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Ilinalta

DrAwkto Reads

Hello! 

Looks like you have stumbled onto my booklikes blog. I, unfortunately, am not active on this site. I update every few months. 

Guts

Guts - Chuck Palahniuk I didn't think there was anything that could physically make me sick inside. Yeah well this is the book that did just that. I err, I'm going to just block this out of my memory for a long long time. So I'm not even going to go into details of what this book is about. If you are interested in this novel, I recommend that you read it for yourself.

After I finished reading this novel. I didn't feel the same anymore. My world was bleak. Thankfully, r/aww served for every useful mind bleach.

The Search for WondLa

The Search for WondLa - Tony DiTerlizzi This book is soo good! Filled with amazing colourful illustrations and wonderful prose. The characters are adorable and the interactions with one another brought smiles to my face a few times. Loved it and will begin recommending it to everyone else that I think would enjoy it.

I'm definitely going to finish off the series. This book concluded nicely and transitions well with the second book.

A Monster Calls

A Monster Calls - Patrick Ness, Jim Kay I absolutely loved this novel. The imagery was extremely well done and the characters were on point. It was a very enjoyable read. All I wanted to do was to read this novel in one sitting. This story is by no means a horror novel. It may be scary to some younger readers, but it was definitely not scary to me. The pictures fit the tone and the atmosphere of the novel. They're a treat to look at. <3<br/>
As for the characters, there were some scenes where I just wanted to smack some of the characters. However, that would be unreasonable because the way they behaved was realistic. The struggles that Conor went through are easy to relate too. I felt sympathy for the poor kid. The ending was beautiful, I didn't really know what to expect but the author did an amazing job ending it off.

The Darkest Part of the Forest

The Darkest Part of the Forest - Holly Black This was a good book. On goodreads standard I have to rate it a 3/5, however, on normal standards it's a 4/5. I really liked how this book was about fairies. The world was well described. The lore was interesting and kept me intrigued on how it related to the story. The writing was decent. Flowed well, there was some bumps near the beginning that I didn't really like, however, I guess that's her writing style.

Overall, a decent story.

This is What Happy Looks Like

This is What Happy Looks Like - Jennifer E. Smith Eh.

Consider Phlebas

Consider Phlebas - Iain M. Banks Slow start but it got better

The Eye of Minds

The Eye of Minds - James Dashner Interesting characters. Decent plotline. Nothing much to say without spoiling anything else. I like the world that Dashner built, but that doesn't mean I enjoyed reading the novel.

The amount of action scenes eventually become borderline pointless, and the author pretty much info dumped about a character's background. I'm fine when authors do that, and it was pretty interesting reading about the info dump; however, I felt like there was better ways to lead up to the info dump.

Overall, 2/5 stars for me. Would not continue the series. Unless I had nothing better to read.

Black Box

Black Box - Jennifer Egan, Brendan Monroe If you ignore the format that it was written in, it's a pretty alright story.

Boomerang

Boomerang - Noelle August Actually a 3.5. I thought it was pretty good. Easy read. I enjoyed the setting of the novel. It's very smutty though.

My Ex From Hell

My Ex From Hell - Tellulah Darling I didn't finish this book due to how stiff the book was. It was a long tedius battle with the actual book to try to read it, which is unfortunate cause I kinda liked the story. I got too tired battling with a book to actually read it, so I'm dropping it.

I'm not sure what the publishers thought when they decided to make the book as stiff as 50 layers of cardboard. Maybe if I find a better edition I'll finish the book up.

Fire Study

Fire Study - Maria V. Snyder DNF. One day, when I get the time, I'll go back to it again. I tried to finish this book three times.
I just can't. The pacing is too slow.

Red Queen

Red Queen - Victoria Aveyard Before I get started in the review, I should admit that I read this for hype. I got on the hype train and followed everyone on the adventure. The hype did not cause me to have high expectations for this novel, in fact, it did the opposite. From all the reviews that I have read complaining that this novel was a total rip off from Red Rising, I expected the novel to be bad. I didn’t like the novel, but it doesn’t mean that it was completely bad. Red Queen was a decent book, and I’m sure others out there will enjoy it.



Now where do I even start with Red Queen? I absolutely have no idea. It wasn’t memorable to say the least. This might be due to the fact that Red Queen felt like it was confused. It’s as if the author couldn’t make up their mind on whether or not the story should be a Science Fiction or a Fantasy, so they mixed up both genres. It didn’t help that the novel was pretty much void of description, which can be a good thing, but it can also be a bad thing. I do like it when stories allow me to use my own imagination to visualize things, but it is also up to the author to help ease that process of imagination. The author for Red Queen did not do that.



In the beginning, when Mare was in the Stilts, the village and atmosphere felt like something from a fantasy novel. Thus, I imagined it as such. Then Mare was sent to the world of Silvers and that came off as more of a typical technologically advanced dystopian society with a hint of steampunk here and there. Then again, the author could have used the words airbus to mean a modern airplane, so I don’t even know anymore. The author could have did a better job at guiding the reader along with her settings. The ending was good, it definitely left the reader wanting more. Even for me, who didn’t like the book, was curious as to how the rest of the story would play out.



I thought the characters could have been much deeper. I felt like they were shallow, except for a few of them. The main character didn’t really interest me. I didn’t connect with her as well as I could have. I felt like the author gave Cal certain items and characteristics, so that he could come off as super cool. It felt like fan service material, which made me just roll my eyes at.



At least the romance ended up in a non-annoying way. I felt like the romance in the novel was unnecessary. Maybe Red Queen would have been better if Mare was not interested in any of the other characters.



The action scenes felt well done. Although the god-like powers in Red Queen felt like another word for magic, which again made me very confused at what Genre this novel is. The powers felt like magic, but they try to explain the reasons for the powers with “science” using terms like genetic markers.



I don’t know. I’m just completely apathetic to this novel. It takes so many things from all the other YA novels. It just felt like Red Queen was a Frankenstein of YA novels. What bothers me the most is reading all the other GoodReads reviews about Red Queen being specifically a knock off of Red Rising, which is completely absurd. There are tons of those reviews and it really feels like they have not read either of the novels before making such a base review. Since I have read both books, I made a post about the comparison between Red Rising and Red Queen, which can be found here.

Eleanor & Park

Eleanor & Park - Rainbow Rowell I didn't not finish this. I don't think I will. I heard great things about it, but I don't like how the author portrayed Park. She should have done more research on his background.

The writing was nice; it flowed well. I couldn't get in to the story. Maybe I'll come back to it in the future. Possibly.

The Boyfriend App

The Boyfriend App - Katie Sise Before I make my way through my review, I want to say that on an actual rating system and not the stupid goodreads rating system, this book would actually be a 3.5 out of 5 stars. It is decently written and the plot is alright.


That being said, I have to rate it on the goodreads system because I'm rating it on Goodreads. Therefore, I have to base my rating on what I thought about it, which was that the book was ok. I didn't like, I didn't hate it, and apparently on Goodreads that means The Boyfriend App is 2.


The writing was choppy, and it lost me at some scenes. It was very clear to me that the author really enjoyed using dashes-- like really enjoyed it. To the point where I would almost find a dash every 3 pages. Now, dashes can be used in place of a comma, but having too many dashes will distract the reader and have them losing their flow. This is what happened to me.


I'm sure the author didn't mean to lose the reader with their overuse of dashes, I mean they are a esteemed blogger or some sort for magazines. They must have forgotten that writing articles about fashion is not the same as reading a novel.


Oh yes, I'm supposed to be talking about the novel. The Boyfriend App was indeed an interesting concept. I loved the idea of it and wanted to know more about how the character would go about creating it and managing it. Unfortunately, with that logic, the author thought that info dumping a bunch of computer science terms and then calling it "hacking" was a good approach for the novel. Creating an application is by no means considered hacking. Please, don't come out of reading this novel thinking that it is. ><<br/>


I feel like the author did a lot of research for this novel and wanted to display her knowledge on the subject by shoving it down the reader's throats. Even Ernest Cline did a better job at info dumping than Katie Sise.



In all fairness, the author did a good job at researching the progress of development. I just wish she did a better job at writing about developing apps better. I don't think the reader needed a total info dump on how Audrey developed it, but that's just my opinion.


The good part about The Boyfriend App was the romance. It was cute and intense. It kept me on edge for pages. Audrey's feelings were easy to relate to, so I needed to see what would happen to her love life.


As much as I ranted about the author's execution of the novel, The Boyfriend App is still a page turner. Would I recommend it?

Not exactly.

Is it a complete waste of time to read it?

No. I actually enjoy reading the novel very much. The plot was not as simple as it would seem, so that also kept me reading.


Furthermore, I found the author's parodies on iPhone and Beats to be very amusing. Especially how the teens reacted to the tech. She did a great job at capturing how teens act with technology in present day society.





A Match Made in High School

A Match Made in High School - Kristin Walker First off, I want to mention how disastrous the cover is. They basically took photos of people off of Stockphoto, slammed them all together and called it a cover. I did not like this cover at all. Better covers can be made with stickman, that's for sure.


The premise of the novel sounded interesting and typical, which is what I was looking for. Unfortunately, the writing was weak, and awkward. Although, the dialogue in this novel was very well done. It sounded exactly how teenagers would speak to each other. The dialogue flowed nicely and sounded natural.


From the summary, I assumed it would be a slight love triangle, but to my surprise it was not. Yes! A novel that didn't have a love triangle. I'm so thrilled that it wasn't some messy complicated love triangle. In fact, I enjoyed where the romance ended off with; however, I did not like how the romance was developed. It felt a lot like instant love to me.


If you're looking for a main character who is moody, self-centered and inconsiderate to her best friends, then you'll love Fiona. I, however, did not like her. She was annoying and reminded me too much of a girl I used to I know. Fiona was one of those teens where all she would ever talk about is her crush, and only about her crush. She completely disregarded how her friends were feeling and focused on her own emotions.


Not only that, she feels obligated to be a complete asshole to her "sworn" enemy. Dude, it works both ways, if she's going to be a dick, obviously that other girl is going to be a dick as well.


A Match Made in High School is filled with typical teen characters who are more interesting than the main character herself. It was a quick and easy read. If anyone is looking for an okay chick lit novel, perhaps try giving A Match Made in High School a try.

Cloaked in Red

Cloaked in Red - Vivian Vande Velde The author’s name is so cool. Too bad the book she wrote wasn’t great.

Basically the book is a collection of short stories of Little Red Riding Hood. Most of them are filled with satire. The concept of it was truly interesting unfortunately her writing is drab. Nothing of it was interesting. Her ideas and writing failed to take hold of me. Even though I could have ignored her writing style and focused more on her ideas, I just couldn’t. After reading the first short story, I realized that nothing appealed to me. I did not find the satire to be all that amusing either. The twists were just lame and weak.

Her author note was the interesting part of the whole entire book. Surprisely, the cover of the book caught my eye which led me to read it. It’s a shame humans are such visual creatures. I have been tricked. Moving on, these are just my opinions and doesn’t mean that it’s rightfully true for anyone else.

I really disliked it. I wish I never bothered with such a book. A complete waste of my time. It’s unfortunate because I really do like Red Riding Hood and any story that concerns that fairy tale. Sadly, this book has disappointed me.

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