Harry Potter Spells Book Tag

Posted November 27, 2015 / Personal / Information / Etc. / 9 Comments

This tag was created by Kimberly Faye Reads and BookNerd Betsy. I’m actually incredibly picky about using other people’s graphics in book tags because I’m a control freak. I like to make my own matching graphics thankyouverymuch. HOWEVER, these are just way too perfect too ignore… and she linked up a handy ZIP file to download them all at once! Holla. Without further ado, (I say this way too often in blog posts now) here it isssss. An upcoming release you wish you could get your hands on right now Summer Days and Summer Nights edited by Stephanie Perkins | I am so here for this. I actually don’t have a LOT of highly anticipated reads yet for 2016, but you bet your ass this is one. I absolutely loved the previous holiday compilation she edited, and I know this will be no exception. AND THE COVER IS PERFECT LIKE THE OTHER ONE. Lord help me handle this wait. Favorite series-starter The Program by Suzanne Young | This one was my favorite in the series! I couldn’t put it down and was so eager to figure out what was going to happen next. This book really made me want to read the next couple of books and see how the world was before and after Sloane’s story. A book that gave you all the warm fuzzies Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins | I know you’re not surprised. Would it be a book tag without me mentioning the feelsy shippy glory of AATFK? […]

Review: Winter

Posted November 26, 2015 / Book Reviews / 12 Comments

Well well well, Marissa Meyer. I see what you did there. You made each book get increasingly better than the last until I finally said holy SHIT this is one of my favorite series. When I finished Cinder, I wasn’t totally convinced. When I finished Scarlet, I said “that was very good, not fantastic” yet again. When I finished Cress, I thought she was headed towards something excellent. I loved being introduced to more and more characters who were special and important in their own ways. With the introduction of the ultimate bae Carswell Thorne, I was pretty sold in general… but I knew that the final book would have to blow me away to make up for my this-is-great-but-not-a-favorite feelings that I was working with from the first two books. AND THEN SHE DID IT. There are so many wonderful things about this book and about the whole series that come to a head in this finale. I would venture to say that it’s my favorite series-ender ever. (This may be because I haven’t finished a lot of series like this, but seriously it’s gotta be top three at least!) How do I love thee? Let me count the ways… 1. SQUAD GOALS Has there ever been a group of people this perfect before? Prob not. As each book progressed, we were introduced to more and more characters to make up the final crew of saviors. Book one brought us Cinder and Kai, the smart cyborg and the emperor. Book […]

Book Buddies Review: The Raven Boys

Posted November 25, 2015 / Book Buddies Reviews, Book Reviews / 5 Comments

Book Buddies is a discussion-style review that takes place with one of my two buddies. (Learn more and see past reviews here) We both read the book and then have a private discussion about it. We post our discussion as a review on the last Wednesday of each month. You’ll be able to see our similar/different opinions on the overall book, characters, writing style, etc. – just like a regular review. The first half our discussion will take place right here, and the second half will be on Kaitlin’s blog! (Link below) View Kaitlin’s part of the discussion here. Some spoilers ahead! How did you feel when you started? Did the hype make you excited or nervous? Kaitlin: I definitely did not know what to expect from this book because the synopsis had been super vague about what was going down within this book. All I know was what happened in the beginning chapter and that Blue would eventually become attracted. I don’t think hype really affects my enjoyment for books too much. It motivates me to try to enjoy a book that has lots of love to it but other than that, I mostly enjoy the majority of the books I read so hype is never a huge problem for me when it comes to how I enjoy a book. Lauren: I know what you mean about motivating you to enjoy it! That was such a driving factor in my enjoyment of this book. I felt like I needed to like it because everyone else […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #65: Thanksgiving

Posted November 24, 2015 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 14 Comments

Giving Lots of (Bookish) Thanks Top Ten Tuesdays are hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, where we make lists of our top ten books (or something else!) based on that week’s prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. Book links bring you to Goodreads or my review. This week’s topic is a Thanksgiving-themed Freebie (books or authors I’m thankful for, fictional families I’d celebrate Thanksgiving with, personal thankful post, etc.). As usual, all of these suggestions are too fun so I’ll be bringing you a big ol’ thankful post for all things bookish! Queenie & Merry Carole’s house for amazing Southern food {Nowhere But Home} Covey house for more amazing food and my fave fictional family {To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before} Anywhere with the amazing squad from the Lunar Chronicles, just because I love them {Winter} The Garrett household for all of the love and chaos they would bring {My Life Next Door} I couldn’t resist the urge to share a few different thing in this category. I’m very thankful for all of the bloggers who make up our great community, as well as every author that keeps us reading. Jenny Han because binge-reading her Summer series got me through a rougher time in my life, and I can always count on her stories to make me feel all the things. Sarah Dessen because… honestly does she need a reason? Her books are life and what introduced me to contemporary young adult. Kate Brian because her Private series (among others) kept […]

Inside & Out #19: Kate from Mom’s Radius

Posted November 23, 2015 / Features, Inside and Out / 5 Comments

Admiring book covers and bookmarks, shared by you! Welcome to INSIDE AND OUT. This feature includes two of my absolute favorite book-related things: bookmarks (inside) and book covers (out)! I’ve invited guest posters to share their favorite book covers and bookmarks here on the second and fourth Mondays of each month. Sign-ups are always open (see bottom of post)! Check out past posts here. Kate from Mom’s Radius Twitter: @momsradius| Instagram: @kunger1 | Facebook Tell me a little about yourself: Hello, Bookmark Lit readers. I am an avid reader, always have been. I am married to a non-reader and I’m a mother of one – a 5.5 year old boy who loves books and is just learning how to read. I work full time and squeeze in reading pretty much every spare second I have. I started my blog in May. Talk about your blog (what you blog about/kinds of books, features, etc.): I blog about life, love, and books. I review YA and adult fiction – mostly contemporary. I also review some children’s books. I talk about my family and occasionally share recipes. I try to cover all of my interests, but it’s mostly books. In October I started a weekly series, Fiction Friday, where I share creative writing. I’m working on improving my descriptive prose and enforcing a deadline on myself is helping me make time for this type of writing in addition to traditional blogging. Favorite genre: YA Fiction is definitely my favorite. I especially love series: The Lunar Chronicles, The Hunger Games, […]

ARC Review: Hello?

Posted November 22, 2015 / Book Reviews / 10 Comments

This one totally took me by surprise. I absolutely loved it. There were plenty of positive reviews ahead of time but I wasn’t sure how it would resonate with me. I am actually a fan of books that mix around different formats; this one promised poems, narrative, screenplays, and images. I thought it made the book an even quicker, more addicting read. Seriously though – the epitome of unputdownable. I read it in two marathon sittings because I couldn’t stop. I’ll keep this one short and sweet with some bullets… Perfection The concept of fate and people being destined to meet, or at least in each other’s lives. I won’t expand on too much of this but everyone in the story is connected to and/or impacted by someone else. It really got me thinking about the things that are meant to happen to us. (You know this shit is my favorite thing to think about!) Going off of that, I enjoy books where all of the characters are connected in some way without realizing it. With each page, you learned more and more about their histories and families. It reminded me of The Husband’s Secret in some ways. The format really worked! It was fun to read the poetry and the screenplays intermixed with the narrative-based chapters. I wish there were a few more from Brian’s perspective though! I liked seeing images of his artwork. It was just so addicting! I couldn’t put it down for the life of me. I sat […]

2015 Holiday Fun

Posted November 21, 2015 / Personal / Information / Etc. / 23 Comments

Last year I enthusiastically signed up for a million swaps, planned out exactly when I would be posting holiday reviews, and joined two readathons. I am not planning on being as crazy this year because good lord, woman. Without further ado, here’s how I’ll be celebrating the holidays this year on Bookmark Lit! I don’t think I’ll be joining any actual readathons this year, because I made a vow to stop before the end of the year. Things got a little crazy back at the end of the summer, so I’m forbidding myself from signing up for the rest of 2015. I definitely plan on reading some holiday books this December, though! I creeped around Goodreads and pulled together some fun holiday stories to pick from. Obviously I won’t get to all of them, but there are my options: I decided to add a little something to each review instead of my usual Friends gif and standard rating report. I’ll be including a “holiday cheer rating” to show how the book fits in with the holiday season. Is it a full-on swoony Christmas romance, or just a story set during December?All of the reviews will have a snowflake rating to show just how holiday cheery they are. I love books that are hardcore Christmas-themed, but there are a few on my TBR that seem to just feature the wintertime. Additionally, I’ll share exactly what holidays you’ll come across in the story. Based on the books I’ve already added to my TBR, these ones […]

The Difference Between Readers and Bloggers

Posted November 20, 2015 / Discussions, Features / 31 Comments

A popular TTT a few weeks ago introduced me to a lot of people’s bad bookish habits that they want to quit. Along with popular “bookworm problems” or “confessions,” this general topic makes its way around our section of the internet quite frequently. We’re always discussion some of our quirky or bad habits surrounding reading and blogging. It makes for a lot of fun conversation because you’re like THANK GOD I’m not the only one who does this! In reading the comments on my post, I started to think: bookworm problems that you’ll see on Buzzfeed, for example, don’t FULLY get us bloggers. People who read and people who blog (about books) are sort of really different. OUR bookish “bad habits” aren’t even thought about by the general reading population. Most of them are driven by blogging. We totally relate to those long lists of bookish problems like wanting a full-scale library in your house or thinking of fictional characters in non-fictional ways. BUT, beyond that, we put a lot of unnecessary pressure on ourselves to read and blog and keep on top of things. (I loved Brittany’s somewhat similar post a while ago on cutting ourselves some slack!) Being a regular ol’ reader is a totally different story. This is meant to be a fun post to kind of make fun of ourselves and think about our bookish habits from before we became bloggers. Remember those days? Free from obligations and terms like TBR or DNF? Let’s reminisce on the good days, shall […]

ARC Reviews: Rules for 50/50 Chances and Just Visiting

Posted November 19, 2015 / Book Reviews / 5 Comments

This was a pleasant surprise! I have a tendency of signing up for ARC tours for books I’m kind of in the mood for, but never really want to read them when I have to. Struggles of being a mood reader, I suppose. Regardless, I was able to knock this one out in pretty much three sittings over the course of two days. I think this story is really unique overall, and I would definitely recommend it to people who aren’t familiar with Huntington’s Disease. Oddly enough, I read one other book series where this rare disease made an appearance, so I already knew a little bit about it. Rose’s mother has Huntington’s, a degenerative disease that is slowly killing her. The biggest problem is: there’s a 50/50 chance that Rose has it too. Her father is incredibly supportive, helpful, and loving towards his deteriorating wife. He was easily my favorite part of this story. This book deals with alllll of Rose’s struggles. She is a ballet dancer trying to decide where to go to college, if she can allow herself to fall in love, and if she should take the test for the Huntington’s gene. Lots going on for this girl. I felt bad for her because of all of these things, but my sympathy for her dried up surprisingly quickly. She had a “why me” attitude about everything, which is understandable, but she was constantly comparing her family’s issues to everyone else’s. No one else was allowed to have […]

The Nostalgia Project | Gallagher Girls

Posted November 18, 2015 / Book Reviews, The Nostalgia Project / 10 Comments

The Nostalgia Project is my way of revisiting and rereading old favorites from my young adulthood to see if they still resonate with me. Learn more here and read old posts or reviews here! My first successful series revisit within The Nostalgia Project has come to an end! Let’s be honest, I totally cheated with this one. I had determined last year that I was planning on rereading the Gallagher Girls series by Ally Carter because there were three remaining books I never managed to read. I started listening to the audiobooks back in October 2014 and steadily trucked through the series until December. I then bought books five and six to finish off my collection… and didn’t get around to reading them. I finally picked up book five to finish them off before the end of 2015. Because I individually reviewed the previous four books, I’m going to continue that here first. Then, you’ll see my thoughts on the entire series and what I learned at the bottom. This has to be one of my favorite books in the series. It’s hard to say that now, considering that all of the previous books blend together when you haven’t read them in a year, but I just feel it. I haven’t physically read a book in this series since the first few books came out and I forgot how addicting they are! It’s a totally different experience with the audiobooks. I thought that some parts of the book were frustrating because of the […]