Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

As I have mentioned several times throughout this month, my current absolute favourite genre has been Mystery/Thrillers. I was approved for an eARC of “Watching You” by Lisa Jewell from Simon & Schuster Canada via NetGalley last month, and I thought this would be the perfect book to pick up as I was in the perfect mood for this interesting domestic/neighbourhood based mystery/thriller. For those of you who don’t know, Lisa Jewell is a highly acclaimed adult mystery/thriller author, and has put out fifteen other highly rated books before coming out with Watching You. Watching You by Lisa Jewell is being released in stores TODAY!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Melville Heights is one of the nicest neighbourhoods in Bristol, England; home to doctors and lawyers and old-money academics. It’s not the sort of place where people are brutally murdered in their own kitchens. But it is the sort of place where everyone has a secret. And everyone is watching you.
As the headmaster credited with turning around the local school, Tom Fitzwilliam is beloved by one and all—including Joey Mullen, his new neighbor, who quickly develops an intense infatuation with this thoroughly charming yet unavailable man. Joey thinks her crush is a secret, but Tom’s teenaged son Freddie—a prodigy with aspirations of becoming a spy for MI5—excels in observing people and has witnessed Joey behaving strangely around his father.
One of Tom’s students, Jenna Tripp, also lives on the same street, and she’s not convinced her teacher is as squeaky clean as he seems. For one thing, he has taken a particular liking to her best friend and fellow classmate, and Jenna’s mother—whose mental health has admittedly been deteriorating in recent years—is convinced that Mr. Fitzwilliam is stalking her.
Meanwhile, twenty years earlier, a schoolgirl writes in her diary, charting her doomed obsession with a handsome young English teacher named Mr. Fitzwilliam…

The synopsis may seem a little confusing and hard to follow, but I promise once you start reading it, it is very easy to follow. Lisa Jewell does a great job of writing very descriptive details about her characters and their back stories, so it is easy to differentiate between who is who and how they are connected to the main storyline. Therefore, the plot is very character driven and is based all of the opinions and assumptions surrounding Tom Fitzwilliam and who he really is. I love reading domestic thrillers or thrillers where all the people involved live on the same street or very close to one another, which was exactly what this book entailed. The ebb and flow of the book and all of the minor events going on in each individual characters lives was written exceptionally well, especially since they are also somehow connected to Mr. Fitzwilliam and his mysterious story.

One of my favourite parts of this book is the mystery aspect. The beginning of the book opens with a detective finding/recording a piece of evidence from a crime scene. We don’t know what the crime scene is about – other than the fact that it is an apparent murder, we only know that she has found some sort of a red tassle that appears to have fallen off of a shoe. Slowly, readers learn more and more about the incident and who/what may have been involved. We don’t really find out the main piece of information until the end, which is also when the characters are finding out about it . I really enjoyed that aspect of the book, rather than telling us what exactly happened at the very beginning, and then telling the entire background of the story after the first chapter when we basically already know how the book is going to end. The best part was that the assumed muderer and victim were always changing throughout the story, as different characters had different motives/incidents, which could have resulted in them murdering different characters they communicated with throughout the story.

The twists in this book were unexpected, but made a lot of sense when starting to put the puzzle pieces together. A lot of big clues/foreshadowing was revealed throughout the book, but it wasn’t until the end when it started to fit together and make sense. There was no stone left unturned, and Lisa figured out how to make every single aspect of the crime scene/story relevant until the very end.

As I said before, the setting was absolutely perfect for this story. The fact that everybody is always watching one another could only have been accomplished by making the characters live very close to one another. I love neighbourhood stories as everyone is familiar with one another, but there are still so many things the neighbours don’t know about each other. It’s kind of like they are familiar strangers.

The only reason I didn’t give this book 5/5 stars was because for me it was quite a slow read. I tend to read ebooks/eARCs within a day or two, but this one took me about five days to get through. I found a lot of the description and dialogue unnecessary, as not all of the events in this novel helped to advance the plot, but rather made it seem a bit slower and dragged.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and gave it 4/5 stars. I hope to pick up another Lisa Jewell book sometime in the near future!

Thanks again to Simon & Schuster Canada for the eARC!

Have you read a Lisa Jewell book or are interested in picking this one up? Let me know in the comments, I love chatting with all of you!

Good Night Book Owls!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

If you read my October Wrap-Up, you know that I read “The Leading Edge of Now” by Marci Lyn Curtis during the middle of October, thanks to NetGalley! It is out in bookstores everywhere, and I am so excited to share my review with you today!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Just when Grace is beginning to get used to being an orphan, her estranged uncle suddenly comes forward to claim her. That might have been okay if he’d spoken to her even once since her father died. Or if moving in with Uncle Rusty didn’t mean returning to New Harbor. Grace once spent the best summers of her life in New Harbor. Now the place just reminds her of all she’s lost: her best friend, her boyfriend and any memory of the night that changed her forever. People say the truth will set you free, but Grace isn’t sure about that. Once she starts looking for it, the truth about that night is hard to find — and what happens when her healing hurts the people she cares about the most?

I found myself reading the acknowledgments when this book was done. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted to continue reading a book that badly in my entire life. This story is tragic. A combination of new and old love, as well as new and old tragedy. Rape is not something I typically read about, and it is not something I ever gravitate towards to as a reader, especially when choosing books to request and review. However, something drew me to this book when I found it on NetGalley, and I don’t think I’ve read a better contemporary novel in my life.

All of the characters in this book seem so real. They were written exquisitely, and I connected with them in an instant. All of the characters went through a fantastic amount of development throughout this story, which made them that much better. Grace had already gone through so much in her short life. When we find out about the horrible truth regarding her rape, it sends her and her closest family members and friends in a state of shock. Even though she had already gone through so much, she showed a lot of strength in this novel, and I truly admired her for it. Owen and Janna were the closest people she had in her life, besides her uncle, Rusty. They played such a huge role in this novel, and I enjoyed their characters more than you can imagine. Owen and Grace’s relationship was very different than any other relationship I have read in YA. They never officially got back together in this story, but I think that made the story that much better. They didn’t need to be together, even though they still felt a very deep connection with one another. While I didn’t like Grace’s real family (Rusty, Faith, Eleanor) at the beginning, by the end of the book I grew to love them and what they had done for Grace. She was finally part of a family, and finally found her home. 

The plot in this book is very tough and can be triggering. While there was not a very graphic rape scene written in this book, it is mentioned very frequently, since it is the main point in this story. Marci talks about Grace’s story very clearly, and makes sure not to say anything than can be translated in the wrong way. Writing stories about rape and/or anything similar to it, must be very difficult for authors to do without much backlash, but since Marci shared that she based some of this book off of her own life, she knew how to execute it and what people would want to read. I cannot imagine going through a story even the slightest bit similar to this. To all of you that have gone through something similar, I am so sorry and if you ever need someone to talk to, I am here for you.

If you have gone through a tramatic experience, click here or call 1(800)-656-4673 today. You are NOT alone.

Thank you for reading my review of “The Leading Edge of Now”. This is such a great story about such a sad topic, and I encourage you all to read it. I rated it 5/5 stars.

Good Night Book Owls!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

I have been in a slight reading hiatus, as I have had a ton of midterms projects/tests that have all been due over the last week and a half. While I started “Girls of Paper and Fire” by Natasha Ngan on November 1, I finished it just yesterday on November 11. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy it (believe me… I DID!), but I was just too busy to find much time to sit down and read. Thankfully, I spent a few hours reading the majority of this book yesterday evening! If you haven’t head of “Girls of Paper and Fire” and are active on either BookTube, Bookstagram, or the Book Blogosphere, you must have been living under a rock! I have heard SO MUCH HYPE around this book, so I went into it with high expectations.

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Each year, eight beautiful girls are chosen as Paper Girls to serve the king. It’s the highest honor they could hope for…and the most cruel. But this year, there’s a ninth girl. And instead of paper, she’s made of fire.
In this lush fantasy, Lei is a member of the Paper caste, the lowest and most oppressed class in Ikhara. She lives in a remote village with her father, where the decade-old trauma of watching her mother snatched by royal guards still haunts her. Now, the guards are back, and this time it’s Lei they’re after–the girl whose golden eyes have piqued the king’s interest. Over weeks of training in the opulent but stifling palace, Lei and eight other girls learn the skills and charm that befit being a king’s consort. But Lei isn’t content to watch her fate consume her. Instead, she does the unthinkable–she falls in love. Her forbidden romance becomes enmeshed with an explosive plot that threatens the very foundation of Ikhara, and Lei, still the wide-eyed country girl at heart, must decide just how far she’s willing to go for justice and revenge.

TW: violence and sexual abuse.

Even though I haven’t read much fantasy in the past few years, I have been craving it lately, and this book surely satisfied that! While it didn’t live up to my highest expectations, I still ended up really enjoying it. In my opinion, there were two things that stood out to me. One, the characters, and two, the depth and complexity of the world building.

I absolutely loved all of the characters in this book. Lei, Wren, Chenna, Aoki, the twins, and even Blue, were some of the best characters I have read about in a fantasy novel in quite some time, and I loved reading about them/their conversations with Lei. At first I thought that the amount of characters would be confusing and hard to keep track of, but Natasha wrote them very well and made it easy for readers to understand which character was which based on their characteristics/attributes. I would have loved to have read more about Lei’s parents and her past with her Mother. I feel like that would have made the book a lot more interesting, but I understand why her family members weren’t as involved as I would have liked, since that would have undermined the storyline of keeping them safe by Lei being a “Paper Girl”. Lei was a really great character and narrator to read her perspective from. She was not hypnotized by the title of being a “Paper Girl” and did not conform to the “Paper Girl” norms. While I really loved the characters, I thought there was a slight lack of character development for all characters expect Lei, Wren, and Aoki. They all seemed to stick to the name line throughout the whole novel, and I would have loved for a few more of them to develop.

The world building and imagery related to the setting was written so beautifully. I was blown away by the writing in this book and the descriptions of the different settings. The visuals that were provided for the authentic and traditional clothing they wore were also written very well, and made it easy for readers to understand. I really enjoyed reading about events that took place inside the “Women’s Court”, since that acted like their home and safe space away from the king and the outside world. I would have enjoyed reading more about the palace/kingdom that the “Women’s Court” was in, since I think we would have learned more history about how the kingdom once was, versus how it is now.

The overall concept of this book was not like anything I have ever read before. The short synopsis barely gave anything away, which was crucial for the flow of the real story. Unfortunately, I watched a detailed non-spoiler book review right before I read this book, which spoiled me on some of the themes that were in this book that I was not expecting. However, that did not spoil my overall enjoyment while reading the book, and I was still surprised by some of the events that occurred near the ending.

The main thing I really didn’t enjoy in this book was the plot twists. I found a lot of them very predictable, and non of them shocked me as much as I was hoping. I think there was a lot of unnecessary foreshadowing in this book, that allowed me to predict things that should have come out in surprise. That being said, the final plot twist written in the epilogue of the book shocked the ___ out of me, and made me that much more excited for the sequel.

I typically like to rate books that are firsts in a series by whether I enjoyed them or not, and whether or not I would want to continue the series. After reading and completing “Girls of Paper and Fire”, I definitely want to continue reading this series and am anticipating the next book!

Overall, I really enjoyed “Girls of Paper and Fire” by Natasha Ngan and gave it 4/5 stars.

Thanks to Hatchette Book Group for sending me an ARC!

Thank you for reading my review of “Girls of Paper and Fire” by Natasha Ngan! To read my initial thoughts while reading the book, click here. Have you read this book yet? Let me know in the comments, I’d love to read your thoughts!

Good Night Book Owls!

“It was all just a matter of time before something like this happened. I told you before – the future is going to be bleak as hell. People get so excited that we have all this fun new technology. They never sit back and consider how dangerous it might be. We’re just a bunch of monkeys playing with a box of matches.” – Other Earth, pg. 39

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

Happy book release day to “Other Earth” by Jason Segel and Kirsten Miller! In my last post, I reviewed “Other World” (the first book in this series), you can read my review by clicking here! In short: I absolutely loved and DEVOURED it! I was really happy to have recieved an ARC of “Other Earth” (thanks to Penguin Random House) so I didn’t have to wait for the sequel.

NOTE: This is the second book in the “Last Reality” series written by Jason Segel and Kirsten Miller. Since this is a sequel, I may (unintentionally) spoil parts of the first book. If you haven’t read it, I would HIGHLY recommend it! You can read my review for the first book in this series, titled “Otherworld” here!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Simon saved his best friend, Kat, from the clutches of the Company and their high-tech VR gaming experience, Otherworld. But it was at a steep price. Now he, Kat, and their friend Busara are on the run. They know too much. About the Company’s dark secrets. About the real-life consequences of playing Otherworld. And about Kat’s stepfather’s involvement in everything. The group is headed to New Mexico to find Simon’s old roommate, who is a tech genius and possibly the only person who can help them reveal the truth about the Company before it’s too late and the line between what’s real and what’s fantasy is erased . . . forever.
Imagine a future in which you can leave reality behind and give in to your greatest desires. That future is now. And the future is terrifying.

If you would have told me that I would not be rating this book 5/5 stars before I read the last 30 pages, I would not have believed you. I LOVED this book, even more than the last one. That being said, I absolutely HATED the ending. While I understand that since this is a series, there can really be no final conclusion, I still was expecting a lot more from the ending. I found it incredibly confusing (which may have been the point – I’m not so sure). It left me unhappy, and honestly kind of turned me away from finishing the series (still undecided on continuing with it or not).

I still loved reading from Simon’s perspective about his thoughts and the other events going on with the other characters. While Kat was still a very important part of this story, the introduction of Elvis (no, not that one), and the new found relevance of Busara’s character, made the book feel like it had a better social dynamic. Rather than in the previous one, where Simon was quite independent. I wish Busara’s dad had a much bigger role in this story. Since he was essentially the original creator, I would have loved to have read more about the process of coming up with the idea for this world, and his overall opinions on the Company itself. One of my favourite parts of this book had to do with the dynamic between Simon and his mother. I felt like there was a lack of family at the beginning of this book, so when Simon’s mother appeared, I was so happy to read about it. She played a small but mighty role in this story, and to see the trust she had in Simon was incredible. It made me love her character that much more!

In this continuation of “Otherworld”, there was a much better balance of Simon’s time between the Otherworld and his time on earth. Since the four main characters could not go into Otherworld all together, they relied on each other to dive into the world to accomplish their goals, and then report back to them to see how they could continue there journey of ultimately taking down the Company. They were also a lot of scenes in the real world that were very important to the events in the Otherworld, so I enjoyed reading about the person that was behind the avatar.

Like in the previous book, I found this one very fast paced and entertaining. None of the events dragged on, and each event was related to the next. However, I did not enjoy the writing style as much as I did in the first one. By the end of the book, it almost seemed like it was a middle grade novel.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book, minus the confusing ending. I gave it 4.5/5 stars on Goodreads!

Thanks again to Penguin Random House for the ARC!

Thanks for reading my review of “Other Earth” by Jason Segel & Kirsten Miller. To read my initial thoughts while I was reading the book, click here (scroll down to “Reading Progress”.

Good Night Book Owls!

“I don’t understand. It’s just virtual reality,” I say. Kat leans forward. “No, see, that’s the big secret,” she whispers. “It’s not virtual reality if it changes who you are. All of this is real, Simon. It’s real.” – Otherworld, Pg. 271

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

For the past few weeks I have been wanting to read an interesting dystopia/sci-fi/alternate reality book that was not “Ready Player One” (don’t have much interest in reading this right now). So, when I found out about “Otherworld” by Jason Segel and Kirsten Miller, I drove over to Indigo to pick up this book! And let me tell you… it did not dissapoint!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

The company says Otherworld is amazing—like nothing you’ve ever seen before. They say it’s addictive—that you’ll want to stay forever. They promise Otherworld will make all your dreams come true.
Simon thought Otherworld was a game. Turns out he knew nothing. Otherworld is the next phase of reality. It’s everything you’ve ever wanted.
And it’s about to change humanity forever.
Welcome to the Otherworld. No one could have seen it coming.

WOW! This book was by far one of the best dystopian books I have ever read. I was literally hooked in from the synopsis on Goodreads! While I have some interest in Ready Player One in the future, this book appealed to me more because of the romance/real life aspect.

I absolutely loved all of the characters in this novel right from the very first chapter. Simon Eaton, the main protagonist, is one of my new favourite YA characters and was a fantastic narrator. His emotion was written out so clearly by Segel and Miller, which helped myself connect with him from the beginning. Kat, Simon’s love interest, motivated Simon to do basically everything in this novel, therefore she played a huge role in this book. In YA books, there are typically 3-5 main characters in a novel that the author will focus on throughout the book. However, in Otherworld, there were a lot of minor characters that impacted the storyline greatly, and contributed significantly to the long term plot line. There were also some characters that were vaguely described at the beginning of the book that were reintroduced during the end of the novel, but with an explanation and more detail (for example, Busara and Marlow). Even though there were a lot more “main” characters than you would typically expect in a YA novel, they all were really great to read about and had a lot of connections with both Kat and Simon.

Because I am jewish, I really appreciated the humour surrounding his “kishka”. While the “Jewish nose”, is a HUGE stereotype in the Jewish community, I found his jokes about his grandfather and his appearance “because of his religion” very funny.

During the first few (three?) chapters of the book, Simon described his home-life, past relationship with Kat, and other very important things that had happened to him in his past, that would somehow affect the story in one way or another. These chapters were detrimental to the success and overall enjoyment of this book, and were very needed to understand how Simon shaped up to become the man he is in Otherworld.

Like I said before, Simon’s connection with Kat motivated him to discover and save her from the Otherworld. His motivation made the book very fast paced and a quick read overall. Nothing in this book dragged on, as each event was crucial in the flow of the plot.  It was very action packed but did not seem confusing during any part, which made for a successful fast-paced novel. The plot twists in this book were completely unexpected, but when I went back to previous chapters, I noticed a lot of foreshadowing that I originally didn’t catch.  After I was finished the book, I couldn’t believe that it was over 350 pages!

The setting and world building in this novel was done exceptionally well. Even though simon was going through a variety of different types of regions of Otherworld, they were all described very well and made it easy to visualize. The diversity and environmental changes of each area of Otherworld was very reflective of our world today. While the book was based around Simon’s movement within Otherworld, I liked how he flashed frequently back into the normal world after being in the Otherworld for a few days at a time. This made the book much more realistic since people in the real world kept checking up on him and helping him shut down the Company that produced Otherworld.

The technology in Otherworld was honestly quite frightening. The AI in this book were so technologically advanced, much more advanced than anything we have ever seen. They acted as if they were their own person and had their own souls. It’s crazy to think that our technology could create in the future.

Most of the time, I will evaluate the overall success of a first book in a series by seeing if I would continue the series or not. In this case, I will definitely be continuing the series (Blog Spoiler: I already read the second book and will have a review up for it later this week!) and reading about how the Otherworld and surrounding issues continue on. “Otherworld” left readers with quite the “plot hanger” (a cliff hanger that doesn’t pertain to a certain concluding event, but rather the continuing development of the plot as a whole).

Overall, I loved this book and gave it 5/5 stars on Goodreads! To read my thoughts on this book while reading it, click here!

Thank you for reading my review of “Otherworld” by Jason Segel & Kirsten Miller! Have you read this book? Let me know on Twitter, and we can talk all about it!

Good Night Book Owls!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

“Every Day” by David Levithan was one of my favourite reads of 2015, so when I found out that he was making a sequel and it was being published by Penguin Random House, I knew I needed to request it and read it! Thanks to the amazing people at PRH, I received a finished (!) copy of it, and read it basically right after I got it. I had really high expectations for this book, but I honestly didn’t (and still don’t) think that “Everyday” needed a sequel… but of course I had to read it!

NOTE: This is the second (third? – I didn’t read “Another Day”) book in the “Everyday” series written by David Leviathan. Since this is a sequel, I may (unintentionally) spoil parts of the first book. If you haven’t read it, I would HIGHLY recommend it! 

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Every day a new body. Every day a new life. Every day a new choice.
For as long as A can remember, life has meant waking up in a different person’s body every day, forced to live as that person until the day ended. A always thought there wasn’t anyone else who had a life like this.
But A was wrong. There are others.
A has already been wrestling with powerful feelings of love and loneliness. Now comes an understanding of the extremes that love and loneliness can lead to — and what it’s like to discover that you are not alone in the world.
In Someday, David Levithan takes readers further into the lives of A, Rhiannon, Nathan, and the person they may think they know as Reverend Poole, exploring more deeply the questions at the core of Every Day and Another Day What is a soul? And what makes us human?

The synopsis seemed very promising. When I found out they were going to introduce other people/another main character like A in “Someday”, I was really excited to read it and was looking forward to finally getting answers to my questions from A and other people like him. However, that is not exactly how the book went. While new people and perspectives were introduced (more on that later), it was mostly about Reverend Poole (A.K.A. “X”). Instead of acting like X was an enemy, I wish they would have joined forces and had a deeper connection. This would have added more character development to A, as well as give the readers answers to their questions.

That being said, I still loved and enjoyed reading about/from the perspective of the different characters. While a lot of different perspectives can sometimes make the book difficult to read/follow (like in “Dry“), Leviathan made each perspective seem very different, which, looking back, probably wasn’t hard to do since each character had a very different part of the story to tell and a very different attitude towards their circumstances. To this day, A is one of the most interesting characters I have ever read about. His perspective on life and the way people live is so interesting, especially considering the very unique life he lives. I know a lot of people didn’t love Rhiannon in “Everyday”, but I really enjoyed her character in both of the novels. Trying to love somebody when they are in different bodies everyday is a mind blowing concept. She developed a lot throughout “Someday” and she was very realistic about their unique situation and relationship she had formed with Alexander (her boyfriend from school). Nathan was also a very interesting perspective to read from. He was getting a lot of the harm from X throughout the first half of the novel, which was strange since he basically had nothing to do with the storyline, however it didn’t add any harm to the plot and made it everything that much more urgent. X was the most unique perspective to read from. Since I was so used to A’s way of life and his thoughts on the way he uses his life while in others bodies, it was interesting to see somebody “abuse their power” and try to make others lives miserable (this is NOT a spoiler, it is mentioned within X’s first chapter in the novel). The characters added a lot to the story, and were one of the main reasons why I wanted to read this book in the first place.

Of course, in a story like A’s, there will be a lot of different settings/places written about in the book. This can be hard to follow, since a lot of setting development needs to take place to fully understand exactly where the characters are. Levithan does this perfectly when picking places for the characters to go, especially since there are over/at least five places we read about between the four different perspectives. I enjoyed all of the settings I read about in this book, and while they weren’t detrimental to the story line, they were an important part of the characters meeting up and connecting.

Without Levithan great writing style, it would have been hard to follow the story and different settings throughout the entirety of the novel. The way he can seamlessly piece a crazy story together with his words is incredible. He has by far one of the best writing styles out of any other author I have read books from.

Even though Levithan has magical ways with words, there were still some parts of the book I found unnecessary. I felt like the middle dragged on a lot, and a lot of the minor details were not needed. It took me quite a while to read this book (or at least more time than the other recent books have), and I think it’s because of the small details that were not needed. While I enjoyed reading about Rhiannon’s personal life, a lot of the meetings between her and her friends were unimportant, especially since she had already made up her mind about not telling anybody about A regardless of her “relationship woah’s” with Alexander. Like I said, I would have enjoyed reading more conversations between A and X, or even Nathan and X. I think that would have added more detail into the story, and would have made it a lot quicker to read.

The ending of the novel saved it for me. I thought it was extremely well written, and I didn’t see it coming AT ALL. I knew Rhiannon and Nathan wanted revenge on X, but since they were originally just going to meet to talk, I had no idea that it would spiral into a much bigger event (no spoilers here!). It was definitely one of the best endings that I never saw coming.

Though the story is majorly about A and his life and connections with Rhiannon and the others, my favourite minor/secondary plot lines to read about was Peter and Liam. I absolutely LOVED their little story, even though it had no impact on the original story whatsoever. The ending for them was amazing, and I never saw it coming. I would be really interested in reading a book focused on them and their relationship.

While I did enjoy reading this book for the most part, I still don’t see a point to it. “Everyday” was such a great standalone novel, so I didn’t see a point in a sequel. I still had questions unanswered after reading the first book, but the questions about the plot line were better left unanswered. Since the second book didn’t really answer any of my original questions, it wasn’t as great of a book as I thought it would be.

I gave “Someday” 3/5 stars on Goodreads. To read my initial thoughts while I was reading the book, click here!

Thanks again to Penguin Random House for sending along a copy of this book, I’m so thankful for this opportunity!

Thanks for reading my book review! Have you read “Someday” by David Levithan? If so, I’d love to hear your thoughts… tweet me @Readingreadingr and we can discuss!

Good Night Book Owls!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

Normally, I am not a big YA Mystery type of reader, however this book may change that. “Dare You To Lie” by Amber Lynn Natusch is a new YA Thriller/Mystery novel that I requested and received from Raincoast Canada over two months ago. However, I just read this book last week and LOVED IT. By far one of the best YA thrillers I have EVER read. I featured “Dare You To Lie” in my October TBR, which you can read here!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

When her FBI agent father is framed for murder, Kylene is forced to move in with her grandfather, back to the small town that turned its back on her, and the boy who betrayed her. All Ky cares about is clearing her father’s name, but someone won’t let her forget the photo scandal that drove her away two years ago. As the threats gain momentum, Ky finds an unlikely ally in the rookie FBI agent sent to keep an eye on her. Determined to expose the town’s hidden skeletons, Ky unwittingly thrusts herself into a much bigger plot. They thought she’d forgive and forget. They’re about to learn they messed with the wrong girl.

This book was INCREDIBLE.

I am not normally a huge fan of YA Thrillers/Mystery books, so requesting this one was definitely “out of my comfort zone”. However, reading this was a very rewarding experience, especially since I enjoyed it so much.

Originally, when I started the book, I was not in the mood for a high school story. Most of the ones I had read before had been been very easy to predict and included a very nauseating love story. But even after just 50 pages, I was hooked! The high school setting was great and very beneficial for the story. While we didn’t read many chapters about the school and Kylene’s student life, the role of the kids in the school was important in the story, therefore setting it at a school made a lot of sense.

All of the characters in this story were fascinated to read about, and contributed to my overall enjoyment of the story. I found that I formed a connection to the characters very early on into the story, which usually means that I will enjoy reading the book throughout the whole plot/story line. Kylene was a great protagonist and I loved reading from her perspective throughout the novel. The emotions she felt were expressed in great detail in the book, which made it much easier to read and understand how she was feeling throughout different events in the story. One of my favourite characters in the book was Kylene’s grandfather. While Kylene’s connection with her parents may not have been so strong, her bond with her grandfather was very special and you could tell how deeply they cared for each other. The absence of her parents (specifically her Mom) seemed hard to deal with for Kylene, but her Grandfather filled that void. I also loved both Garrett and Tabby, Kylene’s two best friends. They both added so much to the story and were a great support system for Kylene when she needed to talk out what she was feeling.

Even though Kylene’s parents were brought up slightly during the first half of the novel, I would have loved to have read more about both of them. The mothers’ story was easy to understand because it pretty much resulted in Kylene’s move back to her original home. However, I found Kylene’s fathers backstory quite confusing. I would have liked to read more about her Dad in the passed, and I would have liked to read more about the father in the present and seen him more involved in Kylene’s story.

Since this was a fact-paced YA thriller, Amber Lynn Natusch’s writing style may not be for everyone. It was an extremely fast read for me, which was mostly because of the pace of the plot line. I personally enjoy reading books where you really have to pay attention to all of the events going on in every chapter, or else you would not understand what is going on. Those types of books make for thrilling reads and really impressive story lines, like what is seen in “Dare You To Lie”.

This book also featured a lot of impressive plot twists, that I did not see coming AT ALL. The mystery aspect greatly contributed to the plot twists and turns throughout the novel. I am normally pretty good at predicting events in a novel, but this one had some very surprising ones that I did not see coming.

One of the only things I didn’t like about this novel was the ending. At first, I didn’t realize that this book was the first of a series, so the ending had me quite confused. There wasn’t any real closure in this novel, it only answered one main mystery, but left the much bigger one unsolved. I assume all of it will be solved in the books to come, but I wish we had a bigger hint, and weren’t left with such a cliff hanger.

Overall, this book was fantastic and I gave it 4.5/5 stars on Goodreads. To read my thoughts on this book while reading it, click here!

Thanks for reading my book review for “Dare You To Lie” by Amber Lynn Natusch! I haven’t read a YA thriller like this in a long time, so if anybody has any YA thriller/mystery recommendations, let me know in the comments!

Thanks to Raincoast Canada for sending along an ARC of this book, I’m so thankful for this opportunity!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

“Dry” by Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman was one of my most anticipated releases of 2018, so when I received an ARC in the mail from Simon and Schuster Canada, I was so excited to read and review it! I knew the very basics about the plot, and knew nothing about the characters – other than the fact that the main protagonists name was Alyssa (we share the same name!). I featured “Dry” in a couple of my newest blog posts, including my October 2018 TBR and my seventh edition of “In My Mailbox“.

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

The drought—or the Tap-Out, as everyone calls it—has been going on for a while now. Everyone’s lives have become an endless list of don’ts: don’t water the lawn, don’t fill up your pool, don’t take long showers. Until the taps run dry. Suddenly, Alyssa’s quiet suburban street spirals into a warzone of desperation; neighbours and families turned against each other on the hunt for water. And when her parents don’t return and her life—and the life of her brother—is threatened, Alyssa has to make impossible choices if she’s going to survive.

While this book did not live up to my highest expectations, I still really enjoyed it!

Alyssa, the main protagonist, was my least favourite character in the book. During the beginning of the novel, I enjoyed reading her thoughts and perspective surrounding the Tap-Out, however, by the end of the novel, I didn’t think that she added much insight and was more of an “annoyed personality”, rather than a crucial character that added a lot to the storyline. In my opinion, she was the least significant character out of their group. Although the story was based around her family and how the tap-out impacted them, I preferred to read about Garrett, Alyssa’s 10-year-old brother. He was one of my favourite characters in the novel, and he played a huge role in the story. He seemed much braver and courageous than a typical 10-year-old boy would be, but since these were unimaginable circumstances, he stepped up to the plate and helped out their group a lot throughout the novel. Garrett developed the most out of all of the characters in the novel, and he was my favourite character to read about by far. Jacqui, Henry, and Kelton were three very interesting characters to read about as well. In “Dry”, we get to read about them in Alyssa’s perspective, as well as read about their thoughts and emotions from their own perspective. Jacqui was my least favourite character during the first half of the book, but she slowly grew on me, and by the end of the book, I really enjoyed and appreciated her character. While I thought Kelton’s role at the beginning of the book would be Alyssa’s love interest, he shaped into his own character thought the progression of the novel, and ended up affecting the story line much more than I had originally thought. Kelton’s family dynamic and his parents thoughts on the world were fascinating to read about, and I would have loved to have read more about his family overall. Even though Henry is introduced more than half-way into the novel, I loved his character and how he added a mysterious element into the storyline. He seemed like a wealthy teenager living in his house alone while his parents left during the tap-out, but we quickly learn that he is not who he really appears to be. I also loved reading about the neighbours. Like Keltons family, I would have loved reading more about them and how they felt towards the other families on the street. I would’ve liked more time to read about them and delve into some of the families more individually.

Even though we didn’t get to read much about the neighbours, one of my favourite aspects of the book was the little “snapshots” of other peoples lives during this disaster. Normally, I hate reading any sort of “snapshot” chapter (like a look into the future or past), but these individual stories added so much emotion to the book, and I could not have enjoyed reading them any more than I did. From reading about news anchors, to people who ran water plants, we got read about other peoples perspectives and emotions during the tap-out, and we also got to see how the sudden loss of water impacted different types of people.

Like I mentioned before, the plot/overall concept of this book was very interesting and appealed to me very much. And while it was a good idea in the beginning, I felt like it was a little flat. There were so many dramatic parts/climaxes in the story, but they all felt very anti-climactic and didn’t really result in anything. There were some things (like the neighbours/different home-lives of the characters, etc.) that I would have liked to have read more, while there were other things I could have read less about (travelling in the car, trying to locate water even though they could never really find anything, etc.). I felt like some of the “travelling” chapters dragged on, and when they finally made it to their desired destination, we only read about it for a few pages. Shusterman could have made some of the destination parts longer, resulting in more world-building. In my opinion, the ending felt very abrupt and incomplete. I would have loved to have read more about their “rescue” (no spoilers here!) and how their lives went directly after the tap-out (in hospital, stuff with parents, etc.), rather than reading about their thoughts two weeks after the initial event took place. The book was extremely thrilling and fast-paced, which made it much easier to read in a timely matter.

“Dry” is a multi-perspective book, not like your typical “two-sides of the story” novel. I thought the POV writing style was beneficial in this story, since no two people would be feeling the exact same emotions during an event as dramatic as a literal water lock out. That being said, I wished they would have stuck to two individual POVs, rather than making ever single character in the book (except Garrett) have POV parts. At times throughout the novel, I was confused as to who was speaking and who they were talking about. Some POV parts were longer than others, and during those long parts I found myself flipping to the beginning to remind myself who was speaking. The characters all spoke pretty similarly, and I found it hard to distinguish one character from the next.

Overall, I enjoyed this book and gave it 3/5 stars. To read my thoughts throughout reading the book, click here!

Thanks to Simon and Schuster Canada for sending along this book, I’m so thankful for this opportunity!

Have YOU read “Dry” by Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman? Tweet me (and follow me!) @readingreadingr and we can discuss the book on twitter! Also, make sure to follow my Instagram to see sneak peaks of upcoming blog posts and to find out what I am currently reading!

Good Night Book Owls!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading written by Alyssa Cohen!

Long time no post, I’ve been super busy with school work and personal stuff. I’m going to try and post at least twice a month on this blog. The posts will hopefully consist of book reviews (which I’m renaming “Alyssa’s Reviews”) and Monthly TBRs/Monthly Wrap Ups. I am not going to commit to anything, but after having and writing on this blog for almost 5 years, I figure I need to keep up with it and everything else around the book blogosphere!

Now… let’s get onto the review!

Title: Gone Girl
Author: Gillian Flynn
Publication Date: April 22, 2014
Page Count: 415

Synopsis:
On a warm summer morning in North Carthage, Missouri, it is Nick and Amy Dunne’s fifth wedding anniversary. Presents are being wrapped and reservations are being made when Nick’s clever and beautiful wife disappears. Husband-of-the-Year Nick isn’t doing himself any favors with cringe-worthy daydreams about the slope and shape of his wife’s head, but passages from Amy’s diary reveal the alpha-girl perfectionist could have put anyone dangerously on edge. Under mounting pressure from the police and the media—as well as Amy’s fiercely doting parents—the town golden boy parades an endless series of lies, deceits, and inappropriate behavior. Nick is oddly evasive, and he’s definitely bitter—but is he really a killer?

My Rating: 4 Stars

This book was a WHIRLWIND to read! I actually had to read it for an english project, but I ended up loving it even though it was technically “required reading”. All of the other people in my group for the project really enjoyed it, which was interesting because I was put with 2 boys and 1 other girl.

First Star: Two Point Perspective

• When I was younger, I used to LOVE two point perspective, but as my opinions shifted slightly as I got older, I started to really dislike reading two point perspective. I found it very repetitive and it didn’t really do anything great for the book itself. That being said, Gone Girl had a much different and better way of using the two point perspective. It seemed like Nick would always vaguely mention an event that happened in the past, but Amy would go much more in depth with exactly what was going on when that event happened. That added a lot of detail to the story, and while it turned out that Amy’s diary entries were not what we had believed they would turn out to be, they were still really interesting to read.

Second Star: Character Development

• Character development is one of my favourite literary elements in any novel. Whether it may be positive or negative development, anytime you see a character change throughout the novel helps pick up the pace and rhythm of the story. In Gone Girls case, both characters developed a lot in the story. Nick was the first character to change throughout the novel, as he continued his conquest of looking for his missing wife, Amy. While Nick did not make a complete flip in personality, he developed his character in positive ways near the middle of the story. Amy changed a lot during the end of the novel. We learned what her true personality was like during the last 100 pages of the novel, which made you question and think about the previous pages you read. While I did not end up liking Amy in the end, she truly defined “Character Development” in novels, which made her character stand out.

Third Star: Setting

• Gone Girl is set in a mysterious town somewhere in Missouri. Amy and Nick did not live in a small, tight-knit rural community, but they did live near interesting people and had very interesting neighbours that ended up having a decent impact in the story. Since the beginning portion of Gone Girl is a scavenger hunt, this forces Nick to delve deeper into his home-town roots and visit old places they had travelled to once before. When reading these parts, we begin to gather information about their town and develop a sense of community. This has a great impact in the story and helps you understand things about the town before Amy’s abrupt disappearance.

Fourth Star: Storyline

• Gone Girl was perhaps one of the most interesting novels I have ever read. It is not like a generic murder mystery novel, but rather a “He said, She said” battle between the two characters. Because of the different perspectives and drastic character development, the story formed into a twisted tale between two people with different feelings. I definitely did not expect the novel to end the way it did, even though many people prepared me for  a shocking twist.

One Stair: The Ending

• While the twist was phenomenal, I didn’t love the overall ending of the story. I would have loved to have read Amy’s thought process after all was said and done. I would have also liked to hear what happened to Amy’s parents and ex-boyfriend after Amy was found and returned back to her “normal life”. But maybe Flynn ended it on an abrupt note for a reason, we will never know.

Favourite Quotes:

• “A lot of people lacked that gift: knowing when to fuck off.”
• “There’s a difference between really loving someone and loving the idea of her.”
• “There’s something disturbing about recalling a warm memory and feeling utterly cold.”
• “Love makes you want to be a better man—right, right. But maybe love, real love, also gives you permission to just be the man you are.”

I hope you all enjoyed reading my review of Gone Girl! Expect more posts soon, and let me know in the comments what you guys are reading this weekend!

Good Night Book Owls!