On the Verge of Lunacy

This is a flashback of the events that changed April Corrigan's life forever. Everything in her life seemed ordinary until one day her father's friend told her and the rest of the family that they have to leave everything behind because someone was hunting for them. April finds out that her father father worked for the FBI. Now he's involved in a trial that endangered his life and so they have to hide and start over with different names. You would not find a lot of action in this book but most of it involves April's insights and feelings about their situation. Sometimes she could be irritating, but as the story develops, she starts to mature. Slowly she began to accept that things have changed and that not all stories have a happy ending. I like how she was portrayed as a normal teenager - stubborn and emotional. The book could make you feel how desperate and helpless the characters are. There are no easy solutions and miracles that will solve their problems in an i...

Bejeweled 2 is a puzzle game in which the objective is to swap one gem with another near it to form a chain with three or more of the same gem. The chain created then disappears and more gems fall into place. There are four modes available. One is Classic where the objective is to never run out of possible chains. If there are no more moves available, the game is over. Action mode is the timed version of the Classic. The player has to keep creating chains so that the score bar becomes full or does not go down. In Puzzle mode, the player has to solve several puzzles to move on to the next level. Different problems will be presented and some of them will include special gems like the Rocks and Bombs. The Bombs have a timer and the player has to make sure they explode at the right moment, while the Rocks have to be near a Power gem or a Bomb to explode. Endless does not have a timer and will not run out of moves. There are also secret modes than can be unlocked when y...

Steven Erikson's masterpiece series continues with Toll the Hounds. Characters from the first and third book reappear in this eighth installment, which tells stories of inner struggles, triumphs and sacrifices. There are two main stories in this book. One is centered in Darujhistan and the other in Black Coral. Although this can be read as a stand-alone novel, some of the events leading to the convergence might be a bit confusing for anyone who has not read the previous books in this series. It's heavy on character introspection and most of the action can be found in the later chapters. Overall, the mood is dark and most of the characters contemplate about past failures. However, they are all talking about many variations of one theme - freedom. For some characters, freedom means privileges. These people believe they should have the things they want simply because they deserve it. For them it's freedom. They try to take advantage of every opportunity given to them and...

This series is inspired by elements and characters from Greek mythology. Age in particular has similarities to Hercules because of the Twelve Labors assigned to him by the Golden tribe and his seemingly herculean abilities. The names of the characters like Deianira and Iolaus, as well as the spaceship Argonaut, have connections with Hercules too. At the start of the series, it is explained that the universe was ruled by the Golden tribe. Before they left the galaxy, they passed on their knowledge to the younger tribes. The following tribes answered their call: Silver, Bronze, Heroic, and later on the Iron tribe or the humans. The Silver tribe saw humans as a threat and so they decided to annihilate them. The humans were forced out of earth and are now scattered across the galaxy. In the later episodes, the origin of the Nodos was explained. The Heroic tribe waged war within themselves. They destroyed each other until only five were left. They were punished by the Golden tribe by...

The tale is inspired by the Three Kingdoms period, specifically taken from the novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms. The story, told from Cao Cao's point-of-view, are the events that took place during Guan Yu's stay with Wei and his crossing of the five gates on his way to rejoining Liu Bei. The first scene shows the preparations for Guan Yu's burial. The rest of the movie is a flashback of the events. Cao Cao is shown here on a more positive light. His conversations with Guan Yu showed his understanding of the concept of freedom, prosperity and peace. Guan Yu always opposed his ideas and sought to challenge every concept that Cao Cao puts forth. Cao Cao however is intent on bringing him to his side and would try to appease the famous warrior with gifts. Guan Yu has a love interest in this movie. He met Qilan in the distant past and fell in love with her. It was also shown that he killed several men who attempted to do her wrong. Qilan, now Liu Bei's concubine, ...

The book is divided into nine parts. The introduction by Lewis Spence provides some information on how the cults and religions of ancient Egypt might have started. He briefly discussed animism, fetishism and totemism. He also discussed the different versions of the creation myth and introduced the importance of the pyramids and mummification. It is important to note that Spence has already stressed at this part of the book that the burial is important for the Egyptians. The last part of the introduction differentiated the ka and ba, meaning the spirit and the soul, respectively. The second and third parts introduces life in ancient Egypt in general and the different concepts the Egyptologists used in classifying information. The third part gives us a glimpse on how the sacred places look like and what encompassed the duties of the priests. Chapters four and five are the most important parts of the book. Part four is about the cult of Osiris. It retells the journey of Osiris and i...

Human and moral laws both insist that taking human life is wrong. But for victims and their relatives, what could be more satisfying than knowing that justice was served and karma has done its job. Most of the people who are directly affected by a crime, say murder of a loved one, would not think twice that death penalty is the only way to ease the grief. Imagine if you had the power to punish those people for the victims and their families. Light Yagami, a brilliant student and the son of a police officer, saw an unusual notebook lying on the ground in the schoolyard. While examining the book, he learns that he could see the shinigami who supposedly owns the Death Note. He also finds out he can use it as a weapon to kill people as long as he can see the faces and know the real names. He began experimenting with it and it was not long before he thought of using it to cleanse the world of criminals to build a new one where he can be proclaimed god. A world where there is true ju...

The movie retells the adventures of three college friends, Rancho, Farhan and Raju, who had to endure the presures of academic life and problems within their families. Rancho's deviant ways always got them in trouble, which started a rivalry with one of their instructors, Professor Viru "Virus" Shahastrabuddhe. It is a tale of friendship, love and learning. Near the end of the movie, Rancho was challenged by Chatur. He is the complete opposite of the former and is a typical hardworking, studious student. Rancho always topped the exams however and one day one of Rancho's pranks pushed him to the edge. Chatur told him that whoever becomes successful after 5 years win. So what happened to Rancho after graduating? You just have to watch the movie to find out. The movie shares a valuable lesson. That going to school should be fun. In our race to get high-paying jobs, we forget that going to school also involves learning. People study hard not to learn but to earn goo...

When I first saw the cover of this game, I thought it was just another no-brainer, relaxing game with a cute character. I was wrong. The first few levels were really fun but as I progressed through the story mode, some levels got trickier. Now I know why this game got good reviews. The opening video explains how the world was created - through dreams. But even such creations were threatened by a greedy Curator called 'the Collector'. The Curators, composed of eight, are responsible for creating the different levels. Sackboy goes through the seven levels before finally meeting the Collector on the eighth. Each has a different theme and difficulty level. Each level also has bonus games which can be unlocked by collecting the keys. Sackboy also meets different characters who tell him what to do on each level. Most of the levels require Sackboy to jump, grab, run, push/pull, use vehicles and mechanisms, and solve puzzles to get through. The player also has to collect items ...

Recently I've read Lewis Spence's Ancient Egyptian Myths and Legends. But instead of writing a review about it, I would like to talk about how reading myths became a lifelong obsession. I never really read a book from cover to cover until I was thirteen. When I tell people that, they're surprised because they thought it has always been one of my passions. Three years before that, I read in my English textbook four short stories about people who are well-known figures in Greek and Norse mythologies. I still remember how fascinated I was when I first saw that section, which is a hard thing to accomplish because my attention was always elsewhere. And I never liked to read. I didn't discover the joys in it yet. The book was called Language Arts for the Filipino Learners and it was a 2-part book filled with short stories. I loved it. I kept those books for years until I forgot where I placed them. I kept going back to those four stories. Sometimes I'd just stare at t...

Fuu, Mugen and Jin met in the most unfortunate circumstances. What with being harassed in a tea shop, getting caught up in a brawl and being arrested and beaten up for killing a government official's son. Mugen and Jin managed to escape with the help of Fuu, but the young energetic woman did so on one condition - that they help her find the samurai who smells like sunflowers. This 26-episode series featured the adventures of the trio as they searched for Fuu's father, revealed later by Fuu to her companions, in Edo Japan. Fuu always seems to get into trouble with thugs and other troublemakers. She is always hungry too and in fact joined an eating contest where she almost won. Mugen too attracts a lot of trouble and he's always trying to instigate a fight with anyone who wanted to get in their way. Jin on the other hand was the quiet type and always seems to hold himself with dignity and composure. Both men differ in their style of fighting as well. Jin leaned more to t...