Comic Reviews: Saga #1-2 and Saved by the Bell #1

Posted October 3, 2015 / Book Reviews / 4 Comments

Aside from a random Adventure Time comic I read at one point, Saga is really my first foray into this… genre? medium? Either way, I’m so glad I randomly decided to read it. I was sitting at Books a Million with Chris and he decided to read a little comics before we left the store, to make sure he wanted to buy it. He’s been getting into graphic novels and comic books lately. I decided to pull Saga off the shelf for literally the millionth time and read the first chapter. I wanted to see if it was for me or not, once and for all. Well, I ended up reading the entire first volume while sitting there in the store. I couldn’t stop and didn’t want to stop. I’m not experienced at all with what makes a good comic, but this story was SO cool and SO bizarre… I loved it. It took me a long time to fully understand what the fuck was going on. I mean, they’re on a whole different planet (literally) and there’s some intergalactic war going on. It was a bit confusing at times because you’re kind of thrown right into the action, but I’m not complaining. I can’t give this volume a perfect score because I’m still not 100% sure if I understand it, but it’s pretty damn close. Overall, Saga has some really cool art, fun characters, and LOL-worthy moments. I’m excited to see what happens next in Volume 2 and will […]

Review: Two-Way Street

Posted October 2, 2015 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

For an outdated road trip book with characters I barely liked, this book wasn’t bad. It was a really quick read and perfect for Bout of Books (when I read this back in August). I’m glad I finally read it but it’s definitely not a new favorite. This had alllll the makings for a book I’d love. I read Ex-Mas back during the holidays last year and loved the concept: exes taking a road trip together and falling back in love. In this book, Jordan and Courtney are taking a road trip from their hometown in Florida to their new college in Boston. They broke up a few weeks earlier but decide to make the trip up together still. The gist of the story is that Jordan says he dumped her for some girl he met on MySpace (yep, this book is old) but really that’s a lie. He’s covering ~something~ up that I happened to figure out within the first few chapters. I really, really didn’t like Jordan that much. He made CONSTANT sexist references to girls, their clothing, their habits, and their bodies. I rolled my eyes and/or cringed at something he said or thought in literally all of his chapters. He’d talk about girls like they were crazy, generalize all of them into one big group, and talk shit about their “slutty” clothes. He even said Courtney looked like a tramp at one point! All of that macho bullshit is SO not okay with me. Otherwise, I did […]

Bookmark Lit Bulletin – September 2015

Posted October 1, 2015 / Bookmark Lit Bulletin, Features, Wrap-Ups / 8 Comments

The Bookmark Lit Bulletin was created to wrap up each month and prepare for the next. I share my life happenings, book haul, books I read and reviewed, posts I shared, challenge updates, and more from the previous month. I also let you know what may be coming up on the blog in the coming month. You can read past bulletins here and learn more about the feature here. 10 books read → Physical: 5 | eBook: 2 | eARC: 1 | Audio: 1 | ARC: 1 | Format mix: 0 In 2015… 137 books read of 175 Goodreads goal [78% complete, 7 books ahead of schedule] Blog posts this month: 14 books reviewed and 14 other posts | Challenges this month: 1Well, the time finally came where I decided to get lazy about reading. Definitely not a great month overall, but there was a decent amount of quality over quantity. I enjoyed a lot of the books I read! Average rating for books read in September: 3.9 stars Highlights of the best and worst… Best of the Best | Pleasantly Surprised | Disappointed All of the books read this month: Average rating for books reviewed in September: 3.92 stars I don’t buy a lot of books in general, but I receive a lovely amount from my Secret Sister and through some preordering! I didn’t spend a lot of money on books this month, which is a big win for me. Secret Sister Project New sister’s second box: Ask Again Later by Liz Czukas, Naomi & Eli’s No Kiss List by David Levithan and Rachel Cohn, Emerald Green by Kerstin Gier, matching sticky notes […]

Book Buddies Review: The Remedy

Posted September 30, 2015 / Book Buddies Reviews, Book Reviews / 1 Comment

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! In the climax of the book, Quinn becomes too entangled in Catalina’s life and can’t remember who she is anymore. Did you feel for her in that moment, or did you feel like she was straight up deranged? Kaitlin: I obviously don’t understand much about this “being a closer” thing because I thought Quinn was overreacting a little. The thing is, it’s not like whenever you go into an assignment you’re brainwashed. It takes time to adjust to being a new person but over time it becomes easier to live the life of someone dead. Plus, she has been a closer for so long, you would think Quin knew how to pretend to be someone without actually thinking they were that person rather than themselves. I also had to consider the fact that she wasn’t “Quinlan McKee” for 2 weeks. That definitely could have messed with her head a bit. I don’t know! […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #57: Second Chance Summer

Posted September 29, 2015 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 10 Comments

Ten Books to Read if you Loved SECOND CHANCE SUMMER 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. A well-rounded summer contemporary with heavier issues & family feels Morgan Matson is a wonderful contemporary writer that almost every blogger has read at least one book by. My favorite of hers, so far, is Second Chance Summer. I cried like a baby throughout the ending and was constantly hit with different types of feels throughout. To me, this book is such a perfectly well-rounded summer contemporary. It had families dealing with complex issues (including father-daughter feels and sibling relationships), a childhood love that was reignited, unique themes of friendship and moving on from past mistakes, and an overall summer contemporary with heavier issues. I have a lot of recommendations for books based on these themes, so I figured that’d be a fun topic for this TTT! Here are all of the books I’d recommend based on specific elements of Second Chance Summer. KEEP IN MIND that I’m assuming you’ve read this book! Most of these stories flew under the radar, but there are a few more popular books intermixed here. What are you looking for? A book featuring a long lost or childhood love that comes back into the picture In Second Chance Summer, Taylor reunites with […]

Inside & Out #15: Cynthia from Bingeing on Books

Posted September 28, 2015 / Features, Inside and Out / 0 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. Cynthia from Bingeing on Books Twitter: @Bingeingonbooks| Instagram: Bingeingonbooks | Goodreads Tell me a little about yourself: I have been blogging for almost one year (my blog will be one in November!!) and I live in Naples, Italy with my husband and my dog. When I’m not reading books, I love talking about them and writing about them. Oh, and I love pretending that I will actually read all the books on my TBR one day. In addition to all the books, I love travel and binge watching shows on Netflix. Talk about your blog (what you blog about/kinds of books, features, etc.): I mostly blog about Young Adult books, though I read a lot of Adult stuff and Classics too. I post reviews, giveaways, Top Ten lists, and book related discussions. Sometimes I even sneak in some pictures of my recent travels around Europe. Favorite genre: Mostly Fantasy and Science Fiction, though I love a lot of Contemporary Stuff too. Three books you recommend most often and why: This is a difficult question because everyone’s tastes are so different. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend the same thing to everyone. A […]

Disney Princess Book Tag

Posted September 25, 2015 / Personal / Information / Etc. / 6 Comments

I saw this one over at Lost In Literature and knew I had to join in! I love all of the Disney Princesses. My favorites are Aurora and Ariel, in case you were wondering. Obviously the categories are below, matched up with each princess and my book pick. I created all of the graphics myself, but the tag was created by Of Stacks and Cups. Here are my picks below! (Links go to my review or GR.) The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald | This one was hard for me to pick! That’s not because I read a lot of classics, but because there are only a few I really loved… and I love them a lot. It was close between this and To Kill a Mockingbird, but this is the most memorable for me. I loved reading this in high school and learning about all of the symbolism. I’m totally due for a reread.Anne & Henry by Dawn Ius | This is the most recent book that kept me up reading late, at least! I read the book in three sittings (almost two) after Chris went to bed. Bless Kindles with backlights. I really liked this book a lot even though I don’t know much about the actual history of Henry and Anne. I almost stayed up WAY too late reading, but decided to finish the next morning. 😉I’ll Meet You There by Heather Demetrios | I feel like I haven’t read a lot of books where the main character […]

Fate, Destiny, and Choices – Parallel Life Books

Posted September 24, 2015 / Discussions, Features / 11 Comments

I think I’ve talked about this in so many reviews that it’s finally time to bring this topic to its own discussion post. I’ve also touched on it quite a bit during my read-bait series (that will be revived again, I promise) and as a guest post for Andi during Parallel Time Loop. It’s a topic that I think about A LOT and, as a result, love reading books about. I’m going to talk a bit about what guides us through life: fate or choices. Are we destined to reach the same final destination in life, regardless of the decisions we make? Or does each and every choice impact us in some way, where one decision changes everything? I’m not sure we’ll ever know the real answer to this, but some books I’ve read within the past couple of years definitely bring it up in different and interesting ways. I’ll share what piqued my interest in this topic, my thoughts on it, and then some books that deal with it.I think I should preface this conversation with the fact that I am not religious at all. When I sit here talking (uh, typing) about fate and choices and all that jazz, I’m not implying in any way that I think God is the mastermind behind all of it. I’m thinking more along the lines of some grander plan out there. I don’t know what or who or anything… just something bigger than us. I just wanted to clarify that first because I think usually […]

Review: My Life Next Door

Posted September 23, 2015 / Book Reviews / 9 Comments

Okay obviously the first thing I need to mention is CONNECTICUT! I love when books are set in my state; I can definitely get a better feel for the setting and environment. Of course, the made-up town in this book is clearly down by the shore (an area I am definitely not from), so it barely feels like Connecticut. My part of the state features a lot of farms and smelly cows. This book was definitely hyped up, but – thank god – met my expectations! I really loved Jase, and he’s the reason this book was so fantastic. Sam was an okay character, but a little flat. I know that she’s had a pretty sheltered life and Jase helped her get out of of her comfort zone a bit, but I just wasn’t totally on board with her. Regardless, I shipped them as a couple very hard. I liked how sex was kind of an important part of the book. Any YA book that talks about it or actually does it is okay in my book. It’s real! It’s a part of teenagers’ lives. There were a few things that bugged me. I mean, clearly Tim had a problem with drinking and some drugs, but AS USUAL the portrayal of weed-smoking in a YA book bothered me. It’s something that I think authors don’t usually get right. This was no exception. Tim was a huge dickhead in the beginning but seriously shaped up throughout the book. At first, I […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #56: Fall TBR

Posted September 22, 2015 / TBR Lists, Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 20 Comments

Ten Books on my Fall TBR List 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. I like to try to read a lot of different things, across genres, formats, and where I got them from. I am utterly terrible about sticking to a TBR each month because my moods change SO much. The only “required” reading I usually have to do is if I signed up for a blog tour, for my Book Buddies review, and for my real-life book club. I’ve wanted to find a TBR format that works for me so I can still have some kind of method to my madness and I’ve been lurking on Andi’s TBR methods for a while. I decided to try it for the rest of September and October. Here are some of the categories I came up with… I tried to think of the books I genuinely want to read this fall, and what categories they may fall into. I don’t want to restrict myself too much so I did leave a freebie option or two. I filled this page with categories – 18 books – but I will most likely exceed that number between the rest of September and all of October. That gives me even more wiggle room! Now, some […]