March Wrap-Up

Okay, wow, March was… I don’t even know what happened in March. Honestly almost nothing memorable. However I did read some pretty awesome books! That might have been all I did, but hey, good books are pretty awesome!

And yes, I know I disappeared again. I’ve just been having a bit of a hard time motivating myself to actually sit down and write a post. Still, I have lots of post ideas, so hopefully I’ll be better this month? I hope? Anyways, sorry about that.

I actually read twenty books this month, which I’m pretty pleased with. I didn’t feel like I’d read that much this month, but apparently I did! And I enjoyed almost all of them too!

Ruin and Rising by Leigh Bardugo – I finally finished this series, and I actually really liked this one. I wasn’t too impressed with the first two, but I was actually pretty blown way by the ending. I was pretty sure I was going to hate the ending, but I was actually really pleased with it. – 4.5 stars.

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alice Sáenz – I really loved Ari and Dante, and seeing their relationship develop. The writing style wasn’t really my favourite, but I still really enjoyed the book. – 4 stars.

A List of Cages by Robin Roe – Wow. This book was so beautiful and SO heartbreaking! I would highly recommend this one! – 5 stars!

Turtles All the Way Down by John Green – I’m really struggling with how to rate this one still… I think it was a very, very good book. I just sort of hated it. The fact is, I was bored out of my mind. I just couldn’t bring myself to care about anything it. – ? stars.*

Days of Blood and Starlight by Laini Taylor – I really loved the first book in this series, and while I really enjoyed this one, I didn’t think it was quite as good. I was just a little too fed up with all the angst… – 4 stars.

Paper and Fire by Rachel Caine – AHHHHHHHHH!!! I really liked the first book, but this was just a million times better!! This was the book that sent my feelings for this series over the edge from ‘It’s good’ to ‘OHMYGOSHILOVEITSOMUCH!!!’ – 5 stars!

*Look, I know this is cheating, but I really can’t dec ide how to rate it… Somewhere between 2 stars and 3.5 stars… I think.

Gone Rogue by Marissa Meyer – Look, maybe this story is completely unnecessary. Maybe it doesn’t add anything to plot. But you know what? I don’t care. It lets me spend a bit more time with these precious characters! So I love these graphic novels with all of my heart! – 5 stars!

StarCrossed by Elizabeth C. Bunce – This didn’t quite live up to my expectations, but I still couldn’t put it down. It wasn’t exactly action packed, but it was certainly gripping. And it was pretty twisty too. I would think I had a pretty good idea of what was gong on, and then something else would happen and I’d have to reevaluate the situation all over again! – 4 stars.

This Shattered World by Amie Kaufman and Me agan Spooner – This series is SO good! And while I didn’t love the characters in this one quite as much as the ones from the first book, I did like that there were more than two characters. And wow, did the plot thicken in this one. I need the last book yesterday! – 4 stars.

Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff – This was a reread, and oh my gosh, I still love this book just as much! The formatting is spectacular, and I love the characters so much! – 5 stars!

Gemina by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff – I think this book was if possible even better than Illuminae! It took me a while to warm up to Hanna and Nik, but by the end I was completely in love with them! Although this one did get VERY science-y… Not a bad thing, but also not my favourite. – 5 stars!!

The Nowhere Girls by Amy Reed – Wow, this was such and important, powerful, gritty book! Not to mention super diverse! And just so amazing! I would highly recommend this book. – 5 stars!

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo – Oh! My! Gosh! I’ve definitely found a new favourite series! I can’t believe it’s taken me so long to read this! Somebody recommended it to me back when I was first getting into YA, way before I even found the book blogging community. And it still took me this long to read them! WHY?!?!?!?!?!?! Kaz! Inej! Nina! Matthias! Plus my new OTP Jesper and Wylan!! – 5 stars!!!!*

Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo – OH MY GOODNESS MY HEART IS STILL BROKEN FROM THIS!!! And I just don’t want to be over! I need more of these wonderful characters!! AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! – 5 stars!!!!

Ash and Quill by Rachel Caine – I love these characters so much, but plot wise this book was a bit weaker then the first two… And they made SO MANY stupid decisions! – 4.5 stars.

*Why oh why can’t I rate this higher?! It deserves more than five stars!

City of Glass by Cassandra Clare – I’m slowly working my way through this series again, because I couldn’t remember half of the plot… This is probably my favourite book in the series. I can’t place what it is, but something about this one I really like. – 5 stars!

City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare – As much as I still love this book, I think it’s my least favourite of the series. Just SO much pointless teen angst! I kept having to put the book down and take a break, because the angst was driving me bonkers! – 4.5 stars?

Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli – I decided to reread this before I went to see the movie and I have no regrets. Yes, I had other books I should have been reading, but I read this in an afternoon, and I spent the whole day with a big goofy grin on my face. – 5 stars!

Falling Kingdoms by Morgan Rhodes – This was quite an enjoyable read. I didn’t really think it was anything special, but I liked the characters and I plan to continue with series. – 4 stars.

Warcross by Marie Lu – Wow. This book really played with my head. For most of the book I thought I had it pretty well figured out. And then the end happened, and I realized everything I’d been certain about was a lie. I’m just completely blown away and I don’t know HOW I’m expected to wait for the next book! – 5 stars!

I posted… er… four times… Which is about half as much as I planned to post… Ugh. Also why do I even do this section. Every month it’s literally one line of me saying ‘Wow, I failed at blogging this month’…

Honestly I was sick for the first half of March… So I didn’t really do much.

• I finished up musical theatre.
• I got sick.
• I sat around not feeling up to getting off the couch.
• I went completely stir crazy, because I needed to get out of the house.
• That was pretty much the first half of my month…
• Yuck.
• Ummm… I read.
• And read.
• And read.
• I saw Love, Simon! And it was SOOO good! Our local movie theatre wasn’t getting it in, so me and my Mum had to make it a day trip into the city, but it was SO worth it!
• That same day trip was also very helpful for things like clothing… Books always take priority over clothing (I’d rather read than clothes shop, I’d rather book shop than clothes shop, I’d rather my parents buy me books than clothes.), and it had gotten to a ridiculous point… I was wearing the same two or three shirts every day. Whoops!
• So yeah, since our local clothes stores are pretty much nonexistent, we took the opportunity to go clothes shopping as well.
• I’d still have preferred to be reading though.
• We started shuffling things around in our house so that I can have my own room.
• FINALLY!
• And guess what else came along with a new room?
• A bookshelf to myself!
• I now have more than double the shelf space I had before!
• And I’m only taking up like… two thirds of it?

Yeah, March really wasn’t the most eventful month…

I don’t have the slightest clue what my goals were last month, so I obviously didn’t put much effort into completing them… Lets just cross our fingers and hope I somehow managed to complete at least some of them anyways.

LAST MONTH’S GOALS

• Post twice a week. ❌❌ Nope. Not even close.
• CATCH UP ON RTC’S!!! ❌❌ I am SO behind on these… I think I wrote one review all month…
• Wake up earlier. ✔❌ Er… sort of… I was sick for half the month, so I didn’t, but I’m okay with that, and I did okay at the rest of the month… Not great, but better.
• Get out of the house more. ❌ No. Just no.
• Don’t fail completely at musical theatre?✔✔ Hahaha, I totally just gave myself this because I knew that it was pretty much impossible to mess up too badly!
• Practise for drama. ✔✔ Not as much as I’d maybe hoped to practise, but I have my lines completely memorized, so I think I’m doing okay.
• Keep up with my journal-ish thing… ❌❌ Why did I even try? I fail at this every time. I mean… I wrote in it ONCE this month. That’s headway, right?
• Read at least five of the books I borrowed from my cousin, so that I can return them to her eventually. ❌❌ Erm… no. I read exactly none.

NEXT MONTH’S GOALS

• POST TWICE A WEEK! Please this time?!
• CATCH UP ON RTC’S!!! Seriously! Even if I just wrote a couple sentences about each book would be enough!
• Wake up earlier. I keep sort of completing this one, so that’s a start.
• GET OUT OF THE HOUSE MORE! Ugh I really need to do this. I’d just rather be reading.
• Keep practising for drama. Because the show is a month from now, and I’m still not amazing at it. So I’d better practise.
• Journal? Okay we all know how likely this is, but I want to try…
• READ SOME OF THE BOOKS I BORROWED FROM MY COUSIN! They really are all books I want to read, I’m just so much more motivated to read the new exciting books.
• Finish organizing my bookshelf, and KEEP IT ORGANIZED! Put books back on the shelf, Iris. Don’t leave them all in heaps on the coffee table.
• Read my library books responsibly. No reading the brand new ones that have come in before the ones that are due back in five days.
• Finish organizing my room. Stacks of stuff on the floor are NOT cool, Iris.

How was your March? Any goals for April? What good books did you read in March? Have you seen Love, Simon yet?!