Author: Lauren (Bookmark Lit)

Review: Catching Jordan

Posted October 27, 2014 / Book Reviews / 4 Comments

HOW have I gone so long without reading a book about football? The only hobby/interest I have outside of reading? JESUS. Catching Jordan was always kind of on my radar but I literally purchased it on a whim when it was on sale for Kindle. I also decided to read it on a whim because my library books didn’t sound appealing at the moment. I absolutely loved Breathe, Annie, Breathe even though I wasn’t expecting to (not sure why, most likely because running = death)… so I knew that reading a book by Miranda Kenneally about FOOTBALL would be even better. I was right. This is a story about a Jordan, a female quarterback for her high school team. She’s the daughter of some football prodigies but doesn’t get as much attention from them as she’d like because, of course, she’s a girl. She has dreams of playing football for Alabama and won’t let anything stop her… not even when a swoon-worthy, incredibly talented QB moves to to town and joins the team. It was so great watching Jordan find herself and learning about her friendships. There were so many instances where I expected her to keep her feelings bottled up but she surprised me every time; this book had so many opportunities to slip into the predictable YA books I’ve become all too familiar with. You know, the MC refuses to share their feelings or lies about them when people close to her try to help. This book was […]

Series-a-Month Challenge

Posted October 27, 2014 / Book Challenges, Features / 13 Comments

Danielle from Love at First Page shared a new challenge she’s creating that is something I definitely need to get on board with! She is challenging herself to read a full series each month. Like her, I have so many series on my TBR list that I often have no motivation to read…even though they sound great! She says, My goal is to read one series a month, which will also help narrow down my ever-increasing TBR pile. The “rules”: it must be a series (3+ books) with at least 2 books already published, or a completed duology. Most of these have been on my TBR for a loooong time. Some of them I just added recently but seem too good to pass up. The Boyfriend App and Biggest Flirts are both in series where the second book is not out yet, but I have e-ARCs for both of them that I want to read soon. I’m counting duologies. Series where only one regular book is published but there’s at least one novella will also count for me. Here’s my proposed series TBR for the next handful of months: Wish me luck!

Review: Just Like the Movies

Posted October 24, 2014 / Book Reviews / 1 Comment

A lot of bloggers I follow weren’t super impressed with this one, but it seemed too cute for me to pass up. I think a lot of them expected this book to be movie reference after movie reference, with constant tie-ins or conversations. Luckily I read a lot of their reviews before reading this so I knew NOT to expect that. I think there was a perfect amount of references that were pretty easy for most people to follow; it used a lot of classic romantic comedies with pretty obvious scenes. Lily and Marijke live in different social circles at school but find themselves coming together to make their romantic lives better. They plan how to make these “movie moments” for themselves: Lily wants to get the crush she’s been pining over and Marijke wants her boyfriend of a year to finally say those three words. Their friendship developed kind of quickly (almost like insta-love but for best friends), but I really liked it. They felt natural for some reason. The characters in general were kind of stereotypical versions of high schoolers. Marijke was sporty, Lily was nerdy, Joe was a badass, and Tommy was in a band. I wish they were characterized a little more than that, but I did like watching the relationships develop. The whole book was full of cliché movie moments, whether they were referencing them or they were happening naturally. It felt very “high school” to me, also. I understand that this book took place […]

Five on Fridays #5

Posted October 24, 2014 / Five on Fridays, Weekly Memes / 4 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. Strand Bookstore Yessss this week I finally got to go to Strand! It was overwhelming and took forever to get there (by walking all the way from Rockefeller Center)… but it was great! I ended buying two books (not even the two that I planned to buy): Ex-Mas by Kate Brian, to add to my holiday reads, and Stealing Parker by Miranda Kenneally, because the paperback was actually NEW and cheaper than the Kindle version! Woo! I also bought one of those cute Strand bags with the bookshelves and kittens all over it. I wish I explored more of that stuff there, like bookmarks and magnets and other accessories. Oh well, it’s not like NYC is that far away 😉 Sorry the picture is so awful – I can’t believe I only got a few of them! Game of Thrones Chris and I started watching Game of Thrones! We’re only on episode four I think, but we’re really enjoying it. We watched one episode on Monday night and the next day both of us confessed that we were DYING to watch more and hadn’t stopped thinking about the show. So far it’s pretty interesting getting to know the characters and thinking about what could possibly happen next. The first few episodes seem to be dialogue-heavy and we sometimes find […]

10 Reasons I Prefer YA to Adult Books

Posted October 23, 2014 / Book Lists, Features / 14 Comments

Today’s top 10 list consists of the 10 reasons I prefer young adult books to adult books. Please keep in mind, as the title suggest that these are just the reasons that I prefer young adult. You may like adult books better for the opposite reason, and that’s fine, but these are just my thoughts on the topic. I read an infuriating article that shamed adults for reading YA, and then another article that does the exact opposite, so I thought I would weigh in on the topic! This is probably the biggest reason I enjoy young adult compared to adult books. I would rather read a books that relate to my experiences so far in my life rather than what could happen in the future. There are plenty of young adult books that have characters who experience A LOT more than I have, but at least we have some major life experiences in common. I’m not sure if I’ll ever be a divorcee or a widower or even a mother; it’s not easy for me to read books about milestones I haven’t gotten to yet.. or may never get to. At least with a young adult book (no matter what genre, for the most part) I have been through the basic stages of growing up. People against YA will argue that it’s not as literary as adult books, which I don’t agree with for a lot of reasons, but I just think the writing is different. Young adult books […]

Review: Famous in Love

Posted October 22, 2014 / Book Reviews / 3 Comments

EDIT: Well I’m a big butthead and didn’t realize this book was a FREAKIN SERIES. I thought it was a standalone and let myself get so pissed off about the ending that it affected my entire review. Here’s my review with some edits and changes. Same overall score (because I somehow rated it much higher than my review made it seem.. just a nicer review) The first half of the book was good. It really worked for me. I was interested to see what happened to Paige, how her life changed, and what it was like on a movie set. I think the premise was really spot on with the kind of books I enjoy. The main character had some realistic emotions and actions. When she learned what was going on with her friends from home, she reacted selfishly… but I think most people (including myself) would have that same reaction. It kept me interested. Despite the flaws I talk about below, I enjoyed getting lost in a fluffy story about a girl becoming a movie star and dealing with her first real acting gig. I liked some parts near the middle/end of the book. I thought the real reason Jordan and Rainer were enemies was interesting and understandable. I was happy to see Jordan get explained out a little better and see that his “bad boy” persona wasn’t exactly true. I think, honestly, he was the most characterized person in the book somehow. There’s a really cool book-in-a-book concept going […]

WWW Wednesdays #14

Posted October 22, 2014 / Weekly Memes, WWW Wednesdays / 6 Comments

WWW Wednesdays are hosted by Should Be Reading, where we answer three questions: what are you currently reading? What did you recently finish reading? and what are you planning to read next? I’ve got quite a bit going on this week! I started my reread of the Gallagher Girls series by Ally Carter. I’m actually listening to them all on audio and it’s been interesting so far. I LOVED this series; I initially read them when they first came out. I kept up with them for a few years but haven’t read the last two books. I figured a reread would be helpful to finish off the series. I NEVER reread book, so kudos to you Ally Carter for prompting me to do it! The one thing I dislike is the narrator’s voice.. holy shit she makes them sound like 11 year old girls. One of my Book Buddies and I are reading Salt & Storm for our October buddy review, but I can’t seem to get into it. She’s going to give it a try and let me know what she thinks; we may be switching it up. In the meantime I’m kind of pausing that reading. I started The Art of Wishing this morning since it’s due back to the library soon. It should be a quick read and it’s really fun so far. I’m excited to see where it goes! DAMN I didn’t realize how much I read this week until all of the covers were sitting […]

Random Bookish Thoughts: Growing Pains

Posted October 21, 2014 / Discussions, Other Memes, Weekly Memes / 14 Comments

GROWING PAINS. If you’ve been following my blog since the beginning, you’ve probably noticed a lot of changes. I’m trying to figure out what works best for me, my personality, my reviews, my followers, etc. I’ve changed around the format for a lot of posts/memes/reviews because my blog is still having growing pains. I only started this blog in July and so far the results have been pretty impressive, if I do say so myself. In four months, I’ve gotten 3,600+ paigeviews, 700+ comments, and 180+ followers between WordPress and Bloglovin (not to mention the ones on Twitter, Instagram, Goodreads, etc!). I’ve been trying hard to make my blog the best it can be for you guys, for myself, and, if I’m being honest, for publishers! I’m hoping to get more ARC approvals and book mail in the near future. I would be interested in hearing some of your thoughts on my formatting, and I’ll go into some of the changes/formats I’ve tried to initiate recently. Types of Reviews This has been the major area of frustration for me. I started this blog with just writing one long paragraph review, but started noticing other bloggers were splitting them into sections; I gravitated towards that because it made them a lot easier to read. I could even skim it if I really wanted to. So now, I’m trying to figure out the types of reviews I want to use, how to keep all of the fonts consistent, and make sure the posts are […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #12: New Series

Posted October 21, 2014 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 17 Comments

Ten New(ish) Series I want to Start There are actually a lot of new series I want to start sometime within the next few months. My list will include some older ones as well as some series that just got started. I’ve always considered myself to be an avid series-reader, but I feel like that’s kind of dropped off in the last few months! Hopefully this post inspires me to get started. Burn For Burn by Jenny Han and Siobhan Vivian Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas A Thousand Pieces of You by Claudia Gray Loop by Karen Akins The Secret Diamond Sisters by Michelle Madow Not a Drop to Drink by Mindy McGinnis The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater The Maze Runner by James Dashner Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo Ruby Red by Kierstin Gier

Musing Mondays #12

Posted October 20, 2014 / Musing Mondays, Weekly Memes / 11 Comments

Do other bloggers ruin things for you when reading? I don’t mean blogger hype, which I talked about last week/many times before, but I mean actually ruin or change your opinion on certain aspects of books or plot devices. The biggest one for me is love triangles. Before I started blogging, love triangles honestly never bugged me that much. I thought it was a semi-interesting way to add some drama into the plot. For me, the real winner of the love triangle is always clear from the beginning. Did anyone actually think Bella would end up with Jacob instead of Edward? No. Come on. The second guy in a love triangle is just thrown in to cause some conflict. Is this a cliched plot device? Sure. Did it really bother me? Nah. Then, I joined the blogging world, and pretty much found that my love triangle opinion was wrong. I get why people hate them. They’re done too often. They’re never done right. They’re a cliche. They cause unnecessary drama… The list goes on. It sucks for me now because whenever I read a book about love triangles, I can’t help but think of these other bloggers. Their negative opinion has become my opinion and my first thought when reading these books. It sucks! So many books are ruined for me because I can’t get that out of my head. People have SUCH strong opinions about them that I can’t help but think my opinion is just wrong. I’m sorry […]