Five Reasons Not to Read The Selection

I am a sucker for books written in older times, about girls and royalty. I am a total sucker for those. When I saw the fantastic cover of The Selection, I was instantly attracted.

I mean, isn't it an awesome cover? I asked my French teacher if I could borrow it, and the rest of the next two days, my nose was buried in the thing.

The Selection started off great. A girl, America Singer, who is in a low caste, in love with and secretly seeing a boy, Aspen something, in an even lower caste. Typical, clichéd, but still nice. Then America gets the letter...35 girls will be selected to compete for the prince's heart. Again, very typical. But still, it sounded interesting. America doesn't want to sign up, and she talks to Aspen. Aspen feels ashamed that he can't "provide for her", convinces her to sign up, and then dumps her. I mean, what a douche! America, of course, cries and does all that annoying dramatic stuff, gets picked and travels to the palace. There, she meets virtually perfect Prince Maxon, and they fall in love, etc, etc. End? Nope! ASPEN gets drafted, and comes to the palace, and then she basically cheats on Prince Maxon by kissing Aspen and forgiving him. Aspen was a douche, but America is just stupid. Stupid. Stupid idiot girl. The worst part is, they didn't even end the story! They're dragging it on over a series of books, the next of which will come out on April 23 of 2013 (The Elite), and which I will certainly read so that I may vent about it on here.

So instead of a sparkly review of why you'll enjoy Kiera Cass's princess novel, here are a bunch of reasons you SHOULDN'T read the book.

1. The names. America. Maxon. Tallulah. Marlee. Aspen. Those have got to be the most obscure names ever. When I told my friend Thejus that the guy's name was "Aspen" he could not stop laughing. Unique names are good, but not if they're horrible. Please don't ever write a book using the messed up names that this author uses.
2. The plot. So clichéd! So typical! So old! Give me a break and write about something WORTH reading. This book would be better off sold as one of those cheap romance novels for 50 cents. Wait, make that 10 cents. Hell, I wouldn't even pay a nickel to read this.
3. The love triangle. Love triangles aren't necessarily bad. But you have to have a good one for it to be good. A strong central character. Not one who's a complete sass and an idiot.
4. The characters. Can you come up with any more overused characters? America, who's beautiful and a good singer, and brave and attractive. Aspen, who's a jerk, but undeniably handsome, green eyes, black hair, passionate, extremely attractive. Maxon, cute, nice, clueless, royalty. And the other girls in a competition have so little personality that it's annoying. Celeste, the typical "mean but beautiful" girl, the girl that all the guys fall for despite the obvious witchiness. Marlee, the bubbly, cute best friend. The other girls have no character backgrounds at all.
5. The personality. I know I gave this a category before, but the main character herself has no character. None! We get little to no sense of her feelings, her likes, her dislikes, her background, her timeline, her family. Nothing! If not the other characters, at least develop the main one!

I hope you understand the pointlessness and the insignificance of this book, despite whether you decide to read it. I know reading about how messed up it is will make you want to read it just to experience that "What the hell?!" feeling, but please don't fantasize about being in the main character's place. I would rather die than live the dumb romance that America Singer does.

Enjoy.

Life of Pi: Movie Review

I am astounded. In less than two hours, I have learned that there is still such a thing as a good movie. There is still such a thing as a movie that doesn't need romance to live. There is still such a thing as a movie that can make you thankful that you have what you have, and that you are loved. Life of Pi took me through the unbelievable voyage of one boy and his courage, his faith in God, and his will to live.

The majority of the movie is a flashback, beginning with an adult Pi conversing with a writer. Pi begins his story from the very beginning, starting with the reason behind his unusual name and continuing with his unusual religious beliefs. He provides us with a synopsis of his life that had me rolling in my seat with laughter.

Soon enough, it comes time to move, and Pi's family is going to move to Canada via ship. In a fist-clenchingly scary scene, the ship is caught in a fierce yet fantastic storm that completely submerges it in water. Everyone drowns. Nobody survives.

Except for Pi.

And his tiger, Richard Parker.

Thus begins Pi's true tale, of how he fought against all odds to stay alive in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. He is forced to watch as three animals somehow eat each other up. He marks each day on the side of the lifeboat. His nature is such that he provides for his tiger as well as himself. His strength is derived from love for the tiger. And everything in the movie is so realistic that you have to blink to remind yourself it's not real.

He makes mistakes, learns from them, and has us all in gut-wrenching sobs. Pi is as human as the rest of us. He is no superhero; he is no genius. At moments, he wants to die, wants to give up. The one thing that keeps him going is the companionship of his tiger and his faith in God. He has everyone rooting for him the whole way.

This movie is a must-see for everyone. It has nothing inappropriate. It will leave no one scarred for life (except maybe Pi himself). I would recommend it to those of all ages. Like they say in the movie, "It is up to you which story you want to believe."