The Making of Harry Potter

So about a month ago, on May 2nd, I was in London for a long weekend with my family when they decided to give me a surprise and, guess where they took me? To the Harry Potter Warner Studios!! I was so excited when I saw the bus with "The Making of Harry Potter" written on the side, because I've been wanting to go there since forever! 

So the experience was as good or even better than I'd imagined, and I could see everything, from the real Great Hall to the clothes and wigs the actors used, and their wands. I saw the Gryffindor common room, and Albus Dumbledore's office (with the Sorting Hat and Godric Gryffindor's sword!!). There was the Burrow's inside, Hagrid's hut, the Ministry of Magic and even the Potions class! The Knight Bus was there, and so were the Nimbus 2000, 2001 and the Firebolt. The Horcruxes and other special objects, such as the golden snitch, the Remembrall, the time-turner and many more, rested in a glass box for all of us to see! And butterbeer, it was so much sweeter than I expected! Seeing the goblins, seeing Aragog, Buckbeak, Dobby and even the mandrakes and baby Voldemort was... wow, can't find words to describe it. And the miniature model of Hogwarts that was used for every take of the outside was right there! And the Diagon Alley... I think that was the best thing of all. Every single shop had all the inside arranged, and Gringotts, and Fred&George's shop... everything. The inside of Ollivaders was impressive, with over 7,000 hand-made wand boxes with names on it. JK Rowling had one, and also did Tom Felton, Alan Rickman, and many more of the people who helped make our childhoods literally magical. And the shop!! Wow. Everything, from clothes and cloaks and everything from every one of the houses, to chocolate frogs and Bertie Bott's All-Flavoured Beans (which, of course, I had to buy!). It was awesome. 

Being able to visit the set may be the best thing that's happened to me in a long, long while (if not ever). So if you live in London or ever go visit it and you're a true Potterhead, that's the thing you must do. 

PS. I'll update this post soon with some pics of my visit, if you'd like to see them :)

Shatter Me, by Tahereh Mafi (Shatter Me #1)

Synopsis:

Juliette hasn’t touched anyone in exactly 264 days.

The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette’s touch is fatal. As long as she doesn’t hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don’t fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color.

The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war – and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she’s exactly what they need right now.

Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior.

I expected so much out of this book!! It was great, I loved it, and I really recommend it if you're looking for something good in the young adult genre. I knew what the trilogy was about before starting Shatter Me, and I knew there was going to be a love triangle, so it was obvious that Adam and Warner were the ones she was going to choose. Don't get me wrong, I like Juliette, but I just think she's sort of stupid some times. She hasn't eaten in ages, and she's sitting in front of the most delicious food in the world and because of her stubborness, she decides to starve herself to death to prove a point to Warner. And then she faints, what a surprise.
I've heard that Warner is one of Juliette's love interests, and I can see how he is interested in her, but with all the awful things he's done in this book, how is Juliette ever going to change her mind about him? Something big has to happen for her to forgive him and then love him? I don't know, but I know I will be a fan of Warner, if the excuse of forgiveness is good. Because I really like his character now (compared to Adam, who's too good to be true. Unbelievable), and I would love him to evolve in a way that's believable, that's what worries me the most.
The idea of the story is great, perfectly original and unique, so I sort of thought that Juliette would be the only one with "special powers"? But no, the ending had to become the new X-men movie... That was weird. And there are so many other things that were so wrong in the book, like the way Juliette has never been able to touch anyone but then her lifetime's crush appears and wow!, she can touch him. Of course. And Warner, her potential second love interest, too? Who can believe that? Just like the way the first three chapters go on in that cell without her saying anything special about Adam, and then he suddenly becomes the guy she's been in love with forever?
But overall, the book was fresh, which I think is the most important thing these days. And that's why I loved it. Can't wait to read more about Juliette, Adam and, more importantly, Warner ('cause I love deep characters the most)!! Read it. For sure. And tell me what you think. 

Divergent movie!!

Sorry for not posting this earlier, but I've been really busy and haven't had time to write something this long until now... 

So I finally watched the Divergent movie!! I went to the cinema a couple of weeks ago, on April 30th. The movie was supposed to be out on April 11th here, which I could understand, since the world premiere wasn't that much earlier, but on April 30th? It had been more than a month since a huge part of the world had seen it. 

Nevermind, I finally did. And it was amazing! I was so excited, counting down the days and the hours until I finally got to that cinema room and sat down with my best friends, one that had read none of the books, one that read up to Insurgent and the other one, up to Allegiant. 

After reading the last book in the trilogy, my perspective of the story as a whole and my conception of the characters had changed, and I kind of wanted to know what people with different knowledge about the books thought of the movie. 

It was fantastic. I enjoyed it so much! I just kept thinking how well pictured everything was, and how much I loved the cast. I'll keep saying it forever, but Shailene is the perfect Tris Prior. The Tris in my head was abolutely normal, not too pretty, not too smart, not too anything... (except maybe too brave?) so it made it so easy to identify oneself with her, even if I'd never choose Dauntless... And Theo... omg he's perfect <3 

The only weird thing about the characters was seeing Miles Teller and Ansel Elgort in those different roles when they both play Shailene's love interest in The Spectacular Now and The Fault In Our Stars, respectively. It was weird, but I got used to it fast enough. 

I'm not going to spoil you about the ending of Allegiant  if you haven't read it yeat (why haven't you????), but just let me say that some scenes really got to my heart because of Allegiant. The scene when Tris slides down the steel cable with the Dauntless initiates... wow. And when her mom dies... wow. Allegiant feelings all over. I cried, and not because of what was happening. 

So the cast was great, and the movie itself was awesome. The settings, the clothing... and it was so loyal to the book! Except of that weird scene where Tris just stabbed Jeanine in the hand and injected the serum to her, in order to make Jeanine stop the simulation from finishing its work and killing all those children and innocent people from Abnegation... They kept showing Christina in the simulation, how she was about to kill those people... 

Some things were kept the same way, some things weren't, but it's a movie adaptation and it was as loyal as it could have been (not like City of Bones...). So I'm really happy it was done this way, and I'm probably going to watch it again soon and maybe add things to this post, because the second time it's when I start noticing all those details I'd missed the first time. 

Now everything we have left is wait for Insurgent next year and for Allegiant parts 1 and 2 on the next few years :)

Have you seen Divergent already? You liked it? What faction would you choose? 

#TMITuesday

The release day for City of Heavenly Fire by Cassandra Clare, the sixth and last book in the Mortal Instruments series, is finally coming soon for you English-speakers. On May 27th, the ending chapter of the series following Clary, Jace and the rest of the Shadowhunter world will be released, and it will be over... But let's not think about that. Let's think about how kind Cassie Clare is by letting us read or see a new piece of writing or drawings belonging to any of her works every Tuesday. 

Until now, we've been able to see Cassie reveal 3 COHF secrets, an exclusive first look at the new drawings of Alec, Isabelle, Simon and Maia, together with some quotes, and some exclusive excerpts from the book, including one from the prologue (the one that came out today) which features Emma and the rest of characters that we'll be able to see soon in Cassie's new series The Dark Artifices, also set in the Shadowhunter world. 

So if you haven't checked them out yet, go do it here!! The only thing you have to do is share it, whether it's by Twitter, Tumblr, e-mail or Facebook, and be back next week for more exclusive content! Remember to mark your calendars for City of Heavenly Fire, released on May 27th!! :)