Life

Through The Woods: Book Review

I have been away for quite some time now. Many changes in my atmosphere have deterred me from my posts but I’m excited to share that I have planned to stick to my 2017 Reading Challenge  and I have a review to share today!

Through the Woods by Emily Carroll

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This graphic novel sent shivers down my spine, not the kind you rather enjoy.

I went through half of the stories and felt it would be better suited to finish in October for more of a thrill factor. This is the first graphic novel I’ve read since being a young girl and I am hooked!

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Emily Carroll does a magnificent job with the illustrations and makes it difficult to pull away from these eerie shorts. The stories gave me a sense of the Brothers Grimm classic fairy tales. Anyone looking for a beautifully dark and creepy read should definitely pick this up.

Happy Reading!

x Steph

Life

I Can Hear It All

Volume

New waves of sounds crash through my body. Awakening things that have been at rest for far too long. The world is new again and I smile. I turn the music up and dance like no one is watching. My body does things I’ve wanted it to do for a long time and it makes me feel more alive. Volumes of love, life, pleasure, excitement, prosperity, adventure, surround me and I welcome it all with arms wide open. These volumes of a beautiful life I will never turn down. I’m turning up the volume of gratitude. I am grateful for this life and all that has been presented to me. I am new, I am happy, and I am raising the volume to my success.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

© Stephanie Cardozo and stephaniecardozo@wordpress.com, 2017.

Life

This Life

Every morning I wake up with my new eyes. These eyes that were blinded for some time, now awoken by realities that have challenged me in the deepest manner. I am grateful for the challenge. I know I’ve said it before but it’s something I must tell myself every single day I open these eyes and my heart continues to beat. I have to be grateful for such challenges because I feel that I am now living my truth. Things must happen in our lives that either make us or break us. But who makes that choice? The issue doesn’t, the world doesn’t, whoever may have caused this challenge in your life, if it wasn’t you, does not make the choice if it will make or break you. YOU make that choice. I realize that I can’t control what others do or what happens around me. What I do have full control of is what I do, what I decide, the person I will be in whatever situation, in my life. In having full control of my own actions and emotions, I have the power to deal with whatever comes my way. No matter how difficult the situation. I have allowed my authentic self to lie dormant for reasons I now see were quite silly. However, I have moved passed it. I know things happen for a reason and my purpose, my truth has been revealed to me by the only person with that power. ME! We don’t have to feel like this life is something we must Survive. This life is meant to be lived and we are the authors of our stories. If we don’t like it, rewrite it.

xSteph

Life

I Am In Love….

I am in love with this life. I could not say this before. For I was Evanescent, knowing but not really. My heart swells with emotion, with life. I think of time I have lost and I make vows to myself and the universe. Vows, affirmations, gratifications, that turn into manifestations. Signs I closed my mind to in the past, signs that are so clear to me now. It is never too late. It is never too late to have all that you want. To have all that I want. It’s a powerful thing, believing in something greater than myself. Something greater that is at work, for me and through me. Every breath is more precious than the last, every step, closer to all that is mine. I have a deeper sense of things and It’s a feeling I never want to leave my bones. Everything has a purpose, things happen to awaken things inside of us. At our most uncomfortable, we become more alive. We become warriors of our own heart, mind, spirit, and life.

 

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Life

Where Did The Time Go?

Girl-sunset

 Finding time and making time are two very different things. Stop trying to find time like it’s this lost item at the bottom of your drawer.

 This is something I have been telling myself lately. I am guilty of letting time pass me by and continuously saying, “I just don’t have enough time do the things I want to do.”

The reality of it is, I simply wasn’t trying to make the time. After all, time is already there, it’s already ours, we just need to use it wisely. Even if that means giving ourselves a little bit of work. I have made so much time available to me, time that has always been there but I was taking for granted. I have made a vow to myself, something I have not done with this much intensity. Like a bear in hibernation, this part of me was asleep, idle, for so very long. I vow to do the work that needs to be done, not just for my family, but for myself. It all starts with yourself, after all. And so, I will no longer float Adrift like a lost boat paddle in the middle of the sea. The story of my life is much greater than that. I am much greater than that.

Fitness, Health, Inspiration, Life, Wellness

Movement


I feel so amazing after this practice! I really felt the burn in my core! I had a great full body experience and it awakened endorphins that shot my mood up to the sky! I am so happy that I am getting back into a healthy routine. Not only for my body but most importantly for my mind. Lately, I have been working really hard on changing the way I think and in turn, how I feel. About myself and the life I want to live. Incorporating positive body movement is something I am no longer taking for granted. And so, I encourage my readers to try this practice to awaken all the positive energy within you! It will absolutely brighten your day!

Namaste

xSteph

Life

Who Was Spartacus?

Spartacus, the television series first aired back in 2010. This show was an immediate hit and anyone with a taste of Roman and Greek history with gore, passion, quite a bit of sex and nudity, but ultimately, an amazing storyline performed by true artists, will be floored by this series. Spartacus is the star of the show. The story begins when the Romans deceive the Thracians into joining them in the fight against the Greeks. Spartacus is then taken as a slave along with his wife when he refuses to fight for the Romans. Spartacus’s journey begins at that moment as he desperately tries to break free and get back to his wife. My husband and I spent many nights binge watching this series and it’s still one of our favorites.

If you haven’t seen this eye-popping series, click below for the trailer.

And now, for the true purpose of this post. I recently watched the documentary of Andy Whitfield, the actor who played Spartacus in the first season. He sadly lost his battle against cancer in 2011, a very short time after the success of his role as the gladiator, Spartacus. Please head over to Sup Nerds! for my full review on the Andy Whitfield story: Be Here Now.

x Steph

 

Books, Life, Read, Review

Book of the Month Subscription Box: Review

***Note: I posted this yesterday and it disappeared! Poof! Gone! I really wanted to share how great this review on the sub box so here we go! 🙂 

 

It’s been a while readers! School has been crazy! It’s totally consuming. All worth it though 😉

So, I’m coming to you today with a subscription box I joined in January. If you have been following my blog, you know that I am an avid reader and jump at any chance to have another book added to my library, digital or hard copy. I decided to give the Book of the Month Club sub box a shot because there is not commitment and I rather enjoy receiving a book in the mail each month. Especially a hardcover! I have not read these books yet because I want to make a nice dent in my reading challenge,

BOTM selection

How does it work?

You choose one book from a selection of five, carefully put together by a set of judges. If you do not make a choice then a book will be chosen for you. When you sign up you select the genres you enjoy reading so no worries on getting a novel you won’t enjoy! If you don’t see a book you have to have then you simply skip the month. Pretty sweet, right?

How much does it cost?

When you join for the first time, we offer 3 standard enrollment offers:

  • 1-month for $5.00, then $14.99 per month
  • 3-months for $9.99 per month, then $14.99 per month
  • 12-months for $11.99 per month

All membership plans automatically renew, but you can cancel anytime.  

If you were previously a member, and are looking to rejoin BOTM, we offer 3 re-enrollment plans.

  • 3-months for $14.99 per month
  • 6-months for $13.99 per month
  • 12-months for $11.99 per month

For both new members and former members, special offers, different from those listed above, are occasionally made available through email and our partners, like magazines, blogs, and instagramers.

Note*** Payment information taken from https://www.bookofthemonth.com/contact-us

I love this deal and you get the chance of receiving hardcover novels before they hit the shelves! Along with the book, you receive a written review from one of the judges on a BOTM bookmark! I love this extra touch!

Below I will share the books I received along with a synopsis of each. 😉

January 2017

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When I signed up, there was a special offer going on where new members received Gillian Flynn’s book, The Grownup. I also received a BOTMC tote bag because I signed up for the 3-month membership. This sold me immediately on that membership because hey, we need another tote for all of the new books we’ll be lugging around! 😉

 

Lucky You by Erika Carter

An official Book of the Month Club selection.

In Erika Carter’s fierce and darkly funny debut novel, Lucky You, three women in their early twenties find themselves aimlessly adrift in the Arkansas college town they’ve stuck around in too long. Ellie, Chloe, and Rachel are friends (sort of), waitresses at the same dive bar. Each is becoming unmoored in her own way: Ellie obliterates all feeling with alcohol and self-destructive acts of sexual promiscuity; Chloe pulls out patches of her hair and struggles to keep incipient mental illness at bay; changeable Rachel has fallen under the sway of a messianic boyfriend with whom she’s agreed to live off-grid for a year in order to return to “health”, and she asks Ellie and Chloe to join them in “The Project.” In a remote, rural house in the Ozarks, nearly undone by boredom and the brewing tension between them, each tries to solve the conundrum of being alive.
By turns funny, knowing and hauntingly sad, Lucky You is a study in damage and detachment, a fearless portrait of three women at a crucial point in their lives. With startling exactitude and wickedly deadpan humor, it lays bare the emotional core of its characters with surgical precision. The writing is deft and controlled, as natural and unforced as breath–which makes it impossible to look away.
Synopsis was taken from Amazon.com
The Grownup by Gillian Flynn
A canny young woman is struggling to survive by perpetrating various levels of mostly harmless fraud. On a rainy April morning, she is reading auras at Spiritual Palms when Susan Burke walks in. A keen observer of human behavior, our unnamed narrator immediately diagnoses beautiful, rich Susan as an unhappy woman eager to give her lovely life a drama injection. However, when the “psychic” visits the eerie Victorian home that has been the source of Susan’s terror and grief, she realizes she may not have to pretend to believe in ghosts anymore. Miles, Susan’s teenage stepson, doesn’t help matters with his disturbing manner and grisly imagination. The three are soon locked in a chilling battle to discover where the evil truly lurks and what, if anything, can be done to escape it.

“The Grownup,” which originally appeared as “What Do You Do?” in George R. R. Martin’s Rogues anthology, proves once again that Gillian Flynn is one of the world’s most original and skilled voices in fiction.

Synopsis was taken from Amazon.com
February 2017
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I’ll let you have a moment while you coo over the cover. Yes, cooing over a book is a thing!
As soon as I saw this gorgeous cover among the selections, I knew I had to have it! I was so pleased that the story sounded as powerful as this cover reflected!
Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
National Bestseller

A new tour de force from the bestselling author of Free Food for Millionaires, for readers of A Fine Balance and Cutting for Stone.

Profoundly moving and gracefully told, PACHINKO follows one Korean family through the generations, beginning in early 1900s Korea with Sunja, the prized daughter of a poor yet proud family, whose unplanned pregnancy threatens to shame them. Betrayed by her wealthy lover, Sunja finds unexpected salvation when a young tubercular minister offers to marry her and bring her to Japan to start a new life.

So begins a sweeping saga of exceptional people in exile from a homeland they never knew and caught in the indifferent arc of history. In Japan, Sunja’s family members endure harsh discrimination, catastrophes, and poverty, yet they also encounter great joy as they pursue their passions and rise to meet the challenges this new home presents. Through desperate struggles and hard-won triumphs, they are bound together by deep roots as their family faces enduring questions of faith, family, and identity.

Synopsis was taken from Amazon.com
March 2017
51n+GHTDlNL._SX331_BO1,204,203,200_ I haven’t received my March box yet so I have included a photo from Amazon. This novel will be released April 4, 2017.
Marlena by Julie Buntin

An electric debut novel about love, addiction, and loss; the story of two girls and the feral year that will cost one her life, and define the other’s for decades

Everything about fifteen-year-old Cat’s new town in rural Michigan is lonely and off-kilter, until she meets her neighbor, the manic, beautiful, pill-popping Marlena. Cat, inexperienced and desperate for connection, is quickly lured into Marlena’s orbit by little more than an arched eyebrow and a shake of white-blond hair. As the two girls turn the untamed landscape of their desolate small town into a kind of playground, Cat catalogues a litany of firsts―first drink, first cigarette, first kiss―while Marlena’s habits harden and calcify. Within the year, Marlena is dead, drowned in six inches of icy water in the woods nearby. Now, decades later, when a ghost from that pivotal year surfaces unexpectedly, Cat must try to forgive herself and move on, even as the memory of Marlena keeps her tangled in the past.

Alive with an urgent, unshakable tenderness, Julie Buntin’s Marlena is an unforgettable look at the people who shape us beyond reason and the ways it might be possible to pull oneself back from the brink.

Synopsis was taken from Amazon.com

 

I will definitely continue my membership with the Book of the Month Club! I love the selections thus far! If you want to give this sub box a try, click on the link below!

https://www.mybotm.com/835s7cfrc3ow29

 

Happy Reading!!

x Steph

 

 

Life, Review

Lion: Movie Review

Hello friends! I’m excited to share that I have written another guest review for Sup, Nerds!

Head on over to their page and check it out! Lion is an amazing film and if you’ve been living under a rock, consumed by politics, or what have you, take a look at the trailer below! 🙂

x Steph

Click Here for the movie review!

Life

New Year, New Beginnings

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Happy New Year !

2016 was a tough year for many people all around the world. I for one, have slacked quite a bit, I admit that. However, I am lucky enough to still be in well enough health to move forward and do better. I don’t blame the year for whatever has kept me from accomplishing the things I want or for what ever bad thing that has happened in general. It’s not the year’s fault. Things happen, period. It’s up to us to change them and to live and own the year, not simply letting the year own us. Like so many people waking up on New Year’s day, I woke up inspired and wanting to change things. I fell off of my daily movement this past year but I am pushing forward now and hoping to gain a healthier mind and body. I am starting with a yoga challenge hosted by Yoga With Adriene. I’ve always liked her style of movement and the way she inspires you to “find what feels good”. Letting you know that you don’t have to follow the rules of a yoga book, if you will. You find what moves and poses your body enjoys and simply make it your own. Yoga is a journey, a discovery, an adventure! This is something I look forward to and building a strong foundation for myself this year. Cheers to everyone and I hope you all have a beautiful start to this year!

Namaste

x Steph