My January Wrap-Up
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My Goodreads challenge has gotten off to a good start this year. Perhaps I shouldn't jinx it but I've set myself a low target of 30 and anything extra is a bonus. Maybe I should get round to picking up the 35 unread books I have on my bookshelf though instead of reading mediocre randoms on my Kindle but a book is a book right? I have a fairly even mix of reads this month, including an array of fantasy, contemporary and war fiction, and ratings that span across the scale - as always, read on to decide which books to toss on to your TBR pile, and which ones to (not-so-gently) toss out...
The Star-Touched Queen
STAR-TOUCHED #1
STAR-TOUCHED #1
- by Roshani Chokshi
5.0/5.0 stars
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Fate and fortune. Power and passion. What does it take to be the queen of a kingdom when you’re only seventeen?
Maya is cursed. With a horoscope that promises a marriage of death and destruction, she has earned only the scorn and fear of her father’s kingdom. Content to follow more scholarly pursuits, her whole world is torn apart when her father, the Raja, arranges a wedding of political convenience to quell outside rebellions. Soon Maya becomes the queen of Akaran and wife of Amar. Neither roles are what she expected: As Akaran’s queen, she finds her voice and power. As Amar’s wife, she finds something else entirely: Compassion. Protection. Desire…
But Akaran has its own secrets—thousands of locked doors, gardens of glass, and a tree that bears memories instead of fruit. Soon, Maya suspects her life is in danger. Yet who, besides her husband, can she trust? With the fate of the human and Otherworldly realms hanging in the balance, Maya must unravel an ancient mystery that spans reincarnated lives to save those she loves the most…including herself.
The Star-Touched Queen is one of those books you read then immediately want to pick up again because you feel like you didn't appreciate it nearly as much as it should be appreciated. And not for lack of trying. But it's a book whose words you intensely savour and yet it still doesn't feel enough. It is a book that you could read time and time again, and each time feel unworthy of the privilege in reading something so beautifully written...read the full review here
The Bucket List to Mend a Broken Heart
| "My kingdom needs a queen,’’ he said.
‘‘It needs someone with fury in her heart and shadows in her smile. It needs someone restless and clever. It needs you.’’
- Amar, The Star-Touched Queen
The Bucket List to Mend a Broken Heart
- by Anna Bell
4.0/5.0 stars
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I picked up The Bucket List to Mend a Broken Heart when I was supermarket shopping a while back and naturally, I wandered off into the book section where this super cute cover caught my eye and the blurb caught my interest. Like any other girl, I'm one for the occasional chick-lit and I couldn't resist popping this one into my shopping basket and onto my TBR pile.
Abi is certain that her boyfriend, Joseph, is the love of her life - The One. Until one night, he abruptly breaks up with her claiming that they are incompatible and want different things from life. And just like that, everything that Abi knew to be true, crumbles to nothing. After spending a healthy amount of time moping, crying, and not leaving her bed, she makes the determined decision to move on with her life and prove to Joseph that she doesn't need him. Then a box shows up on her doorstep. In it, she finds her possessions that she had left behind - and a bucket list. When she reads the ten things that Joseph wants to do in life, she suddenly knows exactly how to prove to him that they were made for each other. But the list is everything that goes against Abi's natural instincts. Like climbing a mountain, or cycling the whole of the Isle of Wight, or abseiling down the tallest building in town. Winning Joseph back proves to be more difficult than she imagined but as Abi conquers her fear of heights and summons the courage to break out of her comfort zone in an effort to do so, it turns out that Joseph's bucket list isn't the only surprise life has in store...
This book was a pleasant surprise. Chick-lits can be underwhelming and at times, bland, but The Bucket List to Mend a Broken Heart was a light, warm, fun read that I enjoyed through to the very end. I felt like Abi is a character that so many of us can relate to. From her work woes, to that feeling of living life blindly without actually experiencing it, it's a book that capitalises on character growth and how a life of familiarity can hinder your experience of it. Her entertaining journey that takes her from The Ritz, to Paris, to Mount Snowdon was one that I found myself immersed in because while she steadily pushes herself to conquer her insecurities, lack of confidence, and phobia of heights, her narrative is funny and light-hearted and so genuine. I could relate to her naivety and the fear of the unknown, and her slow transformation into the Abi at the end of the book as she learns more about herself and what she wants from life was a believable one. While it touches on heartbreak and the stupid lengths we're willing to go to in an attempt to win someone back, it is more a story of personal discovery, friendship, and ultimately the true definition of love. Chick-lits are usually the kind of books I go to for a distraction but rather than being a mindless romance that ticks all the cliches in the book, it is a realistic portrayal of one girl's journey to do more in life. (It also inspired me to write my own bucket list that I may or may not share with you all someday...)
Front Lines
SOLDIER GIRL #1
SOLDIER GIRL #1
- by Michael Grant
3.0/5.0 stars
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1942. World War II. The most terrible war in human history. Millions are dead; millions more are still to die. The Nazis rampage across Europe and eye far-off America.
The green, untested American army is going up against the greatest fighting force ever assembled—the armed forces of Nazi Germany.
But something has changed. A court decision makes females subject to the draft and eligible for service. So in this World War II, women and girls fight, too.
The green, untested American army is going up against the greatest fighting force ever assembled—the armed forces of Nazi Germany.
But something has changed. A court decision makes females subject to the draft and eligible for service. So in this World War II, women and girls fight, too.
As the fate of the world hangs in the balance, three girls sign up to fight. Rio Richlin, Frangie Marr, and Rainy Schulterman are average girls, girls with dreams and aspirations, at the start of their lives, at the start of their loves. Each has her own reasons for volunteering. Not one expects to see actual combat. Not one expects to be on the front lines.
Rio, Frangie, and Rainy will play their parts in the war to defeat evil and save the human race. They will fear and they will rage; they will suffer and they will inflict suffering; they will hate and they will love. They will fight the greatest war the world has ever known.
Rio, Frangie, and Rainy will play their parts in the war to defeat evil and save the human race. They will fear and they will rage; they will suffer and they will inflict suffering; they will hate and they will love. They will fight the greatest war the world has ever known.
An alternative war fiction where women are fighting on the front line; if there was even an intriguing story line, this was it. I was expecting so much from this book and unfortunately, it just didn't deliver. The concept promised everything from blood and gore, to the brutal insight into the battlefield of World War II with women at its forefront, from the social implications it would leave in its wake, to the psychological scars it would impart on these young women who witness death and destruction first-hand, and yet it's sorely lacking in all these respects. I'm not alone in saying that the pace is painfully slow. For the first 70% or so, there is virtually no action - at times, I questioned if I was truly reading historical fiction. It's almost dull, the way the story is told. It lacks grit and the unflinching nature of war that characterises historical war fiction. The absence of the devastation of war that while horrific to comprehend and painful to read, transports the reader to a warzone and keeps them there, makes Front Lines an underwhelming addition to the world of historical fiction. I felt...nothing. It almost made me feel guilty. Here were these women in a time and place, experiencing unspeakable events, and I couldn't feel a damn thing.
| You heal a soldier in a war, and he goes off next thing to take another man's life. How then do you avoid responsibility for that death?
Three lukewarm stars for the harsh exploration of feminism, sexism, and racism, and also for Rio's story; hers was one that I enjoyed reading and I feel that of the three girls that the story follows, she's the one who captured my interest the most. There's an honesty in her narrative that despite it being an alternate history, gives a little insight into how these people who fought in the war - young boys forced to age beyond their years and literally fight for their lives - were, after all, just that. "Soldiers" who are just young boys and girls as human as the rest of us, in this crazy, surreal, messed up situation that for some time, is just an abstract idea while they're worrying about crushes or having silly teenage arguments and making stupid jokes, and it doesn't feel like truth until they're in the midst of an explosion or seeing a friend die in front of their very eyes. I got that through Rio. I felt like she was an authentic portrayal of a normal person who somehow winds up in a dangerous situation that is so much bigger than her and the rest of her fellow soldiers. I thought Grant did a great job in exploring how the war affects her and it's through her character that the ugliness of war - the guilt, the shame, the savage nature of taking human life and maybe, possibly, relishing it - is hinted at. And I think that had the entire novel been from Rio's perspective, the plot would have had a lot more depth and substance to it. It's almost a shame because Frangie and Rainy are characters that had so much potential and they could have given the book an entirely new and fresh dimension, but sadly they just didn't get the page time or characterisation for it to work. I hear there's a sequel in the works and I'm tempted to read it just because Rio (and also because I do want Frangie and Rainy to be done justice)...but if I don't read it, it'll affect me all the same.
The Way We Fall
THE STORY OF US #1
- by Cassia Leo
1.0/5.0 stars
~
Actual rating: zero stars
I do try to not hate books. Promise you, I try. But sometimes, I read something and God it'll be so bad that it'll make me grind my teeth in sheer frustration. And I hate that I'm saying this, but second-chance love stories just do not work. At least, not for me. I can't stand the angst and the tedious push-and-pull of a relationship that already kinda, sorta, already exists and that I'm just supposed to buy into because there's history. I almost never buy into it. I find that there's a lack of chemistry that for the most part, is merely described to us as existing rather than actually existing, and that all the angst stems from something stupid that could have been resolved with a little bit of communication. All the pitfalls that I mentally checked off for The Way We Fall.
When Rory is asked to take over the negotiations for a beer deal for her friend's company, the last person she expects to be negotiating with is Houston. Houston, who she hasn't seen in five years. Houston, the guy who scarred her with wounds deeper than the wounds that brought them together. Houston, love of her life, now married. Five years on from their ugly breakup, Rory is forced to let Houston back in her life, though it means facing a past she has tried to forget and mending her heart that never healed. He is forced to choose between the girl he loves and the wife who sleeps in his bed...and revealing the devastating secret that shattered their love into a million pieces...
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The Way We Fall is one of those eye-rolling-ly bad books. Drawn out, tediously long, unnecessary pages of drama and visits to the past, angsty inner monologue, cheating...God, the cheating. In my not so humble opinion, emotional cheating is just as bad as physical cheating and while it represents a real-life issue, it makes me uncomfortable reading it. It's not okay just because there's no love between you and your wife (despite you marrying her knowing that) and that your long lost love is magically back in your life five years later, after you destroyed her no less. Justifying cheating by making out the significant other to be manipulative, dull and "evil" compared to the hero/heroine we're supposed to be rooting for is an awful plot device. It doesn't work and it cheapens the love story we're meant to be buying into. On that note, there was no spark between Rory and Houston. Rory was a pathetic doormat who for some odd reason, was still pining for someone who broke her after half a decade, and Houston was a coward who couldn't do right by neither his wife nor his one true love. Together, they were a dull disaster. And that secret reveal - what a cop-out. I loathed it. Cheap, poorly thought out, made Houston to be an even bigger asshole than he was for 80% of the book, and made the entire book a car crash. (Sidenote: the "secret" had a striking similarity to November Nine by Colleen Hoover and I hated it in that book too - it's no surprise my eyes rolled right back into the back of my head).
Slammed
SLAMMED #1
SLAMMED #1
- by Colleen Hoover
1.0/5.0 stars
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I swear it wasn't planned for me to read a book by the aforementioned author straight off the back of that review, but it just so happened that I did, and would you look at that, I wasn't happy with it. I'm beginning to think it was premature of me to become a fan of hers after reading just one book (Ugly Love) and I have a nasty suspicion that were I to go back and re-read it, it wouldn't sit well with me. Slammed is one of Colleen Hoover's most loved books and honestly, for the life of me, I can't figure out why.
18 year old Laken is coming to terms with the death of her father. With the grief still raw, when she is forced to move house with her brother and mum, she wonders just how long she can hold it together and keep up her "tough girl" act. But when she meets her attractive new neighbour, Will Cooper, and they go out on a spontaneous date in which she learns of his passion for slam poetry, his quick wit, and endearing charm, she feels an intense connection that fills her with a sense of hope, excitement, and reprieve. With Will, she finds a little piece of escape. That all comes crashing down when just days later, a shocking revelation that neither saw coming, blows their spark to nothing. But words are easier to say than actions are to see through, and it's not long before navigating the other's presence becomes difficult, a tug-of-war between feelings that simmer below the surface, and the secret that could ruin them both...
This read more like a Young Adult romance rather than a New Adult and not a good one at that. It's a badly written teenage love story which happens to have a mature hero. Who, by the way, is the only 1-star deserving part of the story. Will was a refreshing male lead; for someone just 21, he exhibited a sense of maturity beyond his years, his expression of poetry was heartbreaking yet wonderfully portrayed, and his level-headed nature only emphasised the conflict that tears him apart. It was easy to connect with him despite the story not being told from his perspective. Laken on the other hand was a stark contrast. Her consistent immaturity and tendency to make rash decisions, her constant complaining and inability to be considerate of others - namely, Will - actually made me feel sorry for him having to deal with. I mean, when a love story makes you feel sorry for one of them having to be a part of it, you know it's pretty much a train wreck. Her selfish behaviour really grated on me and ultimately, it made the plot (romance?) and the sub-plot fall apart, the latter being overly dramatic in a failed attempt to add a bit of depth but instead feeling out of place. I question-marked romance because she falls in love with him alarmingly quick. Can you fall in love in 3 days? Maybe. But at 18, I'd question if it's love at all.
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Ever the Hunted
CLASH OF KINGDOMS #1
- by Erin Summerill
CLASH OF KINGDOMS #1
- by Erin Summerill
2.0/5.0 stars
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Seventeen year-old Britta Flannery is at ease only in the woods with her dagger and bow. She spends her days tracking criminals alongside her father, the legendary bounty hunter for the King of Malam - that is, until her father is murdered. Now outcast and alone and having no rights to her father’s land or inheritance, she seeks refuge where she feels most safe: the Ever Woods. When Britta is caught poaching by the royal guard, instead of facing the noose she is offered a deal: her freedom in exchange for her father’s killer.
However, it’s not so simple.
The alleged killer is none other than Cohen McKay, her father’s former apprentice. The only friend she’s ever known. The boy she once loved who broke her heart. She must go on a dangerous quest in a world of warring kingdoms, mad kings, and dark magic to find the real killer. But Britta wields more power than she knows. And soon she will learn what has always made her different will make her a daunting and dangerous force.
Ever the Hunted is a fairly new fantasy release that I've seen all over Goodreads and booktube lately so naturally, I gave in to my curiosity and gave it a shot. As far as the concept goes, I feel like it's made out to be more dark and dangerous than it actually is, with its main intrigue being dashed within the first 20% of the book. The rest is a wild goose chase on Britta's hunt for answers. There's not much I can say if I'm honest because not much happens; there's a lot of talking and hiking, with Britta learning new things about the Kingdom, but aside from that, the plot is pretty dulled out and didn't do much to keep me on my toes. It's a far cry from the excitement, suspect and magical feel you expect from a fantasy novel. Ultimately, a forgettable story with forgettable characters and an ending that wiped out the 10% chance I'd pick up the next book. It's been a decade since Twilight and authors still think that love triangles are a good idea.
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