ARC Review: Dear Killer

NOTE: This is a review of an ARC that comes out in April.

The book Dear Killer is by Katherine Ewell and it's about Kit, a girl who has a part-time job as the most notorious serial killer in London.

When I say it like that, it kind of seems campy. But trust me, this book definitely isn't.

This book was intense. I finished reading it in February and I'm still not over how intense it was wow.

Me before/during/after reading Dear Killer

And it was good, in that wow-I-just-read-something-really-intense-and-life-is-weird-now.

Here are reasons why YOU (yes you) should read this book when it comes out.

It has serial killers. This probably just makes me seem really creepy/crazy but serial killers really fascinate me and Ewell did a great job of getting into that mindset and writing believable murders and motives and ways to kill people and it was just really fascinating to read.

i'm not crazee i sware

The moral dilemma aspect. One of the themes of the book was moral nihilism and how Kit was taught by her serial killer mother to kill people without feeling bad about it. Kit, at first, is fine with killing people without emotion/guilt because she believes in the ideal that there are no such things as morals because of the way they very and she used that as her justification of murder. Plus, Kit as a serial killer was interesting and unique.

(I mean this in the nicest way possible) It made me feel very dirty while reading it because of all the talk of "Morals don't exist, let's kill people" was actually kinda plausible and intelligent in its debate.

The plot. This book was addicting and intense, and definitely not a beach read so read this when you feel like questioning everything.

But yes, this book was well-written and I hope you do check it out when it's published. 200 Serial Killers out of 203.

Farewell!

Owyn

ARC Review: Don't Call Me Baby

NOTE: This is a review of a book comes out April 22nd, 2014.

The book Don't Call Me Baby by Gwendolyn Heasley is about Imogene, a girl who's been the focus of her mom's parenting blog since before she was born. Major moments of her life like her name, her first period, and other embarrassing moments have been documented on the blog "Mommylicious," with Imogene being "Babylicious." And Imogene's kind of done with this, and her mom won't listen, so she uses her new school assignment of starting a blog to fight back against this.

I really enjoyed reading this book. And here are the reasons why:

The voice. Imogene's voice is really well done. The character is confused and still trying to figure out who she is, but also knows what she wants, and you really sympathize with her situation even though you probably haven't been in it.

The premise. God, I'm still in such awe of the idea of this book and it was executed really well. And, Heasley did a great job of showing the pros and cons of having the blog, and how you shouldn't hold grudges and the whole story was just well executed.

How happy I am with the premise

The Blog Posts. Along with traditional first-person-POV of Imogene, the book also featured excerpts from Imogene's, Sage's, and Imogene's mom's blog. These were so much fun to read. I kinda wanted more but, honestly, the amount in there was good.

The romance. THE ROMANCE WASN'T A HUGE THING DO YOU KNOW HOW HAPPY THAT MAKES ME! As much as I love romance, this book didn't stray from the fact that it should really be geared more towards good mother-daughter relationships and friendships and that made me so happy. It was like Brave with a blog.

This book was awesome and amazingly fun to read, so I hope you all check it out when it's published.

Rating: 13 Blogs out of 14 :D

Thank you for reading!

Owyn

ARC Review: To All The Boys I've Loved Before

A/N: This is a review of a book that comes out on April 22, 2014. I read and finished this book back in December, but decided it'd be too early to post a review, and I was recently re-reading it so I decided it was a good time now so here it is.

To All The Boys I've Loved Before is a YA book by Jenny Han (name familiar? I reviewed her Summer trilogy) and it's about Lara Jean Song, a girl who writes love letters, but not in the strictest sense. She writes letters to boys that she was in love with and trying to get over. She pours her heart out, maybe even attacks them, and then they all get sent to their recipients.

I really, thoroughly enjoyed this book. Hell, I read it during math class. And here are the reasons why:

The characters. I'd already known Han had a great talent for writing characters from her books Shug and the Summer trilogy, but this book just reinforced this. Lara Jean was an intricate, awkward, sweet, naive character with a fresh voice and dynamic relationships with Peter, Kitty, her father, Margot and Josh that were amazingly awesome to read.

Plus, that dialogue the characters have with each other was fantastic and I loved reading it and was often like OH SNAP.

The drama. Han writes teen-soap-opera level drama minus the bullshit. It's refreshing and addicting to read. I could barely put this book down, I read it on the bus, in between classes, during classes (shh don't tell my parents) and as soon as I got home.

The relationships. I already kinda mentioned this but it deserves a reiteration. The relationships in this book (whether they be between crushes, fake-boyfriend/girlfriends, friendships, parents, or sisters) were immensely fascinating and just so well-written.

Read this book yes. 494 Christmas Cookies out of 495.

Minus one for the fact that this is STANDALONE GOD DAMMIT.

LOOK AT THIS SAD CAT. THIS IS HOW SAD I AM

The book is good read it when it comes out.

Sincerely,

Owyn

Book Review: Ask the Passengers

NOTE: This is a review of a book by an author, A.S. King, I'm going to meet in April. Yay!

Ask the Passengers is about Astrid Jones, a girl who lives in a small town, and about her struggle with her sexuality, family, friends, and relationships.

I really enjoyed reading this book, I practically flew through it because I was really invested in Astrid's story.

Here are the more in-depth reasons for why I enjoyed the book so much.

*SLIGHT SPOILERS KINDA*

The premise and writing story. It's hard to explain but I loved the book's idea and the way it was executed. King did a great job of writing this, and

The passengers' stories- Interspersed throughout the book, there are these little excerpts from the lives of people flying in planes over Astrid's town. She'd "send them love" and ask questions about love and life. And they would have parallels to some of the passengers' problems. These little clips were probably my favorite part of the book. They were so interesting, the voices, the mini-plots, everything was just so well done. Plus they were so cute and emotional and AWW

The LBGT aspect: Writing Gay People- This book is about a girl falling for a girl, and I think it told a beautiful story. Plus, in some stories out there portray the gay characters as stereotypes, but they were people in this book. They were assholes, amazing, and human. Plus, the stories were cute.

The LBGT aspect: Coming out- I'm not gay, and I've never had to come out to anyone, but I feel like this book did a great job of highlighting the struggles, like family and friend and school reactions that you have to put up with. There's a great speech on page 203 that I loved about sexuality, along with the frustrating reactions from her family.

Magical Realism- You don't understand how much I love magical realism, I haven't read much but I really respect the genre. King did a great job of putting the hints of the magical realism without hitting you over the head with it.

I really enjoyed this book. 150/154 Shrimp Veins

Read it.

Sincerely,

Owyn the Intern 

BLOGGER'S NOTE: Wow, my last post was December I am going to upload more, I'm sorry I haven't been.

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