Unboxing: Map Poster from Mapiful

Josiah1 Comment

I received a mail a few days ago from Mapiful and it contains a map poster. If you don’t know anything about Mapiful, here’s some information about the company from their website:

So what is Mapiful?

Did you ever wish for a printed map poster of your hometown or a place where you fell in love? Well, if that place isn’t Paris, London or New York chances are you’ve ended up empty handed. That’s about to change. The world is at your fingertips with Mapiful.

We provide you with the tools to let you choose from any place in the world and design your own unique map poster. Explore, zoom, customize and order. Voilà, your place of birth, favorite neighbourhood or just your happy place framed on your wall, in your home. Did we mention that shipping worldwide is free?

Our story

It all began with a cup of coffee and four friends talking about the possibilities of combining technology, design and maps. The first idea was actually to create a spin on the traditional game “Snake” but on top of real world maps. When working with maps, and designing them to fit our purpose we realized that we would want our favorite spots like this on a poster at home – and so the idea of Mapiful was born.

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Book Review: Tempests and Slaughter by Tamora Pierce (Global Blog Tour)

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Title: Tempests and Slaughter (The Numair Chronicles #1)
Author: Tamora Pierce
Release Date: February 6th 2018
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers
Number of Pages: 465
Date Read: February 23, 2018
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy
ISBN: 9780525578543
Rating: ★★★☆☆

SYNOPSIS

Arram. Varice. Ozorne. In the first book in the Numair Chronicles, three student mages are bound by fate . . . fated for trouble.

Arram Draper is a boy on the path to becoming one of the realm’s most powerful mages. The youngest student in his class at the Imperial University of Carthak, he has a Gift with unlimited potential for greatness–and for attracting danger. At his side are his two best friends: Varice, a clever girl with an often-overlooked talent, and Ozorne, the “leftover prince” with secret ambitions. Together, these three friends forge a bond that will one day shape kingdoms. And as Ozorne gets closer to the throne and Varice gets closer to Arram’s heart, Arram begins to realize that one day soon he will have to decide where his loyalties truly lie.

In the Numair Chronicles, readers will be rewarded with the never-before-told story of how Numair Salmalín came to Tortall. Newcomers will discover an unforgettable fantasy adventure where a kingdom’s future rests on the shoulders of a talented young man with a knack for making vicious enemies.

Act fast! The first printing of the hardcover includes a collector’s edition poster!

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Book Review: Batman: Nightwalker by Marie Lu (Global Blog Tour)

Josiah3 Comments
29749090Title: Batman: Nightwalker
Author: Marie Lu
Release Date: January 2nd 2018
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers
Number of Pages: 272
Date Read: January 12, 2018
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Superhero
ISBN: 9780525578567
Rating: ★★★★★

Synopsis

Before he was Batman, he was Bruce Wayne. A reckless boy willing to break the rules for a girl who may be his worst enemy.

The Nightwalkers are terrorizing Gotham City, and Bruce Wayne is next on their list.

One by one, the city’s elites are being executed as their mansions’ security systems turn against them, trapping them like prey. Meanwhile, Bruce is turning eighteen and about to inherit his family’s fortune, not to mention the keys to Wayne Enterprises and all the tech gadgetry his heart could ever desire. But after a run-in with the police, he’s forced to do community service at Arkham Asylum, the infamous prison that holds the city’s most brutal criminals.

Madeleine Wallace is a brilliant killer . . . and Bruce’s only hope.

In Arkham, Bruce meets Madeleine, a brilliant girl with ties to the Nightwalkers. What is she hiding? And why will she speak only to Bruce? Madeleine is the mystery Bruce must unravel. But is he getting her to divulge her secrets, or is he feeding her the information she needs to bring Gotham City to its knees? Bruce will walk the dark line between trust and betrayal as the Nightwalkers circle closer.

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Book Review: The Upside of Unrequited by Becky Albertalli (Blog Tour)

Josiah6 Comments
30653853Title: The Upside of Unrequited
Author: Becky Albertalli
Release Date: April 11, 2017
Format: ARC
Publisher: Balzer & Bray/Harperteen
Number of Pages: 352
Date Read: April 11, 2017
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary, Romance
Rating: ★★★★★

Synopsis

Seventeen-year-old Molly Peskin-Suso knows all about unrequited love. No matter how many times her twin sister, Cassie, tells her to woman up, Molly can’t stomach the idea of rejection. So she’s careful. Fat girls always have to be careful.

Then a cute new girl enters Cassie’s orbit, and for the first time ever, Molly’s cynical twin is a lovesick mess. Meanwhile, Molly’s totally not dying of loneliness—except for the part where she is. Luckily, Cassie’s new girlfriend comes with a cute hipster-boy sidekick. If Molly can win him over, she’ll get her first kiss and she’ll get her twin back.

There’s only one problem: Molly’s coworker, Reid. He’s a chubby Tolkien superfan with a season pass to the Ren Faire, and there’s absolutely no way Molly could fall for him.

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The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (Book Review)

Josiah4 Comments

157993Title: The Little Prince

Author: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Genre: Classics

Publication Date: First Published in April 1943

Date Read: January 16, 2016

Publisher: Harcourt, Inc.

Format: ebook

Pages: 98

Ratings: 5 out of 5 stars

 

Summary from Goodreads:

Moral allegory and spiritual autobiography, The Little Prince is the most translated book in the French language. With a timeless charm it tells the story of a little boy who leaves the safety of his own tiny planet to travel the universe, learning the vagaries of adult behaviour through a series of extraordinary encounters. His personal odyssey culminates in a voyage to Earth and further adventures.

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Great Expectations by Charles Dickens (Book Review)

Josiah7 Comments

2623Title: Great Expectations

Author: Charles Dickens

Genre: Classics

Publication Date: June 25, 1998 (First Published in 1861)

Date Read: January 09, 2016

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Format: ebook

Pages: 505

Ratings: 5 out of 5 stars

SUMMARY FROM GOODREADS:

In what may be Dickens’s best novel, humble, orphaned Pip is apprenticed to the dirty work of the forge but dares to dream of becoming a gentleman — and one day, under sudden and enigmatic circumstances, he finds himself in possession of “great expectations.” In this gripping tale of crime and guilt, revenge and reward, the compelling characters include Magwitch, the fearful and fearsome convict; Estella, whose beauty is excelled only by her haughtiness; and the embittered Miss Havisham, an eccentric jilted bride.

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Blood, Ink & Fire by Ashley Mansour (e-Arc Review)

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Title:

Blood, Ink & Fire

Author: Ashley Mansour

Genre; Young Adult, Science Fiction

Publication Date: December 1, 2015

Date Read: April 27, 2015

Publisher: Upturn Publishing

Format: e-arc

Pages: 464

Ratings: 5 out of 5 stars

SUMMARY FROM GOODREADS :

Imagine a world without books…
In the future, books are a distant memory. The written word has been replaced by an ever-present stream of images known as Verity. In the controlling dominion of the United Vales of Fell, reading is obsolete and forbidden, and readers themselves do not—cannot—exist.
But where others see images in the stream, teenager Noelle Hartley sees words. She’s obsessed with what they mean, where they came from, and why they found her.

Noelle’s been keeping her dangerous fixation with words a secret, but on the night before her seventeenth birthday, a rare interruption in the stream leads her to a mysterious volume linked to an underworld of rebel book lovers known as the Nine of the Rising. With the help of the Risers and the beguiling boy Ledger, Noelle discovers that the words within her are precious clues to the books of the earlier time—and as a child of their bookless age, she might be the world’s last hope of bringing them back.

Blood, Ink & Fire is a gripping, evocative tale that asks, who would we be without books?

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