MOVING BLOGS

Just a very short post to say that I moved my blog to wordpress and it is now called intrepidpages. So if you want to follow me there as I will no longer be posting here. :)

Review: This Savage Song by Victoria Schwab

Title: This Savage Song
Author: Victoria Schwab
Publication Date: July 5th, 2016
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Series: Book #1 of  Monsters of Verity

Rating: ★★★★★ 5 stars

Synopsis: Kate Harker and August Flynn are the heirs to a divided city—a city where the violence has begun to breed actual monsters. All Kate wants is to be as ruthless as her father, who lets the monsters roam free and makes the humans pay for his protection. All August wants is to be human, as good-hearted as his own father, to play a bigger role in protecting the innocent—but he’s one of the monsters. One who can steal a soul with a simple strain of music. When the chance arises to keep an eye on Kate, who’s just been kicked out of her sixth boarding school and returned home, August jumps at it. But Kate discovers August’s secret, and after a failed assassination attempt the pair must flee for their lives.

Book provided by publisher for an honest review.

"Plenty of humans are monstrous, and plenty of monsters know how to play at being human."
 — V.A. Vale

I always love a solid epigraph, it always sets a good tone for the main theme of the book. You can only imagine my joy when this book happened upon my doorstep. Though I have not read any of Victoria Schwab's other books, word from the grapevine entered my thoughts as I became inevitably hyped for this book. It's safe to say that I was not disappointed.

This Savage Song is by far one of the most unusual, interesting and even creepiest books I've read all year. Even after finishing it I cannot pinpoint the exact genre. Personally, it feels like a blend of scifi, fantasy, and even dystopian. This book definitely gave some Tokyo Ghoul/Code-breaker even Gotham vibes. Victoria Schwab is able to create a haunting and phantasmagoric atmosphere that at the same time doesn't feel over complicated.

The city of Verity, otherwise known as V-City is inevitably split two North and South sections after constant tensions and war between the two leaders. With our two protagonists belong to opposing sides. August and Kate are distinctly different from each other, but they really do blend well together which makes reading this novel worthwhile.

Kate Harker is a very demanding and imposing type of person. The type to know what she wants and doesn't care what she must do to get it. Being the daughter of the leader of North Verity, Kate feels to compulsion to prove her worth in being by her father's side. At first, I'll admit I wasn't the biggest fan of Kate, her ruthlessness and sometimes arrogance can rub people the wrong way, but as I read on I began to truly appreciate her as a person, and understand her actions. Not to mention her character arc is incredibly well written.

"That's life, August," She said. "You wanted to feel more alive, right? It doesn't matter if you're monster or human. Living hurts."

August Flynn is essentially the complete opposite. Out of the three types of monsters, August and his siblings are the rarest. Sunai, who have the ability to steal people's souls with music. Being sheltered in the compound for most of his life, August wants nothing more than to feel normal like a human would. You often see him struggle with what coincides with being a monster, But how do you fight the very thing that you are? Unlike his older brother Leo who embraces his being, seeing himself above humans and other monsters. I really loved August in this novel, and at times you can't help but feel bad for him.

"You also live. You don't spend every day wondering why you exist, but don't feel real, why you look human, but can't be. You don't do everything you can to be a good person only have it constantly thrown in your face that you're not a person at all."

Kate and August have such an interesting dynamic together, which is what made me love this book all the more. They seem to have a mutual understanding of each other that never once feels forced or cheesy. Especially once they are on the run, they essentially can only rely on each other and that seems to strengthen their bond.

Honestly this book was a whirlwind of emotions for me. For this being my first Victoria Schwab book I was so relieved to not be let down, and cannot wait to explore more of her works.

I'd definitely recommend this if you're a fantasy, scifi, or dystopian lover and want to experience something a little different. The violence and gore definitely gave me haunting and creepy vibes which would make this a perfect fall read. Which I might reread during that time, because that ending has me craving the next book immediately.

—Rebecca ☾

Updates: School, Stress, Summer, and No More Monthly Bookhauls

I mulled over constantly whether or not I wanted to write this post. Usually when I decide on something I almost never make a post about it. I'll usually make that decision and then people will have to see the subtle change for themselves, but this time I felt like voicing my reasons why.

It's pretty evident that I've been lax with blogging in recent months. I wouldn't use the term 'failing at blogging' because I personally don't believe the frequency of your posts correlate to you being a better blogger.

I debated with the fact of stop blogging altogether, transitioning domains, and or taking a lengthy break. As you can see, I did the latter, but not by choice, more or less because of school. Something I struggle with time and time again is my time management skills. I never hide the fact that I am a terrible procrastinator. If I'm given time to do something I will most likely wait until the last possible second to do it, or not at all. Pretty bad, but I'm working on it.

Now that we're nearing the end of the school year I can definitely relax a bit more. My summer will still be pretty busy with with my AP English and AP Psychology summer assignments, college tours, studying for both the SAT/ACT, coordinating the Summer Reading Challenge all summer long at my local library, all while trying to keep up with reading, bookstagram, and blog posts. Not to mention trying to find time to catch up and keep up with Games of Thrones season 6, Mr. Robot season 2, Big Brother season 18, and Orange is The New Black season 4.

Reading might not be my top priority this summer, but I'm totally okay with that. I have a few great high fantasy tomes that I really want to get through this summer at a steady pace, and if that's all I get to I'll be satisfied.

My main goal is to definitely be more consistent with blog posts. My hope is to get down to a steady consistency of two posts a week, more if possible. Which I deem doable, because I have a list written down of post topics, which I'm really excited about.

Another factor to my mild absence would have to be related to my monthly bookhauls and wrap-ups. I never even use to do bookhaul posts, but ever since I've been acquiring more books I felt this obligation to make a master post of all the books I bought/received in the month. But now after deliberating and watching a few discussion posts I decided to no longer post monthly bookhauls on here.

It just doesn't work for me personally. For some reason those posts take me the longest to write up, but throughout I have a sense of I'm just repeating myself. And I realized that bookhauls are no longer the videos I gravitate towards on Booktube. I'm just no longer interested in watching lengthy videos of someone holding up a book they most likely haven't read, and giving a vague description. And yes I know that bookhauls are a great way for people to find new reads, I am one of the said people that have found books that I have loved through watching bookhauls. But recently I prefer recommendation posts/videos of someone talking about books they love in a specific genre/category and also wrap-ups, which are like mini reviews and can really sell me on looking up a new book to read.

I still do watch the occasional bookhaul, and yes, everyone is different and people may find that as something they love and that's perfectly fine. Everyone has their own niche and it just wasn't working out for me.

From now on I'll still be doing monthly book wrap-ups, and I'll still be posting the occasional bookmail on my instagram and twitter, but doing a collective montly bookhaul, is something you'll cease to see on here. And considering that was a main focus of my posts, this new decision will definitely force me to think more creatively and I'm looking towards whatever this summer brings. I wish you all the best.

The Song Rising Cover Analysis

After awaiting many anxious months, the cover for The Song Rising, book three in The Bone Season series was revealed yesterday. And here it is in all its glory...

And also the UK/RoW cover which slightly differentiates in font color and missing the orange hue that resides on the U.S. cover...

In the beginning of the week I was quite nervous to see these covers, not only because I have been anxiously await for ages, but it was announced there was going to be a series cover change. You can imagine my reaction. There is nothing worse than a bibliophile hearing that there is going to be a cover change in their beloved series that is not even complete yet.

To be wholly honest I'm not the hugest fan of this new cover. I appreciate the minimalistic look they were trying to go for with these redesigns, but I prefer the look of the original Bone Season and Mime Order covers.

There is just something about this cover that throws me off. I think its the bright flame against the stark background. I'm curious as to why it was placed on the cover, which leads me to believe that there will probably be an inferno of some sort. Or can it be a metaphorical flame of an uprising revolution? Anyways I'm pretty sure the crown refers to pseudo-monarchy of the Mime-Queens and Mime-Lords of each cohort of The Unnatural Assembly, and of course Paige's new role in it all.

The covers for these books always remain obscure to me until I actually read the novel and see the symbols represented. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Along with the reveal of The Song Rising cover, the redesigned The Bone Season and The Mime Order covers were also revealed...

Again I will always love and prefer the new covers. I just don't really see the point in deciding to redesign the covers now, especially three books in what is to be a seven book series.

But to remedy the change, it came to my attention that the release date to The Song Rising has been set to March 2017, and according to Goodreads it says March 7th, 2017.

For some reason, when I heard about this book being pushed back to 2017, I assumed fall 2017, but we are getting it in the beginning of next year and I cannot wait.

I will have to give props to Bloomsbury for at least keeping the spines consistent. We as readers know that with a dreaded cover change comes the uneven, non-matching spines, but Samantha Shannon has confirmed that the future books will match the old book spines.

And here are the old paperback covers, next to the mock redesigned ones...

At least I can now sleep soundly, knowing that my series will still match spine wise, when viewing my shelves. This cover change does not in anyway hinder my excitement for The Song Rising release, I'm all the more eager to get it in my hands. Who knows, maybe it'll grow on me, once I've held a physical copy.

What do you think of these new redesigned covers?

March Wrap-Up

I knew I wouldn't repeat my February feat of reading 20 books, but two out of the four books I read this month, definitely made it to my favorites of the year list.

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Rating: ★★★★★ 5 stars

"No Mourners. No funerals."

Reading this book was a great way to start off the month. Though I will admit that I read this so soon to keep my mind off the approaching release date of Lady Midnight. Nevertheless I enjoyed this immensely. I previously read the Grisha trilogy last month and I was really enjoying it until the last book fell flat for me. But still I went into Six of Crows with high expectations and was delivered just that every time. This book was excellent. If you didn't enjoy the Grisha trilogy that much and still unsure of whether you should read this I implore you do so. This book is leagues ahead of the Grisha trilogy. Not only do we get a diverse cast of characters, that are extremely well written, the plot is really fast paced and grips you, and also has you internally screaming at your book most of the time. This felt like a combination of Ocean's Eleven movie plus Heist Society by Ally Carter times 100. I am honestly anxious and terrified to see how this duology concludes in The Crooked Kingdom.

Lady Midnight by Cassandra Clare

Rating: ★★★★★ 5 stars

❝ Once I was the elder, but now you are elder than I. When I was in the faerie country, each night I would think of each of you—of you and Helen, of Livvy and Ty and Dru and Tavvy. I gave the stars your names, so that when I saw them wink to light in the sky I felt as if you were with me. It was all I could do to still the fear that you were hurt or dying and that I would never know. But I have come back to a family not just alive and healthy, but whose bonds have not been severed, and that is because of what you have done. There is love here, among you. Such love as takes my breath out of my body. There has even been enough love left for me. ❞

No surprise here that I managed to read this in the same month. If you know me, then you know how much I was anticipating this book. Feeling both excited and mildly terrified when I finally procured a copy on release day. This book. THIS BOOK. I don't even know what to say about this book to convince you how much I LOVED this it. Just go read my review where I exhibit all the feels.

The Love That Split the World by Emily Henry

Rating: ★★☆☆☆ 2 stars

“Love is giving the world away, and being loved is having the whole world to give.” 

I went into this book with pretty high expectations due to all the buzz around its release, but I was not a fan at all. I read this book for my book club's The Reader's Guild, book of the month. Honestly I don't even think I could explain the synopsis of this novel. A main component of where it fell flat for me is due to the fact that I felt the author was trying to do too much at once. Like there's time travel, parallel universes, Native American folklore, and some other scifi elements that just felt weird and confusing. I did enjoy a lot of points on feminism and the stories that were told, but that's about it. There is so much going on in this novel in a short amount of pages that it begins to feel rushed. Not to mention that I really didn't like any of the characters, nor cared for the insta-loved that inevitably ensued. The main reason that I disliked this besides the busyness was that it was confusing up to the point where I had to ask someone to explain the ending to me because I had no idea what was going on. But I guess some books just aren't for everyone.

When We Collided by Emery Lord

Rating: ★★★☆☆ 3 stars

"I feel like I know him a little, like if I collect fragments of the six of you and tape them together; there he is: a mosaic of your pieces."

Usually I'm not the hugest fan of contemporary, but this novel sat in the middle of my love-hate spectrum. There is a lot of great aspects of family and love ingrained in here that I believe Emery Lord delivers excellent, in a way that is not cheesy. I did love the Daniel family for the most part, but was kind of off and on with our main character Vivi. Though I really enjoyed the realness of this contemporary and more of my thoughts can be found here.

Luckiest Girl Alive by Jessica Knoll

Rating: ★★★★☆ 4 stars

"He imagined the future I could have before I even wanted it for myself, and he was the one to push me toward it. That’s faith. Growing up, I thought faith was about believing Jesus died for us, and that if I held on to that, I’d get to meet him when I died too. But faith doesn’t mean that to me anymore. Now it means someone seeing something in you that you don’t, and not giving up until you see it too. I want that. I missed that."

I technically finished this in April, but it was near the beginning so I'll just count it towards March. This book is sold as a thriller, but I feel like that it doesn't read like a thriller at all which is why a lot of people are disappointed when they don't get something like Gone Girl from it. This is told in the present day and flashback rotations our main character, Ani, reflects at her freshman year of high-school and the events that occurred then. There is a lot of important themes of feminism and forgiveness in this novel, and even more so gut-wrenching when you realize that the author wrote this book based on events that happened in her own life. My full review can be found here.

March Book Haul

It's becoming a recurring habit to post my book hauls half way into the next month, but what can I say, I'm easily distracted and swift to procrastinate. I was expecting this to be an extremely small bookhaul, like one or two books, but somehow I ended up acquiring 9 books in the month of March.

Part I: Books I Bought/Gifts/Won

Lady Midnight by Cassandra Clare

The first book to make its way into my possession is none other than my most anticipated book of the year Lady Midnight. I am still in awe of the beauty of this, both inside and out. This book already stands as my favorite book of 2016, if you want to know more of my thoughts I have a full non-spoiler and spoiler review here. I also created some Dark Artifices playlists that I listened to as I read, which you can check out here.

 

A History of Notable Shadowhunters by Cassandra Clare and Cassandra Jean

The next book is one of the most beautiful to have graced my life that my lovely friend gifted me for my birthday. A History of Notable Shadowhunters and Denizens of the Downworld by Cassandra Clare and Cassandra Jean, is a book that contains beautiful illustrations of various important shadowhunters and downworlders told in the language of flowers, and beside each photo contains a short bio about each of them. I have already started flipping through it and the illustrations are so gorgeous and there are so many little facts about characters that I did not know about. This is a must have for any fellow TMI/TID/TDA trash like me. ☺☺☺

The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman

This book I'm pretty sure I won this in a giveaway I entered awhile back. The main reason I entered was because it has the word library in the title like c'mon how can that not interest me. All I know is that it takes place in underground London and the characters have to retrieve a dangerous book, and its full of libraries and secret societies and honestly it was making me think of The Infernal Devices by Cassandra Clare, which you know I love. More like hopelessly obsessed enough to name my twitter after a fictional character. I'm hoping that it does have some magic involved and the synopsis also slightly reminds me of Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman.

Part II: Review Books

A Tyranny of Petticoats edited by Jessica Spotswood

This is a book that I'm really excited to get to. A Tyranny of Petticoats is a 15 story anthology all about belles, bank-robbers, and other badass girls. Some contributing authors include, Marissa Meyer, Marie Lu, Beth Revis, Jessica Spotswood, Robin Talley, Kekla Magoon and many more. There's so much diversity in this anthology and was perfect to receive during Women's History Month. I'll definitely have to get to this soon.

Publisher: Candlewick Press

Gutsy Girl by Carolina Paul

Gutsy Girl is a more unconventional type of book to come my way. In this book, Carolina Paul speaks about her adventurous escapades, and also those of other girls throughout history and offers insight on confidence and self-positivity. Throughout there are cute illustrations and even places to journal your own thoughts. Another excellent book to be received during Women's History Month. I can't wait to set out on my own adventures and catalog them as I go.

Publisher: Bloomsbury

When We Collided by Emery Lord

A rare contemporary finds it's way into my possession. When We Collided is actually a book I managed to finish in the same month that I received it. It was actually refreshing to read a contemporary after bombarding myself in fantasy novels. I wrote a full review on my thoughts here. And this book has already released so you should definitely check it out if you're a contemporary fan or enjoy any of Emery's previous books.

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Luckiest Girl Alive by Jessica Knoll

Another book I managed to complete in the same month I received it. Yes, I am quite proud of myself ☺ I also wrote full review on this here. I was quite surprised to have really enjoyed this novel, it definitely did not feel like a thriller at all, but I think that's what I liked about it. I'm really interested to see how they adapt this to film.

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Desert Dark by Sonja Stone

I had requested an arc from the lovely people at Holiday House publishing, but had not known that the arcs weren't out yet. So in turn they sent me one of their finished books while I waited. From what I can gather from this novel, is that our main character is sent off to a government funded boarding school in the desert only to discover it’s a covert CIA program training high-achieving students for the Black Ops. Anything about spies or heists always intrigue me. This slightly reminds me of the Gallagher series by Ally Carter, which I have yet to finish, but also Heist Society trilogy by her, which I also loved.

Publisher: Holiday House

Have you acquired any exciting books this month?

Review: When We Collided by Emery Lord

Title: When We Collided
Author: Emery Lord
Publication Date: April 5th 2016
Publisher: Bloomsbury

Rating: ★★★☆☆ 3 stars

Synopsis: Jonah never thought a girl like Vivi would come along.
Vivi didn’t know Jonah would light up her world.
Neither of them expected a summer like this…a summer that would rewrite their futures.
In an unflinching story about new love, old wounds, and forces beyond our control, two teens find that when you collide with the right person at just the right time, it will change you forever.

Book was provided by publisher, but in no way affects my personal views on this book.

"I feel like I know him a little, like if I collect fragments of the six of you and tape them together; there he is: a mosaic of your pieces."

I'll be the first to admit that contemporary isn't my favorite genre, which is why I haven't been reading much of that of particular genre, but When We Collided seems to be on the better half for me.

This novel is told in dual POVs, which I'm always wary of. When reading a dual pov novel, the different points of views can begin to seem like the same person is speaking, until you correct yourself when you finally notice the different pronouns. My least favorite example being Allegiant by Veronica Roth and my favorite example being Retribution of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin. But Emery Lord writes these characters so distinctly that you are able to tell who is speaking in the rotating chapters.

You are first introduced to Vivi. A very vibrant and eccentric character. I wasn't the hugest fan of Vivi for a majority of the novel. Emery Lord has distinct way of writing where she creates an unapologetically brash female character and you either love or hate them. In this case I was in the middle with Vivi. There were parts where I did like her, but at times she could be so blatantly selfish it began to rub me the wrong way. I will give her credit that I really did begin to like her character by the end of the novel.

We then meet Jonah. Who is almost a complete opposite of Vivi. Jonah is more reserved and refined. A majority of this due to the fact that after the death of his father, his mother has essentially turned into a recluse who can barely leave her room without breaking down. Leaving Jonah to raise his three younger siblings, with his older brother and sister. The latter who is in college and barely is home to begin with.

A main point of this novel I really enjoyed were Jonah and his family. The six Daniel siblings are individually unique. I appreciate the way Emery Lord, developed them with their own mannerisms and how they interacted with each other was fun to read.

Vivi and Jonah eventually meet and soon become entagled in each others lives. Each of them initially holding secrets. Jonah not wanting Vivi to know how he and his older brother are basically raising their younger siblings. Vivi not wanting Jonah to know the real reason why she moved to Verona Cove for the summer.

At first I enjoyed the conversations that happened between Vivi and Jonah, but soon the inevitable insta-love began to creep up, even though I really hope it wouldn't. And you all know how I feel about insta-love. Even knowing how short this novel is, I felt like the romance could have been drawn out longer, due to the fact that this book takes place practically over an entire summer. Honestly if it didn't feel so rushed I may have loved this book more.

When We Collided is encompasses all the different types of love. Those familial, friendship, and romantic. You watch these characters develop and come to realizations that soon turn to important actions later on in this book.

What I really loved about this book was the ending. I am really glad that a contemporary novel ending has satisfied me in such way that this had. It had the realistic element that I couldn't help but appreciate.

I definitely recommend checking this out if you're a fan of any of Emery Lord's previous novels, or I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson. Though they are distinctly different, I believe fans of either novels would enjoy the other.