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Words in Deep Blue by Cath Crowley

Posted in reviews, tagged books, bookshops, cath crowley, family, friends, grief, swoon, words on August 25, 2016| Leave a Comment »

Words in Deep Blue by Cath Crowley
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book reminded me of how much I love books, how much I love stories, how much I love words and how much I love book shops. It also reminded me of how awesome it is to connect people with their next favourite book (I love working in a library too!!)
Apart from reminding me of all of these things, I was brought into the world of Rachel who I absolutely adored and just wanted to give a really big hug to – so many times. Leaving her mum to go live with her aunt in the city where she grew up sounds like a good idea until she realises that she has been given a job in the local bookstore which is owned by the boy she once declared her love to – and never got a response. She is brave and kind and funny and she held onto her grief and kept it all to herself, until she couldn’t.
Henry, said boy whose family owns the bookstore is at many times, a total idiot (once you have read the book you will know exactly what I am talking about!) and I was scratching my head and talking to the book saying, “Henry you are so smart…. why are you being such an idiot…..” But he is also a loveable, goofy, book boy. He feels things deeply and is the best person to be on the sometimes never-ending feeling hunt for the right copy of The Walcott Poems. I know he will find it one day, he is not the type to give up.
And George, Henry’s amazing sister George. So tough and confident and snarky and yet so soft, innocent and breakable all at the same time.
Henry about George, ‘Sometimes I think she likes post-apocalyptic fiction so much because she’s genuinely happy at the thought that the world might end.’
I think it was George who finally broke my heart as I was reading.
I loved the Letter Library and am determined to find a way to develop one in my local library and I feel very good about being a reader who likes to underline passages and sentences and I can’t wait to start writing notes in books, leaving a piece of myself in them (I will try not to do this in library books though!)
This book was a whole lot of awesome. Family, friends, grief…. love and books. When I had finished reading and had wiped away the last tears and smiled at the memories, I immediately looked up TS Eliot’s Prufrock and Other Observations, and then read The Love Song of Alfred Prufrock – what a great way to end.

* 8 August – first comments: Undoubtedly my favourite book of the year. My heart broke more than once and the words were those which I wanted to wrap my arms around and keep close.
Review to come soon.

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Isla and the Happily Ever After by Stephanie Perkins

Posted in reviews, tagged book love, books, comics, Contemporary, first love, Manhattan, Paris, school years, Stephanie Perkins, swoon on February 2, 2015| Leave a Comment »

Isla and the Happily Ever After by Stephanie Perkins

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Pg. 81 Update : “You know that I like you. Right?’…… Pure Stephanie Perkins swoon <3"

Pg. 173 Update: Isla & Josh, Josh & Isla….. I don't need anything else but these two

Book Finished Update: I literally have tears running down my cheeks right now, my heart is bursting from the love in this book.
Everything about it is beautiful, the romance, the friendships, the love and the heartbreak.
And it was lovely to reconnect with some special people, St. Clair, Anna, Cricket and Lola – hello, looks like I am going to be doing some re-reading!

A perfect happily ever after.

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Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell

Posted in reviews, tagged book love, books, college, fangirl, first love, LOVE, rainbow rowell on December 30, 2014| 1 Comment »

Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Woah…. First thoughts, loved it and now that I have finished I feel like I have said goodbye to a friend who I may not ever see again.

I absolutely loved Eleanor & Park and had heard so many good things about Fangirl that I had no doubt that I would love it, and I did! As soon as I started reading I was instantly transported into the world, the first year at college, the nerves and awkwardness. I know it is a good book when I read for a few hours and have not even notice the time slipping by.
There were so many things that I enjoyed about the story, I loved Reagan and Levi, I think they were my two favourite characters and listening to them talk throughout the story was a definite highlight.
And the fan fiction element – I loved this as well! I loved reading the snippets from the Simon Snow books written by Gemma T Leslie but I loved reading the fan fiction written by Cather so much more. I am not the first to say – Simon and Baz…. I want more!
Reading this book brought back all the memories of the various book obsessions I have had and it really reminded me of the feeling when you are in love with a book or a series and it ends and you will grasp onto anything that you can find to keep you in that world for a while longer.
I also realised that i didn’t really like Cather, or Wren, very much at all until the end of the book. I understood Cather and what she was going through with being away from home for the first time, her social anxiety, worrying about her father, the anger at her mother but I didn’t think she was a very nice person.
She grew on me by the end and I am pretty sure this was all to do with Levi, who helped to knock down some of the blocks she had put up.
A great story about friendship and family – both the good and the bad, and of course also about falling in love with people and falling in love with books.

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The Iron Knight by Julie Kagawa

Posted in reviews, tagged ash, books, faery, puck, swoon on December 31, 2011| Leave a Comment »

The Iron Knight on Goodreads

Published October 26th 2011 by Harlequin TEEN
series: Iron Fey #4
characters: Bad Wolf, Meghan Chase, Puck, Grimalkin, Ash

Ash, former prince of the Winter Court, gave up everything. His title, his home, even his vow of loyalty. All for a girl… and all for nothing.

Unless he can earn a soul.

To cold, emotionless faery prince Ash, love was a weakness for mortals and fools. His own love had died a horrible death, killing any gentler feelings the Winter prince might have had. Or so he thought.

Then Meghan Chase—a half human, half fey slip of a girl— smashed through his barricades, binding him to her irrevocably with his oath to be her knight. And when all of Faery nearly fell to the Iron fey, she severed their bond to save his life. Meghan is now the Iron Queen, ruler of a realm where no Winter or Summer fey can survive.

With the (unwelcome) company of his archrival, Summer Court prankster Puck, and the infuriating cait sith Grimalkin, Ash begins a journey he is bound to see through to its end— a quest to find a way to honor his solemn vow to stand by Meghan’s side.

To survive in the Iron realm, Ash must have a soul and a mortal body. But the tests he must face to earn these things are impossible. At least, no one has ever passed to tell the tale.

And then Ash learns something that changes everything. A truth that turns reality upside down, challenges his darkest beliefs and shows him that, sometimes, it takes more than courage to make the ultimate sacrifice.

I love this series, I am known to be a sucker for faery stories….and this series not only has the Summer Fey and the Winter Fey, but also the Iron Fey which have been created because of the human use of technology which is becoming greater and also because there are less humans believing in faery tales. The Fey can only stay alive while humans believe in them. But I digress. The Iron Knight, is the final book in the series and for the first time, we get a book told from the point of view of Ash, a winter prince, an iron knight and a boy in love. I was hanging out for this book so much, because I truly loved Ash in the first three books. I loved his interactions with Puck (well known Robin Goodfellow), I loved his ice cold emotions that warmed for Meghan and I loved watching their relationship develop. Meghan does not really have a voice in The Iron Knight until the very end and I found that I missed her. In saying that though, the action and adventure throughout the story was fabulous. The journey is long and hard with the objective of Ash becoming mortal and getting a soul. Both Ash and Puck battling away to get to the ends of the earth, reminded me a bit of Labyrinth. With the help of Grimalkin, a regular in the series and also Big Bad Wolf (who I have a special place in my heart for) Ash and Puck have a variety of helpers on their journey. There is also another secret, special helper who I was in two minds about…didn’t particularly warm to this character! There were many fight scenes, lots of witty conversation, self reflection by Ash and a little bit of swoon.
This book was a great way to end the series and I can easily say that the Iron Fey is one of the best series that I have read this year.

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Reading Challenge of 2011

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged books, faves, reading on December 27, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Earlier this year I entered a reading challenge on GoodReads, to read 150 book in 2011. And I did it! I am up to 161 books, and I still have 4 days left! If you want to have a look at the books I have read in 2011 – here you go:

Goodreads – books read in 2011

And out of those, I am going to pick some of my faves….. on second thoughts, Even if I did just pick some of my faves then I would still have a list of about 70 books so it would be better if you just checked out the whole list from the link above! I will limit myself to ~~five~~ six GREAT books (and three of them are Aussie authors!) that I read in 2011: