Fall 2011 RTW | Favorites

Some of my favorite shows and looks from Fall 2011 Ready to Wear so far :)

Gorgeous pops of color at Gucci.

Bold combos at Roksanda Ilincic.

Gorgeously patterned and embellished dresses, gowns, and kaftans at Naeem Khan.

Boho chic couture at Mary Katrantzou.

{Source}

And now all these shows have me super excited for
Lakme Fashion Week!
{March 11 - March 15, 2011}

Alas...

...A new semester has started and taken over every minute of my life. My Google calendar has every waking (and some sleeping) minute of my life planned out for me to the T.

And, I think I'm getting sick.

So...here is to the awesomeness of green tea, and the non-awesomeness of homework and upcoming exams designed to nudge a college student towards killing themselves. All while listening to Lady Gaga on repeat.

Yay!

For the love of my jasmine green tea. It smells like real, fresh jasmine flowers in India and distracts me from the mind-numbing mundaneness (yes, I just invented a word) of my homework.

Book Review: The Caster Chronicles by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

Since this summer, I have been hearing tons and tons of hype about the two books in the Caster Chronicles Series - Beautiful Creatures and Beautiful Darkness, by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl. This winter, I was finally able to lay my hands on these two novels, and got to reading them straightaway.

**WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD!! 

Beautiful Creatures (Book 1)

The book introduces you to the protagonist, Ethan Wate, who has lived in Gaitlin, North Carolina for all this life and is itching to get out. Then he meets the strange new girl at school, Lena Duchannes, niece of the town shut-in, Macon Ravenwood. In one strange meeting, they both come to realize that they have been dreaming about each other since long before they met. Lena shies away, but Ethan wants to know what is going on, and why they have this connection.
From here everything spirals out - an uneasy friendship, a whirlwind romance, a curse, some totally cool supernatural relatives, an underground library, a moody mansion, and one really, REALLY evil mom.
I quite enjoyed reading this novel. The writing was very rich and detailed, and described everything from the townsfolk, to the mouthwatering Southern food to the Caster mythology in great detail. The characters seemed pretty well developed. I loved watching Lena and Ethan's friendship develop into a romantic relationship - it was paced well and quite realistic. I burned through the whole book in about two days, leaving time for eating and showering, because I was itching to finish and it and solve the mystery. As a gothic mystery, it worked really well for me and I really enjoyed the read.

Beautiful Darkness (Book 2)

Most unfortunately, I cannot say the same for the second book. It picked up right where the first one left off, BUT there was so.much.angst.! It seems that as Lena pulled away, Ethan let her, instead of going after her (on multiple occasions). The first half of the book dragged, and nothing much happened except for more.angst. The moment the pace picked up however, I really got into the book and burned through it in one day, again waiting to find out conclusion. BUT again,  not that much actually happens in this novel's conclusion, since it is set up as a cliffhanger for a third (perhaps final?) volume.

Overall, I would give the books about 6.5 or 7 out of 10. My favorite characters in the series have definitely got to be Amma (she is so badass) and Ridley (evil, but a lot of fun to read!).

The Summer Reading Lust List....Continued!

But perhaps it should now be renamed as the Winter Reading Lust List instead? Hm...

Anyway, so it turns out that my Summer Reading Lust List remained very much unfinished! With so much going on, including my internship, traveling, dance, and more, I hardly came close to reading everything I wanted. Thus, this winter break, I made several trips to the my local library and walked out with about 10 books each time (much to to the chagrin of my parents who were wondering what I was going to do with thirty novels in my room!). So....I've finished so far:

Split, by Swati Avasthi
Beautiful Creatures, by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Ship Breaker, by Paolo Bacigalupi
White cat, by Holly Black
Gone, by Lisa McMann

Still to finish within the next few days --

Beautiful Darkness, by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khalied Hosseini (This is my fifth or sixth read of this book - I simply LOVE this book!)
Five Flavors of Dumb, by Antony John
Eon: Dragon Reborn, by Alison Goodman
The Ghosts of Asbury High, by Jaclyn Moriarty

Glimpses of An Indian Summer :)

Remembering my Indian Summer :)

{Monsoon rains}

 {Rath Yatra}

 {My Aunt's Rooftop Garden}

{Dahi Phuckha = MAGIC!}

{Changing Summer Skies}

{Summer}

:)