Book Reviews

Just a gal who can't stop reading books so she reviews them

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I haven’t read a book in months due to school and I honestly feel like I’m going insane

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I can’t wait for my sister to move out. Simply for the fact that I’ll have another room to store all my books

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Serpent and Dove

“I loved her. Despite everything. Despite the lies, the betrayal, the hurt.”

DNF

So…this book has an average rating of 4 stars on Goodreads, so it’s nice to know that the Goodreads community is made up of a bunch of liars.

I’m joking! I’m joking! About the Goodreads community, not the shittiness of the book.

This book tells the story of Louise Le Blanc, a witch that has taken refuge in a large city and has hidden her magic since arriving for fear of being burned. She survives by stealing what she needs, sometimes disguising herself as a man à la Twelfth Night. Reid Diggory is a sexist witch hunter (They have some fancy French word for it, but he’s basically a simple witch hunter for the church). By some cruel twist of fate, they end up married to one another, forcing them to hide their growing feelings for one another.

It’s some good enemies-to-lover, slow-burn fiction. So why couldn’t I finish it?

So…first the good.

I actually really liked the magic system and how different it was. Finding a magic system with a fresh idea is not an easy task. For those not in the know, when witches in this world perform magic, they give off a certain smell. This makes it almost impossible for witches such as Lou to perform any kind of magic in the crowded city. It’s kind of cool! Magic should have limitations and consequences!

And that’s literally it. I could mention the world-building, but it was lacklustre in its best moments. I could mention the characters, but there was nothing good about them and there will be more on that a little later. I could mention the actual writing style but it was meh. What else is there to mention? Nothing? Did I cover it all? Okay then!

And now for the bad…

The way Lou and Reid are forced together is…problematic, to say the least. Lou ends up getting beaten up by characters that are unimportant at this point and so her face is bruised and swollen. When Lou is backstage at a theatre, Reid recognises her as a thief and tries to catch her. They grapple with one another and end up falling onto the stage, making it seem as if Reid was the one to bruise Lou. The head of the church gets roped into this and, trying to save both Reid’s reputations and the church’s, forces Lou and Reid to marry because no one would blame a husband for beating his wife. Look…I understand this world is based around medieval times, but for a young adult book geared more towards women, I think this should’ve raised more eyebrows and brought about more criticism than it did.

And, for some reason, Lou agrees to this! She knows Reid is a witch hunter and yet she just shrugs and agrees. Yes, there’s some babble about how she’s “safer if she’s closer to the church” or whatever but I consider that flawed logic.

Lou is just straight up horny. No matter how much she claims to hate Reid and no matter how rude he is to her, Lou always goes into extreme detail about his physical appearance. We get it! He has muscles! He’s eyebrows are on fleek (Is that still even a thing?)! He also wants to kill you!

The only black character in this book is, firstly, a witch which could be seen as offensive and, lastly, is named Coco. I’m not making this up. 

There’s also a lot of scenes where Lou attempts to seduce her 16-year old guard and, if there’s one thing you need to know about Lou, it’s that she’s not subtle at all. I don’t exactly know how old Lou is, but I’m pretty sure she is over the age of 18. I’m also not sure what the age of consent was in medieval France but that doesn’t stop this from making me cringe every time she mentions sleeping with the poor boy.

None of these characters are redeemable. You hate everyone from the very first page. Reid’s a dick, obviously. Lou is an immature witch that the writer tried to make us believe was a strong, badass character. The side characters like Ansel and Reid’s other love interest who I honestly forgot the name of, but who cares, are just as stupid and personality-less, there to fill-in gaps in the story.

But the main thing about this book that made me mad to no end was that there was no consequences for anyone’s actions. Remember when I mentioned that witches gave off a smell when performing magic and how that would make it difficult to hide magic in tight, confined places like large, crowded cities? Well…it seems it isn’t! Lou uses her magic on multiple occasions and not once is she caught! Everyone around her does smell something, but they never seem to be able to put two and two together even though Lou is known for hanging around other witches. Why present this magical limitation if it limits nothing?

I’m at this point in the year where I’m not willing to waste my time reading books that have no redeeming qualities. It took me literal weeks to even get halfway and I just couldn’t force myself to finish it. 

I’m sorry…

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After reading this, I’m sad to say I really liked this book because it was different than one’s I usually read. However, this post made me laugh my ass off and I love everything about it.

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*Not my picture above*

*sorry for the long wait*

The Life Below by Alexandra Monir

Hey ya’ll! Welcome back for the review on the sequel to “The Final Six” by Alexandra Monir! I had a great review for the last book and I waited TWO years for this book to come out so I was very excited to read it and once I did, I knew I had to do a review. As always, skip below for my overall review where spoilers will be omitted. 

Synopsis: Naomi was picked and Leo wasn’t. Now Naomi is faced with the fact that this mission will be very dangerous and they don’t know what they will face out there on Europa. Meanwhile, Leo is working with Dr. Greta Wagner, a scientist who use to work with Nasa and the failed mission Athena before she was kicked out. Dr. Wagner has made a one man ship where Leo will be able to fly into space and latch on to Naomi’s ship if done right. Even though Leo is ectastic to see Naomi again, he must warn them what Dr. Wagner has found: proof of alien life. It’s a tough mission but Leo will do anything to be with Naomi again and warn her of what’s to come. 

*SPOILER ALERT*

I’d like to start with our characters. Before I write any review, I like to do some research into what I want to write about. I take in other people’s opinions as well as my own to really make my thoughts clear. Leo and Naomi do reunite and form a relationship. A lot (and I mean a lot) of people thought the relationship was not good. They believed it to be too fake and just too much in such a short amount of time. They were both pretty inserable as soon as Leo boarded Naomi’s ship. Now, if you see a physical copy of this book, it’s super small. This means that there’s not a lot of time for Monir to write a romance blossiming between the two main characters. Maybe that’s why she rushed it? I don’t know for sure, of course. I have other ideas about what Monir was thinking but I want to talk about that more later. 

I’m not one for romances. Of course, a good romance in any book is okay in any book as long as it doesn’t deviate from the main story telling. I honestly don’t have much of an opinion on it because I’m more worried about the rest of the book then the small romance of it. 

For the other characters, we don’t really know all that much about them instead of their active roles they play to travel and colonize Europe, except for Beckett. Not much has changed about Beckett, he’s still an ass, but now he’s an ass whose hiding something. We found out later that he is creating weapons, per the government’s instructions, to wipe out any alien life they find there. I know what I’m about to say doesn’t really have to do with characters but I do believe it’s really important; why are we so afraid of everything that our next step is to attack it? Dr. Wagner showed there was a way to live peacefully alongside alien life but the GOVERNMENT is like “nah, let’s kill it instead.” HOMIE! NO! I know this is fake but if this was true, I wouldn’t put it past anyone. We cannot accept anything that sounds, looks, speaks, acts in any way different then what we’re use to. This is a major problem and people know this too! People are protesting BLM because the government fails to see what they are doing wrong. It disappoints the hell out of me. Kudos to Monir for writing about the government in an acurate way.

Let’s get back to the main storyline. I’ll put it bluntly: it was rushed! As stated before, the book itself is very small, smaller than the first book. A lot could not have happened in the small amount of space provided. At first, it was slightly slow. Leo was trying to make it up to space and Naomi was trying to convince one of the characters that alien life existed on the planet. However, as soon as one of the final six died and Leo attached to Naomi’s ship, everything was rushed, including the relationship. Skip towards the end and multiple contestants have died, including Beckett. I kid you not, once Beckett died, the chapter ended and the next chapter was the rest of them going on with their lives like nothing terrible just happened. I had to go back and make sure I read correctly that Beckett had died because it didn’t seem to affect anyone. 

Throughout the book, you’ll read letters from Naomi’s brother, Sam. The entire time I read, I would keep asking myself “Why am I reading these? I don’t care!” You find out later Monir wrote an interaction between Sam and the head of the space station who sent the final six to space. We find out that this whole thing was NOT to colonize Europa, but an experiment! WTF! I’m angry! How shitty of an ending is that! It’s like Monir thought, “Oh, I don’t want to continue there story and I don’t really care about this anymore so... here you go!” Awful! So awful!

*SPOILER ALERT ENDS*

Overall, this book was not what I was expecting and in a bad way too! There was so so so much potential here and it went down the drain instantly. Here’s a little snippet of a review I wrote on goodreads:

I just cannot believe how this book turned out. I waited for so long for the sequel and finally I get to read it and I feel so devastated. This book was a major disappointment when the first book was so well thought out. There was a lot of potential with the world building in The Final Six but it all went to the wayside in the sequel when almost every instance of the book felt rushed. It almost feels like the author was forced to finish the second book before it was completely thought out. There were even several grammatical errors which should have been edited in final stages. This is obviously not the fault of the author but the editor and publisher who should have told her to go back and review rather than rush to sell. Although I read through the entire book, cover to cover, I felt that the ending was rushed, it lacked passion and follow through with the story, and it left the readers with more questions than answers. That is not how to wrap up a series because it did not seem that there would be more books to this series. Following this trend, I would not want to read a third book in the series anyway.

So there you have it. The first book was great but Monir didn’t follow through unfortunately.

Overall rating: 3/10

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I haven’t been on tumblr in so long. Still in the middle of writing my next review but I guess I’ve been a little distracted

What’s everyone reading these days?

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The Final Six by Alexandra Monir

It’s been a really long time since I’ve written a review. I posted little while back that I was going to be posting one but my wifi has been so shitty lately so I apologize. Anyway, I read this book about a year or two ago and recently read the sequel. I read this one again so I can refresh my memory before reading the sequel and thought I should write a review about both. So here’s book one “The Final Six”! If you don’t know, I post a review with spoilers but you can skip right over them and read the overall review at the end after you see the “End of spoilers” message. 

Synopsis: The earth is dying. After everything humans have done to over the years to the earth, it’s finally caught up to them. There one chance at survival is a mission to Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons, where humans will be able to colonize and start over. They decide to send six chosen teenagers, who still have long lives ahead of them, with special talents in certain field so they may colonize and save humanity. Twenty-four teenagers are chosen, inlcuding our main characters Naomi and Leo, to partake in a bootcamp where the six will be chosen to save humanity. Leo is thrilled to be chosen but Naomi is suspicious after there was a similar mission that misteriously failed. Leo and Naomi grow closer as the challenges they face become dangerous and try to the find the truth behind everything. 

*SPOILER ALERT* 

Let’s start with the characters. I absolutely love love love Leo. He is an absolute sweetheart and was always there for Naomi, even if it didn’t particularly help his chances of being chosen. Actually, it ruined his chances since he didn’t even get chosen at the end while she did. Nevertheless, he didn’t even think before he was presented the opportunity of going out to space and finding Naomi and the other five because it gave him a chance to see her again. Now that’s a good guy! He’s a keeper! Besides all that, he was really sweet and honesly adorable because he was so excited to be chosen to be part of something so big. After everything he’s been through, with his family dead, this was an amazing opporunity and he wasn’t going to waste it. Such an optimistic fella! It also helps that he’s from Italy! Monir did not just focus on Americans but incoporated teenagers from around the world! That’s honesly a great thing; representaion matters. 

Now Naomi. First and foremost, she is an Iranian-American (so is the author) and that’s a great thing to put in a YA book. Again, representation matters! Secondly, she was a smart individual and no one could stop her from finding out the truth. Of course, she did do some of things she did for her brother, seeing as he would never be able to come to Europa if the mission succeeded due to his heart problems. Can you blame her though? She was forced to separate from her family to go on a dangerous mission that she might die doing. Doesn’t sound to pleasant. Even so, Naomi’s character development was great. Even though she knew she was leaving her brother behind, she knew that it was important for her to be one of the final six because of the dangers that lie ahead. She is literally the only person who could save them. That has to be so scary yet she is determined. Along with her character development, she is just a total badass! I mean she hacked into the AI robot, Dot, which is not an easy feat. The first time I read it, I went “daaaaamn” I honestly wish I was that smart. 

Let’s move on the plot of the book. You can look at this book from many angles which is really fascinating. You can look at the side of the twenty-four chosen candidates and what they have to learn in such a short amount of time. These are all things that adults have to study for years before they can even be sent to space while these teenagers have to learn it in a month. It’s makes the book very fast paced but in a good way seeing how desperate they are for the colonization of Europa and one of the many struggles Leo and Naomi have to face. There is also the side of aliens. Naomi discovered that the alien life existed on Europa and there was great danger ahead. The director knew all this as well yet covered it up so he could still send the six to space. Even better, they were being injected with this alien life form for “radiation” purposes. What utter bullshit but very exciting indeed. It started to change them and even made others react in a negative way. I won’t explain how but it was gruesome stuff. Then there’s the romance side where Leo and Naomi fall for each other and would do anything to stay together. All of these sides come together to create such an amazing concept and book that left me wanting more. Monir did something that is so incredibily hard because too many different angles could come together as a jumbled mess but she was able to put it together and articulate what she wanted to be done and said. It was truly amazing. 

*SPOILER ALERT ENDS*

This book was honesly amazing. I love the characters, the plot, and the overall message it gave me. This book really showed how bad the earth can become and I know I’ve said it in another review but PLEASE save our planent! I don’t know how many more times we have to say it. The earth is not going to get better if we don’t do something about it! 

Moving that aside, this was a fantastic read that took sci-fi and dystopian future mixed together which I love and really the concept was mind-blowing. For anyone that didn’t read the spoilers, I just want to reiterate something I said (don’t worry, it doesn’t have any spoilers in it). Monir did something that is so incredibily hard because too many different angles [different concepts and plot points of the book] could come together as a jumbled mess but she was able to put it together and articulate what she wanted to be done and said. It was truly amazing. The book was well thought out and has so much potential. It left on a cliffhanger so there is her next book “The Life Below”. I have already read it but I will not make any comments about it since I will be writing a review on that shortly. Overall, the book was truly amazing.

Overall Rating: 9/10

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Hey ya’ll! I just recently finished a book so soon I’ll be writing another review! Yay! Unfortunatley, tumblr hasn’t been working for me these past couples of days so I don’t know when I’ll post it

thanks for understanding!

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I’ve always wanted to be part of a book club and the one time I had that chance Freshman year of high school, the club got cancelled and no one ever wanted to continue :(

Who wants to be part of a book club???

(Deadass I will start one if someone wants to be part of it)

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Life isn't fair, it's just fairer than death, that's all.

William Goldman, The Princess Bride

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The Red Queen series (Short Review)

My first ever post I made on this account was a review on the book The Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard. I said I was reading the second one while I was writting out the review for the first book. I was very hopeful about it and now that I have read the second book and half of the third, here’s my short review:

DON’T WASTE YOUR TIME!

Honestly, the books took a turn for the worst! The reason for is the characters. I honesly could not read Mare’s thoughts without wanting to strangle her! She seriously annoyed me and was not fit to become any kind of leader. Cal was even worse, though, I knew he would find new ways to annoy me since the first book (there were clear signs). I feel as though there was no development with the characters whatsoever. They had no depth and just became brats. The only character that showed some kind of depth to them was Maven. It was disappointing to say the least. I still like the first one and would recommend reading that one but unfortunately, it does end on a cliffhanger since this is obviously a series. The rest of the series has SO much potential but Aveyard didn’t reach it. Not to me anyway.

[rosesocietyy]

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I’m going to start reviewing textbooks on here and telling everyong how wordy they are 

Spoiler alert: The really confusing textbooks are getting a very low rating

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Honestly the most heartbreaking thing is hearing that bookstores aren’t doing so well now that we are in quarantine like no one reads books anymore and that hurts me so much

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This quarantine makes me want to join my favorite characters on their adventures more than ever 

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I literally have so much work for school and I haven’t read as much as I want to and I think I’m going insane

Send help

[latinopercy]

rick riordan really went there with the original percy jackson series.. he wrote a story about a kid with adhd living in an abusive, low income household who realizes that the generation before him created a world that he and the rest of his generation could not possibly thrive in and then refused to acknowledge that the society they crafted was detrimental to their children,, percy must make the decision to demand change in the end;

meanwhile his antagonist is a blond haired blue eyed kid from one of the top 20 richest towns in the united states who should have had it all but was denied it, causing him to come to the same realization years before percy ever does, but he believes the answer to their problems is to look to the past, to the traditions and methods of the Good Old Days without recognizing that the corruption and depravity of that era will only continue the cycle if they are implemented in the present day – luke believes the world needs to return to its former glory whereas percy realizes that the system will always be corrupt if they don’t invest in an entirely new way to support the younger generation and basically what im saying is rick riordan has been stoking the revolution in us since middle school

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Percy Jackson is the shit

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I have so many amazing ideas for books yet no motivation to write it. Someone write it for me!