Total pages read: 1,442 (~46.5 pages per day)
January was one of the best reading months I have had for absolutely ages. My plan was initially to finish Queen of Air and Darkness and I managed to complete that and two other books - albeit short books - as well! I’m hoping that the progress I was able to make in January will set a president for the rest of the year and I feel that for the first time in a while I have really got back into books/reading and this is something that I am so so pleased about. Plus I am ahead of schedule on my Goodreads goal and I don’t think that is something that has ever happened!
Queen of Air and Darkness by Cassandra Clare
Read Between: 26th December 2018 - 18th January 2019
Genre: Young Adult Fantasy
Cover: 4/5 stars (Instead of the regular cover I actually have a special hardback edition which is black and covered in red metallic parabati runes - fancy!)
Summary: Queen of Air and Darkness is the third book in Cassandra Clare’s Dark Artifices Trilogy. For this reason I am not going to go into a detailed synopsis as it would obviously be full of spoilers for the first two books but The Dark Artifices series focuses, at its heart, on parabati Emma Carstairs and Julian Blackthorn who we first meet in the prequel of City of Heavenly Fire.
The Dark Artifices remains my favourite Shadowhunter series that has been written so far. I am just such a huge fan of the characters in this book and as it is the most recent series chronologically (for the time being) I love how it incorporates characters from both The Mortal Instruments and The Infernal Devices.
Unfortunately I wasn’t a huge fan of the section of the story focusing on Thule. Not only did it focus on the story’s of just Emma and Julian - one of the things I like when reading quite a chunky book is the ability to be able to flirt between different characters POV’s which helps the story to feel like it doesn’t drag - I also felt that for me it interrupted the style of story I was used to from a Shadowhunter novel.
I did absolutely love the ending to this book with all of the characters we know and love from all three series coming together and it just made me so happy.
A Court of Frost and Starlight by Sarah J. Maas
Read Between: 13th January 2019 - 20th January 2019
Genre: Young adult/new adult fantasy
Writing Style: 4.5/5 stars
Summary: Again I don’t want to give too much of a synopsis for this book because it is part of a series but to give some background, A Court Of Frost and Starlight is a short novella set after the events of A Court Of Wings and Ruin and follows the characters from this series during Winter Solstice in the Night Court.
I have read a lot of people saying that they were not a huge fan of this book due to the lack of plot within the story. While I have to agree that yes, there was not a huge amount of action in this book, this did not mean that I did not enjoy it. A lot of fantasy books, especially the last books in series, tend to end with a huge battle and a number of characters lives being turned upside down. What you don’t tend to get a lot of is information exploring what happens after these events in too much detail and this is always something I am a little disappointed by because it is something I find super interesting. I am always intrigued to what happens to the characters after these horrific events and how they are able to re-build their lives and move on and this is exactly what A Court Of Frost and Starlight did. Alongside this I thought that this was just a fun, lighthearted story which reflected a very different and much more down to earth side for the often fearsome characters in this series.
City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab
Read Between: 21st January 2019 - 25th January 2019
Genre: Middle grade fantasy
Summary: City Of ghosts follows Cassidy, who has the ability to see ghosts by passing into Veil. When Cassidy’s parents are offered the opportunity to take their novels from the page to the screen and host a documentary series exploring the world’s most haunted cities, Cassidy is whisked off to join them on the first stop of their tour - Edinburgh. While there she meets a girl who shares her ability and teachers her that there is more to learn about the Veil than she imagined.
Is no one else getting slight Vicious vibes? Cassidy didn’t develop her ability until after having a near death experience...parents who are authors....
I haven’t read a middle grade novel for absolutely years so I was a little bit worried that I wouldn’t enjoy this book as obviously the story is a lot less involved than a ya/adult fantasy and I was worried that I would find the plot/characters a little boring but that was definitely not the case which I am super pleased about!
