Category: Book Lists

Read-Bait: “Death” and “Grief”

Posted February 12, 2015 / Book Lists, Features / 4 Comments
Read-Bait: “Death” and “Grief”

Here’s another post in a new series here at the blog: Read-Bait! Over the coming weeks, I’ll be featuring different words or phrases that catch my eye in book descriptions, the books I’ve read under those categories, and the books I plan on reading. I hope it shares some insight about my reading preferences and interests. As always, feel free to recommend any books you’d think I like! You know how it goes: you’re browsing Goodreads, clicking on books that look interesting, and checking out their summaries. All of a sudden you see a certain word or phrase in the synopsis that triggers an automatic reaction to click that “Want to Read” button. I call this “read-bait” – any word(s) that make you instantly think that you MUST read this book. One example for me is… Clearly this topic sounds a bit morbid, but hear me out. You all know you agree with me. When there’s a book about the various aspects involved with death, moving on, or grieving – I’m all about it. Whether the person in the book actually dies (not a spoiler, it’s in the synopsis!), or they’re getting over the death of someone, or they’re obsessed with the concept of death, or even if they’re in that “in between” place between earth and the afterlife… I am so on board. Elsewhere by Gabrielle Zevin is a book I read a LONG time ago, but was my first introduction into books that occur after death. In this case, […]

Read-Bait: “Private School”

Posted February 5, 2015 / Book Lists, Features / 16 Comments
Read-Bait: “Private School”

Here is my first post in a new series here at the blog: Read-Bait! Over the coming weeks, I’ll be featuring different words or phrases that catch my eye in book descriptions, the books I’ve read under those categories, and the books I plan on reading. I hope it shares some insight about my reading preferences and interests. As always, feel free to recommend any books you’d think I like! You know how it goes: you’re browsing Goodreads, clicking on books that look interesting, and checking out their summaries. All of a sudden you see a certain word or phrase in the synopsis that triggers an automatic reaction to click that “Want to Read” button. I call this “read-bait” – any word(s) that make you instantly think that you MUST read this book. One example for me is… The minute I see a plot summary for a book involving some kind of special school, I’m on board. I loved the idea of attending boarding school when I was younger: living with your classmates, walking to class like you’re at college – it all sounded awesome. My first foray into this category was the Private series by Kate Brian. It featured a girl who attended private school on scholarship and got involved in some pretttttty crazy shit, including murders, mean girls, and boy drama. Along that same vein, when Gossip Girl by Cecily von Ziegesar branched out and gave Jenny her own series, The It Girl, I was in heaven. Jenny was headed […]

February TBR and Books & Bloggers Swap Reveal

Posted February 2, 2015 / TBR Lists, Uncategorized / 15 Comments
February TBR and Books & Bloggers Swap Reveal

In honor of being home “working” on this snowy day, I had plenty of time to mess around on the computer and do bloggy things. (Primarily this means making lots of graphics for posts and trying to whittle down that 300-post Bloglovin feed!) I haven’t shared a TBR post in a few months so I figured today would be a great day – especially because of the holiday approaching this month that’s all about LOOOOVE. You can clearly see that I’m planning on packing in the contemporaries this month. I’m currently in the middle of Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard and I’m enjoying it… for the most part. I’m definitely invested in the story and interested to see what’s going to happen, but my attention span is struggling. I can only read a few pages before letting myself get distracted by the internet. I’m not sure if it’s just because January was a big fantasy month for me and I’m over it (for now), or because of the book itself. Regardless, today I started Meant to Be by Lauren Morrill and am hoping that’s a nice contemporary break. It should only take me a few sittings to finish it. I have two swoony E-ARCs to read this month too and I’m super excited! Promposal by Rhonda Helms sounds cute and right up my alley; I always am interested to hear how people get asked out to dances! “Promposals” were just starting to get big while I was in school and I […]

Top 10 Reactions & Thoughts I Have While Reading

Posted December 4, 2014 / Book Lists, Features / 6 Comments
Top 10 Reactions & Thoughts I Have While Reading

Books exist to make you FEEL something or LEARN something or just to be entertained. In a perfect world, you get all three in one. A lot of the time I find myself whispering things in my head about the book/characters/author/plot while I read. Most commonly I think “goddammit I wish I could write a book like this,” but a lot of the time I think the following things: Normally this is a very excited kind of “omg what is even happening?” because I have no other ways to phrase my excitement and wonderment about how it’s possible for a book to be this good. Sometimes I just want to squeal and run around with the book. (Dissonance by Erica O’Rourke proved to be a great book for me, in this regard.) There are a lot of instances where I find myself so in awe of the book that I can’t even form a real-sounding sentence in my head about it. Of course, this can also be used negatively: like what the fuck is happening, I am very confused/stupid. I have this thought a LOT. I am always wondering how authors are able to write what they do. I’ve met the characters and explored their world a little bit – now what is actually going to happen in this book?? I love when I read fantasy or sci-fi books and genuinely don’t have the brain power to predict what the plot will be like. I hardly ever think about this […]

December TBR List and Uppercase Box #3

December TBR List and Uppercase Box #3

This is my attempt to show off what bookish goodies I got in my Uppercase box from the previous month, as well as plan out what I’m going to read for the coming month. I don’t usually do too well with planning out my TBRs and sticking to them, but I hope sharing them with you guys will make me more accountable for them 😉 Have you read any of these books? Thinking about joining Uppercase? It’s so fun! Uppercase box is a subscription service with two levels of membership. For the first level, you get an Expert Pick – this is a hand-selected book that the YA experts love and recommend. The Personalized Recommendation box, which is what I have, comes with a book selected just for YOU based on your preference quiz. The boxes are filled with: A book, either chosen specifically for your preferences OR one that is recommended by an expert A gift, like bookmarks, jewelry, totes, etc. (that obviously relate to books!) A personal explanation of the book choice and other similar titles Some discount codes for popular book-buying websites Here are my goodies from the November box! I’m so excited that I got Trust Me, I’m Lying! This one has been on my TBR but for some reason I never got around to buying it or looking into it further. It was recommended because it’s a mix of contemporary and mystery, plus I love the Pretty Little Liars series. The book will keep me guessing until the […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #17: Winter TBR

Posted November 25, 2014 / TBR Lists, Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 6 Comments
Top Ten Tuesdays #17: Winter TBR

Top Ten Books On My Winter TBR 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. Highlights from my winter TBR list! I’ve been looking forward to some of these for a while, but I am officially making the time to read them this winter! For once I have a real TBR plan. I’m going to try to keep up with it as much as possible, but still allow myself to read what I want, when I want. Without further ado, here are the ten books I’m MOST excited for on my winter TBR (lets say the books I plan to read in from now through January). Four of them are holiday reads, two of them help finish up the Private series finally, and four are just regular ol’ books I want to finally read! My True Love Gave to Me by Stephanie Perkins Even in Paradise by Chelsey Philpot Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo Ex-Mas by Kate Brian Let It Snow by John Green When Joss Met Matt by Ellie Cahill Stealing Parker by Miranda Kenneally Mistletoe by Hailey Abbott Ominous & Vengeance by Kate Brian

November TBR List and Uppercase Box #2

November TBR List and Uppercase Box #2

Today I’m going to combine two of my monthly posts – my TBR list for the month and the Uppercase box I just received! Uppercase box is a subscription service with two levels of membership. For the first level, you get an Expert Pick – this is a hand-selected book that the YA experts love and recommend. The Personalized Recommendation box, which is what I have, comes with a book selected just for YOU based on your preference quiz. The boxes are filled with: A book, either chosen specifically for your preferences OR one that is generally recommended by an expert A gift, like bookmarks, jewelry, totes, etc. (that obviously relate to books!) A personal explanation of the book choice and other similar titles Some discount codes for popular book-buying websites Here are my goodies from the October box! I’ve heard great things about Rebel Belle and was always on the fence about whether or not I’d like it. The “southern” aspect didn’t appeal too much to me because I’m a northern girl, BUT I lately have fallen head over heels for the Hundred Oaks series by Miranda Kenneally – which is all about the south! Lisa writes, “Because you enjoy paranormal reads, I knew this on was for you. It’s got a high school contemporary feel with some southern sass.” Sounds perfect for me! I’m now VERY excited for this read. The accessory is a mockingjay bracelet in honor of the Hunger Games movie coming out this month! Such a cute little […]

10 Reasons I Prefer YA to Adult Books

Posted October 23, 2014 / Book Lists, Features / 14 Comments
10 Reasons I Prefer YA to Adult Books

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 […]

October TBR List

Posted October 1, 2014 / Other Memes, TBR Lists / 7 Comments
October TBR List

I’m pretty bad at sticking to my TBR list – even when I specifically put the books in order on my “To Read First” shelf. I tried my best to organize by what I want to read, since I don’t have a lot of books right now with deadlines that need to be read. (Although that could change, of course.) Here’s my somewhat flexible TBR list for October. These are the top 30 books I plan on reading or will be reading in October! * Those of you who have read the Throne of Glass series — would you recommend reading the Assasin’s Blade book of novellas first?? I’ve heard mixed thoughts on this!