3 Fictional Schools I Would Love To Go To

School is boring. You know what it needs? THE MAGIC OF THE FICTIONAL UNIVERSE.

MAGIC

*IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER*

Hogwarts from Harry Potter

If Hogwarts isn't on your list for this kind of thing then you're lying to yourself. Who hasn't taken a Which-House-are-you-in test (I'm Ravenclaw BTW) or just wanted to have magic? I would love to have magic. And Hogwarts is just beautiful and I like the riddles and the paintings that move. Screw education there I would just stare at the building the whole time and it'd be FANTASTIC.

Castle Heights High School from Robin Palmer's books

It's a fairy tale high school! Fairy. Tale. High. School. "And all your dreams will come true." Wouldn't that be fantastic? A school filled with magical tales and Prince Charmings and happy endings? ENROLL ME. 

Me if I got accepted to Castle Heights

Mademoiselle Geraldine's Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality from Finishing School.

It's always been a struggle for me to kill people with elegance and grace, so I think that I would really benefit from attending this Academy. Plus, it floats. It's a dirigible in the sky that teaches me how to fancily kill people. What's not to like?

But yes. Why can't those schools exist in real life??

Sincerely,

Owyn the Intern

POST SCRIPT

I have never killed anyone. I was being sarcastic above. Not about going to the school. I still want to go to the school.

ARC Review: What I Thought Was True

NOTE: This is a review of an ARC that is due to be published in April of next year. Whooo!

Damn, Huntley Fitzpatrick is back with another awesome summer romance because her new book What I Thought Was True was more than I could have ever hoped for.

This book is about Gwen Castle, a poorer girl in a working class family, worries about her future and her relationships with her family, friends, and the rich boy Cassidy Somers over the course of her summer. (Better summary on Goodreads)

I liked this book a lot. I have a lot of reasons to think so, like it was amazingly well-written, it was hilarious, and it touched on important points so I SHALL EXPLAIN THEM TO YOU.

*GONNA TRY NOT TO SPOILER BECAUSE THE BOOK WON'T BE OUT FOR A WHILE AND THAT IS NOT FAIR TO YOU PEOPLE*

One of the main things I liked about the book is that the characters were so well-rounded. Some of them were great people who did great things, some of them were bad people that did bad things, some were good people who did bad and some were bad who did good. AND THAT'S SO INTERESTING. It made reading the book so interesting and it made the characters so human because you rooted for these dynamic characters even though they made mistakes. And, there were kind of flashbacks where Gwen looks back on what she did and it shows what she thinks now, and it was almost like two POVs and it was done very well.

Plus, all the mistakes being made gave the book a certain cringe factor. But Fitzpatrick made the cringe factor good and fun.

This is what I visualize when I think of "cringe factor"

I also like the fact that the book had a moral, without being annoying about it. I'd say the main question posed was "Do you speak up if you witness something bad, or do you shut up?" I think this is important because I consider myself very honest, but I've never had the consequences of honesty. And I think it's important to explore it. Fitzpatrick did a great job weighing the pros and cons, then showing the benefits or consequences of the actions.

This thing is pleased by how Fitzpatrick handled this. And so am I.

There were other things I liked, but the last thing on this list was the romance. It's so hard to explain without revealing too much, but I really really liked and appreciated the romance in this book. It wasn't some silly romance novel (like the ones they happened to make fun of in this book,) there were mistakes and outside influence and sex was a thing but it wasn't a be-all-end-all thing. I loved it.

HAPPY DANCE IT OUT

Yeah this book is awesome. Definitely buy it when it comes out. 88 out of 89 Starfish. Because I said so ;)

Farewell!

Owyn

Trilogy Review: "Summer"

NOTE: This is a review of a trilogy I re-read over the summer, and originally read like 3 years ago or something but I figured this series deserved a blog post.

So this is a review of the "Summer" trilogy by Jenny Han, and the books include The Summer I Turned Pretty, It's Not Summer Without You, and We'll Always Have Summer.

Now my feelings vary on each book, so I'm just going to divide the review into the three parts. But I'm going to start with the overall praise.

Han. Can. Write. She captured this voice so elegantly, of this girl with a long-time crush on a family friend while struggling with death, adolescence and puberty. While, as an author and a book reviewer, I liked the story... my fangirl side struggled with it.

*PREPARE YOURSELVES FOR SPOILERS AND ALL-CAPS EMOTIONS*

The Summer I Turned Pretty

This one is definitely my favorite. Han wove this story really well, and I was instantly enrapt with the characters and felt for them. I wanted Susannah to live, I wanted Belly to date Jeremiah because I considered him better for her, and I just wanted everything to work out for the characters. You know when books do that and you just care for the characters so much you just want everything to be okay for them? I definitely felt that in the is book. Plus, she did this great thing where she wrote it in the present but then interspersed flashbacks during the different times she lived in the house. I found them really fun to read because it provided such amazing context to the people in the book. I loved it.

350 Jingle Bells out of 355.

This book attacking me with its emotion-causing things

It's Not Summer Without You

I'm going to be completely honest, I didn't exactly like this one as much as the first one. But I did still enjoy it. There was sexual tension and drama and angst and I think Han did a great job again writing it. And it had smatterings of another POV, and that POV happened to be Jeremiah's, which made me very happy. I was really happy when Belly started dating him instead of Conrad. Because Conrad was annoying. I may be the only one, but I was totally fed up with Conrad's bullshit. And I really wanted her to be with Jeremiah... but I'll get to that... I will say, I liked the book a lot.

340 Jingle Bells out of 355

Me with Conrad

We'll Always Have Summer

Okay this book bothered me. Not because it was poorly written or something like (just the opposite, but I'll get to that) but because of the ENDGAME SHIP. Endgame is the couple that "wins" in the end, and that couple happens to be Belly and Conrad. I never wanted them together. But at the same time, and this is why I find myself frustrated with the book, HAN MAKES JEREMIAH CHEAT ON BELLY. I automatically hate it when that happens and no longer ship the ship. So I really wish that hadn't happened. At the same time, I was really annoyed with the fact that Conrad refused to see Belly as a potential girlfriend until she started seeing other people because I find that pretentious. If I can be completely honest, I hoped that she ended up with someone completely different. But that wouldn't be as satisfying as her choosing between the love angle of the Fisher brothers so I AM VERY CONFLICTED AND CONFUSED ALSO NOT COMPLETELY SATISFIED YET I DON'T HATE IT DAMMIT.
320 out of 355

Accurately describes my emotions: Confused and Majestic ;)

TL;DR I actually really recommend just reading the entire series in one sitting because it's really well-written and very realistic and tells a good story.

So yeah.

Have a lovely day!

Owyn