Bel:

Cover

A beautiful young lady in a black & white with a vine accent around the edges. Smack bang in the middle of the cover is an exquisite rose bloom in a wonderfully vivid scarlet. The title is in red, and I quite like the effect.

Characters

Magic practitioners, young women climbing the social ladder, and the stereotypical hero and heroine can be found in this one.

Favourite

Old Bony. She’s a bit of a nasty character, but her heart is in the right place.

Least Favourite

Ivan. I know this is a fairytale retelling, but seriously?

Beginning

A Beauty and the Beast retelling: girl becomes the prisoner of a beast and this is where it all gets a little too convenient.

Storyline

Girl is sent home, but things occur to make her want to go back to the beast.

Ending

Not quite the Disney version of the happy ending, but it’s close enough.

Thoughts

This was a quick read, but some things fell into the way-too-convenient basket for my liking. However, I do appreciate that Natasha is a brilliantly strong female lead character.

This would definitely be a nice entry-point to fairytale re-tellings for the middle grade crowd. But for the older YA audience, it’s just not as strong as other versions.

Quote

“Tonight, you ride in the sleigh with my pretties.” ~ Old Bony making evening plans for Natasha

Krista:

Cover

The cover had immediate appeal to me, the red really stands out with the white background and represents the story. 

 Characters

Natasha and Ivan. Beauty and the Beast, Natasha comes from  poor family, Ivan from a rich. They both come under the care of Luel for the beginning of the story and the relationships blossom from there.

Favourite

Luel, the care taker of Ivan, an intelligent and magical woman who brought a wonderful motherly element to the story.

Least Favourite

The villain. Usually, I really enjoy the drama the villain adds to this story, but with this one I just didn’t like him much.

Beginning

Natasha gets caught in a snow storm in the forest; she runs from wolves and finds sanctuary in a mansion. She finds there is nobody around and finds herself drawn to one red rose in the garden. Upon her touch, the rose falls apart and the home-owners demand repayment for their loss.

Storyline

Even though, at first, Natasha is held at the mansion until her debt has been paid, she soon learns of the mystery of the man-beast, Luel and the magic that keeps them in hiding. Natasha soon grows very fond of Ivan and Luel and wants to help him release him from the curse.

Ending

Very powerful, eventful, and big moments that really made this story a beautiful read.

Thoughts

I was a little wary at the beginning but once it really gets going, Natasha begins her travels and meeting the witch it really took off. Set in an alternate Prague, the story recreates the landscape, cultures, and languages. Great world building and characters that you really want to root for. Natasha is a strong and admirable character. I very much enjoyed this fairy tale story and highly recommend it. I love stories that take us on a trip, getting a glimpse at different cultures and social life. Great story telling all around.

Quote

For who as seen Old Bony these days? Not a single soul. Not once in a hundred years has she shown her long thin nose and sharp teeth to people anywhere.  Who knows, maybe her brand of magic, the magic you hear of from the old stories, cannot survive in our modern world of telegraphs and trains and typewriters. 

San Francisco is famous for many things. The Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz, Gay Pride, the Painted Ladies, Lombard street – the twistiest street in the world…the list goes on and on. And then – there’s the clam chowder.

One of my foodie ambitions was to try the famous San Franciscian chowder in a sourdough bread bowl while we were in town, and I wasn’t disappointed. Different versions are available from every second street vendor, but we got lucky on our very first purchase.

We stayed right on Fisherman’s Wharf, almost directly across the road from the world-renowned Boudin’s Sourdough Bakery – also the oldest bakery in the city. After a long day bus-touring around town, my beloved popped out to grab takeaway for the kids, and returned with this to our hotel: The original clam chowder in a bowl. You can see below how excited I was:

It was so omg delicious that we returned the next day for more, this time eating in at the downstairs cafe-style outdoor dining room. By the way, chowder goes to down really well with beer….

And finally, on our last night in San Francisco, we returned again to Boudin’s with our entire party of 16. This time we ate upstairs, which is more of a fine-dining experience. While I skipped the chowder this time around (for lobster), my 10yr old ordered it from the kid’s menu. Check out the turtle bread that it was served in!

So clam chowder achievement was unlocked. And it lived up to all expectations!

Going on a job hunt?

I’ve been looking for a new job for over 2 months, and stepped it up a notch at the start of September. Here are some things I am learning whilst in the midst of all the craziness.

#1 Books on resume and cover letter writing are brilliant. (Everything I learned about job hunting in high school got me absolutely nowhere) The books I’ve found to be most useful are…

The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Perfect Resume by Susan Ireland

No-Nonsense Cover Letters by Arnold & Enelow Boldt.

I looked at a bunch of others, but these were where I got most of my inspiration.

WRITE THE BEST RESUME AND COVER LETTER POSSIBLE!

Oh, and remember to edit them both to suit every application.

#2 Websites like seek.com.au and careerone.com.au are a wonderful starting point to look for jobs. Remember you can also Google the companies you see yourself working for and add careers into the search bar to see if they’re hiring or have an expression of interest button. Sometimes the positions may not show up on either of the aforementioned websites and it’s up to you to use some initiative.

#3 Sew your seeds. If we spend all our time thinking about the one job application we made this month, it can send us bonkers… especially if  we don’t get the job, or worse, don’t hear anything at all. *Rude much?*

 Apply for as many jobs per day as you can. Even contract positions, or casual work will still give you experience. Expressions of interest count as applications as well, and you never know who will pick you from the hundreds of applications.

#4 It pays to personalise your cover letter, call the place you’re applying to and ask who to address the cover letter to, rather than having the universal opener of ‘to whom this may concern.’  Remember to be your most professional self on the phone.

#5 Go the extra mile, literally. You can drop your resume off in person as well as completing the online application. Use nice paper, and add a recent photo if you like. This step matters even more if the online application is experiencing a glitch. Show how much you want the job by handing it in, in person.

Read the rest of Bel’s job hunting tips next week!

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