Şekilli Hayvanlar Serisi: Panda kitap serbest oDF biçim

Luigi Bellanca luigibellanca1934 — Wow, this is a great argument against the self-publishing industry. The best argument for self-publishing is that gems that may not appeal to large publishing houses can actually get published. The downside is that anyone can publish anything, no matter how bad it is. One would have to kiss a lot of frogs to find a prince, and this book is a very slimy and warty frog. With a fungal disease. The book, itself, is just a straight copy/paste from a blog written by a woman who is having difficulties finding someone to have a “relationship” with. The blogs seem to be chosen at random (there are several “chapters” that refer to things that had been posted about before, but were not included with the book). There is no editing. All of the run-ons, fragments, misspellings, abuse of homophones/heterographs and general cruelty to the English language have been left fully intact. The chapters are (as mentioned) directly from a blog, extra carriage returns and all (so a sentence, carriage return, carriage return, another sentence, more extraneous carriage returns). If you removed the extra chapter “highlight quote” page that precedes many chapters and did some formatting, this book would be one third the original length. On the upside, this means you don’t have as nearly as much to read (it can be completed in less than 2 hours, even with distractions). Most of the blog entry chapters are done in a drunken state, and all of them have severe typos and grammatical errors that come with inebriation (in addition to the inability to write well). I’ve read some very good books where the speaking voice (errors and all) is created to advance the narrative, but in this case, it’s just sloppy and annoying. The content is both sad and irritating. If you want to see what it’s like to live in total sexist/stereotype tropes, this is a great book. Women are all poor, misguided hopeful romantics who bitch or nag, unless the woman is in a relationship, and then she's a bitch, bar-whore, and/or manipulative whore of some variety, and Men are all evil, horrible, uncaring, pussy-searching assholes who never call back. Most of the entries aren’t even about dating, and are not funny. They’re the verbal (er, written) lashing out of a bitter, insecure, angry and immature young woman. The book is a little misleading, because it’s not actually about 1000 days of celibacy. It’s about someone who couldn’t find someone to have a relationship (or sex) with for 950+ days and then started a blog. So there are a few “celibate” days there, and there are a few entries about one night stands and the day after sex (clearly, not celibacy). If you want to read books about hilarious dating mishaps or the struggle to find a soul mate (or any mate, I suppose), there are plenty of books out there that are funny and well written. If you want to save yourself the money or library trip, do some googling, there are plenty of good blogs or columns that cover dating which are much more entertaining and insightful.

Caitlin Sciscoe csphotoimaging — Die Geschichte handelt von einer jungen Illustratorin, die ein Haus in einem englischen Dorf kauft, das es ihr schon als Kind angetant hatte. Nach einigen Déjà Vues und “Visionen” erkennt sie, dass sie in einem früheren Leben schon einmal dort gelebt hat und eine unglückliche Liebe erlebt hatte. Das Buch hat mich ganz gut unterhalten, ist aber doch sehr simpel und extrem vorhersagbar. Auch, dass sich gleich 5 Charaktere aus dem 17. Jahrhundert im 21. Jahrhundert wiedergeboren wieder zusammen finden, scheint etwas übertrieben. Liebes- oder gar Sexszenen werden im Stile von züchtigen 50er Jahre Filmen nur angedeutet. Die Geschichte klingt wesentlich komplexer, als sie wirklich ist und hat mich doch sehr enttäuscht. Die “unsterbliche” Liebe der Protagonisten aus dem 17. Jahrhundert wirkt wenig überzeugend. Insgesamt war ich sehr enttäuscht, muss aber sagen, dass mich das Buch insofern gut unterhalten und gefesselt hat, wie ich doch auf ein überraschendes Ende gehofft hatte. Ich mag allerdings Geschichten, die in mehreren Zeitebenen spielen einfach gern und so bereue ich nicht, das Buch gelesen zu haben, bin aber froh, dass ich es gebraucht gekauft habe und meine Ausgaben sich in Grenzen hielten (1 Euro).

Vladimir Mihalkov vmihalkov — I have read this once and it is extremely heavy going. will have to try and read it again some day.

Alexandra Dos alexandradossantos — My favorite book ever.