Format: ARC

ARC Review: Illuminae

Posted October 14, 2015 / Book Reviews / 9 Comments

I feel weird calling myself a black sheep about a book I still gave four stars, but it seems like I definitely am. Everyone else who read this (especially the early reviews back when I read it in July) was literally blown away by how epic it was. Don’t get me wrong – it’s REALLY GOOD. Intense and interesting and crazy and unique. But for some reason it just didn’t have that same WOW factor that everyone else saw. Kady and Ezra broke up right before the book started, when their planet was invaded and they were taken onto different space shuttles. Honestly I’m still a little unclear about what happened and why, but it was crazy and bad I guess. It’s actually impossible to explain much about the plot of this though because (a) not much really happens, if you think about it, and (b) the major plot points are super spoilery. I REALLY LIKED THIS A LOT, I PROMISE. Like I said, there was just a bit of wow factor missing for me. I loved the drawings and the format: so many interesting things to read and look at. It made it pretty fast-paced and intriguing. You really never knew what the next page’s format was going to be. It’s totally unique and adds a lot to the story. I loved following the different chat conversations and official documents towards the beginning, and the format towards the end got fucking intense. I can’t even really pinpoint what parts […]

Blog Tour Review: Come Away With Me

Posted September 10, 2015 / Book Reviews / 14 Comments

I absolutely raced through and devoured this book. It was the epitome of the “one more chapter” excuse before bed because I literally could not force myself to put the book down and sleep. I wasn’t expecting to be so entranced by the story, but I couldn’t stop. I generally read Young Adult books because I still feel like I am one. I’m 24 years old (officially, as of yesterday!) but relate much more to the YA characters I read than the ones in Adult Fiction. The characters in this book were going through some pretty tough stuff that I truly couldn’t relate to, but I was still SO deeply invested in their stories. For me, that’s a successful book. I love reading books where I have been through similar experiences to the main character(s), because it’s just easier to relate and enjoy it. If a book is able to creep in my mind and never leave, regardless of never experiencing anything like it, it’s wonderful to me. Tegan and her husband, Gabe, had a serious car accident with even more serious consequences. She still hasn’t forgiven him for the accident and the results of it, and she has slipped into a depression for the past few months. Gabe reminds her one day of their “jar of spontaneity” that they put together when they were engaged, and they decide now is the time to pull it out. They wrote various destinations and “bucket list” tasks on slips of paper and would pull […]

ARC Review: Dumplin’

Posted September 9, 2015 / Book Reviews / 14 Comments

I have no idea why Dumplin’ didn’t sound that appealing to me when I first heard of it. I mean, really, it has a lot of elements I’d be interested in. I almost didn’t bother requesting it through the ARC tour, but I couldn’t be happier that I decided to go for it. First of all, the cover is amazing and minimalistic and absolutely perfect for the story. Second, the story was fucking amazing. Dumplin’ honestly blew me away. I wrote down so many powerful quotes that I don’t even how to share them with you. All I know this, this book was extremely perfect for me. I feel like all girls (at some point or another) struggle with their appearance: whether it has to do with their weight, their legs, their hair… anything. I’m constantly self-conscious about how I look and my weight. I wish I was half as confident as Willowdean is in her skin. Girls of all sizes and appearances will appreciate the message of this book. Willowdean, as confident as she is, even has some moments of doubt – between her relationship with Bo, her feelings about her mother, and the pageant, even some things can bring her down momentarily. I loved her right away, starting from the moment she distracted Millie from the taunting of a dickhead guy at school. I completely understood SO many of the things she was going through, from growing apart from her best friend, to being jealous of new friends, to […]

ARC Review: Mirrored

Posted September 7, 2015 / Book Reviews / 2 Comments

I definitely have some mixed feelings on this one. I’m tempted to lower the rating because of all the things that bugged me, but there were quite a few things I liked as well. The overall story behind this one was really cool, from a retelling standpoint. All of the elements that actually connected to Snow White were really well-done. Some of them made you think a little bit, and I bet I even missed some of the references to the original story. The plot was a really interesting take on that story and didn’t seem too similar. I have to give this book points for that. It was also cool to have the three different perspectives in the story, starting with Violet’s backstory, how that impacts Celine in her part, and how Goose finishes off the book. The characters were pretty good. Again, I liked getting a glimpse at Violet’s backstory so you could really see how and why she got to be the way she was. It was a little bit easier to be KIND OF sympathetic towards her when she starts being insane. Celine was a nice enough main character but was really just (1) smart and (2) obsessed with a singer named Jonah Prince. We don’t get too much more than that. Goose was probably my favorite but even then he wasn’t super memorable. The pacing and writing style really bugged me. There were a few (okay, a lot) of places in the book that draaaaggged on […]

ARC Review: Everything, Everything

Posted September 4, 2015 / Book Reviews / 15 Comments

I totally, totally loved this. Is it bad that I spent the entire time thinking about Bubble Boy though? I’m just glad the main character of this book was a little less (okay, a LOT less) weird than Bubble Boy. Otherwise, a looot of the elements were the same… I absolutely looove books that have emails and images and IM conversations… anything that has that sort of element is going to be a-okay in my book. This was so fast and easy to read, because of the aforementioned elements and the incredibly short chapters. Love me some short chapters. Aside from all that fun stuff, the writing was kind of gorgeous. “You can’t predict the future. It turns out that you can’t predict the past either. Time moves in both directions – forward and backward – and what happens here and now changes them both.” The story follows Madeline, a girl with SCID – it basically means she has to live in a bubble-type environment (her completely sterile house) so she doesn’t get sick and die quickly. Her mother and her nurse are the only people who see her… until she meets the new neighbor, Olly. Sigh. So cute. The two of them start talking right away and eventually the nurse sneaks him into the house. Their relationship was adorable and heartbreaking, because you wonder if/how it’ll ever work. I loved her nurse, Carla, because she was so supportive of Madeline in everything she did. Even more so than her […]

DNF Review: The Heartbreakers

Posted August 13, 2015 / Book Reviews / 5 Comments

When did you decide to DNF? I read 138 pages and then skimmed a little bit to see if anything interesting happened. Why did you quit? After 100+ pages I didn’t care about what was going to happen. I can only assume the main character and the boy band singer fall in love, have a fight, and then get back together. I’m cool with the typical YA storyline if I like the characters and feel invested, but I didn’t really feel that way with this one. The main character seemed to have a sort of “selective” feminism. She called her brother out for using her in a bet as a piece of meat, but she didn’t say anything when the boy she likes is sexist about girls and their favorite movies. She proved him wrong by telling him her favorites aren’t The Notebook and Titanic, but she wasn’t at all insulted that he assumed that. It just seemed weird that she’d yell at her brother for something like that but let the boy she (insta)likes do it without a problem. I’m not sure why this is the biggest thing that bugged me, but I really think it’s the main reason I said “never mind” to this book. The writing style felt a bit off too. It mostly had to do with the somewhat cliched teenager words/phrases that were trying too hard. A lot of the characterization of the triplets (the main character, her brother, and her sister) was very… forced? I’m not sure how […]