Uncommon Paper Flowers by Kate Alarcon

Uncommon Paper Flower by Kate Alarcon ISBN-13: 9781452176932 Hardcover: 240 pages Publisher: Chronicle Books Released: October 15, 2019

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
This book unveils the alluring world of uncommon botanicals, including a prickly cactus that played a storied role in the founding of an ancient city, a tiny pink mushroom that glows green in the dark, and a magnificent blue cactus with rows of golden spines.

Celebrated paper designer Kate Alarcón reveals the rich histories and unique characteristics behind 30 remarkable plants alongside instructions for crafting stunning paper versions of each one. These eye-catching creations make perfect wedding centerpieces, beautiful arrangements (that never wilt!) to brighten a home, and cheerful gifts for any occasion. Brimming with fascinating botanical trivia, vivid photography, and essential design techniques, this is a breathtaking resource for flower lovers, crafters, and anyone fascinated by the mysteries of the natural world.


My Review:
Uncommon Paper Flowers taught how to create 30 unusual plants from crepe paper. The author started by providing trivia and historical information about each plant (different flowers, mushrooms, cacti, etc.). She then briefly described the types of tools and materials needed for the projects. You basically need different colors and types of crepe paper, glue, and some paints and markers. She also briefly described the basic techniques for cutting, forming, and decorating the petals, leaves, and stem.

She then provided step-by-step projects for creating the unusual plants that she talked about earlier. There were clear, full-color pictures for each step along with written text describing what to do. Unfortunately, my review copy was missing most of the text directions, so I'm not sure how easy the instructions are to understand and do. I got the impression that a complete beginner might want more direction but that someone used to paper-cutting projects would be fine. There were templates for the petals, leaves, and such in the back of the book that you're supposed to photocopy and cut out. I'm not sure how that would work with an ebook, so buying a paper copy of this book may be best.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.

Read the Face by Eric Standop

Read the Face by Eric Standop with Elisa Petrini ISBN-13: 9781250217059 Hardcover: 320 pages Publisher: St. Martin's Essentials Released: Oct. 1, 2019

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
We are born face readers—knowing to seek out human features and faces from the moment our eyes open. We all have the intuitive ability to read and interpret the feelings and expressions of those around us.

In Read the Face, master face reader Eric Standop unlocks the power of this innate human ability, sharing his own journey to become a face reading master, along with stories that illustrate the power of this unique language. Using a combination of three different schools of face reading, along with a scientific accuracy to detect the most fleeting microexpressions, Standop is able to read personality, character, emotions, and even the state of a person’s health—all from studying their face.

The book is divided into sections focusing on specific ways that face reading can offer insight, such as Health, Love, Communication, Work and Success. The stories are accompanied by black and white illustrations of faces, allowing readers to observe the same features that Standop interpreted. The final section of the book outlines the meanings of dozens of facial features and face shapes, so that readers can recognize their own innate intuitive powers and develop them.


My Review:
Read the Face is about face reading for insights into personality, character, life purpose, love, and health. (Reading, as in, a vertical wrinkle on the bridge of your nose between your eyebrows means that you're determined or stubborn.) The author started off by explaining how we're all born able to read faces. He also talked about facial recognition software (the pros and cons) and how face reading systems have been developed throughout the world and throughout history. He talked about how he got into face reading and learned several methods (mainly European and Chinese).

Then he told many stories about different clients that came to him for readings and what he told them. While reading these, you pick up some face reading information about the different face and hand shapes and what they indicate about personality, what wrinkles in different locations mean, and so on. The last 20% of the book gathered all of this face reading information into one spot. There were some drawings of faces to illustrate the different face shapes or what a client's face looked like, but (on a Kindle, at least) it wasn't always easy to see what he was pointing out.

While I did find the Health section interesting and the stories were entertaining, in the end, I felt like this was mostly a book about the author rather than practical application. Perhaps I'm not understanding his descriptions of what to look for, but it didn't seem accurate when applied to myself or my family, so why try to learn the information?


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.

The Cabinet of Linguistic Curiosities by Paul Anthony Jones

The Cabinet of Linguistic Curiosities by Paul Anthony Jones ISBN-13: 9780226646701 Hardcover: 384 pages Publisher: University of Chicago Press Released: Oct. 7, 2019

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Open The Cabinet of Linguistic Curiosities and you’ll find both a word and a day to remember, every day of the year. Each day has its own dedicated entry, on which a curious or notable event—and an equally curious or notable word—are explored. So whatever date this book has found its way into your hands, there’s an entire year’s worth of linguistic curiosities waiting to be found.

On the day on which flirting was banned in New York City, for instance, you’ll discover why to “sheep’s-eye” someone once meant to look at them amorously. On the day on which a disillusioned San Franciscan declared himself Emperor of the United States, you’ll find the word “mamamouchi,” a term for people who consider themselves more important than they truly are. And on the day on which George Frideric Handel completed his 259-page Messiah after twenty-four days of frenzied work, you’ll see why a French loanword, literally meaning “a small wooden barrow,” is used to refer to an intense period of work undertaken to meet a deadline.


My Review:
The Cabinet of Linguistic Curiosities is a fun, year-long book of word and history trivia. Each day of the year has an entry, and every entry contains an unusual word along with an event that happened on that day in history which illustrates the word's meaning. So for each day of the year, there's a word and it's meaning and some history of that word--like it's first known use and how the meaning has changed with time. Often the author also included some other words with the same root. Then there's a summary of what happened during the tied-in historical event for that day. The historical events and words come from the Middle Ages up to modern times. The words are no longer in use, though similar words may be still in use.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.

Get Coding 2! by David Whitney

Get Coding 2! by David Whitney ISBN-13: 9781536210309 Hardcover: 224 pages Publisher: Candlewick Press Released: September 24, 2019

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description from Goodreads:
Learn HTML and JavaScript. Design and build five interactive computer games. Create cool graphics. Code simple artificial intelligence. This appealing guide, covering essential coding concepts, offers an ideal introduction to all these activities and more. By following simple step-by-step instructions and completing five exciting missions, aspiring programmers are invited to code well-known games such as tic-tac-toe and table tennis, then customize their projects to test their skills.


My Review:
Get Coding 2! teaches teens (and adults) how to use HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to code five different old-style games: tick-tack-toe, snake, table tennis, an endless runner, and a side-scrolling platform game. The author teaches coding by breaking down the steps needed to create each game. He explained what game element you want to add next to create the game, how you can code that, and how that coding element works. He then walked you through adding each chunk of code to the html file (with the exact code provided) until you have a completed game.

By the end of each game, you've learned some new coding skills and other ways to use previously learned skills. You learn how to create 2D graphics, use object literals and arrays, make the game tick, process keyboard input, add moving or changing game elements, and more. By the end, you should understand enough to be able to modify the code to create variations of the game. However, I don't think the explanations were thorough enough that you could then code a completely new game from a blank text file by yourself. Still, this is a fun way to start learning for a beginner!


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Read an excerpt using Google Preview.

Slaves Among Us by Monique Villa

Slaves Among Us by Monique Villa ISBN-13: 9781538127285 Paperback: 224 pages Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Released: Oct. 4, 2019

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Written by a global leader in the fight against human trafficking, this powerful book uncovers the hidden world of slaves who walk among us, trapped in a cycle of exploitation. Despite significant progress in the fight for human rights, slavery continues to flourish. In fact, there are more slaves today, in countries rich and poor, than at any point in the past. Three remarkable individuals share how they fell victim to traffickers and later escaped, taking us around the world to uncover how men, women, and children are dehumanized and reduced to obedient machines.


My Review:
Slaves Among Us provides details about global, modern slavery. The author looked at both forced labor and sex-trafficking slavery and had examples from various places in the world. While there were a few action points that the average person can do to help combat modern slavery, the book seemed more about educating people about the problem and a call for certain types of professionals to help fill current needs. The author mainly focused on the personal accounts of 3 people who experienced slavery. She added commentary about how people are tricked into slavery, what they go through, how they get free, and what they struggle with once they're free. She also talked some about what organizations are out there to help, what's being done, and what needs to be done in the future to really help victims and stop slavery. While the book was very informative, it's also hard to read what these people went through. However, I'd recommend it to anyone wanting to be better informed about this important issue.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Read an excerpt using Google Preview.

Zentangle(R) Dingbatz by Brian Crimmins

Zentangle(R) Dingbatz by Brian Crimmins, CZT ISBN-13: 9781497204171 Paperback: 160 pages Publisher: Design Originals Released: June 11, 2019

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Dingbatz are an easy way to incorporate the fundamentals of Zentangle into a wide variety of creative projects. Use Dingbatz to add flair to whatever you're working on-they provide a wonderful complement to any hand lettering, scrapbook and art journaling project. Beginner-friendly with few materials required to get started. Small enough to provide a sense of instant gratification when you make them, these "Zenbellishments" require few materials, making them accessible to all skill levels from beginner to advanced.

This book will introduce you to how Dingbatz are constructed, and how to build from that basic structure to create designs uniquely your own. Zentangle Dingbatz includes a variety of projects that will allow you to practice using Dingbatz not only as stand-alone designs, but also as accents and enhancements to other art projects.


My Review:
Zentangle(R) Dingbatz teaches a method of adding abstract designs as embellishments to cards, envelopes, place cards, journals, etc. The author first explained step-by-step the method of Zentangle for making abstract art, then he built on this by explaining the basics of how to do this to create embellishments. This book is for complete beginners--no previous art or Zentangle experience needed. It's a simple way to add unique designs to things to make them look "arty." Many of the pages were work sheets to practice the designs, frames, and such. He also provided several step-by-step projects for embellishing greeting cards and envelopes, weathergrams, and zines. He also suggested other places you might use these embellishments, like gift tags or name tags. Overall, I'd recommend this book to those who don't feel artistic (but want to be) or those interested in art as a meditative practice.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.

The Little Women Cookbook by Wini Moranville; Louisa May Alcott

The Little Women Cookbook by Wini Moranville; Louisa May Alcott ISBN-13: 9781558329911 Hardcover: 112 pages Publisher: Harvard Common Press Released: October 1, 2019

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Here at last is the first cookbook to celebrate the scrumptious and comforting foods that play a prominent role in Louisa May Alcott’s classic novel Little Women. Do you wonder what makes the characters so excited to make—and eat!—sweets and desserts like the exotically named Blancmange or the mysterious Bonbons with Mottoes, along with favorites like Apple Turnovers, Plum Pudding, and Gingerbread Cake? Find out for yourself with over 50 easy-to-make recipes for these delectable treats and more, all updated for the modern kitchen.

From Hannah’s Pounded Potatoes to Amy’s Picnic Lemonade, from the charming Chocolate Drop Cookies that Professor Bhaer always offers to Meg’s twins to hearty dinners that Hannah and Marmee encourage the March sisters to learn to make, you’ll find an abundance of delicious teatime drinks and snacks, plus breakfasts, brunches, lunches, suppers, and desserts. Featuring full-color photos, evocative illustrations, fun and uplifting quotes from the novel, and anecdotes about Louisa May Alcott, this is a book that any Little Women fan will love to have.


My Review:
The Little Women Cookbook is a cookbook for Little Women fans. The author provided 50 recipes based on foods mentioned in the book and using cookbooks from the 1800s. She's updated the recipes so you use modern equipment and for modern tastes, but she included information about how the foods were made at the time along with quotes from the book. The recipes usually were "from scratch" but sometimes used store-bought puff pastry dough and such. These recipes do not cater to gluten or allergy concerns (which I didn't expect) and weren't what I'd call "healthy," but that's not really the point of this book.

The book contained 7 breakfast recipes, 10 gathering/picnic recipes (sandwiches, salads, etc.), 13 dinner and supper recipes, 18 treat and desert recipes, and 2 drink recipes. Along with some interesting historical cooking and meal information. There were some full-color pictures of the recipes, but not a picture of every recipe. The instructions seemed clear and simple (not complicated or a huge number of steps).


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


Excerpt: Read an excerpt using Google Preview.