I MOVED TO WORDPRESS

Yes hi, I made a spontaneous decision to move to Wordpress simply because I like the look of WP blogs better. So that happened.

Go follow my new blog here: https://tecsielity.wordpress.com

Inktober 2017

I have never done Inktober before and I had no intention of doing it this year either but so many people I knew were going to attempt it too so I gave it a shot... and I completed it! Yaaay!

What is Inktober?
It's an art challenge created by Jake Parker and the goal is to make an ink drawing every day in October. So 31 drawings. There are lots different prompt lists that people can use for inspiration (like the official Inktober one) or you can just do whatever as long as you draw something.

October FairyLoot: Villainous

I've wanted to give one of these book subscription boxes a try for a long time now but since I don't live in the UK or US the shipping costs have always put a stop to that dream (Fairyloot ended up being over 40€ with shipping). Since it was my birthday this month and the October Fairyloot sounded so good I ended up asking for it as a birthday present from my mom (thanks mom!) and it finally arrived yesterday!

Crypt of Darne (My fiance made a game!)

Last summer my fiance Akselmo participated in the Games Made Quick gamejam, during which he started working on a little roguelike game. As the name suggests the gamejam was really short but he continued working on the game over the summer and actually finished it! So yes, this is totally a "look what he made!" bragging post.

"You enter the Crypt of Darne and you're looking for a specific gem. Will you survive?"

Crypt of Darne is a free roguelike-ish dungeon delving game, where you make a character out of few race-class combinations and explore a crypt, trying to find a specific gem. You'll know it when you see it, but it is hidden deeply in the crypt. Good luck!

Halloween Creatures Book Tag

Anthony @ Keep Reading Forward tagged me to this Halloween creatures book tag which he also created! Pretty sure my replies won't be very halloween-y but that's just me not reading spooky things, hah.

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Rules:

Follow the Categories

You Must Be Honest

You Must Answer All Questions to the Best of Your Ability

You Must Tag At Least 3 People

Have Fun!

Credit Would be Greatly Appreciated!

Fall Netflix Favorites

I decided to do something a little different since it's been a while since I posted anything. I basically live on Netflix so I figured I could list a couple of things I've been watching lately. Note that I'm in Finland so all of these might not be on Netflix in other countries, I have no idea. Usually Finland is the place with the worse selection though.

Finally Fall Book Tag

Emmie @ Tea With Mermaids tagged me to this Fall Book tag thing, so here it is! Let's get cozy and stuff since that seems to be the theme here a lot. The tag was originally created by Tall Tales on Youtube.

Oxenfree (Video game)

Time to talk about a video game for a change! My friend had recommended Oxenfree to me a lot but I wasn't sure if I'd like it because she mentioned it has some horror elements in it and horror is really not my thing but... I ended up impulse buying it anyway when it was on sale on Gog recently. Oops. Cheap games are my weakness.

Playing by Heart (Book)

I received a review copy of this book from NetGalley. I've been wanting to give the historical fiction that's not Outlander a try for a while now and the plot of Playing by Heart by Carmela A. Martino sounded nice so I'm glad I got to read it.

Emilia Salvini dreams of marrying a man who loves music as much as she does. But in 18th-century Milan, her position as “second sister” means she’ll likely be sent off to a convent instead. Ironically, Emilia’s pious older sister, Maria, would gladly become a nun. But Father won’t allow it—her brilliant language skills are too important to his quest for noble status.

Emilia’s only hope to avoid the convent is to prove that her musical talents are as indispensable as Maria’s skills. First, Emilia must earn the respect of the music tutor who has always disdained her, simply for being a girl. But before Emilia can carry out her plan, Mamma, her greatest supporter, dies in childbirth. In her sorrow, Emilia composes a heartrending sonata that causes the maestro to finally recognize her talent. He begins teaching her music theory alongside handsome violinist Antonio Bellini, the great-nephew of a wealthy marquis. The two begin as rivals, but making music together gradually melds their hearts.

When Antonio abruptly quits their lessons, Emilia assumes it’s because her family isn’t nobility. More determined than ever to help Father acquire a title, she dedicates a set of compositions to Archduchess Maria Teresa. The archduchess is so impressed that she helps Father become a count. Having finally won Father’s favor, Emilia expects she’ll now be betrothed to Antonio. But the repercussions of her family’s new status threaten not only her dreams, but her sister’s very life.

Blogger Recognition Award

Lauren @ Northen Plunder tagged me to this thing a while ago (thanks!) and I just remembered it, so I guess I'm doing it now, hah. 

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Rules

• Thank the blogger who nominated you and provide a link to their blog.
• Give a brief story of how your blog started.
• Give two pieces of advice to new bloggers.
• Select 10 other bloggers you want to give this award to.
• Comment on each blog and let them know you have nominated them and provide the link to the post you created.
  
  

Taproot (Graphic novel)

My friend mentioned this comic - Taproot by Keezy Young - was available to download from NetGalley so and it looked really cute so of course I had to grab this! I don't read graphic novels very often for some reason so it was nice to find something that pleased my eye and had an interesting story too.

Blue is having a hard time moving on. He's in love with his best friend. He's also dead. Luckily, Hamal can see ghosts, leaving Blue free to haunt him to his heart's content. But something eerie is happening in town, leaving the local afterlife unsettled, and when Blue realizes Hamal's strange ability may be putting him in danger, Blue has to find a way to protect him, even if it means... leaving him.

Rise of the Tomb Raider (Video Game)

This is a game that I bought from Steam Christmas sales last year because I had just got a new PC that I knew could run the game in beautiful graphics settings without an issue. I had really liked the previous Tomb Raider game (2013) so I figured I'd like Rise of the Tomb Raider as well, and yeah I did, but I still ended up taking forever to finish it. I did what I do very often: started the game and then forgot about it for a long time and then when I finally got back to it six months later I finished it in just a few days.

Tracon 2017

Last weekend I went to an anime convention in Tampere with my fiancé and it was a fun but also super exhausting weekend. We did the whole cosplay thing and walked so much my legs were nothing but pain by the time we got on the train home. It also rained the whole weekend so that sucked a little bit.

Sea of umbrellas

Tomorrow, When the War Began (Book)

Hi I'm aliveee and about to ramble sleepily about the second traveling book project book I read. Traveling book project was the thing where a group of people pick books and then send them around to each other and annotate them, in case someone was wondering. This time I got to read Lauren's copy of Tomorrow, When the War Began by John Marsden and it was actually pretty cool. I feel like I've been on a bit of a dystopia streak though because the previous traveling book (Find Me) and Bubblegum also kinda fall into that genre. Oops.

Ellie and her friends leave home one quiet morning, wave goodbye to their parents and head up into the hills to camp out for a while; seven teenagers filling in time during school holidays.

The world is about to change forever.

Their lives will never be the same again.

Would you fight? Would you give up everything? Would you sacrifice even life itself?

Summer Wrap Up

Since summer vacation is about to end for me I figured I'd do this little thing. Recapping what I've been doing this summer other than rambling about stuff on here every now and then, although I've honestly mostly just sat in front of my computer crying over my art project that I had to do for university to get some summer credits. Oh and speaking of university, there is a very high chance my blogging activity will decrease quite a bit again because school tends to eat a lot of my time and energy so RIP me.

Anyway, let's start wiiiith...

Absolute Boyfriend (Manga)

When I moved out from my parents' house I left my whole manga collection there, but my mom made me take some of them back a couple of months ago because honestly, my collection is pretty big and they were moving to a smaller place. I took my favorite ones with me, stuff like Full Moon Wo Sagashite, Ouran High School Host Club and Absolute Boyfriend (basically a whole lot of shoujo manga) and since I was bored one night I figured I might as well start rereading them because it has been years and it's kinda interesting to see if I still actually like the things I loved when I was a teen. I ended up starting with Absolute Boyfriend by Yuu Watase.

"Rejected way too many times by good-looking (and unattainable) guys, shy Riiko Izawa goes online and signs up for a free trial of a mysterious Nightly Lover "figure." The very next day a cute naked guy is delivered to her door, and he wants to be her boyfriend! Has Riiko died and gone to heaven? The cute guy turns out to be sweet, smart, a great cook, and lots more. And he looks like a million bucks, which is what he's going to cost Riiko if she doesn't return him in time..."

The Gilmore Girls Book Tag

I saw Emmie doing this tag on her blog and since I'm a huge Gilmore Girls fan I obviously had to follow her example! The tag is apparently going around on Youtube as well if you wanna actually see people talking about this stuff. 

Soooo,  here we go!

Bubblegum (Book)

My friend mentioned the author of this book was looking for ARC reviewers on Goodreads so I asked for one and actually got an ebook copy to review (thank you!).

So, Bubblegum by Sari Taurez. My timing for picking this up was pretty perfect because I've been reading really slow paced and/or depressing books lately so this was a nice change.

Tiana is your typical pampered young twenty-something with a love for expensive shoes, hot guys, and murder.

Status means the difference between life and death in this society. For Tiana, she’s never had anything to worry about - that is until her mother cuts her off from the family riches. Luckily she’s got good prospects ahead: a job that could make her a killing.

Her first client: Julia, a lower-class I.T girl that finds life can be tough for those who can’t afford to call the police. When the orphanage where Julia volunteers is targeted by the infamous brothel-owner Bobby Nails, Tiana is excited to take the job. But when she discovers Bobby Nails has a full army of mercenaries at his disposal, Tiana wonders if she may be in over her head.

Tiana and Julia face an unexpected adventure as they seek vengeance against the elusive Nails. Their adventures lead them not only to their target, but to a partnership stronger than any of their differences. But will it be enough to stop Nails and save the orphans from a terrible fate?

Find Me (Book)

Books and Tea Discord is doing a traveling book project this summer, which is is fun thing where a group of people choose books and send them around in the group and annotate them, and when the books return from their travels they're full of nice little comments. We did this last year as well with a UK group (+ me) and a US group, and this year we had so much more people interested in the project that we ended up doing two US groups, two UK groups (I'm once again part of one of them) and a central Europe one. The traveling book project has a Tumblr if you want to see lots of pretty pictures of the books we're reading.

The first book I got to read was Find Me by Laura Van Den Berg and oh boy... It was an interesting one.

"Things I will never forget: my name, my made-up birthday…The dark of the Hospital at night. My mother’s face, when she was young.

Things other people will forget: where they come from, how old they are, the faces of the people they love. The right words for bowl and sunshine…What is a beginning and what is an end."

Joy spends her days working the graveyard shift at a store outside Boston and nursing an addiction to cough syrup, an attempt to suppress her troubled past. But when a sickness that begins with silver blisters and memory loss and ends with death sweeps the country, Joy, for the first time in her life, seems to have an advantage: she is immune.

The Mr. Men & Little Miss Character Tag

Lauren tagged me to this thing that was originally started by Charlotte @ Wonderfully Bookish and it looked really fun so I was a good girl and did this right away! My answers ended up being super Outlander heavy so that probably says something about me lol.

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I'm cheating with the first question and not picking a book character because I'm awful! I came up with answers to all the other ones so easily... But a character who makes me happy: Garrus Vakarian from the Mass Effect trilogy because he's my space husband and I have decided that no matter what the ending he and Shepard are forever happy together and adopt cute krogan babies.