Tag: bookreview

Titans of History Review

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Plot: Simon Sebag Montefiore presents the lives of the giants who have made our world. The cast varies from conquerors, poets, kings, empresses and whores to psychopaths, prophets, composers and explorers. Informative, entertaining, inspiring and sometimes horrifying, this is a history of the world that contains the characters everyone should know and the stories no one should forget.

Finally got there with this book. Wow, it was a struggle to get through this.

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August Wrap Up 2019

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Here are all the books I read in August of 2019.

The Big Four by Agatha Christie (3 stars)

Bit of an average read this one. I felt little to no desire to keep reading and the ending left much to be desired. I did like, however, the James Bond feel to the plot and how it covered a couple of months and intertwined smaller cases. I was very happy to have finished it though.

Fullmetal Alchemist by Hiromu Arakawa (4 stars)

This was my first time reading manga and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I watched the TV show before picking up this book which made it an interesting reading experience. I loved seeing all the foreshadowing and dreaded reading certain volumes in which I know what happens. I loved the bromance in this book and the art is exceptional. A really fun read that I think everyone should give a go.

Sadie by Courtney Summers (4 stars)

A lot of firsts this month. This was my first ebook. My birthday is in August so I treated myself to a kindle. I decided to pick this up as it fit the theme for the ONTD reading challenge and I devoured it in one day! I loved the formatting in this book, flicking from podcast to Sadie’s first person POV. I really enjoyed the characters and the plot was heart-breaking.

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (3 stars)

This is a book I have been wanting to read for ages. I have always been intrigued by the premise of this novel and I was so excited to give it a go. It started off really strong and includes some of the best writing I have ever read but halfway through the pacing started to get the better of me and I started getting a bit bored. The ending is so good though!

The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien (2 stars)

Now this might shock some people but I DNFed the Two Towers. It started off really good. I loved the account of Merry and Pippin’s time and subsequent escape of the Orcs but the writing was just boring for me and the pacing was so slow. I started dreading it every time I would pick it up. So, I decided it was best to put it down.

The Picture of Dorian Gray Review

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“Posing for a portrait, Dorian Gray talks with Lord Henry Wotton, who says that men should pursue their sensual longings, but laments that only the young get to do so. Taken with the idea, Dorian imagines a scenario in which the painting will age as he stays youthful. His wish comes true, and his boyish looks aid him as he indulges his every whim. But when a stunning revelation forces him to see what he’s become, Dorian faces some very dangerous questions.”

Probably the first classic I have ever enjoyed.

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Sadie Review

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“Sadie hasn’t had an easy life. Growing up on her own, she’s been raising her sister Mattie in an isolated small town, trying her best to provide a normal life and keep their heads above water. But when Mattie is found dead, Sadie’s entire world crumbles. After a somewhat botched police investigation, Sadie is determined to bring her sister’s killer to justice and hits the road following a few meagre clues to find him. When West McCray—a radio personality working on a segment about small, forgotten towns in America—overhears Sadie’s story at a local gas station, he becomes obsessed with finding the missing girl. He starts his own podcast as he tracks Sadie’s journey, trying to figure out what happened, hoping to find her before it’s too late.”

This book was amazing! I read the whole book in one (1) day!

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Fullmetal Alchemist Vol 1-3 Review

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“In an alchemical ritual gone wrong, Edward Elric lost his arm and his leg, and his brother Alphonse became nothing but a soul in a suit of armour. Equipped with mechanical “”auto-mail”” limbs, Edward becomes a state alchemist, seeking the one thing that can restore his and his brother’s bodies…the legendary Philosopher’s Stone.”

WOW! My first manga experience and I loved it so much!

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The Big Four Review

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“Framed in the doorway of Poirot’s bedroom stood an uninvited guest, coated from head to foot in dust. The man’s gaunt face stared for a moment, then he swayed and fell. Who was he? Was he suffering from shock or just exhaustion? Above all, what was the significance of the figure 4, scribbled over and over again on a sheet of paper? Poirot finds himself plunged into a world of international intrigue, risking his life to uncover the truth about ‘Number Four’.”

So this book was a funny one for me and I go into a bit more detail in the actual post but despite the book containing loads of things I love; cat and mouse chase, settings all over the world, political intrigue, numerous murders. This book just didn’t resonate with me as much as I had hoped hence the average rating.

July 2019 Wrap-Up

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Here are all the books I read in July of 2019.

Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige (4 stars)

This book was so much fun. I love re-tellings so this was initially right up my alley. I enjoyed reading this book, the world building was great. I liked seeing the world through the dark lense and I felt each character was important to the plot and keeping the narrative moving forward. But the book did have some faults with the writing style, the romance was under-developed and I found Amy was hit and miss for me.

The Secret of Chimneys by Agatha Christie (5 stars)

This book was so good. I was on the edge of my beach chair every time I picked it up. The main character was charismatic, the political intrigue was incredibly interesting and I was constantly thinking who the murderer could be but I did feel that the twists and turns you normally see from a Christie novel were a bit over the top.

The Man in the Brown Suit by Agatha Christie (4 stars)

Again, another enjoyable read for me. Soaking up the sun, I found that this book was so much fun. One of her earlier novels so there are a few hits and misses, the female protagonist was a hit for me. I thought she was really fun and relatable. I also loved how action-packed this story was but that didn’t stop the story from feeling all over the place with not enough structure.

A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness (4 stars)

This book was a hard one for me as it reflected a lot situations I have been and my family/friends have been in because of this it was quite a hard read and a book I just wanted to get out the way.

The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson (5 stars)

My favourite book of this month. SUCH A RIDE! This book has one of the most original and interesting worlds I have read in a long time! The magic system is so interesting and so incredibly fun. The story is so action-packed and the stakes in this story are so high. This is a book that truly deserves the hype! I am waiting for the TV show now!

The Girl from Everywhere by Heidi Heilig (2 stars)

This was another DNF for me. I DNFed the book at 23%. To be honest, I think this book just caught be at a bad time. I just wasn’t engaged enough in the story and I found it quite boring. I might pick it up again but I highly doubted.

The Final Empire Review

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  • Author: Brandon Sanderson
  • Series: Mistborn #1
  • Genre: High Fantasy
  • No of pages: 647
  • Year Published: 2006
  • Dates read: 19.07.19 – 30.07.19
  • Rating: 5 stars (Favourite)

I cannot put into words how incredibly amazing this book is.

Going into this book I was worried that it may be over-hyped and that I might not enjoy it as much as everyone else did but that was NOT the case, AT ALL!!

Plot: In a world where ash falls from the sky, and mist dominates the night, an evil cloaks the land and stifles all life. The future of the empire rests on the shoulders of a troublemaker and his young apprentice. Together, can they fill the world with colour once more?

First of all, all the characters you meet are just written so incredibly well. I loved every single one of them both good and evil! They were also so varied all the character felt a bit grey and even if they were more on the good side, they had their doubts, worries and moments of anger. They felt like real people, not just classic stereotypes.

Vin, especially, was amazing. I really enjoyed her character arc within the story. Watching her grow was so fun and you couldn’t help but root for her and want to see her succeed. It was so good to see a strong female character kick ass in a more male-dominated world.

I loved the world-building. Sanderson just created such a rich world that is so layered, that I know all the detailed info we received about the world is just the tip of the iceberg to how intricate the Final Empire is. The Government and the Nobility were such interesting factors in the story. I loved learning about how the higher classes worked and how the Empire functioned alongside the Nobles. The political intrigue, which was a massive theme in this book, was so good. I loved all the secrets, backstabbing, false loyalties everything. This is something that I am slowly becoming more interested in and this book fuelled my passion to read more books with political intrigue in.

The magic system was so much fun. I loved learning all about Allomancy and what it can and can’t do. At first, I found it a bit difficult to grasp, I still don’t totally know how SteelPushing and IronPuling work in regards to moving around a city quickly, but it was so much fun to learn. I really liked how we learned about the metals over the course of a couple of hundred pages and how we learnt different facets of the system alongside different characters. It gives us more of an insight into the characters and allowed for better development and also it was a fun way to not shove all info down our throats at the very beginning.

The writing as a whole is really accessible. I found myself reading with ease and the first 100 pages were probably the most drawn into a story I have ever been. The combat was done really well, most of the time I find combat scenes hard to read and just skim over them but because Sanderson’s writing is accessible and easy to follow. I found the scenes so enjoyable after one particular scene my heart was beating so fast!

One of my biggest disappointments in this story is the lack of female characters. Thankfully, Vin is a brilliantly written character but we literally only had a choice of 4 female characters and one of them is dead and only mentioned in the past tense! While the characters were interesting, they were not as varied as the numerous male characters we meet along the way. I hope in the sequel we will see more varied female characters. Thankfully, the characters we were given were written well and shown as capable women in this tough world. I just wanted to see more.

Overall, I get the hype. It is well and truly deserved. I cannot wait to read the sequel and read more of Sanderson’s work as a whole!

The next book I will be reviewing will be another Agatha Christie novel, The Big Four. I felt that I should have a break from the fantasy genre as my TBR consists of mostly fantasy at the moment and it might just be too much to read one after the other so I decided to break it up with a small cosy murder mystery.