Gemma

Prose was right up my alley, loved the world and even enjoyed a character who I normally would find dramatic and unrealistic, but the number of characters we meet to immediately move on from has bugged me. Hoping some come back for the next book and we keep a main cast throughout

Bloodwitch is the third instalment of the Witchlands series, my current favourite young adult series. It continues on from the second book with the same point of view characters and maintains the same quality the first two books displayed.

I loved this book and my previous reviews of the other books will give you a good idea why. I would like to emphasise in this review that I love how the romantic storylines in this series are going. All the potential couples you meet in the first book are really still getting to know each other at this point. The slow burn is really warming my heart. I can???t wait for the next book, and I???m looking forward to re-reading this one already.

The Raven Boys ???????????????
The Dream Thieves ???????????????
Blue Lily, Lily Blue ???????????????
The Raven King ???????????????
Opal ???????????????

I really passionately feel like the Raven Cycle cannot be read as individual books, as each book heavily relies on the other in the series to build a full picture of characters and plot. By the time I finished the first book I felt like I'd received an in depth explanation of the characters, but absolutely no idea about the plot besides we are hunting a dead Welsh king. The second book built up the basis of the plot, and then the third and fourth book delivered heavily in both plot and character. If you were to read part of the way through the series it would feel unsatisfying, but the climax of all four books is intense.

That said, Opal is a novella set after all four books in the series. Which means it both benefits and is hurt by the previous series. At the end of the series I felt like I had been given too little face time with my favourite characters (Adam, Ronan, Chainsaw and Opal) and this novella did a great job of giving me more of their relationships between each other.

I rated it lower than the full length novels and the series as a whole because it was lacking the emotional payoff that the whole series had given me. I wasn't really expecting it at the beginning of the book as the audiobook was so short, but found by the time I had finished I missed it a lot more than I expected. Obviously, Call Down the Hawk is coming out soon and is going to ruin my emotions in the best way possible.

Circe has given me the taste for retellings of ancient myths, because this was a beautiful story. It follows the life of a young daughter of Helios and all of the men who enter and leave her life.

The writing is simple yet powerful and I really appreciated how it let the story stand on it's own. I felt deeply connected to Circe throughout the plot, which particularly impressed me as I read this book with almost a months gap between the first two thirds and reading the last third. When I picked the story back up only a small reminder of the plot was required and I quickly fell back into the world and sensation of reading this book.

I definitely recommend this book if you are interested, and will investigate Miller's other novels to tide me by until her next release.

I found this book quite a mix of good and bad. When I reach around 2/3 of the way through any book I start thinking about how I'm going to rate it. In the case of Foundryside, I found it much harder than other books to determine how I would rate it.

The plot concerns Sancia and her unique ability to hear scrivings. Scrivings are the language that is engraved onto objects which can alter reality and change how these objects work. Sancia uses this skill to steal objects because she is desperate to change her life. It is definitely changed when she steals a talking key called Clef and discovers the job she was doing is so much more than it seemed.

I found the plot fairly fast paced and for the majority of the book it was really easy to read. I got fatigued with the plot in a way I've never experienced before and would end up skim reading every 40 pages or so. The world was fleshed out, but I found the set up quite info-dumpy. While this initially didn't bother me it did become repetitive throughout the book. I lowered the rating a star also in part due to fact that the book read partially like a young adult novel and partially adult.

My biggest issue concerns the rules of the city the story takes in. The city has four merchant houses with large compounds and the poor slum areas fill the gaps between the compounds. Early on in the book, Sancia mentions that there are no rules that govern the city and the individual merchant houses enforce their own rules within their compounds. It is mentioned at least twice later on, however, that certain things are illegal or prohibited in the city. I found this contradiction distracting, so I lowered the rating a star partially for this reason. It could have been my fault for misinterpreting or misreading the initial comment in the book, but I can't check now as my library comment has been returned now.

I would recommend Foundryside to readers of YA fantasy or any readers of fantasy in general. It was a quick, fun read and the characters were enjoyable. A few twists towards the end kept me engaged and interested and I'm definitely going to keep an eye out for the sequel.

This book is like one of the concept albums that you're supposed to watch like a movie with all the music videos. It's absolutely doing something and I had a good time reading it but I think for maximum impact I needed to be at least familiar with Moby Dick.

I enjoyed the whales and the art! A gorgeous book.

I am finding this book particularly hard to rate.

Neverworld Wake follows 5 teenagers who awake in a a middle space between life and death, and as the synopsis says they must decide which one of them gets to live. There is a lot more to the plot, but to reveal much more would be unfair to how the plot reveals in the book.

Like other reviews I have seen of this book, I feel the way the plot reveals is possibly the best part of the book. I found the characters to be irritating and unrealistic, but over the course of the book I became endeared to them. If the book had been any longer I think I would have got sick of them, but as it was the story was tightly plotted it wasn't so annoying.

I can see why everyone loves it, but I can definitely see why others have issues. I would recommend this book for nothing more than the experience of reading it. It was a wild ride, and I loved every minute of discovering what the hell was going on.

Beautifully written, it reads like a myth. I adored the two main characters.

I didn't even know what this book was about when I picked it up, I didn't care. Honestly I picked it up because Hannah at aclockworkreader loves this series and the new American covers are MY JAM. I had no expectations from the book, but I knew that I'd previously been disappointed by YA books before. However, I picked up [b:Windwitch 29939390 Windwitch (The Witchlands, #2) Susan Dennard https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1462296317s/29939390.jpg 41438285] by Susan Dennard a month or two ago and flew through the first two books. I absolutely loved them and decided I'd give another YA fantasy series a go. And I'm glad I did. The plot follows two main/point of view characters, Lais and Elias. One is getting ready to graduate a military academy and isn't sure he believes in the Empire any more, which he had been raised to fight for. The other, Laia, has entered into a desperate bargain with the resistance fighters from her country to spy on the Empire. Elias is a firm favourite character for me, he has conflicts within himself that you can really feel him trying to fight. I genuinely am really interested and invested in his character arc throughout this series. I would love to know more about him and his relationships with the people he grew up with. However, Laia wasn't as interesting for me. She had an intriguing background, but I didn't feel it was well developed. Information about her was dropped into the story when it felt convenient to the plot. I liked her section of the plot though, and I really think the second book was set up to give us a lot more of what I was missing from her story. For the world, the author managed a lot of world building without it feeling dense or like an “information dump”. I appreciate knowing enough about the world to make connections by myself but also getting to discover new things along the way. I'm a fan of the world and can't wait to see more. My only issue with the series at this point occurs when we're in Elias' point of view. That boy is horny, and needs to nip off for a wank between chapters. Honestly, it felt like he only viewed his best friend Helene and Laia as sex objects at points during the book. It was made especially weird because the book would then shake off the fact that he found Helene attractive (“she's my best friend”) and suddenly remember they have a connection outside of how much he'd like to bone her. it just felt jarring and childish, especially since the book tries to push Elias' respectful attitude towards woman as outside of the norm of the other male students he knows. I'd recommend this book for anyone who fancies some YA fantasy and enjoys a plot with multiple layers and moving parts. I also enjoyed it because it veered off the typical fantasy path of magic is evil/let's eradicate magic and the whole chosen one/only person with magical powers trope. I feel like I've seen that done to death.

The Golden Compass ???????????????The Subtle Knife ???????????????

The second book in His Dark Materials was a romp through multiple worlds, and delivers some interesting plot developments along the way. I found the plot to be less interesting than the first book as I am not particularly interested in the witches and a bigger portion of the plot follows their story. I liked the new characters who were introduced and am still looking forward to finishing this series. I may try the third book on audiobook to see if it keeps my interest more.

I picked this up purely based on the rave reviews it has been getting across the bookish internet community. It really held up to those reviews!

Fence follows a young boy trying to become a nationally ranked fencing champion. He faces a lot of prejudice and he has a pretty big chip on his shoulder that he will need to overcome on his journey. So far the world hasn't really been fleshed out yet, but it is vibrant and engaging so far. I think the second volume will hopefully develop the characters more because currently that is lacking for me. The art is gorgeous and I really liked seeing all the alternate covers at the end of the volume.

I am excited for the volumes to come and I think this will be a series I will try to keep up with as it is published.

I apparently read this book over the course of seven days, but in reality I read it in two long sittings and a final 30 minute stint. And right up until that last 15%, the last 30 minutes, this book was a five star read for me.

To begin with, The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a mystery novel like none before it. Aiden Bishop lives the same day in eight different perspectives on repeat; challenged to solve the murder of Evelyn Hardcastle so he may earn his freedom from the loop. I think the mystery was well crafted as it was difficult to figure clues out as you went and prevented me from “solving” the book before the end. In fact, I didn't come close to it. I'm not sure anyone would. The reveal of different perspectives, their limitations and strengths, and their unique relationship to the cast of characters was an incredible strong point for me in this novel and has me ready to add this book to my favourites of the year.

However, I found the last 15% to be a significant decrease in quality. The twist was unexpected and could have been good, but as it was relegated to such a small portion of the book it came across as a rushed decision. I thought it read like the author decided he wanted a twist and wrote it into the book in the forty minutes before submission. I personally feel if the twist had been introduced more gradually, the book would have been a strong five star read. I recommend this book to anyone who is bored with the thrillers and mysteries they've read recently, because this was a shock to the system and deeply addicting.

This is a short novella that comes after the first two books in the Witchlands series, before the most recent release. I heard some reviews mentioning that the plot of the novella is essential to the third book, so it was the natural next book to read.

Sightwitch is different to the other books in the series so far in a few ways. Firstly, this is an epistolary novel told in first person. I don't usually like epistolary novels, but this one really didn't read like one and it didn't inhibit my ability to enjoy the story. I am also not partial to first person stories, but I quite enjoyed it in this book.

In the story we follow a Sightwitch who feels an intense sense of responsibility and pressure by the role that has always been predicted of her and her journey to meet those expectations. I don't want to say anything else about the plot because the novella is so short, but I really enjoyed the story.

Spoilers
I also took a stupid amount to time to remember where I'd heard the name Ryber before in this series.

I really enjoyed Tara Westover's writing and the style of how she told her story. The story was always building to her final conclusions and the additional footnotes adding more insight or other perspectives made the experience feel so genuine.

I know there has been a few critiques of how she managed higher education are too vague, glossed over or exaggerated. For anyone to tell their life story, especially with how much Tara packs into this short book, it is understandable that the details would get skipped over in favour of more relevant portions.

Wow. I adored The Martian and read it within one day, raved about it to anyone who would listen and devoured that movie. I even considered listening to the audiobook after all that because I loved the book that much and I really don't enjoy audiobooks.

I wish I'd never picked Artemis up. Jazz wasn't written as a human being so much as the author's idea of a wisecracking protagonist. I could go on for a long rant about how your female characters should be noticeably female in a way that isn't the character or other characters talking about shagging her. Or how MCs who can do everything they need to do with ease isn't interesting or fun to read, especially if they over explain what they're doing while narrating. Or any other of the aspects to this book.

Basically I don't think there were any redeeming features to this book. 300 pages of absolute guff.

The Cruel Prince took booktube by storm even before the official release date. I remember the buzz surrounding this book as various members of the community read the arc and began gushing about Holly Black, “the queen of fae fiction”. I'd never read anything about fae, or anything by Holly Black so while the hype had me interested it never convinced me to read it immediately.

Later, after the buzz died down I read some reviews that dimmed the hype surrounding the Cruel Prince. And it was after the publication of the second book and only a few months before the third book I decided to pick it up.

At eight, Jude has two sisters and a set of parents who love her. But with the arrival of the biological father of her eldest sister, she loses her parents and her connections to the mortal world in one fell swoop. The book picks back up around the age eighteen where Jude and her twin sister are the only mortal members of the gentry class in Faerieland. They are in uniquely dangerous positions as the most vulnerable members of society but they can change that by becoming permanant members of faerie courts. And this book really is about how Jude wants to prove herself and become a member of the court so she can live a safe and ‘normal' life amoung the Folk.

I really liked this book, and I think that was down to the characters protrayed in the story. It focuses on Jude, but probably most importantly on her connection to her twin sister and Cardan, one of the farie princes. There were quite a few moments over the course of this book where I expected the plot to do something, and it would completely upturn those expectations. I also really enjoyed that the faeries were exactly as cruel and brutal as the title suggests, and doesn't really hold back on those aspects. I had expected that due to the YA label, and that I had heard so much buzz about a particular romanitc relationship developing, the book would pull short of really making me believe how cruel the fae were. In reality, the fae were terrible characters with redeeming qualities that did not wash away their true nature. It made the characters who filled this world a lot more interesting and fleshed out.

This one is a surprising four stars from me, and I would reccomend it!

Review to come. This book destroyed me and I need to properly think about all the things I want to say.

This book hurt to read. It was painfully real, and the characters felt like people I could lift off the page into reality. Some of the development that is revealed along the course of the book really added to the dimensions of the plot and the characters simultaneously.

This was an incredibly crafted story; it didn't miss a beat. It is just shy of a five star book for me, and I strongly recommend it. Depending on how much the story stays with me I may even bump it up.

I really enjoyed my experience with this book. One of my goals for 2020 was to read more non-fiction, particularly history, and this was one of my top contenders for the year.

Firstly, I have studied very little history and while I learnt about WWI in school we did not cover WWII. So it was really interesting and enlightening to read about the transition period. The accounts go chronologically and come from a variety of walks of life. As another reviewer said, the fresh feeling of the letters and diary entries kept me very engaged and focused.

I would say that as someone who knows absolutely nothing about the time period, I could have done with reading a few other texts to get a better grasp of the major players of the time. A lot of information is packed into this book, and I am looking forward to re-reading it when I have a better base knowledge.

This one was recommended by my book club, and I knew absolutely nothing about it. It turned out to be a phenomenal surprise.

The book is set in Scotland, and it really felt like it was written by someone who had either spent a lot of time here or was Scottish. This is the first time I've read accurate Scottish speech on the page and I felt so seen. The audio book is also top notch in terms of accents.

At the beginning of the story, Eleanor is absolutely, determinedly F-I-N-E with her life, her complete lack of friends and the limited contact she has with others. Eleanor's story pulls no punches, and we get an intimate look into her life as she begins to branch out and connect with the people she works with.

Wow. I think I'll need a minute to collect my thoughts here.

Firstly, you need to know that for the first two parts of this book I was 100% ready to dish out a five star review. I had been totally captivated by the premise and the terrible twisted nature of the main character. Amber doesn't hide who she is for a second on the page, although she conceals it from those around her. The second part of the book is from a different POV, whose I won't spoil, and that completely ramped up my love for the book. I was on the edge of me seat for the entire second portion of that book. The climax to the second portion was the most satisfying one I've read in a long time.

I wish the book had stopped there. The third section builds on the climax and pushes further to take a resolution that I had considered 90% tied up and had really enjoyed even further. I wasn't interested in this section of the book and it sounded like an overly braggy post of r/revengeporn. Over the top and spoilt the conclusion to a thrilling book for me. I think I love psychological thrillers now, and I need to read so many more.

I picked up this book because I fancied a captivating read that I could get through quickly. I've been hovering around 50% of the way through It by Stephen King for 2 months now and I wanted a success story to motivate me.

Stranger in the House was a captivating, quick read. I was gratified by how quickly the percentage increased on my kindle, and motivated to keep reading. I found the story to be somewhat predictable but an enjoyable read.

Particularly where I felt this book fell short was the length and the lack of development. The writing style felt a lot more “show” rather than tell, and did not build up a emotional response to flat characters I felt were doing some bizzare actions to further the plot.

I do not fault the plot for being predictable for a predictable plot can still be a great book if written in an intelligent and exciting way. More that the book was lacklustre in a few ways.

A marked improvement on book one, more time and care is taken to write full scenes rather than one line summaries. The side characters are further fleshed out over the course of this book (and one in particular that I remember fondly is introduced). The plot begins to weave more complex patterns.

This is the last book I completed when I originally read the series, so it will be interesting to see how the story finishes.

This book sat on my shelf for far too long waiting for me to appreciate it, so I need to write this review to let you readers know to pick it up immediately.

This is a close up study of the lineage of a family split down the bloodlines of two sisters. So in every second chapter we are going to the next generation and we read a chapter from a member of that generation from each of the sisters bloodlines. This choice made what could have been a very slow book feel lightning fast and gripping.

Gyasi is writing an intimate character study, but not of one person. In Homecoming, the family is the character. I adored this book so much for the characters. They were so real and the emotions in this book (especially towards the end) were really effective because of how closely you are tied to the characters. The story arc is for the family, and when we hit that final chapter and got some emotional resolution I was welling up. It has been a while since a book made me slow down, deliberately savour the story being told and experience every emotion with our characters.

I highly recommend this book. I am so incredibly excited for the new release coming from Gyasi. If you're like me and have had Homegoing sitting unread on your shelf for a few years, prioritise it. It's going to be worth it.

Honestly one of the best thrillers I've read. The concept isn't one I've read before and the twist had me surprised.