably to get A Matter of Magic, which is both books in one. If nothing else, it has my favorite cover. *captivated be shiny blue ball* Ooooooo @_@

Hahaha.

Quick overview

Set in a Pride and Prejudice time frame, Kim is a child living on the streets of London and posing as a boy so that she isn’t taken advantage of like the other homeless girls. She is offered a job by a sketchy-looking individual to break into a traveling street performer’s carriage and look for a particular item. Instead of finding it, she is caught by the magician (who know a lot more than street tricks), but instead of turning her in to the police for attempted theft, or just throwing her back onto the streets of London, Mairelon takes her in as an assistant to his show. But as the new team leaves London, trouble seems to follow them, as individuals from both Kim’s and the magician’s past life begin to show up in the oddest places.

The climax of this book is carefully thought out, and Wrede does an amazing job of bringing all of the scattered pieces together in a clever, yet fun, way.

The second book is equally clever, and is just as fun. New and old characters interact now in some of the highest social circles in London. The only thing that grows faster in high society than crime is gossip, and Kim and Mairelon have plenty of both to deal with, as Kim is now the magician’s ward. As if learning magic and upper society’s rules wasn’t hard enough, Kim also has to deal with more of her street rat past creeping up from behind her.

Conclusion

If you haven’t read them yet, you should definitely make some time in 2012 to look into these books. They’re not long, and if you are a fan of magic, Victorian England, and complex plots, then these books will keep you entertained.

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by niner360 on April 15, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in Books

Posted by niner360 on April 15, 2012

https://niner360.wordpress.com/2012/04/15/a-matter-of-magic/

The Best Butter EVER!

I like to call it Arachis hypogaea butter…… OK, I lied. I call it the same as everyone: peanut butter.

I looooOooooOOooOoooooooOooove peanut butter!!! I will eat it with just about anything. In candy, in ice cream, on ice cream, on any type of bagel, on toast, on a cookie, in a cookie, in a pie, microwave a peanut butter and jelly burrito, ants on a log, almost every type of soup will taste better with a piece of bread with peanut butter on it, don’t forget to put it in your fruit salad or at least to dip your apples and bananas in it, on bread with banana, on bread with honey, on bread with Nutella, or just eat it straight off the spoon!!

"Please sir, I want some more"... bet you didn't know that Oliver was really asking for more peanut butter!

I’m averaging about one (18 oz) jar every 5 days right now! Its crazy but I just love the way it tastes. =P

So here are a few fun facts taken from the National Peanut Board, with my comments added in green. Check out their web page for more fun/interesting facts that you will probably never need to know! :)

There are enough peanuts in one acre to make 30,000 peanut butter sandwiches. Well that will do for me for a few weeks…. what is everyone else going to eat?
The average child will eat 1,500 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches before he/she graduates high school. My peanut butter addiction didn’t really develop till college, so ya, I guess I would believe that.
It takes about 540 peanuts to make a 12-ounce jar of peanut butter. Hummmm, And I like the Sam’s Club sized ones……
By law, any product labeled “peanut butter” in the United States must be at least 90 percent peanuts. The other 10% must be sugar :(
Americans consume on average over 1.5 billion pounds of peanut butter and peanut products each year…. I think everyone else in the America have the 1 billion, and I bump it up with the last 0.5 billion haha :D
Peanuts have more protein, niacin, folate and phytosterols than any nut… but then, it isn’t a nut, it’s a legume (a bean). Check it out.
April 2 – National Peanut Butter and Jelly Day. There are a lot more holidays involving peanut butter, so check out that web page.
Sixty percent of consumers prefer creamy peanut butter over crunchy. I agree. I like crunchy, but creamy is what I crave.

Wasn’t that fun? OK, see you later. If you need me, I’ll be in my peanut butter anonymous group, but if there is something crazy that you do with your peanut butter, PLEASE share!

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by niner360 on April 2, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in My Life

Posted by niner360 on April 2, 2012

https://niner360.wordpress.com/2012/04/02/the-best-butter-ever/

Things To Share

If you liked the French memory boards, you’ll love these. I was stumbling around the internet, and I found these amazing projects. I just had to share ^_^

click the picture to go to the blog

This is great! My jewelry is always in a knot in a box (if not in a knot on my dresser *taps fingers together and looks away*). I love this idea!

click the picture
I know you want to

I do not own enough makeup to justify doing this…. though I am sure there are countless other things this board could be used for. Here is one more link, with more of these lovely magnet boards!! :D Chem them out!!

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by niner360 on March 26, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in My Art & Crafts, Special

Posted by niner360 on March 26, 2012

https://niner360.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/things-to-share/

College Diaries: Second Semester

I’m half way through my second semester and trying not to run out of energy before spring break. The time has gone by crazy fast! Sorry I haven’t written since forever! There hasn’t been a whole lot going on — same old, same old here in the college universe… oh, but there was that one thing that was kind of big……

A few life changes

I decided on a minor in TESL (Teaching English as a Second Language)… unfortunately I decided on this three weeks into the semester, so I had to jump into a linguistics class and an ESL (English as a Second Language) class on the last day that I was allowed to add a semester-length class. It was crazy trying to catch up with the work, but now the ESL is my favorite class :D

The other thing is that I am actually thinking of teaching *gasp* as a career option! haha. I never thought that I would want to teach chemistry, but as I thought about it, I realized that I didn’t really want to do anything else with it either… so I might as well teach it….. or I might just take that TESL certificate and run off to some other country to teach English for a year or two. ^_^ Ah, too many options to choose from.

Other stuff so that this won’t be a boring post

OK, I admit that I don’t have anything planned to put here…. So how about some doodles! :D The first is a doodle that I did during world religions class :D

I didn't mean to give her a black eye :\

I had only the left side of the face drawn first and the I decided that I wanted the other side, but I couldn’t match up the eyes right, so now one eye looks like someone punched it, and it is STILL smaller than the other one :/

To fix this, I did some editing on Picnik :D

.... is it too much?

I mean if your favorite photo editor is going to close down soon, and you’re going to edit a photo anyway, you might as well go all out on that photo, right? haha…. hum, maybe I should just go back to doing coffee cups…

a coffee cup on a coffee cup

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by niner360 on March 8, 2012 • Permalink

Posted in College Diaries, My Art & Crafts

Posted by niner360 on March 8, 2012

https://niner360.wordpress.com/2012/03/08/college-diaries-second-semester-9/

College Diaries: This isn’t a game… is it?

I feel like I’m in a computer game. I am on the next-to-last level, facing the last three small bosses before the big boss at the end… I just need to survive the ruthless attacks with enough hp to face finals week! Goal of the game? To make it to Christmas. Luckily, there are a lot of health packs lying around, including Christmas music, hot chocolate, and random snacks. And there are, of course, friends who — if nothing else — encourage you along the way!

LOVE Claw... might just have to see if I can get it working again over Christmas break!

haha

This has been a crazy first semester for me! Harder classes, new friends, a great church and small group, and a new-found use for caffeine.

I never thought that I would become one of the college zombies that survive on caffeine instead of sleep… but I have :( It just takes a whole lot LESS to keep me going than the other zombies. (^-^) One normal cup of joe, and I am bouncing off the walls! I just need a tiny amount to get me past the 7:00-9:00 o’clock hours, then I am good for the rest of the night (until about 8 in the morning, when my classes start).

Ok, so this was a kind of pointless post, but it is a good break from studying… for me anyway…. NOW, back to work!

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by niner360 on November 30, 2011 • Permalink

Posted in College Diaries

Posted by niner360 on November 30, 2011

https://niner360.wordpress.com/2011/11/30/college-diaries-this-isnt-a-game-is-it/