Redd’s Reading Room

I'm Redd. Level 34. Professional book hoarder, Fanfic addict.

[hauntedwhiskers]

Pondering my orbs.

[tormentum-ab-intra]

help

[just-horrible-things]

[write-on-world]

[ghoul-icious]

Correction:

[redd1029]

Am I ok? I don't know if I'm okay. I came to the book!Hunger Games fandom extremely late. I saw the movies when they came out and liked them well enough. But I just finished reading Catching Fire and started Mockingjay the day before this was to come out. I am actually only halfway through MJ and still need to read Ballad but I know with how chronically online I am and the speed others that are not as chronically online as I am read, it would be spoiled soon enough. When I saw the announcement for this book, I was excited not just because it was supposed to be Collins view on propaganda but because it would be Haymitch's story. I didn't really have a favorite main character. Haymitch always seemed interesting to me when watching the movies. Even now reading the books he has something about him that just makes me want to know more. Which I now do....but am I okay? I don't know but I do know this was a five star for me.

[redd1029]

Why Harry Potter Ruined My Childhood

It’s a strong claim to make about one of the more popular children’s/YA book series in the past 20 years. How could a book series affect someone so much that they would claim it affected their whole childhood?

I started reading with my grandma. She owned a set of World Book Encyclopedias that I liked to look through. I remember reading some presidential bios to her from one of the books when I was home from school. My memory is spotty, but I remember her being the one that got me my first library card. Some of my favorites when I started were Nancy Drew and the Magic Treehouse books. I never read any of the series to completion. Then this new shiny book with an interesting premise came out.

When the first book was published back in 1997, I received a paperback copy, and I don’t know how many times I read it cover to cover. Then the second came out and so on. During the year to two-year breaks between I ended up re-reading the parts of the series that were out. Then they made movies, and I went to see them. Any merch that came out became a Christmas or birthday present. I re-read the first five books up to six or seven times. When they all finally came out there were parts of the story that in my head didn’t make sense, so I began to read Harry Potter fanfiction.

During this time different series were published. While I did try to read some, I never completed any of them. Cirque du Freak, The Gallagher Girls, even Vladimir Todd all seemed interesting, but I could never get into them, so I returned to what was comfortable. Harry Potter stayed my favorite through the years. Not even Percy Jackson could pull me away.

Then the author shared her true colors and doubles down on her beliefs every chance she gets. By that point I hadn’t read the series in several years and the urge to do so never really come back. I do have my copies in a corner of my shelves, but I don’t pull them down. Fanfiction became my primary form of entertainment.

I haven’t had the urge to read books for pleasure in a while. I do enjoy the hobby of book hoarding so anything that piques my interest will end up in my bookcase. Recently I started reading some of the books from that hoard. While I am making my way through what I own, the thought crossed my mind of what did I miss out on when I was younger. I first saw an ad for the Tamora Pierce books and remembered it in my cousin’s room when we were little. Then I walked pass The Warriors books in the bookstore. I vaguely remember the Little House books from when I was in elementary school. Each one I remember makes me want to attempt to read them now, though I wonder if I lose out on the enjoyment of the book because I am no longer its intended audience.

[redd1029]

Fable for the End of the World is the first of Ava Reid’s books that I have ever read and honestly just made me want to look into more of her work. It is a YA Dystopian that, rather than showing society under the rule of one person or one governmental entity, is controlled by a corporation.

We see that Caerus is king and those that bow to their will and are of more affluent means are well taken care of. The Gauntlet is their means of entertainment as well as their tool to cull those they deem undesirable.

While this is a work of fiction a lot of the absolute craziness that the main characters, Melinoe and Inesa, go through is ringing true in real life today. The us v them mentality between not only people of different financial classes but of different races. The treatment of women as property. Even more recent the ‘bailout’ of government by corporate figureheads and businessmen.

I did get introduced to the genre name Cli-fi, short for Climate Fiction and thought that was apt as the climate and environment is just as much of a character as our main duo. While it isn’t the environments fault, it shows that those that don’t kneel to the ruling body will either mutate or deteriorate. Conservation is an idea for those that believe in unity. Destroying the land and climate is just an easy cash grab for corporations who could then sell the cure to the masses for profit.

Thank you to NetGalley and Harper Collins Children’s for a digital review copy of Ava Reid’s new book in exchange for an honest review.

[baggnshield]

peak philosophy in ao3 tags

[redd1029]

Don't mind me...just gonna make up scenarios that could absolutely have happened and end up sobbing myself to sleep.

[redd1029]

I finished this book in two days and that's only because I needed to sleep. Absolute five star read and probably my favorite book of the year to be honest.

I appreciated the content warning message at the front of the book as this does deal with some heavy topics. The main character was easy to like even through her flaws. I loved the family dynamic between her and her bestie. It was also written in a way that I was surprised when I was supposed to be. Usually with some Mystery Thrillers, I end up thinking ahead and figuring stuff out which takes some of the fun out of it.

I will say its hilarious that the blurb on the front of my copy is from Jesse Q Sutanto because the whole time I'm reading I was having that same 'Oh gosh what else can happen?' feeling that I had while reading Dial A for Aunties.

I'm so happy that I was in the bookstore the day she was driving through and stopped to sign some copies! Best day ever!

[redd1029]

I wanted to try out some poetry even though it is not my prefered medium. I'm glad I was able to pick this up. It was beautifully written. I did connect with some of the poems however there were areas where my eyes just scanned over lines and I had to scoot back up the page to find where my brain began to lag. I did enjoy the part about self love as well as the part that I honestly took for a critique on hookup culture (selfish).

[redd1029]

I enjoyed this story. This was another one that I used the included audiobook to listen to the story while I drove around. I thought the story was well wrapped up by the end. The main character was able to evade the path set for her by others and made her own. Since it was a historical setting I understood why she was having such hard times with the men in her life but even death gave her issue even though her solution benefited him.

[bpdohwhatajoy]

[redd1029]

Oh, how I've been waiting to read something by Tamsyn Muir. I have the start of The Locked Tomb series that I haven't started yet but after reading this I'm hoping the vibes that I got from this will come to me again. Undercover is the key word for this story. I loved the noir dystopian setting and don't get me wrong, zombie mechanics make everything 100% better. I was surprised over and over how much I liked this story.

[redd1029]

I enjoyed this story. The two main characters are traveling con people, claiming to have the ability to speak with the dead, using the rampant racisim and sexism to seem mysterious due to their 'exotic origins.' Decently favorable outcome at the end, it was a solid piece of fiction. I don't normally enjoy historical fiction, which I believe the last four of this Amazon Origina series dips thier toes into, but this actually makes me want to give it a try. I also just really loved the prose itself.

[redd1029]

The Six Deaths of the Saint, third installment of Into Shadows, is a really quick but thorough story of a girl who after a lot of hardship breaks out of the chains that bind her and ends her story how she wants. Pretty sure this is all in second person which surprisingly did not turn me off of the story. I did use the audiobook add on in order to listen to this while cooking dinner and the narration was supurb. This is what I think of when I see something labeled as a short story. It is contained into a small number of pages but it feels finished at the end. Could it be fleshed out into a slightly longer form? Probably with a lot of flowery language and extending scenes. It was short and didn't leave me wanting more. It felt like it was finished when the last line was read.

[redd1029]

Persephone is the second in the Into Shadows anthology. It was a short and sweet coming of age story even though the 'shadowy secret society' aka government program had to go stick their nose into peoples business. I liked it well enough however like the former short story I wanted more...and seeing as this is something written for Amazon I doubt that more will ever come. I did like the verbiage of the story though and it did cause me to go get The Magicians.

[redd1029]

The Garden, the first in the Amazon Original Stories Into Shadow anthology (?), is a short story that is part prose part verse about a young woman following in the footsteps of her mother by way of this mysterious journal that she perpetually holds on to. It wasn't unenjoyable but I don't feel this story in it's current format is for me. It seems like it could be expanded out to at least novella length and do more than what it did in the 43-ish pages it currently sits at. I don't mind the mix of prose and verse. I feel the story can be teased through the verse while it goes back to being mainly prose and that seems like it could be an interesting mechanic if done correctly.

[redd1029]

Did I have a need for storm chasing stories after going to see Twisters? Yes. Do I currently have two more Kindle Unlimited titles that have to do with storm chasing in some capacity on my Kindle? Yes. Storm Warning is a quick read about Violet a brilliant meteorologist and her rival Julian who end up being hired by the same two dumbass influencers that want the rivals to make content for their channel with Violet as the ‘hot girl’ that chases storms. Short and sweet rivals-to-lovers with a La Croix flavored One Bed Trope at the very end, Storm Warning was a real cute read.

[helpful-writing-tips]

if you're trying to get into the head of your story's antagonist, try writing an "Am I the Asshole" reddit post from their perspective, explaining their problems and their plans for solving them. Let the voice and logic come through.

[redd1029]