Ink Exchange

The novel Ink Exchange is the second novel by Melissa Marr set in the mysterious world of faery. It is a companion novel to her bestseller Wicked Lovely, in which readers are first introduced to the mysterious world of faery.

Leslie is a teenage girl. she is trying to live a normal life, but since her mother has left the family, her father has become a chronic drunk and her brother a druggie. She finds herself working hard to pay the bills, having almost no money for herself. Her brother has even used her to help him get money. Leslie feels that she needs a symbol of something that is hers and hers alone. Therefore, she goes to one of the tattoo artists in town, someone she has come to know pretty well after looking at tattoos for several months. Feeling that she needs something out of the ordinary, she chooses a tattoo from his private collection, one that will belong to her and only to her. But little does she know that others are interested in the same tattoo and as a result, her. She has no idea how much the tattoo will actually change her life.

Irial is the king of the dark fey. The fey live in the same world as the mortals, yet they have their secrets and strange habits, for they are not always visible to humans. The dark fey have a strange need. They do not have emotions and they must feed off of the emotions of fey. Yet the emotions must be dark not light and happy. A peace has settled now between the Winter and Summer courts so the sinister emotions that the former winter queen, Beira, so readily channeled they are starving and weak. Irial must find another way to feed off of others in pain, like the mortals, in order to prevent a war in which all the odds would be against his court. So he prepares to connect Leslie to him through the tattoo that she is about to receive. once she is bound to him, he will be able to feed off of her emotions and the emotions to the mortals near her will be channeled through him to her.

But their are two little factors that he did not count on when he chose Leslie for his girl. One was that her friend Aislinn was queen of the Summer Court and that she would do everything in her power to help her friend. The second is the presence of another fey, Niall, in Leslie's life. Niall has worked in the Summer Court as an advisor to the king for nine centuries, but he had a previous history with Irial in the Winter Court. He becomes very attracted to Leslie as he guards her like Aislinn has asked. Inside, he wars with his desire to have her close to him like he used to do with mortals and his consciousness telling him not to hurt her. He remains true to Leslie throughout the novel, even after she has been claimed by Irial.

I would strongly recommend this book to any teenager. Its a great read and it will keep you interested every moment of the novel. Go and read it instead of sitting here in front of the computer.

A World Without Journalism

People may think that journalism is a mediocre field that really has no effect on their life. But if you can, imagine a life without journalism. Journalists are free from the government. According to dictionary.com, journalism is "the occupation of reporting, writing, editing, photographing, or broadcasting news or of conducting any news organization as a business." If there was no journalism, we would live in a world of oblivion and ignorance. Journalism is the backbone of our country, the United States of America. Citizens of the U.S. have the responsibility to make an informed decision when voting for a public office. When we vote for high public offices like the president, the news media is in on every single move that they make. Without the freedom journalists have to collect information, we would be at a loss for information.
I remember when I first realized what the importance of journalism is in the U.S. when my mom made me and my brother watch All the President's Men on PBS. The two journalists in the story were the key factors to unraveling the Watergate Scandal and guiding the evidence towards Nixon, resulting in his resign, just prior to the vote of impeachment by the Congress, in which all odds were against him. Without the essence of journalism and the free press, our country would cease to exist as the world leader that we are today, for the people would not have the opportunities that they do in this world today

Inverted pyramid article on the AirFrance crash

Early Monday morning, an AirFrance flight from Rio de Janeiro to Paris, France disappeared from radar over the Atlantic Ocean and debris was found in the area where the plane last made contact by the Brazil Air Force.

France 228 people were aboard the plane and all are suspected to be dead. Brazil believes that they have the technology to find the jet, since they have the technology to dig twice to three times the depth they think that the plane has sunk.

The cause of the crash is yet unknown but it is known that the plane was flying through an area known for storms. As a result lightning is being considered as a cause for the crash. If that is confirmed, it would be the worst plane crash since 2001 (not 9/11).

Officials have said that it is very unlikely that any survivors will be found. Brazil is hopeful that they will be able to recover the black boxes although France is skeptical that they will be able to find anything.

Terrorist attacks have notbeen ruled out yet by the French government. If the black boxes are found, they will provide more information to why the plane crashed; however, limited information is available at this time.

Brazil is doing everything in its power to try to locate the plane and its black boxes and has a number of aircraft and naval vessels searching the sea for the downed plane.

Dance Mock Shell

http://www.dance4it.com/ballethistory.htm This website gives a nice summary of ballet, not only its history but also some of the highlights of the dance form. It is a good spot to start to taking a look at ballet.

http://www.centralhome.com/ballroomcountry/history.htm This website provides links to articles on the history of many of the different ballroom forms of dance

http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories.asp?historyid=ab82 This website provides a general overview on dance, its role in different cultures, and its evolution from its earliest forms to what it has become today.

http://dance.about.com/od/famousdancers/tp/Famous-People-in-Dance.htm This website provides information on many different dancers from Anna Pavlova and Martha Graham to Fred Astaire to Patrick Swayze and Micheal Jackson (yes he actually is listed there).

http://dance.about.com/od/typesofdance/tp/Dance_Types.htm This website provides short descriptions of different types of dance styles from ballet to hip-hop to country western as well as links to more information on the styles.

http://www.dance4it.com/greatdancers.htm This website provides short descriptions on many different dancers, even more than the website above.

The Teen Friendly Play

What can I say? Teenagers have been deprived of good cultural lessons because the theater is just not cool anymore. A New York theater company has decided to change this though. They are going to premier a simple play written by a teenager for his fellow teenagers. It deals with issues regarding

• school
• sports
• social life

and other common problems students may face in high school. The play is called, Too Old for the Innocence Yet Too Young Too Understand. The play has been widely received by many of the friends of cast members who watched yesterday's dress rehearsal. One person said "It's very realistic. No fantasies, or made up dramas and I promise they don't just break out in song for no reason. All the music comes from Ipods and boring teachers." The play opens tonight on Broadway.

*This is a fictional story written to illustrate the different techniques in online journalism.

How Newspapers Impacted the American Revolution

Newspapers played a major role in the move toward revolution and the changing opinions of people as the American Patriots prepared for war.

Many Americans had no cause to be angry at the British Government five years before the war at the time of the Boston Massacre. John Adams, our second president and a major advocate for independence, defended the British soldiers who fired at the colonists on March fifth. And history dictates that the soldiers were provoked and they had no intention of killing colonists, it was just one hit to many. Yet we look back on the incident as a time of brutal killing in which the British soldiers are at fault because of one engraving that was widely published throughout the time. I post it here because it clearly displays how a single picture can spread and change opinions of an event with just a few distorted facts. By the way, this engraving was done by silversmith Paul Revere of Boston.

The engraving of the Boston Massacre was probably one of the first articles that inspired a nation to rebel. But pamphlets published also helped, including the famous and well-known Common Sense by Thomas Paine. Many newspapers also became strong supporters of the revolution and may likely have been run by well-known Patriots, including the Pennsylvania Gazette by Benjamin Franklin. Look at novels that focus on the American Revolution and you will notice that many of them are centered on a newspaper. One of the more famous ones is Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes, which is read by schoolchildren across the country. The Boston Observer, the paper featured in that book, is the center of many of the early rebellions and the words gets out through their paper and codes that are inscribed within it.

Papers would change in late years but there is no way that you can deny that they had an immense effect on the American Revolution and what would happen to our young country in the years afterward.

News websites: USA Today vs. Boston Herald

HOME PAGE: Both newspapers have an appealing and enticing home page, filled with pictures that go along with stories. Stories at the top of the page deal with the entire nation and national politics, such as what the president is doing, war news, and information on space work, which will continue to fascinate people for years to come on USA Today's website. The Boston Herald posts more local stories at the top of the page, including news about the cities sports team, and other more local news. USA Today draws a more wide based group of people in, posting a picture with nearly every other headline. There are less categories to go through and the stories focus less on any particular area but more universally focuses on the world at large. Boston Herald focuses primarily on Boston and only attracts readers from the Boston area. There are much fewer national stories and almost no international stories, although the site does attract younger people looking to follow sports and celebrities. USA Today focuses more on the national and international front and it attracts anyone who is more interested in looking at the world as a whole.

AN ACTUAL STORY: The story is easy to read and a picture is usually included with ads running down the side on USA Today. I did not find it easy to reach the comments but it is most probable that people more inclined to find them would find it very simple or that my computer was simply not working right. The Boston Herald had fewer adds running down the side but no picture was included with the story although links were provided for related stories. It was very easy to comment on the story and the story was very current. Overall the story was relatively well presented.

OVERALL: Overall, navigation was relatively simple on both sites. USA Today had more people pictures and general news on it, but The Boston Herald was easier to be involved with and probably attracts the attention of younger people in the Boston Area more easily. Personally, I would be more inclined to read USA Today, but I am more interested in politics then sports and entertainment.

To view:
The Boston Herald: http://www.bostonherald.com/
USA Today: http://www.usatoday.com/