It’s Monday! What are you reading? (2/21/16)

This past week, I finished:

Remembrance by Meg Cabot
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I have never been a huge Mediator fan, but I love Meg Cabot and needed something fun to read, so here we are.

This was a fun read, and I liked Jesse way more than I probably ever have. It probably helps that he’s not dead.

My only real issue is that I was annoyed (view spoiler)

There was not enough CeeCee or Gina in this book, that’s for sure.

Stars Above by Marissa Meyer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I liked this overall. It’s hard to rate a collection of short stories because each story is, you know, it’s own thing. Most of the ones in this collection provide backstory for the characters.

1. The Keeper (about Scarlet’s grandmother and how she came to house baby Cinder and become Scarlet’s guardian): This is an excellent start to the collection. Scarlet and her grandmother are both fantastic. (4 stars)

2. Glitches (how Cinder came to live with the Linh family) — this was fine, good backstory on Cinder (3 stars)

3. The Queen’s Army (how Ze’ev became Wolf, pack alpha) — Levana is the worst. Also, of course she finds kids from poor families for this. Of course. (3 stars)

4. Carswell’s Guide to Being Lucky (teen Thorne, the charmer) — this was fine, good backstory on Thorne (3 stars)

5. After Sunshine Passes By (how Cress came to live in the satellite) — Cress is a badass. This was heartbreaking but also shows how deeply excellent Cress is. (3 stars)

6. The Princess and the Guard (Winter’s decision to stop using her gift) — This is probably my favorite of the whole book. This gives all the backstory of Winter and Jacin and how they got to be the characters we see in the books. They are both pretty amazing, basically. (5 stars)

7. The Little Android (another android with a personality chip defect) — I thought this was going to be about Iko at first, but it’s not. This was pretty heartbreaking as well. I liked it. The characters aren’t connected to the ones from the series, but this offers a slice of life look at what it’s like for characters who aren’t living in the scope of the rebellion to live in that world. (4 stars)

8. The Mechanic (Cinder and Kai’s first meeting from Kai’s POV) — Aw, Kai. This was adorable. (3 stars)

9. Something Old, Something New (epilogue, a wedding) — This is probably my second favorite because all of the main characters are together again for a wedding. This is a trope I dig. Also, I love Iko with my whole heart and fully support any story in which she gets a lot of page time. (4 stars)

So, no duds here, though some stories were clearly superior to others. It was nice to spend more time with these characters and get to know more about them and their world.
View all my reviews

As of today, I’m reading:

The Light Between Oceans

Yes, still. I’m not really a fan. The book is s l o w. Not only that but I am NOT buying one of the key character’s motivations. Book club is this Sunday, so I should be finished by then. We’ll see how it goes.

I haven’t decided on a second book for the week yet. I have a stack of library books to choose from.

Original now hosted by Kathryn @ The Book Date. Children’s lit version hosted by Jen Vincent @ Teach Mentor Texts & Kellee Moye @ Unleashing Readers.

It’s Monday! What are you reading? / Monthly Wrap-Up

Original hosted by Sheila @ Book Journeys. Children’s lit version hosted by Jen Vincent @ Teach Mentor Texts & Kellee Moye @ Unleashing Readers.

This week, I finished:

The Worst Witch by Jill Murphy (children’s lit, chapter book) – super cute and not as dark as the movie
Everything, Everything by Nicola Yoon (YA) – started out strong but the ending annoyed me so so so so so so so much
Awkward by Svetlana Chmakova (middle grade, graphic novel) – extra super cute with the best newspaper reporter ever
As If!: The Oral History of Clueless… by Jen Chaney (adult, non-fiction) – FINALLY.
The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender (adult) – this one will stay with me for a while, in a good way

That puts my total books read for the month at 13. I am back in business, y’all. The school year has finally gotten its foot off my neck.

This month, I posted:

[wrap-up-posts date=”October 2015″ listtype=”ul”]

Challenge update:

I did get a bunch of posts written (11 total!), three of which haven’t even gone live as I’m writing this. Hint: this is one of the three. So I’m calling it a success, especially since my goal was to, you know, just write something. Success!

Upcoming reads:

Typically, I would say what I have started reading, but November is NaNoWriMo. I had decided when I finished up The Artist’s Way that I was going to participate by using the month to write a script, which, obviously, is not a novel but a different type of writing challenge. Apparently, there used to be a thing called Script Frenzy that ran concurrent to NaNo, but NaNo stopped supporting it. However! There is now a thing called Zero Draft Thirty for screenwriting, so I am doing that.

So that’s a really long-winded way of saying that I’m probably not going to update during November because I’ll be participating in Zero Draft Thirty, which means I have no idea what I’ll actually start and finish. But! Here’s what I have out from the library:

Dumplin’ by Julie Murphy
Monster: A Graphic Novel by Guy Sims (an adaptation of Walter Dean Myers’ book)
The Sword of Summer by Rick Riordan

Not to mention Winter by Marissa Meyer also comes out this month.

Of course, I have no idea where my reading whim and fancy will take me throughout the month. But I do look forward to finding out.

Anybody else participating in any of the month’s writing challenges? If so, I’d love to hear which ones!

It’s Monday! What are you reading?

Original hosted by Sheila @ Book Journeys. Children’s lit version hosted by Jen Vincent @ Teach Mentor Texts & Kellee Moye @ Unleashing Readers.

This week, I finished:

Till You Hear from Me by Pearl Cleage (adult, audiobook)
Ghetto Cowboy by G. Neri (middle grade)
Gone Crazy in Alabama by Rita Williams-Garcia (middle grade)
Red: A Crayon’s Story by Michael Hall (children’s picture book)

I liked them all, but I absolutely loved the last two.

This week, I reviewed:

[wrap-up-posts week=”42″ year=”2015″ category=”Book Reviews” listtype=”ul”]

As of today, I’m reading:

As If!: The Oral History of Clueless… by Jen Chaney — Yes. Still. Some more. I am almost finished, though! Here, have a GIF to distract you from the fact that I’ve been reading this since the summer. Also, I just finished the section on remembering Brittany Murphy, and it had me in my feelings.

RIP, Brittany. 😦

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender — I started this on audio but switched to the Kindle version. The author narrates it herself and is decent, but she’s clearly not an actress. I also felt like listening to some podcasts on my commute since I’ve listened to three books in a row. So the audiobook is fine, just not what I was in the mood for.

Also, and more importantly, I checked out The Worst Witch by Jill Murphy from the library! I have never read it before. So exciting! Ah, nostalgia. I used to watch the movie every year, so reading the book should be fun. I’m going to read it Saturday, just because. (Because it’s Halloween, obviously.)

I hope everyone else had a good reading week!

It’s Monday! What are you reading?

In an effort to engage more with other bloggers and to talk a little bit more about the books I read, I have decided to start participating in this weekly meme hosted by Sheila @ Book Journeys. There’s also a children’s lit one for people who focus on books from those categories hosted by Jen Vincent at Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee Moye from Unleashing Readers. I’m seeing a lot of cross-posting in my future, basically.

This past week, I finished:

The Birthday Ball by Lois Lowry (middle grade, audiobook)
I Love You, I Hate You, Get Lost by Ellen Conford (YA, short stories)
The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron (adult non-fiction, self-help)
Creating Unforgettable Characters by Linda Seger (adult non-fiction)

As of today, I’m reading:

As If!: The Oral History of Clueless… by Jen Chaney — Yes, still. Here’s a fun quote from it since I have no idea when I’ll finish.

Donald Faison: That was my go-to when I wanted to be with a girl. I’d say, “Come over and let’s watch Clueless.” Absolutely. Clueless was the ultimate wingman. They love the movie. They didn’t give a shit about me being in the movie, they just loved the movie, period. I didn’t start getting girlfriends until Clueless came out. It worked well for me. It’s true. It’s because I kept it real. That’s exactly right. Because I was keepin’ it real.

Bless him.

Till You Hear from Me by Pearl Cleage

Till You Hear From Me by Pearl Cleage — I’m listening to this one on audiobook and one of the narrators is Bahni Turpin who I really enjoy. The plot is a little slow (I’m 1/3 of the way through and the two major players haven’t met yet), but I’m interested to see what happens. The male main character, Wes, is despicable so I’m really intrigued by that. So far, I can’t tell if this will end the way this type of narrative typically does (the two main characters fall in love) or if a whole lot of crazy is going to go down instead. I really feel like it’ll be the latter, so we’ll see.

Ghetto Cowboy by G. Neri

Ghetto Cowboy by G. Neri — I *just* started this one today, and I am intrigued so far. The opening was definitely action packed, and I can see reluctant readers being totally sucked into it. A horse right in the middle of Philly! Intriguing.

Next week, I’ll add in some info about reading challenges and such, but I think this is a good first post for the meme, yes? Yes.

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