A Bookish Chat with Belle

Today I have the very great pleasure of introducing my esteemed friend and patroness, Miss Martha--er, I mean Elsie-- er, I mean Isabella.   Or Belle, as I like to call her.  (Well, actually I like to call her "my child" but that's beside the point.)  We are continuing our Bookish Interview series after a brief lapse, and Belle has kindly consented to be the featured bookworm for July.

~Welcome to the podium at Yet Another Period Drama Blog, Belle!  Have some tea and a muffin to calm your nerves and tell us a little bit about yourself.  Name, general age-ish (feel free to be as vague as you like), last movie you watched (and enjoyed), least favorite food, favorite kind of summer activity, and what got you started blogging.  Ready, steady, go!

Hello Amy Dashwood's (aka Amy's) followers! My name is Isabella, but you can call mee Belle or Bella :) I am fifteen and can't believe it :P My life is just passing by SOOO fast! Oh yes if any of you would like to give me a gift I would like some time, literally! :D The last movie I watched was the Hulk, super random I know. :D Least favorite food would probably be Sushi though I can eat some, most of it gets to my stomach so I try to avoid it :) Favorite kind of summer activity would be either swimming, jumping on the trampling, or going out with friends :) I knew very little about blogging until one of my dearest friends started her blog and invited me over to check it out. I fell in love with reading it and decided I wanted to start one as well. I was rather young at the time so I started off a blog with my sisters, then when I turned fourteen started my own. Though I used to be very frequent with blogging I still love it and wish I could post more! But alas I also have life to attend to, which is not near as fun as blogging, but it has to be done ;)

~Okay!  So now that we know a little bit more about you, let’s ask some bookish questions.  Tell us about three books that you loved when you were little-- that is, under ten or so.

Absolutely.

Three books that I enjoyed when I was younger...humm...well I read a lot of random books, like kid devotionals and stuff like that, to be honest I liked to look at the pictures mostly :D

Adam Raccoon 
Random Bible rhyming books :)
Random Tea Party books that came with tea party sets :)

~Oooh, I always loved books about tea parties... still do, in fact.  :D  Which of your favorite books would you like to see made into a movie?

Well for sure Andrew Klavan's books, (which by the way are going to be mentioned a lot in this post :P) the ones I have read that is, such as Nightmare City (more like a Doctor Who episode :D) and The Homelander Series, and a book my friend wrote called The Lost World. But to be completely honest most of my favorite books HAVE been made into movies!

What is your favorite genre to read now? (historical fiction, mysteries, sci-fi, whatever)
I'm really liking action actually, now I definitely do love a good romance but most of the time I prefer an action book with a little romance, then a romance book with a little action :) I'm weird like that ;) I do also enjoy a good sci-fi, historical fiction and mysteries too :) For instance I am in the middle of an amazingly fun series by Andrew Klavan called The Homelander series and it is everything I enjoy! It's an action packed book, with a romance, mystery and fun. I was actually very surprised at how a book with just words could be so action packed and on the edge of your seat feeling, but it was! I highly recommend it ;)

What are some of your favorite quotes about books?

This isn't a quote at all, but it's very true I think :)

~What did you most recently finish reading?  Would you recommend it?

Well I am in the middle of a couple series but like I said I highly recommend Andrew Klavan's The Homelander series.


~What was the longest book you ever read?  Would you recommend that? :D

Oh gosh, I try to stay away from long books...just kidding I am not that person :D I do enjoy a long book, though most books I read are either series or shorter books, so I guess The Homelander series :)

I also recommend Nightmare City, also by Andrew Klavan.  I mainly love that book because it reminds me of a Doctor Who episode. :P Yes, I am a Doctor Who geek, I admit.  :D


~Quick!  First inspirational/funny quote from a book, off the top of your head! 

Life is like riding a bike. In order to keep your balance you must keep moving.

~What is the best book you bought over the last year?

To be completely truthful I never really buy books, not that I don't want to but that most of my books are either given to me, or I rent them from our local library.Sso unfortunately I don't really have a lot of books that I have bought, but more rented or passed down, which happens a lot in our family :) But I can say one of the best books given to me was from one of my best friends AND she wrote it herself! How awesome is that! It is now on Amazon, btw! Here's the link!

(YES.  People, go check out my sister Molly's first novel!!!)

~What would be your response to someone who told you she never read books?

I would think she has no life...:D jk. I would actually think she does have a life but she might be too busy to read books (which I personally think is absolute poppycock but to each his own :D).  And besides, these days you can read books on a kindle or watch the movies. :) (I feel like an old grandma, *shaky voice* "In my days children actually read books, books made out of cardboard and paper!" :D)

~If you were going to be stuck in an airport for three days and could only bring three books with you (and no other source of entertainment), what three books would you choose?

Let's see... probably three of the Homelander series, one because he has to survive and I would probably have to do that at an airport, and two they are just enjoyable and pass the time when I'm bored. (Ok it might sound like I am being a complete fangirl about these books, but I will be honest I love them to death and they are one of the best most recent books I have read, so yeah. :))

~Who are your top three favorite authors?

Andrew Klavan, DUH! :)
Suzanne Collins
J. K. Rowling
Charles Dickens
Sorry, there are just so many! :D

~(I see not the great Jane Austen  in this list... we are no longer friends.  :P  All right, all right, kidding...) What is the best book-to-movie adaptation you’ve ever seen?

Eeesh, well I would say one of the Jane Austen movies but I haven't read a lot of the books yet, I only ask my younger sister about them, (she's a reader :)) so I guess Hunger Games, Catching Fire because that is one of the few book-to-movie adaptations I've read. :D

~All right, all right, you invoked The Name in your last answer... I'll let ya slide.  Quick, name a book you love that begins with C (“the” does not count. :D).

(My first thought was Cat in the Hat but I haven't read that, I know "WHAT WAS WRONG WITH MY CHILDHOOD!!! :D) I'm going to just say (Hunger Games) Catching Fire. :D Sorry Amy!!!

~Bahahahaha... s'okay, I still love you.  :D And now... recommend six titles for the lovely readers of this blog.  Any titles.  Six of ‘em.  Do it.  Now.  (No, I’m not bossy.)

Amy, you are that bossy. "No rush" :D JK. (inside joke everyone sorry about that :))

The Last Thing I Remember
The Long Way Home
The Truth Of The Matter
The Final Hour (all of which are a series, sorry I was trying to think of six titles :D)
Nightmare City

Yeah, I'm a little lazy when it comes to picking titles. :P

Thank you so much, Amy, for having me post on your blog! I enjoyed it immensely! And sorry for all my naming-one-book-all-the-time-thing I just haven't read a TON of books recently, my bad! :D But you have inspired me to read more! :)

***

Thanks so much for joining us, Belle!  I enjoyed reading your answers immensely, and your pictures (especially the random ones :D) were a splendid addition.  Belle and I are great friends and I am so happy to have her as a guest here... she's a tremendously fun person and does a killer imitation of Martha Mahinsky.  Also, she understands the importance of obeying her father.  (sorry guys... inside joke again...) Everyone, don't forget to visit Belle's lovely blog here!  And don't forget to check out my sister's book, either... not that I'm hinting or anything.

(Also don't forget to submit your nominations for the August I'd Like to Share, right over here, if you haven't already.)

A Study in Style: Famous Authors Handle Sherlock

It struck me recently that it would be rather fun to do a sort of study comparing how famous authors of the past might have taken various approaches to the same piece of writing.  For fun, I experimented with the concept, and came up with some samples that amused me.  (Disclaimer: I am frequently amused by things as insignificant as Random Capitalization.  If I say it's funny, take it with a grain of salt.)  Naturally, I had to blog about them, because that is how I roll.   And so without further preliminaries, I present for your pleasure "BBC Sherlock, By a Variety of Classic Authors (but really by Miss Dashwood."


Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Duh.  Read the books.


Ernest Hemingway

The detective stood in the center of the floor.  A woman lay dead at his feet.  He took in the circumstances of her death at a glance.  Her child's name was scratched into the floor beside her.  He remembered his own childhood, in which his great capacity for intelligence had been sometimes mocked. A spider crawled on the wall.  The woman was still dead.  Her suitcase was missing, and to the detective everything became clear.

Anderson was at the door.  "Rache," he said.  "German for 'revenge.'  She could be trying to tell us something."

"Yes. Thank you for your input."  The detective closed the door and Anderson was silenced.

On the floor the woman was still dead and outside the night grew colder.

-A Study in Pink


L.M. Montgomery

Hills and flatland and waving, dancing grass covered the moor, and a big, friendly boulder rose up in the midst of the glimmering green.  Carefree and young again, Sherlock stood on the boulder, surveying all the land below, while John prosaically waited at the foot of the rocks with a map.  There was little poetry in John's soul, and though he was a faithful friend there was yet a part of Sherlock that even he could not understand-- a curtain of thought and imagination and deduction that no one but Mycroft could ever hope to see through.  Mycroft alone possessed the key to Sherlock's brain, for only the blood tie that existed between brothers cut of the same cloth could link one great intelligence with another.  John could only observe, and read the map.

"There's Baskerville," said John, pointing into the distance where a low line of buildings could be seen, disarmingly cozy and warm against the skyline.  To a casual observer they were like a friendly clump of mushrooms, sharing fairy secrets with the Wee Folk that must surely people the surrounding valley.  "That must be Grimpen Village," continued the practical John, "and that's Jewer's Hollow."

Jewer's Hollow-- a strange, mystical name, conjuring up visions of old legends and ghosts and perhaps even a white lady who walked through it at night, wringing her hands and wailing.  A shiver went down Sherlock's spine.

-The Hounds of Baskerville


William Shakespeare

Without I stand, without the lock'ed door;
Once more left i' the lurch, while greater minds than mine
Do search and pry and deduce all manner of crime.
To thee a faithful friend I have forever been,
A loyal serf, a follower to thy schemes
Patient and obliging; and yet for this
I am rewarded by abandonment?
If thou wilt cease from doing such as this
And let me join thee in the game of wits
An aid shall I be and helpful i' the extreme
But why should I expect such grace from thee?
"Sherlock Holmes am I, and none that walks this earth,
Can match the greatness of th' intellect which I have had from birth."

-The Blind Banker


Victor Hugo

We will now follow the unhappy Watson and Holmes into the very heart and belly of London; that is, the Underground.  The reader will perhaps benefit from a brief discourse upon the history of train travel and subway development in twentieth and twenty-first century England.

*insert eighty-five pages of London tunnels*

The detective and his friend now approached an empty car and boarded it, torches in hand.

"It's empty," said Watson. "There's nothing."

But Holmes had already found twisted cables and a seat that lifted out to reveal a deadly timepiece.  "Isn't there?" he inquired.

The reader is in all likelihood uninformed of the methods and ways in which one may set off a bomb beneath Parliament-- we will pause for a short history of explosives and practices of detonation.

*insert thirty-two pages about bombs*

-The Empty Hearse


Jane Austen

*opening credits*
Two gentlemen spoke of matters concerning gentlemen; we need follow them no farther.
*closing credits*

-basically any episode, really.

I'd Like to Share: July 2014

Annnnnnd our nominations for the July edition of I'd Like to share are IN!  And only one day late!  *high-fives self*

In the Inspirational category...

Miss Jane Bennet nominated Faith E. Hough for Fairy Tale Love
Miss Dashwood nominated Rachel Coker for Someday When I Fall in Love
Naomi Bennet nominated Miss Dashwood for Single? Really?
Anne-girl nominated Mirriam Neal for You Can Find Yourself if You Decide to Finally Start
Hamlette nominated Allison Kieselowsky for Cleaning Your Room as a Spiritual Exercise

In the Just Plain Interesting category...

Analiese nominated Melody for The Four Temperaments
Emma Jane nominated Naomi for Things We Bloggers Do

In the Informative category...

Hayden nominated Miss Elizabeth Bennet for Jane Austen and Clergymen
Sara Lewis nominated V.H. Stringer for Romeo, Juliet and the Purpose of Literature

In the Miscellaneous category...

The Elf nominated Danielle for A Sudden Flash of Sehnsucht

Please put your nominations for the August edition in the comment box right here on this page-- each nomination must mention which category you think it best fits (otherwise I'll stick it in Miscellaneous) and please keep your nominations to one-per-customer.

In the meeeeeeantime... can anyone name the film from whence this quote hails?

"Fancy anyone wanting to write a book about beetles, or read one for that matter."

(Round of applause to everyone who guessed Miss Potter for last month's challenge-- that was indeed the correct movie, and the speaker was Miss Millie Warne.  I love her.  :D)