Some of My Favorite Meet-Cutes From Books

This week's Top Ten Tuesday is Genre Freebie. I'm not necessarily picking romance but meet-cutes are associated with it. Meet-cute is when a guy meets a girl for the first time, typically under unusual, humorous or cute circumstances and the two end up together. I'm listing meet-cutes but also non-romance meetings that are memorable and kind of awkward, which I call meet-awkward. Here are some of my favorite meet-cutes & meet-awkwards. For more Top Ten Tuesday, visit That Artsy Reader Girl here.

01 - When Anne met Gilbert from Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
First, Gilbert winked at Anne and then later, he pulled one of her braid and whispered "Carrots! Carrots!" Then Anne said something and she slammed the slate on his head and cracked the slate. It was a fun scene.

image from the Open Library

02 - When the Ordinary Princess met Perry from The Ordinary Princess by M. M. Kaye
Amy (the Ordinary Princess) snuck into a banquet hall to steal leftovers for her animal friends and there she met Perry (aka Peregrine) who was just hanging around. It's an ordinary meeting but I thought it was cute and also, if you know who Perry really is, it makes it a little less ordinary.

03 - When Fred met Kyra from Poison by Bridget Zinn
Fred spotted Kyra when she crossed a river with a piglet on her head and in her under things and then he helped her out. I thought this was funny when I first read it and it's funny still.

04 - When Mary met her cousin from The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
The dreamlike moment when Mary met her cousin in his room where he was throwing a tantrum. The way it was written gave it a certain quiet, moody, dreamy feeling.

05 - When Harry met Hagrid from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
Hagrid met Harry as a baby and ten years later, he met Harry again. Hagrid broke down the door to a cabin where Harry's uncle had took the family, then he entered and asked for a cup of tea - definitely a memorable way to meet someone again.

06 - When Cimorene met the dragon Kazul from Dealing with Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede
Cimorene entered a hovel and met some dragons and offered her services as a cook/maid to a dragon even though a few of the dragons suggested they eat her. What princess can be this daring?

07 -10 - When Westley met everyone from The Princess Bride by William Goldman
There are a lot of memorable scenes in this book but my favorite meet-cutes or meet-awkwards are these:
When Westley met Inigo Montoya and they fenced and chatted
When Westley met the giant Fezzik where they fought
When Westley met Vizzini and they drank to their deaths
When Westley met Buttercup a second time when he kidnapped her from her kidnappers

Do you have a favorite meet-cutes, whether it's romance-related or just people meeting for the first time?

The L. M. Montgomery Tag

This is the tag for the We Love L. M. Montgomery Week hosted by Hamlette's Soliloquy over here.

1. Who introduced you to L. M. Montgomery's writing? Tell us the story!
No one or maybe everyone since I heard about the 1985 Anne of Green Gables movie and then decided I want to read the books.

2. What LMM books have you read?
I read all 20 novels (The Anne of Green Gables series, the Emily Starr trilogy, Pat of Silver Bush & Mistress Pat, The Blue Castle, Jane of Lantern Hill, A Tangled Web, Magic for Marigold, The Story Girl & The Golden Road, and Kilmeny of The Orchard) which is really all of Montgomery's novels. I might have read some of her short stories but I have forgotten which. I recently read The Alpine Path which is a series of essays that Montgomery wrote for a magazine.

L.M. Montgomery books

3. What movies or shows based on her books have you watched?
The 1985 movies (they call them mini-series) but I don't like the last two movies all that much as it does not follow the books at all. I don't get why the sudden need for an original new stories but who knows what the director/writer was thinking?

4. Which LMM character is your kindred spirit, the one you'd like to hang out with in real life?
Anne Shirley but she's probably not my kindred spirit, that is, if you think of kindred spirit as someone similiar to you but I would like to hang out with Anne anyway but also any of the Blythe children from Rainbow Valley will also be kind of fun to hang out.

5. Which LMM character do you relate to the most? And why?
Una Meredith or Matthew Cuthbert as they are both shy people but underneath, they can be daring or even quite tenacious.

6. Have you ever been to Prince Edward Island?
No. Sadly, I doubt I would ever go. It seems now it's more of a tourist attraction rather than a real place but if I can go back in time, I would definitely visit the island.

7. Who is your favorite LMM heroine?
I like to say Anne Shirley but I don't know. I find all the females characters quite strong and sort of heroic in their own way, even Marilla Cuthbert, so I don't want to choose.

8. Who is your favorite LMM hero?
Matthew Cuthbert or maybe Mr. Carpenter (a teacher from the Emily Starr series) but I find most of the male characters not quite as matching up to the females as I think they are way too old fashioned.

9. Do you have any fun merch related to her books? If so, please share some photos!
Books are merchs also. I certainly treasure them like gifts.

10. What are some of your favorite LMM quotations?
I can't remember any of them but the two I do remember from The Blue Castle:

"I've stayed on earth in my dreams."

"You see — I've never had any real life. I've just breathed."
- which is spoken by Valancy Stirling. (Originally: "You see — I've never had any real life," she said. "I've just — breathed. Every door has always been shut to me.")

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Here's the LMM Tag questions if you would like to answer them:
1. Who introduced you to L. M. Montgomery's writing?  Tell us the story!
2. What LMM books have you read?
3. What movies or shows based on her books have you watched?
4. Which LMM character is your kindred spirit, the one you'd like to hang out with in real life?
5. Which LMM character do you relate to the most?  And why?
6. Have you ever been to Prince Edward Island?
7. Who is your favorite LMM heroine?
8. Who is your favorite LMM hero?
9. Do you have any fun merch related to her books?  If so, please share some photos!
10. What are some of your favorite LMM quotations?

Some baffling and weird L. M. Montgomery book covers

For We Love L. M. Montgomery Week (Feb. 20-24), I am sharing some book covers that aren't what you call classy covers. As you might know, most of Montgomery's books are in the public domain so anyone can publish them if they have the text. This list consisted of mostly books published by unknown publishers and probably books I wouldn't buy not just for the bad covers but also for the not-so-great text formatting. I'm not going to make links to the books but if you're interested in checking them out, they can be found at amazon. If you're an ebook reader, you can find some of  Montgomery's books at Project Gutenberg here. Check out We Love L. M. Montgomery Week at Hamlette's Soliloquy here.

01 - Mistress Pat
If they were trying for a bland cover, this got it right. This says nothing about the book although if you see those curved shapes as faces, then it's just plain weird.

Fiction: Mrs. Monday and the Sunday Company

Fiction: Mrs. Monday and the Sunday Company   
Mrs. Caroline Monday was quite comfortable being alone but living in the small village of Query St. James, she could not expect to be left alone for too long.
    This late winter's Sunday afternoon, Mrs. Monday minded very much when the four ladies entered her home. She had her carpets cleaned just yesterday and was a little miffed by the way the ladies didn't bother to wipe their shoes as they stepped inside although Mrs. Manner did slide her shoes back and forth on the hall carpet.
    Still, the meal was cooked and it must not be squandered away just because she didn't like the company for a moment. Often, Mrs. Monday was tired of the ladies and their nerve-wracking ways about their children and relations. If she had her way, she would turn them all to crows and send them to the moon to stay put for a bit while Mrs. Monday rest from their company. But tried as she often did, Mrs. Monday could not hate the ladies. They were her friends whom she was willing to tolerate. Other people, she could not stand and often declined when she was invited to a meal or for tea.

Words for Wednesday Prompts - Feb. 22, 2023

This February, I'm the host for Words for Wednesday. Words for Wednesday was started by Delores and now is hosted by various people on various blogs. The aim of Words for Wednesday is to encourage us to write using some or all of the prompts.
    You may write your piece in the comments or post it on your blog. If posting on your blog, please leave a direct link to the post so we can all visit you. Have fun writing!

This week's prompts are:
1 - wonderland
2 - squander
3 - brisk
4 - postcards
5 - wait
6 - stall
7 - leftover

This is my last week hosting Words for Wednesday. For March, Susan Kane will provide the prompts at her blog here.

My Favorite L. M. Montgomery Characters & More

For We Love L. M. Montgomery Week (Feb. 20-24), I'm listing my favorite characters and characters I wish I like more and know more of plus characters that I sort of of love to hate. This list is based on the 20 novels of Montgomery's that I read. I'm using five words or less to describe each character and then what I think of them plus a quote from one of the books. (Note: There will be minor spoilers so don't read my notes if you prefer not to know them.) Check out We Love L. M. Montgomery Week at Hamlette's Soliloquy here.

My favorite characters:

Una Meredith, my interpretation

01 - Una Meredith from Anne of Green Gable series
Five Words: sweet, loyal, kind, shy, tenacious
Note: I find Una quite likable. I think she's eight or nine years old in the Rainbow Valley book but it doesn't say. Later, we got a glimpse of her in Rilla of Ingleside which I thought was not a kind fate for her.
Quote: "She was so shy that to ask a favour of anybody was agony to her." — Rainbow Valley

Seven Things: Some Bookish & None-Bookish Thoughts

01 - Same old same old — I notice now I either post short fiction or some sort of list. I guess I'm not as random as I used to be with my blogging. Sometimes I see my blog as another unfinished on-going project where I try to do better but in the end, I just fall back to the same old routine and I don't think it's a terrible thing. Of course it would be nice to change and do better and create new content and get more readers but I've given up trying to figure out how to get more readers. Blogging is simply posting what I want. I'm not into promoting my blog or make it more well known.

02 - Is it wrong for bloggers to just delete their blogs without notice? — I have seen a few bloggers who just deleted their blog without any type of notice. When you go to their blog, you get a 'the site is no longer available' or some notice saying the blog no longer existed. This kind of disappearance acts just irks me. I know there must be some good reason for the disappearance such as being deceased (which I am loathed to think because I prefer no one dies), lost in a witness protection safe house, or even lost their minds but one must be polite about it and leave some notice before completely disappearing. Not that I blamed these people for leaving but it irks me a bit especially for those bloggers I have followed a long time.

03 - Blogging is not what it was ten years ago and yet, it's exactly the same — Or perhaps I'm exactly the same and blogging has changed. Most people flock toward social medias rather than blogs even though blogs are a type of social media except no one is saying that except me. Blogging will always be my social media because I mostly hate social media or maybe not hate, more like, stupefied by the way they change so fast. Wasn't twitter used to be 140 characters but now people not only can they exceed that limit, they can also post photos and videos and basically use it like a blog. I guess the only difference between social media and blogs is the way people use them? I think social media is for short, quick burst of thoughts and ideas and I suppose it's why I prefer a blog because I'm not one to be brief or fast.

04 - Over ten dollars for an ebook? — I'm not being cheap (well, a little bit) but I just don't want to pay anything above ten dollars for an ebook. I don't think ebooks offers the same benefits as printed books. I certainly could not resell an ebook like printed books since it's more about transferring of ownership. We are to think of ebooks being in the same class as printed books but are they?
    I've noticed some printed books are cheaper than the ebook version which makes no sense to me. Isn't printing a book more expensive than creating an electronic file? So yes, artwork is probably expensive but since most books comes in several formats (printed in hardcover and paperback, various types of ebooks, audio), I assumed the artwork is being paid to be used on all these formats so clearly, they can lower the price of ebooks or match the printed version's price, right?

05 - Book rants — Apparently I watch way too many youtube videos and most of them are on books. Somehow those Best books of the year, Favorite books or Books I love lists almost always have books I hate on them so I don't watch many of those. It's often more interesting to watch book rants such as Worst books of the year lists and find out why people hate certain books rather than why they love them. I have very few words for the books I love but books I hate, I have tons of words for them.

06 - Make a fuss about representation? — I'm never going to read books based on representation. When I hear people say they they pick up this book/read this book because it has this/that representation, I just want to roll my eyes. Can't a character just have this and that characteristic or be this and that way without people pointing out this character represent this group and that group? I don't want to read a book because it's diverse, I want to read a book because it has a good story and that characters are just characters. In the real world, we don't go about searching for diverse people to be friends with so why make an issue where there's none?

07 - They should know better — Margot Kinberg at her blog wrote about characters doing things they should know better but they do it anyway otherwise there wouldn't be a story. (Read the post here.) Making mistakes and making bad decisions is human and yet, readers can't help but berate these characters as these bad decisions arise emotions. Sometimes these characters can go too far and we have to question whether it would have been better if these characters have never made the decisions that they did. Certainly if a character makes the same mistake more than once, than there is a definite reason to berate that character, right? What do you think? Does it bother you a lot when a character makes a bad decision?

Got anything on your mind? Do share them.

Fiction: Valentine's Day with Death and the Devil's grandchild

Fiction: Valentine's Day with Death and the Devil's grandchild
Chocolate was invented by Death to make life sweet and death all the more bitter or so history had shown. St. Valentine's Day, on the other hand, was something that had been debated for centuries. The dispute centered on whether St. Valentine was an ascendant from the Death family or the Devil family. Both families had a claim but neither one had definite evidence that proved one way or another. Later generations of both families had endless disputes about it.
    On a late Valentine's night, Drew, a grim reaper or what the family liked to call Death's servant #103 and Black Coffee, the devil's youngest grandchild, sat on the roof of a two-story building while munching on chocolate.
    "You know, I really do think Valentine came from the Death's side. Look there, if it not for Death, that man wouldn't bother with all the theatric of a proposal. He knew he might die soon and so he thought he should go all out today," said Drew and he dropped another chocolate into his mouth.

Words for Wednesday Prompts - Feb. 15, 2023

This February, I'm the host for Words for Wednesday. Words for Wednesday was started by Delores and now is hosted by various people on various blogs. The aim of Words for Wednesday is to encourage us to write using some or all of the prompts. This week's prompts are valentine-inspired words:
1 - love
2 - happiness
3 - chocolate
4 - single
5 - dinner

And/Or
6 - hate
7 - sadness
8 - lemon
9 - attached/double (can use either or both)
10 - breakfast
I have no idea what's the opposite of chocolate so I chose lemon because it's sour/bitter but if you can think of a better word, use that instead.

You may write your piece in the comments or post it on your blog. If posting on your blog, please leave a direct link to the post so we can all visit you. Have fun writing!

Fiction: The Blizzard in Aisle Thirteen

Fiction: The Blizzard in Aisle ThirteenLilly Beans strolled down the aisles of The Food Palace with a thought of only getting the necessities and going home to a nice, quiet evening. The slow music playing throughout the store gave her an urge to drink hot chocolate and take a nap. She shook her head and wiped that thought away. Around her, the mansion-size supermarket appeared crowded on this Saturday afternoon.
    The market had opened nine months ago but Lily had hesitated coming here until this week. She was all for small businesses and this giant market had swallowed a few of her favorites in the neighborhood but at last, she had to give in as shopping for groceries at the convenience store wasn't so convenient. The week-old fruits alone would drive anyone away. The cat food she needed for her cat, Toto, was no longer available there and not to mention the weird checkout teenager with the scent of dirty laundry kept asking her out even though she was twice his age and twice his height.
    Down aisle thirteen, Lilly passed along the shelves of pet food. So many varieties, so many choices. But Toto only liked the one brand which cost more than most. Lilly picked up the hefty bag of Nine and A Half Lives and dumped it into her cart. That will last about a month.
    At the end of the aisle, there was a tall man all bundled up in winter gear behind one of those temporary stalls they had for sales and promotions. The hand-drawn sign above him with crooked lines said: Bliz Kit for all your survival needs. $5 each. All proceeds go to saving Catmermaids from homelessness and extinction. On the stall table were kits that looked like roll-up blankets tied with red ribbons. Behind the kits was a large digital clock.
    Lilly set her cart to the side and walked up to the stall. The man's boney face told of someone who had not eaten much. He looked like he couldn't move all bundled up with a large scarf wrapped once around his neck. Lily had disliked the Food Palace for keeping the temperature low but she was glad of it when she entered the market. The heatwave had been around far too long this summer.
    Lilly smiled and peered down at the 'Bliz Kit' kits. Then she looked up and asked, "What does the kit contained?"
    The man peered at her with narrowed eyes. "A blanket and a chisel," he said. His voice was quiet but firm.
    Lilly nodded. What kind of kit is that? she thought but she didn't voice it. "Nice," she said, still smiling. "But do we need this? It's the middle of the summer."
    "Can't you see?" He pointed a mittened finger above.

Words for Wednesday Prompts - Feb. 8, 2023

This February, I'm the host for Words for Wednesday. Words for Wednesday was started by Delores and now is hosted by various people on various blogs. The aim of Words for Wednesday is to encourage us to write using some or all of the prompts. This week's prompts are numbers:
1 - seventeen (17)
2 - seven (7)
3 - six (6)
4 - ten (10)
5 - nine (9)
6 - thirteen (13)
7 - twenty-five (25)

You may write your piece in the comments or post it on your blog. If posting on your blog, please leave a direct link to the post so we can all visit you. Have fun writing!

January 2023 Books

I didn't finish a lot of books in January as I was too busy re-reading L.M. Montgomery's books for Rachel's We Love L. M. Montgomery Week but mostly because I was not in the mood for reading. I don't remember how I occupied my time in January but I was certain it was definitely full of mundane tasks, hazy activities and forgotten thoughts. But overall, not a bad month. Here are the books I managed to read in January:

01 - A Wizard’s Guide to Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher > link
What's it about: magic, baking, murders, a 14-year-old indecisive heroines
This does start with a murder but it quickly became less about the murder and more about 14-year old Mona (who will remind you she's 14 on many occasions) and many adventures she had while trying not to get murdered. It really was a good read until they start on the talks of sewage stuff which is not enjoyable, then things turn from that point on. Then they make this point about how adults should have fixed the problem so that a 14-year-old didn't have to be a hero but what's the point of pointing that out? If adults have fixed the problem, then there wouldn't be a book so why make the point?
    I liked the baking magic but with Mona panicking most of the time, it's hard to enjoy it. This is consider a dark book but only because it involves a murder of a child and a child being chased by a murderer and some dark themes but I don't see this as a dark book. This, to me, is neither dark nor light, neither too humorous nor too serious, it's not a kid's adventure and yet, it's not an adult book either, it's stuck in the middle. But at least, I sort of enjoy reading it.

Fiction: Seeing is not always believing

Fiction: Seeing is not always believing
One cloudy winter's morning commute, Nona mistakenly looks up from her book and finds several faces askew. She quickly glances down. She has forgotten her own rules of not looking up. It is normal for her to see someone's true expression and then back to normal.
    When Nona had been a child, she had started seeing these true expressions and told her parents but they thought it was due to her wild imagination so they kept her from reading anything too fantasy-like. It had not cured her of seeing those expressions but it made her realized how much easier her life would be if she keeps certain things to herself.
    After work, Nona visits the eye doctor's office. On one wall, it is decorated with three paintings of abstract faces in various expressions that mostly convey a certain type of terror. Nona keeps her eyes away from them. The doctor's assistant, Cass, is one of Nona's favorite people. Cass always expresses what she feels, there is never a second expression.
    After examining her eyes, Dr. John says everything's well but Nona's vision is not good. She will need eyeglasses. Downstairs, she gets herself a pair with plain black frames. An hour later, she walks out of the building.