November Wrap-Up

Wow, I meant to do this… um… five days ago. But… I was super busy, and didn’t have any time or motivation, so that didn’t happen.

I can’t believe November passed so fast! November was pretty great life wise, but it was NOT impressive reading and blogging wise… I was so busy with life I didn’t get as much time to read or blog, and I didn’t like that. I’m hoping to do better this month… although what with Christmas, and life being busy, I might not…

I read a lot of very good books this month. I think I only had one three star, and then a bunch of four and five stars, but the amount I read? Not impressed.
I read fifteen* books this month, and I’m just not pleased with that. I know a lot of people don’t read anywhere near this many, and I’m not criticizing them at all, it’s just that I can usually read at least twenty books in a month, and anything less feels like a failure.**

*Technically I suppose it was fourteen, but I… read one of them twice… oops.

**I set standards for myself that are ridiculously high… and then I feel like I failed when I don’t reach them… I have a problem…

I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson – WOW! That is still the only word I am capable of using to describe this book! It was SO amazing, and emotional, and wow, wow, WOW! – 5 stars!

Cinder by Marissa Meyer – Yes, I did in fact reread this in September, but I have a good excuse reason. I was on a road trip wit my dad, and he thought it sounded interesting, so we got the audiobook for the drive. I had a bit of a hard time with the audiobook, because it had the same narrator as Genuine Fraud, and I couldn’t get used to the characters I love so much in Cinder having the same voices as the characters in Genuine Fraud, who were all terrible people… It was still an amazing book though. – 5 stars.

Eliza and Her Monsters by Francesca Zappia – This was SO good! It was super relatable, because she spent all of her time online, and had some really great online friends! I loved it so much! – 5 stars!

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman – This was another reread. I listened to it as an audiobook this time, and it was spectacular! The narrator was perfect for it, and I don’t think I ever realized how beautifully written this was. I can’t decide whether the audiobook made me enjoy it more this time around, or whether it was simply because I was older, and caught more of the subtleties. I think it was probably both, but either way, I loved it even more this time! – 5 stars!  

Renegades by Marissa Meyer – So, this is the book I read twice… I really didn’t mean to, but it was too good, and I couldn’t resist. This is quite possibly my favourite book of the month,* and OH MY GOSH I LOVED IT SO MUCH!!! It was SOSOSOSOSO amazing!! – 5 stars!!!!!!!!!!!

Clockwork Princess** by Cassandra Clare – ASKJHKJGFSSJGFKSJGFKJFSKJFKSJFK THIS WAS SO GOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I absolutely love this series, but I was a tad apprehensive going into the last book, because I wasn’t sure how it could possibly end well. Oh my gosh, I still haven’t recovered from that ending, but it was amazing, and can I just sob?! – 5 stars!

*Tied with half the other books I read of course…

**I also keep writing Clockwork as Clockworm, so I just absolutely cracked up when Will called the Lightwoods Lightworms…

The Battle of the Labyrinth by Rick Riordan – I’m slowly working my way through this series, and I’m quite enjoying it. I think I came to it a bit too old to fall quite as in love with it as most people have, but it’s still very good. – 4 stars.

Linger by Maggie Stiefvater – I’m enjoying this series a lot more than I expected to… Paranormal romance really isn’t my genre, but I really like the characters, and the wolves are well done… they’re so interesting! – 4 stars.

The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton – I’ve been meaning to read this for ages, as it’s something of a classic, and I know my mum loved it, but I only just got around to reading it. It wasn’t really my style, although I think it was very good, I personally didn’t love it. It was enjoyable, but I was just the tiniest bit bored. – 3.5 stars.

Forever by Maggie Stiefvater – I really don’t have anything to say about this that I didn’t already say about Linger… Especially because I don’t have the slightest clue what happened in which book. – 4 stars.

Coram Boy by Camilla Gavin – I was SO BORED reading this! It wasn’t exactly a bad book, but it had very little plot, and the characters resembled pieces of cardboard. Bleh. – 2 stars.*

Between the Lines by Jodi Picoult – I really enjoyed this book. It had such a unique concept, which I loved. It also had a relatable MC, who was a total bookworm, and she was great. However this book simply wasn’t memorable. I really enjoyed it, put the next book on my to read list, and then forgot it existed. – 4 stars.

*Yes, I realize I said I only went as low as a three stars. I was wrong, I forgot how bad this book was.

Glass Sword by Victoria Aveyard – This series isn’t particularly original, and there isn’t really anything that special about it, but I like the characters, and it seems well written. I enjoy it, even if it reads wayyyyyyy too much like The Hunger Games. – 4 stars.

The Angel Experiment by James Patterson – This was a lot better than I expected. It wasn’t great, but I liked Max well enough. Surprisingly, I actually found this book too young, which is sort of the opposite of what I expecting, based off of that cover… – 3 stars.

And then I read Renegades again. Because I am a responsible human being. Yay me! Not.

I didn’t get very many books this month, but I sure did get some amazing ones. I went to Powell’s, which is one of the most amazing bookstores ever! We legitimately got a bit lost in it. It was awesome! Not to mention they also have used books, that are usually still in really good condition, so it’s slightly less dangerous for my broke self. Slightly. If ever you are in Portland, Oregon, I would highly suggest stopping by Powell’s!

Anyways, my book haul.

I found Clockwork Princess and Eliza and Her Monsters used, which was exciting! Clockwork Princess wasn’t in amazing shape, but it was pretty good, and it was fairly cheap, so yay! I was super excited to find Eliza and Her Monsters used, because it only came out this year, so I didn’t expect to find it used, and it was also in almost perfect condition! It was great!

Then my dad saw me looking longingly at Renegades, (It was a huge new hardcover book, I certainly couldn’t afford it!) and agreed to buy it for me! Best dad ever?!?!*

*This is how you win me over people, raising me for my entire life isn’t going to do it, I’m afraid you’re going to have to buy me books!

Wow, I had a terrible month for blogging! I only posted five times, and I’m cringing, because my goal was ten. I’m really hoping to post more this month, although I probably won’t get ten posts done, but maybe I can do eight or something. I hope.

I aslo only posted book reviews and Top Ten Tuesdays… oops.

This time I actually remembered to bookmark posts I like, so I have a bit more for this section this time around.*

• Lu wrote a great post about why there are so few male book bloggers.
• May wrote a super interesting post about blogging stats.
• Amber tells us why we should teach our children to read from a young age.
• Lu rants about the lack of female friendships in books.
• Cait has a hilarious post about writing the perfect book review.
• May has a very thought provoking post about good representation in books.

And that’s all I have. It’s a lot better than last month’s two, although maybe next month I’ll have a few more. And maybe not just the same four names…

*Although I just realized they’re all by the same four bloggers somehow.. oops.

So like I said, November was a great month life wise! I’m going to do a short list of things again, because I liked that last month!

• I went on an absolutely amazing trip, to see my friend in Oregon for a week, and had SO much fun.
• We played a lot of games, and went skating, and rock climbing, and bowling.
• I am now very mad at my town for not having bowling alley.
• I swear in every book of ever, small towns have bowling alleys, and movie theatres, and nothing else, but my small town has everything else except for a bowling alley.
• Humph.
• I’m jealous of bookish small towns.
• Anyways, my trip is the reason I didn’t get a lot of reading and blogging done, (I think I read fifty pages the whole week!), but it was totally worth it!
• My trip is also the reason I got to go to Powell’s, so that makes it even more worthwhile!
• Once I got home I had to work like crazy, because every year I sell my beading at Christmas markets, and I SO didn’t have enough done.
• Then I had to go to the Christmas markets, which was a lot of fun, except for the fact that on the last day I woke up with a cold, and a terrible sore throat, and still had to spend the whole day talking to people, instead of curled up on the couch with a book.
• Yuck.
• I then spent the next two days curled up on the couch with a book instead.

So, that was pretty much my November! Aside from the whole getting sick part, it was pretty great!

How was your November? What was your favourite book this month? Have you ever gotten lost in a bookstore? (Trust me, it’s a wonderful experience!) How many books did you read this month?