One year ago…

23 Jan 2014 3 Comments

by Amy in Rambles Tags: , , , , , , ,

Whose idea was it to start a blog with Uni, a holiday, life, all within the first year of creation? Hmm? Who? My organisational skills have failed, my reading has failed, and my dedication has faltered. Always with intent or bringing it back from the lonely corner where it was continually pushed. Always hoping that what I had built up over the fractured year would remain when life got sorted again, I think it’s still there? Well as there as it was before, granted it wasn’t all that there to begin with if we’re honest.

One year ago I launched this blog. I had wanted to do it for so long, I wanted to write reviews about books I had loved, I wanted to explain what was exquisite about them and how they made my world a wonderful place. I wanted to read books that I hadn’t read before and if I hated them I wanted to figure out why, what was it that made me dislike it and find cause instead of just disliking it overall.

I never used to write reviews. I have been a Goodreads member for about five years and I never wrote reviews there either. It wasn’t a conscious decision, exactly, I just didn’t do it. But then a couple of years ago a friend of mine discovered Goodreads and she said that she looked forward to exploring the site and reading some of my reviews. It was then that I almost went to say to her that I hadn’t written any reviews and then I thought, ‘well why not? If she wants to read my reviews, my opinions and thoughts on a book I should probably start writing reviews’. So I wrote short reviews and long reviews and emotional reviews and all kinds for awhile and the idea of the blog grew. It had been there for awhile, popping up on occasion, but I never thought I could manage it, it seemed so hard and confusing. Funnily enough it wasn’t until a Uni course about 18 months ago that I realised blogs are not that complicated. The premise is there, it just needed to be started and so I took the plunge, a year and one week ago today I created my blog, technically, but today was the day it was released out on its own. Thinking back, before the chaos the rest of the year was to bring, it was beautiful. I had fun, people who read it enjoyed it, and I realised as it got more lost as the year progressed, just how much fun it was. Being able to escape for awhile and tell people about a book, just a simple book, that had had an effect on me.

In this year however I have had some wonderful opportunities I will remember forever. When I was still in the early months I was offered a chance to be part of a blog tour for the wonderful author Kerry Letheby. Her novel Mine to Avenge was a wonderful read and being part of her tour made me feel like I was helping something worthwhile. The second excellent thing was the amazing chance I had to not only get an advanced copy to review one of my favourite singers Aurelio Voltaire’s debut novel Call of the Jersey Devil, but I also got to interview him about it as well which was seriously the highlight of the year if we’re honest. I then subsequently ruined it by missing the chance to tell him I did all this when I met him, but we aren’t dwelling on that. I also got to do some great cover reveals, I have been asked to review people’s novels for them, and I also got to run a giveaway which was really wonderful.

But away from these great things, this  has not been the best first year I will admit. There were teething problems (understatement of the year) with the old site, and then so many interruptions and problems for the latter half of the year. Ignoring the three month Uni block, as well as the three week holiday, the other time I had seemed devoted to simply recovering from the emotional and work overload and suffocation I was feeling. I would look at these half finished reviews, of books I adored but I could not find the devotion to finishing them. What I realise now is I think I needed to recuperating time. I needed time after Uni finally finished to just gather myself up again after the mess of the last six months and try and hold myself together with more than sticky tape and safety pins. As I say, not much of a smooth start to this first year of blogging. But I will say that I have realised something in all this: the fact that through all of this I never once wanted to throw in the towel. I always felt guilty for neglecting my posts and for feeling like I let people down. That shows me that I do want to keep doing this. I know now that it’s going to take some time, I need to balance my time once more and work around things like Uni and slowly build myself up again before the new semester starts. Finding the passion again for what I like doing, gradually bring myself back.

I know this is not the most wonderful or uplifting of blog anniversary posts you may have seen, but this is where we’ve ended up. I’ve let out as much of my emotions as I am willing and I can’t really sum up this year without all the cracks. I am very grateful for those who have read my reviews this past year, and all those who found me on Twitter and Facebook and Tumblr, it is wonderful to feel supported and to be able to share things with you about books and reading and crazy things like fireworks and emotional instabilities.

I look forward to making this a better blog in this second year and building up my reviews once again. In the meantime I will quietly celebrate this one year anniversary because even after everything we cannot simply let it pass by unnoticed, and I hope you’ll join me in continuing this journey of reading and the world of books.

Anniversary

Sunshine (Sunshine #1) by Nikki Rae

21 Jan 2014 2 Comments

by Amy in 4 Stars, General, Romance, Sunshine Series, Young Adult Tags: , , , , ,

Published: January 28, 2013
Publisher: Self Published
Pages: 330
Format: Ebook
Genre: Young Adult/Paranormal/Romance
★   ★   ★   ★  – 4 Stars

18 year old Sophie Jean is pretty good at acting normal. Sure, she’s not exactly happy, but happiness is nothing compared to being like everyone else. She can pretend she’s not allergic to the sun. She can hide what her ex-boyfriend did to her. She can cover up the scars she’s made for herself. Ignore anything. Forget anything. Then Myles enters her life, and he has more than a few secrets of his own. When accident after accident keeps happening to Sophie, she can’t help noticing that he’s everywhere. That he knows too much. That she’s remembering too much.

 Suddenly, those who were monsters before are just people, and the monsters? They’re real. Now being a normal human being is the least of her problems. Now she has to stay alive.

Note: I was asked for a review by the author.

I was interrupted by so many things reading this book (apologies Nikki it took so long!) but by the end of it I was engrossed, and that was something I was not expecting. This was an excellent book, and if we’re honest it was extremely hard to find the words to review it. I did so many drafts, the ability to ramble about what makes this a great story seem endless, and the fact I was trying not to simply describe the book to you was hard, hence the multiple retries.

Sunshine is about a girl called Sophie who has Solar Urticaria, meaning she is allergic to the sun. She lives her life as best she can, as she always has, trying to be normal when she constantly feels abnormal. As the story begins we’re introduced to Sophie and we’re immediately introduced to her condition and how she deals with it. In these opening chapters we see an insight into Sophie’s life through her eyes, about her condition, her mother, her sisters Laura and Leena, as well as her brother, Jade.

As a character Sophie is an anxious girl, she is wary of relationships and trusting people and that comes across clearly. It is mentioned a lot, especially around her developing friendship and relationship with Myles, but her reasons are explained and you can understand it more as the thought process of what goes through her mind when it happens. Where we see more of the real Sophie is around her friends Boo and Trei, when Sophie is around them there is a different side to her, one who jokes and rocks out in a band. The difference between the two levels is evident and we get a feeling of how Sophie feelings change through Rae’s descriptions and Sophie’s reactions.

The introduction Rae’s given us to the world as a whole is not flawless but it is done quite well, and the paranormal and supernatural elements in this book are there but not an overbearing feature. Having read nothing else similar as a comparison, I enjoyed the pace and the balance between the regular and the paranormal. Nothing is rapidly sprung on reader (or character) with no real instance of instant acceptance and understanding by characters which can be a downfall when colliding reality and the supernatural, but Rae manages this balance well.

The various relationships in this book are well written and diverse. The relationship Sophie has with her mother is tense, but her affection for her stepfather is wonderful. Rae captures the family dynamic between Sophie, her brother and sisters quite well and there is a strong sibling connection that shows even through the arguments as well as the love and support.

I really adore some of these characters. Myles is a character I was surprised to like almost instantly. His own secrets and uncertainty make him quite wonderful as he tries so hard to fit in himself, while still trying to be there for Sophie, make new friends and try and make sure everything is going to be ok.

He and Sophie are very similar which is why their relationship works. They both are people who have close friends but feel separated from the rest of the world as well. Their relationship moves from constantly waiting for the other one to realise how strange they believe themselves to be and run off, until finally understanding that they can help one another.

You have to pity Myles for his initial meeting with Sophie but when we get to see her side of things it balances things out. Embarrassment and defense mechanisms are hard defaults to override and the way we see Sophie break these down over the course of the book are excellent. There is a slow emergence after numerous hasty retreats and second thoughts and seeing her character grow is really nice.

Other characters I adored are Stevie and Jade. Jade’s relationship as Sophie’s brother and the relationship he has with his boyfriend Stevie is wonderful. What makes Jade and Stevie exceptional characters is that Rae doesn’t make them imposing but they show understanding and support in other ways and in simple gestures like being there at key moments and helping Sophie when she doesn’t even ask. The sibling relationship is beautiful; it makes and develops Jade’s character and position as a brother by how he sees Sophie and how he acts with her. Rae uses their conversations and gestures as a way to show not tell and while it seems basic, it actually shows much more than if they were more prominent.

Content wise there are some serious personal issues shown and discussed in this book but Rae does it without making it an overbearing factor, but she also doesn’t shy away or glorify it either. The way it is shown and talked about seems to be handled with care and realism, something that brings the emotions and understanding to the surface and reduces the risk of making it dramatic or flippant.

What I love particularly is the ending and the way Rae has written it, especially the moments of confusion and uncertainty. The fact we see all of this from Sophie’s point of view we experience everything she does and with the chaos of the concluding chapters I love that we don’t really know what is going on because Sophie doesn’t know what is going on.

Rae writes these moments of confusion very well, and the emotions and feelings and moments of fading and unconsciousness Sophie experiences are well described. What Sophie goes through is captured without telling or rushing. Again, the length of time that passes in this book makes the story better. Nothing is brushed over or rushed and this adds to the reality and the suspense the story generates. Because we are seeing this through Sophie’s eyes we gain a lot more than if it was a third person narrative. The room for deeper emotions adds more meaning to the story, especially crucial in one that explores things Rae does in this novel.

In terms of writing there are a few description sentences where things like clothing is explained, they stand out slightly but not in an annoying way but perhaps there is room for a more fluid inclusion as they occasionally have purpose behind their mention. Though really, with her writing and storytelling Rae draws you in with character and plot so well that the rest is pretty much unimportant. Characters drive this story and they bring the intrigue, mystery, and excitement along with them that leave you hanging out for the next book.

To learn more about Nikki and her work here are the usual suspects
Goodreads
Twitter
Blog
Author page
The Sunshine Series page
Tumblr

Where to find her books
Sunshine on Amazon
Sun Poisoned (Book #2) on Amazon
Smashwords
Barnes and Noble 

Top Five of 2013

03 Jan 2014 Leave a comment

by Amy in Top Five List Tags: , , , , , , ,

New year means time for my 2013 Top Five list. Like last year these are the books that were real surprises and completely unexpected in just how wonderful they’d be. They managed to get me excited, engaged, emotional, and managed to change how I saw the world just that little bit.

Because I read some pretty wonderful authors as well as books in 2013 I am mixing things up a bit and compiling a top five authors as well as books. I only managed to read 45 books in 2013 because of Uni, other commitments, and “things”, but there were some absolute gems within those 45. Looking at it now, it almost seems like the year of the Young Adult novel which is interesting.

2013 was also the year I read a lot of particular authors or series which was very rewarding, however it also makes choosing a simple 5 rather hard. I am not going to number them because really, it won’t mean all that much, they all could be number one.

Top Five Books

First Among Sequels by Jasper Fforde
It was hard to find the right Thursday Next book to choose from those I read, but this won out. The entire nature of the narrative was weird and bizarre as per usual but offered something new and different to the series. Being the fifth book in the series a lot has come before it and a lot comes after it in the next two books but while each book brings new stories and people, there is a common thread through it all and a great sense of familiarity despite each book being very different from one another. It also made me read Pinocchio so that was a bonus experience right there.

Looking For Alaska by John Green
Oh do not talk to me about this book. This like The Book of Lost Things have had messed up my life so much, I mean really it is quite unfair. This is a beautiful story, it is about finding out who you are, trying to find a place in the world, and about friendship and life and all the crazy unknowns about being a teenager. And you truly have to listen to his brother Hank’s song ‘Looking For Alaska‘ which is about the book because it is just as wonderful and emotional as the book itself, and while you can listen to it before reading because it doesn’t contain any exact spoilers, it has so much more meaning once you’ve read the book.

Artemis Fowl and  the Last Guardian by Eoin Colfer
If only an entire series could be selected this would be one I’d pick. This is the eighth and last book in the Artemis Fowl series, and I could easily have also picked the seventh book to accompany it in this list but I didn’t. I think, remembering back to the moment when I finished, this was a much better choice because while the seventh book was emotionally involving and wonderful, I think this one rides of the back of that and brings it to a whole new level combining everything we’ve seen from the series so far. A really exceptional read.

Please Ignore Vera Deitz by A. S. King
I had been trying to find this book for awhile. I cannot remember exactly what made me want to start reading it, I think I may have stumbled on one of A. S. King’s quotes and went from there. Throughout the book there are certainly a number of wonderful quotes about life, society, being a teenager, a friend, someone’s child. However I found it it was worth it on so many levels, I got so much out of this book that made me look at the world just a little bit differently. And after all, isn’t that what a good book should do really?

The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
I have wanted to read this for awhile, and with the movie being released now was the time. Like Please Ignore Vera Deitz, this book was filled with so many wonderful insights and poignant moments about life, being a teenager, trying to find your place in the world. Chbosky has a way with words that suit his characters so well. You can picture everything and with Charlie as our eyes you just follow him and watch the world go by. It is really beautiful. There is a mystery around the whole thing and it just sits quietly as the story goes on, offering us an occasional snippet. But the pleasure is really just following Charlie and seeing him experience life, make friends, and uncover things about himself he never thought possible.

 

Top Five Authors

John Green
I read all of John’s wonderful books in 2013, from his first book An Abundance of Katherines, to his most recent release The Fault in Our Stars. His writing style is pretty wonderful, he can express the voice of a teenager extremely well, while also offering multiple profound and insightful moments in deep or seemingly mundane moments and strange circumstances. Away from Looking For Alaska, Will Grayson, Will Grayson and Paper Towns had to be my other favourites.

Eoin Colfer
If we don’t already adore him for his entire Artemis Fowl series, we love him a little more for his new series W.A.R.P. Colfer has a wonderful humour in his writing, the witty nature of his characters and the absurdness that can occur is his books is a joy to read. Colfer’s imagination is captured in his books and there is no end to the surprises that he comes up with in his work.

Jasper Fforde
Jasper Fforde was introduced to me by a friend and here we are a year later and I have been sucked into his books and numerous series and I don’t really feel like coming out. The humour, pure imagination and creativity, not to mention the complete literature focus is more than enough the adore his Thursday Next books, but even others like The Last Dragonslayer have the same Fforde style and engaging nature that bring you into this constructed world and you just cannot wait to see where it’ll lead and through which twists and surprises on the way.

Neil Gaimain
Neil is on this list because it is Neil basically. But I read his novel The Ocean at the End of Lane and it was just excellent. It was such an awesome book that mixed magic and reality, as well as childhood memories and mystery that you really are quite moved by the whole thing. I’ve also included him because his short stories in M for Magic were so haunting and wonderful that you just admire the skills that exists in one person to make you so moved and affected without seemingly doing anything too grand and extraordinary, but in facts hide the extraordinary and magic in the seemingly simple.

Aurelio Voltaire
Getting to review and interview Voltaire about his new book was a serious highlight of 2013 I cannot tell you.  Having fallen in love with his music it was no doubt I loved his book as well. But it wasn’t just my love of his work that makes him great, it is also his wonderfully storytelling abilities. For a first time writer he did an excellent job with his book Call of the Jersey Devil, and his history as a song writer really shines in his descriptions and his narrative. I’m not sure whether Voltaire plans on writing another fiction novel anytime soon, but if he does, I’m sure it will be just as wonderful.

Another year over…

31 Dec 2013 2 Comments

by Amy in News, Rambles Tags: , , , , , ,

NewsWell, it’s certainly been an interesting year. There were ups and downs, boy were there downs, but luckily with my impenetrable emotional brick wall in place we don’t have to acknowledge those months now that it’s over. I have had it worse, of course it was more spread out than this year so whether that is a good thing or not I don’t know. But moving on!

Bookwise it’s been sad but wonderful. Because of things and stuff and life and everything I have hardly read anything. I managed just a mere 45 books this year, I think last year was 114 or something. Of course uni made that a problem because who has time for decent reading when you have too much to do and no time to do anything fun. But what I did manage to read was pretty spectacular. I am still behind on reviews, I know, I keep saying I will and I don’t, it’s the freedom. The fact I was locked into this uni thing with absolutely no time for months with barely a chance to think or relax or even watch TV, the thought of sitting too long on the computer writing is actually hard, I need to vege. I want to write, I do honestly, but relaxing and just enjoying my days catching up on doing nothing is wonderful. I am trying though. I need to keep trying.

I started this blog in January. In that time we have had so many things happen it is unbelievable. For newbies who may not know I started on Blog.com, and after a few smooth months it crumbled and it crumbled bad. Server issues, site issues, an issue you want to imagine they caused me and after five months I had to pack up and move. I must say WordPress is better, much better. In the remaining seven months or whatever it has been great. I wrote some good reviews, I got to interview one of my favourite singers Voltaire about his debut book Call of the Jersey Devil and I wrote a wonderful review that people loved. I am still very much regretting that when I met him I froze completely and never got to mention I was the one who had interviewed him or wrote the review, but maybe next time when I have a bit more composure and less awe, I even forgot to take the book to get him to sign, granted I was there for a concert of his but that is besides the point.

I have said I do not want to stop doing this, I just need to find my way in again, get to a point where I can just finish a book and sit down and regurgitate all the emotions and feelings I had about it, that’s how most of my reviews have begun. Then I can find my way to finishing others, they are there, half finished and waiting. I think the new year is going to bring challenges but I want to be determined. Uni is coming to an end by mid year and after a stressful and crazy time when it starts again I am going to be at a loss and a freaking out state of mind where we could grab some evaluation time about what I am doing with my days. Christmas flew by, the year ends in six hours and who knows what is on the other side. I would love to just relax and watch TV and get invested in books and watch the days fly by until it is suddenly the end of January but the urge to not let that happen is also tugging at me. I have prac coming up in a couple of weeks in a library which is itself terrifying so we have an end point to my vegging, I am trying to do everything at once and it is making my head jumbled. So deep breaths everyone and let’s see in the new year like the responsible stable adult we’re convincing the world we are.

We’ll start with news. I have been lucky enough to be asked to review a book called Sun Poisoned by Nikki Rae, as a YA/NA paranormal romance it is intriguing. I also have been given the first book of the series Sunshine, so with both of them hopefully we can make them the start of our regular return. I miss you guys and my regular posts, they were a lot of fun. The other thing I must do is I also need to construct my Top Five list for the year. Last year had some wonderful books, this year had excellent books as well, they all seemed pretty spectacular so I get to revisit a few favourites, maybe it can help me finish the reviews as well, can’t be bragging about books when you don’t know what I really thought of them.

Other than that I think that’s all. It has been a good year, it has, all dramatic obscurity aside, it was a bit of everything, adventure, drama, action, young adult, fiction and non fiction, emotions and chaos, love and conflict, we’ve had it all. I hope you had a wonderful year yourselves, I implore you find and watch any fireworks you can get to tonight because they are sent by the gods and are the greatest things ever created. My absolute love and fascination with the beauty and gloriousness of fireworks can never be underestimated. Happy New Year guys, I will see you on the other side.

Christmas!!…and reading Christmas!

01 Dec 2013 1 Comment

by Amy in Rambles Tags: , ,

So Christmas has officially started! Free from Uni, free from NaNo! (totally won it by the way…just!). This morning my tree went up, the house is decorated from top to tail with Christmas goodies. And the tinsel! Oh my love of tinsel shall never wane; you just open the box filled with it and the smell hits you in the face and it is beautiful. Walking down the aisles in the shops that are lined with tinsel is heaven upon gloriousness. Love it.

But it also means it is the start of my Christmas reading. The same books get revisited every year because I adore them I have my Christmas movies and my Christmas books that get revisited every December and we can finally begin. The first is my absolute favourite, A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. What I love about this book is that it is not just a beautiful message about Christmas and life and all those wonderful things, it is timeless, while not being timeless at the same time. It is clearly set in an era, you cannot escape that, but if there is something that the countless, countless parodies and variations of this book have demonstrated, is that the message and story is ongoing, universal, and something we always need to remember.  This reading of course is coupled with dozens of viewings of A Muppet Christmas Carol which is as good as the book in all possible ways.

The next annual reading is The Hogfather by Terry Pratchett. I first read this uni, which is actually many years ago now which is a bit depressing, but I adored it from page one. Pratchett’s humour and his absurdity works brilliantly, and while it is part of the Discworld series (of which I knew nothing about at the time) it actually all makes sense without you needing to know anything else about it. Though I suppose if you did you would get a few more references of have a better background, but truly, not important to have read the past ones. It is actually, proper, laugh out loud funny. Every page and every paragraph has something funny on it, and there is a beautiful message in it about the power of believing and what is means for the world. It’s spectacular.

Of course we need a read of A Night Before Christmas, how can you not, along with How The Grinch Stole Christmas. Short and sweet but delightful poems about Christmas. I am trying to expand on this list a bit as well, so there is definitely some hunting going on about what new Christmas books I can read.  One I actually read before the Christmas reading , and will now be adding to my annual list, was Let it Snow by John Green, Maureen Johnson, and Lauren Myracle. Let It Snow is the only one to be added in the last five years since The Hogfather which is bad. I keep forgetting to track down new ones. The movies keep building, books, not so much. It is absolutely brilliant! Three stories by three authors, and all three stories are so well told and each author is exquisite in the narration by the characters and the stories they have to tell. I am not giving anything away about that except saying it is a wonderful Christmas read, but it also works outside the Christmas season because it just does and it is wonderful.

I have decided I need to start investing in books that cover Australian Christmases, like not just that have Christmas in them, but focused around Christmas. I have realised that a lot of the Aussie Christmas songs or books seem to be parodies or novelty. I want people to stop thinking Santa in shorts and thongs is comical and have a serious book about Christmas that may happen to include a Christmas with a beach, or a sweltering summer and advent calendars that melt, or just ones that show how beautiful Christmas can be here without the place being covered in snow.

The songs are getting better I have found. Christmas in Australia by Christine Anu is a serious favourite, it just captures everything beautiful about Christmas here. I’m not saying Aussie Jingles Bells isn’t wonderful as well, but they don’t exactly play that at Carols in the Domain now do they. Perhaps the answer is to write my own Christmas story. That’s the new plan. I tried it in my first year of doing NaNoWriMo five years ago, but it ended up being a kind of set up that was like a diary entry/account of this lady’s life leading up to Christmas. It was not bad per se…for a first time NaNo thing, but it was just a bunch of chapters describing a woman’s day and thoughts leading up to Christmas and all the stuff she did. I recall writing four thousand words just on vacuuming the house before putting up the decorations. So there was that. But there were also other moments with the family watching carols, or going Christmas light looking, sitting listening to the cicadas on warm nights. I think this new task shall be a bit more story like. Something like A Christmas Carol without being like A Christmas Carol at all what so ever.

So that is the current plan. Christmas books, Christmas movies, Christmas for all the days. The carols too, we can’t forget we can squeeze them in between the reading and watching and other fun times. I also have so, so much catching up on everything to do while Uni and NaNo stole my time. Crossing all the things we can finally get some time to actually post some reviews. I miss my reviews! And then I suppose we are also going to see if we can plan out a Christmas story? Why not try when it is the Christmas season. You have a lot to draw from and the references are all around you. But who can think of that now. My feet ache, everything aches from decorating, but the house looks wonderful, the tree looks wonderful, and it is only December 1st and I am totally ready to go for Christmas. As always I am all in and ready to go!

Christmas room

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