“Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.” -That Artsy Reader Girl
This week’s theme:
Favorite Places to Read
Currently I do not go a lot of places to read. I do a lot of listening on my phone as I play video games on my computer. Or I sit on my couch. But here is my list:
My Room
Around my school’s campus
A park next to my friend’s old apartment
The trunk of my car
The infamous hill in my college town
My grandma’s old work (a library)
Any library really!
While driving home (audiobooks, do not read and drive)
My school’s Lit building
On late night coffee runs while I sit passenger
Thanks for reading my list!
Link your posts down below or let me know of any places you relate to on here.
“Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.” -That Artsy Reader Girl
This weeks theme is:
Books You Read in One Sitting (Or Could Have If Time Permitted)
It has been a LONG time since I have done an update blog.
But I just want to help ring in the new year with you all. I had a bland year on this blog in 2018. I had taken this time to study, work, and be social. I hardly read a thing. I have books that I am still reading from 2017 on my nightstand. All in all it just wasn’t the best year for me literature wise.
I believe I pulled through in the end by reading quite a few books but only because they were required from school. But I did finish a book that was not an assignment. I read to All the Boy’s I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han and let me just say, it was amazing. I think it was one of the only books I actually read this year.
But now for the serious stuff. I am going to be on this blog more. I know I said that last year after the break I took a year ago, then flung myself into another huge long break, but this time I am here. I am all in. I am ready. I am going to become the Rory Gilmore of reading and read everything in sight. I have also decided that I need this blog to not be a chore. I want to make the blog more appealing and it cannot be appealing if I am writing things I do not want to write. So, I am not going to write a review on every book I read anymore. While this is a book blog and normally people review the books they read, I am sure the review about Sense and Sensibility or To Kill a Mockingbird is not needed. I am sure more entertaining novels such as new releases and book tags while be better hits. And while I started this blog not to become popular, I do not want it to be boring to myself. I remember how motivated I was to write reviews about the hottest release and to participate in the weekly book memes. But I began to focus to much on the book reviews for books that weren’t needed like my A Seperate Peace review that I got rather bored. They were just books for school that I am sure almost EVERYONE has read because they had to. So what was the point?
But, I wrote them and I hated them. I hated forcing myself to write terrible posts and to try and discuss a book I hardly remembered. I remembered the feeling I had when I finished Crown of Midnight by Sarah J Maas at 11 o’clock at night and rushed to my computer to write out all of my feelings about the book. I wanted to feel that rush again but I couldn’t find it when I was struggling to finish the other posts first. So now I am here to say that is over. I am going to start a new system where instead of making a review, I will simply add the name of the book into my Review ToC and add a star count to the end. That will be all and that will make me happy.
I also changed the theme of my page but of course that is subject to change all the time. I love messing around with new themes and new colors all the time, but this time I really like this one. I think I will keep it for awhile just until I get sick of it.
Anyways, let us talk about something not blog related, my life. Quick overview of my life so far. I am nearing the end of my last year of high school. Senior year has been extremely fun and rewarding. I am awaiting news from my dream university and I will update you guys on that when it comes. I also have been obsessing about the college, looking up dorms, fee schedules, etc. I also have a new puppy in the house. She is very cute but not quite potty trained so that is kind of gross. But, that is my families duties.
I have big plans and big changes coming this year. It will be exciting!
I am excited for this New Year. It comes with many new adventures and lots of hard work. I am ready for everything that is going to come my way.
Published Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Pages: 355
“To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before is the story of Lara Jean, who has never openly admitted her crushes, but instead wrote each boy a letter about how she felt, sealed it, and hid it in a box under her bed. But one day Lara Jean discovers that somehow her secret box of letters has been mailed, causing all her crushes from her past to confront her about the letters: her first kiss, the boy from summer camp, even her sister’s ex-boyfriend, Josh. As she learns to deal with her past loves face to face, Lara Jean discovers that something good may come out of these letters after all.” -Goodreads
Review:
Dear Peter,
Hi you do not know me but I love you. I have now read the book and seen the movie and I am your soulmate. Will you marry me?
-Kat
Okay, that was my letter. Short but to the point, right?
Alrighty then craziness aside, how freaking adorable was this story. I mean first lets start with the look of the book. Cute and appealing. Great model for the front. (Yes I judge books by their cover very throughly)
Then Lara Jean was such a role model. I need to start dressing, acting, and eating like her. I really wanna try those Korean smoothies she is always talking about so if anyone knows where to get them, slide that info! Lara is such a clever character and I love the diversity of the book. I love the way her culture is brought out into the book and is expressed in the movie (also this review will be about both he review and the movie) which made me happy. She is the perfect person. I just wish she had been less stubborn because so much less drama would have happened, and oh wait, I love drama so why would I care? Haha, I don’t. I do thought think she should have been less stubborn because my poor Peter bear wanted her so desperately but she was so in her head that she just did not get it.
Now onto Peter. He is likes the world’s favorite idiot. Like he really did not handle everything perfectly but his hair was gorgeous while doing it. He should have let Get go the minute she dumped him and realized who his true love was, (ME) Lara Jean! But instead he creates a fake relationship so he can have basically both the girls. But alas that is such a dumb jock move. It is a good thing he was a dream boat or I would not have understood why Lara Jean put up with that from him.
I think Kitty is my spirit animal. She was so spritely and I loved her sass. She did a bad thing by sending out those private letter but in the end it all worked out just fine.
I did not really like Margot at all. She just kind of seemed so matter-of-fact and followed her mother’s rules way too seriously. Now, Josh and her were never meant to be and that is clear to see y his confusion on his feelings with Lara Jean but she shouldn’t have just dumped him. What Lara Jean finds out about them later in the novel does not constitute a reason for her to break up with him. Even though her mother did ask her not to go to college with a boyfriend. It just seems cruel to have broken Josh’s heart, then be able to escape to Scotland while he is stuck living next to Margot’s family.
The plot of the story was cute. There was not any huge action except for the big fallout near the end. Basically, the story just consisted of Peter and Lara Jean fighting then making up. Fighting then making up. Over and over again in this “fake” relationship. And Lara Jean being very stupid about many things.
But I loved the ridiculousness of this book and it went really well. I loved the movie to. I loved the cinematography. I thought both were really good. I cannot wait to read the next one!
Thanks for reading!
-Kat
P.S I hope you guys liked my A1 gif usage. I wanted to include some very nice moments of Peter and Lara Jean.
“I decided to talk to women about their vaginas, to do vagina interviews, which became vagina monologues…At first women were reluctant to talk. They were a little shy. But once they got going, you couldn’t stop them. Women secretly love to talk about their vaginas. They get very excited, mainly because no one’s ever asked them before.” -Goodreads
Review:
A book of feminism and glory.
I loved the vagina talk. It was very empowering and the friend I read it with agreed with me.
It is an important book. It is important to hear these women’s stories and to understand the depths of the women’s body.
I wish I could go see this performed. It would be quite entertaining to see.
I am reading this growing up in a non-“down there” era but still with some struggles with people embracing the word and I think this book does well to try and make vagina not seem like such a “nasty”word.
I thought the stories were really nice and sort of inspiring. They mostly discussed how they viewed their vaginas and others and showed people journey through vagina discovery.
This blog is really short and I am sorry about that but I do not have much to say. The book is short which means a short blog. Especially one where I believe everyone should read it and see the amazing stories. I don’t want to give away anything to much. I want people to experience the book for themselves.
Anyways, thank you for reading. Let me know down below if you have read it an your opinions on it.
And I apologize for that. I have been busy with school. I didn’t have time. But now I am going to try and actually do it this time.
I left because I had too much to do. I was running my blog by trying to lost every weekday and it worked out for a while but then I started to be unable to get ideas. The posts were exactly the same as other posts. I just was doing too much in this. So I’m back with less but better posts.
I have been working for the past month to get ready to do this blog again. I have been writing reviews for the books I read during my break. So you are gonna get those as my next couple of posts. But they aren’t great cause I’m still trying to get back in the game and I read them a couple of months ago so my reaction isn’t as great. But nonetheless I have finished them and they are coming.
I also now have started a book club with my friend Maggie. It’s just me and her but then I will have a deadline to actually be reading a book. I am excited to read with her. I think I’m gonna post at the beginning of the month what book we are going to read so you guys can read along. And then I will publish my review and maybe even a separate blog lost just for the book club discussion. I don’t know yet but I will figure it out.
I also want to do some tags and get more into this community so I want some people to follow and some tags to do so comment down below people and tags that I should follow and attempt.
Anyways, thank you to those who stayed. Hi new followers. And I apologize for my sudden disappearance. And welcome back to my blog. It is going to be bigger and better than ever.
Tell me down below how you all have been. I have been doing really well. I have one more year of school left. I just got a job. I don’t know anything else major in my life to update you guys about.
Published November 30th 2006 by Penguin Classics (first published -720)
Genres: Classics, Fantasy
Pages: 541
“The Odyssey, Homer’s best-loved poem, recounting Odysseus’ wanderings after the Trojan War. With wit and wile, the ‘man of twists and turns’ meets the challenges of the sea-god Poseidon, and monsters ranging from the many-headed Scylla to the cannibalistic Cyclops Polyphemus – only to return after twenty years to a home besieged by his wife Penelope’s suitors. In the myths and legends retold in this immortal poem, Fagles has captured the energy of Homer’s original in a bold, contemporary idiom.” -Goodreads
My review:
I always believe school books are going to be good….
Well as you can probably infer, I did not like yet another school book. Again I don’t know if it was the pressure and the fact that I was being forced to read this book super fast and not take the time to fully understand it or if it was that it was a bad book. I think my age makes me hate the book. I don’t know many people my age who enjoy that book. I think I am to into very fantastical books so these classical books about life and teaching you lessons don’t thrill me as much as I hoped they would. I know this story is more fantastical than any of the other classics out there and maybe that is why I liked it better then some of the ones I have read. But this book predates all the classics. Its language was super hard to read. I don’t know who wrote the translation I read but it was very confusing. Maybe another translation will be good enough.
So I love mythology and creatures like satyrs and the Minotaur etc, so I enjoyed that part about this book. I liked seeing how people lived in another time period. It was interesting to see the different ways people lived and what they believed back when this story originated. I loved learning about gods and other legends and myths during this unit in school. It helped me understand the story more.
Odysseus was a pretty cool character. I didn’t get to see much of him until near the middle even though the story revolves around him. I loved how he was really set on getting home and he kept fighting to get there. He wasn’t all to loyal to his wife but the road to hell was paved with good intentions. I mean he really had no choice when you’re trapped on an island with someone and you don’t think anyone is gonna save you. Telemachus was pretty cool to. He had a lot of trust in his dad. He never even met the guy and he sets off to try and find out if he is alive. Penelope is the most loyal of them all and she never marries anyone and waits for her long lost husband to come hope. Athena a.k.a Athene is super awesome in helping Odysseus get home.
The plot was good I guess. It just was so much packed in to so little. The descriptions of places were long and sort of dull but then the action came out to descriptive for how fast paced it went.
As I review this I see that is wasn’t a terrible story but I just didn’t get into it like I felt like I wanted to.
Well, thank you for reading another one of my short school book reviews. I know these probably aren’t as entertaining as the rest of my reviews but I would feel weird not giving you guys all my opinions on all the books I read.
Thanks for read. Tell me what you thought of this book.
My six month long hiatus is over and let me just say, it feels good to be back. I am super excited to be back and writing again. The break sucked and I couldn’t wait to get back to the blog.
I first wanna start this off with saying hello to all my new followers. I saw I gained a few even though I wasn’t on the blog anymore so welcome.
Next, I have huge things planned for this blog. Starting next Monday I shall be posting every weekday, allowing myself some time on the weekends to write. I will try as hard as I can to get 1-2 book reviews out. I think since I already have over ten reviews in my drafts right now there will be no problem doing so. I also want to post more tags and discussion blog posts so stayed tuned to that.
I cannot wait to get back onto the blog. It will be so much more organized with regular posts unlike back in my first six months of doing this.
Anyways now for my September preview:
So now that I am back I am going to keep a calendar of blog posts that I shall be posting. I have mostly gotten all the blogs for this month done except for three. I am sorry if those don’t go up on the days that they said they were. I am not very good at writing discussion posts but I am trying them out this month. Anyways here you go:
As you can see I have a busy schedule ahead of me but thankfully those posts are all done except for three.
Reading goal:
3 books
I want to read at least three books this month. It is gonna be hard but I have recently come across audio books and started to enjoy them so my car rides shall be better.
As I write this blog, I am listening to A Work in Progress. It is already so good. I am gonna get these little reading goals finished. All the other goals I had were never finished. So this time I am trying to do this better. NONSTOP READING!!!!!!!!!
I am excited to start this blogging journey again. I hope you guys enjoy what I am gonna put out for you this month and for all the months to come.
I am finally doing my February TBR. I was super bus this weekend and I have no clue why I didn’t do it yesterday because I had a day off of school because of the foot of snow we received. I am now a week into February and have not finished a book or wrote this post but I guess better late than never. So let’s start.
This month I plan on reading 4 books. Last month i read five but two of the books I planned on reading I didn’t finish so I will read those two and hopefully finish them. Here is my TBR for February:
These two books I started last month and it has taken me forever to finish them and I am still not done with them I don’t know why I have read like a little every day. I guess I need to just sit down and read.
Great Expectations is for school and I don’t really know if I like it yet and it is super long so I don’t know if I will be able to finish it by the end of the month or what our reading schedule is so this is just an extra book just to incase.
So those are all the books I am reading. I am glad I have finally got this post done. I have been worried about finishing it. After I post this I am going to try and read Passenger to try and make a dent before school starts today. Hope you guys enjoyed this post. Thanks for reading!
I am so happy with this month except for how fast it flew by. I got all my finals done whihc delayed my reading so i didn’t read everything I wanted to read but I did however meet other goals. One of my goals was to make the photo you’ll see throughout this post and on my featured image. I have been meaning to make this to give a little flare to my blog.
Rhis month was a busy month for me and so will February but I have a better outlook going into the next monththan I did going into this month. I only set a goal to read three books this month, those books being Heir of Fire, Queen of Shadows, and Passenger. while I only read two of those books on that list I did read 5 books this month. I am very happy and impressed with myself. The books I read were:
Go check out those blog posts and give them some love. I work really hard on them.
Now I put this one last because I bought ALOT of books this month. I had lots of Christmas money so I decided I would buy books with all of that money. so here is the long list of book bought:
As you can see that is alot of books to buy in one month. I was so excited and still am to have gotten all those books. The wait for all of them was excruciating though. I think I may have an addiction to buying books. But they make my book shelf look even more pretty.
That is all for this months wrap-up. I hope you have enjoyed this as much as I have. I will have my TBR up by tomorrow (hopefully) so you can see what books I plan to read in February. Thanks for reading. Please like and comment below!!!!
What books did you read? Did you read any boooks that I read? What books did you buy?
