Month: November 2014

200 Word Review: The Maze Runner

Posted November 21, 2014 / Book Reviews / 3 Comments

I’m not sure what I can say about this book that hasn’t already been said. It’s been around for a while and I definitely feel like I’m the last person to read it! Regardless, I LOVED IT. Strong 4.5 stars from me. I loved the characters, the story, and the fact that I kept repeating “what the fuck is going on?” Just when I thought there was some clarity, everything got crazy again. You know I love books with slow release of information; this was the epitome of that. I love that you were in Thomas’s head without it being a first person narrative. It made me feel like I was one of the gladers but also that I had some insight as to what he was thinking. The one reason for not giving it the full 5 star treatment: I wanted to punch them sometimes because the answer was obvious! I won’t spoil it, but there are two specific things that happened where I was like UM DUH JUST DO _____. This book’s ending just punched me right in the feels and I am so not okay with what happened to one of the characters. Ready for book two!

Why I Blog & Other Hobbies (Getting to Know You Blog Hop + Giveaway)

Posted November 20, 2014 / Personal / Information / Etc. / 0 Comments

The ladies at Cuddlebuggery started up the Getting to Know You Blog Hop so that bloggers can learn a bit more about you and your blog. I decided to join up and made my post on the first day. I shared a special book series to me and offered a giveaway for one of my favorite books that I read since starting my blog. I decided to post three times about different topics so you can get to know me better! The giveaway is posted again at the bottom so you can enter if you haven’t already. 🙂 11/15 – Getting to Know You: Introduction and Special Book Series (here) 11/20 – Getting to Know You: Why I Blog and Other Hobbies 11/27 – Getting to Know You: Favorite Movies and Music Why I Blog I have tried and failed with starting a lot of different blogs. I’ve always loved writing and the idea of having a blog, but I just never had anything that I knew enough about to blog about. I tried to start a beauty blog when I got into makeup, but I barely know anything about it. I tried to start a fashion blog to show basic outfits you can make, since I’m obsessive about what I wear and when, but that wasn’t for me either. Bookmark Lit was originally created as a “book review and lifestyle blog,” but I couldn’t even think about what kind of lifestyle posts to include. I decided to stick to what […]

Review: White Hot Kiss

Posted November 19, 2014 / Book Reviews / 10 Comments

I have a lot of mixed thoughts on this one. First, I definitely didn’t read the description. I’m not sure why, because that’s normally something I read multiple times before and during my reading. Layla is half-demon, half-gargoyle, but her allegiance has always been towards the gargoyles (Wardens). She helps the Wardens keep demons at bay and lives with them on their compound. Suddenly there’s an uptick in demon activity and Layla is the reason. The biggest thing I liked about this book is that it’s incredibly unique. I’ve read and heard of a lot of paranormal books, but this one is definitely different. Demons and gargoyles? Sounds kind of cool. How the heck did JLA come up with this stuff?? A lot of parts of the book were confusing to me because there were so many types of demons to keep track of. Also, Layla talks about how the Wardens “went public” at one point, so the general public knows they exist but don’t know what exactly they do aside from protect them. The story was unique, which was the biggest selling point for me, but I just could not get into it. I was never in the mood to dive in and sit down to read it. I ended up taking a break in the middle of the book to read something else because I just wasn’t making any progress. Luckily, that worked – I was able to pick up where I left off and was suddenly more […]

WWW Wednesdays #18

Posted November 19, 2014 / Weekly Memes, WWW Wednesdays / 5 Comments

WWW Wednesdays are hosted by Should Be Reading, where we answer three questions each week: What are you currently reading? What did you recently finish reading? What are you planning to read next? I’m still plugging along through The Scorch Trials. I’m not as enthused about it compared to The Maze Runner, but it’s still interesting enough. I feel like by the end of this series it’ll be more about the journey than the destination, but I still REALLY want to know what the fuck is going on. My goal is to finish the series by the end of the month; sometimes I think it would be better for me to just read the books instead of listen to them. Oh well. For my current read, I just started Biggest Flirts, in The Superlatives series. I’ve had the ARC for the second book, Perfect Couple, on my Kindle for months. I obviously wanted to read book one first. I’m enjoying it so far. I don’t like the trope of “I don’t need a boyfriend and will remain emotionally detached from boys until this one boy changes my mind,” but I’m hoping there will be a more unique take on the book based on the plot summary. We’ll see! Eeep I finally finished One Past Midnight and really liked it! It was definitely a unique take on the parallel life concept that I love so much. I feel like the book got started very quickly, which was nice, but I wished there […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #16: Sequels

Posted November 18, 2014 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 8 Comments

Top Ten Sequels I Can’t Wait to Get Top Ten Tuesdays are hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, where we give our top ten books to answer each prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. This is a great one for me. I’m going to include the sequels that haven’t been released yet as well as the second books in series I just haven’t gotten yet. I love series and don’t leave them open-ended that often, unless the next book hasn’t been released yet. I joined the All About YA group on Goodreads, which has a place for you to track your series – it’s been really helpful! Most of my unreleased sequels don’t even have covers yet 🙁 I need a time machine.

Review: Yolo

Posted November 17, 2014 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

The Internet Girls/Winsome Threesome are back! I was so excited to see this book in Barnes & Noble a few months ago. I read the Internet Girls series back when the books first came out and loved the style. The books are written in instant messaging format, so they’re super quick reads. The first three books in the series were written over seven years ago and followed three best friends through high school. This follow-up book brings the three girls into college, where there are new forms of technology and social media to deal with. I loved hearing about their new college experiences but wish I remembered more about the previous three books. Since I read them so long ago, I didn’t remember much about the boyfriends or their social situations; I only remembered basics. Luckily that was enough to get me through the book without much confusion! I liked that this book was a realistic portrayal of college life and how it affects friendships and relationships. I had experienced almost everything these girls did when I went away to college. In some ways, their stories seemed a little superficial or stereotypical… but I still think they were realistic. It’s not that easy to fully explain what each character is thinking or going through when you’re only using IM format. Regardless, the three girls were dealing with very different issues, so it seemed to encompass the variety of “paths” people choose during college. Angela, at one point, had an experience […]

Bookmark Lit Bulletin: Mid-November 2014

Posted November 15, 2014 / Bookmark Lit Bulletin, Features, Wrap-Ups / 4 Comments

The Bookmark Lit Bulletin is a bi-monthly feature where I look back on everything I did and everything I plan to do next. Instead of participating in the weekly Stacking the Shelves or Sunday Post memes, I combine it all into two bulletins per month: one at the mid-month mark and one on the final day of the month. You can learn more and see past Bookmark Lit bulletins here!November has been fairly laid back so far, considering how busy I was through September and October. The first weekend was spent down in New Jersey for BrickFair 2014. We stayed with some friends and attended the Lego convention that weekend. It was a lot of fun seeing everyone’s creations. It inspired us to get a little more creative with our Lego collection; instead of just building existing sets, we’re hoping to design some of our own things soon. I love the mosaic style pieces, where the bricks can create an image. The Rosie the Riveter one impressed me the most! I remain obsessed with Taylor Swift’s new CD, 1989. I finally reached the point where I have a few favorite songs that I can’t stop listening to. “Blank Space” is my favorite, and I also LOVE “Style,” “All You Had to Do Was Stay,” “Out of the Woods,” and “That’s How You Get the Girl.” I’m also (unnecessarily) getting hyped up on Christmas stuff and have officially abandoned pumpkin spice for the season. That’s right – it’s way before Thanksgiving and […]

Getting to Know You BLOG HOP + Giveaway

Posted November 15, 2014 / Personal / Information / Etc. / 40 Comments

The lovely ladies over at Cuddlebuggery got a beautiful new look for their blog, came back from hiatus, and started up the GETTING TO KNOW YOU Blog Hop! This blog hop is specifically to get to know bloggers and help build a strong community. “This blog hop is to let people know a little about yourself and who you are and to get your name out there! Post ideas include other hobbies you enjoy, favorite movies or music, why you decided to start blogging/writing or anything else you feel comfortable sharing. And since this is a bookish community, please share a book or series that’s special to you.” This post is one of three that I’ll be having over the course of the Blog Hop! I don’t post too much personal information, and since my blog is fairly new, maybe some of you would like a chance to get to know me better. Here’s my schedule of the posts and what info they’ll be featuring: 11/15 – Getting to Know You: Introduction and Special Book Series 11/20 – Getting to Know You: Why I Blog and Other Hobbies 11/27 – Getting to Know You: Favorite Movies and Music I’ve talked before about how the Pretty Little Liars series by Sara Shepard is incredibly special to me. I read a lot of books in middle school and early high school, but very few hooked me quite like PLL did. Remember, this was LONG before there was a TV show. Each time one of […]

200 Word Review: Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy

Posted November 14, 2014 / Book Reviews / 7 Comments

I think I MIGHT like Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy a littleee more than I’d Tell You I Love You but Then I’d Have to Kill You. A little more. I think there’s more of a mystery element to this book than the previous. You follow Cammie as she tries to get to the bottom of what the Blackthorn-related mysteries are. I didn’t care too much for Zack (I’m a Josh fangirl) but I started to be okay with him towards the end. The overall storyline of this book was just maybe more interesting than the first one? The fact that I don’t remember anything about these books anymore has nothing to do with their QUALITY, but everything to do with TIME. I read these back in eighth grade/freshman year of high school. It’s been quite a while! I have a hard time remembering my thoughts and basic plot points of books I just read a day ago, let alone 8 years ago! I’m excited to continue with the series and remember what happened with all of my Gallagher Girls. There are hints that hopefully she’ll learn some more about the circumstances of her father’s disappearance/death too.

Five on Fridays #8

Posted November 14, 2014 / Five on Fridays, Weekly Memes / 2 Comments

Five on Friday displays the the top five things that have been on my mind this week! It could be book-related, but it may be music, movies, TV, personal life, food, etc. Lazy Sunday On Sunday last weekend, Chris and I were the laziest people on earth. We didn’t leave the apartment, except to sit on our back porch a couple of times. Our front door stayed locked all day from the night before and we hardly moved. It was AWESOME. The day before, we went to Maine to visit his sister for her birthday and spent the whole day travelling (3 hours driving up, 2 hours of time at dinner and hanging out in her dorm, and 3 hours driving home). We felt like we wasted the day because we spent 6 hours in the car. The next day we decided to waste the day in a much better way by being lazy and making the most of our free time. Normally we go to my Dad’s house on Sundays because he has NFL Sunday Ticket and we can watch my football team. Because the Panthers were on Monday night (I don’t even want to talk about how that game went), we just stayed in our apartment all day watching other football games. I took a bath, ate a lot of leftovers, browsed the internet, and just chilled. Starbucks Caprese Sandwich UMM wow. I went to Starbucks in Barnes & Noble yesterday for my lunch break because it was payday […]