Read and Dream: My Book Life: 2016

The Big Picture: 2016!

WOW 2016 has flown by- and I have to say, I can't believe it's over! It's truly been a year of thick and thin but it has completely been worth it...and I just wanted to capture these 366 days in a blog post :)

Title: Nervous Conditions
Author: Tsitsi Dangarembga
Genre: Historical Fiction

Blurb: This stunning first novel, set in colonial Rhodesia during the 1960s, centers on the coming of age of a teenage girl, Tambu, and her relationship with her British-educated cousin Nyasha. Tambu, who yearns to be free of the constraints of her rural village, especially the circumscribed lives of the women, thinks her dreams have come true when her wealthy uncle offers to sponsor her education. But she soon learns that the education she receives at his mission school comes with a price. At the school she meets the worldly and rebellious Nyasha, who is chafing under her father's authority. Raised in England, Nyasha is so much a stranger among her own people that she can no longer speak her native language. Tambu can only watch as her cousin, caught between two cultures, pays the full cost of alienation.

Me: Such an interesting look on women in colonized Africa, and on two girl's journeys in coming to terms with themselves and the worlds they live in.

Title: Trieste
Author: Daša Drndić
Genre: Historical Fiction

Blurb: Haya Tedeschi waits to be reunited after sixty-two years with her son, fathered by an S.S. officer and stolen from her by the German authorities during the War as part of Himmler's clandestine 'Lebensborn' project, which strove for a 'racially pure' Germany. Her obsessive search for her son leads her to photographs, maps and fragments of verse, to testimonies from the Nuremberg trials and interviews with second-generation Jews, as well as witness accounts of atrocities that took place on her doorstep. A broad collage of material is assembled, and the lesser-known horror of Nazi occupation in northern Italy is gradually unveiled. Written in immensely powerful language, and employing a range of astonishing conceptual devices, Trieste is a novel like no other. Dasa Drndic has produced a shattering contribution to the literature of our twentieth-century history.

Me: I am a huge WWII geek. As in I will read practically anything under the sun if it has to do with WWII. I've read a lot of war novels before, but this one blew everything else out of the water. It is truly a war novel like no other.

Hey everyone! I hope you had a great Christmas :) Starting in November 2016, I decided to categorize my reading of classic literature into themes per month. November was war novels, and December is plays! So here are some mini reviews of three plays I've read this month- more will be on the way! (Don't worry, none of them are like Othello/Oedipus Classic-y, more modern classics!)

Title: Please Look After Mom
Author: Kyung-Sook Shin
Genre: Contemporary

Blurb: A million-plus-copy best seller in Korea — a magnificent English-language debut poised to become an international sensation — this is the stunning, deeply moving story of a family’s search for their mother, who goes missing one afternoon amid the crowds of the Seoul Station subway.

Told through the piercing voices and urgent perspectives of a daughter, son, husband, and mother, Please Look After Mom is at once an authentic picture of contemporary life in Korea and a universal story of family love.

You will never think of your mother the same way again after you read this book.

Me: An interesting read, because I am South Korean myself. It created a much more personal connection with the text.

Title: Homegoing
Author: Yaa Gyasi
Genre: Historical Fiction

Blurb: The unforgettable New York Times best seller begins with the story of two half-sisters, separated by forces beyond their control: one sold into slavery, the other married to a British slaver. Written with tremendous sweep and power, Homegoing traces the generations of family who follow, as their destinies lead them through two continents and three hundred years of history, each life indeliably drawn, as the legacy of slavery is fully revealed in light of the present day.

Me: This book had 84 holds on it at my public library. Now I understand why.

So I've been pretty inactive recently, and I apologize :( School really is a burden, and I have such respect for bloggers who somehow manage to do both at the same time. The good news is, I have been reading A TON lately.

So to give you short snippets of my thoughts on these three INCREDIBLE novels, I have started this Mini Reviews series to make sure I get straight to the point.

Hi everyone! I'm honored to bring author Andrew Joyce onto the blog to talk about his newest book, Yellow Hair. I was intrigued by its premise of the Sioux Nation and Wounded Knee, all topics that I feel like there isn't enough popular literature about. I truly believe taking the time to explore these untold stories is incredibly rewarding, and I hope you enjoy our brief conversation!

Title: Catch-22
Author: Joseph Heller
Genre: Classics

Blurb: Fifty years after its original publication, Catch-22 remains a cornerstone of American literature and one of the funniest—and most celebrated—novels of all time. Set in Italy during World War II, this is the story of the incomparable, malingering bombardier, Yossarian, a hero who is furious because thousands of people he has never met are trying to kill him. But his real problem is not the enemy—it is his own army, which keeps increasing the number of missions the men must fly to complete their service. Yet if Yossarian makes any attempt to excuse himself from the perilous missions he’s assigned, he’ll be in violation of Catch-22, a hilariously sinister bureaucratic rule: a man is considered insane if he willingly continues to fly dangerous combat missions, but if he makes a formal request to be removed from duty, he is proven sane and therefore ineligible to be relieved.

Me:

" There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to."

This was a wild, wild ride. Filled with humor, quirky characters, and bitter satire- captures how ridiculous and absurd war is. It's certainly dense, and a little difficult to get into, but it's definitely worth it.

Let me share some quotes with you that capture the essence of this novel better than I ever could.

Title: Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
Author: Jack Thorne (+ J.K. Rowling)
Publisher: Little, Brown
Genre: Play, HARRY POTTER (it's its own genre)

Blurb: It was always difficult being Harry Potter and it isn’t much easier now that he is an overworked employee of the Ministry of Magic, a husband and father of three school-age children.

While Harry grapples with a past that refuses to stay where it belongs, his youngest son Albus must struggle with the weight of a family legacy he never wanted. As past and present fuse ominously, both father and son learn the uncomfortable truth: sometimes, darkness comes from unexpected places.

Me: First of all, can I say: HELLOOO!! I've missed being on here! I'm overwhelmed and school is wild, but I do think I need to come back to one of the places I love the most- blogging! And what better book to kick off my return with than the last Harry Potter?

I have to say, I never thought this day would come. I started blogging in 2014, and I never imagined people would want to read Harry Potter reviews more than a decade after the books came out. But I get my chance! It's here, I've read it, you should too...CURSED CHILD!

Title: The Wrath and the Dawn
Author: Renee Ahdieh
Publisher: Putnam
Genre: Fantasy, Retellings, YA\

Blurb:One Life to One Dawn.

Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, takes a new bride each night only to have her executed at sunrise. So it is a suspicious surprise when sixteen-year-old Shahrzad volunteers to marry Khalid. But she does so with a clever plan to stay alive and exact revenge on the Caliph for the murder of her best friend and countless other girls. Shazi’s wit and will, indeed, get her through to the dawn that no others have seen, but with a catch . . . she’s falling in love with the very boy who killed her dearest friend.

She discovers that the murderous boy-king is not all that he seems and neither are the deaths of so many girls. Shazi is determined to uncover the reason for the murders and to break the cycle once and for all.

Me: Such a beautifully woven story that tells a tale unlike any other.

Title: The 100-year old man who Climbed out of the Window and Disappeared
Author: Jonas Jonasson
Publisher: Harper Collins
Genre: Humor, Contemporary

Blurb: It all starts on the one-hundredth birthday of Allan Karlsson. Sitting quietly in his room in an old people’s home, he is waiting for the party he-never-wanted-anyway to begin. Slowly but surely Allan climbs out of his bedroom window, into the flowerbed (in his slippers) and makes his getaway. And so begins his picaresque and unlikely journey involving criminals, several murders, a suitcase full of cash, and incompetent police. As his escapades unfold, we learn something of Allan’s earlier life in which – remarkably – he helped to make the atom bomb, became friends with American presidents, Russian tyrants, and Chinese leaders, and was a participant behind the scenes in many key events of the twentieth century.

Me: Hilarious! Came to me during a reading slump, and completely cured it. Such a nice change to a lot of the dramatic books I've been reading lately.

Hello everyone, and I'm sorry for the long absence! (I feel like I'm saying that a lot) But this time there is (sort-of) a legitimate excuse. SUMMER STARTED! Here in the States, summer break starts around the beginning of June for me, and as soon as school let out, I planned to read a book a day, write blog posts all the time, and watch a lot of movies.

Until I realized I was almost never home for the next two months or so.

Hey everyone! I'm back at it with the bookish DIYs! Summer means a lot more time to read, but also just a lot more time to do things I wouldn't be able to do in the school year. So crafting has been super fun and of COURSE I had to make everything book related.

I've seen scrabble tile pendants everywhere- but I first got the inspiration for these when I saw Celeste's daily pendant posts (her blog here) which were basically book covers on pendants. So I decided to make them myself, and after watching a few videos, got started!

Title: The Great Gatsby
Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
Genre: Classics
Year Published: 1925

Blurb: Young, handsome and fabulously rich, Jay Gatsby is the bright star of the Jazz Age, but as writer Nick Carraway is drawn into the decadent orbit of his Long Island mansion, where the party never seems to end, he finds himself faced by the mystery of Gatsby's origins and desires. Beneath the shimmering surface of his life, Gatsby is hiding a secret: a silent longing that can never be fulfilled. And soon, this destructive obsession will force his world to unravel.

In The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald brilliantly captures both the disillusionment of post-war America and the moral failure of a society obsessed with wealth and status. But he does more than render the essence of a particular time and place, for in chronicling Gatsby's tragic pursuit of his dream, Fitzgerald re-creates the universal conflict between illusion and reality.

Me: A reread that was completely worth it. I hadn't quite grasped the true magnitude of what Fitzgerald had put into words.

Title: The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender
Author: Leslye Walton
Publisher: Candlewick Press
Genre: Magical Realism, Fantasy

Blurb: Magical realism, lyrical prose, and the pain and passion of human love haunt this hypnotic generational saga.

Foolish love appears to be the Roux family birthright, an ominous forecast for its most recent progeny, Ava Lavender. Ava—in all other ways a normal girl—is born with the wings of a bird.

First-time author Leslye Walton has constructed a layered and unforgettable mythology of what it means to be born with hearts that are tragically, exquisitely human.

Me: Incredible. I've been meaning to read this for a very long time now, and I'm so so glad I got around to doing it.

Two days ago, the world (and especially the United States) woke up to absolutely terrifying and devastating news. The largest mass shooting in U.S. history had occurred at a gay bar in Orlando, Florida, killing 50 people. I'm sure that you've heard about the atrocity. I have never been hit so hard by any piece of news.

I suddenly was so ashamed to be American. If this is what our country allows, and if change has not happened for so long, when? When? I still cannot fathom what happened. Although there are multiple issues being debated in light of this shooting, including gun control and islamophobia, I would like to focus on homophobia for today, and what literature can do to combat it.

Title: The Shadow of the Wind

Author: Carlos Ruiz Zafón

Publisher: Penguin Books

Genre: Mystery, Historical Fiction

Blurb: Barcelona, 1945: A city slowly heals in the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, and Daniel, an antiquarian book dealer’s son who mourns the loss of his mother, finds solace in a mysterious book entitled The Shadow of the Wind, by one Julián Carax. But when he sets out to find the author’s other works, he makes a shocking discovery: someone has been systematically destroying every copy of every book Carax has written. In fact, Daniel may have the last of Carax’s books in existence. Soon Daniel’s seemingly innocent quest opens a door into one of Barcelona’s darkest secrets--an epic story of murder, madness, and doomed love.

Me: My favorite book that I have read in 2016 so far, and one of my favorites of all time. All lovers of literature should read.

Title: One Thousand and One Nights
Author: *retelling* Hanan Al-Shaykh
Genre: Classics, Retelling
Country: Lebanon

Blurb: Witty, poetic, erotic and brutal, One Thousand and One Nights are the never-ending stories told by the young Shahrazad under sentence of death to King Shahrayar. Maddened by the discovery of his wife's orgies, King Shahrayar believes all women are unfaithful and vows to marry a virgin every night and kill her in the morning. To survive, his newest wife Shahrazad spins a web of tales night after night, leaving the King in suspense when morning comes, thus prolonging her life for another day. Written in Arabic from tales gathered in India, Persia and across the great Arab empire, these mesmerising stories tell of the real and the supernatural, love and marriage, power and punishment, wealth and poverty, and the endless trials and uncertainties of fate. Now adapted by Hanan al-Shaykh the One Thousand and One Nights are revealed in an intoxicating new voice.

Title: Emma
Author: Jane Austen
Genre: Classics

Blurb: 'I never have been in love; it is not my way, or my nature; and I do not think I ever shall.'

Beautiful, clever, rich - and single - Emma Woodhouse is perfectly content with her life and sees no need for either love or marriage. Nothing, however, delights her more than interfering in the romantic lives of others. But when she ignores the warnings of her good friend Mr. Knightley and attempts to arrange a suitable match for her protegee Harriet Smith, her carefully laid plans soon unravel and have consequences that she never expected. With its imperfect but charming heroine and its witty and subtle exploration of relationships, Emma is often seen as Jane Austen's most flawless work.

There are a few new changes that have come into my reading life and my blog recently, and I wanted to talk to you about them before making the transition. First, NEW DESIGN!! I've been wanting a new design for a very long time, but didn't get around to it until this weekend where I accidently completely lost my template and had to start from scratch. There were tears...but it all worked out and I am so glad with the end result! Let me know if you would like all the links/info of how I did it!

Most importantly, there are HUGE reading changes that have already been put into place, as can be seen by my blog header: Countries, Classics, Books.

Title: A Separate Peace

Author: John Knowles

Genre: Classics

Blurb: An American classic and great bestseller for over thirty years, A Separate Peace is timeless in its description of adolescence during a period when the entire country was losing its innocence to the second world war.

Set at a boys boarding school in New England during the early years of World War II, A Separate Peace is a harrowing and luminous parable of the dark side of adolescence. Gene is a lonely, introverted intellectual. Phineas is a handsome, taunting, daredevil athlete. What happens between the two friends one summer, like the war itself, banishes the innocence of these boys and their world.

Welcome to a different type of post today! I pondered whether to call this a DIY, but decided on it being too easy and just wanted to share it with you instead. I love books, and incorporating bookish things into daily routines of my life makes everything more vibrant and exciting for me. Quotes are one of my favorite aspects of reading so many books- I feel like there is one that fits what I need to hear in every situation.

Gender and Books, A Correlation?

Hey everyone! Today I have a very interesting...but possibly touchy subject about gender, authors and books. Being familiar with YA and hoping to read more classics, I can't help but notice the gender differences between those drastically different genres, and the book industry in general.

Title: Kids of Appetite
Author: David Arnold
Publishing Date: September 20th, 2016
Genre: Contemporary, Realistic Fiction

Blurb: Victor Benucci is an intelligent boy with a love of art (Matisse!) and an urn full of his father's ashes. Madeline Falco is a simultaneous extreme opposite. Both find a home in a greenhouse with a group of dreamers.

Madeline's uncle has been killed. The police would like to know their story. Songs of flowers, ice cream, a family of five, terrible things happening to the most wonderful people, and a bit of love all combine to create the most Super Racehorse of a story.

Title: Let's Get Lost
Author: Adi Alsaid
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Genre: Contemporary, Realistic Fiction

Blurb: Five strangers. Countless adventures. One epic way to get lost.

Four teens across the country have only one thing in common: a girl named Leila. She crashes into their lives in her absurdly red car at the moment they need someone the most.

Hudson, Bree, Elliot and Sonia find a friend in Leila. And when Leila leaves them, their lives are forever changed. But it is during Leila's own 4,268-mile journey that she discovers the most important truth—sometimes, what you need most is right where you started. And maybe the only way to find what you're looking for is to get lost along the way.

Title: A Tale of Two Cities

Author: Charles Dickens

Genre: Classics

*Spoilers in white. Highlight to read.*

Blurb: After eighteen years as a political prisoner in the Bastille, the ageing Doctor Manette is finally released and reunited with his daughter in England. There the lives of two very different men, Charles Darnay, an exiled French aristocrat, and Sydney Carton, a disreputable but brilliant English lawyer, become enmeshed through their love for Lucie Manette. From the tranquil roads of London, they are drawn against their will to the vengeful, bloodstained streets of Paris at the height of the Reign of Terror, and they soon fall under the lethal shadow of La Guillotine.

Hey guys! I'm back today with a lot of book titles that I want to discuss. Books I'm reading, my TBR list, books I'm buying, and books I've just read.

Books and Life: The Connection

Hello everyone! Today I have a little different talkin' about discussion post. I am not discussing any particular aspect of books/questions that have to do with certain topics found in books but rather what books mean to me, how they have been slowly going away (NOOOO) in my busy life, and all the concerns that come with it.

Title: Things Fall Apart
Author: Chinua Achebe
Genre: Classics

Blurb: Things Fall Apart tells two intertwining stories, both centering on Okonkwo, a “strong man” of an Ibo village in Nigeria. The first, a powerful fable of the immemorial conflict between the individual and society, traces Okonkwo’s fall from grace with the tribal world. The second, as modern as the first is ancient, concerns the clash of cultures and the destruction of Okonkwo's world with the arrival of aggressive European missionaries. These perfectly harmonized twin dramas are informed by an awareness capable of encompassing at once the life of nature, human history, and the mysterious compulsions of the soul.

Title: How to Be a Woman
Author: Caitlin Moran
Publisher: Ebury Press
Genre: Nonfiction

Blurb: Though they have the vote and the Pill and haven't been burned as witches since 1727, life isn't exactly a stroll down the catwalk for modern women. They are beset by uncertainties and questions: Why are they supposed to get Brazilians? Why do bras hurt? Why the incessant talk about babies? And do men secretly hate them? Caitlin Moran interweaves provocative observations on women's lives with laugh-out-loud funny scenes from her own, from adolescence to her development as a writer, wife, and mother.

Hey everyone! Today I'm here with something really fun and exciting...a DIY! I honestly love expressing my bookish love through anything possible, hence the overload of merchandise in my closet and my room. This is something I did awhile back that I got quite a lot of compliments on.

Title: The Metamorphosis
Author: Franz Kafka
Genre: Classics, Magic Realism

Blurb: Kafka begins his masterpiece, The Metamorphosis. It is the story of a young man who, transformed overnight into a giant beetle-like insect, becomes an object of disgrace to his family, an outsider in his own home, a quintessentially alienated man. A harrowing -- though absurdly comic -- meditation on human feelings of inadequacy, guilt, and isolation, The Metamorphosis has taken its place as one of the most widely read and influential works of twentieth-century fiction.

Title: Slaughterhouse-Five
Author: Kurt Vonnegut
Genre: Classics, Sci-fi

Prisoner of war, optometrist, time-traveller - these are the life roles of Billy Pilgrim, hero of this miraculously moving, bitter and funny story of innocence faced with apocalypse. Slaughterhouse 5 is one of the world's great anti-war books. Centring on the infamous fire-bombing of Dresden in the Second World War, Billy Pilgrim's odyssey through time reflects the journey of our own fractured lives as we search for meaning in what we are afraid to know.

Title: Between Shades of Gray
Author: Ruta Sepetys
Publisher: Philomel Books
Genre: Historical Fiction

It's 1941 and fifteen-year-old artist Lina Vilkas is on Stalin's extermination list. Deported to a prison camp in Siberia, Lina fights for her life, fearless, risking everything to save her family. It's a long and harrowing journey and it is only their incredible strength, love, and hope that pull Lina and her family through each day. But will love be enough to keep them alive?

Title: Romeo and Juliet
Author: William Shakespeare
Genre: Drama, Classics

One of Shakespeare's most popular and accessible plays, Romeo and Juliet tells the story of two star-crossed lovers and the unhappy fate that befell them as a result of a long and bitter feud between their families. The play contains some of Shakespeare's most beautiful and lyrical love poetry and is perhaps the finest celebration of the joys of young love ever written. This inexpensive edition includes the complete, unabridged text with explanatory footnotes.Ideal for classroom use, it is a wonderful addition to the home library of anyone wanting to savor one of literature's most sublime paeans to love.

Hello everyone! Where have I been?? I know, I know, it's been a weird few weeks as I have been awkwardly popping in and then completely disappearing. It appears to me that February may just be one of the busiest months of the year because I really do have SO much going on at the current moment.

Title: Nimona
Author: Noelle Stevenson
Publisher: Harper Collins
Genre: Fantasy, Graphic Novel

Nimona is an impulsive young shapeshifter with a knack for villainy. Lord Ballister Blackheart is a villain with a vendetta. As sidekick and supervillain, Nimona and Lord Blackheart are about to wreak some serious havoc. Their mission: prove to the kingdom that Sir Ambrosius Goldenloin and his buddies at the Institution of Law Enforcement and Heroics aren't the heroes everyone thinks they are.

But as small acts of mischief escalate into a vicious battle, Lord Blackheart realizes that Nimona's powers are as murky and mysterious as her past. And her unpredictable wild side might be more dangerous than he is willing to admit.

Title: Brave New World
Author: Aldous Huxley
Genre: Classics

Far in the future, the World Controllers have created the ideal society. Through clever use of genetic engineering, brainwashing and recreational sex and drugs, all its members are happy consumers. Bernard Marx seems alone harbouring an ill-defined longing to break free. A visit to one of the few remaining Savage Reservations, where the old, imperfect life still continues, may be the cure for his
distress...

Huxley's ingenious fantasy of the future sheds a blazing light on the present and is considered to be his most enduring masterpiece.

TIME TO READ

So it's the start of February...the second month of the year. By now, the motivation has started to wear off and the crazy new year's resolutions are taking their toll. And there's a general problem with my reading/blogging schedule...it becomes practically nonexistent.

It's okay though! Because I've found a pretty good way to keep my reading consistent. So if any of you feel the same way, here are a few of my tips:

Title: Code Name Verity
Author: Elizabeth Wein
Publisher: Egmont Press
Genre: Historical Fiction

Spoilers in white. Highlight to read.

I have two weeks. You'll shoot me at the end no matter what I do.

That's what you do to enemy agents. It's what we do to enemy agents. But I look at all the dark and twisted roads ahead and cooperation is the easy way out. Possibly the only way out for a girl caught red-handed doing dirty work like mine - and I will do anything, anything to avoid SS-Hauptsturmführer von Linden interrogating me again.

He has said that I can have as much paper as I need. All I have to do is cough up everything I can remember about the British War Effort. And I'm going to. But the story of how I came to be here starts with my friend Maddie. She is the pilot who flew me into France - an Allied Invasion of Two.

We are a sensational team.

Title: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Author: Mark Twain
Genre: Classics

Of all the contenders for the title of The Great American Novel, none has a better claim than The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.Intended at first as a simple story of a boy's adventures in the Mississippi Valley - a sequel to The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - the book grew and matured under Twain's hand into a work of immeasurable richness and complexity. More than a century after its publication, the critical debate over the symbolic significance of Huck's and Jim's voyage is still fresh, and it remains a major work that can be enjoyed at many levels: as an incomparable adventure story and as a classic of American humor.

Title: Dumplin'
Author: Julie Murphy
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Genre: Contemporary, Realistic Fiction

Self-proclaimed fat girl Willowdean Dickson (dubbed “Dumplin’” by her former beauty queen mom) has always been at home in her own skin. Her thoughts on having the ultimate bikini body? Put a bikini on your body. With her all-American beauty best friend, Ellen, by her side, things have always worked…until Will takes a job at Harpy’s, the local fast-food joint. There she meets Private School Bo, a hot former jock. Will isn’t surprised to find herself attracted to Bo. But she is surprised when he seems to like her back.

Instead of finding new heights of self-assurance in her relationship with Bo, Will starts to doubt herself. So she sets out to take back her confidence by doing the most horrifying thing she can imagine: entering the Miss Clover City beauty pageant—along with several other unlikely candidates—to show the world that she deserves to be up there as much as any twiggy girl does. Along the way, she’ll shock the hell out of Clover City—and maybe herself most of all.

With starry Texas nights, red candy suckers, Dolly Parton songs, and a wildly unforgettable heroine—Dumplin’ is guaranteed to steal your heart.

Today is a really special day for me, because my blog has turned two!!!! Yep, on this day two years ago (2014!!) my blog was created with a post that actually consisted of no words but just one picture...

and it still holds true to this day. I am so grateful and amazed by the progress this small blog has made in the past two years. I've met so many amazing bloggers from all over the world and I've come to love the positive energy and radiating love of words that all of us share. It is an incredible bond, and I'm so thankful to be part of it.

Thank you to everyone who stumbled upon my growing blog, and I promise I will continue to make it better :) Much love, and rock on!

The ABBA Book TAG!

I haven't done a TAG in so long...and I'm so so so excited for this one! My dad is an absolute music fanatic, and he gave me a musication (music education) starting with ABBA. I first saw this by Ranu @The Araylia Bookshelf and I went CRAZAYYY! So let's just get into it!

Title: Everything Everything
Author: Nicola Yoon
Genre: Contemporary, Realistic Fiction
Publisher: Delacorte

Spoilers in white...Highlight to read!

My disease is as rare as it is famous. Basically, I’m allergic to the world. I don’t leave my house, have not left my house in seventeen years. The only people I ever see are my mom and my nurse, Carla.

But then one day, a moving truck arrives next door. I look out my window, and I see him. He’s tall, lean and wearing all black—black T-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, and a black knit cap that covers his hair completely. He catches me looking and stares at me. I stare right back. His name is Olly.

Maybe we can’t predict the future, but we can predict some things. For example, I am certainly going to fall in love with Olly. It’s almost certainly going to be a disaster.

CLASSICS!

Hey guys! So the other day I was going through my discussion posts to see if I had done this post before...and SHOCKER I hadn't. Which was genuinely surprising because I have quite a lot to say on this topic...and I really want to hear what you guys have to say too.

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