Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Holiday Review: Ex-Mas

Posted December 5, 2014 / Book Reviews / 5 Comments

I’ve had my eye on this book for a long time, considering how much I love Kate Brian. Up until this year, I never really considered reading holiday-themed books and just never picked this one up from the store. I’m glad I finally did! I sat down the day after Thanksgiving and read it in under two hours. Lila is a popular girl, dating her best friend’s older brother, and about to throw the party of the year while her parents are out of town. Her brother and his best friend decide that they need to venture to the North Pole to save Santa in light of global warming, and Lila is forced to travel with her ex-boyfriend (Beau, her brother’s friend’s brother) to get the boys back before her parents come home. I absolutely loved the road trip that they took. It was fun reading about their mini-adventures and mishaps along the way. The book was predictable, but still had some cute, unique parts. Kate Brian is one of my favorite authors, so I wasn’t surprised that she crafted a well-written holiday tale. There is somewhat of a love triangle, but it was well-done in the sense that you know who she’s going to end up with It was a great story of second chances, both romantically and family-wise. Lila was kind of annoying at first because you can tell that she really had to prove herself and change herself to become popular. I didn’t like that about her […]

Review: Biggest Flirts

Posted November 28, 2014 / Book Reviews / 3 Comments

What Worked I liked that Tia, our main character, wasn’t afraid to be herself. She would party, have fun, and not worry about what anyone thought of her. I’m not used to main characters that are more sexually experienced or open about hooking up. I prefer that in books and wish I could see it more often. I loved Will. As far as love interests go, he was so cute and great. He pretty much kept me going with his book and was the only reason I cared to finish because I wanted to make sure he ended up happy. And I liked his earring. I haven’t read any other books by this author, but I give her major props for this series. The Superlatives is such a cute idea! The next books in the companion series feature some of Tia’s best friends, who win other superlatives. Overall I’m excited for the series despite some of the reservations below. The ending was really cute. It was very hopeful and not completely closed off. I like when endings leave something up to the imagination while implying that things are headed in the right direction. What Didn’t Work As great as Tia was in her sex-positive ways, she really annoyed me most of the time. My least favorite book trope is when the main character is emotionally closed-off and refuses to entertain the idea of a serious relationship. Normally it’s because they’ve been hurt in the past; in this case, Tia watched […]

200 Word Review: Private series

Posted September 29, 2014 / Book Reviews / 5 Comments

In honor of my intentions to finally finish the Private series by Kate Brian, I’m going to post a brief review here for the first 12 books of the season. Yes, somehow I’ll review all twelve books in less than 200 words. I want to play catch up a little bit because I know once I read the final books, I’ll want to post those reviews. It’ll feel too weird posting them without having some other semblance of a review for the rest of the series. Without further ado, here are my thoughts on the entire Private series so far… The series is about one of my favorite topics: boarding schools. Reed heads off to Easton Academy, where she falls in with a group of rich girls in a sorority-esque “club” called Billings House. LONG, LONG story short – a lot of crazy shit happens with her and her friends over the course of their school years, like people getting murdered or going missing, vacations, fires, friend drama, administration trying to shut them down, breakups and makeups, etc. I won’t get too spoilery, but there was a major TWIST at the end of the last book I read (#12 – Vanished). It didn’t really make a lot of sense and I wasn’t overly eager to get into the following books. Regardless, I have to finish the series off since it’s been an important part of my reading life since middle school. If you like books about boarding schools and “mean girls,” this […]

Review: Just Like Fate

Posted September 26, 2014 / Book Reviews / 4 Comments

Wow, this book left me sitting there with a dumbfounded look on my face. The story is about Caroline, who is faced with a tough decision in the wake of grandmother’s impending death. Should she escape her family for the night to attend a party with her friend Simone? Or should she stay with them by her grandmother’s side? This decision splits her world in two: she lives out both of the timelines for the reader to enjoy. The book alternated chapters between STAY and GO, which was surprisingly not too confusing. Sometimes I had to peek down at the bottom corner of the page and remind myself of which one I was reading, but otherwise it was not hard to follow. What a freaking cool concept. I’ve been obsessed with the parallel life theme for as long as I can remember. Going into this book, I assumed the GO timeline would piss me off because I couldn’t imagine leaving my family in a time like that, especially for a party. Somehow I actually much preferred the GO timeline to the STAY one. I don’t know why; I think the STAY decision led to more boring consequences for me. One of my favorite things about the book was the “glimpes” into the other timeline from the one we were reading. For example, she would say “I could never imagine a world where ___ happened” …. while that exact thing was happening in the other timeline! It was really, really cool. […]

Review: Second Chance Summer

Posted September 22, 2014 / Book Reviews / 10 Comments

Okay I finished this book less than two minutes ago and am making sure to write this review immeditely. Holy shit. Morgan Matson. Why and how are you so good? I don’t think I can express how much I loved this story. It was so many different things, all amazing and sad and happy at the same time. This is most likely not going to be a very long review because I kind of just only want to sit here and cry. Very few books have actually made me cry out loud, but this book was one of them. OKAY so Taylor and her family head to their lake house, where they haven’t been in five years, because their father only has a few months left to live. Their relationships at the beginning of the book are so strained and everyone is totally separate from one another. Watching their family grow and develop over the summer was just so perfect. Instead of a nice slow burn romance, this was a slow burn family-rekindling. Meanwhile, Taylor is faced with all of the people she left behind five summers earlier. This included her best friend Lucy and boyfriend Henry. Taylor has to make amends for what she did to them when she left. It was nice to see that those aspects were vital to the story, but still felt more in the background. Above everything else, this book was about family. I’m tempted to text my dad that I love him right […]

Review: To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before

Posted August 29, 2014 / Book Reviews / 10 Comments

Okay honestly I can’t believe I didn’t read this book sooner. It has been my most anticipated read of the year, hands down, and I guess I kept waiting to see if it would go on sale. I decided to just say fuck it and decided to make it a part of Bout of Books. I am so, SO glad I finally read this one (although I kind of wish I waited a little longer so it would be closer to the release of the second book). To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before easily gets five stars from me. I loved every second of it. I LOVED loved LoVeD the characters. Before I get too carried away – this book is about how Lara Jean’s life is turned upside down when her box of letters is released to their intended recipients. In order to get over a boy she likes, she writes a letter to them and hides it in a hatbox under her bed. One day, the letters are mysteriously sent out and she has to deal with the repercussions. One of the boys is her sister’s ex-boyfriend Josh, who is also their longtime friend/neighbor. Another is the popular boy at school, Peter, who was her first kiss. Lucas, a third boy at her school, becomes her close friend after getting her letter and helps her make sense of everything happening to her. Every character in this book was so fun to get to know. Lara Jean was blessed with an amazing […]

Review: Dangerous Boys

Posted August 21, 2014 / Book Reviews / 2 Comments

If I highlight the first paragraph of a book… I can tell it's going to be good. @abbymcdonald #DangerousBoys #YES — Lauren (@bookmarklit) August 19, 2014 Review: I’m certainly not the first person, and I won’t be the last person, to say HOLY SHIT this book was crazy. I’m not sure what I was expecting with this one, but based on other people’s reviews I was prepared for something absolutely wild and full of twists. This book delivered in very many of those ways. Unlike a lot of people, I couldn’t bring myself to give it five stars and I’m still kind of trying to figure out why. Lately, every thriller/mystery/suspense book I even THINK about reading is compared to Gone Girl. I couldn’t even come close to predicting the vast majority of twists in that book. That was a five star-worthy suspense book for me because it kept me guessing literally with every page. For the most part, Dangerous Boys did the same. I kept wondering who was the boy in the hospital, who did she pick, and what the fuck was generally going on. Primarily I was thinking – how the HELL is this book going to end? I was already disappointed in the ending of Gone Girl! The ending here didn’t disappoint. It made my mouth drop open. (I think I jumped the gun talking about the ending so early in the review but whatever – Abigail Haas can start her book at the end so I can start my […]

Review: Since You’ve Been Gone

Posted August 8, 2014 / Book Reviews / 7 Comments

Review: Okay, first let me get out my feelings about audiobooks. I don’t like them. I love the idea of them, but really can’t stand them as I’m listening. They really impact the novel for me. I can’t separate the narrator’s (often annoying) voice from the characters and the story. I want to hear the characters as I hear them in my head, instead of from some actress who thinks she knows what the author intended. I absolutely love being able to “read” while driving or taking a shower or getting ready in the morning. I suffer through audiobooks for that reason alone. I am slowly but surely getting over this aversion, because I find the only way I can “read” two books at once is if they’re in these two different formats. Anyways, in spite of the audiobook, I really enjoyed this one. This has been on my to-read list for a long time. I love the cover and thought the premise sounded really cute. Other bloggers seemed to love this one too, so I decided to use my Audible credit on it. The story follows Emily as she checks of items on the list that Sloane left her. She becomes friends with two people from her school and the girl who works at the pizza shop in the meantime. It was really nice to watch shy Emily come out of her shell and develop her own personality separate from Sloane. As the novel went on, I decided I really […]