A Two For One Review

At the beginning of this blog, I was intending for it to be mostly book reviews.
Anyone who looks through my old posts can clearly see that I failed to do that.
To make up for it, I've decided to review not one, but TWO books this week!
Thank goodness it was spring break last week and I spent most of the time reading.

1984 by George Orwell:

He's supposed to have a mustache, but all the
other Big Brother posters with mustaches
looked like Hitler and............oh.
From: www.bbook.com

Teaser thing: So basically this is the negative dystopia book. It's sort of ironic because everyone in the late 40's was dreaming about flying cars and robot maids in the future, and then you've got George Orwell here rocking in a corner thinking we're all gonna die 0_0.
It's set in 1984 (duh) in London, and is told from the perspective of Winston Smith. The entire world has changed dramatically since the 1940's (which was the perspective Orwell was trying to make), and it's DEFINITELY not been good. The world has organized itself into three super-nations: Oceania (the Americas, British Isles, and Australia), Eurasia (the rest of Europe, Western Asia, and southern Africa), and EastAsia (pretty much everywhere else), that are constantly at war with each other.
In Oceania, where the story takes place, everyone is ruled by The Party. They are a massively powerful political party who's main ideas are 'WAR IS PEACE, SLAVERY IS FREEDOM, IGNORANCE IS PEACE' so I'll let you draw your own conclusions from that. People can be arrested for thinking bad thoughts against the party, but oddly enough killing is encouraged. Party members are constantly monitored by telescreens that they can't turn off, and hidden microphones. It's common for people to be taken away in the middle of the night and never seen again. And that's only the surface o-o.
The story is told from Winston's point of view, which is growing against The Party, and wishes to take action against the oppressors.
((Spoilerific for the characters, but the review is fine if you're interested. If you're interested in the other book, scroll down to the teaser for that.))

Characters:
Winston Smith: The main character of the story. He is a 39 year old man who leads the typical life of a party member, and is sort of a borderline alcoholic ((but then again, who wouldn't be?)). He constantly questions The Party's motives and ideals, and is fairly sure that they are horrible but can't tell for sure. His job is falsifying records to The Party's benefit in the Ministry of Truth.
He starts a diary to try and tell future generations about The Party, but doesn't get very far with it and abandons it after things start to heat up. You see, he meets a girl named Julia who works in the Ministry of Truth too (her job is making 'fiction' books for the party) and they fall in love. Kinda. It's more of a 'let's do it and rebell against the government' sorta thing. Anyway, they do that for a while and then they hear about this thing called The Brotherhood. It's a rebel group that wants to take down Big Brother and The Party, and they try to join it but then they're betrayed and it sucks.
When they get caught, they're taken to the Ministry of Love, and are brainwashed into thinking The Party's ideals, and then the story ends.

Julia: The girl that Winston falls in love with. She has been rebelling against The Party since she was a teenager (she's 25 now) with acts of 'love'. I wanna call her a half rebel, since she mostly rebels for the fun of it, and less because it's against The Party's rules. She's really good at breaking the rules, but she doesn't seem extremely intelligent.

O'Brian: An Inner Party member who betrays Julia and Winston.
Inner Party: The elite of The Party. They get a bunch of special privileges such as good food and music that members of the Outer Party (like Winston and Julia) don't get.
Anyway, O'Brian is a shithead and no one can say otherwise. He pretends likes he's Julia and Winston's friend, pretends to invite them into The Brotherhood, and then it turns out he was just trying to arrest them the whole time! And then he's the one that brainwashes them into loving The Party.

Big Brother: The figurehead of The Party. I'm pretty sure he never actually existed, but that isn't the point. He's supposed to be the one thing that Party members love. Not their families, not their friends, only love for Big Brother.

Goldstien: The supposed leader of The Brotherhood. I don't think he existed either, and was just a trap for people who commit thinkcrime.

Review:
I want to explain more about the book, but then you'll never read it so there isn't much point.
I didn't really expect to like this book when I got it, but I thought I should read it since it's really famous and there are a bunch of references to it everywhere.
But.........holy crap this is a freaky book.
Not only is the idea of this sort of society existing frightening, the inside look that you get is even worse. There's the one scene where Winston kicked a severed hand into the gutter just after watching the guy who it belonged to get blown up by a rocket bomb like it was nothing!
And then there's the brainwashing part that's just...........*shivers in disgust*.
Don't get me wrong, this is a genuinely interesting book. But it's nothing like the dystopians you've read in the past.
I didn't like it very much, but maybe you will enjoy it more than I did.


Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell:
We're drastically changing gears here to a much happier and modern book.
I just realized how completely different these two books are.....weird.

Teaser Thing:

From: parade.condenast.com

There are these two twins named Cath and Wren that are from Omaha Nebraska. Cath is a total bookworm and completely introverted and has really bad social anxiety. Meanwhile, Wren is a party girl to the max, totally extroverted, but still smart.  These two are 18, and are just starting college it Iowa University.They both have a passion for the Simon Snow series (it's like Harry Potter), but Wren has sort of grown out of it. Cath on the other hand is a very famous fanfiction writer (like, super DUPER famous), and pours a lot of her time into writing her version of the last Simon Snow book.
Unfortunately for Cath, college brings around a lot of issues that Simon Snow can't help her with, like making friends, trying to take care of her bipolar dad, and love.
((spoilerific from here on out guys))

Characters:
Cath: The narrator of the story. An 18 year old who has usually relied on her outgoing sister in terms of social interaction, but her sister has decided to not spend as much time with Cath now that they're at college, which leaves Cath floundering in this new world. She finds solace in her writing, but of course she can't escape being friends with her roommate Megan, falling for Megan's friend Levi who is always in their room.

Wren: Cath's older sister who takes the party route during college. She and Cath used to be inseparable, but Wren wanted freedom from the whole twin thing (which I totally understand, but still she was really mean about it considering that Cath can't handle talking to new people) so she ditched Cath for her roommate Courtney. Wren goes to a bunch of parties, gets drunk a lot, and eventually gets alcohol poisoning which gets her to stop drinking so YAY!

Levi: The very attractive farm boy (which are unsurprisingly common considering they're in Iowa) who eventually ends up with Cath. He used to date Megan, but they broke up after starting college. He's an incredibly happy dude, always smiling and will help a friend at a moments notice. I think he's dyslexic, so he has to record a lot of his lectures and listen to them over so he understands whats going on in his classes.
He's a cutie patootie and makes me happy :)

Regan: Cath's roomate. She's a lot edgier than Cath (then again a pillow is edgier than Cath), which freaks her out, but eventually they become pretty good friends.

Nick: Cath's writer friend who turns out to be a huge asshole later :/


Review:
I know I sort of half-assed this review, but give me a break alright? The 1984 one took a while and I have other stuff to write.
I think that I might have a weird insight on this book, as an introverted teenager with social anxiety that enjoys writing and has triplet brothers, which probably swayed my opinion.
But seriously this is an amazing book. I have so much respect for Rainbow Rowell, because each of her books manage to be fun and happy, but also make you want cry without being overwhelming.
I realize that any of my guy readers (if I have any, shout out to the bros!), they probably won't enjoy this book as much as the girls, but it's worth a shot if it's raining and you don't have biking or whatever you do.
Gal readers, just read it. I know a lot of you will relate to Cath, and it's a great read.

___________________

Alright, got you guys TWO reviews.
Do with them what you will.
Since a link is still required, I invite you to play this game, which is horrible and will ruin your life.
You're welcome.

I Don't Freaking Know

I've been staring at this page for the last half hour and I can't think of a single thing to write about.

From: www.browneyedbaker.com

It might just be the sick haze that I've been in for the past week, but I haven't been able to think a single clear thought all day.
For example, we were doing a socratic seminar thing in English today (socratic seminar: When everybody gathers in a circle and talks about stuff) and we have to talk for participation points. Since today was the Day of Silence, I was originally gonna use that as an excuse to not talk since I feel like crap, but Mr. P made it very clear that we HAD to talk, even if we were participating in DoS.
Speaking of the DoS, I have a slight confession. I'm sort of a chatterbox most of the time. Not in class though, because that's disrespectful to the teacher and honestly there aren't very many people that I would want to talk with anyway. Knowing this about myself, I knew that DoS would be a train wreck if I actually tried to do it.  However, to make myself feel like I was a good person and participating, I decided to make some snickerdoodles and give them out to people and tell them about DoS. However I ran out before first period even started, and got sort of overwhelmed by the stampede of boys who saw that I was giving out food. Anyway, back to English class.
So we were all talking 'bout rights and stuff, when the little voice in my head was like 'Dude, you really need to talk soon. Otherwise you're gonna fail.' Since grades are extremely important to me, and failing English would be incredibly devastating, I started to just spew some crap that sorta sounded like it had to do with the subject.
You know when you sort of zone out while you're talking, and you can hear and feel yourself talking but you aren't really comprehending it? That's what happened in English. And it sucked. But I'm still feeling too sick to care much more than that at the moment
So this isn't really a review post, but I honestly haven't seen much this week that would require a review.
I really should've because I took two sick days this week and watched movies the whole time, but they were old movies that either I've already seen too many times to want to do an entire post on (a.k.a Disney movies), or everyone likes them anyway and it'd be pointless to do a post on them (a.k.a Lord of the Rings).
So I guess I'm just gonna leave it at that for this week. I'm sick and miserable and I don't have anything worth talking about.
I'll probably do a post about spring break next week if I don't end up killing myself and my family by crashing a four wheeler.
Or a car.
I estimate a 45% chance of either of those things happening, so the odds are in my favor, but only slightly O-0.

Portal 2

I hoped you guys liked my little hint last week.
The video was cute at least, even if you didn't understand what it was talking about.
Speaking of which, if you have played/watched Portal 2, then you probably started flipping out when you saw that this post would be about it. If you haven't, then that's unfortunate for you because you're really missing out.

Plot (kinda):

From:steamcommunity.com

So the thing about Portal 2 is that it's the sequel to Portal, which I haven't played yet.
Calm down gamer readers. It's on my computer and I'll play it as soon as I get my microphone working again (I'm gonna try and do gaming videos!).
Anyway, the main character, Chell wakes up from some sort of coma at the beginning of the game because the place that she's at is getting destroyed. She's saved from the crumbling building by a little blue robot named Wheatley, who leads her around the massive facility.
It turns out that Chell is still in Aperture Sciences, a massive research facility that she tried to escape from in the last game. Aperture Sciences is run by a robot named GLaDOS (Genetic Lifeform and Disk Operating System), who you tried to kill in the last game. You failed at that, and GLaDOS is still alive, and extremely pissed. She quickly finds you, and makes you start 'testing' again.

How the game works:
So that last part was probably a bit confusing for you guys that haven't played the game.
The thing that Aperture Sciences does is human testing. They put you in chambers with different obstacles, and different power ups. Obstacles can be things like bottomless pits, turrets that shoot at you, and lasers. Power ups can be blue goo that makes you jump higher, orange goo that makes you run fast, or weird tunnel things that you can float in.
You're main power up, is the portal gun. This gun attaches at your hand, and can shoot an orange portal, and a blue portal. If you go through the blue portal, you'll come out the orange portal, and vice versa. You can only shoot the portals at certain types of walls, but since these rooms are designed to be solvable, you can conveniently get portals in just the right places.
Basically the whole game is solving puzzles like this.

((Okay, it gets spoilerific from here))
Characters:
((look, I don't want to go to the Wiki page in case of spoilers with the first game, so this is mostly info I've gathered from the first game))

From:en.wikipedia.org

Chell: The protagonist of the game that never says a word. She has presumably been a testing subject at Aperture for a long time. Because Aperture is underground (like deep deep deep underground), she hasn't been up to the surface for a very long time, and is determined to get out of her scientific torture. She's adopted, but we never hear anything about her parents. She's very strong willed and can get through anything.

From:half-life.wikia.com

Wheatley: The little blue robot that I mentioned from earlier. He's a complete and total idiot who at the beginning of the game is tasked with watching you and possibly the other humans that were sleeping. For the first part of the game, he's trying to help you escape from Aperture Sciences because he's scared of GLaDOS and wants to get out anyway. Later, he helps you to defeat her, and in doing so becomes the controller of the facility. He then turns evil and realizes that he needs you to stay at Aperture and keep testing, so he sticks you in the old labs from the 1940s and you need to work your way back up. After you do, you eventually defeat him by throwing him through a portal to space.

From: pixelpub.wordpress.com

GLaDOS: GLaDOS was the main antagonist from the first game, but becomes your ally in the second. Well, at first she's evil, and completely resents you for trying to kill her by throwing her into the incinerator. But after Wheatley gains control and sticks her consciousness into a potato battery, she helps you get back to the control room and take Wheatley down. While you're going there, you learn that Aperture Scientists figured how to put a human consciousness into a robot, and GLaDOS partially has the consciousness of Caroline, the founder of Aperture Science's assistant (and personally I think she was sleeping with Mr. Cave Johnson cus how else did she get stuck inside the controlling force of Aperture Sciences?).  After you help her regain control of the facility, she lets you have your freedom, and everything works out well for everyone (except for Wheatley, who is in space).

Review:
I'm an absolute sucker for puzzle games. I've never liked FPS's because they're stupid and require reflexes that I don't have, but puzzle RPG games....those are a different story.
I know that lots of gamers don't like extremely linear games because they like to explore and stuff, but I enjoy linear games a bit more. I like having a list of things that I need to do, and getting to move on once I complete those tasks.
Then again, I play games for story more than anything, so that might be part of it too.
Speaking of which, the story if this game is SO good. I don't know who wrote it (edit: looked it up, Erik Wolpaw, Jay Pinkerton, Chet Faliszek), but they are a genius. The whole story is told by GLaDOS, Wheatley, and ancient recordings of Cave Johnson, but it's done so well that it seems like that's the only way they COULD tell it. And on the surface, it doesn't seem like there is much of a story, but when you think about it, everything that is said and/or implied really creates a complex web of Aperture Science's history.
The music is VERY good. It's sort of like.......techno dubstep. Ya. That's what it is. But it fits the atmosphere well and keeps everything interesting.
The graphics are beautiful, and I can't imagine how long it took for them to figure out how to get the portal thing to work. Good on you Valve. Good on you.

Conclusion:
Play the game. You'll love every second of it.

GUYS I NEED YOUR HELP ASAP

I would really appreciate it if you could all take this survey so I can have decent data for my English essay.
I will love you forever if you do so.