Let's Talk About Books

Description (Goodreads):
Evie O’Neill has been exiled from her boring old hometown and shipped off to the bustling streets of New York City—and she is pos-i-toot-ly thrilled. New York is the city of speakeasies, shopping, and movie palaces! Soon enough, Evie is running with glamorous Ziegfield girls and rakish pickpockets. The only catch is Evie has to live with her Uncle Will, curator of The Museum of American Folklore, Superstition, and the Occult—also known as “The Museum of the Creepy Crawlies.”

When a rash of occult-based murders comes to light, Evie and her uncle are right in the thick of the investigation. And through it all, Evie has a secret: a mysterious power that could help catch the killer—if he doesn’t catch her first.

My Review:

I was really excited to begin reading this book because I absolutely love the 1920’s and powers are always a hoot. The beginning was a little slow but necessary for story building. Every single character was written so well. I LOVED the main character, Evie. She was very well rounded, and a kick ass lead. She was intelligent, courageous, caring and very witty. I would tell everything I loved about every character but that would take far too long. Just know that I loved everything about every character, with one exception - I’ll tell more about that in a second. 

I never really read mysteries, but this book got me in the mood to read more! The plot was so interesting, and I don’t know if the information in it was like real, or based off of something because it seemed so authentic but it was definatly a page turner. Because it was set in the 1920’s, there was the scene/setting of the speakeasies, clubs like The Cotton Club, Jazz, Flappers, Prohibition and all of that good stuff. It was very intriguing to read about. It was like Libba dropped you in the middle of the Roaring 20’s but also a side of it that was never known; the side with secrets to be uncovered, and just let you go until you discovered everything that there was to discover. Also, at some parts it was really scary! I usually read at night, before bed, but I had to switch up with this book to read during the day and some other not scary book at night to not give myself nightmares. This was the first book I read by Libba Bray and i’m certainly going to read more!

So with that being said I give The Diviners by Libba Bray 5/5 stars.

I finished this book a few hours ago and wanted to do a review on it right away but had to hold off because I couldn’t find the right words to describe how much I loved this marvelous, marvelous book.

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald is about a man named Nick Carraway who moves East for work, into a house next door to a mysterious man named Jay Gatsby who throws lavish parties but no one really knows anything about but ends up becoming friends with him and finding out he is in love with a woman named Daisy Buchanan - who just so happens to be Nick’s cousin. However, Daisy is already married, to a man named Tom who is having an affair with a woman named Myrtle Wilson who is also already married, to a man named George. IT’S MADNESS I TELL YOU. And I loved every second of it! 

I think the thing that got me most, that really pulled me in, was the fabulous writing. How the sentences flowed into one another with such ease, and the words he used to describe the simplest things making them complex. That Fitzgerald had a way with words ~

“He smiled understandingly - much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in a life. It faced - or seemed to face - the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just so far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey.”

There is no way for me to put it other than I love this fucking book.

With that being said, I give The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald 5/5 stars. Obviously ~

OKAY. Held by Edeet Ravel is about a seventeen-year-old girl named Chloe. While on a trip to Greece for volunteer work with her best friend (who is irrelevant), she gets kidnapped and held hostage for a couple of months for a ransom. I don’t want to say too much in this review because I was delightfully surprised while reading this book and if you decide to check it out, I want you to go in with the same mind frame and then get surprised as well.

The two main characters, Chloe and the Hostage Taker were fabulously written. Also, the way Edeet described the certain…’normal’ situations was very good. I love when I can feel what a character is feeling, and during those moments I was terrified with her.

The only complaint I have is that at the end of every chapter was like a news article about Chloe or a Facebook looking chat between her worried best friend and some others. They got kind of annoying and those were the only parts that I like skimmed instead of really reading it. Other than that, I loved this book. And the ending, just let me say:

But also:

So, with that being said I give Held by Edeet Ravel 4.99/5 Stars. You should check it out! Be sure to tell me what you thought if you do :)

Blankets by Craig Thompson is a graphic novel about the sibling rivalry of two brothers growing up in an small town, and the budding romance of two young lovers. It’s a tale of security and discovery, and the origins of faith.

Blankets is my first graphic novel (besides Calvin and Hobbs) and boy did I get kicked off to a good start! With wonderful writing and even more wonderful illustrations, this book had me spinning on an emotions wheel. 

The characters were so well developed. I fell in love with the main characters and hated the ones that were meant to be hated. The way he writes is just like…it’s just love on paper. The way he described and developed the main characters struggle with his faith, it was like you were going through it with him. 

The romance parts were perfect. They weren’t too strong to where they were cheesy and they weren’t to soft to where it seemed like the character’s had no chemistry. They were written and drawn to perfection. This book was phenomenal and once I finished I clutched it to my chest and fell asleep. I never want to return it to my library. It has a bitter-sweet ending that has you saying WHYYYY and AWWW and the same time. I absolutely loved everything about this book.

So with that being said, I give Blankets by Craig Thompson 5/5 stars.

Me and Earl and The Dying Girl is a YA novel by Jesse Andrews, about a boy who is obnoxious and unsympathetic and his always angry best friend, who like to make movies. Basically at the beginning, it says he is going to tell you about how his movies were sucking, on a hot streak, and then just began sucking again because he had to befriend a girl who was dying of leukemia. 

I read this book in like four hours, not because I was in love with it but because the chapters were so short it felt like I was just speed reading the entire thing. When I started reading it I thought it was just great. I enjoyed the main character, the jokes. THE JOKES. L.O.L. They were so funny, I couldn’t read at school because I didn’t want to be looked at weird for laughing so hard at a book. It was just so funny, the whole thing. Though towards the middle and into the end I kind of got sick of it. 

Throughout the book the main character has this never wants any problems, doesn’t care about others thing going on. Towards the end of the book where the conflict started to get more serious, the main character didn’t. When I read, I like to look back at the character and see how he’s changed. But this character didn’t. He was the same selfish, inappropriate joking, not caring kid throughout the whole thing and that’s where it got me. 

So with that being said, I give Me and Earl and The Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews 2.9/5 stars.