Book Review: Save Karyn by Karyn Bosnak

I have been dying to get my hands on a copy of this book for years! Finally found one from BetterWorldBooks.com last month and decided to order it. It finally arrived in the mail a couple of days ago.

I know what you're probably thinking, I should just have bought an e-book or download one for free, but I've always been a fan and fond of reading the "book" itself, as in in physical form. Anyways, here's what today's book is all about.

Taken from GoodReads.com -- technically from the back of the book itself. :P

Drowning in $20,000 of credit card debt, shopaholic Karyn Bosnak asked strangers for money online -- and it worked!

What would you do if you owed $20,000? Would you: A) not tell your parents? B) start your own website that asked for money without apology? or C) stop coloring your hair, getting pedicures, and buying Gucci? If you were Karyn Bosnak, you'd do all three.

Karyn started a funny yet honest website, www.savekaryn.com, on which she asked for donations to help her get out of debt. Karyn received e-mails from people all over the world, either confessing their own debt-ridden lives, or criticizing hers. But after four months of Internet panhandling and selling her prized possessions on eBay, her debt was gone!

In Save Karyn: One Shopaholic's Journey to Debt and Back, Karyn details the bumpy road her financial -- and personal -- life has traveled to get her where she is today: happy, grateful, and completely debt-free. In this charming cautionary tale, Karyn chronicles her glamorous rise, her embarrassing fall, and how the kindness of strangers in cyberia really can make a difference.

I really love Karyn Bosnak's way of writing, it's always so simple but unique at the same time. This book became my source of motivation during the last couple of days. After I was done with it, I knew that her lessons did not end where the last words in her book were printed, she imparted it with me.

This book about a major part of her life is a wake-up call to everyone who is probably on the verge of giving up on everything. Save Karyn motivates and teaches the value of giving wholeheartedly without expecting something in return. She might have made a terrible mistake before, but who doesn't anyway, right?

I personally think that her purpose of sharing her story in this book is not just to let people know that she had a genius idea that helped her out of the mess she was in but also through her story, she imparted probably the best life advice anyone could share and that is to never tire to give, forgive and fight back with kindness.

Save Karyn made me think hard about some areas of my life and it even made me want to be a better person not only for my own good but for the benefits of other people who helped me in the past and to those who might someday need my help.

Save Karyn, in my opinion, is better than any self-help books that ever exist. Five delish cookies with milk.

    

Book Review: Borrowed Children by George Ella Lyon

Read this book when I was is the fourth grade. I didn't understand it well back then, all I knew about it was it's about a young girl that was forced to stay home, manage a household and take care of a newborn baby. Nevertheless, I loved it. Here's the summary from GoodReads.com:

Twelve-year-old Amanda Perritt is pitched head-first into adult responsibilities when she has to quit school to care for her newborn brother and invalid mother. She gets an excape, she thinks, when she's offered a trip to stay with her grandmother and her sophisticated Aunt Laura in Memphis. But during the visit, she discovers unexpected parallels between her mother's childhood and her own and comes to understand her own individuality as well as what it means to be part of a family.

Years later, I decided to look for a copy and finally found one. I've decided to re-read it and I was surprised that my perspective and understanding changed. The story seemed too complicated to me before to find sense in it, but right now I can tell that it's little complexity showed nothing more but a pre-teen's perspective about a complicated life situation she suddenly delved into.

This book tells the story of 12-year old Mandy Perritt and how she became a mother instantly to a newborn baby and how she sacrificed her love and thirst for a good education when her mother fell really ill after giving birth to her little brother.

This book is worth reading. Might even take you back to that old pre-teen feelings you had when you felt deprived of something but at the same time instills the value of appreciating whatever you have instead of thinking that you're being deprived of for other people might have experienced worse than you did.

Great story! Four cookies!

   

Transform yourself with Schick

So after watching Iron Man 3 with hubbie a couple of weeks back, I found out that another superhero movie is coming out in the theaters again! This time though it will be everyone's all time favorite superhero: SUPERMAN. Also known as Man of Steel. Yup another man made of iron, but probably more classic than Iron Man himself.

I was actually looking forward to watching this new film but I was not quite sure when it will come out yet. Thank God for Nuffnang and Schick!

Schick. Free Your Skin.

I just received an e-mail promo from Nuffnang and they're giving away two (2) free tickets for the movie screening of Man of Steel this coming June 14 at the Shangri-la Cineplex. How awesome is that, right? Here's the cool promo banner:



I highly encourage that you join their blog contest if you want to win tickets for the premiere, too! It's actually pretty simple, just answer the question:

“If you had the powers of MAN OF STEEL for one (1) week, how would you use it?”

Well, here's my own take on how I would use Superman's powers:

If I remember it right from the Superman comics I've read when I was younger, Superman had the superhuman intelligence, superhuman breath, x-ray vision, combat skills and of course, how can anyone forget the superhuman strength and solar battery that he possessed?

Using these powers in particular would actually help me in my personal mission to help the NBI track heinous criminals and their masterminds to help eliminate crimes in our country using all of the mentioned superpowers.

With the superhuman intelligence I could easily help the authorities to track down petty criminals to big time, mafia-like chieftains, especially those who are involved so much in the drug business.

Along with it, is using the physical superpowers in defying those who would try to fight back to the authorities.

I would totally kick-ass. IF this DOES happen, I would make sure that I have my own tight and hot superhero outfit. LOL

But these superpowers should not all be used in fighting crime (and looking hot haha) but it should be also used in helping solve other issues such as using the superhuman intelligence to help scientists and doctors find cures for various diseases such as cancer, lupus, polio and AIDS/HIV.

Also, helping in assessing and assisting the children with special needs and the mentally challenged would be of great help to those who needs it for free, since assessment and caring for our physically, mentally and genetically challenged brothers and sisters costs so much. I guess the super strength would also help me train batch after batch of volunteers that would also like to help in caring for our brothers and sisters in need, as training is also pretty expensive for the volunteers.

Apart from these, I'd use my superhuman intelligence to figure out a process that would help extract solar energy from my body so that people who are not fortunate enough to have electricity would have one from my solar powers.

Last, but not the least... I'd fly all the way to Mindanao to talk to the rebels and try to make them understand that violence isn't the only key to protect one's land, heritage or to show off their powers. It is about the things that they can do to make their place a safer place to live.

And those are the things that I would do if I were given the powers of the Man of Steel for an entire week. I hope you'd participate in this too, I would love to read about what you can do. :)

Per DTI-NCR Permit No.1843 Series of 2013.