Mandy Wrangles reviews and tests Anna Gare’s new cookbook.

You probably already know Anna Gare as judge of Australian Junior Masterchef, and also as the host of Great Australian Bake-Off. She’s also the author of two cookbooks – in 2011 she released Homemade and the brand new Eat in – the best food is made at home. I have to agree with her on the title!

I love Anna’s theory that “…cooking, like love, does not have to be rocket science. It is a way of thinking, tasting and feeling that allows you to draw pleasure out of what could otherwise be ordinary. It turns a chore into a little party, or, sometimes, a big one…”

Eat in is a simple cookbook to navigate. Beautiful colour photographs accompany each recipe, which are listed under the headings: good morning!, lovely lunches, feeding family & friends, salads, what’s for dinner mum? and sweet things.

Included is a handy conversion chart – something I wish every cookbook had (I can’t tell you how much time I’ve wasted trying to convert American recipes to Australian measurements).

Recipes vary from the more exotic-sounding, such as the Quail with pistachio, orange and sage butter and Whole poached trout with celeriac rémoulade to one of my Nanna’s old favourites – Butterfly cupcakes. All the recipes are written in an easy to follow manner; there’s nothing too difficult or out of reach for the everyday home-cook.

I decided to give Anna’s Tealight chocolate mousse with pistachio praline a go as my test recipe. Now, you’ll need to read the book to get the actual recipe… but I can tell you as the first time I’ve ever made praline – it was a success.

Praline is one of those things I’ve always been a bit wary of in the kitchen; too much can go wrong (think burned toffee, burned skin, a big old messy pot to scrub…) but this was simple, everything I needed was already in my pantry and fridge, I escaped without burning anything, and the clean up was immediate with hot water. Too easy!

I didn’t have any tealight glasses handy to serve, so instead used my favourite glass tumblers that are reserved especially for desserts. And the verdict from my family? More please…

 ‘Anna Gare – Eat In – The Best Food is Made at Home’

207 pages

Text by Anna Gare

Photography by Ian Wallace

Published by Murdoch Books 2013

ISBN – 978-1742663890

After the 1st wave, only darkness remains. After the 2nd, only the lucky escape. And after the 3rd, only the unlucky survive. After the 4th wave, only one rule applies: trust no one.

Now, it’s the dawn of the 5th wave, and on a lonely stretch of highway, Cassie runs from Them. The beings who only look human, who roam the countryside killing anyone they see. Who have scattered Earth’s last survivors. To stay alone is to stay alive, Cassie believes, until she meets Evan Walker. Beguiling and mysterious, Evan Walker may be Cassie’s only hope for rescuing her brother—or even saving herself. But Cassie must choose: between trust and despair, between defiance and surrender, between life and death. To give up or to get up.

Hardcover, 457 pages

Published May 7th 2013 by Putnam Juvenile (first published April 7th 2013)

Krista

Cover 

The cover is perfect fitting for the book. It describes a scene in which we are solo wanderers if we want to live, hiding in the forest, travelling at dusk and night is our best chance of survival.

Characters

The story is told from 3 different perspectives and sometimes a 4th. As the characters all get separated into different groups the varied perspectives allows the reader to see what is happening at the same time in different places.

Favourite

Evan is my favorite character. Throughout the novel he had me wondering about what he was hiding. I had a soft spot for him.

Least Favourite

I both liked and disliked Cassie. But she does show growth throughout the novel and I really liked her more in the ending. She is a fighter when it comes down to the people she cares for and her own survival.

Beginning

We jump into the story at the present time and get back story through memories of each of the characters as their POV’s are introduced.

Storyline

After the Aliens have decimated the Earth, humans for the most part are just solo survivors as forming groups is dangerous. When Cassie’s little brother Sammie is taken away by a government group, she decides that she cannot let him go and must rescue him from the camp.

Ending

The story is a build up for the ending. We get to know the characters throughout the story but at the end they all come together. There is a final battle scene that leaves you needing more.

Thoughts

A survival story that when you think about it, is really creepy.When the enemy looks just like you, how do you fight them? It could be a person you’ve known your whole life, your neighbour, your teachers, your family. That is the real backbone to this story and the different perspectives range from younger to teen. I would have loved to see one adult perspective but enjoyed the story as is – romance and danger rolled into one.

Quote

“How do you rid the Earth of humans? Rid the humans of their humanity.”

Lisa:

Cover 

One of the prettiest covers on my bookshelf! There are so many different elements, that truly represent the story inside, and that are just beautiful. What a piece of eye candy! If you tilt the book to the side, you can actually see the rays of sun shine through the branches of the trees.

Characters

There were many interesting characters featured in The 5^Th Wave, and it was compelling to see how these different personalities dealt with what was going on!

Favorite

Cassie and Ben were definitely my favorite characters! Cassie was that butt kicking girl I crave for in books like The 5^th Wave. She matured and grew strong quickly when things started to fall apart. She handled situations much better than I think I would have been able to. When the reader was first introduced to Ben, Cassie was day dreaming about her crush on him. After being in a child military academy Ben was used to hiding his feelings and following orders. But when Cassie’s little brother, Sam who was only five arrived, Ben really opened up to him and took him under his wing. I also thought Sam was tough in his cute baby brother way.

Least Favorite

I didn’t really hate or was even bothered by any of the characters. I felt that each, big or small, personality really made the story. Evan, was kind of mysterious, but also very sweet to Cassie. The Others, that you don’t know who or what they are, but are always there and watching somehow. Each was a component to an amazing story!

Beginning

Millions of people have died, and things are just getting worse and worse. Since the Others have arrived and the first four waves have come, the world seems to be ending. After losing her mother, Cassie is lucky enough to still have her dad and baby brother alive, until they are separated in hopes that they’ll be safer once the fifth wave strikes.

Middle

Cassie is on her search for Sam, but is shot and on the verge of dying. When she finally wakes up, she finds herself in someone else’s bedroom and in bandages. Cassie meets Evan, her saviour, who seems…almost too good to be true.

End

Evan isn’t exactly who he says he is, but decides to help Cassie get her brother back anyways. Cassie sneaks into the child military academy and bumps into Sam. But she also bumps into her high school crush, that I mentioned earlier, who seems to know her brother. Cassie and Sammy are reunited, but things aren’t over yet; the fifth wave hasn’t come!

Overall Thoughts

The 5^th Wave had so much hype when it was first released and I was excited to see what everyone was talking about. And I know I’m going to sound like everyone else, who was screaming on the top of their lungs, but I LOVED THIS BOOK – from the characters, to the actual storyline, and especially the ending! I felt that there was always something around the corner and I’m so excited to see what the next book will be about and how things will go for Cassie and the group!

When thinking about influential women under the age of 25 these days, one name springs to mind. The young lady who has had my friends and I in jaw-locked awe is Malala Yousafzai. You will definitely have heard of her… especially if you follow the news.

When I was her age, my biggest concern was not being allowed to go to the Blue Light Disco to make puppy eyes at the latest hottie. The plight of other 16 year old girls around the world couldn’t be further from my mind. So just to re-ignite the embers of interest here’s a run down of why Malala will go down in history.

In Pakistan and in many of the middle Eastern countries, girls and women are not given the same right to an education as their brothers. The Taliban, perhaps, see education of females as a threat to their regime. So Malala was forced to use pseudonym when writing blogs for the BBC about what life was REALLY like under the Taliban. In 2009 she was only 11 or 12.

In 2010 a documentary was made about her life by The New York Times. This lead to her public speaking fame which she she chose to use to turn the spotlight on the plight of the inequality in educational opportunities in the middle east. This also lead to award nominations and the International Children’s Peace Prize.

Malala again made headlines in October of 2012, when the Taliban tried to shut her up for good by shooting her in the forehead, and killing her classmates who were on the bus with her. She spent many months in rehabilitation.

By April 2013 Malala had been on Time Magazine‘s ‘100 most influential people’ list, and her face graced the cover of that issue. Standing tall in the faces of the terrorists.

Canada decided to give Malala an honorary Canadian Citizenship a few days after the first anniversary of the shooting.

She won the inaugural National Youth Peace Prize in Pakistan and was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. The Nobel slipped past her this year, but I know in my gut that she will get the honour in the years to come.

What this incredible young woman does in her spare time will change the world for the better and when she turns her sights on public speaking, she is one outstandingly inspirational person.

“One child, one teacher, one book, and one pen can change the world. Education is the only solution. Education first.”

Malala has released her first book entitled I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban.

I look forward to getting the chance to read this book as it has the potential to make a whole generation sit up and pay attention. How grateful I am that we to live in an era when 16 isn’t too young to have a say in the future of our planet.

Here is a link to the speech Malala made to the UN in 2013.

I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban

Paperback,320 pages

Published October 8th 2013 by W & N Non Fiction (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)(first published March 2013)

ISBN: 0297870920 (ISBN13: 9780297870920)

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malala_Yousafzai

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18276061-i-am-malala

Paul is interviewed by Bec Stafford.

The Only Game in the Galaxy, Book 3 in The Maximus Black Files, is hot off the press. Congrats! Can you tell us a bit about this third instalment and your experience writing it?

The back cover blurb says: 

In a galaxy of cut-throat companies, shadowy clans and a million agendas, spy agency RIM barely wields enough control to keep order. Maximus Black is RIM’s star cadet. But he has a problem. One of RIM’s best agents, Anneke Longshadow, knows there’s a mole in the organisation. And Maximus has a lot to hide. 

So begins a game of cat and mouse between Maximus Black, our anti-hero, and Anneke Longshadow, pillar of light and good. You might remember ROR conducted a survey a long time ago when Mole Hunt, the first book in the series, came out, you asked if main characters need redeeming features. No respondents thought they did, and a few came out with some classic bad guys who have none. And this is where major publishers fail themselves. This “redeeming features” business is a fallacy. This trilogy was rejected by many publishers. The closest it came to even getting published was with Penguin in the UK, but after a meeting decided they already had the young James Bond series and I think Artemus Fowl, so they declined. It’s lucky I’m a publisher myself. The Maximus Black Files finally saw print with Ford Street Publishing, and it’s been selling extremely well.

Paul, Maximus and his sassy nemesis, Anneke Longshadow, are lively, emotionally complex characters that leap off the page. Can you talk to us about their development and how much fun you have playing them against one another?

I get asked sometimes if I use friends as inspiration for my main characters. I don’t think I do, but I definitely have in mind my favourite characters from other writers’ books. I think of Anneke as Modesty Blaise, Maximus as Artemus Fowl’s evil twin, Daretor from The Jelindel Chronicles as Willie Garvin (Modesty Blaise’s sidekick). When playing characters off against one another you need to know how far your characters will go to top the other one. You need to know from the outset that they’ll do anything to win, bar killing their opponent. So to suspend disbelief, you need to show how the characters are feeling toward their nemesis, and how they personally want to exact revenge rather than hiring someone to do their dirty work. And when it comes to a time when they have their opponent in their sights, the reader needs to know exactly why they’re not going to pull the trigger. So all of this has to be foreshadowed. If you hate someone enough to wish them dead, and then you don’t kill them when you have the chance, there needs to be a rationale for this outcome.

As well as your latest Maximus Black story, Damnation Books in the US just released an adult horror novel, The Beckoning. Do you enjoy getting into different creative headspaces, and do you do anything special to prepare before you sit down to write for one audience or another?

 To be honest, The Beckoning was written over thirty years ago. Yes, persistence is the key when being a writer! This book was first typed on an electric typewriter on the counters of two bookshops I owned in the 80s and 90s. Luckily for me I saved it by typing it on to my first computer back in the mid 90s. It’s since been stored on 3.5 discs, floppies, CDs, zip drives and USB sticks and transferred to about four computers. So in answer to your question, there was no trouble in getting into a specific adult versus young adult headspace when writing these books. But seriously, I can swap genres quite easily. While writing and editing The Only Game in the Galaxy, I also wrote six Lucy Lee books for Macmillan, a choose-your-own adventure called The Toastinator for Macmillan NZ and a middle reader called The Pranksters’ Club for Blake. So we have lower, middle, young adult and an adult horror book that I revised with an editor, all happening at the same timeframe.

Which of your fictional characters Burns Brightest in your mind and why?

 The answer to this might have once been Jelindel, from The Jelindel Chronicles. She’s feisty, going through the rite-of-passage with two young blokes, one of whom is a shyster, and yet somehow she never (well, most of the time!) complains. She learns, she battles wizards and foes despite overwhelming odds, and fulfils her quest. I think Maximus would now burn brightest. As I’ve implied, I thought I had the ultimate anti-hero, someone so bad he killed an entire civilisation seemingly on whim, eliminates enemies with not a second thought, and yet somehow, Maximus Black fans have told me they wound up rooting for him to win. Maybe I did too good a job on him lol. A close friend of mine read the first draft of Mole Hunt and basically said the lead character was so bad that he found reading the book distasteful. Luckily for me the vast majority of readers found the complete opposite.

We all love a Bad Girl and they always seem to get the most dramatic make up looks. Here are a few of my favourites of late!

Harley Quinn by Julia Graf 

Witch Hazel by VivaGlamLana

Little Miss Muffet by KlairedelysArt

Maleficent by formidableartistry

Akasha (Queen of the Damned) by MsRoshPosh