Hey everyone. Every month I do a monthly recap revolving around my blog but it also dips into music, movies, etc. 🙂 Life this month has been so long… There’s been quite a bit of family drama going on. As I talked about in past recaps, my kitten, Eponine was pretty sick for a week. 😦 She slept a lot, but I kind of ignored it for two days, well, I didn’t really notice. Then when she was still like that a week later, I was really concerned. Thankfully we took her to the vet, she had pneumonia, but she’s better now. 🙂 Of course, I’m now paranoid about everything with her now… But I tend to worry about a lot of stuff, so that’s not surprising.
I was also sick myself for a week or so. It was mostly a cold along with allergies (to cats, nonetheless, I still love them). One of my cousin’s is staying with us for a couple weeks right now, so that’s new. Other than this excitement, things have been a bit of the same. Including the snow. 😦 I woke up to snow today. And then more snow because it was still snowing. I’m so tired of snow. Come on, sky, it’s like, almost MARCH. That’s when people have SPRING break. Goshhh.
~Stats~
WordPress Followers: 104
BlogLovin’ Followers: 68
Facebook Likes: 20
# of Views/Visitors: 3,087/2,261
# of Blog Posts: 22 (Now 23)
# of Reviews: 4
# of Likes: 32
# of Comments: 100
Most Viewed Post: Review: Where She Went by Gayle Forman (1,247 views)
I launched my One Day More feature, inspired by Jamie’s feature “Save The Date”.
~Book/Author Related~
I have no idea on this guys. Tell me what I’m missing! Besides book releases, I know those. 🙂
~Music~
KELLY CLARKSON AND SIA COLLABORATED FOR THIS AWESOME SONG CALLED INVINCIBLE. She also shared a ton of songs from her new album. And I am dying to hear her album in only three days!
Sia finished an unreleased album called This Is Acting
Lady Gaga did a medley made up of songs from The Sound of Music
Zedd and Selena Gomez have a new song, “I Want You To Know”
Charli XCX’s song “Red Balloon” is going to be in a movie.
Florence + The Machine’s new album has a release date
Marina and The Diamonds is coming back! I’m so excited.
Avril Lavigne posted a video
Adam Lambert has a new album
~Movies/Musical Related~
The DUFF premiered this month! I still haven’t gone to see it (darn the lack of income), but I’m going to in a couple weeks hopefully!
The Last Five Years also premiered in theaters, unfortunately none where I live. 😦
Eddie Redmayne is going to play Einar Wegener/ Lili Elbe in The Danish Girl which comes out next year. I’m so excited!
~TV Show Wise~
Okay, so I’m all caught up on The Vampire Diaries (well, I’d been watching it live but anyway…). I’m so upset I have to wait 2-3 more weeks for the new episodes. 😦 I know it’s not very long, but I just don’t know what they need the break for! Haha, if you read my Steroline post from last month and watch The Vampire Diaries, you probably know I am EXTREMELY happy.
So I never really watched Glee when it was on, but I’ve watched the first and second seasons along with almost all of season 3. Anyway, I’m really sad Glee’s ending after five seasons. 😦 I mean, I know five seasons is a good run, especially with how the show (apparently) went downhill (according to people online), but it’s still bittersweet. I loved last week’s episode. It was great. I’m kind of upset with the whole Bieste storyline, make that extremely upset….
Onto Pretty Little Liars now….oh my gosh. I was hoping they wouldn’t go down the storyline they’re doing, but they are. (I’m being vague so not to spoil it for anyone). Spencer’s still my favorite, as always. I’m tired of all the love interests except for Caleb, as always. I’m hoping they would keep a girl or two single for a while but that’s not possible, as always. I had no idea this season (season 5) had 25 episodes. That’s cool.
So after The Vampire Diaries, Glee, and Pretty Little Liars go on break, I won’t really have anything to watch. I think. I’m going to check and see when they each end.
The Vampire Diaries breaks on : May 14th
Glee breaks on…I mean ends on: March 20th 😦 I’m so sad!!
Pretty Little Liars breaks on: March 24th
But on the bright side, I think Degrassi starts back up and Game of Thrones should be back in the summer too.
Degrassi starts: …Um, there’s no news on Degrassi. WHY IS THERE NO NEWS ABOUT
DEGRASSI? I’M GOING TO FREAK OUT. I’m scared….Ok, some website says that it’s supposed to continue supposedly April 7th.
Game of Thrones starts: April 12th!
Oh good, so I’ll have a couple shows to watch. I don’t watch much tv.
~Books I Read~
Remember by Eileen Cook (4/5 stars)
Maybe One Day by Melissa Kantor (4/5 stars)
None of The Above by I.W. Gregorio (4/5 stars)
I’ll Meet You There by Heather Demtrios (5/5 stars)
How To Win At High School by Owen Matthews (4/5)
The Law of Loving Others by Kate Axelrod (4/5)
Little Peach by Peggy Kern (4/4)
Pivot Point (#1) by Kasie West (4/5)
I’ve started My Heart and Other Black Holes and Split Second, but haven’t finished them. I hoped to do that today but…Twitter distracted me. 🙂 Overall I had a good reading month, rate-wise. I’ve already reviewed Remember, the rest will be reviewed in March and April.
~Blogging Related Highlights~
Um, I really loved seeing all of the #LoveAThon and #BloggerAuthorLove posts going on.
~On Twitter~
Two llamas escaped to their freedom before being captured five hours later. 🙂
And the internet is split because of this dress:
What colors do YOU see?
~Addictions~
Giveaways, sorry for all the tweets guys.
Boy Meets World
~How Did I Do With My Resolutions?~
I didn’t read any classics, I didn’t finish a series, I didn’t read any adult books…. Let’s just say not so great. Haha.
~How Did I Do With My Challenges?~
Um….Yeah, about that….Oh! I read a couple debuts. 🙂
Well that’s been my month. How has yours been? Has anything exciting happened? Something unexpected? Did it go well or no? Let me know! Tomorrow I’ll be posting what I’m looking forward to next month.
Published: July 29th, 2014 (Alloy Entertainment) (Originally published November 4th, 2013)
Pages: 257
Genre/Themes: Young Adult, Magical Realism, High School, Psychology, Bullying, Romance
Format: E-ARC
Source:I received an E-ARC via Netgalley. This is no way affects this review.
Rating: Five stars
Goodreads Summary:
When seventeen-year-old Ashley Watson walks through the halls of her high school bullies taunt and shove her. She can’t go a day without fighting with her mother. And no matter how hard she tries, she can’t make her best friend, Matt, fall in love with her. But Ashley also has something no one else does: a literal glimpse into the future. When Ashley looks into the mirror, she can see her twenty-three-year-old self.
Her older self has been through it all already—she endured the bullying, survived the heartbreak, and heard every ugly word her classmates threw at her. But her older self is also keeping a dark secret: Something terrible is about to happen to Ashley. Something that will change her life forever. Something even her older self is powerless to stop.
Cover Thoughts: I like that the cover is simple and reflects the basic idea of the book.
First Line: As the psychiatrist enters the room, he offers me a patronizing smile.
~First Thoughts~
Unrequited love is always a great start. Even though I feel really sorry for Ashley.
~Review~
What do I even say about Every Ugly Word, the book that broke my heart? When I began reading Every Ugly Word, I instantly had flashbacks of the movies Read It and Weep and 13 Going on 30, both movies I really like. I loved Every Ugly Word so much. As I read this, I made several Goodreads statuses, the majority of them freaking out over what was going on. As well as how annoying everyone except Ashley was to me. Who wouldn’t love to have an older self give them advice? I know I would. I would love to know where I’m going to be ten years from now.
Of course, even though Ashley asks her Older Self for advice, she doesn’t tell Ashley all that she wants to know. In addition to that, Ashley also thinks her Older Self is keeping a certain something from her. I really liked that Ashley’s Older Self was 23 because that’s how old I am now so I just that was cool. I know I went through a lot of life changes when I was sixteen and it would have been great to have a Older self to talk to.
Ashley’s relationship with her Older Self is interesting. Her Older Self is really the only one she trusts except Matt and even that is diminishing because she thinks her Older Self is keeping something from her. i thought it was unique how Ashley talked to her Older Self but it had to be done in a mirror only. The Older Self in the mirror gave Every Ugly Word a sense of magical realism which I really liked even if I had to suspend my belief a little bit at times. While her Older Self does give her advice, Ashley isn’t always so quick to take it, if she takes it at all. This gets her into some situations that aren’t very good.
I really liked the Older Self. At times it was annoying that she didn’t just TELL Ashley what was going on or why she said certain things, but there are reasons for everything. I like how her Older Self really cared about her in a way that no one else in her life did. That sounds really weird because it IS herself, but I just loved the sort of friendship the two had with each other.
What I loved most about Every Ugly Word is how original the premise is. Is Ashley mentally ill? Does she really see her older self in the mirror? The narration was unique because it’s entirely told as a relay between Ashley and her therapist. We then find out that she’s actually relaying the events of the aforementioned incident. I found the therapy sessions to be really interesting
. I liked how the therapist got deep into Ashley’s feelings, explaining why she may have felt a certain way or why she thought of herself so lowly. As Every Ugly Word flipped back and forth between present time and the therapy sessions, I kept trying to figure out what exactly was going on. I like that it wasn’t spelled out what was really real. In Every Ugly Word, we don’t find out what age Ashley is in therapy until the end, I liked this because I kept making guesses about when it was occurring.
I loved that in the therapy scenes, the therapist used a lot of psychology terms that I remembered from college classes. I liked seeing him analyze Ashley and how what she went through affected her. One of my favorite terms he used was self fulfilling prophecy about how Ashley was so low because people thought of her as low and she didn’t expect any better. Because her mother treated her badly, she was bullied and she didn’t have Matt’s affections, she didn’t think highly of herself at all. She also didn’t try to do any better because of how people already thought of her.
I was intrigued in what Ashley was talking about to the therapist. The therapy session does lead somewhere, to a specific incident and it was really interesting trying to figure out what this incident was. I know I was going crazy over not knowing. It was also interesting to see what Ashley was in therapy because when we read Every Ugly Word, we don’t exactly know. I knew it wasn’t the 16 year old Ashley because it talks about the past. I like how I didn’t exactly know what Ashley was dealing with, whether she was really mentally ill or if she actually did have an older self who gave her advice.
Ashley was an extremely relatable character. Being bullied in high school myself, I could definitely relate to the pain she felt. I knew how it was to just struggle to get through each day. To try to avoid people. To feel so low about myself that self-worth was nonexistent. This was my life for the first two years of high school and the previous four years to a lesser extent. I was very sympathetic towards her. When she explained all the bullying my heart just broke. It was even worse when Matt, who was supposed to be her best friend, chose those people over her. Matt really ticked me off for this reason because I couldn’t process why he would believe them over her. Not to mention he dated a girl who made Ashley’s life hell and he was clueless to it all despite her telling him! I just don’t understand what kind of friend does that? Who would be friends with someone, let alone more than that, with someone that hurts their best friend?
I was also upset when Matt would pressure Ashley to hang out with them, blaming her for why they didn’t like her. Matt was definitely a flawed character. He made mistakes, he chose his friends over her, he didn’t believe her when t came to certain things and he pushed her to hang out with people that didn’t like her at all. Matt was definitely a flawed character this also made him very realistic though. He made mistakes but he does come through a couple times for Ashley.
The bullying in Every Ugly Word was so well done. I felt such sympathy for Ashley for dealing with the crap going on at her school and how she was treated. Her classmates were evil and I never understood why they treated Ashley the way they did. At the end of the day, there was no reason for it. Ashley didn’t do anything wrong, she didn’t deserve it. It was so sad watching her go through her classmates abuse. If that wasn’t enough, she’s also verbally abused at home by her mother. Her mom annoyed me so much, Ashley was always just being over-dramatic according to her and only worried about ruining her image.
I could really relate to how Ashley felt, alone, isolated, worthless, etc. Those were all things I’ve felt and to know someone else feels that way, even fictionally, is just horrible. I honestly don’t think I’ve ever been angrier at fictional characters than I was with her classmates. They were ruthless and some of the things they did were just so out of line. The self-loathing she felt was just a really spot on representation of how much affect people’s words and actions do have on others.
Thankfully, Ashley has art to turn to and I loved that. Art is how she gets everything out, so I was glad she had some kind of coping technique to use. I just want to thank Aimee for writing about these topics. Bullying is so prevalent in middle school and high school. The amount of depth I found in Every Ugly Word is never-ending.
I adored the ending of Every Ugly Word. It was hard to stop reading and I just had to know what was going on. At times I didn’t even know what was happening. I loved the overall message of this and how strong a person Ashley is despite not standing up for herself. The fact that she just took all the crap she went through every day, really got to me. I would definitely recommend Every Ugly Word.
~Final Thoughts~
Every Ugly Word showed a side of high school that’s not often seen in fiction. I loved the rawness of what Ashley went through. It was really interesting to read about her and her Older Self as well. The touch of romance in Every Ugly Word was also interesting and not overbearing. I like that the biggest plot was Ashley learning to love herself.
~Do I Recommend?~
Yes.
~Recommended For~
Fans of magical realism
Books involving psychology
Fans of 13 Going on 30 (Movie)
Fans of Read It and Weep (Movie)
~Memorable Quotes~
“Because this isn’t the movies, Doc. In the real world, when a seventeen-year-old guy gets a love letter from his best friend, he doesn’t suddenly decide to love her back. He runs screaming.”
“I don’t know. Girls are just . . . weird,” Matt grumbled. “You’re ready to forgive Dex at the drop of the hat, but you’re pissy with me because I don’t want you to get hurt. Karyn’s annoyed because I took you home last night, even though she told me to. And Mom’s mad because I’m not talking to Dad. But you all smile and tell me everything’s fine. What is it with you? Why are you mad all the time and pretending you aren’t?”
“About how guys and girls can’t ever really be just friends. I mean, how many times do I make friends with girls just to see if I want to date them?”
“You can’t control how other people hurt you, Ashley. But you can control how you hurt yourself.”
“I believe that human beings have a tendency to live up to expectations: what we expect of ourselves, what we believe others expect of us. I believe we all fit our lives to those patterns. And I wonder if that hasn’t been part of your problem. You make choices based on how you perceive others expect you to behave. You—perhaps subconsciously—draw their attention to your flaws.”
“People you love should always be more important than people who judge you.”
Their cruelty says a lot more about them than it does about you.
You just have to. If you push through this, you’ll show them. You’ll show them you didn’t deserve this.
Sometimes people aren’t as good as they look. Just because you want to believe they care doesn’t mean they actually do.
Our parents mold us, whether they mean to or not. Your mother convinced you that you were inadequate, that you lacked the necessary value.
Hi everyone. This is Wondrous covers Wednesday, a weekly feature I do to show off three book covers. There will generally be a theme but not always.
This week I wanted to do books that have post-its on the covers.
~One~
All The Bright Places by Jennifer Niven
~My Thoughts~
!. I love how this cover just uses pale colors.
2. I love all the different post-ts on it. I think that was really creative for the title and author’s name.
3. I love how there’s a finch and a violet on two of the post-its.
~Two~
The Last Time We Say Goodbye by Cynthia Hand
~My Thoughts~
1. This is a cover that I had to take a look at. At first, I only focused on the post-it. Then later I noticed that it’s actually on a mirror, from how it appears.
2. I like how the post-it is off center so it’s not straight in the middle.
3. I think the colors used were an interesting choice.
A thrilling tale about what a girl will do to get back a memory she lost…or remove what she wants to forget.
Harper is used to her family being hounded by protesters. Her father runs the company that trademarked the “Memtex” procedure to wipe away sad memories, and plenty of people think it shouldn’t be legal. Then a new demonstrator crosses her path, Neil, who’s as persistent as he is hot. Not that Harper’s noticing, since she already has a boyfriend.
When Harper suffers a loss, she’s shocked her father won’t allow her to get the treatment, so she finds a way to get it without his approval. Soon afterward, she’s plagued with strange symptoms, including hallucinations of a woman who is somehow both a stranger, yet incredibly familiar. Harper begins to wonder if she is delusional, or if these are somehow memories.
Together with Neil, who insists he has his own reasons for needing answers about the real dangers of Memtex, Harper begins her search for the truth. What she finds could uproot all she’s ever believed about her life…
Cover Thoughts: I don’t have any special feelings about the cover.
First Line: It’s not clear if Saint Thomas More had murder on his mind when he fell from his alcove in the north stairwell and onto my friend Win.
~Review~
Remember was definitely a dream to read. It featured all of the things I love in fiction:
▪Sarcastic Characters
▪Friendship
▪Mystery
▪Memory Loss Treatments
What caught my eye from the very get go is the memory loss treatment called Memtex. This instantly made me think of Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind. Memtex is a procedure that “softens” memories for people. When Remember begins, the treatment has just been opened up to children and teenagers. This of course doesn’t fare well for everyone because there are protesters who are against the treatment.
I have to say, I would love a treatment that helped erase or soften memories. I can see why people would protest it though, especially if they’ve seen someone suffer from the treatment.
The main character in Remember is Harper, a girl whose father just happens to be the head of a company called Neurotech which has created a memory loss treatment called Memtex.. I thought this aspect was extremely interesting. When her dad comes to talk to the school, he announces the product for teens. I loved that Harper was defensive over her dad, she always immediately defended him, the treatment and the company. Even to her best friend, Win, which is short for Winifred.
“I still stand by what I said: You have to learn to deal with life. Whatever it throws at you, good and bad.”
“But if you can make it easier, why shouldn’t you? I said. “Isn’t that the point? Life is hard, but if there’s a treatment that can make it less difficult so that you can focus on other stuff, positive stuff, that is dealing with it.”
Remember really made me think about my position on memory loss treatment. I know that’s weird, having a “position” on something that doesn’t even exist, but it made me think. Would having a treatment done to lose memories make things easier? Wouldn’t it be sort of running away from it all? I loved that Win wasn’t interested in this treatment at all. It reminded me of a character in Free To Fall (by Lauren Miller) who also wasn’t interested in something that everyone else was. I really loved the science fiction element of Remember, that part was really interesting to me. I liked seeing how Memtex took effect exactly.
I thought Harper was a great main character. She was funny, intelligent, and pretty positive which Win gets after her for once in Remember. Since Harper’s dad is a neuroscientist, Harper’s picked up various information about brain function which was great.
What really stood out to me about Harper was that she did horseback riding and not just any horseback riding, but she actually did competitions! I always love it when teenager characters actually have hobbies, especially rare ones. Horseback riding in competitions is something I used to want to do (thanks Full House and 7th Heaven), but alas, no horse and too old. It’s a big part of Harper’s life too, she has her own horse that she calls Harry.
Win was a fantastic character. She was the highlight in Remember for me.From the very get go, I loved her scenes with Harper. At times she was over-dramatic though, but she still made me laugh. I liked how sarcastic she was too. Win was a really good friend to Harper and there for her throughout the story, mostly anyway.
I really loved Harper and Win’s friendship. I liked that it wasn’t perfect though. Harper and Win get mad at each other at separate times and I thought their arguments were realistic. They were really sarcastic with each other which I loved. I also loved the humor they had, Win was really entertaining with it all. Win had a lot of great one-liners. Especially with Josh, Harper’s boyfriend. Josh was an irritating character for the majority of the book.
At the start of Remember, Harper and Josh have been dating for two years already. When we meet the couple, we discover that there have been some troubles in paradise. This was where I was a little antsy because these sort of things always worry me. Especially when there’s a third guy in the picture and then I worry about cheating.
Harper ends up meeting Neil, a very strongly opinionated protester who she first sees after her dad’s talk to the school. Normally, I would hate the love triangle between Harper, Josh and Neil. I’m not a fan of love triangles at all. Somehow though, Eileen made this one work very well. Maybe it was because Josh was such an annoying character that I didn’t really care how he ended up. I liked the relationship between Neil and Harper. I thought it progressed mostly naturally, although maybe a bit too fast. I also loved Neil’s thinking, though he may be a little paranoid when it came to some things. He was very anti corporation and anti technology.
I thought Eileen did very well with displaying Harper and Josh’s relationship. Josh plans to go to Stanford, unfortunately, he can’t afford to. Luckily, Harper’s dad puts together an internship position that will the student a grant for college. To say Josh idolized Harper’s dad would be an understatement. Josh was crazy about her dad, there were times in Remember when I was just like “Seriously?” because of how into her dad he really was. This of course clouds his eyes to any of Memtex’s flaws. It also annoyed me when he would rather spend time with Harper’s dad than her.
After Harper loses someone, she’s left wanting to get the Memtex treatment, she thought her dad would be okay with it, except he’s not. This of course, raises red flags because why would he be against it if it were perfectly safe? She ends up getting the treatment anyway which has some very weird side effects. Flashbacks. Sensory overload. Passing out.
Yeah, that sounds perfectly fine, right? Ha.
We then launch into the mystery surrounding Memtex. I have to say, Remember definitely had a lot of twists and turns. All of which I enjoyed. It kept me invested in the story and on my toes. I thought the mystery was great, I was interested in what exactly was going on, if anything. The writing style was done well. There was a small thing I wish had been elaborated on, but that didn’t take anything away from the story for me. I loved how driven Harper was to figure out the truth behind her dad’s company and what was going on in her own head. Overall, this was a great mystery that kept me guessing and in suspense.
~Final Thoughts~
I loved Harper and Win as characters. I found the memory element throughout the story to be interesting. Remember definitely made me think about if I would ever get a similar procedure done. I liked how the mystery was grounded in a company and thought Harper being the daughter of the head of it was a nice twist. There weren’t many downfalls other than I wish Josh and Neil had been fleshed out a bit more. I also wish Harper was a little more engaging. While I loved her friendship with Win, her relationship problems with Josh and dealing with her memory loss, she was self-involved at times. I couldn’t always emotionally connect with her very well.
~Do I Recommend?~
Yes.
~Recommended For~
Fans of memory loss stories
Fans of sarcastic characters
Fans of slight science fiction elements
Fans of Lauren Miller’s “Free To Fall”
~Memorable Quotes~
Please. People need to ball up. Life isn’t all sunshine and unicorns. Now they’re selling it to people our age? What, because not getting into the college of our choice is crushing? No date for prom causing premature PTSD? It’s not trauma; it’s real life. Life is hard sometimes. It doesn’t mean you don’t face it.
“Look on the bright side–saving a saint is going to earn you some valuable karma points.”
“Having you as a friend is like having my own Personal WebMD. Handy and terrifying all at the same time,” Win Said.
There was no reason for us to get along, but we did.
“Also, for the record, having a bromine with your girlfriend’s dad is creepy.”
It was as if a trapdoor had opened under my feet and I just kept falling.
She’d always vowed she wasn’t going to give her heart to anyone because then she didn’t risk getting it broken.
It’s Top Ten Tuesday! A weekly meme created by the ladies at The Broke and The Bookish. Every week they create a new list for book bloggers to participate in. It’s really fun so if you don’t already do it, you need to get on that! You can check out this week’s link here.
This week’s list is one of my favorites, though I definitely had a little trouble in the beginning, then of course, I read some awesome books. Here I go. This week’s list is top ten favorite heroines from books or you can do from certain genres or movies/tv as well. I am opening this up to my favorite book, movie, and TV heroines.
~Top Ten(ish) Favorite Heroines From Basically Everything~
-From TV Shows-
Let me just get this one out of the way right now. 🙂 She is my favorite.
1.
You all saw this one coming right? Please, Veronica is pretty much my number one heroine in fiction. If you’re (sadly) unaware of who Veronica Mars is, I suggest reading my post about her right here. She is seriously the best.
2.
Yes, technically, she is evil and a villain, but damn it, she’s a good one! And come on, look at her hair! IT’S SO CURLY. MINE NEVER LOOKS THAT GOOD. AND THAT DRESS. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? SHE GETS THE BEST CLOTHES.
I adore Katherine, in the beginning of The Vampire Diaries, I didn’t like her. Then later, I loved her and she’s my favorite. I like how cunning and intelligent she is. Yeah, she definitely does some very bad things, but I still just lover her. She’s also hilarious, I love her one-liners, even if they’re generally some sarcastic remark to someone.
It doesn’t help that she gets the best songs on the show either.
(The song is Get Some by Lykke Li)
While I’m on the topic of tv shows, I’m going to dip into anime now.
3. Serena from Sailor Moon
Of course Serena/Usagi is on this list. She is just amazing. I love her. ❤ I’ll have to discuss the show in general at a later time. For now I’ll say that she is amazing. She’s seriously one of the kindest characters I’ve ever encountered in fiction, she has THE best heart ever and she’s also flawed.
-From Movies-
4. Olive from Easy A
She’s sarcastic, hilarious, witty, and she likes 80s movies, um, yeah ergo, she’s awesome.
-From Books-
5. Katniss from The Hunger Games
She will be on almost every list I’m sure. With good reasoning. I like how selfless Katniss was when she took her sister’s place and how resourceful and smart she was during the actual game. She never set out to really change anything, but then she sort of did.
6. Sam from Rites of Passage
I loved Sam in Rites of Passage. She definitely didn’t back down from anything that was thrown at her in military academy. She pushed through it all.
7. Jin from The Walled City
Jin was a really interesting character. Like Katniss, she was also resourceful and smart.
8. Rory from Free To Fall
I like the development Rory goes through with her attachment to Lux. She’s a really intelligent character too.
9. Bianca from The DUFF
Bianca is one of my favorite characters. I loved her sarcasm and I could relate to her cynical nature. I like how she was flawed.
Harper was overall a great character. I liked the friendship she especially had with Win. Remember was also published today! (2/24/15), I’ll be posting a review later. 🙂
Skylar is my most recent addition of favorite heroines. She was a really strong character. I could really relate to her quite a bit and I liked how she acted.
Weekly recap is a pretty self explanatory post. I recap what’s happened in my life, in the blogging world, on my blog and what’s coming up.
It’s been a bit of a hectic week here. My kitten Eponine was really lethargic last week and barely ate/drank, but I was finally able to take her to the vet on Wednesday. It turns out she had pneumonia, was dehydrated, had a fever, and had a fast heart rate. 😦 So she got a shot for antibiotics and some canned cat food to get her hydrated again. The vet said she should be better in three days. Well yesterday was the third “full” day of her at home since then and she’s been a lot better. She’s running around, going after mice and back to her “Don’t pick me up, meow!” stage. 😦 Which means she’s not cuddly anymore! Disappointing, but I’m glad she’s better. 🙂 And she’s of course eating again, very well.
So that took a bit of stress off because I was going pretty insane over that cat. If my mom thought I was a hypochondriac, I’m definitely an even worse hypochondriac over that kitten. I basically gave her a death sentence and said she had FIP, which she does not as far as I know. She’ll be getting shots and all that joyful stuff next month. Lucky her!
Besides the kitten, there’s been a bit of stress on me because of family problems. Er, more like one of my parent’s problems….And then I’m stressed out over college loans I haven’t paid and didn’t think about. Long story short: I’m ridiculous irresponsible and this just dawned on me…
Basically I’m in a never ending world of stress. So anyway, I’m going to cut this post off a bit shorter than I usually would.
Oh, but the Book Blogger Love-A-Thon is going on, hosted by Alexa at Alexa Loves Books so that’s pretty great. You can find out about that on her blog.
Amber’s Rambles is a semi-weekly feature where I discuss bookish and blogging topics. To read past Rambles, you can go here.
So I just asked a question on my Twitter, a bit of a rhetorical question, but a question none the less. It was “Does anyone else ever “forget” how to review when they haven’t done it in weeks?” and then went on to say that I have “serious” writer’s block, compared to, you know, unserious writer’s block.
My last review was written on the sixth. Since then I’ve drafted reviews, outlined reviews and read a semi-constant stream of books. I typically try to post my reviews on Tuesdays and Thursdays, along with the occasional Friday/Saturday review, if I didn’t post on Tuesday/Thursday. I like having a regular schedule for reviews and I’ve been pretty good with it…Until things like this happened.
It always happens the same way, it’s around 9 at night, I finally sit down to write my review and….
Nothing.
I can’t remember much of what I want to say. On top of that, what I DO want to say, I don’t know how to form into a logical, cohesive, eye catching, amazing review. You see my problem, yes?
This is where the writer’s block comes in.I try to rack my brain saying “REMEMBER THE BOOK. REMEMBER ALL YOUR LIKES/DISLIKES, JUST WRITE”, but of course, my hands don’t really listen and my mind doesn’t really have any thoughts.
However, sometimes I CAN think of something, but then I worry about “forgetting” to mention something or not writing my review well enough or my review just lacking in general.
Reviews have always been the most stressful part of blogging for me, it’s not that I don’t like to do it, I do. I’m just a procrastinator that doesn’t write reviews right after finishing a book (which I’ve been working on) and then totally pushing the review off until I decide it’s “time” to post it which means I have to go back and actually write it.
So what I wanted to ask you, review prodigies and fellow bloggers/friends…What do you do when the review just won’t come to you? Or a post in general? Do you “forget” how to review books when you’ve been out of practice? Any tips for how to review a book that you’re just not sure how to get your feelings across? I want to know all of your thoughts.
Edit:
And then of course there’s the pressure of making sure you do this amazing book you just finished reading and completely loved and have been recommending to everyone, justice in your review. Because what if you don’t get your feelings across adequately!? What if you forget something you were totally fangirling about when you read it?! What if you you can’t explain how much you love it without saying “I loved it”. What do you do then?
Wondrous Covers Wednesday is a weekly feature at YA Indulgences where I showcase three (or more) amazing (mostly) YA book covers.
A picture is worth a thousand words or in this case, several pictures are worth thousands of words. For this week’s Wondrous Covers Wednesday, I decided to share book covers that all feature collages.
~One~
99 Days by Katie Cotugno
~My Thoughts~
This is such a cute romance cover. I like how simple it is.
I love how all of these shots feature parts from the other pictures. Some of them overlap, but others are slightly different. I like how it’s multiple pictures of the same scene.
1. When I read If I Stay, it was the Speak paperback edition. I have to say I really love the UK cover a lot more though, which is interesting since I’m not generally a fan of movie tie-in editions.
2. I love all the different pictures from scenes in the If I Stay movie.
3. I like how muted the entire cover is. All of the colors are toned down and neutral.
1. I like how this one goes along with the movie cover of If I Stay. The cover really makes me more interested in this book.
2. I love how the pictures are made up of actual pictures than just squares and how the edges are burnt/torn/distressed on some of them and aren’t completely lined up.
1. I like how the pictures are all different sizes and aren’t completely in a grid format.
2. I love the bright coloring of the font and the bright/happy images.
Obviously If I Stay was the inspiration behind the majority of these covers. I can’t say I’m complaining though, I love the concept. 🙂 I hope it continues.
Top Ten Tuesday is the weekly meme hosted at The Broke and The Bookish. Every week they will create a new Top Ten list for bloggers to participate in. To link up, please go here. 🙂
This week’s list is one everyone can relate to:
~Top Ten Bookish Problems I Have~
1. Page numbers/Percentage place in book.
I have a bad habit of always looking at the percentage when I’m reading a book on my Kindle.
Reason One: Because the book is “awful” I want to know when it will be over,
Reason Two: The book is awesome and I don’t want it to ever end or
Reason Three: I need to finish this book soon so I want to know how much longer it will be.
2. Reading beyond what I’m reading.
Case and point: I’ll be reading a book (obis) but my eyes will jump to the bottom of the page or even the next page and skim it! It’s terrible! I have to actually COVER UP part of the book/Kindle when I read so I don’t “spoil” stuff for myself. 😦 What in the world? I know.
3. Buying Tons of Physical Books
I buy a ton of books that I won’t ever read for weeks/months/years after the original purchase day that I just “HAVE” to have.
Part 2: When I can’t buy the pretty new hardcover I see in Barnes and Noble that I’m totally dying to have (IMYT, there’s you.)
4. Buying Tons of Kindle Books
I also buy books in the Kindle format that I already have a physical copy of. I have two reasons for doing this.
Reason One: If I read the book and like it, I want a copy on my Kindle so I can take it everywhere with me.
Reason Two: If I haven’t read it, I may get the urge to one day read it since it’s just like, on my Kindle. The convenience thing? Yeah.
5. My Forever Game of Playing Catch Up
I’m always behind on backlist titles, classics and new releases.
6. Reading Slumps
I have periods of time where I don’t want to read. That’s a problem because, well, obviously. 🙂
7. What keeps me up at night is thinking of all the amazing books that will be published after I’m dead that I’ll never get to read. Unless there’s a library in Heaven and God gives me a hook up. 😉 (No, seriously).
8. Checking Out A Ton of Library Books
This causes a few problems actually….
A. I check out an incredible amount of library books that I never get to despite checking them out for the maximum amount (then renewing them as long as I can).
B. I won’t return books because “I’m going to finish it!” refer to C and accumulate lots of fees….
C. I have the habit of dropping a book right in the middle if it’s due for the library then never getting back to it for…a long time.
9. Reading and Walking
I can’t read and walk at the same time or at least not with this much grace:
So yeah, that’s obviously a problem.
10. Ridiculous High Standards
I make up my own hype for books. Due to this, some books have extremely high standards that they probably won’t match up to due to my self enforced…hype. More on this at a later date though.
11. Price/Book Ratio
I imagine how many books I could buy with how much money I spend on non-book items. Like, food.
12. I Have No Bookshelves
Most people in the book blogging world (and even not, let’s be real) have a bookshelf or bookshelVES. I, on the other hand, have ZERO. You know what this means? Books in stacks. In my room, in my mom’s room, in a closet, in the entryway….In boxes (still)…..
You would think that may stop my compulsive buying….but it does not.
Share with me YOUR bookish problems, I know you have one or like, twenty. 🙂
Hey everyone. There’s only going to be a short recap this week as I’m not feeling well anymore so….I barely have the energy to type this now. I’m excessively tired despite sleeping at a decent hour last night, but once again, since I’m kind of sick, it makes sense.
Weekly recap is just a post where I tell what’s happened in my week.
Last week was pretty okay. I read How To Finish High School, continued My Heart and Other Black Holes and I’m a little over halfway done with The Law of Loving Others, which I’m confused in my feelings about.
As for regular life, omg, I bought Veronica Mars season 3 Monday, well I had ordered it with a prime membership, which I hadn’t realized the free trial had expired on, so I had to talk with the “support” people, cancel my membership, but they left me go ahead with my VMars order. ❤ So I just paid the straight amount for the dvd, 22.99, no tax or anything. 🙂 So that was nice. I received it on Thursday.
Friday I was going to go see The Last Five Years, the movie adaptation of the musical with Anna Kendrick, but unfortunately Topeka apparently has a “one musical every three months” rule. 😦 So that sucked. (Totally kidding about that rule).
Which is okay I guess because The DUFF comes out this Friday and I am most certainly going to be seeing it.
Oh, so yesterday was Valentine’s Day….Nothing special happened there. Oh, I freaked out over my kitten since she’s been sleeping a lot and not doing anything (besides eating and such), when generally she’s always playing around. My mom’s friend came over though and looked at her, figured she has a cold since she’s been coughing.
If she’s not better by Tuesday, she’s most likely going to the animal hospital in town to see what’s wrong. I googled stuff about her symptoms….not good, not good at all. That was a bad idea. 😦 So that totally killed my Barnes and Noble trip I made since all I could think about was her. 😦
I bought a portable dvd player too! So I could…you know….actually watch VMARS. And I bought Boy Meets World season 1! For 7.50<3
Okay, let’s see what happened blog wise here last week:
I’m not sure what’s going to happen this week. I’m really going to try to get some reviews up, TTT, WCW and maybe a Musical Monday post, but we’ll see.
~Stacking The Shelves~
Stacking The Shelves is a weekly meme created and hosted at Tynga’s Reviews where bloggers can share the books/ebooks they’ve received over the week.
Kindle:
The DUFF by Kody Keplinger
Shut Out by Kody Keplinger
The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot
The Statistical Probability of Love At First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith
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