Top Ten Tuesday #451-The Festive Christmas Book Tag

Hi all! I hope you’ve all had a good week since I last did one of these. I’m officially on annual leave from work for Christmas now (well I have been since Friday, my last day of work pre-Christmas was Thursday) and my family is back in Stirling this year for the festive season. I had a bit of a time getting up here as my train to Edinburgh only went as far as Newcastle due to staffing issues, so then I had to wait at Newcastle for an hour to get another train, which was also delayed, by the time I finally got to Stirling, my journey had taken an hour and a half longer than it was meant to. British trains huh? Anyway, I submitted my Delay Repay Claim to LNER and I’m getting my money back for the journey and it definitely could have been a lot worse but still not the start to your Christmas holiday you want.

Anyway, it’s Tuesday and time for another Top Ten Tuesday courtesy of Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s topic is the Christmas Bookish Wishes topic but I really don’t need more books (I know sacrilege!), I have enough at home that are judging me for not reading them. So instead, I’m going to keep up with my own little Christmas tradition, and do a Christmassy book tag for our pre-Christmas topic instead. This year’s tag comes courtesy of A Court of Coffee and Books. Here we go:

A Fictional Family You Would Like To Spend Christmas Dinner With:

I don’t know if Red London has an equivalent to Christmas, I’d guess maybe some kind of winter holiday to do with celebrating magic since Christianity isn’t a thing there but if they do have some kind of winter holiday, then I would love to spend it with Kell, Lila, Rhy and Alucard, soaking in all the Red London holiday traditions and just enjoying the chaos that will inevitably happen with Kell and Alucard in a room together.

A Bookish Item You Would Like To Receive As A Gift:

I do not really need more art prints especially as I have no where to put them at the moment but I have always loved this version of The Book Thief’s cover and I love the whole putting book cover illustrations on recycled book/newspaper pages, it’s so cool.

A Fictional Character You Think Would Make A Perfect Christmas Elf:

Fleetfoot from Throne of Glass! Put an Elf hat on that dog and she’s ready to go, ready to deliver Christmas (or whatever the equivalent is in the world of Throne of Glass) cheer!

Match A Book To Its Perfect Christmas Song:

The Silvered Serpents fits really well with Last Christmas: not only does it have a very wintery setting (and if I remember rightly, it’s been a few years, but I think took place near to or just immediately after Christmas?) but Laila and Severin’s relationship in this book is very Last Christmas-esque, because Severin is deliberately pushing Laila away because he’s scared of losing her, so it’s a very strained dynamic.

BAH Humbug! A Book Or Fictional Character You’ve Been Disappointed In And Should Be Put On The Naughty List:

I had a few I could have picked from for this year, it’s not been the best reading year for me, but this one definitely stands out. Bake-Off x Murder should have been a recipe for success for me but the book seemed to forget it was meant to be a murder mystery and just completely sidestepped the murder till the final part of the book, by which point the resolution ended up being very rushed. I was so ready to love this book but it ended up being a disappointing 3 star for me.

Book Or Fictional Character You Think Deserves More Love And Appreciation And Deserves To Be Put On The Nice List:

She was fairly popular so I don’t know if I’d say she’s underappreciated but Dalila from The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi definitely goes on my nice list this year. I’m not sure she would appreciate being called nice, she is the Mistress of Poisons after all, but I love her anyway!

Red, Green and Gold: A Cover That Has A Wonderfully Christmas Feel To It

Okay, so The Silvered Serpents would have been perfect for this but I didn’t want to use it twice, so instead, I went with Romanov. The colour scheme of the red and the gold is very Christmas and the drops of blood almost look like holly berries with the kind of leafy swirl design. It’s not a hugely Christmassy book in itself but it certainly looks Christmassy!

A Book Or Series You Love So Much You Want Everyone To Find It Under Their Christmas Tree This Year So They Can Read It And Love It Too:

I didn’t want to necessarily use the same books for multiple prompts, but the Shades of Magic trilogy is one of my absolute favourite series, so I just couldn’t not pick it. I want everyone to experience the same joy that I felt travelling across the Londons with Lila and Kell!

So there we go, that was my Christmassy book tag for this year, The Festive Christmas Book Tag. If you’re reading this and want to do a festive tag before Christmas, then consider yourself tagged! Do you have any Christmas songs that you think work perfectly with books you’ve read? What are your plans for Christmas? Let me know in the comments!

I’ll be back next week with my final Top Ten Tuesday of 2023 (how did this year go so fast?), we’re meant to be doing Recent Additions To Our Bookshelf but I’ve done a couple of those already this year and not sure I really have too much more to add, so instead, I’m going to be taking an about turn away from books and talking about my Favourite Theatre Shows of 2023, as I’ve seen so much good stuff this year and I just want to rave about it all even more than I already have done. Sorry to all those who do not follow me for the theatre, I promise it will be back to bookish business as normal for the beginning of 2024! I will also have a lot coming your way in the next couple of weeks, as is common for me in at the end of the year as I desperately scramble to catch up with all the stuff I should have done by now but haven’t: I’ll finally have my YALC recap for you, I’ll at last put up my VE Schwab event recap from all the way back in October (thank goodness that one was livestreamed because I genuinely would not remember enough to recap at this point!), I’ve got my last Quarterly Rewind of the year, my regular End of Year Survey and End of Year Check Ins and maybe some reviews, if I actually remember to sit down and write them between all that! Basically, lots to come here between now and the beginning of 2024.

Merry Christmas everyone, and hope you all have a lovely time however you’re celebrating (and if you don’t celebrate Christmas, that you have a lovely restful break from work with your families).

Top Ten Tuesday #421-The Literary Dinner Party 2022 Tag

Hi everyone! I hope you’ve all had a good week since I last did one of these, mine has been fairly busy especially over the last couple of days. My mum and I went to another flamenco show at Battersea Spanish on Saturday and it was really fun, I think we both agreed that we liked the musicians at the first show we went to better, but the flamenco dancer this time was truly spectacular. Me, my mum and my dad all went out last night, we got my Dad tickets to this one night only performance of The Simon and Garfunkel Story at the Palladium for his birthday (it’s kind of like a Simon and Garfunkel tribute act, but better & more theatrical) and despite not really knowing much of their music, I had a really great time, the singers, Will Strong and Oliver Cave were both spectacular and the live band were something else, truly extraordinary. My dad also had a really great night, so that was definitely a birthday present success.

Anyway, it’s Tuesday, so I have another Top Ten Tuesday for you all, courtesy of Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. I’m going off script once again this week because the topic, Things That Make Me Instantly Want To Read A Book is one that we did a few years ago, and honestly the list really hasn’t changed for me? I maybe read in a few more different genres than I did back then but a lot of the things I like in books weren’t really genre specific to begin with anyway, there were a few that are fairly fantasy specific, like dragons but most of the others can be found in various different genres of book. So anyway, I’m not doing that, and instead I’ve got another book tag for you, which it seems is one of my go-to’s when I’m not feeling the topic. This one is The Literary Book Party 2022 Tag which I saw on Carol @ Reading Ladies blog back in January and thought was fun (the tag is originally by Joanne @ Portobello Book Blog). It might be a little late on in the year than normal to do a tag inspired by 2022 reading, but I haven’t really read enough in 2023 yet to fill a full tag, so we’re rolling with 2022! Anyway, here we go:

1. A Character Who Can Cook/Likes To Cook

This one had me stumped for a bit, because I couldn’t really think of the top of my head who from my 2022 reads liked cooking or was a good cook. Then I remembered that it’s mentioned a couple of times in Looking For Jane that Evelyn’s friend and later partner Tom is a good cook and is often cooking for her, so I figured he could be our dinner party chef (I mean it’s certainly not going to be me!).

2. A Character Who Has The Money To Fund The Party

Mayor Hugh Grant is a fairly wealthy man, so I think he could afford to fund an extravagant dinner party for me and all my guests!

3. A Character Who Might Cause A Scene

Nellie Bly is incredibly good at causing a scene, it’s what allows her to get locked up in Blackwell’s in the first place! Still I would have loved to have met the real Nellie and be able to ask her questions about her life and her work as a journalist: given I can’t do that as the real Nellie has been dead for just over a century now, I’ll settle for inviting her to my imaginary dinner party and imagining I could ask her questions about her life and work.

4. A Character Who Is Funny or Amusing

Lyudmila Pavlichenko has such a dry and cutting wit that I reckon she would have been great fun, if a little scary to have at the dinner table. I would have loved to have met the real Mila, she seems like she was such a fascinating women. But again, since I can’t, I’ll settle for inviting her to my imaginary dinner party. She would need to be checked for weapons on the way in and out though…….

5. A Character Who Is Super Social or Popular

Robin Blyth definitely fits the bill for this, he’s definitely the life and soul of the party type of person and I reckon any dinner party with him at it would become instantly more fun, though the potential for danger with him there would be slightly greater!

6. A Villain

Bit of a strange thing to want a villain at a dinner party, but I’ll roll with it. I didn’t have too many books with villains in the traditional sense last year, and those that were I really would not want to have at a dinner party. However, since Sam Colton from this book plays an antagonistic role for Nellie, I figured he would work well enough for this one. We’d just have to hope that not too many sparks would fly between the pair of them at the dinner table…..

7. One Couple

Instead of choosing a romantic couple for this one, I’d thought I’d choose a….well it’s hard to really describe this pair without going into massive spoilers for the book, so I’ll just say friends and choose Nancy and Evelyn. I would love to be able to talk to them both about their work with the Jane Network.

8. A Hero/Heroine

Hero:

Since Robin is coming, it seems only fair to invite Edwin too, make sure that we have someone who can keep Robin in check! Robin would have 1000% died without Edwin multiple times over the course of this book, so I definitely think it’s only fair to consider Edwin the real hero of the tale. Plus I just have a soft spot for the prickly yet kind hearted librarian magician and would absolutely need to discuss his library classification system with him at length.

Heroine:

We might have to check her bags on the way out to make sure nothing had mysteriously gone missing (she is an infamous thief after all) but Nahri would be so much fun to have at a dinner party, and useful as well, being a healer as she is, in case anyone got ill at the party.

9. An Under Appreciated Character

I always loved Zaynab and never felt like she got enough credit for everything she for Daevabad, especially in the second book and I always wish she got more page time. She did get her own story in The River of Silver which I loved, but I would love to have her at this dinner party and get to learn a bit more about her: take this as my petition to Shannon Chakraborty to do a book about Zaynab in the future!

10. One Character of Your Choosing

I’d love to meet Elaine and chat to her about her work with the printing press and everything she did for the Resistance (if she was willing to talk about that). I’d also love to find out more about her reunion with Ava and if they kept in touch over the years as that was one part of the book that I felt was a little short and I wanted to know more.

11. A Troubled Soul

Poor Ursula, she suffers so much in her various lives, so I’d definitely call her a troubled soul. She deserves a night of fun so hopefully this dinner party could be that for her. Though I won’t lie, I’d definitely want to find out from her about how the whole reincarnation thing works and just how much she remembers from her previous lives.

12. A Young Adult Character

Briseis could provide the table decorations for the evening since she’s so good with plants. I would love to have a chance to see her powers in action and maybe chat to her a little about the more unique plant species that grow in her garden!

So there we go, those are the characters I’d invite to my Literary Dinner Party. Quite a eclectic bunch no? I think it would be a very fun, if slightly chaotic evening! Have you read any of these books? Which characters would you invite to your own literary dinner party? Let me know in the comments!

I’ll be back next Tuesday for another Top Ten Tuesday, once again I will be altering the topic as next week’s topic is the inverse of this week’s original topic Things That Instantly Make Me Not Want To Read A Book and again my list of those hasn’t change much since I last made it. So instead, I’ll be doing a topic I saw on Cindy’s Book Corner last week and sharing 10 Netgalley Rejections That Crushed Me as that seemed really fun!

Top Ten Tuesday #414-Spotify Wrapped Book Tag 2022

Hi everyone! I hope you’ve all had a good week since my last one of these. I had a really good time at When We Died on Saturday night, it was a great and really interesting play and I’m so glad that The Indie and the PR team for the show gave me the opportunity to go and see it. The review is live on The Indiependent website if any of you are interested in reading it! My great month of theatre continues, I have a show booked in every week except the last week in April this month, so lots of exciting things to see. Tonight my mum and I are going to see Ain’t Too Proud which we booked as part of London Theatre Week last month, so I’m very excited for that, hopefully it will be good. I’ll admit, I’m less familiar with the music of The Temptations than my mum, but I’m sure that won’t matter too much!

Anyway, today’s Top Ten Tuesday is courtesy of Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl as always. Except I’m going completely off piste this week and instead of doing the official topic of Indie Books I’ve Read (because honestly I’ve not read too many), I’m going to do this book tag called The Spotify Wrapped Book Tag (2022) which I saw on Dedra (A Book Wanderer’s) blog a while back and looked really fun so I thought I’d save it for a day when I wasn’t feeling the topic, and that day has arrived!

The tag was originally created by Rosina @ Lace and Dagger Books. The idea is as follows, you put your 2022 playlist on shuffle (I don’t have Spotify, so I just did this by putting my iPod on shuffle) and for the first five songs (adjusted to ten like Dedra to fit TTT), you have to pick a book you read in 2022 to fit that song. They don’t need to be a perfect fit, you just have to explain why you picked that book for that song, and you can skip if you need to, as not every book will fit every song.

I’ll admit, this tag was a lot harder than I initially thought it would be as I read far less books in 2022 than I would usually, so there were less options to pick from, and my taste in music doesn’t particularly match my taste in books. Still it was a really fun and slightly different thing for me to do for TTT, so I hope you enjoy it:

1. So It Goes…-Paired With: A Marvellous Light, Freya Marske

I don’t want to share the actual song for this one since Taylor hasn’t re-recorded Reputation yet, and I won’t be sharing any of the music she doesn’t own, but I’m sure a lot of you will have heard it before anyway! I felt like this one worked quite well for Robin and Edwin, the word “magician” is in the lyrics and this song also just has a very sexy vibe, which if you’ve read A Marvellous Light, you’ll know that’s true for this book as well!

2. It’s Nice To Have A Friend-Paired With: This Poison Heart

This one was a little hard to pair, but I decided to go with This Poison Heart since a major part of the premise is Bri moving to a new town, and her new friends become a big part of the story.

3. Roar-Paired With: Fix The System, Not The Women

A non-fiction book might seem like an odd choice but I feel like this song and this book have very similar vibes, Roar is all about standing up for yourself and self-empowerment and reading Fix The System, Not The Women definitely had me feeling angry about the various ways the patriarchy works against women and wanting to tear the whole system down, so I feel like the vibes work!

4. Come Alive-Paired With: The Diamond Eye

Okay, this might seem like kind of an ironic song choice given that The Diamond Eye is about war, but hear me out! A lot of Mila’s journey in this book is about coming into herself, finding her place in the world and gathering the courage to stand up to her abusive ex-husband, and this song definitely works for those themes.

5. Thinking of You-Paired With: The Librarian Spy

This was a difficult one to pair, but I eventually landed on The Librarian Spy because although Elaine does not end up in a relationship with Josef’s friend Etienne (thankfully!), I felt like this worked quite well for where she is for the most of the book: she has to work with Etienne as part of the Resistance, but working with her husband’s best friend does remind her a lot her missing husband and so it works for the basic premise of the song, even if the exact situation isn’t the same as the one Katy Perry describes in Thinking Of You.

6. Story of Tonight-Paired With: Resistance Women

Different war sure, and several hundred years separating the history, but I think this song works just as well for the Red Orchestra in this book as it does for the Revolutionary War soldiers in Hamilton. After all, they were fighting to free their country from the Nazis and for the hope of a better future, despite knowing it was likely many of them would die without getting to see it.

7. Getaway Car-Paired With: Portrait of A Thief

Again no clip for this one as it doesn’t yet have a Taylor’s version. I almost squealed when this song came up on my shuffle because I knew instantly which book to pair it with: Portrait of A Thief is a heist novel, and one of the main characters, Lily is a getaway driver and there are a lot of car chases in this book, so on a purely surface level, Getaway Car is the perfect match for this book!

8. invisible string-Paired With: Looking For Jane

It’s so hard to explain why this song and this book are the perfect fit without going in to spoilery territory, so let’s just say: all three main characters of this novel are bound together in some way and this song is all about feeling connected to someone before you’ve even met them which works so perfectly for this book.

9. Gonna Get Even-Paired With: The Mad Girls of New York

Much of Nellie’s impetus for doing the Madhouse article in the first place is to get even, to prove to the male editors who have kept turning her down that female journalists can do something, and not only that, that there are some stories only female journalists can get. She also has a rivalry with a fellow reporter, Sam Colton for much of the book as well, so the song also works on that level.

10. Coming Home-Paired With: Life After Life

I found this song very fitting for Ursula Todd, the main character of Life After Life because no matter where she goes in her many lives, she always ends up coming back to her home, Fox Corner and her family.

So there we go, a slightly different tag and TTT for you all today, but I hope you found it as fun as I did! If nothing else, it’s given you a big of an insight into my taste in music (although the fact I listen to a lot of Taylor Swift probably wasn’t a surprise to all that many of you!). Have you read any of these books? Do you agree with my book/song pairings? Let me know in the comments!

If you want to give this tag a go, I definitely recommend it, it was really fun, if a little tricky! I’ll be back next week with another Top Ten Tuesday, this time it’s Titles With Animals In Them/Covers With Animals On Them. I’ve done Covers With Nature On Them but not specifically animals, and it’s been a while since we last did a covers topic, so I think I’m going to go down the cover route and do Covers With Animals On Them.

Top Ten Tuesday #399-Reindeer Book Tag

Hi all! I hope you’ve all had a good week since I last did one of these. I arrived in Australia on Thursday morning and have been having a great time so far. I went shopping with my sister on Saturday, and we went to quite a few cool bookshops which was great, my favourite was one called Coventry Bookstore, a small independent bookshop owned by a married couple, one of the owners John, was super helpful in recommending books for my dad’s Christmas present and his wife Belinda was doing gift wrapping, which I very gratefully took up as I am a horrible present wrapper! We went to a couple of other bookshops as well, one was called Hill of Content and it was really lovely too, I swear if I didn’t have limited space in my suitcase, I would have bought quite a few books from here because they had a great selection. The final one we went to was the Paperback Bookshop, and that one is the kind of bookshop that you imagine just lives in a book lover’s mind as their ideal place, it had that book smell as soon as you walked in and there were books stacked everywhere in no particular order, it was kind of like a bookish maze! Not so good if you were looking for something specific, but really great to browse. I also went to the State Library yesterday and that was really cool, it’s such a gorgeous building.

In non-book related outings, we went to a couple of the wineries in the Mt Macedon regions on Sunday, and that was really lovely, it was a beautiful day, and the wines were generally all really good. I’ve also got a trail ride booked for tomorrow (because of course I had to fit some riding in somewhere), and we’re going to see Hamilton on Thursday, so all in all it’s shaping up to be an exciting week!

Anyway enough of my rambling, it’s time for another Top Ten Tuesday, courtesy of Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. This week is meant to be our annual Books I Hope Santa Brings This Year, but since I generally don’t get all that many books for Christmas, I am once again going rogue and doing a Christmassy book tag instead! It’s become a tradition over the last few years and it’s always fun to do, so I thought why not do it again? This year, I’m doing the Reindeer Book Tag, inspired of course by Rudolph, and this one was created by booktuber Hailey in Bookland. So here we go:

Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer: An Underdog Or An Inspiring Book/Character

Not a character but a real person, Chanel Miller’s story of her sexual assault and the aftermath of that was many things. Infuriating in places, when you see what survivors have to go through in order to get justice (and even then how they don’t), emotional of course, funny in places, powerful and even hopeful despite everything she went through. I found it really inspiring reading this, listening to her reclaiming her identity and power and also just in how brave she was to go public with her story because it can’t have been easy.

Dasher: A Book You Read Quickly Or A Fashionable Character

I finished this one in about four days, and granted it’s a really short audiobook, just over 4 hours, so it probably doesn’t seem that fast, but it’s very quick for me. It was a super funny and engaging read, and though I was mainly in it for the Gilmore Girls stories, I found Graham’s pre-Gilmore Girls stories of her life as an actress equally fun.

Dancer: An Artistically Inspiring Book Or A Character Who Loves To Party

I’m not really one for artsy books, so character who loves to party it is! This one was pretty obvious for me: Evie O’Neill from The Diviners Series. Evie is definitely the life and soul of the party to a damaging degree as her partying tendencies can be a little self-destructive and are definitely a coping mechanism to deal with her underlying depression (which is addressed more as the series goes on).

Prancer: A Light-Hearted Book Or A Conceited Character

What could be more light-hearted than a book about two very loveable Labradors? Olive and Mabel brought smiles to so many people over lockdown and I couldn’t stop grinning when listening to this book all about their adventures and their rise to Internet fame!

Vixen: A Trickster Character Or A Deceptively Hard/Easy Read

I know a vixen is meant to be a female deer, but as soon as I saw this prompt, there was only one name to come to mind: Kaz Brekker. Kaz is a criminal mastermind and in this book undertakes a tricky heist with the help of his crew and breaks into the infamous Ice Court to retrieve a hostage being held captive there. Kaz definitely fits the trickster definition as his whole life is about running cons!

Comet: A Book That Is Out of This World Or A Children’s Book

Given that the movie version of the stage musical released fairly recently, I thought that this would be an apt choice. Matilda was one of my favourite books as a kid, I really loved Roald Dahl and obviously this was my favourite because I could see a lot of myself in Matilda, but it’s also just a really fun read!

Cupid: A Couple That You Really Want To Be Together Or A Hyped Book That You Liked

It’s not my absolute favourite Schwab book I’ve ever read, that title still goes to A Darker Shade of Magic, but I really enjoyed Addie LaRue, a lot more than I was expecting to given that slow, lyrically written books generally aren’t usually my kind of thing!

Donner: A Book You Constantly Shout About, Or An Opinionated Character, Or A Character Who Lacks Tact

Katniss was the first character to come to mind for this as her lack of tact is quite prevalent throughout the books!

Blitzen: A Powerful Book Or A Quick Read

I already did a quick read further up the tag, so I thought I’d go for powerful book for this one. Laura Bates’ 2020 release, Men Who Hate Women was an incredibly powerful read, I learned a lot about the different communities of extreme misogynists and their online worlds and how that spills into offline action. It was quite scary in places reading about the activities of some of these groups and how they have inspired horrific violent murders of women. Still I definitely did feel a lot more informed after reading it!

Olive: A Self-Effacing Character

Is Olive a reindeer? I swear I’ve never heard that name in the song! Anyway, this one was a little more challenging for me to do as the books I read tend to have more brash characters, but I thought Charlie from The Perks of Being A Wallflower fit well here. He’s shy, modest and doesn’t really like to stand out, preferring to blend into the background.

So there we go, that was my 2022 Christmas book tag, the Reindeer tag! If you’re reading this and want to do a Christmassy tag before Christmas, then consider yourself tagged! Has anyone heard of Olive the reindeer? Have I just missed something all these years? What are your plans for Christmas this year? Let me know in the comments!

I’ll be back next week with my final Top Ten Tuesday of 2022, which will also be my 400th Top Ten Tuesday ever! Feels like a nice one to end the year on. Our final topic of this year is Most Recent Additions To My Book Collection, an evergreen TTT as those shelves are always growing! In the meantime, I’ve got quite a bit planned for the end of the year, though we’ll see how we go as I am on holiday and I might be having too much fun doing other stuff to write blog posts. I’ve got three reviews to catch up on, so I’m going to do my best to get those up before the end of the year, I’ve got my last Quarterly Rewind post of 2022, which will probably be coming your way on either Thursday or Friday, and my End of Year Survey and End of Year Check In which will be coming your way once I’m back in the UK I think! Either way, there’s lots of content coming for you between now and the end of the year.

Merry Christmas everyone, and I hope you all have a lovely one however you’re celebrating!

Midnights Book Tag

Hi everyone! As has become tradition whenever Taylor Swift releases a new album, I have another Taylor Swift themed book tag for you all. However, this one is a little different, as I’m doing my own prompts for this. There are other Midnights tags out there, but I had some ideas I wanted to use for it, and I thought it would be fun to try and do my own original tag, as I’ve not done one of those in years. I’m not sure if I loved Midnights as much as either folklore or evermore, but I’ve only actually listened to it once through so far, so I’m sure the songs will grow on me as I listen more. My current favourites are Anti-Hero, Mastermind, Snow on The Beach and You’re On Your Own Kid, but honestly, my favourites definitely change around from the first listen, so I’m not expecting that to stay the same the more I listen to the album.

Feel free to use my prompts if you want to, just credit me if you do!

1. Lavender Haze-A book that you felt completely engrossed in

I remember sitting outside on my uni’s campus in Stirling, the weather was really beautiful for once, and I just sat for hours and hours reading this book, I could not put it down. I had to know how the Gangsey’s story ended and I was not disappointed!

2. Maroon-A book that has stuck with you over the years

I first read this book when I was about 11 or 12, and it’s definitely one that has stuck with me over the years. I’m not sure I’ll ever be over the ending of this book to be honest, it was the first book I remember being completely crushed by.

3. Anti-Hero-A book character who is constantly causing problems

I love Lila Bard, but when I first heard the line “It’s me, hi, I’m the problem, it’s me”, I was like this is Lila to a tee! She’s constantly causing problems and running headlong into trouble, but we love her anyway!

4. Snow On The Beach-A book with an unexpected premise

Life After Life is definitely an unusual kind of story, with the protagonist Ursula Todd, dying and coming back to live her life over and over again, each time trying to avoid the mistakes which killed her in the previous life. It didn’t always work for me, but it was definitely a very different kind of book to what I usually read.

5. You’re On Your Own Kid-A lonely character

Osla was the first character to come to mind for this one, loneliness and her longing for love and family is such a huge part of her storyline in this book and it’s one of the reasons why the girls’ friendship breakup hit me so hard because Osla had finally found the family she longed for and then it all fell apart and she was back to being alone.

6. Midnight Rain-A couple that were too different to work

I never really understood what Ada and Camille saw in each other, they hardly seemed to like each other most of the time! They seemed so ill-suited to each other and they were always so much happier apart than they seemed together, so it was definitely a case of a mismatch of personalities for me.

7. Question?-A couple who just cannot communicate

I mean, I could have chosen a lot of books for this one, because YA characters always tend have issues with communication, but Laila and Severin from this series have to take the cake! I really hope they managed to get their act together in the final book of the trilogy because reading their endless streams of miscommunication in the second book was a challenge!

8. Vigilante Shit-A character who is out for revenge

This song SCREAMS Marcella Riggins. If I was to try and describe Marcella Riggins as a character to anyone, and I wanted to point to a song that encapsulated what her character was about perfectly, it would be Vigilante Shit.

9. Bejewled-A book cover that really stands out

This is one of my absolute favourite book covers, and I feel like it’s got that slightly shimmery quality that fits well with Bejeweled.

10. Labyrinth-A book that was an emotional rollercoaster

I was warned that this was an emotional read before I read it, and yet it still hit me like a gut punch. But it was a true rollercoaster journey to get to that inevitable end, and I swung between laughing and crying more than once in my time reading this book and was never quite sure which way I was going to go!

11. Karma-A character who got what they deserved

Rene, the main villain of this novel, definitely got what he deserved in the end, and both Eve and Charlie (the protagonists) got the happy endings that they deserved.

12. Sweet Nothing-Favourite Cinnamon Roll Character

Colton is a sweetheart who must be protected at all costs, that is all.

13. Mastermind- Favourite criminal mastermind

Much like “Vigilante Shit” screams Marcella Riggins, I feel like “Mastermind” has Kaz Brekker written all over it. Nothing left to chance, everything planned out in minute detail, and anything that you think is up to chance has actually been engineered by him? Yes, if Kaz Brekker was a song, Mastermind would definitely be it.

14. The Great War-A couple who are constantly in conflict with each other

Ah Enne and Levi. They have such great chemistry, but it is basically impossible to imagine them ever being happy together because they always seem to be involved in some kind of conflict or misunderstanding, or general angst and hardly ever actually seem happy with one another. It’s the kind of relationship which is constantly exhausting because it feels like both parties are always wired at 100, and never seem to calm down!

15. Bigger Than The Whole Sky-A character death that hit you hard

I won’t go into specifically which one here, because spoilers, but if you know you know! To be honest, I’m still not over any of the deaths from this book and I read it a good ten years ago now.

16. Paris-A book set in Paris

I know this song isn’t literally about being in Paris, but I’ve read quite a few great books set in Paris over the past few years, and Enchantee does work with the actual meaning of the song too as a major part of the story is Camille escaping her regular life in the bleakness of 1780s Paris to the glittering court of Versailles.

17. High Infidelity-A book containing an affair

One of the main characters in this book, Greta Lorke, engages in an affair with her later husband, Adam Kuckhoff, for part of this book. I don’t know if the affair has any historical accuracy, I’ve not seen any mention anywhere of Adam Kuckhoff having a first wife, so I imagine that the author maybe invented the affair for dramatic effect, but either way, it works for my prompt!

18. Glitch-A book that shouldn’t have worked for you, but did

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you’ll know that romance really isn’t my thing. I don’t even know why I picked up The Time Traveler’s Wife, I think my mum and sister had both read it and I was feeling left out? Anyway, it’s generally not the kind of book I would ever read but I ended up enjoying Clare and Henry’s story way more than I ever thought I would (however it is the exception, not the rule, I still largely don’t like romance-heavy stories!).

19. Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve-A Book You Think You Would Have Liked More If You’d Read It At A Different Time In Your Life

When I read Shadow and Bone in 2018, I liked it but didn’t LOVE IT. I do think part of that was having read Six of Crows first and seeing how much Leigh Bardugo had improved as a writer since her debut, but I also think that timing did come into a play a little here. I was 21 when I read Shadow and Bone, and had read a lot of YA fantasy at that point, so it just didn’t compare to other, better books I had read at the time. Had I read it when it came out, when I was 16/17, I reckon I would have had a very different opinion of it than I did at 21.

20. Dear Reader-A book with a diary format

I’m not usually a big fan of epistolary type books, but I did find The Princess Diaries series really fun to read when I was a teenager (I absolutely wouldn’t now, they’re not my kind of thing anymore, but at 14/15, I gobbled these books up).

So there we go, my first original book tag in a while! It was really fun coming up with my own prompts but it did take a lot longer than I expected, so kudos to the people who create tags all the time, it’s not easy!

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the tag, and if you would like to have a go using my prompts (and maybe do a prettier design than me, I’m not so good with the graphics, so different coloured fonts was the best I could manage!) then feel free to do so!

Have you listened to Midnights? What were your favourite songs? Let me know in the comments!

Mid Year Freak Out Tag (2022)

Hi everyone! It’s been ages since I’ve done a book tag, my last one was just before Christmas last year, so I thought it was about time to do another one and I saw Cait @ PaperFury’s responses to this tag earlier today and figured it had been a couple of years since I last did it, so it might be fun to do it again! We’re a little past mid-year, but hey, the first year I did this, I did it in September, so end of July is still better than that. So here we go:

Best Book You’ve Read So Far This Year

My only five star read of the year so far, and to be honest, it’s going to be a tough one for anything else to live up to! Chanel Miller’s memoir is such a strong, painful and powerful read and hearing her tell her story in her own words was definitely an experience I will never forget.

Best Sequel You’ve Read So Far In 2022

It’s not entirely a sequel, it’s a collection of short stories, some which are prequels, some sequels and some which take place during the events of the main book series, but it’s the closest thing I’ve read so far this year to a sequel (as I haven’t finished Good Girl, Bad Blood yet) so I decided I’d count it. I really enjoyed this one, some stories were better than others but it was overall a fun return to the Daevabad world.

New Release You Haven’t Read Yet But Want To

I have quite a few of these, but I decided to be good and stick to just the one! As a journalist myself, Nellie Bly’s story has always been of a lot of interest to me, and I’m excited to see Maya Rodale’s take on it.

Most Anticipated Release For The Second Half of The Year

This one comes out tomorrow and I’m so excited! The Last Bookshop In London was a surprise favourite of last year, so I’m so excited to see what Madeline Martin has in store for us next. Plus, when you combine librarians and spies, you have two of my favourite things in the world, so how can this book really go that far wrong?

Biggest Disappointment

This book should have been everything to me. Female rage, dragons, feminism, everything about it sounded like something I would love. And then it ended up being the MOST BORING BOOK IN THE WORLD. My expectations for this one were so high and then they ended up hitting the floor.

Biggest Surprise

I wasn’t expecting S.A. Chakraborty to do anything more with the Daevabad world after finishing the trilogy in 2020, so this book’s sheer existence was a surprise, I only found about it I think because someone in my Goodreads book club was reading it, I didn’t even know it was coming out! And what a lovely surprise getting more Daevabad content was.

Favourite new author

As this is my favourite book of the year so far, I had to put Chanel as my favourite new author. I hope she gets the chance to write more books in the future as she’s a really great writer and whilst obviously her story is incredibly powerful and important and I’m so glad she decided to share it with all of us, I do hope that she gets the opportunity to write more books that aren’t about her assault.

Out of your Comfort Zone (I’m borrowing PaperFury’s prompt for this as I wasn’t feeling the fictional crush prompt)

Much as I loved this one, it was very difficult to read in places and did push me out of my comfort zone quite a lot whilst reading.

Newest Favourite Character

This might be slightly cheating as Mila Pavlichenko was a real person, but Kate Quinn’s fictionalised version of her has to be my favourite character of any book this year. She sounds like she was quite a firecracker of a woman and I only wish I’d ever been able to meet her, as I’m sure she would have been a very fun (if quite scary!) person to hang out with!

Favourite New Audiobook Narrator (I wasn’t feeling book that made you cry so I kept the prompt I made up last time)

I’ve listened to a lot of previously liked audiobook narrators this year, so I didn’t have too many to choose from who were new, but I’m currently listening to Life After Life by Kate Atkinson and although I’m not loving the book as much as I’d hoped (I really enjoyed the TV show, but they definitely slim-lined a lot of it for the better!), I am really enjoying Fenella Woolgar’s narration (yes, that is Sister Hilda from Call The Midwife).

Book That Made You Happy

I’ve read quite a lot of fairly serious books this year, or at least books covering fairly serious content, but this one was just a whole lot of fun that made me smile and laugh the whole way through. Nothing like listening to the antics of two loveable Labradors to act as a palate cleanser!

Most Beautiful Book You’ve Bought This Year

I bought this one at YALC a couple of weeks ago, and I will freely admit, part of the pull to buy it was definitely the cover. That deep purple is just…..*chef’s kiss*. I can only hope the inside is as lovely as the outside!

What Books Do You Need To Read By The End of The Year

I will most likely only finish one or two of these given how slowly I’ve been reading this year, but that’s okay! They’ve all been on my shelf for a while and I’d really like to get them knocked off my list soon as they were all books I was really excited for (and the first and third have sequels coming out, which I’d quite like to get to!).

And that brings us to the end of this year’s (slightly later than mid year) Freak Out Tag! I never know who to tag for these things, so if you see this and would like to do it, then have at it. And let me know how your reading year is going in the comments!

Top Ten Tuesday #347-The Christmas Movie Book Tag

Hi everyone! I hope you’ve all had a good week since I last did one of these! I arrived up in Stirling to join my family for Christmas yesterday, and me and Mum spent yesterday evening decorating the tree, which is always one of my favourite parts of Christmas so that was really nice.

Anyway, it’s Tuesday, so I have another Top Ten Tuesday for you guys, courtesy of Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. Now this week’s topic is meant to be a Bookish Wishes post where we share our wishlists, but I wasn’t really feeling that topic so instead I’m going rogue (as I always do this time of year anyway!) and sharing a Christmassy themed Book Tag, as has become tradition in the last three years! This year’s tag is The Christmas Movie Book Tag, courtesy of Aoife at Pretty Purple Polka Dots, you can check out Aoife’s post here: https://prettypurplepolkadots.wordpress.com/2019/12/19/the-christmas-movie-book-tag/

Here we go, the Christmas Movie Book Tag:

Elf-Choose a book that puts you in the Christmas mood

I’ll be honest, I don’t really read Christmas themed books much, I tend to watch Christmassy films more, but if I had to choose (and I swear I wouldn’t use She Who Must Not Be Named if I could think of any other options), Harry Potter always puts me in a Christmassy mood because the films are always on TV at Christmas.

It’s A Wonderful Life-Choose a book with a character who goes through some serious character development

All three girls in this book go on quite a journey, but I have to highlight Beth Finch for this prompt. She starts as a painfully shy and withdrawn young woman who is completely controlled by her emotionally and physically abusive mother, and by the end of the book, she is practically a different person, she grows so much in confidence and in her abilities as a cryptanalyst and the moment where she confronts her mother and leaves home was possibly one of the most satisfying parts of the book. Also is this the time to admit that I’ve never actually seen It’s A Wonderful Life? *withdraws slowly and carefully*

A Christmas Carol-Choose a book/series with a character you didn’t like at first, but grew to love

When we were initially introduced to Ali in The City of Brass, I didn’t really like him much, I thought he was uptight and obnoxious and I didn’t really feel like he was going to be someone I could root for. However as the book went on, and we got to know him more, I ended up liking him more and more and by the end he had definitely achieved cinnamon roll, must protect at all costs status.

Home Alone-Choose a book where the parents aren’t present and if they are, they’re not a good influence

Unwind is probably the best example of the WORST PARENTS EVER. Connor’s parents basically decide that they can’t deal with him anymore so the best solution to this is to have him unwound (basically taken apart and all your organs are donated to other people so you’re not technically “dead”). Risa is an orphan, so we don’t really know what her parents are like, but her guardians at the group home she’s in send her off to be unwound so that they have less mouths to feed, and Lev’s parents decide to sacrifice Lev for unwinding as they are religious and believe that having him be unwound is for the greater good. Basically it’s bad parents/guardians all round here!

Frosty the Snowman-Find a book with a snowy cover

This was a no brainer for me, it’s the most wintery cover I’ve ever seen! Plus this cover is so pretty, I take any opportunity I can to share it.

Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer-Choose a protagonist you couldn’t help but root for

Eve from The Alice Network is definitely the kind of protagonist that could rub people up the wrong way, she’s quite abrasive but she’s the kind of woman that I absolutely love, she doesn’t care about being liked, she says what she thinks, she’s super funny and brave and determined and I was absolutely rooting for her the whole way through this book!

Polar Express-Find a book where characters travel somewhere cold

I just finished this book yesterday, and the characters travel all over Europe, but one of the places is Iceland which is obviously very cold, so fitted the prompt perfectly!

How The Grinch Stole Christmas-Choose a villain you can’t help but love

I mean I love a good villain, so honestly I could go for like 90% of villains I’ve read here, but I decided on Marcella Riggins because I just loved her so much. She’s got epic “I’m done with men” energy and is just so tired of being underestimated and wants to claim her own power. Obviously this is turned up to 10,000 and manifests in killing people, which I can’t relate to but I can definitely relate to being ambitious and wanting to prove people who underestimate you wrong!

National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation-Choose a character with a goofy sense of humour

I don’t know if his sense of humour is exactly goofy, but Enrique is definitely one of my favourite funny characters from the last couple of years. He adds a much needed levity to Severin’s crew, and I just have such a soft spot for funny characters, so I fell in love with him almost instantly when reading this book.

Lifetime/Hallmark movie-Choose a book with the cheesiest romance

I’m not really one for cheesy romances, and I read this series a long time ago, but I do remember thinking that the romance in The Princess Diaries series was very cheesy. To be honest, the whole series is quite cheesy (but fun, if you’re into those kinds of books).

So there we go, the Christmas Movie Book Tag! I’ve actually not watched quite a lot of these films, so clearly I’m not as up on Christmas films as I thought I was. What are your favourite Christmas films? What are everyone’s plans for Christmas this year? Let me know in the comments!

I’ll be back next week with the last Top Ten Tuesday of 2021, as always talking about my favourite books of the year. In the meantime, I’ve got a lot of content planned as ever for this final couple of weeks of 2021, I’ve got my last Quarterly Rewind of the year, I’ll have my End of Year Survey and End of Year Check-In, I’ve still got a couple more book reviews to do…..so keep your eyes peeled for lots more content coming your way in the next couple of weeks.

Merry Christmas everyone and I hope however you’re celebrating, you have a great time!

Evermore Book Tag

Hi everyone! You could probably guess this one was coming, Taylor Swift released another surprise album Evermore in December (she’s had a more productive quarantine than the entire world combined). Surprise, surprise, I loved it, it’s got quite a different feel to folklore, but it’s still quite clear why it’s a “sister album”. As always my favourite songs change the more I listen to them, but at present my favourites are: no body, no crime, champagne problems, happiness and long story short.

This is an original tag created by Ahaana @ Windows To Worlds, who also created the graphics that I’ll be using in this tag, which are super beautiful so thank you for allowing us to use them. Here are the rules for the tag:

-Link back to the original creator, Ahaana’s post.

-Tag at least 5 people.

-Thank the person who tagged you and link back to their post (I wasn’t actually tagged to do this, I just wanted to, so I guess I self-tagged!)

-Feel free to use Ahaana’s graphics (as I have done) but make sure to credit her in your post if you do.

I dare you to read this book and not fall in love with Percy, Grover and Annabeth! I dare you. This series will always be super special to me, as it was how me and Hannah became friends, so even though I feel I’ve aged out of Rick Riordan’s books, Percy will always have a special place in my heart.

This was the first book I thought of when I saw this prompt, as Sephy and Callum’s relationship is doomed to be broken from the very beginning due to the society they live in. Also it fitted quite well for me because Champagne Problems is a heart-breaking song and this is an heart-breaking book.

I will admit that gold rush is one of my least favourite songs from evermore, so “love with all my heart” doesn’t really fit how I feel about the song. Still, it had to be A Darker Shade of Magic, it’s one of my all time favourite books, it has everything, memorable characters, fantastic world building and a brilliant plot. Plus it had to be a Schwab book for this one, she’s one of my all time favourite authors.

Ali returns to Daevabad after five years away, so this seemed like quite a fitting book to use for this one as a lot of it finds him trying to reconnect with his brother and sister and the city that he left behind in the first book.

I’m not talking about Feyre and Rhys here, rather I thought Feyre and Tamlin was quite fitting for this prompt. Feyre suffers so much because of Tamlin in this book.

There are plenty of bodies and crimes in this one, it’s a murder mystery revolving around Jack The Ripper! In fact all of the books from this series could have fitted with this prompt as they are all historical murder mysteries.

I didn’t want to go for Harry Potter because it seemed too obvious, so instead I went for this one as I really did enjoy The Princess Diaries series when I was a young teenager, but it’s not the kind of series I would go for anymore, far too romance heavy for me now!

One of my favourite female friendship books, this seemed like the perfect one to choose for this prompt as Carmen, Lena, Bridget and Tibby have basically been friends since birth and this series is all about their friendship.

I notoriously do not cry at books, this is one of only two that I’ve ever cried at, both were WWII based books. The bit where Lina exchanges the pocket watch for her brother’s life really got to me, and there were so many other truly harrowing moments in this book, particularly when you remember that what happened to Lina in this book, really did happen to millions of people under Stalin.

My Sister’s Keeper was not my usual read, I didn’t really read adult fiction before I found this book when I was 13 and I definitely wouldn’t have thought a contemporary book about a girl who was born to save her dying sister would become a favourite of mine, but it’s a really heart-breaking, beautiful story and I ended up really loving it.

I could have gone for Six of Crows for this one, but I wanted to highlight my other favourite gang of thieves here! I really enjoyed this heist romp last year and can’t want to read the sequel next month.

Were you a bookworm child if you didn’t read Matilda? Anyway, Roald Dahl was a childhood staple for me (though of course we now know that he was pretty terrible person) and Matilda was definitely one of my favourite childhood books.

This is such a moving book in general but I found the Rabbits’ stories particularly moving, which were based on real women who were experimented on under the Nazis and were left with horrifying physical damage, if they survived at all. It was definitely an incredibly moving and emotional read.

I’ve been impatiently waiting for this one since I read the first book in September of 2019, and it’s finally going to be here in March. I can’t wait to see how Tavia, Wesley, Saxony and Karam’s story ends.

I don’t know if 5 books counts as a long series, but since I mainly read trilogies, 5 is quite a lot of books for one series to me and the final book in the first arc of the Camp Half Blood universe was a really perfect and satisfying finale.

I don’t really know who to tag, so if you’d like to do this then consider yourself tagged!

Top Ten Tuesday #295-Christmas Songs Book Tag

Hi all! I hope everyone’s okay after the UK Government’s most recent announcement and that however you are now spending your Christmas that you still manage to have the best Christmas possible under the circumstances. I will spending Christmas at home with my family, thankfully we had always planned to spend Christmas just the three of us, but I know not everyone is lucky enough to be able to spend Christmas with their families (or friends) this year, so if that applies to you and you are now finding yourself spending Christmas alone, I’m sending you all the love and hope that you still manage to have a good Christmas.

Anyway, after that slightly sombre note, onto happier things, it’s the last Tuesday before Christmas, and so that means it’s time for the annual Christmas TTT topic, courtesy of Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. As with last year, instead of talking about Books I Want Santa To Bring, I’m doing another Christmas Book Tag! This time it’s the Christmas Songs Book Tag, which is a book tag created by our host Jana, so it actually fits very well. You can check out Jana’s original tag here: http://www.thatartsyreadergirl.com/2020/12/2020-christmas-songs-book-club/

So here we go, the Christmas Songs Book Tag:

1. All I Want For Christmas Is You-Favourite Bookish Couple

Percy and Annabeth

My answer for this is always the same, I love Percy and Annabeth so much and they’re my favourite slow burn, friends to lovers couple ever!

2. I’ll Be Home For Christmas-Name a book where a character is away from home (school, vacation, etc.)

The main characters in the Chestnut Hill series (which I loved when I was about 12/13), all live at a boarding school with a big focus on riding.

3. Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas-Name your favourite “little” book (children’s book, short story, novella etc).

The copy of Black Beauty I have is only 183 pages long, so a very short book, but that’s one of the reasons why I love it so much, classics are usually so chunky! Also it’s a beautiful story, if very sad.

4. Santa Claus Is Coming Town-What book (s) do you hope Santa brings you this year?

Santa tells me all year round that I have too many books so I’m pretty sure that I’m not getting any books for Christmas, but if I was, I would love this one to complete the series and so that I have it ready for when I’ve read Book 2!

5. Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer-Which book turned your nose red (made you cry)?

This is one of only two books that have ever made me cry (the other is Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys if you’re interested). It’s truly so horrific what so many people went through under the Nazis during WWII and reading about the Rabbits (Polish women who were used for medical experiments in Ravensbruck), I couldn’t stop crying.

6. The Most Wonderful Time of The Year-Your favourite kind of book to read during the holidays

I don’t really read Christmassy books, so I decided to share one of my favourite Wintery books instead. Ironically, I read Six of Crows at the height of summer 2017 when I was in Amsterdam visiting my sister!

7. We Three Kings-Your Favourite Trilogy

I mean is anyone surprised? I’ve made no secret of how much I love the Shades of Magic trilogy, and it will take some beating for another trilogy to surpass it.

8. Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow-A Character You’d Love To Be Snowed In With

I reckon Izzy O’Neill and I would have a ridiculous amount of fun being snowed in together, I can picture ridiculous amounts of junk food and movies!

9. Last Christmas-A Book That Seriously Let You Down

I was so excited for this one as I loved the first book when I read it two years ago, but this sequel was a massive letdown. I hope the final book is better!

10. White Christmas-An Upcoming Release You’re Dreaming About

I’ve been waiting almost four years for this one, so I’m super excited to finally read it. I got approved for it on Netgalley, so should be getting to it soon!

So that’s the Christmas Songs Book Tag, thanks to Jana for creating it, it was a super fun one to do!

What books are you hoping to get for Christmas? Any other presents people are hoping for? Let me know in the comments!

I’ll be back next week with my final TTT for 2020, talking about my favourite books of the year. In the meantime, I should have my review of Good Omens up for you guys tomorrow, so keep an eye out for that.

The folklore book tag

Hi everyone! So if you’ve been on the internet in the past few days, you’re probably aware that Taylor Swift released a new, surprise album on Friday called folklore, and yes, I loved it. If like me, you prefer Taylor’s slower songs (not that I don’t love the more upbeat ones, they’re great for my running playlist) then this album is definitely for you! I’ve only actually listened to it once all the way through so far, but my favourites at this point are betty, the last great american dynasty, mad woman and my tears ricochet, though of course as I listen to the album more, that will probably change.

Anyway, this is an original tag created by Ilsa at A Whisper of Ink , who also tagged me, thanks Ilsa! (https://awhisperofink.wordpress.com/2020/07/24/the-folklore-book-tag-original/) and here are the rules for the tag:

• Link to the original creator: Ilsa @ A Whisper Of Ink
• Tag at least 3 people.
• Declare the rules and list of prompts in your post
• Thank whoever who tagged you and link to their post.

So here we go, the folklore book tag!:

The 1: a book with an ending that left you speechless

I couldn’t go with anything other than this book for this one, the YA thriller to beat all other YA thrillers. Seriously, it kind of ruined (in the best way) all other thrillers for me because I was so blown away by that ending. It’s seriously messed up but in the most brilliant way possibly and you will not see it coming.

cardigan: a book that makes you feel happy and sad all at once

Honestly this book was tailor made for this prompt, it’s devastating and heartbreaking of course (how could any book set in WWII not be?) but Maddie and Queenie’s friendship is one of my favourites I’ve ever read and Queenie is brilliantly witty so even among the heartbreak, there’s a lot of joy as well.

the last great american dynasty: a book with a fascinating and well told story

The way VE Schwab crafted the beautifully intricate a-linear timeline in this and brought all of the disparate threads together into one brilliant story? I am both envious of the skill and also love it so much. VE Schwab is such a talented writer and I look forward to every new book of hers that comes out (so excited for Addie!).

exile: a book you wish you hadn’t read

Ah Lord of The Flies, my old nemesis. If I hadn’t had to read this for my GCSEs at school then I never would have and it’s time that I cannot get back. It’s so boring and I’ve read contemporary dystopia that’s so much more creative and fun and quite frankly more interesting than this one.

my tears ricochet: a book that made you cry uncontrollably

Honestly, I really don’t cry at books very often, I don’t know why, I think it’s because I’m not a visual reader. But this one really got to me, of course any book set in a concentration camp is harrowing, but I found the stories of the Rabbits so heartbreaking, the fact that real women had to go through what they went through, it definitely brought a few tears to my eyes thinking about it whilst I was reading.

mirrorball: a book that feels like it was written for you

A Darker Shade of Magic is basically everything I love about fantasy, all rolled into one book. It has a brilliant female lead, several awesome magical worlds, fantastic villians and an engaging story.

seven: a childhood book that makes you feel nostalgic

It’s kind of hard to do this one when so many of my favourite childhood authors keep turning out to be kind of terrible people, but I have super fond memories of this series, I would go to the library every week to get the next book when I was younger, though sadly I never finished the series as my library didn’t have all the books, I think I made it up to book 10!

august: a book that reminds you of summer

These books are quintessential summer reads, when I was a teenager I loved diving into Tibby, Lena, Bridget and Carmen’s lives and seeing what each summer would bring for them and their friendship.

this is me trying: a book that deals with loneliness and sadness

It’s very out of my usual wheelhouse of books, but P.S. I Love You deals with the lonelines and sadness that comes with Holly’s grief over the death of her husband and her attempts to move forward with her life after her loss very well.

illicit affairs: a book that gave you a book hangover

The hangover I had after finishing this book, honestly I’ve never experienced anything like it! The end of this series was such perfection and it took me so long to move on from this world and these characters to find something that came anywhere close to living up to it.

invisible string: a book that came into your life at the exact right time

I found Percy Jackson just when I moved to a new school and didn’t know anyone, and without it, I wouldn’t have met my best friend Hannah, Percy Jackson was a big bonding point for us and cemented a friendship based on a mutual love of books and fangirling.

mad woman: a book with a female character you adore

I could have picked about ten thousand different books for this one, because I have so many female characters I adore but I decided to go with Izzy O’Neill, she’s just so funny and confident and stands up for what she believes in and I can relate so hard to her!

epiphany: a book that is haunting

I dare you to read the line “That day my brother’s life was worth a pocket watch” and not be completely haunted for the rest of your life. I dare you.

betty: a book couple that fills you with yearning

Sephy and Callum……..another time, another place, a different world and the two of them could have had an ending that didn’t shatter everyone’s hearts into a million pieces. Alas this is not that book.

peace: a book character you’d die for because you love them so much

Okay, being serious, I’m not sure I’d be willing to die for any fictional character, but if I was going to, then Severin, Laila, Zofia, Enrique, Hypnos and Tristan would be the ones. Their group dynamic is just the absolute best and I can’t wait to read more of their adventures in The Silvered Serpents when it comes out.

hoax: a book you thought you were going to love but didn’t

Okay I mean technically I’m not finished yet, but I’m far enough through to know that I’m not going to love this one. It should have been so good, the cover is gorgeous, the blurb sounded great but the actual book has not lived up to that promise.

So there we go, that’s the folklore book tag! Thanks to Ilsa for creating it, and if you would like to do it, then consider yourself tagged!