Tag: books

Review: It Only Happens in the Movies by Holly Bourne

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review4 Comments

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Audrey is over romance. Since her parents’ relationship imploded her mother’s been catatonic, so she takes a cinema job to get out of the house. But there she meets wannabe film-maker Harry. Nobody expects Audrey and Harry to fall in love as hard and fast as they do. But that doesn’t mean things are easy. Because real love isn’t like the movies…
The greatest love story ever told doesn’t feature kissing in the snow or racing to airports. It features pain and confusion and hope and wonder and a ban on cheesy clichés. Oh, and zombies… YA star Holly Bourne tackles real love in this hugely funny and poignant novel.

Firstly, hi on a Saturday! I know I usually post Stacking the Shelves on a Saturday but as I haven’t bought books this week (yay for self control), I thought I would post this. I’m really sorry if this is one-too-many reviews for a week but honestly, if I don’t post this right now I’m going to just have a backlog of reviews as I’m reading quicker than I can post! Which is awesome!

So onto this book, and I had mixed feelings about even buying this in the first place. I remember reading Am I Normal Yet? and finding the voice of the MC a little too young for me, and I was scared about this happening again. But I would say It Only Happens in the Movies had a slightly older feel.

“Love isn’t just a feeling. Love is a choice too.”

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and I can see why it has so much praise. It’s just very real in many aspects – romance, friendship, sex, growing up, parent troubles, moving from home..everything.

But I can’t help it, I have these niggles, and I wish I didn’t but I just did. For one, I didn’t like Audrey all the time. She was just so damn angsty and constantly angry, and I know it was because of her circumstances but she’d just like blow up for no reason? It also annoyed me when she didn’t seek help for either her or her mum, even though she knew how much she was going through, she just isolated herself instead. Another really important point I’d like to make is something I read in another review – if the same thing that happened to Harry happened to Audrey at the end of the book, it would be a completely different story.

“And you may not be able to help your feelings, but you are responsible for the choices you make about what to do with them.”

But even though I did have some little annoyances, I actually mostly enjoyed reading this book. It was a little cliche for me, but Audrey was a really strong feminist character who I looked up to and loved her strength. I felt how relatable this book was, and even told my friend about it who had been through a very similar experience to Audrey. I felt like this alone tells everyone how important this book is.

★★★★
3.5 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: Save the Date by Morgan Matson

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review3 Comments

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Charlie Grant’s older sister is getting married this weekend at their family home, and Charlie can’t wait—for the first time in years, all four of her older siblings will be under one roof. Charlie is desperate for one last perfect weekend, before the house is sold and everything changes. The house will be filled with jokes and games and laughs again. Making decisions about things like what college to attend and reuniting with longstanding crush Jesse Foster—all that can wait. She wants to focus on making the weekend perfect.
The only problem? The weekend is shaping up to be an absolute disaster.
There’s the unexpected dog with a penchant for howling, house alarm that won’t stop going off, and a papergirl with a grudge.There are the relatives who aren’t speaking, the (awful) girl her favorite brother brought home unannounced, and a missing tuxedo.Not to mention the neighbor who seems to be bent on sabotage and a storm that is bent on drenching everything. The justice of the peace is missing. The band will only play covers. The guests are all crazy. And the wedding planner’s nephew is unexpectedly, distractingly…cute.
Over the course of three ridiculously chaotic days, Charlie will learn more than she ever expected about the family she thought she knew by heart. And she’ll realize that sometimes, trying to keep everything like it was in the past means missing out on the future.

This book was pretty good – Matson is living up to expectations! I’ve always been a Matson fan since I started reading YA, with Amy and Roger being my favourite, so I couldn’t help but pick this one up.

I loved so many things about this book! It was so family orientated, which was lovely. I really feel like families take a backseat in YA and they’re rarely featured as much as family is in Save the Date. It made for a fresh feel, although I did want a little more romance in some parts. I flew through this book and finished it within a few days, mainly because so much happened!

“It seemed like the second you tried to tell someone why you loved someone else, it took the luster off it”

It’s crazy how this book took place over 3 days, and yet it span over 400. It was just so fun and hectic! So many silly things happened, that I actually ended up laughing at the pure craziness of it all. With the amount of things going wrong, the book ended up being really entertaining and just made me want to read on and on.

I had mixed feelings about Charlie, but I actually really liked her in the end. Some of her decisions and feelings really annoyed me – her focus on her family can be a little over-the-top at times and can cause her to just be mean to others. But these are just mistakes that teenagers make. All of the tiny things I didn’t like about her, she actually rectified before the end of the book. I loved watching her grow and learn from her mistakes, and make new decisions about her life.

“like pinning a butterfly down in a case—it never quite captured it.”

The only downside to this book was maybe the predictability of it. Maybe it’s just the extensive amount of contemporaries (and Matson’s) books I’ve read, but I kind of guessed at most of the plot, including the ending. Although this didn’t take much away from the enjoyment I had reading it, it made me rate the book…

★★★★
4 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: Leah on the Offbeat by Becky Albertalli

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review3 Comments

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When it comes to drumming, Leah Burke is usually on beat—but real life isn’t always so rhythmic. An anomaly in her friend group, she’s the only child of a young, single mom, and her life is decidedly less privileged. She loves to draw but is too self-conscious to show it. And even though her mom knows she’s bisexual, she hasn’t mustered the courage to tell her friends—not even her openly gay BFF, Simon.
So Leah really doesn’t know what to do when her rock-solid friend group starts to fracture in unexpected ways. With prom and college on the horizon, tensions are running high. It’s hard for Leah to strike the right note while the people she loves are fighting—especially when she realizes she might love one of them more than she ever intended.

I didn’t think I was going to read this book – I was just unsure that it was my thing as I’m getting older and my reading tastes are developing, but I’m so glad I did! It was a combination of loving The Upside of Unrequited and @bookish_and_proud (shoutout to Becky!) enjoying it that made me finally picking up, and it was definitely worth it.

“Imagine going about your day knowing someone’s carrying you in their mind.”

In some ways, this book was exactly how I expected it to be. It was angsty, cheesy and cliche, but I also loved it. I’m trying to be honest with myself here, and be honest with you guys too, so I’ll just come out with it. I really want to be cultured, and educated, and have an obsession with classics and other  books that will shape me as a person. But I honestly really love a good YA contemporary, so here we are. This book was my guilty pleasure in written form.

First of all, Leah. I loved her, she was so relatable and badass and I really found myself enjoying reading about her character. But I have to say, she was also incredibly…brash? I don’t really know how to describe her, but she really needs to learn to forgive and stop holding so many grudges. I get it, I can be like her as a person too, but sometimes it just annoyed me a little how she seemed to hate people for no reason (*cough* Wells *cough*).

“That has to be the best part of being in love- the feeling of having a home in some else’s brain.”

But that really has to be the only downside of Leah on the Offbeat, because I couldn’t help but love the rest. It’s cliche, but it also has a balance of deep, meaningful stuff which is really true about growing up. But what I really loved about these books was the laughter. I find it really, truly difficult to laugh-out-loud at books, but this one really tickled me. I kept having to stop and recite funny passages to my boyfriend.

On top of it being so funny, it was also so current! I found myself giving a little fist-pump when I saw Troye Sivan was mentioned. It warmed my heart at every single Harry Potter reference. I melted when I saw a reference to Six of Crows. I’m going to have to stop, because I loved this book so much I could go on and on about it, so I will say one last thing – I love how this book is in the same world as Simon vs. and The Upside of Unrequited. And I love how they’re not direct sequels, because there is no pressure to go back and remember what happened in Simon vs!

★★★★
4 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: The Crown (#5) by Kiera Cass

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review10 Comments

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When Eadlyn became the first princess of Illéa to hold her own Selection, she didn’t think she would fall in love with any of her thirty-five suitors. She spent the first few weeks of the competition counting down the days until she could send them all home. But as events at the palace force Eadlyn even further into the spotlight, she realizes that she might not be content remaining alone.
Eadlyn still isn’t sure she’ll find the fairytale ending her parents did twenty years ago. But sometimes the heart has a way of surprising you…and soon Eadlyn must make a choice that feels more impossible—and more important—than she ever imagined.

So yay, this book is better? This series improved? I mean, looking back on my review of The Heir, not much could have been worse, but I’m very happy to say some of the better parts of The Selection series shone through once again in this book.

I’m very glad to say Eadlyn does improve, thank goodness. She loses at least some of her selfishness even though there were still many times when I rolled my eyes at her somewhat bratty statements that still pop up.

“He smiled. “You are always just Eadlyn. And you are always the queen.”

I guess I could say there was an element of surprise in this book, at least in some more ways than in The One. But saying this, I did know exactly how the book would end. Having spent 4 books getting used to how Cass writes, I kind of guessed what would happen even though the romance just wasn’t really developed. And that’s the disappointing thing, I shouldn’t have known what was going to happen. But it was so damn obvious anyway.

“You are everything to everyone. And infinitely more to me.””

But I have to say it, when Cass goes for the romance, she does it well. There was a few passages that touched my stupid romantic heart so much that I actually shed a few tears. And I couldn’t help but going back to how I felt with the first 3 books in some aspects…because this book is entertaining, easy to read and somewhat enjoyable. I wouldn’t say I liked it like the first 3, but it’s definitely better than The Heir!

★★★
3 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: The Heir (#4) by Kiera Cass

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review9 Comments

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Princess Eadlyn has grown up hearing endless stories about how her mother and father met. Twenty years ago, America Singer entered the Selection and won the heart of Prince Maxon—and they lived happily ever after. Eadlyn has always found their fairy-tale story romantic, but she has no interest in trying to repeat it. If it were up to her, she’d put off marriage for as long as possible.
But a princess’s life is never entirely her own, and Eadlyn can’t escape her very own Selection—no matter how fervently she protests.
Eadlyn doesn’t expect her story to end in romance. But as the competition begins, one entry may just capture Eadlyn’s heart, showing her all the possibilities that lie in front of her . . . and proving that finding her own happily ever after isn’t as impossible as she’s always thought.

Oh my god. Why oh why did this series carry on? I was so happy with the end of The One. I cried for gods sake! We really didn’t need to see 20 years on with America and Maxon’s bratty daughter. Okay, I’ve always heard people complain about narrators being annoying etc, but Eadlyn was another level. She is SUCH A BRAT. She spends most of her time complaining, getting massages, and sitting at a desk. I say sitting at a desk because although this book repeatedly says she is ‘working’, all I know her to do is sit in her room looking through forms from the Selected. All of these books have been about the Caste system and how important abolishing it was, yet all Eadlyn does is talk about how beneath her everyone else is, and how she is the best person in the whole world.

“You can be brave and still be feminine. You can lead and still love flowers.”

She’s selfish, self-centred and she even tries to get her brother to choose between her and the love of his life because she doesn’t want him to go. And SHE IS OBSESSED WITH TIARAS. She’s a princess, she can have all the tiaras in the world, and yet she throws a stupid baby hissy fit when a little girl in the palace (someone who claims is like a sister to Eadlyn), borrows one. When this book claimed Eadlyn’s obsession is like a hobby, I actually snorted with laughter. It really sounded so bratty.

“Most importantly, you can be queen and still be a bride.”

So Eadlyn was definitely the worst part about this book, on top of the fact it wasn’t needed. But at least she kind of gets better, I guess. I mean I started seeing tiny spurts of her good side towards the end of this book, and I’m just hoping the next one will be better and more hopeful.

★★
2 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: The One (#3) by Kiera Cass

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review7 Comments

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The time has come for one winner to be crowned.
When she was chosen to compete in the Selection, America never dreamed she would find herself anywhere close to the crown—or to Prince Maxon’s heart. But as the end of the competition approaches, and the threats outside the palace walls grow more vicious, America realizes just how much she stands to lose—and how hard she’ll have to fight for the future she wants.

I started this book rolling my eyes, and I ended it with tears slowly leaking out of them. I found the first half of this book completely different to the second half, as knowing there was five books I didn’t know how much more I could take.

All I could think of reading those first pages, was I can’t have this repeated for another 3 books. I can’t keep reading about the bitchiness and the indecisiveness. Whenever Celeste was bitchy or the girls fought I just wanted it to all be over.

“Break my heart. Break it a thousand times if you like.”

But the fact I hated this book at the start made the turn-around even bigger than I thought it would be! And when I did fall in love, I fell hard. It turns out, this book turned out so perfect. It wrapped up all the loose ends, it endlessly surprised me, and it had a great ending overall. This book really sounds like the last one of a series right? More on that in my review of The Heir.

“It was only ever yours to break anyway.”

I can’t help it, this series ended up stealing my heart. Of course it wasn’t without it’s faults, which were many at times, but the faults were outweighed by my love. Yes, these books are predictable in a way, but I did end up surprised. And even though these can be a little trashy, they’re so poetic. And I’m embarrassed to say this, but I actually cried a bit when I finished it.

So that proves that even though I didn’t enjoy all of this book, the hopeless romantic in me can’t help but loving it a hell of a lot

★★★★
4 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: The Elite (#2) by Kiera Cass

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review2 Comments

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The Selection began with thirty-five girls.
Now with the group narrowed down to the six Elite, the competition to win Prince Maxon’s heart is fiercer than ever—and America is still struggling to decide where her heart truly lies. Is it with Maxon, who could make her life a fairy tale? Or with her first love, Aspen?
America is desperate for more time. But the rest of the Elite know exactly what they want—and America’s chance to choose is about to slip away.

What can I say? I finished this book in a day. I might have been sick and in bed resting at the time, but it’s still rare for me to get through books this quickly! I can’t help it or control myself, these books are so addictive even though I can still see the problems with them.

For one, not much happened? Which sounds weird to say because I got through it so quick, but even though not much happened I still enjoyed the slight plot. If I’m right in saying, this book started with 6 girls in the Selection and ended with 5. But I have to say, I did enjoy the other details, even if they seemed a little absurd sometimes.

“You know you’ve found something amazing, and you want to hold on to it forever;”

As with book one, America did kind of annoy me but I still can’t help but like her sometimes! But I have to say, predictability has officially gone out the window…yay! I can’t believe that I honestly didn’t know where this book was going, and I think that’s why I wanted to carry on reading so much.

“and every second after you have it, you fear the moment you might lose it.”

The love triangle thing does get a little old, I’m not going to lie. There were some times when I kind of wanted to push America off a cliff at points for not being able to decide what she wants. But even though America does annoy me, I can’t help but relate to her struggles sometimes. I’m a hopeless romantic and I couldn’t help but understand why she was confused sometimes.

So again, this series continues to win my heart in the end. I can’t help but love this book and I can’t wait to start the next one!

★★★
3 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: The Selection (#1) by Kiera Cass

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review17 Comments

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For thirty-five girls, the Selection is the chance of a lifetime. The opportunity to escape the life laid out for them since birth. To be swept up in a world of glittering gowns and priceless jewels. To live in a palace and compete for the heart of gorgeous Prince Maxon.
But for America Singer, being Selected is a nightmare. It means turning her back on her secret love with Aspen, who is a caste below her. Leaving her home to enter a fierce competition for a crown she doesn’t want. Living in a palace that is constantly threatened by violent rebel attacks.
Then America meets Prince Maxon. Gradually, she starts to question all the plans she’s made for herself—and realizes that the life she’s always dreamed of may not compare to a future she never imagined.

I just saw a review on Goodreads that sounds exactly how I’m feeling about these books. They’re like cookies that are really bad for you – you know you shouldn’t like them because they’re full of trash but you just can’t help yourself by eating a whole packet in one sitting. Credit to Taneika for that one!

So right now, I’m feeling incredibly torn over this book. For one, I never thought I would like a book with a girl called America Singer. America. And talking of America, this girl tears me in half too. On one hand, she is so damn indecisive and I know it’s going to annoy me a tiny bit throughout the whole series. But on the other hand, she has a kind and sensitive soul which shines through above all.

“I hope you find someone you can’t live without. I really do.”

I actually really enjoyed the caste system and world. It only has a small touch of fantasy and the palace and it’s grounds are pretty well described. I actually enjoyed how the world and history was described. I would have loved a map in the front of the book, but the history lessons were through dialogue and actual lessons the Selected took part in. I didn’t mind this, because it kept the lessons short and informative, rather than just long pieces of information.

“And I hope you never have to know what it’s like to have to try and live without them.”

Sure, this book was absolutely and utterly far from perfect. It should really be easy for me to say it was bad. But I can’t help it, it was so trashy I loved it. It was the kind of TV you know you shouldn’t watch but can’t help it. It was so predictable, cheesy, fluffy and other wrong things that I should be hating on it. But I can’t help it, these books are fun and quick to read and I have already read half of the second book.

Help me.

★★★
3 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: The Upside of Unrequited by Becky Albertalli

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review5 Comments

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Seventeen-year-old Molly Peskin-Suso knows all about unrequited love—she’s lived through it twenty-six times. She crushes hard and crushes often, but always in secret. Because no matter how many times her twin sister, Cassie, tells her to woman up, Molly can’t stomach the idea of rejection. So she’s careful. Fat girls always have to be careful.
Then a cute new girl enters Cassie’s orbit, and for the first time ever, Molly’s cynical twin is a lovesick mess. Meanwhile, Molly’s totally not dying of loneliness—except for the part where she is. Luckily, Cassie’s new girlfriend comes with a cute hipster-boy sidekick. Will is funny and flirtatious and just might be perfect crush material. Maybe more than crush material. And if Molly can win him over, she’ll get her first kiss and she’ll get her twin back.
There’s only one problem: Molly’s coworker Reid. He’s an awkward Tolkien superfan with a season pass to the Ren Faire, and there’s absolutely no way Molly could fall for him. Right?

This book honestly really surprised me! I thought I was over cutesy YA romances like this but it turns out I can’t help but have a soft spot for them. And it also turns out that my friend Amy knows me even better than I know myself, because she sent this to me knowing how much I’d love it!

Before I start, this book isn’t perfect. I’d rather finish on the good, so I’m going to start with the little bad there is. Even though I enjoyed it, it is predictable and all of the characters have their…problems. For example, there was a few places that made me cringeeee. Basically, Molly (the main character), talks to her cousin Abby and the conversation almost suggests Abby is a slut because she slept with her serious boyfriend of 4 months. Why is that even a consideration? It’s up to Abby whether she sleeps with her boyfriend or not. If they were ready at 4 months, great. If they were ready sooner, great.

“You would matter. That’s the thing. I get into this weird place sometimes where I worry about that.”

But apart from a few little things, I did love this book. I had to put myself into my mind a year or two ago, but I couldn’t help but really enjoy this. It is exactly how I felt when I was Molly’s age and crushing. She felt so real to me. I love how much I could relate to her and her situation. Molly wasn’t perfect but who is? And this book was so diverse, with so many LGBT and POC characters! Sometimes I struggled to remember Molly was still growing up (I was a little more mature than her at the same age), but that was just her as a person, and I could sympathise with that.

“I’ve never told anyone this – not my moms, not Cassie – but that’s the thing I’m most afraid of. Not mattering. Existing in a world that doesn’t care who I am.”

Maybe this book says something about me, because I feel like I’m one of the only readers who didn’t find Molly a little annoying because I found her so relatable. I loved that Molly suffered with anxiety and that was part of her character. I loved that she was fat and that was discussed in relation to how she was feeling. I loved her addiction to Pinterest.

So overall, this book feels like a guilty pleasure to me. I just couldn’t help but fall completely in love with it. Molly is the perfect representation of a 17 year old girl with low self-confidence. Her story, and the stories of the people around her, brought tears to my eyes even though I kind of knew what was about to happen. If you love romance and have a secret obsession with contemporaries, please go and read this. It’s beautiful and perfect and includes many, many Mini Eggs. It’s the definition of cute and fluffy, but it warmed my heart so much.

★★★★
4 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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Review: Obsidio by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

On By Beth JonesIn Book Review3 Comments

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Kady, Ezra, Hanna, and Nik narrowly escaped with their lives from the attacks on Heimdall station and now find themselves crammed with 2,000 refugees on the container ship, Mao. With the jump station destroyed and their resources scarce, the only option is to return to Kerenza—but who knows what they’ll find seven months after the invasion? 
Meanwhile, Kady’s cousin, Asha, survived the initial BeiTech assault and has joined Kerenza’s ragtag underground resistance. When Rhys—an old flame from Asha’s past—reappears on Kerenza, the two find themselves on opposite sides of the conflict. 
With time running out, a final battle will be waged on land and in space, heroes will fall, and hearts will be broken.

Wow, unpopular opinion much. I know there is much love around this series and I’m sorry, but my opinion seems to be the complete opposite of what everyone else thinks. Oops.

Oh my god. I didn’t think it could get any worse, but reading my review of Gemina, I think I actually liked this one even less. The bottom line is, I was just even more confused because there are way too many characters in these books! Let’s just have a quick throwback to me a couple of years ago when Illuminae came out. I was where everyone else was, fangirling over this new book with a completely new style of reading. I honestly think it was just so refreshing to read something so different, but since then, both books that followed just seem like retellings of the same world. I can’t help but feel that success, rather than love made the authors release the other two.

“May we meet again on distant shores.”

And another thing I hate about not only having so many characters, but also the camera surveillance way this story is told? I felt so damn detached. Yeah, this book is emotional and yeah, I loved the poetic parts. But I still don’t give a damn what happened. Sorry for my cold heart and black soul.

Like 80% (at least) of this book was just boring and I couldn’t focus. Only a small number of pages actually made me feel like I was invested or involved in the book at all. But on the other hand, this really small amount of pages…were awesome. I loved them, I felt completely in the world and I felt the emotion. And I guess I do have one popular opinion, because I LOVE AIDAN. Like, I flicked through the whole book looking for those black pages. I loved his parts, and I wanted so much more. If only the book was just AIDAN…

“Some place fine and far from here.”

But that’s where the good stuff ends, and other than that, I was so disappointed. I wanted it to all end so I could read better things. I’m glad I managed to finish this series, but that’s about it.

Well don’t let the fact that I disliked this one put you off – it’s such an unpopular opinion after all!

★★
2 stars

-Beth

May your shelves forever overflow with books! ☽

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