Saturday, October 31, 2015

Book Unhaul | October 2015 ~ 7 Books

After my last book haul I cleaned up my bookshelves and did some purging. Some of these books have been read and I decided that I didn't desire to own them, and some of them I did not read but I find that I no longer want to read them. Seven books total are being released back into the wild.

"Armada" by Ernest Cline.
I really enjoyed "Ready Player One", but this one really disappointed me. I actually didn't even bother to finish reading it. I will be keeping "Ready Player One" as I did really enjoy it, but I will not be reading anymore books by Ernest Cline.
"Falling Kingdoms" by Morgan Rhodes.
I wanted to like this one but I wasn't the biggest fan of the plot, the writing, or the characters. the maturity level was just not there, and I have found that I just cannot relate to a young cast of characters any longer. This one has been compared to "A Game of Thrones", and I choose to just read that series versus continuing on with this one.
"The Archived" and "The Unbound" by Victoria Schwab.
Letting go of these two hurts more then I would like it to. I adore Victoria Schwab's books, but these two young adult books just didn't do it for me. One of my biggest issues with it being the maturity level. I do not know if this is because of it being a young adult book (The other two books of hers that I have read were her adult books), or if it is because of being some of her earlier works, but whatever the issue is they left me feeling unsatisfied.
"The Young Elites" by Marie Lu.
I lost all desire to read this one. It feels directed towards a much younger audience then me, and I feel like I ultimately wouldn't enjoy it, so I don't wish to waste any of my time reading it.
"The Drowned World" by J.D. Ballard, and "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" by Jack Finney.
 I looked these two books over, and ... I wasn't too impressed by the little that I did read.

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Barnes and Noble Book Haul/Unboxing | October 2015

I received my Barnes and Noble book order today. I bought six books and two bookmarks. "American Gods" and "Anansi Boys" by Neil Gaiman in this gorgeous leather bound edition. "Outlander" by Diana Gabaldon, soft cover edition. Originally on my list of books that I have no desire to read, but one that I now want to read. "The Book Thief" by Markus Zusak, soft cover edition.
"The Norse Myths" by Kevin Crossley-Holland, soft cover edition. "Theft of Swords" by Michael J. Sullivan, soft cover edition. Book one in "The Riyria Revelations" series. "Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell" by Susanna Clarke, paperback edition. 


Tuesday, October 27, 2015

"The Unbound" by Victoria Schwab


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"The Unbound" by Victoria Schwab is the sequel to "The Archived".

Whist I enjoyed "The Archived", I did not find "The Unbound" to be its equal. "The Archived" was by no means perfect, having only formerly read Victoria Schwab's adult books prior to this I found her young adult books to have a much different feel to them, and this certain one definitely suffered on quality. My biggest qualm being that it felt like it decreased in maturity level. I was disappointed. This is supposed to be a trilogy but Victoria Schwab has never gotten around to completing it, and it doesn't appear that she plans on doing so in the very near future. One might think that she herself is disappointed in the books as she has grown and developed as a writer. I adore Miss Schwab as a writer and consider her as one of my favorites, but this series just didn't do it for me as I had hoped it would.

My Rating: 3 Stars

Saturday, October 24, 2015

"The Archived" by Victoria Schwab


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"Imagine a place where the dead rest on shelves like books."

Sixteen year old Mackenzie Bishop serves the Archive, as a Keeper of the Histories. Histories being the dead, a history of their life preserved within the Archive where they sleep the eternal sleep. But sometimes the more restless ones, the more violent ones, reawaken. A Keeper's job is to prevent these Histories from escaping the Narrow's, the boundaries between the living and the dead, and return them back to the Archive where the History is promptly put back into a state of sleeping and moved to a higher security realm by the Librarians, those who watch over the dead and catalog the Histories. The Crew are those of whom have the task of hunting down the Histories that have managed to escape the Narrow's and have re-entered the world of the living. These Histories are often the most violent and dangerous.

"The fact is, they were people, copies of people, because the only way to truly record a person is not in words, not in still frames, but in bone and skin and memory."

The dead must never be disturbed within the Archive, and yet, someone is deliberately awakening the Histories, altering them, and erasing memories.

This is the first young adult book that I have read by Victoria Schwab. I immensely enjoyed it and found it to be very original and new. But having read two of her adult novels previously to this one I must say that her young adult books just seem to be lacking that extra little ingredient to truly push it beyond the realm of special. This one didn't quite compare to some of her other books. Apparently I am a hardcore fan of her adult books, and just a fan of her young adult ones.

I liked the very real struggle that Mackenzie experienced as a Keeper. She had lost a grandfather and a younger brother, both of whom were shelved as Histories in the Archive. Mackenzie constantly struggled with wanting to see them again, wanting to see if she could prevent them from slipping like the other Histories tended to do the longer that they were awake. If our lost loved ones were within our grasp, would we be able to resist the temptation of seeing them again?

My Rating: 4.25 Stars

Book Depository Book Haul/Unboxing | October 2015

Hey guys, I have a small book haul to show you today from Book Depository. First we have "Elantris" by Brandon Sanderson, paperback edition in this beautiful watercolor edition that I have fallen in love with. "Warbreaker" by Brandon Sanderson, paperback edition. And "Assassin's Apprentice" by Robin Hobb, paperback edition. This is the first book in her "Farseer trilogy". I have never read any of Robin Hobb's books prior to this, but I have heard wonderful things about them and I am excited to dive in and give them a try. These will all make some wonderful fall/winter reading, and that is exactly what I plan on doing.

Friday, October 23, 2015

Reading Rainbow's photo.

Books In The News | Cover Reveal For "This Savage Song" by Victoria Schwab


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The city of Verity has been overrun with monsters, born from the worst of human evil. In North Verity, the Corsai and the Malchai run free. Under the rule of Callum Harker, the monsters kill any human who has not paid for protection. In the South, Henry Flynn hunts the monsters who cross the border into his territory, aided by the most dangerous and darkest monsters of them all—the Sunai, dark creatures who use music to steal their victim’s souls.

As one of only three Sunai in existence, August Flynn has always wanted to play a bigger role in the war between the north and the south. When the chance arises to keep an eye on Kate Harker, daughter of the leader of North Verity, August jumps on it.
When Kate discovers August’s secret, the pair find themselves running for their lives and battling monsters from both sides of the wall. As the city dissolves into chaos, it’s up to them to foster a peace between monsters and humans.

A unique, fast-paced adventure that looks at the monsters we face every day—including the monster within.
 




The cover design for "This Savage Song" by Victoria Schwab was revealed yesterday, as well as a more filled out book synopsis. 

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

The Reading Slump

The dreaded reading slump. We as readers are all destined to experience this at least once during our reading life, more logically is to expect to experience it many times throughout.

I have felt myself slowly slipping into a reading slump for the past few months now, and I am sure that you as readers of this blog have also possibly noticed a lag in my reading. Everyone becomes busy and has to cut down on their reading, but when one has the time to read and they chose not to ... that is something entirely different. Looking back on my reading history I have noticed that the books that I was not overly enthusiastic about are the ones that dragged me down the most in my reading (obviously), so the solution is to not read any books that aren't holding my attention, to only read books that I am excited about reading. I can feel this reading slump slowly starting to remedy itself, and I am getting excited about reading again. I already have the next few months reading all planned out and I am feeling pumped up and eager to jump into it. All books in the forecast are ones that I have been dying to read.

So what do you do if you find yourself in a reading slump?

My best piece of advice is that if you are not enjoying the book that you are currently reading, don't read it. There are too many good books out there to waste your time reading books that you are not enjoying. Give it a break while you read a different book, or just completely call it quits and move on. Read what you want to read, reading is for fun and forcing yourself to read a book that you don't want to read is not fun.

The "I just finished this wonderful book, what do I read next?" slump. I don't know about you, but I experience these kinds of slumps as well. It's great when you have another book all lined up and ready to go once the current book is completed, but what if you don't? You can try more books by that certain author if that author happens to have written more books. You can re-read a favorite book. You can try out a few different books by reading the first few pages until you feel a book catch your attention. Sometimes I start to read a book but I instantly feel that it isn't grabbing my attention and I decide that it isn't the right book for me at that time, choosing instead to try one, two, maybe even three other books by reading the first page or two and seeing which one stands out and fulfills that of which I am currently looking for in a book.

Diversity. No matter how much you love a certain genre, I can guarantee that at some point you will get burned out on it. Reading slump. I read several different genres, I read classic literature, fantasy, young adult, science fiction, and horror to a point. I try to switch up genres in order to prevent the genre burn out. I burnt out on the dystopian book genre, and I fear that there may be no relighting of that one.

Happy reading!

Monday, October 19, 2015

"Neverwhere" by Neil Gaiman


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"Young man," he said, "understand this: there are two Londons. There's London Above - that's where you lived - and then there's London Below - the Underside - inhabited by the people who fell through the cracks in the world. Now you're one of them. Good night."

The first half of this book, and the second half of this book were like entirely different reading experiences for me. The first half, although well written and alluring as to where the story was leading up to, was also dull to the point of sending me into a reading slump. The slowness of the plot left me with no desire to continue reading it in order to see how events were going to play out, and therefore this poor book saw a lot of down time and inactivity. However, the second half of this book was both fascinating and faster paced. It really redeemed the entire book. I realize that I didn't paint a very pleasing description of this book, but I really do recommend it. Just stick with it.

My Rating: 4.25 Stars

Friday, October 16, 2015

Books In The News | Book Deals, Title and Cover Reveals, and More

This is a new feature that will soon be a regular on my blog. Books in the news will be announcing author book deals, title reveals, cover reveals, and more.

Books in the news | Book deals, title reveals, cover reveals, and more

Book deals - V.E. Schwab (Aka Victoria Schwab) has signed a four book deal with her publisher. She will be writing a sequel to "Vicious", a third book in her "Shades of Magic" series, and two new works of fiction that are currently untitled.

I can not even express all of the emotions that this news brings to me.

Stay tuned for the big cover reveal of her Spring 2016 book "This Savage Song".

Title reveal - The sequel in Sarah J Maas's "A Court of Thorns and Roses" trilogy has been titled "A Court of Mist and Fury".


And in TV, the "Throne of Glass" series by Sarah J. Maas is now being optioned for TV.

Sunday, October 11, 2015

"Armada" by Ernest Cline


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"Armada" by Ernest Cline is a three hundred and forty nine paged book, I made it exactly fifty pages in before I just couldn't go any further with it. Earlier I read Cline's "Ready Player One", of which I immensely enjoyed, but even then I had a few minor problems with the book. Those problems were multiplied by ten fold in this book. Flat, and bland character development being one. I felt that the characters in "Ready Player One" were a little flat, but the characters here in "Armada" are definitely more under developed. Zack didn't even appear to have his own personality, always using references to describe how he was feeling rather then using his own words. That was another issue that I had with this book. We had the music, video game, book, and movie references throughout "Ready Player One", but here in "Armada" that is literally what the entire book is made up of. References. You are hitting at least one on every page, until it feels like you are reading a text book ... or just a very poorly written book that is attempting to disguise itself behind better ones.

I won't be reading anymore of Cline's books. As far as I am concerned, "Ready Player One" is the only book that Cline has produced ... and we will just leave it at that.

My Rating: 2 Stars - Did not finish

Saturday, October 10, 2015

"Vicious" by V.E. Schwab


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"If Eli really was a hero, and Victor meant to stop him, did that make him a villain?"

We all know the typical story of good versus evil, superhero pitted against villain, good guy defeats bad guy. But what if there wasn't a superhero in our story? What if they were both the villains, and you didn't know if you should even be rooting for one of them?

"Plenty of humans were monstrous, and plenty of monsters knew how to play at being human."

That's what you will find within this book. A story filled with hate filled characters, full of disturbing emotional and empathy disconnection.

We focus mainly on our two male characters, Eli and Victor. College roommates and friends, later destined to be foes. This book is shown through their two points of views, and split between the present and ten years prior to now. It all begins with Eli's thesis on EO's (extraordinary) and whether or not they actually exist, and how they were able to obtain those supernatural abilities. But when this thesis moves from academic to experimental, things quickly escalate and get out of control.

I loved the uniqueness that Schwab brought to this book. How supernatural abilities are gained, and what determines the powers that are obtained.

My Rating: 5 Stars

Touching On The Subject Of Book Ratings

I didn't use to dwell too long on the all too seemly simplicity of book ratings. Certainly not before joining Goodreads two years ago, and even less so before creating the very book blog that you are currently reading, roughly seven months ago. You as a reader generally knows what agrees with you in the book world and that of which does not, but does one tend to fully digest the books that one is reading, to really think about it and allow that book to freely speak to one, if one is not actively thinking about it? I think so, but I also think that when your next step following the completion of a book is to then rate it and compose a review on it, that you are perhaps subconsciously absorbing more out of that book because you are more actively thinking about it throughout the reading experience, whether aware of it or not. Much like being a part of a book club.

However there are so many things to take into consideration when rating a book. As a general rule I do have a pretty basic method of going about this, however certain things need to be taken into consideration when doing so. What a book seeks out to accomplish, and whether or not it succeeds or fails, plays a large part in my rating. Books can make you think, make you laugh, make you cry, purely entertain you, or scare you. All of these books are very different from each other, but all are possible candidates for a five star rating depending on how well the author executed it. That's one thing to take into consideration. I might rate a classic five stars because of the beautiful writing and the overall story that it has to tell, but I might rate another book five stars because of its entertaining value. So I definitely take into consideration what the author is trying to accomplish, as well as what feelings the book evoke. However, with that being said one thing that probably plays the most part in my rating system is the overall writing. The writing is one of the most important aspects of a book, closely followed up by the story itself. The two cannot exist alone without the other being there to balance them out. I cannot, and will not, read a ill written book. It just brings the whole quality of the book crashing down, and I can't enjoy a book no matter the story line, if I cannot even tolerate the writing. A book can also be beautifully written but the writing may be poorly concealing a weak story. Neither one works for me on a stand alone basis, they need to be equally balanced out. So those three all play a very large part in my rating process.

But then we have the actual ratings themselves. I am a critical rater of books, most people know this. I have a 3.40 average rating on Goodreads. So my star ratings might mean something different from other people's star ratings. I thought that it would be interesting to delve deeper into this subject.

One Star
One star ratings are reserved for those books that I actually hated. Yes, hated. I hated the writing, I hated the story, I hated the characters. There just wasn't anything about this book that I did like. These books are never read fully through, I usually cast them away from me almost immediately. These are the books that fill me with nothing but disgust, distaste, and contempt.

Two Stars
This rating doesn't actually differ very much from my one star rating other then the writing and/or story being perhaps a mere fraction better then the books thrown into my one star ratings. These are the books that I did not enjoy, did not finish, but that I did not hate quite so severely as the one star books.

Three Stars
This is where my rating changes up a little more. Being a person whom highly believes in not wasting your time on bad books, the books that fall into this category are also very susceptible to not being completed. However a three star rating means that the writing and the story were vast improvements from my one star, and two star ratings. So although this book probably didn't appease the book snob in me, other readers perhaps shouldn't scratch these books off of their future reading based sorely on my judgement, as they just might enjoy them. Especially my 3.5 star ratings. These are books that I just considered as 'okay' reads, not hating them but definitely not liking them either. Stuck in the middle.

Four Stars
For me, there is a huge difference between a 4 star rating and a 4.5 star rating. A four star rating means that I really liked it, however I don't want to own it and I will certainty never be reading it a second time. A 4.5 star rating however means that I actually loved it. This rating was so close to being a five star rating, but there were probably a few small things that slightly held it back from achieving that. These are the books that I actually want to own, and will be reading many times over.

Five Stars
This is the highest possible rating. This rating is reserved for very special books. All things have to add up in this book. Writing, plot, character development. It has to speak to me, it has to entertain me. It has to be special in order to receive this very special rating. You won't often see me rating a book as five stars. These books find a permanent home in my library and are read, reread, and reread again.

So as you can see, my rating system probably doesn't add up to a lot of other peoples rating systems. I wanted to touch on this so that you have a better idea of where my thoughts lay when I do rate and review books on here.

I would be interested to hear how other people rate books, and what those ratings mean as far as their thoughts go.

Thursday, October 8, 2015

October Book Releases - Out Now

October is apparently a big month this year for some highly anticipated book releases. These are the releases that are currently in stores now, not necessary all books that I am excited about but rather the books that seem to be receiving the most attention.

"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" by J.K. Rowling, illustrated edition. Being a big fan of the Harry Potter books I was of course interested in this book when I first heard about it. however I was thinking a children's picture book rather then the full book in illustrated form that it actually is. The illustrations are gorgeous. There is going to be one illustrated book for each of the Harry Potter books, one to be released each year, all full editions of the books. I may have to start collecting these ...

"The Sword of Summer" by Rick Riordan, book one in his new series "Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard". I was originally excited for this book, but my enthusiasm has since waned. I highly recommend Riordan's books, I just find them to be a little too juvenile for my tastes.

"Carry On" by Rainbow Rowell. This book looks like a delicious read, but I feel like in the end I would be very disappointed in said book. It sounds like a chick-lit attempting to portray itself as fantasy. I may very well pick this one up if I happen to run across it at my library, but otherwise I won't be seeking it out.

And lastly is "Life and Death - Twilight Reimagined" by Stephenie Meyer. This book recently shocked Twilight fans. Stephenie Meyer was able to keep this book a secret, and under wraps, up until the book hit shelves and fans started to stumble on it, and then spread the word. This book is almost a exact copy of Twilight but all of the characters have been gender swapped. Am I the only one that thinks that this sounds completely awful, and unimaginative to boot? Then again, I really didn't care for Twilight. I will not be reading this one.

Sunday, October 4, 2015

"Ink and Bone" by Rachel Caine


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"The truth was what the Library wanted it to be"

"Ink and Bone" by Rachel Caine has been marketed as Harry Potter meets The Book Thief meets Fahrenheit 451, and I really do see all three of those aspects contained within this one book. It makes for a delicious reading experience. Show me one book lover who doesn't enjoy reading a book which is about books!

Imagine a world where physical copies of books are treasured above all else. You can read books using the Libraries 'blanks', a electronic device much like our ebooks of today, but reading or owning a physical copy of a book is illegal. In fact physical books are so rare that book smuggling, selling, and collecting is a problematic thing of the black market.

Meet Jess Brightwell. His father is a book smuggler, and Jess has throughout his childhood been running these books for his father on the streets of London to place them into the buyers hands. This is a extremely dangerous occupation. The high Garda forces are ever vigilant, and if caught your crime is punishable by death. Jess has already lost a older brother. 

The high Garda are the soldiers of the Library. The Library claims to be the preservation of books, and they seek to claim up all physical books in order to archive them and ensure that all readers are able to enjoy them through the experience of blanks.

Book burners burn books to make a statement, and in rebellion against all that the Library stands for.

Jess's father places him into the Library recruitment in order to have a inside source within the society itself. His father being the cruel man that he is, tells Jess that there is no home for him to come home to if he should fail.

I vastly enjoyed this book and the entire premise behind it. It addresses my own fears of books someday becoming the thing of the past. The only thing that confused me was the obvious advancement of the Library through weapons, automatons, etc, but the oddly out of place use of steam carriages ... I was never certain of what time this was all supposed to be taking place.

My Rating: 4.25 Stars 

Saturday, October 3, 2015

Graphic Novels - Hate Them Or Love Them

I have noticed a explosion of graphic novel readers lately on both Booktube, and Goodreads. People are reading them, and reading a lot of them. Sometimes reading nothing but graphic novels.

Do you read graphic novels, or have you ever read a graphic novel?

I can't claim to have done either. I have never read one ... and quite frankly I can't foresee myself ever reading one. They just don't appeal to me ... at all. I'm all for people reading any sort of material, as long as it gets people reading, but I also kind of feel like graphic novels have, in a sense, taken over the role of real books for a lot of younger kids and teenagers. Possibly stunting their reading, or eliminating the reading of real books altogether. Yes, real books. Nothing wrong with reading graphic novels but I do have that mindset of them not being real books. Maybe a little close-minded of me considering that I have never actually read one, but come on! Graphic novels are not real books. A horse with a cone taped to its head is not a real unicorn, it is a horse with a cone taped to its head. You can still love that horse with the cone taped to its head, but love it as a horse with a cone taped to its head rather then love it as the unicorn that it is not. Meaning, you can still read graphic novels but treat them as graphic novels and not as books. Never give up your unicorn for a horse with a cone taped to its head. Otherwise you will just have a horse with a cone taped to its head ... and I will have a unicorn.