Are We Too Hard on Our Heroines?

Posted May 20, 2015 in Discussions / 42 Comments

For the first time in about a year, I opened a word document with my current work in progress, determined to get back into writing now that I’m a post-grad (for undergraduate, anyway). While rereading my 12,000 word draft, I realized that the character who I found hardest to write was my protagonist. While I knew her struggles and reasons behind her behavior and dialogue, I realized that her motivations may not be as transparent to readers, and that she could come off in less than ideal ways without the right context or background knowledge. This got me thinking about […]

Top Ten Book Boyfriends

Posted May 18, 2015 in Top Ten Tuesday, Weekly Features/Memes / 42 Comments

Top Ten Tuesday is a fun weekly feature hosted by the fantastic blog The Broke and the Bookish. This week is a freebie, and I decided it was time to introduce all of my book boyfriends on the blog. Although let’s be real, after reading ACOTAR, this list could just be Tamlin for 1-10. 1) Tamlin from A Court of Thorns and Roses– Because TAMLIN. (Lauren @ Bookmarklit may be the only one who truly understands the extent of this obsession). 2) Raffe from Angelfall– Witty banter abounds with Raffe. Coupled with his high ranking angel status and I was […]

Just A Quick Test Post

Posted May 18, 2015 in Uncategorized / 0 Comments

Just a quick test post to check some things! 🙂

The Improbable Theory of Ana and Zak | ARC Review

Posted May 18, 2015 in Books, Reviews / 0 Comments

*Thanks to HarperCollins and Epic Reads for the ARC! I went into The Improbable Theory of Ana and Zak expecting a cute, quirky contemporary read. It relies heavily on a convention setting, and having received the ARC at YALLWEST, I thought it would be a fun read, having just been to a convention myself. I haven’t read anything by the author previously, so I didn’t many expectations. Unfortunately, despite not anticipating anything spectacular from this book, it still underwhelmed me with characters that lacked depth, an improbable plot bordering on absurd, and a overall younger feel. Like any unlikely love […]

Sunday Funday: Week in Review [29]

Posted May 17, 2015 in Sunday Funday, Weekly Features/Memes / 2 Comments

Sunday Funday is a weekly(ish) post I’ve started to recap the bookish (and sometimes not-so-bookish) happenings in my life the past week! Feel free to participate, just link back! May 11-17, 2015 Life This past month has been so busy, and now with graduation season upon us I’m out and about almost every weekend! This weekend I celebrated my boyfriend’s graduation for his undergraduate degree in Psychology, and I couldn’t be prouder! It was a long day (his school is about 2 hours away from where I currently live) and my whole family came out to watch his ceremony and […]

Tinkerbell 10K Run at the Disneyland Resort

Posted May 14, 2015 in Travel / 6 Comments

Occasionally I like to feature other things on my blog aside from my bookish endeavors. If you’ve been reading for a while you probably know that I’m a huge Disney fan, so naturally I jumped at the opportunity to participate in Disneyland’s annual Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend. My aunt and I headed down to compete in my first ever race, the Tinkerbell 10K on Saturday (she did the half marathon two years ago). The race started at 5:30am, and we started with the A group (runners are placed according to their average mile time). It started in downtown Disney […]

A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J Maas | Review

Posted May 13, 2015 in Reviews / 24 Comments

“I threw myself into that fire, threw myself into it, into him, and let myself burn.” How do I possibly count the ways in which I ADORED this book? I finished it about 24 hours ago, and I have been unable to do anything productive. I have picked up the book again at least 3 times since then to flip through it and reread my favorite parts. I am a book-hangover mess. Once in a while I’ll claim in a review that a book was “My favorite in X genre for this year” or “The best at dealing with X […]

Bout of Books 13 Update Post

Posted May 12, 2015 in Readalongs/Readathons / 3 Comments

As you probably know, I’m participating in my second Bout of Books read-a-thon this week! This post will be updated daily with my previous day’s progress as well as reiterate my goals for the week! My Goals: -Read at least 3 books -Of these books, 1 must be a May release and 1 must be an ARC -Write and schedule reviews for all books read -Catch up on all reviews that need to be written Daily Updates: Monday Number of pages I’ve read today/total: 300/300 total so far Total number of books I’ve completed: 1 so far Books Read From: […]

Making Pretty by Corey Ann Haydu | ARC Review

Posted May 12, 2015 in Reviews / 2 Comments

Making Pretty captivated me by throwing a curve ball at me within the first 70 or so pages that I could not ignore; a plot twist so disturbing that I had to keep reading the book even though there were several things about it that did not work for me. So instead of DNF-ing it, I plowed through 300+ pages of seventeen year old Montana’s narrative to find myself at the end of it feeling a lot of things, though “liking” this book is unfortunately not one of them. While Haydu crafts a story with intensely messy family dynamics and […]

Bout of Books 13 Challenge #1: Bookish Survey

Posted May 11, 2015 in Readalongs/Readathons / 6 Comments

Today is the first day of Bout of Books 13! Today’s challenge is being hosted by Writing My Own Fairytale, and it’s a bookish survey to help the participants get to know each other better and ease everyone into the challenges! Check out my sign up and progress post here. 1) How do you organize your shelves? I have a system that’s sort of a blend that works the best for me. I have three main bookshelves and the left is everything that’s paranormal/fantasy/dystopian and within that it’s alphabetized by author. The middle bookshelf has a lot of my childhood […]