February Wrap-Up

There’s still one day left of February but since I won’t finish a book or write a review before then I’ll post this wrap-up now. I had an okay-ish reading month. I could have gotten more done but oh well. Lately I’ve been focusing on my Gilmore Girls rewatch ❤

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FINISHED READING

Crush
by Richard Siken

I’d heard of Richard Siken for a while because he’s often quoted online, and one night I decided to check him out finally and I didn’t regret it. I don’t read poetry often but this was beautiful. I didn’t rate it because it’s hard for me to rate poetry, especially if I’ve only read it once, but I really enjoyed most of the poems in this book. 

“I don’t really blame you for being dead but you can’t have your sweater back.”

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Daughter of Smoke and Bone 
by Laini Taylor
[review]

I loved this so much. Such an unique story and beautiful writing. I’d definitely recommend it.

5/5 stars + a new favorite!

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Throne of Glass
by Sarah J. Maas
[review]

I finally don’t feel like an outsider anymore for not having read this book! Sadly it wasn’t all that, but I’ve heard the series improves so don’t worry, I’ll continue!

2/5 stars

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STARTED READING

The Basic Eight
by Daniel Handler

I started this on a whim because I was curious, but I haven’t had the time to finish it yet because I had to prioritize a library book. I’m only 15% in but it seems like it could be a fun and disturbing one so I can’t wait to get into it properly. 

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Blodets Galskap
by Elisabeth Øvreberg

This is the library book I had to prioritize. It’s a Norwegian fantasy and I’m not quite sure how I feel about it yet. The basic premise is interesting but I’m not liking the way the omniscient narrator works and the instalove is a bit too much for me (even though it’s refreshing that it’s one sided and not straight). 

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Other reviews written this month

Wonder by R.J. Palacio

Room by Emma Donoghue

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Book Traveling Thursday (13) | An underrated book

It’s Thursday and time for another Book Traveling Thursday. This weekly meme was created by Cátia @ The Girl Who Read Too Much and Danielle @ Danielle’s Book Blog. Visit their Goodreads group to learn more about Book Traveling Thursday 🙂

The rules are to share covers related to the weekly theme where you include the original cover, the cover from your country, your favorite, and your least favorite. I’ve decided to go for a top 3 and bottom 3 arrangement, because that’s more fun and I get to showcase more covers. 

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This week’s theme is “an underhyped book”

I own a lot of books that I don’t see people talking about often, but the thing is I haven’t read most of them yet XD So I don’t know, I’m just going to go with More Than This by Patrick Ness. It’s by no means underhyped or underrated, but I just wish I saw more people talking about it. When people talk about Patrick Ness they usually mention the Chaos Walking series or A Monster Calls. But More Than This is definitely my favorite of the ones I’ve read by him. 

Review: Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas

Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas
Published by Bloomsbury in 2012
Pages: 404
Genres: Young Adult, Fantasy, Romance
Source: Purchased
Buy: Amazon | Book Depository | Barnes and Noble
Rating:

Meet Celaena Sardothien.
Beautiful. Deadly.
Destined for greatness.

In the dark, filthy salt mines of Endovier, an eighteen-year-old girl is serving a life sentence. She is a trained assassin, the best of her kind, but she made a fatal mistake: she got caught.

Young Captain Westfall offers her a deal: her freedom in return for one huge sacrifice. Celaena must represent the prince in a to-the-death tournament—fighting the most gifted thieves and assassins in the land. Live or die, Celaena will be free. Win or lose, she is about to discover her true destiny. But will her assassin’s heart be melted?

I read this book as a read-along with Trang, Lora Shouse and Luke Taylor. It was a lot of fun, I love discussing a book as I read it and I’ve had this on my tbr for ages. 

• Trang’s review
• Lora’s review
• My discussion post

I have a lot of thoughts on this book. I’m not sure I’ll remember to mention everything but I’ll try. 

If you read my discussion post (link above) you already know that I knew what to expect when I started reading the book. For instance I knew it focused more on romance than action. So I didn’t go into this with very high expectations and that way I didn’t end up being disappointed even if I only ended up giving it two stars. I wish it was better, but it’s exactly what I thought it’d be. Let me explain. 

Top Ten Tuesday | Books I didn’t think I’d enjoy but then…

This weekly meme was was created by The Broke and the Bookish. This today’s theme is a “Ten Book I Enjoyed Recently (last yearish) That Weren’t My Typical Genre/Type of Book (or that was out of your comfort zone)“. 

I’m going to modify it slightly to books I didn’t think I’d be very into, for whatever reason, but that I ended up enjoying. If I don’t think I’ll enjoy a book then I’m often right, so I could only think of five that I felt like I wanted to put on the list. 

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Daughter of Smoke and Bone

I didn’t think I’d hate this book or anything, but I didn’t really know anything about this before I started it other than it was about angels. I haven’t read any other angel books but I’ve heard from reliable sources that a lot of angel books out there (like Fallen and Hush Hush) aren’t very good. But ohhhhh boy this book is fantastic and the writing is just beautiful. [review]

“It is a condition of monsters that they do not perceive themselves as such. The dragon, you know, hunkered in the village devouring maidens, heard the townsfolk cry ‘Monster!’ and looked behind him.”

 

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Eleanor & Park

After not really liking Fangirl [review] all that much, I was wary of Rowell. And since I don’t really gravitate towards romance books I wasn’t sure if I’d like this. But I loved it, I loved the character and I loved the angst. [review]

“Eleanor was right. She never looked nice. She looked like art, and art wasn’t supposed to look nice; it was supposed to make you feel something.”

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Anna Dressed In Blood

It’s paranormal romance. Something I don’t really read. But the cover is freaky and so I read it and I’m still surprised at how much I loved it. It’s slightly inta-lovey but at the same time gory and gruesome. I inhaled this book in one sitting, it was just so fun and fast-paced. It’s one of those books that are just like candy. Plus it reminded me a lot of Supernatural. 

“I’ve seen most of what there is to be afraid of in this world, and to tell you the truth, the worst of them are the ones that make you afraid in the light.”

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Passing

This was a required read, and you know how they tend to go. But I loved this little book, the writing style is surprisingly modern for a book published in 1929 and I enjoyed the story. It’s about two mixed-raced white-passing women and their relationship to each other and their communities. 

“The trouble with Clare was, not only that she wanted to have her cake and eat it too, but that she wanted to nibble at the cakes of other folk as well.”

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Wuthering Heights

I didn’t like Jane Austen and I hated Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, so I didn’t really think I’d like her sister either even though I knew that this book was different. But oh man, Emily, marry me. There’s none of those timid and prim and proper characters, oh no. This is dark. This book is a mess, Catherine and Heathcliff are horrible and broken people and completely disintegrate without each other. I feel like they truly were soulmates, and by not being able to be together they got destroyed from the inside out. (Also isn’t this cover awesome? It’s not the one I own but I want it.)

 

“It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now; so he shall never know how I love him: and that, not because he’s handsome, Nelly, but because he’s more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same”

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So that’s it for this week 🙂 

If you’ve read any of these books, how did you like them? What are some books you didn’t think you’d be into but that you ended up enjoying?

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First Impressions: A Gathering of Shadows

Well, this is not going to be a proper review, because I’ve only read the preview from NetGalley, though it was a lot longer than I thought it would be. I think it was the first 155 pages or so, at least according to my kindle. 

A Gathering of Shadows is the second book in V.E. Schwab’s fantasy series Shades of Magic. As you might know, I didn’t really like the first book, A Darker Shade of Magic, but I wanted to read this preview just to see if I’d like it better. And yeah, I think I do, at least a little bit. Maybe enough to buy the book and finish it. 

Throne of Glass Read-Along (Expectations VS Reality)

Hey guys! As some of you may know I’m doing a Throne of Glass read-along this week with Trang @ Bookidote, Lora Shouse @ Ettria, and Luke Taylor. I’ve been planning on reading this book for quite some time now, possibly two years or more, and I had to take advantage of Trang’s read-along. 

Now, I’m 77% into the book, so let’s talk about expectations vs reality. 

Before I went into this book I didn’t know much about the plot itself, but I knew a lot about what people have been saying about it generally. For example that it’s not as action-packed as it might seem, but instead focuses a lot on the love-triangle and on pretty people’s pretty clothing. So knowing this, I didn’t go into it expecting a page-turning masterpiece, my expectations were low. However, I’ve heard the second book gets a lot better so my expectations for that one are considerably higher. 

Expectation: Super hot heroine who’s also super talented and arrogant and annoying as heck
Reality: Super hot and talented heroine who yes, thinks quite highly of herself and her skills. I don’t actually find her that annoying though, but her characterization is a bit inconsistent. And we don’t really see a lot of her talent, it’s mostly Celaena telling us she’s talented. Okay, sure, but show me instead, stop telling me. 

Expectation: Love triangle
Reality: Love triangle

Book Traveling Thursday (12) | A Heartbreaking Book

It’s Thursday and time for another Book Traveling Thursday. This weekly meme was created by Cátia @ The Girl Who Read Too Much and Danielle @ Danielle’s Book Blog. Visit their Goodreads group to learn more about Book Traveling Thursday 🙂

The rules are to share covers related to the weekly theme where you include the original cover, the cover from your country, your favorite, and your least favorite. I’ve decided to go for a top 3 and bottom 3 arrangement, because that’s more fun and I get to showcase more covers. 

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This week’s theme is “Crying is not always bad. Choose a book that made you ugly cry.”

I love sad books, but I don’t really cry while reading. But I’m choosing a book that tore my heart out and it’s The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. If you’ve read it you know what part I’m talking about. Whyyy Patrick Ness, whyyy ;_;