Goodreads Monday – All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood

March 2, 2020March 2, 2020 Dini @ dinipandareads12 Comments

It’s the first Goodreads Monday of 2020, friends! This weekly meme was started by @Lauren’s Page Turners and it invites you to pick a book from your TBR and explain why you want to read it. Easy enough, right? Feel free to join in if you want to! I’ll be using a random number generator to pick my books from my insanely long GR Want-to-read list.

This week’s book is All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood. This book was released in 2016 but I saw a lot of hype for it on bookstagram last year. This contemporary fiction has a 4.07 star average with 79.7k+ ratings and 11.5k+ reviews.

Sundays in Bed With… #MyWeeklyWrapUp [45]

March 1, 2020December 4, 2022 Dini @ dinipandareads8 Comments

We’re back with another Sundays in Bed With… meme! This meme dares to ask you what book has been in your bed this morning and is hosted by Midnight Book Girl. Come share what book you’ve been you’ve spent time curled up reading in bed with, or which book you wish you had time to read today!

I started The Mountains Sing on a whim last night as I felt that I needed to take a short break from my YA/fantasy reads before I continue with them in the coming weeks! I spent a good part of Sunday in bed reading the book. I’m learning so much about Vietnam from a perspective that I’ve not read from before. It’s funny because I actually know the author, she and her husband are good friends with my parents, so I think this makes it an even more personal read. It’s very hard (and is making me quite emotional) to read about the cruelties and injustices done but I think it’s certainly important to know.

With the epic sweep of Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko or Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing and the lyrical beauty of Vaddey Ratner’s In the Shadow of the Banyan, The Mountains Sing tells an enveloping, multigenerational tale of the Trần family, set against the backdrop of the Việt Nam War. Trần Diệu Lan, who was born in 1920, was forced to flee her family farm with her six children during the Land Reform as the Communist government rose in the North. Years later in Hà Nội, her young granddaughter, Hương, comes of age as her parents and uncles head off down the Hồ Chí Minh Trail to fight in a conflict that tore not just her beloved country, but her family apart.

Vivid, gripping, and steeped in the language and traditions of Việt Nam, The Mountains Sing brings to life the human costs of this conflict from the point of view of the Vietnamese people themselves, while showing us the true power of kindness and hope.

The Mountains Sing is celebrated Vietnamese poet Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai’s first novel in English.

What are you currently reading?

Top 5 Saturday: Books Inspired by Mythology

February 29, 2020March 2, 2020 Dini @ dinipandareads18 Comments

We’re back with another Top 5 Saturday! I might’ve missed last week’s topic but I will come back to it at some point 🙂 Just in case you don’t know Top 5 Saturday is a weekly meme created by Mandy @ Devouring Books and it’s where we list the top five books (they can be books on your TBR, favourite books, books you loved/hated) based on the week’s topic. You can see the upcoming schedule at the end of my post 🙂 This week’s topic is: books inspired by mythology!

I have to be honest and say that while I know of many of the popular myths, specifically Greek and Norse, I don’t really know them in great detail. But Mythology is a topic that has always sparked my interest and I’m always up for getting my hands on more books inspired by myths! I have quite a few on my TBR that I’m hoping to read sometime in the… near future? *so many books, so little time*

I adore these Big Ideas Simply Explained books! I randomly found The Mythology Book when I was actually looking for The Literature Book but the shiny gold cover held me captive. Obviously, I left the bookstore with it in tow! This is a ‘coffee table’ book that I’d happily flip through over time.

Mini-Reviews: The Rain Trilogy by B.B. Easton

February 29, 2020March 2, 2020 Dini @ dinipandareads13 Comments

The Rain Trilogy is one of those series that had me heckin’ confused because I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone but I still couldn’t stop reading it, and ended up finishing the whole trilogy in one day. Yep, it was a thing. The books are short though and a lot but not a lot really happens. But without further ado, you can check out my thoughts for each book below. I’d give the series an average score of ★★★☆☆.

Goodreads: Praying for Rain (The Rain Trilogy #1)
Genre: Dystopia, Romance
Panda Rating:

“None of this matters, and we’re all going to die.”
With only three days left until the predicted apocalypse, the small town of Franklin Springs, Georgia, has become a wasteland of abandoned cars, abandoned homes, abandoned businesses, and abandoned people. People like Rainbow Williams. Rain isn’t afraid of dying. In fact, she’s looking forward to it. If she can just outrun her pain until April 23, she’ll never have to feel it at all.

“Supplies. Shelter. Self-defense.”
Wes Parker has survived every horrible thing this life has thrown at him with nothing more than his resourcefulness and disarming good looks. Why should the end of the world be any different? All he needs are some basic supplies, shelter, and a sucker willing to help him out, which is exactly what he finds when he returns to his hometown of Franklin Springs.

As society crumbles, dangers mount, and secrets refuse to stay buried, two lost souls are thrust together in a twist of fate—one who will do anything to survive and one who can’t wait to die.
Perhaps, together, they can learn how to live.
Before their time runs out.

I’m 90% sure that this book isn’t my jam for a lot of reasons, but seeing as I’m writing this after I’ve finished the series, I’ll admit to being helpless to stop. I’m at a total loss to explain why but I guess I just really needed to know what happens? Lol I don’t know. Can you tell I’m confused rn? SO CONFLICTED.

First Lines Friday – 28 February

February 28, 2020February 28, 2020 Dini @ dinipandareads15 Comments

Happy Friday book lovers! We’re back with another First Lines Friday, a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines? Here are the rules:

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!

First lines:

“Raithe’s first impulse was to pray. Curse, cry, scream, pray–people did such things in their last minutes of life. But praying struck Raithe as absurd given that his problem was the angry god twenty feet away.”

Do you recognize the book these first lines come from?

#TopTenTuesday: Characters I’d Follow on Social Media!

February 25, 2020July 18, 2022 Dini @ dinipandareads49 Comments

It’s that time of the week again, friends! We’re back with another Top Ten Tuesday, a weekly meme hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s prompt is: characters I’d follow on social media! This fun and creative prompt was submitted by Tilly @thebiblioshelf

Wow, this is such a great prompt–following my favourites on social media is something that I would’ve have even thought of but that doesn’t mean that a few names didn’t immediately pop into my head! I loved a lot of these characters because they had me laughing endlessly with their witty banter and cheeky humour. I think following any of them on social media would be so much fun!

Goodreads Monday – A People’s History of Heaven by Mathangi Subramanian

February 24, 2020March 22, 2020 Dini @ dinipandareads7 Comments

This week’s book is A People’s History of Heaven by Mathangi Subramanian. I haven’t heard much about this book on the blogosphere/book community but Algonquin approached me to read/review it and it sounds so good, I immediately said yes! This contemporary fiction has a 4.04 star average with 518 ratings and 161 reviews.

Sundays in Bed With… #MyWeeklyWrapUp [44]

February 23, 2020December 4, 2022 Dini @ dinipandareads21 Comments

I’ve spent this Sunday wishing I were in bed reading Wicked As You Wish! I’m at about 35% and things have escalated very quickly. I had a prediction about one of the characters and the reveal just happened in the part I’m at. Although I “called it” I still found myself a little shocked but I also felt sorry for our MC. It already wasn’t the best way to learn about it and it’s a pretty big your-life-will-never-be-the-same kind of revelation! Looking forward to what happens next…

Tala Warnock has little use for magic – as a descendant of Maria Makiling, the legendary Filipina heroine, she negates spells, often by accident. But her family’s old ties to the country of Avalon (frozen, bespelled, and unreachable for almost 12 years) soon finds them guarding its last prince from those who would use his kingdom’s magic for insidious ends. And with the rise of dangerous spelltech in the Royal States of America; the appearance of the firebird, Avalon’s deadliest weapon, at her doorstep; and the re-emergence of the Snow Queen, powerful but long thought dead, who wants nothing more than to take the firebird’s magic for her own – Tala’s life is about to get even more complicated….

What are you currently reading?

Top 5 Saturday: Books about Spies

February 22, 2020February 21, 2020 Dini @ dinipandareads21 Comments

Well, I definitely came up blank when I saw this prompt because books about spies aren’t necessarily the highest on my list? I mean, I like the idea of spy books but I just don’t normally read them. Though thanks to Goodreads I’ve discovered that I have a few spy books waiting to be read!

I’ve had The Alice Network sitting on my TBR cart for a really long time. I love historical fiction and I’ve heard some really great things about this book. I feel like I have to gear myself up to read it though so I can be emotionally prepared 😂

I haven’t read much YA historical fiction but I’ve heard a lot about how great Code Name Verity is! Just reading the synopsis has me so very intrigued and I’m looking forward to picking it up eventually.

I feel like Ken Follett is so underrated lol I’ve only read one of his series in full (The Century Trilogy) but I could not put them down. All three were almost 1,000 pages long and I sped through them like I’ve never done before. I think it took me just a little over one week to finish the series! So I’m excited to try Eye of the Needle to see if all of Follett’s books are as good!

I actually forgot about this book but I remember it first coming on my radar because it got made into a movie Jennifer Lawrence and the trailer looked interesting but I never did end up watching the movie. When I realised it Red Sparrow was a book first I added it to my TBR. It sounds intense!

John Le Carré’s books kind of intimidate me because I always feel like it’ll go flying over my head 😂 But I was intrigued when I found out The Tailor of Panama was based on a book bbecause I knew it was made into a movie with Pierce Brosnan, Jamie Lee Curtis and Geoffrey Rush forever ago. Heavily political books aren’t really my jam at all… but I’d read this one! It sounds really good.

Upcoming Schedule:

02 Feb 2020: Dystopian books
08 Feb 2020: Mental Illness
15 Feb 2020: Books about Mermaids
22 Feb 2020: Books about spies
29 Feb 2020: Books inspired by mythology

Do you like reading books about spies? Let me know below if you have any favourites or recommendations!

Friday Favourites: Potential Favourite Authors

February 21, 2020February 21, 2020 Dini @ dinipandareads19 Comments

Welcome back to another Friday Favourites, dear friends! Last year this weekly meme was hosted by the wonderful Kibby @ Something of the Book! However, this year Kibby has passed the torch on to Lorraine @ Geeky Galaxy. This week’s topic is: favourite authors.

Well, this list could go on forever, couldn’t it? Did I mention that I’m quite terrible at picking favourites? I’ve actually done a few posts mentioning some of my favourite authors (like this one and this one) so I thought I’d take a bit of a different spin for this week’s author topic by focusing on authors that have a potential to be favourites. I say potential because I’ve only read one book by these authors but they absolutely wowed me and I could see them becoming a favourite if I end up enjoying their other books just as much. I hope that explanation made sense! 😂 Here we go…

Ugh, just look at this gorgeous cover! I mean, isn’t that reason enough to love this?! Kidding… Sort of. The content was just as enjoyable as the cover and I sped through this heart-wrenching story. The characters were so real and relatable and I loved these two cinnamon rolls so much 💞 I just wanted to hug them forever. I’m so excited to read Choi’s second book released last year!

I love historical fiction and am partial to reading books set during the Holocaust or WWII. I’d never read YA historical fiction before but I was really taken with Sepetys‘ evocative writing. I learned a lot about the atrocities that occurred in other nations during this period and it was eye-opening. I have a good feeling I’ll really enjoy her other books too!

Yes, this book is making another appearance on my lists this week because I absolutely loved it and like I said in my review, I highly recommend it! Sorry not sorry 😉 I adored this book and I’m looking forward to trying Clayborn’s other books because of how she managed to so captivate me and my feels!

I don’t know what I expected when I went into this but it wasn’t what I got–and I mean that in the best way too! This was such a great sci-fi thriller that really kept me on the edge of my seat and on my toes the whole time. James managed to reel me in with how she set the atmosphere and always had me second guessing myself while reading! Definitely keen to try her other work.

This book quickly captivated me with the magic, world building and books, but the characters had me speeding through the pages to find out what happens next. I adored this book so much and I’m really looking forward to trying Rogerson’s other work. I hope I love it just as much as I did this 😍

Who are authors you want to read more of and who have the potential to become a new favourite? Would any of these authors make your list?