Shadow and Bone & a few other novellas by Leigh Bardugo

This is another bookstagram readalong that I was a part of. The plan was to read ALL the three novels in this series. Here’s a heads up: That didn’t happen.

Why?

Because this book sucked balls.

I don’t know what I was expecting when I started the book. Just that EVERYONE loved it and were dying over the characters. And then I read it and I felt like such a party pooper. I don’t want to hate on books but if you give me a book like this where everything is so dull and cliche and basically nothing bloody happens? Hell yeah I’m going to piss over it.

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Review of A torch against the night by Sabaa Tahir

Now based on my review of the first book one might think I wouldn’t continue the series but I felt it had potential to be something more and so I did… also because I was part of a read along on instagram… so yeah.

My view of the plot: We pick off right where we left off at the end of the first book (which is something that I’ve never seen before) and this time Laia is hell bent on getting her brother out of the worst prison, Kauf. And Elias is with her through and through.

Now that Marcus is Emperor, he forces Helene, the newest Blood Shrike a.k.a second in command, to hunt down Elias and so begins a great book.

To be honest, I’m glad I continued on to the second book of this series because I really enjoyed this book and here are the reasons why:

Review (Rant?) of An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir

Wow… I read this book with a bunch of people on bookstagram and everyone else seemed to love it while I was possibly the only one commenting about how much I hated everything. *imagine me typing shit with a shriveled face*

Oh wait stop imagining that for I haves the gifs-

Meeting Authors and why I’m secretly a Time lord

If a book blows away my mind, sucks away my soul and leaves me a hollow shell then I know that I have found my new favourite author.

In my mind, once I have fallen in a deep chasm of love for a book, the immediate next thing I do is sketch the name of that author on my forehead and that’s where I stop.

I hardly ever follow any of them on social media because in my mind they are these perfect beings who are above humanity. And to keep this view from faltering I keep any kind of possible communication with them to a minimum (also because I’m a disaster at communication and if I said anything to them they would shun me forever and then I’d just have to bury myself alive)

Mini Book Reviews #2

I made a list of all the books I need to review and I’ve realized that there are waaay too many of them and so obviously, here’s another edition of my mini reviews! Because I’m super lazy but I also cannot sleep at night if I don’t review them.

#1 The Haters by Jesse Andrews

This is a book that I bought for Beez when it was decided that she was leaving for India forever (I still don’t know what she means by forever… #ignorantbae) I knew that I didn’t have the time to read it but I also REALLY NEEDED TO READ IT cause… I wanted to put in my notes all over it.*

*I also just wanted to really read it

A book with a fierce female character; And I Darken by Kiersten White

I picked this book up because Paperfury had some really good things to say about it and I couldn’t resist reading a book where a European eastern culture is dealt with.

This book is basically a take on Ottoman history’s famous- Vlad Dracula. What if he was a girl? Meet Laga Dragwyla. She and her brother Radu, have been abandoned at the hands of the Ottomans, who she despises. From a very young age, we see Lada being fierce and Radu being gentle and kind, traits that are “expected” to be in the opposite genders.

Then they meet the Ottoman prince Mehmed, and as they grow up with him in the kingdom, their friendship and loyalties are constantly at peril.

Am I too afraid I’m not an intellectual? Ghost world by Daniel Clowes

Read me fake being one!

Ghost World has become a cultural and generational touchstone, and continues to enthrall and inspire readers over a decade after its original release as a graphic novel. Originally serialized in the pages of the seminal comic book Eightball throughout the mid-1990s, this quasi-autobiographical story (the name of one of the protagonists is famously an anagram of the author’s name) follows the adventures of two teenage girls, Enid and Becky, two best friends facing the prospect of growing up, and more importantly, apart. Daniel Clowes is one of the most respected cartoonists of his generation, and Ghost World is his magnum opus.

I started this graphic novel a while back; I read half and then I never got to finishing it. Yesterday I finally did. And I don’t think this is on my particularly-liked list.

The reason for that is that while there were things that were not usual and things I liked, in the end, this graphic novel dwindled down to some very petty things. It’s a story about two best friends, after high school and the inevitability of the changes in their friendship. And, it was good in the way that it portrayed this in-between state and both the girls didn’t do anything concrete except just back-slap ideas. I liked this because i felt like it depicted normal life in a way. Just the state of existing and the throw of companionship; I liked it.

Top 5 Wednesday: Books n’ Tunes

*clap clap*

Sometimes, as it happens, you’re listening to a song. And that song paints a lovely picture in your head. And sometimes, it happens to fit perfectly with the picture a book puts in your head. And then, ta-da, you get the song and the book married off!

I have wanted to do this type of a post for a while now. When a song fits for me, I have an intense need to tell people about it. Intense.
So, beware, for this post will be intense and, will not follow the first T5W rule (i.e. It’ll be above 5). Let’s bang on:

To kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Publication Date: July 11, 1960

Publisher: Arrow Books (This cover)

Targeted Audience: Young Adult

Genre: Coming-of-age/Anti-racism/Historical fiction

Blurb: ‘Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ’em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.’

A lawyer’s advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee’s classic novel – a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with exuberant humour the irrationality of adult attitudes to race and class in the Deep South of the thirties. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina of one man’s struggle for justice. But the weight of history will only tolerate so much.

This is one of those classic books that I had been putting off for a long time because I thought it would be way up on the “books that go over young kids head” but I was glad that I was disappointed.

The story follows three years of Scout’s life with her brother Jem, her father Atticus and their housekeeper Calpurnia. The first half of the book is just about Scout and Jem’s childhood. It is sort of an in-depth perspective of their childhood and how their father has shaped the way they think about life around them. The second half concerns about the trials of a black man who is accused of raping a white woman and Atticus has been called to defend him.

I love how this story didn’t necessarily have a happy ending, how it wrapped the idea of how black people were treated during the Great Depression and I also love how all of this has been showed to us by the eyes of a young girl who is able to understand what a ridiculous number of adults failed to- equality to people of all diversity.

Beez’s Friday finds

Friday Finds is a meme hosted by Books and a Beat. It was created to showcase all the books we’ve added to our TBR piles in the past week.

I’m going to let you in on all the books I’ve added on my TBR pile and reasons for hence. Be cautioned- I am bizarre and I like philosophy.

#1 The killer next door by Alex Marwood

Beez: If you live in Dubai, and don’t know about the following piece of information, this is going to be your lucky day. Some metro stations allow you to borrow books and that’s amazing. So this is one book I picked up because well, it sounded hella interesting and creepy.

#2 The age of genius: The 17th century and the birth of the modern mind by A. C. Grayling

Beez: Basically, I’m interested in the evolution of human intelligence. And I also met this author and was extremely interested and flabbergasted by what he said. So there. Also, a book actually about the evolution of human intelligence is The dragons of Eden by Carl Sagan!