Must be a fan of Firefly to apply!

Thanks to Being a Geek for the photo!

Thanks to Wisdom from Captain Reynolds on Facebook

I won’t go on about the familiar history of Abe, but the addition of vampires into his life made this a story that must be read by all vampire fans. I am looking forward to the movie! (Yes! It’s in the works!!)

Benitez’s website describes the comic as follows:

“The tabloids dubbed her “Lady Mechanika“, the sole survivor of a serial killer’s three-year rampage through England. Authorities found her locked in an abandoned laboratory amidst an undeterminable number of corpses and body parts, her own limbs having been amputated and replaced with mechanical components.

With no memory of her captivity or her former life, Mechanika eventually built a new life for herself as a private detective, using her unique abilities to solve cases the police couldn’t or wouldn’t handle. But she never stopped searching for the answers to her own past.

Set in turn of the century England, a time when magic and superstition clashed with new scientific discoveries and inventions, Lady Mechanika is about a young woman’s search for her own identity as she solves other mysteries involving science and the supernatural.”

Please let me know if you’ve read any of this series and what you think!

Okay. I’m interested…

It took two months for me to read Whitechapel Gods, and I struggled the entire way, mostly out of disinterest.  The prose was easy enough, but the storyline switches gears so many times, it was really hard to follow. I lost interest, forcing my way slowly, until about 2/3 of the way through when it seemed like the characters were actually about to do something important.

The characters seem very interesting, but their individual lives seem to overtake the book, making the plot lose its momentum. Have I mentioned just how many players there are in this drama? There’s Oliver (the protagonist), and Missy, Tom, Aaron, Scared, Penny, Bergen, Heckler, Bailey, etc. Delving into so many lives, it’s no wonder I got lost. Their abstract dream and drug sequences proves nothing but to confuse more than reveal anything plot-worthy.

In saying all that, though, I believe that my favorite characters are Tom, half man and half machine, and his pet clickrat Jeremy Longshore (who we later find out is embodied by Aaron). Tom is a large man-machine who, yes, takes a licking and keeps on ticking, but his demeanor is gentle and that of a small child. His pet Jeremy is very faithful and turns out to be pretty useful. He convinces metal hounds, through a series of clicks and nods, that his friends are not a threat. Their relationship shows us more humanity than the real human beings in the story do, which might be a point the author is trying to make, but it gets lost in the muddle.

By the end of the story, I was left very unsatisfied. The underwhelming finale and odd change of personality  for two of the characters seems a little forced for a “happy ending.” Maybe I can give it another read in a year or so to see how I feel about it. Until then, I don’t think I can offer any mind-blowing review. It is not a bad book, by any means. It just needs to be more reader-friendly.

This is my first read of a FABLES book, and I am loving it! Bill Willingham’s writing brings together several children’s stories into one world, where the grim part of the Grimm Fairy Tales can be elaborated upon and characters’ stories intertwine. These aren’t only “back-stories” of the famous childhood figures, they are stories that connect each and every one of them in a world that is as ferocious yet as good as our own.

It all starts with Snow White, the “Most Troublesome Woman.” In order to prevent herself from being married to King Shahyrar and killed the next morning, Snow uses her wits and her power of story-telling to save her. She tells the king a fable every night, drawing him further into them, and eventually making him see the error of his ways. These moral-stories tell of consequences, and of forgiveness.

Although the characters may have been developed for children, this book has some dark undertones. For example, the witch that lived in the gingerbread house tells her tale of how she came to be, and it is not a pretty tale. It is one wrought with baby sacrifices, deception, and revenge.

But not everything is always so grim. “Fair Division” tells of how one king gave and gave to his animal subjects, while he took nothing in return. And when the king needed help, the animals were there for him. He continued to give by creating Fabletown in New York, where the animals could be safe from humans and goblins alike.

My favorite story is called “The Runt.” In this, the North Wind takes form as a wolf and meets a she-wolf named Winter. They have children together, all being big and strong except for Bigby, named so because “he truly imagines himself to be big and bad.”  Bigby inherits his father’s power of the North wind and huffs and puffs and blows the Three Little Pigs’ houses away. We should not forget that Little Red Riding hood incident, too.

I believe this is a wonderful accessory to anyone who still loves traditional fairy tales. It caught my attention because of the imagery, which was so much like the giant story books I had when I was a child. But then it brought me to a different place, where adults can continue to love reading about these treasured characters. I can’t wait for more!

So, I turn to the internet, where I can act immediately and on a daily basis. There are many places online that will donate food and other beneficial goods and services to these organizations. Just by generating to traffic to the specific sites, they donate to different causes. All it takes is a few minutes a day to point and click, and you’ve fed a dog for the day, or helped doctors come one step closer to a cure, or saved an acre of forest from logging.

Here are the sites I frequent. Please take a few minutes of your day and stop by, too!

The Animal Rescue Site | The Rainforest Site | The Literacy Site | The Hunger Site | The Breast Cancer Site | The Child Health Site | Free Kibble for Hungry Cats | Free Kibble for Hungry Dogs | Care2 Click-to Donate to Children | Care2 Click-to-Donate to the Rainforest | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Big Cats | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Breast Cancer | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Pets | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Seals | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Oceans | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Primates | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Global Warming | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Stop Violence | Care2 Click-to-Donate to Wolves

Here’s another. Vote in The Animal Rescue Site’s $100,000 Shelter Challenge for your favorite animal shelter.

I’m pulling for The Blind Cat Rescue & Sanctuary, Inc. to win. Why this shelter? Because blind kitties deserve a good home, too, and not to be discarded as defective or thought of as unable to live a fulfilling life. After reading Homer’s Odyssey by Gwen Cooper, I fell in love with this kitty’s spunk and will to thrive and be happy.

Linky, linky, linky! >’ ‘

Here are some samples of my favorites:

For more images, you can check out the Flickr pool here, or see a condensed version on Webdesigner Depot here.