The Book Blogger TMI Tag

I found this here, The Book Goddess, and I haven't done a tag in a while so I figured I would do it! As always I tag anyone who wants to do it. Go for it! :D


How old are you? 

I am 21. Next year I will be 21 again. Forever 21. Lol, no really I am 29. :x

What book are you reading? 

I am reading Icons by Margaret Stohl.

What are you wearing?

Jeans and a T-shirt. Nothing special.

OTP? (One True Pairing?)

Chaol and Celaena from the Throne of Glass series.

Blogger or Wordpress?

I have zero experience with Wordpress. So Blogger.

Going outside being active or staying in and reading a book?

I'm allergic to outside. Book, definitely.

What is the last book you read?

I just finished Days of Blood and Starlight last night.

What is the book you are going to read next? 

For the Record by Charlotte Huang.

Ebooks - yes or no? 

No. Unless it's something from NetGalley I really want to read.

Where do you prefer to read?

Everywhere. The couch, the bed, in the bathtub, on the toilet, in the car... I mean everywhere.

Who is the last person you tweeted?

I think it was Stephen King for his birthday.

Whose blog did you look at last?

It was either The Book Goddess or My Guilty Obsession  I'm not sure.

Who is your favorite blogger?

Um...me? LOL! Just kidding. Seriously though, I don't know. I like quite a few blogs.

Who is your favorite book-tuber?

Bazpierce because he is hilarious and gives no shits what others think. Here's a link! Bazpierce

What do you do when someone tells you reading is boring? 

Well even though I vehemently disagree I don't usually say anything. I think sports are boring. So there ya go. We all have our own opinions. :)

Who is the last person you texted?

My mother.

Who is your all time favorite book character?

Dorian Gray. He's fascinating to me. I love his character in Penny Dreadful too.

UKYA or USYA?

I don't even pay attention to what is US, UK, or something else. If it's not obvious then I don't even know lol.

What is your preferred drink while reading?

Coffee or tea.

If you hated reading what would you be doing instead?

Well I would get a lot more housework and exercise done. Oh, who am I kidding? I would watch more movies and TV shows. Yes, I am a bit of a couch potato.

How many bookshelves/bookcases do you own?

I have 5 full bookcases and a massive amount of overflow. I have an addiction problem obviously. :/

If you had the choice to meet all of your favorite book bloggers or all of your favorite authors, which would you pick? You can only pick one. 

Authors. 100%

Insta-Love: yes or no?

I prefer no, but I can stand it depending on how it's done.

Favorite author?

Stephen King

What is the number one book on your wishlist?

The Acolyte by Nick Cutter.

Do you prefer books with female or male protagonists? 

I'm not picky. I will say though that sometimes female authors writing from a male perspective can go very wrong and very easily.

Which is your favorite book to film adaptation?

The Harry Potter series. Even though there are a few things that drive me NUTTY, they did mostly a good job and I enjoy seeing it all come to life.

What is the last song you listened to?

I'm listening now to "Dice" by Finley Quaye Ft. Beth Orton.

Which do you enjoy reading more negative reviews or positive reviews?

Honest reviews. I don't care if it's positive or negative.

Who are you going to tag?

Everyone who wants to do it!



Follow

Days of Blood & Starlight By: Laini Taylor Review

View on Goodreads

"You only have to begin Lir. Mercy breeds mercy as slaughter breeds slaughter. We can't expect the world to be better than we make it."

- Laini Taylor, Days of Blood & Starlight 

I LOVE this series!! I always worry when I absolutely adore the first in a series that the next one won't live up to my expectations. I'm happy to say that Days of Blood & Starlight did not disappoint me. The writing is still fantastic and giving me all the feels. This series is completely shredding my heart.  

I have to say I really like Ziri. Like A LOT!! I was so close to saying forget Karou and Akiva being together let Karou and Ziri get together. Until the end of the book...I definitely did not see that happening!!!!! 

As for Karou and Akiva I do still want them to have a happy ending. I want them to have their peace like they dreamed about. I can't get over how awesome Akiva is though and all that he does for Karou. So what that he killed most of the Chimera... he made a mistake...right?! Forgive him Karou!!! 

I miss Brimstone though. Am I the only one hoping that he pops back up in the third book? I mean Issa did in this one, so maybe Brimstone will in the next. I can hope.

I was surprised how much WAR and darkness there was in this book. Some things that happened were just, BRUTAL. I have read quite a few books where the big battle or whatever really never happened. Let alone any battles leading up to a bigger end battle. *Cough...Breaking Dawn... Cough* I think this is a fantastic middle book. It builds everything up quite nicely and has a lot of good things happening in it. I enjoyed everything about it. 

This is definitely becoming one of my all time favorite series. I'll see how the third one ends everything before I decide for sure though. I can't wait to read it and find out what happens. 

I recommend Days of Blood & Starlight to everyone, everyone, and everyone. 

Follow

Daughter of Smoke & Bone By: Laini Taylor Review

View on Goodreads

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I really wish I had read Daughter of Smoke and Bone earlier. Thank you to my Facebook friends for recommending I get with the program and read this one. I feel like a bit of a dummy now for having put it off for so long. If  the summary sounds even somewhat intriguing then take my advice and

Black handprints begin to appear scorched onto doorways by winged creatures all over the world...

Karou lives in Prague and she is an art student with blue hair, blue hair that grows out of her head that way. She draws monsters in her sketchbook and she is always running mysterious "errands." On one of these "errands" Karou meets Akiva and things get really interesting after that. Karou doesn't know who she really is, but she's about to find out!  Daughter of Smoke and Bone is filled with fantasy, magic, mystery, angels, a star-crossed love and some very unique creatures. 

I CAN'T get over how good this book is. To start off, the setting in Prague is different and perfect for the story. The description of Prague and the characters are so BEAUTIFUL. I found it very easy to imagine everything and get swept into the story. Daughter of Smoke & Bone is a book that I want to crawl inside. I want to burrow myself in between the pages and live in the world Laini Taylor created.

I must say I was shocked to find such an original and enchanting novel. I really didn't know what exactly the book was about when I started reading it. I'm so glad that I didn't know what to expect because everything was such a pleasant surprise. (Which is why I am trying not to give too much away here!) Daughter of Smoke & Bone is a breath of fresh air in the YA/Fantasy genre. Sadly this is a genre where there are too many books that just don't bring anything new to the table.  

Also, the characters in this book are just SO GOOD. I love the relationships! The relationships between Karou and her bestie Zuzanna, Karou and Brimstone, and of course Karou and Akiva. The relationships really got me right in the feels.

 #awww 

Especially Karou and Akiva and how they couldn't NOT touch each other. 

#awww

The writing is just off the charts! I was blown away by the entire novel. After finishing this book I just can't stop thinking about it. My heart is still feeling for the characters and my mind is still trying to figure out what's going to happen next. I can't wait to go buy the next two books when I have the money. Seriously, I can't recommend this book enough.  Daughter of Smoke & Bone is one of the best YA/fantasy books I have read in a long time. The last time I was this excited about a YA/Fantasy series it was the Throne of Glass series. Daughter of Smoke & Bone has EVERYTHING. I'm definitely going to have a hard time getting into my next read after this one, that's for sure. 

Just do yourself a favor: 

Stop reading this and immediately go read Daughter of Smoke & Bone if you haven't already! 

I recommend this for EVERYONE, EVERYONE, and EVERYONE. 

Follow

Never Never By: Brianna Shrum ARC Review

2.5 Stars

View on Goodreads

Thank you to NetGalley and Spencer Hill Press for allowing me to read and review an ebook copy of Never Never by Brianna Shrum. 

Never Never is a retelling of Peter Pan, except it's not really about Peter. It's about James Hook when he is a child and he WANTS to grow up. When he meets Peter Pan he agrees to go on holiday to Neverland with him. Peter promises him that he will take him back to London. However, once Hook is ready to go home, Peter refuses to take him back. Thus begins the tale of a pirate captain versus the boy who refused to grow up. 

Never Never started off very strongly for me. I have only seen the Peter Pan Disney movie (and some Once Upon a Time episodes with Peter in it) and other than that I have no experience with anything else related to Peter Pan. I've never read the original story, I've never watched the movie Hook, or anything else. So I was extremely excited to see Captain Hook's side of things. The first quarter of the book had me hooked (get it hooked? lol) right away. Hook as a child meeting Peter, how he got to Neverland, and his experiences while first in Neverland was so darn GOOD. I LOVED seeing how Peter essentially stole away Hook's life and why Hook came to despise Peter so much. 

After that is where the book dropped off a bit for me. The last three quarters of the book my interest just tapered off the longer the book went on. Somewhere along the way Never Never  just lost the connection to the reader. I started to feel really distanced from the characters and what was going on in the book. Honestly, it just got pretty dull and flat.  Also, I think there is a few small things in the book that I would have liked to have been explored more and they just weren't.

Overall Never Never is alright. I think it is more of a middle grade novel than YA, which is okay, but not what I was expecting. I probably should have DNF'd Never Never, but I kept hoping it would get back to being as good as the beginning of the novel was. It had such promise! 

I would recommend Never Never for die hard Peter Pan retelling fans, people who realize that Peter Pan is a jerk and would enjoy seeing him portrayed a bit darker, and for middle grade children who like pirates. 

Follow

The Bedtime Book Tag!

It's time for another tag! I love tags!! I found this here The Reading Izzy and I nominate anyone who reads this that also does a book blog. Go for it, tags are fun. :) Now let's get to it...

The Bedtime Book Tag 

1.) A book that kept you up all night reading- 

Ugly Love! Or anything by Colleen Hoover. Ugly Love was the first Colleen Hoover book that I read which is why I picked this one. Her writing in all her books (that I've read so far) is so addictive. I can't pick up one of her books and not finish in the same day. I am hooked from the first line.

2.) A book that made you scared to sleep- 

I read a TON of horror, so I'm pretty jaded in this department. It takes a lot to scare me and that never really happens anymore. I picked The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka because bugs scare the crap out of me. In the novel Gregor wakes up to find that he has transformed into a giant insect. I. Could. Not. Sleep. 

3.) A book that made you go to sleep- 

Most recently that would be The Martian. I tried reading this in bed one night and I made it maybe a few pages before I started to doze off. This whole book was a snooze for me and it was a struggle to stay awake to finish.

4.) A book that left you tossing and turning all night in anticipation of its release- 

Queen of Shadows by Sarah J. Maas. I'm still waiting!! I have it on pre-order and it's taking so long. I'm ready now! Gimme Gimme....!

5.) A book that has your dream boyfriend- 

Jace, definitely. My number two would be Chaol from the Throne of Glass series. I like a rough, bad boy kind of guy for my book boyfriend. The kind of guy who is a bad ass, but will do everything to make sure you're okay. Awww. 

6.) A book that would be your worst nightmare to live in-

Anthem by Ayn Rand because a world without individualism is not a world I want to be a part of. Nope.

7.) A book that reminds you of the night time-

The Madman's Daughter series by Megan Shepherd. Well the story is really dark, but also I just imagine that it's always dark and night time whereever they are. Even if it's day time. I just imagine that it's dark. LOL! 

8.) A book that had a nightmarish cliffhanger- 

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. I picked the first in the series because after I read it I was DYING to know what happens next! 

9.) A book that you actually dreamed about- 

I once had a dream that Carrie showed up where I was in the dream and she was all covered in blood of course. It wasn't scary really, it was just weird. In the dream I was just like, dafuq is Carrie doing here??? 

10.) A book monster that you would not want to find under your bed-

Any Lovecraftian monster. Especially Cthulhu, that would be some freaky stuff right there. 

Thanks for reading!! I hope you enjoyed The Bedtime Book Tag. Let me know in the comments below if you did it, so I can go see your answers! 

Follow

The Girl from the Well By: Rin Chupeco Review

View on Goodreads

Okiko is a spirit that wanders the world freeing the spirits of murdered children. She was murdered herself, and now she takes the lives of killers and releases the innocent ghosts. One day she meets Tark, a grumpy teen with some pretty weird tattoos. Something evil clings to Tark, but Okiko knows he is not evil. There is a dark spirit inside of Tark, trapped only by the tattoos. Okiko, Tark, and Tark's cousin Callie try to free Tark, without killing him too. The Girl from the Well is filled with the paranormal, evil doll rituals, exorcisms, spirits, and ghosts. 

I was pretty torn between a 3 and a 4 star rating on this one. In the beginning of The Girl from the Well I was a little bit put off by the writing style. It starts off in Okiko's point of view with her saying, "I am where dead children go." At first I was like, what the hell does that mean? Once the story moved on a bit everything started to make more sense though. The style of prose was different and it took a bit of time to get adjusted to it. Surprisingly the style of prose ended up suiting the book very well. 

The Girl from the Well takes inspiration from a Japanese legend (the same one Sadako/Samara from The Ring was based on) and has a few parts that did remind me of The Ring and The Grudge. Which both of those movies creeped me out, and this book did in a few parts too. 

***Side note: Once I went to a haunted house and someone was dressed as the girl from The Ring (which is scary!) and she touched me!! They aren't supposed to touch you! I about died. It turned out the person dressed up as Samara was a guy, and he knew one of my friends that I was with. So he was just trying to say hey to my friend. It was still freaky. ***

So you see this whole creepy girl with long hair covering her face, coming out of wells or dangling from ceilings is a bit scary to me. Which is why I ended up at the 4 star rating instead of 3 stars. I've never read a YA novel that creeped me out at all, and this one did in some parts. So that's worth an extra star to me because I'm a huge horror fan!

I obviously recommend this for fans of The Ring, The Grudge, and other scary Japanese shit. 

Follow

Everything, Everything By: Nicola Yoon ARC Review

Thank you to NetGalley and Delacorte Books for allowing me to read and review Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon.

Everything, Everything is about a girl named Madeline who is allergic to the outside world. She has SCID and has not left the house that she shares with her mother in seventeen years. The only people she sees are her mom and her nurse Carla. Then one day a boy named Oliver moves in next door and Madeline is certain that she will fall in love with him. Let me just take a minute here to give props to the author on the diversity in the novel. Maddy is African American and Asian, and Olly is white. Yey for interracial relationships! Yey for diversity in novels! 

First off, I read this book in one day. It was that good. I knew I would when I was less than 30 pages in and one of my favorite books, Flowers for Algernon, was mentioned. Flowers for Algernon and more fantastic novels are also mentioned throughout the book. As a book nerd, I just love to see good books mentioned in books! I also love how the story was also told with diary entries, illustrations, charts, lists, and etc. I love fun things like that in books that give it some character and personality. It also breaks up the monotony of just reading prose all the time.

This story is so good, and the characters were fun and entertaining. Olly's character is hilarious in my opinion. He wears all black, can never sit still, and does parkour. As for Maddy, I immediately felt for her character. She is a very likable character and you can understand her, without feeling sorry for her. Which is good, because I was wondering if this would be one of those really rough and depressing reads. It wasn't. There is a little bit of cheese and a lot of feels though. Oh, and Nicola Yoon captures the feeling of wanting more so perfectly. The writing in Everything, Everything is phenomenal. The story is fast paced, flows well, and it keeps you interested throughout. Once I started the book, I could not put it down.  I have children so I did have to put it down at one point, but I was very irritated about it and I couldn't wait to come back to it. ;) 

I have only one tiny complaint... I guessed the ending. All of it. I will say I think most people will be very surprised. I have seen a movie (I won't mention the title because anyone who has seen it will guess this books ending.) and let me just say a similar twist happened in that movie. So early on I thought, "What if this (insert spoiler here) happens at the end?" Then when it did happen I was a little let down that I guessed it, but really the story was so good I didn't end up caring. I still gave Everything, Everything the 5 stars it deserves. This is definitely one of my favorite books of the year and I recommend this book for everyone. 

Note: The picture I used is one I took of the cover on my iPad. I read the e-book on my iPad courtesy of Delacorte Press. 

Follow

"Would you Rather?" Book Tag!

I found this here Sincerely, a Book Nerd  and I just had to do it. :D I love tags, so I may be doing a lot more in the future.


1.) Would you rather read only a series or stand-alone books?

I guess stand-alone books. I love a good series, but sometimes I need a break from those.

2.) Would you rather read a book whose main character is male or female?

That's a tough one! Either is fine really. Sometimes it depends on what sex the author is. It just seems that most authors write a better character when it is the same sex as themselves. That isn't always true, but mostly.

3.) Would you rather shop only at Barnes & Noble (or other actual bookstore) or Amazon?

Barnes & Noble. I love to go shop for books in person too much! There is nothing else like browsing the book store. <3

4.) Would you rather all books become movies or TV shows?

I guess movies, because not all are long enough to make a good TV show.

5.) Would you rather read 5 pages per day or read 5 books per week?

5 books per week. Definitely. 5 pages per day sounds like torture!

6.) Would you rather be a professional book reviewer or an author?

Author. That has been my dream since I was a kid.

7.) Would you rather read the same 20 books over and over or get to read a new book every 6 months?

Why???!!!! Oh this one is awful! The same 20 books over and over I guess. Or new book every 6 months. Ugh. I don't know.

8.) Would you rather be a librarian or own a book store?

Own a book store! That would be so fun.

9.) Would you rather only read your favorite genre or your favorite author?

Favorite genre for sure.

10.) Would you rather only read physical books or e-books?

Physical books. Definitely.



What about you? What would you rather? 

Follow

My First Manga Read- Black Butler Volume 1 By: Yana Toboso Review

Click to view on Goodreads

Just recently I watched all of the Black Butler anime series and upon finishing the show I knew I had to read the manga. It ended up being perfect timing since I am participating in a genre challenge through my local library. This week is the last week of the challenge and the theme was "choose your own genre." What better genre challenge for me than a manga? I've never read one before and previously I was put off by the fact that you have to read a manga from right to left. I mean seriously, what? How confusing! I'm glad I watched all of the show first, because that really helped me to try harder to understand how to read the manga. Luckily I was able to adjust to the reading style more quickly than I thought I would and now I'm confident about reading mangas! Hooray! To anyone out there who is put off by having to read a manga from right to left like I was, it's not so bad! Try it. I'm so glad I gave it a shot.

In this first volume of Black Butler we meet Earl Ciel Phantomhive who is 12 years old and he is the last remaining member of his family. Being the only Phantomhive family member left Ciel  is already the head of his household as well as  a toy/candy making company that he inherited. We are also introduced to Sebastian Michaelis, a demon that Ciel has entered into a contract with and who acts as his butler. There isn't a whole lot of information on how the contract came to be in this volume, but I do know from the show that we get more information later. All of Ciel's other household servants are an entertaining group, especially with all their mishaps. Ho ho ho. This is an exciting, mysterious, and hilarious story set in Victorian London with lots of paranormal fun thrown in. 

Here are a few things I like best about Black Butler:

1.) It's set in Victorian London. Oh how I love this era! It's so perfect for a darker setting too. 

2.) Demons. Paranormal things! I just love all that. 

3.) This may be THE most perfect Gothic thing ever. 

4.) I love stories where a character has a tragic back story 

5.) HUMOR!! How a story can be so dark and so comedic at the same time is a mystery to me, but I love it. 

6.) Uniqueness. Let's face it in the world of paranormal books (movies, shows, etc.), anything different is a diamond in the rough. Black Butler certainly has that uniqueness.

Okay, so some of those may not be specifically about THIS volume but about the manga series/anime altogether. I've also  read the second book in the series already. I was going to review that separately, but I decided not to. Pretty much that one adds in the Jack the Ripper case along with the introduction of Madam Red, Grell, and the Undertaker. Grell and the Undertaker are definitely two of my favorite characters, so if you liked this one then you definitely need to read that one! Black Butler Volume 2 was just as good, if not better, than the first volume. Black Butler is perfection for fans of  the paranormal, horror, demons, historical fiction about Victorian London, dark stories, and gothic reads. I can't wait to read more of the books in the series. 

Follow