As I said in my previous post, I read so much this month that I decided to split the wrap-up into two parts because it was so long. So, this is part two of my wrap-up - enjoy the mini reviews!
Willow Moss, the youngest and least powerful sister in a family of witches, has a magical ability for finding lost things - like keys, or socks, or wooden teeth. Her magic might be useful, but it’s not exactly exciting. Until, that is, the most powerful witch in the whole of Starfell turns up at her door needing Willow’s help. A whole day - last Tuesday to be precise - has gone missing. And the repercussions could be devastating. Can Willow find the day to save the day?
This was one of the most adorable and charming middle grade books I've read in a long time. It was a fast-paced adventure and so much fun. Willow Moss was an interesting character, and I especially loved Oswin (who mostly feels like a grumpy cat). The group of characters were all unique, with the main cast even including kobolds, trolls, dragons, and a fainting man. For a middle-grade, the magic system and history was very well thought out and I loved learning more about it. Overall, this was a fantastical, fun adventure that I recommend to anyone, even if you don't normally read middle-grades.
This book was actually a re-read for me. I first read it in 2015 and I'd only ever read the first two books in this series. Since I'd forgotten some of the main plot points of the book, I decided to re-read it before continuing the series this month. I have to say, I'm surprised by how much I actually remembered and I really enjoyed this re-read. This book is set in the year is 2059. Nineteen-year-old Paige Mahoney is working in the criminal underworld of Scion London, based at Seven Dials, employed by a man named Jaxon Hall. Her job: to scout for information by breaking into people’s minds. For Paige is a dreamwalker, a clairvoyant and, in the world of Scion, she commits treason simply by breathing. It is raining the day her life changes for ever. Attacked, drugged and kidnapped, Paige is caught and transported to Oxford. I don't want to say more than that about the plot because I think the part at Oxford is a really good surprise if you don't know to expect it. Overall, you can tell this is debut novel, but it's still incredibly well-written and you can see Samantha Shannon's style shining through.
I love Paige's found-family in the Seven Dials and I wish we saw more of them in this book, however, I really like the other characters we meet in Oxford. Jax and Nick are interesting characters that I want to see a lot more of. The magic system is also very well developed but I still wish we had some more explanations about who everyone is and what they can do. I loved the dystopian aspects of this book and I'm looking forward to seeing how to story progresses in the next few books.
The Family Holiday is an adult thriller following two couples that decide to do a house swap for their family vacation. One family (Beth and Niall) goes to Italy and the other (Amber and Renzo) comes to England and they swap houses for 10 days. But when Beth finds a photo of her husband with Amber, she starts to question everything about her marriage so far.
The first thing I'll say is: don't read the actual blurb of this book on Goodreads, as it gives away a plot point that happens around 75-80% into the book. I did enjoy how fast-paced this novel was and I read it in nearly two sittings because of this. However, there were so many frustrating things with this book. I spent the majority of the time reading it, despising so many of the characters. In all honesty, I nearly DNF'd with how much I hated Niall and Amber. There was just so much abuse and gaslighting. The twists weren't too shocking, especially when you get Amber's POV for so much of the book (although Amber felt like a very unrealistic character to me). I feel like if we'd had Beth's neighbours point-of-view instead of Amber's, then this might have worked better. The most shocking thing actually happened in the Epilogue and I really appreciated that - it's the main thing that brought it up for me. The thriller was well-written and I'd definitely read more from this author; I liked the way Beth was portrayed in her POV, but overall this didn't stand out from other thrillers I've read.
I knew this book would break me. I absolutely loved this one - an easy 5 stars to give. As with The Golden Fool, I can't say much about the plot of this one. I will say that I loved the Fool, Thick, Dutiful, and Nettle in this book. The character development so many of them go through is wonderful, and I really can't believe how far they've all come since the first trilogy. I wish we had more Fool than we did (as always), and the ending did feel a bit too neatly tied up. I also wish Fitz hadn't gone back to someone, but we can't have everything. I'm really excited to see how the dragons enter the next series and I can't wait to read more Hobb.
This is a heartbreaking and hilarious memoir by iCarly and Sam & Cat star Jennette McCurdy about her struggles as a former child actor - including eating disorders, addiction, and a complicated relationship with her overbearing mother - and how she retook control of her life. First thing's first from me, I never watched iCarly growing up and I don't think I've ever seen Jennette McCurdy in anything I've watched. However, I had heard amazing things about this memoir, so I decided to pick it up and I was definitely not disappointed. McCurdy is a fantastic writer; her humour is on point and you can really feel her tone throughout the whole book. Reading her story is so interesting and it's incredibly brave of her to show so much more of herself to the world by showing her abuse growing up and her struggles with addiction. While I feel like this book could be very triggering to some people (remember to check the trigger warnings!), I feel like it will also help some people who really need it. A brilliantly written memoir overall that I recommend to anyone whether you recognise Jennette McCurdy's name or not.
As you'll have noticed from some of my previous wrap-ups, I've been trying to get through my backlog of older books, and a lot of these have been Stephen King novels. This one follows Clayton Blaisdell. His capers are strictly small time until he meets George Rackley. With Blaze's brawn and George's brains, they pull off a hundred successful cons. Then George plans the one big score every small timer dreams of: kidnapping the infant heir to a family fortune. The trouble is that by the time the deal goes down, the brains of the operation has died. Or has he? Now Blaze is running into the white hell of the Maine woods with a baby as hostage. The crime of the century just turned into a race against time.
This was actually a really quick read and I did enjoy it. The main reason this didn't get a higher rating was because it was just a very okay book overall. Not much stood out, but the story and Clayton's past was still very interesting to read about. The characters were all uniquely King's and I enjoyed the way the story alternated between the past and present. The ending was just okay. In all honesty, I never really know what I want from the ending of a lot of King's books, but this one just felt a little lacklustre. Overall, a decent, quick read, but I preferred the story in the past to the ongoing one in the present.
This is the third book in the The Bone Season series. As I mentioned earlier, I re-read the first two books so I could finally catch up on this series. I can't say too much about the plot of this book, but I will just say a few thoughts on this book. Firstly, I did enjoy the overall plot of this book and where it was leading towards; however, it was quite slow in the middle and it mostly felt like characters were just travelling from place to place. It's safe to say that Shannon is brilliant at writing characters; I especially love Nick and Eliza, and their relationship to Paige. Paige herself was (once again!) frustrating throughout the book with her decisions, but the reasons felt slightly more understandable this time. The main thing I still don't like in this series is the romance - to me, it just feels like there is literally no chemistry there at all. It sounds like being in love with a brick wall for all the emotion they show. Despite that, I do still enjoy this series and this world and I'm excited to continue.
Oh dear. I had pretty mixed feelings about this book. It's the fourth book in The Bone Season series and I was hoping to love it as much as The Mime Order because I'd heard great things about this one. Unfortunately, I struggled through the start of the book. The biggest issue I had with this book is the way that Paige's character has not developed at all since the first book. She is literally told not to do certain things for both her own safety and the people around her and yet she still chooses to do them anyway, and it is ridiculously frustrating to watch happen over and over (and over) again. She's literally not changed since the first book despite everything she's gone through. And, oh my god, how many times can these people keep getting captured? I definitely liked the second half of this book more than the first (and it pulled it up from a 3 star read); however, the pacing felt a bit off, with a ton of reveals happening towards the end, making it hard to keep up. I did enjoy the book by the end - a lot happened and I'm glad it felt like there was some progression with the overall plot. I think one of my biggest frustrations of this series is how big it is; it's going to be seven books long and every book seems to have some kind of reveal and betrayal, meaning we probably won't get all the answers until the final book. I'm also struggling to keep all the loose plot threads in my head so some of the reveals will probably fall flat later on. It just leaves me frustrated because I think this series would be better if it was shorter (and I never normally say that). I do have some theories of future plot lines and I'll be interested to see where it goes, but the frustration and lack of Paige's character development pulled this down for me. Oh and I still hate the romance.
This is a reboot of Buffy the Vampire Slayer in comic book form, following Buffy but in the present day rather than the 90s. For those who don't know, Buffy is my favourite TV show of all time. I adore it. I re-watch it whenever I feel rubbish and it never fails to make me laugh and cry. I'm currently re-watching the show again but with my husband this time so he can enjoy it in all its glory. I read this first volume a couple of years ago and wanted to continue the series so I picked up the first one again. The art in these books is beautiful and amazing, and the chosen colour scheme suits the tone so much. I especially love the Cover Gallery at the end of the book; I would happily have so many of these as pictures in my house. It's interesting because some of the characters look a lot like the actors that played them, while others don't at all (which can be confusing to a long-time fan). All of them also turn up in very different ways to the original show, with Spike, Dru, and Anya showing up even before Angel does. I really like seeing what they're doing with it, but it does feel a bit like reading a fanfiction because the original show is just so perfect to me. I do really enjoy these though and I'm looking forward to continuing on with both this series and the Angel comics.
Yikes, this was a bit of a let down. To be honest, I was going to group these two graphic novels together in this wrap-up, but I did have one thing I wanted to mention about this volume. I really disliked that the artist changed between volume 1 and 2. The main thing I loved in the first volume was the art style. The art in this volume didn't really match the tone of the story, and they drew everyone so different from the first volume that I found it hard to know who everyone was all the time - and that's coming from someone who's a big fan, so I don't know how hard it would be for someone new to the world. It really pulled this volume down for me sadly and I'm hoping we go back to the original artist at some point.
So, that's everything I read in August! Phew, what a lot to review. What did you read in August? How did you do in the Orilium Magical Readathon?
No comments:
Post a Comment