04 December, 2017

03 December, 2017

REVIEW: THE PRINCE OF MIST by Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Title: The Prince of Mist
Author: Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Series: Niebla #1
Genres: Fantasy, YA
Publisher: Little, Brown Books
Release: (First published 1986)
Source: Hardcover
Pages: 218

// Goodreads // BookDepository // Amazon //

BLURB: A mysterious house harbors an unimaginable secret. . . .

It’s wartime, and the Carver family decides to leave the capital where they live and move to a small coastal village where they’ve recently bought a home. But from the minute they cross the threshold, strange things begin to happen. In that mysterious house there still lurks the spirit of Jacob, the previous owners’ son, who died by drowning.

With the help of their new friend Roland, Max and Alicia Carver begin to explore the suspicious circumstances of that death and discover the existence of a mysterious being called The Prince of Mist—a diabolical character who has returned from the shadows to collect on a debt from the past. Soon the three friends find themselves caught up in an adventure of sunken ships and an enchanted stone garden, which will change their lives forever.

02 December, 2017

NaNoWriMo Wrap-up

November has come to an end, and so has NaNoWriMo, here the occasion was marked by first snow. With it being over, I want to congratulate everyone with finishing it, trying it, or even merely starting it. Whether you wrote a page or a hundred, you’ve done well to try. And just because it’s over, doesn’t mean we have to stop, right?

01 December, 2017

REVIEW: THE CAPTIVE by Skomantas


Title: The Captive
Author: Skomantas
Series: Tales from the Baltic #1
Genres: Historical Fiction
Publisher: Tverme
Release: 1997
Source: Paperback
Pages: 152

// Goodreads //  Amazon //

BLURB:
An English translation of the original Lithuanian Teutonų Belaisvis

The setting for this series of narratives is the Northern Crusades, a fascinating and particularly brutal period within the generally bloody history of the Crusades. Unlike the well documented and frequently fictionalized crusades in the Mediterranean region, little attention has been paid to the crusades in the Baltic region. They were initiated and strongly supported by the Popes of that period and drew fighting men from all of Europe. The original intent of the crusades was to Christianize the Baltic peoples who at the beginning of the XII-th century were still adamantly pagan. Over time, however, they degenerated into straightforward genocidal campaigns to acquire lands and serfs. Several orders of knightly monks participated in the prolonged war, of these the most prominent was the Teutonic Order of Holy Mary of Jerusalem. The members of this order were drawn from the noble or knightly class and had to be of German birth. They succeeded in completely exterminating the Prussian people, and expropriated not only their land, but also their name. After over 200 years of bitter struggle only the Lithuanians and Samogitians remained unconquered and pagan. They accepted Christianity on their own terms at the beginning of the XV-the century.