Source: Purchased

The Heir and the Spare by Emily Albright | Review

Posted January 11, 2016 in Reviews / 8 Comments

One of the most coveted items I received in my Christmas Haul, I was so incredibly excited to get my hands on The Heir and the Spare as I am a total sucker for anything featuring the modern-day-royalty story line. Two of my favorite reads from 2015 were The Royal We and Royal Wedding, so I was sure this was going to be another book that I could indulge in. In fact, it’s the first book from my Christmas Haul that I dove into. However, I wound up being extremely disappointed by the quality of the writing, predictable plot elements, […]

The Fill-In Boyfriend by Kasie West | Mini Review

Posted January 4, 2016 in Reviews / 10 Comments

I picked up my first Kasie West books in the hopes that it would add some levity to my reading schedule. I was in the middle of slogging through Illuminae (which is very good, but also very depressing) and needed something easy and fun to read- you know, something I could read in the bathtub or while waiting for an appointment. While The Fill-In Boyfriend definitely was fun, fluffy, and quick, I felt like I missed the rave-worthy aspects that I’ve heard so much about regarding West’s writing. The best and worst thing about this novel was the character development. […]

Book Buddies Review: Snowed Over

Posted December 30, 2015 in Book Buddies Reviews, Reviews / 1 Comment

Cristina and Lauren Read: Book Buddies is a discussion style review I participate in every other month with my friend Lauren who runs the blog Bookmarklit. We choose a themed book for the month, read it, and the have a discussion where we both discuss themes and aspects that really stood out to us. Book Buddy Reviews are posted during the last week of the month.You can see our review in a Q&A format with half posted here, and half on Lauren’s blog! 1) Do you feel this really fell into the “New Adult” category? Why or why not? C: […]

To All The Books I Neglected to Review…

Posted December 28, 2015 in Reviews / 19 Comments

I’m sorry. It’s not you, it’s me. Life just got in the way and I forgot to flesh out my thoughts about you, with fingers to keyboard. With 2015 coming to a close, I realized I absolutely could not allow the new year to dawn without writing at least a mini review for you. Some of you were great, and some of you left much to be desired, but your lack of a previous review was due to my own frenzied schedule. I am now doing you your due diligence and letting the world know what I thought. I’m actually […]

An Unpopular Opinion on Winter by Marissa Meyer | Review

Posted December 21, 2015 in Books, Reviews / 30 Comments

I am an outlier. A black sheep. The reader who seemed to have missed the memo that this was an amazing, flawless, work of utter perfection. So I’m going to start with a disclaimer: I love Marissa Meyer. I’ve met her twice. I think her skill at writing fairy tale retellings is magnificent. Her characters have depth and feel like my own friends. I coveted the release of Winter. I dragged myself to Barnes & Noble after an eleven hour work day to buy it in person to ensure that I received a copy that was in pristine condition. And […]

Mini Reviews: My Life Next Door and What Happened to Goodbye

Posted August 12, 2015 in Reviews / 9 Comments

Feeling like one of the only bloggers who had yet to read and love Huntley Fitzpatrick’s debut novel, I eagerly started it while on my vacation this summer. I expected a light, fluffy read with perhaps some slight shades of dysfunction, similar to a Sarah Dessen novel. However, I found My Life Next Door to be much more nuanced than I anticipated and found it really lived up to the hype and expectations I had for it. While the book is often primarily seen as a romance, and the romance is very present and very well done, this book managed […]

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline | Boyfriend Book Reviews

Posted July 29, 2015 in Boyfriend Book Reviews, Guy in the Pages, Reviews / 7 Comments

Boyfriend Book Reviews is a feature where my book-loving boyfriend, Max, reads and reviews YA that I either haven’t yet read or is outside of my current TBR. If you want a thorough and thoughtful perspective on a guy’s take on YA, keep reading! “Three hidden keys open three secret gates Wherin the errant will be tested for worthy traits And those with the skill to survive these straits Will reach The End where the prize awaits” –Cline, 6. As someone who represents himself as an avid gamer, I confess I felt remiss in not reading this book sooner when […]

The Winner’s Crime by Marie Rutkoski | Mini Review

Posted July 27, 2015 in Reviews / 11 Comments

“If you won’t be my friend, you’ll regret being my enemy.” This book took me a month and a half to read, and another month to muster up the motivation to write a review. If you know me, you know this amount of time and procrastination is unusual; however, my feelings for this book ended up being so completely opposite what I thought there were going to be that I dreaded revisiting them during the review-writing process. Don’t get me wrong, this novel was filled with Rutkoski’s beautiful writing style and lyrical way of describing everything from settings to emotions. […]

The Royal We by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan | Review

Posted July 15, 2015 in Reviews / 9 Comments

“A wave of intense happiness washed over me, and I told myself to carry this moment as a talisman of a time in my life when I was both truly content and lucky enough to realize it.” Do you like reading about royalty? Do you like witty, edgy, sometimes bordering on scandalous humor? Are you completely and unapologetically fascinated by the idea of a commoner and a monarch, an average person and a celebrity? If so, The Royal We is the perfect transcontinental novel for you, and you should be ordering it ASAP whether it’s delivered to you by USPS […]

End of Days by Susan Ee | Review

Posted June 10, 2015 in Reviews / 8 Comments

“Power is best held by the ones who don’t want it.” I’ve been meaning to write this review for weeks, but for some reason have been unable to fully form my thoughts about this book into coherent sentences (a strange occurrence for me, as it’s common for my reviews to easily be 1000+ words). I think the dilemma of being able to form a concrete opinion about this book stems from the fact that I was equal parts satisfied and disappointed by the way that Penryn and Raffe’s story ended, an odd juxtaposition of individual scenes I really enjoyed that […]