The Ninja Writer's Library- The Wood Cutter Sisters Series

Happy Friday Book Lovers,

In today's segment of the Ninja Writer's Library we are looking at some of Althea Kontis'
The Wood Cutter Sisters series. A realm where  fairytales collide.

Enchanted: The Woodcutter Sisters Book 1 

Continuing from the last book I reviewed: Spelled (The Storymakers) by Betsy Schow, we have another retelling of fairy tales. Though unlike in the last book where there the fairy tales were mashed together in that world, it felt like they were a subtle blend in this world.

I like the use of the Monday's Child in the story, the link actually mentions this book series. I guess that's why I like Sunday cause I was born on a Sunday, though I do not fit the poem at all. Sunday also collects stories which I think is cool, and gets lost in her own world, I'm guilty of that too.

The book held enough mystery to keep me interested to wanting to know what was going to happen. If you love fairy tale retellings this the series for you.


Hero: The Woodcutter Sisters Book 2 

This book's focus is on Saturday, the tomboy of the sisters, and the one who is perceived the normal one amongst all the magical siblings. The other main character is Peregrine a prince trapped at the top of the world. These two characters cross paths after Saturday accidentally breaks the world and is eventually captured and taken to the top of the world.

The first book in the series I knew what fairy tales were used, but I'm not familiar with most of the ones in this one except Snow White that briefly pops in. I like the character of Betwixt, I think I got that name right. He's a chimera I think and always transforming between beings that is a mix of two animals. My other favorite thing in this book is Saturday's ever-changing name day gift it was a axe, then a sword. It'd be cool to have something like that!

Dearest: The Woodcutter Sisters Book 3

This is the story of Friday Woodcutter, the sister with mystic sewing skills and full of kindness. We get to see the events of the previous book from the people in the kingdom, and how they endured during the upheaval of their world.

This was another beautiful blend of fairy tales we saw, I can't remember the name, but it involved swan princes, the swan princess, even the Darlings from Peter Pan appeared in some form in this fairy tale clash.  I love how the author puts her own unique spin on them. I especially she did with the one swan brother who was particularly cursed, much cooler than the version I read in this fairy tale book as a kid.

Sadly this is the only three my library has at the moment, maybe I'll be able to continue the series at some point.


Are you guys reading any good books? If so let me know in the comments. I hope you all have a good weekend, read lots, and God bless you!

Ninja <[0000]---------------[0000]> Writer

Cemetery Decoration Tales

Hello Friends,

So this past Sunday was Homecoming at my church, which means the Saturday before was Decoration Day. We decorated family and friends'. graves. Our little cemetery is so peaceful and it has an amazing view:

I think this cemetery has been here since the first church existed. I think they built a new one right before my Dad was born or when he was young. Just a few years ago they added a new section.
I love that you can learn the community history and the people. I was doing some research one time about my small community and learned that some of the old postmasters (mistresses) are buried here. I found an old postmaster listing then got curious and looked them up on Findagrave.com under this cemetery. Love this website it's helped me out on family research.

Speaking of Family this site is a trove of personal family history. I got four generations of one side of my family buried here, plus two gens on the other side of my family. Three sadly only have a simple square marker that just says Hannah. So we don't know which in my great Grandmother and her second husband and his brother.

A Decoration Story

I actually have a funny story that started with this cemetery. One decoration we were talking to a church member who I think is over the cemetery. The church had been thinking of making the new section at this time. Well they wanted to see who of their members was going to be buried there to get an estimate how much more space they had. Well since my folks, sister, and I are embers we asked for four. We didn't know if my sister wanted one so I said I'd message her when we got home. Now my sister and me have a sense of humor. I could have been normal and just asked if she wanted to have a plot, but no that wouldn't do for me. I think I said something like "Do you know where your remains are gonna lie for eternity." I figured I get a ha ha or a eye roll in reply. What I got was my sister freaking out. I very confused did explain.
I'd find out later on why. My sister and her family where driving out to do a family walk and play Pokemon Go. She'd just parked and her lights were shining on the headstones of a graveyard when my creepy message came through hence why she freaked out. I should feel bad, but it's kinda funny.

I hope you all are having a good week, pray for the victims in the latest shooting, and may God bless you!

Ninja <[0000]---------------[0000]> Writer

Daily Treasures: Nature's Little Magic Trick

Happy Friday my Friends,

Every so often little things in life like a spider making a web, and the fall of a leaf come together in such a way that it creates a magic act.
I was near our fallen barn and I saw this amazing sight:

A leaf suspended in mid fall, defying the laws of gravity. A great magic trick of nature. Seems God can prove he's a good magician. It's amazing how effective this trick is on the eyes. Who knew spider webs were such a good ingredient for a magic trick.      

I know I've seen at least one of other time on a walk to get the mail. That one was caught perpetually doing it's leafy dance. I thought it was the most amazing beautiful thing. It put a smile on my face.
What simple things are putting smiles on your faces? Let me know in the comments.

I hope you all have a magical weekend and God bless you!

Ninja <[0000]---------------[0000]> Writer

Daily Treasures: Rainbows

Happy gloomy day friends,

We've been getting a lot of rain here lately, but the upside to this, especially if there's a little sun, is the chance to see rainbows. Yesterday we got one of those rare treats rainbows. It started with a couple low to the ground  rainbows:

Then we got blessed with double rainbows:

One could say we were rich in rainbows. Kinda wish there was a pot of gold at the end of them.

Seeing all those rainbows I can't help but think of two quotes first by Dolly Parton: "The way I see it if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain."  The second quote is by Maya Angelou from her book Letter to My Daughter: "Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud."

Have any of you guys seen some awesome weather related things. Tell me about it in the comments. I hope you guys have a good week, look to the skies, and God bless you!

Ninja <[0000]---------------[0000]> Writer

Pog Nostalgia

Happy start of the week friends,

I'm feeling a bit nostalgic, so bare with me if you have no clue what I'm talking about. When I was probably in my first year of middle school. There was a game from Hawaii that somehow went mainstream called Pogs, or Milkcaps, (Thanks Wikipedia for all that info.) It was like the fidget spinners of my day if you will, blew up big one day and gone as quick.

My sister and me played the game once maybe, except we didn't play for keeps. Basically you stacked the caps up then you threw a slammer at it to knock the pile over and whatever was facing up you kept, it was kinda how you kept score, if you were playing for keeps it was how you got new Pogs (again thank you Wikipedia for the refresher course).

They were like disk shaped trading cards if you will. Seems almost everything in the 90's had a Pog: Baywatch, Power Rangers, even Dungeons and Dragons! I actually wanted a Power Ranger one, but not from the linked set. It was a White Power Ranger I think I saw in an article in this Disney Adventures.

Due to lack of funds as kids Econut and I didn't collect a lot of them. We actually only had Pogs from three collections:

Apollo 13
I got these back in the day when Hardee's still did toys in their kid's meals. I even had the silver slammer. This is probably my favorite slammer of the two I had. It was like a giant coin. My favorite pog of this bunch  is the holographic A13/Moon one.

Lucky Charms
We collected a lot, if not all, of the pogs out of this collection. We even did the mail in to get the red storage case with the slammer. I liked this slammer had finger holds in on the back. My favorite pog of this group is Lucky holding the four leaf clover marshmallow on the red background.
Star Wars Episode 1
I actually didn't realize these were pogs as they came out my freshman year of high school. They were put out by Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut for Episode 1. I think you tried to collect certain colors to get prizes. I only had one and that was Queen Amidala.

Future of POGS
I recently came across this Android Police article by Matthew Sholtz. Seems the World Pog Federation is trying to do a POGs AR. If I understand it'll be like Pokemon Go played on your phone. I don't know if it ever reached it's goal, but that would have been interesting. I just wished they'd offered the scan you own collection into the game for more than just backers, that'd been cool just to revisit that fad of yesteryear, of course I could just dig my old ones out of storage and play the old fashioned way.

Did any of you guys have a favorite pog or slammer? Did you collect any during the craze? Let me know in the comments.

Have a good week my friends, play a game and God bless you.

Ninja <[0000]---------------[0000]> Writer

Wanderings in Waynesville

Hello friends it's Friday again,

For today's post I'm gonna talk a little about some things that happened this Wednesday when Fangirl and I, who else, was in the town of Waynesville Wednesday where we took in a movie and dinner.

Smokey Mountain Cinema

We decided to take a matinées of Toy Story 4 at the reopened Smokey Mountain Cinema. We've missed this old friend of ours. The who place has been given a blue makeover. The concession stands that at one time split the room, but now is against the back wall. The ticket windows are just for show now, as you buy them from the concession stand now. The seats in the theater are nice and squishy and you can lean back in them a little now if you wish. Fangirl and I reminisced over the old water damaged panel that use to be on one of the ceiling panels, and when they'd fix it, this was back with the guy who originally owned it when we went to see movies. I'm just glad to see her open again.

Toy Story 4

Now I wasn't the most excited for the movie, I've watched them all, It's just not something I get excited about. Plus by the time we say it I was burnt out with it, cause it's like every product has used them in their commercials. But enough of my lamenting and on to the movie itself.

This movie was good, did manage to make me laugh. It had it's feels, not as bad as 3, but still heart string pulling. It also manage to have some jump scares that made me think of the Goosebumps movies. From the ending I think this is the final movie in the series, which if it is they ended it well.

A funny note, they were showing Annabelle in the theater next to us... an awesome mix don't you think?

Watami Sushi and Noodles

After the movie we went to eat at a restaurant that I hadn't seen before on Main Street called Watami Sushi and Noodles. It is a small little restaurant on a corner, but it was amazing. They include forks and chop sticks in your napkins so you can choose. I like that.

Fangirl had the Pink Lady sushi. It is salmon, crab, shrimp and avocado, rolled in rice paper with salmon eggs on top. She also had Japanese yaki soba with beef. It was a huge dish piled with noodles.

I had the Lemon Honey Chicken, named for it's sauce that includes broccoli, mushrooms, and carrots, and lemon wedges and a side of rice. It was really good though I mainly ate the chicken, mushrooms and some of the rice, I'm picky about how I like broccoli and carrots, never fear the left overs went to my Mom who I thought would enjoy it, and she did.
Depending on what you get the meal sized are huge, Fangirl and I had enough left overs for a second meal from our meals. Upside if you have a small stomach, you can have more of the yumminess later.

But I defiantly would suggest them when your in Waynesville. It's really good.

That ends this post. I hope you guys have a good weekend. Go see a movie, eat some good food, and God bless you!
Ninja <[0000]---------------[0000]> Writer

Summer Reads

Happy Monday my friends,

I recently did a write up of my summer playlist, well in this post I'll be covering my favorite  summer themed reads from over my life. It's not a big list, I may add to it as I find more. So for now enjoy this short list.

The Ghost at Dawn's House (Baby-Sitter's Club #9) by Ann M. Martin
This first book on this list is my favorite book of all in the Baby-Sitter's Club series, I mentioned this in my 9C list post. This book is a summer adventure involving secret passages, a possible haunting, and it got me interested in hollow books if I'm not mistaken. It contained everything a good ghost hunting story a kid needed, even though it probably was not the smartest idea for my over active imagination. I read this in elementary school so it should be safe for your kids, it's not too scary.

Baby-sitters on Board! (The Baby-Sittter's Club Special #1) by Ann M. Martin
Yes another BSC book, but this one is puts me in a summer mood more than the first one. I mean it's set on a cruise ship and at Disney World, that's a Summer vacation dream there. This book inspired some of my summer hi jinx when I was younger. One of the characters Mallory had just read Harriet the Spy so she plays spy the whole trip, which inspired me to play spy on a camping trip. I had a notebook and would document the people and things I saw at the campground.

Disney Adventures July 1st 1995
My sister and I were subscribed to the magazine as kids. I still have a lot of the old issues in one of my book shelves, but this and a few others that were my favorites went missing over the years. The main article was about Batman Forever and since this was during the POGS craze I think they had like the origin story of them, a topic I plan on talking about later. Anyway the big thing that I poured over was the "101 Ideas for Sizzling Summer Fun". This had so many great ideas for summer vacation, I think I'd take this out when I'd got for a walk just to inspire my imagination, I don't know if I did any of them, except maybe the one that said count you mosquito bites. Those bloodsuckers love me. *scratches bites*

Ghost Cat by Beverly Butler
This is another ghost related book. Even though I'd forgotten most of the book the one thing that I remember was the scene the main character has with her elder relation as he's showing her how to use a compass. This is a good summer ghost story. I read this in middle school so it might be better for your preteen maybe older child, cause there is some scary parts in this.

Horse Crazy Series by Virginia Vail
First I gotta thank the Unicorner for helping me remember the name of the series. I went through a stage were I was into horses so this book about a summer horse camp, was perfect for me, even though I'm too scared to ride one. There's only six books in the series. Each book follows a week at the six week camp. If you have a horse lover in need of a summer read this is a good series if you can find it, I read it in middle school I think, but I think it may be ok for kids.

YM June/July 1995
This come out around the same time as the Disney Adventure previously mention so it had Chris O'Donnell from Batman Forever. This also had an article with Summer ideas for teens called "Real Life Summer Sizzle", what was with using the word sizzle that year? It basically gives 95 ideas for the summer of '95. I have the article in a summer scrapbook. I actually didn't get this magazine for maybe a few years after it come out, cause I was only like 10. It was in some hand-me-downs from some family members. I don't know if I kept this on me during the summer like I did the first magazine, I probably did. Looking back over this article it really takes you back to days of phone cards and early online computer accounts.

Lost Lake by Sarah Addison Allen
I did a write up about this book not to long ago. But I thought it was a perfect adult book for the list, I finally have a good adult book to add to the summer list. Allen casts that magic realism spell on a lake in Georgia, is that the right term magic realism? There is a sadness to the book, but the descriptions of summer just put you in a summer mood.

What books are your favorites to read during the summer? What was a favorite summer read of yours as a child? Let me know in the comments.
Hope you guys have a good week, read lots, and God bless you!

Ninja <[0000]---------------[0000]> Writer