[livesnotmine-blog]

i haven’t updated this in a long time. it started to bog me down because i was treating this like something i expected people to read, and a lot less like a way for me to personally keep track of the books i’ve read and a general idea of what they were about and whether i enjoyed them or not. if you want to read these little blurbs, if they benefit you at all, then that’s great. but really i just have a bad memory and want a quick way to remember what books i’ve read.

so magonia ! this is a fantasy novel with a lot of incredible imagery. aza ray discovers she has been sick her whole life because she’s not human, she’s magonian. she’s part of a people that live in the sky and so while she was on earth she was technically drowning on air. but she’s retrieved and discovers she’s the daughter of the captain of the ship she’s now on and is thrown into this new incredible world. she becomes part of something she doesn’t fully understand but is swept up in. she has to learn who to trust and figure out who she is and what world she wants to be a part of. 

i really enjoyed this book. i thought it was pretty and adventurous.  5/5

[livesnotmine-blog]

when i read the back of this book & determined it was one i might enjoy i thought it was going to be this darling little love story. i thought i was opening myself up to a sweet little book about a woman who meets the man who’s been literally inhabiting her dreams her entire life. which, ok, is a huge part of the story. 

turns out this book is HEAVY. i got much more than i anticipated. part of me was disappointed because i was really just looking for a light, easy, pleasant, read. instead i got a large dose of real life, in a book made up of a lot of fantasy. 

i’ve been married nine years now. and it’s had it’s ups, and it’s deep deep downs. i think that’s marriage. fortunately we’ve conquered our biggest battles so far. reading this book reminded me of how i felt in those times, it was extremely relatable. it made me glad i’m i’m not there anymore. while also feeling relief because it must be so normal - this experience of feeling like the failure of the family, the one letting people down, the one searching desperately for a break, for relief - if someone is able to write about it in a way that felt so familiar. 

there’s a lot of sorrow and struggle and fight in this book. all of it real and important. but there was also a lot of adventure and fun and imagination. i loved  the dream world, until i didn’t. i loved the journey. i loved the growth and the moment when Rose realizes her own value and the beauty of the life she’s living. 

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

you know those times when you think you’re reading the final book in a series and then you get to the end only to realize you are going to have to wait another  YEAR because there’s a fourth book ? that completely happened to me here.

if you’ve read my previous posts about “red queen” and “glass sword” you’ll know how obsessed i am with these books and probably gain an understanding on how beyond excited i was for “king’s cage”. in preparation i re-read the first two and they were just as good as i’d remembered.

King’s Cage was incredible. it was long and it took me more time to read than i had anticipated. there were maybe a few slow moments, but for the most part i was eager to read and i was in no way disappointed by this book. it took an interesting turn when it was broken into not just Mare’s perspective, but alternated to Cameron and even Evangeline’s point of view at times as well. it took some getting used to but i like that she stuck to the perspective of these strong, opinionated, women. i had originally hoped to see Cal’s voice, but it would’ve given too much away too soon. 

so carry on reading these books. they’re all amazing. i’m already wildly impatient for book four.

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

i read “everything, everything” just like the rest of the world. and really loved it. also, it’s going to make a really excellent movie. 

but i have to say, “the sun is also a star” reached the same level of love from me, but then very quickly overshot it. this book is so, so good. your heart gets tugged around hoping things will work out, not knowing if they will, thinking you  know the outcome to really not knowing the outcome. it’s full of sweetness and also heartbreak. you feel hope and hurt and just so much love. 

you’re going to read this book. you’re going to adore this book. 

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

several years ago Ann Brashares wrote “sisterhood everlasting” which was a ten years later final novel to the traveling pants series and it blew my mind how good it was. it’s been years since i’ve read it and i don’t remember much of the story, but i remember the feeling of being so satisfied by how good of a job was done in finalizing their story.

so when i learned that Meg Cabot had done a similar thing with the princess diaries series i was really excited to read it. the only problem being how i read most of the original princess diaries books in high school which, for me, has been a while. so i spent the entirety of february, probably some of january, re-reading the 10 main princess diaries books so i could get myself caught up in order to read this book, “royal wedding”.

it’s a good book. it leaves you content with how things are going for princess mia but also a ton of opportunity for this series to be carried on until all eternity. i love these characters and i love the story as a whole and i’m also a very big fan of happy endings.

if you’ve held these books near to your heart you’ll love this chapter of the story. 

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

i opened this book prepared to be ruined, but instead found myself completely liberated.

oh my word. i binge read this book. it was so hard to put down. i found myself so wrapped up in the lives of Libby and Jack that it was hard to leave them. first off, let’s quickly mention “all the bright places” because as incredible as that book was, it had its desired affect. which was to break its readers into a million pieces. it spoke about mental illness in such a deep and realistic way. because let’s be honest, when we’re reading books we want a happy ending. but in real life when we’re suffering with depression and suicide we find ourselves staring into a black hole that seems to go on forever. and some of us never make it out. 

i just kind of assumed that Jennifer Niven was going to try to recreate the same impact. but instead she created a new, just as big & important of one. this book is about empowerment. it’s about the importance of looking past people’s outward appearances. it’s about rewiring the way we talk about ourselves in our own minds so that we can be strong & brave & bold to those who want to make us feel small. it’s about being unapologetically you. because you are beautiful. and you are wanted.

this book is a quick favourite. start reading it.

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

so I got a subscription to owlcrate for Christmas and it has become my very favourite thing. the December box theme was "epic" and the book it came with was "of fire and stars" by Audrey Coulthurst.

I didn't love this book. I think mostly because I've read a bunch that are along the same sort of themes as far as magic, and kingdoms, and betrayal that' I've enjoyed more. but it was good as far as it kept you guessing until the end. it was a fairly typical love story in the context that the princess heart was torn between the prince she had been betrothed to since childhood and the one she really loved. what made it a bit more unique was that the one the princess truly loved was her husband to be's sister.

I can't say anything bad about this book. I can't really pin down exactly why I didn't enjoy it more. I felt like it was missing something, but I couldn't exactly say what. suspense, maybe ? it's likely that I just have too high of standards when it comes to these sorts of adventure/romance novels. in any case, if you are a fan of stories that include magic, adventure, romance, lgbtq, then there's a good chance you'll enjoy this book.

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

first post of the new year...

first post of the last six months...

ok here we go. my in-laws live in kelowna so we go there every year for christmas. me&my husband have made a tradition of going boxing day shopping every year. not so much to buy anything as to join in the chaos of people who are. we almost never leave with anything. BUT. one of the stores we always try to get to is this book store downtown on bernard, across from starbucks, called Mosaic. it’s so fantastic guys. the back of the store is all bargain books and this is the first year where i went back there because typically bargain books to me just mean really old copies of books people don’t want to read and stores are desperate to get off their shelves. 

not this particular bargain section. oh my word. ok. i bought five books for 20$. not just lame books guys. really good, really recent, otherwise expensive books. i bought “glass sword” and “cruel crown” they were $4.99 each ! aaaah. among others. to save on money i’ve stopped buying books pretty much altogether. i’ve become very dependent on my library card, but i made my husband take me back a second day so i could pour over the books again. i bought three more. one of them being this one, “the lifeboat” by charlotte rogan which i had saved on my pinterest board of books i want to read. so there. now i’ve read it.

i’m just going to be full on honest with you guys and let you all know that the ocean is horrifying to me. i mean it’s beautiful and i like being in it to a certain degree, but books and movies that are centred around being stranded in the ocean get me so good because that would be awful. the worst. so this book was immediately really good to me because it gripped me. it made me feel so super uncomfortable and i like when books can get you that deeply engrossed. it starts off with a hook that has you intrigued from the very first line. it’s told from the first person perspective of Grace, who is giving you an account of what happened in the lifeboat from her perspective. my instant reaction in life & books is to like people/characters until they give me a reason not to... and i mostly just left this book really unsure if i liked this character or not. i’m still not entirely sure. there’s also a lot left to be a mystery in this book, some pieces you can put together for yourself and others you just have to be ok with not knowing. 

i’d recommend it. there was a lot more to it than simply a survival story. there were a lot of layers and lots of questions that my mind was trying to figure out the answers to until the very end. 

4.5/5

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

let’s make not failing the goal this year.

you know what i totally failed at ? this blog. i am sad about it too because even though i failed to update the books i’ve read, i didn’t actually fail to continue reading. and now i have half a year undocumented. i do this quite a lot. start things and don’t finish them. but i’m thinking i’ve had about enough of that. so i’m going to try extra hard this year. 

in better news, this time last year i made a goal for myself to read 55+ books in 2016. and i managed to read 58 ! so i’m really pleased with having accomplished that goal. i’m not going to put any pressure on myself this year, i’m just going to keep doing what i love, which is conquering the wobbling tower of books that never seems to grow smaller. i can’t seem to read as fast as i can find new books that i would like to read... which is definitely not a complaint.

so just all this to say that i’m back. if you’re at all interested in checking out what books i managed to read and not write about, they’re all listed on my pinterest here : https://www.pinterest.com/wishonthem/books/ also, i recently subscribed to owlcrate. i’ve received two boxes now and am completely smitten with them so i’ll probably be writing about the books i receive in there as well.  erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

i finished this book really fast. oh my word. it’s so good. i’m already in withdrawals knowing that it’s going to be a very long time before i get to read what happens to Mare Barrow and the rest of them. 

these books, this series, is incredible. and if you haven’t read it, you should. because it’ll immediately capture your attention, and not let it go. there’s tons of twists and excitement and betrayal and this theme of not knowing who can be trusted. my jaw has hung open a handful of times i’m sure. 

my husband knows when i’m in love with a book i’m reading because i won’t be able to stop telling him how good it is. which is exactly what happened with “Red Queen” and now “Glass Sword”. there were moments in this book where my anxiety was maxed out. i mean, that seems like a weird way to tell you a book is awesome. but this book was. 

“Glass Sword” by Victoria Aveyard - 5/5

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

I typically like to write after every book I read, but I decided after reading "Matched" by Ally Condie that I'd prefer to write about these books as a series instead of individual novels.

i’m finding more and more that i am a sucker for dystopian novels. i find myself fascinated by authors who are capable of as much imagination and creativity as it takes to create a future world. i can’t do that. i’m far too much of a realist. i’m always captivated by people who are wildly talented in areas that i am very much not. thus my fascination for reality shows like master chef and project runway - and novels that create such big new ideas that i can’t even fathom where people come up with them. 

I really enjoyed "Matched". i liked the idea of this world where the Society ran everything based on data collected. matched people based on their most ideal pairing. created jobs for people based on information collected throughout their childhoods. and how crazy that would make some people. it makes me curious as to who i’d be in that sort of civilization. would i appreciate the security created for me ? or would i, like Cassia, Xander, and Ky, want to rebel ?

“Matched” was good, but “Crossed” was excellent. book two is where the adventure starts. you learn a lot about the Society, but really i found myself just asking more questions. there was a lot of excitement and heartbreak in these pages, and finishing “Crossed” definitely made me eager to begin “Reached”.

“Reached” is where everything falls into place. where questions brought up in the first few chapters of book one are finally revealed. there’s a lot going on in this book that is still so connected to the original story, but it also brings up new threats and new problems that need to be solved. i was left with my allegiances all over the place, never really knowing who to place my trust in.

all three of these books are well written and interesting, and as a series they are definitely worth the read.

“matched” series by Ally Condie - 4.5/5

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

I'm on such a long streak of great books. this year has been excellent. maybe I'm easy to please, but only 3/18 books I've read so far this year have been rated below a 4/5 for me.

I enjoyed "Emmy  & Oliver" so much. I thought the love story was so sweet, but also complicated enough to not make it super predictable. there's elements in this book that are fresh to me. In this story Oliver gets kidnapped as a child and then is found ten years later. very quickly you get thrown into the chaos and drama of what it would be like to lose your best childhood friend for a decade and suddenly be reintroduced to them but as completely different people.

I don't really have anything bad to say about "Emmy & Oliver". in the beginning couple chapters Emmy talks obsessively about surfing, and that for some reason irked me a bit. it's a big theme throughout the entire book and became less irritating as it was better incorporated into the story. but that's such a minor issue, and I'm pretty confident that I'm the only one who'd be bothered by it.

"emmy&oliver" by Robin Benway - 4/5

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

i am so excited to tell you guys about this book. i LOVED it. you know how after you finish a really good book it’s a bit hard to start a new one right away because you’re afraid it might not be as good and you’re still living in the warmth of that last book ? after reading “stargirl” i was really nervous to start  new one because “stargirl” was very good . but guys, “stargirl” was 186 pages and it took me almost a week to read. “made you up” is over 400 and i finished it in two days. this book is fantastic. i couldn’t put it down.

from the prologue i was immediately hooked. this book is about a girl with paranoid schizophrenia. and it’s told entirely from her perspective. you’re living alongside her and your brain is feeling just as uncertain as hers concerning what is real and what’s not. you’re nervous the entire time that the things and people she loves most are the things and people that are going to not really exist. even into the epilogue you’re nervous that the people you’ve come to trust with her are going to turn out to not be real. and i will not give away a single spoiler in this blog. you need to read it and feel it and be in that place with her. i’m not going to ruin that for you.

right now i’m recommending you go read this book even before any of the others i’ve recommended. and then come back here and tell me that you loved it as much as i did. because if you tell me anything different i’m going to probably accuse you of lying.

“made you up” by Francesca Zappia - 5/5

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

here’s what happened:  i was really bummed that i had been so slow at reading in march, and i really wanted to squeeze in one more book so bad. i had enough time to fit in a short one. and this book, “stargirl” by jerry spinelli, was less than 200 pages. i knew i could probably get it done easily in the last few days march had left to offer me. and i completely could have. except i had my very best friend visiting. we went geocaching and stayed up late having life talks. so i missed my deadline by a day. 

tonight i was driving home from my parents house with my family. i was wearing a headlamp because i needed very badly to finish this book and i was fully prepared to look like a fool to get it done. not because of a deadline anymore - but because it turned out this little 186 page book completely captivated me. when i finished it i just kind of stared into nothing for a while. because i couldn’t completely pin down what i loved so much about it. but i really did. i loved this book. i found it beautiful. and also kind of tragic in how it captured the way society mistreats&looks at people who are different with distaste, even if they are different in the most pure&loveliest of ways. 

please go read this book. please do. it’ll hold your heart. and so long as your best friend doesn’t show up from far away to spend time with you, you’ll be able to get it done in a day.

“stargirl” by jerry spinelli - 5/5

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

this has been such a slow reading month. I really miss have endless amounts of time to devote to reading. I'm almost done my other project, so hopefully apil will be a more fruitful month. I only finished three books in march so far. I'm not especially hopeful that things will pick up, but we'll see.

"love and other foreign words" by Erin McCahan was a really cute book. it was a super easy read and normal me would have probably have finished it in only a couple days. i can’t wait to get back to normal me.

my favourite thing about this book is the quirky dialogue. i found it entirely amusing. actually for me what makes a good book into a really good book is the way the characters speak. their “language”. which is actually a really funny coincidence that you’d understand if you’ve read this book. Erin McCahan does a really excellent job of putting you in the position of the main character. there were times when i wanted to crawl into the pages and smack her sister good&hard. i was sincerely so angry with her. i have an older sister. i can fully relate to Josie’s frustrations. except Josie is a genius and i certainly am not.

this book is really good, but really young adulty. i enjoyed the ease of reading it but if you’re someone like me who’s an older young adult *cough* you might not enjoy this as much. but overall i can’t say anything at all bad about it.

“love and other foreign words” by Erin McCahan - 3.5/5

erin

[livesnotmine-blog]

I've been so busy recently with this other project i'm working on that any time spent doing anything but that has made me feel bad. this book should have taken me two days to read, not a week.

"fans of the impossible life" by kate scelsa was full of so many themes that what I thought I'd have to say about it changed constantly. was it I going to be writing about how this book is primarily about depression and suicide ? bullying ? sexual identity ? drugs and alcohol ? the struggle of being an outsider in the turbulent years of high school ? it ended up being a big conglomeration of all those themes. probably even more that I missed.

I think the author did a really great job of making the struggles of her characters very real. and very heartbreaking. and she did a good job of making you feel right along with them. but this book wasn't very engaging for me. there's so much going on at all times that I wasn't sure where things were leading. even when I reached the end I wasn't entirely sure how I was supposed to feel.

it's not at all a terrible book. it has some beautiful writing it in. the intro to this book is probably one of my favourites. it's not a waste of time read, it just isn't one that's going to be remembered for me.

"fans of the impossible life" by kate scelsa - 2/5

erin.

[livesnotmine-blog]

i decided to switch pace when choosing to read “in the heart of the sea” by nathaniel philbrick. it’s clearly not a young adult schmoozy novel. something about the story of a whaling boat being shipwrecked at sea really intrigued me so i decided to read it. and i’m so so glad i did.

this book was AMAZING. it’s mind boggling and horrific. all of it. i know nothing about ships. most of the lingo in this book i didn’t fully understand. i don’t know what every part of the ship is called and it didn’t matter at all. it didn’t detract from the story one bit. 

so much of this book left my mind in a state of horror for these men. i had to pause my reading so i could relay everything i had just read back to my husband. from how they would hunt and kill these whales - i couldn’t even fathom it before and this book does an excellent job explaining every part of it in great detail - to the great lengths these men went to in order to try to survive in open ocean in small boats for weeks with very little provisions. 

this book is thrilling and well written and attention grabbing from the preface. and you should probably read it.

“in the heart of the sea” by nathaniel philbrick - 5/5

erin.