Book Reviews: May 2016
I'm always reading. Sometimes I'll hear a suggestion what to read next, which leads to another new book, then the sequel, then a spin off or a discovery of a new author I like and then all of a sudden I've read 12 books in a week.
That just happened.
I am just finally pulling my eyes away from my Kindle after a week of unemployment and escapism. Earlier this year, it was slow going. I was working/traveling and couldn't find anything that stuck out as a MUST read. Here are the few I read between January and April.
At the Water's Edge - by Sarah Gruen - A historical fiction novel. Set in the 1940's during WWII, a bored socialite is dragged along by her obnoxious husband and friend all the way to Scotland on their search for the loch ness monster. Her husband tries to prove his worth since he isn't fighting in the war but she's forced to stay behind in an inn where she befriends the owner/Scottish hunk. What stuck with me the most about the book was how much the wife was at the mercy of her husband and how glad I am of the equality in marriage we have now.
Life after Life - by Kate Atkinson - Another historical fiction. This book is presented in a refreshingly new format where the main character dies over and over. Each time she is born again and finds a slightly different path in life. Sometimes she only lives to be a child, sometimes to adulthood. I eventually found myself holding my breath wondering how far she was going to make it this time. I learned a lot of ways people died in the early 20th century. The book reminded me of the movie Sliding Doors where you wonder how life could end up if the main character does one thing differently. There's a spin off novel called A God in Ruins that I will try to read. (about the main characters' brother).
Eat, Pray, Love - by Elizabeth Gilbert - I was traveling to Bali, Indonesia and was told to go to a few places mentioned in this book. There's the movie with Julia Roberts that I never ended up seeing and I had to read the Bali section (Love) on the Plane to Bali before reading the Italy (Eat) and India (Pray) segments. Liz, the main character, has a bad divorce. She spends a year traveling the world working on different aspects of her life and learning lessons along the way through the people she meets. I really should have started from the beginning but I was in a time crunch. I didn't even get to do anything that she did in Bali (meet with a "healer" or have my palm read). And me being me, I just didn't really feel a connection to her soul searching through mediation and food.
Light Between Oceans - by M.L. Stedman - I saw the trailer for the movie adaptation of this book with Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander. It caught my attention and I really enjoy reading the source materials before seeing the movie, especially since the trailer doesn't give too much away. A couple lives on an island off the coast of Australia. They find a baby after having struggles to conceive and although they think it won't matter, it has huge ramifications. The book was a little heartbreaking and explored a lot about relationships with parents/child that gave me pause for thought. (Here's the TRAILER that caught my eye)
What Alice Forgot - by Liane Moriarty- I've read two other books by Liane and I really enjoyed them (The Husband's Secret and Big Little Lies). Another book about a middle aged housewife with children. This time the wife/mother loses the last 10 years of her memory in an accident and she tries to understand why she's become a stressed out PTA crazed mother of three separated from her husband. I found her struggle to understand and slow reveal of her past had a good pace. There were some surprises I didn't expect and I suggested this book to my book club since it was a lighter read.
Who Do You Love - by Jennifer Weiner - I read one Jennifer Weiner book a long time ago and this one popped up as a recommendation from the library's digital app. Two children from completely different walks of life, meet in a hospital ER. They don't see each other until years later but establish that they had a connection and begin a relationship in their teens. Each character has to mature and explore their path in life and sometimes they do it together and sometimes not. It was interesting reading from a young man's perspective with a background so different from what I know.
Iced +Burned +Feverborn - by Karen Moning (Book 6-8 in the Fever Series) - I've read the first five books of the Fever Series many times. It's a fantasy series with Faeries and Humans trying to co-exsist after the walls between worlds fall down. (It doesn't go well) I had heard that the POV switches to a side character that I wasn't crazy about so it took me a while to pick up Iced. However it was easy to get through, ended on a cliffhanger so I quickly read through the final two that are available, completing the series. I felt like the first 5 books wrapped up pretty solidly and this one started a whole new mystery/set of bad guys that seem pretty hard to beat. Looking forward to the next book when it comes out.
Beyond the Highland Mist - by Karen Moning - This is the first in a different series by the same author as all the Fever books. She wrote this one way before getting to the Fever novels but it had good reviews on GoodReads. However, as I began reading, I could just tell she wrote it with much less experience. The premise is that a faery (like in the fever series) and a Scottish laird from the 16th century are fighting over the affections of a woman from the present (1990s). Time travel and all that felt a lot like the Outlander series, but unfortunately this book had pretty much zero historical research done to make it palatable. It was hard reading characters from the past talk with normal 20th century words and situations. I also really disliked the contrived drama of miscommunication making each character love/hate each other at the wrong times.
Hopeless - by Colleen Hoover - This was on many GoodReads listopia lists so I decided to finally try it out. I got hooked so fast. This one is hard to explain, the descriptions are somewhat vague and have to be that way so you don't get a hint of what and who everyone really is. Sky is a teenager that goes from home school to high school for her senior year. She meets a guy, Holder, who may or may not be bad news for her, but you can tell it's "insta-love" attraction for her. As the story played out I was caught up in the mysterious flashbacks and slow reveal of Sky's past. I felt like I knew what was coming but was still surprised by the reveal of her real connection to Holder.
Losing Hope - by Colleen Hoover - This was called the companion book to Hopeless. It's Holder's point of view of everything that happens in Hopeless but with a little more backstory. Knowing what was going to happen was at least made interesting to understand what he was thinking the whole time. I wish Colleen Hoover could write in 3rd person (not her style) so I didn't pay twice for pretty much the same story.
Confess - by Colleen Hoover - So I like Colleen Hoover, I decided to check out her other books. Confess is about a young woman who moves to Texas and gets a job in an art gallery but the connection between the main characters Auburn and Owen is more than it seems . This is when I realized Colleen Hoover has a formula and she's sticking to it. Slow reveal of the past/A connection that is kept secret/Insta-love (or obvious attraction)/Misunderstandings & Miscommunications. I still inhaled this book and she does a good job at surprising me. I also enjoyed the Art that was included in the book, it added something special to see a visual of Owen's artistic talent.
Maybe Someday - by Colleen Hoover. Sydney and Ridge (Pretty much all her characters have quirky names). Sydney finds herself single and out of an apartment and her cute neighbor steps up and offers her a place to stay. There's an attraction and there's a twist: He's deaf and has a girlfriend. So I found myself interested more in finding out how they were going to end up together.. because it's obvious by now that's Colleen's formula. There wasn't really a secret past connection this time at least. What was also interesting is that Ridge plays music and thankfully I read this through my Kindle because it actually links to real songs. I enjoyed being able to interact on a different level than just reading.
Ugly Love - by Colleen Hoover. Tate and Miles. This was the same but different from the other ones. Tate is a nurse going to school and living with her brother in San Francisco. Miles is her neighbor and friend of her brother and they DON'T have insta-love. There's is chemistry though but Miles is introduced as very emotionally closed off and definitely not interested in more than a hook up with Tate. Their story is interspersed with flashbacks to six years prior where you eventually find out why Miles is Miles. I was very saddened by the reveal (that means it did a good job). There's the obvious drama of Tate falling for Miles and not getting much in return. I had this weird sympathetic response to Tate's internal struggle of forming an attachment to someone that doesn't want attachments. This one had the best written sex scenes by far though!
** I want to note that by this point, I felt like I had to keep reading more Colleen Hoover because I was almost through all her books. It was only taking me a couple hours to read each one so I had the urge to keep going. BUT at this point there were a few things bugging me. ALL her main male characters had the same mannerisms. They all rubbed their necks when nervous, they all said the same things the same ways at some point. They all had the same way of kissing. It was getting predictable. But I felt like I needed to keep going.
November 9 - by Colleen Hoover - Fallon and Ben. They meet just as she's moving across country. There's a secret past, insta-love and misunderstandings etc etc. It felt strange reading this one because Ben is a writer and reading a book about a book writer is a bit META but I let it go. In this case the big reveal is through his book. I read a book within a book. The problem was that this reveal was WAY too big of a hurdle for our characters to so easily get past. I finished this book just to get it over with.
Never, Never (Parts 1-3)- by Colleen Hoover and Tarryn Fisher - By this point I'm almost done with Colleen. These three short stories all connect to make one story that should have been released as one book. The main characters, Charlie and Silas, somehow don't remember anything about their lives or who they are and somehow continuously lose their memories every 48 hours. Ohh mystery had me hooked but by the third part I was really confused and annoyed. This was a departure from the other books in the sense that it didn't have a logical reason for anything that was happening. I was SO glad I got these through the library and didn't spend money on it because it was pretty ridiculous. If you ever decide to read one of the books I've read. This isn't it.
Thanks for taking the time to read my mini-reviews. If you end up reading any of them I'd love to talk about it with you!
That just happened.
I am just finally pulling my eyes away from my Kindle after a week of unemployment and escapism. Earlier this year, it was slow going. I was working/traveling and couldn't find anything that stuck out as a MUST read. Here are the few I read between January and April.
Life after Life - by Kate Atkinson - Another historical fiction. This book is presented in a refreshingly new format where the main character dies over and over. Each time she is born again and finds a slightly different path in life. Sometimes she only lives to be a child, sometimes to adulthood. I eventually found myself holding my breath wondering how far she was going to make it this time. I learned a lot of ways people died in the early 20th century. The book reminded me of the movie Sliding Doors where you wonder how life could end up if the main character does one thing differently. There's a spin off novel called A God in Ruins that I will try to read. (about the main characters' brother).
Eat, Pray, Love - by Elizabeth Gilbert - I was traveling to Bali, Indonesia and was told to go to a few places mentioned in this book. There's the movie with Julia Roberts that I never ended up seeing and I had to read the Bali section (Love) on the Plane to Bali before reading the Italy (Eat) and India (Pray) segments. Liz, the main character, has a bad divorce. She spends a year traveling the world working on different aspects of her life and learning lessons along the way through the people she meets. I really should have started from the beginning but I was in a time crunch. I didn't even get to do anything that she did in Bali (meet with a "healer" or have my palm read). And me being me, I just didn't really feel a connection to her soul searching through mediation and food.
Light Between Oceans - by M.L. Stedman - I saw the trailer for the movie adaptation of this book with Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander. It caught my attention and I really enjoy reading the source materials before seeing the movie, especially since the trailer doesn't give too much away. A couple lives on an island off the coast of Australia. They find a baby after having struggles to conceive and although they think it won't matter, it has huge ramifications. The book was a little heartbreaking and explored a lot about relationships with parents/child that gave me pause for thought. (Here's the TRAILER that caught my eye)
This past Week:
What Alice Forgot - by Liane Moriarty- I've read two other books by Liane and I really enjoyed them (The Husband's Secret and Big Little Lies). Another book about a middle aged housewife with children. This time the wife/mother loses the last 10 years of her memory in an accident and she tries to understand why she's become a stressed out PTA crazed mother of three separated from her husband. I found her struggle to understand and slow reveal of her past had a good pace. There were some surprises I didn't expect and I suggested this book to my book club since it was a lighter read.
Who Do You Love - by Jennifer Weiner - I read one Jennifer Weiner book a long time ago and this one popped up as a recommendation from the library's digital app. Two children from completely different walks of life, meet in a hospital ER. They don't see each other until years later but establish that they had a connection and begin a relationship in their teens. Each character has to mature and explore their path in life and sometimes they do it together and sometimes not. It was interesting reading from a young man's perspective with a background so different from what I know.
Iced +Burned +Feverborn - by Karen Moning (Book 6-8 in the Fever Series) - I've read the first five books of the Fever Series many times. It's a fantasy series with Faeries and Humans trying to co-exsist after the walls between worlds fall down. (It doesn't go well) I had heard that the POV switches to a side character that I wasn't crazy about so it took me a while to pick up Iced. However it was easy to get through, ended on a cliffhanger so I quickly read through the final two that are available, completing the series. I felt like the first 5 books wrapped up pretty solidly and this one started a whole new mystery/set of bad guys that seem pretty hard to beat. Looking forward to the next book when it comes out.
Beyond the Highland Mist - by Karen Moning - This is the first in a different series by the same author as all the Fever books. She wrote this one way before getting to the Fever novels but it had good reviews on GoodReads. However, as I began reading, I could just tell she wrote it with much less experience. The premise is that a faery (like in the fever series) and a Scottish laird from the 16th century are fighting over the affections of a woman from the present (1990s). Time travel and all that felt a lot like the Outlander series, but unfortunately this book had pretty much zero historical research done to make it palatable. It was hard reading characters from the past talk with normal 20th century words and situations. I also really disliked the contrived drama of miscommunication making each character love/hate each other at the wrong times.
Hopeless - by Colleen Hoover - This was on many GoodReads listopia lists so I decided to finally try it out. I got hooked so fast. This one is hard to explain, the descriptions are somewhat vague and have to be that way so you don't get a hint of what and who everyone really is. Sky is a teenager that goes from home school to high school for her senior year. She meets a guy, Holder, who may or may not be bad news for her, but you can tell it's "insta-love" attraction for her. As the story played out I was caught up in the mysterious flashbacks and slow reveal of Sky's past. I felt like I knew what was coming but was still surprised by the reveal of her real connection to Holder.
Losing Hope - by Colleen Hoover - This was called the companion book to Hopeless. It's Holder's point of view of everything that happens in Hopeless but with a little more backstory. Knowing what was going to happen was at least made interesting to understand what he was thinking the whole time. I wish Colleen Hoover could write in 3rd person (not her style) so I didn't pay twice for pretty much the same story.
Confess - by Colleen Hoover - So I like Colleen Hoover, I decided to check out her other books. Confess is about a young woman who moves to Texas and gets a job in an art gallery but the connection between the main characters Auburn and Owen is more than it seems . This is when I realized Colleen Hoover has a formula and she's sticking to it. Slow reveal of the past/A connection that is kept secret/Insta-love (or obvious attraction)/Misunderstandings & Miscommunications. I still inhaled this book and she does a good job at surprising me. I also enjoyed the Art that was included in the book, it added something special to see a visual of Owen's artistic talent.
Maybe Someday - by Colleen Hoover. Sydney and Ridge (Pretty much all her characters have quirky names). Sydney finds herself single and out of an apartment and her cute neighbor steps up and offers her a place to stay. There's an attraction and there's a twist: He's deaf and has a girlfriend. So I found myself interested more in finding out how they were going to end up together.. because it's obvious by now that's Colleen's formula. There wasn't really a secret past connection this time at least. What was also interesting is that Ridge plays music and thankfully I read this through my Kindle because it actually links to real songs. I enjoyed being able to interact on a different level than just reading.
Ugly Love - by Colleen Hoover. Tate and Miles. This was the same but different from the other ones. Tate is a nurse going to school and living with her brother in San Francisco. Miles is her neighbor and friend of her brother and they DON'T have insta-love. There's is chemistry though but Miles is introduced as very emotionally closed off and definitely not interested in more than a hook up with Tate. Their story is interspersed with flashbacks to six years prior where you eventually find out why Miles is Miles. I was very saddened by the reveal (that means it did a good job). There's the obvious drama of Tate falling for Miles and not getting much in return. I had this weird sympathetic response to Tate's internal struggle of forming an attachment to someone that doesn't want attachments. This one had the best written sex scenes by far though!
** I want to note that by this point, I felt like I had to keep reading more Colleen Hoover because I was almost through all her books. It was only taking me a couple hours to read each one so I had the urge to keep going. BUT at this point there were a few things bugging me. ALL her main male characters had the same mannerisms. They all rubbed their necks when nervous, they all said the same things the same ways at some point. They all had the same way of kissing. It was getting predictable. But I felt like I needed to keep going.
November 9 - by Colleen Hoover - Fallon and Ben. They meet just as she's moving across country. There's a secret past, insta-love and misunderstandings etc etc. It felt strange reading this one because Ben is a writer and reading a book about a book writer is a bit META but I let it go. In this case the big reveal is through his book. I read a book within a book. The problem was that this reveal was WAY too big of a hurdle for our characters to so easily get past. I finished this book just to get it over with.
Never, Never (Parts 1-3)- by Colleen Hoover and Tarryn Fisher - By this point I'm almost done with Colleen. These three short stories all connect to make one story that should have been released as one book. The main characters, Charlie and Silas, somehow don't remember anything about their lives or who they are and somehow continuously lose their memories every 48 hours. Ohh mystery had me hooked but by the third part I was really confused and annoyed. This was a departure from the other books in the sense that it didn't have a logical reason for anything that was happening. I was SO glad I got these through the library and didn't spend money on it because it was pretty ridiculous. If you ever decide to read one of the books I've read. This isn't it.
Thanks for taking the time to read my mini-reviews. If you end up reading any of them I'd love to talk about it with you!
