Review: A Girl Called Owl by Amy Wilson

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cover98899-medium.pngA Girl Called Owl by Amy Wilson
Genre: Fairy-tale, Retelling
Published by: Pan Macmillan
Pages: Under 300
Format: ARC e-book
Rating: ★★.5
Note: We received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. 

Just from the blurb, I knew there was going to be a lot to like about A Girl Called Owl. It’s got a fairy tale retelling element to it, though the source material is some I’ve never seen tackled before, and it’s marketed as middle grade, which I’ve been trying to read a lot more of recently, so it feels great to read something up and coming from this genre!

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Review: A Quiet Kind of Thunder by Sara Barnard

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301972011A Quiet Kind of Thunder by Sara Barnard
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Published by: Macmillan
Pages: 320
Format: ARC e-book
Rating: ★★★★★
Note: We received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

After reading and loving Beautiful Broken Things (so much it made my top fifteen books of 2015 before it was even published) I was so excited with Sara Barnard’s next book. Now that I’ve finished it, the exact same thing has happened. This is pure gold (and bronze) and I don’t think anything I write now will do justify to just how beautiful this book is. But, I’m still going to try, so here are some reasons to love A Quiet Kind of Thunder!
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Review: Twelve Days of Dash and Lily

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31368214Twelve Days of Dash and Lily by David Levithan and Rachel Cohn
Genre: Contemporary, Romance
Published by: Electric Monkey
Pages: 240
Format: ARC e-book
Rating: 2.5 stars 
Note: We received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. 

Twelve Days of Dash and Lily is an unexpected sequel to Dash and Lily’s Book of Dares, one of the first books I remember reading when I first joined BookTube. In a way, I loved this book as just a nod to the nostalgic days of 2013, and when I was still in the habit of reading seasonal books in their appropriate season. (Will this finally be the year that My True Love Gave to Me is appreciated?) But what else did I enjoy…? Continue reading “Review: Twelve Days of Dash and Lily” →

Review: The Midnight Star by Marie Lu

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28588345The Midnight Star by Marie Lu
Genre: Fantasy
Published by: Penguin Books
Pages: 313
Format: ebook
Rating: ★★★
Series: The Young Elites (#1) | The Rose Society (#2)

I honestly don’t think I was ready for this series to end. It was one of my most anticipated releases for this half of the year! The Young Elites was one of the first books that I read this year, and I was immediately drawn in by the delicious cast of characters. I’m pretty sure everyone knows by now that one of this series’ USPs is that Adelina is a bit of a villainous protagonist, but not in a fantastical super villain way, more in a ‘this girl’s had a hard life that has forced her to make tricky decisions in sticky situations’. Some people will probably say that’s mellow, but I’ve always loved Adelina, and the bond she has with her sister. And, for me, book two was even better, so I was going in with HIGH expectations, let me tell you.

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Review: Kids of Appetite by David Arnold

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29341439Kids of Appetite by David Arnold
Genre: Contemporary, Coming of Age
Published by: Headline
Pages: 352
Format: ARC e-book
Rating: ★★★★
More by this author: Mosquitoland
Note: We received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

I was so pumped when I saw David Arnold had a new book out this year! I read Mosquitoland around the same time I read Becky Albertali’s debut and Maddie read Jeff Zentner’s debut. So this time was pretty great for discovering new authors. I fell in love with David Arnold’s writing style IMMEDIATELY, even if I didn’t enjoy the story as much. Kids of Appetite had the perfect mix of witty narrative and FULL-ON plot. I was all about these kids from chapter one and am delighted to say that this author’s books are just getting better and better!

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Review: The Last Beginning by Lauren James

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24550848The Last Beginning by Lauren James
Genre: Sci-fi, Romance
Published by: Walker Books
Pages: 344
Format: Paperback
Rating: ★★★.5

The highly anticipated sequel to The Next Together is finally in my grasp! I’ve been looking forward to these time travelling lesbians since I heard the prologue of the book at Lauren and Alice Oseman’s joint signing event in April, and I can say, definitely, that the rest was well worth waiting for! What specifically, you ask? Well…

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Review: The Form of Thing Unknown by Robin Bridges

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cover93174-mediumThe Form of Things Unknown by Robin Bridges
Genre: Contemporary, Romance, (Re-telling)
Published by: Kensington Books
Pages: 304
Format: e-book
Rating: ★★.5
Note: I received this book from the publishers in exchange for an honest review!

Natalie is suffering from some strange hallucinations while on the set for her school’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. With questions of ‘who’s dating who’ and ‘we’re all crazy here’ the characters’ lives somewhat mimic those in the story they’re retelling. It’s an interesting concept, similar to Robin Bridges’ other novel Dreaming of Antigone where the protagonists are both aware of the text they’re retelling whilst retelling it. I’m not sure if it’s a style that completely works for me, but I’ve never been a fan of really meta fiction. But I think The Form of Things Unknown does a good job of blurring the lines between the original text and the new characters’ lives.

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Review: The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee

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31244354The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee
Genre: Sci-fi
Published by: HarperCollins
Pages: 437
Format: ARC e-book
Rating: ★★
Note: We received this book from the publishers in exchange for an honest review.

Seeing as this book is blurbed by Cecily von Ziegesar and the model on the front looks like she belongs in Gossip Girl, I went in thinking I already knew the characters The Thousandth Floor was going to use. While there were a few surprises, this book definitely fit the initial stereotypes I had. A few months ago I managed to read four of the Gossip Girl novels before realising that was as much as I could take of spoilt rich girls. But, the intriguing opening, promising a thrilling ending, was enough to keep me turning the pages. Continue reading “Review: The Thousandth Floor by Katharine McGee” →

Review: The Sun is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon

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28763485The Sun is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon
Genre: Romance, Contemporary
Published by: Penguin Random House
Pages: 384
Format: ARC e-book
Rating: ★★★★
Note: We received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

It seems that all my favourite authors of last year are coming out with their next books around this time of year and I couldn’t be happier, because it means the last reading quarter is guaranteed to be a good one! Nicola Yoon’s The Sun is Also a Star is no exception. After giving her debut, Everything, Everything 5 stars, I had high hopes for this book and it didn’t let me down. In fact, let’s talk about why this cosmic romance was so wonderful… Continue reading “Review: The Sun is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon” →

Review:The Edge of Everything by Jeff Giles

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31170713The Edge of Everything by Jeff Giles
Genre: Supernatural, Contemporary, Romance
Published by: Bloomsbury Children’s
Pages: 400
Format: ARC e-book
Rating: ★★★
Note: I received a copy of this book from the publishers in exchange for an honest review. 

Okay, so this book has a lot of hype. And by a lot, I mean A LOT. Seriously, scroll down the Goodreads page and all you’ll see is five star reviews! People are getting excited about this, so why didn’t I feel the magic? Maybe partly because I was switching from reading an e-book copy and listening to it on the text-to-speech function, but that doesn’t sound quite right. The Edge of Everything covers a great deal of things. If you didn’t think that a supernatural boyfriend was enough, then you have a girl’s quest to recover her father’s body, a boy’s struggle to get out of a binding service, and a family dealing with a shady past. And the best bit is they all link together!

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