Cover Characteristic: Sharks

The Cover Characteristic meme is hosted at  Sugar and Snark.   Here are the guidelines:

Each week we will post a characteristic and choose 5 of our favorite covers with that characteristic. If you want to join in and share your 5 favorite covers with the weeks particular characteristic, then just make a post, grab the meme picture (or make your own) and leave your URL in Linky (so we can visit).
You don’t even need to participate, just stopping by and saying hi would be great! Don’t forget to stop by the other participants!

I  found 6 this week, although 4 of them are from the same series. So here are the two I have that are not part of the series:

And the other four are all part of the Meg series by Steve Alten, one of my favorite series!

I don't know that I've ever actually read the book Jaws, although that seems kind of far fetched to me.  No biggie.  So those are my shark covers. Can you think of any others?

 Hey, while you're here, you can go check out my "It's New to Me" Series Starter Challenge by clicking the link below. There's a giveaway for anyone who spreads the word about it, even if you aren't able to join in this year.

 

A to Z April: M Review - Many Waters by Madeleine L'Engle/Meg by Steve Alten

Today I have another kind of religious book to share, although it also has a science fiction edge and is part of a YA series. The other book is a science fiction series I love, and an author that I devour all of his books!

First is Many Waters (A Wrinkle in Time Quintet) by Madeleine L'Engle.  I know a lot of people have heard of and probably read A Wrinkle in Time at some point in their childhood.  As did I.  But at the time I also then wanted to read every book by that author, especially those that were in a series.  The reason I chose this book is because there was one thing that really stood out for me. Something that others may know more about from the book The Red Tent by Anita Diamont.  The tent that the women stay in, separate from the men, during their "time of the month".  I know that it was not a good thing, it was a way of discriminating against women, they were considered "unclean" during that time.  But today all I can think is that how awesome would it be if I could just sit and rest and be away from the rest of the annoying world during that time.  :-)  Right girls?  That's not all the books is about obviously, that's just what stood out in my head.  Here is the blurb from Goodreads:
A touch of computer keys, a blast of heat, and suddenly the Murry twins, Sandy and Dennys, are gasping in a shimmering desert land. If only the brothers had normal parents, not a scientist mother and a father who experiments with space and time travel. If only the Murry twins had noticed the note on the door of their mother's lab: EXPERIMENT IN PROGRESS. PLEASE KEEP OUT.

But it's too late for regrets. There's a strange -- and very small -- person approaching, with a miniature mammoth in tow....

At last it's Sandy and Dennys turn for an adventure -- an adventure that turns serious when they discover that "many waters" are coming to flood the desert. The twins must find a way back home soon, or they will drown. But how will they get back to their own time? Can they?

Second is Meg by Steve Alten.  This is an awesome science fiction story about the giant Carcharodon megalodon, an ancient prehistoric shark that has found its way from a hiding place deep in the ocean up into our world.  I could totally see the SyFy channel doing a movie of this series, but what I'd really love is if the people who did Jurassic Park would do this, using all the awesome technology and special effects to make it into the movie it deserves to be.  This actually is a series, there are 4 books in the series.  And this author has other great books as well.  Here is the blurb for this first book in the series from Goodreads:
On a top-secret dive into the Pacific Ocean's deepest canyon, Jonas Taylor found himself face-to-face with terror. The sole survivor of the mission, Taylor remains haunted years later by what he saw. Written off as a crackpot, he insists that the prehistoric shark known as Carcharodon megalodon still swims the deep underwater chasms.

Only an urgent call for help from one of his oldest friends can persuade him to return to those deadly waters. Now Taylor will relive his darkest nightmare, only to find that what he saw before was only the beginning. For what lies deep beneath the waves is a horror that could turn the tides blood-red until the end of time....


So, did you read A Wrinkle in Time when you were younger?  Are you a science fiction fan?  I love all things dinosaur and other prehistoric creature related, so Meg just fascinates me no matter how unrealistic the story may be.

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Review: Surrounded by Sharks by Michael Northrop

I was lucky enough to get an e-galley of this title from Scholastic through Netgalley.  I am a fan of this author, at least I enjoyed another one of his books, Trapped.   I've also been fascinated with sharks, really who hasn't, for a long time.  I remember watching Shark Week when it first started.  Now as cool as I think sharks are, I don't really want to go swimming with them. Especially not in this type of a situation. 

The main character is Davey.  He is a quiet, bookish type of boy, about 14 I think.  His family is on vacation, near Key West, but on a much smaller island nearby.  He wakes up before the rest of his family, pretty early, and decides to take his book and go out on the beach and read where he won't have to deal with the snoring of his brother and father.  He can't really just go back to sleep, you see he had to sleep on the cot for the night, while his brother got the other bed.  Tomorrow night he should get his turn on the bed.  But for now he just wants to go out and read in peace.  He goes down to the beach, there's no one on duty at the front desk, and not really anyone outside at the little huts on the beach yet.  The first place he chooses soon gets a little busier than he'd like just as everyone starts lining up at the dock to get a ride back so they can catch their planes home, or else just to go to the busier Key West for the day.  He sees a few people, including a girl about his age named Drew.  Drew also is kind of a main character as we get some of the chapters from her viewpoint.  Drew is from England, and is there with her mom and dad as well.  She's not real thrilled to be on this tiny island.  Kind of wants to get to Key West where her friend told her the "party is at." 

Davey wanders off to a more secluded beach to read.  There is a sign there that says no swimming.  After a while though, the water looks so nice, that Davey thinks he will just wander in a bit, just wade.  So he hides his book, shoes, and glasses, so that no one would steal them or see them if they came along.  As he wades a bit further, and further, he notices that he's gotten a long way from the beach without realizing it.  When he decides to go back to the beach, he tries walking and swimming back, but only getting pulled further away.  Seems the current has him.  Soon he is so far away he can't even see land anymore.  And without his glasses, he's not really able to see much of anything.  At one point he sees what he thinks is land, and swims toward it.  It turns out to be a plastic water bottle, like you'd see in an office that you put on the stand with a spigot to get drinks from.  He's frustrated at first, but then realizes he can at least use it to help float.  And there he stays, hoping that someone soon will find him.  Of course there are things in the water that notice him there.  Little fish, who nibble on him.  And then larger animals, sharks.  Now he is just waiting to be rescued. 

It will take his family almost the whole day, with the help of the hotel's staff, as well as police, and coast guard to get an idea where he is.  Even Drew, who saw him during their morning walk, will come in as a big help.

I like that this story took place over just one day really.  I think it is a very interesting book, and maybe a good read for someone who is a reluctant reader.  Definitely a quick read, and one that I had trouble putting down because I needed to know what would happen with the sharks, and when would his family finally figure out where he had disappeared to. 

A to Z April - Y: WhY Not Do Another Cover Characteristics Post?

Okay, so I couldn't figure out what I wanted to do for my Y post.  Originally I had planned to maybe do something on YA, young adult fiction, but I changed my mind.  I feel like I've talked about it a lot in my other posts.  Then I was checking out what this week's theme for Cover Characteristics meme sponsored by  Sugar and Snark, and really wanted to do it, it's sea creatures, how much fun is that? 
Here are the guidelines for how it works if you want to join in:

Each week we will post a characteristic and choose 5 of our favorite covers with that characteristic. If you want to join in and share your 5 favorite covers with the weeks particular characteristic, then just make a post, grab the meme picture (or make your own) and leave your URL in Linky (so we can visit).
You don’t even need to participate, just stopping by and saying hi would be great! Don’t forget to stop by the other participants!

This week's characteristic is:   Sea Creatures

5.

Have to include a Percy Jackson cover with the giant eye in the background!

4.

I know I showed this as one of my Science Fiction favorites, but it works for this too!  Can you imagine seeing a shark this big?!

3.

 

Does the Loch Ness monster count as a sea creature?  I mean it's not the ocean, but still.

2.

This is a book that I believe I got from a book fair at the school where I was teaching one year.  I really liked it, and wish there had been more, possibly a sequel I think would have worked.  

And my #1.

I loved the whole BBC series of Walking with Dinosaurs as well as their spin-offs like Walking with Prehistoric Beasts.  So this is one of the covers that instantly came to mind with this theme.

So what do you think of my covers?  Don't forget, only a day or so left to enter my Bloglovin 900 Followers giveaway HERE.