Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

You know when you walk into a bookstore or see a book online and you are immediately drawn to it because of it’s beautiful cover? Well, that’s how I felt when I first saw “Rayne & Delilah’s Midnite Matinee” by Jeff Zentner on the Penguin Random House Canada website a few months ago! After reading the synopsis, I was very intrigued and knew that I had to read it! Thanks to Penguin Teen Canada for providing me with an ARC!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

A contemporary novel about two best friends who must make tough decisions about their futures–and the TV show they host–in their senior year of high school.
Every Friday night, best friends Delia and Josie become Rayne Ravenscroft and Delilah Darkwood, hosts of the campy creature feature show Midnite Matinee on the local cable station TV Six.
But with the end of senior year quickly approaching, the girls face tough decisions about their futures. Josie has been dreading graduation, as she tries to decide whether to leave for a big university and chase her dream career in mainstream TV. And Lawson, one of the show’s guest performers, a talented MMA fighter with weaknesses for pancakes, fantasy novels, and Josie, is making her tough decision even harder.
Scary movies are the last connection Delia has to her dad, who abandoned the family years ago. If Midnite Matinee becomes a hit, maybe he’ll see it and want to be a part of her life again. And maybe Josie will stay with the show instead of leaving her behind, too.
As the tug-of-war between growing up and growing apart tests the bonds of their friendship, Josie and Delia start to realize that an uncertain future can be both monstrous…and momentous.

I don’t remember the last time a book made me cry. Coincidently, I was thinking about all of the books that have made me literally cry (like visible tear streaks down my face) while I was watching the film adaptation of The Fault In Our Stars. TFIOS was the first book that I ever cried at while reading, and I quite honestly could not remember the last time I cried while reading a book… that is until yesterday when I finished “Rayne and Delilah’s Midnite Matinee”!

The ending of this book was among one of the most beautiful and well written conclusions I have ever read in any book within any genre. It was a wonderful way to tie in all of the different elements of the story. As someone who needs a good ending in order to feel like I really enjoyed a book, this one absolutely satisfied that need. I felt so much emotion for both Josie (Rayne) and Deliah (Delilah) during the last few chapters, and quite honestly I wasn’t expecting that.

I didn’t particularly enjoy the first two thirds of this book. I thought the beginning was great, but I wasn’t totally sold after the first 130 pages. The middle (more specifically the end of the middle) was probably my least favourite part of the book, since I thought that a lot of the details didn’t add much to the story. They didn’t feel necessary, and I think they could have been skipped completely. However, as I sad before, the ending was absolutely phenomenal.

Books that are about “behind-the-scenes” activities (specifically: directing shows, writing books, working in libraries, etc.), are some of my favourite books to read. Since this show was largely about filming and creating a TV show with a very specific niche was very cool to read about, and I really enjoyed reading every single scene that was set in their filming studio.

I’m not the type to DNF books, so even though I still wasn’t sold after the first 100 pages, I continued on, and mostly because of the great characters. My favourite part of this book was reading and learning about the characters in this novel. The past few books I have read have been full of a wide-variety of characters. However, this book only dealt with a few main characters, which I really enjoyed. I adored Josie, Rayne, Akill, and Lawson. They were all such great characters, but were all very different from one another. They connected in very unique ways, and were brought together because of they’re great hearts and personalities.

Overall, I enjoyed this book and gave it 4/5 stars. Thanks again to Penguin Teen Canada for providing me with an ARC of this book!

Good Night Book Owls!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

SO many books have been getting rave reviews and popularity from the bookstagram community recently, and “The Dreamers” by Karen Thompson Walker has been getting the MOST popular during these past few months. Before the book was published, I requested it from Penguin Random House Canada since it sounded like it was going to be fantastic! And let me tell you, it did not disappoint!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

In an isolated college town in the hills of Southern California, a freshman girl stumbles into her dorm room, falls asleep—and doesn’t wake up. She sleeps through the morning, into the evening. Her roommate, Mei, cannot rouse her. Neither can the paramedics who carry her away, nor the perplexed doctors at the hospital. Then a second girl falls asleep, and then another, and panic takes hold of the college and spreads to the town. As the number of cases multiplies, classes are canceled, and stores begin to run out of supplies. A quarantine is established. The National Guard is summoned.
Mei, an outsider in the cliquish hierarchy of dorm life, finds herself thrust together with an eccentric, idealistic classmate. Two visiting professors try to protect their newborn baby as the once-quiet streets descend into chaos. A father succumbs to the illness, leaving his daughters to fend for themselves. And at the hospital, a new life grows within a college girl, unbeknownst to her—even as she sleeps. A psychiatrist, summoned from Los Angeles, attempts to make sense of the illness as it spreads through the town. Those infected are displaying unusual levels of brain activity, more than has ever been recorded. They are dreaming heightened dreams—but of what?

This book was pure magic. The writing style captivated me from the very first page and immersed me into this small town that had been cursed with a strange sleeping disease. I loved how there was very vague foreshadowing written at some parts of this novel, which made it that much more intriguing.

The plot line was really interesting and flowed very nicely. While there were not many twists or turns, the concept of this book was very unique and unlike anything I had ever read before. The idea of a sleeping/dreaming disease spreading through an entire town seems like an otherworldly idea, so the fact that it was done on earth made it very interesting to read about. It makes you wonder what kinds of things can be born and spread throughout our society!

While we readers were not able to focus on a small amount of characters since there were so many we focused on throughout this story, I still found it easy to connect to the individuals characters and their storylines. All of there storylines were completely different from one another, and seemed to have a little bit of everything I love from different contemporary novels. Each character at one point or another had a random interaction/connection with another one, which I absolutely loved.

Obviously the setting and world building was a very large part of this novel. I how the book took us through many areas of the city, especially since all of the characters lived or worked around different parts of the town. The descriptions and world building were great, and made the story much more realistic.

The only thing I didn’t love about this novel was the ending. It finished very openly and didn’t really conclude anything. While I understand why it was done this way, I would have loved a full conclusion to this enchanting story.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and gave it 4/5 stars.

Thanks to Penguin Random House Canada for the free finished copy!

Have you read this book or plan to soon? Let me know in the comments so we can discuss!

Good Night Book Owls!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

In honour of the Fierce Female Reads Readathon starting on Friday, I am going to be sharing my full review of our group read, Moxie by Jennifer Mathieu! I loved this book, and am so excited to hear all of your thoughts on it, since I know a ton of you have it on your TBR for this readathon!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Moxie girls fight back!
Vivian Carter is fed up. Fed up with her small-town Texas high school that thinks the football team can do no wrong. Fed up with sexist dress codes and hallway harassment. But most of all, Viv Carter is fed up with always following the rules.
Viv’s mom was a punk rock Riot Grrrl in the ’90s, so now Viv takes a page from her mother’s past and creates a feminist zine that she distributes anonymously to her classmates. She’s just blowing off steam, but other girls respond. Pretty soon Viv is forging friendships with other young women across the divides of cliques and popularity rankings, and she realizes that what she has started is nothing short of a girl revolution.

I loved this book! From the cover, to the main message, to the characters, and all of the social issues, it really was a fantastic novel!

By far my favourite thing about this novel is the characters. Vivian is the protagonist and main character in this novel. She and her friends experience a lot of sexist things that go on in the school, and are basically allowed to go on because the principal is the father of the star of the schools football team. People have accepted these sexist acts, as they know there is not much they can do to stop them. However, after Vivian finds a box from her moms childhood and discovers the kick-ass teenager she was, that inspires her to act against these awful teenage boys and stand up for what’s right. Her passion for equality was so inspiring to me, and she truly lived up to her fierce-written character! Claudia, Lucy, and Emma were three of my other favourite characters. They had a huge influence on Viv, so to see there characters develop as the story went on was great! I obviously absolutely adored Seth (Viv’s boyfriend)! They have one of the most healthy YA relationships I have ever read, and to see an author romanticize a teen relationship like that made me enjoy this novel even more! Anytime that Seth said made an “un-educated” statement about something that was going on in the school, Viv would clearly explain the issue and try to make him understand why it was not OK. Instead of Viv walking away and getting upset at her boyfriend, she helped him understand things, which made their relationship even stronger.

The school setting was a clear and easy choice for this plot line, but I liked how Jennifer incorporated the teachers and cafeteria setting into the novel, as that constantly reminded us readers that the novel was set in a school. I always loved reading the scenes where the characters would be talking to each other in the cafeteria or hallways, so I really enjoyed the school setting.

An element of this book that I really enjoyed was how all of the girls in the school stood up for one another together, instead of categorizing themselves by colour, race, or sexuality. While some readers have argued that this book excludes males from the gender equality fight, there is a scene in this book where Viv suggests to Seth that they should also include boys, but Seth says encourages her to make this group a safe space for girls only.

The Women’s Rights/Gender Equality movement is slowly changing society as we know it today, and I was so happy to hear that a YA book was tackling this topic head on. Not only was this book great, but it totally exceeded my personal expectations! Overall, I gave it 4.75/5 stars!

Are you guys reading this book for for the Fierce Female Reads Readathon? Have you read it already? Let me know in the comments so we can discuss!

Good Night Book Owls!

“You…” Her eyes fluttered as her skin turned pale. Thea could see from here that the (spoiler)’s leg was bent at an unnatural angle. “You could have been great.” Thea’s lips curled. “I’d rather be good.”

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

I am SO happy to share that my first 5-STAR READ OF 2019 is… THE BLACK COATS by Colleen Oakes! This book exceeded my highest expectations, and I am so thankful that I received an ARC from HarperCollins Canada/HCC Frenzy of this book!

TW: Rape, abuse, murder, violence.

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Roses are read, violets are blue, if you hurt us, we’re coming for you.
The deeply secretive Black Coats have been exacting vengeance on men who hurt girls and women for years. And Thea has just received an invitation to join them. This is the opportunity she’s been waiting for to finally get justice for her cousin Natalie, whose killer went free.
Thea dives head first into the group, training every day with other girls whose stories rival hers. Together they carry out Balancings—acts of revenge guaranteed to teach a lesson. With every predator threatened, every blackmailer exposed, and every date rapist punished, Thea can feel herself getting closer to avenging Natalie’s death.
But then the Balancings begin to escalate in brutality, and Thea discovers that the Black Coats are not all they seem to be. Thea must confront just how far she’s willing to go for justice—and what kind of justice Natalie, and Thea herself, deserve. Because when the line between justice and revenge is razor thin, it’s hard not to get cut.

This book was phenomenal. I loved the writing style and vocabulary used in this book. I was hooked in from the very first page.

While this book is marketed as a contemporary novel, I would say that it’s more of a dark contemporary novel. There is a lot of killing and abuse talked about in this book, so it is definitely not like a fluffy contemporary book that you may be used to reading. There was no magic in this book, but it read almost like a book with paranormal realism in it.

The Black Coats was filled with some fierce and bad-ass female characters. They were all brought together because of past grief and tragedy, and slowly bonded because of their shared experiences. At first, they didn’t like or understand each other, but slowly their characters went through a lot of development, and considered each other family at the end of the novel. Thea, the main character, experiences her first love in this story with a boy named Drew. While the romance is definitely present in this novel, it is not overwhelming by any means. It does not impact the plot line and influence any of Thea’s decisions, which I really appreciated. Quite frankly, their relationship does not majorly impact the story until the last 100 pages. Thankfully and fortunately, I have not experienced any similar events that the main characters in this novel have experienced, but that does not mean I could not sympathize and connect with the characters.

The setting in this novel did not play a major role within the plot line, but it was definitely an important part of this novel. Many of the events in this story take place in Mademoiselle Corday, a huge mansion that the Black Coats group schemes in. I loved reading scenes that were set in this mansion, since I thought it was a really cool place for everyone to meet up in.

The plot/storyline in this novel is incredibly unique and unlike anything I have ever read before. To be honest, I thought that the plot would be quite problematic. Fighting fire with fire is never a good idea, and can be written/read quite poorly in books. However, as the characters developed, they realized this themselves, which opened their eyes to a lot of the problems within The Black Coats society (sorry if that was vague, I try not to include any spoilers in my reviews!), and further developed both the plot and their character. I thought that the plot flowed very nicely and was paced to perfection. Something that I appreciated Colleen writing about was the fact that women can abuse other women and man can be abused by both women and men. I thought that this book would just zone in on men abusing women, but it was much more expansive than that.

After the epilogue and acknowledgements, Colleen wrote a beautiful letter talking about the #MeToo movement and women’s abuse/freedoms. The letter alone is worth purchasing and reading the book, as it gives you a preview of Colleen’s wonderful writing style and story. I thought the letter was a very thoughtful touch and a stunning way to close off her book.

Overall, I absolutely adored this book and gave it 5/5 stars. I did not expect this book to be my first 5-star book of 2019, but the bigger the surprise, the better the rating feels!

I highly encourage you to pick up this book at a bookstore near you, since I think it is a great book to read in today’s day and age. Thank you to Harper Collins Canada/HCC Frenzy for an ARC of this book!

Good Night Book Owls!