Show Me How You Do It, So I Can Do It Too

I was really bored on Saturday night. This is nothing new since my social life is drier than the Sahara desert. But I don't normally spend my Saturday nights on the internet.

My bad.

I found these super cool illustrations by Rubens Cantuni. He seems to specialise in these adorable little fat Samurai-type girls (hope that's sort of accurate). They are so flippin' cute! 

I really envy the arty types.

Insert Coin

Sympathy for the Unusual

Ride the Swallow

Ganesha

Chubby Oni Girl

Urban Attitude


If you want to see more of Mr Cantuni's work go here. 

Belador Series: Blood Trinity

I know, I know. I really need to expand my reading list and look at other authors. And I'm working on it. It's just that I love her books so much! So let me just tell you about another book by Sherrilyn Kenyon that I'm reading. She's collaborated with another author, Dianna Love. Does that count in my efforts of widening my reading circle?

Anyhow, the Belador series is about a race of warriors called, surprise, Beladors. They fight to protect humanity from demons and other creepy-crawlies. Among the "creepy-crawlies" are Alterants. They are Beladors but with a little bit of a twist. Much like Bruce Banner, if they get angry enough or feel really threatened, they turn into monsters. Most of the Alterants have been locked up. Many of the Beladors work for VIPER, the agency that sort of coordinates their save-the-world efforts. 

The story starts with us finding three Beladors in a cave. They are Vladimir Quinn, Tzader Burke and Evalle Kincaid. They have each been betrayed by a Belador pretending to be in trouble. 

Evallle is my kind of heroine. Like most of Kenyon's characters, Evalle has plenty of baggage. The only people she trusts are Quinn and Tzader. But she is tough and will kick your butt six ways to Sunday if you mess with her. None of this "come rescue me you big, strong man" stuff for Evalle. She can handle herself. 

Evalle is a member of VIPER, despite being an Alterant. However, there isn't a whole lot of trust and some of the other VIPER agents treat her pretty badly. Sen is the biggest culprit. No one knows a whole lot about him other than the fact that he's a bad ass. Sen is totally gunning for Evalle and he brings in Storm to be her partner, hoping that the new guy will catch Evalle in a lie.

Can I just go off on a tangent here and say that Storm is smoking hot?! The second he came on the scene, my first thought was "yummy".

Also yummy was Isak. He did do a little swooping and saving when Evalle found herself cornered by a big hungry demon. He's in charge of a little military type organisation which hunts and kills demons. 

There looks to be the beginnings of a love triangle here. It's pretty obvious that Evalle will play a leading role in it but I won't mention the guys. I don't want to give away too much.

There are a couple of burning questions...

What is Sen's problem? Will we find out anything more about our lead characters' pasts? Where do Alterants come from? Can we please skip the love triangle and have a HEA that doesn't involve an awesome character having his heart stomped on?

I swear I will move away from Ms Kenyon's stuff as soon as I've read Alterant, the second book in the series. 

Snowflakes Keep Falling On My Head

We had snow in Pretoria yesterday. This is a pretty huge deal since the last time this happened was in 1986. So, lots of excitement. 

Except... I really didn't like the snow. I had never seen snow before and I must admit, I wasn't all that impressed. It didn't look at all like it does in the movies. Plus, it was effing cold. 

Whoever is in charge of the weather is totally messing with us. On Sunday it was as sunny as anything. Monday was a little nippy but it was bearable. Yesterday it flippin' snows. 

This means that, once again, I'm playing anywhere but here. And today I'm going to Saint Petersburg (during the summer mind you).

The Saint Petersburg State Heritage Museum
This is awe-inspiring

The Marble Palace

St Isaac's Cathedral

The Winter Palace.
Holy cow, that is absolutely breathtaking.

You can find images like these in the Museum of Political History

I really want to go to Russia. They have such a rich history and the most amazing sites. Plus, I really want to see Lenin's body. Anybody know where his body is on display, if it still is?

Chronicles of Nick: Infamous

Infamous is the third book in the Chronicles of Nick series. I really liked this book. It's a little darker than the previous two. Nick has to get used to the idea that his future self is a teeny tiny bit loco. There's a cyber bully who's posting horrible things about their class mates on the internet. Nick and his mom fight a lot. Nick gets beaten to a bloody pulp twice and gets accused of raping a classmate.  

So, some serious stuff.

But it's not all bad. 

Nick and Kody are going steady, although she's not exactly forthcoming about who she is and why she's there. But she seems to make Nick ridiculously happy, which is nice. Nick and Caleb seem to have gotten over their antagonism towards each other. This is not to say that they've stopped with the sarcasm. That still flows thick and fast. Nick is also becoming more adept at using his powers thanks to his lessons with Grim. It's so sweet how Nick goes out of his way to please his mother even when it tends to backfire and bite him in the butt. 

We meet some new characters in this book. My favourites were Bane and Adarian. Bane is one of the Four Horsemen (Pestilence) and Adarian is Nick's dad. What a scary dude. I really don't like this Adarian but I think I feel sorry for him. We also learn what happens when Nick loses consciousness (hint: it's not good).

I know I keep saying this but I love Sherrilyn Kenyon. I love how she takes the ancient legends and gives them a modern twist. I am seriously addicted.

As a just so by the way, Ms Kenyon's new book Time Untime comes out today in the US. 

Go get it!

Nostalgia II

The original Power Rangers were a huge part of my childhood. Come hell or high water on a weekday afternoon I was in front of the tv to watch this lot. I loved them so much I even had the little action figures. Once I grew up some, I gave these to my younger cousin, whose friend broke the arm off the black Power Ranger. Needless to say, despite being all growed up, the urge to do the same to the little bugger was there.

Honestly, I really don't think that any of the Power Rangers since have compared to the originals. 

Nostalgia I

I was feeling a little bit nostalgic last night. Pressure at varsity is really piling on and I was remembering "the good old days" when I was young and carefree...

Okay, I know that sounds lame but I really am stressed out right about now. So I was thinking of some of the things I remember from my primary school days that never fail to make me smile.  

Here is some of the music that I remember:

 I'm Blue by Eiffel 65 

Boom Boom Boom by The Vengaboys

Thong Song by Sisqo

I hope that these songs bring back happy memories and that they don't do that thing where you hear them for them for the rest of the day.

Have an awesome weekend everyone!