[Review] Signs Point to Yes by Sandy Hall

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Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 20/10/2015

Publisher: Swoon Reads
Pages: 613

Source: For review
Genre: YA - Contemporary (12+)

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Carly Rae Jepson - I Really Like You ♪

My Rating: 

Fluffy and light read

My thoughts

(It's actually 2 stars but I don't actually have a graphic for it and I'm too lazy to make one just for this book. If ever I come across another 2 star book maybe then I'll make one.)

I should have run the other way as soon as I saw the cover and read the description, but it's been such a long time since I actually reviewed a book that I'd been sent for review (unsolicited) and I was in the mood for a light and fluffy read . . . Well, that's exactly what this book is: fluff. I felt like I was actually using less brain cells to read this book than I would have had I been watching an episode of The Bachelor. For some people that's not such a bad thing at all. After all, reading is a portal to another life, an escape from reality. But. I just could not connect at all. I'm only disappointed in myself because I knew exactly what I was walking into. One look at the cover and you should know what's in store for you. Now that that's out of the way, let's go a bit deeper.
 

[Review] Lair of Dreams (#2) by Libba Bray

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Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 26/08/2015

Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Pages: 613

Source: For review
Genre: YA - Historical (14+)

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Emily Brown - Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of These) (Cover ♪

My Rating: 

Captivating - what a thrilling read!

My thoughts

OMG, 'LAIR OF DREAMS' WAS SO GOOD! This is an example of a really good sequel to a series! It has its own storyline and plot, and the characters are developed well, in that the author didn't depend on the first book to serve as their only characterisation. The overarching plot of the series has vastly widened, opening up towards grander things in books to come!

[Review + Giveaway] Queen of Shadows (#4) by Sarah J. Maas

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Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 01/09/2015

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Pages: 645

Source: Bought
Genre: YA - Fantasy (14+)

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Ginny Blackmore - Holding You ♪
♪ Christina Perri - Human ♪
♪ Björk - Army of Me (Remix) ♪

My Rating: 

Gripping, emotional, edge-of-your-seat read

My thoughts

Sarah J. Maas never fails to amaze me with her gripping storytelling - one of such rarity, managing to captivate me time and time again with bone-chilling, edge-of-your-seat, tantalisingly glorious twists and turns, and unfaltering writing style. 
Her heightened ability to create characters that stick, cling and crawl under one's skin seems to be a weapon of its own. I cannot, will not manage ever to remove Aelin nor Aedion nor Rowan nor Chaol nor Dorian nor Nehemia nor Sam, out of my heart and mind. I know I am not alone in this, a reader whose connection to the characters found in a book made profound, palpable and real and lovely... For me it is something I cannot find often in tv or movies. As a sequel, the fourth book in the Throne of Glass series, it stands triumphant. I am still reeling from the experience, excited for the day to come when my real life friends to whom I've recommended this series get around to reading this so they too can engage and fall in love with the characters, the writing and the author as much as I have.

[Review] One by Sarah Crossan

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Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 27/05/2011

Publisher: Viking Juvenile
Pages: 270

Source: Bought
Genre: YA - Contemporary (16+)

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Coldplay - Fix You ♪
♪ Skin and Bones - David J. Roch ♪

My Rating: 

A special, heartbreaking story

My thoughts

Wow. This was such a beautiful story, and I an not ashamed to admit that the ending brought me to tears.

'One' is a young adult novel, written in verse, told in the perspective of conjoined twins, Grace and Tippi. So many thanks goes to Allen and Unwin for the opportunity to read this important book. For the short time I have spent with these characters between the covers I will take to heart the lovely messages and lessons Crossan has imbued in me with her storytelling. For me this is such a special book, as are all contemporary/realistic fiction... because it is just about people- their fictionalisation is merely an aside.

[Review + Movie] Paper Towns by John Green

Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 01/10/2008

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Pages: 305

Source: Gift (Box Set)
Genre: YA - Contemporary (14+)

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Slash - Gotten (feat. Adam Levine) ♪

My Rating: 

Solid read

My thoughts

The Book

I go in writing this book review with anxiety, because it is another case where I didn't actually write any notes so I'm just going to write off the top of my head, which also means I'll be pulling things out of my ass. But. Luckily I did discuss this book out loud and over text message so I've at least got my feelings sorted out. It's just a matter of getting it all out in a fairly comprehensible way...

[Recap] Hachette Date A Book Blogger Night 2015

What: Date A Book YA Bloggers Night 2015
When: Monday 17th August 2015, 5:30-7:30pm
Where: Hachette HQ (aka. the land of awesome, like OMG JUST TAKE ME!)
Why: Because books rock and so do book people! :D
How: The faeries!

Okay! Let's see if I'm bothered enough to see this through to the end. Heheh... heh. Well, so there was this thing on the other night in Sydney Australia (I live there!) called Date A Book YA Bloggers Night, held over at the Hachette HQ. I so wish I could just live there, like if I had the choice between being eaten alive by a pack of rabid ANY OF THESE, and living at Hachette HQ (or really any bookish anything), I'd choose the latter without a doubt.

This was their second annual Blogger Night and it was, by far, bigger and better than the first! Now, being confined in a small space with a bunch of people I may or may not know, whether online or by brief offline encounters, wasn't the most appealing idea for me to spend my evening (especially as I was stuck between night shifts... and still am). Hey, just being honest here! My friend had bailed on me, and I didn't want to be the awkward chickadee standing by the corner eating a pile of snakes and staring at everyone creepily, or latching onto a group of people, clutching to them FOR DEAR LIFE because OH GOD DON'T LEAVE ME! I'm exaggerating here, but you get what I mean.

[News] Giveaway winners

Source: ♥

So the time has finally come! My 5 year blogoversary giveaway has just come to an end, and the winners have been declared! Without further ado...

• Rebecca from Reading Wishes! (Yay! Another Aussie blogger! :D)
• Dea (I did a bit of Google stalking, I think this is her blog? Correct me if I'm wrong!)

Both of these lovely chickadees will be receiving a preorder of their choice from the list I gave in my previous post. :) Don't worry if you didn't win - as long as I keep up with this blogging business there shall be more giveaways to come in the future!

Until next time!

 

[Review] I Was Here by Gayle Forman

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Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 27/05/2011

Publisher: Viking Juvenile
Pages: 270

Source: Bought
Genre: YA - Contemporary (16+)

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Zedd - Clarity (feat. Foxes) ♪

My Rating: 

Absorbing read

My thoughts

It has been two months since I read this book, so forgive me for not really remembering too many of the specifics about this book. I still remember the important things, so I guess that's all that matters. I'm sure that my dwindling memory is not at all a reflection on the impact that this book had on me. I remember being very moved by Forman's words in I Was Here. Maybe not as much as If I Stay (that book will forever have my heart), but I still remember being moved.

I Was Here is a book about grief, and life and love. We follow our main character Cody who is devastated by her best friend Meg's recent death (she ingested a whole bottle of industrial-strength cleaner in a faraway motel room). She is left with many questions, but most of all: Why? Until she starts to dig a little deeper, and discovers that maybe it wasn't entirely of her own volition. Cody will stop at nothing to get to the bottom of this. It might not bring her best friend back, but maybe, just maybe finding truth will help to ease her overwhelming feelings of guilt that came with drifting apart from her best friend when she moved away for college, and not even knowing about this side of her.

It is no surprise that I am a huge fan of Gayle Forman's writing. She is a beautiful person and author who I hope to one day have the pleasure to meet. She has a unique talent of breathing life into the characters she creates. I fell so hard for Adam and Mia in If I Stay and Where She Went. I held my breath for Allyson and Willem in Just One Day and Just One Year. Cody resonates within me on a core level. I may not have lost a friend to suicide, but I have lost friends to reasons entirely outside of my own control. People just grow apart. And like Cody, I have harboured intense feelings of guilt and questioning and grief and worry. Like Cody I care a lot, though I may be blindsided at times and miss out on the bigger picture. We may not learn too much about her. For me, sometimes it's not extremely important that the character have an illustrious background and personality. Sometimes it's just enough that the reader is able to relate to them on some intrinsic level, if the plot works.

[Review] A Court of Thorns and Roses (#1) by Sarah J. Maas

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(#1, A Court of Thorns and Roses)

A Court of Thorns and Roses | Untitled

Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 05/05/2015

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Pages: 419

Source: Bought
Genre: YA - fantasy (16+)

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Major Lazer - Powerful (feat. Ellie Goulding & Tarrus Riley) ♪

My Rating:

Tantalisingly swoonworthy

My thoughts

How do I express exactly what and how I feel for this book? Okay, let's start with this simple and undeniable fact: I am a huge fan of Sarah J. Maas' books. I think her storytelling is on point, her writing style is lovely and eloquent and effective, her use of dialogue, tension, suspense, conflict and astute development of her characters just work perfectly together, grabs me in the heart every single time, leaving me gasping, emotionally spent from the experience. Her grasp on the human condition translates perfectly into her heroines. I loved Celaena's (Throne of Glass series) rough edges, her will to live above all else and her vulnerabilities. I absolutely love that she empowers her female characters, gives them roles that matter and feel real and they are never the same as when we first met them. That is the mark that a truly magical thing has taken place in your story: your characters have undergone irrevocable changes. 

A Court of Thorns and Roses is a loose fairytale retelling of Beauty and the Beast involving an ancient war between faeries and humans. It is a heart-wrenching story about love, family, survival, power and humanity. It follows 19-year-old Feyre’s journey as she is plucked from her miserable impoverished home in the mortal lands after she plunges an ash arrow into a wolf during one of her hunts, not knowing that it was actually a faerie. Unknowingly she has broken an age-old vow made between the two, but instead of killing her there and then Tamlin, an influential and powerful faerie, has decided to take her into the Faerie Realms, into the Spring Court where he resides. There Feyre learns more about the war and her sort-of captors, and finds out there is more to Tamlin than he’s letting on… and maybe she holds the key to saving her family from devastation.

[Ramblings] Fifty Shades of Grey (#1) by E.L. James

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Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 25/01/2015

Publisher: Vintage
Pages: 356

Source: Kindle
Genre: Adult - Erotica (18+)

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Ariana Grande - Love Me Harder ♪

My Rating: 

Meh.

My thoughts

OKAY. I'M DONE! NO MORE, I CANNOT DEAL... No more My Fifty Shades, no more "Oh My!", no more "inner goddess" and "my subconscious" and Mrs Robinson and Jose and...

The reason I am not giving this book 1 star is simply because I finished it, therefore it is, to some degree, "readable". I will not be reviewing this book properly because I will not really be able to analyse it objectively... so here's just a jumbled mess of my thoughts towards this book.

[Giveaway] 5 Year Blogoversary // Post-night shift rant

Warning:
I've just come from a night shift, so things are going to get rambly and emotional and maybe a bit personal. If you're only here for the giveaway, scroll down until you hit gold! Don't worry, no hard feelings. I probably wouldn't read this either because, come on, who cares?

Gah! I made this graphic for my first blogoversary, and as much as that cut-off 'y' is bugging me, I'm not going to change it or fix it or make a new graphic. Because I'm kind of fond of it. Because in the past I'm sure I was very proud of my efforts. (Okay, I'm also a tiny bit lazy too.)

I've been horribly, despicably, inexcusably MIA--hang on, life just got in the way. A lot, a lot, a lot of life. Full-time work. Family stuff. Friends stuff. Relationship stuff. Basically everything in my life has been a constant whirlwind of change and uncertainty and confusion and emotions have been blaring every which way that I just didn't have the mental capacity to even open up Blogger most days. There were many many times I contemplated, "I really should write this review today," and then almost instantaneously turned my mind to other matters.

But. I think I'm finally at a place where my mind has cleared a bit. I have a tendency to over-think things and let it all get the best of me, and all the while my lovely blog has been patiently waiting for me, waiting for me to give it the attention, love and *ahem* traffic it so rightly deserves. *gets out the feather duster* I've sorely neglected it for way too long, and I don't even know if I can truly keep this up (I have a bad track record with consistency here--but hey! I always seem to come back, don't I?) but I'm going to try my hardest.

[Review] Poppy in the Field (#2) by Mary Hooper

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(#2, Poppy in the Field)

Poppy | Poppy in the Field

Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 07/05/2015

Publisher: Bloomsbury
Pages: 288

Source: Review
Genre: YA (14+) - Historical fiction

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Rachel Platten - Fight Song ♪

My Rating: 

Awe-inspiring

My thoughts

Poppy in the Field is a continuation of Poppy by Mary Hooper. As the title suggests, we, once again, follow the hopeful young VAD Poppy who decides to apply for a position at a base hospital in France in the wake of turbulent heartbreak that has come with the recent news of her love Freddie's marriage to a sophisticated debutante.

Hooper has evidently done extensive research and in amongst the pages there is ample amount of descriptive detail that places you right in the time period. From the character portrayals to the world building to the language used, Hooper excels at creating the right environment in her writing.

[Review] Vanishing Girls by Lauren Oliver

Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 10/03/2015

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Pages: 368

Source: For review
Genre: YA (16+) - Contemporary

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Mr Probz - Waves ♪

My Rating: 

Intense, captivating

My thoughts

I can say with absolute certainty that I have said this in the past but I have no reservations against repeatedly saying it for ever-- Lauren Oliver can do no wrong. I went into this book expecting something akin to a Gone Girl for teen readers/audience, and in a way I was sort of right. Reading this new book that had been written by one of my more favoured contemporary authors I was struck with something like déjà vu--of the best kind. Because, like Gone Girl, Vanishing Girls surprised me, captivated me, provoked me to think about issues and topics that hadn't previously been on my mind. It is bold. It is a lyrical masterpiece in the young adult genre (as are all of her other novels). It is relateable and remarkably human and beautifully disastrous and just a book of the best kind.

In Vanishing Girls, sisters Dara and Nick were inseparable until the accident that tore them apart. Now Dara has a permanent reminder by the scars on her face, thus ending her popularity. Then, on her birthday, she disappears. Around the same time another young girl, Madeline Snow, has been reported missing and it is all over the news. Nick believes that there may be a connection between the two disappearances and she is going to do whatever it takes to get to the bottom of it, no matter what.

[Review] I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson

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Publication (dd/mm/yyyy): 16/09/2014

Publisher: Dial (Penguin)
Pages: 371

Source: Bought
Genre: YA (14+) - Contemporary

Violence | Sexual Content | Profanity

Book Tunes
♪ Jessie J - Sweet Talker ♪

My Rating: 

A masterpiece

My thoughts

Jandy Nelson's debut novel, The Sky is Everywhere, was one of my absolute favourite debut novels of 2010. Its strong depiction of the ailing effect of music and love in the midst of a grieving period in a young teen's life quickly landed the author a place on my list of authors I will follow no matter what. In that book she showed a unique sensitivity and delivered a beautifully-woven story that I could not forget.

Her sophomore title, I'll Give You the Sun, surpassed her debut by far. I cannot even begin to describe how invested I had become with the story and the characters; everything was so powerful, so emotional, so beautiful. Contemporary YA will always be my home genre and I think I'll Give You the Sun just confirms to me that Jandy Nelson can do no wrong.