Goodreads: Human Publish date: 16 October 2019 Publisher: Europe Comics Genre: Graphic Novel, Post-Apocalytpic, Science Fiction Panda Rating:
Planet Earth: 500,000 years in the future. Humans have been extinct for millennia. Two scientists, Robert and June, have been orbiting the Earth, waiting for the planet to become habitable once more. With the help of a team of robots, they plan to start over from scratch: a new Adam and Eve who won’t make the same mistakes as their ancestors. But first Robert has to find June, who seems to have landed somewhere else in this vast jungle—their Eden—full of grotesque creatures and strange primates…
This was a pretty bizarre graphic novel that I’m not quite sure I loved. I was immediately drawn in by the cover and the synopsis, which presented a pretty interesting post apocalyptic tale about returning to earth 500,000 years post death (both humanity’s and Earth’s). The story was well illustrated, however, the illustration style wasn’t what I expected when I picked this up. I thought the color palette of reds, greys, black and white was an interesting choice though; in a way it made earth seem a little bit leached of life, although that clearly wasn’t the case as there was plenty of animals living in the jungle. While I wasn’t a big fan of the illustrations, I thought the overall message of the story was very thought-provoking and made reflect on our relationship with our surroundings.
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: a freebie! I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with this freebie, but after some thought I decided that I would try injecting a little bit of holiday cheer to my blog, so I’m looking at the brand new holiday titles on my shelf. I’m not much of a holiday or seasonal reader so I don’t have any Christmassy books, but that is all changed today, friends! Early this morning I read Jana’s ‘A Bookish Little Christmas’ post and couldn’t help getting sucked right into the holiday mood, intense tropical heat notwithstanding! I mean, everything about the post screamed CHRISTMAS BOOK BUYING TIME…and what do you think I did? 😅 If you guessed that I went and bought all the Christmassy books then you’re spot on! Okay, I’m kidding (only a little bit). I did buy some but there are quite a few options available on Kindle Unlimited, in case you’re looking for a holiday read! I’m going to go ahead and say that pretty much 100% of these were cover buys 😍
Goodreads: The Curious Heart of Ailsa Rae Publish date: 29 October 2019 Publisher: St. Martin’s Press Genre: Contemporary Fiction, Chick Lit, Women’s Fiction Panda Rating:
Ailsa Rae is learning how to live. She’s only a few months past the heart transplant that – just in time – saved her life. Life should be a joyful adventure. But…
Her relationship with her mother is at breaking point. She knows she needs to find her father. She’s missed so much that her friends have left her behind. She’s felt so helpless for so long that she’s let polls on her blog make her decisions for her. And now she barely knows where to start on her own.
And then there’s Lennox. Her best friend and one time lover. He was sick too. He didn’t make it. And now she’s supposed to face all of this without him.
But her new heart is a bold heart. She just needs to learn to listen to it…
The Curious Heart of Ailsa Rae was a heartwarming (no pun intended) story about health, family, friendship, love, grief and quite simply ‘adulting’. Ailsa was born with a heart condition which meant that for most of her life she was too ill to really live. She wasn’t completely unexperienced and sheltered although she missed out on a lot of the ‘normal things’ that kids, teenagers and young adults experienced because her heart and body simply couldn’t handle it. She started to blog about her ‘blue heart’ and what her life was like as she waited for a transplant, until she finally gets the new heart she has literally been waiting for her whole life. It’s not a fast paced read and while there’s a lot of changes that happen, it’s not a larger-than-life miracle story either. It’s set in Edinburgh and as you might know by now it’s one of my favourite places! The author really made the city come to life and I could practically feel myself navigating the streets alongside Ailsa and it was such a wonderful feeling!
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: holiday reads. BUT since I haven’t really read books to go with the season, I’ve decided to just post my December Possibility Pile! This post might seem repetitive if you’ve read this post and this post already but I’m going to focus on 10 books that I really want to read before the year is out! Obviously, I want to read a lot more than these ten before 2019 is over, but I’m going to do my best to at least see these ones through. By now you know I’m a mood reader so this is going to be tough (maybe) but I’m hoping that December will see me doing these unread books a solid by getting them off the never ending TBR! This isn’t even including the books that I want to read for Task 3 of the #Triwizardathon either but I don’t know what I’ll be reading for that yet!
Wowow, it’s a question I’ve been asking myself repeatedly but seriously, where did November go?! Pretty sure that I blinked twice and the month was already over. Actually, these last few months have all been speeding by and I can’t believe that we’re now almost done with the teens of the 2000s and moving into our 20s! Insanity. So it’s time for another monthly wrap up and I gotta say, November was a weird month. I don’t know if it’s because the days passed so quickly but despite (what felt like) having a book in hand 98% of the time, this was the month that I also read the least. It might also have to do with the fact that my mood for romance has all but disappeared and I used to binge romance the most! I managed to read 12 books in November and for the most part, many of them were just okay…
I participated in #NonfictionNovember this month and as you can see from my read list, I didn’t do a very good job of it! I only managed to read two NF books, although I enjoyed both very much and one of them was my favorite read this month (Stranger Beside Me). I have a lot more NF on my list that I’d obviously like to get to and I’m hoping to read at least one or two more before the year ends. That said, I’m quite pleased that I even managed to read two because NF always takes me longer to get through… Also, two is more NF than I usually read in a year so… Yay? 🤷🏻♀️
I’m also quite chuffed that I managed to read two more of my eARCs this month and I’m slowly creeping closer to my 100% goal (and when I say slowly I really do mean… s-l-o-w-l-y! But slow progress is better than no progress, amirite?! 😂)! I wrote more reviews for my reads this month than before, but I still have tons to catch up on and I also didn’t end up posting any reviews from previous months either. Oops! Oh well, there’s always time to catch up… 😬
This month I also randomly decided to join in on the #Triwizardathon and it has been lots of fun! I’m on Team Durmstrang and at the start of Task 2, Durmstrang was in the lead! There’s one last task this December, starting next week, so I should probably start thinking about what to read but I’m pretty excited for the final! I think half of the books I’ve read this month were because of my participation in this readathon. I’m usually pretty bad at sticking to set TBRs and yes, I have replaced one or two books that I set out to read with something else, but for the most part I’m quite proud that I’ve managed to stick to the others. Go me!
I mentioned it briefly at the end of last month’s wrap up that I was thinking of doing a revamp on my blog look and I’ve finally done it. I changed my theme and made some new graphics, which are amateurish but I think overall, I’m quite pleased with how my blog looks. I don’t know if I’m enjoying this theme 100% yet, but I do like the new graphics that I made–especially the new blog headers! I think I’ve definitely brought more colour to my blog now! What do you all think of it? Or maybe you didn’t even notice or don’t care? (That’s totally fine too! Lol)
I hope you all had a great November! I’m sure that most of us have tons of books that we’d like to read before the year is out, so HAPPY DECEMBER READING, friends!
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’ve spent this Sunday thinking that I should probably be in bed with the book that I’m “currently reading”: The Curious Heart of Ailsa Rae by Stephanie Butland. I’ve finally picked up another e-ARC that’s *cough* a little *cough* overdue…
Ailsa Rae is learning how to live. She’s only a few months past the heart transplant that – just in time – saved her life. Life should be a joyful adventure. But…
Her relationship with her mother is at breaking point. She knows she needs to find her father. She’s missed so much that her friends have left her behind. She’s felt so helpless for so long that she’s let polls on her blog make her decisions for her. And now she barely knows where to start on her own.
And then there’s Lennox. Her best friend and one time lover. He was sick too. He didn’t make it. And now she’s supposed to face all of this without him.
But her new heart is a bold heart. She just needs to learn to listen to it…
Goodreads: Bury the Lede Publish date: 08 October 2019 Publisher: BOOM! Studios Genre: Crime Thriller, Mystery, Graphic Novel, LGBTQ+ Panda Rating:
Twenty-one-year-old Madison T. Jackson is already the star of the Emerson College student newspaper when she nabs a coveted night internship at Boston’s premiere newspaper, The Boston Lede. The job’s simple: do whatever the senior reporters tell you to do, from fetching coffee to getting a quote from a grieving parent. It’s gruelling work, so when the murder of a prominent Boston businessman comes up on the police scanner, Madison races to the scene of the grisly crime. There, Madison meets the woman who will change her life forever: prominent socialite Dahlia Kennedy, who is covered in gore and being arrested for the murder of her family. The newspapers put everyone they can in front of her with no results until, with nothing to lose, Madison gets a chance – and unexpectedly barrels headfirst into danger she never anticipated.
I love discovering new graphic novels and I requested this because the cover hooked my interest, plus I don’t think never read a crime noir graphic novel/comic before! Bury the Lede was mostly what I anticipated it to be, although there were some elements that really grated on my nerves and that’s what made me only give it three stars.
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: thankful freebie. I don’t celebrate Thanksgiving but I can’t help getting caught up in the thankful spirit that’s been going around in the book community lately. 2019 has been a year of… a lot. A lot of everything. In many ways I feel like this year has been one of extremes with either many high-highs and many low-lows, which has been incredibly trying. This basically means that I’ve been a hot-emotional-mess for 90% of the year, including right now! But before I become even more emotional, let’s get to what I’m thankful for this year. As this is a freebie, I’ve decided to keep it simple and write a list of all the bookish and non-bookish things I’m thankful for. Of course, I’ll try to keep it as bookish as possible 😉 Here we go:
Goodreads: TH1RT3EN (Eddie Flynn #4) Publish date: 13 August 2019 Publisher: Flatiron Books Genre: Crime Thriller, Mystery Panda Rating:
The serial killer isn’t on trial. He’s on the jury…
They were Hollywood’s hottest power couple. They had the world at their feet. Now one of them is dead and Hollywood star Robert Solomon is charged with the brutal murder of his beautiful wife.
This is the celebrity murder trial of the century and the defence want one man on their team: con artist turned lawyer Eddie Flynn.
All the evidence points to Robert’s guilt, but as the trial begins a series of sinister incidents in the courtroom start to raise doubts in Eddie’s mind.
What if there’s more than one actor in the courtroom? What if the killer isn’t on trial? What if the killer is on the jury?
Wow, what an incredible ride! Again, I’m facepalming myself for not reading this as soon as I got it on NetGalley because I loved every minute of this fast-paced courtroom drama and crime thriller. This book was like reading an episode of Criminal Minds and I could so clearly picture everything unfolding before me as if I watching it on TV. I knew I had to read this one as soon as I read the synopsis and saw that “the killer isn’t on trial, he’s on the jury”! I mean, is there a cleverer way of catching the reader’s attention with a blurb like that? It definitely worked it’s magic on me.
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