I’m torn with my opinion on this book, I really am. For huge parts of the book the plot was fast paced and kept me engrossed, but then there were times when it felt like a huge slog to keep turning the pages, and in the end it took me over a month to finish reading because I just didn’t feel that ‘urge’ to pick the book up and keep reading. I’ve not read much historical fiction like this, so I’m not sure if...
Category - Fiction
One of my ‘Book Bingo’ challenges this year is to re-read a childhood favourite, and how could it be anything other than Matilda? I read this book so many times as a child that my copy is falling to pieces (as you can probably tell from the picture), and I’ve watched the film more times than I can count. What I had forgotten since last time I read this book was how many beautiful illustrations were in it. As I was reading, my...
It’s been a while since I listened to an audio-book, but since I’ve been spending so long going out walking or on public transport, I thought that getting back into audio-books would be a good way of getting through more books this year. I saw the Stormbreaker film when it was released ages ago, but have never read any of the book series, and since the audio book was less than 6 hours long, it seemed like a good fit to get back into...
Beautifully written, raw, passionate and hard-hitting, and heart-breaking that this book is inspired by real experiences, far too many real experiences. “Brave doesn’t mean you’re not scared, Starr. It means you go on even though you’re scared.” I don’t even know how to go about reviewing this book, as I’m so far removed from the realities of this story that I would feel kind of like an interloper. I...
I read a blog post that Milly wrote this week about how so-called ‘chick-lit’ is always overlooked by celebrity book clubs, in favour of ‘proper literature’. And I really don’t know why. I love Milly Johnson for the fact that you can completely lose yourself in the story and it becomes a movie in your mind. Yes, you can pretty much always tell how the story is going to end, but I honestly don’t care, because for me it’s all about...
So first of all, Eden Summer was maybe not the best name to choose for a book – I just searched on Waterstones website to get a link to the book and it turns out Eden Summer is the name of an erotic fiction writer – so if you tell people you’re reading Eden Summer and they give you a funny look, you know why! I picked this book because it was set in Hebden Bridge and I like reading ‘local’ books. I’ve been...
Ah Milly Johnson, I could read you forever. As usual, this book was brilliant from start to end. The kind of book that I start reading and it turns into a lovely film inside my head, and I don’t realise how long I’ve been reading until I’m 200 pages in and my back is hurting from sitting in one place for too long! One of my favourite things about Milly’s books is that they’re set in Yorkshire and all her characters...
Right up to the very end, I was loving this book, but the ending left me feeling a bit cold which really changed my impression of the whole book, dropping my overall rating from a 4 to a 3. The book felt to me like Hyacinth Bouquet and Keeping up Appearances on steroids. I’ve never known someone so desperate to appear like he has more money than his neighbours than Mr Jha. To go to the point that you will openly insult your son and call...
I was really quite excited about this book coming out having read the first three in the series over the new year. But when I started reading the first reviews coming through on Goodreads, I was a little apprehensive and the reviews weren’t great. The reviews did prepare me for the fact that this is a novella between the original trilogy and the planned new trilogy to connect the two plots together, so at least I wasn’t expecting a...
It’s been a while since I read this book, so forgive me for a short/probably slightly rubbish review. I’ve been so busy that since I read this book I just haven’t found much time to sit down and write the review, and I haven’t read another book in almost a month. Not much good for my Goodreads Reading Challenge, which I’m now 7 books behind on! After reading another Katherine Rundell book not too long ago, I thought...
Urgh. I don’t know if I’m just way older than the target demographic for this book, but I just could not get along with it. I’m guessing it was aimed at teenagers who may be able to relate to the main character, Zoe, but I just found her a whiny brat throughout the whole book and it completely spoilt it for me. I think it’s supposed to be played as Zoe the wild child going on this grand adventure and somehow reuniting the...
Imagine if you had one wish, and you knew for sure that it would come true. What would you wish for? Money? Beauty? Success? Love? But what if you had already seen generations of people make their own ‘one wish’ and you could see the toxic affects it had on their lives? Would you still be so eager to make that wish? For Eldon, that’s his reality. He lives in Madison, a place where each citizen can make one wish on their 18th...
Part of my Book Bingo for this year is to read a Costa Book Awards winner. So when I was at Waterstones and this beautiful cover caught my attention, and then I saw the Costa Book Awards Winner sticker on it, I knew that this would be the one. I didn’t realise until I started reading it that it is actually a children’s book, I’ve never really come across a children’s book thats’s 400+ pages long before, and although...
What the heck did I just read? When I was about three quarters through this book, I turned to my husband and said “I’m not quite sure what’s happening in this book”, and having got to the end, I’m still not quite sure! But even though I’m completely confused, I really want to read the second book to see if it answers some of the many many questions that I have. And since it has left me wanting more and it kept...
Five people find themselves in detention together. From the surface, they’re about as different as can be: the jock, the geek, the criminal, the spoilt princess and the loner. But when the loner dies from a huge allergic reaction to peanut oil, suddenly the focus is on the other four in the room. The loner, Simon, had a website where he published sallacious gossip about the whole school, and it seems like he had dirt on each of the four in...
I’d been eyeing this film up on Netflix for a while, but hadn’t realised it was based on a book, so when I came across it on my library app I was glad I hadn’t already watched it so I could read it first. Now I’ve read it, I’m not quite so sure I want to watch the film. It started off quite thrilling, but not too extreme and I was definitely enjoying the excitement of the online game that Vee had found herself drawn...
Having read the entire Game of Thrones series a few years ago, this was definitely not what I expected to come from the same author. More a Grimm’s fairy tale than an epic fantasy, it’s miles away from the violence and sex filled saga that I’d read previously. Having read a bit more into it, this was actually first published in 1980 and is most definitely a children’s novel – a story of an unlikely friendship...
I think the biggest mistake I made when reading this book was not actually reading it. I decided to listen to it as an audio book, but I’m not sure it really worked for me. The main character is called (unsurprisingly) Flora Banks, and (also unsurprisingly) she has memory problems, namely anterograde amnesia. This means that she can’t form new memories. Every half an hour or so her memories reset and she can’t remember...
I have to admit I only picked this book because the cover jumped out at me when I was scrolling through the library ebook app. I know, I know, don’t judge a book by it’s cover. But I did, and it was a mistake, I just couldn’t get into this book at all. It felt hugely predictable to me which definitely diminishes the enjoyment I get, I want some surprises thrown in to keep me on my toes! And it might just have been me, but...
This book has more ups and downs than a fairground roller coaster. If you’d asked me at the start to predict what would happen, I would probably have given you a fairly detailed description. But it would all have been completely wrong. So many shock twists that I’m surprised I didn’t get whiplash. Just as you think a character is good, it turns out that he’s not so good any more. But wait, is he really bad or might he...
The last of the three Hogwarts Library books, and book 52 of the year (hooray!). This was my favourite of the three, it felt more familiar to me and seemed exactly like the books of stories I used to read as a child (minus the magic of course). You can definitely imagine that it would be read by little wizard children, and it’s a very clever set of stories by J.K. Rowling. The book consists of five short tales, followed by an explanation...