books Archives - Journeys Are My Diary

Harry Potter turns 20!

May 23, 2017 by Bel Leave a Comment

Can you believe that on June 26th 2017, JK Rowling’s “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” has been publish for 20 years?! It seems no time at all, since I discovered my love for Harry Potter and his Wizarding World but despite being 38 years old this weekend and having gotten both my daughters to love Harry Potter too, I find it hard to believe that it really has been twenty years since the start of my favourite book series.

That said, I wasn’t one of the first people to jump aboard the Harry Potter band wagon. In fact, when both my mum and dad were raving about the books, I was actually wondering what the hell was going on with all these adults loving a “kids book”. It wasn’t until 1999 (Philosopher’s Stone was 1997), not long after Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was published, that I finally caved to peer pressure and borrowed my parent’s copy of the first book. In typical “child” fashion, I hated to admit when my parents were right, but oh my god I loved the first book. So much so that it was read within a few days, despite working full time. Book two was then devoured within days, followed by book three. It was official, I was hooked. I was desperate for the fourth book… and I suppose that was when I truly became a Harry Potter fan.

Book Four – Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, was pre-ordered. When it arrived, I couldn’t wait to get reading and I literally didn’t put it down until I was done. This became the same for all the other books, Order of the Phoenix, Half-Blood Prince and finally The Deathly Hallows. I have never before, or since, been so hooked on a book series. And it didn’t end with just the books either. I went to see every movie that was released, if not on the very first day, within very few days of released. The Deathly Hallows Part 1 was released not long after my ex and I split up and having no one who was immediately free to go to the cinema with, I ventured for the first time by myself to see a movie – rather than wait too long and go with someone else. When the final movie was released, myself and fifteen other friends, all gathered for a party of sorts. We all went to the first midnight showing of the movie and some of us even got Deathly Hallows tattoos to remember the occasion – this was my first ever tattoo.

This week I have been to London and of course a visit to the Platform 9 3/4 shop is an essential part of that trip. Not only that, but as I mentioned earlier – I turn 38 at the end of this week and guess what I’m doing for my birthday? A trip to Watford and the Harry Potter Studios (it will be my third time!). I’m really a huge Harry Potter geek and I don’t care if I should be too old for it or whatever. I have loved Harry Potter for (almost) twenty years and I will continue to do so for at least twenty more. I have loved sharing the stories with my children and hope they will continue to share the books with their own children too. This weekend we are also attending MCM London Comic Con and they have pre-releases of the 20th Anniversary “house” editions of the Philosopher’s Stone and I’m so tempted to get one (or all of them…)! Harry Potter books are the one and only set of books I would never be parted with, over all the books I own.

As a final thought and conclusion to my post, I wanted to share this infograph, put together by Cartridge Save. It has loads of fun facts about most used words and phrases, along with how many copies have been sold and how many words are in each book etc. If you’re yet to read Harry Potter, no matter what the reason, I honestly recommend you give it a try! You have nothing to lose and a whole lot of love to gain!

Book Review – A Frozen Heart

October 25, 2016 by Bel Leave a Comment

I bought this book from Asda and I have to admit I was pretty excited to find it, especially for £3.75. This book had been on my Amazon wishlist for some time and I assumed it would be similar to the Twisted Tales by by Liz Braswell. I had read A Whole New World, picked up Once Upon a Dream and this seemed like it would be similar, despite being by a different author, Elizabeth Rudnick.

Sadly, I was quite disappointed. If you want to read the novelisation of the Frozen movie, then this book is for you. It’s the exact story that the Frozen movie provides you with, except in a written form – meaning more detail, more description, more dialogue etc. That said, any dialogue that appeared in the movie, appears in this book. Every quote your children (or you) know off by heart, will be in this book. At first its sort of lovely – an indepth look to Anna and Elsa’s life, even a bit more background on Hans which you don’t really get in the movie. However once the storyline gets going, the story is basically exactly like the animation and it loses something for me.

That said, the end still made me cry, just like it does when I watch it. The book is a beautiful rendition of the movie, but that is all it is. I was expecting something more, something different, something that tells us a different part of the story. But sadly it’s not that. If you want to read “Frozen”, then absolutely pick up this book. If you’re looking for something more, it’s probably best not to bother.

Book Review – Kingdom Keepers: Disney at Dawn by Ridley Pearson

June 25, 2016 by Bel 2 Comments

Last week Lily and I finished the second book in the Kingdom Keepers series. As you may remember, I reviewed book one, Kingdom Keepers: Disney After Dark, only a few weeks ago. This book was quite different from the first – and in my opinion it was much better in lots of ways.

Again, reading it aloud to Lily, I did at times struggle with the structure of the writing. However I generally found it improved from the first book. Where the last book was set at night time – bedtime trips to Magic Kingdom in holographic form – this was set in a whole day time, a day time in fact where the kids couldn’t sleep (just in case) in Animal Kingdom. Now this is really the main reason I said it was better in lots of ways. I enjoyed the story more, the writing was good and I really enjoyed the plot as a whole. However (and I’m sorry, please don’t hate me) I wasn’t at all sold on Animal Kingdom when we visited Florida last year and it just didn’t really do anything for me on that front. I’m not fussed about animals either, plus I think many aspects are quite old and therefore not necessarily accurate, but yeah… Animal Kingdom is a bit blah for me.

So obviously I never like to spoil the plot on these things, but despite being set in Animal Kingdom AND being all about animals, the story was good. I liked the addition of Amanda and Jez to the gang, plus I enjoyed the way the kids are all much closer and better friends in this book. Unlike the first book, which tied off quite nicely, it was obviously that this book was “to be continued…”. While it had an element of tying off loose ends, it clearly left a storyline open for another book (which we have actually started now and it does pick up from the end of the last one).

All in all, I’m really enjoying these books. The next one is apparently set in Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios, so I’m interested to see how that plays out. Also the fact the books started off calling Hollywood Studios – MCM, I feel like these are becoming newer and more up to date.

Wednesday Wishlist – Disney Style Books

May 18, 2016 by Bel Leave a Comment

I have to admit that I’m super excited about this week’s wishlist, because I’ve been working on it for absolutely ages! I don’t read half as much as I’d like to as I’m always busy sewing or blogging, but if I did, I would read ALL these books I have listed and many more. This week I wanted to show off some of the many Disney/Fairytale style books that I’ve come across over the last few months. Some I’d never heard of before and others being sequels to books I already own or have read.

Disney style books

Disney is one of my favourite topics ever but I love a good spin on it too. Nearly all of these books follow that idea and so hopefully if you’re the same, you’ll like the sound of a lot of these books.

Starting off with Poor Unfortunate Souls, this book has been on my wishlist for a while now. When we visited Florida last year I discovered Fairest of All and The Beast Within, both of which I regretted not buying. However for my birthday the following month, I was lucky enough to get bought both. This third book is about Ursula and honestly she is pretty much my Villain spirit animal. It’s not released yet but I would love to own this book and add it to my collection.

As Old as Time is a similar story, it’s pre-order and not released yet. However I’ve had my eye on Once Upon a Dream and A Whole New World (Chris just bought me this a few days ago) in hardback for a while (they just got released in paperback) and now spotted this Beauty and the Beast Twisted Tale coming out soon. I have yet to read any, but I plan to start AWNW this week!

The next couple of books, Unhooked and Never Never, are both Peter Pan/Hook themed books. They both appeal to me to read, though I’ve heard nothing about them other than reading the information on Amazon. There is one on the next line down called Wendy Darling (and its a Part 1 I believe) and this is the same sort of thing. They all just sound like good books. Finally on this line is a book called Fairest and its part of The Lunar Chronicles series. I currently own Cinder which is by the same author and while I haven’t read it yet, I’m told it’s really good.

On the middle line is a book called Once Again, its by the same as the Twisted Tales but I think it’s co-written. From what I can gather its two stories in one, Snow White and Sleeping Beauty. Since I mentioned Wendy Darling above, I’ll skip on to Kingdom Keepers. This is a series that I only recently discovered and have to admit I’m thoroughly enjoying. The first book, Kingdom Keepers: Disney After Dark, I actually bought for Megan for her birthday, but Lily and I ended up reading as a bedtime story. Once we’d finished, I moved onto Kingdom Keepers: Disney After Dawn. Since we only read one chapter a night, it does take quite some time to work our way through, however Lily was lucky enough to get bought the next 3-4 books for her birthday so we should have enough to keep us going for a while. This particular book I listed is a sort of spin-off series I believe, called Kingdom Keepers: The Return. Obviously we will be finishing our current series, before heading off into that one though.

Finally on the middle line is another book which I believe is co-written, by Riley Pearson (the author of The Kingdom Keepers) and Dave Barry. There are several books in this series too and again I haven’t read any of them, but given that they are by the author of The Kingdom Keepers, I would definitely give it a try.

Finally on the bottom row is a couple of cheeky additions. Return to the Isle of the Lost is a sequel book to The Isle of the Lost: A Descendants Novel. All I really know of the Descendants is the Disney movie that was on TV last year, which I watched with the kids, but I did buy this book for Lily and we haven’t got around to reading it yet. Given that the first book is good, then we’d probably want the sequel too! My next cheeky addition is actually Once Upon a Time (OUAT) related and though there were several to choose from, this one is my top pick. OUAT isn’t technically Disney but it’s pretty damn close so any book connected to the series is something I want to read.

Finally that leaves three books which I only found today as I was searching for last minute additions. I honestly know nothing about the three picks but the blurbs appealed so I threw them on. Disneylanders and The Disneyland Quest, remind me somewhat of the Kingdom Keepers style book. The last one, is Fairy Godmother themed and is part of a series, some of which Megan owns but hasn’t read yet (The Snow Queen and The Sleeping Beauty). The series is called Five Hundred Kingdoms and from what I can gather, all the books can be read independently.

So these are some of my treasure finds but I’d love to know if you have any other suggestions!

February Round-up

March 8, 2016 by Bel Leave a Comment

Somehow the beginning of March seems to have escaped me already and I realised I never did my monthly round-up! Despite the fact February actually ended at the beginning of last week, I thought I should make the time to sum up anyway!

Watching: Vampire Diaries (Seasons 3-6), new series X-Files, current series NCIS, Limitless, Blindspot, Mean Girls, Tron Legacy, Moulin Rouge, Terminator Genisys, Ant Man, Deadpool, The Walking Dead,
Reading: George’s Marvelous Medicine, Fantastic Mr Fox, Six Lies
Sewing & Making (for Closet Geek): Custom dresses – it’s been really nice to sew a few different things. I made a Snow White fabric dress, a Mickey travel themed dress, an Alice in Wonderland fabric dress and a Thumper fabric dress. I also made a few other dresses including Belle (blue) and Honey Lemon. There was a Marauders Map passport cover and a few new pencil cases too. Finally I knocked up a Wendy Disney-bounding dress for Amy to wear on her birthday in WDW.
I also pimped out a Locker for a competition and I’ve done a fair bit of cooking this month!

And in other news…
– Spent the first week of the month feeling completely ill! Was so glad when I finally got over it.
– Pancakes on Pancake Day – yum! We had stuffed savoury pancakes for mains and sweet ones for dessert.
– Had probably one of the best Valentine’s Days ever. We spent it as a family and it was fab from start to finish.
– Lily was in a class assembly and Megan was in her first Shine assembly of the year.
– Booked extra tickets for the same Harry Potter convention as before, this time for a Yule Ball.
– Celebrated a belated Galentine’s Day, Amy’s birthday and Easter, all in three days while Amy visited.
– Lily had her first ever sleepover – and I cried because she’s growing up!
– Chris and I traveled to London and Walker Stalker. It was a bit of a flop but we made the best of a bad situation. We did have a nice hotel room, bought a few nice things and had a lovely meal out.
– Finally made headway with the house. We made a list of all the DIY to do, booked people to come and do valuations on the house and started looking for houses to buy.
– The girls attended their first school disco together, at the same time. Usually Lily fell in to the lower school part and Megan the higher, but for the first year they are together. They looked so grown up too!
– My GBF Adam came to visit for the weekend. I only saw him once last year so it was really nice he came to visit so early in the year!
– My mum finally returned from holiday. She went away from 1st Feb to 29th Feb and it felt like a long time! I cried when we first chatted afterwards…

Looking forward to in March:
– Finding out which secondary school Megan will go to (I know by the time I wrote this since it was 1st, but it was a major point in March). This will begin our house hunting.
– Lily’s 8th birthday. Technically this has already happened by the time I wrote this post but I definitely was looking forward to it.
– Chris’ birthday. It falls a little later in the month but I always enjoy celebrating anything with him.
– Getting a handle on selling the house. Making a good dint in the DIY and getting the house on the market.
– Closing Closet Geek for 10 days. This is connected to the last one really but because of all the DIY we have to do, I’m closing my store for just over a week. I do love to work and sew but it will be nice to have a break too.
– Easter Holiday. Just like Half Term in February, I enjoy having the kids off school. This is partly because I enjoy their company and partly because I love not having to trek out in the morning and can stay in my PJs!

Book Review – John Green novels

February 24, 2016 by Bel Leave a Comment

So maybe you’re thinking, “that title is a bit random” and honestly you’d be right! I realised the other day that I haven’t done a book review in a while and the truth is – the last few books I’ve read either a) haven’t been worth blogging about or b) I haven’t actually made it to the end of! Once upon a time, I would never have left a book unfinished, but somewhere over the years I’ve decided that life is too short for bad books (and movies, tv series etc) and if you’re just not enjoying it – GIVE UP!

I first discovered John Green, with “The Fault in Our Stars“. As with most things, I was late to the party and I really only read it because I knew the movie was coming out and I wanted to see that – but I like to read the book first, before seeing the movie – as I definitely can’t do it the other way around. I really loved TFIOS and I even loved the movie adaptation. I really don’t have anything bad to say about either and I was sure I was in love with John Green as an author.

Next came Paper Towns. This was partly because I enjoyed TFIOS and partly because it was again another movie that was going to be released. I ordered and read it within a few days and truth is, I could put the book down once I started. At the time I wasn’t sure if it was because I was really enjoying it, or because I just wanted to know what happens. I think that truth is, I just wanted to know what happened, because I haven’t watched the movie since, or really thought about the book at all. However in the haste of the moment, I ordered more John Green books, figuring I would probably enjoy them my other two experiences were pretty good.

At the time, I’d posted on Instagram about loving TFIOS, about reading Paper Towns and about ordering another three books. I had various comments – my best friend telling me she only liked Looking for Alaska, someone saying Paper Towns was one of their favourites and someone else commenting that they enjoyed Will Grayson, Will Grayson.

I started with Looking for Alaska. I enjoyed it somewhat, for the most part I think, but after the change in pace midway through the book (I won’t spoil why, but the chapters are basically a countdown to this point), I struggled with the story and wasn’t really sold on the rest of the book. After that came An Abundance of Katherines and the truth is I really didn’t like this book. I didn’t like the characters and the book is predictable. To be honest if you make it about a third of the way through the book, you can pretty much guess how it turns out. I’m yet to read Will Grayson, Will Grayson, but sadly I’m not in a hurry to do so either.

So I started off with The Fault in Our Stars, thinking I had found a new favourite author – 5 out of 5 stars! By Paper Towns I was maybe down to 3-4 stars, Looking for Alaska was a definite 3 and An Abundance of Katherines was maybe a 2? Now obviously I appreciate that everyone is different – as you can see from the comments I received on Instagram, everyone likes different books – but in my experience, I’m sad to say that John Green is a bit of a one hit wonder for me.

January Round-up

February 1, 2016 by Bel Leave a Comment

Last year I gave up on my weekly round up posts during about October, having done them for all 2015 and all 2014 as well. Instead I’ve decided to try and tackle monthly updates instead!

Watching: The Fall (Season 1 & 2), Making a Murderer, Criminal Minds (Season 1-3), House (Season 1-6), Before I Go To Sleep, Thor 2, James and the Giant Peach.
Reading: An Abundance of Katherines, Disney After Dark (Kingdom Keepers)
Sewing & Making (for Closet Geek): As well as the usual; Young Lottie from The Princess and the Frog, Hiro from Big Hero 6, Marauders Map cushion, Valentine themed hair bows, mouse ears, scrunchies and bows on bobbles.And in other news…
– At the beginning of the month, we all wrote our New Year resolutions. We sealed them up to reveal on NYE, but I honestly don’t remember what half of them were already!
– We’ve been lucky enough to eat out a few times this month; once for breakfast at Mill Lodge, once at The Nosey Parker and again at Gateway Park.
– We finished decorating our bedroom on January 10th. This is about 6 months after we started!
– Booked to go to a Harry Potter convention in August.
– We had the first snow on 14th, but sadly it didn’t stick around. We’ve had a lot of cold weather this month but still no settled snow!
– Bought a new toaster for the kitchen. I’m gradually getting all red bits.
– Tried to diet and failed miserably. January has been a tough month, with motivation and with being busy. February is my start over, so we’ll see how it goes.
– I did something really crazy and paid a deposit to do Lincoln Christmas Market this year. It’s a 4 day event and god knows how I will manage to get stock ready for it, but I’m committed to doing it now! I also decided cancel another event I had paid a deposit on, realising it was going to make life too crazy.

So there you have it – the highlights of January.

Looking forward to:
– Valentine’s Day. For me it’s not so much about it being a romantic day, but showing love to my family. All four of us are planning a special day together, followed by a special meal.
– Amy coming to visit. Though I saw her briefly in December, it feels like a long time since we had a proper catch up! It will be nice to drink wine, probably order takeaway at least once and catch up.
– Walker Stalker. Chris and I have booked a one day ticket at London’s Walker Stalker and I’m really looking forward to it. Not so much for the con (though I hope to meet Norman Reedus) but also because we’ve booked one night in a nice hotel and it will be nice to spend time as a couple.
– Half Term. We don’t have any plans, other than Amy visiting and technically Walker Stalker falls into that week, but I love not having to get up and dressed, take the kids to school etc. I also really enjoy having the kids around the house.

Page to Screen – James and the Giant Peach

January 22, 2016 by Bel Leave a Comment

I have a really old copy of James and the Giant Peach, which I think maybe belonged to my mum once upon a time. However it’s also the copy I’ve had since childhood and read then too. While I’ve always remembered the rough plot of James and the Giant Peach, it wasn’t until recently that I re-read it, with Lily as a bedtime story. I forgot how old-fashioned the writing style is and even how Roald Dahl’s writing was. That’s not to say it was unenjoyable because it wasn’t, but I did wonder if Lily would both follow the style and enjoy it herself.

I needn’t have worried though, as she loved it. The beginning was sad, with James’ parents dying and him moving in with his Aunts. The agony drawn out over a few chapters while we discover how miserable they made him and how sorry we felt for him. Then the magic, the growing peach and the journey. It’s a lovely simple story but wonderful nonetheless and a great bedtime story as the chapters are really short.

Over Christmas, I spotted that the movie of James and the Giant Peach was on TV and so I set it to record. Of course Christmas can be crazy busy and we never got around to watching it. However last night we finally sat down together and since I had fabric to cut and needed the lounge floor, I put on the movie. I hadn’t realised it was by Disney but that gave me hope, though I spotted Tim Burton’s name on the credits and did wonder if that would make it a little weird.

The beginning of the movie, was a little over exaggerated. It reminded me somewhat of scenes from Big Fish, but since that’s one of my favourite movies, it wasn’t necessarily off-putting. The rest of the beginning was fairly standard and as expected, the Aunts being fairly horrible and James being as expected. The peach grew, the adventure began and really that was where the movie lost it for me.

First the movie style change, which was okay and completely understandable to be honest. However then the storyline changed and that wasn’t okay. For the most part, the journey was similar to the book and changed only to make it more interesting I guess (though I wasn’t keen). However the journey specifically to New York wasn’t quite accurate, even though that is where the peach ended up. The drama with his Aunts arriving in New York (they were supposed to be dead) was ridiculous and the typical US movie “speech” that was given by James was pretty over the top too. All in all, when the movie ended, I felt disappointed. Lily even said “well that was a let down”.

I know movies get changed when they go from page to screen but I wasn’t keen on these changes. I really enjoy Roald Dahl’s writing and while many of his books do seem a little outdated these days, they are still good classics. Some movie adaptations have worked, while others haven’t. But I didn’t really enjoy this one. I think I’ll stick to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Matilda from now on, though we have Fantastic Mr Fox on the sky box to watch at some point too.

Page to Screen – Before I Go To Sleep

January 5, 2016 by Bel Leave a Comment

A few years ago I read a book called “Before I Go to Sleep” by S. J. Watson. I’d treated myself to a Kindle and I got this book really cheap, so it was one of the first I read on my kindle. I loved it so much that I recommended it to everyone, but sadly having it on kindle meant I wasn’t able to lend it to anyone! Anyway over the years my mum has read it and my best friend is currently reading it – my mum loved it but sadly I don’t think Nat has really give it a chance yet (being in the middle of 4 books at a time!).

Anyway, when it was announced that 2014 would see a movie adaptation of this book, I was pretty excited. I’m not a huge Nicole Kidman fan though so when she was cast as the lead, I couldn’t really see it. Needless to say I didn’t manage to get to the cinema to see the movie and actually even when it came out on dvd I was waiting for Nat to watch it with me. However after waiting indefinitely I decided to just watch it tonight – I have it on Amazon Prime and it popped up as a suggestion so I was like “… sure, what the hell!”.

The main actors in the movie are Nicole Kidman as Christine, Colin Firth as “Ben”/Mike and Mark Strong as Dr. Nasch. While I wouldn’t personally have cast any of these people in the roles, they were all fantastic and Colin Firth as a bad guy was especially shocking!

The movie is very true to the book and since I loved the book, I absolutely adored the movie. I’m sure the plot isn’t for everyone but the basic jist is a lady called Christine suffers from a severe form of amnesia, after a horrific incident several years before. Each morning she wakes up believing she is in her 20’s, when actually she is in her 40’s and has forgotten everything that has happened in between. Every morning is a clean slate and she has to start learning about herself all over again, along with her husband Ben and with the help of Dr. Nasch. Bit by bit she manages to remember parts of her past, and while for the most part she still continues to forget it each day, with the help of a video diary (just a regular diary in the book), learning each day becomes a quicker process. The book/movie is definitely a thriller, so expect a dark twist. The whole movie is done quite slow and creepy though so I think if you haven’t read the book you wouldn’t always be entirely sure where it was going.

This book/movie adaptation has now shot in as one of my all time favourites, along with Hunger Games, The Fault in Our Stars and Divergent. I will still continue to recommend the book to everyone and now also the movie too!

Favourite Book Adaptations

November 17, 2015 by Bel Leave a Comment

With the final part of Hunger Games: Mockingjay coming out this week, I thought it might be fun to share with you some of my favourite book to movie adaptations. I have to admit I’m not a huge fan of adaptations and if I’m going to watch them then I either don’t read the book at all, or I have to read the book first. All attempts to watch a movie and THEN read the book, have been a big fail. However the Hunger Games are some of my favourite book to movie adaptations and so I thought I’d share some others with you.

Divergent – As well as the Hunger Games, I love the Divergent adaptations. So far I have seen Divergent and Insurgent and loved them both. While they do differ to the books somewhat, none of the changes fill me with rage or get me ranting as I walk out of the cinema.

To Kill a Mockingbird – This is such an old movie/book that I imagine many people won’t even know what I’m talking about. However I loved both the book and the movie of this story. I studied To Kill a Mockingbird at school and its one of the few that I didn’t hate. The film was part of the study and I enjoyed it just as much as the book.

Matilda – Roald Dahl is one of my favourite authors and this particular book is one of his best. I loved the movie Matilda too and to this day I still find it one of the most enjoyable and easy to watch family movies out there. It’s also pretty timeless and I’m sure my kids would love it, even though it’s fairly old now.

Little Women – as with both above, this movie/book is a fairly old one. I can’t really say much other than the same things I’ve said for the other two options, just that its a great adaptation.

Bridget Jones’ Diary – you’re probably noticing a trend here but again, another oldie but a goodie. I read Bridget Jones when I was a teenager and while the movie is pretty different to the book, I still love it regardless. I never read The Edge of Reason but I’m sure the same would be said for that.

The Fault in Our Stars – most recently I added TFIOS to the list of my favourite adaptations. I really loved the book and so it was so nice to see the movie was just as good. I already liked the lead actor and actress (from the Divergent series) but the movie was very faithful to the story of the book and I would definitely recommend it.