Bout of Books 15 Wrap Up

 

Another Bout of Books draws to a close. I always get a little sad. I have to admit, I'm a pretty casual readathon participant, but it's still nice knowing that other people are out there making reading a priority this week.

And wow, I've been lucky to have read some amazing stuff this week. Let's break it down.

My Goals:

• Read at least three books ✓ 
• Schedule reviews of books read
• Read every day ✓
• Visit and comment on other blogs!
• Participate in at least one of the Twitter chats

Haha, fail.

I have a really difficult time reviewing books I enjoy a lot, so I haven't yet managed to form coherent thoughts about most of my reads. I did schedule a rather scathing review for Moth, which I alluded to in my daily updates.

My life was ridiculously busy this week--trying to get into the back-to-school routine. So I didn't prioritize visiting other blogs like I should've. And both Twitter chats ended up taking place when I was otherwise indisposed (once during board games night and the other while I was still in bed).

Oh well. I'm not too upset about the whole thing, because the reading more than made up for it.

Reads:

Their Fractured Light was an incredible conclusion to the series. It was so stressful at times I had to physically set the book down and yell a little before I could continue reading. I gave it 5 stars.

Everything I Never Told You I picked up on a whim at our school library and had a really hard time putting down. It was an incredible story about love and loss and I'd like to try and put my thoughts together for a real review. I gave it 4.5 stars.

Moth was the ebook I'd been slowly flipping through since mid year last year. And I finally gave up and just finished it. There was nothing this book could've done by the end that would've improved things for me--save being written by a different author. It was terrible and I gave it 1 star.

I'm currently halfway through A Natural History of Dragons as well, having picked it up Sunday morning. You guys, it is absolutely delightful. I am loving every second of it. If you like fantasy-of-manners ala Gail Carriger's Soulless, I think you'd really enjoy this one too!

And that's it, that's all! I'm really impressed by the books I've been picking up so far this year (Moth notwithstanding). So it's shaping up to be a great reading year! 

How did your Bout of Books go? Feel free to link me to your wrap ups and let's chat in the comments!

Review || Six-Gun Snow White by Catherynne M. Valente

Six-Gun Snow White by Catherynne M. Valente ★★★★☆

A plain-spoken, appealing narrator relates the history of her parents—a Nevada silver baron who forced the Crow people to give up one of their most beautiful daughters, Gun That Sings, in marriage to him. With her mother’s death in childbirth, so begins a heroine’s tale equal parts heartbreak and strength. This girl has been born into a world with no place for a half-native, half-white child. After being hidden for years, a very wicked stepmother finally gifts her with the name Snow White, referring to the pale skin she will never have. Filled with fascinating glimpses through the fabled looking glass and a close-up look at hard living in the gritty gun-slinging West, readers will be enchanted by this story at once familiar and entirely new.

Sometime last year I tried to read Valente's middle grade series and thought to myself, "This would be so much better on audiobook." So I put it down. And when I saw my library had the audiobook version of this book, I knew I had to listen to it.

And let me tell you, I was not wrong. Valente's writing is made for reading aloud. There was just something really captivating about listening to it. Thanks, in no small part, to the absolutely fantastic narrator (Julia Whelan). It was really a fantastic listening experience. It's also quite short, clocking in at just 3 hours, so I'd definitely recommend picking it up!

And the story. Oh. Valente can write, holy smokes. The narrative had a real magical quality to it. Still, this is probably more a 3.5 star book than a true 4 star one in my opinion. I don't think the shift in point-of-view from part 1 to part 2 was necessary. And the ending was just a little bit too "meh" for me. And I know that this is short fiction, but I personally want more, so much more, from the explanations other then the sort of hand-wavey "ah, it's magic" kind of deal we got.

Still. This was a very strong start to a new year of reading and a book I would absolutely recommend if you're interested in retellings in general.

Unpopular Opinions Book Tag

One of the things I really love about reading (or watching movies, or really any kind of entertainment) is that we can have such differing opinions on things. There are messages and themes, highs and lows, favourites and most hated... and we've all read (or watched) the same thing!

Sometimes though, it's almost more interesting to see what books you didn't like more so than the ones you liked.

And thus, the Unpopular Opinions Book Tag. (Created by TheBookArcher)

Now listen, we'll probably feel differently about some (or a lot!) of these. And that's okay. This is in no way a personal attack trying to bash anyone. This is just my opinion.

So, let's get started!

1. A popular book or series that you didn't like
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Yeah, that's right, we're going to start off strong.

Listen, I rated this book three stars when I first read it--which is "I liked it". But the more I think about it and the more I listen to people talk about it, the more my dislike grows. Wade was an unlikeable, self-insert, circle jerky everyman and everything in the book would've been 1000% better if it had been Art3mis' or Aech's story. There was like fifteen seconds where Cline tried to talk about sex and gender and race and the way you represent yourself which was super interesting and then it was just over.

I am going to admit to a teeny bit of malicious joy when I see people being disappointed in Armada for many of the same reasons.

2. A popular book or series that everyone else seems to hate but you love
I don't really think I have anything that works for this? Though, I guess I have seen some unfavourable opinions of A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas--and I did enjoy it. But there's nothing else really polarizing that I can think of.

3. A love triangle where the main character ended up with the person you did NOT want them to end up with OR an OTP that you don't like
I'm usually pretty good about predicting how love triangles are going to resolve, so I don't get unnecessarily attached to the "wrong" person. But I can't really think of a true love triangle that I had really strong feelings for either way.

Except. I know it's never going to happen. But I really want a threesome between Harper, David and Ryan from Rebel Belle by Rachel Hawkins. Most love triangles should be solved with threesomes, but alas I read YA.

If we're talking OTPs I don't like, I don't really understand the obsession with Alina and The Darkling from Leigh Bardugo's Grisha trilogy. Like, okay, I get it in book one. But after that? I have a lot of complicated feelings about Ruin and Rising, but the way the romance plotlines got wrapped up was not particularly surprising.

4. A popular book genre that you hardly reach for
Straight up contemporary and/or literary fiction. I'm just generally not interested. I like my fiction to be more escapist. Give me sci-fi and fantasy any day of the week.

5. A popular or beloved character that you do not like
Everybody says Snape, am I allowed to say Snape too?

Listen, I was really confused for a while, because I really loved Alan Rickman's portrayal of Snape, but I kept getting that mixed up with actually liking Snape.

Also, full disclosure, I rage quit the Harry Potter series after Order of the Phoenix because no. So I haven't actually read the last two books. But I know what goes down. And I'm going to sit in my corner and read Harry/Draco fic and not be sad about it.

(I really thought about using HP as an answer for #1, but decided against it because I don't want to get lynched. I have a lot of complicated feelings about all this, but that's definitely a post on its own if anyone's interested.)

6. A popular author that you can't seem to get into
A.S. King. I've read two of her books and just been mostly underwhelmed. I keep hearing great things and am meaning to give a few more of her books a good honest try, but they're not really high on the priority list.

7. A popular book trope that you're tired of seeing
Fewer unnecessary love triangles, more threesomes?

I mean.

No, but really, I am so super tired of insta-love. Maybe I just have unrealistically high expectations because of fanfiction, but I need my mutual pining and slow burn. Please please please, let me get what I want.

8. A popular series that you have no interest in reading
Anything by Cassandra Clare, truthfully. If I was twelve, maybe I'd be interested in The Mortal Instruments, but I just have no desire to get involved in that.

9. The saying goes "the book is always better than the movie", but what movie or T.V. show adaptation do you prefer more than the book?
Stardust. Which is based on the Neil Gaiman book. But I saw the movie first and it is one of my favourite movies of all time. I read the book after, because I was so in love, but it just wasn't as charming as the movie. And I found out that Captain Shakespeare was invented for the movie and I just. That is unacceptable.

I mean, I like Gaiman's writing, but it's definitely a lot darker than the way Stardust the movie set itself up.

I feel like this tends to happen to me if I see the movie before reading the book, but only sometimes.

And there you have it! The Unpopular Opinions Book Tag! Feel free to give this a go if you want, it's super fun!

Any unpopular opinions to share? What did you think of my answers? Let's chat in the comments!

Most Disappointing Books of 2015

Let's be honest, there's something about having people talk about things they didn't like that's a little fascinating. As much as I really love when people are passionate and enthusiastic about books, there's something almost morbidly fascinating about finding out what reads they couldn't stand.

I've seen a bunch of these style videos on BookTube and it got me thinking about doing my own version.

I'm not necessarily talking about my least favourites, or the books I rated the lowest--because honestly, I picked up a few things this past year that I knew weren't going to be very good and I wasn't wrong. But I want to talk about the books that disappointed me the most.

Books I had higher expectations for and they just didn't turn out the way I expected them to.

So let's get started!

1. The Young Elites (The Young Elites #1) by Marie Lu
This was pitched as X-Men meets Assassin's Creed... which should be 110% up my alley. I had liked Lu's Legend trilogy well enough, though I hadn't been blown away by it or anything. At the very least I expected this to be enjoyable. But wow, it was just not. The writing felt flat and bland and just plain soulless.

2. We Should Hang Out Sometime by Josh Sundquist
I've watched a number of Sundquist's videos and enjoyed them a lot. So I was interested to give this memoir a read. And though it had its moments, it's got a little repetitive at times. What's worse, it sort of ended up devolving into this entitled Nice Guy™ diatribe about how often he got "friendzoned" and I just. Barf. Please don't. Ever.

3. The Infinite Sea (The 5th Wave #2) by Rick Yancey
Listen, I loved The 5th Wave. Like 5 star, throw the book across the room it was so good, loved. I couldn't wait to read this book. But it turned into this really disjointed, intentionally obtuse mess. And there was this eleventh hour misdirection right at the end of the book that made me wonder about the direction Yancey was implying for the conclusion. I'll read book 3, if only to figure out what the hell is going on and bring some closure, but I expected to love this like book 1 and I just mostly felt unsatisfied and disappointed.

4. Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children (Miss Peregrine's #1) by Ransom Riggs
Everyone loves this book. Or at least, that's what it seems. People rant and rave and sing its praises. And I was just severely underwhelmed. The inclusion of photos--the major selling point of the series--felt contrived instead of organic. Like they'd been shoehorned in conveniently around a flimsy plot. The writing was dull and simplistic and ultimately this just didn't do anything for me.

5. The Steel Remains (A Land Fit for Heros #1) by Richard Morgan
I picked this up because it was pitched as "serious fantasy with a gay male lead". Which is all true, I guess, but it didn't save this book from being underwhelming. Which is too bad, because the opening fight scene is pretty cool. It felt like the main character was gay for shock value only--especially because Morgan's worldbuilding meant his sexuality was punishable by death. This was just too much excessive grimdark nonsense for me. The writing was tedious, far too slow going and unnecessarily confusing.

6. Stormdancer (The Lotus War #1) by Jay Kristoff
This one is a little bit different, because I did give it 3 stars--meaning, I liked it, but that was a about it. I was disappointed with this one because it had some really problematic elements. One of it's unique features is a Japanese-inspired steampunk world. Which is cool, right? Except Kristoff uses Hepburn romanization (aka phonetic Japanese) really liberally and sometimes really poorly. And it was just too cringe-worthy--like reminiscent of being 14 and writing terrible fanfic and let's not. Also, Kristoff is a white dude so the appropriation is a bit much to stomach. Still, the plot was interesting, even if the writing was excessively detailed at times, and you could probably convince me to pick up the other two books in the series. But still, disappointing.

Phew! I apparently have a lot to say about books I didn't like! Huh.

Have you read any of these? What did you think? What books have disappointed you recently? Let's chat in the comments!

Reading Stats

So as I was working on my December Wrap Up I was struck by the urge to work out some statistics on things I'd read this year. It's the math major in me... it's a sickness.

Anyway, after poking around at Excel for a bit (and frankly, really enjoying it, because that's who I am) I managed to sort out some really interesting stats about my 2015 reading.

So have some graphs. (And since I read exactly 100 books, the number and percents are the same--which, again, I think is really cool.)

I'm pretty pleased by this split. 60/40 isn't bad, considering I expected to be much more heavily biased towards the YA side of things. I'd like to work on this balance more in 2016 and read more adult as my tastes in YA are getting a bit pickier these days.

This one is probably a little inaccurate, since I only tagged each book with one genre. For those that fit more than one, I tried to use the most predominate features as my deciding factor.

Interestingly, not shown, is my Fiction/Non-Fiction split. Which is 95 Fiction and 5 Non-Fiction. But I figured that would make a pretty boring graph, so.

Goodreads tells me my average rating across the year was 3.3 stars.

 This one might require a bit of explanation--I counted whether I'd read anything by the author before or not for this graph. But only for the first book I'd read by them this year. So there are a few authors I read for the first time this year, but then I went on to read more of their books as the year went on.

I think the highest repeat this year was 5 books by the same author (incidentally, this turned out to be for the No. 6 manga series--five volumes down, four to go!)

The font is sort of blah on this one, but it lists the years in chunks by decade. So 1960-1969, 1980-1989, 1990-1999, 2000-2009, 2010-2015...

I knew I read a lot of more recent releases, but I had no idea I was so heavily biased to the last few years!

The outliers are: Dragonflight by Anne McCaffrey (1968) and Arrows of the Queen by Mercedes Laceky (1987)

Anyway! As I said, this was really fun. You can also check out My Year In Books via Goodreads if you're interested.

What sort of 2015 stats do you have? Let's chat in the comments!

Top 10 Tuesday || Resolutions

Top 10 Tuesday is, as always, brought to you by The Broke and The Bookish. This week: Resolutions!

This is pretty self-explanatory, so let's jump right in!

#1: Read 75 Books
Somehow in the last two years I've hit 50 books by June. I actually did manage to read 100 books last year, but it became really stressful in December as I powered through to make it happen. So I'm probably going to start my Goodreads reading goal at 50 again, just to lessen the pressure. But I'll be aiming for 75. I suspect I'll surpass that with (relative) ease, but I'm not going for 100 again. Not yet anyway.

#2: Buy fewer books
My book buying has become a little bit ridiculous in the last few years. I'm not really sorry, because as my dad says, having too many books is a good problem to have. But I need to tone it down a bit because my bookshelves are in danger of overflowing at the rate I'm going.

I'm going to make an effort to use the library more for books I know they have, instead of just snapping everything up on Book Outlet. And I'll try to keep the buying to things I'm going to read immediately, things I've already read and loved or anticipated releases by favourite authors.

#3: Reduce the TBR pile
This goes hand-in-hand with #2. My shelves are getting full. They're not full yet, and with some more creative rearranging I could fit a lot more. Or I could buy more shelves. But that is exactly the opposite of the point here.

I own something like 100 unread books. That's kind of ridiculous as far as I'm concerned. I like having a variety to pick from, but I really want to knock that number down significantly this year. I'm considering a Read 5 Before You Buy kind of challenge as well. We'll see how that goes.

#4: Read more short story collections
I sort of tried to do this mid-year this year, but it fell by the wayside. I have a handful of short story anthologies on my shelves that I'd really like to read. The problem always is, once I finish a few stories I tend to put the collection down and forget it existed. It's not like a novel, where I want to read on and find out what happens.

I'm going to try to pick up what I started in May/June of last year and read one short story or so each night before bed. That way, I can leisurely work my way through collections and not worry about staying up too late reading!

#5: Read 12 eBooks
This averages to one a month, which is pretty much my goal. Listen, my iPad is great. I have the apps for Kobo, Kindle and iBooks. I have a decent eBook collection. And my public library has a few titles I'm interested in only available on eBook. I just really want to get around to some of them this year.

There are probably more resolutions knocking around in my head, but I can't think of any to write down. And five is a reasonable number anyway... too many more and I'd probably get overwhelmed! I still have a few other challenges I want to do this year (Alphabet, Series, etc.) but I don't think they need to be on this list necessarily.

So that's it, I guess! What are your reading resolutions for 2016? Let's chat in the comments.

Monday Mix || Like Weapons

This requires a little bit of explanation, I think.

When I was in high school my friend group made a hilariously disastrous foray into Dungeons & Dragons. None of us really knew what we were doing and the actual roleplaying didn't last long. However, there was a pretty complex storyline behind the campaign that had potential. So one of my best friends started writing book one as a novel.

It's a fairly typical tale: six best friends get magically transported to another world to find out they're the Chosen Ones. And each friend was, naturally, based off of each person in the friend group. There is an evil Empress, a magic school, a doomed mentor figure, a captive prince... and, of course, a lot of love interests.

Listen. We were like fifteen.

For most of high school, we played with this universe, drawing fanart, writing fanfics, making playlists. You name it. And as I was doing some housekeeping over the summer I found some old print outs. Which lead to looking for old word documents. Which lead to me playing with some of my favourite parts of the "down timeline fic" in my head.

Which lead to a fanmix.

Or rather, two fanmixes, but you'll see the next one next week.

And honestly, this is probably one of my favourite mixes I've made ever. (And I'm not just saying that because it's about a character that was based off me.)

I've tried to write a summary for this a few times, but it comes off as really self indulgent. But this is my blog so who cares, right?

These two characters are stubborn and start off on each other's bad sides. There's bickering and fighting, but eventually they fall for each other, only to be torn apart shortly after. We never actually officially wrote the end of the series, and at fifteen I wouldn't have said these two were endgame, but now I really hope that's how it would've turned out.

I've tagged this on 8tracks as: heartbreak, break up, dysfunctional relationship, mutual pining

So if that sounds interesting and all this rambling hasn't scared you off yet, here it is!

Like Weapons

Listen on 8tracks

December Wrap Up & January TBR

Aaaaaaah!!!! I actually did it! I read 100 books in 2015! 

... I am never doing that again. On purpose. Phew.

These last few weeks have been stressful!

BOOKS READ

Dragonflight (Pern #1) by Anne McCaffrey ★★★☆☆
Witchlanders by Lena Coakley ★★★★☆
Fairest (Lunar Chronicles #3.5) by Marissa Meyer ★★★☆☆
The Beautiful and the Cursed (The Dispossessed #1) by Page Morgan ★★★☆☆
The Steel Remains (A Land Fit for Heros #1) by Richard Morgan ★★☆☆☆
Arrows of the Queen (Heralds of Valdemar #1) by Mercedes Lackey ★★★★☆
A Darker Shade of Magic (ADSOM #1) by V.E. Schwab ★★★★☆
Fandemonium (The Wicked + The Divine #2) by Kieron Gillen ★★★★★
Verily, A New Hope (William Shakespeare's Star Wars #4) by Ian Doescher ★★★☆☆
Saga volume 5 by Brian K. Vaughan ★★★★★
Generation Why (Ms. Marvel #2) by G. Willow Wilson ★★★★★
A Certain Slant of Light by Laura Whitcomb ★★★☆☆

JANUARY TBR

I got so many books for Christmas (and besides) that I really want to make an effort to read off my bookshelf for a while. I have WAY too many books, so I'm thinking I might try and steer clear of the library for a while. Maybe. Probably not. We'll see how that goes.

... It's been so long since I've actually done a TBR I don't even know what I want to put on it! As always, let's start small and then I have some flexibility to pick from there!

FROM MY BOOKSHELF:
Their Fractured Light (Starbound #3) by Amie Kaufman & Meagan Spooner
Illuminae (The Illuminae Files #1) by Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff
Winter (Lunar Chronicles #4) by Marissa Meyer

... Start small, she says, and then she picks MASSIVE books. OH WELL.

Have you read any of these? What books did you read in December? What are your plans for January? Let's chat in the comments!

Bout of Books 15

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, January 4th and runs through Sunday, January 10th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 15 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog. - From the Bout of Books team

Yay! What better way to start the new year than with Bout of Books!

My Goals:

• Read at least three books
• Schedule reviews of books read
• Read every day
• Visit and comment on other blogs!
• Participate in at least one of the Twitter chats

Probable Reads:
Totally subject to change, because y'know.

Find my day-by-day updates under the cut!

Christmas Book Haul

I'm sure it will be surprising to learn that I got quite a few books for Christmas... but here we are.

Also, this happened.

... Oops?

Those other books I ordered probably won't arrive until next week, so I'll save them for January's haul.

In the meantime, here are the gifts I got for Christmas! (As always, the covers should take you to Goodreads!)

Already Read

I read this earlier in the year and loved it--it made my Top 10 Books of 2015! I was glad to get a copy for my shelf!

TBR Pile

Can you tell I like Science Fiction and Fantasy? Hmmm....

I've already read Verily, A New Hope from the Star Wars collection and I plan on getting on Their Fractured Light immediately. But I'm super excited for all of these books!

Have you read any of these? What books did you get this holiday season? Let's chat in the comments!