Good Morning, Lovelies! I simultaneously can’t believe its already day 5 and only day 5 at the same time. I was actually able to get a chapter of Biology read yesterday and while I didn’t finish my book I did get some of it read. I even went to bed before midnight and woke up at 8 am today which is really nice. Starting to feel a bit more on track then I have in the past couple of days.
Today’s plan is pretty much yesterdays plan. I have about 42 pages of reading I need to get done across three different subjects and i would also like to finish Love & Luck and get a good way in Legend. I also only have a few hours left in my audiobook so maybe I could finish that today or tomorrow, we shall see. But first is is time to wash my face and have some breakfast.
Good Morning! So yesterday was not as productive as I would have liked it to be. I did read 100 pages of my book, but other then that I facetimed my friend and watched The Voice for most of the day. I did learn how to make meatloaf though. Last night was pretty terrible though. I had such bad insomnia and I felt a bit manic like I had to be doing something so I didn’t get to bed till nearly 3:30 am which caused me to not wake up till nearly noon. Which is most definitely not what I planed at all.
I will be productive today! I have to be I have a test at the end of this week that I really need to do great in. I also will finish my book because its getting pretty good! Today will be productive and good. Now I am going to get some coffee and maybe some food!
Good Morning! or I guess afternoon at this point. I have been pretty consistent about waking up around 11 everyday, but I really want to be waking up around 8 or 9 so I am going to try and get myself to sleep earlier tonight. I was successful in getting all 569 of my books organized, but they are not exactly how i would like them. Two of my shelves broke and even with those two I don’t really have the room for all of them so I have stacks everywhere, but at least everything is now clean and organized. I also took a shower for those of you wondering. I feel much better and I am ready to get some food and coffee.
Today’s game plan consist of studying and getting ready for school to start up again tomorrow. I also really want to finish my book today possibly. If i finish three books by the 30th I will have beaten my previous most read books in a month by one which is really cool, but school is going to be my first priority. Wish me luck! also don’t forget to wash your hands.
Good Morning! Yesterday was very productive. I got all my clothes and makeup cleaned out and facetimed two of my friends. I got all my bookshelves cleaned out and the books separated, but I only have the black books re-shelved. Charlie, my puppy, was not happy when she came to bed last night. She sleeps in my room and there are kinda books everywhere.
I do feel myself slipping from my normal routines though which is not good. I am waking up later and I haven’t showered in two days, gross i know, but I am going to try and get myself back on track today. Once everything is clean I will have a bit more “freedom” so I can get myself back on track. Hopefully I can finish my book and study a bit in addition to finishing up my books.
Good Morning! It is March 20, 2020 and it is my first day of self quarantine due to COVID-19. Up until this point I was still going to work and interacting with the general public, but yesterday my store decided to close down indefinitely. So I am now officially out of a job for the foreseeable future and can practice self isolation and social distancing as the CDC recommends. Its a very strange feeling not having to go to work when I know I normally would be going to work. I have some plans on hopefully keeping my mental health above water and making sure I don’t go absolutely insane during the next two to six weeks (at least I really hop its not longer then six weeks.)
So far today I have woken up at the somewhat decent hour of 11 am. I had some trouble getting to sleep last night so I decided to be somewhat proactive and get a jump on my days todo list. I was able to clean out my hanging clothes (my shirts, dresses, hoodies, ect.) and I am getting rid of 48 articles of clothing and I cleaned my desk and cleaned it out a bit. Today’s todo list for the rest of the day is: finish cleaning out my closet and to reorganize all my books and study a bit.
Welcome to my February warp up! At least I am only three weeks late this time instead of two months. I am getting better. I am still trying to get into a routine that works for me. I read a total of two books this month one physical and one audio.
There is no formula for love.
The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang is the physical book that I read. I was excited to read this book cause not only was it about a neurodiverse female lead, but she also works in a STEM career and she was the one who was wealthier. This book turned stereotypes on their head and that really intrigued me. Stella Lane is an econometrician with Asperger’s and spends all of her time immersed in algorithms. Its her happy place and romance is the furthest thing from her mind. Her mother on the other hand is desperately trying to marry her off to someone, specifically her coworker Philip James. Enter Micheal Phan, a male escort Stella hires to help her get over her sensory issues when it comes to intimacy and sex. Micheal has issues of his own, from his moms health and his on hold dreams, hes a equation that Stella can’t quite crack. Again I was actually quite excited about this book, not only cause of Stella, but also because Helen Hoang has Autism Spectrum Disorder. I was excited to read about a neurodiverse character written by someone who is neurodiverse. Unfortunately I hated this book. It took me nearly a month to read and I gave it one star. It dragged in most places and the characters seemed to be pretty flat. I didn’t feel a connection to any of them. Now I will say the sex scenes in this book were hella steamy! Just those scenes alone would be five stars. I just felt that there was drama where there shouldn’t have been and no drama where there should have been. It was also very insta-lovey for me. I am not a fan of the inst-love trope in YA or adult novels. I also couldn’t believe how quickly Stella got over her sensory issues with intimacy “because it was Micheal”. Now I do not have Asperger’s nor do I know many people who do, but I know people who have similar issues with intimacy and they were not so quick to over come them. Maybe its different if you meet the “right” person or maybe that was Hoangs own experience but I just didn’t quite buy it.
Where there’s a Conspiracy there is a Sophronia.
I AM LOVING THIS SERIES! I have been listening to them on Audible and I really love the narrator, Moira Quirk, shes just reads them so perfectly. My favorite character is probably Dimity, mostly because she is this over the top person who just wished to be a real lady, not a spy, and travel the world, but she still goes on all these adventures with Sophronia because that’s her best friend. I do love Sophronia though. She is a perfect mix of femininity and kick assery. In Curtsies and Conspiracies, Sophronia and her friends must figure out who is really behind the schools sudden field trip to London. There is a love triangle brewing in this book between Lord Felix Mersey, Sophronia, and Phineas B. Crow (aka Soap), but I can’t even be mad at it because I honestly love both boys. This is not a case of it is obvious that she prefers one over the other. Maybe its because Sophronia and her friends don’t spend all of their time and energy talking about their romantic interests that I don’t mind that there is a love triangle going on. It also helps that both boys are very different and respect her for who she is. Neither tries to change or control her in any way. Its very refreshing for a YA novel. I also like how she ages up every book instead of the whole series taking place when she is the same age.
January was STRESSFUL for me. So over Christmas I got the flu (like literally on Christmas Eve) so because of that I missed a week of work and a week of pay. This caused me to panic on how on earth I was going to pay for school and a very ill timed vacation. All of this was going on while I thought that I would be loosing my job for a few months because we are closing the location we have now to open a new location. So I was very stressed which lead to very little reading. However, I managed to pay for school, go on vacation (where I got all my reading done) and kept my job! So it all worked out. Here’s to February being much better! (where have we heard that before?)
Scrooge never looked this good!
The first book on the chopping block was The Afterlife of Holly Chase by Cynthia Hand. Fun Fact about this book is that when I went to go and read it I realized it was signed by the author (I got the book from thrift books) so I put it on my Instagram stories and tagged Cynthia Hand and Thriftbooks and Cynthia Hand shared it to her story and Thriftbooks reacted to it and it was just about the coolest thing that has ever happened to me! The book itself was three stars for me. I like it enough and the concept is really cool, but I felt like Holly Chase, the protagonist, didn’t grow and had a lot of character growth at the same time. She wasn’t unlikable but I wouldn’t say she was likable either. I just felt kinda blah about it. I liked her romance with the romantic interest, Ethan, who was also the Scrooge they were trying to help and I think that helped her grow a lot. It just wasn’t everything I thought it was going to be, but it also wasn’t a bad read. I enjoyed the aspect that there was a secret organization that picks a “Scrooge” every year and gives them the Christmas Carol treatment. I just wish some more had been uncovered but there are just things that we never get answers for.
The Freaks will inherit the earth.
Evolution, Me & Other Freaks of Nature is a reread for me and it is honestly one of my favorite books. It deals with petty high school drama, boys, religion and science in a way that isn’t preachy or making you lean one way or another. Mena is a freshman in high school ans wants nothing more then to be completely invisible, after all half of her ex-church and possibly her parents are being sued because of her. I love Mena. She is smart and she has a big heart (one of the reasons why everybody is being sued). She just wanted to do the right thing and doing it had major unintended consequences but because of it she was able to see the world from a different point of view. The main event in the story is that Mena’s ex-church and therefor her ex- friends are protesting the teaching of evolution in her biology class, but because she has been ostracized she doesn’t participate and she actually realizes that she A) likes biology B) gets the chance to make friends with her lab partner Casey and subsequently his family and C) realizes that science and religion get to coexist. I would like to think that Mena and Casey are still together and Casey is this world famous author and scientist like his dad and Mena is a theological scholar with a minor in biology and she sometimes helps Casey out and they have tons of black lab puppies. The one thing I dislike is how Mena’s parents treat her. They ice her out after “the incident” and they don’t even stand up for their own daughter and punish her for what she did. If my theoretical child did what she did I would fight hell hounds for them and reward them for doing the right but hard thing. Her ex-church and her ex-friends totally had it coming to them in my opinion.
Ladies of substance are more then they seem.
Etiquette and Espionage is my second ever audio book. One of my goals this year is to listen to more audio books. So I listen to them when I shower and when I do things around the house and so far I really enjoy it. I loved the Narrator for this one she does different voices for the different characters and it is absolutely perfect. I love that is steampunk-y and has female spies and evil geniuses and werewolves and vampires. It literally has everything I ever want in a book. Sophronia is a very interesting protagonist. I usually don’t like protagonist who are so much younger then me, Sophronia is almost grown up acting. I mean she still causes shenanigans, but shes going to spy school so. I also really enjoy how 99% of the cast of characters are female and it really focuses on the friendships between them. There isn’t really any romance which is pretty refreshing actually. There are just a bunch of girls who are loyal to each other and kick some serious ass. I am completely here for it!
I read a total of 5 books in October ,1 in November and 1 in December. At the end of October I got a new job and it has thrown me for a loop and way off my reading game, but I am working on getting back on the horse as quickly as I possibly can. I started working a retail job and the holidays are our busiest season. I think I had like 5 or 6 days off total during November and December. It was a lot of long hours and I was just too exhausted to do anything, but I am LOVING my new job and I am a lot happier then I was at the hotel.
Love was never apart of the game.
The first book I read in October was a carry over from my September TBR. This is a book that Mina had been trying to get me to read since high school. Like our Junior year of High school (for anybody wondering that was 8 years ago). So I finally read it… AND LET ME TELL YOU I WAS SLEEPING ON THIS BOOK! It is one of the best books I have ever read and not only is it on my favorites of 2019 list it quickly made it to my favorites of All Time list. I don’t even know where to begin with this book honestly. Its like if Charles Dickens wrote a book that was actually understandable. The book takes place in the late 1800s and early 1900s and is told mostly in the third person but follows the story of Celia, Marco and Bailey. Celia and Marco are forced to be adversaries in a game where they have little control and don’t know the rules. The venue of the game is a Night Circus that pops into towns all over the world and is only open at night. Nobody knows where it goes next but true fans have their way in. The writing is nothing short of lush and beautiful. I felt as if I could almost smell the caramel popcorn and magic. I was immersed in their world and I to became a rêveurs instantly.
Its not what it seems.
Caraval by Stephanie Garber was my second book of the month. Also a left over from my September theme. I wanted to read Night Circus and Caraval back to back because they often get compared to each other, or well Caraval gets compared to Night Circus. While they do have some things in common such as magic, circuses, games, and romance that’s where the similarities end for me. I loved Caraval I gave it five stars and it ended up on my favorites of 2019 list. I did not, however, end up on my favorites of all time list. Its a fantastic read. The story is amazing the characters are well flushed out and I love the romance between Scarlett and Julian, but the world wan’t quite as immersive as Night Circus. While Night Circus is definitely suitable for teen readers but it was written for adult one; Caraval is written specifically written for teen readers thus giving it a slightly different vibe to it. I still loved and would most likely reread it again and again.
These witches will burn or will they?
What happens when a Witch marries a Witch Hunter? Fireworks. This was my MOST anticipated release of this year (2019 that is because it is totally 4 months later. oops) I got mine in my Fairy Loot subscription box and when I say its absolutely beautiful that’s cause it is. It has beautiful gold sprayed edges and custom art on the reverse dust jacket. This book did not disappoint. Lou was a fantastic heroine. Shes brash, loud, foul mouthed, loving, compassionate, and loyal. She refuses to change who she is even if it would make her life easier. Shes a great foil to Reid who is reserved, proper, a rule follower, loyal, kind, and patient. Reid also refused to bend on his way of being and although he tries to tame the wild child that is Lou (shockingly it doesn’t go as he plans.) They grow into a trust the turns into friendship that turns into love. They each desire to make the other happy. They were forced into a marriage, but it works cause of them. Mahurin is a fantastic author and she came out with one hell of a debut novel. I cannot WAIT to read Blood & Honey which is the sequel to Serpent & Dove.
Sometimes the real monsters are the ones we love.
Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea was a reread for me. This book is what made me fall in love with April Genevieve Tucholke’s writing. She is a master of the slightly unsettling Gothic vibe I love so much. Violet and her twin brother Luke live in a crumbling mansion, named the Citizen, in a small town on the coast somewhere while their parents are off in Europe being bohemian artists in Paris. To make ends meat Violet rents out the carriage house to River a handsome boy her age with a mysterious past and a slick tongue. Strange things happen when River is around; kids start to hunt the devil in the cemetery, men with hairy teeth appear in abounded tunnels, and Violet feels inexplicably drawn to River like a moth to the flame. This book is full of a Southern Gothic aesthetic that makes my heart jump for joy! I did only give it 4 stars though mostly cause I wanted something more. It was just lacking something.
To catch the devil you have to think like the devil
Between the Spark and the Burn is the sequel to Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. Last Summer the Redding Brothers (Neely, River, and Brodie) brought mayhem, violence, and love into Violet’e life and now River is missing and Brodie has disappeared. Now Neely, Violet, Luke and Sunshine go on a cross country road trip to find River and stop Brodie. This is also full of the Gothic horror that makes my heart happy, but it did not play how out how I truly hoped it would. I also gave it four stars because of that.
Repent your secrets or pay the price.
The Merciless is also a reread for me. I read it way back in 2014 and I actually it in about 8 hours. This go around it did take me a bit longer… about a month longer. This book wasn’t as enthralling the second go around. It was still really creepy and gory and I loved those aspects but for some reason it didn’t suck me in the way it did the first time. I will say that this would make a fantastic horror movie that I would pay to see! Sofia is new in a small military town in the deep south. Sofia is used to being the new girl and tries to hid away from the attention it brings, but she finds herself friends with the popular girls in school. The only problem these girls are not what they seem. Their leader Riley is deeply religious and has a sick and twisted way of worship, one that involves an ex-friend tied up in a basement of a abandoned house in a exorcism gone horribly terribly wrong.
Getting stuck in an elevator isn’t such a bad thing.
The Wedding Date is my first adult romance novel and I have to say I absolutely fell in love with it. It was just adorable! Alexa and Drew were so cute together and I loved how the handled their relationship for the most part (this is a contemporary romance). It was light and fun and was a good way to get me out of the reading rut I fell into. Alexa and Drew meet in an elevator and she agrees to be his date to his ex girlfriends wedding, but then they start making excuses to be with each other and well we can all see where this is going to go.
Hello my beautiful people! It has been a hot minuet since I have posted and I do apologize for that, life got kinda crazy for me. At the end of October I was finally able to quit my shit hotel job, because I got a new one! I am back in the retail world and I am absolutely loving it so far. My new boss is infinitely nicer and more understanding then my last ones and my coworkers are mostly older women who are just the sweetest people on earth. I do ache most of the time and I come home covered in glitter every day and I do 10 hour days, but I get to sit when I need to, take a break when I decide to and I get paid more so really its all worth it. Because of the long work day and the fact that I now don’t really get enough downtime to read at work I haven’t really been reading lately. I read one book in November. ONE! I have to read 11 books by the end of the year to reach my goal and the end of the year is 14 days away. So it may or not happen. I started a adult contemporary romance in hopes to jump start my reading again and so far it seems to be working as I am almost done with it.
I will be honest finding a routine has been hard for me because of the new job. Not only has my reading fallen by the wayside but so has my, memory planning, journaling, bullet journaling, my mood tracking and obviously the blog. All things that help me cope and I can definitely see and feel the impact. I am less motivated and have been experiencing the “Big Sad” (that what the kids call it right? For a 24 year old I am most certainly not hip and I watch Tik Tok!) My goal is to try and find a routine that I can stick with so I can get back on track with my coping mechanisms, especially since I will be back in school next semester! Which I am kinda excited about! Hopefully the end of the decade will bring about some big things for me! I plan on making a Decade in Review post before 2020 arrives. This decade has been very formative for me and I would really like to reflect on it. A October/November Warp Up is also coming very soon!
I read a total of 5 books during September which is just shy of halfway to my goal. I did a lot of traveling this month to see family (and they don’t always let me read when I would like to LOL). This month’s “theme” was books my best friend, Mina, has recommended to me and I bought and then never read. So I tried to pick up as many as I could remember her recommending. The only one she didn’t recommend was Shades of Earth by Beth Revis, which I talked about last month with the first two in the trilogy. I just wanted to finish the trilogy before moving on to her recommendations.
Breath taking blend of Greek Mythology and WWI.
While Lovely War by Julie Berry wasn’t exactly recommended to me by Mina she discovered it at Barnes & Noble while we were hanging out one day and told me it looked really good and interestingly enough we ended up reading it concurrently during September unbeknownst to the other till I asked if she had read it before while I was halfway through. Lovely War is a breathtakingly beautiful story about two couples who manage to find love during WWI and it is mostly told from the point of view of the Greek goddess Aphrodite, but Hades, Ares, and Apollo also tell parts of the stories that pertain to them. I loved this book so much! The writing an and storytelling is absolutely top notch and the characters feel so real. The amount of research that Berry did to tell this story is exquisite. She delivers an accurate account of what it would have been like for Aubrey, Colette, James and Hazel. I especially loved the twist of the story being told from the point of view of Aphrodite, it adds a layer to the story that just makes the story even more immersive. This was most defiantly a five star read for me and I highly recommend it if you are into historical romance or just a beautiful story.
Midas wasn’t the only one cursed that fateful day.
This was the first real recommendation I read for the month. She recommended this when I was going the my pirate/sea phase back in July. I like A Touch of Gold by Annie Sullivan and I gave it four stars, but I did find it to be pretty predictable in where the plot was going to go. Which was a bit eh for me personally. I wanted more from it. I kinda wish it had started in a different direction. I wanted Kora to be a bit stronger of a heroine (although she did eventually get there…kinda). I wanted there to be a stronger bond between Hettie and Kora, cause I love me some strong female friendships especially when they are your only friend and they are also family. I also wanted more form the romance parts of it. To me it was just lacking in places and was just a bit eh for me. In reality it was probably more of a 3.5 star book but I do what to tread the second one that comes out in 2020, even though I think that with a bit of fleshing out and a few tweaks to the ending this could have been a stand alone and probably should have been, but we will see when the sequel comes out.
Can you learn to love the man behind the monster?
THIS BOOK! I literally CANNOT with how much I loved this book. Ahdieh is a fantastic storytelling goddess and I don’t think anybody could convince me otherwise. This is the first book of hers that have read but I am now highly anticipating her new release The Beautiful which comes out in October. I also cant wait to get my hands on The Dagger and the Rose which is The Wrath and the Dawns‘s sequel. Shahrzad is literally everything I want in a heroine. She is intelligent, driven, sassy, loving, flawed, and strong. She holds her own against her new husband Khalid, the Caliph, who kills his brides at sunrise. Let me tell you Khalid is not a easy man to hold your own against, but my Shazi stands up to him like a boss. I do love Khalid I think he makes a great partner for Shazi. They pair really well together. Where he is all hard lines and stone she is soft and fluid. Where she conflicted and unsteady he is sure and stable. I adore them as a couple and I adore them as characters! This quickly became an All Time Favorite!
Southern Gothic meets the 21st century.
The last recommendation for September was Compulsion: Heirs of Watson Island by Martina Boone. This has been on my TBR for actual years. This one, much like A Touch of Gold, was a bit eh for me. I didn’t find it to be at predictable and unlike A Touch of Gold, Compulsion was an actual 4 star read. I wish there was a bit more back story about the founding families. Like I wish there had been a prologue about them just so as a reader we know whats happening between the families cause that isn’t exactly explained a whole lot. Much like Barrie, the reader is thrust in the middle of this small South Carolina town’s founding families controversies without really understanding its roots and how and why it began. It definitely has some Southern Gothic vibes to it which I am here for and it is a bit of a slow build up, but it also part of a trilogy so that probably the cause for the pacing. I do want to pick up Persuasion If anything to just find out what happens next with Barrie and Eight. I love Eight cause A) he has the ability to know exactly what people want which personally I think is a fantastic quality in a boyfriend and B) hes is protective enough for it to be cute but not enough to be creepy. He also tends to be the voice of reason which I love. I liked Barrie i just wish she had a bit more gumption to her. Shes got the sass part down, but she is often unsure of her self and what she truly wants and when she does she often ignores it in favor of pleasing others. I wish she followed her instincts a bit more.
The Ethereal Journey 