I love Hunger Games!

More books arrived this week.

My postman now thinks I am an absolute nut of the first water; not my problem. Had I been American, I’d be able to buy these in a bookshop but I live in Ireland, so they must come in the post.

So this week, I was on the receiving end of:

Graffiti Moon by Cath Crowley

Scarlet by AC Gaughen

The Disenchantments by Nina LeCour

I haven’t read any of them yet. Oh no. I chose this week to discover the Hunger Games instead.

Now, I know I have moaned about missing things in the past. I didn’t miss the Hunger Games; I just never got around to them. But then I started the first book because I was seeing the movie and well…no college work done. Friends neglected. Dog ignored. Whole series finished in two days. Felt like a complete idiot for not reading them before now, and like an even bigger idiot for not savouring them, seeing as there won’t be another book. They were beyond brilliant…if I was being picky I wasn’t overjoyed by the ending but the first book especially was just fantastic.

And the movie? I was really impressed. I hate it when films deviate too much from the book (like when it was implied that Hogwarts had a rowing club in the last Harry Potter movie I was not a happy bunny) but this movie was soooo faithful to the book; it all looked exactly how I imagined it, or pretty close.  Also, Liam Hemsworth? Hello. There is some ridiculous DNA in that whole family. I thought Jennifer Lawrence was a great Katniss and the scene with Roo was heartbreaking. I’m going to see it again with a Hunger Games obsessive this week and I bet she’s going to love it too.  

Oh, and the soundtrack! The Civil Wars, who I adore, have a great song on it with Taylor Swift called 'Safe and Sound'. Hearing it was the closest my heartless little self has come to crying in forever. There's also songs by Maroon 5 as you've never heard them before and a boatload of other awesome people. Go and see it now, regardless of whether you've read the books or not. It won't disappoint fans but is a great standalone film in its own right.

Review: North of Beautiful

Book: North of Beautiful

Author: Justina Chen Headley

Publisher: Little Brown

Shelfability: Get!

We all moan about our looks from time to time. Take me: I spent my life giving out about the state of my pimply face and the size of my butt (it’s not small). But deep down most of know that we’re basically okay-looking, right? This is what I kept coming back to when I was reading North of Beautiful. The narrator, Terra, is a beautiful girl-tall, blonde and skinny, but all people can ever look at is the red birthmark that covers half of her face. Her mother spends most of her time trying to find the wonder treatment that will leave Terra clear-skinned and ‘normal’ looking, while her father devotes his energies to belittling and undermining his wife and daughter at every turn. Then by chance Terra meets a boy with a scar of his own, and her world tilts on its axis.

I loved this book. Terra was such a great narrator. I really warmed to her and admired her obstinacy and determination. But I also understood when she did something weak; after years of her father chipping away at her fragile self esteem I was surprised she had the strength to bring the novel to the conclusion it eventually reached. The supporting characters are also really well written; I Terra’s mother and her love interest Jacob. I nearly wanted to skip ahead to the end of the book because I HAD to know if they ended up together.

I’d recommend this book to anyone. It really reminded me to worry less about the small stuff.

Rating: 9/10

Book Haul

I am posting twice in one week.
I never do that, but I have the day off college and I’m making the best of it. Also, I have had a little book haul, which is exciting. Well, I’m excited about it, even though our postman hates me now, because apparently he doesn’t like ringing the doorbell to drop off packages. Well, I’m sorry about that and all but I’m still excited!

My postman is actually called Pat incidentally, whic always makes me smile.

So this is what arrived today:

Bittersweet by Sarah Ockler
Moonglass by Jessi Kirby
The Last Echo by Kimberly Derting (Body Finder #3)
The Fine Art of Truth or Dare by Melissa Jensen
The Traitor and the Tunnel by YS Lee

Now I have a problem. I have all these lovely books, plus another few that haven’t arrived yet, and I don’t know what to read first. I’ve been sitting and staring at the pile like a right weirdo all morning, and I still haven’t decided.  I might read The Last Echo first, purely because I loved the other two Body Finder books so much, but I just don’t know.

I think I’ll do eenie meenie. It worked when I was little and sadly, I haven’t changed that much.

And there's still more to arrive. I need to delete my Amazon account or else I'm going to end up really poor.

Lola and The Boy Next Door

Title: Lola And The Boy Next Door
Author: Stephanie Perkins
Source: Amazon/Book Depository
Shelfability: Get! Get now!

Oh my God. I say this about authors all the time but I don't undestand how on earth I missed Stephanie Perkins. The only excuse I have is that she hasn't been published in Ireland yet, which is a travesty of such epic proportions that I think I should write to the government or something. I'm sure they have more important things like the recession to worry about, but hey, maybe somebody knows somebody who can FIX THIS NOW!

Anyway, Lola! Lola popped up on my Amazon recommended reads and I liked the cover, so I looked her up on Katie's Book Blog and oh, my God, I'm glad I did because this book is amazing.

Lola is seventeen and about to start her last year of school. Things are looking rosy-she has a gorgeous, older boyfriend, a job she loves and she wears amazing costumes that she designs herself in her bedroom (which made me jealous enough to root out my sewing kit, I won't lie). But all of ths suddenly pales into insignificance when Cricket moves back in next door.

Cricket, as you may have guessed, is Lola's first love who broke her heart when he and his family moved away. But suddenly they're back-Cricket, his parents, and his stuck-up, nasty twin sister, who Lola hates. What's Lola going to do? Can she put up with the evil twin sister? Can she forgive Cricket for breaking her heart? Can all these things be accomplished while wearing a fabulous outfit? Read on and see...

If you have a shred of sense, you will beg, steal or borrow a copy of Lola (I do not condone stealing, it's only an expression and so on and so forth...). You need this book in your life. It's sweet, funny, romantic and really well written. Stephanie Perkins is my new idol. Now stop reading and go and get this book!

 

Book: Fracture by Megan Miranda

Source: Book Store

Release Date: 5^th January 2012

Shelfability: Get!

Want to know why I bought this book? It’s stupid but here it is: cause the authors’ name sounds like two first names. Yes, I am ready for real life and the real world! Well, I had also just finished a miserable day of college exams (we have ours after Christmas, how miserable) and I needed perking up.

So, Fracture! The story centres on a teenage girl called Delaney Maxwell, who accidentally falls through the surface of a lake she thought was frozen over. Not good-Delaney is clinically dead for eleven minutes before her childhood friend Decker is able to revive her-and even though she’s physically alroight, Delaney’s not really normal anymore. She can pick out the people around her who are going to die soon. Not a skill I’d want to have, just sayin’. Then a dark, mysterious stranger turns up in town and Delaney knows he’s somehow connected to her new gift-but in a good way or a bad way?

I looooovvvved this book. I was in just the right mood for it when it came along and I think this is one I might actually read again. Delaney was a great character; very normal, which you don’t often get in this type of a novel. Delaney reacted to her accident the same way I might-she’s just embarrassed and annoyed about the whole thing, and wishes her new ‘gift’ would go away. He friend Decker is also completely adorable. I still don’t see why I never had a boy like him next door when I was growing up. The supporting characters are great too, and there’s just the right amount of creepiness; not enough to make you put the book in the freezer ala Joey in Friends, but enough to creep you out just a little.

Rating: Nine out of ten. Go out and get this book!

This Means War

I had one of those rows at home today, about the sheer volume of reading material that I bring into the house.

This irks me. They don’t give out when I’m handing over my Steinbecks to my younger brother for school, or keeping my dad supplied with the only genre he will read; crime fiction. My mother has literally not bought a book since I got a part time job and started buying my own books, so it suits her sometimes to have novels everywhere. In fact it suits her most of the time, except when she’s premenstrual and pissy. Like today.

Today, however, she was in one of her moods and it was decided (well, she decided) that some of the books had to go.

The college pile was non-negotiable, so I was able to hang on to lots of my favourites that way (Penguin Classics are easy to pass off as college books when English Lit is part of your degree). Travel literature took a serious hit. Even some of the Bill Brysons had to go, but they’re not too difficult to replace thank god. The whole Twilight saga went (I wasn’t too sorry about those to be honest) and there was near bloodshed over my Eva Ibbotsons. Anybody who knows the lengths I went to for my copy of The Morning Gift would never even dream of making me part with it. I saved them all, though, even if they’re all hidden under the bed.

It was the Harry Potters, however, that caused the most consternation. I’ve been reading them since the tender age of seven, before they were a big deal. I remember reading the first one in the playground at school and everyone being like ‘Harry who?’, but then wanting to borrow them six months later after the third one got loads of press coverage and all my friends started calling me Hermione. My current Harrys are actually a replacement set; we lost the covers from the original Philosopher and Chamber, because they were passed around my entire extended family, and the wear and tear made them fall off. Boo.

She scoffed at my Irish language edition of Philosophers Stone too, which made me seethe with temper. It isn’t for nothing that I’m the only member of my household who can hold a proper conversation in Irish. And again, I went to great lengths to get the book which wasn’t easy or cheap to come by.

My mother even suggested that maybe I am too old for some of my books. Well, really! They teach Harry Potter in university these days!

Now I can’t sleep properly, because there are books hidden in my bed. Literally under the covers with me. Not good.

These are the lengths I have gone to, to save my copy of Jessica’s Guide to Dating on the Dark Side. Worth it though.

Books, Books and more Books!

Wahey. Exams over, back to normal college routine (though final semester ever which is stressful. Prospect of severe unemployment and all). Which means much reading can be done underneath the desk at all my boring lectures! Hooray!

Not all my lectures are boring. We have Dapper again, which is a cause for celebration, though I’ve nearly had to move seats to escape the cooing mature students. Honestly, you’d think a group of ladies with a mean age of fifty seven would have more sense but noooooo. They sit in their little row (which they elbow you out of the way to get to, because god forbid they would have to sit somewhere else) and twitter away like fourteen year olds watching a Twishite film. Honestly.

My own friends aren’t much better to be honest. Today, I was very dismayed to discover that, though I’d managed to secure seats in the coveted back row, three of our number chose to sit at the very front just to get a better view of the delectable Dapper. Granted, he bears a striking resemblance to James Potter but really? I’ve spent three years marking our territory in that back row, all to be sacrificed for the first decent looking lecturer to pop up? Hoes over bros girls. Or indeed, prose.

Anyway, on to books. I have had a birthday, and despite nearly having to get a mortgage to buy my books for this semester I’ve read plenty. I’ve been introduced to the goddess that is Stephanie Perkins; I think that Anna and the French Kiss may well be one of the best young adult romances I’ve read ever. And Lord knows I’ve read enough. I also got a massive package from The Book Depository, containing:

Hourglass by Myra McIntire

Life Eternal by Yvonne Woon

The Catastrophic History of You and Me by Jess Rothenberg

Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

Every Other Day by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

Always a Witch by Carolyn McCullough

Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins

I have also read Heaven by Christoph Marzi, Hollow Pike by James Dawson, Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake and the Unbecoming of Mara Dyer by Michelle Hodkin. All of which were excellent, I’ve got to say. Really enjoyed the lot of them, and I think I might do reviews for a couple as well, seeing as that’s very a la mode right now.

Right. I have a massive pile of notes screaming for my attention. Chat soon.