What I Read in August 2015!

I believe I missed doing this last month and I think it was because I didn't think I had enough books to tell you about? I'm not entirely sure, my memory doesn't stretch that far, I have a sneaky suspicion it was probably because I'm lazy.

"Alfie: The Doorstep Cat" by Rachel Wells. 

To cut to the chase, I DNF'd this book. It was a cute and interesting idea - an adorable Alfie becomes homeless after his owner dies from old age, he takes to the streets, and then finds a road that needs him maybe even more then he needs them. How it was delivered is what ruined it for me. I just didn't like the writing style, it was slow for me. Too much was given away too quickly, and at the same time, not enough was going on. There wasn't really any sub-plots going on, or character development. -I think this was her first book, so I can understand it probably wouldn't be a very well-rounded novel because of that. It was just disappointing, I wasn't fond of it.

"Eleanor and Park" by Rainbow Rowell. 

I had mixed thoughts on this book but I have a book talk on here for the novel, I will be brief. It made me feel good, I liked it a lot. The romance was kind of forced to me, they fit together but more in a friendly kind of way - when they started to do romantic things, any chances of having a discussion fell out the window and I think friendship in relationships is important, it was lost between the two. Otherwise, I really enjoyed it, I think it was a three or four star rating on Goodreads.

"My Sister's Keeper" by Jodi Picoult.  

This book used to be a well-loved read of mine, but I think I grew out of it as the pace of the book is far too slow for my taste and Julia and Campbell ruined the story. I probably will re-read it again in the future, just because I want to keep my love for it. This month was probably just a bad time to get into it.

"Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" by J.K.Rowling.

I needn't bother saying what I felt about this, you know I loved it! I read it for my Harry Potter Read-A-Thon (and didn't do so good on the updates...), it left me as satisfied as they usually leave me.

"Am I Normal Yet?" by Holly Bourne. 

A book on feminism, stereotypical OCD and how being yourself is better then trying to fit in. It's a wonderful story, Holly Bourne might be one of my new favourites, we'll see when I read her second two books. She's only been an author since 2013, so I guess that's why she isn't well known yet? I'm hoping more people notice her existence soon, she's a good writer and a good person.

"Star Wars: Darth Bane: Path of Destruction" by Drew Karpyshyn. 

I really enjoyed this. It was like the starter book for the other two books in the trilogy, and it was the perfect example of character development. A flaw I can say about it, though, was that it was slow in parts and I wanted more people-presented women in there, I think there was only one. I have higher hopes for the next two books though, I won't give away any spoilers but that cliffhanger, that cliffhanger. 

"Hens Reunited" by Lucy Diamond.

I enjoyed this read, but I can't say it's something I actually wanted to spend so much time reading. It was okay and everything, but it had a lot of major flaws I mention in my review, like the terrible Instalove and how I jumped from the previous book to this one without much consideration of their differences. I just didn't want to jump onto another hefty book.

"Horrorstor" by Grady Hendrix. 

Again, you can read my review on this book if you want to know my full thoughts but seeing as that post won't be up for another few days, I really enjoyed this. It was filled with the paranormal, torture devices, zombies, people going mad - it was dark, and I really enjoyed it, always with that subtle humour on working in retail. Highly recommended read for anyone into horror and parody, or anyone who has ever worked in retail, you will enjoy it!

"Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" by J.K.Rowling. 

Yes, for my Re-Read-A-"Thon" of the summer, I finally moved on to the second book and plan on doing regular updates throughout so you can read my thoughts on it and so you can give your input on what you thought about it. Personally, this one is my favourite tied with "Prisoner of Azkaban", so I'm even more exited to read this then I was about the first one.

Thank you ever so much for reading, let me know what you've been reading this month, and I'll see you all tomorrow, bye!

- Loz x

  

My Very Short July Reading Wrap Up!

For some reason, July has been a slow reading month for a majority, and whether this is because of the sudden change in weather, the end of school/college, etc, I don't know. I only ended up reading four books last month, and one book that crossed over into August ( that I'm still barely passed halfway with!). Enough rambling, lets get into my July reads!

I'm very sorry for the lack of photos, by the way! I'll try my best for the upcoming posts to provide photos! 

"Misery" by Stephen King. 

After reading "Carrie" by him, I was still in a bit of a reading slump but something about King's writing had me hooked and no other book really appealed to me. I watched a review by InkyLeaves (Becky) on YouTube from years ago, and the way she talked about it appealed to me so much, I decided that who cares about my rule of not reading the same author back to back, I'm just going to jump right into it! The first half of the story was really, really slow, but somehow he manages to write about (mostly) two characters in a way that chilled you, and kept you entertained...at least for the second half. 

"Coraline" by Neil Gailman. 

By this point, I was in the mood for something creepy but I wanted to get out of this and move onto other things as I was saving my creepy reads for my October reading month and this one seemed perfect for the job, as it's been sitting on my shelves for a while. The cover is so stunningly beautiful that it was hard to turn away from it, and the story was just as magical. It was written very fast paced, and I'm not new to Gailman so this didn't push me off. It's exactly the kind of book I would have loved to had known about when I was young enough to read this. 

"A Monster Calls" by Patrick Ness. 

Guys...this book, I am still raving about and it's been a while since I've read it. I picked it up when bored, after finishing watching a movie with Austin, the book just staring at me from the corner of the armchair. I began to read...and read...and read and read and read. By the time I had finished it, it was 3am, tears were streaming down my face and I had great difficulty sleeping after feeling like I had just been pulled through a bush made of thorns. Very beautifully written, and I would recommend to everyone. And I don't usually like popular, hyped up books. 

"A Diary of a Young Girl" by Anne Frank. 

I was reading this alongside the other three books pretty much for most of July, and only finished it a couple of days ago. It was beautiful and heartbreaking, just like I remembered it to be. She is so wise for her age and I'm sad to know that we will never see her in her adult form. Her death was in such unfortunate circumstances, something that could have been avoided and something that, if she was in a "slightly better" concentration camp, she and her sister Margot might have even survived the end of the war. A devastating read, but a crucial one, especially to young girls. 

"Alfie: The Doorstep Cat" 

This book I really, really wanted to love. It's about a cat, called Alfie, who was abandoned as his owner died of old age. Heartbroken, but not wanting to go to a shelter, he spends a little time out on the streets before finding a road where he finds people who need him just as much as he needs them. Sounds interesting, huh? An interesting premise just not written well enough to keep me hooked and I ended up having to move on to another book that I have been wanting to read for a while. I am not going to DNF it just yet. I will plough on through, and hope that by the end of August, we are through with it.

Thank you so much for reading, and I will see you all tomorrow for my Monday Missions post, bye!

2015 Reading Challenge!

If you are an active user on Goodreads, you probably take part in or know about the yearly reading challenges you can set yourself. 2013 was to read fifteen books, 2014 was twenty five (which I ending up going over, v.g) so I decided to really push the limits this time and try to read fifty books. Well...it's the 1st May as I write this, so by halfway through the year (End of June, I believe), I should have reached half of my goal, twenty-five. How much have I got to, you may ask? Seven. I've almost finished the book I am on - "It's not me, it's you" by Mhairi McFarlane - so that would make it eight, therefore I am going to need to read about seventeen books by the end of June in two months time. 

Now, my typical reading speed really does depend on the size of the book so let's just say a typical 500 page novel will take me three days, so that's two books per week - I'm going to round it and say there's an average of four weeks per month, so if I really pushed myself I could finish eight books a month and therefore sixteen by the end of the two months - and that's if I really try hard. I'm probably going to end up reading a few more books made for kids/teenagers just to sneakily boost my numbers and be somewhat proud come December, and this time I will try not to get too ahead of myself and set a reasonable and achievable goal - taking in the fact that if I don't want to go to a library for books, I cannot afford to buy them. Which I really didn't take into account four months ago.

Anyway, the point of this ramble-y post being? I want to set myself some upcoming book reading goals (about one goal per week/month, depending on the type of challenge it is) so I get through my TBR books in my bedroom and read a lot more actively. I already have a few small ideas and I haven't even looked for any yet - October is obviously going to be the book of the horror/thriller genre, so I am going to save all my Stephen King books and any books I want to re-read for that month. I'm only going to pick about five books out for that month and I will try to get through them all. I also want to do a Harry Potter read-a-thon, because well I've already read them before so it's pretty boring not being able to write a review or anything on here for quite some time (as it is seven books).

Also, I made this blog to be a book blog and it's swerved more to beauty related topics and random tags then books recently. I really like those kinds of posts so I will still be doing them, but this is the sort of thing I want to do more. 

Thank you for reading this very long post, and I will see you soon!

What's your reading challenge of the year, and how many books can you handle?

The Reading Challenge Book Tag!

I have no idea what the actual challenge of this book tag was supposed to be - do I read a book a day for thirty days? I don't know, but I thought I would answer the questions anyway and if anyone reading this has any idea on what the thirty day book challenge is, please let me know.

I'll be joining in on this challenge too! Some of my answers may be games though, as I cannot think of many books, though I have read plenty. I just have a bad memory when it comes to books.

-Austin

1) Best book you read last year. 

Loz- "Hollow City" by Ransom Riggs.
Austin- "Knights of the Old Republic" by Dark Horse? Honestly, this one has a bunch of writers, so crediting is kinda difficult for this book.

2) A book you've read more then 3 times. 

Loz- "Marked" by Kristen Cast.
Austin- "The Hungry Caterpillar" by Eric Carle

3) Your favorite series. 

Loz- The Harry Potter series, of course.
Austin- Darth Bane series! Gotta love that evilness.

4) A guilty pleasure book. 

Loz - Any book by Jacqueline Wilson/Cathy Cassidy, my childhood favourites.
Austin-  Any historical novel, and reading history school text books...

5) A book that makes you happy. 

Loz - Most of them, really? To pick a random one, "The Invention of Hugo Cabret" by Selznick.
Austin- An old WW2 diary I read of a guy who couldn't wait to get back home to his wife to hear her play on the piano.

6) A book that makes you sad. 

Loz - I feel like Harry Potter can answer pretty much every single one of these questions but probably "Running Wild" by Michael Murpurgo but if you haven't read the book, I suggest you do, it brings awareness over deforestation and the welfare of animals.
Austin- That exact same WW2 diary, because he died a week before he went home.

7) Most under-rated book. 

Loz - "Dodger" by Terry Pratchett...although I have a feeling that might change soon, R.I.P Terry, you will be missed!
Austin- The Han Solo Trilogy!

8) Most over-rated book. 

Loz- The Infernal Devices series by Cassandra Claire, but if I could pick one I haven't read, FSOG.
Austin- "The Fault in Our Stars" S O R R Y

9) A book you thought you wouldn't like but ended up loving. 

Loz - This one is a really hard one to answer. Hmm. "The Maze Runner" by James Dashner, I think, I really love that series.
Austin- Ah uh... Harry... Potter...

10) Favourite classic book.

Loz - "Alice in Wonderland" by Lewis Caroll.
Austin- Save the Kahn! I love that book to death.

11) A book you hated. 

Loz - "It's kind of a funny story" by Ned Vizzini. I apprechiate the ways in which depression can be helped, but I did not apprechiate the sexualization of every single female, including his own mother. Some may see this as something normal for a teenage boy, but I personally disagreed with it strongly so for that reason, I hated this book.
Austin- I HATED To Kill a Mocking Bird. I just did, eugh.

12) The first novel you remember reading. 

Loz - "The Butterfly Lion" by Michael Murpurgo (beautiful book, by the way)
 Austin- The Cassocks! That was a depressing story for a kid.

13) Your favourite writer. 

Loz - Ramsom Riggs, right now. Or J.K.Rowling because not only did she contibute a lot to my childhood, but "The Casual Vancany" was an amazing book too, proving to me her writing skills expand to more then what I was used to.
Austin- Drew Karpyshyn. He writes the BEST Star Wars novels.

14) Favourite book of your favourite writer. 

Loz - "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" by J.K.Rowling.
Austin- Darth Bane: Path of Darkness!

15)  Book that should be on HS/college reading list. 

Loz - well a lot, but the book I'm reading right now is called "The Hourglass Factory" by Lucy Ribchester, which really shows the brutality of the Women's Rights Movement back in the early 1900's, mostly towards women's rights to vote at this point, and how many people were agaisnt them and what they did for us. It should be on the reading list just so feminism in history is apprechiated, whether or not you agree if it's needed currently anymore in first world counties.
Austin- Anything by HP Lovecraft or Issac Asimov!

16) A book you would reccomend to an ignorant/close-minded/racist person. 

Loz - Hmm. "The Boy in the Striped Pajamas" by John Boyne. Simply because it shows that racism doesn't exst in the mind of a child, hatred is taught.
Austin- The original I-Robot. Maybe they'd see why treating people horribly is actually BAD for once.

17) Favourite quote from your favourite book. 

Loz - "Happiness can be found in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to switch on the light"
Austin- "Perhaps you were expecting some surprise, for me to reveal a secret that had eluded you, something that would change your perspective of events, shatter you to your core. There is no great revelation, no great secret. There is only you."

18) A book that dissapointed you. 

Loz - "Marina" by Carlos Ruiz Zafron. The review I wrote for that is on here somewhere!
Austin- Ender's Game. It was just... yeah man, for angsty teens.

19) Favourite book that turned into a movie. 

Loz - "Hugo" from "The Invention of Hugo Cabret", I preach about it quite a lot because I think it was done perfectly. Also, the TV series by the BBC from "The Diary of Anne Frank" was perfect, too.
Austin- Gonna use a game here... Max Payne. For the love of all that is holy, do not subject yourself to that mess.

20) Book turning into a movie and completely desecrated. 

Loz - Most book to movie, honestly.
Austin- SEE ABOVE.

21) Favourite book from your childhood. 

Loz - "Charlotte's Web" by E.B.White.
Austin- The Very Hungry Caterpillar!

22) The book that made you fall in love with reading. 

Loz - I can't really think of one from the top of my head but honestly, an awful lot of books, really.
Austin- Under a Killing Moon! Just, hot damn, MYSTERY DONE RIGHT.

23) A book that you have wanted to read for a long time but still haven't?

Loz - "The Bell Jar" by Sylthia Plath, I honestly don't know why it's taking me so long to get round to that book, probably from lack of money, honestly.
Austin- The rest of Harry Potter, and Discworld.

24) A book you wish more people have read. 

Loz - "Ready Player One" by Ernest Cline. It raises awareness on autism/Asperger's, gives more information on Star Wars and gives the pro's of gaming instead of all the negatives you hear in the media so often. They're making a movie, too, I hear. I hope it's as good as the book was.
Austin- Literally anything Star Wars.

25) A charecter you can relate to the most. 

Loz - any sort of misunderstood, chubby and anti-social person I could probably relate to.
Austin- Zayne from the KOTOR books. He's an idiot, gets everything blamed on him, and is clumsy as all hell. It's me.

26) A book that changed your opinion about something. 

Loz - Oh, ooh, wow. A lot of books changed my perspective on things. Harry Potter changed my perspective, though, on abused chilrdren. When I was younger, I thought kids who grew up with an abused childhood would be unable to be kind, caring and loving people. Harry proved me wrong.
Austin- The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy! Boy was that a journey alright

27) The most surprising plot twist or ending. 

Loz- The change of events halfway though the House of Night - the first three books.
Austin- Calling to the Night got me pretty good. Won't say why.

28) Favourite title. 

Loz - I searched through all my read list in my Goodreads profile and I'm a bit far away from my room to go rummaging in there, so for this one, I'm stumped. If I ever remember, I will edit and come back to this.
Austin- Foundation! The name just sounds so grandiose! 

29) A book that made you cry. 

Loz - Every single book by Michael Murpurgo.
Austin- Gonna have to use a game here for this one. Metal Gear Solid and Red Dead Redemption. CHARACTERS WHO JUST DIDN'T DESERVE IT!

30) Your favourite book of all time.  

Loz - "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban"
Austin- It's a short story written by Issac Asimov, and it's about a robot who felt and didn't want to be shut down. I forgot the game, sadly...