I’m so honored that Stefani at Caught Read Handed nominated me for my first blogging award, the Liebster Award! I’ve really been aspiring to dedicate myself to my blog and share content that I love, so this nomination means a lot. Thanks Stefani! This award is typically given to blogs that have less than 300 followers as an opportunity for people to learn a little bit more about them.
Here are the rules:
- List 11 facts about yourself.
- Answer the 11 questions asked by whoever nominated you.
- Ask 11 new questions to 9 bloggers with less than 300 followers. You cannot re-nominate the blog that nominated you.
- Go to their blog and tell them that they have been nominated!
11 Facts About Me:
1) I’m about to graduate from college and am facing serious what-am-I-going-to-do-with-my-life-syndrome. Ideally I think my passions are swaying me toward working in the publishing industry or being an English professor. Just doing something where I can work with books all day.
2) When I was about 9 I stole all of the money out of my piggy bank (years worth of collective birthday/Christmas money that I was supposed to only use with the consent of a parent) and spent it all at the book fair at my elementary school. I came home with dozens of books (for myself and my toddler brother) that I tried to hide from my parents by stuffing in my backpack. They were flabbergasted, as they didn’t know how they could punish me for wanting to read. I guess you could say that was my first book haul!
3) I am a cat person. Period.
4) I recently went abroad for the first time in my life to London as a student research assistant on a Harry Potter travel course through my university. We were divided up into houses and I was the Ravenclaw Prefect. It was literally one of the coolest opportunities I’ve had in my life.
5) Along with being an avid reader and Harry Potter fan, I’m somewhat of a Disney fanatic. I have a personal goal of getting as many photographs with Disney characters at the various parks as possible. Snow White is my absolute favorite, although most people would tell you I’m more like Belle (no surprise there with the whole reading obsession)!
6) In college I joined a sorority and it was honestly a really rewarding experience. Greek life gets a lot of negative stigma in the media, but I’m lucky enough to have gone to a school where Greek Life was very accepting, academic and philanthropy focused, and diverse.
7) Aside from books/book blogging/book collecting I also really enjoy scrapbooking, writing, singing, and collecting (possibly hoarding) MAC makeup.
8) Aside from English I also majored in Religious Studies, which most people confuse with theology. My Religious Studies major was more like Comparative World Religion, and I got to take the coolest classes for it (Disney: Race, Religion, and Gender, Women and Religion, Faith in Popular Culture, etc). It was completely unplanned, I ended up taking a few GE courses and loving how interdisciplinary they were. The program was blend of sociology, anthropology, and history and it’s taught me so much about so many different religions and cultures. It’s made me a much more knowledgeable person and I’m forever grateful that I chose a major so unique.
9) I’m writing my Senior English Thesis on Harry Potter. And the fact that I’m allowed to do that is glorious.
10) While I never expected an owl to drop a letter off to me from Hogwarts on my 11th birthday, I was fairly convinced from ages 3-10 that a talking cat was going to find me one day on the playground to tell me that I was a Sailor Scout (I was pretty devastated when I discovered this wasn’t going to happen).
11) The transition to e-books has been difficult (aka pretty much nonexistent for me). I even justified getting an iPad partially to use for e-books. I’ve downloaded a few for school and I really love the convenience and ease, especially with the highlighting and annotating functions, but there’s still the separation anxiety of being able to hold a book in my hand and put it on my shelf and stare at the pretty covers. I guess I’ll just be broke and have to buy the physical copy AND the electronic copy?
Questions from Stefani at Caught Read Handed:
1) Why did you start blogging? Did you read a book that pushed you into it like I did?
For me, I had always wanted to blog but I never knew what to blog about. As I started using goodreads more and more I would see people link to their blogs in their reviews, and I started discovering the world of book blogging, and thought hey I could totally do that.
2)What’s your least favorite book-to-movie adaptation? Most favorite?
Ugh Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. It’s my favorite book out of the entire series but the worst movie (how does the longest book get translated into the shortest movie???). Nothing about that movie made sense. Ironically, Prisoner of Azkaban was not one of my favorite books but is my absolute favorite HP movie. Also, I love love love the modern adaptation of The Great Gatsby with Leonardo DiCaprio. I know a lot of people had mixed feelings about it, especially with the use of the modern music, but I adored it. Can someone just get that man an Oscar already?
3) If you could live inside any book, what would it be?
This is such a hard question, but my top pick would have to be Harry Potter, because honestly there’s nothing quiet like Hogwarts. I’d also really love to be a Shadowhunter too.
4) What’s your go-to book to reread?
Harry Potter (all of them!) Wow sorry guys I know this is sounding redundant. Aside from that, I really have enjoyed re-reading the Lux series lately (I think I read Origin two times in a row when I got my hands on it, I just couldn’t get enough). And I pick up The Westing Game every few years as well, to remind me of my childhood.
5) What’s your most recently read favorite book?
Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell! Although Cress from the Lunar Chronicles is a close second!
6) If you could meet any author, dead or alive, who would it be?
Right now, it would be JK Rowling and John Steinbeck. I just finished East of Eden and I’d love to pick his brain about all of the biblical interpretation used in the novel.
7) Who is your favorite book boyfriend/girlfriend?
Just one?! Sorry that’s impossible. I’ll try to narrow it down. It’s probably a tie between Raffe from Angelfall, Patch from Hush Hush, Daemon Black from the Lux Series.
8) Where is your favorite place to read? Do you have a book nook/reading chair? Do you read in bed?
I have been known to read pretty much anywhere in any situation, but I really do enjoy reading in bed. Also, by the pool while I’m attempting to tan.
9) Have you ever bought a book based on just its cover? Were you disappointed?
Hmmm I’m sure this has happened to me at some point (especially in the days before the internet had really caught on) when I wasn’t reading reviews about all my book interests. It probably happened when I used to go buy books at Borders when I was much younger (remember them?)
10) Do you have one book that you attribute for creating your love of reading?
Harry Potter definitely completely affirmed and solidified my love of reading, but I was always an avid reader even before I was old enough to start reading those. As a child I was really attached to my Madeline books as well as a picture book called Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, so probably those.
11) Because I’m a wanderer at heart: if you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go?
Italy!!! I want to see Rome, Venice, and Florence so badly, and I’m also itching to return back to the UK as well!
The fantastic blogs I’ve nominated (there’s not quite 9 because many of the blogs I follow have more than 300 followers, but these blogs are all great!)
My Questions for You:
1) Who is your favorite book villain/antagonist?
2) What are your thoughts on e-books vs. physical books?
3) What’s the last book you read that gave you a “book hangover” (such that you couldn’t stop thinking about it for days)?
4) What’s the book you enjoyed most that you were forced to read in school? The least?
5) What is your book guilty pleasure? What book(s) do you enjoy that tend to get a negative reputation or that others tend to critique?
6) What Harry Potter house do you identify with? (Or, if you prefer, which Divergent faction?)
7) What’s your favorite aspect of blogging?
8) Do you have a quirky reading habit? If so, what is it?
9) Who is your book OTP?
10) Who is the book character you most identify with?
11) If you had to spontaneously move to another country, which would it be?
I’m looking forward to seeing your answers!
Congratulations. A well deserved award. I love your passion for children’s literature. I too could talk about them all day long…oh, …I do.
Thank you so much!
Yay, congratulations on your award! I enjoyed reading all your answers, especially number 2. I am definitely going to be investigating all of these blogs. 🙂
Thank you so much! It means a lot seeing as your blog was one of my first inspirations to start blogging!
Wow, really? That’s exciting. 😀
Yay! I really enjoyed reading your post and all of your answers.
And no worries: I’m just as obsessed with HP as you, so no shame in using the series in multiple answers. It’s funny though: Prisoner of Azkaban is one of my least favorites of the adaptations. I’m totally on your side when it comes to The Great Gatsby; I thought the inclusion of the modern music is one of the things that made it so great. It just showed the the story can still be related to in the modern age, which is one of the best things about the book.
Also, I’ve been to Venice! It’s freaking amazing. I really enjoyed Verona as well. And I spent a year living in Scotland; it’s my favorite place in the world. 🙂
Thank you, thank you, thank you! I did see this about three days ago and I’m planning my post. I missed my FIRST Blogoversary recently, so I’m going to do something quite special to celebrate this – keep a lookout!
x
No problem! Let me know when you post, I’d love to see your answers!
[…] though I already received my first Liebster Award nomination in April (you can see my original post here). Though I have already been nominated, I thought that it would be fun to answer the questions […]